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What is the central theme of all of Judeo-Christian faith according to the writings protestant and Catholic believers alike call their holy scriptures--the greatest commandment from God, the central tenet, the core, the essence and centerpiece of all of Christianity? I'm assuming my conservative, religious friends know the answer to this. It came directly from the mouth of Jesus Christ when he was asked what the greatest commandment is. The scriptures state it explicitly: Love the lord your God with all of your heart.

Jesus Christ goes on to state that the second greatest commandment is much like the first one above: Love your neighbor, your fellow people, like you love yourself.

This is easy. If we boil all of faith practice down to the most important two things, according to the "head guy," it would be to love God with all your heart, and love other people just as you love yourself. That sums it all up. We are to think no more of ourselves than others and both within a context of loving God.

How far organized Christian faith practice has moved from these, the greatest, most important commandments.

When I think of Christianity today, sadly, I think of religious hucksters trying to dominate the media landscape*. I think of the merging of church and capitalism and politics. I think of "it's all about me," theocracy, lies and deceit, hate and anger, subjugation, mega-churches with unprecedented entertainment-focused services and extraordinary lifestyle centers. I think of a Machiavellian adherence to a political and social agenda that will vastly enrich and empower a few while spiritually bankrupting a nation. But above all, I think about money. Big money. Massive amounts of money, money, money.

Before his death, Jerry Falwell had an annual revenue of $8.9 million. James Dobson has an annual revenue of $138 million. Pat Robertson has an annual revenue of an astounding $459 million. What?!

But, at the same time, I think of good people, decent people who sincerely want to do what is right, want to love God, who believe they need to help others but are being misled.

Forty million Americans are currently worried about feeding themselves. Many are children. Why isn't the Christian church leadership spending vast resources placing this issue before believers as a cause for substantive action? Millions of Americans have lost their homes because of broken government and economic greed. Why isn't the Christian church leadership spending a vast amount of its resources placing this issue before believers as a cause for action?

Perhaps the Christian church today is a bit over extended with huge debt of its own? Perhaps the Christian church today is pre-occupied with divisive issues as it tries to win their so-called "culture wars" in America. Perhaps the Christian church today finds it easier to continue a well practiced pattern of dismissive condemnation of real people rather than following the more demanding commandments of Jesus Christ himself.

I fear that the Christian church today is reaping what it has sown for the past three decades--failed leadership . Its emphasis on mega-facilities and the contentious and political have rendered it irrelevant and have made it impossible for the church to address Jesus Christ's second greatest commandment: treat everybody else as well as you treat yourself. People are in the streets with no food or shelter or medical attention while churches argue over what lattes and ciders to sell in the mega-vestibule while the carolers sing among the 30 live Christmas trees. We pretentiously dismiss the needy as reaping the results of their own sin rather than doing the hard work of that second commandment from Jesus.  Is 50% of the church's income meeting the very real and pressing needs of people in the community outside the congregation?  Would that be in the spirit of the second commandment?

When our nation desperately needs the due diligence of sincere and meaningful faith practice to address the real needs of real people with enormous problems, the church is over-extended, out of focus, and incapable of stepping up to the call of Christ.  Christianity only represents one third of the people on this planet, and it is failing that one third!

Perhaps the church is more healthy than I think it is. Perhaps the religious, fundamentalist, ultra-conservative, "it's all about me" shill that dominates the media landscape is only a tiny fraction of the Christian church made to appear larger and more mainstream by its volume, its persistence, and its annoying divisiveness. I certainly hope so.

So I'm advocating for a populist movement. I'm advocating for good people everywhere to turn it off, stop giving it money, stop walking in the doors of those self-serving churches that are not focused on doing Jesus' commandment. I'm advocating for good people everywhere to start helping others one on one if need be, to do the work of the first and second greatest commandments. Return to the central theme, the core, the essence of faith practice.

"They will know we are Christians    b y    o u r    l o v e."

*I'll spare everyone the examples of each of the items in this list. Most people could think of their own from the media.

Related Posts at tt.us

• We Need a Populist Movement-Part 1: Healthcare
• We Need a Populist Movement-Part 2: Governance
• We Need a Populist Movement-Part 3: Civil Rights
• We Need a Populist Movement-Part 4: Journalism
• We Need a Populist Movement-Part 5: Faith Practice (this post)

It's pretty simple, really.

I can not imagine a United States in which women were not allowed to vote, in which they were considered more as a man's property, his birthright, his just reward for manhood.  I can't imagine a United States in which black people were considered property, slaves, people owned and bred for the profit of white men.  I simply can not imagine a United States in which entire nations of people, the American Indians, were exterminated because white men wanted what was theirs.

And to do these things in the name of a god, a deity, a faith practice that holds to some ancient tenets most of 21st century civilization finds barbaric and so out of touch with present reality as to be rendered irrelevant superstitions is appalling, oppressive, and the very definition of evil.

Now don't misunderstand, I think people should be allowed to practice their chosen faith but within constraints that will be the content of the upcoming post on faith practice.  Denying the civil right of marriage to inter-racial couples is the stuff of antiquity.  To deny same sex couples the right to marriage is also the product of a similar hate-filled thinking process.  To deny gay men and women from serving in the military is just as ignorant, intolerant, and, like the aforementioned marriage issues, the product of forcing a narrowly defined faith practice on people who do not hold to the teachings of that ancient religious belief system.

Additionally, the whole marriage concern poses another interesting issue.  The church claims that they must "defend the traditional definition of marriage." That tradition is, of course, born in the very religious intolerance of which I've already written.  In other words, marriage is a curious legal and religious institution in which church and state are not separate. The founding fathers built as a major and fundamental tenet of this nation the separation of church from the state.  They, after all, had fled the religious tyranny of the protestant British Empire, though Sarah Palin might think it was the North Koreans.

I strongly, adamantly advocate for the separation of church and state.  Obviously, in the context of marriage, we need, as a nation, to explore this intermingling of the two.  The two must be separated!

As I have written before, if a church does not want to "endorse" or participate in a same sex couple's marriage because that marriage is inconsistent with the ancient teachings of their church, teachings to which they choose to adhere [are any of them out there still doing blood sacrifices?], then they should not be required to.  But for any religious body to try to inflict their faith practice on others is unacceptable and completely out of touch with the fundamental and founding tenets of this nation.

I frankly am glad that the religious front organization, the bogusly named Family "Research" Council, was labeled a "hate group" the day before yesterday by the Southern Poverty Law Center.  Indeed, they are a hate group.  They are trying to force their hate-filled beliefs about a minority group on the nation as a whole.

Their activist agenda is immoral. Their activist agenda perpetuates a culture of hate and intolerance that continues to encourage and even endorse violent words, verbal assaults, bullying, taunting, physical assaults, murders, suicides, verbal abuse, distrust, and hatred. This can not be tolerated by those who value the separation of church and state, who value tolerance, understanding, civility, and who aspire to live by the golden rule. Their activist position is the antithesis of American values, is the antithesis of who I believe God to be and what God wants of people.  And while this post will not be popular with some of my very conservative friends, I believe in my soul that my position is the moral and just one that will stand the test of time.

People can oppose marriage and military service equality and not be a hate group.  I can respect that.  And for those who find the notion of same sex marriage and inter-racial marriage something loathsome, then I invite them to live by the simple words Whoopie Goldberg recently said, just "Don't get one.". It's pretty simple really; isn't it.  In the land of the free and the home of the brave, no one will force them to.  They simply must stop trying to force their chosen, narrowly defined, religious beliefs on those who do not accept them as the teachings of a loving, relevant God.

Related Posts at tt.us

• We Need a Populist Movement-Part 1: Healthcare
• We Need a Populist Movement-Part 2: Governance
• We Need a Populist Movement-Part 3: Civil Rights (this post)
• We Need a Populist Movement-Part 4: Journalism
• We Need a Populist Movement-Part 5: Faith Practice

Nostalgia.  The good old days.  The old ways.  Back in the day.

We tend to remember the past all packaged up as warm and glowing.  This morning, for no discernible reason at all, I had a flash back memory from my childhood.  I was a young child visiting my great Aunt Hester—my mother's mother's sister.  My great Aunt Hester had very poor eyesight and had also had cataract surgery.  In those days, the result was very thick glasses that made your eyes look like saucers!  My Aunt Hester, as was so frequently the case, was sitting on the sofa (with the omnipresent National Inquirer at one end) in her den with a flaming wall heater, leaning forward, offering us something good from the kitchen.

While my mother, sister, and I were visiting my great aunt during the day, it was dark outside.  I then recalled that we frequently visited Aunt Hester and Uncle Shelley when it was storming outside.  My mother has had a lifelong fear, no phobia, of lightening.  Most of the visits to Aunt Hester were during thunderstorms.  My mother can't stand to be alone in a thunderstorm.

My great Aunt Easter, the other of my mother's mother's sisters lived too far away to go visit her during a thunderstorm.  My mother wouldn't drive that far—keep in mind it was probably less than 5 miles.  We frequently visited my Aunt Easter and Uncle Frank (pictured to the right), but my father had to drive us that far.

Then I recalled that we would also visit my cousins during thunderstorms, until they moved from up the street to Gulf Breeze.  Naturally, Gulf Breeze was too far to drive, and you had to drive over the 3 mile bridge, which, of course, my mother considered an utter impossibility in those days.  When my cousins lived up the street, several times a summer we would all pile into the car and drive over to the beach.  But Aunt Helen had to do the driving.  It was even further than Gulf Breeze and required traversing two bridges!

How quaint:  not driving too far.

Then I recalled a trip we took with my grandparents.  We had to drive through Atlanta.  Talk about traumatic:  four lanes of cars on I-285 in those days.  Every time a car passed us, naturally my grandfather drove slower than the flow of traffic, my grandmother, sitting in the back seat, would brace herself for a wreck while running her hand down my mother's leg with a sharp inhaling sound.  My mother's leg was raw by the time we got to the hotel in Atlanta.  No, our final destination wasn't Atlanta.  We were heading to South Carolina to visit my great, great Aunt Sophia (pictured to the left wearing a sweater with my grandmother), but the trip from Mobile to Atlanta was a huge journey to us back in those days.

My final morning recollection of the good old days was the fact that my grandmother, who lived to be 92, my great Aunt Easter, who lived to be 77, and my great Aunt Hester, who lived to be 99 (may all of their completely beautiful souls rest in peace) never drove a car, not even once, in their entire lifetimes.  So I guess it shouldn't be considered too odd that my mother never really drove very far.  She was adventurous because she actually would drive!

How quickly times change.

Well, yes.  Naturally I watched Steve Jobs emcee Apple's Back to the Mac event yesterday.

Now, I must confess that when Apple first introduced the huge change from iMovie HD (version 6 in 2007) to iMovie (version 7 in 2008) I made no secret of my utter disgust.  It was a huge, enormous step backward.  Apple quickly responded to the extreme customer dissatisfaction, because users were in an outright uproar, by almost immediately, within days, releasing an update with added features.  Everyone who had used iMovie HD continued to use it.  I don't know of anyone who actually used iMovie 7, which was less than featureless, even with the immediate update.

iMovie (version 8 in 2009) was a big step forward, though previous users of iMovie HD, myself included, had a difficult time getting into the new interface. which was conceptually nothing like iMovie HD (version 6 in 2007) and every previous version of the software.  Previous users generally didn't like the new interface introduced in 2008.  New users were not so encumbered.  Ok.  With this new version in 2008, there seemed to be some hope.  Maybe Apple hadn't made a huge mistake with this new GUI.

Yesterday Apple introduced iMovie (version 8) in iLife '11.  (Isn't all of this year versus version number thing so damned confusing?!  And then you have the suite numbers and version numbers for the pro products...  Jeeze!)  The new version now, in my mind, officially rocks my world.  So, from where I'm sitting, it took Apple 3 to 4 years to release a product that is absolutely better than iMovie HD.  You know, I guess I just wish this had been the version they released back in 2008.

iMovie '11, as I'll call it to minimize confusion, appears awesome.  I should be getting my hands on a copy of it today.  I suppose what I found most fascinating, even tantalizing about this newest version, is the movie trailer templates feature--a virtually bullet-proof way to make nothing less than stunning movie trailers.  From an educator's perspective, I see this a an excellent way to teach students to better articulate their quasi-innate understanding of the language of film production.  (The quality of the video footage used in the demo didn't hurt any, of course.)  But I will be interested in seeing how this actually takes off out in the field for common users and, more importantly, for students.  I see enormous, enormous, enormous potential here.

The new MovieMaker in Windows 7 is just about where iMovie HD was in 2007, although the interface, like most of Windows, in my opinion, is just flat out ugly as hell and grotesquely stark—the last thing a person who is being create needs or wants.  Now the latest version of the Windows movie production software appears to be in the stone age once again, eating Apple's dust.  Can't Microsoft do something innovative rather than just copy everything Apple is doing?!

I've been hearing the rumor mill whispering about a complete remake of Final Cut Pro, Apple's pro level movie-making software.  I immediately thought that if they did such a thing, I wouldn't even consider upgrading.  Now, having seen where Randy Ubillos has taken iMovie '11, I'm a lot more open minded.  This could be really interesting.

Oh, and sure, the new features in iPhoto '11 and GarageBand '11 were cool as well, but iMovie '11 was the product that just blew me away.  (I don't know what the new features are in the other apps in the iLife '11 software suite.)  Of course, iLife comes free on every new Mac purchase.  Existing users can upgrade, and Steve Jobs is right:  for $49, iLife '11 is the best software value on the planet!

What Apple has done in the past decade is nothing short of a miracle.  My heart is actually warmed by the fact that the marriage of brilliant engineering, meticulous design, and creative genius has produced the spectacular contribution that is Apple, Inc. And I want to further note that Apple is now a blistering financial success, with stunning sales records and profits in everything they are doing, even in an extreme depression—an American economy that is utterly in the toilet because of America's complete lack of creativity and innovation in everything except blowing things up and killing people.  The bulk of Apple's revenue is coming from completely new and innovative products that didn't even exist much more than 3 years ago.  Apple is a model for what America can do, what America can be.  It's about leadership that carefully nurtures the marriage of engineering, design, and creative genius!

Related articles

• iLife '11: The Best New Tricks in iPhoto, iMovie and GarageBand [Apple] (gizmodo.com)
• Apple announces iLife '11 with new iPhoto, iMovie, GarageBand (venturebeat.com)
• Apple Announces iLife '11 With New iPhoto, iMovie, GarageBand (nytimes.com)
• Apple unveils iLife '11 with significant updates to iPhoto, iMovie, and GarageBand (edibleapple.com)
• Back to the Mac: GarageBand and iMovie '11 (nytimes.com)

The banks were too big to fail.  Google is too big to be anything but evil.

I'm sure everyone has heard by now that the little Google street car that has mapping our world (while very cool, it takes away our privacy) was also snooping around everyone's wireless networks.  If your network was unprotected when the Google street car came by your home or office, Google took your email and password information as well.

Don't tell me the very bright people at Google haven't been doing analysis on the human cognition of password creation.  To the nefarious among us, we are nothing more than data.  I'll never forget overhearing a restaurant dinner conversation here in LA, "Yeah, I like so-and-so, but that's just one data point!"

As far as I am concerned, Google can never be trusted.

Wi-Fi traffic intercepted by Google’s Street View cars included passwords and e-mail, according to the French National Commission on Computing and Liberty (CNIL)."

[Source: Google Street View Wi-Fi data included passwords and e-mail | Security | Macworld.]

I have made no secret of my disdain for the Mormon effort to influence the outcome of an election in the state of California by spending millions of dollars to mount a campaign of lies and deceit.  I have never understood why the Mormon church is so aggressively funding this campaign against civil rights, and I had no idea as to the magnitude and scope of their efforts and their financial influence in the election.

Why, exactly, are these people so insistent on forcing people who do not share their religious beliefs to live by their religious beliefs?

What is striking about the numbers is that although Mormons make up less than two percent of California's population, they made up more than 71 percent of campaign contributions, according to the film. Jeff Flint, a strategist with Protect Marriage, the group that spearheaded the Prop. 8 campaign, told the New York Times that 80 to 90 percent of the early volunteers who walked door-to-door in election precincts were Mormons. "

[Source: '8: The Mormon Proposition' - Exclusive Clip Reveals Church Coerced Members to Raise Millions For Prop. 8 Campaign (VIDEO).]

I haven't seen this Sundance Film, but this very excerpt is shocking and disturbing, portraying their church more as a cult of strong armed coercion than a faith practice.

Related articles:

• '8: The Mormon Proposition' is a powerful expose (trueslant.com)

I have become increasingly concerned over the past 10 years over what I have perceived to be an increasing polarization of Americans — an increasing radicalization, a swell of extremism of polar opposites, an unwillingness to listen, an indefatigable commitment to never change, a rise in anger and frustration over feeling powerless to live with and around what one perceives as "right."

The media seems to accentuate binary choices of either / or: right or left, conservative or liberal, win or lose, etc. In a Machiavellian strategy to win a culture war, words and people are redefined to achieve goals rather than unfurl meaning. I've concluded that technology, the great unequalizer, has just made all of this worse: so much distraction and so many deaf ears.

Enter an unlikely character who I think is bright, clever, and onto something significant: Kevin Roose. Kevin took his year abroad study opportunity at Brown University to attend a semester at the late Jerry Falwell*'s Liberty University, which now, to my shock, has over 60,000 students!

Kevin then wrote a book about this experience, The Unlikely Disciple: A Sinner's Semester at America's Holiest University.

If his book is anything like the video clip below, it is thoughtful and reflective, gently and respectfully probing ways to get people to start listening and finding common ground again. The video is well worth the 20 minutes.

I hope his efforts with the Jonah Project are successful.

Kevin Roose at Gel 2010 (author, The Unlikely Disciple) from Gel Conference on Vimeo.

*I've made no secret on this blog of my loathing of this man.

Craig Venter's announcement begins rather matter-of-factly:

We're here today to announce the first synthetic cell—a cell made by starting with the digital code in the computer, building the chromosome from four bottles of chemicals, assembling that chromosome in yeast, transplanting it into a recipient bacterial cell, and transforming that cell into a new bacterial species. This is the first self-replicating species that we've had on the planet whose parent is a computer. It's also the first species to have its own web site encoded in its genetic code. ...

Holy cow! What did he just say? And who is this guy?!  This is cited from the TED web site:

In 2001, Craig Venter made headlines for sequencing the human genome. In 2003, he started mapping the ocean's biodiversity. And now, in 2010, he's created the first synthetic lifeforms --… Full bio and more links

Yesterday, in the grocery store, I saw some magazine cover lamenting that no new cures are being developed by scientist for diseases.  This morning I listen to this.  I'll be frank with you, I'm not so sure this is a good thing.  Venter talks about how this discovery may open the door to creating effective vaccines, especially for viruses that mutate so quickly like the common cold and HIV.

I would like to hear a discussion about what all could go horribly wrong.  We don't even know how to dig oil out of the ground in the Gulf of Mexico and now we're going to rush ahead creating new, rapidly reproducing life forms that have never existed before?!  How long will it take for the nefarious among us to make a computer virus that becomes a new and horrifically deadly human virus?!

Have mercy!  We tinker boldly with that which we do not understand.  One bright and creative young man who saw this, and whose tweet actually steered me to this TED talk, said, "This is the future of software." I would like to add to that:  "This is the future of software, computer viruses, spam, the human virus???"

At the least, this is the stuff for some great science fiction!

Craig sort of does look like God, doesn't he. I mean, his beard could be longer and totally white. Put a white robe on him. And there you have it. It's all settled.

Related articles:

• CRAIG VENTER creates a cell with synthetic DNA. Venter is an interesting character. I invited him ... (pajamasmedia.com)
• Mad Scientist Creates Living Cell, Potentially Dooming Us All [Science] (kotaku.com)
• Scientist creates first living synthetic cells (nationalpost.com)
• Craig Venter's synthetic life breakthrough raises scientific hopes (guardian.co.uk)
• It's alive! Artificial DNA controls life (msnbc.msn.com)

So here's a mind-blowing question for everyone. Can you even entertain it? Can you play, "What if..."? Are you capable of this? I'm going to guess that you are not – especially if you are an extremely religious person, but we'll see.

Now remember, this is just a "What if..." mental exercise.

OK: The Setup
Most of the people I grew up with believe that the Bible, especially the New Testament, is the literal word of God and that it is a code by which we should all live our lives if we desire to be followers of Christ.

Question One:
So, what if... What if the translators of the original Greek texts got the translation wrong, significantly wrong.

What if a vast repository of literally tons of manuscripts written in the actual language of the original biblical Greek texts were found that clearly proved that numerous important words in the Bible were incorrectly translated throughout the entire Bible in ways that substantially altered the original meaning of the teachings of the New Testament.

Question Two:
What if there was irrefutable evidence that the church, for the past 2,000 years, has been misinformed and is not doing exactly what the Christ of the New Testament actually wanted his followers to do?

Question Three:
IF this were true, how would the people of the Christian church today respond?

Background:
For centuries the Christian church has acknowledged that no documents in the day-to-day Greek language of the time of Christ have survived to the modern era. This, of course, is the language in which the Bible is written — Koine Greek. Therefore, for centuries, scholars have painstakingly and methodically worked to piece together the very best translations they could using very meticulous methodology to derive the best understanding of the illusive ancient texts.

According to Michael Wood, literally tons of ancient manuscripts have been unearthed in the Egyptian desert over the past 120 years, manuscripts that are written in Koine Greek — the language of the Bible which was in fact the common language in which wills, deeds, and private letters of the day were written. These manuscripts reveal the exact meaning of the language the biblical manuscripts were written in. So, no more need for trying to ascertain the meaning of the words. This enormous collection of manuscripts clearly reveals the meaning of the words.

Mystery solved!

Hold your horses! Not so fast. According to Michael Wood, the Christian church has some rethinking to do.

Hundreds of passages have been translated incorrectly — so incorrectly that the meaning is significantly altered. Michael goes on to say that while numerous Biblical scholars applaud the fact that we now, for the first time, can accurately understand the actual language in which the Bible was written, the church downplays this and continues to produce the same old Bibles it has always printed — utterly bereft of the benefit of the accurate translations.

He presents a few of these mis-translated and thereby misunderstood Biblical teachings in his short book, The Jesus Secret.

Some Distance:
Now, I'm the first to admit that I have little knowledge and zero expertise in this area. I don't know if what he has written is factual or not. But he makes some compelling revelations that, for me anyway, have the ring of truth and really add a sensible level of historical and ideological perspective that perfectly resonates with the context of Jesus as I understand it.

What I do know is that the Christian church has a compelling reason not to change the 2,000 year old status quo; so, I wouldn't trust much of what their scholarship would have to say on this matter. They have too large of a vested interest in a specific outcome. Some unintentionally, others very deliberately, would be inaccurately swayed in their thinking by the weight of this 2,000 year old veil of thinking.

Hopefully, in the not-too-distant future scholars with no dog in this fight will weigh in on what the facts are in this very interesting and very important debate. In the meantime, I recommend you read Michael's book. It's certainly thought provoking. (This all has the makings of another great Dan Brown-style book and movie!)

[In my humble opinion, the title is a bit misleading. There are no secrets about Jesus, only new insights into the teachings of Jesus and the New Testament.]

An Interesting semi-related article:

• Mike Lux: How Do Christians Become Conservative? (huffingtonpost.com)

I speak a lot about making a difference, about making the world a better place because you live in it. I say this mostly to educators. The work of the educator is a calling more than a job, and our mission is to empower human potential. For some reason, about this I have always been passionate.

I have generally tried to live to this goal. But, perhaps in the business of living, I hadn't really stopped to consider where I measure up on this personal mantra. And today I was rather stricken with the realization. I've been actually doing it I think.

A very dear friend of mine said to me, years ago, "Tyson, you have no idea how strongly you impact people. You're just totally oblivious, aren't you." At the time I wasn't sure that was a compliment. He called me today. He will be here in LA tomorrow speaking at a conference. I haven't had the opportunity to see him for years. I'm so excited.

And today I got an email to my work address with the subject: "Dr. Tyson?"

The email was from a student from 30 years ago. I've received several of this type of unexpected email lately. As I read and memories come flooding back, these former students, sometimes former employees, speak in rather sobering terms of my impact in their lives. Yet, at the time, I had no idea.

Completely unaware, I've even had children named after me by former students. My kindergarten teacher from many, many years ago now, even named her son, "Tim." Maybe I've had an affect on people all my life. Again, I've never stopped to really consider any of this until, unexpectedly, today, it just sort of hit me with Yo Yo Ma playing while I was working away–bit of an emotional moment.

You just never know.

Justice John Paul Stevens' service to this nation has been substantive. I am fearful of what the court will become as he retires.

Justice John Paul Stevens’s departure from the Supreme Court represents the end of an era. Just not the one you are probably thinking of. Stevens’s unblinking devotion to human rights, civil rights, and the rights of the little guy have led him to be widely seen as the Last Great Liberal Justice, the end of a lineage that included William Brennan, Thurgood Marshall and William O. Douglas. But Stevens is something else entirely. He is actually the last of the Moderate Republican Justices.

Source: Dan Froomkin

Frankly, I'm with those who believe that Justice John Paul Stevens didn't become more and more liberal. Rather, the court became radicalized in its extreme conservatism. Justice Stevens never changed.

Related articles

• John Paul Stevens Retiring: We Need A Liberal Justice (oliverwillis.com)
• Memories of Justice John Paul Stevens From His Former Clerks (nytimes.com)
• Justice Stevens to Retire After 34 Years (nytimes.com)

Reflecting back about my recent trip to south Asia...

As I've mentioned before, Bangkok especially and central and south Vietnam were terribly hot and humid. Shorts and short sleeved shirts were always in order.

I was, however, astonished to see so many of the local people in those areas wearing long sleeved shirts, sweaters, and jackets. How could they possibly be cool?!

Most of the women also wore masks around their faces. I was a bit shocked to learn why this was so customary: these people, with gorgeous olive complexions, want to avoid tanning their skin at all costs. The women even purchase expensive skin whitening creams from Japan. The lighter the skin, the more beautiful you are considered.

Here in the US, white people are just the opposite.

Why are we humans never content with what we have? Sometimes I guess this compels us to achieve better things. Sometimes it is not in our best interest.

This trip, unlike any of my other travels around the world, was not without some rather anxious moments. I'm glad to be home. I think.

I read in CNN this morning that Thailand has declared a state of emergency after the protesters stormed parliament yesterday. While I was in Bangkok, the protests were peaceful. I really have no idea what their internal politics are all about and wasn't even aware of the current political unrest when I went to Thailand.

I left Bangkok on March 31st to spend about a week in Vietnam. (I still haven't had time to post pictures from my time in Bangkok. I was busy working. But I found the people in Bangkok to be so incredibly gracious and friendly.)

While in Vietnam, the mood of the people there was also hospitable. However, I felt the people were a little bit more rigid—not at all in the way they treated me, but just in their general approach to life. Life in Vietnam seemed more difficult for common people.

Their food is amazing. They smile easily. They have very, very different customs and culture. Their driving is frightening. Maybe I was infusing some of my own guilt for what the United States did in Vietnam into my perceptions of my time there. Maybe it was just the constant horn honking...

When I began to leave Da Nang to return home via Ho Chi Minh City and Bangkok and Narita, I was stopped by a woman working for the airport. She said my carry on bag was too large if it didn't fit in this little "size thing." When it did fit, as I knew it would, she then said it was too heavy. It was. It contains my expensive camera equipment. She insisted I check it. I refused.*

Vietnam Airlines is in the process of becoming a member of the SkyTeam Alliance. With my being a charter member of the Diamond Club with SkyTeam, which means I travel way too much, Delta allows free oversized and overweight bags. Not Vietnam Airlines--yet, anyway. After some ridiculous wrangling I got my stuff on board without having to check it.

So the return already was getting off to a bad start. Upon arriving in Bangkok, I was staying at Novatel, the very nice hotel at the airport. A shuttle picks everyone up and takes you to the hotel as it is not easily accessed by walking, and Bangkok is hotter than hell anyway.

We had to go through a security check point to enter the hotel property. The Mercedes in front of us was thoroughly inspected for explosives. I could immediately tell things were much more serious. In my room in this modern, gorgeous hotel, the air conditioning wasn't working well! I didn't sleep well.

When we were all boarding the airplane in Narita, the gate agent told us that everyone had to be weighed by order of the United States Federal Aviation Administration. They brought out 5 scales or so and everyone had to be weighed and our weights recorded. What I weigh is none of the US governments damned business!

I don't sleep well on planes either. After spending virtually two days on airplanes, I was dead dog tired and very irritable. I was glad to land at LAX. So I thought. US Immigration asked me an unusual number of questions. What was that all about?! I was soon to find out.

Apparently I am now, like millions of other law abiding Americans I've read about in the news, being confused with some idiot from another state who must be in some kind of trouble with the government. I had to go through additional screening. I was so irritated. To make matters worse, their is no due process. They will not tell you anything about why this is being done. This is the American way?!

I must say that the customs agent was very professional, even cordial. Thank God! My shoulder was hurting terribly; I hadn't slept for two days; I was in a really bad mood. I won't go into any details about the extra screening so I won't be arrested, as was the journalist (or photographer, I don't recall now) who blogged about a similar experience with Immigration through Seattle a few months ago.

I was given a web site to use to redress this issue, but, according to the news, this rarely even works. I have to travel out of the country again next week. Will I be able to get out? Will I be able to get back in? This is so absurd.

Our world is getting uglier and uglier. Freedom in the US died with the Patriot Act. We sold our national birthright for fear. Soon, our children will never have know the US I was born in as it will never have existed in their lifetime. Weird how things change.

I worry that, as the divide between the super wealthy and the poor widens and the number of poor continue to grow, we will see very bad times ahead. I guess this is nothing new. What will be new is how technology will be wielded in this conflict of interests.

At any rate, I hate traveling now. It's just so terribly unpleasant: badly behaving children, cramming too many people into too little space, and now airlines want to start charging to use the overhead storage and to use the bathrooms?! One airline will be reducing the number of toilets on board so they can cram even more seats on the plane. What the hell?!!!

* I've had international "security" go through and steal things from my checked luggage in the past and, since we can't lock our checked bags, will not allow my expensive items to be checked ever again.

Related articles

• Vietnam: Day Six - Rest and Relax in Hoi An (timtyson.us)
• Vietnam: Day One (timtyson.us)
• Vietnam: Day Five - The Ancient City of Hoi An (timtyson.us)
• Vietnam: Day Two - My Life Is Quirky That Way... (timtyson.us)
• Vietnam: Day Four - Driving (timtyson.us)
• Vietnam: Day Two - Hanoi (timtyson.us)
• Vietnam: Day One - Dinner (timtyson.us)

The extreme, religious right-wing conservatives have won yet another significant victory in their efforts to force their world view down the throats of unsuspecting Americans. I personally don't care what they choose to believe. But I take HUGE issue with their feverish evangelical approach to forcing everyone else in the nation live by their narrow belief system. In fact, I resent the hell out of anyone, right or left, forcing their beliefs on me, let alone forcing them on unsuspecting children to whom they didn't give birth!

Knowing they could never pull this off in California, the conservative movement targeted Texas, the state that gave the nation George W. Bush. In a 10 - 5 vote along party lines, the Texas Board of Education voted to approve the following conservative tenets being taught in their state's Social Studies curriculum and supported by the state-adopted textbooks:

• stress the superiority of American capitalism
• question the founding fathers commitment to a purely secular government
• present Republican political ideologies in a more positive light

Make no mistake, this is a carefully planned, well executed strategy by the ultra conservative think tanks. They have turned their initial claims of their own personal religious persecution into the wholesale religious persecution of the entire nation.  The end result will be religious tyranny, a return to the middle ages.

This decision in Texas has enormous ramifications for the entire nation—hence why it was targeted. The school textbook industry sells more textbooks in California, but too many people here have diverse thinking. But Texas is ripe for the picking. The good people of Texas think conservatively—very, ultra conservatively. Texas has the second largest textbook purchasing power in the nation. This is significant.

Now, the textbook industry will rewrite the Social Studies textbooks so they can sell them in Texas. This means the remainder of the nation will be forced to buy the drivel with which the ultra conservatives want their children in Texas indoctrinated. Mark my words:  This is a political victory of the highest order with long term ramifications of the most serious kind.

The extreme right-wing conservative think tanks have taken the minds of many unsuspecting Americans with their ownership of FOX so-called "news."  They have taken ownership of the conservative Republican party of which I was once a part. They have manipulated to control the highest court in the land. Now they are seeking the minds of the nation's children.  This is serious!  My country is actually under assault!

These extremists have quietly and patiently executed their strategy well under the banner of traditional values, heritage, and the homeland for decades.  The only way I think Americans can fight this momentous trend to force the nation to live by a narrowly-defined, prescriptive set of religious values that divest diversity, deep thinking, critical analysis, social justice, economic opportunity for all, open mindedness, tolerance, freedom of thought, freedom of speech, freedom of faith practice, et. al., is to support countervailing strategies that are just as well planned and executed.  As I've said, people who have divergent opinions and thoughts are the carefully selected target.

And as I've said before, I've become increasingly disgusted with what my nation is rapidly becoming, where the will of the few is increasingly being inflicted on the many in wealth aggregation, religious practice, legal policy, and now school curriculum. The extremist conservatives are well funded and organized at the grassroots level. It's time to stand up to them in an equally well funded grass roots effort.  The problem:  unlike the radical conservative thinkers of their movement who can manipulate their masses with a highly defined, carefully crafted agenda of fear, open minded people who think critically lack a central focus around which to organize.

We have lacked a motivating rallying cry around which to centralize our efforts.  Let this be it:  preserving our true American heritage from those extremist conservatives who are rapidly redefining it and marginalizing everyone who thinks differently from them!

Where are all of the libertarians that want the freedom to live their lives as they personally define the pursuit of life, liberty, and happiness?!

Tim is so not happy!

Related articles

• Texas Textbook MASSACRE: 'Ultraconservatives' Approve Radical Changes To State Education Curriculum (huffingtonpost.com)
• Texas Approves Conservative Curriculum (politics.slashdot.org)
• Texas conservatives rewrite history | Richard Adams (guardian.co.uk)
• Texas Becomes Laughingstock Once Again: State Board of Ed Determines History Is a Liberal Conspiracy (schoolsmatter.info)
• Texas Conservatives Win Vote on Textbook Standards (nytimes.com)
• Texas ed board adopts social studies standards (sfgate.com)

I have quoted from Mike's blog more than once here at tt.us.  So often, he nails it.

Mr. Stearns argues that evangelicals were often so focused on sexual morality and a personal relationship with God that they ignored the needy. He writes laceratingly about “a Church that had the wealth to build great sanctuaries but lacked the will to build schools, hospitals, and clinics.”

via Waving or Drowning?.

I loathe the use of religion to aggregate wealth and power by marginalizing and then persecuting those who aren't a "member of the club."  The more noble path is to contribute good to the world by helping, with no strings attached, those in need.

My life is blessed with some very wonderful, bright people of substance.  One of those is GG.  She recently shared one of her own quotations with me.  It is spot on!

"You believe of others what you know of your own heart."

This man isn't just superstitious, I find Pat Robertson to be hateful and evil! He also sounds like he can't breath. This extremist right-wing religious viper is a discredit to the God he claims to serve. My guess: he's about to seize an opportunity to "minister" to these people and make a fortune in the process.

He states that Haiti made a "pact with the devil" and has been cursed by God ever since. Astoundingly, he's actually serious! These are lunatic babblings and moral platitudes of a black-hearted mad man!

The people of Haiti don't need the filth of his religion. They need the kindness and compassion of people of God and the real help of real people motivated by real goodness.

And you know, Christy, something happened a long time ago in Haiti, and people might not want to talk about it, they were under the heel of the French, uh, you know, Napoleon the third and whatever, and they got together and swore a pact to the devil, they said, we will serve you, if you get us free from the Prince, true story. And so the devil said, 'OK, it's a deal.' And they kicked the French out, the Haitians revolted and got themselves free, and ever since they have been cursed by one thing after the other, desperately poor. . . the Island of Hispaniola is one island cut down the middle. On the one side is Haiti, on the other side is the Dominican Republic. Dominican Republic is, is, prosperous, healthy, full of resorts, etc. Haiti is in desperate poverty, same Islands, uh, they need to have, and we need to pray for them, a great turning to God. And out of this tragedy, I'm optimistic something good may come, but right now we're helping the suffering people, and the suffering is unimaginable.

Who among us today, in the media, will die being remembered as "the most trusted name in news." Oh, I know: Glenn... what's his last name?! You know, the one that cries on TV.

The former CBS anchorman cared not just about the next story but about the future of reporting in a country where was known for the better part of a half century as 'the most trusted name in news.'

So it should come as little surprise that what worried Cronkite in the last years of his life was the collapse of journalistic quality and responsibility that came with the increasing dominance of newsgathering by a handful of media corporations.

'I think it is absolutely essential in a democracy to have competition in the media, a lot of competition, and we seem to be moving away from that,' Cronkite told me the last time we spoke about media issues.

The definitional American anchorman, who has died at age 92, recognized that Americans would always need diverse and competing media outlets, with the resources and the skills to examine issues from a variety of perspectives -- and to challenge entrenched power.
"

(Via Why Cronkite Fretted About Media's Future - CBS News.)

As technology radically changes journalism, with the "citizen journalist" movement lacking sufficient voice and resources, as Rupert wants more money, I worry that our future may be increasingly filled with unexposed corruption and undiscussed issues of the great import.

Warning! Most Christians in the United States, and probably all conservative ones, will be deeply offended by this sign. I personally find it shocking. The thought that it was displayed by a Christian church astounds me.

Do not click the image to the right, which will open a picture of the sign that is large enough to see and read, if you are easily offended by those who may have different religious views from your own and express them in ways you may find incredibly offensive.

A church, St. Matthew's Church in Auckland, New Zealand, put this sign up "intended to challenge stereotypes about the conception of Jesus." It has sparked enormous levels of anger and outrage on both sides of the controversy.

"We would see a billboard like that being used by an anti-Christian group to actually poke fun at the divinity of Christ," Freer told National Radio.

Christ's conception was a profound theological question and the billboard would not "give rise to any intelligent discussion on the birth of Jesus," she said.

Many messages on the church Web site attacked the image, while others defended it.

"This billboard and your 'sermon' is a sacrilege," one visitor, identified as Karen, posted.

Another, identified as Andrew M, wrote: "I for one think this is an excellent billboard. Challenging and thought-provoking. Just what it was intended to be."

Via: NPR -- Billboard Depicting Joseph, Mary In Bed Sparks Row

A banker reminded me recently that capitalism creates more wealth than any other economic system. It just creates it very unevenly.

I think that it also treats disenfranchised people with little to no kindness at all--harkening back to that whole notion of "survival of the fittest." And as jobs have been outsourced abroad to those willing to work for wages well below what a typical American can sustain in the average American market, wage earning capacity is dropping to precipitous levels. I suspect that, rather than passing along cost savings to consumers, corporate execs have enhanced their own wealth aggregation with corporate jets, fat pensions and bonuses, etc.

I worry that the capitalist machinery of this nation has lost its moral compass, and the situation will only get worse. As markets explode in Asia, the fact that they are drying up here in the USA is of little concern to corporate America who sees a new cow fat for the slaughter house. Is it possible that, in time, America will in fact become the largest third world nation on earth as people lose their homes, their jobs, their spirit, their influence on democratic government, their voice, their access to news and critical information...

While in Ireland I noticed local villages took a very dim view of corporate ownership. "Buy local!" the signs read.

When you know the face of the wo/man who made/purchased the product or provided the service, it's more difficult to take advantage of her/him. You have an ancient social contract with them, as old as "Do unto others as you would have them do unto you."

Corporations have mastered the art of hiding their faces, have become inaccessible and unaccountable for their egregious conduct, are perpetuating a growing divide between those who have more than they will ever need and those who need just to survive.

I'm paying far more attention to my own purchasing habits. I want to "buy local" more than I want to support big box impersonal corporations whose first allegiance is to the bottom line. Doing so generally costs me a little more, but is this the price for taking better care of people, of attending to community?

Nicholas Carr's writing over at Rough Type often makes me think. He recently posted "Does My Tweet Look Fat?" I laughed.

I've grappled with Twitter for some time now. Yet I still don't know what I think of it.

I have no interest in knowing "What are [most people on this planet] doing?" at any particular moment in time. Most of what we do day to day is just not all of that interesting. It's routine. It's, as it must need be, mundane and perfunctory. And I personally find the narcissistic emphasis of the late 20th and early 21st centuries completely revolting. I guess, to be trite, I'm just not that into "you" when you think it's all about you.

Some have suggested to me that Twitter is more like tapping into the stream of consciousness for the world, or at least the Twitter-verse. Yikes, so much noise! My life is already filled with enough noise. Besides, managing my own stream of consciousness in real time is pretty much a full time job.

Now, when friends are traveling and tweeting pics and such: cool--I rather do find that interesting. And some virtual friends pique my interest when they tweet something fascinating or informative. But these seem to be the exception to the twitter-verse. And I suspect that almost everyone on this planet, except for my mother, has no interest in what I am doing at any particular moment in time.

So what does it say about us when our skinny little 140 character tweet is too fat? And from my vantage point, so many of the tweets that stream through this virtual spinal tap are all but anorexic--completely devoid of sustenance and meaning.

For me, tweets are too often like digital ADHD--disconnected flits of thought thereby rendered pretty meaningless. Yes, that's more like what it is to me: digital ADHD. (And don't get me wrong, I can ride that vibe for a while.)

I feel a need for deeper engagement with people than a flittering tweet here and there. And I don't really enjoy the tweet overload. I rather enjoy a good, realtime conversation--virtual or face to face. Yeah, whatever happened to the art of conversation? Surely we're not too busy for that, are we?

This non-partisan article, Many still believe that Saddam Hussein was behind 9/11, and now we have some idea why, is an interesting read. I would like to know more about the study. I think it just requires less effort to conform facts to our present, existing perspective. But I also have always suspected that extreme religious leaders cultivate an unhealthy faith-based over reason-based world view among their followers.

I am reminded of my father's humorous statement, "Don't confuse me with the facts."

I just discovered Mike Todd's blog a couple of days ago when I posted about his insights into Capitalism and Christianity. I really don't know much about Mike's thinking, but in just a couple of days he has stated things that really resonate with me!

From where I sit, this quotation is so totally on the mark. It's much too easy to talk. Few people bother live what they say they believe. That's much harder to do.

"We must move from a belief-based religion to a practice-based religion, or little will change. We will merely continue to argue about what we are supposed to believe and who the unbelievers are."

(Richard Rohr, The Naked Truth, p. 108)

link: Waving or Drowning?: We Must Move

Throughout the years, I've alluded to the improbable collusion of the conservative church movement of my childhood and the economy of greed and the "it's all about me" unfettered capitalism that has broken the back of my country. But Michael's letter makes some excellent points that I would hope cause those of faith to pause and reflect on the serious breach between what we say we believe and what we do in our lives.

I've frequently heard, "WWJD?" But, what is the answer to that question? For real this time...

Friends,

I'd like to have a word with those of you who call yourselves Christians (Muslims, Jews, Buddhists, Bill Maherists, etc. can read along, too, as much of what I have to say, I'm sure, can be applied to your own spiritual/ethical values).

In my new film I speak for the first time in one of my movies about my own spiritual beliefs. I have always believed that one's religious leanings are deeply personal and should be kept private. After all, we've heard enough yammerin' in the past three decades about how one should "behave," and I have to say I'm pretty burned out on pieties and platitudes considering we are a violent nation that invades other countries and punishes our own for having the audacity to fall on hard times.

I'm also against any proselytizing; I certainly don't want you to join anything I belong to. Also, as a Catholic, I have much to say about the Church as an institution, but I'll leave that for another day (or movie).

Amidst all the Wall Street bad guys and corrupt members of Congress exposed in Capitalism: A Love Story, I pose a simple question in the movie: "Is capitalism a sin?" I go on to ask, "Would Jesus be a capitalist?" Would he belong to a hedge fund? Would he sell short? Would he approve of a system that has allowed the richest 1 percent to have more financial wealth than the 95 percent under them combined?

I have come to believe that there is no getting around the fact that capitalism is opposite everything that Jesus (and Moses and Mohammed and Buddha) taught. All the great religions are clear about one thing: It is evil to take the majority of the pie and leave what's left for everyone to fight over. Jesus said that the rich man would have a very hard time getting into heaven. He told us that we had to be our brother's and sister's keepers and that the riches that did exist were to be divided fairly. He said that if you failed to house the homeless and feed the hungry, you'd have a hard time finding the pin code to the pearly gates.

I guess that's bad news for us Americans. Here's how we define "Blessed Are the Poor": We now have the highest unemployment rate since 1983. There's a foreclosure filing once every 7.5 seconds. 14,000 people every day lose their health insurance.

At the same time, Wall Street bankers ("Blessed Are the Wealthy"?) are amassing more and more loot -- and they do their best to pay little or no income tax (last year Goldman Sachs' tax rate was a mere 1 percent!). Would Jesus approve of this? If not, why do we let such an evil system continue? It doesn't seem you can call yourself a Capitalist and a Christian -- because you cannot love your money and love your neighbor when you are denying your neighbor the ability to see a doctor just so you can have a better bottom line. That's called "immoral" -- and you are committing a sin when you benefit at the expense of others.

When you are in church this morning, please think about this. I am asking you to allow your "better angels" to come forward. And if you are among the millions of Americans who are struggling to make it from week to week, please know that I promise to do what I can to stop this evil -- and I hope you'll join me in not giving up until everyone has a seat at the table.

Thanks for listening. I'm off to Mass in a few hours. I'll be sure to ask the priest if he thinks J.C. deals in derivatives or credit default swaps. I mean, after all, he must've been good at math. How else did he divide up two loaves of bread and five pieces of fish equally amongst 5,000 people? Either he was the first socialist or his disciples were really bad at packing lunch. Or both.

Yours,
Michael Moore

[From Michael Moore: For Those of You on Your Way to Church This Morning...]

There's just something very, very wrong with a society in which any of these things happens, and yet, all of them happened in the same tragic situation:

• A woman is murdered (swimsuit model)
  
• All teeth are pulled out of her skull (to prevent identification)
  
• All finger tips are cut off (to prevent identification)
  
• Her body is discarded in a dumpster
  
• The body is identified by the serial numbers on the breast implants
  
• Her presumed murderer apparently commits suicide
  

(In this photo, the murdered is embraced by her husband who is the presumed murder who committed suicide after fleeing the country.)

In five different events in LA this weekend alone, five people were murdered.

This is why I never watch the local news! Our culture disgusts me!

I get to meet and have engaging conversations with a number of amazingly bright people around the world as a result of my work. Today, on the way to the airport with Wayne was another such opportunity. Some noteworthy points from the conversation:

American society is built on three pillars: representative government (democracy), capitalism, and the Judeo-Christian ethic. After World War II perhaps the strongest pillar was democracy with an emphasis on civic responsibility.

Subsequently, democracy and civic responsibility has been overshadowed by capitalism, which has been elevated to the point of a religion focused on short term material gain in our modern culture. (He also added that the ultimate end of unfettered capitalism is one surviving corporation that has endured the fight of "survival of the fittest." Is that what we really want?)

Couple this with a significant shift in the original basis of the Judeo-Christian ethic: a move away from service to others, the golden rule (do unto others as you would have them do unto you), and love/compassion to a new emphasis on the self, personal gain in both power over others and materialism.

I recently heard a minister at a wedding say that if you will put your trust in God, "he will bless you with material gain beyond your wildest imagination." A couple of days ago I read an article in the NY Times about a thriving religious empire that profits (at staggering levels) from prodding people's superstitions with the notion that the more you give to their ministry, the more God will give to you in these difficult financial times; therefore, you should sacrifice and do without to give to them. (What charlatans! I'm delighted their "ministry" is under investigation for fraud and tax evasion.)

Hopefully (but doubtfully) we have seen the end result of the horrific marriage of this distorted view of the Judeo-Christian ethic and unfettered capitalism--the collapse of the entire financial system in the United States with significant collateral damage to the financial infrastructure of the entire world. Interesting to me that the nations that all along controlled the greedy capitalist machinery of their economy have already seen economic recovery!

In the process of a small number of people in this nation becoming exceedingly rich, we have done long term damage to the financial health of the nation our children will inherit.

Are we really that selfish and evil as a people? I suspect so, as we continue to allow the same greed and selfishness to dominate the health industry rather than caring about the health and physical well being of the people in our nation.

But my favorite quotation from our conversation: "Challenge the status quo every chance you get."

Amazon's mp3 store has another one of those deals today where you can get hours and hours of classical musics for pennies a song: 99 Bach masterpieces (8+ hours!) for $2.99. Even though Bach's works preceded copyright protection, this is a good example of how our culture benefits from sensible copyright term limits: eight hours of some of the finest music ever composed for about the price of a Happy Meal. More good classical music mp3 deals here.

via kottke.org

I've actually been thinking about the horrid outcome of making beauty nothing more than vacuous atmosphere requiring no cognitive interaction whatsoever, just vague mindless awareness devoid of the rich attention of soul deserved. Then when I read Jason's comment about 99 works of Bach, arguably the greatest composer to ever have walked the face of the earth, for the cost of a happy meal, I laughed out loud--a laugh of sadness.

It's outrageously sad that such beauty is so unappreciated, that so many people living today, in a time when they have access to so such of the earth's beauty don't see, hear, or sense it in any way.

America still, all these years later, can't control a renegade president in office who wants to wage war against the will and reason of the people. Our government has been self serving and out of control for 40 years now, at least.

I suspect McNamara felt he was doing some sort of penance by serving as the president of the Wold Bank for 13 years where he focused on doing some good in the world with his massive intellect.

Others are not so charitable:

Robert McNamara, who died this week, was a complex man—charming even, in a blustery way, and someone I found quite thoughtful when I interviewed him. In the third act of his life he was often an advocate for enlightened positions on world poverty and the dangers of the nuclear arms race. But whatever his better nature, it was the stark evil he perpetrated as secretary of defense that must indelibly frame our memory of him.

[From Truthdig - Reports - McNamara’s Evil Lives On]