McCain Theocracy Watch

Grampaw McCain is going around saying that he would appoint Supreme Court justices with "a proven record of excellence in the law, and a proven commitment to judicial restraint."

That's code, in case you didn't know, that lets reluctant wingnut voters know that he's on board with the fascist right turn that the court has taken, thanks to a inordinate number of Rethug presidential appointments.

That means he just loves some of the more rabid rightwing members of the court. So let's take a look at a speech given by Antonin "Quack-Quack" Scalia, the de facto leader of the fascist wing of the court, back in 2002 at the University of Chicago divinity school, on the subject of the death penalty:

This is not the Old Testament, I emphasize, but St Paul…[T]he core of his message is that government – however you want to limit that concept – derives its moral authority from God … Indeed, it seems to me that the more Christian a country is the less likely it is to regard the death penalty as immoral … I attribute that to the fact that, for the believing Christian, death is no big deal. Intentionally killing an innocent person is a big deal: it is a grave sin, which causes one to lose his soul. But losing this life, in exchange for the next? … for the nonbeliever, on the other hand, to deprive a man of his life is to end his existence. What a horrible act! …

The reaction of people of faith to this tendency of democracy to obscure the divine authority behind government should not be resignation to it, but the resolution to combat it as effectively as possible. We have done that in this country (and continental Europe has not) by preserving in our public life many visible reminders that – in the words of a Supreme Court opinion from the 1940s – "we are a religious people, whose institutions presuppose a Supreme Being" … All this, as I say, is most un-European, and helps explain why our people are more inclined to understand, as St Paul did, that government carries the sword as "the minister of God," to "execute wrath" upon the evildoer.

[quoted from The End of Faith by Sam Harris, pp. 156-157]

Read that over again and then tell me that we are not centimeters away from theocracy in this country. If McCain is elected, he will have the opportunity to appoint at least two, and more likely three, justices to the Supreme Court. There is no reason to suspect that he will appoint men (women need not apply) who disagree in any substantial way with Scalia's theocratic musings.

And that, once again, is why, if Clinton somehow manages to weasel her way into the nomination, we all need to suck it up and campaign for her, despite any or all of our reservations.

But fortunately, after last night's total Obama victory in North Carolina, and his oh-so-close showing in Indiana, it appears that we won't have to make that decision.

Now let's keep our eye on the prize and win the White House in November.