The other article was about the draft and how the military is so thin that the draft may be inevitable. Remember Bush running for President claiming he wouldn't spread of military around? This was in response to the notion that America could fight maybe two wars at a time. Well, we're fighting at least two wars, our military is thin, our President is clueless, our treasury has direct deposit to god know how many Bush Buddy Businesses. As I've previously blogged, you'll hear draft until November. If Bush wins it's a go. It might even be a go with Kerry - don't know. But by that time the word will have lost much of its scariness as it gets repeated and used. And with the current explorations of the draft expect that the idea "Withdrawal from Iraq is a non-option" will get similar airplay.

Perhaps we need to send a message to our Government like "Our children are not your play toys. The Draft is unwanted, unnecessary, and will not bring about peace. As you consider whether to vote for or against the Draft consider this - You work for us, the American people. You do not work for and are not beholden to a company or a religious group or a PAC. You work for American people: parents; singles; young; old; healthy; infirmed. You work for us tax-payers."

Religion And Politics Again
In the opinion section of the 7/11 LA Times there was an article by Charlotte Allen about religion entering politics and how it was a good thing. She starts off by quoting the positions of Robert Reich (former Secretary of Labor) and Barry Lynn (Executive Director for Americans United for Separation of Church and State) that not only is religion in politics bad but could lead a major conflict between "those who believe in the primacy of the individual and those who believe that human beings owe their allegiance and identity to a higher authority...between those who believe in science, reason, and logic and those who believe that truth is revealed through Scripture and religious dogma".

From this basis she attacks subtly. Mixing religion and politics is acceptable because:

"Most Americans don't mind - indeed many demand - that their president not only honor religious faith, an American hallmark, but function in some sense as a religious leader." This is an opinion expressed without any facts or statistics and therefore has no merit. What a President does and says in public is usually with an eye towards the polls. For a Republican President spouting religion in general is worth poll points but that doesn't mean we demand a President honor religious faith. Certainly we do not want a President who functions as a religious leader. We're fighting wars against those type of leaders. Our Founding Fathers understood the dangers of having leaders who served dual functions hence the eparation of Church and State.

"America owes its high level of religious intensity to the separation of church and state." Which is a damn good reason to keep and strengthen that separation, not weaken it. By keeping the wall intact we honor all religions and those who chose not to believe. By keeping the wall intact we keep the Government's focus on governing, on country issues, and not on religious matters. By keeping the separation intact we truly become "one nation, indivisible."

"Religion, by nature, is a public thing, because it acknowledges a reality that is outside the private realm of the inner heart. Individuals' faith and religious experiences are private matters but religion itself...is shared and communal. Those who would banish religion to the realm of the strictly private in effect contend that religion has no relevance to public life. This notion fatally trivializes religion by treating it as essentially meaningless." Religious dogma is public and does have relevance to public life, and does have meaning. In has no relevance in Government for by infiltrating Government religion forces the Government to give focus to a subset of the American people, namely those who believe. By spewing references to God you further eliminate those who do not believe in the Judeo-Christian dogmas. In short, religion entering politics can only be divisive.

"..religion recognizes there is inherent meaning, order, and purpose in the universe. It thus induces humility, a recognition that our puny ideas about how things are and ought to be may not be the final word. The horror of 20th century totalinarianism was the insistence of atheistic, militantly secularist intellectuals..." More opinion and poorly stated. Religious expression and belief is subject to interpretation and abuse. Sure, religion may hold that there's order and meaning in the universe but that rationale can be used to justify suicide bombers or as reason to open a charity. Religion may induce humility and it may induce a feeling of superiority, that one's religion is the true path to God and other religions are false. From that, we get religion fractionalizations and wars. The references to Hitler, Stalin, and Mao are commonly made to show that Atheism is dangerous in Government. If religion is usually and commonly held as belief in a higher or supreme being, I would contend that Hitler, Stalin, and Mao were forms of religions themselves int hat they passed themselves off as the ultimate powers. Sponsored Atheism would be a means to force the focus onto themselves.

More importantly the totalitarian argument implies that if you knock religion out of politics then you end up with a totalitarian regime, which is completely false. Knocking religion out of politics may also lead you to Democracy, example being the United States. By letting religion infiltrate politics we run the massively dangerous risk of having a President act as political and religious leader. The President could then demand that he be given the power to declare war without permission from Congress (*cough*). From there it's an easy short step to totalitarianism.

Is that what we want in America - a President with absolute power? Our Founding Fathers understood the dangers of that scenario, hence the "checks and balances" system of our Government. We must not let our system of Government be undermined by religious influences. It's bad enough that it's corrupted Corporations. We, the American People, must retake our Government, enforce the separation between Church and State, vote loudly, and re-take our Freedoms and Liberties. If we don't, the Government surely won't.