I’m building up to the “Baby Baphomet” story from this past week. First a bit of background. There exists a religious organization called the “Church Of Satan“. They don’t actually believe in a real supernatural entity called Satan. The entire reason for the formal establishment of the Church of Satan is to basically fight fire with fire. Whenever right-wing fundamentalists roll up and strive to inject their beliefs into the political arena, the folks from the Church of Satan also turn up and demand equal rights.
It plays out like this, “Oh, so you want the right to religious freedom in the political arena, OK then, how about this religion?”, then step back and watch fundamentalist heads explode. Generally, the desired outcome prevails, all religions are tossed out and the wall of separation is restored.
A specific example has been the demand to erect religious monuments outside courts in several states. This has resulted in the Church of Satan turning up with a statue of Baphomet, a huge winged goat-headed humanoid, to erect. Seriously, I’m not exaggerating.
The latest chapter in this long-running battle-of-wits against the clueless has been this – “The Satanic Temple Unveils New Satanic Artwork in Illinois Capitol Rotunda“. It turned out to be Baby Baphomet …
They also invited a Bishop to participate in the unveiling. It was the guy who declared that only specific groups should be permitted to display in the Capitol Rotunda. When faced with this, he proceeded to suffer a thermonuclear verbal meltdown.
Legally, the folks that permit the breaching of the wall of separation between church and state are obliged to permit all or none, so they can’t object. What can one say except, “well played” to the folks who thought up this response.
Who knew that policing the wall of separation could be so entertaining.
So what else happened this past week?
Below you will find my usual selection of some truly bizarre claims that popped up during the last 7 days.
COVID-19
Josephine Harvey writes in the HuffPost: Sarah Palin Says She’ll Get COVID-19 Vaccine ‘Over My Dead Body.’
- If she continues to refuse the vaccine, then her “dead body” quip just might happen, and it would be a totally all on her.
- To be honest, I’d have been astonished if Palin had actually accepted the vaccine.
- Her “thinking” is that because she previously had COVID, then she will be fine. Previous exposure like that is not as reliable and effective as vaccines, which provide a high level of protection against coronavirus.
‘Now Is Go Time’: Stew Peters Is Threatening to Arrest Government Officials Over COVID Restrictions
- Stew, along with much of the GQP, is literally a death cult now, dedicated to painting anybody striving to keep people safe as “the enemy”, and vigerously working to ensure that COVID spreads to as many as possible.
NewsWeek: Pastor Shane Vaughn Says God Told Him COVID Is ‘Never Leaving’ Until Churchgoers Take Off Masks
- Let’s all gather together, forget about vaccines or masks, and just hug, what could possibly go wrong.
- Shane is really determined to ensure that lots of believers go to meet the God they believe in ASAP.
Unexpected Good News Items
Ron FilipkowskiAlex Jones is saying this yesterday: “This is an emergency Christmas Day warning to Pres Trump. You are either completely ignorant .. or you are one of the most evil men who ever lived .. What you told Candace Owens is nothing but a raft of dirty lies.” Truly Bizarre
- Context is that when Trump was interviewed by Candace Owens he was very pro-vaccine. This has horrified many of his base. Alex is simply tapping into that support for grifting purposes.
UK’s Independent, Wed Dec 22: Texas QAnon cult is now drinking bleach, member’s horrified family says
- I honestly did not expect this problem to actually take care of itself.
Truly Bizarre
Brigitte Gabriel proclaimed on Twitter that you should … “Raise your son to be like Mike Lindell and not like Barack Hussein Obama”
- Indeed yes, God forbid that your son graduates from Columbia and Harvard, is happily married and faithful to his wife for 30 years, a great father to two daughters, and serves two terms as President of the United State
- Avoid such horror and instead train your son up to be a crack addict that makes a fortune selling shitty pillows on the internet, then throws it all away by getting sued for a deranged attempt to destroy American democracy
Hemant Mehta: GOP lawmaker Lauren Boebert told a conservative audience yesterday that she’s “tired of having godless people who hate America run this country!”
- Hemant also points out this detail in a posting: According to the Pew Research Center, the current Congress is made up almost entirely of Christians (88.1%), followed by Jewish members (6.2%), a few other minority faiths (2.0%), and a handful of members who don’t share their religious information publicly (3.4%).
- In other words, who exactly are all these “Godless” people she is talking about?
- What she is really saying is this: All the religious people who don’t believe exactly what she believes are godless heritics.
- Imagine the uproar if Biden or for that matter any Democrat, used language like this.
Ron Filipkowsk reports this: Steve Bannon announces his creation of a new MAGA cryptocurrency called ‘FJB.’ “This is eventually going to be used as a means of transactions, you’re going to have an alternate currency .. You’re going to very quickly have no reliance on their financial system.”
- Google, show me Steve Bannon’s latest con.
- In same broadcast, Bannon said that “a portion” of the proceeds he takes in will be donated to the J6 prisoners and their families, the ‘Widows and Orphans Fund,’ and the Police Benevolent Association. We have been here before, for example his promise to fund completion of the border wall, resulted in him keeping all the proceeds gathered for himself.
- Crypto Tip: When the guys telling you to buy a certain crypto token own the majority of those tokens, it’s a scam. They’re going to scare you into jacking their tokens value through the roof and then they’re going to cash out and leave you hanging
Christmas
Mario Murillo accuses the left of cultural appropriation over Christmas: “They appropriate Christmas; do not give credit to its source; and go even further, by mocking, blaspheming and even banning the phrase, ‘Merry Christmas.’ And meanwhile, they celebrate Christmas.”
- Ask him to name just one example of somebody who has banned the phrase “Merry Christmas” and then listen to the sound of tumbleweed.
- His claim that people who are on the political left are celebrating Christmas is truly shocking stuff. How dare these left-wing people encroach upon an exclusively right-wing holiday.
- What is true is that some opt to use the term “Happy Holidays” as a way to be inclusive of everybody. That is apparently blasphemy.
Then of course there was this ..
The False Profit$
Self-appointed Prophet Johnny Enlow insists that he cannot be labeled a false prophet because he does not announce himself as a prophet, even though he totally is one.
- His word game here is that he claims he is a prophet, he simply did not ask people to call him one, so you can’t call him a false prophet.
- In other words, the guy who claims he is a prophet, and makes prophecies that don’t come true, really hates it when you point that fact out, and wriggles really hard to duck your fact-based critcism.
This week’s final quote
The first principle is that you must not fool yourself and you are the easiest person to fool.
Richard Feynman