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Pawlenty Stars in American Civil Religion: The Movie

By Michael J. Altman

…squerades as a book ad that looks like a movie trailer. The ad runs only a minute and fifteen seconds but it packs in a flurry of American religious and civic mythology around the themes of freedom, security, and prosperity. With a thrilling musical score of vague but impending danger that could have been lifted from the season finale of 24, Pawlenty’s voiceover reminds us that these three goals won’t be easy but that we can accomplish them becaus…

Day of (Anti-Bullying) Silence Shows “Pro-Family” Activists to be Anti-Gay Bullies

By Julie Ingersoll

…e times during your day.” In a document [pdf], entitled “Tips for the Last Minute Organizer of Those Whose Administrators Said ‘No,’” students are explicitly told that if a teacher asks them to speak they “do NOT have a right to remain silent during class time.” In schools where permission is denied, students are encouraged to remain silent at lunch, wear a button or a ribbon, or write a letter to the editor. According to promotional materials, “t…

Mitt Romney Announces Exploratory Committee

By Joanna Brooks

…d the formation of his exploratory committee yesterday, with a low-key two-minute video aimed to connect with deep anxiety (especially among younger voters) about joblessness and the future of the American economy. Poised against the background of a misty football field at the University of New Hampshire, Mitt continued to act like a front-runner, focusing on the economy while leaving burn-ups over homosexuality, abortion, and other hot-button “va…

6 Reservations About U.S. Intervention in Libya

By Haroon Moghul

…ter of an emergency humanitarian intervention, he should have stood up the minute the missiles started flying and explained why he hadn’t consulted the American people—because, as he saw it, there was no time. Still more, making exceptions is a messy business. There are many court cases in which a defendant is clearly guilty, and yet we must throw out the case due to a violation of the rules of evidence. In individual instances, this creates inj…

Ken Ham Uninvited for Mocking Fellow Speaker’s Version of Creationism

By Julie Ingersoll

…ress releases from the parties involved, and the release, by Ham, of a two-minute clip from a convention talk that he says is at issue. It seems Ham had been critical of one of the other speakers who is not a young earth creationist, and critical of the convention for allowing him to speak. In fact, it’s this very issue of the alleged convention’s “compromising with compromisers” that led to the kerfuffle. Ham wrote on his blog: “It is this very c…

Hypocritical Freakout over Shari’ah, but Not Biblical Law

By Sarah Posner

…deral government of stealing the public’s money. Imagine all of that for a minute. There would have been an unbelievable outcry: the anti-Muslim shari’ah fear-mongers would have claimed the Constitution was under seige and the Christian nation under attack by religiously-motivated seditionists. These sorts of arrangements — contractual agreements to submit to dispute resolution outside of the courts, with choice-of-law provisions — are commonplace…

ABC’s Good Christian Bitches Makes Feminists of Religious Right

By Sarah Morice-Brubaker

…ut misogyny. The lion is laying down with the lamb. The messiah is due any minute. Best get right with God, folks, because it’s all Hicks paintings, angelic choirs, and vegetarianism from here on out. Before I rise to meet the Lord in the air, though, permit me a few thoughts. Thought one: Psst… Some feminists have been reclaiming the word “bitch” for, like, a few years now. A woman who adopts the label of “bitch” for herself, the thinking goe…

Egyptians vs. The Police

By H.A. Hellyer

…ff, when Muhammad, one of my neighbors, recognized him. “Oh, hello. Wait a minute — aren’t you the police officer we saw here yesterday?” Bashfully, he replied, “Um, yes.” Muhammad responded, with all the righteousness evident in his voice, “So, no work for you today?” None of us wanted to see a cop. None of us wanted to see one ever again. A few days ago, it was the police who were both the mainstay of our security, and the annoying bane of our l…

Palin Goes ‘Hopey-Changey,’ But Don’t Call it Political

By Julie Ingersoll

…t (sitting in for Lt Governor Jeff Kottkamp, who had cancelled at the last minute). Heroic Media regional president, Deborah Ortiz, was the only one permitted to ask questions. This session was even more explicitly political as Thrasher, for example, talked about replacing members of Congress in Florida, though not before launching into the night’s familiar refrain: “I don’t want to get too political but we need to change the culture of Congress.”…

The 99 Names: Allah is not
He or She

By Amina Wadud

…bic, the sun is feminine and the moon is masculine. Think about that for a minute. We tend to think in opposite gender terms about the sun and the moon in English. But it is not literal; it’s a metaphor. It’s true the Qur’an only uses the Arabic masculine (singular) pronoun and not the feminine. But that’s not literal either. You know how I know? the Qur’an uses the first-person singular, ‘I’ and ‘Me’ for Allah, and also uses the first-person plur…