"One Nation Under God?" A Stunning Commentary by J. Mayes

The friendliest place on the web for anyone that follows U2.
If you have answers, please help by responding to the unanswered posts.

Danospano

Refugee
Joined
Jun 24, 2000
Messages
1,415
Location
Oklahoma
This column was written for my University Newspaper. It addresses the ruling by the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals concerning the problems facing the Pledge of Allegiance. I'm curious to hear what you think....

****************************************************
Alfred T. Goodwin is one of the least popular men in America
right now. If you have been in a coma for the past two weeks,
Goodwin is the judge on the 9th Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals
who ruled that the phrase "under God" in the Pledge of
Allegiance is unconstitutional.

"A profession that we are a nation 'under God' is identical...
to a profession that we are a nation 'under Jesus,' a nation
'under Vishnu,' a nation 'under Zeus,' or a nation 'under no
god'," Goodwin wrote. Consequently, he's been described as "out
of step with . . . America", "just nuts", and "sad and absurd".

He isn?t nuts; he's absolutely correct.

Here?s a brief history lesson about our beloved Pledge of
Allegiance. It was written in 1892 by a Baptist minister, but
the original text made no mention of God or any other deity.
This Pledge seemed to serve America just fine without those
words for several decades. Then, in the 1950's, during the
throes of the Cold War and the now-infamous McCarthy Era,
President Eisenhower decided to make a broad, bold statement
differentiating the United States from the sinister, atheist
Soviets. He wanted to bolster "the transcendence of religious
faith in America?s heritage and future."

The text of the First Amendment is explicitly clear on the
subject: "Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment
of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof." But in
1954, at Eisenhower?s request, Congress did exactly what the
Amendment says it should never do. They passed a bill adding the
words "under God" to the oath. In other words, they made a law
respecting the establishment of Christianity. From that point
onward, if a person wanted to pledge allegiance to the nation of
his birth, or choice, he had to acknowledge a deity.

Even if the text of the Bill of Rights taken at face value
weren?t enough evidence of unconstitutionality, there is plenty
of legal precedent to draw from. The most unambiguous case is
probably the 1971 Lemon v. Kurtzman decision, in which the
Supreme Court established a three-part test (now known as the
"Lemon test") to determine whether a law is permissible under
the First Amendment religion clauses. Anything put to the test
must 1) have a secular purpose, 2) its primary effect must
neither advance nor inhibit religion, and 3) it has to avoid
excessive entanglement of church and state. Anyone can
understand how the bill which added the phrase "under God" to
the Pledge violates these criteria-?its purpose is anything but
secular, it advances Christianity by acknowledging God, and it
interweaves religion into one of our most cherished avowals of
patriotism.

So there?s nothing ridiculous whatsoever about Goodwin?s
decision. He ignored the inevitable public outcry and issued a
ruling based solely on his interpretation of the Constitution,
regardless of popular opinion. That shows integrity, not
insanity.

If anything is "sad and absurd" about the situation, it?s the
reactionary eruption of shock and anger following the news of
the Court's ruling.

The entire Republican party is writhing in ecstasy over the
ruling because it?s a freebie for them. They can literally wave
the flag to their hearts? content, secure in the knowledge that
approximately 80% of Americans experienced a knee-jerk reaction
of horror when the Court?s decision made the news. And because
it?s an election year, the politicians fell over one another in
a mad rush to plant themselves in front of TV cameras so they
could express their shock and indignation to television
audiences nationwide.

The emotionally charged furor is by no means limited to the GOP.
The 99-0 Senate vote to denounce the ruling speaks volumes, and
many Democrats, including former Vice Presidential candidate
Joseph Lieberman, have just as eagerly made it a point to
ridicule Goodwin. No self-respecting politician could pass up a
chance like this. It?s the kind of event that is as fundamental
to the campaign trail as kissing babies and town hall meetings.

Their constituents are eating it up. The Tulsa World?s "Call the
Editor" section (it prints telephone comments from disgruntled
readers who are too lazy or stoned to write letters) offers a
daily dose of stale platitudes, most of which fall along the
lines of "If you hate God, you hate America, so get out and go
elsewhere." The average American apparently believes that the
concept of separation of church and state is "tearing our
country apart", and "putting God back into America" is the only
solution.

These people are advocating fascism. As Freedom From Religion
Foundation president Anne Gaylor put it, "There can be no
religious freedom without the freedom to dissent."

Many worried Christians have said that the supporters of this
decision are trying to banish God and Biblical values from
American. That is certainly not the case. Non-religious
Americans?-there are 40 million of us and we make up about 14%
of the population-?simply don?t want to be pressured into
recognizing a deity we don?t worship. We definitely aren?t
trying to suppress so-called Biblical values. We have principles
jut like anyone else, and they?re very similar to the ones
Christians and other religions uphold. Christians didn?t invent
morality, and Biblical values are by no means unique?you will
find the same concepts in the texts of many other religions.

So what can we do to please both sides? There is a simple,
elegant, and obvious solution. Remove the words "under god", and
restore the original pledge. And while we're at it, we should
change the national motto from "in God we trust" back to our
original, very appropriate motto: "E pluribus unum." Out of
many, one.
 
A few random notes about the article before I begin:

1) The 9th Circut Court had THREE judges on it, not just Goodwin. Two found the pledge unconstitutional, and one did not. I find it sad - and yet unsurprising - that the court was misrepresented in this article as being ruled over by one man.

2) Am I the only one who believes that the author was being flippant and sarcastic when he mentioned the "sinister, atheist Soviets"? I wonder if the author has any idea that 20 million people were killed in Stalin's purges. I wonder if he knows that Soviet Premier (read: dictator) Kruschev told the U.S. "WE WILL BURY YOU" in November 1956, just two years after Ike apparently overreacted about the Soviet threat.

Moving to my main point....

It is NOT clear that the First Amendment restricts the mention of God in our Government, nor is it clear that "there is plenty of legal precedent" to draw the same conclusion.

I hate to beat a dead horse, but - yet again - Senate Bill 2690 disputes the claim of legal precedent:

On April 28, 1952, in the decision of the Supreme Court of the United States in Zorach v. Clauson, 343 U.S. 306 (1952), in which school children were allowed to be excused from public schools for religious observances and education, Justice William O. Douglas, in writing for the Court stated: `The First Amendment, however, does not say that in every and all respects there shall be a separation of Church and State. Rather, it studiously defines the manner, the specific ways, in which there shall be no concern or union or dependency one on the other. That is the common sense of the matter. Otherwise the State and religion would be aliens to each other--hostile, suspicious, and even unfriendly. Churches could not be required to pay even property taxes. Municipalities would not be permitted to render police or fire protection to religious groups. Policemen who helped parishioners into their places of worship would violate the Constitution. Prayers in our legislative halls; the appeals to the Almighty in the messages of the Chief Executive; the proclamations making Thanksgiving Day a holiday; `so help me God' in our courtroom oaths--these and all other references to the Almighty that run through our laws, our public rituals, our ceremonies would be flouting the First Amendment. A fastidious atheist or agnostic could even object to the supplication with which the Court opens each session: `God save the United States and this Honorable Court.'.'.

On June 17, 1963, in the decision of the Supreme Court of the United States in Abington School District v. Schempp, 374 U.S. 203 (1963), in which compulsory school prayer was held unconstitutional, Justices Goldberg and Harlan, concurring in the decision, stated: `But untutored devotion to the concept of neutrality can lead to invocation or approval of results which partake not simply of that noninterference and noninvolvement with the religious which the Constitution commands, but of a brooding and pervasive devotion to the secular and a passive, or even active, hostility to the religious. Such results are not only not compelled by the Constitution, but, it seems to me, are prohibited by it. Neither government nor this Court can or should ignore the significance of the fact that a vast portion of our people believe in and worship God and that many of our legal, political, and personal values derive historically from religious teachings. Government must inevitably take cognizance of the existence of religion and, indeed, under certain circumstances the First Amendment may require that it do so.'.

On March 5, 1984, in the decision of the Supreme Court of the United States in Lynch v. Donelly, 465 U.S. 668 (1984), in which a city government's display of a nativity scene was held to be constitutional, Chief Justice Burger, writing for the Court, stated: `There is an unbroken history of official acknowledgment by all three branches of government of the role of religion in American life from at least 1789. . . . [E]xamples of reference to our religious heritage are found in the statutorily prescribed national motto `In God We Trust' (36 U.S.C. 186), which Congress and the President mandated for our currency, see (31 U.S.C. 5112(d)(1) (1982 ed.)), and in the language `One Nation under God', as part of the Pledge of Allegiance to the American flag. That pledge is recited by many thousands of public school children--and adults--every year. . . . Art galleries supported by public revenues display religious paintings of the 15th and 16th centuries, predominantly inspired by one religious faith. The National Gallery in Washington, maintained with Government support, for example, has long exhibited masterpieces with religious messages, notably the Last Supper, and paintings depicting the Birth of Christ, the Crucifixion, and the Resurrection, among many others with explicit Christian themes and messages. The very chamber in which oral arguments on this case were heard is decorated with a notable and permanent--not seasonal--symbol of religion: Moses with the Ten Commandments. Congress has long provided chapels in the Capitol for religious worship and meditation.'.

On June 4, 1985, in the decision of the Supreme Court of the United States in Wallace v. Jaffree, 472 U.S. 38 (1985), in which a mandatory moment of silence to be used for meditation or voluntary prayer was held unconstitutional, Justice O'Connor, concurring in the judgment and addressing the contention that the Court's holding would render the Pledge of Allegiance unconstitutional because Congress amended it in 1954 to add the words `under God,' stated `In my view, the words `under God' in the Pledge , as codified at (36 U.S.C. 172), serve as an acknowledgment of religion with `the legitimate secular purposes of solemnizing public occasions, [and] expressing confidence in the future.'.

On November 20, 1992, the United States Court of Appeals for the 7th Circuit, in Sherman v. Community Consolidated School District 21, 980 F.2d 437 (7th Cir. 1992), held that a school district's policy for voluntary recitation of the Pledge of Allegiance including the words `under God' was constitutional.

That's pretty damn definitive evidence FOR the pledge, doncha think?

And consider this: the author's precedent was ONE case, involving the "Lemon test," and he doesn't actually go to ANY real effort to demonstrate that the Lemon test fails (or succeeds, depending on your point of view).

Specifically, he claims - without explanation - that the pledge, which "interweaves religion into one of our most cherished avowals of patriotism" is an OBVIOUS case of an "excessive entanglement of church and state."

What do I think of the article?

It's shite.
 
Last edited:
I?m the author of this article. I must say, this response is far better than all the e-mail I got telling me to get the hell out of America.

Allow me to retort. :)

1) The 9th Circut Court had THREE judges on it, not just Goodwin. Two found the pledge unconstitutional, and one did not. I find it sad - and yet unsurprising - that the court was misrepresented in this article as being ruled over by one man.

Yes, I am aware that there are three judges on the 9th Circuit Court. I specifically mentioned Goodwin because he?s the judge whose decision I quoted in the article. Since newspapers tend to assume their readership knows nothing about the subject at hand, they all mentioned the 2-1 ruling, provided a brief background of the court, and pointed out that one of the judges opposed the decision. Presumably anyone who?d bothered to read past the headline of the ?top story? would have been brought up to date.

2) Am I the only one who believes that the author was being flippant and sarcastic when he mentioned the "sinister, atheist Soviets"? I wonder if the author has any idea that 20 million people were killed in Stalin's purges. I wonder if he knows that Soviet Premier (read: dictator) Kruschev told the U.S. "WE WILL BURY YOU" in November 1956, just two years after Ike apparently overreacted about the Soviet threat.

Wow, what a delightful red herring. Okay, I?ll take the bait.

It is only slightly amusing that you assume the author is male. Dude, I?m a chick! It is not amusing at all that you assume the author does not possess the slightest knowledge of world history.

The flippancy and/or sarcasm you noted (and I am very proud of you for picking up on THAT, since it was so incredibly subtle) was in reference to the association of atheism with evil.

My bachelor?s degree is in Russian Language, Culture, and Lit, by the way.

Yes, Stalin killed millions of people. Yes, the Soviet regime was deeply flawed, rife with corruption, and unbelievable oppressive. The Soviet people, however, are not evil?not even the atheists.

Yes, Nikita Khrushchev took off his shoe at the UN General assembly and pounded it on the table as he shouted ?We will bury you!? He had just made the assertion that Communism was more efficient than Capitalism, and honestly believed that in an economic race, the Soviet Union?s communism system would eventually, if given the chance to flourish without the U.S. intervening with random wars, overtake capitalism and the U.S.S.R. would surpass the U.S. as the world superpower. He was not referring to Communism invading America either directly or indirectly; he was only talking about the economy. He took off his shoe because that is a very old Russian tradition used when someone wishes to emphasize a particular point.

Eisenhower was indeed overreacting to the Soviet threat. The Cold War was a steaming pile of crap. I don?t say that to imply that no threat existed, because it certainly did in the purest sense. However, the tsunami of propaganda generated under the guide of patriotism was ridiculous. Painting Communism, and those who didn?t openly malign it, as an insidious threat to American values did a lot of damage. To borrow a phrase, I wonder if the critic is aware of the thousands of Americans whose lives were ruined because of Joe McCarthy.

Raising our military defenses against a real or perceived threat is one thing, but adding the words ?under God? to the Pledge of Allegiance by an act of Congress has nothing whatsoever to do with the issue. It is propaganda. A distraction. Absurd.

It is also divisive. It ignores the millions of Americans who don?t believe in God, or who believe in more than one god, or who believe in a different god.

Moving to my main point.... It is NOT clear that the First Amendment restricts the mention of God in our Government,

The First Amendment is crystal clear when it says ?CONGRESS SHALL MAKE NO LAW respecting the establishment of religion.? How much clearer do you think it should be? In 1954, Congress MADE A LAW which expressed a definite preference to Christianity (and Judaism). Muslims call the supreme being Allah, Hindus have more than one supreme being, Buddhists don?t really recognize a deity, per se, and godless heathens like me know that such a being does not exist.

The term ?Americans? includes 1.4 million Muslims, 2.4 million Buddhists, almost 40 million self-described non-religious persons, a million Hindus, about a million Pagans, and 100,000 people who adhere to Native American religions which tend to be animist.

?Under God? leaves us all out in the cold.

Most of us are just as patriotic as you Christians and Jews. But if we want to pledge our allegiance to this nation, we have to tell a lie. We have to swear, with our hands upon our hearts, that we, too, are ?under God?, whatever the hell that means, even though we don?t even believe in that entity.

nor is it clear that "there is plenty of legal precedent" to draw the same conclusion.

Yes, it is. Even a first-year law student could tell you that. The grand-daddy of all the tenets of the Establishment Clause jurisprudence is that the Constitution forbids not only state practices that "aid one religion . . . or prefer one religion over another," but also those practices that "aid all religions" and thus endorse or prefer religion over nonreligion.

We could easily go head-to-head on this and spit court decisions from that last 70 years back and forth at each other indefinitely. (Boy, isn?t the internet great? It brings full legal documents right to our fingertips.) Different justices have different opinions, and the Supreme Court tends to backtrack and circle around and repeat itself and refute itself.

I?ve snipped the extensive citations?

That's pretty damn definitive evidence FOR the pledge, doncha think?

Sure. And there?s a shit-ton of definitive evidence against it, too?I?m sticking with Lemon for simplicity?s sake, and . . .

And consider this: the author's precedent was ONE case, involving the "Lemon test," and he doesn't actually go to ANY real effort to demonstrate that the Lemon test fails (or succeeds, depending on your point of view).

. . . because The Lemon v. Kurtzman decision is the most widely cited ?test? used to determine constitutionality. Due to space constraints, I was obviously unable to include the many other rulings from district courts and the Supreme Court which would support my position (as it was, I grossly exceeded the 600-word limit imposed by the editor of the paper).

But I?m happy to clarify for those who don?t understand.

Prong 1. Its purpose must be secular.

What was the purpose of adding the words ?under God? to an otherwise secular oath? Eisenhower himself said he wanted to strengthen ?transcendence of religious faith in America?s heritage and future." That is the antithesis of secular. So the addition of the phrase clearly fails Prong 1 of the Lemon test.

What is the purpose of making schoolchildren recite the Pledge every day? Probably just to get them into a routine. (A 6-year-old doesn?t understand the impact of swearing loyalty to any nation, and by the same logic, they probably don?t understand that saying ?under God? violates their religious liberties, either.) So the act of reciting the Pledge probably passes Prong 1 of the test. Let?s move on.


Prong 2. Its primary effect must neither enhance nor inhibit religion.

What primary effect did adding the phrase ?under God? have? Its primary effect enhanced religion. That was the whole point.

What primary effect does reciting the altered Pledge have? That might depend on whether one knows that it was changed to be more religious. If so, then its primary effect would be to enhance the image of America as a ?Christian? nation, thereby enhancing religion itself. If most people were unaware that the Pledge didn?t always mention God, then perhaps we can conclude that it does not enhance religion, and is therefore fine and dandy under the Lemon test.

But that?s not the case at all. Judging from the huge public outcry resulting from the 9th Circuit Court?s ruling, reciting the Pledge with the words ?under God? clearly DID have the effect of enhancing religion. Just listen to all the hullabaloo! People are now horrified to think that America might not be a Christian nation, after all, and that is a direct result of years of conditioning?hearing that we are ?one nation, under God?.

So it fails Prong 2 as well.

It?s passed one prong, and failed another. All it has to do is fail one prong to fail the test overall, so it fails, period, and it?s unconstitutional, and that?s that.

But to humor my charming antagonist, I?ll address Prong 3 just for shits and giggles.

Specifically, he claims - without explanation - that the pledge, which "interweaves religion into one of our most cherished avowals of patriotism" is an OBVIOUS case of an "excessive entanglement of church and state."

Prong 3. It has to avoid excessive entanglement of church and state

The revised pledge, with its superfluous reference to God, obviously entangles church and state. Is it excessive, though?

This is what Justice Black had to say in Everson v. Board of Education:

"The 'establishment of religion' clause of the First Amendment means at least this: neither a state nor the Federal Government can set up a church. Neither can pass laws which aid one religion, aid all religions, or prefer one religion over another. Neither can force nor influence a person to go to or to remain away from church against his will or force him to profess a belief or disbelief in any religion. . . ."

If it is wrong to force a person to profess a belief or disbelief in any religion, then it is wrong for the Pledge of Allegiance to contain the words ?under God?. No, today nobody is technically forced to say the Pledge of Allegiance. And yes, theoretically a person could recite the Pledge without saying those words. But given the fact that the highest legislative body in the country passed a law adding the phrase to the Pledge, who wouldn?t find that ?coercive?, to say the least?

If the pressure of Congress isn?t enough for you, what about the reaction of your peers?

When I was in 4th grade, a boy in my class was a Jehovah?s Witness. Shawn was a normal, well-dressed, decent-looking kid, but he never stood up with the rest of us to say the pledge?and because of that, nobody in the class would even talk to him. He was forever branded a ?weirdo?. If he accidentally brushed up against a kid, the typical reaction was to freak out and melodramatically demand cootie spray or try to pass his ?germs? on to someone else. He was a complete pariah. Shawn was dealing with, as Goodwin noted, an "unacceptable choice between participating and protesting." This is a classic example of the result of a school ?conveying a message of state endorsement of a religious belief.?

When this happens, and it happens often, it demonstrates just how ?excessive? indeed the entanglement of church and state really is with regard to the Pledge.

And there you have it. The addition of the phrase ?under God? to the Pledge easily fails all three prongs of the test, and reciting it at school fails two out of three.

What do I think of the article? It's shite.

Regardless, I appreciate your feedback, even though you what you had to say was snotty, presumptuous, and chock full of religious bias.
 
shriek said:
In 1954, Congress MADE A LAW which expressed a definite preference to Christianity (and Judaism). Muslims call the supreme being Allah, Hindus have more than one supreme being, Buddhists don?t really recognize a deity, per se, and godless heathens like me know that such a being does not exist.

The term ?Americans? includes 1.4 million Muslims, 2.4 million Buddhists, almost 40 million self-described non-religious persons, a million Hindus, about a million Pagans, and 100,000 people who adhere to Native American religions which tend to be animist.

?Under God? leaves us all out in the cold.

Most of us are just as patriotic as you Christians and Jews. But if we want to pledge our allegiance to this nation, we have to tell a lie. We have to swear, with our hands upon our hearts, that we, too, are ?under God?, whatever the hell that means, even though we don?t even believe in that entity. Originally posted by shriek


You have completely lost me here. The connection that you make between the word "God" and Christianity is so far-fetched that I am simply in a state of disbelief. But you go even further beyond the pale when you claim that use of the (apparently Christian) word "God" is also offensive to Muslims, Hindus etc. etc. Jehovah's Witnesses, a Christian sect, too!

Maybe you should have also taken a comparative religions class in college.

1. The proper name for the Christian god is YHWH, pronounced Jehovah or Yahweh. Even when translated from Hebrew into English, the result is close to "I Am Who I Am" (though that is an inexact and somewhat disputed trans.) In other words, YHWH cannot even be directly translated into the English word "God".

2. The word Allah is NOT a proper name. Its exact translation into English results in the English word "God" Muslims prefer the term Allah because they believe that Arabic is the human language God prefers. However, they are absolutely comfortable using the word "God" and frequently use it in English conversation. Arab Christians also use the word Allah for God

3. To say that Hindus believe in many gods, period, end of story, is a gross oversimplification of the Hindu religion. Ask any Hindu. I have and I can tell you that is what you will be told.

Hindus are also comfortable using the term God in English conversation to refer to an ultimate Oneness that they very much believe in even if they don't attribute the same qualities to this unity that we would attribute to ours. At worst they might diagree that anything could actually be "under God" but more than likely are NOT offended by the word "god" itself.

4. Ditto for Bhuddists. They also believe in an ultimate one-ness and they have been known to use the word "god" to refer to it though perhaps with less comfort. They are also perhaps the most easy going of all religions. Nothing is ultimately real according to their beliefs, therefore its pretty hard to offend them.

5. Even animist American Indians believe in a Great Spirit and are comfortable with the use of the word God by others, even if they don't tend to use that word themselves. To them its just a different word for the same thing really.

6. Jehovah's Witnesses DO NOT object to using the word "god" at all. They do not believe in saying the Pledge whether the phrase "under God" is in there or not. They do not believe in swearing oaths period and give their loyalty only to YHWH or Jehovah not to any government. (And if you ask me, its a shame that that boy was treated that way, but its an even worse shame if no teacher took the pains to explain why he did not say the pledge. Knowledge goes a long way in combatting bigotry, even with children.)

7. Finally, if the phrase "under God" was so offensive to the people of other religions, why is that only athiests have brought suit against the Pledge for this reason.

He wanted to bolster "the transcendence of religious
faith in America?s heritage and future."

For the same reasons as above, I wonder how Eisenhower's use of the word religion without stating a specific religion automatically means that he meant the Christian religion. That's an awful big assumption to say that he did mean Christianity and its an assumption that would never stand up in court by itself. Yet, you used a quote from him in which he only referred to religion generically in order to prove your point that his goal was to establish Christianity and Judaism as the official religion of America.

And again in reference to Congress passing the law in question you said that adding the phrase 'under God" was establishing Christianity. You said,

They passed a bill adding the
words "under God" to the oath. In other words, they made a law
respecting the establishment of Christianity

Thats quite a stretch. Establishment of religion, maybe.

In summation, your argument that the phrase "under God" is an attempt to establish Christianity as the national religion is based on a presumption that is fatally flawed. The phrase in fact is general enough that it can be interpreted to suit almost any religion.

You would have done better to stick to the tactic of arguing that "under God" is offensive to athiests alone.
 
Last edited:
Welcome to the forum, shriek.

(Lovely reply, whiteflag. :))

shriek said:
Yes, I am aware that there are three judges on the 9th Circuit Court. I specifically mentioned Goodwin because he?s the judge whose decision I quoted in the article. Since newspapers tend to assume their readership knows nothing about the subject at hand, they all mentioned the 2-1 ruling, provided a brief background of the court, and pointed out that one of the judges opposed the decision. Presumably anyone who?d bothered to read past the headline of the ?top story? would have been brought up to date.

I'm glad to see that you are aware of the nature of the Ninth Circuit Court, but that doesn't excuse misinformation on the part of your article (emphasis mine):

If you have been in a coma for the past two weeks, Goodwin is the judge on the 9th Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals who ruled that the phrase "under God" in the Pledge of Allegiance is unconstitutional.

A more accurate way to phrase it is, "Goodwin is one of two judges on the 9th Circuit Court..." In the world of journalism beyond the university, you would get nailed for the inaccuracy of the article.

Wow, what a delightful red herring. Okay, I?ll take the bait.

I wouldn't call it a red herring since I was clear that the observation was a "random note."

It is only slightly amusing that you assume the author is male. Dude, I?m a chick! It is not amusing at all that you assume the author does not possess the slightest knowledge of world history.

I did not assume that you were a man; I used "he" in the gender-neutral sense, as many other writers have used it. Honestly, I find the alternatives ("he or she", "s/he") to be clumsy and an unnecessary extension of political correctness.

And concerning my assumption about your knowledge of world history, I can see how you would take offense. But I still think your sarcasm about the nature of the Soviet Empire made it reasonable for me to question your knowledge.

The flippancy and/or sarcasm you noted (and I am very proud of you for picking up on THAT, since it was so incredibly subtle) was in reference to the association of atheism with evil.

My bachelor?s degree is in Russian Language, Culture, and Lit, by the way.

Yes, Stalin killed millions of people. Yes, the Soviet regime was deeply flawed, rife with corruption, and unbelievable oppressive. The Soviet people, however, are not evil?not even the atheists.

I'm sure that many individual atheists within the Soviet Union weren't evil. But the Soviet Union itself was evil and was atheistic. It was evil in its purges and oppression of its people, and it was atheistic in its efforts to destroy all religion within its borders. Churches were destroyed and the religious were pesecuted.

Honestly, I don't think using the phrase "sinister, atheist Soviets" incorrectly associates evil and atheism; it correctly labels those controlling the Soviet Union as sinister and as atheists.

Yes, Nikita Khrushchev took off his shoe at the UN General assembly and pounded it on the table as he shouted ?We will bury you!? He had just made the assertion that Communism was more efficient than Capitalism, and honestly believed that in an economic race, the Soviet Union?s communism system would eventually, if given the chance to flourish without the U.S. intervening with random wars, overtake capitalism and the U.S.S.R. would surpass the U.S. as the world superpower. He was not referring to Communism invading America either directly or indirectly; he was only talking about the economy. He took off his shoe because that is a very old Russian tradition used when someone wishes to emphasize a particular point.

There was no military overtones in Kruschev's speech?

Three words for ya: Cuban. Missle. Crisis.

In case I need to remind you, the Cuban Missle Crisis resulted when - in 1962 - the Soviets started sending missles to Cuba, some 200 miles from Miami, Florida.

Guess who was the Soviet Premier at the time? Nikita Khrushchev.

Eisenhower was indeed overreacting to the Soviet threat. The Cold War was a steaming pile of crap. I don?t say that to imply that no threat existed, because it certainly did in the purest sense. However, the tsunami of propaganda generated under the guide of patriotism was ridiculous. Painting Communism, and those who didn?t openly malign it, as an insidious threat to American values did a lot of damage. To borrow a phrase, I wonder if the critic is aware of the thousands of Americans whose lives were ruined because of Joe McCarthy.

I believe that the Berlin Airlift (1948-49) alone demonstrated very early that the Soviet threat was real. That threat was the establishment of Soviet Communism worldwide, including North America. Soviet Communism had no regard for political, economic, or religious freedom, and thus it did threaten nearly every principle held by the United States.

Certainly, Joe McCarthy may have went too far, but that is no indication that the threat was not real, that "the Cold War was a steaming pile of crap."

(Even accepting that it is somehow evidence that the Soviets weren't really threatening us, the evidence of thousands of American lives ruined by Joe McCarthy is overwhelmed by the tens of millions of Russian lives extinguished by Joe Stalin.)

Raising our military defenses against a real or perceived threat is one thing, but adding the words ?under God? to the Pledge of Allegiance by an act of Congress has nothing whatsoever to do with the issue. It is propaganda. A distraction. Absurd.

It is also divisive. It ignores the millions of Americans who don?t believe in God, or who believe in more than one god, or who believe in a different god.

I think the pledge was useful, insofar as it differentiated us from the Soviet Union. There are lots of things in wartime - ad campaigns, etc. - that do not make an easily measured difference, but that doesn't make them worthless.

But maybe it is an absurd distraction. I first don't believe it's propaganda in any case. At the very least, it doesn't twist reality; we have historically been a religious nation.

But either way, distraction or not, propaganda or not, that doesn't make the pledge unconstitutional.

Nor does the charge of divisiveness, which I will tackle in a moment.

The First Amendment is crystal clear when it says ?CONGRESS SHALL MAKE NO LAW respecting the establishment of religion.? How much clearer do you think it should be? In 1954, Congress MADE A LAW which expressed a definite preference to Christianity (and Judaism). Muslims call the supreme being Allah, Hindus have more than one supreme being, Buddhists don?t really recognize a deity, per se, and godless heathens like me know that such a being does not exist.

Sorry, the First Amendment is not "crystal clear" on this issue. Certainly "Congress shall make no law" is fairly easy to understand, but what does the amendment mean by "respecting the establishment of religion"?

It seems to me that you're making the case for interpreting an "establishment of religion" to mean "religion" itself.

I believe the so-called establishment clause refers to churches and other religious organizations; in other words, I believe the First Amendment keeps Congress only from organizing, funding, or assisting a church the way the Queen and Parliament influences the Church of England.

Again, it's not clear from the text what is meant. I believe that the only thing to do, then, is to try to infer the intent of the authors - to try to find other sources that indicate what they really meant.

These other sources - official government documents and speeches from the Founding Fathers - confirm my interpretation much more strongly than yours.

I quote more findings from Senate Bill 2690, the gift that keeps on giving:

(2) On July 4, 1776, America's Founding Fathers, after appealing to the `Laws of Nature, and of Nature's God' to justify their separation from Great Britain, then declared: `We hold these Truths to be self-evident, that all Men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty, and the Pursuit of Happiness'.

(3) In 1781, Thomas Jefferson, the author of the Declaration of Independence and later the Nation's third President, in his work titled `Notes on the State of Virginia' wrote: `God who gave us life gave us liberty. And can the liberties of a nation be thought secure when we have removed their only firm basis, a conviction in the minds of the people that these liberties are of the Gift of God. That they are not to be violated but with His wrath? Indeed, I tremble for my country when I reflect that God is just; that his justice cannot sleep forever.'.

(4) On May 14, 1787, George Washington, as President of the Constitutional Convention, rose to admonish and exhort the delegates and declared: `If to please the people we offer what we ourselves disapprove, how can we afterward defend our work? Let us raise a standard to which the wise and the honest can repair; the event is in the hand of God!'.

(5) On July 21, 1789, on the same day that it approved the Establishment Clause concerning religion, the First Congress of the United States also passed the Northwest Ordinance, providing for a territorial government for lands northwest of the Ohio River, which declared: `Religion, morality, and knowledge, being necessary to good government and the happiness of mankind, schools and the means of education shall forever be encouraged.'.

(6) On September 25, 1789, the First Congress unanimously approved a resolution calling on President George Washington to proclaim a National Day of Thanksgiving for the people of the United States by declaring, `a day of public thanksgiving and prayer, to be observed by acknowledging, with grateful hearts, the many signal favors of Almighty God, especially by affording them an opportunity peaceably to establish a constitution of government for their safety and happiness.'.


The term ?Americans? includes 1.4 million Muslims, 2.4 million Buddhists, almost 40 million self-described non-religious persons, a million Hindus, about a million Pagans, and 100,000 people who adhere to Native American religions which tend to be animist.

?Under God? leaves us all out in the cold.

Constitutionally, that doesn't really matter. Certain religious groups are offended by the request to pledge allegiance to flag and its country. Those who honestly believe that the courts should make more decisions on its own really aren't pledging allegiance to a "republic." Those who think that the South should have been free to secede from the Union don't really believe that bit about the country being "indivisible."

Look at the pledge's last phrase: "with liberty and justice for all." Those who would regulate every moment of our lives don't really believe in liberty for all. And members of the Ku Klux Klan (and, arguably, those who support affirmative action) don't really believe in justice for all.

And, yet, the rest of the pledge is constitutional.

Most of us are just as patriotic as you Christians and Jews. But if we want to pledge our allegiance to this nation, we have to tell a lie. We have to swear, with our hands upon our hearts, that we, too, are ?under God?, whatever the hell that means, even though we don?t even believe in that entity.

Nope, you don't "have to swear." The Supreme Court, while upholding the pledge, has also upheld your right to refuse to recite it. If you wish to recite a different pledge, or to simply stay silent for the "under God" clause, you can. It's a free country, after all.

Yes, it is. Even a first-year law student could tell you that. The grand-daddy of all the tenets of the Establishment Clause jurisprudence is that the Constitution forbids not only state practices that "aid one religion . . . or prefer one religion over another," but also those practices that "aid all religions" and thus endorse or prefer religion over nonreligion.

Sorry, those first-year law students are wrong, if the actions of the first Congress and the subsequent decisions of the Supreme Court mean anything.

We could easily go head-to-head on this and spit court decisions from that last 70 years back and forth at each other indefinitely. (Boy, isn?t the internet great? It brings full legal documents right to our fingertips.) Different justices have different opinions, and the Supreme Court tends to backtrack and circle around and repeat itself and refute itself.

I?ve snipped the extensive citations?

That's pretty damn definitive evidence FOR the pledge, doncha think?

Sure. And there?s a shit-ton of definitive evidence against it, too?I?m sticking with Lemon for simplicity?s sake, and . . .

And consider this: the author's precedent was ONE case, involving the "Lemon test," and he doesn't actually go to ANY real effort to demonstrate that the Lemon test fails (or succeeds, depending on your point of view).

. . . because The Lemon v. Kurtzman decision is the most widely cited ?test? used to determine constitutionality. Due to space constraints, I was obviously unable to include the many other rulings from district courts and the Supreme Court which would support my position (as it was, I grossly exceeded the 600-word limit imposed by the editor of the paper).

You have plenty of room here.

If you don't mind, start naming the court decisions and explaining their relevance.

For the moment, let's look at the Lemon test. You explain quite a bit here, but I would like to focus on one or two quotes:

It?s passed one prong, and failed another. All it has to do is fail one prong to fail the test overall, so it fails, period, and it?s unconstitutional, and that?s that.

But to humor my charming antagonist, I?ll address Prong 3 just for shits and giggles.

You first seem to be using the antonyms "pass" and "fail" interchangeably. I believe it would be helpful to more clearly define our terms. Let's define a law that "fails the Lemon test" as one that "fails a test for constitutionality" and is thus unconstitutional.

That said, what you really seem to claim at this point is that it's failed two prongs.

You then say, "All it has to do is fail one prong to fail the test overall, so it fails, period, and it?s unconstitutional, and that?s that."

I think you are in error here.

You said in your article (emphasis mine), "Anything put to the test must 1) have a secular purpose, 2) its primary effect must neither advance nor inhibit religion, and 3) it has to avoid excessive entanglement of church and state." The use of the word "and" means that all three prongs must fail for the law to be unconstitutional.

To quote Chief Justice Warren Burger:

First, the statute must have a secular legislative purpose; second, its principal or primary effect must be one that neither advances nor inhibits religion; finally, the statute must not foster "an excessive government entanglement with religion."

This also means that all three prongs must fail.

So you must address the third prong to make your case, not just for "shits and giggles."

And let's see what you had to say about this third prong:

Prong 3. It has to avoid excessive entanglement of church and state

The revised pledge, with its superfluous reference to God, obviously entangles church and state. Is it excessive, though?

This is what Justice Black had to say in Everson v. Board of Education:

"The 'establishment of religion' clause of the First Amendment means at least this: neither a state nor the Federal Government can set up a church. Neither can pass laws which aid one religion, aid all religions, or prefer one religion over another. Neither can force nor influence a person to go to or to remain away from church against his will or force him to profess a belief or disbelief in any religion. . . ."

If it is wrong to force a person to profess a belief or disbelief in any religion, then it is wrong for the Pledge of Allegiance to contain the words ?under God?. No, today nobody is technically forced to say the Pledge of Allegiance. And yes, theoretically a person could recite the Pledge without saying those words. But given the fact that the highest legislative body in the country passed a law adding the phrase to the Pledge, who wouldn?t find that ?coercive?, to say the least?

I take it you're suggesting that the pledge is coercive no matter how voluntary it is. Who wouldn't find it coercive, you ask?

Well, first, by definition, it's still not coercive.

Beyond that, the Supreme Court doesn't find it coercive. Every time they've ruled that the pledge must be voluntary, they have still upheld the existence of the pledge in its current form: a God-affirming document created by Congress.

But none of this details any excessive entanglement between Congress and a church.

If the pressure of Congress isn?t enough for you, what about the reaction of your peers?

When I was in 4th grade, a boy in my class was a Jehovah?s Witness. Shawn was a normal, well-dressed, decent-looking kid, but he never stood up with the rest of us to say the pledge?and because of that, nobody in the class would even talk to him. He was forever branded a ?weirdo?. If he accidentally brushed up against a kid, the typical reaction was to freak out and melodramatically demand cootie spray or try to pass his ?germs? on to someone else. He was a complete pariah. Shawn was dealing with, as Goodwin noted, an "unacceptable choice between participating and protesting." This is a classic example of the result of a school ?conveying a message of state endorsement of a religious belief.?

When this happens, and it happens often, it demonstrates just how ?excessive? indeed the entanglement of church and state really is with regard to the Pledge.

What entanglement? Sad as your story is, it has nothing to do with the third part of the Lemon test.

Rather than this little anecdote, you need to demonstrate how the decisions and activities of the Roman Catholic Church, the Southern Baptist Convention, or some other church (an actual religious organization) are influenced by Congress - or vice versa.

And there you have it. The addition of the phrase ?under God? to the Pledge easily fails all three prongs of the test, and reciting it at school fails two out of three.

No, it doesn't. At the very least, neither the addition nor the recitation has anything to do with "excessive entanglement." Thus, since they do not fail that part of the Lemon test, they do not fail the Lemon test at all. They are constitutionally protected acts.

Regardless, I appreciate your feedback, even though you what you had to say was snotty, presumptuous, and chock full of religious bias.

You're welcome.

Snotty? Maybe. Presumptious? I don't think so. Religiously biased? Sure, but not to the point that I misunderstand the Constitution or the Lemon test.
 
Last edited:
I have a very hard time believing that the US congress also had other religions than Christianity in mind when they added the "...under God" part.
 
I would just like to add a little addendum to the side discussion concerning the Soviet Union and the Cold War.

The Cold War was not one sided as if the Americans were defending themselves from a communist menace. The Soviets similarily felt threatened, no doubt, and hence wanted to set themselves up in strategic positions.
And is there a big difference between the Soviets wanting to spread Communism and the West wanting to spread Democracy, biases against Communism aside? Do you not think these "evil" soviets felt cornered and forlorn in a world that was ultimately against them? Ultimately wanted them to convert to Democracy and capitalism?

The Cold War was a krock, any legit historian will tell you that. It was made extreme by paranoia and propaganda. There was no "red threat". There was no exuse for the black listing and innane trials OR the execution of the Rosenburgs. The cold war is an embarressing era in U.S history if you ask me...

but what do I know...I'm a lowly Canadian!
 
I have a very hard time believing that the US congress also had other religions than Christianity in mind when they added the "...under God" part.

I agree with you, DrTeeth. It may be true that Buddhists are not entirely uncomfortable with the term, or that non-Christian Native Americans can comfortably say "God" instead of "Great Spirit," for example, but I posit that in the U.S. the word "God" is more often than not thought to mean "Christian God" to the extent that most people I know personally of religions and spiritual paths other than Christianity actually go out of their way to use a different word when describing the higher power they believe in so as not to be confused with Christianity. I personally only use the word "God" to describe the higher power I believe in when talking to Christians--it's a way to connect with them. But when I want to make it clear that I am not Christian, for whatever reason, I will say "The Powers that Be" or "Spirit" or "The Supreme Being" or "The Creator", etc., and I think this is a common practice in this country. I hear it all the time where I live anyway, which is in an area of many diverse spiritual paths and religions.

So while technically "God" does not equal "Christian God," and should in theory refer to the higher power of all religions, I maintain that in this country Christianity has a monopoly on that word. Just test it out for yourself--keep an eye and ear open for the word "God"--on TV, on billboards, in conversation--wherever you see it or hear it, and more often than not, it will be a Christian reference.
 
I am too tired.

Keep God out of government and schools.

Period.

I see no harm in that wheras I see harm in bringing that word in.
 
I'm a Christian and I don't think the court ruling is crazy - especially when you consider the words "under God" weren't even part of the original pledge, but were added during the McCarthy era (hardly our nation's most shining hour). I have never understood why some Christians get bent out of shape over the idea of actually showing some tolerance (gasp!) for those who have different beliefs than they do.
 
DrTeeth:

Even if politicians had Jehovah in mind, the term they added to the pledge was vague enough to include many other faiths and was probably not much more than acknowledging the divine Creator mentioned in the Declaration of Independence and implied by the "blessings of liberty" mentioned in the Constitution.


Basstrap:

The idea that we wanted to spread our way of life as much as the Soviets wanted to spread Communism is perhaps a valid observation. But so what? That doesn't lessen the Communist threat that existed for some forty years.

And there was a SUBSTANTIAL difference between the West and the Soviet Bloc, namely one of ideology: we have been for more individual freedom, they were for less. We encourage debate; they killed their dissidents. Chruchill wasn't wrong in his use of the phrase "Iron Curtain," nor was Reagan when he called the Soviets an "evil empire".

The Cold War was a krock, any legit historian will tell you that.

Is that so? I remind you of what I mentioned above: Cuban. Missle. Crisis. Perhaps the nuclear missles being sent to Cuba couldn't reach far enough to hit Canada, but they sure as hell were a threat to American security.


joyfulgirl:

You seem to be giving a circular argument in two statements: non-Christians have abandoned the word "God," and Christians have a monopoly on the word.

You seem to assert that non-Christians abandoned the word because Christians have the monopoly on it - but it seems equally possible that Christians have a monopoly on the word because non-Christians have abandoned it.

And even if the government went out of its way to be as inclusive as reasonably possible in its terminology, I suspect that many would still say they're referring to the Christian solely because so many Congressmen profess to be Christians.


ouizy:

Why should we "keep God out of government and schools"? What is the specific harm in doing otherwise?

And there may be harm in a purely secular classrom. One can argue that it is much more difficult (possible impossible) to teach morality without a religious foundation. Removing or damaging moral instruction may make these children and future citizens much less capable of becoming responsible adults.


Bono's shades:

The decision to remove "under God" from the pledge - on its own - is still something I would personally disagree with, but I'm more outraged at how the removal was attempted.

Bottom line is, even if we can agree that "under God" should be out of the pledge, it's STILL most likely constitutionally protected. The courts (yet again) overstepped their powers. If Congress had voted to undo what it did, that's a different story altogether.

Either way, this isn't an issue of Christians showing or not showing tolerance to people of other faiths.
 
Achtung Bubba said:

The idea that we wanted to spread our way of life as much as the Soviets wanted to spread Communism is perhaps a valid observation. But so what? That doesn't lessen the Communist threat that existed for some forty years.



This is just a question, not an endorsement of either US-style capitalism or USSR communism.

It seems that you accept that the US wanted to spread its capitalist ideology just as much as the USSR aimed to spread communism, and yet you don't believe the US ever posed a threat to other nations. Do you think it would have been fair for individuals who supported left-wing ideologies to view the US as a threat to them? I'm thinking of examples such as the CIA backed coup to remove Allende from power in Chile, or other examples from Latin America.
 
FizzingWhizzbees said:


Do you think it would have been fair for individuals who supported left-wing ideologies to view the US as a threat to them?

Not until we started doing things like


the CIA backed coup to remove Allende from power in Chile, or other examples from Latin America.

That being said, I still think it's accurate to say that the Soviet Union was a threat to the US's security, not just a bunch of crazy left-wingers trying to spread their ideas of a socialist paradise around the globe.
 
FizzingWhizzbees said:
It seems that you accept that the US wanted to spread its capitalist ideology just as much as the USSR aimed to spread communism, and yet you don't believe the US ever posed a threat to other nations. Do you think it would have been fair for individuals who supported left-wing ideologies to view the US as a threat to them? I'm thinking of examples such as the CIA backed coup to remove Allende from power in Chile, or other examples from Latin America.

Very generally speaken, the United States is a threat to every other country on earth: it is, after all, a military and economic superpower.

But I believe the question has more to do with being a likely threat - not only being capable of moving against another nation but being likely to move.

In grand geopolitical terms, we have been a likely threat to many other nations, but these nations (from Nazi Germany to modern-day Iraq) were generally threats to us first, threats to ourselves, our allies, or our interests.

Or, in laymen's terms, we've generally threatened bad guys.
 
I have come to a conclusion....

Bubba thinks his country is without spot or blemish...they have never done anything wrong.

This is alright I suppose - you have to love your country
but I think you let your biases control you too much. It comes out soo clear all the time.

It blows my mind how you can actually say the U.S did not become consumed with paranoia during the cold war

thats all the f**king thing was! a big pot of paranoid fantasys on both counrty's behalf.

I don't think America OR the Soviet Union made one right move during the whole fiasco.
And the Soviets WERE not evil!! This is the most generalizing and stereotypical thing I have heard you say.

I have huge respect for you A Bubba, you know SOOO very much about such a broad range of subjects...I really wish I could be as knowledgable as you but not if it comes with my eyes being blinded by bias.
 
Nope, I don't think we're "without spot or blemish." The overreaction on McCarthy's part was a BAD thing. But however excessive his reaction was, it was a reaction to a LEGITIMATE threat - not a "big pot of paranoid fantasys".

Once again: Cuban. Missle. Crisis.

And the Soviets WERE evil, or the word "evil" is meaningless.

Joseph Stalin greased the wheels of the Soviet machine with the blood of 20 million of his own people. The Soviets crushed freedoms religious, political, and economic.

The Soviets epitomized evil. If not the Soviets, who?
 
Achtung Bubba and Shriek are both wrong: the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals has FORTY-FIVE judges, not 3. A panel of any 3 judges typically hears a case on its initial appeal, the entire active circuit may hear a re-hearing. It is intersting to note that the Nonth Circuit is the most overturned, reversed, and otherwise remanded appellate circuit in the land. Too bad judges can't be removed for shitty opinions.

Overall, I agree with Achtung Bubba and a few of the others, but I think that this never-ending debate illustrates the problems of interpretation and intent. The fact of the matter is that NO ONE is REQUIRED to recite the Pledge of Allegiance, in whole or in part. If the mention of God in a ceremonial oath is tantamount to theocracy, then so is the case for the Declaration of Independence's references to God and the Creator, and the Constitution's use of the word "Blessings" (with a capital 'B'). I honestly think this plaintiff was complaining of being "offended" at the presence of the word "God" in the Pledge.

What do such people propose for people who continue to say "under God"? jail time? What if I were a public school teacher and I said "under God" when reciting the pledge each day? Would you fire me? Put me in handcuffs? Whip me till I like it?

Shriek, I have two possible remedies for you which would likely be more amicable:

(1) When reciting the pledge, leave out the words "under God," or,

(2) Propose, via you congressional representatives, the following Amendement to the United States Constitution:

The right of every individual to never be offended or feel left out shall not be infringed.

~U2Alabama
 
And I think it's funny now that Mr. Newdow's daughter and her mother have come forward and revealed that THEY are church-going Christians and have no objection to "under God" being in the Pledge! So if the daughter was an original plaintiff but was not "harmed" or "wounded" as Mr. Newdow claims, wouldn't that make it a FRIVOLOUS LAWSUIT? I am further convinced that Mr. Newdow is an attention-starved BOOB.

~U2Alabama
 
Bama:

Good call about Newdow, but you forgot "exploitive." After all, if he cared a whit about the how his daughter will be treated within the walls of a public school, he should not have sued the government in HER name when she doesn't actually object to the pledge.
 
Although, this is not the main point of this thread, I'm here to tell that the Soviet government and military were evil in many respects and that they posed a massive threat to the world. I can demonstrate that by simply listing their conventional military strength and efforts vs. the US and its allies during the Cold War. Look at what Soviet troops did in Eastern Europe. Look at what Soviet troops did in Afghanistan during the 80s. Look at Soviet military strategies and training designed to take over Western Europe in less than 4 weeks! Look at the Soviet suppression of Eastern Europe, the Berlin Wall, on and on. The Soviet Union itself was a prison house of nations! While often refered to as Russia and Russians during the Cold War, Soviets were also Ukrainians, Kazaks, Estonians, Chechans, who were dominated by Moscow, as they had been for hundreds of years during the reigns of the Czars.
 
Citizens of the former Union of Soviet Socialist Republics were not "evil" as a group, but I definitely have a problem with most of the policies of the Soviet government and military (and yes, I took "History of Soviet Russia" at a Liberal Arts college in the early 90s, so I am not just saying what I read in the newspaper).

The Soviets (meaning the government) had a rather imperialistic diplomatic policy that had 2 strong components: the establishment of a "bloc" of nations around the border of the USSR, and the establishment of satelite governments around the world. They did not hide this policy; it was simply their policy of spreading THEIR agenda around the world.

As U2 fans, many of us look back at Soviet communism as a disappointment for it not succeeding, as a memory of "what could have been." Many of us would have been more jubilant at the fall of the United States and western Europe instead of the fall of the USSR and the Eastern Bloc governments because with the Soviet system, the people allegedly owned all of the resources and industry. We look at the sacrifices of not being able to listen to U2 (or other western music) freely as a small price to pay for everyone being "equal" or "the same." So what if people were not able to assemble and worship God as they chose? At least that kept the Baptists and Catholics from arguing! So what if Stalin took care of a bunch of unruly Jews; Jews as a group usually do not want to lose their identity, and such stubbornness has NO PLACE in the Soviet dream! And when the US "interferred" with this Soviet dream and helped groups that did not want to become Soviets, that gives us all the more reason to hate the US!

Sure, the US took many actions around the world to combat such a spread, and many of those actions were probably not appropriate. But sometimes the only way to counter military might and propaganda is with military might and propaganda.

~U2Alabama
 
STING2 said:
Although, this is not the main point of this thread, I'm here to tell that the Soviet government and military were evil in many respects and that they posed a massive threat to the world. I can demonstrate that by simply listing their conventional military strength and efforts vs. the US and its allies during the Cold War.

So...military strength is an indicator of 'evil'? The United States is the biggest military power in the world, does that make it the most evil?

Efforts vs. the US and its allies...are US efforts against its 'enemies' are also evil then?:
  • Grenada
  • Guatemala
  • Nicaragua
  • Chile
  • El Salvador
  • Cambodia
  • Laos
  • Vietnam
  • Korea
  • Panama
  • Indonesia
  • Iran
  • Libya
  • Iraq
  • Afghanistan
Thos are just some examples of US interventions since WW2. If we equate interventionism with evil then what does that make the United States?
 
FizzingWhizzbees said:

Efforts vs. the US and its allies...are US efforts against its 'enemies' are also evil then?:
  • Indonesia
Thos are just some examples of US interventions since WW2. If we equate interventionism with evil then what does that make the United States?

errr, I'm quite familiar with Indonesia, having spent most of my life there. Please update me with what exactly the U.S. has done to intrude upon their sovereignty? Because if I recall correctly the U.S. has done more to aid their government than anyone.
 
sulawesigirl4 said:


errr, I'm quite familiar with Indonesia, having spent most of my life there. Please update me with what exactly the U.S. has done to intrude upon their sovereignty?

Support for the 1965 military coup which brought Suharto to power and involved the murder of some 700,000 people in just a few months. To be fair to the United States, other Western countries were also happy to see Suharto come to power because of his willingness to trade with Western countries, and their willingness in turn to supply weapons to allow him to continue the murder of his country's citizens.
 
yes, I'm quite familiar with the coup and the ensuing massacre (having known people who had to hide for their lives during that time-period), but I was under the impression that you were adding Indonesia to the list of places where the U.S. has intruded upon national sovereignty and whatnot. In this case, as far as I can recall the U.S. did more to stay out of the way and look the other way than in actively participating.
 
Last edited:
Way to take an important quotation by George Kennan out of context, Fizz.

[edit: looks like FizzingWhizzbees removed the sig from his last post?]
 
Last edited:
sulawesigirl4 said:
yes, I'm quite familiar with the coup and the ensuing massacre (having known people who had to hide for their lives during that time-period), but I was under the impression that you were adding Indonesia to the list of places where the U.S. has intruded upon national sovereignty and whatnot. In this case, as far as I can recall the U.S. did more to stay out of the way and look the other way than in actively participating.

The US was sending military aid to Indonesia at this time, and even though it's relations with the Indonesian government were increasingly hostile, it did have close links with the military. Secretary of Defence McNamara actually told Congress that he believed US relations with the Indonesian military had now paid dividends and described Indonesia as "a gleam of light in Asia."

Former CIA agent, Ralph McGehee stated "I know the specific steps the agency took to create the conditions that led to the massacre of at least half a million Indonesians." He's also written a book and several articles about his time in the CIA, with particular reference to Indonesia. I can try to find some of them available online if you're interested in reading them?
 
Back
Top Bottom