"Socialism is a rich man's game."

Roger Simon writes about the development of a "new class" on the Left:

Socialism is a rich man’s game.

Oh, sure, random overheated (sometimes impoverished) Occupiers agitate for their version of economic equality, possibly gumming up the works at the Lincoln Tunnel, but the real financial justice action comes from the wealthy – or so it would seem.

And I’m not just talking about Hollywood, where George Clooney is full steam ahead on a putative record-breaking ten million dollar fundraiser for Barack Obama, or the laughably meretricious theatrics of the “Buffett Tax” that no one would pay anyway, but across the nation.

According to a book about to be released, The Rise of the President’s Permanent Campaign by Brendan J. Doherty, Obama has held more fundraisers than all presidents since Nixon combined.

What does this have to do with socialism? A lot, really, because what Obama promises – especially in his second term — is a socialism of permanent elites, a kind of new, very American, version of the old Soviet-style nomenklatura. And those who are in it will get to stay in it (via government support) as social mobility, aka the American Dream, diminishes or disappears.

This was what socialism ultimately was all about, indeed is all about, the preservation of nomenklaturas, whether of Hollywood, the media, union, and bureaucratic leadership or what remains of selected industry. Keep hoi polloi out.

All those fundraisers and bundlers, from Clooney to the considerably more anonymous, know this on one level or another. It’s certainly not subtle and those too clueless to understand were reminded by the recent quasi-blacklisting of potential Romney supporters. A warning shot was fired. No elite status for them.

Being part of this new nomenklatura is particularly crucial in hard times and even more so in hard times that look to be long-lasting and possibly permanent.

Don't think it's happening? Check out the video on this Gawker post about how the reliably leftist Atlantic magazine put on a cocktail party that put the VIP on a stage so that mere readers could gaze at them from the "cheap seats."

"Are you now or have you ever been a Lutheran?"

Mollie Ziegler Hemingway at Get Religion, who is a Lutheran, analyzes the silly hit piece on Michelle Bachman's former membership in the Wisconsin Evangelical Lutheran Synod (WELS):

I don’t know what it is about conservative women that makes some reporters lose their everliving minds, but Bachmann’s candidacy is this year’s Sarah Palin media meltdown, apparently.


In any case, Joshua Green is one of the more partisan folks at The Atlantic, and that harms his piece when it comes to stuff like facts, nuance and context.

For one thing, the headline is not true. It’s about the church body to which Bachmann once belonged, but not her current church. And let’s actually start there. I’m a confessional Lutheran. Ostensibly, Michele Bachmann was a member of a more conservative but also confessional Lutheran church body. And for years, whenever I heard her speak, she never sounded even mildly Lutheran to me. The “the Lord put it on my heart” type language. The “the Lord anointed me” stuff. This is not how Lutherans speak, although I won’t bore you with all of the why. Her other affiliations have always been more evangelical than Lutheran, going back decades.

You might keep that in mind when you’re thinking about what news value a hit-piece on the doctrinal views of a church that a presidential candidate no longer belongs to has.

And:

The justification for the hyperbolic story about 500-year-old history is that, we’re to believe, Michele Bachmann will have trouble getting the Catholic vote in light of the fact that she was once a member of a Protestant church that had Protestant views on Catholicism.


Yeah, right.

There is no political significance to what the article reports. Instead it serves only to alarm the casual observer over a non-issue. I mean, seriously, go to Minnesota and you can see for yourself that there is no 30 Years War breaking out among the large Catholic and Lutheran populations. That state has had tons of Catholic and Lutheran governors — many of whom held opposing views on the papacy. They somehow managed to get through it.

Exactly.  As Rodney Stark points out, religious cooperation in America is a unique phenomenon.  Despite their oppositions, members of different religions - led by their clergy - have cooperated in emergency relief and prayer services - in ways that have no imitation throughout the way.

This cooperation is what true tolerance looks like.  Rather than a watering-down of difference, in American religious pluralism we see a respect for other human beings because we recognize their humanity and their likeness to God and their common membership in a community united in mutual respect.

So, why in the face of that singular success, does the leftist media want to stir up religious discord by focusing on Mitt Romney's Mormonism and Michelle Bachman's former church's roots in the 16th Century?

Leftists suddenly concerned about Anti-Catholicism in America.

Tears welling up in my eyes...the Atlantic Magazine cares that the Wisconsin Evangelical Lutheran Church (WELS) keeps faith with Luther's teaching that the Pope is the Anti-Christ in its official doctrines....because Michelle Bachman belongs to a WELS church.

Here is the Atlantic smear-piece.

Newsflash! The Lutheran Conference - Missouri Synod (LCMS) also keeps this bit of hateful history, as do a few other denominations.

Unlike Obama's relationship with Rev. Wright, where he could hardly have missed the Anti-American sermons preached by Wright, there is - as yet - no evidence that Bachman knows about or agrees with this noxious bit of Lutheran doctrine.

Are we going to start outing all Lutheran politicians.