Well, If you’re taking a stand behind a politician that you can’t be bothered to vote for, then you can’t be much worth as a supporter, so I’d call that mutually exclusive. Ron Paul’s fanbase and the Tea Party tend to be separate groups, despite supporting very similar things, so I figured that I’d separate them considering. That’s changing, though, now that little Randy is the Paul on Deck, and he gets much more support from the Tea Party supporters.
If you do a search for “robert james talbot” on either cnn.com or google using the site:cnn.com operator, there are no results found. Nor is there anything on site:bbc.co.uk
I’m prepared to believe he has the delusion that he is a christian, but he’s clearly not following the teachings of Jesus.
This is not a “no true scotsman” argument either, it’s a matter of straightforward comparison; by their fruits shall you know them. Or in this case, by their nuts. Two large groups of people might find this line of reasoning uncomfortable:
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Angry nutjobs who would have to accept that a large proportion of self-described christians are hypocrites and traitors to the memory of Jesus and his teachings. To actually live by the WWJD motto, they would have to change their minds about several dearly-held policies and attitudes that are part of their political tribal identity. Their hand offends but they refuse to cut it off. Also, they are pretty dumb and think the whole of scope of moral reasoning about any issue is encompassed within the span of one news cycle. Mind you they think the world began 6000 years ago and the apocalypse is next week, so, you know…
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Non-rationalist atheists, whose tribal identification demands that Quakers and Buddhists be lumped in with Al Qaeda and the Spanish Inquisition as equally hateful brainwashers of children. Some of these people should maybe chill out a bit, but on the whole they are less likely to kill you for not respecting their belief system. They can be dicks about it though.
Rationalist atheists and the abovementioned Quakers and Buddhists (with more overlap between these groups than you might assume) can roll their eyes at the irrelevant distraction of whether one particular violent idiot wanted to believe God was on his side.
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I don’t think there’s much support for the idea that this guy is a thoughtful and reflective Christian, debate seems to be centring on whether there was a presumptive judgement made about his professed religion, with a kind of passive aggressive sub-text that such a presumption would be considered politically incorrect if levelled at Muslims, but its OK to do it to Christians, so Christians are being unfairly treated by the liberal media.
I identify as Christian, but I don’t think that Christianity is some magic bubble of violent-crazy-person proof spiritual purity. The evidence to the contrary is pretty overwhelming.
As far as I am concerned all major religions are pacifist in nature if properly understood, and all have been subverted to hatred and war when its been politically expedient to do so.
I know this isn’t an uncontroversial point of view.
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He was probably getting his weapons from Leland Yee.
I broadly agree. I just think it bears repeating now and then that “wants to kill muslims” is not a defining characteristic of Christianity, any more than young-earth creationism or self-righteous interference in other people’s “sins”. I identify as Christian, and I won’t concede ground to the violent crazies by tacit assent to that narrative.
Although… posting comments on boingboing probably doesn’t help much with that. : (
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Actually, on a whole they wouldn’t go that far… They would certain condemn the guy, but they certainly wouldn’t argue he was motivated by the right and its rhetoric, and part of a larger terrorist problem of white terror aimed at bringing down the American way of life. They’ll tsk-tsk, yet sympathize with his frustration, because America is becoming way too socialist… in other words, they will do the things that they won’t do for Islamic terrorists, which is to put it into historical and social context.
If and when they really do start embracing these guys as actually being freedom fighters, then we have a real problem with Fox News…
Yeah but the point being made here is that terror arrests of Muslims are disproportionately represented in the mass media to terror arrests of Christians, and that is pretty much a matter of public record. No point circling the wagons.
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I think that’s only true for certain citizens. I doubt rich wall street bankers are thought of as terrorist, despite all the havoc they’ve caused.
Kudos for managing to arrest him without burning down his dwelling or shooting his wife.
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Yeah, I got that point. He’s white and American and hates Muslims, and therefore identifies with the tribal in-group rather than the hated designated-enemy-of-the-day. No disagreement there.
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Texas sure does turn out a bunch of whacko’s.
No. It makes him pretty much EXACTLY a right wing terrorist.
If you’re White and Christian and Conservative you’re a “nut” or a “tax protester” or a “separatist”. If you’re Black or Brown or a Swarthy Oriental or a race-traitor eco-freak you’re a terrorist.
And you’ve bought into it
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So does the arrest mean he missed this month’s payment to the FBI?
There’s a surprising number of far-right people who think Ron Paul is a nutcase.
I mean, well, he is, but it shocks me how many people seem to agree with him, but disagree with him. I tend to hear this sentiment expressed every time he says he would like to cut military spending. Which says more about most far-right nuts than it does about Ron Paul; way too many of 'em want to drastically cut government spending, as long as you don’t cut military, Medicare, or Social Security.
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