I take no pleasure in the things that transpired in the “Gimme 5” take over on K street but I must say that some of you guys sound absolutly nuts. I mean you want to mention things about God sending Molly to Hell! Im with the other born again holy roller that found a better way so my christian creds are on the up and up but I gotta say I think some of you people have gotten so close to God that it has cut the air off to your brain!

The fact that he was able to steal and corrupt as blatantly as he did, shows how undemocratic this system of government is. I agree with Molly, that Delay, and anyone else, will use religion, while at the same time do harm to many.

To 6713, Hilding,
Thank you for sharing your experience and understanding of how destructive religion can get to its followers.  Greedy manipulators seem to instinctively know how, in the name of Jesus, to lure gullible persons to embrace the exact opposite direction of Jesus’ teachings.

My sadness sets in when I think about how many persons “followers” willingly (and unquestioningly) embrace prejudice, hatred, and selfish “me-first” theologies as part of Jesus’ teaching.  Thank you #6713 again for speaking as one who can speak about fundamentalism from your personal experience.

Contrary to popular trends to reject religion and embrace atheism, I continue to believe in a God.  I just have a hard time going to a church. 

I’m reluctant to go to church if the main reason I go is because I hope God will reward me.  I want to go because I want to, without expectations and assumptions of reward.

My prediction: DeLay will be a host on Christian Broadcasting Network (CBN) or Trinity Broadcasting Network (TBN) within 5 years.

I once saw a TV contest in which the goal was to complete the sentence “Never trust a man who...” . The winning entry was “Never trust a man who keeps saying ‘Trust me’. I think this now should be updated to “Never trust a man who keeps making public mention of God”.

Speaking with some experience--having been raised a Fundamentalist Christian ... born again, speaking in tongues ... the whole gamut as a child ... and now a senior citizen and long since freed of that bondage (see, I know the lingo) ...

I have met a lot of True Believers in my time ... and George W. stood out as one as soon as I heard him give a speech. G.W. is just a dumb, rich kid who turned his life around via a religious experience. It’s not a particularly unique story.

DeLay is one of those who believes God blesses those who are True to Him! I mean, like getting gold in return for doing what God wants ... which gets directly translated by the DeLay type of True Believer into, “If I’m getting the loot, I must be doing what God wants me to do!” (Ken Lay was another one of this type of True Believer.)

Read the Book of Job in the Bible. You’ll get the picture. It’s the “stay the course” mentality with God heaping the rewards on. (And if you don’t get it here on earth, you will in Heaven!)

You’d be surprised how that attitude attracts a certain type of “camp follower”. (Well, maybe not too surprised.)

But look at the message being preached in a lot of these mega-churches: this is the Way to God and His blessing here on earth aka join us and get rich (at least well-off). And if the world is getting screwed up ... it’s all right ‘cuz Jesus is coming to straigten it all out ... soon, y’all hear me now.

This is another Pogo moment: With over half of the nation believing in the God of the Judaic-Christian Bible, we’re looking at ourselves.

Scarey aren’t we.

I had a personal run-in with Tom Delay, in front of a crowd full of supporters, at a get together held in his district in Brazoria County, Texas on a Saturday morning in May of 1997.  I entered the meeting about 10 minutes after it started, and Delay, as preacher to the choir, was whipping up the crowd with talk of impeaching Clinton (Whitewater, Travelgate, Vince Foster, his fisticuffs with Sen Don Obey DWis which was Obey’s fault, etc.), as the choir roared back.

I then quietly and politely asked him about his position on establishing normal trade relations with China.—Delay: “I am a free-trader, this will be a <good thing, build democracy, etc.>”.  The crowd grew hushed, as someone raised the issue of China’s position on abortion. Delay tried to weasle but the crowd responded cooly.  After about 10 minutes, I asked another question: “What is your position on Social Security”—Delay: “People don’t realize how far we’ll go on this. Retirement is your personal responsibility.”—Me: “If Social Security is done away with, won’t the money now being paid by employers toward their employees’ Social Security be pocketed by the employers, and if given to the workers will just inflate the price of immediately purchased goods thereby reducing gross pay down to present take-home pay?” - Delay, after some back and forth in which he yelled at me “don’t put words in my mouth"(did I?), and accompanied by snickering from his youthful aides, replied : “We’ll work in the cuts slowly enough to <minimize inflationary pressures>.” The crowd, many of whom were elderly and clearly not wealthy, was now silent.  I argued that if Social Security was made voluntary, than like voluntary environmental laws, no business would or could abide by it. - Delay, smirking and snickering like a teenager: “Then you want MORE regulations?” There was some tittering from his aides, but the crowd remained silent.

After about 10 minutes, I asked Delay what he had done to prevent trade abuses by China and other countries.  He rolled his eyes and his face got flushed.  He said he had done alot to prevent such abuses.  I asked to name some examples.  He couldn’t.  I then asked him if he could name just one instance. He squirmed, his face got cherry red, he averted his eyes from the crowd, and as sweat dripped down his cheeks, he glared at me and shouted: “I helped JEWS escape from the Soviet Union”! I was wearing my glasses.  I again asked him to name one example.  By this time, he was clearly in a panic, and his aides were cursing me under their breath ("son-of-a-bitch" one of them muttered), and finally he blurted out, almost crying: “SOCKS, children’s socks.  I demanded a ban on the <import of> children’s socks.” He then calmed down.

After this, Delay scanned the crowd, which was stone faced and silent.  He then looked at his watch and declared that he had to end the meeting early (by 20 minutes).

That encounter is one of the high points of my life.  Delay was and is a hate mongering, pandering, lying scum, a bully and a crook.  From that point forward, I yearned for the day when he’d be brought down. This black cloud has finally passed.  Let’s be thankful.

The world would be greatly improved if all the exploiters of the fundamental religionists of the Jewish, Christian and Islamic faiths could be delivered to an island somewhere and supplied with evenly distributed weapons. They could eliminate each other and the poor victims would escape all the worst consequences of their exploitation except the Tammy & Jim Baaker type rude awakening...how many times will these sheep be fleeced/led to slaughter before they learn. Each religion has its own version...the Zionists have been told that the Middle East belongs to them thanks to their big daddy Real Estate dealer in the sky, and the Islamics have Osama Bin Laden, who thinks the way to prevent them from getting all the land in the ME, is to go and bomb New York City real estate.

Tommy is perfectly positioned to transmogrify himself into a TV preacher in order to maximise his talent as a money sucking animal. What better way for a former exterminator and congressional fixer to take a shot at redemption? I can see Tommy building his very own Jayasus World. One attraction is sure to be where the rubes line up on a golf driving platform(Mt. St. Andrew’s) and fork out $10 a shot for that ever elusive “MURKLE” hole-in-one. There will be no cash prize, but “God’s Little Acers” will receive a personally signed by Tommy guarantee of automatic entry to “Pie In The Sky When You Die Land”. This attraction alone will be much sought after by theme park patrons eager to secure a little spiritual insurance should they snuff it before The Rapture, which is the preferred exit strategy of the Righteous.

Go get ‘em Tommy, ‘atta boy!

Well he’s now to be referred as the Ex-Terminator! May he rot in hell someday.

Read this somewhere months ago...and loved it…

“Dear Lord, please save me from your followers”

Tom (exterminator) Delay should exterminate himself.

Response to Comment #6630 by David Williams on 4/06 at 6:54 am: “I must read an entirely different Bible than most of those folks read.Jesus judged no man or woman.”

Jesus did harshly judge one group of people: the self-righteously, hippocritical religeous right of his day.  See Matthew Chapter 12

Peace

Thanks, Molly, for the Marianas anecdote.

DeLay’s mix of utter corruption, utter ruthlessness and devotion to making the rich richer is particularly nauseating when served dripping with religious sanctimony.

Ms. Ivins, you are exactly on point.  The false Christian values of DeLay and the White House administration are just appalling.  Forget, “teach peace”, show mercy, do justice - all foreign concepts to these hypocrites. 

We now face a president, who not only thinks that collateral damage (innocents being killed in Iraq and Afghanistan), unprecedented preemptive strikes against sovereign nations, taxing the poor to give to the rich, breaking constitutional laws designed to protect america’s citizens as in the NSA wiretapping and Due Process clauses is acceptable under the color of the presidential office.  AND, now this administration is determined to build more nuclear bombs after years of negotiation to create some semblance of peace globally?  America has run amok !  We are in serious trouble with this administration’s current policies.  Yes, it is true, “where there is no vision the people perish.”

There’s never been such an ethically challenged bunch as DeLay, Gingrich, Reed, et al. It’s ironic that so many of the crooks in the GOP cloak themselves with the mantle of Christianity!

You are all missing the point, it ain’t just DeLie, it’s all of them.  Like Molly says, revenge as justification goes both ways.  I like candidate Friedman’s basic premise:  don’t re-elect anyone, period.  Nader, this year.

I think the Godly people of Sugarland should resist this vile attack by the liberull media and write Old Tom in this November. Let the TRUE conservatives show they won’t stand for this Democratic bs.

The nation is at war. Delay declared it himself. The enemy that needs to be destroyed is the 2/3 of the American people who are traitors and socialists. The Republicans are NAtional Socialist.

The Army is led by Republican true believers and full of Godly conservative farm boys just waiting for the word from Generals like Boykin to purge the courts and Congress of this liberal scum on the sole of the boot of Freedom.

Yes, yes, we, the choir, can sing to each other with beautiful eloquence about DeLay or any other of these Christo-fascist Republican hucksters until the cows come home, but the one-third-plus contingent of far-right Christian voters out there don’t ever get their minds soiled by actually reading anything that could possibly enlighten them to endless corruption of the Bush-Cheney regime. 

I mean, just the other day, I happened to speak with a woman who belongs to a church where, she says, her pastor importuned his congregation prior to the 2004 elections to vote for Bush because of his anti-gay stance.  It is places like these where this voting contingent gets their marching orders, and the Rovesters duly take note.  Not to mention the right-wing talk show whores, Faux News and others who get their own marching orders from a White House fax machine.  And don’t even get me started about the other faux major media “news” outlets.

Molly has, as per the usual, hit the nail on the head about the ceaseless softball question interview styles of every single faux newscaster I EVER see.  Thus, if a tree falls in a forest but no one hears it, did it really fall?  Even if we fragile, little organisms in the forest heard it?

He also remarked that the Marianas were a perfect petri dish of the new capitalism, or something to that effect.  Worst. Congressman. Ever.

Now he is climbing deeper into bed with the religious fundamentalists.  They richly deserve each other, but what a terrifying combination of malevolent energies......

Unfortunately, Molly, Tom Delay and all the other crooks in Congress and the Administration have shown the way for future power-mongers, and that blueprint will remain for exploitation when all these jerks are long gone.  The people were lulled to sleep by the comforting Madison Avenue political ads in the Reagan years, then worked up into an anti-government fever during the Rush Limbaugh years, and then scared by the Bush/Cheney lies and dissembling.  The American people have never shown much interest in the rights the Founding Fathers gave them and that is especially dangerous right now.  I fear that the vigilance that is needed for our government falls to a very small percentage of the population, and without a real megaphone for that group to use, the very real concerns will never get a decent airing.  I think if they were aired, the American people would respond, but it would take a remarkable convergence of just the right things--a charismatic personality or personalities who are truly disinterested, with the good of the nation as their goal; a public platform where they can speak to many; and an echo chamber like the rich and powerful now have. We can only hope.

it is a great and joyous day in the house of the lord to see this pharisee tumble from his congressional throne.  GOOD RIDDANCE scum!!!

the obvious cure for most of what ails our democracy is total public funding of elections.  if the dems don’t come up with that as a plank in their ‘06 platform, along with universal health care, and getting out of bush’s iraq, then they will deserve to lose all down the line.

These people are going to burn. May the God of their understanding pass the judgement on them they deserve.

Thinking about DeLay gratisly wading in with both feet into a cesspool of labor inhumanity while spewing pseudo-Christian platitudes and accepting lavish freebies from the oppressers makes me think of all the “Hanoi Jane” flap that endures to this day, and which was used, in part, to skewer John Kerry two years ago.  How is what DeLay did in with and in the Marianas less reprehensible than anything Fonda did in the early 70’s?  And yet, aside from sources like Franken’s The Truth With Jokes or Lou Dubose’s book, NOBODY ever talks about this Marianas escapade - like it never happened.  I never saw the 20/20 special on it back in the 90’s either, but it got very little air-play while the country was over focused on fellatio-felony-impeachment mania.  The rank hypocrisy of this tinpot anti-christ is just so stark, but the fundies go into Moonie mode, tune it out and act like it isn’t there at all.  In a truly caring world, DeLay would be leaving office - for Leavenworth.

Thank you Molly-
ALL these things need national exposure.  I also would like to know if you have any comments about Al Franken’s book The Truth where he discussed the alleged prostitution ring there in the islands that these “workers” are forced to participate in-?

Hiding behind the"Born Again"facade is the most disgusting and hypocritical strategy that is used by the Republican rightwing.Delay is only one of hundreds that use this tried and true method to “connect"with the millions of so called Christian conservatives out there in America.
I must read an entirely different Bible than most of those folks read.Jesus judged no man or woman.He was a man unencumbered by material wealth and as far as I know,He did not desire earthly riches.He chased the money lenders from the temple.He preached “blessed are the peacemakers”.He fed the multitudes and healed the sick.He gave hope to the hopeless.His Kingdom was all inclusive;you were not cast out if you were different.
No where in Christ"s teachings do I recall him saying cut taxes from the ultra wealthy and take away food providing programs from the poorest amongst us.I don"t believe he ever advocated invading a country and murdering its civilian population on trumped up charges and outright lies.He never taught to seperate an entire segment of the population and deny them the civil rights that are taken for granted by the rest of the people.He said “love your neighbor”,not build a wall and keep them out.I could go on and on but you get the picture.
If Jesus was around today,I"m sure he would be a liberal Democrat.So all you Republican hypocrits and liars out there:put that in your"What would Jesus do?"pipes and smoke it.You"re not going to heaven and neither is Tom Delay.
Ms.Ivins,You"re one of the few shining lights out there.I send all good thoughts your way and hope that you will be well.America needs your voice. 
David Williams in the Mountains of western North Carolina

The “I’m so holy” hypocrisy is what galls me the most about the Republican cabal.  If this self-interested, uncompassionate bunch met their “beloved” Jesus today they would be the first to demand his crucifixion. And you can bet they’d insist their followers’ prove their goodness by lining up to hammer in the nails. Conscienceless and divisive users. The absolute opposite to anything Christian.  Disgusting.

Dear Molly,
If hipocrosy was a snow flake, DeLay would be a blizzard. I don’t think he will be frog marched, but he certainly deserves it. When Wright and Rostenkowski were done in , it was for individual indiscretions. Thus, no “hammer.” DeLay’s are institutional. Thus, he knows where all the money, favors and quid pro quo went. He can blackmail his way to a pardon. He is definitely not the only skank in the Republican Party elected or not. I hate to hold my hopes that Reed, Norquist and the rest tainted by Abramoff and DeLay are mug shot but as slimy as they are they will slither out of it.

My God, thank you, Molly Ivins. DeLay is so crooked from kissing the ass of The Demi-Gods called Republicans...and then cloaking his actions in the colors of Christianity. We’ll all have alot to answer for when our time comes, but how will ilk like DeLay explain all thier lies away? How does DeLay sleep at night? In the name of Jesus...? whew.

But wait, DeLie was just practicing good old American capitalism, you have a problem with that? I mean, he was just protecting our right to be able to buy cheap goods and corporate, ah, I mean American interests. So what if these people are being paid pitiful wages? Don’t they have schools where they can better themselves and get some of those higher paying jobs that bush says are coming after all the lay-offs from the jobs that are being out-sourced to places like the Mariana’s?
Get off DeLie’s back! He prays everyday about these things, so when you come down on him you’re coming down on God!
How dare you! You’re going to Hell Molly.

We have ridded ourselves of a shiphilitic oozing sore, but as bad as that sore is/was the Disease remains. And most dangerously the “slap-you-in-the-face symbol is no longer there to keep your attention focused.

There are a party full of Delay Wannabees out to get their piece, and there is no new structure to stop them. The Republicans are changing the burned out lightning rods in preperation for the “elections” but they are not changing the voing machines, or the pay-to-play rules.

It does not stretch the analogy to point out that any thing less than knocking the disease out of the park will only make it stronger, and more resistant yet to solutions that might have worked in the past, or even now.

Hopefully, it’s the twilight of the GOPs.