American Wahabbis and the Ten Commandments

[Undertoad]

I think he would find the modern world different from the post-colonial one, in ways that make federalism less of a concern. The main issues would be whether the government remains representational and the country free and productive. Check check and check.

[jaguar]

The difference in perspective between you two is intersting. I don't knwo nearly enough to know who is right but while UT has a point, he always seemed to be jolly pragmatic surely the erosion of lot of rights would have been....unwelcome.

[tw]

Originally Posted by Undertoad

I think he would find the modern world different from the post-colonial one, in ways that make federalism less of a concern. The main issues would be whether the government remains representational and the country free and productive. Check check and check.

He would approve of international kidnapping? Unilateral invasion of sovereign nation without one valid reason and without even a declaration of war. Mandating the principles of one religion on all other people? Running up debts at record levels using accounting that would be fraud anywhere else. Government free access to a person's home and of personal papers without even a court order (Patriotic acts). Government approved torture as long as the body damage is not permanent. And a people who would even encourage this - with veins hanging from their teeth. Clearly Jefferson would be happy?

[Undertoad]

Jefferson owned slaves. Jag's hit on it, I think he would have been pragmatic about it.

One of my points is skew to the politics involved. The big picture is what's really important. We can always find faults and we perceive some problems as being just enormous... when perhaps they aren't, and it's just our perception that's at fault.

Look at surveys of public opinion and you see that lists of the "most important issues" change constantly. One year the economy is the most important issue. Next year the war is the most important issue. Next year the environment is the most important issue. Next year crime is the most important issue.

9/11 was a perfect example of this. Clearly, the most important issue in the USA in the year 2000 was terrorism. In surveys of public opinion it would not have made the top 100.

We are not immune. Right here on the cellar is a thread asking whether we "feel safe" - I might have asked the question, even. But the question is silly. On 9/10/2001 100% would have answered YES. Everyone felt completely safe. The real question is ARE we safe, not do we FEEL safe.

Each and every one of us here is perfectly convinced we know the most important issues to our nation and the world. A third of us believe it is the environment, another third believe it is military/governmental overreach, and another third believe it is following the will of their god. Two-thirds of us are wrong!

Sorry for the threadjacking...

[xoxoxoBruce]

Quote:If I tell you that you are never again allowed to put salt on your food and my authority to make that decree comes from God, then of course you will stop using salt because it is God's will. Right?

Well if you believe god will smite you down with a whacking great thunderbolt for doing so, yea. Cultural paradigms and all that anthropological claptrap.

I was being sarcastic, Jag. Anyone can set down rules and claim it's god"s will. Don't make it so.

Look at surveys of public opinion and you see that lists of the "most important issues" change constantly. One year the economy is the most important issue. Next year the war is the most important issue. Next year the environment is the most important issue. Next year crime is the most important issue.

Which is why Bush stonewalls knowing the public will lose interest shortly and move on to the next subject at the water cooler. Also why Nixon would have succeeded had it not been for people like TW with the tenacity to beat the drum till the public took notice.

The real question is ARE we safe, not do we FEEL safe.

I disagree. The truth is we are never safe, be it a terrorist, rabid mailman of diseased mosquito. But feeling safe has a great deal of effect on our quality of life. People in jail have much less chance of being killed in a car crash but I think they'd rather be driving.

[jaguar]

looks like iamthewalrus109 has bitten the dust, oh well, wheat from the chaff.

I was being sarcastic, Jag. Anyone can set down rules and claim it's god's will. Don't make it so.

Yea my bad there but my point stands, build up enough stuff around it and people start believing you, look at all the wacky cults and their followers out there, all you need is good salesmanship. Soon as that happens whether it is or not is moot.

[xoxoxoBruce]

Oh No! Not LumberJimism!

[wolf]

I've been waiting for LJ to get tired of the car game and go into televangelism.

He's got the look for it.

And the necessary gregariousness.

[mrnoodle]

They'd have to put him on tape delay to bleep out the naughty words

I think that Jefferson would be amazed at the way things have turned out. Remember, in his day, they left the only home they'd ever known to go to a new country that was barely habitable except in the few "urban" centers, and create an entirely new way of running a country. There were some monarchists in the new world, but the majority of the folks were into freedom and becoming something more than just another British colony (not that there's anything WRONG with that). The FF's had the backing of the populace.

Today, Jefferson would see a country with an unfathomable number of citizens, living in conditions that are downright Utopian for the most part, arguing the finer points of government and Constitutionality, arguing WITH the government without fear of reprisal (for the speech, anyway). I'd think he'd be beside himself. Plus, he'd think airplanes are cool.

Jesus, on the other hand, would probably need some Alka-Seltzer.

[wolf]

Originally Posted by mrnoodle

They'd have to put him on tape delay to bleep out the naughty words

He's cable-ready. I think it would work.

[vsp]

All things considered, I'd be a _lot_ more comfortable with the God Squad if their Congressional representatives didn't keep submitting bills like the Constitution Restoration Act to Congress. What in the blue fuck is _wrong_ with people, my alleged district representative among them, who have attempted to make this bill a law _twice? (It was introduced last year by Zell Miller and Sam Brownback with Judge Roy Moore present, reached subcommittees and died there, and was reintroduced a few weeks ago.)

Text of <a href="http://thomas.loc.gov/cgi-bin/query/z?c109:H.R.1070:">House bill</a>, companion <a href="http://thomas.loc.gov/cgi-bin/bdquery/z?d109:SN00520:@@@L&summ2=m&">Senate bill</a>

Summary:
<i>Constitution Restoration Act of 2005 - Amends the Federal judicial code to prohibit the U.S. Supreme Court and the Federal district courts from exercising jurisdiction over any matter in which relief is sought against an entity of Federal, State, or local government or an officer or agent of such government concerning that entity's, officer's, or agent's acknowledgment of God as the sovereign source of law, liberty, or government.

Prohibits a court of the United States from relying upon any law, policy, or other action of a foreign state or international organization in interpreting and applying the Constitution, other than English constitutional and common law up to the time of adoption of the U.S. Constitution.

Provides that any Federal court decision relating to an issue removed from Federal jurisdiction by this Act is not binding precedent on State courts.

Provides that any Supreme Court justice or Federal court judge who exceeds the jurisdictional limitations of this Act shall be deemed to have committed an offense for which the justice or judge may be removed, and to have violated the standard of good behavior required of Article III judges by the Constitution.</i>

Let's break this down, shall we?

The second paragraph is a direct slap at O'Connor, Ginsburg, Kennedy and the others in the "liberal-moderate" wing of the Supreme Court, who have cited international law on several occasions as being worthy of examination and comparison when judging our own law. However, that's not the spookiest part.

Paragraph one: The Federal Courts, including the Supremes, would now have _zero_ jurisdiction over any case involving Christianity. Paragraph three removes past findings in these areas as binding precedents on state courts.

Roy Moore's Ten Commandments idol? Replaced. Sodomy laws? Back in black. Laws banning abortion or a variety of other things on the explicit grounds that "God says it's wrong?" Suddenly quite possible.

Imagine a state whose courts are packed with fundies. (If that sounds like a stretch, imagine Alabama.) Its state legislature passes some noxious and discriminatory bill on religious grounds. If the highest state appellate court upholds the bill, it's DONE, because it cannot be appealed to and overturned by ANY federal court.

Extra incentive for that? Paragraph four. If a judge violates this new jurisdiction and tries to overturn some blatantly unconstitutional law that's religion-themed, it's considered an offense worthy of impeachment and removal from the bench.

Fucked if I even want to _think about_ driving through the South if this bill somehow passes.

The political ju-jitsu involved is both clever and dangerous. Goes something like this:

* Congress: Hey! Supreme Court! You now have no jurisdiction over God-related laws. We can put up the Commandments, enshrine Old Testament law into American law, and do anything we want in the name of God. Nyahh.

* Supremes: Fuck THAT. That's unconstitutional.

* Congress: Ah, but we've removed your ability to judge that to be unconstitutional, using Article III of the Constitution as our basis. Better yet, if you _try_ to rule that way anyway, we can impeach any of you who do so.

* Supremes: ... Shit.

CAN Congress pass a law that specifically exempts itself, much less an entire class of laws, from federal court jurisdiction and Constitutional scrutiny without amending the Constitution itself? Do they have the independent authority via Article III to do this? It's a Constitutional clusterfuck waiting to happen that'd make Watergate look like a parking ticket hearing.

Now, is this likely to pass or even reach the floor for full consideration? No. It'd be a very open admission of "We want theocracy" by the hard right, and thus would have its share of Republican defectors. It's been submitted once before, and went nowhere. Many lawmakers have a habit of submitting bills that are more symbolic than serious. I'm not losing too much sleep over the possibility.

But when the House Majority Leader has come right out and declared war on the judicial branch, he's under severe scrutiny and may be on the way out, and there's a bill in the House and Senate _already_ that would clamp down severely upon the "activist judiciary" who are "tyrannizing" the country (a country whose former president he attempted to impeach, citing "He holds the wrong Biblical worldview" as one of the justifications)... well... I itch.

Just a bit.

[wolf]

One more time, just in case you didn't get it ...

Freedom of is not freedom from.

[vsp]

Originally Posted by wolf

One more time, just in case you didn't get it ...

Freedom of is not freedom from.

And I have no idea what that has to do with a proposed law that would not only specifically endorse Christianity, but remove all judicial checks and balances ensuring freedom OF.

[BigV]

Originally Posted by vsp

--snip--Now, is this likely to pass or even reach the floor for full consideration? No. It'd be a very open admission of "We want theocracy" by the hard right, and thus would have its share of Republican defectors. It's been submitted once before, and went nowhere. Many lawmakers have a habit of submitting bills that are more symbolic than serious. I'm not losing too much sleep over the possibility.

But when the House Majority Leader has come right out and declared war on the judicial branch, he's under severe scrutiny and may be on the way out, and there's a bill in the House and Senate _already_ that would clamp down severely upon the "activist judiciary" who are "tyrannizing" the country (a country whose former president he attempted to impeach, citing "He holds the wrong Biblical worldview" as one of the justifications)... well... I itch.

Just a bit.

Nice post and analysis vsp. But I would look into getting my dosage of anti-itch medication reduced, because this kind of story is not the warning of an attack, it is the attack.

You and I both have seen the most unrealistic proposals gain traction and reality from sheer repetition. By saying it over and over and over again, it becomes familiar, and from familiar to reasonable. Look at our police officers--how they're always having to arrest criminals. I mean they wouldn't arrest them if they weren't guilty, right? But what happened to the presumtion of innocence? Oversaturation by the idea that we arrest guilty people leads to belief. Repetition doesn't create truth, but it can create belief.

Which is why this story is dangerous.

Ironically, the way to combat this insidious attack on the foundation of our nation's guiding priciples is MORE discussion. This kind of story can not live in the light of day. Even loud long exclamations like the chicken little lies we've heard this week from both the President and the Congress about "saving" Terri Schaivo did not mislead the majority of the population. When the ridiculous anti-constitutional idea of having Congress write a Federal law to "save" one person (that's how it was spun), was revealed to the people, they saw how wrong it was and rejected the Fed's attempt to extend it's control into our lives.

This power grab you write about is much more frightening, but still has the same vulnerabilities. When people see and hear this wrongness, they will reject this one too.

[richlevy]

Except that the entire law is itself unconstitutional and the if the court rules it so, cannot be enforced. The only way for that kind of change to be made is a Constitutional amendment and there the checks and balances will work.