Family Research Council Is Thankful for Lack of Fact-Checkers:
In case you were there sittin' around with yer families, all around that mighty Thanksgiving table tomorrow, starin' at each other across the steroid-enhanced gigantor turkey, the mashed potatoes larded with hormone-filled cream and butter, high fructose corn syrup-based pies, the whole pesticide-coated cornucopia, and you were wonderin' to high holy heaven just what the hell you can beg Godjeezus fer in yer grace-sayin', then the Family Research Council's Super-Duper Prayer Team has answered your...um...prayers.

The Rude Pundit joined the Super-Duper Prayer Team several years ago under a nom de rude (so he can be a spy in the house o' love), and every week he receives his dirty prayerchez orders, telling him what to implore the invisible sky wizard to do to others and/or for us. This week, it's a special Thanksgiving version, which did you know is all about socialism?

Aw, sure. "In their struggle to survive in the New World, our Pilgrim Fathers learned that socialism does not work! A two-year long experiment in 1621-1622 taught them that when government redistributes income, scarcity, dependence and even death result...For their first two years at Plymouth, the Pilgrims embraced a well-intended scheme: the fruit of each man's labor went into a common storehouse; each then took from the storehouse as his family had need," says the FRC (motto: "Your one-stop history filter"). "Laziness and thievery resulted when capable men refused to labor but demanded to be fed." Then, one might imagine, they got drunk and had a giant gay orgy since apparently no women were around. It's why the sexual position known as "pilgrim buggery" involves buckles and...oh, wait. No?

Hells, no. According to the FRC, then good and wise Governor Billy Bradford changed shit around, "requiring each family to raise its own food." And they lived happily ever after because from 1623 on because of "the hard lessons about socialism and the benefits of free enterprise learned by those who inspired Thanksgiving Day."

And that'd be awesome if it was true. However, that version of the pilgrim story "misrepresents the purpose of the Pilgrims and the results of their heroic strivings. It derives from a superficial appraisal of a statement by Governor William Bradford and a partial reading of the copious records left by the literate Pilgrims." That quote is not from some wild and woolly liberal blog spouting socialist propaganda. It's actually from a 1976 publication by the John fuckin' Birch Society (hence the "heroism" of Indian slaying). And if those paranoid motherfuckers decide something ain't socialist, it ain't fuckin' socialist. Even rabid right-wingers know the real story is so much more complex that there's no way to reduce to a grunting "socialism bad, capitalism good" simian dichotomy.

(Of course, the notion that it was only stupid, selfish white people who couldn't live communally in the "New World" doesn't come into play here.)

But, still, this is supposed to be about the mighty, mighty praytones of Thanksgiving, and here's the kick-Karl-Marx-in-the-taint prayer: "May families across America, especially Christians, reflect this Thanksgiving upon these great lessons of socialism vs. liberty," and further, "May we unite in prayer against every new government program built upon an ideology in which government exercises far too much power." Mmm, that makes stuffing taste so much more stuffinger.

The SDPT is always given bible verses to demonstrate that the prayers have some stamp of approval. They are almost always confounding. Like this one that's supposed to somehow relate to the pilgrim story, from Isaiah 61:1: "The Spirit of the Sovereign Lord is on me, because the Lord has anointed me to preach good news to the poor. He has sent me to bind up the brokenhearted, to proclaim freedom for the captives and release from darkness for the prisoners."

Seriously, FRC, does anyone actually read the bible there? Because not only is that a verse that asks for mercy for prisoners, but five short verses later, Isaiah 61:6-7, it actually supports socialism: "You will feed on the wealth of nations, and in their riches you will boast. Instead of their shame, my people will receive a double portion." The King James version is a hell of a lot more explicit, something that's easily interpretable as a call for revolution against the rich. Share that dinner.