Happy Fourth

I've had a few people ask about the old column in the last few days. Sorry to say I'm still on indefinite hiatus. May never get back to it. Who knows.

I will only say this much more about that:

"Laws alone cannot secure freedom of expression; in order that every man present his views without penalty, there must be a spirit of tolerance in the entire population." ~Einstein

But, if you actually miss my column, and/or you love the Fourth of July as much as I do, Click here to re-read some of my old columns about Independence Day and/or the Declaration of Independence.

Have a safe and sane holiday weekend.

Free Speech

"Laws alone cannot secure freedom of expression; in order that every man present his views without penalty, there must be a spirit of tolerance in the entire population." ~Albert Einstein

Empathy from the dead

NEW YORK — It only took a 100 years or so, but the world is finally getting a piece of Mark Twain’s mind on the subject of free expression and whether it’s safer for your words to be expressed after you’re dead.

“Free speech is the privilege of the dead, the monopoly of the dead. They can speak their honest minds without offending,” Twain observed in “The Privilege of the Grave,” an essay written in 1905, and long unpublished, that appears in the Dec. 22 issue of The New Yorker.

"The living person is not really without this privilege- strictly speaking- but as he posesses it merely as an empty formality, it cannot be seriously regarded as an actual posession. As an active privilege, [free speech] ranks with the privilege of committing murder: We may exercise it if we are willing to take the consequences. Murder is forbidden both in form and in fact. Free speech is granted in form but forbidden in fact. By the common estimate, both are crimes and are held in deep odium by all civilized peoples. Murder is sometimes punished; free speech, always — when committed, which is seldom. There are not fewer than five thousand murders to one (unpopular) free utterance. There is justification for this reluctance to utter unpopular opinions: the cost of utterance is too heavy; it can ruin a man in his business, it can lose him friends, it can subject him to public insult and abuse, it can ostracize his unoffending family, and make his house a despised and unvisited solitude. An unpopular opinion concerning politics or religion lies concealed in the breast of every man; in many cases not only one sample, but several. The more intelligent the man, the larger the freightage of this kind of opinions he carries, and keeps to himself."

Collateral damage to the "unoffending family" is ultimately why I stopped writing a weekly column in our local newspaper, though I certainly endured my share of public insult and abuse- although I'd endure that to my dying day whenever I knew I was in the right because I'd researched what I wrote and confirmed it with a variety of independent sources. Generally, if they were genuine friends, people who disagree with me tended to ignore me, forgive me, or listen to me with an open mind long enough that we could come to some sort of compromise.

Reading Twain's essay at least helped me realize that what I experienced is universal to anyone who speaks (or writes) their mind "freely." Pick up a copy of the Dec. 22&29, 2008 "Winter Fiction Issue" of the New Yorker to read Twain's full essay. It is well worth the $4.99, at least that's MY opinion, but I'm sure there are plenty of people who'd think I'm a jerk for saying so.

My favorite Republican President

"The President is merely the most important among a large number of public servants. He should be supported or opposed exactly to the degree which is warranted by his good conduct or bad conduct, his efficiency or inefficiency in rendering loyal, able, and disinterested service to the Nation as a whole. Therefore it is absolutely necessary that there should be full liberty to tell the truth about his acts, and this means that it is exactly necessary to blame him when he does wrong as to praise him when he does right. Any other attitude in an American citizen is both base and servile. To announce that there must be no criticism of the President, or that we are to stand by the President, right or wrong, is not only unpatriotic and servile, but is morally treasonable to the American public. Nothing but the truth should be spoken about him or any one else. But it is even more important to tell the truth, pleasant or unpleasant, about him than about any one else."

~Theodore Roosevelt
in the Kansas City Star", 149 May 7, 1918

Free Press

"Freedom of the Press,
if it means anything at all,
means the freedom
to criticize and oppose"
~George Orwell (1903-1950)

Support our troops, bring them home!

I recently got an email that complained-

"Americans who support our troops used to be called the "silent majority". We are no longer silent, and are voicing our love for God, country and home in record breaking numbers. We are not organized, boisterous or over-bearing. We get no liberal media coverage on TV, to reflect our message or our opinions."

I couldn't believe how persecuted they felt. They control all 3 branches of government. I clicked the "reply-all" button and fired back:

How the President and Secretary of Defense FAILED to support our troops:
1. Didn't send enough of them to Afghanistan
2. Began planning to send them to Iraq BEFORE they even got into office, let alone before 9/11
3. Lied to us to make us thing that Iraq had anything whatsoever to so with 9/11
4. Sent them to Iraq
5. Didn't send enough of them to Iraq
6. Didn't send them with enough or good enough supplies, from body armor to vehicle armor
7. Don't take good enough care of their families while they're gone
8. Don't take good enough care of them or their families once they come home
9. Didn't and still don't have a plan for the reconstruction of Iraq once Saddam Hussein was overthrown
10. Contract too many aspects of the operation out to private contractors, who get paid insanely greater amounts than our soldiers
11. Extended stays, re-ups, re-mobilizations
12. Failed to train them adequately for coping with IEDs and RPGs
13. Failed to train them adequately for security, infrastructure rebuilding and general peacekeeping duties of occupation (which should be reconstruction)
14. Failed to train them in ethics and human-relations OR actually instructed them to violate international treaties, leading to abuses in Abu Grahd, and Haditha- then let them take the fall for it in the courts and the media instead of taking responsibility at the command level.
15. Abused the National Guard system for major combat operations when they're supposed to be reserved for natural emergencies like Katrina and Rita. Especially when guys like Bush and Cheney conveniently avoided service in Vietnam by joining the Guard

Support our troops, remember them, pray for them, offer any assistance you can to their families at home, welcome them back with open arms when they do ge to come home, thank them for their service and sacrifice, give to veterans' charities, write to them and send them care packages, vote for them when they run for office once they get home, please, PLEASE keep them and their families in your prayers- but don't stop thinking, don't start hating people who think differently than you do, don't worship our leaders and follow them blindly without scrutinizing them. Support our troops by exercising the rights that they fight for. Best of all, support our troops by calling for their return home.

And don't send mindless, arrogant, foolish, prejudiced, right-wing propaganda to me unless you want me to answer back with the truth like this again.

Your fellow American, and member of the TRUE silent majority- the MIDDLE!

Who stole my freedom of speech?

I had this magnet on my truck, but someone took it.

Hey, I support the troops, I just happen to remember that Jesus is the "Prince of Peace," so I oppose the current administrations' foreign policy which includes an unnecessary war under the guise of fighting terrorism.

Stealing a magnet of someone's car is a small thing. There have been incidents where veterans and parents who've lost children in the war have put up memorials of white crosses representing each of the Americans killed in Iraq, only to have "war-hawks" drive over them to mow them down with their cars. That's anger. I guess I don't understand how that's pro-American or pro-troops, pro-veterans, or pro-Christian. Isn't it, in fact irreverent, and sacreligeous?

Anyway, if you want your own "Support Peace" sticker, pin, or magnet, click here: http://www.support-peace.com/about.php

What would Jesus Talk About

This column was started with a mission, to talk about “sex, politics, and religion- not necessarily in that order…” and I might add, the kitchen sink too. The point being, this is somewhere were we’ll talk about more than work or the weather, not that those things aren’t vitally important.

Actually I’m not sure I ever have written about sex. Of course that’s why the phrase “sex, politics, and religion” was invented, to tell you what not to talk about in polite company. You can see why. Talk about sex and you might be embarrassed or else people will think you’re some kind of pervert. It’s an intensely personal and intimate issue, so it should just as well be private.

Religion is also an intensely personal and hopefully intimate thing too. I think it should be personal and intimate anyway, maybe you don’t believe that way. Because religious beliefs are held so intensely and deeply, it can be dangerous to talk about it without offending people. No one really wants to compromise on what they interpret to be sacred or even what they consider to be primary fundamental doctrine. “I’m always right and you’re always wrong,” is the perspective we assume when we become absolutist about our religious beliefs.

Don’t get me wrong, I certainly don’t mean to promote “relativism.” Certainly there are absolutes, there is truth, and if Jesus said that He is the way the truth and the life and no one comes to the Father but by Him, a whole lot of other people must be wrong. What they think is truth, must not be.

But the problem there is, I’m not God. I hope you’ll agree that you aren’t either. While they may imagine that they’re God’s personally appointed spokesmen on Earth all those televangelists, denominational leaders, and “faith-based” politicians aren’t God either. None of us has a monopoly on the God-breathed, inerrant truth. No one but Him.

Too often we decide not to talk about religion, not because we don’t want to offend someone else, not because we’re afraid they’ll judge, reject, or persecute us, but just because we know it’s likely to make things tense, maybe even lead to argument.

You know it’s true. One of the biggest complaints I hear from atheists is that all the wars have always been caused by religion. I tell them, no people cause wars. Jesus didn’t cause the crusades or the holocaust. Saint Mary and Martin Luther didn’t start the 100 year’s war. You can’t even really blame Muhammad for terrorist attacks or jihads. People go to war, people full of hate, fear, jealousy, greed, and anger. Religion is only their excuse, a convenient pretense.

Then there’s politics. It’s about control. You think my candidate is a liar and a philanderer, so you want to wrest control away from him. I think that your candidate is ill-equipped, ill-advised, has ill-conceived notions and at best made grave mistakes and at worse abuses his power- guess what, I won’t want him in control anymore than you wanted the other guy.

It gets even uglier if our politicians wrap themselves in the banner of faith. How may abused spouses stay in a bad marriage because they love their abuser. Do we sometimes defend politicians like someone enabling an addict because we think that they share our beliefs, and by God, we know our beliefs are absolutely right- so somehow no matter wrong they do, at least they’re right about a few things.

Here is a true story that involves all three- sex politics and religion:

Once there were two people. One was a white, middle-aged man. He taught Religion at a Christian school. The other was an Hispanic teenaged girl who attended that Christian School.

The man and his wife could not have children. They were staunchly pro-life. They boycotted companies that supported candidates or charities that condoned abortion. They marched for the right to life, admirable civic participation. But rather than a day or even a unit of one or two of his Religion classes, anti-abortion indoctrination dominated most of the time in most of his classes.

The girl lived with a single mom. She was interested in history and politics. She especially enjoyed learning about the civil rights movement and women’s rights. The girl grew more and more depressed as she attended the Religion teacher’s class. She became silent and sullen, she doubted her faith and God’s love for her. At one point later in college, she even thought about suicide.

The girl had been the victim of incest as a child. But of course she kept it a secret. There are some things you just don’t talk about.
__________________________________________________________________________________
A note just for blog visitors: I'm no more "pro-abortion" than I am actively "pro-life" I just want Christians to see that the "Religious Right" aren't as compassionate or as conservative as they claim to be. It's okay to vote for Democrats, it's not immoral and your eternal salvation is not put in danger. Likewise I want Democrats and Republicans both to be GENUINE and open about their own personal faith experiences and convictions, but not coercively impose their faith traditions on anyone.

The last few posts on this blog (bellow this column) have links to organizations that are BOTH Christian and progressive or liberal. If you're struggling with your faith because of the current political climate, you're not alone.

Jesus was a dirty, barefoot hippy, radical who was executed by an unjust political establishment because the entrenched institutional religious power brokers didn't want to hear about turning the other cheek, going the extra mile, loving your neighbor, and selling all you have and giving it to the poor!

Of course, He forgave them, for they knew not what they were doing.

And by the way, He loves you, no matter who you are.

Letter from a reader

Ted, what are you doing to our nice little hometown newspaper? Do we have to constantly read about how unhappy you are with our Country, our President, and our Beloved God? Please stop insulting the intelligence of your readers by ranting and raving about our great country and our great leaders and our great military! And for you to use passages from the Bible in one paragraph, only to follow through with your hatred towards our Country! I will pray for you. It sounds like you are a very unhappy American! Also, you need to get your facts straight. The history lessons and political rhetoric you constantly bestow upon your readers is such an insult to us! Remember how you believed every word Dan Rather reported? Didn't you learn your lesson then? Enough is enough of these political columns of yours? Can't you find something nice to right about?

Thanks for hearing me out, I just hate to see our sweet little newspaper being dragged down the political road by untruths. From a "Tired Housewife in Ute who is married to a Vietnam Veteran and very very proud of it!"

~Jean Nepper

- Not sure if I want to either reply to her or forward this to the NEWSpaper so that they can run it? Obviously we dissagree about the war and the Bush administration. I am an unhappy American I love my country and fear for it. That's why I write what I write. It's as simple as that.

"I tremble for my country when I reflect that God is just." ~Thomas Jefferson

I learned my lesson when I wrote about what Dan Rather was reporting about Bush's service record. I wrote a retraction in a later column. But has anybody learned their lessons about Bush/Cheny/Rove/Libby? Come on- which is more un-American? Complaining about the current administration, or not wanting people to be able to complain about it?

Must have touched a nerve

Charter Oak-Ute NEWSpaper Column for Thursday, May 20, 2004

"This administration cannot be trusted to govern if it cannot be counted on to think and, having thought, to have second thoughts." ~Conservative columnist George F. Will

“Oh,” Bethany worried “You’re gonna get burned on this one” she said, looking at me over the NEWSpaper after reading last week’s column.

“What do you mean? Was it a little strong” I asked.

“I mean, you’re gonna get what the Dixie Chicks got!”
I am worried. I can’t stand having people angry with. It made me a little uncomfortable that that column was placed right next to the story and picture of the Kuhlmahn Sisters receiving an award from the National Guard.

I love the Kuhlman Sisters, I admire their work and support inspired by their father’s service.
And I am proud of the men and women in our Nation’s service. Please know that I feel pathos and compassion on the American guards, not hate.

I still believe in supporting our troops, I would NEVER advocate spitting on GIs or calling them names like “baby killer.” There are over 150,000 American troops serving in Iraq , and so far as we know only 7 or 8 prison guards responsible for the atrocious acts of torture.

Those 150,000 men and women are responsible for countless acts of kindness to the majority of Iraqis and they’re representing America and our ideals well. Unfortunately life is about perception. Psychologists suggest that it takes 10 positive comments to overcome one negative one. So those few bad apples have made a helluva mess for us to try to overcome.

Did you hear Rush Limbaugh excuse the abuse as little more than a fraternity prank? What if Americans were treated that way? Any one victim is now traumatized for life. Limbaugh said that it was no worse than any of the hazing pledges would have to go through to enter the “Skull and Bone” society at Yale.

THAT horrified me. Is THAT what fraternities are like? How would Rush Limbaugh know? Is he the kind of bully who’d abuse underclassmen in dehumanizing ways when they’d come out for football? Remember that both President Bush and Candidate Kerry were members of Skull and Bones.

Congress has now reviewed nearly 1,800 pictures and several videos. There is speculation that someone may have planned on making a pornographic film out of the footage.

I sent a copy of last week’s column to my former Pastor in California.

“What must God think of us?” was the headline.

”God must think we are poor miserable sinners; knowing we are only deserving of His wrath and judgment, yet forgives us through the blood and sacrifice of His Son, Jesus Christ” wrote back Rev. Martin Brauer.

He reminded me that God probably is not tolerant of those who want to destroy His children. I know that’s how I’d feel about anyone who would try to harm my children.

I haven’t read the Koran, although I’ve heard people claim that Muhammad calls for followers to kill every infidel. I have read the Bible a few times and Jesus tells Christians to “love thy neighbor, and pray for those who persecute you.”

I am appalled that Americans have treated our prisoners as poorly as their former dictator would’ve. I would hope that every American is too. Yet I do apologize to readers who feel like I went too far or who feel that last weeks column was somehow unpatriotic.

Saddam Hussein ran and hid, terrified in a hole because he knew that what he had done was wrong. Thank God we live in a country where we are shining light on our wrong doings, we want to get to the bottom of it and dig it out. So that we can move on and hopefully prevent it from getting worse or happening again.
We are society that allows open and honest criticism and debate.

Even as divided as we are and as passionately as we hold our opinions, we can continue to work together, in spite of our differences. Pastor Marty assured me that even though he and I are on different sides of the fence on many issues, “absolutely no chance of a wedge coming between us,” he told me.

What must God think of us?

”God must think that all those who are proud to be Americans have the God-given right to BE proud living in a country whose foundation was built on the laws of Christ and whose freedom stems from the freedom Jesus, Himself, has given us from the curse and power of sin in our lives,” said Pastor Marty.

I mostly agree, though as a History Major I know that there are plenty of “Christians” who are good at misinterpreting and misapplying God’s Word and His laws. And Free Masons and Deists who’ve pretended to be Christian over the course of our 200+ years. Which is why it’s important to know the difference between Church and State. The America system is a great blessing, but it’s still a human and fallible institution. God may use us, but that doesn’t make us somehow perfect and give us a right to become arrogant.

I also agree with Pastor Marty that the most important thing we can do as Americans is to pray.

Rev. Marty Brauer’s prayer is this "Father in heaven: We pray You to continue to uphold our President and his administration as they continue to strive to do Your will. Grant them Your wisdom and Your protection as they continue to stand strong in the face of political attacks and the arrows of Satan. In Jesus' Name. Amen...so shall it be!”

And I’d add, God bless and protect our troops, forgive us and help us when we err, and let our differences and diversity continue to be our strength

I’d also add Irving Berlin’s famous prayer, God Bless America, Land that I love. Stand beside her, and guide her Thru the night with a light from above.

If I were a Supreme Court Justice

The following italicized questions are being considered by the U.S. Supreme Court.

1) Whether the policy of Petitioner ELK GROVE UNIFIED SCHOOL DISTRICT that requires teachers to lead willing students in reciting the Pledge of Allegiance, which includes the words “under God,” violates the establishment clause of the First Amendment to the United States Constitution?

If I were a justice on the high court, this is how I’d reply: There are two important parts to this question. First, should the teachers lead willing students. The Court already agreed in 1935 that unwilling students couldn’t be forced to recite the pledge. No one was forcing Michael Newdow’s daughter to recite the pledge at Elk Grove School.

Second, the First amendment prohibits the establishment of religion, in modern language, they didn’t want to endorse any one Christian denomination. Government is prevented from establishing religion, not from recognizing that there is an unnamed, undefined supreme being of some sort.

That’s why the ACLU helped the Lutheran single mother from Minnesota who sued a public school in Mississippi that required her children to participate in prayers and religion classes led by Southern Baptists. Mormons would lead prayers in Utah, Unitarians in Vermont, Catholics in Boston, Jews or Moslems in New York, perhaps Branch Dividians in Idaho. Faith is something that should be handled in the home or the Church, not by government agencies like public schools.

The Pledge is a public creed. It reminds us what our flag represents, freedom, justice, and unity. Even Michael Newdow seems to agree with the rest of the values and sentiments it contains, otherwise why would he call the movement to have the words “under God,” removed an effort to “restore” the pledge?

2) Whether a non-custodial parent of a minor child has standing in federal court to challenge the policies of a public school district … when the non- custodial parent does not have legal authority to direct either the education or the religious education of the child?

In my opinion, No. Michael Newdow does not have custody of his daughter. As a matter of fact, she is not an atheist like her father. What’s more, her mother, Sandra Banning and Newdow aren’t divorced, they were never even married.

A petition to disbar Michael Newdow was filed in Northern California for “misusing his authority as a member of the State Bar of California by filing frivolous and malicious lawsuits, violating the rules of professional conduct and lying to the courts under oath”.

Oddly enough, Dr. Rev. Michael Newdow is actually an “ordained minister.” In 1977, he received “ordination” by the Universal Life Church, whose sole teaching is “Do what’s right.” You can be ordained too. If you go to their web site, fill out the ordination form, a pop-up ad instantly presents a credential for you to print out and begin using to conduct weddings and funerals for whoever will pay you.

In 1997, he started his own religion, the First Amendmist Church of True Science (FACTS). This “religion” claims that there is no god, and it’s sole purpose is advocating the separation of Church and State.

How sad if 265 million Americans have to forfeit two words from our Pledge of Allegiance because one man is bitter that he can’t control the child he sired outside of marriage.

3) Whether a public school district policy that requires teachers to lead willing
students in reciting the Pledge of Allegiance, which includes the words “under
God,” violates the Establishment Clause of the First Amendment, as
applicable through the Fourteenth Amendment.
I assume this refers to the due process clause:

“No state shall make or enforce any law which shall abridge the privileges or immunities of citizens of the United States; nor shall any state deprive any person of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law; nor deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws.”

I assume Newdow thinks that the state or school district can’t require teachers to lead Pledge recital if, in his mind, the Federal Constitution prohibits it as a form of respecting or establishing a religion. Which religion? Agnostics concede the possible existence of a god, but don’t worship on as members of a religion. What if as a public school teacher, I wanted to hang up “Passion of the Christ” movie posters or listen to Christian rock CDs in my classroom?

Shouldn’t I be allowed to do that since the First Amendment also says that the government can not have any laws or policies that prohibit the free exercise of religion? Student’s wouldn’t have to pay attention to it any more than I have to notice the things they wear and listen to even if they’re Satanic, occult, sexually suggestive, or promoting drugs or alcohol?

The great comedian Red Skelton had no idea what a prophet he was when he said “Wouldn’t it be a pity if someone said that is a prayer and that would be eliminated from schools too?”