Obama's Sister Souljah Moment

A Magdalene Laundry ca. 1900

I have to apologize to Barack Obama for what I said in an earlier post:

The faith-based initiative was risky from the start, and it was only by the grace of God (sorry) that Bush was tight-fisted enough not to give the program the money he promised. There are plenty of non-religious, non-profit orgamizations doing what the government should be doing. And there are a host of people waiting to volunteer their time and efforts who don't need to say, "First tell me Jesus is your personal savior, then you can have your bowl of soup." And who will the bulk of the money go to? Only churches big enough to have a grant proposal writer, a promotion director and a glossy introduction kit. Megachurches will get bigger and small churches may go the way of the Dodo. Question: does Joel Osteen really need more money? And just where is Rod Parsley going to come up with an agency to feed the poor instead of himself? He'd have to agree to some kind of transparency - something many megachurch/televangelists are loathe to do. Something stinks in the Obama campaign.

It now looks like Obama will not tolerate proselytizing nor will he tolerate discriminating hiring practices for those programs that the government will help to fund. In other words, he wants to expand faith-based initiatives but without the faith-based hypocrisy. Someone told me to look up the work of Catholic Charities because they closely adhere to the kind of faith-based initiatives Obama wants to target: (from wikipedia)

Catholic Charities is a worldwide network of charities whose aim is to "reduce poverty, support families, and empower communities." It is one of the largest and most respected charities. Catholic Charities traces its origin to an orphanage founded in 1727 in New Orleans, Louisiana by the French Ursulines Sisters.

Catholic Charities, however, has hit a snag in the department of "support families" department:

Archbishop Sean P. O'Malley and leaders of Catholic Charities of the Archdiocese of Boston formally announced the agency will terminate its adoption work, abandoning its founding mission after the Massachusetts state legislature passed a law requiring that homosexuals be allowed to adopt children, and refused to make an exception for religious organizations, even after appeals from both the Governor and the Archbishop of Boston.

So, will Obama's administration of funds tolerate such kind of homophobia? It looks like Archbishop O'Malley would rather the children needing parents become Duplessis Orphans than give them over to loving same-sex couples. Yeah, better to give the kids lobotomies than to do that! Or what about going back to the old system of the Magdalen Laundries?

Obama: PLEASE tell faith-based agencies that they can't have their cake and eat it too.

He'll be here soon

Originally uploaded by HazelFiver

So many people wanted to fill in much an earlier date of death on this grave marker. Too many people. Quite sad, when you come to think of it. It brings to mind one of the most intensely hateful lines in the American Theater:

"I hope you die. I hope you die soon. I'll be WAITING for you to die!!" - Regina Giddons to her husband Horace, The Little Foxes by Lillian Hellman.

Satan is NOT Dead: Some Evil Thoughts on Jesse Helms

Note: This was a totally accidental placement of an ad for a baseball's team 4th of July picnic on top of Helms' obituary. I think they've apologized by now. Then again, maybe not.

Dying on The Fourth of July puts Senator Jesse Helms in quite elite company: John Adams, Thomas Jefferson and James Monroe (see previous post). Whether or not he deserves to be in such august company is another matter altogether. Through the wishful thinking of the American public, many people thought he was dead long ago.

Of course, I will always remember him as the bulwark of prejudice against people with AIDS. He hated homosexuals with a venom that made some Republicans wince. He opposed all funding for AIDS agencies or research.

He was known as "Senator NO!" And it seemed that everything he attempted or touched had a negative quality to it. His first Senate campaign was based on ethnic bias ("Vote for Helms - He's One of Us") against Congressman Nick Galifianakis of Durham, NC.

Here are some telltale quotes from "Senator NO":

"The Negro cannot count forever on the kind of restraint that's thus far left him free to clog the streets, disrupt traffic, and interfere with other men's rights."

"Crime rates and irresponsibility among Negroes are a fact of life which must be faced."

"All Latins are volatile people. Hence, I was not surprised at the volatile reaction."

"Homosexuals are weak, morally sick wretches."

"Your tax dollars are being used to pay for grade-school classes that teach our children that cannibalism, wife-swapping and murder of infants and the elderly are acceptable behavior."

"To rob the Negro of his reputation of thinking through a problem in his own fashion is about the same as trying to pretend that he doesn't have a natural instinct for rhythm and for singing and dancing."

Satan? To some, perhaps. But I tend to think of him as a precursor to Satan: someday the supreme Christofascist might take hold of the country - HE will be Satan.

The Curse of the Fourth: What Is It? Will Obama or McCain Get It?

John Adams - Thomas Jefferson - James Monroe

The principal Founding Fathers--Washington, Jefferson, Adams, Franklin--were in fact deeply suspicious of a European pattern of governmental involvement in religion. They were deeply concerned about an involvement in religion because they saw government as corrupting religion.*

Does Independence Day have a curse attached to it? John Adams, Thomas Jefferson and James Monroe - all Presidents, two signers of the Declaration of Independence - died on July 4th. (See side bar "On This Day").

All three were Diests, all three were idealists, all three advocated strict separation of church and state. Did God curse them because of their beliefs?

Oh, Brother! Here we go again on the "America Was Founded As A Christian Nation" rant! I'll admit: this is not one of my most coherent posts, but it's not exactly an anti-Christian rant. I tried to find out what past presidents really thought about religion.

Adherents.com is a very good place to start. By clicking here you can find out about the religious affiliations of all the presidents PLUS some of their views on religious tolerance and separation of church and state. For example:

"I believe in the American tradition of separation of church and state which is expressed in the First Amendment to the Constitution. By my office -- and by personal conviction -- I am sworn to uphold that tradition." That's Lyndon Baines Johnson talking (- Interview, Baptist Standard, October, 1964)



With religion playing at the forefront of the upcoming elections, we might reflect about the philosophies of past presidents. So, which presidents were abhorred Deists? Which Presidents advocated separation of church and state? Which of them championed religious tolerance? Read again the quote at the top of this post:"...saw government as corrupting religion." But what about RELIGION CORRUPTING GOVERNMENT? I believe that many presidents came across the very same question.

List of Deists: Washington, Adams, Jefferson, Madison, Monroe, Tyler, Lincoln. (Note: most of the Founding Fathers were listed as Episcopalians because they were, by law, to profess the Anglican - Church of England - faith)

List of Unitarians: John Quincy Adams, Millard Fillmore and William Howard Taft. In the eyes of today's Religious Right, Unitarians are not really Christians.

List of Jehovah's Witnesses: Dwight David Eisenhower.

List of Dutch Reformed: Martin Van Buren, Theodore Roosevelt

Strict Separation of Church and State: Jefferson, Madison, Jackson, Garfield, Johnson (Lyndon).

Presidential statements on religious tolerance:

"The lessons of religious toleration -- a toleration which recognizes complete liberty of human thought, liberty of conscience -- is one which, by precept and example, must be inculcated in the hearts and minds of all Americans if the institutions of our democracy are to be maintained and perpetuated. - Franklin Delano Roosevelt


"Here we now have the freedom of all religions, and I hope that never again will we have a repetition of religious bigotry, as we have had in certain periods of our own history. There is no room for that kind of foolishness here." - Harry S. Truman

Political religionists of today must really detest these presidents. Pat Robertson, for example, has stated that separation of church and state is NOT in the Constitution. James Dobson says the same thing (but more emphatically). Religious tolerance? Take a look at Rod Parsley:

"I'm urging you to fight," Parsley preached on May 4th. He declared that the United States is in a two-front war against "rabid Islamo-fascism" and secularism at home.

So why didn't God send a message and kill most of our presidents on Independence Day? Perhaps He respected them and their ideologies after all. Perhaps these men were respected because of their reverence for truth and - reason:

"It is only when the people become ignorant and corrupt, when they degenerate into a populace, that they are incapable of exercising their sovereignty. Usurpation is then an easy attainment, and an usurper soon found. The people themselves become the willing instruments of their own debasement and ruin." - James Monroe

"If an election is to be determined by a majority of a single vote, and that can be procured by a party through artifice or corruption, the Government may be the choice of a party for its own ends, not of the nation for the national good." - John Adams

Happy Independence Day:

Independence of Governance.

Independence of Choice.

Independence of Thought.

* From: Rick Shenkman, "An Interview with Jon Butler ... Was America Founded as a Christian Nation?", posted 20 December 2004 on History News Network website (http://hnn.us/articles/9144.html; viewed 30 November 2005):

The Mighty 4th of July: Free To Be...Stupid

America - Ya Gotta Love It!

Or Else!

One of my favorite quotes:

For a long time, when someone was called a "Philistine," it was an insult - a derogatory term for a boorish, classless, ill-educated person with no appreciation of life's finer things. The French have a different word for such a person - "American." - Kenneth C. Davis, Don't Know Much About the Bible.


We all joke about stupidity (yes, I usually equate it with George W. Bush, but who hasn't?). Stupidity is the main form of our entertainment. And it's the only way we can laugh at ourselves without being too self-conscious about it.

Stupidity is not, nor will it ever be ignorance. Ignorance is simply not knowing about something: its makeup or its circumstances are not known to us. Ignorance implies lack of education. Stupidity, on the other hand, implies either willful ignorance or doing something in spite of knowledge.

On this Fourth of July, we celebrate our freedoms - all of them. And that includes the freedom to be stupid. And boorish. And classless. And just plain dumb.

So in this post, let's celebrate our freedom to be stupid Philistines.

Koko and her Kitten

Koko and her Kitten
Originally uploaded by Room With A View

It's Koko's Birthday today!

Koko's vocabulary is now over 1000 signs. She's also very creative with her words: once she was angry with her playmate and called him a "bad dirty toilet." She loves cats and kittens. Her first kitten was tail-less, so Koko called her "All Ball."

I wish she would run for President. Well, she's a helluva lot more intelligent than the one we've got now!

Pssst: Oil Will Be $200 a Barrel by Christmas!

(But Don't Tell Anyone - Because It's A SECRET!)

From: The Oil Drum, July 2, 2008

Countdown to $200 oil: International Energy Agency says current prices justified...

It is oddly fitting that we touched $100 oil on 31 December and got half way from $100 to $200 oil on 30 June - so we're on track to reach $200 oil by 31 December this year (in case you're wondering: +42% and again +42% from that level = +100% from the initial level).

It is also fitting that on that same date, the International Energy Agency published one of its gloomiest ever analyses
of the oil markets, asserting that oil prices are justified by fundamentals

Now Read THIS: (From the Washington Independent July 2, 2008)

Waxman: White House Knew Of Hunt/Kurdistan Oil Contract

Today the House oversight committee released a report asserting that the White House knew about an oil deal between the Kurdistan regional government and Texas-based Hunt Oil, though President George W. Bush had claimed he knew nothing about the contract before it was announced. According to the report, Ray Hunt, President of the company, talked to Bush administration advisers months before the deal was made. Also, officials at the Commerce and State departments encouraged the deal and even congratulated Hunt after obtaining the contract. ... In a letter to Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, committee chair Rep. Henry A. Waxman (D-Calif.) asked whether the Bush administration also played a bigger role than they claim in recent Iraq oil contracts given to Exxon Mobile, Shell, BP and Chevron. The New York Times reported Monday that the State Dept. assisted the Iraq oil ministry in rewarding these contracts.

The nature of this assistance and how much it's dictated Iraqi oil deals is unknown. Surely, though, Rice will immediately respond to Waxman's questions and the matter will quickly be settled.

Ya think so?

Is it just possible that George knows all about oil and where the price will be headed - and when to clean up financially like he did with Arbusto and his insider trading deals? This is a man so close to Prince Bandar and the Saudi Royal Family that they hold hands while waltzing down the lane of the Crawford ranch. And this is a man so prone to secrecy that none of his records as Governor of Texas are available to the public (they're under lock and key at his father's Presidential Library).





This man comes from an oil-rich family and has made his money with very dubious methods. He's back-slapped his way to the White House. The concept of "cronyism" has been rekindled in his administration. He has secrets. His secrets have secrets. He wanted war for oil BEFORE 9/11. I'm too tired to say "Wake up, America!" Go to sleep. When you wake up, the only memory you'll have of George W. Bush will be at the gas pump: $10 per gallon. Oh, and that picture of your son who served in Iraq.