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| ...William Tell.
Speaking for myself, I'm in stark terror.
*shudders*
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| American government is a theocracy.
You didn't know? On Sunday, I learned that too, and for once in my life, I kept my mouth shut. But I'll spill it here.
The adult education class between services at The Advent is built around a book written by N.T. Wright, the Bishop of Durham (in the UK) titled Simply Christian. Its purpose is to deal with some of the core meanings of Christianity and has been billed as a "modern" version of C.S. Lewis's Mere Christianity. I think the comparison is wildly overstated, but the book is generally interesting and makes thoughtful and appropriate arguments.
In the discussion for this past Sunday, one of the two British men in the room made the astonishing statement that:
"The contrast between the UK and America is stark. In the UK, we have a de jure established church, but a real separation of church and state. In America, there is a de jure separation of church and state, but America is a de facto theocracy."
I guess Americans aren't the only ones who happen to think their homeland is "exceptional" and especially good in comparison to near competitors. The British (and the French too) are well-practiced in the art of snobery. Apparently.
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| Vice Presidential nominees are not main attractions.
But that was before Sarah Palin arrived. I begin to think that a lot of things have changed because of the hockey mom from Wasilla.
See if you agree after this:
Rush Limbaugh, who has made his dislike for McCain anything but secret for years, began calling the maverick senator from Arizona, "McBrilliant".
Liberals who think of Republicans as bigots suddenly found themselves saying things that would make even hardened demagogues gasp. Byron York noted some of the eyebrow-raisers here. What really got me was the depths to which the Feminist Left would plunge--even to the point of questioning Sarah's womanhood. Well, one thing's for sure: radical Feminists certainly aren't basing their definition of "woman" on biology any more.
Liberals usually appalled at the abstemious tendencies of Evangelical Christians swear off at least one kind of booze in response to Palin's selection. Alright, that was cheap, I admit. But let's get this straight: the Left thought the Right was totally loony when Heinz Ketchup (and other sauces) suddenly became objects of ridicule, even boycott, when John Kerry's wife and hieress of the Heinz fortune became a possible First Lady in 2004. At least there was a real connection, though. A Chilean organic wine with an coincidental similarity to Sarah Palin's name hardly deserves the pent-up rage of the Liberals. Surely they're more nuanced than that.
I know one person who, though ordinarily cheerful and friendly, became incoherent with rage at the mention of Sarah Palin's name. His face became red, his words would not come out in an intelligible manner, and he was literally spluttering. Astounding.
Oh, and Bill Clinton suddenly seems credible.
Forget Spider Man. We've got Sarah.
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| From Victor Davis Hanson on National Review's "The Corner":
And the Media Worries about Palin's Experience and McCain's Age?
I think in the space of about the last 24 hours, Joe Biden claimed that the AIG bailout was bad, but then said it wasn't bad;
that we did not need to burn coal;
that his apology about the dirty McCain ad was, as they say, inoperative;
that
FDR once went on television to address the nation after the stock
market crash of '29 (that's a twofer that trumps Obama's Americans
liberating Auschwitz);
and all but said that McCain took a $50,000 bribe.
Not
a bad day's work — encompassing terrible energy policy, flip-flopping,
historical ignorance, and slander. And this comes on top of Palin the
"good looking" "Lt. Governor" of Alaska, Hillary as the better VP pick
than himself, the patriotism of paying higher taxes, and so on.
And
those in turn come on top of the primary remarks about Indians in donut
shops, and "bright and clean" blacks. And those in turn come on top of
. . . (Well, go back to the pilfered speeches and made-up bios.)
Something
is very wrong here. While most forgive the silly slip like "Barack
America" or asking the wheel-chair bound to stand up, I think the Obama
staff must have gone from amusement to embarrassment and now to
serious concern whether Biden is up to the job.
Had this been Palin, the election would now be over.
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| ...to 1775. It's funny how a news story will trigger an historical daydream.
The constitutional monarchy of Great Britain that was attempting to pacify--by force if necessary--the North American colonies had a Common Law tradition, one that continues both in England and in America today. One of the things that developed first in Britain and was a cause of major consternation in the Americas by 1775 (when the first skirmishes between Royal troops and local militias took place), was the understanding that state troops were not to be used against citizens of that state. The troops were supposed to be bound by civil law like everyone else. Particularly, troops were not to be quartered in homes by fiat--they would have to be set up in bivouacs or pay for their lodging.
But that didn't happen in the Colonies as tensions rose. Troops are numerous, and quartering them is expensive. So the Crown violated the understood rules. Its popularity plummeted to such an extent that once-proud subjects of the King actually took up arms to fight their earthly lord with heavy hearts.
-----
Fastforward 233 years. The native home of the Common Law has an American-owned hotel that will behave like an American ivy-league university and declare that it won't serve members of the armed forces.
It would be laughable if it weren't so real. This is no appeal to Common Law. It's a kind of anarchism masquerading as an ideology of "justice".
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