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[IP] more on We're Not in Lake Wobegon Anymore





Begin forwarded message:

From: Warren Magnus <wmagnus@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
Date: August 27, 2004 10:10:59 PM EDT
To: dave@xxxxxxxxxx
Subject: Re: [IP] We're Not in Lake Wobegon Anymore


Dave,

I really hate feeding the partisanism, but I doubt that FDR and JFK really had much in common with the religious right. Even William Jennings Bryan would likely have had trouble with the way that Republicans frame religion and politics. The issues of his day focused on social justice, which they could today just as easily. For that matter, the original trust busters were themselves very religious men. Unfortunately, the nation and the parties seem far more concerned with brutalizing each other with shouting matches over events of the past and blatant character assassinations.

The fact that Mr. Atkinson seems to feel that one party over another has some monopoly on vitriol seems a little myopic on its own. There's no good guy or bad guy here, just lots of bickering and finger-stuffed-in-ears shouting. Mind you, such times have arisen in the past, but there doesn't seem to be a unifying event on the horizon. Even the 9/11 attacks have widened the rift between groups instead of cementing us together.

As for when the whole process derailed? It's certainly been since World War II, but no amount of shrill political diatribe will change the fact that we as a nation eventually have to figure out how to work together for the good of the people or simply write-off the whole American Experiment.

Warren Magnus

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