- Do justices not foresee consequences?
- Heather Cox Richardson on the big beautiful bill;
- How JD Vance reveals the administration’s true motivations; cruelty is the thing;
- Jonathan Chait on Republicans’ “incomprehensibly reckless plan”;
- Robert Reich on conservatives’ animosity to empathy (never mind Jesus Christ);
- Initial thoughts about Springsteen’s “Western Stars”.
Sometimes you wonder if lawyers, judges, and justices are so focused on the validity of a particular law that they don’t consider the implications of their ruling. Obsessed with the technical details and missing the big picture.
Slate, Heidi Feldman, 30 Jun 2025: Supreme Court Rules Some Americans Have a Constitutional Right to Insist on Theocracy
Mahmoud arose when parents in Montgomery County, Maryland, demanded from the school board that they receive notice and the right to refuse their children’s attendance whenever books with LGBTQ+ characters and themes will be used during classroom instruction. The parents argued that the free exercise clause of the First Amendment entitles them to these accommodations. They posited that any exposure of their children to the books interferes with their right to instruct their children in religion.
The article details the arguments for and against. The gist is that, according to the conservative justices, religious sensibilities trump everything.
–But does that mean parents can ask public schools to set up different accommodations for white and black students so children don’t have to be exposed to, what their religion tells them (and they can claim this about anything, according to religion, which has no root in reality), are inferior and offensive people? Where does this end?
\\\
Heather Cox Richardson summarizes the bill.
Letters from an American, Heather Cox Richardson: June 30, 2025
“This is the most deeply immoral piece of legislation I have ever voted on in my entire time in Congress,” said Senator Chris Murphy (D-CT).
“[W]e’re debating a bill that’s going to cut healthcare for 16 million people. It’s going to give a tax break to…massively wealthy people who don’t need any more money. There are going to be kids who go hungry because of this bill. This is the biggest reduction in…nutrition benefits for kids in the history of the country.” Murphy continued: “We’re obviously gonna continue to offer these amendments to try to make it better. So far not a single one of our amendments…has passed, but we’ll be here all day, probably all night, giving Republicans the chance over and over and over again to slim down the tax cuts for the corporations or to make life a little bit…less miserable for hungry kids or maybe don’t throw as many people off of healthcare. Maybe don’t close so many rural hospitals. It’s gonna be a long day and a long night.”
“This bill is a farce,” said Senator Angus King (I-ME). “Imagine a bunch of guys sitting around a table, saying, ‘I’ve got a great idea. Let’s give $32,000 worth of tax breaks to a millionaire and we’ll pay for it by taking health insurance away from lower-income and middle-income people. And to top it off, how about we cut food stamps, we cut SNAP, we cut food aid to people?’… I’ve been in this business of public policy now for 20 years, eight years as governor, 12 years in the United States Senate. I have never seen a bill this bad. I have never seen a bill that is this irresponsible, regressive, and downright cruel.”
Recall Adam Serwer: The Cruelty Is the Point.
\\\
A story going around today is this statement by JD Vance, which reveals maybe more than he intended. The photo is the one that got someone arrested, or maybe even deported, because ICE agents found it on his phone.
Boing Boing, Jason Weisberger, 1 Jul 2025: US Vice President Vance says terrorizing people is job one
The JD Vance post:
Everything else–the CBO score, the proper baseline, the minutiae of the Medicaid policy–is immaterial compared to the ICE money and immigration enforcement provisions.
The take by someone on Bluesky named Karl:
The vice president is opening saying [their] only goal is to fund the infrastructure of industrial death at all costs and that nothing else matters because their goal is to murder as many of their opposition as they can as quickly as possible.
This is an admission of genocidal intent.
And Boing Boing‘s take:
United States Vice President JD Vance claims there is no job more important for the Federal government than the seemingly random abduction, detention, and deportation of people off the streets.
..
Cruelty is the thing. Everything up to and including healthcare for the elderly is unimportant compared to funding the round-up and deportation of folks who contribute far more to their communities than JD Vance. The “big beautiful bill” is about cruelty.
Again recall Adam Serwer: The Cruelty Is the Point.
Again and again, as I see it, self-professed Christians are not Christian, in the sense of following the teaching of Jesus Christ. Rather, they express base tribal animosity toward everyone unlike themselves. And have no sympathy for anyone in need.
\\\
Obviously the reason Trump wanted to pass his “Big Beautiful Bill” all at once is because it has so many provisions that, examined individually, even most Republicans would not stomach.
The Atlantic, Jonathan Chait, 1 Jul 2025: They Didn’t Have to Do This, subtitled “By passing Donald Trump’s One Big Beautiful Bill Act, congressional Republicans have talked themselves into an incomprehensibly reckless plan.”
From the middle of this piece:
One explanation is that they don’t understand just how unpopular the bill is apt to be when it takes effect. Many Republicans rely on party-aligned media for their news, and these sources have mostly cheered the bill while ignoring its downsides. Both chambers of Congress have rushed the bill through with minimal scrutiny, shielding members from exposure to concerns. Even the White House seems unaware of what exactly it’s pressuring Congress to do. Yesterday, when a reporter asked Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt about the megabill’s proposed tax on wind and solar energy, she appeared totally unfamiliar with the measure and punted the question. (The tax provision was later removed.)
\\
Once again, how conservatives are not Christian, even though they say they are.
Robert Reich, 1 Jul 2025: Trump, Musk, Republicans, and the Empathy Bug
Recalling Elon Musk’s comments about how “The fundamental weakness of Western civilization is empathy.”
When a reporter asked Trump if he had located the latest detention facility in the Everglades swamp so detainees who tried to escape would be eaten by alligators he said “I guess that’s the concept. This is not a nice business.” He then joked that immigrants will need to learn how to run away from alligators. “Don’t run in a straight line. Run like this,” he added, while hand-motioning a zig zag. “And you know what, your chances go up by 1 percent. Not a good thing.”
It’s all the opposite of empathy — treating people as if they aren’t human, as if they’re the “other.”
Both Musk and Trump are experts in taking selfish advantage of everything, anything, and anybody. Both have altered government programs and regulations to reap personal financial gain. Both have been quick to fire people. Both demand loyalty to themselves but have no loyalty to anything or anyone besides themselves.
They are the tribal past. The world will not survive until we get over this. Reich understands.
They’ve got it all wrong. Empathy is a necessary precondition for a society.
Without empathy, we’d be living in a social Darwinist jungle animated only by selfish individuals pursuing selfish needs, like Musk and Trump.
If everyone behaved like Musk and Trump, we’d have to assume everyone else was out to exploit us if they could. Much of our time and attention would be devoted to outwitting or protecting ourselves from other Musks and Trumps.
Without a shared sense of empathy and responsibility, we would have to assume that everyone — including legislators, judges, regulators, and police — was acting selfishly, making and enforcing laws for their own benefit.
Of course many conservatives do assume that everyone is out to get them. (I recall my father, alas, as he sat in front of the TV news.)
Reich goes on with more examples, and finishes,
Our core identity as Americans — the most precious legacy we have been given by the generations who came before us — consists of the ideals we share and the obligations we hold in common. We are tied together by these empathic meanings and duties. Our loyalties and attachments, guided by empathy, define who we are.
If we are losing our national identity, it is not because we are becoming blacker or browner or speak in more languages than we once did. It is because we are losing the ties that bind us together, our collective empathy.
Musk and Trump typify what has gone wrong. Their most damaging legacies may be the erosion of the trust and empathy on which our society — any society — depends.
\\\
Listening to Western Stars.
I’m sure I listened to it a couple times when it came out. But I need to listen to it again, and again.
I had forgotten that this is one of Springsteen’s low-key albums, like NEBRASKA and THE GHOST OF TOM JOAD.
It takes two or three, or maybe four or five, listenings to album, to absorb it. Pop songs are designed to be instantly catchy. Softer, more complex songs, take multiple listenings, but will take root in your soul in a way catchy pop songs never will.
