Onward Fundian Soldiers
Digby has a good post up about Former Reagan White House counsel, Air Force veteran, U.S. Air Force Academy graduate and activist, Mikey Weinstein, who has formed a foundation to combat fundies who use the US forces as recruiting ground for their Evangelical Christian shock troops, and who harass and sideline those who are not evangelicals or Christian. This is a particular problem at the Air Force Academy in Colorado – from Religious Tolerance.org:
Allegations of religious intolerance at Air Force Academy,in Colorado Springs, CO .
Some areas of concern:
Cadets who choose to not attend an evening chapel service were marched back to their dorms by upperclassmen in what they call a “heathen flight.”
Teachers openly identified themselves as born-again Christians and proselytized among the student body.
Prayers invoking Jesus Christ are regularly held before routine events such as meals and award ceremonies in apparent violation of the principle of separation of church and state in the First Amendment of the Constitution.
In a full page greeting at Christmas time in the AFA newspaper in 2003 contained 300 signatories — some senior officers — who said that they “believe that Jesus Christ is the only real hope for the world.” They suggested that the cadets contact then to “discuss Jesus.”
Jewish and Seventh-Day Adventist students were not permitted to attend off-campus religious services on their Sabbath (Saturday). Christian students were allowed to attend such events on Sundays.
A cadet was refused permission to attend a Freethinkers’ meeting off campus. He was also denied permission to form a similar non-religious group on campus.
AUSCA reported that: “At a more basic level, we have been informed that General Weida has cultivated and reinforced an attitude?shared by many in the Academy Chaplains’ Office and, increasingly, by other members of the Academy?s permanent [staff]?that the Academy, and the Air Force in general, would be better off if populated solely by Christians. A stronger message of official preference for one particular faith is hard to imagine.”
There’s no doubt that, like torture, this is coming from the very top. This is policy. Bush in Palestine last year:
Jerusalem — President Bush told two high-ranking Palestinian officials that he had been told by God to invade Afghanistan and Iraq and then create a Palestinian state to bring peace to the Middle East, they recall during a documentary on Middle East peace that airs next week in Britain.
“President Bush said to all of us: ‘I’m driven with a mission from God,’ ” said Nabil Shaath, who was the Palestinian foreign minister at the time of a top-level meeting with Bush in June 2003. Mahmoud Abbas, then Palestinian prime minister and now the Palestinian Authority president, was also present for the conversation with Bush.
“God would tell me, ‘George, go and fight those terrorists in Afghanistan.’ And I did, and then God would tell me, ‘George, go and end the tyranny in Iraq …’ And I did. And now, again, I feel God’s words coming to me, ‘Go get the Palestinians their state and get the Israelis their security, and get peace in the Middle East.’ And by God I’m gonna do it,” Shaath quotes the president as saying in the three-part series.
(White House press secretary Scott McClellan denied the report at his press briefing Thursday. “No, that’s absurd. He’s never made such comments,” he said.
Add to this the increasing tendency of Republican politicians to use uniformed military at partisan political events, against all military regulations, and it’s pretty strong evidence that the administration regards the armed forces has just another weapon in the fundamentalist Christian armoury.
Tags: US Politics Armed Forces Fundies
