Hello, Wall-E

From the moment I heard his irritating voice in a movie trailer, I knew I would hate Wall-E. However, as it was evident the movie was practically made for our Geek-In-Training, Eldest Weed, it was equally clear I was going to see it. After reading it was a Bush-bashing green-fest, I told EW we'd have to wait for DVD, because I ain't payin' that much money for Al-Gore praisin'/ Bush bashin'. He had to admit that was reasonable.

I caved. It was peer pressure. First ninme assured me it wasn't a Bush-basher in spite of one line. Then three other moms in our kids' circle sold me out and took their kids last night and their positive reviews re-started the begging. And it's hot. What pushed me over the edge, though, was the Weedlets wanted to go so badly they did all their chores plus a few extra plus piano practice without complaining in time to make the first matinee. (If you think my expectations about how long these things take haven't adjusted accordingly, you underestimate me.)

We'll get to my reaction, but first, since the Conservative blogosphere is dishing up mixed opinions on how offensively green and corporation-bashing Wall-E is, here are the unalloyed reactions of the various Weedlets when asked --fresh from the flick and out of earshot of each other-- what the movie's message was.

• Eldest Weed (11-yr-old boy), who predictably loved it: Don't let one corporation take over everything, and don't be afraid of hard work --it's actually good for you.
• Rose Among Thorns (9-yr-old girl), who gives it an 8: Don't turn your life over to robots.
  
• 7-yr-old boy (who liked, not loved, it): Clean up after yourself.
• 4-yr-old boy (who says he loved it but seemed bored whenever I looked over at him) frowning: I don't wememboh.

So if it is green propaganda, it's not the most effective sort. It might even be anti-propaganda, actually. The premise is that Earth has been temporarily abandoned so that it can be cleaned and rendered inhabitable again. Am I the only one who noticed, however, that as we pan the endless junked up wastescapes of earth, one of the items they're most filled with is those eco-windmills we're supposed to get carbon credits for? And the big corporation that bolluxes everything up is the one responsible for cleaning up the earth? The plot complication comes not because the corporation is corrupt or wicked per se; it has been ceded too much power and has no capacity to adapt to unforeseen circumstances. Seems like a critique of at least the carbon credit form of environmentalism in favor of a more wholesome "stewardship" approach. If I were Al Gore, I wouldn't be pleased.


What's being widely read as a critique of consumerism is likewise a bit more subtle than it's being given credit for. The movie seems to delight in some of our useless junk. Much of it --notably bubble wrap-- actually get loving treatment. It's anti-bacterial virtual reality where life is fully automated and no dirt need ever enter our lives that gets "the treatment." The film itself is interesting and alive on trashy earth, and gets as boring as the couch potato existence it portrays on the spaceship Axiom. There is more genuine beauty and interest on the trashed earth than in the spaceship paradise (and Wall-E's first encounter with E.V.E. is a genuine "here at last is bone of my bone" moment of self-discovery). The message seems to be that real life gets messy --even very messy--, but it's preferable to the utterly sanitized alternative.

At that level it reminded me of Walker Percy's Lost in the Cosmos. I haven't read it in years, but I recall that at the end as a thought experiment he has the reader make a choice. Earth is subsumed in nuclear holocaust. You can hide out in a cave in Kentucky where you will survive, but your only companions will be human beings horribly crippled or mutated by the blast. Or you can colonize the moon with a couple of Bunnies (yes, those kind). I can't say how he does it, but he makes you earnestly prefer real life with mutants than "the perfect life." Similarly [spoiler alert], the people here learn to prefer a difficult life on an "uninhabitable" Earth than virtual reality that's literally pie in the sky.

Wow, I've actually talked myself into liking Wall-E more than I in fact did. (I got bored.) But I defend it from the charge of being a Pixar sell-out. I think perhaps we Conservatives have grown so touchy on the subject of the environment we're having trouble seeing it's not the real point of this story.

Update: This evening when I was trying to concentrate on something else, I kept thinking about Wall-E instead, and how the "green" theme really isn't there, except as a metaphor. It isn't greenhouse gases that have poisoned the earth, and the junk we see isn't primarily cars, it's just "stuff." Rubber duckies, Rubix cubes, etc. Lileks agrees with me about that:

for heaven’s sake it’s a parable. Any civilization capable of interstellar travel isn’t going to be done in by excess trash. They can warp it out or blast it. The products of consumption society are the things that give Wall-E’s life meaning, just as the empty pursuit of consumption is the flaw that saps meaning from the lives of the survivors. It’s a matter of perspective.

He also found beauties in the flick that make me like it retrospectively even more. In the end, I think I just can't be that moved by an animated film, even if it's beautiful. Probably a personal shortcoming. Curtsy: ninme.

Update 2: Welcome blogged readers. Since there are new readers, I'll indulge myself in an additional point. Is Wall-E a pro-life movie? In comments we explore the creation, Adam & Eve theme:

Wall-E lives in peace and harmony in a world created for him (it's a trashed earth to us, but since he's a trash compactor...) He has dominion over the "garden," and shapes it to his will. He has companions (a video, various "treasures," a cockroach...) but no fit partner to share his paradise. As I mentioned, the moment he sees Eve, it really is a "here at last" moment, and somehow this cartoon manages to give the scene true emotional content. The subsequent scenes in which he shows her all the delights of his home are sweet too.

Later it occurred to me (for a film that bored me, it stuck with me!) E.V.E. looks like an egg. Wall-E "plants" (heh) new life in her and she goes kind of dormant for awhile as he protects her and she devotes all her energy to protecting the life within her. (The glowing of the plant inside her was sort of reminiscent of a sonogram, no?) Then the two of them struggle to protect the life within her while the powers that be labor to deny that what is obviously life is life, to avoid the consequences. In an interview with World magazine, the filmmaker discusses what he was trying to do. His interviewer concludes:

In fact, if Stanton criticizes people for anything, it's for worship of leisure. Because they live to be cared for rather than to care, the few human beings WALL•E meets have become, to use Stanton's words, giant babies—literally feeding on milk rather than solid food. In contrast, WALL•E, the meek little trash collector, accepts stewardship in a way that people have rejected. And because love springs from service, he comes to love the creatures that inhabit Earth. That's not an environmental message, it's a biblical one.

See, it is very "theology of the body."

"Radio Drama"

From The Ryskind Sketchbook

Why this is coming up now. What's not fair about the Fairness Doctrine (aka, more accurately, the Hush Rush bill). Instapundit finds a Fairness Doctrine preview. In the mood to feel depressed about your fellow citizens? Check out this discussion of the Fairness Doctrine. Charity: it's an intellectual virtue!

At least the Canadian HRC dropped the complaint against Maclean's and Mark Steyn. (The BC ruling is still pending.) Even if, as Ezra Levant pointed out, the blessing is decidedly mixed.

Bin Laden On The Verge Of Capture

Mr. W. sent me this last night, clearly because he wanted me to close out a lovely feast day on a note of fury. Captured from the Drudge screen last night:

SOURCES: BUSH ANGER AT COMING NEW YORK TIMES STORY DETAILING HUNT FOR BIN LADEN... The newspaper is planning to expose a 'highly classified Pentagon order' authorizing Special Operations forces to hunt al-Qaida leader in mountains of Pakistan... DEVELOPING....

So they're going to release details that will help bin Laden evade capture, eh? I was in high dudgeon, all "Bill Kristol should resign and no one who loves the country should subscribe to, grant interviews to, link to, purchase, read or in anyway have truck with the Formerly Gray Lady...." But I can't see how the story they actually ran this morning (I'm sorry, I can't bring myself to link to her) tells us more than has already been revealed over and over in the past few years, and certainly two weeks ago in the international press.

Sure, there is some gossip about who hates whom within the CIA and the opinion of Richard Armitage is solicited about our situation (well, he is the go-to guy for revealing CIA info that ought not be revealed, right? But what he knows about boots on the ground is another question.) Not sure what those details add to our store of knowledge, and the clear goal of the story is the ancient trope that none of the troubles in Waziristan would be happening if Bush hadn't been obsessed with gearing up for war in Iraq. Sigh. It would be nice if the Gray Lady had the class to be slightly less transparent about her agenda.


Nevertheless, what heartens me is that in a matter of great national import, The Gray Lady is of the opinion that what ought to be done can't be done. Therefore success must be imminent.

So You're Saying Just Showing Up Doesn't Cut It?

I was over at atonement online checking out Fr. Christopher Phillips' blog and discovered his parish has the Anglican Use Mass (which I love) posted. With an introduction from St. Pius X:

If you wish to hear Mass as it should be heard, you must follow with eye, heart and mouth all that happens at the altar. Further, you must pray with the priest the holy words said by him in the name of Christ and which Christ says by him. You have to associate your heart with the holy feelings which are contained in these words and in this manner you ought to follow all that happens on the altar. When acting in this way you have prayed Holy Mass.

Be Like Paul

Georges de La Tour

St. Paul's jubilee year (he was born 2000 years ago) begins today. B16 kicked it off with a vespers ceremony at St. Paul's Outside The Walls (many ecumenical reps present as well). Pictures forthcoming, but in the meanwhile, review all the ways you can receive a plenary indulgence --for yourself or your beloved departed-- in the coming year.

General pre-conditions:

• As many as you want, but only one per day (no claiming multiple pilgrimages because you stepped out and back in to the Cathedral; absence of sincerity nullifies grace, you know!)
  
• (Here's the rub, right?) You must be truly repentant, duly absolved through Confession and healed by Holy Communion (usual time constraints).
• Pray for the intentions of the Holy Father

Specific Pauline Indulgences:

1. Visit St. Paul's Outside The Walls with the intention of drawing closer to St. Paul. Joined to whatever personal devotions and intentions you choose, you must pray in front of the altar of the Confessio the Our Father & The Creed, and invoke the help of Mary, St. Paul & St. Peter.
   
2. With complete detachment from sin, devoutly take part in a liturgical or public pious function in honor of St. Paul during the year; any such function in any sacred place on the opening (today!) and closing days of the Pauline year; on other days specified by the local bishop; in holy places dedicated to St. Paul (and additional places indicated by the bishop for that specific purpose --so if there's no St. Paul's in your diocese, the bishop can designate an official pilgrimage site).
3. If you're too ill to travel (or for some other reason like caring for someone who is), spiritually join in any Jubilee celebration, with the intention of fulfilling the sacramental commitments as soon as possible.
   

And P.S., priests are asked to make themselves more available for Confession so that the faithful can more easily fulfill these conditions.

At Vespers this evening, the Pope said:

'Teacher of the gentiles' - this title is open to the future, to all peoples and all generations. Paul is not for us [only] a figure of the past, whom we recall with veneration. He is also a teacher, apostle and proclaimer of Jesus Christ for us as well. We have therefore gathered not to reflect on a history left behind forever. Paul wants to speak with us - today.

Detach from sin, reform your life, become devout, burn with zeal and make St. Paul your friend and mentor. That's the Catholic project for this year.

Potpourri of Popery, St. Escriva Edition

Yesterday during the weekly Audience, the Holy Father delivered himself of a beautiful reflection on St. Maximus Confessor. In his scholarly way he explains what was at stake in monothelite heresy (the belief Christ had only one will, the divine one) --and defends human dignity in the process.

a humanity without will -- a man without a will -- is not a true man, but rather an amputated man. Therefore, the man Jesus Christ would not have been a true man, would not have experienced the drama of the human being, which consists precisely in the difficulty of conforming our will with the truth of being.

Thus St. Maximus affirmed with great determination: Sacred Scripture does not show us an amputated man, without a will, but a true complete man: God, in Jesus Christ, has truly assumed the totality of the human being -- obviously except for sin -- hence, also, a human will. Stated that way, the question was clear: Christ is either a true man or not.

But if Christ has both a human will and a divine one, doesn't that lead to dualism?

St. Maximus demonstrates that man finds his unity, the integration of himself, his totality not in himself, but in surpassing himself, by coming out of himself. Thus, also in Christ, man, coming out of himself, finds in God, in the Son of God, himself.

Man must not "amputate" the human Christ to explain the Incarnation. One must only understand the dynamism of the human being who is fulfilled only by coming out of himself. Only in God do we find ourselves, our totality and our completeness.

Meditate on this for the next month or so:

Adam -- and Adam is us -- thought that the "no" was the apex of liberty; that only he who can say "no" is truly free; that to truly realize his liberty, man must say "no" to God.

Only in this way, he thinks, he is finally himself; he has arrived at the summit of liberty. This tendency was also present in Christ's human nature, but he overcame it, because Jesus saw that "no" is not the greatest liberty. The greatest liberty is to say "yes," to conform with the will of God. Only in saying "yes" does man really become himself. Only in the great opening of the "yes," in the unification of his will with the divine will, does man become immensely open, he becomes "divine."

To be like God was Adam's desire, namely, to be completely free. However, he is not divine, the man who is closed in on himself is not completely free. He is so by coming out of himself, it is in the "yes" that he becomes free. And this is the drama of Gethsemane: not my will but yours.

Transferring one's will to the divine will, that is how a true man is born. That is how we are redeemed.

Other addresses:

• To the Catholic Biblical Federation
• Yay! The homilies from Puglia are up. My favorite is the one given at St. Mary de finibus terrae. Gorgeous.
  

  In this place, so important historically for devotion to the Blessed Virgin Mary, I wanted the liturgy to be dedicated to her, Star of the Sea and Star of Hope. "Ave, maris stella, / Dei Mater alma, / atque semper virgo, / felix caeli porta!". The words of this ancient hymn are a greeting which in some way echoes that of the Angel at Nazareth. All Marian titles, in fact, have as it were budded and blossomed from that first name with which the heavenly messenger addressed the Virgin: "Hail, full of grace" (Lk 1: 28). We heard it in St Luke's Gospel, most appropriately because this Shrine - as the memorial tablet above the central door of the atrium attests - is called after the Most Holy Virgin of the "Annunciation". When God called Mary "full of grace" the hope of salvation for the human race was enkindled: a daughter of our people found grace in the Lord's eyes, he chose her as Mother of the Redeemer. In the simplicity of Mary's home, in a poor village of Galilee, the solemn prophecy of salvation began to be fulfilled: "I will put enmity between you and the woman, and between your seed and her seed; he shall bruise your head, and you shall bruise his heel" (Gn 3: 15). Therefore the Christian people have made their own the canticle of praise that the Jews raised to Judith and that just a little while ago we prayed as a Responsorial Psalm: "O daughter, you are blessed by the Most High God above all women on earth" (Jdt 13: 18). Without violence but with the meek courage of her "yes", the Virgin freed us, not from an earthly enemy but from the ancient adversary, by giving a human body to the One who was to crush his head once and for all.

  This is why Mary shines on the sea of life and history as a Star of Hope. She does not shine with her own light, but reflects the light of Christ, the Sun who appeared on humanity's horizon so that in following the Star of Mary we can steer ourselves on the journey and keep on the route towards Christ, especially in dark and stormy moments.

  Then he weaves in St. Peter...it's marvelous.
  
• But there's also the address to young people in which he tells them Christ doesn't accept half-measures, and the homily in Brindisi.

  holiness is always a force that transforms others. In this regard, it is useful to reflect that the Twelve Apostles were not perfect men, chosen for their moral and religious irreproachability. They were indeed believers, full of enthusiasm and zeal but at the same time marked by their human limitations, which were sometimes even serious. Therefore Jesus did not call them because they were already holy, complete, perfect, but so that they might become so, so that they might thereby also transform history, as it is for us, as it is for all Christians. In the Second Reading we heard the Apostle Paul's synthesis: "God shows his love for us in that while we were yet sinners Christ died for us" (Rm 5: 8). The Church is the community of sinners who believe in God's love, letting themselves be transformed by him and thus become holy, sanctifying the world.

There are several big papal doings this week as well.

Unity?At the Holy Father's behest, Cardinal Castrillon de Hoyos made an overture to Bishop Fellay of the SSPX (the Lefebvrite group). Very exciting, and Fr. Z. has the best coverage of what's happening. See here. And here. Also an interview he gave to Hugh Hewitt and his plea that we pray, pray, pray for unity.

Reform of the Reform. Remember the Holy Father's homily at the Eucharistic Congress asking everyone to rediscover the liturgy, which is "not our own, but the Church's treasure?" Folks noticed when, at the papal celebration of Corpus Christi, those who received communion from the Pope received kneeling and on the tongue. That's now policy at papal masses.

Pauline Year: Opens June 28th. Ecumenical Patriarch Bartholomew will attend the Holy Father's Mass on the 29th, Feast of Ss. Peter & Paul. The Pope & the Patriarch will give the homily together, jointly recite the Creed, and each give a blessing. 43 Archbishops to receive the pallium. How to obtain Pauline year indulgences.

Potpourri:

• Brazil: Priests --dozens of 'em-- illicitly running for office.
• Canada: fruits of the Eucharistic Congress. Cardinal Oellet says he feels the Church in Quebec is "raised from the dead." Bishops advise parents not to submit to mandatory HPV vaccinations for their children.
  
• Oz: WYDSYD Starts July 15th. Venues, aussie slang dictionary, planned anti-Catholic protests and latest developments at Pope 2008.
• US: more on the Bishops' conference in Orlando. Bishops' document encouraging more Gregorian chant soon available. More Catholic Charities difficulties --this time in CA.
  

And finally: Ironic Catholic poetry contests. June 28th deadline.

An Inconvenient Tragedy

You've no doubt read that An Inconvenient Truth is to be adapted into an opera, which will open at La Scala in 2011. Trousered Ape asks, why wait? and brings us the libretto. Here's an excerpt from Act II. We join the action shortly after Skeptica has been silenced by the sorcerer Khi-Oto:

Enter Consensus, in judicial robes, Algor, and Citizens.
.
Consensus:	This man has argued very well, And with such wit and sense, That no one hearing him can tell Of greater eloquence. But as my task perforce requires, I must hear a rebuttal, Or equity at once expires And justice is a muddle.
.
(rec.)	What have you to say? Can you refute him?
.
Skeptica, horrified, finds herself unable to speak. After a long and agonizing effort, she sinks to the ground in despair.
.
Consensus:	I shall my verdict now announce: Since no one did object, By rule of law I must pronounce That this man is correct.
.
Exit Consensus.

Tee Hee. I think I'd actually pay to see this. The singing slide show? Not so much.

Tomatoes At Twilight

I've always wanted to meet Paul Greenberg. His columns were a little island of pro-life sanity during the Clinton years, and he knows what's good:

personally planted and tended and harvested but God-produced tomatoes.

He writes poetically of the pride of Arkansas, the Bradley County Pink. Which reminds me it's time for a tomato update.

There are dozens of these beauties now,

and more where they come from.

But note they're not close to ripe and it's June 25th.

First ripe tomato data, for each year available:

• July 8, 2007
• July 5, 2006
• June 23, 2005

Clearly global warming peaked three years ago, which is a shame because a greatly extended tomato season would be a boon to all mankind.

Note the vivid color, the simple heft, the way it was made for the human hand. Neither delay nor hurry. Pause to appreciate the ripeness slowly achieved over the past few days. Don't forget to enjoy the scent - with eyes closed. Breathe deeply. Then slice evenly, noting the fine texture. Be careful of the juice. No, don't taste yet. If you must, barely sprinkle with just a little coarse salt, or make a tomato sandwich using two slices of brown bread and very little, just the lightest little hint, of unsalted butter, nothing more. Now. Have the first bite of summer. And you'll know what time itself tastes like. Good appetite!

But the tomatoes, as we have established, don't lie.

Exactly

Ramesh Ponnuru takes the words out of my mouth:

Any time I see somebody described in the papers as "devoutly Catholic," my mental reaction is: Oh. I didn't know he was pro-choice.

Child Rape Not A Capital Crime

I reserve judgment on the latest SCOTUS opinion, not having read it, and limit myself to one observation based on the WaPo story. Justice Kennedy is cited arguing for the majority

the absence of any executions for rape and the small number of states that allow it demonstrate "there is a national consensus against capital punishment for the crime of child rape."

Somehow I doubt that logic would hold water for him with regard to same-sex marriage.

China Versus Islam --Update

Two more items courtesy of our Aussie correspondent, who predicted in comments ages ago that Christianity was the great untold story of China, and yesterday sent us a story predicting Chinese Christian confrontation with Islam. Further to that: China demolishes mosque. No Christian angle per se, but a straw in the wind. More interestingly: a lengthy and fascinating piece in the Chicago Tribune entitled: Jesus in China.

Christianity — repressed, marginalized and, in many cases, illegal in China for more than half a century — is sweeping the country, overflowing churches and posing a sensitive challenge to the officially atheist Communist Party. By some estimates Christian churches, most of them underground, now have roughly 70 million members, as many as the party itself.

One interesting wrinkle is that many of these Christians consider themselves Communists; as China's wealth grows, so does its consumerism and corruption, and there is a flight into faith as a bulwark against emptiness. There are intriguing signs of Party softening, too, even though the faith is officially still condemned and churches can be tolerated one moment and closed and persecuted the next.

the government is permitting churches to be more open and active than ever before, signaling a new tolerance of faith in public life. President Hu Jintao even held an unprecedented Politburo "study session" on religion last year, in which he told China's 25 most powerful leaders that "the knowledge and strength of religious people must be mustered to build a prosperous society."

If the flight from corruption is one factor, Tiananmen Square is another.

"It affected my generation of university students very deeply," Jin said of the crackdown that is known in Chinese as "6-4," for the date, June 4, 1989. "The university students in the '80s were groomed by the country. Our fees and living expenses were paid for by the country. The 6-4 event left many students hurt. ...Like all my other university peers, I felt an immense sense of hopelessness."For them, Christianity offered an alternative to China's political orthodoxy. To those in search of something new in which to believe, the church promised salvation, moral absolutes and a sense of being part of an enterprise larger than China.

This is an evangelical phenomenon, as the Catholic Church is still highly restricted; the regime isn't sure what it thinks about Jesus but it knows it's against the Pope! (Although there are signs of warming relations even there, and the Pope's Letter to Chinese Catholics was surprisingly open to the Patriotic Church -- an eye-opener to me.) Nevertheless, I'm not sure what to make of the evangelical docility to the regime. One popular pastor's Church is described here:

After a stint of studying in the United States, Jin returned to China last year but felt constrained by the official church."Originally, we used to have a huge government that controlled everything, but now the government is gradually shrinking and civil society is growing stronger and larger," he said. "I felt that churches should make good use of that opportunity to expand and spread the word of God."

Authorities were wary — "Officials tried to persuade me not to go down the illegal path"—but Jin reassured them that he had no interest in conflict. "They asked me to write reports to explain what I'm doing. I complied and explained who we are, what we want to do and gave them a schedule of our activities."

The Zion Church opened its doors in May 2007 with just 20 people. Within a year its membership had surged to 350 worshipers. He preaches a non-denominational but relatively conservative brand of evangelical Christianity. Jin's urbane services, full of contemporary references to the economy and education and pop culture, tapped a well of fervor among young, successful Chinese."Most of our members are highly educated—master's degree holders, PhD holders, university professors," he said. There also are executives, entrepreneurs and other professionals. Nine out of 10, he estimated, are younger than 40.

Is this cutting Christianity down to size, or is it wise as serpents and harmless as doves? It calls to mind the Polish Communists accepting Karol Wojtyla as bishop of Krakow because, as he was apolitical, he seemed harmless. But I'm not sure I trust this instinct:

He is no political heretic. On the contrary, he thinks permitting Christianity to play a greater role in society could help guarantee the party's survival at a time when communist ideology is no longer visible in daily life. He believes it is comparable to the party's decision, a generation ago, to embark on economic reform."We see that the Communist Parties of the Soviet Union and all of Eastern Europe have collapsed, and their countries have collapsed with them," Zhao said. "But the Chinese Communist Party survives ... precisely because it continues to change."

He seems to foresee a Christian Communism. Something to watch.


Update: Last night I watched the Frontline report on which the Tribune story is based. It emphasizes some of the difficulties more than the print version. The government still wants to train clergy in the official Churches and bugs and follows the pastors of independent Churches, and you see more of the tension between Christians who want to find an accomodation with communism and those who oppose it. Fascinating footage of the style of worship in many house churches. (Every song you learned in Vacation Bible School sung in Chinese.)


I must say however, the impact of the story was deadened somewhat by the fact it was followed immediately by a piece on global warming's impact on the Himalayas. As the Glaciers which feed the major rivers of Asia recede, dire consequences are predicted: drought, famine, wars over water rights, etc. That may or may not be true, one would have to look into that, but huge chunks of the report were given over to interviews with tribal peoples living in tents or huts without electricity, who are quoted as saying their lives are being destroyed by global warming. I'm sorry, I simply don't believe people living without the modern means of communication have ever heard of global warming. It struck me as overwrought, fearmongering and false. And if that's the level of journalism acceptable at Frontline, it calls everything reported there into question. Getting back to the Chinese Church story, it makes me wonder whether the reporter was permitted by the Chinese to do some pre-Olympic publicity for them. See? Everything's fine, no human rights abuse here!

The Continuing Holy Alliance

Curtsy to our Aussie correspondent, Brett McS, who recognizes grist for my mill when he sees it. This time in the form of "Spengler's" comparison between Bush & Benedict. I don't accept his characterization of Bush's Iraq gambit, but I pass over that for the good stuff. When Bush was in the Vatican last week, the Italian papers quoted disgruntled anonymous members of the Curia supposedly miffed at the warm welcome he received, and on this side of the Big Pond, folks tee-heed at the President's demoting the Pope by referring to him as "Eminence." (Perhaps he genuinely got it wrong, but it seemed more like a Bush-style tease to me, which the Holy Father parlayed into a joke about the Prez's eminent retirement. But I digress.) Few people seem to see --in spite of the obvious simpatico between the two-- what Spengler sees:

It is not only faith, but the temerity to act upon faith, that the pope and the president have in common. In the past I have characterized Benedict's stance as, "I have a mustard seed, and I'm not afraid to use it." (See Ratzinger's mustard seed Asia Times Online, April 5, 2005.) Despite his failings, Bush is a kindred spirit. That is what horrifies their respective critics within the Catholic Church and the American government, who portray the president and the pope as destroyers of civilizational peace. The charge is spurious because there was no civilization peace to destroy, but like many calumnies, it contains an element of truth.

[snip] Here's where it gets interesting:

Benedict XVI may preach against violence, but in his own fashion he takes a tougher stance than the American president. That surely is not the way it looks at first glance. Bush invaded an Arab country, while Benedict preaches reason to the Muslim world, receiving in the past few months Saudi Arabia's King Abdullah as well as delegations from Iran. He has agreed to a meeting with a group of 138 Muslim scholars at the Vatican in November. Why should Muslims fear Benedict?

For the first time, perhaps, since the time of Mohammed, large parts of the Islamic world are vulnerable to Christian efforts to convert them, for tens of millions of Muslims now dwell as minorities in predominantly Christian countries. The Muslim migration to Europe is a double-edged sword. Eventually this migration may lead to a Muslim Europe, but it also puts large numbers of Muslims within reach of Christian missionaries for the first time in history.

He goes on to talk about Chinese evangelicals talking openly about marching toward Jerusalem to re-evangelize. Hmm. That seems a little premature at this point, but this is an interesting observation for those of us inclined to Steynian gloom about demographics:

The European Church may be weak, but no weaker, perhaps, than in the 8th century after the depopulation of Europe and the fall of Rome. An evangelizing European Church might yet repopulate Europe with new Christians as it did more than a millennium ago.

See? I told you the "holy alliance" was still functioning.

He'd Rather Die Than Run As A Republican This Year

Not to make light of what's obviously a tragedy for his family (eternal rest grant unto him) but this is not a good omen.

Surprisingly Firm Ground For A Quagmire

I missed it, but was told of the Formerly Gray Lady's big story yesterday: Big Gains For Iraq Security, But Questions Linger. A notable lede:

BAGHDAD — What’s going right?

RTWT.

The Church's Treasure, Not Ours

B16 gave an awesome homily (via satellite) at the close of the Eucharistic Congress in Quebec this morning. In French, mostly, but you can read the English portion here. Among other things, he asks that we commit to reading and studying "individually and in groups" the Council's constitution on the liturgy to regain our sense of what we are doing at Mass. As he puts it,

every sentence and every gesture conceals a mystery.

Well Then

It's the month of the Sacred Heart, so I've been reading The Spiritual Direction of St. Claude de la Colombiere, spiritual director to St. Margaret Mary Alacocque. I'm attracted to a spiritual director who doesn't scruple to kick you in the pants.

The spirit of God inclines us to fervor, but this fervor is calm and causes no trouble either to ourselves or to others; when it meets with obstacles it knows how to stop and submit to God's will. Its only arms are patience and gentleness. You want to be a martyr; you have a daily martyrdom which you endure unwillingly and without resignation! I see nothing reasonable in such a desire and nothing which looks like an inspiration.

In another letter he writes to a religious:

I think you are somewhat slow and pusillanimous...

and then gives him a gentle but firm list of matters on which to examine his own conscience to see if it's so. Many topics come up, but the main thing the saint does is take away excuses. Distractions, sorrows, complaints of any kind...he's having none of it.

You say that if you could see me more often you would be better than you are. Perhaps you have not sufficiently considered that in your convent you have him from whom all grace comes, without whose help no one can help you, and who has no need of me or of anyone else to sanctify you. Think about this and say no more about it, because there is nothing to be said. It is only our want of confidence that prevents us from profiting by the presence of Jesus Christ, who does not remain with us in order to do nothing!

Or:

You think you would be less distracted if you were away from the circumstances in which God has placed you; I think, on the contrary, that you would have fewer distractions if you accepted things with more conformity to God's will....Think more of making good use of your crosses than of getting rid of them under pretext of having more liberty with which to serve God.

Or:

...avoid anxiety and discouragment at your faults; this comes merely from self-love, because you think more of yourself than of God.

He's never harsh, merely direct. He has much of value to say about friendship with Christ, which is more important than his somewhat blunt style. I highlight the latter because it seems extra-refreshing while we're in the middle of the Pander season, and because in the Self-Esteem Culture in which we're immersed, it's good to spend time with people who want to see their faults so as to conquer them, rather than pretend and be told they don't have any.

All Marriage Is Gay Marriage, II

When I first made that assertion three years ago (as an addendum to this), I didn't quite mean this. Lemme 'splain. Someone sent me a front-page story the Formerly Gray Lady ran several days ago on how same-sex unions can teach everyone else a thing or two about marriage. I was saving it 'til I had time to properly put my snark on, but lo, Fr. Neuhaus has already done the job. One has to laugh, you know.

The opening sentence: “A growing body of evidence shows that same-sex couples have a great deal to teach everyone else about marriage and relationships.” The LGBTQ community has so much to teach the orientationally challenged not only about marriage but also about relationships, which is just about the whole of life. While there is slight reference in the story to evidence supporting that claim, you know it has to be a “growing body of evidence” since there was none at all before the Massachusetts court invented same-sex marriage in 2003.

And:

The report discloses that “same-sex relationships, whether between men or women, were far more egalitarian than heterosexual ones.” Both men being men and both women being women, as in more egalitarian, that would seem to stand to reason.

This is the best, though.

“While the gay and lesbian couples had about the same rate of conflict as heterosexual ones, they appeared to have more relationship satisfaction, suggesting that the inequality of opposite-sex relationships can take a toll.” No one can deny that there is a very long history of men having problems with women, and vice versa. I am told that novelists and playwrights have constructed entire stories around the theme. But it’s good to have this confirmed and backed up by “a growing body of evidence” in a front-page story in the Times. From now on, nobody can plead ignorance.

Got that? Read the first sentence of that graf again. Same-sex unions are the harmonious norm towards which the rest of us can only aspire!

Rule Or Ruin Or Both

"5/4" from The Ryskind Sketchbook

Paul Greenberg:

Something else became clearer to me on wading through the court's muddy majority opinion: If Abraham Lincoln had had a Supreme Court like this to deal with, and he pretty much did, and had that president and commander in chief failed to outmaneuver that court's pro-slavery chief justice, the Hon. Roger B. Taney, he of the infamous Dred Scott decision, then I might well be writing this column from Little Rock, Ark., C.S.A.

We're in a power struggle all right. It's a contest between SCOTUS & the Press who rules us.

Congress Hates Black People

I'm not for smoking bans at all (I prefer freedom, and think the rights of smokers v. non-smokers are best handled by the kind of courtesy that is discouraged when government intervenes in every dang thing. "Do you mind if I smoke?" "So sorry, I have asthma, please don't." "I'll just step outside then.") But if we're going to have them --bans-- isn't this the rankest hypocrisy? Congress is poised to ban flavored cigarettes --except menthol flavored cigarettes. Turns out 75% of black smokers like menthols. So it's okay for blacks to get lung cancer and stroke?

The Somewhat Good Satan

Hezbollah in Canada? Two reports. Well, why not? They've been in Venezuela for quite some time.

Curtsy: Corner.

Update: Heavens, I'm going to have to start a whole Crazy Canucks category. As if the HRCs weren't bad enough.

• A judge in Quebec has overturned a father's punishment of his 12-yr-old daughter. (Can this story possibly be for real?) She should come here and get habeas corpus rights from SCOTUS. Don't just close Gitmo, close family homes where children are kept imprisoned for years at a time without legal redress!
  
• And then there's the ongoing human feet washing up on the shores of British Columbia thing.
  

Nostalgic For Rhodesia

You know Mugabe hacked up and then burned an opponent's wife the other day, right? (Might not matter, she was only a woman.) ninme catalogs the latest doings, complete with links, but summarized nicely here:

Poor Zimbabwe. Stuck between an insane octegenarian (and what does he have to lose?) and a West that can only summon enough bravery to merely suggest the possibility of broaching the subject of some day potentially sending in an ill-equipped, badly-organized group of would-be soldiers with a tendency towards sexual exploitation of the 12-year-old female population and an even worse success record.

Somewhere in a box of memorabilia I have my old I heart Rhodesia t-shirt (from one of Dad's journalism junkets.) Might have to start wearing it.

Potpourri of Popery, Eucharistic Congress Edition

Quebec's hosting the International Eucharistic Congress. Livestreaming here. Zenit & many of the big dog blogs are putting up the major addresses. Surf around. I'm especially interested in the talk by the founder of L'Arche (bottom of the post), which I didn't realize was a Canadian-born movement. The Pope will give the closing homily on the 22 via satellite.

Popery
Yesterday's Audience brought us St. Isidore of Seville (unofficial patron of the Internet, BTW) and the "middle way" of being both contemplative and conquering.

In the light of the example of the divine Teacher, Isidore could conclude with this precise moral teaching: "Therefore, the servant of God, imitating Christ, must dedicate himself to contemplation without denying himself the active life. To behave otherwise would not be right. In fact, as we must love God with contemplation, so we must love our neighbor with action. It is impossible, therefore, to live without the presence of one and the other way of life, nor is it possible to love if one has no experience of one or the other" (o.c., 135: ivi, col 91C).

I hold that this is the synthesis of a life that seeks the contemplation of God, dialogue with God in prayer and the reading of sacred Scripture, as well as action in the service of the human community and of one's neighbor.

Alas, only Italian's as yet available for the Pope's visit to the heel of Italy's boot last week. I'm especially enamored of his homily at Santa Maria di Leuca: an absolutely beautiful meditation on Mary. Here's part (very roughly):

What we just heard from the Gospel of Luke is fitting because this Shrine --as illustrated by the plaque above the central door-- is dedicated to the Virgin of the Annunciation. When God calls Mary "full of grace," she becomes the hope of salvation for all mankind: a daughter of our people has found favor in the eyes of the Lord, has been chosen as Mother of the Redeemer. In the simplicity of Mary's home, in a poor village in Galilee, the solemn prophesy of salvation begins to be fulfilled:"I will put enmity between you and the woman, / and between your seed / and its offspring: / he will crush your head / And you will bruise his heel "(Gen 3:15). So the Christian people have embraced a song of praise that the Jews elevated to Judith and we just prayed as the Responsorial Psalm: "Blessed are you, daughter, / by the Most High God / above all the women on earth " (Jud 13.18). Without violence, but with the mild courage of her "yes," the Virgin has released mankind not from an invading enemy, but from the ancient Opponent, giving a human body to the One who will crush his head once and for all.

His address to youth and "citizens" of Brindisi I like as well. It's what he typically says to young people, but I like it, very JP the Great-esque:

...Christ is the answer to all your questions and problems. Every honest aspiration of the human heart finds its support in him. Christ, however, is demanding and refuses half-measures. He knows he can count on your generosity and consistency and for that reason expects a lot from you. Seek him faithfully, and so as to find him, love his Church, feel yourselves responsible for it, don't shrink from being --each in his own atmosphere-- its courageous protagonists. Here is a point to which I would draw your attention: try to know the Church; understand and love it, paying attention to the voices of its pastors. It is composed of men, but Christ is the Head and his Spirit firmly drives it. You are the young face of the Church: don't miss your chance to make a contribution, because the Gospel we proclaim can spread everywhere. Be apostles of your peers!

• Here's the Angelus from Brindisi last week.

• Address to the Pakistani bishops on their ad limina visit. He talks about the centrality of the Eucharist and ecclesial movements. "New movements" in Pakistan? How wonderful!
• The Pope hopes to visit the Holy Land.
• And...countdown to WYDSYD. Everything you need to know at Pope 2008. Scroll around.
  

Potpourri:

• Burma: Silver lining.
  
• Great Britain: Cardinal Castrillon de Hoyos celebrates in the extraordinary form. Remarks cause a stir, reaction round-up here. And: Peter Akinola says Anglican Communion is at an end?
• Ireland: Treaty of Lisbon rejected. Irish Save Civilization Part II?
• Israel: Vatican requests opening of archives related to Pius XII.
  
• Italy: Ron Howard can't use Catholic churches to film anti-Catholic movies. ninme notes a certain proportion in Catholic response to blasphemy. And Holocaust survivors will hold a symposium on Pius XII and his efforts to save Jews this September.
• U.S. Little noticed bishops' meeting ends with a big debate about forthcoming mass translation. Bishop Seratelli explains his position. They also voted to clarify rules about artificial nutrition and hydration. Tim Russert's Catholic send-off. Bigger impact, less-well-known: Edwina Froehlich of La Leche League passed away, Divine Mercy at the Pentagon?

  I felt this would be a good way for the Marians to serve our country, especially in a time of war," says Fr. Mark.

• Vatican: Neocat statutes approved. And: Patriarch Bartholomew I warm to the idea of "dual unity" for Eastern Catholics.
  

And finally: James Bond Priest. And: "severe, austere, manly, natural & despised."

"Deadwood"

From The Ryskind Sketchbook

The Delightful Invalid

Do you recognize this fellow? He's Rene Auberjonois, he of buttoned-up lawyer-or-bureaucrat part fame (Though he was also Odo of Star Trek, and the voice of Chef Louis in The Little Mermaid). He's a marvel of slapstick and physical comedy in the Shakespeare Theater's production of The Imaginary Invalid. I wouldn't have guessed it from the work I've seen him in, but he turns out to be that rare thing, an actor with range. (Interesting family too, check out his bio.)


The production is a hoot. French theater of Molière's time had something of the flavor of a variety show, with all sorts of music, dance or comedy interludes to cover scene or costume changes. I've never seen anyone attempt to re-create that atmosphere, but director Keith Baxter does, to delightful effect. He makes particularly effective use of the commedia dell arte characters whom Molière loved, and the costumes are a feast for the eyes. I'm impressed with Baxter's work. My gripe against many contemporary directors is that they're too in love with stage business or this or that conceit making the plays "relevant," to the neglect of essentials such as tight performances, pacing, projection --and being sure the actors understand what they're saying. Even in a farce it is possible to overact, and Baxter, like the Shakespeare Theater's artistic director, Michael Kahn, understands this. Well done.


Mr. W & I were trying to figure out the significance of the date enscribed on the stage curtain: 17 Février 1673. It was the date Molière died, hours after performing in this play. We also noted that while the humor of the play comes from the title character's hypochondria, the "message" such as there is the right to marry whom one pleases --to marry for love. That's not wrong --the father here, Lear-like, has in a sense abdicated his fatherhood, and we confront once again the terrible plight of women at the mercy of corrupt men-- but it's not complete, either, as we are discovering lo, these many centuries later.

Getting To Know The Drill

From The Ryskind Sketchbook

TCIGSFP gave a speech on energy yesterday. The brief report I heard on the news made me afraid to read it, but I am pleasantly surprised. He's still not for ANWR drilling, but he calls for lifting the moratoria on off-shore drilling, clean nuclear power and clean coal. You might think the two columnists mentioned here wrote the speech. It's an excellent statement of the costs in terms of security and simple justice of our current policy. For example,

Oil revenues are enriching the enemies of the United States, and potentially limiting our own options in containing the threat they present. Iran alone receives more than 66 billion dollars a year from oil sales, even as that regime finances terrorists, threatens Israel, and endangers the peace of the world with its designs on nuclear weapons. Moreover, by relying upon oil from the Middle East, we not only provide wealth to the sponsors of terror -- we provide high-value targets to the terrorists themselves. Across the world are pipelines, refineries, transit routes, and terminals for the oil we rely on -- and Al Qaeda terrorists know where they are. Osama bin Laden has been quite explicit in directing terrorists to attack the oil facilities on which so much of America's economy depends. They have come close more than once. And we are one successful at tack away from an economic crisis of monumental proportions.

Not only that:

Even if our economy were somehow immune to this threat, the vast wealth we shift to the Middle East, Venezuela, Angola, and elsewhere would still have a third harmful and perverse effect. It would continue to enrich undemocratic, unjust, and often corrupt regimes. Some of the most oil-rich nations are also the most stagnant societies on earth. And among the many luxuries their oil wealth affords them is the luxury of ignoring their own people. In effect, our petrodollars are underwriting tyranny, anti-Semitism, the brutal repression of women in the Middle East, and dictators and criminal syndicates in our own hemisphere.

We cannot allow the world's greatest democracy to be complicit in such corruption and injustice.

Right on. This is a continuation of the Bush effort (through the Bush Doctrine, however muddled and Condi-fied in the past two years) to make our foreign policy "clean," in the political rather than the environmental sense. He gets a few good shots in as well. Speaking of the fact that about half our oil comes from Mexico & Canada, McCain notes:

That's a heavy reliance on these two nations. But there is a world of difference between relying on two democratic neighbors and partners in NAFTA, and relying on often hostile and undemocratic regimes in the Middle East and elsewhere. When critics of trade talk about unilaterally renegotiating NAFTA, as my opponent has done, that's one more concern they might want to keep in mind.

Also:

what does Senator Obama support in energy policy? Well, for starters he supported the energy bill of 2005 -- a grab-bag of corporate favors that I opposed. And now he supports new taxes on energy producers. He wants a windfall profits tax on oil, to go along with the new taxes he also plans for coal and natural gas. If the plan sounds familiar, it's because that was President Jimmy Carter's big idea too -- and a lot of good it did us.

The headlines had me braced for a huge global warming emphasis that simply doesn't appear. He is worried about it --hence his support for alternative energy and clean nukes-- and he's drawing a line in the sand on ANWR. But his overall approach is entirely sensible. He can be John McCain (not just TCIGSFP) for today. Powerline has more reaction to the speech. And the President is going to call for off-shore drilling today.

Update: Al Gore's personal energy consumption is up 10% since last year.

Catholic Charities Procures An Abortion

Lileks wrote the other day about Bizarro world coming home and here's more evidence.

Federal authorities are investigating the actions of a Catholic charity in Richmond which helped a 16-year-old Guatemalan girl to receive an abortion in January, in possible violation of Virginia law.

The government is scolding the bishops about an abortion? Yup, and they seem to deserve it, not directly, but through lack of oversight.

HHS provides $7.6 million a year in contracts with the USCCB for foster care of immigrant children. The bishops group subcontracts services through agencies like Commonwealth Catholic Charities.

"These federal funds are awarded with the clear purpose of caring for unaccompanied minors here from other countries," said HHS spokesman Kenneth Wolfe. "To that end, we were surprised and disappointed to learn of a chapter of Catholic Charities using this funding to facilitate a minor procuring an abortion."

Tell me this doesn't sting coming from the federal government:

"We have also requested several corrective actions be taken by the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops ... in order to prevent this type of abuse from happening again," Mr. Wolfe said. "Our agency is one that supports human life, and we take that responsibility seriously."

The whole story is awful. Orphaned refugee child gets pregnant, and placed in the care of Catholic Charities of Richmond, she gets...exactly the care she'd have gotten had she gone to Planned Parenthood.

Communist Confirmation

Remember Elián González? Cuba's Granma reports he's come of age and entered the Union of Young Communists. Here's how the Cuban press summarizes his story:

When he was a six-year-old boy who had been kidnapped by the Miami mafia and his father demanded his return to Cuban soil, the whole population rose up to demand his freedom, from the youngest schoolchild to the most elderly citizen," recalled Martín.

It was from this demand that the Battle of Ideas was born, not just for him but for all Cuban children, she added.

That last line's a little weird, even considering the source, no? Didn't Fidel bring the Battle of Ideas to the noble island nation? Anyway: future plans, Elian?

Having finished secondary school, Elián is set to enter the Camilo Cienfuegos military school – popularly known as Los Camilitos - next September:

"It’s the least that someone can do, someone like me that owes so much to this people and to the Revolution: study hard, but more than that, defend them under any circumstance."

His father is very proud.

Today, Elián has given me the greatest gift that I could wish for and hope to receive on Father’s Day. I have experienced this sense of joy twice before – on the day that I received my membership of the UJC and again today – but I have, without doubt, enjoyed this more, as a communist and as a father, to watch my eldest son take his first steps forward in life.

"I was once asked if it might not be possible that, once he grew up, Elián may decide to leave his country. I answered that I didn’t think it could happen for two basic reasons: one, for the education that my parents gave me and which I have passed on to my son. And secondly, for his own life story, because once he is aware of how much his people fought for him, he would be incapable of betraying them.

No guilt trips there. Curtsy: Opinionated Catholic

The Big Get

From The Ryskind Sketchbook

What Part Of FOCA Does Kmiec Not Understand?

This gets tedious. Prof. Kmiec and some evangelicals sat down with Obama to talk social questions.

The discussion dwelt at some length on abortion. Obama said he earnestly wants to "discourage" the practice—despite the distortions of some who think if they affix the "pro-abortion—won't overturn-Roe-label" to the senator, pro-lifers like myself won't give him the time of day. Sorry, good friends, not this year.

Not to understand that there is more than one rather indirect and elusive judicial way to address an intrinsic evil understates the ingenuity of the devout. Describing the abortion decision as a "difficult, deeply moral one," Obama sees it as one only the woman can make. Unless her choice affirms life that is not my Catholic view, and I told him so. But disagreement or not, it is abundantly clear from our conversation that Obama shares a common aspiration to reduce the incidence of abortion.

Spare me. He wants to reduce the incidence of abortion by making it illegal to place any constraints on it whatever. This is what it means to support (as Obama emphatically does) the Freedom of Choice Act which, as I pointed out at length here, will undo such consensus as this country has already reached on the matter, overruling 70% of the American people, the Congress, the President & the Supreme Court on such matters as the Born-Alive Infants Protection Act, the Partial-Birth Abortion Ban, informed consent, parental consent and conscience shield laws.

Moreover, speaking as a former pro-life lobbyist who know most of the players personally --is there a serious activist in these matters who doesn't understand that the ultimate victory will be a cultural one --that hearts change before laws do? Does Prof. Kmiec thinks he discovered that idea? All those measures passed federally and in the states passed precisely because pro-lifers did the hard work of convincing their neighbors and winning the votes to change the law --and the culture. More Americans now identify as pro-life than pro-choice, an important difference between today and 30 years ago. Kmiec is supporting a candidate and a policy who wants to take us not forward toward consensus, but backwards --away from the consensus that's already been achieved. He was on better ground from a Catholic point of view when he was arguing the war trumps abortion in this instance. That case can be made legitimately (not prudently in my view, but legitimately). The idea that Obama can be his choice (sorry) on pro-life grounds is absurd.

Tangentially: American Digest noted something interesting in Mr. Obama's Father's Day speech.

Just asking: If Obama believes,

"We need fathers to recognize that responsibility doesn't just end at conception." [Obama's Father's Day Message ]

does he also then believe that human life begins at conception?

The Toyota Pious

Image shamelessly pinched from American Digest.

How is a bumper sticker like a potato chip?

Some Don't?

WaPo: The Reporter Who Speaks For Obama.

Two Years Later, Everyone Catches On

The British press is reporting we're making heap big effort to catch bin Laden. ninme provides the link and one of the Powerline fellers speculates:

I've wondered for a long time whether we have had a better idea of bin Laden's whereabouts than has been publicly revealed, and whether we have preferred to leave him at large rather than to capture or kill him. Why could this be the case? Presumably because we have cracked the security surrounding bin Laden and have been able to acquire valuable intelligence by leaving him at large.

That's an interesting wrinkle. But on the larger story, Toldja. All you had to do was pay careful attention to what Bush & Karzai said back here. When people are strangely unconcerned about an objectively disastrous development, they know something you don't know --or at least think they do.

Justice Fred

Fred Thompson for SCOTUS. Here's what he said in part about SCOTUS' decision to afford irregular enemy combatants who try to kill us rights that you and I do not have.

In reading the majority opinion I am struck by the utter waste that is involved here. No, not the waste of military resources and human life, although such a result is tragically obvious. I refer to the waste of all those years these justices spent in law school studying how adherence to legal precedent is the bedrock of the rule of law, when it turns out, all they really needed was a Pew poll, a subscription to the New York Times, and the latest edition of “How to Make War for Dummies.”
[snip]

It is truly stunning that this court has seen fit to arrogate unto itself a role in the most important issue facing any country, self-defense, in a case in which Congress has in fact repeatedly acted. This was not a case where Congress did not set the rules; it did. But the court still decided – in the face of overwhelming precedent to the contrary – to intervene. This decision, or course, will allow for "President Bush Is Rebuffed” headlines, the implication being that the Administration was caught red-handed violating clearly established Constitutional rights when in fact the Administration, and the Congress for that matter, followed guidelines established by the Supreme Court itself in prior cases.

People can disagree over whether Congress got it right, but at least members have to face the voters. What remedy do people have now if they don’t like the court’s decision? None. If that thought is not enough to cause concerned citizens to turn out on Election Day to elect a new president, then I don’t know what will be.

Fred for AG, suggests Stephen Hayes. That would be good, too.

Times Two

Bush with the Pope yesterday. More excellent pix here. More details from the visit. Remember, this was

the first time a meeting with a head of state at the Vatican was not held in the pope's private study and was meant to repay Bush for the warm White House lawn reception the pope got in April on his 81st birthday.

The President got to walk in the Vatican gardens and see St. John's tower.

AP/ Evan Vucci

I was thinking a photo was a little lame as a gift (though better than a stick), but the Pope gave Bush almost the same photo. That plus a 4-volume work on St. Peter's.

Perhaps you'll have time to read it,

His Holiness said. From various things I've read, I get the sense the Pope is a little puckish in private. The President was kvelling. The press is mocking because he doesn't get the lingo right. OK, but he acts natural, and I think the Pope must find it refreshing.

That's Awful

Mr. W. just told me Tim Russert has died. Yikes. Tributes and fond remembrances from Bush, McCain & various Conservatives here.

No Sushi For You!

This is creepy. In Japan, state-funded health care means Big Brother tells you how wide your waistline can be.

Those exceeding government limits — 33.5 inches for men and 35.4 inches for women, which are identical to thresholds established in 2005 for Japan by the International Diabetes Federation as an easy guideline for identifying health risks — and having a weight-related ailment will be given dieting guidance if after three months they do not lose weight. If necessary, those people will be steered toward further re-education after six more months.

To reach its goals of shrinking the overweight population by 10 percent over the next four years and 25 percent over the next seven years, the government will impose financial penalties on companies and local governments that fail to meet specific targets. The country’s Ministry of Health argues that the campaign will keep the spread of diseases like diabetes and strokes in check.

Curtsy: NLT. This brings to mind (doesn't everything?) a little Chestertonism:

The free man owns himself. He can damage himself with either eating or drinking; he can ruin himself with gambling. If he does he is certainly a damn fool, and he might possibly be a damned soul; but if he may not, he is not a free man any more than a dog.

Don't Know The Drill

I like John McCain, but when he says things like this, I think of him as TCIGSFP (The Candidate I Grudgingly Support For President). Perhaps he'd consider looking at this map to see that no one is talking about despoiling the Arctic. ANWR is a 19 million acre (larger than 10 states!) park on the Northeast coast of Alaska. People are proposing to explore 8% of the coastal plain, with eventual development affecting only 2000 acres (that's roughly the size of Dulles airport). More than 90% of the land would remain utterly untouched.

Something I didn't realize is that the region we're talking about isn't uninhabited. The native people who live there desperately want this development, so they'll have jobs and be able to maintain their way of life. They offer Ten Reasons To Support Development In ANWR, including #8, no negative impact on animals.

VDH says: Do The Right Thing: Start Drilling, beginning his commentary with a tale of two gas stations. On the poor side of town he finds people in used cars, lacking money for brand new hybrids, spending one or two days' wages on their commutes to work. On the right side of the tracks, no one was much worried about the price of gas -- in fact they're happy higher gas prices are forcing fuel economy. They've grown comfy in the assumption that Republicans want to drill to enrich oil companies, while the virtuous want to save the environment. He enumerates the paradoxes:

• the burden of our energy policy falls on the poor and middle class
• just because we don't drill doesn't mean others don't.

  By locking out energy exploration in the United States, we are encouraging it almost everywhere else.

  When you put it that way, it does seem a bit rich to have the attitude that others must despoil their pristine places but we won't --and then we demand they must sell to us at prices we like. (May I add: Russia, Mexico, Cuba & Venezuela all drill right off our shores --and none of those countries is famed for its attention to safety and environmental concerns. By not drilling ourselves, we're still putting our own environment at risk).
• Worried about justice and exploitation of workers?
  

  Look at who's helped by these massive energy transfers: Productive energy-strapped Americans, Europeans, Japanese, Chinese and Indians are working day and night to give the world critical material goods, ideas and services. To be blunt, oil-rich Saudi Arabia, Venezuela, Russia and Iran are not.

  At best, the massive transfer of national wealth to most oil producers translates into a Chinese worker on an assembly line working longer for less money while artificial island resorts pop up in the Persian Gulf. At worst, that strapped Chinese fabricator is also working harder for another Iranian centrifuge, al Qaeda landmine or Saudi-funded madrassa.

• Alternative energy? By all means. But we're not there yet, and drilling domestically would be a smart intermittent step until we are. It's certainly decadent to starve the world's poor with our ill-thought-out ethanol disaster. (Congress to poor people: You must starve so we won't have to touch ANWR. Hmm. Why do they hate us?)
  

Daniel Henninger sees not human rights and environmental issues, but a defense matter. In Drill! Drill! Drill! he argues we're turning the world over to bad guys.

We live in a world in which Russia's Vladimir Putin and Venezuela's Hugo Chávez use their vast oil and gas reserves as instruments of state power. Here, Nancy Pelosi and Harry Reid use their control of Congress to spend a week debating a "climate-change" bill. This they did fresh off their subsidized (and bipartisan) ethanol fiasco.

One may assume that Mr. Putin and the Chinese have noticed the policy obsessions of our political class. While other nations use their oil reserves to attain world status, we give ours up. Why shouldn't they conclude that, long term, these people can be taken? Nikita Khrushchev said, "We will bury you." Forget that. We'll do it ourselves.

Putin intimidates Ukraine, Georgia, the Baltic states and Poland with oil and gas cutoffs, while Chávez uses petrodollars to bankroll Colombian terrorists. Cuba plans to exploit its Caribbean oil fields within a long tee shot of the Florida Keys with help from India, Spain, Venezuela, Canada, Norway, Malaysia, even Vietnam. But America won't drill. [snip]

You'd think the "national security" nominee, John McCain, would get this. He's clueless – a don't-drill zombie. We may mark this down as the year the U.S. tired of being a serious country.

(Don't get me started on oil-for-spoils, an actual instance of someone lying and people dying. Talk about your blood for oil. What if France & China could buy oil from us and not Iraq & Iran?)


While we're talking energy policy, a little defense of our domestic oil companies. First, government scapegoating, including McCain's, makes no economic sense. Powerline published an enlightening chart awhile back (click to enlarge): 94% of the world's oil is state-owned. If we refuse to produce our own oil, clearly our domestic oil companies aren't in control of the price of energy.


Human rights, the environment, national defense, and finally: politics. If McCain used the high cost of gas as an excuse to "evolve" according to changing circumstances (we know he is too honorable to change his mind), it would be a winning issue for him. Did you know some 700,000 have signed a petition to Congress?


Alas, as Rich Lowry writes, he --much like Obama-- is exactly wrong on energy policy, both candidates taking the attitude toward the poor of our own country and the world:

Let them eat airy abstractions.

Pop quiz. Who said this?

That part of ANWR is one of the bleakest, most remote places on this continent, and there is hardly any other where drilling would have less impact on the surrounding life.

Did you guess WaPo, in a 1987 editorial? And ANWR is the least if it. As Mr. Henninger points out, there's also:

• California won't drill for the estimated 1.3 billion barrels of recoverable oil off its coast because of bad memories of the Santa Barbara oil spill – in 1969.
• Our waters may hold 60 trillion untapped cubic feet of natural gas. As in Brazil, these are surely conservative estimates.

Plus, a couple of months ago people found

• a massive oil field in the Dakotas --found in the sense that we now think we can recover it.
  
• And there's more oil in the Rocky Mountains than in Saudia Arabia, according to that bastion of right-wing nut-ism, npr.