By

Zachary Klein

It’s 2015 heading into ’16 and our national discourse seems like a throwback to before I was born—and that’s a serious journey in a time machine. Frankly, it’s extraordinarily depressing to watch presidential candidates scurry into racist, xenophobic postures pandering to people who aren’t worth the air they breathe.

Yeah, I feel as harsh as I sound. This is shaping up to be my winter of discontent. I see the beauty of scientific progress in the close-up videos of Pluto. But I’m listening while our politicians rail against immigration, Muslims, educational standards, a woman’s right to choose and the name #Blacklivesmatter, while, at the same time, they dismiss evolution, climate change, and environment protection. One long run-on sentence in opposition to the 21^st century.

“But Zach, they took down the Confederate flag. Obama has gone rogue and is finally acting like a progressive. Clinton opposes the pipeline. Feel the Bern!”

Feel THIS. As of June 2014 “More than four in 10 Americans continue to believe that God created humans in their present form 10,000 years ago, a view that has changed little over the past three decades. Half of Americans believe humans evolved, with the majority of those saying God guided the evolutionary process. However, the percentage who say God was not involved is rising.” Whoopie.

Maybe I should dance because Alabama will now teach evolution. BUT, Alabama will also keep its disclaimer sticker on the textbook cover. That sticker is actually a one-page insert placed on the inside of the front or back cover of every biology textbook a child reads in public schools in the state, according to Steve Ricks of the Alabama State Department of Education. “It encourages students to question the theory [of evolution] and ask questions about it.” The insert was advocated for by conservative Christians, according to the Associated Press.

Which brings me to the bullshit about the “war on Christianity.” Presently, more than two-thirds of Iowa Republican voters surveyed said President Barack Obama is doing the waging. Then who the hell is his army? Jews? African-Americans? Buddhists?

Ahh, what’s the matter with me? Must be those Muslims because, according to a new (Sept.14, 2015) CNN/ORC poll, 29% of Americans say they think Obama is himself a Muslim. That’s a whole lot of stupid. Sorry Kim Davis et al, you folks are fucking crazy.

We get Christmas shoved up our asses from November on. Look at the “evolution chart” presented earlier. Look at the Christian know-nothing stranglehold Texas has on text books. Hell, look at the abortion issue.

Roe V. Wade was settled in 1973. Forty-two years and counting and this is where our country sits. (Abortion | Gallup Historical Trends)

To nuance the issue, according to a recent national CNN poll, the “take-away” becomes this:

This does not suggest any assault on Christianity. Not while politicians fall over each other to wrest away a woman’s control of her own body. Rather than a war on Christianity, what we’ve got is a religious war on basic freedoms. Hell, if the NSA ain’t hacking, the pious are. And succeeding.

I’m fine with anyone who chooses to not have an abortion, or has religious objections to it. But the idea that they have some sort of moral superiority over those who believe in a woman’s right to choose is flat out dog dung. Especially since I really haven’t seen these Holier-Than-Thous lining up at adoption agencies despite our country having 397,122 children who live without permanent families in the foster care system with 101,666 of these children eligible for adoption. Where is the morality in the fact that nearly 32% of these children will wait over three years in foster care before being adopted. Or wait forever. Please, spare me ethic lessons.

But I do understand the religious jihadists’ panicked projections. Fifty-seven percent of Republicans want to dismantle the Constitution and establish Christianity as the official national religion. So, of course, we must be fighting a war against them since they just haven’t gotten their way.

As a typical old White guy, I haven’t yet discussed our viciously racist, supremacist society. Where to begin? We don’t lynch anymore? Well, why bother? Just throw ’em in jail or have the police beat or kill them.

“Black Americans are more than twice as likely to be unarmed when killed during encounters with police as white people, according to a Guardian investigation which found 102 of 464 people killed so far this year in incidents with law enforcement officers were not carrying weapons.” (Emphasis mine.)

Nationally, according to the 2010 U.S. Census, African-Americans are incarcerated five times more than Whites are, and Hispanics are nearly twice as likely to be incarcerated as Whites:

I ask my conservative Christian friends, who is the war really being fought against?

And so it goes. And goes. And goes.

I know this is the paragraph that should be screaming “strap ’em on, win one for The Gipper,” but I’m no Howard Beal from Network. I can’t sit here and write, “I’m mad as hell and I’m not going to take this anymore!” because I am going to sit here and take it. I’ll sign my petitions, vote, and maybe even work for Sanders—despite his ugly numbers, (Clinton is backed by 42% of Democratic primary voters nationally, compared to 24% for Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders, 22% for Biden and 1% for former Maryland Gov. Martin O’Malley.) but so what? Just another exercise in futility.

Anyhow, I have to barricade my door to protect my Jewish ass from the war on Christianity.

“Stripped of ethical rationalizations and philosophical pretensions, a crime is anything that a group in power chooses to prohibit.” ~ Freda Adler