Comments

Funny. I seem to remember the religious left fretting about wedding partisan politics with theology. How quickly things change.

Good point, Mike, a very good point. But, times change, and global warming could well change everything, quite possibly for the worse over most of the world.

I've never heard of the Cornwall Alliance before. The website has the look of a faked grassroots front group to me; to hide right-wing special interest individuals and organizations in order to falsely create the appearance of widespread "grassroots" support. Or, to create the impression of an "expert consensus" when there isn't one. Or, to create the false impression that there is a lack of an expert consensus when there is a strong consensus...but I could well be wrong with my first impression.

When it comes to global warming, I respect the real scientific consensus. Global warming is real, it's very likely dangerous, and poor people will quite probably be hit the hardest, and the earliest. The Cornwall Alliance seems to me to be shedding crocodile tears for the poor; and, along with the FRC, are very shortsighted.

I have a very dim view of the extremist, dubiously manipulative, smarmy ill-will mongers called the Family Research Council. It's deeply immoral to support them, in any way, likely about most everything.

Of course, as to the "Evangelical Left" campaign, there is reason to think that 2 Timothy isn't a genuine Pauline letter, but that's something for later, right? How much authority as God inspired should one then ascribe to 2 Timothy? It is good, however, for moderate organizations that at least attempt that Golden Rule thing in a genuinely loving manner, to make people rethink the Pauline letters, however, as not something for the exclusive use by the exclusive minded.

"Families, not government, should control how health care dollars are spent," the FRC writes. (thanks for the link, CT.) Oh really? What family can control how their health care dollars are spent, this side of the super wealthy? My family can't. I have a genetic disease and associated problems, that will likely will require treatment until I die, hopefully after a long and adequately happy and productive life. (which can well happen with life-long treatment, fortunately.)

Before WW II, if families couldn't afford needed health care out of pocket, money begged and borrowed from friends and relatives, charity, or from savings that were severely depleted from the Depression or crisis of some sort, they simply died prematurely and needlessly...as some indigent and working poor do now.

So, it's not families that control health care dollars. They haven't for quite some time. Health care dollars are largely controlled by corporations, Medicare and such. For the uninsured poor, and increasingly, the under insured. some charities that likely get some tax money help, and tax funded county hospitals and such. They can do something, sometimes a lot, but it's scary, sometimes incomprehensible, capricious and confusing.

My sister is a social worker, and she says the the under insured problem has increased noticeably during the economic crisis.

Corporations which don't seem to be doing a good job of providing comprehensive health care for all, should have their burden lifted, don't you think? ...he asks leadingly.

Of course, it's likely never to be as simple as I would wish. When I don't feel good, which is often (but I seldom feel really bad, fortunately), I don't want to deal with bureaucracy even if I'm up to it, which I'm sometimes not, not really.

The reason why less people have health care is because they don't want to be in unions any more. It was the unions that got people good health care, retirement, living wages, etc. and not the government. When the average union member worker made enough money to send their kids to college, the kids got jobs in management and left the union membership behind. As union membership declined so did the benefits (health care, etc.) decline. Management became business people who cut full time staff to part time staff to save on benefits. To help their profit line become higher than a "good" profit, management moved their oompanies elsewhere to where there were no unions to force management to pay living wages instead of got by wages which keep you under the companies control, Like everything that succeeds, unions did themselves out of business and the economy is falling back into having no balance between the man and the boss. As for goverment, my Mother is on medicare and it does not pay for much. You have to have a supplementary policy to pick up what the government doesn't pay for or you go broke. When the unions were in their heyday you only needed one policy because it covered everything. I don't see business or unions coming back, at least not in my area. So, now, we work all our lives so we can retire on the dole (government support).

I am continually amazed at how people stick their heads in the sand regarding the health care debate. People say that Medicare has been a success...yet it's going broke. We're living on borrowed time regarding Medicare, Medicaid and Social Security. If they go broke NO ONE gets helped.

And now there's this big movement, aided and abetted by leftist groups (both religious and non-religious) to get government even further involved in health care. But what if doctors and other health care providers are unwilling to accept the low fees established by the government? Will they be FORCED, in Nazi-esque style, to continue to practice and take the low reimbursement?

What if doctors just quit or students stop going into medicine? What if health care ends up getting rationed and people DIE standing in line waiting to get treated? What if the unbelievable spending by this administration results in the government defaulting on payments to providers? What then? If this happens hardly anyone, least of all poor people, will get health care. Things may be bad now, but never forget they could always get worse.

I don't doubt that leftist groups have concern about the health care of the poor. But, based on their actions, they are just as interested in getting power as they are helping the poor. They want CONTROL as much as they want a real solution. That's the dirty little secret.

Regarding global warming, there is scientific consensus that it exists, but there is no real consensus that human activity is the primary cause of it. If you kill the economy based on unproven speculations then the most vulnerable--the poor--will get hit hardest. Most of the proposed "cures" for global warming will hurt poor people more than global warming itself.

I think your information about a lack of scientific consensus on the cause of global warming is obsolete, Truthmeister.

Of course, a scientific consensus can be wrong and dangerous, but...? That's why, I think, we need diversity in people in science, to see the world fresh, from different vantage points.

At the same time, science needs people who understand and respect scientific integrity...of which extremist conservatives, Creationists and other pseudo-science advocates, left/right/middle politically, don't seem to have a clue, or have very compartmentalized minds.

Global Warming may be being made worse by non-human factors, or perhaps helped, or moderated or made more extreme by not adequately understood feedback loops and such, but in the main, it's our ugly offspring.

Don't forget that it's warming while the there is global dimming from jet contrails and particulates.

Judging from the last conservative era, which looted America, broke the world and generally and constantly disgraced us, for starters (but they couldn't be wrong about everything, if only by chance), I don't think we should respect them anymore than we should respect neo-confederates or Leninists. Sometimes extremists are right, true, but when they're right, it's usually for the wrong reasons, extremist reasons. The world needs people who are right for the right reasons, meaningful, reliable, productive reasons, with good will towards all reasons. And of course, what's right, for any reason, isn't always known or understood with adequate reliability. In fact, we can't know something completely. We're not God.

Don't forget that the Earth doesn't care if we live or die. The Earth likely can't care. It will revolve around the Sun with us, or without us, with life or without life...until the Sun will likely engulf it in the far distant future. I can't imagine such deep time, but I can imagine a few generations time. I want my great grandchildren to enjoy their world, enjoy productive lives, not curse us for what we didn't do when it could be done.

Most neo-conservative solutions seem to be contemptuous and dangerous to poor people, or even my modest income self, so why should we believe them on global warming and the poor now?

There are reasons why Black people, in general, despise and pity Reagan and the Bush presidents, and don't usually vote GOP. I'm not Black, but like their ancestors generally did, my ancestors once supported the Republicans. Have done so since we came down the gangplank from Norway just before the Civil War.

Reasons to do so pretty much started evaporating when states' rights/anti-civil rights extremists gained control, after being pushed from what was once their base party. This purge mostly started with Truman and Humphrey factions. If folk tales are true, poor Lincoln's bones are probably revolving like a high speed turbine at what's become of his party. Lincoln grew in wisdom all of his life, today's Republicans just seem to mainly co opt and manipulate to exclude.

Interesting comments, Gregory, some of which I agree with. I would point out a rather salient fact, however: over the course of the last 50 or so years our government has been overwhelmingly controlled by Democrats. Over the course of the last 4 years, again, it has been mostly liberal Democrats who have controlled our national government. Objective analysis yields the following conclusion: conservatives haven't had nearly the chance to govern that liberals have. If you're looking for a scapegoat you may not want to go down that road.

Good point, however...in the Fifties the voting South was solidly Democratic...then something changed. Now, the South is very Republican, except among Black voters. Dr. Martin Luther King was once a Republican than changed parties in the Kennedy years. Why is that?

Why did Billy Graham once help once Democrat but then became GOP Jessie "Call me a bigot" Helms get elected?

Let see, in my lifetime, the presidents were Democrat elected one term. Mixed. Good as one could hope for on civil rights, at that time, but there was that Korean quagmire. Was a knee jerk racist, but intellectually overcame that...as best he could anyway. Was proud to be a liberal..and he earned that pride with hard mental work, as did I.

Republican elected two terms. OK. We didn't get Atomic Bombed anyway. Ended Korean quagmire, more or less, though we're still there. Reluctant to support the Supreme Court on integration, but he did. I remember that recession.

Democrat assassinated during his first term. Well, we didn't get Atomic Bombed and he somehow made one proud to be an American.

Democrat elected one term. Jim Crow seemed to be on the ropes, but then we sunk into the Vietnam debacle, beyond anything really rational.

Republican elected two terms but resigned as because he was a traitor. Secret plan to end war was to greatly expand it, then just walk away in time to get reelected. Did some good things and some despicable things. Accidentally exposed Billy Graham as the bigot he most certainly was.

The unlected Republican President. We could have done worse, so he's fine by me, I guess. When I moved and needed to be reregistered to vote, I changed parties and officially became a Democrat. Regretted that the GOP had definitely lost its way and there was nothing I could do about it. Hasn't found it's way back, either.

Democrat one term. Star crossed but semi adequate, I suppose. Great ex-president, on whole. He should apologize for restoring Jefferson Davis citizenship, he who was a blood soaked, slave master, plutocrat, and morally bankrupt traitor..but a pious Christian so it's all right then.

Republican two terms. The most dangerous racist since Wilson. Very responsible for the rapid spread of AIDS, as his Surgeon General later confessed. Morally disgusting, but so gosh durn lovable...though I thought he was smarmy, maniacally manipulative and untrustworthy. Lebanon debacle. Cold War ended thanks to Thatcher using him as her front man and to Gorbachev...more likely because the crash in oil prices left the wretched Soviet Union bankrupt, but the Gipper (a co opted nickname, of course) didn't get in the way, to his credit.

Republican one term... didn't finish the Gulf War as he had promised, understandable, but then, he shouldn't have made that and other promises to begin with. Gave way too much legitimacy to religious right extremists. Pretended not to be the racist he most certainly was...but still better than Reagan...a low bar to be sure.

Democrat two terms. Much too conservative for me, but mostly competent in managing economy, and/or lucky. Hated and hounded because conservatives didn't like a conservative who wasn't a states' rights racist like themselves. Destroyed Saddam's weapons of mass destruction for the next president to pretend or presume that they still existed...but then, Saddam wanted his many enemies to believe they still existed.

Republican two terms. The worst president since Buchanan. Self Deluded, or just plain deluded, incompetent, incoherent, autocratic (yes, good old country boys, pretend or not, can be autocratic. I was raised in the country. People are people). I don't think he lied, I think he confabulated, far more dangerous and much more pitiful. But he was Born Again. Saved by Billy Graham, so I must be wrong about everything, right?

Democrat in his first term. I like him, understand him, though he's too conservative but I'm not President. Considering his bigoted and downright strange candidate opposition, I think, I hope, I pray, we did good electing him. Needs to somehow push harder for full citizen equality for all.

Oh, one of my security words is a misspelled profanity, or part of a word. Interesting.