A Different Kind of Pub

From the Telegraph:

A 17th century crypt in Rome has been converted into a pub by the Roman Catholic Church in an attempt to draw young Italians away from British-style binge-drinking.

The bar, named GP II after the Italian initials for John Paul II, offers beer and wine at much cheaper prices than neighbouring pubs and bars, but frowns on drunkenness.

The initiative, which has the blessing of the diocese of Rome, is intended to offer a late-night venue for young people who might otherwise wander the streets.

There are concerns that Italians are beginning to embrace the sort of binge-drinking that until recently has been alien to most Mediterranean countries, with a report released yesterday warning that one in three young Italians was at risk of serious health problems because of the amount of alcohol they consume.

Penalty or Tax?

Virginia's Attorney General Ken Cuccinelli discusses the ins and outs of the state's legal suit against the healthcare law. Is what Americans will have to pay for opting not to purchase health insurance a tax (which the president vehemently denies), or a penalty?


(Skip the first 30 seconds to arrive at the relevant section.)

Rules of Engagement and the Ridiculous

From the Washington Examiner:

KANDAHAR, AFGHANISTAN -- To the U.S. Army soldiers and Marines serving here, some things seem so obviously true that they are beyond debate. Among those perceived truths: Tthe restrictive rules of engagement that they have to fight under have made serving in combat far more dangerous for them, while allowing the Taliban to return to a position of strength.

"If they use rockets to hit the [forward operating base] we can't shoot back because they were within 500 meters of the village. If they shoot at us and drop their weapon in the process we can't shoot back," said Spc. Charles Brooks, 26, a U.S. Army medic with 1st Battalion, 4th Infantry Regiment, in Zabul province.

How to address this problem? Elect Republicans.

Milwaukee Catholics and the Next Phase

Interior view of the dome of the Basilica of Saint Josaphat, in Milwaukee

The much beleaguered Archdiocese of Milwaukee has yet another unique opportunity to begin anew, after decades of wandering aimlessly through a heavy fog. Visitors to this blog are well aware of my utter bewilderment by the decades-long theological and liturgical malaise that has persistently latched onto the archdiocese. The long-overdue retirement of Bishop Richard Sklba, a resolute ally of disgraced Archbishop Rembert Weakland represents, if you will pardon the mixed metaphor, the final gasp and last pillar of the ancien régime; a pillar that needed to be knocked down before substantive change can arrive in Milwaukee.

As a Milwaukee native, someone who lived through the reign of terror as a youth, my own advice to Archbishop Jerome Listecki is simple: look outside Milwaukee for an orthodox, fearless auxiliary bishop to replace Sklba. Then, the difficult and long-overdue task of cleaning house can begin in full force. This work will be much more difficult to accomplish with an entrenched insider filling Sklba's shoes in the role of auxiliary. The Archdiocese of Milwaukee's sempiternal problem has been an incalcitrant, incestuous, closed-off inner circle that has stubbornly blocked the light of day from penetrating the dark corners and from dispelling the shadows of scandal and intrigue. This is not to suggest that there are no traces of fidelity in Milwaukee among the laity and priests, but their dire need of backup support is all the more reason for a rock-ribbed auxiliary bishop!

To Archbishop Listecki: Follow the example of Denver's Archbishop Charles Chaput, who brought in an outsider, now-Archbishop José Gomez of Los Angeles, to serve as his auxiliary. The final decision of course, rests with the Pope, but no doubt, Listecki can offer strong counsel and recommendations as to the next auxiliary.

In an age of the "dictatorship of relativism," now is not the time to send a mixed-message. Faithful Milwaukee Catholics simply cannot bear to see yet another generation of their own reared on milquetoast Catholicism in the schools and parishes as a direct result of poor, feckless leadership that trickles down to the local parishes, to the detriment of souls.

Interviewing Condi

Condoleezza Rice takes some questions on domestic and international affairs in this interview with TIME. I can't say I agree when she regrets that immigration "reform" foundered under George W. Bush, but it's a worthwhile Q&A.

"Utterly Failed"

How has the multiculturalism experiment fared in Germany? Angela Merkel gives a sobering assessment. From the Guardian

The German chancellor, Angela Merkel, has courted growing anti-immigrant opinion in Germany by claiming the country's attempts to create a multicultural society have "utterly failed".

Speaking to a meeting of young members of her Christian Democratic Union party, Merkel said the idea of people from different cultural backgrounds living happily "side by side" did not work.

She said the onus was on immigrants to do more to integrate into German society.

"This [multicultural] approach has failed, utterly failed," Merkel told the meeting in Potsdam, south of Berlin, yesterday.

Her remarks will stir a debate about immigration in a country which is home to around 4 million Muslims.

She's right, of course. For Europe though, is it too late to do anything about it? That is the real question.

Within Reach

Nile Gardiner, writing for the Telegraph:

Leading pollster Scott Rasmussen is now predicting a 55 seat gain for the GOP in the House. His latest Daily Presidential Tracking Poll has President Obama with a presidential approval rating index of minus 17 points, with just 28 percent of the nation’s voters strongly approving of the way that Barack Obama is performing his role as president, and 45 percent strongly disapproving.

While the Senate race remains extremely tight, most polls are pointing to a Republican takeover of the House. And as Michael Barone has noted, the shift to the GOP could be the biggest since 1894, let alone 1994. For President Obama, this is a nightmare scenario, with his legislative agenda lying in ruins, and facing a campaign for the repeal of his hugely controversial and costly health care reform law. November 2nd could well be the worst day for America’s Left in more than a decade, signaling the start of another conservative revolution and a firm rejection of Barack Obama’s Big Government agenda.

The Fed and the Interest Rate

Some economic sense from Kevin D. Williamson, writing for National Review Online:

The Fed should stop trying to drive down interest rates. It should instead work to raise them. Why? Our economy needs savings and investment — but why save when interest rates are effectively zero? And where can funds for investment be had if not from savings? Answer: from borrowing — and more debt is the last thing American businesses, American households, or American government needs right now. Interest rates are going to go up eventually, anyway, so we may as well get started now in order to avoid an especially disruptive transition when the time comes. Higher interest rates would encourage savings, encourage investment, discourage wanton borrowing, and help rebuild the value of the dollar. Sure, we’d lose the value of the allegedly stimulative effects of zero interest rates — and a lot of good they’ve been doing us so far: 10 percent unemployment, growth that is as dynamic as molasses in February.

The United States should start acting like a dollar is worth something if it expects a dollar to be worth something. Otherwise, to borrow from a wise man, we are left with Barack Obama as the devalued head of a devalued government.

Movin' On Up

From the Associated Press:

PENSACOLA, Fla. – Crucial pieces of a lawsuit challenging the Obama administration's health care overhaul can go to trial, with a judge ruling Thursday he wants to hear more arguments over whether it's constitutional to force citizens to buy health insurance.

In a written ruling, U.S. District Judge Roger Vinson said it also needs to be decided whether it's constitutional to penalize people who do not buy insurance with taxes and to require states to expand their Medicaid programs. Another federal judge in Michigan threw out a similar lawsuit last week.

Vinson set a hearing for Dec. 16. The lawsuits will likely wind up before the U.S. Supreme Court.

Who else can't wait for Chief Justice John Roberts to get his hands on this one?

Back to the Source

United States Senate candidate Ron Johnson offers an accurate explanation for the economic malaise.

From the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel:

Government action, beginning with federal legislation passed 33 years ago to help low-income people buy homes, was the cause of the economic collapse, Republican U.S. Senate candidate Ron Johnson said Wednesday.

Johnson told Journal Sentinel reporters and editors, as well as its Reader Advisory Committee, that the seeds of the collapse began in 1977 with passage of the Community Reinvestment Act.

"What caused this economic downturn, collapse, was pretty much government action," Johnson said. "It wasn't helped by the big banks. I always refer to it as caused by Washington, propelled by big banks and paid for by the American public."

Decades after its passage, the federal law that helped low-income and disadvantaged people get loans to buy their own homes continues to be hotly debated. The federal law applied only to depository institutions, not private, unregulated mortgage lenders.

In Johnson's view, the law "started forcing banks to make loans to people who couldn't afford to pay them back . . . "

Asked if the banks were forced to lend to people who couldn't afford it, Johnson said: "They threatened to bring the Department of Justice in to, I guess, to prosecute banks that would be accused of redlining. Not making loans to people in certain areas."

Johnson said the law made it easy for banks to lend money.

Seeking Further Clarity

A longstanding tradition, from Saint Paul, to Augustine and up to today. What did St. Thomas Aquinas say about capital punishment?

The main page of the website for the Archdiocese of Saint Louis features the following story:

On October 20, the state of Missouri is scheduled to carry out the execution of Roderick Nunley for the murder of Ann Harrison in 1989. If Mr. Nunley is executed he will be the 68th person executed in Missouri since the reinstatement of the death penalty in 1976.

Catholic teaching opposes the use of the death penalty because it disregards the sanctity of life and promotes revenge as a principle of justice. In his 1999 address in St. Louis, Pope John Paul II called for a consensus to “end the death penalty, which is both cruel and unnecessary.”

It has been the tradition of the Catholic Bishops of Missouri to join with other religious leaders to submit a clemency application to the Governor of Missouri for any individual with an execution date. This petition voices concerns about the case and asks the governor to grant mercy to the individual.

As Catholic citizens you too can add your voice with the bishops and call on Governor Nixon to grant mercy to Roderick Nunley and stop his execution.

I have to say, when I came across this declaration I was more than a little disappointed and frustrated by the inadequate flushing out of the Church's entire teaching on the subject, as explained in the Catechism of the Catholic Church. In other words, the statement appearing in bold that proclaims "Catholic teaching opposes use of the death penalty" is simply incomplete and, dare I say, flat out wrong. My principal bone of contention with this formulation is that it could lead to confusion or a blurring of the lines among sincere Catholics regarding other issues that carry far greater moral weight, as with abortion, for instance. The dangerous "seamless garment" theory often seeps in when discussing the death penalty and abortion in the public forum. I remember someone once telling me that he found it hypocritical for George Bush to describe himself as pro-life when he favors the death penalty. This is, of course, ridiculous, but I was not surprised by it, since woefully inadequate statements like the one quoted above have only encouraged this kind of slapdash thinking, in my opinion.

The website statement also declares that capital punishment "promotes revenge as a principal of justice." I strongly disagree. Some may view it this way, but that is not the position stated in the Church's own Catechism.

I came across the following commentary by Father John A. Hardon S.J. on the matter:

...To return to the original question, "What is the Church's teaching on capital punishment?" the best answer is found in the Catechism of the Catholic Church. "Preserving the common good of society," we are told, "requires rendering the aggressor unable to inflict harm. For this reason the traditional teaching of the Church has acknowledged as well-founded the right and duty of legitimate public authority to punish malefactors by means of penalties commensurate with the gravity of the crime, not excluding in cases of extreme gravity, the death penalty" (no.2266). -Fr. John A. Hardon S.J., from "The Catholic Faith" magazine

I added the emphases to contrast Hardon's thoughtful reply (which simply relies on the Catechism) with the simplistic, broad stroke talking points found on the website for the Archdiocese of Saint Louis. The question of the death penalty is a very serious one and deserves serious treatment. (By "talking points" I am not referring to the words of JPII, but rather the narrow and frankly incorrect assertion that "Catholic teaching opposes use of the death penalty.")

Also the implication here is that by supporting the death penalty one is committing some kind of disobedience as regards Church teaching, and should therefore repent. I find this offensive. Capital punishment, and it's moral implications, is not an issue that can be held up, mutatis mutandis, to abortion. The latter is intrinsically evil, the former is not. Then-Cardinal Ratzinger said as much in the following excerpt from a 2004 letter:

Not all moral issues have the same moral weight as abortion and euthanasia. For example, if a Catholic were to be at odds with the Holy Father on the application of capital punishment or on the decision to wage war, he would not for that reason be considered unworthy to present himself to receive Holy Communion. While the Church exhorts civil authorities to seek peace, not war, and to exercise discretion and mercy in imposing punishment on criminals, it may still be permissible to take up arms to repel an aggressor or to have recourse to capital punishment. There may be a legitimate diversity of opinion even among Catholics about waging war and applying the death penalty, but not however with regard to abortion and euthanasia.

It would be mighty refreshing to see this sort of serious, thoughtful explanation of the Church's real teaching mirrored on diocesan websites in America.

Yes, Another Poll...

From The Associated Press:

The Obamamania that gripped college campuses two years ago is gone.

An Associated Press-mtvU poll found college students cooling in their support for President Barack Obama, a fresh sign of trouble for Democrats struggling to rekindle enthusiasm among many of these newest voters for the crucial midterm elections in three weeks.

Forty-four percent of students approve of the job Obama is doing as president, while 27 percent are unhappy with his stewardship, according to the survey conducted late last month. That's a significant drop from the 60 percent who gave the president high marks in a May 2009 poll. Only 15 percent had a negative opinion back then.

The President's Ego Problem

Writing for National Review Online, Jonah Goldberg hits all the right notes, once again.

After all, this was the man who, as a candidate, descended on Berlin as the leader of a worldwide cause that transcended national borders. And when asked in a debate what his greatest weakness was, he plumbed his soul and answered that he was disorganized. “My desk and my office doesn’t look good,” he said. When a man runs as a national redeemer and says his biggest failing is a messy desk, that should be a warning sign that he likes himself a bit too much.

When Arkansas Democratic congressman Marion Berry complained that health-care reform felt like a replay of the Hillarycare debacle, Obama explained that the big difference between then and now was “me.” In other words, the White House’s plan for making everything work out was an unyielding confidence in the power of Obama’s own cult of personality. That’s why that cult’s high priest, David Axelrod, pursued a strategy of greeting every problem as if it were an excuse for Obama to give another big speech.

Now that the strategy has proved catastrophic, the self-pity is pouring out.

"The Will of the Judge"

He understood the problem with the judiciary.

With the stroke of a pen, one judge in California, Ms. Virginia Phillips, dictatorially swept aside the legislative and executive branches of government today when she dissolved the military's "don't ask, don't tell" policy. Question: Where do federal judges acquire this kind of unparalleled authority? Who gets to censure them for their rank abuses of power in cases such as this one? (and not to mention the California Prop. 8 ruling) People just assume the judge's great power is legitimate and beyond reproach because of longstanding precedent to rule on everything under the sun. They've done it before, and they'll do it again. Case closed. But is reliance on precedent alone, as opposed to the Constitution, a satisfactory justification? Judicial review is a sticky, controversial thing, stretching all the way back to the founding (read James F. Simon's What Kind of Nation: Thomas Jefferson, John Marshall, and the Epic Struggle to Create a United States), but something has to be done to curtail the power of the judiciary.

When it comes down to it, what is the point of voting if judges, on a personal whim, can simply snuff out any legitimate law coming from the majority? That is a fundamental question facing Americans today, with federal judges reigning supreme as thinly veiled despots, hurdling down their politically laced rulings from their marble encased, Mount Olympus-like court rooms.

When a battle is lost in the halls congress or in the ballot box, at least there is that strong, stinging sense of, "Well, I need to do a better job convincing people." There is an awareness of personal responsibility to get involved and dive into the debate to make a difference. But with the judicial tyranny we are witnessing today, not even fighting hard tooth and nail and perhaps, in the end, coming up a few votes short matters. Majority or no majority, what the court says goes.

Finally, why should the military even listen to Phillips? It is remarkable that a federal judge like Ms. Phillips can impose her personal views about fairness and equality on the armed forces, especially considering the Constitution clearly places this entity under the Executive authority.

To be sure, Jefferson had his eccentricities, but on the dangers of an unchecked judiciary, he was right on the money.

"We supposed we possessed fixed laws to guard us equally against treason and oppression; but it now appears we have no law but the will of the judge." -Thomas Jefferson

Lost and Found Michelangelo?

Remarkable, if true.
From The New York Post:

This unfinished painting of Jesus and Mary could be a lost Michelangelo, potentially the art find of the century.

But to the upstate family on whose living-room wall it hung for years, it was just "The Mike."

When the kids knocked the painting off its perch with an errant tennis ball sometime in the mid-1970s, the Kober clan wrapped it up and tucked it away behind the sofa.

There it remained for 27 years, until Air Force Lt. Col. Martin Kober retired in 2003 and had some time on his hands. His father gave him a task -- research the family lore that the painting was really a Michelangelo.

Obama Crushed

From TIME:

Barack Obama is being politically crushed in a vise. From above, by elite opinion about his competence. From below, by mass anger and anxiety over unemployment. And it is too late for him to do anything about this predicament until after November's elections.

With the exception of core Obama Administration loyalists, most politically engaged elites have reached the same conclusions: the White House is in over its head, isolated, insular, arrogant and clueless about how to get along with or persuade members of Congress, the media, the business community or working-class voters. This view is held by Fox News pundits, executives and anchors at the major old-media outlets, reporters who cover the White House, Democratic and Republican congressional leaders and governors, many Democratic business people and lawyers who raised big money for Obama in 2008, and even some members of the Administration just beyond the inner circle.

The Overreach

Writing for The Washington Post, George Will reflects on a common problem faced by parties with large majorities when they misread their governing mandate. This rings especially true for liberals like FDR and Obama.

Philip II, Vindicated

I am making steady progress through an excellent book entitled The Escorial: Art and Power in the Renaissance, by Henry Kamen. Professor Kamen has previously written on sixteenth-century Spain, King Philip in particular, and in the process, he has done much to rehabilitate the historical picture of this intriguing royal.

In "The Escorial", Kamen demolishes centuries old stereotypes and outright lies that have stubbornly dogged King Philip II, a man I have long been fascinated by and have come to admire. It is remarkable how so many of the clichéd misconceptions concerning Philip II have stuck over the years. Most history books present the king as a somewhat creepy misanthrope, who combined a ruthless religious zealotry with a healthy serving of quirky nervous ticks. Kamen's book addresses all of the misconceptions within the context of the magnificent complex of the Escorial, which, under Philip's watchful eye, was constructed as a monastery and residence, not, as many say, as a vainglorious monument to himself and to his supposedly intolerant Church.

The Escorial

Conventional wisdom would have you believe that the allegedly "gloomy" and overly scrupulous king built the enormous building as a way to vanish from the outside world, to hide himself behind its thick walls, the plumes of church incense, and the countless robed, chanting monks roaming the dark corridors. Nothing could be further from the truth. The following excerpt from "The Escorial" gives a good idea of what I am trying to convey:

The legend of the Escorial as a monastic prison is employed in order to present the picture of a king who was timid and nervous, a physical coward, and verging on insane...This presentation, which I (in common with other students of the period) have had reason to analyse on several occasions, was created a century and a half ago by a group of Spanish Liberal historians, and thanks to subsequent political ideologues has enjoyed a long and unmerited lease of life.

One has to read Kamen's book to get the real story behind the Escorial and more importantly, King Philip II, who was in fact a cultured, considerate man, deeply committed to Catholicism (not a fanatic), his realm and yes, even to the arts.

Dems Running from Obama, Pelosi

Surprised to see this on CNN:

The Emerging Black Republican

An interesting article from the Telegraph:

There are currently 42 black members of Congress, all of them Democrats. Republicans haven't had a black congressman since J.C. Watts stood down in 2003. Ironically, opposition to the policies of the first black President on a whole range of economic and social issues are a key motivating factor for this new wave of black conservatives.

Rather than ushering in a post-racial era, Obama's election to the White House appears to have intensified racial divisions in America. This is not, as the Left asserts, because Right-wing opponents are full of white-hooded bigots who refuse to accept a black man as President. Obama's own strange myopia on race has played a big part.

Timothy Johnson, co-founder of the Frederick Douglass Foundation, a group that helps promote black Republican candidates, told me that that Obama was not scrutinised properly in the 2008 election because of his race.

"The election wasn't so much about what Obama brought to the table," said. "People voted for him because they wanted to feel good about themselves, that they weren't racist."