1 Will we ever reach a point where we understand each other? Only when people learn to think for themselves, and quit accepting opinion as fact. Just because someone you like or respect says something doesn't make it true.

2 How fun. This is something I've been thinking about all week. I'm reading "Rise to Globalism" about american foreign policy from WWII to at least the 90s and have been really surprised at some of it. Bush has nothing on Kennedy and Nixon and Kissinger in manipulating the public and other things. But yeah, if we can't agree on what actually happened in history, much less why it happened, how do we ever agree on anything?

3 I posted about the hatred about Reagan. When they first announced he was near death, but not dead, the folks at Democratic Underground said thinks like "I'll piss on his grave". What punks.

4 The problem, Sarah, is there really IS "objective truth"; however, in our new progressive, post-modern society, objective truth has been drowned out by existentialists who, when challenged on their idealogies, stick their fingers in their ears, and shout, "I'm not listening, la-la-la-la-la-, ..." &c, &c, &c, ad nauseam. There are those who do, of course espouse the concept of objective truth: some of whom we are now in a life-or-death struggle with; but note how they go about spreading their idealogy, their understanding of objective truth. They espouse that theirs is the only truth. They "evangelize" (if I may be so bold as to use that word) by driving 757s into 110-storey buildings. Their converts are cowed into a semblance of belief (a very close friend of mine--who is on his own quest to spread his own concept of Truth--has lived in Bosnia for over a decade; Bosnians, he has learned, followed Islam out of convenience, not out of conviction or fear. Essentially, the Ottoman Empire's er, "representatives", suggested that if they will allow mosques to be built, and if they at least make a point of visiting on a regular basis, the boys from Ottoman-land will keep those infidel Orthodox folks (Serbs) and infidel Catholic folks (Croats) out of their land, where they often met to carry on their centuries-old feud), or are either enslaved or removed from the equation. This I know you painfully understand, since your hero husband is there in the thick of things (and I, as well as all Americans owe him--and you, as well--an enormous debt of gratitude). But another group asserts that theirs is the only "true Truth", if I may coin that phrase. The primary difference between how they live out their truth is by just telling others of their truth. They also do such things as build hospitals, care for elderly, effect social change where needed (the abolition movements both here in the United States and in Great Britain come to mind), step in when necessary to help those in need (though not nearly as devoutly or as effectively as in the past--to their (and my) shame)--I think of Amy Carmichael, who, at the turn of the last century, discovered that her calling was to purchase, if necessary, those TODDLER girls (and later, when conditions enabled her) those TODDLER boys who were destined to be "married to the gods" and be groomed for erotic plays, respectively. Of course, that same genre of people settled in what they had first hoped was Jamestown (turns out they were a few hundred miles to the north) in 1620. Now they and their offspring are reviled and dismissed as being irrelevant: Their ideas, their world view, their foundational beliefs which were made manifest in not only their writings, but in the kind of society and government they wrought, are now considered passe. They don't understand, we are told; they weren't as learned as we. Kind of like President Reagan--or so I learned listening to this morning's "Morning Edition" on the local NPR affiliate. It just seems to me that the Judeo-Christian understanding of Truth has done a rather better job of creating a civil society of people who CHOOSE to be governed in a certain manner by whomever THEY choose, than any other form of keeping the homo sapien race from self-destructing. By the way--your husband? He's my hero too, and I remember him in my prayers regularly. May Divine Providence keep him and all those who have picked up the baton to run the race in these dangerous times safe. And thank YOU for lending him to us, your fellow citizens. Jim

5 Does Objective Truth exist? If it did we might not even recognize it as such. It would just look like any other dubious theory. It is more usefull to think of truth in terms of survival of the fittest. The fittest ideas about any phenonmenon survive in their environment. If the environment is an authoritarian church-state, like Europe was in Iran, is then the state will decide which ideas survive. If the environment is community of free-thinking, open-minded people who are ready to follow the facts to where they lead rather than trying to manipulate the facts to fit their agenda, then you have Science.

6 Sorry, should have previewed that, lets try again. Does Objective Truth exist? If it did we might not even recognize it as such. It would just look like any other dubious theory. It is more usefull to think of truth in terms of survival of the fittest. The fittest ideas about any phenonmenon survive in their environment. If the environment is an authoritarian church-state, like Europe was and Iran is, then the state will decide which ideas survive. If the environment is community of free-thinking, open-minded people who are ready to follow the facts to where they lead rather than trying to manipulate the facts to fit their agenda, then you have Science.

7 I love it when Christian evangelicals talk abou their obvious objectivity then make slurs about a religion different from their own. The people that piloted those planes into the World Trade Center were not typical Muslims - mass murder is not a central component to Islam. If one's religion could be judged by the actions of the most self-righteous of its faithful, then the Christians are no better than the Muslims. How many Native Americans - and people from all over the world - were conquered, turned into slaves and force fed Christianity? How many millions of Muslims died in the crusades? How many witches and heretics were burned at the inquisitor's stake? The reality is, a lot of those terroristic Muslims are not interested in destroying Americans because they hate our "freedom" as the president aaserts. A lot of them hate us because the rich guys that run our country have repeatedly bombed their families, killed their friends, supported their tyrants, and relegated them to lives of misery to preserve our access to cheap resources. There is objective truth. Everything is not simply a matter of opinion or "librul bias". The problem is that you guys rarely read enough about history and foreign affairs to be able to see something that is objectively true. If a situation does not coorespond with your set of beliefs, you simply ignore the conflicting information. The Republican party platform is built on ignoring inconvenient facts.