No Saber-Tooth Tigers!

What makes more sense: passing a law that prohibits anyone from keeping a saber-tooth tiger as a pet or passing a law that prohibits the replacement of our current laws with sharia law? Strictly form a legal standpoint keeping a saber-tooth tiger as a pet is viable whereas replacing our current laws with sharia law is not. Keeping a saber-tooth tiger as a pet does not violate the first amendment or any of the other amendments to our constitution. Replacing our laws with sharia law, on the other hand, violates the first amendment and several other amendments to our constitution. In other words, sharia law could not survive the scrutiny of any appellate court. It poses no more of a threat than saber-tooth tigers do. Yet here we have Newt Gingrich advocating the passage of a law to prohibit replacing our current laws with sharia law. If Mr. Gingrich succeeded in passing such a law, he could wait several years and claim that it worked because no one replaced our laws with sharia law. If I succeeded in passing a law prohibiting anyone from keeping a saber-tooth tiger as a pet, I could also wait several years and say the prohibition worked because no one resurrected one of those creatures to keep as a pet.

I know this is not a political blog, but I cannot ignore Mr. Gingrich’s inadvertent satire. This man was once the Speaker of the House of Representatives. He was considered the leader of the Republican Party and its leading intellectual. Is he really that ignorant about our constitution and judicial review? I hope so. If that is not the reason he is advocating such an absurd law, I will have to conclude that he is arrogant enough to think he can sell the American people legislative snake oil. This means he is insulting our educational system and/or the retention level of anyone who successfully completed a seventh grade civics course. Is he so bereft of any thoughts about how we might deal with our real problems that he has to drum up such an obviously phony issue? Is he cynical enough to think we are so ignorant and gullible that we will thank him for saving us from such an imaginary threat?

Maybe he is trying to appeal to low information voters, but what he is advocating is so ludicrous that it falls well below the lowest common denominator. It is almost as if he is mocking irrational fears. Could that be what he is doing? Is he trying to compete with Stephen Colbert or John Stewart? Is he doing a parody of a right wing demagogue? Frankly, I do not think he is that bright or that funny. Better leave the comedy to the professionals, Newt. Believe me, you are no Pat Paulsen!

This was first published in macsbackporch.foxtail-farms on Sept. 22, 2010.  The reason why I am posting again is to remind people of how absurd the Republicans are and how vicious they became under Gingrich's leadership.  I want to remind people of the impeachment of Bill Clinton. I want to remind the voters of when partisan interests became more important to Republicans than the interests of this nation.  Elections have consequences and the consequences of the last election could be dire!