THEIST_WATCH
  Msg  : 21                                         Written : 07/01/94 03:34pm
  From : ROBIN MURRAY-O'HAIR                        Status  :                 
  To   : ALL                                                                  
  Subj : Running for President                                                

                      Running for President

     It is never to early to start for president and that is why G.O.P.
presidential hopefuls are popping up all over the place. Among them is
William Bennett, who was first our Secretary of Education and later
Bush's drug czar, but now is a co-director of Empower America, a right
wing thinktank.
     His hawking of _The Book of Virtues_, which has remained on
the best-seller lists for months is one of his outreaches toward that
end.
     Now on June 25, he has written an article for the _Washington
Post_ which is happy to back a stalwart such as he. It was titled,
"Credit the Christian Right." And, sure enough, the good Christian
Right has already done and can do everything good for the nation.
Pointing out, and rightly so, that the Democrats have been using
invective, he notes that the Christian Right would never do that.
     And that is the quandary. Since both the Democrats and the
Republicans are on the same side of the Bible there is hardly anything
that they can really say one against the other. They both agree that
humans have souls, that when they die there is a "life after death,"
that prayer is efficacious, and that everyone is a sinner and in need
of redemption through Jesus Christ.
     When the Democrats, leaning heavily on biblical morality, try to
thump the G.O.P., it simply doesn't come off.
     In this "moderate and well reasoned" article, Bennett hopes to
come off as a voice of reconciliation - as long as the ballots are
marked for him. But he ends it all with some bitterness:

          The irony is that the critics of the "Christian right"
     are often guilty of the things they profess to be offended
     by (Ed - yes, he ended the sentence with a preposition!):
     intolerance, mean-spiritedness, divisiveness, and even
     bigotry.



THEIST_WATCH
  Msg  : 34                                         Written : 07/08/94 06:51pm
  From : ROBIN MURRAY-O'HAIR                        Status  :                 
  To   : ALL                                                                  
  Subj : Bennett for president                                                

    Once again William Bennett is being mentioned as a Republican
candidate for president. Here are a few quick bits on the man:

-- His "Book of Virtues" has sold one million copies in just over six
months
-- He was Reagan's education secretary from 1985-88
-- He served as Bush's "drug czar" from 1989-90
-- He is a Catholic
-- Bennett finished first in a straw poll at the Texas Republican
convention in June



THEIST_WATCH
  Msg  : 44                                         Written : 07/23/94 08:13pm
  From : ROBIN MURRAY-O'HAIR                        Status  :                 
  To   : ALL                                                                  
  Subj : Interfaith Politics                                                  

                   The Blind Leading the Blind

     Frightened by the specter of the religious right, a group of
"mainstream" religious leaders have formed a group to "fight the right"
and have named it "The Interfaith Alliance."
     This is, at best, amusing.
     Almost every social issue in the United States today springs from
irrational religious ideas. Those persons who interpret the Bible as it
was written and intended to be are advocates to give marching orders
back to Medievalism. Those persons who want to interpret the Bible so
as to give it and the tenets it teaches some shadow or rational thought
want to interpret it order to protect the advances which have been made
in spite of religion.
     What's that old saw? They want to have their cake and eat it.
Well, The Interfaith Alliance is now the new group to undertake the
impossible as they attack the "intolerant" ideas of the religious right
while maintaining their members' attachment to the Bible. It can't be
done despite their caterwauling that the "American principles of
tolerance and liberty" are now being threatened.
     The mainstream religions of the United States never recognized
principles of tolerance and liberty when they were in power - and do
not do so today. Ask any Atheist.
     The new group composed of Protestants, Roman Catholics, and Jews
are determined "to speak out against the Religious Right" which is also
composed of Protestants, Roman Catholics, and Jews. And what will this
heroic group do? Will they challenge the absurdities of
Judeo/Christianity? No, they are going to register voters and provide
political education. This will be a neat trick since the overweening
characteristic of any average American is his political illiteracy.
     Yet, a spokesman of the new group characterized the agenda of the
Christian Coalition as "dangerous." Well, sticks and stones will break
their bones but names will never hurt them. What is "dangerous" to one
group of religious nuts is simply God's words for another. Another
spokesman for the new group charges that the Christian Coalition has "a
clear agenda" calling for the take-over of the Republican Party.
     Well, pardon us, but does not the Republican Party have a
commitment to defend itself if it does not *want* a "take over."
     This reminds American Atheists of the fiasco of President Clinton
threatening to take away "favored nation" status of China in its trade
with the United States if it was not more hospitable to human rights
activists. China merely told the U.S. to mind its own business and went
on its merry way. The Republican Party can well do the same kind of
thumb-nosing and the new Interfaith Alliance will not be able to do a
damn thing about it.


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