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I have to be honest, I don't see either Senator Lott's or Senator Reid's comments to be racist at all. I may be one of few in the world with that view. Let me give my arguments for each case. First, Senator Lott's remarks

To understand Lott’s comments, you have to take into account the CONTEXT. As you know, reviewing writings or remarks out of context will leave you, almost always, with a mistaken view of said writings or remarks. Sen. Lott was at a birthday party for a very old Sen. Strom Thurmond. At what, for all Lott knew, could be Sen. Thurmond’s last birthday party ever, Lott was one of many people in attendance who praised Sen. Thurmond, each for different reasons and different areas. Lott said, and I’m paraphrasing, America would be better off today if Strom Thurmond had won his bid for the Presidency in 1948. And his platform was unabashedly and rabidly segregationist. But it is highly doubtful that Lott was referring to segregation when he said we’d be better of had Thurmond won.

I believe the main reason he said what he did is that he knew Thurmond was close to death. He and others were showering the man with praise so he would feel that he’d led a good life, done things people would be proud of, and done important things. Given an elderly person the gift of pride and self worth is an honorable thing, and I believe that is why Lott made his remark.

And if I had to say that Lott WAS referring to a specific issue Thurmond lobbied for, I would say it would be states’ rights. When Thurmond ran in 48, he ran as a third party candidate in the “States’ Rights Party” that he helped create.

Having met and spoken with Senator Lott a handful of times, I can tell you he is not a racist, though he does hold a strong position on states’ rights. And that, if anything in particular, is what Lott was referring to when he said we’d be better off had Thurmond won.

As for Reid, all he said was that he didn’t think that Justice Thomas was that bright. He also said that his opinions weren’t well written. Personally, I don’t know Justice Thomas and I’ve only read a couple of his opinions. From what I can see, he seems fairly intelligent and good, though not excellent, writer. Reid never said “Justice Thomas is a dumb black guy,” or that “Justice Thomas is obviously dumb, look at him, he’s black!”

Just my thoughts

AV

First, yes, I believe that we will be a strong force, if not a true occupation force, for 10 more years at least. We still have troops in Europe from WWII, and at least in Europe we were dealing with a developed society, not a tribal situation as it exists in Iraq.

And second, Paudio, I don't buy the "We are fighting Saddam loyalists" business. I know those aren’t your words, but I would still like to respond to them. The Iraqi people were not big supporters of Saddam for the past decade or so. Maybe they were when he first came to power. But not now. And from all our estimations, there would have to be a lot of regular Iraqis out there killing our guys. So then, if they're not fighting because they loved Saddam, then why do they fight us? Put simply, because we are there. I know if, say, my county was to be invaded by a foreign country, for whatever good or bad intention, we here would take up arms and explosives and whatever else we could find. And we would do our best to drive them out. Would we be doing this because we are all Bush Loyalists? No, we'd be doing it to defend our homeland, our families, our houses, all the people and things we love.

I believe the same is true about many of the Iraqis fighting against us. Sure, there are some left over Fedayeen types, but I believe the majority are just people trying to defend themselves. It's not like they all have TV's and are watching CNN all the time saying "hey, the Americans are here to liberate us!". For the most part, they don't have a clue about who those camouflaged guys are or why they're there. They just don't like seeing their friends and family die.

Now don't get me wrong, I am in NO way supporting the people over there killing OUR friends and families. I just don't see a reason not to be honest about motives. Ours and theirs.


AV

So, now that you've seen the facts, there appears to be no more bellowing and name calling? Curious....

AV

Here's another document of interest

In full, the Complaint filed by Stephen Williams and attorneys in Williams v. Vidmar et al. in PDF format.

http://www.alliancedefensefund.org/media/WilliamsvCupertinoComplaint.pdf

Sorry, left out a couple links:

http://www.nytimes.com/2004/12/05/weekinreview/05murp.html?oref=login

http://entroposcope.blogspot.com/2004/12/stevens-creek-school-debacle.html

Here's a couple of links to pieces with a little more insight into the events:

From the San Mateo Times

http://www.sanmateocountytimes.com/cda/article/print/0,1674,87%257E11268%257E2556644,00.html

And from a little more Leftist perspective, www.eRiposte.com. There is a lot of legit information here, but there is also an obvious anti-religion perspective. Disregard what you like, but please at least check out his sources and some of the real facts (as opposed to this guy's opinion stuff).

http://www.eriposte.com/philosophy/fundamentalism/stevenscreek.htm

I'd like to clear up a few things here. First, the school, principal, etc did NOT BAN the Constitution or the Declaration of Independence or any such thing. What they did do was make this teacher get his lesson plans approved by the administration before he put the lesson plan to work. Now, here in Mississippi this is very common for someone to have to approve a lesson plan before it is taught. Maybe it's an odd thing in CA, I don't know.

Now, the problem they had with his lesson plans in the first place was that the teacher was taking excerpts from the various founding documents and making handouts with JUST these excerpts on them. These excerpts ONLY contained references to God or a Creator, etc, that were in the founding documents he was using.

What started this all off? Of the preceding paragraph, I am certain of its veracity.
But as to what precipitated the actions of the administration, I’m not 100% sure. However, based on early reports of the situation, and hearing personally from some of the involved people, what happened is as follows:

The administration had received previous complaints from parents and students that Mr. Williams had been, basically, proselytizing in his classroom. At some point before the administrative screening began, a student asked Mr. Williams why he had to say “under God” in the Pledge of Allegiance. In response, Mr. Williams made the handouts with excerpts from certain founding documents which supported his case that America was wholly founded as a Christian nation, and that was why this student had to say “under God” in the pledge.

I’m not trying to start a fight here. I believe that we were, basically, founded on Judeo-Christian values. I believe in God. I believe in lower taxes and strong families. I believe in States’ Rights and gun ownership. But I do not believe that teachers should be evangelizing students as a captive audience in a public school. If this is what happened, and again, I don’t know with 100% certainty that it did, then the school has every right to keep an eye on him.

My only real point here is that before a mob is started to torch the school (metaphorically speaking), I think we should know ALL the facts involved. And if a school DID ban the Constitution, DoI, etc on religious or ANY grounds, I would be first in line to demand that its certification and funding be withdrawn as it would not be able to teach history with any truth. However, even though I don’t have every fact, I DO know that that is NOT what happened in this case. So please, before we all have arteries popping, calm down and wait for all the facts to come out.

Thank you for your time.

Sincerely,

AV