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Tuesday, July 10, 2007

Another "Clean Slate Christian" conservative hypocrite
Posted by Jill | 6:06 AM
I know I keep harping on the hypocrisy of Christian conservatives, and it often comes across as if I'm bashing Christians and Christianity. On the contrary, I'm very live and let live about religion -- with an emphasis on "let live", and that's the main reason I so ardently oppose the attempts of the so-called Christian Right to impose some twisted version of so-called Christianity on the entire country. If people need to believe in a punitive authority figure in the sky to keep them on the straight-and-narrow, or even if they need to believe in some kind of eternal life to compensate for the shit that happens to them in this one, who am I to take away whatever it may take to get them through the day? But recognize faith for what it is -- just that -- faith -- and not Absolute Truth to be Codified in Law.

It seems that those crying loudest about the decline of morality are the ones who can't seem to keep themselves on the same moral path they would impose on others. While my own spiritual beliefs tend to be a hodgepodge of various pagan and Eastern traditions, the fact that I don't believe in a Great White Alpha Male in the Sky Micromanaging People's Lives hasn't kept me from what I think is a relatively virtuous life. I've never cheated on my husband. I pay my taxes. If there's something wedged in my shopping cart when I get out to the parking lot that neither I nor the cashier saw, I take it back into the store and pay for it. I give to charity. I recycle, drive a fuel-efficient car and try to leave as small a footprint on the earth as possible.

It's not that I'm without fault; I'm quick-tempered, do not suffer fools gladly, and yes, I sometimes Carry Hate in my Heart. As do those who would set themselves up as my moral superior. But you'd never see me embezzling money, or taking bribes, or patronizing prostitutes, or trying to divorce a sick spouse and run off with the pool boy, or any of the other capers that the biggest mouthpieces of the so-called moralists in our political life have been known to do.

Why is it that some people can walk the walk, and other people can't even resist temptation when they surround themselves with this elaborate belief system providing for punishment for those who transgress? Perhaps it's because the rise in the particular flavor of evangelical Christianity favored by so many of our conservative politicians provides a "get out of jail free" card. You need not live a virtuous life; all you need do is not get caught -- and if you get caught, it's still OK because Jesus died on the cross for your sins. And that means you can be forgiven for ANYTHING. Isn't that convenient? You don't have to think twice before calling the prostitution service to satisfy your fetish. You can just do it because you know God and Jesus will forgive you. And if you're especially lucky, your good, submissive Christian wife will also forgive you, for who is she to be more judgmental than Jesus?

It all works out so well for these guys, doesn't it?

Today's exhibit in Republican Christian moral hypocrisy is Louisiana Senator David Vitter, the first to be exposed as a patron of the "D.C. Madam"'s prostitution ring.

Vitter is a particularly nasty breed of Clean Slate Christian wingnuts. In 2004, Mary Jacoby wrote about Vitter in Salon:


He presents himself as a morally righteous, clean-cut family man, and his wife and three young children have become virtual campaign props. The Harvard-educated Rhodes scholar is also extremely intelligent, observers say, and runs perhaps the most effective political ads in the state.

[snip]

At a Sept. 21, 1993, town hall meeting in Metairie, he got into a confrontation with a questioner that led to a lawsuit against him.

Mercedes Hernandez, who was involved in Republican politics, testified that she frequently attended local meetings to engage officials on the issues, usually tape-recording the events. At a town hall meeting, Hernandez asked the state representative about a rumor she'd heard that he was supporting a gay-rights bill in the Legislature. Vitter became "enraged by her question, left the podium where he was standing, advanced toward her in a rapid, threatening manner, pushing aside chairs ... and grabbed a portable tape recorder" that Hernandez was holding, according to her legal complaint.

In his legal filings, Vitter denied that he had assaulted Hernandez and instead accused her of trying to set him up by planting the false idea with other attendees that he supported gay rights, a position that is anathema in his religious conservative district. He further accused Hernandez of working with John Treen and his other political enemies by trying to shop a story about the incident to the media.

After a trial, a judge awarded Hernandez $50. "The court finds that Mr. Vitter's demeanor changed when he saw the tape recorder. He became angry, agitated and excited," the judge wrote. "He thought Ms. Hernandez was using her question [about gay rights] as a ruse to 'set him up' and embarrass him." But the judge also admonished Hernandez. "It appears that Ms. Hernandez was rather enjoying the political advantage she seemed to have perceived herself to have gained."

[snip]

The Vitter campaign sent fliers to black voters stating that the racist David Duke was supporting his opponent. In fact, Treen had been an enemy of Duke and had tried to stop his rise in Louisiana GOP politics. "Dave Treen and I have absolutely no use for David Duke whatsoever," John Treen said. "He [Duke] tried to shake my hand once, and I said, 'I'm not going to shake your hand, you son of a bitch.' It's hypocritical to shake someone's hand if you consider them an enemy." But in what John Treen believes was a secret pact between Duke and Vitter, the former Ku Klux Klansman came out publicly for his nemesis, Treen.

The effect was to suppress the black vote. Amid low turnout, Vitter eked out a victory with 51 percent. Curiously, though, the New Orleans area precincts that had supported Duke in the earlier phase of the race went not for Treen -- whom the white supremacist had claimed to be supporting -- but for Vitter. That was evidence, John Treen claims, that Duke's supporters had secretly been rounding up votes for Vitter.

[snip]

In Congress, Vitter became a reliable vote for the extreme right, earning a 100 percent rating from the American Conservative Union in 2002. He vowed to outlaw abortion in almost all cases, even when pregnancy results from rape or incest; his only exception was to save the life of the mother. And -- with an eye on the governor's office -- he continued the crusade against gambling that he'd started in 1993 with the ethics complaint against Gov. Edwin Edwards.

In 2002, Vitter criticized his fellow Republican, Gov. Mike Foster, for supporting the expansion of a casino operated near the Texas border by the Jena Band of Choctaws. Coming to Vitter's aid was an advocacy group called the Committee Against Gambling Expansion, which mailed out campaign fliers on Vitter's behalf and allowed Vitter to use its name in phone calls to supporters.

It turned out that the advocacy group was not run by "Louisiana folks with the Christian community," as Vitter told the Times-Picayune he had initially thought. Rather, it was a sophisticated front group set up by a Washington lobbyist, who is now under federal investigation for his activities, on behalf of a rival tribe that was trying to block competition. Vitter has said he had no idea the Committee Against Gambling Expansion was actually representing casino interests.


The prostitution rumors were swirling even then, and Mrs. Vitter's response to them, when compared to Vitter's statement yesterday that

"Several years ago, I asked for and received forgiveness from God and my wife in confession and marriage counseling. Out of respect for my family, I will keep my discussion of the matter there — with God and them. But I certainly offer my deep and sincere apologies to all I have disappointed and let down in any way."


...indicates that some serious guilt-tripping was laid on Mrs. Vitter during that presumably church-based "marriage counseling."

Here is what Mrs. Vitter said in 2000:

Asked by an interviewer in 2000 whether she could forgive her husband if she learned he'd had an extramarital affair, as Hillary Clinton and Bob Livingston's wife had done, Wendy Vitter told the Times-Picayune: "I'm a lot more like Lorena Bobbitt than Hillary. If he does something like that, I'm walking away with one thing, and it's not alimony, trust me."


It isn't even a surprise anymore when these guys get caught. The question is whether it will matter; whether voters buy into this "clean slate Christianity" or if they too believe that it doesn't matter what you do because a Jewish carpenter got nailed to a cross 2000 years ago. I would hope not, for anyone who has lived knows that what you do is a far greater measure of your moral code than what you believe. Belief is easy. Action is hard.

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