“The village atheist has the right to be heard; he has no right to be heeded. While he has a right not to have his own children indoctrinated in what he believes are false and foolish teachings, he has no right to dictate what other children may be taught.”

How typical of Pat. He consistantly forgets that the reverse of that is just as true.

Mr. Buchanan makes sense. We may presume, however, that his view of the term "right" is that of a strict constructionist?

Please explain, Anonymous.

how can the reverse be true when our country is founded on Christian values?

A great quote from a great man. America wouldn't be in the mess it is today if there were more people like him.

What if the village athiest children want to learn about the the truth and not learn about some feeble fairy tail that 90 percent of the stupid earth population choose to believe. You wanna know the reason how you exist? Science is how you exist. You wanna know why? Go fuck yourself!

There is a right to speak, not a right to be heard. The exercise of a right never requires involuntary action on the part of others.

absolutely right. Freedom allows all to speak so choice may be exercised and those that have ears may hear. The idiot malcontent with no name and no place to call home above is a good example of: the ignorance that comes from allowing only one religious concept (a supposed and otherwise alleged science), and the loss of any depth of truth's understanding.

Doing away with the government run schools would solve the problem.

So do the village idiot and the village christians. However, the right to speak pertains only to speech to the government, not to each other. We follow different rules, not the ones that we use to control government, e.g., I control who speaks in my home. No one has the power to stop me there.

All I can say about Pat and his quote is Duh!

Atlas touches upon an interesting point. The First Amendment of the Constitution merely states that "Congress shall make no law" with respect to restricting the practice of religion, the press, or speech. Religion should be taught in schools AND the bloody history of persecution and power that accompanied it. If Buchanan is talking about what can be taught at a government school forcibly paid for by the taxes of the community, I believe all who pay for the school have a right to say what will be taught there. Personally I think that if you want to get a good education you have to pay for it -- pick a religious or secular private school that best fits what you want for your children. Free lunch strategies do not turn out productive citizens.

Waffler, sadly this isn't so "duh" as we'd like to believe.... somehow the strange concept that atheism doesn't fall into a decidedly belief-based category - that it is somehow neutral in it's core beliefs and values- has gained traction and is thereby propogated as being a "safe" stance to teach, and no one else has the right to not believe, or keep their children from being indoctrinated with atheistic values and thought. This quote applies to all cases of belief. The very concept of "belief" itself dictates that it is a personal, internal choice which no one has the right to manipulate. Buchanan was right, and the America should listen.

I'm with you on this one Waffler - a terrible quote, one that has no intellectual base. Archer really, usually you have insightful posts but this one must be an aberration. Public schools don't turn out productive citizens, really...

RBESRQ, I agree that this isn't much of a quote. It provides a somewhat limited illustration of some aspects of the 1st Amendment, and no real insight. Atlas, the right to speak certainly does pertain to our speech to each other, in public at least. You may be pleased to control who speaks in your home, but I am pleased that I do not live there.

Cogitator nailed it. There should be a separation of school and state.

The state now dictates where a child will go to class and what he will study. Wrong!

Exactly right.

RBE, I have attended several schools, public, private, religious and my children have been homeschooled, Montessori, British-schooled, Spanish-schooled, French-schooled so I do have experience in the varying possibilities. Government-subsidized public schooling provided the most hostile environment -- students are treated like cattle, and for the most part, it is a government unionized jobs program -- educating the students is hardly a priority. In private school, students pay for an education, and results count -- the schools lose money if they do not do their job. Looking back, those that ended up in blue collar union jobs came from public schooling, while those in white collar positions acquired them through higher (better) education. Of course, there are some who dropped out and went straight to work and even run their own businesses now. Sorry to say, the education industry is a BUSINESS propped up by the banking industry subsidized by the government. Not only do you get a crappy education but a house-sized debt to go with it. This is the education they are getting, trained to be obedient and indebted for life -- the American Dream, eh? And they cannot produce anything, RBE, only tap someone else's production.

RBE, I said "Free lunch strategies do not turn out productive citizens," meaning that if the impetus to attend public school is to get a free lunch or a free anything, that is hardly the motivation for being self-sufficient (i.e. productive).

Sorry, Mr Buchanan, 2+2=4, all individuals must be regarded and respected as equals, and there simply exists no supernatural entity must be accepted if we are to move forward. We are obligated to follow the correct path.