Fed. appeals court upholds 'under God' in pledge

[Garfield1966]

So the $4 trillion that Bush ran it up was OK. Got it. Please stop being a hypocrite. The $4 trillion from Bush and the $2 trillion (and climbing) from Obama are equally horrendous. To criticize one with out the other carries no credibility.

 

[SparrowHawk]

Going back to the words "Under God" being upheld by the courts. I think one has to look to history and note that the Founding Fathers even in their zeal to keep church and state apart acknowledged a "Creator".

That Creator, whether one calls him God or another name is the source of our rights. Not Barack Obama or any man alive or dead.

Our rights come directly from this God Head who is known by many names. Therefore it is totally appropriate for the words "Under God" to be in the pledge.

 

[Garfield1966]

Nah, I don't think so. Just did a search of the COTUS. the words god or creator do not appear any where in the document. One would think that if either of these to terms were so important to the founding fathers in the manner which you imply, that they would have included it in the founding document. Oddly they did not.

As for the pledge, I guess we can ignore the fact that the original pledge was written by a socialist in 1892 IIRC. The irony of that is just too damn funny. The portion "to the flag of the United States of America" was added at a later date when we adopted it as our pledge in the first part of the 20th century. Only in the 50's did Eisenhower get Congress to add 'under god' because of those horrible commies.

I do not agree that our rights come from any higher being. I believe our rights originate and are based on our own consent. We as a nation have decided that these rights are basic to an organized society and that each individual should be entitled to certain rights. I believe religion is a by product of basic human rights and not the other way around. Humans have always wanted to be treated fairly. Religion was just another form of government in that it codified these rights and added a mystical judge to enforce the rights. Other governments just replaced the mystical one with a real one that could hand down rulings such as a judge.

 

[SparrowHawk]

Creator is found in the Declaration of Independence and it is the basis for the entire premise that founded our country.


"We hold these truths to be self evident, that all men are created equal, each endowed by their creator with certain inalienable rights, among those are Life, Liberty & the pursuit of happiness"

This one sentence is the essense of who we were and what we are today. This sentence addresses gay rights, minority rights in general and yes even the right for Pat Robertson to make stupid comments.

Rights conferred on us NOT by Obama or Bush but by the Creator, whatever your definition or name for the Creator may be. God, Yahweh, Allah, Great Spirit, etc etc. This being alone conferred our rights and no government can take them form us unless we allow it.

It's really pretty simple

 

[Garfield1966]

The DI was as a note to mom saying we are moving out and this is why. The COTUS was/is the document on which this country is run. All laws are supposedly based on the COTUS. The idea of god was in my opinion purposefully left out of the COTUS. The DI while important, has no legal bearing on the laws of the nation.

Your opinion seems to imply that without religion we can have no moral code. Given that I believe god was created by man and not the other way around, I have no problem believing that morality is viable without any religious origin.

Yes, it really is quite simple.

 

[southwind]

So the $4 trillion that Bush ran it up was OK. Got it. Please stop being a hypocrite. The $4 trillion from Bush and the $2 trillion (and climbing) from Obama are equally horrendous. To criticize one with out the other carries no credibility.

Bush 8 years= 4 Trillion

Obama 14 months= 2 Trillion

Obama 8 years= appox. 13.6 Trillion

Who's the hypocrite !

 

[Garfield1966]

So the war and the foreclosures were all Obamas fault? Bush added $4 trilion and Obama will ad $5 Trillion. Not sure I see a difference between $12 and $13 trillion when it comes to the national debt.

The original point still stands. Most Republicans were not crying about the $4 trillion from Bush, just the $5 trillion est from Obama.

 

[delldude]

The DI was as a note to mom saying we are moving out and this is why. The COTUS was/is the document on which this country is run. All laws are supposedly based on the COTUS. The idea of god was in my opinion purposefully left out of the COTUS. The DI while important, has no legal bearing on the laws of the nation.

Your opinion seems to imply that without religion we can have no moral code. Given that I believe god was created by man and not the other way around, I have no problem believing that morality is viable without any religious origin.

Yes, it really is quite simple.

BS.....If you are denied Liberty...............its a court case.

You're side does all it can to eliminate God in every aspect of American life and look at the country...Give me a break.

Yes, it really is quite simple.

 

[SparrowHawk]

So the war and the foreclosures were all Obamas fault? Bush added $4 trilion and Obama will ad $5 Trillion. Not sure I see a difference between $12 and $13 trillion when it comes to the national debt.

The original point still stands. Most Republicans were not crying about the $4 trillion from Bush, just the $5 trillion est from Obama.

Once again we have a board full of duped idealogues. Once the Federal Reserve was created the debt has increased steadily.

US Federal Debt As Percent Of GDP is now at near WWII levels:

US Federal Debt As Percent Of GDP
Fiscal Years 1910 to 2010 Year GDP-US
$ billion Gross Public Debt-fed
pct GDP
1910 33.4 7.94
1911 34.3 8.06
1912 37.4 7.67
1913 39.1 7.46
1914 36.5 7.98
1915 38.7 7.90
1916 49.6 7.28
1917 59.7 9.58
1918 75.8 19.25
1919 78.3 34.98
1920 88.4 29.36
1921 73.6 32.58
1922 73.4 31.29
1923 85.4 26.17
1924 86.9 24.45
1925 90.6 22.64
1926 96.9 20.27
1927 95.5 19.38
1928 97.4 18.07
1929 103.6 16.34
1930 91.2 17.75
1931 76.5 21.96
1932 58.7 33.20
1933 56.4 39.96
1934 66 40.99
1935 73.3 39.16
1936 83.8 40.31
1937 91.9 39.64
1938 86.1 43.16
1939 92.2 43.86
1940 101.4 42.37
1941 126.7 38.64
1942 161.9 44.73
1943 198.6 68.83
1944 219.8 91.45
1945 223 116.00
1946 222.2 121.25
1947 244.1 105.81
1948 269.1 93.75
1949 267.2 94.60
1950 293.7 87.63
1951 339.3 75.22
1952 358.3 72.32
1953 379.3 70.15
1954 380.4 71.31
1955 414.7 66.16
1956 437.4 62.36
1957 461.1 58.67
1958 467.2 59.15
1959 506.6 56.20
1960 526.4 54.39
1961 544.8 53.04
1962 585.7 50.91
1963 617.8 49.51
1964 663.6 46.97
1965 719.1 44.12
1966 787.7 40.61
1967 832.4 39.19
1968 909.8 38.20
1969 984.4 35.93
1970 1038.3 35.72
1971 1126.8 35.33
1972 1237.9 34.51
1973 1382.3 33.14
1974 1499.5 31.68
1975 1637.7 32.56
1976 1824.6 34.00
1977 2030.1 34.42
1978 2293.8 33.64
1979 2562.2 32.26
1980 2788.1 32.56
1981 3126.8 31.91
1982 3253.2 35.10
1983 3534.6 38.96
1984 3930.9 40.00
1985 4217.5 43.23
1986 4460.1 47.65
1987 4736.4 49.62
1988 5100.4 51.02
1989 5482.1 52.12
1990 5800.5 55.74
1991 5992.1 61.17
1992 6342.3 64.09
1993 6667.4 66.17
1994 7085.2 66.23
1995 7414.7 67.08
1996 7838.5 66.66
1997 8332.4 64.97
1998 8793.5 62.84
1999 9353.5 60.47
2000 9951.5 57.02
2001 10286.2 56.46
2002 10642.3 58.52
2003 11142.1 60.88
2004 11867.8 62.18
2005 12638.4 62.77
2006 13398.9 63.49
2007 14077.6 63.99
2008 14441.4 69.15
2009 14258.2 83.29
2010 14623.9 94.27


You want to establish blame for the debt you have to start with Woodrow Wilson. Even during the Great Depression, Debt as a percentage of GDP was well below 50%. Since 1955 through 1990the percentage has consistently been between 40 and 60%!

In the last 10 years we've seen it grow well beyond that and now resides around 94%. Moody's has spoken about our bond rating and if that gets lowered we are done

 

[Garfield1966]

BS.....If you are denied Liberty...............its a court case.

You're side does all it can to eliminate God in every aspect of American life and look at the country...Give me a break.

Yes, it really is quite simple.

Not quite but nice try. I would like to see religion removed from publicly funded life and placed back in to private where it belongs. Where this country is has nothing to do with the removal of 'god' from public. Were that the case, we have never had god where ever it is you think it should be. Look at the atrocities that this nation had perpetrated such as massacres of the Native American, witch trials, and slavery to mention three.

I am agnostic and I believe I have a far better moral compass then most of those who claim to be religious. The two ideas are not mutually dependent but rather independent.

I'll ask the question again in hopes that someone will answer. Why do you feel the need to have religion in public. Why ca you not be happy with going to church and practicing your faith in public without wearing it around like a billboard on your chest?

 

[SparrowHawk]

Not quite but nice try. I would like to see religion removed from publicly funded life and placed back in to private where it belongs. Where this country is has nothing to do with the removal of 'god' from public. Were that the case, we have never had god where ever it is you think it should be. Look at the atrocities that this nation had perpetrated such as massacres of the Native American, witch trials, and slavery to mention three.

I am agnostic and I believe I have a far better moral compass then most of those who claim to be religious. The two ideas are not mutually dependent but rather independent.

I'll ask the question again in hopes that someone will answer. Why do you feel the need to have religion in public. Why ca you not be happy with going to church and practicing your faith in public without wearing it around like a billboard on your chest?

Not an issue of religion in public per se. Religion is in the public eye because the founding fathers practiced a religion, yet were so concerned about religous freedom they wanted constitutional assurances that a religion did not have undue influence on the laws that govern society.

For an agnostic like yourself this is a bit of catch 22. the very liberties conferred upon you came from the Creator which you're not sure exists, yet those very same people gave us the COTUS in order to protect you from discrimination from holding that belief. A conundrum to be sure.

 

[Garfield1966]

Not an issue of religion in public per se. Religion is in the public eye because the founding fathers practiced a religion, yet were so concerned about religous freedom they wanted constitutional assurances that a religion did not have undue influence on the laws that govern society.

For an agnostic like yourself this is a bit of catch 22. the very liberties conferred upon you came from the Creator which you're not sure exists, yet those very same people gave us the COTUS in order to protect you from discrimination from holding that belief. A conundrum to be sure.

Assuming facts not in evidence your honor.

Not a catch 22 at all. Whether there is a creator or not is not relevant. As I stated earlier, our rights came from logic and self interest, not religion. I content that while the some of the founders had religious beliefs they were wise enough not to let them could their beliefs and made sure to specify that those beliefs did not intrude into the public arena. In other words you may do as you wish behind closed doors but make sure you keep it there because it has no business in the public arena.

Unfortunately we have strayed from those ideals and let that cat out of the bag and it is quite difficult to reverse that trend.

 

[SparrowHawk]

Assuming facts not in evidence your honor.

Not a catch 22 at all. Whether there is a creator or not is not relevant. As I stated earlier, our rights came from logic and self interest, not religion. I content that while the some of the founders had religious beliefs they were wise enough not to let them could their beliefs and made sure to specify that those beliefs did not intrude into the public arena. In other words you may do as you wish behind closed doors but make sure you keep it there because it has no business in the public arena.

Unfortunately we have strayed from those ideals and let that cat out of the bag and it is quite difficult to reverse that trend.

See here is where the "Original Intent" legal theory advanced by Scalia among others comes into play. Near as I can tell, ALL of the founding fathers held basic Christian beliefsand religous freedom to them meant you didn't get persecuted for being a Quaker, Puritan or any other Christian faith not named Church of England.

Since they pretty much got everything right, people of various and sundry faiths flocked here for the very reasons they created these freedoms both civil and religous. Now we have a true melting pot and as we are learning, religous beliefs don't melt very well at any temperature.

The most interesting part in all of this is the lengths the founding fathers went to to ensure religous freedom. Had it not been for Ben Franklin proposing the words we read now as a compromise it is doubtful that we would have had a Declaration of Independance in 1776. Some were so adamant that even the word "Sacred" would ensure a "NO" vote.

I mentioned the legal concept of Original Intent because what it does is ask you to put yourself in the Founding Fathers shoes and look at the law and the intent of it based on the events not of today but when the law was written. So in that context what the Founding Fathers proposed, a nation based upon Freedom and Liberty for everyone was in that historical period so radical that there was no logic. Rather it was based upon a deep spiritual belief that we are all equal in the Creators eyes.

Now for the Conservative Christian Crowd going "Yippee he's on our side" as you read, SIT DOWN!!!! The reason the word creator was used is because deep down inside many of those founding fathers could see the this day when you'd attempt to use those words to advance your religous and political agenda.234 years ago these men were wise enough to predict the BS being spouted now and sought to nip it in the bud.

Did they get it 100% right? NOPE they didn't but they got closer than anyone before or since. Slavery? Wisely they let that ride until later as they knew it was to much to deal with in 1776. Judging from the end results, it was a pretty hot potato 80 years later. there are other examples where things were left to sort themselves out and largely they have because the founding fathers focused on the framework of good government. Only problem being they gave us enough rope to hang ourselves. Which we are quickly doing.