The Praying Coach

A person that just joined my blog made this comment on one of his posts:  The Bible is my rulebook … I’m supposed to use it as the standard bearer for everything that I do in life.

And it seems this is also the philosophy of the four Supreme Court judges who ruled in favor of the high school coach who led a “voluntary” postgame prayer on the field.

It’s been suggested that had it only been the coach performing this act, the impact of the ruling might not have been so great. But as images have shown, it wasn’t long before some of the players joined him. A few at the beginning, but soon the entire team. Most likely, early on the joiners were actual believers, but the Law of FOBLO (Fear Of Being Left Out) soon came into play.

Another point that should not to be overlooked is the considerable amount of power coaches have over high school players. They are huge authority figures and can delve out many sought-after benefits … from playing time to access to scholarships. Plus, at its core, such an action tends to become coercive –and exclusionary– when performed by authority figures.

Moreover, what about religious minorities … or people who are not affiliated with any religion? Several parents wondered how receptive the high court would have been to the freedom arguments if the coach in question had been a Muslim, who placed a prayer rug at midfield and bowed in prayers to Allah.

What’s interesting about this ruling is how many believers (and especially certain SC Judges) seem to “forget” (ignore!) the scripture in Matthew: “And when you pray, you must not be like the hypocrites. For they love to stand and pray in the synagogues and at the street corners that they may be seen by others. But when you pray, go into your room and shut the door and pray to your Father who is in secret,”

Final thought: A WHITE man gets the OK from the Supreme Court to pray after a high school football game, but a BLACK man is castigated for “taking a knee” during a Super Bowl football game. Prejudice anyone?

Can The Supreme Court Be Fixed?

The U.S. Supreme Court is a failed institution. According to Alternet.org*, it is …

A nakedly partisan majority installed by a losing presidential candidate in the Oval Office simply because he could, using only its authority, and not the law, as justification.

A captured body serving a powerful, very small political minority (the very rich, the pathologically “moral”) to the exclusion of the whole of the rest of the country and its needs.

Over the years, suggestions have been bandied about to increase the number of Supreme Court judges as a solution to the partisanship (most recently evidenced in the Roe vs. Wade debacle). However, past efforts to this end have not been successful. Further, it has been noted that doing so could “unleash a spiral of retaliatory moves by whichever party is in power.”

Nevertheless, the idea has once again surfaced. Most recently the talk centers around increasing the number of judges by four. If done under the current administration, this would obviously give the Dems a majority (7-6), but who’s to say that down the road the same imbalance wouldn’t happen again? If vacancies continue to be filled by the POTUS in power, it’s inevitable the tide will shift.

Several other ideas have been put forth in the referenced article, but IMO, each one tends to have its drawbacks.  Except one. It’s referred to as a Supreme Court lottery:

All federal appellate court judges, roughly 180 in total, would become associate justices on the Supreme Court. Panels of nine justices would be randomly selected from this pool. Importantly, decisions on whether to grant certiorari on a given case would be made by panel members who would not know the ideological makeup of the panel that would hear the case. Thus, this plan would frustrate partisan maneuvering.

IMO, the key words in this proposal are “randomly selected” and “frustrate partisan maneuvering.” In other words, as the article notes, this approach would tip the scales of justice toward justice and away from partisan manipulation.

There is little doubt that the makeup of the Supreme Court needs to be reworked. While Democrats are extremely unhappy with the current slate, there have been times in the past when the opposite was true.

Bottom line: Discussion concerning the structure of the U.S. Supreme Court needs to be moved to the active agenda (including, IMO, changes in the age limit).

What do you think? Is the above a workable solution? Do you have other ideas? Is a change even possible in the current political climate?

*(Full Disclosure: Alternet.org is described by MediaBiasFactCheck.com as Left Bias.)
*********************************************
Image by Venita Oberholster from Pixabay

Hypocrisy

I just came across an article that talked about Marjorie Dannenfelser, the President of Susan B. Anthony Pro-Life America — a nonprofit group that works to end abortion in the United States by electing antiabortion politicians.

The article noted that she, perhaps more than any other woman, is responsible for the fall of Roe vs. Wade because of her key role in “getting President Trump to commit to appoint U.S. Supreme Court justices who oppose abortion.”

(Andrew Harnik / Associated Press)

As I looked at the picture accompanying the article (with Trump standing next to Ms. Dannenfelser), I couldn’t help but wonder why Trump would have made this commitment. There is little doubt that during his playboy days, he had “women-friends” who would have sought abortion. And there is even less doubt (in fact there is proof) that many in Congress have slipped a few bucks under the table for their outside-of-marriage lady-friends to “take care of things.”

But I suppose it’s like everything that goes on in the political world … hypocrisy is the name of the game.

(Besides, there are still states that support abortion, so for the political crowd, nothing has really changed.)

And so it begins …

Below is what Steve wrote on his blog (“Uncommon Sense”) related to the recent Supreme Court decision on abortion. I’m sharing it because I admire his rather cool, calm, and collected approach to the action. Although I also have much to say about this INSANE decision, I’m going to let him speak for me until I cool down.

The GOP advanced their Freedom Agenda today, when their hand-picked Supreme Court Justices overturned Roe v. Wade which established abortion as a valid option for pregnant women everywhere in the country.

By voiding Roe, the GOP’s minions have established their small government, freedom loving vision upon the country. The government is expected to stay out of the private lives of citizens . . . , uh, well, except when a woman gets pregnant and the state steps in and exercises control over that woman’s uterus.

No other organ is thus “protected” by the state. The state (federal or local) cannot require you to accept an organ transplant, nor require you to donate any of your organs to another (even blood). The state cannot require you to protect your heart and lungs by not smoking. But uteruses, well, they’re special, you see.

And while the SCOTUS justices may have been correct that the constitution right to privacy may not be the shield Roe needed, there is this small matter of . . . the Fourth Amendment of the U.S. Constitution which provides that “[t]he right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated.” So women are secure in their persons, except when the anti-abortion states step in and exercise control over their uteruses. And determining that a woman is pregnant, how is that not an illegal search? How does that make any sense at all? And what about “equal protection” of the law? The Fourteenth Amendment states that “No state shall make or enforce any law which shall abridge the privileges or immunities of citizens of the United States” but that apparently doesn’t apply to the United States collectively. So, in the United States, a women will get an abortion in one state and be arrested and tried for murder, but another woman, just on the other side of the state line, will get an abortion, paid for by her insurance company. This will happen because the U.S. itself doesn’t provide equal protection under the law.

Clearly the current crop of SCOTUS ne’er-do-wells were just looking for legal-schmegal language cover for what they wanted to do for their religiously inspired agendas.

The Republicans orchestrated this. The only solution is to vote them out, vote them all out.

LET ME REPEAT: The Republicans orchestrated this. The only solution is to vote them out, vote them all out.

*************************************
Image by Engin Akyurt from Pixabay

A Reblog That Isn’t A Reblog

I recently came across a blog post that deeply impressed me and, for all intents and purposes, I planned to do a “reblog.” However, the post title is VERY long and to my thinking, really doesn’t do justice to the contents. So I decided to provide some snippets (along with a link to the post itself) and let you decide if you want to read more.

The writer starts out with this, which immediately intrigued me:

I’m not a leftist as you would define it. Why? Because you have no idea what a “leftist” is. So, I’m going to educate you.

And educate you he does!

Although he touches on several issues, he easily moves the reader from one to the next. Examples of things he covers:

• He discusses the terms “Leftist” and “Rightist” and where they came from. (Great history lesson!)
• He talks a bit about the five years that he lived in Canada and some of the differences between their government and that of the U.S.
• He counters the belief that the U.S. is a “Christian” nation with some history and examples to support this “wrong thinking.”
• He addresses the current gun controversy and relates it to our history as a British colony.
• And finally, he compares our healthcare system with Canada and explains why the U.S. will probably never adopt Universal Healthcare. 

I admit that much of what he wrote is a reinforcement of the democratic ideals that many of us already hold. Nevertheless, I found he did share some facts and information that I hadn’t considered for a long time. Maybe you will have the same experience.

In any event … here is the link. I look forward to reading your thoughts and reactions.

(BTW, just as an FYI, the title is “Why Don’t Leftists Realize America is Too Different to Adopt the Nordic Model?”)

P.S. I encourage you to read his entertaining “About Me” page while you’re there. 😊