Run for the hills!

Some of you may have heard of the webforum Democratic Underground. It's where the most partisan folks of the left hang out to talk, discuss, and rant. And boy, do they rant.

One of their number, Koko01, recently asked,

Oldie DU'ers where are you planning on moving? I can't stay and fight. But, I don't know where to go. I don't like cold..like in Canada. But, when Rather caves I know it's time...if one can...to get outta here.

Hmm... so, a major network news anchor admitting (and he barely did that) that there might be problems with memos used to "prove" that Bush was a poor TANG officer is the tipping point to leave the country? Huh???

That's not all... in response to some comments, Koko01 went on to say,

Yes...I will vote before I go...but I need to make plans. I don't want to be left here like the Jews who didn't get out in Nazi Germany. I have a big mouth...it's hard for me to "blend in." I've already lost friends and family members because of Bush, so I know just like with Ann Frank's experience in Holland...I and my family would be turned in because I have an "aura" of Resistence. Folks can just tell about folks like me.

I will have to leave here. Many of you can "blend in" and go "unnoticed with a "practiced Repug...blend in ...making your subtle points and thereby you can stay to mount La RESISTANCe....But, I am not blessed with virtue of "blending." I'm tired of this and I know I can't do more...so I will have to find a place...I just am stymied as to where..

Wow.

If John Kerry were to win the election, I'd be very disappointed. But I'd never think something like this, let alone express it, in public or private.

Not only that, but the fact is there isn't anywhere to go. I've lived abroad, and I've enjoyed doing so. And I know plenty of people who have moved to other countries, usually for family or cultural reasons. But the fact of the matter is, you aren't going to find anywhere else more free than the US.

It's possible to take politics too seriously. Koko01 is Exhibit A.

(Hat tip: Jonah Goldberg.)

Fake. But accurate.

Some of you may have heard about the NYTimes article last week that acknowledged that the CBS memos were fakes, yet asserted that they were still accurate. In other words, the general point of the CBS story (that Bush was AWOL, a poor pilot, etc.) was still true, even though the memos CBS produced were forgeries.

A number of people have commented on the inanity of this position. Basically, without the memos, there is no proof that Bush was a poor TANG (Texas Air National Guard) officer, and hence the story collapses.

That doesn't deter some, though. For instance, liberal blogger Kos says,

The [right-]wingnuts are crowing about the CBS memo issue, as though they've somehow proven something.

They may have proven the memos were reconstructions or forgeries or whatever. But fact is, they haven't touched the underlying assertion -- that Bush was AWOL and didn't fulfill his duty to his nation, not when he was in Alabama, and not when he went to Massachussets for business school.

When the wingnuts prove Bush fulfilled his duties, then I'll pay attention. As it stands, the overwhelming mountains of evidence against Bush's National Guard service may have gotten a few memos lighter.

When one becomes too much of an ideologue, they say stupid things. Really stupid things. Kos, what evidence do you have that Bush "was AWOL and didn't fulfill his duty to his nation," other than the forged documents?? Bush has released his military records, and they demonstrate that he fulfilled his military duty.

But if you're convinced that he is a lying, evil imbicile, that evidence is worthless.

New Bush ad

The President's campaign has a new ad which shows clips of Senator Kerry windsurfing one way and then another, and a voice-over talking about his voting flip-flops.

Pretty clever ad. See it here.

Now why do they do that?

Eve Tushnet posts excerpts from an AP story which tells us how "leftover" embryos created by invitro fertilization are "discarded" (i.e. killed). According to the story, "the reverence that some clinics gave to the task surprised researchers at the University of Pennsylvania and Rutgers University." To be honest, it surprises me too. But it shouldn't... I think we all have an intuitive recognition that human embryos aren't just blobs of tissue, etc., but are real, living human beings. No matter how much we might consciously believe the opposite, reality has its way of "intruding upon us despite ourselves.

Let's make a deal!

Stanley Kurtz proposes a trade:

I would suggest the following steps as a rough outline of a resolution of our national media conflict. Conservatives need to control at least one major broadcast television network news division; at least one, and possibly two, major national newspapers; and at least one of the two major national news magazines. In addition to their current control of NPR, liberals need to be granted ownership of at least one-third of all existing talk-radio stations in the country. So, for example, we could solve the media-bias problem by giving ABC News, the Washington Post, USA Today, and Newsweekover to conservatives, while allowing Al Franken to dispense about one-third of all talk-radio stations to his allies. With the successful completion of such a grand bargain, America's media-bias problem would be effectively solved.

I personally would support such a deal, as I think objectivity (journalistic or otherwise) is much harder to attain that we think, and this would provide balance while we work toward that objectivity. Others, though, aren't so sure.

What think ye?

Some ears aren't deaf

Norma McCorvey (the "Roe" in Roe v. Wade) recently filed a lawsuit to get the infamous case which bears her pseudonym overturned (a number of years ago she became pro-life). Last week a federal appeals court rejected her case, but as Shannen Coffin notes, McCorvey's arguments did not fall on deaf ears. Go read his article here.

(Hat tip to Emily of After Abortion.)

Unions today

Last Friday, Bill Cork asked, "Why should Catholic social teaching be supportive of labor unions today?" He has his own thoughts, and the opened it up for discussion.

Check it out.

"Proportionate Reasons" again

Thanks to Bill Cork, I found this Catholic News Service story, in which Dominican priest (and one heck of a theologian) Augustine DiNoia (of the Dominican's St. Joseph province of the Eastern U.S.) explains what that "proportionate reasons" thingy in Ratzinger's June note meant (see my post on this below). DiNoia's take is important, because he is the undersecretary for the Congregation of the Doctrine of the Faith, of which Ratzinger is the prefect. A few excerpts...

The memo was certainly not intended to clear the way for Catholics to vote for candidates who are in favor of laws permitting abortion or euthanasia, but rather to clarify that the simple act of voting for such candidates might not per se justify one's exclusion from Holy Communion...

The problem is that it's difficult to determine the purpose, or "moral object," of an act of voting, DiNoia said. "The only thing we could say is, a person might come to be in the state of mortal sin and therefore unworthy to receive Communion if they voted precisely with the moral object of extending abortion or the provision of abortion. But that would be the only case where that would happen...

The entire article is worth reading. In short, DiNoia refutes critics on both the right and left who think that Ratzinger opened a mile-wide exception with this note.

I'd also recommend checking out this post from Catholic [?] Kerry Watch on this.

Proportionate Reasons

A couple of archbishops have offered explanations of that dreaded "proportionate reasons" clause in Ratzinger's note on politicians, abortion, and voting.

See this letter from Archbishop John Donoghue of Atlanta, and this article from Archbishop John Myers of Newark.

(Hat tip: thanks Mo!)

It's about time

(Meant to blog this the other day...)

Saudi Arabia is pretty well-known its oppression of freedom of religion (see the case of Brian Savio O'Connor.) And it looks like our State Department is finally getting its act together on this and putting that nation on its list of "countries of particular concern".

Unfortunately, it sounds like Colin Powell is hoping to get Saudi Arabia taken off the list.

Ahh, politics...

If only blogs were around then...

Anne Morse writes today about a Dan Rather Vietnam documentary aired in 1988 which featured a number of vets who told unbelievably horrid tales about their time in Vietnam.

Morse talks about the widespread critical acclaim poured on CBS and Rather for the documentary, and then notes, "There was just one problem: Almost none of it was true," and proceeds to explain.

It appears that we are in the midst of Ra^thergate Part Deux (or more).

(Hat tip to Dr. Blosser.)

"Besotted with fun"

Grad theology student, son of Dr. Phillip, and brother of Christopher, Jamie Blosser today commented on an address by Pope John Paul to a delegation from New Zealand. To quote Jamie,

According to the Holy Father, Kiwis are caving in to an 'unrestrained secularism' and becoming 'besotted with fun.' 'Besotted with fun' has instantly become one of my favorite phrases of all time, and I intend to use it as frequently as possible.

I can see why! "Besotted with fun"... what a turn of phrase! Kudos to JPII for using it, and to Jamie for quoting it.

"Proportionate Reasons"

There has been a flurry of controversy in the Catholic corner of blogdom known affectionately as St. Blogs regarding the final statement in Cardinal Ratzinger's June note to Cardinal McCarrick and Bishop Gregory regarding politicians, voting, and abortion. The note concludes with the following:

A Catholic would be guilty of formal cooperation in evil, and so unworthy to present himself for Holy Communion, if he were to deliberately vote for a candidate precisely because of the candidate’s permissive stand on abortion and/or euthanasia. When a Catholic does not share a candidate’s stand in favour of abortion and/or euthanasia, but votes for that candidate for other reasons, it is considered remote material cooperation, which can be permitted in the presence of proportionate reasons.

It's the final clause which has confused and even angered many Catholics: "which can be permitted in the presence of proportionate reasons." What possible reasons, they ask, can possibly justify voting for someone who supports the killing of innocent children? Isn't Ratzinger (he's one of the good guys, right?) opening a loophole big enough for a truck to drive through? These are the things people are saying.

But Ratzinger's final sentence is hardly a novelty in Catholic moral thought. Both the principle of double effect and the "maxim" of the lesser of two evils are applied when it comes to voting, and the Church has always allow the view that in certain circumstances it is morally licit to vote for a candidate who supports abortion rights (e.g. the well-known moral theologian Germain Grisez, who noted in the second volume of his The Way of the Lord Jesus that it is sometimes right to vote for the "less bad of two unworthy candidates" [p. 872]).

Ratzinger didn't perform a realpolitik calculus to arrive at this conclusion... he simply stated what has always been the case. After all, it's this moral principle which will allow me to vote for Larry Diedrich, John Thune, and George Bush, all of whom support the right to abortion in certain circumstances (e.g. rape and incest). If some bloggers and commenters were right, then it would be immoral to vote for any of those candidates!

Some people also wish that Ratzinger would have spoken "plain english" in his note, or at least elaborated on the "proportionate reasons" point to make it clearer. But they're forgetting that he sent this note to fellow cardinals and bishops, not to the general public, and I think it was safe of him to assume that he wouldn't have to elaborate on this point.

This all having been said, I don't know of an actual race at least at the national level in our country where proportionate reasons are present. I think we need to remember, though, that this doesn't mean that such a situation could never arise.

For more on this, I'd recommend this letter by Fr. Frank Pavone of Priests for Life and especially this post by Jimmy Akin.

You gotta be kidding me

Tonight I heard a new ad against President Bush, this one starring Edie Falco of "The Sopranos" fame. The ad is from MOB -- Mothers Opposing Bush. Yes, I'm serious.

Ms. Falco makes a handful of criticisms against the President, all of them around the theme that he has failed our families and our children, and hence should be opposed by all mothers. Or something.

One of her complaints is that our schools are failing our children. This has got to be the most disingenuous of all the charges, considering the the Leave No Child Behind Act has sunk billions upon billions of dollars into public education.

But that doesn't matter. The important thing is to make people think that the President cares neither for our children nor for their education. In other words, to make people afraid.

And I thought that only Republicans used the politics of fear.

C'mon, Tom...

The other night I saw Senator Daschle's latest ad, in which he criticizes his opponent, John Thune, for running a negative ad which claims -- among other things -- that Daschle supported gas tax increases, when he did no such thing.

Small problem.

Thune didn't run the ad.

And Daschle did support gas tax increases.

Go here for more.

And while you're at it, visit www.DumpDaschle.com.

The Anglican Church and Theology

Interesting column by George Weigel on the apparent tendency to avoid theology by higher prelates in the Anglican Church. One quote:

Dr. Rowan Williams is a formidable and well-regarded theologian. Whether he can convince his fellow bishops of the Anglican Communion to think theologically, rather than sociologically and politically, about central questions of Christian doctrine and Church order would seem to be one of his challenges.

New site:

www.Ra^thergate.com

Speaking of oil...

as I was in the last post, many people continue to believe that the US invaded Iraq last year for its oil, and that opposition to the war from France was motivated by peace-loving intentions.

Guess again. (Shorter summary here.)

Oil did play a role in the diplomatic war leading up to Operation Iraqi Freedom, but not in the way a lot of people think.

Human Rights

Last week, Tacitus of Redstate wrote a post entitled A Lonely Beacon, detailing how the US government has declared that the violence in Sudan constitutes genocide.

While Europe dithers (refusing to call it genocide, because, as Instapundit notes, "Because if it were, you know, we [the EU] would have to do something about it"), the Arab League refused to get involved (rejecting sanctions and international intervention), and the UN does little, it is the US and its President, George W. Bush, that calls a spade a spade (again) and seek action against this ongoing, current genocide.

How will our allies in Europe (that's more than France & Germany, Senator Kerry) and elsewhere respond? Will they refuse to get involved? In the case of France, I wonder why (do a Find for oil).

Update: there was a rally for the genocide today in Washington; check out some pictures of the event here, including the one of the sign headlined, "Thank You President Bush For Your Leadership".

New MS Office program

Jeff Miller discusses the latest offering in the Microsoft Office line of software: MS Forger.

As he says, "if you are a Kerry campaign operative or a CBS intern then this is the program for you."