Been busy

I have had all kinds of blog posts simmering in my mind over the last 12 days. Actually sitting down at the computer and typing them out to share with everyone is another matter. I flew out to Idaho last week to visit my aging grandparents and some other family members, had to catch up with work when I got back, had a full day with the Hoosier Congressional Policy Leadership Series with the Indiana Family Institute this last Thursday AND have to keep up with 2 time-consuming, but very fulfilling Liberty University courses.

So if I don't blog for days that stretch into double-digit numbers (as is now the case), you can bank on it that I'm experiencing these levels of obligations in other areas of life.

But of course, much is happening that demands commentary. Sometime during this holiday weekend, I'll try to provide it. Right now, I have to read some collateral for "Hermeneutics"class.

Speaking of that, let me put something to rest right now that I often get asked when people hear that I am in a Master's in Religion program with Liberty (especially since I have another Master's in Business). No, I am not going into the ministry. For that to happen, Jesus would have to show up in my living room and make His intentions known that plainly. I am in awe of pastors who do their job well; because of just such servants of the cloth, I know what a commanding task and awe-inspiring responsibility ministry is.

I had a number of reasons for embarking on this particular program, and suffice it to say that they are being realized, one by one, as I go. More on this later...

Sick of smileys

I will never forget the first time I saw a smiley face. I had no idea what it even was because the two eye marks and the mouth were there, but there was no circle around them...something like this, except vertical, not horizontal: =)

I was 10 years old and my 5th grade teacher was attempting to convey to me that I had done a good job. It worked once she explained to me what this mysterious symbol meant.

I still like that teacher; in fact, she reads this blog and comments sometimes. I also love my wife and all kinds of other people in my life who use smiley faces on a regular basis. I have drawn them myself for many years now. (Is "drawn" the right term? "Doodled" seems more precise, but somehow doesn't quite cut it, either).

But I refuse to participate any longer. I am done with smiley faces. Discourse in America, especially via e-mail, has degenerated to a point where we seem to feel that unless we draw, doodle or create a smiley face every other sentence, our tone will come across as cold, withdrawn, detached or less than heartfelt.

There are a plethora of problems with this, but I'll content myself with listing my main peeves. First, shouldn't I have an extensive enough vocabulary that I can convey my personal warmth towards someone without constantly employing a smiley face? Also, maybe sometimes, I actually am not happy about something or someone! Have we reached a place where I can't make those feelings known occasionally?

But perhaps most troubling of all, why are we SO quick to take offense and feel slighted? Are we so hasty of a society with friendships that are so thinly foundational that they will be injured that simply...over a wrongly worded sentence or one that is phrased a little carelessly? I think all of these things are worth pondering; it seems that we all have gotten steadily more thin-skinned even as we attempt to constantly stay in touch in a variety of ways. But does EVERYTHING need to be sugarcoated? Why are we so easily hurt?

Regardless, I'm through with Mr. or Ms. Smiley Face...I don't believe, in the end, that it fosters greater intimacy or kindness, but probably serves more as a shield or a subtle request to "please not hate me for saying this." I challenge you to ask yourself how stable that friendship really is if you can't say what you mean without a smiley face?

Rooting for Miss California

This will be a post that is destined to make just about nobody happy, so only the Almighty knows why I feel compelled to write it...but forthwith...

I will be written off by some as hopelessly outdated for asking what possible long-term good for the nation comes out of beauty pageants? To me, they send all the wrong messages, namely that physical beauty of a very narrow type is something that should be rewarded...why? Just because it exists? By definition, then, any woman is lacking whose measurements are less (or, I guess, more) than what is deemed the ideal by the fashion community at large that sponsors the pageants.

What is the point of a beauty pageant beyond a group of stunningly gorgeous specimens of the female sex baring 95% of their bodies and strutting on a stage for the judges to admire? I probably don't sound serious, but I actually am. I should hastily add that I can think fairly rapidly of a number of former beauty pageant queens who have gone on to do very well for themselves and whom I admire (but my opinion is still the same!) Gretchen Carlson on Fox & Friends is one; Sarah Palin is another. But even Sarah Palin, who participated, if my memory serves, in some sort of high school pageant looked back on it all in a humorous, yet rueful fashion in a TV interview that aired during the campaign last year. (I vividly remember it still because she smilingly talked about the nerve they had to "show off our butts" to the judges...and I wondered if this was the first time this portion of the anatomy had been discussed on TV by so high-profile of a politician...let alone a female VP candidate?)

Call me a prude if you will, and I obviously don't think I am, but I just can't see where the benefit and uplift comes from a beauty pageant. It all strikes me as plastic and contrived and I've already detailed the signals I think are not so subtly sent, but I'll happily listen to anyone who wants to inform me how misguided I am...especially because now I'm probably going to hear from all the female friends I have who have participated, still unbeknownst to me, in beauty pageants at some point in the distant past!

Now, having alienated half of my vast readership, I'll proceed to tick off the rest: Miss California (Carrie Prejean) is to be commended for speaking the truth fearlessly and forthrightly, after she took the question on gay marriage from the sanctimonious little perverted twit that fancies himself a journalist and serious commentator. And it amazes and infuriates me that the Left refuses to be satisfied until they have not only guillotined her, but drawn and quartered her for good measure. This poor kid is only 22 years old and simply answered a question. And suddenly, the fact that she posed semi-nude for some photos at some point in her past is a heinous transgression for which her detractors are demanding our collective horror, complete with slacked jaws and rapid palpitations?

The hypocrisy and faux outrage of it all is enough to make one clench.

Juan Williams is right. No conservative, he nonetheless is an honest and fair journalist who tries to tell the truth as he sees it...and has been viciously attacked by liberals as a result. He spoke out about it on the O'Reilly Factor a few weeks ago, declaring that, yes, the Right has its extremists, but their ire is miniscule compared to the venom unleashed when one deviates from the orthodoxy of the Daily Kos/Democrat Left.

Another conservative hero gone

Jack Kemp passed away sometime in the middle of the night between Saturday, May 2 and Sunday, May 3. He had struggled with cancer for some time; the public became aware of his diagnosis in January of this year. Things must have gone downhill quickly from there.

Kemp was one of the first Republican political figures who was vivid for me. The 1988 election is the first one in which I clearly recall a lot of the candidates and their supporting casts, even in the primaries. Kemp was supposed to be the challenge from the right to George H. W. Bush, but he failed to anticipate a long-shot run by Pat Robertson, who stole the show by coming in second in the Iowa caucus behind Bob Dole (yes, Bush 41 came in third, for those who can't remember back that far...and yes, for those of you under 20, he did go on to win the general election).

Kemp then went on to serve as Bush 41's HUD Secretary, and as Bob Dole's running mate in 1996.

I came along a little too late to be able to claim memory of the Kemp-Roth tax cuts at the time they happened, but I've read my share about them over the years since. Jack Kemp was the embodiment of supply-side economics, and this doctrine, along with the candidacy of Ronald Reagan, revitalized the GOP for a generation. George Will paid Kemp the highest compliment that he could bestow on him on "This Week" today when he called him an "idea man." We need many more of them right now.

Republicans have lost another footsoldier from the Reagan Revolution. May Jack Kemp rest in peace.

Souter retires

Obama gets a Supreme Court vacancy very early, with David Souter, George H.W. Bush's first Supreme Court appointee, calling it quits today. My guess is that he probably would have liked to retire before now, but held out until he knew a President was ensconced in the Oval Office who would replace him with another activist justice.

Of all of the Supreme Court picks of the last 30 years, Souter was the most deftly stealthy; I could be more unkind and say "sneaky" instead. Souter managed to convey to Bush 41 a completely opposite impression of the kind of justice he would turn out to be, especially on the Roe v. Wade issue. ABC legal correspondent Jan Crawford Greenburg has written the most readable book I know of on the Supreme Court and it tells this whole story in detail. (It is called Supreme Conflict: The Inside Story of the Struggle for Control of the United States Supreme Court.)

The only regrettable aspect of Souter's departure at this juncture is that Obama is likely to tap a much younger person in his place who will serve for several decades.

But, the ideological make-up of the Court will not change.

Specter switching parties

Human Events, the Drudge Report and the Washington Post are all running, to varying degrees with the story that Arlen Specter will be running as a Democrat in 2010 for re-election to the Senate from Pennsylvania. Michelle Malkin's blog, however, is where I found Arlen Specter's own statement, that the Republicans have moved too far right and he is more in sync with the Democrats now, yada, yada, yada.

So Arlen, let me figure this out: Ronald Reagan's brand of Republican practice, built on a visceral opposition to totalitarianism, pro-constitutional and anti-judicial activism bias and strong support for the sanctity of life and other social issues was just fine, obviously, since you ran on this GOP ticket for the first time in 1980 and won. But now, having been decimated in 2 consecutive election cycles by George W. Bush's compassionate conservatism, the GOP has gone too far to the right and won't do any longer? Calling Specter a "sham" doesn't do him justice. Way to go, sir...use the party for your own personal advancement for 30 years, then ditch it when this ploy no longer is effective.

But just as troubling to me or more so is that a mere two weeks ago, Senator Cornyn threw the support of the NRSCC behind Specter. What if we had stood on constitutional principle rather than ceding Pennsylvania to the forces of liberalism? Would the outcome have been any worse if we had maintained the courage of our convictions?

So the Democrats, once Al Franken is seated, will now have their 60 votes. And unless at least one Democrat can be peeled off while all Republicans stand together unanimously, a filibuster is a nonoption.

Would Jesus torture?

Pat Buchanan's column today is titled "Is Torture Ever Moral?" AND I have purposefully not yet read it! Had I done so, this would be the third post in a row where I have cited something he wrote, and although I do read everything he writes, I don't want to be accused of being so tied to someone that their thoughts and mine are inseparable. Believe me, that would never be the actual truth when it comes to Buchanan...not that the facts ever got between some people and a good story.

I do not support torture. For any reason. The only serious argument that I ever hear anyone marshal for the efficacy of torture is "Well, what about if a dirty bomb is planted somewhere and the terrorist knows where it is and he'll tell us if we break enough of his toes or pull out a sufficient number of fingernails?" Sorry, I just don't buy it. If you are inflicting enough pain on someone, he will tell you what he thinks you want to hear.

But my reasons for opposing torture are actually deeper than whether or not it "works" (more on that in a minute). How could torturing someone do anything but dehumanize the torturer? I have never even understood people who subject animals to inhumane practices. I am the furthest thing from a vegetarian; I love my red meat and my white. Bring it all on: steak, hamburger, pork chops, grilled chicken, salmon, bratwurst...and we're only just getting started. But the slaughter should be quick, efficient and as painless as possible. Even when I think of animals that I find repulsive, such as rats and possums, which I try to eliminate whenever I see them, I don't want to see them tortured.

Most integrally, though, how can someone who claims to speak for Christ advocate such practices? In what scenario would Jesus have tortured someone? I do try, however ineffectively at times, to implement the WWJD question in my life on a regular basis. On this issue, it is an open-and-shut question. Let's all imagine together Jesus wiring up the jumper cables or the rack or the dunking bucket. See what I mean?

The bottom line is that I don't believe it does "work." I have my differences with John McCain, but this is one area where I have to cede the ground to him, as a former torture victim. McCain contends exactly what I have said, that it does not work and does not make us better people.

I will admit that if my little girl were missing, for instance, and the pertinent authorities believed they had located the kidnapper, in the wild heat and anger of the moment, I would support ANY technique that would extract the information. I do have blood flowing through my veins, not ice water. But this is precisely why we build layers into the justice system between the victim and the perpetrator, so that the perpetrator is treated humanely, and hopefully, as their deeds deserve in the end.

Taking the long view, how can a nation that practices insidious interrogation methods not be resented for decades to come, allowing the seeds for future wars to be planted? Even if torture did save a few lives in the short run, would it not condemn future innocents over the long haul? But even more importantly, is it ever right to "do evil that good may come?"

Now, having said all of that...humiliation should not be equated with torture. Forcing Islamic male prisoners to wear panties on their heads, a la the Abu Ghraib debacle, is not something I would advocate either, but it is not torture; it does not involve physical pain. I am also not opposed to aggressive interrogation techniques, such as calibrated sleep deprivation, loud music and similar measures.

I don't like waterboarding, though; if it isn't torture, it is the illusion of the same, although my wife disagrees (yes, she supports it). But those who practiced it on the very few occasions that it was done did so under the full consent of law that was unchallenged. And by all accounts, Nancy Pelosi and her fellow Democrats who are now burning with indignation over such "OUTRAGES" sat in the very committee hearings where it was approved, and raised no objections. Zip. Zero. Nada. What a bunch of plastic phonies.

So there is my position, nuanced as it is; I suppose some would characterize it as inconsistent.