Month: August 2011

"It takes balls to execute an innocent man," – a Texas primary voter, when asked about the charge that his preferred candidate for governor, Rick Perry, may have presided over the execution of an innocent man, Cameron Todd Willingham.

A reader writes:

I am an Eastern Orthodox seminary student studying to become a priest. I want to thank you so much for this quote yesterday:

"Imagine a libertarian Christianity, which urged individuals to give away as much of their property as possible to the poor, to forget about the sex lives of their neighbors and focus on their own, to pray more than politic and to forgive more than to judge. Imagine, in other words, Christianity, and remind yourself how alien Christianism is to it."

My Church is currently being flooded with ex-Evangelicals who "want something more". I'm happy to have them return to the embrace of more ancient Christianity, but they have also brought their baggage and bizarre political agendas. This is currently causing a great deal of strife in our Church in America as one faction wants to be Christians as you described above, and the other wants to be people who march in political rallies, send letters to congress, and hold public guilt ("prayer") services for victims of abortion.

Thank you so much for expressing so clearly what Christianity is, and for calling out all of us who fall short of it. I think many Christianists would label you somehow as an enemy of Christianity, but really, in demanding that Christians practice what the scripture actually preaches, you are the greatest friend of all of us who struggle to do so. Many thanks from a long-time reader and devout and faithful Christian.

That small quote did so much to bolster my spirits and it gave me energy to get back to fighting the good fight on behalf of those in need.

At one point, Christians will look back on this period, I believe, with horror. The desire to control others' lives and souls through politics is so anathema to the Gospels it will one day have to be exposed and ended. Until then, we just have to keep our spirits up and attend to our own failures as Christians, which, of course, are many.

Lewis Black explains why he has never made jokes about Sarah Palin. I get it. I still resent the fact that this farcical figure has taken quite a few t-cells of mine in the past few years. But Black is a comedian; and I have to tackle reality. And the reality is that the GOP establishment actually thought this person could be president; and the GOP base still does. The danger is not past yet, however much the Beltway wants to believe it is.

By the way, I'm reading a very scarce advance manuscript of The Rogue by Joe McGinniss. All I can say is: pre-order it.

The Dish is on the move … to Seattle, where our executive editor, Patrick Appel, the rock on whom the Dish relies, is about to get married. Chris, Zoe and I will be there. Somehow, my own super-gay marriage didn't deter him. Our love and joy extend to him and Katie and their families.

Michael Scherer spotlights it:

The federal marriage amendment, first proposed in 2004, would go further than simply stopping state or federal courts from imposing gay marriage in a state. “Marriage in the United States shall consist solely of the union of a man and a woman,” reads the first sentence. Dale Carpenter, an associate professor at the University of Minnesota, has explained that the effect of this language would be “foreclosing not just courts but also state legislatures from recognizing same-sex marriages and perhaps other forms of legal support for same-sex relationships.” In other words, the people of the state of New York would no longer be able to define liberty  in their own lives.

This runs contrary, in spirit, to Perry’s stated views.

“The Constitution does not empower Congress to make decisions about morality for the American people,” he writes in his book. Perry finds a way, however, by arguing that amending the U.S. Constitution is, in fact, an act driven by the states, since 38 of the 50 states must act to ratify any amendment for it to be adopted. “Our Constitution was designed to respect states including the amendment process,” Perry told Perkins. “The overall constitutional protection, if you will, by and how we amend our United States Constitution to reflect the values of the nation as whole is very important.”

Benen shakes his head at the contradictions. Steve Chapman situates Perry's views within a long history of the GOP paying lip service to federalism and then ignoring it:

When there is a conflict between state sovereignty and conservative policies, [Republican] reverence for the 10th Amendment abruptly goes by the wayside. That became apparent several years ago, when the Bush administration asserted its power to prevent Californians from using medical marijuana after the state allowed it. It also tried to block an Oregon law allowing doctor-assisted suicide. Attorney General John Ashcroft had no qualms about mobilizing the fearsome resources of the federal government when states veered out of line.

Friedersdorf recently noted Perry's abandonment of another federalist position – leaving abortion to the states.

A definition from Garden And Gun's Allison Glock:

When a Southern woman fusses over her appearance, it does not reflect insecurity, narcissism, or some arrested form of antifeminism that holds back the sisterhood. Southern women are postfeminism. The whole issue is a nonstarter, seeing as Southern women are smart enough to recognize what works—Spanx, Aqua Net—and wise to the allocation of effort. Why pretend the world is something it isn’t? Better to focus on what you can control (drying your hair) and make the best of what you have.

Side note: Southern women do not capitalize on their looks to snag men, though that often results. The reason we Southern women take care of ourselves is because, simply, Southern women are caretakers.

(Photo: Reese Witherspoon attends the premiere for 'Water for Elephants' at the Cine Comedia on May 1, 2011 in Barcelona, Spain. By Robert Marquardt/Getty Images)

Notes from the Randy Shilts correspondence archive.

“I don’t mind defending the church to black people. I do mind defending my blackness to the church,” – Mormon actress Tara Smith.

Well, she's down with Obama, which seems the AIPAC criterion most days. From her interview with James Bennet and Jeffrey Goldberg:

When Obama pushed Bibi, Bibi made some steps forward. The American pressure led those who don't believe that time is of the essence to a better understanding that there is no status quo option. For Israelis, when they wake up in the morning and ask themselves, what is the general situation today, the litmus test for them is the health of the relationship between Israel and the United States.

Gershom Gorenberg looks at her party's positive relationship with the tent protestors.

"Remember: Tax reform will already have slashed rates radically. In one Simpson-Bowles scenario, the top rate plunges to 23 percent. Conservatives could at that point contemplate increasing net revenues by slightly tweaking these new low rates, say, back to Reagan’s 28 percent, still much lower than the current 35 percent and Obama’s devoutly desired 39.6 percent. The deviation from revenue neutrality would yield new tax receipts for the Treasury, in addition to those resulting from the economic growth stimulated by the lower rates." – Charles Krauthammer, NRO.

Frum celebrates the neocon high priest's deviationism. Of course I agree with both. Radical tax reform is win-win for both parties and the country, as Bowles-Simpson pointed out. If the Super-Committee were to embrace it, it would transform the debate.