Less Political Stuff for this Post

I have to say that I am absolutely loving the relationship I am in. I need to take more pictures of Matthew before I go off to school, just so I can have something to remind me of him. Forgive me, but I am turning out to be one very mushy girl. He totaly is the Carl to my Ellie.

Recently he purchased for himself Photoshop CS5 and then came over to my place and uploaded it onto my computer for me. I think that what I should do is do a little "Thank You" piece for him. And what better way than to draw us and color it in Photoshop?

I've already started figuring out a few tricks with it. I am starting to like it better than my older program; lots more I can do with it.

Anywho, Matt has already talked with me about what we're going to do about my going to USU and his staying at Weber State. He and I are going to try and see eachother once a week. He'll drive up one week, I'll drive down the next. We're just going to have to coordinate which days are best for us. Even if that means he has to come up and wait for me to get off work, so be it. Atleast I know of some places for us to go walking, and there's a nice little cemetary next to my dorm that would be perfect for a picnic. Yes, I like picnics in the cemetary. If you haven't already figured out that I'm weird like that, I feel sorry for you. Haha!

I hope that he will be able to come up to USU for school some day. Hopefully if he has good enough grades, he will get scholarships and grants. Right now my goal is to get A's and B's in my classes. I NEED MONEY.

Separation of Church and State

Separation of Church and State - The Metaphor and the Constitution
"Separation of church and state" is a common metaphor that is well recognized. Equally well recognized is the metaphorical meaning of the church staying out of the state's business and the state staying out of the church's business. Because of the very common usage of the "separation of church and state phrase," most people incorrectly think the phrase is in the constitution. The phrase "wall of separation between the church and the state" was originally coined by Thomas Jefferson in a letter to the Danbury Baptists on January 1, 1802. His purpose in this letter was to assuage the fears of the Danbury, Connecticut Baptists, and so he told them that this wall had been erected to protect them. The metaphor was used exclusively to keep the state out of the church's business, not to keep the church out of the state's business.

The constitution states, "Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof." Both the free exercise clause and the establishment clause place restrictions on the government concerning laws they pass or interfering with religion. No restrictions are placed on religions except perhaps that a religious denomination cannot become the state religion.

However, currently the implied common meaning and the use of the metaphor is strictly for the church staying out of the state's business. The opposite meaning essentially cannot be found in the media, the judiciary, or in public debate and is not any part of the agenda of the ACLU or the judiciary.

This, in conjunction with several other factors, makes the "separation of church and state" metaphor an icon for eliminating anything having to do with Christian theism, the religion of our heritage, in the public arena. One of these factors is the use of the metaphor in place of the actual words of the constitution in discourse and debate. This allows the true meaning of the words in the constitution to be effectively changed to the implied meaning of the metaphor and the effect of the "free exercise" clause to be obviated. Another factor facilitating the icon to censor all forms of Christian theism in the public arena is a complete misunderstanding of the "establishment" clause.

Kind of makes it sound like the Anti-Proposition 8 people are a bunch of moron's, doesn't it?

I am pretty tired of hearing people spout off terms and using them in the wrong context. It makes their argument weak and faliable. Get your terms right, THEN come back and argue a point.

What brought this on? Well, for anyone who has seen my Facebook Status, and the comments written therein, I am upset about Proposition 8 being overturned by the Supreme Court after it recieve a majority vote to be passed. What the Court did was Unconstitutional, and if you ask me, the government is starting to stray away from the Constitution. We even have radicals who are trying to get the Constitution thrown out and reworked because it is "out-dated" and "irrelevant to today's society." One of these people is, infact, our lovely President. And I am sorry, but he is turning out to be more of a King George III. Here is a list of what King George III did to the colonist's that provoked them to declaire independance from England (really long, I know, but well worth the read.) :

He has refused his assent to laws, the most wholesome and necessary for the public good.
He has forbidden his governors to pass laws of immediate and pressing importance, unless suspended in their operation till his assent should be obtained; and when so suspended, he has utterly neglected to attend them.
He has refused to pass other laws for the accommodation of large districts of people, unless those people would relinquish the right of representation in the legislature, a right inestimable to them and formidable to tyrants only.
He has called together legislative bodies at places unusual, uncomfortable, and distant from the depository of their public records, for the sole purpose of fatiguing them into compliance with his measures.
He has dissolved representative houses repeatedly, for opposing with manly firmness his invasions on the rights of the people.
He has refused for a long time, after such dissolutions, to cause others to be elected; whereby the legislative powers, incapable of annihilation, have returned to the people at large for their exercise; the state remaining in the meantime exposed to all the dangers of invasion from without, and convulsions within.
he has endeavored to prevent the population of these states; for that purpose obstructing the laws for naturalization of foreigners; refusing to pass others to encourage their migration hither, and raising the conditions of new appropriations of lands.
He has obstructed the administration of justice, refusing his assent to laws for establishing judiciary powers.
He has made judges dependent on his will alone, for the tenure of their offices, and the amount and payment of their salaries.
He has erected a multitude of new offices, and sent hither swarms of officers to harass our people, and eat out their substance.
He ahs kept amobg us, in times of peace, standing armies without the consent of our legislature.
He has affected to render the military independent of and superior to the civil power. He has combined with others to subject us to a jurisdiction foreign to our constitution and unacknowledged by our laws; giving his assent to their acts of pretended legislation:
For quarting large bodies of armed troops among us:
For protecting them, by mock trial, from punishment for any murders which they should commit on the inhabitants of these states:
For cutting off our trade with all parts of the world:
For imposing taxes on us without our consent:
For depriving us in many cases, for the benifits of trial by jury:
For transporting us beyond seas to be tried for pretended offences:
For abolishing the free system of English laws in a neighboring province, establishing therein an arbitrary government, and enlarging its boundaries so as to render it at once an example and fit instrument for introducing the same absolute rule in these colonies:
For taking away our charters, abolishing our most valuable laws, and altering fundamentally the forms of our governments:
For suspending our own legislatures, and declaring themselves invested with power to legislate for us in all cases whatsoever.
He has abdicated government here, by declaring us out of his protection and waging war against us.
He has plundered our seas, ravaged our coasts, burned our towns, and destroyed the lives of our people.
He is at this time transporting large armies of foreign mercenaries to complete the works of death, desolation and tyranny, already begun with circumstances of cruelty and perfidy scarcely paralleled in the most barbarous ages, and totally unworthy the head of a civilized nation.
He has constrained our fellow citizens taken captive on the high seas to bear arms against their country, to become the executioners of their friends and brethren, or to fall themselves by their hands.
He has excited domestic insurrections amongst us, and has endeavored to bring on the inhabitants of our frontiers, the merciless Indian savages, whose known rule of warfare, is undistinguished destruction of all ages, sexes and conditions.

How many did you read in there that could be applied to what our president has done so far? I saw quite a few.