bjorn_skurj

All that is true, and one should not underplay his charisma and very strong leadership abilities. It's been a long time since a politician has shown the ability to inspire that he does. But if he does not have the toughness to survive the process of getting elected, it's all a moot point. His nomination was the end result of the leftier Dems splitting away from the moderates and resulted in a candidate who may well be too much change too fast for too many people. Though, it could well be Hillary would not be doing any better at this point. The Republicans are just plain ol' better at president

The best argument from reason I have ever read for the divinity of the Nazarene is the first part of C.S. Lewis' "Mere Christianity."

Forgive me for bringing race into it, but Obama's nonwhiteitude excites the exoticism of the left in way even Mrs. Kucinich can't. Nice.

Hoyle's "steady state" theory was disproved a while ago, so we know the universe didn't exist, then did exist. (His derisive name for the opposing theory was "Big Bang.")

What do you think of the theory that religious yearning is hardwired into the human brain?

I like to think of it as more "beyond rationality" than "irrational," which sounds a little pejorative, but I think you think of it in a pejorative sense anyhow. Maybe all my belief in Jesus advertises is that I am not a Vulcan, i.e., I allow feelings a place in my belief system as well as logic.

Many people need those myths. I need those myths. As I have said before, print out a copy of the Nicene Creed and I will sign it with my blood. My belief in Jesus is invulnerable to rational attack and believe me, I tried. Believing in God is as based in reason about as much as falling in love is, and despite my conviction that the scientific method describes the physical world accurately, I don't want to do without falling in love or believing in God.

Personally, I don't like being threatened with eternal damnation. Judgment is Mine, saieth the Lord, and if Gandhi went to hell because he didn't believe Jesus was the son of IHVH, then hell is good enough for me too, as it will have proved man's goodness hath surpassed God's.

The problem is that a lot of religious people won't let people who are not in their religion lead their lives unmolested. They want to kill them sometimes, or threaten them with eternal damnation if they do not change their beliefs. And we've all had the experience of somebody knocking on our door on Sunday or whatever day and wanting to talk about being an IHVH Witness.

Not all religions are like that. Just the ones for stupid people.

I want SCIENCE to answer that question, but science may not be equipped to do so.

That's what the Large Hadron Collider is for. Unless IHVH gets pissed at us being too nosy and makes it make a big black hole to devour the Earth.

It was a brilliant stroke by the GOP. One of my fears about Obama getting the nomination is that he and his team just aren't in the same ballpark with the Repubs when it comes to political savvy. (See Joe "Zzzzz" Biden.) Only the Clintons are, but all the idealists in the Democratic party turned up their noses and went for Obama, the ultimate lefty wet dream. So far, he has not proved up to the task.

Palin is to McCain as the Bandit is to Cledus.

We did once. It was called "The Gilded Age," and was characterized by a lot of wealth at the top and a lot of misery at the bottom, not to mention unsafe food and poisonous patent medicines. I prefer a slightly less free market.

They have a big copy of the Constitution at the FDR library down the street from me that everyone can sign.

I nominate Joseph E. Stiglitz for Fed chairman.

Jesus. Of all the industries to nationalize, we choose Wall Street.

A lot of New Yorkers and others helped in the days after Sept. 11. Some of the ones at Ground Zero paid a high price to do so by exposing themselves to a lot of toxic crud. There are a lot of programs and charities to help the families of the victims, but one hears stories of people falling through the cracks or families thrown into poverty because their main wage-earner was killed. It's impossible to make everything better after something like that, but I can tell you the greater New York metropolitan area did quite a bit and still do.

Saieth the Lord: "Think not that I am come to send peace on earth: I came not to send peace, but a sword."

Every time the Mets bullpen implodes, K-Rod's asking price gets a little higher. I hope he sends a nice card to Billy Wagner.

If Willie had stayed, they wouldn't be in contention at all. Omar probably won't get fired, but he had better do something to address the bullpen besides giving K-Rod all the money on Earth.

Every time I hear the word "deregulation," I want to reach for my revolver. "Deregulation" is code for "rip off and/or imperil the public some more."

Heh.

Gotta hand it to the Phils - they seem to have more fight in them.