Pharisee Nation

http://www.commondreams.org/views05/0215-21.htm

I believe more or less the same as this fellow named John Dear, which reminds me of a tractor joke.

It's not very funny, but it starts out "what did the female tractor say to the male one?" Answer: "Hold me closer, John Deere."

Agricultural humor, not surprisingly, is often "corny." I am well-versed in Aggie jokes, since I live in Aggieland North about 190 miles northeast of the actual campus in College Station. I was actually a student there for about three weeks once before a near-psychosis set in and I had to be medicated. I am not making that up.

Eventually, I returned to sanity and enrolled at UT-Austin, where I was an overly-lubricated student for about five or six years, earning two degrees and only one visit to the Dean of Students' office.

John Dear claims to be a Christian in that article. So do I. But I do not think he would be regarded as such around here. He is close to being a "terr'ist." I know down at my Southern Baptist church, I am now regarded with great suspicion.

(I have decided not to frequent its hallowed halls nearly as often as I once did. "Come out from among them and be ye separate" is what my inner voice has been saying.)

This is because of the few times I've failed to guard my normal reticence and blurted out my strong hunch, now bordering on fervent belief, that Dubya is far more likely the Antichrist than the "new, improved son of God" many of my fellow congregants seem to assay.

Dubya is the "Redneck Jesus." He's the "messiah with an attitude." He comes "not to bring peace, but a sword."

The latter seven words comprise the favorite and maybe the only quote attributed in the Gospels to the Lord of today's self-righteous warmongers who have set out to cleanse the earth of evil.

If they ever had a moment of true insight, most of them would have to commit suicide. But that's not likely to happen. One of the cool things about being a Pharisee is a complete lack of self-reflection and a total confidence that you speak for AwmightyGawd or at least that your lord Dubya does.

If their leader ever rode into Jerusalem on an ass (that's redundant, I think), his "ass" would be an Abrams tank (since we know he is terrified of riding on four-legged beasts of burden) and he'd be at the controls "kickin' ass" by firing depleted uranium shells at all the ragtag Palestinians in the Old City.