Sunday in Outer Blogness: Brilliant Strategies Edition!

Wow, the Mormon Moment hit a couple of big snags this past week!! First off, despite all of the media attention focused on Mormonism, the CoJCoL-dS simply can’t resist excommunicating people. So guess what is all over the news? Mormon with outspoken blog posts on church says may face excommunication!

Mormonthink.com is surely thanking the CoJCoL-dS for a sudden gigantic spike in readership. (Even though we’ve been linking to Mormonthink for years, I actually thought it was a static site — now that I know better, I’ll be subscribing!) Apologists are quick to claim that the excommunication isn’t over criticizing Romney — which is an important point for legal reasons — but it’s not like that will make anyone outside the faith go, “Oh, OK, this stuff is totally normal, then.” So much for trying to counter the impression that Mormons are weirdly authoritarian. (Also, the fact that the leaders have to specifically instruct the members not to form their own paramilitary shadow governments is also a little odd (yet if it’s common, I’m glad that LDS leaders are telling Mormons to knock it off)).

That fiasco didn’t quite overshadow Mitt’s mouthful, though — the one about 47% of Americans being free-loaders. The weird part is that “blame everything on free-loaders” really is a big part of the Republican strategy, so Romney can’t quite contradict his statement, so damage control should be fun. Even weirder, the non-income-tax paying crowd is largely Republican. Cognitive Dissenter posted a portrait of the Tea Party attitude that seems reasonable to me (perhaps I’m biased…?) but I think that the “Flaming Straw-man Award” for this masterpiece:

One of the primary claims made by progressives is that people will not act responsibly. Therefore, progressives say, it is incumbent upon moral people to ask government step in to help these people who cannot help themselves.

Naturally, Mitt benefited from the non-level playing field, and his philosophy contradicts the Book of Mormon, but what can you do?

Mitt apparently also made a remark about his wife (“We use Ann sparingly right now, so that people dont tired of her, or start attacking”) which was reminiscent of the Mormon treatment of Heavenly Mother. Some claim Romney’s campaign is now dead, others say not to speak too soon — the Mormon connection may yet help!

OK, now it’s time to give a little linky love to ally the people who wrote about non-Mitt-and-Mormonthink-related subjects — there was some great stuff!!

• Blogging helps people make connections,
• Two different experiences with teaching,
• The problem with “one size fits all,”
• Thoughts on the Tabernacle organ,
• I picked on Geoff B. above, but this attitude really impresses me. (But what if you don’t have church?)
• Runtu reminded me that Midgley claimed my blog lacked intellectual content, so I wrote two posts, one on child development and one on Israel,
• Chris C. Smith wrote two interesting foreign policy posts,
• Overcoming Green Tea Addiction through the Atonement, by everyone’s favorite Stake President,
• Ren is taking a sabbatical from Mormonism,
• Christians tangle with DCP over God having sex with Mary — my favorite part is that DCP argues both sides: the God-Mary-sex thing isn’t really doctrine, but you’re a prude if you have a problem with the idea,
• Everybody’s favorite object lesson,
• What dad learned from being a POW,
• A family tragedy,
• Personal reflections on Brazil and the priesthood ban,
• The pressure to be happy and busy,
• Everyones Getting Married the Wrong Way! Except for This Guy, Apparently,
• The joys of being subject to a lay ministry,
• Further controversy over depicting Muhammad,
• and confusing works of man for works of God.

It’s been a fun week — I can’t wait to see what happens next!