The United States of Arbusto

Last updated on: November 9, 2004 at 5:22 pm By Fred Clark

Scripps-Howard's Mary Deibel is not shrill. Her tone in this article — "Your wallet and Bush's second term" — is matter-of-fact, almost clinical. That matter-of-factness makes it all the more chilling, lending it the detached staccato of a war correspondent from the trenches of the class warfare. The Washington Post's Jonathan Weisman takes a similar detached approach in "Analysts Call Outlook for Bush Plan Bleak." That article, under the heading "for the record," begins: President Bush signaled [Thursday] that he... Read more

Ed — the movie

Last updated on: November 9, 2004 at 3:13 pm By Fred Clark

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From what I've read, Friday Night Lights is a pretty good movie. I haven't seen it yet, but I plan to. My hope is that if it's a success at the box office, then Hollywood may consider adapting another Buzz Bissinger book for the big screen. The movie I really want to see is A Prayer for the City. Prayer is the story of Ed Rendell's first term as mayor of the great city of Philadelphia. He inherited a city... Read more

Cleaning the Attic

Last updated on: November 8, 2004 at 8:08 pm By Fred Clark

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Clearing out the ol' bookmarks folder post-election. Stuff I probably should've posted about before. Or not. Activist Toolbox, from the Rainforest Action Network. Some cool stuff if you find yourself tempted by the sins of boredom and/or despair. "The Baghdad Follies." From Janet Reitman in Rolling Stone. BillHicks.com. The site has tons of audio and video, so go laugh at a dead man. Business, none of your. Like many things in the attic, this is several months old. Note the... Read more

Chucky’s back

Last updated on: November 7, 2004 at 3:59 pm By Fred Clark

26 Comments

Yesterday I got a direct mail solicitation from Angel Tree, an annual program by Chuck Colson's Prison Fellowship that collects and distributes Christmas toys for the children of prisoners. It's a nice program, well conceived and well run. The toys are collected from church or business groups, just like with Toys for Tots, and then are distributed to the children through their parents. Lately, Angel Tree has expanded to include mentoring and camping programs for these children. Like child-sponsorship programs,... Read more

Seminary

Last updated on: November 6, 2004 at 4:43 pm By Fred Clark

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"So you're, like, a priest or a preacher or something?" people ask. No, I tell them. I went to seminary to study theology, the queen of the sciences. But I'm not ordained. I don't believe I was called to the ministry or that God would inflict someone like me on a congregation. "So why go to seminary, then?" Answer No. 1: I say that I went to seminary because I wanted to make a lot of money. This is usually... Read more

The immoral majority

Last updated on: November 5, 2004 at 4:21 pm By Fred Clark

30 Comments

Much is being made of the exit polls that show "moral values" were one of the driving forces behind this election (Ted Olson has a nice roundup of articles on this). The only people doing exit polling in my precinct were me and the other Moveon volunteers. But if, as I exited the voting booth, some pollster had been there, clipboard in hand, and asked me if "moral values" had played a role in my vote, I would have said,... Read more

Who made Steve?

Last updated on: November 4, 2004 at 4:44 am By Fred Clark

96 Comments

In the third grade at Timothy Christian School, we learned a variation of the children's catechism. I don't remember most of it any longer, but I've always treasured the first three questions. Recently, however, I've come to realize that these three questions do not accurately represent what it is that many American Christians believe. I have amended them to bring them into line with current practice and teaching: Q: Who made you? A: God made me. Q: What else did... Read more

Worldview window

Last updated on: November 3, 2004 at 4:13 pm By Fred Clark

17 Comments

Clearing out the e-mail inbox, I find the following from the folks at worldvieweekend.com. These folks are the lunatic fringe. But as we found out yesterday, the lunatic fringe is now in the driver's seat. The election, it turns out, wasn't about terrorism or the war in Iraq. It wasn't about fiscal insanity and crippling budget deficits, two-tiered health care and education systems, the death of American manufacturing and staggering trade imbalances, an increasingly regressive tax system, the rape of... Read more

The Good News

Last updated on: November 3, 2004 at 6:48 am By Fred Clark

21 Comments

1. Massive turnout here in Media, Pa.'s south precinct — approaching 90 percent. The borough went for Kerry 2,045 to 974. We went for Joe Hoeffel by a 300-vote margin. Even poor Dr. Scoles — the former surgeon who stepped in when our original congressional challenger, Greg Philips, was shipped off for active duty in Iraq — carried the town against Representative-for-life Curt Weldon. We're thinking of making up T-shirts: "Don't blame me, I'm from Media South." 2. The race-baiting... Read more

Sunny and 60 degrees

Last updated on: November 2, 2004 at 10:45 am By Fred Clark

4 Comments

I'd never been at our local polling place at 7 a.m. before, so I didn't immediately realize that a line out the door, around the corner and down the block was something unprecedented. About a third of the precinct has already voted here and people seem animated and energized. And it's a gorgeous day in Delco — 60 degrees and sunny. The forecast had called for an overcast day with a 50-50 chance of rain. Sometimes the forecast turns out... Read more