Newt Gingrich has perfectly rational fears.

Well, not really. Not at all, in fact.

Now, I can see being worried about American becoming more secular and full of Atheists, and I can see being worried about American being dominated by Islam, but both at the same time?

http://www.politico.com/news/stories/0311/52023.html

 

He is just bullshitting for his church going audience. I don't believe he really means a word that comes out of his mouth.

He knows he is lagging behind the other Republican candidates when it comes courting the evangelical voters.

 

Maybe, maybe not. For that it's worth, he officially converted to Catholicism two years ago.

 

Maybe the chronological order in which he expressed those fears is in some way related to the chronological order in which he fears they'll happen. Just maybe.

 

Newt Gingrich is a fucking fruitcake.

 

and not the good kind.

 

Well, that does it. You're nuts (if you think there's a good kind of fruit cake.)

 

Yeah, funny thing about that.

The group of evangelicals he is preaching to? Cornerstone Church?

They are led by this guy, John Hagee, who previously had very harsh things to say about the Catholic Church.

He is a complete nutter.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Hagee

 

[yt=Amusing speech by Gingrich as recorded by discreet cam]ubwPqbzYG_E[/yt]

 

That's because reading comprehension isn't your strong suit, Doc. The US could be a secular atheist country. And it could be dominated by radical Islamists in a country like Iran. And the way things are going, it isn't completely incredible.

 

Maybe he's implying that the plague of atheism will drop the big Jesus forcefield that keeps the Islamo-termites from gnawing on us.

Naw, only morons would swallow rhetoric like that, and he can't have that much contempt for his base, he's Newt, and he's wonderful.

 

I welcome our new secular atheist radical Islamist overlords.

 

A secular atheist America would be a massive improvement.

 

BINGO!

I hope for his sake he's full of it & just being your typical cynical politician shamelessly whoring potential voters.

I wouldn't give Neutered Gingrinch much hope against Obama in '12 were it to come down to that unlikely situation.

More than likely, Republicans will only beat Obama if 1 or 2 big Dems change camps.

As of right now it'll be Obama Biden steamrolling over Palin Beck in a boring contest for the Oval Office.

 

Not if the "secular athiests" were mostly snot-nosed college socialists. That's just trading one disease for another.

->

 

We've been traveling in that direction for 50 years or so. Things don't look to be improving, on balance. Sure, some things are better. Now instead of white-on-nonwhite racism being socially acceptable, we have nonwhite-on-white racism being socially acceptable. Instead of sexism against women being tolerated, now sexism against men is tolerated. So we still have racism and sexism, no improvement there. Literacy has dwindled while malliteracy has skyrocketed as our schools still turn out tides of the indoctrinated, except now that they're indoctrinated in secular humanism instead of Abrahamic mysticism, their performance is seriously poor compared to that of previous generations, so no improvement there, either.

Eh... maybe you can think of some improvements.

 

You really only have a single thought in your head, don't you?

 

Evidence?

I can think that maybe just about none of that is true. Nor would it have anything to do with secularism if it were.

 

May we assume that everyone here who's got their panties in a bunch over the possibility of a "secular America" will now become regular churchgoers?

 

Well, it's worth guessing that Async is in "church" all the time, owing to his probable adherence to the teaching of Jesus that a man's relationship with God is between the man and God. Additionally, there are probably more than a few here who, without self-identifying as such, are probably Deists, who have a similar but not identical outlook on it.

As for me, I'm not religious -- but neither am I convinced in the least that secular humanism or atheism has imparted any measurable benefit so far, and the idea that slow poison can be fast medicine strikes me as being at least as idiotic as anything any of the Abrahamic mysticism has to offer.

 

Emphasis mine. Secular humanism is simply that...an abandonment by the majority of the population of its previous adherence to public displays of faith. The majority of people who put down "Christian" on forms - particularly medical forms - are just hedging their bets.

That hyper-religionists like Gingrich see this as some terrifying zombie conspiracy (or at least want their constituents to think they do) is a particularly cynical form of manipulation.

 

Why the bolding? I'm not saying I'm not an atheist -- I'm saying atheism hasn't improved anything in this country and isn't likely to based on its track record so far. As for Gingrich, he's doing what a hypo-religionist would do, just playing the fear game to a different crowd.

 

Secular humanism =/= atheism.

 

If secular humanism =/= atheism, then it's a religion, right?

 

Depends on what you expect "improvement", to be.

Make your floor sparkle, and your asshole smell like lilies?
Probably not.

But, did it ever claim to?

Please elaborate...

 

Already did upthread.

 

No, it's the absence of religion. Pragmatic agnosticism, if you will. Don't make me cite a dictionary definition of agnosticism.

 

Wouldn't the absence of religion be atheism?

Here's a metaphorical one. Agnosticism: "We don't and can't know." Atheism: "We don't believe." Semantics. They're functionally equivalent.

 

Nope.