If an atheist walks by, he can avert his eyes, he can think about something else

The Credit Card Company Profits Protection Act Bankruptcy Bill exempts trusts used by rich people to protect their assets during bankruptcy. Of course it does.

Prince Charles is in Australia, where today they showed him an outhouse, tried to feed him live insects, and made him shake hands with topless Aboriginal women “of whom,” said the Times, “the description ‘willowy’ would be misleading”.




In the Supreme Court hearings today on displays of the Ten Commandments, Justice Kennedy complained about “this obsessive concern with any mention of religion,” and by “obsessive” he did not mean the Christian protesters yelling outside the Supreme Court building, but rather those obsessively concerned with following their nation’s foundational documents and principles. The plaintiff's lawyer pointed out that the crowds and the people sending him hate mail weren’t concerned with preserving the image of the Commandments as a secular symbol. “Obsessive concern.” Kennedy is such a dick.

Kennedy says removing the display might “show hostility to religion.” No, the existing displays show favoritism towards a religion. Not having such displays merely shows neutrality. To show actual hostility would require a monument saying “There is No God,” or “Jesus Sucks,” or “Go Ahead and Lust After Your Neighbor’s Oxen, See if We Care.” Kennedy says, “If an atheist walks by, he can avert his eyes, he can think about something else.” Like about how Kennedy is such a dick.

Fat Tony Scalia, who wouldn’t find it unconstitutional if a law were passed requiring the Ten Commandments be tattooed on everyone’s body, says “It’s a profoundly religious message, but it’s a profoundly religious message believed in by a vast majority of the American people.” He thought that included Muslims, until someone explained it to him. Although right after this display of ignorance, he blithely went on, “You know, I think probably 90 percent of the American people believe in the Ten Commandments, and I’ll bet you that 85 percent of them couldn’t tell you what the ten are.” He says the majority of Americans believe that “government comes from God.” They do?

Actually, I prefer the honesty of Scalia’s position (while totally opposing that position, of course), which at least admits to the religious intent of religious symbolism without pretending it’s secular or historical, to Kennedy’s position that not displaying them is “asking religious people to surrender their beliefs”.