GOP REP. MAX MILLER LEARNS BEING A COURT JEW DOESN'T HELP
Speaks out against "Come to Christ or go to hell" tweet and he winds up apologizing!
The Background: Ohio Anti-Choice Leader Tweets Classic Antisemitic Tropes About People Who Don’t Worship Christ Being Doomed to Hell
Yahoo News and The Hill, among others, recently reported that Rep. Max Miller (R-OH) tweeted an angry response to a pro-life group communication director’s own tweet that there is “no hope for any of us outside of having faith in Jesus Christ alone.” (She later tweeted that “'Jesus answered, ‘I am the way and the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me,’” and"No one has hope outside of Jesus Christ and every knee will bow one day declaring that Jesus Chris is Lord.") Miller asked her to delete the statement. He was forced to aplogize!
It must be noted that the tweeter, Lizzie Marbach, is not a minister nor a theologian; she is a professional right wing Republican activist who is paid as the Communications Director of Ohio Right to Life, a GOP-dominated anti-choice PAC. (She also hosts a conservative You Tube show.) Her messaging is part of her politicking. We all know that the driving force behind the anti-choice movement is a fundamentalist Christian theology that allows for no other views. This is the sole basis for the anti-choice movement, unsupported by science or medicine.
Important to Remember: Ms. Marbach and the Ohio GOP Do Not Represent All Christians!
Living in America, I have known Christians throughout my life on every level of human relationship. By no means do the majority share Ms. Marbach’s hateful views. Most that I have met keep their religious views to themselves and respect those of others. They never claim their way is the only way or that people who don’t agree are bad people who are doomed. Only right wing extremist Christians hold such views, especially those who describe themselves White Christian Nationalists.
On a personal note, one of my wife’s cousins is a Roman Catholic priest. (My wife is a Filipino-American and a Jew by Choice, just like Rabbi Miriam Rivera.) He and I are good friends and he never tries to convert me or criticize my wife’s conversion. The Roman Catholic Church, as distinct from the right wing fundamentalists, has rejected antisemitism and the “Christ-killer” myth and even stated that Jews have their own special deal with The Almighty and are exempt from the need to accept Christ. So today they don’t think we’re bad people or that we are doomed. As an extremely secular Jew, the hell business never worried me one bit, especially since Jews don’t believe in it, but it’s nice to know the bigotry isn’t by any means universal in Christianity.
Why is Rep. Miller Surprised at Bigotry in His Party?
Rep. Miller is that very rare Jewish American who is also a Republican. (For the record, there are 27 Jewish Democrats in the House as opposed to only 2 Republicans.)
He won't be the first to delude himself into thinking he could forge a workable alliance with right wing Evangelical Christians, and that he could expect a relationship of mutual respect. I hope he is the last.
Now he runs into the harsh, cold reality that these folks have no respect for us and are convinced unless we all switch over to what they believe, we're on the fast track to hell.
Rep. Miller is an acolyte of Donald Trump, as such, one of the few Jews in that circle of a different hell. Surely he heard his master call Nazis “really fine people,” tell the neo-Nazi Proud boys to “stand back, stand down,” dine with antisemite Kanye West and neo-Nazi Holocaust denier Nick Fuentes, heard Trump question the loyalty of American Jews. He nevertheless enabled his party to disenfranchise Black voters, strip women and LBGTQ+ people of their rights, and promote White Christian Nationalism in law and policy. He knows of the Muslim Ban, the “shithole countries” remarks and his recent racist tirades against Black judges and prosecutors.
So what is he surprised about? This is what Max Miller has been working towards!
Jewish Republican Representative Max Miller of Ohio campaigning with his hero, Donald Trump, for whom Miller worked during that horrific one term in the White House. Now he is shocked that his party is dominated by racists and antisemites. (Photo courtesy of Drew Anger/Getty Images.)
Don’t Confuse Freedom of Speech and Freedom of Religion With Bigotry
People have the religious freedom to hold even bigoted views, and they have a First Amendment right to express them. They have the right to link anti-choice politics with a very narrow and discriminatory religious view of the world. They have the right to say that people who don’t share their religious views are bad people and are doomed to the hell these religious fanatics envision.
On the other hand, people who are targeted as being on the wrong side and who are declared doomed because of their own beliefs, have the same rights to state their thoughts as does Lizzie Marbach.
Miller should not be surprised at Marbach’s views; as a major figure in Republican circles, he knows her group and he or his staff has surely checked out her group’s website, which contains the following statement about Ms. Marbach:
“She firmly believes that the only path forward in the fight against abortion is to allow the bible alone to define the issue and to reject the temptation to remove God from the conversation. She believes that scripture alone is our sole authority and should be our ultimate guide in all things—including politics.”
Those are the kinds of people Max Miller got in bed with. (Politically only!)
All of a sudden freedom of religion and freedom of speech isn't so good in the eyes of these right wingers when a Jewish Republican speaks out against this missionary/conversion mentality that every Jew in America finds rather repulsive.
I understand that having a Congressional Rep ask someone to delete a tweet could be quite intimidating, though they are without any power to do so. I'm also confident that Ms. Marbach, a professional anti-choice activist and right wing talk show host, who tweeted that everyone better become Christian or head straight to hell, is not one to be intimidated by Rep. Miller. Quite the contrary.
LIZZIE MARBACH’S TWEETS WERE BIGOTED, ANTISEMITIC, HATEFUL, AND SERVE NO PURPOSE OTHER THAN TO DIVIDE AND STIR HATRED BECAUSE THAT IS THE REPUBLICAN GAME PLAN
Just Because Words Are Uttered As a Religious Expression Doesn’t Mean They Aren’t Bigoted
If someone thinks I'm doomed just because I'm not the same religion as them, yeah, that's bigoted. What else should I call it? Tolerance? Inclusiveness? Respect? Come on, no way. It's intolerance, disrespect, bigotry. What am I supposed to think upon hearing that as I currently am, I can’t be “saved?” It doesn’t sound like the speaker thinks very much of me as a person, just because my religion isn’t theirs. That is the essence of bigotry.
I have no desire to become a Christian; to be perfectly honest, I’d rather have a root canal a day for the rest of my life. I also have no desire to alter the First Amendment and tell anyone what to believe or what they can say.
Similarly, I demand that those same rights be afforded people who think differently than the White Christian Nationalists. This means that just as I have to accept people saying my birth as a Jew makes me both bad and doomed, my right to call them bigots, liars and fanatics should be equally respected.
After all, I’m not the one running around trumpeting my religious thoughts and condemning anyone who thinks differently. I’m not linking any one religion and politics.
While we’re on this topic, let’s note that while the fundamentalists and White Christian Nationalists rage endlessly about Muslim attempts to turn Sharia into law, in actuality, the only people trying to impose their religious beliefs on everyone else by force of law are Christians!
As an aside, Rep. Ilhan Omar, who defended Marbach and denounced Miller, is an outlier and backbencher with no serious clout in the Democratic Party and who does not speak for Democrats nor is she in the best position to explain how to respectfully refer to other faiths. (She absolutely doesn’t speak for me.) After all, almost the entire House condemned her for repeating antisemitic tropes about the loyalty of American Jews and their supposed economic control. Omar is from Minnesota, not Ohio. It’s telling she is the only Democrat they could find to support Ms. Marbach and attack Max Miller. I think we know why.
All Americans Under Attack Must Stand Together and Defeat the Bigots
This incident provides yet one more reason for all communities under attack to work with all the other people the right wingers hate. We have to stop them next election by keeping the White House, taking back the House, keeping the Senate, and making big gains in the different states. We can’t allow such intolerant and angry people to grab power.
Jewish Americans must stand shoulder to shoulder with our brothers and sisters in the other communities the Republicans are persecuting: Muslims, immigrants of all backgrounds, LBGTQ+, women, the disabled, scientists, teachers, even businesses fearing DeSantis-style takeovers of the way they manage themselves. Let’s show the haters what Americans are really all about.
You Must Vote Blue in November, 2024!
This is no time for any rational American to even think about voting third party or not voting at all. In November, 2024, vote for President Biden and the entire Democratic ticket. I’m not saying every one of them is perfect, but I can easily say every single Democrat is a better choice than any Republican on the ballot. Democracy itself is at stake!
Don’t bite off your nose to spite your face! If you have issues with Democrats, they can be taken up the day after the election, when MAGA and the bigots have been soundly defeated and we can move forward in a progressive manner. If the Trumpies regain power, we will not have that opportunity.
Image courtesy freepix.com
Max Miller’s Attempts to Fit In Will Never Succeed
Because poor Rep. Miller is trying to do this impossible tightrope walk between being a far right ally of the Christian White Nationalists and being a Jew, he wound up apologizing. That’s weak and embarrassing and we Jewish Americans can’t count on him and his ilk for respect and religious tolerance. He should be on our side and the side of people his party is persecuting. (While Mr. Weinstein, the Democratic state legislator who joined Miller in the condemnation, did delete his tweet asking Ms. Marchant to excise her own tweet, at least he didn’t grovel and apologize to the bigot. But it was weakness.)
Like caving and groveling really going to win Miller the respect of the people who hate us..
He's lost any he might have had of mine.
Poor sap.
Click here to read the Yahoo News/The Hill article about the controversy
I’ve found The hill to be somewhat conservative and Republican, and while the reporting is accurate, they don’t capture the intense anger of non-christian Americans or Christians who don’t hold such narrow and bigoted views.
This Substack page does not have a subscription fee, because I want as many people as possible to read what I have to say. That’s not to say we don’t accept donations!
If you enjoyed reading this post, you can click here to buy me a coffee.
And please check out my fiction. You can visit the Amazon Series Page for the acclaimed NJA Series: CLICK HERE
You can visit the Amazon page for Queensborough Rock, set amidst the NYC rock ‘n’ roll world circa 1970. CLICK HERE
All religious talk is sheer claptrap.
Sorry. I am Jewish. Have been a loyal Dem in the past. But now they are just a con artist party in my opinion. They talk a good game of being on our side but when they are in control they have a myriad of excuses as to why things that are good progressive policies cannot get done. As an example I use Obama when he was elected. There are videos to back this. He said his biggest priority was codifying RvW. Well he had a huge +40 House, a super Senate majority for over 2 months, & all of a sudden it was no longer a priority. Well, lo and behold the Republicans came along & acted! They do what they want yet Dems always find excuses for inaction.
Besides that the Democratic party is an oxymoron. How can it be democratic when it argued in court it had right to rig primaries (which Bernie found out about twice), it has super delegates no voter votes for, & tries to block Greens from the ballot.
I believe the utter mess we are in was created by 2 parties. Yet both parties now are filled with people who blame the other party for all our ills. Time Inc, not a bastion of left wing thought, says over $50T has been redistributed upwards! To think only 1 party is responsible for that is crazy thinking. I believe there is a difference between the 2--the Republicans will cause a quick death, the Democrats a slower one. So.....pick your poison.