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MEXICO CITY* — In the United States, almost no one remembers the war that Americans fought against Mexico more than 150 years ago. In Mexico, almost no one has forgotten. The war cut this country in two, and "the wound never really healed," said Miguel Soto, a Mexico City historian. It took less than two years, and ended with the gringos seizing half of Mexico, taking the land that became America's Wild West: California, Texas, New Mexico, Arizona, Nevada, Utah and beyond. In Mexico, they call this "the Mutilation." That may help explain why relations between the nations are sometimes so tense. As President Bush prepares to fly down to Mexico from Texas, where the war began back in 1846, the debate here over how to relate to the United States is heating up once again. The question of the day is the more than 20 million Mexicans who now live in the United States.But sensitivities about sovereignty surround every thorny issue involving Americans in Mexico. Can Americans buy land? Sometimes. Drill for oil? Never. … Open and close the border at will? Well, they try.

• Religion, or profession of it, will play a role in this year's presidential election, as noted last week. But which religion? George W. Bush is an ex-Episcopalian, ex-Presbyterian Methodist. Howard Dean is an ex-Catholic Episcopalian. Wesley Clark says he is a Catholic who goes to a Presbyterian church. "In most of the world, faith-hopping of this sort is simply unheard of," writes David Brooks in the New York Times . But not in the United States, where religion emphasizes personal experience over tradition and is generally "optimistic and easygoing," Brooks says. Secular elites continue to worry about religious fundamentalists, but "real-life belief, especially these days, is mobile, elusive and flexible." Brooks doesn't say whether this is good or bad (risking the implication that it is good), but he does note that politics remains an area where dogmatic rhetoric endures, suggesting an odd scenario: "If George Bush and Howard Dean met each other on a political platform, they would fight and feud. If they met in a Bible study group and talked about their eternal souls, they'd probably embrace." Full story/bloggers' response

Related:
Alan Wolfe: a "one-nation" election strategy on religion, in the Boston Globe
First Things on Wolfe's new book about generic religion in America

• Fourth of July parades, the American Revolution is remembered as a valiant populist triumph over an oppressive empire. But to a sizable minority of colonial settlers loyal to the throne—including Benjamin Franklin's estranged son—the rebellion was an exercise in arrogance and sanction for their persecution. After the war, many Loyalists fled the new country, some to Central America, others to Canada's Atlantic coast. David DeVoss travels to New Brunswick for Smithsonian magazine to sit in on a meeting of historical reenactors celebrating the struggle of the Loyalists and the American roots of their town.  Excerpt and PDF

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