They still go after the left on abortion and gay rights, including attacking Obama. Reading the article is like reading something from the Huffington Post. I get the importance of the Food Stamp program. I get the value of Unemployment Benefits, but they present it in such a way as if there are no alternatives. It is what it is, don't question, just agree and expand the programs. God forbid these type of articles don't argue pro growth initiatives.

Yesterday, Obama is in Disney World. He now presents a program to speed up tourist visas, especially targeting Chinese and Brazilians, because they have money, and are traveling in significant numbers. This is fucking incompetence on Obama's part. The visa problem has been around for years, and now he is going to address it. Shit, I mentioned this problem back on 10/25/11. Countries have complained about the process. We lose over $15B a year in tourist revenue. Gee, would that create new jobs. Is Obama a food stamp President. He sure the hell isn't a pro growth President.

I was raised Catholic. The only time I'm in Church these days are for weddings and funerals. Do you know the only thing Catholics are good for? Football! Catholic high schools are like factories, and they generate a lot of money.

That's gotta smart!!!  

It's not really a big deal. I'm Catholic and I can't say there is much if any advice I take from the Catholic church.

Most by far in the rank and file of the Catholic church pay little or no attention regarding birth control, education even abortion. The subjects are seldom discussed and little is said at church on them. The few times a Priest has lectured on one of the hot button issues several left including me.

I was once asked by one of the priest why I walked out in the middle of the service. I said I occasionally came to church for religious instruction, not political. Considering the Church lied about Mary Magdalene, was wrong on the Spanish Inquisition up to their neck in the Nazi underground railroad and tried to bury the Priest molesting I considered them barley adequate to give basic bible instruction.

I haven't been asked to be a Deacon, but they still ask for money.

letters and contrived messages that have come out of the Bishops and the Church offices for many, many years.

Many people are like me.  We follow the Catholic faith but want nothing to do with the Catholic Church.  I could give a rat's ass what they think about any politician.

For some reason, people think as the church as conservative.  While it has taken conservative positions on sexual matters, in almost all other matters it is very liberal. Anti-death penalty, supports programs for poor, etc.  Many of my friends teach a Catholic schools and people are always amazed at how liberal the positions are.

Hey, in an era of politcal correctness, many Catholic schools no longer have a Christmas party or an Easter break. They have a Holiday Party and a Spring Break.

That said, I love the fact that Holder and the Dems have called for an honest debate, but every time someone says something it is "code" for racist tendencies.

Maybe people think being on the dole isn't good for anyone. But if you say "food stamp" you really mean Negros.  Gingrich called Juan WIlliams by his first name and Chris Matthews saw it as a hidden code for racism. It is impossible that Santorum really believes people would be better of earning rather than on welfare.  He has to be a secret racist for suggesting that.

Even when conservative try to talk about things that are not racial per se, they are hidden codes that everyone knows are racists, at least according to Chris Matthews and kin.

Posted By: mattradd

That's gotta smart!!!  

even when the conversation is with a "righty", lol

I've given up trying to talk with Phil about religion, it's like talking to Willy about economics.

IMO there is enough endimically wrong with the Catholic Church to slap the label of "evil" on them. The amount of evil that the Church has either tacitly or overtly suppoerted over a period of several centuries, and continues to do today is just mindboggling. Feel free to defend the indefensible, but the Catholic Church's "Sins" are beyond redemption or migigation IMO.

I honestly cannot think of an enitity that is responsible for more pain and suffering than the Catholic Church, and this includes Hitler, Stalin, Pol Pot, et al as their evil was limited to a single lifetime, whereas the evils the Catholic Church has committed spans centuries.

has any business trying to preach ethics or morality.

This "church" thinks itself more important than the welfare of children and has broken so many of Gods laws in the name of vanity it is disgusting!!

Like so many "churches", they think the institution is more important than the word they are supposed to preach.

If the church has no authority to preach ethics or morality, why do Black churches have such an active role in politics.

Indeed, six days ago we celebrated the birthday of a person who became an American hero because he preached from his church his views of what the laws should be.

The REV. MLK got his moral authority from his pulpit and he changed the US. He didn't get it from his Ph.D. as a "doctor."

Of course, you must objection to the the religious basis of the anti-slavery movement.

Come On!! I thought it was obvious!!!

The point of the Catholic Church is they have systematically had a pattern of protecting child molesters. It is not the fact that they are a church as to why they can not preach it, it is because they have NO CREDIBILITY in the area of morality. Simple enough?

I am just AMAZED you could not pick up on that....

Because some people in an orginazation do bad things and some others cover for them, that means that the entire organziation is forever barred from commenting on political and social issues?  I am sorry, I just can't see it.

The church takes a very liberal position of capital punishment.  Are they forever barred from expressing views on that subject?

Stalin probably killed twice as many people in his life time as the history of the church, just because of the numbers in population growth and advances in technology of killing.  

And Stalin wasn't limited in evil to his life time.  He created an empire that enslaved about 400,000,000 for seventy years, so that Russia, Poland, and the rest are still reeling under the scars of history.  He also helped as a mid-wife to Communist China which killed another 20 to 40 million and enslaved a billion for 40 years.  Not to mention his influence of Pol Pot and a dozen other murderous tyrants.  He had evil influence as far as Afghanastan, S. Korea, etc.

As to the Church, I am not defending the wrongs of the past centuries.  I will just say the world was a cruel place in every corner.  

But the church also created hospitals and universities that educated lay people for hundreds of years.  It educacted millions of non-Catholics for next to nothing, inlcuding many Blacks in shit public schools.  Itprovided the best hospitals in many areas.  (My father was a Jewish doctor on the staff of 2 Catholic hospitals.  He and every other Jewish doctor I ever met said the Catholic hospitals were the best in L.A. Far better than Ceders.)

Shall we talk art?

"Nobody expects the Spanish Inquisition!"

Just on population alone, they killed a tiny percent.  One estimate is the total number "processed" by the Inquisition is 150,000.  With 2 to 4 million under Pol Pot,  we got a way to go.  And Pottie was a amature compared to the 20s of millions of Mao, Stalin, & Co.

Also, do you really have to go back 500 years.  ( know it dribbled on until the mid-1800's, but the numbers were so small, it is di minimus.  Can't resist my favorite Limmerick "There was a young flasher named Rex, who was quite deficient at sex. When arraigned for exposure, he said with composure, 'Di minimus non curat lex.'" Sorry.)

As I say, at that time the world was cruel.  The Moslems had over run Europe a little while before, slavery was a universal institution. Aztecs were capturing Toltecs and making them slaves, ripping out their hearts for holiday treats.  No group on the face of the earth was "enlightened" as we know it today.

Hey, I am ashamed of things I did 4 years ago.  Let's say the statute of limitations runs on things that are over 250 years old.

oh yes. that makes a lotta fucking sense comparing the Pope and the Catholic Church to Hitler and the Nazis and Stalin and his fucking commie purges ROFLMFAO!!!!!