This week, the GOP presidential frontrunners ditched a black voters forum: Guess Who's Not Coming to Dinner? Larry Craig voted against a bill that protects gays: Guess Who's Not Coming Out at Dinner? Bill O'Reilly showed his true colors: Guess Who's Coming to Dinner Without Screaming, "M-Fer, I Want More Iced Tea!"? Blackwater madness exposed the depths of our privatized war: Guess Who's Coming for the Dinar? Mahmoud Ahmadinejad created a firestorm: Guess Who's Coming to Deny the Holocaust and Gays in Iran? Phil Spector got a hung jury: Guess Who's Coming to Dinner...To Shoot You in the Face? For more takes on the week's top stories, see our Sunday Roundup below. And if you haven't watched HuffPost's exclusive video of John Cusack interviewing Naomi Klein, click here.
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Congress Quietly Approves Billions More for Iraq War
By John Nichols
The Nation
Friday 28 September 2007
The Senate agreed on Thursday to increase the federal debt limit by $850 billion - from $8.965 trillion to $9.815 trillion - and then proceeded to approve a stop-gap spending bill that gives the Bush White House at least $9 billion in new funding for its war in Iraq.
Additionally, the administration has been given emergency authority to tap further into a $70 billion "bridge fund" to provide new infusions of money for the occupation while the Congress works on appropriations bills for the Department of Defense and other agencies.
Translation: Under the guise of a stop-gap spending bill that is simply supposed to keep the government running until a long-delayed appropriations process is completed - probably in November - the Congress has just approved a massive increase in war funding.
The move was backed by every senator who cast a vote, save one.
Wisconsin Senator Russ Feingold, the maverick Democrat who has led the fight to end the war and bring U.S. troops home from Iraq, was on the losing end of the 94-1 vote. (The five senators who did not vote, all presidential candidates who are more involved in campaigning than governing, were Democrats Hillary Clinton, Barack Obama and Joe Biden and Republicans John McCain and Sam Brownback.)
In the House, the continuing resolution passed by a vote of 404 to 14, with 14 other members not voting.
The "no" votes in the House, all cast by anti-war members, came from one Republican, Ron Paul of Texas, and 13 Democrats: Oregon's Earl Blumenauer, Missouri's William Clay, Minnesota's Keith Ellison, California's Bob Filner, Massachusetts' Barney Frank, New York's Maurice Hinchey, Ohio's Dennis Kucinich, Washington's Jim McDermott, New Jersey's Donald Payne, California's Barbara Lee, Maxine Waters, Diane Watson and Lynn Woolsey.
"Guess who's coming to dinner? Natty Dreadlock." - Black Uhuru
McCain should just pack it in. He has long been showing signs of desperate loserism.
The guy had charisma, once. Now, his repeated poor judgment tells me he would be a lousy president.
I like your Christ; I do not like your Christians. Your Christians are so unlike your Christ.
Mohandas Gandhi
Do what you want, but Don't think GOD will bless America if you refuse to listen to 25 foot Jesus....just saying.
In stark contrast to the field of political Pharisees we're stuck with these days, the Founders in Ms Allen's book played their religious beliefs so close to the vest that their closest friends weren't sure if they were believers or not. Washington for one never discussed religion with anyone -- not even his pastor.
Allen includes a historical summary of the range of beliefs at large in the 18th and early 19th Centuries to help you keep track of who was calling whom a heretic. She also has appendixes with letters from Thomas Jefferson showing that English Common Law was derived from ancient Roman sources long before Christian missionaries came to England; and James Madison's "Memorial and Remonstrance Against Religious Assessments".
This is a short, clearly written book that I'd want to give to my favorite candidates if I thought I could trust them to read it.
A very wise person once told me that misunderstandings are not the fault of the person RECEIVING the information.
It's his right to express his preference for a Christian president. As a Christian, I take no offense at that. However, I recognize that the nation is a) not governed based on a religion or faith (again, see the Constitution) and b) not comprised solely of Christians.
It is my right to vote for people who will be inclusive and tolerant of those who do not fit their neat little-minded profile of a perfect white Christian. I assure Mr. McCain that I will exercise my rights with the same fervor he exhibits in exercising his.
Since the majority of Americans don't attend church on a regular basis.
An added note: Jesus, on departing for Heaven, DID enjoin his disciples to: "Go ye into the world and preach the gospel to every creature." Many evangelicals take this injunction rightly or wrongly as meaning they have to talk incessantly about their religious beliefs, as well as try their damnedest (so to speak) to foist them on others. A more favorite line of mine is: "When ye pray, pray in secret and your Father who seeth in secret will reward you in secret."
(Chapter-and-versers please don't come down on me for these not being exact quotes from the Gospels. I'm quoting from memory and its been a while since I read the Bible through for perhaps the half-dozenth time. The meaning is there. And BTW, though I still read the Bible from time to time, I do not consider myself a Christian -- more like a kind of closet Hindu, I think....)
Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof.
The original settlers left England in order to escape religious persecution. The Puritans were persecuted for refusing to join the Church of England which is the official state ordered denomination of the British Isles
All they were saying is that unlike England where the Church of England is the lawful established denomination; France with Roman Catholicism; Lutherism in Germany; The Dutch Quakers,etc; America would not have an Official State Church. I do, however, believe their thinking regarding an official religion was limited to Christianity. I say this because at time their world was a much smaller place; limited their perception. The citizens at that time were Western Europeans. Not that they had never heard of the Jews or Hindus or Buddhists or Muslim, or knew of their existence, in many ways this fact still seemed other-worldly. Yes, the wording does say religion, but that is a commonly misused word when one really means denomination. I'm fairly sure that there were no proofreaders available.
Can anyone find the grammatical error below in the Bill of Rights?
The Constitution of the United States of America
We the people of the United States, in order to form a more perfect union, establish justice, insure domestic tranquility, provide for the common defense, promote the general welfare, and secure the blessings of liberty to ourselves and our posterity, do ordain and establish this Constitution for the United States of America.
I hope they wear their purple heart band aids the day they have a roll call vote to TRASH Limbaugh.
McCain try to make the vote...ya slacker
Say, it ain't so!
Would you demand an apology if he had said that he'd prefer a Muslim President? Or a Mormon President? (which he would not say right now)?
Just CURIOUS!
Secondly, and on a seperate point, I am sooooo tired of Republicans and Christian conservatives ignorance and perversion of history ... especially OUR history.
For instance, they bemoaned the soundness of Bill Clinton to no end for his receipt of feminine favors whilst in the White House. Yet, these same people would rank Jefferson, Eisenhower, and Martin Luther King amongst our country's greatest leaders. Guess what? Know what they ALL had in common? Infidelity. Yet, somehow, they still managed to be AMAZING leaders. Oh. And you know who WAS faithful?! Jimmy Carter. Your least favorite president of all time!
This brings me to the new Republican catchphrase: a President should be Christian or at least very religious. Well guess what? You know which of our President's was NOT a Christian? You know which of our President's was actually fairly anti-Christian?
Lincoln.
Yep. That's right. The man atop the short list of greatest Americans ever failed even once during his Presidency to mention Jesus in any speech. Furthermore, he only mentioned God under pressure from advisors. It is simply a statement of fact, that the man had soundly rejected Christianity.
So stop perverting our history and LEARN it before you act as if you know what qualities become an excellent leader.
What's in question is the fact of the statement itself, by a public figure. I'm don't expect a Republican, in particular, to observe the niceties of civil discourse, but those in the lap of the media owe it to the American people to avoid pandering to special interests. When they speak so, they are not speaking to the nation. Yes, in the context of secular government, Christianity is a special interest.
I myself would prefer that we NOT have a "Christian" president, if that means playing on Christianity as a selling point. Promising to be a "Christian President" is an explicit promise to exercise the office of President according to Christian priorities. A voter would be right to interpret such a promise as a pledge to use Christian principles and priorities as guidance in executing the laws of the nation. Our laws explicitly do not permit such interpretations in enforcement.
For instance: Christianity counsels forgiveness if an offender is sincerely repentant. I like this, myself (given the sincerity, which to my mind includes a determination to make amends), but law does not countenance a religious bias in pardon/forgiveness. Given that like minds to the pardoner are more likely to get the pardons, it follows that Christians would be more likely to get them.
This would be in direct opposition to the principle of separation of church and state -- a principle, remember, that has well-established constitutional and judicial precedent. At least it does until our increasingly neoconservative Supreme Court overthrows that precedent. Do date, it is the law of the land, and should receive more than lip service from candidates for high office.
Sure, we all have principles (erk- Sorry, I couldn't say that with a straight face), but the principles a president must exercise are those that protect all citizens, not just those who feel as he does.
McCain was not out of line in his statement, IF he makes that observation as an addendum.
"If you can't say anything nice, don't say anything to show that you are a hypocritical political ROWG supremacist who supports no separation between Church and State."
McCain shot himself in the political foot AGAIN.... (How many times does this make now, since he announced his candidacy?)
Thank you for the Sunday Roundup. Also, congratulations on the nice write-up of the Huffington Post in USA Today. It was an interesting read.
French weekly, Le Canard Enchaîné reports that Russia's Putin has warned Tehran "You are going to be bombed." As well as Saudi Prince Faisal also said the attack is imminent.
The silence on this side of the pond is deafening.