Even by the low, low standards of Faux “News,” let alone of “Lyin’ Ryan,” this is truly pathetic. For one thing, as ThinkProgress explains, there’s a lengthy passage in the Democratic platform on faith, which notes that “Faith has always been a central part of the American story, and it has been a driving force of progress and justice throughout our history.” Feel the hostility, huh? No? Right, didn’t think so.
Second, having watched many of the speeches last night, I can attest to the fact that the word “God” was mentioned numerous times. For instance, Mayor Julián Castro mentioned that his grandmother “prayed to God,” and also remembered his mother, “every morning as Joaquin and I walked out the door to school, making the sign of the cross behind us, saying, ‘Que dios los bendiga.’ ‘May God bless you.'” Gov. O’Malley said “Our parents taught us to love God, love our family and love our country.” Just about every speaker at the minimum ended their speech with “God bless you, and God bless America.” NARAL’s Nancy Keenan argued that “a woman should make health care decisions with her family, her doctor, and her God.” On and on it goes, clearly Lyin’ Ryan was onto something with his “Democrats hate God” riff. Not.
Then there’s the craziness of Paul Ryan of all people – the guy who actually worships religion-despising Ayn Rand, even requires that his staff reads her books about how “greed is good,” etc. – talking about how the word “God” needs to appear as many times as possible in the Democratic Party platform. Of course, this is the same guy who said he ran a marathon in under 3 hours, which would have been incredible, but actually it was a bit over 4 hours. Whatever, details details. Oh, and Lyin’ Ryan’s the same guy who keeps repeating his lies, on a large and growing number of topics, even after they’ve been debunked by pretty much everyone who’s looked at them. Hey, isn’t there something in the Bible about God commanding that we don’t bear false witness, aka “lie?” I guess Lyin’ Ryan must have been too busy reading Atlas Shrugged or The Fountainhead to check out the Bible once in a blue moon.
Finally, of course, is the irony, not to mention utter absurdity, of a party which has criticized Democrats for supposedly harping on “social issues,” when this campaign’s supposed to be 24/7 about the economy (which Republicans screwed up, and Democrats are saving, although that’s not Lyin’ Ryan’s narrative clearly), harping on how many times one’s theology – or lack thereof (like Ryan’s God-hating hero Ayn Rand) – is in the Democratic Party’s platform. Clearly, these people either have wayyyy too much time on their hands. Alternately, they simply have nothing to say, are getting completely desperate, and/or simply can’t help themselves to eruptions of John Birch Society-style wackiness every five minutes. What next, the Democratic platform didn’t condemn the evil Soviet Union or fluoridated water or something? Hey, give Faux “News” and Lyin’ Ryan time, they’ll get to it I’m sure…
P.S. Also, this is a nice distraction from the fact that Ryan’s horrendous budget, rightly condemned by the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops for failing to meet certain “‘moral criteria’ by disproportionately cutting programs that ‘serve poor and vulnerable people.'” I guess in Lyin’ Ryan’s world, the number of times you SAY the word “God” is FAR more important than whether you actually follow Jesus’ teachings (which were basically the polar opposite of everything today’s Republican Party stands for).
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