The story:
SAN ANTONIO — Senator John McCain got support on Wednesday from an important corner of evangelical Texas when the pastor of a San Antonio mega-church, Rev. John C. Hagee, endorsed Mr. McCain for president. Mr. Hagee, who argues that the United States must join Israel in a preemptive, biblically prophesized military strike against Iran that will lead to the second coming of Christ, praised Mr. McCain for his pro-Israel views.
The response:
Yesterday, Senator John McCain said he was “very honored by Pastor John Hagee’s endorsement.” The Republican presidential hopeful also called Hagee “the staunchest leader of our Christian evangelical movement,” citing the minister’s pro-Israel stance.
Catholic League president Bill Donohue addressed this today:
“There are plenty of staunch evangelical leaders who are pro-Israel, but are not anti-Catholic. John Hagee is not one of them. Indeed, for the past few decades, he has waged an unrelenting war against the Catholic Church. For example, he likes calling it ‘The Great Whore,’ an ‘apostate church,’ the ‘anti-Christ,’ and a ‘false cult system.’
Hagee, to put it mildly, is an unpleasant fellow – I went over to McCain’s website to see if there was more on this, and so far I haven’t even found it mentioned. I hope that Senator McCain will address this issue – but I am also quite confident, due to McCain’s past actions vis a vis Catholicism, that he doesn’t in any way, shape or form agree with Hagee’s views of the Catholic Church. My bet is that McCain was aware of Hagee’s staunchly pro-Israel stance, and that is what McCain was thinking of in obtaining this endorsement.
In general terms, I never engage in a fight with my brothers and sisters in Christ – and even though I view Hagee as terribly wrong, I won’t even fight him on this. I’ll pray he’ll allow God to enlighten him on the truth of these matters, but I see no profit in fighting a fellow Christian – however erring – when the whole of religion is under attack in our nation. I understand, and respect, Mr. Donohue’s position and agree that such things need to be brought up, and condemned, but in my view there is a need, also, for a careful understanding of the real stakes in 2008; Hagee’s influence is relatively small, and no matter how destructive he might be, he won’t do nearly the damage that a President Obama or a President Hillary will do.
UPDATE: Given that our lefties are trying very hard to pick a fight between McCain and Catholics over this, I think it worthwhile to bring up Catholics for McCain; there are quite a lot of my fellow Catholics who are enthusiastic backers of John McCain and this is a much stronger indicator of McCain’s views about Catholicism than the fact that the anti-Catholic Hagee endorsed him.
UPDATE: John McCain responds to the firestorm:
Yesterday, Pastor John Hagee endorsed my candidacy for president in San Antonio, Texas. However, in no way did I intend for his endorsement to suggest that I in turn agree with all of Pastor Hagee’s views, which I obviously do not.
I am hopeful that Catholics, Protestants and all people of faith who share my vision for the future of America will respond to our message of defending innocent life, traditional marriage, and compassion for the most vulnerable in our society.
Of course, it would have been better if the endorsement had never happened – but it did happen, and one can’t undo the past; meanwhile, we don’t want to alienate those followers of Hagee who are sincere, if misguided, Christians who do want what is best for America and the world. This is the best way around it all – making lemonade out of the lemons, as it were.
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Nope, by my definition abortion is not murder. You have never proved any such thing. Wow you’re boring, talk about a s-l-o-w learner.
You’d lose that bet the same way you’ve lost every argument today dummy.
See, I know you won’t criticize a Democrat no matter how hypocritical. So that makes your arguments biased and lessens your credibility.
Whereas conservative posters here regularly criticize Republicans and other conservatives based upon ideas and actions.
So you don’t get any points from me. And Southerner has admitted that he is OK with baby murder. Or at least that he’s not willing to even criticize it.
Ahhhh insults again. OK a**hole.
You said that human consiousness occured sometime during the third trimester. Well, partial birth abortions are allowed up until moments before natural birth. ergo – murder. You disagree with yourself. Or maybe you’re too stupid to realize you disagree with yourself. Or maybe your just a calous bastard that would kill a baby if it was convenient.
AND – Unions get to be political and their source of funds gets to stay tax exempt. But not so for a church. So guess what? You lose that argument also.
And, I know how to post a link that actually puts you in thr right place, and you don’t.
OK Dummy?
So, Mark, you think the reason McCain has sought and accepted the endorsement from Hagee only because of his stance on Israel?
That is still extremely problematic. Hagee’s support of Israel is for purely selfish reasons, as is demonstrated by his book, “Jerusalem Countdown” (just let that chilling title sink in for a moment).
He believes the End Times are near and he is willing to ‘speed up that proces’ by waging religious wars, because of his interpretation of the scriptures. He believes the West Bank should remain in Israeli hands, he opposes any Two-State solution or Roadmaps to Peace and he opposes any division of Jerusalem.
Any American president who endorses such views will be met with huge distrust and it will alienate every state – even the relatively pro-Western states – in the Middle East and around the world. Not even the majority of Israelis support it. At will set back every prospect of a peace proces, how fragile, for decades.
A McCain as president who lends his ear to religious warmongers like Hagee would be a clear signal to Iran and Syria to stock up on WMD’s, preferably nuclear, now.
Deleted – complains about comment policy.
Deleted – obscenity; if it happens again, commenter will be banned.
Why am I not surprised that you don’t get this? Let me educate you once again Kahn – unions are allowed to endorse candidates because they are mandated to work collectively for the economic good of their members. Ergo they are allowed to endorse the candidate they fell will best benefit their members once elected. They are not allowed to campaign among the general population for a candidate, famously unions ‘get out the vote’ amongst their own members for a candidate and they generally do so for a candidate who they think will help them economically when elected.
Not quite the same as a church leader capriciously selecting a candidate and using money which was donated for charitable reasons to fly around the country endorsing that candidate and trying to persuade all and sundry to vote for that candidate. But hey, this is somewhat subtle so I doubt you’ll get it. Maybe you should go back to ranting about abortion, you seem to enjoy that.
I have ONLY insulted in direct response to a post where I was insulted. Once a liberal gets threatened intellectually here, they result to insults. Don’t expect me to not escalate.
I saw no attacks on southerner when he insulted me – not ONE.
LiberalMind – not right now, I’m with southerners mother.
And Southerner – YOU make the distinction between a union and a church. I do not. I see two different kind of organizations who take money from members. I see one type restricted form political endorsements, and the other not restricted.
Obviously, under current laws and regulations, this is permitted. But it sure looks to me like an unConstitutional restriction of speech on one group where another is NOT restricted. And big surprise, churches generally (though certainly not always) lean conservative and Unions don’t. Go figure.
I understand your reasoning – and FYI – you have NOT explained why the unions get this treatment, only that they do. You do that a lot, say you’ve explained something when you haven’t. But how does working for the economic benefit of it’s members differ from the working towards the ethical and moral beliefs of a church? FYI, religion is actually Constitutionally protected. “work(ing) collectively for the economic good of their members.” is not.
So we have a a group of liberal leaning organizations who can make ads, donate to politicians, and endorse whoever they want. Their proceeds are tax free and their source of money is tax free. YET, another group of organizations who are charged with the spiritual and emotional welfare of their members may NOT participate in these very same activities without being stripped of their tax status.
So you think you explained why. But you didn’t really explain why one group should get treated differently than another,
Man – YOU are the slow learner here.
Oh, and I reject your choice of the word “capriciously” as being uncalled for and extremely biased. Churches make choices based upon their interests and belief systems just as unions do. Just as anyone does.
Don’t transfer your inner hatred onto someone else.
And I’ll stay away from the insults if you do.
And we’re playing Frisbee, what did you think I meant? Gutter brains.
Bed now, my lack of immediate reply does not mean I cede your point.
Wow, how tedious. You really seem to have comprehension problems Kahn. I’m not going to baby feed you this time, read my post #175 again and see if you can figure out why what you’ve written above is not actually true. I’m sure that if you apply yourself you’ll be able to do it all on your ownsome. Come on now little boy, you can do it! Yay for the special kid!
PS Kahn – If you don’t want to be ‘insulted’ ie have your intelligence called in to question then stopping making such stupid posts.
There ya go southerner, showing your total lack of class. I only respond to your insults. I offer to stop. But you just can’t. At this point, I guess we’d have to come across the table at each other. What with liberals all peace loving and all, I bet your fists would be a flailin’.
You don’t really explain why one group should get special treatment at all. You definition would fit a bank, or a credit union – wouldn’t it? Why would Unions, of all organizations be able to stay tax exempt while being political?
Your immediate resort to insults just proves that you can’t handle an argument.
The unions were written into the 501C law by Democrats precisely because they are left leaning political organizations. That’s one of the reasons we opposed those laws. GET IT? You people rig the system.
Its not that I can’t read your pathetic attempt to explain it. I can read it fine. I just understand that its wrong and you miss the point.
Here are your buddies out in Berkeley –
http://www.breitbart.tv/?p=55464
Off topic? Well, it expalins how you guys think and act.
Hey look, I managed to post another correctly working link. That way I don’t need to falsly insult someone for not being able to make it work.
Hmmmm, who did THAT tonight? It was someone with an enormous liberal head. Hmmm, who was it?
Not that the history of the year 501 wasn’t interesting. Fascinating in fact.
Willem,
Actually, it is my view that Jerusalem must remain the undivided capitol of the State of Israel…furthermore, as Moslems in the West Bank and Gaza have routinely proven their willingness to desecrate Christian and Jewish religious sites, I want very much for all non-Moslem religious sites in the West Bank and Gaza to be under Israeli stewardship.
And, finally, if it comes about that the Palestinian leadership remains intractable and is is unwilling or incapable of stopping terrorist attacks on Israel, then we might have to go about helping Israel to re-occupy the West Bank and Gaza just to restore order.
I put this out there for you to understand that my primary complaint with Hagee is his anti-Catholicism – it is foolish of him to indulge in such a thing; it insults Catholics, wrecks the Christian unity Our Lord commanded and merely plays into the hands of those who bear all religion ill will. As for Hagee’s “end times” views – well, he’s flat wrong on his manner of doing that as even Our Lord doesn’t know when that will come, but only the Father.
Mark,
I apologize for some of tonights posts. I was having way too much fun.
By the way, like the Berkeley video? Thats who we post against here.
Diana,
A hundred million homes? Errrmm…that would be just about all of them, I’d think…might be that your exaggerating a bit?
As it is, I had never heard of Hagee until January of this year – when Huckabee decided to give a sermon at his place. Once advised of who Hagee was and what he believed, I wrote a post urging Huckabee to reconsider what he did. When I heard that McCain had been endorsed by Hagee, I was saddened and disturbed, but I also know from the past that McCain is a friend of Catholics and bears no ill will towards the Church – thus, the explanation for McCain’s acceptance of Hagee’s endorsement must lie outside Hagee’s views on Catholicism.
Kahn,
Well, the cats were away and the mice got to play quite a bit today – as Matt and I routinely point out, we do have lives outside of blogging, and we can’t monitor the blog every minute of the day. Our hope, however, is that by our hitting off topic comments on a regular basis that the people who make them will grab a clue and stop doing it – our theory on this stems from our understanding that some lefties are sent out from leftwing blogs in order to disrupt the comments on conservative blogs; its impossible to tell who is just an obtuse lefty and who is an obtuse lefty on a mission, but we have had some success in weeding out the worst offenders.
Mark
Even when it goes against the wishes of the majority of Israel? Why do you think opinion polls in Israel show that Hillary is BY FAR the most preferred for US President? 60%. Second is Obama with 20%. Democrats are favoured by 80% precent of Israel.
McCain is third and favoured by only the extreme conservatives in Israel.
Dont you hate it when folks cite unconfirmable polls and think they are actually making a point?
Kahn,
“Fair enough. On what day and at what hour of the pregnancy does the fetus stop being part of the womans body and start being and individual person?”
Quite obviously, that would be on the day day that the baby is BORN, being, you know, that we celebrate a person’s BIRTHday and not their CONCEPTIONday.
An existing woman’s body is more important than the life of a person who does not yet exist. You can call it whatever you want. I call it bodily autonomy.