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04/20/2004 Archived Entry: "Ooo-WEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE-oooooo...."
Ooo-WEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE-oooooo....
Right-wing politics - it's Rapture-riffic!
By clicking on www.raptureready.com, you can discover how close you might be to flying out of your pyjamas. The infidels among us should take note that the Rapture Index currently stands at 144, just one point below the critical threshold, beyond which the sky will be filled with floating nudists. Beast Government, Wild Weather and Israel are all trading at the maximum five points (the EU is debat ing its constitution, there was a freak hurricane in the south Atlantic, Hamas has sworn to avenge the killing of its leaders), but the second coming is currently being delayed by an unfortunate decline in drug abuse among teenagers and a weak showing by the antichrist (both of which score only two).We can laugh at these people, but we should not dismiss them. That their beliefs are bonkers does not mean they are marginal. American pollsters believe that 15-18% of US voters belong to churches or movements which subscribe to these teachings. A survey in 1999 suggested that this figure included 33% of Republicans. The best-selling contemporary books in the US are the 12 volumes of the Left Behind series, which provide what is usually described as a "fictionalised" account of the Rapture (this, apparently, distinguishes it from the other one), with plenty of dripping details about what will happen to the rest of us. The people who believe all this don't believe it just a little; for them it is a matter of life eternal and death.
And among them are some of the most powerful men in America. John Ashcroft, the attorney general, is a true believer, so are several prominent senators and the House majority leader, Tom DeLay. Mr DeLay (who is also the co-author of the marvellously named DeLay-Doolittle Amendment, postponing campaign finance reforms) travelled to Israel last year to tell the Knesset that "there is no middle ground, no moderate position worth taking".
So here we have a major political constituency - representing much of the current president's core vote - in the most powerful nation on Earth, which is actively seeking to provoke a new world war. Its members see the invasion of Iraq as a warm-up act, as Revelation (9:14-15) maintains that four angels "which are bound in the great river Euphrates" will be released "to slay the third part of men". They batter down the doors of the White House as soon as its support for Israel wavers: when Bush asked Ariel Sharon to pull his tanks out of Jenin in 2002, he received 100,000 angry emails from Christian fundamentalists, and never mentioned the matter again.
In the words of Al Franken - Oy.
Replies: 3 people speak up
I think if Ashcroft does take wing when the event happens, God should show he has a sense of humor and give Ashcroft a heavenly escort by a dozen or so of the calico cats living up there.
Posted by Barry @ 04/20/2004 11:20 AM NY
The really scary part is the last paragraph of the full article. Bush stands to lose fewer votes by encouraging Israeli aggression than he stands to lose by restraining it. Wow, now I understand why the US gets on its hands and knees and spreads its cheeks for Israel no matter what Sharon does.
Posted by Mike @ 04/20/2004 12:13 PM NY
Its not just the Jewish vote at home, because quite a few of the Jewish folks living in America believe all the killing is wrong on both sides, and there should be another answer. Part of it is due to the Christian belief that God will punish anyone who harms or stands in the was of the Israelites.
Told you this was a religious war. So there.
Posted by IXLNXS @ 04/20/2004 01:55 PM NY
