So what? I still haven’t upgraded the Ol Shifty WordPress to 2.5… Why do they have to keep bugging me about it? As someone whose computer is elderly and getting worse, I have a natural inclination to avoid upgrading anything. But I have already upgraded two of my blogs, so where do I turn off this “Please update now” message?

But more to the point. I finally finished “Christians and the Fall of Rome”. It is another in the wonderful “Great Ideas” series of pamphlets from Penguin Books. It is just a 90 page excerpt from Gibbon’s The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire. It may be the piece that finally gets me to read the entire work. It is a witty and scathing attack on faith and religion, but phrased in a way that it doesn’t come across so much as an attack as just a rational report on how people behave.

It is filled with great lines, such as:

A state of scepticism and suspense may amuse a few inquisitive minds. But the practice of superstition is so congenial to the multitude, that if they are forcibly awakened, they will regret the loss of their pleasing vision.”

and then

So urgent on the vulgar is the necessity of believing, that the fall of any system of mythology will most probably be superseded by the introduction of some other mode of superstition.”

Anyway as someone who, well… I’m somewhat opposed to the usage of the word atheist, as I think that religious folks should be the ones who are singled out with a label, but whatever, anyway.

I’ve never once understood religion or faith, except and something to make naive people feel better… comforted or something (the same way that druggies like to think that their lame delusions are “reality”)… And as such I’ve never felt the urge to read any Atheist literature. And I still don’t, as a general rule… But/so the recent readings of Robert Ingersoll (read about them here at penguindevil) and Edward Gibbon have seemed wonderfully refreshing.

Though I haven’t really settled one way or another between Obama and Clinton (not that it matters, I’ll vote for whichever gets the nod), the tide keeps turning me more towards supporting Obama. This newest dumb flap about the “behind closed doors” comments he made about “bitter voters” really just takes the cake. The eternal facade about politicians understanding “middle America” is so tiring. I doubt that any national career politician (except for Jimmy Carter) has really had much understanding of, or at least respect for and interest in “middle America”. For McCain and Clinton to come down on Obama  for being honest is  lame irritating and  quite telling. It really does point out that, at least for the present, Obama  actually is an outside voice. Someone who is willing (or more willing, at least) to express and stand by the honest truth.

Clinton and McCain both know darned well that his comments are true. People are bitter and feel a loss of control and people do flock towards more localized and personal concepts (recreation, entertainment, religion), when they feel disconnect or at the whim of bigger issues.

And I realize that it is standard politics to through anything back at someone that might be harmful to them, even if it makes one a hypocrite, but it is still annoying and I think that this issue puts me firmly into the Obama camp.