iPandora

The proof is in the pudding, they say.

Timothy P. O’Neill claims the history and roots of the current members of the High Court are too similar, their backgrounds too homogeneous, to allow for true justice to be dispensed.

According to O’Neill, President Obama has an historic opportunity to correct the court. To broaden it’s foundation and strengthen it’s ability to work in this modern time with an open-minded understanding of our current situation.

Professor Lee Epstein of Northwestern has observed that “Diversity of inputs makes for stronger outputs.” Obama should cast the widest possible net to find a person who can bring a fresh set of experiences and perspectives to the work of the Supreme Court.

O’Neill claims as evidence of the problem the dearth of unanimous decisions in recent court history. And states as a possible cause the acrimonious attempted appointment of Bork and the travesty of political murder that borked Bork.

With the reticence of succeeding Presidents to propose any but established Federal judges to the high court, the court’s base has indeed narrowed, but is the non-unanimous nature of the court a bad thing?

I say not. And I say that a preconceived notion with an aim toward heterogeneity is not the solution to any problems the court now faces.

The purpose of the high court is to apply and interpret the law in difficult cases. It is not to have empathy or to make exceptions or to make law. Anything more or less than application and interpretation of the law is a failure and a grab for power not allocated to the judicial branch by the Constitution.

Reasonable people may disagree and the stress of disagreement slows down a mad human rush towards oblivion.

Such enforced conflict is not the best solution, but in our current era of stratified ideology, it’s pragmatic and effective.

The aim, in selecting judicial appointees, for any President, ought to be whether or not the person selected has an understanding and appreciation for the law. That is the only criteria which is reasonable.

Thomas Sowell counters with the basic argument of Constitutional rationality:

People who are speculating about whether the next nominee will be a woman, a Hispanic or whatever are missing the point.

That we are discussing the next Supreme Court justice in terms of group “representation” is a sign of how far we have already strayed from the purpose of law and the weighty responsibility of appointing someone to sit for life on the highest court in the land.

That Obama has made “empathy” with certain groups one of his criteria for choosing a Supreme Court nominee is a dangerous sign of how much further the Supreme Court may be pushed away from the rule of law and toward even more arbitrary judicial edicts to advance the agenda of the left and set it in legal concrete, immune from the democratic process.

It is always interesting to me that those who are so (mistakenly) tied up with the “Democracy” of America are so very un-Democratic about critical moral, cultural, and social issues. America is designed to be a Republic (if we can keep it) because of the innately sinful nature of man.

Those claiming the mantel of Democratic ideals are often the first to bypass them and the will of the people, or directly contravene it, by seeking attention and action from the legislative and judicial branches to impose their minority ideas upon the majority.

Fairness is too often very unfair for someone else, and the flip-side of tolerance is tyranny.

We are an equal society, say many. But Sowell cautions that this is often no more than smoke and mirrors:

We would have entered a strange new world where everybody is equal but some are more equal than others. The very idea of the rule of law would become meaningless when it is replaced by the empathies of judges.

Obama solves this contradiction, as he solves so many other problems, with rhetoric. If you believe in the rule of law, he will say the words “rule of law.” And if you are willing to buy it, he will keep on selling it.

We live in a society governed by the rule of law. Our society requires that it’s members be knowledgeable and intelligent and involved.

When we sacrifice knowledge and intelligence at the altar of equality we lose the ability to be involved.

As more and more power is usurped from it’s right and proper owners, we all lose.

Thomas Sowell ends his article with a somber warning we would all do well to heed:

The biggest danger in appointing the wrong people to the Supreme Court is not just in how they might vote on some particular issues — whether private property, abortion or whatever. The biggest danger is that they will undermine or destroy the very concept of the rule of law — what has been called “a government of laws and not of men.”

Under the American system of government, this cannot be done overnight or perhaps even during the terms in office of one president — but it can be done. And it can be done over time by the appointees of just one president, if he gets enough appointees.

Some people say that who Obama appoints to replace Souter doesn’t really matter, because Souter is a liberal who will probably be replaced by another liberal. But, if no one sounds the alarm now, we can end up with a series of appointees with “empathy” — which is to say, with justices who think their job is to “relieve the distress” of particular groups rather than to uphold the Constitution of the United States.

First, the Duh!

Gay men get HIV, and they’re getting it faster. 12% faster, says a new CDC report.

And of course, to remind those hotheads whose brains have boiled out: HIV is the disease the US Government released in Africa to desimate the black population.

The rest of us know it’s transmitted by homosexual relations between men. And that it’s not bias or bigotry that caused it, but pride, willful ignorance, and the natural result of an unnatural act.

Now the Interesting Stuff

Investor’s Business Daily reports that an architect the the Canadian socialized health-care system, that one we hear is so incredible and worthy of emulation from the leftist socialist running for POTUS, has had a change of heart:

“We thought we could resolve the system’s problems by rationing services or injecting massive amounts of new money into it,” says (Claude) Castonguay. But now he prescribes a radical overhaul: “We are proposing to give a greater role to the private sector so that people can exercise freedom of choice.”

Counteracting the tales of woe and terror which are peppering the debate south of our northern border, the IBD tells a tale of truth which ought to give those considering the proposed socialized utopia pause:

Sick with ovarian cancer, Sylvia de Vires, an Ontario woman afflicted with a 13-inch, fluid-filled tumor weighing 40 pounds, was unable to get timely care in Canada. She crossed the American border to Pontiac, Mich., where a surgeon removed the tumor, estimating she could not have lived longer than a few weeks more.

Because she’s a woman, and it’s her ovaries, it’s a real tear-jerker.

No, the point is that the capitalistic, profit-based system provides better care to a greater number of people with two primary reasons:

1. The costs cause people to evaluate themselves whether they really need that procedure, freeing the system from a glut of unnecessary and frivolous procedures.
2. Those same costs entice more skilled labor and research and development into medical/technological advances, enhancing quality and quantity of available care.

Read more at IBD.

Republican ‘”Obama”, Only With History And Substance’ Jindal takes the hard line

Louisiana Governor Bobby Jindal, who has actually accomplished things in his life, was outraged over the Supreme Court’s liberal judges finding the death penalty is not applicable or valid for use in extreme cases of child rape, so he signed a bill allowing chemical castration in certain specific cases of rape and sexual abuse.

Sponsored by Democrat Senator Nick Gautreaux of Meaux, LA, arguments surrounding the bill were mostly on scope and effect, rather than validity and right.

It sounds like, unlike the members state houses in many of the states, the members of the Louisiana State House are a group who actually have backbones connected to their brains.

The Lady Roxanne de Luca, contributing author at Haemet, has penned this gem regarding the recent Supreme Court decision finding it illegal to sentence those guilty of raping children to the death penalty:

(L)iberals have just written a Supreme Court opinion which is the jurisprudential equivalent of “If rape is inevitable, lie back and enjoy it.”

Well put Roxanne.

Here we have one more glaring reason why this election matters so very, very much.

Found in the Chicago Defender:

With the presidential race in full swing, the U.S. Supreme Court is currently considering a case that could have a huge impact on the nation’s electoral system forever. It revolves around an Indiana statue that requires voters to show current state issued photo identification when they cast their ballots. Last Election Day, 61-year-old Valerie Williams attempted to vote in the lobby of her retirement home as she had the past two elections.

She and 31 others affiliated with the case [were not allowed to vote after failing to provide photo ID]. Most failed to comply with the law because they lacked the transportation to get to the local voting office to convert their provisional ballots into actual votes or couldn’t afford state issued identification. They represent as much as 12 percent of all voters, a disproportionate number of them elderly, poor, minorities or disable, who do not have government-issued photo identification.

Huh? I admit it’s sad that people are turned away from polls when people there could verify their identity. Maybe the law could allow for group living facilities which have already verified ID can speak for their members… but that gets into a whole ‘nother can of worms and allows further loopholes for fraud. Maybe states should have a cheap or free ID for those who don’t drive (Like California, I got my first official ID, which was not a drivers license, at 14 for less than 20 dollars).

When the elections can hinge on as few as 100 votes such as Florida in 2000, each vote counts. While you are worrying about disenfranchising (a big word which is used as a bugbear in our fearful society) the poor and elderly (popular poster-children of the bugbear bearing social activists). I’m worried about disenfranchising (see, I can use it too) myself and the millions of other voters who have worked hard and taken the appropriate steps to ensure I have proper identification necessary to function in this society. It is a slight requirement. We are aware of the need and we have a whole year, or two, to get it before needing it for the election.

You may not be aware of the severity of the issue: In Seattle, WA, hundreds of votes are entered by people all listing the Postal Office as their “home”. The assumption is their transients, but there is no proof of that. Any Joe or Sally with nefarious intent could easily register and vote, even though it is against the law to misrepresent your address on voter registration. The difficulty lies in verifying the address of the voter.

Requiring ID puts additional responsibility on the voter, but we do not live in a society where all things are given to us. Instead, we are given reasonable requirements and then allowed to do as we please.

Voter ID is a simple and effective way to mitigate the issue of voter fraud. Fraud disenfranchises everybody, lessening the effectiveness of each and every one of our votes.

Apparently it’s a GOP issue. The Democrats don’t want to stop any fraudsters, phonies, gangs, or assorted nefarious election scammers from exercising their desire to break the law and disenfranchise all of us law-abiding citizens. It’s those nasty Republicans who want to safe-guard the election for us average Joe’s and Jane’s by requiring reasonable levels of identity security into the process.

See my previous post on this for my solution to electronic voting, vote fraud, and voter ID.

Democrat House staffers recommend getting full immunizations before going to NASCAR events. Recommended immunizations include the Hepatitis B (an STD) vaccine. Apparently their caricatured idea of NASCAR fans include homosexual and promiscuous hicks of varying degrees of uncleanness openly engaging in sexual acts in the stands and infield.

…either that or they think conservatism is transmittable. Heh, they have no idea.

(Ain’t worth a)Hill(of beans)ary Clinton says that for African Americans, she’s going to be Clinton.

…and how long ago did she drop Rodham?

…and that means they should vote for her, why? The inscrutable logic simply does not follow.

…and for all the Chinese- and Mexican-, and German-, and British-, Australian-, Swedish-, Spanish-, Brazilian-, and every other (hyphen) Americans, who will she be? Urkel?

Run, Al, run!

…anything to give the nutroots more choices. They are pro-murder “pro-choice”, right?

Speaking of running: Harry Reid may want to start running, along with Clinton, Schumer et al.

Democrats push through bill making sure we all know the Turks committed genocide 60 years ago.

I don’t deny it’s a good thing to be accurate, especially about such heinous events and crimes as genocide. But they’re our staunchest ally in the Mid-east region. And we need some clout with them to keep them from beginning a war on the northern border of Iraq with Kurd rebels who are taking shelter among some of our strongest supporters inside Iraq, the Kurds.

Either intelligence on the left side of the isle is lower than even I thought, or ego is even larger. Do we really have to lose at all costs?

It was aliens, I knew it.

Quote:

You do not negotiate peace until you’ve kicked somebody’s rear end.
~Rush Limbaugh

Social conservative Christian leaders meetings are being trumpeted by the media. The talking heads crowing that the current crop of Republican presidential contenders are not conservative enough on certain issues and that movers and shakers such as Dr. James Dobson are planning on voting for a third party or not at all if the eventual chosen nominee of either of the two main parties does not support traditional family values such as opposing abortion and support marriage for one man and one woman exclusively.

I agree with these leaders that we desperately need strong leadership, morals and values in our President, without them we really do not have a chance as America. It has been rightly noted that the next President may very well nominate several more Justices to the Supreme Court, and with the current balance of ideology in the Court, the next Justices will direct the Court firmly in either direction.

Things we know for sure:

Hillary will appoint Ginsburg’s and similar justices. Men and women whose moral compass is screwed wrong. This is not a question or a chance, it is a known and acknowledged fact. She is not ashamed to say it. These Justices will direct the court towards the globalization of our legal authority, the affirming and legalization of abortion, the normalization of homosexual “marriage”, and the legal protection of terrorists and the aiders, abettors, and sympathizers, among other things. The Justices will practice judicial activism and will deny the will of the people and their elected representatives and the original intent of the constitution. They will hasten the destruction of America in immorality, wickedness, and the blood of our children.

The front runners of the Republican race, Guiliani and Romney, would appoint justices similar to Scalia and Thomas, who believe in the rule of law and the strong original intent of the Constitution. As such, the will of the people and their elected representatives when codified in law, is the law to them and they would not change it or define it into oblivion. They would deny the constitutionality of Roe V Wade, they would uphold the rights and protections of American citizens and the entire world by denying the supposed “rights” of enemy combatants and terrorists. They would uphold the will of the people in their laws and constitutional amendments protecting marriage between one man and one woman.

I have serious disagreements with the social ideas of Guiliani and qualms about the religious view of Romney, but when the option is Hillary, I will throw my whole weight of support behind them for our Country’s sake.

Of the two, I support Romney right now. He has changed his mind on social issues, but in the right direction.

So what of Thompson, McCain, and the others? Thompson has not done much since he announced his candidacy, wowing few and wooing fewer. He is not consistent in cutting spending or on social issues. I’d support him just as heartily if he were to be the nominee, but I will not support him in the primary. McCain is not good for America. His highest aim is his own preeminence and he can only be trusted to to what is expedient for himself. A selfish man is not a man to whom one gives authority.

Huckabee is trying too hard to be all thing to all people, the funny man, the cool man, the smart man, the right man. He is all things to all, and nothing true. This is sad. I had hoped he’d be a good man for the job, but he would be polling and focus-grouping as much as the last President from Arkansas. And with a name like Huckabee, how can he be elected?

As for Paul, to (mis)quote a bastion of English (French?) literature: “I fart in (his) general direction”. There is neither honor, honesty, nor leadership potential in that man. He tickles the ears of his listeners with good ideas mixed with bad. With false libertarianism and fake posture. His listeners and adherents are as enthusiastic as they are deluded and I pity them, and have little patience for them.

Do I wish there were a strong Christian man with history and depth, with values and strength? Yes. It is a sad commentary on the state of the lazy and bloated, idle Christianity which defines our Country that we do not have a strong man leading the way, an obvious and unimpeachable choice, a shoo in who no one can say wrong about because He is right and good.

We do not have such a man, and to search elsewhere for one is to run the risk of finding ourselves lost in history as those who forsook the good hoping to find the impossible.

There were several items which caught my attention today, none which really settled and led anywhere deeper than a quick thought or two. Maybe this crop will be more relevatory about myself than anything else in particular. So here goes:

First up is Hugh Hewitt.  Labeled with distinction as the “Most Famous Conservative Journalist Whom Liberals Have Never Heard Of” by Nicholas Lemann of The New Yorker magazine, he is my favorite talk show host and it is a pity and a travesty that the local conservative talk station holds him until after his live show, beginning play well after I’m am situated near any radio. Instead there’s Michael Savage, who I don’t care for on a regular basis; Hugh is much more reasoned and articulate and his arguments exist with positive force for creating good change rather than with negative energy, exacting verbal and mental retribution such as Savage’s savagery. Hugh Hewitt’s work is by no means limited to radio, he is one of the fathers of the conservative blogosphere as well. He has been instrumental in developing conservative communication and technology nexuses such as Townhall.com and the Victory Caucus.

Hugh was interviewed by Mr. Lemann for the New Yorker in a biographic article which pinpoints some of my favorite parts of his eclectic purview. This article is a close and personal look at a man and a vision, a plethora of visions, which are shaping our conservative voice today.

Hewitt stands for something more than just hyperactivity. Conservatives love to complain about journalism. Lately, they have been not only complaining more full-throatedly but also devising, with more energy than before, their own version of what journalism ought to look like: faster, more opinionated, more multimedia, and less hung up on distancing itself from the practice of politics than the daily-newspaper and network-news versions. Hewitt is at the center of this effort. If there is any battle to be waged next month over the confirmation of John Roberts, an old friend of Hewitt’s, as a Supreme Court Justice, the conservative press (and Hewitt in particular) will be an enthusiastic participant. The idea is that it will make for a good test run of conservative journalism’s enhanced capabilities, which would then be redeployed frequently. Hewitt’s world is journalism’s alternate universe.

Read the whole thing (may require logging in, free access).

Next is a series of articles written by Alan Keyes, the Statesman. Here is an American with few equals indeed. Perpetually misunderstood and underestimated, it is a shame he has not found his way into the halls of congress or higher despite his many tries.

Keyes writes on the Crisis Of The Republic, his view of the importance of the 2008 elections, the issues involved, and the potential fallout. He addresses, through these extensive but accessible articles the range of issues from cultural to fiscal to spiritual to global. In short, a holistic view of the conservative viewpoint which is battling for its very life against the foes of ignorance, fear, and evil.:

I hope that by the end of this effort, those like myself who deeply cherish the hope for humanity America is supposed to represent will be moved to view the 2008 election with the same sense of urgent foreboding that I do. I hope they will realize that the American people must create and seize the opportunity to break free from the grip of the ambitious, self-serving elites who have been manipulating them toward destruction.

If you think the necessity of this election is mere hyperbole, you’ve got another think coming.

And finally, Tony Blair has this beautiful speech explaining what he sees is wrong with the media-political confabulation:

The purpose of the series of speeches I have given over the past year has been deliberately reflective: to get beyond the immediate headlines on issues of the day and contemplate in a broader perspective, the effect of a changing world on the issues of the future.

This speech on the challenge of the changing nature of communication on politics and the media is from the same perspective. I need to say some preliminaries at the outset. This is not my response to the latest whacking from bits of the media.

It’s long, but very worthwhile and honest. 

Kelly McCutchen of the Georgia Public Policy Foundation wrote an article in the Atlanta Journal-Constitution on Michael Moore’s “Sicko.” She cites some numbers from both Canada’s and Britton’s socialized health care systems.

“In the real world, tragedy isn’t limited to the United States. In 2005, the Canadian Supreme Court struck down Quebec’s ban on private health insurance for services already covered under their national health care program based on evidence that many people were dying while waiting for treatment in the public system.

“In Britain, long delays for colon cancer treatment result in 20 percent of the cases becoming incurable during the wait, according to an academic study cited in the Guardian newspaper.”

Predictably, the newswire and blogosphere are awash with opinion on the Supreme Court decision commented on here.

There are several articles written on either side of the issue published in the last few days which give a perspective on the views surrounding this:

1. BloggerNews.net writes a scathing rebuke of the ACLU and their responses to this debate.
   

   (T)he ACLU disagrees with the 14th (”equal protection”) Amendment — which requires equal treatment before the law for all. Nice to be able to pick and choose which amendment you support!

2. Bowling Green News, in an opinion editorial contains a tortured and incoherent response to the ruling, spewing facts and figures I’d really like to see on paper, with proof.
   

   Chief Justice John Roberts said, “The way to stop discrimination on the basis of race is to stop discriminating on the basis of race.” Thanks, Justice Roberts, for that clarification. I never would have been able to figure that one out on my own, I see now why you were chosen as to be the highest judicial officer in the country. If it’s really that simple then why is it that more than one in six black children now attend schools that are 99 to 100 percent minority?

   Well, if we understood that and applied it, Roberts wouldn’t have needed to say it. Apparently we weren’t able to figure it out in application. And by minority does he realize this also means people of mexican and asian descent? And does he even pause to consider the social assumptions, the real root causes of such poverty among that particular demographic?

3. The New Republic delves into Justice Kennedy’s “Controlling” opinion, which it turns out is less opinion and more the apparent fevered ramblings of a an old mind, great as it may once have been.
4. Black America Web has a perspective from the NAACP perspective, American Black leadership, which appears to me to be more of the same standard liberal social perspective we see so prevalent today. Feel good fixes more than actual solutions. Style over substance.

The Chicago Sun-Times, my new home-town newspaper, published an article recently noting a few of the many claims made against the religious dogma known as Global Warming.

A cooperative and productive discussion of global warming must be open and honest regarding the science. Global warming threats ought to be studied and mitigated, and they should not be deliberately exaggerated as a means of building support for a desired political position.

Read the article and weep, if your name is Al Gore. Otherwise, just read the article.

In the shadow of the landmark decision by the Supreme Court striking down key provisions of Brown v. Board of Education, ideologues, politicos, and public school administrators are struggling to find new policy now that they’re not allowed to be racists any longer. Racism in any form is evil. W.E.B. DuBois was, and his philosophies continue to be, as racist as any other. The idea that by artificially creating “diversity” at any given social strata benefits no one, and harms many, most of all the ones the do-gooders purport to be assisting.

When any person, regardless of any unchangeable characteristic (such as race, gender, etc), is advanced artificially because some higher “level” of society is not “diverse” enough, that one’s most harmed are: first, the individual or individuals being elevated, and second, those they represent symbolically or actually. Role models are important, there are none who can deny this fact. When a whole generation of black Americans are seeing role models in the form of rap stars who are in and out of jail as frequently as they are on and off the stage. When the women the girls look to dress like whores and sluts, selling and subserviating themselves to men and boys. There is no respect or honor here, there will be precious little in the generation who looks up to them.

Rather than elevation there is opportunity. Booker T. Washington, a contemporary of W.E.B. DuBois, founder of the Tuskegee Institute, and promoter of the plight of the black American post Civil War during the reconstruction, espoused the idea that instead of artificially elevating an unready person who would then doubtless fail, adding insult to injury, “proving” the lies believed by the ex slave owners, and damaging the fragile plight of the newly freed humans, we ought to remove any restrictions that hindered the black American any more than the white American. Given opportunity, the strong would succeed, no matter their race. And those black Americans who succeeded because of their own strength would be less likely to fail and far better role models. Out of the Tuskegee Institute and the dreams and visions of Booker T. Washington came such shining examples as George Washington Carver, arguably one of the paramount inventors of America and one of the more prolific of all time. His inventions benefited millions with additional uses of common agricultural products, growing the demand for products common to the extremely poor, depressed post-war south. The Tuskegee Airmen, an all-black American Fighter Squadron formed during WW2 had one of the best records of success for bomber escort missions, to the point where bomber groups would ask for and demand them as escorts for their missions. These are examples of opportunity seized, and any of the Tuskegee Airmen would make excellent role models, several of them are still alive today (I’ve met them). George Washington Carver, were he alive, would make an excellent role model as well, and you can meet him, in books and articles, and every time you eat a peanut butter sandwich.

Racism occurs any time there is any measurement based on race. There is an important distinction between measurements based on race and measurements which take race into account. A measurement based on the incidence of terror propensities would be pointless in todays world if it did not take into account the religion and race of its sample. We need to know who is more LIKELY to be a terrorist. And right now, though it is dreadfully unpopular to say so, radical Muslims and those of Middle-Eastern descent are more LIKELY to be involved in terrorist action. Security is a numbers job. We don’t KNOW when and where and who and how. We can only guess based on when and where and who and how are more LIKELY. This is not a judgment, per se, on any race or creed, merely a statement of fact which happens to be rather sad in it’s results. A measure of crime will show that young black males are more LIKELY to be incarcerated than counterparts of other races. This is another very sad fact, but it does not make a judgment based on race, it merely takes race into account in measuring another, important, metric.

Racism is where you take those who have done no wrong and, because they, inescapably and through no choice of their own, belong to a particular category and either benefit them or cost them. Racism is always evil.

And if you like to read about odd and unethical experiments which nonetheless shed light on burning questions of human nature and vast social evil, the Milgram Experiments are classic cases studying the propensity of normal humans to do harm to other humans in given authority structure situations.