I am truly perplexed that so many of my friends are against a mosque being built near Ground Zero.
I think it should be the goal of every American to be tolerant. The mosque should be allowed, in an effort to promote tolerance.
That is why I also propose, that two nightclubs be opened next door to the mosque thereby promoting tolerance within the mosque. We could call one of the clubs "The Turban Cowboy" and the other being a topless bar "You Mecca Me Hot".
Next door should be a butcher shop that specializes in pork and adjacent to that have an open barbeque pork rib restaurant, called something like “Iraq o’ Ribs”?
Across the street there could be a very daring lingerie store called Victoria Keeps Nothing Secret with sexy mannequins in the window modeling the goods.
Next door to the lingerie shop, there would be room for an Adult Toy Shop (Koranal Knowledge), its name in flashing neon lights, and on the other side a liquor store, maybe call it "Morehammered"?
Then the Muslims could be allowed to show their tolerance. Problem solved.
If you agree in promoting tolerance and you think this is a good plan, pass it on.
Monday, October 25, 2010
We ARE a Christian Nation
One year after the signing of the Declaration of Independence, this is the text from the Thanksgiving Day Proclamation in 1777. Read this and tell me that America is not a Christian nation founded on Christian principles:
"Forasmuch as it is the indispensable duty of all men to adore the superintending providence of Almighty God; to acknowledge with gratitude their obligation to him for benefits received, and to implore such farther blessings as they stand in need of; and it having pleased him in his abundant mercy not only to continue to us the innumerable bounties of his common providence, but also smile upon us in the prosecution of a just and necessary war, for the defense and establishment of our unalienable rights and liberties; particularly in that he hath been pleased in so great a measure to prosper the means used for the support of our troops and to crown our arms with most signal success:
It is therefore recommended to the legislative or executive powers of these United States, to set apart Thursday, the 18th day of December next, for solemn thanksgiving and praise; that with one heart and one voice the good people may express the grateful feelings of their hearts, and consecrate themselves to the service of their divine benefactor; and that together with their sincere acknowledgments and offerings, they may join the penitent confession of their manifold sins, whereby they had forfeited every favor, and their humble and earnest supplication that it may please God, through the merits of Jesus Christ, mercifully to forgive and blot them out of remembrance; that it may please him graciously to afford his blessings on the governments of these states respectively, and prosper the public council of the whole; to inspire our commanders both by land and sea, and all under them, with that wisdom and fortitude which may render them fit instruments, under the providence of Almighty God, to secure for these United States the greatest of all blessings, independence and peace; that it may please him to prosper the trade and manufactures of the people and the labor of the husbandman, that our land may yield its increase; to take schools and seminaries of education, so necessary for cultivating the principles of true liberty, virtue and piety, under his nurturing hand, and to prosper the means of religion for the promotion and enlargement of that kingdom which consisteth in righteousness, peace and joy in the Holy Ghost.
And it is further recommended, that servile labor, and such recreation as, though at other times innocent, may be unbecoming the purpose of this appointment, be omitted on so solemn an occasion."
"Forasmuch as it is the indispensable duty of all men to adore the superintending providence of Almighty God; to acknowledge with gratitude their obligation to him for benefits received, and to implore such farther blessings as they stand in need of; and it having pleased him in his abundant mercy not only to continue to us the innumerable bounties of his common providence, but also smile upon us in the prosecution of a just and necessary war, for the defense and establishment of our unalienable rights and liberties; particularly in that he hath been pleased in so great a measure to prosper the means used for the support of our troops and to crown our arms with most signal success:
It is therefore recommended to the legislative or executive powers of these United States, to set apart Thursday, the 18th day of December next, for solemn thanksgiving and praise; that with one heart and one voice the good people may express the grateful feelings of their hearts, and consecrate themselves to the service of their divine benefactor; and that together with their sincere acknowledgments and offerings, they may join the penitent confession of their manifold sins, whereby they had forfeited every favor, and their humble and earnest supplication that it may please God, through the merits of Jesus Christ, mercifully to forgive and blot them out of remembrance; that it may please him graciously to afford his blessings on the governments of these states respectively, and prosper the public council of the whole; to inspire our commanders both by land and sea, and all under them, with that wisdom and fortitude which may render them fit instruments, under the providence of Almighty God, to secure for these United States the greatest of all blessings, independence and peace; that it may please him to prosper the trade and manufactures of the people and the labor of the husbandman, that our land may yield its increase; to take schools and seminaries of education, so necessary for cultivating the principles of true liberty, virtue and piety, under his nurturing hand, and to prosper the means of religion for the promotion and enlargement of that kingdom which consisteth in righteousness, peace and joy in the Holy Ghost.
And it is further recommended, that servile labor, and such recreation as, though at other times innocent, may be unbecoming the purpose of this appointment, be omitted on so solemn an occasion."
Thursday, March 25, 2010
The Greatest Democracy on Earth. Such As It Is...
The framers of the Constitution may have been brilliant but they were not perfect. They lived in another age- lawyers, merchants, and gentleman farmers- all amateur politicians. For their time, the concepts they introduced were radical, but they were not unrestrained. The preamble may have been orchestrated for “We the People,” but the fine print kept the common fingers off the piano keys.
The founders were all men of property, in an age when only men who owned property could vote. The concept of common suffrage, to say nothing of women voting, was alien to them, something they would have rebelled against vigorously as they fought the British Empire.
Campaigning for election to office was an act of personal dishonor. They could not conceive of their experiment falling into the hands of full-time politicians steered by armies of consultants, forming committees to suck millions in “donations” from those seeking favor from government; permanent officeholders who would wield the levers of power with the partisan ruthlessness of warlords.
A Congress routinely hijacking essential national legislation just to load it with amendments like tumors, hauling pork back to their districts to solidify their death grip on power would have been as alien to them as E.T.
When Lincoln sat in Congress for his single term, beginning in 1847, he considered himself lucky to have a desk with a drawer for his private papers and the privilege to borrow a book from time to time from the Library of Congress.
Only the insane of the eighteenth century could foresee that a bleak two lines added to the Constitution a century after its creation, authorizing the collection of federal income tax, could result in a rampage by our government to mentally rape its own citizens with millions of pages of totally unintelligible tax laws, rules, regulations, and forms.
Today we have special federal tax courts because the law is so convoluted that ordinary federal judges are presumed too ignorant and unschooled to understand the complexities of laws and forms that every citizen down to the village janitor is required to understand, to obey, and to sign under penalty of perjury and threat of imprisonment.
Nor could it be possible in the Age of Reason to foresee a Social Security system that if run by a private business would result in their arrest, prosecution, and conviction for operating a Ponzi scheme. In the real world, taking invested funds in the form of Social Security taxes, paying current claims, and skimming the rest for other purposes is called embezzlement. When government does it, it is simply called politics. In either case the arithmetic is always the same. When the scheme goes belly-up, its operators, if they are smart, will be in Brazil, or, in the case of Congress, retired, which is the political equivalent of being in Brazil.
With all of this, the people in what is touted as the greatest democracy on the planet have no effective recourse. They cannot act directly to fix any obvious open sores or seeping wounds in their own government, because the founders didn’t trust them with the only effective medicine, the power to amend the Constitution. That is reserved for the serpent its creators never saw.
Short of revolution, something Jefferson urged to take place at least every twenty years, the average citizen is left to pound sand by casting a largely empty vote to replace the devil-in-office with the devil-in-waiting and hope that the caustic nature of power to corrupt can somehow be neutralized.
Praying for the devil to grow a halo, we all plod on, one foot in front of the other, trusting that somehow we will not follow the Soviet Union over the national cliff.
-Steve Martini
The founders were all men of property, in an age when only men who owned property could vote. The concept of common suffrage, to say nothing of women voting, was alien to them, something they would have rebelled against vigorously as they fought the British Empire.
Campaigning for election to office was an act of personal dishonor. They could not conceive of their experiment falling into the hands of full-time politicians steered by armies of consultants, forming committees to suck millions in “donations” from those seeking favor from government; permanent officeholders who would wield the levers of power with the partisan ruthlessness of warlords.
A Congress routinely hijacking essential national legislation just to load it with amendments like tumors, hauling pork back to their districts to solidify their death grip on power would have been as alien to them as E.T.
When Lincoln sat in Congress for his single term, beginning in 1847, he considered himself lucky to have a desk with a drawer for his private papers and the privilege to borrow a book from time to time from the Library of Congress.
Only the insane of the eighteenth century could foresee that a bleak two lines added to the Constitution a century after its creation, authorizing the collection of federal income tax, could result in a rampage by our government to mentally rape its own citizens with millions of pages of totally unintelligible tax laws, rules, regulations, and forms.
Today we have special federal tax courts because the law is so convoluted that ordinary federal judges are presumed too ignorant and unschooled to understand the complexities of laws and forms that every citizen down to the village janitor is required to understand, to obey, and to sign under penalty of perjury and threat of imprisonment.
Nor could it be possible in the Age of Reason to foresee a Social Security system that if run by a private business would result in their arrest, prosecution, and conviction for operating a Ponzi scheme. In the real world, taking invested funds in the form of Social Security taxes, paying current claims, and skimming the rest for other purposes is called embezzlement. When government does it, it is simply called politics. In either case the arithmetic is always the same. When the scheme goes belly-up, its operators, if they are smart, will be in Brazil, or, in the case of Congress, retired, which is the political equivalent of being in Brazil.
With all of this, the people in what is touted as the greatest democracy on the planet have no effective recourse. They cannot act directly to fix any obvious open sores or seeping wounds in their own government, because the founders didn’t trust them with the only effective medicine, the power to amend the Constitution. That is reserved for the serpent its creators never saw.
Short of revolution, something Jefferson urged to take place at least every twenty years, the average citizen is left to pound sand by casting a largely empty vote to replace the devil-in-office with the devil-in-waiting and hope that the caustic nature of power to corrupt can somehow be neutralized.
Praying for the devil to grow a halo, we all plod on, one foot in front of the other, trusting that somehow we will not follow the Soviet Union over the national cliff.
-Steve Martini
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