Kavanaugh, Due Process, Privacy, Torture, and the Supreme Court

Kavanaugh:

Due Process, Privacy, Torture,

and the Supreme Court,

by "Liviana" (Giovanna Laine)

Okay.  Kavanaugh.

Brace yourselves.

I'm going to give you five links, representing most of the latest intel to come across my desk before I wrote this (this was originally posted on G+, Facebook, and Discord, in various stages of completion, on 28 September 2018;  there have been a few developments since then, but my own view has remained unchanged).  Then I'm going to give you my take.

Tim Black (Video):
Kavanaugh Returns!

Deb Della Piana (Video):
Shut the Fuck Up-The Kavanaugh Hearings Edition, September 27, 2018

Minneapolis Star-Tribune (AP):
After powerful day of testimony, Senate panel plans a Friday morning vote

The New Republic:
Brett Kavanaugh Disqualified Himself From the Supreme Court

Carey Wedler (Video):
The TRUTH about Kavanaugh's "harassment" and "assault"


So now, here's my take ...

Giovanna Laine:
I don't like Brett Kavanaugh.

I don't want him on the Supreme Court.

My reasons are many, and were already formed before the news of accusations of sexual shenanigans was revealed.  But most are focusing solely on that aspect of who he is and whether or not he should be confirmed.

His behavior in these hearings has not endeared him to me, but I cannot say how I might have behaved were I in his shoes.  Ms Ford seems like a credible witness;  she not only submitted to, but passed, a lie detector test (which is by no means evidence of anything, quite honestly, apart from her conviction that she would be able to pass it), and furthermore wants an investigation.  Mr Kavanaugh has neither submitted to a lie detector test nor does he seem to want any investigation (if he's changed his mind about an investigation, I haven't seen indication of that, so please direct me to any evidence which says otherwise).

What I find disturbing about this whole affair is how the division falls neatly along party lines.  Republicans invariably (claim to) believe Kavanaugh to be innocent, while Democrats invariably (claim to) believe Ford's story.  It is predictable, of course, business as usual, and oh so tiring.

What I find most disturbing, however, is what one of those sides is advocating.  And it annoys me greatly that I have to agree with the other side on this, because I despise both of them, both parties -- not Kavanaugh and Ford, but Republicans and Democrats.  One side is advocating that the vote must go ahead today, that there's no reason for any kind of investigation.  And their motivation for this?  The midterm elections are coming up, and the investigation might last until they are over.  It's absolutely nothing but political expediency.  There's no concern for justice, no concern for truth, just a concern for how well or how poorly their party might fare in the midterm elections as a result.  And they're not considering that pushing this vote through without an investigation might actually hurt their performance in the said elections.  Short-sightedness, at the very least.

But, then again, I can't imagine anyone with half a brain seriously suggesting that either of the two main parties is particularly noted for foresight, or self-awareness.

I believe there should be an investigation (and, if the investigation should turn up reason for indictment, a trial), and only after that DUE PROCESS should any vote be held.  I do not believe he should be disqualified purely on the basis of an accusation.  We have Due Process precisely because there was a time when an accusation was all that was necessary for a presumption of guilt (heresy trials, witch hunts).  It hasn't been 31 years yet since a young woman by the name of Tawana Brawley made accusations which later seemingly turned out to be bogus, and which might have destroyed lives of the accused had they not been cleared.

"But Giovanna," some would say, "is their career or life more important than her body sovereignty?"  No.  But is her body sovereignty more important than someone's life?

Again, anyone can claim anything;  the claim alone does not make itself true.  I can claim to be Mary Queen of Scots.  Will you all address me as "Your Royal Majesty" if I do so?  Of course not, nor should you.  Truth does not depend on a mere assertion, nor how "believable" someone views the person making a claim to be, nor even on the character of the person making the assertion.  It certainly does not depend on partisan affiliation or leanings, nor what one has between one's legs, what chromosomes someone has, or what brain gender someone has.

Truth must cohere with reality and be self-referentially consistent.  It is not a matter of what team someone plays for, nor is it a matter of convenience or expedience.

This article gives some of the reasons why I opposed his appointment before I ever heard of Christine Blasey Ford:

The Constitutional Reasons to Oppose Kavanaugh for the Supreme Court




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This blog contains copyrighted material the use of which may not been specifically authorized by the copyright owner. I am making such material available in my effort to advance understanding of scientific, environmental, political, human rights, economic, philosophical, psychological, cultural, and social issues, etc. 
I believe this constitutes a 'fair use' of any such copyrighted material as provided for in section 107 of the US Copyright Law. In accordance with Title 17 U.S.C. Section 107, the material on this site is distributed without profit to those who have expressed a prior interest in receiving the included information for research and educational purposes.  No challenge of ownership is intended or implied.
For more information: https://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/17/107.
If you wish to use copyrighted material from this site for purposes of your own that go beyond 'fair use', you must obtain permission from the copyright owner. 


Copyright notice

All original content in this blog is © Copyright 2013-2018 & an. seqq. by "Liviana" (Giovanna Laine). 

The Omega Glory

The Omega Glory,

or,

Down the Centuries,

You Have Slurred the Meaning of the Words,

by Liviana

Oh, the bad, bad, wicked, evil, undemocratic, bad, evil, wicked, anti-democratic, bad Electoral College!

Let's (again) look at why the Electoral College exists in the first damned place, and without the recent bullshit about how it was done for racist or pro-slavery reasons (it wasn't, and those who have said that it was are spinning a line because they want their damned queen to be installed in the White House).  I mean, after all, those who think they want to abolish the thing really ought to be aware of the reasons it exists in the first place.

And too often, those who have been calling for the abolition of the Electoral College are significantly less well-read in the fields of Political Philosophy and History than those who drafted the Constitution.   How many of you have read Locke, Rousseau,  Montesquieu, Cicero, Tacitus, Juvenal, Machiavelli, Genovesi, Voltaire, Hume, Hobbes, Bayle, Diderot, Kant, Seneca, and Plutarch?  Plato?  Aristotle?  Zeno?  How about Jefferson, Madison, and Hamilton?  Paine?  Franklin?  How much do you know about the way the government of the Roman Republic was set up, how it worked, how it changed over time to the beginning of the Empire?  What do you know of the government of Classical Athens?  I'll wager that most of you are not familiar with even half of these things.  And you think you are better suited to decide on how our government should be set up than the Founders, who knew all of these authors and all of this history and political philosophy, rather thoroughly?  They were concerned and serious about trying to establish something better than anything which had existed before, but you guys FEEL like it's "bad," because poor little Hillary didn't get to be "the First Woman President" and you FEEL afraid of da big bad Twump.  Isn't thinking that you are better suited to do that than the Founders were (based on your FEELS instead of any actual STUDY of how governments have worked -- and failed -- in the past, how this government was set up and why, the thoughts of the Enlightenment thinkers and the Philosophers and Historians of the Classical World) a bit presumptuous?  Just a little bit, maybe?

Let's see here, then, ...  Ah, here we go, a bit of a summary.  Here's an excerpt:

The reason that the Constitution calls for this extra layer, rather than just providing for the direct election of the president, is that most of the nation’s founders were actually rather afraid of democracy. James Madison worried about what he called “factions,” which he defined as groups of citizens who have a common interest in some proposal that would either violate the rights of other citizens or would harm the nation as a whole. Madison’s fear – which Alexis de Tocqueville later dubbed “the tyranny of the majority” – was that a faction could grow to encompass more than 50 percent of the population, at which point it could “sacrifice to its ruling passion or interest both the public good and the rights of other citizens.” Madison has a solution for tyranny of the majority: “A republic, by which I mean a government in which the scheme of representation takes place, opens a different prospect, and promises the cure for which we are seeking.”

You can read it all here:  The Reason for the Electoral College

What else do we have?  Oh, right.  Federalist Papers, Number 10, by James Madison, to which I have already referred some of you:
The Federalist Papers, No. 10

I think some of you didn't read it.  Perhaps you thought it too tedious, or maybe the language was too dated.  So here's a summary and analysis.

If that's still "too long" for you, then you really shouldn't even be trying to tell anyone else a damned thing about the Electoral College, but here's a Cliffs Notes version.

We also have Federalist Papers, Number 68, in which Alexander Hamilton gives his reasons for wanting the Electoral College:
The Federalist Papers, No. 68

Again, though, maybe you find that too tedious (it's considerably more brief than Number 10, however), or think the language is too dated, so here's another summary and analysis, for Number 68.

Cliffs Notes version?  Got that, too (although, really, wow).

Here's something else:
Federalist No.68 vs. Antifederalist No. 72: The Debate over How to Elect the President

And another tasty morsel:
Why the Electoral College Exists (and Isn't Going Anywhere Soon)

The abolition of the Electoral College would be disastrous; it would allow NYC, Houston, DFW, Chicago, LA, and San Francisco to elect the President of the US, without anyone else's votes counting for shit. Presidential candidates would no longer give a damn about campaigning in any other part of the country, and, once in office, would be free to totally ignore the majority of the nation and cater to those six high population centers. Democratic? Maybe. Good? Not even close.

Some of you have attempted to frame the Electoral College in terms of a "tyranny of the minority" in response to our talk of a "tyranny of the majority" (which comes from de Tocqueville, for those who seem to have never heard the expression before -- and I have to ask, did y'all not take US History or Civics in school, have you forgotten all you learned in those classes, or did you just not pay any fucking attention?).  You guys are falling into Bifurcation Fallacy again. It doesn't have to be a tyranny of anyone, so get your heads out of that box already. That's the point. In a democratic federal republic, the minority is protected from the whims of the majority. It's a rule of law, not a rule of the majority (nor of the minority).

Some of you have asserted that the Electoral College is "backwards."  It's not backwards, and here's why. The ecosystem of each region is different from that of other regions, and that affects the economy of each region.  That's even more true now than it was in 1787 when the final draft of the Constitution was finished, or 1789 when the Constitution was ratified.  What is useful for the economy of the Great Plains of DFW may not be useful for the swamps ("Coastal Plains") of Houston, or the Great Lakes North of Chicago, or the temperate rain-forest of the PNW, ... much less the breadbaskets of the nation, which, Comrades, are obviously rural.  The needs and concerns of the rural "minority" are no less important than the needs and concerns of the urban "majority."  It's not about Democracy. It's about seeing that the minority are not disenfranchised by the majority. That's why we have (or used to have) a democratic federal republic and not a democracy.

It's not about tradition, either.  Y'all have to come to terms with the reality that different regions have different economies due to their different ecosystems. Catering to nothing but the five or six highest population centers will deny any voice at all to the rest of the nation, and their needs and concerns will become irrelevant. You can call this "undemocratic." I don't care. It IS undemocratic. It denies the tyranny of the majority. Hillary knew how the elections work, and she had her chance to make her case to the rural voters, but she didn't give a shit about them, and she never has. She's an elitist. It's not hard to reach out to the people; you just have to show an authentic interest in their needs and concerns, but she has no interest in anything other than her own ambitions, and she's not particularly bright. So now we have her relative (by marriage) howling about the Electoral College, because Hillary didn't campaign in any sort of winning manner.

To win the presidency, a candidate must make his or her appeal to the people of the nation, and not merely to some areas in which they believe their support is strong. The Democratic Party establishment, being so out of touch as has been demonstrated often over the past few years, has even suggested that they could basically "write off" the South entirely, with the exception, perhaps, of two or three states. Here are a couple of several examples of such a call:

Dems, It's Time to Dump Dixie

Whistling Past Dixie:  How Democrats Can Win Without the South, by Thomas F. Schaller

The Democrats have been advised against this several times:

Why National Democrats Should Not Neglect the Deep South

Should the Democrats Give Up on the South?

Democrats Can Win the South Again.  Here's a Simple Strategy for Hillary 2016

Democrats' Neglect Perplexes Southerners

Democrats Are Not Speaking Loudly Enough to Be Heard in Rural America

In spite of this advice, however, the establishment Democrats, including Hillary Clinton, have stubbornly clung to this arrogant elitism (oh, and how they love to believe themselves to be elite, but they're NOT;  they're fucking STUPID, or we would right now be looking forward to President Bernie Sanders), and, as anyone who WAS in touch could have told them, the result was that they got bitten in the ass after shooting themselves in both feet:

Rural Vote Fuels Trump;  Clinton Loses Urban Grip

Rural America and a Silent Majority Powered Trump to a Win

Revenge of the Rural Voter

Collapse: Democratic Insider Says Clinton Lost White Rural Voters By A Three-to-One Margin

Even had they undertaken a massive PR campaign in the South and other rural areas, however, it would not have helped Hillary, who is seen by a majority of such voters as inauthentic, untrustworthy, and corrupt, as well as elitist and condescending; in Arkansas especially, this reputation is predominant. Many Arkansas voters are much more familiar with Mrs Clinton than the rest of the nation.

Abolition of the Electoral College would solve nothing, and only make things worse. What we need is reform, not abolition. And the reform needed is more to do with the way the Electors are awarded, not in the Electoral College itself. Instead of First Past the Post and Winner Takes All, some kind of Proportional Representation and/or Ranked Choice Voting and/or Score Voting would resolve most of the issues, and I'm not presumptuous enough to say at this point in time that I know how to blend those types of elections to resolve most of the issues, but I am erudite enough to realize that it is by some combination of those ways of electing that the resolution will be found. You'll never make it perfect. That's not to say it can't be improved; it certainly can. But it's always going to be imperfect, no matter how much it is improved. The question to consider is whether allowing the majority of people in tiny territories to dominate the minority in vast territories, when all these territories have different needs and concerns, is an improvement, and the answer is no.

This push to abolish the Electoral College is as ridiculous as the bullshit the Federalists pulled with the Continental Convention; the Articles of Confederation did not need to be replaced, when they could as easily have been reformed, and in fact, under the Articles and even under the Constitution itself, the "ratification" of the Constitution did not follow the rules, but was pushed through as if it were a done deal in spite of that (but that's a story for another time).

To suggest that the needs and concerns of the very diverse ecosystems which make up this nation should be ignored in favor of urban interests, whims, and fads, is unsustainable, untenable, and indefensible.  It is also even, dare I say it?  Anti-democratic.

The title of the post (and the subtitle, this time) comes from Star Trek (The Original Series), Season 2, episode 23;  episode 52 overall;  production code 54.


Fair use notice
This blog contains copyrighted material the use of which may not been specifically authorized by the copyright owner. I am making such material available in my effort to advance understanding of scientific, environmental, political, human rights, economic, philosophical, psychological, cultural, and social issues, etc. 
I believe this constitutes a 'fair use' of any such copyrighted material as provided for in section 107 of the US Copyright Law. In accordance with Title 17 U.S.C. Section 107, the material on this site is distributed without profit to those who have expressed a prior interest in receiving the included information for research and educational purposes.  No challenge of ownership is intended or implied.
For more information: https://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/17/107.
If you wish to use copyrighted material from this site for purposes of your own that go beyond 'fair use', you must obtain permission from the copyright owner.

Copyright notice
All original content in this blog is © Copyright 2013-2016 & an. seqq. by "Liviana" (Giovanna L.). 

Some Musings Regarding LGBTI Discrimination

Some Musings Regarding LGBTI Discrimination

Directed to Proponents of Discrimination on the Alleged Grounds of "Religious Freedom"

by Liviana (Giovanna L.)

In the article, "Kansas Guv Endangers Thousands of Gays," V. Gene Robinson writes:

It is an astounding and horrifying phenomenon when rights are actually taken away from citizens. It is the overwhelming tradition in our democracy for laws, acts of Congress, and the Constitution itself to give and protect its citizens’ rights, not take them away.

I keep affirming this idea just as Robinson has done.  The Constitution should never be amended to restrict rights, but only to extend them.  America is about Freedom as preferable to Control -- especially preferable to Control by some religious sect.

If I didn't know better, I would be tempted to argue for establishing a Senate Unamerican Activities Committee which could try unamerican twats like Bareback ... uh, Brownback ... on trial for disloyalty to the ideals of Americanism.  But such committees, like Puritans and Pilgrims in New England, tend to go on witch hunts, imagining that the bogeyman is behind every tree and under every rock, and a lot of cute and furry animals get hurt in the process.  (Try not to get lost in my extended metaphors.  It might hurt your brain if you can't find the key to get back to literal and figurative prose.  Then again, too many people seem to have lost the key to get into the figurative and metaphoric expressions and are stuck in literality, with serious psychological dysfunction being the rather obvious result.)

But this guy doesn't need to be entrusted with any authority over any citizen or group of citizens.  He's a crackpot, to put it mildly.

What I find most astonishing in all of this hoopla from the Sanhedrin of the present is the notion that discrimination is acceptable.  Woe unto you, busybodies and self-righteous ones, for you neither enter in nor suffer others to enter in.  Woe unto you, for you swallow camels in your credulity, but cannot let go of a turd that is of little or no importance to you, due to your anal retentiveness and compulsion to mind everyone's business but your own.  I can understand the desire you have not to look into the mirror -- the reflection must be akin to the picture of Dorian Gray.  You will eventually look at the reflection;  the act is unavoidable.  Best to do so consciously, willingly, and for an extended period.

I am going to repeat myself, though it annoy me to have to continue to do so on so many different matters in which the obvious ought to be obvious to all without having to be pointed out even once.  As such, I will add more details and allusions, for variety is the spice of life.

A limited number of Christian sects (or, as they prefer to call them, "denominations") teach that there are seven sacraments.  More sects teach that there are two.  Only those sects which teach the existence of seven sacraments hold to a view that one of the sacraments is what they term "Holy Matrimony."  The majority of Christian sects, including the Southern Baptist Convention (so very vocal in the fight against liberty, justice, and equality for all), teach that the only sacraments are Baptism and the Eucharistic ceremony.  In fact, one Protestant sect which still does affirm that "Holy Matrimony" is a sacrament is the Church of England, which came into being in part as a result of an English monarch deciding that his marriage was not such a big thing after all since the wife had produced no heir for him.  In spite of how the Anglican sect came into being, and in spite of the fact of most Christian sects not even teaching the doctrine that Holy Matrimony is a sacrament, a far more relevant prey awaits our hunt in this forest:  semantics.

Some of these opponents to Marriage Equality have suggested that same-sex couples should be "content" with being granted "civil unions."  Newsflash:  all marriages are nothing more or less than social/civil contracts.  That includes even "Holy Matrimony."  You can live anything sacramentally, even the work of digging a ditch.

On the contrary, I have suggested and still continue pointing out:  "Marriage" and "Holy Matrimony" are TWO DIFFERENT THINGS!!!!!!!!!

Or more precisely, for any x, if x is Holy Matrimony, then x is Marriage, but not every Marriage is Holy Matrimony.  There is no Holy Matrimony which is not Marriage, but there is Marriage which is not Holy Matrimony.  This is called "an A Statement."  Here, I'll show you a pair of Boolean Circles:

         

You'll note that the vesica piscis (the overlapping area of the two circles) there is entirely shaded in.  One of the two circles represents a subject S, and the other represents a predicate P.  This diagram says that all of the members of one exist solely in the other.  Verily, Holy Matrimony is a type of Marriage and all Holy Matrimonies fall into the category of Marriage.  Nobody disputes this.

Were the diagram showing one circle shaded in entirely, except for the vesica piscis area, it would represent "No S are P."  That is "an E Statement."  Since we don't have one here, I won't show the diagram.  Sorry, bigots;  I don't accept your contention that "no same-sex unions are marriages," because I know better, and the entire point of this is an attempt to educate you -- not to indoctrinate you, but certainly not to kowtow to your sacred cows nor enable your willful ignorance and fears.  I will instead show you Boolean Circles illustrating I Statements and O Statements:

The top diagram shows an X in the vesica piscis, and represents "an I Statement," which is a proposition that "Some S are P."  The lower diagram shows an X inside the S circle but outside the vesica piscis, thus graphically representing "Some S are not P," which is "an O Statement."

• All examples of Holy Matrimony are members of the category of Marriage. (A Statement, All S Are P)
• Some examples of Marriage are members of the category of Holy Matrimony. (I Statement, Some S Are P)
• Some examples of Marriage are not members of the category of Holy Matrimony.  (O Statement, Some S Are Not P)

Now, of course (I utter in mildly condescending terms), the rest of us are aware that some of you insist that the world was created in 4004 BCE and that "God," by which of course you mean your God, somehow "instituted" marriage between the (forgive me, but I have no desire to coddle your literalism or irrationality) mythical Adam and Chaivah (or "Eve," if you insist on the English form).  Aside from the fact that your myth also refers to "the other people," and "the men of Nod," which ought, if your literalism were even remotely self-referentially consistent, to at least hint to you that your Adam and Eve were not the first humans, but fortunately, I'm not terribly interested in using your "beliefs" to demonstrate to you that you are inconsistent in the acceptance of what you claim to believe -- at least not presently.  Instead, I would like rather to remind you, once again, of your heritage and the freedom of religion you now have as a result of the activism, tears, sweat, and blood of those who left that heritage to you.

America is not a Christian nation.  Before you stop reading, consider why I say this and what I mean in saying it.

Adherents of many Christian sects migrated to "the New World" precisely to escape nations in which the government was married (you will forgive my further illustration of the equivocal nature of the term, I trust) to this or that sect's clergy and sought to impose the will of that clergy upon the masses, no matter the religious persuasion of the individual citizens.  When they were establishing their communities and governments, they sought to do so in a way which would allow them to believe and practice as they saw fit.  Pennsylvania was ab origine a haven for Jews as well as diverse sects of Christianity.  Puritans and Pilgrims were not the only settlers in Massachusetts.  The Merrymount Colony points to hints of non-Christians having come to these shores seeking freedom to live according to their own lights as well.  The result was eradication by the less tolerant;  in that there is some evidence of early efforts to enforce conformity.  The same can be said of the later witch trials.  Admittedly, this current runs deep in America, but it was rejected early as the constitutions of the states were prepared, before the Constitution of the USA, which proclaims not only that "Congress shall make no law ... prohibiting the free exercise ... [of religion]," but also that "Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion."

You may stomp your feet and cry and flail and rage.  You may not deny.  Neither your religion nor mine is acceptable as a source for legislation affecting both you and me.  Why?  Simple.  I don't agree with your religious views, and thus should not be bound by them, and you don't agree with my religious views and should not be bound by them.  Nor should either of us have to contribute financially to the work of the other's religion.  We may agree in some particulars.  Religions and Sacred Traditions do share some common features, and some have more in common than others, but commonality nevertheless exists in all.  These common features, however, should not be emphasized to the point of obscuring the differences.  I should not be expected to abide by laws based on religious teachings which I find ethically outrageous or rationally questionable.  Here, however, let us consider exactly what this means.

Neither you nor I should be forced to pray to Antiochus Epiphanes or his image in some structure somewhere.  You don't view the man in question as at all divine, and I don't view him as any more divine than anyone else, and marred by flaws in addition.  In addition, Antiochus Epiphanes should not set up his image in a structure established for religious purposes by a distinct sacred tradition.  Furthermore, Antiochus Epiphanes, being a government head, should not be promoting any religion in any way, whether it be the religion of megalomaniacal narcissism or something less ... unhinged.  The government over which he sat was a government of a religiously pluralistic society, in which the rights of the minority should also be protected.

What it does not mean, however, is that I or anyone else has the right to impose restrictions on others which I place on myself by adherence to any particular (or universal, for that matter) religious teaching.  We do not.  If you believe that eating pork is a sin, then you are free to refrain from eating pork.  If you believe that the use of certain words is something you should avoid, then you are free to avoid using those words.  If you believe that your God would condemn you for marrying a person of the same sex, then you are free to refrain from doing so.  If you believe that having an abortion would displease your God, then you are free to refrain from having one.  Pork is not exactly my favorite meat, but I do eat swine flesh on occasion, and have no religious qualms about it.  You do not have the right to prevent me from doing so, no matter how wrong you believe the act would be for yourself.  I have very few taboos with regard to the use of language, and I do fairly often use words which others believe to be somehow forbidden (few know the origin of taboo words in English, nor how the cause thereof was anything but religious or ethical, but the information is not hidden), nor should any legislation impose a prohibition upon me with regard to those words based on socio-economic snobbery and cultural prejudice -- or the teachings of any religion.  In the same way, no law should prohibit the representation of your God or the supposed name of that God in print or art, except a religious law binding only adherents of that religion.  If I chose to have an abortion, I would not do so lightly or frivolously, but it would nevertheless be MY choice based on my reasons, and not your denial of such choice to me based on your views of what your religion teaches.  Your religion is yours, not mine.  I am not bound by its teachings, nor should I be forced to abide by the teachings of your religion any more than you should be bound by the teachings of the sacred tradition of my people.  If I fall in love with another woman and she falls in love with me, and we connect on such a deep level that we would like to marry, that will be OUR choice based on our feelings and our reasons and our beliefs.  It is NOT your right to deny us OUR rights, and all the more so is it not your right to deny anyone else their rights based on your religion, even if they share your religious views.  You may encourage your own fellow sectarians to abstain from exercising all their rights;  certainly most Baptist clergy discourage the exercise of the right to consume alcohol as a beverage, but the point is that even the members of their congregations still have the legal and civil right to purchase alcoholic beverages and consume them as potables, no matter the teachings of their religion on the act.  Freedom of religion does not mean that you can impose religious restrictions on others, nor that you can discriminate against others in a free society.  The very idea that one should defend a supposed "right" to do so is beyond shocking, and far from what we find in your own sacred texts (e.g., the epistle to the Galatians, which proclaims:  "There is neither Jew nor Greek: there is neither bond nor free: there is neither male nor female. For you are all one in Christ Jesus.").

I'll point you also to the sixth chapter of Matthew, which can teach you many things, if you allow it to do so.  Directed prayer in public schools, for example, is rather discouraged by Jesus in this chapter, along with pretending to be something you are not in order to improve the way others think of you (like the fake "Ex-Gay" personalities and all others who pretend to be straight in order to conform to the expectations of society).  In fact, Jesus rather strongly condemned such hypocrisy.

You were slaves in Egypt.  It's time to take the chains off, and use them for something more humane, rather than to simply perpetuate the cycle of abuse.




In other words, ...

Grow up and get over it.

American Law Enforcement Becoming Militarized

From The Guardian:

Between the Armored Personnel Carriers locking down main streets in major American cities – mimicking our MRAPs in Afghanistan – or Special Weapons and Tactics (Swat) and Special Forces units canvassing our country, if we're not careful, this militarization of our domestic policing will make-over America, and fast.

Here's how it all happened. A little-known Pentagon program has been quietly militarizing American police forces for years. A total of $4.2bn worth of equipment has been distributed by the Defense Department to municipal law enforcement agencies, with a record $546m in 2012 alone. ...

Though the program's existed since the 1990s, it has expanded greatly in recent years, due, in part, to post-9/11 fears and sequestration budget cuts. The expanse, however, seems unnecessary given that the Department of Homeland Security has already handed out $34bn in "terrorism grants" to local polices forces – without oversight mind you – to fund counter-terrorism efforts.

Additional militarization, then, deserves congressional attention as the program is harmful and must be scaled back for a number of reasons.

First, the program is transforming our police into a military. The results of such over-militarized law enforcement are apparent from the dispersion of Occupy protesters in Oakland to the city-wide lockdown in Boston. ...

Tanks, grenade launchers, armored vehicles, and assault rifles are just a few of the items that have been transferred from military control to municipal police forces. Law enforcement agencies need only to arrange and pay for shipment in order to receive the items of their choice ... One particularly egregious example is found in South Carolina, where Richland County's sheriff acquired a tank with 360-degree rotating machine gun turrets. Sardonically, the vehicle has been named "the Peacemaker".

Swat teams, furthermore, are no longer found only in large, high-crime areas. Instead, even small rural towns now have the equipment to arm their own paramilitary units. Investigative reporter Radley Balko estimates that around 150 Swat raids are performed every day in the United States.

Read more:
America's police are looking more and more like the military


Related:
Police destroy the Garden of Eden

Do something!


Updates:

Militarization of America: Campus Cops Get Armored Vehicle Built to Withstand IEDs and Mines

Time to be Afraid in America: The Frightening Pattern of Throwing Police Power at Social Problems

Texas Campus Cop Kills Unarmed College Student After Sarcastic Remark


See also:
Police in Miami Gardens Abusing Authority?


SuccubaSuprema writes:

The fact that law enforcement officers are human beings, and therefore fallible like all other human beings, must be remembered, lest we invest them with too much authority and too much power.

The NSA Believes Privacy is a Threat?

From The Atlantic Wire:

In short, then, the new Guardian story is this: The NSA considers the anonymity provided by Tor to be a threat, and is actively trying to figure out how it can engineer a way to track people's activity online. As of the point at which its presentations were created, it hadn't done so.

Read more:
The NSA Tried to Undermine Online Anonymity, and Failed

Also, from The Hightower Lowdown:

You're not paranoid--they really are spying on you ...

Rube Goldberg, a Pulitzer Prize-winning cartoonist of the last century, was famous for drawings of what he called "inventions" --complicated contraptions and convoluted schemes for achieving the simplest of goals. ...

Apparently, Rube was also the designer of the National Security Agency's "Simple Catch-a-Terrorist Program," for only a mind as impish as his could've invented such a preposterous, roundabout spy scheme. Rather than simply targeting terrorists and really homing in on them, NSA is running a labyrinthian, secret, extravagant, unconstitutional, and out-of-control electronic surveillance operation that targets you. Yes, you! And me. And every other American living in our Land of the Free. This agency has redefined citizens as suspects. ...

Not that NSA officialdom actually thinks that you, Mr. Upright or Ms. Doright, are terrorists or even "persons of interest" --but, then again, you might be. So, the spook bureaucracy has unilaterally chosen to put its convenience over your constitutional rights. Doing the serious police work to sort out the tiny number of people in our country who are connected in any substantive way to real terrorist threats is too much bother for NSA's techno-warriors, so they've taken the shortcut of dumping all 330 million of us into a digitalized, guilty-until-found-innocent box, keeping an unblinking computer eye on us, and hoping the few bad guys stand out.

Read more:
In the name of making us "safe," the NSA has shredded privacy rights and now treats all citizens as suspects

Related:
Do the Three Hop

Do something!

Republicans Shut Down the Government, but They Can't Stop Obamacare

From Rolling Stone:

What kind of "massive government subsidies" is Bachmann so worked up about? Programs like the Special Supplemental Nutrition Program for Women, Infants and Children, which will likely lose all of its funding thanks to the shutdown – potentially leaving millions of low-income women, babies and small children hungry. The same thing may happen to Temporary Assistance to Needy Families, causing many more Americans to go unfed. If the shutdown continues, disabled veterans could lose their pay next. ...

Today, the federal government is shut down because of Republicans' zealous opposition to helping poor Americans. Families across the country are worrying about how far they can stretch their meals. Federal employees (though not members of Congress) are wondering if they'll be able to pay their mortgages this month. Disabled veterans aren't sure how much longer they can count on the benefits they earned in battle.

But despite the Republicans' best efforts, the calendar still reads October 1st – which means the Affordable Care Act's most important provision has taken effect. The health care exchanges are now open to any uninsured person who wants coverage. For millions of Americans – including the 6 out of 10 uninsured who say they don't want Obamacare defunded – that's a victory.

Read more:
Republicans Shut Down the Government, But They Can't Stop Obamacare

SuccubaSuprema writes:
The trouble here is that the Right has no proper understanding of the word "compromise."  To many of them, this is a religious bias (or is at least cloaked in terminology which will appeal to religious zealots), as they insist that they will not compromise their principles.  This stubborn insistence on "My way or the highway" is precisely why no negotiation can be made with them.  They want everyone else to give ground, but they refuse to do so.  Worse, if anyone else does attempt to cooperate with them to the point of compromise, then that person is accused of "waffling" or being "wishy-washy," because to these Right Wing Extremists, any sort of compromise is nothing but weakness (and so they will not compromise, they will not cooperate, but instead they will continue to do everything they can to halt any progress).  Even if the Republican Party first proposed a progressive idea, as is the case with environmentalism, the Right Wing Extremist Fringe which has taken over the Republican Party will oppose any cause vehemently because the Democrats embraced that cause.  This is ridiculous partisan polarization.  It is not patriotism.  It is not serving the people.  It is opportunistic demagoguery, but it will turn around and bite the Extreme Right in the ass, and justly so.  This is why we should not have religious fanatics (or those who pretend to be such) in political office (no matter what their religion may be).  Strangely enough, one of the voices of reason in all of this is the head of a religious group that has historically been at odds with reason.  This person (whom I've referenced before) is quoted in a response to the Right Wing nutjobs in this Hightower Lowdown:
Ryan rants, and a new voice of morality responds.
Maybe there's some hope for rationality after all, but with the Right Wing being so obstinate, it will be an uphill battle.

Related:
Boehner to Obama:  No Debt Hike without Concessions (or as I like to call it, "The GOP Threatens to Murder the Hostage Economy Unless Their Ransom is Paid" -- heedless of how they're alienating their own party members and how moderate Republican Representatives feel about the whole thing)
and The White House to Boehner: Hold the Vote Already (or as I like to call it, "The White House Refuses to Negotiate with Terrorists")
Unfortunately, House Democrats  Have Offered a Budget Deal (video) - (which has resulted in enough Republicans saying they'll vote for the clean funding bill to show Boehner's refusal for what it is:  bullshit).
Nevertheless, the shutdown has not been popular among voters, who now have a very low opinion of Republicans in the House of Representatives as a result, according to polls:  NBC/WSJ poll: Shutdown debate damages GOP and NBC/WSJ poll: 60 percent say fire every member of Congress.

See also:
How the Shutdown Impasses Might Play Out

Judge Orders New Jersey to Allow Gay Marriage

From The New York Times:

A New Jersey judge ruled on Friday that the state must allow same-sex couples to marry, saying that not doing so deprives them of rights that were guaranteed by the United States Supreme Court in June.

Read more:
Judge Orders New Jersey to Allow Gay Marriage

How Many People Have Died from a Marijuana Overdose?

The Huffington Post has some details:
Here Are All The People Who Have Died From A Marijuana Overdose

The answer is, of course, ZERO.  A big, fat ZERO!

In fact, long before a person could die from Cannabis poisoning via smoking, they would be dead from Carbon Monoxide poisoning.

Now, how many innocent people have been victims of "the War on Drugs"?  I'm not sure there's any official answer, but the slide show at the bottom of the "HuffPo" article discusses a few of them.  Figures from Mexico's "War on Drugs" are available (as noted below with reference to the WSJ).

How many violations of the Bill of Rights have occurred as a result of "the War on Drugs"?  I doubt there are any hard figures on this, but the number would obviously exceed the number of those innocents who died as a result of "the War on Drugs."

How many violent offenders have been released early due to Federal laws requiring "mandatory minimum sentences" for any drug crime, including non-violent possession and use?  The WSJ has some figures on numbers of people incarcerated in the US, connected to "the War on Drugs."

How much money is spent annually on "the War on Drugs"?  Again, the WSJ provides an estimate of this.

From The Wall Street Journal:

Total current spending is estimated at over $40 billion a year. ...

The total number of persons incarcerated in state and federal prisons in the U.S. has grown from 330,000 in 1980 to about 1.6 million today. Much of the increase in this population is directly due to the war on drugs and the severe punishment for persons convicted of drug trafficking. About 50% of the inmates in federal prisons and 20% of those in state prisons have been convicted of either selling or using drugs. The many minor drug traffickers and drug users who spend time in jail find fewer opportunities for legal employment after they get out of prison, and they develop better skills at criminal activities. ...

Mexico offers a well-documented example of some of the costs involved in drug wars. Probably more than 50,000 people have died since Mexico's antidrug campaign started in 2006. ...

Read more:  Have We Lost the War on Drugs?

Most Likely States to Legalize Cannabis Next

From The Huffington Post:

Attorney General Eric Holder gave a green light on Thursday to two states whose efforts to legalize marijuana had been locked in by legal uncertainty for more than nine months. With that announcement, Colorado and Washington -- both of which passed pro-pot initiatives at the polls last November -- can now proceed with establishing a framework for the taxation and regulation of legal weed for adults.

Read more:  These States Are Most Likely To Legalize Pot Next

NSA Illegally Supplying Intel to DEA, IRS, and Other Agencies?

AG Holder pressed to explain DEA use of hidden data evidence

Eight Democratic senators and congressmen have asked Attorney General Eric Holder to answer questions about a Reuters report that the National Security Agency supplies the Drug Enforcement Administration with intelligence information used to make non-terrorism cases against American citizens.

The August report revealed that a secretive DEA unit passes the NSA information to agents in the field, including those from the Internal Revenue Service, the FBI and Homeland Security, with instructions to never disclose the original source, even in court. In most cases, the NSA tips involve drugs, money laundering and organized crime, not terrorism. ...

The Reuters reports cited internal documents that show how DEA's Special Operations Division funnels information from overseas NSA intercepts, domestic wiretaps, informants and a large DEA database of telephone records to authorities nationwide to help them launch criminal investigations of Americans.

The documents show that agents have been trained to conceal how such investigations truly begin - to "recreate" the investigative trail to effectively cover up the original source of the information, raising questions about whether exculpatory information might be withheld from defendants at trial.

Read more here.

United Nations says it will contact United States over spying report

United Nations says it will contact United States over spying report

And while we're on the subject of whistle-blowers, both Manning and Snowden were ethically obligated to not keep silent.  Among the information revealed by Snowden is a claim that the US government has spied on the United Nations:

Citing secret U.S. documents obtained by fugitive former intelligence contractor Edward Snowden, Germany's Der Spiegel reported on Sunday that the United States succeeded in gaining access to the internal U.N. video conferencing system in 2012.

Read more here.

Five Reasons Cops Want to Legalize Marijuana

Five Reasons Cops Want to Legalize Marijuana

More and more police officers are realizing the War on Drugs is a mistake

All of these are very compelling reasons to legalize Cannabis.  Let's also remember the medical value of the herb, as I reported here in an earlier post.  And that post's contents are just the tip of the iceberg regarding the medical benefits of Cannabis.  Remember, Clarence Thomas is not a medical expert.

The Fight for Trans Rights in the Military

The Fight for Trans Rights in the Military

Transgender Flag by Jennifer Pellinen

While the successful repeal of Don't Ask Don't Tell (DADT) means sexual orientation is now protected, gender identity is not. And although gender dysphoria is considered a medical disqualification, discharges may be classified as "administrative," potentially limiting troops' future access to VA healthcare. ...

As a medical student, Jai feels especially astounded by the discrimination trans* people face when it comes to accessing necessary health care. "It's comparable to a person with type II diabetes or hypothyroidism not having their medication covered," Jai says.

Read more at Rolling Stone.

For those in doubt about the fact that this is a medical issue, with physical causes, several articles in peer-reviewed, scholarly and scientific journals are linked in A.E.Brain: Transsexual and Intersex Gender Identity, which also contains records from an Australian Supreme Court decision.  It's well worth reading, so educate yourselves, because objecting out of ignorance or prejudice is simply wrong.

In somewhat related news, Matt Taibbi discussed the Chelsea Manning (formerly "Bradley" Manning) case in a masterful critique of the press reports on the subject:  As Bradley Manning Trial Begins, Press Predictably Misses the Point.

Among other things, he writes:

All of this shit is disgraceful. It's Chumpbait.

If I was working for the Pentagon's PR department as a hired press Svengali, with my salary eating up some of the nearly five billion dollars the armed services spends annually on advertising and public relations, I would be telling my team to pump reporters over and over again with the same angle.

I would beat it into the head of every hack on this beat that the court-martial is about a troubled young man with gender identity problems, that the key issue of law here rests inside the mind of young PFC Manning, that the only important issue of fact for both a jury and the American people to decide is exactly the question in these headlines.

Is Manning a hero, or a traitor? Did he give thousands of files to Wikileaks out of a sense of justice and moral horror, or did he do it because he had interpersonal problems, because he couldn't keep his job, because he was a woman trapped in a man's body, because he was a fame-seeker, because he was lonely?

The American Medical Association and the American Psychiatric Association have stated that Transsexuality is indeed a physical medical issue (with psychological aspects).  It's not "all in their heads," in the sense of it being purely psychological;  it's not purely psychological -- the causes are physical.  As Chaz Bono stated, it's a "birth defect," and the sooner the evidence presented in the blog post by Zoe becomes common knowledge, the better off everyone will be (except those who are delusional, refusing to accept any evidence contrary to their preconceived ideas -- although they could benefit from this information as well, if they would allow themselves to learn).

“Please don’t let my daughter die, Governor.”

‘Please don’t let my daughter die’: Father begs Chris Christie to legalize medical marijuana [VIDEO]

An aggrieved father confronted New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie during a campaign stop on Wednesday, begging the Republican to sign into law a bill that would provide easier access to medical marijuana for children, CBS New York reports.

Brian Wilson’s 2-year-old daughter Vivian is diagnosed with Dravet Syndrome, a rare and potentially lethal form of epilepsy. She wears glasses to avoid having light trigger seizures and has stopped breathing twice during epileptic episodes, her parents said.

Chris Christie Confronted By Dad Over Medical Marijuana For Kids [Video]

Last month, Christie expressed reservations about the bill during a radio program. “I’m concerned about expanding the program. And I want to make sure that if we do it, we do it in a way that is helpful to children, does not reduce any of the requirements of the program; to make sure this does not go down a slippery slope of broadening the program and making it easier (for unqualified people) to get marijuana.”

Non Causa Pro Causa is a type of the logical fallacy known as "Slippery Slope."  A logical fallacy is an incorrect inference form, or, more prosaically, an example of faulty reasoning.  We've seen this before from the Right Wing (and in particular, "the Religious Right"), for example in connection with Marriage Equality (in which they not only commit the fallacy of Non Causa Pro Causa, but also the fallacy of Argumentum ad Hominem, specifically in the Abusive ad Hominem variety, by essentially equating Gay Marriage with pedophilia, bestality, etc).  Fallacy is in fact all too common from politicians of every party and ideology, but an ideology which glorifies ignorance, prejudice, superstition and irrationality, such as does the Religious Right, is obviously more likely to make use of erroneous reasoning.

But, Donna Giovanna, isn't there something else the little girl can take?

No, as seen in this article (and blatantly stated in the CNN broadcast today):
Chris Christie expected to announce decision on medical marijuana bill

Brian Wilson's 2-year-old daughter, Vivian, suffers a version of epilepsy called Dravet syndrome. Normal epilepsy medications have so far failed to work for Vivian, and her family believes a certain type of medical marijuana -- one with high levels of cannabidiol, or CBD -- may be able to help. High-CBD strains of marijuana have helped other patients with Dravet Syndrome.

You'll note in the videos that Christie believes that his office entitles him to "make these decisions."  Au contraire.  The Ninth and Tenth Amendments to the US Constitution say otherwise.

But just who is this Governor Chris Christie, anyway?

Chris Christie is the favorite for the GOP's super-rich:  The GOP wants the New Jersey governor to save the party from Sen. Rand Paul's libertarian wing

The donor class that wanted Christie, settled for Romney, and wants Christie again needs a candidate who’ll slash at regulation in office and come off patriotic (and pro-Israel) enough to actually get into office. ...

Every week there’s another reminder that the GOP’s libertarian wing hasn’t truly overcome the Bush wing. Back in Aspen, Christie gave them more fresh evidence. “President Obama has done nothing to change the policies of the Bush administration in the war on terrorism,” he said. “I mean practically nothing. You know why? Because they work.”

Violations of the Bill of Rights do NOT work.  They instead promote the causes of hatred of "our freedoms" which George W. Bush alleged was the motivation of the terrorists.


BREAKING NEWS:
From CNN:  "New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie supports easing access to medical marijuana for sick children."
... but issues a qualified veto of the bill.

I'll update this later when a full article will hopefully be ready from a news source, but the quoted bit above can currently be found at the top of the same CNN article linked above;  it does not yet mention the qualified veto, which was discussed on CNN moments ago.

UPDATE:
New Jersey Gov Christie to ease access to medical marijuana for children

Gov. Chris Christie has agreed to give chronically ill children easier access to medical marijuana.

However, the governor conditionally vetoed a bill on the issue because it goes further than he was willing to go.

America, is this the person you want to be the President?  I'll be voting against him myself.

NYC officials to appeal federal 'stop and frisk' judgment

NYC officials to appeal federal 'stop and frisk' judgment

New York City officials say they are ready to begin their appeal of a federal judge’s ruling that a controversial NYPD tactic known as “stop and frisk” violates the constitutional rights of blacks and Hispanics. ...

“Crime can come back anytime the criminals think that they’re going to get away with things. We just cannot let that happen,” the mayor said. Over the course of his nearly 12 years leading the city, the New York’s murder rate has fallen by half.

The tactic in question allows police to stop and pat down ("frisk") anyone they deem suspicious. Scheindlin found it was used 4.4 million times between 2004 and 2012, and that 80 percent of the stops were of blacks and Hispanics.

In her ruling, she wrote, “In their zeal to defend a policy that they believe to be effective, they have willfully ignored overwhelming proof that the policy of targeting ‘the right people’ is racially discriminatory and therefore violates the United States Constitution.”

 Guess what?  If the police have "probable cause," they can get a search warrant.  If they don't have a search warrant, they're already violating the US Constitution, specifically the Fourth Amendment, which says:

The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated, and no Warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by Oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized.

Note:  "in their persons."

Appealing to fear of crime in an effort to justify the violation of the civil rights and liberties of the people is not only an example of the fallacy of Argumentum ad Passiones (Appeal to Emotion), it's also a favorite tactic of demagogues and authoritarians.  This is America.  Gestapo tactics, Stasi tactics, KGB tactics, NKVD tactics -- none of this is used in free societies.   If this is to continue to be America, the ruling must stand.