Tag: Blithe Spirit

The good and the bad, emphasis on Trib and Sun-Times

Trump “imperfect messenger of the perfect storm in American politics”

Toward the end of his extremely persuasive pitch to conservatives to support Trump comes this from Hugh Hewitt:

Donald Trump, like it or not — like him or not— is the imperfect messenger of the perfect storm in American politics.

He is the shuddering, convulsive conclusion to decades of perceived indifference to the American middle class combined with a conviction that the GOP is spineless, and if he is not to your tastes, too bad.

Hewitt lists (a) the Supreme court nominees, (b) the foreign control on her (Russia, China, Iran, others) because of her hacked emails, and (c) the 3,000 political appointees he will bring with him, starting with Pence as v.p. and Christie as transition chief.

Hewitt is good. Read him.

Clout-heavy UNO hired his firm, Sen. Harmon clams up; narrow-gauge politics satisfy . . .

At town hall meeting, Oak Park library, July 17, 2013 — from Illinois Blues: How the Ruling Party Talks to Voters — UNO, fracking, pensions:

The clout-heavy United Neighborhood Organization (UNO) was brought up, reference was made to a sizable public-money grant for a charter school in nearby Galewood in 2009. There had been much spending on a post-announcement celebration — all of it widely reported, especially in detailed Sun-Times accounts.

Harmon responded carefully: “I have no knowledge of money being wasted.”

Spoken like a lawyer, and more than that, a partner with UNO’s lawyer in the firm, Burke Burns & Pinelli, which had taken UNO on as a client as soon as the scandal took shape months earlier.

By March, 2016, the firm had worked long and hard on UNO troubles to the extent of more than $962,000 in fees, wrote Sun-Times’ Dan Mihalopoulos (“THE WATCHDOGS: UNO’s secret spending spree”).

Few knew of this cheek-by-jowl Harmon-UNO connection. Many did know of the news stories, however, about which Harmon apparently had not felt prompted to inquire. He pleaded ignorance, said no more. No one questioned him further on the point.

Other issues arose:

fracking downstate (approved later by the legislature and judicially good to go by December, 2014) , dispensing of psychiatric drugs, and others.

The pension comes first, said Lilly. Harmon backed her up with a graph thrown up on a screen showing the size of pension outlay, asking along the way if anyone had “missed a payment.”

He had asked earlier who worked in government jobs, twenty-five or so had raised their hands. None did so this time. It was a litigator’s question, asked knowing the answer.

Again, it was so far, so good for one side of the issue,

payouts to pensioners, without reference to the state’s fiscal health — and continued ability to meet payments, for that matter.

He was practicing narrow-gauge politics that was good enough for his supporters. He was a sort of good shepherd caring for his flock.

Illinois Blues is available in paperback, epub and Amazon Kindle formats.

The Gnosticism of Barack Obama

This early Christian heresy, condemned in the 6th century, has its (unwitting?) adherents down through history.

One of them is our president, as here analyzed by a Catholic theologian.

Here’s the start of it:

Eric Voegelin, one of the great political philosophers of the last century (1901-1985), professed no religion, but he recognized its falsifications.

After extensively studying early Christianity, he found “Gnosticism” to render intelligible certain twentieth century movements like Nazism.

Gnosticism, as he understood it, spins an ideology within which all reality becomes refashioned and so falsified. Gnosticism …

Etc.

Sit down with this one, from Crisis Magazine.