…when President Reagan’s first secretary of the interior, James Watt, told the U.S. Congress that protecting natural resources was unimportant in light of the imminent return of Jesus Christ. “God gave us these things to use. After the last tree is felled, Christ will come back,” Watt said in public testimony that helped get him fired.
Actually, Watt (probably) didn’t say this. The funny thing is, this view wouldn’t get him fired nowadays. This view is mainstream among many US senators.
Also very worth reading, some letters responding to the article…
These idiots are just typical of the political dipsticks ruling the roost in Washedupton nowadays. They are as dangerous as any “Islamofascist” albeit in a less obvious but no less malign way and they have a greater impact and broader reach than Osama’s lads. These morons in charge of the purse strings in Washingshiton unfortunately have the power and means at their eminent disposal to affect all of us anywhere with their stupid ideas and beliefs.
If there is a God, He should rein them in.
BAN RELIGION! IT IS ARCHAIC, DISCONNECTED, HYPOCRITICAL AND EXPLOITATIVE.
Turn the Vatican into an asylum for God’s (who he?) propagandists.
I’m as eager as anyone to trash the Bible-thumpers. Although I believe that religious feeling is essential to human nature (call it the divine, sublime, etc.), organized religion has done as much good as harm if you look at the cost in intolerance and religious wars (McVeigh and Osama are the more obvious examples). However, I found this article very short on anything but skimpy conjectures that could be pointed as much at the US government as at any European governments. In fact, legislation in the US has successfully kept religion out of schools whereas this is obviously not the case in Europe. Does the fact that most Congresspeople are Christians really surprise anyone given that the US is predominantly Christian? Given that to be a successful polician you usually have to come from a wealthy family, which tend to be conservative… ? Oh, there’s nothing like fake outrage. Why don’t the Eurotrash US-bashers attack the Indian government for being predominantly Hindu? :loco: Anti-environmentalism is more big business than religion; most US presidents are forced by their constituents to think in the short term. Gore would have done a MUCH better job than Bush with the environment, but Bush’s policies merit greater scrutiny than they get (i.e. AIDS research funding, education policies, etc.). Given US dependence on Middle Eastern oil, drilling in Alaska really might be a necessity since no one has really invested much money into alternative energy sources. Better yet, Africa has a lot of untapped oil and they don’t have the same nefarious brand of fundamentalist religion that you find in the Middle East.
[quote=“sbmoor262004”]
Better yet, Africa has a lot of untapped oil and they don’t have the same nefarious brand of fundamentalist religion that you find in the Middle East. [/quote]
:bravo: An astute reply. Hard to counter that one! There is no pan-African religious ideal like there is in Arab nations. The concept of a country is still, for many, an artificial European construct that doesn’t take into account tribal differences. How would drilling for oil off Sao Tome and Principe, a tiny little corrupt nation with supposedly lots of oil, be as dangerous as working in Saudi Arabia, the home of Islam? We already drill a lot in Nigeria and that country probably so far has the worst religious tensions in Sub-Saharan Africa.
I’ve heard of some cases in the Bible belt where teachers quickly passed over chapter information on evolution, but from my experience it is the only theory on the origin of human existence that is taught in school. I would really like to know what is being taught in Europe. There seems to be different versions of Christian creation. In Sunday school I remember something about God making mud figures that came to life, but then others told me that man was created out of nothing and then God pulled out one of his ribs to make a woman. Now that’s a magic trick I’d like to learn! :bravo: I think rubber balloons are more probable than mud, however.
Broon, I support legislation making religion a private matter, but again spirituality is something that exists in all cultures and takes different forms. It is impossible to get rid of religion. By attacking religion you seem to want to make rationality a religion, and we all know that reason is but one way of understanding the universe (i.e. intuition/instinct, emotion, ‘something else’ ???). I fear nihilists as much as I fear fundamentalists. As for the rest, it’s cool…
I’m as eager as anyone to trash the Bible-thumpers. Although I believe that religious feeling is essential to human nature (call it the divine, sublime, etc.), organized religion has done as much good as harm if you look at the cost in intolerance and religious wars (McVeigh and Osama are the more obvious examples). However, I found this article very short on anything but skimpy conjectures that could be pointed as much at the US government as at any European governments. In fact, legislation in the US has successfully kept religion out of schools whereas this is obviously not the case in Europe. Does the fact that most Congresspeople are Christians really surprise anyone given that the US is predominantly Christian? Given that to be a successful polician you usually have to come from a wealthy family, which tend to be conservative… ? 
Oh, there’s nothing like fake outrage. 
