At a campaign appearance in Dover, New Hampshire on Saturday, Mitt Romney was confronted head on with the issue of medical marijuana. Clayton Holton, whose muscular dystrophy keeps him in a wheelchair, explained to Mitt that pot is the only medicine that seems to help him, and his doctors say he is “living proof [that] medical marijuana works.”

“My question for you,” Holton continued, “is will you arrest me or my doctors if I get medical marijuana?”

Romney’s reaction, as seen in this video, is contemptible. He says, shortly, “I am not infavor of medical marijuana being legal in this country,” and abruptly walks away. Another member of the audience asks Romney if he’s going to answer Holton’s question, and Romney replies, “I think I have.”

I can’t imagine what it must have been like to be Holton in that situation—to have a leader of your country say, effectively, that they’d let you die or go to prison before they’d let you smoke pot, and then walk away, smiling and shaking hands.

My infuriation with the anti-medical pot camp lies in their dogmatic denial of hard science that refutes their position. If people’s lives are at stake, the least you should do is enter into a reasoned debate where all the facts are openly considered. Then again, this might be too much to expect from our government, where the pre-Iraq war debate amounted to a quibble over whether Iraqi’s would welcome us with open arms or whether they’d bring us fruit baskets as well.

Ayaan Hirsi Ali, an outspoken critic of Islam who moved to the United States to escape death threats, returned to the Netherlands on Monday because the Dutch government said it would no longer pay for her security needs while she lived in the United States.

Hirsi Ali’s return raises the question of how the Netherlands or any country can protect its citizens from extremists while securing the rights of free speech and critical debate. Some politicians have called for an urgent session of Parliament. Many in the United States want to know why our government hasn’t stepped in to guarantee her protection in some way.

Dutch novelist Leon de Winter, a supporter of Hirsi Ali, offered the following commentary, reprinted in the New York Times and Courrier International:

Dutch society has no choice in this case. Canceling Ayaan’s protection would be the equivalent of a death sentence. Because she is so well known in the Netherlands and practically lives the life of a prisoner, not even able to go out on the street, the most humane solution is to continue to provide her with protection in America.

Society should cover the cost of this protection, for freedom of expression, one of the pillars of our culture, is being questioned. … The cost of this protection is nothing compared to its goal, which is to guarantee the continuity of our values.

So how do we as citizens of free countries reach out to protect those who have the courage to speak out? Radio Netherlands Worldwide reports that, according to her lawyer, Britta Böhler, Hirsi Alli is willing to pay for her own protection but that it will take some time to find the necessary resources. What is the cost of courage for the individual and for the nations? Both in monetary and in less substantial but still important terms. Can we let someone who is brave enough to speak out stand by themselves or shouldn’t we stand with them?

In the last few weeks, the Burmese people and monks have been protesting against their dictatorial military government in an attempt to bring freedom and democracy to their nation. This has been an ongoing struggle for 40+ years, and the Burmese people need our global solidarity to increase pressure on their government and the Asian governments that support the brutal regime.

The military junta has created a gulag atmosphere in the major cities to counter the peaceful demonstrations, rounding up people in the dead of night, beating people randomly, and detaining and torturing Buddhist monks. At least 200 monks have been killed, with over 2,500 arrested. We know that countless citizens have also been killed, with upwards of 3,000 arrested. They have stopped most external communication, cutting internet and phone lines in and out of Burma, in an attempt to keep their brutality out of the world press. But the world is watching what they’re doing to their defenseless citizens, and we will not be silent!

The time for action is NOW to show the Burmese people that we support them in their struggle for freedom and justice!

Saturday, October 6th, is the Global Day of Action on Burma. Many locals from all over the country have arranged vigils, marches, and speakers. The idea is that in every major and minor city in the world, events will start at noon local time to show a wave of international support for the Burmese people. Everyone, nationwide, is encouraged to wear red to show solidarity with the saffron-robed monks risking their lives for democracy and human rights.

The AHA is supporting a major rally and march in Washington, D.C. this Saturday. We expect over 1,000 people to attend! I am an organizer for this event and a number of the staff members from the AHA will be in attendance.

You can see if local events have been scheduled in your area by clicking here. You can also register your own local event, if you chose to plan one, by clicking here. Make sure to contact local media if you decide to plan an event, which will raise the profile of the Burma issue in your town.

If you need more information on current events in Burma, visit the US Campaign for Burma, Mizzima News or the Irrawaddy News Magazine.

Sam Harris and Ellen Johnson are at the center of the latest sparring match between rationalist thinkers. Sam Harris (The End of Faith, Letter to a Christian Nation) gave a speech at the Atheist Alliance International conference this past weekend and made a rather astounding claim:

We should not call ourselves “humanists,” or “secular humanists,” or “naturalists,” or “skeptics,” or “anti-theists,” or “rationalists,” or “freethinkers,” or “brights.” We should not call ourselves anything. We should go under the radar—for the rest of our lives. And while there, we should be decent, responsible people who destroy bad ideas wherever we find them.

. . . [R]ather than declare ourselves “atheists” in opposition to all religion, I think we should do nothing more than advocate reason and intellectual honesty—and where this advocacy causes us to collide with religion, as it inevitably will, we should observe that the points of impact are always with specific religious beliefs—not with religion in general.

As a Humanist I’m all for being decent, responsible people who destroy bad ideas wherever we find them, but I think now is the worst possible time to go under the radar. With the religious right trying to make even greater inroads into our political and legal system we have to stand up and be counted, now more than ever. We also can’t go underground at a time when we are the most untrusted group in the country. Only visibily can change those statistics.
Read the rest of this entry &raquo

John McCain, the Episcopalian who goes to a Baptist church, when asked by Beliefnet “Have the candidates’ personal faith become too big an issue in the presidential race?” Offered up an answer that put him on par with Bush for putting his foot in it.

Questions about that are very legitimate. . . . And it’s also appropriate for me at certain points in the conversation to say, look, that’s sort of a private matter between me and my Creator.

To this point he was a publicist’s dream but he couldn’t stop:

But I think the number one issue people should make [in the] selection of the president of the United States is, “Will this person carry on in the Judeo Christian principled tradition that has made this nation the greatest experiment in the history of mankind?”

He was given a chance to backdown with the next question, but like an energizer bunny…

Beliefnet: It doesn’t seem like a Muslim candidate would do very well, according to that standard.
McCain: I admire the Islam. There’s a lot of good principles in it. I think one of the great tragedies of the 21st century is that these forces of evil have perverted what’s basically an honorable religion. But, no, I just have to say in all candor that since this nation was founded primarily on Christian principles . . . personally, I prefer someone who I know has a solid grounding in my faith. But that doesn’t mean that I’m sure that someone who is Muslim would not make a good president. I don’t say that we would rule out under any circumstances someone of a different faith. I just would—I just feel that that’s an important part of our qualifications to lead.

Beliefnet’s God-o-Meter has McCain at a solid eight since this interview. Clinton and Obama are tied at seven. Is this what campaigns have become, merely a litmus test of whose got that old time religion?

The Supreme Court dodged two church-state cases that the religious right believed would be the beginning of the nation’s rightward march. Evidently even a court stack so heavily in their favor isn’t quite ready to simply follow the religious right’s marching orders.

One was a case from New York on whether church-affiliated employers who object to birth control on religious grounds must still provide contraceptive coverage to their female employees as part of their medical insurance coverage, as required by laws in New York and some two dozen other states. The other case challenged the refusal of a public library in California to make a community meeting room available for worship services.

Both cases potentially test lines that the Supreme Court has drawn to separate accommodations of religion that governments are required to make from those that aren’t required or, perhaps, are even forbidden.

The legal issues involved in the New York case are religious freedom versus the states’ right to impose rules and regulations on employers. The precedent for this type of case has been set by a 1990 Supreme Court decision, Employment Division v. Smith, which barred most religion-based exemptions from laws that are neutral, generally applicable and that don’t single out religion for special burdens. This particular law includes an exemption for “religious employers,” precisely defined as a nonprofit organization that seeks to inculcate “religious values;” that “primarily employs” people of its religious faith; and that “serves primarily” those who share that faith. The challenge is based on expanding what organizations qualify for the exemption.

To decide the California case, the Supreme Court would rely on the series of decisions in which the court has placed religious expression on the same footing as other forms of speech, ruling that it must be permitted in public forums that are generally open to other speakers. The court hasn’t directly confronted a case seeking a public forum for pure religious worship. This question lies at the intersection where the two religion clauses of the First Amendment meet: the protection for the “free exercise” of religion and the prohibition against the official “establishment” of religion. It is a hard call for Humanists. Is worship free speech? Should it be supported in public buildings? I lean toward yes to the first and no to the second. How do other Humanists see this question?