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| Obama |
Having no other explanation for a
president who has cut unemployment, reduced the deficit, extricated troops from
Iraq, ended more than 50 years of hostility with Cuba, began the reform of the
medical industry and did so without a hint of scandal, Republican seers are now
claiming that President Barack Obama is the devil.
Their “proof” comes from a picture
taken recently when the president spoke about the militant Islamic State from
the Cross Hall of the White House. A curtain
behind him contained an odd design that, when Obama was perfectly positioned,
looked like he was adorned with horns.
If that was not enough, according
to published reports, Obama must be the devil because his name has “three
syllables, a triangle has three sides, 9/11 is three numbers,” and soon the
nation will mark “the 13th anniversary of the Sept. 11 terrorist
attacks.”
 |
| Bright |
South Carolina State Senator Lee
Bright has no doubts of Obama’s hellish ties.
He said approval of same-sex marriage was proof of the devil’s influence. He was
supposed to be talking about the removal of the Confederate flag from the state
house there, but instead launched into his diatribe against Obama, adding, “We
can rally together and talk about a flag all we want, but the devil is taking
control of this land, and we’re not stopping him.”
Of course, Satan is always lurking in the minds of our most learned political leaders. In 2008, for example, former Senator and failed presidential candidate Rick Santorum claimed that the devil was trying to destroy the country – and this was before Obama was even elected to his first term.
Santorum told his audience at Ave
Maria University in Florida: “This is
not a political war at all. This is not a cultural war. This is a spiritual
war. And the Father of Lies has his sights on what you would think the Father
of Lies would have his sights on: a good, decent, powerful, influential
country—the United States of America. If you were Satan, who would you attack
in this day and age. There is no one else to go after other than the United
States, and that has been the case now for almost two hundred years, once
America's preeminence was sown by our great Founding Fathers.”
 |
| Santorum |
To Santorum, who represents many
people of the same ilk, Satan has already successful conquered academia. College educated folks were the first to fall
victim, led by Harvard, Santorum claimed.
Not surprisingly, polls repeatedly show that better-educated people
somehow have lost faith in the devil’s existence.
Santorum then said that the devil
conquered Protestant sects and finally politics and government. Santorum apparently didn’t see any irony to
his own claim although he’s a politician.
Of course, the devil has been
active in so many other arenas. Pat
Robertson, a minister and another failed president candidate whose inanities are now
limited to religious broadcasts, once insisted the Haiti’s founders “swore a pact to the
devil,” which explains the devastating earthquakes and other natural misfortunes
there. Actually, the rebels who threw
out the French held a religious ritual prior to the 1800s uprising. However, they followed voodoo, which is a
perfectly normal faith despite its reputation and Robertson’s slander.
 |
| Cain |
The devil can get very personal. Failed
presidential candidate Herman Cain was sure God told him to run in 2012, but then
three women promptly accused him of having affairs. He quickly withdrew. What really caused his failure? Not his own behavior, of course. Cain, now a minister,
knows all too well who was behind his failed bid for the White House: the
devil.
"It made me realize that there
was a force bigger than right," he said.
Actually, according to former Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad in
2012, the devil has expanded his influence well beyond our borders. He
insisted that the United States and European Union, "have entrusted
themselves to the devil."
 |
| Netanyahu |
The
evil one has control of Israel, too.
Nicaragua’s President Daniel Ortega said Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin
Netanyahu “appears to be possessed by the devil … He needs Pope Francis to
exorcise it, to become appeased.”
That may not work. Apparently, Pope Francis is also thought to
be the devil in some quarters.
Nor are these folks the only targets of such calumny.
How
about George W. Bush? He was called the
devil by then-Venezuelan President Hugo Chávez during a United
Nations’ presentation. “Yesterday, the devil came here,” Chávez said, a snide
reference to Bush’s appearance before the General Assembly the day before.
“Right here. Right here. And it smells of sulfur still today, this table that I
am now standing in front of.”
 |
| Steyer |
Then there's capitalist and environmentalist Tom Steyer, the Democratic Party’s billionaire
donor, who was identified as the devil at the 2015 Conservative Political
Action Conference (CPAC) at Maryland's National Harbor.
Such
claims invariably touch a large percentage of the population. According to a 2013 survey, “a majority of Americans, especially Republicans, blacks and
women,” embrace the idea of the devil.
Count
Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia among that group. In 2013, he said, “I even believe in the devil.
Yeah, he’s a real person. In the Gospels, the devil is doing all sorts of
things. He’s making pigs run off cliffs; he’s possessing people and whatnot. What
he’s doing now is getting people not to believe in him or in God. He’s much
more successful that way.”
 |
| Scalia |
Not surprisingly, a small group of
Republicans have been touting Scalia as a possible compromise Republican
presidential candidate.
He’ll just have to remember not to
stand in front of the Cross Hall curtain.
People could get the wrong impression.
You
can enroll in his on-line class, Comparative Religion for Dummies, at
http://www.udemy.com/comparative-religion-for-dummies/?promote=1
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