A bill now before the Idaho legislature raises a thorny question. The choice facing our legislators is this. If they vote yes, and they remove the religious exemption shield, then they will be seen as encroaching on the religious freedom of parents to care for their children according to their conscience. But if they vote …
There’s A Dear
When it comes to your “personal data” and national security issues, there are two basic layers to the question. The first has to do with the nature of the world, and the second has to do with the nature of our particular moment in history. The first asks whether anybody should be trusted with this …
In a Pig’s Eye
The president’s Twitter account recently sent out this small dribbly contribution to the oceans of illiteracy that already exist out there. What’s another half pint? Here’s how to improve our economy and create hundreds of thousands of jobs: #RaiseTheWage. http://OFA.BO/tXMYUq pic.twitter.com/UDTcTSaqZJ So here’s the comeback, and I must say that it is hard to type …
Conceit on Stilts
Yesterday the president showed defiance on the Obamacare question, although, it must be said, it was an anemic kind of defiance. He said, in a calm and listless sort of way, that Obamacare would not be repealed “as long as [he was] president.” In this, he has, yet again, mistaken the actual position of affairs. …
Ducks, Both Lame and Dead
There are two kinds of legitimacy when it comes to political rule. The first is the obvious — when the rules are honored, and the procedures followed. The second is not so obvious, and I want to get to a detailed discussion of it in a minute. But for the purposes of the set up, …
Obamamandias
With apologies to P.B. Shelley . . . I met a traveler from bankrupt land Who said: ‘One vast and hapless head of stone Lies in the desert. Near it, on the sand, Half sunk, a shattered website lies, still down. That haughty look, and sneer of cold command, And photo-op poses, a myriad! Still …
A Cycle of Pomes: Reflections
There once was a president-king Who could do most any cool thing Except writing code, (His limits there showed,) Now our health care is broke, in a sling. There once was an Obamono-whiz Whose health care rollout kinda fizz Led. And it crashed A new clunker for cash, Because that is just what it is. …
Voting in a Wobbly Canoe
Yesterday I exhorted the saints at Christ Church to make sure that they voted in our local election tomorrow. In the course of that exhortation I said that it was not the church’s business to descend into partisan factionalism, but that it was our responsibility to pray that we would be allowed to “lead a …
In a Perfect World . . .
“Moreover thou shalt provide out of all the people able men, such as fear God, men of truth, hating covetousness; and place such over them, to be rulers of thousands, and rulers of hundreds, rulers of fifties, and rulers of tens” (Ex. 18:21). In a perfect world — because it is an imperfect world — …
The Bozo Over at Mablog
Over at Religion News Service, Jonathan Merritt has decided that a web brawl with me might make for some good click fodder. This post, in which he picks a fight with me, concludes with a stirring reminder that the apostle Paul requires that Christian leaders must not be should not be “quarrelsome,” but rather “peacemakers, …