Full story on The Raw Story,
http://www.rawstory.comBy Brian Dowell
RAW STORY COLUMNIST
, in their usual lethargy, the corporate media has gone mostly back to old standbys; the Iraq debacle, the Lakers getting stomped by a team full of nobodies, and the godforsaken Scott Peterson trial. Another story thrown into the media blender this Monday was that Supreme Court threw out a challenge to the “under God” portion of the Pledge of Allegiance. On it’s face, this story has “Fox News” written all over it; it’s easy to cast as a “Let’s scare the grandmothers of America with how the communists are trying to trying to scare the schoolchildren away from Jesus” juggernaut.
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I must say that this case does nothing to arouse any particular passion in me. Even though I am a doubting agnostic, I do acknowledge that a majority of Americans are believers in God, so mentions of His name don’t offend me. I don’t get offended and throw a hissy fit every time a sneeze of mine is greeted with a “God bless you” or when I hear a co-worker utter “Thank God my girlfriend decided to get that abortion.” I recognize that, whether I like it or not, during the average American day, whether I like it or not, God is going to get a fair share of shout outs.
Don’t get me wrong here. How far the separation of church and state goes and what role it is to play in the daily lives of our children is an important question, and one that our Supreme Court is eventually going to need to address. However, I’m not sure that this manufactured Pledge of Allegiance controversy is the best vehicle to use to arrive at that definitive answer.
It would seem that in the Age of Ashcroft, the ACLU should have bigger battles to fight than whining over two words of a thirty-one word pledge. That kind of nitpicking makes progressives seem, to the larger populace, slightly snotty. True, the words “under God” weren’t a part of the original pledge; they were added in the 50’s, as a lip servicing part of Joe McCarthy’s shameful crusade, which wasn’t exactly a beacon of Christian forgiveness.
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The Pledge also includes the dubious phrases “indivisible” and “with liberty and justice for all.” America is easily divisible. Any basic review of our history would show us that; everything from the Civil War to the Los Angeles riots to the 2000 elections..... John Edwards ran an almost-successful run for the Democratic nomination this year with the theme of there being “two Americas.”
That part of the pledge should be amended to “and liberty and justice for those that can afford it.”
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Perhaps both the Michael Newdows of the world and the Christian “patriots” could stop conducting a silly skirmish about two words in a pledge and instead actually do something constructive to make the “liberty and justice for all” ring true — and thereby make America something truly worth our allegiance.
http://www.rawstory.com/exclusives/dowell/blah_pledge_of_allegiance.htm