Learn it! Speak it! Live it!
Special Student Discount for WORLD!
Bart Stupak's amendment barring federal funding for abortions did pass but could be removed from the final bill.
Click to Print
Include Comments
Obama: Nobody has done more …
During yesterday’s Compassion Forum at Messiah College, Barack Obama got a little more personal about his faith and its impact on his policy views. Calling himself a “devout Christian,” Obama referred to religion as “a bulwark, a foundation when other things aren’t going well.” He then went on to claim that “… nobody in a presidential campaign on the Democratic side in recent memory has done more to reach out to the church and talk about, what are our obligations religiously, in terms of doing good works, and how does that inform our politics?”
Is that a fair statement?
Topic: Campaign 2008, WorldMagBlog
You can skip to the end and leave a response. Pinging is currently not allowed.
back to top46 Comments to “Obama: Nobody has done more …”
That depends on what he means by “recent memory”.
Report comment to moderator
It also depends on what he means by ‘religion’. If you define ‘religion’ as the cult of hatred of people not like oneself and race warfare as extolled by his minister and supported by Obama himself for twenty years, I guess so.
Kind of odd, though, in my view. Like a politician with ties to the KKK or the Phelps ‘church’ trying to suggest that he is ‘reaching out’ in a religious sense.
I guess, though, that the Rev. Wright/Obama version of ‘religion’, of asking God to d–n America, and of cursing the founders and the very meaning of America is, presumably, the only ‘religion’ of any use to the far-left wing these days.
Report comment to moderator
Oh yeah. Obama also recently discovered why we (the average American in small towns and rural areas) go to church and have guns. Because we are bitter that the government is not Socialist enough.
A real man-of-the-people budding statesman, there.
Report comment to moderator
I watched Obama speak at the Compassion Forum and he said that religious people have an obligation to translate religious language into a universal language so that we don’t offend the non-religious. Apparently the world revolves around the non-religious.
He spoke strongly for a gag order on faith based programs saying they have no right to evangelize. In other words, you can help out as long as you keep your mouth shut.
Also he spoke about his background. He said, “that because his father’s family was Muslim and he lived for more than four years in Indonesia as a child, he had great respect for Islam and believed that Muslims could join members of other faiths in solving the world’s problems.”
Really? Since Islam is the cause of nearly every violent conflict in the world today, I wonder how this will work? Obviously he has appeasement in mind. The Islamic religion is barbaric, teaching hatred and violence and admiration for a terrorist prophet. The last thing we need is to promote it.
Report comment to moderator
He’s so devout that he refers to Romans as “obscure”.
Report comment to moderator
I’d forgotten about that even though I commented at the time that I was incredulous that he’d label Romans, which is arguably the most fundamentally theological book in the whole bible, as “obscure”. Unbelievable…
Report comment to moderator
The other good news about Obama’s camp and their astonishingly deep grasp of religious/ethical issues, is a recent gem (brought to my attention courtesy of one of our left-wing bloggers, Scroop Moth on Saturday’s Obama thread).
It seems that the Obama camp has identified why the backwards mass of people are AGAINST abortion, specifically partial-birth abortion.
It is because of our bitterness about – get this – TAXES and INTEGRATION, from a bygone political era.
So if you don’t like ripping a full term healthy baby out of the womb and butchering her, it doesn’t have ANYTHING to do with that just being PLAIN WRONG or any MORAL SENSE. It is because you are BITTER about TAXES and INTEGRATION, you see!
That is a real epiphany. And is a real relief to the Left-Wing Fruit-Cake Emporium to discover this, since it fits nicely into their world view of people as basically two-legged version of Pavlov’s dogs and morality and religion as merely an extension of the eternal on-going political/cultural power struggle.
So, if you are ‘morally’ outraged, it is simply because you are bitter about the lack of a government handout on a totally unrelated and different issue.
And if you go to a Bible-believing church, or believe in the 2nd amendment and the Bill of Rights, it is simply because you are ‘bitter’. To a leftist us citizens are like dogs – we can always be appeased by a handout from the all-powerful State or rebuffed by a well-deserved kick from the all-powerful State.
In Obama’s mind, and in the mind of the leftist in general, morality and religion are simply extensions of the political. And the political in turn is simply an extension of the struggle for power to rule over others, to bequeath hand-outs, threats, favors, and punishment upon the squirming unwashed masses.
It is a tidy world-view to them, as it gets rid of all these pesky morality and religious problems and properly lowers religion and faith to be the footstool of their political ambitions to rule and reshape the Republic.
Report comment to moderator
When Obama talks about “our obligations religiously, in terms of doing good works,” he is talking about government doing the good works. He is blending church and state into a fog called a “kingdom” or a theocracy. And he wants to be our national pastor or messiah.
* On October 7, 2007, Obama addressed an evangelical congregation in South Carolina, saying: “Sometimes this is a difficult road being in politics. Sometimes you can become fearful, sometimes you can become vain, sometimes you can seek power just for power’s sake instead of because you want to do service to God. I just want all of you to pray that I can be an instrument of God… and all of you are instruments of God… I am confident that we can create a Kingdom right here on Earth.”
* A few weeks ago, Obama said, “In the end, then, what is called for is nothing more, and nothing less, than what all the world’s great religions demand – that we do unto others as we would have them do unto us. Let us be our brother’s keeper, Scripture tells us. Let us be our sister’s keeper. Let us find that common stake we all have in one another, and let our politics reflect that spirit as well.” (Barack Obama in Philadelphia, March, 2008, in his speech about his pastor at Trinity United Church of Christ).
Obama said, “…let our politics reflect that spirit as well.”
Does he want our government to be our “brother’s keeper”? That’s called, a “nanny state.”
Report comment to moderator
Dear DRILL,
Amid the urgency of your exposé of the Antichrist, you understandably confused a small detail about the source of the the commentary at #116 in the previous Obama thread.
That interpretation of the religious right comes from Grover Norquist, not the Obama camp as you erroneously imply above. In promoting his new book, “Leave Us Alone,” Grover explains that the Christian right became politically active because they lost their tax exemptions for segregated schools, not because they were ignited by abortion and school prayer. Grover claims that Paul Wyerich says so too.
Grover doesn’t suggest you don’t care about abortion — my God, you care — but that’s not the trauma that engaged evangelicals in politics.
Report comment to moderator
His claim reflects pridefulness, in my opinion. The problem is that “reaching out to the church” usually is indistinguishable from trolling for votes, whether it is done by Barack Obama, Mike Huckabee, or any other candidate.
Report comment to moderator
JOEL MARK: That’s called, a “nanny state.”
That’s what Republicans call it, of course.
Obama calls it government of the people, by the people, and for the people — people who take on the responsibilities he’s preached on.
It works like this: If we get 51% of the vote (distributed strategically for the electoral college) plus 3/5ths of the senators (unless we adopt the “constitutional option” for a simple majority), then the constitution permits us to inaugurate a Social Democracy for the common welfare! People will love it, and the world will love us!
Report comment to moderator
Scroop Moth: Actually, since you were touting this fine bit of logic in your post on that thread (that opposition to abortion is rooted in prior era problems with integration and taxes) and you are definitely in the Obama camp, it is YOU and like-minded Obama supporters I had in mind as far referring to the ‘Obama camp’. Perhaps you would like to disassociate yourself from the perception that you are in the ‘Obama camp’?
You are undoubtably correct that Norquist stated the idea that it was earlier issues that brought Christians into the political fray.
If he did he is not entirely wrong, but not much right either. I can attest that abortion was an extreme galvanizing issue – maybe THE galvanizing issue for many of us – along with the realization that we are REQUIRED by the nature of our government (We ARE the government) to be actively participating and fighting for what is right.
As I have been around for a long time and am more a child of the last century than I will ever be of this one, I can assure you that NEVER was integration OR taxes the subject of religious discussion or fervor, one way or the other, in all the small town and rural churches I have been associated with in my time. Abortion was, and remains so, where people still have not aborted their integrity and their humanity.
I don’t think of Obama as ‘anti-Christ’, Scroop Moth. I think of him in one of two ways:
1. As a man who I would really hate to see as President because he supports killing children, supports negotiation and surrender with our sworn enemies, lies like a two-bit corrupt used car salesman, has no understanding of and no lack of contempt for the average American, and would subvert the liberties and freedoms that previous generations have sacrificed and worked to obtain for us. Since that describes the typical run-of-the-mill far left-winger, he is nothing special, so he can’t be the anti-Christ.
or
2. Alfred Neumann with a sun-tan. And I am pretty sure that Alfred Neumann is not the Anti-Christ.
Report comment to moderator
Whatever you may think of the contents of his religious understanding (yeah, that crack about Romans), Obama is certainly right about the role that religion is playing in this campaign.
While both Clinton and Obama come from the mainline church, anathema as it is to evangelicals, they have not been shy about grounding their view in their convictions. There was a whiff of this in Clinton 92, and certainly in Carter 76, but really for the Democratic party of the past 10 years, this new visibility of religion represents a change.
While it is understandably tempting to look at this as a conversion of convenience, I think it better to see it as a move of the pendulum back towards the center (say, in much the same way, the recognition of need for regulation in the financial industry is also a movement back to the center for the Right).
Cock-eyed optimist that I am, a Christan and a Democrat, I see this move as a good thing.
Report comment to moderator
Specifically explaining his recent controvertial statement in San Francisco, Obama said (at Messiah College a few days later), “Those aren’t bad things.”
Remember, the very “things” he was talking about were; “…guns or religion or antipathy to people who aren’t like them or anti-immigrant sentiment or anti-trade sentiment…”
So, does Obama think it’s NOT a bad thing for people to have antipathy toward others simply because they are “not like them?”
As a conservative, I do think that sort of prejudice is a bad thing, and it’s not conservatives who think that way.
Report comment to moderator
Scroop Moth, read the quotes I shared at #8 again. Obama called it a “Kingdom right here on earth.” That’s called a theocracy and that is NOT a “government of the people, by the people, and for the people.”
If Obama thinks that the government should operate as our “brother’s keeper” (as he said so), then that is very much a “nanny state.” In fact, it is a “BIG BROTHER” state.
Report comment to moderator
If people “cling” to religion (and guns) out of bitterness, what does this say about Obama’s claimed closeness to his religion (which he defines as “devout Christian” although his public life is devoid of much evidence for it and his church is based upon hatred of whites)?
Report comment to moderator
Xion:
I don’t understand your objection to this, Xion. Wouldn’t you say that if a Christian wants to argue that the state ought to enforce some religious principle (say, prohibitions against sodomy or divorce or working on the sabbath), then he must argue in general terms? That it would be insufficient (as far as the state is concerned) to say “God has decreed it”? Even as a matter of pure practicality, in a pluralistic society (and like it or not, that’s what we are these days), we cannot expect everyone to be bound to God’s revelation to his people.
Report comment to moderator
I have personally known people whose “you can pry my gun from my cold dead hands” attitude was certainly a form of bitterness. It was a reaction to what they perceived as a continual encroachment on their rights or liberties or status as good Americans. This encroachment was not one specific event, but an amalgam of everything from taxes to prayer in school to modern art.
Report comment to moderator
KRM: How easily you manage to transform the “basis” of Obama’s church into “hatred of whites”!
Frankly I think your party is not just playing the race card here, but throwing the entire deck into the face of the American public.
It’s pathetic.
Report comment to moderator
Xion: RE: #4
A hypothetical question here.
Suppose a branch of your family is desperately poor and needs the aid of a food bank. The only one available is run by Muslim faith-based organization funded by government dollars.
In order to get the food they need they must listen every week to a brief sermon preached by a Muslim Imam somewhat hostile to Christianity…
Is this acceptable to you?
If not, then why should Christian food banks using government money be allowed to prostletyze their patrons?
Like it or not, there are times when Christians and others must have the self-discipline to do good works for their own sake.
Obama knows that.
Report comment to moderator
Arcadia – Read up a little on Cone’s Black Theology (which Trinity itself says it follows) and tell me that isn’t the foundation of the group’s religion.
Report comment to moderator
Arcadia wrote; “Like it or not, there are times when Christians and others must have the self-discipline to do good works for their own sake.”
The religious right has been saying this all along and this is our consistent response to those who want the government to do good works for the government’s sake and political purposes.
Report comment to moderator
“In order to get the food they need they must listen every week to a brief sermon preached by a Muslim Imam somewhat hostile to Christianity…”
I don’t know of any Church food Bank that would force someone to do that in order to receive help.
Report comment to moderator
Really? I’ve heard and read of aid organizations that require chapel attendance, etc.
But I don’t see anything wrong with that. If my desperately poor Christian relative is being given aid by a mosque, the Imams have a right to use their charity as a means to spread their message.
I don’t think that private charities should be given government money, though, so I take care of the “establishment clause” problem at the other end.
Report comment to moderator
The article concerning Obama and Clinton appeal to evangelical voters shows that John McCain can’t have a policy of no comment. The only way he might be able to get by is if he has an evangelical Christian as his running mate. This is a large chunck of the electorate – pro-life Democrates as well as Republicans. If he has a VP candidate with a record of supporting abortion he will lose a lot of these voters.
Report comment to moderator
How easily some of you hand your freedom over.
Report comment to moderator
#20 Arcadia,
Everything I have heard and about and read about Obama’s church on its own Internet site clearly shows it to biggoted against whites and racist as was its retired pastor. IT was also clearly anti American with its Damn America stance.
Just because you are blinded by ideology does not make this church less racist, bigoted and anti American. It is pretty typical left wing all the way as I see it and no wonder why you rush to defend it.
No one expects a black marxist like Obama to love America or white people.
Report comment to moderator
DRILL: You are like a piano wire with a bad peg — as soon as you receive the benefit of my wrench, you drift off pitch. Norquist and Wyrich say that abortion and school prayer did not bring the religious right into politics — the loss of tax exemption for school segregation did. That’s embarrassing for you (pl.) and you have my sympathy, but If you think it’s wrong, your argument is with them, not the “Obama camp.”
For Grover Norquist, this interpretation of the origins of the religious right is necessary. His “Leave Us Alone” coalition assumes mutual co-operation on “the issues that move voters.” Your origins in a tax protest reveal that your essential nature is to want to be left alone, and your busy-body impulses are less significant.
Report comment to moderator
Scroop Moth: I had a piano tuner kind of like you come over once to tune my wife’s favorite piano. When he finished with the thing, it looked like a colony of giant prehistoric beavers had attacked and digested it.
Let me jog your memory, Scroop Moth: Here is YOUR statement from yesterday’s post (remember I am assuming you are in Obama’s camp):
“So, did abortion just push you over the edge, or is it merely the excuse for your radical politics? According to Grover Norquist, these moral issues aren’t really what set you off, but rather the decision by the government that a Christian school that practices segregation is not a tax-exempt, charitable organization.
In other words, if you hadn’t experienced prior traumatic stress disorder over taxes and integration, you maybe would have had the resilience to handle abortion and queers like grown-ups.”
That sort of seems to me like you are saying that our opposition to abortion is over prior issues with taxes and integration. Regardless of whether you snitched the idea from someone else.
But maybe English is not your strong suit? Care to rephrase? We can work together on this, Scroop my lad, until you get it more or less right.
Drill is most helpful, or has been known to be, or has been rumoured that he CAN be. But fortunately you are catching me at a really good time – I need to do a good deed today and good deeds have been especially elusive today for some reason. So me helping you rephrase your rant into something minimally intelligible would actually be a win-win scenario.
Report comment to moderator
JOEL MARK: Obama called it a “Kingdom right here on earth.” That’s called a theocracy
Kingdom is a figure of speech. Obama is competing for votes, not pretending to a throne. As you know, he opposes theocracy.
So, if not monarchy or theeocracy, what positive meaning does he mean by “kingdom?” Fortunately, the word has useful meanings in science and literature that save Obama from the trap you’re trying to drive him into. He was talking about the city on a hill, of course. When Reagan used those words, the religious right said, “No, no, he doesn’t mean theocracy.” (And maybe he didn’t, but he certainly wanted people to think he did.)
I share your concerns about Big Brotherism. Where I disagree with you is in your suggestion that totality and control emerge from the activity of bringing government into the project of being one’s “brother’s keeper.” I think these negative effects are more likely to arise from denying that obligation. We could go back and forth about it, but neither of us would have the last word. Yet, I’m hopeful that Obama will be more persuasive than your crowd.
The fact is, our government already helps us to be our brothers’ keepers, and most of us want it to do a better job. The quality of government isn’t fixed.
Report comment to moderator
You mean we’re not our brother’s keeper??
Oh yeah. Obama also recently discovered why we (the average American in small towns and rural areas) go to church and have guns. Because we are bitter that the government is not Socialist enough. A real man-of-the-people budding statesman, there.
Someone’s bitter.
If people “cling” to religion (and guns) out of bitterness, what does this say about Obama’s claimed closeness to his religion
Perhaps this points to the misinterpretation of his statements by the right. People cling to social institutions and beliefs and become less trusting of social change when their way of life is under threat. He’s not demeaning religion he’s simply stating the obvious with the obvious follow up of how Republicans have exploited this tendency to cling to these social institutions. If you listen carefully a few weeks back he said the same of Rev. Wright and blacks of Wright’s generation. They clung to religion as community value in reaction to the economic difficulties blacks faced in America. Even when the racial climate changed, the older generation is still unable to give up the community they grew up with.
Report comment to moderator
DRILL: it looked like a colony of giant prehistoric beavers had attacked and digested it.
How much did he charge? It sounds like a $7k job.
Truly, Drill, that analysis surprised me. I would not have thought it up myself, nor did I get it from the Obama campaign. Norquist is a pretty smart guy, but he may just be whistling past the graveyard of the Republican coalition. Just because he’s motivated by antipathy to government or by loyalty to some theoretical “limit” to the role of government doesn’t mean that the religious right voter is — I certainly hope not, anyway. Taht would be discouraging.
Report comment to moderator
Scroop Moth: Well, like I said from the get go, it doesn’t conform to my own experience, which I have no reason to think is atypical. I will just cut and paste my take on that from an earlier post (you might have missed it with all my other related blathering):
“If he (Norquist) did (advance that) he is not entirely wrong, but not much right either. I can attest that abortion was an extreme galvanizing issue – maybe THE galvanizing issue for many of us – along with the realization that we are REQUIRED by the nature of our government (We ARE the government) to be actively participating and fighting for what is right.
As I have been around for a long time and am more a child of the last century than I will ever be of this one, I can assure you that NEVER was integration OR taxes the subject of religious discussion or fervor, one way or the other, in all the small town and rural churches I have been associated with in my time. Abortion was, and remains so, where people still have not aborted their integrity and their humanity.”
On the other thing you said about limited government (which I firmly believe is necessary for liberty – surprised you indicate you do not believe in limitations of some sort – are you saying you do not believe there is ANY limitation to the role of the government???):
The belief in an extremely limited government is not rooted in ‘religious right’ voters – as a matter of fact, Thomas Jefferson, hardly a religious right kind of guy, was probably the best voice for that principle. As much as I generally detest Thomas Jefferson as compared to the other ‘Founders’ in a number of ways, he had THAT right.
Point being, the capacity of belief in a limited government (Republic) for the preservation of personal liberties is not rooted in the religious right (at least exclusively) but is a very broad foundational principle that this nation was (originally) built upon. Most true libertarians are not Christians (I am pretty sure) although many Christians I know have pretty strong libertarian threads in the way they think about the role of government. The moral issues of abortion and marriage are widely disputed (big variance of opinion/beliefs) in the libertarian community (I believe) depending on the specific flavors of the libertarians doing the disputing.
Report comment to moderator
Drill, I tend to regard the “limits” as belonging to the procedures of government rather than to the content or scope of government. As Robert’s Rules of Order tells you how to run a meeting, not what you may put on the agenda, so the Constitution restricts how we pass and sustain laws, not what kind of laws we make up, primarily.
A few things are forbidden, such as any violation of the Bill of Rights and the Civil War Amendments, but, even there, Congress and the president have wide latitude to pass unconstitutional legislation, and the courts can restrain only after the fact, as cases arise. I don’t think the Constitution is “in exile.”
The Constitution established clear democratic principles, but not a democracy. Democracy first emerged with fatal “birth defects” in the words of Condoleeza Rice. It immediately was disputed by Washington and Jefferson. It died. It was born again through the obstetrical intervention, if not insemination, of Abraham. It survives, yet is still contested. If you’re interested in this line of interpretation, you will appreciate Sean Wilentz’ history of America from Jefferson to Lincoln.
Report comment to moderator
#31 – HRW wroe: “You mean we’re not our brother’s keeper?”
Never siad that or implied it. Go back and read my comment, then comment on it if you wish.
#15 – “If Obama thinks that the government should operate as our ‘brother’s keeper’ (as he said so), then that is very much a ‘nanny state.’ In fact, it is a ‘BIG BROTHER’ state.”
I am a big believer in being our “brother’s keeper,” but unlike you, HRW, I’m not a socialist. It is not the government’s rightful role to be a big brother or a brothers’ keeper.
Report comment to moderator
Obama said, “…nobody in a presidential campaign on the Democratic side in recent memory has done more to reach out to the church and talk about, what are our obligations religiously, in terms of doing good works, and how does that inform our politics?”
If nobody among Dem candidates in recent memory has done more than Obama, I was wondering just what it was that Obama has actually done.
From his quote, it seems that Obama might be confusing ‘doing,’ with ‘talking’ about doing.
Report comment to moderator
Government is for the people, by the people and of people. People are his/her brother’s keeper. Hence a government of the people is our brother’s keeper.
You just don’t accept the government as representative of the people, and thus the state can escape responsibility.
Report comment to moderator
HRW wrote; “Hence a government of the people is our brother’s keeper.”
UTTER nonsense. In fact, you seem to think that the government is a big utter and our job is just to suck. Is this because you think of the ‘people’, the helpless masses, as a bunch of babies?
In the USA, HRW, we actually have grown ups; real men and real women who take responsibility for themselves and their families and by so doing, they make this country great.
Have you ever heard of the principle of limited government, HRW? Government CANNOT be for the people, by the people or of the people unless and until the people work hard enough to produce the wealth that government lives on.
Sure I accept that the government should represent the people who pay the taxes that government takes from us, but not coddle them, pamper them, nurse them, nanny them, or patronize them. That’s why I oppose the nanny state, or the “Big Brother” state. That’s not representative of the people, that’s paternalistic and enslaving. The government could do nothing for anyone were it not for a strong private sector doing the work and producing the wealth that government lives off of.
Where the people live off of the gov’t, the gov’t is the boss. The people are not free. Where the people sufficiently support themselves and support a limited gov’t to boot, the people are free and the gov’t serves the people.
HRW, please send me $500.00. Or do you not even believe that you are your brother’s keeper?
Report comment to moderator
Yesterday HRW wrote
“The Rand formula in Ontario stipulates a closed shop which means you automatically join the union as a condition of employment…”
This is the problem of Liberals. unionists, socialists, and Democrats: they use the state to force people to do things that good men and women can honestly differ on. They use the power of the state to coerce all to follow their ways of doing things. No differences are tolerated. There is only one way of doing things, the right way, their way.
How can HRW, Scroop Moth, STEVEG and others advocate these positions? Don’t they see the error of their ways?
John Dalberg-Acton, 1st Baron Acton: “absolute power corrupts absolutely”
The only exception to this rule is the triune God.
“Conservatives think liberals are stupid. Liberals think conservatives are evil.” Charles Krauthammer
Report comment to moderator
Arcadia? Arcadia?
What? No response? Is the Trinity racism blatent enough that even you can see it through your Obama colored glasses?
Report comment to moderator
Scroopy writes: “Kingdom is a figure of speech. Obama is competing for votes, not pretending to a throne. As you know, he opposes theocracy.”
I have no doubt that Obama opposes a theocracy. I have no doubt that Obama is competing for votes. But when he uses the word “kingdom,” it is meant to bring forth a certain image in the mind of a Christian — that of Christ’s Kingdom. A Christian knows better to suggest that there can be a such a kingdom achieved politically. It is insulting, certainly to this Christian.
I agree wholeheartedly with Bob Buckles’ criticsm of HRW in post 39. They never fought the Revolution there in old Canada, but we did here! HRW forgets that — everyday. So do the American liberals here. The people who fought the Revolution would be astonished, shocked and appalled at how the liberals today BEG to be under the power of the government, which is what they fought to get away from!
Report comment to moderator
Joel you have difficulty realizing that your country and your government are nothing if they do not include the people. In order to make a great country, the people must also be great. A measure of a country’s greatness then is in how it treats the marginalized and raises them up.
The principle of limited gov’t is embodied in a country who has balanced its budget for the last 15 years and maintains the lowest debt to GDP ratio in the G7; that is not America. I agree wholeheartedly that a country needs to produce enough wealth for a government to exist. If there is an imbalance, you need to cut spending, raise income or both. I suggest America look for efficiencies, investigate best practices elsewhere in departments where they spend more than others (health care) and look at where there is obvious overspending. The US military spends more than the rest of the world combined. Surely they are not getting their money worth.
That’s not representative of the people, that’s paternalistic and enslaving.
Enslaving is working without a representative to discuss your compensations. Paternalism is a boss who determines your working conditions. If the people want universal health care and their elected representatives create universal health care than it’s representative of the people.
Where the people live off of the gov’t, the gov’t is the boss. The people are not free.
Where people live off a corporation, the corporation is the boss. The people are not free.
please send me $500.00.
Well no. I’m not the gov’t with whom with my tax dollars I trust to fulfill this responsibilities. However, if I meet you in the streets I might give some spare change but not too much since I don’t want to ruin your initiative.
Report comment to moderator
#39
Bob
John Dalberg-Acton, 1st Baron Acton: “absolute power corrupts absolutely”
Which is why unions are necessary to balance the dictatorial nature of a corporate workplace.
The people who fought the Revolution would be astonished, shocked and appalled at how the liberals today BEG to be under the power of the government, which is what they fought to get away from!
NJL — “No taxiation without represenation” The American governing class fought the British because they wanted their own representative gov’t to have the power of taxiation. They didn’t revolt for the elimination of gov’t. The Whiskey Rebellion was a genuine attempt to overthrow the power of the gov’t to tax and it was quickly put down by the winners of the Revolution.
Report comment to moderator
The Washington Post
For Obama and McCain, the Bitter and the Sweet
By Dana Milbank
Tuesday, April 15, 2008; A03
So much for the liberal media.
John McCain and Barack Obama both appeared before the nation’s newspaper editors yesterday. The putative Republican presidential nominee was given a box of doughnuts and a standing ovation. The likely Democratic nominee was likened to a terrorist.
Report comment to moderator
Arcadia,
“In order to get the food they need they must listen every week to a brief sermon preached by a Muslim Imam somewhat hostile to Christianity… Is this acceptable to you?”
Certainly! I would welcome it. I am not obligated to go to a Muslim charity. But if I choose to do so then I would fully expect that they would exercise their freedom of speech and tell me whatever they like.
If you know me at all you would realize that I would relish such an opportunity to have an open and frank discussion about Islam. I would enjoy nothing more. Of course, afterward my family would be forced to enter a witness protection program.
All Americans have a right to freedom of speech. For some reason, modern liberals utterly detest hearing things they don’t like and see no problem using the strong arm of government to censor religious speech.
Report comment to moderator
#42 HRW
“Which is why unions are necessary to balance the dictatorial nature of a corporate workplace.”
I worked for a school district: a government workplace. I had to bow to the dictatorial nature of socialism in the form of a government required union payment. There was no balance.
We disagree. I have explained and you keep coming back with the same leftist answers.
The Vision of the Anointed by Thomas Sowell
Report comment to moderator
back to topJoin The Conversation
You need to be a registered user of WORLDonTheWeb.com to "join the conversation."
If you are not a member yet, what are you waiting for? Register / Login Now!