Practice Non-Religion: Non-Religious Generation

Here is an interesting, but overwhelmingly ignored poll conducted by the Pew Forum on Religion & Public Life.  According to this new poll almost 80% of our generation do not actively practice religious observance.  Most still believe in an afterlife (why wouldn't you?  it's a safe assumption), but that doesn't translate into attendance at religious ceremony anymore.

My question is, why was it buried in a corner the Huffington Post?  A dramatic shift like this should be front page news for weeks.  What do we get instead?  Tiger Woods and an angry Orca.  Those are not useful topics of conversation.  sad?  yes.  lessons to be learned?  yes.  useful to the general public?  no.

What this article should spark is a debate on the nature and relevance of religion to public policy and the future of our nation.  I would never deny the fact that our country is overwhelmingly religious (for the moment), and that religion is protected by the constitution (just as we should be protected from it).  However, this poll should suggest that religion as a form of political power is a dying power, and will be irrelevant in the near future.  It should also be a lesson to conservatives who like to hang their hat on the "religious nation" or "Christian nation" mantel.  We may be a religious nation now, but that might change when millennials start to dominate public and private life.

I can only hope that this poll represents a permanent shift that signals the end of religious domination in our lives and our country.  Too many wrong have been committed and too much progress halted because of religious intransigence.  It is up to this non-religious generation, to make sure the future is a little bit brighter for all Americans, not just the faithful.

Common Sense

Neo-Con Agenda: Mount Vernon Statement

Today conservatives reaffirmed their fundamental belief in constitutional principles which they have spent the past 50 years undermining at every chance.  The truly ironic part of the Mount Vernon Statement is that only two of the 5 principles they present can actually be located in the constitution.  The remaining three are neo-con principles that have evolved over the past 50 years as today's republicans rested control of their party away from classical conservatives and limited government conservatives.

Here are the "Constitutional Principles" that the neo-cons have decided to stand for:

(1) It applies the principle of limited government based on the rule of law to every proposal.
(2) It honors the central place of individual liberty in American politics and life.
(3) It encourages free enterprise, the individual entrepreneur, and economic reforms grounded in market solutions.
(4) It supports America’s national interest in advancing freedom and opposing tyranny in the world and prudently considers what we can and should do to that end.
(5) It informs conservatism’s firm defense of family, neighborhood, community, and faith.

Alright, so to be fair the first two are definitely constitutional principles, but lets not pretend the republicans EVER respected those principles.  Republicans have been all to happy to expand the size and role of government under their rule.  Take for instance George Bush.  On the economic front, he used to tax policy to pump money directly into the bank accounts of the rich, which by all realistic measures caused the enormous over-growth of our economy that resulted in the enormity of the economic crash of the past 2 years.  on the social front, he was happy to support the regulation of sexual practices (sodomy, which was only overthrown thanks to the liberal leanings of the court) and marriage.

As for individual liberty, I'm not sure who gets the liberty.  Certainly not gays, minorities (who are being denied higher education thanks to conservative intervention in admissions policies), women (who may soon lose control of their bodies), or the non-religious.  So who exactly gets liberty in conservative america?  oh yeah, straight white religious men.  That doesn't really sound like a good thing to me.

The second three are not even constitutional principles.  The free market was always separate from the constitution, because economic policies are irrelevant.  It was only in the 1950s during the Red Scare that liberty, democracy, and free markets were associated as a means of alienating the communists.  There is nothing necessary about Free Markets, it simply happens to be the most fitting form for our economy and also the most effective, but that is irrelevant to a discussion of constitutional principles.

Advancing freedom is also found no where in the constitution and involving ourselves in the affairs of others has ALWAYS been a suspect practice and one that has hurt us in the past.

I don't think I even need to note why family, community and neighborhoods would be irrelevant to the framers of the constitution.  As for faith, the government was never meant to defend faith it was meant to stay out of it and defend itself from faith.

Notice how the last three look a whole lot like a laundry list of policy pandering to the three powerful constituents of the republican party: Social conservatives, economic conservatives, and war hawks.  Republicans, lets not pretend that this has anything to do with going back to constitutional principles, it is a bold faced attempted to pander to your base.  Nothing more.

The results of today's declaration are nothing more than a reaffirmation that Republicans will continue to abuse the constitution to push their power-hungry agenda of religious extremist, military domination and oppression of the world, and economic incompetence.

Common Sense

Neo-Con Agenda: Why it's too early to count out the Dems

Let's be frank, a lot can happen in the next 7 months before the elections and the republicans are not up by THAT much in most districts.

I watched a show on MSNBC, and they have all but given the house to the GOP (I would remind you that it's still 7 months away).  However they were squabbling over whether the Senate would stay in Democratic hands.  They even put Nevada, home of the Majority Leader, as a likely GOP take over.  I've seen those polls.  Reid is down by 9 points to either challenger, but again, lets be frank, he's been busy.  He hasn't rolled out a robust re-election campaign yet, so lets assume when he does that he picks up 5 points.  that makes a a 4 point game, which is most polls falls just shy of the margin of error.  The real question becomes can the democrats change the message in time to make up those 4 points and then grab some extras to spare.  I say, yes, they will.  and here is why:

(1) In the past 7 months the economy has gone from bad to worse and then from worse to still bad but not spirally out of control.  Taking my cues from the most recent economic news, everyone was bummed out that we lost 20,000 jobs instead of the 5,000 we expected.  come on!  20,000 is still better than 700,000 losses.  At the same time we went from 10.2% unemployment to 9.7%, a drop of half a percent.  Not bad, huh?  well don't expect the media to catch onto that.

The reality is that the economy is poised for a rebound.  The Dow is on solid ground compared to where it was last year, the employment numbers suggest we are on the brink of job growth, and every economist worth their expensive degrees is saying the worst is behind us.  Me prediction:  Unemployment will drop slowly until May/June, when it will fall sharply (if most companies are like my university than that will mark the end of their current hiring freeze, and they will begin to take some chances).  I tentatively suggest that by August we are at 7.5 to 8.0% unemployment.  Guess who is going to get the credit for that?  And don't forget the president's new job plan.

(2) Health care will be yesterday's news.  Assuming the democrats take care of health care immediately, by the time the elections role around people wont be as angry about it.  The Republicans will still try to use it as a weapon, but it wont make a lot of sense since most of it wont take effect until 2011, well after the elections.  So the facts wont support the republican position and lets all remember that the public ha about a 3 month memory when it comes to politics.  Prediction: Health care won't be a big issue on election night 2010.  Exit polls will say that the economy, jobs, and social issues will be the big issues, because that is always what people say, despite the fact that statistics show Republicans often vote against their economic interests.

(3) Incumbent democrats haven't started "running" yet.  Republicans have been running for 2010 since November 5, 2008.  Democrats have been trying to govern.  Just as Reid will pick up points when he kicks his campaign into high gear, so too will other democrats.  Between now and the summer, I would expect some small changes in the numbers with republican leads shrinking but staying solidly outside the margin of error, but starting in June I would be very surprised if those leads don't disappear with at least a few Democrats pulling into the lead.

So here is my over-all predictions:

(1) Democrats will hold both houses

(2) Republicans will pick up 2 seats in the senate (57-43)

(3) Republicans will pick up between 10 and 20 seats on the house (246/236-188/198)

This election is NOT 1994.  Will the republicans win back some seats, yes of course.  The only reason the congress swung so far to the left was because Democrats were VERY motivated in 2008.  That and Obama managed to pull a lot of informed moderates and uninformed fair-weather voters toward the democrats who were seen as the inevitable victors.  The Republicans will pick up seats because the congress will be working it's way back toward a comfortable equilibrium, not because their policies win over any credibility.  How could they?

Common Sense

Sarah Palin: Fire Rahm Emanuel

Let me start by saying I am not at all a fan of Mr. Emanuel.  Most of the time I find him smug, unpleasant, manipulative, and crude.  further, being that he is chief of staff, much of the blame for a lousy first year can be laid at his feet as much as Obama's.  However, I think Palin is, at best, exaggerating the severity of his crime if she thinks he should be fired for calling other Democrats retarded when they were threatening to jump on the anti-health reform band wagon.

The fact that Palin wants him fired for using the word "retarded" isn't what pisses me off about this situation.  What pisses me off is that she is using her child's tragic disorder as a means for grabbing the media spotlight once again AND for furthering her extremist neo-con agenda to bring down the administration.  I think that is reprehensible and she should be ashamed.

Now, lets be clear, what he said deserves a swift and serious response.  I would agree that there is a similar sentiment surrounding the work retarded and the n-word.  both are justifiably offensive and should be avoided in civilized daily conversation.  However, this is an opportunity to smack some sense into Rahm, not fire him.  The movement to fire him is tantamount to more of the same neo-con bullcrap, that they have been throwing at all of Obama's nominees, appointments, etc.  They need to get over it and stop trying to throw everything including the kitchen sink at the guy for screwing up.  Admonish him sure, but Obama isn't the one losing credibility because he throws a temper tantrum every time someone doesn't single-handedly save the economic turmoil left by failed Republican policies or isn't able to keep himself from using bad language.  Not that the neo-cons have much credibility these days among people with any semblance of common sense.  Most of their constituents are so stupid they still think Obama is a racist, socialist foreigner.  Plus, since when do republicans give a damn about vulnerable groups?

But by all means, let's keep feeding the ignorance and pandering to the anger of stupid people.  Way to go GOP, really raising the bar on that one.  Sarah, the guy screwed up.  Admonish him, then get over it and do something constructive with your time instead of using your children for political gain.  perhaps an education campaign would be a better use of your time than destroying out political system.  just a thought.

Common Sense