As Mayor, Palin Inquired About Banning Library Books

As Mayor of the Wasilla City Council in Alaska, Sarah Palin inquired about banning some books from the local library and eventually fired the librarian, but was forced to accept her return after a public outcry.

For progressive voters concerned about civil liberties it is a disturbing example of Palin who was elected with strong support from Assembly Of God church, and sought to use her office to force her extremist political and religious views on the general public and control what sorts of literature may be distributed in public libraries and community businesses. It is a disturbing image of a far right book burner who would use her political office to control the flow of information and the media to only allow her own viewpoints to prevail. It is hardly much different from other dictators such Vladimir Putin or Kim Jong-Il who rule by controlling the press and suppressing freedom of speech. It is a fascist instinct for sure.

Palin's Assembly Of God church also preached about some sort of a bizarre church doctrine that believed that the U.S. was going to be destroyed by nuclear war or disaster, and that Alaska was to be where the "saved" Christians would gather in safety. However, not a single word of the Bible supported such a crazed church doctrine. Further, Palin's church believed in something known as "speaking in tongues" in which members would utter out some strange sounding words claiming this is a gift of the Holy Spirit. However, in Scripture the Apostles were supposed to have the gift of "speaking in tongues" because they needed to understand and preach in foreign nations that spoke in languages other than Hebrew or Greek. For the Apostles it was a language translation gift. Language experts tend to doubt that "speaking in tongues" among some fundamentalist religious groups represents genuine language, unlike the gift that the Apostle Paul used to communicate in journeys to many lands during his ministry. Some language experts believe that modern "speaking in tongues" may be mostly just babble, and not a true language.

Palin now claims to belong to some sort of a nondenominational church. However it is a common practice for many fundamentalists to change churches several times in their lifetime for some reason compared to most people who spend their entire faith in a more established and traditional faith.

Palin may not be a member of a snake handler church. But she tends to find churches with extreme doctrines that are both far from the religious mainstream as well as not supported by Scripture. Her goofy church speeches using God to justify the bloody Iraq War for oil that may have killed as many as 1.2 million Iraqis and left another 2 million as refugees or her call to prayer in support of an Alaska pipeline project that may or may not be built in 2018 are only further examples of the type of nonsense that seems to find it's way into the type of churches that Palin belongs to compared to more mainstream churches.

Assembly Of God churches were sometimes known as "Holy Roller" faiths because of the type of music used and sometimes practices of members or pastors rolling around on the floor and shouting and acting in a radical manner.

Palin also seems to support many other church doctrines associated with the Assembly Of God faith including teaching creationism in public schools and teaching abstinence-only sex education, which seems to have worked out real well for Palin's pregnant unwed 17 year old daughter. The fall of Assembly Of God preacher Jimmy Swaggart seemed to pretty well characterize some of the hypocrisy of some members of this church who preach one thing, seek to impose their will on others, but sometimes live like the Devil themselves. The Assembly Of God church also appears to attract many members of low economic income or low education as well. Whether such persons are capable of understanding complex economic or foreign policy issues facing the U.S. is a very good question, but Palin is enjoying a bounce in popularity due to this demographic who feel that Palin is one of them and believe that she will use her office to promote their religious views. If anything it is naked attempt to establish something of a church-government for the U.S., a concept which is totally contrary to the principles of the Founding Fathers who opposed both England and it's official church-government as well.