Perhaps I should slow down with the drawing. I may need to hold back some pencils so I can put them in a tin cup, and sell them on a busy street corner.

I was shocked and saddened to read today of Tim Russert’s passing. Tim Russert was among a handful of journalists upon whom I would rely to make me an informed citizen. He was a member of the journalistic elite but never an elitist. His questions were tough but fair, and he could ask a combative question in such a pleasant, amicable way that he would get answers other journalists couldnt. He was a Democrat and worked for politicians including Mario Cuomo, but you’d never know it watching him moderate “Meet the Press” because he exemplified objectivity. Every week when I finished watching “Meet the Press,” I’d think, “…and that’s the way it is.”

I can’t remember when I started watching ”Meet the Press,” but Russert was the host by then. I gravitated to the show because Russert elevated the discussion beyond petty partisan bickering. Oh, sure, he often had guests who would simply parrot the talking points of their political party, and “debates” that amounted to people like James Carville and Mary Matalin expelling oral flatulence. But Russert had a way of moderating those discussions in such a way that one could find the speck of gold among all the dust of partisan rhetoric. And when it came to the roundtable, he’d assemble some of the finest journalists in the field, and together they would add to the sum total of our knowledge rather than fall all over each other trying to score some imaginary “points.” 

Russert used the medium of television skillfully. When some political figure declared that he or she had “always” supported this or opposed that, he would then put on the screen text of a quote that belied their claim, or video that did the same. For example, just before Hillary Clinton bowed out of a the Democratic primary race, Clinton supporter Harold Ickes was claiming that she had won the popular vote. Russert reminded him that months ago Ickes had told him, “Tim, repeat after me, the delegates determine the nominee, not the popular vote.” Ickes closed his eyes for a fraction of a second and heaved a sigh. He, like so many before him, found that Tim Russert wouldn’t let him get away with the spin. 

Russert was born and raised in Buffalo, just about an hour from my hometown of Rochester, N.Y. He never forgot his roots; NBC’s Brian Williams called Russert “aggressively unfancy.” During football season, Russert would always give a shout out to his (and also my) favorite football team, closing out “Meet the Press” by saying “go Buffalo Bills” and then urging them to beat whatever team they were playing that week.

Russert was clearly enjoying covering this most remarkable presidential race. It is particularly tragic that he died before being able to cover its conclusion. He deserved to live long enough to report on the outcome.

My thoughts and prayers go out to Russert’s family, friends, and colleagues. The world is poorer for his passing. And my Sunday mornings will never the same.

Rest in peace, Mr. Russert. And may the Buffalo Bills win a Superbowl in your honor.

Pakistan was already in turmoil before Bhutto’s death, after all. Pervez Musharraf is locked in a vicious cycle where he tightens his grip on power in response to declining public support, which of course leads to further erosion of his popularity. His pro-U.S. stance isn’t helping him, and Al Qaeda and the Taliban are salivating for any chance they can get to influence, or worse yet, become Pakistan’s leadership. Let us not forget that India and Pakistan are still at odds over a territorial dispute.

The assassination of Archduke Franz Ferdinand was enough to touch off a World War. The assassination of Bhutto may not have such immediate or widespread ramifications, but sometimes all it takes is one falling domino to topple a hundred others.

One of the obstacles before Romney as he pursues the Republican presidential nomination is his faith: he is Mormon, and many of the fundamentalist Christians who form the party’s base consider his religion to be heretical and cult-like. So Romney gave a speech about “Faith in America,” with the goal of assuring people that his religious beliefs would not influence the way he governs should he be elected president.

Unlike John F. Kennedy, who overcame the stigma of his Catholicism by making clear that he believed “in an America where the separation of church and state is absolute,” Romney made a case for faith-based governance, declaring that “freedom requires religion, and religion requires freedom.” Romney promised that should he be elected president, he will “serve no one religion, no one group, no one cause, and no one interest.” But he made it clear that he believes faith in God is the bedrock upon which our nation was founded: “In John Adams’ words: ‘We have no government armed with power capable of contending with human passions unbridled by morality and religion… Our constitution was made for a moral and religious people.’ ”

Romney diluted his message of religious plurality by pandering to hardcore Christians, explicitly making clear that while Mormons may have a different spin on things, they accept Jesus Christ as their “personal savior.” He made no overt attempts to similarly connect, for example, with Jews, Muslims, Buddhists, or (perish the thought) atheists.

(As an aside, Mike Huckabee, another contender for the Republican nomination, tried to take a swipe at Romney by “asking” if Mormons believed Jesus and Satan were “brothers.” When he was called out, he apologized, but I remain convinced that Huckabee was merely sorry his remarks failed to sail under the mainstream media’s radar.)

The idea that “freedom requires religion, and religion requires freedom” is nothing new. After all, the Declaration of Independence has as its premise that we are “endowed by [our] Creator with certain unalienable Rights.” The concept, which is grounded in the ideas of the philosopher John Locke, is that humans have certain rights by virtue of “natural law,” and that no government has legitimate authority to deny us these rights.

While there are those who believe such rights flow from the existence of a Divine Creator, one could just as easily argue that these rights are inherently ours because they represent the natural aspirations of the human race, flowing from the survival instinct and a desire to do that which makes us happy. One could also argue that these rights are inherent because history has shown that governments that respect those rights have had the greatest success providing a modicum of prosperity, security, and stability to their people.

That’s why I find the cut of Romney’s jib so troubling. I am an advocate of not tinkering much with what the Founding Fathers created, because it has worked pretty damn well. But our nation was not created without flaws: we had to fight a war to end the scourge of slavery within our borders, and women had to wage a fight of sorts to be granted the right to vote. By the same token, I believe our Founding Fathers’ views about religion and spirituality must also be open to examination and re-consideration.

If anyone believes that secularism is the source of our society’s ills, and religion the cure-all, one has to look no further than a recent assault against some Jewish youngsters on a NYC subway. They were attacked by putative Christians who were attempting to avenge the death of their savior at the hands of Jews on Chanukah (these “Christians” weren’t exactly the brightest bulbs in the box).

Religion to me is like a hammer. It is a tool that is neither inherently good nor bad. A hammer, after all, can be employed alongside other tools to build a house for Habitat for Humanity. In that case, it is a transformative tool that turns raw materials into the manifestation of the American Dream for people who otherwise couldn’t afford it. On the other hand, one can use a hammer to crush someone’s skull. In a similar fashion, religion can inspire people to great acts of compassion, or even lifetimes devoted to the service of others. Mother Theresa is but one example. Religion can also be the motive for violence, however, as the NYC subway attack sadly makes clear. Atheism is no different. There are movements such as Marxism that seek to enforce atheism as part of a rigid and ultimately self-defeating dogma that has resulted in violence and the restriction of human liberty. On the flip side, the secular humanist movement, comprising a number of atheists, has been at the forefront in many cases of defending human rights.

This is why I believe it is inaccurate to say that “freedom requires religion.” I believe it is more accurate to say that freedom includes the right to worship – or not to worship – as one’s conscience dictates, and that religion is best served by a government that stays out of matters of faith. And this is why I am saddened that to this day presidential candidates feel they have to demonstrate their “Christian street creds.”

The man was just convicted! Maybe we could, y’know, let him pay the piper for blowing his first chance before we talk about whether he deserves a second one?

Good Christ, here we go again.

President Bush shot our credibility to hell by exaggerating intelligence about WMDs in Iraq and got us embroiled in a war with no clear objectives, no clear benefit to us, and no end in sight. And yet here he is trying to do the same thing all over again.

Yes, there is logic in the argument that Iran’s merely having the knowledge to produce weapons-grade nuclear material is a very bad thing for us. There is naught but illogic, however, in the idea that we can intimidate Iran into giving up its nuclear power program. Our failures in Iraq have done nothing but embolden the Iranian government, and they know damn well we don’t have the resources to occupy both their nation and Iraq simultaneously. Moreover, our credibility with the rest of the world is in tatters. I can guarantee you that however little help we’re getting from our allies in Iraq, we’ll get infinitely less from them should we foolishly choose to start a war with Iran.

On the streets of Iran, there is growing discontent with the repressive government headed up by President Ahmadenijad. Moreover, there are many Iranians who are unconvinced that we are the Great Satan. Instead of squeezing them with sanctions or thinly veiled and empty threats of military action, perhaps we should be looking at strengthening and emboldening this anti-government sentiment. The results may not be as immediate as “shock and awe,” but it may be far more effective in the long run.

Lee is being prosecuted for accidentally distributing to a minor a comic-book containing coarse language and a depiction of the artist Picasso in the nude. And yet, there is this statue sitting right in front of City Hall in Rome:

I don’t know what’s more disturbing… the fact that Gordon is being prosecuted for accidentally giving a kid a comic that is no more offensive than a statue sitting right out in public… or how godawful that statue is.

Back when films were silent, there was no need for elaborately written screenplays. Directors, therefore, were the source of films’ stories. Sometimes they’d write them down, sometimes not. Writers were only brought in to throw in some half-assed captions after the movie had been shot. Once sound was added to movies, however, the role of the writer became infinitely more important. Audiences could hear the characters talk, and therefore those characters had to have something to say. Stories of a necessity became more complex, creating a need for, yep, you guessed it: screenplays.

Unfortunately, rather than adapt to a new reality, Hollywood’s thinking remained stuck in its silent film past, and never became un-stuck. That’s why the industry — and the public at large — continues to treat directors as though they are the authors of “their” movies, even though those directors are merely realizing a vision carefully crafted and laid out by a screenwriter. Think of it this way: would you refer to a builder as the architect of a structure if that builder was working from someone else’s blueprints? Of course not. The architect is the one who drafted the blueprints. Yet in ass-backwards and thought-deprived Hollywood, directors are considered the architects even though someone else drafted the blueprints!

This intellectual inflexibility is a great deal of the reason why writers in Hollywood are treated so unfairly, why the WGA is necessary, and why they must go on strike to get even a fraction of the revenue pie that they deserve.

Rudy Giuliani decided to cast aside his moderate street creds and accept an endorsement from the Rev. Pat Robertson, while McCain was busy brown-nosing Sam Brownback. Both Robertson and Brownback represent a Christian evangelical movement that promotes bigotry and immorality.

Yeah, yeah, I know, Christians believe themselves to be “moral.” I don’t care. The belief that homosexuality is an affront to God is merely bigotry, and bigotry is immoral. I don’t care if it’s in the Bible. I really don’t. The Bible was written not by God but by men.

What’s worse is that Robertson is merely an extreme manifestation of the bigotry that is sanctioned by some of the largest mainstream Christian denominations. While I realize that not all Christians are bigoted, far too many are. What’s most frustrating about it is the extreme hypocrisy of these Christians. The New Testament of the Bible preaches humility and non-judgment, and yet so many Christians blithely exemplify the opposite. It’s why I went from being a devout Catholic to a man without a religion. 

Giuliani was a social moderate. McCain used to be a maverick who actually took stands on principle regardless of the cost. Now both are pandering to the bigots who form the base of the Republican party. Well, guess what? Even if either one wins the party nomination and later the general election, how can either be an effective leader after having abandoned so many of their principles? How can anyone? It’s a problem that’s plagued every president since Ronald Reagan, who pretty much agreed with his party’s base but was charismatic enough to win a general election.

I mean, good Lord, no one who goes into an airport bathroom looking to pay for gay sex expects the bloody Spanish Inquisition, now, do they?