One day in early December, I received one of countless telephone calls pertaining to the upcoming Dec. 6 election. Normally, the calls are pre-recorded, or “robocalls” appealing for my vote for this or this candidate or telling me how horrible the opposing candidate would be for Mom, apple pie and America.
This one, however, was a live call from a woman claiming to be calling on behalf of AFA. Never having heard of the organization up to that point, I interrupted her spiel to ask who AFA was.
“American Family Association,” she said and without even pausing to take a breath, she launched into her pitch. “We’re not calling on behalf of any particular candidate,” she assured me. “We just want to remind you to be sure to vote for candidates who represent our Christian heritage and the Christian principles on which America was founded.”
(Well, first of all, America was not founded on Christianity—or by Christians. The Founding Fathers were, for the most part, Deists. Chief among the founders was one Thomas Jefferson, the man who re-wrote the Bible. Jefferson’s Bible omitted all references to miracles by Jesus, the Resurrection and other miracles as well as passages indicating Jesus was divine. Our very own Gov. Bobby Jindal, by the way, was named recipient of the American Legislative Exchange Council’s Thomas Jefferson Freedom Award at ALEC’s national meeting in New Orleans in 2011.)
When I heard that, I simply said, “I’m Jewish.” (Actually, I’m Methodist.)
End of conversation.
Now comes word that AFA is sponsoring Gov. Bobby Jindal’s prayer rally at the Maravich Assembly Center on the LSU campus Jan. 24.
So, what’s the big deal? The Gaithers have held gospel concerts in the same facility (I’ve attended two of them and they were great) and the Pope held a service at the University of New Orleans. Besides, the Prayer Rally will be strictly faith-based and will not be a forum for political discourse—because they say so. http://blogs.theadvocate.com/politicsblog/2014/12/19/prayer-rally-organizers-distance-event-from-afas-positions/
Yeah, right. With Jindal taking part, the absence of right-wing political rhetoric is about as likely as…well, as likely as a general denial of evolution or climate change at the event. After all, one of his political operatives, Baton Rouge Business Report publisher Rolfe McCollister (former Jindal campaign treasurer and later appointed by Jindal to the LSU Board of Supervisors), smoothed the way for securing the center for the event through…you guessed it, political channels. http://theadvocate.com/features/faith/11119534-123/documents-reveal-behind-the-scenes-details-of
The Southern Poverty Law Center lists AFA as a hate group, just as it does the Westboro Baptist Church, probably because both spew venom instead of the Christian tolerance taught by Christ when it comes to groups that think and act contrary to their rigid set of self-imposed standards of morality, namely gays.
Remember the story from the Bible when the woman was about to be stoned for adultery. Didn’t that quote, “Let he who is without sin among you cast the first stone” (John 8:7) come from the mouth of Jesus?
And then there was: “Inasmuch as ye have done it unto one of the least of these my brethren, ye have done it unto me.” (Matthew 25:40). I can’t help but wonder if the fine Christians from Westboro Baptist Church and AFA have ever read those words or if so, did they gave even a passing thought to their meaning.
And no claim can be made that those quotes were lifted out of context; their meaning could not be plainer.
As might be expected, Jindal critics (and they’re growing in number with each passing day) have leveled criticism of the governor for participating in the event, which skeptics insist will have political overtones. http://www.bayoubuzz.com/buzz/item/803216-lost-faith-in-lsu-prayer-rally-and-in-bobby-jindal
But the most interesting barrage was leveled by one Taylor Huckaby of Los Angeles, former Deputy Communications Director for the Louisiana Republican Party, a volunteer in Jindal’s election campaign and later, Jindal’s New Media Director.
Huckaby penned the following for LouisianaVoice:
Never have I been more embarrassed to be an alumnus of Louisiana State University. Yesterday, the LSU powers-that-be finally broke their silence on Gov. Bobby Jindal’s ostentatious prayer/politically pandering rally. “Rental of an LSU facility does not imply any endorsement,” wheedled director of media relations Eddie Ballard to the New Orleans Advocate.
I wonder if he said that before, or after he accepted the $18,500 from the American Family Association, agreeing to not only entertain them for a day but also to provide a baldly political platform from which Jindal intends to pander to his ultraconservative electorate.
I wonder if he knew extent to which Jindal-appointee to the LSU Board of Supervisors, Rolfe McCollister, prodded the University to give up the Pete Maravich Assembly Center for such use.
I wonder if he realizes that while technically correct and certainly legal, in practice people all over the country will now associate LSU with happily playing host to an organization that blames the Holocaust and the existence of the Nazi Party on gay people. Yes, you read that correctly. From AFA spokesman Bryan Fischer in a web post from 2010 (and this is indeed a representative sample, so don’t you worry):
“Homosexuality gave us Adolph Hitler, and homosexuals in the military gave us the Brown Shirts, the Nazi war machine and six million dead Jews.”
Yes, this is the very same guy around whom Bobby Jindal has voluntarily decided to drape his arms around come January 24th.
Also appearing in the New Orleans Advocate story was a certain Clay Tufts, the current LSU student body president, who claims the AFA is “not reflective on the university in any way or its students.” Then, immediately after staking that claim, he goes on to explain how no action can possibly be taken on the issue via student government because, well, too many LSU students agree with the AFA’s positions.
“I’m sure a large group of students will go to the event.” Tufts said, “Student government itself won’t be going either way on anything.”
Apparently condemning an organization that blames the Holocaust on gay people is a bridge too far. Such controversy!
Is this really the best LSU can do? Accept the AFA’s blood money and turn a blind eye? Proclaim that the university community supports its LGBT students while also simultaneously admitting helplessness in the face of so many anti-LGBT sentiments on campus? It seems to me that LSU’s “commitment” to LGBT people is less representative of a fighting tiger and more akin to the paper variety.
How incredibly embarrassing it is that LSU allows itself to be such a willing pawn in this political game, and how incredibly sad it is that the Louisiana LGBT community has to again endure false and patently ridiculous accusations of Nazism, child recruitment, equivocations to bestiality, and perversion. Why would anyone want to send their son or daughter to a university that so blithely resigns itself to such bigotry? I certainly wouldn’t.
Louisiana Voice 
Where does Duck Dynasty come down on this? That should be Ocam’s Razor.
Good one.
The planned event is already political, so it is impossible to deny that it is political. For starters, it was announced on the letterhead of the Office of the Governor, and every action Jindal takes is political.
The storm of controversy it is stirring up is probably exactly what Jindal wants, for political reasons, of course.
My prayers are already answered, because Jindal will never be president, and that is indeed comforting.
Here’s an interesting NEW YORKER article about AFA and its Director of Issues Analysis, Bryan Fischer:
http://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2012/06/18/bully-pulpit
Mr. Fischer is also host of FOCAL POINT, a radio program on AFR (American Family Radio).
Here is a blog post by Mr. Fischer reprinted at the Southern Poverty Law Center website:
“Welfare has destroyed the African-American family by telling young black women that husbands and fathers are unnecessary and obsolete. Welfare has subsidized illegitimacy by offering financial rewards to women who have more children out of wedlock. We have incentivized fornication rather than marriage, and it’s no wonder we are now awash in the disastrous social consequences of people who rut like rabbits.”
— BRYAN FISCHER, blog post, April 5, 2011
While LGBT issues seem at the forefront of AFA attacks, it clearly takes stands on other issues and is very anti-Obama. According to the NEW YORKER article linked above:
“Like much of the religious right, the A.F.A. was losing traction until Barack Obama was elected President, in 2008. His victory galvanized the group. Its leaders saw Obama as a radical proponent of godless socialism.”
You might want to further research the AFA at the Southern Poverty Law Center, Wikipedia, and other websites. Having done so, you might agree this is less a religious organization than a political one.
How can it be argued with a straight face that the LSU gathering is simply a group prayer and not a political event?
Tom,
I have certainly enjoyed all of your hard work this year. It has been entertaining, insightful, and very informative. This post was no exception.
Keep up the good work.
Merry Christmas!
Ken Burk (atheist, formerly Jewish)
Great post, Tom, and I think it speaks volumes that such a high-level member of Jindal’s inner circle is now essentially lambasting him as a right-wing nut job.
Regarding McCollister, he gave a dual-endorsement for the 6th CD seat (Claitor & Graves). I have to wonder if the Claitor endorsement didn’t hurt, rather than help Claitor. Since he backed Graves (and my guess is likely voted for him in the primary since Graves was the CLEAR, CLEAR Jindal candidate), it wouldn’t surprise me one bit for McCollister to have played a role in the last-minute gay-centered attack against Paul Dietzel. After all, I never remember McCollister’s publication hardly even recognizing the fact Dietzel was a candidate. Given that McCollister was working so heavily behind the scenes for the function on 1/24, he likely may have played a role in the Dietzel attack via gay innuendo. Internal polls (from within multiple candidates’ camp) showed Dietzel to be a serious threat to Graves making the runoff, so what better way to torpedo Dietzel’s chances than to insinuate that he may be gay. I personally think Dietzel should be proud of the finish he had in the primary after that vicious attack which no doubt severely impacted Dietzel among some of his most ardent supporters.
Speaking of Graves and the 6th CD seat, the scuttlebutt going around is that the 6th CD will be an open-seat election again in 2016. Why? Because Sen. Vitter, with the full and blank-check backing of the Koch Brothers (through unlimited and legal PAC commitments) has made it known he wants Garret Graves to be his successor as U. S. Senator from Louisiana. Graves formerly served on Vitter’s staff, and Vitter had a representative present at the Baton Rouge Press Club when Graves debated the other candidates weeks before the primary election. So, that’s the dream scenario being envisioned by Vitter and Vitter-related affiliates (i.e. Vitter becomes Governor in 2015 and Graves succeeds him as U. S. Senator in 2016).
God helps us all if Vitter succeeds Jindal as governor. State government has become little more than a huge cookie jar that political allies can reach into for lucrative contracts that pay high dollars for little or no performance. Too bad legislators and the majority of citizens are just now waking from a long sleep- the damage is done.
BTW an aside – wouldn’t it be interesting to see an audit of the jindals’ financial holdings? Including any offshore accounts. Nobody gives that much away without a quid pro quo.
Sorry chief but you can’t get a free pass to rewrite history to suit your feelings toward Jindal and this prayer rally. Our country was founded on Judeao-Christian beliefs and morals. Some of the Founding Fathers were deists, some. Jefferson’s abridged Bible was for incoming Congressmen, with verses he thought would be appropriate for their use. There is not enough time or space to quote the Founding Fathers and disprove your assertions. Merry Christmas!
The AFA represents a distortion of Judeo-Christian values. Can anyone doubt that if the AFA had its way, this nation would move in the direction of a theocracy? Jindal, demagogue and charlatan that he is, exploits the worst aspects of ultraconservative Christianity for his own benefit, namely, using xenophobia, fear of science, homophobia, and relentless attacks on Obama as the prince of darkness. It is sad, because a lot of conservative Christians are decent people. It is the leaders and politicians who are the slimy, oily ones who know an opportunity when they see one.
Trace this whole fiasco to the source, and it begins and ends with Jindal’s raw ambition to be POTUS. So in a way, this rally is becoming increasing moot with each passing day. Jindal is slipping in the polls, believe it or not (I know, how can you slip when you are only in the two percent range to begin with?) Some of the latest 2016 polls, to be found on Real Clear Politics, have stopped listing Jindal’s name. He is not a factor, not a player, not a contender, has no coattails, has less than zero momentum and has no appeal even as VP, because what does Jindal bring to the table? Certainly not voters. Demographically speaking, his pockets are empty.
“The U.S. Constitution is a wholly secular document. It contains no mention of Christianity or Jesus Christ. In fact, the Constitution refers to religion only twice in the First Amendment, which bars laws “respecting an establishment of religion or prohibiting the free exercise thereof,” and in Article VI, which prohibits “religious tests” for public office. Both of these provisions are evidence that the country was not founded as officially Christian.
“The Founding Fathers did not create a secular government because they disliked religion. Many were believers themselves. Yet they were well aware of the dangers of church-state union. They had studied and even seen first-hand the difficulties that church-state partnerships spawned in Europe. During the American colonial period, alliances between religion and government produced oppression and tyranny on our own shores.
“Had an officially Christian nation been the goal of the founders, that concept would appear in the Constitution. It does not. Instead, our nation’s governing document ensures religious freedom for everyone.”
https://www.au.org/resources/publications/is-america-a-christian-nation
Even if that were true who cares about all this founding fathers crap? Why should people be forced to believe in the same superstitions that men had over 200 years ago…and just because we were born in a certain land??? Go look up this wild new term called “progress.”
I couldn’t read the entire post. When the Southern Poverty Law Center was mentioned, I felt credibility crash. The SPLC calling another organization a “hate group” is remarkably humorous.
Jindal’s prayer group is just another opportunistic stance in his long list of posturing. Can anyone with a grain of reason truly take him seriously at this point?
Not sure what your beef with the SPLC is, but your last paragraph is an indication you have an open and inquiring mind. You might want to read the NEW YORKER article I linked above unless you have a problem with them, too.
My beef with SPLC concerns their history of fund raising tactics and systematic labeling of various groups as “hate groups” simply based on them disagreeing with their political and religious viewpoints. Earlier this year, the FBI removed the SPLC as a resource for information on hate groups. Part of the reason for this may stem from reactions following the 2012 shooting at the offices of the Family Research Council in Washington DC. The shooter in this incident stated he singled out the FRC for his act based on the reports on the SPLC website that the FRC was a hate group and used the SPLC “hate map” to plan his shooting.
I also remember reading about several liberal publications editorializing that the SPLC’s founder Morris Dees has grown wealthy based on his fundraising practices, practices that have been labeled as “hyping fear” of right wing hate groups in order to raise obscene amounts of money (including making founder Morris Dees very wealthy). It has been pointed out that SPLC is quick to label conservative or religious groups as “hate groups” while failing to do the same to equivalent left-leaning groups. Furthermore, despite all available law enforcement evidence indicating hate groups in the US have declined significantly over the years, the SPLC reports a large increase in the number of such groups.
There is a good bit of information on the Web about the SPLC’s problematic more recent history and I encourage you to research it and not accept the organizations proclamations without some skepticism.
I do try to have a fair and open mind. What bothers me the most these days is that dishonesty is so widespread. It’s getting difficult to believe anyone any more. More and more, groups and individuals that should value their integrity above all else are willing to ignore facts to push their perception of Truth. There’s too much “means justify the ends”. The SPLC is just one example of a group that has an admirable history in fighting prejudice, white supremacy groups and helping right the wrongs performed by biased or illegal court actions. But the SPLC now appears to be in the business of hate, manufacturing hate groups to profit from scare tactics. They’re not the same group they were in the 1970s and that’s a sad commentary on the state of the world.
The SPLC was formed in part as a reaction to the worst hate group in American history—the KKK. If that makes them bad in your mind, so be it.
If you can defend a group of people claiming that Hurricane Katrina was God’s revenge on the decadent lifestyle of New Orleans, go ahead but do so in the knowledge that the French Quarter was spared by Katrina while the Baptist Seminary suffered heavy damage. http://hyperphysics.phy-astr.gsu.edu/nave-html/s05/nobtskatrina.html
You are free to draw your own conclusions from that.
http://workbench.cadenhead.org/news/2733/pastor-god-destroyed-new-orleans
But the organization also has helped to free wrongly convicted men from prison. In virtually each case, the conviction was handed down because corrupt prosecutors deliberately withheld exculpatory evidence that would have proved their innocence.
One of the worst records for convicting innocent men belongs to former Orleans Parish District Attorney Harry Connick’s office.
Given a choice between trusting the Orleans D.A. or the SPLC, I’ll go with the latter.
The organization’s history is admirable. But it’s not the same organization today. And, no, I’m not defending any group that makes outrageous and ignorant statements such as “Katrina was God’s revenge”. Any group…any.
Reblogged this on The Daily Kingfish.
Using the logic explained above, we must hate the democratic party since they were the party of the KKK.
You may well have touched on something here. The southern Republicans of today are simply the old southern Democrats re-branded. They’re the same people with the same ideology who are savvy enough to know they need to put an “R” behind their names to get elected.
Casting the religious argument aside, there is little difference between the parties these days; they are both run by the big money of Wall Street and special interests. One is no less guilty of that than the other.
I found none, but looked for a connection linking AFA to the LA Family Forum, subordinate to the American Family Forum, home of radical right religious propaganda flooding Republican states. LFF and Jindal cowed LA legislators who passed yet another creationism bill sponsored by Sen.Ben Nevers. He claims he wrote it himself.
In fact similar legislation was written and pushed by AFF in 5 other targeted states. LA fools were the only legislators to actually pass it. Among other provisions Louisiana’s current creationism law (Nevers’ previous one was struck down by the Supreme Court) allows the introduction of “supplemental” “science” texts by those who would use evolution instruction to teach the Bible instead. Conveniently, American Family Forum publishes and sells “supplemental” texts.
The “born again” Hindi uses the religious right as they use him. They all know there’s money in GOD. And Jindal knows there are votes.
Remember this?
“I can sense right now a rebellion brewing amongst these United States where people are ready for a hostile takeover of Washington, D.C., to preserve the American Dream for our children and grandchildren.” [Bobby Jindal, keynote address at the annual conference hosted by the Faith and Freedom Coalition, June, 2014].
After you check out the AFA website, check the Family Freedom Coalition site:
http://ffcoalition.com/
At least the FFC makes no effort to pretend it is anything other than a political organization with a religious basis.
so many good replies.