Gordon Howie drops by late to our Christmas stockings to falsely accuse us leftists of being at war with Gordon, his groupies, and his God.
As a leftist, I consider myself somewhat more qualified to comment on “What Leftists Really Want” than rightist Howie is, so let’s do some lunchtime line-by-line on Howie’s latest effort to portray Democrats and moderate Republicans as the mortal enemies of all that is good, holy, and American:
Gordon at war… with truth
…Leftists and moderates share the agenda that government should be supreme and individual rights can only be protected if and when they are in direct conflict with Godly moral principles [this blockquote and all subsequent from Gordon Howie, “What Leftists Really Want,” The Right Side, 2017.12.27].
The idea that contradiction of Christian moral principles is the only criterion by which I would prioritize individual rights over government power is absurd. For example, I passionately support the rights of citizens to initiate and refer laws as a check on Legislative overreach and unresponsiveness. Initiative and referendum protect Christian moral principles of human dignity and autonomy.
Government is their ‘god’.
I hear this charge frequently. I remind Gordon that I am an atheist; I have no god, in quotation marks or not. I respect individual human dignity, humanity and civilization as a whole, and the laws and institutions that we establish to preserve our values and lives.
Leftists will stop at nothing… nothing… to remove or render ineffective the current President.
One can only wonder what they would do with a President Pence, who may actually be more completely committed to traditional Christian values than Trump.
Oh! A moment of truth from Gordon! He can’t bring himself to say it outright under the current regime, but he is right! Mike Pence is clearly more committed to traditional Christian values than lying, adultering, twice-divorced, demonstrably un-Christian Donald Trump.
Their hope is probably that Pence would be less effective than Trump.
Actually, I have no such hope. I recognize that if we remove Trump from office and Pence takes power, Pence’s political and executive savvy will make him more effective than Trump in driving legislation through Congress, working the press, and dealing with foreign leaders than Trump. My desire to remove Trump before 2020 runs opposite a political calculation of Pence’s impact on leftist goals and instead revolves around the central fact that Trump is bad for America.
The Leftists are committed to overthrowing anything… everything… that has anything to do with God.
Now Gordon is just singing in the shower. We leftists have far more important things to do than go around “overthrowing” any churches.
They want it to be CRIMMINAL [sic! Gordon really used two Ms!] to practice Christianity. In many cases, it already is.
It is not illegal to practice Christianity or any other religion in the United States (as long as you’re not conducting human sacrifice, poking your neighbor’s eye out, or marrying ten women). I have no desire to outlaw practicing Christianity or any other religion… as long as you practitioners don’t try to outlaw us non-practitioners.
While it raises it’s ugly head in many forms, some of them even appearing to be ‘reasonable’, don’t kid yourself, this is a war against God.
Here, Gordon may be correct: since I don’t believe in God, I stand in what Gordon can probably theologically justify saying that I’m technically in a state of war against his Christian God. (I’d prefer the term cease-fire, but there I go trying to appear “reasonable”, and Gordon warned you about that.) But if I step into Gordon’s worldview (overshoes, please), don’t I find that all of us fleshy creatures are at war with God and can only find peace through grace?
Everything they want is actually contrary to the laws of God. If you examine their proposals and their agenda, judging based on whether it aligns or rejects Godly principles, you will discover that most (if not all) of what they want is anti-God.
Gordon? Gordon!?! Did you not read my note from the Pope? I want us to honor and assist the weak and the frail. I want to make room at the center for the men and women forced to live on the edges. I want to embrace those driven from their lands by tyrants and welcome them to our abundant shores. Most of what I want politically fits with what Christians like Pope Francis and Tim Bjorkman want. Unless your God is Gozer the Destructor, most of my leftist agenda is the opposite of anti-God.
I respect Gordon Howie as a livestock expert. He knows how to choose a longhorn bull. If only he were as discerning in his choice of political and religious bull.
I understand how you feel, Mr. H. Many leftists blogging here often accuse all Republicans or all Conservatives of being overgodders or pro-Trump or anti-women or pro-bathroom law bill when I clearly demonstrate that not to be true.
Roger Cornelius
Obviously Howie doesn’t know the history of this country, how could he when is strictly focused on his definition of God and expressing his hate and contempt of gays and other people that displease him.
Absent in Howie’s meaningless rant is the single word that makes this country what it is, the U.S. Constitution.
Howie claims that leftist worship government as their God when in reality we worship the Constitution and what it stands for and the rights we fight for everyday of our lives.
The civil war Howie claims we are in is not a war of God vs. No God, it is the 241 year battle of church vs. state. We can never allow Howie and his type rewrite that great document to please their hateful agenda.
Further, Howie believes there must be a winner and loser to this great struggle, a win that is impossible to win by either side. It is as though Howie is eagerly awaiting the flow of American blood into the streets.
Make no mistake about it, the Howie’s of this country are dangerous. Dangerous to our rights granted by the U.S. Constitution and our rights to peace and justice.
Grudz, I appreciate your continued if not sufficiently frequent counterexamples.
Roger, bingo. The Constitution must be the basis of our political actions. Get everyone to agree on that principle, and we don’t have to worry about anyone, Christians or atheists, having alternative belief systems shoved down their throats.
Roger Cornelius
Thanks Cory.
If we are to get rid of Trump through the Impeachment process it will require that we have some strict Constitutionalists in the House and Senate.
It was Rep. Peter Rodino in the House and Sen. Sam Ervin in the Senate that presented the Impeachment process against Richard Nixon. Both Rodino and Uncle Sam were Constitutional scholars and their hard work was what forced republican senators to demand Richard Nixon’s resignation.
It is disgusting how Howie and the wingnuts blithely dismiss the founding document that gives them the ability to express their lunatic words and causes.
If Howie, et al, fully understood the Constitution and how to apply it, their recklessness would end.
Donald Pay
Let’s talk about being a good Christian.
When I was with the Rapid City Reporter in the early 1990s I did several stories on water quality in the Rapid City area. One involved the water system owned and/or operated by Gordon Howie. The system, which was out near the Countryside Development had bad quality water back then. Apparently Howie hasn’t done much done over the last quarter century to improve the situation.
If Howie thinks the Christian thing to do is to supply poisoned water to his development, yeah, I want to crucify that brand of “Howie-first Christianity.” Give me Jesus, not Howie. Jesus wouldn’t supply water that could kill fetuses (babies, if you want Howie’s brand of political correctness).
David Newquist
In reading over Howie’s rant, the total absence of any factual basis for what he states is stunning. In fact, everything fits into the symptoms of a severe mental disorder:
*Holding onto false beliefs even with proof that the beliefs are not true or logical (delusions)
*Finding it hard to organize thoughts, leading to jumbled speech (disorganized thinking)
Proverbs and Ecclesiates devote much to warning against trying to engage the mentally deficient, as in Proverbs 14:7 “Go from the presence of a foolish man, when thou perceivest not in him the lips of knowledge.”
Lessons for the cyber age.
grudznick
Mr. Newquist blogs:
…the symptoms of a severe mental disorder:
*Holding onto false beliefs even with proof that the beliefs are not true or logical (delusions)
*Finding it hard to organize thoughts, leading to jumbled speech (disorganized thinking)
My thoughts immediately jump to Mr. Nelson and Ms. Hubbel.
Bob Newland
Oh, I have no doubt Gordon Howie suffers from mental disorder(s).
About 15 years ago, while the residents of his legislative district endured his false-Christian regime as a representative of his constituents, I organized a write-your-legislator campaign urging common sense in the legislative approach to medical cannabis.
Howie’s crack investigative skills led him to me, whom he called on the phone. He harassed me with an argument somewhat parallel to the one Cory cites here. Finally, he said, “If I needed medical marijuana, I’d just buy some illegally and deal with whatever legal problems might arise later.”
When I reported his remarks to my constituents, he said he was disappointed in me for mis-quoting him. A few days later, his wife ran into a tree off Catron Blvd., high on anti-Gordon downers.
Cory, this Gordie dude is not relevant so why bother writing about him? But really, the Democrat Party is more about Love and Peace, which is what God really represents, than the anti-LGBT, anti-immigrant stances that the GOP of today stands for. Peace, everyone.
Roger Cornelius
Howie may not be important, but he is relevant for a multitude of reasons, chief among them is that Howie is a benefactor of Trump’s irrational and impulsive thought process. In fact, Howie was a Trump before Trump was on the scene.
leslie
see mercer’s post>
“When people say that President Trump’s attack on the press corps in Washington doesn’t have anything to do with us locally, I disagree. And I would point to this campaign email by Shantel as an example.”
Howie, Krebs–they are all apparently the same when spreading fake news about their own fake news
o
I have considered the question: What makes me a “leftist/liberal/progressive . . .? Central to defining a difference with our esteemed “rightists/conservatives . . . is our differing views of government. The answer to me comes down to how the Preamble of the Constitution begins, “We the people. . . ” That simple identification serves as my view, my definition of “government.” I see the government as the collective extension of we the poeple. The government is not “the other” or some outside entity like a boogieman to be feared (nor do I think it worthy of worship), it is the logistical necessity of a people working together – people who probably cannot do the actual work, but can participate in that work getting done for the common good. And I am and want to be part of that.
When we seperate from “government”; when the right can say things like, “I’m from the government; I’m here to help” as a punchline we foster MORE of an environment Howie decries where government becomes an entity removed from the people – paving the way for the dictator and demagog.
Furthermore, I absolutely reject Howie’s limited right-wing paradigm of what “christian” means.
jerry
Gordo gets his money from the flat earth crowd. He just spouts this roypublican nonsense out there to fill his collection plate. He now knows that his contribution plate will be diminished with his boy trump leading the charge against charitable giving. So, as any good roypublican does, they gots to blame someone or something without looking in the mirror.
jerry, that is a damn good find.
Makes me wonder when Howie declares war on big government what the cut-off point is.
It must be after he gets his fists full of money.
Jenny
They always hate the government but will grab their handouts. These people just need to admit they’re hypocrites.
jerry
Roypublicans are all the same Roger, every damn one of them. As they now look at themselves as being somehow superior, always their next big targets are to go after those that actually need the government’s help and disparage them. The Roypublican con is to get people thinking that they are being victimized. Used to work pretty damn good too, but in every con, the trick is never to get too greedy. Roypublicans like Gordo/NOem and the rest of the rogues gallery of frauds did that with the tax cut. Roypublican Gordo sees that so he is thrashing and flopping about now for cash from his suckers, like a bloated bottom feeder carp tossed out on the river bank. Old Handout Gordo, always working on the government teat.
Laurisa
I’m a seminary student and a devout Christian, and I am a very proud leftist. And I certainly have no intention of changing that once I graduate and begin work. And I am joined in those views by the vast majority of my classmates.
It seems to me that the Gordon Howies are the ones who are “anti-God”, with their rampant individualism, fetish for capitalism, intolerance for any other groups, their love of social Darwinism, their stomping on the poor, sick, disabled, and disadvantaged, their troglodyte view of women and gender roles, their relentless theocratic demands. NONE of this has anything to do with Jesus’ teachings and actions, in fact, quite the opposite. The biblical culture they love to scream about was not at all individualistic, the bible was NOT written at all in an individualistic, capitalist bent. I am sick of these people claiming they are the “only” Christians, when nothing could be further from the truth, and I am tired of their claims that we were founded as a Christian nation and that is the only thing that should be tolerated and promoted, when THAT is far from the truth also.
mike from iowa
grudznick
2017-12-27 at 13:49
I understand how you feel, Mr. H. Many leftists blogging here often accuse all Republicans or all Conservatives of being overgodders or pro-Trump or anti-women or pro-bathroom law bill when I clearly demonstrate that not to be true.
What is true, Grudz, is you are a nobody without being a legislator. You cannot do the harm to others you’d like to do with your political beliefs.
This why I will not vote for even a sensible (I just threw up in mouth a little) wingnut running for office above township level. They can’t harm a soul that far down the food chain.
Ryan
Idiots like this guy prove that the number one threat to world peace is religion, and that the most likely cause of the extinction of our species is one group of people getting mad at another group of people because their imaginary friends have different names.
jerry
I wonder how much longer the anti-God shtick we will be able to allow. https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2017-12-22/louisiana-sinking-fast-prepares-to-empty-out-its-coastal-plain These roypublicans are destroying our planet with their anti-God phony baloney nonsense, while they take God’s creation and burn it down while poisoning it with toxic chemicals. I think that if you believe in God then you will know that God has a special place in hell for those that destroy His house, Gordo and crew will find it. They steal from us with their phony subsidy con while biting our hands and living in nice warm homes with full belly’s. They see no need to try to clean up their mess with energy that makes sense and land use that will not destroy our precious water, all for a stack of paper. Here we are in the midst of a drought that has been wrecking our soils and depleting what little water we have and Gordo and crew are out collecting on it for doing nothing. Stealing is Anti-God, even for a roypublican like Gordo. The coastal plains are uninhabitable with the direct cause being mankind, no doubt about it. Yet these charlatans blather on and on about how they are the mouthpiece of God and how they and they alone are the only ones capable of delivering that message. Mostly it is about hate, but that is how they roll.
John W.
Sadly, me and a member of my family have had various interactions with the Howies over at least two decades and there has seldom been a time lacking conflict, contradiction, and self piety. This man has cost numerous people an awful lot of money over the years and it is due, in large measure, to people putting too much trust in somebody that isn’t worthy of it.
I’m a Christian, have been spiritually and religiously cemented to the faith since age 10 and will always be Christian. I take the New Testament biblical message literally and strive to follow the meaning and intent of the the instruction and wisdom provided. I am also a sinful person that fails often but I continue to run the race in order to achieve the prize.
Howie’s pseudo Orthodox Christianity is no where close to any historical theology nor is it even an honest interpretation of biblically instructed Christian thought or behavior. He uses old testament rhetoric as a weapon to demonize anybody, to include sincere Christians, that disagree with is view of religious order. He holds himself out to be something he’s not as does all his pals like Ed Randozo who heads up the Family Heritage Alliance. Howie and the gang are the precise image of the Jewish Sanhedrin whom Jesus rebuked for their superficial adherence to legalism and purposed misrepresentation of the prophets. Howie holds himself out to be a religiously qualified authority condemning and criticizing all those in and out of government for slandering god and taking god out of government, schools, etc etc. Yet he has taken god out of his personal, family and business life for decades. He professes to use the power of government to impose a fictional religious will on the populace in complete contradiction to anything found in New Testament theology. He’s a heretic, a hypocrit and self righteous apostate that has been largely ostracized by believers across South Dakota and yet he hasn’t learned one thing about either himself or the religious he professes to represent. I am a slightly left leaning independent that stands in direct contradiction to his allegations and I hope and pray the god of hosts has mercy on the miserably confused and spiteful man.
Francis Schaffer
o
Nice comment. I thought it should be highlighted.
‘Furthermore, I absolutely reject Howie’s limited right-wing paradigm of what “christian” means.’
Laurisa, nice post thank you.
I believe and please correct me if I am wrong, but didn’t Jesus give us only 2 commandments?
Jesus said unto him, Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy mind. This is the first and great commandment. And the second is like unto it, Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself. On these two commandments hang all the law and the prophets.
If this is all any of us need to do be a christian, well simple enough; drop the entire Old Testament, ten commandments and all and follow these as one’s guiding principles. This is what Jesus himself brought us.
Donald Pay
Yeah, Howie is a complete hypocrite, theologically and politically.
Countryside, if I recall correctly, was a Howie development. I recall that he received a big handout of money, maybe subsidized loans, from the federal government to develop the property. That property was a few miles up the road from the outskirts of Rapid City, and was the epitome of bad development in a Ponderosa Pine forest environment. It should never have been allowed. For one, it was not connected to city water, so he had to drill a well and supply water. The water he supplied was chock full of radium and uranium, but he kept delaying any water treatment. I would surmise he killed and maimed more fetuses in Countryside than all the abortions performed in South Dakota.
Countryside was started, I believe, during the first year or two of the Reagan Administration, and those folks were cutting regulations and giving money away to fake conservatives, like Howie. I opposed that development, even writing comments to try to get an Environmental Impact Statement, but that didn’t happen.
Laurisa
Jerry and John W., very well-stated. It’s no mystery at all to me why millennials are jumping the organized religion ship faster than any other age group. My atheist son and I have had many interesting discussions over the past several years. Unfortunately, the right-wing takeover of American Christianity has fed and fueled this exodus and will continue to do so. Meanwhile, they are acting far more in the spirit of Christianity than many wingers who like to call themselves Christian.
And Grudz-love the term “overgodder”, it’s perfect!
Howie’s response, a new blog post titled “What Leftists Really DON’T Want,” epitomizes the style Newquist talks about and the difference between Howie’s style and mine. Howie is writing sermons to sing in the shower and reinforce what he already believes. He provides no sources or citations. He refers only obliquely, partially, and smart-aleckly to this blog post, without mentioning my name or providing a link to help his readers expand their reading and see the argument in full.
Howie does provide examples of policies he finds ungodly—requiring bakers to make cakes for homosexuals, requiring doctors to perform abortions, and using taxes to fund benevolence. He also throws in a video reciting the argument that Democrats founded the Confederacy and fought the Civil Rights Act and thus are the party of racism… but he says he shares that video “just for fun”.
But this is all political prooftexting, ignoring every example given by commenters here of reasonable ways in which sincere Christian belief can lead to progressive political values and policies. We can prooftext Howie’s Republican/ theocratic platform the same way: Republicans support war, corrupt the church by comingling it with the state/empire, and elect a fake Christian like Donald Trump, so Republicans must all hate God.
We know better. Republicans, Democrats, and independents can believe in the same God and still come to different conclusions about public policy. Disagreeing on public policy does not mean one side is at war with God and the other side is all good Christian warriors who can do no wrong (that’s Grudz’s “overgodding” in a nutshell). As I note above, proper Christian theology would say we are all at war with God. We all sin, we all fall short, but we all do our best while enjoying salvation by grace.
Laurisa, I could view that millennial exodus as a good thing: let the Howie theocrats drive the freer thinking young people from the churches, thus weakening the theocrats’ own influence. But is there a danger analogous to what we see in the GOP and primary elections: disenchant the moderates, and while the churches will have fewer people, they’ll have higher concentrations of radicals who will still exercise harmful influence in the community while young moderates disengage?
Jenny, I do agree that Howie is barely more influential than Sibby. He is, however, more pleasant than Sibby, and his language better reflects the theocratic thinking of his neighbors and many legislators and thus is worth the occasional rebuttal.
mike from iowa
The monster under the bed is a……..wait for it…..wait…
Where to start with Howie’s second blog post?
First off, I tried to leave a comment, but apparently Howie has banned me, so much for a constructive open and free dialogue with the guy. However, looking over his posts it seems that nobody ever comments. Who is preaching to, himself?
Howie than follows up with a Trumpian statement, “I will take a moment to say I have some Liberal/Leftists friends (and relatives) many of whom are NICE people. As in Trump’s Nazi’s are nice people.
Continuing with his irrational thought process he claims that Democrats are the party of tax and spend disregarding that the state of South Dakota, under republican rule, has been responsible for virtually every tax and fee increase in the last 40 years.
Howie also gives a lecture on the benevolence of our government. For a Christian he forgets that benevolence means to be kind and compassionate.
In other words he condemns the government for giving him a welfare handout of $400,000, as Jerry pointed in a comment above.
Howie doesn’t know history or ignores it, Democrat President Johnson went against southern democrats to gain the Civil Rights and Voting Rights Acts that republicans have for decades tried to repeal.
Howie is a bundle of ignorance and conflict that does not know what a true Christian is supposed to be. I know hundreds of people that have never picked up a Bible or gone to church that are far better Christians and likely follow the compassionate teachings of Jesus.
Gordon Howie is no Christian.
jerry
I think Howie is only listening to Randazzo, the little turkey buzzard, that speaketh into Howies left ear. Roger is correct, Howie is no Christian, in my view, he is just another roypublican fascist.
leslie
mfi, grudz was a legislator as I understand….
mike from iowa
and it drove him to slurping down gravytaters? No wonder things are the way they are in bloody South Dakota.
I understand how you feel, Mr. H. Many leftists blogging here often accuse all Republicans or all Conservatives of being overgodders or pro-Trump or anti-women or pro-bathroom law bill when I clearly demonstrate that not to be true.
Obviously Howie doesn’t know the history of this country, how could he when is strictly focused on his definition of God and expressing his hate and contempt of gays and other people that displease him.
Absent in Howie’s meaningless rant is the single word that makes this country what it is, the U.S. Constitution.
Howie claims that leftist worship government as their God when in reality we worship the Constitution and what it stands for and the rights we fight for everyday of our lives.
The civil war Howie claims we are in is not a war of God vs. No God, it is the 241 year battle of church vs. state. We can never allow Howie and his type rewrite that great document to please their hateful agenda.
Further, Howie believes there must be a winner and loser to this great struggle, a win that is impossible to win by either side. It is as though Howie is eagerly awaiting the flow of American blood into the streets.
Make no mistake about it, the Howie’s of this country are dangerous. Dangerous to our rights granted by the U.S. Constitution and our rights to peace and justice.
Grudz, I appreciate your continued if not sufficiently frequent counterexamples.
Roger, bingo. The Constitution must be the basis of our political actions. Get everyone to agree on that principle, and we don’t have to worry about anyone, Christians or atheists, having alternative belief systems shoved down their throats.
Thanks Cory.
If we are to get rid of Trump through the Impeachment process it will require that we have some strict Constitutionalists in the House and Senate.
It was Rep. Peter Rodino in the House and Sen. Sam Ervin in the Senate that presented the Impeachment process against Richard Nixon. Both Rodino and Uncle Sam were Constitutional scholars and their hard work was what forced republican senators to demand Richard Nixon’s resignation.
It is disgusting how Howie and the wingnuts blithely dismiss the founding document that gives them the ability to express their lunatic words and causes.
If Howie, et al, fully understood the Constitution and how to apply it, their recklessness would end.
Let’s talk about being a good Christian.
When I was with the Rapid City Reporter in the early 1990s I did several stories on water quality in the Rapid City area. One involved the water system owned and/or operated by Gordon Howie. The system, which was out near the Countryside Development had bad quality water back then. Apparently Howie hasn’t done much done over the last quarter century to improve the situation.
http://rapidcityjournal.com/news/local/most-water-clean-in-hills-but-some-systems-have-problems/article_3538f015-178b-5ee2-8a99-98832802947c.html
If Howie thinks the Christian thing to do is to supply poisoned water to his development, yeah, I want to crucify that brand of “Howie-first Christianity.” Give me Jesus, not Howie. Jesus wouldn’t supply water that could kill fetuses (babies, if you want Howie’s brand of political correctness).
In reading over Howie’s rant, the total absence of any factual basis for what he states is stunning. In fact, everything fits into the symptoms of a severe mental disorder:
*Holding onto false beliefs even with proof that the beliefs are not true or logical (delusions)
*Finding it hard to organize thoughts, leading to jumbled speech (disorganized thinking)
Proverbs and Ecclesiates devote much to warning against trying to engage the mentally deficient, as in Proverbs 14:7 “Go from the presence of a foolish man, when thou perceivest not in him the lips of knowledge.”
Lessons for the cyber age.
Mr. Newquist blogs:
My thoughts immediately jump to Mr. Nelson and Ms. Hubbel.
Oh, I have no doubt Gordon Howie suffers from mental disorder(s).
About 15 years ago, while the residents of his legislative district endured his false-Christian regime as a representative of his constituents, I organized a write-your-legislator campaign urging common sense in the legislative approach to medical cannabis.
Howie’s crack investigative skills led him to me, whom he called on the phone. He harassed me with an argument somewhat parallel to the one Cory cites here. Finally, he said, “If I needed medical marijuana, I’d just buy some illegally and deal with whatever legal problems might arise later.”
When I reported his remarks to my constituents, he said he was disappointed in me for mis-quoting him. A few days later, his wife ran into a tree off Catron Blvd., high on anti-Gordon downers.
take your lithium grudz for your racing thoughts
elect a guy like trump and pence and this unleashes the gordons of the republican dying party. http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-5210531/Flake-says-GOP-rallies-look-like-spasms-dying-party.html
Cory, this Gordie dude is not relevant so why bother writing about him? But really, the Democrat Party is more about Love and Peace, which is what God really represents, than the anti-LGBT, anti-immigrant stances that the GOP of today stands for. Peace, everyone.
Howie may not be important, but he is relevant for a multitude of reasons, chief among them is that Howie is a benefactor of Trump’s irrational and impulsive thought process. In fact, Howie was a Trump before Trump was on the scene.
see mercer’s post>
“When people say that President Trump’s attack on the press corps in Washington doesn’t have anything to do with us locally, I disagree. And I would point to this campaign email by Shantel as an example.”
Howie, Krebs–they are all apparently the same when spreading fake news about their own fake news
I have considered the question: What makes me a “leftist/liberal/progressive . . .? Central to defining a difference with our esteemed “rightists/conservatives . . . is our differing views of government. The answer to me comes down to how the Preamble of the Constitution begins, “We the people. . . ” That simple identification serves as my view, my definition of “government.” I see the government as the collective extension of we the poeple. The government is not “the other” or some outside entity like a boogieman to be feared (nor do I think it worthy of worship), it is the logistical necessity of a people working together – people who probably cannot do the actual work, but can participate in that work getting done for the common good. And I am and want to be part of that.
When we seperate from “government”; when the right can say things like, “I’m from the government; I’m here to help” as a punchline we foster MORE of an environment Howie decries where government becomes an entity removed from the people – paving the way for the dictator and demagog.
Furthermore, I absolutely reject Howie’s limited right-wing paradigm of what “christian” means.
Gordo gets his money from the flat earth crowd. He just spouts this roypublican nonsense out there to fill his collection plate. He now knows that his contribution plate will be diminished with his boy trump leading the charge against charitable giving. So, as any good roypublican does, they gots to blame someone or something without looking in the mirror.
Roypublican Gordon Howie with his hand up the skirt of lady liberty https://farm.ewg.org/persondetail.php?custnumber=A07657098 Those damn lefties have given him almost $400,000.00 for a big load of hooey from a blowhard
jerry, that is a damn good find.
Makes me wonder when Howie declares war on big government what the cut-off point is.
It must be after he gets his fists full of money.
They always hate the government but will grab their handouts. These people just need to admit they’re hypocrites.
Roypublicans are all the same Roger, every damn one of them. As they now look at themselves as being somehow superior, always their next big targets are to go after those that actually need the government’s help and disparage them. The Roypublican con is to get people thinking that they are being victimized. Used to work pretty damn good too, but in every con, the trick is never to get too greedy. Roypublicans like Gordo/NOem and the rest of the rogues gallery of frauds did that with the tax cut. Roypublican Gordo sees that so he is thrashing and flopping about now for cash from his suckers, like a bloated bottom feeder carp tossed out on the river bank. Old Handout Gordo, always working on the government teat.
I’m a seminary student and a devout Christian, and I am a very proud leftist. And I certainly have no intention of changing that once I graduate and begin work. And I am joined in those views by the vast majority of my classmates.
It seems to me that the Gordon Howies are the ones who are “anti-God”, with their rampant individualism, fetish for capitalism, intolerance for any other groups, their love of social Darwinism, their stomping on the poor, sick, disabled, and disadvantaged, their troglodyte view of women and gender roles, their relentless theocratic demands. NONE of this has anything to do with Jesus’ teachings and actions, in fact, quite the opposite. The biblical culture they love to scream about was not at all individualistic, the bible was NOT written at all in an individualistic, capitalist bent. I am sick of these people claiming they are the “only” Christians, when nothing could be further from the truth, and I am tired of their claims that we were founded as a Christian nation and that is the only thing that should be tolerated and promoted, when THAT is far from the truth also.
grudznick
2017-12-27 at 13:49
I understand how you feel, Mr. H. Many leftists blogging here often accuse all Republicans or all Conservatives of being overgodders or pro-Trump or anti-women or pro-bathroom law bill when I clearly demonstrate that not to be true.
What is true, Grudz, is you are a nobody without being a legislator. You cannot do the harm to others you’d like to do with your political beliefs.
This why I will not vote for even a sensible (I just threw up in mouth a little) wingnut running for office above township level. They can’t harm a soul that far down the food chain.
Idiots like this guy prove that the number one threat to world peace is religion, and that the most likely cause of the extinction of our species is one group of people getting mad at another group of people because their imaginary friends have different names.
I wonder how much longer the anti-God shtick we will be able to allow. https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2017-12-22/louisiana-sinking-fast-prepares-to-empty-out-its-coastal-plain These roypublicans are destroying our planet with their anti-God phony baloney nonsense, while they take God’s creation and burn it down while poisoning it with toxic chemicals. I think that if you believe in God then you will know that God has a special place in hell for those that destroy His house, Gordo and crew will find it. They steal from us with their phony subsidy con while biting our hands and living in nice warm homes with full belly’s. They see no need to try to clean up their mess with energy that makes sense and land use that will not destroy our precious water, all for a stack of paper. Here we are in the midst of a drought that has been wrecking our soils and depleting what little water we have and Gordo and crew are out collecting on it for doing nothing. Stealing is Anti-God, even for a roypublican like Gordo. The coastal plains are uninhabitable with the direct cause being mankind, no doubt about it. Yet these charlatans blather on and on about how they are the mouthpiece of God and how they and they alone are the only ones capable of delivering that message. Mostly it is about hate, but that is how they roll.
Sadly, me and a member of my family have had various interactions with the Howies over at least two decades and there has seldom been a time lacking conflict, contradiction, and self piety. This man has cost numerous people an awful lot of money over the years and it is due, in large measure, to people putting too much trust in somebody that isn’t worthy of it.
I’m a Christian, have been spiritually and religiously cemented to the faith since age 10 and will always be Christian. I take the New Testament biblical message literally and strive to follow the meaning and intent of the the instruction and wisdom provided. I am also a sinful person that fails often but I continue to run the race in order to achieve the prize.
Howie’s pseudo Orthodox Christianity is no where close to any historical theology nor is it even an honest interpretation of biblically instructed Christian thought or behavior. He uses old testament rhetoric as a weapon to demonize anybody, to include sincere Christians, that disagree with is view of religious order. He holds himself out to be something he’s not as does all his pals like Ed Randozo who heads up the Family Heritage Alliance. Howie and the gang are the precise image of the Jewish Sanhedrin whom Jesus rebuked for their superficial adherence to legalism and purposed misrepresentation of the prophets. Howie holds himself out to be a religiously qualified authority condemning and criticizing all those in and out of government for slandering god and taking god out of government, schools, etc etc. Yet he has taken god out of his personal, family and business life for decades. He professes to use the power of government to impose a fictional religious will on the populace in complete contradiction to anything found in New Testament theology. He’s a heretic, a hypocrit and self righteous apostate that has been largely ostracized by believers across South Dakota and yet he hasn’t learned one thing about either himself or the religious he professes to represent. I am a slightly left leaning independent that stands in direct contradiction to his allegations and I hope and pray the god of hosts has mercy on the miserably confused and spiteful man.
o
Nice comment. I thought it should be highlighted.
‘Furthermore, I absolutely reject Howie’s limited right-wing paradigm of what “christian” means.’
Laurisa, nice post thank you.
I believe and please correct me if I am wrong, but didn’t Jesus give us only 2 commandments?
Jesus said unto him, Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy mind. This is the first and great commandment. And the second is like unto it, Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself. On these two commandments hang all the law and the prophets.
If this is all any of us need to do be a christian, well simple enough; drop the entire Old Testament, ten commandments and all and follow these as one’s guiding principles. This is what Jesus himself brought us.
Yeah, Howie is a complete hypocrite, theologically and politically.
Countryside, if I recall correctly, was a Howie development. I recall that he received a big handout of money, maybe subsidized loans, from the federal government to develop the property. That property was a few miles up the road from the outskirts of Rapid City, and was the epitome of bad development in a Ponderosa Pine forest environment. It should never have been allowed. For one, it was not connected to city water, so he had to drill a well and supply water. The water he supplied was chock full of radium and uranium, but he kept delaying any water treatment. I would surmise he killed and maimed more fetuses in Countryside than all the abortions performed in South Dakota.
Countryside was started, I believe, during the first year or two of the Reagan Administration, and those folks were cutting regulations and giving money away to fake conservatives, like Howie. I opposed that development, even writing comments to try to get an Environmental Impact Statement, but that didn’t happen.
Jerry and John W., very well-stated. It’s no mystery at all to me why millennials are jumping the organized religion ship faster than any other age group. My atheist son and I have had many interesting discussions over the past several years. Unfortunately, the right-wing takeover of American Christianity has fed and fueled this exodus and will continue to do so. Meanwhile, they are acting far more in the spirit of Christianity than many wingers who like to call themselves Christian.
And Grudz-love the term “overgodder”, it’s perfect!
Howie’s response, a new blog post titled “What Leftists Really DON’T Want,” epitomizes the style Newquist talks about and the difference between Howie’s style and mine. Howie is writing sermons to sing in the shower and reinforce what he already believes. He provides no sources or citations. He refers only obliquely, partially, and smart-aleckly to this blog post, without mentioning my name or providing a link to help his readers expand their reading and see the argument in full.
Howie does provide examples of policies he finds ungodly—requiring bakers to make cakes for homosexuals, requiring doctors to perform abortions, and using taxes to fund benevolence. He also throws in a video reciting the argument that Democrats founded the Confederacy and fought the Civil Rights Act and thus are the party of racism… but he says he shares that video “just for fun”.
But this is all political prooftexting, ignoring every example given by commenters here of reasonable ways in which sincere Christian belief can lead to progressive political values and policies. We can prooftext Howie’s Republican/ theocratic platform the same way: Republicans support war, corrupt the church by comingling it with the state/empire, and elect a fake Christian like Donald Trump, so Republicans must all hate God.
We know better. Republicans, Democrats, and independents can believe in the same God and still come to different conclusions about public policy. Disagreeing on public policy does not mean one side is at war with God and the other side is all good Christian warriors who can do no wrong (that’s Grudz’s “overgodding” in a nutshell). As I note above, proper Christian theology would say we are all at war with God. We all sin, we all fall short, but we all do our best while enjoying salvation by grace.
Laurisa, I could view that millennial exodus as a good thing: let the Howie theocrats drive the freer thinking young people from the churches, thus weakening the theocrats’ own influence. But is there a danger analogous to what we see in the GOP and primary elections: disenchant the moderates, and while the churches will have fewer people, they’ll have higher concentrations of radicals who will still exercise harmful influence in the community while young moderates disengage?
Jenny, I do agree that Howie is barely more influential than Sibby. He is, however, more pleasant than Sibby, and his language better reflects the theocratic thinking of his neighbors and many legislators and thus is worth the occasional rebuttal.
The monster under the bed is a……..wait for it…..wait…
https://tinyurl.com/y9gwpelz
From the mouths of children.
So to which leftists is Gordon listening?
Where to start with Howie’s second blog post?
First off, I tried to leave a comment, but apparently Howie has banned me, so much for a constructive open and free dialogue with the guy. However, looking over his posts it seems that nobody ever comments. Who is preaching to, himself?
Howie than follows up with a Trumpian statement, “I will take a moment to say I have some Liberal/Leftists friends (and relatives) many of whom are NICE people. As in Trump’s Nazi’s are nice people.
Continuing with his irrational thought process he claims that Democrats are the party of tax and spend disregarding that the state of South Dakota, under republican rule, has been responsible for virtually every tax and fee increase in the last 40 years.
Howie also gives a lecture on the benevolence of our government. For a Christian he forgets that benevolence means to be kind and compassionate.
In other words he condemns the government for giving him a welfare handout of $400,000, as Jerry pointed in a comment above.
Howie doesn’t know history or ignores it, Democrat President Johnson went against southern democrats to gain the Civil Rights and Voting Rights Acts that republicans have for decades tried to repeal.
Howie is a bundle of ignorance and conflict that does not know what a true Christian is supposed to be. I know hundreds of people that have never picked up a Bible or gone to church that are far better Christians and likely follow the compassionate teachings of Jesus.
Gordon Howie is no Christian.
I think Howie is only listening to Randazzo, the little turkey buzzard, that speaketh into Howies left ear. Roger is correct, Howie is no Christian, in my view, he is just another roypublican fascist.
mfi, grudz was a legislator as I understand….
and it drove him to slurping down gravytaters? No wonder things are the way they are in bloody South Dakota.