"Those words never left my lips."

NYT: “You’ve been talking on your show about whether Trump is the Antichrist”

Tucker Carlson: “I have not said that”

NYT: *plays clip of him saying that* pic.twitter.com/L0sUQnfhpb

— Marco Foster (@MarcoFoster_) May 2, 2026

"In just four years, anti-gay bias rose by around 10 percent.... Just as bias against gay people fell especially steeply before 2020..."

"... it has surged particularly sharply since. Perhaps most surprising is that these trends were distinctly robust among the youngest American adults — those under 25. This group increased its animus against marginalized groups in general and gay people in particular at a faster rate than older Americans did. Also surprising is that although anti-gay bias has risen faster among conservatives, it has also risen among liberals. What explains this decline in tolerance?"

From "Americans Are Turning Against Gay People" (NYT).

Tolerance?! I would think it's considered homophobic just to use the word "tolerance," which connotes minimal acceptance and little more than a willingness to refrain from discriminating or saying actively mean things. In fact, I'd suggest it is the demand to do so much more — to celebrate pride in sexual matters and to endure indoctrination sessions that force feed questionable fine points — that has made people resistant and more likely to check a less gay-friendly box on the survey.

The authors of the NYT article reject the speculation that it's a reaction to the push for transgender rights or worry about sexually grooming children. They prefer to speculate that the decline in "tolerance" for gay people is tied to 1. "social instability" — "the Covid pandemic, economic strain and intensifying political conflict” — and 2. "a loss of confidence" in the establishment combined with a perception that gay rights is "an establishment position."

***

My rankling at the word "tolerance" was influenced by George Washington. In his famous 1790 Letter to the Hebrew Congregation in Newport, Rhode Island, he wrote: "It is now no more that toleration is spoken of, as if it was by the indulgence of one class of people, that another enjoyed the exercise of their inherent natural rights."

Where in traditional/social media is alarm being raised about "Christian nationalism"?

AI responded to my question with a concise, well-formatted chart:

"This was not a case of we say tomayto, you say tomahto. This was we say tomato, while you cannot say anything these days because of the EU and its rules..."

"... not to mention the repressive government of Great Britain. A citizen of that benighted nation had come to Washington to talk about what he had seen: a fellow named Nigel Farage. 'I have come today to be a klaxon,' he said in his opening remarks. The klaxon appeared in a bright blue suit, telling the story of the Irish comedian Graham Linehan, who was arrested at Heathrow airport this week for something he had said on social media. Linehan had been arrested by five armed police officers, he said. While it is perfectly ordinary for police to be armed to the teeth in the United States, 'it is a big deal in the UK,' he said. 'This could happen to any American man or woman that goes to Heathrow that has said things online.' American politicians and businesses and all freedom-loving people should say to the British government, "at what point did you become North Korea?"' Farage said."

From "Farage’s rules for free speech: talk about anything but your lunch/The Reform leader defended Democrats’ right to say dreadful things about him — but said some things were better left unsaid" (London Times).

The headline referred to Farage's "discretion" in refusing to say who he needed to leave to have lunch with — clearly, the President.

Also interesting: Democratic Congressman Hank Johnson talked so much, asking questions and interrupting answers, that "Farage asked the chairman if he could go and 'get a cup of coffee or something' until it was his turn to speak."

Here's the video. I love the freeze frame:

"I know the president said on Fox News this morning that he's partially seeking peace in order to get to heaven. Was he joking or is there spiritual uh motivation behind his peace deals here?"

Asked Mary Margaret Olohan, of the Daily Wire.

That happened at yesterday's White House Press Briefing. Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt answered:

"I think the president was serious. I think president wants to get to heaven as I hope we all do in this room as well."

Trump's quote was the title of yesterday's post: "I want to get to heaven if possible. I'm hearing I'm not doing well. I hear I'm at the bottom of the totem pole. If I can get to heaven, this will be one of the reasons." Video of Trump saying all that at the link.

Was he serious? The question is how serious?

Was Mary Margaret Olohan serious — seriously hoping that he was serious?

"It’s never been about whether or not I’m going to lose my tax-exempt status. It’s whether I’m going to lose my prophetic status."

"Let’s not be wussy about this. When we see sin, then name it. But I think it limits me, if somebody believes that I am tied to a candidate or political party."

So said Bonnie A. Perry, an Episcopal Bishop, quoted in a NYT article that's mostly about a Lutheran pastor,  Jonathan Barker, who resigned from Grace Lutheran (in Kenosha, Wisconsin) rather than give up on his plan to deliver a sermon about Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, endorsing her as a Democratic Party candidate for President in the 2028 election.

The article is "He Tried to Endorse From the Pulpit. He Wound Up Without a Church. The I.R.S. says churches can now support candidates during services, but many denominations still forbid it. A Wisconsin pastor learned the hard way."

So is this about religion or tax exemptions? Bishop Perry refers to "my tax-exempt status," but it's about the ability of all the donors to her church to claim a tax exemption.

It used to be clear that endorsing a political candidate would disqualify a church from its tax-exempt status, but there was a lawsuit challenging that and the Trump administration settled the lawsuit and said that churches could endorse candidates "to their own congregations, in connection with a worship service."

That doesn't mean they should. They may, like Perry, wisely refrain from losing their clout, their fervor, their credibility. Who would go to church to be harangued about voting for the latest Democrat? And then on top of that, you have to worry that you might lose their tax deduction if your church strays beyond the limited concession made in settling that lawsuit.

The churches have good reason to maintain a wall of separation between "the garden of the church" and "the wilderness of the world," even if there's a loophole in the tax law.

"Let the parents decide. My daughter was born August 31st. Had she been born September 1 , she could have started 1st grade a year later."

"Why should this bureaucrat date dictate my child’s education?"

So says the top-rated comment at "D.C. banned ‘redshirting’ years ago. Here’s why people are talking about it. The controversial practice of delaying kindergarten enrollment by a year has been allowed to happen at a small number of schools" (WaPo).

I think the answer to her question why is: It's part of the struggle against (what is perceived as) white privilege: "It is difficult to determine exactly how common it is to delay a child’s enrollment in school. Some national data suggest it’s rare — somewhere between 3.5 percent and 5.5 percent of eligible children do it. Most of those students are boys born in the summer months. Academic redshirting is also more common among White children at schools that serve large numbers of wealthy families, who can afford an extra year of preschool or day care, according to an article published by the American Educational Research Association."

ADDED: The Supreme Court's opinion in Mahmoud v. Taylor, which upheld the parents' right to exempt their own children from the school's gender-ideology indoctrination, relied heavily on Wisconsin v. Yoder, which upheld the parents' right to exempt their child a school requirement that had to do with the age of the child. In Yoder, Wisconsin wanted to compel school attendance up to the age of 16, and the parents, Amish parents, sincerely believed that schooling beyond 8th grade impairs religious salvation. They wanted their children to avoid the "worldly educational environment" and sought a different kind of wisdom and way of life, and the Supreme Court viewed their preference as a constitutional right. I'd thought of Yoder as a marginal case until I saw Mahmoud v. Taylor.

The WaPo commenter's slogan "Let the parents decide" resonates.

"The Dalai Lama has set his millions of followers on a direct collision course with Beijing by announcing plans for his reincarnation and succession that will exclude involvement of the Communist Party...."

"He was identified by senior monks as the 13th Dalai Lama’s reincarnation when he was a baby, and confirmed in his position in 1939. At the time, Tibet had been effectively independent of China since the collapse of the Qing dynasty.... Being based on reincarnation, the matter of the succession of senior lamas has created an ideological problem for the Communist Party.... The party requires members to be officially atheist, even though this is widely ignored. However, it also demands the right to vet the senior figures of all state-sanctioned religions, including Christian bishops. In the case of Tibetan Buddhism, the party demands the right to supervise the reincarnation of lamas. This week, party newspapers have given wide space to historians discussing its preferred 'golden urn lot-drawing' method of identifying lamas. This was a system introduced when its predecessors in the Forbidden City, the Qing emperors, attempted to assert tighter control of Tibet, which they had conquered in 1720. A stern editorial by the state news agency Xinhua, and signed by an approved Chinese Tibetologist, damned in advance any attempt by the Dalai Lama to control his own succession... The Dalai Lama’s own statement was more confrontational than some had expected. He had in the past openly speculated about whether he would reincarnate at all.... Now, he has not only effectively confirmed his reincarnation, but left it open as to when and where it will happen, saying that it will be up to his office, the Gaden Phodrang Trust — and no one else — to find him...."

From "Dalai Lama’s reincarnation plan sets him up for clash with China/The Tibetan Buddhist leader’s decision to ignore Beijing’s demands for control over the succession process enrages the Communist Party" (London Times).

Moments away — we'll be getting the last cases of this Supreme Court term.

The cases will be posted on the Court's website, here. And here's the live-blogging at SCOTUSblog.

Here's Grok's summary of the remaining cases — birthright citizenship, racial gerrymandering, the nondelegation doctrine, Obamacare, access to on-line porn, and parents opting their kids out of woke school lessons.

UPDATE 1: "Universal injunctions likely exceed the equitable authority that Congress has given to federal courts. The Court grants the Government’s applications for a partial stay of the injunctions entered below, are broader than necessary to provide complete relief to each plaintiff with standing to sue" — Trump v. CASA. This is the "birthright citizenship" case, but it did not address the issue "whether the Executive Order violates the Citizenship Clause or Nationality Act. Instead, the issue the Court decides is whether, under the Judiciary Act of 1789, federal courts have equitable authority to issue universal injunctions." Decided 6-3 (in the usual 6-3 breakdown).

From Justice Barrett's opinion: "The universal injunction was conspicuously nonexistent for most of our Nation’s history. Its absence from 18th- and 19th-century equity practice settles the question of judicial authority. That the absence continued into the 20th century renders any claim of historical pedigree still more implausible. Even during the “deluge of constitutional litigation that occurred in the wake of Ex parte Young, throughout the Lochner Era, and at the dawn of the New Deal,” universal injunctions were nowhere to be found....Had federal courts believed themselves to possess the tool, surely they would not have let it lay idle."

Addressing Justice Jackson's dissent, Barrett writes: "JUSTICE JACKSON decries an imperial Executive while embracing an imperial Judiciary. No one disputes that the Executive has a duty to follow the law. But the Judiciary does not have unbridled authority to enforce this obligation—in fact, sometimes the law prohibits the Judiciary from doing so. See, e.g., Marbury v. Madison, 1 Cranch 137 (1803) (concluding that James Madison had violated the law but holding that the Court lacked jurisdiction to issue a writ of mandamus ordering him to follow it). But see post, at 15 (JACKSON, J., dissenting) ('If courts do not have the authority to require the Executive to adhere to law universally, . . . compliance with law some-times becomes a matter of Executive prerogative'). Observing the limits on judicial authority—including, as relevant here, the boundaries of the Judiciary Act of 1789—is required by a judge’s oath to follow the law. JUSTICE JACKSON skips over that part. Because analyzing the governing statute involves boring 'legalese,' post, at 3, she seeks to answer 'a far more basic question of enormous practical significance: May a federal court in the United States of America order the Executive to follow the law?' Ibid. In other words, it is unnecessary to consider whether Congress has constrained the Judiciary; what matters is how the Judiciary may constrain the Executive. JUSTICE JACKSON would do well to heed her own admonition: '[E]veryone, from the President on down, is bound by law.' Ibid. That goes for judges too."

UPDATE 2: Kennedy v. Braidwood rejects the Appointments Clause challenge to the U. S. Preventive Services Task Force. The members of the task force are deemed "inferior officers," thus not needing appointment by the President and Senate confirmation. This one is 6-3 in an unusual way. Sotomayor, Kagan, and Jackson join the majority opinion written by Kavanaugh (and also joined by Roberts and Barrett). The dissenters are Thomas, Alito, and Gorsuch.

UPDATE 3: FCC v. Consumers' Research — "The universal-service contribution scheme does not violate the nondelegation doctrine." Another 6-3 the unusual way — with a dissent from Thomas, Alito, and Gorsuch.

UPDATE 4: Mahmoud v. Taylor, 6-3, the usual way. "Parents challenging the Board’s introduction of the 'LGBTQ+-inclusive' storybooks, along with its decision to withhold opt outs, are entitled to a preliminary injunction." Justice Alito writes for the majority:

The Board of Education of Montgomery County, Maryland (Board), has introduced a variety of “LGBTQ+-inclusive” storybooks into the elementary school curriculum. These books—and associated educational instructions provided to teachers—are designed to “disrupt” children’s thinking about sexuality and gender. The Board has told parents that it will not give them notice when the books are going to be used and that their children’s attendance during those periods is mandatory. A group of parents from diverse religious backgrounds sued to enjoin those policies. They assert that the new curriculum, combined with the Board’s decision to deny opt outs, impermissibly burdens their religious exercise. 

Today, we hold that the parents have shown that they are entitled to a preliminary injunction. A government burdens the religious exercise of parents when it requires them to submit their children to instruction that poses “a very real threat of undermining” the religious beliefs and practices that the parents wish to instill. Wisconsin v. Yoder, 406 U. S. 205, 218 (1972). And a government cannot condition the benefit of free public education on parents’ acceptance of such instruction. Based on these principles, we conclude that the parents are likely to succeed in their challenge to the Board’s policies....

I added the boldface. The school was so out front in its desire to reprogram children. They must have been pious believers... or at least people who felt called to pose as pious believers. 

UPDATE 5: Free Speech Coalition v. Paxton, 6-3, the usual way, upholding the Texas law that restricts access to on-line porn. How do you exclude minors without burdening access for everyone? Here, the state required age verification. "But adults have no First Amendment right to avoid age verification. Any burden on adults is therefore incidental to regulating activity not protected by the First Amendment. This makes intermediate scrutiny the appropriate standard under the Court’s precedents." And the law "advances important governmental interests unrelated to the suppression of free speech and does not burden substantially more speech than necessary to further those interests." 

Kagan writes in dissent: "[I]f a scheme other than H. B. 1181 can just as well accomplish that objective and better protect adults’ First Amendment freedoms, then Texas should have to adopt it (or at least demonstrate some good reason not to). A State may not care much about safeguarding adults’ access to sexually explicit speech; a State may even prefer to curtail those materials for everyone. Many reasonable people, after all, view the speech at issue here as ugly and harmful for any audience. But the First Amendment protects those sexually explicit materials, for every adult. So a State cannot target that expression, as Texas has here, any more than is necessary to prevent it from reaching children."

UPDATE 6: The racial gerrymandering case — Louisiana v. Callais — will be reargued. Justice Thomas, alone, dissents: "These cases also warrant immediate resolution because, due to our Janus-like election-law jurisprudence, States do not know how to draw maps that 'survive both constitutional and VRA review.'"

"If there is one word to define Trump’s atmosphere, it is 'pagan.'"

"The pagan values of ancient Rome celebrated power, manliness, conquest, ego, fame, competitiveness and prowess, and it is those values that have always been at the core of Trump’s being — from his real estate grandiosity to his love of pro wrestling to his king-of-the-jungle version of American greatness. The pagan ethos has always appealed to grandiose male narcissists because it gives them permission to grab whatever they want. This ethos encourages egotists to puff themselves up and boast in a way they find urgently satisfying; self-love is the only form of love they know...."

That's David Brooks, tending to your soul, in "How to Survive the Trump Years With Your Spirit Intact" (NYT)(free-access link).

I hadn't encountered that men-thinking-about-the-Roman-Empire meme in quite a while. Okay. Nice to see its return. Helps us understand what the men are doing these days.

Anyway, I wonder, is this analysis unfair to pagans?

If paganism is a grand but dehumanizing value system, I’ve found it necessary, in this increasingly pagan age, to root myself in anything that feels rehumanizing, whether it’s art or literature or learning. I’ve found it incredibly replenishing to be spending time around selfless, humble people....

Anything that feels rehumanizing?

Well, read the whole thing to be fair to Brooks, not that he's being fair to Trump... or to pagans. 

Looking into this blog's archive to see what I might have said about pagans over the years, I encountered this May 29, 2017 post, which focuses on a quote from Andrew Sullivan calling Trump "a pagan":

"The plaintiffs here are not asking the school to change its curriculum. They’re just saying, ‘Look, we want out.’ Why isn’t that feasible? What is the big deal about allowing them to opt out of this?"

Said Justice Alito, quoted in "Justices Seem Set to Allow Opt-Outs From L.G.B.T.Q. Stories in Schools/In a lively and sometimes heated argument, the Supreme Court’s conservative majority appeared poised to rule for parents with religious objections to storybooks with gay and transgender characters" (NYT).

Here's the transcript of the oral argument.

Trump isn't going to shut down the federal Department of Education.

I'm reading "Trump Chooses Longtime Ally Linda McMahon to Run Education Dept./A friend and financial backer of Donald J. Trump’s, Ms. McMahon, who led the Small Business Administration during his first term, remained close to him during the campaign" (NYT):

While Mr. Trump has repeatedly called for an outright dissolution of the agency, any effort to shutter it would require congressional action and support from some Republican lawmakers whose districts depend on federal aid for public education....

So it's just something to talk about, not actually do. So what is McMahon really going to try to do? She's the chairwoman of the pro-Trump super PAC America First Action.

[T]he America First Policy Institute has set out a more immediate list of changes it says could be achieved through vastly changing the department’s priorities. Those include stopping schools from “promoting inaccurate and unpatriotic concepts” about American history surrounding institutionalized racism, and expanding voucher programs that direct more public funds to parents to spend on home-schooling, online classes or at private and religious schools.

"Biden’s Catholic faith should make him a natural middle-grounder..."

"... but his personal qualms about abortion have zero policy substance since he abandoned his support for the Hyde Amendment, and he’s planted himself to the left of secular Europe on transgender issues.... Biden is only now considering a Trump-like executive order on border crossings....  [T]he White House is reluctant to put any clear distance between itself and climate activists.... 'If you like your gas-powered car, you can keep your car' is a simple, politically effective formulation. Yet somehow the Biden administration has ended up with 'If you like your gas-powered car, you’re a clueless antiquarian' instead. One explanation for this pattern is that Biden’s White House is staffed by progressive ideologues.... The greater freedom that Trump enjoys has roots in some dark places — cynicism, conservative tribalism, a populist indifference to policy detail...."

Writes Ross Douthat in "Why Can’t Biden Triangulate Like Trump?" 

I clicked on that headline as soon as I saw it, so I'm surprised to see it's dated April 13th. Since I scan the front-page headlines at the NYT every day, I have to think Biden's failure to "triangulate" is something the editors wanted buried. By the way, "triangulate like Trump" is funny, considering that Bill Clinton was the original triangulator. No mention of Clinton in Douthat's column.

"Inmates in New York are suing to be allowed to see the solar eclipse."

WaPo reports.

The six plaintiffs in the class-action suit filed Friday, who are Christian, Muslim, Santerian and atheist, are... arguing it has religious significance. Some said it is critical to their practice of their faith — because the Bible describes the sun going dark during the crucifixion of Jesus Christ; because Muslims perform a special prayer upon the eclipse; and because it is important in the Santeria faith to make a spiritual offering.

“Watching the eclipse with the people I know here is a way for me to feel closer to God,” wrote Travis Hudson, a Protestant Baptist....

"Evangelical tradition has built a public identity around being pro-family and pro-children, and many adherents are inclined to see I.V.F. positively..."

"... because it creates more children.... But the Alabama decision 'is a very morally honest opinion,' said Andrew T. Walker, associate professor of Christian ethics and public theology at the Southern Baptist Theological Seminary. The ruling, he said, shows the direct line of reasoning between belief that life begins at conception, and opposition to abortion and I.V.F. 'It’s going to force conservative Christians to reckon with potentially their own complicity in the in vitro fertilization industry,' he said. The Roman Catholic Church is perhaps the largest institution in the world that opposes I.V.F. Nearly all modern fertility interventions are morally forbidden. The I.V.F. process typically includes many elements that the Catholic Church opposes. There’s masturbation — an 'offense against chastity,' according to the catechism, or teaching — often required to collect sperm. There’s the fertilization of an egg and sperm outside a woman’s body — outside the sacramental 'conjugal act' of sex between a husband and wife. And there is the creation of multiple embryos that are often destroyed or not implanted — an 'abortive practice.'..."

From "What Christian Traditions Say About I.V.F. Treatments/While Catholic teaching expressly forbids in vitro fertilization, Protestants tend to be more open" (NYT).

"Even before birth, all human beings have the image of God, and their lives cannot be destroyed without effacing his glory."

Wrote Chief Justice Tom Parker, in a concurring opinion, quoted in "Alabama Rules Frozen Embryos Are Children, Raising Questions About Fertility Care/The ruling raises worrisome legal issues for would-be parents far beyond Alabama whose hopes for children may depend on in vitro fertilization" (NYT).

It has become standard medical protocol during in vitro fertilization to extract as many eggs as possible from a woman, then to fertilize them to create embryos before freezing them. Generally, only one embryo is transferred at a time into the uterus in order to maximize the chances of successful implantation and a full-term pregnancy.

“But what if we can’t freeze them?” [asked the head of a group that represents the interests of infertility patients]. “Will we hold people criminally liable because you can’t freeze a ‘person’? This opens up so many questions.”...

I'm seeing the idea that the economics of the infertility treatment business have been radically transformed (at least in Alabama). 

"'Do my work, ignore the distractions,' she said God told her."

"She" is Fani T. Willis, the district attorney in Fulton County, Georgia, who wants us to think God speaks directly to her.

I'm reading "Atlanta D.A. Defends Qualifications of Outside Lawyer She Hired for Trump Case/At a historic Black church, Fani T. Willis pushed back against an accusation that Nathan Wade, the special prosecutor she brought on, was unqualified for the job" (NYT).

We're told "Ms. Willis said she turned to prayer last week, at one point even writing a letter to God in which she expressed self-doubt." Expressed self-doubt but also seems to have reprimanded God for not telling her how challenging life would be:

"The Satanic Temple of Iowa says a statue depicting the pagan idol Baphomet, part of its controversial display in the Iowa Capitol, had been destroyed."

The Des Moine Register reports.

The installation, permitted under state rules governing religious displays in the building, has come under debate and criticism of by Iowa and national politicians. Presidential hopeful Ron DeSantis on Tuesday joined a chorus of Republicans calling for its removal while others in the GOP said that, though it is offensive, it is a protected form of free speech....

"The role of the French school is to train republicans. I will never accept that at the Republic school we refuse to look at a painting."

Said Gabriel Attal, France's education minister, quoted in "Major row erupts in France after nude painting shown to pupils/Teachers walk out after ‘offended’ pupils at a school near Paris refused to look at Renaissance-era painting as teachers walk out" (Independent).

Sophie Venetitay, from the Snes-FSU teachers union, told the AFP news agency that several first-year high school students, aged 11 and 12, said they were offended by the work by 17th-Century Italian painter Giuseppe Cesari. She said some students had “averted their gaze”, “felt offended” and said they were “shocked”.... Ms Venetitay said staff felt they had been left feeling unsupported and working in a “degraded climate”, adding the incident reminded her of the brutal killing of Samuel Paty.Mr Paty was stabbed then beheaded near his secondary school in the Paris suburb of Conflans-Sainte-Honorine in October 2020 after showing caricatures of the Prophet Muhammad in a class.

This is my second post on the subject. Here's the first. I consider this a new topic because of the quote in the post title, reflecting the distinctively strong French dedication to secularism, something I've blogged about many times in the 20-year history of this blog, beginning with 3 posts in the first year of this blog: "Enforcing strict secularism in France," "It isn't a lack of understanding of history that makes the French head scarf ban seem wrong to Americans," and "Only one slope is slippery."

"I believe that scripture, the Bible is very clear that God is the one that raises up those in authority."

Said Mike Johnson, orating just before taking the oath as Speaker of the House:

Transcript. 

Excerpt: