Supreme Court Gets It Wrong, Twice. Oops, THRICE

Historically the Supreme Court has swung between the extremes of too much or too little power. Early in its history, it could make all the pronouncements it wanted to, but had no means to enforce its decisions. For the past few decades there have been many complaints about an "activist" court or "activist" judges, meaning of course that the complainer did not like the court's decision on a particular issue. Because the court had an obvious liberal slant up until the Bush appointments, most of those charges had come from the right. Now the shoe is on the other (left?) foot and the liberals are making the charges about "activist" judges. Of course, they are not using those words, but the complaints are the same.

So at this point I get to add my complaints. The court has made three critical decisions in the last few days, two along straight 5-4 ideological lines and one 5-3 with one recused. First they decided that using capital punishment for those convicted of child rape is "cruel and unusual" punishment, second they decided that the 2nd amendment includes the right of self-defense, and third they reduced the punitive damages from the Exxon Valdez oil spill from $2.5 billion to $500 million. It is my firmly held conviction that they are wrong on all three.

A strange thing is happening here. I am actually siding with the conservative element of the court on the capital punishment decision. Don't get me wrong. I am opposed to capital punishment. I am in full agreement with the sentiment expressed by the child who asked, "Is capital punishment when we kill people to prove that killing people is wrong?" I am absolutely convinced that violence is never an appropriate response to violence. However, I am just as convinced that if we are going to use capital punishment for any crimes, the crime of child rape ought to be included. I do not understand the logic of the majority which does not see the violence of rape used against the most helpless in our society as being worthy of the highest level of punishment. It is a rare set of circumstances which has me agreeing with Justice Samuel Alito when he said, it means the death penalty would be barred

"no matter how young the child, no matter how many times the child is raped, no matter how many children the perpetrator rapes, no matter how sadistic the crime, no matter how much physical or psychological trauma is inflicted, and no matter how heinous the perpetrator's prior criminal record may be."

Things are back to normal on the handgun decision. I am firmly in the camp of the liberal justices. Justice Scalia, speaking for the majority says, "the inherent right of self-defense has been central to the Second Amendment right." I've read the 2nd amendment many times. It is one of the shortest of the Bill of Rights, only 27 words, and I find nothing that guarantees a right of "self-defense." This is judicial activism at its best.

I am in complete agreement with Justice Stevens that "there is no indication that the Framers of the Amendment intended to enshrine the common-law right of self-defense in the Constitution."

Justice Stephen Breyer, states it even more clearly:

"The majority's conclusion is wrong for two independent reasons. The first reason is that set forth by Justice Stevens _ namely, that the Second Amendment protects militia-related, not self-defense-related, interests. These two interests are sometimes intertwined. To assure 18th-century citizens that they could keep arms for militia purposes would necessarily have allowed them to keep arms that they could have used for self-defense as well. But, self-defense alone, detached from any militia-related objective, is not the Amendment's concern.

"The second independent reason is that the protection the Amendment provides is not absolute. The Amendment permits government to regulate the interests that it serves."

And finally there is the most clear-cut example of judicial activism in favor of corporate America. Of course no one should be surprised that a Bush dominated court would protect the profits of his paymasters. The reasoning behind the decision to cut the punitive damages by 80% is that punitive damages may not exceed what the company already paid to compensate victims for economic losses. Just for the record, the $500 million amounts to four days worth of profits for Exxon.

Justice Ginsburg, in dissent, declared that the court was engaging in "lawmaking" by concluding that punitive damages may not exceed what the company already paid to compensate victims for economic losses. She concluded that this was a "new law made by the court should have been left to Congress."

I find it saddening that the oil-man president's court will not stand up for the rights of children to be safe from rape but will stand up for the rights of oil companies not to be held accountable for their actions.

Worth a thousand words

You gotta admit, they've got balls

I am constantly amazed at the chutzpah of the radical religious right. After years of totally ignoring or at most giving lip-service to the biblical demand about caring for the poor, an issue has finally arisen that makes them take the side of the poor. I was made aware of this when I received an "action alert" from the chief of modern day pharisees, Richard Land of the SBC's Ethics and Religious Liberty Commission. Only last year, Land used as an excuse for not supporting some of the evangelical green efforts, that his "constituency" had not come to any consensus on the issue of globlal warning.

Land is quoted in Christianity Today as saying, "I don't think there is anywhere near that kind of consensus on the issue, at least among the evangelicals I know. … They're not ready to accept it is a settled fact that human beings are the major cause of global warming."

Apparently since then, he has reached his own conclusion that stopping global warming is not biblical. Here are some excerpts from the alert:


Tell Senate to Reject Climate Change Bill that Would Hurt Poor, Economy

Dear Friends:
Alarmists (emphasis is mine not Land's) are calling all senators to board their global warming train this week in Washington to avoid what they consider to be a looming climate catastrophe, despite warnings that it could wreck our economy, destroy jobs, and harm the poor.

I need your help to stop this train before it leaves the station!

The U.S. Senate is expected to vote this week on a bill to mandate massive cuts in greenhouse gas emissions by electrical, industrial, and transportation sectors in a vain attempt to reduce the unfounded threat of cataclysmic global warming. The hype and good intentions driving this train would yield devastating consequences.


What is even more troubling is that poor people in this country and around the world would suffer the most as the rising costs of all goods make mere subsistence increasingly burdensome and millions of people in underdeveloped regions of the world would find it even more difficult to have the cheap and abundant energy they need to escape their desperate circumstances.

All this would come with an almost immeasurable reduction in global climate temperatures. This is a price too high for a policy based on science disputed more and more each day by thousands of scientists and climatologists.

Christians have a responsibility to practice environmental stewardship. But any action should first consider its impact on God’s most prized creation, human beings.

Thank you for joining me as a voice of reason to stop this bill before it crushes livelihoods and liberties.

In His Service,
Dr. Richard Land
President
The Ethics & Religious Liberty Commission
Southern Baptist Convention

By using words and phrases like alarmist, unfounded threat, science disputed he shows that he is cavalierly dismissing the overwhelming evidence and support for the reality of this crisis from the scientific community. Even NASA has released a report acknowledging both the high probablility that global warming is caused by human activity and can be controlled by human activity. But it comes as no surprise that Land and his ilk align themselves with the "do-nothing, status quo" party on this issue, since they effectively wedded themselves to the repubs many years ago. The names Land, Dobson, Perkins, etc. have become synonomous with other sycophants of the radical right, religious or otherwise.

The alert directs readers to a website called We Get It! A blurb from the page proclaims

Caring for the environment and the poor – Biblically
Imagine…one million Christians standing together
to shed Biblical light on one of the biggest
cultural issues of our day…
Honoring our Lord Jesus Christ as creator and
sustainer of this wondrous world…
And impacting the lives of millions of the
poorest people here and around the globe.
That’s what the We Get It!
campaign is all about!

And guess who's names show up as being among those who "Get It."

Dr. Daniel Akin, President, Southeastern Baptist Theological Seminary
Singer Pat Boone
Congressman Paul Broun
Senator Tom Coburn
Dr. James Dobson
Senator James Inhofe
Dr. Richard Land
Wendy Wright, President, Concerned Women for America

What a collection. I thought I had gotten over my shame at having the two most ill-informed men in the Senate be from my state and yet here they are, Inhofe and Coburn. You remember Inhofe, he's the one who said on the floor of the Senate in 2003 that "man-made global warming is the greatest hoax ever perpetrated on the American people." Good old Oklahoma reasoning. Right up there with Sally Kern.

Along with them the campaign is supported by
The Ethics & Religious Liberty Commission of the Southern Baptist Convention
Family Research Council
and believe it or not
Wallbuilders ( I guess since David Barton was thorougly discredited as a historian he is seeking a new platform as a climatologist) They even quote Barton as if he were some sort of expert on something, saying that proper care of creation and the environment will "come not from government-implemented programs but rather from unfettered free-market solutions." I guess I was mistaken. He can be just as wrong about the environment as he was about American history.

But the new and most despicable element in the appeal of these groups and individuals is their professed concern for the poor. I can only conclude that in light of their previous apathy or even hostility toward issues involving the poor, both here and abroad, it is not hard to see that what they really mean is that they don't want to have to give up their SUVs and big houses and consumptive lifestyles. I was particularly appalled by that reference to "cheap and abundant energy." When has anyone in this group that is so closely tied to the oil barons in the White House ever been concerned about the energy needs of the poor.

McCain's Lobbyists Come Out of the Closet

A recent letter from Howard Dean notes:

I've got a joke for you.

Last week, John McCain's campaign manager, Rick Davis, sent a memo to the McCain campaign staff about a brand new "conflicts policy."

This policy was designed to identify staffers with "conflicts" working within McCain's organization after three advisers resigned from the campaign. One was found to be working for an anti-Democrat "527" organization, and the other two -- a regional campaign manager and the convention CEO -- were found to have lobbied for the Myanmar junta in 2003.

Here's the punch line: Rick Davis, author of the memo and the person in charge of finding these "conflicts" within the campaign, founded his own lobbying firm, and, according to the Politico, "has made at least $2.8 million lobbying Congress since 1998."

But it gets worse. Charlie Black is McCain's chief political adviser. Over the past seven years, lobbying filings show he's used his connections with George Bush and Dick Cheney to lobby administration officials for dozens of wealthy clients. The Washington Post reported that "Black said he does a lot of his work by telephone from McCain's Straight Talk Express bus."

John McCain's commitment to keeping Washington lobbyists out of his campaign is a joke -- but it's not funny. It's shocking. Since Davis sent around his "conflicts" memo, two more people have been shamed out of the McCain campaign. But why not Davis and Black? Of all the possible conflicts revealed, isn't lobbying from the campaign bus the worst? And does McCain care that his campaign manager made millions after starting his own lobbying shop? If those are acceptable, what exactly did McCain find about the people they let go?

Tell John McCain to fire Rick Davis and Charlie Black today. If he's really committed to keeping "conflicts" out of his campaign, he should have no trouble cleaning house the way he needs to.

http://www.democrats.org/FireTheLobbyists

This past Sunday, John McCain defended the situation by telling reporters that his lobbyist advisers are "not in the lobbying business; they've been out of that business." And just yesterday, John McCain said he wants to have "the most comprehensive and transparent of any presidential campaign in history" when it comes to lobbyists. How can that be true when people like Charlie Black admit he's conducting his lobbying business on the back of the bus?

John McCain and his campaign can't have it both ways. On the one hand, he says "ethics and transparency are not election year buzz words." But, on the other hand, he and his top campaign advisors have no problem fudging about their lobbying records. When pressed on the discrepancy, they give a flip excuse: Americans don't care.

Demand honesty and openness in politics. Tell John McCain to fire Charlie Black and Rick Davis today:
http://www.democrats.org/FireTheLobbyists
Let's keep McCain accountable,

Howard Dean

McCain needs to do his homework

John McCain is perpetuating a myth that has been debunked many times.

The shrub carried out a thinly veiled attack on Barack Obama as an "appeaser" for suggesting that it might be a good idea to talk to some of the Middle-East leaders. When McCain was asked about the shrub's statements, a part of his response was,

"I believe that it's not an accident that our hostages came home from Iran when President Reagan was president of the United States. He didn't sit down in a negotiation with the religious extremists in Iran, he made it very clear that those hostages were coming home.''

The reaganites are very fond of claiming that it was the fear of the supposed actor's toughness that caused the Iranians to release the prisoners a few minutes after his inauguration on January 20, 1981. All of the news channels gave that as a possible or probable reason for the timing of the release. But the rest of the story came out later when it was revealed that President Carter's Secretary of State, Warren Christopher had concluded negotiations for their release the day before with the signing of the Algiers Accords. Sources inside Iran later revealed that the timing of the release was done deliberately to detract from reagan's inauguration not because they were afraid of his pseudo-macho, Hollywood cowboy toughness.

Please, John. There are enough reagan myths clogging up the minds of the American people without you perpetuating this one.

So Much for Compassionate Convervativism

ThePatriotPost, subtitled "The Conservative Journal of Record," revealed what most of us already knew, that there really is nothing compassionate about conservativism with this comment,

If Obama’s past Senate voting record wasn’t incriminating enough, he recently gave some revealing, and disturbing, insight into how his nominees would be chosen: “We need somebody who’s got the heart, the empathy, to recognize what it’s like to be a young teenage mom, the empathy to understand what it’s like to be poor or African-American or gay or disabled or old—and that’s the criteria by which I’ll be selecting judges.” An Obama presidency led by empathy rather than by constitutional dictates would certainly be in keeping with his pledge to bring “real”change to Washington. Uh, you can keep the change, Barack. (PatriotPost)

I just wish conservatives would be honest about their motives. At best they are motivated by enlightened self-interest and at worst by pure selfishness and greed. I'll take heart and empathy anyday

Worst President of Two Centuries

Only two other presidents have served in two centuries, John Adams and William McKinley. Why oh why did we end up with George Bush?

Five years ago today, George W. Bush got up on that aircraft carrier and fed us the biggest load of bullshit of his entire presidency. Not counting of course, the lies about the imminent threat from Iraq which was the whole pretext or pretense for going to war in the first place.

He told us it was "Mission Accomplished" in Iraq. Of course later he denied that he ever meant the war was over. And just today another lame comment came out of the Whitehouse.

"President Bush is well aware that the banner should have been much more specific and said `mission accomplished' for these sailors who are on this ship on their mission."

Somehow in the previous discussions of this bit of stupidity, I missed the fact that the Whitehouse had acknowledged that they paid for the banner, but only because the crew of the ship had requested it.

President Bush's flight suit posturing was a grotesque gumbo made up of equal parts arrogance, dishonesty and downright ignorance. But it was par for the course.

This whole presidency has been one "Mission Accomplished" moment after another, where our confabulator-in-chief told us how dandy things were in Iraq, how strong our economy was, how well the recovery was going in New Orleans, only for us to quickly find out how wrong he was.

Let's talk about what George Bush has really accomplished since he took office:

-The price of oil has quadrupled;
-We've seen the biggest drop in housing prices in 20 years;
-We experienced the first-ever economic expansion without a rise in median income; and
-Osama bin Laden - the guy who actually attacked us on September 11th -- is still on the loose.

It's a sad record and clear proof that Bush hasn't accomplished much of anything - and it's enough to drive you crazy to think he still has almost nine months left in the White House. Who knows what kind of damage he can do to the country on his way out.

Disclaimer: Contents freely adapted from a fund raising message from James Carville.

Expelled: This is not argument, it’s circus

I really hadn't planned to post on this movie, but I really liked the line from the NY Times review that appears as the title. Nuf said.

This is the link for the full review.

http://movies.nytimes.com/2008/04/18/movies/18expe.html?ex=1332475200&en=709faf668585ee66&ei=5124&partner=facebook&exprod=facebook

Skating on Thin Ice

The Baptist Messenger, mouth piece of the baptist general convention of Oklahoma is navigating some perilous waters. In the latest issue they publish at least two articles telling their readers why they should not vote for Barack Obama. I'm not really sure about the IRS rules in regard to church owned newsletters. I would think that since the BM is an agency of and wholly owned by the bgcO the same rules would apply to it that apply to churches. But maybe not. Someone really ought to tell the IRS about it and let them decide.

One article with a front page lead-in is "EDITORIAL: A gay bully pulpit?"
This staff-written editorial opens with the broad statement,

"If Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama has his way, he will use the Presidency as a bully pulpit to urge states to treat same-sex couples with full equality in their family and adoption laws."

They also make the common mistake of assuming that since a resolution passed at the annual meeting is the voice of Oklahoma Baptists with the statement, "Oklahoma Baptists do not agree with Sen. Obama on this issue." That is not consistent with baptist theology or ecclesiology but is common practice. Resolutions passed at an annual meeting represent only the majority opinion of those who vote at the meeting. These are non-binding resolutions and have absolutely no direct effect on the beliefs and practices of individual baptists or baptist churches. No one can speak for Oklahoma baptists because each Oklahoma baptist can speak for her or himself. The only proof I need of this is that, at least for the moment, I am an Oklahoma baptist and I don't agree.

The other article is just plain wrong for attacking Obama's view of scripture. For some reason that article does not show up in their online version so I will have to synopsize it here and make corrections after I get home tonight if I happen to mis-state any of the facts. Anyway it accuses the Senator of not believing the whole bible is inspired because he said he would prefer to act according to the Sermon on the Mount rather than an obscure passage in Romans when he was dealing with the homosexual issue. Obama is wrong because "real" Christians believe all the bible is inspired and every word is just as authoritative as any other word. I can't really do it justice from memory so I will do a follow-up tomorrow.

I Really Don't Understand this Guy

Mike Huckabee continues to surprise me. His has been one of the few voices of reason I've heard in the midst of the feeding frenzy over Jeremiah Wright.

Huckabee said,

As easy as it is for those of us who are white to look back and say, "That's a terrible statement," I grew up in a very segregated South, and I think that you have to cut some slack. And I'm going to be probably the only conservative in America who's going to say something like this, but I'm just telling you: We've got to cut some slack to people who grew up being called names, being told, "You have to sit in the balcony when you go to the movie. You have to go to the back door to go into the restaurant. And you can't sit out there with everyone else. There's a separate waiting room in the doctor's office. Here's where you sit on the bus." And you know what? Sometimes people do have a chip on their shoulder and resentment. And you have to just say, I probably would too. I probably would too. In fact, I may have had ... more of a chip on my shoulder had it been me. (Source: MSNBC)

I'll never understand how someone with that kind of insight has stayed a fundy republican.

On the other hand I can't understand why this is still a story after all this time. Surely those media types who keep pushing it don't really think people pay any attention to what their pastors say from the pulpit.