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width=79 height=60><BR><SPAN class=abody><FONT size=3>LEONARD PITTS
JR.</FONT><BR><BR></SPAN><!-- END FOR TRANSLATE --></FONT></DIV>
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<DIV id=topscroll></DIV><!-- START FOR TRANSLATE --><SPAN class=maintitle><B>We
don’t deserve this</B></SPAN>
<P align=justify><SPAN class=abody><I><BR><BR>“Congress shall make no law
respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise
thereof ...”<BR><BR></I></SPAN><SPAN class=abody>– from the First Amendment to
the Constitution of the United States That’s for Christine
O’Donnell.<BR><BR>“Where in the Constitution is separation of church and state?”
she asked last week, drawing gasps and astonished laughter from an audience of
law school students.<BR><BR>Chris Coons, her Democratic opponent for a Delaware
Senate seat, replied that in asking the question, O’Donnell shows “fundamental
misunderstanding of what our Constitution is. ... The First Amendment
establishes the separation ...”<BR><BR>O’Donnell wasn’t buying it.<BR><BR>“The
First Amendment does? ...<BR><BR>So you’re telling me that the separation of
church and state, the phrase ‘separation of church and state,’ is found in the
First Amendment?”<BR><BR>It was a bizarre exchange that permits but two
conclusions. One, O’Donnell is frighteningly ignorant, particularly for a woman
who claims constitutional expertise and aspires to the Senate. Or, two, assuming
you buy her after-the-fact explanation (she was merely observing that the phrase
“separation of church and state” is not in the First Amendment), she is terribly
disingenuous.<BR><BR>After all, the framers’ intention to isolate church from
state and vice versa is evident in the amendment’s wording and is a matter of
long-settled law, besides. The phrase “freedom of expression” doesn’t appear in
the First Amendment, either.<BR><BR>Would O’Donnell question that right,
too?<BR><BR>Maybe I shouldn’t ask.<BR><BR>While one is appalled by O’Donnell’s
ignorance and/or disingenuousness, one is not surprised. The capacity to be
surprised by her died long ago, victim of revelations that she once “dabbled” in
witchcraft.<BR><BR>And was the subject of an IRS lien. And said people with AIDS
brought the disease upon themselves. And was sued for nonpayment by her college
and mortgage company. And was cited eight times by the Federal Elections
Commission. And thinks scientists have created</SPAN><SPAN class=abody> mice
with human brains.<BR><BR>That this woman is a major party</SPAN><SPAN
class=abody> candidate for national office, that she is among the brightest
stars of a constellation of like-minded cranks – some of them already in office
– tells you all you need to know about this moment in our political life.
Welcome to the United States of Amnesia.<BR><BR>Somehow we have forgotten the
lesson we spent most of the last decade learning at ruinous cost: that
faith-based governance, foreign policy by gut instinct, choosing leaders on the
basis of which one we’d most like to watch television with, simply does not
work.<BR><BR>Some say this is a conservative revolution, but this is no
conservatism Ronald Reagan or Barry Goldwater would have recognized. At least
their ideology adhered to an interior logic. This ideology adheres to a perverse
“illogic” that posits that the less you know, the more authentic you are. So
what triumphs here is not conservatism, but rather, mediocrity. The Know
Nothings and Flat Earthers are ascendant. But intellect
matters.<BR><BR>Knowledge is good. And what’s it tell you that that point even
needs to be made?<BR><BR>In a recent debate, O’Donnell was asked to name a
modern Supreme Court decision to which she objects. “Oh, gosh,” she said. “Give
me a specific one, I’m sorry. ... Right off the top of my head, I know that
there are a lot, but I’ll put it up on my website, I promise you.”<BR><BR>Some
of us are reminded of how candidate George W. Bush kept calling Greeks
“Grecians.”<BR><BR>Some of us remember how the electorate shrugged off that
evidence of looming gaps in his basic knowledge because he had a folksy way and
twinkling eyes. Some of us remember how that came out.<BR><BR>Others apparently
don’t.<BR><BR>Others are ready to travel that road again. It brings to mind an
old saying: we get the leaders we deserve.<BR><BR>You and I better hope that’s
not true.<BR><BR></SPAN><SPAN class=abody><I>Leonard Pitts Jr. is a columnist
for the Miami Herald.</I></SPAN></P></DIV></BODY></HTML>