Amy Coney Barrett ought to be on the short list

For one thing, there's no question that her faith is genuine:

 . . . she is a mother of seven children, and  . . . when she speaks about her Catholic faith, she speaks about God as if she really believes in His existence  . . . 

Wow! Seven kids! How has she found time to compile a resume like this?

She is a graduate of Rhodes College and Notre Dame Law School. Prior to serving on the bench, Barrett was a law professor at the University of Notre Dame. She also taught briefly at George Washington University and the University of Virginia. Barrett clerked for Judge Laurence Silberman on the D.C. Circuit and then the late Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia after graduating from law school. She also has experience in private practice at Miller, Cassidy, Larroca & Lewin in Washington, D.C. where she was part of the team who represented George W. Bush in Bush v. Gore.

She has been published in numerous law reviews for various topics including originalism, federal court jurisdiction, and the supervisory power of the Supreme Court. She also served six years on the Advisory Committee for the Federal Rules of Appellate Procedure after Supreme Court Chief Justice John Roberts appointed her in 2010.

Several of the others being considered would be great, too. Either of the Lee brothers, for instance.

He's talented and he loves his people

The Very Stable Genius's partner in patty-cake has a unique way of boosting morale in his armed forces:

KIM Jong-un had a top army officer riddled with 90 bullets for giving his troops extra rations of food and fuel.

The high-ranking official was publicly executed by nine military death-row convicts who made up the firing squad.

Lieutenant General Hyon Ju-song was put to death after being found guilty of charges of abusing authority, profiting the enemy and engaging in anti-Party acts.

He was shot at the firing range of the Kang Kon Military Academy located in the Sunan District of the capital Pyongyang.

Online newspaper NK Daily said his “crime” had been to redistribute extra supplies to his men at a satellite launching station in April.

The high-ranking officer told soldiers to send out the food and fuel as they were no longer tightening their belts to pursue Kim’s weapons programme. 

While checking oil supplies for the Sohae Satellite Launching Station on April 10, Hyon reportedly said: “We no longer have to suffer and tighten our belts to make rockets or nuclear weapons.”

He told troops to send out a ton of fuel, 1300lb of rice and 1600lb of corn to soldiers at the Launching Station and their families.

But Kim took a dim view of his actions, viewing them as treason and ordering his death.

A source in Pyongyang revealed the irate dictator blasted the “corruption in the People’s Army” and demanded the “ ideological poisoning” be “nipped in the bud”. 

Inventory control with a bang.

 

Christian doctrine on sexuality: a moral-level, rather than ceremonial or civil-law, teaching

Erick Erickson has an important column at Townhall today entitled "This Stuff Actually Matters." He takes a certain kind of Christian pastor to task for shying away from Biblical teaching about sexual morality.

You see, when they remain mum, we're not offering anything to counter the postmodern secular taunt along the lines of "What about David's concubines? And aren't we supposed to avoid shrimp?"

Erickson, who is currently in divinity school, explains that there are three levels of Old Testament rules, and that that the second level, the ceremonial, was largely rendered obsolete by what Christ came to do:

In the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth. That is not just a quote, but fact for Christians. God himself ordained marriage in the beginning and made it between one man and one woman. His people did not always get it right, but God was clear. In the desert of Sinai, God expanded his moral laws and made it clear that sex outside of marriage is a sin and sex between two people of the same sex is, too.

Yes, it is true that God also issued other laws, including not wearing mixed fabrics and eating shellfish, but God was issuing three components of law. First, he issued the moral law founded in the Ten Commandments. Second, he issued ceremonial laws involving purification and cleanliness related to sin. Third, he issued civil law relevant to the governing of the tribes of Israel.

Fast forward to the New Testament and Jesus affirms the moral law is still in place; sets aside the ceremonial law as he is the living sacrifice for sin and we are made clean through him; and bound Christians to the laws of their state by rendering unto Caesar, unless Caesar demands Christians violate the moral law.

The issues of marriage, sex outside of marriage, and homosexuality are in the moral law, not the ceremonial or civil laws of the Old Testament. They still bind Christians. In fact, Christians accept "progressive revelation" whereby they acknowledge some things changed between the Old and New Testament. The position of women in society improved. The relation of slaves to master improved from servitude to family. Paul writes to Philemon to take back his slave Onesimus "as a beloved brother." The New Testament more fully reveals the relationship of God's people to God. We become "heirs of God and fellow heirs with Christ." (Rom 8:17) 

Though some things change from Old Testament to New, marriage remains between a man and a woman. Sex outside of marriage and homosexuality remain sins. Though some might quote "judge not lest ye be judged," Jesus goes on to say in that very passage "to take the speck out of your brother's eye." Christians are supposed to discern. Christians are not supposed to embrace worldliness. Our lives, our sexual relationships and our personal relationships should not reflect the world but reflect God. 

In the Roman era, pagans routinely left children at the city dumps to die. Christians defied Roman custom and rescued the children, raising them as their own. Christians also rejected Roman imperial sexual norms. Christians in the United States have not had to think about our sexual mores and behavior. As hostility to the faith grows, many will choose to be liked by the world instead of choosing to honoring God. They won't want to be called bigots or homophobes or risk their livelihoods. But Christian sexual ethics still matter.

Too many pastors fail to preach on these things, and too many former Christians preach a false faith that rejects Christian sexual morality. While the nation is celebrating "pride," Christians need to remember the breadth and depth of their faith. Big things fall when small things give way. 

I've heard the rationale put forth that a minister can't afford to alienate anyone who might be considering attending a service and starting to explore the faith. (Think gay couple.) But the fullness of the Truth must at some point be spoken, or what is it that we're inviting the mildly interested to explore?

Let's make prayerful choices whenever we communicate with one another

We now have a motive in the case of this Ramos person who shot up the Maryland newspaper yesterday, killing five and injuring several more. He'd been harboring a rage against the paper since 2011 for an article about him.

And what made him worthy of coverage in 2011? He'd been in legal trouble for social-media stalking of a high school classmate, berating her and with vulgar names and telling her to kill herself. Since that time, he'd made the paper the focus of his harassment activity.

There's apparently no ideological charge to this story. At this point, it doesn't look like politics enters into any aspect of what Ramos has been up to. We ought, then, to be careful, about any kind of "climate of hate" discussions that might arise.

But the somewhat related question of the dark possibilities inherent in social media are definitely relevant here. Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, etc. magnify all the elements of human nature generally: extolling of virtue, genuine friendship, support, humor (ranging from wacky to witty to banal to hopelessly corny), sentimentality - and also insecurity, loneliness, envy, and the one that gets amplified the most: touchiness.

In short, it's fertile ground for the Devil to further his grim machinations.

I'm currently reading a book about spiritual warfare. It's teaching me a lot about the real nature of the swirl that goes on pretty much constantly in my own head and heart. I'm gaining significant insights into my proclivity toward anger, and my habitual expectation for things to go wrong. I can see I've been letting the Devil conquer me, over and over.

There's real danger to never understanding that, not only to oneself, but to - well, randomly chosen newspaper reporters, sometimes.

And regarding current news stories that do have an ideological charge, it's dismaying to see that some with whom I generally align are permitting this infection in their own hearts. Maxine Waters has been getting death threats. Yesterday I read about somebody hurling chicken dung at the Red Hen in Virginia.

It's why I have no use for the Kurt Schlichter-style "new rules, bitch" mentality. He himself has written two books warning how close this country is to breaking apart, but I don't think his columns and tweets are doing anything to counter that peril.

It's time we all made the conscious effort to guard our minds, hearts and souls. The distance between keyboard-banging and real damage is shorter than we'd imagined.

Let's choose our words prayerfully. Language is a great gift, but the price for abusing it is great.

Wheeee!

It's been a glorious week for SCOTUS news, hasn't it? All those decisions, and now this:

Supreme Court Justice Anthony Kennedy announced his retirement Wednesday, giving President Donald Trump a golden chance to cement conservative control of the high court.

The 81-year-old Kennedy said in a statement he is stepping down after more than 30 years on the court. A Republican appointee, he has held the key vote on such high-profile issues as abortion, affirmative action, gay rights, guns, campaign finance and voting rights.

Kennedy said he had informed his colleagues and Trump of his plans, and that his retirement will take effect at the end of July.

Daily Caller has a rundown of leftist Twitter meltdowns.

SCOTUS gets another one very right

In a nation riven by chaos, at least one body is moving in the direction of ever-greater clarity:

The Supreme Court has just issued its long-awaited ruling in Janus v. AFSCME 31, holding that public sector unions cannot compel the payment of agency fees from nonmembers. The ruling was 5-4, with Justice Gorsuch casting the vote that Justice Scalia would have cast in the case before the Court presenting the same issue at the time of Justice Scalia’s death. 

In an opinion by Justice Alito, the Court overruled the Abood case, holding that fundamental First Amendment principles of free association precluded the result in that case. Public employees cannot be forced to subsidize a union if they choose not to join and strongly object to the positions the union takes in collective bargaining and related activities. The public sector unions subject to this ruling have anticipated this outcome and planned to minimize its impact. The impact is not entirely predictable.

This is another case that vindicates the stand of Senate Republicans declining to take up the nomination of Merrick Garland in President Obama’s last year in office. Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell and Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman held GOP Senators together in the face of a withering Democrat/media barrage.

Most federal-court cases involving free speech concern the prohibiting thereof. What makes this one interesting (not to mention glorious!) is that it's about compelling speech.

Senator Hassan seems to be fine with her intern's role in ripping the country apart

We now know who hurled the epithet at Trump the other day across the Capitol rotunda:

Her name is Caitlin Marriott and she’s a 21 year old intern working for Democratic Senator Maggie Hassan of New Hampshire. So what’s going to happen to her? She’s been suspended from her duties for a short time, but will not be removed from her position. I suppose that tells us where the Senator stands on the question. 

Got her badge taken away, so she'll be, in the Senator's words, "highly restricted for the remainder of her internship." But Hassan sees Marriott's actions as small potatoes compared to "the president's destructive and divisive actions, like ripping health care away from people by failing to protect pre-existing conditions" and, of course, the families-at-the-border policy.

Jazz Shaw at Hot Air speculates that the next step is for an actual legislator to do the F-bomb hurling:

So Senator Hassan has determined that a week’s vacation is the appropriate response. We’re getting closer and closer to having Congress turn into one of those South American legislatures where literal fist fights break out on the floor and members wind up hiding under their desks. I suppose I could sit here and wring my hands over this, but let’s face it… we’re sailing on uncharted waters these days and this is probably a minor event in the larger scale of things. We’ve lived to see interesting times as the old saying goes. Anyone want to take bets on how long it will be before one of the senators themselves lets loose with a couple of F-bombs on the floor of the chamber?

And, really, while the United States is unique by design, per the subject of the post immediately below, its luck with regard to stability can't be expected to go on forever, can it? As Bookworm asks in the title of her latest post, what country has ever existed a century and a half without a rebellion?

The brilliance of the Constitution: it's the way to keep the lid on the inherent tensions in a freedom-based nation

Jay Cost has a great piece at NRO today entitled "The Price of Greatness: Hamilton, Madison and America's Paradox." It's an excerpt from his new book on the subject.

He outlines the three great strains that informed the Founding and the early days of our country:

James Madison and Alexander Hamilton belonged to a political movement in the 1780s that generally cohered around three basic principles. The first was a commitment to liberal government, which emphasized the protection of individual rights. As Thomas Jefferson argued in the Declaration of Independence, “governments are instituted among men” to secure certain “unalienable rights,” including life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. The Virginia Declaration of Rights, authored by George Mason, added the protection of property to the list. This view of the ends of government was heavily influenced by the writings of English philosopher John Locke.

Second, they were part of the tradition of republicanism, or self-government. As Cicero put it, “res publica, res populi” (the commonwealth is the concern of a people), who are “associated with one another through agreement on law and community of interest.” Liberty, in the republican conception, has less to do with protecting property and more to do with the proper construction of the state. Citizens in a republic are free because they are governed by laws that they themselves have a hand in making and not by the whims of an arbitrary sovereign. Typically, republics were thought to be unstable — easily corrupted from their proper form in a tyranny (misrule by a king), oligarchy (misrule by the rich), or ochlocracy (misrule by the mob). Philosophers had concluded that a secure government required mixing the republican principle of majority rule with some other form, like monarchy, to create a balance between factions of society as a bulwark against decay. Montesquieu, a French philosopher and historian who was widely read in the United States at the time, had argued in The Spirit of the Laws that Great Britain’s — which balanced the democratically elected House of Commons against the aristocratic House of Lords and a hereditary sovereign — was the one system in the modern world founded on the spirit of liberty. The Founders, however, had rejected the mixing of classes or estates in government and sought to found a stable republic solely on the principle of majority rule.

Third, they were nationalists, arguing that the 13 states had to bind themselves more firmly together if the ideals of liberalism and republicanism were to be secured. This view was more practical than moral, as it involved a question of how to achieve the shared principles of liberalism and republicanism. It was also much more controversial. Though most Federalists and Anti-Federalists agreed in general on liberalism and republicanism, they disagreed on the nature of the union. The Anti-Federalists, having just thrown off the shackles of a distant government in the Revolution, were not too keen on sanctioning another one. Plus, the Federalists were arguing against the conventional view of republicanism, which held that a smaller republic was preferable, because the citizenry would be more homogeneous and better able to keep an eye on their representatives. Nevertheless, the miserable experiences of the 1780s — an impotent national Congress combined with selfish and often illiberal states — had convinced most Americans that a firmer union was necessary. 

Various figures of the day espoused their own particular blends of these strains, reflecting their individual points of emphasis. It made for areas of touchiness in several friendships and even turned some people into bitter enemies.

What he has to say about the distinctions between Madison's views and those of Hamilton are worth noting:

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Days of Rage

Hamilton's program emphasized what I call national vigor. He thought it was necessary to develop the country’s commercial strength to bind the country together and strengthen its ability to rival foreign powers. In Federalist No. 11, he described this vision as “one great American system” that “would baffle all the combinations of European jealousy to restrain our growth.” This meant establishing a reliable currency, encouraging the expansion of credit, and promoting economic diversification. These policies admittedly rewarded the wealthy, but he had a bigger purpose in mind. He wished to turn the wealthy into mediators of the general welfare — dispensing benefits to them in the short run but ultimately reorienting their self-interests to the national interest. Hamilton’s vision of government was not “of, by, and for rich people,” as some critics have said, but rather a public–private partnership between the wealthy and the state, for the benefit of all Americans. The quintessential example of Hamilton’s approach was the Bank of the United States — mostly owned by private investors but holding federal tax revenues and serving as a lender for the government. Yes, the wealthy would profit from their ownership of the stock, but a well-run bank promised benefits that would flow throughout the whole economy.

Madison’s views, on the other hand, emphasized what I call republican balance. He believed that the government had to behave like a neutral judge, fairly dispensing policy benefits and burdens according to the merits of each case. As such, he thought Hamilton’s policies were too one-sided in their favoritism to the wealthy. The rest of the nation should derive some immediate benefits too. He also worried about the potential for Hamiltonian mediation to corrupt republican government. He perceived a dangerous dynamism inherent in the secretary’s use of the moneyed class to promote the general welfare. Institutions such as the Bank of the United States are not a one-way street: The government can employ it for the public good, but the bank’s directors and stockholders can leverage themselves at the public’s expense or even to take control of economic policy. In the parlance of classical republicanism, this is corruption, as the government begins to look like an oligarchy — rule by and for the rich at the expense of the national interest. Madison looked warily at the experience of Great Britain, which had empowered private corporations like the East India and South Sea Companies to execute national economic policy, only to see those private corporations come to wield political influence in Parliament and wreak economic havoc when their schemes failed. He feared the same dangers from Hamilton’s system.

Notice anything with a contemporary flavor to it about the dynamic among these strains?

The key lesson from the Madison–Hamilton battle is not that one was right and the other wrong, but that their feud represents a clash of fundamental American values. The Constitution was premised on liberalism, republicanism, and nationalism — on the supposition that only a stronger, more prosperous union of the states would protect individual rights and secure self-government. But after the Constitution was ratified in 1789, the principles of republicanism and nationalism came into conflict. It seemed as though the country could become a strong and mighty nation, or it could remain a true republic, but it could not be both. Hamilton was the advocate of vigorous nationalism, while Madison defended the principles of republicanism — and the tension inherent in these principles turned the old friends into bitter enemies.

Cost goes on to talk about the period in which the Second Bank of the United States was established as Madisonians and Hamiltonians tried to meld their positions. What it led to was blurred lines between the private sector and government, and to the concept of industrial policy.

. . . the Second Bank of the United States would have branches dispersed across the country rather than concentrated in the northeast. Industrial protection would take the form of tariffs that benefited whole sectors of the economy rather than bounties or cash payments to a handful of firms. And an ambitious program of internal improvement would benefit many locales by directly connecting the country together via a network of roads and canals. In sum, the postwar Republican program was an effort to finally reconcile Hamiltonian nationalism with Madisonian republicanism.

Yet this hybrid of Hamiltonian economics and Madisonian civics was just as dangerous to republicanism as the Hamiltonian original. Once again, oligarchy began to creep into the republic, as the directors and stockholders of the Second Bank of the United States misused their public authority to line their own pockets and influence the course of public policy. Even more dangerous, this Hamiltonian–Madisonian synthesis gave rise to a new kind of mob rule, or what Madison called majoritarian factionalism, via federal tax policy. A diverse array of small economic factions eventually realized that they could combine into a legislative majority to manipulate the tariff rates for their own benefit, at the expense of the good of the nation. This produced the first great constitutional crisis of the young republic in 1832–1833, when South Carolina declared the Tariff of 1828 null and void. 

What those guys needed was a Frederic Hayek to step into their midst. I guess it was going to take a few more years for folks to start seriously looking at the folly of tariffs and central banks.

But let's state clearly that their brilliance lay in acknowledging that societal organization is fraught with tension, all the more so if a nation is going to establish itself with liberty as its primary value.

Me, I come down on the side of republicanism having a greater role than nationalism, for reasons I start to get into in the post below. Yes, I realize that a nation striving to be good and free needs to be strong and unified, but, left unchecked, this impulse can lead to collectivist undertakings to make it more "competitive" and such, when, in reality, only private, for-profit organizations can do any competing.

History is replete with the echoes of its thunderous events, isn't it?