The Latest Anti-Christ

Of all the stupid rumors about Barak Obama that have circulated this country (i.e., He's a Muslem trying to turn America into a Muslem ruled state.  He's Arab.  He's Egyptian. He's going to raise common people's taxes.), I think the one alleging him to be The Anti-Christ is the most amusing of all.  (However, the claims of him being Muslem, Arab and Egyptian were funny.)  This, as well as, the others, indicate desperation on the part of people that make up and spread these fabrications.  Such rumors are intended for gullible and ignorant members of America's voting population, the sort that believe rumors which are loosely based in scripture from the Christian bible. (Most often from the King James Version.)

Obama is not the first person accused of being The Anti-Christ.  I recall when Bill Clinton was pinned with this label during the 2004 election season.

Was Al Gore, John Kerry, or any other Democratic presidential  candidate for the 2000 and 2004 elections branded as The Anti-Christ during those election years?  If not, I might know why.

George W. Bush (most likely with the aid of Karl Rove) knew how to work the fundamentalist "Christians" without relying on the age-old "anti-Christ" scare tactic to attract these people's money and other support.  Bush used wedge issues like abortion, gay rights, including the controversy over gay marriage, to lure religious groups, particularly under the Christian banner, to support each of his presidential campaigns.  He wore religion on his sleeve, passing himself off as the kind of guy that prays for divine guidance and frequently called Billy Graham for advice since he was a kid.  Bush used his claims to faith in God and Jesus to attract  mass support from so-called "Christian conservatives" for anything in his regime's agenda. He and his regime added the religious based manipulations to other things, like physical fear of terrorist attacks, and patriotic (or rather, nationalistic) fervor to convince scores of Americans to readily sacrifice themselves, or their loved ones (including their own adult children).That was enough for him to rally political support from the so-called Christian conservatives.

If anybody was being called The Anti-Christ during Bush's first term, it was Osama bin Laden.  That didn't last long.  Once Bush, Cheney, Rove, and their pals decided that bin Laden was no longer an important tool (except when they needed the recycled and other suspicious "videos", reportedly of Osama bin Laden for diversionary causes), Saddam Hussein became The Anti-Christ.

When I was a kid, right-wing extremists tried to convince young Christians and Christian parents to help ban rock-n-roll by implicating certain rock and rollers  as The Anti-Christ.   Did you know, Elvis Presley was The Anti- Christ? He was rumored to mesmerize women and teen girls, not just with his good looks and songs, but also with his gyrating pelvis.

In the 60's and 70's, John Lennon (Beatles) and Mick Jagger (Rolling Stones) were each accused of being The Anti-Christ. Little wonder with Lennon's social and political views, such as, his opposition to war, and Jagger's reportedly acid-trip inspired song, Sympathy for the Devil.

Ozzie Osborn, who openly described himself as a Satanist (before the luggage mixup incident which reportedly changed his religion), was called The Anti-Christ.  That was when right-wing extremists with a socio-political agenda set about their task of convincing concerned parents that Satanic cults were cropping up all over the country in every suburban and rural community, and every small town with a small-minded population. (Like the people of West Memphis, Tn.)

More believable:  the John Birch Society warned that The Anti-Christ would rise among the political and geographic rulers of so-called communist countries (where socialism and bans on free enterprise were used as a tool for mass control).  What made this more easily believed was that religious discussions, literature, practice, and institutions were banned by the governments of the U.S.S.R., the Republic of China, and Castro's Cuba.  As I recall, such bans also existed in East Germany before the Berlin Wall was breached and destroyed.

Why Barak Obama? What did he do to inspire some covert group of religious propaganda to elect him as the latest accused anti-Christ?

Obama is probably the latest alleged anti-Christ for the same reason why President Bill Clinton was so accused.  Talk of Clinton being The Anti-Christ seemed to circulate wildly around the time of the 1996  major US election season. His political enemies were calling him names like Slick Willie and Teflon Bill.  No matter what, they couldn't seem to ruin his popularity among more than half of the US voting population.  They had plenty of help from the so-called liberal media, which they condemned for not being severe enough on Clinton's image.  Clinton was too resiliant, and obviously more clever than his political enemies, until he testified in his own defense to the Grand Jury.

I've heard frequent remarks about Barak Obama's Teflon-like image. He's handling himself and his campaign quite well.  He's consistently leading in polls which are intended to compare his popularity among US voters, to John Mc Cain's.  In recent weeks, John Mc Cain's and Sarah Palin's popularity has waned, now that the newness surroundin Palin is wearing off, along with her "folksy" talk.  Additionally, Mc Cain appears to attract a lot of supporters that strike many of us as being ripe candidates for psychiatric evaluation. They've  been seen and heard on TV!  One (crazy lady with messed up hair) was parodied on the prime time Thursday night SNL specials.  This is causing desperation among partisan Republicans, especially since Bush's popularity dwindled lower than any US president's, even among the most mentally whacked, right-wing religious fanatics that had once held Bush as equal to Jesus.

One other thing:  Obama is the son of a black man and he has a Muslem-sounding name, according to some hicks in Wood County, Texas. Since high-profile Republicans don't feel comfortable with openly stating that they don't want any president with anything, except an all Caucasian family history, they must find another reason to discourage more voters (namely Christians) that aren't hung-up on ethnic backgrounds and names.

It is pointless to attempt to reason with the kind of Americans that really believe all this talk of Obama being The Anti-Christ.   If you've gotten to know any of these people very well, then you know that they are inclined to learn a lot of life lessons the hard way, regardless of how obviously foolish their choices tend to be.  They foresake logic and truth for twisted perspectives and lies that sound "right" to them, because those lies and twisted perspectives reflect what these people want to be true. Many of them never really learn from the consequences caused by their poor choices, no matter how many rounds of cause-and-ill-effects they experience.

My way to handle this is to laugh and shake my head.  If I say anything, it's, "So, this is the latest so-called anti-Christ.  I wonder, who will be the next one."