 |
The World's Largest Coalition of Nontheists and Nontheist Communities!
My Canadian Friend
My Canadian friend Pauline cannot understand why some Americans support certain politicians whose election would not be given a second's thought in Canada or almost all other nations in the so-called Free World. She was particularly critical of the news lately concerning the right wingnut-packed Texas School Board's proposals to take Thomas Jefferson and Bishop Oscar Romero out of history texts for obvious theocratic motives.
First I pointed out that the governor who appointed a significant number of the TSB did so out of theocratic considerations (he wanted Texas to secede so his friend, Rev. John Hagee, can try a little Dominionism here). Rick Perry, the Secessionist, was mentored by George W. Bush, and progressives Progressives have taken to calling him "Gov. Hair" because or his silly Blogoyavich mop, the ample black cowl held aloft with gel or hair spray.
Obviously, these geeks are evangelicals dedicated to destruction of the doctrine of separation of church and state. But rather than present two sides to the argument and by so doing allow free debate in what Justice Oliver Wendel Holmes called "the marketplace of ideas," the TSB obliterated the name of Thomas Jefferson from history texts. Jefferson happens to be the guy who wrote much of the Declaration of Independence and coined the expression. You won't hear Justice Scalia demanding that we interpret the Constitution by examining the writings of the Founding Fathers on issues like this, but there is plenty of precedential authority for the proposition that the doctrine is not a "myth," as the evangelicals claim, but the result of a logical analysis of the Establishment Clause.
Now watch as Roberts, Scalia, Alito, Thomas and Kennedy (mostly dogmatic Catholics) dismantle Jefferson from Constitutional law, another legacy of George W. Bush and corrupt GOP political shenanigans (though that other party has plenty of shame to rue). At a legal seminar I attended a day ago, one of the speakers illustrated with PowerPoint "the New Majority, almost all neo-conservative and religiously dogmatic -- backward -- cases coming out of our highest court under Roberts have the same majority five." A lot of progressives are asking, "How did those guys get on the Court?" The answer is, spineless Democrats who worked out secret deals, as well as legislative procedural tactics used recently to get so-called health care "reform" passed. The Dems became what they beheld.
But there were other names removed from TSB-approved history texts. Hispanic students will not learn anything of Cesar Chavez and Bishop Oscar Romero. I explained that the former represented an "uppity Meskin" who made the cost of grapes higher in the supermarkets, while the latter was not only a Catholic, he practiced the same sort of passive resistance as Gandhi and the same ahimsa as any devout Buddhist. I tried to explain tea party mentality, that these people represent the last vestiges of an unevolved being not quite human but predatory and dangerous.
Mostly evangelical, they can justify even slavery with reference to the O.T. of their Booble. And because, as we all know, slaves have traditionally been African, no way should this Muslim from Indonesia be sleeping in the White House. When I was growing up, crackers called Rev. King "Martin Luther Coon," and I should think quite a few tea partiers would still get a guffaw out that one. Although they don't call it that, these people are aware of the power of non-violence, but they have lizard brains. They agree wholeheartedly with the GOP pol who had to wither away in disgrace after say that if we'd only elected segregationist Strom Thurmond way back then, we wouldn't have the civil rights campaign thrust upon us. Hell, we wouldn't have had Barack Hussein Obama to bother with.
Oh, darn, I forgot to include in the email the fact that in Latin America there is a tradition of Catholic bishops aiding and protecting indigenous peoples, as one sees today in Chiapas, Mexico, where the most tourist-visited, fascinating city, San Cristobal de las Casas, was named for Bartolome de las Casas, the first bishop in that state. I don't know if Romero was cut from that same cloth, but if he was, what difference does it make if he's a Roman Catholic?
First I pointed out that the governor who appointed a significant number of the TSB did so out of theocratic considerations (he wanted Texas to secede so his friend, Rev. John Hagee, can try a little Dominionism here). Rick Perry, the Secessionist, was mentored by George W. Bush, and progressives Progressives have taken to calling him "Gov. Hair" because or his silly Blogoyavich mop, the ample black cowl held aloft with gel or hair spray.
Obviously, these geeks are evangelicals dedicated to destruction of the doctrine of separation of church and state. But rather than present two sides to the argument and by so doing allow free debate in what Justice Oliver Wendel Holmes called "the marketplace of ideas," the TSB obliterated the name of Thomas Jefferson from history texts. Jefferson happens to be the guy who wrote much of the Declaration of Independence and coined the expression. You won't hear Justice Scalia demanding that we interpret the Constitution by examining the writings of the Founding Fathers on issues like this, but there is plenty of precedential authority for the proposition that the doctrine is not a "myth," as the evangelicals claim, but the result of a logical analysis of the Establishment Clause.
Now watch as Roberts, Scalia, Alito, Thomas and Kennedy (mostly dogmatic Catholics) dismantle Jefferson from Constitutional law, another legacy of George W. Bush and corrupt GOP political shenanigans (though that other party has plenty of shame to rue). At a legal seminar I attended a day ago, one of the speakers illustrated with PowerPoint "the New Majority, almost all neo-conservative and religiously dogmatic -- backward -- cases coming out of our highest court under Roberts have the same majority five." A lot of progressives are asking, "How did those guys get on the Court?" The answer is, spineless Democrats who worked out secret deals, as well as legislative procedural tactics used recently to get so-called health care "reform" passed. The Dems became what they beheld.
But there were other names removed from TSB-approved history texts. Hispanic students will not learn anything of Cesar Chavez and Bishop Oscar Romero. I explained that the former represented an "uppity Meskin" who made the cost of grapes higher in the supermarkets, while the latter was not only a Catholic, he practiced the same sort of passive resistance as Gandhi and the same ahimsa as any devout Buddhist. I tried to explain tea party mentality, that these people represent the last vestiges of an unevolved being not quite human but predatory and dangerous.
Mostly evangelical, they can justify even slavery with reference to the O.T. of their Booble. And because, as we all know, slaves have traditionally been African, no way should this Muslim from Indonesia be sleeping in the White House. When I was growing up, crackers called Rev. King "Martin Luther Coon," and I should think quite a few tea partiers would still get a guffaw out that one. Although they don't call it that, these people are aware of the power of non-violence, but they have lizard brains. They agree wholeheartedly with the GOP pol who had to wither away in disgrace after say that if we'd only elected segregationist Strom Thurmond way back then, we wouldn't have the civil rights campaign thrust upon us. Hell, we wouldn't have had Barack Hussein Obama to bother with.
Oh, darn, I forgot to include in the email the fact that in Latin America there is a tradition of Catholic bishops aiding and protecting indigenous peoples, as one sees today in Chiapas, Mexico, where the most tourist-visited, fascinating city, San Cristobal de las Casas, was named for Bartolome de las Casas, the first bishop in that state. I don't know if Romero was cut from that same cloth, but if he was, what difference does it make if he's a Roman Catholic?
Replies to This Discussion
-
Permalink Reply by Michael Hutchinson on -
I don't trust the Republican or Democratic parties. On election day, I voted Libertarian. Maybe that will give you an idea of where I stand on these issues. It is a sad thing that people think that it has to be one extreme or the other. I don't entertain false dichotomies myself...
-
-
Permalink Reply by James M. Martin on -
Yes, we have an outstanding Libertarian candidate running as did his father, as a Repub. Would you have a problem allowing lunch counters, buses, and theatres to deny access to people because of the color of their skin? If you ask me, the Libertarian Party has as many dumb ideas as it has good ones, which is also true of the Dems and Repubs. The problem is parties, as Washington concluded after serving two terms in the White House.
Well, actually, two problems. The other problem anticipated by Washington’s successor, Lincoln, visa-a-vis the patronage system (which actually saw George W. Bush appointing inept cronies such as Brown) is that "there are too many piglets for the teets.” This time, the patrons are not the problem so much as their employers. Ex-pols are at a premium since they know where skeltons are hid. This might be called government by Mother Pig.
This has only been exacerbated with the rise of C.P. (corporation politics) as witness the oil industry giving McCain over $2M in what amounts to graft, and giving Obama only $750K or thereabouts. The Repubs are a lot phonier than the Dems, though neither party has a monopoly on hypocrisy. The trouble is, K-Street and Wall Street do all they can to buy elections, now bolstered with the most misguided and insidious Supreme Court ruling in a century: allowing corporations to donate as much as they want to political campaigns. They want more opportunities to steal our tax dollars and weaken our take home pay (assuming we have a job -- again, a legacy of the Bush administration.) It is government by-ground-mines dug for your successor. I suspect Clinton did it too.
(I could digress into a discussion of regarding a corporation as a “person” in order to comply with current law and a misguided interpretation of that word as used in the Constitution. Rather than interpreting, the far right New Majority legislates -- precisely the same thing they are always accusing the liberal justices of trying to do. When it comes to that ideologically-hidebound surburban suit heading the Court right now, hypocrisy truly knows no bounds. Roberts knows from his extensive legal education that corporations are ersatz people, if they can be called people at all. Rather, they are primarily a paper entity designed to protect officers, executives, and stockholders from personal exposure to lawsuits and other miseries, and to help wind the business down or merge with another if they see fit.
There is a device in the law called “the legal fiction,” and that, fiction, is exactly what a corporation is. A fiction cannot be a person.)
Your boy Rand reveals a mentality that existed, and supported itself in politico-philosophical argument about federal and state governance, during the 18th century. The arguments continue: remember when the avowed states rights’ majority in the Court made Bush president by interfering in Florida voting? (Read the remarkable book on this by Alan Dershowitz.) It took the better part of a two centuries to get freemen of color the right to sit down at a lunch counter, ride anywhere on buses, and exit movie theatre balconies where they’d been restricted. (I know, I walked with the NAACP in Fort Worth when they picketed the Fort Worth theatres in the early ‘60s.) The Declaration of Independence does NOT say, "All men (and no women, no homosexuals, no blacks, and no Latino Americanos) were created equal. One must presume you live in Arizona. It is too late for you to live in the 18th century, and I am left to wonder are you a birther to boot?
No matter. A vote for a liberarian candidate only works in small towns where people point to a candidate and say, "Aw, that's just old Bill. When he gets to Washington DC he'll do the right thing." That's just what bothers me. At least a vote for a Dem or a Repub gets counted in the double digits on the national slate. And third parties have traditionlly come in dead last. I decided some time back that voting for the party that talks the talk yet fails to fully walk the walk is a better vote than throwing it away on someone who does neither.
Finally, Rand Paul is against the doctrine of separation of church and state, as voiced by Jefferson. Why do you think the right wingnuts want to take Jefferson out of history texts and push the idea that the doctrine of church-state division is – and I quote their adherents – “a myth.” Well, what the hell do they think Jesus is? -
-
Permalink Reply by Michael Hutchinson on
-
Rand Paul isn't my boy for one. I do believe in separation of church and state as Thomas Jefferson himself did. The difference is that I believe the constitution should be applied to all human beings (all races included) in the United States of America.
My problem with your view on a "wasted vote" is this. Nothing will ever change if we continuously vote the same parties in. Also, Ron Paul had no problem with people of different races, or even homosexuals. You should know his positions. Rand Paul has different positions from his father.
To me it is hypocrisy to admit all of the harmfulness of both parties, and then turn around to vote for one of them. Ron Paul really does believe in separation of church and state. I think that his supposed Christianity is just something he lets people assume because a non-christian has a hard time getting into office. Even Obama claimed to be a Christian of sorts.
Please don't assume who my "boy" is, or what my exact opinions are. -
-
Permalink Reply by James M. Martin on
-
Bush pretended to be a Christian, too, but he did next to nothing to help the evangelicals with their social issues once he got elected. I doubt they would be supporting Rand Paul now if they did not know something you do not. Your initial post left me with no other conclusion but that Rand Paul is your boy as well as the assumption that since you voted Libertarian, you support that party's attempts to throwing the D.C. baby out with the bathwater. Their brand of libertarianism can never work. I only wish there were a viable Progressive Party, but as there is not, well I am going to go on being a hypocrite. After all, it as American as cherry pie.
-
CONNECT WITH ATHEIST NEXUS
Latest Activity
- Top News
- Everything
 |
 |
 |
 |
© 2013 Atheist Nexus. All rights reserved. Admin: Richard Haynes.
