Archive for July 16, 2009

Note to New Readers

Hello new visitors — thanks for reading a few suddenly very popular articles! I hope all of you stick around.

However, I’d like to record one short note. This blog is not a “birther” blog. It’s 50% politics, 20% law, 20% science, and 10% miscellaneous. Categories #1 and #2 overlap with some frequency, and sweep in goings-on in the birthersphere as a consequence, but this is by no means a predominant topic (besides, my friends at Yes to Democracy do that better than I could). In fact, while I am proud of our “birther” coverage, I don’t think it’s the site’s best. Can I recommend some additional, more representative reading for you?

1. The GOP’s health care talking points suggest that they’re the real “elitists.”
2. In building his presidential image, Obama could learn from history. Really, really ancient history.
3. NYU Law, despite being one of the most proudly liberal & compassionate institutions on the planet, hired a homophobe to teach human rights law. And she’s not really that bright, either.
4. We’re not “post-racial” yet.
5. The Constitution doesn’t enshrine laissez-faire, as Ron Paul & Glenn Beck imagine it to, but it does protect capitalism, generally.

If you enjoy what you see, please add us to your Google Reader (feed URL), and consider subscribing to comments, too. Thanks!

Justice Sotomayor (Day 4): Lindsey Graham Misses the Point of Brown v. Board

Lindsey Graham, explaining the importance of knowing a Justice’s philosophy prior to confirming her (from CNN):

[Brown v. Board was] instructive in the sense that the court pushed the country to do something politicians were not brave enough to do. [. . .]

“If I had been elected as a senator from South Carolina [in 1955], I would be amazed if I would have had the courage” to support that ruling, he admitted.

It’s a strange thing, indeed, for this Republican Senator to broach the issue of Brown. Not two days earlier he was trying to goad Judge Sotomayor into admitting that judges had, in fact, led the charge on social change; now, he himself is conceding that they have, but for the better.

The importance and singularly positive nature of Brown v. Board flatly rebuts the proposition that the Supreme Court should never lead on social issues. It also tends to prove that conservative concerns about “judicial activism” aren’t objective fears for the integrity of the Constitution, but rather subjective critiques of individual “culture war” issues. How strange that Graham would make this point for us, but stranger still that he doesn’t seem to be aware of it.

Look to Texas: the Culture War Isn’t About Patriotism

And it never was, for the simple fact that, with the religious right, when push comes to shove, their narrow conception of God trumps country, character, and Constitution. How else do you explain the most recent conflagration to come out of Texas’ warped, disgraceful board of education?

The Texas Board of Education, which recently approved new science standards that made room for creationist critiques of evolution, is revising the state’s social studies curriculum. In early recommendations from outside experts appointed by the board, a divide has opened over how central religious theology should be to the teaching of history.

Three reviewers, appointed by social conservatives, have recommended revamping the K-12 curriculum to emphasize the roles of the Bible, the Christian faith and the civic virtue of religion in the study of American history. [. . .]

But the emphasis on Christianity as a driving force is disputed by some historians, who focus on the economic motivation of many colonists and the fractured views of religion among the Founding Fathers.

Because prosleytizing should always take a backseat to science and, indeed, history.

Never let the far-right go unchallenged when they purport to put “country first.” There’s a reason the slogan goes, “God and country.” One has to wonder about an ideology that brands government subsidies “socialism,” but expects the government to subsidize their missionary activity.

More on this subject, from a letter I recently wrote explaining my view of why the Founders did not intend to ground American culture exclusively within Christian morality:

[. . .] The question, of course, is what is morality, and what is religion. The Founders were hardly of one mind on the subject (like most subjects — most differed on the meaning of “the Freedom of Speech,” even, as was clear by 1812!). It’s hard to disagree with the proposition that some absolute moral code must govern, but whose, and how? Historical originalism — the idea that what the Founders practiced, they intended for us — is attractive for its objectivity but discounts the notion, adopted by much of the same generation, that the Constitution was not intended to freeze the social mores of 1789 America. The document was intended to admit of interpretation rather than static meaning: “[W]e must never forget that it is a Constitution we are expounding.” McCulloch v. Maryland, 17 U.S. 316 (1819). Similarly, it discounts the problem that history rarely if ever speaks with one voice. Franklin’s God was very different than Patrick Henry’s God, was very different from Jefferson’s God (Jefferson edited his own Bible, by deleting all mentions of miracles). Whose God (morality) controls, if any?

Despite this void, the rules of constitutional decisionmaking provide some guidance. Due process & equal protection function to insulate small groups from the caprice of majoritarian government, insofar as restrictions placed on the few derive only from subjective notions of the morality of the many, and lack an objective basis in physical reality: “Our obligation is to define the liberty of all, not to mandate our own moral code.” Planned Parenthood v. Casey, 505 U.S. 833 (1992); Lawrence v. Texas, 539 U.S. 558 (2003). This doesn’t deprive the state of the power to regulate morals, although it does limit it to only “rational” regulations, at the maximum. You can call this “constitutional faith” (though I’m misappropriating a term from someone far smarter than me!): that, rather than incorporating any single faith or moral structure as a guiding light, the Constitution sets out rules of decision that require a searching inquiry into any law, or action, that functions to proscribe conduct merely for the twinge of discomfort it creates in others. This rule “plays well” with the other constitutional freedoms of religion, association, and speech, too, to create a freer and more pluralistic society than the Founders knew, but perhaps not more so than they intended.

The Extent of Sarah Palin’s Credibility as a Feminist…

…is her ability to wax poetic about mother bears:

(1) Great day w/bear management wildlife biologists; much to see in wild territory incl amazing creatures w/mama bears’ gutteral [sic] raw instinct to (2) protect & provide for her young;She sees danger?She brazenly rises up on strong hind legs, growls Don’t Touch My Cubs & the species survives (3) & mama bear doesn’t look 2 anyone else 2 hand her anything; biologists say she works harder than males, is provider/protector for the future

She’s a regular William Blake!