Letters to the Editor
Reality-based Liberal
Published Letters: 774 Editor's Choice: 100
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Thank You droogoy
[Read the article: The atheist delusion]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]Your eloquent, thorough presentation on the divergent qualities of scientific and religious constructs was iron clad. (And happy to say Feyman was a wildly eye-opening author for me too.)
I think the atheists here are angry because they are being repeatedly misunderstood. That misunderstanding comes not so much with the evidence but with the interpretation of that evidence.
I think all the atheists on this thread would agree with Haught and other believers that science, in fact, doesn't answer everything. No one ever said it did. But that doesn't mean that a) it is on a par with religion because religion doesn't answer everything; or b) its inability to answer something confers legitimacy upon an alternate system of inquiry with far less rigor.
In other words, we don't choose science over a god, so much as we never have a need for god -- despite our ignorance.
To be more blunt, I don't know that our planet hasn't been visited by aliens, but that doesn't make it so.
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Believers, please understand before you post
[Read the article: The atheist delusion]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]No atheist is saying they can prove gods don't exist -- and that's the point. As I said before, my inability to disprove that aliens have visited our planet doesn't mean they have.
Sure, I can't prove the Bible is wrong. But as another author wrote, why is that burden on me? Christians can't prove that my cat isn't god. Are you seeing where we're coming from?
If you want to believe what your parents told you, or whatever conclusions you've come to on your own, that's fine. All we are saying is that your personal beliefs provide no evidence that God exists.
And because we are theoretically responding to this article, the subjects on the table is Haught's contentions, like the one that holds that science's inability to address the virgin birth somehow bestows legitimacy on the virgin birth. Well then Haught has to admit that my cat is, in fact, a god, because he can't prove otherwise.
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Broken Democracy
[Read the article: FCC votes to allow further media consolidation]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]Democracy is worse for this consolidation, certainly. But the decision itself says a lot about how broken our democracy is. There is no popular demand for this policy change, but it moves ahead, unencumbered, like so many other unpopular policies. Meanwhile, issues that vastly larger portions of the public want to see addressed -- single payer healthcare, an end to war in Iraq, corporate regulation -- have few real champions in government.
Whose government is this?
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You are too kind
[Read the article: Media hostility toward anti-establishment candidates]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]Thanks for this great post. But you could have gone one step further, Glenn. The media is owned by large publicly trade corporations. So your line, "They perceive attacks on the establishment to be attacks on them," should read: "Attacks on the establishment are attacks on them."
Cokie Roberts, talking about a Iowa polls, which showed that day Obama in the lead and Edwards and Clinton tied, talked only about Obama and Clinton. And when asked by the interviewer if Edwards sees an opportunity with the Obama-Clinton scrapping, Roberts said, "well, Edwards, Biden, Dodd and the rest of them." Message: Edwards is one of the second tier candidates. This when he is tied for 2nd in the polling (and now he leads in Iowa according to the latest).
CNN reported on their own poll showing that Edwards beats all GOP candidates in the field in hypothetical matchups -- the first time a Dem has done this. What was the headline? "Huckabee loses to Democratic Frontrunners." A double hit on Huckabee and Edwards (who gets mentioned toward the bottom).
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The NYT Didn't Get the Memo
[Read the article: White House pushes back against Times' tapes story]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]If it's not in an official press release or statement, it cannot be reported.
Usually the NYT plays along with this rule, so I can see why Perino is so confused.
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@Arryma
[Read the article: Media hostility toward anti-establishment candidates]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]As another poster implied, the media would run haircut and mansion stories continuously, until he fell in the polls.
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@ masaccio
[Read the article: Media hostility toward anti-establishment candidates]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]Yes, NewsCorp (AKA Murdoch/Fox) is made up of moderate Dems.
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Bad analysis pantanal
[Read the article: Media hostility toward anti-establishment candidates]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]The Religious Right is not establishment -- they are an electoral tool of the corporate right (who don't give two shits about sex laws, which they will never have to obey).
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pantanal, look at the facts
[Read the article: Media hostility toward anti-establishment candidates]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]Religious Right voters want an end to abortion, sex off the TV and homosexuality outlawed.
They get for their votes none of these things (thankfully) but instead get fucked out of their homes by banks, raped by utility bills, and sent to Iraq for oil.
The Religious Right is at the center of the establishment's strategy -- but don't mix that up with their being at the center of the establishment. There is no evidence of that.
(And the last thing the corporate right wants is a ban on abortion; the Religious Right voters would start voting on other issues -- like kitchen table ones.)