You know, Thomas Jefferson would have been upset at the whole idea of tonight's "Compassion Forum"..

[scheming daemons]

I'm an unabashed Obama supporter. But the bible-thumping I saw tonight by both Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama bothered me.

And the Republicans are worse on this matter.

I'm a Jeffersonian Democrat. I believe Thomas Jefferson, and most of his cohorts among the founding fathers, would be very concerned about the "religious litmus test" that we apply to our Presidential candidates nowadays.

Our candidates' religious convictions should be something personal to THEM and THEM ALONE. They should not even be considered relevant.



Some Thomas Jefferson quotes on the subject:


Believing with you that religion is a matter which lies solely between man and his God, that he owes account to none other for his faith or his worship, that the legislative powers of government reach actions only, and not opinions, I contemplate with sovereign reverence that act of the whole American people which declared that their legislature should 'make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof,' thus building a wall of separation between church and State.

-Thomas Jefferson, letter to Danbury Baptist Association, CT., Jan. 1, 1802


Christianity neither is, nor ever was a part of the common law.

-Thomas Jefferson, letter to Dr. Thomas Cooper, February 10, 1814


In every country and in every age, the priest has been hostile to liberty. He is always in alliance with the despot, abetting his abuses in return for protection to his own.

-Thomas Jefferson, letter to Horatio G. Spafford, March 17, 1814


Priests...dread the advance of science as witches do the approach of daylight and scowl on the fatal harbinger announcing the subversions of the duperies on which they live.

-Thomas Jefferson, Letter to Correa de Serra, April 11, 1820


Man once surrendering his reason, has no remaining guard against absurdities the most monstrous, and like a ship without rudder, is the sport of every wind.

-Thomas Jefferson to James Smith, 1822.


And the day will come when the mystical generation of Jesus, by the supreme being as his father in the womb of a virgin will be classed with the fable of the generation of Minerve in the brain of Jupiter. But may we hope that the dawn of reason and freedom of thought in these United States will do away with this artificial scaffolding, and restore to us the primitive and genuine doctrines of this most venerated reformer of human errors.

-Thomas Jefferson, Letter to John Adams, April 11, 1823

[Hippo_Tron]

1. The founding fathers were deists and the constitution was written on hemp

If the religious wrong ever realized that, they would flip.

[MonkeyFunk]

32. sorry, no

the constitution was written on parchment. It'll just piss off PETA.

[Political Heretic]

34. They weren't "all" deists and they didn't "all" have like mind on religion

Let's just be sure to get it right

[JeffR]

2. Great post!

:kick:

[DearAbby]

3. I know it made me feel kind of uneasy

it sure felt like a religious test to me.

[msongs]

4. people who thump bibles seldom have much compassion IMO nt

[againes654]

23. Those that thump bibles on TV have very little compassion

in real life, my experiences have been different. I think there is a difference.

[KittyWampus]

5. "Bible Thumping?" Your bias is showing. Obama didn't go into anything mystical

just because you have some left-over childhood issues doesn't mean the rest of America shouldn't have an intelligent conversations around religous/philosophical frameworks.

[scheming daemons]

8. My anti-religion bias? Of course! That's what the post was all about. I'm not hiding it.

I've donated $300 to Obama's campaign.... I want him to be President more than any candidate in my adult lifetime.



I'm uncomfortable with candidates feeling the need to show their Christian "street cred" in order to get elected.


It's none of my business.... and it should be none of yours as well.

[aquarius dawning]

21. they may not have been actually thumping the bible but they were panderng 2 those who do..

which is nearly, but not quite, as alarming to those of us who would like to see religion and politics kept as far apart as possible.

[Selatius]

6. Jefferson was a Deist, so was James Madison, Thomas Paine, and several others. Washington was...

a Unitarian, I believe, and John Adams was an avowed Agnostic. The consensus among them was that the government should not take the side of any one religion no matter how popular because they wanted to avoid the destructive mistakes seen in Europe when the government did side with one religious group against another.

[AZ Criminal JD]

30. All of the 13 colonies had official state religions -- after the revolution.

That includes Jefferson's Virginia. The First amendment proscriptions on religion were placed to prevent the federal government from imposing one religion on the states. They had no problem with the states having official state religions. So much for "deism".

[Selatius]

39. As you well know, nearly all states desanctioned state religion in the later years.

Read a little bit further in your history texts, friend. So much for Deism, indeed.

[AZ Criminal JD]

41. That is not the point and you know it.

The OP and others are trying to make the point that the founders rejected religion mixed with government. That is absolutely not true. Bibles were printed by the First Congress and church services were held in the capitol when Jefferson was President. Anyone trying to paint the founders of this country as people who rejected religion are historical frauds.

[Selatius]

42. Not all, but a significant cadre of them avoided evangelism for good reason.

The issue is a bit more complex than what the OP may have implied, but the facts laid down in my original post still stands firm regardless of your "deism indeed" retort. Jefferson, regardless, was a Deist as a historical fact. Jefferson isn't alive today, but his attitudes on religion are known and would give one fodder to guess how he would respond to such a forum.

[indie_voter]

7. I agree. It was uncomfortable. But as a non theist

I've accepted this is necessary to win the election. Hopefully this display was the last gasp of the desperate MSM. I hope I live to see the day an agnostic or non theist can run for President and have a fighting chance. I never thought a mixed race person would have a shot, and look where we are today!

[Neshanic]

9. Upset is putting it mildly. He would ask for a Scotch and a Valium.

[JVS]

10. Yeah, well. A lot of people in the compassion forum would have problems with his slave raping...

so we'll call it a draw.

[scheming daemons]

11. Until BHO gets elected, TJ is still the only President that we KNOW has fathered a black child....

;-)

[AZ Criminal JD]

31. We don't know that at all.

The only thing that is known is that someone in the Jefferson family fathered a black child. He had many relatives on that plantation. Sorry for the facts.

[JasonHill]

12. You may be right

but at the same time, Thomas Jefferson is only a man and his word is only that of one man. Personally, i have no problem with a forum where people discuss their religious convictions since many people derive their political ideology from what they believe to be compatible with their philosophical views of existence. Actually, i think it's good to see what people say on record so the public can try to hold them accountable to their previous stances. Also it serves as a guage for the political climate people exist in and how it can be reformed if needed.

[scheming daemons]

14. He WAS only one man.... but he was the founder of our party, for all intents and purposes....

Thomas Jefferson is to Democrats what Abe Lincoln was to Republicans.


In other word.... the guy who's ideals we should be trying to emulate, but too often fall short of.


...and the other Founding Fathers had similar views on religion and politics.


The "Separation of Church and State", while not EXPLICITLY in the Constitution, is implicit in the wording of the first amendment. Wording that Thomas Jefferson, by all accounts, was the main author of.

[JasonHill]

17. I agree with the seperation of church and state

but this is about a private forum where presidential candidates were invited to discuss religous values. Unless you are talking about cleansing religion from humanity, people will make judgments based in part on their philosophy of what life means and that includes religious values.

[scheming daemons]

19. This forum wasn't private.... it was viewed by millions....

[JasonHill]

20. i meant it wasn't govt sanctioned

i agree it's always good to be suspicious about people when they talk about their morality being based on a religious conviction, but i just don't think they should necessarily be condemned for it or that it needs to be cleansed from acceptable public conversation.

[AZ Criminal JD]

33. You are wrong. James Madison wrote the First Amendment.

Jefferson had nothing to do with it.

[patrice]

13. Bible thumping?????????????

There IS no litmus test. Did you listen to BHO's response to religion in public service?

He said those in government should not be expected to be completely identified with religion, nor should they be required to be completely without religioun and that the individual's private beliefs form the base from which they act in government, but the government itself represents a country that is a multitude of religions AND non-believers so it cannot be identified with any religion per se.

So, am I to take from your objections that, though what BHO proposes includes both believers and non-believers, non-believers cannot include believers in what they would like to see? Isn't that just a tad evangelistic of you? "Agree with us or be excluded." Who is the oppressor here? Putting Jefferson's name all over it doesn't make it anymore acceptble nor American.

You know what, not everyone who believes in something is a Bible Thumper interested in oppressing you, but it sure sounds as though you are interested in excluding them.

[scheming daemons]

15. Look... I love 99% of what Obama is about....

But his comments about the book of Genesis were troublesome. He claimed to "not know" if the "six days of creation" story is a metaphor or a literality, though he thinks it is a metaphor.

To even ask the question is to disregard all the science that shows the age of the universe as we know it being in the billions of years, not 6000 years.

He rebounded by saying that he believed in Evolution.... though that wording is not correct. Evolution is a scientific theory, not something that is "believed in". Accepted or not.. but not believed or disbelieved.


To give any credence at all to evangelical teachings of a literal interpretion of the bible is to "bible-thump".


I love the guy... and I'm hoping he was just saying what he needed to say.

[patrice]

16. I'm not looking for another person who just says what "needs" to be said.

People who disagree with you aren't going to just disappear for your convenience. There will ALWAYS be differences on this issue. What do you recommend we do about that? If you claim some right to be whatever it is that you are, believer or athiest, right or wrong, how is it possible for you to have that right and not those who are different from you? Or is there only ONE right perspective, yours.

Fuck, I hate it when someone assumes they own the truth. Such people are just as bad as those Bible Thumpers you hate so much.

[scheming daemons]

18. I'm not denying anyone any right whatsoever.... I'm saying that one's beliefs are

COMPLETELY personal and should not be part of the public discussion or part of policy-making.


Believe whatever the hell you want to believe.... but don't use it to inform on policy or to decide on "qualifications" for President.


Church on one side of the wall... state on the other. And leave it that way.

[patrice]

22. By your standards the Invasion and Occupation of Iraq are just Fine.

The problem isn't the public discussion of what religious standards are and how they might be relevant in one way or another; that's not the equation of church and state. The problem is intolerance of differences motivated by fascism, religious or secular that IS the equation of church and state.

[AZ Criminal JD]

35. You mean you hope he was lying?

[againes654]

24. I wish I could recommend this post

Well said anyway!

[spoony]

25. Pardon me if I don't give a shit what slave-owning plutocrats think

These people get way too much credit. This nation has survived because the Constitution they wrote has been repeatedly altered.

[enlightenment]

28. That is quite possibly the most uninformed statement in this thread.

Congratulations.

[Political Heretic]

37. Which part of it, exactly?

The founding fathers designed a system in which rich, white, male, landowners had political power and slavery was legal.

It was we, the people, who later undid some of their colossal misdeeds. I'm sick of people who treat the "founding fathers" like gods.

[scheming daemons]

38. Like it or not, Thomas Jefferson is the founder of our party....

...or at least of the ideals our party espouses.


The Founding Fathers were complicated people.... Yes, most were slave-owners, and that fact cannot be taken lightly.


BUT.... they also created a blueprint which would allow for the system to be changed. They were brilliantly prescient in their thinking - even if their individual actions didn't catch up to their thought processes.


Thomas Jefferson, like most people, had his good points AND his flaws.


His views on governance have stood the test of time. Secular government works best. Time has proven that over and over again.

[anonymous171]

26. Clinton would probably call Jefferson an elitist too, if Obama brought him up.

[DUyellow]

27. Today would have been his birthday! April 13, 1743

[bluedawg12]

29. We can't win without 'em and he handled it well. n/t

[grantcart]

36. excellent OP but the question is do we hand this demographic to the Repbulicans

or do we co-opt it and take the White House and 58 seats in the Senate.

[grantcart]

40. true but I think its safe to say that the TV cameras would have left him completely fuckbrained

[Cameron27]

43. It bothered me too,

unfortunately, our lack of pandering to the religious sector cost us votes in past elections.