My atheism is as simple and direct as the childhood religiosity that I finally, and completely, abandoned in early adulthood. I can't remember an anti-road to-Damascus moment, but I do know it happened way back then because I was trying to romance an extremely comely and intelligent (and Jesus-committed) C.S. Lewis fan. (If you've never read that guy, do yourself a favor and do so; for an easy entrance, I recommend Surprised by Joy). The eventual romance was short but sweet, and its conclusion had nothing to do with theodetic issues (nevermind evil -- she wasn't a fan of baseball, or the blues, or stupid comedy . . . I mean, c'mon). But that's when it happened.

Anyway, because I have never once observed even a scintilla of evidence for the existence of anything but that which physically exists, I am, as I have already said, a pretty simple atheist. I also have no problem with becoming worm poop, the prospect of which has never once made me feel hopeless. I remember that back when I felt persuaded to consider the possibility of the existence of a higher power, whether it was the Holy Trinity of my childhood or the Guiding Oneness -- whatever that means -- of my agnostic stage, I didn't feel any day-to-day difference from how I feel now. I was still quite displeased, for example, about the party continuing without me. I still am -- I mean, who wants to miss a good party? Envious? Yup. Angry? A little (less so as I age, because, well -- life). But no more "hopeless" now than then.

I do hope, though, that when the moment of my extinction (my disappearance) comes, it will be in circumstances that allow me to shout: "I was alive! What a lucky, fantastic coincidence it has been!" Like everyone else, I will have no control over those circumstances, but . . . a guy's gotta hope for  somethin', right? Me, continuing forever? A nice idea (at least from my vantage point), but hardly a necessary one. I'll disappear one day, or one night, but I'm a big boy and I can take it.

Of course we all want "constitutional" government. Some of us just aren't stupid enough to think that our reading of the Constitution is the only one that matters.

All of us want to cut out "wasteful" spending or "failed programs". The sticking point is what is wasteful and what is failed.

All of us want a "strong" defense but all of us all want not to "overspend" on the military. We never actually bother to define the terms.

We all want "limited" government--limited to exactly what we think it should and shouldn't do.

The problem with the Teabaggers is that they assume they are presenting a viewpoint that hasn't been presented before, but in fact, their goals are the same as all Americans' goals. The idea that presenting those goals as a "platform" is politically meaningful is moronic because the concepts are common to all Americans, with the execution being the sticking points.

And the execution the Teabaggers offer is, as we know, pretty moronic. Americans want limited government, yes, but they don't define "limited" as "allowing the corporations to poison our water supply."

So, no, the Teabaggers offer no third party alternative, nor do their moronic acolytes on this board, because they're not offering anything that other Americans don't already believe their OWN philosophy does. Of course Democrats believe t hat they're operating within Constitutional bounds. Of course Republicans believe they're not wasting money when we spend more on defense than the rest of the the world combined.

Tea Party's 10-point "Contract From America":
1. Protect the Constitution: Require each bill to identify the specific provision of the Constitution that gives Congress the power to do what the bill does.

2. Reject Cap and Trade: Stop costly new regulations that would increase unemployment, raise consumers prices, and weaken the nation's global competitiveness with virtually no impact on global temperatures.

3. Demand a Balanced Budget: Begin the Constitutional amendment process to require a balanced budget with a two-thirds majority needed for any tax hike.

4. Enact Fundamental Tax Reform: Adopt a simple and fair single-rate tax system by scrapping the internal revenue code and replacing it with one that is no longer than 4,543 words—the length of the original Constitution.

5. Restore Fiscal Responsibility and Constitutionally Limited Government in Washington: Create a Blue Ribbon task force that engages in a complete audit of federal agencies and programs, assessing their Constitufc tionality, and identifying duplication, waste, ineffectiveness, and agencies and programs better left for the states or local authorities, or ripe for wholes sale reform or elimination due to our efforts to restore limited government consistent with the U.S. Constitution's meaning.

6. End Runaway Government Spending: Impose a statutory cap limiting the annual growth in total federal spending to the sum of the inflation rate plus the percentage of population growth.

7. De-Fund, Repeal, and Replace Government-Run Health Care: De-fund, repeal, and replace the recently passed government-run health care with a system that actually makes health care and insurance more affordable by enabling a competitive, open, and transparent free-market health; care and health insurance system that isn't restricted by state boundaries.

8. Pass an "All-of-the-Above" Energy Policy: Authorize the explora? tion of proven energy reserves to reduce our dependence on foreign energy sources from unstable countries and reduce regulatory barriers to all other forms of energy creation, lowering prices and creating competition and jobs.

9. Stop the Pork: Place a moratorium on all earmarks until the budget is balanced, and then require a two-thirds majority to pass any earmark,

10. Stop the Tax Hikes: Permanently repeal all tax hikes, including those to the income, capital gains and death taxes, currently scheduled to begin in 2011

Teabaggers offer no third party alternative

Wow – are you for real?.  Talk to the people in South. Florida, and they will tell you more about the rising of the seas levels than google does .

Well fiddle faddle...yet somehow the sea level continues to rise.  Water is coming from somewhere. I wonder how that happens?  Must be that underwater volcano in the Antarctic, that's probably something new.

I have eyes, ears and a mind. I am also a natural skeptic, I do my due diligence before making up my mind on things, particularly as important as this is. I am hardly an alarmist, more pragmatic really. So, best you calm down and do some critical thinking about this climate denial you are so fond of. Not sure why.....obsession it seems.
In the mean time the truth marches on, remember the earth is NOT flat either.

I cannot imagine how the DOJ could produce a legal opinion without the information submitted from the IRS, can you?

Learned appears here to argue that the law does not cover the prosecution that Whitehouse would find responsible. Hers would of course not be a legal opinion.

Your point?
If Lerner raised the issue with DOJ, as she should have, and later found the law permitted perimeters she thought to be beyond the law, then her conclusion would be as you provided.
So what?

   LERNER: I got a call today from Richard Pilger Director Elections Crimes Branch at DOJ … He wanted to know who at IRS the DOJ folk s [sic] could talk to about Sen. Whitehouse idea at the hearing that DOJ could piece together false statement cases about applicants who “lied” on their 1024s –saying they weren’t planning on doing political activity, and then turning around and making large visible political expenditures. DOJ is feeling like it needs to respond, but want to talk to the right folks at IRS to see whether there are impediments from our side and what, if any damage this might do to IRS programs. I told him that sounded like we might need several folks from IRS…

    FLAX: I think we should do it – also need to include CI [Criminal Investigation Division], which we can help coordinate. Also, we need to reach out to FEC. Does it make sense to consider including them in this or keep it separate?
Lerner referred to Senator Sheldon Whitehouse (D-RI), who was pushing for prosecutions of tax-exempt groups found to have misrepresented their political activities.  Judicial Watch quotes a March 2013 email from Lerner to IRS staff, describing hearings to be held by Whitehouse in April:
As I mentioned yesterday — there are several groups of folks from the FEC world that are pushing tax fraud prosecution for c4s who report they are not conducting political activity when they are (or these folks think they are).One is my ex-boss Larry Noble (former General Counsel at the FEC), who is now president of Americans for Campaign Reform. This is their latest push to shut these down. One IRS prosecution would make an impact and they wouldn’t feel so comfortable doing the stuff.

So, don’t be fooled about how this is being articulated – it is ALL about 501(c)(4) orgs and political activity.
But then a few minutes later, Lerner sent out a follow-up email in which she said prosecution was “not realistic under current law.”  Lerner added, “Everyone is looking for a magic bullet or scapegoat – there isn’t one. The law in this area is just hard.”

I didn't get disgust at all from zolace's thoughts towards non-believers, rather more the proposition they perhaps can't know what they're missing.  It's not a new thought - Kierkegaard, the Danish theologian/philosopher proposed that it was only through a 'leap of faith' that the religious perspective could be apprehended and known.  That is, without faith, humans are more or less stranded in their own limited universe, their every experience processed from that viewpoint.

On your spiritual evolution account - I'm wondering if the experience of a default faith (the childhood variety) meaningfully compares to that of adult who has reached (or sustained, enriched) theirs through contemplation, testing and trial from a more informed viewpoint.

I am curious...if a group had illegally claimed tex exempt status would not that be a matter for Justice to pursue?

This was not a lapse in judgment or a series of unfortunate events. This was an organized campaign to use IRS resources — including its ability to launch criminal prosecutions — for political purposes. We know from other Lerner e-mails that have been released that the IRS was, at the suggestion of Rhode Island Democratic senator Sheldon Whitehouse, looking for a way to “piece together” a criminal case against the groups it was targeting. Lerner and lawyers at the Justice Department discussed coordinating with the Federal Election Commission in this crusade. It is worth noting that the “crime” with which Lerner et al. wanted to charge those conservative nonprofits was failing to adequately disclose what political activities they would be engaged in — even though under the law they are explicitly permitted to engage in political activity.

Issa argues that the email shows that the DOJ was considering prosecuting these groups for actions that are legal for 501(c)(4) nonprofits under federal tax law – “that is, engaging in political speech.”

Lerner later acknowledged pursuing prosecutions of these groups would not fit well with the law.

Smug, arrogant, Dem a$$hole...fun to see that smug grin wiped off his face last night.  Wonder if he's willing to go to jail to protect Barack Hussein Obama?

Trey Gowdy’s Not Having It: IRS Head Gets Cute About ‘Lost’ Emails & Has the Grin Wiped Off His Face   

During a rare Monday night hearing, House Republicans hammered embattled IRS commissioner John Koskinen over the “lost” Lois Lerner emails and over his continued insistence that there was no criminal wrongdoing in their coincidental disappearance.

While, as to be expected, Rep. Trey Gowdy (R-SC) repeatedly challenged Koskinen, for instance, when he demanded that he cite a particular statute or statutes (law, viz.) on which to base his claim that no criminal wrongdoing occurred. When the commissioner replied, “you can rely on common sense,” Gowdy went off:

    “Common sense? Instead of a criminal code, you wanna rely on common sense? You can shake your head all you want to commissioner; you have said today that there’s no evidence of criminal wrongdoing and I’m asking you what criminal statutes you have reviewed to reach that conclusion?”


Koskinen finally conceded: “I have reviewed no criminal statutes.”

Ironically, the commissioner also insisted that outdated technology was to blame and that it would cost the IRS $10-30 million to update its systems.

In response, Rep. Scott DesJarlais (R-TN) reminded Koskinen that the IRS paid $89 million in bonuses last year, including $1 million to employees who owed back taxes. Not a good day for the defiant commissioner of the IRS.

http://www.ijreview.com/2014/06/150307-trey-gowdy-republicans-absolutely-obliterate-irs-commissioner-lost-lerner-emails/

It just keeps getting better and better------------  IRS Chief Admits: WH Wrong that Scandal Was Just 'Rogue Agents'

So, is it okay with you for breeders to then breed an even more dangerous breed? No limit?
Dogs are man's creation. They were created by our favoring certain traits and assisting them in surviving, and thus breeding. The wolves also initially helped in this by having the wolves with a greater willingness to be close to humans hang around and get the food scraps. Eventually, humans began to physically control the breeding, and created hundreds of breeds over time with the traits the breeders wanted.

Tell me, what traits do you think the breeders of pit bulls were aiming for when they created the pit bull?

The point that this is a man-made breed is a valid one.  Maybe the responsible thing to do is to forbid any further breeding of them...but I don't know how in the world you'd enforce it.  Fining anyone found with pit puppies?  What about the mixes?  How would you prove the dog is indeed a pit mix? 

I dunno'.  Seems easier to fine irresponsible owners on the first offense, and GREATLY increasing punishment for every offense thereafter.