Ronald Reagan famously said about progressives, a.k.a., liberals: “The trouble with our liberal friends is not that they are ignorant, but that they know so much that isn’t so.” The most infamous recent example of this willful ignorance is the Left’s reaction to Arizona’s immigration law.
Apparently, no one in the Obama administration has bothered to read Arizona’s law, but they are so heavily invested in their ideology that what they want to believe about the law makes it magically turn into what they believe it is: a racist, fascist excuse for Arizona’s Gestapo-like police to harass and detain anyone with dark skin or an accent.
I know exactly how William Shatner felt in the Twilight Zone episode "Nightmare at 20,000 Feet". Does anyone else notice that the Obama administration is lying about Arizona's immigration law? Stewardess! There's a creature on the wing!
Every time I hear someone in the Obama administration denounce Arizona’s law – from Obama himself down to people whose job it is to actually know the law, like Eric Holder and Janet Napolitano – I feel like I’m living in an episode of the Twilight Zone. I’m almost as shocked and perplexed as William Shatner was when he saw a creature on the wing of the airplane he was flying on. Is this really happening and does anyone else notice it?
This is just the tip of the wing, however, as the belief in an alternative universe translates to every conceivable issue. Cyclical, historical climate change turns into Armageddon. Babies are no longer babies, but clumps of unorganized tissue that reveal themselves as babies only after they leave the womb. The only way to make airplanes safe from terrorists is not to look for terrorists. And so on and so forth.
My favorite is how progressives turn the First Amendment into something completely different than what it actually says. They believe it calls for the “separation of church and state,” though it says no such thing. It actually reads, in part, “Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion…” That’s funny, the words “separation,” “church,” or “state” refuse to appear in the First Amendment. Maybe they’re hiding elsewhere in the Constitution? Or maybe not.
Despite the conspicuous absence of these words from the Constitution, progressives are constantly shouting down any religious references in the public square based on the Constitution’s supposed prohibition of religious speech through the “separation” clause. No such clause exists and the Amendment clearly states that Congress “shall make no law,” which means, for any progressives reading this, that Congress “shall make no law.” Do I need to repeat the phrase again so it’s clear? Apparently I do, but even if I do repeat it, progressives will still read, “separation of church and state.” It’s exasperating to say the least.
In the same way, progressives read the First Amendment’s free speech clauses as applying only to individuals and the causes they believe in. In other words, if you’re an organization representing the interests of a group of people, you’re not entitled to the same speech rights as an individual. Moreover, if you’re a group progressives distrust and malign, say an evil corporation or a conservative non-profit, you have even fewer rights to free speech, if any.
Progressives fervently believe that the First Amendment applies only to individuals when it’s in their best interests to believe this (see Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission), though the text itself says, rather clearly: “…or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.” The key phrase here is “of the people”. Note that it does not read, “of the person,” nor does it say, “of the people we agree with who aren’t racist Nazi homophobes like we say they are because they don’t believe in the same foolish notions of creating an earthly Utopia like we do.”
No logical person is arguing that those words are literally written in the constitution (please find me some respectable progressive who does). You completely ignore the fact that modern concept of separation of church and state has been greatly influenced by the mid-twentieth century rulings of the Supreme Court and remains a topic of debate among the brightest scholars and judicial representatives. This isn’t some ridiculous argument stemming from ignorance or any other perceived progressive personal defect. It is a debatable concept that even the likes of Thomas Jefferson advocated for. Contextualizing this debate the way you did reflects an inability to truly grasp any argument outside of your own.
I’m not sure what debate you’re referencing. Thomas Jefferson worried about (with good reason) a state established religion. No one is advocating an establishment of a state religion in the US. Much of the anti-religion paranoia exists on Left and it’s irrational.
Thomas used the phrase “a wall of separation between church and State” as a description of the first amendment.
Club Soda wrote,”My favorite is how progressives turn the First Amendment into something completely different than what it actually says. They believe it calls for the “separation of church and state,” though it says no such thing.”
I was simply pointing out associating the first amendment with the metaphor “separation of church and state” is not such a crazy thing (http://www.religioustolerance.org/scs_intr.htm). Get it?
You are paranoid about a socialist agenda influencing our govt. I am paranoid about religious theology influencing government leadership. I can live with that.
You’re right; the first 10 words of the First Amendment to the Constitution specifically state: “Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion.”
But if God isn’t an establishment of religion, I don’t know what is.
In the Treaty of Tripoli, ratified in 1797 in one of the Senate’s only unanimous votes, Article 11 famously states:
In 1802, Thomas Jefferson wrote in a letter to the Danbury Baptist Association:
Note that Jefferson did not even capitalize the name of God in his letter. He, along with Benjamin Franklin and Thomas Paine were not Christian, although they were Deists … they believed in one Supreme Being, however, but rejected many elements of the Christian church.
Furthermore, James Madison, primary author of the Constitution once wrote on Christianity:
For what it’s worth, I do believe in God, or rather that there is a higher power within all of us, Christian, Jew, Muslim, Buddhist alike … I guess that makes me a Deist, like Jefferson, et al.
But God, in whatever form, has NO place in official government, by design … and while the Constitution does not specifically state that there is a separation of church and state, that was clearly the intent of the Framers.
Huh? I think you’re right, you don’t know what an establishment of religion is. The law is clear. The state cannot establish a religion. The people of that nation can write, talk, and express any religion they see fit. If the nation is overrun by Deists (I believe Jefferson would have major issues with your definition) who want to express the universal god (you’ve adopted) on the Supreme Court building so be it as long as their not closing down churches with a different viewpoint.
Please research the history of Europe to understand what an established religion was like during the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries.