Pop Quiz For The Christian Nation Living Within America

(Answers below) Four points for writing your name. Eight points each for correct answers.

High over the entrance to the Supreme Court is a frieze filled with statuary. Seated in the middle is Moses with two tablets.

1) The tablets represent:
a) The Ten Commandments
b) The Bill of Rights
c) Moses' endorsement of Tylenol
d) Not a stinkin' thing

2) On either side of Moses are the Greek law-giver Solon and:
a) Homer
b) Homer Simspon
c) Confucius
d) Cotton Mather

Inside, on the south and north walls of the courtroom itself are two other friezes.

3) There are how many Jews depicted?
a) None
b) 2
c) 5
d) 6, but they are reformed Jews so they don't really count

4) How many Catholics?
a) 5
b) 10
c) 100
d) Just St. Francis of Assisi to soften the tone of the joint

5) How many Muslims?
a) None, Muslims aren't really Americans
b) None, Muslims aren't really human beings
c) You're not allowed to depict Muslims in picture or sculpture
d) 1

6) There is one Babylonian, Hammurabi. How many pharaohs?
a) King Tut is up there and a couple of others who have pyramids and stuff
b) 1, but you'll never guess his name
c) Pharaoh's daughter is depicted because she was known as Little Lady Lawgiver
d) Steve Martin

7) How many famous ancient Greeks and Romans?
a) 2
b) 3
c) 5
d) none

8) How many Protestants?
a) 3
b) none - they refused to appear with members of other faiths on the frieze
c) 19
d) zillions, 'cause this is a Christian nation

Who said the following?

9) "The Constitution of the U.S. forbids everything like an establishment of a national religion."
a) Billy Graham
b) Graham Nash
c) James Madison
d) Barack Hussein Obama

10) "Every other sect supposes itself in possession of the truth, and that those who differ are so far in the wrong. Like a man traveling in foggy weather they see those at a distance before them wrapped up in a fog, as well as those behind them, and also people in the fields on each side; but near them, all appears clear, though in truth they are as much in the fog as any of them."
a) Ben Cartwright
b) Diderot
c) Ben Franklin
d) Joe Don Baker

11) "Whoever shall introduce into public affairs the principles of primitive Christianity will change the face of the world."
a) Newt Gingrich
b) Knute Rockne
c) Ben Franklin
d) Franklin Pierce

12) "There is no need for temples; no need for complicated philosophy.  Our own brain, our own heart is our temple; the philosophy is kindness."

a) the Dalai Lama
b) Dolly Parton
c) Salvador Dali 
d) Thomas Jefferson




Answers 
1) b, Bill of Rights - according to the sculptor
2) c, Confucius
3) b, 2: Moses and Solomon
4) a, 5: Justinian, Charlemagne, King John, Louis IX and Napoleon
5) d, 1: Mohammed
6) b, Pharaoh Menes
7) c, 5: Lycurgus, Solon, Draco, Octavian and Justinian
8) a, 3: Hugo Grotius, John Marshall and Sir William Blackstone
9) c, James Madison
10) c, Ben Franklin
11) c, Ben Franklin
12) a, the Dalai Lama. Astoundingly enough he said it to Dolly Parton...
.

Nuremberg, Eichmann and Terror Trials Today

There can be no greater argument for holding the imminent terror trials in a fair, transparent setting than the two photographs in this posting, the top from Nuremberg, below from Jerusalem.

These barbarous men, instruments of evil during the Nazi era, were responsible for the deaths of tens of millions of people and property destruction the likes of which the world had never known, and has not known since. Many of these deaths were not part of the so-called normal course of war, but systematic terrorist acts against helpless civilians.

Yet, in front of the whole world, they were put on trial, evidence was brought, weighed, deliberated upon, and sentences passed. It would have been easier to summarily shoot these fiends, but then billions of eyes would never have seen, billions of ears would never have heard of the scale and scope of their monstrousness.

I don't argue for holding the contemporary terror trials in either civilian or military courts, nor do I argue for lower Manhattan versus a secure military base. The cost of the Manhattan scenario seems repellently high, on the order of $1 billion+.

Regardless of venue, I do argue for the same complete transparency that Nuremberg and the Eichmann trials gave civilization, two complicated acts of juristic courage that will color history forever.

The terror trials should be wide open to the press from all corners as were the World War II trials: 250 journalist covered Nuremberg, 500 Eichmann's.

Eichmann's was the first war crimes trial to be treated to full television coverage. For those of us old enough to remember, he was the Man in the Glass Booth, flickering across the airwaves, a sinister manifestation of a past we knew only in legend.

From where does the argument come to make Khalid Sheikh Mohammad and his devilish brethren "Men in Concrete Bunkers?" From the right wing, naturally.

Senator Lindsey Graham, an extremist Republican who wants the trials to be held away from the eyes of journalists, said disingenuously today: "These Al Qaeda terrorists are not common criminals." Thank you for that sunning insight, Mr. Graham.

In comparison to Goering, Hess, Ribbentrop, Speer, Neurath, Fritzsche, Bormann, Eichmann and the rest of the devil's disciples?The radical Sheikh is a two-bit murderer who should at least get a clean undershirt for the trial.

In a mere 10 months, the Nuremberg trials dealt with six years of war crimes and 21 accused. For all the complaints at the time of "victors' justic," the trial was astonishingly fair to the accused, with three being acquitted. Eichmann's trial was short, as well, although appeals put off his death sentence for a year after the trial.

Keep the trials open, well-covered by all members of the press around the planet, hold dear to our system of openness and fairness. Let the Republican radicals understand that vengeance and justice are two distinct ideas, let the world know that proper evidence has been brought and serious deliberation been made in an open society.

College Loan Revamping Threatened By Greedy Lobbyists and Complicit Senators

From The New York Times February 5, 2010 (Click here for full article):

"Sallie Mae, a publicly traded company that is the nation’s biggest student lender with $22 billion in loans originated last year, led the field in spending $8 million on lobbying in 2009, more than double the year before, and other lenders spent millions of dollars more, according to an analysis prepared for The New York Times by the Center for Responsive Politics." 

As discussed on New York Liberal State of Mind, January 29, 2010, the revision/rehabilitation of the way Federal college loans are administered is being threatened by self-serving lobbyists. (See original blog post).

The projected savings in the bill over 10 years would be $80 billion dollars.

The private lenders are often enormous institutions like Sallie Mae, Citi, and Wells Fargo, although there are many mid-size competitors, many of which are not household names unless you're in the market for a student loan.

Industry lobbyists claim that some, although they can't or won't say how many, of the 35,000 jobs will be lost if the government takes the reins of the out-of-control profits the companies are making. Let's make an extreme case: one quarter of those 35,000 jobs will be lost under the new plan, or 8750 jobs.

By distributing that $80 billion dollars in savings amongst those theoretical 8750 workers if they are not laid off, each of those jobs would be subsidized by taxpayers at the rate of $91,000 per year, every year over the ten year cycle. Who wouldn't love to run a company with that kind of government subsidy? I volunteer immediately to receive my $91,000.

Put another way, the financial institutions will be receiving $266 from every man, woman and child in America in order to save these pointless jobs. (We know that children don't pay taxes, and we also know that about 1/4th of all adults pay little or no taxes, so you can figure your real share is more along the lines of $400 to support big banks and the like. Great, isn't it?)

There are many alternatives to the current system leaving aside straight up federal administration. States could administer the loans, as could colleges, or scholarship foundations. Direct grants could be made to students using the savings.

Interestingly, Sallie Mae, while it was spending $8 million in lobbying last year maintains a "scholarships" program. The amount they give away? $250,000 - about 3% of what they spend for lobbying. Click here for their "scholarships" page.

There has also been a shocking degree of corruption and lack of oversight of the program as now administered. Educational institutions are entwined with the lenders on an unimaginable scale. Click here to read some highlights - or low-lights, as the case may be.

Frightening Survey of Republican "Values" By the Daily Kos

Click here for the survey

While I am only the grandchild and great-grandchild of immigrants, a certain amount of my ancestors' values rubbed off on me. 

First and foremost they believed in knowledge. It could have been knowledge about anything - a trade, the natural world, a language, history, politics, mathematics. Being free young people, we could pretty much choose our fields of interest. "Study hard and be smart," they might have said. "Smarter than we are." When we began to surpass them in book learning, they would tease us by calling us "Professor," or "Doctor," often in Italian, but their faces also beamed with pride and joy.

None of my grandparents went beyond the 8th grade, and my parents only graduated from high school, although my father had "some college."  Even though they were all staunch Catholics, I never heard them speak of creationism, or doubt the theory of evolution.  Science and medicine were practically worshiped. History took the silver medal; we were from a culture that was 2700 years old, after all. And speaking well, utilizing good grammar and elegant words, earned even more kudos. It was shameful to be ignorant. Better to keep silent rather than betray your own stupidity. 

Now, however, in the dangerously right wing Republican Party, there has somehow grown up a pride in ignorance, misinformation, and lack of awareness. Even so radical a commentator as William Kristol warned the New Know Nothings in 2006 in The Weekly Standard against "turning the GOP into an anti-immigration, Know-Nothing party..." adding, "It could easily dash Republican hopes of becoming a long-term governing party. How many Republicans will have the courage to stand up and prevent the yahoos from driving the party off a cliff?”

Click here for the survey

The Showboat Comes To Vermont

So now we can add Vermont to the long, illustrious list of states that have seceded, or have wanted to secede. Welcome, Showboaters, to the Green Mountain State! (Article from Time Magazine)

Some people in the state, who call their group Second Vermont Republic, hope VT joins not just the former Confederacy but Rick Perry and the Fightin' and Snortin' Texans of today in pulling our country apart. Bravo. More shallow thinking from the fringe, which apparently is an equal opportunity magnet for nuts and bolters from both right and left. 

And apparently, the left far-outs are just as capable of indulging themselves in fuzzy economics, fuzzy history and silly crystal ball gazing. 

You have to appreciate a bunch of guys, however, with flannel shirts, fancy cars, jobs with mega computer companies and a twisted sense of humor. At least I find them funny - I mean funny like a clown.

It's really just more media circus showboating and it's depressing to see it coming from Vermont, of all places, which gave us founding uber-patriots Ethan Allen and the Green Mountain Boys, Abe Lincoln's highest margin of victory in any state, and a 15% mortality rate in the Civil War, a rate higher than any other state.

Maybe they don't remember Abe. You know, that President who said at Gettysburg: The world will little note, nor long remember what we say here, but it can never forget what they did here. It is for us the living, rather, to be dedicated here to the unfinished work which they who fought here have thus far so nobly advanced. Yep, that Abe. The one who separatists assassinated with a bullet from behind.

What's even sadder is that the Vermont-firsters, like one of their leaders Thomas Naylor, are living in some sort of Disneyland of the North. Naylor says, for instance:"Not only would an independent Vermont survive. It would thrive, because it would free up entrepreneurial forces heretofore held in abeyance." 

And where would those mystical forces come from? Nova Scotia? You can be sure it won't be coming from the remaining United States, because the hostility and reluctance to invest for 100 years, if the experience of the Confederates is any indication, will be suffocating.

By the way, showboaters on both ends of the extreme fringe exhibit a reflexive compulsion to use high-fallutin' language to validate wobbly positions, their blah blah blahing obscuring the lack of deep analysis. Contrast Naylor's leaden prose with Lincoln's simple, powerful words. ("Heretofore held in abeyance..." Have they been consulting the Foghorn Leghorn Manual of Style?) 

Some economic facts of life... Vermont ranks a fair-to-middling 34th in per capita income in the United States ($35,493). You could count on that dropping by 20% even before secession became reality, as companies began moving their operations across the borders to NH, NY and MA, or QUE. So you'll be down to about $28,000 per capita before you can say "Freedom and Unity," the state's motto. That will put you down with states like Arkansas.

And making things difficult for "out-of-state" corporations, as another leader of the showboat movement hopes to do, will surely not help that Deep South level of performance. 

Moreover, there would be costs associated with a breakaway - for instance, all those nice federally-funded schools, roads, and so forth. Train tracks? Guess what? Airports - uh-oh. Any power plant, whether traditional or alternative, that took any kind of fed money? We'll be wanting them back, or at least will want you to pay for them. Plus a premium for causing the rest of us annoyance. You sure don't think the rest of us, who appreciate the Union even with all its difficulties and frustrating aspects - are going to actually let you keep infrastructure we all paid for, do you? Showboaters.

Now, I know that Vermont was a "republic" for about 14 years. And the Second Vermont Republic is somehow seeking linkage with that 220 year old "republic."

But, for much of that time there was no other country, as we understand the term, in North America. Indeed, all the colonies were mini-nations - states in waiting. None of them were forced to ratify the Constitution. Anyone of them might have stayed independent. Nevertheless, Rhode Island ratified in May of 1790 and the country was born in its current form. Vermont joined the Union less than a year later in March of 1791. So, you were kinda, sorta, almost unique for about 10 months. 

Get off the high horse. Get off the showboat. Join the real battle.

Speaking of NO - right wing says no to more efficient college loans

Bill ending banks' role in student loans stalls in Senate  from the Washington Post 1/29/10

The breadth of the effects of the right wing's nay saying is sickening. As millions of aspiring kids and their families struggle to figure out how to finance college tuition, the Senate Republicans are saying NO to a bill passed by the House last year that would save families $80 billion dollars over the next ten years, largely by eliminating bank fees and profits. What's not to like? 

Ask Republican Lamar Alexander of Tennessee who said, in some sort of Orwellian double-speak, "Relying on budgetary gimmicks to stage another Washington takeover, this time of 15 million student loans, is not good for college students. The Department of Education in Washington will not be able to serve students as well as 3,000 lending institutions."  Mr. Alexander has been the recipient of more than $500,000 in contributions from the securities and banking industry since 2005, by the way.

Now, those institutions range across a broad spectrum of size and kind. But let's take an average. This average bank would, if the legislation fails, earn $26,667,000 over that ten year period, or roughly $2.7 million per year. Alexander claims this is a government "takeover." Senator, this is a federally funded, federally guaranteed program. The banks have been used to administer the funds but, because of their dubious records over the last 10+ years and their excessive profits torn from the skin of the backs of the middle-class, they have lost their privileges. Direct lending of taxpayer money back to taxpayers seems to make eminent good sense. And, as the right wing is so fond of trumpeting, it would cut inefficiencies. 

Who is really for the American people when millions of struggling kids need college financing?

Certainly not the right wing, which wants to wring every last nickel out of the middle class, and has no moral compunction about doing so.