Experts are Confusing.

We live in a world of experts. All you have to do is look at any of the social media feeds.  Everyone has all the answers, sometimes without even knowing the questions. In this world of experts, it is becoming increasingly difficult to know what to do, who to do it too, and what will happen when it’s done. To illustrate this, let’s start with a big question and work our way down to a little one.

Question 1:  How was the universe created?

Answer:  Experts believe it was created by a “big bang” and it is expanding outward until someday it will stop expanding and collapse back within itself.  Other theological experts believe God created the universe with intelligent design. Depending on the theology it is working as a clock wound up or God is tinkering with it like a clocksmith.  

My confusion:  If the universe started from a single big bang, what was there before, and what caused that single big bang?  If it is expanding outward – what is it expanding into?  From a theological standpoint, if God created the universe how come it’s expanding at all?  

My theory: we are just a giant loaf of bread and right now God has us on the counter while the yeast rises.  The reason we have global warming is the yeast creates an exothermic reaction, or we are about to be put into the oven.  That solved let’s move on to the next question.

Question 2:  Why is there war?

Answer 2: War is a competition for resources, control, and wealth.  OR, it is just caused by men with small penises. 

My confusion:  How do experts know what size penis a Dictator, King, or President has?  Also, what happens when Queens start wars?  Does that mean it is a competition for wealth?  The Egyptians never seemed to need a massive empire like the Macedonians, does that mean Alexander the Great, wasn’t really that great in the manhood department?

My theory: War is caused by women, who’ve cleverly found a way to blame men, except when they are in charge and have beheaded anyone they could have blamed.

Question 3:  What is the greatest risk to U.S. National Security?

Answer 3:  The greatest risk to U.S. National Security is a) nuclear war, b) global famine caused by climate change, c) a few white supremacists, d) parents actually questioning school boards or e) insurrection.  Each of these answers has experts who will explain why these are all threats to national security because you know a single threat would be mundane.  You can never have too many threats.

My confusion:  Is it possible to prioritize threats without political agenda?  Can we agree that one threat is more likely to destroy the nation than another?

My theory:  No, it is not possible to prioritize threats without a political agenda.  The importance of a threat depends solely on your point of view and the ability to get in front of the right megaphone to yell out what you think the problem is.  With that in mind, I think the biggest threat to us as a nation is obesity, we will all gain so much weight the population of the west coast will cause the continent to flip over.

Question 4: What is the greatest threat to Public Health?

Answer 4:  This seems to change on almost a daily basis as various experts come forth to tell us what the latest health risks are. It was all pretty simple before the Chinese discovered the Wuhan Virus, now known affectionately as COVID-19. With its arrival, we shut down the world with government mandates until we could get enough personal protective equipment (i.e., masks and rubber gloves, along with social distancing) to stop the spread.  When those didn’t work, we rolled vaccines that were supposed to stop people from getting the virus, and when those didn’t work some went back to government mandates. Now that every rational being seems to be burned out with COVID we are moving on to a new set of “greatest threats.”  Of course, there is “monkeypox” but that hasn’t emerged as the vehicle of choice for the experts, so we are coming up with things like insurrection, assault weapons, and angry young men.

My Confusion:  The number one threat to public health used to be the disease or diseases that killed the most people, although automobiles had a strong lobby and never really got traction as #1.  Smoking and cancer stood out for a long time, but then we started getting the “real” scientists involved.  (By real I mean the internet scientists) and things like gender identity, bullying, and questioning the government experts raised concerns that disinformation was becoming a real threat.

My Theory: Identifying a single greatest threat would risk the other threats losing government funding and the people who like to spend other people’s money would be upset when their political donors don’t get their fair share, so they will continue to funnel money back to the politician.

Attempting to Do in Fifty Days What You’ve Not Done in Fifty Years

Or

Never Let an Emotional Issue Go to Waste.

The leaking of a draft decision in the case of Dobbs vs. Jackson Women's Health Organization indicated the high court may overturn a previous court’s ruling in Roe vs. Wade, that a woman had a right to abortion, throughout the nation.  All those who see opportunity in this have risen up to defend or condemn the potential ruling.  Facts don’t really matter here.  Those who are pro-abortion are outraged, while those who are pro-life rejoice.

What does matter is how the politicians of the two sides are going to react!

We see the feigned outrage of the DNC as Senators, Representatives, Governors, and even the President (and his spokespeople), come before the nation to condemn the court, and vow action to undo the decision to return the right to decide on any limits to abortion to the states in accordance with the U.S. Constitution[1].  The Democratic members of the House and the Senate, as well as the President, believe they can craft a law that either makes abortion a national law or limits the ability of each state to decide its own standard.  I believe this is simply a politically opportunistic folly, that shows how little our politicians really know about the Constitution, and the belief they will be able to change the composition of the Supreme Court to move it to the politically liberal side to overturn whatever ruling comes out of the Dobbs case.

Now let’s be clear, in the almost 50-years since Roe v. Wade there has been little if any effort to codify a woman’s right to choose what to do with her pregnancy. In fact, since 1972 there has been only one amendment to the Constitution approved.  The 27^th Amendment, first proposed in 1791, but finally ratified in 1992, sets limits on Congress to give themselves pay raises.

So now the left thinks they can write a law that will “codify” a woman’s universal right to abortion before the fall elections.  All I’ve got to say is good luck!  Even if they wrote such a fanciful law would it stand the scrutiny of a court that defers to the Constitution as a principle?

Of course, there are those “radical” politicians who think this can all be corrected if we just pack the court with enough radical justices to make the Constitution irrelevant.  Again, good luck in achieving that before the mid-terms.

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[1] Amendment 10 - Powers of the States and People. Ratified 12/15/1791.  The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people. 

 

Just an Opinion on the Faith of a Progressive

         I’m told someone serving in the Supreme Court of the United States (SCOTUS) has taken the unprecedented step of releasing a draft opinion of the court as it is being debated and written by the justices.  Of course, it is not some mundane matter, but over abortion rights in the country.  As a disclaimer I’ve not read the draft, nor do I intend to.  There is nothing I can do about it.  To be honest, while I have my opinion on the issue, aligned to my faith, and the moral questions people who support abortion on demand will not and cannot answer the Court's opinion is what it is, and will not directly affect me. 

What I observe in the media that lives for these kinds of events is the outrage on both sides, as the issue enters the public forum.  Those who’ve sought to overturn the SCOTUS rulings in Roe vs. Wade and the subsequent cases, which expanded the limits of abortion on demand are rejoicing, but are upset with what they see as a politically driven breach of procedure.  While those who’ve advocated for unlimited abortion are now mobilizing for what they believe to be a historic fight for their freedom to kill those whose lives are inconvenient.  All the usual players have taken the stage, with all the usual rants and opinions.

What I like to observe and comment on though is how those who have no faith in a higher power, putting all their faith in the rule of man are now reacting.

Those people see the nation falling into an age of darkness because of the men and women who may vote to overturn a social ruling of the court to comply with their view of the role of government in the determination of life and individual rights.  I would simply point out that those zealots for abortion have had 50-years to codify the SCOTUS decision into the constitution, but have failed to do so because so many disagree with it and it is a polarizing issue – one they use each election to fight over rather than resolve.

I think it was Chuck Colson, of Watergate fame, who talked about God and faith and pointed out the conspirators of Watergate couldn’t hold up under the pressure of inquisition for a year, while the Church has withstood the questioning of man for over two-thousand years and still keeps the story of the Resurrection alive.

When you chose to place your faith in a politician, political party, or even a SCOTUS ruling you are indeed standing on thin ice.  All the outrage, inflamed rhetoric, or blood-flinging protests will not end the lack of substance in what you believe to be logic and reason.  How quickly you abandon science when it is proven life begins before birth and then when confronted move to outrage.  How fascinating it is to watch you move from the defense of “birthing persons” to “women’s rights” when it comes to a desire to end an inconvenient life.  

I expect we will see all the old and distasteful images of the pre-abortion era flung out as those who’ve placed their faith in man seek to condemn the judgment of man.