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Related: Editorials & Other Articles, Issue Forums, Alliance Forums, Region ForumsTerry Gross interviews Sarah Posner about Bannon/Sessions/Pence alt-right
http://www.npr.org/2017/02/02/513041005/exploring-the-nationalistic-and-christian-right-influences-on-trumpExploring The Nationalistic And Christian Right Influences On Trump
Sarah Posner, a reporter with The Nation's Investigative Fund, talks about how the Steve Bannon-Jeff Sessions-Mike Pence nexus is influencing President Trump's policies.
includes awful stuff about Bannon like this:
snip...the way he described Islam to me similarly frames that as not a religion that's entitled to the protections of the First Amendment free exercise clause. He described Islam to me as a political ideology similar to Nazism or communism. So in his mind, Islam is not a religion but rather a political ideology that is in conflict with Western values.
GROSS: I see. So if you frame it as a political ideology, then it no longer has the protections of religion.
POSNER: Right. I mean, the free exercise clause of the First Amendment protects people's religious exercise, but if it's not a religion, it's not entitled to that. Now, of course, Islam is a religion despite Steve Bannon and many other conservatives efforts to portray it as a political ideology rather than a religion. But this is part of their political strategy. It is to frame Islam as an enemy of the West. And that is what underlies these efforts to keep Muslims out...snip
Dawson Leery
(19,348 posts)Orrex
(63,215 posts)Fresh Air is one of the few consistent bright spots on the increasingly center-right NPR.
Achilleaze
(15,543 posts)Please? ...for those of use who did not have an opportunity to listen?
Inquiring minds want to know...
Hekate
(90,714 posts)...truncated. So I entered the pilates studio feeling kind of like how that guy in your photo looks, but without the full info. Sorry.
diva77
(7,643 posts)from the same interview in original post: http://www.npr.org/2017/02/02/513041005/exploring-the-nationalistic-and-christian-right-influences-on-trump
snip...Bannon's film called "The Torchbearer" (ph). Bannon had produced the film in conjunction with Citizens United, the nonprofit outlet that led to the Citizens United Supreme Court case. And there was a reception afterwards, and I just approached him to talk about the film and how it was going - intended to appeal both to the Christian right and to the alt-right. And it was in that conversation that he said to me that Breitbart is the platform for the alt-right.
To me, it was his statement that he actually embraced the movement as it defines itself as a white nationalist movement, even though he tried to deny to me in the interview that it is a white nationalist movement.
it was Jeff Sessions, not Trump, who was basically the forerunner of this nationalist movement that we're seeing now in the United States; he told me quite specifically that Trump was late to this party, meaning this nationalism party, and that it was really Jeff Sessions who had been the champion of it for many years before that. So I think looking back at that statement in hindsight and knowing now from reporting by The Washington Post and others that Jeff Sessions has played a very strong hand in the executive orders on refugees and immigration that we saw last week and that Bannon is playing a very key role in advising the president, it seems that the Bannon-Sessions nexus is crucial in understanding how the Trump policy is being laid out right now...snip
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There is some even more scary stuff (yep, scarier!) that I can't find in the transcript -- maybe they edited it out; hopefully they left it in the audio interview
Achilleaze
(15,543 posts)Jim Beard
(2,535 posts)To claim Muslim as not a religion is a long stretch but then again, they are not christian.
pat_k
(9,313 posts)Propaganda painting Islam as a political ideology (and in the heads of Bannonites, undoubtedly a "dangerous political ideology" is intended to demonetize, sure, but how does conceiving it as a political ideology make it any less protected?
Short of calling on followers to commit crimes, aren't both religious doctrine and political ideology protected? If a group of neo-nazi's promote an ideology that falls short of incitement to crime, can I deprive them of liberty, or otherwise infringe on their civil rights, because they identify as neo-nazi's? As far as I know, the answer is no. Seems to me that Neo-Nazism, or Liberalism, or whatever, is just as protected as Catholicism, or Judaism, or whatever.
And, if a religious doctrine called on it's followers to commit a crime -- treason, unlawful battery, domestic abuse, whatever -- followers who do as they are told would still be committing crimes. Just because the catalyst was religious doctrine doesn't protect the perpetrator from the criminal justice system Same would go for political ideology that called on followers to a commit criminal act. Crimes are crimes.
What am I missing?
wishstar
(5,270 posts)They seek to put all Muslims, or all Muslims from certain countries in a category of suspected terrorists, rather than merely affiliated with a religion or political ideology in order to deny legal protection.