Dear Sarah Palin,
I promised myself I’d never write to you because quite frankly I don’t take you seriously as the best looking woman in American politics. Whilst beauty does not preclude brains, you certainly are the epitome of style over substance. Personally, I think you’d be far more successful doing an arm-in-arm political fashion tour with the most attractive man in Washington, Ann Coulter. But your remarks made on the Billy O’Reilly ‘Factor’ last Thursday got my typing fingers juiced up, and here we are now. Hi.
Look, I know you’re running in 2012, the cat’s out of the bag. (I hesitate to make mention of any four-legged animal for fear you might gun it down) It’s obvious you’re doing the pre-nomination dance while giving the all too predictable, “I have no formal plans to run for the presidency” quip. You’ve got the failed high school home economics dropouts in your corner, the Tea party. And your appearances on conservative talk shows have out numbered the total number of vicodin pills swallowed by Rush Limbaugh, since breakfast. In other words, you’re on the airwaves a shit load.
Taking up your regular slot on the FOX networks’ Factor you called for U.S law to be based on the Judeo-Christian Bible. You said:
“I think we should keep this clean, keep it simple, go back to what our founders and our founding documents meant. They’re quite clear that we should create law based on the God of the Bible and the Ten Commandments.”
Wait. Wait. Wait! You said, what? My god, you’ve made some head turning comments in your short public life but this should have even you blushing like a debutant porn star on the set of ‘Aussie Men Gone Wild’. Your commentary (above) displays a breathtaking lack of knowledge not only of American history but also the evolution of law.
The U.S Constitution and Bill of Rights are not at all based on the Bible; and the founders (most of whom were not religious) absolutely advocated separation between government and religion. So much so that Thomas Jefferson, as President, wrote an official letter of the need for a ‘wall of separation’ between church and state. (“Make no law respecting an establishment of religion or prohibiting the free exercise thereof.”) Jefferson also wrote explicitly about the falsehood that our laws are based on the Ten Commandments:
“The fundamental law of our nation — the basis of our liberties — is the Constitution, not the Bible. Indeed, it is the Constitution that elected officials are sworn to uphold.”
Further, in an 1823 letter to John Adams, Jefferson was forthright about his views of religion, and Christianity specifically. “And the day will come when the mystical generation of Jesus, by the supreme being as his father in the womb of a virgin will be classed with the fable of the generation of Minerve in the brain of Jupiter,” Jefferson wrote. “But may we hope that the dawn of reason and freedom of thought in these United States will do away with this artificial scaffolding, and restore to us the primitive and genuine doctrines of this most venerated reformer of human errors.”
Sarah, the Constitution is declared in the name of ‘We the people’, and not in the name of Zeus, Apollo, Jesus, Allah, Yahweh or Buddha. The U.S has never been a theocracy, we leave that to nations like Iran, Saudi Arabia and that child rapist harboring pretend state, the Vatican.
As I lay awake tonight, I wonder if you really are that ignorant or you’re just playing the religious wedge card to firm your wacko Christian base in the run up to 2012. We do know the far right Republican base is suspicious of anyone with an education, an understanding of history, geo-politics, economic policy and anyone else that can count to ten. So, maybe it’s the latter. Just maybe you are an idiot playing an idiot appealing to idiots. Yeah, that seems about right to me.
Regards
CJ Werleman
Author ’God Hates You. Hate Him Back’ (Making Sense of the Bible)
” —LOVE.