Growing Up Secure

Asking for Trouble:

[Fallows post] ‘When we can’t talk about what we’re really doing, and when we penalize politicians for speaking the truth, we’re asking for trouble. Of the sort many people will encounter at the airport tomorrow — and in months ahead. ‘

The question I’m always left with after reading this is this: How do you get to a place where, as a society, we cultivate a mature approach to risks facing us?

(Via Ta-Nehisi Coates :: The Atlantic.)

Indeed I’ve been asking that for some time now.

Three Steps Toward a Balanced Budget

Three Steps Toward a Balanced Budget:

“Our personal and national relationship to debt is indeed a moral issue. Leaving our children to pay the bills for excessive spending cannot be justified. But, if a budget really is a moral document, how we reduce the deficit is also a moral issue. Our budget should not be balanced on the backs of the poor. Cuts should not come from the services and programs that people rely on now more than ever. The reality is that we have a lot of wasteful spending in our federal budget, but most of it does not come from things that help the most vulnerable people in our society.”

(Via God’s Politics Blog.)

In short, he suggests cuts to:

  • Defense spending
  • Return to Clinton-era tax rates for the wealthy
  • Eliminate farm subsidies

We’d save billions upon billions and we’d have a more moral budget to boot.

Jon Stewart on the Response to the Rally to Restore Sanity

The Daily Show With Jon Stewart Mon – Thurs 11p / 10c
MSNBC Suspends Keith Olbermann
www.thedailyshow.com
Daily Show Full Episodes Political Humor Rally to Restore Sanity

The rename of the fake rally is genius.

UPDATE:  Here he is on Rachel Maddow of MSNBC.

 

Jon Stewart’s Closing Rally Speech: “If We Amplify Everything, We Hear Nothing”

Jon Stewart’s Closing Rally Speech: “If We Amplify Everything, We Hear Nothing”: “Jon Stewart and Stephen Colbert’s Rally to Restore Sanity and/or Fear wrapped up this afternoon with one of its only serious moments—Jon Stewart’s 12-minute closing address—that was also its most important/poignant one.”

(Via Gawker.tv.)

MLK On a Proper Education

I often wonder whether or not education is fulfilling its purpose.  A great majority of the so-called education people do not think logically and scientifically.  Even the press, the classroom, the platform, and the pulpit in many instances do not give us objective and unbiased truths.  To save men from the morass of propaganda, in my opinion, is one of the chief aims of education.  Education must enable one to sift and weigh evidence, to discern the true from the false, the real from the unreal, and the facts from fiction.

The function of education, therefore, is to teach one to think intensively and to think critically.  But education which stops with efficiency may prove the greatest menace to society.  The most dangerous criminal may be the man gifted with reason but no morals.

We must remember that intelligence is not enough.  Intelligence plus character–that is the goal of true education.  The complete education gives one not only the power of concentration but worthy objectives upon which to concentrate.  The broad education will, therefore, transmit to one not only the accumulated knowledge of the race but also the accumulated experience of social living.

I mourn for the current state of affairs in our education system and in our politics.

Amos on Economic Justice

“We will buy the lowly for silver, and the poor for a pair of sandals; even the refuse of the wheat we will sell!’ The LORD has sworn by the pride of Jacob: Never will I forget a thing they have done!” What does that say about minimum wage?

USCCB | NAB – September 19, 2010:

Am 8:4-7

Hear this, you who trample upon the needy and destroy the poor of the land! ‘When will the new moon be over,’ you ask, ‘that we may sell our grain, and the sabbath, that we may display the wheat? We will diminish the ephah, add to the shekel, and fix our scales for cheating! We will buy the lowly for silver, and the poor for a pair of sandals; even the refuse of the wheat we will sell!’ The LORD has sworn by the pride of Jacob: ‘Never will I forget a thing they have done!'”

(Via United States Conference of Catholic Bishops.)

This was the First Reading at Mass this morning on the theme of the day: socio-economic justice.  I always read this Bible passage as a general attack on the exploitation of the poor and so it is.  But it’s worth examining exactly what’s going on here.  Diminishing the ephah and adding to the shekel is pretty straightforward: It’s evil to cheat the poor.  But buying the lowly for silver the the poor for a pair of sandals hit me because it speaks to the morality of living wages and paying people below them.

Continue reading “Amos on Economic Justice”

MLK on Science vs. Religion

Science investigates; religion interprets.  Science gives man knowledge which is power; religion gives man wisdom which is control.  Science deals with facts; religion deals with values.  The two are not rivals.  They are complementary.  Science keeps religion from sinking into the valley of crippling irrationalism and paralyzing obscurantism.  Religion prevents science from falling into the marsh of obsolete materialism and moral nihilism.

Take that fundamentalists both of the evangelical and atheist variety.

Change

I’ve been reading a book of quotes of Martin Luther King, Jr. and they are powerful.  I’ve decided to drop a few because they are so jarring in their direct truth-telling.  Look at how he straight up sons white America.

The majority of white Americans consider themselves sincerely committed to justice for the Negro.  They believe that American society is essentially hospitable to fair play and to steady growth toward a middle-class Utopia embodying racial harmony.  But unfortunately this is a fantasy of self-deception and comfortable vanity. Overwhelmingly America is still struggling with irresolution and contradictions.  It has been sincere and even ardent in welcoming some change.  But too quickly apathy and disinterest rise to the surface when the next logical steps are to be taken.  Laws are passed in a crisis mood after a Birmingham or a Selma, but no substantial fervor survives the formal signing of legislation.  The recording of the law in itself is treated as the reality of the reform. [emphasis mine]

Returning Honor

A friend asked me to comment on why I found the Beck’s connection with Martin Luther’s King speech offensive, I had to take time to explain. I mean to be sure, the “Returning Honor” rally itself was fine and by the accounts I’ve skimmed, was pretty nice and a tamping down of the hatred of the recent past and hopefully a sign of a return to civil discourse. But I found Beck’s connection offensive and below is my explanation.

A friend asked me to comment on why I found the Beck’s connection with Martin Luther’s King speech offensive, I had to take time to explain.  I mean to be sure, the “Returning Honor” rally itself was fine and by the accounts I’ve skimmed, was pretty nice and a tamping down of the hatred of the recent past and hopefully a sign of a return to civil discourse.  But I found Beck’s connection offensive and below is my explanation.

Continue reading “Returning Honor”

On Rooting for The Gays

Recently, I was taken to task about the morality of homosexuality and how the Bible “clearly” teaches it’s practice is a sin. Frankly, I never believed that and having other priorities chose not to bother examining the issue other than cataloguing some verses. Other things are important to me in my faith journey. But given all the proud bigotry surrounding so-called “gay marriage” and the civili rights of LGBT persons I’m seeing, I decided to give it a look see.

UPDATE: The post has been updated for clarity and to reflect an evolving understanding of my LBGT brothers and sisters.

Recently, I was taken to task about the morality of homosexuality gay individuals having intimate relations with their beloved and how the Bible “clearly” teaches such is a sin. Frankly, I never really believed that and having other priorities chose not to bother examining the issue other than cataloguing some verses. Other things are were important to me in my faith journey. But given all the proud bigotry I’m seeing, surrounding so-called “gay marriage” and the civil rights of LGBT persons, I decided to give it a look see.

Continue reading “On Rooting for The Gays”

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