Patterico's Pontifications

6/20/2015

The Silver Lining to That Dark Cloud Bearing the Mile-Wide Destructive Tornado

Filed under: General — Patterico @ 11:53 am



At Hot Air, Jazz Shaw tells us:

Losing the gay marriage case before SCOTUS could be the best thing to happen to conservatives in ages

(Further) shredding the meaning of the 14th Amendment may lead to a short-term political advantage!

PROGRAMMING NOTE: You might have noticed I have been relatively absent in the past few days. (Or maybe you haven’t.) Everything’s fine; busy at work. Thanks as always to Dana, JVW, and JD for pitching in.

334 Responses to “The Silver Lining to That Dark Cloud Bearing the Mile-Wide Destructive Tornado”

  1. drama queen

    happyfeet (831175)

  2. and I will live today

    and I will live tomorrow

    no matter what is said or done

    even if it’s going wrong*

    happyfeet (831175)

  3. This is what you write when you’ve given up.

    DRJ (e80d46)

  4. duggar on through duggar on through there’s a light at the end of the tunnel

    and

    it

    is

    glorious

    and I will live today

    happyfeet (831175)

  5. Penumbras and their harmonics: now you see ‘um, now you don’t.

    ropelight (6712ae)

  6. This is what you write when you’ve given up.

    Jazz Shaw’s post, or mine?

    Patterico (3cc0c1)

  7. I could make a better case that for them to lose at the Supreme Court would be the best thing that could happen to gays.

    Outline: A woman’s right to an abortion is still on eggshells 40+ years after Roe v Wade. To hear Dems tell it, one more conservative justice and *poof* no more abortions. Why? Because the growing political change (Reagan signed one of the first abortion bills!) was preempted and now there is no room for compromise.

    Gays should not want that to happen to them. It is still possible that the states will move in the direction they were headed before politics was abandoned in favor of judges. It is quite likely that a SC decree will be temporary as the next two or three appointments may well be conservative.

    A bad bet for gays.

    Kevin M (25bbee)

  8. marriage is a religious institution.

    governments should recognize contracts between competent adults, and nothing else.

    redc1c4 (cf3b04)

  9. Jazz Shaw’s post, not yours. I’ve never known you to give up.

    DRJ (e80d46)

  10. Outline: A woman’s right to an abortion is still on eggshells 40+ years after Roe v Wade.

    nonsense we’ve pretty much come to a consensus that abortion is ok up to like 20-22 weeks

    Rick Perry passed a law about this.

    happyfeet (831175)

  11. besides christians have climate change duty now thanks to pope whoreface

    gay marriage is a lot of things but planet-threatening?

    no way dude

    climate dioxides is the Real Enemy

    ave marrriiiiiiiia

    happyfeet (831175)

  12. Jazz is a social leftist so it’s no surprise he doesn’t care and wants to throw the towel in. He’s no different than happyfacist in that he loves destroying the institution of marriage and attacking Christians, but finds transsexuals to be abhorrent and beyond the pale… for now.

    njrob (c94106)

  13. It would not be a good thing for the Rule of Law. In fact, I’m sure it won’t be, because it’s likely to be a good swift kick down a very slippery Equal Protection slope that I believe to be slimy and treacherous. I cannot be very pleased about any further erosions of the basic difference between (a) stuff we deliberately put into the Constitution using a supra-majority ratification or amendment process, and (b) stuff that is probably (at least arguably) a good idea as a matter of policy. I am certain beyond peradventure that the United States Constitution says absolutely nothing one way or the other about sexual preference or marriage; anyone who disagrees doesn’t understand what a constitution is or why we need one.

    But yeah, the silver lining to the toxic cloud is that it will let a lot of conservative politicians (including, e.g., Scott Walker, but emphatically not including Ted Cruz, who’ll have none of that) dodge this kind of divisive issue, which is a good thing, because not very many of them (other than, say, Ted Cruz) is capable of making that principled distinction.

    Beldar (fa637a)

  14. (^^^ Hereinabove Beldar draws a further fine distinction between being “right” and being “electable.”)

    Beldar (fa637a)

  15. happyfeet (831175) — 6/20/2015 @ 1:41 pm

    I have no idea where you are coming from, dude. But I’ll go out on a limb and guess that it was something you read and took as “gospel truth” because it confirmed you own personal bias. Prolly about the Pope’s new book. Anyway, to paraphrase Mother Teresa of Calcutta, “if everyone likes you, you are doing something wrong.” So you got that going for you.

    Last time I checked, There were exactly zero church laws used to hand down a fine, penalty, or sentence to anyone in the U.S. in order to force/enforce any agenda. But publish a book about steardship of God’s creation and it’s “OMG, who died and made you the Pope?”

    It is sometimes amusing to see what manner of straw men are presented on this site – not this time, happy.

    felipe (56556d)

  16. Another provocative assertion that I’ll throw out there:

    I think the unintended consequences we’re still suffering as a result of no-fault divorce laws are vastly more pernicious than anything that will result, or that has yet resulted in those states which have adopted, SSM. (Although I continue to condemn judicial imposition of that result; if you can’t get the legislators to vote for it and the governor to sign it, your state’s not yet reached the level of political policy consensus necessary for it to be a legitimate result.)

    I believe in marriage, and I think the national adoption of no-fault divorce laws has wounded that institution, very nearly mortally. I don’t think you ought to have to prove adultery or the other traditional historical grounds. But I think marriage ought be something too significant to be able to turn one’s back upon on a whim and a visit to the LegalZoom website.

    Beldar (fa637a)

  17. i’m a capitalist and for that you can blame mama and you can blame daddy

    it’s how they raised me up

    poor pope butterhead, his parents done him a bad turn

    i know he don’t know no better, growing up in filth and squalor of the third whirl like he done

    but why he gotta be so damn dumb

    ave marrriiiiiiiia

    happyfeet (831175)

  18. Most of the pro-SSM sentiment originates from liberal biases, which tend to flourish when facing the idea of a victim existing out there, who is somehow, someway, somewhere not being helped or stroked. Such sentiments are most strongly triggered when rallying around a clearly identifiable underdog, and liberalism in general also triggers the desire to scapegoat (ie, to mindlessly, blindly assign guilt and blame). So the Supreme Court ruling against SSM would give a new lease on life to the left, to liberal emotions throughout the US (ie, why we’ve been taking a joy ride down that road paved with good intentions).

    No justice, no peace!

    Mark (a11af2)

  19. The Pope is infallible in his Encyclicals and you’re looking at eternal damnation if you disagree, happyfeet. In Hell if you’re lucky; in California if you’re not. But like felipe said, we ain’t seen the Encyclical yet; just wishful speculation from the picklebiters.

    nk (dbc370)

  20. well he still has time to read my comments and make the appropriate edits

    happyfeet (831175)

  21. Queers and their results don’t scare me as much as the lying, traitorous mother flucking team republican.

    mg (31009b)

  22. I think the unintended consequences we’re still suffering as a result of no-fault divorce laws are vastly more pernicious than anything that will result, or that has yet resulted in those states which have adopted, SSM. (Although I continue to condemn judicial imposition of that result; if you can’t get the legislators to vote for it and the governor to sign it, your state’s not yet reached the level of political policy consensus necessary for it to be a legitimate result.)

    Absolutely true, Beldar. It’s always wonderful to see a comment from you, because it means we will get a thoughtful and well-written perspective from an intelligent reader who is offering something of substance.

    well he still has time to read my comments and make the appropriate edits

    I’m not sure what this is referring to. Are you referring to the fact that, ten days ago, I moderated a comment of yours talking about killing public officials? Or something else?

    Patterico (3cc0c1)

  23. Pat, I believe he was referencing the Pope.

    Gazzer (be559b)

  24. yes yes i was referencing Mr. Pope

    we’re having a bit of a falling out

    (mostly his fault)

    happyfeet (831175)

  25. I wish team republican could do something intelligent with substance.

    mg (31009b)

  26. these carbondy dachshunds are unstainable!

    remove them from my sight!

    happy popefeet (831175)

  27. I wish team republican could do something intelligent with substance.

    mg (31009b) — 6/20/2015 @ 4:21 pm

    Yah, but occasionally that turns into substance abuse. The Republicans haven’t been much above Democrat Lite since the first Bush. No- strike that. Nixon just occurred to me.

    Bill H (2a858c)

  28. OK, the bit about the Pope having time to read happyfeet’s comments and make the appropriate edits is going over my head, sorry.

    Patterico (3cc0c1)

  29. as a former catholic, he’s been dissapointing, he choses not to really defend those things that are cathedra, and comment on everything outside the circle,

    narciso (ee1f88)

  30. Edits to his anticipated Encyclical about which all kinds of rumors are floating; one of them that he will side with the AGW/Climate Change/Michael Mann crowd.

    nk (dbc370)

  31. #28
    which is his particular genius
    hf’s, not the Popes
    Very uncertain the Pope would get hf’s style… it might be more chimichurri than churassco

    steveg (fed1c9)

  32. Re: Beldar @16: I’ve worked on a lot of divorces over the years as a paralegal. Almost invariably, it is women and children who suffer the consequences of no-fault divorce and those consequences are indeed ‘pernicious”.

    Brooks (a9c69a)

  33. I agree with Beldar that the institution of marriage has likely been mortally wounded over the last generation and a half but only partly because of no-fault divorce.
    Anybody checked out the shocking illegitimacy rates lately? There’s this from the CDC in 2012:
    Percent of births considered “non-marital” by racial or ethnic group

    Asian Americans and Pacific Islanders
    17 percent

    Non-Hispanic whites
    29 percent

    Hispanics
    53 percent

    American Indian and Native Alaskans
    66 percent

    Non-Hispanic blacks
    73 percent

    Sadly, it looks to me like the formerly well understood and broadly accepted societal benefits of traditional marriage and two parent intact families have already been pretty much washed down the slippery slope and into the the gully on their own for a lot of Americans –regardless of what the supreme court rules.

    elissa (b99a7d)

  34. If one could separate the allowance of SSM from the marginalization and demonization of those two or three people left who think that heterosexual union is the norm, like all of history until a few blinks in time ago and probably 6 billion or more of the current world human inhabitants,
    then I might agree with you about no fault divorce being worse.

    So, if no fault divorce turned the institution of marriage into a shell of its former self,
    and SSM crushes the shell,
    is it worth discussing which one did the most damage?

    I didn’t book mark it, as I thought it was so ho hum and what I already knew to be true,
    but I recently saw an article with candid quotes from pro SSM advocates talking about all of the deceptions in arguments they used to push the agenda, themselves knowing them not to be true but knew they would work, and now discussing how to proceed with the next step to societal transformation. I think one of the admitted lies was making the claim, “We’re not trying to change the definition of marriage”. Maybe someone else knows to which I refer and can link it.

    As far as the matter at hand, I do not frequent that blog,
    but in the linked article he seems to suggest that the Row v Wade decision was in the long run a good one because it motivated a large and organized pro-life movement.
    I think the large and organized pro-life movement thinks the aim is to limit the number of unborn slaughtered, not to incentivize a movement, and that Roe v wade going the opposite way would have been just fine and dandy.

    It really is a simple and direct illustration of Romans 1, people like to deny what they know about God and right and wrong, then after awhile God says, “Ok, that’s the way you want it, go ahead.” And people/society goes into greater and greater foolishness. Maybe you are annoyed at my repetition, or think I’m being simplistic.
    But look where we are now:
    now no one can agree on how to define marriage other than by going along with the societal construct of the moment, that gender identity has nothing to do with physical characteristics and comes in dozens of versions, and if your 17 yo high school daughter is uncomfortable showering next to a physical guy who identifies as a girl,
    it is your daughter who has a problem and needs to be reeducated.

    MD in Philly (f9371b)

  35. Somewhere between being a little snowball at the top of the hill and a planetoid of ice ready to destroy a town the problem got out of hand.
    So the answer is to stand and watch it gather another 100 yds of snow before it roles over you?

    MD in Philly (f9371b)

  36. “Maybe you are annoyed at my repetition, or think I’m being simplistic.
    But look where we are now”

    The truth bears repeating. There is a reason it’s called “the simple truth.”

    felipe (56556d)

  37. no fault divorce was certainly the original corrosive, it’s not accidental it was introduced in Soviet Russia, first, the point about Roman 1 is on point, but the latter part of Romans 5,
    is also important, the law without the accompanying moral code, provokes the nature to rebel,

    narciso (ee1f88)

  38. My bankerette has a “boyfriend”. My dental hygienist has a child by her ex-husband and another by her “boyfriend”. So does another lady we know. Another has a child by a one-night stand and the father had to sue for paternity to get visitation. They don’t even bother to say “common law” anymore.

    nk (dbc370)

  39. in my life where everything was wrong
    something finally went right

    now there’s two less lonely people
    in the world

    tonight

    happyfeet (831175)

  40. Elissa,

    If no-fault divorce is only partly responsible for the damage done to the institution of marriage, what do you attribute to being the underlying reason for the drastic increase in out-of wedlock childbirths?

    Dana (86e864)

  41. Jazz is also of the mind that all these issues of concerns, are too alienating to the general populace to be brought up, so even more corrosive elements must to tolerated,

    narciso (ee1f88)

  42. whinging about the “state of marriage” is a first whirl problem

    failmerica can but aspire

    happyfeet (831175)

  43. well it is at the foundation, without intact families values cannot be transmitted, other institutions dissolve, one by one, and the state becomes the sole providor, hence fail america

    narciso (ee1f88)

  44. 16. Another provocative assertion that I’ll throw out there:

    I think the unintended consequences we’re still suffering as a result of no-fault divorce laws are vastly more pernicious than anything that will result, or that has yet resulted in those states which have adopted, SSM. (Although I continue to condemn judicial imposition of that result; if you can’t get the legislators to vote for it and the governor to sign it, your state’s not yet reached the level of political policy consensus necessary for it to be a legitimate result.)

    I believe in marriage, and I think the national adoption of no-fault divorce laws has wounded that institution, very nearly mortally. I don’t think you ought to have to prove adultery or the other traditional historical grounds. But I think marriage ought be something too significant to be able to turn one’s back upon on a whim and a visit to the LegalZoom website.

    Beldar (fa637a) — 6/20/2015 @ 2:51 pm

    I will take on that assertion. No-fault divorce was intended to harm marriage, and more broadly society, as marriage is the foundation of society. If your going to fundamentally transform a society, it’s almost tautological to say you need to start at the foundation.

    And the same people who brought you that are bringing you SSM. With the same intentions.

    http://www.weeklystandard.com/articles/you-will-be-assimilated_969581.html?page=1

    You Will Be Assimilated
    The same-sex marriage bait-and-switch

    …It’s a small thing, to be sure. But telling. Because it shows that the same-sex marriage movement is interested in a great deal more than just the freedom to form marital unions. It is also interested, quite keenly, in punishing dissenters. But the ambitions of the movement go further than that, even. It’s about revisiting legal notions of freedom of speech and association, constitutional protections for religious freedom, and cultural norms concerning the family. And most Americans are only just realizing that these are the societal compacts that have been pried open for negotiation.

    Same-sex marriage supporters see this cascade of changes as necessary for safeguarding progress against retrograde elements in society. People less deeply invested in same-sex marriage might see it as a bait-and-switch. And they would be correct. But this is hardly new. Bait-and-switch has been the modus operandi of the gay rights movement not, perhaps, from the start, but for a good long while.

    For decades now, it’s been the most powerful argument in the LGBT arsenal: that we were “born this way.” .  .  .Still, as compelling as these arguments are, they may have outgrown their usefulness. With most Americans now in favor of gay marriage, it’s time for the argument to shift to one where genetics don’t matter. The genetic argument has boxed us into a corner.

    It’s always a little unsettling when a movement that claims the mantle of truth, liberty, and equality starts openly admitting its arguments are mere “tools” to be wielded for their “usefulness.” But that’s where the movement is these days. Remember when proponents of same-sex marriage mocked people who suggested that creating a right to same-sex “marriage” might weaken the institution of marriage itself: How could my gay marriage possibly affect your straight marriage? Those arguments have outlived their usefulness, too. Here’s gay activist Jay Michaelson last year in the Daily Beast:

    Moderates and liberals have argued that same-sex marriage is No Big Deal—it’s the Same Love, after all, and gays just want the same lives as everyone else. But further right and further left, things get a lot more interesting. What if gay marriage really will change the institution of marriage, shifting conceptions around monogamy and intimacy? . . .

    [T]here is some truth to the conservative claim that gay marriage is changing, not just expanding, marriage. According to a 2013 study, about half of gay marriages surveyed (admittedly, the study was conducted in San Francisco) were not strictly monogamous.

    Slate’s Hanna Rosin agrees, suggesting that gay marriage won’t just change “normal” marriage, but will do so for the good:

    …Of course, not everyone in the same-sex marriage movement wants to help traditional marriage evolve into something better. Some want to burn it to the ground. Again in the New Republic, for instance, one member of a married lesbian couple wrote about her quest to use her own brother’s sperm to impregnate her wife. Why would she seek to do such a thing? Because “The queer parts of me relished the way it unsettled people. Uprooting convention, collapsing categories, reframing and reassigning blood relations was a subversive wet dream.” This is quite intentionally not, as Andrew Sullivan once promised, a “virtually normal” view of marriage.

    Other changes are coming…

    As they say, read the whole thing.

    If you believe SSM has not and will not do any damage to marriage or wider society, there’s a reason for that.

    The same leftist anti-American, anti-capitalist crown that brought you no-fault divorce have been lying to you about how SSM is just a big nothingburger that only a homophobe could oppose.

    These people haven’t and aren’t shy about admitting they’ve been lying to get what they want. And they want a lot more than their “for public consumption” propaganda claims they want.

    I really don’t understand how they’ve gotten away with lying in public and bragging about how their lies are working, also in public.

    State Dept LGBT Speaker: We Don’t Want Gay Marriage; We Want No Marriage

    …Among the event’s speakers was noted LGBT activist Masha Gessen, who rose to prominence as a fierce critic of Russia’s treatment of LGBT issues, particularly under Vladimir Putin. However, Gessen has more in mind than simply “expanding” marriage rights in the United States to include homosexual couples. At a panel discussion for the Sydney Writers Festival in 2012, Gessen noted:

    I agree that we should have the right to marry, but I also think equally that it is a no-brainer that the institution of marriage should not exist. . . . Fighting for gay marriage generally involves lying about what we’re going to do with marriage when we get there, because we lie that the institution of marriage is not going to change, and that is a lie. The institution of marriage is going to change, and it should change, and again, I don’t think it should exist.

    Read more at: http://www.nationalreview.com/corner/381148/state-dept-lgbt-speaker-we-dont-want-gay-marriage-we-want-no-marriage-ian-tuttle

    You are correct, Beldar, that no-fault divorce mortally wounded the institution of marriage.

    But SSM is intended to be the coup de grace. Given this crowd’s track record I’m sure it will be.

    Your provocative assertion is premature, and I’m afraid either naive or ill-informed.

    Steve57 (48418e)

  45. same sex marriage is when two people of the same sex get married

    it’s not a real humdinger kinda thingidy thing to get your head around

    happyfeet (831175)

  46. If no-fault divorce is only partly responsible for the damage done to the institution of marriage, what do you attribute to being the underlying reason for the drastic increase in out-of wedlock childbirths?

    I am not elissa, but I attribute it to the same Western Liberal thought which has a mistress instead of a wife for the First Lady of France. Hollande’s third publicly-known one, as a matter of fact. His first was Segolene Royal and they had three kids together. Royal is quoted as saying that she considered marriage an outmoded bourgeois institution. The infection has spread to the United States. I would also say that the abolition of common law marriage skews the statistics, because it lumps in the couples with committed long term monogamous relationships who adhere to all the indicia of marriage with those in meretricious relationships.

    nk (dbc370)

  47. please to ignore the bipolar dyke

    happyfeet (831175)

  48. 34. …I didn’t book mark it, as I thought it was so ho hum and what I already knew to be true, but I recently saw an article with candid quotes from pro SSM advocates talking about all of the deceptions in arguments they used to push the agenda, themselves knowing them not to be true but knew they would work, and now discussing how to proceed with the next step to societal transformation. I think one of the admitted lies was making the claim, “We’re not trying to change the definition of marriage”. Maybe someone else knows to which I refer and can link it.

    MD in Philly (f9371b) — 6/20/2015 @ 5:59 pm

    I didn’t see this earlier. Probably because I was working on my lengthy treatise. But I believe you’re talking about the Weekly Standard article I linked to @44.

    The thing is, SSM advocates have been quite open, quite vocal, and prolifically writing for years about how they were lying to get what they want. And they no more wanted a mere expansion of marriage than Hitler merely wanted the Sudetenland.

    Radical socialists feminist Kari Moxness wrote an article in Sweden’s major daily, their equivalent of the NYT, that their goal was what she called “empty marriage.” To gut marriage entirely of it’s meaning to the point where the word might still exist but not any content. And that SSM would essentially be the final nail in the coffin.

    SSM proponents generally admit to lying only when they think they’re among friends. At least until they think they won, then they brag about how well their lies worked.

    Steve57 (48418e)

  49. marriage is now seen as an optional thing among a large part of the society. “Out of wedlock birth” doesn’t mean what it once did. now you can have two professionals who decide to have a child and raise it together as a sort of joint partnership
    that is different from a child born to a single mom “unplanned”.

    It’s a first whirl problem because the third world knows better.

    true narciso, the Law with its demands, if seen as a standard to live up to in order to earn approval, either leads to rebellion out of frustration, or a delusion of self-righteousness.
    if the Law is seen as an illustration of what God is like and what He wants of us/for us, it can be a mirror to cause one to look for mercy.

    MD in Philly (f9371b)

  50. same sex marriage is when two people of the same sex get married

    An apple is what you give a horse as a treat. A horse apple is what comes out at the other end of the horse. It’s not a real humdinger kinda thingidy thing to get your head around.

    nk (dbc370)

  51. I’ve commented about the above phenomenon on this thread:

    https://patterico.com/2015/06/18/eugene-volokh-pushes-back-against-university-of-californias-advisement-to-avoid-microaggressions/#comment-1770311

    With the progressive, cultural Marxist left the goal is never the goal. And they will be quite open about their real goals. They are quite open about the need to lie to achieve them. And the need to intimidate, harass, etc. anyone who tries to alert the public to the reams of evidence that they’re lying to achieve some goal other than the one they’re propagandizing the public about.

    Steve57 (48418e)

  52. horse apples is an idiom

    that’s all i can really tell you about them horse apples why?

    cause horses terrify me

    they too big and they too crazy and they think you’re jay-z and they think they’re solange and they’re pretty damn sure we all just stepped on an elevator

    happyfeet (831175)

  53. I honestly don’t know, Dana. Do you? I suspect there are many reasons. Maybe it began in California in the Summer of Love. Or with LBJ. I am just reporting the CDC findings.

    I only know that as recently as 50-60 years ago there were still many “shotgun” weddings if a young woman got pregnant, that there were “homes” for unwed mothers where they could be hidden away from society until the child was born and put up for adoption, or that sometimes grandparents pretended their young daughter’s illegitimate baby was their own “late in life surprise” baby and it was raised as a pretend sibling to its own mother. Today it’s common to have preggers students in American high schools. I don’t need to go into the welfare benefits of single moms having many children.
    And of course Hollywood celebs and musicians have proudly been having babies with men/women not their spouses for a while, so the whole idea of “shame” has almost vanished.

    elissa (b99a7d)

  54. Steve57 (48418e) — 6/20/2015 @ 6:43 pm

    yes, that was it. I probably saw it recommended at PowerLine
    It’s always a little unsettling when a movement that claims the mantle of truth, liberty, and equality starts openly admitting its arguments are mere “tools” to be wielded for their “usefulness.” But that’s where the movement is these days. Remember when proponents of same-sex marriage mocked people who suggested that creating a right to same-sex “marriage” might weaken the institution of marriage itself: How could my gay marriage possibly affect your straight marriage? Those arguments have outlived their usefulness, too

    MD in Philly (f9371b)

  55. apparently one of the more noxious weeds was the Charleston shooter, a greater coffee clatch of dysfunction would be hard to find,

    narciso (ee1f88)

  56. much of this is found at the Daily Mail, which is a window into the dysfunction of Perfidious Albion as much as it highlights this country’s flaws,

    narciso (ee1f88)

  57. one might say it’s a look ‘2o minutes into the future’

    narciso (ee1f88)

  58. There was some discussion earlier on this thread about the pope and leaked rumors concerning his encyclical.

    http://www.washingtonpost.com/world/europe/how-climate-change-doubters-lost-a-papal-fight/2015/06/20/86af3182-15ce-11e5-8457-4b431bf7ed4c_story.html

    Sorry, but I think that American Catholic laity and clergy are going to have to deal with this new pope’s global warming issues and pronouncements whether you want to or not.

    elissa (b99a7d)

  59. i harbor these same fears elissa

    dark clouds are gathering

    happyfeet (831175)

  60. well they will, and he will sway more than a few, with his rank foolishness,

    narciso (ee1f88)

  61. It will depend on whether Kevin Hoyer or the Koch brothers give more money to the Al Smith foundation. Or, more likely, the Church will play both sides for all they can be squeezed for.

    nk (dbc370)

  62. Dealing with priests is easy. Just give them everything in sight and if that does not satisfy them give them some more.

    nk (dbc370)

  63. easy simple

    nk (dbc370)

  64. Tom Steyer, and the Top Men have their own patron,

    narciso (ee1f88)

  65. Tom Steyer is whom I meant. I don’t know why “Kevin Hoyer”.

    nk (dbc370)

  66. maybe you got him mixed with Steny Hoyer,

    narciso (ee1f88)

  67. I suppose this link would be a better fit on the thread about the UC system and their jihad on microaggressions, but it’s also suitable here since SSM is just another tentacle of the same giant leftist monster.

    http://www.nationalreview.com/article/419806/political-lefts-favorite-new-buzzword-thomas-sowell?target=author&tid=900925

    The Left’s ‘Microaggression’ Obsession Is Indicative of Its Micro-totalitarian Tendencies

    …The concept of “microaggression” is just one of many tactics used to stifle differences of opinion by declaring some opinions to be “hate speech,” instead of debating those differences in a marketplace of ideas. To accuse people of aggression for not marching in lockstep with political correctness is to set the stage for justifying real aggression against them.

    …In a sense, the political Left’s attempts to silence ideas they cannot, or will not, debate are a confession of intellectual bankruptcy. But this is just one of the Left’s ever-increasing restrictions on other people’s freedom to live their lives as they see fit, rather than as their betters tell them. Current attempts by the Obama administration to force low-income housing to be built in middle class and upscale communities are on a par with forcing people to buy the kind of health insurance the government wants them to buy — Obamacare — rather than leaving them free to buy whatever suits their own situation and preferences.

    …But their know-it-all mindset leads repeatedly and pervasively in that direction, even if by small steps, each of which might be called “micro-totalitarianism.”

    Read more at: http://www.nationalreview.com/article/419806/political-lefts-favorite-new-buzzword-thomas-sowell?target=author&tid=900925

    Sowell understands that this invented term microaggression is just one part of an agenda. As is SSM. Gay rights are not about gay rights (remember, with the progressive cultural Marxist left, the goal is never the goal).

    As the author of the Weekly Standard article on the gay marriage bait-and-switch, Jonathan Last, also noted in the same magazine:

    http://www.weeklystandard.com/blogs/gay-marriage-goes-beyond-bake-me-cake_956934.html

    Over the last few years, the gay marriage movement has transformed from “equality for all” to “bake me a cake.” As it picks up steam, the movement looks more and more totalitarian, both at home and abroad. Witness the latest news from the Great White North:

    …”How much they’re against gays.” “Disrespectful” and “unprofessional.” “What we went through.” What they went through? It’s a testament to how bountiful and decadent Western civilization has become that people with such tender, delicate sensibilities are able to somehow make their way in the world.

    But what’s interesting here isn’t the majestic scale of hurt feelings in Canada. It’s that we have a same-sex couple who asks for the services of a wedding vendor who has a different understanding as to what constitutes marriage. This vendor provides their services-and by all accounts provides them in a gracious manner. And that still isn’t enough. Even possession of deviant thoughts is verboten.

    Actually, that’s not quite fair. As Mrs. White says, it’s fine for the Christian jewelers to think whatever they like. So long as they do so in private and don’t say it out loud.

    You simply can’t have SSM and the First Amendment. Just as you can’t have the HHS employer mandate and the First Amendment.

    The Obama administration was explicit that the contraception/abortifacient mandate was not about health care at all. In the Hobby Lobby case they told the SCOTUS that it was about empowering women. Bait-and-switch is how the progressive cultural Marxist left always operates. They lied about the entirety of the purspose of Obamacare, as Sen. Baucus drunkenly bragged on the Senate floor when he crowed about the ACA being about the redistribution of wealth. They lied to the public about specifically about the purpose of the abortifacient/contraceptive mandate; that it was about “reproductive health.” Then they admitted to that lie in their argument before the SCOTUS, only to replace it with another lie.

    The HHS mandate isn’t about empowering women. It’s about empowering government. Specifically a leftist authoritarian government. Empowering it to do what? Separate you from your rights. You can not have a right to employer provided contraceptives/abortifacients and the free exercise of religion.

    As the Canadian Lesbian couple lectures us, you can have your religious beliefs, but it’s disrespectful to state them publicly. Especially at work, because your business already has a religion. That religion is progressive cultural Marxist leftism. At work, if you’re going to voice an opinion it must be theirs. You must violate your beliefs.

    The CHICOMs recently enacted a law forcing Muslim shopkeepers to sell cigarettes and alcohol. Since they don’t have anything like our Constitution they can be open as to the reason. To forcibly separate people from their non-party approved beliefs. The Obama administration is following the same model, but the have to be deceptive about their true goals.

    This has been the left’s wet dream for years. To force everyone, as Sowell notes, into lockstep conformity with political correctness. And that includes verbal conformity. No dissent will be permitted. As Sowell notes:

    France’s Jean-Paul Sartre has been credited — if that is the word — with calling social conditions he didn’t like “violence,” as a prelude to justifying real violence as a response to those conditions. Sartre’s American imitators have used the same verbal tactic to justify ghetto riots.

    “Microaggression” is just setting the stage for real aggression against people who voice dissent from the leftist agenda. The campus special snowflakes have gone beyond Sartre. Now dissenting speech is violence.

    Right now this authoritarianism is only in the educational system and the military (Chaplains have been put under the military equivalent of a restraining order for publicly stating their religious convictions).

    But it won’t stay there. And SSM will be one of the pretenses for bringing it out of the government-controlled petri dishes into wider society.

    Steve57 (48418e)

  68. OT- sort of-
    just saw an intro to philos book loaned to my daughter. It is organized chronologically by major philosopher with a short bio and description of what the person is best known for.
    The writer of the book is the editor of the New Humanist…if the New Humanist is anything like the Old Humanist it looks like someone is out to fool the people again…

    A sample:
    “Rene Descartes was a young man when the church thought burning astronomers at the stake was the thing to do.”

    Another example, saying how “strange” it was for someone so committed to reason like Pascal to have a conversion experience.

    So…how to approach the subject with daughter that what she thinks is worthwhile and challenging summer reading is not well rounded high school curriculum, but rather a very slanted view of the world presented as “of course this is what (intelligent and reasonable) people think”.

    Reminds me of the time when a (very bright) student in my college dorm thought that God’s existence had been disproved by a version of the argument of evil handed out by his philos 181 TA. Having read the same paper in my 500 level Philos of Religion class and critiquing it I surprised the young fellow by already knowing about it, discussing the objections, referring to his attempt at refuting the objections, and observing that his TA either wasn’t aware of the further dialogue or felt it unnecessary to divulge it.

    Those so inclined feel free to pray that I handle this well.

    MD in Philly (f9371b)

  69. The pope is not faring well in the comments section of the Washington Post.

    elissa (b99a7d)

  70. poor fellow was outmatched, Doc, it’s like bringing a plastic knife to a duel,

    narciso (ee1f88)

  71. A link to Pope Francis’ Encyclical that addresses climate change.

    DRJ (e80d46)

  72. I do it by saying nasty things about Philosophy at every opportunity. The last one was “Life is not a philosophical exercise”. She also understands “Ethos, Pathos, and Logos”. Is the speaker worth listening to; is he sincere; does what he says make sense?

    nk (dbc370)

  73. someone needs to tell this pope how the cow ate the cabbage

    happyfeet (831175)

  74. narciso, it is unfortunate that I am not always around to rescue every said unknowing undergrad from intellectual dishonesty.
    At the moment I am hoping and praying to rescue said daughter from such a fate.
    Unfortunately she does not face every new bit of information with, “Dad, what do you think?”, to make raising the topic easy.

    MD in Philly (f9371b)

  75. Mr. Pope the cow approached the cabbage warily

    she sniffed at it

    then she licked it with her big rough tongue

    played with it a little

    then she bited it!

    it was sweet and crunchy!

    and she gobbled it all up!

    and that, Mr. Pope, is how the cow ate the cabbage

    ave marrriiiiiiiia

    happyfeet (831175)

  76. Wired publishes the short version of the Encyclical if you don’t want to read all 42,000 words. It depicts Pope Francis as a social justice warrior.

    DRJ (e80d46)

  77. it’s a task worthy of Hercules at the Augean stables,

    narciso (ee1f88)

  78. Thank you for the links, DRJ. It looks like you were right, happyfeet. I apologize.

    Both are TL;DR. Did anybody see how much the Vatican is asking for Papal Indulgences Carbon Credits?

    nk (dbc370)

  79. nonono no apology necessary

    we’re all just in such a pickle

    they got the pope

    happyfeet (831175)

  80. sadly we can’t underestimate the level of mere ignorance, and category error in every pronoucement, hence my concern the court will one day discover ‘the right to arm bears’

    narciso (ee1f88)

  81. elissa @58, the article you linked to is actually pretty good but in general it’s more the case that American Catholics will have to deal with how the LHMFM distorts the Pope’s pronouncements then the actual pronouncements themselves.

    The pronouncements themselves are depressing enough, but they’re much worse after they pass through the LHMFM’s leftist filter.

    Activists eagerly awaited Pope Francis’s encyclical Laudato Si’, which was supposed to confront climate-change skeptics and build momentum toward a binding global agreement at the international conference in Paris this December. But by emphasizing the needs of the poor, the document achieves the opposite, exposing and widening cracks in the climate-action coalition.

    …Into this morass has stepped the pope. The encyclical declares an “urgent need” for policies that will drastically reduce greenhouse-gas emissions. So far so good, for the #ActOnClimate crowd. But it then slices through the Gordian knot of competing international interests by placing the onus for action entirely on wealthy nations.

    …Instead, it reiterates Pope Benedict XVI’s call for “a true world political authority” and advocates “mechanisms and subsidies which allow developing countries access to technology transfer, technical assistance and financial resources.” These statements only compound the difficulties awaiting diplomats in Paris, entrenching the position of the developing world and driving up demands that would not have been met anyway. They are the equivalent of building momentum toward a Mideast peace summit with a declaration that Israel has no right to exist. Yes, it is a solution, but not one likely to improve the tenor of talks.

    For domestic activists and politicians, the challenge is even greater. Popular discussion of climate change conveniently ignores the gap in logic between “the science is real” and “therefore accept our policy prescriptions and the world will come along.” The encyclical places the gap on full display, alongside the unacceptable cost such a logical leap imposes on the developing world.

    …Supporters of climate action have been pitching win–win solutions that do not exist. Supporters emphasize the need for U.S. “leadership,” but the encyclical reminds us that other countries are looking not for leadership but for a handout. Supporters say American companies can develop renewable technology and “sell it to the world,” but the encyclical suggests that we give it away and send a check to cover installation…

    Read more at: http://www.nationalreview.com/article/420058/laudato-si-forces-climate-challenge-activists-consider-tradeoffs-oren-cass

    Don’t get me wrong, this encyclical is a hot mess of scientific and economic ignorance. It’s embarrassing, but then statements by Catholic authorities like the USCCB on subjects like these tend to be embarrassing. These guy just aren’t shy about putting their woeful grasp of the facts and the very basics of logic on public display.

    This encyclical, at least, will not prove to be a challenge to American Catholics who aren’t on board with the global warming agenda. It will prove to be a challenge to those who are on board with it. It exposes the insanity of the agenda. Unfortunately this Pope takes sides, and he comes down on the wrong side, but he provides a useful service nonetheless.

    Steve57 (48418e)

  82. they got the pope
    happyfeet (831175) — 6/20/2015 @ 8:12 pm

    Is that sort of like LBJ saying, “They’ve got Cronkite”?

    MD in Philly (f9371b)

  83. yes but probably way more costly

    happyfeet (831175)

  84. Well, getting Cronkite meant a lost war, devastation for the S. Vietnamese, and worse for Cambodia.
    Millions dead and a widespread belief in a false narrative that still misinforms and deludes millions to this day.

    So I hate to think what “Way more costly” will look like.

    Signing off for now, time to do dishes while listening to a great sermon.

    MD in Philly (f9371b)

  85. I’m sure liberals will use this Pope to bolster their belief in climate change but Popes aren’t infallible. Ask Galileo.

    DRJ (b0b5ac)

  86. elissa,

    My belief is, that like most indulgent behaviors that become more pervasive during a cultural downhill slide, the out-of-wedlock childbirths evidence a resistance to, and pushing away from any moral framework that was once firmly in place. Man left to his own devices is never a pretty outcome. While some see this freedom, others see it as yet another form of surrender and bondage to the self that refuses to yield to God. And that typically never ends well for those involved or for society. Ultimately, at its root, I see it as a spiritual problem. And for Godsake, free love is never free. Maybe we’ve become stupider as a nation, too.

    Dana (86e864)

  87. I hope any Roman Catholics on the thread will be willing to report back on how this message was handled in church services they may have attended tonight or tomorrow morning.

    elissa (b99a7d)

  88. it is the confluence, of the pope, the media, the president, and the all too tepid resistance of the loyal opposition,

    narciso (ee1f88)

  89. Wired publishes the short version of the Encyclical if you don’t want to read all 42,000 words. It depicts Pope Francis as a social justice warrior.

    DRJ (e80d46) — 6/20/2015 @ 8:00 pm

    Yes, it does. What’s more, the people at Wired seem to think that’s a good thing.

    …It’s well argued, clear, at times moving…

    It’s none of those things. To take my own stab at it, throughout Pope Francis decries “privatization.” At no point does he seem aware of the fact that socialism/communism has been far more harmful to the environment than the free market. In fact, privatization is one of the methods that preserves the environment. If you compare BLM land to privately owned, or leased, ranch land the difference is staggering. Private owners take care of their environments, but there are no incentives for governments to do the same. Particularly socialist/communist governments.

    Now I’ll leave it up to the editors of NRO to further dismantle this hot mess of an encyclical:

    …Taking a page from the neo-Malthusians, the pope predicts that resource depletion will lead to wars, and he contemplates the possibility that the weapons used in them may be nuclear or biological. He laments “technocracy” and consumption that seems to him “extreme.”

    This latter objection strikes us as particularly objectionable: The economic progress of the late 20th century and early 21st century — which is to say, the advance of capitalism — particularly in the areas of agriculture, medicine, and energy, has not so much enabled consumption that is excessive in the rich world but adequate in places such as India and China, where famine, once thought to be a permanent and ordinary part of life, has largely disappeared. This outcome was made possible not by the political oversight of economic activity that the pope contemplates but by its partial abandonment. The pope’s stridently anti-development vision would be the opposite of a blessing for the world’s poor.

    “Political institutions and various other social groups are also entrusted with helping to raise people’s awareness. So too is the Church.” Fair enough, but the Church, like any other institution, has an ethical obligation to do so in an intellectually rigorous fashion, and here, with respect, the pope fails, writing…

    Read more at: http://www.nationalreview.com/article/420013/laudato-no-praise-not-pope-franciss-crude-economics-editors

    Steve57 (48418e)

  90. Don’t know if there is a topic or not, but I’ll just throw this out after watching the WSJ Editorial Report on FoxNewsChannel today:
    They are totally in-the-bag for Marco Rubio – described as the “only Hispanic” in the GOP race.
    I guess that Cruz guy is one of Brendan Sullivan’s “potted plants”.

    askeptic (efcf22)

  91. rupert is fully on board with amnesty, and that was Marco’s debut, now there does to be a meme, on House of Cards, Benito Martinez was channeling Rubio, and on Tim Robbins new ‘comedy’
    Esai Morales as the Vp, seems to be based on him, don’t know if the Times has script writing privileges,

    narciso (ee1f88)

  92. Anybody checked out the shocking illegitimacy rates lately? There’s this from the CDC in 2012: Percent of births considered “non-marital” by racial or ethnic group

    The desensitization of our culture is going to do to the stability of this society what socialism has done to the economies of various nations.

    The left (and ideological chameleons or squishes) believes the wheel needs to be reinvented, that centuries of trial and error involving the quirks of human nature should be upended. So traditions of over 2,000 years ago and normative boundaries as recently as 60 years ago are being thrashed and pummeled on a regular basis.

    Will liberals be there in the future to survey the wreckage they’ve had a big hand in creating the same way they’ve surveyed the wreckage of cities like Detroit, Michigan, etc, or nations like Venezuela, Greece, Argentina, France, etc?

    mariamilani.com: Marriage was a fundamental institution of Roman society and as such was always venerated as something sacrosanct. Through marriage the Roman woman left her father’s household and family in order to enter that of her new husband. Once married she became almost equal to her husband in the household although not of the same legal standing as far as the state was concerned. Unlike their Greek counterpart, Roman women were free to go about the city as they wished, go shopping, visit the public baths or their friends in very much the same way they would do today.

    These three forms of marriage gave different degrees of rights and correspondingly different degrees of difficulty in divorce… The purpose of marriage was quite plainly that of ensuring the family’s descendency and the solidity of the family nucleus and hence of Roman society itself. As such the Romans were at great pains to regulate marriage through a specific section of law called “ius connubii”, marital law.

    Suetonius tells us that Augustus added a rule which nullified marriages where there was no hanky panky within two years of being contracted.

    nationalenquirer.com: Long before cheating scandals played out daily in the political and show biz arenas, Hollywood icon Ingrid Bergman was condemned in not only the US Senate but from church pulpits around the world. When the world learned of her affair with ROBERTO ROSSELLINI, the acclaimed playboy movie director, Ingrid went “from saint to whore” in the eyes of her legion of fans.

    Publicly, thanks to the Hollywood PR machine Ingrid was happily married to Dr. Peter Lindstrom and had a young daughter Pia. But Ingrid was well known for her affairs with many of her leading men, directors and even studio photographer Robert Capa.

    Initially, sparks flew between Ingrid and her new director, with Rossellini betting a pal he could bed Ingrid within two weeks. Evidently, he did as they soon became impassioned partners – making films AND babies.

    Returning to the US in 1950, Ingrid was blindsided by gossip columnist Hedda Hopper who badgered her to confirm the rumors that she was three months pregnant. Bergman denied it. Days later, rival columnist Louella Parsons broke the story in the Hearst papers. Hedda Hopper then jumped on the hate bandwagon “mean-girling” and “slut-shaming” Ingrid without mercy in her daily column.

    All hell suddenly broke loose as a worldwide attack battered the newly-immoral screen goddess. Ingrid quickly fled to the safety of Italy – – and the bed of Roberto — leaving hubby and daughter behind. On the floor of the U.S. Senate, Senator Edwin C. Johnson condemned the Swedish beauty as a “free-love cultist,” and “a horrible example of womanhood and a powerful influence for evil.”

    “She was forbidden to enter the country,” Ingrid’s daughter, Pia Lindstrom later told Larry King. “There was a vote in Congress, where she was made persona non grata. “It was incredibly difficult to see and observe a parent going from being a saint and a nun to being an evil harlot within a few months.”

    Even Ingrid’s most liberal admirers turned on the “Joan of Arc” star.

    ^ If that seems quaint, naive and excessive, then what we have today is exhausted, cynical and excessive.

    Humans and their socio-political cycles apparently tend to favor bouts of extremism, all because people don’t know when to switch on or switch off tears and compassion.

    Mark (a11af2)

  93. I want to talk about votive candles contributing to AGW, and green alternatives to them like those solar-powered garden lights. But would that be too technocratic?

    nk (dbc370)

  94. Ultimately, at its root, I see it as a spiritual problem.

    Not helped when the Pope — coincidentally or ironically — is to the Catholic church what Barack Obama is to the American presidency.

    Mark (a11af2)

  95. 85. I’m sure liberals will use this Pope to bolster their belief in climate change but Popes aren’t infallible. Ask Galileo.

    DRJ (b0b5ac) — 6/20/2015 @ 8:24 pm

    Actually Galileo is a poor example to use to make your point. Copernicus had also written and taught about his heliocentric theory of the solar system with no problems from the Vatican.

    It’s important to remember that universities were very much a creation of the Catholic Church, and at the time the Church functioned very much like the National Academy of Science.

    Galileo on the other hand had problems for two reasons. First, he claimed to have proven that the Earth revolves around the Sun. What was his claimed evidence? The tides, which we know have nothing to do with the Earth revolving around the Sun. The Earth’s rotation on it’s axis, and it’s tilt on its axis, plays a minor role. But the moon is the dominating factor. Even the sun has a greater effect on the tides than the Earth’s rotation on its axis.

    But Galileo argued that the tides were entirely due to the Earth’s motion around the sun, as water sloshes around in a bucket when its placed in a moving cart. In fact, Galileo ridiculed the idea that moon has any effect on the tides.

    In other words, Galileo was just wrong; he hadn’t proven anything.

    Galileo could have written about and taught his heliocentric theory as a hypothesis. But he could not teach and write about it as an established fact. Which, indeed it was not at the time.

    Second, he demanded that the church change its theology to match his theory, during the course of which he chose to publicly ridicule the Pope in a book that he published. A book that he had misrepresented to church authorities in order to get permission to have it printed.

    No prince or king would have put up with that. And the Pope was very much a temporal prince as ruler of the Papal states. He couldn’t ignore the insult, either. So it was for the insult, and the fact that he had not proven anything yet was teaching and writing as if his theory was an established fact, that he was tried. Not for the theory itself.

    And the Pope was a lot more lenient with Galileo than other monarchs would have been.

    But you are correct. Popes are not infallible.

    Steve57 (48418e)

  96. this was Descarte’s thinking, fwiw,

    http://patrick.maher1.net/317/lectures/desc3.pdf

    narciso (ee1f88)

  97. The point about Galileo is not whether he was right or he was wrong, or whether he could prove his theory. The point is that he was punished for not giving a “Yessir” to “settled science”.

    nk (dbc370)

  98. What Galileo proved and disproved, plus thoughts on Copernicus and Giordano Bruno.

    DRJ (e80d46)

  99. i’m a capitalist and for that you can blame mama and you can blame daddy

    it’s how they raised me up

    poor pope butterhead, his parents done him a bad turn

    i know he don’t know no better, growing up in filth and squalor of the third whirl like he done

    but why he gotta be so damn dumb

    ave marrriiiiiiiia

    happyfeet (831175) — 6/20/2015 @ 3:09 pm
    Not to mention the common corruption of Don’t Cry for Me Argentina.

    AZ Bob (f850a2)

  100. 86. …Man left to his own devices is never a pretty outcome. While some see this freedom, others see it as yet another form of surrender and bondage to the self that refuses to yield to God.

    Dana (86e864) — 6/20/2015 @ 8:24 pm

    You know what’s even uglier than man left to his own devices? Man subject to the whims of the central planners of Leviathan.

    For example, the kind of all powerful “true world political authority” this Pope calls for, with the power to redistribute resources, technology, and wealth.

    Mark @94, they’re not quite comparable. Nothing the Pope does, says, or writes has the force of law.

    But the Pope does share Obama’s ignorance of history, science, and economics.

    Steve57 (48418e)

  101. As for Copernicus, he benefited from the benevolent bigotry of low expectations. He was Polish.

    nk (dbc370)

  102. no, he just came before, so they were more lenient, also it might have been under a different pope.

    narciso (ee1f88)

  103. DRJ @98, it’s just a letter to the Editor. And it doesn’t cite any evidence that Galileo proved or disproved anything. It simply asserts that Galileo’s observations had proven something.

    How did Galileo and his “observations” supposedly do this? His observations convinced Galileo that Copernicus was correct, but they could not prove Copernicus was correct. No one was capable of proving the heliocentric theory of the solar system through observation until the 19th century. Prior to that the instruments were too crude, and not even Galileo was aware of the immense distances involved.

    http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/nova/earth/galileo-big-mistake.html

    Galileo’s Big Mistake

    For most of his adult life, from about the age of 30 until his death at 78 in the year 1642, Galileo propounded his theory of how the tides work. Yet a lengthy summary of our understanding of the tides that the British physicist Lord Kelvin published in 1882 mentions Galileo only in passing.

    Why the cursory treatment? Because Galileo’s theory of the tides, while extremely well thought out and eminently reasonable considering the state of scientific knowledge at the time, was wrong…

    … It was in 1595 when Galileo, just shy of his 30th birthday, first came up with his explanation for the tides. The idea occurred to him while traveling on a barge that was ferrying freshwater to Venice. (Galileo lived in nearby Padua and often visited Venice.) He noticed that whenever the barge’s speed or direction altered, the freshwater inside sloshed around accordingly. If the vessel suddenly ground to a halt on a sandbar, for instance, the water pushed up towards the bow then bounced back toward the stern, doing this several times with ever decreasing agitation until it returned to a level state.

    Galileo realized that the Earth’s dual motion—its daily one around its axis and its annual one around the sun—might have the same effect on oceans and other great bodies of water as the barge had on its freshwater cargo. The key, as Galileo saw it, was that even though we don’t sense it, different parts of our planet move at different speeds depending on the time of day. It’s as if the Earth were a barge, which sped up, slowed down, and periodically changed direction…

    I was mistaaken about claiming Galileo thought the tides were entirely due to the Earth’s motion around the sun. He did think the Earth’s daily rotation around its axis also had a role. And he was correct, but it’s a very tiny, contributory role. The Earth’s motion is not the cause of the tides.

    …For years, Galileo kept his thoughts on the matter close to his chest, but eventually he could contain himself no longer. He fervently believed Copernicus was right, and he would tell the world. In 1632, Galileo published his Dialogue Concerning the Two Chief World Systems. During the six years he had labored on it, Galileo’s working title for the book had been On the Flux and Reflux of the Sea, and indeed, he reprised his 1616 argument in the last of the book’s four sections.

    That was Galileo’s working title because that was Galileo’s “proof” that Copernicus was right. And it was wrong.

    …All the old arguments were there. At one point, for example, one of the book’s three main characters, Salviati, who is a thinly disguised stand-in for Galileo, says, “Among all the famous men who have philosophized [about the tides], I wonder more at Kepler than any of the rest. Though he is a free and acute genius, he has lent his assent to the moon’s dominance over the oceans and to other occult happenings and other such trifles.”

    In a dramatic way, Galileo also broke his promise to obey the Church’s mandate not to espouse the Copernican system. The Dialogue represents, as another superior thinker, Albert Einstein, put it in a foreword to a 1953 edition of the book, “a downright roguish attempt to comply with this order in appearance and yet in fact to disregard it. Unfortunately, it turned out that the Holy Inquisition was unable to appreciate adequately such subtle humor.” Galileo was placed under house arrest and the Dialogue banned.

    Actually it was the very unsubtle insult to the Pope that the Holy See did not appreciate. Just as Salviati was a thinly disguised stand-in for Galileo, one of the other of the book’s main characters was named Simplicio, or Simpleton in English. Simplicio was a poorly disguised stand-in for Pope Urban VIII. So, poorly disguised it was obvious to everyone he was calling the Pope a simpleton.

    …Einstein had keen insights on why Galileo acted so rashly. First of all, it was Galileo’s longing to find a mechanical proof of the Earth’s motion, Einstein felt, that misled him into not only formulating but clinging so tenaciously to his flawed theory on the tides. The planet’s motion accounts for the tides, Galileo posited, and the tides account for the planet’s motion—it was all so neat. Moreover, all Galileo’s astronomical observations convinced him that Copernicus was correct, and he wanted desperately to prove that fact scientifically…

    Again, while Galileo’s observations convinced him that Copernicus was correct, they didn’t prove that Copernicus was right. Galileo, and Einstein, were aware of that distinction but your NYT letter writer is not. So as Galileo looked for mechanical proof of Copernicus’ theory and offered as evidence the Flux and Reflux of the Sea. And he was wrong.

    He was so wrong that Lord Kelvin only made one brief mention of Galileo in his comprehensive 1882 treatise on the tides and that mention was disparaging. He wrote that Galileo found the theory that the moon caused the tides “a lamentable piece of mysticism….” An “occult happening,” as Galileo himself put it.

    Galileo was in many ways a brilliant man. But he was more a mechanical engineer than an astronomer. Hence his compulsion to provide mechanical evidence of the Earth’s motion around the sun. Which is why any fair evaluation of his contributions to astronomy leads to one conclusion. His major contribution was inventing the telescope, not anything he did with it.

    Steve57 (48418e)

  104. Mark @94, they’re not quite comparable. Nothing the Pope does, says, or writes has the force of law.

    Steve57, I was referring to the way that the philosophy or politics of a major figurehead effects the public. It’s sort of analogous to the way that the fashions favored by a president’s wife have been known to influence the clothing styles of women throughout the US. But in this case, the leftism of the current Pope and the leftism of the current US president are altering the thinking of the populace and are therefore a match made in hell.

    Actually it was the very unsubtle insult to the Pope that the Holy See did not appreciate.

    I wasn’t aware of the politics behind the notorious case of the Catholic church and Galileo. I originally believed the “off with his head!” reaction from the Pope was due mainly to his devotion to the sanctity of Al-Gore type of scientific research. That it was similar to the dynamics of the Green Earthers of today’s era becoming extremely incensed when their little belief system is being challenged and contradicted, and less to do with protecting one’s bruised ego.

    Mark (a11af2)

  105. Well, I always go straight to the Vatican site to read Church documents. The Pope makes clear that his personal take is grounded on his Namesake’s attitude to creation. He establishes that the root of his position predates (what I will call) the AGW novelty.

    No doubt paragraphs 23, 24, 25 are what the left are gleefully using to say “See? The Pope is on our side!” But They do not pay close enough attention to this sentence (italics mine):

    “A very solid scientific consensus indicates that we are presently witnessing a disturbing warming of the climatic system. In recent decades this warming has been accompanied by a constant rise in the sea level and, it would appear, by an increase of extreme weather events, even if a scientifically determinable cause cannot be assigned to each particular phenomenon.”

    In graph 42 He calls for investment in the research of ecosystems. Then in graph 49 he lets them have it. I’ll let you decide who he is talking about:

    49. It needs to be said that, generally speaking, there is little in the way of clear awareness of problems which especially affect the excluded. Yet they are the majority of the planet’s population, billions of people. These days, they are mentioned in international political and economic discussions, but one often has the impression that their problems are brought up as an afterthought, a question which gets added almost out of duty or in a tangential way, if not treated merely as collateral damage. Indeed, when all is said and done, they frequently remain at the bottom of the pile. This is due partly to the fact that many professionals, opinion makers, communications media and centres of power, being located in affluent urban areas, are far removed from the poor, with little direct contact with their problems. They live and reason from the comfortable position of a high level of development and a quality of life well beyond the reach of the majority of the world’s population. This lack of physical contact and encounter, encouraged at times by the disintegration of our cities, can lead to a numbing of conscience and to tendentious analyses which neglect parts of reality. At times this attitude exists side by side with a “green” rhetoric. Today, however, we have to realize that a true ecological approach always becomes a social approach; it must integrate questions of justice in debates on the environment, so as to hear both the cry of the earth and the cry of the poor.

    50. Instead of resolving the problems of the poor and thinking of how the world can be different, some can only propose a reduction in the birth rate. At times, developing countries face forms of international pressure which make economic assistance contingent on certain policies of “reproductive health”. Yet “while it is true that an unequal distribution of the population and of available resources creates obstacles to development and a sustainable use of the environment, it must nonetheless be recognized that demographic growth is fully compatible with an integral and shared development”.[28] To blame population growth instead of extreme and selective consumerism on the part of some, is one way of refusing to face the issues. It is an attempt to legitimize the present model of distribution, where a minority believes that it has the right to consume in a way which can never be universalized, since the planet could not even contain the waste products of such consumption. Besides, we know that approximately a third of all food produced is discarded, and “whenever food is thrown out it is as if it were stolen from the table of the poor”.[29] Still, attention needs to be paid to imbalances in population density, on both national and global levels, since a rise in consumption would lead to complex regional situations, as a result of the interplay between problems linked to environmental pollution, transport, waste treatment, loss of resources and quality of life.

    Up to this point, I believe Francis is saying “O.K., climate change is real and these are the things humans are doing wrong. so like, time for metanoia.” That some of the faithful are agog that Francis would be dialoging earnestly with the AGW crowd is to remind us that Jesus was roundly scorned for associating with tax collectors and other sinners.

    I don’t believe in AGW and I am fine with what I have read so far. An Encyclical is not a solemn pronouncement made EX CATHEDRA, so it is in no way binding on any Catholic. As such, I am confident Laudato Si’ will be laudeded by the secular world just as much as Humanae Vitae was lauded by them – oh, wait.

    felipe (56556d)

  106. To find an unenumerated right to marriage in the Constitution, you have to claim that it was at least arguable that such right was there from the time of ratification, or created by the passage of an amendment. Does anyone think that before 1960 any noticeable number of people thought it was an unenumerated right? If you make the claim that “societal mores have evolved”, which causes creation of an unenumerated right, then you have thrown away the concept of a written Constitution. It won’t be the rule of law any longer, just whatever the justices think at the moment.

    Though it has become a crapshoot how the Supreme Court will rule on any case (thus almost eliminating the purpose of a written Constitution already), I actually believe there is a good chance the Court will rule based on my logic above, and find that there is no Constitutional right to same sex marriage. I also believe it is likely to be 6-3 or 7-2, or even unanimous.

    Ken in Camarillo (061845)

  107. Mark, from my reading the Galileo affair was entirely due to personal politics. And Galileo wasn’t completely innocent in this regard. He seems to have had the unfortunate tendency to ridicule anyone who didn’t agree with his theories as too stupid to understand them.

    It wasn’t that they were stupid. Well, some of his enemies were, but not all of them. They knew what evidence he would need to provide in order to prove the Copernican theory, and he hadn’t done it.

    But Galileo’s decision to publicly ridicule the Pope as a simpleton is an example of his unfortunate tendency to deride all his detractors (or even people who remained unconvinced) as idiots.

    Galileo himself was aware that he wasn’t being tried or imprisoned over his theory but over personal politics and bruised egos.

    http://law2.umkc.edu/faculty/projects/ftrials/galileo/galileo.html

    From the “Selected Letters” link on the main page.

    Letter from Galileo to Diodati (excerpt)

    July 24, 1634

    …From this and other circumstances from which it would take too long to repeat here it will be seen that the fury of my powerful persecutors continually increases. The have at length chosen to reveal themselves to me; for about two months ago, when a dear friends of mine at Rome was speaking of my affairs to Father Christopher Griemberger, mathematician at the college there, this Jesuit uttered the following precise words;—‘If Galileo had only known how to retain the favor of the fathers of this college, he would have stood in renown before the world, he would have been spared all his misfortunes, and could have written what he pleased about everything, even about the motion of the earth.’ From this you will see, honoured Sir, that it is not this opinion or that which has brought, and still brings about my calamities, but my being in disgrace with the Jesuits.

    He doesn’t, of course, acknowledge that he had any part in falling out of favor with the Jesuits. And others, including of course the Pope.

    There’s a lot of good information on that site regarding the trial. In particular it shows that in the absence of hard evidence that the Earth revolves around the Sun, then astronomers, mathematicians, etc., could not teach heliocentrism as if it were a physical reality. Everyone acknowledged that Copernicus’ theory was the more elegant solution, and people were free to teach it that way, but not as if it were fact. This is why Copernicus didn’t have any trouble from the Vatican.

    Nicolaus Copernicus is credited with first proposing an alternative to the reigning Ptolemic explanation of the universe. Rather than a system in which the Sun and stars revolved around the Earth once a day, as Ptolemy proposed, Copernicus suggested a Sun-centered system in which the Earth, rotating on its own axis every twenty-four hours, revolved around the Sun once a year. Copernicus published his views in a 1543 treatise, the Revolutions of the Celestial Orbs. Copernicus dedicated the book to Pope Paul III. The book did not offend Catholic censors (at least until 1616, when it was placed on the Index of banned books), in large part owing to a preface which (without much conviction) denied any pretension of the physical validity of the model discussed.

    Actually the book wasn’t banned, but it’s distribution was suspended so it could be “corrected.” How?

    Letter from Monsignor Piero Dini to Galileo (excerpt)
    March 3, 1615

    With Bellarmine I spoke at length of the things you had written….And he said that as to Copernicus, there is no question of his book being prohibited; the worst that might happen, according to him, would be the addition of some material in the margins of that book to the effect that Copernicus had introduced his theory in order to save the appearances, or some such thing-just as others had introduced epicycles without thereafter believing in their existence. And with a similar precaution you may at any time deal with these matters. If things are fixed according to the Copernican system, it does not appear presently that they would have any greater obstacle in the Bible than the passage ‘[the sun] exults as a strong man to run his course,’ etc., which all expositors up to now have understood by attributions motion to the sun. And although I replied that this also could be explained as a concession or our ordinary forms of expression, I was told in answer that this was not a thing to be done in haste, just a s the condemnation of any of these opinions was not to be passionately hurried….I can only rejoice for you…

    Copernicus’ theory did away with eccentrics and epicycles, and everyone agreed that made more sense. Even the forementioned Cardinal Bellarmine, the church’s chief theologian.

    Letter from Bellarmine to Father Foscarini

    April 4, 1615

    …First, I say it seems to me that your Reverence and Signor Galileo act prudently when you content yourselves with speaking hypothetically and no absolutely, as I have always understood that Copernicus spoke. For to say that the assumptions that the Earth moves and the Sun stands still saves all the celestial appearances better than do eccentrics and epicycles is to speak with excellent good sense and to run the risk whatever. Such a manner of speaking suffices for a mathematician. But to want to affirm that the Sun, in very truth, is at the centre of the universe and only rotates on its axis without traveling from east to west, and that the Earth is situated in the third sphere and revolves very swiftly around the Sun, is a very dangerous attitude and one calculated not only to arouse all Scholastic philosophers and theologians but also to injure our hold faith by contradicting the Scriptures….

    …Third, I say that, if there were a real proof that the Sun is in the centre of the universe, that the Earth is in the third sphere, and that the Sun does not go round the Earth but the Earth round the Sun, then we should have to proceed with great circumspection in explaining passages of Scripture which appear to teach the contrary, and we should rather have to say that we did not understand them than declare an opinion to be false which is proved to be true. But I do not think there is any such proof since none has been shown to me. To demonstrate that the appearances are saved by assuming the sun at the centre and the earth in the heavens is not the same thing as to demonstrate that in fact the sun is in the centre and the earth is in the heavens. I believe that the first demonstration may exist, but I have very grave doubts about the second; and in case of doubt one may not abandon the Holy Scriptures as expounded by the hold Fathers…

    And in fact, Copernicus was very careful to speak hypothetically about his theory, as was Galileo for a great while. Had he remained cautious he wouldn’t have had any trouble from Church authorities. (in the above letters the emphasis is it appears on the site. The emphasis below is mine.)

    Letter from Galileo to Monsignor Piero Dini (excerpt)

    May, 1615

    … This amounts to saying that Copernicus’ book, accepted by the Church, contains heresies and may be preached against by anyone who pleases (sic) while it is forbidden for anyone to get into the controversy and show that it is not contrary to Scripture….

    Yet I should not despair of overcoming even this difficulty if I were in a place where I could use my tongue instead of my pen; and if I ever get well again so that I can come to Rome, I shall do so, in the hope of at least showing my affection for the holy Church. My urgent desire on this point to that no decision be made which is not entirely good. Such it would be to declare, under the prodding of an army of malign men who understand nothing of the subject, that Copernicus did not hold the motion of the earth to be a fact of nature, but as an astronomer merely took it to be a convenient hypothesis for explaining the appearances….

    Some people seem confused by the censure Bellarmine delivered to Galileo (again the emphasis is mine).

    Statement (Affidavit) of Cardinal Bellarmine to Galileo

    May 26, 1616

    We, Roberto Cardinal Bellarmine, having heard that it is calumniously reported that Signor Gallileo Galilei has in our hand abjured and has also been punished with salutary penance, and being requested to state the truth as to this, declare that the said Galileo has not abjured, either in our hand, or the hand of any other person here in Rome, or anywhere else, so far as we know any opinion or doctrine held by him; neither has any statuary penance been imposed on him; but that only the declaration made by the Holy Father and published by the Sacred Congregation of the Index has been notified to him, wherein it is set forth that the doctrine attributed to Copernicus, that the Earth moves around the Sun, and that the Sun is stationary in the centre of the world and does not move from east to west, is contrary to the Holy Scriptures and therefore cannot be defended or held. In witness whereof we have written and subscribed these presents with our hand this twenty-sixth day of May, 1616.

    It is apparent from subsequent events that “defend” and “held” had a very specific meaning. Scholars could speak about Copernicus’ theory hypothetically, but could not hold and defend it as truth. If that weren’t the case than Galileo would have been signing his own arrest warrant in later discussions with his old friend Cardinal Maffeo Barberini when he became Pope Urban VIII in 1623. Seven years after some confused people think the church ordered Galileo to not discuss the Copernican theory at all.

    …In the early days of his reign, Galileo had reason to believe Maffeo Barberini’s elevation to Pope might lead to a loosening of the Church’s opposition to Copernican thought. Pope Urban VIII received Galileo for six long audiences. Although a humanist largely baffled by scientific principles, Urban VIII seemed genuinely interested in Galileo’s ideas. Urban VIII assured Galileo that as long as he remained Pope, the memory of Copernicus had nothing to fear.

    Eventually, however, the Pope’s pride and suspicious would produce the dramatic confrontation with Galileo that culminated with his arrest, trial, and conviction in 1633. The troubles developed after Pope Urban VIII gave Galileo permission to write a book discussing the contending views of the universe: his Dialogue Concerning the Two Chief World Systems. Galileo’s biggest mistake seems to have been putting into the mouth of an ignorant, literal-minded character named Simplicio the Pope’s own views, offered to Galileo in 1623, concerning God’s omnipotence.

    Clearly if the church had ordered him to shut up about the matter entirely, the last person on Earth he would have tried to convince of the validity of the Copernican theory would be the Pope himself. And the last person on Earth who would be interested in Galileo’s opinion on the matter would be the head of the church who supposedly told him to never talk about it again.

    Yet not only did the Pope not have him arrested then and there, approximately ten years later this Pope gave Galileo permission to publish a book which would discuss the Copernican theory.

    Basically Galileo’s ego caused him to make poor choices in the people he would mock and antagonize and turn into his enemies.

    Steve57 (48418e)

  108. 106. …Though it has become a crapshoot how the Supreme Court will rule on any case (thus almost eliminating the purpose of a written Constitution already), I actually believe there is a good chance the Court will rule based on my logic above, and find that there is no Constitutional right to same sex marriage. I also believe it is likely to be 6-3 or 7-2, or even unanimous.

    Ken in Camarillo (061845) — 6/20/2015 @ 11:54 pm

    You may very well be right.

    But even if they rule that there is no Constitutional right to SSM, they will probably rule that states must accept as valid same sex marriages performed in other states, just as they accept as valid heterosexual marriages performed in other states.

    Which will have just the same effect of creating SSM in all 50 states as if they had ruled SSM to be a Constitutional right.

    Steve57 (48418e)

  109. It appears to me the May 1615 letter from Galileo to Monsignor Piero Dini is a bit ambiguous and could be read either way. I have a reason for reading it as Galileo defending Copernicus against charges of heresy by arguing Copernicus did not believe in the physical validity of hes theory. And that would be Galileo’s own defense against the charge that he had perjured himself.

    When asked if I had signified to the Reverend Father, the Master of the Holy Palace, the injunction privately laid upon me, about sixteen years ago, by the order of the Holy Office, not to hold, defend, or “in any way” teach the doctrine of the motion of the Earth and the stability of the Sun, I answered that I had not done so. And, not being questioned as to the reason why I had not intimated it, I had no opportunity to add anything further. It now appears to me necessary to state the reason, in order to demonstrate the purity of my intention, ever foreign to the practice of simulation or deceit in any operation I engage in.

    I say, then, that, as at that time reports were spread abroad by evil-disposed persons to the effect that I had been summoned by the Lord Cardinal Bellarmine to abjure certain of my opinions and teachings and also to submit to penitence for them, I was thus constrained to apply to his Eminence and to solicit him to furnish me with an attestation, explaining the cause for which I had been summoned before him; which attestation I obtained in his own handwriting, and it is the same that I now produce with the present document. From this it clearly appears that it was merely announced to me that the doctrine attributed to Copernicus, of the motion of the Earth and the stability of the Sun, must not be held or defended; but that, beyond this general announcement affecting everyone, there should have been ordered anything to me in particular, no trace thereof appears in it.

    Having, then, as a reminder, this authentic attestation in the handwriting of the very person who informed me of the command, I made no further application of thought or memory with regard to the words employed in orally announcing to me the said order not to hold or defend the doctrine in question; so that the two articles of the order–in addition to the injunction not to “hold” or “defend” it–to wit, the words “not to teach it” and “in any way whatsoever”–which, I hear, are contained in the order enjoined on me, and registered–struck me as quite novel and as if I had not heard them before; and I do not think I ought to be disbelieved when I urge that in the course of fourteen or sixteen years I had lost all recollection of them, especially as I had no need to give any particular thought to them, having in my possession so authentic a reminder in writing.

    Galileo was referring to Cardinal Bellarmine’s May 26, 1616 affidavit, delivered to Galileo. Which indeed does not command him “not to teach it,” i.e. Copernicus’ theory, “in any way whatsoever.”

    It seems an odd charge to make, given that Galileo went on to publicly teach it in a certain way. As a hypothetical. With the knowledge and approval of the Pope himself.

    Theoretically, according to the Inquisition file, Galileo had been summoned to Rome and personally admonished not to teach, hold, or defend Copernican theory “in any way whatsoever” on February 26, 1616. But the admonition document is not in the file. Instead there is a transcribed report of the supposed events. But scholars question the authenticity of that report as the procedures described did not comport with established forms and that the substance was not consistent with what scholars know of events of 1616.

    It is clear that Ballarmine’s May 1616 statement delivered to Galileo as a letter makes no mention at all of him being enjoined from discussing Copernican theory “in any way whatsoever.”

    If that had been the case, then Pope Urban VIII would have had Galileo arrested for discussing Copernican theory with him in 1623. The Pope certainly wouldn’t later have given Galileo permission to write a book about it.

    In other words it looks like Galileo’s enemies were fabricating evidence against him. Which makes sense as the Roman curia has always been about as corrupt as the UN (which is why they get along so well today).

    Steve57 (48418e)

  110. (to Steve57, #108): I don’t think the Court will force states to recognize same sex marriages from other states. The Constitution says that Congress will determine how the states must accomplish “full faith and credit” to the administrative actions of the other states. DOMA defines that with respect to same sex marriage, and the Court did not disturb that provision in the earlier case with DOMA (though the Court stated that that part of DOMA was not at issue in the case, an ominous suggestion that “we’ll address that when it suits our convenience.”)

    I think they actually got the earlier DOMA case right when they said the federal government must recognize marriages according to state of residence recognition when applying tax law. States have always controlled marriage law, so it was appropriate to let them continue to control it.

    I am confident in this DOMA assessment, subject to the always present “crapshoot” factor.

    PS: Your comments about the deceit of the same sex marriage “movement” are impressive.

    Ken in Camarillo (061845)

  111. Elissa – not a word about it.

    I trust the MFM to report on the Pope about as much as I would trust a leftist to use my money well. How many in the MFM reported his position on abortion, and how he tied it to AGW?

    JD (3b5483)

  112. felipe, those two passages sound a lot like socialism with a veneer of environmentalism to me. Which is better than crony-capitalist parasitism and dilletantism, masquerading as environmentalism, as practiced by the likes of Steyer, Gore, and DiCaprio, and the rest of that ilk.

    nk (dbc370)

  113. @ Brooks (#32): I agree. The children suffer most, but everyone in society suffers.

    @ elissa (#33): I believe there is a direct connection between the cheapening of the institution of marriage by turning it into something which can be put on or taken off like a sweater and the spectacular rise in out-of-wedlock births. No-fault divorce made single-parent families spectacularly more common and, in many of the communities you identify, the norm. If people don’t respect the importance of the institution, neither are they likely to value its benefits for children appropriately.

    @ steve57 (#44): There’s no doubt that SSM is a big, big change. That’s very definitely one reason I’d far prefer to see it done on a state-by-state basis over a period of many years, rather than nationally by virtue of a SCOTUS decree that binds the entire country, including states where there is still no political consensus to try it. Those who embraced no-fault divorce generally did so from good motivations; they neither wanted nor expected that no-fault divorce would actually reduce the number of happy people. So I do have to acknowledge that there might prove to be, over many years, unanticipated bad consequences from permitting SSM. (Perhaps you would argue that the bad consequences from SSM wouldn’t be unanticipated, and that indeed, you’re anticipating them now.)

    But SSM will permit more people to be married, which seems to me to be a step in pretty much the opposite direction from encouraging more people to dissolve their marriages. As has always been true of those entering into opposite-sex marriages, some number of people entering into SSMs will treat them frivolously and irresponsibly, and they’ll fail; but some number of them will certainly be people who have a powerful commitment to one another and to the creation and preservation of family units (even if those units don’t look much like Ward & June Cleaver’s), and they will succeed, to the benefit not only of the individuals directly involved but also to the benefit of the society in which they live. While I’d like to try to reverse the effects of no-fault divorce, I’m unconvinced that we ought only encourage the institution of marriage for heterosexuals. I certainly know gay couples who’ve already demonstrated, even without society’s imprimatur, that they are capable of being stable, loving, mutually supportive, law-abiding, and yes, even child-rearing (if not naturally procreative) — all in ways of which I approve, all in ways that compare favorably to a whole bunch of heterosexual opposite-sex couples who’ve treated their own marriages like the aforementioned sweaters.

    I’d prefer, therefore, to see marriage made harder to get into, more meaningful legally while one’s in it, and harder to get out of. But I’d do that without regard to whether it’s the traditional opposite-sex couple or instead a single-sex couple. I think individual states ought experiment, cautiously, with steps in that direction; let’s put the laboratory of democracy, distributed across 50 states, back to its intended purposes. And I hold and endorse that preference, and advocate for it as calmly as I can, while genuinely respecting the concerns — and conceding the good motives and intentions — of those who’re not yet convinced we ought try that. I don’t want to silence those who disagree, and I might well end up being persuaded by their reservations and concerns regarding details around the margin with respect to proposed changes. I’m not going to be persuaded, though, that whatever changes get made in an attempt to make marriages more stable, valued, and meaningful ought only be offered to heterosexuals.

    Beldar (fa637a)

  114. I’m homosexual and I hope it loses. Marriage is defined as man and woman. If I want to enter into a lifelong attachment to a significant other, I don’t care what it is called as long as we have the rights to make medical decisions for each other in bad times; hospital visitation; inheritance, and all that. There is also the idea of states rights, which I support. There has been too much dictation from Our Betters in Washington; that is not what this country is supposed to be all about.

    The Gentle Grizzly (cf4a3e)

  115. Beldar:

    I’m not going to be persuaded, though, that whatever changes get made in an attempt to make marriages more stable, valued, and meaningful ought only be offered to heterosexuals.

    I assume you would let ministers refuse to perform SSM if their doctrine opposes it, but would you do anything to protect everyday people — the bakers, wedding planners, etc. — who object to SSM on religious grounds? Or would you also leave that up to each State to decide?

    DRJ (e80d46)

  116. Since the 1960’s, the cultural revolution led to no-fault divorce, spiraling illegitimacy rates, gay rights, and now SSM. It’s a linear progression that results from the change from traditional Judeo-Christian values to the free love “if it feels good, do it” culture. But there is an inherent conflict between SSM and religion that will severely restrict religious rights in America, and ultimately undermine or eradicate their protection. Something has to give and it won’t be free love.

    DRJ (e80d46)

  117. Trading principles for short term political expediency is silly. Shaw is increasingly so.

    JD (3b5483)

  118. DRJ -‘that is a very good article you linked there.

    JD (3b5483)

  119. Thank you, JD (who is having a great Father’s Day). Here is one of several excerpts from that 2006 article that resonates with me:

    Reading through these and the other scholars’ papers, I noticed an odd feature. Generally speaking the scholars most opposed to gay marriage were somewhat less likely than others to foresee large conflicts ahead–perhaps because they tended to find it “inconceivable,” as Doug Kmiec of Pepperdine law school put it, that “a successful analogy will be drawn in the public mind between irrational, and morally repugnant, racial discrimination and the rational, and at least morally debatable, differentiation of traditional and same-sex marriage.” That’s a key consideration. For if orientation is like race, then people who oppose gay marriage will be treated under law like bigots who opposed interracial marriage. Sure, we don’t arrest people for being racists, but the law does intervene in powerful ways to punish and discourage racial discrimination, not only by government but also by private entities. Doug Laycock, a religious liberty expert at the University of Texas law school, similarly told me we are a “long way” from equating orientation with race in the law.

    By contrast, the scholars who favor gay marriage found it relatively easy to foresee looming legal pressures on faith-based organizations opposed to gay marriage, perhaps because many of these scholars live in social and intellectual circles where the shift Kmiec regards as inconceivable has already happened. They have less trouble imagining that people and groups who oppose gay marriage will soon be treated by society and the law the way we treat racists because that’s pretty close to the world in which they live now.

    They said it wouldn’t happen but less than 10 years later and this is where we are now.

    DRJ (e80d46)

  120. there’s no more of a conflict between religion and ssm than there is between religion and civil ceremonies

    but yes yes a lot of self-styled christians are hankering to be america’s hot new grievance group

    all wrapped up in the duggarlicious swaddling of Real Life Victims

    lol

    these ones disgust me to where they make me sick and i wanna go to my room and play star wars

    happyfeet (831175)

  121. Hush Happyfeet. Your bigotry is showing.

    JD (3b5483)

  122. nuh uh is not Mr. JD

    what this emotionally stunted squally-baby minority of bigoty “christians” (quote quote) is asserting is that gay people are fundamentally incompatible with christianity

    and that is pure unadulterated kkk-style thinking right there

    and so so arrogant, my goodness

    nobody gets to tell nobody they is unacceptable in the eyes of the Lord

    that’s not how for reals christians are

    jesus loves the lil children all teh children of the whirl!

    and these fake poseur christians, they need to be shunned and to receive negative comments on their yelp pages that say hey you need to repent and walk with the lord hallelujah

    please to stand behind the yellow line on the platform as the paradigm shifts enter and leave the station – and thanks for riding the CTA

    happyfeet (831175)

  123. All of these culture war issues eventually, when drilled down far enough, point to a spiritual conflict. It follows that the more the framework of Judeo-Christian values are pushed aside in the name of freedom to choose, the more a disintegration occurs. Knock out the foundation and a people are left to make up whatever new rules to suit the indulgence of the day. Everything ends up in a state of flux as there are no longer any guideposts. This is nothing new as we’ve seen it happen at various times throughout history. While constructive and informative to see the legal ramifications as we will all have to endure them, it’s always prudent to push back at the root in order to effect real change.

    Dana (86e864)

  124. But SSM will permit more people to be married, which seems to me to be a step in pretty much the opposite direction from encouraging more people to dissolve their marriages.

    I think its long-term effects — in terms of the dynamics of human nature (in which compassion for compassion’s sake has become the guiding principle) — will be similar to what’s described herein:

    usnews.com, December 2013: Harvard professor Harvey Mansfield stirred up controversy recently by criticizing the rampant grade inflation at his institution. As reported by the Harvard Crimson, at a faculty meeting earlier this month, Mansfield asked the Dean of Undergraduate Education about the college’s grade distribution, stating, “A little bird has told me that the most frequently given grade at Harvard College right now is an A-.” The Dean corrected him: “The median grade in Harvard College is indeed an A-. The most frequently awarded grade in Harvard College is actually a straight A.”

    Grade inflation isn’t just a problem at Harvard. A recent study of 200 colleges and universities found that more than 40 percent of all grades awarded were in the A range. Some have argued that these inflated grades are necessary to help students get ahead in a competitive job market. While that might be true for an individual professor or university, at the national level grade inflation is a negative-sum game that imposes serious costs on society.

    Under regular inflation, prices can rise without limit. However, because grades are capped at A or A+, grade inflation results in a greater concentration of students at the top of the distribution. This compression of grades diminishes their value as an indicator of student abilities. Without grade inflation, a truly outstanding student might be awarded an A, while a very good student might receive a B+. With grade inflation, both students receive As, making it hard for employers and graduate schools to differentiate them. There is also evidence that lenient grading reduces student effort.

    Imposing SSM is also analogous to society’s reaction to figureheads like Bill and Hillary Clinton — or NBC’s Brian Williams — who after a series of scandals and misdeeds are given a nod and a wink and allowed to skip away to their next fundraising event or job. IOW, what would have been disallowed and frowned upon in the past is given a lot of free passes today.

    So traditional marriage was once the true “A grade” on the report card, but no longer. Or the parameters of what helps or hinders a society (eg, the stability of the family unit) are loosened until they’re no longer really recognizable.

    America in the 21st century is blithely careening down that road paved with good intentions.

    Mark (a11af2)

  125. When I was a young man most of my peers thought marriage was a worthless piece of paper.

    Now redefining the definition of marriage to accommodate 1% of the population is of absolute paramount importance, worth trashing our children’s birthright of religious liberty. And we must include our transgender brothers/sisters/whatever whom we are told are psychologically unimpaired.

    Yet it feels as though nothing has changed, at all.

    Amphipolis (072bea)

  126. Hush Happyfeet. Your bigotry is showing.

    You’re not even referring to the various times he has denounced polygamy and polygamists and stereotyped such people as being trailer trash.

    BTW, the existence of multi-partner relationships actually aligns with more cultures through human history (then and now) and the innate biological, if you will, nature of males in particular — of far more males — than homosexuality and concepts like SSM.

    Mark (a11af2)

  127. i don’t hold no truck with them poligs no sir

    but i’d sell em a trailer

    everybody need a place to live

    happyfeet (831175)

  128. Happyfeet – I love you more than flank steak with chimichirru, but you are aggressively unreasonable on this topic, to the point where you don’t even attempt to understand other people’s position; lumping everyone into that caricature you prefer to rail against.

    JD (9ad545)

  129. happyfeet 123,

    That comment seems especially immature, vengeful and cruel. Are you having a bad day?

    DRJ (e80d46)

  130. well a new day will dawn someday Mr. JD, god willing

    the day of the Great Reconciliation

    when Mr. Governor President Walker unites us all and rallies us as a nation to stand together and bravely face an uncertain future

    and when that day comes, there will be ice cream and there will be tears and there will be hugs and there will be heartfelt apologies for the sundry contretemps what occurred in the Dark Times

    but that day is not yet here

    happyfeet (831175)

  131. i was having a bad day DRJ then i gave up on this whole dreary housecleaning project and made an appointment with Homejoy

    i have people coming this week god bless america

    i’m kind of in a pickle about it, cause of it’s a bucket-lister thing where this impossible dear person, she’s taking a break from her chemo to come see Chicago and me

    two birds dead plonk plonk, with just the one stone

    her daughter T is coming too, who is my super best friend what I moved out to California with many many moons ago

    so now that the cleaning’s out of the wqay i just have to do food and wine, which I enjoy, and which I’m good at

    wine is coming from round the corner at this…. assyrian (?) liquor store, though i’m a check whole foods for some cakebread cellars which is the only california wine i buy anymore, and just for special people

    i’m not used to all the new ethnicalities here – it’s a whole different potpourri than la

    i already tried Dylan’s for some moonshine chockits… looks like they’re out til next thursday, when we’ll be in the city – I’m a get some to take to minnesota for the 4th as well… probably get some fudge for Minnesota as well – Dylan’s birthday cake fudge makes me cry it’s so good

    i’m also gonna get a nice basket from Pastoral which is on the way to my train from work

    not sure if you need to call ahead or what so I’m a research that Monday

    then i just need some fruit and I think for what we’ll want around the house we’ll be covered

    i need to probably have some vodka squirreled away too just ion case, but I think T would prefer I try and keep us in a red wine sort of place

    happyfeet (831175)

  132. just *in* case i mean

    happyfeet (831175)

  133. oh. out of the *way* i mean

    i think all that contemplation of housecleaning unsettled me a bit

    happyfeet (831175)

  134. i don’t hold no truck with them poligs no sir

    The shtick aside, I find it both amusing and pathetic when pro-SSM devotees (but not necessarily even you as much as garden-variety liberals) suddenly become flustered and, well, surprisingly intolerant (and bigoted?!!) when dealing with the idea of polygamy.

    I don’t care for SSM or polygamy, but do admit that the concept of a guy with two or more wives seems less bizarre to me than the concept of a guy with a husband. Similarly, the notion of a woman with a wife seems less strange to me than dealing with the image of a man and his husband.

    Mark (a11af2)

  135. polygamy does not add value Mr. Mark

    it’s not a model what advances enhanced economic security, prosperity, and self-reliance

    this is why the trashy poligs always live in trailers

    it’s hell on the women and kids in particular, how it forecloses so many opportunities

    marriage on the other hand enhances economic security, prosperity, and self-reliance

    this is why it strikes me as unfathomably immature vengeful and cruel for some people to try and deny this boon, freely given unto them by God, to our homosexual brothers and sisters in christ

    can i get an amen

    happyfeet (831175)

  136. And yet another Christian-owned wedding venue bites the dust because the Mennonite owners denied a gay couple use of the facility as it would violate their faith. The gay couple promptly filed a discrimination complaint through the Iowa Civil Rights Commission.

    Per the couple:

    The Odgaards see a 2009 decision of the Iowa Supreme Court as the beginning of their violation of religious freedom. “I think if people in Iowa would have had a chance to vote on this, it would have never have been this way. People in Iowa are pretty conservative,” Betty was quoted as saying.

    “With the discrimination laws and the legality of same-sex marriage in this state, now you have to prove that you didn’t discriminate,” added Richard.

    They plan to turn their former business into a church.

    Dana (86e864)

  137. people what trivialize religious freedom like these pampered iowa corncobs do a disservice to the cause I think

    treating everybody equal is how you defend religious freedom

    stupid corncobs

    happyfeet (831175)

  138. “A very solid scientific consensus indicates that we are presently witnessing a disturbing warming of the climatic system. In recent decades this warming has been accompanied by a constant rise in the sea level and, it would appear, by an increase of extreme weather events

    Sorry, felipe, but I think that statement is not true as written. The most that can be said for it is that the sea level is rising, but this has been occurring steadily since long before the anthropomorphic factor is proposed to have been significant.

    But I do recognize that the Pope likely depended on research his assistants gave to him.

    MD in Philly (f9371b)

  139. nk (dbc370) — 6/21/2015 @ 5:13 am

    Yes, I agree, they can sound very much like that once you assume that the words mean what the left want them to mean. With all of the talk about “speaking in code,” is it any wonder that we are experiencing another tower of Babel?

    felipe (56556d)

  140. omg

    someone set the pope up to look like a tardwipe

    tom hanks pls to investigate

    happyfeet (831175)

  141. Yeah, this is all quite productive.

    Really adds value to Patterico’s blog.

    Have fun with all this folks. Apparently it’s the New Normal here.

    Thanks to everyone who is trying not to be a jerk.

    Simon Jester (c76df1)

  142. Beldar, in your response I do not see you addressing my concerns, as you directly did to others. maybe you didn’t see my post, maybe you don’t think it is worth responding to.
    I’m curious.

    2 cents on Copernicus and Galileo,
    what little I know, which relies heavily on what I learned from lennox’s “7 days that divide the world”, is that an earth centered universe was more an Aristotlean concept that the church adopted rather than something the church claimed in opposition to prevailing scientific opinion, that even after his censure galileo basically was placed in very comfortable surroundings under house arrest, and as said above, it was more his brashness in his claims and personality that caused him trouble compared to Copernicus, who was content to postulate theories and not insult people.

    Which makes it shameful for someone who supposedly knows a lot about philosophy and the history of philosophy to suggest it is commonly held knowledge that the Church was in the habit of burning astronomers as heretics as I described above.
    Did any astronomer ever get burned at the stake by the Church?

    MD in Philly (f9371b)

  143. thank you india

    happyfeet (831175)

  144. *love* annie lennox

    happyfeet (831175)

  145. I hope any Roman Catholics on the thread will be willing to report back on how this message was handled in church services they may have attended tonight or tomorrow morning.
    elissa (b99a7d) — 6/20/2015 @ 8:25 pm

    Just as JD reported, not a word about it. I would have been surprised had it been discussed at all. I took a curious non-catholic friend to mass who was surprised that we “use the Bible”, as he put it. When I asked what he thought we used, he replied, “I always thought you used the Pope’s writings.”

    We were both still in high school at the time, but I remember thinking “wow, this guy sure knows a lot about the Pope’s writings.”

    felipe (56556d)

  146. Hi MD. Sadly, much of “common knowledge” today is about Narrative, not fact. And we can’t all research everything. Maybe that is why I am so irritable with kneejerk posturing and sloganeering.

    I appreciate your efforts here.

    Simon Jester (c76df1)

  147. The Gentle Grizzly (cf4a3e) — 6/21/2015 @ 5:57 am

    Thank you for your comment.
    Do you voice this view among other homosexuals, or only those you know who agree with you, lest the experience of the hotel owner in NYC be visited upon you?

    MD in Philly (f9371b)

  148. I haven’t spoken with my daughter about the philos textbook yet. knowing who she received it from, I expect to find that it was/is a text in the HS she will be going to in the fall.

    if she can see me as an ally on her side then it may be a very good experience for us both,
    but I remember the time she came home from the public school down the street in 1st grade to tell me how the polar bears are in trouble. she knew it was true because her teacher said so,nomatter what I thought.
    of course, 7 years have gone by

    MD in Philly (f9371b)

  149. MD in Philly (f9371b) — 6/21/2015 @ 11:02 am

    No apology necessary, doc. I agree with you. This is not one of those times when the Pope is supposed to be infallible. There is no doubt that the Vatican used whatever research was given to them. One could charitably say the Pope is not lying about AGW, he is just simply wrong. But the things the Pope proposes, insofar as they deal with faith and morals, are sound.

    “A very solid scientific consensus”…

    I read that to mean “a bunch of scientists are solid in their agreement on something.” Which I do not take as a pronouncement that AGW is true. Call them weasel words if you want, but those words were carefully chosen to convey a very fine meaning. I am very well aware from all the comments, including my own that we are always dealing with present events in an atmosphere not unlike that of Babel.

    felipe (56556d)

  150. the pope is giving aid and comfort to those that would rape our freedoms and shackle us to penury and squalor

    this pope is a very bad person

    happyfeet (831175)

  151. well, I take that phrase to mean that all of science as a whole generally agrees with it,
    and suggests there does not exist a whole bunch that disagree.
    and that is the narrative, not the reality,
    weasel words though they be

    whenever food is thrown out it is as if it were stolen from the table of the poor”.
    Only in the sense that perhaps my monthly food bill would be less and I could give more money to the poor.
    if the Pope is concerned about food for the poor, he should tell Obama and everyone else that ethanol for fuel is not only bad for the environment, making more green house gases per unit of energy,
    but it drives up the price of corn around the world and not only makes a direct hardship on the poor but also drives people in S. America to destroy rain forest to plant corn.

    leftists aren’t interested in the welfare of the poor, they are interested in tearing down the developed world
    clear headed thinking would know that

    Intentions mean nothing if they are in conflict with what actually helps.

    MD in Philly (f9371b)

  152. @ DRJ (#116): Since I think the U.S. Constitution is silent on the subject of sexual preference and marriage, I’d generally leave it to state law to decide, via legislation and based on each state’s choices as a matter of public policy, whether and to what degree each state wishes to make special rules or preferences or rights connected to marriage and sexual preference.

    That a state could make such special rules or grant such special preferences and rights doesn’t mean it ought to. Some probably would, and some probably wouldn’t, when it comes to sexual preference. Personally, I’m presently unpersuaded that there is now, or would be if SSM is permitted, the sort of systematic discrimination, on a systematic and continuing and widespread basis, against people on the basis of their sexual preference that would justify such state legislation as a matter of good public policy — no more than I think, for example, there’s a pressing need for states to pass special legislation protecting gingers or people who are left-handed. Texas could pass a law tomorrow that effectively requires wedding cake bakers to serve lefties, but I don’t think that’s necessary or even wise as a matter of sound public policy. And I wouldn’t change my mind even if shown that five percent of Texas wedding cake bakers refuse to serve lefties. I certainly don’t think that such a need for special protective legislation and status ought to be presumed or assumed just because some number of people, in particular situations want to withhold their commerce or personal approval based on someone else’s sexual preference or involvement in a same-sex marriage.

    And in general I want the federal government out of these issues altogether to the greatest extent that is possible. For example, whatever states may decide to do to subsidize marriage, whether SSM or tradition, with with tax breaks and credits or other legislation, I’d prefer the federal government not try to craft and determine that sort of policy nationally; I don’t think it’s among the federal government’s enumerated powers to dictate and enforce that sort of domestic policy; I don’t think the federal government has the wisdom or flexibility to create a perfect, uniform, top-down policy prescriptive on marriage even if it had the constitutional power to do so; and in the specific situation of the minister, for example, I think the federal and state governments are both specifically prohibited from compelling compliance with such prescriptives by the First Amendment’s guarantees of freedom of religion (as binding upon the States via incorporation through the Fourteenth Amendment).

    Because I am confident the U.S. Constitution — when and if properly and faithfully read and construed — says nothing about protecting either marriage or sexual preference (in contrast to its explicit pronouncements about press, religion, and race), I therefore disagree with the article you linked as to whether a state’s recognition of SSM is necessarily going to create the fundamental incompatibility with freedom of religion (as guaranteed by the First Amendment) that’s discussed in the article you linked. It shouldn’t; those conflicts would be based on a misreading of the federal Constitution; if marriage and family issues are properly kept as matters of state law, then the Supremacy Clause will work when and to the extent appropriate to prevent the state legislatures from trampling religious liberties guaranteed by the U.S. Constitution. But “when and if properly construed” is a very big “if,” of course, and it’s one that I fear Mr. Justice Kennedy may join the four liberal Justices to negate (pending either a change in SCOTUS composition that changes precedent, or a constitution amendment). I concede that if Justice Kennedy gets it wrong — if, as I and others fear, he and four other Justices make sexual preference a category that (like race and religious preference) is subject to strict scrutiny under the Equal Protection Clause, for example, thereby making SSM something that’s a matter compelled by federal constitutional law instead of permissive via state legislative policy — then there will indeed probably be conflicts.

    Beldar (fa637a)

  153. I therefore disagree with the article you linked as to whether a state’s recognition of SSM is necessarily going to create the fundamental incompatibility with freedom of religion (as guaranteed by the First Amendment)

    If the country went by your understanding of the Constitution maybe so,
    but I see very little evidence that such is the case,
    and I see plenty of evidence that freedom of religious expression is thought to exist only in the privacy of one’s own home, as long as the home isn’t also used as a business.

    To go full Godwin, I see no reason to expect that a civilized nation would follow the rantings of Hitler, either, but we know how that turned out.

    MD in Philly (f9371b)

  154. So, if recognition of SSM will only give say a 90% chance of making a fundamental conflict with freedom of religion, that’s ok?

    MD in Philly (f9371b)

  155. The TL/DR version of the above is:

    If he were on the SCOTUS, Beldar would vote that there’s no federal constitutional right to SSM, leaving SSM, like other laws about marriage, to state legislators and governors to decide as a matter of public policy (or perhaps state judges too, if the state’s people have first amended their state constitutions to so permit or require).

    But if he were in the Texas Legislator, Beldar would indeed vote to change current Texas law to permit SSM, and if he were governor of Texas, Beldar would sign that bill. In neither state role would Beldar support a Texas law granting special privileges or rights based on sexual preference because Beldar doesn’t think there’s a pressing need for such a law.

    Beldar (fa637a)

  156. @ MD in Philly, who asked (#155): “So, if recognition of SSM will only give say a 90% chance of making a fundamental conflict with freedom of religion, that’s ok?”

    If recognition of SSM is based on Mr. Justice Kennedy and four other Justices interpreting the U.S. Constitution to mandate SSM, that’s not okay. But if states do it through legislation, I don’t think there is a 90% chance, or any chance, of a fundamental conflict with freedom of religion as guaranteed by the First Amendment; the First Amendment will trump due to the Supremacy Clause. (That analysis presumes we can and do agree on what the First Amendment actually does and doesn’t protect, which is another question entirely.)

    Beldar (fa637a)

  157. as pointed out by aphrael, to some degree you are right, it is the inclusion of sexual orientation in protected non-discrimination law that is the real problem, even if SSM is not legal.

    but I think that is dodging the main issue, which is mandating belief that there is no moral/philosophical/or religious difference between heterosexuality and homosexuality, and any other sexuality that comes along that gets enough pr support.

    You can believe there is a difference in your brain, and even act that way in your home as long as your home has no public accommodation responsibility, like housing a business, but actually acting in a way consistent with your thinking in such a way as to be noticeable in public is verboten.

    MD in Philly (f9371b)

  158. I haven’t seen a freedom of religion argument trump a single blasted thing so far in practice,
    unless you agree that a small private business should be forced to provide service for an occasion they disagree with.
    Is that your stance, that a florist who goes on site to set up flowers for a wedding must do the same at a SSW whether they agree with the concept or not?

    MD in Philly (f9371b)

  159. just trust the market Mr. Dr.

    the go-to florists will emerge organically

    and in time the crappy bigoty ones will be wholly overlooked

    organically

    it’s all about the invisible hand

    let

    the river run

    let all the dreamers

    wake the nation

    come

    the new jeru

    sa

    lem

    happyfeet (831175)

  160. To expand (ha!) upon one of my assertions above, specifically this one:

    I concede that if Justice Kennedy gets it wrong — if, as I and others fear, he and four other Justices make sexual preference a category that (like race and religious preference) is subject to strict scrutiny under the Equal Protection Clause, for example, thereby making SSM something that’s a matter compelled by federal constitutional law instead of permissive via state legislative policy — then there will indeed probably be conflicts.

    Internal conflicts among provisions in the Constitution is what you should absolutely expect to get when you adhere to the “let’s pretend that such-and-such is really written into the Constitution”-school of constitutional law. That’s the “living, breathing, it means what we really want it to mean”-school of constitutional law embraced by the entirety of the American Left and too many good judges (including Anthony Kennedy) who ought to know better.

    Beldar (fa637a)

  161. feets,
    your continued crap that ignores the obvious is annoying.
    the market says chicken restaurants that are biggoty bigots in your mind get more business,
    so there, the market works

    MD in Philly (f9371b)

  162. have you tried the chickin breakfast biscuits?

    so so so slap yo mama good, but in real life they’re just for when you need a lil bucking up on a brutally cold chicago morning

    cause of the carbs, they are so many

    happyfeet (831175)

  163. why doesn’t popeye’s do a breakfast menu

    their biscuits aren’t half bad

    happyfeet (831175)

  164. @ MD in Philly (#159), who asked, “Is that your stance, that a florist who goes on site to set up flowers for a wedding must do the same at a SSW whether they agree with the concept or not?”

    I don’t think the U.S. Constitution speaks to that subject one way or the other. I think a state could pass a law so requiring, if the state decided as a matter of public policy and statute (not constitutional law) that there is systematic discrimination against those who want to have same-sex marriages that should be remedied, and that can only be remedied by a state law that restricts the liberty merchants otherwise have to deal, or refuse to deal, with whomever they choose. I don’t think that florist’s rights to religious liberty under the First Amendment would be infringed by such a state law; I think that’s an over-reading, based on misunderstanding, of the scope of the First Amendment with respect to a florist’s business (although I come out differently if it’s the minister’s business under discussion, and maybe if it’s the religious orphanage under discussion). But I don’t think there’s been an adequate showing that there is, indeed, enough of a systematic discrimination against those who want to have same-sex marriages that I’d vote in favor of such a state law if I were a state legislator, or that I would sign it if I were a state governor.

    Beldar (fa637a)

  165. So you limit freedom of religion to be explicitly related to direct religious employment and participation in religious services??
    In other words, freedom of worship, not freedom of religious conscience?

    MD in Philly (f9371b)

  166. jesus washed the footsies of a hooker

    good ole jesus he knew what from what

    happyfeet (831175)

  167. polygamy does not add value Mr. Mark

    Everything you say about multi-partner marriages can easily be applied to same-sex ones. Even more so since there are generally more women out there in search of a husband than guys in search of a wife. Also, single mothers and their kids are financially and logistically more vulnerable than guys who have the capacity to accommodate, and interest in having, more than one wife.

    Mark (a11af2)

  168. “whenever food is thrown out it is as if it were stolen from the table of the poor”.
    Only in the sense that perhaps my monthly food bill would be less and I could give more money to the poor.”

    Doc, you are truly a man guided by the Spirit. That is exactly the sense meant.

    felipe (56556d)

  169. @ MD in Philly: I don’t think the florist’s decision who he will or won’t do business with is a decision that’s constitutionally protected under the Free Exercise clause of the First Amendment, no.

    The fact that it’s not constitutionally protected under the Free Exercise clause, though, doesn’t necessarily mean that I think that decision ought to be regulated.

    Beldar (fa637a)

  170. Everything you say about multi-partner marriages can easily be applied to same-sex ones.

    this is an over-generalization

    Also, single mothers and their kids are financially and logistically more vulnerable than guys who have the capacity to accommodate, and interest in having, more than one wife.

    not really

    in real life the whole clan of fail goes on the food stamps and tries to get a trailer with an empty lot adjacent for so one day they can be one of them hoity-toity two-lot poligger families

    what’s a poligger got if he don’t got a dream

    happyfeet (831175)

  171. So, it seems that the reason you don’t think there is any conflict is because your understanding of freedom of religion is narrow compared to the writer of the article.

    MD in Philly (f9371b)

  172. MD in Philly, you seem to be under the misconception that Freedom of Religion extends to Christians. You are misguided. Ever since The Secular State replaced “We are endowed by our Creator” any and every non-Christian faith, cult, religion and belief or non belief system is a protected victim of the oppressive WASP, Protestant Ethic which enslaved our Founders and thwarted our development as a nation. We can all see now how much better and how much of a great future our nation has under the “new” leftist anti religion. What could be more appealing than a chick with a dick? Or dudes banging each other? I’m sure gay Scout leaders will be as successful as gay priests were.

    You do realize the leftists want to interbreed us into one race of androgynous low income democrats? So instead of ein volk. ein Deutschland. ein furer. The American salute will be: One Race. One Gender. One Income.

    Rev. Barack Hussein Hoagie (f4eb27)

  173. jesus washed the footsies of a hooker

    good ole jesus he knew what from what
    happyfeet (831175) — 6/21/2015 @ 12:32 pm

    As usual, you have backwards.

    felipe (56556d)

  174. Jesus told the hooker attached to those footsies to stop being a hooker feets.

    feets, again, I don’t know if you are being willfully obtuse or what
    the definition of marriage has been blown out of the water, with no clear rationale or specificity as to what the new definition is.
    No one came out, as far as I know, and made legal precedent that marriage is now defined as two people of consenting age of any sex, and only two people. It can be whatever
    some judge wants it to be.

    I guess I will not hire Beldar for my defense when I get hauled into court for publicly revealing my convictions.

    MD in Philly (f9371b)

  175. I don’t think that the decision who to sell flowers to as part of a commercial business operation is part of the free exercise of its owner’s religion, no.

    If the Free Exercise Clause is interpreted that broadly, the Rule of Law collapses, because everyone will use “religious liberty” to justify anything.

    Lines have to be drawn; I’m not asserting that they’re always drawn correctly, but I’m comfortable drawing that one with respect to florists, and indeed I’m quite confident that is consistent with the bulk of existing precedent and practice in American constitutional history.

    Beldar (fa637a)

  176. ok first of all everyone should stop being a hooker

    second of all if two gay people want to get married that’s way better for america than two gay people not wanting to get married

    how hard is this?

    it’s not hard at all

    this is why you never see this question on the SATs

    happyfeet (831175)

  177. Rev. Hoagie,
    My mistake was thinking how narrowly some people who I have respected see the freedom of religion clause.

    I know how many view it, I just thought we had a little more backing when it comes to my minor child being taken away by the thought police.

    MD in Philly (f9371b)

  178. As usual, you have backwards.

    yes you are right

    Jesus got his toesies polished by the hooker not vicky backwards

    who knew he was such a playa

    happyfeet (831175)

  179. Beldar:

    But I don’t think there’s been an adequate showing that there is, indeed, enough of a systematic discrimination against those who want to have same-sex marriages that I’d vote in favor of such a state law if I were a state legislator, or that I would sign it if I were a state governor.

    Doesn’t a Supreme Court decision requiring that States recognize SSM have the same effect, especially if the Court treats opposition to SSM as a suspect classification like race and gender (as it probably will)?

    I respect your and Ted Cruz’s belief in States’ rights and the 10th Amendment but I think it’s too late for that analysis to carry any weight. Christians who oppose SSM are losing their businesses and savings because of this issue. At least happyfeet is honest about why. This is happening because Christians were once a powerful majority that the new majority wants to get even with and punish for their (now) unpopular beliefs.

    DRJ (e80d46)

  180. 176.I don’t think that the decision who to sell flowers to as part of a commercial business operation is part of the free exercise of its owner’s religion, no.
    Beldar (fa637a) — 6/21/2015 @ 12:50 pm

    Is that a purposeful change in the description of the scenario, or do you deny the distinction some have tried to make?
    No florist, baker, pizzeria owner, or photographer, that I am aware of, has ever denied service to an individual because of sexual orientation. In fact it is clear that some have routinely served gays and lesbians in their line of work.
    They have declined to provide service for a same sex wedding because they do not believe in the concept.

    Do you take the position that there is no material difference?

    MD in Philly (f9371b)

  181. I haven’t said anything here about taking away minor children or thought police. That kind of hyperbole isn’t useful, nor does it encourage a continued conversation. I believe I’ll stand for now on what I’ve already written.

    Beldar (fa637a)

  182. DRJ, in case you missed it, I think beldar is just fine with a business owner losing their business for not servicing a SS wedding. His view of freedom of religion is what I would call very narrow. Obviously he would call mine overly broad.

    MD in Philly (f9371b)

  183. Well, I guess when I’ve been told I have no right to act on my religious beliefs in public it was easy to do hyperbole.

    Fine discussion over, enough has been said.

    MD in Philly (f9371b)

  184. this is an over-generalization

    So is the notion that lots and lots of single males (who are gay) in particular throughout America are so forlorn and miserable without the state granting them the privilege of a marital contract with another guy—uh, a high percentage of male homosexuals are notorious for being both non-monogamous and promiscuous.

    OTOH, the stability of this society has been undermined by large numbers of women (most of them presumably straight) who are single mothers raising children without a father figure — a male — in the home. See: Black America.

    Mark (a11af2)

  185. MD,

    I think religious freedom isn’t just the private right to think about and contemplate your religious beliefs. I think it’s also the public right to live your beliefs. I assume religious gays want the right to SSM so they can live their beliefs. Similarly, Christians who oppose SSM should be able to avoid participating in SSM ceremonies because of their beliefs.

    It will be very hard to draw the line between these two positions, but if the Supreme Court treats SSM/gays as a suspect classification then it won’t be hard at all. Gays will win every case, as they are now, and that’s what I think Beldar is saying.

    DRJ (e80d46)

  186. Beldar:

    If the Free Exercise Clause is interpreted that broadly, the Rule of Law collapses, because everyone will use “religious liberty” to justify anything.

    Dare we call this hyperbole? I doubt many courts would recognize a religious objection unless there was a church doctrine supporting the claimed objection. Thus, I’m not going to be able to refuse service to someone wearing a red shirt because I claim my religion says red is the color of the devil.

    DRJ (e80d46)

  187. And, as MD pointed about above, we’re not talking about refusing service to gays. We’re talking about refusing to participate in SSM ceremonies because of religious beliefs.

    DRJ (e80d46)

  188. 176.I don’t think that the decision who to sell flowers to as part of a commercial business operation is part of the free exercise of its owner’s religion, no.

    But I and others do, Beldar. I also see it as forcing someone to sell anything against his/her/it’s will as slavery. Freedom of Religion is sacrosanct, not freedom to buy flowers, sorry. I’m sorry if some snowflake’s feelings are hurt but that’s not really the point, is it? The point is to break Christianity and break the Constitution. Unless my not selling flowers to you will physically harm you, butt out. What’s the matter, hasn’t the leftists broken Christianity and the constitution enough with crap like hate speech, hate crimes, microaggressions, transsexualism, transracism, transgenderism, transhumanism and on and on? Lets just keep making up words, victims, oppressors, conditions, exceptions and get all the lawyers involved. The new democrat program should be No Lawyer Left Behind.

    Rev. Barack Hussein Hoagie (f4eb27)

  189. We’re talking about refusing to participate in SSM ceremonies because of religious beliefs.

    no you’re talking about a passive-aggressive attempt to refuse to allow the participation of gays in YOUR ceremonies because of YOUR religious beliefs

    you’re talking about segregation

    and it’s wrong

    happyfeet (831175)

  190. happyfeet,

    Why would I oppose letting a gay person participate in a straight marriage, if the people involved wanted it? I’m talking about letting people live their values. There was a time when you wanted that, too, but now you seem to want to force your values on others.

    DRJ (e80d46)

  191. Oh, now I see what you meant. You’re back to claiming any opposition to SSM is discriminatory. Never mind.

    DRJ (e80d46)

  192. Happyfeet, you’re becoming a parody of yourself. The same comments you apply to opponents of SSM can be applied to you regarding your hostility towards polygamy. (And, again, there have been more societies throughout human history that have recognized polygamy but not gay marriage.)

    Mark (a11af2)

  193. I think we’ve had this discussion before, happyfeet. As I recall, I said I’m not sure what I want to do about SSM. Initially, I wanted to have civil unions instead of SSM but that’s no longer feasible. Now I think the best option would be to separate religious marriage from civil marriage, but times have changed so much and so quickly that this is probably not feasible anymore either.

    So we’re stuck with SSM and no-fault divorce and illegitimate births. Only some of the middle class and the rich will bother to live their lives the old-fashioned way, because it works and they want their children to succeed. The end result will be that American society will become even more divided in class, race, and economic status. That’s not good but it seems inevitable.

    DRJ (e80d46)

  194. Now I think the best option would be to separate religious marriage from civil marriage, but times have changed so much and so quickly that this is probably not feasible anymore either.

    Why? All a church has to do is to stop participating in civil marriages. Conduct religious services only and tell the couple they are married in the eyes of the church and God, but if they want the State to recognize it, they need to go see the city clerk.

    The Catholic Church already takes this position wrt civil divorce.

    Kevin M (25bbee)

  195. Beldar, thank you for stopping by and contributing both legal observations and your personal thoughts. It seems like you used to spend more time at this site and I’m sure I’m not the only one who wishes you would comment and interact here on various threads and topics much more often than you do.

    elissa (428e3f)

  196. Okay, I’m going to try one more time. I’m disappointed, frankly, that this discussion is bordering on being uncivil, and I despise having words put in my mouth, which is one reason I write so many of them, I suppose.

    MD in Philly wrote (#183), “I think beldar is just fine with a business owner losing their business for not servicing a SS wedding.”

    That’s not correct even as far as it goes, and it’s not at all an adequate specification of the context, which makes a huge amount of difference. If you think that’s a fair or accurate summary of my position, then I’ve completely failed to explain it, or perhaps you’ve failed to read it carefully enough.

    I’m trying to keep very distinct what I think is constitutionally mandated or prohibited; what might be (within the confines of the U.S. Constitution) permissible regulation by a state or federal statute; and what might be wise. Those are three very different things.

    Let’s use the florist. Here’s the scene: The florist has been hired to provide flowers and his floral arranging services for a church wedding. He gets there and finds that it’s a same-sex marriage; he puts his flowers back in the truck and goes home, and he says, “I don’t want to continue with this job because I believe God meant for marriage to only be between a man and a woman, and in living my life according to what I believe to be God’s teachings, I believe my performing these services would be going against God’s will.”

    Constitutional evaluation: I don’t believe the U.S. Constitution has any application to this situation — neither the First Amendment, nor the Equal Protection Clause, nor any other part of the Constitution.

    Add more facts. Let’s say the couple sues the florist for breach of contract in state court under state law. I’d analyze that like any other contract case. If one of the material terms of the contract, as agreed upon when the parties had the meeting of their minds when it was formed, was that it would only be for non-SSM marriages, then the florist had a right to breach, and the couple’s lawsuit will fail. Otherwise, he’s breached his contract; the court should award a money judgment for the couple’s damages. Lesson: Next time, the florist needs to make his insistence on only working on non-SSM ceremonies part of the basis of his meeting of the minds with his customers; they can go elsewhere if they don’t like it, and if they hire him anyway, it’s them who’ll be in breach (excusing his nonperformance).

    Add more, different facts: This florist lives in a state which has passed a state statute which says, “No business shall deny its goods or services on the basis of its customers’ sexual preference, and customers have a private right of action for money damages against violators of this statute.” The couple sues under this law; the florist defends, claiming enforcement of this statute would violate his laws under the Free Exercise Clause. I’ll grant you that First Amendment law has some fuzzy edges as it’s now enforced in the federal courts, but now or at any time in the last 200 years, the florist’s defense would lose. That’s because the reason the florist is at that wedding is to sell flowers and services relating to flowers — not to be an integral, essential part of the religious ceremony being conducted. (The priest, by contrast, is there for exactly that purpose.) On its face, and even as applied to the florist (but not the priest) in these circumstances, the state statute is constitutional under the First Amendment. I don’t think this would be a close question in any federal court; I think if this precise issue got to the SCOTUS as currently composed, all nine Justices would agree with me. The reason is exactly what I said earlier: If the Free Exercise Clause is interpreted broadly enough to be used as this kind of sword to strike down legislative regulation, then nothing can be regulated and we can have no law at all. If “God told me to do it this way” is a trump card to any law, there is no law, because no one can test or dispute the accuracy of that statement.

    But that does not mean that I’m “just fine” with that result.

    Even though I think a state could, consistent with the federal Constitution, pass and enforce such a statute regulating the business activities of its florists in this exact manner, I don’t think it should. I don’t think there’s a need for it. I’d vote against that law if I were a legislator; I’d refuse to sign it if I were a governor; I’d quite likely vote against a legislative or gubernatorial candidate who wanted to do so. I would leave this decision by florists without state regulation.

    I’d do that even though I personally disagree with the florist. That’s different than saying I disapprove of him for his decision. If I were the florist, I’d do this work and wish the same-sex couple well in their marriage. If you were the florist and you wouldn’t, I could accept and respect that. I wouldn’t go lobby the legislature to force you to do otherwise, no more than I’d lobby the legislature to force florists to service weddings among gingers or the left-handed.

    Beldar (fa637a)

  197. If the Free Exercise Clause is interpreted that broadly, the Rule of Law collapses, because everyone will use “religious liberty” to justify anything.

    Who says it’s “that broadly”? It’s interesting defining what “that broadly” entails. Your parameters are clearly different than others on this board.

    Dana (86e864)

  198. *”The couple sues under this law; the florist defends, claiming enforcement of this statute would violate his rights [originally I wrote “laws”] under the Free Exercise Clause.”

    Beldar (fa637a)

  199. The florist has been hired to provide flowers and his floral arranging services for a church wedding. He gets there and finds that it’s a same-sex marriage; he puts his flowers back in the truck and goes home, and he says, “I don’t want to continue with this job because I believe God meant for marriage to only be between a man and a woman, and in living my life according to what I believe to be God’s teachings, I believe my performing these services would be going against God’s will.”

    Beldar,

    Does it and/or should it change your assessment knowing that none of these cases that have gone public, IIRC, were not at the point of floral delivery on the day of the wedding when the knowledge of it being a gay wedding was discovered? As a matter of fact, the vendors that have been attacked for declining the jobs found out well before the planning actually began and then declined their services. (If I’m mis-remembering, please let me know.)

    Dana (86e864)

  200. Hoagie #189: I agree with your comment, but you let Beldar get away with an improper assumption. The florist is typically fine with selling flowers over the counter to anyone, gay or straight. The florist, however, does not want to go to the site of a same sex wedding and decorate on the premises. That is too much like participating in the event itself, and the florist should be perfectly free to make that decision. To rule otherwise is an abuse of the Constitution (ignoring his free exercise rights).

    I think one can say the Constitution requires the florist to sell generic merchandise to anyone, until the specific request for merchandise requires the merchant to do something that specifically connects it to a same sex event. In other words, merchant must sell a generic cake for same sex event, but must not be forced to make the cake in a way that is specific to a same sex event. The customer in such a case should have the good sense to not be “in your face” about how the generic cake is for a same sex wedding.

    A venue provider should not be forced to allow a same sex wedding at his facility if that conflicts with his religious beliefs. It is obvious that the Bible is clearly disapproving of same sex sex, so it is clear that it is not a matter of arbitrary discrimination.

    Ken in Camarillo (061845)

  201. it’s about being gracious

    not about being pious

    and one certainly shouldn’t have to reference the law so copously as this thread suggests just to navigate their day

    when someone walks into your store you say

    how can i help you good people?

    just make believe you’re brave, you see

    and the trick will take you far

    cause you may be as brave

    as you make believe you are

    happyfeet (831175)

  202. *copiously* i mean

    happyfeet (831175)

  203. Dana, I don’t know what “attacks” you’re referring to. If you’re talking about people making a big protest on social and other media in trying to shame and boycott particular targets, that’s not what I’m looking at. I’m talking about legal compulsion by the state or federal government, not attempts to compel through social pressure.

    You can’t have this conversation in a meaningful way without specifying the exact context, which is why I used the series of hypotheticals I just did.

    Beldar (fa637a)

  204. it’s about being gracious

    Yes, so, for example, when seeing two guys who say they’re married to each other, don’t immediately stereotype them as being hairdressers, florists or suffering from HIV.

    Okay?

    this is why the trashy poligs always live in trailers
    — happyfeet (831175) — 6/21/2015 @ 9:39 am

    Mark (a11af2)

  205. ==It is obvious that the Bible is clearly disapproving of same sex sex, so it is clear that it is not a matter of arbitrary discrimination.==

    If known homosexual activity is the primary religious objection, then how is decorating a birthday cake for Ellen Degenerous, or delivering buffet pizzas for a gay couple’s housewarming party, or taking publicity photos of the Gay Men’s Chorus OK –but a baking a wedding cake for a hotel reception for a gay couple or taking photos of the couple, family members and guests isn’t? The brite line there is hard for many people, including many practicing Christians to grasp.

    elissa (428e3f)

  206. becauses it confers acceptance of the practice of behavior, this is why dissenters are targeted, as an object lesson,

    narciso (ee1f88)

  207. have you driven through polig country?

    that’s where you are if you go south of zion national park

    it’s gorgeous country, but the people are peasants at best

    drive through the neighborhoods

    you wouldn’t buy there either

    it’s narsty

    happyfeet (831175)

  208. Beldar #204: You’ve made some great comments on this thread, but added a distortion to an example that has not occurred in any case that has been publicized, and you did not address an example that matched well with the actual cases that occurred.

    As Dana pointed out in #200, the merchant has never reneged on the day of the event, they always politely declined very early in the process.

    By attacks, we mean how the activists get behind the “victims” and make a literal federal case out it, and get the Lame Stream Media to couch their stories in a sympathetic tone. To get the picture on these choreographed attacks, you can read some of Steve57’s comments earlier in the thread.

    Ken in Camarillo (061845)

  209. and there’s no food for miles

    happyfeet (831175)

  210. a ‘food desert’ you might say,

    narciso (ee1f88)

  211. yes yes you really have to just kinda go with it and not bring ANY expectations whatsoever to the table with you – both in terms of service and food quality

    it’s a very different whirl there

    in those poliggy in-between spaces

    happyfeet (831175)

  212. but the people are peasants at best

    Mistresses, per below, are technically merely one step away from the implementation of a formal multi-partner or polygamous arrangement.

    Don’t think for a second that people in any society, but particularly one where gay marriage has been recognized and touted, won’t be subtly influenced by — won’t get their cues from — the loosening of acceptable boundaries. Simply put, if two guys or two women can be in a legally recognized social-sexual relationship, then the message will be sent down from on high that a guy can have more than one sexual-social female partner.

    thenational.ae, February 2013: As someone in the jewellery business, Mr Huang knows all about beautiful luxuries: the way they excite, the envy they invoke and, most of all, the feeling of power and success that they bring. Now the 37-year-old wants the latest luxury status symbol for wealthy men: Mr Huang is looking for a mistress.

    “160 to 170 centimetres tall, beautiful and sexy, with a brain”, writes Mr Huang of his would be-lover in an ad on website Baoyang.cn. The position would come with a salary of 100,000 yuan (Dh58,900) a month and a car, he says.

    As the China’s ruling Communist party has loosened the social and economic reins over the past 30 years, many men with wealth or power have re-embraced the pre-revolutionary practice of keeping a mistress, or mistresses, as sign of power and status.

    “Among men of a certain status it is the norm, not the exception now,” says Li Yinhe, a sexologist at China’s Academy of Social Sciences.

    “They think of it as a tradition, like an emperor keeping concubines,” she said

    One recent academic report found that of the officials found guilty of corruption last year, 95 per cent kept mistresses, including one member of the Land and Resources Department in the southern province of Guangdong who kept 47 of them.

    ^ The sexual nature of a high percentage of males in China is no different from what’s true of a high percentage of males — but particularly those who have wealth and influence — in the US or elsewhere.

    Women of the left who still cling to, and demand, the old-fashioned idea of monogamy but also believe SSM and its participants should be hugged and cheered, have opened up a bigger can of worms than even they realize or will admit to.

    Mark (a11af2)

  213. the dominoes in your whirl, they fall in some gorgeously intricate patterns

    happyfeet (831175)

  214. Beldar @ 204,

    I am referring to the lawsuits filed against the various business owners. These came not as a result of the actual wedding day being ruined by the businesses pulling out upon discovering the clients would be having a gay wedding, but well before, and in most cases that I recall, even before there was a signed contract.

    Dana (86e864)

  215. well it’s not a new observation, the Russians and the Chinese, had no usable templates for capitalism, so they took the robber baron and the mobster, as their model for aggressive accumulation,

    narciso (ee1f88)

  216. Kevin M:

    Why? All a church has to do is to stop participating in civil marriages. Conduct religious services only and tell the couple they are married in the eyes of the church and God, but if they want the State to recognize it, they need to go see the city clerk.

    I can live with that solution, too, but that’s not how the current law works. It’s a secular-church blend, but government is preferring the secular over the church in the case of SSM. Plus, the ministers better be part of an established church because being Christian is not enough.

    DRJ (e80d46)

  217. Further, in the case of the Canadian jeweler, the couple had their engagement rings designed by a jeweler, loved the rings, loved the jeweler, then were shown a picture of a sign in his store that extolled hetero marriage and proceeded to demand their money back. After signing a contract and after the rings were completed. I realize while in Canada, easily the same thing could happen here, if it hasn’t already.

    Does this likely eventual scenario here in the states change your assessment?

    Dana (86e864)

  218. Also, Kevin M, what about divorces? Where will people who only get married in church get divorced? Will their children be illegitimate for the purposes of inheritance? What about custody issues and the ability to enroll children in schools?

    DRJ (e80d46)

  219. it’s about being gracious

    not about being pious

    I agree, happyfeet. So why doesn’t the gay wedding couple enact embrace and open-minded understanding that others may not agree with what they are doing, therefore, they will graciously accept that and respect others’ religious views? Why let their own piety and sanctimoniousness about it rule the day? How is that respectful toward others? Where is the graciousness in demanding someone knuckle under in their beliefs?

    Dana (86e864)

  220. you’re right of course

    except for there is honor in baking a cake for a gay wedding

    there is no honor in refusing to bake a cake for a gay wedding

    none at all

    there is only dust

    happyfeet (831175)

  221. this isn’t a hypothetical, institutions are being razed to the ground, and Jazz Shaw comments about the kindling, the Court has abetted slaughter in Roe, conducted malpractice in NFIB and Perry, and yet we are told ‘it’s just a flesh wound’

    narciso (ee1f88)

  222. 143. …2 cents on Copernicus and Galileo,
    what little I know, which relies heavily on what I learned from lennox’s “7 days that divide the world”, is that an earth centered universe was more an Aristotlean concept that the church adopted rather than something the church claimed in opposition to prevailing scientific opinion, that even after his censure galileo basically was placed in very comfortable surroundings under house arrest, and as said above, it was more his brashness in his claims and personality that caused him trouble compared to Copernicus, who was content to postulate theories and not insult people.

    Which makes it shameful for someone who supposedly knows a lot about philosophy and the history of philosophy to suggest it is commonly held knowledge that the Church was in the habit of burning astronomers as heretics as I described above.
    Did any astronomer ever get burned at the stake by the Church?

    MD in Philly (f9371b) — 6/21/2015 @ 11:15 am

    Technically the church never burnt anyone at the stake. The actual executions were done by civil authorities. I’m not aware of any astronomers ever having been burned at the stake. But if they were, it wasn’t for committing acts of astronomy, but for an entirely separate crime. Astronomy itself wasn’t a crime as the Vatican had maintained its own observatory since some indeterminate point prior to issuing the Gregorian calendar in 1582, and continued to maintain not just that observatory but others around Europe in order to maintain it the calendar and support other work.

    If an astronomer had been burned at the stake for advancing a particular theory I’m sure we would know about it. Apparently the case of Galileo is the best those hostile to religion can do to claim religion is “anti-science.” And no one ever thought for a moment of burning Galileo at the stake. That wasn’t even in the realm of possibilities. The worst that would have happened would have been imprisonment under less comfortable circumstances. Originally, although officially sentenced to the prison of the Holy See, they considered sending him to a monastery for an indeterminate time to do penance. But the relented and settled for house arrest, originally in a palace in Rome then to the bishop’s residence in Sienna. Later, when he was under house arrest in a villa outside of Florence it appears it was a modified form of house arrest. He wasn’t entirely confined to the villa; he could visit his daughters who were nuns at a nearby convent. But he was barred from actually going to the city. He kept writing the church authorities and asking for the restriction to be lifted so he could return to Florence. They eventually told him not to ask again or they would take him back to Rome and put him in a real prison.

    Interestingly, the observatory in Rome was run by the Jesuits. And if you refer to my comment @107 and Galileo’s letter of 1634 he acknowledged he wasn’t in his mess because of a particular opinion but because he had gotten on the wrong side of the Jesuits.

    Which confirms a recollection of mine that he had clashed with them over astronomical theories.

    The geocentric theory of the universe was very much an Aristotelian concept. It was also the prevailing view among scientists and mathematicians. This is why Copernicus dedicated his treatise, The Revolutions of the Celestial Orbs, to the Pope. He wasn’t afraid of the Vatican. In fact, when he first outlined his hypothesis decades earlier the Pope and other church leaders were greatly interested in his ideas. It was actually a Cardinal who encouraged him to publish his hypothesis in full in a treatise.

    What he was afraid of was the dreaded scientific consensus. As was Galileo, as this exchange of letters with Johannes Keppler shows (emphasis mine).

    http://law2.umkc.edu/faculty/projects/ftrials/galileo/letterkepler.html

    Galileo-Kepler Correspondence, 1597

    [Galileo to Kepler, 1597]

    ….Like you, I accepted the Copernicun position several years ago and discovered from thence the causes of many natural effects which are doubtless inexplicable by the current theories. I have written up many of my reasons and refutations on the subject, but I have not dared until now to bring them into the open, being warned by the fortunes of Copernicus himself, our master, who procured immortal fame among a few but stepped down among the great crowd (for the foolish are numerous), only to be derided and dishonored. I would dare publish my thoughts if there were many like you; but, since there are not, I shall forebear….

    [Kepler to Galileo, 1597]

    ….I could only have wished that you, who have so profound an insight, would choose another way. You advise us, by your personal example, and in discreetly veiled fashion, to retreat before the general ignorance and not to expose ourselves or heedlessly to oppose the violent attacks of the mob of scholars (and in this you follow Plato and Pythagoras, our true perceptors). But after a tremendous task has been begun in our time, first by Copernicus and then by many very learned mathematicians, and when the assertion that the Earth moves can no longer be considered something new, would it not be much better to pull the wagon to its goal by our joint efforts, now that we have got it under way, and gradually, with powerful voices, to shout down the common herd, which really does not weigh the arguments very carefully? Thus perhaps by cleverness we may bring it to a knowledge of the truth. With your arguments you would at the same time help your comrades who endure so many unjust judgments, for they would obtain either comfort from your agreement or protection from your influential position. It is not only your Italians who cannot believe that they move if they do not feel it, but we in Germany also do not by any means endear ourselves with this idea. Yet there are ways by which we protect ourselves against these difficulties….

    Be of good cheer, Galileo, and come out publicly. If I judge correctly, there are only a few of the distinguished mathematicians of Europe who would part company with us, so great is the power of truth. If Italy seems a less favorable place for your publication, and if you look for difficulties there, perhaps Germany will allow us this freedom.

    It was the vicious attacks from the mob of scholars who kept people like Keppler and Galileo from publishing. This is why Copernicus sought Papal patronage as protection, and still he was “derided and dishonored” by the vast majority of scientists and mathematicians of the time.

    I try to defend the church for its role in this affair, since Galileo had not proven Copernicus’ theory true, had violated an injunction, had been deceptive about the book he intended to publish, and had insulted the Pope. I realize a lot of people today are shocked by his treatment but that’s beside the point. Not only the Pope but Galileo were men of their time. Not even Galileo would have argued that any of this meant the Pope was exercising illegitimate power over him. He would have found all these restrictions normal and natural.

    But you would have thought the church would have learned from this how ill-advised it is to go along with scientific consensus and to criticize and admonish people who aren’t in lock step with the vicious mob of scholars.

    Judging by Pope Francis’ encyclical, guess not.

    Steve57 (48418e)

  223. dumbest. pope. ever.

    happyfeet (831175)

  224. ==I am referring to the lawsuits filed against the various business owners.==

    Dana, I hope you know by now that I am not unsympathetic to the legal attacks against these business owners –and especially so since I and my neighbors have been the victims of a series of frivolous and expensive lawsuits filed by a sick and evil man (having nothing to do with provision of service, BTW). But as our lawyer says, and as any lawyer in America will tell you, any body can sue anybody else, for any reason at all, at any time.
    Lawfare is not pretty and is not bound by the rules of politeness and niceness. It is always meant to be brutal and served as intimidation. Sometimes a government agency is contacted and brought in by the plaintiff to try to increase the pain and fear. I don’t know how it can be stopped in this day and age, though, do you?

    elissa (428e3f)

  225. after the furman interregnum, the left could not frontally attack the death penalty, so they came up with something called the baldus study, that focused on the application of the penalty, but they still had few takers, so they moved on blocking the production of drugs
    necessary to it’s carrying out,

    narciso (ee1f88)

  226. actually most of the time the lawsuits seem to be brought by some government entity on behalf of the injured party who just wanted a tasty cake or a pretty dress

    at least from the posts i’ve seen on the “blogs”

    it seems kinda rare where the victim of the horrific prejudice brings the lawsuit directly on behalf of themselves

    happyfeet (831175)

  227. oh dear

    Karl’s on the lookout for some oomph again

    this never ends well

    happyfeet (831175)

  228. Dana, re #215: I’d have to read the lawsuits or at least read very specific summaries of what rights they purported to be based upon, to comment on them in any detail. I’m sorry, I’m not trying to be coy or difficult. It’s just that my reaction to them is going to depend on what exact rights someone claims were violated, and what their source is (contract, city ordinance, state law, federal constitutional law, or whatever). I can only say that I think there are tons of things that city and state governments may regulate without offending the federal Constitution, but that doesn’t make them wise, and sometimes they become Berkeley-level stupid. That’s why I don’t live there.

    I know nothing about Canadian law, but I would not be at all surprised if it had extremely broad prescriptions and proscriptions that I’d find shocking, unreasonable, and unnecessary. Ditto the French, ditto the Brits, and ditto in spades for the EU.

    Can you ask me a more specific question in a more specific factual setting, Dana?

    DRJ, re #186, I don’t think the phrase “live your beliefs” is specific enough to be useful here. I suspect you’d agree with me that there are limits, though, to the Free Exercise Clause. For example, can we agree that the federal courts have refused to strike down the Civil Right Act of 1964’s prohibitions against discrimination based on race for many matters of public access within interstate commerce as being unconstitutional, even when applied against defenses that someone’s First Amendment Free Exercise rights (“I can’t serve black people because God tells me they bear the mark of Cain”) are abridged by that law? That hotel owner may indeed being prohibited from “living his beliefs,” but I don’t think the federal courts are going to say he’s got a First Amendment right to refuse black customers.

    As for your earlier question at #180: If the SCOTUS does indeed say that the Equal Protection Clause compels all states to recognize SSM, then yes, I agree: That would most likely be based on a finding that sexual preference is a suspect classification like race or religious preference, and that any state laws discriminating based on sexual preference (including in other contexts besides the specific context of SSM) would therefore be subject to strict scrutiny, which would effectively mean that those laws would probably be unconstitutional; so for example, a state law which said only people with heterosexual preferences could be kindergarten teachers would probably be deemed unconstitutional. It’s an overstatement to say that sort of ruling would immediately compel either the state or federal government to go further, and to pass affirmative protections prohibiting commercial or other types of private-party discrimination against people based on sexual preference. So I don’t think the case currently before the SCOTUS is likely to directly and immediately compel a particular result in favor of the same-sex couple suing its unwilling florist.

    Beldar (fa637a)

  229. Giordano Bruno was burned at the stake by Romans after being found guilty of heresy by the Inquisition. His heresy was both theological and scientific (based on his “Copernicanism and cosmological beliefs”).

    DRJ (e80d46)

  230. ok new rule no burnings

    happyfeet (831175)

  231. DRJ, re #186, I don’t think the phrase “live your beliefs” is specific enough to be useful here.

    My concern is that Christians who believe a gay lifestyle is a sin are being punished by the federal, state or local governments for refusing to participate in SSM ceremonies. This is different from accepting gays, including married gays, in everyday life. I see the logic of treating gay couples the same as straight couples, including get married if the Supreme Court rules as I suspect it will. What I don’t understand is forcing Christians (and Muslims, for that matter) to provide services to SSM ceremonies, even if they object for religious reasons. Just as gays think the ceremony matters, so do Christians.

    DRJ (e80d46)

  232. elissa:

    I don’t know how it can be stopped in this day and age, though, do you?

    You can’t stop lawsuits but that doesn’t mean the government should take sides or criminalize legitimate differences of opinion.

    DRJ (e80d46)

  233. a gay lifestyle

    srsly?

    this is early 90’s 700 Club phraseology

    and it’s really weird in his context

    are we to believe that getting married is the apotheosis of the dreaded “gay lifestyle” what haunts Marion Gordon Robertson’s nightmares?

    I think what bigoted christians are actually afraid of is that failmerican heteros are outstripping gay people in general trashy skankyness.

    Duggar me this. How many gay people you know diddled their family members?

    happyfeet (831175)

  234. yes the Descartes seems a misrepresentation,

    http://www.britannica.com/biography/Giordano-Bruno/Final-years

    narciso (ee1f88)

  235. 206. …The brite line there is hard for many people, including many practicing Christians to grasp.

    elissa (428e3f) — 6/21/2015 @ 2:32 pm

    It would be as if I were an early Christian in pagan Rome, and I sold cattle at the market.

    It would be one thing for me to sell you a bull.

    It would be another if you demanded I write in blood “Hail Aries, god of victory!” because you tell me you’re going to sacrifice it at the temple.

    http://www.cbn.com/cbnnews/world/2015/June/X-Mens-Patrick-Stewart-Defends-Christian-Bakery/

    Actor Patrick Stewart is supporting the free speech rights of Christian bakers from northern Ireland who declined to decorate a cake with a pro-gay-marriage message.

    An Irish court fined the owners of Ashers Bakery £500 for not writing the slogan “Support Gay Marriage” on a cake.

    The bakery owners say they’re happy to bake a cake for anyone, but reserve the right to decline messages that are contrary to their religious beliefs.

    Stewart, who is known for his roles in “Star Trek” and “X-Men,” told BBC “Newsnight” that no one should be forced to write things they disagree with.

    Gay activists have been attacking Stewart for his comments…

    This to me clarifies things, and is why I believe Beldar is being naive about the effects of SSM.

    These gay activists aren’t simply stumbling into Christian bakeries by accident and asking for cakes. They’re targeting Christians and demanding they violate their beliefs. In this case it wasn’t even a wedding cake. Ireland was having a referendum on SSM. This gay activist targeted a Christian bakery and demanded that they bake a cake with the message “Support Gay Marriage” in violation of both their religious and political convictions.

    They do not support gay marriage.

    This is the definition of tyrannay. The case of the Canadian lesbian couple I linked to @67 is also illustrative.

    …”How much they’re against gays.” “Disrespectful” and “unprofessional.” “What we went through.” What they went through? It’s a testament to how bountiful and decadent Western civilization has become that people with such tender, delicate sensibilities are able to somehow make their way in the world.

    But what’s interesting here isn’t the majestic scale of hurt feelings in Canada. It’s that we have a same-sex couple who asks for the services of a wedding vendor who has a different understanding as to what constitutes marriage. This vendor provides their services-and by all accounts provides them in a gracious manner. And that still isn’t enough. Even possession of deviant thoughts is verboten.

    Actually, that’s not quite fair. As Mrs. White says, it’s fine for the Christian jewelers to think whatever they like. So long as they do so in private and don’t say it out loud.

    The jeweler is a Christian but provided the service anyway, and as the article notes did so in a gracious manner. The lesbians claim that they later found out about the fact he had a sign up in his shop which professes his beliefs. I call BS; they went in there because of that sign. So after he had rendered them courteous service they went back and demanded a complete refund. They weren’t going to return the rings. They were demanding them for free.

    “I referred some of my friends to them, just because I did get some good customer service and they had good prices.”

    That was before one friend went in to purchase a ring for his girlfriend_and instead found a distressing sign.

    It reads: “The sanctity of marriage is under attack. Let’s keep marriage between a man and a woman.”

    The friend took a picture of the poster, which made its way back to White. “I had no idea about the sign up until that point,” she said.

    “It was really upsetting. Really sad, because we already had money down on [the rings], and they’re displaying how much they are against gays, and how they think marriage should be between a man and a woman.”

    The couple went to the store the following day, and asked about the sign.

    “They just said that that’s their beliefs, and they think they can put up whatever they want. I just said it was very disrespectful, it’s very unprofessional and I wanted a refund,” White said.

    “I have no issues with them believing in what they believe in. I think everyone’s entitled to their own opinion. But I don’t think they should put their personal beliefs inside their business.”

    Signs expressing personal beliefs are perfectly fine. As long as they’re the personal beliefs of your overlord’s. Clearly, as we see in the Dublin case, it would be perfectly fine to have signs that say “Support Gay Marriage.”

    “Support Gay Marriage” is the new “Workers of the World Unite!” sign.

    http://history.hanover.edu/courses/excerpts/165havel.html

    Vaclav Havel
    “The Power of the Powerless”
    (1978)

    …{4}The manager of a fruit-and-vegetable shop places in his window, among the onions and carrots, the slogan: “Workers of the world, unite!” Why does he do it? What is he trying to communicate to the world? Is he genuinely enthusiastic about the idea of unity among the workers of the world? Is his enthusiasm so great that he feels an irrepressible impulse to acquaint the public with his ideals? Has he really given more than a moment’s thought to how such a unification might occur and what it would mean?

    {5}I think it can safely be assumed that the overwhelming majority of shopkeepers never think about the slogans they put in their windows, nor do they use them to express their real opinions. That poster was delivered to our greengrocer from the enterprise headquarters along with the onions and carrots. He put them all into the window simply because it has been done that way for years, because everyone does it, and because that is the way it has to be. If he were to refuse, there could be trouble. He could be reproached for not having the proper decoration in his window; someone might even accuse him of disloyalty. He does it because these things must be done if one is to get along in life. It is one of the thousands of details that guarantee him a relatively tranquil life “in harmony with society,” as they say.

    {6}Obviously the greengrocer . . . does not put the slogan in his window from any personal desire to acquaint the public with the ideal it expresses. This, of course, does not mean that his action has no motive or significance at all, or that the slogan communicates nothing to anyone. The slogan is really a sign, and as such it contains a subliminal but very definite message. Verbally, it might be expressed this way: “I, the greengrocer XY, live here and I know what I must do. I behave in the manner expected of me. I can be depended upon and am beyond reproach. I am obedient and therefore I have the right to be left in peace.” This message, of course, has an addressee: it is directed above, to the greengrocer’s superior, and at the same time it is a shield that protects the greengrocer from potential informers. The slogan’s real meaning, therefore, is rooted firmly in the greengrocer’s existence. It reflects his vital interests. But what are those vital interests?

    {7}Let us take note: if the greengrocer had been instructed to display the slogan “I am afraid and therefore unquestioningly obedient;’ he would not be nearly as indifferent to its semantics, even though the statement would reflect the truth. The greengrocer would be embarrassed and ashamed to put such an unequivocal statement of his own degradation in the shop window, and quite naturally so, for he is a human being and thus has a sense of his own dignity. To overcome this complication, his expression of loyalty must take the form of a sign which, at least on its textual surface, indicates a level of disinterested conviction. It must allow the greengrocer to say, “What’s wrong with the workers of the world uniting?” Thus the sign helps the greengrocer to conceal from himself the low foundations of his obedience, at the same time concealing the low foundations of power. It hides them behind the facade of something high. And that something is ideology…

    Steve57 (48418e)

  236. Pope to visit USA….

    I wonder what the odds are on a NorEaster blowing through with copious amounts of snow and ice in September?
    Will AlGore be with him?

    askeptic (efcf22)

  237. he will say President Obama TEAR DOWN THIS WALL

    and that will be that

    happyfeet (831175)

  238. DRJ, thanks for #233, which helps me understand your concerns. I share them to a considerable extent, which is why if I were a state or federal legislator or executive, I wouldn’t enact/sign an anti-discrimination law comparable to the Civil Rights Act of 1964 or my hypothetical state law in #197 above to protect gays. I don’t think that’s needed; I don’t think it would be wise; I’d prefer to leave private lives and practices unregulated in these particular settings and on these particular issues.

    If the SCOTUS declines to find that sexual preference is a suspect classification and leaves SSM to the states, I really don’t expect a set of anti-gay “Jim Crow”-law analogs to sweep even the deeply conservative red cities and states across America, nor do I expect private parties to express, by their commercial and other private decisions, massive revulsion against gays.

    But I also am capable of drawing a distinction between the florist and the minister, and I have no trouble say that participating as the officiant in a religious marriage ceremony is a constitutionally different thing than selling & arranging the flowers for it. So even though I wouldn’t support or encourage or participate in passing it, if a state or city does chose to pass a law forbidding merchants to refuse from doing business based on their customers’ sexual preferences, I can agree that law is constitutional on its face, and that as applied to the florist, it’s still constitutional. (It wouldn’t be as applied to the minister.) If the City of Berkeley or the State of Vermont pass such an unwise and unwarranted but constitutional law, that’s a good reason to vote for other city council members and legislators, and perhaps good reason to move to a city or state that hasn’t passed such a law.

    I just don’t think the federal Constitution speaks to sexual preference or to flower shops.

    Beldar (fa637a)

  239. ==My concern is that Christians who believe a gay lifestyle is a sin ==

    DRJ–would you be willing to take a stab at addressing the questions I raised with respect to this @ 206? This is a distinction that many many decent and intelligent people I know have real trouble sorting out and understanding –the shaky gradation of biblical sin that some Christians seem to juggle, I mean. Living together in an open same sex relationship–fine, having a legal ss civil union–not a problem. But a party, a “wedding” at a hotel or other venue crosses the line? Maybe I’m wrong but I think a high school or college debate team would struggle with this inconsistency in logic.

    elissa (428e3f)

  240. Beldar, I’ll try to be more clear.

    At 197, you made an assessment about what you think is constitutionally mandated or prohibited; what might be (within the confines of the U.S. Constitution) permissible regulation by a state or federal statute; and what might be wise.

    You based this assessment, in your first example, with a scenario that we have not yet seen play out in any of the media reports: The florist has been hired to provide flowers and his floral arranging services for a church wedding. He gets there and finds that it’s a same-sex marriage; he puts his flowers back in the truck and goes home, and he says, “I don’t want to continue with this job because I believe God meant for marriage to only be between a man and a woman, and in living my life according to what I believe to be God’s teachings, I believe my performing these services would be going against God’s will.”The gay couple has not been left hanging with guests do to show up shortly, with caterers in place, with minister rehearsed and ready, etc. The disagreements between gay couple/business owners have consistently taken place well *before* any wedding ceremony/event date, and even before a contract has been signed by all parties.

    Therefore, would you change your assessment made in the balance of your comment?

    Dana (86e864)

  241. DRJ @231, from your source:

    5. …After his death he gained considerable fame, being particularly celebrated by 19th- and early 20th-century commentators who regarded him as a martyr for science,[5] though scholars emphasize that Bruno’s astronomical views were at most a small part of the theological and philosophical beliefs that led to his trial…

    I suspect this is why we hear more about Galileo then Giorgano Bruno. Other people held equally rebellious astronomical views and they didn’t get burned at the stake, or even tried for those views. For instance, also from your source:

    In the first half of the 15th century, Nicholas of Cusa challenged the then widely accepted philosophies of Aristotelianism, envisioning instead an infinite universe whose center was everywhere and circumference nowhere, and moreover teeming with countless stars. He also predicted that neither were the rotational orbits circular nor were their movements uniform.

    Nothing happened to him.

    Your source’s footnotes indicates there is a Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy article about about Copernicus mentions Bruno.

    http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/copernicus/

    Here’s what it has to say:

    …Pope Clement VII (r. 1523–1534) had reacted favorably to a talk about Copernicus’s theories, rewarding the speaker with a rare manuscript. There is no indication of how Pope Paul III, to whom On the Revolutions was dedicated reacted; however, a trusted advisor, Bartolomeo Spina of Pisa (1474–1546) intended to condemn it but fell ill and died before his plan was carried out (see Rosen, 1975). Thus, in 1600 there was no official Catholic position on the Copernican system, and it was certainly not a heresy. When Giordano Bruno (1548–1600) was burned at the stake as a heretic, it had nothing to do with his writings in support of Copernican cosmology, and this is clearly shown in Finocchiaro’s reconstruction of the accusations against Bruno (see also Blumenberg’s part 3, chapter 5, titled “Not a Martyr for Copernicanism: Giordano Bruno”)…

    So I’ll stand by my statement. I’m not aware of any astronomer who was burned at the stake. And certainly not for committing the crime of astronomy.

    Steve57 (48418e)

  242. I have made multiple posts because I too want to be clear and precise.

    The original departure was a link to an article suggesting that the legalization of SSM would result in a conflict with “religious freedom”, that people would be told that their religious objections to participation in various events were not adequate/valid. I believe the type of thing meant was the refusal of some businesses to agree to make a commitment to provide a service, such as a baker to refuse to make a wedding cake, or in the worst scenario, a pizzeria demonized just for saying they wouldn’t cater a SS wedding reception as a hypothetical.
    (None of us has ever, as far as I know, even suggested that a business person break a contract at the last moment, we have always talked about the simple ability to decline to enter into a contract, implied or otherwise).
    Beldar made the following statement:
    I therefore disagree with the article you linked as to whether a state’s recognition of SSM is necessarily going to create the fundamental incompatibility with freedom of religion (as guaranteed by the First Amendment)

    I have tried to understand this and have gone back and forth on it, because on the surface it appears to me that it denied the obvious.
    As I stated above, I have come to understand that comment not as disagreeing with the claim of societal conflict of ideas as described in the article, but disagreeing with the idea that this was a conflict with the First Amendment. That Beldar’s understanding of the freedom of religion amendment did not cover the kind of situations some of us thought should be protected. I have seen this referred to by some legal types as a difference between freedom of “worship” and freedom of “religious expression”, with “worship” being a narrow definition of explicitly religious practices and “religious expression” being every day activities with a moral component, such as a nurse or doctor being ordered to assist with abortions.

    Had this been clarified in general terms for some of us like, “Well, some of the conflicts as discussed will continue to be there, but they really aren’t first Amendment issues”. I’m sorry that some people will feel the need to go out of there way to harass people of different religious convictions, but the First Amendment is not your redress”, I, a non-lawyer, would have understood the perspective completely. I may not have agreed, I may not have understood the reasoning to take that view of the first amendment, but I would understand what was being said.

    What I saw the comment as saying, mistakenly, was that the type of conflicts suggested between SSM advocates and those with religious objections would not occur. That did not make sense in any other than a theoretical sense, as we have plenty of empiric evidence to the contrary.

    Let me be clear about something that is not hyperbole. Next year my 15 yo daughter will be in a public school where she will be told that SSM is a great thing and anyone who disagrees is a bigoted idiot. What recourse will I have when the values I have raised my child with are attacked? None, absolutely none, unless going in to the school to talk to an administrator or a school board meeting where I can have the same things told to my face is considered recourse. It would be nice to know that there was some legal precedent somewhere that I had at least as much protection under the law as SSM advocates.

    Instead, I’m being told that I can actually say whatever I want when I am in a church service, but don’t think for a millisecond that I have any right to say the same thing in a public forum.
    Or, maybe I can say what I want, I just need to be hypocritical and not do what I say I believe,
    or maybe I can exist on the margins of society as a certain class of citizen, finding what work I can that my conscience can live with,
    a number greatly reduced from a mere 4 years ago or so.

    So be it. Christians around the world suffer much more.

    As far as elissa’s thought about not understanding the logic of saying one would serve a gay person, but not provide the service for the wedding, are you simply making an observation, or are you asking for some kind of response? You are of course welcome to make the out-loud question, but I’m not going to comment unless you were inviting a response (and it will not be until later tonight or tomorrow).

    Thank you for the links about burned at the stake astronomers. I did not think there were any, and if there were, they were few, not the everyday occurrence that the previously mentioned learned New Humanist philosopher seemed to suggest.

    I’ve made it clear before that I am having trouble sorting out honest difference in opinion and obfuscation. Was I to understand Beldar’s statement as implying there was no need to fear the kind of scenarios in the article that was referred to, or that the scenarios were plenty real, they just didn’t involve a conflict with the 1st Amendment?

    MD in Philly (f9371b)

  243. I don’t know how it can be stopped in this day and age, though, do you?

    elissa,

    I was being tongue-in-cheek with hf re being gracious and pious…

    I don’t think lawsuits can be stopped, of course, but it’s frustrating that, to my layman’s mind, that the exercise of freedom of religion is so constrained, while SSM and all it’s accoutrement seems far less constrained or frankly, given such an apparent edge by the government. Why does one prevail over the other when both are valid beliefs and views?

    Dana (86e864)

  244. Feel free to stand by your statement, Steve57. I pointed out that he was burned at the stake for both theological and scientific heresy. If you want to ignore the scientific aspects, feel free.

    DRJ (e80d46)

  245. MD,

    I think Beldar’s point is that the First Amendment isn’t going to help the Christians in most, if not all, of these cases. I don’t think he expressed an opinion whether that is a good or bad result, other than his preference that this should not be a federal question. I see Beldar’s comments as trying to educate us about how the legal issues should be handled.

    DRJ (e80d46)

  246. 240. …So even though I wouldn’t support or encourage or participate in passing it, if a state or city does chose to pass a law forbidding merchants to refuse from doing business based on their customers’ sexual preferences, I can agree that law is constitutional on its face, and that as applied to the florist, it’s still constitutional…

    I just don’t think the federal Constitution speaks to sexual preference or to flower shops.
    Beldar (fa637a) — 6/21/2015 @ 4:18 pm

    Do you honestly equate refusing to be involved in any way with facilitating a ceremony that one believes blasphemes a sacrament is the same as refusing to provide service based on sexual preference?

    I have trouble distinguishing between the minister and the florist. Could you tell me where the First Amendment’s free exercise of religion singles out ministers?

    Steve57 (48418e)

  247. politesse

    i would ask my fellow christians please to not abstain in the practice thereof

    even if doing so will earn you no glory

    and maybe nobody will even notice

    but you’ll know

    and God will know

    and goshdarn it that means something

    happyfeet (831175)

  248. Living together in an open same sex relationship–fine, having a legal ss civil union–not a problem. But a party, a “wedding” at a hotel or other venue crosses the line? Maybe I’m wrong but I think a high school or college debate team would struggle with this inconsistency in logic.
    elissa (428e3f) — 6/21/2015 @ 4:21 pm

    Since you did ask
    first, there is the concept of freedom of conscience in Scripture. Getting drunk is clearly spoken against. Encouraging a person who has had trouble with alcoholism in the past to have a beer is a sin. Drinking a beer at a large block party where there may be 1 person you don’t know who has had trouble with alcohol in the past? Most people I know would not say that was a sin, but some of them might refrain anyway.

    Do you not see a difference between coexisting with something and helping to enable it? If a guy wants to buy flowers for his live-in girlfriend, or for his male lover, is the florist making statement about his approval of their conduct by selling a flower? I would say no, I suppose some might say yes. What about showing up at a gay wedding looking all smiley and saying “I’m so glad I can be apart of this?” I think that would imply approval.

    By the example with the jeweler (and common sense) nobody wants service unless it can be “done with a smile”.

    Second, who am I to tell another person what their conscience allows?

    MD in Philly (f9371b)

  249. Mr. 57 here’s the clarification about that Midway plane

    happyfeet (831175)

  250. Why does one prevail over the other when both are valid beliefs and views?</block

    Because the proponents of SSM o not believe the adherents to freedom of religion are entitled to their beliefs. At least not in public nor in practice. Again, SSM is not about Mike marrying Joe. It's about breaking the religious, philosophical and moral hold Christianity has on our culture. The left cannot win if people believe God is greater than government.

    Rev. Barack Hussein Hoagie (f4eb27)

  251. Well, maybe so DRJ, but I did not see that clearly at all at his original discounting of the supposed dilemma raised in the discussed article. It came later, after pressing for clarification.

    Last comment, I have to go

    MD in Philly (f9371b)

  252. I think the reason the First Amendment isn’t going to help Christians is that if the Supreme Court recognizes SSM, its basis will be because it finds sexual orientation should be treated like race and gender discrimination. The standard for court review in discrimination cases is “strict scrutiny,” which means a litigant will have a very high burden to overcome government laws that protect that class of people. Religious objections will likely fail to overcome that standard.

    Thus, it isn’t a question of whether or not the religious objection is real. The scales will be tilted in favor of the person claiming discrimination and it will be almost impossible to overcome.

    DRJ (e80d46)

  253. i’m just a holy fool and baby it’s so cruel

    happyfeet (831175)

  254. Living together in an open same sex relationship–fine, having a legal ss civil union–not a problem. But a party, a “wedding” at a hotel or other venue crosses the line? Maybe I’m wrong but I think a high school or college debate team would struggle with this inconsistency in logic.
    elissa (428e3f) — 6/21/2015 @ 4:21 pm

    I think we can assume that the same people who decline to host gay weddings in the place of business, or provide a service at such a wedding, would also decline any invitation to attend one. That is because, no matter the circumstance, their beliefs don’t change. And what they are committed to, they are committed to – whether or not the circumstance is different.

    Dana (86e864)

  255. I’d be surprised if the GLBTers who are very self-righteous, pushy and bossy about their entitlement to receive specific, specialized services from private businesses aren’t obnoxious, extremist creeps in their own right.

    I wonder what type of folks would attend the weddings or what-not of such people, certainly if the guests are fully aware of the controversy surrounding the hosts? I envision the turnout resembling the characters at one of, for example, San Francisco’s freaky gay-pride bacchanals held in public.

    In such situations, I always think of Jesse Jackson saying he’d spit into the food of customers who gave him a hard time, so buyer (or guest) beware of the cakes or refreshments served at the affairs presented by shameless GLBTers.

    Mark (62b020)

  256. Steve57-that wall o words does not illuminate the brite line at all. It elegantly restates once again the position you feel strongly about, and for obvious reasons it reinforces and impresses people who stand with you. I mean that sincerely and with respect. But what it does not do is formulate a clean and crisp modern narrative to address and then convince some of those outside your circle why a cake at a “wedding” party for practicing homosexuals is different than a cake for a party following a civil ceremony for practicing homosexuals, or is different than a cake at a party that is a housewarming for two practicing homosexuals and where there is actually a bedroom in the house! Sex is sex and once you accept that the biblical gay Rubicon has been crossed by the couple, then what does it matter what you call the party or the cake? Is the “sin” you are witnessing any greater, or less? Are the “sinners” any more likely to go to hell? Are you any more likely to go to hell for facilitating or “participating” in their sin by providing an edible cake? These are questions that many people have, especially young people who want to understand the resistance to ssm.

    elissa (428e3f)

  257. which is not to say people shouldn’t strive to be flexible

    happyfeet (831175)

  258. crimethink which skydragon denial seems to be part, are the new sins elissa, for Eich it can serve as excommunication,

    narciso (ee1f88)

  259. the sin is in giving assent, elissa, it’s as simple as that,

    narciso (ee1f88)

  260. it finds sexual orientation should be treated like race and gender

    The wise jurists and pro-SSM litigants, therefore, need to expand the horizons of US law to accommodate people like Clive Davis, the famous music producer who said not too long ago that he has had serious social-sexual relationships with both men and women, and made no bones about it.

    It’s no longer a case of sarcasm to theorize that various people in modern society deserve to be recognized as having both a husband and wife.

    Mark (a11af2)

  261. #206: ==It is obvious that the Bible is clearly disapproving of same sex sex, so it is clear that it is not a matter of arbitrary discrimination.==

    If known homosexual activity is the primary religious objection, then how is decorating a birthday cake for Ellen Degenerous, or delivering buffet pizzas for a gay couple’s housewarming party, or taking publicity photos of the Gay Men’s Chorus OK –but a baking a wedding cake for a hotel reception for a gay couple or taking photos of the couple, family members and guests isn’t? The brite line there is hard for many people, including many practicing Christians to grasp.
    elissa (428e3f) — 6/21/2015 @ 2:32 pm

    The general principle is the desire to not participate in, encourage, or condone behavior that is counter to Biblical teaching. Thus I would be willing to do: decorate cake for Ellen (as long as it has no gay messages on it, because it’s a generic cake for a birthday), delivering buffet pizzas for the housewarming party (no gay messages on the pizza, and no publicity of how my business supports gay activities). The other things I wouldn’t do because they have an inherently gay component: Men’s Gay Chorus because their name is a message, taking photos of the gay wedding because the event speaks for itself. The cake is a wobbler: if they want a cake with no gay messages and will deliver it themselves, fine. If they want gay themed messages, or for me to set it up at the gay wedding site, then no.

    Ken in Camarillo (061845)

  262. wobblecake!

    happyfeet (831175)

  263. narcisco that article confirms what I said on this blog a week or so ago about referring to one’s partner. It is a deliberately planned strategy to force everyone to be “inclusive.” And sometimes when a person references their partner you mistakenly assume they are ghey. But you can be further re-educated, so don’t worry your pretty little head about it.

    Gazzer (be559b)

  264. Also, how do they differentiate between a bidness partner and a spouse co/habitant, I wonder?

    Gazzer (be559b)

  265. it’s corporate crimethink, I mean microagression,

    narciso (ee1f88)

  266. Actually Beldar seems to be quite mistaken about Constitutional law on this issue. There has already been an on point case for this issue: Hurley v. Irish American Gay, Lesbian, and Bisexual Group of Boston, 515 U.S. 557 (1995). The gay group sued to be included in the St. Patrick’s Day Parade on the basis that it was a public event and they could not be discriminated against. The Supreme Court ruled that the organizers of the event could not be forced to make a statement that they did not want to make (approval of gay behavior), and that being forced to include a group that conveyed such a message was a violation of their rights.

    In light of this, I don’t see how the baker or florist had any trouble in their cases. Of course you have to take into account the “crapshoot” component of jurisprudence in recent years.

    Ken in Camarillo (061845)

  267. elissa:

    These are questions that many people have, especially young people who want to understand the resistance to ssm.

    I think that’s a valid point but courts draw narrow lines like this everyday. Just because the lines are sometimes hard to draw doesn’t mean there shouldn’t be any lines. I think the place to draw the line is with the SSM ceremony. Thus, if you want someone to cater, decorate, plan or officiate at your wedding — whether you are gay or straight — then it should be someone who wants to.

    DRJ (e80d46)

  268. But you would have thought the church would have learned from this how ill-advised it is to go along with scientific consensus and to criticize and admonish people who aren’t in lock step with the vicious mob of scholars.

    Judging by Pope Francis’ encyclical, guess not.
    Steve57 (48418e) — 6/21/2015 @ 3:30 pm

    Yep, you nailed it.

    the sin is in giving assent, elissa, it’s as simple as that,
    narciso (ee1f88) — 6/21/2015 @ 5:14 pm

    I agree.

    felipe (56556d)

  269. Ken in C @263 –I genuinely appreciate your trying to address the issues and inconsistencies that puzzle many people. Thank you. I think you have shown how much judgement and thought and analysis of personal belief is required to sort through even a few of the permutations and possible situations presented by our brave new world. Clearly Christians are not monolithic in terms of how literally we read the Bible with respect to this particular “sin”, nor do we all agree on when or how that sin might kick in. And then we also have to throw in the Jews, Buddhists, atheists and agnostics, etc. of our society who also have history and opinions and lives and families and pay taxes.

    It ain’t simple. People who are sure they know all the answers and that every body else is wrong or deceitful or stupid or immoral always worry me. (And I’m not referring to any specific person or comment on this thread so chillax everybody! 🙂

    elissa (428e3f)

  270. 246. …Feel free to stand by your statement, Steve57. I pointed out that he was burned at the stake for both theological and scientific heresy. If you want to ignore the scientific aspects, feel free.

    DRJ (e80d46) — 6/21/2015 @ 4:39 pm

    DRJ, I was relying on genuine scholarship that says the scientific aspects don’t actually exist. I’ve cited the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy. I suppose that’s not enough. The final records of Bruno’s sentencing disappeared during the Napoleonic wars. There is a list of charges, apparently compiled by Cardinal Bruno Bellarmine, that leads people to believe Bruno was tried, sentenced and executed in part for promoting the Copernican theory. There are two problems with that. First, Bruno could not have been condemned for promoting that theory as it was not a heresy at the time. Second, it’s bad scholarship. That wasn’t the list of charges of which Bruno was ultimately found guilty. The Stanford article mentions Maurice A. Finocchiaro’s (Prof. of Philosophy, UNLV) recreation of the charges for which Bruno was tried and convicted. Italian historian Luigi Firpo (1915-1989) also reconstructed the charges. Except for minor differences probably due to translation those lists are essentially identical to this list:

    http://themarlowestudies.org/Baines_Note.html

    The charges of Heresy against Giordano Bruno:

    Holding opinions contrary to the Catholic Faith and speaking against it and its ministers.
    Holding erroneous opinions about the Trinity, about Christ’s divinity and Incarnation.
    Holding erroneous opinions about Christ.
    Holding erroneous opinions about Transubstantiation and Mass.
    Claiming the existence of a plurality of worlds and their eternity.
    Believing in metempsychosis and in the transmigration of the human soul into brutes.
    Dealing in magics and divination.
    Denying the Virginity of Mary.

    All these lists of charges have one thing in common; Copernicanism had nothing to do with it. Consequently science had nothing to do with it.

    What about his belief in the plurality of worlds and their eternity? That seems to touch upon science, but in fact Bruno himself could not separate his theology from his philosophy. Because it’s anachronistic question to even ask. In his day scholars considered their theology and philosophy one and the same. But, he had no scientific basis to believe there were multiple worlds, nor that those worlds were eternal. In fact, the main problem was that he believed those worlds were eternal, as that denied creation. Only God is eternal. Moreover, the Big Bang theory indicates there was a moment of creation, so they aren’t eternal.

    Bruno couldn’t have known about the Big Bang theory, of course, but he had no factual basis to believe they were eternal either.

    What about believing in multiple worlds? The church would have had no problem with that. How do we know? If you scroll back up to 243 I noted that your source mentioned Nicholas of Cusa, who had equally rebellious views about the universe as Bruno. If you go back to your Wikipedia article on Bruno, and click on the link to Wikipedia’s article on Cusa you’ll read:

    Like Nicole Oresme, Nicholas of Cusa also wrote about the possibility of the plurality of worlds.[13][14][15]

    I’m not going to place this magazine article on the same level of scholarship as the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy but it does quote extensively from Cusa’s works:

    http://www.challzine.net/29/29extraterr.html

    Also known as Nicolaus Cusanus, Nicholas of Kues and Nicolaus Krebs. He lived in the 15th Century and he was a priest who later became a Cardinal. Some would say that extraterrestrials are a fact and no man invented them. Maybe in their way they are. However, in another way, Nicholas invented them. Also, some might wonder how a priest who later became a cardinal could argue for the existence of extraterrestrials. In addition, some might wonder how anyone could have argued for their existence before Copernicus and his heliocentric solar system. Before Galileo. Could Extraterrestrials fit into the Ptolemaic universe, they might ask, where the Earth was the center?

    Evidently, they did. Nicholas wrote in his 1439-40 book, De docta ignorantia, i.e., Learned Ignorance:

    “Life, as it exists on Earth in the form of men, animals and plants, is to be found, let us suppose in a high form in the solar and stellar regions. Rather than think that so many stars and parts of the heavens are uninhabited and that this earth of ours alone is peopled – and that with beings perhaps of an inferior type – we will suppose that in every region there are inhabitants, differing in nature by rank and all owing their origin to God, who is the center and circumference of all stellar regions.”

    Not only did Cusa believe in the possibility of a plurality of worlds like Bruno, Cusa went Bruno one better. He proposed there would be extraterrestrials living on those worlds.

    Did he get burned at the stake? No, he was appointed Cardinal 8 years after publishing De docta ignorantia, Prince–Bishop of Brixen two years later, vicar general in the Papal States in 1459, and died in his bed in 1464.

    So I’m not ignoring anything. When you look at the evidence, there were no scientific aspects to Bruno’s trial and execution. It was entirely possible to advance all sorts of weird (for the day) cosmological hypotheses and prosper. Cusa’s ideas were stranger than Bruno’s in that regard.

    It was Bruno’s religious heresies alone, and his refusal to recant, that sealed his fate. Science had nothing to do with it.

    Steve57 (48418e)

  271. I thought that rung a bell, in Germany, they are full on acolytes of the sky dragon,

    http://www.amazon.com/The-Cusanus-Game-Wolfgang-Jeschke/dp/0765319098

    narciso (ee1f88)

  272. Duggar me this. How many gay people you know diddled their family members?

    You had to go and ask. This case changed a lot of my thinking about things. http://www.ibtimes.com.au/gay-paedophile-couple-sexually-abused-their-adopted-son-1334488 WARNING, it will make you throw up.

    nk (dbc370)

  273. elissa @258, I thought I was pretty clear. You could have stopped after just the few lines about selling cattle in ancient Rome.

    1 Corinthians 5:

    12 What business is it of mine to judge those outside the church? Are you not to judge those inside? 13 God will judge those outside. “Expel the wicked person from among you.”[d]

    It isn’t a matter of gay sex. It’s not my place to judge people who put themselves outside of the church. Their souls are their own concern. I can only consider what I must do to remain inside it. And that means not facilitating certain things, such as ceremonies that blaspheme a sacrament.

    So if someone wants to have me deliver pizzas to their housewarming, fine. But I’m not going to decorate a cake with a message that counters my beliefs and places my salvation at risk. Any more than I would participate in or facilitate a pagan ceremony in Rome.

    But there is not bright shining line. That isn’t the point. All that matters is that it’s a sincerely held belief. I’m not a theologian, and neither are the courts. Nobody can say for anyone else where that line is.

    Steve57 (48418e)

  274. The original topic of this thread, that losing the SCOTUS case benefits conservatives, is not supported by the evidence IMO. He uses Roe v Wade as his precedent, but I’m pretty sure the amount of $ contributed by pro-abortion groups since then exceeds the $ spent to oppose abortion by a fairly wide margin. It’s likely that the difficulty of Republicans getting elected in the northeast, the west coast and other areas of the country is related to abortion. So his whole premise is wrong.

    Gerald A (949d7d)

  275. Jazz Shaw seems to think the more principles the more successful the GOP gets, hasn’t that boat sailed, floundered, and been refloated again,

    narciso (ee1f88)

  276. WARNING, it will make you throw up.

    I wonder how the two main people (the “husbands”) in that sickening story think and debate? It would be fascinating if it were determined they’re similar to this forum’s Perry or others who have a particular way of viewing and talking about controversies and prominent newsmakers. Of course, there’s always a possibility the two criminals are down-to-earth conservatives (or Australia’s counterpart to sensible Republicans), but I kind of doubt that.

    Mark (a11af2)

  277. @ Dana (#242): In general, in the absence of a state or federal statute or constitutional provision saying otherwise, we’re each free to structure our commercial transactions with other private parties according to our own whims. There’s been no law passed by Congress or the Texas Legislature which says, for example, that I have to agree to perform legal services for gingers. I can discriminate against gingers, and they can’t sue or otherwise compel me to be their lawyer. But if I announce tomorrow that I’m not going to represent any gingers, the Ginger Equality League may mount a campaign against me on internet social media, they may boycott me, they might picket my office on public property — and that is their right.

    The reason I constructed the hypothetical above in the way I did — presuming that there had already been a contract formed between the couple who wanted the florist to sell flowers and his floral arranging services for their wedding — is that I wanted the hypothetical to include in its scope the question whether a civil court, in ruling upon a breach of contract claim, would be obligated to consider a defense based upon the Free Exercise Clause. I believe there’s no such defense to a breach of contract claim (when the parties’ contractual meeting of the mind was silent on the subject of same- or different-sex orientation of the people making the contract and participating in the wedding).

    But if your question is simply, “Even before forming a contract and agreeing to sell flowers and floral arranging services, did the florist have an obligation to accept the same-sex couple’s business in the first place, that is, an obligation to offer them a contract on the same terms he would to mixed-sex couples?”: Then my answer is: No, the federal Constitution certainly doesn’t compel that, nor has Congress passed a law so requiring (e.g., something comparable to the Civil Rights Act of 1964, but including a prohibition against discrimination based on sexual orientation). So unless the florist’s home state or city has passed such a law, he’s free to refuse to do business with the same-sex couple without encountering any legal compulsion otherwise, just as I’m free to refuse to take ginger clients.

    (He’s going to face attempts to demonize him and boycott him and so forth, and I will instantly agree that those who’re busy doing that sort of demonization these days are much, much, much more virulent in their efforts than the Ginger Equality League. I’m not encouraging supporters of SSM to engage in that short of behavior, and indeed I believe it’s counterproductive to their own goals of trying to develop a voluntary public consensus.)

    If our florist lives in Vermont, though, for example, and if Vermont has already passed a law like I hypothesized above, I believe that Vermont can enforce that law against the florist without violating his rights under the Free Exercise Clause of the First Amendment. I don’t think selling flowers and floral arrangement services is the exercise of religion. I don’t think a state law regulating the terms and conditions under which a florist can sell flowers can therefore meaningfully abridge the free exercise of religion, no more than a law which requires hotels to rent rooms to black people meaningfully abridges the hotel owner’s free exercise of religion.

    But if I were a member of the Vermont legislature, I’d vote against the sort of law I sexual preference anti-discrimination law hypothesized above — because I think it’s unnecessary. That’s where I stand as a matter of public policy. As a personal decision, I’d still try to persuade the florist to change his mind and to treat same-sex couples like opposite-sex couples; but if he tells me that for reasons of faith, or otherwise, he refuses, I’d accept that decision.

    Ken in Camarillo (#270): Hurley is about freedom of speech, not freedom of religion. Parades are a very traditional and long-recognized means of expressing speech. Selling flowers to weddings — isn’t.

    Beldar (fa637a)

  278. Oh noes! I was doing the NYT crossword and the clue was;
    Bruce an Kris from realty TV. Will Shortz will be flayed alive. Quite right too.

    Gazzer (be559b)

  279. I would say that the approach of the loyalty oath cases would be my preferred defense. I have a visceral aversion to putting my religion on trial. Give not that which is holy unto the dogs, neither cast ye your pearls before swine, lest they trample them under their feet, and turn again and rend you. I would argue, same as the religious, that I am being compelled to approve by deed, and participate in, conduct I disagree with. But my reason would be that official Goodthink should not be a requirement for being allowed to earn my daily bread, same as the suspected “subversives” in the loyalty oath cases.

    (I’d probably present it to the court better than this after a little research and one or two re-writes. 😉 )

    nk (dbc370)

  280. Thank you, Beldar, for all the insightful posts in this thread.

    As I’ve read through your posts, I keep saying to myself Yes! Yes! and again, Yes!

    ThOR (a52560)

  281. In my view the reason to not endorse same sex marriage has little to do with my salvation, it has to do with their salvation. Declining to endorse an act of sin by refusing to participate in it is a statement/reminder that it is sin. God doesn’t ask anyone to be more rude than they need to be, but He asks us to be truthful about sin, because one cannot be truthful about forgiveness and God’s love and mercy if the reality of sin is ignored.
    God does not tell us what to do to be a killjoy, He tells us out of love for what is good for us. It is not us Christians who are going out of our way to offend people, others are going out of their way to challenge, taunt, and mock.

    I am not claiming to know everything, I am only claiming what the clear meaning of unproblematic passages of Scripture teach. If someone wants to claim being a Christian means something directly inconsistent with the NT, they can do so, but I do not know on what basis they would make the assertion.

    So, the bottom line is that the forced legal acceptance of gay behavior through anti-discrimination laws and same sex marriage will not cause a conflict with 1st amendment religious protection,
    it will just cause a major conflict with the implementation of firmly held religious beliefs,
    because the 1st amendment isn’t going to help anyway.

    But since people tell us that we should be talked out of these beliefs anyway, I guess it’s our tough luck.

    And all they wanted was to be left alone to do what they wanted.

    MD in Philly (f9371b)

  282. Actually, it is not so much our tough luck as the tough luck of those encouraged to live a lie instead of finding abundant love, mercy, grace, and healing.

    MD in Philly (f9371b)

  283. All of this could have been clarified and spelled out in 1/4th of this.

    MD in Philly (f9371b)

  284. it’s a fair bet, anything they accuse us off, is what they intend, ie; the accusation of oil companies funding the skeptics, when Maurice Strong and Soros were doing exactly that,

    the reflex to ban weapons from law abiding citizens, while the gangs turn the streets into a slaughterhouse in metropoli like Chicago and NY,

    narciso (ee1f88)

  285. 286. In my view the reason to not endorse same sex marriage has little to do with my salvation, it has to do with their salvation. Declining to endorse an act of sin by refusing to participate in it is a statement/reminder that it is sin…

    There are two issues. Endorsing SSM, and participating in or facilitating it. I won’t endorse it for sociological reasons.

    As far as participating in or facilitating a gay marriage, your reasoning isn’t the message I get from Paul’s letters.

    When he was writing there were very few Christians, and many, many polytheists. If Christians refused to engage in standard economic activity that might have endorsed another’s sin out of regard for the salvation of the non-believers, they never would have worked, and they never would have eaten.

    The only passage I could find that’s relevant is 1 Corinthians 5:12-13; I’m pretty sure there’s something even more on point.

    But to me the message I get is I can’t do anything about the state of anyone else’s soul than my own. So I must refuse to do what I can not do. And God will take care of the rest.

    But since people tell us that we should be talked out of these beliefs anyway, I guess it’s our tough luck.

    And all they wanted was to be left alone to do what they wanted.

    MD in Philly (f9371b) — 6/21/2015 @ 8:11 pm

    No, they never just wanted to be left alone. I mentioned they’ve been lying about their true goals for some time.

    And when it comes to separating us from our beliefs, the progressive cultural Marxist left will not limit themselves to trying to talk us out of them.

    Steve57 (48418e)

  286. And all they wanted was to be left alone to do what they wanted.
    That was sarcasm. I agree with you.

    MD in Philly (f9371b)

  287. And all they wanted was to be left alone to do what they wanted.

    MD in Philly (f9371b) — 6/21/2015 @ 8:11 pm

    No, they never just wanted to be left alone. I mentioned they’ve been lying about their true goals for some time.

    Steve57 (48418e) — 6/21/2015 @ 8:50 pm

    Steve57, MD in Philly is being sarcastic.

    felipe (56556d)

  288. Further to my last, doc. There were two recent cases in which states conspired with groups like Planned Parenthood and other abortion absolutist groups to force pharmacists to violate their conciences.

    Those cases were Stormans v. Wiesman (Stormans v. Selecky when decided by the UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT WESTERN DISTRICT OF WASHINGTON AT TACOMA in 2012) and Morr-Fitz, Inc. v. Quinn in Illinois (also decided in 2012).

    Both were blatant attempts to target Christian pharmacists and force them to violate their beliefs or drive them out of business. By blatant I mean unlike Hillary! they didn’t delete their emails discussing exactly what they intended to do. Or, in the Illinois case, then Gov. Blagojevich couldn’t keep his mouth shut about what they were trying to do. They changed their pharmacist rules to require pharmacies stock and sell abortifacients and sell them with no conscience exemptions.

    http://aclj.org/pharmacists-victory-illinois-seven-year-fight-conscience-rights

    http://www.becketfund.org/stormans-case/

    Unfortunately the state of Washington appealed the case after a resounding defeat at the district court level. In November of last year the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals heard oral arguments.

    As the Becket fund puts it, your job or your conscience. The progressive cultural Marxist left really hates Christians. And the HHS mandate is just another attempt at this same thing. Your business or your conscience. None of this is about health care.

    So, don’t expect anyone to try to talk you out of your beliefs, doc.

    Steve57 (48418e)

  289. I knew doc was being sarcastic.

    34. …I didn’t book mark it, as I thought it was so ho hum and what I already knew to be true, but I recently saw an article with candid quotes from pro SSM advocates talking about all of the deceptions in arguments they used to push the agenda, themselves knowing them not to be true but knew they would work, and now discussing how to proceed with the next step to societal transformation…

    MD in Philly (f9371b) — 6/20/2015 @ 5:59 pm

    Steve57 (48418e)

  290. I am not claiming to know everything, I am only claiming what the clear meaning of unproblematic passages of Scripture teach. If someone wants to claim being a Christian means something directly inconsistent with the NT, they can do so, but I do not know on what basis they would make the assertion.

    What you “only claim” is almost as outrageous though.
    Lets list it out:
    1. That iron age peasants accurately documented miracles: no lies or sensationalisms
    2. That there is no error in translation
    3. That the exact documents/”gospels” that were selected (many times by voting) to be included/excluded in the NT are correct ones
    4. That the selected documents are divinely inspired
    5. Repeat 1 and 2 but run the clock back even further and apply the same to the OT and the even less sophisticated peasants from that time frame who among other things practiced:

    Slavery
    Selling their daughters
    Stoning
    Genocide

    Hats off to ya!
    -Gil

    Gil (febf10)

  291. #282 Beldar: You very cleanly split the hair that wasn’t there. “Hurley is about freedom of speech, not freedom of religion.”

    In that case then, I don’t claim freedom of religion, I claim freedom of speech. The Court ruled that even a law designed to prevent discrimination would not stand against my freedom of speech if it compelled me to in effect make statements counter to my beliefs.

    Ken in Camarillo (061845)

  292. Karl and team republican have the largest bullseye on their backs, how could we miss?
    http://www.americanthinker.com/articles/2015/06/karl_rove_vs_the_2nd_amendment.html

    mg (31009b)

  293. thanks for the reminder to pray for you, Gil.

    you may not want to ride any horses to Damascus

    MD in Philly (f9371b)

  294. Sure thing MD.
    George Carlin – religion & praying
    The above link is a funny one, especially the part about praying.
    Remember they’re jokes people!

    Gil (4e1585)

  295. Most common capacities are 5000 litres, 10000
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    Elke (55c70e)

  296. Raise your hand if it surprised you that Gil loathes religion. What a tired broken record.

    JD (3b5483)

  297. MD in Philly, ya gotta stop poking the heathen with a stick. He’s a one trick pony and it’s tiring.

    Rev. Barack Hussein Hoagie (f4eb27)

  298. Like I was saying ….

    nk (dbc370)

  299. it will just cause a major conflict with the implementation of firmly held religious beliefs,

    For all the new-age secularists out there — whose eyes may glaze over (or roll) when anti-SSM or, for that matter, anti-homosexuality is placed within the context of Christianity or the Bible — I like to cite the writings of the famous ancient Greek philosopher Plato. It’s fascinating that in an age before the Bible, before Christ, before the New Testament, that Plato originally sounded like a typical modern-day liberal and proclaimed opponents of homosexuality as — to paraphrase — philistines or country bumpkins. What’s far more fascinating is that he eventually came to repudiate same-sex behavior, certainly involving males, and ended up condemning it in the harshest terms imaginable.

    Simply put, Plato’s observations illustrate the phenomenon of various humans — regardless of time or teachings — having an intrinsic disdain for homosexuality. An innate disdain or discomfort that transcends religion A, B or C, or the politics of the moment.

    Mark (a11af2)

  300. I find Gil’s posts illustrative in that they show me how I can modify my own delivery. If I were trying to convince anyone of anything, being a world-class tool is probably not going to help.

    carlitos (c24ed5)

  301. you have to walk them right up to the abyss of understanding

    then all it takes is a lil shove

    happyfeet (a037ad)

  302. 305. I find Gil’s posts illustrative in that they show me how I can modify my own delivery. If I were trying to convince anyone of anything, being a world-class tool is probably not going to help.

    carlitos (c24ed5) — 6/22/2015 @ 7:36 am

    Yes, he’s like a poster boy for how much more rational, tolerant, compassionate, and thoughtful atheists are then Christians, isn’t he?

    Steve57 (48418e)

  303. This is why I don’t trust Jazz Shaw’s analysis.

    http://hotair.com/archives/2015/06/22/so-now-we-have-to-worry-about-knife-control-laws/

    So now we have to worry about knife control laws?

    …I was aware that there were specific regulations regarding knives in certain places, but it seems there are quite a few more than I realized. In New York City, for example, there is a debate underway regarding long standing state prohibitions against gravity knives.

    …I suppose the first point of contention here is the need to identify exactly what a “gravity knife” is. This is the best, most general definition I was able to find.

    …You learn something new every day I suppose.

    …This is a picture I just took of the Gerber folding utility knife I carry on a daily basis. The Gerber needs to have a small, spring loaded lever in the base pushed to the side in order to unlock and open it or to close it again. It’s a two handed operation, so I suppose I’m safe on the gravity knife front…

    The knife looks like a Gerber EVO (oval slots in handle, five screw holes around blade pivot pin, etc.). By “spring loaded lever in the base pushed to the side” it sounds like he’s trying to describe a liner lock.

    I know my Gerber has a liner lock, and a quick search shows that EVO’s have liner locks (and unless it’s an automatic knife I don’t know of any current Gerber’s that use any other lock), and that would describe it.

    With practice or even just with wear you can most definitely open and close them with one hand.

    So just because it’s a two-handed operation for him does not mean he’s safe on the gravity knife front. Because if he were to go into NYC with that knife any experienced cop could flick it open with one hand. Boom! Illegal gravity knife. That’s not something new you want to learn someday.

    If I were him, I’d know my knife laws instead of waiting to get busted. I keep up with Texas knife laws, including what cities such as San Antonio and Corpus Christi have more restrictive knife laws (we really need to get state preemption in Texas).

    As I said, this alone makes it tough to trust his analysis.

    Steve57 (48418e)

  304. Raise your hand if it surprised you that Gil loathes religion. What a tired broken record.

    Hi JD. I did not express hatred. I point out the folly of believing in it. What evidence is it actually based on eyewitness evidence? We have thousands of eyewitnesses today who claim they’ve been on UFOs yet we don’t take them seriously. But we take a select series of Gospels from thousands of years ago without any real verification as divine. It is a matter of fact the tribunals reviewed and selected Gospels to include and exclude in the New Testament sometimes by voting. Was this to a divinely inspired process?

    To top this off the entire thing is based on an even older and more sketchy document that is only taken as true based on a belief that has no rational justification. I’m on the other problems this document tells us of the world that is only 6000 years old that was flooded globally above the height of the highest mountains in which people can live inside of fish for days and many other nonsensical facts.

    To claim any type of certainty about how true Christians should behave based on a process like this is absurd.
    Hate has nothing to do with it. But it is a convenient way of dismissing ideas that you do not like.

    Gil (fb6f2c)

  305. Like I said above, please don’t associate me with this tool.

    carlitos (c24ed5)

  306. carlitos -‘Gil goes to great lengths to reinforce and confirm what we know to be true about him. It is like he wants to make 110% certain that we know he is a verbose preening sneering twatwaffle.

    JD (3b5483)

  307. steve57 (#308): I know you don’t approve of my views on SSM, but I hope you approve of daily-carry pocketknife (which I can indeed open with one hand, and I practice doing that quite regularly). I didn’t know Corpus and SA had restrictive knife laws, but I agree with you about the Legislature needing to preempt that (as they did with local fracking bans).

    Beldar (fa637a)

  308. Beldar, I love Spyderco knives. I still carry a fixed blade neck or boot knife as it used to be folders could run into trouble as gravity knives or switchblades (assisted opening). Not since 2013.

    http://www.akti.org/news/texas-legislation-would-remove-switchbade-restrictions/

    Effective September 1, 2013

    Legal in the State of Texas to:

    Possess switchblades
    Manufacture switchblades
    Transport switchblades
    Repair switchblades
    Sell switchblades

    Knife Preemption did NOT pass in 2013. The American Knife & Tool Institute advises caution. Some municipalities (including San Antonio) do have city ordinances with restrictions regarding knives, some with exceptions for hunting, fishing or occupational use.

    Still illegal per Sec. 46.01(6)(C) are “dagger, including but not limited to dirk, stiletto and poniard.” There are no definitions for these knives in Texas law. Exercise caution as it is generally accepted that dagger includes any double-edged knife (and any double-edged switchblade would probably still be considered an illegal dagger).

    Governor Perry Signs Bill to Legalize Switchblades

    UPDATE (June 14, 2013) – Thank you Governor Rick Perry for signing HB 1862. Effective September 1, 2013, it is no longer illegal to possess, manufacture, transport, repair or sell switchblades in the state of Texas.

    And indeed:

    http://www.statutes.legis.state.tx.us/docs/PE/htm/PE.46.htm

    TITLE 10. OFFENSES AGAINST PUBLIC HEALTH, SAFETY, AND MORALS

    CHAPTER 46. WEAPONS

    Sec. 46.01. DEFINITIONS. In this chapter:

    (6) “Illegal knife” means a:

    (A) knife with a blade over five and one-half inches;

    (B) hand instrument designed to cut or stab another by being thrown;

    (C) dagger, including but not limited to a dirk, stiletto, and poniard;

    (D) bowie knife;

    (E) sword; or

    (F) spear.

    It used to be there were other factors that could make a knife illegal that would only apply to a folder. But no more. So, yes, I approve. I only stopped carrying folders because state of the law when I moved here. With a fixed knife as long as it was single edge, less than 5.5″ (really anything over 4 1/4 to maybe 4 1/2 and it’s no longer EDC), and you had nothing more to worry about. Now I’m used to it.

    I also carry a Case Rancher pocket knife in my back pocket and a Swiss Army money clip knife in my side pocket with my money, natch, which is useful if you need scissors. Or money.

    R.E. your stance on SSM I disagree with it and I fear you’ll be disappointed.

    But you won’t be disappointed in the Spyderco folder. I never was.

    Steve57 (48418e)

  309. Shoot. I meant the Case large Stockman; the one with three blades; spey, sheepsfoot, and clip point.

    My typical EDC:

    http://www.amazon.com/Ka-Bar-BK11-Becker-Necker-Knife/dp/B001N1CBB6/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1435025670&sr=8-1&keywords=ka-bar+becker+necker

    I have one set up as a boot knife. I bought the optional TDI clip and paracord-wrapped the handle for comfort. The other is just as K-Bar made it, and I wear it as a neck knife.

    Depending on how I’m dressed I can often get away with this:

    http://www.amazon.com/Dragon-Fixed-Blade-Wharncliffe-Handle/dp/B005LS4B6U/ref=sr_1_4?s=sporting-goods&ie=UTF8&qid=1435026188&sr=1-4&keywords=columbia+river+knife+%26+tool+dragon

    The point isn’t the strongest but that’s what the Case pocketknife is for.

    And, yes, boys and girls and everything else that’s new, they’re all perfectly legal. I’ve never run across a cop who wasn’t aware of that fact.

    Steve57 (48418e)

  310. steve57 (#313 & 314), that’s quite a collection! My daughter’s been doing charity work in Haiti and the Dominican Republic lately, and you will appreciate the huge thrill it gave me to comply with her request: “Daddy, one of my friends I trust recommends that I carry a knife for protection when I’m out and about down there. Can you buy me one, please?” She wanted something that she could also use as a utility knife, so I got her a Spyderco Endura. I don’t have much need for a utility knife in my daily work, though, so I prefer the wickedly curved and serrated edge on my Civilian — it looks really bad-ass and makes a very gratifying click as I draw and open it, and, although I’ve never yet had to use it for personal protection purposes, if I do I want it to look as scary as possible.

    Beldar (fa637a)

  311. And isn’t it somehow terribly sad and ironically inappropriate that a Bowie knife is illegal in Texas?

    Beldar (fa637a)

  312. Never brandish a knife, Beldar. Should you ever need to use it for protection, your attacker should only feel it and not see it. And afterwards, you want the police and Felony Review to think “Tom Sawyer” and not “Hannibal Lecter” (he used an Endura or very similar, I believe). Further, don’t be James Dean — be a hockey player. Step in close, grab on to your opponent with your free hand, and … well, you know ….

    As for the Bowie ban, that dates back to Reconstruction. Seriously, I’ve looked it up. But in any case, the Bowie knife is not what romances (and Sheffield knifemakers) made it out to be. It’s likely like the Fowler Bowie at the Alamo Museum, designed by Rezin Bowie and given to Captain Fowler by either Rezin or James. https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/4/49/Fowlerkn.JPG/330px-Fowlerkn.JPG An old Mediterranean design, built a little sturdier. You have knives just as good or better in your kitchen, I’d bet. The real “Bowie” was Jim’s speed, strength, courage and ferocity.

    nk (dbc370)

  313. Sorry, Hannibal’s would be the Harpy that you posted yesterday, not the Endura.

    nk (dbc370)

  314. Beldar, if I may humbly offer a suggestion. If you need a knife for personal protection and a utility knife, carry two. I like my Case Stockman. But a Swiss Army knife for utility.

    Reserve the other knife for personal protection and keep it absolutely sharp.

    http://www.amazon.com/Dragon-Fixed-Blade-Wharncliffe-Handle/dp/B005LS4B6U/ref=sr_1_4?s=sporting-goods&ie=UTF8&qid=1435026188&sr=1-4&keywords=columbia+river+knife+%26+tool+dragon

    The nice thing about the Wharncliffe blade is it’s straight, making it a breeze to sharpen. If it should get dull. Which it won’t, if you don’t use it as utility knife.

    I’m not saying it’s the best blade shape. Just that the sharpness of the blade, it can make a difference, when it comes to cutting through clothes. If you’ve dulled it on something else, it may not do the job.

    Different blades are for different jobs. You could, maybe, use a Wharncliffe blade for cutting cheese. No belly, not much else use in the kitchen. Your Spyderco Civilian, Beldar, has quite the Karambit look to it. Not much use for stabbing, but I’ll bet it’s a ripper.

    Steve57 (ec1eac)

  315. I would at least recommend this. It will keep a knife paper cutting sharp.

    http://www.amazon.com/AccuSharp-1-001-Knife-Sharpener/dp/B00004VWKQ/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1435101083&sr=8-1&keywords=accusharp

    …you will appreciate the huge thrill it gave me to comply with her request: “Daddy, one of my friends I trust recommends that I carry a knife for protection when I’m out and about down there. Can you buy me one, please?”…

    I would be busting-out-of-my-shirt proud if I were you, Beldar.

    Congratulations.

    Steve57 (ec1eac)

  316. 317. …You have knives just as good or better in your kitchen, I’d bet.

    nk (dbc370) — 6/23/2015 @ 7:34 am

    Look it up. Red necks have whole websites dedicated to grinding this to suit.

    https://www.lehmans.com/p-5481-old-hickory-butcher-knife.aspx?utm_source=Bing&utm_medium=CPC&utm_campaign=NB_PLA_AllProducts_BING&zmam=32933335&zmas=1&zmac=20&zmap=1112980

    Old Hickory Butcher Knife

    Today’s Price: $12.99

    Which actually ain’t to bad a utility knife to start with.

    Steve57 (ec1eac)

  317. I know you will check the applicable laws before you send her a knife, Beldar. I don’t know if it’s reliable but this website suggests knives are prohibited from entering or leaving Haiti.

    DRJ (e80d46)

  318. There is always that, DRJ.

    We always seemed to get quite a bit of leeway on the local laws. We were on USN ships, and sailors do need knives. Not for bar fights, but to cut line and other things.

    Steve57 (ec1eac)

  319. Say, nk and Steve57—interesting advice. Sources for self-defense strategies with knives?

    I used to have throwing knives as a kiddo. Those were the days.

    Simon Jester (6bc193)

  320. I don’t know how to respond, nk. I’m actually familiar with the story of Wolhuter from the books by Peter Hathaway Capstick. But everything is boxed up because I’m remodeling the upstairs. So I don’t know which one.

    Steve57 (ec1eac)

  321. Paladin Press has a bunch of books, Simon. Like this one http://www.flyshack.com/DisplayItem.aspx?ItemID=105636&src=froogle&gclid=CIPT1KG1p8YCFdgOgQodMNEOeQ And various military manuals with chapters on knife fighting. And even on prison shanks. There are others, more classical, like this one http://www.amazon.com/Manual-Of-The-Baratero-Handling-ebook/dp/B004BKJUIS . But the Bowie brothers learned how to use knives slaughtering animals on their farm — I’ve read that all Rezin wanted was a knife that could reliably pierce a bull’s skull (I presume at the base). And like I wrote above — it was neither the knife nor the technique — it was speed, strength, courage and ferocity. Ok, and some knowledge of anatomy. 😉

    nk (dbc370)

  322. Simon Jester @325, throwing knives are illegal in Texas.

    I recommend Eskrima or some other Filipino martial art.See @313:

    TITLE 10. OFFENSES AGAINST PUBLIC HEALTH, SAFETY, AND MORALS

    CHAPTER 46. WEAPONS

    Sec. 46.01. DEFINITIONS. In this chapter:

    (6) “Illegal knife” means a:

    (A) knife with a blade over five and one-half inches;

    (B) hand instrument designed to cut or stab another by being thrown;

    Steve57 (ec1eac)

  323. Thank you, gents.

    Simon Jester (490faa)

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