Literal Interpretation

Is there a relationship between reading the Bible literally and your IQ?

Questions for John McCain

For everyone out there who believes voting for a Republican is a vote for conservatism, here are some questions George Will has for John McCain. Let's hope they get answered at some point.

After reading through the questions, it becomes clear that between Obama and McCain's foreign policy, Obama clearly holds more conservative principles. It's no wonder Ron Paul is attracted to Obama's foreign policy.

The Imperial Presidency

At it's inception, the President was to maintain a low-profile and stay out of the public light. The role of the President was simply to uphold the laws of the land and to veto laws where Congress had surpassed their constitutional powers. Unfortunately, this has changed quite dramatically over time.

Gene Healy from the CATO institute writes the feature article for Reason Magazine on how far the role of the presidency has changed from what was intended by the founders. It is definately worth the read. Here is a bit:

Today Americans expect their president to pound Teddy Roosevelt’s “bully
pulpit,” whipping the electorate into a frenzy to harness power against
perceived threats. But the Framers viewed that sort of behavior as fundamentally
illegitimate. In fact, the president wasn’t even supposed to be a popular
leader. As presidential scholar Jeffrey K. Tulis has pointed out, in the
Federalist the term leader is nearly always used pejoratively; the essays by
Madison, Alexander Hamilton, and John Jay in defense of the Constitution begin
and end with warnings about the perils of populist leadership. The first
Federalist warns of “men who have overturned the liberties of republics” by
“paying obsequious court to the people, commencing demagogues and ending
tyrants,” and the last Federalist raises the specter of a “military despotism”
orchestrated by “a victorious demagogue.

The Deep Contradictions of Christian Pop Culture

I've tried to limit the number of books I'm going to get for summer reading, but I think I just found another - Rapture Ready by Dan Radosh.

The following is part of Slate's review of the book:

At a Christian retail show Radosh attends, there are rip-off trinkets of
every kind - a Christian version of My Little Pony and the mood ring.
There are Christian raves and Christian rappers and Christian techno, which is
somehow more Christian even though there are no words. There are Christian
comedians who put on a Christian version of Punk'd, called Prank
3:16.

At some point, Radosh asks the obvious question: Didn't Jesus chase
the money changers out of the temple? In other words, isn't there
something wrong with commercializing all aspects of faith?

What does commercializing do to the substance of belief? and what does an
infusion of belief do to the product? When you make a loving Christ sound
just like loving your boyfriend, you can do damage to both your faith and your
ballad.

Its always been a stretch to defend Christian pop culture as the path to
eternal salvation. Now, they may have to face up to the fact that it's
more like an eternal oxymoron.

Thank-you. Someone had to say it.

Dropping Babies

I don't think I would ever do this with my kids.