Last night the “debate” on Foreign Affairs was hosted by CBS former Anchor Bob Schieffer and watched by some 59 million. I had no choice but to see it; it was rebroadcast everywhere. Most onlookers may not realize the number one target voters of both Romney and President Obama is the same: the 30-40 million voters in the Christian Right.
How can I tell who was being targeted? Because both candidates repeatedly recited their allegiance to the non-voting state of Israel. I think I counted six pledges by Obama and five by Romney before the moderator improperly raised the subject of Israel by asking, “Do you consider an attack on Israel to be an attack on America.” Both men answered with a resounding “yes,” an attack on Israel is an attack on America!
We ask, what attack? Attack by whom? What does the Constitution say? Does the President’s oath give him authority to extend the boundaries of war to a foreign state? Someone, somewhere, is “attacked” by some faction or country about every day, and we do not go to Norway, Burma or the Ukraine to make these our wars. If we did, we would be warring in a hundreds places all the time.
This question is really asking both candidates if Christian Zionists can trust them to treat Israel as a religious symbol, as they do. It is no secret why. Obama and Romney must consider the 30 or 40 million Christian Zionists to be a swing vote. Only Christian Zionists think today’s Israel has anything to do with God’s plan 3000 years ago; no one else does.
We face an instant replay of the 1991 war in Iraq. Neither political candidate promises to keep us out of what may be a “war” in Iran. Our leaders compete for how cruel they can be to the Iranian people; President Obama proudly announced he had already put “crippling sanctions” on Iran. Is crippling a population not an act of war? Romney said he would outdo Obama with even more harsh sanctions.
Both seemed to think the word “crippling” was what American mom and dads want to hear. Neither mentions that it is the ordinary people in Iran who are being crippled by sanctions. Our candidates think we are not capable of seeing the suffering so far away. Their silence about war itself tells us neither will resist a remote-controlled annihilation of Iran, followed by the usual army of highly paid civilian petroleum contractors, a true mercenary army.
Their falling all over each other over Israel seems also to tell us they would support an attack on Iran by Israel. After all, if an attack on Israel is to them an attack on America, it is not a stretch to say Israel’s war is our war, no matter who starts it or where it is fought.
We Americans live in a war-based economy. Those who pay the election bills for both candidates need war for personal gain. War is the unspoken issue in this election. Both Romney and Obama know they are being pushed by those who provide the billions for their elections.
We must talk about war for humanitarian reasons. It is undeniably the primary cause of our inflated food and fuel prices. Please read my appeal (Iraq: American Prepped for “War”) of 22 years ago to fellow members of my Baptist Church (now, mostly Christian Zionists), when Christian Americans were being pushed into what became the first annihilation of the Iraqi people for their oil. At that time, gasoline was about $1.00 per gallon and hamburger cost about a dollar a pound.
Our enemy is not Islam as we are being told; it is those who promote war as an economic policy, a “stimulus” at a time when “quantitative easements” have become the drug of choice in our national system. Offering us a financial “stimulus” is offering us dope; it doesn’t stimulate growth, it only makes us sick. We are being duped into thinking war is necessary for our survival. It is time to try peace.
I challenge any religion that puts up with war. Christ followers have been tricked into believing Israel is the fulfillment of biblical prophesy. The defining question remains, “Who Would Jesus Bomb?”. The answer is, “No one.”
“WAR” today means scientific, remote controlled slaughter of weaker foes who are sitting on large resources that our bankers and politicians want for saving our faltering economy, not for our benefit, but for theirs. War and theft by our nation cannot make life better for us; it can only enrich the banksters-warmakers.
The job of the war propagandists is to vilify Islam. They deny and ignore the fact that Islam honors Jesus while following its own faith. We are being prepped to accept the destruction of Iran, just as we were prepped to accept starvation in Gaza and the annihilation of a generation of youth in Iraq starting in 1991.
Our task is to expose Christian Zionism to those who are caught up in it or influenced by it. Christian Zionists who read this letter are invited to introduce themselves to us. We do not think they are aliens from some other world. They include our closest friends, loved ones and associates. We have learned how to deal with Christian Zionists over the past ten years. Some of us were from among their number, and we continue to learn day by day. Our task is to teach them what they need to know.
Toward The Strait Gate,
Chuck Carlson
http://charlesecarlson.com/foreign-affairs-debate-buying-christian-...
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