Boy What A Hole The Supreme Court Dug!

I knew that this day will happen, it was bound to happen and it did!

A Jewish couple was rejected as foster parents because of their religion. This is the future Project 2025 envisions
The conservative blueprint envisions ‘a biblically based’ definition of marriage and wants to protect adoption agencies that only work with Christians
The Guardian
Rebecca McCray
24 July 2024

In 2021, Liz and Gabe Rutan-Ram decided to take the next step toward growing their family and applied to foster a child. After identifying a three-year-old in Florida who they hoped to ultimately adopt, the Rutan-Rams turned back to their home state of Tennessee to start training to become foster parents.

But their plans quickly fell apart when the Christian state-funded foster care placement agency informed them by email that they “only provide adoption services to prospective adoptive families that share our belief system”. The Rutan-Rams, who are Jewish, were out of luck.

Now, it is against the law to discriminate based on religion! But what happens when it is another religion that discriminates?

The predicament facing the Rutan-Rams could become more common under a second Trump administration. Project 2025, a 900-plus page blueprint for the next Republican administration and the policy brainchild of the conservative Heritage Foundation, contains an explicitly sympathetic view toward “faith-based adoption agencies” like the one that rejected the Rutan-Rams, who are “under threat from lawsuits” because of the agencies’ religious beliefs.

Project 2025’s Adoption Reform section calls for the passage of legislation to ensure providers “cannot be subjected to discrimination for providing adoption and foster care services based on their beliefs about marriage”. It also calls for the repeal of an Obama-era regulation that prohibits discrimination against prospective parents and subsequent amendments made by the Biden administration.

So how is the court going to rule when a case like this gets to them? Does “Religious Freedom” include the “freedom” to discriminate against other religions?

You see the quandary that the Supreme Court got themselves into?

Then there is Project 2025 goals of bring us back to the 1950s!

The plan envisions upholding “a biblically based, social science-reinforced definition of marriage and family”. It would remove nondiscrimination roadblocks governing faith-based grant recipients, such as the agency that denied the Rutan-Rams. The authors argue that “heterosexual, intact marriages” provide more stability for children than “all other family forms”. In addition to calling for the passage of the Child Welfare Provider Inclusion Act, which would allow adoption and foster care agencies to make placement decisions based on their “religious beliefs or moral convictions”, it also calls on Congress to ensure “religious employers” are exempt from nondiscrimination laws and free to make business decisions based on their religious beliefs.

[…]

“Project 2025 says that religion is a permanent institution that should influence American life,” said Washington-Leapheart. “That alone communicates the kind of arrogant way Christianity is situated as an inevitability. And it’s not. I say that as a Christian person who is firmly grounded in my faith. It is not an inevitable part of my identity, it is a choice I make every day.

Welcome to the American Taliban!

I’m voting for the party that does not tell you what holy book you should follow.
I’m voting for the party that does not tell you what bathroom to use.
I’m voting for the party that does not tell you who you can and cannot marry.
I’m voting for the party that does not tell you what books you can read.
I’m voting for the party that does not tell you what you can do with your body.
I’m voting for the party that is looking forwards and not backwards.
I’m voting for VP Harris.
I’m voting for the party with Integrity, Virtue, & Respect and not for a party that is lead by a con-artist who makes insurance salesman seem like saints!

STFU

That is what the Republicans colleagues are saying to Rep. Burchett about his racist remarks.

House colleagues repudiate Rep. Tim Burchett, threaten censure over 'DEI hire' comments
Knoxville News Sentinel
By Allie Feinberg
July 24, 2024

U.S. Rep. Tim Burchett, a Knoxville Republican, could face censure from his House colleagues after he called Vice President Kamala Harris a "DEI hire," a new report says. His GOP colleagues are joining the chorus by repudiating his comments as racist and sexist.

Politico reported Democratic Reps. Tony Cárdenas of California and Jasmine Crockett of Texas plan to introduce a censure resolution. It's essentially a condemnation of a member's behavior or speech.

On the same day this week on Capitol Hill, Burchett called presidential candidate Harris and former Secret Service Director Kimberly Cheatle a "DEI hire."

Let’s see…

• House women: 92 Democratic women and 33 Republican women in the House, Republicans.
• House minorities: 113 minority members of Congress serve as Democrats, compared to 30 serving as Republicans
• Senate women: 15 Democratic women and 9 Republican women in the Senate
• Senate minorities: Senate Republicans, Black =1 , Hispanic = 2, and American Indian = 1; Senate Democrats, there are 8 minority Democratic senators
• It's worth noting that: The vast majority (80%) of racial and ethnic minority members in the new Congress are Democrats, while 20% are Republicans.

via Perplexity AI

“Her ethnicity and her gender have nothing to do with this whatsoever. This is about who can deliver for the American people and get us out of the mess that we’re in,” Johnson said at a press conference.

So why do you think that the Republicans are saying back-off on the race Vice President Harris?

Could it because the Republicans know that they are vulnerable to a label of racism? And that they are trying to get the Black vote so they don’t want to bring up race?

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Then we have the VP candidate calling childless couples "childless cat ladies...

 

You have to understand where he is coming from.

The Republican party is kowtowing to the evangelical Christians who believe a woman's place is in the kitchen barefoot and pregnant. So to them any women without children is not a productive member of society so must be pitied.

I'm voting for the childless cat lady and not the used car shyster.

The Numbers.

The annual Connecticut Commission on Human Rights and Opportunists (CHRO) report for 2023 sheds light on discrimination against us…
 

Gender Identity:

Employment: 34
Housing: 1
Public Accommodation: 6
Other: 1
Total for July 1, 2022 to June 30, 2023: 42

Sexual Orientation:

Employment: 55
Housing: 7
Public Accommodation: 6
Other: 1
Total: 69

The 2024 report will be out shortly, usually around September.

Tick Tock, Tick Tock…

Let’s face we are all getting old but it sure beats the alternative, pushing up daisies, but when you are LGBTQ+ our care is limited. This is an old article but it is still informative.

How to find care for LGBT seniors
PBS News
By Leah Eskenazi, Family Caregiver Alliance
June 11, 2015

I clearly remember the first time I met Herb. He had beautiful white hair framing a handsome face with an inviting smile. But he greeted me with decidedly exhausted eyes.

He introduced me to Charles, who sat in the wheelchair Herb was pushing towards the church entrance where the local dementia day respite program met. As the director of Caregiver Services for a local community hospital — sponsor of the day respite program — my staff and I learned to respect Herb’s fierce independence. He clearly was determined to manage all of the care Charles needed — meal prep, bathing, toileting, dressing, emotional support and more. But the stress was taking a toll on Herb’s health. On the advice of his doctor, Herb finally agreed to take advantage of the two afternoons a week the day program afforded him. It wasn’t until Charles’ death about four years later that we learned, at the memorial service, of Charles and Herb’s 47-year committed relationship.

Twenty-five years ago, when I first met this couple, a community health and social version of ‘don’t ask, don’t tell’ was common. Herb and Charles grew up during the McCarthy era when any indication of homosexuality was met with pervasive stigma, destructive branding and legal and economic consequences. In select older lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender (LGBT) age groups, and in certain geographic areas and social settings, people remain selective about who and when it feels safe enough to reveal one’s authentic LGBT self. Some individuals may even choose not to disclose their sexual orientation or gender identity to their medical doctor, therapist or community service agency, leaving them unable to gain the full benefit from the services provided. Health and social service professionals at all levels can even contribute to this problem by ignoring or not having time to discuss an older adult’s emotional health concerns and altogether avoiding sexual health in their assessment.

I think the hardest thing about getting help with seniors… is the first step, where to find help. The first step in finding someone to clean, finding someone to take care of your basic home care needs, or for that matter someone to fix the small things around the house.

The LGBT community and long-term care

Today, thanks to dedicated social and political activism fermented in the 1960s and ’70s, LGBT adults reaching their 50s and beyond are seeing incremental improvement in acceptance and assistance by mainstream health practitioners and long-term care community service providers.

Before I came out I used to “Sanitize my house” before family and friends came over to remove anything trans or LGBTQ+ from around the house. Things like the Pride and Trans flags magnets from the refrigerator. As we get older do we need to “Sanitize” our living arrangements? Do we need to take down photos of loved ones from the cleaning crew?

Caregiving
The support that a caregiver receives from friends and family is often critical in relieving stress that can be part of caring for someone who has a chronic debilitating health condition. LGBT caregivers may find that they have less support than they would like from their own — or the care receiver’s — biological family members. Historically, to fill in this gap, many LGBT people have formed strong “families of choice,” a support system comprised of trusted friends, relatives and supportive community service providers.

I have an amazing group of friends, as my mobility has decreased they have helped me clean and do small projects around the house that I can no longer do.

Who will have my Power of Attorney who will have the power of life and death over me? I had my father’s Power of Attorney and one thing that they never tell you is that you are the one to say “Pull the plug.”

I cried, and I cried, and I cried. My father had aspiration pneumonia with some food getting lodge in his lungs. When the doctor and social workers told us that my father’s changes of getting better were almost non-existent I had to say the words. My brother and sister-in-law were with me and we were in agreement but it still came down to me. I had to say the words… pull the plug. It left a scar on my mind that is still there.

Health care and financial decision-making
It is important for LGBT seniors and their caregivers to complete a few key legal documents establishing the right to make care decisions and to document treatment preferences for hospital and health care providers.

Rules governing resources to plan for and pay for long-term care remain an obstacle. We know that same-sex partners do not have access, as married older adults do, to federal family leave benefits, equivalent Medicaid spend-downs, Social Security benefits, bereavement leave, or automatic inheritance of jointly owned real estate and personal property. In addition to spousal impoverishment depending on the state, there may also be differences in how assets in same-sex couples are treated in regard to Medicaid liens, asset transfers and estate recovery.

One last thing…

Dementia
LGBT community members are living longer and with this increase in life expectancy comes the risk of Alzheimer’s disease and related dementias…

A trans friend went in a coma and when she came out of the coma, she didn’t remember that she was trans and then she saw that she had Gender Confirming Surgery. She freaked out! What would happen if her memory didn’t come back?

That affected me greatly… what will happen if we get Alzheimer’s disease and we don’t remember we are trans?

I asked Perplexity AI that question and its answer in part is…

In terms of memory problems specific to transgender individuals with dementia, it has been noted that they may forget aspects of their gender transition. For example, they might forget that they have started or completed gender-affirming surgery or hormone therapy. This can lead to distress and confusion, both for the individual and their caregivers

[…]

Overall, while there is evidence of cognitive decline and dementia among transgender individuals, more research is needed to fully understand the unique challenges they face, including the potential for forgetting significant aspects of their gender transition.

Our minds are very fragile and some times they go before the rest of the body.

Being LGBTQ+ Is Now Considered “Obscene Material”

In Idaho they just passed a new law making any thing LGBTQ+ adult material! And require people to be an adult! The Constitution? What Constitution?

GOP law forces library to require ID from patrons under 30 to access “adult” books
The adult book section includes books with queer themes, something a new law defines as "sexual" content.
LGBTQ Nation
By Matt Keeley
July 23, 2024

An Idaho library sign went viral on Reddit earlier this month for stating that all patrons under the age of 30 must show a photo ID proving that they’re above 18 years old to access an adults-only section. The sign is real, and it’s part of a troubling trend affecting librarians, communities, and free speech rights nationwide.

Earlier this year, Idaho’s Republican-led government passed House Bill 710, forcing libraries to recategorize challenged books — including children’s books with LGBTQ+ themes — as being for adults only. The law is similar to censorious legislation introduced in other red states, and a similar law could be enacted nationwide if former President Donald Trump gets reelected and puts Project 2025 into effect.

Isn’t it funny that Trump and the Republicans swear up and down that they are following Project 2025 but everything they do is in the Project 2025

Just look at Trump’s platform and Project 2025…

One more nail in to the coffin...

J.D. Vance in Serious Trouble After Damning Project 2025 Book Foreword

Donald Trump’s running mate can’t claim he knew nothing about the extremist Project 2025 after this.

The New Republic

Robert McCoy

July 24, 2024

As Trump desperately tries to separate his campaign from Project 2025, users on X have noted one big problem: J.D. Vance wrote the foreword to a forthcoming book by the plan’s lead author, Heritage Foundation President Kevin Roberts.

On the Amazon product page, the promotional material for the book, titled Dawn’s Early Light, highlights Roberts’s role in composing Project 2025, the Heritage Foundation proposal for a conservative overhaul of the federal government.

The product page also includes a favorable review from Vance. “Never before has a figure with Roberts’s depth and stature within the American Right tried to articulate a genuinely new future for conservatism,” the review says. “We are now all realizing that it’s time to circle the wagons and load the muskets. In the fights that lay ahead, these ideas are an essential weapon.”

But hey! He swears he is knows nothing about Project 2025!

Meanwhile children are being banned!

When parents sign their child up to get a library card, they have the option to allow their kids to check out any books in the library, or to restrict them to the children’s section on the first floor, Wright said. If a child has a restricted library card, they must be accompanied by a parent to the third-floor adult library and sign an affidavit every single time they go to the adult section.

“Doing so acts as an affirmative defense if the parent were to later file an action against the library,” Wright said.

The Republicans are worried. They are afraid that the children will see the bigotry and animosity behind their policies… that they will see the lies for what they are.

The vagueness of the statute has librarians like Scheline nervous about what could be challenged. She says, hypothetically, that a patron could object to a children’s book about two mothers who go to a parent-teacher conference. In that instance, she would have to file that book alongside literature actually meant for adults, where it would never get circulated among young readers.

“We have children in our school district who have same-sex parents. And those children deserve to see themselves reflected in literature. They deserve to go to the shelf that is designed for children, and they deserve to check out a book that reflects their home life,” she said. “And I will not, will not,  move those books and begrudge those children of books that reflect themselves in literature. It does not matter what my views are on the book itself. I will not move the book.”

The Republicans are always preaching “Parent’s Rights” but their hypocrisy is amazing, they scream and yell about the rights of parents to chose their education for their children but at the same time they are yanking LGBTQ+ books off the shelves for the parents to choose what their children read.

“Those are the only problems I’ve had at the library. But yet, here the government is, ‘Let’s go ahead and reach our big giant long arm onto this little tiny library and create a penalty if they have LGBTQ books in their kids section. Let’s not just give them a slap on the hand, because they’re promoting homosexuality. Let’s go ahead and slap them with the $250 fines, plus civil penalties. Because God forbid that we’d be a modern society in 2024. We don’t want our children to be subjected to kindness, humility, virtue and gentleness.’ So that is how I feel about the bill,” Scheline said.

The First Amendment be damned!

Another book ban battle emerges in Florida, with high stakes for the First Amendment

Tallahassee Democrat

By Douglas Soule USA Network

July 24, 2024

Another legal battle has begun over Florida's book bans, with significant stakes, as the sued school district is launching a controversial defense that could shake First Amendment law nationwide.

[...]

Facing a federal lawsuit over its removal and restriction of school library books, county school district officials say such decisions are actually protected by the First Amendment, which they are accused of violating.

"(Our) actions constitute government speech for which no First Amendment protections attach," they wrote in a Friday court filing.

That argument has also been used multiple times in the courts by Gov. Ron DeSantis' administration and other school districts, who maintain that governments can remove any school library book regardless of reason.

It's set off alarm bells for many First Amendment advocates, some labeling it as authoritarianism. Its appearance in another case creates another chance that a judge agrees with the argument, potentially elevating it to higher courts where far-reaching precedent could be set.

In 1982 the Supreme Court…

How a 40-Year-Old Supreme Court Ruling May Quash the Book Banning Wave
Freedom Forum
By Tony Mauro

Supreme Court Justice William Brennan Jr. issued an opinion 40 years ago asserting that under the First Amendment, “Local school boards may not remove books from school library shelves simply because they dislike the ideas contained in those books.”

You might think that such a statement would put an end to the current trend among legislators and school officials of banning books that are deemed to be unsettling or inappropriate for students.

No, of course not. The Republicans don’t care what the courts have ruled, they want to make a point, being that they are tough on gays (The right-wing conservative consider all LGBTQ+ people as “gay”) and then when the law gets overturned they blame it of the liberal activist judges.

Strangely enough, even though Supreme Court precedents usually last for a long time, Brennan’s forceful 1982 pronouncement opposing the removal of books from school libraries has mostly been ignored. The opinion that Brennan issued was in Board of Education, Island Trees Union Free School District v. Pico.

The Pico decision “may well be the most overlooked Supreme Court decision involving students’ rights in the nation’s history,” said Yale Law School professor Justin Driver in an interview. Driver is the author of “The Schoolhouse Gate,” a book about students’ First Amendment rights.

Like I said, the Republicans don’t care about the court rulings.

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And then we have the Republican VP candidate saying to blow-off the courts if the courts rule against Trump!

Judge Cannon and JD Vance Are on the Same Team
The New York Times
By JESSE WEGMAN
July 23, 2024

In the days since Judge Aileen Cannon issued her inexplicable 93-page dismissal of the classified-documents case against Donald Trump, I’ve been coming back to something JD Vance said on a podcast in 2021.

Mr. Vance, the Ohio senator and now Mr. Trump’s running mate, predicted on the podcast that the former president, who had been recently disgraced by his insurrectionary attempt to overturn the 2020 election, would nevertheless run again in 2024. Should Mr. Trump win, Mr. Vance said, he had some advice: “Fire every single midlevel bureaucrat, every civil servant in the administrative state, replace them with our people.” And if the courts ruled against him? No problem, Mr. Vance said: Just blow them off.

“We are in a late republican period,” he added, alluding to weakness in the ancient Roman Republic. “If we’re going to push back against it, we have to get pretty wild, and pretty far out there, and go in directions that a lot of conservatives right now are uncomfortable with.”

His interviewer, Jack Murphy, prominent in the right-wing pro-masculinity world, agreed and said, “Among some of my circle, the phrase ‘extra-constitutional’ has come up quite a bit.” Mr. Murphy said it was necessary “to become a little more robust in our behavior” in order to “refound the country,” and Mr. Vance responded, “That’s exactly right.”

Like I said the Republicans just ignore the laws that they don’t like and follow the ones they like.

“R” is for going backwards
“D” is for going forwards.

Vote for the future… vote D.

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But not all the news is bad...

Whitmer signs law banning gay and trans ‘panic’ defenses

The Hill

BY BROOKE MIGDON

July 24, 2024

Gay and transgender “panic” defenses are no longer viable in Michigan courtrooms under legislation signed Tuesday by Democratic Gov. Gretchen Whitmer. 

Michigan is the 20th state to outlaw such defenses, which allow individuals accused of violent crimes to receive lesser sentences by arguing that the victim’s sexual orientation or gender identity caused them to panic. While gay and trans “panic” defenses — referred to collectively as the LGBTQ “panic” defense — are not freestanding defenses, they are used in conjunction with other legal strategies to reduce the severity of charges or sentencing. 

Michigan’s law significantly expands legal protections for LGBTQ people against discrimination, prejudice and hate crimes by specifying that a defendant cannot use a person’s actual or perceived identity to demonstrate “reasonable provocation” or to show they acted in the heat of passion.

Connecticut passed a similar law back in 2019, PA19-27 AN ACT CONCERNING GAY AND TRANSGENDER PANIC DEFENSE.

School's Out For Summer, School's Out Forever, School's…

In the past I have written about how I feel that the ultimate goal of the right-wing conservatives is to bring back public education to the 1890s where all was taught in schools was Reading, ‘Riting, and ‘Rithmatic.

We see that in the “Voucher” programs have predominantly benefited affluent families at the decrement of lower income families. Time writes about the destruction of public schools.

Project 2025’s Plan to Eliminate Public Schools Has Already Started
By Jessica Alcantara and Laura Petty
July 22, 2024

Project 2025, the policy agenda for Former President Trump’s potential first year back in the White House published by the far right conservative think tank the Heritage Foundation, has been making waves recently. Some of the many destructive proposals within the agenda include the elimination of the U.S. Department of Education—along with federal education funding and any civil rights protections—and the diversion of public money to private school voucher programs instead.

Make no mistake: The goal is to end public education. But dismantling our public schools isn’t just the plan if Trump is reelected—it is already happening.

I have been saying this for a long time… heed my warnings!

The policies that Project 2025 plans to prioritize—government payments to families sending their children to private school and creation of new charter schools that are run like businesses—have expanded in the last few years, starving public school districts that serve all students of already insufficient resources. In the 2023-24 school year, at least 70 school districts, including in San Antonio, Texas, Jackson, Mississippi, and Wichita, Kansas, announced permanent closures of public schools, impacting millions of students. These districts are resorting to the harmful, discriminatory, and ineffective so-called ‘solution’ of closing schools in Black and Latine communities, stripping those communities of their local public schools.

And lets not forget the Secretary of Education under Trump, Betsy DeVos…

A Betsy DeVos-backed group helps fuel a rapid expansion of public money for private schools
The American Federation for Children has found success amid a 20-year low in support for K-12 education and protests over lessons involving race and identity.
NBC
By Tyler Kingkade
March 30, 2023

A conservative nonprofit group founded by former Trump administration Education Secretary Betsy DeVos said it poured about $9 million into state elections last year, backing nearly 200 candidates. Now, some of those candidates are pushing a wave of legislation boosting DeVos’ longtime goal: subsidizing private schools with public dollars.

Using at least $2.5 million from DeVos and her husband, the American Federation for Children has played a pivotal role in getting what supporters call “school choice” policies passed into law in at least three states and introduced in several more, according to current and former GOP legislators, lobbyists for teachers unions and academics.

Oh, by the way… did you know that Ms. DeVos is a billionaire?
 

The Time article ends with…

Project 2025 is not an inevitability—it is a call to action for anyone who cares about public education in this country. Our public school system requires more resources to create better school environments for everyone. We need investment in our public schools—not closures.

We seen it in the banning of books.
We seen it in the banning of teaching Black history.
We seen it in the banning of LGBTQ+ topics in the classroom.
We seen it in the cutting of funds for public schools and diverting the moneys to vouchers.
We seen it in putting the Ten Commandments in the classroom.

Educated children are thinking children and thinking children are not conservatives.

New England’s Blue… Wrong!

People think that New England is solid blue but New Hampshire is reddish purple. In the land of "Live Free or Die" they passed laws banning us!

New Hampshire governor signs bill banning transgender girls from girls' sports
CBS News
July 20, 2024

Republican Gov. Chris Sununu of New Hampshire has signed a bill that would ban transgender athletes in grades 5-12 from teams that align with their gender identity, adding the state to nearly half in the nation that adopted similar measures.

The bill passed by the Republican-led Legislature would require schools to designate all teams as either girls, boys or coed, with eligibility determined based on students' birth certificates "or other evidence." Supporters of the legislation said they wanted to protect girls from being injured by larger and stronger transgender athletes.

Sununu signed the bill Friday, saying in a statement it "ensures fairness and safety in women's sports by maintaining integrity and competitive balance in athletic competitions." It takes effect in 30 days.

That doesn’t sound very blue to me.

That is the Republican new talking point, “protect girls from being injured by larger and stronger transgender athletes” In Massachusetts during a girls volleyball game a trans student “Spiked” the volleyball injuring another player and the right-wing conservatives went running around saying… See that’s what happens when you allow these big burly trans girls play. We protect from being injured by larger and stronger transgender athletes.

Yeah but! What they don’t say is that there were over 250 facial injuries last year and only one, that’s “1” player was injured by a trans athlete. If they were really interested in preventing injuries that would follow the recommendations to make sports safer.

It seems to me that injuries are common in sports between all players, why don’t they work toward injuries? Instead of attacking us over common injuries and riling them up against us!

Sununu also signed a bill Friday that would ban gender-affirming surgeries for transgender minors. That takes effect on Jan. 1, 2025. The care has been available in the United States for more than a decade and is endorsed by major medical associations.

"This bill focuses on protecting the health and safety of New Hampshire's children and has earned bipartisan support," Sununu wrote.

Well since there has never been “gender-affirming surgeries for transgender minors” in New Hampshire nor anywhere in the nation! But that doesn’t fit their agenda, instead they count on the general public not know about trans healthcare so they create a climate where people think that the doctors are like vultures waiting to preform surgery on minors on demand.

I vote for the party that does not tell you what bathroom to use.
I vote for the party that does not tell you can and cannot marry.
I vote for the party that does not tell you what books you can read.
I vote for the party that does not tell you what holy book you should follow.
I vote for the party that does not tell you what you can do with your body.
I vote for the party that is looking forwards and not backwards.
I’m voting for VP Harris.
I’m voting for the party with Integrity, Virtue, & Respect and not for a party that is lead by a con-artist who makes insurance salesman seem like saints!