Prof sees religion in '08 vote
http://www.billingsgazette.net/articles/2007/04/18/news/local/40-vote.txt
[excerpt]
By JIM GRANSBERY
Of The Gazette Staff
While Americans may pretend there is a separation between church and
state, in reality there is not, a Montana State University-Billings
professor argued Tuesday.
And the personal religious rhetoric that flavored the 2004
presidential campaign between President Bush and Sen. John Kerry,
D-Mass., is now a model for would-be presidential nominees from both
parties, David Weiss said.
Posting several quotes from recent speeches by 2008 hopefuls, Weiss
illustrated his point that personal religious background and beliefs
became central to political messages in the run-up to the 2004
campaign in ways never seen before in the United States and that set
the stage for the future.
"God was absolutely essential to the last election," Weiss said, and
the religious tenor is "a confessional personal rhetoric."
*
Weiss, assistant professor of media studies, presented his faculty
lecture to about 25 listeners at the MSU-Billings library. His talk
was distilled from his doctoral thesis at the University of New Mexico.
Weiss is new to the campus after spending a year teaching in Ohio.
Before a "midlife crisis" pushed him toward an academic career, Weiss
spent 17 years in advertising in New York City.
Weiss outlined a brief history of the idea of separation of church and
state in America and the role of civic religion in politics.
The phrase "wall of separation between church and state" is not in the
Constitution, but comes from a letter from President Thomas Jefferson
to Baptists in Danbury, Conn., in 1802. Subsequent Supreme Court
decisions enhanced the principle and found its expression in what
Weiss call civil religion, "the nonofficial version which operates" in
American life. Thanksgiving, Sunday "blue laws" and closing banks and
post offices on Sunday reflect the force of Christian religion in
everyday American life.
"Politicians never acknowledge to the public this guise," he said.
[end excerpt]
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You are invited to check out the following:
The Rise of the Theocratic States of America
http://members.tripod.com/~candst/theocracy.htm
American Theocrats - Past and Present
http://members.tripod.com/~candst/theocrats.htm
The Constitutional Principle: Separation of Church and State
http://members.tripod.com/~candst/index.html
[and to join the discussion group for the above site and/or Separation of
Church and State in general, listed below]
HRSepCnS · Historical Reality SepChurch&State
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/HRSepCnS/
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.. . . You can't understand a phrase such as "Congress shall make no law
respecting an establishment of religion" by syllogistic reasoning. Words
take their meaning from social as well as textual contexts, which is why "a
page of history is worth a volume of logic." New York Trust Co. v. Eisner,
256 U.S. 345, 349, 41 S.Ct. 506, 507, 65 L.Ed. 963 (1921) (Holmes, J.).
Sherman v. Community Consol. Dist. 21, 980 F.2d 437, 445 (7th Cir. 1992)
.. . .
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USAF LT. COL (Ret) Buffman (Glen P. Goffin) wrote
"You pilot always into an unknown future;
facts are your only clue. Get the facts!"
That philosophy 'snipit' helped to get me, and my crew, through a good
many combat missions and far too many scary, inflight, emergencies.
It has also played a significant role in helping me to expose the
plethora of radical Christian propaganda and lies that we find at
almost every media turn.
*****************************************************************
THE CONSTITUTIONAL PRINCIPLE:
SEPARATION OF CHURCH AND STATE
http://members.tripod.com/~candst/index.html
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