The Fork in the Road.

Perhaps Representative Pence thinks defining marriage and building a greater culture surrounding it in America will stave off cohabilitation and divorce, to say nothing of homosexuality, incest, polygamy, and bestiality. On the other hand, I do not doubt for a single instant that Pence is alarmed by the fiendish rhetoric coming out of Iranian President Mahmoud “Show me the Mahdi” Ahmadinejad’s mouth.:

http://www.globalsecurity.org/wmd/library/news/iran/2005/iran-050918-irna02.htm

President Armageddon—my personal nickname for Ahmadinejad—wants both Israel and the United States wiped off the map. He has denied the Holocaust and approved a dress code designed to segregate Iranian Jews from the rest of the Iranian population—which, VERY fortunately for us, seriously dislikes the ayatollahs, as evident national security hawk Kenneth R. Timmerman argues in “Countdown to Crisis: The Coming Nuclear Showdown with Iran.” The most alarming aspect of Ahmadinejad’s genocidal machinations—and my primary reason for referring to him as President Armageddon—is a conviction that acquiring nuclear weapons to wipe Israel completely from the Middle East is the first step in ushering in an age of apocalyptic Shiite tyranny in the form of a totalitarian caliphate commanded by the Islamic messiah, known in Islam generally as the Mahdi and in Shiism specifically as the Twelfth Imam. To reinforce this conviction, Ahmadinejad has prayed for Allah to hasten the Mahdi’s emergence at the past TWO meetings of the United Nations General Assembly and allocated the Iranian equivalent of $17 million toward the renovation of the Jamkaran Mosque, the mosque designated to be the Mahdi’s reappearance site. (To perhaps inject a certain humor into this nightmare, Charles Krauthammer admonished us in a column written 11 months ago to “pity the Democrats. They cannot catch a break” since Ahmadinejad believes that the Mahdi will appear, as of today, within the next year… in other words, before the 2008 presidential election.):

http://www.townhall.com/columnists/CharlesKrauthammer/2005/12/16/iraqs_not-so-good_neighbor
http://www.frontpagemag.com/Articles/ReadArticle.asp?ID=23425

At this point, the threat from “American theocracy” is theoretical… as my puzzlement as to what denomination of Christianity would be imposed would indicate. Evangelicalism, United Methodism, Southern Baptism, Anglicanism, or Roman Catholicism? That said, the threat from a nuclear-armed Iranian theocracy is real… as the brutalization, imprisonment, and murder of dissenting Iranian people in the name of Allah make painfully manifest. I seriously doubt I need to imagine the reaction of the media if President Bush tried all of that here. Given this context, I am thoroughly curious about the potential effects of your professed agnosticism on the policies you would pursue regarding the messianic mullah cadre of Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad… assuming, of course, that Iran doesn’t acquire a nuclear weapon and use it against us within that time period.

Dear Mr Smith,I have just read your comments on Mr Pence.I am very surprised to read that you consider yourself a republican or a libraterian either for that matter. If you read the Constitution (the origanal that is not the revamped version) you will come to realize that the United States of America was founded on the word of God not on opions. The very fact that that the U.S.A. was strong and respected world wide when we honored God and followed the way Christ led should be enough to make you think about today. Now everyone wants individual rights and does`t care if they take away the rights of others. That is why we have to be goverened with everyone having equal rights meaning of the people, by the people,for the people. We do not have the right to destroy what we have not created to begin with. That means life. If you doubt that Jehovah is the creator then when you can make dirt call me. It is the lack of understanding the word of God that you don`t know the truth so I suggest that you look back in history and see that God blessed this country and the more you kick Him out, the less you can expect from the results of mans design for the world. Please reconsider the direction you`re heading in, for it will surely take us back to the times of tierney that our fore fathers fought so hard against so we could have the freedom we have now.If everyone follows the same laws,peace is kept.Let us do what is natural and leave the unnatural to science fiction. Sincerly Stephen Kloss, Indianapolis, Indiana.

CAcorn4,

You seem to have suggested that homosexuality is akin to incest, polygamy, and bestiality – then somehow suggest that Rep. Pence’s social conservatism is all OK because he recognizes the threat posed by Iranian President Ahmadinejad.

I find your first premise offensive, and the second assumption irrelevant.

For CAcorn4 and Mr. Kloss, there are plenty of Republican candidates who will come closer to your views. I enjoy hearing different points of view, but you may find a more receptive audience at the sites for Bill Frist, Sam Brownback, or Newt Gingrich.

Michael, sorry for the following rant.

Mr. Kloss, I’d REALLY like to see this supposed original version of the Constitution, not that it matters.

The Constitution of the United States of America, the one that is ratified and actually counts, does not mention God, not once. We are not a Theocracy. The Government is not our Moral Compass (thank God or whomever you choose for that!).

The Constitution also doesn’t mention the word Democracy anywhere, because we are not one. We are a democratically elected Republic. It is unconstitutional for the majority of the population to impose it’s will and/or religion on the minority. I for one would like to keep it that way. You should too. It doesn’t take much imagination to visualize a future with a minority population of Diety Worshippers. Perhaps religion in all forms could become viewed as a subversive breeding ground of malcontents and be taxed, regulated, and restricted into oblivion by the majority? Freedom of religion must be protected.

The government shouldn’t have it’s fingers in any form of Marriage, straight or otherwise. Marriage is between two people and their God, or just between themselves. How silly is it that they have convinced us that some authority (human, spiritual, corrupt, or all) must give us permission and a license to make a commitment to another person. Maybe they should hand out child bearing licenses too? How about required genetic checks before breeding is allowed to end birth defects and disease? Maybe parents that get divorced or have disabled children should be charged with abuse because of the anguish they have caused their offspring? Why stop there? Forced interbreeding between the races of humanity would help wipe out racism and increase the effective size of the world’s gene pool. Sound shocking? It should; it’s a horrific invasion of privacy. Unfortunately, it’s a possible future if we continue to support a government that insists on interfering in our morality and personal lives.

Civil marriage licenses are an invention of the state. According to some Biblical scripture God created Marriage. Are you saying that He needs permission from a government to make it official Mr. Kloss?

I strongly suggest relocating to a Theocratic state if this is your idea of government. Good luck speaking your mind though. Try Egypt they’re pretty lenient with infidels and blasphemers. The sentence would probably only be a few months long.

Get religion out of government. Separation of Church and State. Period.

CAcorn4, There is only one way to deal with a rogue nuclear power. If they attack (and we should allow them the first move) we remove them from the planet, preferably from afar. I realize this wouldn’t be allowed by the world community, but it really is the only way. Iraq should be enough evidence to show that reform isn’t much of an option in a rogue state, and they weren’t even a real Theocracy.

Weird