Photo: Martin LeBar

My blog has been there five years now. Guess I'm pretty stubborn.

Recently, I received an email from the American Humanist Association notifying me about National Reason Day:

Every year on the first Thursday in May, our right to religious freedom--the right to decide when, how and whether or not to pray free from government interference or compulsion--is disregarded. The National Day of Prayer, which will be observed this year on May 6, is an event in which citizens are urged by the president to "turn to God in prayer and meditation at churches, in groups and as individuals."

The government has no business directing citizens to pray. Moreover, such an observance is especially offensive to nontheists, who are made to feel as though they don't count.

This affront to our First Amendment principle of separation of church and state has been ruled as unconstitutional by a federal judge. Yet President Obama has indicated that he plans to celebrate the National Day of Prayer anyway.

You can learn more at the National Day of Reason website.

Barack Bush, showing his contempt for the Constitution and the civil rights of atheists, did indeed issue such a proclamation for the "National Day of Prayer." Remember how he talked about "change" a lot during his campaign?

Anyway, this seems to be a good time to go over the issues and concerns that motivated me to start this blog in the first place.

A national hate crimes bill passed for queer and disabled people. This was a huge deal, and it was the second most important lgbt issue, behind employment discrimination. Other queer issues have remained stalled on the national level, and the Democrats still are trying to avoid passing legislation supporting us whenever they think they can get away with it.

Racism and sexism are even worse today than they were five years ago, especially sexism. The war on Iraq continues with no end in sight. The corporate media are even more rightist and propagandistic than back then. Our tax code is still inequitable, our military is absurdly overextended throughout the world, and corporate power/corruption still runs roughshod over the middle class and the poor.

Religious extremists of a lot of faiths are still doing everything they can to shove their superstitious beliefs down the throats of people who don't share them. State/Church separation needs to do a lot better here in the US. Yet, there are a couple of good things on this front. More and more religious hypocrisy and barbarism is being exposed. More importantly, freethinkers are becoming more vocal and assertive in expressing their atheism, agnosticism, and humanism.

Having Barack Bush in the White House has created the eighth term of the Reagan administration, and Obusha has acted like almost as much of a wingnut Republican as the Clintons. Our elections are still being bought and sold by wealthy and corporate interests.

It looks like I will have a lot to write about for some time.