Lining Up At The Grandstanding Opening
Well, the Texas Lege opens next month and nobody in Texas is safe while they are in session, especially women, children, minorities, the poor, the handicapped, the gay, the elderly, or the lame. The only safe people are white men and their right to be total jerks just because they can be.
Allow me to introduce to you State Rep Dan Flynn. Dan’s got 99 problems but the one that matters is that there are not enough of the Ten Commandments in Texas classrooms.
House Bill 51 would modify the Texas Education Code, specifying that “the board of trustees of an independent school district may not prohibit the posting of a copy of the Ten Commandments in a prominent location in a district classroom.”
I don’t know what he means by prominent.
Now, I haven’t heard any big uproar over the Ten Commandments being in classrooms one way or the other, but I am going to ask my State Rep to add an amendment to HB51 saying that if the Ten Commandments are posted, so must be a picture of the President of the United Damn States of America.
That’ll end that right there.
I do not know if you are aware of this, but in 2005, the Supreme Court ruled that Texas could put the Ten Commandments on the grounds of the State Capitol but the also struck down the posting of the commandments in county courthouses in Kentucky. That means that even the Supreme Court acknowledges that the best of the Texas Lege needs divine guidance in their behavior more than the worst judge in Kentucky. Sad, ain’t it?
Thanks to Mary for the heads up.
I am all for it, if we can add that any Republican legislator caught breaking one of them gets the death penalty. That includes lying and stealing.
1I believe this issue has been settled repeatedly. Do these GOP idiots not know about precedence or do they think (I already know the answer) that their brand of religion is exempt from how the Constitution has been repeatedly interpreted?
2Have to be a lot of special elections, in that case (;-), ;-), 🙂
Want specially severe enforcement of Number Nine: false witness against your neighbor. Who is everyone. Yup.
Though why this bozo thinks schools need to appeal to the Bible to tell kids that stealing and killing are wrong, and in fact already against the law of the land, and though policemen and DAs can lie with impunity to suspects and juries, they (the students) can’t lie to policemen and DAs without being subject to legal stuff….I don’t know. Mrs. Dugger, the principal of my elementary school, had most of us plenty scared without ever bringing God into it. The schools could suspend someone for several days for wearing the wrong clothes–which isn’t in the Ten Commandments–so what did they need them for?
3Even straight white men aren’t safe under the current bunch of current legislators, especially Democrats. There are a few exceptions in the legislature though and hopefully they can prevent the most extreme bills from getting passed for Perry to gleefully sign.
4Are these guys so insecure in their own religious beliefs that they must force them on other people in order to be comfortable? I’m an unholy atheist myself and I don’t give a rat’s patootie what anyone else believes unless/until they try to force it down my throat.
Guys, religious beliefs or the lack of them is personal, not governmental. Imagine how huge the government would have to be to enforce the 10 commandments. (Heck, arresting Repubs for porn and false idols would take up 80% of the resources.)
5When will we get relief from these god botherers trying to impose their Mosaic Law on Americans?
6It appears the adherents of Christian Dominionism, who happen to own the Texas State Legislature, are determined to turn this state’s public school classrooms into their own private biblical week-day learning centers.
7Well, Rep. Flynn, those Ten Commandments aren’t worth a hill of habichuelas if the kids don’t know how to read, thanks to budget cuts.
8I have changed my mind about the ten commandments. First of all, they are Old Testament, not the Christian New Testament. Second, they are a simple moral code for living successfully with all people, even your relatives. And third, I think they should be prominently displayed in Washington, D.C. and in large block letters so that everyone who reads them will understand that it is wrong to lie, steal, dishonor the elderly, be greedy, kill others, sleep around, mistreat your neighbors, etc. Every major religion has the equivalent of this code in its teachings, and most secular humanists who are moral people follow a similar personal code of simple humane and ethical behavior.
9Read Section 3 of the bill. Am I mis-reading it or does it actually provide for the bill to go into effect by Sept. 1, 2013 whether or not it is passed?
10O.K., my bad; I did mis-read it. The key word is “immediately.”
11Picture of the President! That’s the best one I’ve heard since Mickey Leland’s Aggie amendment to an abortion/husband bill.
12Ellen Childress: yes, every major religion (and non) has the equivalent of the Ten Commandments, which makes them pretty nonspecial as far as many of us are concerned. And the only ones that are US laws are don’t kill, don’t steal, and don’t lie to authority (bear false witness), which every society on earth also says.
The mistake was stopping at ten– should have added don’t rape, don’t abuse children, don’t pollute your environment, don’t be cruel to animals, and a few other things.
The school district has no business telling kids to honor a particular god, and the Supreme Court has agreed.
13Shall I call the ACLU now, or wait for a real resident of Texas to do it?
14If ten are posted, I want the other 600+ in Leviticus posted.
15Dammit, G-d’s law is G-d’s law and Texas kids need to follow, to the letter, EVERY one of them.
Why do all these “good” Christians have to over- compensate? Maybe cuz they are not such good Christians?
16Oh, I forgot Deuteronomy.
17I want Rep. Flynn to explain Deut. 25:11-12 to all the girls in Mrs. Patman’s second grade class.