After the Democrats released their platform (a platform I believe was a very good one), someone (probably a Republican) noticed that the platform did not contain the word "god". And the media jumped on that with vigor. They wanted to know why the Democrats had taken god out of their platform. Had they done it intentionally, or was it just an oversight?
The truth is that this was a silly argument to begin with. A party platform, any party platform for any party, is a secular document -- not a religious document. It is not to describe what god is, will do, or even whether he even exists. It is simply to outline the policies and goals the party will try to achieve if elected. Those are secular goals, and should have nothing to do with any religion -- especially in a country with a guarantee of religious freedom (which by definition must include the right to be free from religion).
The Democrats got scared, or at least too many of them did. They worried that the Republicans (who had sprinkled god throughout their platform -- at least 10 times) would accuse them of being against god. It would have been a silly accusation, but it scared them -- so they changed their platform by re-inserting the word god.
Will it make any difference in the election? Of course not! The only people who think a party platform is a religious document are Republican fundamentalists -- and they aren't about to vote for a Democrat no matter how many times the word god appears in the platform. It was just an exercise in silliness.
But so is the claiming of god by the Republican Party. This rather disingenuous use of religion to hopefully get votes is not a Republican tradition. As the graph above clearly shows, for the first hundred years or so of the Republican Party's existence, they also believed a party platform was a secular document. And they felt no need to mention god in their platform. It is only in the last few years, in an effort to claim christianity as their party's religion exclusively so they could get religious voters on their side, that the Republican Party began putting god in the platform.
People of all parties have the right to believe in god, and to worship as they please. They also have the right to be free of any religion. Party platforms are about how the people of America, all the people of America, will be governed -- and that is not the place to insert god or religion. I'm very disappointed -- and I'll bet there are 30 to 50 million other Americans (atheists, agnostics, skeptics, or just non-religious people) also disappointed.
P.S. -- Both party platforms also now say that Jerusalem is, or should be, the capital of Israel. Frankly, I don't think it is the business of any American or any political party in the U.S. what the capital of Israel is or should be. Why do our political parties think they should have any say at all in this matter? We certainly would not care what anyone in a foreign country thought about which city should be our own capital. This is just more silliness.
I agree entirely with your PS, although I would add that our position is gratuitously insulting to the Arab world, since Jeralusem contains several places which they consider holy. Why we insist on assisting the Israelis in their rush to make the Arab world hate them excapes me.
ReplyDeleteI don't think the media jumped on the absence of God in the platform, so much as they jumped on the noise made by the Obama-led faction of Democrats who objected to that absence, and to the appallingly undemocratic manner in which that absence was "corrected."
You are right. Naming Jerusalem as the capital of Israel just shows we are not really the impartial middleman that we claim to be in the Arab-Israeli problem.
ReplyDeleteYou are also right about the heavy-handed way the amendment was passed in the convention. I personally don't think they ever got the two-thirds required, but the Obama people wanted it so they rammed it through.
This is not that uncommon in convention politics -- both on the state and national level.