The Republican agenda of fighting a fatal and expensive war in Iraq, going as far as possible to prevent women's sexual choices, from abortion to birth control, and restructuring the tax code and spending on defense to divert spending from domestic programs, to name a few items, has always struck me as immoral. More recently, I have realized that this agenda is a big waste of time, given all of the serious problems our nation should deal with.

On Tuesday night, I went to see a speaker, an editor from the French newspaper Liberation who talked about deteriorating European-American relations. Although I have been upset by certain actions in Europe, like anti-immigration and anti-Semitism, one thing that this speaker mentioned that makes European Union countries that much more advanced than some in our country is that there is little debate on "social" issues like abortion, religion in schools, and homosexuality. This is not to say that debate is stifled but just that virulent fundamentalists are few and far between.

Think about it. Isn't it counter-productive to focus one's engergies on trying to prevent women from having sexual choice? Is this the most important thing our nation must deal with today? Is it even close? With all of the other problems threatening life--what anti-choice Republicans claim to care so much about--and economic well-being, why waste money, resources, and in some cases lives by demonizing women or sending young men off to war.