And in the midst of all this, as if we didn't have enough to do, He called me to run for the Minnesota State Senate. I had no idea, and no desire to be in politics. Absolutely none. --State Senator Michele Bachmann, Saturday, October 14, 2006, Senator Michele Bachmann speaking at Pastor Mac Hammond's Living Word Christian Center, in Brooklyn Park, Minnesota.
A Dump Bachmann blogger named Ken Avidor captured that moment on video: the moment that Bachmann told that to a congregation of Christian believers assembled at a church that God had told her to run for the Minnesota State Senate in 2000 and that prior to that she had no interest in politics--"Absolutely none."
The statement is a demonstrable lie. Bachmann's told many, many lies over the years--but what makes this one special is: it's a lie in the name of Jesus Christ. (continued)
How can it be proved that Bachmann was lying when she made this statement to the congregation? Because it can't possibly be true that she had "no interest, absolutely none" in politics before God told her to run in 2000. Bachmann entered Minnesota politics as a GOP-endorsed candidate for a school board race in 1999. A local Republican political figure advised her on how to run that year; a year earlier than she says God told her to enter politics. During the 1999 election season, her school board candidacy was promoted on a local evangelical radio station, KKMS. She lost.
The school board election was not even her first foray into political life. She had worked for the campaign of Jimmy Carter in 1976 and the campaign of Ronald Reagan in 1980. She'd also spent time as education reformer in Minnesota, speaking before various activist groups and making some very strange charges about the nature of public education.
Why do I say that her testimony was a lie "in the name of Jesus Christ?" Because when she told believers this particular lie, she was testifying for Jesus Christ in the Church--giving Christians an account of her personal relationship with Jesus, and the history of how it transformed her life. (In other parts of her recorded testimony, she recounts conversations with the Lord, life directions coming directly from the Lord, how the Lord showed her a vision of her future husband on a dairy farm in Wisconsin long before she met him.)
When you testify for Jesus, your audience is not just the assembled: you are, as always, speaking before God--and you must tell the truth. If you are an evangelical or a student of evangelical politics, you know there are certain behaviors that are "deal breakers" for people who claim to represent Christ or Christ's will on earth. For example, if Pastor Ted Haggard is caught in adulterous affair with a male prostitute, leaders of his congregation will quietly ask him to resign his leadership position. Haggard will still be accepted as Christian believer, but his deed and the dishonesty surrounding it disqualify him as a leader, a Christian that other Christians admire and follow.
An adulterous affair is one kind of sin; lying to a congregation while testifying in the name of Jesus Christ (and about receiving divine guidance) is another. To devout Christians, God's very name is sacred, to make wrongful use of it (for example, to swear, to sell a product or to use it in false testimony while campaigning for office) is a sin. But doing the latter did not cost Michele Bachmann the enthusiastic support of evangelical voters in the 6th district of Minnesota.
One reason that it didn't is that this particular lie was never exposed in the local press. They did a story on Bachmann's appearance in the church that day, but the angle was about whether it was proper for the pastor to endorse her for office. (He did; it triggered an investigation into that particular church's tax exempt status.)
A national evangelical political machine (the Council for National Policy and its affiliates) mentored and supported Bachmann's rise in Minnesota politics since its earliest days. That's one of the main reasons that Bachmann can stay competitive this year, despite her appalling record of failing to deliver for her constituents.
It's too bad that this politicized, right wing perversion of evangelical Christianity has become the most high profile picture in the eyes of "unbelievers" (people who don't share its right wing conservative views.) They've been so successful in co-opting the word "Christian" that many Americans have gotten a strange idea about what it means to be an evangelical Christian. (Hence the angry and dismissive comments you can sometimes read about Christians in these diaries I'm writing about Bachmann.)
About thirty years ago, some Protestant ministries began to combine together to wield political might from within the Republican Party. That's the genesis of politicians like Michele Bachmann. Their identification of true Christianity with right wing conservatism won them political power, at a cost to many evangelicals. Many Christians are now often identified (incorrectly) with the American right, and suffer insult to their beliefs as a consequence. The Council for National Policy (James Dobson, Tim LaHaye, Tony Perkins et al.) derive immense political power from conflating "true Christianity" with right wing political positions (guns, taxation, no gay rights, etc.) And because they've appropriated the Name, the reputation of devout Christians with no interest in power politics suffer guilt by association.
And that's deplorable.
Today in Minnesota:
Bachmann fires back at Tinklenberg--with more lies:
http://blogs.citypages.com/...
Bachmann's anti-Tinklenberg site omits her connection to contracts
Rep. Michele Bachmann has a new site against her opponent: Tink Broke the Law.
The main point of the site? Here is some of the site text:
When Elwyn Tinklenberg was Commissioner of the Minnesota Department of Transportation (MnDOT), a review resulted in 45 allegations of wrong-doing. They included violating state rules, issuing contracts without competitive bids and massive contractor overcharges. A legislative auditor claims that the agency broke laws. But Tinklenberg went on the radio and claimed that what he did was "appropriate."
(Note: Stop right there. What actually happened was the people who opposed Tinklenberg charged that his methods as Commissioner were in violation of the law. But after these were reviewed: no violation of the law was found. The "Tink Broke the Law" charge is another Bachmann lie.)
Also today: a local election mailer prominently features Colin Powell's denunciation of her charges of anti-Americanism against Obama and her colleagues in Congress.
election mailer
The local alternative Minneapolis newsweekly City Pages did an unnecessarily cruel review of a Christmas newsletter that Bachmann circulated back in 2003. I wish they would have printed "the lying in church" item, instead, if they are going to go back that far.City Pages
Eric Black of the Minn Post web page recalls her deceptions on Social Security. He also reports how hard it was to pin her down on her radical tax-cut-for-the-rich philosophy (one of the chief draws for Bachmann fans not enamored of her pseudo-Christianity.) Black asserts that he identified her an "ultra-conservative" a long time ago--but he never did so in print when he was the leading political reporter for the Minneapolis Star Tribune: and so she rose. Thanks, Eric.
And how about this, from the Tulsa World, in Oklahoma. In an article that reports that Bachmann was largely apolitical during her days at Oral Roberts law school, the Tulsa World drops this bombshell:
Bachmann's husband, Marcus Bachmann, is a clinical therapist in Minneapolis and a Christian counselor whose practice reportedly includes "curing" gay people.
Marcus Bachmann has been a key figure in promoting his wife's political career. At Dump Bachmann we've been speculating for years about whether he's in the business of de-gaying gays (always a favorite target for Michele's demagoguery.)
Action link to contribute what you can to her Dem opponent, Elwyn Tinklenberg: http://www.tinklenberg08.com/...