The Practical Justice 

     Mollie Hemingway, no relation to Ernest, we guess, is an author, columnist (not communist) and political commentator. She could write a good book about Supreme Court Justice Samuel Alito. So, she did.

     It's title: Alito: The Justice Who Reshaped the Supreme Court and Restored the Constitution.

     Hemingway interviewed about 100 people and joked that her reporting became "a little boring" because nearly everyone praised him. Nick Eicher wrote, "The book is a serious account of how character, conviction and prudence shape institutions." 

     A colleague of Nick's (try to keep up) describes Alito as "pragmatic, skeptical of government, skeptical of the expert class, and attentive to ordinary people." An Alito clerk found him in his office on a weekend. The justice told him, "That 30 minutes the litigant has before this court is likely one of the most important 30 minutes of his life. It's worth a little bit of my time on the weekend." 

     Hemingway said, "He is committed to constitutional text and original meaning but deeply concerned with how a ruling will work in real life. This could be dangerous. But Alito's moral seriousness binds him more tightly to the judicial role. He does not believe courts should invent rights or policies and hide them in constitutional language." 

     Eicher: "Some care only about being right. Others care only about winning." Hemingway sees Alito as "a rebuke to both errors. Values and principles are meant to benefit people. In any vocation, the question is how to serve God by serving others." 

     Sounds supreme to me.    Jimmy

 

 The Better States 

     Tuesday, we passed along what observers considered the 10 least desirable states for opportunity, education, cost of living, housing, lifestyle flexibility, etc. Today, they give us nine "better states to move to."

     Ohio is not in either group. 

     In no particular order, the better states are Georgia, Florida, Texas, North Carolina, Nebraska, Kansas, Iowa, Minnesota and Wisconsin. 

     Minnesota??? After all that scandal we heard about? Guess we didn't get the full story. We're a little surprised South Carolina isn't on this list. We lived in Aiken for eight years on my final job and might have retired there had not close relatives drawn us to Florida. 

     You might want to avoid states where healthcare fraud schemes rise up to $6.5 billion, where voters choose communists, and where anti-Trump people mar the Lincoln Memorial Reflecting Pool. Oh, wait, that's Washington, D.C., not a state. 

     As we approach our 250th birthday, our founders would not be surprised at our troubles. The 13 colonies were all Christ oriented. Today, no state claims such. 

"You can have no dominion greater or less than that over yourself."

- Leonardo da Vinci 

Is that true today? 

20 Winners from Ohio 

     We understand you don't care about most of these Ohio people who excelled in life. Come back tomorrow.            Now...still with us? 

     Neil Armstrong was the first person to land on the moon. Maybe you have eaten at Bob Evans, whose name is still on his restaurants. Steven Spielberg was a great filmmaker. 

     I grew up in Pennsylvania and went to Ohio State where Woody Hayes won five national football championships (by vote, not playoffs). I saw him in his tantrums. Urban Meyer is another national champion coach, first at Florida, then at Ohio State. 

     Halle Berry, outstanding actress, was Miss Ohio in 1988, and runner up for Miss America. Orville and Wilbur Wright were brothers from Dayton who built and flew the first airplane. Simone Biles was a champion gymnast. Labron James is an all-time great basketball player.

     Joe Burrow, voted best in the nation in college (LSU), now quarterbacks the NFL Cincinnati Bengals. Jim Harbaugh, a Michigan star, also won a championship at his alma mater, "that team up north," as Woody referred to Michigan. He has been a winner in the NFL. Ben Roethlisberger won NFL championships with the Pittsburgh Steelers. 

     Other specials include John Legend, Yvette Brown, Toni Morrison, Sherred Brown, R.L. Stein and Sheree Whitfield. 

     Thanks for...wait a minute. The article left someone out. There was a boy in the same high school as my dad. He was small but so determined to play football his dad shrugged and turned him over to the coach. He became a winning quarterback, and a college player north of Cincinnati.

     He returned to coach his hometown Massillon Tigers, winning numerous state championships, winning a national championship at Ohio State, more championships with the Cleveland Browns, got fired and retired in California, returning in five years to coach the new Cincinnati Bengals (Bengal tigers), whose stadium is named Paul Brown. My late Cincinnati uncle took me to the first home game. 

10 Worst States 

     What? All 50 states participate in the best nation ever. 

     Well, there is good and not so good in all 50. Important are healthcare, behavior, economics, housing and food security. And there is education, incomes/poverty and infrastructure.

     We all live under the same Constitution, but state by state we are diverse. Not all of us think quite the same. Not all of us like our Constitution. Right, Democrats? Our founders purposely gave states freedom, except for issues that require unity, such as war. We even had a civil war - if wars can be civil - not unity - but not all states participated. 

     Who are the 10? Suprise. According to scholars who ranked the states, our home state of Pennsylvania is the 10th worst. The two large cities are known for crime, and if we can blame nature somewhat, mountains largely separate the west and the east. 

     Would you blame the "sooners," the settlers in 1889 who rushed to claim the unassigned land before the starter gun? Oklahoma is the ninth worst, not quite as troubled as Nevada, in eighth place. 

     Welcome to the story, seven Southern states, in order from less difficulty to more: Mississippi, New Mexico, Alabama, Tennessee, Arkansas, Louisiana and...

     West Virginia is the most troubled. Maybe they should have remained part of Virginia, Civil War and all. Okay, they did right, in 1860. 

              Jimmy

A Thousand Years

     Where are we going? Drugs. Crime. Illegals. American students are moving further left. Russia's foreign minister is hinting of a nuclear exchange with Ukraine. Just a scare?  

     Mrs. Donut and I have been reading the book of Revelation again. Tough go, but the final five chapters are illuminating. God will have had enough with human sin. Believers - who don't let the antichrist's mark put on them - are taken to heaven, and God sends an angel to deal with the dragon - serpent - devil, that is, Satan. There would be no more deception for a thousand years. 

     Christ will reign for all those years...in Jerusalem, and as King of the world. 

     In commentary on a hymn written in the 1800s: "External peace may not come, despite our efforts and our prayers. But internal peace can be a reality because our rest and trust are in a God who is omnipotent, all merciful, all righteous and all wise. Our God is greater than the armies of the nations, though He allows them victories, and He permits hurricanes, tornadoes and earthquakes and more. When you get to heaven ask him why.   

God remains, and reigns. 

 

Father's Day

     "Fathers, do not embitter your children or they will become discouraged." So advised Paul in a letter to the Colossians 3:21. 

     This future blogger didn't embitter my three children. In fact, I was too lenient, concentrating on my job and church responsibilities, while my wife raised the kids. That seemed to be working, until the wife wanted a divorce. Wow! I had been transferred to work 80 miles from home. My father drove 90 miles or so to check on me, concerned I might harm myself. 

     Years later, my adult "kids" now respect me. I had been guilty of putting other activity, important as it was, ahead of their path to salvation. All of us live in different states. Boo. I became the only man in my extended family to be divorced. Boo again. At age 52, God gave me a faithful second wife, Mrs. Donut. Yea! 😄

     So, fathers, if you are raising children, they come first, as does your marriage. Other scriptures: Genesis 18:19, Deuteronomy 6:7, Psalm 78:5 and 127:3, Ephesians 6:4, Colossians 3:12-14, 21, Luke 1:27 and Matthew 19:14. There are more verses. No favoritism. Encouragement. Kindness. Humility. Gentleness. Patience. 

              Jimmy  

And Saturday 

Nature Rewires Brains

     Perhaps you didn't know this. My brain certainly needed something... all my life. We're not going to give you the neurological details. 😀 

     Yes, we are. Nature rewires brains, so say those who do imaging studies. In nature, a cascade of changes that quiet the brain take over. This effect doesn't occur with those watching sports events or attend big concerts. 😉 It does occur on the former - now quiet - fairway #4 behind our house. You've heard of stress circuity? And the replenishment of depleted attention?  

     Forgive me if I'm going too fast. The brain produces neural states... resembling meditation, if that helps. Immersive virtual reality is another way of understanding this. 😏 Even indoor greenery can produce neuroimaging techniques. 

      A man in Chile, of all places, gives me the chills, says, "nature's effects on the brain unfolds in a cascade across several interconnected levels." These levels interact dynamically, he says. 😕 Well, of course. 

     If this helps, sensory features of nature imitate the cascade, which propagates through stress regulation. Attention, he says, this is ultimately how we experience ourselves. 😒

     Oh, how I wish I had known this during school years. My teachers - and the girls - would have been so expressed, I mean impressed. 

Jimmy 😎