The Morning Dispatch: The Supreme Court Expands Discrimination Protections

Plus, doctors explain the trends in coronavirus cases and deaths.

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Happy Tuesday! Quick reminder that Father’s Day is in five days, and if you’re struggling to think of a gift, do we have a suggestion for you!

Quick Hits: Today’s Top Stories

  • As of Monday night, 2,113,488 cases of COVID-19 have been reported in the United States (an increase of 19,430 from yesterday) and 116,122 deaths have been attributed to the virus (an increase of 390 from yesterday), according to the Johns Hopkins University COVID-19 Dashboard, leading to a mortality rate among confirmed cases of 5.5 percent (the true mortality rate is likely much lower, between 0.4 percent and 1.4 percent, but it’s impossible to determine precisely due to incomplete testing regimens). Of 23,984,592 coronavirus tests conducted in the United States (449,488 conducted since yesterday), 8.8 percent have come back positive.

  • The Supreme Court ruled on Monday that LGBTQ individuals are protected under federal anti-discrimination laws. SCOTUS decided against reconsidering the qualified immunity doctrine, and passed on the opportunity to rule on several Second Amendment.

  • Just days after Trump administration officials made clear they would not disclose recipients of taxpayer-funded Paycheck Protection Program loans, a new Freedom of Information Act suit alleges the Treasury Department is “unlawfully [withholding] agency records … regarding the decision to print President Donald Trump’s name on” CARES Act stimulus checks.

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  1. Amy Carril

    I will always be proud and feel blessed to be an American.

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    Julie from Texas

    I've thought a lot about that Gallup poll, particularly after it was discussed on the Commentary Magazine podcast and the insinuation made there was that young people were less proud of America, given academia and cultural messages that the US is an imperialistic and unequal nation. However, my grown sons would have answered not proud because of the current occupant of the White House, the mismanagement of many institutions, and the desire to live up to who we can be, given our principles. I pretty much agree. While I'm generally proud that I'm an American, not so much right now. I feel embarrassed for our country not being what it should be and hope we can live up to our standards and calling much better in the future.

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    Chris

    You ask, "When are you proudest to be an American?"

    I have two answers: I feel proudest when I consider the philosophical developments that led to the American founding, like the works of John Locke and Adam Smith. I also feel pride when the United States acts to increase the safety, justice, and freedom of the world. The photo of the flag being raised above Iwo Jima is one of my favorite pictures ever taken.

    Then you ask what has contributed to the decline of American pride in recent decades.

    I recently read "White Guilt" by Shelby Steele, a controversial Black conservative. His analysis of the last 50 years' cultural trends is very interesting. He grew up under segregation and believes that the country's subsequent rejection of overt racism is a good thing, obviously. But when America acknowledged its' racism, it lost its' "moral authority." He gives an example. When he was in elementary school, his history book only gave a few paragraphs to the topic of slavery. There was a photo of a white farmer with a smiling black woman, and the book simply said that most slaves were happy and well-cared for. This is obviously, undeniably, egregiously false.

    But then, America acknowledged her racism. Steele would say "the era of white supremacy" gave way to the "era of white guilt." All of a sudden, it became vogue to undermine America's moral authority at every opportunity. Not only did young Americans reject their parents' racism, they rejected their sexual mores and economic ideas, and belief in personal responsibility as well.

    In the "era of white guilt," we got writers like Howard Zinn, who respond to the simplistic, rose-covered picture of American history that was commonly believed with a damning critique. Nevermind that Zinn's infamous book "A People's History of the United States" was equally simplistic, obviously biased in the other direction (Zinn admits this himself) and received strong criticism from serious scholars...people ate it up! Why? Because Americans realized that our nation, founded on high-minded principles of Liberty and Justice for All, had committed an act of doublethink for two centuries.

    A Patriot's History of the United States was published in response to Zinn, but it failed to attract the same popular support. The cat's out of the bag. Columbus was a conqueror. Jefferson didn't practice what he preached regarding slavery (nor did he follow the conservative principles of fiscal responsibility). Lincoln, though he always hated slavery, believed black people to be the lesser race for most of his life.

    There's no going back from this, but we can move forward. Thomas Sowell, in his book "Black Rednecks and White Liberals," has a chapter called "The Real History of Slavery." If this chapter was written by a white person, it would probably be cancelled in today's cultural climate. He talks about the ubiquity of slavery in history. He talks about how the American ideology of liberty led many slaveowners to free their slaves, even in the south. In some places, the freeing of slaves (manumission) was met with legal barriers, so SOME slaveowners DID treat their slaves as family members, even though they retained legal ownership on paper.

    My point is, the TRUE history of slavery is more complex than 20th century history books, or Zinn, has ever acknowledged. Telling the WHOLE story, good and bad, is the only way we can restore patriotism in a country disillusioned by her past sins and the present consequences. The same goes for any other contentious part of American history...from the Indian Wars to McCarthyism.

    There's a difference between healthy pride and hubris. Pride motivates a person, or a nation, to deeply introspect and ask "what went wrong?" Hubris leads a person, or a nation, to minimize what went wrong. If I'm going to feel pride for the Iwo Jima photo (something that happened decades before I was born) I must also seek to deeply understand Wounded Knee.

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    Patrick Brennan

    In October, 2001, I drove with my wife from Upper Michigan to visit our children in Northern New York State and New England. We traveled via Ontario on the Trans-Canada Highway, Route 17. All the way from Sault Sainte Marie to Cornwall we were greeted by hand-lettered signs proclaiming support, friendship and partnership. In the wake of 9-11, the Stars and Stripes greeted us in every Canadian community we entered. The memory of that experience fills my heart to this day. What a nation we must be, to incite such affection in the citizens of a neighbor state, founded by the descendants of the people defeated in the battle for our independence. I am proud - intensely, extremely proud of that nation, the people who dared proclaim it one, and all who sacrificed to keep it together. I am equally grateful (not personally proud) that such a nation welcomed my immigrant ancestors, and makes it possible still for ordinary folk like me to benefit from its blessings.

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    Roland Butytho

    I am proud of America and love this country. Is it a mystery why pride here has declined? We elected an ignorant petty boob to lead us. Our leader is embarrassing us. Its not a puzzle.

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    Donald E. L. Johnson

    I wrote about being proud to be an American. I was directed to sign in and did. My post was lost. Please fix your software for iOS devices.

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    Marian Cates

    Extremely proud and extremely lucky to be an American. I was proudest when Ronald Reagan was president.

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    BikerChick

    David French....can you please expound on your commentary in Advisory Opinions podcast from today with respect to the Title VII case and how the opinion could undermine the contention there is more than two biological sexes, i.e. male and female? I had a hard time following your analysis. KUDOS to Sarah Isgur for participating in the pod today, Wonder Woman!! And also congratulations.

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    BikerChick

    Re Hydroxychloroquine: "Can doctors still prescribe the drug for Covid 19? Yes, so long as they can find a doctor who will write them a prescription. The FDA doesn’t police so-called off-label prescribing, where a doctor uses an FDA-approved drug to treat a condition or other ailment that the drug isn’t approved to treat. Since hydroxychloroquine is approved to treat malaria and lupus, doctors can use it to treat any condition they want, including Covid-19. The FDA’s decision to revoke this authorization doesn’t take that right away."

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  10. FranA

    I'm glad to be an American - can't say that I've ever been proud to be an American.

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