Monday, February 27, 2012

Higher Education

If the notion of the separation of Church and State makes Rick Santorum want to throw up, his ignorance regarding, and subsequent muddled analysis of, our nation's founding makes me want to crawl out of my own skin. First, to dispel the notion that I am some sort of left-winger, let me state the following: the modern connotation of the concept of separation of Church and State (the one where we can't have a creche in the town square at Christmas; the one where the local CYO can't hold a meeting at a public school, even after school hours) does not exist in the Declaration of Independence or the Constitution. The Constitution prohibits the establishment of a State religion (Note to Rick: the first generations of settlers came to escape the tyranny of the Church of England). In fact, the phrase "separation of Church and State" came from Jefferson, years after the adoption of the Constitution (1802).

Santorum's claim that the founders did not envision a nation where the Church (um, WHICH Church, Rick? Yours? Mitt's?) had no role in government is laughable and historically inaccurate. Apparently, Mr. Santorum is unaware that many of the founders were Deists and not adherents of organized religion. Even those who belonged to churches did not want to see the establishment of a State religion. Santorum then completes his loopy circuit by claiming that the founders wouldn't have wanted "people of faith" excluded from the process, leaving a nation where "only people of non-faith" had a voice in our government. Aside from the fact that his analysis is altogether inaccurate, he is conflating two separate concepts. Which is it, Mr. Santorum, an established Church, or "people of faith"?

I now see why he speaks so negatively of higher education - it clearly did not serve him well. How was this man given advanced degrees? How did he even get a high school diploma?

Be afraid...be VERY afraid.


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