It's Time To Neuter Mutt ("Mitt"( Romney AND His Religious Claptrap

Bhfrik already posted about GOP presidential candidate Mitt Romney's extremely tortured logic and compared it, as much in the media did on Thursday, with JFK' famed speech on Catholicism, religion, and the United States' highest office. Yet, when I went back and looked at a rather complete version of the Kennedy speech, I see HUGE differenes (and that's even before you address the issue that America in 1960 was a considerably different place than it is today; in 1960, few gave second thought to being force-fed religion in schools, for example).

Two things especially about Romney's statements not just irritated but scared the hell out of me.

First, his frequent use of "require" as in freedom REQUIRES religion. Uh, say what? freedom. What he's saying blatantly is that he chooses to pretend he knows far more about how a democracy should run than our founding fathers. And, fwiw, it wasn't John Adams or his son who just about bankrupted the commonwealth of Massachusetts over the disastrous "BIG DIG" as Romney did as governor while, according to many reports, the "friends" who thanked him in cash for those contracts increased Mutt's (Call it a typo if you wish, but it fits) his personal fortune considerably.

Second, I don't WANT a president who will "rule" me and the rest of America based on his religious convictions. We're not electing a pope, damn it. I want the president to lead the country and let me practice my religion separate and apart from fundamentalist pandering in Washington.

Third, if Romney can't respect one of the core tenets on which this country was founded and its democracy begun - the separation of church and state - than he has NO business whatsoever running for local dog catcher, let alone the leader of the free (to worship exactly as Mutt tells you to) world.

Considering the scandals and miserable practices of these "good moral values" Republicans like Romney, I doubt very much that God wants them speaking for Him either.

Tragedies Waiting To Happen: Yesterday Minneapolis, Tomorrow Your Town?

Right now, according to ABC News, the federal government acknowledges that about 35% of this nation's major highways are in desperate shape; this in addition to the tens of thousands of bridges, countless thousands of stretches of railway, and other parts of the infrastructure that have been left to decay and are now at best "structurally unsound" and more likely flat out very dangerous.

It's only a matter of time before we see the disaster on the I35W bridge in Minneapolis repeated, perhaps with far more deadly results.

Department of Homeland Security? I dunno; al Qaeda supposedly attacked us ONCE. But can these terrorists do anywhere near the damage our federal government has, just in its total irresponsibility regarding the failing infrastructure?

I think not. President Bush's plan? Why, to tell us to pray, of course.

As Rome And Bridges Burn (And Collapse), Bush Fiddles But Without The Talent of Nero

[Ed. note: For more on this issue, read my posts here and here.]

As a person of faith, I happen to believe in the power of prayer. I make no bones or apologies about this. I also have no desire to shove it in your face, whether we think alike or not.

However, when President Bush finally appeared, sandwiching in time for a comment about the tragedy on the I35W bridge across the Mississippi River in Minneapolis Thursday evening - hard to schedule between his naps, bike rides, Condi Rice still helping him read "My Pet Goat" (he's still trying to finish it lo these six years since he began it on the morning of 9-11 but, written for small children, some of the words probably prove quite a challenge to him) along with (of course) his myriad lies and machinations - Bush was once again quick to cite that he was praying and telling us we should do so as well.

Now, I'm certainly not going to say it's inappropriate for the leader of the free world to pray. However, I rather expect that same leader to do MORE than pray. And I sure as hell don't need him telling ME to do so since the decision to pray, or not, is one that is intensely private and personal.

Time and again, whether on the subject of September 11th or the horror he's caused in Iraq (and Afghanistan, and Pakistan, and here, there, and everywhere), the U.S. Constitution he and pal Alberto Gonzales have used for toilet paper, or whether his favorite Texas team wins the playoffs, Bush shoves prayer at us like he's our moral compass (well, he does seem to believe he sits not just at the right hand of God, but on His - or Her - lap, fiddling dangerously with the control panel, wondering what happens if he presses that big red button - indeed, as Gonzales says he serves at the pleasure of the president, our president thinks God serves at the pleasure of Bush's "decider" omnipotence). Why bother to actually lead when you can just spout prayer and then return to his nap, right?

Let me suggest that Bush should be looking at the nation's infrastructure; for example, the thousands of OTHER bridges out there ruled as structurally questionable if not more so than the one that collapsed yesterday. And not just LOOK at the infrastructure and rush to award lucrative no-bid/no-work/no-good-results contracts to his bestest pals in exchange for money in Bush & Cheney's pockets, but start implementing a real plan to address these issues. The ever-accelerating decay of the nation's infrastructure did not begin with the Bushies, but in the name of the ridiculously incompetent "Homeland Security", everything thing else has gone to goo while he sees terrorists everywhere but where we have the greatest concentration of terrorists these days: namely, HIS administration.

Paul Krugman: "For God's Sake"

Somehow, I believe that God, if He gave press conferences, would completely disavow any relationship with Bush, the Bush Administration, or any of his so-called pals: but here's Krugman in The Times on April 13th (I know, I know: I'm catching up):

In 1981, Gary North, a leader of the Christian Reconstructionist movement - the openly theocratic wing of the Christian right - suggested that the movement could achieve power by stealth. "Christians must begin to organize politically within the present party structure," he wrote, "and they must begin to infiltrate the existing institutional order."

Today, Regent University, founded by the televangelist Pat Robertson to provide "Christian leadership to change the world," boasts that it has 150 graduates working in the Bush administration.

Unfortunately for the image of the school, where Mr. Robertson is chancellor and president, the most famous of those graduates is Monica Goodling, a product of the university's law school. She's the former top aide to Alberto Gonzales who appears central to the scandal of the fired U.S. attorneys and has declared that she will take the Fifth rather than testify to Congress on the matter.

The infiltration of the federal government by large numbers of people seeking to impose a religious agenda - which is very different from simply being people of faith - is one of the most important stories of the last six years. It's also a story that tends to go underreported, perhaps because journalists are afraid of sounding like conspiracy theorists.

But this conspiracy is no theory. The official platform of the Texas Republican Party pledges to "dispel the myth of the separation of church and state." And the Texas Republicans now running the country are doing their best to fulfill that pledge.

Kay Cole James, who had extensive connections to the religious right and was the dean of Regent's government school, was the federal government's chief personnel officer from 2001 to 2005. (Curious fact: she then took a job with Mitchell Wade, the businessman who bribed Representative Randy "Duke" Cunningham.) And it's clear that unqualified people were hired throughout the administration because of their religious connections.

For example, The Boston Globe reports on one Regent law school graduate who was interviewed by the Justice Department's civil rights division. Asked what Supreme Court decision of the past 20 years he most disagreed with, he named the decision to strike down a Texas anti-sodomy law. When he was hired, it was his only job offer.

Or consider George Deutsch, the presidential appointee at NASA who told a Web site designer to add the word "theory" after every mention of the Big Bang, to leave open the possibility of "intelligent design by a creator." He turned out not to have, as he claimed, a degree from Texas A&M.

Read the rest here.

Religious Persuasion And The Presidency

I am NO fan of Mitt Romney, for a variety of reasons. I won't bother to list them all since all we have to do is look at his very recent "sudden conversions" against a woman's right to choose, etc. to tell you Mitt is, as Rudy Giuliani, something of a political whore.

But as I read this news byte at Taegan Goddard's Political Wire re: Mitt Romney's religious affiliation (Mormon) being a detriment (not Taegan's issue, just reporting it), I'm not very happy about it regardless of how much I dislike Mitt.

While I may not be extremely happy about Mormonism because of some of its tenets, I think it is terribly wrong to exclude someone simply based on their religious affiliation, or lack thereof. Of course, religion isn't the only buggaboo, is it? After all, the press is messing its collective pants that we have both a woman AND an African-American running for the Dem nomination for 2008 presidency. In 2000, people went nuts because Lieberman, a Jew, was running for VP.

As much as I believe we MUST have separation of Church and State, excluding anyone because of their religion, their race, or some other issue is just wrong. Period. Because Mitt's running Republican, it will (inappropriately) matter more because there are too many GOPeeupons who feel someone else's choices are everybody's business.