Drink some coffee -- you'll feel better, and perhaps feeling better perceive that what protects the rights of those wishing, as you see it, to live their lives under the dictates of witch doctors is precisely what protects your right to hold, and act on, that opinion.
"Obviously, rulings like this are planned out to interlock with future laws, state initiatives, and other right-wing mischief so as to give the old privileged classes, white, rich, male & Christian, the “freedom” to reduce the rest of us to poverty, servitude, imprisonment, and oppression." That's quite a plan -- actually Hobby Lobby and Conestoga simply point out that what the plaintiffs below seek can readily be provided by HHS's granting the same right to for-profit corporations as it does to non-profit corporations, with the obligation and cost of providing coverage shitted to the corporation's health insurance provider.
"These five justices . . . " Whatever else,we should count the votes correctly. Six justice supported the holding. Kennedy's concurrence is very important, and makes a contribution well beyond the contours of the two cases it directly addresses. And the six male justices did nothing to prevent women employees of Hobby Lobby or Conestoga Wood Specialties from receiving insurance coverage for any of the contraceptives at issue in these two cases. On the contrary, the Court noted that the HHS (headed by a woman) has the same authority to grant an exemption to for-profit corporations just as it has to non-profit corporations, with the burden of providing coverage without additional charge to the employee or to the employee shifted to the insurance provider.
The Court did not say and has never said that corporations "are people"; the Court has said for well over a century that for purposes of invoking constitutional protections against government intrusion corporations are "persons". Before you criticize that principle think whether any charitable or for profit organization whose work and purpose you support is a corporation.
Juan Cole knows how much I admire both the quality and courage of his work - It's in that context that I suggest that these remarks on the "JWG" are a bit wide of the mark.
Assume, as I do in all that follows, that "the fragment" was written in the earliest centuries of Christianity.
First off, to state that "Of course, that it is ancient does not require that it be correct" -- meaning, that Jesus had a wife -- is rather an understatement. It would in fact not require that there was a Jesus, in a sense other than as a figure variously portrayed in Christian texts from the time of Augustus forward.
It's also the case that it would not require that the fragment's text was part of an "oral tradition" that predates the fragment or indeed extends beyond the fragment - forward, backward, or sideward.
Indeed, it would not "require" that anyone other than the scribe ever saw or heard of the statement.
But worse yet, without the full context of the document of which the fragment is a very small piece, there is not even any way to know that the words, "Jesus said to them, 'My wife...'" and "She will be able to be my disciple." are a). referring to the same subject (i.e., what is printed in the article does not require that the "she" is the same person as "my wife".
And finally, a reference that says, "My wife" does not require that two words declare the existence of the wife - what if the words that are given after "My wife" as . . . were in fact, "in the event, contrary to fact, that I had or come to have, a wife"?
There could of course have been a Jesus.
If so, he could have had a wife.
If he did, there could have been an "oral tradition" transmitting references by Jesus to his wife.
On the other hand, to respond to her allegations against the CIA by attacking her hypocrisy (The Feinstein Syndrome) or dismissing the allegations and the CIA's riposte as kabuki theater intended by both sides as a distraction intended to change nothing seems to me a profound mistake.
The hell with the hypocrisy and the kabuki theater -- Take what's out there - US Senator, chair of Senate Intelligence Oversight Committee accuses CIA on spying on branch of US government - and run with it, for god's sake
You write that "Iran is far more aggressive that Iraq ever was under Saddam". You may be correct, but my understanding is that unlike Iraq and Israel Iran has not launched a war of aggression ("the supreme crime")in the course of modern history. Certainly they've not done so as recently as Israel (ctr. Egypt, Syria, Lebanon, Palestine, Turkey [Mavi Marmora] and the United States [USS Liberty])or Iraq (ctr. Iran, with US support).
"The neoconservatives who have brought the world to the present perilous situation want to turn the clock back, despite the fact that their warmongering philosophy was rejected roundly by American people and has been shown as a ghastly failure by history." Yes, it was indeed "roundly rejected", but is none the less firmly ensconsed in the Obama administration and in the Democratic Party, in and out of the federal legislature.
"Biden began by defending Barack Obama on foreign policy, pointing to his withdrawal from Iraq, his plans for drawdown in AFghanistan, his killing of Usama Bin Laden, and the way his administration has raised the esteem of the United States abroad".
I beg your pardon -- we've just signed a deal with Afghanistan that the NYTimes says will have us "helping" them for years ahead, with exactly whom has Obama "raised the esteem of the United States abroad", who is helped by the increasing killings (of women, children, innocent men, American citizens) carried out by Obama's assassin drones, who exactly is being helped by Obama's much lauded sanctions on Iran, but the real laugher is Biden's calling on Romney to "tell us his plan" if he intends to go to war against Iran! Now THERE would be a change from our current president's transparency (sic!).
It's not that I think that Romney is what the country needs -- it's just that I'm quite sure that Obama is not the president the country needs either.
Obama and Clinton should suppress their addiction to "scolding" other people and spend their energies addressing and atoning for their own sins. That others sin also does not excuse one's own sins - nor does scolding others for theirs.
"Mark Halperin in their book Game Change said that 2008 McCain campaign manager Steve Schmidt was appalled at [Sarah Palin's] . . . ignorance, saying:
. . . 'when her son was being sent off to Iraq, she couldn’t describe who we were fighting.’".
Well, neither can those who are now, or those who have for more than nine years in Afghanistan and more than seven years in Iraq, "been able to describe who we were fighting". Such ignorance seems to be a condition precedent for election to the job she seeks.
Drink some coffee -- you'll feel better, and perhaps feeling better perceive that what protects the rights of those wishing, as you see it, to live their lives under the dictates of witch doctors is precisely what protects your right to hold, and act on, that opinion.
"Obviously, rulings like this are planned out to interlock with future laws, state initiatives, and other right-wing mischief so as to give the old privileged classes, white, rich, male & Christian, the “freedom” to reduce the rest of us to poverty, servitude, imprisonment, and oppression." That's quite a plan -- actually Hobby Lobby and Conestoga simply point out that what the plaintiffs below seek can readily be provided by HHS's granting the same right to for-profit corporations as it does to non-profit corporations, with the obligation and cost of providing coverage shitted to the corporation's health insurance provider.
"These five justices . . . " Whatever else,we should count the votes correctly. Six justice supported the holding. Kennedy's concurrence is very important, and makes a contribution well beyond the contours of the two cases it directly addresses. And the six male justices did nothing to prevent women employees of Hobby Lobby or Conestoga Wood Specialties from receiving insurance coverage for any of the contraceptives at issue in these two cases. On the contrary, the Court noted that the HHS (headed by a woman) has the same authority to grant an exemption to for-profit corporations just as it has to non-profit corporations, with the burden of providing coverage without additional charge to the employee or to the employee shifted to the insurance provider.
The holding was 6-3, not 5-4.
The Court did not say and has never said that corporations "are people"; the Court has said for well over a century that for purposes of invoking constitutional protections against government intrusion corporations are "persons". Before you criticize that principle think whether any charitable or for profit organization whose work and purpose you support is a corporation.
Juan Cole knows how much I admire both the quality and courage of his work - It's in that context that I suggest that these remarks on the "JWG" are a bit wide of the mark.
Assume, as I do in all that follows, that "the fragment" was written in the earliest centuries of Christianity.
First off, to state that "Of course, that it is ancient does not require that it be correct" -- meaning, that Jesus had a wife -- is rather an understatement. It would in fact not require that there was a Jesus, in a sense other than as a figure variously portrayed in Christian texts from the time of Augustus forward.
It's also the case that it would not require that the fragment's text was part of an "oral tradition" that predates the fragment or indeed extends beyond the fragment - forward, backward, or sideward.
Indeed, it would not "require" that anyone other than the scribe ever saw or heard of the statement.
But worse yet, without the full context of the document of which the fragment is a very small piece, there is not even any way to know that the words, "Jesus said to them, 'My wife...'" and "She will be able to be my disciple." are a). referring to the same subject (i.e., what is printed in the article does not require that the "she" is the same person as "my wife".
And finally, a reference that says, "My wife" does not require that two words declare the existence of the wife - what if the words that are given after "My wife" as . . . were in fact, "in the event, contrary to fact, that I had or come to have, a wife"?
There could of course have been a Jesus.
If so, he could have had a wife.
If he did, there could have been an "oral tradition" transmitting references by Jesus to his wife.
Or not.
Goodness knows I am no fan of Diane Feinstein.
On the other hand, to respond to her allegations against the CIA by attacking her hypocrisy (The Feinstein Syndrome) or dismissing the allegations and the CIA's riposte as kabuki theater intended by both sides as a distraction intended to change nothing seems to me a profound mistake.
The hell with the hypocrisy and the kabuki theater -- Take what's out there - US Senator, chair of Senate Intelligence Oversight Committee accuses CIA on spying on branch of US government - and run with it, for god's sake
" . . . suggests . . . " Doesn't it actually just "mean"?
You write that "Iran is far more aggressive that Iraq ever was under Saddam". You may be correct, but my understanding is that unlike Iraq and Israel Iran has not launched a war of aggression ("the supreme crime")in the course of modern history. Certainly they've not done so as recently as Israel (ctr. Egypt, Syria, Lebanon, Palestine, Turkey [Mavi Marmora] and the United States [USS Liberty])or Iraq (ctr. Iran, with US support).
"The neoconservatives who have brought the world to the present perilous situation want to turn the clock back, despite the fact that their warmongering philosophy was rejected roundly by American people and has been shown as a ghastly failure by history." Yes, it was indeed "roundly rejected", but is none the less firmly ensconsed in the Obama administration and in the Democratic Party, in and out of the federal legislature.
Thank you, RoseMerry. Dan Larkin
link to nytimes.com
More evidence of the increased esteem gained for the US by Barack Obama.
"Biden began by defending Barack Obama on foreign policy, pointing to his withdrawal from Iraq, his plans for drawdown in AFghanistan, his killing of Usama Bin Laden, and the way his administration has raised the esteem of the United States abroad".
I beg your pardon -- we've just signed a deal with Afghanistan that the NYTimes says will have us "helping" them for years ahead, with exactly whom has Obama "raised the esteem of the United States abroad", who is helped by the increasing killings (of women, children, innocent men, American citizens) carried out by Obama's assassin drones, who exactly is being helped by Obama's much lauded sanctions on Iran, but the real laugher is Biden's calling on Romney to "tell us his plan" if he intends to go to war against Iran! Now THERE would be a change from our current president's transparency (sic!).
It's not that I think that Romney is what the country needs -- it's just that I'm quite sure that Obama is not the president the country needs either.
Obama and Clinton should suppress their addiction to "scolding" other people and spend their energies addressing and atoning for their own sins. That others sin also does not excuse one's own sins - nor does scolding others for theirs.
I think that this is an unusually penetrating and important piece from a thinker whose work I find consistently penetrating and important.
And yet there are those who question American exceptionalism.
"Mark Halperin in their book Game Change said that 2008 McCain campaign manager Steve Schmidt was appalled at [Sarah Palin's] . . . ignorance, saying:
. . . 'when her son was being sent off to Iraq, she couldn’t describe who we were fighting.’".
Well, neither can those who are now, or those who have for more than nine years in Afghanistan and more than seven years in Iraq, "been able to describe who we were fighting". Such ignorance seems to be a condition precedent for election to the job she seeks.