I’ve been really busy today, but here’s a place for you to sound off on whatever interests you.
Some possible topics:
- The Post’s 2014 midterm forecast — The WashPost took the trouble of putting this together, so I thought I’d share.
- Supreme Court Allows Opening Prayer at Town Board Meeting — That seems to be most papers’ lede story at the moment.
- Nigerian Islamist group ‘to sell’ abducted girls — And now, for news fresh from the 14th century…
- 1,000 ounces of gold recovered from sunken ship off SC coast — I figure that at current rates, that’s about $1.3 million worth.
Or… talk amongst yourselves about whatever you’d like…
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If the Post’s prediction comes true (Republicans take control of Senate and gain a 45 seat advantage in House), it’s going to get REAL interesting.
Gotta thank Lindsey Graham for flooding the airwaves with anti-Obama ads. I see them all the time now. Even during a show about buying property in Alaska.
People buying property in Alaska seem like a fertile ground for anti-Obama. Alaska brought us Sarah Palin, after all.
Graham anti-Obama? But this release from Lee Bright says he’s “Obama’s pet Republican.”
There seems to be an inconsistency here. I’m so confused…
Here’s another poll with bad news for the Dems.
Not sure this election cycle matters much except at the state level. If the senate flips that just means Obama can’t get his appointments confirmed. Otherwise no legislation will pass either way. In any event I think the Post is far to bullish on the GOP. At best they are about a 60% favorite to take the Senate and only a tiny number of house seats are even up for grabs. Races in LA and AR should not be in the GOP camp just yet. I’d rate those two as toss-ups. KY could be a surprise pickup for the Dems.
I think what will make the difference are two things. First, the GOP obsession with Benghazi and the other non-scandals is quickly growing tiresome for the voters. They want to see congress focused on the economy. Second, Obamacare is not going to work to the advantage that conservatives believe it will. The “horror” stories continue to be debunked. There is a large net increase in folks who are insured. Plus people are becoming more concerned, and with good reason, that a full repeal will result in a loss of features (pre-existing conditions, donut hole for Medicare, etc.) that folks see as positives.
If the Democrats run on a platform of fixing the flaws in the ACA while pointing out the huge shortcomings of the GOP on this issue then they have a winner. I say bring it on if they want a fight on this issue. Remember the Republicans had full control of government for 6 years and did nothing to improve the worst health care payment system in the world. Do we really want to go back to the bad ole days? I think not. But the Dems have to sell it. And they are not very good at marketing.
The SCOTUS continues it’s string of horrible 5-4 decisions. Why is it so hard for people to understand that this is not a Theocracy?
The guy challenging the prayer “sought to limit the town to ‘inclusive and ecumenical’ prayers that referred only to a ‘generic God’.”
A Generic God. Somehow, I think praying to a Generic God pisses off God more than not praying at all.
Which is one reason I’m not a huge fan of ceremonial prayers. Prayer isn’t for show.
But unconstitutional isn’t synonymous with bad idea.
Absolutely!
I think most understand that.
Most also understand that a prayer before a council meeting isn’t state sponsorship of religion anymore than the council drinking from Subway cups is a state endorsement of Subway restaurants (most people except for Justice Kagan that is).
I think you speak like an adherent to the majority faith. How would you feel if, before every meeting, or most meetings, they cleared the floor and did the Muslim thing.
Or sacrificed an animal? Or prayed to Satan?
Well, clearing the floor to “do the Muslim thing” would kind of be a disruption, more than the 30 second prayer that’s been going on. Same with animal sacrifice – think those are a little messy. So that’s not really a good analogy.
I’d have no problem with them doing a short Muslim prayer or a short prayer to the animal god spirit of the groundhog or whatever they worship in New York State animal cults. Maybe the beaver? (State animal of NY).
Oregon has been the Beaver State since 1969. Even has the distinction of being the only state with a different reverse side to the state flag – of, you guessed it, a beaver.
NY state was late to the party; only adopting the beaver in 1975.
Ah, but if you are going to pray Muslim-style, you gotta do it right.
If I were attending a public meeting in Saudi Arabia, I would expect some mention of the Prophet. And I would bow my head and show my respect, as a stranger in a strange land.
What I expect in this country is a Gaussian prayer. You ever read The City Boy by Herman Wouk? It was sort of an urban, Jewish, 20th-century version of Tom Sawyer, about a kid growing up in New York in 1928.
Mr. Gauss is the school principal, who augments his income by running a summer camp, where part of the novel’s action takes place. He’s quite the diplomatic politician, and his camp features devotionals that are carefully crafted to be comfortable for both Jews and Christians, which in this country is about as generic as prayer gets.
A satanic verse, or a Hindu ritual, would create bumps in the liturgy — they would stick out. Mr. Gauss isn’t into bumps; he wants everything to stay smooth…
Actually the thing that most amused me moving to the South was the habit of the Christian prayer immediately after the Pledge of Allegiance before governmental meetings.
“I pledge allegiance to the Flag of the United States of America, and to the Republic for which it stands, one Nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all.” Followed 5 seconds later with a prayer that says, yeah, we didn’t really mean all that stuff we just said…
There is a certain richness of hypocrisy in that which always seemed not to enter the consciousness of the masses – or at least I felt as though I was in the minority in seeing things that way. But, this being the complex South, maybe it is widely appreciated – and simply gone on with; just as things have been done before.
I don’t know what you mean by, “yeah, we didn’t really mean all that stuff we just said.” Seems to me that the intent of the prayer is to elaborate on the “under God” part of the pledge.
Unless you’re asserting that there’s something inherently unAmerican about the invocation. I suppose some people would make that argument, and some do. But the pledge, with its civic piety, it’s devotion to symbols and particularly the mention of God, all suggest to me something that goes hand-in-hand with the kind of prayer you hear at such gatherings…
Maybe he was suggesting the pledge is un-Godly instead of un-American? Can you pledge allegiance to God and America both? What happens when America does things that are not consistent with following God?
It’s the conscious self-editing of giving a Christian prayer immediately after saying “…one Nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all.” The intended effect is to restate the Pledge into a more narrowly focused, and pointedly exclusionary, conceptualization of us vs. them.
Liberty and justice for all just really isn’t what people want to have as the concluding phrase. And that’s sad.
“under God” was not added to the pledge until 1954. The “red scare” of godless Commies probably drove that event. Now we’re sure that America is God’s country.
Dear God,
Please help people who spend an excessive amount of time worrying about trivialities like a thirty second generic prayer before a meeting find more important things to focus on. Thanks for all you do. Your grace is amazing.
Amen.
The biggest story that should be going in SC is the one behind the Ariail cartoon.
It’s the same story as the Harrell one, really. The kind of story that ought to raise hell among the voters; yet seems to never really get through to people the stakes involved and the audacity of this sort of political (and social and economic) corruption. This is the story of less than 10 homeowners setting unimaginable precedent for the ocean dune lines of this state and erasing fifty years of progress. Sort of like the Speaker of the House trying to make the legislature a protected class immune from the real world…
@Mark
I haven’t seen any news since The State wrote about it a month ago. Do you know the status of the legislation now?
http://www.thestate.com/2014/04/29/3416904/senators-side-with-gated-debordieu.html
Nothing since this, Norm.
Hopefully the House is otherwise engaged with House stuff. Sometimes it’s nice when they’re distracted.
Agreed. I do think most SC people would care if Myrtle Beach were threatened, but the beach adjacent to an exclusive enclave like Debedoo [sic], just does not grab their attention. Too many intellectual hops, when Southern Charm is on…..
And the Vatican is taking the position that it only agreed to limit torture inside Vatican City…..