Scalia and Me

I have had three (kind of) run-ins with Justice Antonin Scalia, none of which he knows about or would remember.

The third of these was decades ago, when I was on the Beltway traveling to see friends.  A large BMW passed me and I noticed that the license plate read “SCALIA.”  That’s gotta be Tony, I thought and I sped up to catch it.  Whoever was driving the thing must’ve seen me coming, because suddenly the Beemer sped up to about 90.  And now it was a race, which only made me even more determined to catch him.  I gunned my car and gave chase.  We kept playing follow-me/catch-up until eventually the Beemer got caught in traffic and I could pull alongside it to peer within.

The driver shot me a look and in my recollection he seemed a bit scared.  Which is how I know it wasn’t Antonin Scalia – even federal district court judges carry emergency “panic buttons” (I would learn that later; I didn’t know that when I was still young enough to start chasing Beemers that might be carrying Supreme Court justices) with which to summon federal marshals, but this guy was panicked by a kid in an old Chevy convertible chasing after him.

Still . . . the driver actually looked at lot like Tony, just a younger version.  He turned and stared at me and I thought it must be his son, but I don’t even know if Scalia has a son.  Maybe the streets of DC are just filled with a lot of short, heavy-set Italians named Scalia.

Happy Holidays, Everybody!

Posting is likely to be light or non-existent until sometime after tomorrow, but I want to wish everybody who celebrates this season all the very best.

Whether you celebrate Christmas religiously,

or more secularly:

or maybe a combination of both:

Or maybe you don't really celebrate Christmas, but you still want the toys:

Whether your holiday this season is Hanukkah:

or Kwanzaa:

Or some combination of all three:

Whether your holiday is Festivus:

or simply the Winter Solstice:

All the very best to you and yours.


Bonus Cheer:  And because tomorrow is Sunday, for those of you who still worship very, very old gods here's a religious cheer I remember seeing scrawled in graffiti on the men's room wall in a panel of Alan Moore's Top Ten:

ONE GOD, SUN GOD

RA! RA! RA!

Bonus Photo:  And I admit this has nothing to do with the holiday season, but it does involve religion (kind of) and - I swear - I want this sign so very, very much:

(h/t Tim F.)

A Conscientious Objector in the War on Christmas

During The Daily Show’s first segment last night, Jon Stewart went after Fox News for again turning the Holiday Season into a trumped up culture clash that Fox insists on describing as “The War on Christmas.”  Once again, blogger doesn’t seem to be able to embed video from The Daily Show but you can watch it here.  (It really is very funny.)

As always, right-wingers’ complaints about their so-called ‘War on Christmas’ devolve to an assertion that “America is Christian nation” and – when called upon to defend this patently untrue statement – they point to the Pilgrims, who settled in New England seeking ‘religious freedom.’ 

(For the record, Americans may be a Christian people – by and large – but that does not make us a Christian nation.  The First Amendment makes clear that the government is to neither establish a religion nor to interfere with its citizens’ religious observances.  Our governing document, in other words, is religion neutral.  Of course, being ‘neutral toward’ religion is not the same as being ‘hostile toward’ religion.)

But hearing this sort of stuff always sticks in my craw, because it is very, very stupid.  I can never help but think that the people who make this argument betray that they never acquired more than a Fourth Grade education of American history, and that they should by all rights be embarrassed by their own ignorance.  So let me get just a few things off of my chest:

It’s Beginning to Look a Lot Like Christmas . . .

. . . .  Ev’rywhere you go;

Take a look in the five and ten, glistening once again

With candy canes and silver lanes aglow.

It’s beginning to look a lot like Christmas

Toys in ev’ry store

But the prettiest sight to see is the holly that will be

On your own front door.

It’s beginning to look a lot like Christmas

Ev’rywhere you go;

There’s a tree in the Grand Hotel, one in the park as well,

The sturdy kind that doesn’t mind the snow.

It’s beginning to look a lot like Christmas;

Soon the bells will start,

And the thing that will make them ring, is the carol that you sing

Right within your heart.

            --Lyrics by Meredith Willson

Photo of woman on sidewalk during Black Friday’s holiday shopping extravaganza by Michael Nagle/Getty Images.  (h/t Matt Yglesias)