{"id":15960,"date":"2009-10-09T12:59:18","date_gmt":"2009-10-09T18:59:18","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/?p=15960"},"modified":"2009-10-09T12:59:19","modified_gmt":"2009-10-09T18:59:19","slug":"one-nation-under-godawful-art","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2009\/10\/09\/one-nation-under-godawful-art.html","title":{"rendered":"One Nation Under Godawful Art"},"content":{"rendered":"
<\/div>\n

I was going to do an extended, blow-by-blow ranting screed over this truly wretched (and specially annotated) piece of art (and history)<\/a> … but David Willis did the (specially annotated) job for me<\/a>, and far more entertainingly.<\/p>\n

I cannot, however, restrain myself from summarize my feelings on three points of Jon McNaughton’s hit job on American history, polity, religion, and and law:<\/p>\n

    \n
  1. America is, in McNaughton’s eyes, lily-white. Yes, there is one black historical figure, one Indian, one black everyman soldier, and one Godless Heathen Immigrant Terrified of Constitutional Jesus. That’s all very appropriate, because Constitutional Jesus is about as Semitic-looking as Brad Pitt. Oh, there’s a black college student, but it’s okay because he’s surrounded by more mature while folk.<\/li>\n
  2. The irony of Thomas Jefferson standing proudly next to Jesus is remarkable, given that while Jefferson considered Jesus to have been a great human teacher, he decried the mythmaking down about him, and created his own abridged New Testament where he excised all the miracles.   He’d probably be a bit nonplussed in front of glowing Constitutional Jesus. Indeed, while most of the founders shown were theists, they tended to be freethinking in various aspects of their religion, deeply distrustful of churches, and many of them were dedicated to the separation of Church and State.<\/li>\n
  3. The litany of stereotypes on the lower right — the heedless politician, the remorseful SCOTUS justice, the evil-utionist professor, the smarmy actor, the greedy lawyer, the liberal journalist — would be breathtaking enough, even without Emperor Palpatine<\/strike> Satan <\/em>lurking in the shadows behind them. All that’s missing is a swishy hair stylist and a slavering abortionist to make the picture complete. (I’m not quite sure what the pregnant woman is doing hanging out with that crowd.)<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n

    Yeesh.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

    I was going to do an extended, blow-by-blow ranting screed over this truly wretched (and specially annotated) piece of art (and history) … but David Willis did the (specially annotated) job for me, and far more entertainingly. I cannot, however, restrain myself from summarize my feelings on three points of Jon McNaughton’s hit job on American history, polity, religion, … Continue reading “One Nation Under Godawful Art”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_seopress_titles_title":"","_seopress_titles_desc":"","_seopress_robots_index":"","_seopress_robots_follow":"","_seopress_robots_imageindex":"","_seopress_robots_snippet":"","_seopress_robots_primary_cat":"","_seopress_robots_breadcrumbs":"","_seopress_robots_freeze_modified_date":"","_seopress_robots_custom_modified_date":"","_seopress_robots_canonical":"","_seopress_social_fb_title":"","_seopress_social_fb_desc":"","_seopress_social_fb_img":"","_seopress_social_fb_img_attachment_id":0,"_seopress_social_fb_img_width":0,"_seopress_social_fb_img_height":0,"_seopress_social_twitter_title":"","_seopress_social_twitter_desc":"","_seopress_social_twitter_img":"","_seopress_social_twitter_img_attachment_id":0,"_seopress_social_twitter_img_width":0,"_seopress_social_twitter_img_height":0,"_seopress_redirections_value":"","_seopress_redirections_enabled":"","_seopress_redirections_enabled_regex":"","_seopress_redirections_logged_status":"","_seopress_redirections_param":"","_seopress_redirections_type":0,"_seopress_analysis_target_kw":"","_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[66,9,27],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-15960","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-media-art","category-politics-law","category-religion"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":128437,"url":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2015\/10\/25\/a-map-of-middle-earth-annotated-by-tolkien.html","url_meta":{"origin":15960,"position":0},"title":"A map of Middle-earth, annotated by Tolkien","author":"***Dave","date":"Sun 25-Oct-15 9:07pm","format":false,"excerpt":"This is very cool.(Word has it that Christopher Tolkien will be issuing a trilogy of atlases based on it.) Tolkien's annotated map of Middle-earth discovered inside copy of Lord of the Rings Map goes on sale in Oxford for \u00a360,000 after being found at Blackwell\u2019s Rare Books inside novel belonging\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "~PlusPosts"","block_context":{"text":"~PlusPosts","link":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/category\/blogging\/plusposts"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":6888,"url":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2004\/12\/09\/take_ten.html","url_meta":{"origin":15960,"position":1},"title":"Take Ten","author":"***Dave","date":"Thu 9-Dec-04 2:28pm","format":false,"excerpt":"Swell. The Bush administration, saying that religion \"has played a defining role'' in the nation's history, urged the U.S. Supreme Court to permit Ten Commandments displays in courthouses. The Justice...","rel":"","context":"In "Politics & Law"","block_context":{"text":"Politics & Law","link":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/category\/politics-law"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":8072,"url":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2005\/05\/26\/into_the_woods.html","url_meta":{"origin":15960,"position":2},"title":"Into the woods","author":"***Dave","date":"Thu 26-May-05 3:26pm","format":false,"excerpt":"Ooooh. The Stanford Sierra Camp thang that Margie and I are going to looks pretty neat, and a nice place to stay, too. Food and drink and Constitutional Law lectures,...","rel":"","context":"In "Travel"","block_context":{"text":"Travel","link":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/category\/travel"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":24517,"url":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2011\/12\/13\/not-quite-george-lucas-star-wars-reissue-level-of-annoyance-but-still.html","url_meta":{"origin":15960,"position":3},"title":"Not quite George Lucas Star Wars Reissue level of annoyance, but still","author":"***Dave","date":"Tue 13-Dec-11 2:28pm","format":false,"excerpt":"Dagnabbit! I already have the Platinum Ultimate Absolute Edition Sandman, and now there's the Annotated Edition? Dagnabbit! And it looks so cool! DAGNABBIT! #ddtb Embedded Link The Annotated Sandman, Vol. 1 (Excerpt) by Neil Gaiman,Leslie Klinger | Tor.com An exclusive excerpt from The Annotated Sandman, Volume 1 by Neil Gaiman\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "~PlusPosts"","block_context":{"text":"~PlusPosts","link":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/category\/blogging\/plusposts"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":51869,"url":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2015\/07\/24\/all-your-law-is-belong-to-us.html","url_meta":{"origin":15960,"position":4},"title":"All Your Law Is Belong To Us","author":"***Dave","date":"Fri 24-Jul-15 6:44pm","format":false,"excerpt":"The State of Georgia suggests that annotating and publishing the state's laws is a violation of copyright. And they're suing the guy who did it.So much for respect for the law, not to mention free enterprise. Originally shared by +Electronic Frontier Foundation: Georgia brings a copyright lawsuit against Carl Malamud\u2014for\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "~PlusPosts"","block_context":{"text":"~PlusPosts","link":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/category\/blogging\/plusposts"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":8967,"url":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2006\/03\/14\/first_things_fi.html","url_meta":{"origin":15960,"position":5},"title":"First things first","author":"***Dave","date":"Tue 14-Mar-06 8:04pm","format":false,"excerpt":"During testimony regarding a proposed Maryland state law that would ban gay marriage (but would, perhaps, recognize some sort of civil unions), James Raskin, a constitutional scholar from American University,...","rel":"","context":"In "LGBTQ &c"","block_context":{"text":"LGBTQ &c","link":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/category\/gay-stuff"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]}],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15960","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=15960"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15960\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=15960"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=15960"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=15960"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}