syntax252

And I take it that that is your fall back way of having the last word in a discussion that you are incapable of sustaining?

No, my belief does not depend on anything. Is the belief of an atheist dependent upon not hearing someone else say the word "God?" It would seem reasonable that you at least thought that I was trying to hurt you, or you would not have brought it up. As to choices you have made in your life, I still don't see where you are comming from on that one. Anyway, back to the pledge. If the words "under God" were taken out of the pledge, as you seem to desire, and then during the pledge, some of the students said "under God" anyway, do you think they should be diciplined or corrected for that?

I probably go back a little farther than most of you, having entered the labor market in 1954. The main difference that I can see over the past 50 years--and here I am talking about blue collar work--is that things are, on an average a lot cheaper that they used to be. The result is that us po folks have considerably more that we had then. I started working in a box making shop for $1.55 pr. hr. Now that same job pays about $16 pr.hr. A gallon of gas was about 25 cents, so I could buy 6 gallons for an hour's pay. Now, at $2 pr gallon, the guy doing that same job can buy 8 gallons. Blue jeans were $4 a copy for levis, that was 2.6 hrs pay. Now levis are about $20--that is unless you want them pre worn out--that is about 1-1/4 hrs pay. I could go on and on. We didn't have a color TV. We didn't have a car for each member of the family. We didn't have a cell phone for each family member. We didn't have a jet ski. We didn't have snowmobiles. We didn't take carribian boat trips. And we didn't have computers so that we could argue with people who live in Europe. You get the picture I am sure.

I think the problem is one of solving the riddle of how to transmit energy via micro wave, or in how to convert micro waves into electricity. Probably the latter would be preferred, because orditing solar cell farms could collect the electricity required to generate vast amounts of micro waves which could then be beamed to Earth to be recreated into electricity. Even an efficiency in the single digits would be OK because of the vast potential of solar cells in orbit (both in their area as well as their collectivity potential because of the lack of any atmosphere.)

OK, here is your post #148. So again I ask you--what makes you think that I wanted to hurt you?

When did I say that your choices "suck?" And again' date=' you mentioned earlier that I wanted to hurt you? What makes you think that I wanted to hurt you? All I am saying is that you do not have a right to deny someone else the right to acknowledge God, just because you [b']think[/b] that that would constitue some sort of child abuse.

And you would win that bet.....

No one is trying to deny atheists their rights. It is the other way around. It is the atheist that is telling the religious person that they must not exercise thair constitutional right to express their beliefe in God. As I have said repeatedly, when and if the USSC rules that the words "under God" is a promotion af a religion, then that will be the case. Until then--they haven't and it ain't.

Well, if the participants of this forum are sensitive enough that they can't handle a little opposition to their ideas, so be it.

I was alluding to the fact that she insists upon referring to the fact that kids in school might somehow be "abused" if their clasmates recited a voluntary pledge of allegience that included the words "under God."

No, if I were a teacher, I would not reccommend that my students pray, however, to harp on that as an act of abuse, in my opinion, speaks volumns about your lack of unerstanding as to what constitutes abuse. I think this whole issue is blown completelt out of proportion in the hope that the general public will hear the word "aduse" often enough to actually believe that abuse is occuring. The story about abused children will garner the sympathy that you and the rest of the anti religious community require to get your agenda passed into law, and it matters not to you and your kind that the truth is the only thing being abused here. You obviousely have a problem with your ex husband, and I suspect with the court system because they didn't throw him into a deep dark dungion and throw away the key. There is nothing that I or anyone can do about your previous problems, but you can be pretty sure that we won't change the constitutional right to practice our religions as we please, just because you made some bad choices in your past.

Well, thank you for the update. First the typo. On my computer keyboard, the "I" is right next to the "U"--need I go further? Ad hom, anyone? I am shocked that a teacher in a public school would stoop so low as to reccommend to a student that they might PRAY. It goes without saying that this teacher should by tied to the nearest stake and roasted over a slow fire. Now, since you seem to be so well connected in the area, what with being appointed by the court as an advocate for abused children, how is it that you find yourself in such a helpless position? You would have us believe that you are so very well versed in all the various intricacies of child abuse, yet you completely overlooked the signs of abuse in your own daughter? Look, the law is on your side. No teacher in a public school can force a child to pray, say the pledge, or use the term "under God" if they choose to say it. So WHERE IS THE BEEF? If you know enough people to get appointed to an advocates position, certainly you know enough to get a teacher fired or repremanded if that teacher is abusing children. No?

My Machinists Handbok went out on loan to an apprentice before I retired and was not returned. At the time, I thought it was not important because I was about to retire. Now, I wish I had it back. I suppose I could buy another.

You don't happen to know the precise reason that Al Quaeda decided that we needed to be on their hit list, do you?

Well would time pass faster on the moon? it is also a satellitte of the Earth. And how much faster would time pass on the moon?

Perhaps not, but it does possess a certain resonance, doesn't it?

I agree and I disagree. I think it (torture) is probably not a reliable way to get information from a terrorist who is quite capable of committing suicide for his cause. But as to the torture somehow justifying further terrorist acts, well I am of the opinion that terrorists will do all that they can to us and what we do, good or bad, has nothing to do with it.

I am saying that McCarthy tried to get people into trouble because he thought they were communists, not because they were atheists. Decorum and common decency? You are tooooooooomuch.

That is nonsense on it's face. Just saying that will not make it true, no matter how much you repeat it.