Vatican Issues Instruction on Bioethics

Well, the Vatican has issued instruction on bioethics.

From ELISABETTA POVOLEDO and LAURIE GOODSTEIN in the Times:

The Vatican issued the most authoritative and sweeping document on bioethical issues in 20 years on Friday, taking into account recent developments in biomedical technology and reinforcing the church’s opposition to in vitro fertilization, human cloning, genetic testing on embryos before implantation and embryonic stem cell research.

I realize the Vatican's feeling towards sodomy, but in the face of what science can offer the world, the Vatican's profound ignorance and foolishness offends me.

So here are other instructions: Stick your suggestions up your collective ass.

Your child molester-protecting outfit is out of its league when talk of ethics arises. How about the Vatican issues a disclaimer on the bottom of every official document for the next 50 years apologising for its collective sin?

McCain Underperformed with Religious Voters

Barack Obama outperforms Gore and Kerry among Protestants and evangelicals From MyDD:

Barack Obama received a higher share of the Protestant vote, 45%, than any other Democratic nominee since at least 1972, the earliest year for which I have data. By comparison, in 2004 Kerry received 40% of the Protestant vote and in 2000 Gore received 42%.

Even though McCain honed his campaign message to appeal to the religious right, alienating much of the country in the process, there was at a significant increase in Obama's share of the religious vote over Kerry's, especially among Catholics.

McCain's lack of appeal to the religious right and his poor people skills have been obvious since the inception of his campaign.

As we write here on Jan. 31. 2008:

Democrats are looking forward to a John McCain GOP nomination for president.

McCain faces the impossible task of disentangling himself from George W. Bush and presents the close-to-impossible task of bringing along the religious right.

You can bet that not just McCain but the remaining congressional Republicans will have similar results as McCain when they try to appeal to the American people through obstruction, assuming they are as sociopathic as Bush which is a fair assumption.

James Dobson, That Poor, Sad Person

Check out this letter from James Dobson's Focus on the Family that I ran across on MyDD.

What's interesting is that there are 100,000s of religious whacks who are reachable on a political and human level.

James Dobson's a buffoon.

But a lot of the grassroots religious people seek community and fellowship, and suspect all that compassion-tolerance-love-peace stuff might actually not be realized by war, greed, hate and the screw-you politiks of today's GOP.

Let's not give up on reaching these people.

Glenn Greenwald and Gen. David Petraeus' Whackey Flack

Check out the newest biting-off-more-than-they-can-chew-nonsense over at 's Glenn Greewald's column in Salon.

Greewald received "this morning an unsolicited email from one Col. Steven A. Boylan, the Public Affairs Officer and personal spokesman for Gen. David G. Petraeus...," with odd P.R. habits.

In the curious and bizarre world that is the Bush administration this strange move by Col. Boylan may win him secret plaudits and praise.

Boylan began the exchange with Gleenwald with a juvenile rant and then after Gleenwald called into question the authenticity of the e-mail (for confirmation form Boylan), Boylan's refused to offer a denial, and ludicrously asked why Gleenwald would pose such a question.

Now the Col Boylan has clammed up.

Check back at Glenn Greewald's column in Salon for updates. Keep us posted Glenn, somehow we don't think candid statements on this matter are forthcoming from the Pentagon.

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Top Republicans Still Wrong for Religious Right

Update II: Novak - McCain's Christian Problem

Update: Read Michael Scherer's report in Salon. The religious right's two-day gathering in D.C. demonstrates the enduring political trouble for the top-tier Republicans running for the GOP presidential nomination.

As reported in the New York Times, the politically significant straw poll taken at the "values voters" conference found three of the top four Republican candidates performing dismally, with Fred D. Thompson at 9.8 percent, Rudy Giuliani finishing second to last with less than two percent of the vote, and Senator John McCain finishing dead-last.

Mitt Romney, the only one of the top four Republican candidates who performed well, placed a close second in the straw poll (two online polls produced conflicting numbers), but did nothing to dissipate the deep skepticism toward his candidacy that has been marked by major flip-flops on social issues.

The NYT's Michael Luo reports that Romney received only a "smattering" of applause; and reading between the lines may have engineered the victory as voting was allowed before the conference.

Bottom line: Still no mandate from the religious right that political observers believe must come out in full force for the Republican nominee if he is to have a chance in the general election in 2008; a conclusion to which even organizers of the conference admitted they agreed.

Straw Poll Results

Mike Huckabee - 51.26%
Mitt Romney - 10.40%
Fred Thompson - 8.09%
Tom Tancredo - 6.83%
Rudy Giuliani - 6.30%
Duncan Hunter - 5.67%
John McCain - 3.15%
Sam Brownback - 2.73%
Ron Paul - 2.63%
Undecided - 1.16%
Not Voting - 0.74%

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Scott Horton: A Politicized Military?

Everything else in the Bush administration is politicized and deprofessionalized, what not the military too.

Scott Horton at Harper's deliverers his usual incisive analysis.

Luckily, we have people like Horton and Mikey Weinstein (a former Air Force Judge Advocate (JAG)) at the Military Religious Freedom Foundation to fight the rightwing forces, impervious to argument and contemptuous of religious minorities (like those Jews who are going to burn in hell for not accepting Christ), who believe that their version of Christianity trumps the rule of law, individual rights and pluralism.

I have often had a problem with Abe Foxman at the ADL for smearing opponents of Israeli militarism; but the fact of the matter is we need Foxman's passion against anti-Semitism because under Bush our military is becoming a de facto for-Christians-only force.

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