Remember the "Ayatollah" Fallwell when he said something like how the

"Divine powers that be" allowed the reelection of Bill Clinton as penance for the "transgressions" or "sins" of America. If Bill Clinton is a :spank: or punishment, it kind of made you wonder what Bush is and what the Americans did to deserve him, except maybe (dare I say it) inflict "reality shows" on the rest of the world and be more concerned with "who got voted off the damn island" in Survivor than who got voted into the White House as their new President.

I've never been able to look at the religious right leaders (although I am a born again Christian) without having my skin crawl, after reading "The Best Democracy Money Can Buy" (Greg Palast). The image that does not leave my mind is Pat Robertson buying planes with Operation Blessing money and then claiming they weren't fit for hauling food to Africans who were starving & using them instead to fly in mining equipment. The native born miners, who had deeds to the land, were ordered off their property after the government "privatized" (read:stole) the land from them. Not all would leave, so the US business had the houses bulldozed anyway and miners were buried alive. "American Dynasty" (Kevin Phillips) drew connections between this crime and Bush, Sr.

So, while I agree, we the public are drunk with entertainment-- the reality of what our elected officials have done in the world (Panama, Chile, Haiti, S. Africa, Nicaragua, and many, many atrocities) surely sets us up to be deserving of a far larger whirlwind than we are reaping at the moment. I believe in democracy. I believe in America-the-idea. But, when I hear "evil" bandied about by such perpetrators... what we've inflicted is not invisible to the rest of the world. And it's not invisible to Falwell et al. And it's not invisible to God.

These recent images are horrible-- but they are not an aberration. We have left mass graves in so many countries-- bulldozed whole neighborhoods in Panama-- they're still recovering bodies there for proper burials.

Sorry for the speech. Just a heavy heart tonight & the idea that "reality shows" were the "sin" we'd inflicted on the rest of the world just makes me sad-- you know, I think that movie line is true of us--we "can't handle the truth".

peace.

Kinda makes me want to go find Pat Robertson and club him in the head.

These people deserve the worst that life can give them.

Korans.

Stop in the Wisconsin State forum when you can!
:hi:

BUSH rather than a PRESIDENT ALBERT "I WILL FIGHT FOR YOU" GORE, because of the evils of POLITICAL APATHY and COMPLACENCY, for I had read that at least 100 million people didn't bother to vote.

The sad or :cry: or :( thing about this election is probably that many more may think "why should I bother voting anyways, for all politicians are different assholes filled with the same crap, and my vote won't count for anything anyways."