Opinion: In today’s pages: Christian soldiers, sanctuary, and South Central
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Michael L. Weinstein and Reza Aslan say the Pentagon needs to stop Christianizing soldiers:
Last week, after an investigation spurred by the Military Religious Freedom Foundation, the Pentagon abruptly announced that it would not be delivering ‘freedom packages’ to our soldiers in Iraq, as it had originally intended.What were the packages to contain? Not body armor or home-baked cookies. Rather, they held Bibles, proselytizing material in English and Arabic and the apocalyptic computer game ‘Left Behind: Eternal Forces’ (derived from the series of post-Rapture novels), in which ‘soldiers for Christ’ hunt down enemies who look suspiciously like U.N. peacekeepers.The packages were put together by a fundamentalist Christian ministry called Operation Straight Up....
Columnist Ronald Brownstein comments on the battle over ‘sanctuary’ for illegal immigrants. USC’s Manuel Pastor explains how to develop South-Central, and Andrew D. Blechman discusses reforming the complicated German language.
The editorial board calls Vice President Dick Cheney to task for contempt, and says it’s high time to fix runways at LAX. The board also encourages Hollywood studios to let consumers decide between video formats Blu-ray and HD DVD.
Readers react to a Column One about a cruel trend of killing farm animals for fun, and getting a slap on the wrist. Hiram, Ga.’s Michelle Shamasneh notes, ‘Despite our carnivorous desensitization to the suffering of these animals, the violence that they should have to face needs to have clear legal limits.’