Sheldon Richman: The Only way to get money out of politics

  Last week’s Supreme Court ruling striking down the ban on corporate and union spending at election time is both a blessing and a curse. On the one hand, removing a legal barrier to free speech is always a good thing in itself. Government shouldn’t dictate who can speak or from where people may get their information. This is more than a matter of abstract freedom; it’s also a practical matter. More contentiousness in politics is better than less. Free-wheeling debate is more likely to produce good outcomes than a controlled flow of information.

  But there is a downside to the ruling that we should freely acknowledge. If history and recent times are any indication, big corporations and unions will use their new freedom of political speech to promote bad ideas. By “bad ideas” I mean proposals for more government interference with our lives and liberty. (Not that the spending ban kept them from doing that in other ways.)

Charles C. Haynes: Beyond the shouting, what the law really says about religion

  Because good news is all too rare in our culture wars, Americans should welcome a common-ground agreement released this week titled “Religious Expression in American Public Life: A Joint Statement of Current Law.” (Download the report, which is a PDF document.)

  Drafted by a diverse group of religious-liberty advocates, educators and scholars, the document represents the first-ever consensus on how the law addresses the role of religion in the public square in the United States.

Joseph O. Patton: Introducing Alabama’s next Attorney General…

  In case you missed it, Mobile District Attorney John Tyson (D) announced he was running for the office of Alabama Attorney General today. I know, it looked like he was being appointed as Bob Riley’s new anti-gambling crusader head henchman, and that‘s what the press release contended, but in truth he was laying the groundwork to get elected AG, to go a second round with Troy King in November.

  No one has forgotten the slime-throwing embarrassment of the 2006 AG’s race, especially Tyson. For a man with his crime-fighting record, he should have stomped King flat with his eyes closed and one hand tied behind his back. But as Deep South custom dictates, the very people who always tout their so-called family values - King and his cronies - managed to ride a trail of their own slime past Tyson and back into office when the polls closed, slinging every variety of muck they could scoop up with their hands.

Gary Palmer: Abortion still an issue in health care reform

  President Obama and the Democrat leadership in Congress have created a major political dilemma for themselves in their efforts to nationalize our health care system. The dilemma they face is over abortion.

  Obama made some specific promises to Planned Parenthood and others in the abortion industry and to pro-abortion interest groups. Basically, they promised to deliver more children to their clinics by removing virtually all restrictions on abortions. In fact, in a speech to Planned Parenthood during the presidential campaign, Obama said, “The first thing I would do as president is sign the Freedom of Choice Act (FOCA).” He added, “On this fundamental issue I will not yield and Planned Parenthood will not yield.”

Daniel Corsair: Supreme Court gives United States of America back to Britain and the world

  It was just announced that in a 5 to 4 decision, the United State's Supreme Court voted to allow corporations the ability to spend unlimited amounts of money on campaign ads. It is said that this ruling wipes out decades of legislation which worked to provide the American people with a voting system that was intent on only supporting the American voter.

  I have scoured the Constitution and the Declaration of Independence and nowhere do I find that our forefathers intended for our country to be controlled by businesses, corporations or foreigners. Because so much of our country has been bought up by foreigners, foreign companies and corporations, the Supreme Court has given our country away to the world and severely diminished the rights of the American people.

Josh Carples: Cutting through the Massachusetts senate race hype

  Let's be real about the Massachusetts senate race for a second. If Martha Coakley was serious about winning, she would have done some things differently.

  Whether it was her directly or her handlers, she allowed her campaign to come across as arrogant and out-of-touch with regular people. Complaining about having to shake hands in the cold and relying completely on the “star power” of the big-name Democrats to stump for her – rather than her getting out there herself like her opponent did – allowed her to come across that way, not to mention taking a week vacation between the recent primary (Dec. 8) and the election (Jan. 19).

  Those campaign failures, along with not resonating with voters, will make any progress of the president's agenda more difficult – not that things were going smoothly to begin with.

Sheldon Richman: National security: The Big fraud

  The hand-wringing about the would-be Christmas Day airplane bomber and the politicians’ tiresome declarations that it will never happen again miss the point: As long as the U.S. government pursues its imperial program of invasion, regime change, occupation, and sponsorship of corrupt governments in the Muslim world, Americans will be targets for avengers. This does not excuse the killing of innocents — it merely points out an inevitable chain of events.

  It’s either foreign intervention and retaliatory terrorism or nonintervention and security. There’s no third way.

Joe Bageant: Bass boats and queer marriage

The battle for the American soul is over and Jay Leno won
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Ajijic, Jalisco, Mexico

  Holy smoking Jesus, America is losing its middle class! “We're taxing the middle class out of existence,” charge the conservatives. “The middle class is being hollowed out,” wail the liberals, pouring forth great mock turtle tears (although one wonders how such a vacuum, as middle class life in America could be further hollowed).

  For both political camps, high dudgeon over “the vanishing middle class” is supposed to represent some sort of “new populism.” Not that the populace disagrees with them, mainly because the populace, if we are referring to the genuine America populace, hasn't the slightest notion of the definition of populism. But the word sounds like it has to do with popularity, the highest virtue in the American mind, and can even lead to the celestial heights called celebrity. So what the hell, they're willing to run with it. 

  In any case, much overwrought political theater is being dedicated to the subject of the middle class’ demise… if demise is the right word for losing its ability to engorge on commodities at obscene levels.

Josh Carples: Why Donald Miller misses the point on Pat Robertson’s new low

  Donald Miller wrote a very good response regarding the newest Pat Robertson foot-in-mouth moment regarding the suffering going on after the devastating earthquake in Haiti. If you missed the original comment, Robertson said the country is cursed because many years ago a pact was made with the devil to free them from French control. Classy, right?

  Miller, on his blog, sets out to ease the anger by calling his fellow Christians to pity Robertson and show him that God is not impressed with religious posturing. His blog is geared toward Christians – he is a Christian author, and I would say a good one after reading his book “To Own a Dragon” – and I say that to put the post in proper context.

I think that Miller gets it mostly right in his take on the situation. He says, “Many controlling personalities are drawn to the idea of a severe, vengeance oriented God,” and says that Robertson was “sadly irresponsible” for making “such a devastatingly shocking statement in the context of great hurt.”

Michael Josephson: Character Counts: The Intimidating power of integrity

  A teacher once wrote telling me that a parent with a great deal of clout at her school asked her to change attendance records to make her child’s record look better. The teacher said she thought long and hard about the request but eventually refused, knowing it would make the parent angry.

  I commended her moral courage. I wish it didn’t take courage to do the right thing, especially in such a clear case as this, but in the real world people with power often retaliate when they don’t get what they want. This can make our lives difficult.