Legion of Angels News Archive

Lori Lipman Brown has had her fill of God-talk.

“It’s a very frustrating time,” said Brown, director of the Washington-based Secular Coalition for America, the first lobbying organization devoted to secular issues.

“All of us have been very hopeful that at the end of the Bush administration, we would stop seeing theology impose itself on civil law and yet in just the last few months, we’ve heard both major party presidential candidates support faith-based initiatives.”

For obvious reasons, Brown and other nonbelievers dislike President Bush’s emphasis on integrating religious faith with public policy. But what has her more upset — and perhaps disappointed — is the Democrats’
newfound emphasis on religion and courtship of evangelical voters.

With a recent survey showing that increasing numbers of Americans feel “uncomfortable when politicians talk about how religious they are,” is it possible the Democrats’ fervent attempts to court religious voters could backfire on Election Day?

Much media speculation and campaign strategy has been devoted to the political preferences of evangelical Christians, who make up an estimated 26 percent of Americans. But very little attention has been paid to the 16 percent of Americans unaffiliated with any religious tradition — or to those religious voters who prefer not to hear politicians talk about the Iraq war and God’s will in the same sentence.

Perhaps that’s because it is widely assumed that no matter how uncomfortable secular Americans are with Sen. Barack Obama’s overtures to the religious right, they simply won’t abandon the Democratic ticket.

Or, as Brian Parra of the Southern California-based Atheists United says, “They understand that (we) have nowhere else to go.”

The Coalition of Secular Voters’ blog, for instance, refers to Obama as “the Democratic candidate overseeing the greatest expansion of religiosity and religious pandering in his party’s history.” And secular groups were appalled when the organizers of the interfaith gathering at the Democratic National Convention refused to allow a nonreligious speaker to address the convocation.

“That’s a blatant disregard to the secular community, which makes up a huge portion of the Democratic ticket,” said Parra, director of communications and membership for the atheist group.

But Bobbie Kirkhart, a board member of Atheists United, said secularists do have options. In recent elections she has watched as some of her fellow nonbelievers defected to the Green Party or Peace and Freedom Party “for a more secular approach.”

Could the alienation of secular voters spell trouble for the Democrats? According to the Pew Forum, religiously unaffiliated voters favored John Kerry over President Bush in 2004 by a margin of 44 points. In the most recent survey, that same demographic, though still strongly Democratic, preferred Obama to Sen. John McCain by only 32 points.

Greg Smith, a researcher at the Pew Forum on Religion & Public Life, says it’s unclear whether the Democrats’ greater willingness to talk about faith will cause nonreligious voters to decamp, but says the nonreligious comprise an important voting bloc that should not be ignored.

“If you were to count (the unaffiliated) as a religious tradition so to speak, it would be the fourth largest in the country,” he said.

Some fear that both campaigns’ intense focus on religious issues and constituents distracts the candidates and the country from more pressing matters.

For nearly a year, a group of citizens, science organizations and Nobel laureates operating under the name Science Debate 2008 have been trying to get the candidates to debate science issues.

Asked if she thinks science should have an equally prominent, if not more prominent, role as religion in this election, Darlene Cavalier, director of public engagement for Science Debate 2008, said, “I really do because a president is going to have influence on these critical science topics that will … affect us, not just in the next four years, but it will affect our nation.”

Though Republicans probably aren’t losing much sleep over alienating secular voters, some believe their professed devotion to evangelicals may not deliver the payoff they are expecting either.

“The word `evangelical’ doesn’t mean that much anymore because the population it describes is so incredibly diverse,” said Christine Wicker, the author of “The Fall of the Evangelical Nation.” “The groups that they’re catering to are not the majority of Christians, they’re not the majority of religious people in this country.”

Still, August Berkshire, president of Minnesota Atheists, said in this election the candidates “not only have to be Christian, but (they) have to be the right kind of Christian.”

What won’t be known until all the ballots are counted is whether being the right kind of Christian can deliver the White House if such singularity ends up turning off religious and secular voters alike.

Source — The Pew Forums

HARRISBURG, Pa. - In an election where so many voters are hungry for “change,” both candidates are trying to position themselves as the one who can deliver it in Washington. Barack Obama has made famous the tagline “change we can believe in.” The first word in one of John McCain’s oft-used campaign slogans is “reform,” and in recent weeks on the stump he has begun emphasizing his reputation as a “maverick.”

But reading between the lines this week, voters may have gotten a glimpse of who the real reformer is. Although the public back-and-forth between McCain and Obama has focused mostly on energy, residing at the root of the candidates’ political attacks may be a fundamental difference in their style of governance.

This most recent debate started around the time McCain released an ad stating that Obama would support an “energy tax” if elected president. This point came from an interview that the Illinois senator did with the San Antonio Express-News in which he was asked about increasing taxes on wind power to fund education. “What we ought to tax is dirty energy like coal and, to a lesser extent, natural gas,” Obama said, but such a tax is not actually a part of his economic proposals.

Both candidates support a form of cap-and-trade in which polluters are allowed to emit only a certain amount of greenhouse gases but can purchase extra pollution credits from less-polluting companies. Because “dirty energy” producers would likely be forced to purchase additional credits, a cap-and-trade system could in some ways be seen as an “energy tax” — but then both Obama and McCain would be in favor of it. The only difference between them would be how high the cap and how expensive the credit.

Obama responded to McCain’s attack with an ad of his own alleging that the Arizona senator was “in the pocket” of the big oil companies and “wants to give them another four billion in tax breaks.” Although this is technically true, these tax breaks would come from a significant cut in the corporate tax rate across the board, which McCain argues would help spur growth and increase employment levels.

The apparent hypocrisy of Obama’s commercial was certainly not lost on the McCain campaign, which quickly pointed out that Obama had supported the last round of tax breaks for big oil companies contained in the so-called Bush-Cheney energy bill. According to an article in the Washington Post written at the time of bill’s passage, the Energy Policy Act of 2005 included “an estimated $85 billion worth of subsidies and tax breaks for most forms of energy — including oil and gas,” renewable energies and nuclear power.

McCain refused to support the president’s bill, and at the time said his opposition was due to the large number of funding packages targeted at special interests — specifically Big Oil. He even mused to his colleagues in Congress at the time: “I wonder what it’s going take to make the case for fiscal sanity here?”

Although Obama voted for the bill, he too remarked that he felt the bill was misguided, saying in his speech on the Senate floor that he voted for the bill “reluctantly,” calling it “a step forward,” but “not a very big step.”

So while both senators saw major problems with the 2005 energy bill, Obama decided that the good aspects of the bill outweighed the bad, whereas McCain determined that voting against the good parts of the bill was necessary to send a message about pork barrel projects, which he has consistently criticized.

While visiting a nuclear power facility in Michigan last Tuesday, McCain responded to his opponent’s commercial and the allegation that he was in the pocket of Big Oil by criticizing Obama’s support for the energy bill: “I think he might be a little bit confused because when the energy bill came to the floor of the Senate, full of goodies and breaks for the oil companies, I voted against it. Senator Obama voted for it. People care not only what you say but how you vote.”

By Thursday he had found a much pithier message, telling a crowd in Ohio, “I know he hasn’t been in the Senate that long, but even in the real world, voting for something — voting for something means you support it, and voting against something means you oppose it.”

But the U.S. Senate isn’t quite the “real world,” and voting against something there doesn’t always mean you oppose all of it — especially when a bill is already certain to pass. In a place where compromise and concession are part and parcel of productivity, senators often feel forced to vote for bills they feel are less than perfect in order to achieve their ultimate goal. McCain is opposed to that practice.

“The system is so badly broken that they try to present us with a choice of voting for stuff that has pork barrel projects in it and some good things in it to force us to vote for them,” McCain told reporters on his plane last week when asked about his opposition to the energy bill. “I have consistently voted against those kind of entrapments because then pork barrel projects and the good deals and the benefits never stop.”

Obviously, McCain hasn’t said “no” to every bill that contained earmarks. In fact, he’s voted for specific earmarks that he regularly lambastes on the stump, including $3 million to study the DNA of bears in Montana (McCain often tells audiences that he isn’t sure if that was “a paternity issue or a criminal issue”). Still, McCain prides himself on his record of voting against bills that he sees as the products of a “corrupt” system, often bragging about his earmark-free tenure in Congress and promising crowds that he will put an end to the practice if elected president.

“Public money should serve the public good,” McCain told a crowd at the Disabled American Veterans conference in Las Vegas last weekend. “And if it’s me sitting in the Oval Office, at the Resolute desk, those wasteful spending bills are going the way of all earmarks, straight back to the Congress with a veto. And you will know their names and I’ll make them famous.”

Back on his campaign plane, McCain said that this is the fundamental difference between himself and Obama.

“There’s a clear difference between someone who nearly a million dollars a day proposes pork barrel projects and therefore would support a bill that has lots of pork in it,” McCain said, referring to the total value of Obama’s requested earmarks. “Between those of us who are reformers, who are trying to fix the system and saying, no, no, we’re not going to take the pork. We’re not going to take the special-interest deals that ends up with people in federal prison, with people indicted, and there will be more indictments…. So it’s a difference between the reformers and the ‘go along to get along’ system.”

It’s probably not fair to simply label Obama as a part of the “go along to get along” system, but his support of the 2005 energy bill suggest a willingness to play Washington’s game for what he sees as a greater good — or at least a “step” in the right direction. Although McCain has supported many compromises during his time in the Senate, and he has said that many of those bills did not turn out exactly as he would have written them, he has also been much more willing to vote against something because, in his view, the bad outweighed the good.

So despite the Obama campaign’s reliance on buzzwords such as “hope” and “change,” when it comes to reforming the system in Washington, Obama may actually be more of a pragmatist, while McCain may be the real idealist in the race.

Source — MSNBC

WASHINGTON (RNS) - U.S. Sens. David Vitter, R-La., and Larry Craig, R-Idaho, have signed on as co-sponsors of a proposed Marriage Protection Act that would amend the constitution to ban same-sex marriages.

Some groups that support gay marriage charged that Vitter, whose number had appeared on the phone list for a Washington prostitution service, and Craig, who was arrested last year for lewd conduct in the men’s bathroom at Minneapolis St. Paul International Airport, were engaging in hypocrisy.

But Vitter, who has backed legislation against gay marriage since first being elected to the House in 1999, said he will not walk away from his beliefs.

“I strongly oppose attempts by liberal judges to redefine marriage, and so do a very large majority of Louisianans,” Vitter said. “As I’ve said, I am deeply remorseful over having sinned in my past. But I don’t think walking away from my beliefs is the way to make up for that.”

Evan Wolfson, executive director of Freedom to Marry, a New York City advocacy group for gay rights, said that it is ironic that the Marriage Protection Act is co-sponsored by two senators who did not honor their own marriages.

“These two senators in some ways are perfect spokespeople for this cause because they are showing the same contempt for the Constitution that they showed for their own marriages,” Wolfson said.

Craig could not be reached for comment.

The bill’s sponsor is Sen. Roger Wicker, R-Miss., who introduced the proposed amendment on June 25 after the California Supreme Court overturned a statewide ban on same-sex marriage and allows gay and lesbian couples to wed.

Wicker, a freshman senator, said 19 states have passed laws and 26 states amended their constitutions to “protect traditional marriage.”

“Rather than giving unelected activist judges the opportunity to legislate from the bench, this amendment will reaffirm what most Americans believe — marriage is between a man and a woman,” Wicker said.

To amend the Constitution, a proposed amendment must be approved by a two-thirds vote of the House and Senate, and then ratified by the state legislatures of three-fourths of the states, which would be 38.

In addition to Vitter and Craig, also co-sponsoring the proposed amendment are Sens. Wayne Allard, R-Colo.; Sam Brownback, R-Kan.; James Inhofe, R-Okla.; Pat Roberts, R-Kan.; Richard Shelby, R-Ala.; and John Thune, R-S.D.

Source — The Pew Forum

The following is a transcript of Sen. Barack Obama’s speech on May 9, 2008, as provided by Obama’s campaign.

It’s great to be back in Oregon. Over the last fifteen months, we’ve travelled to every corner of the United States. Now I know that if you listen to Washington or pay attention to the pundits, you hear a lot about how divided we are as a people. But that’s not what I’ve found as I’ve travelled across this great country.

Everywhere I go, I’ve been impressed by the values and hopes that we share. In big cities and small towns; among men and women; young and old; black, white, and brown - Americans share a faith in simple dreams. A job with wages that can support a family. Health care that we can count on and afford. A retirement that is dignified and secure. Education and opportunity for our kids. Common hopes. American dreams.

That’s why this election is so important. Because for far too many Americans, those hopes and dreams are slipping away. We just came through the first period of sustained economic growth since World War II that saw incomes drop. People are working harder for less. You’re paying more for gas, and groceries, and tuition. Millions of families are facing foreclosure. We’ve already lost hundreds of thousands of jobs this year.

To be sure, some of these problems are a result of changes in our economy that no one can control. But instead of helping, Washington’s policies have made it worse.. Instead of expanding opportunity for working people, we’ve tried to grow our economy from the top down, and eventually that pain trickled up. Instead of making sure that people can live their dreams on Main Street, we’ve tilted the scales for special interests and Wall Street. Instead of saying “we’re all in this together” as Americans, Washington has sent a message that says - “you’re on your own.”

John McCain has served his country with honor, and I respect that service. But it was dead wrong when he said recently that he thinks our economy has made “great progress” under George Bush. Is there anyone outside of Washington D.C, who could truly believe that? Do you? Senator McCain is running for President to double down on George Bush’s failed policies. I am running to change them, and that will be the fundamental difference in this election when I am the Democratic nominee for President.

We have a difference on taxes. John McCain wants to continue George Bush’s tax cuts for the wealthiest Americans; I want to give a tax cut to working people. I admired Senator McCain when he said he could not “in good conscience” support the Bush tax cuts. But now, as the Republican nominee, he’s fully embraced them. He wants to give a permanent tax cut to the wealthiest Americans who don’t need them and didn’t ask for them while working people are struggling. And for all his talk about fiscal responsibility, he’s proposed $400 billion in tax cuts without any word about how he’ll pay for him. That’s exactly the kind of attitude that has shifted the burden on to the middle class, and mortgaged our children’s future on a mountain of debt.

I think it’s time to restore fairness and responsibility to our tax code. We need to reward work - not just wealth. We need to stop giving tax breaks to companies that ship jobs overseas, and put a tax cut in the pockets of middle class Americans. That’s why I’ve proposed a “Making Work Pay” tax credit of up to $500 for workers, and $1,000 for working families. This will cut taxes for 150 million Americans. It will help you deal with rising costs, and give our economy a boost by easing the burden on Main Street.

We have a difference on health care. John McCain wants to continue a George Bush approach that only takes care of the healthy and the wealthy; that allows insurance companies to discriminate and deny coverage to those Americans who need it most. This is exactly the kind of approach that has left out tens of millions of Americans. It’s why you are struggling with rising costs. And it’s why we have failed to solve our health care crisis year after year after year.

I think it’s time to finally make health care affordable and accessible for every American. We need to stand up to the insurance companies and the drug companies. We need to bring Americans together. And we need to pass a plan that lowers every family’s premiums, and gives every uninsured American the same kind of coverage that Members of Congress give themselves.

We have a difference on gas prices. John McCain has embraced a gas tax gimmick that - when it’s said and done - will save you less than thirty dollars this summer. This is a classic Washington fix that’s more about getting John McCain through an election than solving your problems. It will put more money in the pockets of the oil companies. It’s bad for our environment. And it won’t bring own gas prices over the long term - most economists think it will send those prices up.

I believe we owe the American people the truth. That’s why my plan to lower gas prices raises fuel efficiency standards on cars; invests in alternative energy to end our addiction to oil; and creates millions of new Green Jobs while saving our planet in the bargain. That’s the kind of change we need in Washington.

We have a fundamental difference on our priorities for the presidency. John McCain wants to continue George Bush’s war in Iraq, losing thousands of lives and spending tens of billions of dollars a month to fight a war that isn’t making us safer. I want to end this war. I want to invest that money in America - in our roads and bridges and ports. And I want to invest in millions of Green Jobs, so that we finally develop renewable energy, end our addiction to oil, bring those gas prices down, and save our planet in the bargain.

There will be real differences on the ballot in November. And that’s what elections should be about. John McCain will stand with Washington’s tried and failed approaches of the past; I will stand with the American people on behalf of a new direction for working people. Because I believe it’s time for America to once again be a place where you can make it if you try. I believe it’s time for Washington to work for your hopes, for your dreams. That’s the choice I’ll offer in this campaign. And that’s what I’ll do every day as President of the United States.

Source — CNN