Man, Did We Ever Dodge A Bullet!
Just imagine how screwed up we would be right now if that religious wacko Palin had gotten elected! I mean, just look at the stuff she said just the other day:
“We are God’s partners in matters of life and death”
Ever hear of the “Separation of Church and State,” you fly-over hick? And you’re such a right-wing fascist you’d probably hear Nazi music in your empty head when ever you see a Jew, too.
In a morning conference call with about 1000 rabbis from across the nation, Obama asked for aid: “I am going to need your help in accomplishing necessary reform,” the President told the group, according to Rabbi Jack Moline, who tweeted his way through the phoner.
“We are God’s partners in matters of life and death,” Obama went on to say, according to Moline’s real-time stream.
The 15-minute morning briefing was sponsored by the Religion Action Center of Reform Judaism, and included rabbis of all persuasions. Although the RAC hosts the call each year, participants had never before heard from a sitting president.
What stood out about the call is that Obama “is a master communicator,” Moline, the rabbi of the Conservative Agudas Achim Congregation in Alexandria, said in an interview after the call ended.
Yes, he’s such a “Master Communicator”
Eyebrows were also raised by the choice of hold music that played to rabbis before the call began.
“First mistake,” Moline tweeted, as he waited for the call to begin. “Music on hold is ‘Deutschland uber Alles,’ ” a classical German anthem, the lyrics to which in part say, “Preserve and protect our Kaiser, our land.”
Funny, nobody I’ve ever met has associated “Deutschland Übar Alles” with the Kaiser...
People, Politics | Mr. Bingley | 
August 22, 2009 9:15 am
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Yikes. This guy is really getting scary. Does he think the rabbis are going to temple and tell their congregations that God and Obama want government healthcare? Good luck with that.
I was thinking about lightning striking Obama for claiming to be a partner with God over issues of life and death and remembered Hurricane Bill is supposed to head up Martha’s Vineyard way. Heh.
That is the single-most frightening thing I’ve ever heard an American president utter.
And when I was much younger I was taught that playing Deutschland Über. Alles was illegal in Germany. I’ve never heard it played as “classical” music. Heck, the only times I’ve heard it is on war movies and documentaries. You really have to go out of your way to get a recording of that song. It has to have been an intentional insult, if the claim is true.
Actually, Skyler, in typical tortured legalistic Germanic style the 3rd verse of the song is Germany’s national anthem.
But only the third verse.
My, this is an amazing display of pandering. Religious or not, Skyler is right, it’s scary.
And just imagine the level of leftie outrage if Bush had made a call like this for any reason.
Hope! Change!
“Music on hold is ‘Deutschland uber Alles,’ ”
I thought you were making that one up, Mr B. A little Bingley satire for for a Saturday morning. It turns out that you just can’t make this shit up.
Pandering? I see no pandering to put oneself on the same level as the devine.
Skyler, I think you meant “The Oneself” 🙂
[…] More: Man, Did We Ever Dodge A Bullet! […]
Yes, and I meant “divine” as well.
Skyler, Obama might put himself on the same level as God. I do not. Nor will I accept his definition of “divine”, which appears to be “Me!”
Obama has been in office for months, and still hasn’t selected a church to attend. Given his years of attendance at Trinity Church, that’s a very revealing attitude towards religion.
And suddenly, he reaches out to a large religious group, for a specific purpose, i.e., health care reform, invoking God in the process, and appealing to the beliefs of the rabbis.
Granted, that’s not “pandering” in the sense that religion is a vice (see definition #2), but given Obama’s approach to religion, it’s likely that he considers it “pandering”. I’ve little doubt that his attendance at Trinity Church was pandering in that sense.
I still are not completely sure what the big fuss about the lyrics to Deutschland uber Alles. After all the words to the French national anthem, La Marseillaise, basically state it is cool to use the blood of your enemy to enrich your farmland.
And everyone thinks the French are peace and love people 😛
JeffS, he didn’t “reach out.” He pissed on them. First, he intentionally insulted a gathering a Jews by playing the Nazi anthem, then he equated himself with God. That is not pandering or even reaching out. That is threatening them. Very typical of Chicagoan politicians.
To be pedentic, the Nazi Anthem was the Horstwessellied, not Deutschland uber Alles.
So that’s the secret to their cheese and wine, Mudcrab!
From your perspective — and mine — Obama pissed on the rabbis. No argument. His entire approach is an affront to any person who does not mix up religion and politics.
But from his perspective, he “reached out” for their “help”. That’s the spin being put on this.
It is indeed the Chicago way; I lived there for 5 years, and worked fairly closely with state and city employees. And that’s exactly how they viewed this sort of thing.
So we’re just talking past each other.
The music to Deutschland uber Alles is titled “Austrian Hymn” in my church’s hymnal. We sing the words, “Glorious Things of Thee Are Spoken” to it.
http://digitalhymnal.org/dhymn.cfm?hymnNumber=423
Exhibit A
“The music to Deutschland uber Alles is titled “Austrian Hymn” in my church’s hymnal.”
That’s because the melody was originally written by Haydn as “Gott Erhalte Franz den Kaiser,” for the Holy Roman Emperor Francis II. With different lyrics from the Deutschlandlied, it remained their anthem until the dissolution of Austria-Hungary in 1918.