Hi,

I agree that Tone is a nutjob however I am hoping that he will do something for the cause of sanity. Part of the remit of his recently created 'faith foundation' is to educate religious people about other religions. Whilst I recognise that there will remain a hardcore of staunch 'my religion is right' crowd, I hope that less dimwitted religious folk will start to realise how contentious all religions are. And he is doing this all under the heading of 'faith foundation', a term that is clearly faithful friendly, and has a clear similarity to 'faith based initiative' in sound. I think that it will resonate well in the US, which is of course where it is being launched. It would be quite concerned if he were doing this in the UK as it would mean a step backwards for the UK.

The guy is now what he has always been, a politician. In the interview on the BBC World Service he pointedly avoided answering any question that specifically asked in what way his "foundation's" alleged principles could be translated into action. Or better said, when asked he answered a different question entirely, and then with non-specific nonsense (religious organisations are better at providing disaster relief because they are).

The man was vacuous and vain as a parliamentarian. He is still.

And he was never a convincing public speaker in my opinion. Even when he occasionally did try to impart a point that was based on sound and justifiable reasoning (normally someone else's) he managed to make it sound like a spin job. Yet other agencies still persevered in telling us to deny the evidence of our eyes and ears and believe that he was eloquent, intelligent and properly briefed. It is no wonder at all to me therefore that he is gravitating more and more towards religion in his chosen public persona, it has traditionally proved a refuge for just such cant and vain hypocrites in the past, and it is of course founded on the principle of denying evidence, a central plank upon which his political career was built.

And of course its ambiguities dressed up as certitudes is quite a nice environment for inveterate liars too. Blair's problem, I imagine however, will not be that he will necessarily be found out in his new role (he is proof that sufficient numbers of people have no strong objection to being hoodwinked), but his inability to arrest his own progress down the path he has chosen before he declares himself to be god.

Yeah, this is the first time I've really followed the American primaries, and the role that religion plays in it is incredible. The candidates would probably never admit to being non-religious because it means losing votes. In this country politicians, particularly leaders will rarely talk about religion "We don't do God" is still pretty much the government's stance on religion. There are several politicians who call themselves religious, but it is a private matter and it barely has any effect on anything (except the recent votes on embryology and stem cell bills which are contentious for Catholic MPs). 

In any official sense we're still way off being a secular state. We still have a monarch who is head of the state and head of the state's institutionalised religion. Even if we are a culturally progressive nation we still have backward state institutions, the remnants of a feudal monarchy and aristocracy, a state religion, a parliament which is more like a battelfeild than a civilised policy-making legislature.  I can't wait for the day when Britain is declared a secular socialist republic.