Fresh Loaf

During the legislative session, Rep. Bobby Franklin, R-Marietta, blogged for The American View, a conservative Christian web site whose organizers aim to create “Christian America, and a Christian world, a Christian galaxy and a Christian universe.”

But since there is no area of life outside of the Lordship of King Jesus, all votes cast are religious in nature and must be based on what the Bible says is the proper function of the civil government.

— Franklin, on Jan 31, explaining how he decides his legislative votes.

By a vote of 154-1 the House approved HB 1088, a bill to provide state central planning of “agricultural tourism.” The last time I checked, I could not find any Biblical role of the civil government in the function of tourism, agricultural or otherwise.

— Franklin, on Feb. 18.

HB 1043 amended an already bad law, the “Childhood Lead Exposure Control Act” by allowing the state to enter your property if some state agent thinks that your kid has been exposed to lead. Whatever happened to the Supreme Court’s “Roe” and “Casey” right to privacy?

— Franklin rails against a bill aimed at protecting children from lead-contaminated structures.

You are a person while in the test tube. But the state then can deny your personhood the moment you are implanted in a uterus. With so called right to life organizations promoting this type of abomination, no wonder roughly 40,000 babies are still being slaughtered in their mother’s womb’s each year in Georgia.

— Franklin criticizes a bill proposed by Georgia Right to Life that would designate embryos in test tubes as “people.”

While Georgia is throwing the book at people that use alcohol vaporizing devices, the butchering of the unborn continues[.]

— Franklin writes about a House bill that would ban alcohol-vaporizers.

This bill allows the commissioner of the Department of Natural Resources (why there is such a department is another story) to prohibit all commercial and recreational fishing for blue crabs.

— Franklin questions the importance of an agency charged with protecting the environment.

Why is the Georgia House of Representatives concerning itself with any sport when tens of thousands of babies are slaughtered in the womb each year here in Georgia?

— Franklin expresses disgust with a bill that would urge the NCAA use a playoff system to determine a national college football champion.

First, individuals do not have any natural rights — which transitions to the second point: rights are given by God and are not privileges handed out by the state. It is very dangerous when those elected to office begin to believe and govern as if the State is God.

— Franklin states his views on basic rights.

Does it surprise you that the question never lets the voter know that if the Governor so chooses that not a dime of the tax could go toward transportation? Republicans - gotta love’um [--] NOT!

— Franklin channels Wayne’s World in his final post of the legislative session.

Rep. Franklin then said that the folks that wanted to end slavery were called “crazy” and “radical”, but they were doing “what was right”, so he didn’t mind being called crazy because he’s doing what’s right.

— Andre Walker in a Jan. 2007 GeorgiaPoliticsUnfiltered blog post after he asked Rep. Franklin about pro-choice groups labeling him as “crazy.”

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One of my favorite moments from the inaugural AJC Decatur Book Festival last year was an appearance by public-TV journalist Ray Suarez, who was pushing his latest work, The Holy Vote: The Politics of Faith in America (Rayo).

But then, Suarez is a hero of mine. In his best moments, as the host of NPR’s “Talk of the Nation,” he seemed like the best-prepared, most even-keeled and fair-minded of moderators, gliding conversations from multiple subjects to callers and back. As much as I enjoy his equally balanced segments as a senior correspondent for “The NewsHour with Jim Lehrer,” it feels like so much less compared to his NPR work — by about 50 minutes daily, in fact. But hey, Ray’s a rising star; he deserves the promotion onward and upward.
Suarez will be in town Thursday (Nov. 29), at the Jimmy Carter Library and Museum for a little schmooze-down from 4 p.m. to 7 p.m. Save your pennies; the tickets range from $50-$75.

I haven’t yet had a chance to read The Holy Vote, but loved watching Suarez do his thing at the DBF, making a compelling case for how religion has become indelibly woven into the fabric of modern-day politics and wondering very critically whether it’s a good thing.
Check out this clip from a Suarez book appearance …

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According to Fayette County authorities, pro wrestler Chris Benoit placed Bibles next to his wife and child after he murdered them last weekend.

Will American journalists and bloggers use the placement of the Bibles to speculate about Benoit’s motives and whip up anti-Christian hysteria?

Of course not.

Only morons and anti-religious bigots would use the mere presence of Bibles to link an apparent murder-suicide to religion or global religious extremism.

Contrast the news coverage of and blogging about the Benoit family deaths with the Virginia Tech shooting.

After reports surfaced that Virginia Tech mass murderer Seung-Hui Cho had the phrase “Ismail Ax” written on his arm when he was found dead by police, right-wing talking heads and assorted cyberbigots immediately tried to connect the massacre to Islam. According to their idiot logic, “Ismail” is the Arabic spelling of Ishmael, therefore Cho was a Muslim extremist (examples: 1, 2, 3).

Among the speculators was Washington Post conservative columnist and Fox News talk-show staple Charles Krauthammer. “I suspect it has some more to do with Islamic terror and the inspiration than it does with the opening line of Moby Dick,” said Krauthammer on Fox.

Nevermind that Cho was raised a churchgoing Christian or that he’d suffered from mental illness. And nevermind that “Ismail” isn’t the Arabic spelling of anything (Arabic doesn’t use the Roman alphabet) or that he actually wrote “Ismael” instead of “Ismail” on the video package he mailed to NBC News.

When you’re a bigot, you see what you want to see. Imagine what these idiots would be saying if copies of the Quran were found in Benoit’s home.

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HITCHENS AT MITCHELL HOUSE: “Wait, I’m thinking … nope, I still don’t believe in God.”

Contrarian author Christopher Hitchens visited the Margaret Mitchell House last Thursday to promote his new book, God Is Not Great: How Religion Poisons Everything. The main attraction: two invigorating intercourses between Hitchens and Emory Christian ethics professor Timothy Jackson. The subject: the existence of God and the worthiness of religion.

The two men covered a lot of ground, including the bombing of Nagasaki, Adolf Hitler, evolution, the Ten Commandments and religion in politics. Hitchens, as expected, lobbed a couple of rhetorical bombs. He called the Rev. Jerry Falwell, who had died the previous day, “a big tub of crap.” He questioned Martin Luther King Jr.’s commitment to Christianity. And he mocked his debate opponent’s professorship, calling it a “very modest” job.

Hmmm, do you think Hitchens undermines his arguments by being such an asshole?

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