Letters to the Editor
Joel_Grant
Published Letters: 174 Editor's Choice: 13
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Conason gets it right
[Read the article: Romney and Huckabee's religious intolerance ]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]Kudos to Joe Conason who is not so easy to con as Michael Scherer.
Conason is exactly right about the inherent bigotry of religion-exploiting pols like Huckabee and Romney (and GW Bush).
Joe Conason also does not succumb to the temptation, found so often even among secularists, to elide the issue by talking about "removing religion from the public square" and such tripe.
No one but no one - not one single person of any stature in public life and not a single person I have ever read or heard of - wants to remove religion from the public square.
Even Dawkins and Hitchens do not advocate outlawing religion.
The public square is where you find just about every church in the country. The public square, by definition, absolutely permeates our society. No one is going to remove religion from the public square.
We are talking about keeping religion out of government and government out of religion.
One thing: the public square.
Something different: the government.
Secularists, who may or may not be religious, insist that the vision of the founding fathers be honored by separating church and state.
That shouldn't be so hard to understand, but Romney and Huckabee will continue to exploit the fact that, indeed, millions of Americans are not able to grasp this simple distinction.
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About zackandzanesmom
[Read the article: Romney and Huckabee's religious intolerance ]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]I assume the screen name derives from being the mother of those kids?
Anyway, rather than pile on zz'smom why not ask her to elaborate on her critique?
zz'sm, could you be a bit more specific?
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Consider who leads and who does not
[Read the article: Harry Reid -- compare and contrast]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]Those of you who support HRC or Obama should consider that they say they oppose the bill, they say they support the filibuster, but they do not think they can do much more than cast a single (non-deciding) vote.
If they were leaders they would have been in DC today, leading. Are they so weak they are unable to influence a few of their fellow senators?
If so, do we want people like this leading the country?
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A "theologian"?
[Read the article: The atheist delusion]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]What do they call someone who studies leprechaun habits and history? A lepralogian?
Anyway, Haught (and his softball-pitching interviewer) is just another clueless and arrogant theist who does not, will not, and cannot understand what atheists like Dawkins are saying.
It is impossible for someone as gullible, silly, and superstitious as Haught to understand the point of atheism. Guys like him are a dime a dozen, railing against straw men, useless, drooling, air-headed fools.
So why worry about this stuff? Just read his non-answer to the question about evidence and "transcendent reality" (yeah, right) and chuckle and move on.
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@Reality-based liberal hits the nail on the head
[Read the article: The atheist delusion]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]He writes:
"I think the atheists here are angry because they are being repeatedly misunderstood."
Exactly! I have had plenty of friendly arguments about god and religion with my theist friends. I am right there to correct them when they misunderstand what I am saying. And they can correct me.
Haught is one of those theists who never seems to have figured out what atheism actually is and what arguments such as Dawkins are making.
One of the more telling atheist points is this: when you ask if I "believe in god" just what god are you asking about? Thor? Odin? Allah? Jesus? Or what?
This idea that some people "believe in god" and some people do not believe in god is wrong; even the believers tend to choose either one god or group of gods in which to believe.
With respect to those other, inferior gods, well, that's different. They don't believe in those gods. They believe in their own god(s). They are atheists when it comes to the sun god or whom/whatever.
Does Haught deal with this? Does he demonstrate a good understanding of what he rails against?
Haught should go to a magic show and see if he can figure out the tricks.
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Consider the reality of all non-fiction writing
[Read the article: Championing mainstream political thought while pretending to oppose it]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]Whether you are writing an eight-volume biography of Winston Churchill or a blog like this one, it is not possible, on any topic, to explicitly state everything one believes and (more importantly) everything one does not believe.
It is not possible to anticipate every possible objection in advance. Glenn tries very hard to state his views as explicitly as possible. It is not easy to imagine writing that is more clear and more focused.
And still, people like this Klein and the other (Joe) Klein continue to misrepresent Glenn's positions.
But wait! Need I mention that there is a difference between understanding and disagreement and misunderstanding and disagreement?
I am a liberal and yet I fully agree with Ron Paul's critique of the lawless and imperialist policies that have been pursued by GWB and Cheney. It is possible to agree with Ron Paul about some things and disagree with Ron Paul about many other things.
We all must assign priorities to the issues and we all must determine to the best of our ability what the likely effect of a particular candidate's actual presidency would be.
Will the United States and the world be better off or worse off with Ron Paul as president than Hillary Clinton? Who knows?
But, in general, we would all be better off if the United States promoted policies of peace rather than policies of war and we would all be better off if the executive branch behaved as if its personnel were constrained by the rule of law.
I believe this is incredibly important and that Ron Paul's arguments should be taken seriously. And taking these arguments seriously does not prevent one from also taking arguments about abortion rights seriously.
So, Mr. Klein. Pound sand.