Religion is not the belief there is a god. Religion is the belief god tells you what to do.

I don't regard myself as any kind of conservative, except conceivably neo, and that word, of course, is a ridiculous appellation, because it's used to describe a group that was ready to make war on the status quo, which is not a conservative position.

Here is the point about myself and my co-thinkers. Our belief is not a belief. Our principles are not a faith. We do not hold our convictions dogmatically. We believe with certainty that an ethical life can be lived without religion. And we know for a fact that the corollary holds true - that religion has caused innumerate people not just to conduct themselves no better than others, but to award themselves permission to behave in ways that would make a brothel-keeper or an ethnic cleanser raise an eyebrow.

And the pleasures and rewards of the intellect are inseparable from angst, uncertainty, conflict and even despair.

it is interesting to find that people of faith now seek defensively to say that they are no worse than fascists or Nazis or Stalinists

Anyone who can look me in the eye and say they prefer the story of Moses or Jesus or Mohammed to the life of Socrates is intellectually defective.

I'm a single-issue voter, to get straight to the point. I'm really only interested in the candidate who's toughest and least apologetic when it comes to the confrontation with Islamic Jihadism.