Five things: Welcome to SCOTUS, Justice Jackson

Five ran­dom obser­va­tions from the week that was… plus a “hot take” on the news.

1. Planned Parenthood is ready to assist peo­ple in find­ing resources for any type of repro­duc­tive ser­vice, includ­ing abor­tion. Contact them at plannedparenthood.org or 800–230-PLAN. The laws are chang­ing but there are options. Other orga­ni­za­tions in Kentucky work­ing for repro­duc­tive free­dom include the Reproductive Freedom Project, and the Kentucky Religious Coalition for Reproductive Choice.
2. I’ll be on Mornings on Main with host Tim Smith this Thursday along with Mike Caldwell. Check us out!
3. I don’t know why it took us so long but last week­end, my wife and I made our first vis­it to the Waterfront Grille & Gathering, down on the riv­er at Boonesboro. It won’t be our last! The place is not fan­cy, but the atmos­phere is nice and relaxed and the food is oh so good! They grill their meats on a salt block for a dis­tinc­tive and deli­cious fla­vor. They have indoor and out­door din­ing on a patio over­look­ing the Kentucky river. 
4. It might not seem like much con­so­la­tion to pro­gres­sives, but the seat­ing of the newest asso­ciate jus­tice of the U.S. Supreme Court Ketanji Brown Jackson is a big deal. Ms. Jackson becomes the very first Black female to be appoint­ed to the high­est court. This is some­thing to be celebrated. 
5. You just know there has to be much intrigue behind the sto­ry of CCPS super­in­ten­dent Molly McComas’s “mutu­al part­ing” with the dis­trict. McComas served less than a year. According to the Winchester Sun, the deci­sion came as the board of edu­ca­tion was prepar­ing to con­duct the super­in­ten­den­t’s first evaluation. 

Hot take: Many of my friends are declin­ing to cel­e­brate Independence Day this year, cit­ing the loss of free­dom over body auton­o­my recent­ly suf­fered by American women. I get it. I grieve over this as well. But I’ve cel­e­brat­ed July 4^th all my life and I’m not going to stop now. This coun­try is far from per­fect and some­times we take a step or two back­ward as we strug­gle toward real­iz­ing the dream of free­dom for all. When I cel­e­brate, I always remem­ber that even a cen­tu­ry and a half into this great exper­i­ment, we are still not there. There is still much work to be done. Whether you cel­e­brate this year or not, I stand in sol­i­dar­i­ty with you and with every American who is still yearn­ing to be free. And I promise to con­tin­ue stand­ing, lis­ten­ing, and work­ing side-by-side with you until the dream is real­ized. (One of the ways I’m cel­e­brat­ing is by increas­ing my month­ly sup­port for Planned Parenthood.)