The Gospel According to Luke

CAME HOME FROM SCHOOL A SHORT TIME AGO AND FOUND a mysterious package, a large, well-stuffed manila envelope, addressed to me, c/o my Old Man whose last name is different from my own, which causes substitute postal workers no end of frustration, something to be avoided at all costs in case they are armed. The handwriting of the addresser was unfamiliar. The thing was sealed with a mock-up of a small U.S. flag where the word "PUNK" is seen in place of the white stars on their familiar blue background. Penned just above the word PUNK is "You're a" in the same hand that addressed the package. A cryptic message, obviously, intended for some person or persons unknown.

Inside were found a large-sized T-Shirt, made in America, in a union shop it is assumed, in a rich, deep black that will be the envy of the few Goths who hang out in this part of town looking for cats to steal. Across the front is emblazoned the single word "EVILDOER" in block, sans serif lettering. Also in the package were buttons proclaiming "Fascism Sucks", "Bush/Orwell/2004" and, my favorite, "BUSH/Satan/2004". Several stick-on labels were also included, one of which has been already affixed to the bumper of a Baptist Minister's Ford Van (by his very own son, I might add) which appears to be another American Flag, this time with an almost invisible dollar sign in the star field; the stripes replaced by what purport to be cruise missiles. The motto "UNITED MY ASS" is scrawled across the bottom. More below.

Other than "Thank you, Ian," there is not a good deal to say about these products except that they are of excellent quality, timely, funny, ironic, hard hitting, and wickedly indiscreet. It is recommended that you check out the items for sale in another area of the vast DEMOCRACY MEANS YOU website and start purchasing what I know will be very popular Christmas presents and stocking stuffers for any little ones who may display a political bent in their formative years. Washing a little mouth out with soap when the kid regurgitates, "Bush Is God," is so un-P.C. in this enlightened age.

It is hoped a line of baseball type hats will be added. I would suggest putting the logo or message on the back as well as the front of each so that any slack jawed, underachieving, non-motivated, twenty-something slacker can get his message across no matter how the chapeau sits atop his brainless head.

TALK RADIO AND MOI: This needs to be said early in our time together here at DMY. I do not listen to much talk radio. I find Limbaugh predictable, boring, repetitive, redundant, and totally iterative. Sean Hannity is almost a cipher; I have never heard more than ten minutes of any single show, radio or television. Mike Savage I knew only from his short-lived TV outing on MSNBC which was disjointed, dull, and ineffective. So the TR fraternity is simply not part of my life.

But there are two shows I like very much. First is a local offering, called the KENNY B. and JAMI G. Show, found early mornings hereabouts on AM radio 940 (there is a direct link to it at http://members.aol.com/luciusson/lukeslinx.html) This is among the best talk radio in the SouthEast, and covers a broad spectrum of events from national and international focus down to the local political scene. It is well paced, 'fair and balanced' (Kenny is a Conservative; Jami a liberal), and entertaining. Unfortunately the show can only be accessed locally, although they do have a toll free number for call-ins.

And there is a character out of Atlanta, syndicated nationally, a man who helped bring about the demise of that god-awful Phil Donahue program on MSNBC, and who was, during his only appearance on THE O'REILLY FACTOR, called by cable TV's three hundred pound gorilla, "a viscious son of a bitch". The fellow's name is Neal Boortz, he has an informative web site at http://www.boortz.com ; we have written about him at http://expage.com/luciusson259

Boortz touts himself as a 'Libertarian', but tends to take issues one at a time and as they come. He can be abrasive, has the steel-trap mind of a practiced trial lawyer (which he once was), and is always entertaining.

Neal's favorite targets include Hillary Clinton, government schools, the income tax system, Jesse Jackson, and religious bigots.

Boortz may well be syndicated in your area. Check local listings to be sure. His show also has an audio feed available through the magic of your own computer. For some reason, he cannot be accessed on any Office Depot PC.

I bring this up lest some poor soul think, as was done early in my relationship with Political Pulpit Dot Com, that Luke gets his opinions from Rupie Murdoch and his FNC. For the record, I cannot stand O'Reilly. I do watch, sometimes, a bit of Cavuto and am a fan of John Gibson who occasionally airs one of my emails. But as a rule, there is not much time for either radio or TV in my daily schedule. Pop is one of those archaic parents who thinks that reading is far more important than the electronic media, and both practices and enforces what he preaches. To this day he hides the remote from brother Rob, age thirty-four. Dad is convinced that any boy who has time for TV should be out in the large back yard pruning, trimming, and cutting.

Bet he did his homework by the light of a glowing fireplace when he was a kid, just like his hero, Abe Lincoln. I'm the only teen around who didn't get a car on his sixteenth birthday, doesn't own a cell phone, or even have his own credit card.

Gives me something to bitch about!!

SCOPES MONKEY TRIAL, ALABAMA STYLE: WHERE IS WILLIAM JENNINGS BRYAN WHEN YOU NEED HIM: FYI�the courts have spoken, the sculpture of the Ten Commandments should be removed from the Alabama Courthouse where they currently are to be found. That's my opinion. However��..

��this is The land of King Cotton�..

The Alabama fiasco seems to be a throw-back to the Southern Political Scene of a hundred or so years ago. Judge Roy Moore is nothing short of a blustering demagogue who is using his bible friendly stance as a way to enhance his own political future, or simply to stir up trouble.

We are reminded of the careers of such illustrious sons of Dixie as Eugene Talmadge (Georgia), Huey Long (Louisiana), and the ever lovin' George Corley Wallace of, you guessed it, Alabama. These guys were masters of a uniquely southern style of vote getting which made politics a contest bewteen 'us' and 'them', and it didn't matter much who the 'them' were: the federal government (Talmadge), people of wealth (Long), African Americans AND the federal government (Wallace).

These icons of traditional Southern (white) mentality were, to a man, effective speakers who could whip up a crowd of any size to a real frenzy. And this in the days before Television, mainly. They evoked deeply ingrained values in their harangues including a lofty pedestal for the elevation of Southern femininity, a xenophobic mistrust of outsiders, an overpowering bias against Blacks, and the strong appeal to traditional, bible based, conservative religion.

Enter Judge Roy Moore. Now in Alabama, the Chief Justice is an elected office. To listen to this old bastard proclaiming the righteousness of his cause strikes most of us as humorous. But in his home state, this is serious stuff. The Word of God is at stake. God doesn't lie. Jesus was a perfect child; why can't you be more like him?

Was the United States founded as a 'Christian Nation'? I personally do not think so. Some of the Founding Fathers were religious, of course, but the intellectual climate of the times was of a much more freethinking nature than modern Fundamentalists would have us believe. The early United States was certainly not 'christian' as was, say, the seventeenth century settlement of the Massachusetts Bay Colony, a wholly bible oriented society where 'Puritan' values were law, dissent was punished, and where an all pervasive perversion of Christian belief led to the Salem Witch trials of 1692.

Please don't remind us that more so-called witches were toasted in Europe than in North America during that calamitous era. We should be as outraged over the legalized executions of witches as over the lynching of African Americans and other minorities in times past. Besides, Europe was already 'Old Europe' by 1692.

What is not well known is that the model for a Puritan-Style, Christ-cum-Bible society is an ideal that many fundamentalist, Southern Christians aspire to. Their version of a perfect U.S. is a kind of 'theocracy', and they truly admire the Mass Bay antecedent, except for the 'unfortunate' incidents of 1692. But, to their credit, the leaders of Massachusetts did acknowledge they made a mistake in frying the poor ladies. Otherwise, there is no reason not to bring back the good old days of seventeenth century New England, provided we can still drive our SUV's, of course. Theirs would be a social order based on conservative biblical teachings, where women are subservient to men, where kids would never be spoiled due to frequent application of the rod, and where any sort of sexual deviancy would be outlawed and severely punished, if found out. Scarlet letters, anyone? They would all vote Republican, one assumes.

This entire notion was new to me until a few short weeks ago. It came up in a conversation with a Southern Baptist (SoB) friend. So I did some research questioning several Baptist clergy, half a dozen men and women who teach in christian and secular schools, and neighbors who are representatives of Macon's religious faithful. Incidentally, one of those Baptist clerics now sports Ian's UNITED MY ASS stickers on his back bumper. Wonder if he will notice it.

Scares hell out of you, does it? Yet this is, I suspect, exactly the philosophical position taken by Judge Moore's devout followers: bring 'God and the Bible' back into our lives, our schools, our politics; too long has god been absent from human activity. All you have to do is look at the rampant encroachment of sex, especially homosexuality, into mainstream life to see that The United States has turned its back on God Almighty.

These guys have a real fear of sex. Wasn't the missionary position, sanctified by Yahweh, good enough for Jesus?

And these good folks are very serious about achieving their little bit of heaven here on earth. There are a lot of them�and they vote in large numbers. Talk about agenda. What they want is so much more than a simple 'let's have more religion in America's daily life'. They want nothing less than a pure, Christian society where every single thing must be by law biblically based. Doesn't seem to allow much room for us unbelievers, does it?

These guys would gladly achieve a total 'union of church and state'.

The State Supreme Court has given Moore and his followers a few days to remove the five thousand pound sculpture. We shall see what happens very soon, now. My guess is that the offending tablets will be covered up or removed to a spot close-by, but that Judge Moore will, in the fullness of time, run for ever higher office, until the gullible Alabama electorate shall elevate him to the United States Senate, or governor's mansion, or both. If he were Catholic, he might be a candidate for pope or Sainthood, but the Southern Baptists do not consider Roman Catholics 'real' Christians, worthy of either inclusion or salvation.

The lesson to be learned from all this? Avoid zealots and ideologues of all stripes whether Christians, Muslims, Liberals, Conservatives, or Chimpanzees. Christian chimpanzees, especially.

SHAMELESS SELF PROMOTION DEPARTMENT: For those interested in keeping up with the essays on my own website we offer a trio that have come online over the past several days: (1) http://expage.com/lukester267 CALIFORNIA THERE YOU GO, BACK TO WHERE WE TOLD YOU SO (The title is rhymed to prove to Professor Bohannon that we can write poetry at least as bad as his); (2) http://expage.com/lukester268 LUKE STARTS COLLEGE: You're Not In Ding Dong School Anymore, Bubba; (3) http://expage.com/lukester269 GUNS FOR TOTS: And We Don't Mean Toys. The whole collection can be viewed at http://members.aol.com/luciusson/contents.html I think all the links now work. Please let me know if you find anything broken.

Don't forget to catch us over at http://politicalpulpit.com and in our own domain coming online any day now http://gospelaccordingtoluke.com Have an unlabored Labor Day.

Ciao,

Luke Angelo
EMAIL: luke@democracymeansyou.com
Tobacco Road, GA

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Luke Angelo, Cyberbrat Out Of Hell, lives in Macon, GA, where he regularly causes trouble and proves that the pen is far mightier than the Mayor