A commenter on Friendly Atheist's thread about the Woonsocket, RI's cross atop the memorial for 4 soldiers on public ground insinuated that the FFRF had "backed off," so I went looking for an article. I didn't find any such evidence that they are backing off, but I took a look at this article (an opinion piece regarding several issues):
http://www.golocalprov.com/politics/travis-rowley12/
In a nutshell, the author takes random issues like PC, support for illegal immigration, secularism, and what the kids learn at college, and equates them with being a Democrat, and that Democrats warp all these issues to trick the general public that they are mainstream and not liberal socialists.
Likewise, I equate being a Republican as being a Christian, and for the most part, not giving a shit about anyone but yourself if it costs money, and doing anything they can in the wheels of the government machinery to frustrate Democrats out of spite. I might have it a little bit wrong, but I feel like the reason people are Democrats is because the Republicans make themselves so unattractive - mean, petty, and exclusive. Some people do fit into that category, and join in the team that is against Democrats. Democrats make them feel stupid and make them share, and they hate Jesus. I'm simplifying because I'm simple, and this is my overall impression. I think it's a lot of people's overall impression - and they vote.
There are a lot of people in the US who just don't fit into what a Republican stands for, and a lot of them are Christian also. When I say I'm an atheist, I don't want my political leanings to be chosen for me because one side is proudly Christian, and the other side mostly considers religion a non-issue. In government, religion should be a non-issue. Democrats tend to recognize people as equals that the Republicans would like to disappear: gay people, immigrants, women who work outside the home, and anyone on welfare. I hate politics because it is made to be so black and white. Who are your good guys and who are your bad guys? Republicans sell a package where we are sent backward to an idealistic time when people were allowed to discriminate, make all-white neighborhoods with all-white couples and their children, and no gay people, and no dissent as to the overt Christian make-up of the town. Some places are like that anyway.
I know the issues are much more complicated than that, but I feel like they're not. I feel like there are solutions to the problems that can't be solved out of spite. I think that Democrats make some terrible solutions, too, I mean, sometimes it sounds like a vapid Miss America pageant. "Feed the poor and world peace." Well, how are you going to accomplish that? Tax and spend, of course. But it's like the Republicans would not like to "feed the poor and world peace" at all, this is reality. We have to starve the poor so the rich can prosper, and kill the world because they're mean to us. These latter issues are so bound up in petty arguments to preserve the homogeneous Christian ideal, not because they are the right thing to do, which is feed the poor somehow, and become friendlier with the world, if not lovers. This takes both sides getting a grip, and getting to work coming up with a way, and not to muddle up issues of religion with it. See how religion messes up again, people are so threatened by secularity that they can't even work out plausible solutions to issues that matter. In that way, even though it is a candidate's right to practice their religion, as a citizen covered by the 1st amendment like all of us, using that religion as a lever to get votes and to equate propositions as contingent on this belief is overstepping the 1st amendment establishment clause, and also a bonus! lever for which to consider themselves "more" American than the other side, who want to "destroy" America, using a very narrow definition.
I know that's pretty much what we talk about here, keeping religion out of policy, but as an American, I also find politics like a football game. A really good play is a really good play, objectively, but people pick sides, so a triumph for one is an upset for the other; it doesn't matter that they have the same goals if they are on opposite ends of the field. Even if you don't like sports, that should be simple enough to understand.
