abaldwin360:

On Wednesday, MSNBC’s Martin Basir invited Rep. Joe Barton to discuss an upcoming vote in the House that would slash funding for, among other things, Meals on Wheels, and school lunches for poor children. Barton, some of you may recall, was the dipshit congressman who apologized on the House floor to British Petroleum for our ocean getting in the way of their oil.

Barton said a few interesting things, but one thing that REALLY caught my attention was when he tried to defend his callous cuts by pointing to the Bible.

Here’s a partial transcript:

Bashir: I know you’re a long time member of the Methodist Church. Is that correct?

Barton: Yes, sir. That’s a true statement.

Bashir: How do you square your approach with the Psalm 146, where the Psalmist writes this: “He gives food to the hungry. The lord protects foreigners. He defends orphans and widows.”  Isn’t this the exact opposite of the cuts being proposed by Republicans in congress?

Barton: No, the lord helps those who helps themselves…

Bashir:  Which verse of scripture is that, sir?


Barton: Well, it’s uh..


Bashir: I don’t think you’ll find that in the Old or New Testament.


Barton: Well, that was taught to me by my father who is president of the United Methodist school board in Waco Texas, and Bryant, Texas. 

So Bashir quoted scripture to make his case against the Repubicans’ policy, and Barton tries to defend himself by using a line, which he THOUGHT was also scripture,but actually doesn’t exist in the Bible. And his father taught him that? Sounds like a pretty shitty teacher. I Wonder if his dad happens to be David Barton… 

But what made that exchange worse was that here you have a guy who clearly thought that he was being clever with his rebuttal, and yet when it was made painfully apparent that he was full of shit, he remained absolutely unfazed. Not only was he not bothered by this, but he actually laughs about it (“Haha, so you mean one of the basic tenets of my religion, which I followed throughout my entire life was actually never advocated by the central figure of said religion? Boy is MY face red!”)

In fairness, I suppose I can’t be too hard on Barton for having no understanding of his religion, since most of his fellow Christians don’t seem to have any understanding either.

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