I’ve been missing the big stories about this in newspapers and on the tube. Anybody else have this problem?

President Donald Trump is more than 19 months into an administration engulfed in so much controversy that it may overshadow a tremendous achievement, namely an economic boom uniquely his.

During his time in office, the economy has achieved feats most experts thought impossible. GDP is growing at a 3 percent-plus rate. The unemployment rate is near a 50-year low. Meanwhile, the stock market has jumped 27 percent amid a surge in corporate profits.

Friday brought another round of good news: Nonfarm payrolls rose by a better-than-expected 201,000 and wages, the last missing piece of the economic recovery, increased by 2.9 percent year over year to the highest level since April 2009. That made it the best gain since the recession ended in June 2009.

His critics, a group that includes a legion of Wall Street economists, most Democrats and even some in his own Republican Party, don’t believe it will last. They figure the current boom will begin petering out as soon as mid-2019 and possibly end in recession in 2020. [Italics mine throughout]

Ah yes. Consummation devoutly to be wished, by whom you can surely guess.

For them there’s a cloud for every silver lining. Oh for the Obama-trademark new normal.

Those were the days, my friend. We thought they’d never end. And then came the evil Donald Trump. Go figure.

via CNBC

Sun-Times’ excellent coverage here:

• Pope ‘won’t say a word about it’ after he’s accused of ignoring abuse claims

• As sex-abuse crisis roils the Catholic Church, Cupich goes on seminary retreat

• Cardinal Cupich orders priests to address disputed TV report at Mass

• In Ireland, Pope Francis apologizes for ‘crimes’ Catholic Church committed there

• In wake of sex abuse crisis, archbishop asks Pope to cancel youth conference

via Catholic Church lay board that probed sex abuse 15 years ago seeks reappointment

Illinois supreme court chief justice Anne Burke wrote a letter to the U.S. bishops’ president that shows she is not kidding.

List of those willing to serve once again is nothing to sneeze at. Only the pope can call such group. Here’s the rub. Francis wants lay people to say nothing at this point. Why would he hand such an investigation over to non-vetted lay people? Would be out of character for him.

via Catholic Church lay board that probed sex abuse 15 years ago seeks reappointment

A modest proposal:

Just last week, we argued that the stakes are too high for the credibility of the Catholic Church to ignore accusations of misconduct or poor judgment made against the pope and various bishops by a high-ranking church diplomat.

We said there should be an independent investigation.

Now Illinois Supreme Court Justice Anne Burke has proposed an excellent way to do just that.

Burke’s proposal — to reappoint a lay board created 15 years ago by the U.S. Conference of Bishops to investigate sex abuses by priests and authorize it now to investigate top U.S. church leaders — makes sense. Burke sat on the original lay board, and she and her colleagues are willing to be called back into service and report their findings directly to Pope Francis.

This time it may work, but no one should hold his or her breath.

via Sun-Times editorial

Funny way to put this, since being “doored” is a peril cyclists face as what surprises them: Driver opens door without looking, down goes cyclist.

Investigators still investigating, and at this point incident is apparently being considered as unwary cyclist, not careless door-opener.

via Chicago Tribune

Interviewer (Kath.net) to auxiliary bishop of Chur, Switzerland after close of World Meeting of Families in Dublin: 

Interviewer, August 30, 2018). “The attempts to rewrite the traditional doctrine that regards homosexual acts as disordered in themselves, and therefore forbids them, are conspicuous. Pope Francis is surrounded by cardinals and advisors who are headed in this direction.”

So says the Auxiliary Bishop of Chur and former Jugendbischof of the (Catholic) Episcopal Conference of Switzerland [i.e. the bishop delegated to oversee programs for the pastoral care of young people] in this interview with kath.net.

Kath.net: The World Meeting of Families in Dublin was completely overshadowed by the topic of sexual abuse, and not just because of the revelations by Archbishop Carlo Maria Viganò, the former Nuncio in Washington, D.C. Well, the Pope himself would like to say nothing about the accusations. What do you say about this?

Bishop [Marian] Eleganti, [O.S.B.]: The fact that Pope Francis does not want to say a single word about them is a classic non-denial. Lying, of course, is completely out of the question.

Speaks softly, carrying big stick of getting to the point.

More here at Catholic World Report

A story that is less about Vigano et al. than about secrecy and the Vatican in the 21st Century, where need to know is stretched to its limits, becoming covering up, that is in effect, deceiving the public.

Question is, how long the church will be able to get away with this.

via CatholicHerald.co.uk

Swamp spokesman here.

Expected him before this. Poll on his credibility, anyone? But they do make splash for a while.

Throw mud or drag out and put between covers what main streamers have been pushing for months, some sticks.

Catnip for Beltway, as Fox hostess Dana Perino said.

It’s Drudge’s main headline for the nonce. (In fact, I just looked, and it’s been demoted.)

All will pass.

 

Caught in the act, one doing the other.

Cardinal Cupich, where are you?

via CBS Chicago