The Last Acceptable Prejudice?

I suspect that many, in view of the U. S. Supreme Court's ruling on June 26, which struck down the Defense of Marriage Act of 1996, will be displeased. It is inevitable that when one side loses a hard fought political/ideological battle, feelings will be hurt, relationships strained, and bitterness rampant. Yet, while I understand the disappointment which always attends such losses, having endured similar emotions over a lifetime of watching closely and caring deeply about our politics, I cannot understand the shock that so many have expressed. Things have been moving this way at a fairly breakneck clip over the past ten years, and there can be little if any doubt that what the ruling portends for this country in the not too distant future, is full marriage equality for all Americans, gay or straight.

For the shocked and stunned, I pose a simple question: which America did you suppose you lived in? In America, as has been said by non other than Martin Luther King Jr., "The arc of the moral universe is long, but it bends toward justice." Indeed, and it has ever been thus in this country. Maybe not at first, nor all at once, but its the direction we have taken from the outset, and June 26 resoundingly reconfirms it.

Yes, it might have escaped our notice in the beginning that the concept of owning other human beings was contrary to all that was decent and moral, but when it became clear, we went to war and paid dearly to bring an end to the heinous institution of slavery. It may have taken us some time to see that withholding voting rights from women was fundamentally unjust and un-American, but in the end we saw it and acted accordingly. The list goes on and on from ending Jim Crow Laws created to bypass the freedoms gained in the Civil War, to enacting anti-trust laws, to protecting child laborers, to demanding full public access for the physically challenged. We have, and hopefully will always move in the direction of fairness and equal treatment for all of our fellow citizens. When the need to do this arises, it will be the letter and spirit of the founding document, the constitution, that will provide the framework for bringing it about.

Enshrined in the constitution is the simple notion of equal treatment under the law, and the freedom of every American to seek what is moral by his or her own lights. Some of late have disparaged these freedoms when their particular understanding failed to win the day. A recent columnist bemoaned the very essence of America's freedom to plot her own course when she has the unmitigated gall to choose a course not comporting with one of his liking. In an effort to deride our "Self Understanding," the writer lost his way comparing the peaceful, orderly process of American democracy to the mindset and actions of the Boston Marathon Bombers and Philadelphia abortion doctor, Kermit Gossnell. Such comparisons are truly odious since our system of freedoms draws a firm line at breaking the law, as in the case of the individuals he cited. 

I suspect others as well, in despair, will succumb to outrageous and misguided arguments in the days to come. Already the usual suspects are predicting everything from "The End of Western Civilization as We Know It," to a looming confrontation with the "Wrath of God," as many before them did when we chose to emancipate the slave. As they did when we chose to afford equality to women in determining the direction of our country on issues of utmost importance. As they did when we chose to strike down miscegenation laws forbidding intermarriage between the races. As they did when we deemed sodomy laws to be outside the purview of a just society. And finally, as they did when compulsory prayer was ended in public schools. Clearly (since we still seem to be here), the deity is not as intolerant as far too many believers have taken Him to be. Maybe the time has come for them to accept ownership of their oft demonstrated lack of empathy and fairness, and leave off blaming God for it.

To quote Martin Luther King again; "I have a dream that one day this nation will rise up and live out the true meaning of its creed: 'We hold these truths to be self-evident: that all men are created equal.'" I would offer that the ruling of the court is, in part, what "living out the true meaning of our creed" looks like. It looks like a nation in which no single community can rule unquestioned forever. It looks like a nation in which the oppressed may make redress to their government and succeed in attaining fair treatment. Indeed when the rulers are unfair or unjust, it is a citizen's sacred right and duty to question, to organize, to demonstrate. In the gay rights cases before the court, that is precisely what has happened, and now the court has ruled.

I would suggest that freedom has been upheld and expanded in the ruling. Gay Americans are at last free (or soon will be) to claim the numerous marital rights and privileges afforded to their heterosexual countrymen. And those who oppose the ruling remain as free as ever to soldier on, vigorously expressing their dissent, disapproval, and even disgust with same sex marriage. But in America it was decided that those who disapprove may no longer demand that a government of, by, and for ALL Americans discriminate against its law abiding gay citizens. If, contrary to King, you had dreamed that you lived in a country that would continue to sanction your desires for keeping your fellow citizens in a condition of second class status, as of June 26 that dream has ended.

"Hitler Card" Denounced

The webpage, Wikipedia cites an adage of the internet known as Godwin's Law (also called Godwin's Rule of Nazi Analogies) which states, "As an online discussion grows longer, the probability of a comparison involving Nazis or Hitler approaches. In other words, as Mike Godwin observed in 1990, given enough time, in any online discussion--regardless of topic or scope--someone inevitably makes a comparison to Hitler or the Nazis." One corollary following from Godwin's Law is that once such a comparison is made, the thread is finished and whomever mentioned the Nazis has automatically lost whatever debate was in progress. The rationale is that when one invokes Hitler, one has left the terra firma of logical debate and now stands on the less than solid ground of emotional manipulation. As on the net, so in print.

Thus, when a fellow columnist in the Longview News Journal (Feb 2) chose to play the "Hitler Card" while doubling down on his contention that re-electing President Obama reveals a fundamental deficit in public decency and virtue, one would be correct in concluding that the conversation was nearing its end. Of course, the writer attempted to create daylight between himself and his own words, but it was disingenuous at best to attempt to do so after the fact. After all, as the saying goes, one can't "un"ring a bell. Likewise, you cannot easily dismiss the specter of arguably history's most monstrous dictator once you've equated his philosophy with that of your opponents.

Yet, our writer adamantly plunges on, arriving at "irrefutable" conclusions from a welter of generalizations drawn from disparate aspects of the rough and tumble political world. Though its not clear how he quantifies a so called "deficiency in character and virtue" which can neatly been placed at the feet of the President and those who voted for him, that is what he myopically continues to insist upon doing. Chief among the confused arguments he relies on is the mixed message of decrying partisanship, even as he proceeds in the next breath to present a litany of hackneyed arguments that are largely partisan.

The issues that continue to be a burr under his saddle appear to be these: The U.S. deficit; the historically significant, growing acceptance of gay marriage; the requirement for religious organizations to recognize employee rights to access to a full range of health care options, including contraception and abortion. And finally, the curious addition of  "various would-be scandals" such as the largely forgotten Fast and Furious incident, and the raid on a diplomatic outpost in Benghazi. The last two would seem to be typical "grey area" non-scandals that are perennial plagues on our foreign policy. The outing of Valery Plame and the use of torture under the Bush administration come to mind, but I don't recall any Hue and Cry from the right over our lost virtue when these were the talk of the nation.

First, it seems to escape the writer's notice that the deficit existed before this President took office. As to the other issues, it never seems to occur to the columnist that we liberals might take our positions precisely because of our view of morality. Like conservatives, we too vote our ethics and values when we enter the voting booth on polling days. Which brings us to the crux of the matter. It's not the loss of virtue that troubles our writer so much as the idea, enshrined in law, that each of us is free to interpret virtue and morality as he or she sees fit. Though the writer seems to believe that in order to preserve the "eternal verities" he frets about, we should move in lockstep, there is no evidence to suggest that we were ever so monolithic.

When we as liberals, vote to extend marriage equality to members of the LGBT community, it is precisely the virtue of fairness and equality that we are promoting. When we embrace the revenue enhancing aspects of the budget, we are expressing the virtue of generosity to our fellow citizens who, through no fault of their own, are struggling just to survive. Hurricane Sandy and subsequently the funds needed to help its victims is only one example among many of how life can overwhelm good, responsible people. When we fight for the employees (many of whom are not religious) of Catholic and other religious organizations to have access to contraception and abortion to plan their families, it is the virtue of respect for privacy and self-determination that are foremost in our thinking.

A rising star of the Republican Party, Governor Bobby Jindal of Louisiana, recently admonished the RNC:
“We’ve got to stop being the stupid party. It’s time for a new Republican Party that talks like adults. We had a number of Republicans damage the brand this year with offensive and bizarre comments. I’m here to say we’ve had enough of that.” Agreed. To that end, conservatives might begin by learning to see our diversity as a strength rather than a weakness.  As to morality, depending on how they are defined, there are between 217 and  30,000 denominations of the Christian church worldwide. If the church itself is incapable of achieving unity in its interpretation and expression of the faith, is it reasonable to expect a government representing over 300 million diverse citizens to be monolithic on moral issues?

Finally, as conceived by the framers, our constitution does not encumber the government with the task of imposing any moral consensus on its citizenry. That is the job of our religious institutions, which frankly, have been there all along. I fail to see how it is appropriate to blame any administration for the moral and ethical shortcomings that we sometimes see today. The government is a reflection of "we the people," not the other way around. But even if the loss of character and virtue that our writer bemoans is real and can be quantified (I'm not prepared to say that it can), is it really possible to place the blame for this on any particular President? I think not. Nor should we countenance the scapegoating of good, decent Americans who voted their values as well as their highest aspirations for our country on November 6, 2012.

Decency Deficit Debunked!

"Do unto others 20% better than you would expect them to do unto you, to correct for subjective error."~Linus Pauling, Double Nobel Laureate for Chemistry and the Peace prize.

A recent column in the Saturday Forum (January 12) opined, in despair, that the obvious conclusion to be drawn from the results of the 2012 Presidential election was that public decency had now fallen to the charge of a brave, heroic few who predictably are anti Obama conservatives. Upon consideration, I would like to offer a somewhat different (certainly less wrought up) interpretation. It is this: After having engaged in the fairly conventional quadrennial exercise of electing an American president, the candidate who ran the better campaign won the day. Furthermore, our "decency," over which much unnecessary hand-wringing has occurred, remains not only intact, but vibrant.

While the bitterness that follows hard on the heels of losing a major election is understandable, surely we can muster enough respect for those who simply hold differing political opinions, to resist libeling them with a misguided charge of indecency. I contend that our core values as a people remain viable, because it seems to me what is implied by the civic minded action of taking the time to hear the candidates out, then voting in accordance with one's conscience is inherently patriotic and decent, regardless of the outcome of any given election cycle.

So to those given to predicting the most dire repercussions because their candidate came up short in the eyes of the electorate, I say, all evidence to the contrary. In our history, both sides of our ongoing debates and political skirmishes have experienced victory at the polls, and miraculously the country endures. The republic lives on, and the sky still depends from the framework of the heavens. 

If decency resides only on one side of the political spectrum, one wonders just what nation voted to re-elect president Obama. If the demographic analyses of his re-election are to be believed, then he won in convincing fashion on a promise to raise taxes on the wealthiest 2% of Americans, while refusing to raise them on the middle class and the poorest among us. He ran on this and was re-elected. In days of old, we called such a result "The Will Of The People," and it seems to me that those who have trouble accepting the election's results, may indeed have a problem with democracy itself. There is never a guarantee that your side will win. However, your chances improve if you forcefully and elegantly make your case.

There is an old bromide often heard among our statesmen that runs, "Decent people can disagree." I submit that this is exactly what has happened. But as they face the week of Obama's second Inaugural, conservatives seem to be having a more difficult time than usual accepting the reality about what the election has meant. Clearly, an unprecedented coalition composed of White and African Americans, Latinos, Women, Asian Americans, and young Americans came together to see to it that their voices were heard. It remains to be seen whether conservatives in the rank and file, and more importantly, the leadership, will make heads or tails of what is staring them in the face.

But claiming a loss of common decency would seem to be a poor choice. I for one, am a liberal who will not stand idly by while having my values and ethics questioned by a party that has its own issues to deal with on that front. Was it decent of GOP candidates to stand silently smiling onstage when at one of their debates an audience member yelled "YES" to the question should a person without insurance be allowed to die? Who is the "Death Panel" now? Was it decent of party leaders to again remain silent when a prominent conservative commentator referred (while on the air) to a young college woman as a "slut" simply for her advocacy of policies he disagreed with?

Was it decent of congressional candidate Todd Akin to hold forth about "legitimate rape" and proclaim the unscientific notion that a woman's body had the ability to ward off pregnancy if she was assaulted? Was it decent of candidate Richard Mourdock to state that it was "God's Will" if a woman's pregnancy resulted from a rape? Was it decent of Vice Presidential candidate, Paul Ryan to adamantly stick by his bill (co-authored with Akin), allowing no exceptions" for abortions for rape victims, arguing that the "method of conception" was irrelevant? Was it decent of Republicans in several states to attempt the disenfranchisement of thousands of Americans (mainly in democratic leaning districts) through voter suppression tactics thinly disguised as "anti voter fraud" provisions?

Mitt Romney, the conservative candidate for the presidency, famously slandered 47% of the electorate as being dependent on government and incapable of "taking responsibility for their lives." I'm going to go out on a limb here and suggest that insulting nearly half of the electorate seems a poor strategy for winning their hearts and minds. Besides that, what he said was wrong on its face. As to the yarn about our "Decency Deficit," it is of a kind with Romney's fateful, wrongheaded statement. And is equally as false.

Good, decent Americans could (and did) disagree with the philosophy and economic theory of conservatism this time around. These voters, to a larger extent than conservatives are willing to admit, are church goers and others who attend synagogues, mosques, and temples. Most of them are ethical, community minded, family oriented citizens doing their moral and patriotic duty by their own best lights, which is really all that can be asked of any of us. Prominent Republicans Colin Powell and 2012 presidential candidate John Huntsman have come out in recent days and admitted that the GOP and conservatives have a lot of work to do when it comes to being less insulting to the electorate. Until that occurs, voting for the other guys seems the only decent thing to do.

2016: Obama's America - A Review

The odd thing that strikes the viewer in the opening minutes of Dinesh D'Souza's 2016 - Obama's America, is a rather lengthy biographical sketch of none other than Dinesh D'Souza himself. If this seems a strange way to begin to tell the story of the formative influences on President Barack Obama, it proves to be a telling detail that explains more about the film's creator than about his chosen subject.

At the outset is a montage (complete with sad, wistful music) of D'Souza's humble beginnings in India. Actors stand in for his family as he describes their fateful decision to send him to America to find a better life. A better life, for D'Souza included attending Dartmouth College on his way to becoming a Reaganite and later, an ultra-conservative author. He has been a fellow with both AEI, and the Hoover Institute. We also receive a hasty, thumbnail history of India itself, a land that has known its share of cultural strife, political corruption, and most importantly for D'Souza's purposes, the scourge of colonialism.

Why colonialism? Because that is the unexpected and frankly, novel line of attack on President Obama that D'Souza is now bringing to the table. Indeed, so obsessed is he with driving home the image of the President as a deeply enraged anti-colonial crusader, that he blithely does away with old attacks. In the theater on the night I saw the movie, I heard a distinct, murmur of disapproval move through the conservative crowd when the narrator (D'Souza) dismisses out of hand a matter of received sacrosanct dogma among many to this day: Barack Obama, he asserts in confident off-handedness, was born in the State of Hawaii. That's right, the one in the U.S.A. The birther notion in "2016" has been jettisoned for something more subtle. The concern here is not so much in where the president was born as in what D'souza believes was born in the president.

The colonialism angle becomes clearer when D'Souza telegraphs his intent, at the expense of everything (including the truth), to project onto the President his own lingering doubts, bitterness, and dare we say, self hatred as a citizen of a once colonized country. Yet whereas he came by such feelings naturally as a result of living through the aftermath of Indian history, he intends to make the case that Obama's rage came through a kind of patriarchal "osmosis" from his avowed socialist father, Barack Obama Sr. Never mind that the older Obama was only present in his son's life for a total of thirty days. Cleverly using over dubbed readings by the President himself from the audio version of his memoir, Dreams From my Father, D'Souza spins the gossamer threads that comprise his case that Obama is a sinister Marxist who is the last person we should send to the White House.

If the senior Obama gets the leading role in the drama of transmitting the President's so called rage, D'Souza provides us with a supporting cast of characters such as his mother Ann Dunham who met the intelligent, charismatic Obama Sr. at the University of Hawaii in 1960. D'Souza strains mightily to build a disparate, loosely joined collection of relatives and family friends that he dubs the president's "Founding Fathers," into Obama's anti-colonial brain trust. It bears saying that though Obama writes openly of these acquaintances, he never used D'Souza's phrase. Rounding out the cast are the President's grandparents, described by Barack Obama himself as "vaguely liberal," Columbia University Professor, Edward Said, with whom the President took a class, and most sinisterly, Frank Marshall Davis, journalist, avowed communist, and an acquaintance of the President's grandfather.

Though it bills itself as a documentary, 2016 really is nothing of the kind. The documentary form is one of discovery. At their best, these films evoke a sense of  of imminent, unexpected surprise. This movie has no such feeling because it's conclusions are in place from the beginning. It takes most of what it has to say from two books by D'Souza: The Roots of Obama's Rage, and Obama's America: Unmaking the American Dream. If Obama's alleged dark rage is a foregone conclusion from the beginning, then the movie cannot lay claim to the mantle of an objective piece of journalism in search of truth. Rather, it comprises a lengthy infomercial at best, and at worst, a two hour long attack ad.

As to the "proofs" of the president's driving desire to re-distribute geopolitical power to third world and former colonial interests, political reporter, David Weigel puts all to rest in a review that appears on SLATE'S website under the title, "Only In His Dreams," referring to D'Souza, whose theories Weigel describes as "Swiss-cheesed with logic holes." Yet, though the film does show some facility with the well known movie devices of slick, shadowy graphics, discordant music in all the right places (to paint as dark, and sinister a picture as possible), and the rhetorical tricks of half-truths and innuendos, at its close we only find what we already knew. That President Barack Obama, born in America, was raised partly in Hawaii and Indonesia. He was reared by a single mother and her parents whose politics though admittedly liberal, were not especially radical. His grandparents were conventional Americans who had friendships with a few liberal and left leaning individuals, yet pursued the American Dream in the typical way.

Dinesh D'Souza's movie thus, is a political thriller in search of its Manchurian Candidate. One suspects that the only one he found was the one he brought to the project himself. Conjured from his own mind.

Early this spring, in a story certainly long forgotten by now, an interesting issue was highlighted by MSNBC’s Lawrence O’Donnell. It seems that U.S. Representative Paul Ryan (R) Wisconsin, who heretofore was unshakeable in the theory of economics on which his draconian budget plan presumably rested, suddenly was shaking. As long as lily-livered liberal politicians and economists were his detractors, Ryan remained supremely aloof and self-assured. But when Catholic priests hammered him on moral grounds about his budget and its seeming connection with novelist/philosopher Ayn Rand, all bets were off.

Ryan, House Chairman of the Budget Committee found himself in a sticky wicket after attempting to run from his adoration of Rand when questioned about it in the National Review. He dismissed the story as an “urban legend.” He went on to say: "I reject her philosophy. It’s an atheist philosophy. It reduces human interactions down to mere contracts and it is antithetical to my worldview”. Ryan’s problem is that he is on record as recently as 2005, warbling effusively about Rand’s influence on him, going so far as to say: “The reason I got involved in public service, by and large, if I had to credit one thinker, one person, it would be Ayn Rand” and “Ayn Rand, more than anybody else, did a fantastic job explaining the morality of capitalism, the morality of individualism, and that, to me, is what matters most.”

Perhaps Ryan, a Roman Catholic, wouldn’t be in a fix had he not engaged in some ham-fisted pandering by linking his brutal budget to his faith. In doing so he raised the eyebrows and ire of ninety faculty members and priests at Georgetown University last March, who were compelled to differ with him in a written statement which said in part: "Your budget appears to reflect the values of your favorite philosopher, Ayn Rand, rather than the gospel of Jesus Christ. We would be remiss in our duties to you and our students if we did not challenge your continuing misuse of Catholic teaching to defend a budget plan that decimates food programs for struggling families, radically weakens protections for the elderly and sick and gives more tax breaks to the wealthiest few."

The dustup has special relevance to the ongoing discussion surrounding politics and religion, some of which we were treated to in these pages on Saturday, June 23. In my view, the conversation is far from over. It was the exposure of the Ryan/Rand axis that inspired me to do something I have long wanted (and dreaded) to do, which was to read Rand’s magnum opus, ATLAS SHRUGGED. I was motivated in part by a longstanding reluctance to criticize works that I had not read, seen or heard for myself. But a more sinister factor may have been the greater catalyst, namely that Rep. Ryan is on record as boasting that he “requires” all interns and staffers in his office on Capitol Hill to read ATLAS SHRUGGED.  Such an admission, in my view, should be cause for everyone to read and seriously consider the implications of this novel. All 1168 pages.

Now that I've done so, I believe I am on firm ground in agreeing with the aforementioned priests and faculty who sharply criticized Ryan. It attests to the importance of perceptions regarding politics and religion that Ryan is suddenly desperate to create daylight between himself and the virulently atheist Rand. It attests to his dim-wittedness that he forgot that we live in an age of ubiquitous audio and video recorders.

Rand’s writings present a serious problem for religious Americans who want to champion her ideas as well as a belief in Jesus as motivators of their political behavior. In her novels and non-fiction prose she sought, in striking forthrightness, to overthrow millenia-long religious definitions of altruism and compassion. One can’t have it both ways. It is quite a stretch on one hand to promote the governmental indifference to the poor preached by Rand and her devotees, while professing the compassion and unconditional generosity of Jesus. If, as a Christian, one finds oneself largely in agreement with Rand, one should, as the eponymous hero of ATLAS SHRUGGED, John Galt, might suggest, “check one’s premises.”

It seems to me that if the whole idea of Christian participation in politics is to reflect the teachings and actions of Jesus through the political system, then adherence to the stinginess and misanthropy of Ayn Rand would be out of the question. Jesus gave freely to the poor without ever seeming overly concerned about abstract notions of "fostering a good work ethic" or "preventing a sense of dependency" among those in need. Conversely much of what conservatives obsess about around these issues seem to arise from a pervasively nasty opinion of their fellows. That their fellows are inherently lazy. That they are perpetually on the take. That they’d rather take handouts than work for a living.

I’m a liberal who has worked hard ever since I joined the labor force at seventeen as a bag boy at Safeway. Furthermore, most if not all of the adults that I’ve known have been hard workers, presuming there was work to be found. Rand's great flaw as a writer, and as a human being, was a fanatical unwillingness to admit that good, hardworking people sometimes fall victim to the vagaries of existence. Notions of pulling oneself up by one’s own bootstraps, and of being steadfastly independent, are valid up to a point. Jesus understood that the limit to such abstractions was the fact of actual hunger and poverty suffered by real people who were decidedly not abstract. If Rand ever knew it, she expunged it from her philosophy. If we assume that Rep. Ryan, as a follower of Christ, also knows it, how did he ever fall under the sway of Ayn Rand?

Not a Christian Nation

On the December 31 Longview News Journal's Forum page an editorial appeared under the rather portentous heading: "Is America a Christian Nation?" Such a question in my view displays either a fundamental failure to comprehend basic American civic law, or a fundamental rejection of it. In any case, each can be seen as another unfortunate failure in the education of a people on the core question of who we are.

At the outset, let me state that no American who is informed can deny the historical importance of religion to our society. Religion has always been, and doubtless will remain a vital and public resource for ethical conduct and spiritual sustenance for our people. Indeed, that seems to have been at least a part of the intent of the framers of the constitution and the Bill of Rights. But these men, who most, if not all were products of a culture pervaded by Christian ideas and religious practices, did not intend to build a theocracy in the New World. Thus, we can proudly say that there is no "Church Of America" to hold in comparison to Britain's publicly established and supported "Church of England."

Had they so intended, why did they not simply enshrine the intent in law? Instead, they wrote a constitution and Bill of Rights from which the word "God" is glaringly, conspicuously omitted. To those who believe that this was somehow just another stupendous oversight of history, I say on the contrary, the matter was roundly if not furiously debated by the Continental Congress prior to the ratification of our Constitution in Philadelphia in 1787. Those proposing what Kramnick and Moore in their book, "The Godless Constitution," have dubbed "Religious Correctness," lost the day.

As to the victors in that debate, the authors cited above write, "Yet, so successful were the drafters of the Constitution in defining government in secular terms that one of the most powerful criticisms of the Constitution when ratified and for succeeding decades was that it was indifferent to Christianity and God. It was denounced by many as a godless document, which is precisely what it is."

But, contrary to what detractors of our founding system of law characterized as being hostile to religion, I contend that the opposite is the case. In their wisdom, I believe the founders demonstrated supreme faith in their religion not only to survive, but to flourish on its own with no need of a "leg-up" from the government. In this way, the two institutions could be free to attend to their own affairs relying appropriately on their respective and unique doctrines and modes of operation. History would seem to have confirmed the wisdom of the insight.

What makes this country great is that no Christian can be compelled to pray to Brahma. But the obverse also makes us great. No Hindu can lawfully be compelled to pray to Jehovah. The writer was correct in his assertion that much of our law has been shaped indirectly by the Holy Bible. But it is also true that our system of Democracy at least in part was influenced by ancient Greek culture, hardly a hotbed of Christian theology.

And since our constitution can be seen a living document open to the indirect influence of all the spiritual traditions adhered to by our legislators, other "influences" also can have a place in shaping our polity. All to the good. Members of congress today are Jewish, Christians, Muslims, Buddhists, and indeed, I suspect, some who profess no religious tradition at all.

A better question to have begun that editorial might have been, "Is America a Nation in which everyone could (potentially) be Christian?" the answer of course is, yes. But given the nature of human beings to follow their own lights on matters of the soul, it should come as no surprise that we are not all Christians. I'm certain that our founders would not be surprised in the least, because they formed a government large enough in spirit to accommodate us all.

In short, American must of necessity be a nation of all religions, and of none.

Hypocrisy On Review

In his remarks for the forum page of February 19, Rev. Herb Spady found it necessary to make a detour from his comments on the importance of National Black History Month to advocate for continued discrimination against another oppressed group: Gay Americans. He was at pains to insure that no one compared the ongoing struggle for equality in which gays presently find themselves, with that of Black America, going so far as to label such a conceit as "absurd."

Because I am a Black American who sees the struggles of gays and African Americans as being precisely equivalent, and because just this week, the first administration led by an African American has signaled that it will no longer defend the constitutionality of the Defense Of Marriage Act, I believe I am on firm ground to take issue with Mr. Spady's views.

Spady’s chief argument against confusing the two groups seemed to rest solely on pigmentation. He stated that "The homosexual movement is made up of different races of people who have chosen this idea as a lifestyle. The equality of rights for all citizens should be used and granted in the interest of a race of people and in the discussion of matters pertaining to the race of people."

This statement was stunning in its incoherence. It not only made the demonstrably untrue claim that oppression can only be imposed on racial groups, it was contradictory on its face, speaking of the "equality of all citizens," while it clearly singled out the hopes and aspirations of one community, namely homosexuals, as being beneath contempt. In light of recent incidents of bullying and gay teen suicide, it was astounding to witness the insensitivity displayed when a member of one oppressed group told another such group that it had no right to dream of basic equality.

It bears recalling that in the case of Loving vs the State of Virginia (1967), on the right of blacks and whites to inter-marry, the Supreme Court upheld a "Lifestyle Choice" which faced opposition very similar to that faced by gays and lesbians today.

As an African American, I believe that gays in this country have experienced many of the same indignities that blacks were forced to endure in the past, and could only stand in silent solidarity with the civil rights struggles of Martin Luther King Jr., James L. Farmer Jr., and other heroes of that fractious time in our history. King often framed the struggle in the same language used by the founders of our nation which shone a light on ideas supportive of our common humanity.

To my mind, that humanity is all that is required to see that institutionalized discrimination against the LGBT community in America must be brought to an end. I have stated in these pages recently that the impulse toward equality is quintessentially American. No counter argument that I’ve seen here has altered that view. President Obama has said that he has "grappled" with this issue for a long time. I for one, am pleased that he appears to be coming around to the American way of seeing things when it comes to gay rights.

But my faith that gay fellow Americans will one day enjoy the thousand or so rights and benefits that I as a married heterosexual can take for granted, has less to do with a president than with a country. The list of the achievements of similar movements stretches into the distant past, and shows no sign of ever stopping: women voters, African Americans, child laborers, disabled Americans, migrant workers, labor unions, and gay Americans. When we as a people tire of the iron fist of oppression, and utilize the street and the ballot box to express our unwillingness to endure inequality, the country changes for the better. This is exactly what is meant by "creating a more perfect union."

When commentators like Spady and others who have appeared here speak in the stentorian tones of the prophets of old, it is easy to reach the conclusion that theirs is the only possible interpretation of scripture, morality and ethics as regards the issue of homosexuality.

Not so. I encourage your readers to begin to listen to, and dialog with those within the emerging "Christian Left." These are people no less devout or ethical than those in the Christian Right, who seem intent on disenfranchising a whole class of law-abiding Americans based on narrowminded, often misguided views of morality. The Christian Left, or liberal Christians, are becoming increasingly vocal in their opposition to the conservatively religious, who, on a range of issues have proven that they are ready and willing to cast the first stone.