American Dystopia, Pt. 2

The Beat Goes On

"The decision whether or not to bear a child is central to a woman's life, to her well-being and dignity. It is a decision she must make for herself." – Ruth Bader Ginsburg

Dave Barnhart seems like an interesting guy. He’s a pastor, author, and teacher whose mission in life is to teach and live abundant life among passionate people. He is currently a student of mental health counseling at UAB and nature and forest therapy through ANFT.

In his latest blog post, dated April 15, 2022, He writes:

So, here we are. Good Friday. Honestly, this is a day I’m no fan of Christianity.

First, I find that little is more annoying about this season than bougie white boy preachers in thousand-dollar sneakers talking about Jesus and “revolutionary love.” Church is full of folks who are no friends of the revolution. “Revolutionary?” They ain’t even interested in abolishing prisons or reducing militarized police budgets, much less “revolution.” Their message isn’t revolutionary. It’s marketing.  

Second, Rome shows you what it does to revolutionaries: it crucifies them. “Crucifixion wasn’t just a form of execution; it was advertising,” says Amy-Jill Levine. A cross was a billboard. Crucifixions were staged near roads, so passersby could see clearly who was in charge and what happens to “revolutionaries.” As Max Weber put it: the state has a monopoly on the legitimate use of violence. Crucifixion displays the state’s monopoly of violence literally: by splaying human limbs.

Those are words that I can get behind. But he is more famous for the quote making the rounds right now about his view on abortion:

“The unborn” are a convenient group of people to advocate for. They never make demands of you; they are morally uncomplicated, unlike the incarcerated, addicted, or the chronically poor; they don’t resent your condescension or complain that you are not politically correct; unlike widows, they don’t ask you to question patriarchy; unlike orphans, they don’t need money, education, or childcare; unlike aliens, they don’t bring all that racial, cultural, and religious baggage that you dislike; they allow you to feel good about yourself without any work at creating or maintaining relationships; and when they are born, you can forget about them, because they cease to be unborn. You can love the unborn and advocate for them without substantially challenging your own wealth, power, or privilege, without re-imagining social structures, apologizing, or making reparations to anyone. They are, in short, the perfect people to love if you want to claim you love Jesus, but actually dislike people who breathe. Prisoners? Immigrants? The sick? The poor? Widows? Orphans? All the groups that are specifically mentioned in the Bible? They all get thrown under the bus for the unborn.

And on the right, the braying can be heard across the land as it’s all about the LEAK. The leaky leak. While the Dems are crying foul regarding the possible doing away with Roe v. Wade, what escaped from Mitch McConnell’s lipless lips was “Last night’s stunning breach was an attack on the independence of the Supreme Court. By every indication, this was yet another escalation in the radical left’s ongoing campaign to bully and intimidate federal judges and substitute mob rule for the rule of law. The disgraceful statements by President [Joe] Biden, Speaker Pelosi, and Leader Schumer refuse to defend judicial independence and the rule of law and instead play into this toxic spectacle. Real leaders should defend the Court’s independence unconditionally.”

Yes, we radical lefties are all about mob rule.

Jointly, House Republican Leader Kevin McCarthy, Republican Whip Steve Scalise and Republican Conference Chair Elise Stefanik (R-N.Y.) released a statement about–you guessed it–the leaks: “Yesterday’s unprecedented leak is an attempt to severely damage the Supreme Court. This clearly coordinated campaign to intimidate and obstruct the Justices of the United States Supreme Court, and its independence in our political system, from upholding the Constitution must immediately be investigated by the court. House Republicans are committed to upholding the sanctity of life, and we will continue to fight to be a voice for the truly voiceless. There is nothing more special, extraordinary, and worth fighting for than the miracle of life.”

About the leak, even Heather Cox Richardson jumped in last night saying But while McConnell and the right wing are implying that a liberal justice’s office leaked the draft, there is no evidence either way. Observers note, in fact, that the leak would help the right wing more than the dissenters, since it would likely lock in votes. Those trying to blame the liberal justices did not comment on an apparent leak from Chief Justice Roberts’s office that suggested he wanted a more moderate decision. Jennifer Rubin suggested calling the bluff of those blaming the liberal justices: she proposed agreeing that whichever office leaked the draft ought to recuse from the final decision.

She started her article off with history, of course, of the right wing turning to evangelicals and other religious groups in the 1980s to bump up their voter base. At that time political operative Grover Norquist said, “Traditional Republican business groups can provide the resources, but these groups can provide the votes.” Richardson went on to say Although even as recently as last week, only about 28% of Americans wanted Roe v. Wade overturned, Republicans continued to promise their base that they would see that decision destroyed. Indeed, the recognition that evangelical voters would turn out to win a Supreme Court seat might have been one of the reasons then–Senate majority leader Mitch McConnell refused to hold hearings for then-president Barack Obama’s nominee for the Supreme Court, Merrick Garland. Leaving that seat empty was a tangible prize to turn those voters out behind Donald Trump, whose personal history of divorces and sexual assault was not necessarily attractive to evangelicals, in 2016.

As far as keeping the workings of the Court under such a tight, secretive vice, many on the right are decrying the SANCTITY and the UNFORGIVABLE SIN that this leak has brought about. For instance, SCOTUSblog said “It’s impossible to overstate the earthquake this will cause inside the Court, in terms of the destruction of trust among the Justices and staff.”

But Jack Shafer of Politico makes the case that the court has long occupied a sacred and mythic place in the national consciousness, a place that the court itself has cultivated. Although the justices are political appointees, the court pretends to rise above politics. It conducts its work under a veil and depends on the press to fetishize the mysteries of the temple. It derives its authority not from the people but from the cosmos, the court’s deifiers would have you believe. Hence the robes that rival Batman’s cape, the court’s ban on cameras and the grand edifice from which it hands down its rulings. But this exalted view of the court, we must remind ourselves, is not a part of the natural order. It is of the court’s creation.

He went on to say, The POLITICO exclusive did the nation a service by ignoring the magic fairy dust that envelops the court to take an overdue look at the court’s decision-making process. The story was all the more warranted because if we had a viable Congress, it would have sorted out the legality of abortion by now. Instead, we’ve shunted to the Supreme Court the job of legislating what the abortion law should be. Viewed from that angle, the POLITICO scoop is less an intrusion into the Supreme Court’s sanctified domain than it is an investigation into a piece of evolving legislation. (As noted everywhere, the Alito draft is only a draft, and subject to change.)

We even had a slew of marchers downtown yesterday which is quite heartening!

Hang tight, gang, and you know…Just. Vote. Blue.

And now…