Fascinating.

NOMCWS (”Not On My Civil War Site”).

(cross posted from Confirm Them)

I know it’s probably like spitting into the wind, but here I make the case for Obama to renominated Peter Keisler.
Then again, the Bush administration’s utter failure to use its Roger Gregory olive branch to better PR effect was a huge missed opportunity that helped make it more difficult to confirm people like Keisler in the first place.
Comments welcome.

The Macon Telegraph has nice article on Judge Griffin Bell this morning, which includes some of my thoughts on the life of this great man:

“We’ve lost a real hero. We’ve really lost somebody who helped shape the modern-day South,” said Stephen Dillard, a Macon attorney who in 2003 wrote an essay on Bell for the book, “Great American Judges: An Encyclopedia.” . . . .

“He did the right thing in a very difficult time,” said Dillard, who wrote the Bell essay. “He was having to enforce the Supreme Court rulings on civil rights . . . [and] go back to the some of the places where he grew up and say, ‘It’s legal. It’s what’s required by law and it’s the moral thing to do.’ … Nowadays we think it’s no big deal. Then it was an extremely trying time. You had people standing in doorways.” . . . .

Dillard said Bell should be celebrated as “the quintessential Southern gentleman.”

“He epitomized everything that was right and good about the South. … It’s what America is all about, that you could have someone rise up to the heights that he rose to, solely on merit. This is a guy who grew up with nothing and ended up being one of the most powerful people in the United States. And more importantly, he used that power for the common good.”

Update: I’ll be on the Kenny B. and Charles E. Richardson show this morning at 7:30 a.m. discussing the life of Judge Bell.

Griffin Bell was a truly great man, and he will be dearly missed by his family and friends.

I was fortunate enough to meet and interview Judge Bell while working on an essay about his tenure on the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals, which you can read here. I cannot even begin to describe what a generous and warm person he was during our brief time together. Indeed, one of the greatest compliments I’ve ever received about my writing was from Judge Bell, who loved the essay I had written about him.

The United States has lost a great patriot, and the South has lost one of her modern-day heroes. 

Please take a moment today to say a prayer for Judge Bell’s family and friends. 

God Bless you Judge Bell. Requiescat in pace.

(Image Credit)

Update: Here are some other personal reflections on Judge Bell’s amazing life and tremendous legacy.

It is a New Year and the time of reflection is greatly upon us.  This reality is especially poignant in the wake of a revolutionary left-liberal presidential victory and the onset of substantial economic challenges.

Under the circumstances, I thought now might be a good time to propose a list of outstanding books for the intellectually curious friend or fellow traveler.

I would not dare attempt to put these in order based on excellence.  Just consider it a series of number ones.

1.  Lancelot by Walker Percy — A southern moderate-liberal is slowly fading out of his own life.  He doesn’t know what his purpose is or where his marriage and family are going.  But then, something strange happens.  He discovers there is such a thing as evil.  Percy won the National Book Award for The Moviegoer, but Lancelot is my favorite.

2.  Witness by Whittaker Chambers — Surely, the greatest memoir of any man of the right.  Possibly, the greatest memoir ever.  I once tried to copy out the passages that meant the most to me and ended up just typing in whole pages at a time.  For those too young to know, Chambers was an American traitor loyal to the Communist cause, who left the Communists for what he felt was the losing side.  He had to do it because of his recovered belief in God.  In the course of his life, he became a senior editor of Time magazine and ultimately defeated Alger Hiss in legal battles over Hiss’s identity as a communist agent.  Since Frost/Nixon is hot, you might also know that Richard Nixon’s presidency would likely never have happened without his championing of Chambers’ cause.

3.  Atlas Shrugged by Ayn Rand — I can’t resist putting Chambers and Rand together, especially since Chambers was the instrument William F. Buckley used to read Rand out of the conservative movement.  As a Christian, I find Rand’s work antithetical to my own sensibilities, but I have to admit its power.  Besides, this is a conservative-libertarian list and she can’t be left off.  On the other hand, as literature, it cannot rank with the greats.  I still remember the moment when John Galt grabs a microphone to speak to the nation . . . and one hundred pages later is wrapping it up!

4.  After Virtue by Alasdair MacIntyre — This is arguably the finest and most readable piece of political philosophy I have ever encountered.  Anyone who wonders why our political discourse has become so poisonous and incommensurate should read this work.  So, for that matter, should anyone interested in answering John Rawls.  George W. Bush would have known long ago that “the new tone” was destined to fail, if only he’d read his MacIntyre.

5.  Anarchy, Utopia, and the State by Robert Nozick — I’ll make this one simple.  Robert Nozick provides the most convincing case for a minimalist state that I’ve ever seen.  You can break your head on his symbols and formulas, but bear with it because you WILL get it if you keep reading.  Even if you were only to read the short portion where he tells his “tale of the slave” you will be confirmed in your libertarian instincts.

6.  Man and the State by Jacques Maritain — This collection of lectures about the relationship between the individual, the culture, and the state contains the kind of essential thought we wish every politician understood.  Careful, wise, insightful.  You will understand many things better after reading Maritain. If you would like to read political philosophy, but have been afraid to start, this may be your entry point.

7.  Stained Glass by William F. Buckley — William F. Buckley is dead and I don’t feel so good, myself.  However, I am comforted by reading his best works.  This Blackford Oakes heart of the Cold War novel is one of his strongest entries.  You want to see the kind of chess match the Soviets and Americans were playing?  Then, read this Buckley spy novel.

8.  The God Who Is There by Francis Schaeffer — Would you like to know who was the prince of the Christian conservatives?  It wasn’t Falwell or Robertson.  It was Francis Schaeffer.  The missionary who set up a Swiss Chalet spent years arguing with college students in Europe.  Along the way, he formed a convincing apologetic for the existence of God and the reality of values.  (I am almost required to point out that Schaeffer was wrong in his critique of certain figures.  So, I said it.  Still, this book is great stuff.)

9.  Perelandra by C.S. Lewis — I could have chosen almost any title by C.S. Lewis, so I picked the one that had the greatest emotional impact on me.  Perelandra is the second book of Lewis’s space trilogy (underappreciated next to Narnia).  The story centers around the drama of Adam and Eve being replayed on a new planet with an earthman there to witness it.  Utterly compelling and, of course, full to bursting with philosophical and spiritual meaning.

Courtesy of Bryan Garner:

ma’am.This contraction of “madam” can be found pretty much throughout the English-speaking world. But it especially characterizes Southern, Midwestern, and Western American English on the one hand, and British aristocratic speech (but only in reference to royalty) on the other. E.g.:

o “‘Is this your dog, ma’am?’ the man asked.” Amy Friedman, “The Shaggy Dog,” News & Observer (Raleigh), 15 Apr. 1997, at E8.

o “Greetings Ma’am: The Queen, in the only public appearance on her 70th birthday, is given flowers at the Church of St. Mary Magdalen at Sandringham yesterday.” “70th Birthday Flowers for the Queen,” Independent, 22 Apr. 1996, at 5 (photo caption).

Rod has the latest.

I hope everyone has a wonderful and blessed 2009.

Feel free to post your NY resolutions in the comments, if you like.

Matthew Franck has a post up discussing whether or not Henry Reid and the Senate Democrats have the constitutional authority to reject Governor Rod Blagojevich’s appointment of Roland Burris to fill President-elect Obama’s Senate seat.  Eugene Volokh also tackles the issue.  Both commentators say no based on the 1969 decision of Powell v. McCormack.  What I find interesting is that both seem to rely on the Supreme Court case, but do not fully tackle the issue of whether or not the Constitution actually permits the Senate not to seat Burris.  In fact Franck states that he thinks the Powell case was wrongly decided.

So we’re confronted with a number of issues.  Was Powell correctly decided?  If not, should the Senate in effect ignore the precedent and do what it is constitutionally permitted to do?  Even if it is constitutionally permitted to block Burris’s appointment, should it?

On the first question, I have no opinion because I haven’t read the case, and don’t really have the time to skim it now.  On the third question, I think anything or anybody associated with Blagojevich is so tainted that the Senate ought to block the appointment.  As for the constitutional issue, on it’s face I think that the Senate has a leg to stand on.  Here is the relevant passages from Article I, Section 5: (more…)

Then get thee hindquarters to church.

You can add this to my “things I love about the South” list.

(LvRod)

I won’t hold my breath waiting for the SNL folks to mock Caroline Kennedy like they did Sarah Palin.

Pretty impressive, if you ask me.

(LvErick)

It looks as if Rick Warren is now being taken to task by some in the prolife community for giving the invocation at President-elect Obama’s inauguration.

I don’t think this type of opposition to Warren is wise. The bottom line is that Barack Obama will be our president for the next four years. There’s just no getting around that, folks. And if every prominent prolifer shuns Obama, then he will have zero incentive to listen to our concerns.

Now, don’t get me wrong. I have no illusions about what an Obama presidency will mean to the prolife movement. It’s not going to be pretty. That having been said, I see no harm in Warren playing a small role in a historic event, when doing so may allow him to be an effective advocate for the prolife community over the next four years.

Hey gang. I apologize for the light posting of late. I’ve been a tad under the weather, and I am trying to get a few matters tied up before the end o’ the year. Anyway, I wish all of you a very Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year.

Oh, and I’ll be on the Kenny B and Charles E. radio show today from 8:00 a.m. until 9:00 a.m. So, tune in if you have the time.

Michael Lind wrote an article at Slate accusing the South of waging an economic civil war against the North and calling for another reconstruction of the South. I have been meaning to comment on this article for some time but have only recently found the time.

First of all, it should be noted that Mr. Lind has made attacking the South and Southern culture his professional calling card. A reoccurring theme in his work is the threat the South posses to the rest of America. Consequently, one should consider the source when reading this article.

With the predatory warning out of the way, let me also say that one could write a book debunking the encyclopedic volume of economic fallacies, hyperbolic silliness, and faulty reasoning on display in Mr. Lind’s article. For instance, Mr. Lind states that:

“Today the division is no longer between slave and free states, or agrarian and industrial states, but between two models of industrial society — the Northern model, based on adequate public service funding and taxation and unionization, and the Southern model, based on low-tax, low-service government and low-wage, non-unionized, easily exploited labor.”

Let’s leave aside the debate on whether “adequate public service funding” or “bloated bureaucracy” is the appropriate term and focus on the underlying premise of this statement. Mr. Lind seems to think that high taxation, bureaucracy, and union domination of labor is a recipe for economic success. If that were the case then he and his fellow blue state liberals would have little to fear from the South and there would be no need for him to offer up such a contradictory argument for increased Federal assistance. Mr. Lind unwittingly concedes that his system can’t succeed on its own in a free market system. Instead of seeking ways to improve Northern industry he has to argue for the destruction of the South’s competitive advantage.

Lind’s retreat from reason is spectacularly on display with this little gem:

“If the industrial North and the industrial South compete for global capital investment, then the industrial South is likely to prevail, because Northern advantages in the form of a skilled workforce and superior public services are unlikely to overcome the South’s advantages of low wages and low taxes and state and local tax subsidies.”

If the North has an advantage in skilled workers benefiting from superior public services than why aren’t they more productive? If they are the recipients of better pay and services shouldn’t they be able to produce more? The disparity between the big three and their Japanese rivals regarding labor costs and productivity has been obvious for awhile (as this June 13th Washington Times Article points out). The Japanese cars produced in the South also happen to be superior products.

The real problem with Mr. Lind’s article is the awful conclusion he comes to. When Lind states that we need to replace state power over services and economic policy with a federal tax revenue sharing program and total federal control over all state economic activity he is arguing for the destruction of our Constitutional form of government. Instead of the federal system enshrined in our Constitution where the states retain the power to direct the bulk of their domestic activities Lind would set up a single government leviathan controlling everything. Mr. Lind wants to replace the diversity of our federal system of government with a one size fits all system with no room for individual state innovation.

Our parish has a Las Posadas observance which is where small statutes of Mary and Joseph are carried from one home to another during Advent in search of an “innkeeper” who will let them stay the night.  As part of our parish’s observance of this custom, each family takes pictures of Mary and Joseph in the family and those photos are added to a scrap book which accompanies Mary and Joseph.  One of our curates and his family were taking Mary and Joseph (who happen to be 24 inch tall plastic statutes) to their next home when they decided to stop at Starbucks.  They took Mary and Joseph in with them only to be told that Mary and Joseph couldn’t stay in the store because their presence might offend other customers and the priest (who was not wearing his collar), his wife and daughter were asked to leave. 

Now I understand that there is always a risk of internet hoaxes but I know this priest and trust him.  He has gone so far as to write a letter to editor of the local paper describing the events (no link available) so I believe that the event did occur.  It is outrageous.  So if I walk into the Starbucks and see an “Obama” t-shirt and decides it offends me (it wouldn’t but stay with me) can I then insist that the wearer be required to leave.  Of course not!  It is only because the statutes have religious significance to Christians that the employees thought it not only appropriate but their duty to insist on the offending symbol be removed.  It is sad commentary on the state of our Nation and political correctness run amok again.

Feast your eyes on the incarnation of all that is cool.

You can buy yours here. I did.

Today I showed that conservatives win when they actually try to limit government. Comments welcome.

Here’s the “change” we prolifers knew was coming.

My buddy Leon Wolf of RedState sends this gem along:

In the course of arguing that Obama should not allow Warren to give the invocation[, People for the American Way notes]:
 
“He has recently compared marriage by loving and committed same-sex couples to incest and pedophilia. He has repeated the Religious Right’s big lie that supporters of equality for gay Americans are out to silence pastors. He has called Christians who advance a social gospel Marxists. He is adamantly opposed to women having a legal right to choose an abortion.”

Well done, thy good and faithful servant.

USA Today has an interesting article on the legal elites who regularly practice before the Supreme Court of the United States.

Thomas Peters of American Papist has a post with everything you need to know about this landmark statement from the Catholic Church on “The Dignity of the Person.”

Ben Smith has the details.

He does, however, have the wrong link in his post. The blog post Smith is referring to in his post can be found here.

Update: Here is another liberal who is none to pleased with Obama’s selection of Warren to give the invocation at his inauguration.

Update II: Sully too.

Was there really any other choice?

I once recall hearing an anecdote about Reagan. Apparently, Reagan and his handlers were experts at ensuring that his public appearances — all of them — were carefully managed to project positive qualities. Even the simple act of Reagan exiting Air Force One was done in such a particularly reassuring, presidential fashion.

On one occassion, a major network did a story on Reagan that was extremely negative, but they used stock footage of Reagan throughout. Afterwords, a Reagan staffer called the reporter to thank him for the story. The reporter was aghast, and explained his shock given the negative tone of the piece. The Reagan staffer then explained that most viewers didn’t pay attention to the content, and that the constant montage of commanding Reagan appearances actually played to his benefit. Despite the hostility from the media, Reagan won out.

With Obama, we’re seeing a different dynamic. Obama doesn’t have to go around the media — he can work directly with it, because the mainstream media isn’t hostile to his presidency. This is most pronounced with Time Magazine’s recent decision to name Obama “Man of the Year,” and then use Obama campaign art on the cover. (more…)

New York raises taxes.

I mean, why reduce the size of government when you can always just impose a greater tax burden on your citizens?