Patriotic Atheists
It's amazing how easy it is for some people, let's say some political "leaders" — okay, let's make that presidents and their presidential fathers, simply to write off big chunks of their citizenry.
This exchange is reported as taking place between G.H.W. Bush & Robert I. Sherman (a reporter for the American Atheist news journal) in 27 August 1987:
Sherman: What will you do to win the votes of the Americans who are atheists?
Bush:I guess I'm pretty weak in the atheist community. Faith in God is important to me.
Sherman: Surely you recognize the equal citizenship and patriotism of Americans who are atheists?
Bush: No, I don't know that atheists should be considered as citizens, nor should they be considered patriots. This is one nation under God.
Sherman (somewhat taken aback): Do you support as a sound constitutional principle the separation of state and church?
Bush: Yes, I support the separation of church and state. I'm just not very high on atheists.
[from "Can George Bush, with impunity, state that atheists should not be considered either citizens or patriots? The History of the Issue", by Madalyn O'Hair.]
Of course, I had already been written of as gay by GHWB ("Not fit to clean the White House toilets" if memory serves correctly), so this was just icing on the conceptual disenfranchisement cake anyway.
But how can one reconcile the widely held perception that the current president (or the first papa, for that matter) are "men of principle", when their principles are so egregiously sucky? Why do so many people want to put all their trust in a men who find it so easy to come to the conclusion that certain groups of people are clearly not patriotic and probably shouldn't be allowed citizenship?
Update: How startling. Just minutes ago, which was itself only minutes after I'd read the above, I tripped over this quotation (via Shakespeare's Sister) from the televised news conference that the president held last night:
The great thing about America, David, is that you should be allowed to worship any way you want, and if you choose not to worship, you're equally as patriotic as somebody who does worship. And if you choose to worship, you're equally American if you're a Christian, a Jew, a Muslim. That's the wonderful thing about our country, and that's the way it should be.
I still have no reason to believe that he believes it, since this Bush is quite adept at saying things that have little to do with reality or with what he actually thinks, but it's still startling to hear [see] him say it.