Good to see that National Endowment for the Arts flack Yosi Sargent has resigned over the “art for Obama conference call. It was an abuse of taxpayer funds that smacked of Soviet Russia or communist China.

That said, at least the source of the propaganda was essentially secular. A segment of the conservative media, especially Salem Broadcasting-type Christian talk radio, propagandizes for the GOP and claims to do so with the authority of scripture.

For example, this statement by popular talk show host Janet Parshall about voting for a third-party candidate for president:

When we do that we have advocated the antithetical position to what we know to be biblical truth. Because, when we sit it out, what we’re saying, in essence, is, ‘Our vote doesn’t count. We don’t care to influence and occupy.’ The other person’s vote takes precedence. The other person de facto gets the vote.

Parshall meant, of course, that voting for anyone other than the Republican nominee was “antithetical” to “biblical truth”. That particular verse must not be in the translations I read.

Now, it’s true that her opinion and the venue in which she expressed it were not financed by tax dollars as far as I know. However, it’s well-known that prominent evangelicals enjoyed relatively easy access to the Bush White House, where they were actively and cynically courted, and one could argue that the 501(c)3 tax-exempt status enjoyed by churches constitutes a government subsidy.

My point: it’s only propaganda when it’s the other party doing it.