North Korea has supposedly tested a nuclear weapon. The world warned them not to do so. Even their communist brother, China, spoke out against a nuclear test. However, on Monday October 9th, 2006 North Korea claimed to have successfully test a nuclear device. Now, sources are saying North Korea has not yet reached their nuclear goal and that are not capable of launching a nuclear assault upon the world. However, they have completed the first step in a series of many at becoming a nuclear power. A logical step that they most likely will take in the future is to find a way to equip long range missiles with nuclear devices. At this stage, their nondog medium range missiles could be fitted with a nuclear device and be able to hit most of Japan and South Korea is in much more danger than that. Our world could be heading towards World War III, especially if North Korea assists Iran in their path to become a nuclear power.

Now, while this is just one of many paths our world could take at this moment it seems as if it is the most obvious. This spells out trouble for us as citizens of the United States. While North Korea's Taepodong-2 missiles (which were believed to be able to reach the US) failed their test, they were and are still not our biggest problem. Our most dire danger comes from within our own country. As the winds of war begin to blow, the Bush Administration along with the religious right would build up a barrier against it, a false barrier. For while building their barrier, a barrier they say will protect us, they will strip away more of our rights in the name of safety. This is not far fetched at all. Already Congress has passed a bill that allows people to be held with out cause and to also be tortured with permission from only one man, the President. Before this, the Patriot Act began stripping away our right to privacy, also in the name of safety. However, a bill that was passed earlier this month, the Public Expression of Religion Act, scares me more than any of them.

Why? Because such an act is a push towards theocracy. The constitution of our country, our Bill of Rights, states that no religion shall be sanctified by the federal government. And yet our Congress passed a Bill that gives more special treatment to Christianity. Yes, Christianity. Christianity holds the religious majority in our country and any pass given to religion is a helping hand in disguise to Christianity. This is a very dangerous move and the barrier that will be built supposedly for our safety will be grounded in the church. Our leader is a born again Christian. His strongest supporters are fundamentalist Christians. If they had their way, Christianity would be the official religion of our country and all others forms of spirituality or lack thereof would be made illegal. This is why PERA scares me. A bill has been passed that gives christianity yet another free pass above criticism. It's no longer taboo, it's law.

As the world becomes a more dangerous place, the United States is slipping into the spider web of President Bush. A nation threatened is a nation that will take actions not normally taken under peaceful circumstances. Our rights will be stripped away one by one in clever disguises like that of PERA. They claim to be for the protection of all, but in reality they only protect a select few. When the world is full of enemies, those who are not like the majority are the first to be suspected. This nation at the tipping point. Shall it completely tip over, the constitution shall crumble and our nation will transform into the anti-United States of America. A country where the rights of it's people come second. The cause of this dangerous slip towards chaos can be narrowed down to one word, religion.

President Bush believes in an invisible man in the sky. He believes in judgement day. A day in which the world will end as his invisible pal will invite all of the others who have befriended him into paradise while the rest of the worlds population is thrown into a lake of fire. This is why our nation stands where it does now, before a road that leads towards evil. If our President believes such a fairy tale with all of his heart, the end of the world is of no concern to him. In his twisted, childish mind such an event will only be aiding the will of his invisible man. This scares me. As religious fundamentalists begin their march towards power with such brainwashing facilities as "Jesus camps" (bible camps in which fundamentalists indoctrinate young children into God's Army for a war against the non-believers), our world begins it's path towards destruction. If this world ends, religion will be the force that pushes the big red button that destroys it.

The winds of war that sting our faces feel differently to the religious fundamentalists of the world, especially those who believe and wait for the apocalypse. To them, these winds feel like the heavenly light of salvation calling them home to Jesus (or Allah...whatever). How can those of reason stand by because of the taboos our culture have placed upon religion forbidding criticism of it? Criticism it deserves. This is no longer about not hurting the feelings of the religious moderates who praise it's good (religious moderates that also lend credibility to nutty fundamentalists). This is about saving our planet. Religion needs to be criticized to the point in which there is no doubt it is nothing but the worship of mythical beings created by man. We need for Yahweh and Allah to go the way of Zeus and Thor. We need for evil in the name of invisible men to stop before it goes too far. Take a look at the children you love in your life. Whether it be your own children, children related to you, or just those you know and love. Do you want their chances of living, long fulfilling lives to be stripped away because we are afraid of speaking out against the beliefs people have in a non-existent deity? Would you want them to lose their future because of Zeus?

Sources:

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/asia-pacific/6033577.stm