Not into radicalism here, but I do like to keep up, which this “radical calendar” with do for me, I’m sure. It’s a terrific site, if misguided in its motivation.
Trumba is the maker, FYI, with its “Online Web Calendar Software.” Four starz!
Tag: Blithe Spirit
The Roeser position
Tom Roeser lays cards on table:
READERS’ NOTE; This story [“The USCCB Pontificates”] …as all others in this blog…reflects my personal opinion and not that of any organization with which I am voluntarily affiliated—civic, charitable, political, social and religious. This is stated so as to notify any board or advisory committee members of such organizations of my independent status as a journalist and my right of free speech… in case they are contacted by the Catholic Archdiocese of Chicago urging them to silence me…as was attempted last month. For further information see U.S. Constitution’s 1st amendment written by James Madison and adopted December 15, 1791.
Roeser felt obliged to make this perfectly clear because he was about to call unfavorable attention to the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops — though not before dissecting what Agence France Presse said about the much-debated Arizona immigration law.
The USCCB, he wrote,
sought to use the name of the Catholic Church officially [to] help the Obama administration pass ObamaCare if Hyde language were included, [and] is now wantonly and partisanly interfering in domestic politics by issuing a statement that wraps electoral aspects of the immigration issue in the folds of social justice where in fact they do not belong.
Etc., to good effect.
Roeser was slapped by the cardinal archbishop for what he wrote, as you may recall, via a letter to the board of Catholic Citizens of Illinois, whose board Roeser chairs.
That said, bloggers with a life might follow R’s lead here and embed such a self-defense in their work, even those whose profile is not as high as his.
And by the way, read carefully what he says about this blog and me. It’s finely tuned, and I endorse it without reservation.
Tentacles
Patriot Post has a picture of a dangerous spill:
Yep.
Can I see your papers, Axel?
What bothers me about the Arizona law that says cops must (not may, as I had earlier) ask for documentary evidence of suspected undocumented people (an Arizona driver’s license will do) is that they will do it in the case of Mexican-looking people and not Scandinavian-looking people.
Next thing we know, they will be asking such evidence of Mexican-looking people in places near our Scandinavian border.
What is this Catholic conference anyhow?
Time, I say, to distinguish between the U.S. Catholic Conference, not to mention “the church,” as this AFP story does not:
WASHINGTON — The US Catholic church on Tuesday condemned Arizona’s “draconian” new immigration law, saying it would alienate immigrant communities across the United States.
“This new law, although limited to the State of Arizona, could have impact throughout the nation in terms of how members of our immigrant communities are both perceived and treated,” Bishop John Wester said in a statement issued on behalf of the US Conference of Catholic Bishops (USCCB).
Time was when “the church” was the pope and the bishops, neither of which has pontificated on the Arizona law, to use a familiar verb. Then time was or is when it is the people of God — not sure: we used to talk that way a lot when Vatican 2 was news.
In neither case did we mean the DC bureaucracy run by staffers and a bishop director and a bishops’ committee. AFP probably doesn’t know any better and/or doesn’t give a care about such inside-baseball information. But who among the bishops is trying to educated it? (That’s Agence France Presse, by the way.)
=========
Later, from a faithful reader:
Jim — I’m not the only Catholic among my friends who is about to “leave the USCCB” but stay in the church. The USCCB does NOT speak for me — in fact it speaks what I consider the language of the enemies of freedom of religion in this country. I am tired of being treated like a dumb, lowly tax payer by TWO national entities. I’m glad you are taking up this issue.
Buyers' remorse among the newsies
Politico’s Josh Gerstein and Patrick Gavin have “Why reporters are down on Obama,” loaded with info, including this:
The [White House] correspondents association recently met with [Press Secy. Robert] Gibbs to discuss, in the words of Bloomberg’s Ed Chen, “a level of anger, which is wide and deep, among members over White House practices and attitude toward the press.”
A few days later, Gibbs said at one of his briefings, “This is the most transparent administration in the history of our country.”
Peals of laughter broke out in the briefing room.
Among many beefs:
Obama. . . has severely cut back the informal exchanges with the press pool, marking a new low in presidential access
Compared to what?
During his first year in office, President Bill Clinton did 252 such [informal] Q & A sessions — an average of one every weekday. Bush did 147. Obama did 46, according to Towson University professor Martha Kumar.
Well look, it’s only right. As Rush Limbaugh regularly notes in passing, referring to his inauguration with an apt made-up word, Obama was “immaculated.” He’s Cocky-locky, as this blogger got tired of saying back in campaign days.
What he does is give interviews — 161 of them, compared to Bush’s and Clinton’s 50 or so each — as to Team O’s comrade-in-arms, NY Times, on one occasion giving “a blockbuster scoop” to a NYT favorite after tapping him on the shoulder and whispering in his ear to join several key players at an international conference.
White Housers tear into reporters by emails and phone calls if even one word is awry in their view. But
One of the most irritating practices . . . is when aides ignore inquiries or explicitly refuse to cooperate with an unwelcome story — only to come out with both guns blazing when it takes a skeptical view of their motives or success.
“You will give them ample opportunity on a story. They will then say, ‘We don’t have anything for you on this.’ Then, when you write an analytical graph that could be interpreted as implying a political motive by the White House, or something that makes them look like anything but geniuses, you will get a flurry of off-the-record, angry e-mails after you publish,” one national reporter said.
Etc.
Tags: White+House+press+corps, Obama+as+Cocky-locky
Guidance from on high
Who did you say is misguided?
“President Obama called the Arizona [immigration] law misguided. What’s misguided, Mr. President, is the federal government’s ongoing refusal to enforce the laws that are already on the books. Read the Arizona law. Parts of it are word-for-word the same as the federal statutes which continue to be all but ignored.”
That’s Jack Cafferty of CNN speaking, via Patriot Post.
Kill 'em and sell the parts
Big organ trade in China, reports Wash Times, and why not, the authorities argue implicitly:
“These groups are useless to the state,” Mr. Gutmann said. “They are toxic, so you can’t release them. But they’re worth a great deal of money in terms of their organs.”
Gutmann is of the Foundation for Defense of Democracies, which keeps an eye on such things. He’s analyzing Chi-com thinking, of course.
But the argument! Useless to the state! Like Down Syndrome child before birth, or oldster for whom med care is denied in the total state.
More: We forget the role of the Christian Church in humanizing our responses. The 10th-century Norsemen routinely exposed flawed or female infants, in forests or on mountainsides, or pitched them into the water and made marriage choice a wholly paternal matter. (See intro to Sigrid Undset’s Gunnar’s Daughter, by Sherrill Harbison. ) Then came King St. Olav (we say Olaf), who imported another way of looking at such matters, namely Christianity.
For your desktop, live a little . . .
Hey, looking for a good desktop background to replace the picture of yourself and/or wife and kids? Here’s a good one:
Credit is due to The Patriot Post: Voice of Essential Liberty, in its “Brief” for today.
Can’t say enough for this excellent source.
Once-saintly founder repudiated
Wow. Skinback by priest-publisher of a national Catholic newspaper, naming two writers, the late Gerry Renner and Jason Berry, for defending the disgraced founder of his religious community:
Fr. Owen Kearns, L.C., the publisher of the National Catholic Register, has published an apology for defending the disgraced Legionaries of Christ founder Fr. Marcel Maciel. He specifically apologized to victims of Maciel’s abuse, investigative journalists who helped expose the crimes and to readers of the Register.
The two, who collaborated on the book that has Maciel down as cold as reporting can make it:
He expressed regret that he “took to task” journalists Gerald Renner and Jason Berry and their Hartford Courant editors.
“They didn’t get everything about the Legion right but they were fundamentally correct about Father Maciel’s sexual abuse and I ask forgiveness — too late for Gerald Renner, who is deceased.”
The book is Vows of Silence: The Abuse of Power in the Papacy of John Paul II. It’s become a movie, with footage of then-Cardinal Ratzinger (now pope) visibly irritated at being stopped and asked about Maciel — as told in the book, of course.
Blithe Spirit 