Readers Write (Aug. 1): Gay marriage, climate change, Obamacare, networks and Nazis

I just read the July 31 article "Gay marriage foes more sad than bitter," and I continue to struggle with how people choose their faith over their neighbors and their loved ones. These folks simply choose to be "sad." They're missing out on wonderful relationships. They're missing out on building treasured memories to carry with them into their old age. There is no way there can be too much love. Too often religious dogma breeds bigotry, and the people who preach it don't even know that they have been brainwashed by it. Meanwhile families grow more estranged.

As for the couple with the gay son: I wish they would shelve the Good Book and spend some time loving and getting to know their son. He has a life and friends and a world that loves him. Why wouldn't they want to be part of that world? Don't preach and don't judge; just love your family and neighbors. Choose to be happy and see if that doesn't make your day a little better.

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To the religious gay rights foe who lamented in the story that "nothing is intrinsically evil anymore," I submit: genocide, poverty, spousal and child abuse, greed and intolerance. Need I go on? Instead of decrying gay rights as a victory of the "me"-obsessed gay, there is good news in an overwhelmingly straight society saying, "We embrace you."

May I repeat your words back to you? "Good news is only good news if the hearer hears it as good news. So I pray and wait — wait for an opportunity to share at a time that finds a friend with listening ears and open heart."

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Like the people interviewed for the gay marriage story, I too am deeply concerned with growing immorality in our nation.

The wretched idea of "I've got mine — to heck with you" has taken deep root. Jesus would weep. Against this tidal wave of immorality, gay marriage is one of the few bright spots. It flows from the same river that brought us the civil rights movement — freedom's river.

How very disappointing that the Star Tribune editorial page let global-warming denial be cloaked as a joke. I'm sure some people got a chuckle out of the July 31 letter that said our climate was "perfect" until "evil white men showed up." But the effect of that message is to pass off as plausible an argument that the responsible scientific community finds indefensible. Global warming is here, it is at least in large measure caused by human activity, and it threatens us all. Making smug jokes about Al Gore while the American West burns like a tinderbox and monster tornadoes ravage the Great Plains is a modern-day version of Nero fiddling while Rome burns. In other words, it's not funny at all.

The July 31 letter in support of Obamacare made my blood boil. The same morning the letter appeared newscasts were reporting that the Congressional Budget Office is estimating that delaying the "employer mandate" for providing coverage by one year will add another $12 billion to the cost to taxpayers for this boondoggle. We won't be able to keep our coverage like President Obama promised, and we won't be saving $2,500 per year in premiums, like he promised. Everyone but the most zealous Obama supporters are convinced this program will damage the best health care system in the world. It is time to put aside your liberal blinders and see that this is the worst legislation to come along in our lifetimes.

Defund Obamacare now and replace it with some common sense, practical health care reform that maintains the best health care system in the world without bankrupting the economy and eliminating our privacy and freedoms around our health.

Let me see if I get the point of the commentary by Harvard Law School Prof. Cass R. Sunstein: German society was socially vibrant in the period before the Nazis seized power, and many of these people later joined the Nazi party. Ergo, we need to cast a suspicious eye on face-to-face activities like bowling, gymnastics or singing, lest the social ferment give rise to Nazi-like, conservative extremist political movements. Cass Sunstein? That name rings a bell. He was the guy, while heading President Obama's information office, who advocated infiltrating 9/11 truth groups and sowing "cognitive dissonance."