Exposing a dangerous Republican lie
I routinely get blast emails from rightwing sources, and I like to read them, not only because they’re funny, but because it’s important to know what the enemy is up to.
For instance, there’s this thing called Congressional Insider, which sounds like a bona fide media site, but is fake news. They sent out a blast email on Friday. There’s no trace of the Congressional Insider on the Internet, and the only contact information on the email is a Huntsville Texas address, which is the same as on other rightwing emails I get from other organizations pretending to be real. But if you read the email carefully, you’ll see where this stuff is coming from: Newsmax.
Now, you’ve probably heard of Newsmax and recognize that it’s an extreme rightwing, proto-fascist media site that peddles hate and conspiracy theories. In 2020, they contributed hundreds of thousands of dollars to political candidates and conservative causes, through so-called “affiliates” of Newsmax. Here are the biggest recipients of their funding: the Republican National Committee, the 1820 PAC (a super-secretive conservative group, based in Washington), Security is Strength (another extreme rightwing group that strongly endorsed Amy Coney Barrett for the Supreme Court), and Donald Trump himself.
The email they blasted out is a hodgepodge of rightwing talking points, but its main target is Critical Race Theory. Here’s their headline:
[Critical Race Theory’s] real target is Christianity and the Bible.
The far left wants it in our schools.
The war on Christians is in full gear, says a most famous Jewish thinker.
(The “famous Jewish thinker,” by the way, is none other than David Horowitz, who’s been a rightwing crank for decades.)
Now, as a Jewish thinker myself, let me weigh in on this supposed “war on Christianity and the Bible.” I am adamantly opposed to any Christian influence on government, federal, state or local. I don’t mind the milder forms of Christianity, but in modern America, Christianity has been hijacked by a lunatic fringe of ideological radicals, who aim at nothing less than the overthrow of our democracy (think of Jan. 6) and the establishment of a Taliban-style theocracy, run by evangelical mullahs who would nullify gay rights, make abortion illegal, and mandate a thousand other things that would end freedom and diversity in America.
If you want to call that a “war on Christianity,” go right ahead! I couldn’t care less. So, yes, the Congressional Insider, AKA Newsmax, AKA the Trump/evangelical party and its dark money, is correct when they say people like me want to undermine Christianity in America. I want Christians to go back into their churches. They can believe whatever they want; they can practice their religion to their heart’s content; they can have festivals and revival meetings and T.V. shows that bilk credulous poor people out of their money, the same way Trump does. What they can’t do, though, is to impose their homophobic, anti-science, misogynistic and anti-immigrant fanaticism on the rest of us. Their little war on Critical Race Theory amounts to nothing less than an assault on our democratic, Constitutional rights. Stoked by Donald Trump, they appeal to the most ignorant, frightened slice of the electorate, people whose knowledge of reality comes from their Bible-thumping preachers and from fraudulent sites like Newsmax.
By the way, if you’re a California voter, the best way you can resist the dangerous insanity of these rightwingers is to vote NO on the recall of Gov. Newsom!
Thank you.
