More Noted Things

Patricia Ward Biederman and Jason Felch,"Antiwar Sermon Brings IRS Warning," LA Times, 7 November, reviews threats by the Internal Revenue Service to revoke the tax-exempt status of All Saints Episcopal Church in Pasadena, California, because of a sermon preached against the war in Iraq shortly before the 2004 presidential election. As it happens, this is the church our colleague, Hugo Schwyzer, attends and we may hear from Hugo about this. I imagine that my colleagues have a healthy difference of opinion about whether houses of worship ought to be tax exempt, but there's a very old American tradition of freedom of the pulpit (civilly undergirded by freedoms of religion and speech; and theologically primal) that separation of church and state is designed to protect. Unless the IRS also intends a broadscale assault on the Religious Right, it needs to abandon this threat.

I suppose something good could happen if a college English professor used Howard Zinn's A People's History of the United States as a text, but the odds are against it. One such prof writes about it at After School Snack and still doesn't get it. Thanks to Erin O'Connor at Critical Mass and Inside Higher Ed's"Around the Web" for the tip.

So, why can't a presidential candidate run for the office with prospective cabinet members already known? Well, it violates a federal law that carries a two year prison sentence, says Eugene Volokh, but the law may be unconstitutional.

Finally, if you need a good laugh (as I did), try"New Notes from Harriet to George," New Yorker, 14 November. Thanks to Eric Alterman at Altercation for the tip.