Good for Whom, Westside?

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ABQjournal: Ice Shift

Doug Frank, owner of the Scorpions, stands at the proposed site of a $42 million multipurpose event center that could be the home of the professional hockey franchise. It’s part of an expansive, multiyear project that would include a shopping mall and a city hall. (Randy Siner/For the Journal)

Say goodbye to that view, hello asphalt. Westsiders whine about traffic as they choke themselves with more. mjh

This Blog Renewed for 12 More Years?

KRT Wire | 12/03/2004 | Bush’s 2nd-term agenda: Set Jeb up BY ZEV CHAFETS

[L]ast week, in a meeting with The Washington Times editorial board, Ken Mehlman, the new chairman of the Republican National Committee, put Jeb back in the race.

Responding to a question, Mehlman mentioned eight potential candidates for 2008: Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist, Virginia Sen. George Allen, Colorado Gov. Bill Owens, Arizona Sen. John McCain, Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney, George Pataki, Rudy Giuliani – and Jeb Bush. …

Four years is a long way off. But if Jeb does run, he has a real shot at the nomination. Pataki and Giuliani may be too liberal on “values” issues to win red-state primaries. Romney’s from Massachusetts. Owens and Allen are unknowns. McCain, the media’s candidate, is a cancer survivor who will be 72 in 2008. Frist has a golden resume, but he’s a snooze.

Jeb is head and shoulders above this field. … That’s why it would be a mistake to view the next four years as a terminal presidency.

the Lure of “Moral Values”

Maureen Farrell > “God Is With Us”: Hitler’s Rhetoric and the Lure of “Moral Values”” href=”http://www.buzzflash.com/farrell/04/12/far04041.html”>BuzzFlash > Maureen Farrell > “God Is With Us”: Hitler’s Rhetoric and the Lure of “Moral Values”

If photographic evidence of the Third Reich’s Christian leanings were not enough, Hitler’s own speeches and writings prove, at the very least, that he presented many of the same faith-based arguments heard in America today. Religion in the schools? Hitler was for it. Intellectuals who practiced “anti-Christian, smug individualism”? According to Hitler, their days were numbered. Divine Providence’s role in shaping Germany’s ultimate victory? Who could argue? In other words, there is enough historical evidence to color Scalia deluded. Writing for Free Inquiry, John Patrick Michael Murphy explained:

“Hitler’s Germany amalgamated state with church. Soldiers of the vermacht wore belt buckles inscribed with the following: “Gott mit uns” (God is with us). His troops were often sprinkled with holy water by the priests. It was a real Christian country whose citizens were indoctrinated by both state and church and blindly followed all authority figures, political and ecclesiastical.

Hitler, like some of the today’s politicians and preachers, politicized “family values.” He liked corporeal punishment in home and school. Jesus prayers became mandatory in all schools under his administration. While abortion was illegal in pre-Hitler Germany, he took it to new depths of enforcement, requiring all doctors to report to the government the circumstances of all miscarriages. He openly despised homosexuality and criminalized it.”

For anyone wanting even more proof, Mein Kampf is chock full of the Fuhrer’s musings on God. …

“When was the last time a Western nation had a leader so obsessed with God and claiming God was on our side? If you answered Adolph Hitler and Nazi Germany, you’re correct,” Bob Fitrakis wrote.
Continue reading the Lure of “Moral Values”

‘We have more people who believe in the devil than who believe in evolution.’

Future at risk: U.S. is fast letting its tech edge slip away By DAVID BALTIMORE

Where does all this leave the United States, a nation with so many who are poorly educated and whose educational system does a particularly ineffective job with math and science? We have more people who believe in the devil than who believe in evolution. Why? …

So the cascade could begin: If America becomes a less affluent society, we will see a diminution in support for the research that is critical to our future. There are already clouds on the horizon: because of the deficit, federal budgets will get tighter and science funding is likely to suffer. The economic recovery is generating too few jobs. Silicon Valley still has lots of vacant space. The venture-capital industry is scared and conservative.

These trends are real. We cannot afford to ignore them. We must think deeply about the realities we face. We need to respond to the newest challenges of globalism. A fortress-America approach will get us nowhere.

"It does not require a majority to prevail, but rather an irate, tireless minority keen to set brush fires in people's minds." — Sam Adams