Oh come on people. Protestant WASP types who are into the politics of divide and conquer will use anything to do so, but they know bloody well nothing works better than religion, race, and ethicity. And their preferred targets are still Catholics, Jews, and African Americans.

Hence this stupid thread, which accuses Kerry of being both Catholic and Jewish, and lying about his ancestry.

That said, I'm still a little suspicious of Americans who refuse to talk about their background. We are a nation of immigrants, so I always feel someone is hiding something from me when they don't reveal their background. But I'm interested in peoples' backgrounds because I love being around people who are from cultures different from my own, who are multilingual, or who have immigration stories to tell.

Politicians often use race, religion (or lack of one, especially secularity), and ethnicity to divide and conquer, but then only identify themselves as "Americans" which I find to be incredibly phony. Kerry makes no mention of his family background on his website bio. Haven't bothered to check Bush's website.