To the many excellent reasons to abolish the death penalty — it’s immoral, does not deter murder and affects minorities disproportionately — we can add one more. It’s an economic drain on governments with already badly depleted budgets.

It is far from a national trend, but some legislators have begun to have second thoughts about the high cost of death row. Others would do well to consider evidence gathered by the Death Penalty Information Center, a research organization that opposes capital punishment.

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/09/28/opinion/28mon3.html?_r=1

Hey, wasn’t that George W. Bush presidency really fantastic?

You do still remember it, don’t you?

Wasn’t it great?  Don’t you have lots of warm and fuzzy memories of it?  Isn’t it a shame that he couldn’t have a third term?

Okay, so maybe you don’t see it that way.  Maybe the last eight years weren’t such a party for you.  But remember the regressive right?  Remember how much they loved the guy?  Remember how they adored Ol’ Georgie, especially back in 2001, 2002, 2003?  Remember how they gloated and stuck it all in our faces?  Remember how much they loved not only Bush’s politics, but his in-your-face, my-way-or-the-highway, love-it-or-leave-it, macho cowboy routine delivery?

http://www.counterpunch.org/green09252009.html

In so many countries in the world, religion is losing adherents. The figures show quite clearly that even in supposedly deeply devout nations, such as the USA and Italy, church attendance is falling while the numbers are rising of those declaring themselves to have no religion.

And yet there is a common theme in newspapers and some books that deny this. Our suspicions of a co-ordinated misinformation campaign are growing. A book called God Is Back: How the Global Revival of Faith Is Changing the World was widely reviewed on its publication earlier this year. It tells us that “faith” has made a dramatic comeback despite previous predictions of its imminent demise.

http://www.secularism.org.uk/religion-is-not-reviving-its-bei.html

It's worse than a conspiracy. It's a war. They're very open about it–it's a War on Sex." It's a war that threatens the very fabric of our secular democracy. The American Taliban, our own sexual jihadists, want to replace our government with laws based on the Bible, creating a country in which "normal sex" is narrowly defined and no one has the right to alternative sexual information, health care, or personal expression. America is fighting a war on terror to prevent the overthrow of our way of life by fanatics who want to base all law on their strict religious beliefs. It is completely unacceptable that a group of conservative Americans is trying to accomplish the same thing right here.

http://freestudents.blogspot.com/2009/09/there-is-fury-and-and-sadness-inside.html

http://www.lfb.org/product_info.php?cPath=56&products_id=46

Update: President Obama axes abstinence-only programs

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2009/05/07/obama-eliminates-abstinen_n_199205.html

Frank Schaeffer explains where all this madness stems from and states that "the Evangelical sub-culture has rotted the brain of the United States of America".

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lPwGV1h4lW8