Chicagoist: Just Another Day In Illinois Politics: Governor, Atheist, School, and Church Spar Over $1 Million

Albanyparkour

Thu, 24 Jul 2008 16:16:05 -0600

It's for neither. It's to make Blago look magnanimous. More empty gestures, less actual governing. And Fake Thomas Jefferson would defer to Bad Horse, the Stallion of Sin.

Shannon

Thu, 24 Jul 2008 15:37:31 -0600

what does the fake thomas jefferson have to say? i'm no fan of organized religion, but i am a fan of architecture. is this money to help out the church, or to rebuild the building?

Albanyparkour

Thu, 24 Jul 2008 14:51:21 -0600

That quote refers to divine right, the notion that rulers are ordained by the almighty, one of the more odious institutions that our founding fathers shuffled off. This recent strain of thought amongst atheists, that the even the most benign of religious beliefs are akin to fanaticism is simple-minded, intolerant and does a disservice to well-reasoned arguments about theism and atheism. Fascinatingly, these arguments are often made by the most liberal and "tolerant" of individuals.

fed up

Thu, 24 Jul 2008 14:47:47 -0600

Sherman goes to far many times but atleast someone is fighting the BS that Blago is serving up.

sparky

Thu, 24 Jul 2008 14:02:00 -0600

Jefferson also wrote: "May it be to the world, what I believe it will be, (to some parts sooner, to others later, but finally to all,) the signal of arousing men to burst the chains under which monkish ignorance and superstition had persuaded them to bind themselves, and to assume the blessings and security of self-government." Too bad it has not happened. I'm glad Sherman is fighting.

Albanyparkour

Thu, 24 Jul 2008 13:52:36 -0600

May he annoy and sue until his cash runs out. This is the logic of failure. Calling people names, suing at the drop of a hat and generally being obnoxious isn't going to bring people to reason. You're adopting the tactics of the zealot to make the argument of the well-reasoned. I'm of conviction that the separation of church and state benefits both church (and mosque and temple and shrine) and state. Thomas Jefferson is smarter than you or I Matilda. 216 years ago he put it thus in "Notes on Virginia" "The legitimate powers of government extend to such acts as are injurious to others. But it does me no injury for my neighbour to say there are twenty gods, or no god. It neither picks my pocket nor breaks my leg." A call for the tolerance of others beliefs as well as an articulation of the benefits of a secular state. Give me Jefferson's wisdom over Rob Sherman's drone any day.

matilda

Thu, 24 Jul 2008 13:34:07 -0600

Good for Sherman. He may be annoying, but the more reasonable among us need to hit back harder against those who would force silly superstitions down our throats. May he annoy and sue until his cash runs out.

literati

Thu, 24 Jul 2008 13:29:16 -0600

Would that be an Imperial or metric fuckton?

Prescott Carlson

Thu, 24 Jul 2008 13:21:45 -0600

Get used to even more from Sherman -- just read in Zorn's column the other day that he recently inherited a fuckton of money from his mother, and he plans on using a lot of it to further his cause.

Albanyparkour

Thu, 24 Jul 2008 12:27:55 -0600

I feel unclean agreeing with Rob Sherman, a lawsuit happy pain in the ass who makes atheism as irritating as religion, but he's right on this one. When a million dollars gets misplaced in a bureaucratic error, the bureaucracy in question is broken.