Today is clearly religion day at The Daily Pulse. It wasn't intentional. It just seems to be what people are talking about. There are some really well considered pieces here about what religion means, what Christianity means, and how it can be abused. There are also some letters and editorials about Social Security and judges. The nation seems to have gotten off DeLay and Frist, and is focusing pretty clearly on the role of religion in national politics (at this point the filibuster is tied up in that as well as being its own issue), the filibuster, and Social Security. Iraq, remember Iraq, this is a song about Iraq, is completely off the radar. But first, an ode to what we once were, and still are, if we just had the balls to say it out loud.
Cross posted at MyDD, where The Daily Pulse appears every morning.
Newark (New Jersey) Advocate
The Middle Class
I have been following the great American political scene since 1952 (I like Ike).
To all Americans ages 15 to 95, of course you know that the middle class in the good old USA has been greatly helped by Democrats, liberals and labor unions over the years. When Democrats were the majority party in Washington -- yes, the Democrats -- they proposed and passed Social Security, better health care, good wages, a 40-hour work week, extra pay for overtime, paid vacations, retirement plans and generally a higher standard of living.
If the present Philistine party stays in power for a few more years, I feel that they will eliminate your higher standard of living and wipe out the middle class. There will be two classes in America: the very rich and the very poor, just like so-called Third World countries. ...
Remember, always keep your hand on the Bible, wear that little American flag pin on your lapel and speak of patriotism and the Ten Commandments.
Jack Lepley
Heath
Brownwood (Texas) Bulletin
I've never done this before. I try to let the pieces speak for themselves. But read the bolded paragraph alone, and tell me it doesn't sound like something we could hear any day from the White House, the Congress, or Fox News.
Hitler and Christianity
Christianity is getting more coverage in the news these days. Fritz Stern, professor emeritus at Columbia University, said some profound words about Christianity and Hitler in a talk titled "National Socialism (Nazi) as Temptation."
Adolph Hitler's rise to power in Germany in the 1930s is amazing in the way he induced so many Germans to embrace his ideas and programs.
Among Stern's reasons for the rise of Hitler's fascist state, one related to Christianity. Here is an entire paragraph from his paper:
"There were many reasons, but at the top ranked Adolph Hitler himself, a brilliant populist manipulator who insisted and probably believed that Providence had chosen him as Germany's savior, a leader charged with executing a divine mission. God had been drafted into national politics before, but Hitler's success in fusing racial dogma with Germanic Christianity was an immensely powerful element in his electoral campaigns. Some people recognized the moral perils of mixing religion and politics, but many more were seduced by it. It was the pseudo-religious transfiguration of politics that largely ensured his success, notably in Protestant areas."
A little research reveals that in his first radio address to the German people, Hitler declared: "The National Government will preserve and defend those basic principles on which our nation has been built up. They regard Christianity as the foundation of our national morality and the family as the basis of national life." ...
History reminds us that when a religious persuasion is stirred into the mix, the result is anything but democracy. ...
The state cannot harass or discriminate against people for their religious convictions. Equally true, religious leaders should not use their pulpits to promote a political agenda.
Last Sunday there was an example of mixing religion and politics in the Highview Baptist Church of Louisville, Ky. Pastor Kevin Ezell worked out the program with Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist and the Family Research Council.
A television segment of the worship service featured Senator Frist urging support for his plan to end Democratic filibusters of a handful of President Bush's most conservative nominees for federal judgeships.
Ezell and the Family Research Council claimed Bush's nominees were being blocked from a Senate up or down vote "because they are people of faith and moral conviction."
It is one thing for Christians to be concerned for the nation and politics. It is another to promote a particular political agenda as if it came from God and all who oppose it are persecuting people of faith.
This is another example of how ignorant people have become when they don't agree with me.
(Please note: That last sentence is from my own sarcastic nature and the only un-serious part of this column.)
Newark (New Jersey) Advocate
This letter pretty much sums up how they feel. 'We won, to the victors go the spoils. Sit down. Shut up.' Do you think they will still feel that way when the pendulum swings back?
Get Out of the Way
I am appalled that the Senate is behaving in such an unprecedented manner that is clearly outside of the intent of the Constitution.
If the public elects a majority of either party in the Senate and House, and to office of the president, I would expect them to have the opportunity to make certain changes in key positions, and not have the minority party endlessly debate for the sole purpose of preventing a vote. Why did the public elect a Republican majority in two branches of government and a Republican president if they can't change anything?
If the Senate allows this nonsense to continue, I don't see the purpose of allowing the public to vote at all. It will endlessly be "business as usual" and we will never see change no matter who is in office. ...
Since you aren't leading, and certainly not following, the least you could do is get out of the way.
Lisa Laughton
Newark
I don't find many conservative cartoons. First, there just aren't many. Second, with Republicans in power they are the usual target. Third, most are just mean, with very little humor or even thought. This one came up, and while I disagree with it, it fit with the thesis of The Daily Pulse of showing what people are thinking about and writing about, and was adequate enough to repeat.
Sun Journal (Lewiston, Maine)
Oh my. A Christian questioning "Christians." You mean to tell me there's more to Jesus that homosexuality?
Religion and Homosexuality
Since when did religious convictions start being defined by a person's stance on gay marriage? With all of the great injustices in the world today, why do religious leaders spend so much time debating this nonissue? That time seems far better spent making the world a better place by advocating inclusion.
When did the Bible get stripped down to a few cryptic verses on homosexuality? Where was the outrage when Bernard Law was promoted for covering up a pedophilia ring? Is sodomy only a sin when it is between consenting adults? ...
Where do these people stand on the issue of war? Is it not a sin to kill? While these people are (perhaps subconsciously) preoccupied by homosexuality, what is their position on the 3,000-plus verses in the Bible concerning poverty? Is the Unitarian Church the only denomination that embraces inclusion rather than judgment?
Daniel Coulombe, Lewiston
Fayetteville (North Carolina) Observer
This editorial states the obvious in a pretty simple way. He might have a point- that scientists need to argue better. He really does cut right to the base flaw in "intelligent design," that it is no more than an observation that we are "designed" for exactly the environment in which we EVOLVED!
Natural Selection and Dogma
If, tomorrow morning, the view outside your window were cave-black, with no moon or even a star; if the "air" was a mix of ammonia and methane; if there was no water, ice or even steam anywhere, and the only solid matter around was rock...what would you know?
You wouldn't know anything, would you? Truth is, there wouldn't be any morning. There'd be no window, because there's no need to build portals from which to peer into impenetrable blackness. In fact, there would be no you. And why not? Because your species could not have evolved in such an environment. ...
In other words, if a habitat is of a sort that you consider chaotic and unintelligent - in a word, uninhabitable - you're not a part of it.
I've been waiting months for scientists to say it in plain language, but they do love their jargon, so here goes: If "intelligent design" proves anything, it proves natural selection. ...
To me, trying to get such conjecture into the public school curriculum replicates the sin of Job: a Man-centered vanity that demeans the works of the Creator by trying to reduce them to mere knowledge; that seeks to bind the architect of the universe to humankind's puny logic.
If you believe that natural selection was a tool that God used to create the world, no one can prove you wrong. "A thousand ages, in thy sight, are like an evening gone" - it's from a hymn, not the Bible, but it fits nicely and I have no problem with it. If you believe that the world and everything in it came to be in 144 hours, or that every species now living has been here from the get-go, then you're running on high-octane faith that cannot be reconciled with science; but that's your right, too.
By all means, believe what you like about the origins of life. But if you're working from faith, don't try to pass it off as science in hopes of smuggling religious dogma into the science curriculum. It won't work.
Even hard-headed Job, who ended up with 6,000 camels along with his lesson in humility, knew a thing or two about noses under tents. Besides: There's a Ninth Commandment that is widely interpreted to prohibit dishonesty.
The Marshall (Missouri) Democrat-News
You will not find the word "Republican" anywhere in here. But it's there, right between every line.
Pride and Christianity
Forgive me for speaking my mind. It certainly won't be the first time. Don't think that I'm being judgmental. I'm just pointing out something that I see as a flaw that might well be becoming an epidemic in the church.
Seems to me that there is a lot of pride among the ranks of Christendom these days. And I don't believe there's room for both arrogance and blessedness within the kingdom. The first of the Lord's teachings on blessedness -- better known as the beatitudes -- speaks to this point.
Speaking authoritatively to the mass of people gathered at "the Mount," Jesus described the first character of one who would be a citizen of the kingdom of God. He said, "Blessed are the poor in spirit." ...
Why is it, then, that many believers walk with their heads in the clouds? To my notion, the narrow gate is not high enough or wide enough to let that man enter who carries an inflated estimation of his own importance or greatness. When I speak to some believers, it brings to mind an old Mac Davis song that stated how very hard it is to be humble "when you're perfect in every way."
To folks who idolize themselves and, yes, their own perceived righteousness, worship is no more than a ritual or ceremony. I wonder if God even hears their praises when they ignore their own spiritual destitution. Does He count it as folly? Does He even notice? ...
"Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the Kingdom of God." Matthew 5:3
St. Louis (Missouri) Post Dispatch
If the definition of a genius is somebody who agrees with you, this guy is Albert freakin' Einstein. I have said repeatedly that we already have "private accounts," and that the real goal is to kill Social Security. This guy says the same thing. He sure is smart.
Bush's Real Goal
Why all the controversy about private accounts? I've had one for the past 20 years; almost everyone is eligible. It's called an individual retirement account.
Of course, our president knows that. If he wanted simply to create an ownership society, he could have proposed IRA matching funds for low-income workers. I think the real goal is to emasculate the Social Security system. Why else propose major changes to a system that is not in crisis?
Or he could have proposed a slow transition to a fully-funded pension plan, hiring professional money managers to invest a portion of the current Social Security surplus on Wall Street. That would improve the long-term rate of return for all participants. But he didn't do that either.
A little more clarity - or should I call it honesty - would go a long way toward raising the president's approval ratings.
Klaus Illian
Manchester
(Cocoa) Florida Today
Let me start with a confession. This is my (tiny little) hometown paper, the one I grew up reading. And Cocoa was the big city. I lived in Rockledge. This is an interesting exchange- two LTEs published together on the same issue. I, for one, agree with the second guy. And what is this insane paranoia about international courts? Do these people spend all day looking for black helicopters?
Point and Counter Point
FLORIDA TODAY's Sunday editorial "Threatening the courts" painted a picture of conservatives opposed to judicial activism from a secularist point of view. ...
Perhaps House Majority Leader Tom DeLay, R-Texas, is blunt in his critical assessment of our judges. But he has a point.
President Bush won a second term with the majority of Americans voting for him. The secularist message did not win the day.
The hysterical claim that a theocracy is forming is ludicrous. It fails to give credit to the average American citizen who certainly knows the difference. ...
Article 3 of the Constitution enables our courts to preside over issues arising from U.S. constitutional laws, not applying international laws. We are the United States, not the U.N. ...
I suggest the editorial board start giving equal weight to both sides of an argument, rather than always making the big left turn.
John Brett
Melbourne
The vast majority of us greatly appreciate FLORIDA TODAY's Sunday editorial "Threatening the courts" about those on the fanatic right who have long claimed that anything not meeting their agenda was "judicial activism," when in fact the exact opposite is true. ...
True Christians, who understand the meaning of "secular" -- things that religions have chosen not to become involved or allied in -- need to stand up and forbid them from hijacking and corrupting the good name of Christianity in pursuit of secular power.
Christian churches need to cast down anyone who pretends to be acting in the name of God. True churches would be leading the charge to keep the government out of church business, as well as vice versa.
Anyone who has ever actually read the Bible knows Jesus would be appalled at the lies and power-grubbing the Republicans are perpetrating in his name.
Remember what he did to the money-changers in the temple?
D.H. Strong
Cocoa
How about one more cartoon just for fun?