I want to write this down somewhere because I think there should be a record someplace that someone felt this way.
Has anyone watched the Reverend Wright footage closely? I mean, real closely, not the "GDA" soundbite so lovingly played ad infinitum by the likes of Sean Hannity.
Prior to the infamous phrase, the Reverend is speaking about bad stuff the United States has done to its own citizens and I think he mentions the treatment of Japanese-Americans in WW2 and the Tuskegee experiments and he says that God does not bless a country that does such things and he says something like "It is in the Bible" and then he says the hated phrase.
How would it have been received if he just had an extra "s" after the word "Damn"?
As in...
God doesn't bless countries that do bad things. Look at what happened to Japanese-Americans in WW2 or to the people in the Tuskegee experiments. I say God does not bless America. It is in the Bible. I say God Damns America, God Damns America. And he does so to all unjust nations.
Would there still be a controversy? All that the Reverend was doing was exposing the nauseating platitude ( so beloved of politicians and their drones ) of "God Bless America" used at the end of every speech by every candidate in every election.
I don't believe in God, but if I did, I would definitely think he would not be in the nation-blessing business. ( except maybe Israel ).
OK I know this sounds like I'm parsing phrases even closer than "It all depends on what your meaning of the word 'is' is", but in the larger context of what the Reverend Wright was saying, I think that extra "s" really makes sense.
