Jimmy Carter Is Saying Out Loud What We All Know: Trump Is An Illegitimate President

Thursday former President Jimmy Carter and former Vice President Walter Mondale, were in Leesburg Virginia for an⁩ event hosted by presidential scholar Jon Meacham on human rights. Carter responded to a question by Meacham by pointing out what politicians are too scared to address, namely that a full investigation “would show that Trump didn’t actually win the election in 2016… He was put into office because the Russians interfered on his behalf.”

Mondale didn’t go quite that far, simply noting that Trump’s “got something deep in him that is detestable, citing “his rhetoric, his harshness, his divisiveness… Doctors tell me they think they recognize symptoms of psychological problems.”

Carter also said that “every day we send a terrible signal” with border policy, “a disgrace to the United States, and I hope it will soon be ended. Maybe not until the 2020 election.”

Meanwhile Trump is at a G20 meeting in Japan, sniffing Putin’s asshole. They were seated next to each other at dinner when a reporter asked Trump if he would tell "the Russian president to not meddle in the election." Trump, without looking at Putin, responded, "Of course I will. Don't meddle in the election, president. Don't meddle in the election." Ha, ha… big funny! And… the illegitimate "president" lashed out from the summit. "He’s a nice man. He was a terrible president," said Trumpanzee at a press conference. "He’s been trashed within his own party. He’s been trashed… Everybody now understands that I won not because of Russia, not because of anyone but myself. I went out and campaigned better, smarter, harder than Hillary Clinton." The use of the word "everybody" is a typical example of Trumpian gas-lighting, a technique he uses to manipulate his base of 2-digit IQ supporters.

But what if it is indisputably proven that Trump is an illegitimate "president?" Does that mean Bernie gets to fire Gorsuch and Kavanaugh? They’re illegitimate Supreme Court justices if they were appointed by an illegitimate "president," no? And 41 judges to the U.S. Court of Appeals and 80 judges to U.S. District Courts. Let’s take the 9th District, which has jurisdiction over California, Oregon, Washington, Alaska, Hawaii, Arizona, Nevada, Idaho and Montana. How much better off would that Court of Appeals be without right-wing extremists Mark Bennett, Ryan Nelson, Eric Miller, Bridget Bade, Kenneth Lee, Daniel Collins and Daniel Bress (not confirmed yet)? Same goes for the 7th Circuit, which has jurisdiction over Illinois, Indiana and Wisconsin. Trump packed it with far right whackadoodles: Amy Coney Barrett, Michael Brennan, Michael Scudder and Amy St. Eve. The other big Midwest Circuit— the 6th— is even worse off. The 6th has jurisdiction over Tennessee, Kentucky, Ohio and Michigan. And Trump put half a dozen judicial psychopaths on the bench there so far: Amul Thapar, John Bush, Joan Larsen, John Nalbandian, Chad Readler and Eric Murphy.

At the second Democratic debate, Bernie said he doesn’t support packing the Supreme Court but brought up the idea of rotating judges off the Supreme Court. I had never heard of that before and wasn’t sure what it meant but it doesn’t sound particularly constitutional to me. I like the idea of just saying, "look, Trump wasn’t elected; he was put in the White House by Russia. He was an illegitimate president so everything he did was illegitimate. Let’s start with Gorsuch and Kavanaugh  and work our way down."

Bettina Hubby

Look At Jimmy Carter, An Admirer Of Jesus-- Now Look At Donald Trump, A Worshipper Of Mammon

I don't know a better observer of life in America's evangelical communities than author and filmmaker (and former evangelical) Frank Schaefer. He and I are both working on a project called VoteCommonGood, "an effort to dislodge control of Congress from the Republican Party by inspiring Christians to vote on November 6, 2018 according to what our faith tells us is the Common Good. This is the answer to the white evangelicals who put Trump in power and thereby demoted Jesus. We at VCG," he continued, "are brokenhearted and angry about the turn our nation has taken, and the role many of our fellow Christians have played in that turn in electing a thug. The Trumpism take-over of the Republican Party departs from America’s best norms and principles. This is lynch mob America, not Lincoln’s country. Trumpism is an affront to the teachings of Jesus. Put plainly, the Republican-led Congress lacks the moral standing to do its work as a check and balance on the Presidency. Vote Common Good is hitting the road in a 35 city tour to work for candidates out to flip the House, encouraging and equipping you to do your part to help dislodge Congress from Republican Trump enablers’ clutches and restore it to patriotic humane people."

Ice, Ice by Nancy Ohanian

Many of these white Christians are now regretting their Trump votes. They didn't sign on for endless lies, payments to porn stars,  crying children, and a Congress refusing to do its job. Significant numbers of these voters have changed. They are ready to say enough is enough. VoteCommonGood is working to help progressive Democrats reach out to them. Writing these voters off is understandable, but a critical mistake being made by Democrats across the board especially because the Republicans are also taking them entirely for granted. Speaking to these voters about shared values, emphasizing Democrats' ability to stop Trump when it matters most is attractive to some evangelicals who still put Jesus before Trump. On Sunday, Frank penned a piece on his own blog, Compare Jimmy Carter's Idea Of Christianity And Leadership To What Comes Next: The Republican/Evangelical/Trump Turn To Theocratic Fascism. Harsh!

Thirty-seven years after leaving office, Jimmy Carter, 93, still bypasses the wealth and perks that flow so freely to other former presidents. White evangelicals hate this Christian who lives like Jesus and follow a lying pervert as he demolishes American democracy.

The Republican Party is only in power and Trump is only “president”-- not because of the Russians, but because of white evangelical supporters. The Republicans ARE the evangelicals and vice versa.

Take Betsy DeVos. She’s a Republican, white and an evangelical leader. DeVos is also the first secretary of education with a $40 million family yacht that’s registered in the Cayman Islands to avoid American taxes. Just another unpatriotic white evangelical right wing thief, right up there with con-artists like Pat Robertson.

DeVos is today’s white evangelical ideal, not Carter. Humility is out. Honesty is out. Trump’s greed for money and power is in.

DeVos is worried about the government making “burdensome” demands on the for-profit schools run by Trump-like con-artists offering valueless “education” to those duped into giving them money for nothing. DeVos has stuffed her department with people from the for-profit education industry. The guy supposed to be overseeing fraud investigations is a former dean of a for-profit named DeVry University, which paid $100 million to settle a lawsuit over misleading marketing tactics.

That’s nothing compared to what comes next in the Republican Evangelical Trump turn to theocratic fascism: Kavanaugh will reverse Roe. Then the Gorsuch-Kavanaugh court will use the Constitution to ban all abortions, striking down state laws as a violation of a fetus’s “right to life” under the 14th Amendment. That’s the long-held plan antiabortion constitutional scholars have been pushing. These are the same people who have compiled the lists of potential far right judges Trump is appointing to keep his white evangelical base-- led by Franklin Graham-- happy.

Republicans in Congress and their evangelical sycophants are acquiescing in Trump’s corruption, his incitements to violence, and his abuse of power, up to and including using the power of office to punish critics; they’re even increasingly vocal in cheering him on. Republicans, white evangelicals and Trump are now one and the same.

Make no mistake: If Republicans still hold both houses of Congress after November Trump will go full authoritarian, abusing institutions like the I.R.S., jailing opponents and journalists on false charges, and he’ll do this with full support from the Republican Party and white Evangelicals.

Republicans in Congress must be destroyed in November for the same reason World War II had to be won. And the stakes are just as high. Republicans in Congress have made a coldblooded calculation that the demise of democracy is worth it if it means lower taxes on the rich and the freedom to pollute. Republicans are not just wrong but evil.

With Trump as the lens we’re looking through we’re seeing what the enabling Trump-Republican Party is made of: White supremacist, pro-billionaire, anti-environmental, racist and sexist fascism. American democracy will die unless Democrats take back the House.

As far as I know, the VoteCommonGood tour is scheduled to kick off in Bangor, Maine on September 29 and head to a big event with Rev. William Barber in Raleigh on October 5 via Syracuse, Scranton, and Allentown. After that, it's right into the heart of "Trump country," with events in West Virginia and Kentucky. There are lots of stops in Iowa, Kansas, Nebraska and Texas and over a week in "red" parts of California. We'll be giving more information about this effort as the kick off date gets closer.

Why The Florida Democratic Party Is A Political Shambles

Like Bernie Sanders and Elizabeth Warren, Alan Grayson isn't fooling around. He is willing to fight-- for real-- for the legitimate interests of American working families. There are a lot of politicians willing to talk as though they are, but few who are actually willing to go up against the vested interests of the oligarchs and plutocrats who extra-constitutionaly rule this country. 

As former President Jimmy Carter told Thom Hartmann Tuesday, the United States is now an "oligarchy" in which "unlimited political bribery" has created "a complete subversion of our political system as a payoff to major contributors." Both Democrats and Republicans, Carter said, "look upon this unlimited money as a great benefit to themselves." Carter, who will be 90 in October, knows. He's not still in the business; Grayson is. And he's roiling the political waters by speaking out... and speaking out... and speaking out. The oligarchs and plutocrats do not like it-- nor do their handmaidens in the politics business, creeps like Chuck Schumer, the senator who has taken more in (legalistic) bribes from Wall Street, $21,052,681 at last count, than any other non-presidential candidate in history.

And sold-out politicians like Schumer cast their nets-- their power networks-- widely. Schumer has pledged to his Wall Street financiers that he will keep more progressives out of the Senate; no more Democrats whom the oligarchs and plutocrats fear as "the Elizabeth Warren wing" of the party. They demand-- and Schumer has pledged to deliver-- fake Democrats and corporate shills like "ex"-Republican Patrick Murphy.

This week Kyle Munzenrider, writing for Miami's New Times, tried explaining how this works inside the utterly failed Florida Democratic Party establishment, one of the worst and least successful state parties in the country.

Some of Rep. Alan Grayson's more colorful comments may get him labeled a "crazy liberal," but what's that old cliché about the true definition of insanity? The one Bill Clinton, of all people, repeated several times during his 1992 campaign? Oh, right. Doing the same thing over and over and expecting a different result.

But that's exactly what Florida's Democratic establishment is doing by backing Rep. Patrick Murphy in the Democratic Senate primary for Marco Rubio's to-be-vacated seat while trying to run Grayson out of the race.

Of course, the Democratic party hasn't tried to run Murphy over and over again, it's just that the young representative (and former registered Republican until 2011) from Palm Beach County is the latest in a long line of moderate, boring candidates Dems have run for state-wide races. With the exception of the untouchable Sen. Bill Nelson, almost all of those candidates end up losing. Fittingly, Murphy has the endorsement of past Democratic losers Charlie Crist and Alex Sink. Murphy also snagged the endorsement of the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee before anyone else got in the race.

Today, Daily Beast columnist Eleanor Clift asks the question, "Can Florida Dems squash Alan Grayson?" [And by "Florida Dems," the Clift relic doesn't mean actual Florida Democratic voters, who love Grayson, but her version, the hacks and mini-Schumers who make up the state's contemptible Establishment, which has always feared and loathed Grayson.]

The answer seems to be that they're trying their best.

Granted, the fight has already proved something of an idealogical war within the party, but most brass are too smart to enflame it even more by talking publicly. Clift however does get mega-attorney and mega-donor John Morgan on the phone to share his take. Morgan, of course, is best known from being a major bankroller of recent electoral failures like 2014's effort to legalize medical marijuana and Charlie Crist's post-Republican political career. (He's also literally Crist's boss. The former Gov works at his law firm).

“Alan is a friend of mine, he’s a client of mine, and I tried mightily to dissuade him from walking away from a national platform that most congressmen and women do not have,” says Morgan. “He’s like Barney Frank-- he was a congressman from Massachusetts and he was America’s congressman, progressive America’s congressman. I told him, I hate to see a smart guy like you walk away from the Congress because I don’t see a path forward for you in Florida.”

Morgan clearly thinks Grayson has no shot of winning the state.

“It’s a tightrope with no room for error, it’s threading a needle with a fine piece of thread,” says Morgan. “You have to be able to do well in the Panhandle. I’m a fan of Alan’s politics but he has a lot of minuses."

Granted, Barack Obama won Florida twice and did absolutely horribly in the Panhandle both times, and even though this Senate election will take place in an presidential election year, that's apparently of little import to Morgan.

Never mind that recent polls show Grayson beating Republican contenders by a healthy margin (to be fair Murphy beats them by a healthier margin).

Never mind that Republicans continue to dominate state-wide races by not running insurgent candidates like Rubio and Rick Scott from their primaries.

Never mind that Florida appears in recent years to be as much as a "Get your base out to vote" swing state as it is an "appeal to the middle" swing state.

Want to help Grayson get into the Senate-- a rebuke to the bosses, a rebuke to Wall Street, a rebuke to the worst political forces not overtly part of the GOP? You can do it here. I hope you will.

Sinking the Sanders Campaign Beneath a Wave of Silence

The press, covering their imagined version of the Sanders campaign (source)

by Gaius Publius

You knew that "the chatterers" — writer Steve Hendricks' name for corporate-employed pundits and analysts — would try to sink the Sanders campaign. As Hendricks points out below, their bosses want nothing less, and employees live to serve.

Hendricks, writing in the Columbia Journalism Review:

On the eve of the 1948 presidential election, Newsweek asked the 50 reporters on President Truman’s campaign train to forecast the winner. To a man they went the way the Chicago Tribune infamously would on election night: “Dewey defeats Truman.” Lay historians will recall that not only did Truman defeat Dewey; he clobbered him. Sorting out how the media got it so wrong, The New York Times’ James Reston concluded that he and his brethren had been a lot like the aloof Governor Dewey himself, who was said to be the only man who could strut sitting down. Dewey played well with plutocrats and publishers. “[J]ust as he was too isolated with other politicians,” Reston wrote, “so we were too isolated with other reporters; and we, too, were far too impressed by the tidy statistics of the polls.”

This was true, but it fell to A. J. Liebling, the nonpareil of The New Yorker, to pick out the crucial vice that Reston and similarly minded colleagues overlooked. “A great wave of contrition hit the Washington newspaper world in the days immediately following the joyous catastrophe,” Liebling wrote, “and men swore that they would go out and dig for the real truths of politics as they never had dug before. But few publishers encouraged them in their good resolutions, and most of them are back again running errands designed to bolster their bosses’ new illusions.”

As Hendricks points out, Liebling’s most memorable bon mot is also his most eternal — "Freedom of the press is guaranteed only to those who own one."

The "bosses' illusions" about the Sanders campaign are that it has no chance to succeed, and that it should be given no chance. And they're doing their best, the chatterers and their bosses, to give it no chance at all. Hendricks on the wave of silence in the press:

"[That this] crank actually could win” is nearer the mark. But having settled on a prophecy, the media went about covering Sanders so as to fulfill it. The Times, for example, buried his announcement on page A21, even though every other candidate who had declared before then had been put on the front page above the fold. Sanders’s straight-news story didn’t even crack 700 words, compared to the 1,100 to 1,500 that Marco Rubio, Rand Paul, Ted Cruz, and Hillary Clinton got. As for the content, the Times’ reporters declared high in Sanders’s piece that he was a long shot for the Democratic nomination and that Clinton was all but a lock. None of the Republican entrants got the long-shot treatment, even though Paul, Rubio, and Cruz were generally polling fifth, seventh, and eighth among Republicans before they announced. ..

There's more about this in the article, including similar coverage by those whom Hendricks calls, not euphemistically, Sanders' "admirers."

"But He's Such a Long-Shot..."

Yet Hendricks firmly believes that Sanders could win, that the Sanders campaign could succeed after all. (I share that belief.) In addition to the "Eugene McCarthy in 1968" argument, which Hendricks doesn't make, there are several strong arguments which Hendricks does make.

First, about those long odds (my emphasis):

The foregoing would be woeful enough even were it true that Sanders has almost no chance of winning, but it’s not true. I’ll skip lightly over the conspicuous fact that any frontrunner can have a Chappaquiddick, a deceptively amplified “scream,” or a plane crash. Instead, let me dwell on the simple fact that over the last 40 years, out of seven races in which the Democratic nomination was up for grabs—races, that is, when a sitting Democrat president wasn’t seeking reelection—underdogs have won the nomination either three or four times (depending on your definition of an underdog) and have gone on to win the presidency more often than favored candidates.

Some of these seekers were long shots indeed. Jimmy Carter was a lightly accomplished governor from a trifling state beyond whose borders he was little known and less regarded. A few weeks before he entered the presidential race, the Harris Poll asked voters their thoughts on 35 potential candidates. Carter was not on the list. After a year of campaigning, just a couple of months before the first primary, he routinely polled 1 percent among Democratic voters and finished eighth in the narrowed field of eight Democrats. But he won all the same because the other guys were Washington insiders, and after Watergate and Vietnam, Democratic voters (and eventually the wider electorate) didn’t want another insider, no matter how often journalists told them they did. If you don’t see a parallel to the present moment—a discontented time of Occupy, Black Lives Matter, Moral Monday, Fight for $15, the People’s Climate March, Move to Amend, and other anti-establishmentarian agitation—you’re either asleep or a publisher.

Michael Dukakis also polled as little as 1 percent just a few months before he announced (Sanders, by the way, was polling 5 to 8 percent at the equivalent stage), which paled beside the Hillary-esque 40 to 50 percent that Gary Hart was drawing. When Hart’s campaign went down with a boatload of bimbo, Dukakis profited, although even then he was no favorite. Shortly before the first primary, he still polled no better than 10 percent, which was toe to toe with the forgettable Paul Simon and 15 points behind both Jesse Jackson and a resurrected Hart, who mounted a brief comeback because Dukakis and all the rest looked so impotent.

Some observers wouldn’t rate Bill Clinton an underdog, mostly because he wasn’t one for long after he hopped into the race. But so slight was the shadow he cast nationally that nine months before the primaries, pollsters weren’t listing him as a potential contender. Even he thought so little of his chances (Mario Cuomo was supposed to run, and to be invincible once he did) that he didn’t announce until five months out. His odds improved from there.

The quixotic Barack Obama entered the race against a juggernaut whose endorsements were so thunderous and war chest so surpassing that many spectators thought the young senator was only trying to make himself known for a future contest. After campaigning all of 2007, he not only failed to advance on Clinton but found himself a little further back, dropping from 24 to 22 percent, while Clinton advanced from 39 to 45 percent. There were rumblings that he should bow out before the first vote so as not to weaken the ineluctable nominee.

That's a pretty decent list of precedents. Of the four, three entered the White House as residents.

What About Clinton's Money?

And then there's the issue of the money, specifically Clinton's money relative to Sanders'. I'll let you read Hendricks' counter-arguments for yourself — start with the paragraph beginning "Spurious though early polls may be." But consider that among the points he makes is this:

But the last contested nomination, in 2008, was itself a huge-money affair, and Obama won despite having started from a worse financial position than Sanders is in now (Clinton had $10 million at the start of 2007, Obama virtually nothing) and having been out-fundraised by Clinton throughout 2007.

Just one data point of many.

Is Sanders Too Far from the "Center"?

Which brings Hendricks to the final argument against Sanders' viability — his distance from the "political center." Hendricks, pointing to several past elections, notes how valuable that distance can be. I agree. His prime example is Michael Dukakis — distant from the center indeed — and he could easily have added Georgia's Jimmy Carter as well, or Arkansas's Bill Clinton.

But consider — what does the "political center" means in modern America? It means the place where the wishes of the One Percenters — of David Koch and Jamie Dimon, for example — overlap each other. The political center of the American people is way to the left of that.

For example, 87% of Republicans want Fast Track and TPP to fail. Republicans want that. And therein lies the real danger of the Sanders campaign — that it does represent the people, a great many of them, and it therefore could easily succeed if it gets any tailwind at all. Hendricks:

Is the day of the IKEA socialist at hand? The chatterers don’t know the answer. What they know is how to do their damnedest to ensure that day doesn’t come too soon.

They can try, the chatterers and their bosses, to sink the campaign beneath a wave of silence, but with impassioned words like these coming from the likes of Elizabeth Warren, Sen. Sanders' core platform has a huge megaphone:

I'm willing to bet that the Warren megaphone, whatever her eventual endorsement ends up being, isn't going away. Nor is coverage of her by "the chatterers." All this bodes well for the Sanders campaign.

(Click here if you'd like to help his campaign. You can adjust the split in any way you like. My collected Bernie Sanders coverage is here.)

GP

Li'l Egypt

Sorry for the Cher version; I'm sick. I shouldn't be looking at something as serious at another Egyptian revolution-- there are already a couple dozen people dead and 14 million angry Egyptians in the street including some real assholes-- through the prism of U.S. pop culture, let alone my own travelogue. Morsi Muslim Brotherhood crackpots started screaming about martyrdom this week-- going out in a blaze of glory. At least that's what's being reported. How much we can know about a fluid situation like this so far away and through the linguistic, culture and political barriers is another matter entirely.

We do know that the military gave Morsi a 48 hour deadline (today) to... something and that Morsi rejected whatever it was. Reuters reported that the army is looking at suspending the constitution and the nullifying the elected parliament as part of their "roadmap." Awkward.

The sources told Reuters the Supreme Council of the Armed Forces (SCAF) was still discussing details of the plan, intended to resolve a political crisis that has brought millions of protesters into the streets. The roadmap could be changed based on political developments and consultations.

Chief-of-staff General Abdel Fattah El-Sisi called in a statement on Monday for Mursi to agree within 48 hours on power-sharing with other political forces, saying the military would otherwise set out its own roadmap for the country's future.

The president rebuffed the ultimatum and the main liberal and leftist opposition alliance has refused to talk to him, demanding along with youth activists that he resign.

The sources said the military intended to install an interim council, composed mainly of civilians from different political groups and experienced technocrats, to run the country until an amended constitution was drafted within months.

That would be followed by a new presidential election, but parliamentary polls would be delayed until strict conditions for selecting candidates were in force, they said.

The armed forces planned to open talks with the main opposition National Salvation Front and other political, religious and youth organizations once a deadline set for Mursi to reach a power-sharing agreement expires on Wednesday.

The sources would not say how the military intended to deal with Mursi if he refused to go quietly. The emerging roadmap could be amended as a result of those consultations, they said. Among figures being considered as an interim head of state was the new president of the constitutional court, Adli Mansour.

The emerging army blueprint closely resembles proposals for a democratic transition put forward by the NSF, which appointed former U.N. nuclear watchdog Mohamed ElBaradei on Monday to negotiate with the military on the way forward.

The military sources said the new transition arrangements would be entirely different from the military rule that followed the overthrow of autocratic President Hosni Mubarak in a 2011 popular uprising.

Then, the armed forces' council held effective power but was widely criticized by liberal and left-wing politicians for failing to enact vital economic and political reforms, and siding with the Muslim Brotherhood.

NBC's Richard Engel is in Cairo. He's better than any of the other network reporters so it's worth paying attention to his insights. Less than a minute-and-a-half:



Military coups aren't what progressives usually like to see. But against an increasingly divisive, religionist regime... there seems to be a lot of acceptance of the idea. Al Jazeera is reporting that international pressure is being applied to Morsi to... I'm not sure what... bow to pressure from the street?

The UN human rights office called on Morsi's government on Tuesday to listen to the demands of the Egyptian people and engage in a "serious national dialogue" to defuse the crisis.

Rupert Colville, the spokesman of the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, Navi Pillay, also said the role of the Egyptian military was crucial.

"Nothing should be done that would undermine democratic processes," he said.

Earlier, the US President Barack Obama spoke to the Egyptian leader via phone. A White House statement said he "stressed that democracy is about more than elections; it is also about ensuring that the voices of all Egyptians are heard and represented by their government, including the many Egyptians demonstrating throughout the country."

...The crisis has triggered a series of resignations by cabinet ministers, leaving Morsi isolated.

Senior officials who have quit include foreign minister Mohamed Kamel Amr, who tendered his resignation on Tuesday.

Others to resign are tourism minister Hisham Zaazou; communication and IT minister Atef Helmi; the minister for legal and parliamentary affairs, Hatem Bagato; water minister Abdel Qawy Khalifa; and environment minister Khaled Abdel-Aal.

Morsi also lost the support of Sami Enan, his military adviser, who resigned and said the army would not “abandon the will of the people."

Opponents of Morsi viewed the army statement as an endorsement and continued to flood the streets to press on the president to step down.

Morsi supporters criticised the ultimatum as an attempted coup. A group of pro-Morsi parties, calling themselves the “coalition to defend legitimacy,” called for mass protests in support of the president during a late-night press conference.

“We reject attempts to use the army to attack the legitimacy of the president," said Safwat Abdel Ghani, a senior member of the Gamaa al-Islamiyya.

Gehad el-Haddad, a senior adviser to the Freedom and Justice Party of Morsi's Muslim Brotherhood, said the military was trying to paper over its own poor performance during the transitional period after Mubarak's ouster.

"The right of the people to choose the leader of the country will not be jeopardised by anyone, even by those with guns," he said in an interview.

This sounds like it could easily turn into a civil war and a military dictatorship. It's worth reading an interview with President Jimmy Carter about the deleterious impact on people's lives when religionists take over government. Jonathan Merritt explains that he was visiting The Carter Center to attend “Mobilizing Faith for Women: Engaging the Power of Religion and Belief to Advance Human Rights and Dignity.” The goal of the event was to “educate and mobilize religious leaders from around the world” on the incompatibility of their teachings with gender inequality. In his opening remarks, President Carter called abuses of women “the most pervasive and unaddressed human rights violations on earth.”

Eighty percent of slaves are women, and 80% of those are sold for sexual abuse. In Saudi Arabia, for example, women aren’t allowed to drive automobiles or vote in political elections. Though The Universal Declaration of Human Rights has been ratified by every major nation on earth, it is often ignored on religious grounds.

...Jimmy Carter: "I think in the Catholic Church and the Southern Baptist Convention and in some Islamic countries, women are ordained to be inferior to men in their ability to serve God.

"My own belief is that the Bible teaches the equality of men and women. In fact, Paul told the Galatians in chapter three that there is no difference between Jews and Gentiles, between slaves and masters, between men and women in their standing before God through Jesus Christ. And in the 16th chapter of Romans, when Paul delineates the leaders of the church in the early Christian era, there is about a third or almost half of those mentioned who were women who serve as priests and apostles and so forth.

"So, you can pick out particular verses in the Quran or the Bible to tell women they can’t be ordained or even adorned with jewelry or cut their hair and that sort of thing or to be subservient to their husbands. But at the same time, the Bible says that husbands should treat their wives with the same respect they treat Jesus Christ. So it’s this elective use of verses from the Quran and Bible that permits some male leaders to assert that women are inferior. I object to that no matter who the entity might be."

Morsi's national TV address this evening appears to have gone badly:

UPDATE: Deadline Passes-- Army Moves

There have been rumors all day that Morsi has either been taken into custody or is under house arrest. The military has taken over the state TV station. The Egyptian Brotherhood have been screaming "coup" all day and they're probably correct. Reports say that despite an offer for a consensus government, there are tanks on the streets, both in and outside of Cairo. And a travel ban has been announced for Morsi and high-ranking Brotherhood officials. My late afternoon, Morsi asked Egyptians to resist the coup peacefully, although one of his aides says there will be a great deal of bloodshed. Al Arabiya is posting a minute-by-minute update here.

•  4:15 pm Several hundred Egyptian soldiers, together with armored vehicles, perform a military parade on the main road near the Presidential Palace, Reuters reports

   • 4:10 pm Egyptian President Mohammed Mursi's message to all Egyptians is to resist a military coup peacefully, aide says

   • 4:08 pm Egyptian President Mohammed Mursi is still working at the republican guard barracks in Cairo, unclear if free to leave, aide says

   • 4:02 pm At least 37 people have been killed and 1600 injured in violence since Tuesday night, Al Arabiya correspondent reports

   • 3:57 pm  A military coup will not pass without bloodshed, Egyptian President Mohammed Mursi's adviser says

   • 3:56 pm Egyptian President Mohammed Mursi’s adviser says he expects army and police violence to remove pro-Mursi demonstrators

   • 3:55 pm The army begins to deploy in Giza, Al Ahram reports

  • 3:52 pm Mursi's security advisor: military coup is underway

  • 3:50pm Mursi, top Brotherhood leaders banned from traveling

   • 3:50 pm Egypt president's national security adviser says military coup under way

  • 3:48 pm The U.S. secretary of defense called his Egyptian counterpart yesterday

  • 3:46 pm The Egyptian army told President Mohammed Mursi it will postpone issuing its statement for hours to avoid bloodshed, Al Ahram reports

   • 3:42 pm The Egyptian president's national security adviser says a military coup under way.

   • 3:35 pm National Salvation Front: U.S. pressures on army not to act

   • 3:35 pm: National Salvation Front: Army will strip Mursi of legitimacy

   • 3:16 pm  Egypt state TV denied that employees evacuated TV building and reassured ongoing work

   • 3:13 pm Opponents of Islamist President Mohammed Mursi gather near Ittihadiya Presidential Palace in Cairo, calling  for his ouster

Jimmy Carter: Male religious leaders have "overwhelmingly chosen" to "subjugate" rather than "exalt" women

Authentic Christians: Rosalynn and Jimmy Carter

"Religion, and tradition, are powerful and sensitive areas to challenge. But my fellow Elders and I, who come from many faiths and backgrounds, no longer need to worry about winning votes or avoiding controversy - and we are deeply committed to challenging injustice wherever we see it."

-- former President Carter, in an op-ed in The Age

by Ken

When Jimmy Carter's in a funk, you don't want to mess with him. Apparently the Southern Baptist Convention still hasn't gotten the message.

The former president left the church in which he was raised very publicly in 2000, saying, "I have been disappointed and feel excluded by the adoption of policies and an increasingly rigid SBC creed, including some provisions that violate the basic premises of my Christian faith." The press release he issued said that he and Rosalynn preferred to associate with "other traditional Baptists who continue to share such beliefs as separation of church and state, servanthood and not domination of pastors, local church autonomy, a free religious press and equality of women." He stressed his objection to the SBC's rigid enforcement of its objectionable new doctrines, to the point of excluding those who resisted.

At that time, though, the Baptist Standard reported, "He said he will remain a deacon and Sunday school teacher at Maranatha Baptist Church in Plains and support the church's recent decision to send half of its missions contributions to the Cooperative Baptist Fellowship."

President Carter wrote about this latest crisis of conscience for, of all venues, the Australian national newspaper The Age. That remarkable op-ed piece has gotten some attention, but not nearly enough. At a time when the country is choking on our epidemic of Crap Christianity, it's both startling and in the deepest sense reassuring to hear the authentic voice of "a practising Christian."

THE AGE

Losing my religion for equality

Jimmy Carter
July 15, 2009

Women and girls have been discriminated against for too long in a twisted interpretation of the word of God.

I HAVE been a practising Christian all my life and a deacon and Bible teacher for many years. My faith is a source of strength and comfort to me, as religious beliefs are to hundreds of millions of people around the world. So my decision to sever my ties with the Southern Baptist Convention, after six decades, was painful and difficult. It was, however, an unavoidable decision when the convention's leaders, quoting a few carefully selected Bible verses and claiming that Eve was created second to Adam and was responsible for original sin, ordained that women must be "subservient" to their husbands and prohibited from serving as deacons, pastors or chaplains in the military service.

This view that women are somehow inferior to men is not restricted to one religion or belief. Women are prevented from playing a full and equal role in many faiths. Nor, tragically, does its influence stop at the walls of the church, mosque, synagogue or temple. This discrimination, unjustifiably attributed to a Higher Authority, has provided a reason or excuse for the deprivation of women's equal rights across the world for centuries.

At its most repugnant, the belief that women must be subjugated to the wishes of men excuses slavery, violence, forced prostitution, genital mutilation and national laws that omit rape as a crime. But it also costs many millions of girls and women control over their own bodies and lives, and continues to deny them fair access to education, health, employment and influence within their own communities.

The impact of these religious beliefs touches every aspect of our lives. They help explain why in many countries boys are educated before girls; why girls are told when and whom they must marry; and why many face enormous and unacceptable risks in pregnancy and childbirth because their basic health needs are not met.

In some Islamic nations, women are restricted in their movements, punished for permitting the exposure of an arm or ankle, deprived of education, prohibited from driving a car or competing with men for a job. If a woman is raped, she is often most severely punished as the guilty party in the crime.

The same discriminatory thinking lies behind the continuing gender gap in pay and why there are still so few women in office in the West. The root of this prejudice lies deep in our histories, but its impact is felt every day. It is not women and girls alone who suffer. It damages all of us. The evidence shows that investing in women and girls delivers major benefits for society. An educated woman has healthier children. She is more likely to send them to school. She earns more and invests what she earns in her family.

It is simply self-defeating for any community to discriminate against half its population. We need to challenge these self-serving and outdated attitudes and practices - as we are seeing in Iran where women are at the forefront of the battle for democracy and freedom.

I understand, however, why many political leaders can be reluctant about stepping into this minefield. Religion, and tradition, are powerful and sensitive areas to challenge. But my fellow Elders and I, who come from many faiths and backgrounds, no longer need to worry about winning votes or avoiding controversy - and we are deeply committed to challenging injustice wherever we see it.

The Elders are an independent group of eminent global leaders, brought together by former South African president Nelson Mandela, who offer their influence and experience to support peace building, help address major causes of human suffering and promote the shared interests of humanity. We have decided to draw particular attention to the responsibility of religious and traditional leaders in ensuring equality and human rights and have recently published a statement that declares: "The justification of discrimination against women and girls on grounds of religion or tradition, as if it were prescribed by a Higher Authority, is unacceptable."

We are calling on all leaders to challenge and change the harmful teachings and practices, no matter how ingrained, which justify discrimination against women. We ask, in particular, that leaders of all religions have the courage to acknowledge and emphasise the positive messages of dignity and equality that all the world's major faiths share.

The carefully selected verses found in the Holy Scriptures to justify the superiority of men owe more to time and place - and the determination of male leaders to hold onto their influence - than eternal truths. Similar biblical excerpts could be found to support the approval of slavery and the timid acquiescence to oppressive rulers.

I am also familiar with vivid descriptions in the same Scriptures in which women are revered as pre-eminent leaders. During the years of the early Christian church women served as deacons, priests, bishops, apostles, teachers and prophets. It wasn't until the fourth century that dominant Christian leaders, all men, twisted and distorted Holy Scriptures to perpetuate their ascendant positions within the religious hierarchy.

The truth is that male religious leaders have had - and still have - an option to interpret holy teachings either to exalt or subjugate women. They have, for their own selfish ends, overwhelmingly chosen the latter. Their continuing choice provides the foundation or justification for much of the pervasive persecution and abuse of women throughout the world. This is in clear violation not just of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights but also the teachings of Jesus Christ, the Apostle Paul, Moses and the prophets, Muhammad, and founders of other great religions - all of whom have called for proper and equitable treatment of all the children of God. It is time we had the courage to challenge these views.

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EVERYONE IN BANGKOK KNOWS ABOUT IOWA TODAY-- REALLY

Here in Bangkok, we're in the midst of a huge national election campaign. I've been trying to figure it out. My friend Paul, a Thai who spent two years at Sacramento State University studying mass communication and knows far more than the typical American about the subtilties of U.S. politics, waxed eloquently about the reasons Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama would be corporate pawns with more in common with Bush and any of the GOP hopefuls than with the aspirations and dreams of ordinary Americans. But Paul couldn't help me understand the intricacies of the Thai elections. He dismissed both major parties, the PPP and the Democrats. "They both suck."

Today's Bangkok Post on the other hand, features a major piece on how overseas Thais look at the election. It was instructive-- and for more than just the ins and outs of the election here. It starts in, of all places, Iowa-- with a great big color picture of Obama. (In India, Hillary is the clear favorite; here they like Obama.) Now, despite today's Des Moines Register endorsements of McCain and Clinton, the thriving Thai communities in Ames and Iowa City, while completely interested in the U.S. elections-- more, I'm guessing than many Americans-- are even more concerned about the elections in their homeland.

Over the past few months, Nittaya Burnham has met Bill Richardson and John Edwards. She's seen Obama, watched Chris Dodd stump and was left at least mildly impressed ("they were good") by a rally with America's political power couple, Hillary and Bill Clinton. While she's still hoping to catch Mike Huckabee and some of the Republicans, there's a decent chance she's already seen the next president of the United States.

Like others living in Iowa, where the US political season is in full swing and the nation's first presidential political caucus will take place on January 3, Nittaya has had plenty of opportunity to get up close and personal with America's presidential hopefuls.

Yet, for this 12-year Thai resident of Iowa and a native of Nakhon Pathom in Thailand, the next ballot she will cast will be in a Thai election and for parties that she has had considerably less exposure to.

She plans to vote in the December 23 general election, and though she regularly follows news coming out of Thailand through online sites and her Thai satellite TV and she's already been sent her ballot by the Chicago consulate, she's not yet sure how she is going to cast it.

Though unadulterated by whatever vote-buying antics that may be going down in their homeland, Nittaya and other Thais living in Iowa nonetheless struggle with their vote. It is an effort to sort out basic information about the choice of parties, potential prime ministers, and sometimes, even the voting process.

While she plans to turn to Internet research and friends back home for help, she notes that even her mother in Nakhon Pathom is struggling with information and a decision this election.

"It's hard, whether in Thailand or here, to know who is a good candidate. They all have similar messages, and after elections, you never hear anything again about what they do or if they've made any progress. You just see them on billboards," says Nittaya.

In his new book, which you may have noticed I keep referring to-- Fear and Courage in the Democratic Party-- Glenn Hurowitz shows that party affiliation is the surest predictor of how someone will vote. It means far less in Thailand, where parties come and go and partisan alliances are temporary, expedient and career-oriented. Nittaya in today's Post story is looking for a way to figure out who to vote for. She is leaning towards a third party, the Farmer Network of Thailand Party, which is polling in the lowsingle digits. "They are not highly educated, but their representation comes from the people. I think this is important. Lots of Thai people will look for qualities like good education and career and assume these will make good leaders-- but this has not always worked out for us in the past."

When asked what qualities she wants in Thailand's next leader, she returns to the idea of change.

"Honestly, I want candidates who will get something done, and respect human rights and help poor people more. I don't want a party or a prime minister that will go in and commit corruption and lie to people as has happened in the past. We need someone that will look out for poor people."

While she identified fighting corruption and helping the poor as key issues, she also hopes the next leaders will improve the situation in the Deep South [Muslim seperatists] by promoting understanding from both sides, and also end the human rights abuses that she has heard go on in Thailand's refugee camps.

"I hope with our new election, we have new faces who will get more work done and move in the right direction," she added.

Nittaya sounds like many Iowa voters. Another Thai living in Ames, a PhD at the university there, explains to the Post how he's going to pick his candidate, a process that validates much of Hurowitz's research.

He based his decision on party backgrounds and personal qualities, rather than their policy, which he says are rarely accomplished anyway. "Politicians just keep saying good things as they want to convince you," he added.

Even with such cynicism towards the parties, he believes this election is critical for he country: "It will determine our country's future. I don't want to see a [civil] war and hopefully it won't happen. I feel if the old government team comes back, there will be a number of people that strike and it will be a major cause of economic crisis."

If Indians have convinced themselves that Bill and Hillary is what the world needs now and if Thais are falling for Obama's snakeoil charisma-- hey, no offense meant; I once did too-- this week people in both countries and all over the world, have been celebrating another American political figure, one who isn't running for anything. Jimmy Carter has been widely quoted outside of the U.S.-- I'm betting this got little if any coverage on corporately-controlled U.S. media-- slamming Bush Regime torture policies, and the complicity of the entire Republican Party. "The administration and the Congress have become immune to the tragedy of human rights violations under the aegis of security. We say in order for us rich folks to be secure, we can deprive others of their civil rights."