Nashville. I spent last week in the Nashville area -- in Clarksville, Gallatin and Tullahoma, among other places. Very beautiful country and very charming folks. Yes, I do spend too much time on the road -- in the upcoming months I've got trips to Ohio (Columbus, New Philadelphia, possibly Chillicothe and Zanesville; hopefully Steubenville, where the great Franciscan University of Steubenville makes its home), New York City, Miami, and Michigan (Ann Arbor, Battle Creek, and Lansing).

The New PB. Tonight we had a Father's Day celebration over at my wife's brother's house -- most of her family was there and we had a lot of intergenerational chatter. We got around to discussing The Who and our favorite songs. The consensus favorite song: "Won't Get Fooled Again" ("...meet the new boss / same as the old boss..."). Then I got home and heard the news about the election of Rt Revd Katharine Jefferts Schori to be the next Presiding Bishop of the ECUSA and wondered if this was prophetic.

I have no problem with the fact that the presiding bishop elect is a woman. In fact, like Ruth Gledhill, I feel "a shiver of excitement at the election of a woman to the position of Presiding Bishop..." Will it cause problems within the Anglican Communion, the fact that KJS is a woman? No, I don't think so -- some consternation perhaps, but the Primates have long ago looked at this issue and determined they would

respect the decision and attitudes of other provinces in the ordination or consecration of women to the episcopate, without such respect necessarily indicating acceptance of the principles involved, maintaining the highest possible degree of communion with the provinces which differ.

Moreover, they agreed they would "exercise courtesy and maintain communications with bishops who may differ, and with any woman bishop, ensuring an open dialogue in the Church to whatever extent communion is impaired."

They decided this 18 years ago -- at the 1988 Lambeth Conference. Unlike the American Bishops who will pledge anything, knowing their words are meaningless, the African bishops and the other bishops and ministers of the Global South are men of their word.

So, although they might differ with the Americans on the ordination of a woman as priest or bishop, this will not be what causes a problem.

Experience? Yes, her resume is thin. She has never led a parish. It's only been eleven years since she was ordained. On one hand, that gives me pause -- but then the Lord of Israel sometimes calls a young shepherd, a young betrothed woman, a young sailor named Nicholas.

No, it's not her gender, nor her experience which troubles me. It's her actions.

She is a strong supporter of the ordination of VGR; a strong supporter of Integrity; an opponent of, among other things, the Articles of Religion, the Chicago-Lambeth Quadrilaterial of 1886, 1888, and the obedience to "the teaching and direction of Our Lord Jesus Christ as set forth in Holy Scripture." According to John Burwell, "she left the 2003 convention and instituted same-sex rites for her parishes and missions."

In other words, she appears to be just another in a long line of apostate clergy. And I weep.


Now, I don't mean to give up hope -- the most encouraging comment I've seen was something Kendall Harmon posted before the election:

Bishop Schori is a very interesting wild card–I think she is the person least beholden to the Episcopal Church “system.” We shall just have to wait and see.

If he is right about that and if she is faithful to the Lord -- perhaps has a Thomas à Becket conversion -- then the VGRs and the Spong's of the world could be begging someone to rid them of this troublesome priest.

In any event, I do not trust in men, I trust God. Psalm 20.

[Note: As can be seen, I started writing this when I couldn't get to sleep -- I didn't publish it initially -- it has since been revised and extended.]

Columbus (Flag Day, Part II). Scanning the blogs tonight, I saw that baby blue has a picture up of the hanging of the flags. It's here. As best I can tell, they've replaced the Duvalier flag with the one that preceded it, not the current one, as mentioned below. I know this is more in the category of jots and tittles, but you'd think being an Empire, The Episcopal Church™ could get it right.

The Episcopal Tergiversation. Prior to going to Columbus, Truro Rector Martyn Minns issues a short statement of goals for the denomination formerly known as ECUSA:

What do we hope and pray for at General Convention in Ohio this week and next?

REAFFIRMATION: The teaching of the church on matters such as the uniqueness of Christ and the trustworthiness of Holy Scripture especially on matters of human sexuality was called into question at GC2003. Now is the time to reaffirm the truths of classical Christianity.

REPENTANCE: At GC2003 the General Convention made decisions that have torn the Church apart. ECUSA has been challenged to repent (change direction, turn around), not merely express remorse for the consequences of their actions.

ROLL BACK: Actions were taken at GC2003 regarding the election of Gene Robinson and the blessing of same-sex unions that have had a devastating impact on our witness and the work of the wider church. They need to be rolled back so that the damage can be undone.

This brought a rebuke from the Diocese of Virginia:

There has been much talk of embracing the Windsor Report. We think that’s good. But do you really know Windsor’s ABCs? Or for that matter, how about the ‘R’s?

Of the four ‘R’s currently making the rounds you will find two in the report:

REGRET: As in, we should express regret “that the proper restraints of the bonds of affection were breached” in the election and consent to Gene Robinson.

RECONCILIATION: As in, Windsor is not a judgment but “part of a pilgrimage towards healing and reconciliation.”

But we’ve been hearing some other ‘R’s that you will not find in Windsor:

REPENTANCE: As in repent for the election of Bishop Robinson. There is no reference to repentance for the election and consent to Bishop Robinson.

ROLLBACK: As in, undo it. There is no call in Windsor for a rollback of the consent to Bishop Robinson.[*] Indeed, Windsor recommends that the Archbishop of Canterbury (Windsor’s real ABC) use “very considerable caution” in inviting and admitting Bishop Robinson to the councils of the Communion. The premise of that recommendation is that Gene Robinson will indeed remain a bishop.

What the Diocese is engaging in is nothing short of a lie, as I will show, below. The sad thing, for the Diocese is that the leadership apparently believes its own lies, as do many others who are ECUSA delegates and by believing these self-serving lies, they are dooming the denomination for destruction and separation from the larger Anglican Communion.

This type of lie is an equivocation, a prevarication, a distortion of the truth with the intent to mislead. It appears that the DioVA is hoping to set a very low bar so that it can pass a meaningless expression of regret ("we're sorry you chose to be hurt by our actions") as opposed to a real expression of regret at having rejected the rest of the Anglican Communion (and those members of the Diocese who have chosen to remain faithful to the teachings of Christ).

But don't take my word for it, let's see what Bishop Tom Wright has to say. In a paper republished on Titus1:9, Bp. Wright, a senior member of the Lambeth Commission (which produced the Windsor report, in .pdf here) seeks to set the record straight. Because, as he explains, "the only way forward which will command assent from the Communion and enable us to proceed together is to be careful and exact about what precisely Windsor said and meant."

As an aside, before I continue to digest Bp. Wright's paper, which should be read in whole, a point of clarification. There is a bit of confusion with the use of the term "Commission" throughout the paper. In some cases, it refers to the Lambeth Commission which produced the Windsor Report. In others, it refers to the "Special Commission on the Episcopal Church and the Anglican Communion" which produced a 61 page report -- here, in .pdf -- for ECUSA. I will refer to this Commission with a bracketed [ECUSA] for clarification when quoting Bp. Wright.

The context of Bp. Wright's paper, as noted in my aside, is the response being prepared by the ECUSA Commission for consideration by the delegates in Columbus. He notes the ECUSA commission omits key facts in its history: "It is surprising to see that in its account of the history of the current issue there is no mention of what the Primates said in October 2003 [notes and references omitted] and hence of the fact that the consecration of Gene Robinson had gone ahead in full knowledge of the consequences."

Bp. Wright continues in ¶5 of his paper:

The [ECUSA] Commission then rightly turns its attention to the key questions, ‘expressing regret and repentance.' This section is crucial as an introduction to the key recommendations. It focuses on Windsor para 134, quoting its introductory sentence (‘Mindful of the hurt and offence that have resulted from recent events, and yet also of the imperatives of communion – the repentance, forgiveness and reconciliation enjoined on us by Christ – we have debated long and hard how all sides may be brought together’). It does not, however, quote the next part of Windsor 134, but contents itself – vitally, as will emerge in a moment – with a summary in terms of ‘a statement of regret for breaching the bonds of affection’ and ‘moratoria on particular actions’ (34, end). It notes that ‘statements of regret have been made by the House of Bishops and the Executive Council,’ though without noting that these have not been the ‘statements of regret’ asked for by Windsor, but rather statements of regret that some people were hurt by ECUSA’s actions, and a statement (from the House of Bishops in March 2005, anticipating the phraseology now used in the Commission’s proposals) of regret for breaching the bonds of affection ‘by any failure to consult adequately with our Anglican partners before taking those actions’, which as we shall presently see is clearly and specifically not what Windsor asked for.

He continues in ¶ 6:

The section continues to speak in general terms of ‘statements of regret’ without quoting, or addressing, the specific statements asked for in Windsor 134. Instead, para 38 says (at the end), ‘We also believe that the General Convention’s consideration of such expressions of regret and repentance will provide clear evidence of our desire to reaffirm the bonds of affection that unite us in the fellowship of the Anglican Communion.’ This is a puzzling statement, whose implications become clear in the resolutions that follow. Certainly the fact that General Convention will consider expressions of regret and repentance will demonstrate that most in ECUSA want to remain within the Anglican Communion. But the important question is whether that desire will lead to the specific and particular expressions of regret and repentance asked for by Windsor 134, or whether ECUSA will try to attain the goal of staying within the Communion without travelling by the only route that will get there, namely that of the road mapped by Windsor and endorsed by the Primates and ACC.

Continuing in a very key section in ¶7, he explains:

... At no point in the Commission’s report is it even mentioned that the real problem is not that actions are ‘out of sequence’ or taken ‘without time for consultation’, but that the actions in question went exactly, explicitly and knowingly against the expressed mind of Lambeth, ACC, the Primates and the Archbishop of Canterbury. There had, in fact, been plenty of consultation at several levels, and ECUSA chose to ignore the results of that consultation.

Emphasis added. Bp. Wright continues on to succintly dismantle the prevarications of the ECUSA Commission, which, as I said, should be read in full.

In ¶10, he notes the duplicity** being proposed by the ECUSA Commission:

When it comes to public rites of blessing of same-sex unions, the Commission suggests that its previous resolution has been misunderstood. . . . From a Windsor perspective, this sounds like a straightforward attempt to have one’s cake and eat it, using a narrow definition of ‘authorized’ (= ‘printed in an official prayer book’) to deny that local liturgies come into that category, while explicitly encouraging their development and use. See (17) below for the outworking of this, where it becomes clear, as noted in Windsor 144, that General Convention is seen as ‘making provision’ for, and individual diocesan bishops can then ‘authorize’, such blessings.

In paragraphs 12-17 of his paper, he turns to the proposed resolutions, beginning with the twisting of Windsor:

The benchmark against which the key resolutions must be measured is of course Windsor 134 (for Resolutions A160 and A161) and Windsor 144 (for A162). The report quotes the preamble to Windsor 134 . . . but never quotes the recommendations themselves. The reason for this, sadly, becomes all too clear: the [ECUSA] Commission . . . decided to decline Windsor’s request and to do something else instead, using some words and phrases which echo those of Windsor while not affirming the substance that was asked for. This, with real sadness, is my basic conclusion: that unless the relevant Resolutions are amended so that they clearly state what Windsor clearly requested, the rest of the Communion is bound to conclude that ECUSA has specifically chosen not to comply with Windsor.

¶12. Again, my emphasis.

He continues in the next few sections to eviscerate the ECUSA [fake] apologies summing up in ¶15:

To put it bluntly: Resolution A160 is not, as it stands, Windsor-compliant, and the Commission must have known that only too well. Granted that, the statement in the ‘Explanation’ that this Resolution is ‘thus signalling our synodical intentions to remain within the Communion’ must, sadly, be seen as essentially cynical. Windsor said that ‘such an expression of regret’ – i.e. the one that Windsor requested, not the one that the Resolution offers – ‘would represent the desire of ECUSA to remain within the Communion.’ The fact that the ‘explanation’ quotes this latter phrase demonstrates a desire, not apparently to comply with Windsor, but to give the appearance of doing so to those who glance at the text but do not look carefully at what is actually said.

He weighs the next proposal, dealing with a moratorium on the ordination of sexually active gay persons and finds it wanting, concluding "...if Resolution A161 is passed without amendment, and still more if it is not even passed, it will be impossible to draw any other conclusion but that ECUSA has chosen not to comply with the Windsor recommendations." ¶16.

Finally he concludes most emphatically:

It is very important not to let the plethora of material, in the official document and in all the various commentaries on it, detract attention from from the central and quite simple question: Will ECUSA comply with the specific and detailed recommendations of Windsor, or will it not? As the Resolutions stand, only one answer is possible: if these are passed without amendment, ECUSA will have specifically, deliberately and knowingly decided not to comply with Windsor.

at ¶19, again, my emphasis added.

The duplicity of ECUSA and echoed by its DioVa Amen Corner must not stand. If it does, ECUSA will be "'turning [it's] back on', i.e. forsaking, something in which one was previously engaged, interested or concerned; desertion or abandonment of a cause, party, etc.; apostasy, renegation."

----------------
*Note, that Canon Minns, in his statement above, does not call for an express rollback of the consent of the ordination of Gene Robinson.

**In an aside in ¶ 14, Bp. Wright notes:

(and at this point, reading and re-reading what they wrote, I have to say with sadness that the word ‘duplicity’ comes unbidden to my mind)

Columbus Reflections (Day One, Flag Day). The best observation from the first day is that ECUSA has decided to rebrand itself. It is no longer just the US part of the Anglican Communion, but is now The Episcopal Church™, a 16 nation confederation standing on its own and coming to a neighborhood near you.

In someways, this is a natural progression -- ECUSA has always acted more like an Empire rather than a collection of Christian congregations.

Oh, and then there was the little problem with the flags. It seems that The Episcopal Church™ in its press conference designed to impress upon the world how truly global it is, used the Duvalier flag of Haiti, instead of the one which has been in effect for, oh, the last 20 years! See this picture taken from Rev. Burwell's report (I drew in the yellow arrow pointing to the Duvalier flag):

Here is the current flag of Haiti:

Source.

Opps! No one said it was easy to be an empire...

But the really important stuff was the paper by Bishop N.T. Wright which may be found here and will be the subject of another post.

Columbus (Introduction). My duties as a little league manager are winding down -- work is still busy (in fact, I almost got sent to Columbus this week at the last minute), but I should be able to resume blogging soon.

In the meantime, like most of the 'piskies here in America, I have been monitoring developments at GenCon06 in Columbus.

Here are my favorite sites:

• TitusOneNine - Kendall Harmon, the heavyweight of Anglicans in American.
• BabyBlue - writer (and fellow Truro-ite) Mary A's reports and thought from ground zero.
• John Burwell's reports - NOT a Blog!. John gives you his perspective and it's got the folksy manner of a Paul Harvey report. Plus, pictures (it was good to see a picture of Mary Hays, who conducted the baptism classes for our first child, now 17).
• GenCon06 - run by the elves of CANN. Everything is there -- Everything.
  

These are my big 4, but there are others who are on the ground and should not be missed, if you want to get the whole picture:

• Matt Kennedy at StandFirm.
• The San Joaquin perspective.
• Ruth Gledhill from London (can I be frank? -- with a name like this and the whole British thing, I was expecting her to look like a dowdy 60 year old retired school mum, not someone who could give Nicole Kidman a run for her money);
• Rick Lord from Vienna, VA.
  
• and Lydia Evans also from SC.

And the non-evangelical (or post-Christian) websites:

• The Center Aisle -- the official DioVa propaganda arm, reporting from the "center aisle" of the cathedral on the far left side of the spectrum.
• Inch at a Time -- (also known as the $200 dollar answer under the category, "Church Demolition" the question being "What's the best way to chip at the foundation?")
• and, of course, Louie Crew.
  

More on the shooting... I picked my daughter up tonight after her small group and my two ball games (actually a practice for my son's team -- I'm the manager -- and my middle daughter's softball game, where I just help out). We stopped at Wal-Mart on the way home and, while picking up some practice balls for the team, I saw the sign over the rifles which indicated that "YOU MUST BE 21 TO PURCHASE AMMUNITION IN VIRGINIA." Although it is apparently okay to purchase a handgun at 18.

Now this is one of those areas where I separate from my conservative brethern. I want to know how this 18 year old mental patient, who had escaped from a mental institution, then engaged in an armed carjacking, then was arrested and bailed out of jail all within the past month... I want to know where he got five pistols, two rifles and a bucketload of ammunition from?

Does this make any sense at all?

I mean, even if you are a gun nut?


My daughter said she heard that some kids at Westfields had heard him talking about doing this... and that the shooter apparently had a myspace page.

this makes no sense...

Still More. My oldest daughter was right -- here's his myspace page.

Browse through the comments and the most expressed comment seems to be "rest in peace." This guy was a neo-nazi who took seven firearms and got off 70 shots -- killing a mother with two kids and critically wounding another and all you can say is rest in peace? One guy writes,

Well, you did what you always claimed wanting to do. I've never prayed for anyone before, but i'll do it for your sake tonight, praying that there is no hell.

This seems to me the John Lennon Imagine generation at its best....

Sad Day. We lost a police officer in the line of duty here in Fairfax County today. There are two more who have been hospitalized in critical condition. Please pray.

More. Here is an article on the officer, Vicky Armel, who was shot and killed. An excerpt:

Vicky Armel made a life-changing decision about two years ago, and she wanted everyone to know it.

“She was on fire for the Lord,” said Julie Higdon, part of a home-based Bible study with Armel in Jeffersonton.

Armel, an outgoing mother of two young children and a resident of the Quail Ridge subdivision in northern Culpeper County, was killed Monday afternoon in Chantilly when a gunman opened fire on the Sully District police station.

She was a nine-year veteran of the Fairfax County Police Department. Her husband, Tyler, also worked with the FCPD.

Armel leaves behind a 4-year-old girl, Mason, and a 7-year-old boy, Thomas.

“She accepted Christ within the last couple of years,” said Mark DeCourcey, assistant pastor at Mountain View Community Church. “It was fairly new to her, which is what made her so exciting to be around. The new relationship with Christ was just energizing to her.”

Church members say Armel performed several behind-the-scenes roles such as painting, planning a family retreat, folding bulletins, making decorations and doing administrative tasks.

“Knowing that she had given her life to Chirst,” DeCourcey said, “that’s something we’ll be able to celebrate soon once we get through the shock and the loss.”

Word spread quickly that the Mountain View Community had lost a loved one. Lead pastor Mark Jenkins and Bible study leader Dwayne Higdon were in Chantilly Monday night and could not be reached for comment.

Members of the Mountain View congregation did not know Armel’s age or when she moved to Culpeper, but Julie Higdon said she had lived here “for a while.”

“She was probably one of the nicest people you’ll ever want to know,” said church member Kim Elias. “Great mom.”

This is so sad -- to leave behind young children.

I live in a neighborhood with a lot of police officers and they're really great men and women -- this loss affects us all.

A few months ago I was in a McDonalds with my son out in Chantilly and a very beautiful female police officer came in and was keeping an eye on some [probable] gang members. My son was very impressed with her -- her uniform and of course the pistol. She struck up a conversation with my son and he was just so impressed. She was 30-ish and had a boy about his age. The thing that really impressed me was that she could be so gentle with my son and yet, I could see her tough vigilance of the gang guys. It was like being in two worlds at once.

And that's the way most of the force that I encounter seem -- they walk in two worlds and do so with skill. It's gut-wrenching to think of one of these women or men cut down in the prime of life with young kids.

Pray for Tyler, Mason, and Thomas.

Still More. I don't mean to imply that the police officer I met was Officer Armel; it's possible, but doubtful. While that McDonalds was in Chantilly (Greenbriar Shopping Center, for those familiar with the area), it's kind of far from the police station and may be in another district. I just meant that, well, we have some really good folks on the force and I appreciate them.

YES!

(Jai Lewis, please work on your foul shots -- nearly all of Fairfax just had heartattacks.)

Forget "Roe for Men," what about Roe for Children, Babies, and the Unborn?

What happens to the mind of a person, and the moral fabric of a nation, that accepts the aborting of the life of a baby without a pang of conscience? What kind of person, and what kind of society, will we have 20 years hence if life can be taken so casually?

- Jesse Jackson, Jr., quoted here

Many people are very, very concerned with the children in India, with the children in Africa where quite a number die, maybe of malnutrition, of hunger and so on, but millions are dying deliberately by the will of the mother. And this is what is the greatest destroyer of peace today. Because if a mother can kill her own child - what is left for me to kill you and you kill me - there is nothing between.

- Mother Teresa, Address to the Nobel Committee, November 11, 1979

Mickey Kaus, in his very concise manner, throws out some quick scenarios if the "Roe for Men" case were to have some degree of success. Yet, what so much of what the Roe for Men issue misses is Roe’s impact on children, born and unborn. The current issue* of the Harvard Journal for Law & Public Policy has a valuable essay which explores “the connection between the mistreatment of children and the dehumanization of unborn children, and will argue that both wrongs stem from the misguided premise that human lives only deserve constitutional rights once a set level of development is reached.”

Moreover, as author Tracy Leigh Dodds states in the next sentence, “[t]rue recognition of the civil rights of children will not meaningfully progress until America learns to value children at all stages of development.”

This is something I firmly believe – it used to be a tenet of progressivism, witness the Jesse Jackson quotation above – but it is something which has been lost along the way.

In the Guardian last week, Madeline Bunting wrote “…a bias against having babies has permeated our culture. This phenomenon needs a new word - anti-natalism…”

No, actually, I think Pope John Paul, II had a better grasp of what civilization was up against – it’s the culture of death:

Above all, society must learn to embrace once more the great gift of life, to cherish it, to protect it, and to defend it against the culture of death, itself an expression of the great fear that stalks our times. One of your most noble tasks as Bishops is to stand firmly on the side of life, encouraging those who defend it and building with them a genuine culture of life.

- John Paul, II Address of the Holy Father to US Bishops of California, Nevada and Hawaii, October 2, 1998

* In addition, the Journal republishes one of William Hubbs Rehnquist’s more important law review articles, The Notion of a Living Constitution from 1976. I know when he passed away, I wanted to link to it, but it was not on-line at the time. The article shows Rehnquist’s always dry humor (“At first blush it seems certain that a living Constitution is better than what must be its counterpart, a dead Constitution.”) but was really one of the first to scrutinize the arguments for the “living constitution” fallacy.

Out Again. *sigh* Yes, I do travel too much -- I was in NC recently -- we stayed in the same hotel with the VaTech and Boston College Teams for the ACC tournment. Also, the Miami cheerleaders -- why don't the cheerleaders stay in the same hotels as the teams?

Anyway, I probably won't be blogging much until July -- I'm managing a Little League team (the A's!) and it's taking a lot more time than I expected. Plus, still traveling for work.

Also, rumor has it that two people at work were fired for misusing the computer. Since our organization has a "no blogging with Corp. equipment" rule, and when I travel, I only use a Corp. computer (as I mentioned when this rule was put into effect), well you get the picture. I miss writing while I'm on travel, but I do like my job.

Ding-Dong. (repeat frequently) . From afar the congregation of Truro Church has been watching young love in bloom -- (am I being too corny? -- hang it -- who cares). Specifically, for a number of years, the son of one minister has been dating the daughter of another minister. Sometimes, (speaking for some of the parents at least) we feel less like a congregation and more like those background singers in "The Little Mermaid" (kiss the girl Sha-la-la-la-la-la )

The daughter, Catherine Crocker, was my oldest daughter's small group leader for a number of years. The son, Jamie Brown, has been, among other things, the worship leader for the Saturday Night service at Truro Church.

And Catherine blogs about her life and experiences. So when my daughter, Joy, told me the bare minimum, namely that Catherine had a ring, I turned to her blog (on xanga) to get the details that Joy was too stingy to share.

It's a really sweet story -- I urge all of you to read it. A very romantic day with some very romantic traditions (the ding-dong of the title could be wedding bells, but isn't -- you'll see if you follow her story). Start here, then go here (this is the one with all the details), and go here to see the ring.

Oh and she has lots of great pictures.

(and since Catherine said I had a really big blog that everyone read, I'm hoping her news will get picked up by some of the real biggies, like CANN and Kendall)

Now we're all wondering who will celebrate (or is the proper ecclesiastical word "officiate") the service?

Alternate History and the Constitution. One of my resolutions for the new year has been to read at least one law review article a week. This isn't a discipline, so much as it is a treat -- yeah, it's good for me, but I also love it. I've come across quite a few things I should be sharing. Here are two bits of alternate history.

Both come from Michael Stokes Paulsen's "Captain James T. Kirk And The Enterprise Of Constitutional Interpretation: Some Modest Proposals From The Twenty-Third Century" 59 Alb. L. Rev. 671 (1995), which riffs off from the Star Trek episode The Omega Glory.

The gist of Paulsen's article is that the Constitution is for "WE THE PEOPLE" not just for the high priest known as the Supreme Court. In making his argument, he puts forth a number of hypotheticals and proposals. The first hypo is this one:

Consider another not too far-fetched hypothetical. The year is 1861. Abraham Lincoln has been inaugurated as President and southern states are seceding in droves. Suppose that the same southern-dominated Taney Court that decided Dred Scott ruled that the South could lawfully secede, and that President Lincoln's prosecution of the Civil War was therefore unconstitutional. If Lincoln is persuaded that the decision is wrong, lawless, and immoral, is he nonetheless bound to recall Union troops, vacate the White House, and move the capital of the remaining states in the United States of America somewhere north of the Maryland border? Or suppose instead - quite plausibly, in light of Dred Scott - that the Supreme Court declared the Emancipation Proclamation unconstitutional as a taking of property. Should Lincoln acquiesce in a judgment returning freed blacks to slavery?

I say, and Lincoln (by then) certainly would have said, absolutely not.

Notes omitted. Interesting question, no? Is the Supreme Court always right?

Okay, now consider this hypo, which relates to the doctrine of interposition:

As a way of trying to consider this issue afresh, and counteracting out instinctive biases, I ask you to consider the real-life case of Lemmon v. The People, decided by the highest court of the Empire State, the New York Court of Appeals, in 1860, on the eve of the Civil War. Lemmon is, in many ways, the companion piece to Dred Scott.

A Virginia family was travelling to Texas by way of New York City. (That was the most efficient route in those days, because of the efficiency of steamboat travel from New York City to New Orleans.) The Virginians brought their eight slaves into New York State, where they were freed on a writ of habeas corpus. New York was, of course, free soil. Under New York law, Negro slaves brought by their owners voluntarily into New York immediately became free. (Runaways were governed by the Fugitive Slave Cause and the Fugitive Slave Act of 1850.) The New York courts chose to apply their own state's law, rather than the law of Virginia, to this choice-of-law situation. The Court of Appeals affirmed the lower courts' holding that these were free men and women.

Suppose now that history had played out slightly differently in 1860 and 1861: Either Vice President John Breckenridge or Senator Stephen Douglas is elected President in 1860, rather than Lincoln, and the South stays in the Union. Lemmon goes up to the U.S. Supreme Court on appeal. The Taney Court reverses the New York Court of Appeals, on the authority of Dred Scott's recognition of the right to hold slaves as property and a determination that the Privileges and Immunities Clause of Article IV protects a slaveholder's right to keep that property when he travels to another state.

This was a foreseeable, even an expected result, noted by Lincoln and a good many others in the aftermath of Dred Scott. Lemmon would be simply the next logical step from Scott. And, as a consequence, it would require that slavery be tolerated in the North, confirming Lincoln's prophecy that the Nation could not survive half slave and half free. Lemmon would make slavery the law of the land. There could be no such thing as a "free" state.

Suppose now that you are the Governor of New York. The pro-slavery Taney Court has held that former slaves freed under the laws of New York must be returned to their Virginia masters. Indeed, anyone may move to New York from the South and keep their slaves. Moreover, it follows that native New Yorkers can start holding slaves too. Under the Supreme Court's ruling, which you firmly believe is both wrong under the Constitution and wrong as a matter of morality, New York harbor is about to become the largest slave-trading port in the world. What do you do? May you refuse to obey the Supreme Court's decision, refuse to return the freed slaves, and resist the Douglas or Breckenridge administration's attempted enforcement of the Lemmon decree?

I am inclined to say yes, yes, and yes. State government officials - governors, legislators, judges - also swear an oath to support the federal Constitution. Fidelity to that oath, I should think, requires resisting violations of the Constitution by the federal government with all the powers at your disposal as a state, including, perhaps, calling forth the militia. I have to tell you that, under this scenario, I would expect (or hope) that Governor Paulsen would be leading the Yankees into armed rebellion against the lawful government of the Union, rather than acquiescing in the extension of slavery to free soil and the sending of freed men back to bondage.

Now this should be disturbing. For, in a sense, this is Governor George Wallace blocking the schoolhouse doors to resist integration. My point here is simply that interposition can be used for good or for ill, and its legitimacy should not turn on the historical accident that it has been most regularly invoked for ill.

Again, note omitted.

Girl Scout Cookies. Ever feel like eating a whole box of Girl Scout cookies? Want to know what will do the most damage? My wife, the troop cookie Mom, has figured this out.

Calories per box

Trefoils . . . . . . . 1430
Cafe Cookies . . .1410
Thin Mints . . . . . 1330
Do-si-dos . . . . . .1320
All Abouts . . . . . 1200
Samoas . . . . . . . 1125
Tagalongs . . . . . .975
Lemon Coolers . . 858

Sorry, no internet sales allowed.

Of Partial-Birth Abortions and Heart Attacks. Okay, why does our beloved media feel compelled to refer to partial birth abortion in scare quotes or with other qualifiers? See, for example, this WaPo Story from yesterday, which began,

The Supreme Court agreed yesterday to decide whether a 2003 federal ban on the procedure that critics call "partial birth" abortion is constitutional . . .

The justification ususally given is that this is a term that pro-lifers came up with or that it's not medically accurate (or both).

Of course, I would reply that it doesn't matter who came up with it and that it is accurate.

In any event, why can't our beloved media get the story of Harry Whittington's heart irregularity correct? So far, I've only seen one story, by the LA Times, surprisingly enough, describe it correctly. It wasn't a "heart attack."

The rest of the media keep referring to it as a "heart attack." See, for example, this story by ABC, also posted yesterday:

Whittington, 78, was struck by up to 200 shotgun pellets in the right torso, neck and face. He sustained a mild heart attack caused by a pellet lodged at his heart three days after the shooting but was released from a Corpus Christi hospital Friday.

As explained in the Best of the Web,

A physician who reads this column writes:

Calling the pellet-induced arrhythmia a "heart attack" is a little sensationalist. A "heart attack" is not an official medical term, and is generally taken as meaning a blockage of a significant cardiac artery and resultant damage to the heart. Calling the pellet-induced heart damage a "heart attack" is like calling a bruise a "tissue infarction." The pellet presumably irritated a small area of heart tissue or obstructed a tiny blood vessel.

If the media can go through all its pains when it comes to partial birth abortion (or what journalists call "a procedure critics call 'partial-birth abortion.") why can't they get Whittington's heart irregularity correct?

Admittedly, I've had way too many arguments about this in the past, but this is one of those things that will not go away...

Which Sci-Fi crew would you fit best in? Hmmm....

Your Ultimate Sci-Fi Profile II: which sci-fi crew would you best fit in? (pics)

created with QuizFarm.com

I'm afraid of this one.

What do you get? An ambiguous Derrida mug with no top and no bottom?

Hurricane Names, 2006. My name is on there -- is yours? Is this the year your name becomes mud? We have two friends named Katrina -- both have told us they always loved their name until this year.

Alberto
Beryl
Chris
Debby
Ernesto
Florence
Gordon
Helene
Isaac
Joyce
Kirk
Leslie
Michael
Nadine
Oscar
Patty
Rafael
Sandy
Tony
Valerie
William

I predict the one to watch out for is Nadine.

The Pacific names (including "Bud" -- how can anyone evacuate when faced with a Hurricane Bud?) and future names are here.

Test: Keys to the Heart.
(Valentine's Day Edition)

The Keys to Your Heart

You are attracted to those who are unbridled, untrammeled, and free. In love, you feel the most alive when things are straight-forward, and you're told that you're loved. You'd like to your lover to think you are loyal and faithful... that you'll never change. You would be forced to break up with someone who was emotional, moody, and difficult to please. Your ideal relationship is open. Both of you can talk about everything... no secrets. Your risk of cheating is zero. You care about society and morality. You would never break a commitment. You think of marriage as something precious. You'll treasure marriage and treat it as sacred. In this moment, you think of love as commitment. Love only works when both people are totally devoted.

What Are The Keys To Your Heart?

Global Warming. I had hoped to get back to the subject of global warming, but the "Blizzard of '06" took up too much of my time this past weekend. (No, I'm not trying to be snarky there -- although the juxtaposition is definitely difficult for those making the global warming comments. [When I was a boy living in DC from 1969-71, we had one big snow and at least one winter with no snow. These days we get more frequent snowfalls and also heavier snows.]) I had some time yesterday to go on-line, but couldn't get through to my dial-up, so I did taxes instead. And shovelled a lot of snow...

I hope to come back to this in a day or two.

In the meantime, here's an interesting article about the political developments regarding global warming in the US: Academy to Referee Climate-Change Fight from the free section of the WSJ last Friday, regarding the National Acadamy of Sciences.

And a big hello to Bruce Geerdes a gentleman I truly want to recommend.

I met Bruce through the Daniel Amos Discussion List and its various Off-Topic lists he established. Bruce is a very thoughtful person -- I especially recommend him to those of you who are bloggers on the Right side of the political spectrum. Bruce is faithful to Christ and brings a perspective that will make you think twice about your political beliefs.

Go forth and be challenged.