Emancipation, Reconstruction, Redemption, the Ku Klux Klan,
Jim Crow

The struggles of the Civil Rights Movement took us two steps forward

Now the "Second Redemption" yanks us back

Racism, White nationalism, misogyny, heteropatriarchy, xenophobia, militarism, authoritarianism, neofascism, Alt-Right

The prestigious Radcliffe Institute for Advanced Study at Harvard College will host a panel on Monday, Oct 17, titled "Righting the Record: Conservatism and the Archives."

According to the press release:

Over the past half-century, grassroots activists and organizations both left and right have focused on women's roles, family values, homosexuality, and reproductive policy, transforming modern American life. Yet the collections of major public repositories, especially those housed at universities, tend to document only one side of this complicated history: the left side.

This claim is absent any evidence, and is part of a longstanding (and fraudulent) whine from the Right that campuses are hostile to right-wing ideas. No surprise to find out nemesis here at Talk to Action, New York Times columnist Ross Douthat, moderating the event.

The term "Political Correctness" was hijacked by right-wing ideologues in the late 1980s to trivialize and disparage concern for basic human rights for people whose race, gender, ability, size, or other attributes were inconsistent with the norms established by straight, White, Christian men.

Before then the term was seldom used other than among Leftist to discuss political ideology.

The idea of claiming there was a Culture War by liberals and leftists against America was formulated over several years by right-wing ideologues Patrick Buchanan, William Lind, and Paul Weyrich.

Many of us know Indiana Governor Mike Pence as a nasty homophobe with a carefully-crafted respectable demeanor. But did you know that In 2006, then Indiana Congressman Mike Pence tried to rally the Christian Right behind a punitive and nasty immigration "reform" program that would have forced all undocumented persons in the United States to leave the country. They would then would have to apply for a return "guest worker" visa from a for-profit private-sector system dubbed (with no apparent sense of irony) "Ellis Island Centers." They could return to the United States after a health screening--and a promise to learn English.

At the 2006 Washington Briefing of the Values Voters Summit, Pence was introduced by Tony Perkins of the Christian Right Family Research Council (FRC) as a "a Christian, a conservative, and a Republican--in that order. "  The Values Voters Summit is the primary national political action training and mobilization convention of Christian Right Republic Party election activists on the state level.

Correction Sent to Christianity Today, April 11, 2016

Regarding the article:
"Stop Calling Ted Cruz a Dominionist:
The Christian candidate's faith influences his platform, but not in the ways most critics assume."

by Robert Gagnon and Edith Humphrey, April 6, 2016

http://www.christianitytoday.com/ct/2016/april-web-only/stop-call ing-ted-cruz-dominionist.html?start=1

I have discussed this matter with Sara Diamond and she refutes the claim that she ever used the term "dominionism," and it does not appear in her book Spiritual Warfare.

See pages 138 and 238 for her discussion of "Dominion Theology" as facilitating the politicization of the Christian Right.

Diamond refers to this on page 138 as "Dominion Hegemony."

Fred Clarkson and I coined the term "Dominionism" to refer to the politicization of the Christian Right as influenced by Dominion Theology such as in the Christian Reconstructionist movement. See: http://www.talk2action.org/story/2011/8/31/17047/5683/Front_Page/ How_We_Coined_the_term_quot_Dominionism_quot_ Sincerely, -Chip Berlet

Be strong. Have each other's backs. Defend every target of demonizing right-wing rhetoric threatening our allies and those facing oppression or repression. Leave no one behind: build a society where no one is thrown under the bus or out of the lifeboat. Take time for yourself and those close to you. Let the next generation grow into leaders. Pass it forward so that the circle remains unbroken.

With Republican candidate Ben Carson dropping like a stone in a pool of confusion, who gets invited to the tea party?

Tea Party activists currently appear to be splitting their votes between Donald Trump and Ted Cruz. That's at 9 am December 14, 2005.

Things could be different by tomorrow in this fast-shifting environment.

Over at the Free Republic website, which caters to all things of interest to the Right-Wing Patriot Movement, there is an
ongoing and vibrant discussion about this split.

Putting this in perspective takes a few steps.

We stand in the overflow crowd of some 300 in the small town of Tyngsborough near the New Hampshire border. Several thousand people are inside a local elementary school. The crowd is excited. Here is Donald Trump in Massachusetts in October of 2015. "Why do they always say a Republican can't win in Massachusetts?" we hear Trump say over the loudspeakers set up outside the school.

One woman we meet at the Massachusetts Trump Rally is Joan. A mature White woman who works three jobs to make ends meet. Joan believes in the Lord Jesus Christ and warns that the United States will soon be judged because events in Israel reveal that we are in the seven-year countdown to the apocalypse and Armageddon.

Now is the time for blunt talk. Donald Trump is a dangerous demagogue generating "scripted violence." Trumpism threatens not just the First Amendment but democracy itself. I call him a right-wing populist using fascistic rhetoric to target scapegoated groups. Other journalists and scholars have dubbed him a fascist or a totalitarian. But we all smell the stench of the burning bodies. So let us have our terminological debates, but setting aside all intellectual disagreements, as citizens of an increasingly unfree society, we must stand up and speak out.

The First Amendment guarantees the free exercise of religion, and that includes the right to call religion ridiculous. It protects devout Roman Catholics and those in the church of the Flying Spaghetti Monster--even those who sometimes wear colanders as hats. Here at Talk to Action we are nonpartisan, welcome respectful contributions discussing human, civil, and constitutional rights, and find debates between theists and atheists annoying (no trolls blasting either are allowed). Democracy is what we cherish...and it is in trouble.

Professor Gerald Horne of the University of Houston notes the Emanuel African Methodist Episcopal Church was at the center of Black resistance to slavery in Charleston by the early 1800s.

Roof wrote that he picked Charleston because it is the home of so many Black people. Black people, Roof feared, threaten the existence of the White race. Events in the church's history play a role in Roof's fear.

Inspired by a Caribbean slave rebellion which began in 1791 in what is now Haiti, Black parishioner Denmark Vesey of Charleston began organizing an insurrection using the Emanuel AME church as a base.