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On September 19 2015 07:56 oneofthem wrote:
anyway
the pope is coming over soon. he's said some good things but what's the u.s. catholic view on him?
I can't speak for places I've never been to or studied, but here in New Orleans, a very catholic city, we love him. In my experience, Catholics are essentially pro-life democrats.
I'm not is the camp that thinks debt is the boogeyman, but from my understanding most of our debt was accrued from costly wars in the Middle East and a massive economic disaster. Well, those are over. I've read plenty of economic theory about government debt, it can be good if I understand correctly. But I mean shit, if we can't balance the budget now that things are getting better, when can we? At the very least it should be on the agenda for the next president.
Also why does the far right have such a raging hard on for Israel
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On September 20 2015 14:56 MattBarry wrote:Show nested quote +On September 19 2015 07:56 oneofthem wrote:
anyway
the pope is coming over soon. he's said some good things but what's the u.s. catholic view on him? I can't speak for places I've never been to or studied, but here in New Orleans, a very catholic city, we love him. In my experience, Catholics are essentially pro-life democrats. I'm not is the camp that thinks debt is the boogeyman, but from my understanding most of our debt was accrued from costly wars in the Middle East and a massive economic disaster. Well, those are over. I've read plenty of economic theory about government debt, it can be good if I understand correctly. But I mean shit, if we can't balance the budget now that things are getting better, when can we? At the very least it should be on the agenda for the next president. Also why does the far right have such a raging hard on for Israel
Everyone in us politics has a forced love affair with Isreal. It's called Florida.
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On September 20 2015 14:56 MattBarry wrote:Show nested quote +On September 19 2015 07:56 oneofthem wrote:
anyway
the pope is coming over soon. he's said some good things but what's the u.s. catholic view on him? I can't speak for places I've never been to or studied, but here in New Orleans, a very catholic city, we love him. In my experience, Catholics are essentially pro-life democrats. I'm not is the camp that thinks debt is the boogeyman, but from my understanding most of our debt was accrued from costly wars in the Middle East and a massive economic disaster. Well, those are over. I've read plenty of economic theory about government debt, it can be good if I understand correctly. But I mean shit, if we can't balance the budget now that things are getting better, when can we? At the very least it should be on the agenda for the next president. Also why does the far right have such a raging hard on for Israel
Two of the many reasons I can think of are:
1. Based on Biblical/ Christian lore, Jesus will only return if the Jews- not the Muslims- have control of the Holy Land.
2. Protecting Israel has been a pretty good positional excuse to butt in to the Middle East any time we want, to protect foreign investments, invade and steal resources, etc.
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Norway28761 Posts
On September 20 2015 13:17 coverpunch wrote:Show nested quote +On September 20 2015 03:26 Liquid`Drone wrote:On September 19 2015 04:16 DarkPlasmaBall wrote:On September 19 2015 03:38 Plansix wrote:On September 19 2015 03:34 Gorsameth wrote:On September 19 2015 03:27 farvacola wrote:On September 19 2015 03:14 Gorsameth wrote:
Here is an idea. Obama is a 'Christian' because the political culture in America requires it.
The guy is smart enough to know God is not real and the bible is a work of fiction.
Sadly America is not ready to accept an atheist as President so he has to pretend to be a Christian. Here's an idea: there are multitudes of highly intelligent individuals who believe in God, and you are in no position to question the faith of another person. This discussion is as vulgar as it is stupid. Do you think being an Atheist makes it less likely to be elected compared to being Christian? We all know the answer to that question, but that doesn't' mean this is going to be a productive discussion. It is a fact that being an atheist or religious has not baring on how intelligent a person is. Just because you know Obama is intelligent does not automatically make him an atheist. I absolutely agree that Obama is a Christian because of his faith, and the fact that he's intelligent doesn't mean he *can't* be a Christian or that he's *secretly* an atheist, which is what Gorsameth was saying. That being said, there have been multiple studies that have shown a negative correlation between religiosity and intelligence. Not causal, of course. Merely an association, but something to stir the pot if people think that there's no correlation whatsoever (or no studies done at all about these two factors). Wikipedia has a good compilation of some of them: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Religiosity_and_intelligence Here are some relevant quotes from the studies in the above link: "the authors investigated the link between religiosity and intelligence on a country level. Among the sample of 137 countries, only 23 (17%) had more than 20% of atheists, which constituted “virtually all... higher IQ countries.” The authors reported a correlation of 0.60 between atheism rates and level of intelligence, which was determined to be “highly statistically significant”.[4]" "The idea that analytical thinking makes one less likely to be religious is an idea supported by other early studies on this issue[19] including a report from Harvard University.[15] ... Furthermore, the Harvard study found that participants who tended to think more reflectively were less likely to believe in a god.[15]" "In a 2013 meta-analysis, led by Professor Miron Zuckerman, of 63 scientific studies about IQ and religiosity, a negative relation between intelligence and religiosity was found in 53, and a positive relation in the remaining ten. Controlling for other factors, they can only confidently show strong negative correlation between intelligence and religiosity among American Protestants.[1][2]" "Most of the recent scientific studies have found a negative correlation between I.Q. and religiosity.[1][2]" "Studies have shown a strong link between national average IQ and atheism in society." There exist many other studies out there too, which tend to be either inconclusive, show a very weak correlation, or show a moderately negative correlation between intelligence and religiosity. But all this being said- yet again- being religious (or nonreligious) does not necessarily imply that you are particularly dumb (or smart), and there is no causal link between the two. really not a big fan of referencing richard lynn, but I'll assume you didn't know that. ;p Also, I'm with Kwark, and this is entirely supported by my own anecdotal evidence. My impression is that american atheists are overwhelmingly more intelligent than average - but I have the same, perhaps even more significantly so, impression of Norwegian christians. Like every single person I've known throughout school who has been like a 'self identifying christian' (less than 10%) has been way smarter than the average student. Beware the temptation to draw empirical conclusions. This falls in the classic mistake of assuming blacks make better athletes because most pro athletes in the US are black. Or, more relevant to this forum, that there's something inherent to being Korean that makes Koreans better at StarCraft. I would point out that religiosity and atheism are not mutually exclusive or even a spectrum in most places. In fact, I would posit that this is a flawed dimensionality. Rather, it is the tolerance and vibrancy of other beliefs that comes with modernity, which in turn associates with advanced education and industry that baselines a society capable of providing for and cultivating citizens' intelligence, that is creating this correlation.
I'm not really basing my belief here around the anecdotal evidence though, I'm using my anecdotal evidence to back up a very logically sound principle ; that it is more intellectually demanding to independently adopt or hold on to a philosophy not shared by your surroundings than it is to merely adopt the philosophy of your surroundings. I don't think there's a relation between religiousity and intelligence - I think there is one between independent thinking and intelligence. And I think in the US, being an atheist requires more independent thinking than being religious, much how like I think in Norway, being openly Christian (while to a lesser degree an independently evolved position than being atheist in the US, as openly Christian Norwegians almost always have Christian parents while American atheists are more likely to go against their childhood faith) is more challenging than being atheist.
I'm not necessarily saying this is correct, and I'm definitely not saying it is correct because of my personal experiences, but it's something that fundamentally makes sense to me and it also happens to be backed up by my experiences.
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On September 20 2015 13:17 coverpunch wrote:Show nested quote +On September 20 2015 03:26 Liquid`Drone wrote:On September 19 2015 04:16 DarkPlasmaBall wrote:On September 19 2015 03:38 Plansix wrote:On September 19 2015 03:34 Gorsameth wrote:On September 19 2015 03:27 farvacola wrote:On September 19 2015 03:14 Gorsameth wrote:
Here is an idea. Obama is a 'Christian' because the political culture in America requires it.
The guy is smart enough to know God is not real and the bible is a work of fiction.
Sadly America is not ready to accept an atheist as President so he has to pretend to be a Christian. Here's an idea: there are multitudes of highly intelligent individuals who believe in God, and you are in no position to question the faith of another person. This discussion is as vulgar as it is stupid. Do you think being an Atheist makes it less likely to be elected compared to being Christian? We all know the answer to that question, but that doesn't' mean this is going to be a productive discussion. It is a fact that being an atheist or religious has not baring on how intelligent a person is. Just because you know Obama is intelligent does not automatically make him an atheist. I absolutely agree that Obama is a Christian because of his faith, and the fact that he's intelligent doesn't mean he *can't* be a Christian or that he's *secretly* an atheist, which is what Gorsameth was saying. That being said, there have been multiple studies that have shown a negative correlation between religiosity and intelligence. Not causal, of course. Merely an association, but something to stir the pot if people think that there's no correlation whatsoever (or no studies done at all about these two factors). Wikipedia has a good compilation of some of them: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Religiosity_and_intelligence Here are some relevant quotes from the studies in the above link: "the authors investigated the link between religiosity and intelligence on a country level. Among the sample of 137 countries, only 23 (17%) had more than 20% of atheists, which constituted “virtually all... higher IQ countries.” The authors reported a correlation of 0.60 between atheism rates and level of intelligence, which was determined to be “highly statistically significant”.[4]" "The idea that analytical thinking makes one less likely to be religious is an idea supported by other early studies on this issue[19] including a report from Harvard University.[15] ... Furthermore, the Harvard study found that participants who tended to think more reflectively were less likely to believe in a god.[15]" "In a 2013 meta-analysis, led by Professor Miron Zuckerman, of 63 scientific studies about IQ and religiosity, a negative relation between intelligence and religiosity was found in 53, and a positive relation in the remaining ten. Controlling for other factors, they can only confidently show strong negative correlation between intelligence and religiosity among American Protestants.[1][2]" "Most of the recent scientific studies have found a negative correlation between I.Q. and religiosity.[1][2]" "Studies have shown a strong link between national average IQ and atheism in society." There exist many other studies out there too, which tend to be either inconclusive, show a very weak correlation, or show a moderately negative correlation between intelligence and religiosity. But all this being said- yet again- being religious (or nonreligious) does not necessarily imply that you are particularly dumb (or smart), and there is no causal link between the two. really not a big fan of referencing richard lynn, but I'll assume you didn't know that. ;p Also, I'm with Kwark, and this is entirely supported by my own anecdotal evidence. My impression is that american atheists are overwhelmingly more intelligent than average - but I have the same, perhaps even more significantly so, impression of Norwegian christians. Like every single person I've known throughout school who has been like a 'self identifying christian' (less than 10%) has been way smarter than the average student. Beware the temptation to draw empirical conclusions. This falls in the classic mistake of assuming blacks make better athletes because most pro athletes in the US are black. Or, more relevant to this forum, that there's something inherent to being Korean that makes Koreans better at StarCraft. I would point out that religiosity and atheism are not mutually exclusive or even a spectrum in most places. In fact, I would posit that this is a flawed dimensionality. Rather, it is the tolerance and vibrancy of other beliefs that comes with modernity, which in turn associates with advanced education and industry that baselines a society capable of providing for and cultivating citizens' intelligence, that is creating this correlation.
Perhaps I'm misunderstanding this statement, but are you saying that being religious and being an atheist are not mutually exclusive? I don't see how someone can be both religious *and* an atheist, unless I'm misunderstanding your point. Can you clarify please?
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On September 21 2015 02:53 DarkPlasmaBall wrote:Show nested quote +On September 20 2015 13:17 coverpunch wrote:On September 20 2015 03:26 Liquid`Drone wrote:On September 19 2015 04:16 DarkPlasmaBall wrote:On September 19 2015 03:38 Plansix wrote:On September 19 2015 03:34 Gorsameth wrote:On September 19 2015 03:27 farvacola wrote:On September 19 2015 03:14 Gorsameth wrote:
Here is an idea. Obama is a 'Christian' because the political culture in America requires it.
The guy is smart enough to know God is not real and the bible is a work of fiction.
Sadly America is not ready to accept an atheist as President so he has to pretend to be a Christian. Here's an idea: there are multitudes of highly intelligent individuals who believe in God, and you are in no position to question the faith of another person. This discussion is as vulgar as it is stupid. Do you think being an Atheist makes it less likely to be elected compared to being Christian? We all know the answer to that question, but that doesn't' mean this is going to be a productive discussion. It is a fact that being an atheist or religious has not baring on how intelligent a person is. Just because you know Obama is intelligent does not automatically make him an atheist. I absolutely agree that Obama is a Christian because of his faith, and the fact that he's intelligent doesn't mean he *can't* be a Christian or that he's *secretly* an atheist, which is what Gorsameth was saying. That being said, there have been multiple studies that have shown a negative correlation between religiosity and intelligence. Not causal, of course. Merely an association, but something to stir the pot if people think that there's no correlation whatsoever (or no studies done at all about these two factors). Wikipedia has a good compilation of some of them: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Religiosity_and_intelligence Here are some relevant quotes from the studies in the above link: "the authors investigated the link between religiosity and intelligence on a country level. Among the sample of 137 countries, only 23 (17%) had more than 20% of atheists, which constituted “virtually all... higher IQ countries.” The authors reported a correlation of 0.60 between atheism rates and level of intelligence, which was determined to be “highly statistically significant”.[4]" "The idea that analytical thinking makes one less likely to be religious is an idea supported by other early studies on this issue[19] including a report from Harvard University.[15] ... Furthermore, the Harvard study found that participants who tended to think more reflectively were less likely to believe in a god.[15]" "In a 2013 meta-analysis, led by Professor Miron Zuckerman, of 63 scientific studies about IQ and religiosity, a negative relation between intelligence and religiosity was found in 53, and a positive relation in the remaining ten. Controlling for other factors, they can only confidently show strong negative correlation between intelligence and religiosity among American Protestants.[1][2]" "Most of the recent scientific studies have found a negative correlation between I.Q. and religiosity.[1][2]" "Studies have shown a strong link between national average IQ and atheism in society." There exist many other studies out there too, which tend to be either inconclusive, show a very weak correlation, or show a moderately negative correlation between intelligence and religiosity. But all this being said- yet again- being religious (or nonreligious) does not necessarily imply that you are particularly dumb (or smart), and there is no causal link between the two. really not a big fan of referencing richard lynn, but I'll assume you didn't know that. ;p Also, I'm with Kwark, and this is entirely supported by my own anecdotal evidence. My impression is that american atheists are overwhelmingly more intelligent than average - but I have the same, perhaps even more significantly so, impression of Norwegian christians. Like every single person I've known throughout school who has been like a 'self identifying christian' (less than 10%) has been way smarter than the average student. Beware the temptation to draw empirical conclusions. This falls in the classic mistake of assuming blacks make better athletes because most pro athletes in the US are black. Or, more relevant to this forum, that there's something inherent to being Korean that makes Koreans better at StarCraft. I would point out that religiosity and atheism are not mutually exclusive or even a spectrum in most places. In fact, I would posit that this is a flawed dimensionality. Rather, it is the tolerance and vibrancy of other beliefs that comes with modernity, which in turn associates with advanced education and industry that baselines a society capable of providing for and cultivating citizens' intelligence, that is creating this correlation. Perhaps I'm misunderstanding this statement, but are you saying that being religious and being an atheist are not mutually exclusive? I don't see how someone can be both religious *and* an atheist, unless I'm misunderstanding your point. Can you clarify please?
Though I'm not sure he was getting at this, there is an argument to be made in favor of a Christianity that revolves around doubt. In other words, many of the Christians I've met who subscribe to what I'd call an "intellectually rigorous" Christianity look and act very much like Atheists/Agnostics in how they couch their belief relative to logic and empirical thinking.
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On September 20 2015 22:06 DarkPlasmaBall wrote:Show nested quote +On September 20 2015 14:56 MattBarry wrote:On September 19 2015 07:56 oneofthem wrote:
anyway
the pope is coming over soon. he's said some good things but what's the u.s. catholic view on him? I can't speak for places I've never been to or studied, but here in New Orleans, a very catholic city, we love him. In my experience, Catholics are essentially pro-life democrats. I'm not is the camp that thinks debt is the boogeyman, but from my understanding most of our debt was accrued from costly wars in the Middle East and a massive economic disaster. Well, those are over. I've read plenty of economic theory about government debt, it can be good if I understand correctly. But I mean shit, if we can't balance the budget now that things are getting better, when can we? At the very least it should be on the agenda for the next president. Also why does the far right have such a raging hard on for Israel 1. Based on Biblical/ Christian lore, Jesus will only return if the Jews- not the Muslims- have control of the Holy Land.
That has got to be one of the most blatantly war-reasoned Christian beliefs. I can't believe some people think that is just something totally legit from god and not included for morale/militaristic reasons. Oy, so painful.
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On September 21 2015 03:40 Mohdoo wrote:Show nested quote +On September 20 2015 22:06 DarkPlasmaBall wrote:On September 20 2015 14:56 MattBarry wrote:On September 19 2015 07:56 oneofthem wrote:
anyway
the pope is coming over soon. he's said some good things but what's the u.s. catholic view on him? I can't speak for places I've never been to or studied, but here in New Orleans, a very catholic city, we love him. In my experience, Catholics are essentially pro-life democrats. I'm not is the camp that thinks debt is the boogeyman, but from my understanding most of our debt was accrued from costly wars in the Middle East and a massive economic disaster. Well, those are over. I've read plenty of economic theory about government debt, it can be good if I understand correctly. But I mean shit, if we can't balance the budget now that things are getting better, when can we? At the very least it should be on the agenda for the next president. Also why does the far right have such a raging hard on for Israel 1. Based on Biblical/ Christian lore, Jesus will only return if the Jews- not the Muslims- have control of the Holy Land. That has got to be one of the most blatantly war-reasoned Christian beliefs. I can't believe some people think that is just something totally legit from god and not included for morale/militaristic reasons. Oy, so painful.
That isn't really the reason why we back Israel so hard. The issues are more political and that the US is home to a ton of Jews, some of who are very influential. The religion is just a flavor to the political machinations, but not the cause.
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On September 21 2015 03:48 Plansix wrote:Show nested quote +On September 21 2015 03:40 Mohdoo wrote:On September 20 2015 22:06 DarkPlasmaBall wrote:On September 20 2015 14:56 MattBarry wrote:On September 19 2015 07:56 oneofthem wrote:
anyway
the pope is coming over soon. he's said some good things but what's the u.s. catholic view on him? I can't speak for places I've never been to or studied, but here in New Orleans, a very catholic city, we love him. In my experience, Catholics are essentially pro-life democrats. I'm not is the camp that thinks debt is the boogeyman, but from my understanding most of our debt was accrued from costly wars in the Middle East and a massive economic disaster. Well, those are over. I've read plenty of economic theory about government debt, it can be good if I understand correctly. But I mean shit, if we can't balance the budget now that things are getting better, when can we? At the very least it should be on the agenda for the next president. Also why does the far right have such a raging hard on for Israel 1. Based on Biblical/ Christian lore, Jesus will only return if the Jews- not the Muslims- have control of the Holy Land. That has got to be one of the most blatantly war-reasoned Christian beliefs. I can't believe some people think that is just something totally legit from god and not included for morale/militaristic reasons. Oy, so painful. That isn't really the reason why we back Israel so hard. The issues are more political and that the US is home to a ton of Jews, some of who are very influential. The religion is just a flavor to the political machinations, but not the cause.
I'm not addressing our support for Israel. I'm addressing the fact that a lot of parts of either the bible itself or general Christian beliefs were clearly created at one point for societal/war reasons. And this one, the fact that Jesus would only come back if Muslims weren't there, is so laughably obvious that I can't help but wonder how people believe it.
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On September 21 2015 03:27 farvacola wrote:Show nested quote +On September 21 2015 02:53 DarkPlasmaBall wrote:On September 20 2015 13:17 coverpunch wrote:On September 20 2015 03:26 Liquid`Drone wrote:On September 19 2015 04:16 DarkPlasmaBall wrote:On September 19 2015 03:38 Plansix wrote:On September 19 2015 03:34 Gorsameth wrote:On September 19 2015 03:27 farvacola wrote:On September 19 2015 03:14 Gorsameth wrote:
Here is an idea. Obama is a 'Christian' because the political culture in America requires it.
The guy is smart enough to know God is not real and the bible is a work of fiction.
Sadly America is not ready to accept an atheist as President so he has to pretend to be a Christian. Here's an idea: there are multitudes of highly intelligent individuals who believe in God, and you are in no position to question the faith of another person. This discussion is as vulgar as it is stupid. Do you think being an Atheist makes it less likely to be elected compared to being Christian? We all know the answer to that question, but that doesn't' mean this is going to be a productive discussion. It is a fact that being an atheist or religious has not baring on how intelligent a person is. Just because you know Obama is intelligent does not automatically make him an atheist. I absolutely agree that Obama is a Christian because of his faith, and the fact that he's intelligent doesn't mean he *can't* be a Christian or that he's *secretly* an atheist, which is what Gorsameth was saying. That being said, there have been multiple studies that have shown a negative correlation between religiosity and intelligence. Not causal, of course. Merely an association, but something to stir the pot if people think that there's no correlation whatsoever (or no studies done at all about these two factors). Wikipedia has a good compilation of some of them: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Religiosity_and_intelligence Here are some relevant quotes from the studies in the above link: "the authors investigated the link between religiosity and intelligence on a country level. Among the sample of 137 countries, only 23 (17%) had more than 20% of atheists, which constituted “virtually all... higher IQ countries.” The authors reported a correlation of 0.60 between atheism rates and level of intelligence, which was determined to be “highly statistically significant”.[4]" "The idea that analytical thinking makes one less likely to be religious is an idea supported by other early studies on this issue[19] including a report from Harvard University.[15] ... Furthermore, the Harvard study found that participants who tended to think more reflectively were less likely to believe in a god.[15]" "In a 2013 meta-analysis, led by Professor Miron Zuckerman, of 63 scientific studies about IQ and religiosity, a negative relation between intelligence and religiosity was found in 53, and a positive relation in the remaining ten. Controlling for other factors, they can only confidently show strong negative correlation between intelligence and religiosity among American Protestants.[1][2]" "Most of the recent scientific studies have found a negative correlation between I.Q. and religiosity.[1][2]" "Studies have shown a strong link between national average IQ and atheism in society." There exist many other studies out there too, which tend to be either inconclusive, show a very weak correlation, or show a moderately negative correlation between intelligence and religiosity. But all this being said- yet again- being religious (or nonreligious) does not necessarily imply that you are particularly dumb (or smart), and there is no causal link between the two. really not a big fan of referencing richard lynn, but I'll assume you didn't know that. ;p Also, I'm with Kwark, and this is entirely supported by my own anecdotal evidence. My impression is that american atheists are overwhelmingly more intelligent than average - but I have the same, perhaps even more significantly so, impression of Norwegian christians. Like every single person I've known throughout school who has been like a 'self identifying christian' (less than 10%) has been way smarter than the average student. Beware the temptation to draw empirical conclusions. This falls in the classic mistake of assuming blacks make better athletes because most pro athletes in the US are black. Or, more relevant to this forum, that there's something inherent to being Korean that makes Koreans better at StarCraft. I would point out that religiosity and atheism are not mutually exclusive or even a spectrum in most places. In fact, I would posit that this is a flawed dimensionality. Rather, it is the tolerance and vibrancy of other beliefs that comes with modernity, which in turn associates with advanced education and industry that baselines a society capable of providing for and cultivating citizens' intelligence, that is creating this correlation. Perhaps I'm misunderstanding this statement, but are you saying that being religious and being an atheist are not mutually exclusive? I don't see how someone can be both religious *and* an atheist, unless I'm misunderstanding your point. Can you clarify please? Though I'm not sure he was getting at this, there is an argument to be made in favor of a Christianity that revolves around doubt. In other words, many of the Christians I've met who subscribe to what I'd call an "intellectually rigorous" Christianity look and act very much like Atheists/Agnostics in how they couch their belief relative to logic and empirical thinking.
Interesting, so you're speaking in terms of how well-reasoned the beliefs or non-beliefs are? I was thinking in terms of their definitions (No you don't believe in any gods vs. Yes you believe in 1+ gods, which are obviously mutually exclusive), which made them mutually exclusive for me, rather than the thought process going into one's beliefs.
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Even if you don't care for religion, Israel is most stable regime in the area, and is a regime with a governing structure that makes it likely to be friendly for the long term. The only real debate is whether the Mid East has strategic importance for the United States.
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On September 21 2015 03:59 Mohdoo wrote:Show nested quote +On September 21 2015 03:48 Plansix wrote:On September 21 2015 03:40 Mohdoo wrote:On September 20 2015 22:06 DarkPlasmaBall wrote:On September 20 2015 14:56 MattBarry wrote:On September 19 2015 07:56 oneofthem wrote:
anyway
the pope is coming over soon. he's said some good things but what's the u.s. catholic view on him? I can't speak for places I've never been to or studied, but here in New Orleans, a very catholic city, we love him. In my experience, Catholics are essentially pro-life democrats. I'm not is the camp that thinks debt is the boogeyman, but from my understanding most of our debt was accrued from costly wars in the Middle East and a massive economic disaster. Well, those are over. I've read plenty of economic theory about government debt, it can be good if I understand correctly. But I mean shit, if we can't balance the budget now that things are getting better, when can we? At the very least it should be on the agenda for the next president. Also why does the far right have such a raging hard on for Israel 1. Based on Biblical/ Christian lore, Jesus will only return if the Jews- not the Muslims- have control of the Holy Land. That has got to be one of the most blatantly war-reasoned Christian beliefs. I can't believe some people think that is just something totally legit from god and not included for morale/militaristic reasons. Oy, so painful. That isn't really the reason why we back Israel so hard. The issues are more political and that the US is home to a ton of Jews, some of who are very influential. The religion is just a flavor to the political machinations, but not the cause. I'm not addressing our support for Israel. I'm addressing the fact that a lot of parts of either the bible itself or general Christian beliefs were clearly created at one point for societal/war reasons. And this one, the fact that Jesus would only come back if Muslims weren't there, is so laughably obvious that I can't help but wonder how people believe it.
Well the bible was written before Islam existed so it's not like the bible was targeting Muslims specifically. I wonder if the bible meant ethnic Jews, would be pretty silly is Jesus would only return if people who don't believe in him were in control of the holy land.
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On September 21 2015 03:48 Plansix wrote:Show nested quote +On September 21 2015 03:40 Mohdoo wrote:On September 20 2015 22:06 DarkPlasmaBall wrote:On September 20 2015 14:56 MattBarry wrote:On September 19 2015 07:56 oneofthem wrote:
anyway
the pope is coming over soon. he's said some good things but what's the u.s. catholic view on him? I can't speak for places I've never been to or studied, but here in New Orleans, a very catholic city, we love him. In my experience, Catholics are essentially pro-life democrats. I'm not is the camp that thinks debt is the boogeyman, but from my understanding most of our debt was accrued from costly wars in the Middle East and a massive economic disaster. Well, those are over. I've read plenty of economic theory about government debt, it can be good if I understand correctly. But I mean shit, if we can't balance the budget now that things are getting better, when can we? At the very least it should be on the agenda for the next president. Also why does the far right have such a raging hard on for Israel 1. Based on Biblical/ Christian lore, Jesus will only return if the Jews- not the Muslims- have control of the Holy Land. That has got to be one of the most blatantly war-reasoned Christian beliefs. I can't believe some people think that is just something totally legit from god and not included for morale/militaristic reasons. Oy, so painful. That isn't really the reason why we back Israel so hard. The issues are more political and that the US is home to a ton of Jews, some of who are very influential. The religion is just a flavor to the political machinations, but not the cause.
I think there are many other political and economic reasons as well, but I still think that there are quite a few American leaders who are Christian fundamentalists and promote this Zionist mindset.
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The only economic fact you need consider is that the Fed decided not to raise interest rates even 25 measly basis points. If the US is doing quite so well then why are we still hovering around 0%, with real discussion of negative interest rates in the event of a slowdown? Keep in mind this tiny rate hike has been anticipated for a long time. The fact that the Fed balked at the last second should inject some doubt into the media's fanfare about the supposed health of the economy.
The pope is un-American, unless you are talking about South America.
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On September 20 2015 14:56 MattBarry wrote:Show nested quote +On September 19 2015 07:56 oneofthem wrote:
anyway
the pope is coming over soon. he's said some good things but what's the u.s. catholic view on him? I can't speak for places I've never been to or studied, but here in New Orleans, a very catholic city, we love him. In my experience, Catholics are essentially pro-life democrats. I'm not is the camp that thinks debt is the boogeyman, but from my understanding most of our debt was accrued from costly wars in the Middle East and a massive economic disaster. Well, those are over. I've read plenty of economic theory about government debt, it can be good if I understand correctly. But I mean shit, if we can't balance the budget now that things are getting better, when can we? At the very least it should be on the agenda for the next president. Also why does the far right have such a raging hard on for Israel
I have difficulty comprehending the public image of the few Popes who have been active during my lifetime, unless I reduced it entirely to the omnipotent imbecility of the media. Compare the reputation of Francis I with Benedict XVI; it is as if the former has unleashed an iconoclastic revolution in Catholic doctrine or Theology; yet he has not. Catholic doctrine remains what it has always been, merely the face has changed, and as the media likes to say, the "tone" and "emphasis," selfishly shepherded by their own image-making machinery.
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Well, Ben Carson can go fuck himself. I can't be the only one who is astonished by the irony and hypocrisy of him saying that Muslims shouldn't be president.
That should pretty much disqualify him from winning in a general election. Of course it will play fine in the Republican party.
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It's a race to the bottom, and Carson decided to join Trump in digging deep into the Earth's fiery core 
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It's judeo-christian values, not islamic values.
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On September 21 2015 04:55 IgnE wrote:
It's judeo-christian values, not islamic values.
What is?
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EPT
) on the economy.
