“She has all the attributes of Jesus.” - Rev. Frank Bushey, pastor of Fellowship Community Church (Southern Baptist), speaking of Nevada GOP U.S. Senate nominee Sharron Angle (as reported in The New York Times).
And what exactly makes Ms. Angle, the Tea Party candidate, so Jesus-like? The Washington Post has the run down on her positions:
Inflammatory rhetoric: In an interview last month with the Reno Gazette-Journal, Angle had this to say about gun laws: "What is a little bit disconcerting and concerning is the inability for sporting goods stores to keep ammunition in stock," she told the newspaper. "That tells me the nation is arming. What are they arming for if it isn't that they are so distrustful of their government? They're afraid they'll have to fight for their liberty in more Second Amendment kinds of ways. That's why I look at this as almost an imperative. If we don't win at the ballot box, what will be the next step?" Abolishing wide swaths of the federal government: Angle believes the U.S. Education Department should be abolished, as she explains on her campaign Web site: "Sharron Angle believes that the Federal Department of Education should be eliminated. The Department of Education is unconstitutional and should not be involved in education, at any level." Angle went further in an interview with a Nevada online publication, writing that she favored the termination of the Energy Department, the EPA and much of the IRS tax code; complete elimination of the National Endowment for the Arts, Freddie Mac and Fannie Mae.
* Yucca Mountain: Angle supports the permanent storage of highly radioactive nuclear waste in this cavernous mountain 100 miles northwest of Las Vegas. It has long been a bipartisan matter for the Silver State's congressional delegation to oppose the Yucca Mountain storage plan. Reid has touted his ability to kill the plan to store the waste at Yucca as the single most important thing he's done for his state since becoming Democratic leader in 2005. Here's how she described her support in the interview with the online publication: "For nearly twenty years, I have been in favor of Yucca Mountain as a profitable center." Reid's campaign is sure to ask Angle, since she has proposed abolishing the DOE, who would oversee the nuclear waste stored at Yucca.
* God and guns: At her coming out party in Washington -- at a "tea party" event April 15 at the National Press Club -- Angle invoked God and guns as her leading issues. It's unclear how such views will play statewide in a general election, given that local polling shows fewer than 20 percent of voters aligning themselves with the tea party. "You know, I feel a little lonely today, I usually bring Smith and Wesson along, and I have to tell you I'm going to give Washington, D.C., a lesson in the Constitution, especially the second amendment. But I didn't come alone today. I brought God -- always bring him -- and I brought my husband of 40 years, Ted Angle. Now, I subscribe to the KISS principle, Keep It Simple, Sharron. The solutions to the problems that we have with our economy are as simple as: pay it back, cut back and take back."Global isolationism: Angle has called for the United States to withdraw from the United Nations. Again, from her campaign Web site: "The UN. has been captured by the far left and has become ineffective and costly. The UN. continually threatens US. sovereignty, with endless rhetoric and treaties and it has now become the 'umpire' on fraudulent science, such as global warming. The United State needs to withdraw from the United Nations and work solely with America's willing allies."
I don't see a lot of the Gospel in her political positions. Regardless, as Jim Wallis likes to say, Jesus isn't a Republican...or a Democrat. But we've heard this kind of rhetoric before from the GOP. Remember how it ended?
