The state to the right of Washington

Bill Sali, a first term Republican congressman from Idaho, has weighed in on last month's opening of a session of the Senate with a prayer by a Hindu cleric, Rajan Zed of Nevada. Needless to say, he was against it and he's sure our founding fathers would have agreed with him.

We have not only a Hindu prayer being offered in the Senate, we have a Muslim member of the House of Representatives now, Keith Ellison from Minnesota. Those are changes -- and they are not what was envisioned by the Founding Fathers.

You know what else our founding fathers didn't envision? Microwave ovens. That's right, not even Ben Franklin, who a very smart person and who knew more than a little about ovens. But, I digress.

Sali says America was built on Christian principles that were derived from scripture. He also says the only way the United States has been allowed to exist in a world that is so hostile to Christian principles is through "the protective hand of God."

"You know, the Lord can cause the rain to fall on the just and the unjust alike," says the Idaho Republican.

According to Congressman Sali, the only way the U.S. can continue to survive is under that protective hand of God. He states when a Hindu prayer is offered, "that's a different god" and that it "creates problems for the longevity of this country."

HIstorical revisionism, Christian persecution complex, and open bigotry are par for the course with Sali. Before moving to Washington, Sali was in the Idaho statehouse where Bruce Newcomb, the conservative Republican speaker, said of him, "That idiot is just an absolute idiot. He doesn't have one ounce of empathy in his whole fricking body. And you can put that in the paper." Many Boise observers were aghast at his winning the nomination last year, but with lots of support from the Club for Growth he managed to win in the reddest of the red states. Sali once declared that critical thinking skills were relatively unimportant for the job of legislating and has been doing his best to prove that in his first year in Washington.

In slapping down Sali's historical revisionism about America as a Christian nation, Ed Brayton brought up a wonderful quote from 1788. The writer, Isaac Kramnick, was one of the many ministers who railed against the Constitution during the debate over its ratification because they saw it as a godless document. Kramnick warned that passage of the constitution would allow the following undesirable types to hold office:

1st. Quakers, who will make the blacks saucy, and at the same time deprive us of the means of defence - 2dly. Mahometans, who ridicule the Trinity - 3dly. Deists, abominable wretches - 4thly. Negroes, the seed of Cain - 5thly. Beggars, who when set on horseback will ride to the devil - 6thly. Jews etc. etc.

A commentor named Wes did a top notch job of updating the quote to identify today's undesirable types:
pdate this quote:

1st. Liberals, who will make the blacks saucy, and at the same time deprive us of the means of defence - 2dly. Atheists, who ridicule the Trinity - 3dly. Homosexuals, abominable wretches - 4thly. Arabs, the seed of Cain - 5thly. Illegal immigrants, who when set on horseback will ride to the devil - 6thly. Abortion doctors and evolutionists etc. etc.

There you have it; Bill Sali is our last line of defense against Quakers and saucy Negroes.