When I was a little boy...

[broncolife]

I attempted to read it about three times, but I still havent finished it. I guess I will give it one more try.I hope I can make it to his second post.

[Robb]

Originally Posted by orange 4 life

im just kidding robb, but good Lord!!

you dont even respond to people anymore.
its just one preaching post after another.
just so you know, that makes people NOT want to be christian.

i am a person of DEVOUT faith, but you will not ever see me preach to a group of football fans that didnt ask to be preached to.
it just turns people off.
do you really not understand that?
is there a reason why you dont even respond to people?
another 5000 word diatribe is not a response.
what are you trying to accomplish here?

it just doesnt make any sense at all, and im wondering if youre aware of that.

jake

Jake...

Thanks for the scope of new historical thinking, it really embraces all the basic problems of our time. For all the contradictions of present-day world, for all the diversity that you've brought to the passengers of this ship. I am conscious of the fact, we genuinely need your knowledge for the world's future.

[kappys]

A lot of hating on Robb going on here. This was one of his better rants though. The first two are good, the last ones where it turns into evangelicism I skimmed.

There are good points in this:

1) Obviously - zero tolerance has just gone too far. Everything is not black or white - which is what our kids are being taught. Creativity is out the window. I remember doing videos in high school for various projects, all of which involved violence, and some of which involved drugs and alcohol(all simulated of course). I got A's on every one of them. If I tried that today I would be thrown into lockdown.

2) Some knowledge of Christiantiy is necessary - I AM NOT CHRISTIAN - but I understand that in order to read about, and undertand Western History and the Western literary tradition knowledge about the Bible is a must. There are just far too many literary and historical events that center around these to be ignored. For sure we should teach kids more, a lot more, about other religions like Islam, Judiasm, Hinduism, Buddhism, but knowing Christianity is important to read English texts.

3) Kids will lose their ability to think creatively - which will be a big detriment to this country. I have seen the results of my cousins who go to school in India - they have amazing Math and science abilities at a young age - but their creative instincts and abilities are simply not stressed in schools and as a result are not developed. Note - going to Christian only schooling would have much the same effect.

[orange 4 life]

Originally Posted by Robb

Jake...

Thanks for the scope of new historical thinking, it really embraces all the basic problems of our time. For all the contradictions of present-day world, for all the diversity that you've brought to the passengers of this ship. I am conscious of the fact, we genuinely need your knowledge for the world's future.

sorry pal, you and your sarcasm "embrace all the basic problems of our time".

you dont act like a christian, you act like a beligerant, self righteous, narrow minded, egotistical jerk.

...but i forgive you.

jake

[orange 4 life]

Originally Posted by kappys

A lot of hating on Robb going on here. This was one of his better rants though. The first two are good, the last ones where it turns into evangelicism I skimmed.

There are good points in this:

1) Obviously - zero tolerance has just gone too far. Everything is not black or white - which is what our kids are being taught. Creativity is out the window. I remember doing videos in high school for various projects, all of which involved violence, and some of which involved drugs and alcohol(all simulated of course). I got A's on every one of them. If I tried that today I would be thrown into lockdown.

2) Some knowledge of Christiantiy is necessary - I AM NOT CHRISTIAN - but I understand that in order to read about, and undertand Western History and the Western literary tradition knowledge about the Bible is a must. There are just far too many literary and historical events that center around these to be ignored. For sure we should teach kids more, a lot more, about other religions like Islam, Judiasm, Hinduism, Buddhism, but knowing Christianity is important to read English texts.

3) Kids will lose their ability to think creatively - which will be a big detriment to this country. I have seen the results of my cousins who go to school in India - they have amazing Math and science abilities at a young age - but their creative instincts and abilities are simply not stressed in schools and as a result are not developed. Note - going to Christian only schooling would have much the same effect.

it doesnt seem like anyone's really "hating" on robb.

i think the CONSENSUS opinion though, is that he could have summarized his gone with the wind size posts into your three paragraphs.

good post, good read.

i have no problem with longer posts (because im a big offender), but come on. when its time after time of robb's untra conservative PREACHING it ceases to be a discussion and ends up what we have here.

jake

[orangeatheist]

Originally Posted by AlecRaenos

That first paragraph was well written.

Snagged my attention for a moment.

Then he lost me.

Oh well.

*snif*

He had me at "When I was a little boy..."

*snif*

[broncolife]

Originally Posted by orange 4 life

it doesnt seem like anyone's really "hating" on robb.

i think the CONSENSUS opinion though, is that he could have summarized his gone with the wind size posts into your three paragraphs.

good post, good read.

i have no problem with longer posts (because im a big offender), but come on. when its time after time of robb's untra conservative PREACHING it ceases to be a discussion and ends up what we have here.

jake

For some reason your avatar always has me thinking your Taco John.

[listopencil]

"The Christian right is trying to rewrite the history of the United States as part of its campaign to force its religion on others. They try to depict the founding fathers as pious Christians who wanted the United States to be a Christian nation, with laws that favored Christians and Christianity.

This is patently untrue. The early presidents and patriots were generally Deists or Unitarians, believing in some form of impersonal Providence but rejecting the divinity of Jesus and the absurdities of the Old and New testaments.

Thomas Paine was a pamphleteer whose manifestos encouraged the faltering spirits of the country and aided materially in winning the war of Independence:
I do not believe in the creed professed by the Jewish church, by the Roman church, by the Greek church, by the Turkish church, by the Protestant church, nor by any church that I know of...Each of those churches accuse the other of unbelief; and for my own part, I disbelieve them all."
From:
The Age of Reason by Thomas Paine, pp. 8,9 (Republished 1984, Prometheus Books, Buffalo, NY)



George Washington, the first president of the United States, never declared himself a Christian according to contemporary reports or in any of his voluminous correspondence. Washington Championed the cause of freedom from religious intolerance and compulsion. When John Murray (a universalist who denied the existence of hell) was invited to become an army chaplain, the other chaplains petitioned Washington for his dismissal. Instead, Washington gave him the appointment. On his deathbed, Washinton uttered no words of a religious nature and did not call for a clergyman to be in attendance.
From:
George Washington and Religion by Paul F. Boller Jr., pp. 16, 87, 88, 108, 113, 121, 127 (1963, Southern Methodist University Press, Dallas, TX)


John Adams, the country's second president, was drawn to the study of law but faced pressure from his father to become a clergyman. He wrote that he found among the lawyers 'noble and gallant achievments" but among the clergy, the "pretended sanctity of some absolute dunces". Late in life he wrote: "Twenty times in the course of my late reading, have I been upon the point of breaking out, "This would be the best of all possible worlds, if there were no religion in it!"

It was during Adam's administration that the Senate ratified the Treaty of Peace and Friendship, which states in Article XI that "the government of the United States of America is not in any sense founded on the Christian Religion."
From:
The Character of John Adams by Peter Shaw, pp. 17 (1976, North Carolina Press, Chapel Hill, NC) Quoting a letter by JA to Charles Cushing Oct 19, 1756, and John Adams, A Biography in his Own Words, edited by James Peabody, p. 403 (1973, Newsweek, New York NY) Quoting letter by JA to Jefferson April 19, 1817, and in reference to the treaty, Thomas Jefferson, Passionate Pilgrim by Alf Mapp Jr., pp. 311 (1991, Madison Books, Lanham, MD) quoting letter by TJ to Dr. Benjamin Waterhouse, June, 1814.


Thomas Jefferson, third president and author of the Declaration of Independence, said:"I trust that there is not a young man now living in the United States who will not die a Unitarian." He referred to the Revelation of St. John as "the ravings of a maniac" and wrote:
The Christian priesthood, finding the doctrines of Christ levelled to every understanding and too plain to need explanation, saw, in the mysticisms of Plato, materials with which they might build up an artificial system which might, from its indistinctness, admit everlasting controversy, give employment for their order, and introduce it to profit, power, and pre-eminence. The doctrines which flowed from the lips of Jesus himself are within the comprehension of a child; but thousands of volumes have not yet explained the Platonisms engrafted on them: and for this obvious reason that nonsense can never be explained."
From:
Thomas Jefferson, an Intimate History by Fawn M. Brodie, p. 453 (1974, W.W) Norton and Co. Inc. New York, NY) Quoting a letter by TJ to Alexander Smyth Jan 17, 1825, and Thomas Jefferson, Passionate Pilgrim by Alf Mapp Jr., pp. 246 (1991, Madison Books, Lanham, MD) quoting letter by TJ to John Adams, July 5, 1814.

"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 Minerva in the brain of Jupiter." -- Thomas Jefferson (letter to J. Adams April 11,1823)

James Madison, fourth president and father of the Constitution, was not religious in any conventional sense. "Religious bondage shackles and debilitates the mind and unfits it for every noble enterprise."
"During almost fifteen centuries has the legal establishment of Christianity been on trial. What have been its fruits? More or less in all places, pride and indolence in the Clergy, ignorance and servility in the laity, in both, superstition, bigotry and persecution."
From:
The Madisons by Virginia Moore, P. 43 (1979, McGraw-Hill Co. New York, NY) quoting a letter by JM to William Bradford April 1, 1774, and James Madison, A Biography in his Own Words, edited by Joseph Gardner, p. 93, (1974, Newsweek, New York, NY) Quoting Memorial and Remonstrance against Religious Assessments by JM, June 1785.

Ethan Allen, whose capture of Fort Ticonderoga while commanding the Green Mountain Boys helped inspire Congress and the country to pursue the War of Independence, said, "That Jesus Christ was not God is evidence from his own words." In the same book, Allen noted that he was generally "denominated a Deist, the reality of which I never disputed, being conscious that I am no Christian." When Allen married Fanny Buchanan, he stopped his own wedding ceremony when the judge asked him if he promised "to live with Fanny Buchanan agreeable to the laws of God." Allen refused to answer until the judge agreed that the God referred to was the God of Nature, and the laws those "written in the great book of nature."
From:
Religion of the American Enlightenment by G. Adolph Koch, p. 40 (1968, Thomas Crowell Co., New York, NY.) quoting preface and p. 352 of Reason, the Only Oracle of Man and A Sense of History compiled by American Heritage Press Inc., p. 103 (1985, American Heritage Press, Inc., New York, NY.)

[listopencil]

Benjamin Franklin, delegate to the Continental Congress and the Constitutional Convention, said:
As to Jesus of Nazareth, my Opinion of whom you particularly desire, I think the System of Morals and his Religion...has received various corrupting Changes, and I have, with most of the present dissenters in England, some doubts as to his Divinity; tho' it is a question I do not dogmatize upon, having never studied it, and think it needless to busy myself with it now, when I expect soon an opportunity of knowing the Truth with less trouble." He died a month later, and historians consider him, like so many great Americans of his time, to be a Deist, not a Christian.
From:
Benjamin Franklin, A Biography in his Own Words, edited by Thomas Fleming, p. 404, (1972, Newsweek, New York, NY) quoting letter by BF to Exra Stiles March 9, 1790.


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Speaking of the independence of the first 13 States, H.G. Wells in his Outline of History, says:

"It was a Western European civilization that had broken free from the last traces of Empire and Christendom; and it had not a vestige of monarchy left, and no State Religion... The absence of any binding religious tie is especially noteworthy. It had a number of forms of Christianity, its spirit was indubitably Christian; but, as a State document of 1796 expicity declared: 'The government of the United States is not in any sense founded on the Christian religion.'"

The words "In God We Trust" were not consistently on all U.S. currency until 1956, during the McCarthy Hysteria.

The Treaty of Tripoli, passed by the U.S. Senate in 1797, read in part: "The government of the United States is not in any sense founded on the Christian religion." The treaty was written during the Washington administration, and sent to the Senate during the Adams administration. It was read aloud to the Senate, and each Senator received a printed copy. This was the 339th time that a recorded vote was required by the Senate, but only the third time a vote was unanimous (the next time was to honor George Washington). There is no record of any debate or dissension on the treaty. It was reprinted in full in three newspapers - two in Philadelphia, one in New York City. There is no record of public outcry or complaint in subsequent editions of the papers.

[listopencil]

National Platform of the Libertarian Party
Adopted in Convention, July 1998, Washington D.C.

Preamble
As Libertarians, we seek a world of liberty; a world in which all individuals are sovereign over their own lives, and no one is forced to sacrifice his or her values for the benefit of others.

We believe that respect for individual rights is the essential precondition for a free and prosperous world, that force and fraud must be banished from human relationships, and that only through freedom can peace and prosperity be realized.

Consequently, we defend each person's right to engage in any activity that is peaceful and honest, and welcome the diversity that freedom brings. The world we seek to build is one where individuals are free to follow their own dreams in their own ways, without interference from government or any authoritarian power.

In the following pages we have set forth our basic principles and enumerated various policy stands derived from those principles.

These specific policies are not our goal, however. Our goal is nothing more nor less than a world set free in our lifetime, and it is to this end that we take these stands.

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Statement of Principles
We, the members of the Libertarian Party, challenge the cult of the omnipotent state and defend the rights of the individual.

We hold that all individuals have the right to exercise sole dominion over their own lives, and have the right to live in whatever manner they choose, so long as they do not forcibly interfere with the equal right of others to live in whatever manner they choose.

Governments throughout history have regularly operated on the opposite principle, that the State has the right to dispose of the lives of individuals and the fruits of their labor. Even within the United States, all political parties other than our own grant to government the right to regulate the lives of individuals and seize the fruits of their labor without their consent.

We, on the contrary, deny the right of any government to do these things, and hold that where governments exist, they must not violate the rights of any individual: namely, (1) the right to life -- accordingly we support the prohibition of the initiation of physical force against others; (2) the right to liberty of speech and action -- accordingly we oppose all attempts by government to abridge the freedom of speech and press, as well as government censorship in any form; and (3) the right to property -- accordingly we oppose all government interference with private property, such as confiscation, nationalization, and eminent domain, and support the prohibition of robbery, trespass, fraud, and misrepresentation.

Since governments, when instituted, must not violate individual rights, we oppose all interference by government in the areas of voluntary and contractual relations among individuals. People should not be forced to sacrifice their lives and property for the benefit of others. They should be left free by government to deal with one another as free traders; and the resultant economic system, the only one compatible with the protection of individual rights, is the free market.

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I. Individual Rights and Civil Order
No conflict exists between civil order and individual rights. Both concepts are based on the same fundamental principle: that no individual, group, or government may initiate force against any other individual, group, or government.

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Freedom and Responsibility

We believe that individuals should be free to make choices for themselves and to accept responsibility for the consequences of the choices they make. We must accept the right of others to choose for themselves if we are to have the same right. Our support of an individual's right to make choices in life does not mean that we necessarily approve or disapprove of those choices.

We believe people must accept personal responsibility for the consequences of their actions. Libertarian policies will promote a society where people are free to make and learn from their own decisions. Personal responsibility is discouraged by government denying individuals the opportunity to exercise it. In fact, the denial of freedom fosters irresponsibility.

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Crime

The continuing high level of violent crime -- and the government's demonstrated inability to deal with it -- threatens the lives, happiness, and belongings of Americans. At the same time, governmental violations of rights undermine the people's sense of justice with regard to crime. The appropriate way to suppress crime is through consistent and impartial enforcement of laws that protect individual rights. Laws pertaining to "victimless crimes" should be repealed since such laws themselves violate individual rights and also breed genuine crime. We applaud the trend toward private protection services and voluntary community crime control groups. We support institutional changes, consistent with full respect for the rights of the accused, that would permit victims to direct the prosecution in criminal cases.

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Victimless Crimes

Because only actions that infringe on the rights of others can properly be termed crimes, we favor the repeal of all federal, state, and local laws creating "crimes" without victims. In particular, we advocate:


the repeal of all laws prohibiting the production, sale, possession, or use of drugs, and of all medicinal prescription requirements for the purchase of vitamins, drugs, and similar substances;

the repeal of all laws restricting or prohibiting the use or sale of alcohol, requiring health warning labels and signs, making bartenders or hosts responsible for the behavior of customers and guests, making liquor companies liable for birth defects, and making gambling houses liable for the losses of intoxicated gamblers;

the repeal of all laws or policies authorizing stopping drivers without probable cause to test for alcohol or drug use;

the repeal of all laws regarding consensual sexual relations, including prostitution and solicitation, and the cessation of state oppression and harassment of homosexual men and women, that they, at last, be accorded their full rights as individuals;

the repeal of all laws regulating or prohibiting the possession, use, sale, production, or distribution of sexually explicit material, independent of "socially redeeming value" or compliance with "community standards";


the repeal of all laws regulating or prohibiting gambling;


the repeal of anti-racketeering statutes such as the Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations Act (RICO), which punish peaceful behavior -- including insider trading in securities, sale of sexually explicit material, and nonviolent anti-abortion protests -- by freezing and/or seizing assets of the accused or convicted; and


the repeal of all laws interfering with the right to commit suicide as infringements of the ultimate right of an individual to his or her own life.

We demand the use of executive pardon to free and exonerate all those presently incarcerated or ever convicted solely for the commission of these "crimes." We condemn the wholesale confiscation of property prior to conviction by the state that all too often accompanies police raids, searches, and prosecutions for victimless crimes.

Further, we recognize that, often, the Federal Government blackmails states which refuse to comply with these laws by withholding funds and we applaud those states which refuse to be so coerced.

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The War on Drugs

The so-called "War on Drugs" is a grave threat to individual liberty, to domestic order and to peace in the world; furthermore, it has provided a rationale by which the power of the state has been expanded to restrict greatly our right to privacy and to be secure in our homes.

We call for the repeal of all laws establishing criminal or civil penalties for the use of drugs and of "anti-crime" measures restricting individual rights to be secure in our persons, homes, and property, or limiting our rights to keep and bear arms.

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Safeguards for the Criminally Accused

Until such time as persons are proved guilty of crimes, they should be accorded full respect for their individual rights. We are thus opposed to reduction of constitutional safeguards of the rights of the criminally accused.

We oppose labeling cases as "civil" strictly to avoid the due process protections of criminal law and we further oppose governmental civil and criminal pretrial seizure of property for criminal offenses.

We oppose police officers using excessive force on the disorderly or the criminally accused, handing out what they may consider to be instant punishments on the streets, preventive detention, and no-knock laws. Instant-punishment policies deprive the accused of important checks on government power -- juries and the judicial process. We oppose any concept that some individuals are by nature second-class citizens who only understand instant punishment and any claim that the police possess special insight into recognizing persons in need of punishment.

We support full restitution for all loss suffered by persons arrested, indicted, tried, imprisoned, or otherwise injured in the course of criminal proceedings against them that do not result in their conviction. When they are responsible, government police employees or agents should be liable for this restitution.

We call for a reform of the judicial system allowing criminal defendants and civil parties to a court action a reasonable number of peremptory challenges to proposed judges, similar to their right under the present system to challenge a proposed juror.

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Justice for the Individual

The present system of criminal law is based almost solely on punishment with little concern for the victim. We support restitution for the victim to the fullest degree possible at the expense of the criminal or wrongdoer.

We oppose the prosecution of individuals for exercising their rights of self-defense.

We oppose all "no-fault" insurance laws, which deprive the victim of the right to recover damages from those responsible in the case of injury. We also support the right of the victim to pardon the criminal or wrongdoer, barring threats to the victim for this purpose. We applaud the growth of private adjudication of disputes by mutually acceptable judges.

We support a change in rape laws so that cohabitation will no longer be a defense against a charge of rape.

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Juries

We oppose the current practice of forced jury duty and favor all-volunteer juries. In addition, we urge the assertion of the common-law right of juries to judge not only the facts but also the justice of the law. In all cases to which the government is a party, the judge should be required to inform the jurors of their common law right to judge the law, as well as the facts, and to acquit a criminal defendant, and to find against the government in a civil trial, whenever they deem the law unjust or oppressive.

[Spider]

Wow ... Most I ever did when I was little was steal a Moped and try to have sex with girl next door ..........

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Individual Sovereignty

The only legitimate use of force is in defense of individual rights -- life, liberty, and justly acquired property -- against aggression, whether by force or fraud. This right inheres in the individual, who -- with his or her consent -- may be aided by any other individual or group.

The right of defense extends to defense against aggressive acts of government. We favor an immediate end to the doctrine of "Sovereign Immunity" which ignores the primacy of the individual over the abstraction of the State, and holds that the State, contrary to the tradition of redress of grievances, may not be sued without its permission or held accountable for its actions under civil law.

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Government and Mental Health

We oppose the involuntary commitment of any person to or involuntary treatment in a mental institution.

We advocate an end to the spending of tax money for any program of psychiatric, psychological, or behavioral research or treatment.

We favor an end to the acceptance of criminal defenses based on "insanity" or "diminished capacity" which absolve the guilty of their responsibility.

[plummerrox]

When I was a little boy - I couldn't wait for the next Star Wars Action Figures commercial, thought Pop Rocks were the wildest candy in the world and wanted to be a fire truck when I grew up.

That worked for me

[listopencil]

Freedom of Communication

We defend the rights of individuals to unrestricted freedom of speech, freedom of the press and the right of individuals to dissent from government itself. We recognize that full freedom of expression is possible only as part of a system of full property rights. The freedom to use one's own voice; the freedom to hire a hall; the freedom to own a printing press, a broadcasting station, or a transmission cable; the freedom to wave or burn one's own flag; and similar property-based freedoms are precisely what constitute freedom of communication. At the same time, we recognize that freedom of communication does not extend to the use of other people's property to promote one's ideas without the voluntary consent of the owners.

We oppose any abridgment of the freedom of speech through government censorship, regulation or control of communications media, including, but not limited to, laws concerning:


Obscenity, including "pornography", as we hold this to be an abridgment of liberty of expression despite claims that it instigates rape or assault, or demeans and slanders women;


Reception and storage equipment, such as digital audio tape recorders and radar warning devices, and the manufacture of video terminals by telephone companies;


Electronic bulletin boards, communications networks, and other interactive electronic media as we hold them to be the functional equivalent of speaking halls and printing presses in the age of electronic communications, and as such deserving of full freedom;


Electronic newspapers, electronic "Yellow Pages", and other new information media, as these deserve full freedom.


Commercial speech or advertising.

We oppose speech codes at all schools that are primarily tax funded. Language that is deemed offensive to certain groups is not a cause for legal action.

We favor the abolition of the Federal Communications Commission as we would provide for free market ownership of airwave frequencies, deserving of full First Amendment protection.

We oppose government ownership or subsidy of, or funding for, any communications organization.

We strongly oppose the government's burgeoning practice of invading newsrooms, or the premises of other innocent third parties, in the name of law enforcement. We further oppose court orders gagging news coverage of criminal proceedings -- the right to publish and broadcast must not be abridged merely for the convenience of the judicial system. We deplore any efforts to impose thought control on the media, either by the use of anti-trust laws, or by any other government action in the name of stopping "bias."

Removal of all of these regulations and practices throughout the communications media would open the way to diversity and innovation. We shall not be satisfied until the First Amendment is expanded to protect full, unconditional freedom of communication.

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Freedom of Religion

We defend the rights of individuals to engage in (or abstain from) any religious activities that do not violate the rights of others. In order to defend freedom, we advocate a strict separation of church and State. We oppose government actions that either aid or attack any religion. We oppose taxation of church property for the same reason that we oppose all taxation. We oppose the harassment of churches by the Internal Revenue Service through threats to deny tax-exempt status to churches that refuse to disclose massive amounts of information about themselves.

We condemn the attempts by parents or any others -- via kidnappings or conservatorships -- to force children to conform to any religious views. Government harassment or obstruction of religious groups for their beliefs or non-violent activities must end.