Lady Gaga cancels Indonesian show after Muslim threats

Before you continue half-cocked, it might be apposite to read about the concept of "civil religion" and its pertinence in American history by experts in the field, Martin E. Marty and Robert Bellah, inter alia.

Ever read Laura Ingalls Wilder? I wonder whether 'Abraham Lincoln' has ever done so, and what he made of her books, if he did.

Children's books can be very interesting, and Ingalls Wilders' intelligent reflections upon her growing up in frontier America - which were published in the 1930s and early 1940s - are worth the reading: I commend them to anyone here who has not yet read them, especially to those posters and lurkers who are (like me) from countries other than the USA.

And so, to others posting or lurking here: if you ever watched the tv series 'Little House on the Prairie' which was VERY loosely based on the series: ERASE IT FROM YOUR MIND. Just read the books, if you have not already done so. If you are not American, when you have finished you will understand a *lot* about America.

'Little House in the Big Woods' (1932), 'Little House on the Prairie' (1935), 'On the Banks of Plum Creek' (1937), 'By the Shores of Silver Lake' (1939) (to understand the railways, just read one chapter in that, in which Laura is taken by her father to see the men out at the advancing end, where the railway is being built over unploughed prairie land), 'The Long Winter' (1940), 'Little Town on the Prairie' (1941), 'Those Happy Golden Years' (1943) and 'The First Four Years' (a draft edited and published posthumously, in 1962, by Ingalls Wilders' daughter Rose). Also 'Farmer Boy' (1933) which is the story of her husband's upbringing on a prosperous farm in the Eastern states (his dad never went west like Laura's dad did).

Above all: read 'The Long Winter' (1940). It is very politically - and spiritually - sophisticated, and spine-chillingly powerful. The chapters that matter most? - 'The Wheat in the Wall', 'Not Really Hungry', 'Free and Independent', 'Breathing Spell', 'For Daily Bread'. 'Four Days Blizzard', and 'The Last Mile'.

And then there is 'Little Town on the Prairie' (1941), the chapter entitled 'The Fourth of July'.

The town that has come through the six month blizzard - surviving by the skin of its teeth - celebrates Fourth of July. Someone reads the Declaration of Independence. Then Laura's Pa begins to sing: My country,'tis of thee/ sweet land of liberty/ of thee I sing/ Long may our land be bright/ with Freedom's holy light/ protect us by thy might/ Great God, our King'.

And Laura Ingalls Wilder, looking back on that moment, writes "The crowd was scattering away then, but Laura stood stock still. Suddenly she had a completely new thought. The Declaration and the song came together in her mind, and she thought: God is America's king".

There's more; all of it pertinent to the issues raised in this thread: a reflection upon freedom, conscience and what Ingalls Wilder understands as 'God's law'. Whether 'Abraham Lincoln' likes it or not, that's the way a young woman brought up on the prairies by two intelligent and by no means fanatically devout, but nevertheless churchgoing Christian parents, responded to one of America's founding documents, and what it meant in terms of her own experience; it is also the way that that same young woman, looking back on her childhood and youth when she was an old woman, thought about her country.

"So this not evidence of Islamists increasing their grip on power in Indonesia"

You're right; they are not increasing their grip. They ALREADY have it; whether it's officially recognized or not it's completely besides the point. They ARE calling the shots. The government's response gives it s smokescreen to pretend it cares.

I would NEVER, EVER spend a penny of my money buying things made either on Indonesia or Malaysia if I had the choice.

WAKE UP!

'Abraham_Lincoln' wrote : "What exactly would those authoritarian Western "conservatives" do differently on that issue? "Re-education" camps come to mind ".

Yes - there are daily news reports about conservative western authoritarians, who want to send people like Lady Gaga into re education camps because they find her offensive.

Happens everyday.

What you wrote is a lot of nonsense.

The " reeducation " camps do exist, but they are the off spring of the authoritarian left.

They are called " Sensitivity training classes ", and " Diversity work shops ". Calling them reeducation camps is not good for public relations.

Yep - those right wingers are a real threat to freedom...

dda,

Thanks for that wealth of recommendations of literature I'm ashamed to say I'd never heard of (and I'm American). I'll try to look some of them up and continue my education.

On a related note, I was reading about how Obama took his oath on Lincoln's Bible. I'd be curious to look at the pages of Lincoln's Bible. I'd wager they are worn from regular and frequent reading, and may have interesting notes he wrote in the margins reflecting a mind preoccupied quite differently from that of the eponym's namerobber.