Walter Cronkite Quotes
Attorney General John Ashcroft has earned himself a remarkable distinction as the Torquemada of American law. Tomás de Torquemada...was largely responsible for...[the] torture and the burning of heretics — Muslims in particular. Now, of course, I am not accusing the Attorney General of pulling out anyone's fingernails or burning people at the stake (at least I don't know of any such cases). But one does get the sense these days that the old Spaniard's spirit is comfortably at home in Ashcroft's Department of Justice.
Cronkite, Walter. "Ashcroft's Justice." King Features Syndicate, 1 Dec. 2003.
While Christianity and other religious groups were the inventors of these particular devices of compulsion of conscience, in modern times, but almost all other groups have given up torture and execution as a means of compelling religious obedience, many Muslim nations, even in modern times use the machine gun or the headman’s sword or other barbaric means to punish heretics. At the beginning of the third millennium, Islamic theocracies such as Iran, commonly executed followers of the Bhai and other non-Islamic religions. Many historians feel that the Muslims learned from the Christians such barbarity, but maintained the practices long after the questions had abandoned them. In addition, Shiite and Sunni Muslims have been butchering each other for centuries in dominate Islam nations and trying to force their interpretation of Islam in each other. The practice still continues.
Ingersoll was considered to be the greatest orator and political thinker of his day, but his overt atheistic views curtailed his elected political career.
In the midst of the Argentine Dirty War where the right wing government was murdering and torturing their political enemies of the left, most of the Catholic Church Priests and other Church Authorities had sided with the government and morally overlooked their atrocities and crimes against humanity. Others were fearful as Bishop Enrique Angelelli had been murdered by the military death squads in 1976. Bishop Hesayne was one of the few members of the Church hierarchy who criticized church officials for their silence.
Servetus’ book On the Motion of the Heart and Blood of Animals, was so threatening that of the 1000 copies that were printed only 3 survived the burning including ironically Calvin’s personal marked up copy.
The King, a religious exremist fanatic, was a great supporter of the Inquisition whose excesses were horrible during his reign.
Toleration is a relative term. The Muslim Moors made Christians (and Jews) pay a special tax. At times they were forced to wear special clothing so that they could be readily identified. And they could not build churches larger or taller than the smallest mosque in the community. At times, their occupations were restricted but at other times Christians and Jews were appointed to the highest positions like Vizier. The Inquisition, in contrast, forced all Muslims (and Jews) to leave the country without any of their property or money or be tortured and killed—usually by burning at the stake unless of course that they converted to Christianity.
She was referring to the pictures that American soldiers had taken of their acts of torture and humiliation of Iraqi prisoners in the Abu Graib.
William was a Catholic himself. Spain then controlled Holland.
Samuel Langhorne Clemens, 1835-1910
In most countries those who identify with the economic views of Mises also tend to be strong supporters of orthodox religion—usually Christianity. American conservative Republicans are typical. However they rarely are aware of views and quotations of their intellectual guru that are evidenced by this quote. See {632408} for another quotation that distressed many European conservative devotees of Mises.
Walter Leland Cronkite Jr. was an American broadcast journalist who served as anchorman for the CBS Evening News for 19 years (1962–1981). During the 1960s and 1970s, he was often cited as "the most trusted man in America" after being so named in an opinion poll. Cronkite reported many events from 1937 to 1981, including bombings in World War II; the Nuremberg trials; combat in the Vietnam War; the Dawson's Field hijackings; Watergate; the Iran Hostage Crisis; and the assassinations of President John F. Kennedy, civil rights pioneer Martin Luther King Jr., and Beatles musician John Lennon. He was also known for his extensive coverage of the U.S. space program, from Project Mercury to the Moon landings to the Space Shuttle. He was the only non-NASA recipient of an Ambassador of Exploration award. Cronkite is known for his departing catchphrase, "And that's the way it is", followed by the date of the broadcast.
