The Roman Catholic religious faith of Democratic candidate John F. Kennedy played a major role in the 1960 Presidential campaign. Widespread anti-Catholic agitation by Protestant groups which feared the election of a Roman Catholic to the Presidency was answered by other Protestant groups and leaders in both political parties who denounced the introduction of a “religious issue” into the campaign.

The convention of the American Council of Christian Churches April 28 unanimously passed a resolution disapproving a Catholic as President. The resolution said, in part, “The present accusation of bigotry by Kennedy supporters and others we believe is an effort to silence those who are raising pertinent questions relative to our historic American heritage of separation of church and state. Therefore, the American Council of Christian Churches goes on record as being opposed to a Roman Catholic for President.”

The National Assn. of Evangelicals April 29 adopted a resolution expressing doubt that a Catholic President “could or would resist fully the pressures of the ecclesiastical hierarchy…. The real source of unrest in respect to church-state separation is the total lack of any convincing commitment of the Roman Catholic Church to the principle of church-state separation….”

The American Lutheran Magazine April 19 called for an official declaration by the Roman Catholic Church that “its traditional position of union or collaboration of church and state” did not apply to the United States.

https://library.cqpress.com/cqalmanac/document.php?id=cqal60-880-28174-1331407

It’s emblematic of what the political media in this country are doing so badly in covering this race. With dizzying regularity, Trump lies. He says toxic, antidemocratic things over and over again. And he still gets treated like a normal candidate. It’s often the case that the media, presented with another one of his addled rants, will dive in, scoop, and separate enough words to make it seem like he’s got enough actual gray matter gooping around in his skull to form a complete sentence, and present their director’s cut of his wandering mind for public consumption.

Rant: Learning to Love the Imperial Presidency
How conservatives made peace with executive power.

GENE HEALY | FROM THE OCTOBER 2007 ISSUE

"I took an oath, and I take that oath to the president very seriously," former White House aide Sara Taylor told the Senate Judiciary Committee during the summer hearings on the U.S. attorneys purge. Taylor's statement prompted an indignant clarification from Sen. Patrick Leahy (D'"Vt.): "No, the oath says that you take an oath to uphold and protect the Constitution of the United States!"

Leahy was right, of course. But it's not surprising that the 32-year-old Taylor, born the month after Nixon's resignation, had some trouble locating the object of her sworn fealty. For as long as she's been alive, the conservative movement has prioritized the expansion of presidential power, often at the expense of the Constitution.

https://reason.com/2007/09/12/rant-learning-to-love-the-impe/

Principles of Marriage

1Now concerning the things of which you wrote to me:

It is good for a man not to touch a woman. 2Nevertheless, because of sexual immorality, let each man have his own wife, and let each woman have her own husband. 3Let the husband render to his wife the affection due her, and likewise also the wife to her husband. 4The wife does not have authority over her own body, but the husband does. And likewise the husband does not have authority over his own body, but the wife does. 5Do not deprive one another except with consent for a time, that you may give yourselves to fasting and prayer; and come together again so that Satan does not tempt you because of your lack of self-control. 6But I say this as a concession, not as a commandment. 7For I wish that all men were even as I myself. But each one has his own gift from God, one in this manner and another in that.

8But I say to the unmarried and to the widows: It is good for them if they remain even as I am; 9but if they cannot exercise self-control, let them marry. For it is better to marry than to burn with passion.


To the Unmarried and Widows

25Now concerning virgins: I have no commandment from the Lord; yet I give judgment as one whom the Lord in His mercy has made trustworthy. 26I suppose therefore that this is good because of the present distress—that it is good for a man to remain as he is: 27Are you bound to a wife? Do not seek to be loosed. Are you loosed from a wife? Do not seek a wife. 28But even if you do marry, you have not sinned; and if a virgin marries, she has not sinned. Nevertheless such will have trouble in the flesh, but I would spare you.

29But this I say, brethren, the time is short, so that from now on even those who have wives should be as though they had none, 30those who weep as though they did not weep, those who rejoice as though they did not rejoice, those who buy as though they did not possess, 31and those who use this world as not misusing it. For the form of this world is passing away.

32But I want you to be without care.He who is unmarried cares for the things of the Lord—how he may please the Lord. 33But he who is married cares about the things of the world—how he may please his wife. 34There is a difference between a wife and a virgin. The unmarried woman cares about the things of the Lord, that she may be holy both in body and in spirit. But she who is married cares about the things of the world—how she may please her husband. 35And this I say for your own profit, not that I may put a leash on you, but for what is proper, and that you may serve the Lord without distraction.

It was a key talking point during President Trump’s 2016 campaign, and even before it: The idea that other countries were laughing at the United States. “The world is laughing at us,” he said in May 2016. “They’re laughing at us, at our stupidity,” he said of Mexico in his campaign launch speech. He used the phrase “laughing at us” more than 50 times between 2011 and his election as president. Trump, the argument went, was going to make it stop.

Instead, Trump has been the object of repeated jest and even mockery by fellow world leaders. And it’s been caught on tape — again.

The most recent example came Tuesday, when the leaders of Canada, France, Holland and the United Kingdom seemed to be recounting Trump’s lengthy — and occasionally wild — interactions with reporters earlier in the day.

Even more world leaders appeared to join in mocking Trump last year during his speech at the United Nations. Trump made one of his characteristically hyperbolic claims about his achievements as president — “In less than two years, my administration has accomplished more than almost any administration in the history of our country” — and drew audible laughter.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2019/12/04/brief-history-world-leaders-laughing-trump/