Published December 7th, 2007
My blog, and yeah, I’m pissed. The more I think about the things Romney said, the more angry I get. It’s no surprise he gave his speech at the George H.W. Bush library - the library of a man who once said, “No, I don’t know that atheists should be considered as citizens, nor should they be considered patriots. This is one nation under God.” This quote is somewhat disputed, but has never been outright denied by Bush or his teams.
So who else is talking? Well, not surprisingly, bulldog atheist Christopher Hitchens, saying the speech was “worthless, windy.” No doubt. His column is one of exasperated contempt, as Hitchens tends to exude towards the religious. I personally don’t go as far as him in my feelings, but he has one very poignant section, which I will quote here:
“Romney does not understand the difference between deism and theism, nor does he know the first thing about the founding of the United States. Jefferson’s Declaration may invoke a “Creator,” but, as he went on to show in the battle over the Virginia Statute on Religious Freedom, he and most of his peers did not believe in a god who intervened in human affairs or in a god who had sent a son for a human sacrifice. These easily ascertainable facts are reflected in the way that the U.S. Constitution does not make any mention of a superintendent deity and in the way that the delegates to the Constitutional Convention declined an offer (possibly sarcastic), even from Benjamin Franklin, that they resort to prayer to compose their differences. Romney may throw a big chest and say that God should be “on our currency, in our pledge,” and of course on our public land in this magic holiday season, but James Madison did not think that there should be chaplains opening the proceedings of Congress or even appointed as ministers in the U.S. armed forces. Trying to dodge around this, and to support his assertion that the founders were religious in the Christian sense, Romney drones on about a barely relevant moment of emotion in 1774 and comes up with the glib slogan that “freedom requires religion just as religion requires freedom.” Any fool can think of an example where freedom exists without religion—and even more easily of an instance where religion exists without (or in negation of) freedom.”
The constant and continuing mis-characterization of the Founding Fathers - who were truly revolutionary minds and should be respected for what they created, warts and all - drives me absolutely insane. The Religious Fanatics who want to turn America into a Christian wonderland, everyone else be damned (literally), simply fabricate outright lies about the founders. It’s incredibly disrespectful and downright pathetic.
At Salon, a posted column discusses and points out that secularists and the non-religious have, throughout history, been FAR MORE tolerant than any religion can claim.
“We can begin with Romney’s speech Thursday, in which he declared, as Joan Walsh noted with alarm, that there can be no liberty without faith. “Freedom requires religion just as religion requires freedom … Freedom and religion endure together, or perish alone.”
This statement is so patently false that it scarcely deserves refutation. If Romney has studied the bloody history of his own church, then he knows that the religious fervor of its adversaries drove them to deprive the Mormons not only of their freedom but their lives, and that the Mormons reacted in kind. If he has studied the bloody history of the world’s older religions, then he knows that the most devout Christians of all sects have not hesitated to suppress, torture and murder “heretics” throughout history. Only the strictest separation of church and state has permitted the establishment of societies where freedom of conscience prevails — and those freedoms are firmly rooted in societies where organized religion has long been in decline.
Surely Romney knows that Mormonism, in particular, was historically hostile to liberty for blacks as well as women. The founders of his church believed that God had cursed the world’s dark-skinned people. They rejected abolitionism and later the civil rights movement. And their acceptance of full membership for African-Americans in the LDS church dates back only 30 years.
If Romney is going to attack humanists and secularists as “wrong,” then let him explain why they were so far ahead of his church on the greatest moral issues of the past half-century.”
If he wants to say his morals are based in his religion, then it’s fair game to examine what those morals really are rooted in. Their final paragraph really drives home the theme of the column:
“Phonies like Huckabee and Romney complain constantly about the supposed religious intolerance of secular liberals. But the truth is that liberals — including agnostics and atheists — have long been far more tolerant of religious believers in office than the other way around. They helped elect a Southern Baptist named Jimmy Carter to the presidency in 1976, and today they support a Mormon named Harry Reid who is the Senate majority leader — which makes him the highest-ranking Mormon officeholder in American history. Nobody in the Democratic Party has displayed the slightest prejudice about Reid’s religion.
Liberals and progressives have no apologies to make, or at least no more than libertarians and conservatives do. Cherishing the freedoms protected by a secular society need not imply any disrespect for religion. But when candidates like Romney and Huckabee press the boundaries of the Constitution to promote themselves as candidates of faith, it is time to push back.”
Damn right. I’m pushing back as best I can.
Category: romney, religion, Personal, opinion, politics, election 2008, news | Tags: mitt romney| Be the First to Comment »
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Published December 7th, 2007
Some actual sense out of the Washington Post editorial page.
Point the first:
“If, as Mr. Romney correctly says, the country’s founders took care not to impose a religious test for any public office, a candidate’s belief, or not, in the divinity of Christ ought to be irrelevant.”
Spot on. I’m posting practically the last half of the editorial here:
“Where Mr. Romney most fell short, though, was in his failure to recognize that America is composed of citizens not only of different faiths but of no faith at all and that the genius of America is to treat them all with equal dignity. “Freedom requires religion, just as religion requires freedom,” Mr. Romney said. But societies can be both secular and free. The magnificent cathedrals of Europe may be empty, as Mr. Romney said, but the democracies of Europe are thriving.
“Americans acknowledge that liberty is a gift of God, not an indulgence of government,” Mr. Romney said. But not all Americans acknowledge that, and those who do not may be no less committed to the liberty that is the American ideal.”
Exactly. I’m sick and tired of being called unpatriotic because I opposed a BS war, it just took 5 years for 30% of the country to figure it out. I’m tired of being called “not a real American” because I don’t trust in God. I’m tired of my only choice for political representation being people who are seemingly compelled to talk about how pious they are. I don’t care what your religion is - as long as you don’t try and tell me I’m wrong for having none. But as soon as you even imply that you’re a better American than I am, simply because you believe in some Guy in the Sky, you’re pissing me off. If you dare say that morals can only come from religion, I’m bound to get pretty upset.
PZ Myers has little patience for this ridiculous speech as well, as is to be expected.
“That speech was an appalling piece of dreck. He claimed the mantle of John F. Kennedy, but no, he’s no idealistic Democrat, and he sure mangled the Kennedy sentiment that we should elect our presidents as secular leaders, with no allegiance to any church, into an obscene insistence that our presidents must be fervent religious kooks.”
“The nations of Europe are free; religion is perishing, yet somehow, democratic institutions thrive. His thesis that freedom requires religion is shown to be wrong right there in his own speech. Not that it will matter to the religious fanatics who will praise his speech — to them, America is the only free nation in the world, so they won’t see the contradiction.”
And the conclusion, the take-home point:
Greg Laden has a more thorough dissection of the revolting speech. He must have a stronger stomach than I do, because trying to read Romney’s mindless blitherings made me want to retch. How has this country reached the state where such inanity is considered presidential material?”
Absolutely. I’m really offended by Mitt’s assumptions and what they say. If he had gone up there and said that only white people are Real Americans, or that you’re only a Real American if you own your own home, he’d have been shamed. Instead, he says that the non-religious are disgusting fools hellbent on bringing down civilization - and he’s applauded for it. It’s the continued and increasing importance placed on religion in the American political system that is driving me to become a “militant” atheist. The more I am marginalized, the angrier I get.
A few years ago, around the time the idea of a Constitutional Amendment banning gay marriage was gaining steam, I was in a discussion with a friend about the subject. It was my contention that change doesn’t happen quickly, gay marriage will be allowed eventually, there just needed to be some patience and some willingness to accept that it has to happen in baby steps. Well, he (a gay man) pretty much didn’t like that at all. At all. It was his contention that if something is right, there shouldn’t need to be a slow process to get there. It’s either right or it’s not. It’s either fair or it’s not. He was tired of waiting for equality. You know what? He was totally right, and completely changed my mind. As was once said, “A dream deferred is a dream denied.” It made him angry to wait for what is right.
I’m starting to get real angry too - this country needs to get back to what it was founded on - and that means the exact opposite of what Romney talked about.
Category: romney, religion, Personal, opinion, election 2008, politics | Tags: mitt romney| Be the First to Comment »
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Published December 6th, 2007
So, apparently Mitt Romney believes that “Freedom requires religion, and religion requires freedom.”
At the same time, he decried those who would remove from public life “any acknowledgment of God,” and he said that “during the holiday season, nativity scenes and menorahs should be welcome in our public places.”
I’m sorry - what? I have no problem with nativity scenes and menorahs and kwanzaa decorations and Festivus poles in public places - none at all. The PROBLEM is that jackass groups inevitably seem to think that THEIR symbols are better than someone else’s, so only THEIR symbols should be allowed. Well, the simplest and fairest way is to just have none of them. But that’s not a secularist’s fault - that’s the fault of the religious who can’t get along. Additionally - there shouldn’t be symbols in government institutions IF other symbols are disallowed. That is in DIRECT violation of the First Amendment - the government shall make no law favoring one religion over another. So either you let everything be displayed - or none of it. Again, that’s not the secularist’s fault - it’s the fault of the religious.
“The founders proscribed the establishment of a state religion, but they did not countenance the elimination of religion from the public square. We are a nation ‘Under God’ and in God, we do indeed trust,” he added.
Yeah, guess what - it wasn’t the Founding Fathers that came up with those words or mottos. Jerk.
“Our greatness would not long endure without judges who respect the foundation of faith upon which our Constitution rests,” said Romney.
Hey jackass, can you tell me how many times “God” or “Jesus” or even “Creator” appear in the US Constitution? Go ahead, count. I’ll wait. Figure it out? Yeah - ZERO. If it’s so important a foundation, how did the Founding Fathers so obviously forget to mention it?
“Freedom and religion endure together, or perish alone.”
My response to this is pretty simple: Bite me.
“We should acknowledge the Creator as did the Founders – in ceremony and word.”
Where do they do that, again?
“America faces a new generation of challenges. Radical violent Islam seeks to destroy us.”
Fair enough, can’t much argue with that.
“I believe that every faith I have encountered draws its adherents closer to God.”
Including radical violent Islam? Huh. Well I suppose it does then.
Crap like this pisses me off. It IS in the Constitution that there will be no religious test to hold office - Romney mentions that. But his whole speech is about how religion is necessary for freedom. Religion is necessary. Well guess what - it is NOT. Romney gave a whole speech about how religious he was and how important that is. For something that, Constitutionally, is IRRELEVANT.
Drives me insane. If I went out there and gave a speech about how religion is NOT necessary, that I have no religion, that I don’t care what religion you are or whether or not you even believe in a God - I’d be crucified. I’d be run out of town on a rail. As much as I’d love to, I can never run for public office, because even though the Founding Fathers tried as hard as they could to make religion and politics separate - this country has completely reversed it.
Here’s what some others have to say:
Greg Laden
Jim Fiore
Democrat Dad
MGL
Category: romney, religion, Personal, opinion, politics, election 2008, news | Tags: mitt romney| Be the First to Comment »
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