JOhn KERry do you really support him?

MgC wrote

Is that the rebuttal that justifies the intolerance and teachings of the Born Agains.
Two wrongs make a right.

This might be a good time to mention that Christianity had a time in its history when it was thought that dying for Christianity in battle against what Christians considered heathens...was something to be sought and treasured.

Exactly, McG. The extreme fundamentalists of any religion are dangerous. There is no reason to believe that Christian fundamentalists are any stronger advocates of Democracy than Muslim fundamentalists. In fact, on the very same program, they asked the father(?) whether there should be separation of church and state and he said 'the truth is not a democracy', and expanded on that in a way that I found disturbing. Luckily, as a group, they don't control the government enough to bring about these changes, but I think it's something we should be aware of.

Now I have to go hunt down a transcript for the rest of his comment. It was very interesting.

No, you have obviously missed my point.

A fanatic muslim is dangerous. They want to kill.

A Born again Chritisn merely wants you to become a Christian. To consider that dangerous is, well, fatuous.

To forget the Crusades may be dangerous.

McG wrote


it starts with a request and ends with a demand.

Your blaming the crusades on Born-again-Christians?!

Maybe, but what's the worse that can happen if decline to acquiesce? They call you a name, say you will go to hell and move on? That's real dangerous...

Actually, McG, there are many fundamentalist Muslims who are not murderous. Just as there are fundamentalist Christians who are murderous -- abortion clinic bombers come to mind.

What they have in common is their allegiance to their faith over anything else, and a feeling that American culture is damaging their spirituality.

McG wrote


As usual you miss the point. First they request and than when they have the strength they will impose. You must have heard of Bush's religious agenda.

Now that I think about it, I've never seen Bush and a functioning brain at the same time.

After Terror, a Secret Rewriting of Military Law
By TIM GOLDEN

Published: October 24, 2004


ASHINGTON - In early November 2001, with Americans still staggered by the Sept. 11 attacks, a small group of White House officials worked in great secrecy to devise a new system of justice for the new war they had declared on terrorism.

Determined to deal aggressively with the terrorists they expected to capture, the officials bypassed the federal courts and their constitutional guarantees, giving the military the authority to detain foreign suspects indefinitely and prosecute them in tribunals not used since World War II.

The plan was considered so sensitive that senior White House officials kept its final details hidden from the president's national security adviser, Condoleezza Rice, and the secretary of state, Colin L. Powell, officials said. It was so urgent, some of those involved said, that they hardly thought of consulting Congress.

White House officials said their use of extraordinary powers would allow the Pentagon to collect crucial intelligence and mete out swift, unmerciful justice. "We think it guarantees that we'll have the kind of treatment of these individuals that we believe they deserve," said Vice President Dick Cheney, who was a driving force behind the policy.

But three years later, not a single terrorist has been prosecuted. Of the roughly 560 men being held at the United States naval base at Guantánamo Bay, Cuba, only 4 have been formally charged. Preliminary hearings for those suspects brought such a barrage of procedural challenges and public criticism that verdicts could still be months away. And since a Supreme Court decision in June that gave the detainees the right to challenge their imprisonment in federal court, the Pentagon has stepped up efforts to send home hundreds of men whom it once branded as dangerous terrorists.

"We've cleared whole forests of paper developing procedures for these tribunals, and no one has been tried yet," said Richard L. Shiffrin, who worked on the issue as the Pentagon's deputy general counsel for intelligence matters. "They just ended up in this Kafkaesque sort of purgatory."

The story of how Guantánamo and the new military justice system became an intractable legacy of Sept. 11 has been largely hidden from public view.

But extensive interviews with current and former officials and a review of confidential documents reveal that the legal strategy took shape as the ambition of a small core of conservative administration officials whose political influence and bureaucratic skill gave them remarkable power in the aftermath of the attacks.

The strategy became a source of sharp conflict within the Bush administration, eventually pitting the highest-profile cabinet secretaries - including Ms. Rice and Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld - against one another over issues of due process, intelligence-gathering and international law.

In fact, many officials contend, some of the most serious problems with the military justice system are rooted in the secretive and contentious process from which it emerged.

Military lawyers were largely excluded from that process in the days after Sept. 11. They have since waged a long struggle to ensure that terrorist prosecutions meet what they say are basic standards of fairness. Uniformed lawyers now assigned to defend Guantánamo detainees have become among the most forceful critics of the Pentagon's own system.

Foreign policy officials voiced concerns about the legal and diplomatic ramifications, but had little influence. Increasingly, the administration's plan has come under criticism even from close allies, complicating efforts to transfer scores of Guantánamo prisoners back to their home governments.

To the policy's architects, the attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon represented a stinging challenge to American power and an imperative to consider measures that might have been unimaginable in less threatening times. Yet some officials said the strategy was also shaped by longstanding political agendas that had relatively little to do with fighting terrorism.

Justice as defined by Cheney and Bush. I am assuming that Bush was told. Whether he understood is another question.

What's the point? I seem to have missed it again.

I understand that neither of McCain's daughters are on speaking terms with him because of his support for Bush . I get the feeling from everything he has said he is secretly hoping for a Kerry win. :wink: It's all just politics. I would not be at all surprised if Kerry were to offer McCain a cabinet post when he is elected.

Nader on the other hand is secretly in Bush's corner. Bush offered him a job as White house garbage man. Anything to get to the white house.

Rudy is on the stump for Bush as well he is going to get a hairpiece and a lifetime pass to all yankee games. And a Dick Tracy badge.

George W. Bush goes to a primary school to read My Pet Goat one more
time, hoping that this time he'll understand the ending. After his
photo opportunity, he offers question time. One little boy puts up his
hand and the President asks him what his name is.

"Billy," responds the little boy.

"And what is your question, Billy?"

"I have three questions. First, why did the USA invade Iraq without
the support of the UN? Second, why are you President when Al Gore got
more votes? And third, whatever happened to Osama Bin Laden?"

Just then the bell rings. The Leader of the Free World informs the
kiddies that it is time for recess, but, because he is The Education
President, because he really believes in education, he will take
time out of his busy schedule to hang around the school, and he will
still be there after recess, and they will continue then.

When they resume, The Education President says, "OK, where were we?
Oh that's right: question time. Who has a question?"

Another little boy puts up his hand. The President points to him and
asks him his name.

"Steve," the boy responds.

"And what is your question, Steve?"

"I have five questions. First, why did the USA invade Iraq without
the support of the UN? Second, why are you President when Al Gore got
more votes? Third, whatever happened to Osama Bin Laden? Fourth, why
did the recess bell go off 20 minutes early? And fifth, where did
those men take Billy?

I missed a lot by working today, wow. I don't see this as wrong I think if nothing else it teaches kids that there are consequences for behaviors good and bad. Kids can be raised pretty much as parents see fit here in the USA, then when the kids get older if they want to belive something different or belive nothing at all then there is nothing to stop them.

Then Beverly's god is gonna lose...because George Bush is gonna lose.

We will all have to take consolation in the fact that the United States...and all the rest of the world is gonna win as a result.

And so too is the Catholic Church. It would seem they are less interested in the death and distruction of war than they are regarding the right to perform abortions. .