I'm a devout Christian and I am a proud Democrat

I would consider myself a devout Christian; a Baptist, with a strong Baptist heritage. My grandfather was a Baptist minister and probably had the most influence on my brand of Christianity. I was raised in the church and saved in 4^th grade. I have been a member of a Baptist church my whole life. I go to church as much as I can to hear the how to become a better Christian; to act more and more like Christ. I’m also a proud Democrat and enthusiastically vote for Democrats whenever I can (and that includes Hillary Clinton). I think my devout Christianity informs my embrace of the Democratic Party.

I want to address a few of the points that this article touches on by the so-called All-Star panel. There was a quote from Samuel Rodriguez saying he “will vote my Christian values. It’s life, the family ethos, it’s religious liberty, it’s limited government.”

First of all, how is limited government a Christian value? Don't remember Christ discussing this.

By life, I’m assuming he’s anti-abortion, because there is nothing else in the Republican platform that enhances the life of underserved and less fortunate born people. Republicans want to defund head-start, defund school free-lunch, remove all social services, and institute policies that only help the wealthiest and most powerful of American Capitalists. (As an aside, I don't think there is anything about Capitalism that jives with the Christianity described by Christ.) The care of life referred to is only extended to the unborn. The life of mothers, of poor children, of minorities are denied that care.

Who has the better family ethos between these two candidates? It’s not Trump, who has had several wives and once said that he would probably be dating his daughter… if she wasn’t his daughter. Anyway, this is obviously a reference to LGBT rights and what Republicans are considering the war on Biblical values. This is a difficult question to be sure, but Christ said in John's gospel that unbelievers will know us for our love and compassion, not for our hatred and oppression.

The USA is an amazing country. It is a country full of Christians and that’s a good thing. But we are not a Christian nation, thankfully. Whose brand of Christianity would be King? I sure don’t want this to be a Catholic nation and I’m sure Catholics don’t want this to be a Baptist nation. We believe very different things.

We are a nation born from the pursuit of religious freedom as a rejection of the Christian Kingdom of England. Our government is not formed, nor ruled by the Bible. It is a secular government that has a secular constitution guaranteeing the certain rights of its citizens, one of which is the separation of Church and State.

Religious liberty, in the context of Mr. Rodriguez’s quote, means the right to practice your religious beliefs without regards for the rights of those who don’t chose to practice like you. I couldn’t disagree more. My religious liberty means I can believe in God and meet with other like-minded Christians without fear of government reprisal or imprisonment. It does not mean that I can force people that work for me to adhere to my practices. It does not mean I can discriminate against a group of people whose life choices I disagree with, nor can those same people discriminate against me for being Baptist. The legislative bills that are passed across the Republican controlled legislatures in the guise of Religious Liberty are nothing more than legalized discrimination.

Franklin Graham was quoted as saying the Americans “have let progressives take God out of government.” I would argue that our founding fathers did that with the first amendment, and we are better for it.

SCOTUS rules that corporations have religious beliefs.

BREAKING NEWS!!!!!!!

Oklahoma City, OK - Hobby Lobby, buoyed by Monday’s landmark decision by a split Supreme Court which ruled that closely held corporations, whom employ more than half of the American workforce, can be exempted from regulations based on the religious beliefs of the corporation, has announced a new policy to be effective immediately. In a press release the Oklahoma City based craft retailer has announced the reassignment of all women in management positions to either cashier or night stocker if and only if there is at least one male under their leadership. The retailer said this would only affect a portion of the female workforce in general and only 984 of the 989 women in leadership roles. Based on figures obtained from the Bureau of Labor Statistics, men will now hold 7521 of the 7526 managerial positions.

“We’ve prayed about this move for some time now and yesterday’s victory has given us new hope for religious freedom,” said CEO David Green adding that they are also considering a move that will eliminate a co-ed workforce, only allowing women to work during specified female shifts. “This plan would prevent many of the problems associated with co-ed intermingling. What is a man to do but lust and be unproductive when a female coworker is immodestly or provocatively dressed?”

Some of the women effected by this latest decision

Osama bin Laden's Death

With the recent news of the attack on a compound in Pakistan and the subsequent death of terror-lord Osama bin Laden, there is much to think back on over the last ten years.  I know everyone over the age of probably 13 or 14 remembers where they were and what they were doing when bin Laden's master plan came to fruition.  Oh how that day changed us as a country forever and mostly for the worse.

At the outset, as President Obama mentioned in his speech last night, we came together like never before.  Republican, Democrat, Yankee, Southerner, whatever race, it didn't matter.  We all cried.  We were all emotionally destroyed.  We were all New Yorkers.  We were all American.

The whole world was American.

We soon realized that bin Laden and Al-Qaida were behind the attack and the whole world came together to attempt to bring these extremists to justice.  And that's where the warm-fuzzy feelings start to go away.  Instead of asking for sacrifice from Americans, then-president Bush told us to spend.  He could

Extraction Industry Regulation

Yesterday I read a story in The Inter Mountain (Elkins, WV) covering the Republican gubernatorial debate in Wheeling Tuesday.  From the story it seemed the debate consisted of, not surprisingly, a lot of Obama bashing and fear-mongering.  One candidate even claimed that Obama was waging war on West Virginia industries because he didn't win the state in 2008.  I don't want to get into the ridiculousness of those arguments, but I do want to address a few things that were said by candidates during the discussion.

The first sentence in the article says this:

"Republicans seeking to be West Virginia's next governor want environmental regulator to keep their hands off the state's coal and gas industries."

I don't understand anyone, especially someone from West Virginia, especially so soon after Upper Big Branch disaster, who claims that regulation hurts West Virginia and her people, unless they are being paid to say that by the coal and gas industries.  Regulation and regulators are painted as vengeful beaurocrats out of touch with the world outside the beltway, which couldn't be farther from the truth.  These are people at the top of their scientific fields who do important research and make conclusions and regulation based on the most current science.

It seems to me that the purpose of the regulations are 1) to protect the health and safety of both the people who work in these industries and the people who live near the extraction points and 2) to protect the health of the environment.

When some "Free-Market" Republican says that regulators are hurting West Virginia workers, I say think about how things were before regulations.  The working environment was so bad before regulation that workers had to band together and literally fight a war with the coal barons to get the rights to a clean(er) and safe(r) work place and better pay.  Many hard working