A Cynic's Endorsement of Obama

I don’t mean to upstage Colin Powell or Warren Buffett or Matt Damon, but Barack Obama has now earned perhaps the most important endorsement of his political career. After a long and agonizing debate with myself, in which I’ve employed every dirty trick in the book to win me over, I’ve decided to end my campaign for the presidency. I’m releasing all my delegates as soon as I can find the key to their leg irons. In addition, I’ve decided to stop urging my readers to vote for a third-party candidate or, for those who can spell, to write in their own names. I hope that, like me, they’ll lend their support to Barack Obama.

I’m not completely happy about this decision. Obama strikes me as a spineless Machiavellian liar, not unlike almost every other person in Congress, particularly the current breed of Democrats who, for political expediency, chose not to try to impeach a pair of known dangerous criminals. As I’ve written here often, many of Obama’s ideas and policies make me gag. I’m disgusted by his intertwining of religion and politics, and I’m dead-set against faith-based initiatives, which he gleefully supports in flagrant disregard of the Establishment Clause of the First Amendment. I’m still pissed off about his vote giving telecoms immunity against prosecutions for the spying they did on American citizens, acts which flout the Fourth Amendment. I’m frightened by his saber-rattling against Pakistan, an alleged “friend” of the United States, and his knee-jerk support, without any substantive explanation, of Georgia against Russia. I’m uncomfortable with his wishy-washy stands on abortion, gun control, and the death penalty. And I hate that he was one of the loudest voices in favor of the sucker-punch known as the “bailout.”

But, in the total picture, I think that Obama is at a moral level so far above John McCain as to make it imperative that he win. For one thing, a world increasingly at odds with – and afraid of – America will breathe a sigh of relief if the “Country First” candidates fail. The McCain/Palin campaign, with its constant thuggish chant of “U.S.A., U.S.A., U.S.A.,” has been exploiting the worst crypto-fascist instincts in the jingoistic portion of our citizenry. And, while Obama’s overwhelming support among blacks is an indication of a kind of racism, it’s definitely not the same kind to which the Republicans have been playing. With its demonization of Obama, right-wing speechifying often sounds, to my ears anyway, like a veiled encouragement of lynch-mob mentality: He’s not one of us. They can throw hundreds of cute winks, adorable smiles, and thumbs-up gestures into that rhetoric; they can intone, over and over again, the falsely amiable my friends and the phonily homespun doggonit, youbetcha all they want; they still convey one message: He’s not one of us. The implication? Run him out of the neighborhood.

After eight years of monkey government, we clearly need a leader now. One of the best yardsticks we have for measuring a candidate’s ability to lead is the kind of campaign that he or she runs. McCain’s campaign seems as if it’s being conducted by people who have ADD; it lacks focus, and constantly shifts its tactics in reaction to the polls. Obama’s campaign, on the other hand, has stayed on-target since the first: It’s my time, now. That was the strategy when he announced his candidacy, and it hasn’t wavered. His people have been throwing around that extremely effective bullshit for almost two years, and it has resulted in unheard-of contributions – both from the usual favor-shoppers and the so-called “little guys.” A seeming nobody has successfully taken on the power brokers in both parties; can anyone doubt that he knows how to lead?

Normally, that kind of leadership, built on empty promises, would be chilling. Under usual circumstances, I’d look at it as potentially dangerous, the bedrock of a tyranny. But Obama’s calculatedly anti-divisive speeches have taken off some of the edge. With the exception of the Democrats’ usual bugbear, big business – and, of course, the obviously crooked and incompetent Bush administration – he singles out no group for scorn, blames no one for our two wars (three if you count the bogus “war on terror”), our economic fiasco, our catastrophic energy policies, and our infrastructure disasters. In America, big business can always take care of itself; it needs no help from presidents, or the congress, or my wallet. I don’t have to protect it through my vote. And the Bushies, as far as I’m concerned, should be brought to justice for their crimes against the state and humanity.

My final reason for throwing my admittedly trivial support behind Obama is the specter of a Sarah Palin presidency. John McCain’s age, in and of itself, doesn’t put me off. But, clearly, he has health issues; anyone who has watched his performances during the entire campaigning process can’t fail to be aware that he’s not as well as he should be. He dodders, hems and haws, spouts words that he has to weasel out of sometimes only hours later, exhibits an impatience that may well be generated by the slowly failing workings of his body. If he’s elected, and if he dies or becomes unable to perform the duties of his office (two possibilities that seem unnervingly likely to me), a proudly ignorant, unworldly, religious fundamentalist hockey mom will take over in the White House. She’ll bring her “go team” sports mindset with her. Everything she does will be filtered through her glib us-against-them vision. When issues arise that can’t be divided simplistically into two sides, she’ll do so anyway, and take one of them quicker than you can say “Joe Sixpack.” She wouldn’t be a president to inspire national trust at a time when we so badly need to feel that; she’d be a hometeam fanatic, rooting unreasonably for Americans who are “one of us.” I’m not – and neither are you. By definition, no freethinker is.

Do I agree with everything Obama says? Nope, not by a long shot. Do I believe that he’s honest? Hardly. Do I think that he’ll solve all our problems – or even most of them – in four years? Give me some credit for not being a moron.

But the alternative is so horrific, so unthinkable to me, that I will vote for him. I hope you will, too.

Questions for Obama – or His Cheerleaders

Although, I would never even consider voting for the intolerable and untenable McCain/Palin ticket, I’m finding it extremely difficult to work up any enthusiasm for – or trust in – Obama/Biden. I’m trying to do so, though, because I live in Florida, where my vote will matter much more than it would if I still lived in New York.

Yes, the Democrats’ platitudes are articulated better than the Republicans’, and, superficially, sound far more appealing. But even a cursory reading of the transcript of last night’s tea party (only an idiot would refer to it as a “debate”) demonstrates that Obama’s words are just as meaningless and empty as McCain’s.

So the following, organized by category, are some questions that I’d like to hear Barack Obama answer. I even invite any reader who's a member of the "We Love Obama" fan club to stand in as his proxy, as long as you can provide some cogent evidence that you're speaking for him. Please don't waste your time telling me how bad McCain would be; I already know that.

Economic Policy

• You’ve spoken a lot about wanting to “fix” our energy system. Can you tell us about five specific actions toward such an end that you would either take directly as president or push Congress to adopt? Can you give us an estimate of the cost of these actions, and give us particulars about where the money and manpower would come from? If any of these actions would require a degree of government administration and/or oversight, can you explain in detail how that would work?


• Same questions about fixing our health care system. Again, please be specific rather than speaking in generalities.


• Same questions about our educational system, with the same requirement for details.


• How, exactly, do you plan to prevent lobbyists from influencing government actions? What do you mean when you refer to “special interests,” and can you name any interests that aren’t special?


• You’ve said over and over again that you would cut taxes for the middle class, and raise taxes for those making more than $250,000. Are you talking about gross or net income, and how would you specially ensure that there isn’t a huge loophole disparity between those amounts? What kind of dollar figures are you talking about for those cuts and those raises, and what will be the end result in total revenues collected each year through federal taxes?

Constitutional Issues

• How will you go about deciding whom to appoint as a Supreme Court justice, should a vacancy occur. Without speaking in vagaries, what criteria will you use?
  


• Assuming that a pregnant woman is healthy both mentally and physically, at what point does her fetus’s potential future trump her right to choose? How would you justify, constitutionally, ever denying a woman the right to make decisions about processes occurring within her own body?
  


• Can you explain, exactly, how the faith-based initiatives you’d propose would work? Can you also explain how such initiatives would not conflict with the Establishment Clause of the First Amendment?


• You voted to give telecoms immunity from prosecution after they had colluded in spying on American citizens. Can you explain how you justify that vote? If your answer is related in any way to realpolitik, can you clarify why that should take precedence over the Fourth Amendment?

Foreign Policy

• What specific advantages in “the war on terror” do you think will be gained today by killing bin Laden? What specific advantages will be gained by capturing him and not killing him? Are there any other persons whom you would like to kill or capture? Why or why not?


• Which countries do you currently consider America’s friends? Explain. Which countries would you like to bring into America’s circle of friends, and how would you do that? Explain. Which countries are most dangerous today to America, and how would you make them less dangerous? Using specific details, please explain that answer as well.
  


• How do you envision an Iraqi democracy working? Can you support your ideas with examples drawn from Iraqi history, culture, or religious beliefs.


• The Palestinians democratically empowered Hamas. Is that OK with you? Why or why not? Should the United States be more committed to worldwide democracy or worldwide freedom? Can you elaborate on the distinction between democracy and freedom?


• Do you believe that all Jews worldwide are represented by Israel? If so, how? If not, then given that Israel is a quasi-theocratic state and not representative of an entire ethnic or religious group, how can you justify using the loaded phrases “never again” and “Holocaust” in statements supporting that country?


• Do you agree that many of the problems in the 21st century world are caused by religious extremists? Why or why not? In what way are the beliefs of religious extremists different from the beliefs of other theists? What steps would you take to curb religious extremism around the world and in our own country?

Other Relevant Matters

• Using as an example at least 25 votes during your years in the Senate, in what ways have you personally stood up to the Bush Administration? What was your own reasoning for casting those votes? Again, using as an example at least 10 votes during your years in the Senate, in what ways have you personally stood up to the majority of your own party? What was your own reasoning for casting those votes?


• Under what circumstances would it be all right for a president to lie to, or mislead, the American public? If you answer “never,” then under what circumstances would it be all right for a presidential candidate to lie to, or mislead, the American public? If again you answer “never,” then can you explain your pro-FISA vote and your decision to bow out of the public campaign financing system, both of which you'd promised not to do.


• As president, will you represent atheists as well as theists? If you agree to get advice from, and/or speak privately to, religious leaders, will you also seek advice from, and/or speak privately to, avowed atheists? Have you consulted on public policy with any representatives of atheist groups, or appeared at any atheist functions? If so, with whom, where, and when? What was your rationale for agreeing to appear at a public circus sponsored by Saddleback Church and hosted by its pastor, Rick Warren?


• Whom are you thinking about for various cabinet and advisory positions, and whom are you considering for your presidential staff? Again, without speaking in vagaries, what criteria will you use to select these men and women?


• Under what circumstances should a president seek evidence from experts rather than consulting opinion polls? Do you think the majority of the American people have ever held "wrong" opinions? What opinions are those, and why, in your view, were they wrong?
  

Those are 20 straight-talk opportunities. I’d be satisfied if Obama addressed himself to any four of these items — a mere 20% — in the next month. But I’ll bet he won’t. Any takers?

What Obama Must Do

Sarah Palin is a very bad choice — for Democrats. The Obama campaign needs to reevaluate their stupid strategy and tactics immediately. Here are some reasons why Palin should be making Republicans salivate.

• She's hardcore pro-forced-maternity. She’s anti-gay. She’s got that whole Christian thing imbuing her with a godly glow. That will mobilize the fundies and give "undecided" woo-ists a good reason to abandon Obama.
• She can say, over and over again, something along the lines of: “The Democratic candidates talk a lot about what they've done in the past for women. But the Republican party is the one that really empowers women today." I predict that she'll mention Hillary's "18,000,000 cracks in the glass ceiling” many, many times throughout the campaign.
• She nullifies Biden. Because of his age and potential "chivalrousness," he will not be comfortable attacking her with full vigor. Or else, he'll look like an asshole, and probably put his foot in his mouth. She, on the other hand, can lace into him freely — and, no doubt, will.
• As a former beauty queen and sports anchor, she won't be too threatening to Republican sexists, who will be able to dismiss her — privately of course — as "window dressing," all the while talking publicly about how egalitarian their party is.
• She'll be able to play on the just-below-the-surface justifiable anger of middle-of-the-road white women, who feel as if their gender issues have once again been forced to take a back seat to African-American issues. This has been going on since shortly after the Civil War, when the word "male" was added to Section 2 (which addressed voting rights) of the Fourteenth Amendment.
• She's young enough for Republicans to fantasize about her running for president eight years (or only four!) from now, after she has raised her national profile in the vice presidency.
• She's a fisherwoman and hunter, and her husband is a sportsman. She has been a member of the NRA all her life, and her husband is a longtime union member. Those blue-collar workers, the electoral base that, apparently, must be pandered to, will eat that up.
• She really can call herself a maverick because she stood up to Republican insiders in Alaska, and raised hell about corruption within her own party. Pat Buchanan characterized her as "a reformer with guts." In fact, she ran her gubernatorial campaign as an agent of change. So the Democrats can no longer claim sole ownership of that word. (Biden, on the other hand, is clearly a Washington insider, no matter how many times he took the train back and forth during the last thirty-six years.)
• She cut property taxes when she was mayor of Bumfuk ... excuse me, Wasilla. Americans hate property taxes.
• She has a son going to Iraq in September, just as Biden does. So all the before-the-fact presumptive heroism of Beau Biden is moot now. On top of which, the Biden kid is a privileged captain, while her son is an enlistee first private.

So here are some things the Democrats must do if they want to win:

• Immediately give up on pandering to the evangelical fascists, and start trying to excite freethinkers and other secularists, who are embittered by the constant god-pushing of the primaries and the convention.
• Cede the gun-lovers to the Republicans. Advocate, loudly and proudly, for gun control.
• Stop being so wishy-washy about abortion and categorizing women’s rights by how many months have elapsed in a pregnancy. Say Roe v. Wade as often as possible.
• Don’t keep telling us what a good man John McCain is, and how he served his country heroically. He’s not a particularly good man; he’s a fucking hustler. And it doesn’t take any courage — or military savvy — to get shot down.
• Resist the temptation to praise Hillary at every goddamned opportunity. Mentioning her over and over merely pours salt on the wounds of her supporters. She and Bill know that. Instead of singling her out, talk about how women will be empowered in an Obama administration. Maybe even make a promise to appoint women to the Cabinet and/or the Supreme Court.
• Avoid characterizing Michelle as a wife and mother, and give her free rein to open her effective mouth and speak out strongly on the issues.
• Don’t fall into lockstep with the Republicans on the Russia/Georgia situation. Point out how the Bush White House helped to instigate a world crisis.
• Refer as often as possible to the Bush family’s friendship with the ruling Saudi theocrats. If necessary, trot out some photos of their mutual hugfests.
• Come up with a substantive alternative energy plan, and explain how that will ultimately help Americans save money.
• Talk about an education plan that will keep our public schools out of the hands of fundamentalists, who discourage children’s interest in science, and by so doing, may hinder future scientific advancements. Excoriate states that propose bills or amendments (like Florida 7 and 9) that will publicly finance religious teaching at the expense of secular education.
• Drop all support for faith-based initiatives, reading aloud, if necessary, the First Amendment to the Constitution and appropriate passages from the writings of the Founding Fathers (for example: Thomas Jefferson's "Act for Establishing Religious Freedom" and James Madison’s “Memorial and Remonstrance”). Remind Americans, again and again and again, that one of the things that makes our country great — and separates us from the Muslim world — is our absolute refusal to bow to the authority of religious extremists.

I don't know how the rest of you feel about my suggestions. But if Obama does all those things, he might actually earn my vote.

The "God" Deletions

That’s a purposely ambiguous title up there. Is this post about deletions of the word “God”? Or is it about deletions by “God” or — given the quotation marks — people who claim to represent some supernatural character whom they call “God”?

Well, it’s about both.

Deletions OF “God”

If I had my way, which is not really my way but, rather, the way of the framers of the Constitution, the word “God” would be removed from all enterprises sponsored, directly or indirectly, by the American government. Article VI and The First Amendment are quite clear on that point: “God” has no official business here. Let’s take that silly, but loaded, word off our money and out of our pledge. Let’s banish it from our courts, from our legislative chambers, and from the mouths of our elected representatives. And, since, according to the third clause of Article VI, religion can’t be used as a test for official office or “public trust,” let’s keep those fucking spiritual advisers away from the president. The views of religious leaders who counsel our elected officials are selected, weighed, vetted for conformity to America’s alleged Christianity. That’s a religious test, folks.

There’s nothing more unAmerican, more anti-patriotic, than elected and appointed governmental office-holders intoning the word “God.” Why? Because the wise men who drew up our Constitution and its Bill of Rights consciously and purposefully chose to leave that word out of their formula, and to take steps to make sure it would never be included in any future activities done specifically under the auspices of the government they created.

Perhaps the writers of the Constitution didn’t foresee the loopholes. They mistakenly thought that all our laws would be passed by the legislature, instead of many “laws” being enacted by the executive branch and by governmental agencies. With that erroneous thought in mind, they voted to include the First Amendment, which specifically banned our legislature from pandering to the superstitious: Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion. Notice that they didn’t write “an establishment of a religion,” which would argue against elevating a specific belief system over others. No, what they said was “an establishment of religion,” with no article, no qualifier. Religion, itself, cannot be established by the legislature. The spirit, if not the letter, of their ideas should be extended to the Oval Office and the Supreme Court, and, therefore, to every executive office and courtroom under the titular jurisdiction of either.

Stop forcing “God” on me, you tyrants.

Deletions BY “God”

OK, let’s start by admitting the obvious: There are many reasons for blogging. Not everyone is interested in sharing ideas, discussing their own and opposing views, or debating with passion and at least some degree of coherence.

In this neck of the Atheosphere, though, we all seem to enjoy doing those things. If you check out my list of frequent commenters, you’ll see the names of lots of people with whom I’ve engaged in intellectual smack-downs, people who have eagerly and effectively jabbed me back. Almost everyone on that list has argued with others in that “honor” roll, although many of us consider one another to be friends. We may get nasty, satirical, or just plain silly. Sometimes, we even piss each other off. A lot. Yet, when we cool down, we can acknowledge that the attacks aren’t personal, they’re back-and-forth thrusts about ideas. To me, taking part in a vehement verbal dispute is a way of showing that I respect another person, although not necessarily his or her opinions about a particular subject. You’ll never see me (and most of us, I think) whining — as one commenter did here: “Obviously you don’t like me.” How stupid and irrelevant is that?

One thing most of us don’t do is delete comments. We may refuse to engage in debate with some people who do write ridiculous remarks, even urge our readers to avoid feeding the “trolls.” But we don’t ban anybody’s ideas from our premises. Most faithfreeists champion Freedom of Speech. In our opinion, it may well be the most valuable right we possess.

But go take a look at some religious blogs. I’m not giving you any links; just pick a few sites at random. What you’ll find, for the most part, are “moderated” threads. If the blog-owner doesn’t care for what someone says, if it offends “God,” then, bam!, it’s gone. Back to the ether. Deleted. The attitude seems to be:

Hey, I have an idea. Let’s have a debate. Only I’ll remove most of the things you say because they’re offensive and they’re aimed at me personally.

I win!!!!!!! YAY!!!!!!

Whether you agree or disagree with anything I've written here, feel free to leave a comment. I promise: I will not delete it.

The Course of Human Events: A Quiz

What better way to celebrate Independence Day — OK, this is a few hours early, so sue me — than by taking a quiz? Forget the fireworks and the patriotic band concert, put down that hot dog and bottle of tasteless American beer, turn off your Mel Gibson double-feature (The Patriot and The Passion of the Christ), and don your thinking caps. (Note: Yarmulkes and bishops' mitres don't count.)

If you believe that America is a Christian nation, you might not do very well on this little test. All others ought to get most, if not all, of the questions correct. You earn no extra points for wearing a flag lapel pin, so don't feel obliged. I haven't provided the answers, but will do so if commenters need them.


1. Which of these terms for a deity did Jefferson not use in the Declaration of Independence?

A. Divine Providence
B. Jesus Christ
C. Nature's God
D. Creator


2. Before the Declaration was edited by the Continental Congress, Jefferson wrote scathingly of the King who had

waged cruel war against human nature itself, violating its most sacred rights of life and liberty in the persons of a distant people who never offended him, captivating and carrying them into slavery in another hemisphere, or to incur miserable death in their transportation thereto.

Which entirely capitalized adjective did Jefferson use negatively to describe this King?

A. HEATHEN
B. INFIDEL
C. GODLESS
D. CHRISTIAN


3. In the Declaration of Independence, how many times are the Ten Commandments referred to as a source of Law?

A. none
B. one
C. four
D. ten


4. According to the Declaration, governments draw their powers from the __

A. "Bible"
B. "Word of the Lord"
C. "Consent of the Governed"
D. "Religious Heritage so Beloved of all True Christian Men"


5. Fill in the blank:

[We] … solemnly Publish and Declare, That these United Colonies are, _______ FREE AND INDEPENDENT STATES …

A. by the Grace of Him Who Died for Our Sins,
B. by the Blessings Bestowed unto Us by the Author of the Universe,
C. and of Right ought to be,
D. in Accordance with the Wishes of our Heavenly, not Earthly, King


6. Which of the following was a self-evident Truth to the signers of the Declaration?

A. Abortion is Murder
B. All Men are created equal
C. Homosexuality causes Hurricanes
D. Scientists hate American Values


7. One of the colonists' grievances against the King of Great Britain was that

A. he prevented immigrants from coming to the colonies.
B. he refused to provide funds for religious charities.
C. he allowed doctors to perform abortions.
D. he approved of homosexuals marrying one another.


8. Which of the following grievances against King George, equally applicable to George W. Bush, is NOT mentioned in the Declaration of Independence?

A. He has combined with others to subject us to a jurisdiction foreign to our constitutions and unacknowledged by our laws.
B. He has refused his assent to laws the most wholesome and necessary for the public good.
C. He has erected a multitude of new offices and sent hither swarms of new officers to harass our people and eat out their substance.
D. He has held persons captive without charging them with crimes and empowered his representatives to commit the most egregious acts of torture upon them.


9. How many of the 56 signers of the Declaration of Independence were, in 1776, active clergymen?

A. none
B. one
C. two
D. three


10. Thomas Jefferson, main author of the Declaration of Independence, wrote all of the following quotes EXCEPT:

A. Reason and free inquiry are the only effectual agents against error.
B. The day will come when the mystical generation of Jesus, by the supreme being as his father in the womb of a virgin, will be classed with the fable of the generation of Miverva in the brain of Jupiter.
C. I believe in the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit, and hope to God Almighty that our country be recognized as a Christian nation.
D. Question with boldness even the existence of a God; because if there be one, he must more approve of the homage of reason than that of blindfolded fear.


Bonus Question:
Of the following people, who is LEAST likely to understand the religious ideas that led to the Declaration of Independence?

A. a historian recognized among her peers as one of the foremost experts on the American Revolution
B. a scholar who has made an extensive study of Enlightenment philosophy and how it influenced America's founders
C. an academically well-respected authority on eighteenth-century deists' attitudes about the role of religion in government
D. televangelist and Christian shill Pat Robertson


Now that you've answered the questions, you might want to take a few minutes and actually read or reread The Declaration of Independence. (My British friends are invited to do so, as well. No hard feelings, eh?)

Blame

When my wife gets a cold, she tries to identify the culprit who gave it to her. Was it that teenage bagboy who sneezed at the grocery? Or, perhaps, the irresponsible co-worker who coughed without covering her mouth. Maybe it was the old geezer with the sniffles in the bookstore, who was browsing through the same magazines my wife was looking at.

Someone must be blamed. The villain must be found.

I’ve been thinking about blame today because we here in Central Florida are experiencing a fiery spring. Throughout the area, dangerous brushfires are raging, and there’s no rain in sight for at least four or five days. About twenty miles from my house, 500 people were mandatorily evacuated from their homes; 300 more were asked to leave voluntarily. Other cities nearby are battling their own conflagrations.

Looked at in the greater scheme of things, a relatively small number of displaced persons can’t compete in the disaster olympics with the thousands killed, hurt, or rendered homeless by the cyclone in Myanmar, or the earthquake in China. Anyone with a shred of humanity, who doesn’t see the world as a collection of ethnic teams, feels for those people. But I have to confess that, one-worlder though I be, there’s a level of “reality” to the disaster here that those others lack. I smell the smoke in the air, hear the pleadings of local newscasters urging their listeners to flee, see the scared looks on the faces of neighbors. Yes, I feel great sympathy toward those poor people in Asia, and will contribute what I can to help them. But they don’t shop at the very same stores that I do; they don’t eat in the very same restaurants; they don’t put up with the very same governmental incompetence. Their misfortunes don’t — as illogical as I know this sounds — enrage me.

Fires are actually necessary for the environment. A number of plants, some of our native Florida pawpaws and orchids among them, get a competitive advantage only when other flora are cleared away. Longleaf pine, with its fire-resistant bark, will not flourish except in areas that have frequent low-intensity burns. Scrub habitats, filled with all those messy, eyesore plants, would wind up being hardwood oak forests if it weren’t for frequent fires; the huge trees would shade out the understory. All the critters who depend on these environments would have a tough time, if it weren’t for the flames.

But, of course, eco-friendliness is no comfort to a family watching their home getting enveloped in a blaze.

Apparently, a few of the fires — not those in my immediate vicinity, but others in bordering counties — were set by humans: arsonists or just plain idiots. There’s almost a tone of relief in the TV announcements that, just as we all suspected, some of those fires were started by human agency. There will be persons to blame, villains on whom to vent our community anger.

Being an atheist during a natural disaster is an existential experience. Despite scientific advancements undreamt of by past generations, there are some things in this world that can’t be controlled, that have to be accepted with reluctant resignation. It’s a sad and scary feeling; I’m not the master of my fate. Yes, I’d love to be justifiably infuriated, but at whom, at what? Only “nature” is the culprit, and, not being an actual entity, it’s blameless. All living things are both victims and victors in its endless cycle; that family in the $2 million house is no more “worthy” of sympathy for getting displaced by the fire than the scrub jay who would be displaced without it.

On the other hand, the theists amongst us do feel that there’s a causative entity, a super-intellect, a maker of cyclones, earthquakes, and fires. The blame is not, of course, his; he’s all good. The homosexuals, the libertines, the infidels, the “others” are responsible for the catastrophe. Even those who don’t take an accusatory position have to admit that “God works in mysterious ways.” Somehow, their supernatural sneezing bagboy is behind the calamity.

To think that some intelligent force is accountable for the tragedies that beset humanity, is, to me, a far sadder and an infinitely scarier explanation than knowing we’re each of us alone in a wild and seemingly random world.

Escape from the Moral Dimension

Ever since Barack Obama said in the Compulsion Forum that there’s a “moral dimension” to abortion, some of us in the Atheosphere have been arguing about morality. Although I hate like hell to get involved in philosophical masturbation (I much prefer the physical kind), I can’t resist an opportunity to piss off some of my fellow atheists. So here, in brief, are some random thoughts about morality, numbered for the convenience of commenters.

1. For an issue to have a moral dimension, there must be some question of “what’s right?” and “what’s wrong?” Obviously, not all issues have such a dimension. However, people who love judging others can invent moral dilemmas where they don’t exist. That doesn’t mean the rest of us have to blindly accept those issues as posing moral questions. Example: whether or not to eat meat is a moral issue for some vegetarians. It isn’t for me, though, no matter how much they protest. I don’t see any rightness or wrongness to argue about. If I engage in a debate about whether or not it’s moral to indulge in a slice of meatloaf, I’m validating the premise that there is a right and a wrong at issue. I’m not willing to make that concession.


2. The negative version of the Golden Rule — don’t do to anybody else what you wouldn’t want them to do to you — may be evolutionarily hardwired into our brains. Even if it isn’t, it makes rational sense. For me, the Golden Rule means: Don’t harm anyone. Don’t steal. Don’t cheat. Don’t use physical or psychological threats to impose your ideas on others. Don’t lie. But even those most basic moral precepts aren’t accepted as universals. Cultures throughout history, and all over the globe, have found ways to justify violating those simple rules. Some people in the Atheosphere, in fact, have actually defended polticians’ lying as “that’s what you have to do to get elected.” Maybe so, but it’s immoral nonetheless.


3. Jumping off from the Golden Rule: my idea of morality is avoiding those actions that are immoral. An action that poses a moral problem is either moral (what’s right) or immoral (what’s wrong). One may (and I do) take the position that the morality scale is not a line with gradations of rightness and wrongness. Neutral actions (those that don’t pose moral questions) and right actions are equivalent; we’re not collecting points for an afterlife. In other words, if one is not immoral, one is automatically behaving “morally.”


4. It follows, therefore, that there’s no such thing as moral “high ground” or “low ground.” Morality is not terrain. Some actions, as I’ve said, are off the map entirely, neither right nor wrong. Other actions seem to be right; they’re conscious decisions not to violate the Golden Rule. Immoral actions are all those things we do or say that are “wrong,” that do break the Golden Rule. Sometimes, immoralities have to be given relative weight: Which one is less “wrong” under the circumstances. That’s why waging war, for instance, is always immoral, but may be less so, under some conditions, than not waging war. So-called white lies are always immoral, but may be less so, under some conditions, than telling the truth.


5. Freethinkers realize that, humans being the flawed creatures we are, ideas about morality are relative. Each person has to think through his or her own code. That means constantly debating within yourself about which immoralities are less bad than others when two “rules” conflict. Is killing ever an option if it could mean saving others? Is stealing by the government OK if it redistributes wealth to the neediest? Is it all right to force your ideas on others when those ideas might build a better world? For atheists, deciding what is and isn’t immoral is, ultimately — and unfortunately — a personal choice.


6. Religionists, on the other hand, think that morals are absolute, dictated from on high. They’re things that you should do in addition to things that you shouldn’t. Thus, the onerous positive version of the Golden Rule: Do unto others.... In fact, I’d argue that the religionists’ version of the Golden Rule sees morality through a lens held in the wrong direction. In the version of morality I’ve been writing about, being moral is the natural state of humans; one has to take specific wrong actions to be immoral. In the god-driven version of morality, being immoral is the natural state of humans; one has to take specific right actions to be moral. If you don’t, you’re eternally fucked. But are morals right because a god says they are, or does the god say they are because they’re right? Can you say “Euthyphro”? In reality, of course, the various “holy” books contain so many vague, conflicting, or despicable “morals,” that, again, a workable, humane code comes down to a personal choice. But in the religious version, the godpusher feels justified in butting into others’ lives, telling people what they must do as well as what they mustn’t.


7. The word “moral” is loaded. When pious zealots use it, they always have their own warped religious teachings in mind. In debating an issue, the rest of us shouldn’t necessarily accept the word “moral” as a synonym for “right” just because someone claims that his or her position is such. Theists are quick to raise bogus moral questions where, often, there shouldn’t be any. One’s private sexual activity, for instance, is an instinct that’s outside the realm of right vs. wrong. It’s not a moral issue unless it involves force, physical or emotional. In that case, the moral dimension grows out of: Don’t harm anyone. That’s why, in my personal code, rape is immoral. Having sex with children is immoral — although I’m not sure I can define the age at which a person is no longer a child. Similarly, a so-called normal person having sex with a mentally handicapped partner may be a subject for moral discussion and examination. Incest between consenting adults, in cases where it may result in childbirth, is scientifically unwise, and, perhaps morally dubious from the potential child’s standpoint, at least in the medical sense; where there’s no threat of pregnancy, I don’t see how morals come into the picture. The stricture against multiple husbands and wives is a societal convenience, but not a moral issue. Gay sex is not a moral issue, whatsoever. And sex between unmarried heterosexuals is, of course, not questionable at all on moral grounds.


8. Societies codify their sense of morality through laws. Those laws, in democratic countries, are majoritarian. But that doesn’t necessarily mean that everyone agrees with the “morals” being enforced, or even whether there really are any valid moral arguments involved. Freethinkers should refuse to let woo-ists dictate the terms of the national dialogue.


9. That’s why abortion — at least in the early stages of the pregnancy — is not a moral issue. In fact, for those of us who think there may indeed be a moral issue once the fetus has attained some level of brain function, or “consciousness,” let’s use two different terms for abortion instead of just one. I hope someone can come up with better terms than I have, but for the sake of this essay, let’s call removal of the fetal cells at the preconscious stage a “procedural pregnopause” or an “amniectomy.” Let’s call a so-called “late-term abortion” a “surgical miscarriage.” I’ll happily grant moral ambiguity to the question of whether or not to have a surgical miscarriage. But for atheists, for whom presupposing a soul is unthinkable, the procedural pregnopause has no moral dimension at all; there’s no right vs. wrong for those of us who don’t give credence to the idea that a magical spiritual spark is lit at conception. The only moral question that exists insofar as a procedural pregnopause: Is it right or wrong to force a woman to have a child? That’s not a moral question at all unless and until theocrats try to use physical or psychological threats to impose their ideas on others.


10. One last point: Ideas about the evolutionary and historical development of morality may be colored by one’s position on the authoritarian/libertarian scale. For an authoritarian, morality arises from a system that imposes the greatest sense of community. People should be encouraged to act together for the good of the species. For a libertarian like me (please do note the lowercase L) morality arises from a system that imposes the fewest constraints. People should, essentially, be free to do whatever they want unless their actions impinge on the freedom of others.

OK, readers, feel free to weigh in. But remember: There’s no moral dimension to commenting.

It's the Theocracy, Stupid

As you know by now, Barack Obama declined to participate in the Science Debate, and both Hillary Clinton and John McCain just sort of ignored it until it went away. The Democratic candidates, however, have agreed to attend the so-called “Compassion Forum” — originally billed as the “Religious Compassion Forum,” so don’t be hornswoggled — which takes place this coming Sunday at Messiah College.

According to the college’s press release, to which I've added only some emphases, the event will be:

an unprecedented bipartisan presidential candidate forum dedicated to discussing pressing moral issues that bridge ideological divides within our nation.

The Church Communication Network (CCN) will broadcast the event to tens of thousands of people of faith in at least 1,000 congregations nationwide on April 20, the Sunday evening before the Pennsylvania primary.

Now more than ever, Americans motivated by faith are bridging ideological divides to address domestic and international poverty, global AIDS, climate change, genocide in Darfur, and human rights and torture. The Compassion Forum will provide the opportunity for candidates to discuss how their faith and moral convictions bear on their positions on these important issues....

The Compassion Forum is supported by diverse religious leaders and Democrats and Republicans alike.

There then follows a series of quotes from various pulpit bullies: Mike Huckabee, Senator Bob Casey of Pennsylvania, Frank Page (President of the Southern Baptist Convention), William J. Shaw (President of the National Baptist Convention, USA, Inc.). The text ends with a long list of pious godpushers who make up the Forum’s board.

For many years, the Republican party has been the main governmental arm of the religious zealots in this country. Therefore, many atheists, freethinkers, and secularists have increasingly identified themselves with the Democrats.

Of course, voting for a political candidate is usually not just about one issue. If you’re an informed voter, you weigh dozens of factors before deciding who best represents your views.

However, the way to achieve any political clout is to refuse to stand for repeated “Screw You”s from the powers-that-be. Most African-Americans would never dream of voting for a candidate who attended a White Supremacy Forum. Gays would rightfully shun a political contender who spoke at a Defense-of-Marriage Forum. Women — at least those who haven't been religiously indoctrinated to be submissive — would refuse to support a vote-seeker who attends a Male-Domination Forum. Jews wouldn’t vote for anyone who participates in a Hitler-Had-Some-Good-Ideas Forum, and Muslims would surely steer clear of contributing to the campaign of a person who took part in a Crusades-Forever! Forum.

But we atheists — we oh-so-rational skeptics — will watch and shrug as both Democrats cozy up to the nation's ignorant and superstitious masses, make who-knows-how-many implied promises to them, actively inject more and more woo into the nation's discourse, while simultaneously telling us that our ideas and values are irrelevant.

There’s no other group in this country that would allow itself to be kicked in the teeth like that. They’d be organizing from now until Election Day and beyond.

That’s why I urge every person who values the Constitution, who believes in the Separation of Church and State, who knows that Religious Freedom means the right not to have someone else’s beliefs rammed down his or her throat day after day after day ... that’s why I urge all of us to loudly start making it clear on our blogs and in our personal lives that we will not vote for the Republican OR the Democratic candidate unless our priorities get some small degree of respect.

We are a potentially viable political force, but we all need to publicize our concerns. And make political threats. The Christian Right used just such tactics, and they continue to flourish.

In November, unless one of the candidates has spoken about issues that are the most profoundly important to me — namely, the value of critical and rational thought in governing the country and relating to the rest of the world — I’ll march into my polling place and write “The Exterminator” and “The Chaplain” proudly on my ballot. Perhaps you’d like to do that, too, or write in your own name. Or vote for a third party candidate, or a cartoon character, or your dog.

But please don’t furnish anyone with the boots to kick us again.

New Rules for Commenters

Well, another blogger I like has instituted a comments policy. Take a moment to read his post. It made me realize that I’ve never specifically stated what my strictures are. I need to rectify that. So:

The Exterminator's Eleven Rules for Commenters

1. Please do not be respectful. You can feel free to extol, to flatter, to fawn, to kiss up, and to sweet-talk, but make sure you do it in a disrespectful way.


2. Use profanity whenever fucking possible. Do not substitute characters from the top line of your keyboard or resort to euphemisms. If you’re not comfortable enough to write FUCK in giant red capital letters, then you shouldn’t be using it at all, even in some weenie version.


3. Insult anyone you want to. Just understand that the regular readers of this blog are used to being insulted by me and I'm used to being insulted by them. And we're all far better at it than you are. If I were you, I'd restrict myself to wisecracks about the president or the pope.
   


4. Go ahead and try to convert me. But know in advance that you will not succeed and that I'll do my best to make you look and feel like the incredible asshole you are. If you do try to convert me, however, then f’Chrissake check your goddamned spelling.


5. Freely exchange ideas and keep an open mind. OK, I stole that last sentence from the sweet, but quaint, blog jointly written by Rebecca of Sunnybrook Farm and Pollyanna. Ideas haven’t been exchanged freely on this continent since a couple of early Americans kicked around the best way to trap a saber-toothed tiger. That was right before one of them clubbed the other for worshipping the wrong bird. Really, keeping an open mind is overrated. There are some ideas — like caveman religions and Christianity — that don’t deserve to be given serious attention.


6. Don’t feel compelled to stick to the topic. To tell you the truth, about three-quarters of the time I don’t have a clue what the topic is. In fact, if you read a post and do know what the topic is: Leave a comment telling the rest of us. Then we can use profanity while we argue about whether or not you’re right.


7. Do not read this blog while driving. Objects may appear stupider than they really are.


8. There are no special prizes for being concise. On the other hand, be aware that I no longer pay by the word. In any case, try to say what you mean in your own unpaid-for words rather than quoting from the bible or P.Z. Myers.


9. This is a no-French-cut-canned-stringbeans zone. Violaters will be persecuted. You may, however, mention any other fruits or vegetables: canned, frozen, pickled, dried, or fresh. Bear in mind, though, that the words "broccoli" and "zucchini" are much funnier than "corn."


10. Linking to and/or plugging other Web sites will be tolerated, but try not to be too garish about it.
    
    


11. Your comment will probably be deleted if it’s automated spam. But why am I telling you this? Anyway, even if it is a machine-driven ad, your note might be kept if I think it's hilarious. In that case, it'll be made fun of mercilessly because the people around here love insulting robots almost as much as we love offending theists. If you're a theistic robot, you'd better have a particularly thick skin.

So that's my list of rules. Aside from them, No More Hornets remains a free speech blog. That means everyone can say whatever he or she wants, and, although I may think you're a complete and utter jerk, I'll not deprive you of your right to speak your mind. So thanks in advance for mouthing off.

Is There a Catholic Doctor in the House?

As I’ve said many times before, I tend to avoid philosophical rambles here at No More Hornets. I’m not interested in long, pointless discussions that were much more interesting 2400 years ago when Socrates was stopping strangers in the street and asking them annoying questions. Issues of ethics, in particular, usually bore the shit out of me. In my opinion, the whole universe of ethics boils down to the Jewish version of the Golden Rule, which says, essentially:

Don’t do to anybody else what you wouldn’t want anybody else to do to you.

In more biblical language:

Fuck not thy neighbor royally, if thou wouldst not be fucked in kingly fashion thyself.

But today, I’m going to begin an examination of an ethical issue, mainly by posing a question and suggesting some alternatives. I hope my readers will jump in with comments and we can get a real dialogue going.

So here’s what got me started on this topic.

This evening my wife opens up our local rag, and she notices a front-page story about the mama-papa medical practice she goes to. The headline is: Doctors won’t offer ‘the pill’.

It seems that both husband and wife, described as “two area Catholic doctors” — uh-oh! — have decided that there’s alarming medical evidence supporting their view that swallowable birth-control is bad, bad, bad for women. The ironclad proof supporting their opinion has, unfortunately, been swept under the carpet. In a sneaky disregard for scientific data, our overly permissive society has insisted for years that everybody should be free to have sex willy-nilly with one another, regardless of gender, age, or species.

God works in mysterious ways, and one of those mysteries is why the story of the two doctors made the paper today. They claim to have sent out a letter to their patients way back in October. My wife — one of their patients, as I’ve mentioned — never received it. Perhaps that was because the doctors decided she was well past her child-bearing years and wouldn’t be needing pharmaceutical assistance to keep from getting pregnant. Or maybe they just fucking lied to the newspaper. It's possible that they informed only those patients who actually asked for a prescription. “Oh, sorry, but we think that’s really bad for you, and so does Pope Benedict, and so does Jesus! Do you need any Xanax or anything?”

Anyway, the alleged letter contained some mumbo-jumbo about research that shows how using hormones to prevent pregnancy can lead to a whole world of ills: cervical and breast cancer, deep vein thrombosis, strokes, heart problems, everything but an enlarged prostate. In other words: God is waiting to fuck up your whoring bodies, ladies!

The note failed to mention stigmata, hallucinations, or epileptic seizures on the road to Damascus. Apparently, pill-takers, as opposed to devout Catholics, are safe from those particular diseases.

Now, it so happens that most of the country’s gynecologists dismiss the medical evidence offered up by the Crusading Doctor Duo. That’s probably because most of the country’s gynecologists did not attend the recent conference of the Catholic Medical Association, nor did they feel themselves “convicted spiritually” to stop prescribing birth control.

(As an amusing side note, the news article contains the not-so-startling information that Mrs. Doctor is about to pop her fifth child. As soon as she does, she and her husband would like to begin proselytizing for “natural family planning.” That method has clearly been hugely successful in their household.)

Is the pill risk-free? Of course not; what drug is? But the medical evidence, standing by itself, is certainly not sufficient to warrant a refusal to prescribe birth-control to patients. The two Papal Physicians have clearly allowed their scientific judgments to be swayed by religious, not medical, concerns.

Which brings me to the ethical issue that I’d like to throw open for discussion.

The way I see it, one can view a doctor’s responsibility in five ways:

1. A doctor has a responsibility to do what a consensus of well-informed medical professionals, based on the best scientific data, would think is right for the patient.


2. A doctor has a responsibility to do what he believes is right, regardless of the patient.


3. A doctor has a responsibility to give his patient the best advice he can. But then he should follow his patient’s wishes, whatever they are, as long as they’re not illegal.


4. A doctor has a responsiblity to think of the greater good, even if it means acting against a particular patient’s best interests.


5. A doctor has no more responsibility than any other person who performs a service. He ought to be able to pick and choose the specific jobs he does.

There may be other alternatives, but those ought to get the conversation rolling. My own view is number 1, although I'm not sure I can justify it philosophically. As a one-time libertarian, I have difficulty dismissing number 5.

What do you guys think?

My Friend "Fuck": A Tribute

[NOTE: I’m not gonna lay responsibility for this post on anyone, although some flippant conversations in various comment threads over at Flumadiddle had a lot to do with it.]

OK, let’s start with a kinesthetic exercise. Pull your lower lip up and over your lower teeth. Almost simultaneously, bite down as hard as you can stand it with your top front teeth, trying to get them to crunch against their toothy siblings hiding under that labial covering. Propel your entire skull forward quickly as if you were beginning a head-butt against the world, and at the same time snap your top teeth upward, opening your mouth wide to scream silently; if you hear a slight explosive sound, you’re doing it correctly. As you do this, pretend that you’ve been punched by the entire cosmos hard in the gut, and react with a pained “uhhhhhhhhhh.” After a while, bring the back of your tongue up to the place where your hard palate meets your soft palate, and then force the tongue and the roof of your mouth apart by propelling a compressed, but noisy and disgusted, loogie of air forward.

Isn’t that fun? Try putting it all together, and doing it faster. Short of putting your fist through a wall, can you think of a better way to express anger, or annoyance, or exasperation, or extreme disappointment? It made you laugh, too, didn’t it?

Congratulations. You’ve just said “fuck,” a word allegedly frowned on by polite society. If you like saying it, you can turn it into an adjective: “fucking” or the Noo-Yawky “fucken.” You can follow it with a preposition to express an action: “fuck up” or “fuck off.” You can merge it with other words to make composites: “fuckface” or “fuckwad.” You can use it to emphasize a simple yes-or-no answer: “fuck, no” or “fuck, yeah.” You can throw a pronoun after it to make a complete sentence: “Fuck it!” or “Fuck you!” You can play with it by adding any syllables that sound good to you and/or by repeating it a few times: “fucka-fucka-fucka” or “fuckety-fuck-fuck.” Or you can just bang it out as many times in a row as it takes you to calm down: “fuck fuck fuck fUck fUCK FUCK.”

Technically, of course, the word means “to have sexual intercourse with.” If you look up “fuck” on Wikipedia — and I’ll bet some of you have already done that just for fucking fun, haven’t you? — you’ll find all sorts of bogus derivations, none of which makes a fuck’s worth of difference in the context I’m discussing here.

Some fuckwit blogger who pretends to understand sociology, psychology, culture, and linguistics wrote this:

Americans prefer to think of themselves as a classless society, but in fact there are some pretty clear distinctions along linguistic lines. If you take the number of "fucks" spoken by a person in their daily conversation and divide it by the total number of words they speak, you will come up with a stable fraction that could be called that person's "fuck quotient." Statistically, a high fuck quotient corresponds to low education, economic opportunity and social standing. In some inner-city neighborhoods, "fuck" may be one of the most-used words; in posh suburbs, it is hardly ever heard. Occasionally, people of high social standing will use "fuck" to indicate theatrically that they are street-wise, but a high fuck quotient usually signifies frustration and powerlessness. You wouldn't have to use it if you were respected and getting what you wanted.

Now, I don’t know what “posh suburbs” this jerk has been hanging around in, but I’ve heard “fuck” everywhere. In fact, I’d guess that the use of the word is not class-rooted, but rather, education-based. (By “education,” I ‘m not referring only to classroom stuff; I mean the mental activity we call “learning.”) People with the lowest levels of education use it a lot because of its “magical” properties; “fuck” and its variants help them get their mojo on. People with the highest levels of education use it a lot because it’s so much fucking fun to say; they realize that words, in and of themselves, have no dark, mystical powers; and they have big enough vocabularies and sufficient linguistic awareness to know that English lacks a suitably forceful synonym to express their strongest emotions.

Steven Pinker addresses some of his ideas about “swearing” in his new book, The Stuff of Thought. Usually, my lack of knowledge about a subject doesn’t keep me from spouting off about it, but I have so much respect for Pinker that, since I haven’t read his book yet, I won’t comment on it. I did find a quote from an article (now, alas unavailable for a link) Pinker wrote for “The New Republic.” He said:

When used judiciously, swearing can be hilarious, poignant, and uncannily descriptive. More than any other form of language, it recruits our expressive faculties to the fullest: the combinatorial power of syntax; the evocativeness of metaphor; the pleasure of alliteration, meter, and rhyme; and the emotional charge of our attitudes, both thinkable and unthinkable. It engages the full expanse of the brain: left and right, high and low, ancient and modern. Shakespeare, no stranger to earthy language himself, had Caliban speak for the entire human race when he said, "You taught me language, and my profit on't is, I know how to curse."

(You can also listen to this short excerpt re this subject from a Guardian Unlimited interview with Pinker.)

The problem I have with Pinker’s take on “fuck,” at least from what I’ve seen and heard so far as representative of his position, is that he lumps that delicious nugget of language in with other so-called “swear-words.” He does say: "Since swearing involves clearly more ancient parts of the brain, it could be a missing link between animal vocalization and human language." But he doesn’t seem to focus on how terrific you feel, physically, when you drop, specifically, the f-bomb. But saying “fuck” is different, somehow, from intoning “shit,” or “hell,” or “goddammit.” Those latter words are all expletives derived from unpleasant associations. But let’s face it: most of us enjoy the act of fucking. It’s not unpleasant at all, unless you’re doing it wrong. Even then, it’s probably better than lots of things you’re doing right. Religions may frown on fucking in many contexts, but that doesn’t keep humans —even devout ones — from taking indescribable glee in jumping on one another’s intelligently designed bones whenever and wherever they can. Yet, none of the other synonyms for “fuck” has been classified in quite the way that “fuck” has. Sure, you might say, “Screw you!” or “Go bugger yourself,” but they’re not the same, are they?

So why this long testimonial to “fuck”? Because I’ve noticed — and you’ve probably picked up on this, as well — that it appears a lot in comments throughout the Atheosphere. We freethinkers really like to say it. What’s more important, though, is that we’re not afraid of saying it, we’re not restrained by a need to make a hypocritical nod to convention, we don’t feel that we’ve demeaned our ideas by seasoning them with some verbal salt and pepper. Not only do we not believe in any gods, we also don’t believe in ridiculous “standards” of speech and behavior that have no moral basis whatsoever.

So we use “fuck” for emphasis, humorous value, expressing irritation, and just plain for the fuck of it. And the simple usage of that word is sometimes sufficient to enliven a piece of writing. You can’t just read “fuck” with your eyes. In order for it to have any effect, you have to hear it in your head, or, better yet, say it out loud. Inserted into a text at the right point, “fuck” adds an intimacy and conversational quality to even the driest argument. At that very moment, the writer is speaking directly to the reader; he or she asks you to listen to that “fuck,” and maybe even sing along.

So should you use “fuck” all the time? No, please don’t. It gets boring after a while, like too many episodes of Seinfeld back-to-back; it starts losing its flavor, like the sixth glass of fancy wine during dinner.

But by all means, use it when it feels right, when your emotions need that kind of bang for their buck (or fang for their fuck). The Atheosphere is about freedom from religion, but it’s also about freedom of speech. Nobody’s gonna call “foul language” on you for saying whatever you want. In fact, I’d guess that many of you, as I do, enjoy reading “fuck,” writing “fuck,” hearing “fuck,” and saying “fuck.” As I noted at the beginning of this post: it’s fun. In fact, it’s the funnest English word there is.

This episode of No More Hornets was brought to you by the word “fuck.”

A Challenge to Just 30 of the 130 Million

I’m going to begin my little sermon today with a disclaimer. But even before that, I’m going to beg pardon.

Begging Evo’s Pardon

Well, this is a first. But, seriously, I’ve jumped off from a thread at John’s place (see the link below), and, to set the stage, I’ve quoted from a few of the comments. I didn’t feel as if the debate had been properly framed over there, since it was sort of a digression from the main post; I think, though, that we should focus on the ideas and toss them around. Since the coming challenge emerges out of my viewpoint, with which, I believe, John disagrees, I thought it was only fair to issue it here, in a full-fledged post for which I take sole responsibility. So I ... umm ... stole selections from a few comments to toss them out below.

The Disclaimer

In the course of writing this post, I’ll be referring to the ideas of some of my fellow bloggers. If I’ve misinterpreted what you’ve been saying, do jump on me in the comments and correct whatever opinions I’ve wrongly attributed to you.

OK, now that we all know I’m fallible ...

The Background to the Challenge

John Evo wrote a nice, post-Thanksgiving, warm-‘n’fuzzy post that essentially reminds all of us “veteran” atheists to reach out to recent de-cons. He urges us to actively seek out their blogs, and to invite them into our sometimes rowdy community. I couldn’t agree more. There are probably dozens of new atheists out there who may not be fully comfortable mouthing off in some of the aggessive, confrontational comment threads spawned by our essays. Some of these people may not be used to the kind of raucous give-and-take — complete with jokes, friendly insults, and weird digressions — that occur daily in the Atheosphere. As has been said many times, we freethinkers are most definitely not in lockstep wth one another. We disagree often. That’s one of the pleasures of being an atheist; you can argue about details, sometimes heatedly; nobody has ever been thrown out of the loose community of skeptics because of heresy.

In the course of the comment thread over at Evo’s place, infidel753 pointed out that a recent poll reveals this fact: about 130 million Americans are "adults who describe themselves as Christians, but who are Christian in name only." Infidel goes on to say:

Many of the latter are clinging weakly to the tattered remnants of a religion which they hardly really believe in any more, but which they have never heard seriously or intelligently challenged. These people are reachable.

I disagreed.

If they've never heard their religion seriously or intelligently challenged, where the fuck have they been lately? There are atheistic spokespeople being interviewed on TV and on the radio. There are dozens of skeptical books available in the chain bookstores. There are newspaper and magazine articles about the "new" atheism. There's an entire Atheosphere engaging in dialogue every single day. Quite a few atheist bloggers seek out fundies to debate. And there are even some moderate Christian bloggers who speak of atheism with tolerance and write about it. So you have to be brain-dead not to have heard that there are a few people out here in the world challenging religion.

I'm dubious that those people are reachable. Those people are not seeking answers, as most de-converts begin by doing. No, they remain Christians because it's easy to do so; they don't have to think. I see no indication that they'd like to start.

Evo weighed in.

Even if Infidel's numbers are too optimistic, it seems likely to me that there are millions of people out there who could potentially change their positions on religion. Let's look at the 130 million number he tossed out there. I fully agree with you that the vast majority of those are not on a "quest for knowledge". But say 5% of them are.

A Response to Evo ... and the Rationale Behind the Challenge

So John urges me to “say 5% of them are.” But why should I say 5% of them are? Why not say 55% of them are? Or 95%? These are all made-up numbers, anyway. Does he present any data?

My strong suspicion is that de-converts come from the ranks of the active practitioners of religion, not from the mentally numb 130 million. Three recent de-cons we’ve been thrilled to welcome into our nay-borhood are chaplain, Lifeguard, and JP. I believe that all of them came from among the serious church-going population. As I've been learning from them, the process of de-conversion takes a lot of time and some deep thought about philosophy; a person must be willing to wrestle with his or her "cherished" beliefs. I think the people most likely to want to expend that kind of energy are the ones who already channel their efforts into thinking about "life, the universe, and everything."

In the past, I’ve argued adamantly against both Philly and SI about the value of engaging fundies in blog debate. Philly recently pointed out to me, however, that while he may appear to be debating with one or two stubborn religionists, he’s actually hoping that the lurkers — those who don’t take an active part in the smackdown — will benefit from hearing a rational viewpoint. I’d like to solicit our recent de-cons’ take on that point; it makes sense to me. So maybe Philly and SI are right. Unlike Christians, I’m happy to switch opinions when a preponderance of the evidence shows that I’ve been wrong.

I'll bet, though, that most, if not all, of those silent readers are either practicing or ex-religionists, active in their churches either now or in the past. Somehow, I can't see a single one of those uninvolved 130 million bothering to read arguments for or against Christianity. Which brings me back to Evo and Infidel, and leads me to my challenge.

The Challenge

OK. There are 130 million people in this country claiming to be Christian but who are actually indifferent to their religion. John’s 5% of that would be 6.5 million (and not 65,000, as I originally wrote here — Yikes! — before he corrected me). But I’m not gonna ask for 6.5 million. I’m not gonna ask for 65,000. Why, I’m not even gonna ask for 6,500, or a measly 650, or half that amount. (Oops. I've been watching too much TV again.) I’d like to hear from a mere 30 of them who have recently been de-converted by cruising the Atheosphere. The response has to be from the person him- or herself, not via some second-hand anecdote. I trust my regular readers to help me keep count.

There’s no reward for taking the challenge except a warm welcome into the Atheosphere, and a chance to speak out freely about what you stand for.

But isn't that a great prize?

Frequent Updates for Those Keeping Score

Of approximately 130 million adult "casual" Christians in America today,
we've identified 1 de-convert so far.

Join Me in Welcoming ... (Name Withheld)

This is sort of apropos my last post, which talked about women atheist bloggers. Of course, everything at this joint is sort of apropos every post, because it’s an atheist blog, f’cryinoutloud. It’s kind of late to point this out now if you haven’t already noticed it, but there’s a theme here.

OK, so I’m reading my way around the Atheosphere late last night. There are thirty, maybe forty, blogs that I check on regularly, but I frequently try to look at one or two with which I’m not familiar. There are lots of ways to find these new-to-me sites, but my favorite method is to click on the names of previously unheard-of commenters at other blogs I like.

One of these clicks takes me to a post on a politico-legal subject of interest to me, although I’m not going to reveal the precise details. You’ll see why in a minute. I assume the female author is an atheist, both from her comments at the blog on which I found her link, and from the subject she's discussing. And I'm right. I have pretty good A-dar.

Without introducing myself, I proceed to tell her exactly why her post is wrong. Obviously, I’ve never read How to Win Friends and Influence People. As I’ve mentioned here before, tact is not my strong suit.

Today, I get an email from this woman. I recognize the first name – which is the name she goes by on her blog – and open her note. I expect something along the lines of, “You’re a fucking moron,” although maybe a bit more creative.

Instead, I have a rather pleasant thank you for visiting her site, and an explanation of why I was wrong in thinking she was wrong. And I was wrong, because she hadn’t really said everything she wanted to in her post. The reason? It’s a family site, and she’s a recent de-convert. Nobody in her family, and that means nobody, knows. She just wanted to clue me in.

Because I'm not totally insensitive, I understand the message without her having to spell it out: Please don’t refer to her as a fellow atheist. And don’t be too harsh on religionists just yet, because she's not quite ready to jump into the fray. I write back and assure her that I would never “out” anyone. I also say that I think she should pass the word around to her loved ones, not defiantly, not confrontationally, and certainly not out-of-the-blue. But if religion comes up in the conversation, I think she should state her feelings about it.

That’s easy for me to say because I’ve never de-converted; I’ve always been an atheist. But I do have a family story which relates to this. Many, many, years ago, my younger sister decided to “out” herself as a lesbian, just to me and my wife. The problem was: we already knew. Her sexual orientation had been blatantly clear for years. Over a restaurant dinner one night, my poor sister stammered across the table that she’d “like to have a talk with us.” I asked, “What about?” She shrugged. I offered help: “What, like lifestyles?” “Yeah,” she said, “lifestyles.” I looked at my wife, my wife looked at me, and we both burst out laughing. “Listen,” I told my sister, “we don’t need a long, drawn-out, pained 'true confession' from you. We both know you’re gay. We don’t care who you fuck, OK? If there’s somebody you’re seeing regularly that you want to bring around, do it. We'd love to meet her. If you have friends you want to introduce us to, feel free.” My sister’s smile was as wide as the table, and she was sitting on the long side.

So we got to talking, and my sister revealed that she’d carried that “secret” around with her for four years, dreading the day when she’d have to “reveal” herself. I urged her to tell Nanny, our stepmother (our father was dead), our stepsister, and every old friend she had. Nobody gave a shit. She’d agonized about who-knows-how-many imagined shocked reactions for four long years, and all her fears were phantoms. Only one asshole friend, out of probably two hundred people she told over the course of the next few weeks, refused to see my sister because – and get this! – her boyfriend was uncomfortable.

The anticipated conversation my sister tortured herself most about was the one with Nanny. They got together at Nanny's house for lunch. My sister steeled herself over Campbell's chicken soup, a baloney sandwich, and ginger ale. Afterwards, she made her announcement. Nanny, who truly had no idea beforehand, thought for a few seconds about what she'd been told. Then, this is how the dialogue ended. You’ll see why I can still quote it verbatim more than thirty years later:

Nanny: To me, a man and a woman is like bread and butter. A woman and a woman is like bread and ... bread.
My sister: I guess I like bread.
Nanny: I guess you do. (Pause) You want some more Jell-O?

No heartache, no weeping and gnashing of teeth, no accusations, no nothin’. “I guess you do” and a second helping of a dessert for which there’s always room.

Anyway, getting back to our recent de-convert, I returned to her “family” blog and looked over some of the stuff she’d written. She was careful in her phraseology, but the negative attitude toward religion, I felt, was loud and clear, if somewhat obscured. Still, I think, somebody, somewhere in that group of relatives, already knows she’s left the flock.

But she’s terrified that she’ll shock the ones she loves. I know that this is a common fear. But, as I wrote to her: It's amazing how many de-converts don't discuss their new worldview with their loved ones because they're trying to avoid emotional blackmail. That avoidance, though, is also a form of emotional blackmail – and you're the one blackmailing yourself.

I told Ms. D-C that I was going to write a post about our email interchange. I invited her – actually strongly encouraged her – to comment here, and share her experiences with us. I know that quite a few of my friends in the Atheosphere have gone through de-conversions themselves, and I assured her that she’d find plenty of supportive pals, all kinds of advice, and lots of understanding, not only here at No More Hornets, but at any of their blogs, as well. She wasn’t sure she’d participate, but I hope she does.

I’ll say once again: I’ve never had to go through that experience. Everyone I’ve ever known, family, friends, casual acquaintances even, has been aware of my godlessness. But I can empathize and sympathize because my sister told me horror stories about the many nights when she couldn’t sleep, when she had the cold sweats, the midnight headaches, and the early-morning panic attacks.

I don’t think it’s worth putting yourself through that.

Dangerous Link: Proceed at Your Own Risk

The link at the bottom of this post will not take you to a Web site specifically of interest to atheists. In fact, atheism isn't even an issue. Be warned, too, that clicking on the link, which will bring up a story from the Phoenix New Times, may subject you to various degrees of data-mining. You could well be included in the government's attempt to find out:

A) which pages visitors access or visit on the Phoenix New Times website;

B) the total number of visitors to the Phoenix New Times website;

C) information obtained from 'cookies,' including, but not limited to, authentication, tracking, and maintaining specific information about users (site preferences, contents of electronic shopping carts, etc.);

D) the Internet Protocol address of anyone that accesses the Phoenix New Times website from January 1, 2004 to the present;

E) the domain name of anyone that has accessed the Phoenix New Times website from January 1, 2004 to the present;

F) the website a user visited prior to coming to the Phoenix New Times website;

G) the date and time of a visit by a user to the Phoenix New Times website;

H) the type of browser used by each visitor (Internet Explorer, Mozilla, Netscape Navigator, Firefox, etc.) to the Phoenix New Times website; and

I) the type of operating system used by each visitor to the Phoenix New Times website.

Now, I must admit that I don't read the New Times and I don't live anywhere near Phoenix. But a friend of mine sent me this article, which alleges such a gross, unconstitutional usurpation of the justice system that I thought I should pass it on. Because we atheists must be vigilant to outrages like this, even when they fall outside our immediate realm of anti-theocratic concern, I just had to get involved.

After the article was published yesterday, its writers, both executives of Village Voice Media (the parent company of New Times), were arrested.

I'm not going to tell you anything further about the situation. The long report does a fine job of laying out the facts without needing my help. Perhaps, though, it won't even be available by the time you get around to looking at it. If it is, just be aware that you're endangering your privacy if you do choose to click.

I hope you will. I also hope you'll publish the link on your own blog. Here it is:

Breathtaking Abuse of the Constitution

[Update - Saturday, Oct. 20, 11:58 a.m. edt: All charges against the Phoenix New Times have been dropped. The threat against your e-privacy, what little you have of it in Bush's America, has been removed — for the time being.]

Good Advice

Unless I’m ranting about political or legal matters, I try to avoid being serious here because I think my readers prefer being entertained. There’s enough dead-seriousness in the Atheosphere already, and I’d rather not add to it. But today, you’ll have to pardon me, because I’ve got something I need to get off my chest. If I were a Roman Catholic, I’d probably go to confession. But I’m an atheist, so I blog.

I gave advice to a friend. The advice, unfortunately, was good. In fact, I think it was very good. But I hate myself for giving that advice.

Throughout my life, I’ve been in the enviable position of never having to censor my nonbelief. Notice that I said “enviable.” I know all too well that some people aren’t free, for one reason or another, to advertise their atheism.

My friend is an atheist. My advice was to keep completely quiet at work about that. I didn’t say, “Don’t go out of your way to publicize the fact that you’re a nonbeliever.” I didn’t say, “Avoid debates”or “Shun conversations about religion.” I just said, basically, “Shut up entirely.”

Now, I’m about the last person in the world to urge someone to keep mum. About anything. But I thought my suggestion was right because revealing an atheistic worldview could seriously jeopardize my friend’s career. I would never advise anyone to stand idly by while religion was being aggressively advocated. But that wasn’t the situation I was told about. It’s just that my friend faces the possibility of being “outed” as an atheist by some folks in the workplace who accidentally stumbled upon the “secret.” If that were to happen, my friend might be faced with some serious out-rage on the part of the people who pay the salaries. So I said, in essence, “Don’t talk about it at all.”

When I thought later about what I’d said, I realized that I would never have voiced a similar opinion to a friend who was worried about being revealed as a Christian, or a Jew, or a Muslim. No one would dream of taking action against a worker who wears a cross or a star of David.

But as I’ve mentioned, my advice was very good under the circumstances. If you knew all the facts, you, yourself, would have given the exact same counsel. But it’s advice I’ll never give again because it makes me disgusted to concede that we live in a world where merely acknowledging one’s atheism can deprive one of a livelihood.

So, in retrospect, I wish I had said, “Yes, admit proudly that you’re an atheist. Assure your boss you wouldn’t dream of trying to convert anyone at work. Insist that your non-belief doesn’t conflict with your job, doesn’t hurt the people with whom you come into contact, and doesn’t make you any more suspect of propagandizing than your Catholic coworker who gets his or her forehead shmeared on Ash Wednesday. But don’t deny who you are.”

That would have been very bad advice, indeed. But, on reflection, it’s the advice I should have given.

Richard Dawkins and the "Jewish Lobby"

Well, Richard Dawkins turns out not to be a god after all, since he said a very stupid thing. (Hey, maybe he is a god). This is what it was, as quoted in The Guardian:

When you think about how fantastically successful the Jewish lobby has been, though, in fact, they are less numerous I am told — religious Jews anyway — than atheists and [yet they] more or less monopolise American foreign policy as far as many people can see. So if atheists could achieve a small fraction of that influence, the world would be a better place.

Dawkins, I suspect, will be painted as an anti-Semite, which isn’t necessarily true based on what he said. He is, however, misinformed, and jumps to an erroneous conclusion.

Yes, Dawkins qualifies his statement by saying “as far as many people can see,” but those are just weasel words. He would not have made the claim were he not one of those people. So let’s not let him off the skyhook just because of a phrase he throws into his assertion to give him a retreat position.

Is There a Religious Jewish Lobby in America?
It should be clear that Dawkins’s “American foreign policy” is a reference to U.S. support of Israel, and all the ramifications of that support. And, indeed, there are a number of lobbying groups — most members of which are Jews — that do urge support for Israel. But those groups do not represent all religious Jews. Many of the ultra-orthodox , including the numerous Satmar Hasidim, are anti-Zionists, because they believe that the state of Israel should not have been formed until the arrival of the Messiah. There are also plenty of less fanatic religious Jews who deplore the theocratic flavor of Israel’s government.

One religious group that is gung-ho about American support for Israel is the collective of fundamentalist Christians. Fundies make all kinds of noise about the “Holy Land,” but they’re not really tolerant of religious Jews (or any Jews, for that matter). So Dawkins can’t have it both ways; either religious Jews “monopolise” American foreign policy or they don’t.

Look, the world’s anti-Semites love to spout nonsense about the Jews’ desire for global domination, an idiotic conspiracy theory, rooted in fear of "the other," that has been tossed around for centuries. It took serious hold in America when Henry Ford paid to have The Protocols of the Elders of Zion published in the United States. References to a fictitious, super-powerful “Jewish Lobby” are variations on that theme. But the ultra-rationalist Dawkins ought to know that the book was a propagandistic hoax. Perhaps his hunger for evidence doesn’t extend beyond science.

What Is a Jew?
Not clear. The word “Jew,” as commonly used, has two meanings. One, of course, is “a person who practices Judaism.” People who dislike those "Jews" should be labeled as “Anti-Judaists,” not “Anti-Semites.”

The other meaning is “anyone descended from a distinctive ethnic group called ‘Jews’ who were never fully assimilated, for one reason or another, in any country.” In this sense, a Jew is someone whose mother, father, or both referred to family ancestors as “Jews.” A Jew, therefore, could be an atheist, a Hindu or a Buddhist or a Muslim, a Wiccan or a believer in fairies at the bottom of the garden, or even a practicing fundamentalist Christian. People who dislike these "Jews" should be labeled as “Anti-Semites.” Anti-semitism is about genetics; anti-Judaism isn't.

Is Supporting Israel the Same as Supporting Jews?
Many people believe, erroneously I think, that support for Israel is somehow support for “Jews,” under whichever definition you like. But let’s look closely at Israel. There’s no denying that it often seems to be controlled by ultra-nationalists, and that it’s a quasi-theocratic state. However, there’s another fact that is frequently ignored. Regardless of its location, Israel is a Western nation. The founders of modern Israel were Europeans, who brought their interpretations of Western Civilization to the Middle East. A large part of the anti-Zionist mentality in the area has to do with the hatred of Western ideas. If Israel were a state of mixed religions, or no religion, it would still be loathed by its neighbors. It’s easy to pin on “Jews” the entire phenomenon of Israel’s conflict with the Muslim world. But that’s a tunnel-vision approach. Lots of folks who are highly critical of Israel’s sometimes thuggish policies nevertheless favor the spread of 21st-century knowledge over the retention of 12th-century ignorance. It’s not difficult to find the Israelis’ basic acknowledgement of democracy and rationalism preferable to the region’s glorification of feudalism (our allies) and/or enforced superstition (all others). This preference is certainly not unique to a nonexistent "Jewish Lobby."

The Nightmare Upshot of Dawkins’s Comments
I strongly suspect that Richard Dawkins is not an anti-Semite, although he has apparently bought into the delusion that there's a "Jewish Lobby." But in the next few days, weeks, and months, he will definitely be given that label by a media hungry for sensationalism. Since Dawkins is perceived by many religionists as a major spokesperson for atheism, we nonbelievers may all have to fend off similar charges of bigotry.

I think Dawkins deserves credit for using his high-profile persona to warn the world of the god delusion. But he has hurt the atheist “movement” by his ill-considered statement. By suggesting that atheists emulate the mythological Jewish Lobby, he has given propagandistic fodder to the theistic masses. Those who know that there is no Jewish Lobby will dismiss Dawkins as a fool; and, people being what they are, will then feel free to reject everything he has ever said or written as equally unfounded in reason. On the other hand, those who believe that there is an international Jewish conspiracy for world domination, as manifested in the Jewish Lobby, will be delighted to demonize atheists whose “leader” clearly wishes to set up a similar cabal.

(H/T Atheist Revolution)

Democrazy

Because Americans have the word “democracy” humming in our heads like a mantra all the time, we tend to see the entire world through majority-rule lenses. The common fly’s-eye view, in which judgments can be made only in multiple, makes us crazy to cast our ballots on everything. This accounts for the success of ridiculous pseudo-entertainments like "American Idle" and "Prancing with the Stars." Our democracy mania is laughable, but it's also dangerous. One of the threats that atheists face is the misconception among the rabble that all areas of human endeavor are subject to a vote.

But they're not.

Science
This one should be obvious. No matter how the public feels, scientific truths are not subject to popular wishes. Yes, the morons in the electorate can vote to forbid any kind of public teaching that doesn’t suit them; they can spread officially sanctioned ignorance from sea to shining sea (that shine may be pollution); they can insist that a belief in the literal truth of Genesis be required for any researchers who want government funding; but they don’t get to cast a ballot on scientific knowledge. The god-crazed masses can lobby against “Darwinism” all they want, but they can’t stop the flu virus from evolving. Even among scientists themselves, there’s an understanding — although tacit at times — that consensus doesn’t necessarily reflect the way things actually are. Hey, maybe medical experts will find out that Hostess Sno-balls are good for you.

History
OK, it’s a field wide open to interpretation. As Churchill said, “History is written by the victors.” (And the Winstons, too.) But I’m not talking about written history; I’m referring to what actually happened. You can’t call for a show of hands to change events of the past. Godpushers can continue to insist that America was founded as a Christian nation, for example, but it just ain’t so. There’s no historical evidence for that conclusion, and plenty of evidence against it (like, um, the fact that no deities are mentioned in the Constitution, and there’s not even one word of religious propaganda). Again, the majority can affect what’s taught in public schools; they can influence what idiot senators like John McCain have to say; they can forbid certain facts from being uttered. But they can’t hold a referendum to undo what actually happened. Sorry, folks: Elvis died.

Math
Admitted: You can lie with statistics. But you can’t make two plus two equal five, regardless of what We the Innumerate People want. For instance: If the figures overwhelmingly show that abstinence education doesn’t work to stop teenage pregnancies, a voice vote — even led by the loudest, most pious throats in the country — won’t alter the calculations. Those girls are carrying real, countable babies. Get out your abacuses, fundies, you’ve got some adding to do.

The Arts
Hell, art isn’t democratic at all. What we call “art” is, of course, subject to the plastic ballots we carry in our wallets. But there are objective standards, for anyone who cares to apply them. Beethoven’s Ninth Symphony is objectively better than “Jingle Bells.” Rembrandt’s Aristotle Contemplating the Bust of Homer is objectively better than those poker-playing puppies. Alice in Wonderland is an objectively better kids’ book than any of the Harry Potters. Hamlet is an objectively better play than Cats. And Double Indemnity is the best movie ever made. (Well, maybe that’s not objective.) There are real criteria for determining what is and isn’t art, although critics and aficionados may disagree about what those criteria are. But popularity isn’t one of them. And neither is eligibility for government aid. Most important, no polling-place mandate can determine what art isn’t. Oh, sure, when the hoi polloi’s nays outnumber the yeas, the authorities can step in to ban books from libraries, force museums to remove certain works from display, tell musicians what they may not perform in public. But, as long as there are objective standards — not “community” standards, mind you — art is art. I may not be able to define it, but neither can the guy who can't figure out how to punch a chad.

Democracy Itself
If U.S. citizens were asked to vote for or against democracy, as a principle of government and not just a word, they would probably vote against it. As they did in 2000 and 2004. The Bush administration has never followed the “will of the people.” Not about the Iraq War, not about abortion, not about stem cell research, not about the environment, not about stopping pork-barrel legislation, and not about refraining from out-and-out criminality. Fortunately, in a system like ours — where there are certain basic guarantees that trump the whims of the multitude — it’s not possible for democracy to be democratically rejected. Of course, that doesn’t stop the politicians and the theocrats from trying.

I suspect I’m going to be in the minority on some of the views expressed above. But you know what? This blog is not a democracy, either.