THIS MODERN WORLD

I’m sure you’re as sick as reading the DeLay/Jesus posts as I am of writing them, but this bit from an interview he gave to Time yesterday is too good to pass up :

TIME: Your smiling mug shot—what made you think of that and what do you think the consequence of that has been?

DeLay: Oh, I don’t know. I said a little prayer. First of all, you only get one take. It’s a very humiliating thing, to be booked. And I said a little prayer before I actually did the fingerprint thing, and the picture. And my prayer was basically: “Let people see Christ through me. And let me smile.”

I guess Photoshopping DeLay’s mugshot onto Jesus was even more fitting than I thought, though if I really wanted to “let people see Christ through [him]”, I should have adjusted the opacity on the layer with his face.

Just to make things perfectly obvious (and since people rarely click on all the links), here’s the Bible verse that I linked to in my previous post with the words “the people most likely to pat themselves on the back for being Christians “ :

And when you pray, do not be like the hypocrites, for they love to pray standing in the synagogues and on the street corners to be seen by men. I tell you the truth, they have received their reward in full.

DeLay’s a hypocrite, this I know, for the Bible tells me so.

On the radio just now, Bush said something to the effect that health savings accounts allow someone who makes the right decisions about smoking or drinking to save money. Which I find infuriating — the implication that catastrophic illness only strikes those who “deserve” it due to their bad lifestyles.

Disease happens, even to the most health conscious among us. A friend of mine just spent a couple of years battling cancer. Out of the blue, no rhyme or reason to it. That’s how this crap shoot we call life works. Health care shouldn’t be about saving money if you’re virtuous enough to avoid illness. Health care should be about, you know, providing health care, particuarly to those unlucky enough to need it in a serious way.

This is kind of basic. Everybody gets sick, everybody know someone who’s been through something catastrophic. If the Democrats are smart, they’ll grab this issue with both hands and not let go.

45 years old today. Strange. I think your mental image of yourself stops at a certain age — for me, sometime in my early/mid-thirties — and after that, you just look in the mirror and wonder where the extra years came from. Or went, as the case may be. Though I saw a picture of myself the other day, from the early nineties, and I looked shockingly young. Anyway, life is good — due in no small part to the ongoing support of you good people — so, happy birthday to me.

I’ve written a few times about the arrogant, anti-worker subtext of the “jobs Americans won’t do” lie, but I never thought a Republican would be dumb enough to come out and say it. Cue the Republican party’s biggest panderer :

Sen. John McCain threatened on Tuesday to cut short a speech to union leaders who booed his immigration views and later challenged his statements on organized labor and the
Iraq war.

“If you like, I will leave,” McCain told the AFL-CIO’s Building and Construction Trades Department, pivoting briefly from the lectern. He returned to the microphone after the crowd quieted.
. . .
Later, the senator outlined his position on the Senate immigration debate, saying tougher border enforcement must be accompanied by guest-worker provisions that give illegal immigrants a legal path toward citizenship.

Murmurs from the crowd turned to booing. “Pay a decent wage!” one audience member shouted.

“I’ve heard that statement before,” McCain said before threatening to leave.
. . .
But he took more questions, including a pointed one on his immigration plan.

McCain responded by saying immigrants were taking jobs nobody else wanted. He offered anybody in the crowd $50 an hour to pick lettuce in Arizona.

Shouts of protest rose from the crowd, with some accepting McCain’s job offer.

“I’ll take it!” one man shouted.

McCain insisted none of them would do such menial labor for a complete season. “You can’t do it, my friends.”

Some in the crowd said they didn’t appreciate McCain questioning their work ethic.

“I was impressed with his comedy routine and ability to tap dance without music. But I was impressed with nothing else about him,” said John Wasniewski of Milwaukee. “He’s supposed to be Mr. Straight Talk?”

True, sounds a lot more like Mr. Condescending Asshole, but he’s always sounded like that to me so what do I know?

Jesus Christ! Tom DeLay’s friend is a loony :

There are those who would say Tom DeLay lost his job as House majority leader because he was indicted by a Texas grand jury on charges of money laundering and conspiracy, or because of his extensive ties to lawbreaking lobbyist Jack Abramoff. But they would be wrong.

In fact, the Texas Republican fell from power because he is a Christian.

That, at least, is the view of Rick Scarborough, convener of a conference this week called “The War on Christians.”

“I believe the most damaging thing that Tom DeLay has done in his life is take his faith seriously into public office, which made him a target for all those who despise the cause of Christ,” Scarborough said, introducing DeLay yesterday. When DeLay finished, the host reminded the politician: “God always does his best work right after a crucifixion.”

Or to put things visually, here’s what DeLay’s followers think of him :

This guy trivializes the sacrifice of his own god by comparing them with Tom DeLay’s self-induced political troubles, and we’re the ones who are supposed to be anti-Christian?? Jesus deserves better than to be fronted by assholes like Tom DeLay. And just to prove (like I should have to) that I don’t blame Christians or Christianity for the self-righteous bloviating of egomaniacs, here’s one (of many) of my favorite bits from the Bible :

“When the Son of Man comes in his glory, and all the angels with him, he will sit on his throne in heavenly glory. All the nations will be gathered before him, and he will separate the people one from another as a shepherd separates the sheep from the goats. He will put the sheep on his right and the goats on his left.

“Then the King will say to those on his right, ‘Come, you who are blessed by my Father; take your inheritance, the kingdom prepared for you since the creation of the world.For I was hungry and you gave me something to eat, I was thirsty and you gave me something to drink, I was a stranger and you invited me in, I needed clothes and you clothed me, I was sick and you looked after me, I was in prison and you came to visit me.’

“Then the righteous will answer him, ‘Lord, when did we see you hungry and feed you, or thirsty and give you something to drink? When did we see you a stranger and invite you in, or needing clothes and clothe you? When did we see you sick or in prison and go to visit you?’

“The King will reply, ‘I tell you the truth, whatever you did for one of the least of these brothers of mine, you did for me.’

“Then he will say to those on his left, ‘Depart from me, you who are cursed, into the eternal fire prepared for the devil and his angels. For I was hungry and you gave me nothing to eat, I was thirsty and you gave me nothing to drink, I was a stranger and you did not invite me in, I needed clothes and you did not clothe me, I was sick and in prison and you did not look after me.’

“They also will answer, ‘Lord, when did we see you hungry or thirsty or a stranger or needing clothes or sick or in prison, and did not help you?’

“He will reply, ‘I tell you the truth, whatever you did not do for one of the least of these, you did not do for me.'”

Despite being an atheist, I look forward to a day when the people most likely to pat themselves on the back for being Christians start paying attention to the things Jesus had to say.

UPDATE : I got an email from Jonathan Schwarz reminding me of this earlier bit of DeLay-as-Jesus absurdity :

As we leave First Baptist, I ask DeLay about the many citizens who would be quite uncomfortable with the idea that he would mold the government in the belief that his religion – fundamentalist Christianity – had the only answers to society’s problems.

DeLay looks me squarely in the eye and shakes his head sadly. “When faced with the truth, the truth hurts. It is human nature not to face that . . . People hate the messenger. That’s why they killed Christ.”

You’d think comparing yourself to Jesus would be considered blasphemous, but based on some of the responses this post has received blasphemy only seems to be a problem when it’s done by a liberal. If you’re offended by the photo (which I totally understand), why would you be more offended by a tongue-in-cheek visualization of a sacrilegious metaphor than the serious statements that inspired it? Save your rage for the politicians who would belittle the suffering of Jesus by comparing his slow, bloody death with the political and legal fallout that has stemmed from their own corruption.

Only cowards like the GOP leadership would have the temerity to hide behind the Bible when forced to atone for their own crimes. Samuel Johnson was wrong. DeLay and his allies have shown us that religion is the real last refuge of a scoundrel. If you care about your faith more than your political party, I’d recommend taking Jesus back from the scumbags who have hijacked him for partisan purposes. You deserve better.