I agree with **magellan01 **, I refuse to vote for politicians who don’t follow tradition. I insist they are white, male, christians who wear funny short pants and wigs, use chamber pots, own slaves, and support the right to own muskets.
The same day that the liberal voters of Minneapolis elected Muslim Keith Ellison to office, the Eastern suburbs of the Twin Cities elected his peer in the House, Michele Bachmann - who fits the profile (in my opinion) of Christian Fundamentalist legislator (over child safety advocate Patty Wetterling). Ms. Bachmann is proponent of teaching ID in the school system, highly anti-abortion and favors leaving a nuclear option on the table for Iraq. We aren’t in any danger of getting run over by liberal Muslims in Congress - and if we were, it wouldn’t disturb me. But I’ll admit Ms. Bachmann scares me.
(I’m smack between the two districts).
Only if he had his hand on a Bible. If it was a copy of the Koran, he’s in the clear…
I’m glad you’ve appreciated them.
Well, you can imagine how I felt when you asked that, after the specific objections to your argument have been repeated again and again so many time. Give me a break. It’s been twelve pages. It’s hard to keep the snark in check for that long.
Yes, even then.
Well, that’s not really for you to say, is it? Plenty of people in this thread have expressed insult at how you want to treat their government and their holy book. Handwaving about ceremonial deism (which, let’s face it, is all ceremonial deism is to begin with) doesn’t change that.
I suspect the Christians, who are the solid majority, would tend to agree with you. I suspect the non-Christians would disagree. Which is precisely the point of division with which I’m concerned. Christianity was important to the founding of the country, but giving Christian’s special rights because of that completely undercuts the entire point of founding this country in the first place. Treating all religions equally is not divisive, it is uniting. Treating one religion better than all other religions sends the message that you can’t really be a part of this country if you don’t share the mainstream faith. There is simply no way a heterogenous nation like ours could maintain cohesion in that enviroment.
Of course there would! How could a law saying, “Congressmen cannot make religious oaths,” be anything other than a violation of the first ammendment? A law saying, “When taking the oath of office, all Congressmen shall swear on the Constitution,” would be a different matter, but we’re not talking about the official swearing in ceremony. We’re talking about an optional, after-the-fact ceremony held for the benefit of the press and the congressman’s constituency. Dictating what sort of oath is acceptable in that context would be a gross misuse of government power.
No, he absolutely did not, and it is entirely dishonest of you to paint the situation in this way. Prager made this an issue. You made this an issue. You are the ones attacking this man for making an expression of personal faith, an attack you would not level at any other politician. Blaming this controversy on Ellison is nothing less than attacking a man simply for having the temerity to be different, and it is utterly revolting.
How is he “shoving the Koran down your throat?” Jesus, you sound like badchad or Der Trihs here. He’s not making you read the Koran. He’s not making you buy a copy. He’s not making you worship it. He just wanted to use it in a harmless photo op.
Why? Why should you be insulted that he wanted to use a Koran? How does this affect you at all? Even if you lived in his district, how does this effect you? Unless you’re objecting to the fact that a Muslim got elected to congress at all, which, more and more, sounds like what’s really upset you here.
I’m having some very real trouble imagining something that could tell us less about a candidate. Most pols take their oath on a Christian Bible. What does that tell us about a politician? Can we tell, by the fact that a pol swore on a Bible, wether he is pro-life or pro-choice? Does it tell us how they feel about gay rights? Tax policy? The war in Iraq? Their stance on global warming?
If Ellison swearing on a Koran is so telling, please share with us exactly what you’ve gleaned from his oath? All it tells me is that a) he’s a Muslim (already known before he took the oath) and b) he didn’t want to swear on a Bible (which was easily inferred from A). What else have you learned about him by his use of this book, magellan? And let’s leave, “He hates American traditions” aside from now, because there’s no clear consensus on wether or not he actually did that.
It never occured to me that real-world practicality would be something objectionable.
Yes, I’d want to know if a candidate I was voting for were a virulent homophobe before I voted for him. The odds of me not learning this up until the moment the candidate swears himself in are so fantastically remote as to make the entire hypothetical useless.
At any rate, no, I don’t have a “right” to know. I have the right to ask, but I don’t have a right to an answer.
Even if he wants to swear in on a Koran?
I’m glad you’ve explicitly stated that, because I was honestly starting to wonder.
Shouldn’t we be wary of anyone who seeks political office? Sure, we don’t want a Sharia Muslim in office. Neither do we want a Phelps Christian in office. Given that there are far more Christians in this country who would want to see America become a fundamentalist theocracy (although still a tiny minority of the over-all Christian population, of course) than there are Muslims in this country who want to see America become a fundamentalist theocracy, shouldn’t we be more wary of Christians? After all, they’ve got a far better shot of seeing their goal recognized than the fundamentalist Muslims.
I’m not implying anything. I’m stating it flat out. The founders did not want the kind of religious test you’ve advocated in this thread to be part of American law or American culture, and they said so, explicitly, both within the system of law they designed, and in their private and public correspondence.
Ellison taking an oath on the Koran is not injecting Islam into the government in any degree. Ellison getting elected to office, on the other hand, is injecting Islam into the government of this nation, but you’ve said that you don’t have an objection to Muslims holding office in America, so I’m not sure what you’re objecting to, here.
There are thousands of Christian politicians in this country about whom you could make virtually an identical complaint. This here is Jim Langevin, a Representative out of Rhode Island. I’ve never heard of him before I googled “Rhode Island Representative.” Is he violent? I don’t know. What book did he swear on when he took his office? I don’t know. Does he think American should be run under Biblical laws? I don’t know. Should I be worried about him? Should we have a national debate about wether Jim Langevin is a danger to America? Or should I trust that the people of Rhode Island elected a man that best represented their interests, and trust their judgement at least until presented with evidence that he’s actually done something wrong?
Have you tried asking him? Here’s his webpage. Shoot him an email. Ask, “Do you think we should follow Sharia law in the US?” Will that settle your curiousity, or do we automatically assume that Muslim candidates are liars as well as fanatics?
Are you an authority on Christianity? Has that ever stopped you from voting for a Christian? Then why would you treat any other religion differently?
But all swearing on a Koran is, is another way of saying, “I’m a Muslim.” Which he’d made perfectly clear well before he ever started campaigning for office. He’s a Muslim: it’s a given that he thinks the Koran is important. If thinking the Koran is important is a bar to public office, then being a Muslim is a bar to public office. So again, unless you’re objecting to simply having a Muslim in office, why do you care what book he swears on?
I’d like Congress to be made up of people whose political views most closely mirror my own. My political views are seperate from my religious views. All I want from my elected representatives is that they keep their religious beliefs from interfering with my private life, regardless of wether those beliefs are Christian, Jewish, Muslim, Hindu, Scientologist, or anything else. Sharia Muslims believe, by definition, that secular law must be Islamic law. So I wouldn’t vote for a Sharia Muslim. Keith Ellison isn’t a Sharia Muslim. So as far as I’m concerned, my interest in his religious beliefs is at an end.
That’s not an extra step. That’s precisely the same number of steps that you have taken. tom~ claims that people swear on a Bible to demonstrate personal faith. That’s a motivation. You claim that people swear on a Bible to demonstrate national unity. That’s also a motivation. The only difference is, tom’s motivation doesn’t violate our deepest, most cherished national values. Yours does.
And so what? Because you and Prager and a few people like you view this as an important American tradition, Ellison should be forced to follow your interpretation of tradition, and not mine? Can he not be allowed to disagree with what you perceive as tradition? As much as you think his (and mine) interpretation is wrong, can you not grant that he honestly disagrees with you, and took his actions under his own beliefs about what this particular action means without being attacked as “slimy,” or “unAmerican?”
Yes, I guess we do. In my universe, people are individuals. In your universe, people are stereotypes.
Again, there was a Bible available on Air Force One when Johnson took his oath. He chose not to use it. Should this not be condemned just as strongly as Ellison? After all, this country was not founded by Catholics. It was founded by Protestants. Where’s your concern for tradition here?
I didn’t leave that out at all. I addressed it directly:
I would not vote for a strict Quaker for president. Not because he’s a Quaker, but because he’s a pacifist. I would not vote for Osama bin Laden for president. Not because he’s a Muslim, but because he wants to kill non-Muslims. I don’t vote for or against people because of their religion. I vote for or against them because of their policies. You have yet to demonstrate any policies proposed by Keith Ellison that you feel would be detrimental to our nation, and which can be directly tied to his faith. So as far as I’m concerned, Ellison’s faith is entirely immaterial to his fitness to govern.
No worries. Get to it when you can.
Progress at last! I’m glad this thread has had some effect!
Of course they don’t have a “right” to know this in advance. They have a right to ask, but so much of the average American political campaign is already wasted on meaningless twaddle, I’d much prefer that nobody wasted their time on such a trivial and pointless question as, “What book are you going to use for your post-swearing in photo op.” Might as well ask him where he bought his suit, for all the bearing the question has on the candidates ability to do the job he’s applying for.
You welcome. I hope nothing in my above reply comes across as too harsh or personally insulting. It’s not the tack I’m trying to take, but the vehement distaste I feel for your position (and a fair amount of frustration inherent in any contentious thread as long lived as this one) might have come across as distaste for you as a person, which was not my intent.
There has been an unbroken line of Speakers of the House, dating all the way back to the founders, who peed standing up. For hundreds of years, Speakrs of the House have urinated while upright. Speakers peeing standing up is an American Tradition.
Yet all of a sudden Nancy Pelosi comes along and pees sitting down. WHY DOES SHE NOT RESPECT AMERICAN TRADITIONS?
They lost the Legislative Funnel?
cite?
No, just like Prager & magellan01, I think your ‘tradition’ is not based on facts.
For example, I believe that during his last few months in office, Speaker Sam Rayburn was confined to a wheelchair. So I presume he did NOT pee standing up during that time. There probably were more examples back in history.
Hey, I’m 62 and get up every friggin’ morning to pee between 4-5 am. And not wanting to miss the toilet in the dark, I sit down to pee. Deal with it!
Are you now, or have you ever been Speaker of the House?
Yeah, well, I’m 65, and I piss every morning at three!
Wish I could wake up before five, though.
[sub]Note: No portion of the above post is true.[/sub]
:eek:
My eyes! They burns!
It might also say that I don’t have a time machine. You know, one to go back and ask him if he was going to swear on the Koran and then look into matters before the election. Not to mention to use it again to move into his district.
Now let me comment on you, you little scumbag. This thread is now 13 pages long, you have contributed squat. The few posts you have are snipes at me, just like you’ve done in other threads. Now you might be fine with this type of behavior, maybe you were raised to try to bully people and pile on someone who already has the masses against him. If so, I guess my gripe is on the poor parenting of those that spawned you. But, just to hold your actions up for you to see: you get on your high fucking horse in an old thread and write a long post to me. Fine. I respond, clarifying certain things, as well as asking for clarification and asking additional questions. Your response: zero. No attempt to actually have a dialogue. No, just, as I mentioned to continually snipe. And now, after I express to Miller that I don’t have much time, you deliver this post? I guess, it fits you perfectly you cowardly, blusterly piece of shit. Go find a Koran and stick it up your ass and give it a good read.
I’m treating you and your opinions with precisely the level of respect they merit.
People have been trying to engage you in dialogue here for more than twelve pages, and indeed, in a larger sense, for two and a half years, and you’re just as stupid as you were when you started. If I have to engage in pointless activity, I’m damn well gonna get paid for it.
The question went to which would be more divisive. You seem to agree here.
Okay. I basically agree. But, I am surprised that you are making this argument. Wouldn’t he be using his government office and title to advance a particular religion?
We disagree. I would submit that this is more easily chalked up to our respective views of the world and this incident rather than dishonesty. But, that aside, he could be have been “different” and simply not have sworn on the Koran. It was a completely voluntary act. Neither his election nor his religion dictated that he do so.
So now it’s not just “just a photo op”, but a “harmless” photo op? Miller, do you think all these photo ops are held because they have no power? No value? That is precisely the reason anyone goes through the trouble. These are staged events, with each detail paid attention to? Why? Because the people who hold them know that they are able to communicate through the staging. Who is present, who stands next to who, etc. is all intentional. Please stop with the handwaving that “i’ts just a photo op” as if it has no meaning or effect. Every PR person and politician in the world would vehemently disagree with you.
Regarding the rest, it was a more forceful way to state that he injected it into the dialogue. He could have been sworn in in the House, then not have chosen to stage the photo op. By making the choice he did he injected it into his term as congressman. By doing so after there was resistance, he showed his insistence that we accept it.
I admit that I’m not thrilled about it. The same way you would be unhappy that a fundamentalist Christian be elected to congress. But my unhappiness over that does not mean I want to bar him from holding office. As I answered your earlier question. A Muslim congressman could be a much better choice than a bible-swearing Christian. The discussion revolves around an optional, voluntary act using his office to inject the Koran into government.
No. We know it doesn’t so we ask about those issues. As I said in an earlier post. Swearing on the bible is part of our common heritage. It is not the same as swearing on any other religious book. The same way that swearing on Dianetics wouldn’t be the same. Most Americans do not know what the book conatins. We also don’t know what in that book is so important to the oath taker. You can claim that the same is true with the bible, but most of the passages in the bible brought up much earlier in the thread as evidence of how that book conflicts with the Constitution are accepted to not be taken literally by the vast number of Christians in the country, if not the world. To not acknowledge that one book is much more a part of the American Experience then the other is to contort reality.
That injecting the Koran into his role as Congressman was important. So important that he was willing to cause a stir over it. Actually, that is probably why he did it, particulalry in using Jefferson’s bible. And again, THAT is what resurrected this thread. And all the fair, careful thinkers that have been arguing against me since then have been mum on that issue. If a Conservative had done something similar, implying that Jefferson owning the book matters at all in this debate, they would have been castigated. And rightly so. But because it’s a Dem—and a non-Christian—crickets. (Except, I think from one poster, who may have been you.)
Okay. But you then do have the right to judge him for not answering.
Yes. I thought that was your question.
This goes to the hear of the matter. We are, for all intents and purposes, a very Christian nation. It is part of our heritage and culture. It has been around us so much that we are kind of experts on it. (Not in a theologic sense.) If someone tells you he is a Christian there is a window of reasonable expectatiions you can make about what that person believes, and doesn’t believe. While there is plenty of room for deviation within that window, it’s boundaries are fairly well defined. Again, going back to an earlier objection concerning the degree to which the bible can be viewed to be in conflict with the Constitution, no sane person would be troubled about where a Christian he runs into on the street or is running for office stands on these issues:
The Bible espouses the divine and sacred nature of monarchies.
The Bible makes no provision for democratic or republican electoral processes.
The Bible contradicts itself in a couple of places, but clearly provides substantial evidence to support bills of attainder (violating the Constitution Article I, Section 9, paragraph 3).
The Bible demands that the religious authorities be provided with a tithe of each family’s earnings.
The Bible makes explicit calls for or provides examples of blood sacrifice, divine revelation, the anointing of leaders, communist economy, and a number of other provisions that are in conflict with the Constitution.
And while the Bible does permit slavery, it puts restrictions on slavery that are not permitted by the original Constitution.
Although those things are in the bible we know we can ignore them when it comes to our governance. The fact of the matter is that we do not have that experience with the Koran. That is simply a fact. Another fact is that in the world—today, not seven hundred years ago—the holy book tied to violence on a mass scale AND ideas that are in direct conflict with the Constitution is the Koran. Not the bible. There are millions of people who believe that the laws it contains should be the laws that rule all societies. This is a reality of today. Now, while I am willing to accept that the Koran can be interpreted differently, similar to the way the bible can, it is not unreasonable of people to be wary. I’d say it is wise.
This, particularly the correct interpretation of the Establishment Clause, is a continuing debate. And for every quote from a founder saying what you think supports your side there is one from my side. This has been shown in many debates. The only thing that is proven is that neither side can “prove” anything.
It’s a moot point. He’s been elected.
I answered this a few paragraphs up.
The slimey thing is what resurrected this thread. I repeat: using a Koran owned by Jefferson does not make this ONE IOTA more acceptable. But so much for critical thinking when sloppy thinking will benefit your side. (Impersonal you.) Also, I’d venture to say there are more people sharing my opinion than “a few”.
You may characterize things in derisive manner if you’d like. I’d say that in my universe people have more reverence for tradition and unity. I’d say they also are more cautious, looking for what might be a threat before it becomes slapping us in the face. Now this doesn’t say which univers is ultimately better, just defines where we live. I prefer mine, you prefer yours. Nothing wrong with that in my book. Except, of course, mine is better.
Let’s say a candidate says he will be swearing in on the Koran. And then subsequent discussion reveals him to be an adherent to quite a literal interpretation of it and the populace rejects him as a candidate. Has not the public interest been advanced. Would that not be valuable information?
I thank you for your grace in this and other threads. Discussions with you exemplify the style of debate I hope to have here. I think we’ve each put a toe over the line once or twice in the past in the heat of the moment, and that is to be expected. I disagree with you often, but I recommend to all—mods included—that by modelling their style after you it would result in a better debating experience for all.
Of course, now would be the prefect time to unleash the vitriol.
Blah, blah, blah, you blustery, cowardly scumbag. Now, unless you can show how you have been paid to read my posts and respond, first with snipes and then with slightly more sincere, much longer effort to engage me, you have revealed yourself to be a liar, as well.
Unlike many on these boards, I do not throw that word around lightly, as I think it requires proof. So congratulations you bullying pussy, you now can add LIAR to your resume.
Frankly, I think that if Keith Ellison had done that, then Prager, et. al. (and you) would then have attacked him like this:
Muslim Congressman refuses to perform traditional swearing-in ceremony!
I’m sorry. I can see how that might have been clear. What I meant was that he could have sworn in in the House, as he did, and just leave it at that. And not have taken the additional step to do the photo op. It was not required by law or his religion.
Okay. That does it. I’m taking back the Torah.
You Christians are no longer allowed to touch your ‘Old Testament’. It’s ours, and you can’t have it. Moses? Gone. Solomon? Gone. Get your erotic poetry somewhere else. Leviticus? Gone. Get your homosexual condemnation from Paul.
It’s thinner now. So read it and try to follow some of the suggestions of the guy you’re all hepped up about.
So you claim, and yet you have not provided any evidence that there was wholesale outrage (or even a murmur of discontent) when other works were chosen. Repeating an assertion does not make the assertion true.
No. It is an assertion. There are quite a few large countries whose populations are overwhelmingly Muslim but which do not use Sharia law or mix Muslim teaching or theology into their secular law. They initially followed the secular ideals set forth by the U.S. (And I wonder if the Islamists’ threat to a few of those countries has not been promoted by the recent shift in U.S. government attitudes that are in keeping with the loudest promoters of the U.S. as a “Christian” nation.) There are also millions of Muslims living in Western societies who have never called for (and who even oppose) the imposition of Muslim theological dictates upon the secular governments and laws in the nations in which they live. (Just as there are any number of Christians who wish to impose biblical law on those secular nations–witness the Dominion movement with John Rushdoony, Gary North, Pat Robertson, et alii).
The very fact that there has recently been agitation in some countries for the imposition of Islamic law has been a response of some of their citizens to the perceived cultural imperialism being forced upon them by Christian nations. I prefer that we continue to pursue a policy of religious independence rather than following the worst traits of the Islamists and Dominionists while you appear to prefer to impose a hypocritical “we all must look alike” ceremonial deism on our nation in a way that would give hope to the most violent Muslim and Christian bigots. I’m pretty sure that the Catholics whose churches, schools, and homes were burned simply because they did not choose to use the “traditional” bible were not encouraged by those actions to become “more” American. For that matter, as recently as 2000, Fundamentalist Christians in the House of Representatives forced the selection of a Protestant chaplain, rejecting the Catholic priest who had been chosen by the search committee. They were, of course, simply following our “American tradition.”
Which action supports the ideals of E Pluribus Unum, tolerance, and separation of church and state: making a show of only permitting “favored” religious traditions, (particularly when espoused by hypocrites such as Prager who do not even believe in the tradition they are promoting), or actually welcoming sincere people to serve our country, even if they are not currently chosen from an “approved” list?