Place your hand on the wad of cash and repeat after me...

Keith Ellison is drawing fire by being the first person to place his hand on the Qu'ran when he takes the oath of office when entering the U.S. Congress. I don't like the implications of this. It's not because I'm a Bible-thumping fundie (because I'm not), it's because the precedent is one I disagree with. The Bible, like it or not, is the foundation of our laws, because the laws make sense. The Bible is not used as a religious instrument in this case, as atheists, Jews and members of other religions have placed their hands on the Good Book and joined our legislature. And they did it without any complaint. But since it's now fashionable for Muslims to claim that they're wronged at every turn, we now have An Incident. Perhaps an example of Going Along to Get Along is in order.

On a message board that I belong to, there is this guy who goes by the handle "JayRockUSA". He begins his posts with

==JAY SEZ!==

and then he goes on to post whatever thought sticks in his head. When he's told that you don't do silly formatting and other stuff on a message board, he claims that he wants to be different. I don't buy it. When there is an in-place tradition that makes sense, you don't question it just to run against the grain. After all, if you run against the grain of a porcupine, you get stabbed several hundred times. The new Representative Ellison should place his hand on the Bible, take the oath of office and be glad that we're in a country where we really do have that freedom of choice.