Don't forget there's an election coming

Did you notice what happened during the storm? Barack Obama did what a President should do. He mobilized the government to do its job. Even Republican Governor Chris Christie of New Jersey had nothing but praise for Obama's leadership.

Christie told news outlets that the president’s response had been “outstanding,” said that coordinating with the administration had been “wonderful,” and remarked that “the president has been all over this and he deserves great credit.”

Mitt Romney, however, having previously called on FEMA to be abolished, staged a fake "relief rally" where his campaign bought cans of food for people to pretend to donate. There is nothing about that man that is real.  How can people be so blind as to actual consider voting for that smarm-artist?

And let's not forget that the Republican cast of characters is defined by a platform that is anti-women, anti-gay, and really anti-anyone who isn't a Christianist white male.

From Religion Dispatches,

Mourdock and his Republican, anti-women, anti-choice teammates invoke God so God might bless their dirty work—which all too frequently comes down to controlling women. In a recent interview, Gloria Steinem said, “The deep anthropological, political reason for controlling women is to control reproduction,” adding that, “reproductive freedom, the right to decide for yourself when and whether to have children, is the single greatest determinant of whether you are healthy or not, whether you are poor or not, how long you live, whether you are educated, [and whether you are] able to be active outside the home.” Even our legal system, she pointed out, “penalizes the invasion of private property more than the invasion of bodies,” because the legal world “was built on a law that saw women as possessions, as objects.”

It’s convenient to appeal to God to justify power structures that benefit you. But it’s not really God Mourdock is worshipping. It’s misogyny.

 And as the Roman  Catholic Church mobilizes to fight marriage equality in four states, it is increasingly driving a split into the community, although some brave priests are speaking out, like Fr Richard Lawrence in Maryland:

"But could not civil law be allowed to progress where church law cannot go, at least not yet? Personally, I believe that it can and that it should," he said. "So there you have it: the official teaching of the church and my personal reflections." 

The St. Vincent parishioners gave Lawrence a standing ovation.

 Don't forget to vote.