Entries Tagged 'America' ↓

Once again, the US Postal Service has denied a petition to feature on a stamp the visage of Gen. Henry Martyn Robert. We have stamps honoring Wonder Woman and other individuals who do not exist, but we cannot honor the man who wrote Robert’s Rules of Order, a treatise used around the world, from church committee meetings to national parliaments, that, in many ways, makes participatory government and collective decision-making possible. I know none of us like meetings, but still, we should salute what this man accomplished. The linked article gives some background on Gen. Robert and how he came up with his rules:

As Robert the grandson tells the story, the elder Robert was living in New Bedford, Mass., in 1863 and was asked to preside over a meeting to consider the defense of the city during the Civil War.

He didn’t know beans about it [presiding over a meeting], and he found it very embarrassing,” Robert III said. “He made up his mind that if he got out of it alive, he would learn something about the subject.”

Learning something about parliamentary procedure involved reading a few books and making some notes, which he carried in his wallet for about four years.

When he moved to San Francisco, he encountered a city where prostitution was rife and Chinese laborers brought in to build the railroad were exploited, even chased by dogs for sport. Robert, a Baptist lay leader, was offended.

He joined the YMCA and several newly formed religious groups dedicated to relieving the plight of exploited souls, but he found that the city’s motley population had discordant notions about how to conduct meetings. San Francisco needed rules.

When Robert came out with the first version of his rules of order in 1876, he had trouble finding a publisher. Who’d want to read such a book? So he printed up 4,000 copies himself. Since then, Robert III says, it has sold 5 million copies.

I suspect that the very committee that turned down his stamp did so after receiving a motion that was properly seconded, with all in favor saying “aye,” and all opposed by the same sign.

So, we have now been in Iraq for five years. Our troops did win the war part, brilliantly, in a short time. But it’s that nation building that keeps bogging us down.

In hindsight, should we have invaded Iraq? And even if we shouldn’t have, wouldn’t it be another kind of disaster if we gave the jihadists a great victory from Allah and just pulled out?

Any suggestions?

Judging from the different justices’ comments on the oral arguments over Washington, D.C.’s gun ban, it appears that the Supreme Court will rule that the 2nd Amendment does indeed give individuals and not just corporate militias the right to keep firearms.

The linked article said that the ruling might provide for some regulation, such as of military weapons such as machine guns. But if the Constitution specifies the role of individual ownership of weapons for militias, shouldn’t that apply specifically to military weapons? And doesn’t the 2nd Amendment amount to a constitutional requirement for local militias, of local civilians keeping weapons in their home so they can, if needed, be organized into a local defense or law enforcement force? That’s basically what Switzerland does. And 18th century America. The right should indeed inhere with individuals, but what should we do with the militia provision?

What struck me about the controversy over Rev. Jeremiah Wright’s inflammatory anti-American and anti-White preaching is that in the television coverage I saw the African-American pastors and laity who were asked about it seemed to basically agree with him! He does articulate what lots of black people believe. So I’ll give credit to Barack Obama for his speech on racial relations. Here is the transcript. He talks about the anger felt by black people AND, in something I don’t ever remember hearing in this context, the anger of white people, which unlike most Democrats he does not simply reduce to racism:

For the men and women of Reverend Wright’s generation, the memories of humiliation and doubt and fear have not gone away; nor has the anger and the bitterness of those years. That anger may not get expressed in public, in front of white co- workers or white friends. But it does find voice in the barbershop or the beauty shop or around the kitchen table. At times, that anger is exploited by politicians to gin up votes along racial lines or to make up for a politician’s own failings. And occasionally it finds voice in the church on Sunday morning, in the pulpit and in the pews.

That anger is not always productive. Indeed, all too often it distracts attention from solving real problems. It keeps us from squarely facing our own complicity within the African-American community in our condition, it prevents the African-American community from forging the alliances it needs to bring about real change. But the anger is real, it is powerful, and to simply wish it away, to condemn it without understanding its roots only serves to widen the chasm of misunderstanding that exists between the races.

In fact, a similar anger exists within segments of the white community. Most working- and middle-class white Americans don’t feel that they have been particularly privileged by their race. Their experience is the immigrant experience. As far as they’re concerned, no one handed them anything, they built it from scratch. They’ve worked hard all their lives, many times only to see their jobs shipped overseas or their pensions dumped after a lifetime of labor. They are anxious about their futures, and they feel their dreams slipping away. And in an era of stagnant wages and global competition, opportunity comes to be seen as a zero sum game, in which your dreams come at my expense.

So when they are told to bus their children to a school across town, when they hear that an African American is getting an advantage in landing a good job or a spot in a good college because of an injustice that they themselves never committed, when they’re told that their fears about crime in urban neighborhoods are somehow prejudice, resentment builds over time.

Like the anger within the black community, these resentments aren’t always expressed in polite company. But they have helped shape the political landscape for at least a generation.

Can this anger gap be healed instead of being stirred up?

Shortly before the Declaration of Independence was signed, Benedict Arnold led a colonial force to invade Canada, in the hopes of harrassing the English army and, more importantly, hoping the Canadian people might rise up in support of independence. Columnist Brian O’Malley quotes letters from General Washington on how the Canadians should be treated. O’Malley’s point is to criticize our current invasion of Iraq. Whatever you think of that, though, the portrait of Washington that comes through is fascinating, a combination of wisdom, tactical brilliance, and moral integrity. From O’Malley’s column:

First, if the citizens don’t want us there, don’t go. Washington told Arnold, “You are by every means in your power to endeavour to discover the real sentiments of the Canadians towards our cause, and particularly as to this expedition; ever bearing in mind that if they are averse to it, and will not co-operate, or at least willingly acquiesce, it must fail of success. In this case you are by no means to prosecute the attempt.”

The expense of starting the mission and the disappointment of not completing it, Washington wrote, “are not to be put in competition with the dangerous consequences which may ensue from irritating them against us.”

Second, the safety of American personnel depended on how they treated people. Washington wanted Arnold to “conciliate the affections” of the Canadian settlers and Indians and ordered Arnold to teach the soldiers and officers under his command “that not only the Good of their Country and their Honour, but their Safety depends upon the Treatment of these People.”

Third, proper treatment of prisoners was necessary. The prominent British parliamentarian William Pitt, who championed American grievances, had a son serving in Canada. John Pitt was never taken into American custody, but in the event that Pitt was captured, Washington warned Arnold, “You cannot err in paying too much Honour to the Son of so illustrious a Character, and so true a Friend to America.”

This insistence on kind treatment extended beyond Pitt. Washington wrote, “Any other Prisoners who may fall into your Hands, you will treat with as much Humanity and kindness, as may be consistent with your own Safety and the publick Interest.”

Washington told Arnold to restrain the Continental troops and their Indian allies “from all Acts of Cruelty and Insult, which will disgrace the American Arms, and irritate our Fellow Subjects against us.”

Fourth, any Americans who mistreated Canadians should be punished. “Should any American Soldier be so base and infamous as to injure any Canadian or Indian, in his Person or Property,” Washington wrote, “I do most earnestly enjoin you to bring him to such severe and exemplary Punishment as the Enormity of the Crime may require.” In an accompanying letter Washington added, “Should it extend to Death itself it will not be disproportional to its Guilt, at such a Time and in such a Cause.”

Fifth, respect the people’s religion. “As the Contempt of the Religion of a Country by ridiculing any of its Ceremonies or affronting its Ministers or Votaries, has ever been deeply resented, you are to be particularly careful to restrain every Officer and Soldier from such Imprudence and Folly and to punish every Instance of it.”

Unfortunately, the troops did NOT obey Washington’s injunctions–this was Benedict Arnold, remember–and Canada has been mad at us ever since.

You know how the mint is putting out quarters featuring all of the 50 states. Now the territories will also get a quarter, as will Washington, D.C. The District of Columbia turned in a proposed design that featured the slogan “No taxation without representation.”

See, the District of Columbia has no representatives in Congress, and yet its population has to pay taxes, which violates that old revolutionary principle. Many D.C. activists go so far as to demand statehood, so that the Milwaukee-sized city of 600,000 would have as many senators as California. (My solution is to shrink the district to just cover the federal buildings, so that all of the residential areas are in Maryland or Virginia. And if that is too radical, though I suspect eliminating Washington would make for a popular political cause, we could just make a provision allowing residents to register to vote in either of those states.) So resentful Washingtonians put that slogan on their license plates and want it on their quarters.

The mint, unfortunately, vetoed the slogan. Setting aside D.C.’s claims, wouldn’t it be cool to have a pocketful of quarters that say, “No taxation without representation”?

(On serious issues, my policy positions are based on my deeply-held convictions. On less important issues, I go by whatever position is funniest.)

Barack Obama has a lot of things going for him, but once his positions get scrutinized, he may have trouble getting the votes of the masses. For example, he has an unusually extreme, even for liberals, Anti-Gun Stance.

A discussion about guns has broken out in the comments, but I’d like to raise some questions. How could anyone–let alone a former professor of Constitutional Law like Obama– think the 2nd Amendment is just to protect the gun-owning rights of hunters and skeet shooters?

Did the founders think “militias” were groups of guys who went out on hunting trips? Or a club devoted to SKEET SHOOTING? Doesn’t the reference in the 2nd Amendment to a “militia” suggest that an armed populace is to be a safeguard against enemies foreign and domestic? While the 2nd Amendment certainly protects hunters and skeet shooters, isn’t its major purpose to give citizens the right to use weapons to defend themselves?

Protestants are just about to slip down into minority status, according to this report. “Whereas nearly two thirds of Americans identified themselves as Protestant as recently as the 1980s, only 51 percent identify as Protestant today, the study found.” (For a more in-depth discussion of the survey results, read this.)

The major reason is not a surge in the number of Catholics. That church body is losing members faster than any other, except that large numbers of legal and illegal immigrants, most of whom are Catholics, are keeping the numbers up to pretty much what they have been. The biggest factor is the rise of the fastest-growing religious category: the “unaffiliated,” which now numbers 16%. Evidently, people who once went to churches are abandoning them.

I myself am glad Protestants will soon be another minority group. That will allow Protestants to seize the moral high ground, claim victimhood, get respect, silence critics with shame, and allow for the claiming of a whole bunch of new rights.

But seriously, folks. . .The poll also shows a great deal of people changing from one church or one religion to another.

This graph summarizes the data, including showing the losses from childhood to adulthood in each group. What conclusions can you draw from this information?

A letter-writer to the “Washington Post” fulminates at the way NASCAR allowed the Daytona 500 to begin with a prayer.  Not only a prayer, but one that “invoked Jesus Christ by name.”  This, says the letter-writer, is another step in the effort to make Christianity into our nation’s official state religion.  Read  the letter.  Notice what is happening.  Yes, the government is not allowed to favor Christianity in schools, the military, and public events.  But now that same standard is being applied to a private event that receives no federal money (why should NASCAR need to?).   On a much larger scale, we have been seeing the God-free rules of the government applied in private companies, as in stores not allowing their employees to mention “Christmas” even in Christmas sales.   This is phenomenon has not just religious implications but also political implications.   People evidently see the government as so all-encompassing that government standards should be applied to EVERYTHING.

My son-in-law and I explored the Antietam Battlefield  yesterday.  That site of the bloodiest day ever in American history, with 23,000 casualties, was amazing, humbling, sad, thrilling, inspiring.  We read Jeff Shaara’s account of the battle in his guide to Civil War battlefields, so we understood about the corn field, the sunken road, and Burnside’s bridge, still standing and upon which we walked, imagining the carnage it held (as well 

 I want to wish each and every one of you a merry Presidents Day.  I hope you have all of your decorating done and will have a wonderful Presidents’ Day dinner and enjoy all of your President’s Day customs like. . . . 

Notice:  The Church knows how to throw good holidays, but the government has not got a clue.  This day began as a commemoration of George Washington, that great man and father of our country.  He deserves a holiday, and customs started to grow up around the day, such as having cherry pie and stores throwing sales.  

But then the sentiment grew to throw in Abraham Lincoln, whose birthday was also in February.  And then, what the heck, let’s just celebrate ALL presidents, as if they were all of the stature of these two great Americans.So the holiday became generalized into impossible-to-visualize vagueness.  In doing so, the very reason for the holiday became lost.  (Why should we celebrate presidents and not have days devoted to the other branches of government?  Legislator Day?  Supreme Court Day?)  

And then the real reason to have holidays in our secularized state emerged:  Let’s change the day, marking a specific historic event, into a moveable feast so that it will always produce a three-day weekend!  That way government workers and others will have their day off work as part of a long weekend!

(I just wish someone would authoritatively rule on the place of the apostrophe in the holiday’s name.)  

Here is why this all matters:  This is another example, along with what we are seeing in education and theology, of the shift away from the OBJECT  (content,Christ,  honoring someone) to the SUBJECT (me, me, me).

The U.S. military is being accused of being a hotbed of  Christian “fundamentalism.”  Horror stories are being gathered, investigations are underway, and lawsuits are being filed.