Amy Coney Barret

[Jonathan]

It appears that the activist leftist press thinks that Barret will be Trump's pick for scotus. They're digging deep and floating scary speculations about groups that she belongs to and relationships that she may or may not have had. They're pretty certain that she hates women so much that she wants to invent laws which make them subservient to men. They're already angry that she wants to violate women's right to force me to pay for their wombs and vaginas whiles screaching at me to stay away from their wombs and vaginas because their lady bits are none of my ficking gad damned business. They're already more afraid of her than they are of radicals from other religions who are throwing gays off of roofs and stoning women to death for having committed the offense of being raped. If she's the pick, it's going to be a lefty hatefest summer. But will they be able to sustain any one of their hate fads? Going after Trump's pick with the standard leftist panic hate smear will take the babies in cages issue off the front burner. They're really starting to spread their hatred too thin.

[william.scherk]

4 hours ago, Jonathan, with a quote rendered into point form, said:

 

• They're digging deep and floating scary speculations about groups that she belongs to and relationships that she may or may not have had.
• They're pretty certain that she hates women so much that she wants to invent laws which make them subservient to men.
• They're already angry that she wants to violate women's right to force me to pay for their wombs and vaginas
• whiles screaching at me to stay away from their wombs and vaginas because their lady bits are none of my ficking gad damned business.
• They're already more afraid of her than they are of radicals from other religions who are throwing gays off of roofs and stoning women to death for having committed the offense of being raped.

 

Forcing 'you' to pay for their wombs and vaginas is awful, whether They do it or She does it. Some women want to be in personal control of their own vaginas, wombs, ovaries and fallopian tubes, but you know that goes.

It could be that what America needs to fill the vacancy is a God-struck person,  albeit someone whose beliefs are strong enough to write an opinion like the well-constructed 1998 article Barret co-wrote while she was law review editor at Notre Dame -- Catholic Judges in Capital Cases (published in the Marquette Law Review).

Another Barret opinion is more recent: Originalism and Stare Decisis, which appeared in the Notre Dame Law Review in 2017.

Since she faced some whinging and inappropriate Senate questioning upon her nomination as Judge of the US Court of Appeals (7th Circuit), her poise (as related at Wikipedia's brief article) allows her to dispose of the Catholic Question; she said then: "It is never appropriate for a judge to impose that judge's personal convictions, whether they arise from faith or anywhere else, on the law."

It might be fun to see some examples of Them being all They-ish about wombs and the judge's Weird Cult -- though to me that 'cult' is about as anodyne as Amway, given the competition in America.  Apparently they (not Them, but the judge's charismatic-Nicene-credo group, People of Praise) are about as off-stream as Presbyterians or Methodists. With a little bit more obey thy husband, but hey. A strongly-held faith is no impediment to being a Supreme Court Justice, I figure.

It could be that some portion of Trump supporters will be infatuated with the religious part of her CV, if she is nominated on Monday. I don't see that it matters an infatuation, hopes or dreams. Just because some might believe that a conservative majority of the nine will lead to reversals of, say, gay marriage rights, or Roe v Wade, and also rule against protections for LGBT folks ... just because someone has a grand narrative of Christian Resurgence, it doesn't make it much more likely, does it?  End-days hucksters like Trump-before-Tribulation Jim Bakker notwithstanding.

Our Supreme Court has a very feeble 'oversight' from Parliament (engendered by Trudeau), as the choice of a nomination is a PM's personal prerogative. At the moment we have a mongrelized legislative (non-constitutional) process by which a list of nominees reaches the Privy Council after vetting by the law societies, and senior magistrates and such.  All the 'rules' of choosing are unspoken: the Justices should be bilingual, they must have knowledge of both common and civil law (as is the 'code' in Quebec), there must be some stab at regional representation. From the outside, arbitrary, opaque, undemocratic.

The USA system is a thousand times more robust in terms of vetting, challenging a jurist before he or she is confirmed by a vote. If the choice is likely to be momentous in the long run ... passions may inflame. 

Spoiler

 

Edited July 8, 2018 by william.scherk
You know "how" that goes ...

[Michael Stuart Kelly]

All of this leftie angst is based on a procedural stupidity.

Roe vs. Wade should not have happened.

Abortion should have been dealt with in Congress by passing a law and having the President sign it. Or, better, by amending the Constitution.

That's the way the system works, not by making up rights (like right to privacy) that some judges (and people) think are implied in the Constitution and others not.

The idea of legislating from the Supreme Court bench is a leftie idea going back to Franklin Roosevelt (or even beyond) and now people are seeing the vulnerability of this approach. They pulled it off for Roe vs. Wade and now it is dawning on them that, just like with the Dred Scott decision, what the Supreme Court granteth, the Supreme Court can taketh away.

Rather than trying to stack the Supreme Court, the left should throw in the towel because President Trump is now going to do that.  If the left is truly interested in protecting abortion choice and having it stick, they should do it legislatively. The attempt to do it through the Supreme Court is an attempt one day take over without worrying about elections anymore.

Hopefully, that day will never happen. The checks  and balances system is just too robust for that disaster. At least so far. Our Founding Fathers were wicked smart in setting that one up.

Michael

[william.scherk]

2 hours ago, william.scherk said:

Our Supreme Court has a very feeble 'oversight' from Parliament

Which means they can steamroller the whole business of justice. For example, abortion. Did you know that our Supreme Court dashed down the last abortion law here in 1988?  Crushed and vacated. Gone.

The government of the day and since that day have had the opportunity to legislate something new, but all attempts expired before being put on the order paper.  So Canada has no law on abortion, none at all. It is a medical matter a party to which the government is not. No political party within a ham's distance of power is up to the challenge of going down the same ugly road again. 

-- I imagine a years-long abortion debate is just what the doctor ordered for the USA. Not.

The courts here also followed our Charter and upended the entire shebang over gay marriage. One province, Ontario, allowed a gay marriage in 2001. Every other province then had the Crown sued by unmarried gay couples saying, "Why lawful there, not accepted here, WTF?  Are we not persons?"  One by one, provincial courts basically said, "Yeah, shit. The provincial attitude is fucked. One for all, all for one. Canadians are bound by the same Charter, and may assert the same freedoms, rights and responsibilities across the land."

A couple of 'hold-out' provinces, Alberta notably, said Nu-uh at some point and pretended local courts could be disobeyed. "No way are we going to accept an Alberta Court decision. Nope, we will appeal, and if the federal courts end up saying we can't define marriage then we will invoke the Notwithstanding Clause" (this being a constitutional clause that allows a province to stiff-arm the constitution for a five-year period).

And did you now, Alberta? Did you invoke?  Nope. Didn't have the guts or any political capital.  Holding out was by then becoming an embarrassment.  Opinion had shifted quickly once some provinces were on board.

No, because after the Canadian Supremes said Marriage Definition is Federal, You Idiots, the feds addressed it in a new Marriage Act.  And now nobody really gives a shit, save for who you would expect.

As in America, due to the huge cultural drag, even religious minority groups like Muslims contain majorities of individuals who don't give a shit about gay marriage. I mean, some officious and worried clerics and laymen certainly do, but more evangelicals now reject gay marriage than do Muslims.

In Canada, we missed out on a whole lotta religion that you all explored. No Southern Baptist Convention. No majority of 'born again' Christians in any polity. No Mormon state.  The biggest religion in Canada by half-hearted adherents or baptism is Catholic, as ever.  The Protestant traditions have their harshest old time religion, perhaps, in the Reformed Churches, but they are a sliver of the pie.

Socially libertarian, wildly secular, mostly uninterested in snuffling at other people's crotches. How did we become this kind of place in such a relatively short period of time? The same thing happened by referendum in Ireland, a place one might least expect it.  The same general thing happened in the USA, and much of Western Europe.

So, ultimately I think I agree with Michael's end-point.  Be careful what you wish for, if you wish for a politically-instrumental court. I think the President has to satisfy the evangelical base with a supposedly boo hiss anti-abortion judge, but I don't think you all want the court to revisit the issue or see the issue give rise to social unrest.

Did Ayn Rand have a litmus test or other criteria going into the first Reagan election?  She must have detested Carter's policies, but did she also harbour suspicion of the Moral Majority or the so-called Christian Right attendant to Reagan and other conservatives?  I probably misremember, but she said somethin about abortion in re at least one election campaign. Maybe I am thinking of Stephen Boydstun.   

Edited July 8, 2018 by william.scherk
Leadership in spelling errors caught and punished

[Michael Stuart Kelly]

3 hours ago, william.scherk said:

Did Ayn Rand have a litmus test or other criteria going into the first Reagan election?  She must have detested Carter's policies, but did she also harbour suspicion of the Moral Majority or the so-called Christian Right attendant to Reagan and other conservatives?  I probably misremember, but she said somethin about abortion in re at least one election campaign.

William,

From Open Culture:

In Her Final Speech, Ayn Rand Denounces Ronald Reagan, the Moral Majority & Anti-Choicers (1981)

I think her real beef, though, was crony corporatism. What we nowadays call the "Establishment Republicans." These were the people she tried to help ever since Weldel Wilkie, but who kept screwing things up and growing the government when they got power.

She did not use either term, but here is what she said in The Ayn Rand Letter,  Volume IV, Number 2, November-December 1975:

Quote

Now I want to give you a brief indication of the kinds of issues that are coming up, on which you might want to know my views.

1. The Presidential election of 1976. I urge you, as emphatically as I can, not to support the candidacy of Ronald Reagan. I urge you not to work for or advocate his nomination, and not to vote for him. My reasons are as follows: Mr. Reagan is not a champion of capitalism, but a conservative in the worst sense of that word—i.e., an advocate of a mixed economy with government controls slanted in favor of business rather than labor (which, philosophically, is as untenable a position as one could choose—see Fred Kinnan in Atlas Shrugged, pp. 541-2). This description applies in various degrees to most Republican politicians, but most of them preserve some respect for the rights of the individual. Mr. Reagan does not: he opposes the right to abortion.

I cut her slack on her scorched-earth stance on abortion since she had one earlier in life. That's not something a woman can undo. She either embraces abortion as good and drives all emotions about the experience underground, or she feels guilty. (It's a biology thing.) And Rand was intensely anti-guilt. So she was left with extreme hostility as the residue.

(Apropos, I am not in favor of the government legislating anything about abortion. Personally, I detest the practice.)

On a lighter note, where on earth among "most Republican politicians" of the day did she find someone to contrast against Reagan re "respect for the rights of the individual"? Every Republican politician I had ever heard of back then opposed the right to abortion. Maybe I lived on a different planet than she did?  

Michael 

[Michael Stuart Kelly]

If anybody wants to go deeper into O-Land weeds on Rand and Reason, or on abortion for that matter, see an OL discussion of six years ago:

Ronald Reagan: Fan of Ayn Rand

Our dear Carol had a lot to say back then.

Michael

[Jonathan]

22 hours ago, william.scherk said:

Forcing 'you' to pay for their wombs and vaginas is awful, whether They do it or She does it. Some women want to be in personal control of their own vaginas, wombs, ovaries and fallopian tubes, but you know that goes.

The primary issue at hand is not control of wombs, but of when rights obtain in a new life. The fact the left's soundbite campaigns generally avoid mentioning the issue, and therefore try to dodge the essentials of the discussion, and emotionally spin it into a false Narrative about those Themmy white men sticking the hands in Our vaginas, smacks of desperation and the inability to make an intelligent argument. Dishonest as hell.

Apply the same idiotic tactic to, say, a discussion on whether or not it should be legal to shoot anyone whom you don't like or whose existence is inconvenient to you: "People say that I don't have the right to pull the trigger on my rifle and kill my irritating brother in law. Well! How dare these authoritarian tyrants try to control my trigger finger! Stay away from my finger, man! What's you're problem? Why are you obsessed with fingers and with telling everyone, 24 hours per day, how they can or can't use their fingers. Freaking finger police! Finger Nazis! And some of them are trying to control my finger by not giving me free ammo! It's my right to use my finger and to make them pay for my ammo. Stop violating my finger rights!"

Childish, intellectual shitbaggery.

Our bodies are our property, just as our property is. If anyone, man or woman, takes an action which allows another rights-bearing being to inhabit their property, whether it is their body or their home, the host may evict the guest at any time. He or she may expel the guest, but may not kill it. Killing it is not a reasonable, rights-respecting approach. Anyone who thinks that it is morally acceptable that She may kill (or hire another to do so) a guest whom she caused to be there, and/or whom has become an unwelcome guest, but who is not threatening any use of force, does not believe in or respect rights, and therefore has no claim to the right to control her vagina while denying others' rights to live.

22 hours ago, william.scherk said:

It might be fun to see some examples of Them being all They-ish about wombs and the judge's Weird Cult -- though to me that 'cult' is about as anodyne as Amway, given the competition in America.  Apparently they (not Them, but the judge's charismatic-Nicene-credo group, People of Praise) are about as off-stream as Presbyterians or Methodists. With a little bit more obey thy husband, but hey. A strongly-held faith is no impediment to being a Supreme Court Justice, I figure.

I'd rate her cult at about a 3 or 4 on the kook scale. In comparison, the Bernie Sanders and Liz Fauxcahontas Warren cults are at level 8. Religion can have some negative consequences, but nothing like the cult of socialism.

Quote

Just because some might believe that a conservative majority of the nine will lead to reversals of, say, gay marriage rights, or Roe v Wade, and also rule against protections for LGBT folks ... just because someone has a grand narrative of Christian Resurgence, it doesn't make it much more likely, does it?  End-days hucksters like Trump-before-Tribulation Jim Bakker notwithstanding.

I don't see any of that happening. The culture doesn't have a taste for it. Well, at least I don't see it happening due to any sort of mass desire on the right to impose religious-based rules on those who have differing sexual preferences. The only way that I see it becoming an issue is if LGBTQ keep pushing for special rights and hypocritical, forceful impositions on the Themmy Others. LGBTQ began with the attitude of leave us alone, treat us equals. But success led to powerlust, and now the mindset is how can we enhance our power and use it to punish Themmy Others and impose our will? What should we forcibly compel them to do? How shall we make some examples of destroying their lives to demonstrate our power and instill fear and respect?

J

[Jonathan]

17 hours ago, Michael Stuart Kelly said:

William,

From Open Culture:

In Her Final Speech, Ayn Rand Denounces Ronald Reagan, the Moral Majority & Anti-Choicers (1981)

I think her real beef, though, was crony corporatism. What we nowadays call the "Establishment Republicans." These were the people she tried to help ever since Weldel Wilkie, but who kept screwing things up and growing the government when they got power.

She did not use either term, but here is what she said in The Ayn Rand Letter,  Volume IV, Number 2, November-December 1975:

I cut her slack on her scorched-earth stance on abortion since she had one earlier in life. That's not something a woman can undo. She either embraces abortion as good and drives all emotions about the experience underground, or she feels guilty. (It's a biology thing.) And Rand was intensely anti-guilt. So she was left with extreme hostility as the residue.

(Apropos, I am not in favor of the government legislating anything about abortion. Personally, I detest the practice.)

On a lighter note, where on earth among "most Republican politicians" of the day did she find someone to contrast against Reagan re "respect for the rights of the individual"? Every Republican politician I had ever heard of back then opposed the right to abortion. Maybe I lived on a different planet than she did?  

Michael 

Rand and her heirs were never good at political endorsements and political prognostication. They always misread which of a candidates positions and values were significant, core beliefs, and which were something closer to lip service. They're generally just really bad at making the crossover from theory to practice.

j

[william.scherk]

William Scott Scherk and Ann Coulter, humorist ...

23 hours ago, william.scherk said:

Be careful what you wish for, if you wish for a politically-instrumental court.

 

[Michael Stuart Kelly]

5 hours ago, Jonathan said:

I don't see any of that happening. The culture doesn't have a taste for it. Well, at least I don't see it happening due to any sort of mass desire on the right to impose religious-based rules on those who have differing sexual preferences.

Jonathan,

I'm always amused by people who think Christians will try to abolish gays, abortions and so on. They so very worry their pretty little hearts about theocracy and theocratic dictatorships.

Last century, the leaders who--in reality, not just in theory--tried to do that were Hitler, Stalin, Mao, etc. And they didn't just try to abolish rights. They abolished the people who wanted those rights. They killed as many as they could get away with.

Not a Christian among those leaders.

But, wait...

Hmmmmmmmm...

What else did they all have in common?

I wonder... I wonder...

What could it possibly be?

Oh yeah!

I remember!

They were all socialists!

 

Michael

[Michael Stuart Kelly]

It's not that I think Christians will ever be happy about abortion, etc.

It's that Christians forgive.

Other ideologies don't.

That means I believe the train has passed the stop on banning abortion, homosexual marriage, etc. I don't see Christians in power ever overturning them.

However, a strongman dictator would abolish it all in a heartbeat and imprison and kill off those who stand up against him.

And what keeps a a strongman dictator from ever getting that kind of power in America? From what I see, it's the people who consider themselves patriots, most of whom are Christian.

Michael

[Jonathan]

9 hours ago, Michael Stuart Kelly said:

It's not that I think Christians will ever be happy about abortion, etc.

It's that Christians forgive.

Other ideologies don't.

That means I believe the train has passed the stop on banning abortion, homosexual marriage, etc. I don't see Christians in power ever overturning them.

However, a strongman dictator would abolish it all in a heartbeat and imprison and kill off those who stand up against him.

And what keeps a a strongman dictator from ever getting that kind of power in America? From what I see, it's the people who consider themselves patriots, most of whom are Christian.

Michael

Yeah, Christians aren't a threat to anyone. They've overwhelmingly accepted the idea of staying out of others' bedrooms. But now that's not enough. Now, they must be punished. They must have their thinking forcefully corrected. They may not have their own opinions and act on them. They must pay for others' contraception and abortions. They must bake cakes and decorate them with messages to which they are personally opposed.

J

P.S. If Hillary had won the election, we'd be headed toward laws which mandate that heterosexuals must have sex with homosexuals who find them attractive, because to not have sex with them would be unfair, bigoted, discriminatory and hateful.

[william.scherk]

The train, the train!

3 hours ago, Jonathan said:

3 hours ago, MSK said:

I believe the train has passed the stop on banning abortion, homosexual marriage, etc.

Christians aren't a threat to anyone. They've overwhelmingly accepted the idea of staying out of others' bedrooms. 

Some days I just don't get sarcasm.  

The candidate Trump was pretty clear on what is going to happen to Roe v Wade.  He uses the word "automatic."  

[caroljane]

15 hours ago, Michael Stuart Kelly said:

Jonathan,

I'm always amused by people who think Christians will try to abolish gays, abortions and so on. They so very worry their pretty little hearts about theocracy and theocratic dictatorships.

Last century, the leaders who--in reality, not just in theory--tried to do that were Hitler, Stalin, Mao, etc. And they didn't just try to abolish rights. They abolished the people who wanted those rights. They killed as many as they could get away with.

Not a Christian among those leaders.

But, wait...

Hmmmmmmmm...

What else did they all have in common?

I wonder... I wonder...

What could it possibly be?

Oh yeah!

I remember!

They were all socialists!

 

Michael

Almost right. Dont know about the others, but Hitler had shamefully compliant religious leaders, and Pope Pius's role   is still contentious.

But Dietrich Bonhoffer, that shining light.  I stress that this is just an impression. I have no facts I have looked up; But I see Merkel as a spiritual daughter of his, and as a fine representative of his legacy.

[Michael Stuart Kelly]

26 minutes ago, caroljane said:

Almost right.

Carol,

Not almost.

100% right.

Michael

[Michael Stuart Kelly]

What's more, lefties like to elevate Islam as the persecuted victim over the big bad oppressive Christianity.

And they turn off their eyes. They don't see how women and gays are treated--for real today--in most Islamic cultures as opposed to how they are treated--for real today--within Christian cultures.

Let a hardcore Muslim become President or a Supreme Court Justice and see how far Roe v. Wade and gay marriage last...

Michael

[Jonathan]

20 hours ago, william.scherk said:

The train, the train!

Some days I just don't get sarcasm.  

The candidate Trump was pretty clear on what is going to happen to Roe v Wade.  He uses the word "automatic."  

No, you get sarcasm, you just don't get Trump. You're like Ayn Rand and her heirs misreading candidates, filling yourself with fears after disregarding context and tone, and after believing false positions or attitudes that those on Your Side have assigned to Trump.

Did you not notice in the video that it was an uncomfortable question for Trump? Go back and watch it again. Notice the hesitancy, and the downplaying of the issue, and also the offering of the compromise/saving grace that it will be given to the states?

Try to set aside your fears of the Themmy Otherses and how they plan to get you.

Maybe think about answering some substantive questions from your discussion pals here, like you used to, and like you used to often encourage others to do. Maybe start with this one: When does a new life begin, and at what point does it acquire rights, and why?

J

[Jonathan]

So, Barret is not the nominee. Not that it matters. The orchestrated leftist fear machine is running full throttle in high gear. ABC even had a pre-meltdown. Celebs are freaking out about the imminent dictatorship. Everything, every issue, is fear panic terror. Millions, maybe billions, perhaps even trillions, of women and minorities will die painful deaths because of Trump's choice. He's already worse than Hitler.

[Jon Letendre]

 

 

 

 https://mobile.twitter.com/AlexPappas

 

 

 

 

When you pre-write your press release slamming Trump’s SCOTUS pick but forget to add the name....

 

 

7:47 PM · Jul 9, 2018

[Jonathan]

3 hours ago, Jonathan said:

Maybe think about answering some substantive questions from your discussion pals here, like you used to, and like you used to often encourage others to do. Maybe start with this one: When does a new life begin, and at what point does it acquire rights, and why?

Additional substantive points for Billy and like-minded serious thinkers to consider addressing: Do you think that Roe v Wade and current law is perfect? If someone were in screeching hyperventilating emoting fever mode (in other words, standard leftist discourse), couldn't he or she legitimately wail that Roe v Wade itself intrudes into bedrooms and wombs and vaginas, and endangers and kills trillions of women and minorities each month? Shouldn't we keep our filthy hands out of women's vajayjays totally completely, rather than just sometimes? If an almost-entirely-born baby has a millimeter of one toe still lingering within the technical boundaries of its mother's hoo hoo, she should have the right to smash it with a sledge hammer, no? And anyone who disagrees is a monster dictator who hates women and minorities, and dreams of their having their coochy bizniz cut up with rusty tools in forced back alley abortions?

[Jonathan]

13 minutes ago, Jon Letendre said:

 

 

 

 https://mobile.twitter.com/AlexPappas

 

 

 

 

When you pre-write your press release slamming Trump’s SCOTUS pick but forget to add the name....

 

 

7:47 PM · Jul 9, 2018

Heh. That's so awesome, especially considering the idea that Kavanaugh should now have the nickname "Dos Equis."

J

[Peter]

On ‎7‎/‎9‎/‎2018 at 11:15 AM, Jonathan said:

Yeah, Christians aren't a threat to anyone. They've overwhelmingly accepted the idea of staying out of others' bedrooms. But now that's not enough. Now, they must be punished. They must have their thinking forcefully corrected. They may not have their own opinions and act on them. They must pay for others' contraception and abortions. They must bake cakes and decorate them with messages to which they are personally opposed.

J

P.S. If Hillary had won the election, we'd be headed toward laws which mandate that heterosexuals must have sex with homosexuals who find them attractive, because to not have sex with them would be unfair, bigoted, discriminatory and hateful.

Michael wrote, ”However, a strongman dictator would abolish it all in a heartbeat and imprison and kill off those who stand up against him.” And J had the PS above.

A vote for Das Progressives is a vote to control “the womb to the tomb.” Is that catchy enough?

[Jonathan]

3 minutes ago, Peter said:

Michael wrote, ”However, a strongman dictator would abolish it all in a heartbeat and imprison and kill off those who stand up against him.” And J had the PS above.

A vote for Das Progressives is a vote to control “the womb to the tomb.” Is that catchy enough?

 

 

The left's motto should actually be "Everything which is not forbidden is mandatory."

J

[Peter]

I don't know, Comrade. I can't see that on a banner or a TV Public Service Announcement. Too "1984." 

[Jonathan]

Just now, Peter said:

I don't know, Comrade. I can't see that on a banner or a TV Public Service Announcement. Too "1984." 

Well, they are getting bolder in saying who they are and what they stand for. They're quickly stripping away the facade and getting closer and closer to just outright saying that they enjoy controlling and punishing others, even at the expense of making their own lives worse. Just so long as they feel that the targets of their punishment are being punished worse than they are, they are quite satisfied, and less bashful about admitting it.