Last Tuesday, Rand Paul and John Kerry clashed in a Senate Foreign Relations committee meeting over whether the executive branch is allowed to declare war in Syria even if the committee no-goes it. I really hate to say it, but Rand Paul was right on the money and John Kerry was making a point straight out of the Bush administration.

If Obama declares war after the legislature expressly refuses to declare a war valid, it would be an unconstitutional overreach which would likely justify impeachment proceedings.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/09/03/rand-paul-syria_n_3862624.html

Washington has become an absentee legislature, unable to function in the short amounts of time that it is in session. While this situation isn’t limited to a single politician playing online games during a vital briefing, McCain’s foolish poker “scandal” does present an interesting allegory as to the legislature’s lack of desire to work.

In 2013, the legislature will only be in session for about a third of the year–the rest of the time, the legislators will be on vacation or kissing donor ass.

Conservatives have few historic achievements which have been popular with the people. As such, they have started to revise history and claim credit for progressive activists and heroes. Of these such figures who have been adopted by the right, three of the best known would be Lincoln, MLK and Jesus.

To add irony to idiocy, the right wing is diametrically opposed to the policy platforms and goals of those who they would adopt (ex. The GOP supports protecting the “job creators” and sees the poor as parasites while Jesus threw the “job creators” out of the temple and preached that the poor should be looked after as though they were him.

The Washington establishment on both sides of the political isle have united to support intervention in Syria–Obama, Pelosi, Reid, Cantor, Boehner, McCain and Graham are all on the same side for the first time is a long time.

What does it say about us when we, as a country, cannot agree on whether we should provide Americans healthcare or fund education, but we can almost immediately unite behind the idea of a war of choice?

Morality is not based upon religious adherence and any attempts to say that only religious people can be moral are simply misguided. This video gives a short refutation of the religious morality argument and argues that it is virtually impossible to tell whether a religious person is moral, as it is impossible to tell if they are acting morally through a desire to be moral or a desire to enter heaven/avoid hell.