Trump's Card

[ursus arctos]

?

By what maths is 58% a "fairly small minority"?

In any event, the election was decided by just over 100,000 votes

[Guy Profumo]

?

By what maths is 58% a "fairly small minority"?

In any event, the election was decided by just over 100,000 votes

Of the population as a whole?

[ursus arctos]

Tubbs said "fairly small minority in a minority"

[Guy Profumo]

Tubbs said "fairly small minority in a minority"

Ok.

It's a fair cop.

[Tubby Isaacs]

Fairly small majority in a minority, I meant. The minority being evangelicals.

[ursus arctos]

It’s somewhere between 45 and 50 million people

[WOM]

Evangelicals? Really that many?

[ursus arctos]

58 percent of white Evangelicals, who represent approximately 25% of the US population

[Tubby Isaacs]

What's that? 14% of the population, but higher share of the electorate?

[ursus arctos]

I'm using Pew figures

[caja-dglh]

You would be surprised by the number of Evangelicals. There is a large congregation near us (Southern CT, so basically NYC suburbs) and over time we have learned that many people we know are members - typically through neighborhood things like school. I actually really like hanging out with them - it has provided me a window into something I never expected. Religiously I think they have already given in on us.

That said, I doubt I am ever going to go near a topic with them where it is likely to get fighty. I am sure they have prayed for me on a few occasions.

[Hot Pepsi]

I'm using Pew figures

I suspect the percent of white evangelicals who expect Jesus to return soon and also actively believe all the bullshit about Israel's role in bringing it about is even smaller, but I don't know how much.

I could also call out that quoted sentence for apparently conflating "American Christians" with "White conservative evangelicals," but that ship has probably sailed. Not all Christians are evangelicals, (not even sure its most in the US), not all evangelicals are white, and not all evangelicals, white or otherwise, are conservative.

My guess is that the power of white conservative evangelicals is going to wane. Every year, a few of their numbers become disillusioned and either give up religion completely or joining Catholic or more progressive scenes like mine. And their best hope for adding adult members is from immigrants, which will make them less white, and thereby probably change their politics. On the other hand, this population may have more kids than average which could keep them going if their kids stay in the fold.

Scary shit.

[WOM]

But is it 'inch deep / mile wide' faith, like praying for a good parking spot at Costco? Or actual 'waiting for the Rapture' shit?

[ursus arctos]

You don't have to believe the 58 percent figure if you don't want to, but that concept is a constant element in discussions of Evangelical attitudes on Israel and climate change (among others).

[Hot Pepsi]

But is it 'inch deep / mile wide' faith, like praying for a good parking spot at Costco? Or actual 'waiting for the Rapture' shit?

Both.
And it's so full of bullshit. Like the guy I encountered on a friend's facebook trying to explain how Jesus endorsed the second amendment. Ron Howard's Voice: It doesn't.
I showed him a detailed explanation of the verse in question and how it doesn't mean at all what he wants it to mean. "Well, I choose to interpret it more literally." Never mind that, if he actually interpreted it literally, it would mean that every group of 12 travelers should carry two daggers. I'd be fine with unlimited access to daggers if we could ban guns. But I didn't say that. I just blocked and moved on.

Anyway. That's the kind of shit we're dealing with. These people aren't gun-loving white nationalists because they're pseudo-Christians. They're pseudo-Christians because they're gun-loving white nationalists. Or, at least, the causality flows both ways. This is true of all religion, really. So many people erroneously think that Western culture was "based on Christianity" or that Arabian culture is "based on Islam," when it's really, in most cases, it makes more sense to think of it the other way around.

“The Christian ideal has not been tried and found wanting. It has been found difficult; and left untried.” ― G.K. Chesterton

[WOM]

You don't have to believe the 58 percent figure if you don't want to, but that concept is a constant element in discussions of Evangelical attitudes on Israel and climate change (among others).

No, I just don't have a clear idea of how to imagine 'Evangelical'. To me, thats the God-fearing nuts, not the casual Easter/Christmas Christians who would still profess their faith because it would be heresy to do otherwise.

[Hot Pepsi]

You don't have to believe the 58 percent figure if you don't want to, but that concept is a constant element in discussions of Evangelical attitudes on Israel and climate change (among others).

I believe it as far as that goes, but if the question was just "do you think Jesus will come back in the next 25 years" or something like that, it will include people who just have a vague feeling about it or remember hearing something about it in church but are not au courant on all the latest Left Behind mumbo jumbo and that one guy on TV who goes on and on about how current events in the Middle East line-up with shit in Revelations (Narrator: They don't.)

It's like, take the percentage of people that like Star Wars, and then the percentage of people that REALLY like Star Wars, and then the percentage of those people who spend hours online arguing if such and such character from the ESWU is "canon" or not.

Indeed, religious culture and fan/nerd culture are extremely similar in lots of ways.

[Flynnie]

White evangelicals voted 81-16 for Trump. They're 25% of the electorate. We'd have a significantly different and better country without them.

[Tubby Isaacs]

He's speaking now. The logic seems to be "peace hasn't worked, so let's do this".

[Gerontophile]

I had to turn the cunt off. I've had enough of listening to it.

[Mr Beast]

Cunt is right. He really is the scum of the earth, as are the people behind him and the people who voted for him.

[San Bernardhinault]

Meanwhile, this seemed to slip under the radar

The Senate Republican tax plan totally screwed up, and left the corporate AMT at 20%. Which is exactly the same as the new corporate tax rate. Which means that companies basically don't get any benefit from taking any of the juicy deductions put in the tax bill for them.

They had to stick the Corporate AMT back in to the bill at the very last minute in a scrawl in the margin, but - like idiots running a desperate last minute unchecked tax plan - forgot to change the actual value.

(The AMT is what organisations are forced to pay if they have so many deductions that they take their tax rate below a minimum threshold - if it's the same as the actual tax rate, it means that all deductions go below the threshold and therefore everyone pays that rate regardless of whatever pork congress has put in the tax code for them).

In the end, this won't matter, because they'll sort it out in reconciliation. But it does mean that the bill has to go to reconciliation - the House can't just vote for the Senate bill and get this on the books tomorrow.

[WOM]

Cunt is right. He really is the scum of the earth, as are the people behind him and the people who voted for him.

I always look at the 'people behind him' and think 'what the fuck are you doing there?' Is this an image you're going to want your children or grandchildren to see? Is this how you want history to judge you...providing the human backdrop for this narcissistic POS who's destroying lives?

[Lang Spoon]

The Saudis don’t give two fucks for Palestine at all, do they? So there will be mealy mouthed condemnation, but SA Egypt and Israel will continue as the world’s most pig evil axis. Suppose we could dream the effects of a new intifada spill into Saudi and destroy every bastard family member, that the US gets its ass handed to it just like Lebanon in 82. But nah, we’re just going to see the tacit approval by the Gulf States and Egypt for a new destruction of Gaza, and the West Bank, and Lebanon. It’s a shitty situation when I’m cheering on Iran and proxies.

[Gerontophile]

Are Iran evil? Obviously the ayatollahs are arseholes, but I suspect the people are much more progressive, given the chance.