Modernity vs. religious bigotry is not solely a phenomenon here and a few other places, it’s an age-old worldwide conflict.

A couple of things that always struck me about the writings of Asimov et al is the inherent optimism each of these authors showed in their writings. It seems, in their “future histories” that there is/will be a dystopian interlude that humanity has to struggle through, maybe even more than one. I have always found these to be optimistic that we will reach the stars and do so before we kill ourselves and all living creatures.

Religiously speaking, the answers given at the VP debate by Paul Ryan and Joe Biden to the question of how their personal faith relates to their work as politicians were striking. The difference between the two candidates — and the parties and platforms they stand for — could not have been starker. Ryan spoke with absolute certainty that he/his party/his church are absolutely correct when it comes to banning abortion, while Biden expressed both his own personal beliefs alongside respect for those who hold other views and the concomitant right to act on their religious views.

But while abortion was the specific example Martha Raddatz used to frame her question, it is hardly the only one. The editors of the Jesuit magazine “America” pose another very good question themselves, that deserves an answer from both Obama and Romney. If no one brings it up at the town hall-style debate next week, I’d love to see Bob Schieffer ask it at the foreign policy debate that follows.

In the Spring of 1978, Afghan minister of social Affairs, Anahita Ratebzad, wrote, “Privileges which women, by right, must have are equal education, job security, health services, and free time to rear a healthy generation for building the future of the country … Educating and enlightening women is now the subject of close government attention.” Soon afterward, the United States spent about a billion dollars to help keep her vision from coming to ligh

I got frustrated by the way few people in the media seem to be considering that Obama’s pressure on the Palestinian leadership to suppress the Goldstone report on Israeli and Hamas war crimes in Gaza has destabilized Palestinian politics in a manner beneficial to extremism. You’d have to basically say in public that it would have [...]