• Memory, it’s been 7 years.
• Positive words for Mrs Palin, if you want some balance.
• The message I take from this is not what’s intended. Less college and more professional schooling is the answer not “better colleges”. Too many kids treat college as 4 years of partying away from home … market is reflecting that.
• The Christian Carnival is up.
• Facts about pigs, many of which I didn’t know before reading.
• One college, making a difference in some lives. Fireman too?
• Two campaigns and some kids.

Many of you have probably seen this Obituary from the Washington Post, as reprinted in National Review Online’s Corner. If not, read it, especially if you’re a father.

More commentary at this post in the Corner. Pray for this family, especially the son. I know he has close remaining family but I cannot help wondering what he’s going to do with his dad gone.

I love finding new-to-me words in everyday writing. Today’s word is psephology, as in the study of elections. Example: Keith Olberman is to psephology as Ptolemy was to astronomy. Many thanks to Jonah Goldberg for improving my vocabulary.

From this link:

An article in the Legal Times discusses the impact that Sarah Palin and Joe Biden would have on judicial picks if elected vice president. For those who question the potential influence of a VP on judicial selection, the Legal Times notes that “Gore was a strong voice … in pushing the nominations of Justices Ruth Bader Ginsburg and Stephen Breyer.” The article concludes that

“Palin … is thought to be an assurance that Sen. John McCain will make good on his promise to nominate more judges in the mold of Chief Justice John Roberts Jr. and Justice Samuel Alito Jr.”

We agree:

“McCain’s choice of Palin, a social conservative, shut down criticism from [CFJ’s Curt] Levey and others. ‘McCain is a moderate, and she’s more of a movement conservative,’ Levey says. ‘If she has any effect on his judicial picks, I think it’ll be a positive one.'”

The article notes that, while Palin has less of a record than Biden on judicial selection – as Judiciary chairman, he led the fight to defeat Robert Bork and Clarence Thomas – Palin

“already has had more impact on the Alaska judiciary than her predecessor. Since taking office in December 2006, Palin has seated more than a dozen judges, including a state Supreme Court justice and a state court of appeals judge, the first appellate appointments in the state in more than a decade.”

Palin’s questions when interviewing potential nominees for the Alaska bench give assurance that she understands two of the most important principles of judicial selection: 1) select nominees who believe in judicial modesty and restraint, and 2) impose no litmus tests (both principles can be found in the judges section of the GOP’s 2008 platform). The Legal Times reports that

“[Andy] Harrington, executive director of Alaska Legal Services Corp., interviewed with Palin in November 2007, days after the state Supreme Court issued a ruling striking down a law that required girls less than 17 years old and younger to get permission from their parents before receiving an abortion. … Harrington anticipated a question about the ruling. But Palin never asked about the case or any other, Harrington says. … At one point, she asked him to define an activist judge. … Another judicial candidate who interviewed with Palin this year says Palin asked questions about work history, background, and basic judicial philosophy. ‘Some of my colleagues say the Constitution is a living, breathing document. What do you think?’ Palin asked.”

RASMUSSEN SURVEY

Of course, some liberal judges and commentators claim that it is they who believe in judicial restraint. And perhaps a few of them do. But for those who doubt which side of the political spectrum most consistently supports the rule of law, the results of a Rasmussen survey this month should dispel those doubts. The survey found that McCain supporters overwhelming believe – by an 82% to 11% margin – that “the Supreme Court [should] make decisions based on what’s written in the Constitution and legal precedents,” rather than “be guided mostly by a sense of fairness and justice.” Obama supporters, on the other hand, believe the converse by a 49% to 29% margin.

Some time ago, I suggested an alternative debating format, which would certainly make for a more interesting (and informative) evening. The format would go something like this:

moderator: The next topic will be educational reform. Mr Obama you are to begin. Please explain briefly Mr McCain’s position on what needs to be done to improve our educational system. You have three minutes, which will alternate with one minute corrections from Mr McCain until you are both satisfied.

[The two exchange]

moderator: Now, Mr Obama that you established an understanding of Mr McCain’s stand, you have 3 minutes to rebut that position.

Then … they reverse and Mr McCain explains Mr Obama’s position until Mr Obama is satisfied he has successfully explained it. And Mr McCain gets a short rebuttal of that.

And then of course, they move on the the next topic.

What this avoids of course is the endless arguments we so often find, where one side rebuts a position not held by the other and vice versa. It also means that at least two people (the candidates themselves) and perhaps several in the audience as well will finally come to understand the arguments and motivations of the otehr side instead of just demonizing a caricature of the same said position.

“If you don’t like change, you’re going to like irrelevance even less.”
General Eric Shinseki, retired Chief of Staff, U. S. Army

“Change” is the new black. Senator Obama has made change the cornerstone of his campaign, promising that he is running “to offer this country change that we can believe in.” Senator McCain of late is also promising change from the same old Washington politics. (Senator Obama, unsurprisingly, has taken some umbrage that Senator McCain, who is a member of the party that has (somewhat) been in control the past eight year, has appropriated the banner of change.)

Here’s my problem: It’s not the change that either candidate intends that matters. It’s the change that is going to befall this country in the next four years that matters. Look, the pace of change in our lives is unlike ever before: the ubiquitous threat of terrorism, more countries joining the nuclear club, information proliferation, emerging economic competition, outsourced jobs. The list goes on forever. Read the rest of this entry

For 8 years, liberals have accused George W. Bush of “shredding the Constitution”.  But as Rasmussen Reports notes, Obama supporters don’t even seem to take the Constitution seriously.

OK, civics question:  The job of the Supreme Court is to … what?  What is their primary purpose?  Wikipedia tells us that, while the Court’s purpose was a bit hazy during the early years of our country, it finally congealed.

Initially, during the tenures of Chief Justices Jay, Rutledge, and Ellsworth (1789–1801), the Court lacked a home of its own and any real prestige.

That changed during the Marshall Court (1801–1836), which declared the Court to be the supreme arbiter of the Constitution (see Marbury v. Madison) and made a number of important rulings which gave shape and substance to the constitutional balance of power between the federal government (referred to at the time as the “general” government) and the states. In Martin v. Hunter’s Lessee, the Court ruled that it had the power to correct interpretations of the federal Constitution made by state supreme courts. Both Marbury and Martin confirmed that the Supreme Court was the body entrusted with maintaining the consistent and orderly development of federal law.

The Supreme Court is to rule on the constitutionality of the cases, and the laws involved with them, which are brought before them.  That’s their job.  But then, if you don’t know that, or consider the Constitution to be two-century-old Silly Putty, that may alter your perception.

Which takes us back to Rasmussen, where, for starters, the overall numbers seem passable, but not what I would have hoped.

Most American voters (60%) agrees and says the Supreme Court should make decisions based on what is written in the constitution, while 30% say rulings should be guided on the judge’s sense of fairness and justice.

But take a closer look, and you’ll note that one’s perception of the Constitution alters your vote.

While 82% of voters who support McCain believe the justices should rule on what is in the Constitution, just 29% of Barack Obama’s supporters agree. Just 11% of McCain supporters say judges should rule based on the judge’s sense of fairness, while nearly half (49%) of Obama supporters agree.

The better your grade in social studies, or the better you know how the US government was intended to work, the more you’re likely to vote Republican.  If you think that, in order to change the laws, you just need to change the courts, you’re both badly mistaken from a civics point of view (that’s for the legislature) and likely to misuse the system (e.g. gaining same-sex marriage by judicial fiat rather than legislation). 

And you’re most likely a liberal.

• What the pig/lipstick kerfuffle misses.
• Answers to 20 questions apparently posed for Ms Palin.
• Ms Paglia and Mr Gingrich on the same page … how often does that happen?
• On Mr Wonmug.
• One moderate returns to the fence.
• Mr Obama and one of his bills.
• On Mr Rushdie’s new novel.

No, I agree with The Atlantic’s Marc Ambinder that Obama did not call Sarah Palin a pig.  I don’t believe all references to “lipstick” are, from here on out, oblique references to her.  The “lipstick on a pig” word picture has been with us for a while.  It’s probably not the best word picture to use at this point in time, but I don’t think it was a personal attack.

What I’m hoping comes out of this election season is a realization by the many “professional victim” groups that sexism (or racism or homophobia) isn’t hidden in every disagreement.  So, Democrats, stinks to be on the other end of the hysteria, eh?

Update:  Speaking of hysteria, looks like the term “community organizer” is now forbidden.

At the Crain’s Business Forum this morning, [NY Gov. David] Paterson drew attention to a phrase used numerous times by speakers at the Republican National Convention to describe Barack Obama’s leadership experience: community organizer.

“I think the Republican Party is too smart to call Barack Obama ‘black’ in a sense that it would be a negative. But you can take something about his life, which I noticed they did at the Republican Convention – a ‘community organizer.’ They kept saying it, they kept laughing,” he said.

Guess some Democrats aren’t getting the realization.

The recent buzz around the conservative blogosphere (and a bit on the liberal side, too) is that Keith Olbermann and Chris Matthews will no longer be anchoring MSNBC’s election coverage specials. 

I have never considered hosts of opinion shows — including Matthews and Olbermann, as well as O’Reily, Beck and Dobbs — as examples of bias at a network one way or the other.  The sum total of “opinionators” and their leanings at a network might be indicative (i.e. if they all lean one way or the other), but their specific pronouncements never seemed to me to be fair game for claiming bias.  Of course they’re biased; that’s their programs’ stock in trade.  They have an opinion, and it comes out in their “Talking Point Memo” or their interviews or whatever.  The bias is the purpose for the show.

On the other hand, bias when it comes to those in the more pure journalistic endeavors — news anchors and reporters — those folks have a higher standard to attain to.  Their stock in trade is their even-handedness and objectivity.  When they abdicate that responsibility, then I see it as fair game for scrutiny.

In this, MSNBC crossed way, way over the line putting Matthews and Olbermann in the anchor chairs for their convention coverage.  The idea that they thought they could get away with this and still insist they’re objective and balanced strained credibility to the breaking point.  All the networks had other opinion folks on to give their takes on the events of the day, and that’s fine, too.  But MSNBC put guys with their own opinion shows in the anchor chair during two events that are already very partisan.  This says a lot about the editorial leanings at the network.  At least they’re doing the right thing now, though why they thought this was ever a good idea is beyond me.  The liberal bias in the editorial room is probably mistaken for “mainstream”.

• How to … wrap a bottle (like the pro’s).
• Uhm, not a good comparison, d’ya think?
• Mr Biden and a response from the Bishop.
• Is war inevitable?
• Pre-Socratic philosophy.
• What’s happening in Afghanistan?

If Barack Obama loses the election this November (and at this point it’s impossible to say whether he will – it’s too close to call) it will be because of a series of unforced errors. They are missteps in the campaign that when taken individually don’t seem like a huge issue but when combined have the effect of totally derailing what would have otherwise been a hugely successful campaign.

Read the rest of this entry

Ed Brayton, normally quite accurate in his reporting, titles a post of his, Another Palin Lie. Ed states,

And Stephen Foley, at The Independent, has an article titled, Sale of Alaska’s state jet on eBay revealed as a lie. From Foley’s article,

Yet, here are the lines from Sarah Palin’s speech, at the RNC, in which she references said plane:

That’s it. No other references to the sale of the jet was made in her speech. Astute observers will note that she does not state that the plane was sold on eBay, nor does she state that it was sold for a profit.

It ain’t there, fellas.

Do you think, just a thought here, that her intentions (at that point in the speech) were to emphasize her attitude towards wasteful spending, and not to give a detailed accounting report of how Alaska unloaded it’s luxury jet?

Did she imply, in her RNC speech, that she had actually sold the plane on eBay? Could be. Yet, did any intrepid journalists or Democratic party operatives, armed with the not-so-secret data of the plane’s actual sale, trap Palin by asking her for specific data on how the plane was sold? Are you kidding? That would mean actually trying to get to the truth of the matter.

Truth be told, we must rewrite Foley’s paragraph, from above, as follows:

Sarah Palin bolstered her reputation as a reformer – and got one of her biggest cheers in her Republican convention speech last week – when she said she had sold put the governor’s official jet on eBay as her first act on taking office in Alaska.

Words… just words.

Note: However, John McCain’s statement, referenced above, seems to be a different matter entirely. Maybe he should just let Sarah speak for herself.

As noted in the introduction to this series, I’m blogging on two short works on Poverty, the first is Ched Myers The Biblical View of Sabbath Economics and the second is the 14th oration by St. Gregory of Nazianzus entitled “On Love for the Poor” (note I misquoted the title in the prior essay as well as Mr Myers first name). In this short essay, I’m going to attempt to precis the basic thrust of the two works. The current plan is follow this short summary with some critical assessments of the two works. The introduction was here, and the overview essay here.

Reading Mr Myers pamphlet is a little disconcerting. For that which he argues, that concern for the poor, charity, and turnings one heart and aspirations to God instead of the material transient world are all well known and established virtues in Christian living. This where he concludes, where he is driving and this conclusion is not wrong. But it must be admitted, that it is very rare to use the validity of a conclusion to justify an argument … and alas Mr Myers reasons and arguments are very very bad. Mr Myers, as noted in the introduction, follows a unusual hermeneutic for extracting meaning from Scripture. That is he views Scripture via a lens of economics … with a caveat on that description that one must note that his views of economics themselves are also somewhat unusual. Read the rest of this entry