Food for Thought...

Penn Jillette, the talkative half of Penn and Teller, is a well-known atheist and speaks out regularly about his non-belief. He was interviewed for the "This I Believe" segment on NPR a few years ago, and I found his explanation thought-provoking. Someday, someone might actually read this blog, and might find it interesting also. The original is at:

http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=5015557

Here's what he had to say:

"I believe that there is no God. I'm beyond atheism. Atheism is not believing in God. Not believing in God is easy — you can't prove a negative, so there's no work to do. You can't prove that there isn't an elephant inside the trunk of my car. You sure? How about now? Maybe he was just hiding before. Check again. Did I mention that my personal heartfelt definition of the word "elephant" includes mystery, order, goodness, love and a spare tire?

Nubar Alexanian

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Penn Jillette is the taller, louder half of the magic and comedy act Penn and Teller. He is a research fellow at the Cato Institute and has lectured at Oxford and MIT. Penn has co-authored three best-selling books and is executive producer of the documentary film The Aristocrats.

So, anyone with a love for truth outside of herself has to start with no belief in God and then look for evidence of God. She needs to search for some objective evidence of a supernatural power. All the people I write e-mails to often are still stuck at this searching stage. The atheism part is easy.

But, this "This I Believe" thing seems to demand something more personal, some leap of faith that helps one see life's big picture, some rules to live by. So, I'm saying, "This I believe: I believe there is no God."

Having taken that step, it informs every moment of my life. I'm not greedy. I have love, blue skies, rainbows and Hallmark cards, and that has to be enough. It has to be enough, but it's everything in the world and everything in the world is plenty for me. It seems just rude to beg the invisible for more. Just the love of my family that raised me and the family I'm raising now is enough that I don't need heaven. I won the huge genetic lottery and I get joy every day.

Believing there's no God means I can't really be forgiven except by kindness and faulty memories. That's good; it makes me want to be more thoughtful. I have to try to treat people right the first time around.

Believing there's no God stops me from being solipsistic. I can read ideas from all different people from all different cultures. Without God, we can agree on reality, and I can keep learning where I'm wrong. We can all keep adjusting, so we can really communicate. I don't travel in circles where people say, "I have faith, I believe this in my heart and nothing you can say or do can shake my faith." That's just a long-winded religious way to say, "shut up," or another two words that the FCC likes less. But all obscenity is less insulting than, "How I was brought up and my imaginary friend means more to me than anything you can ever say or do." So, believing there is no God lets me be proven wrong and that's always fun. It means I'm learning something.

Believing there is no God means the suffering I've seen in my family, and indeed all the suffering in the world, isn't caused by an omniscient, omnipresent, omnipotent force that isn't bothered to help or is just testing us, but rather something we all may be able to help others with in the future. No God means the possibility of less suffering in the future.

Believing there is no God gives me more room for belief in family, people, love, truth, beauty, sex, Jell-O and all the other things I can prove and that make this life the best life I will ever have."

I'd be very interested in the responses of my theoretical readers.

Meaningful Legislation on the Bush-era Tax Cuts?.......

.......Don't hold your breath while this group of Bozos is running things in Washington.

On one hand, the Republicans are willing to sacrifice trillions in income by shielding the wealthy from tax cut repeals, but they insist that unemployment benefits be "paid for" before being extended. Ya can't have it both ways, people. They make me want to retch. Add to that, the Republicans, if they had their own way, would only give tax cuts to millionaires. Which would continue their agenda of transferring wealth from the poor and middle classes to the wealthy. I refer you to:

http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article15923.htm

".....The economic pie is getting bigger -- how can it be true that most Americans are getting smaller slices? The answer, of course, is that a few people are getting much, much bigger slices. Although wages have stagnated since Bush took office, corporate profits have doubled. The gap between the nation's CEOs and average workers is now ten times greater than it was a generation ago. And while Bush's tax cuts shaved only a few hundred dollars off the tax bills of most Americans, they saved the richest one percent more than $44,000 on average. In fact, once all of Bush's tax cuts take effect, it is estimated that those with incomes of more than $200,000 a year -- the richest five percent of the population -- will pocket almost half of the money. Those who make less than $75,000 a year -- eighty percent of America -- will receive barely a quarter of the cuts. In the Bush era, economic inequality is on the rise.

Rising inequality isn't new. The gap between rich and poor started growing before Ronald Reagan took office, and it continued to widen through the Clinton years. But what is happening under Bush is something entirely unprecedented: For the first time in our history, so much growth is being siphoned off to a small, wealthy minority that most Americans are failing to gain ground even during a time of economic growth -- and they know it......"


Meanwhile, the Dems just forced a vote on keeping tax cuts in place for ONLY the middle class. Even though they knew it wouldn't work. Nothing but posturing. All they're thinking about is how they'll frame issues to the voters in the next election cycle; they want to be able to say they voted for middle class tax cuts and not tax cuts for the wealthy. I have a hard time believing they really give a crap either. All they care about is their own re-election.

And, of course, there's much made of the fact that this is all taking place during a "rare" Saturday session. My heart bleeds for them. As a nurse, I've worked plenty of evenings, nights, weekends, and holidays. Those shifts weren't at all "rare." Am I supposed to feel sorry for our poor Senators for having to work on a Saturday? Cut the fuss people. I'm not impressed.

Can the USA as we know it survive this kind of government? The answer may be no:

http://investmentwatchblog.com/when-the-people-find-they-can-vote-themselves-money-that-will-herald-the-end-of-the-republic-benjamin-franklin/

“A democracy cannot exist as a permanent form of government. It can only exist until the voters discover that they can vote themselves largesse from the public treasury. From that moment on, the majority always votes for the candidates promising the most benefits from the public treasury with the result that a democracy always collapses over loose fiscal policy, always followed by a dictatorship. The average age of the world’s greatest civilizations has been about 200 years. These nations have progressed through this sequence: From bondage to spiritual faith; From spiritual faith to great courage; From courage to liberty; From liberty to abundance; From abundance to selfishness; From selfishness to apathy; From apathy to dependence; From dependence back into bondage.”

Might just be time to go get a little piece of land in the middle of nowhere, dig a moat and pull up the drawbridge.