THIS WEEK IN SECULAR NEWS "I would never vote for a female candidate!" - female candidate: Honestly, you simply can't make this stuff up. Mylie Biggs, Arizona Senate candidate and daughter of GOP Rep. Andy Biggs, has some thoughts about women in politics... specifically, that they shouldn't be in politics. She's a real trailblazer, running for a seat while simultaneously declaring women are meant for "the home," not the office. In what can only be described as a masterclass in irony, she's running on a platform that seemingly contradicts her own existence. It gets better: she's also joked (haha, hilarious) about repealing the 19th Amendment. So, if you're looking for a candidate who believes in her own right to run, this might not be the one. But she's certainly making her father proud by continuing the family tradition of political contradictions. Read more. Establishment Clause FTW... for now: A federal judge has issued a preliminary injunction that temporarily blocks an Arkansas law requiring public schools to display the Ten Commandments in every classroom. The law was challenged by church-state separation groups on behalf of seven families, who argued that it violated the First Amendment's Establishment Clause. The ruling called the state's arguments "disingenuous" and "intellectually dishonest, pointing out that a similar Kentucky law was ruled unconstitutional by the Supreme Court 45 years ago. The judge also noted that the state's claimed secular purpose for the law—to teach about the Ten Commandments' historical significance—was contradicted by the fact that it hadn't mandated the display of any other foundational secular documents like the Constitution. Read more. The attacks are coming from inside the department: Maricopa County School Superintendent Shelli Boggs, a self-proclaimed MAGA enthusiast, has graciously bestowed a Phoenix school board seat upon a fellow right-wing operative. After weeks of leaving the seat vacant despite a slate of very qualified (but not MAGA) applicants, and reportedly grilling other on their political views including DEI and voter registration, Boggs found a match in Suanne Edmiston. Edmiston, the Arizona state director for the hyper-conservative State Freedom Caucus Network, will now serve on the board of a diverse, liberal-leaning elementary school district until at least 2026. The move, while seemingly within her legal rights, has left other applicants and parents wondering if Boggs's appointments are more about political alignment than actual qualifications. It's almost as if she's trying to build a team of like-minded individuals to push her agenda. Who would've thunk it. Read more. Unleashing hell on those that wrong you: Because we're sure you're all as heavily invested in the ongoing Ryan Walters/work porn situation as we are (🤣 lol), let's have a little update. If you don't know, Walters is the OK Superintendent of Schools who's best known for demanding the 10 Commandments be hung in every classroom and that the state purchase Trump-brand bibles for use in public schools. Last week, he made the national news for his hypocrisy, as he was apparently caught watching weird 80's Showtime porn at work while in a meeting with school board members. As it turns out, Walters may be innocent after all; an investigation indicates that the "porn" may have been an old Jackie Chan movie from the 80s that featured a scene with nude women in a doctor's office, and the movie was simply playing on TV when Walters turned it on. (OK, fine... this is a much less hilarious explanation, but whatever.) We're willing to give Walters the benefit of the doubt, but Mr, Holier-than-thou's actions to the board members who caught him "watching porn" have been less-than-Christlike. While Walters may not have intentionally been watching, the nekkid ladeez were on his screen. Nonetheless, he continues to attack the board members of lying, calling their accounts a “junk tabloid lie” and implying they were part of a political conspiracy. He has yet to apologize for his accusations, and has in fact doubled down by using his social media to post images of cowboys holding guns and threatening to unleash hell upon those that wrong him. Guess Walters isn't following the scriptures as laid out in his beloved Trump bible, such as Matthew 6:14-15 and Ephesians 4:32 and Mark 11:25 and Matthew 18:21-22 and like eleventy-billion other verses about forgiveness. Maybe forgiveness is just an Old Testament thing that Christian nationalists feel free to ignore these days? Read more. |
