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And that would be a detriment to them, to society, and to their children, in my opinion.

If that is our criteria for deciding which sorts of things we ought to legislate, then I might remind everyone that this is also the same sort of logic that the left uses to push their agenda against religion (particularly Christianity). They look at the worst examples of people who call themselves Christians (i.e. the murdering, persecuting popes and Reformers of past ages, also people who supported slavery and racial segregation using the Bible, etc.) and think, if we allow these people to continue teaching what they teach then this is the sort of effect it will leave on the population. "And that would be a detriment to them, to society, and to their children, in my opinion." It could almost be verbatim from a person on the left in their views as to why freedom of religious expression ought to be curtailed.

I say this to point out the fact that this is not a valid way to look at matters of morals. Illicit heterosexuality is equally (I think more, simply because it's more common and prevalent) detrimental to people, to society and their children, and yet not too many people are screaming about legal regulations of premarital sex, adultery, divorce, etc. This is the ultimate double-standard and reveals how our thoughts on this subject have gone awry. It is impossible for the societal and familial effects of immoral sex (of any kind) to negated by any sort of law. It has to be chosen on the individual level, one by one. Otherwise, it never works.

BTW, I think the government ought to butt out of the marriage issue altogether (except in the case of minors---I do believe the government has the responsibility to protect those who are incapable of protecting themselves and who are not yet capable in terms of maturity to choose adequately for themselves.) Marriage should be a religious and personal matter entirely.

Also the government needs to stop telling churches and religious bodies and individuals that they cannot teach against immoral activity (such as illicit heterosexuality, homosexuality, etc.) We simply need less government intervention in the whole affair and more individual and church involvement in the matter. For Christians, these matters are our responsibility to handle, not the government's. They need to get out of the way and let us handle our own responsibilities.

Why choose between sexual freedom and religious freedom (when it comes to making laws)? We can have both. As a Christian, I can only be right with God both morally and spiritually if I choose to be, not because someone makes me be. Simple physical restraint of the act does nothing whatsoever to change the heart of the person---which is of course where salvation or damnation are truly chosen. So, legally speaking, I think it absurd that we should not allow both sexual and religious freedom. As a Christian, my goal is to see people be saved and to have their interaction with God and the church be the reason why they change their evil behaviors. It is of no value to me if the people stop doing evil acts but never change in heart. They are still not saved, so, religiously speaking, neither I nor they have gained anything at all.

Christians ought to focus on reforming their churches and church discipline first before thinking anything at all about the government. Individual relationships with God (particularly through the Holy Spirit), churches and church discipline are far more effective at regulating immoral behavior than any government will be.

On both the Catholic and Protestant fronts unfortunately we have ample examples of spiritual "leaders" who promoted anti-Semitic activity.

Below is part of the papal bull known as "Cum Nimis Absurdum" issued by Pope Paul IV in 1555.

§ 1. Desiring firstly, as much as we can with [the help of] God, to beneficially provide, by this [our decree] that will forever be in force, we ordain that for the rest of time, in the City as well as in other states, territories and domains of the Church of Rome itself, all Jews are to live in only one [quarter] to which there is only one entrance and from which there is but one exit, and if there is not that capacity [in one such quarter, then], in two or three or however many may be enough; [in any case] they should reside entirely side by side in designated streets and be thoroughly separate from the residences of Christians, [This is to be enforced] by our authority in the City and by that of our representatives in other states, lands and domains noted above.

§ 2. Furthermore, in each and every state, territory and domain in which they are living, they will have only one synagogue, in its customary location, and they will construct no other new ones, nor can they own buildings. Furthermore, all of their synagogues, besides the one allowed, are to be destroyed and demolished. And the properties, which they currently own, they must sell to Christians within a period of time to be determined by the magistrates themselves.

§ 3. Moreover, concerning the matter that Jews should be recognizable everywhere: [to this end] men must wear a hat, women, indeed, some other evident sign, yellow in color, that must not be concealed or covered by any means, and must be tightly affixed [sewn]; and furthermore, they can not be absolved or excused from the obligation to wear the hat or other emblem of this type to any extent whatever and under any pretext whatsoever of their rank or prominence or of their ability to tolerate [this] adversity, either by a chamberlain of the Church, clerics of an Apostolic court, or their superiors, or by legates of the Holy See or their immediate subordinates.

§ 4. Also, they may not have nurses or maids or any other Christian domestic or service by Christian women in wet-nursing or feeding their children.

§ 5. They may not work or have work done on Sundays or on other public feast days declared by the Church.

§ 6. Nor may they incriminate Christians in any way, or promulgate false or forged agreements.

§ 7. And they may not presume in any way to play, eat or fraternize with Christians.

§ 8. And they cannot use other than Latin or Italian words in short-term account books that they hold with Christians, and, if they should use them, such records would not be binding on Christians [in legal proceedings].

§ 9. Moreover, these Jews are to be limited to the trade of rag-picking, or “cencinariae” (as it is said in the vernacular), and they cannot trade in grain, barley or any other commodity essential to human welfare.

§ 10. And those among them who are physicians, even if summoned and inquired after, cannot attend or take part in the care of Christians.

§ 11. And they are not to be addressed as superiors [even] by poor Christians.

§ 12. And they are to close their [loan] accounts entirely every thirty days; should fewer than thirty days elapse, they shall not be counted as an entire month, but only as the actual number of days, and furthermore, they will terminate the reckoning as of this number of days and not for the term of an entire month. In addition, they are prohibited from selling [goods put up as] collateral, put up as temporary security for their money, unless [such goods were] put up a full eighteen months prior to the day on which such [collateral] would be forfeit; at the expiration of the aforementioned number of months, if Jews have sold a security deposit of this sort, they must sign over all money in excess of the principal of the loan to the owner of the collateral.

§ 13. And the statutes of states, territories and domains (in which they have lived for a period of time) concerning primacy of Christians, are to be adhered to and followed without exception.

§ 14. And, should they, in any manner whatsoever, be deficient in the foregoing, it would be treated as a crime: in Rome, by us or by our clergy, or by others authorized by us, and in the aforementioned states, territories and domains by their respective magistrates, just as if they were rebels and criminals by the jurisdiction in which the offense takes place, they would be accused by all Christian people, by us and by our clergy, and could be punished at the discretion of the proper authorities and judges.

Unfortunately among Protestants this has also been heard. Below is a portion of Martin Luther's booklet, "The Jews and Their Lies."

Since they live among us, we dare not tolerate their conduct, now that we are aware of their lying and reviling and blaspheming. If we do, we become sharers in their lies, cursing and blaspemy. Thus we cannot extinguish the unquenchable fire of divine wrath, of which the prophets speak, nor can we convert the Jews. With prayer and the fear of God we must pratice a sharp mercy to see whether we might save at least a few from the glowing flames. We dare not avenge ourselves. Vengenance a thousand times worse than we could wish them already has them by the throat. I shall give you my sincere advice:

First to set fire to their synagogues or schools and to bury and cover with dirt whatever will not burn, so that no man will ever again see a stone or cinder of them. This is to be done in honor of our Lord and of Christendom, so that God might see that we are Christians, and do not condone or knowingly tolerate such public lying, cursing, and blaspheming of his Son and of his Christians. For whatever we tolerated in the past unknowingly - and I myself was unaware of it - will be pardoned by God. But if we, now that we are informed, were to protect and shield such a house for the Jews, existing right before our very nose, in which they lie about, blaspheme, curse, vilify, and defame Christ and us (as was heard above), it would be the same as if we were doing all this and even worse ourselves, as we very well know.

Second, I advise that their houses also be razed and destroyed. For they pursue in them the same aims as in their synagogues. Instead they might be lodged under a roof or in a barn, like the gypsies. This will bring home to them that they are not masters in our country, as they boast, but that they are living in exile and in captivity, as they incessantly wail and lament about us before God.

Third, I advise that all their prayer books and Talmudic writings, in which such idolatry, lies, cursing and blasphemy are taught, be taken from them. [...]

Fourth, I advise that their rabbis be forbidden to teach henceforth on pain of loss of life and limb. For they have justly forfeited the right to such an office by holding the poor Jews captive with the saying of Moses (Deuternomy 17 [:10 ff.]) in which he commands them to obey their teachers on penalty of death, although Moses clearly adds: "what they teach you in accord with the law of the Lord." Thoses villains ignore that. They wantonly employ the poor people's obedience contrary to the law of the Lord and infuse them with this poison, cursing, and blasphemy. In the same way the pope also held us captive with the declaration in Matthew 16 {:18], "You are Peter," etc, inducing us to believe all the lies and deceptions that issued from his devilish mind. He did not teach in accord with the word of God, and therefore he forfeited the righ to teach.

Fifth, I advise that safe-conduct on the highways be abolished completely for the Jews. For they have no business in the countryside, since they are not lords, officials, tradesmen, or the like. Let they stay at home. [...]

Sixth, I advise that usury be prohibited to them, and that all cash and treasure of silver and gold be taken from them and put aside for safekeeping. The reason for such a measure is that, as said above, they have no other means of earning a livelihood than usury, and by it they have stolen and robbed from us all they possess. Such money should now be used in no other way than the following: Whenever a Jew is sincerely converted, he should be handed one hundred, two hundred, or three hundred florins, as personal circumstances may suggest. With this he could set himself up in some occupation for the support of his poor wife and children, and the maintenance of the old or feeble. For such evil gains are cursed if they are not put to use with God's blessing in a good and worthy cause.

Seventh, I commend putting a flail, an ax, a hoe, a spade, a distaff, or a spindle into the hands of young, strong Jews and Jewesses and letting them earn their bread in the sweat of their brow, as was imposed on the children of Adam (Gen 3[:19]). For it is not fitting that they should let us accursed Goyim toil in the sweat of our faces while they, the holy people, idle away their time behind the stove, feasting and farting, and on top of all, boasting blasphemously of their lordship over the Christians by means of our sweat. No, one should toss out these lazy rogues by the seat of their pants.

While neither Catholics nor Protestants have maintained anti-Semitism constantly over the centuries, they have certainly both taken huge part in it at times and some among us have at times taught in the name of God that others ought to do so. And it was pure blasphemy, as we all would agree, I think. And I am convinced that the purveyors of this blasphemy (Catholic, Protestant and otherwise) are all receiving their due reward in the flame of Hades. For as we know, the word of the only real master the Church has ever had said:

"He answered: " 'Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your strength and with all your mind'; and, 'Love your neighbor as yourself.' " ---Luke 10:27

And to him, the greatest love was not in committing violence against others but rather, "Greater love has no one than this, that he lay down his life for his friends."---John 15:13

So while the Church has certainly had its anti-Semitic heretics in its midst over the years, the true teachings of Christ have never faded and his message has always in the end come out victorious.

USA! USA! USA!...the most beautiful words on earth

Not even close. They don't even come close to the glory and beauty of these: "For God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten Son that whosoever believeth in him should not perish but have everlasting life." There. Now those may indeed be the most beautiful words on earth.

Nothing can compare with that.

Why not argue with what I actually said rather than attempting to ridicule the way in which I said it? Might help your cause more.

No. Just know what I’ve been reading here on FR of late and know what that sort of mindset leads to. That’s all.

If she does, the wailing and gnashing of teeth here will know no end.

Nah. They'll just start supporting whatever bogus, unConstitutional thing she decides to support because it's "good for the Party" or they'll "hold their nose" and vote for her whether they support her ideas or not because it's "good for the Party" and because "the other guy is practically the Devil incarnate."

As such I consider you to be an enemy of my country.

Clarify to what extent you mean that. In your mind does that mean traitor (i.e. treason)? That's the kind of vibe I'm feeling out there from time to time in FR circles, so a bit of clarification may be useful here.

Sine government caused this crisis and since it was way larger and more immediate than private enterprises could respond to, it was a correct call for governemnt to intervene. Sad that such obvious realities get lost in political rhetoric.

No political rhetoric, just simple facts. The only government interventions (oh, and by the way, I agree with you that they helped to cause this) that should have occurred should have been a repealing of laws requiring banks to give mortgages to high-risk borrowers, total removal of the entire Federal Reserve system, a return to Congressional handling of their own Constitutional responsibilities to handle our currency (rather than giving entities like the Fed such power), cessation of all artificial manipulation of interest rates and the such like. No American taxpayer money should have been spent bailing out anyone whatsoever. The banks did their fair share in earning these bankruptcies, and so they ought to have had to face them alone. You and I should never have had to pay for them at all.

And I maintain that it is most certainly true that it was not altruism or a sense of responsibility that moved the President and much of Congress to pass these bailouts; it was fear (for the more honest members of Congress) and a simple desire to grab more power for the federal government. It was a coup, frankly speaking, and we will be sorry when the consequences of it finally become completely clear.

Absent real, massive and substantial action we would have been in a worldwide banking system collapse.

As usual, people in our country think bigger government is the answer to all ills. It's just sad to see such unConstitutional nonsense being espoused on Free Republic.

They whip us up into unnecessary panics (i.e. We're going to have a worldwide banking system collapse!) for one reason and one reason only: to grab power and trample the Constitution. Our people foolishly listened to them back during the Great Depression, and are paying for it to this day. And now, we are foolishly listening to them again, and both we and the next generation and the next and so on will pay for the foolishness and weakness of this generation. We have to wake up! They are using us, plain and simple, and it's about time we finally realized that.

I just wish Paul would put the country ahead of his ego right now. Obama & the Democrats are so fricking dangerous to the nation that I don't think Paul understands this threat just like he doesn't understand Islamic terrorism.

Nonsense. It doesn't have beans to do with his ego, and anyone who's watched him as much as you have ought to know that. It's just that everything he's been telling us for decades is coming home to roost, and everyone knows it. And as for supporting McCain and becoming his economic adviser, I think rationally we all know or at least suspect that McCain would never have even offered him such a position. He sent out a small token gesture to get him to support his campaign just because he wanted the Ron Paul voting bloc, but do we really think McCain would have been decent enough to offer him the position over the numerous war hawks he could choose for the position? No, of course not.

Paul was right about the economy and right about Islamic terrorism, and he is absolutely right in sticking to his guns and going wall to wall with that message wherever people will let him tell it. If he sold those things out to become a McCain supporter, he'd be no better than all the other Washington sellouts who sacrifice all in the cause of power and position and "the lesser of two evils" (which is an absurd lie.) It would be the worst mistake of his career.

Be it McCain or Obama, this country is going to lose BIG TIME, and we need more Ron Pauls out there refusing to go along with either of them.

No worries. :)

But yes, I am a Southern gal.

This technology, like all technology is susceptible to misuse, but there is nothing inherently evil about it.

Agreed. But as I stated in a previous post, the potential for harm is so great and pervasive as to make this technology utterly inadvisable. In short, I wish they weren't developing it.

Unless I missed in the article where this technology is using fetal stem cells I have to strongly disagree with your comparison.

Maybe I wasn't very clear about what I was really getting at in my comparison. In both cases the potential for (or in the case of fetal stem-cell research, the certainty of) harm to others far outweighs the potential for good to a relatively small percentage of the population. With the helmet, I have no doubt that not only our government, but also other governments, stalkers, pedophiles, and other less than savory individuals or groups will endanger the entire public---the disabled included.

My point is with some technologies (such as wheelchairs and other mobility devices), there is little to no intrinsic danger posed to the population at large. With others, such as this one, the danger is so obvious and pervasive as to make it not worth risking.

They should. It is never more than a step between what they do to "them" and what they do to "us." It's the old adage that if you give them an inch they'll take an ell.

I'm reminded of the poem "First They Came..." by Martin Niemoller which reads:

"When the Nazis came for the communists,

I remained silent;

I was not a communist.

When they locked up the social democrats,

I remained silent;

I was not a social democrat.

"When they came for the trade unionists,

I did not speak out;

I was not a trade unionist.

"When they came for the Jews,

I remained silent;

I was not a Jew.

"When they came for me,

there was no one left to speak out."

We have to be careful and extremely hesitant about what we support our government doing to anyone (including terrorists, criminals, prisoners of war, etc.), mostly out of pure principle, but also because it will most certainly be us next.

Indeed. But this is also the sort of rationale which makes many people support fetal stem-cell research. It appeals to the emotional side in all us with the question, "But what about the sick people it may help?" It ignores the fact that there may be far greater numbers of people harmed by the research, or, in this case, technology, than those (far fewer) who will be helped. Besides that, there is usually a better way to help the sick and disabled than the one they are being used to justify, and the fact that the worst possible method is proposed shows plainly that the reasons that the developers of the new technology want it are far from altruistic.

Not being a scientist or a doctor, I don't know what other possibilities may be out there for Gehrig's patients, but I wouldn't be shocked to find that other proposals (of equal likelihood to work) do exist but aren't being touted---just like adult stem cell research is so often ignored (despite its greater promise) by those who push for fetal stem-cell research.

The fact that this has been a project of military hints at the uses that are intended. If successful (and I suppose that is a rather large if), this technology will be used as an agressive tool and a spy machine rather than simply a tool for communicating messages.

They say it can be turned off. We know however that technology does exist to turn on (or at least access) certain devices through remote means by unauthorized persons. This is shown by the report that came out in the last couple of years that the government can in fact remotely trigger a microphone in a person's cell phone, even when the cell phone is turned off, giving the government the ability to listen to everything the person is saying. These are but some of the misuses I can envision. There are more that seem to me not outside the realm of possibility.

This is disturbing, albeit not surprising. This technology is ready-made for misuse.

I know what you mean. They've been taught that we were saved by grace but often haven't been taught, "What? Shall we sin that grace may abound? God forbid!" The lower, more worldly desires of humanity have been catered to and excused far too much in the church, I think, as an overreaction to the excessive condemnation and lack of forgiveness shown to those penitent sinners who had committed those sorts of sins in the 50's, 60's and back beyond that. It's an overreaction I think.

The unfortunate thing is that now we're beginning to see another, opposite overreaction to the excesses of recent years in the resurgence of Calvinism. People seem to turn from one false idea to another rather than meeting Jesus in the middle where he actually is.