God or Country?

Trevor Keezor, a cashier for Home Depot, was recently fired because he wore a pin that said "One Nation Under God".

According to Home Depot, their company guidelines state that employees are not allowed to wear any pins or buttons except those approved by the company, and especially those that related to one's personal religious beliefs.  Keezor was asked to remove the button and was fired after he refused.

Keezor's responses to this included "I was just doing what I think every American should do, just love my country" and "It feels kind of like a punishment, like I was punished for just loving my country"; however, when Home Depot offered to replace his "One Nation Under God" button with a company-approved button that said "United We Stand", Keezor once again refused.

He continues, though, to claim that he is wearing the button to support his country, and to support his 27-year-old brother, who is in the National Guard.  He seems, however, to only want to wear a button that both supports his country AND his god.  So it begs the question: Is he doing it for his country, or using his patriotism (and his soldier brother) as a cloak and excuse to support his religion?

I've mentioned it before: My father will be doing his second tour in Iraq this winter, also as a member of the National Guard.  I'm damn proud of him, and although I don't support the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan (because I believe they do more harm than good), I love my country.  I would never in a million years dream of using him, or my country, as an excuse to promote my religion or spirituality, at work or anywhere else.  And I'm really, REALLY sick of this false patriotism, these people who scream "one nation under God" as if America could not be great without religious belief (despite the harm that other religiously-centered nations have done and/or suffer through, and what our OWN country suffered through at the height of religion's grip on her) and claim, ironically, that you should leave if you don't bow to and accept that statement.  These people who seem to have no actual grasp of our nation's beginning, but take a 60-year-history of Communist paranoia as if it were the very cornerstones of our Constitution, over a rich, fluid, 200-year ladder of inclusion.

I believe that Keezor should have been able to wear the pin.  If a customer had been offended by it, well, they need to get over themselves.  What IS offensive is that Keezor has hidden behind our country and her troops, proclaiming that he is only doing this out of patriotism, when his other actions betray him.  This has nothing to do with loving one's country.  This is a tantrum because Keezor's employer expects him to follow the same rules that people of other religions and political views are expected to follow, and he believes that his religion's top status in American history somehow gives him a free pass.  He is not supporting his country; he is serving his religion and his politics while hiding behind a flag.  And he is not the only one.

Obama wins the Nobel Peace Prize?

What a shock!  I open up my "newspaper" (*cough*news.yahoo.com*cough*) this morning to be greeted with the blazing headline PRESIDENT BARACK OBAMA WINS NOBEL PEACE PRIZE.  Surely I didn't read that right?  Oh, but, yes, I did.

I voted for Obama.  I support Obama.  Sure, I've been disappointed with what he's done so far... "Don't Ask Don't Tell" hasn't been repealed, Iraq and Afghanistan are plugging along with nary a change, health reform has been sacrified on the altar of that absent god "Bipartisan Support" because of the shrieks of the harpies on the far right crying "death panels!" until they're blue in the face (and empty between the ears).  Although it isn't too much better (yet) it could have been a hell of a lot worse, and I for one am grateful for that at the least.  So, no, I don't really have anything against Obama that would cause me to pause at the announcement of his honor.

Except that he didn't earn a Nobel Peace Prize.

Oh, sure, he's talked about ending nuclear ambitions.  But has that stopped anyone?  Well, not yet.  Sure, he's emphasized diplomacy, which is a welcome relief from the days of "either you're with us or you're against us".  But is this really an accomplishment?  He's just doing what any sane president has done before him (*ahem*).  It's just an accident of presidential lineage that his actions catch our attention at all. 

The committee says that their choice is logical because they want to promote his efforts, and Obama's calls for peace and brotherhood amongst nations has caused a shift in the global mood.  I say bull.  The "mood" was already there... we were just plugging our ears and going "lalalalalala" because the climate of peace (really, just brought on by the globe being sick of American colonialism and involvement in other countries' politics) didn't fit in with our government's agenda of war.  The mood hasn't shifted... we just started listening to what people have to say instead of shouting "Freedom Fries!" at the tops of our lungs.

President Obama has improved America's image in the world, and I applaud him for that.  I'm happy, and proud, that he is our president.  His actions are a definite step in the right direction, and I'm happy... nay, relieved, ecstatic, euphoric... that our image abroad has improved.  But is this enough to earn a Peace Prize?  In my opinion, no.

Now, Mr. Obama, about those troops...

Laying Blame

I can't believe this.  The news has barely broken and already people are lining up to blame Obama.  He offended the committee by not sticking around to hear the vote.  He's done nothing but tell other countries that "America sucks" and so has turned the committee off of having the Olympics here.  He was in cahoots with Daley trying to line his pockets with Olympics money and the committee knew it.

Of course, it's all Obama's fault.  It had nothing to do with the fact that 60% of Cook County residents didn't even want the Olympics here to begin with.  It had nothing to do with the fact that the projections for cost and income were apparently pulled out of someone's bum, or that this would surely cause the city to lose money, or that no one wanted to back Chicago monetarily.  It had nothing to do with the fact that our bid didn't even get serious until the 11th hour, or that Chicago can barely handle its regular tourist levels, much less the influx that the Olympics would cause.  It had nothing to do with the fact that our mass transit system would require a complete overhaul to even come close to being up to snuff, or that the Olympics has already been in North America several times, but never in South America. 

Nope, all Obama's fault.

Chicago Olympics? Yes - but not yet

The announcement was just made that Chicago is out of the running, and I for one am glad.  No, it's not because my taxes would have gone up - I don't live in Cook County (although I do shop and work in Cook), but rather DuPage, the next county over.  In fact, it would have been a great thing for my company, a local wallpaper and custom sign and mural provider.  The crowds, likewise, wouldn't have really bothered me either.  I have no reason to be in the city except for pleasure.   

No, it's because you just can't convince me that Chicago is ready for the Olympics. 

About a month ago, I was downtown on the Museum Campus visiting the Field Museum of Natural History.  If you've never been to Chicago before, the Museum Campus is a cluster of buildings of learning - the aforementioned Field Museum, the Adler Planetarium, and the Shedd Aquarium - flanked by Soldier Field to the south.  There is a road that separates the Museum Campus from Soldier Field where the taxis, double-decker tour buses, and the city's CTA hybrid accordian buses pick up commuters to take them up to the Loop and Michigan Avenue to the north.  Needless to say, it's a popular bus stop, connecting some of the most popular tourist attractions  and city staples to one another. 

Well, the day we were visiting the Field Museum, there just happened to be a U2 concert preparing at Soldier Field.  When we got out to the bus stop to catch it up to Michigan Avenue for a little shopping, there was a sign announcing this and advising us riders to plan for some delays.  Okay, no problem... even though the concert wasn't starting until the next day, I can see how the equipment trucks and tour buses might cause a little bit of a traffic backup.  It wasn't until over 45 minutes later that one of the city workers came over to inform us that this stop had actually been closed, but since there was no concert traffic and about 80 people standing around waiting for a bus, she would reroute the buses to start going to that stop again.  It took two whole double-length accordian buses to accomodate all the museum-goers who were trying to get back up into the proper downtown area and get on with their day.  I never found out where we were supposed to have gone to catch a bus, since this popular bus stop was closed (although apparently CTA had not found it important to inform us of this). 

The really ridiculous part of this is that this is nothing new.  Concerts, not to mention football games, are held at Soldier Field all the time.  It's not difficult, even if you've never had any involvement in planning the city's mass transit routes during times of high traffic, to imagine that this stop in particular would need attention.  And of course, this doesn't even go into detail on the day-to-day maintenance, routing, and other issues that CTA experiences (for example, on that same day, the train line - the CTA Blue Line - we took to get from the suburbs into the city was completely closed for several stops, and they had to route us onto buses to get from the last stop available to our destination.  There are two exits from the train platforms, but the CTA didn't deem it necessary to indicate at which exit the buses were waiting... causing several people to exit the platform on a completely different street on the other side of the block from where the buses were parked.  Finding the buses to get back to the train station was ever hairier.)

Now, all of this was just on the day of a concert.  Can you imagine what it would be like if the Olympics were in town?  I can't.

I love Chicago to death.  Like President Obama, since I moved around a lot as a Navy brat, I never really felt like any place was truly home, until I moved here.  And I absolutely adore taking the train (both CTA aka "The El" and the commuter trains of the Metra) into the city and riding the accordian buses around downtown and up Michigan Avenue.  Chicago's government did a wonderful job creating the beautiful, art-filled, and fun Millennium Park, and the newly renovated Buckingham Fountain looks even more majestic.  But those projects cost way more than was originally planned, and as beautiful and welcoming as Chicago is, it is still filled with the corruption and cronyism that it is famous for. 

I think that Chicago will be a great place to host the Olympics some day.  But we need a whole lot more work before we can get there.

A must-read WSJ article

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052970203440104574405030643556324.html

It's called "Man vs. God" but it's not an atheist tyrade against religion.  Instead, it takes a look at the introduction of the theory of evolution and how it impacted religion, and takes us back to religion's roots when it was an aid to understanding the world around us and not black-and-white literal "truth".

Very good read and highly recommended!