Hillary Clinton’s quick out-of-the-gate start has put her way
out in front of her fellow Democrats in “the hunt for the great
American Catholic voter of 2008,” writes New York Observer
columnist E.J. Kessler.
Bringing Jesus into her criticism of the Republican-passed bill
in the House of Representatives that would make it a felony to be
in the United States illegally, and make it a crime to aid an
illegal immigrant, Mrs. Clinton said, “It is certainly not in
keeping with my understanding of the Scriptures, because the bill
would literally criminalize the good Samaritan and probably even
Jesus himself.”
Back when she had the power in 1994, however, the Scriptures
didn’t seem to stop Hillary from devising a health-care scheme that
would “literally criminalize” the behavior of patients and
physicians who dared to operate outside the dictates of her master
plan, with fines up to $10,000 and prison terms up to 10 years “for
each instance.”
A physician who ordered a few extra X-rays for a patient he
considered to be particularly at risk, X-rays not authorized under
Hillary’s one-size-fits-all model, could well have found himself
behind bars, not exactly the way one would think a good Samaritan
doctor should be treated for going a bit outside the lines in order
to help a patient.
In any case, today’s Mrs. Clinton, speaking more of salvation
than incarceration, has aimed her faith-based arrows at Senate
Majority Leader Bill Frist, a Tennessee Republican, and other GOP
leaders, stating, “It is hard to believe that a Republican
leadership that is constantly talking about values and about faith
would put forth such a mean-spirited piece of legislation.”
Seeking additionally to build up her religious and “pro-family”
credentials, Mrs. Clinton recently threw caution to the wind and
got in bed with “man-on-dog” Rick Santorum and Sam Brownback,
described by Kessler as “the Senate’s two most conservative
Catholics,” to push for a bill that’ll have the government delving
into the purportedly evil effects of the electronic media on
kids.
True, “It’s Hard Out Here for a Pimp” won the Oscar this year
for best original song, understandably a tune that causes jitters
in some circles. But there’s something even scarier about Rick and
Hillary teaming up to launch a government-directed investigation
into which music, TV programs, and movies are allegedly harmful to
human development or insufficiently helpful in advancing the civic
good.
That sounds too much like how things ended up in China, where
for purity and the collective good the Maoists fired up the
book-burning apparatus and record-smashing machines in order to
destroy anything that didn’t fit into the central plan. In the
Maoist model, the rightful function of music, books, and the
performing arts is to increase productivity, downgrade
individualism, and promote collectivism.
Nonetheless, Kessler sees Hillary hitting all the right
religious buttons: “Unlike most Democrats, she sounds sincere when
she employs Jesus language.” Even husband Bill, writes Kessler, can
be employed to enhance Hillary’s religiosity: “Once upon a time a
follower of an evangelical denomination — a Baptist named Bill
Clinton — begged her to marry him.”
Add some conciliatory and less-liberal language on abortion and
gay marriage — plus some “pro-family” tinkering, like her bill to
make cars safer for children — and Kessler views Mrs. Clinton,
“one of the most overtly Christian politicians in the country,” as
the Democrats’ best shot in recapturing the nation’s so-called
values voters. “Count on this: With Catholics and other faith-based
voters, Hillary Clinton will be the Democrat best positioned to
speak to their issues.”
IN OTHER FAITH-BASED POLITICAL news, it looks like Christian
Coalition founder Ralph Reed may have joined the ranks of
televangelists Jimmy Swaggart and Jim Bakker.
Reed’s 1998 e-mail to mega-lobbyist Jack Abramoff — “I need to
start humping in some corporate accounts,” reports Salon’s Michael
Scherer — set the stage for Reed to rake in more than $4 million
from Abramoff’s clients, including casino-operating Indian
tribes.
“Reed worked, as he put it in one e-mail, to get ‘our pastors
all riled up’ — organizing his unwitting followers to oppose
gambling regulations and new casinos that would have competed with
Abramoff’s clients,” reports Scherer.
Explained Abramoff’s partner Michael Scanlon to one Indian
tribe: “We want to bring out the wackos to vote against something.
The wackos get their information through the Christian right,
Christian radio, mail, the Internet and telephone trees.”
The lesson, on all sides: Be very skeptical.
