why comparing Dred Scott to marriage equality is incredibly wrong:
This brings him back to Dred Scott. He writes, “Stripped of its shiny rhetorical gloss, the majority’s argument is that the Due Process Clause gives same-sex couples a fundamental right to marry because it will be good for them and for society. If I were a legislator, I would certainly consider that view as a matter of social policy. But as a judge, I find the majority’s position indefensible as a matter of constitutional law.”
This is, to borrow Noonan’s word, an appalling argument, and not only because the results—Dred Scott constrains liberty and Obergefell expands it—are so disparate. Nor is the problem just that Roberts so crudely misrepresents Kennedy’s argument. Rather, Roberts is most wrong when it comes to which side in the marriage debate has inherited the Dred Scott legacy. Kennedy’s opinion, far from being the poisoned product of the Taney majority, is the honorable heir of the Dred Scott dissents.
I am Team Air Conditioning forever, and like to think that also keeping my house at about 63 degrees in the dead of winter makes it basically an environmental wash (DO NOT DISABUSE ME OF THIS, PLEASE):
The New York Times agrees: “It seems absurd, if not unconscionable.” But the case against AC has always been more a moral judgment than a scientific one. Summer cooling is no more damaging to the climate than the heating that we do in winter. In fact, it’s substantially less so, since the United States burns more fuel on radiators than it does on air conditioners. According to the most recent stats available from the federal government (which cover 2010), the average American household puts 40.4 million British thermal units into home heating, and just 9.3 million BTUs into home cooling. As I’ve pointed out before, this explains why the long-term shift in population from our coldest, Northern states into the hot and humid South has in sum reduced the amount of fossil fuel we burn to keep our houses at a comfortable temperature. Simply put: It’s more efficient to air-condition homes in Florida than it is to warm the ones in Minnesota.
Nicole Cliffe, medical professional, on drinking while breastfeeding:
Now I go by that rule, too, but it took me a while to get there. The better judgment of new mothers, like that of teens, is often mistrusted. We’re given rules and guidelines and told what’s best because the stakes are high, and better safe than sorry, and you never know. But somewhere around my kid’s fourth or fifth month, I had a good three- or four-hour window between feedings, so if timed correctly (or if I hid out in the car and nursed while everyone else got us a table), I could easily have a midday beer. There was always strategy involved, always math. It’s all anecdotal, but this — from Toast editor Nicole Cliffe — is something you won’t read on BabyCenter: “The math on drinking while nursing makes it clear that you are best off rapidly shotgunning a drink WHILE nursing but they never SAY that.”
awww (my daughter had a HORRIBLE transition to preschool, she wasn’t “bad,” ever, she was just sad and anxious and withdrawn, and my heart is with the wee children who need help):
The next step is to identify each student’s challenges—transitioning from recess to class, keeping his hands to himself, sitting with the group—and tackle them one at a time. For example, a child might act out because he felt that too many people were “looking at him in the circle.” The solution? “He might come up with the idea of sitting in the back of the room and listening,” D’Aran says. The teachers and the student would come up with a plan to slowly get him more involved.
I am OBSESSED with Lew Smedes’ My God and I: A Spiritual Memoir, having discovered Smedes as a result of Mallory telling me to read him in Gabbin’ About God, and I CANNOT put it down, so if you know me IRL you have probably already had me call you to talk AT you about it, but I just want to share this really lovely passage about prayer, which is even lovelier when you know he was known for being GREAT at praying:
He is a warm and gentle delight! I also loved this:
“In the early seventies Henry Stob, one of my college heroes, wanted me to succeed him as the Professor of Christian Ethics at Calvin Theological Seminary. In those days, only the General Synod of the church could decide who was and who was not qualified to teach his future ministers. A vote had to be taken. I was one of three candidates. But certain delegates of the Synod had disturbing concerns about me. I had once admitted that I harbored a hope that everyone would go to heaven, a hope that made me suspect for having it.”
This guy wants better safety measures at Peggy’s Cove but like the signs they have are already PRETTY TERRIFYING pic.twitter.com/D0PFV4JfwM
— Anne Thériault (@anne_theriault) July 8, 2015
