Thursday, November 18, 2004
Moral Hypocrisy of God-Fearing Politicians Exposed
Around the globe, savvy politicians are starting to wear religion on their sleeves. In the last US election, the two leading contenders for the presidency used their professed faith in Christianity as a way to snare the moral vote. Yet, according to a new Internet research study, none other than the founder of Christianity would condemn many of their economic and social policies.
The economic and social policies of these politicians are firmly grounded in free-market economic theory. Free market economics, in turn, is grounded in self-interest--essentially in the belief that greed is good. So you have the strange situation where politicians regularly invoke the name of God, and in the same breath announce policies based on a belief condemned as one the greatest evils by the very faith they profess.
The research, based on an attitudinal study, provides a score for a series of questions relating to many current issues. The higher the score, the greater is the deviation from fundamental Christian beliefs. The researchers used the Internet and expert sources to model the responses of key political and religious leaders to estimate a score for comparison purposes.
The results graphically expose the hypocrisy of some of the world's church-going political leaders. At one end of the scale you have Jesus Christ with a score of -151 and at the opposite end you have George Bush with a score of +145, Tony Blair with a score of +127 and John Howard with +132. Other leaders included the Dalai Lama with a score of -62, Gandhi with a score of -120 and Pope John Paul II with a score of -125.
The survey also bears out the long-held suspicion that the radical religious right, as represented by Pat Robertson of CBN fame, is more about political and economic power than about religion. Pat Robertson registered a score of +141.
The research is being conducted by author George Matafonov in collaboration with Dr. David Smith, a psychologist with over 20 years experience in executive psychological evaluation. The attitudinal survey is now open to the public and available online. The researchers invite people to test their own beliefs and see where they stand on the same scale.
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