[Off-topic comment deleted--Editor]

I will pray that people who think this way will not decide another election in this country.

Sincerely,

A Godless, Heathen Oregonian who has actually read the Bible

Carla, you didn't grow up in Klamath Falls or Grants Pass. Actually the people that are freaking out are this woman. They don't get a country of diversity. A universalist world view utterly freaks them out. When you are entrenched in a tribal mythic membership paradigm, a religio-ideology that denies science, and sees everyone but one's own kind, one's own trib,e as threat, when the world and history are in an escalating death spiral of polarization of good(us) and evil (them), toward an end of days where the good are taken up into rapture and the bad, (most of us) get their comeuppance. These folks are the American version of Islamic Fundamentalism with Christian label on it. And I say that as a devout Christian myself.

What we have here is an extension of the late 19th early 20th century Christian fundamentalist nativism, that spawned the Know-Nothing party and the resurgence of the KKK in Oregon when it took over the Oregon legislature in the early 1900s. The good news is these people are becoming ever more culturally marginalized, and they know it.

In the Bible Belt, this sort of attitude is socially reinforced, so she is less concerned with making it public. I am sure there are many Oregonians who think this way. They will give some BS excuse for opposing Obama to cover their true attitude.

That woman hurts my head.

This woman fits my definition of "Uptight".

I couldn't get any audio out of the clip, but here is a more intelligent view on whom to vote for: Zinn: Vote for Obama but direct action needed. I have loads of respect for Howard Zinn but disagree slightly with him. In states where there is the slightest risk of McCain winning, vote for Obama. In states that are solid for Obama, vote for Nader to get the message out that there are real progressives who agree with his positions.

Carla: You're "freakin out"? The one who should be distraught in the extreme (presumably = freakin out) is that woman's husband.

I'm reminded of an interchange between Winston Churchill and Lady Astor. Lady Astor said that if she were Churchill's wife she would put poison in his tea. Churchill replied if he were her husband he would drink it.

@ Carla "I grew up in John Day. And I do know some folks who are very conservative and even entrenched in their view. But I've never met anyone, even from my hometown, that is as out there as this woman."

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I have been to John Day many times and I suspect there is a different demographic there. There is a libertarian conservative prevalent in the ranching culture of Eastern Oregon that has a "live and let live" ethic. The kind of culture I am talking about here is not conservative, it's reactionary and radical. It's a reaction against modernity that is vehement and sometimes violent fueled by a fear of the contagion of the modern world. It is fueled by fundamentalist religion, stoked from the pulpit. It is the kind of radical reaction that has birthed the Christian patriot and militia movements. So I would take issue that this is conservative at all. It's not. These people see themselves under siege and at war with the modern world.

Without further information on the woman who appears in this clip I can not say definitively but it would seem that she is a dispensational Christian. The book by Bawer Stealing Jesus gives a great description of the origins of this fringe group who are a reactionary reponse to Darwin in the nineteenth century but are a convenient companion to the military industrial complex with their end time views. This is not a group defined by the demography of John Day; the dominionist movement is nationwide. Also known as the Christian Identity Movement they are scary.

She is voting for whoever has the most faith, end of story. Whoever has the most flags in their yards, yellow ribbons on their car, and says Jesus the most wins.

...and now you know why I live here now. I've got Fundagelical friends and, on a regular basis, bleed from the ears for that love.

I am fortunate in that they recognize me as a Holy Spirit Woman. That's my only help sometimes.

I liked it that the family I married into, despite their mental illness, dvis, addiction and various other illicit fraternizations I shall leave unmentioned... they were of the line of Cherokee who practice the Old Ways of herb and smoke and earth alongside their staunch Babdist attendance. Not a terrible way to live. But historically complicated.

Also A Godless Pagan That Prays To Rocks

Hey Carla -- I don't drink anymore. You are welcome to have mine AND yours if that helps you over this shock.

She hails from neither Mars or Venus, but URANUS.

Uranians are easily identifiable....

1) They have the brains of an ice cube. 2) They missed the Enlightment. 3) They exhibit the behavior of undeveloped children and live in a fantasyworld.

They're sometimes also known in the Galaxy as "Real Americans" by bad anthropologists.

Bodden sez: "In states where there is the slightest risk of McCain winning, vote for Obama. In states that are solid for Obama, vote for Nader to get the message out that there are real progressives who agree with his positions."

Obama gets my vote for being what I would call a generally progressive politician, for actually caring about running an effective campaign, for trying to break the GOP stranglehold on a bunch of states, and for a variety of other reasons.

Nader will not get my vote regardless of any opinion polls--although I support quite a few of his positions-- because his idea of campaigning, to the extent he does any, seems to be to insult people who don't agree with him, and to imply that anyone who doesn't support him is asleep or a dupe of the Republicrats.

i grew up in Grants Pass and i've met a lot of people like that woman - most of them are related to me.

yeah, they freak me out too. it's one of the reasons i moved to Portland.

Carla, Anecdotals..

My wife comes from a fundamentalist Christian family of origin. Her mother, who is an otherwise very sweet and kind person, buys into this kind of world view. She attends a church where the end-time apocalyptic thinking here with all of its paranoia, is the main course at Sunday sermon. It's not unusual for these people to see Obama as the anti-Christ, as a secret Muslim Manchurian candidate, and the Democratic Party as an agent of Satan. She attends a respectably viewed church in Medford. These people will vote for McCain and Palin, especially Palin, because the election is not about policies for our country, it's about God vs. Satan. They will consistently vote against their own individual and class interest.

It's amazing to me that you haven't known people like this. They are more prevalent in smaller towns of Oregon, but as someone noted, they are also prevalent in the larger population centers. The difference is, in Klamath Falls this kind of thinking might be considered main-stream, whereas in Portland, Eugene,Corvallis, or Salem, it's seen as kooky and extreme. These are the "pro-American" Americans that Palin refers to. They love her because she's one of them. That's why James Dobson is her primary benefactor. It's radical Dominionist ideology. They are a large faction in the so-called religious evangelical right. Again, they are not conservative, they are radical.

You boil it down and it's a fear based tribalistic reaction to the fear of invasion and contamination, a gut level xenophobia,fear of the "other," whether they be black, latino, immigrant, gay, Muslim, Jew, whatever... probably has its roots in the herd instinct of our ape genes.

I hope the Secret Service is aware of this woman and the others like her that hold the same beliefs. She and others like her are a threat to national security, no matter who holds office. I grew up in KFalls and never met anyone like her... and I hope I never do.

I think Bill R gets it pretty nearly right in two comments. E OR isn't really representative of much more than E OR. John Day certainly has a strong conservative streak, but that is a different thing.

The aspect of tribalism that Bill R touches on may have a lot to do with your experiences. You aren't a member of the tribe and not invited. Relatives are different.

My sister has a BSME from Michigan State U Honor College graduating Cum Laude. She is a Fundamentalist and will vote Republican on the basis of Satan. If you can figure that one out you've done a better job than I have.

Hey, it's my cousins! And 9/10ths of my graduating class!I was raised in Oklahoma and 90% of the people I encountered there were just like this woman. The "god provides" crowd cannot be reasoned with---if something good happens, its a blessing from "god". If something bad happens, it's a test from "god" and he (always "he") will help you through the crisis if you just have enough faith. And if you don't come through the crisis? It's your own fault because you didn't have sufficient belief.

Their worldview is simplistic and black/white (no pun intended). You are either one of "us"--a believer in the "one, true god" or you are a hell-bound heathen, out to subvert true believers and deatroy the country. No discussion, debate, or thought required.

And this is one of many reasons I live in Oregon....yes, there are people like this woman here, but they aren't as prevalent and you find more people willing to debate views and challenge preconceptions here. And folks here are less likely to try and pray over me all the time.

This video is the best argument against vote-by-mail I’ve seen yet! Can you imagine being that poor husband of hers, sitting down at the kitchen attempting to mark your ballot for Obama, and having her standing over your shoulder?

Talk about voter intimidation!

I had to laugh at that video - people in my extended family talk like that too. But that's their public "church face".

This is a way they are "trained" to talk in public, part of that trying to convert us sort of thing. Behind the scenes, when the camera isn't on, she's just another unreachable Republicant that drank the Rush Limbagh, Lars Larson kool-aid. Off camera she will most likely say semi-racist or race coded things, and really talk up how Obama is a covert Muslim.

How do I know race is an issue? Her core stated concern was that Obama wasn't the type of Christian she is. But what is McCain? For her to support Obama versus McCain on only religious grounds, she'd have to be able to compare and contrast on that issue. She doesn't say one word about McCain.

Does anyone really know where McCain is at on religion? She doesn't. Because he is "more like her" she assumes his religion is more like hers. And that "more like her" is really about race/name.

So, Carla, don't get your knickers in a knot. When I was a young feller, there were still people that I ran into that wanted to replay the civil war, and reinstate slavery. We make progress in increments. As least she didn't talk about putting Obama back in his rightful place back on the farm picking cotton.

Carla, I picked up a copy of Stealing Jesus before going to a church camp in Montana last summer. This camp goes back to the late forties but I have been familiar with it since the sixties. They have drifted. The guest speaker was from Falwell's group. People from all over the US at this camp. It was a shock. Ask someone to show the bibical origin of the rapture. There is none. The dispensationalists created it.

If I were her husband, I would run like hell because I wouldn't want to married to a crazy person a minute longer. In Oregon I have yet to meet someone who was this upfront about their off the wall views but in terms of degree, yes I have met some people that were certainly on that side of the continuum, just not as far out of the limb.

What was really scary is that she was absolutely dead certain without a shadow of a doubt that she was right and everybody else was wrong. Poor woman. Her head's going to explode Nov 4.

In a somewhat similar vein, a temp coworker from Idaho told me the other day that, "I heard Obama's going to take our guns away!" I was just flabbergasted. "You've got to be kidding." I replied.

But, I guess I shouldn't of been because the repubs are desperate and will push any hot button to try and get another vote. I was just disappointed in her because up to that point I had thought well of her and that just destroyed my opinion of an otherwise nice person.

Dispensational premillennialism is a creation of the group who followed John Nelson Darby. Bible quotes notwithstanding, Pat, they have created from whole cloth the notion that there are dispensations. According to this view we are living in the sixth dispensation or the church age. This is to be followed by the version made popular in the Left Behind series. And quite honestly I am not interested in swapping quotations with anyone who defends this entirely corrupted version of what has been becoming a satanic cult. Previously known by many as Christianity.

"Southern Oregon was settled by veterans from the South who came following the civil war"

This also the area that wanted to create their own State of Jefferson until Pearl Harbor broke out.

Unrep. Lib: one thing that will sometimes stop you from encountering such folks is if you do not purposely mix with a broad spectrum; another is if you are so clear and out there with your own views that those contra to those will not want to engage the waste [in their view and, conversely, in yours, if we are all honest] of energy in saying something that activates controversy.

There is a species of smug quietness that black friends of mine have spoken of -- they'd prefer an overt southern racist to the covert northern style kind, and the like.

They are very much out and about, but "they", the fundagelicals, are just as likely to keep to their own kind and an ex pat kind of comfort zone as we are to keep to our own stripe.

American voters are all up in here.

(5 minute exposure with 14" Schmidt-Cassegrain, one year ago today)

Carla - that was meant for Lib, but anyway, I guess I am a lightning rod. I've mixed without meaning to, and mixed fully awares. It's my fate, I suppose.

I've encountered these [to me] unrepentant boneheads much of my life once I left the womb of Eugene at the ripe old age of sixteen.

It took a couple of years, but soon I was knocking heads with bilious reactionaries of all stripes - liberal as well as conservative. From SF to Tahlequah, OK.

I suppose you might count yourself lucky to have not been exposed overly [or vulnerable to, even worse] such extremists as this woman.

You are not naive. That is judgemental. You simply, apparently, have not had to deal with them in your mileue.

Thanks Pat Ryan for demonstrating again that the current crop of xtian zealots are descended out of Pauline marketing. Simple test. How many times to you quote Paul to make a "oh, you don't get it point" that Jesus NEVER SAID. How many behaviours do you consider essential that JESUS NEVER DID. Most important how many things did Jesus do daily that YOU NEVER DO?

From his JEZUS marketing brand- they guy's name is Yeshua ben David- to hunting down his mother and family and having them killed (AFTER the Council of Jerusalem), only the most meager traces of any of his rabbinical wisdom has survived.

Christianity will always be attractive to the powers that be, from Constantine to Shrub, because it provides a theological framework for what the State has already decdided to do. That's how Paul designed it. Reread the conversation in Acts with the centurian in the prison cell. That's the a-ha. It's coming out of a Roman soldier's mouth and Paul thinks, "ka-ching...I can sell this to the world!" Bit of extemporaneous license and all.

What a coincidence that when they get back to the Council of Jerusalem the big hairy debate is about do gentiles have to become Jews before becoming Xtians. Only everyone that had ever met the rabbi said, "of course", and Paul convinced them that none of them knew what they were talking about and gave us the mass produced, convert the airwaves and anything sentient mentality.

I'm going to bed with a particularly lurid account of the Boxer Rebellion tonight.

Ya, Pat, then why is there a bumpersticker on your car that reads:

In Case of Rapture, This Car Will Be Unmanned ?

There are plenty of people like this in Albany, Lebanon and Sweet Home. I lived down there in the 90's and my mom still lives there and deals with this all the time at her job.

Case in point: A woman who is part of my kids' lives (against my wishes and theirs) told my under age 10 (at the time) daughters that they would go to hell if they read Harry Potter. Same woman took them to a church where speaking in tongues and rolling around on the floor were considered everyday activities. Same woman who said in 2000 that she wouldn't vote for McCain because he was pro-choice, or as she put it, "He wants to kill babies!". Now of course, this same woman will wholeheartedly vote for McCain because Obama is a "terrorist Muslim", not to mention that he's black. All of this endorsed by their church, all of this justified by "Jesus".

I swear, if Jesus had any idea of the things these people do and say in his name, I wouldn't blame him a bit for staying away. I sure would. But then again, I'm no longer a member of the Christian faith, by choice.

Jiang: that's about the most lucid rant I've heard from you yet. It was worth the wait.

I'd very much like to read some anecdotals from those who have encountered such views. Please share.

The (Bend) Bulletin has a stable of correspondents writing letters to the editor that this woman would agree with.

If another Jim Jones becomes this woman's pastor, her husband should head for some insurance shop and take out a policy on her life in the event she is offered some of Jim's special Kool-Aid.

In the meantime the McCain-Palin organization should have her introduce Sarah. After her spiel Gov. Palin would sound like Einstein in a skirt - or pantsuit.

Carla, did you write this post in order to invite hate speech and ugly rememeberings of fundagelicals of our lives? I'm a bit chary of the request/invitation for "anecdotals". What's the point?

I disapprove of the people in my circle who share invective against christians, even as I find many to most christians to be blunt, dogmatic and unwilling to cease objectifying anyone who does not speak in the particular phrasings they rot-inize from the bible.

I just don't really like to hear it from either side. It's all objectification, and, to boot, if you engage it, you are part of it.

Perhaps Carla would like to redirect what she's looking for in this thread besides an invitation to some hate speechifying? I'm sure that is not her intent.

C - that came out all freakin' wrong. I'm trying to make the point to others here that this thread is possibly drifting towards an unproductive and unpalatable trend.

http://politicalticker.blogs.cnn.com/2008/10/22/palin-god-will-do-the-right-thing-on-election-day/

Here's Palin assuring James Dobson that God will do the right thing for America on Election Day. I dearly hate to remind folks that we on the Obama side also have a lot of evangelicalistic folks saying God's decreed it is Obama. It's from the social justice revelations theology side of things. Equally bad clockwork.

I want to hear what she says if the votes are not stolen-enough this time.

"This also the area that wanted to create their own State of Jefferson until Pearl Harbor broke out. "

I got news.. I grew up in Klamath Falls and the dream of the State of Jefferson has not died. The secessionist movement lives on in K. Falls, to this day, if reports are true!

I know the Nader comment was a little off topic, but I've been wanting to say this for awhile: a significant reason I did not vote for Nader in 2000, 02 2004, or day before yesterday, even though he is saying some things that badly need saying which the big party candidates all shy away from, is that he would make a LOUSY president. His inability to listen, his arrogance, his inability to countenance disagreement and his tendency toward imputing bad motives or downright evilness to those who offer it, his impatience with dissent, would render him at the far edge of incompetence in dealing with Congress, the joint chiefs, labor or industrial leaders, or the bureaucracy.
A president must be more than a collection of issues, however we may agree with them; he or she also should offer the talent to govern, and to vote for someone lacking that seems to me to be close to irresponsible.

RE: Jeff Alworth on southern Oregon,

Southwestern Oregon, in my experience, is more racist, anti-Semetic, and anti-Catholic than other parts of the state. This is anecdotal, though. I have seen no research on the subject.

I've been wanting to say this for awhile: a significant reason I did not vote for Nader in 2000, 02 2004, or day before yesterday, even though he is saying some things that badly need saying which the big party candidates all shy away from, is that he would make a LOUSY president.

<h2>Nader is saying many things that badly need saying so he would make a very good president. His presidency, however, would be a disaster. While Nader would initiate programs for the benefit of the nation, the Democratic and Republican party oligarchs would be leading their cohorts to drag Nader down to protect their fiefs and power. To put it another way. It's "my party right or wrong and, if necessary, to hell with the national interest."</h2>