According to "w" the Iraq war was supposed to make things better in the Muslim world. After five tragic years of incompetent leadership from this administration the consequences are clear. Pakistan is a nation already coping with a rising terrorist threat and this increased instability only makes the whole area much more dangerous.
Al Qaeda and President Musharraf himself have been blamed for Bhutto's assasination. Regardless, what has transpired is a victory for Osama bin Laden, who called Bhutto a US political puppet. And who stands to gain the most from this unrest in Pakistan? That's right, Bin Laden and Al Qaeda. Pakistan has nuclear weapons and would be the grand price Bin Laden has worked for all along. While "w" and Cheney have bankrupted our treasury and depleted our military with the needless illgotten Iraq war they have taken their eye off the real target. No, it's not Iran. It wasn't Iraq or Saddam. It is the nuclear weapons in Pakistan. We have known all along that Bin Laden was hiding on the border of Afghanistan and Pakistan but our president has been so distracted in Iraq he has done nothing relative to finding Bin Laden. Now are we any better off seven years after 911? You decide. We have wasted our nations blood and treasure on a fools errand in the sands of Iraq and are worse off for having done it. Let's just pray that the next president has the intellegence and wisdom to conduct our country's security in a more sane and logical manner.

As much as our country’s founders abhorred any religious tests for public office, some presidential aspirants today are so pretentious in their Bible thumping ostentatious piety they have become obnoxious. Huckabee is so over the top that he truly believes his recent popularity in Iowa is an act of God. He has played the Jesus card to perfection just like “w” did. He has manipulated his evangelical Baptist bigot klan of Iowa into believing that Romney’s Church is a satanic cult. That is what it has come to in the republican party of today and now Romney is trying to out-Jesus Huckabee. We have seen the destruction inflicted on America and the world as a result of a dogmatic president who believes he was divinely chosen and that God urged him to start a war. Romney states that “freedom requires religion” but completely ignores the bloody history of his own Church being deprived of freedom and their lives at the hand of other American religious zealots. His statement is so patently false it doesn’t deserve refutation. Those countries that have separation of Church and State have the strongest organized religions. Why would we want to return to the religious repression of centuries ago? If Romney is going to attack humanists and secularists as “wrong,” then let him explain why they were so far ahead of his Church on the great moral questions of the last half century. They said God had cursed the world’s dark skin people and rejected the civil rights movement up until they were just recently forced to accept blacks as equals and allow them in their Church. Let Huckabee explain why he rejects evolution, believes the planet is less than 10,000 years old, and how that might influence his science policies as president. Would he apply the harsh Old Testament punishments for homosexuality and adultery?

These politicians often complain about the religious intolerance of secular liberals. But the truth is liberals have been far more tolerant of religious believers in office. They elected John Kennedy, Jimmy Carter and now have Harry Reid, Senate majority leader which makes him the highest ranking Mormon officeholder in American history. I can’t see any prejudice about Reid’s religion. A secular society like ours doesn’t imply disrespect to religion. Our Constitution guarantees religious freedom through the establishment clause of the 1st Amendment which is the basis of the Separation of Church and State. But when candidates like Huckabee and Romney try to redefine it by claiming their faith gives them preeminence to power then someone needs to speak up.