The movie introduces you to several families that have two things in common 1) strong religious ties, and 2) a family member that is a homosexual. Director Daniel Karslake’s selection of families with different backgrounds is sure to connect with a variety of viewers. Theres a Midwest lawyer and stay at home mother that are Lutheran; a African American couple from North Carolina who are ministers in a AME church; there a Episcopalian elderly white couple from blue collar rural Kentucky (no spoiler here but their child was the first openly Gay bishop in the Anglican church, Gene Robinson); a single middle class mother, and a long time politician Dick Gephardt and his family.

Karslake introduces each family through a historical lens, letting the viewer get comfortable and details the love stories of the parents, their marriage, child birth, and the eventual coming out of that child. The parents and family members frankness is refreshingly honest. We see the story of each family, their struggle, grief, and reconciliation; each in their own way but with all the different views it draws the audience into the families lives like your attending their Thanksgiving dinner.

Intermingled between the life stories of these God fearing families, Karslake sprinkles in traditional Biblical arguments, from Leviticus to Romans, regarding homosexuality. Historians, Pastors, Theologians, family members, and others (including clips from news reels and tele-evangelists) all give their interpretation of the Bible.

Later, the movie analyzes how the Bible is often used to demonize and condemn homosexual behavior. It takes those Biblical passages that are typically quoted to say that God thinks its an abomination, and puts them into the context of the time they were written, to offer a different opinion.

The film reveals how religious families react to their child coming out of the closet. We see their fears, confusion, struggles, and how they focus that energy. We see the difference between having supportive parents versus unsupportive. When the director asked Christians what the Bible says about homosexuality, that they didn’tt know what the Bible says but only what they’ve been told.

I thought the movie was good, and at just over 90 minutes was just long enough. The access to the families is intimate and compelling. The historical references to the Bible were informative. For those who are well read, there probably isn’t anything new here. The power in the film lies with the families’ individual stories that really draws the viewer into their story with a fresh perspective.

I encourage you to check out the film and make your own decision.

About the Movie

Can the love between two people ever be an abomination? Is the chasm separating homosexuals and Christianity too wide to cross? How can the Bible be used to justify hate? These are the questions at the heart of Daniel Karslake’s FOR THE BIBLE TELLS ME SO. A World Premiere in competition at the 2007 Sundance Film Festival, FOR THE BIBLE TELLS ME SO was also honored with Audience Awards at the 2007 Seattle and Provincetown International Film Festivals and The Kathleen Bryan Edwards Award for Human Rights at the 2007 Full Frame Documentary Film Festival. This provocative, entertaining film concisely reconciles homosexuality and a literal interpretation of Biblical scripture.

Through the experiences of five very normal, very Christian, very American families — including those of former House Majority Leader Richard Gephardt and Episcopal Bishop Gene Robinson — we discover how people of faith handle, or sometimes tragically fail to handle, having a gay child. Informed by such respected voices as Bishop Desmond Tutu, Harvard’s Peter Gomes, Orthodox Rabbi Steve Greenberg and Reverend Jimmy Creech, FOR THE BIBLE TELLS ME SO offers healing, clarity and understanding to anyone caught in the crosshairs of scripture and sexual identity.

Some of what we hear from the Theologians

Reverend Dr. Laurence Keene, Disciples of Christ:

“When people ask questions about homosexuality, almost always they follow with, ‘and what does the Bible really say about it?’”

“When the term ‘abomination’ is used in the Hebrew Bible, it is always used to address a ritual wrong – it never is used to refer to something innately immoral. Eating pork was not innately immoral for a Jew, but it was an abomination because it was a violation of a ritual requirement.”

“I have a soft spot in my heart for literalists because I used to be one. However, when someone says to me ‘this is what the Bible says,’ my response to them is, ‘No, that’s what the Bible reads.’ It is the struggle to understand context and language and culture and customs that helps us to understand the reading, or what it is saying.”

“There’s nothing wrong with a fifth grade understanding of God, as long as you’re in the fifth grade.”

“There is no ability to procreate when you engage in homosexual behavior, so it was a violation of a cultural norm. [This was] the sin of Onan in the Old Testament, where Onan is sentenced to death because he ejaculates out of the woman’s body, so his partner doesn’t get pregnant. As the King James Version says, ‘Onan spills his seed upon the ground, and God strikes him dead.’ It was ritually impure. It was an abomination.”

Reverend Peter Gomes, Harvard:

“There are about 6 or 7 verses in all of Scripture that speak to even remotely what we might call homosexual activity or homosexual conduct.”

“[Literalists] are failing to read the Bible within the context of its authors and of its original culture.”

Reverend Steven Kindle, Clergy United:

“In this particular one, it’s Leviticus Chapter 20, Verse 13, it says if a man lies with a male as with a woman, both of them have committed an abomination, they shall be put to death, their blood is upon them – if you read the Bible on a face value level, that reading disregards several very important things: the first one is just a few verses before that Moses teaches in Leviticus that it is an abomination to eat shrimp….It is an abomination to eat a rabbit.”

Rabbi Brian Zachary Mayer:

“A few verses above and below it says you shouldn’t plant two different seeds in the same hole, you shouldn’t commingle your crops… There is other text that says you shouldn’t wear linen and wool together. To just pick out, this is the one that we’re going to follow…the Bible doesn’t come that way – it’s selective reading…Those Biblical laws, they’re known as the Holiness Code. They were laws that were supposed to help people at that time find holiness in their lives.”

Reverend Susan Sparks, American Baptist Church:

“To me that’s the important thing to recognize: the historical context in which this was written. That particular section on a man not lying with a man goes to procreation. It is about a nation trying to grow. At the time, the Hebrew people understood that male seed was actually all of nascent life contained right there – women had nothing to do with actually the birth except for just incubation, so that particular section was about saving seed, saving seed only to procreate so the nation could grow.”

Revered Mel White, Soulforce:

“When I was on Larry King Live, somebody called in and said, ‘What do you guys do in bed?’ Larry hung up on him and said, ‘that’s none of your business.’ And I said, ‘We’ve been together in the same bed for 24 years – we’re like everybody else, we sleep in bed. And King said: ‘Once they find out you’re as boring as we are, it’s all over.’”

“Now it (the Bible) is being used, misused, to condemn gay people – it’s an old trick. Fundamentalist Christians have been using it throughout the ages, and now they’re doing it again.”

Archbishop Desmond Tutu, Nobel Peace Prize Laureate:

“The Bible is the word if God through the word of human beings, speaking in the idiom of their time, and the richness of the Bible comes from the fact that we don’t take it as literally so that it was dictated by God.”

Some of what we hear from the families

The Gephardt Family

Chrissy Gephardt: “Growing up in the Catholic Church, it was never something that I heard explicitly, but I definitely knew that that was part of the Bible and in fact, there were two things that I remember were an abomination: homosexuality and suicide. And I’ll never forget thinking that ‘Oh my gosh, you can never commit suicide because you’re going to go to hell and you can never be gay because you’re going to go to hell.’”

Dick Gephardt: We thought she was…

Jane Gephardt: She was always a jock.

Dick Gephardt: She was athletic

Jane Gephardt: She was good, too. She was a good athlete.

Dick Gephardt: She was a good athlete – she also wore pants more than skirts and dresses

Jane Gephardt: But that was because she was trying to be like Matt, like her older brother

Dick Gephardt: We thought that, but…

Jane Gephardt: Well that’s what we thought, and I still think that…

The Robinson Family

Isabella “Boo” McDaniel (Bishop Gene Robinson’s ex-wife): “I was just glad to be there for the consecration, because I thought by my presence I could really show that I was supportive. I mean, there was just huge security, Gene had a bullet proof vest under his vestments and I realized how scary it must have been for him.”

Bishop Gene Robinson: “My parents are probably the two best Christians I know and they don’t do it because they ought to do it, they just do it because it’s who they are. So to have them presenting this [the consecration vestments] to me – it’s just kind of a coming out for them as well. They’re all of a sudden just completely light hearted and relieved about this and are able to be proud.”

The Reitan Family

Jake Reitan, activist: “I remember very distinctly when I was a kid when I first learned that so much of the world wasn’t Christian – and that just kind of blew my mind – because I was of the perspective that everyone is Christian because everyone wanted to go to Heaven, you know, and then I learned that only one third of the world was Christian and I thought to myself: are that many people going to Hell?”

“I remember one Sunday where my pastor preached on homosexuality and it wasn’t in the best of light, but I didn’t want to question because I knew that the answers wouldn’t be good.”

The Poteat Family

David Poteat: “I had good kids. We had one of each sex – when my kids were growing up, I said ‘God, please don’t let my son grow up to be a faggot and my daughter a slut.’ And he did not. He did not do that. He reversed it.”

Brenda Poteat: “I can’t say where in the scheme of things that I saw this talk show [the Phil Donahue show] and I realized that what I was embarrassed about was that I was thinking totally of how she was having sex and not about her as a person. When I saw the talk show with two guys — buff, good looking guys — and they were asked the question ‘which one of you guys takes on the female role in the relationship’ and they said ‘neither one of us, we are attracted to men, if we were attracted to women, we’d be with women.’

“I’m sitting there thinking, but what about the ones that twist their butts and act like women, what are they attracted to? Who are they? And I’m thinking ‘but that’s all you’ve ever seen.’ That’s what comes to mind when you hear ‘homosexual’: you think of the girlfriend-acting fellow, the butch dykey-acting woman. You don’t think about everyday people, and there are ‘everyday people’ who are gay, and you’re thinking about how they’re having sex.

“I had to realize that she was my daughter: she had the same personality, she enjoyed the same things that she did before I knew she was gay. Then I had to stop thinking about Tonia that way. Although I still do not approve of the lifestyle, it was a big burden off me, that I could relate to her better and I stopped trying to push her.”

Awards

For more information

Visit the official movie web site at http://www.forthebibletellsmeso.org/

About First Run Features

First Run Features was founded in 1979 by a group of filmmakers to advance the distribution of independent film. Under the leadership of the late independent film pioneer, Fran Spielman, First Run Features quickly gained a reputation for its controversial catalog of daring independent fiction and non-fiction films. Today First Run remains one of the largest independent theatrical and home video distributors in the United States; its legacy includes films by such notable directors as Spike Lee, Michael Apted, Jane Campion, Ross McElwee, Michael Winterbottom, Sven Nykvist, Peter Jackson, Dariush Mehrjui, David O. Russell, Lizzie Borden, Claude Chabrol, Jan Svankmajer, Peter Watkins, Radley Metzger, Victor Nunez, the Quay Brothers, Kim Ki-Duk and Satyajit Ray.

For more information, or to browse their many other films, visit their web site at: http://www.firstrunfeatures.com/

One way MADD is trying to stop drunk driving this holiday season is through their “Tie One on for Safety” campaign. According the the Leaf Chronicle (12.10.07), the Tennessee office of MADD is distributing over 10,000 red ribbons state-wide to raise drunk driving awareness. According to the article, the red ribbon campaign has three stated goals

1. “high visibility of officers, meaning many officers on patrol,
2. sobriety checkpoints
3. and more ignition interlock vehicles, which requires a driver to breathe into a register to prove they are sober before the vehicle can start.”

Goals one and two appear redundant, but that is beside the point. The article does not explain how the display of red ribbons assists in accomplishing the campaigns stated goals.

MADD is a very effective lobbyist group and has helped many states to pass very effective laws to deter drunk driving, especially with repeat offenders. However I am lost on how distributing 10,000 pieces of ribbon for people to put on their cars as “a pledge to drive safe” is a worthwhile effort to reduce drunk driving.

I could only think of one way a ribbon tied to to a MADD supporters car would stop someone from drunk driving –a drunk or soon to be drunk person sees the ribbon on the car, the person knows what the ribbon stands for, and decide not to drive drunk. First, the car and ribbon must be located in a place where drunks or soon to be drunks can see it. Secondly, they must remember (in a drunken state) that the ribbon is reminding them to not drink and drive. And thirdly, the drunk driver must not drive because of the red ribbon. This does not sound like an effective way to deter drunk driving.

These 10,000 ribbon, the transportation for MADD representatives to travel the state for photo ops, the costs of the travel including hotel rooms, meals, gas, etc. is paid for through public donations. MADD’s website it states that “Your donation is used to help fund programs that save lives and prevent injuries every day across our country.” Any reasonable person would have to admit that this red ribbon program has a slim chance to “save lives and prevent injury”.

The red ribbon campaign does raise awareness of drunk driving by getting media attention; the Chronicle’s article seems to be a fluff piece to do just that. The campaign got front page ink; almost 80% of article’ space was devoted to headlines and photo ops. But the article did not give the reader any useful information that actual could reduce drunk driving incidents.

With very little effort, and not using the MADD website, I quickly found the following information.

The May 2000 issue of the Journal of the American Medical Association (JAMA) contains an article discussing a study of drunk driving crashes. I narrowed the information presented here to children, since they are “mothers” against drunk driving. This study found the following:

• Of 5,555 child vehicle deaths that involved drunken drivers, 64% happened while the child’s OWN driver was intoxicated

• Most children (under age 15) killed in wrecks involving a drunk driver were unrestrained in a car with someone old enough to be a parent or caregiver

• Less than 20% of the children involved were properly buckled in

The first stat shows that more children are killed in drunk driving wrecks by THEIR driver than a drunk stranger. I think one can assume that children are mainly driven around by their parents or relatives. The latter two facts indicate that we could “save lives and prevent injury” by simply ensuring our children are properly restrained in a vehicle.

Benjamin Radford, author of the book Media Mythmakers – how journalists, activists and advertisers mislead us, “child advocates don’t like to hear (these statistics) because it holds a mirror up to the real perpetrators of the crime.” These facts point to drunk driving parents/relatives that do not properly secure in cars as the main killer of children in drunk driving related car wrecks. Not the partying frat boy, not the underage drinking high school student, and not the scary alcoholic at the end the bar, but someone that knows and loves the child that gets killed. What is the old saying, not to point a finger cause there are three fingers pointing back at you. The distribution of this information and public action on this information could potentially cut the number of children fatalities in drunk driving accidents in half.

I could not find any statistics regarding the success of ribbon campaigns in achieving their stated goals. But I did find numerous ‘red ribbon fund raising events’. One could infer that the red ribbon campaign is just a reason to raise money not awareness. Organizations like MADD must raise money to effectively address their organization’s mission, but fund raising is not a noted objective of the is red ribbon campaign. It is easier and more effective to ask for your participation, which may lead to your donation, than to just outright ask for a donation. It seems to be economics driving the red ribbon campaign, not actively engaging public participation in solving the drinking and driving problem

Again, I am not anti-MADD; they have done a lot to help keep drunk drivers off the streets. I am against this idea that people can change the world through empty actions. The people that tie these ribbons on their cars and think they are helping, when they are doing nothing. Action is non-action as Orwell might say. Our efforts should not be to just raise awareness or raise money, but provide the public the tools and knowledge to eliminate the cause, drunk driving.

She correctly states that Tennessee is one of the few states that still has the state legislature elect these officers. Kurita has sponosored a bill every year for as far back as I can remember wanting us to decide who the best person for these jobs should be, and the bill has never gotten out of committeee. This year Kurita got the bill out of committee.

Each year when I hear that she is proposing to have us elect these constitutional officers, I write her, friends, family, and the local paper expressing why I think this is bad idea. This year is no different, see my letter below:

Senator Kurita,

I would like to comment on your persistent attempts to change the way Tennessee elects its Constitutional officers. In past years, I have had letters published in the Leaf Chronicle against this idea and have not talked to anyone that thinks this is a good idea.

Tennessee’s constitution was designed so that the legislature would elect the constitutional officers, contrary to the clip they are playing on NPR this morning where you state they are “selected” by the legislature. The legislature is in the unique position of working with these officers on a daily basis. The legislature is designed by the state constitution to be the authority to determine if they should remain in or leave over these position

Having Tennesseans vote on whether the constitutional officers are doing a good job is assuming that Tennesseans know if they are doing a good job. With extremely low voter turn out in all elections, especially local elections for not well known positions, this idea would not seem to be prudent and definitely would not ensure that the best person for the job is selected because our knowledge base to elect them much smaller than the legislatures.

Turning the trusted positions into popularity contests hurts Tennesseans in a number of ways. First, it means that the officers (which work year ’round) would have to take time away from performing their duties and run a campaign. Secondly, Tennesseans could lose long term institutional knowledge that we have come to rely on. Can you imagine if William Snodgrass would have been defeated by lesser qualified candidate? The state government and Tennesseans would lose an immense amount of institutional knowledge that over the years proved very important over the decades Mr. Snodgrass served us.

Please take on your constitutional duties as assigned by our fore fathers and continue to internally ‘elect’ (not select) these officers for the good of all Tennesseans that rely on you and the legislature to make good sound decisions for us based on your unique, elected position.

As far as the other items in the survey, I am pro taxing cigarettes (as a former smoker) with the proceeds earmarked for our underfunded education system. By the way I am also for the state taking on the funding responsibility and relieving our local school boards of that problem. I think if we are to provide free community college tuition to students, we should first fully fund all college under the current formula.

And lastly I do not agree with the state stepping in on illegal immigration. I feel that immigration bills at the state, over 40 have been introduced, will in the long run, as in other states be found to be unconstitutional and/or flat out unenforceable.

Thank you for your years of service to me and all Tennesseans. If you having a email mailing list, that informs yopur constituents of your votes, activity and town hall meetings, I would very much appreciate being added to it.

Sincerely

Blayne

The real letter had my address and contact info. That was the letter I sent April 4, 2007. I sent it to numerous people, most responded that they had not heard of this idea of having the general public vote on these officers and were VERY INTERESTED in hearing Sen. Kurita’s response, which I would have gladly forwarded. Today is April 13th, just over a week since I sent that letter. No response as of yet. So I sent another letter. See below:

Senator Kurita,

I am disappointed that you have not responded to my response to your survey.

I, and others, looked forward to hearing your response, letting everyone know why you think this would be a good idea. We should all first understand the responsibility that we would bare if we elected these officers and since you want to bestow that responsibility to us, logic would follow you should also educate us to those responsibilities.

Sincerely

Blayne

I just want to voice my opinion. She votes on my behalf, and yours. I would expect at leats some sort of response within a week, especially since she ran an ad in the paper asking for my input. I doubt if the response to an ad in the Leaf Chronicle has produced such an overwelming response that not even a staffer can respond.

I also included a link to this forum and this article. and requested that she respond to ALL OF US via this public forum.  If I personally ever receive a response, that Senator Kurita does not post here, I will post it. However, I think it would be great if she posted her response, and by doing so inform us of what she is doing and why, instead of leaving that up to a spotty part time blogger like me.

Dear Editor,

The March 7 paper contained a picture of the huge four American flags at a local car dealership. This was not an ad per se, just a picture. As a Sango resident for the past 5 years, I have seen the rapid growth of this area slowly creeping out to the county. The most visible symbol of this growth, are these four flags, which are visible for miles around, even at night with the flags lit by spotlights.

Every weekend, the flags are flown slightly different. Your picture shows all four waving in the wind; last weekend they had just three flying; the weekend before that all four were flying but one was at half mast. In the past, I’ve noticed at times the US flag is swapped out for a other flags.

These flags are not being used to show patriotism, national pride, or celebrating freedom; they are being used as an obvious cheap ad gimmick. How can society get upset about flag burning, but we seem okay to let companies use it to peddle their goods? I’ve seen other businesses even advertise tag lines like “Home of the Largest United States Flag in Kentucky ”. How can the citizen’s which just a few years ago were upset about the tattered flags on the 101st parkway not be outraged by this. I would rather see a small, discretely placed, tattered flag waving out of respect to veterans, than four enormous, prominently lit US flags waving 300 feet in the sky waving as a cheap billboard for a business.

The republicans are no longer in the majority, the democrats won because America spoke loud and clear, that we need to change the course of this country. So the democrats hands have been untied, the strings have been cut, the gloves taken off….what will the democrats do to answer the cry the public made in November…well..

Finally after nearly four years of war, HUNDREDS of BILLONS of dollars spent, THOUSANDS of Amercian’s dead and mamed, and TENS OF THOUSANDS OF Iraqis dead, Congress is FINALLY going to stand up to this horrible administration and have a DEBATE a NONBINDING resolution of less than 100 words…Huh…nonbinding?…the debate is on the last two sentences?

And its scheduled to take a week of late night debates with everyone getting 5 minutes to talk. Do what?

Congressman Tanner, I hope you emphatically vote for this resolution and pledge to do more to save lives, families, money, future blowback, international face and END THIS INJUSTICE.

Blayne Clements

“Newsweek has scrubbed the cover of its United States edition for October 2, 2006. The cover of its international editions, aimed at Europe and other world regions, has maintained the original title of the story, “Losing Afghanistan.” The new cover for the United States edition features photographer Annie Leibovitz and is titled “My Life in Pictures.”

I found this infuriating and sent the following email to 30 people (it has been edited for space, if you would like the whole email just let me know):

“My Canadian friends say that Americans are seen as not paying attention to international affairs. They thought that Americans were distracted with material goods (cheap plastic crap sold at Walmart) and un-news (for example the latest attractive missing white chick vs the hundreds of missing unattractive nonwhite chicks, or Mel Gibson drunk rant about Jews, Tom Cruise jumping around in a couch, etc).
I would love to tell my Canadian friends that they are wrong. That Americans do pay attention, that we do know what is going on and care about how we affect the world around us. But is that true?
Apparently, Newsweek has determined that Amercians won’t buy the magazine with an international cover story about how we are LOSING in Afghanistan, So what does Newsweek do? Run the cover story that we are LOSING in Afghanistan EVERYWHERE IN THE WORLD EXCEPT in the US. The Americans get a story about a photographer. How touching. Take a look yourself…

http://www.truthout.org/docs_2006/092506R.shtml

I would like to say that this is some sort of media bias, but I do not think that the bias is political but rooted in capitalism. Newsweek is a for-profit business. Their executives have decided that this story about a war where Americans are dying, just isnt going to sell in America. Why? Is this financial “bottomline” proof that Americans do not care? Surely not.
We could rattle off a 100 various un-news items. Almost half of us do not vote. Katie Couric took first place in the ratings her first week with a 7 million viewers in a country of 300 million (O’Reilly just gets around 20 million). We just flat out do not pay attention, and so much so that now a news magazine is making business decisons on the cover stories it runs based on our unattentiveness.

Out of the 30 emails, only eleven emailed back with a response. I was betting there would be less than ten respond. Here is a sample of some of those responses:

“This is the best potential chain mail I’ve gotten in a long time. Heard about that story on my favorite news source (outside of Democracy Now) the Daily Show. Pretty crazy that we’ve got to look to a comedian and a long haired Tennessee guy to “keep it real”. “

“You’re right, most people think Tome Cruise is much more important. I think it is a relatable issue. People can relate to Tom Cruise in some way, but not really to a soldier in Afghanistan.”

” Very interesting. America is a sad place for many reasons. We are, as I think much of the world, concerned with our own ‘very small world’. Many are too busy struggling to get by, put food on the table and worry about college for their kids to be able to expand their world view”

“I agree with you that the real problem isn’t newsweek. I mean, it’s not their responsibility to educate us. They did the reporting and sold the story where they could. The problem is with US. We don’t know anything. We don’t read. Or I should say we don’t read anything that might give us a better perspective on the world. We prefer to remain simple-minded and ignorant.”

“This is scary stuff. We should buy European Newsweeks and sneak them on to the newstands.”

“I had just shown (my husband) the photographs of Tom Cruise and family in my new issue of Vanity Fair and told him Annie Leibowitz took them. He said, “Who?” The next day, Newsweek arrived and I said, “Hey, look, this is the photographer I was telling you about!” I was entranced for a moment by the seeming synchronicity of an Annie Leibowitz cover shot on Vanity Fair one day and a cover article about her in Newsweek the next. I had no idea and never would have guessed that Americans are the only ones getting this fluff story.”

“Clarksville is a stifling climate for free, independent thinking. Too many mushrooms just wanting to have xxxx dumped onto them and let them get on with their comfortable lives of babies, church and dinning out. What more could one want?”

Overall this process of throwing out a topic and getting people’s responses has been quite fascinating. Some people didn’t respond that I thought would. Others responded quite differently than I expected. How would you have responded? Please leave a comment and voice your opinion. That’s what this website is all about.

According to Kathleen Parker (August 14), having a blog and expressing a strong political opinion is akin to “Stalinist tactics”. Such words would not apply to any right winger editorialist like herself of course, but only to those such as the “operative” Michael Moore.

Parker describes a recent blog by Moore as a “manifesto…straight out of Stalin’s playbook”. The blog merely states his strong opinion that the next democrat presidential candidate be anti-war.

Ms. Parker’s editorial states her opinion that leftists want an anti-war president. Is she also plagiarizing from the same “Stalin Playbook”? Of course not, so why say it of Moore?

I suppose the difference is that Parker’s rant is as an ‘editor’, Moore’s same rant is as a ‘blogger’. Or, maybe the difference is one is an democrat and the other a republican. I think most people that follow politics understand the underlying results of Lieberman’s loss. Why both sides have to use it to degrade?  It reeks of egotism and diverts discussion away from the subject to the writer, from the opinion to the opinionated.

This non-debate will never be productive and will never facilitate any resolution of the issues that confront our country, including the war. Lyndon Johnson’s favorite bible verse was said to be Isaiah 1:18– “Come let us reason together”. Reason is the capacity for logical, rational, and analytic thought; intelligence. We would be wise to heed that verse. We should openly invite others to discuss issues and ideas, with reason not rhetoric, not name calling and spin, but with rational thought and intelligence.

http://www.realclearpolitics.com/articles/2006/08/joe_liebermans_war_of_independ.html

http://www.michaelmoore.com/words/message/index.php

This week, Deroy gives the readers certain facts of WMD’s found in Iraq and the subsequent lack of coverage by the “liberal press”. Deroy is out to convince us that over 500 ‘lethal’ WMD’s have been found. These lethal, dangerous weapons were built in 1989, and have been buried for over a decade. Deroy and the newspaper waste 1/5 of the Op-ed page rehashing Peter Hoekstra’s (R-Mich) and Rick Santorum (R-Mich) parading a misleading report of found WMD’s.

Fox News’ Jim Angle contacted the Defense Department who quickly disavowed Santorum and Hoekstra’s claims. A Defense Department official told Angle flatly that the munitions hyped by Santorum and Hoekstra are “not the WMD’s for which this country went to war.”  - Think Progress

Please note that this information was brought up conveniently just prior to the Senate debate about a timetable to exit Iraq. Jane Harman (D-Calif.) said the following: “What worries me is that the intelligence community — Ambassador Negroponte in particular — may be playing a partisan role in the 2006 election.”

Deroy nor the newspaper provided that information. Nor did Deroy or the paper provide these informative quotes on the topic:

David Kay, Former Top US Weapons Inspector - “It (found WMD’s) is less toxic than most things that Americans have under their kitchen sink at this point.” and “And any of Iraq’s 1980s-era mustard would produce burns, but it is unlikely to be lethal.”

Unfortunately for Santorum and Hoekstra, the shells weren’t part of Saddam’s illusory stockpile of WMD. Rather, they were artifacts of the Iran-Iraq war, during which Saddam (helped, incidentally, by the Reagan administration) acquired chemical weapons - The New Republic

Maybe the ‘liberal press’ did not report on the report because it was not news. Who would seem to be the most knowledgeable about WMD’s - Republicans locked in an unpopular war looking for reelection in a few months or the retired top US weapons inspector ? Who do you think has the least likely hood of promoting a not so hidden agenda through promoting this report - Republicans locked in an unpopular war looking for reelection in a few months or the retired top US weapons inspector ?

Again (like last week), I call for readers to let the paper know that we want to read the news, based on all the facts. We want an Op-ed section that is not a platform solely for republican talking points. Demand a real fair and balance presentation of varying opinions that are based on all the facts.

I would like to conclude with a quote from Hoekstra and Santorum’s report, “If the American public can be deceived by people who withhold basic information, we risk losing the war at home, even if we win it on the battlefield.” I think that says it all (by the way Deroy nor the paper used that quote either).

Websites:

• http://forums.backpage.com/showthread.php?t=10925
• http://www.dr-bob.org/babble/poli/20060610/msgs/660267.html
• http://www.tnr.com/doc.mhtml?i=w060710&s=ackerman071306

I also read a book about Andrew Jackson and his campaign to end the national banking system at the time (he succeeded actually). I suppose for a while there it was the flavor of the month in my reading.

Then the other day, I stumbled across a website about how the 16th amendment was possessedly not ratified by enough states. And that some states that ‘ratified’ the amendment actually used wording that disallowed the right of the federal government to tax wages. Interesting, but even though I dabble in controversy theories, I think most of them are just fun to play with mentally, and you subsequently do learn something from these theories, however apparently small and irrelevant.

Then yesterday, I get an email about this new movie, “America: Freedom to Fascism” from the Howard Switzer, Green Party Candidate for Governor. The movie is called “America: Freedom to Fascism”. The movie’s website has numerous trailers and interviews that you can watch. This movie is dealing the the same topic, that the federal government does not have the power to tax wages, the federal reserve is not federal, etc.

Of course, its not playing in Clarksville or in Tennessee for that matter. So I dropped an email to Nashville Independent Movie house, the Belcourt Theatre, requesting that they look into this movie, that is being billed as the next Fahrenheit 9/11.

This post is requesting that you also contact the Belcourt, or your local movie house to request that they look into having the movie shown. This idea of independent movies being released outside the normal distribution chain seems to be catching on (most recently, the success of the movie “Wall-mart: The high cost of low prices”) and we can show our support for these movies by letting movie houses know that customers what to see these movies. Please take a moment and show your support for this type of informative, independent media, by requesting that your local movie house show the the movie.

Useful links:

• Book review of “The Creature from Jekyll Island” - http://www.realityzone.com/creature.html
• Web site regarding the 16th amendment - http://political-resources.com/taxes/16thamendment/default.htm
• Contact page for the Belcourt Theatre - http://belcourt.org/contact
• Movie website - http://www.freedomtofascism.com/
• Howard Switzer’s site - http://www.h4gov.com/
• Chris Lugo for Senate site - http://www.chris4senate.com/lugo/index.php

In “Estate Tax Hurts Black Americans” (Leaf Chronicle July 9), Mr. Deroy Murdock quotes a study that showed that 90% of black business owners “believed” the estate tax hindered long term growth prospects. What people ‘believe’ is irrelevant in the tax code, however, it is a convenient way to spin the issue.

Mr. Murdock omits any facts about the tax, except for the rates - which is irrelevant to 98% of Americans. Per the IRS website (1), “In its current form, the estate tax only affects the wealthiest 2% of all Americans”, because it only effects estates with a net worth greater than $2 million dollars.

Let’s look at this in context, something Mr. Murdock does not do:

- In 1998, the average net worth of the top 1% of Americans was $10,204,000 and the average net worth of the bottom 40% was $19,400, a difference of 525% (2)

- 90% of US stocks are owned by the wealthiest 10% of Americans

Mr. Murdock sprinkles morsels of facts within his article that are severed from reality of the topic. And this web of spin was presented with no opposing view. You might say that this letter, if published, would be the lacking voice of opposition. But my letter to the local editor is limited in size, and if published would be days after Mr. Murdock’s national published opinion.

As a subscriber, I would like to see the opinion page address a topic with a healthy debate of issues that includes all the facts and ideas from all sides so that readers can be well informed and make well informed decisions.

(1) http://www.irs.gov/businesses/small/article/0,,108143,00.html

(2) www.pbs.org/peoplelikeus/resources/stats.html