Introducing the next VP of the United States

[jeffg]

> Is it rational to assume that just because someone is a Christian, a Christianist, or a social conservative that they are trying to create a Theocracy? My common sense tells me "no".

> Perhaps I'm crazy, but I don't see the connection.

The concern isn't McCain, it's the political machine behind him -- the same machine responsible for our current president. And if you don't see their agenda it's only because you've chosen not to see it.

Simply read the current platform of the Republican Party, which e.g. seeks to give 14th Amendment equal protection rights to fetuses. This will, by definition, make a murderer out of any woman who has an abortion, and will make any physician who performs an abortion an accomplice to murder.

Or the "Federal Marriage Amendment" constitutional amendment proposal -- which Sarah Palin fully supports -- that would either invalidate or at least threaten all same-sex marriage, civil union and domestic partner laws across the U.S.

Or read this year's proposition list for the state of California, and elsewhere in the country. The far right hasn't been able to shove its extremist social agenda down our throats via state legislatures, so they've resorted to directly attacking state constitutions via amendment proposals.

Or plug "separation of church and state is a myth" into any search engine and start reading: thousands of websites, nearly all "Christian", espousing the same traitorous viewpoint. This is a concerted and fundamental attack on our First Amendment, unlike any we've seen in the last 230 years, and it's an infinitely more imminent and dangerous threat to our country than al-Qaeda ever could be.

 

[whirlcool]

I don't have any beef with militant Christians, my complaint is that those who go around saying Iraq is in God's plan for our country worry me.

What else is in God's plan for this country? Anything they want to dream up? Look at the limitations thrown at us through the "Homeland Security Bill". What's coming next? Maybe God's plan to eliminate certain individuals? If you can "pray away the gay", what else can you pray away?

I think our political candidates ought to be religiously ambiguous. In other words, they can practice their religion, just don't throw it in our faces.

 

[xyz]

I think the above has been proved by the Nazi's huh Whirlcool. History does repeat itself. As humans, we as a society, keep making the same old mistakes time and time again. Thing is, the victim only changes, one era it's the Jews, next era it's the gays, and so on. This is human nature. This message has been approved by Barack Obama. God knows he has a new victim in his sights.

 

[iheartmaytag]

XYZ

You bring up a good point. Hitler was said to be moving on God's will. Even before the Jews the first people in the ovens were the Homosexuals. This is I believe where the pink triangle came from as a symbol of gays. It is actually half of the Star of David.

If one forgets history he is destined to repeat it.

 

[neptunebob]

Oh, I don't like her at all!

If she had gained some weight, she would look like that human resources person who talked down to me when I worked in the hospital. I am disturbed that she doesn't even watch what her teens are doing, but I guess most parents don't do that anymore.

 

[rocketwarrior]

Separation of Church and State

Jeff,
I don’t think we disagree too much on the fundamentals, but by way of clarification I am not sure that the phrase “separation of church and state” is understood. I think it is a phrase growing out of the balance between the establishment clause and the free exercise clause. Government won’t establish a religion and citizens are free to practice any religion.

But when the phrase is used at cocktail parties, blogs and threads, it tends to mean something else, especially when spoken in the context of expressing concern about the agenda of those some are calling christianists. And that “agenda” is a fair concern.

But in practice, and, frankly, by design, church and state is not separate (by any lay definition). Tax exempt status, for example, nurtures and fosters religious and charitable ventures. Grants of government funds are available to nonprofits, faith based or not, that deliver social services as long at they do not discriminate or proselytize. This delivery of social services through religious or charitable agencies is referred to as “government by proxy.” And government, historically, has relied on these methodologies to deliver social services.

For a long time I was quite offended that our government granted tax exempt status to religious organizations and their real estate. But over time, as I came to understand the role that faith based and other charities have in delivering government services, I have relaxed that position recognizing that I need to understand it better. And I think the better route is to expose the abuses of that status.

Regarding your concern about the movement that is being referred as christianist – well, yeah, I find that scarey.

 

[panthera]

So we're

Un-American for exercising our right of free speech? Well, that fits with the republican mentality.
Take a look at this clip on Palin's attempt to censor books as a Mayor.
You republicans should stop throwing charges of un-American around - it is harder to imaging anything more like the communist and fascist dictatorships then a country which bans books.
Sheesh.

 

[rocketwarrior]

Un-American -- what?

Keven,
What post are you taking about? I am trying to keep track.

 

[gansky1]

Neuter that Pit-Bull!

Five years and six colleges to earn a degree in journalism.
"Hockey Mom"
City Council-person
Mayor of a town with approx. 6000 residents (when she served)
Elected governor of Alaska with 114,697 votes
Book banning.
Trooper-gate --ignoring the previous court warning to back off and the whiskey-tango antics of the family.
Spending earmarks and the lies she's telling about the "Bridge to Nowhere" (she "wouldn't stand in the way of progress" but when congress killed it, still took the money for it and the associated road to nowhere - $70 million)
The lies she's spouting about standing up to big oil and getting money back for the citizens of Alaska (this program has been in place for YEARS - she only gets to determine the amount each person will get)
The lies about selling the state-owned jet (she did put it on ebay but after two months, sold it privately through a broker at a $760,000 loss to the taxpayers).
Cutting a teen-pregnancy advocacy program in place for 30 years that worked to keep teen mothers in school (how ironic is this?)
Now, the brewing missing email scandal brought out in the investigation of her abuse of power allegations (does this sound at all familiar?)
We the people are unable to get answers to any of these questions and/or allegations because she has been kept away from the press for nearly two weeks until such time that it is "beneficial for the campaign" and we're expected to show her the appropriate "deference." Do they mean 1. submitting to the position or opinion of another or, 2. courteous regard? Makes you wonder given the history of this party.

The list will keep growing as the days roll by without a doubt.

This is who we're supposed to feel confident that she can handle the job of president in the quite likely event that something happens to John McCain? Are we to trust her? Are we able to trust HIS judgment? All of this is evidence of the GOP "Country First"? What was that about "change" at the convention? Uh huh, sure.

Just for fun - my sister put one of these on her car in Denver.

 

[panthera]

Mark,

We've got at least four threads going, mayhap I responded to iheartmaytag on the wrong thread.
He found our discussions to be un-American.
I will not permit the conservatives, christianists and republicans to usurp 'American' for their twisted, evil, perverted ends.
The longer these conservations go on, the clearer it becomes that a lot of these folks are willing to go down the same path as so many Germans once did.

 

[conate]

Panthera, you're sounding unlike yourself.

Anyone can find anything they want. Who cares?

I've been called a whole bunch of things on this forum - <shrug> but then again I'm ex-LEO and so maybe I have thicker skin than most people.

I will say, for the record, I see NO differences between the left and right in the USA. As someone who doesn't belong to either party, I see both as bigoted and anti freedom.

A left boot on your neck, or a right boot on your neck, still means a boot on your neck.

Nate

 

[mattl]

Well, the left boots are soft soled "Chucks" , while the right are steel toed boots.

We all make our choices, unfortunately for 8 years the wrong choice was made, I just want to stop it from happening again. For what ever it's worth I am RABIDLY anti R. The simple truth is the party's actions and the people who voted in a simpering idiot because they'd like to have a beer with him and they didn't want to feel inferior to their president made me that way. There is noting wrong with being an elitist, once that was a thing to aspire to, but now with the hip-hop generation it's a race to the bottom. Let's find the dumbest and make them a role model.

I love Matt Damon's comments, "
It's like a really bad Disney movie. The hockey mom, you know, 'oh, I'm just a hockey mom'... and she's facing down President Putin... It's totally absurd... it's a really terrifying possibility... I need to know if she really think that dinosaurs were here 4,000 years ago. I want to know that, I really do. Because she's gonna have the nuclear codes. "

 

[conate]

so in other words...

You don't care if you are under totalitarian rule, if it is socialist/communist.

Well I begin to understand what's wrong with both sides of the aisle in USA now.

 

[rocketwarrior]

Hyperbolic Acid

In the late sixties I was in the far east on a Fourth of July evening, everyone was drinking and partying on the flat concrete roof tops which served as patios or gathering places. A firecracker blew off in our crowd on one roof and someone figured it was thrown from the neighboriing roof that also had a party. He through a half full beer bottle. Well, as you might guess, volleys of beers bottles started flying back and forth, crashing on the concrete, hitting people. It was a riot.

Anyway, it seems like that is what happens to the political discussions on this site only the bottles contain hyperbolic acid.

 

[conate]

I think you're right, Rocketwarrior.

And this is a microcosm of American society.

Unfortunate.

 

[gansky1]

Yes, let's stick to topic - and discuss, not fight.

Here are questions posed by Katha Pollitt of The Nation that we, as voters, have a right to understand Palin's position on.

Suppose your 14-year-old daughter Willow is brutally raped in her bedroom by an intruder. She becomes pregnant and wants an abortion. Could you tell the parents of America why you think your child and their children should be forced by law to have their rapists' babies?

You say you don't believe global warming is man-made. Could you tell us what scientists you've spoken with or read who have led you to that conclusion? What do you think the 2,500 scientists of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change are getting wrong?

If you didn't try to fire Wasilla librarian Mary Ellen Baker over her refusal to consider censoring books, why did you try to fire her?

What is the European Union, and how does it function?

Forty-seven million Americans lack health insurance. John Goodman, who has advised McCain on healthcare, has proposed redefining them as covered because, he says, anyone can get care at an ER. Do you agree with him?

What is the function of the Federal Reserve?

Cindy and John McCain say you have experience in foreign affairs because Alaska is next to Russia. When did you last speak with Prime Minister Putin, and what did you talk about?

Approximately how old is the earth? Five thousand years? 10,000? 5 billion?

You are a big fan of President Bush, so why didn't you mention him even once in your convention speech?

McCain says cutting earmarks and waste will make up for revenues lost by making the tax cuts permanent. Experts say that won't wash. Balancing the Bush tax cuts plus new ones proposed by McCain would most likely mean cutting Medicare, Medicaid or Social Security. Which would you cut?

You're suing the federal government to have polar bears removed from the endangered species list, even as Alaska's northern coastal ice is melting and falling into the sea. Can you explain the science behind your decision?

You've suggested that God approves of the Iraq War and the Alaska pipeline. How do you know?

 

[panthera]

The difference

between the 'left' and the 'right' in the US is quite simple. The left may well be incompetent. We don't know. We do, however, know that the right is.
And how!
Two things caught my notice this week. One, the joint chiefs of staff announced that the US does not have sufficient troop strength to hold gains in Afghanistan, or, indeed, anywhere else in the theater.
Second, Bush has (finally!) given US troops permission to carry the fight to Pakistan.
When the republicans steal this election and McSame is the new president (until he suffers a mysterious incapacitation and Ms. Palin becomes die Führerin) we are going to see the return of conscripted military service.
Right quick.

 

[jeffg]

> Bush has (finally!) given US troops permission to carry the fight to Pakistan.

Yeah, after SEVEN YEARS Bush steps up his bid to start World War III, right before he leaves office. Scumbag terrorist, er, excuse me, war hero:

"The official would not say if the strikes targeted a specific person, but officials said nothing indicated troops were targeting al Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden or his deputy, Ayman al-Zawahiri.

"Local media reports said the troops came out of a chopper and fired on civilians. Pakistan military spokesman Maj. Murad Khan said Thursday that 15 civilians were killed."

http://www.cnn.com/2008/WORLD/asiapcf/09/04/us.pakistan/index.html

 

[panthera]

Jeff,

Like everyone else in NATO (except the US government), I really want to see the terrorists caught.
That means going to where they are.
Most Americans don't know that many NATO partners (including Germany) are fighting to defend the US in Afghanistan. That is a legal war and we are supporting you.
The Irak war has done nothing but foster terrorism. There were no WMD, the terrorists weren't hiding out there in vast numbers nor were they supported by Sadam.
You are right about WWIII, tho'. The christianists really believe all that stuff in Revelations and are firmly convinced that they are 'helping' their 'god'. Shrub hears god's voice. Palin claims the same.
Where I come from, hearing voices in your head telling you to attack people is not considered a good thing.

 

[panthera]

Obama on Habeas Corpus

One of the scariest aspects of the conservatives is their total disregard for the Constitution of the United States.
When I see some of the posts here from group members, boasting of how American and Patriotic they are...but never once admitting that the republicans have trampled on the US Constitution, I wonder if their definition of American is a bit different from the one, oh, say elected officials or officers in the military take an oath to.
Any comments, conservatives?
Barack Obama
Obama to Palin: 'Don't Mock the Constitution'

By Peter Slevin
FARMINGTON HILLS, Mich. -- Sen. Barack Obama delivered an impassioned defense of the Constitution and the rights of terrorism suspects tonight, striking back at one of the biggest applause lines in Republican vice presidential nominee Sarah Palin's speech to the GOP convention.

It was in St. Paul last week that Palin drew raucous cheers when she delivered this put-down of Obama: "Al-Qaeda terrorists still plot to inflict catastrophic harm on America and he's worried that someone won't read them their rights."

Obama had a few problems with that.

"First of all, you don't even get to read them their rights until you catch 'em," Obama said here, drawing laughs from 1,500 supporters in a high school gymnasium. "They should spend more time trying to catch Osama bin Laden and we can worry about the next steps later."

If the plotters of the Sept. 11 attacks are in the government's sights, Obama went on, they should be targeted and killed.

"My position has always been clear: If you've got a terrorist, take him out," Obama said. "Anybody who was involved in 9/11, take 'em out."

But Obama, who taught constitutional law at the University of Chicago for more than a decade, said captured suspects deserve to file writs of habeus corpus.

Calling it "the foundation of Anglo-American law," he said the principle "says very simply: If the government grabs you, then you have the right to at least ask, 'Why was I grabbed?' And say, 'Maybe you've got the wrong person.'"

The safeguard is essential, Obama continued, "because we don't always have the right person."

"We don't always catch the right person," he said. "We may think it's Mohammed the terrorist, but it might be Mohammed the cab driver. You might think it's Barack the bomb-thrower, but it might be Barack the guy running for president."

Obama turned back to Palin's comment, although he said he was not sure whether Palin or Rudy Giuliani said it.

"The reason that you have this principle is not to be soft on terrorism. It's because that's who we are. That's what we're protecting," Obama said, his voice growing louder and the crowd rising to its feet to cheer. "Don't mock the Constitution. Don't make fun of it. Don't suggest that it's not American to abide by what the founding fathers set up. It's worked pretty well for over 200 years."

He finished with a dismissive comment about his opponents.

"These people."

http://voices.washingtonpost.com/the-trail/2008/09/08/obama_to_palin_dont_mock_the_c.html