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Lincoln, Clinton, and Trump: From Strategy to Spin to Straight-Up Bullshit

…nder certain circumstances, to trim the truth in the service of a higher cause. The difference between these two conceptions of Lincoln is revealing. By pausing to examine each of them, we may better understand the way mendacity normally functions in the political realm, and the ways in which, on some occasions, mendacity may violate the tacit rules that keep that system stable. Lincoln’s reputation as a person of absolute integrity has been a sta…

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Gorsuch Confirmed… But Don’t Get Too Bent Out of Shape

…d now requires a simple majority vote in the Senate, those who believe in civil rights, individual autonomy, and the equal balance of power in a democratic republic had better get our houses in order and find a better strategy for opposing the next great threat to our way of life….

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End-Times Watcher Sees Satan in an Energy Drink

…Ever since the Book of Revelation was written, Christians have tried to decode it. They have used gematria to prove that Muhammad, Martin Luther, John Calvin, Napoleon, Kaiser Wilhelm II, and countless popes were the Beast. Some have noted with dread that each of Ronald Wilson Reagan’s three names contained six letters. Indeed, when the Reagans retired to Bel Air in 1989, they asked to have their new address changed from 666 to 668 St. Cloud Road…

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Catholics Across the Globe Reject Vatican’s LGBTQ Cruelty — Others Blame the Sock

…It is stunning the lengths to which his defenders go to offer ludicrous excuses for the fact that yes, Virginia, Pope Francis really did approve this “gratuitously cruel” statement which is doing a lot of harm. I would love to be wrong on this because it has lowered Francis’ standing on other issues like ecology, war, and economics. Of course he could step forward and issue a clarification. But that’s not much of a Vatican custom—at least within t…

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Hail Santa! War-on-Christmas Outrage Over Satanic Tree Reveals the Self-Serving Ambiguity of ‘Religion’

…ernment property in Pawtucket, Rhode Island, violated the establishment clause. The court ruled 5-4 that it did not, largely because the crèche was surrounded by other symbols that evoked Christmas but were not Christian, like Santa, reindeer, etc. As Sandra Day O’Connor explained in her concurrence, “The display celebrates a public holiday, and no one contends that declaration of that holiday is understood to be an endorsement of religion. The ho…

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A desolate road in Israel lined with security fencing.

Decadence, Sickness, and Death: Mourning and the Israel-Hamas War

…incere belief that coexistence was possible. Peace Now, founded in 1978 to promote a genuine and just peace between Israel and Palestine, was a real, forceful movement in the 1980s, with some political power. No more. In fact, it is today’s protest movement, a mostly centrist movement, which has taught us that Israel has transformed into a more ethnocentric, illiberal, even autocratic, right-wing society. Many are against this, but the mere fact t…

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As a Religious Studies Professor I Disagreed With the Hamline Firing — But Now I’ve Changed My Mind

…ditions are diverse. No, higher education cannot flourish without academic freedom. Yes, professors are only human and don’t deserve to be fired over a single disagreement or unintentional offense. But was this particular offense actually unintentional? Ultimately the direct cause of the controversy is that the instructor knew she was going to offend the Muslim students entrusted to her, and she did it anyway. That’s a pretty good example of punch…

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Turn On The News: The Times Has to Make a Choice: It Can’t Laugh at Satanic Claims and Take the Christian Right at Face Value

…ry takes place in a context closer to home. Putting that failure in a funhouse mirror simply allows us to clearly see inconsistencies that otherwise seem normal. If a European arts and culture story can treat conservative opposition to an artist as transparent and unpopular nonsense, why shouldn’t an American-focused piece do likewise? Instead, we’re forced to listen to supposed Christian mouthpieces, who represent not much more than their fax mac…

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James Dobson’s Family Values Were Influenced by a Eugenicist [Audio]

…feminism as these grave threats to the family. He would dismiss domestic abuse—that’s something that appears in later of his books. He would sometimes accuse women of faking it, just to get attention, that sort of thing. Even where he believed abuse was real, he never really thought of it as a good reason for divorce. Everybody had to stay in their marriage. And when he, when he ended up founding Focus on the Family he really gave all of those ide…

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How the Right’s War on ‘Critical Race Theory’ Taps into the Powerful Religion of American Innocence

…tern prep schools and fomenting outraged legislative resolutions in statehouses all across the country. The religion of American Greatness has no shortage of Democratic adherents; it is a fully bipartisan creed. No one doubts that we are living through a moment of racial reckoning. The use of the “reckoning” frame has already attained a well-deserved cliche status. But historical reckonings don’t necessarily resolve themselves in positive ways (no…

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