I love when the Pope comes to town.

Foxwell

Now...I'm as big of a fan of pomp and circumstance as any red-blooded American (Copies of Nixon's, Reagan's, and Ford's funerals can be found in my video collection, and I watch them every so often.). And a good, well-timed 21-gun salute can make my heart skip a beat (I still get teary-eyed when I watch the West Wing episode "In Excelsis Deo" where Toby arranges a formal military funeral at Arlington for a homeless veteran); what's more, I love all the symbolism and tradition ingrained in the guarding of the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier. Stuff like that...I get it, and I'm not saying we should abandon those traditions, but...

...when I saw that our government honored the arrival of the Pontiff with a 21-gun salute, my incongruity alarm went crazy (Not since I witnessed Scott Baio as an honored guest at Reagan's interment ceremony has my incongruity alarm been so frantic.)

Isn't the Pope a man of peace? Hasn't he consistently spoken out against our current military aggression in the Middle East?

Is it me or is giving the Pope a 21-gun salute kind of like giving Ghandi a 21-cheeseburger salute? "Here ya go Mahatma, eat up."

Shouldn't we be releasing doves instead?

Actually, I guess it would be more symbolic of the Bush administration's policies if we would release doves followed immediately by the 21-gun salute.

"Release the doves!" BLAM! BLAM! BLAM!...

...and, of course, if Cheney were organizing the ceremony, he'd release 21 of his friends and then start firing.

Why do we as a nation insist on so closely identifying ourselves with our military might? Our national anthem is basically a West Point fight song.

When we want to honor a man, we fire off a few rounds.

Even in times of relative peace (Remember those halcyon days?), we would ooohh and ahhhh as the Stealth Bomber, a weapon of mass destruction, flew over the Rose Bowl.

Of course we owe so very much to those who died for this country, but don't we owe at least an acknowledgment or two to our nurses and doctors, educators and scientists, men and women of peace?

We could combine the two honors. How about, before the kickoff of next year's Super Bowl, we have an aerial show of our military might followed by six or seven Nobel Laureates parachuting gracefully to mid-field where one of them reads a passage from Martin Luther King's "Letter from Birmingham Jail." It wouldn't even bother me if they were sponsored by Doritos.

And we're not the only country guilty of such sanguine bravado. Have you ever seen Guatemala's flag? Here's a link:

http://www.appliedlanguage.com/flags_of_the_world/flag_of_guatemala.shtml

You see that? Two swords crossed layered beneath two crossed rifles...okay, we get it; you like your killing devices; you don't have to represent your entire arsenal on your flag. I get the feeling that if Guatemala ever gets the bomb, they'll probably slap an image of a mushroom cloud on there too. The word "overkill" comes to mind, also "over-compensating."

And that's the thing, how powerful is the Guatemalan military machine? Answer: Not very.

Putting all those pseudo-macho images on your flag is akin to a man putting a sock down his pants to impress the ladies. Hey, Guatemala, we all know what you're packing, and even if we were fooled by the braggadocio, how disappointing and devastating would it be if we actually needed your military aid and found out, too late, that your flag is just a "sock down you pants"?

I think I'm in danger of getting seriously off-track, so I'm going to stop.

Peace, Love, Anarchy.

VINNY GOOMBA

AMERICA! FUCK YEAH!

I like this post. I hear ya on the National Anthem. I think "America the Beautiful" is a much nicer fit.

Although the Star-Spangled Banner is reflective of what the original patriots (the O.P.), the founding fathers, did to ensure us that this country would never be held hostage to tyranny.

You've got to give those guys credit... They weren't without their flaws, but they set up the Constitution in such a way that, if the people didn't like what the government was doing, it was their right to protest it, force change, and if need up and overthrow it. That's BALLS. That's what they did to Britain, and they asked that they themselves be put in their place if they ever got out of line. The 1st Amendment gave us the protest and assembly, the 2nd gave us the guns to do it, the 4th ensured that they wouldn't come into our houses / lives and arrest us for no good reason, and the 5th ensured us a trial in which we did not have to testify against ourselves.

It's all pretty basic. I wish we could get back to basics.

Oh yeah, back on topic. Guns and the Pope, shitty combination. It does say something about your country and it's image that your most respectful greeting has to include the use of firearms.

veddingsinger

I saw a great caption of his holiness and the president:

The Pope And The Dope.

LikeAnOpeningBandForTheSun

guns are cool because they make loud noises. doves dont and are thus lame.

Danimal

MrSmith wrote:

guns are cool because they make loud noises. doves dont and are thus lame.

Yeah but Dove Bars are delicious!

Towsertunes

Foxwell wrote:

Peace, Love, Anarchy.

Talk about incongruous.

know1

What about separation of church and state?

sweetpotato

And, finally, New Rule: Whenever you combine a secretive compound, religion and weirdos in pioneer outfits, there's going to be some child-f*cking going on. In fact, whenever a cult leader sets himself up as "God's infallible wing man" here on earth, lock away the kids.

Which is why I'd like to tip off law enforcement to an even larger child-abusing religious cult. Its leader also has a compound. And this guy not only operates outside the bounds of the law, but he used to be a Nazi and he wears funny hats. [photo of the Pope shown]

That's right. The Pope is coming to America this week, and, ladies, he's single! Now, I know what you're thinking: "Bill, you can't be saying that the Catholic Church is no better than this creepy Texas cult! For one thing, altar boys can't even get pregnant."

But, really, what tripped up the "little cult on the prairie" was that they only abused hundreds of kids, not thousands all over the world. Cults get raided. Religions get parades. How does the Catholic Church get away with all of their buggery? VOLUME, VOLUME, VOLUME!

If you have a few hundred followers and you let some of them molest children, they call you a cult leader. If you have a billion, they call you "Pope."

It's like if you can't pay your mortgage, you're a deadbeat, but if you can't pay a million mortgages, you're Bear Stearns, and we bail you out. And that's who the Catholic Church is, the Bear Stearns of organized pedophilia. Too big to fail.

When the current Pope was in his previous Vatican job as John Paul's Dick Cheney - he wrote a letter instructing every Catholic bishop to keep the sex abuse of minors secret until the statute of limitations ran out. And that's the Church's attitude: "We're here, we're queer, get used to it."

Which is fine. Far be it from me to criticize religion. But, just remember one thing: if the Pope was, instead of a religious figure, merely the CEO of a nationwide chain of daycare centers where thousands of employees had been caught molesting kids and then covering it up, he'd be arrested faster than you can say, "Who wants to touch Mister Wiggle?"

NMyTree

The Pope (and the Catholic Religion in general) is about peace?

News to me.

Foxwell

sweetpotato wrote:

If you have a few hundred followers and you let some of them molest children, they call you a cult leader. If you have a billion, they call you "Pope."

It's like if you can't pay your mortgage, you're a deadbeat, but if you can't pay a million mortgages, you're Bear Stearns, and we bail you out. And that's who the Catholic Church is, the Bear Stearns of organized pedophilia. Too big to fail.

When the current Pope was in his previous Vatican job as John Paul's Dick Cheney - he wrote a letter instructing every Catholic bishop to keep the sex abuse of minors secret until the statute of limitations ran out. And that's the Church's attitude: "We're here, we're queer, get used to it."

Which is fine. Far be it from me to criticize religion. But, just remember one thing: if the Pope was, instead of a religious figure, merely the CEO of a nationwide chain of daycare centers where thousands of employees had been caught molesting kids and then covering it up, he'd be arrested faster than you can say, "Who wants to touch Mister Wiggle?"

Brilliant! Well done!

Foxwell

NMyTree wrote:

The Pope (and the Catholic Religion in general) is about peace?

Well...at least on paper and in speech they are.

sweetpotato

Foxwell wrote:

Brilliant! Well done!

thanks, and i wish i could take the credit, but it's from bill maher. i've been on a bit of a New Rules bender...

callen

some really great posts....and funny!

NMyTree

I love Bill Maher (Real Time )! Don't always agree with his opinons, but he's friggin' great! Hilarious!

And much of what he says........is right on the money!

Foxwell

PEPPER wrote:

We'll, for what its worth anything that happens over a thousand years ago should be taken as grain of salt today.

To sit and bash a religion that preaches people to be kind to others and voices an end to the war you would think that it would be accepted by most people on this board. Yeah, they had a bunch of scumbags violate kids but in all...the whole principle of the religion is good...but if you want to live the hip scene have at it, that’s my two cents

I don't believe I was bashing the religion when I wrote in the original post:

FOXWELL wrote:

Isn't the Pope a man of peace? Hasn't he consistently spoken out against our current military aggression in the Middle East?

Is it me or is giving the Pope a 21-gun salute kind of like giving Ghandi a 21-cheeseburger salute? "Here ya go Mahatma, eat up."

I thought I was giving Benedict the benefit of the doubt.

My intent was to shine a light on a culture that relies too heavily on the "stick" and ignores the "dove".

But, you know, it's easy to get turned around lost when you're living the hip scene...ask Huey Lewis. (I hope the Huey Lewis reference isn't too hip. )

norm

Foxwell wrote:

I don't believe I was bashing the religion when I wrote in the original post:



I thought I was giving Benedict the benefit of the doubt.

My intent was to shine a light on a culture that relies too heavily on the "stick" and ignores the "dove".

But, you know, it's easy to get turned around lost when you're living the hip scene...ask Huey Lewis. (I hope the Huey Lewis reference isn't too hip. )

just don't be a hipster doufus