Equal Time

Congressman Sander Levin, quite the liberal, was cited in an article in today's newspaper that "liberals were targeted" by the IRS, too.  As if that justifies any such "targeting" by the IRS.  More so, he was right, but only to an extent, a very, very small extent.  House hearings revealed that, yes, liberal groups were also "targeted".  Yep, six of them!  And there were 292 conservative groups that were singled out by the IRS.  Hmmm......  6 vs 292?  That's about equal, isn't it?  With the new math?  With the Common Core Curriculum standards?  I would just like to ask Congessman Levin one question about this:  Are your comments designed to smooth over all this?  "See, we were targets, too!"  Levin certainly displays the qualifications to be a multi-term Congressman (and that's not at all a compliment!).  I think it was John Arbuckle who said more than a century ago, "You get what you pay for."  And, citizens get what they vote for.

I see conservatives are up in arms over the Supreme Court ruling in the Defense of Marriage Act case.  In this, conservatives are wrong, wrong, wrong.  The Supremes too a step in the right direction.  It is blatantly unconstitutional to single out one group and deny it 14th Amendment rights:  equal protection of the law.  It took us a while, but we finally figured it out and extended those rights to blacks (former slaves), women, Indians--and now gays.  Conservatives cite "traditional" definitions of marriage, as if that justifies denial of rights.  They, who often seem so intent on using history in their arguments, forget that "traditional" views, even using the Bible, were employed in perpetuating slavery and second-class citizenship for women.  They often continue to cite the Bible--picking and choosing as use of the Bible frequently requires--to "bolster" their argument.  They are entitled to their religious beliefs about traditional marriage. They are not entitled to impose their religious beliefs on other people.  Nonsequiturs all over the place.  They can approve or disapprove of gay marriages or unions or whatever the newest descriptor.  That is their right. But they can't force their views on others, in contradistinction of the Constitution.  They can, if they really want to walk the walk not just talk the talk, take actions.  They can boycott businesses, companies, even media outlets that support gay marriage.  That's their right to do so, as wrong-headed as it may be.  I even heard or read a pro-DOMA advocate claim that gays raising kids is deleterious.  That's really laughable.  What can be more deleterious to raising kids than what many people are doing now--fatherless families, single-parent families (that so many have done outstanding jobs is a marvel to me!), indulgent parenting, etc.  It's not gays who are raising kids who shoot others out on the streets.  It's not gays who are raising kids not interested in education.  It's not gays who are raising drug addicts.  It's not gays who are doing any of these any more than so-called "straight" parents. Several decried the judicial activism of the Court, that the Court undid what voters and legislatures/Congress did. That's really pretty laughable.  What do these people think of, say, Brown v Board of Education? Was that judicial activism, too?  Hadn't, for decades if not centuries, even with the imprimatur of the Supreme Court (of Dred Scott, of Plessy), voters and legislaures/Congress denied "equal protection of the law" to another group, blacks/slaves?  So, if I follow this reasoning, the Supremes under Warren should have just let the status quo continue until Congress, state legislatures, and voters finally decided that blacks were also guaranteed "equal protection?" As my professors wrote on a number of my papers, "No sloppy thinking allowed."

Just to repeat from a previous post of a few days ago, I wonder what those friends of China are thinking now--still "friends" I bet--with the anti-American actions of the past week.  And these weren't the openly anti-US hostilities of the Chinese commie government, but the people (who may or may not have been following orders).  Why US companies continue to "exploit" the exploding Chinese market in search of profits (at the expense of giving away our technology) is beyond me.  Why American shills continue to laud their "friends" the Chinese is beyond me.  V.I. Lenin used a term to describe such American companies and shills: "useful idiots."  Oh, I keep forgetting:  History isn't important.