7 Quick Takes: Nuptiality, Sexuality, and Pot Roast

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My sister Elizabeth got married on Saturday! Definitely the biggest news around here. It was a simple, intimate wedding, exactly what Jason and Liz wanted. A lifetime of joy to you!

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I adapted this recipe for the slow cooker yesterday.  And changed a bunch of stuff, so I think it counts as being original.

Trim a 2 1/2 lb. chuck roast of all visible fat.  Heat a tbsp of oil in a skillet, sear the meat on all sides.  Put meat aside.  Saute one chopped onion, 3 cloves minced garlic, and a package of sliced mushrooms in the pan.  Put the vegetables in a crock pot, put the meat on top.  Add a bay leaf, 1 tsp salt, 1/2 tsp pepper. Pour a can of beef broth over the whole thing.  Cook on low four hours.

Add 1/2 cup of pearl barley, cook on low another four hours.

Remove meat.  Stir in 1 1/2 cups of frozen peas, turn heat to high.  Peas will be ready in about five minutes.  Empty crock-pot into a colander set over a bowl to catch the gravy.  Yum.

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Note to self:  Do not chop onions while wearing the baby.  She cries too!

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Speaking of baby wearing, I've been wearing Katie Rose pretty much All. The. Time.  With Anthony, I would wear him because I'd read about how beneficial being close to Mother is for babies.  This time it's because I need two hands free when Anthony's around, I don't like moving the baby from one landing zone to another constantly, she doesn't take kindly to being left in the swing or bouncer for more than a few minutes anyway, and I need to protect her from her big brother's affections!  So purely practical, not at all idealistic.  I've read that first borns tend to be idealists, while second borns are pragmatists.  I believe it!

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I'm back to doing French lessons with Rosetta Stone.  I took a hiatus when baby time came, but I actually remembered all of the vocabulary!  Hurray!  Now I'm on to some more about families.  The phrases for hugging and kissing in France are quite difficult to me.  If I go to France I'll just have to maintain my personal space.  I like that the words for "wife" and "woman" are the same.   It is in the nature of the woman to be a wife.  Every vocation is nuptial: We can be married to a man or else be brides of Christ. "Her desire will be for her husband."

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In the same vein, my friend Kate shared a crazy thought with me this week:  Ballroom dancing is really Theology of the Body in a nutshell.  It's actually quite brilliant.  I keep coming up with more ways it fits.  Here are a few:  You can only dance with one person.  It needs to be male-female pairings to really work.  The man has to lead.  If both try to lead, they fight each other, and if neither leads, nothing happens.  If the woman leads, it doesn't really work so well because the woman's role is to be receptive.  She is the one being spun around, dipped, etc. in most dance moves.  They could technically make it work, but it would require much more effort in communication than if they did it the traditional way (e.g. The man only has to turn his hand a certain way for her to spin around.).  It's easy to come up with them.  Share yours in the comments, if you're feeling inspired.

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Kudos to the Boy Scouts for holding fast to their policy of excluding gays from being members or leaders.  And boo to Mitt Romney for trying to appeal to both sides on matter.  Romney's been an all-around disappointment, so this is really no surprise.  Fence sitter since 1994.  At least he's consistent.  Bah.  Anyway, I wanted to talk about the Boy Scouts.  The Supreme Court upheld their right to exclude whomever they wish as they are a private organization, but the pressure has naturally been turned way up of late.  I hope they stay strong.  They're absolutely right to keep gays out.  The great thing, or one of the great things, about the Boy Scouts is that they are unapologetically masculine.  That is a rare, rare thing nowadays.  Even the military is more and more feminized!  Boys need to experience manliness, to test their mettle against nature together with other boys.  Adding a gay kid to the group would completely change the group dynamics, no matter how much sensitivity training occured beforehand.  This shouldn't need to be explained, but it would just be plain awkward to have to share a tent with someone who might be sexually attracted to you.  Boy Scouts ought to be a safe place to test and develop one's manhood.  Adding homosexuals to the mix would automatically hinder that process by making it self-conscious.  It wouldn't be fair to the majority of the boys, and most likely the gay child would have a hard time of it, too.  They would sense that their presence is a problem, even if everyone were outwardly very accepting.  And homosexual leaders are just a bad, bad, bad idea.  Let's not repeat the clergy abuse scandals that arouse from admitting gays to the priesthood.  If people object to this policy, they can start their own organization rather than bully the Boy Scouts into changing it.  The American Heritage Girls were founded as an alternative to the ever more liberal Girl Scouts, and they are thriving.



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Marbury vs. Madison

If you haven't heard our President's latest ludicrously absurd remarks about the health care law, read this:  "I'm confident that the Supreme Court will not take what would be an unprecedented, extraordinary step of overturning a law that was passed by a strong majority of a democratically elected Congress."  Now think back to fifth grade Social Studies.

Uh, yeah, that whole checks and balances thing.  (Skip to 2:00 for the key visual here.  Yep, overturning a law.)  The entire point of the Supreme Court is to act as an intermediary between the legislature and the people, particularly to ensure that the other branches don't overstep their authority.  I guess somebody doesn't like the idea of limits on his power.  The fact that he was a law professor and completely misses the basic point of judicial review scares me.  We as a nation really need to know our history!

Ryan told me about this latest imbecility over breakfast this morning, and I've been wanting to write all day about Marbury vs. Madison.  I doubt many people remember that case from their U.S. History, but I'm weird like that.  Of course, the Wall Street Journal beat me to it.  Darn those professional journalists who have nothing better to do with their day.  It's a very to-the-point article, so do read it.  It doesn't go very much into the actual history of judical review, just that the Supreme Court has always been able to do what the President says is impossible.  Actually it's really, really basic civics.  And that's really the most important thing to be grasped, for sure.

A summary of the case leading to the decision in 1803:  (1803.  The Constitution was only ratified in 1788, so for almost our entire history the power of the Supreme Court to overturn laws was recognized.  And not challenged again for 209 years.  Sorry, couldn't help it.)  In 1801, lame-duck President John Adams and his Federalist lame-duck Congress modified the Judiciary Act of 1789 to create several new judgeships, in order to fill them with Federalist judges, before the Democratic-Republicans took control of the presidency and the legislature.  (See?  Even then Democrats and Republicans were the same!)  Not all of the commissions were delivered by the time President Jefferson took office.  The new Secretery of State, James Madison, refused to deliver them.  One of the would-be judges, William Marbury petitioned the Supreme Court to order him to do so. 

The decision:  The Supreme Court decided that Marbury did have a right to his commission, but it was not the place of the Supreme Court to enforce that right.  That power was not granted to the judiciary by the Constitution, and Congress cannot extend the power of government beyond what the Constitution states.  The part of the Judiciary Act of 1789 giving the Supreme Court that power was therefore void.  A key quote from the decision:  "A Law repugnant to the Constitution is void."  Ever since Marbury vs. Madison, the Supreme Court has been the ultimate authority in the United States on the Constitutionality of any law or executive action, and has had the power to overturn all or part of them on that basis.  This is what is meant by judicial review.  Perhaps the most famous example of the exercise of judicial review is the Dred Scott Decision.  (Look it up. :) It's good for you.)

One interesting point is that the decision was written by Chief Justice John Marshall, who was Secretary of State under President Adams!  Potential conflict of interest for sure, (Elena Kagan, anyone?) but as a result of the decision Marbury never did get his commision!  I can't stress enough the significance of this decision to American history.  Marbury vs. Madison and judicial review established a government governed by the Constituion.  In the United States of America, no person, not even the President, can freely work his will in violation of the written Constitution.