Democrats change platform to add God, Jerusalem

[RanWiz]

198. My First Post TOO !!

I resigned from the Dem Party yesterday over this. So bad on so many levels:
<1> Letting the GOP goad Dems into taking action - spineless as has been pointed out.
<2> The SHAM voice vote - and that damning photo of the teleprompter instructing National Convention Chairman Antonio Villaraigosa (mayor of Los Angeles, CA) that the vote was AFFIRMED even before it was decided!! The party 'uppers' just layed it out on the 'people'.
<3> The whitewash in the media - this was an accusation of conservative news outlets, and it's quite true - this debacle has NOT been widely carried after the fact.
<4> WRONG HEADED on the "GOD" part - we seem to never be able to get any real separation between church and state here in the US of god. We have some freedom of religion, but no freedom FROM it. And if you claim that talents are "God Given" then you must not believe in evolution - that makes the Dem's sound more like Repubs in my book.
<5> Jerusalem as Capital of Israel: this is a very tricky one. Personally I support Israel. I think the US should continue to do so for many reasons (none religious). Note that the Israeli's have the Knessit there (their legislature) and other parts of government ... they want it to be their capital and claim it as such. However some of that land [East Jerusalem] was grabbed in the 1967 7-day war (which I remember well). The UN (for which most Americans do not have enough respect) has several resolutions [#476 & 478 - see Wikipedia "Positions on Jerusalem" for lots of background if you are not up to speed ] which resolutions prohibit the use of this land for Israel's Capital, etc. The rest of the world respects this standard from 1980, except the USA. However, we have conformed with the rest of the world by placing our embassy in Tel-Aviv.
Saying that we support Jerusalem as the capital is CODE for saying that we will support Israel in their possession of this 'stolen' land. I support the idea from about the middle of 1950's of making this contested city into a UN PROTECTORATE...not within any country whatever. This idea, supported by many at that time (including Albert Einstein who was frustrated with the Israeli treatment of his support for Israel University in Jerusalem). There is a good precedent for placing a city outside the borders of states in conflict....that's want we call Washington, DC !!
BOTTOM LINE ON THIS ONE: is the next sentence in the DEM's Platform: "The parties have agreed that Jerusalem is a matter for final status negotiations." The point is {OBVIOUSLY} not settled yet. Why don't we just leave it at that??