Month: June 2009

Twitter Updates for 2009-06-30

Matt Margolis

A Coda to the Scandal in the Church

Mark Noonan

In all of the long and trying events of the Scandal in the Church, the most difficult part for devout Catholics has been to know the truth, but be unable to utter it because the public mind had been propagandized into a particular view. This view is that the Church’s rigidity on sexual matters led to priests being unable to openly express their sexuality and this, in turn, led to the abuse of youngsters and to cap it all off, the Church cynically covered it up because it, as an institution, didn’t want to confront the fact that the Church’s teachings on sex will have to be changed to fit modern mores. This line of thinking has going for it only one thing – the kernel of truth that priests did, indeed, abuse minors. Other than that, it is nonsense from start to finish – and this nonsense is best illustrated by the autobiography of Archbishop Weakland:

It sounds like an over-the-top Tom Wolfe novel: a successor to the apostles conducts an affair with a male graduate student, is accused of “date rape” and emotional harm by said student, and raids the collection basket of the faithful to hush the student up, then, as the bishop settles into a cushy retirement, he pens a “coming out” memoir in praise of homosexual behavior, all the while retaining the canonical rights and privileges of a retired archbishop and receiving pats on the back from fellow clergy.

Alas, this is no racy and risible fiction; it is the real story of Archbishop Rembert Weakland. The retired archbishop of Milwaukee released June 15 his autobiography, A Pilgrim in a Pilgrim Church: Memoirs of a Catholic Archbishop. In it he admits to several affairs with men, crowns himself the first voluntarily “out” bishop, and argues that the Church should endorse the “physical, genital expression” of homosexuality, as he put it to the New York Times in May.

As the article goes on to note, Weakland was the liberal’s liberal Catholic prelate – it was Weakland who was leading the charge to “modernize” the Church and bring it more in tune with, well, Oprah, I guess. It was Weakland who was strong in his condemnation of conservatism’s supposed greed and cruely…and while making such condemnation, Weakland was dipping in to the collection plate to pay hush money to his gay lover. Nothing so strongly illustrates what went wrong than the story of Weakland – a man who allowed himself to be enslaved the world, worked diligently to have others enslaved, caused untold damage to those who refused servitude, and now writes about what a swell guy he is and if only the Church would preach heresy, all would be well.

If you seek for the reason behind the late John Paul II’s insistence upon renewed discipline and orthodoxy, you need look no further: here is the reason. If you wonder why Benedict the XVI is following resolutely in these foot steps: here is the reason. It is only by a return to the most uncompromising orthodoxy that the Church will recover from this scandal. There is rising in the Church what is being called the “John Paul II generation” – young and vigorous priests and religious who are orthodox all down the line and who are starting to take over from the weak, liberal leaders who led the Church into disaster in the two decades immediately following Vatican II – a council, it should be noted, which was twisted out of recognition by liberal bishops such as Weakland; so twisted, indeed, that Weakland and his ilk had it legislating the opposite of what was decreed.

In this Age of Lies, the Rock of Truth may be submerged from time to time, but it remains a Rock, and it is coming back to the surface. It will take a generation for this shame to be washed away – Weakland will soon appear before the judgment seat of God, and I hope he fares well there…but I don’t wish myself ever to be in his shoes, that of a shepherd who led the flock astray.

Going After the "Cap and Tr8tors"

Mark Noonan

This is the way to let them know we’re not going to take this fascist nonsense lying down:

Rep. Mark Kirk (R-IL) is one of the eight “cap-and-tr8ters” who crossed the line and voted for the Waxman-Markey Bill, generally known as cap-and-trade, but in fact is a national energy tax.

Today at Noon a Tea Party protest took place at Kirk’s district office in Northbrook. It was a floating crowd–some came during their lunch hour–but the peak attendance was thirty–a huge number considering the event was announced just yesterday afternoon and received no mainstream media coverage that I know of.

Everyone I spoke with, with the exception of myself Anne Leary of Backyard Conservative, lived in Kirk’s Chicago North Shore district, and Leary and I live within a mile of Kirk’s corner of the state.

While working my father-in-law’s garage sale this past weekend a lady come to shop dropped in to my hands her personal manifesto about what is wrong with our country – too much taxes, too much spending, too much socialism…never had that happened before. The lady was apparently passing it out to all and sundry as she went about her business. I know, just one bit of anecdotal evidence…but I’m seeing more and more people just furious with the current state of affairs. I think a political hurricane is brewing.

Phrase of the Day

Mark Noonan

The hard task of life:

The world is in a constant conspiracy against the brave. It’s the age-old struggle: the roar of the crowd on the one side, and the voice of your conscience on the other. – Douglas MacArthur

Having a "Stay-cation" This Year?

Mark Noonan

The Mrs and I would love to take a cruise, head to an all-inclusive spa, laze on a beach some where…but, you know, poverty sucks. Like all Americans, we’re feeling the pinch of 2009. We’re not nearly as bad off as all too many of our fellow Americans, but we’re certainly not a freewheeling as we once were. So, we’re about to have our second party of the summer – just a gathering of friends, pot-luck, a bit of beer and wine and just chatting over this or that. We’re going to do more of this – we’re having a “stay-cation”.

What are you doing to enjoy summer and poverty?

China: The "Other Shoe" Waiting to Drop

Mark Noonan

And when (not if, boys and girls, but when)it does, we’ll be lucky if we avoid 25% unemployment:

China’s banks are veering out of control. The half-reformed economy of the People’s Republic cannot absorb the $1,000bn (£600bn) blitz of new lending issued since December.

Money is leaking instead into Shanghai’s stock casino, or being used to keep bankrupt builders on life support. It is doing very little to help lift the world economy out of slump.

Fitch Ratings has been warning for some time that China’s lenders are wading into dangerous waters, but its latest report is even grimmer than bears had suspected.

“With much of the world immersed in crisis, China appears to be one of the few countries where the financial system continues to function largely without a glitch, but Fitch is growing increasingly wary,” it said.

“Future losses on stimulus could turn out to be larger than expected, and it is unclear what share the central and/or local governments ultimately will be willing or able to bear.”

Note the phrase “able to bear”. Fitch’s “macro-prudential risk” indicator for China threatens to jump from category 1 (safe) to category 3 (Iceland, et al). This is a surprise to me but Michael Pettis from Beijing University says China’s public debt may be as high as 50pc-70pc of GDP when “correctly counted”.

China has been honeycombed with bad debt for two decades – masked by an exceptionally good trade balance which allowed China to continue to float those bad debts. The debts in question are to institutions and individuals well-connected with the Chinese power elite…its not like these guys have to undergo a credit check or that there’s any chance a Chinese bank will deny them a loan, know what I mean? Now that China’s trade balance is collapsing (later in the linked article it is noted that Chinese exports fell 26% in May), there isn’t this influx of cash to balance the books. Meanwhile, China has to find cash, somehow, to buy US debt because if US debt becomes worthless, one trillion dollars of China’s wealth becomes worthless.

It can’t be sustained – you cannot spend your way to wealth and you cannot forever have an economy geared towards rewarding a tiny, powerful elite. Its all going to come crashing down rather soon and rather hard – and then all that debt Obama wants to sell will become worthless and all the money the Fed has printed will become worthless and we might wind up with the fun, fun, fun of high unemployment, high inflation and high interest rates. Welcome back, Carter – but worse: this will be Revenge of the Carter. Even if we avoid “stagflation”, its clear we’re heading in to some really bad times (anecdote: at the corporation I work for, we’re usually busier than a one-armed paper hanger on Mondays…it was very quiet for most of the day…and then only modestly busy later).

From what I can see, there’s no way to avoid what is coming – the Chinese bubble will burst and it will ripple through the entire global economy. It won’t be pretty – and it will be made worse if we keep trying to borrow and spend our way out of it.

Hungarians Smarter Than Obama

Mark Noonan

They’ll get wealth, we’ll get Obamunism:

Hungary’s minority Socialist government passed a crucial test on Monday when parliament approved key 2010 tax changes to help the country recover from its worst recession in almost two decades.

The passing of the law averts the risk of early elections. Prime Minister Gordon Bajnai had said he would stay in his post as long as the Socialists and the Free Democrats support his programme, which is also the backbone of Hungary’s financing deal with the International Monetary Fund (IMF).

The tax law, which will cut personal income taxes and social contributions paid by employers to the government, was passed with 211 votes and 152 votes against, with backing from the Socialists’ former coalition allies, the Free Democrats.

We’re in a bad way, fellow Americans – European socialists are voting to cut taxes, while our Obama places a crushing burden of taxation and debt upon us. How come we ended up like this? Its just not fair – we’re mired with an European-style President while the Europeans get to become Reaganite!

Twitter Updates for 2009-06-29

Matt Margolis

Obama Sides With Castro, Chavez on Honduras

Mark Noonan

As a matter of course, when you’re on the side of those two guys, you’ve probably got it very wrong on a fundamental level:

Obama says coup in Honduras is illegal

U.S. President Barack Obama said on Monday the coup that ousted Honduran President Manuel Zelaya was illegal and would set a “terrible precedent” of transition by military force unless it was reversed.

“We believe that the coup was not legal and that President Zelaya remains the president of Honduras, the democratically elected president there,” Obama told reporters after an Oval Office meeting with Colombian President Alvaro Uribe.

Castro:

Fidel Castro Denounces Honduran Coup

Havana, Cuba (AHN) – While the United States, European Union and Organization of American States have each condemned the coup in Honduras, former Cuban President Fidel Castro has also spoken out against the military’s “blatantly reactionary attempt to prevent an important popular referendum.”

As if Castro would ever hold a referendum on his beastly rule.

Now, Chavez:

Hugo Chavez said in a formal statement that Zelaya had been “violently expelled from his country by a group of unpatriotic, coup-mongering soldiers.”

Says the man who tried to force through a Hitlerian enabling act…

Bottom line, if these two creeps are against it, I’m at least provisionally for it…and Obama should decide who’s friendship he wants…that of a couple commie thugs, or that of the people of the region?