[PRCo] Re: separation church and state

[Joshua Dunfield]

On 31 October 2010 17:14, Phillip Clark Campbell <pcc_sr at yahoo.com> wrote:
> Mr.Swindler,
> Thank you for speaking up with the truth;
> 'separation of church and state' is double
> speak and rewording of the original,
> definitely not a clarification.

Doublespeak?  You think that "separation of church and state" is
"deliberately euphemistic, ambiguous, or obscure" (Oxford American
Dictionary)?  The phrase seems pretty clear to me.

(BTW, the idea that a right, such as the right to be free of any sort
of religious influence via the government, isn't granted by the
Constitution because you can't find some particular phrase in the text
of the Constitution is naive at best.  Read the Ninth Amendment.)

Would you prefer to live in a country where—every time you move—you're
supposed to tell the government your religion, so that it can (if your
religion is popular enough, or should I say non-Islamic enough, to be
"recognized" by the government) collect a tithe for that church via
your income taxes?  Note that the government of this country has not
established a single state religion, nor has it directly interfered
with anyone's exercise of their religion, so it might be deemed
consistent with a narrow reading of the US First Amendment.  But
keeping up-to-date records of who claims to belong to which religion,
and using the machinery of government to channel money to
religion...separation of church and state, it ain't.

-j.