Somewhere, in the darkest of night, an unmarked grave is roiled. A spectral figure of hideous dessication, clad in mere scraps of moldy cloth, the mortal remains of Thomas Paine stands above his recent grave. He begins to trudge towards Washington. He is clutching a moldy, ancient parchment, a pamphlet that sparked fire and revolution two centuries ago…
“Common sense he wants? Common Sense shall I give him!”
A ghastly chortle rises out of the truest Founding Father.
This will go beyond being either annoying or funny when some bully takes encouragement from it and goes out atheist-bashing. Although not as visible as Blacks or Gays (if not also either as well), if any teenage atheist today can’t keep his or her mouth shut any better than I did twenty years ago, can he or she expect any less torment than I received? Or maybe worse: Jimmy Carter wasn’t spouting this kind of stuff, and I still got the crap kicked out of me.
Even before the 1954 addition of “under God,” the whole idea of the pledge was pretty silly. I mean, a pledge is a form of a contract, right? And minors can not legally enter into contracts. So the PoA is about as meaningful as when junior high schoolers give eachother “going steady” rings. While everyone else is saying the Pledge, can my kid recite that Oath that Ivan Reitman kept repeating in “Glaxy Quest?”
So I hope GWB approves when I excersise my God-given right to vote for any other candidate besides him, so long as they are not equally ready to make political hay out of some no-issue this stupid. Maybe Bush thinks he’s among the elected in the Calvinist sense, but in the political sense that’s not a lock.
Sorry. My post was a sort of general reaction and was actually in response to another thread which I couldn’t get to go through but had copied to my clipboard and so posted it the first place I saw “atheism.” Inappropriate of me and I apologize.
Bush’s comments, however, just mirror the current trend in my State of politicians using their perception of the mainstream’s religious feeling to garner votes. Religious feeling seems to be on the upswing, and politicians will capitalize on that, whatever their personal beliefs.
Well . . . yeah. In today’s breaking news: Fire Is Hot!
This I agree with, though I’ve gotten my head bit off over it in the past. The non-believers shout “You’re just saying it’s not important because it’s not important to you!” Again: Well . . . yeah. I don’t claim to be the Average American, but I’m pretty damn average: white, middle class, Republican but moderate, religious but not rabidly so. I work, pay my taxes, have a beer on Fridays, go to the occasional baseball game. And, to be brutally frank, I don’t really give a shit if IGWT is on the money or not. I don’t give a shit if we pledge “under God,” or over Him, or not at all. There are constitutional violations I can get my panties in a wad about – and I do think this is a violation – but this just isn’t one of them. But I realize that may be just me.
Jodi, the problem with those two words is that they invalidate the rest of the pledge. There is a huge difference between saying “one nation indivisible” and “one nation under god”, without removing any of the other words the right wing invalidated the indivisible statement by flat out saying “this isn’t your country if you don’t believe in our god.”
I have no problem with the true PoA, but with Christians trying to mark their territory by pissing all over the country’s laws.
Maybe the prez should listen to Bob Dylan’s,“With God On Our Side”,the last stanza of which goes:
So now as I’m leavin’
I’m weary as hell
The confusion I’m feelin’
Ain’t no tongue can tell
The words fill my head
And fall to the floor
If God’s on our side
He’ll stop the next war.
Unless I heard wrong, wasn’t the judge in question appointed by Poppy? POTUS #41, his very own daddy? So is he saying that Dad dropped the ball by appointing a judge who didn’t pass the theistic litmus test?
And I thought part of the “traditions and history of America” was to respect and protect the rights of the out-of-step - the minority.
The Senate has apparently gone nuts, with Senators by the dozen making spectacles of themselves reciting the Pledge in public. The whole Pledge was always kind of a goofy idea, even without “under God”; I could never get my school officials to grasp the irony of forcing children to recite a pledge that promises liberty.
I heard Tom Daschle refer to “In God We Trust” being on our money. Good point, Tom; I’d like to get rid of that too. Our motto is “E Pluribus Unum”.
Whenever state and church mix, you get bad government and bad religion. Politicians don’t want to offend a specific church, so they come up with vaguely religious statements that are so watered-down and generic as to be meaningless to a person of faith, and just annoying to me. If “under God” isn’t a religious statement, what the hell is it? What possible purpose does it serve?
Maybe I’m just too reasonable; I agree with the court decision, even though I think the father’s specific argument was weak (he argued that his daughter was injured by exposure to the Pledge; my argument would have simply been that the Pledge is an official government expression and therefore shouldn’t promote religion). So while I agree with the decision, I wouldn’t have bothered to bring the suit, and now I don’t understand what people are upset about.
Some senators are even talking about a Constitutional amendment, for Christ’s sake. (It’s actually called that: “Proposed Constitutional Amendment for Christ’s Sake”.)
However, back in 19 and 56, as a sharp rebuke to all them there godless commy-nists, the offical motto of the U.S. was changed to reflect the truth that the one is splintered into many, as Congress replaced the original with “In God We Trust.”
I’ve been watching this news story from out of the country, and all I can say is “It’s about time.” I think most of us have known for a long time that that particular phrase is pretty much outside of the limits that are supposed to exist in America, but none of us thought that anyone would get around to actually DOING anything about it. The last thing I expected was to see it die under Bush. How long until we get rid of the “In God We Trust” stuff.
For the record, I do believe in a higher power, and I still think that making students choose between pledging their allegiance to a God or making a protest and not pledging allegiance to their country - i.e. “You either have your beliefs or America, you can’t have both” (sounds like a certain Bush Sr, come to think of it) and having the government making religious declarations for all of those in this country who care to use the currency is FREAKING RIDICULOUS. It just amazes me that the fact that it’s stupid had any effect on the situation.
So, add lil ol theistic me to the list of people that our president can bite. Thanks.
I believe the House of Representatives had a vote for a Constitutional amendment(!) to add “under God” to the pledge in the off-chance the US Supreme Court upheld the ruling. Three Representatives reportedly had enough cojones to vote against it.
Not that surprising; none of the Senators comes from a state with an atheist majority.
But then, this whole incident has IMO highlighted the need of atheists to get better-organized and improve their lobbying power. Could you imagine the uproar if one of those Senators making atheist-disparaging remarks had said the same thing about Jews or Japanese or whoever else?
True, and the Declaration serves as a good example as to what the mindsets of the Founding Fathers were intending when they wrote the Constitution. It works as an indicator as to their mindset. Nothing more.
The Declaration was meant to be jingoistic and to appeal to the popular opinions of the masses in America… to rally Americans up against England, and to serve as an indicator as to the intentions behind this rally. As such, hyperbole and common expressions were used.
The Constitution was written in almost what can be considered a mild form of legalese, to be very explicit and clear as to how the country should be set up. 'At’s the difference.
The move in Congress to sponsor just such an amendment (they threaten to amend the Constitution but they can’t do it on their own–yet another proof the highest levels of our government are unaware of the governing document’s contents) is proof that they really do understand that the phrase “under God” is a violation of the Constitution.
Personally I’m starting to wonder why the government doesn’t start proceedings to eliminate the establishment clause and officially declare this a Christian nation. It’s apparently what the majority of them believe anyway, and at least then I can be certain I’m not welcome here.
It would be bettter than pussy-footing around the issue with bullshit.
