Conservatives, Religion and the First Amendment -

Rick Santorum recently said he felt "like throwing up" when he heard a speech where John Kennedy stated his commitment to the principle of maintaining a rigid wall between religious belief's and politics. He went on to say he doesn't believe the separation of church and state is absolute, and apparently that is not an uncommon view among religious conservatives.

Santorum is one of the candidates prone to talk about the Constitution being right up there with the Bible as holy text.   It makes me wonder if he ever really uses either document for anything other than to provide support for his personal ambitions.

When the 13 colonies got together to draft a constitution first they drafted the body of the Constitution which addresses the organization of the Federal Government and divided up the powers between the State governments and the Federal Government.  Then, specifically to protect individual liberty from the powers of the State, they drafted the 10 amendments.  The very first amendment addressed religion, saying the Government shall neither establish, or interfere with a religion.  The 13 colonies were largely populated by people and their descendants who had fled Europe to a remote, wild and dangerous continent to escape governments that used Religion to coerce behavior.  The basic goal of the first amendment's religion clauses was to insure freedom from religion enforced by the state.

When you look at political issues with religious overtones that are prominent today, religion isn't the victim.  What you find are religious conservatives trying to use the power of the state to coerce women into not having abortions.  Or trying to use the power of the Government to deny gay citizens rights that are available to all other citizens, like the right to serve in the military, or legally form a couple for a partnership in life.

It seems like some religious conservatives are so committed to their beliefs they can't tolerate the notion the constitution forbids using government to impose their beliefs on others.  Which is really odd when they profess to be Christians, since the Constitution is entirely consistent with what Jesus taught.

Jesus recognized there were laws of man, that we enact to run our own affairs among one another, and laws of god.  What made him a revolutionary in his day was that he preached a strict segregation between the two.  In Jewish law God's law was to be enforced by men, Jesus's message was that sin was an issue between the individual and God.   Unfortunately this was so revolutionary he had to choose his words carefully to avoid arrest, so you actually have to read his words and think about their implications.  Think about John 1:3 where the officials of the Temple brought a women caught in adultery to Jesus.  They sought to get Jesus to say something that would be heretic so they could arrest him.  They confronted him and said the law of Moses says the women should be stoned to death, so what did he say.  He avoided arrest but made clear his point, not by saying Moses was wrong, but by saying why Moses was wrong.  He told them that whoever had never sinned should cast the first stone.

2000 years later we still have candidates for President (and Religious leaders) loudly proclaiming to be Christians who have not grasped the distinction between mans law and gods law that is enshrined in the 1st Amendment to the US Constitution.  They are, like the Temple officials who confronted Jesus, still trying to usurp Gods power to judge that people are committing sin and use the power of the state to coerce what they deem to be right behavior.

Faith

We are hearing a lot of talk about Faith this election season.

Faith is necessary to allow us to make decisions about our life in matters where there is a lack of definitive factual data.   We often have to rely on faith to make decisions because some things are unknown or unknowable.  The exact nature of God is a big unknowable.  But whatever Gods exact nature, we are endowed with a brain and I think it is because we are supposed to use it.

Unfortunately, for many people these days it seems like "Faith" has become an excuse to ignore data, or as a shortcut to avoid thinking about complex issues, or disturbing their preconceived notions.

Some facts pertinent to Drug Policy

Facts selected from an article in the Economist, June 4, 2011. pp  70-71, which was reviewing the findings of the Global Commission on Drug Policy, a group that includes the ex-presidents of Mexico, Brazil, Columbia and Switzerland as well as officials from the UN and some former US officials.  The findings called for deregulation of all drugs and experiments with legalization of drugs, begining with cannibis.

Findings - for the period from 1998 to 2008 drug consumption continues to rise throughout the world.  The US Federal Government spent $15 billion in 2010 on drug control, another $25 billion on other public spending related to drug control.  Campaigns to drive Narcos out of one country just drive them into another.

Giving out clean needles reduces greatly reduces the incidence of HIV (comparing countries with clean needle programs with those without such programs).  Switzerland and the Netherlands have demonstrated that prescribing heroin to to addicts reduces the total number of addicts as it cuts the tie between pushers trying to get people hooked on drugs and casual customers.   Decriminlaizing cannibis in in Western Australia and Portugul  had no effect on consumption but saved lots of money, and when England tried it for a few years, consumption dropped.  A study looking at different states in the US found no link between the level of enforcement and number of drug users.