Liberty and Justice for All!

A treaty banning the use of cluster-bombs was passed by 111 nations. Guess a nation that wasn’t part of the ban? That’s right, the good ole U S of A. The reason?

State Department spokesman Tom Casey said the United States remained committed to United Nations-sponsored talks that seek voluntary codes of “best practice” among leading makers of cluster bombs.

Yeah, because I am supposed to trust this administration to voluntarily do the right thing? I think not!

We have many ways to kill people in America. I find it hard to believe that our signing onto a treaty that bans one form would hurt us in anyway. And by not using cluster bombs, we would prevent things from happening like small children picking up unexploded shells from the cluster-bomb and blowing off their arms. I guess when you are war profiteering, you want to make sure that you can cause as much death as possible to prove you give more bang for your buck.

The California Supreme Court just struck down the gay marriage ban! Now there are two states where gay people are not treated as second class citizens.

Domestic partnerships are not a good enough substitute for marriage, the justices ruled 4-3 in striking down the ban.

Absolutely right. Of course, the California GHEL plan on striking back.

A coalition of religious and social conservative groups is attempting to put a measure on the November ballot that would enshrine laws banning gay marriage in the state constitution.

I hope they fail. The tyranny of the majority should not get to treat people like second class citizens. PERIOD. If you don’t like gay marriage, don’t have one. It is really just that simple.

According to Bayou Buzz, LAGOP Executive Director Matt Parker (Jindal’s homeschooled homeboy’s  brother in law) stated this about Mary Landrieu and her failure to respond to Nagin’s endorsement of Barack Obama:

Today’s endorsement raises more questions than answers.  In a press release announcing today’s endorsement, Nagin cited ‘Obama’s advocacy for the people of

Louisianaand working men and women across the county’ and specifically his work to address the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina.   Does Mary Landrieu disagree with Nagin?  Why won’t Landrieu stand up and let Louisianans know why she won’t endorse Obama?”

Say what?!?!?! Mabye Landrieu doesn’t want to take sides. Maybe Landrieu would be happy voting for either of the two Democrats against John 100 years in Iraq McCain. Maybe Landrieu figures that she can be silent in a race where the presumptive Republican nominee didn’t get the most votes in the Republican primary. Maybe Mary Landrieu didn’t feel that she needed to make an anouncement over an endorsement by someone else. Or maybe, just maybe, Mary Landrieu doesn’t feel the need to answer to the head of the party who is trying to unseat her. I would at least go with the last one, though others may be valid as well.

This is just a silly question raised by Matt Parker. Now, is he the voice of Cartman? Or is that Trey Stone? See, I got the names mixed up and even those are better questions than the brainchild of Homeschool’s brother in law.

The idea that Nagin’s endorsement raises more questions than it answers is absurd. I guess the Republicans set the bar low when they chose their executive director.

The Gambit is against teaching Creationism/ID in schools. Jindal supports it.

The Gambit supports keeping the helmet law. Jindal opposes it.

Now, the Gambit reprinted Jeremy Alford’s articlediscussing Jindal’s tight ship and how “Melissa Sellers has become Public Enemy no. 1 to many reporters at Louisiana news outlets”. She has already become famous for removing people from mailing lists and otherwise having a very tight ship, keeping the Governor in a press vacuum as much as possible unless she can control the setting. However, included in the Gambit was a piece by Clancy himself discussing the preview of Melissa Sellers and her tactics. The Press Secretary from Hell nearly threw a tantrum about not being allowed in the Gambit endorsement meeting. She could not just sit still. She apparently paced back and forth and even went as far as to put a glass against the wall to hear what was going on! The woman is obsessed!

So the Gambit staff knew Jindal’s positions on helmet laws and ID. The Gambit, who is usually rather liberal, knew his extremist stance on gay marriage and abortion. The Gambit knew the kind of people that Bobby Jindal surrounds himself with. Yet they endorsed him anyway?

This tells me one of two things.

A) They are really that stupid

B) They knew that Jindal was a bad choice for Louisiana but knew it would create four years of stories that they would be able to write about. They could write on how Jindal lied to them, how he hasn’t kept his end of the bargain, and how he turned out to be a wolf in sheep clothing. They would sell advertising in their newspapers and keep raking in the dough.

These are the only to reasons I can think of. Anyone have any other good possibilities? I’ll add them.

I was on the radio this morning on KVOL 1330. I wanted to go ahead and direct any listeners who might check out the blog to several of the points that we discussed on the air. First and foremost would be the David Vitter scandal and his hypocrisy. Here is a link showing that Vitter called for Clintons resignation for his affair.

There is also this quote of Vitter’s from the time that clearly show his hypocrisy:

 Some current polls may suggest that people are turned off by the whole Clinton mess and don’t care — because the stock market is good, the Clinton spin machine is even better or other reasons. But that doesn’t answer the question of whether President Clinton should be impeached and removed from office because he is morally unfit to govern.The writings of the Founding Fathers are very instructive on this issue. They are not cast in terms of political effectiveness at all but in terms of right and wrong — moral fitness. Hamilton writes in the Federalists Papers (No. 65) that impeachable offenses are those that “proceed from the misconduct of public men, or, in other words, from the abuse or violation of some public trust

So how is Vitter not morally unfit to be a Senator (by his own logic)? And of course, here is the link to the lj4a store where you can purchase some WWVD bumper stickers and t-shirts.

We also discussed some of Bobby Jindal’s hypocrisy as well. From Jindal’s kid attending the LSU lab school, to Timmy Teepell’s brother in law becoming executive director of the Louisiana Republican Party, to ticketgate (and the link to the WAFB story),  Jindal’s inflating of the budget he claims was already inflated and finally Jindal’s paying back his campaign contributors with government grants.

It was a really fun experience and I definitely look forward to doing it again.

California Deputy Attorney General Christopher Krueger wrote in a court brief:

A day may come when the people decide to legalize same-sex marriage. But such a social change should appropriately come from the people rather than the judiciary so long as constitutional rights are protected

Hmmm, if we waited on important social change to come from the people instead of the judiciary, I wonder if we would still have separate schools. I guess this legal scholar forgets the necessity of that little ruling called “Brown v. Board of Education“. Does he feel that the Brown ruling was inappropriate? I wonder how long interracial marriages would have been outlawed had it been left to the people instead of being decided by “Loving v. Virginia“? I feel sorry for the people of California if this is the kind of legal representation they have in their DA office.

Anti-gay marriage activists also feel that:

 limiting marriage to members of the opposite sex is reasonable — not only to uphold tradition but because California voters approved a ballot initiative eight years ago bolstering the gay-marriage ban that was in place at the time. To overturn that law, they say, would abrogate the rights of all Californians.

So let me get this straight, allowing gay people to marry abrogates the rights of all Californians? That is absurd! If they don’t feel that gay people have the Constitutionally protected right to get marriage, how on Earth do they figure that Californians have a Constitutionally protected right to live in a state where gay people are discriminated against?

How about this. Maybe, just maybe, if people spent more time worrying about their own marriages instead of worrying about other people getting married, we wouldn’t have such an abysmal divorce rate! Just my humble opinion.

In what seems to be an ongoing struggle between those who feel government should be used as an arm to promote religion and those who stand up for those people who are not part of the “majority”, the ACLU is again pressing a lawsuit against the Tangipahoa School Board for another violation of the establishment clause.

See, it seems that Tangipahoa School Board does not care about those people who are not Christian. They have apparently only invited certain religious leaders to lead the prayer before meetings. Their lack of caring for non-Christians and (and what really seems like disdain for them) could be clearly seen in the WWL TV newscast at 6 where they had an interview with the attorney representing the school board. He was smug and arrogant to the point where you could clearly see the sentiment of those who support a twisting and bending of laws.

Here is a suggestion to Tangipahoa. Instead of trying to bend and twist your policies to try and get around the laws…. JUST FOLLOW THE LAWS! Have some respect for people of ALL FAITHS and not just your own. I think it is SAD and PATHETIC that people who are in charge of educating our children would set this horrid example of how to act like a human being and a responsible member of society.

You can see the video and watch the smug “thats the kind of churches we have in Tangipahoa Parish” comment.

… and that is the end of the civil rights movement.  

I was listening to Rush Limbaugh on the radio during lunch and this shining example of what is wrong with America calls in. He asks Rush if it would be worth it to elect Barack Obama to be our next President so that would shut up all the civil rights activists.

After the break, Rush answers this pillar of society with an answer that I amazingly agreed with. He said no, that the civil rights movement won’t end with an Obama Presidency. The shock of my agreement with Limbaugh quickly disappeared as Limbaugh’s reasoning was far different than mine.

See, Rush stated that the civil rights movement will continue as long as Democrats need 90% of the black vote to win. He also said other things that I am just far to disgusted to remember. Rush’s small pill popping brain could not quite understand the fact that the civil rights movement will continue until society treats black people and Hispanic people and gay people and all other people as… (wait for it)……. PEOPLE! Imagine that!

And perhaps if Rush hadn’t been using his formerly nicotine stained fingers to pop Oxycontin in his mouth, he would realize that perhaps the reason that 90% of black people vote for Democrats is because of Repubicans pundits hold ignorant and racist ideas such as his. I’m just sayin…

I loved him in Ferris Beuller, I loved his game show, I even like his eye drop commercials. Perhaps it is the inner nerd in me, or perhaps it is the way that his dry delivery still comes off as very funny. However, Ben Stein’s new project had me really scratching my head. I knew he was a fiscal conservative but I have quickly learned that he is also quite the social conservative as well. Jews, especially those who are not Hassidim, tend to be more socially liberal. At least this has been my experience as a Jew, raised by Jews, and educated by Jews until 8th grade.

So it shocked me that Stein would do a movie about how people who promote the idea of intelligent design are being persecuted by all of us. He suggests that we are a country that supports the right of free speech in every other aspect of our lives, but not science. He sees something very wrong with that, to the point that he felt like he needed to make a movie. 

This is one of the problems that I have with creationists/ID’ers. You absolutely have the right to free speech. However, just as some people have the right to say what they want to say, others have the right to reject what people say as being false. The Constitution does not require other people to promote your speech as valid, correct, or an alternative… regardless of whether they agree with you or not. Futhermore, if Stein and others had their way, these people would be required to accept ID and creationism and wouldn’t that violate THEIR free speech rights if THEY are told what to say? So, the idea that the scientific community is somehow stifiling the first amendment right to free speech of those who support the idea of an intelligent designer is horribly flawed.

Another point is that intelligent design/creationism is not an actual scientific theory, so why on earth should scientists feel guilty for not accepting it as such? Everything I have read by someone promoting ID goes from a bunch of things that they feel could only be done by an intelligent designer and then just say “so see, because I say it has to be done by an intelligent designer, that means there must be an intelligent designer”. Kinda like the “loose change” idiots of the right wing.

My personal beliefs tell me that there is an intelligent designer. I believe in God and by looking at everything around me I cannot see how it cannot be done by an intelligent designer. However, my beliefs don’t belong in a scientific classroom because they are not science. Science does not care about who. Science and intelligent design can exist in harmony, as long as people realize what belongs in the science class and what belongs to matters of faith.

The end of the trailer was a cute play on his Ferris Bueller scene. That does not make up for the fact that this movie is probably very misguided and will probably reach many of the same false conclusions that those who wish to push creationism (in any form) on us will tend to come up with.

You can read more about the movie on the wikipedia page.

Earlier I was critical of Karen Carter and her actions in the Louisiana Legislature when she sold out her own party and supported a Republican for Speaker of the House. How did the Democratic voters in her district pay her back for her selfishness? They rewarded her with the most votes in her OPDEC election in District B.

This is why the Democratic Party is losing ground in this state. Selfish Democrats who are only concerned with their own personal power are rewarded with more seats. The state party does not even follow its own rules. Because of her actions, she should have been censured. The party should have stood up and said “We not tolerate people who allow the Republicans to gain more and more power for their own benefit”. She should be embarassed for her actions and the voters should have tossed her out.

We are supposed to be “progressives”, but we won’t make any progress by supporting people who support Republicans. Until we learn that, we will continue to fail in this state.