This year, it's our turn to visit Oklahoma for Christmas.
Now, once upon a time, we would visit Michigan for Xmas, but my father-in-law (a former engineer at General Motors) up and decided to go to Lutheran seminary and later took up residence as pastor in the lovely community and somewhat-roughshod town of Granite, Oklahoma.
For perspective, I am a South Carolina native. I thought I had a pretty good handle on what the Republiverse looked like.
That's just not quite accurate.
The reality looks very much as Frank's What's the Matter with Kansas? describes it...especially the sense of a society that God has forsaken, and that if we can repent, ditch the liberals and call out loudly enough for Him to return, He may do so and if not, at least Republicans like Tom Coburn will be in power.
Don't take my word for it. Read The Daily Oklahoman
Front and center on the Opinion page is Kathleen Parker, who is celebrating the beginning of a 'Merry Christmas' backlash.
And that's the slow pitch.
The letters from readers might as well come directly from FreeRepublic.com:
....John Kerry made a last-ditch and feeble attempt at trying to get "God's vote" by quoting Scripture out of context, usuing religious slogans and even hiring someone to help him get the 'religious vote'. So who used God? The majority of Christians saw through Kerry's phony religiousity and voted for Bush. [Leo] Johnson's [,an earlier reader-contributor's,] comments remind me of the old saying that sarcasm is the last refuge of the weak.
Hmmm...hmmm. Sarcasm. Weak. Kerry was contemplating joining the priesthood...majority of Christians could not see Bush's phony religiousity. Got it.
Oh, there's more:
The media are reporting that some Americans are moving to Canada because of the presidential election...
...However, these people should leave all their material blessings at the border since they were gained in the U.S.
Ah-hah. Republicans. State confiscation of private property. The more single-party government changes, the more it stays the same. Got it.
Oh, it gets even better. Jerry Jones of Oklahoma City is "Fed up with Dems"...it reads like a Two Minutes Hate session from George Orwell's 1984, only not as intellectual:
David Rudolph (another reader) is a bigoted boor. President Bush was re-elected by a majority of people who are fed up with being considered stupid and uninformed. I will do anything possible to defeat the phony intellect and arrogance of the present Democratic Party and its candidates...
The rest is a litany of Republican Love-to-Hates such as Hollywood, the 'liberal judiciary and, deserving mention by name, Michael Moore and George Soros, the new Goldstein of our age.
Two Minutes Hate
And that is the crux of it; unchallenged by competition, major conservative media outlets in the Midwest have converted what was once a bastion of progressive thinking (or at least independent-minded, "I do my own thinking, thank you!" conservatism into something that uses the Cross as a proxy for the Hammer and Sickle, and the church as substitute for People's Party HQ.
If it were just one day, I'd say I was vulnerable in this analysis, but that's just it:
It. Just. Keeps. Coming.
From Tuesday, 12/21/04, The topic du jour appears to have been liberals' persecution of Christianity.
Probably 95 percent of the kids in Mustang schools are Christians. Yet some people are so afraid of offending the minority that they would prefer to insult and offend the majority and attempt to erase our history. That's political correctness run amok. It's past time for us to take back our Christian heritage and country.
Keep in mind this is Oklahoma, which just elected (cheerfully) Tom Coburn to the Senate, where the town of Granite has a giant neon cross shining down upon it from the small mountain due north of it. This is where the six-day creation account is not controversial, because it is taken as Gospel truth in a fashion that simply doesn't exist elsewhere, even in other regions of the Republiverse.
And this is the context in which Lela Shidell of Mustang feels insecure.
And, as before, the letters get better as one reads down the column:
All of these attacks on references to God make me wonder if the terrorists are behind this. What a way to stir up religious wars, disharmony, and hate, all to tear us apart and leave us open to war and terrorist attacks on our own soil. Whatever happened to freedom of religion, tolerance and historical truth?
Indeed, Tom Mosher of Newalia. Whatever happened to freedom of religion, tolerance and historical truth?
And I agree 100%: religious wars are bad, even when Republicans advocate them.
Did I mention it just keeps coming?
We have finally arrived at the point where it is entirely fair to observe that within the liberal, legalistic multicultural lexicon of terms, the phrase "freedom of religion" means little more than suppression of Christianity
Well, heck. Now we can optimize our game plan and just go after Christianity, because the Pubs are on to us.
But someone needs to rationalize how my being out to destroy Christianity jibes with my celebrating the holiday and teaching the basics of the faith to my children.
Perhaps, just perhaps would liberals want to suppress is the Republican Heresy that threatens to destroy, disgrace and discredit Christianity.
Yeah, I'm thinking the Republican Heretics should be afraid of that.
And yet, some folks get it
I'll stop with Monday 12/20/2004...on a solemn and hopeful note, what with it being that sort of season.
My wife loves to point out how quiet I become once we cross into Oklahoma. My willingness to brag about our state stops once I actually get inside it! Why is Oklahoma stagnating as other Southern states pass it by?
It's only that other Southern states aren't declining as certainly and swiftly as Oklahoma, sir. At least not yet.
And the wider country is so far outside the pale of comparison that I can forgive you for substituting the word "Southern" for "American"...
...so long as it doesn't happen again.
But this is the best, a reminder that people who whaa about Jesus getting kicked around need to whine less and do more:
Some say that Jesus gets trampled during the Christmas season. I'm sure it looks that way at times, but I see Jesus at work throughout the season. I see it with every dime put in a Salvation Army kettle. I see it with volunteers preparing meals for the poor, collecting food for the needy and donating toys for children who otherwise would have none. I see it when people put up lights for everyone to enjoy. I see it in the churches with special music, plays and drive-through Christmas scenes. I see it in the singing of carols.
Christmas is still the most giving time of year. Jesus is alive and well. The true meaning of Christmas is still very much with us.
Wrapping up the Christmas Post
If there is a single pervasive aspect of all but the last two letters, it is the willful and deliberate encouragement of a sense of anger, alienation, and threat of action, possibly violent action, to defend values that are at most weakly affected by the perceived threat.
And Oklahomans, at least, get a trough full of this slop every effing day.