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Conference lgp30::christian-perspective

Title:Discussions from a Christian Perspective
Notice:Prostitutes and tax collectors welcome!
Moderator:CSC32::J_CHRISTIE
Created:Mon Sep 17 1990
Last Modified:Fri Jun 06 1997
Last Successful Update:Fri Jun 06 1997
Number of topics:1362
Total number of notes:61362

886.0. "Politics and Christianity" by TNPUBS::PAINTER (Planet Crayon) Wed Mar 23 1994 22:32

    
    This note for the political discussion continuation from 877.
    
    Cindy
T.RTitleUserPersonal
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886.1TNPUBS::PAINTERPlanet CrayonWed Mar 23 1994 22:4020
    
    No, Jack.  Koop went against the Reagan administration on this one.
    It's been a while since I read the articles, but I can pull out some
    of the key quotes and stories from that timeperiod if you like.
    
    I knew of AIDS very early on because I subscribe to several science
    magazines, and was actually reading about it in the early 1980s.  It
    took *years* to get this information out to the general public though. 
    Your average person on the street does not typically subscribe to
    these sorts of publications.
    
    My neurologist's wife worked in an AIDS research lab (think it was
    Harvard), and he kept me updated on what was going on, and what the 
    government was NOT doing about it at the time.   The underlying attitude 
    was, "Well, they're just gays and Haitians..."
    
    Now only a few years later, AIDS is the largest killer of men in the US
    between the ages of 25 and 40.
    
    Cindy
886.2appropriate? (reply in topic 9)LGP30::FLEISCHERwithout vision the people perish (DTN 223-8576, MSO2-2/A2, IM&T)Thu Mar 24 1994 06:207
re Note 886.0 by TNPUBS::PAINTER:

>     This note for the political discussion continuation from 877.
  
        Groan!  As moderator I can't really just hit "next unseen"!

        Bob
886.3AIMHI::JMARTINThu Mar 24 1994 11:3914
    Ohh...well, perhaps there was a lack of foresight on the part of the
    Reagan administration.
    
    I think it comes down to a matter of opinion.  I think education is 
    important...through families and the local church.  I have openly
    stated here that the local church as a whole needs to cut out this 
    candor nonsense and deal with the issues of today.  Admiitedly, PC
    can go both ways from time to time.
    
    I know what's coming next.  What about education in the inner cities,
    for the homeless, for the drug users, etc.  What can I say except
    the government makes poor role models.  
    
    -Jack
886.4Sorry, Bob. (;^)TNPUBS::PAINTERPlanet CrayonThu Mar 24 1994 11:421
    
886.5Moderator ActionCSC32::J_CHRISTIEPacifist HellcatThu Mar 24 1994 12:3014
    I have taken it upon myself to change the title of this string
    to "Politics and Christianity."  I, for one, can see the relevance.
    We also have topics: God and the Government
    			 American Civil Religion
    			 and other related topics
    
    Let's not forget to make the connection to Christ, to morality, to
    justice, to compassion, and to mercy.
    
    If anyone has a problem with this, please notify me offline.
    
    Richard Jones-Christie
    Co-moderator/CHRISTIAN-PERSPECTIVE
    
886.6As requested in 9.1051CSC32::J_CHRISTIEPacifist HellcatThu Mar 24 1994 15:5022
        <<< LGP30::DKA300:[NOTES$LIBRARY]CHRISTIAN-PERSPECTIVE.NOTE;1 >>>
                 -< Discussions from a Christian Perspective >-
================================================================================
Note 9.1040                   The Processing Topic                  1040 of 1053
CSC32::J_CHRISTIE "Pacifist Hellcat"                 16 lines  24-MAR-1994 13:08
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
    .1038  Jack,
    
    	Documents revealed in recent years have indicated that Hitler's Germany
    had given up on plans to build the A-bomb, believing it was years away.
    I know this puts some holes in the rationale for all those who believe
    the U.S. has always done what is right and good, but so be it.
    
    	There also exists a body of evidence that the Japanese would have
    ceased the war anyway within 3 or so months of dropping Little Boy and
    Fat Man on populated areas.  I know this puts some holes in the
    rationale for all those who believe the U.S. has always done what
    is right and good, but so be it.
    
    Shalom,
    Richard
    
886.7CSC32::J_CHRISTIEPacifist HellcatThu Mar 24 1994 16:2616
    Bob in 9.1051 is right.  The material in 886.6 (copied from 9.1040)
    is probably more suitable in SOAPBOX than in our conference.
    
    I choose to no longer pursue the issues raised in 886.6 (9.1040).
    
    I do believe though that politics is not an entity wholly separate from
    matters of faith and convictions.  All too many times, I think, people
    vote more with their checkbook in mind than with the Good Book in
    mind.
    
    Basic to the teachings of Christ is to go beyond the self.  We haven't
    gotten the hang of that.  I know I haven't.
    
    Peace,
    Richard
    
886.8AIMHI::JMARTINThu Mar 24 1994 17:168
    It is not the governments responsibility to take on role of the local
    church.  The government is not supposed to be the salt of the earth.
    The government is taking this ministry from the local church but the
    church is allowing them to do this through pacifism!!
    
    This is not a Soapbox issue by any means!!
    
    -Jack
886.9CSC32::J_CHRISTIEPacifist HellcatThu Mar 24 1994 18:1713
    .8  Well, Jack, I never said any of that, in case you thought I
    had.  I've never advocated the government taking on the role of the
    church, nor have I said that the government was supposed to be the
    salt of the earth.
    
    Your third sentence in 886.8, I can't make heads or tails of.
    
    Pacifism is nothing new.  Quakers have been around for 300+ years,
    Mennonites even longer.  That's longer than the U.S. has been an
    independant nation.
    
    Richard
    
886.10AIMHI::JMARTINThu Mar 24 1994 19:3913
    What I meant was that by governments desire to promote welfare and
    things of this nature, they are assuming the role of what the local
    church is supposed to be doing.  It's no secret that the ones who hand
    out the goodies are the good guys.  We are supposed to be the salt of
    the earth, not the federal government.
    
    I don't know, I guess I think gov't over steps its bounds.  
    
    And by the way, I knew you didn't say that initially.  I believe there
    are many, mainly of the liberal point of view, who believe government
    is here to be our savior!!
    
    -Jack
886.11CSC32::J_CHRISTIEPacifist HellcatThu Mar 24 1994 20:0317
    .10  Jack,
    
    Few liberals are pacifists.  You mentioned Lloyd Benson earlier in
    another string.  Need I say more?
    
    Incidentally, you might enjoy a movie called "Atomic Cafe."  The
    film is nothing but media clips from the 1950s and 1960s.  Nothing
    has been added.  It is alarming, horrifying and absurdly humorous.
    You can probably rent it at Blockbuster.  Nixon, Benson, and a whole
    bunch of familiar faces appear in it.  Unfortunately, Hazel O'Leary
    was years away from heading up the DOE.
    
    I may speak to the welfare question later.  (Don't hold your breath)
    
    Shalom,
    Richard
    
886.12FRETZ::HEISERGrace changes everythingFri Nov 04 1994 16:333
    What's the difference between Pro and Con?
    
    Progress and Congress!
886.13Whatsoever you do...CSC32::J_CHRISTIEOkeley-dokeley, Neighbor!Wed Nov 23 1994 20:3411
	"Tanzania received almost three hundred thousand refugees from
neighboring Rwanda in a single day.  Tanzania, a country with far fewer
resources than the United States, didn't close its borders or scheme to
find ways to have the refugees go elsewhere.  And yet the political and
economic consequences to Tanzania of allowing Rwandan refugees to enter
were certainly more pressing than similar consequences in Florida."

				Elizabeth Ferris
				News Release
				National Council of Churches in the USA

886.14AIMHI::JMARTINBarney IS NOT a nerd!!Tue Nov 29 1994 11:247
    Richard:
    
    Just out of curiosity, how much of our GNP is being transitioned as aid
    to other countries in the world and how many refugees come to this
    country every year?
    
    -Jack
886.15CSC32::J_CHRISTIEOkeley-dokeley, Neighbor!Tue Nov 29 1994 13:094
    Darn!  I had those figures at my fingertips just yesterday, too!
    
    Richard
    
886.16FRETZ::HEISERGrace changes everythingTue Nov 29 1994 16:582
    Good one, Richard.  I'll have to nominate -1 for the Mike Valenza
    sarcasm award.
886.17Pope John Paul IIFRETZ::HEISERGrace changes everythingMon Dec 19 1994 15:336
    I'm confused by this one.  Why would the secular media vote a
    anti-abortion, anti-condom, homophobic, white, European male as "Man of
    the Year"?
    
    thanks,
    Mike
886.19COVERT::COVERTJohn R. CovertMon Dec 19 1994 15:4171
Men, Women and Ideas of the Year, 1927 - 1994
   
1927 Man of the Year: Charles Augustus Lindbergh
1928 Man of the Year: Walter P. Chrysler
1929 Man of the Year: Owen D. Young
1930 Man of the Year: Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi
1931 Man of the Year: Pierre Laval
1932 Man of the Year: Franklin Delano Roosevelt
1933 Man of the Year: Hugh Samuel Johnson
1934 Man of the Year: Franklin Delano Roosevelt
1935 Man of the Year: Haile Selassie
1936 Woman of the Year: Wallis Warfield Simpson
1937 Man & Wife of the Year: Generalissimo and Mme Chiang Kai-Shek
1938 Man of the Year: Adolf Hitler
1939 Man of the Year: Joseph Stalin
1940 Man of the Year: Winston Leonard Spencer Churchill
1941 Man of the Year: Franklin Delano Roosevelt
1942 Man of the Year: Joseph Stalin
1943 Man of the Year: George Catlett Marshall
1944 Man of the Year: Dwight David Eisenhower
1945 Man of the Year: Harry Truman
1946 Man of the Year: James F. Byrnes
1947 Man of the Year: George Catlett Marshall
1948 Man of the Year: Harry Truman
1949 Man of the Year: Winston Leonard Spencer Churchill
1950 Man of the Year: American Fighting-Man
1951 Man of the Year: Mohammed Mossadegh
1952 Woman of the Year: Elizabeth II
1953 Man of the Year: Konrad Adenauer
1954 Man of the Year: John Foster Dulles
1955 Man of the Year: Harlow Herbert Curtice
1956 Man of the Year: Hungarian Freedom Fighter
1957 Man of the Year: Nikita Krushchev
1958 Man of the Year: Charles De Gaulle
1959 Man of the Year: Dwight David Eisenhower
1960 Men of the Year: U.S. Scientists
1961 Man of the Year: John Fitzgerald Kennedy
1962 Man of the Year: Pope John XXIII
1963 Man of the Year: Martin Luther King Jr.
1964 Man of the Year: Lyndon B. Johnson
1965 Man of the Year: General William Childs Westmoreland
1966 Man of the Year: Twenty-Five and Under
1967 Man of the Year: Lyndon B. Johnson
1968 Men of the Year: Astronauts Anders, Borman and Lovell
1969 Man and Woman of the Year: The Middle Americans
1970 Man of the Year: Willy Brandt
1971 Man of the Year: Richard Milhous Nixon
1972 Men of the Year: Nixon and Kissinger
1973 Man of the Year: John J. Sirica
1974 Man of the Year: King Faisal
1975 Women of the Year: American Women
1976 Man of the Year: Jimmy Carter
1977 Man of the Year: Anwar Sadat
1978 Man of the Year: Teng Hsiao-P'ing
1979 Man of the Year: Ayatullah Khomeini
1980 Man of the Year: Ronald Reagan
1981 Man of the Year: Lech Walesa
1982 Machine of the Year: The Computer
1983 Men of the Year: Ronald Regan and Yuri Andropov
1984 Man of the Year: Peter Ueberroth
1985 Man of the Year: Deng Xiaoping
1986 Woman of the Year: Corazon Aquino
1987 Man of the Year: Mikhail Sergeyevich Gorbachev
1988 Planet of the Year: Endangered Earth
1989 Man of the Decade: Mikhail Sergeyevich Gorbachev
1990 Men of the Year: The Two George Bushes
1991 Man of the Year: Ted Turner
1992 Man of the Year: Bill Clinton
1993 Men of the Year: The Peacemakers: Yitzhak Rabin, Nelson Mandela,
			F.W. de Klerk and Yasser Arafat
1994 Man of the Year: Pope John Paul II
886.18COVERT::COVERTJohn R. CovertMon Dec 19 1994 15:438
"Voting" on the web was just for show.

Time's management staff made the selection.

Doesn't mean they like him.  After all, Hitler was MotY in 1938, and
	Stalin in 1939.

/john
886.20FRETZ::HEISERGrace changes everythingMon Dec 19 1994 15:462
    I think that was before anyone knew what Hitler and Stalin were up to
    or were really like in character.
886.21CSC32::J_CHRISTIEUnquenchable fireMon Dec 19 1994 15:485
    Time's criteria has nothing to do with how "good" someone is.
    
    Shalom,
    Richard
    
886.22COVERT::COVERTJohn R. CovertMon Dec 19 1994 15:55381
>    I think that was before anyone knew what Hitler and Stalin were up to
>    or were really like in character.

Not so.  The article in 1938 about Hitler is rather clear that they don't
think much of him at all.  Here it is:

   January 2, 1939
   
   
     _________________________________________________________________
   
                                MAN OF THE YEAR
                                       
                                 ADOLF HITLER
                                       
   
   Greatest single news event of 1938 took place on September 29, when
   four statesmen met at the Fuhrerhaus, in Munich, to redraw the map of
   Europe. The three visiting statesmen at that historic conference were
   Prime Minister Neville Chamberlain of Great Britain, Premier Edouard
   Daladier of France, and Dictator Benito Mussolini of Italy. But by all
   odds the dominating figure at Munich was the German host, Adolf
   Hitler.
   
   
   Fuhrer of the German people, Commander-in-Chief of the German Army,
   Navy & Air Force, Chancellor of the Third Reich, Herr Hitler reaped on
   that day at Munich the harvest of an audacious, defiant, ruthless
   foreign policy he had pursued for five and a half years. He had torn
   the Treaty of Versailles to shreds. He had rearmed Germany to the
   teeth--or as close to the tooth as he was able. He had stolen Austria
   before the eyes of a horrified and apparently impotent world.
   
   
   All these events were shocking to nations which had defeated Germany
   on the battlefield only 20 years before, but nothing so terrified the
   world as the ruthless, methodical, Nazi-directed events which during
   late summer and early autumn threatened a world war over
   Czechoslovakia. When without loss of blood he reduced Czechoslovakia
   to a German puppet state, forced a drastic revision of Europe's
   defensive alliances, and won a free hand for himself in Eastern Europe
   by getting a "hands-off" promise from powerful Britain (and later
   France), Adolf Hitler without doubt became 1938's Man of the Year.
   
   
   Most other world figures of 1938 faded in importance as the year drew
   to a close. Prime Minister Chamberlain's "peace with honor" seemed
   more than ever to have achieved neither. An increasing number of
   Britons ridiculed his appease-the-dictators policy, believed that
   nothing save abject surrender could satisfy the dictators' ambitions.
   
   
   Among many Frenchmen there rose a feeling that Premier Daladier, by a
   few strokes of the pen at Munich, had turned France into a second-rate
   power. Aping Mussolini in his gestures and copying triumphant Hitler's
   shouting complex, the once liberal Daladier at year's end was reduced
   to using parliamentary tricks to keep his job.
   
   
   During 1938 Dictator Mussolini was only a decidedly junior partner in
   the firm of Hitler & Mussolini, Inc. His noisy agitation to get
   Corsica and Tunis from France was rated as a weak bluff whose
   immediate objectives were no more than cheaper tolls for Italian ships
   in the Suez Canal and control of the Djibouti-Addis Ababa railroad.
   
   
   Gone from the international scene was Eduard Benes, for 20 years
   Europe's "Smartest Little Statesman." Last President of free
   Czechoslovakia, he was now a sick exile from the country he helped
   found. Pious Chinese Generalissimo Chiang Kai-shek, Man of 1937, was
   forced to retreat to a "New" West China, where he faced the
   possibility of becoming only a respectable figurehead in an enveloping
   Communist movement. If Francisco Franco had won the Spanish Civil War
   after his great spring drive, he might well have been Man-of-the-Year
   timber. But victory still eluded the Generalissimo and war weariness
   and disaffection on the Rightist side made his future precarious.
   
   
   On the American scene, 1938 was no one man's year. Certainly it was
   not Franklin Roosevelt's; his Purge was beaten and his party lost much
   of its bulge in the Congress. Secretary Hull will remember Good
   Neighborly 1938 as the year he crowned his trade treaty efforts with
   the British agreement, but history will not specially identify Mr.
   Hull with 1938. At year's end in Lima, his plan of Continental
   Solidarity for the two Americas had a few of its teeth pulled.
   
   
   But the figure of Adolf Hitler strode over a cringing Europe with all
   the swagger of a conqueror. Not the mere fact that the Fuhrer brought
   10,500,000 more people (7,000,000 Austrians, 3,500,000 Sudetens) under
   his absolute rule made him the Man of 1938. Japan during the same time
   added tens of millions of Chinese to her empire. More significant was
   the fact Hitler became in 1938 the greatest threatening force that the
   democratic, freedom-loving world faces today.
   
   
   His shadow fell far beyond Germany's frontier. Small, neighboring
   States (Denmark, Norway, Czechoslovakia, Lithuania, The Balkans,
   Luxembourg, The Netherlands) feared to offend him. In France Nazi
   pressure was in part responsible for some of the post-Munich
   anti-democratic decrees. Fascism had intervened openly in Spain, had
   fostered a revolt in Brazil, was covertly aiding revolutionary
   movements in Rumania, Hungary, Poland, Lithuania. In Finland a foreign
   minister had to resign under Nazi pressure. Throughout eastern Europe
   after Munich the trend was toward less freedom, more dictatorship. In
   the U.S. alone did democracy feel itself strong enough at year's end
   to give Hitler his come-uppance.
   
   
   The Fascintern, with Hitler in the driver's seat, with Mussolini,
   Franco and the Japanese military cabal riding behind, emerged in 1938
   as an international, revolutionary movement. Rant as he might against
   the machinations of international Communism and international Jewry,
   or rave as he would that he was just a Pan-German trying to get all
   the Germans back in one nation, Fuhrer Hitler had himself become the
   world's No. 1 International Revolutionist--so much so that if the
   oft-predicted struggle between Fascism and Communism now takes place
   it will be only because two revolutionist dictators, Hitler and
   Stalin, are too big to let each other live in the same world.
   
   
   But Fuhrer Hitler does not regard himself as a revolutionary; he has
   become so only by force of circumstances. Fascism has discovered that
   freedom--of press, speech, assembly--is a potential danger to its own
   security. In Fascist phraseology democracy is often coupled with
   Communism. The Fascist battle against freedom is often carried forward
   under the false slogan of "Down with Communism!" One of the chief
   German complaints against democratic Czechoslovakia last summer was
   that it was an "outpost of Communism."
   
   
   A generation ago western civilization had apparently outgrown the
   major evils of barbarism except for war between nations. The Russian
   Communist Revolution promoted the evil of class war. Hitler topped it
   by another, race war. Fascism and Communism both resurrected religious
   war. These multiple forms of barbarism gave shape in 1938 to an issue
   over which men may again, perhaps soon, shed blood: the issue of
   civilized liberty v. barbaric authoritarianism.
   
   
   Lesser men of the year seemed small indeed beside the Fuhrer.
   Undoubted Crook of the Year was the late Frank Donald Coster (ne
   Musica), with Richard Whitney, now in Sing Sing Prison, as runner-up.
   Sportsman of the Year was Tennist Donald Budge, champion of the U.S.,
   England, France, Australia. Aviator of the Year was 33-year-old Howard
   Robard Hughes, diffident millionaire, who flew a sober, precise,
   foolproof course 14,716 miles round the top of the world in three
   days, 19 hours, eight minutes.
   
   
   Radio's Man of the Year was youthful Orson Welles who, in his famous
   The War of the Worlds broadcast, scared fewer people than Hitler, but
   more than had ever been frightened by radio before, demonstrating that
   radio can be a tremendous force in whipping up mass emotion.
   Playwright of the Year was Thornton Wilder, previously a precious
   litterateur, whose first play on Broadway, Our Town, was not only
   ingenious and moving, but a big hit. To Gabriel Pascal, producer of
   Pygmalion, first full-length picture based on the wordy dramas of
   George Bernard Shaw, went the title of Cineman of the Year for having
   discovered a rich mine of dramatic material when other famed producers
   had given up all hope of ever tapping it. Men of the Year, outstanding
   in comprehensive science were three medical researchers who discovered
   that nicotinic acid was a cure for human pellagra: Drs. Tom Douglas
   Spies of Cincinnati General Hospital, Marion Arthur Blankenhorn of the
   University of Cincinnati, Clark Niel Cooper of Waterloo, Iowa.
   
   
   In religion, the two outstanding figures of 1938 were in sharp
   contrast save for their opposition to Adolf Hitler. One of them, Pope
   Pius XI, 81, spoke with "bitter sadness" of Italy's anti-Semitic laws,
   the harrying of Italian Catholic Action groups, the reception
   Mussolini gave Hitler last May, declared sadly: "We have offered our
   now old life for the peace and prosperity of peoples. We offer it
   anew." By spending most of the year in a concentration camp,
   Protestant Pastor Martin Niemoller gave courageous witness to his
   faith.
   
   
   It was noteworthy that few of these other men of the year would have
   been free to achieve their accomplishments in Nazi Germany. The genius
   of free wills has been so stifled by the oppression of dictatorship
   that Germany's output of poetry, prose, music, philosophy,art has been
   meagre indeed.
   
   
   The man most responsible for this world tragedy is a moody, brooding,
   unprepossessing, 49-year-old Austrian-born ascetic with a Charlie
   Chaplin mustache. The son of an Austrian petty customs official, Adolf
   Hitler was raised as a spoiled child by a doting mother. Consistently
   failing to pass even the most elementary studies, he grew up a
   half-educated young man, untrained for any trade or profession,
   seemingly doomed to failure. Brilliant, charming, cosmopolitan Vienna
   he learned to loathe for what he called its Semitism; more to his
   liking was homogeneous Munich, his real home after 1912. To this man
   of no trade and few interests the Great War was a welcome event which
   gave him some purpose in life. Hitler took part in 48 engagements, won
   the German Iron Cross (first class), was wounded once and gassed once,
   was in a hospital when the Armistice of November 11, 1918 was
   declared.
   
   
   His political career began in 1919 when he became Member No. 7 of the
   midget German Labor Party. Discovering his powers of oratory, Hitler
   soon became the party's leader, changed its name to the National
   Socialist German Labor Party, wrote is anti- Semitic, anti-democratic,
   authoritarian program. The party's first mass meeting took place in
   Munich in February 1920. The leader intended to participate in a
   monarchist attempt to seize power a month later; but for this abortive
   Putsch Fuhrer Hitler arrived too late. An even less successful
   National Socialist attempt--the famed Munich Beer Hall Putsch of
   1923--provided the party with dead martyrs, landed Herr Hitler in
   jail. His incarceration at Landsberg Fortress gave him time to write
   the first volume of Mein Kampf, now a "must" on every German
   bookshelf. (Deputy Fuhrer Rudolf Hess helped write it. Imprisonment
   also gave Hitler time to perfect his tactics. Even before that time he
   got from his Communist opponents the idea of gangster-like party storm
   troopers; after this the principle of the small cell groups of devoted
   party workers.)
   
   
   Outlawed in many German districts, the National Socialist Party
   nevertheless climbed steadily in membership. Time-honored Tammany Hall
   methods of handing out many small favors were combined with rowdy
   terrorism and lurid, patriotic propaganda. The picture of a mystic,
   abstemious, charismatic Fuhrer was assiduously cultivated.
   
   
   Not until 1929 did National Socialism win its first absolute majority
   in a city election (at Coburg) and make its first significant showing
   in a provincial election (in Thuringia). But from 1928 on the party
   almost continually gained in electoral strength. In the Reichstag
   elections of 1928 it polled 809,000 votes. Two years later 6,401,016
   Germans voted for National Socialist deputies while in 1932 the vote
   was 13,732,779. While still short of a majority, the vote was
   nevertheless impressive proof of the power of the man and his
   movement.
   
   
   The situation which gave rise to this demagogic, ignorant, desperate
   movement was inherent in the German Republic's birth and in the
   craving of large sections of the politically immature German people
   for strong, masterful leadership. Democracy in Germany was conceived
   in the womb of military defeat. It was the Republic which put its
   signature (unwillingly) to the humiliating Versailles Treaty, a brand
   of shame which it never lived down in German minds.
   
   
   That the German people love uniforms, parades, military formations,
   and submit easily to authority is no secret. Fuhrer Hitler's own hero
   is Frederick the Great. That admiration stems undoubtedly from
   Frederick's military prowess and autocratic rule rather than from
   Frederick's love of French culture and his hatred of Prussian
   boorishness. But unlike the polished Frederick, Fuhrer Hitler, whose
   reading has always been very limited, invites few great minds to visit
   him, nor would Fuhrer Hitler agree with Frederick's contention that he
   was "tired of ruling over slaves." (Bismarck, the Iron Chancellor,
   also complained of the submissiveness of German character.)
   
   
   In bad straits even in fair weather, the German Republic collapsed
   under the weight of the 1929-34 depression in which German
   unemployment soared to 7,000,000 above a nationwide wind drift of
   bankruptcies and failures. Called to power as Chancellor of the Third
   Reich on January 30, 1933 by aged, senile President Paul von
   Hindenburg, Chancellor Hitler began to turn the Reich inside out.
   Unemployment was solved by: 1) a far-reaching program of public works;
   2) an intense re-armament program, including a huge standing army; 3)
   enforced labor in the service of the State (the German Labor Corps);
   4) putting political enemies and Jewish, Communist and Socialist
   jobholders in concentration camps.
   
   
   What Adolf Hitler & Co. did to Germany in less than six years was
   applauded wildly and ecstatically by most Germans. He lifted the
   nation from post-War defeatism. Under the swastika Germany was
   unified. His was no ordinary dictatorship, but rather one of great
   energy and magnificent planning. The "socialist" part of National
   Socialism might be scoffed at by hard-&-fast Marxists, but the Nazi
   movement nevertheless had a mass basis. The 1,500 miles of magnificent
   highways built, schemes for cheap cars and simple workers' benefits,
   grandiose plans for rebuilding German cities made Germans burst with
   pride. Germans might eat many substitute foods or wear ersatz clothes
   but they did eat.
   
   
   What Adolf Hitler & Co. did to the German people in that time left
   civilized men and women aghast. Civil rights and liberties have
   disappeared. Opposition to the Nazi regime has become tantamount to
   suicide or worse. Free speech and free assembly are anachronisms. The
   reputations of the once-vaunted German centres of learning have
   vanished. Education has been reduced to a National Socialist
   catechism.
   
   
   Pace Quickened. Germany's 700,000 Jews have been tortured physically,
   robbed of homes and properties, denied a chance to earn a living,
   chased off the streets. Now they are being held for "ransom," a
   gangster trick through the ages. But not only Jews have suffered. Out
   of Germany has come a steady, ever- swelling stream of refugees, Jews
   and Gentiles, liberals and conservatives, Catholics as well as
   Protestants, who could stand Naziism no longer. TIME's cover, showing
   Organist Adolf Hitler playing his hymn of hate in a desecrated
   cathedral while victims dangle on a St. Catherine's wheel and the Nazi
   hierarchy looks on, was drawn by Baron Rudolph Charles von Ripper, a
   Catholic who found Germany intolerable.
   
   
   Meanwhile, Germany has become a nation of uniforms, goose- stepping to
   Hitler's tune, where boys of ten are taught to throw hand grenades,
   where women are regarded as breeding machines. Most cruel joke of all,
   however, has been played by Hitler & Co. on those German capitalists
   and small businessmen who once backed National Socialism as a means of
   saving Germany's bourgeois economic structure from radicalism. The
   Nazi credo that the individual belongs to the state also applies to
   business. Some businesses have been confiscated outright, on other
   what amounts to a capital tax has been levied. Profits have been
   strictly controlled. Some idea of the increasing Governmental control
   and interference in business could be deduced from the fact that 80%
   of all building and 50% of all industrial orders in Germany originated
   last year with the Government. Hard-pressed for food- stuffs as well
   as funds, the Nazi regime has taken over large estates and in many
   instances collectivized agriculture, a procedure fundamentally similar
   to Russian Communism.
   
   
   When Germany took over Austria she took upon herself the care and
   feeding of 7,000,000 poor relations. When 3,500,000 Sudetens were
   absorbed, there were that many more mouths to feed. As 1938 drew to a
   close many were the signs that the Nazi economy of exchange control,
   barter trade, lowered standard of living, "self-sufficiency," was
   cracking. Nor were signs lacking that many Germans disliked the
   cruelties of their Government, but were afraid to protest them. Having
   a hard time to provide enough bread to go round, Fuhrer Hitler was
   being driven to give the German people another diverting circus. The
   Nazi controlled press, jumping the rope at the count of Propaganda
   Minister Paul Joseph Goebbels, shrieked insults at real and imagined
   enemies. And the pace of the German dictatorship quickened as more &
   more guns rolled from factories and little more butter was produced.
   
   
   In five years under the Man of 1938, regimented Germany had made
   itself one of the great military powers of the world today. The
   British Navy remains supreme on the seas. Most military men regard the
   French Army as incomparable. Biggest question mark is air strength,
   which changes from day to day, but most observers believe Germany
   superior in warplanes. Despite a shortage of trained officers and a
   lack of materials, the German Army has become a formidable machine
   which could probably be beaten only by a combination of opposing
   armies. As testimony to his nation's puissance, Fuhrer Hitler could
   look back over the year and remember that besides receiving countless
   large-bore statesmen (Mr. Chamberlain three times, for instance), he
   paid his personal respects to three kings (Sweden's Gustaf, Denmark's
   Christian, Italy's Vittorio Emanuele) and was visited by two
   (Bulgaria's Boris, Rumania's Carol--not counting Hungary's Regent,
   Horthy).
   
   
   Meanwhile an estimated 1,133 streets and squares, notably Rathaus
   Platz in Vienna, acquired the name of Adolf Hitler. He delivered 96
   public speeches, attended eleven opera performances (way below par),
   vanquished two rivals (Benes and Kurt von Schuschnigg, Austria's last
   Chancellor), sold 900,000 new copies of Mein Kampf in Germany besides
   selling it widely in Italy and Insurgent Spain. His only loss was in
   eyesight: he had to begin wearing spectacles for work. Last week Herr
   Hitler entertained at a Christmas party 7,000 workmen now building
   Berlin's new mammoth Chancellery, told them: "The next decade will
   show those countries with their patent democracy where true culture is
   to be found."
   
   
   But other nations have emphatically joined the armaments race and
   among military men the poser is: "Will Hitler fight when it becomes
   definitely certain that he is losing that race?" The dynamics of
   dictatorship are such that few who have studied Fascism and its
   leaders can envision sexless, restless, instinctive Adolf Hitler
   rounding out a mellow middle age in his mountain chalet at
   Berchtesgaden while a satisfied German people drink beer and sing folk
   songs. There is no guarantee that the have-not nations will go to
   sleep when they have taken what they now want from the haves. To those
   who watched the closing events of the year it seemed more than
   probable that the Man of 1938 may make 1939 a year to be remembered.
886.23FRETZ::HEISERGrace changes everythingMon Dec 19 1994 16:555
    Interesting!  I still think today's media is not objective enough to
    duplicate selecting someone they don't care for as MOY.  Your list of
    recent winners shows that (outside of Khomeini).
    
    Mike
886.24Mr. Bill C.DNEAST::MALCOLM_BRUCMon Dec 19 1994 17:027
    
    I've noticed on several occations, seeing on TV Mr. Clinton going to church.
    Does any one know what denomination he belongs too?
    
    Thanks
    Bruce
    
886.25POWDML::FLANAGANI feel therefore I amMon Dec 19 1994 17:031
    I thought he was a Baptist!
886.26member of the First Church of ChamelonsFRETZ::HEISERGrace changes everythingMon Dec 19 1994 17:111
    Southern Baptist to be exact, but even they've disowned him.
886.27CSC32::J_CHRISTIEUnquenchable fireMon Dec 19 1994 17:445
    .26  Is that fact?  Even the Quakers (Whittier Friends) didn't disown
    Nixon.  It was under consideration though.
    
    Richard
    
886.28COVERT::COVERTJohn R. CovertMon Dec 19 1994 17:585
He most frequently goes to a Methodist Church near the White House.

Probably a pro-gay, pro-abortion one, picked by Hillary.

/john
886.29CSC32::J_CHRISTIEUnquenchable fireMon Dec 19 1994 18:014
    Yeah!  They probably smoke pot during the services, too!!
    
    Richard
    
886.30FRETZ::HEISERGrace changes everythingMon Dec 19 1994 18:112
    yes it's fact.  The leader of the Southern Baptists and Clinton's own
    pastor have publicly denounced him for some of his "political" stances.
886.31CSC32::J_CHRISTIEUnquenchable fireMon Dec 19 1994 18:294
    Ahhh.  Denunciation and disownment are not quite the same thing.
    
    Richard
    
886.32APACHE::MYERSTue Dec 20 1994 09:078
    Richard,

    Let's not let reality and proper use of the English language get in the
    way of our convictions. Reason, fairness, even handedness, compassion,
    humility and thought have no place when it comes to stating what we just
    "know" is the truth. :^}
    
    Eric
886.33CSC32::J_CHRISTIEUnquenchable fireSun Jan 22 1995 17:445
    "Those who say religion has nothing to do with politics do not know
    what religion means."
    
    					-- Mahatma Gandhi
    
886.34CSC32::J_CHRISTIEUnquenchable fireFri Apr 07 1995 13:485
	A conservative government is an organized hypocrisy.

					-- Benjamin Disraeli


886.35MKOTS3::JMARTINYou-Had-Forty-Years!!!Fri Apr 07 1995 13:527
    That's funny I'll say!  And I suppose a liberal government is not
    hypocrisy?
    
    Don't forget, Clinton and his cabinet all prospered from those evil
    Reagan years.
    
    -Jack
886.36Reagan, King of the deficitCSC32::J_CHRISTIEUnquenchable fireFri Apr 07 1995 13:552
    During the time the national debt tripled, eh?
    
886.37MKOTS3::JMARTINYou-Had-Forty-Years!!!Fri Apr 07 1995 14:039
    Absolutely...it was a bone headed yet effective way to crumble the
    Soviet Empire....and even under the current administration, the debt
    continues to climb at a horrific level. 
    
    Every Clinton cabinet member is a millionaire and has been for some
    time.   They all prospered from Reaganomics.  They are traveling to the
    beat of a different drummer than you are...
    
    -Jack 
886.38MKOTS3::JMARTINYou-Had-Forty-Years!!!Wed May 17 1995 15:12111
    There Is No Right to Do Wrong

    Alan Keyes

    This is another in The Chronicle's series by Republican candidates
    discussing their campaigns for the presidency. Alan Keyes is a
    conservative radio commentator and former diplomat.

    THE CRISIS Americans sense in our country today arises from one moral
    challenge manifested in many areas. That challenge involves corruption
    of our understanding of freedom, due mainly to abandoning the respect
    for law and individual responsibility that ought to undergird it.

    Our freedom depends on certain moral ideas. In my personal conscience
    and belief, Christianity most perfectly embodies those ideas. But
    Americans come from many religious and moral backgrounds, so in dealing
    with public policy we must derive ideas from sources open to support
    from people of all religious backgrounds.

    Nothing meets this purpose more completely than the principles and
    logic of our Declaration of Independence. The Declaration states
    principles of justice defining our moral identity as Americans,
    presenting a certain concept of our human nature and drawing out its
    political consequences. It says all human beings are created equal,
    needing no qualification beyond their simple humanity to command
    respect for their intrinsic dignity, their ``inalienable rights.'' The
    purpose of government is to secure these rights. A government
    systematically violating them is neither just nor legitimate.

    But our Declaration does more than assert rights. It also makes a clear
    statement that God, the Creator and author of the laws of nature, is
    the ultimate source of authority commanding respect for those rights.

    If God did not exist, or if worldly powers were not obliged to respect
    God's authority, there is no reason to recognize or respect rights with
    which He has endowed all human beings. Thus the effective prerequisite
    for human rights, and the idea of government based on consent (through
    representation, elections, due process of law, etc.), is respect for
    God's authority and eternal laws.

    If we accept the logic of our Declaration, reverence for God is not
    just a matter of religious faith; it's the foundation of our republic's
    justice and citizenship. Freedom, therefore, cannot be confused with
    licentiousness. We do not have the right, by choice or action, to
    destroy or surrender our inalienable rights. Indeed, if we judge that
    they are being systematically violated, we have a duty to resist and
    overthrow the power responsible.

    This duty involves the judgment and moral and material capacity to
    resist tyranny. These constitute our character as a free people.

    Our Republican Party was born of a commitment to principle by those who
    had the courage to stand before the American people in the face of
    great division, and insist that we respect the principles that make
    America great, strong and free.

    The decline of marriage and the moral dissolution of families come from
    putting self first; from deciding that no obligations need be
    respected. Our Founders knew better. They offered us a true vision of
    America that is not licentious or foolishly indulgent -- but rather one
    of freedom based on fear of God and respect for law.

    We must restore to public discourse the simple truths affirmed by our
    Founders from Washington through Jefferson, and restated by Lincoln and
    every president until we arrived at our own cowardly times.

    We must start by seeking to end government programs (like
    family-destroy ing welfare efforts, and sex-education courses that
    encourage promiscuity) that actually hasten the moral breakdown of our
    nation. Our first priority must be restoring moral and material support
    for the marriage-based, two-parent family. The disintegration of
    families is the major contributing factor in poverty, crime, violence,
    the decline in education performance and a host of other expensive
    social problems.

    The assertion of a right to abortion epitomizes the corrupt concept of
    freedom that has tragically -- and, we may hope, temporarily --
    achieved ascendancy in our times. We will not remain a free people if
    we insist on being corrupt and licentious, or if we arrogate to
    ourselves, individually or collectively through government, the right
    to destroy the rights of others.

    It's empty to praise the courage of those who died to preserve
    America's freedom and principles, and then not stand up for those
    principles.

    America is not a quest for material progress, prosperity, great cities,
    and mountains of money. We are grateful for our prosperity though it
    came at much expense to some of our forebears -- those who toiled in
    slavery -- but the real American dream is of self-government which
    respects the fact that freedom is not just a choice or an opportunity.

    Rather, freedom can be a burden, a sacrifice, and an obligation to
    respect the truth of our moral identity. So long as we have the courage
    to stand up for it, that moral identity can unite us across every line
    of race, creed and color. If Republicans abandon that line of
    principle, there are Americans who will fight to make it prevail -- few
    or many, or alone if they must.

    Historically when Americans choose between right and wrong, we choose
    what is right, and we'll do it again. We know real heroes are those
    who, in families and daily lives, respect the truth that we must meet
    the obligations and sacrifices of freedom before we can claim its
    privileges and benefits.

    We must stand where our Founders stood -- believing that we cannot have
    the right to do what is wrong. And as we adhere to principles of
    justice, we will hold up a beacon of hope for all humankind.

    5/16/95 , San Francisco Chronicle, All Rights Reserved

886.39GRIM::MESSENGERBob MessengerWed May 17 1995 18:1949
Re: .38 Jack

>    Our freedom depends on certain moral ideas. In my personal conscience
>    and belief, Christianity most perfectly embodies those ideas. But
>    Americans come from many religious and moral backgrounds, so in dealing
>    with public policy we must derive ideas from sources open to support
>    from people of all religious backgrounds.
>
>    Nothing meets this purpose more completely than the principles and
>    logic of our Declaration of Independence.
...
>    But our Declaration does more than assert rights. It also makes a clear
>    statement that God, the Creator and author of the laws of nature, is
>    the ultimate source of authority commanding respect for those rights.

As an agnostic I certainly don't agree with this.  To the extent that the
Declaration of Independence promotes belief in God, it does not meet the
purpose of deriving "ideas from sources open to support from people of
all religious backgrounds."

>    If God did not exist, or if worldly powers were not obliged to respect
>    God's authority, there is no reason to recognize or respect rights with
>    which He has endowed all human beings.

Since I don't believe that human rights are derived from God, I also don't
believe that the existence or non-existence of God has any effect on
whether worldly powers should respect human rights.

>    If we accept the logic of our Declaration, reverence for God is not
>    just a matter of religious faith; it's the foundation of our republic's
>    justice and citizenship. Freedom, therefore, cannot be confused with
>    licentiousness.

In other words, atheism should be illegal?

>    We do not have the right, by choice or action, to
>    destroy or surrender our inalienable rights. Indeed, if we judge that
>    they are being systematically violated, we have a duty to resist and
>    overthrow the power responsible.

If a large enough subset of the people judges that their inalienable
rights are being systematically violated and that therefore they "have a
duty to resist and overthrow the power responsible" the result will most
likely be civil war.  This may be what is happening in the United States
today, starting with the Oklahoma City bombing.  Fortunately it's still
only a very small minority that feels that it has a duty to "resist and
overthrow the power responsible".

				-- Bob
886.40LGP30::FLEISCHERwithout vision the people perish (DTN 297-5780, MRO2-3/E8)Wed May 17 1995 22:0313
re Note 886.39 by GRIM::MESSENGER:

> >    If we accept the logic of our Declaration, reverence for God is not
> >    just a matter of religious faith; it's the foundation of our republic's
> >    justice and citizenship. Freedom, therefore, cannot be confused with
> >    licentiousness.
> 
> In other words, atheism should be illegal?

        No, you silly goose -- atheists just lose their citizenship
        and get treated like any other non-huma, oops, illegal alien.

        Bob
886.41MKOTS3::JMARTINYou-Had-Forty-Years!!!Thu May 18 1995 10:2711
    You guys would have loved Samuel Adams.  Rebel to the end!
    
    I mainly posted this as an FYI of where some of the candidates stand.
    I do however believe Thomas Jefferson did in fact infer that deity is
    the foundation for rights and what is right.  Our rights are endowed by
    our creator.  
    
    And you are correct about Civil War...which wasn't at all uncommon in
    the ancient days of Israel and of many other countries in fact.
    
    -Jack
886.42BIGQ::SILVADiabloThu May 18 1995 14:597
| <<< Note 886.41 by MKOTS3::JMARTIN "You-Had-Forty-Years!!!" >>>

| You guys would have loved Samuel Adams.  Rebel to the end!

	And he makes a mean beer, too! :-)


886.43MKOTS3::JMARTINYou-Had-Forty-Years!!!Thu May 18 1995 16:071
    I was waiting for that one!!!!!!
886.44Christian leaders call for political 'cease-fire'LGP30::FLEISCHERwithout vision the people perish (DTN 297-5780, MRO2-3/E8)Tue May 23 1995 11:4482
    (c) 1995 Copyright the News & Observer Publishing Co.

    (c) 1995 N.Y. Times News Service

    WASHINGTON (May 23, 1995 - 00:30) -- Saying that America is caught in a
    spiritual crisis worsened by overly politicized churches, members of a
    broadly ecumenical group of Christian leaders are releasing a statement
    calling for a verbal "cease-fire" and a search for common ground
    untainted by partisan ideology.

    "Christian faith must not become another casualty of the culture wars,"
    says the statement, which has been signed by more than 80 prominent
    mainline Protestant, evangelical, Orthodox and Roman Catholic leaders,
    including six Catholic bishops. "Inflamed rhetoric and name calling is
    no substitute for real and prayerful dialogue between different
    constituencies with legitimate concerns and a gospel of love, which can
    bring people together."

    The 1,800-word statement, titled "The Cry for Renewal: Let Other Voices
    Be Heard," will be released here on Tuesday, a week after the
    conservative religious organization, the Christian Coalition, unveiled
    its Contract With the American Family.

    The statement, in the works for several months, does not respond to the
    coalition's 10-point document, which recommended that Congress restrict
    late-term abortions and pass a proposed Religious Equality Amendment
    that would permit some forms of school prayer, among other measures.
    But it contains pointed criticism aimed at religious conservatives.

    "The almost total identification of the religious right with the new
    Republican majority in Washington is a dangerous liaison with political
    power," the statement says.

    It also faults religious liberals for so closely identifying with the
    Democratic Party as to forsake their "moral imagination" and contribute
    to the nation's political polarization.

    The statement's primary authors, the Rev. Jim Wallis, the editor of
    Sojourners, a bimonthly independent religious magazine, and Tony
    Campolo, a sociology professor at Eastern College in St. David's, Pa.,
    and founder of an educational organization for inner-city children,
    described themselves as "progressive evangelicals."

    Wallis said the document's signers were "not looking for a
    confrontation" with the Christian Coalition.

    "Civility has to be part of the approach, and compassion," Wallis
    added.

    He said that some of the signers had arranged meetings Tuesday with
    President Clinton, Speaker Newt Gingrich and the House Minority Leader,
    Richard A. Gephardt. Wallis said the group had also asked to meet with
    the Christian Coalition's executive director, Ralph Reed.

    Reed said he would be out of town Tuesday and so unavailable for a
    meeting then. Saying he wanted to read the statement first, he added,
    "I don't rule out talking with them."

    "We welcome a broader dialogue," Reed said. "We can disagree without
    being disagreeable." He also said, "I have never suggested that
    political involvement was the sine qua non of our faith or our
    witness."

    Despite the statement's criticism of religious liberals, several
    leaders usually identified with liberal positions signed on, including
    the Rev. Paul Sherry, president of the United Church of Christ, and the
    Rev. Joan Brown Campbell, general secretary of the National Council of
    Churches.

    The signatories included moderates and even a few theological
    conservatives whose names are not often seen on such documents. Among
    them were Steven Hayner, president of Inter-Varsity Christian
    Fellowship, an evangelical youth organization; Millard Fuller,
    president of Habitat for Humanity, and J.I. Packer, a theology
    professor at Regent College in Vancouver, B.C. and a senior editor at
    the magazine Christianity Today.

    Also among the signers were such prominent African-American clergy as
    Bishop John Hurst Adams, senior bishop of the African Methodist
    Episcopal Church; the Rev. Calvin O. Butts 3rd, pastor of Abyssinian
    Baptist Church in New York, and the Rev. James H. Costen, president of
    Interdenominational Theological Seminary in Atlanta.
886.45GRIM::MESSENGERBob MessengerWed May 24 1995 17:495
We each have our own role to play.  Liberals get to be the good cops, and
conservatives have to be the bad cops.  Or, if you prefer, liberals have
to be the good cops and conservatives get to be the bad cops.

				--  Bob
886.46MKOTS3::JMARTINYou-Had-Forty-Years!!!Wed May 24 1995 18:004
    Hey...just so long as you don't forcably hoist your good will on the
    unwilling, please...by all means be the best cop around!
    
    -Jack
886.47fyiOUTSRC::HEISERwatchman on the wallTue Sep 05 1995 18:0714
    Former Chief Rabbi of Israel Takes a Stand
    ------------------------------------------
    "I am surprised that President Clinton, who is known to be a believer
    in G-d and in His Holy Bible, should act against the will of G-d.  This
    is even more puzzling after the President himself confirmed that his
    own pastor had warned him not to harm Israel," said Rabbi Shapira.  The
    rabbi added that if Clinton is rushing to strike a peace deal between
    Israel and the PLO and Syria out of re-election considerations, then he
    must be told that this will have an opposite effect.  "It is highly
    unlikely that G-d will allow someone who supports taking away His
    chosen land from His Chosen People to whom He gave it to keep, to
    remain in a position of power," the former chief rabbi said.
    
    {The Jewish Press, July 28, 1995}
886.48eMKOTS3::JMARTINI press on toward the goalTue Sep 05 1995 18:246
    So I assume the Rabbi has similar disdain for the current leadership in
    Israel as they have for President Clinton?  Considering they also have
    been compromising with the same crowd that vowed to plow Israel into 
    the Mediterranian.
    
    -Jack
886.49OUTSRC::HEISERwatchman on the wallTue Sep 05 1995 18:352
    You bet.  The Rabbis recently made the press for publicly opposing the
    current leaders.
886.50CSC32::J_CHRISTIEPs. 85.10Tue Sep 05 1995 18:414
    Are there no rabbis who support the current leadership?
    
    Richard
    
886.51CSC32::J_CHRISTIETransmundane TravellerTue Nov 19 1996 13:5259