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Mindfulness, people: mindfulness. We have to be thankful when are Marxist superiors tell us we are a land of fallen raaaaacists, capitalism is bad, and we owe the world a debt of guilt for stuff our ancestors did.

Because we are teh bad.

you are funny. Hitler was a Christian.

To say nothing of the Christian support in this country for waging wars of choice against "godless heathen" in middle east

obDisclaimer: I have a left wing bias to say the least. But that's not important for this post since it applies to both sides equally.

You do have to admit that Drudge, the Huffington Post and all the others serve as echo chambers for extreme viewpoints. The conservative side gets bombarded with anti-liberal stories day in and day out, and doesn't have to listen to any other opinion if they don't want to. Same thing happens on the liberal side. You wouldn't have heard Walter Cronkite on CBS news during the Vietnam War talking about "godless baby killers" or something like that, but I could definitely see a more targeted media organization, or let's face it, some dude with a blog, saying something like this. There's no consequences for the blogger dude, and the media outlets will be rewarded for offering this as entertaining fare to their audience.

Personally, I have some very conservative relatives who, while very smart, don't get exposed to differing viewpoints on issues. And when you hear something catchy that you agree with, then repeat it to your friends, then have those same friends amplify your beliefs, you do end up with a very polarized population. Both liberal and conservative talk show hosts know this and use it to their advantage. Suddenly all those people on both sides go out and elect officials that share their polarized opinions of the world, and a sensible debate over healthcare policy turns into a protracted fight that neither side will give ground on. So, talking with people like this for me feels like I'm Rob Reiner ("Meathead") from All in the Family. Yeah, Meathead was a pinko-liberal commie but his character was reasonable compared with Archie...

I don't know, maybe people were more reasonable back in the day when we were fighting a cold war with an adversary who could wipe us out if they were having a bad day.

"I have sworn upon the altar of God, eternal hostility against every form of tyranny over the mind of man.

-- some godless pinko and human trafficer


give me apathy or give me cheetos

Are you calling Captain Steve Austin gay, you fucking godless commie??

Those two things go together fine, if you remember they "rape" customers when they're not "in need." That's enough to get 'em the profit.

But nevertheless, I object to the whole premise of the article. It reeks of evidencism. What does your faith tell you about climate change? That's all you need to know. Tables of numbers, learning from experience, etc.. all that is for godless commie eggheads, not good god-fearing salt-of-the-earth red-blooded Americans.

The US is nothing like the USSR, and never has been. (You should probably be taking notes.)

That's right. Now, please have your identification papers ready for me to inspect, comrade. I mean bro.

Protip, cocknozzle: There are comparisons to be made. Comparisons to be properly made. Probably because twatdrizzles like you want to go on and on about how those darn, godless Commies were evil, dontchaknow - then ignore every goddamned step we take along the path to that destination.

HAHA. Putin is a godless communist and I don't think that has changed. He's just doing to the universities what Hitler did in Germany. Nuclear scientists there did not trust him, and stalled nuclear weapons development with every tactic they could think of. After all the Jews were driven from academia, David Hilbert was asked by a Nazi official, "Herr Hilbert, wie geht's mit der Mathematik in Göttingen?" He replied, "Die Mathematik in Göttingen, die gibt es nicht mehr." "Mr Hilbert, how's the mathematics at Goettingen doing?" - "Mathematics at Goettingen is no more."

This. As you read further, it becomes more and more obvious that God created a whole crapload of people besides Adam and Eve. The very next thing Cain does after killing Abel is he builds a city. Not an outpost, not a village, not a town, but a frigging city. Who the hell for? The Godless savages, who were there all along, but not important enough to be mentioned by name or otherwise. Again, as ImWithBrilliant implies, scribes weren't pervs, they just concentrated on the protagonists and didn't give a crap about "others".

Please read this entire post before commenting. The last part is especially important.

Modern discussions of Religion and Science are dominated by the 19th Century idea that the two are in conflict. This idea was created by two men, Draper and White, in two respective books they wrote. Those books had a powerful influence on the Culture, though their specific ideas were lost to a more basic Truism that Science and Religion are opposites. These books were themselves however based on faulty Historical analysis, and in many cases outright falsehood.

Modern Historians, as well as most Academics, have abandoned the Conflict Thesis, but due to its prevalence, as well as the resurgent Arguments made by the "New Atheism", which really just resurrects the 19th Century Freethought movement and the ideas of early 20th Century thinkers like Bertrand Russell, we've been conditioned to accept terms which aren't always True in this debate.

One such is that Faith is Fragile, and tests of Faith must be avoided. Says who? No the Bible, which Christians believe in.

Then again, Faith itself is often vilified, and is understood as the opposite of Reason. It's often defined in these debates as belief without evidence. However, this isn't what Faith has meant Historically nor is it what most Christians use the word to mean. Faith is actually another word for Trust, and often is built from Evidence.

Basically, to have Faith in God is not to believe in God's existence even though you have no evidence for it, and otherwise you got to Hell, rather, Faith is Trust in God's promises to you based on what he has already done both in your Life, and by the Finished work of Christ on the Cross.

That is how most Christians understand what Faith is, in terms of what Christians ask others to do or when speaking of their own commitment to their Faith.

It should also be noted that Evolution is not itself incompatible with Christianity. It's not like you must choose, between being a Christian and believing in Evolution, as plenty of Christians accept Evolutionary Theory.

I don't think this article on Intelligent Design accurately represents those who want it taught in Schools. I have spoken to proponents of Intelligent Design, and while it is True that some do see Evolution as a way of replacing God, they don't see it as a Test of Faith. Rather, those who understand it as a threat to Christian Faith do so based on the idea that Evolution is necessarily godless, or at least that the Schools will teach only a godless version of it and insist that God does not exist. That isn't the same kind of concern as Evolution leading one away from Faith.

There are also proponents of ID who don't so much think Evolution will lead to Atheism, but simply note that if you teach ID, you must acknowledge a Creator and thus make it easier to introduce God to people by using that as an example. In that sense, Intelligent Design is a sort of Missionary idea, which paves the way for acceptance of Christianity by acknowledging God exists. Thus, rather than Evolution being explicitly Atheistic, its more about Evolution being compatible with Atheism.

However, the majority of Intelligent Design proponents don't think either way. Most simply think Intelligent Design is True. They want it Taught because thy believe in it.

That may be hard for people to understand who are adamant that ID is Religion and not Science and hide behind the idea of Science and Religion as totally alien to each other, and who need an excuse to explain how Religious people think and why they'd deny the obvious Facts of Science. It ties into teh idea of Faith as belief without evidence and the hinge on which Religion, especially Christianity, hangs. But, is it an hindmost assessment?

While I accept Evolutionary Theory, I can't say that those who don't accept it are simply ignoring the evidence or choosing Faith over Science. Many use to believe in Evolution, and now don’t because of evidence and questions they had. Many more may have ch

"It is a popular--and recent--misconception that faith and reasoning are incompatible. Many, if not most, of the great minds of the ages were believers in God or in other forms of religion. The idea that religious people are necessarily irrational fools is simply a lie; there are plenty of both religious and atheistic people who are irrational fools."

You appear to differentiate between religious and atheistic people. That's not always the case. Classical Buddhism is a famous example of an atheistic religion, although in popular versions of the religion Buddha is transformed into some sort of demigod. Some animistic religions could also be considered atheistic ("godless" or creator-less) if the believers consider supernatural beings as simply immortal essences, different but not superior to humans.

US and coalition forces have been responsible for only a minor percentage of civilian deaths in these conflicts. Most of the civilian deaths are a result of terrorist attacks or various forms of internecine warfare, such as the tribal and faction based warfare in Iraq. So, I don't think you've got a good understanding of that either.

That's still the fault of the coalition. Iraq, while a somewhat brutal dictatorship, was stable before the invasion. Most people lived relatively normal, peaceful lives. We went in guns blazing but with no plan and created an environment where factions could fight each other and most people's lives were worse.

While I'm not arguing that eventually Iraq may be better off with democracy, it's our fault that the transition has been so bloody.

The more general problem of Islamic extremism won't be going away soon.

Why do you think they want to attack us? It isn't because they hate our way of life. I mean, they do, but not enough to go jihad over it. They would be fine letting us live our godless immoral lives if only we didn't keep messing with them and the countries they live in.

I'm not sure why this is so hard to understand. They keep telling us that is the reason in plain language.

I'm a godless heathan Communist you insensitive Capitalist pig!

Sell me another one on how me spending a measly $400-500 is gonna save the economy!

If you accept that the bible is literal truth, and most Christians do or at least claim to[...]

This is where the argument starts to fall to pieces. For example the Catholic church officially rejects a completely literal interpretation of Genesis. They are by far the most common form of Christian.

[..]Commits wonton acts of violence and destruction for the smallest of perceived slights. Commits genocide, repeatedly, sometimes on a global scale. Sends bears to maul and kill children for calling a prophet an old bald man. Endorses the rape of women and the sexual slavery of children. Its all laid out in plain and simple terms throughout the text.

There are two very heretical concepts that are never-the-less logical that might shed some light here:

Firstly, the bible is a human document written by people not above painting themselves in a better light, and secondly (even if we ignore the first), attempting to apply our culture and morality to a (by their own admission) rebellious tribe of fairly primitive Jews is a fairly strange thing to do. The second is less heretical and is used by most apologists. If you do look into it, you might find that your "evil god" concept isn't quite supported by available evidence. It is not my job, however to be an apologist, so if you do or not, that is up to you. The first will get you shouted down for an evil godless heretic, but hey, what can you do?

It is now.

The original motto was "E pluribus unum," meaning 'Out of many, one.' It refered to the union both of states coming together into the United States, and of disparate groups of people joining for their collective good. It's still on the great seal and a lot of other formal government things.

In the 50s, during the big communism scare, that old motto was looking dangerously socialst - collective identity was a very dangerous concept at the time. People coming together was seen as one step short of communism, so congress passed a law in 1956 changing the motto to "In God we Trust," meaning 'Fuck off godless commies.'

1. Incorrect, so long as it kills less people it will be fine.

Have you met many people or seen them on TV? You are correct in that it will be better if it kills less people than cars with drivers. However, that isn't how the unwashed masses will see it. It also isn't how the media will present it either. The media will have headlines like "robot car plows through crosswalk, kills 2 - where are the three laws now?" Joe Sixpack (as in beer; not as in abs) who can't afford a driverless car will rant about those damn 1 percenters and their godless death cars. The earlier statement about them being made illegal in all 50 states is closer to the truth.

And let's face it... this particular shitstorm was "flying during Ramadan, while looking like a brown-skinned Godless fur'ner".

Yes. I was a hired mercenary for the dark ubergovernment of illuminati jews involved in countless illegal wars to advance the agenda of... i forget who. they gave us this big briefing and explained it all but they lost me when they started talking about how the CIA / Kennedys was trying to kill all the Christians AND topple the Godless regimes too. The intro video was good though.

Anywho... on the topic of military equipment and its use in advancing my jew banker / ubergovernment christian / corpotocracy / and communist new world order (which is tricky, as you can imagine) I would think my opinion SHOULD carry a little bit of weight. More so than say... yet another batshit insane conspiracy theorist or arctic policy expert. At least as it pertains to the ground soldier.

The "proper authority" wording really catches at me. Authority doesn't mean that you know everything; it just means that you were in the right place at the right time with sufficient credentials to have power.

What he could have said there is, "In my low-level position I didn't have the perspective to see what damage this might cause, and should not have overriden the authority of those in a position to take a broader perspective." It's written so that people could come away thinking that's what he did say, but it clearly doesn't. Instead, he's saying exactly what you said: "I had no power to change things. I'd hoped the leaks would give me some, but they didn't. The power structure remains in place."

What I don't understand is, just who is this addressed to? Surely he doesn't expect the sentencing judge to be fooled by this non-apology into granting leniency. Could it just be a thinly coded message, telling the people who support him that there's still a lot of work to do, dressed up as an "apology" so that it would get press coverage?

Actually, if the quotes are exact, what really bothers me is the way they read.

My dad was obsessed with brainwashing. 1984, Communism, the whole Cold War terror. Which, ironically, even though the Satan-led Godless Commies were going to come in and force us to all Love Big Brother managed to get by just fine without "enemy combatants" or citizens who effectively became non-citizens the minute they left US soil.

So he collected books on brainwashing. And the stilted wording of the "confessions" of the brainwashed in those books were rife with phrasings like those attributed to Manning.

In fact, that is probably why you don't hear too much about brainwashing any more. Essentially brainwashing was the process of brutalizing someone into a psychotic state where they'd parrot out "the truth". But only the most credulous would believe the wooden delivery or unnatural tone of these confessions. As propaganda, brainwashing sucked. And that's all most brainwashing was ever used for, since it didn't actually cause anyone to truly "love Big Brother". It didn't re-shape them to be happy supporters of Communism and its ideals. It just produced automatons whose sole utility was to act as automatons speaking the words that were forced into their heads.

that was added due to the cold war, so we could have smug superiority over godless commies.

Its hard to even write that with a straight face