Early AM Ramblings

"Little Jack Horner sat in a corner eating his Christmas pie. He stuck in a thumb and pulled out a plum and said, "What a good boy am I!"  I'd guess we all know this Mother Goose rhyme.  I'd guess wrong then.  Once again last week in class none, not a one, of my students had heard this before.  (I was relating the bad treatment an unpopular Andrew Jackson appointee received from Michigan residents just before statehood.)  This wasn't the first time I had blank looks on students' faces with this.  A little thing, not knowing Little Jack Horner, Mother Goose?  Maybe.  And maybe not. Funny how some people are now questioning the qualifications of Amy Coney Barrett for the Supreme Court. Most humorous is that she only served on the Court of Appeals for two or three years. "That doesn't seem like a particularly long enough time to prepare one for a seat on the Supreme Court" wrote one fellow. If I recall correctly, there have been a few dozen appointees to the Supreme Court who had no judicial experience. Oh, some of these had been not only lawyers, but held offices such as attorney-general and solicitor-general. But they had not been judges of any sort. Earl Warren, Louis Brandeis, and Abe Fortas fell into this category, as did Harlan Fiske Stone. (I had to get in another plug for my alma mater!) When Oliver Wendell Holmes was appointed to the state supreme court in Massachusetts, he not only had no judicial experience, but had not practiced law at all either. I think Elena Kagan is another who had no judicial experience when appointed. I wonder if these same critics of Coney Barrett were critical of Obama's naming of Kagan as a Supreme. (For that matter, what were Obama's qualifications to be President!) I'm not being critical of Kagan. But it seems to me that people's political philosophies take over in instances like this. They just don't want someone who thinks differently than they do to be on the High Court. I guess "elections have consequences" for some people only when they win. An Amherst professor penned an article claiming the courts used to stay out of election disputes, claiming such disputes were political not judicial in nature. Looking at history, back to Luther v Borden (Dorr's Rebellion in Rhode Island in the 1840s), the Supremes have stayed away from political questions. Not so any more. But I guess I would submit, a lot has changed. Look at the growth of Presidential use, overuse, and misuse of executive orders. Note, too, how easily the legislature (Congress) has ceded its Constitutional authorities to the executive (President) and its bureaucracy (agencies). All that said (written?), is there any reason to trust the outcome of November's election? Who can be relied on for honesty? The politicians and bureaucracy? the media? Americans have been set up, regardless of what side they favor, to doubt, even distrust the outcome. Toss in, as I have before, that well over half of Americans no longer trust their government/politicians and the media. So, that has set up a scene for a disaster over the election results in a couple of weeks. It's difficult to eat crow, to admit one is/was wrong. I had that experience last week in a personal, but pretty important matter. I was just plain wrong in my thoughts. I think the media must do that, examine and critique itself. The admission that reporters (print and electronic), not editors and op-ed writers, now mostly write from their sets of values instead of as disinterested fact-finders will be hard to come by. I don't think journalists can do it. I hope they can, but doubt it. Like so much in society today, they are convinced of their correctness. In that sense, they have become the self-righteous, arrogant elitists that many people have become. Of course, depending on one's own points of view, the media can be completely wrong or right on target. Someone told me the World Series is just around the corner. Is that right? I used to love baseball. I played it and I watched it. I might even say I lived it. Some of my fondest memories are of baseball, my own or my kids/grandkids. Trivial? Of course it's trivial. What does a game matter? It used to matter a lot to me. But now, well, I haven't watched an inning of the playoffs (if, indeed, the World Series is about to start). In a way, my evolution in this is saddening. I sometimes wish I could sit back and watch a ball game for the enjoyment of it. It just doesn't click the way it once did.