>> ^westy:
Is this woman stupid , oh yes she is. like she cannot see the point of the constatutoin and the atheist guy points out exactly the point of it with the black issue just because 90% of yanks r honky's dose not mean that permits people to be racist.
how can sumone not get something thats spelt out and made so clear its like me pionting to a table and calling it a table then the news reporter smacktard woman is like nooo noo its a beach.


What's a 'constatutoin'?

>> ^charliem:
Shes way smarter than she lets on.
She is actually a constitutional lawyer herself, after watching the vids of her argue law against billo' and call him out for being the idiot that he is, you can tell shes just pushing the party line in this one.

Strictly speaking, she doesn't say much that absolutely violates the understanding of the Constitution as articulated by the Supreme Court. She's definitely pushing the party line on this one, but she's very cagey. She very carefully avoids statements that violate any Supreme Court rulings. But she does so in a way that 1) makes it seem like she's attacking the idea that "Under God" is acceptable, and 2) obscure her actual viewpoint.

So I more or less agree with you. I just want to make it clear that she doesn't actually lie.

Tags for this video have been changed from 'atheist, michael, newdow, FOX, establishment clause, pledge, constitution' to 'atheist, under god, newdow, FOX, establishment clause, pledge, allegiance, constitution' - edited by jwray

Tags for this video have been changed from 'atheist, michael, newdow, FOX, establishment clause, constitution' to 'atheist, michael, newdow, FOX, establishment clause, pledge, constitution' - edited by jwray

>> ^gorillaman:
Much more troubling that children are forced to swear allegiance to the state than who the state's cuddly cartoon mascot happens to be.


That's what I was thinking. Maybe it's not more troubling, but it is certainly also troubling. And I can't believe there is a school sending the conservatives out of the classroom! Good for them! Yeah, it's Vermont, but still...

Oh, and it is always troubling to see such a beautiful woman compromising her intelligence to argue the wrong side such as this. If she was "playing devil's advocate" that would be alright, but clearly she is pandering to Fox's demographic. That's low moral character IMHO.

>> ^lv_hunter:
Why is it people still think we had "under god" in the pledge since the 1800s?

Because they're either ignorant or willfully deceptive.

With Fox News, it's always hard to tell.

>> ^imstellar28:
^thats not true jwray, a constitution only needs a single sentence:
"life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness"
name a single right that doesn't protect? human rights are really very simple...

It still depends upon who gets to interpret that constitution (in the supreme court) and the many different ways it will be interpreted by different people in specific cases. Nearly every case is a result of one person's liberty conflicting with another person's liberty, and who or what is to decide what kinds of liberty are more important and where to draw the line? "life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness" isn't enough to determine the outcomes of Eldred v. Ashcroft, Morse v. Frederick, or Newdow. All of those require weighing one kind of liberty against another.

States and local governments can run schools without any federal help, and they did in the past. Most public schools get only a small percentage of their funding from the federal government. Local boards of education are elected locally without much interference by the federal government.

As soon as any school takes so much as a penny from the federal mafia, they are forced to play by the feds' rules. And even if they don't, they are weighted down by edicts from on high, including the NCLB baloney. Local schools boards with electable positions? Sounds like more of the same-o. Compulsory state education means no ingenuity or merit for finding better ways to teach and learn; making sure everyone is doing the exact same thing even when it doesn't work. Schools should be like restaurants...with many trying to make it and the most successful doing so by offering something of measurable quality.

Show me competitive private services that can deliver your letters anywhere in the USA for 41 cents and I'll support your plan to scrap the USPS. There's nothing preventing Fedex and UPS from trying that right now, except that they can't do it that cheap.

Actually, the post office monopoly prevents FedEx and UPS from delivering any letter-sized envelope for the present rate or less; one of postal inspectors' major tasks is to make sure their monopoly is protected by spying on UPS and FedEx. You wouldn't have to disband the post office, just by ridding its artificial barrier I think it would die out on its own.

Your argument against the infrastructure and such has some merit, I'm sure it was used when FedEx got started. Yet here they are, competing with one of the world's largest government boondoggles. FedEx and UPS either turn a profit or die. The USPS, without any incentive to do better, loses BILLIONS of dollars every year. They would not last a year without the law.

This is the same congress that pays a chaplain tens of thousands of dollars a year to lead a prayer every time Congress is called in to session. This is the same congress that almost unanimously passed a condemnation of Newdow's legal attempt to restore the Pledge of Allegiance to its pre-1954 version (the Pledge didn't say "under God" before 1954). This is the same congress that funds Bush's OFBCI. The supreme court has been very clear that students can pray by themselves as much as they want on their own lunch break but official prayer-times when taxpayer-funded teachers entice students to pray are unconstitutional.

And these are things that truly offend you and depreciate the quality of your life? Freedom FROM religion is a gross distortion of the Founders' intent. Tyranny of the minority. I hate to say it like this, but atheism does not represent something "better" than religion. It doesn't offer any moral foundation or transmit societal values. That's why IMAO, there's never been a successful majority atheist society (I'm aware of). I write this as a former atheist. I know what is to be gained by being free of superstition, but I also know society is extremely fragile, and will die without its delusions. If atheists succeed in "getting rid" of religion, life will be worse for them as well.

We're in far more danger of becoming a socialist state than a theocracy. It may happen peacefully and even "legally" if enough people are convinced (to their detriment) that socialism is the way to go.

Those aren't even mutually exclusive. Jesus Christ was a socialist. Jesus Christ gave all kinds of handouts to the poor and asked something in return. He asked people to give all they could to the church and the poor. That's a taxing-and-spending entitlement system. Huckabee, the Christian fundamentalist, was also in agreement with the Democrats on most economic issues. Iran, which is officially a Theocracy ruled by the Ayatollah, also heavily subsidizes the cost of food, which you might call Socialist.

Jesus gave handouts but did not take them from others by force beforehand. He asked people to give, but did not threaten or curse them for not doing so. Most importantly, Jesus did not ever say that government's role is providing the means to help the poor.

Despite its failures due to humans being imperfect, (moderately regulated) free market capitalism has done more to lift the poor out of poverty than any other system. And I'm speaking from near the bottom of the ladder, my friend. I know times is tight for you too right now...

In reply to this comment by jwray:

I come from an upper-middle-class liberal suburban place pronounced Missour-EE within a red state called Missour-UH in the United States of Jesus. My high school had a very high percentage of children of professors at Washington University, and if you added up all the jews, blacks, asians, and mixed people, that was probably over 50%. My mother hails from UCC, which is probably the second most welcoming and nondogmatic of sect of Christianity behind Unitarian Universalism (Barack Obama is in UCC). My father was a woowoo evangelical. Some of my recollections on the subject of religion during childhood are:

1. In third grade, some kid started going around asking everybody, with a dichotomous intonation, "Are you Catholic, or Christian"? I suspect he was an evangelical. I don't recall giving any reply, but even at the time I had doubts due to the lack of any fulfillment of prayer. I had grown to distrust all adults and authority figures as a reasonable extension of my discovery, as a five or six year old, of Santa Claus, the first thanksgiving, Pocahontas, and many other lies. I had also grown to suspect something was terribly rotten in our society due to the cruelty of many homophobic bullies who called me names that weren't even true and the teachers who didn't care. Because of my alienation, I was not inclined to presuppose that the majority opinion was more likely to be correct.

2. Around this time, my (divorced remarried noncustodial) father also took me to see a faith-healer. I don't recall what he was trying to cure me of. He attended some crackpot semirural megachurch, and his business was "no money down" real-estate, another religion.

3. Within two years afterward my father was involuntarily committed to a mental institution for schizophrenia because he believed he could communicate directly with the spirits of Joan of Arc, Jesus, and other saints, and they told him to fight demons by committing arson. He later said the charges were trumped-up and unsuccessfully tried to get out with a religious freedom argument.

4. Teachers from sixth through twelfth grade stressed the importance of critical thinking and incorporated it into the curriculum.

5. In seventh grade, I recall being asked of my religious affiliation, and replying that I was sitting on the fence between agnosticism and atheism. There was no retribution or suprise or stigma. I was already an outcast and had nothing socially to lose, anyway. About a year prior I first acquired persistent unsupervised access to the internet, which I have had ever since. In the following two years I did quite a lot of research online and debating in online bulletin boards. This drew me closer to atheism by gaining a greater understanding of physics, chemistry, biology, astronomy, geology, etc. In other words, a greater understanding of how the world came to be the way it is. However, I would still call myself a teapot-agnostic.

6. In high school, I found a clique of atheists and agnostics. Shortly after 9/11, when the Missouri legislature enacted a bill that compelled schools to recite the pledge of allegiance at least once a week, some of my classmates and I openly expressed our disapproval on the grounds of separation of church and state. No gasps were heard. This was long before the Newdow case. When the Bible As/In Literature was taught in English class, several of my classmates and I expressed our disapproval again on the same grounds. In classroom discussions on that book, I recall many viewpoints being expressed with no great gasps of shock. I, the nerd, said openly that I thought the bible was a collection of fairy tales, poems, and forgeries, while the big football jock next to me expressed a predilection for biblical literalism in not so many words. I recall a very hot semi-orthodox Jewish girl who told me she would only date Jews.

I agreed with, or even said openly online, much of what is contained in the God Delusion, before the book was published. I suspect some others have had similar experiences. Not every consensus is a flock.


The ID movement, and the fact that every single suicide hijacker/bomber is faith-based, and the loosening of taboos by (e.g.) the Daily Show, have probably been three of the most important factors that led to the books of Dawkins and Hitchens. In Dawkins' case, the ID movement alone may have been the most important factor because of his biological profession. Hitchens tends to write books extremely quickly (averaging a book a year for the past 24 years), and it's very plausible that he began writing his after, and because of, the success of The God Delusion.

Most nonatheist people's comments on the Sift about Dawkins accuse him of being too shrill. Accusing one's opponent of too much enthusiasm (stridency, shrillness) is irrelevant to the subject matter of the debate. I personally find nothing unpleasant about Dawkins' manner of speech except his affinity for hooptedoodle. His grotesque description of the god of the old testament is spot-on. A book only appears strident in relation to one's perception of orthodoxy, and neither the orthodoxy nor one's perception of orthodoxy are necessarily correct. Rather, debate the substance of the issue. Neither Dawkins nor any of his followers is advocating curtailing the religious freedom of believers, so his opponents have nothing to fear but the holes in their theories.

One Nation “Under God”
Questions & Answers

In 2002, the U.S. 9th Circuit Court of Appeals in California ruled 2-1 that public schools may not sponsor recitation of the Pledge of Allegiance, due to its religious content through the inclusion of the phrase "under God." This ruling sparked much comment in the media and was denounced by many political leaders. The U.S. Supreme Court later announced that it will hear
an appeal of the decision. The high court’s ruling is expected by late June or early July 2004.

Q. Why did the 9th Circuit Court rule the way it did?
A. The First Amendment to the U.S. Constitution mandates the separation of church and state. Under this time-tested arrangement, government is given no authority to meddle with religion or religious matters. The 9th Circuit Court of Appeals ruled that public school sponsorship of the Pledge furthers religion. Thus, the court declared the action unconstitutional. The court noted , "A profession that we are a nation 'under God' is identical…to a profession that we are a nation 'under Jesus,' a nation 'under Vishnu,' a nation 'under Zeus,' or a nation 'under no god,' because none of these professions can be neutral with respect of religion. The coercive effect of this policy is particularly pronounced in the school setting given the age and impressionability of schoolchildren, and their understanding that they are required to adhere to the norms set by their school, their teacher and their fellow students."

Q. Isn't this a radical ruling?
A. Not at all. The court simply applied the constitutional principle that government has no business promoting religion. Courts have been particularly vigilant when it comes to public schools. The U.S. Supreme Court has repeatedly ruled that religious instruction is up to parents, not government officials or public school personnel. Public schools serve children of many
different religious perspectives (and some who practice no religion at all). Thanks to the protections of the Constitution, students cannot be pressured to participate in prayer or other forms of worship at public schools. The appellate court's ruling on the Pledge is simply a logical continuation of that wise judicial precedent. Furthermore, the 9th Circuit judge who wrote the
opinion, Alfred Goodwin, could hardly be called a radical. He is a Presbyterian elder, a World War II combat veteran and was appointed to his position by President Richard M. Nixon.

Q. Did the court declare the Pledge of Allegiance unconstitutional?
A. No. The court ruled that public schools may not sponsor daily recitation of the current Pledge of Allegiance because of its religious content. If the Supreme Court upholds the 9th Circuit ruling, public schools could continue to recite the pre-1954 version. Americans United for Separation of Church and State

Q. What did the Pledge say before 1954?
A. Students used to end the Pledge, "one nation, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all." Despite the controversy surround the 9th Circuit's ruling, many Americans thought the Pledge was just fine as a patriotic ritual without religious references. After all, America survived the
Great Depression and won two world wars with a secular Pledge, and neither religious devotion nor patriotism suffered.

Q. How did "under God" get into the Pledge of Allegiance?
A. The Pledge of Allegiance was written in 1892 by Francis Bellamy, a Baptist minister. Bellamy crafted the Pledge for a magazine called The Youth's Companion as part of a patriotic exercise to mark the 400th anniversary of Columbus' voyage to the New World. Bellamy, who was an advocate of church-state separation, did not include religious references in his Pledge. In
1954, Congress inserted the phrase "under God" into the Pledge after a lobbying campaign led by the Knights of Columbus. This was during the McCarthy era, and the change was seen as a blow against "godless communism" in the Soviet Union.

Q. Does the ruling mean that public schools can no longer open the day by reciting the
Pledge of Allegiance?
A. The ruling currently affects only those states in the 9th Circuit -- California, Oregon, Washington, Nevada, Arizona, Idaho, Alaska and Hawaii and is currently on hold while the Supreme Court considers the matter. If the high court upholds the lower court ruling, it will apply that decision nationwide. Public schools would have to stop sponsoring recitation of the
Pledge or use the pre-1954 version.

Q. What's wrong with a generic reference to God in the Pledge? Who does it hurt?
A. The Pledge was a purely patriotic exercise until Congress in 1954 made it a patriotic and religious exercise. Millions of Americans who have no religious beliefs or who object to religious-political entanglement were alienated by that change. When it altered the Pledge, Congress sent the signal that in order to be a patriotic American, one must also be religious.
Many Americans disagree with this assertion. Not all religious people agree with so-called “generic” references to God. These references tend
to reflect Judeo-Christians understandings of God that may not be shared by Buddhists, Hindus and others. Other believers oppose phrases like “under God” because it is a form of watereddown spirituality. They note that religion has thrived in America due to the separation of church and state and do not want to violate that principle.

Q. Haven't some courts said that references to God in the Pledge are permissible because
they are ceremonial and don't really promote religion?
A. Some courts have said this and have even asserted that such usages are acceptable because they are merely "ceremonial deism" -- the practice of government co-opting generic religious Americans United for Separation of Church and State language for ceremonial purposes. Religious believers ought to be appalled by such statements. The phrase "under God" has obvious religious meanings. It is not drained of its religious
meaning merely because of frequent repetition. In addition, religion is not some prop designed to give heft to government functions. For believers, faith is to be taken seriously. It demeans religion to claim that phrases like "under God" are no longer religious because they have been so
frequently used by government.

Q. How have politicians reacted to this controversy?
A. Many overreacted. There were immediate calls to amend the Constitution, even through the Supreme Court has not issued its decision yet. Both houses of Congress have also passed resolutions condemning the 9th Circuit's ruling and expressing support for "under God" in the Pledge. Some political strategists have also recommended using the decision for partisan
purposes. President George W. Bush and his allies in the Senate said they would use the ruling to press for confirmation of Bush's judicial nominees.
Bush himself said that the decision shows that "we need common-sense judges who understand that our rights were derived from God. And those are the kinds of judges I intend to put on the bench." Bush's statement implies that he has a type of "religious test" in mind for judges, a violation of Article VI of the Constitution, which forbids religious tests for public office.

Q. What about Religious Right groups -- how did they react?
A. Several Religious Right groups used the controversy to raise money, foment hysteria and attack the separation of church and state. Many groups also hoped the ruling furthers their farright political agenda and urged President Bush to use the decision to argue for more judges who oppose church-state separation. TV preacher Jerry Falwell, for example, sent a message to his supporters telling them that he believes it is "time to go to war" over this issue. TV preacher Pat Robertson said the Pledge ruling may cause more terrorist attacks, concluding, "[I]f something much more terrible than
September 11th befalls our beloved nation, the answer to the question 'Where was God in all of this?' may well be 'He was excluded by the 9th Circuit.'" Ultra-conservative newspaper columnist Cal Thomas suggested that the Pledge ruling may have been even worse than the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks. Thomas wrote, "On the eve of our great national birthday party and in the
aftermath of Sept. 11...the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals in San Francisco has inflicted on this nation what many will conclude is a greater injury than that caused by the terrorists."

Q. What happens now?
A. The Supreme Court will issue its decision most likely by the end of June or early July. The high court could uphold the 9th Circuit’s decision or overturn it. The court could also dismiss the case and rule that the man who brought it, Michael Newdow, lacks “standing” (the right to sue)
because he does not have full custody of his daughter, a public school student who is exposed to Pledge in school.

Q. Could this case result in a tie ruling? What would happen then?
A. It is possible that the Supreme Court’s decision could be a 4-4 tie. Justice Antonin Scalia made public comments about the case in January of 2003. Justices are not supposed to pre-judge cases, and Scalia was asked to remove himself from the deliberations. He later recused himself from the case. If the court splits 4-4, the decision will still apply to the states in the 9th Circuit but will not be extended nationwide.

if you would like to learn more about religious liberty, please contact:
Americans United for Separation of Church and State
518 C Street N.E.
Washington, D.C. 20002
Phone: (202)466-3234 Fax: (202)466-2587
e-mail: americansunited@au.org
website: www.au.org

Some of the statements made in the video and the comments are classic anti-atheist bigotry.

The Jewish woman mentions the "obnoxious Michael Newdow" who went to the supreme court to protect his child's right to not be forced to adhere to someone else's religion. I wish it didn't have to be such a big deal, but that's how the system works. The supreme court is the only court with the authority to rule on cases of Constitutionality. You can bet these pricks would be showing up at court houses by the bus load if their children were required to say "one nation under Satan" in school.

Now I don't care if students say the pledge in school; I don't even care if they say "under god" in school; so long as they aren't forced to say it. We were sent to the principal's office in my elementary school if we didn't say the pledge. I don't understand why it's so hard for people to see that's ILLEGAL in a publicly-funded school.

This country exists because people who were forced to practice religion they did not believe fled their homes and founded it. As an American, is there anything more profane, more anti-American, than the desecration of the foremost ideal that our country is based on?

The fat little Jew then goes on to state that Europe is becoming Islamist and that the US isn't because Christians are strong and Atheists are weak. This is fucked up on so many levels. First, I've never heard anything about Europe becoming Islamic, but I'll assume that's true for the sake of argument. My first question is, why is that a bad thing? Sounds like intolerance to me. The rest of her statement... I don't even know what to say about it... it almost sounds like a threat. Perhaps she'd like to see a new Crusades. While Atheists may be the smallest of minorities, I think she's mistaken in thinking that all Judeo-Christians would support an extremist movement against us. Of the few theists I know, most of them are pretty disallusioned from the organized religions they were raised under. They'd stand up for what's right whether it had God's stamp of approval on it or not.

@cybrbeast: Your explanation of your beliefs would mark you as an Agnostic, not an Atheist. They are often lumped together, but they are quite different. An Atheist believes there is no God or Gods. An Agnostic believes that it's impossible to prove one way or another and, based upon that observation, makes no claim either way.