Is separation of church and state blown out of the water?!?! sm

• You need the *right* religion to work for Head Start - Lilly
  • Is separation of church and state blown out of the water?!?! sm - Democrat
  • They are doing that at the Salvation Army - Carla
    • Working for ministries.. - Rep.
      • I have no problem with a non-profit, non-federally funded...sm - Democrat
    • I echo MT's post and would add one other thing. SM - Brunson
    • Carla, I have to answer this ridiculous post. SM - MT

The messages you are viewing are archived/old.
To view latest messages and participate in discussions, select the boards given in left menu

There are problems and controversy in every church.  I do not agree with things that go on in my church nor everything that my pastor says or does.  I have found that some churches problems are greater than the ones in your own church, so some times you have to be still. 

Here's one for ya....Me along with plenty of other Americans don't agree with what our current President Bush has done in terms of running our country, starting a war, making history by putting every state in this country in a negative deficit, and I could continue to go on, but the point is even in our disagreement with him, we have not jumped up and ran to another country and we wonder why; running is not the answer.  First off it is not our place to condemn one, but since someone is being condemned for what was said, condemn the Rev. Wright, not Obama.

Two Border State Governors Declare Illegal Immigration State of Emergency

SIGN THE PETITION!
CLICK HERE!

THANK YOU!

Many people were confined against their will just because someone wanted them "out of the way." These were normal people with no mental illness - that is why it is so difficult - don't blame the liberals. Blame your state.

CONFINING THE MENTALLY ILL


In the legal space between what a society should and should not do, taking action to restrict the liberty of people who are mentally ill sits in the grayest of gray areas.

Our notions about civil and constitutional rights flow from an assumption of "normalcy." Step beyond the boundaries and arrest and prison may legally follow. Short of that, government's ability to hold people against their will is severely and properly limited. Unusual behavior on the part of someone who is mentally ill is not illegal behavior. Freedom can't be snatched away on a whim, or on the thought that a person is hard to look at, hard to hear, hard to smell.

It was only a few decades ago that the promise of new medications and a change in attitude opened the doors of the mental hospitals and sent many patients into society. There, they would somehow "normalize" and join everyone else, supported by networks of out-patient facilities, job training, special living arrangements and regular, appropriate medication. But the transition has been imperfect, long and difficult.

In some parts of urban America there is little professional support for those with mental health problems. A new generation of drug and alcohol-fueled mental illness has come on the scene. People frequently end up on the street, un-medicated and exhibiting a full range of behaviors that are discomforting at the very least and threatening at their worst.

Over the last few years, I think I know what it feels like to be a frog that's dropped into a pot of cold water, with the temperature rise of the water being so slow that the next thing he knows, he's DEAD.

I know I'm "there," but this "evolution" has been so subtle that I don't know exactly when it began and probably won't realize when it ends (if it ends).

For starters, this bill was apparently introduced on June 26, 2007, while Bush was still President.

The way it was being hyped, it seemed to be something that was designed to encourage public service in young people in exchange for financial assistance with college tuition, etc.  I thought it sounded like a good idea, something that might help to build character in young people and encourage and foster the kind of behavior we saw after 9/11, when Americans helped each other and showed the world what we're made of when it comes to helping each other.  To offer a young person financial help for college in exchange for some volunteer hours, I thought, was great.  Equally great, I thought, was the notion that this was voluntary and NOT mandatory.

Now, it's apparently for everyone, including seniors, which is still okay, I guess, if this is something that some seniors want to do.

However, one little sentence (shown below) is sending up a BIG RED FLAG into my little pea brain, copied below and bolded:

From:  http://www.opencongress.org/bill/111-h1388/show

OpenCongress Summary:
The Generations Invigorating Volunteerism and Education (GIVE) Act would dramatically increase funding for AmeriCorps and other volunteer programs, including those for seniors and veterans. It also establishes a goal of expanding from 75,000 government-supported volunteers to 250,000, and would increase education funding and establish a summer service program for students, paying $500 (which would be applied to college costs) to high-school and middle-school student who participate.

In its current form, the legislation does not include a mandate requiring service.

Quite frankly, I have jumped (like a frog) from link to link to link trying to research this, so I'm not sure what its "current form" is today.  It apparently was passed by the House and now by the Senate just a few days ago (see http://loungedaddy.us/?p=725).

Yesterday, at first, when I heard of Rick Wagoner, GM's "sacrificial lamb," basically being fired by Obama, I felt very uncomfortable with that.  After I thought about it more, though, I do agree that ANY company that accepts financial aid from Americans should be scrutinized, including, if necessary in this manner (even if Wagoner's firing, in my opinion, was merely symbolic and not substantive).  What sticks in my crawl is the fact that Wall Street crooks have been treated like kings while auto industry workers are being kicked more and more every day while they're down.

I was never comfortable with any of the bailouts, and that was the one thing that Obama voted for that earned him a spot on the "negative" column of my pros and cons list.

I freely admit that my thought processes have been severely hampered recently (especially after two hospitalizations in less than a month).  It's much more difficult for me to concentrate and to word-find at times.  I had hoped that Obama would be the "people's" President (as opposed to Bush being the "corporation's" President.

I used to think (and frequently wrote) that the Clintons and the Bushes were merely opposite sides of the same coin.  I still believe that; however, I'm starting to think that Obama's face is on that coin now.

To sum it up, on this day and at this time, all I can truly say with certainty is:

RIBBIT!!!!

Over the last few years, I think I know what it feels like to be a frog that's dropped into a pot of cold water, with the temperature rise of the water being so slow that the next thing he knows, he's DEAD.

I know I'm "there," but this "evolution" has been so subtle that I don't know exactly when it began and probably won't realize when it ends (if it ends).

For starters, this bill was apparently introduced on June 26, 2007, while Bush was still President.

The way it was being hyped, it seemed to be something that was designed to encourage public service in young people in exchange for financial assistance with college tuition, etc.  I thought it sounded like a good idea, something that might help to build character in young people and encourage and foster the kind of behavior we saw after 9/11, when Americans helped each other and showed the world what we're made of when it comes to helping each other.  To offer a young person financial help for college in exchange for some volunteer hours, I thought, was great.  Equally great, I thought, was the notion that this was voluntary and NOT mandatory.

Now, it's apparently for everyone, including seniors, which is still okay, I guess, if this is something that some seniors want to do.

However, one little sentence (shown below) is sending up a BIG RED FLAG into my little pea brain, copied below and bolded:

From:  http://www.opencongress.org/bill/111-h1388/show

OpenCongress Summary:
The Generations Invigorating Volunteerism and Education (GIVE) Act would dramatically increase funding for AmeriCorps and other volunteer programs, including those for seniors and veterans. It also establishes a goal of expanding from 75,000 government-supported volunteers to 250,000, and would increase education funding and establish a summer service program for students, paying $500 (which would be applied to college costs) to high-school and middle-school student who participate.

In its current form, the legislation does not include a mandate requiring service.

Quite frankly, I have jumped (like a frog) from link to link to link trying to research this, so I'm not sure what its "current form" is today.  It apparently was passed by the House and now by the Senate just a few days ago (see http://loungedaddy.us/?p=725).

Yesterday, at first, when I heard of Rick Wagoner, GM's "sacrificial lamb," basically being fired by Obama, I felt very uncomfortable with that.  After I thought about it more, though, I do agree that ANY company that accepts financial aid from Americans should be scrutinized, including, if necessary in this manner (even if Wagoner's firing, in my opinion, was merely symbolic and not substantive).  What sticks in my crawl is the fact that Wall Street crooks have been treated like kings while auto industry workers are being kicked more and more every day while they're down.

I was never comfortable with any of the bailouts, and that was the one thing that Obama voted for that earned him a spot on the "negative" column of my pros and cons list.

I freely admit that my thought processes have been severely hampered recently (especially after two hospitalizations in less than a month).  It's much more difficult for me to concentrate and to word-find at times.  I had hoped that Obama would be the "people's" President (as opposed to Bush being the "corporation's" President.

I used to think (and frequently wrote) that the Clintons and the Bushes were merely opposite sides of the same coin.  I still believe that; however, I'm starting to think that Obama's face has replaced Hillary's face on that coin now.

To sum it up, on this day and at this time, all I can truly say with certainty is:

RIBBIT!!!!

Over the last few years, I think I know what it feels like to be a frog that's dropped into a pot of cold water, with the temperature rise of the water being so slow that the next thing he knows, he's DEAD.

I know I'm "there," but this "evolution" has been so subtle that I don't know exactly when it began and probably won't realize when it ends (if it ends).

For starters, this bill was apparently introduced on June 26, 2007, while Bush was still President.

The way it was being hyped, it seemed to be something that was designed to encourage public service in young people in exchange for financial assistance with college tuition, etc.  I thought it sounded like a good idea, something that might help to build character in young people and encourage and foster the kind of behavior we saw after 9/11, when Americans helped each other and showed the world what we're made of when it comes to helping each other.  To offer a young person financial help for college in exchange for some volunteer hours, I thought, was great.  Equally great, I thought, was the notion that this was voluntary and NOT mandatory.

Now, it's apparently for everyone, including seniors, which is still okay, I guess, if this is something that some seniors want to do.

However, one little sentence (shown below) is sending up a BIG RED FLAG into my little pea brain, copied below and bolded:

From:  http://www.opencongress.org/bill/111-h1388/show

OpenCongress Summary:
The Generations Invigorating Volunteerism and Education (GIVE) Act would dramatically increase funding for AmeriCorps and other volunteer programs, including those for seniors and veterans. It also establishes a goal of expanding from 75,000 government-supported volunteers to 250,000, and would increase education funding and establish a summer service program for students, paying $500 (which would be applied to college costs) to high-school and middle-school student who participate.

In its current form, the legislation does not include a mandate requiring service.

Quite frankly, I have jumped (like a frog) from link to link to link trying to research this, so I'm not sure what its "current form" is today.  It apparently was passed by the House and now by the Senate just a few days ago (see http://loungedaddy.us/?p=725).

Yesterday, at first, when I heard of Rick Wagoner, GM's "sacrificial lamb," basically being fired by Obama, I felt very uncomfortable with that.  After I thought about it more, though, I do agree that ANY company that accepts financial aid from Americans should be scrutinized, including, if necessary in this manner (even if Wagoner's firing, in my opinion, was merely symbolic and not substantive).  What sticks in my crawl is the fact that Wall Street crooks have been treated like kings while auto industry workers are being kicked more and more every day while they're down.

I was never comfortable with any of the bailouts, and that was the one thing that Obama voted for that earned him a spot on the "negative" column of my pros and cons list.

I freely admit that my thought processes have been severely hampered recently (especially after two hospitalizations in less than a month).  It's much more difficult for me to concentrate and to word-find at times.  I had hoped that Obama would be the "people's" President (as opposed to Bush being the "corporation's" President.

I used to think (and frequently wrote) that the Clintons and the Bushes were merely opposite sides of the same coin.  I still believe that; however, I'm starting to think that Obama's face has replaced Hillary's face on that coin now.

If I'm misinformed or otherwise wrong in anything I've written in this post regarding the links I included or statements, please tell me.  Seriously.  I don't want to argue or fight or name-call.  I just want to discuss because I'm beginning to feel almost as vulnerable and distrustful of Obama's presidency as I eventually became under Bush's.

I know discussions get heated on this board sometimes, but I'm not trying to be argumentative.  I'm much, much too tired for that. 

To sum it up, on this day and at this time, all I can truly say with certainty is:

RIBBIT!!!!

Over the last few years, I think I know what it feels like to be a frog that's dropped into a pot of cold water, with the temperature rise of the water being so slow that the next thing he knows, he's DEAD.

I know I'm "there," but this "evolution" has been so subtle that I don't know exactly when it began and probably won't realize when it ends (if it ends).

For starters, this bill was apparently introduced on June 26, 2007, while Bush was still President.

The way it was being hyped, it seemed to be something that was designed to encourage public service in young people in exchange for financial assistance with college tuition, etc.  I thought it sounded like a good idea, something that might help to build character in young people and encourage and foster the kind of behavior we saw after 9/11, when Americans helped each other and showed the world what we're made of when it comes to helping each other.  To offer a young person financial help for college in exchange for some volunteer hours, I thought, was great.  Equally great, I thought, was the notion that this was voluntary and NOT mandatory.

Now, it's apparently for everyone, including seniors, which is still okay, I guess, if this is something that some seniors want to do.

However, one little sentence (shown below) is sending up a BIG RED FLAG into my little pea brain, copied below and bolded:

From:  http://www.opencongress.org/bill/111-h1388/show

OpenCongress Summary:
The Generations Invigorating Volunteerism and Education (GIVE) Act would dramatically increase funding for AmeriCorps and other volunteer programs, including those for seniors and veterans. It also establishes a goal of expanding from 75,000 government-supported volunteers to 250,000, and would increase education funding and establish a summer service program for students, paying $500 (which would be applied to college costs) to high-school and middle-school student who participate.

In its current form, the legislation does not include a mandate requiring service.

Quite frankly, I have jumped (like a frog) from link to link to link trying to research this, so I'm not sure what its "current form" is today.  It apparently was passed by the House and now by the Senate just a few days ago (see http://loungedaddy.us/?p=725).

Yesterday, at first, when I heard of Rick Wagoner, GM's "sacrificial lamb," basically being fired by Obama, I felt very uncomfortable with that.  After I thought about it more, though, I do agree that ANY company that accepts financial aid from Americans should be scrutinized, including, if necessary in this manner (even if Wagoner's firing, in my opinion, was merely symbolic and not substantive).  What sticks in my crawl is the fact that Wall Street crooks have been treated like kings while auto industry workers are being kicked more and more every day while they're down.

I was never comfortable with any of the bailouts, and that was the one thing that Obama voted for that earned him a spot on the "negative" column of my pros and cons list.

I freely admit that my thought processes have been severely hampered recently (especially after two hospitalizations in less than a month).  It's much more difficult for me to concentrate and to word-find at times.  I had hoped that Obama would be the "people's" President (as opposed to Bush being the "corporation's" President.

I used to think (and frequently wrote) that the Clintons and the Bushes were merely opposite sides of the same coin.  I still believe that; however, I'm starting to think that Obama's face has replaced Hillary's face on that coin now.

If I'm misinformed or otherwise wrong in anything I've written in this post regarding the links I included or statements, please tell me.  Seriously.  I don't want to argue or fight or name-call.  I just want to discuss because I'm beginning to feel almost as vulnerable and distrustful of Obama's presidency as I eventually became under Bush's.  I know discussions get heated on this board sometimes, but I'm not trying to be argumentative.  I'm much, much too tired for that. 

To sum it up, on this day and at this time, all I can truly say with certainty is:

RIBBIT!!!!

Written last Thanksgiving:  "Some would argue that two different nations actually celebrated: upright, moral, traditional red America and the dissolute, liberal blue states clustered on the periphery of the heartland. The truth, however, is much more complicated and interesting than that.

Take two iconic states: Texas and Massachusetts. In some ways, they were the two states competing in the last election. In the world's imagination, you couldn't have two starker opposites. One is the homeplace of Harvard, gay marriage, high taxes, and social permissiveness. The other is Bush country, solidly Republican, traditional, and gun-toting. Massachusetts voted for Kerry over Bush 62 to 37 percent; Texas voted for Bush over Kerry 61 to 38 percent.

So ask yourself a simple question: which state has the highest divorce rate? Marriage was a key issue in the last election, with Massachusetts' gay marriages becoming a symbol of alleged blue state decadence and moral decay. But in actual fact, Massachusetts has the lowest divorce rate in the country at 2.4 divorces per 1,000 inhabitants. Texas - which until recently made private gay sex a criminal offence - has a divorce rate of 4.1. A fluke? Not at all. The states with the highest divorce rates in the U.S. are Alabama, Arkansas, Arizona, Florida, Georgia, Mississippi, North Carolina, Oklahoma, South Carolina, and Texas. And the states with the lowest divorce rates are: Connecticut, Massachusetts, Maine, New Hampshire, New Jersey, New York, Pennsylvania, Rhode Island, and Vermont. Every single one of the high divorce rate states went for Bush. Every single one of the low divorce rate states went for Kerry. The Bible Belt divorce rate, in fact, is roughly 50 percent higher than the national average.

Some of this discrepancy can be accounted for by the fact that couples tend to marry younger in the Bible Belt - and many clearly don't have the maturity to know what they're getting into. There's some correlation too between rates of college education and stable marriages, with the Bible Belt lagging a highly educated state like Massachusetts. But the irony still holds. Those parts of America that most fiercely uphold what they believe are traditional values are not those parts where traditional values are healthiest. Hypocrisy? Perhaps. A more insightful explanation is that these socially troubled communities cling onto absolutes in the abstract because they cannot live up to them in practice.

But doesn't being born again help bring down divorce rates? Jesus, after all, was mum on the subject of homosexuality, but was very clear about divorce, declaring it a sin unless adultery was involved. A recent study, however, found no measurable difference in divorce rates between those who are "born again" and those who are not. 29 percent of Baptists have been divorced, compared to 21 percent of Catholics. Moreover, a staggering 23 percent of married born-agains have been divorced twice or more. Teen births? Again, the contrast is striking. In a state like Texas, where the religious right is extremely strong and the rhetoric against teenage sex is gale-force strong, the teen births as a percentage of all births is 16.1 percent. In liberal, secular, gay-friendly Massachusetts, it's 7.4, almost half. Marriage itself is less popular in Texas than in Massachusetts. In Texas, the percent of people unmarried is 32.4 percent; in Massachusetts, it's 26.8 percent. So even with a higher marriage rate, Massachusetts manages a divorce rate almost half of its "conservative" rival.

Or take abortion. America is one of the few Western countries where the legality of abortion is still ferociously disputed. It's a country where the religious right is arguably the strongest single voting bloc, and in which abortion is a constant feature of cultural politics. Compare it to a country like Holland, perhaps the epitome of socially liberal, relativist liberalism. So which country has the highest rate of abortion? It's not even close. America has an abortion rate of 21 abortions per 1,000 women aged between 15 and 44. Holland has a rate of 6.8. Americans, in other words, have three times as many abortions as the Dutch. Remind me again: which country is the most socially conservative?

Even a cursory look at the leading members of the forces of social conservatism in America reveals the same pattern. The top conservative talk-radio host, Rush Limbaugh, has had three divorces and an addiction to pain-killers. The most popular conservative television personality, Bill O'Reilly, just settled a sex harassment suit that indicated a highly active adulterous sex life. Bill Bennett, the guru of the social right, was for many years a gambling addict. Karl Rove's chief outreach manager to conservative Catholics for the last four years, Deal Hudson, also turned out to be a man with a history of sexual harassment. Bob Barr, the conservative Georgian congressman who wrote the "Defense of Marriage Act," has had three wives so far. The states which register the highest ratings for the hot new television show, "Desperate Housewives," are all Bush-states.

The complicated truth is that America truly is a divided and conflicted country. But it's a grotesque exaggeration to say that the split is geographical, or correlated with blue and red states. Many of America's biggest "sinners" are those most intent on upholding virtue. In fact, it may be partly because they know sin so close-up that they want to prevent its occurrence among others. And some of those states which have the most liberal legal climate - the Northeast and parts of the upper MidWest - are also, in practice, among the most socially conservative. To ascribe all this to "hypocrisy" seems to me too crude an explanation. America is simply a far more complicated and diverse place than crude red and blue divisions can explain.

they are adding police and only in the big cities do they have paid firemen. The rest are volunteers.

I look at it this way: If a state can't stay in the black, then they have to cut spending some place that wouldn't jeopardize the safety of the citizens. Threats of cutting essential services like Barney Fife stated today are unjustified. Cut the non-essential services first.

Our governor talks about cutting back on services, laying off government workers, which I think is a good idea because government is too big anyway, but then he turns around and spends more money on non-essential items. Doesn't make sense.  

we discover that KBR (a subsidiary of Cheney's Halliburton) knowingly exposed United States soldiers to toxic materials in Iraq. 

Please watch this video.  It's only three minutes long, and it's heartbreaking.  Don't our troops deserve better from a commander-in-chief that claims to care about them?

http://rawstory.com/news/2008/CBS_KBR_knew_dangers_of_toxic_1223.html

the onliest wun I C trashin' another board is U.  How bout them taters?

Rescuers Race to Save Katrina Victims

Tuesday, August 30, 2005 NEW ORLEANS — Rescuers along the hurricane-ravaged Gulf Coast pushed aside the dead to reach the living Tuesday in a race against time and rising waters, while New Orleans sank deeper into crisis and Louisiana's governor ordered storm refugees out of this drowning city. As looters stripped stores of items, sometimes in front of police, violence broke out in the Big Easy. At around 11 p.m. EDT, two gunmen with AK-47s fired shots into a police station. No one was hurt, and the men fled into the city's French quarter section. Meanwhile, two levees broke and sent water coursing into the streets of New Orleans a full day after the city appeared to have escaped widespread destruction from Hurricane Katrina. An estimated 80 percent of the below-sea-level city was under water, up to 20 feet deep in places, with miles and miles of homes swamped. The situation is untenable, Gov. Kathleen Blanco said. It's just heartbreaking. One Mississippi county alone said its death toll was at least 100, and officials are very, very worried that this is going to go a lot higher, said Joe Spraggins, civil defense director for Harrison County, home to Biloxi and Gulfport. Several victims in the county were from a beachfront apartment building that collapsed under a 25-foot wall of water as Katrina slammed the Gulf Coast with 145-mph winds. And Louisiana officials said many were feared dead there, too, making Katrina one of the most punishing storms to hit the United States in decades. After touring the destruction by air, Mississippi Gov. Haley Barbour said it is not of case of homes being severely damaged, they're simply not there. ... I can only imagine that this is what Hiroshima looked like 60 years ago. New Orleans Mayor Ray Nagin said hundreds, if not thousands, of people may still be stuck on roofs and in attics, and so rescue boats were bypassing the dead. We're not even dealing with dead bodies, Nagin said. They're just pushing them on the side. The flooding in New Orleans grew worse by the minute, prompting the evacuation of hotels and hospitals and an audacious plan to drop huge sandbags from helicopters to close up one of the breached levees. At the same time, looting broke out in some neighborhoods, the sweltering city of 480,000 had no drinkable water, and the electricity could be out for weeks. With water rising perilously inside the Superdome, Blanco said the tens of thousands of refugees now huddled there and other shelters in New Orleans would have to be evacuated. She asked residents to spend Wednesday in prayer. That would be the best thing to calm our spirits and thank our Lord that we are survivors, she said. Slowly, gradually, we will recover; we will survive; we will rebuild. A helicopter view of the devastation over the New Orleans area revealed people standing on black rooftops baking in the sunshine while waiting for rescue boats. A row of desperately needed ambulances were lined up on the interstate, water blocking their path. Roller coasters jutted out from the water at a Six Flags amusement park. Hundreds of inmates were seen standing on a highway because the prison had been flooded. Sen. Mary Landrieu (news, bio, voting record) quietly traced the sign of the cross across her head and chest as she looked out at St. Bernard Parish, where only roofs peaked out from the water. The whole parish is gone, Landrieu said. All day long, rescuers in boats and helicopters pulled out shellshocked and bedraggled flood refugees from rooftops and attics. Lt. Gov. Mitch Landrieu said that 3,000 people have been rescued by boat and air, some placed shivering and wet into helicopter baskets. They were brought by the truckload into shelters, some in wheelchairs and some carrying babies, with stories of survival and of those who didn't make it. Oh my God, it was hell, said Kioka Williams, who had to hack through the ceiling of the beauty shop where she worked as floodwaters rose in New Orleans' low-lying Ninth Ward. We were screaming, hollering, flashing lights. It was complete chaos. Frank Mills was in a boarding house in the same neighborhood when water started swirling up toward the ceiling and he fled to the roof. Two elderly residents never made it out, and a third was washed away trying to climb onto the roof. He was kind of on the edge of the roof, catching his breath, Mills said. Next thing I knew, he came floating past me. Across Louisiana, Mississippi and Alabama, more than 1 million residents remained without electricity, some without clean drinking water. An untold number who heeded evacuation orders were displaced and 40,000 were in Red Cross shelters, with officials saying it could be weeks, if not months, before most will be able to return. Emergency medical teams from across the country were sent into the region and President Bush cut short his Texas vacation Tuesday to return to Washington to focus on the storm damage. Federal Emergency Management Agency director Mike Brown warned that structural damage to homes, diseases from animal carcasses and chemicals in floodwaters made it unsafe for residents to come home anytime soon. And a mass return also was discouraged to keep from interfering with rescue and recovery efforts. That was made tough enough by the vast expanse of floodwaters in coastal areas that took an eight-hour pounding from Katrina's howling winds and up to 15 inches of rainfall. From the air, neighborhood after neighborhood looked like nothing but islands of rooftops surrounded by swirling, tea-colored water. In New Orleans, the flooding actually got worse Tuesday. Failed pumps and levees apparently spilled water from Lake Pontchartrain into streets. The rising water forced hotels to evacuate, led a hospital to boatlift patients to emergency shelters, and drove the staff of New Orleans' Times-Picayune newspaper out of its offices. Officials planned to use helicopters to drop 3,000-pound sandbags and dozens of giant concrete barriers into the breach, and expressed confidence the problem could be solved. But if the water rose a couple feet higher, it could wipe out water system for whole city, said New Orleans' homeland security chief Terry Ebbert. A clearer picture of the destruction in Alabama became to emerge Tuesday: cement slabs where homes once stood, a 100-foot shrimp boat smoldering on its side, people searching for swept-away keepsakes. The damage in some areas appears to be worse than last year's Hurricane Ivan. In devastated Biloxi, Miss., areas that were not underwater were littered with tree trunks, downed power lines and chunks of broken concrete. Some buildings were flattened. The string of floating barge casinos crucial to the coastal economy were a shambles. At least three of them were picked up by the storm surge and carried inland, their barnacle-covered hulls sitting up to 200 yards inland. One of the deadliest spots appeared to be Biloxi's Quiet Water Beach apartments, where authorities estimated 30 people were washed away, although the exact toll was unknown. All that was left of the red-brick building was a concrete slab. We grabbed a lady and pulled her out the window and then we swam with the current, 55-year-old Joy Schovest said through tears. It was terrifying. You should have seen the cars floating around us. We had to push them away when we were trying to swim. Said Biloxi Mayor A. J. Holloway: This is our tsunami. Looting became a problem in both Biloxi and in New Orleans, in some cases in full view of police and National Guardsmen. One police officer was shot in the head by a looter in New Orleans, but was expected to recover, Sgt. Paul Accardo, a police spokesman. On New Orleans' Canal Street, which actually resembled a canal, dozens of looters ripped open the steel gates on clothing and jewelry stores, some packing plastic garbage cans with loot to float down the street. One man, who had about 10 pairs of jeans draped over his left arm, was asked if he was salvaging things from his store. No, the man shouted, that's EVERYBODY'S store! Looters at a Wal-Mart brazenly loaded up shopping carts with items including micorwaves, coolers and knife sets. Others walked out of a sporting goods store on Canal Street with armfuls of shoes and football jerseys. Outside the broken shells of Biloxi's casinos, people picked through slot machines to see if they still contained coins and ransacked other businesses. People are just casually walking in and filling up garbage bags and walking off like they're Santa Claus, said Marty Desei, owner of a Super 8 motel. Insurance experts estimated the storm will result in up to $25 billion in insured losses. That means Katrina could prove more costly than record-setting Hurricane Andrew in 1992, which caused an inflation-adjusted $21 billion in losses. Oil prices jumped by more than $3 a barrel on Tuesday, climbing above $70 a barrel, amid uncertainty about the extent of the damage to the Gulf region's refineries and drilling platforms. By midday Tuesday, Katrina was downgraded to a tropical depression, with winds around 35 mph. It was moving northeast through Tennessee at around 21 mph, with the potential to dump 8 inches of rain and spin off deadly tornadoes. Katrina left 11 people dead in its soggy jog across South Florida last week, as a much weaker storm.

Is this what is going on in the churchs now?  Fear tactics that we are all doomed to he**?  Our society is morally based.  Go walk around the Middle East for a day and you will appreciate just how moral we are.  The public schools aren't there to raise our children and at least they can go to school.  You don't have to put your child in the public school system, that is also the beauty of choice in our country.  Try having your child dodge bombs instead or be taught to strap bombs to themselves and die in the name of God.  I'll take the science class any day over that.  You can teach your children to have faith and to read books based on opinions and science.  We aren't stupid, we can make our own decisions.  I love the fact that my son can argue all points of view.  He was taught evolution, so what?  He is smart enough to make his own decision, just like you!  All opinions should be presented to grow and learn.  If there was only one point of view, how would we know how to chose? 

OBAMA'S CHURCH

Subject: TRINITY UNITED CHURCH OF CHRIST

During this campaign for the Presidency, It's interesting that so much had been made of Mitt Romney's Mormom religion, while we heard/hear so little of Barack Obama's, outside of the denials of his being Muslim.

However, if you look more closely at Trinity United Church of Christ, Obama's church, it sounds more like a racist cult than anything else, with a committment, not to America, but to Africa. Scary, when you consider this man could be the President of this United States.

Please go to this church's website and read what is written there. It is very alarming. Barack Obama is a member of this church and is running for President of the U.S. If you look at the first page of their website, you will learn that this congregation has a non-negotiable commitment to Africa. No where is AMERICA even mentioned.  Notice too, what color you will need to be if you should want to join Obama's church... B-L-A-C-K!  Whites attend, I have also read, but are not members.  Doesn't look like his choice of religion has improved much over his (former?) Muslim upbringing.  This guy desires to rule over America while his loyalty is totally vested in a Black Africa!  It is so important to pass this message along to all of our family & friends. To think that Obama has even the slightest chance in the run for the presidency, is really scary. This is the web page for the church Barack Obama belongs to:

www.tucc.org/about.htm

and then I saw/heard him speak yesterday and only see young white people always arround him....where are these black folks who are supporting him?  The whites on TV clamoring around him far outweigh the number of blacks ALL the time that I see, I do not get that....it should be mixed in my mind wherever he speaks/goes to. 

I am not a racist so please do not attack me.....