Russ McBee

As the sun finally begins to rise and banish the darkness of the Bush years, we continue to witness an alarming chain of eleventh-hour regulations emanating from the White House. The latest of those offenses against decency was published today: The Bush administration yesterday granted sweeping new protections to health workers who refuse to ...

David Neiwert, who has written extensively about eliminationist rhetoric from the right wing against liberals, had this to say about Sunday's tragedy in Knoxville: In reality, of course, rhetoric like this has historically played a critical role in some of the ugliest episodes in American history, as well as thousands of little acts of ...

Yesterday, a senseless act of non-random violence struck this city. A man, mad at the world and blaming liberals for his personal ills, targeted the innocent congregants of a progressive church in Knoxville, killing two and wounding seven. Like everyone else in Knoxville, I've spent the last couple of days in a state of shock over this. Described ...

A couple of days ago, the Pope apologized again, this time in Sydney, for the Catholic Church's global sex abuse scandal: Speaking in Sydney, where he is participating in World Youth Day celebrations, the pontiff called the abuses 'a grave betrayal of trust' that deserved condemnation and called for the victims to receive 'care and ...

Thirty-one members of the US House of Representatives seem to think the establishment of an American theocracy is a more urgent matter than any of the economic, military, or environmental problems we face. Those 31, including Tennessee's own resident wingnut Marsha Blackburn, have co-sponsored HR 598; the bill's stated purpose is: Supporting ...

Despite the fact that creationism and its dark twin intelligent design are nothing more than religious dogma tarted up to look like science, a disturbingly high number of science teachers in US schools insist on presenting that propaganda to their students as a scientifically valid theory. A Penn State researcher has conducted a study of US ...

Pope Benedict gave an address in Washington today in which he derided our country's founding principle of separation between church and state. Our nation's firewall between clerical and legal authority really seemed to bother him. Arguing for an even more aggressive intrusion of religious dogma into the sphere of public policy, he actually said ...

Here's reason #1 Mike Huckabee is absolutely unfit to serve as President of the United States (Raw Story via HuffPo): ''I have opponents in this race who do not want to change the Constitution,'' Huckabee told a Michigan audience on Monday. ''But I believe it's a lot easier to change the Constitution than it would be to change the word of the ...

The Pope said this in his 2007 Urbi et Orbi speech: Benedict said he was turning his thoughts this Christmas to victims of other injustices, citing women, children and the elderly, as well as refugees and victims of environmental disasters and religious and ethnic tensions. He said he hoped Christmas would bring consolation to ''those who are ...

The Tennessee state Constitution carries some interesting relics of the past. Article IX is particularly fascinating: ARTICLE IXDisqualifications. Section 1. Whereas ministers of the Gospel are by their profession, dedicated to God and the care of souls, and ought not to be diverted from the great duties of their functions; therefore, no ...