Nice job on this one. (A QUESTION OF SECULAR FAITH – Issue: 2/15/12) It is amazing how the facts surrounding the origins of our nation have been hijacked by the same miserable jackasses who hijacked Christianity. It’s almost as if it were a plot. Oh, right, it is a plot. Wake up everyone; you are being duped because your sense of history is vague and thus the spaces created by bad education, laziness, youthful distractions, and overall hubris have left you vulnerable to those who wish to oppress you with lies and manipulation.
This latest stupidity over religious liberty concerning the law of the land is intellectual terrorism. This is as harmful to our freedom as any foreign intruder. These are our elected officials making a mockery of our country. I too hated the Health Care Law, but religious liberty? Come on! Are these half-wits joking?
The more I read hard-hitting commentary like yours I am more enraged at my inability to be able to fight these bastards with the right weapons. Lord knows I elect the wrong ones on personal concerns or what goes in and out of my bank account, while this nation is being run by Neanderthal lunatics who know full well we have no grasp of our actual history or what the framers of this nation’s laws intended.
This is indeed a secular nation hijacked by religious fanatics, who use that weapon to rip from us our liberties.
—S. Brusco
Brilliant. Well said. In this 21st century, I think the concept of arguing about birth control is ludicrous. BIRTH CONTROL! For crap’s sake people, wake up.
—Jonathan young (Smithfield, RI)
Wow. This is a ripper of a column, sir. It hits all the touchy areas with a sledgehammer and keeps on bashing. My only issue with this and much of your work is the continued tongue-in-cheek hat tipping to the republic with a tinge of disrespect for its foundations. Although it is ugly at times and glorious in others, it is a great nation with complexities beyond our comprehension now, never mind 250 years ago.
More subtly could be a blessing from you, but it is entertaining. I can say that without hedging.
I guess I would prefer less entertainment and more respectful monologue.
—Gabriel Ross
You godless heretic!
Stop pointing out the obvious factoid and wade comfortably in the sewage of cable news yapping! What are you doing? Are you trying to wake us from our familiar, comforting slumber? Do not be so bold as to think this little independent reasoned thinking is going to CHANGE anything. No, not now, not ever!
It must be quite gnawing to you to realize you’re pissing up a loooooooonnnnnnggggg rope, Campion.
—justice221ram
Mr. Campion,
This column may be the last bastion of reason left [in] us. And since that is a frightening prospect, it is also cleansing in the sense that everywhere I read or listen with the minimal exception, argues with a pre-set stance of talking point droning. This latest debate, if you could call it that, on religious liberty vs. women’s rights vs. civil rights vs. government overreach is, as you always point out, a multi-faceted one. But it is, as usual, whittled down to a political/ideological fight, as if there are only two sides to any argument, when there is clearly various sides, much of it ignored by the Right and the Left, almost all of the media, and many of the citizens, who I think are mostly confused by it all.
I am an educator and have had my students read this piece out loud and break down many of your points and even fact-checked their accuracy within the parameters of the U.S. Constitution and the founding of this nation’s laws. And I am here to commend you and let all your readers know that despite the gaping holes in the public discourse, this piece has without question the most directly air-tight dissection of this critical issue; whether gender, culture, political or government oppression. It is a masterwork.
I thank you for you honesty, bravery and continued disassembly of the vox populi.
—JR
It is obvious you hate religion. But why do you hate this country? Why do you fill this column up week after week with this smut, this misinformation of revisionist claptrap? Besmirching Thomas Jefferson and James Madison, the very founders of our laws defending freedom by dubbing them secular is horrifying. Consider this my last read.
—Mary Ann Gisler
Two ways of looking at this fight; Either Obama knows he is going to be defeated in the fall and wants to get as much of his “dismantling of America” policies enacted before he gets sent back to Community Organizing or he thinks he will be re-elected no matter what he does and this is just a taste of the future.
The man has to be defeated.
—Bill Roberts
Interesting article, James. (THE ISRAEL THREAT – Issue: 2/22/12) We dump a lot of bread into Israel’s back pocket. Meanwhile, anyone in this country who questions the actions of Netanyahu is branded an anti-Semite by the colossal and very effective cash wielding Pro-Israel lobby. To even hint that you may feel an ounce of sympathy for the Palestinians is akin to shouting out the “N” word at Whitney Houston’s funeral. Ahmadinejad (AKA Ringo in pajamas) is great at stirring the pot and saber rattling, but like his brethren in Syria and Yemen, his house of cards will soon topple. Whatever happened to the good old days when a handful of Mossad agents took care of the whole thing? Speaking of The Mossad, don’t be surprised if you get a knock on your door late one night. Shalom.
—Pedro
What the hell is Israel doing? We pay for that operation. They do what we tell them to do. They bomb whom we tell them to bomb. Otherwise we take the bombs back, and then good luck to them.
—DJ Carroll
This is pretty serious now. Iran has always been out of control but now, President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad has lost his own control of the Iranian parliament. Soon he will likely be ousted and the Ayatollah Ali Khamenei has full control of all decisions, especially foreign affairs anyway. Does that finally render Ahmadinejad silent and ineffectual? What does that do to Iran’s nuclear operation?
This is a fluid situation that does not need nuts like Benjamin Netanyahu or these idiotic Republican presidential candidates going off half-cocked.
There is still time to affect change and use the soft-walking big stick.
Also, who the hell wants more war? Has anyone read that poll?
—Allmed
James Campion is the Managing Editor of The Reality Check News & Information Desk and the author of Deep Tank Jersey, Fear No Art, Trailing Jesus and Midnight For Cinderella.
