Random Scenes from the Culture Wars, 2

I'd the great pleasure last night of giving the first in the fall "6-pack" of talks at a local "Theology on Tap." (If you don't know, it's an evangelization program in which you get young "seekers" to sit in dark, smoky bars and drink beer while they listen to Catholic apologists speak and answer their questions.) About 150 young people, and the most fun was the Q & A afterwards. I liked the quality of the questions and the fun of the give and take. You can't judge your own performance, but it seemed to go well. I flubbed one question because it took me by surprise. Someone asked, as a happily married person, what advice do I have for singles? I blanked. Then I finally said, "Date more," since I have the impression that many singles really don't date at all. Which was lame. Though it probably made all the lovely, longing, date-less girls in the room happy. Anyway, speaking at a downtown bar was the occasion for riding the Subway instead of the Minivan, which brings me to the first of three "random scenes."

• Almost all the ads in the Metro cars are PSAs about manners. "We don't want to know what you're having for dinner (please use cell phones quietly)." "If you don't eat on our trains, we won't sit on your kitchen table." Etc.
• I usually tune in Laura Ingraham for a few minutes as I put away the breakfast mess, and Rush for a few minutes as I get the kids' lunch ready. What kind of audiences do these two beacons of conservatism have? This morning, I tuned in just in time for a Trojans ad which began warning of the dangers of STDs and concluding with the moral, "Use a condom. Every time." Are the sponsors aware that Laura Ingraham is a chastity promoting, anti-contraceptive convert to Catholicism? And doesn't the claim that condoms will provide universal protection from all kinds of STDs seem like a class action suit waiting to happen?
• And what's with the DNA paternity-testing-by-mail ads that are running on both Ingraham and Limbaugh? "Time was, you could trust that a child was yours. . . ."

Are people in other markets hearing these ads, too, she wonders?

In Praise of Cronyism

Regarding the Miers appointment, I've admitted I am disappointed the President chose to duck a fight on a known Conservative judge, because public debate is the way the public gets educated on such things, and we desperately need that education.

Nonetheless, I can't understand the extent of many Conservatives' public opposition to this nomination. For a layperson such as myself, who knows no less about Miers than I knew about Judge Roberts, the outrage smacks of in-crowd Washingtonians smarting that they were left out of the loop. Laura Ingraham, for example, has been vocal in her disappointment in Miers, but was thrilled about Roberts. Why? Because she personally knows Roberts and trusts him. Fine for her, but basically her position comes down to: trust me, Laura Ingraham. For the rest of us, who know neither person, we're in exactly the same position we were in with Roberts: we have to trust the President. And where judges are concerned, I do.

When it comes down to it, if I have to trust the President, then I'd prefer he choose a "crony." Gerald Ford didn't know John Paul Stevens. Ronald Reagan didn't know Sandra Day O'Connor. George H.W. Bush didn't know David Souter. They went to great legal minds and/or resumés. Thinking it through, although after the hearing process I feel comfortable with Roberts, I almost trust Miers more --because what does Bush know about Roberts? They have no longstanding relationship which would allow Bush to say, here's a guy who won't "grow" in office once he's confirmed.

Anyone can "grow," so in that sense a nomination is always a bit of a crapshoot. But I do think Bush "gets" the Court problem and a 10-year relationship with a person is a better indication of solidity than a few somewhat indicative rulings (which is all we had to go on with Roberts). And to my commenter from two posts below: I reject the notion that only professional Constitutional scholars can sit on the Court, and therefore I don't think the Manhattan Project analogy holds up. See Ken Masugi's great post over at the Claremont Institute's blog, The Remedy.

Harriet Miers

Blair's Words Eloquent, But Not Enough

Anyone remember the not very good Billy Joel song, "Shades of Grey"? Unfortunately it popped into my head as I read this Mark Steyn column on the culture that produced the London bombers. Here's a long excerpt to entice you.

It's these insulating circles of grey - the imams, lobby groups, media, bishops, politicians - that bulk up the loser death-cult and make it a potent force. We complain about "unassimilated" Muslim immigrants, but in some respects they've assimilated too well. Witness the suspected Tube bomber who on his arrest last week cried: "I have rights!" He and his colleagues demonstrate an impressive mastery of the salient features of the advanced social democratic state - the legalisms, the ethnic pandering, the bureaucratic inertia.

In Mayor Giuliani's New York, they used to talk of the "broken window" theory of crime - that if outward symptoms of petty crime were on display for months on end (broken windows) it signalled to more serious criminals that the town was open to do-badders; crack down on petty criminals and you create a less favourable climate for the hard cases. Her Majesty's Government might usefully learn from that: right now it's the windows of the kingdom that are broken, and through them climbs pretty much anyone who wants to be here. In 2001, after a Dutch crackdown on benefit fraud, 10,000 Somalis moved from Holland to one East Midlands town - Leicester. Why wouldn't a Somali jihadist fancy his chances in such a country?

On the topic of these "gray circles" in which we assimilated Westerners keep desperately seeking "moderate" Muslims (I'm not saying they don't exist, by the way, but they seem to be intimidated into silence) . . . Have you followed the case of the "fatwa" against terrorism issued several days ago? It struck me as a little um. . . .late, but I suppose positive.

Laura Ingraham interviewed one Steven Emerson, author of American Jihad, this morning, and he utterly eviscerated the significance of the fatwa. He showed the signatories themselves are all associated with terror organizations and in some cases implicated in wrongdoing, that they leave vague what they mean by terrorism and condemn no actual people or actions, and let slide the fact that no Jew, by Wahabist definition, can be innocent. In other words, he made it pretty plain that by his own lights, Osama bin Laden could probably sign off on that fatwa.

Ingraham asked, well if you won't accept this, what are Muslims supposed to do to convince us that they're anti-Islamocist? His answer: ask any of these men which specific acts of terror in the past five years they condemn? Which American prosecution or deportation do they support --get them to name one.

Recalling that Yasser Arafat was infamous for saying pleasant things in English, and then turning right around to say in Arabic, don't worry, we're still going to drive the Jews into the sea, I think my own simple question would be, have you issued this fatwa in Arabic and publicized it in your mosques? Or has this been just for the benefit of the MSM? Which brings us full-circle back to Steyn's point about there being, in fact, a good deal of "assimilation" of Western attitudes on the part of some of our dearest enemies.

Eating Crowe

Utterly unimportant department. Stuck in traffic for way too long on the way home from turning the car in for maintenance. Radio on. Laura Ingraham --as everyone else, pretty much-- really lit into Russell Crowe for the phone-throwing incident. Is RC2 the only one whose sympathies lie with Crowe? Yes, yes, there's no excuse for losing your temper like that and when you're a celebrity it's worse, because it looks for all the world like big spoiled rich man spares no thought for the little people.

But listen to his side of the story (curtsy to Ninme, who got it from Drudge):

“Frustrated by a clerk’s unwillingness to help him put through a phone call to his family in Australia, Russell Crowe was involved in a minor altercation at the Mercer Hotel earlier this morning. After asking the front desk several times to replace a faulty phone in his room - and getting only attitude from the clerk on duty - Crowe brought the phone down to the front desk in an effort to address the situation in person. Words were exchanged and Crowe wound up throwing the phone against the wall. He regrets that he lost his temper, but at no time did he assault anyone or touch any hotel employee."

I mean, c'mon, who hasn't dealt with a clerk like that? Haven't you been capable of throwing something?

No matter how much of a jerk he is, RC2 will always feel soft on Crowe because he made a point on Leno of saying that he married in a Church, married his wife before having a child with her, and he also had a chapel (Anglican, presumably) built on their property in Australia. Ingraham played a clip of his "apology" appearance on Letterman last night, and he made a big deal of saying he needed to talk to his wife because when he's away she has the right to know that he's at home, hasn't been drinking, and is alone. Anyone who publicly defends marriage like that gets a small pass from RC2 on his temper (Evelyn Waugh was not known for being a nice guy, either).

(Although, the question does arise, can his millions not buy him his own cell phone? Even RC2 has one.)

"Hope's Wife"

From The Ryskind Sketchbook

I was inclined to dismiss this as a thoughtless remark until I realized it was written into a speech she delivered twice. I heard Laura Ingraham say she doesn't really think Michelle Obama's never been proud of her country before. I wonder. I remember as a kid being told by a black playmate on July 4th that her mom had instructed her they wouldn't celebrate because "it's not our Independence Day." I told my friend (nicely) it was too, because without American Independence and American political principles, there'd have been no Emancipation, and there was no country on earth where blacks were treated better or had more opportunity. After lunch she told me her mom said I should mind my own business and we went back to playing jacks or whatever. I think we were about 9 years old.

Given the rape- of- the -Indian/slavery & Jim Crow-centric view of history we teach in our schools, it's more surprising to find people who are proud of the country, I think.

Pro-Lifers Eating Their Own Again

In defense of Sen. Brownback, who's been taking a drubbing among pro-lifers (read the comments on the straightforward story) for announcing he'll support Gov. Sebelius for Sec. of HHS, even though he's a pro-lifer and she never met an abortion she couldn't subsidize. I heard Laura Ingraham going to town on him the other day.

Sigh. People, not every battle is won --in fact, few battles are won-- simply by wearing your heart on your sleeve.

For starters, of course he and Sen. Roberts would release a statement congratulating Sebelius on her nomination. They're from Kansas and she's their governor. That is considered pro forma courtesy. Just because we haven't seen common courtesies and protocols observed much in the past eight years doesn't mean they shouldn't be.

As for supporting her nomination, Brownback's support is tepid:

“The President won the election and has nominated a Kansan to the cabinet,” Brownback said in a statement. “Despite our profound policy differences, I will support my fellow Kansan.”

Translation for those who don't speak Washington:

I know full well that anyone Obama appoints will be as bad and some could be worse, and this woman will do far less damage at HHS than in Kansas. Therefore, I will happily boot her upstairs.

The unborn have had no more principled defender in the Senate than Sam Brownback. He's not only voted right, he's whipped votes behind the scenes, and without making enemies as some of our more abrasive champions do.

Moreover, he intends to be the next Governor of Kansas, and he has ambitious plans for making Kansas a model for what pro-lifers can achieve. He wants this popular and powerful politician out of the state and out of the picture, which she will be if her nomination succeeds. She's far more dangerous as governor than at HHS. And although her nomination reflects very poorly on the President, it's not as if she will be worse than anyone else he would choose --any nominee is going to follow his agenda, which is radical.

Kansas --and all us pro-lifers-- could not hope for a better governor than Sam Brownback. And now we're going to sit back and watch him torn apart by pro-lifers over a vote that won't save a single baby?

If you disagree with his judgment on this one, fair enough, but the right response is then, "I respect Sen. Brownback's record, but I think he's whiffing this one and here's why..." Not: "He sucks and he always has, that evil, weak, spineless moron!"

Please, people, for the love of souls, let go the paradigm in which no politician is actually pro-life and every difference in prudential judgment represents a betrayal: ah, now we see his "true colors." It's grossly unjust to good men and women on your side. And it's no way to win a culture war that must be won for liberty's sake.

Update: and similarly on the "Palin appointed a Planned Parenthood Stooge." Calm down, she had no choice.

"They Don't Work"

James Dobson, just now on Laura Ingraham, stating flatly that he has never, nor ever will, call for the formation of a 3rd political party --the press got the story wrong.

"Values Voters" Have Most At Stake

Allegedly --not sure I believe it-- it's the Republican base --the values voters-- who are most fed up with Bush and Congress and least likely to show up at the polls. Bill Kristol gets to the heart of the matter in this Weekly Standard piece about what's at stake in the election.

A Republican Senate would confirm the next Roberts or Alito. A Democratic Senate might well not. And furthermore, facing a Democratic Senate, President Bush, or a Republican successor, might preemptively compromise and pick a Kennedy rather than a Roberts or an Alito.
What's more, right now, 16 of the 179 authorized judicial slots on the federal courts of appeal are vacant. So are 33 of the 678 district court positions. With a Republican Senate, President Bush could continue to reshape the federal judiciary over the next two years. Facing a Democratic Senate, he would make much less progress on the constitutionalist agenda at the heart of today's conservatism.
So which party controls the Senate for the next two years matters a lot.

Kristol makes the point I've been making --that the Republicans aren't running on their best issues for some reason:

There is still time to remind voters of Virginia and Tennessee, of Missouri and Montana, all reasonably conservative states, of what is at stake as they cast their Senate votes. There is still time to remind the voters of Pennsylvania and Ohio, also reasonably conservative states, of what is at stake. There is still time to remind the voters of New Jersey that Robert Menendez's first vote upon being elevated to the Senate was to filibuster their own Samuel Alito.

Now let me shift tracks and disagree with Kristol a bit. This morning I heard him on Laura Ingraham giving the "if-the-Dems-take-the-House-it-will-sharpen-us-for-2008" spiel. I don't think so. Especially if Rick Santorum loses, the hacks and yakkers (in both parties and the MSM) will take the lesson they take from every lost election, evidence notwithstanding: that it's all the Christians' fault, and the key to winning is running away from cultural issues. That will not help us get good judges; it will weaken us in the looming battle over marriage; and it will forestall the progress we've been making on the life issues. If in fact we do lose the House, I predict the first substantive thing the House will do is not impeach the President or anything at all to do with Iraq. The first thing they'll do is pass embryonic stem cell research --with a veto-proof majority.

You Know What Happens When You Assume

With each passing day it becomes more clear that none of the loud voices we're hearing on the topic of immigration know enough to offer any real solutions.

• Exhibit A: All the marchers Monday who carried "Bush Step Down" signs, or other anti-Bush propaganda. Either they don't know Bush is the one who proposed the Guest Worker program they support in the first place, or they have a different agenda entirely, and the press doesn't know.

• Exhibit B: Laura Ingraham & all our local A.M. talkers here are up in arms about the Hastert/Frist "cave-in", by which being in the U.S. illegally will be considered a misdemeanor, rather than a felony as first proposed. However, as someone in Frist's office called in to our local guy to explain (after he'd dedicated his entire show to ranting about this as far as I can tell), that's to utterly misunderstand the situation. First, it has always been a misdemeanor to come here illegally, and that aspect of the law has never been in question. At issue is what to do with people who arrive legally but then become illegal by overstaying their visas. The original provision proposed making that a felony, but this was a mistake because a person charged with a felony is entitled to a jury trial and a court-appointed lawyer. All you Conservatives complaining about resource drain might just want to think about the effect trying so many people by jury might have on our Court system.

• Exhibit C: What is with the argument that "we can't possibly deport 12 million people?" Duh, but you don't have to. You only have to have a few very public prosecutions of employers who hire illegal immigrants and a few very public deportations. Enough to make people realize the law once again has teeth.

• Exhibit D:Where is the evidence that the preponderance of immigrants --legal or illegal-- is low-skilled? Or that they remain low-skilled once they come here? Undoubtedly many are. But the actual illegal immigrants I have known in my life were all highly educated, cultured people in their countries of origin, to wit: a physicist, two doctors, and a businessman. They were working as a maintenance man, waiters and a bus-boy respectively because they didn't yet speak English. In my single days, my friends and I used to frequent a Mexican restaurant/bar on Capitol Hill where it drove me crazy to see how all the super-important "in-the-know" Hill staffers treated the waiters on the assumption that anyone in a humble job must be a lesser person. Little did they know in many cases the restaurant staff was better educated than most of the customers. Everyone seems to make the assumption that numerous immigrants will be a drain on our system because they'll come here and camp out at the lower end of the economic spectrum, bringing their parasite families with them. I think there's every reason to think instead that people who are restless, courageous and entrepreneurial enough to leave everything for a shot at a better life can become great contributors to our country. Even if they arrive here ignorant and unskilled, a person with that much determination isn't likely to remain that way. In the four cases I'm aware of, all four are now here legally, fluent in English, and working as a Physics teacher, a restaurant manager, a doctor and a businessman, respectively. As Bush said at the Catholic Prayer Breakfast the other day (and it's a much better argument than the implication that his opponents are racists), our country has frequently been invigorated and renewed by immigrants.

The problem is: the welfare state is as corrupting of this new blood as it is of all the rest of us. Here's a great post about that: Who Shall Be An American Citizen? And continuing my "assimilation" mantra, here's an excellent Remedy post that doesn't yet offer a solution, but at least is beginning to ask the right questions (it also makes the important point that when you fail to enforce your own laws for decades at a time, it's a little rich to start being offended that other people follow your cue). I'm not sure what the answer is, but I know what I want, and I suspect I'm not alone. It ought to be possible to secure our border from terrorists, gang members and criminals and have a very generous, simple legal immigration process that puts people on the path to being Americans rather than hyphenated-Americans. In the meanwhile, I'd settle for some honest reporting on the matter so we could all think the question through.

Finally, a border-crossing story. My alma mater, the University of Dallas (founded by Cistercian immigrants escaping from Hungary), has a campus in Rome. A legendary tale from the mid- 80s, I think, involved a few students who climbed the Vatican Wall (The Vatican city-state's border is protected by a wall!). They were arrested and charged with the felony crime of "invading a foreign country." The charges were later dropped. There's a UD grad mildly limping around Washington from the sorry job the Italians did setting the broken leg he incurred during this misadventure. This was a grand story when I first heard it told, but the details have faded from memory.

Maybe He Was Briefed By The LA Times? UPDATE

Those nasty CAP comments that Kennedy read and Alito was forced to dissociate himself from? They were satire, not actual positions. CAP was a perfectly legitimate group --Bill Rusher, Dinesh S'Souza, Laura Ingraham --these are the names associated with it. Powerline has more. Why do Liberals have no sense of humor? A friend remarks it's because humor rests on pointing out the unnatural. Since libs don't believe in nature, they can't recognize it, and thus can't recognize the unnatural either. Ergo: they can't recognize a joke.


By the way, have you seen the suggested titles? for Kennedy's new kids' book?

Couldn't Have Said It Better

Due to server problems, I couldn't post a big Tookie Williams manifesto last night. In the meanwhile, I found someone who said it better. In a nutshell, I found myself in a pox on both your houses position. On the one hand, the claims for Williams' (alternatively) innocence or conversion and atonement were spurious. Evidence of his guilt: clear. He never apologized, and in fact lionized himself in print as another Nelson Mandela. The only reason not to execute an evil man is not a spurious claim of innocence or redemption (And anyway, where was Hollywood when it came time to defend Karla Faye Tucker, the Texas killer who by all accounts experienced a real conversion, expressed deep remorse for her crime, and whose jailers attested to her change of heart? Apparently only unrepentant radicals merit star support.)

On the other hand, I was deeply ashamed of the conservative talkers I happened to catch on the subject. Sean Hannity kept a ghoulish vigil of "live coverage," and the few moments I happened to hear him, he was mocking an anti-death penalty guest who was making a perfectly reasonable point. The next morning, on the way to an appointment I happened to catch Laura Ingraham actually mocking the death. Yuck. The only decent response to a man's death --even an evil man's death, even a necessary death-- is a solemn and dignified silence. And if you're a praying person, a prayer for his soul.

The Remedy has been on the Tookie Williams case for weeks, most recently with Richard Reeb's post outlining the case for the death penalty. His respondent says exactly what I want to say. RTWT, but here's the main question: on what ground does the modern state claim the right to execute? The traditional Catholic defense of the death penalty assumed a state which rested on transcendent ground: divine law or natural law. I am one who would argue the Constitution does rest on natural law, as expressed in the formula of the Declaration: "all men are created equal and endowed by their Creator with certain inalienable rights. . . ." But let's just say my view is not exactly reignant at present. The reigning view is expressed by Justice Kennedy in US v. Playboy, 2000:

When a student first encounters our free speech jurisprudence, he or she might think it is influenced by the philosophy that one idea is as good as any other, and that in art and literature objective standards of style, taste, decorum, beauty, and esthetics are deemed by the Constitution to be inappropriate, indeed unattainable. Quite the opposite is true. The Constitution no more enforces a relativistic philosophy or moral nihilism than it does any other point of view.

[Take a moment now to sputter at that last sentence and recall that Harriet Miers' writing was considered wanting. . .] The correspondent continues:

In other words, the Constitution is nothing more than a piece of positive law which rests on no transcendent principles at all. It is indistinguishable from gang law.

Obviously neither you nor I agree with Justice Kennedy, but he speaks here for the reigning legal elite. I think his view is almost uncontroverted among judges and lawyers. If that is so, then I repeat Pope John Paul's implicit question, and I am forced to answer that in this light, there really is no justification for the modern liberal state to execute anyone. I would also emphasize how clearly this brings out the connection he made between the culture of death and capital punishment, which he regarded as a manifestation of that culture. If Kennedy's positivism is correct, you can see that it provides the source of the culture of death and that killing anyone under such circumstances is simply another instance of it.

Pope John Paul never made the claim that his argument was biblical or that it was part of the Church's Magisterium. His argument is prudential only, designed as a kind of "medicinal remedy" for the terrible ills of the modern liberal state. I would argue that magisterially, the Catholic tradition in support of capital punishment still holds. [Indeed, you'll find it in the Catechism, albeit under limited circumstances --ed.]

35,000 To 579

Bearing in mind what is said about individual v. multiple deaths, Cliff May's post at the Corner is worth reading.

Incidentally, a black caller to the Laura Ingraham show a week or two ago was irate because he didn't remember any charges of racism against Pres. Clinton when more than 700 poor people in Chicago died from heat in 1995. Someone at Slate noticed the similarities between Chicago's heat wave and The Big Easy's literal ones and wonders why local officials seemed to learn nothing.

Blissfully Un-Self-Aware

Running errands this ayem I listened to Laura Ingraham for awhile, and she was playing excerpts of a speech Chuck Schumer gave at the National Press Club recently (didn't catch when). Among the things he said was that what he learned in college in the 60s was to despise ideologues. Yep, if there's anything Chuck Schumer can't stand, it's an ideologue. I am of the considered opinion that no one deliberately tells a lie that ridiculous, so he must actually believe it.

Once before our daughter had started school, we ran into a bunch of her older brother's classmates at the park. The boys started playing tag, and she thought she was playing too, although the truth is that they paid her no mind. She just joined the huddle and ran at the same time as everyone else. After a time, very pleased, she said to me, "Mommy, Mommy, I think I must be faster than all the first grade boys because I am the only one who has never been caught!" Lack of self-knowledge can be a beautiful thing.

Fantasy Football

I recently offered a lame prize of my choosing to whoever could correctly guess Bush's O'Conner replacement nominee. Guesses are coming in, but I'd say they're more along the lines of people you'd like to see nominated just to stick it to the Dems. Names received thusfar:

• Laura Ingraham
• Robert Bork (3 votes)
• John Bolton
• Miguel Estrada
• Ann Coulter

The Truth May Or May Not Set You Free

Scroll down to read the previous post; it sets this one up.

Increasingly in some circles you see the nastiest and most snide accusations and remarks defended on the ground that these are nothing more than a kind of tough love aimed at purifying the Church. "The truth will set you free," is the claim.

1) First of all, as a friend in Catholic publishing pointed out to me in a little email round-robin we've been having, it's worth noting that when Jesus said "the truth will set you free," he was not talking about journalism! Let's review the passage from John 8, beginning at v. 31:

"So Jesus was saying to those Jews who had believed Him, "If you continue in My word, then you are truly disciples of Mine; and you will know the truth, and the truth will make you free." They answered Him, 'We are Abraham's descendants and have never yet been enslaved to anyone; how is it that You say, "You will become free"?' Jesus answered them, 'Truly, truly, I say to you, everyone who commits sin is the slave of sin. The slave does not remain in the house forever; the son does remain forever. So if the Son makes you free, you will be free indeed."

In other words, Jesus is talking about himself. My friend said it quite well: "He doesn’t say, 'Information will set you free.' Still less does he say, 'Fearlessly repeating speculation and rumor as you sort out what might be true in it will set you free.' He isn’t issuing a commentary on free inquiry and society’s liberation. What he’s saying is that if you follow him, then you’ll know the truth, and that will set you free."

“I am the way the truth and the life.” “For this I was born, and for this I came into the world, to bear witness to the truth.” Got that? Jesus is the Truth that liberates.

2) Of course the press should be free. Journalists have a right to follow stories --even unpleasant ones--where they lead and to say and print uncomfortable things. But it is preposterous to think that true information liberates all by itself. At best, it can be an important servant of liberation, but a Catholic journalist must recognize a concommitant power to harm. As St. Paul writes in 1 Corinthians 8:1, "knowledge makes us arrogant but it is charity that edifies.”

JPG --who championed Catholic involvement in all forms of media, was nonetheless realistic about the limits of the information age. He argued that information saturation --far from liberating people-- had in some respects inhibited that liberation (see here). This is obvious when I'm occasionally listening to Laura Ingraham and the local station breaks in with its teaser for the news-on-the-half-hour: "A 7-year-old has died." (No lie, they actually led w/ that once, and their teasers are all like that.) We're all agreed, I think, that the "it bleeds, it leads" approach to information isn't ultimately very useful to us --even at the level of civic life.

Catholic journalism has its own "it bleeds, it leads" tendencies, even if the blood isn't literal in our case. In an interesting debate about Traditionalism in the current issue of Latin Mass, Joan Zola makes the point that this isn't exactly helpful quite well, albeit in a slightly different context. She writes:

Let us be realistic: a man who works all day supporting and caring for his family has only so much time left, and his spiritual development must be his main concern. The prayer and study this requires leaves him little time for controversy. His limited reading time is precious, and if he spends it on articles in some. . .publications, some sneeringly sarcastic in tone, they may keep him in a state of tension disquiet, and frustration. . . .a state that works against spiritual progress."

3) As long as we're discussing the limits of information, let's not forget that where theological and canonical concerns come up, a little humility is in order. In the letters pages of magazines and the comments pages of blogs, there are a lot of people for darned "sure" about matters in which they have no expertise. They may decry the Currans & Kungs of this world for preferring their own judgments to those of the Scripture and Magisterium, but how do these same people decide whether this or that spirituality is "legitimate" or whether this or that spiritual practice is "healthy" or "cult-like"? As Joan Zola writes, by "increasing reliance on one's own judgment in everything --what one wants to believe. (This is the death of open-mindedness, by the way, but let me not let an over-long post run on even more).

4) Let's not forget the Catechism gives us standards (scroll down in this link to read 'em) --drawn from the 10 Commandments and Christ's admonition that our yes mean yes and no mean no -- for whether the things we say or write are in fact true. My gossipy interlocutor made no claim that what he said was true. He said it was relevant, and "out there." Which amounts to Adam's, "she did it first" defense as far as I'm concerned.

5) What, then, of the claim that "the truth" must be pursued in order to purify the Church? As said above, of course journalists can and may pursue uncomfortable story lines. However, the obligation is, when you hear an outrageous rumor, to investigate the truth of it --not to simply repeat scandalous rumors and leave possibly innocent people and institutions to try to prove negatives to get their reputations back. Many stories turn out not to cut ice, and they should be passed over without comment rather than legitimized through repetition or publication. Stories that pan out should be reported dispassionately --but without sexy embellishments. It certainly isn't a Christian's place to repeat damaging comments simply because we privately think they have the ring of truth to them. You don't steal a person's life away based on "the ring of truth"!

But don't take my word for it, read Inter Mirifica to see what the Church says.

Late for an appointment, so apologize for typos, but you get my drift.

Newsweek Lied, People Died

That's a bumper sticker I'd put on my car. Proposed by a caller to Laura Ingraham, whom RC2 listens to on Mondays on the way home from the grocery run. I feel sorry for Cal Thomas that his snobby anti-blog (they're not real journalists like me, he sniffs) column ran just as this most recent example of professional journalism was breaking. Would we know about the Bush awol memo being a forgery or about John Kerry never being in Cambodia without the blogs? And as for bloggers only talking to themselves, first of all, ahem, has Thomas noticed he's run in the W. Times, not the W. Post? And secondly, the newsblogs make a point of regularly linking to and picking intellectual fights with their ideological enemies. It's not perfect, maybe sometimes it's uncivil, but it beats trusting Jayson Blair, Jack Kelly, Dan Rather and Michael Isikoff for the truth.