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At the risk of exploding this thread again, [...]

Can I nominate this for the Best Post In Thread award?

I'm going to slightly re-order a couple of your statements...

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I truly, deeply believe that all of the political conflict comes from humanities obscuring of the truth and being who we were created by God to be.


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People have used religions to prop themselves up and create codes that bring them personal power and control over others. [...] However, people have also abused many other institutions such as business, government, and other completely secular organizations.


I think you've really touched on two seperate, but intertwined issues there. I'll ignore the religious aspect of the first, and simplify it a little to "political conflict comes from different perceptions of what constitutes the truth" -- where a person finds their Truth, whether through a religion, or not, is immaterial to the fundamental argument. That's the first issue, and I think that sort of political conflict is reasonable, and a healthy conflict -- what do we do about something like abortion? (Rhetorical question for illustrative purposes, only...)

The second issue is in your second quote, and I think that's where a preponderance of current US political conflict comes from. I suspect that a large number of non-Bush supporters see the current administration falling completely, and wholly within that description -- on both the religious and secular aspects. I know I certainly do. (But then, I also see the same problems, at least on the secular side, with the Dems, too.)

I don't know how for certain, but it feels as though the preponderance of conservatives are voting based primarily on the first issue, and secondarily on the latter, while the opposite is true for the liberals. When I see the (re-ordered) first statement, along with the second statement, it's pretty clear that the two sides will never meet in the middle -- they're simply on two seperate paths.

The sad part of all this? The second issue is exactly what the founding fathers were trying to prevent via the Constitution, and the Bill of Rights. For one person's perspective on how that was derailed take a look at this article and book.