Haven't we read this before. Blah blah blah...religion...blah blah blah...politics...blah blah blah...woe is me. You know what's in the article just by reading the title and the author. Another polemic on some problem that is completely blown out of proportion by Hithens' fractured psyche.

I do have to say though, it's mildly amusing to see Hitchens say the following:

"It's that when they are even slightly criticized for their absurd opinions, they can squeal as if being martyred and act as if they are truly being persecuted."

Pot...kettle...black....blah blah blah.

The biggest difference between Hitchens and Christers is that Christers claim martydom while supposedly enjoying mass appeal.

In other words, their complaints about anti-Christian bigotry are half-baked.

If you can't stomach what Hitchens has to say, you can always opt not to read it. It's true he's very direct about his views and that makes some people uncomfortable. It doesn't change the fact that he's often making a valid point.

The claims of most religions, both ancient and contemporary, are absurd when reviewed with the same way we'd consider extinct religions. Most of us think it's silly to proclaim there are gods on Mount Olympus in Greece, so why is it so offensive to think that someone else might find enthusiastic devotion to today's religions a little absurd as well?

"It's that when they are even slightly criticized for their absurd opinions, they can squeal as if being martyred and act as if they are truly being persecuted."

Midly amusing?

I would have to say that his statement is completly correct, and this is the problem with the fervent religiosity in this country. And, then to say that it's the "pot calling the kettle black" is absurd, moronic, and tone deaf.

acro - 101 hits the issue right on the head. Hitchens just can't take what he likes to dish out. No one is saying Hitchens does not have a right to say or write whatever he wants to. Hell, the Supreme Court upheld the rights of the Nazi's and Klan's men to march, so certainly no one is going to deny Hitchens the right to say or write whatever hateful anti-religious diatribe he is dishing out this week. What he can't stand is that so many people are calling him out on his bigotry, the same way that society calls out those pin heads in the Klan. He likes to be the critic, not the criticizied

Instead of rational, point-by-point arguements about any given Huckabee position on issues, Hitchens takes the low road of calling him vile names and attacking his personal religious beliefs. Hitch comes off as hateful and lazy. The funny thing is, Hitchens is helping the religious right, more than he is hurting it. By taking the focus off of issues, and turning it into a simplistic us against them shouting match, it is a distraction from the fact that Huckabee offers little in the way of substance or qualification.

Nothing about Hitchens makes me uncomfortable. Well...maybe I'm uncomfortable with the fact that someone gets paid to write this tripe. I read Hitchens for the same reason I sometimes watch the TV show The Biggest Loser. Someone really gets paid for doing THAT?

Hitchens makes a "valid point" only in the sense that he makes a point against a problem that he's completely blowing out of proportion.

Look...don't you find it a wee bit odd that someone who's being published in slate, writing about issue X is, at the same time, writing that issue X involves the trampling of his first amendment rights? If his rights involving this "religious test" are being trampled, then how is it that he's publishing an article about it???!!!??? That's why I said it was hypocritical of him to whine about someone else acting persecuted. That's also why I said he's completely blows the issue out of proportion. No one is taking Hitchens' rights away. There is no gestapo at his door. There's just a drunk, angry man with a good education making a fool of himself.

Except he's 100% correct in this case: Huckabee and Romney want to pretend that scrutinizing their weird beliefs is like publishing what their kids got on the SATs, and it isn't. It's not 'personal', it's relevant and they need to defend themselves a little.

I don't recall Hitchens claiming his First Amendment rights were being trampled. He's certainly made pretty good use of them over the years.

His point is very valid and very relevant. This campaign has seen a race by both parties to pander to religious voters. Ideally, I would hope that a candidate's religion might play a role in keeping him honest and ethical, but beyond that, it shouldn't be involved in politics. Yet, we have candidates falling all over themselves to talk about how religious they are and how often they go to church.

I'd love to hear about the issues facing us today. I'll support a religious candidate when he or she can show that religion properly occupies a background position in their life and that they are thinking, reasoning individuals who would like to offer realistic ideas on how to address America's issues.

He's not writing about being persecuted, he's writing about the misinterpretation by many of the true meaning of "religious test" for office. He's stating, and correctly, that a "religious test" means that government cannot require that a person running for office be an adherent of a specific state-mandated religion. His argument is that it is our inalienable right to question that person's religion as it is theirs to practice it. We are not the government, therefore we can impose any evaluation we like.

astro -- you need to close your mouth, re-read this Hitchens article, then read the First Amendment, then realize that Slate is not the government. Never was and never will be, so having an article published in Slate (or not) has absolutely nothing to do with the First Amendment.

I would like to thank you for confirming in me my bias against religious idiots. You really do expose your ignorance much better than I ever could.

What the religious fail to understand is that it can be very trying to one's psyche, as well as one's patience, to feel you are surrounded by crazy people who act like you are the crazy one for not believing in their invisible imaginary friend whose existance they can offer no proof of whatsoever. This is how I feel 90% the time. Like I am surrounded by crazy people. But I suspect it has more to do with lazy than crazy in actuality. Probably a little of both. I just shake my head and feel greatful for not fearing so much that I accept delusion.

"However, what Article VI does not do, and was never intended to do, is deny me the right to say, as loudly as I may choose, that I will on no account vote for a smirking hick like Mike Huckabee, who is an unusually stupid primate but who does not have the elementary intelligence to recognize the fact that this is what he is. My right to say and believe that is already guaranteed to me by the First Amendment."

As if that were in question.

"So, can we please have less of this deliberate misunderstanding of Article VI, which, if it goes much further, will actually seem to prevent or even to criminalize any criticism of theocratic candidates for high office. I ask you now, does it seem likely that any article of the U.S. Constitution was specially written so that you could not publicly and freely and fearlessly say that you would most decidedly not vote for:"

Acro101 is just digging himself a deeper hole at this point. He mentions the First Amendment as a reminder that the references to "religious test" by these candidates are a misinterpretation. He's pointing out that taking their "logic" a bit further would contradict the Constitution's protections.

Another mind freed from the burden of truth by the divine gift of faith.

>>on some problem that is completely blown out of proportion...

Jeez, ya mean like claiming Christianity is under attack because someone says "Happy Holidays"???

Ya mean OUT OF PROPORTION like that???