Our founding fathers were not Christians.

[longship]

62. That is the crux of the problem

You said:

My point is that we cannot bleach religion from ANY government. We're going to have
come crossed beliefs.

That is my primary, and fervent, political belief. Th Republicans have, as we may say, jumped the couch. (Google it.)

Our only salvation (so to speak) is to disassociate ourselves from anything approaching a theistic government. That is precisely what the Republicans cannot, and will not do. They are wedded to their theology to the exact extent to which they are wedded to trickle-down economics. Neither ideology will give way to the other.

I will keep on promoting a couple of books on these subjects here. First, is John Dean's Conservatives Without Conscience which is an in depth look at the social, psychological evidence for the authoritarian personality, extensively researched by Robert Altemeyer. Yes, it is that John Dean who went to prison for crimes as Nixon's aide. Listen to him now!

The other is a rather more academic work by Daniel C. Dennett, a philosopher at Tufts and one of the more erudite members of what is called the four horsemen of the counter-apocalypse. (Hitchens, Dennett, Dawkins, Harris, although there are many, many more now.) Dennett is looking for a scientific origin of religion, something evolutionary, but social. He has a compelling argument, but suggests a variety of tests to substantiate his hypothesis. His book, Breaking the Spell is more erudite and suggests a memetic origin for religion.

Both are important works, if only for the fact that they are based on somewhat firm science and propose extensions of that science to answer these important questions.

Some would suggest that in order to defeat these ideologues politically one should understand their underlying psychologies and their possible memetic hold on culture. I would argue that this is the extent that we will not win the battle. We've gotta be smarter than they are. We have to use the media better than they do. So far we are far behind them because nobody is willing to see that we're fighting a cultural battle which has been engrained for decades. It will take a concerted effort to turn it around.

Meanwhile, here we are at DU, throwing chairs around the room about Ann Romney and other trivialities when the theocrats are breaking down the doors.

The only issue important this year is the connection of the religious right to a political party. I don't give a fuck whether you call them fundementalists or evangelicals or siwwy wabbits. Anyway you call them, just listening to them, or reading the legislation they propose should be enough.

These siwwy wabbits are no friends to people in the US.

(Sorry, Bugs. Big fan of yours. Just couldn't resist the Fudd metaphor.)