“I don’t say homosexuality is an abomination, Sir, the bible does.”

[MrScorpio]

And THAT'S how he won.

[Agschmid]

1. Thanks! Loved that episode...

[dlwickham]

2. I miss The West Wing

one of the smarter shows ever to be on TV

[LeftofObama]

3. One of my favorite episodes!

K & R!

[fizzgig]

4. i love that scene

[tavalon]

5. One of my favorite episodes

Of course, with West Wing, there were so many.

[xxqqqzme]

6. Loved that program

The only Democratic administration we had during the siege.

[Initech]

7. Stephen Colbert: "What did Jesus say about homosexuality? Oh that's right - he didn't say anything."

[jmowreader]

8. The Bible also encourages slavery

And plural marriage. And murder. Let's not forget collective punishment.

Ya think maybe a book that encourages so many things that aren't relevant anymore might be out of date on this too?

[hrmjustin]

9. Love that episode!

[1ProudAtheist]

10. NICE K&R

And.........who really cares what a fictitious big book of lies has to say about anything? The blatantly flawed guide book to evil does make a great doorstop, though.

"When religion is good, I conceive it will support itself; and when it does not support itself, and God does not take care to support it so that its professors are obliged to call for help of the civil power, 'tis a sign, I apprehend, of its being a bad one."
– Benjamin Franklin

[el_bryanto]

34. Well I suppose millions of Christians, including some right here at DU, care nt

[NaturalHigh]

41. If you truly think that the Bible is a "guide book to evil"...

then I guess you don't approve of Christ's message of love, peace, and economic fairness.

If we lived by the lessons that Jesus taught, there would be no war and no people starving in the streets (no billionaires either).

[AtheistCrusader]

45. I don't approve of the deal that

in order to be 'saved' I have to pin my faith on the pre-ordained deliberate scapegoating, torture, and brutal murder of any human.

If I believed any of the nonsense in the bible in the first place, I would, as Dostoyevsky wrote of a character in the Brother's Karamazov, "seek to return the price of the ticket".

[Ilsa]

43. Don't forget, it's also a book of horrendous violence. nt

[mwooldri]

60. *I* do care.

The Bible is *not* the foundation of my belief. However the Bible IMO was written by man with God as their inspiration. Most of the Bible is talking about people at that particular time. There is some universality but Leviticus? Exodus? IMO "History books". Revelation? Coded gobbledeegook for that time. There are some parts of scripture that are IMO very powerful. The Parable of the Good Samaritan. It speaks to me in modern times just as well as the original author. One could replace the Priest with Pat Robertson (gack!), the Levite for some generic Right Wing Born Again Christian, and the Samaritan for an Atheist. (or Muslim, or what have you). For me, I can boil down the Bible to one line: Luke 10:27. Especially the latter part, which I think applies to every human being on this planet. I could go on about other examples of where the Bible can be relevant in today's world.

You are correct on one thing we can definitely agree upon - the Bible is a book (or book of books). Depending on how it is printed and how bulky it is, it might make for a good doorstop. I suggest staying away from the $1 bibles that are out there. They're flimsy. No good. I recommend a brick though, as it's a bit more durable than paper.

Bottom line: people will interpret the Bible as they will. I respect your interpretation of the Bible as being a book of lies, even though I vehemently disagree with you... as I vehemently disagree with other Christians' interpretation of the Bible (infallible word of God? King James Version? Gack!).

[1ProudAtheist]

61. It Is In

The fiction section of all libraries, and can be found in the fiction section of major bookstores.

Considering that the English language did not exist at the time of the penning of the lies, then there is absolutely zero credence that can be given to it. Too many translations........too many interpretations.........too many re-punctuations.......drawings on the walls of caves are far more relevant, and accurate. Aside from the fact that the big book of lies was the work of religious zealots, why would anyone even consider ruining their lives of today on writings that are many centuries past their time?

I do not find any faults in the personal faith of anyone.........it is the organized Religions.......all of them, that are vile and evil. Try belonging to one without paying your dues......in cash. They are thieves.........all of them. Money will not buy anyone salvation of any kind.

But back to the big book of lies.........the book that says that our world is just 5000 years old even though we have carbon dated fossils that are 4.5 million years old, and carbon dated rocks that are more than 5 million years old. When the entire premise of the book is one gigantic lie, nothing else in it even warrants review.

As for you xstians.........I do feel really sorry about your predicament.......but I didn't put you there. With all of the history of hatred, violence, intolerance, child abuse, slavery, prostitution, and every other evil known to mankind, you just might want to consider some other less controversial cult. I heard that they now have a religion that uses the bejeweled hubcap off of a 57 chevy as their diety. I also hear that another one uses a rotten head of cabbage..............just sayin'.

[Bjorn Against]

11. I seriously wonder how anyone can quote Leviticus with a straight face

Anyone who has actually read Leviticus should know that it is one of the stupidist and most insane things ever written. I am seriously amazed that people still say we should be basing their llives on what is written in there, I suspect most of those people are only fundamentalists because they have never actually read the stupid things that Leviticus says because I really don't know how anyone could read what the Bible has to say about anal discharges and menstruation and not burst out laughing at how stupid it is. I give you an extended passage from Leviticus so you can all see what the Bible says we should do in the case of anal discharge or menstruation...

15 The Lord said to Moses and Aaron, 2 “Give the following instructions to the people of Israel.

“Any man who has a bodily discharge is ceremonially unclean. 3 This defilement is caused by his discharge, whether the discharge continues or stops. In either case the man is unclean. 4 Any bed on which the man with the discharge lies and anything on which he sits will be ceremonially unclean. 5 So if you touch the man’s bed, you must wash your clothes and bathe yourself in water, and you will remain unclean until evening. 6 If you sit where the man with the discharge has sat, you must wash your clothes and bathe yourself in water, and you will remain unclean until evening. 7 If you touch the man with the discharge, you must wash your clothes and bathe yourself in water, and you will remain unclean until evening. 8 If the man spits on you, you must wash your clothes and bathe yourself in water, and you will remain unclean until evening. 9 Any saddle blanket on which the man rides will be ceremonially unclean. 10 If you touch anything that was under the man, you will be unclean until evening. You must wash your clothes and bathe yourself in water, and you will remain unclean until evening. 11 If the man touches you without first rinsing his hands, you must wash your clothes and bathe yourself in water, and you will remain unclean until evening. 12 Any clay pot the man touches must be broken, and any wooden utensil he touches must be rinsed with water.

13 “When the man with the discharge is healed, he must count off seven days for the period of purification. Then he must wash his clothes and bathe himself in fresh water, and he will be ceremonially clean. 14 On the eighth day he must get two turtledoves or two young pigeons and come before the Lord at the entrance of the Tabernacle[a] and give his offerings to the priest. 15 The priest will offer one bird for a sin offering and the other for a burnt offering. Through this process, the priest will purify the man before the Lord for his discharge.

16 “Whenever a man has an emission of semen, he must bathe his entire body in water, and he will remain ceremonially unclean until the next evening.[c] 17 Any clothing or leather with semen on it must be washed in water, and it will remain unclean until evening. 18 After a man and a woman have sexual intercourse, they must each bathe in water, and they will remain unclean until the next evening.

19 “Whenever a woman has her menstrual period, she will be ceremonially unclean for seven days. Anyone who touches her during that time will be unclean until evening. 20 Anything on which the woman lies or sits during the time of her period will be unclean. 21 If any of you touch her bed, you must wash your clothes and bathe yourself in water, and you will remain unclean until evening. 22 If you touch any object she has sat on, you must wash your clothes and bathe yourself in water, and you will remain unclean until evening. 23 This includes her bed or any other object she has sat on; you will be unclean until evening if you touch it. 24 If a man has sexual intercourse with her and her blood touches him, her menstrual impurity will be transmitted to him. He will remain unclean for seven days, and any bed on which he lies will be unclean.

25 “If a woman has a flow of blood for many days that is unrelated to her menstrual period, or if the blood continues beyond the normal period, she is ceremonially unclean. As during her menstrual period, the woman will be unclean as long as the discharge continues. 26 Any bed she lies on and any object she sits on during that time will be unclean, just as during her normal menstrual period. 27 If any of you touch these things, you will be ceremonially unclean. You must wash your clothes and bathe yourself in water, and you will remain unclean until evening.

28 “When the woman’s bleeding stops, she must count off seven days. Then she will be ceremonially clean. 29 On the eighth day she must bring two turtledoves or two young pigeons and present them to the priest at the entrance of the Tabernacle. 30 The priest will offer one for a sin offering and the other for a burnt offering. Through this process, the priest will purify her before the Lord for the ceremonial impurity caused by her bleeding.

31 “This is how you will guard the people of Israel from ceremonial uncleanness. Otherwise they would die, for their impurity would defile my Tabernacle that stands among them. 32 These are the instructions for dealing with anyone who has a bodily discharge—a man who is unclean because of an emission of semen 33 or a woman during her menstrual period. It applies to any man or woman who has a bodily discharge, and to a man who has sexual intercourse with a woman who is ceremonially unclean.”

http://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Leviticus+15&version=NLT

Yes, that is the type of shit the fundies tell us they live their life by. I wonder how many of them bring pigeons to a priest every time they have an anal discharge.

[Bette Noir]

16. Okay, so you're saying

if I come into contact with purulent drainage, AKA "pus," I SHOULDN'T take a bath and change my clothes?

[Bjorn Against]

22. The passage says far more than that

Read what it has to say about pigeons, fundamentalist churches must go through a lot of birds. There are also some things about the furniture in that passage that will make just about anyone feel unclean.

[pangaia]

31. What is a make discharge?

Does sneezing count?

[marew]

35. Thank you for addressing the stupidity.

I'd seen a lot of silly stuff over the years but lost it! Hard to believe some actually take this stuff seriously.

[mountain grammy]

38. Who was this Leviticus guy? The original Republican?

As kids, we loved it.. lots of birds and bees, especially birds.

[dimbear]

12. When you read the Bible, remember it's a book that Emperor Constantine,

who murdered much of his family, chose.

Seem like a good guide?

[hrmjustin]

17. He chose the NT, Did he have much to do with the OT?

[dimbear]

18. That's an interesting story in itself. The proto-Orthodox church adopted the

Hebrew scriptures directly from the Jews, to give themselves legitimacy, and ignored the writings they themselves had used to write the NT. Jubilees, Enoch, and so on. That's why the NT quotes scriptures that aren't in the OT.

Does that date to the Council of Nicea and hence belong to the influence of Constantine? Have to check.

[hrmjustin]

20. Yes he is the one who started the council.

[riqster]

54. It was a political council, remember

Constantine wanted a state church, and he made bloody well certain that the authoritarian sect of the nascent church cane out on top.

[hrmjustin]

55. What many people don't realize is that there were dozens of Gospels that could have been

included.

[riqster]

57. Correct. The ones chosen either supported...

or at least did the least to undermine the winning Pauline side, the one Constantine wanted.

The Gnostic gospels, Apocrypha, and suppressed books were shoved off to one side, or our if sight entirely.

[IrishEyes]

13. I never watched the West Wing

but that is a good speech.

[Spitfire of ATJ]

15. Timing is everything....

[freshwest]

24. I never watched the program, apparently I really missed some great work there. Thanks, Spitfire.

[sarge43]

30. Yes you have, freshwest.

If you watch only one episode, watch "Two Cathedrals". Writing and acting at their very best.

[zipplewrath]

46. Deserves a Link

Maybe the best fictional writing on TV ever. May not be as powerful without understanding the context. But I've known alot of people quite mad at God over the years. They would have loved it.

[sarge43]

50. Thanks for posting this

Particularly powerful as both the character and the actor are devout Catholics.

[zipplewrath]

59. And the Latin

This isn't some idiot who just can't comprehend his faith. If you see the whole episode, it establishes the basis of Bartlett's faith and his relationship to it. This is a student of his faith having a harsh conversation with the object of his faith. The cigarette harkens back to his days at school and a reference to his father.

[Spitfire of ATJ]

52. Have fun. ;-)

http://www.flasharc.com/search?q=west%20wing&t=1&a=0&m=1&n=0&d=0&e=0&s=0&p=1

[blueamy66]

36. Most excellent

nt

[Egalitarian Thug]

29. I don't watch TV at all and am of the opinion that it has done more to degrade the minds and

character of our people than any other single factor.

So, I hope you'll consider that when I say, The West Wing is one of the very best works this medium has ever been graced with, at least the first four years when it was Aaron Sorkin's show. After he left and Larry O'Donnell took over it began to suffer from right-wingitis and the attendant loss of talent, but still produced quite a few really good episodes.

You really should check it out, I really don't think you will be disappointed.

[Occulus]

53. Television itself is as close as we can come to actual magic

and would have been considered such by many a mere 150 years ago. It is, after all, "the miracle of television".

It is the misuse of television that has caused the rot. As soon as it was invented, the First Amendment should have been amended. Hell, we probably should have done that when radio first appeared, but we have no excuse whatever where television is concerned. All of the same lessons in misuse apply, except that television is ever so much more powerful than radio as a tool for mass communication because of its visual factor. The advertising industry knows this better than anyone, and misuses it in exactly the ways they and only they know how to do best.

As it stands, with the 1A being written as it is, television's power to harm our society is almost totally unchecked. The advertisers and content providers- the people who pay the bills, not necessarily those who are on the screen (although in far too many cases they're right onboard)- are the ones who decide to lie, manipulate, and propagandize. Thanks to how (IMO, overly) broad our freedoms of speech are as those freedoms apply to mass communications on television, though, our hands are at this moment completely tied as far as doing anything at all to reverse the damage caused by television's misuse.

But the only way to stop that misuse is to make such misuse verboten. Which means we first have to recognize what "misuse of television" is, again, as it applies to that particular form of mass communication. Even radio can be a powerfully destructive tool in the wrong hands- like what happened when Radio Rwanda started exhorting people to conduct a blood ethnic purge- but television?

We need to address, in law, what its misuse is, and soon. Letting outlets like FOX lie with impunity, and in fact express legal right, will destroy us eventually as a country and a society. Only a fundamental legal change can properly address that without creating deal-stopper Constitutional issues, and the only way to resolve that in this particular vein is to alter the Constitution itself. After all, people aren't going to stop watching television in numbers large enough to really make a difference on our say-so, even if one can demonstrate the benefits of doing so, and FOX and its ilk won't ever stop lying if they can get away with it.

[Squinch]

14. That scene is a masterpiece.

[madrchsod]

19. according to matthew christ did`t

http://www.wouldjesusdiscriminate.org/biblical_evidence/born_gay.html

funny how the religious zealots overlook christ`s message of peace and understanding

[grahamhgreen]

21. Now that is alpha male

[michigandem58]

23. That's how he won?

It was a freaking TV show.

[SidDithers]

33. Whoosh...nt

Sid

[Manifestor_of_Light]

25. They don't talk about David and Jonathan, best buddies.

[uponit7771]

27. I miss The West Wing

[William769]

28. kick & recommended.

[pangaia]

32. THAT.. was back when I used to watch some tv..

[AlbertCat]

37. Alas!

This is just TV.... and not real....

[mountain grammy]

39. alas. One of the few politicians who spoke truth to the religious fundamentalists

was Barry Goldwater, a man who truly understood the danger of mixing religion and government.

[elleng]

47. and said it!

“Mark my word, if and when these preachers get control of the [Republican] party, and they're sure trying to do so, it's going to be a terrible damn problem. Frankly, these people frighten me. Politics and governing demand compromise. But these Christians believe they are acting in the name of God, so they can't and won't compromise. I know, I've tried to deal with them.”

“I'm frankly sick and tired of the political preachers across this country telling me as a citizen that if I want to be a moral person, I must believe in "A," "B," "C" and "D." Just who do they think they are? And from where do they presume to claim the right to dictate their moral beliefs to me? And I am even more angry as a legislator who must endure the threats of every religious group who thinks it has some God-granted right to control my vote on every roll call in the Senate. I am warning them today: I will fight them every step of the way if they try to dictate their moral convictions to all Americans in the name of "conservatism.”

[mountain grammy]

49. And he said "you don't have to be straight to be in the military,

you just have to be able to shoot straight."
Barry had real conservative ideas, but he had something today's conservatives don't; a brain!

[elleng]

58. Damn right!

[Dawson Leery]

40. k/r

[toby jo]

42. Great middle eastern reads providing comedy to this day.

[elleng]

44. RIGHT!

[Fearless]

48. Would be nice to have someone like that to rally around

In real life.

[redstatebluegirl]

51. Lord I miss West Wing!!!

Lemon Lyman.com

[sarge43]

63. "I'm going to stick a mother board so far ...."

[FiveGoodMen]

56. That was one FINE scene to kick off an excellent show!

It's a damned shame that the real world (and often the real Democratic Party) have so little in common with The West Wing.

[Hubert Flottz]

62. I think a republican "Think Tank" wrote...

the King James version. For democrats to live by.

[davidpdx]

64. Someone posted a clip of that a couple months ago

I always like how Bartlett schooled his opponents. That show will forever be on my all time favorites list.