What could a Muslim religious scholar, possibly know about Jesus?

Nattering Naybob: Greetings, The Red Ranger. I assume you saw or heard of the so-called “interview” conducted by Lauren Green of FOX News, where she spent nearly ten minutes repeatedly questioning author Reza Aslan on why a Muslim was qualified to write a book about Jesus (“Zealot: The Life and Times of Jesus of Nazareth”) or if he or she were qualified, why would they then write that book at all. The fact that Ms. Green holds the title of “Religion Correspondent” for FOX News makes her “questions” even more absurd.

Red Ranger, I know that every single media source or website that I link to or quote from, you think is biased or not valid, so this time I am going to annotate the story by linking to an article from the American Conservative.com, that refers to the “cringe-worthy” interview featuring a “misguided line of questioning”. As our President is fond of saying, “Now…let me be clear”, because this bears repeating: This article is from the American Conservative. Good for them for calling out FOX News’s totally transparent agenda of fear-mongering. The article links to the entire video of the “interview”, which lasts almost ten minutes but is worth watching if for no other reason than Mr. Aslan’s cool, calm, collected, yet firm, reaction to the whole fiasco.

The Red Ranger: OK, so I was wondering why would the Nattering Naybob get so worked up about this relatively innocuous, pedestrian interview, Then through a little detective work I realized that the radical left was all abuzz over this interview and commentary about it had popped up all over the liberal blogsosphere.  As is usually the case the left never fails to crucify anyone who dares to defend Christianity.  Here is a link to something found on FOX News.

So I will agree that maybe the interview did not live up to the exceptionally high standards that the FoxNews network has become expected to deliver it is still better than anything put out by the schlock, faux journalistic MSM.  I guess when you are the best, people are ready to jump on even the slightest misstep.

Nattering Naybob: As a tribe, you Republicans are nothing if not lock-step. As you all invariably do, you defend the actions of someone on the Right, or who espouses Right-leaning dogma in an offensive and intolerant manner, by saying that it is an “attack” or an attempt to “crucify” that person’s advocacy for that issue. For example, if someone on the Right makes a speech or posts a blog saying that there should be absolute unfettered access for all Americans to assault weapons, and a Liberal replies by saying that might not be a good idea, the Right-winger will say that the Liberal hates the Constitution, or that they are are soft on criminality, or that they are unfairly savaging the Right-leaning blogger in a partisan fashion.

So it is with this issue, Red Ranger, when you claim that Ms. Green was “defending Christianity”. Only you are wrong on two accounts, achieving a kind of propagandistic daily double. First, Ms. Green’s question about “why a Muslim should be writing a book about Jesus” had nothing to do with defending Christianity per se’. Instead it was yet another attempt to demonstrate a deep mistrust of all things Muslim, which has been FOX News’s stock and trade since September 11, 2001.

Second, and perhaps most important, it is not the anchor’s job to “defend” Christianity in the first place, it is her job to bring out points and ideas from the author’s book that will enlighten or educate the viewers. Ms. Green did none of that, and when the author suggested that she did not even read his book, she did not disagree with or correct him. Instead of giving Ms. Green the title of “Religion Correspondent”, why doesn’t FOX News just call her “Christianity Correspondent– or sometimes Judaism Correspondent When President Obama Calls For a Two-State Solutions and So Hates Israel”?

The Red Ranger: As usual the liberal left’s paranoia and insecurity comes through.  Has there ever been any group that is so completely and utterly inept at defending there positions or supporting why they have those positions.

How does posing a simple question demonstrate a deep mistrust of all things Muslim.  I suppose that if I wrote a book on Islam and was questioned by an Islamic reporter about why I wrote it then they would be demonstrating a deep mistrust of all things Christian just because they asked the question.

I didn’t realize that you had written Ms. Green’s job responsibilities.  Does your emploiyer know that you are moonlighting at another network?

The Big Three

The Red Ranger: So which of these three recent issues could be the most damaging to Obama:

1) Benghazi cover-up
2) IRS scrutiny on conservative organizations
3) AP search

Looks like these three issues are flaring up against Obama’s administration.  My thoughts on them.

1) Benghazi – Once again it seems like this is one of those instances where the coverup is worse than the crime.  Given the timing of this event right before the election I can see how the administration would want to avoid the dirty details of what happened in Benghazi.  If they would have admitted up from that it was a terroist attack that we were unprepared for I think people would have been disappointed in that this happened but would probably have understood that you cannot prevent these attacks from happening everywhere all the time.  Denying the facts is indefensible.

2) IRS scrutiny on conservative organizations.  If true, and it appears to be, this is just plain wrong.  Everyone hates the IRS and this is just another reason to hate them.  The administration should not be using the IRS to thwart their oppostion.  That being said if these groups were purely political then they should not be tax-exempt.  The IRS needs to remain neutral as to all applications for tax-exempt status.  Everyone should go through the same process regardless of what their name is.

I also read that one of Obama’s sleazy half-brothers got expedited approval for his tax-exempt Barack H. Obama Foundation.  If none of the other things that the IRS is being accused of had happened then I would be willing to let this expedited approval slide as there should be some benefits to being president.

3) DOJ search of AP records.  I really don’t know all of the details behind this but it seems like this should concern all citizens as it is in directly violation of our first ammendment rights and leads us down a slippery slope.

Given the number of scandals it is fun to watch Jay Carney squirm.  I don’t know how these people can do these jobs when they clearly lie pretty much on a daily basis.  It also seems that the MSM is covering these stories at least a little bit.  Where there is smoke there is fire.

Nattering Naybob: I will try to shed some light first on the third topic regarding the AP. Like you I do not know all the details but basically the Obama administration is claiming that a reporter from the AP leaked some sensitive information that was supposed to be off the record, and this leak had national security implications. So now they are reviewing the call records of the entire AP organization to see who may have leaked the information. The supposed danger of this is that they have access to other phone log data for the AP reporters who were not involved in the leak or were privvy to the sensitive information.

That the Obama administration is doing this– and has pushed the envelope on similar issues in the name of National Security– again underlines the foolishness of any Presidential candidate vowing “not to violate the civil rights or privacy of anyone in the name of a criminal or terrorism investigation”. Once you become President, the safety of the nation is in your hands. You have a lot more responsibility once you become President than when you are a candidate (or a member of Congress). Also, a President has access to top-secret information that very few other people have, and if that President knew the same information he or she knew while a candidate, they may not have been so fast to make that promise to protect civil liberties at all costs. I thjink this whole matter is more a question for the Courts rather than a full-blown scandal.

As for the other two issues:
1. The uproar over Benghazi is mainly a product of politics, pure and simple. There is no doubt that things went wrong during the attack, and it suggests the need for a change in security protocols among other things. Whether or not there was a cover-up still remains to be seen, so I do not think this can be classified as a scandal either.

2. The IRS was wrong to do what they did, period, end of story. Everyone knows that. There has been no evidence whatsoever that Obama or anyone in his administration ordered that this be done. However, as titular head of the government, Obama does bear overall responsibility for this, and I am sure he will fulfill that responsibility by firing whoever was involved. Again, no scandal there.

So there you have it, I have de-bunked all three issues and have provided ample proof that none of them can be categorized as a scandal. I have done my good deed for the day from an Obama supporter perspective.

The Red Ranger: The IRS scandals deepens if this story turns out to be true.

Just having the head of the IRS resign, something which he was going to do anyway, is not enough.  Saying that Obama did not know about this is insufficient.  Every time something happens he has no knowledge of it.  What is he doing as President if he never has any knowledge about what is going on.  I thought he was so brilliant that he knew how to do everyone’s job he appointed better than they did.  Now he appears to know nothing.

Nattering Naybob: I do not recall seeing any article or speech in which President Obama claimed he could do a better job at anything than the people he appointed to that job. That is a typical Red Rangerian interpretation.

The problem now is that every time a group that is in opposition to the incumbent Presidential party, has their tax-exempt application denied, or is audited, then everyone is going to say that it is a political hatchet job. The fact is that I agree that the IRS needs a thorough and fundamental overhaul, along with the tax code itself. Maybe this will be the impetus. Maybe as the new head of the IRS, Obama can score some political points and appoint John Boehner’s new son-in-law.

The Red Ranger: I know that you are getting older and that your memory ain’t what it used to be but there were numerous articles written in 2008 and 2009 that fawned over Obama’s supposed brilliance and how he could do any one of the jobs of his appointees better than they could.  I will try to find some.

Do you think Boehner’s daughter is marrying him to spite her father? Hey, if it is OK for the President to smoke pot or use other illegal drugs why not everyone else.

Nattering Naybob: Even if you find those articles, I don’t think Obama can be blamed for other people saying he is intelligent. I carry that burden with me every day of my life, so I know how tough that is.

I don’t think she is spiting Boehner. I actually think he is a decent guy and would accept him into the family without reservations about whether he has smoked pot or wears funny hats, but he would probably also kid around about with the guys at the club (Republicans always belong to some kind of “club”, have you noticed).

 

“The Thrilla in Wasilla”: Cheney vs. Palin

Nattering Naybob: What do you think of the tiff between Dick Cheney and Sarah Palin? In case you missed it, Red Ranger  (I know you spend most of your free time in a monogrammed silk bathrobe and matching ascot, reading the stock ticker), Dick Cheney was interviewed the other day and he stated quite unequivocally that he thought John McCain’s selection of Sarah Palin as his running mate in 2008, was a “mistake”. Cheney then agreed with the interviewer’s suggestion that Palin was “not ready” for the role. Choosing whose side I am on in this face-off reminds me of when I used to watch “Abbott and Costello Meet Frankenstein” on Channel 11 on Sunday mornings, 11:30 thru 1:00 (with a little luck, there could be a Yankee doubleheader on immediately afterwards… this in the day that MLB actually scheduled single-admission doubleheaders). Anyway, I always thought to myself, who should I root for near the end of the movie, when there was basically an intra-monster battle among the Wolfman, Frankenstein, and Dracula, when they pushed the gurney back and forth that had the strapped-down Costello? I never could decide, but it was a fun intellectual exercise.

My choice between Dick Cheney and Sarah Palin, however, while featuring one less monster, is almost as difficult. But after serious soul-searching, I am coming down, with nose firmly pinched shut, on the side of Dick Cheney. My reasoning is simple. Cheney, for all his latter-day evils, has at least had a productive, fairly distinguished career (prior to his shape-shifting into a reincarnation of Mr. Potter from “It’s a Wonderful Life”), highlighted chiefly by his tenure as Chief of Staff to President Ford, and then most notably, Secretary of Defense during the First Gulf War… the war against Saddam Hussein that was actually warranted (I am not including his 8 years as Vice-President as among his “distinguishments”, because I am trying to make believe it never happened). Sarah Palin, on the other hand, could not even hack fulfilling a complete term as Governor. I could go on about her numerous other shortcomings, but there will be many, many other Second Grade Minds posts down the road to fill this important need. Thoughts on the Cheney-Palin conflict, Red Ranger?

The Red Ranger: Your and the Left’s pre-occupation with Sarah Palin is mind-boggling. She currently does not hold an elected position nor is she running for one, but she is constantly brought up in discussions by the Left. She must really strike fear into them; how else can you possibly explain this fixation with her?

I do not know that calling it a “mistake” is the right term. It was more of a calculated risk taken by McCain. He needed to do something to energize the Republican party since the Dems were all awestruck by the “Messiah”, while McCain himself was not the most exciting campaigner. Palin did what was expected of her by bringing some life and excitement back into the Republican campaign.

However, what McCain and his team underestimated (and how they did so is baffling) was the degree to which the MSM would go to portray Palin as a bumbling, backwoods bumpkin who knew nothing other than how to catch salmon. If they would have brought this same vigor into vetting Obama we probably wouldn’t be stuck in this death spiral we are in now.

I do not know how you can say she couldn’t hack a full term as Governor. She left the job out of respect for the people of Alaska realizing that being governor and running for Vice-President were mutually exclusive. Continuing to draw the Governor’s salary from the taxpayers of Alaska was not fair. Palin realized this and did the honorable thing. Unlike Obama, who basically abandoned his job as senator to become a full-time campaigner, all the time showing no remorse about drawing a salary from the US taxpayer. I know that you will bring up that McCain did the same thing but at least he started campaigning later than Obama and served in the Congress much longer than Obama.

Was Obama ready to be President? If you think yes, based upon what criteria, being able to read a TelePrompter?

Nattering Naybob: Ah, Red Ranger. To quote the title of one of my earlier SGM topics, “Where do I begin”?

First, Palin did not resign while she was running for Vice-President. She resigned well after the 2008 Election. She claimed she could no longer withstand the scrutiny that came with being Governor of Alaska, the least populous state in the Union. Whereas just a few months earlier she had been campaigning for a position that was, to use a cliché’ “one heartbeat away” from being leader of the Free World, and the total isolation and anonymity that comes with it.

Second, stop blaming the “Lame-Stream Media” (one of Palin’s many Tiger Beat-level verbal stylings) for her utter lack of knowledge and intellectual curiosity. Your implying that Sarah Palin was intellectually equipped to actually be President of the United States, demonstrates once again that Modern Republicans place blind, partisan ideology above all else. I wish I had a dollar for all the Republican voters I saw interviewed during the 2008 campaign, who said “Oh, I want Sarah Palin to be President one day, because she’s just like I am!” Really?! Ignorant, uninformed voters supporting an ignorant, uninformed candidate for the second-highest office in the land. Perfect symmetry.

Third, is the Modern Republicans’ inexplicable obsession with TelePrompters. Every President since Lyndon Johnson has used a TelePrompter, but, of course, only Barack Obama is criticized for it. Why? Again, to borrow a rhetorical question you posed about Louis Farrakhan in an earlier blog, “is it because he’s black?” What difference does it make whether Obama reads his remarks from a sheaf of papers, from a TelePrompter, or off his own hand, as Dame Palin did a few years ago at some bogus Right-Wing confab. Or do you really believe that a President, or Presidential candidate, should be expected to deliver speeches (typically a half-hour or more in length) extemporaneously?

Just admit it. The Red Ranger has been check-mated by Cheney’s (correct) assertion that Palin’s Vice-Presidential candidacy, was a “mistake”. I suggest you cut your losses and move on to your next topic, perhaps an analysis that wistfully bemoans the fact that America never got a chance to see the real Herman Cain.

The Red Ranger: First, my apologies for the erroneous time line on Palin’s exit from being governor of Alaska (like your crack research team, mine had the day off). Prior to being chosen as McCain’s running mate her approval ratings as governor in Alaska ranged anywhere from a low of 80% to a high of 93%, and this was when all the people in Alaska had to judge her on was her performance. As a point of reference, her predecessor had an approval rating of 19%. However, once the MSM began their vicious assaults on her, her approval ratings declined up until the point that she resigned when she realized that the attacks would never stop and that the course of least damage to her state would be to resign. Funny thing is that her approvals ratings (despite the constant attacks by the MSM) were still better than Obama’s even though he has the MSM fawning all over him and never presenting him in a negative image to the public. Just imagine where Obama would be if he faced the same level of scrutiny that Palin faced. Palin faced this scrutiny while doing an outstanding job according to her constituents. Obama is facing no scrutiny while doing a poor job.

I will stop blaming the Lame-Stream Media when you stop believing them when they say how brilliant Obama is just because he went to an Ivy league school. One of my favorite YouTube videos is of Elizabeth Hasselbeck schooling Joy Behar. Behar makes a statement that Obama is very intelligent because he went to an Ivy league school and Hasselbeck shoots back, “Then Bush must be very intelligent also”. Behar was speechless. It was great to see another dumb liberal put in their place. At least Bush released his college records, I believe. Here is the link to the video just in case you would like to view it yourself and witness one of your ilk being thoroughly embarrassed.

I am assuming that you are joking when you talk about Republicans placing blind, partisan ideology above all else. That is the very definition of the Democratic party. Ignorant, uninformed voters supporting an ignorant, uninformed candidate for the highest office in the land is what got Obama elected. How else do you explain 99% of a race voting for a candidate? If 99% of white women voted for McCain because Palin was a woman like them imagine the uproar that would have created. My guess is that if you matched up SAT scores with voting districts you would find that the voting districts with the higher SAT scores tended toward voting Republican. Granted, high school seniors do not make up a large percentage of the voting population but their scores would represent the relative intelligence of their district as a whole.

I have no problem with him reading off a TelePrompter since as you note making a 30 minute speech without it is difficult. However, what is interesting is that whatever he doesn’t have the TelePrompter guiding him he always seems to go off message and make a gaffe which displays his true intentions.

I wish I had a dollar for all the Obama supporters I saw interviewed who had no idea what his policies were or when given a policy that was actually McCain’s pledged their whole-hearted support for it.

Ready for your typical weak rebuttal.

Nattering Naybob: When exactly does Obama “make gaffes”, either while reading off a TelePrompter or making spontaneous remarks? Any supporter of Mitt Romney should not be accusing President Obama of making gaffes. And the reason that most African-American voters chose Obama, and almost half of Caucasian voters also chose Obama, was Obama’s message of hope appealed more (and still does) to a wider swath of Americans, regardless of ethnicity, than the narrow, fear-mongering, John Birch-tinged message presented by Modern Republicans, who are well-known for their general disdain for minorities, and people they consider beneath the arc of the Bell Curve. Let’s see… what else. Do you really find that a lot of people proclaim their support of President Obama, based on his attendance at an Ivy League school? I rarely hear that. Where do you hear it? Oh yes, Fox News. I forgot.

I still think you would have been better off taking my earlier advice and bowing out of this posting, gracefully. You need to recall your research team back from their vacation at the Cape, and quickly.

Aurora: First thoughts…

The Red Ranger: Why does the MSM (main stream media) try to blame everything on the Tea Party? Brian Ross on ABC news blurts out that the “Dark Knight” shooter in Colorado may be a Tea Party member because there is a Tea Party member in Colorado with the same name. Of course, it turns out that the shooter is not the Tea Party member but the damage and insinuation is already done. Why not just wait until all the facts are in? Aren’t these guys supposed to be reporting the facts. A similar thing happened when Gabrielle Giffords was shot.

It is truly disgusting how slanted and biased the MSM is. If they are going to continue to act that way at least admit it and let everyone know how they operate.

Nattering Naybob: I agree with your main takeaway about jumping to conclusions. The compulsion to be “first” with “breaking news” (I thought that all “news”, was, by definition, “breaking”) has not served the news industry well. I am not a fan of what the Tea Party stands for and the rhetorical methods it sometimes employs but I do also acknowledge that I do not see it as an extremist group in the sense that it would ever consciously encourage or foment violence just as was seen Friday morning.

But there must be a reason (most likely several of them) why this kind of act is seen primarily (not exclusively, but primarily) in the Unites States. More unfettered access to guns is one factor, in my view, but not the primary reason either. Perhaps we can try to figure it out in subsequent posts.

The Red Ranger: I do not believe that these acts are primarily in the United States. If you were to review a listing of the top 20 shootings probably about half have taken place in the US.

Community Reinvestment Act: How government policies impact a stable market environment

The Red Ranger: While the United States is currently in the midst of the Great Recession, much of the blame for the core problems that ail us today can be placed squarely at the feet of past Democratic presidents. Three main legislative failures come to mind. They are 1) the passage of the Community Reinvestment Act by Jimmy Carter, 2) the signing of NAFTA, and 3) the repeal of Glass-Steagal by Bill Clinton.

The CRA, which was initially intended to eliminate redlining (a process which I do not support) by banks, was an early example of the government trying to expand home ownership to a larger percentage of the population because they felt everyone deserved to own a home. This was clearly an example of the government enacting a policy that upset the equilibrium of the free market. By forcing banks to lend to less credit-worthy individuals (those that would not have normally qualified for a loan) the government caused a larger than normally acceptable amount of capital to flow into the housing market.

Over time this artificially raised the prices for homes and the demand for home loans bringing less scrupulous lenders into the mortgage business who were not as highly regulated as the standard bank lenders. Every Tom, Dick and Harry was more than willing to refinance their home time and again to withdraw cash from the inflated equity balances to fund a new car or fancy vacation. However, once the prices of homes reached their breaking point (as always happens in a bubble) these folks were left with mortgage balances which were substantially more than their homes were worth and banks and mortgages lenders were left with loans that would never be repaid thus causing the financial meltdown that started the Great Recession.

Nattering Naybob: First, Red Ranger (hope you don’t mind that I drop the “The” when addressing you directly), it’s great to finally be putting our thoughts in blog form. It was chiefly your idea to take the plunge, so I salute your entrepreneurial spirit. I would expect nothing less from a die-hard Republican. Over the coming weeks and months, I am going to try and look under Red Ranger’s “hood”, if you don’t mind a metaphor there, to finally see what form your Republicanism takes– Eisenhower? Reagan? Bush? Cain? Bachmann? After all these years, I still can’t figure it out.

I have no doubt that your analysis is credible regarding who-did-what, and when, but at the same time I am curious as to why you dredge up presidential acts from the era of Disco Demolition Night. What’s next, an attack on Harry Truman as a “jobs killer” for invoking the Taft-Hartley Act? But beyond that, Red Ranger, even if I stipulate that Jimmy Carter tore himself away from managing the White House tennis court schedule long enough to pass the CRA, what about the bankers and investment “specialists” that facilitated these loans? Do they not share any blame, and if so, how much?

Passing legislation that at the time was honestly thought to open home ownership to a wider segment of Americans is like the “apple” to the “orange” represented by the predatory bankers who should have known better.

The Red Ranger: Where were these bankers and investment specialist before the CRA was passed? Were they just sitting around collecting unemployment waiting for the government to pass the CRA? No, they did not exist because there was not a government-created artificial demand for mortgage products that needed to be funded via the redirection of capital. Their existence only came about due to the government’s passage of this legislation. Unless these bankers and investment specialists held guns to homeowners heads forcing them to take on these loans that they knew they could not afford I do not see how you can blame them.

Like any true liberal you are ignoring the need for any personal responsibility. It was the greedy homeowners who were forcing the bankers and investment specialist to devise new and increasingly complex mortgage products to allow the homeowners to borrow as much money as possible. Given the government requirements that they lend more money and the homeowners demanding more loans what else were they to do without bringing down the wrath of the government upon them. Over the years many people identified the eventuality of a housing bubble but they were disregarded by the MSM and probably called racists to rile up even greater hatred toward them.

Having worked for a large money center bank for many years I can clearly remember how anytime a merger or acquisition was announced, a certain organization (your beloved ACORN or some other similar organization, I believe) would almost immediately require the companies to commit a large dollar amount (Usually $500 million or more) to increased low-income lending or face a legal challenge to the merger based upon the CRA. This was nothing more than government sponsored extortion.

Nattering Naybob: You say that the “greedy homeowners” forced bankers to “devise new and increasingly complex mortgage products”? I can see it now: Mr. and Mrs. Front Porch, sitting nervously in the cubicle of a poor, innocent banker who is skeptical of lending so much money, and Mr. Front Porch saying, ‘Aw, c’mon Jim! We go way back. I just know that you’re capable of devising a new and complex mortgage product for me and the Missus to buy that old Williams place on the corner of Maple and 5th!”

Really, blaming the Carter administration for the mortgage crisis is like saying that Henry Ford is responsible for all vehicular homicides that have occurred since the dawn of the horseless carriage. And let me guess: This “government-sponsored extortion” only occurred during the Carter, Clinton and Obama administration, right? Not during Reagan, Bush I and Bush II ? Red Ranger, I have a feeling you have more to say on this topic, care to wait for your next time at bat or do you have any closing remarks?

The Red Ranger: I never said or implied that the issue only occurred during Democratic administrations just that the whole thing started from the enactment of legislation by a Democratic president. However, whenever a Republican raised concerns about the burgeoning crises they were roundly viewed as unintelligent and unable to accurately grasp the complexities of the situation or they were denying affordable housing to the masses. Typical liberal strategy– Just say whatever you want regardless of the issue.

Frankly, I was expecting a little more than fictional situations and references to non-existent events from the Nattering Naybob. I will chalk this to up to his inexperience and his diminished mental capacity due to years of watching one-sided discussions on MSNBC. Hopefully, he can rebound in the next round and this blog will be something that people can read for intelligent discussions of today’s issues.

Nattering Naybob: Well, had I known your first blog topic was going to involve so many acronyms, I would have called my research staff back from vacation to do some ghostwriting. Since Republicans usually hate intellectuals, I am surprised at the depth and breadth of your arguments (fundamentally specious though they be). I guess now I know why you chose to remain anonymous. Nattering Naybob signing off.

The Red Ranger: I anxiously await your first topic.