Romney hates me

X4mr beat me to the punch, and has a good post up explaining why a "secularist", a category into which I would unquestionably fall, might be very concerned by Romney's speech. I'd like to take a moment to note as of 2001 15% of Americans, minimum, fell into that category, with the numbers growing rapidly.

To put that in perspective, that's more than 10 times as many secularists as Mormons. Secularists would be second only to Christianity in terms of their views vis-a-vis religion in this country (a very distant second, admittedly). If you were to view secularists as their own religious sect (which Romney, incorrectly, does) it would rank third, behind only Roman Catholics and Baptists ... and given trends, secularists have likely moved past Baptists since the linked survey was completed and into second place.

In other words, that's a pretty big minority of people Romney is expressing intolerance for. There are considerably more secularists in this country than Blacks or Hispanics.

X4mr also does an excellent job of explaining why the John Adams "Freedom requires religion just as religion requires freedom" quote doesn't mean what Romney would like everyone to interpret it as meaning. Sadly, he'll get away with it - the vast majority of his intended audience will seize on it as evidence our revered founding fathers always intended our government to be steered by religion, regardless of constraints built into the Constitution. "Oh, they really didn't mean that."

There is another statement out there, Article XI of this document, a document Adams very publicly avowed his support for and signed into law, supported unanimously by Senate, the opening clause of which states in no uncertain terms:

"As the Government of the United States of America is not, in any sense, founded on the Christian religion ..."

Oddly, Romney didn't see fit to include that Adams statement in his address.