Hiatus

JUSIPER goes on hiatus the next few weeks, though there may be a post or a tweet here and there. See you in mid-May.

Waiting for Kata

What happened in Iceland this week was a perfect storm--not least because there wasn't one.

Weather also conspired against Europe. Just as the volcano was erupting, the North Atlantic jet stream was passing over Iceland from the northwest, carrying myriad sharp-edged particles on a collision course with Europe's air fleets. "It's as if it's jinxed," says Helmut Malewski, who is tracking the ash cloud at Germany's National Meteorological Service's central forecasting office. "The wind blew from the east all winter. But just now, when the volcano goes active, it blows from the northwest." Dryness was another factor. "One strong rainstorm over the North Sea would have washed out the ash and helped us dramatically," Malewski says.

But things may very well get a lot worse:

Charles Krauthammer

He's an ideologue first.  And, of course, as a medical doctor, he has no insight, at least by virtue of training, that lends any significance to his natterings on domestic politics, much less foreign policy.

But I always assumed he at least knew something about medicine.

I don't anymore.

Ryan recalls that moment only vaguely, but he's heard the story since that meeting in 1992, back when the term "crack baby" was used to describe children such as him and experts predicted that children born to addiction would become a biological underclass, super-predators who would cause the crime rate to surge, a lost generation.

John Silber, then president of Boston University, spoke of "crack babies who won't ever achieve the intellectual development to have consciousness of God."

"Theirs will be a life of certain suffering, of probable deviance, of permanent inferiority," Washington Post columnist Charles Krauthammer said in 1989.

They were written off even before they could talk. But in the two decades that have passed since crack dominated drug markets in the District and across the nation, these babies have grown into young adults who can tell their stories -- and for the most part, they are tales of success.

The Washington Post should fire Krauthammer and send him to freerepublic.com, a community of likeminded, blissful ignorance.

Why Benedict XVI and his cardinals have no reason to change, and won't

Philip Stephens of the Financial Times has half the bottom line:

Pope Benedict dates the beginning of the church's decline to the social and sexual revolutions of the 1960s; to the passing of the age of deference and the concomitant challenge to traditional authority. It was the secularisation of society, he once said, that had seen Catholic ethics and morals fall into grave decline.

This message was evident in his recent pastoral letter to the church in Ireland. The stated purpose of the address was to express "shame and remorse" about the abuse of Irish children by predator priests. It did so with sincerity. Yet Pope Benedict felt compelled to make another connection - this time between paedophilia among the clergy and the "rapid transformation and secularisation of Irish society". One problem, he implied, had been the liberalising instincts of the second Vatican Council.

The absurdity of this supposed link is exposed by a simple chronology. Most of the crimes against children uncovered by investigations in Ireland long pre-dated that country's embrace of what the Pope sees as a lethal moral relativism. To the contrary, it was the opening of Irish society that exposed the sins that had been inflicted on its children.

The Vatican narrative casts the church as victim - as an institution assailed by secularism, the media, and just about everyone else. Thus the Pope's insistence that his faith will shield him from the "petty gossip of dominant opinion". One close adviser has compared recent criticism to anti-semitism. Others, just as scandalously, have sought to blame the crisis on Jews and homosexuals. How much further can they fall? [...]

John Allen, a biographer of Pope Benedict and analyst for the US National Catholic Reporter, recently told the FT's Rome correspondent that the Holy Father was untroubled by crises of the moment because he had the "great gift of thinking in terms of centuries".

Mr Allen, as it happens, has also charted the shift in the church's demographic centre of gravity. Catholicism is booming in Asia, Africa and Latin America. Europeans and North Americans, Mr Allen calculates, now number only 350m in a church of some 1.2bn. About two-thirds of Catholics live in what is the emerging world - about 400m of them in Latin America. Brazil boasts twice as many communicants as Italy. Mexico and the Philippines have larger congregations than Germany or France.

This perhaps is where Pope Benedict's gaze is fixed. Catholics in the emerging nations, after all, have been largely untroubled by the scandal that has rocked his authority in the west. They are less inclined to challenge the pontiff's moral absolutism and his demand for unquestioning obedience to Rome.

So what of the Catholics left behind in a declining west? Many will join those who have already departed. Others will conclude that Pope Benedict can rob them of their church, but not of their faith.

Demographics are indeed half the story. The other half is money. At least in the United States, major donations to the Church come from ideologically conservative Catholics, particularly through organizations such as the Legionaries of Christ (whose founder, fundraising champ and John Paul II favorite Marcial Maciel was beyond monstrous) and Opus Dei (which, so far, has successfully evaded public inquiry into its accounts and its founder). As long as the church continues to promise its rich, selfish donors that the eye of the needle is wide enough for an SUV, the cash will flow.

In short, between the continued support of millions of Asians and Africans and the ill-gotten gain from American and European usurers and dupes, there's no reason to think this game can't go on indefinitely.  This Pope will go soon; another will take his place. With no document tying him by signature to any major abuse scandal, he (John Paul III? Pius XIII? Benedict XVII?) will say that Church has turned a page. The media will move on, and the "smaller, purer Church" that Benedict spoke of during his savvy campaign for the papacy will be a reality.

The Church doesn't need the allegiance of the many educated and rational Europeans and Americans, increasingly alienated from its dirty hierarchy, to survive. It only needs money from the tiny proportion of the Catholic population that shares its patriarchal theology, its increasing preference for the external accoutrements of religion rather than its essence, and its right wing politics. No, John Paul II's invented, ahistorical "traditionalism" is here to stay.

Treason

Republicans against energy legislation are voting against the interests of American troops. National security is the single strongest argument for energy legislation, not saving the environment, which no one, even on the left, really cares about enough to bother showing up to the polls for. It is sad that VoteVets, an independent political group comprised of veterans, should be the only ones out there making this case. Democrats, take heed.



This ad is even more powerful:

Sexual orientation a litmus test for SCOTUS?

And who is this directed at? Someone who's out, like Kathleen Sullivan? Or is there a top contender who conservatives fear may be a stealth homosexual?

n the midst of the Supreme Court nominations last spring, Focus on the Family took a curious position. Jeff Sessions, a conservative southern Senator, claimed he would be open to a nominee with “gay tendencies.” The Evangelical powerhouse surprisingly agreed. Their judicial analyst told The Plum Line’s Greg Sargent that their verdict on the nominee would depend on “whether they are a good judge or not.” A judge’s sexual identity, he claimed, is “not even pertinent to the equation.”

Well, apparently that was a mistake. It is quite pertinent now.

As another seat on the high court opens up, the group has made an abrupt about-face. Tom Minnery, the organization’s Vice President of Public Policy, clamored to undo last year’s position, calling the conversation with Sargent one they would “like to ‘do over.’ ”

“We can assure you,” he said in released statement, “that we recognize that homosexual behavior is a sin and does not reflect God’s created intent and desire for humanity.” A homosexual nominee, Minnery continues, inherently lacks the “character” and “moral rectitude” necessary for the court.

With the imminent departure of Justice Stevens, this summer is likely to see a repeat of the contentious battle over Obama’s nominee. Abortion will undoubtedly be at the center. Although is usually peripheral to the Court, sexual identity could be a divisive issue with the potential for the first ever openly gay Justice. One Republican Senator offered wavering support for the possibility yesterday. But the firm stance of groups from their conservative Christian base may enable politicians to come out against the prospect of a GLBT nominee.

In today’s statement, Focus on the Family unleashed stringent, Dobson-era language that seems to counter their recent savvier, stealth evangelism. “Sexual behavior,” Minnery concludes, “be it heterosexual or homosexual–certainly lies at the heart of personal morality.”

Given American's continual, documented support of nondiscrimination laws in the workplace, this may be a perfect opportunity to damage the Republican brand in blue and purple states with competitive Senate races. In addition, none of the three Republican senators from New England would vote against a qualified Supreme Court nominee who was gay or lesbian. The Democratic base would be galvanized. Maybe Obama shouldn't go for the stealth candidate but the out one.

"They keep coming"

How Pete Wilson turned California, a solid Republican state during the Eisenhower, Kennedy, Nixon, Ford, Carter, Reagan and Bush Sr. years, into a Democratic stronghold.



Spanish speakers, another excellent video here.

Pete Wilson

Not forgotten. This was the scene two years ago when his hometown of San Diego honored him with a statue:

Over 150 people gathered in Horton Plaza, San Diego to protest the dedication of a statue in honor of former California Mayor Pete Wilson. Considered to be the "Godfather of Proposition 187", Wilson used his office to target the Mexican and "Central American" community.

Prop. 187 was later deemed to be unconstitutional and illegal.

The crowd chanted "Tear down the statue! Tear down the hate!", disrupting the dedication ceremony across the street honoring Wilson. At times, Wilson gestured to the crowd, acknowledging that the protesters were making their message heard loud and clear.

The protest was coordinated by San Diego activist Enrique Morones. Several groups were represented: Border Angels, Gente Unida, Mexica Movement (Los Angeles), Union del Barrio (San Diego), and many others from both the San Diego and Los Angeles areas.

Republicans love Hispanics! Behind bars or deported, anyway!

Their latest:

In 2007, [Arizona] passed first-in-the-nation penalties for employers who don't ensure their workers are in the country legally. The law led many illegal workers to conclude that they could never find steady jobs in Arizona.

Last year, the state made it a crime for state workers to give illegal immigrants unauthorized benefits, which scared many from applying for government assistance they are allowed.

The sweeping bill, SB 1070, passed by the Legislature on Tuesday makes it a crime to lack proper immigration paperwork and requires police, if they suspect someone is in the country illegally, to determine his or her immigration status. It also bars people from soliciting work as day laborers.

"The bill in its totality is designed to make life miserable for immigrants in the state of Arizona," said Chris Newman, legal director of the National Day Laborer Organizing Network.

Critics say the state's approach to combating illegal immigration doesn't work and only stigmatizes Latinos, legal and illegal.

The drop in illegal immigrants, they argue, is largely due to Arizona's cratering economy, which has racked up losses in immigrant-heavy trades faster than most other states.

"The law doesn't matter to someone who's willing to risk their life crossing the border," said Rep. Daniel Patterson, who represents an immigrant-heavy district in Tucson and voted against the bill.

As has happened with other official steps to deter illegal immigration here, Tuesday's party-line vote -- 35 Republicans backed the measure and 21 Democrats opposed it -- was greeted with populist applause from anti-illegal-immigration activists and a smattering of protests from civil liberties and immigrant rights groups. The state Senate passed a similar bill this year; after it approves small fixes in the House version, it will go to Gov. Jan Brewer.[...]

"There is a significant difference between pulling people over for drunk driving and passing laws that create incentives for job discrimination," Landfried said. "It's much more harmful to the broader society."

Critics say the law will lead to stepped-up racial profiling as police ask people who appear foreign to prove they are legal. Immigrants say they already face discrimination and expect it to get worse. Graciela Beltran, 43, of Tucson said she was asked for immigration papers while boarding a bus.

Perla Siquieros, 37, said she would hesitate going to a park patrolled by police should the bill become law. "They don't know if I was born here or married a citizen," she said through an interpreter. [...]

Among many Latinos, however, the overall sentiment was one of disbelief.

Adriana, 40, an illegal immigrant in Tucson, fears she won't be able to drive her two U.S.-born children to appointments without risking being stopped by police.

"I'm afraid. I can't do nothing. . . . My whole life is here. My dreams are here," said Adriana, who is taking English classes. "I'm worried about me and everybody. My family, my kids. We can't do nothing. We're trapped."

A recent University of Washington poll found that most Tea Party Republicans don't believe Hispanics are intelligent or trustworthy. It is their goal to see fewer of them in the United States. They will succeed, to some degree, in driving out some a small percentage of among who are here illegally.  They will also succeed in destroying their party's moral legitimacy among a group that was as co-optable as any in American politics. What Pete Wilson and Prop 187 did to Hispanic voting preferences in California,  the Republican Party will do nationwide during next year's immigration reform debate.

Crist running as an independent?

Now, in principle, a sane Republican running against an insane one and a Democrat ought to help the Democrats.  But that's less true in Florida.  And it's even less true when the Democrat is African American.   There has been some polling suggesting that Democrat Meek can pull in about 40% of the vote even in a three way race, which may well be enough to win.  I'm less sure about that. 

The best outcome for the Democrats, and for the country as a whole, would be for Crist to pull a full-Lieberman and run as an "Independent Republican."  That would have tremendous "debranding" value, since it would help prove to the country that sane people do not have a place in the Republican party. 

Crist, of course, would not do that, since it would debilitate him among moderate and conservative white Democrats, whom he would need to peel away from Meek in order to have a shot.  As he tries to do this, however, he will permit Rubio to say that he's the only conservative in the race. If Rubio can hold 80-90% of Republicans and get enough independents, he'll still be in the driver's seat, since the Democratic vote will split more than the Republican vote and, sadly, along racial lines. 

More importantly, as a full independent without affiliation, Crist would have better access to the lower turnout white independents who would decide the race.  I don't see Meek getting too much of that vote, whereas I could see Rubio making a cynical, successful play at it against a decreasingly popular incumbent white governor. 

Don't expect German support for future bailouts

The problem isn't right now. The Bundestag will surely approve the Greek "rescue package."

But approval comes with a debate, and that's a gift to the opposition:

Yields on Greek debt rose Wednesday in a sign of investor concern after a Finance Ministry spokesman, Michael Offer, said in Berlin that “the Bundestag would clearly participate in legal approval” of any aid.

The yield on the benchmark 10-year bond was at around 7.2 percent, or 405 basis points above comparable German bonds, the benchmark for safety.

At the very least, parliamentary debate would provide a forum for critics of the aid, which many Germans view as a subsidy for a country they see as corrupt and irresponsible.

Approval of some sort of the other must come from 16 nations, including fellow PIIG Ireland. Per Irish Central:

The Minister for Finance Brian Lenihan is seeking to introduce legislation that will allow the government to loan $700 million to Greece as part of a $61 billion rescue package to the debt ravaged country.

The government’s decision to loan money to Greece has shocked the Irish public, as Ireland has already borrowed billions of dollars to bailout the nations banks.

As a result of the banking bailout, Irish taxes have increased and public spending has been cut.

Now that's an electoral winner! Especially in tough economic times!

The Conservative Party manifesto in England

America's Democrats are far to the right of the right wing party in England. From the Conservative Party manifesto:

"We are the party of the National Health Service today because we not only back the values of the NHS, we back its funding and we have a vision for its future."

As Sullivan notes, "Those values are collectivist healthcare delivered, for the most part, to everyone free at point of access via general taxation in government-owned and run hospitals and government-employed doctors....Obama could easily be a Tory leader in Britain."

What is the future of the European Union?

Right now, it's not at all clear. Certainly there is little political will in Germany to rescue its economically ailing (or, as they would likely say, "profligate") sister nations. And without Germany's economic might at the engine, it's hard to see a solution not only for the PIIGieS but further east.

“There has been a tectonic shift in the way Germany acts in Europe,” said Ulrike Guérot, a senior research fellow with the European Council on Foreign Relations. Germans, she says, are “talking of behaving ‘normally’ now, like the others, and that means nationally.”

The European Union is facing a serious crisis over financing and its currency, the euro. But France and Germany also have important disagreements on policy toward Russia, China and Iran, making a coherent European foreign policy increasingly difficult to discern on an array of critical issues.

The French and the Germans, with different domestic constituencies and different attitudes toward economic policy, have a different view of how Europe and the euro zone, the 16 nations that have adopted the euro as their currency, should be managed. Germany, long the financier of the European Union, has made it clear that it will no longer pay for the mistakes and frauds of others.

France has put a much stronger emphasis on European unity and pride, trying to avoid involving multilateral institutions like the International Monetary Fund in the future of the euro, a prominent symbol of Europe’s challenge to the supremacy of the United States.

“Germany is no longer, as a matter of course or of principle, the motor, heart and savior of Europe,” said Constanze Stelzenmüller, a senior fellow of the German Marshall Fund in Berlin. “This isn’t the Europe we signed up for. It’s much larger, much poorer, and we have to take care of our own.”

Germany always acted in its interests, Ms. Guérot said, but those were perceived as sublimated within the European Union and NATO, the two postwar multilateral institutions that both protected the new democratic Germany and kept its ambitions in check. Now Germany is turning more obviously to Russia for energy and commercial interests, she said, making its European and American partners uneasy.

“We sublimated hegemony,” said Ms. Guérot, a German who is working on a paper called “Germany Unbound.” “But we’re dropping the sublimation now.” She laughed, then said: “Of course, this doesn’t sound nice to others.”

This kind of thinking does not come at a good time for Greece. Of course, then, a good chunk of the transformation comes because of Greece!

The International Monetary Fund is back at the peak of its power and relevance. But with Greece it has taken on a novel challenge: helping to repair a sovereign government’s finances with neither a default nor a currency devaluation. No bailout in modern history has managed such a feat.[...]

An I.M.F. package may help euro zone leaders plug the gap for a while. But if history is any guide, Greece still remains at risk of default or a humiliating exit from the euro.

No answers here. Nor do I have any for the followup: if Greece goes back to the drachma, how many of the fellow PIIGS will be forced to follow?

But one thing seems pretty clear: German politicians have decided their people would rather go back to the mark than bail out more profligates. And that can't bode well for the future of European political or monetary union.

So, Michael McLaren, Russ Meyer and Johnny Rotten were in this bar, see

Roger Ebert's tweets and blog entries have made him of the most important figures in social networking among American writers anyway. His reminiscences about the stillborn, Ebert-penned Who Killed Bambi? are stupefying.

Will Ireland dump its blasphemy law?

Let's hope so. Maybe a bit of ridicule will help.

While working on his irreverent television series The Savage Eye, which features excoriating sketches about the Catholic church, comedian Dave McSavage says he was sent a draft version of the law by his producers.

"We were told to keep it in mind," he says. If anything, however, the law may simply provide added impetus for entertainers and artists to push the boundaries.

"The recent activities of the Catholic church are much more of an outrage than anything the blasphemy law might be there to prevent," McSavage says.

"Beside pedophilia and the scandalous cover-up that ensued, blasphemy pales into insignificance."

Because of the stinging criticism, the Irish government may now be reconsidering the move. Complaining that he has been the victim of "a sophisticated campaign, mostly on the Internet," [Justice Minister Dermot] Ahern last month proposed holding a referendum on the law, insisting that this was always his "preferred choice."

Yet another bishop's defense of the Pope

Who knew how much anti-Semitism there still was within the Catholic Church? It's as if the only good thing to came out of John Paul II's otherwise degenerate papacy grew no roots at all.

Last week, retired Bishop Giacomo Babini of the Italian town of Grosseto told the Catholic Pontifex website that the Catholic pedophile scandal is being orchestrated by the "eternal enemies of Catholicism, namely the freemasons and the Jews, whose mutual entanglements are not always easy to see through… I think that it is primarily a Zionist attack, in view of its power and refinement. They do not want the church, they are its natural enemies. Deep down, historically speaking, the Jews are God-killers."

You might think that the 81-year-old Babini had already said more than enough for one day, but once some people "pop," they just can't stop. "The Holocaust was a shame for all of humanity," the good bishop told the world, "but now we have to look at it without rhetoric and with open eyes. Don't believe that Hitler was merely crazy. The truth is that the Nazis' criminal fury was provoked by the Jews' economic embezzlement, by which they choked the German economy." He concluded that the Jews' "guilt is graver than what Christ predicted would happen to them, saying 'do not cry for me, but for your own children.'"

Bishop Babini made the comments on Friday, but the story has only started hitting the fan (a.k.a. the global press) today. The American Jewish Committee already lodged a protest against the bishop's statements over the weekend. Rabbi David Rosen said: "The high level of mutual trust and solidarity that binds our two communities today demands that there be zero-tolerance for such defamatory statements by religious representatives." Babini himself now denies ever having made them. (The bishop seems to relish controversy, by the way. In January he hit the headlines when he opined that the Church should refuse communion to gay people.)

And it's true, no gay person in a mutually consenting adult relationship would want to take Communion from...

From Aretha Franklin's standard performance contract

Striking:

Artist will not perform for a segregated audience. If this condition exists; should Artist not appear or discontinue the performance for this reason it shall not be considered a breach of contract on the part of the Artist but shall be a breach of contract on the part of the Purchaser/Promoter.

JUSIPER RETRACTION: The Vatican is right

Clerical abuse was indeed caused by the 60's.

The 260's, that is.

The history of child molestation in the Catholic Church goes back centuries. The first official decree on the subject was written at the Council of Elvira, held around A.D. 305 near Granada, Spain. The precise history is complicated, but the council is traditionally believed to have set down 81 rules for behavior, the 71st of which is: "Those who sexually abuse boys may not commune even when death approaches." It was the harshest one-strike policy: If you're caught abusing a child, you are not only laicized, but permanently excommunicated—damned for all time.

The other major condemnation of clerical sex abuse was The Book of Gomorrah, completed by radical church reformer Father Peter Damian (a Benedictine monk, as it happens, who became a cardinal) in 1051. He appealed directly to the pope about the abuse of children, as well as consensual sex among clergy—in howling language: "O unheard of crime! O outrage to be mourned with a whole fountain of tears!... What fruitfulness can still be found in the flocks when the shepherd is so deeply sunk in the belly of the devil!"

In the 1930s, a priest-psychiatrist—and also a Benedictine—named Reverend Thomas Verner Moore researched the higher-than-usual rates of insanity and alcoholism among Catholic clergy. He suggested the church build an asylum for priests. The U.S. Catholic Bishops turned down his request in 1936. Father Moore became a Carthusian hermit.

In 1947, Father Gerald Fitzgerald founded the Servants of the Paraclete in Jemez, New Mexico—the same institution Father Poole was to visit almost 50 years later.

In a 1957 letter to the Bishop of Manchester, Father Fitzgerald wrote that predatory priests (who he euphemistically refers to as "schizophrenic") cannot be effectively treated and should not be allowed to continue in the ministry:

Their repentance and amendment is superficial and, if not formally at least subconsciously, is motivated by a desire to be again in a position where they can continue their wonted activity. A new diocese means only green pastures... We are amazed to find how often a man who would be behind bars if he were not a priest is entrusted with the cura animarum [the cure, or care, of souls].

By the early 1960s, Father Fitzgerald had seen enough chronic pedophiles that he did not want to treat them and have them rereleased into the ministry, but, as he proposed in a letter to Archbishop Davis, to build an "island retreat... but even an island is too good for these vipers."

UPDATE: Corm O'Gorman, Executive Director of Amnesty International Ireland and author of Beyond Belief, tweets a salutary correction:

@jusiper Actually further. 117ad Bishop Athenagoras characterised pederasts as foes for Christianity, subjected them to excommunication

So it wasn't the 260's. It was the 60's. Literally!

Not the best kind of "I told you so"

Not at all.

Officials in Poland have repeatedly requested that the government’s aging air fleet be replaced. Former Prime Minister Leszek Miller, who survived a helicopter crash in 2003, told Polish news media he had long predicted such a disaster.

“I once said that we will one day meet in a funeral procession, and that is when we will take the decision to replace the aircraft fleet,” he said.

Will Greece leave the Euro?

Probably not. But I'm not sure anyone knows for sure. And these anecdotes by the Daily Mail's Alex Brummer are certainly food for thought.

All of this poses bigger questions. Should Greece be in euroland at all? And if it wanted out is there a mechanism for doing so?

Looked at from Athens it would not be that surprising if the government was starting to think about an exit.

After all, without the constraints being imposed by Germany and its euroland partners Greece could devalue its currency, borrow at subsidised rates from the International Monetary Fund and like some of the non- euro Eastern European nations work their way through the crisis more rapidly.

There are signs that Greek individuals and businesses are starting to fear the worst and shifting deposits overseas with some €10bn or 3.6pc of domestic non-central banking deposits departing. Such big capital outflows are, under normal circumstances, the precursor to devaluation.

Noah Millman: "Who Closed the Conservative Mind?"

A terrific piece by Noah Millman at The American Scene. One excerpt:

-Blame the South. The argument, in a nutshell, is that a successful political coalition in America cannot be dominated by the South, as the GOP currently is. The South is a distinct region in America, significantly different in history and political culture from the rest of the country. Moreover, regional identity in the South is manifested substantially in opposition to the rest of the nation. A political movement dominated by the South will necessarily manifest a political culture that is more similar to that of the South than to that of the rest of the nation, and that political movement is also going to absorb this oppositional element of Southern identity, and will necessarily become overly invested in intellectual shibboleths. What looks like epistemic closure is really just identity politics.

How brazen will the American hierarchy be?

Will they use José Gómez' status as the first Hispanic to hold a cardinalitial archdiocese as a defense against claims that he oversaw child rape? I expect so. And what is the ethnicity of the victim? Gómez may well be fortunate that the victim's identity has been kept secret.

Archbishop-designate of Los Angeles named in sex abuse suit

This is a simply shocking revelation. The Pope, who was so deeply involved in the coverup of sexual crimes during the papacy of John Paul II, has promoted an archbishop who may have covered up child rape in his present archdiocese.

A sex abuse lawsuit has been filed against the Archdiocese of San Antonio and Archbishop Jose Gomez -- the man tapped to take over the Los Angeles archdiocese.

A West Texas teen filed the lawsuit Thursday alleging repeated sexual assaults by the Rev. John M. Fiala. The teen claims the church's leadership should have known the priest was abusive.

The lawsuit accuses the priest of repeatedly sexually assaulting the teen, including twice forcing him to have sex at gunpoint when Fiala was the pastor at Sacred Heart of Mary Parish in the remote community of Rocksprings. The lawsuit alleges the incidents occurred in 2007 and 2008, during Gomez's tenure overseeing a swath of south and west Texas.

The teen's attorney, Tom Rhodes, said Fiala was "moved around quite a bit" and they believe the church "knew he was a serious problem."

More:

Doe says he met Fiala in 2007, and that soon Fiala "lavished expensive gifts on [him], including an expensive laptop computer, cell phone, an MP3 player and money and, later, a car. He bought and provided alcohol to Doe".

In early 2008, Doe says, "under the pretext of giving [him] private catechism classes," Fiala began sexually molesting him "once or twice a month," including "on church grounds."

In January 2008, Doe says, on the pretext of taking him to a "youth event" in San Angelo, Fiala took him to a Motel 6 there, held him "at gun point [and] anally raped the boy, anally penetrating him. Father Fiala threatened Doe I, saying, 'If you tell anyone what happened, I will hurt you and your family.' In February, Fiala assaulted the boy again, including anal penetration on a similar trip."

Next, Doe says, Fiala bought him a Chrysler Sebring. "When the car needed some work, Doe I went to the rectory and Fiala gave him $80 for repairs, saying Doe I had to perform oral sex to get the keys. The boy complied at the priest's room in the rectory," the complaint states.
Then Fiala began to send him text messages "daily," Doe says.

"When Doe I ignored the texts, Fiala threatened to kill the boy, saying he would then kill himself so they could be in heaven together," according to the complaint.

Doe says Fiala arranged another meeting, where he "pulled a revolver on the boy and forced Doe I to perform fellatio on the priest. This occurred in August 2008."

Doe says, "Finally, unable to take it anymore, Doe I ran away from home and eventually tried to commit suicide."

He says his school counselor finally reported the abuse to authorities.

What did the Archbishop José Gómez know, and when did he know it?

What's behind teabagger anger?

If you're American, you only get one guess. And you are correct!

Many believed that the election of Barack Obama brought to a close the long, painful, and ugly history of race and racism in the United States. But as the incident with Henry Louis Gates last summer, and the more recent outbursts of the Tea Party activists suggest, racial divisions remain. Which is closer to the truth? A recent survey directed by University of Washington political scientist, Christopher Parker, finds that America is definitely not beyond race. For instance, the Tea Party, the incipient movement that claims to be committed to reigning in what they perceive as big government, appears to be motivated by more than partisanship and ideology. Approximately 45 % whites either strongly or somewhat approve of the movement. Of those, only 35% believe blacks to be hardworking, only 45 % believe blacks are intelligent, and only 41% think that blacks are trustworthy. Perceptions of Latinos aren’t much different. While 50% of white tea party supporters believe Latinos to be hardworking, only 39% think them intelligent, and at 37%, fewer tea party supporters believe Latinos to be trustworthy.

What's the point of protesting Virginia's governor

When it's so obvious that he's following the playbook every future presidential contender has used to mobilize the Republican party base since 1964?

Let's think, instead, of someone who made a positive contribution to world civilization. The Bob McDonnells of the South fought her fiercely in 1955. But Rosa Parks' life was a long, enduring triumph.

ABC News: "What did the Pope know?"

In the case of Marcial Maciel, Pope John Paul II knew just about everything.

I don't know about you

It felt good to know that this President teleconferences with Sarkozy, Merkel and Brown every week. But nowhere as near as good as knowing that he can count on the Easter Bunny for the heaviest matters of state.

Meanwhile, this White House is surely the greatest pop culture juggernaut in the history of the presidency.  Reese Witherspoon strolled in with her kids.  The cast of Glee performed.  The J.K. Rowling read from Harry Potter.  Justin Bieber was there.  Hugest White House Easter get: the two hottest celebrities in the world, Barack and Michelle Obama.

One other benefit: as these tweens turn 18 over the next few years, they may be a lock for Obama's Nickolodeon-friendly presidency.

The original mavericks!

That was, um, the other John McCain. You know, the one who called his beloved wife a c**t in public. The guy running for the Arizona Senate right now is the John McCain, a solid Republican.

Fun in Arizona

Following the Arizona Chamber of Commerce's endorsement of John "Not A Maverick" McCain, GOP primary opponent J.D. Hayworth responded with some red meat.

Asked about the news Monday that McCain received the endorsement of the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, Hayworth said, “It doesn’t come as a surprise.”

Chamber President "Tom [Donohue] and the gang over there threw in their support to open borders a long time ago. That’s just what you see from the national establishment in Washington,” he said.

“John’s gonna have the Washington establishment; he’s the incumbent,” Hayworth added. “I’ll let him keep the Washington establishment.”

Read more:#ixzz0kI1WJgq2

She's a national treasure for her songwriting alone

But she's as gifted at singing her compositions as fellow genius Smokey Robinson is at singing his. Musician, actress, model... and comedian.

The government is about to throw the book at Toyota

And you know it's serious, because they're going to hit the company with the maximum fine, $16 million dollars.

I mean, that's like almost eight dollars per affected car!

The Southern, Christianist majority of GOP U.S. Senators would surely prefer to reduce this minimal penalty given its corporatist tendencies and the Japanese carmaker's brilliant strategic decision to locate its plants in the old Confederacy.

Given the American public's (Republican-created) affection for the death penalty, this populist moment is an opportunity for Democratic politicians to get out ahead of the pack.  The deliberate planning of negligent corporate policies that result in consumers' deaths (Toyota) or loss of livelihood (Bernie Madoff) should be criminalized.  Nothing will create corporate responsibility more swiftly than the prospect of the death penalty or, worse, a week in the rape camps better known as American prisons. 

He wrote the book on courage

Literally. And, really, it has to take a lot of courage to lie this brazenly.

Sen. John McCain (R-AZ), who's trying to fight off a primary challenger who claims McCain is too moderate, has in an interview with Newsweek gone back on his most famous nickname.

"I never considered myself a maverick," McCain said. "I consider myself a person who serves the people of Arizona to the best of his abilities."

But there are those who remember the 2008 presidential campaign, when McCain, his running mate Sarah Palin and his entire campaign constantly referred to him as a "maverick."

Just one example: An ad from August 2008 declaring the senator the "original maverick:"

Reader KB points out the subtitle of one of McCain's books: "Worth the Fighting For: The Education of an American Maverick, and the Heroes Who Inspired Him."

"John Paul ‘ignored abuse of 2,000 boys.’"

That's the headline over at the Times UK.

When John Paul II died five years ago the crowd that packed St Peter’s Square for his funeral clamoured “Santo subito (Saint now)!” in a spontaneous tribute to the charisma of the Polish pontiff.

As the faithful marked the anniversary of John Paul’s death on Good Friday, however, he was being drawn into the scandal over child abuse in the Catholic church that has confronted his successor, Benedict XVI, with the worst crisis of his reign.

Allegations that the late pontiff blocked an inquiry into a paedophile cardinal, promoted senior church figures despite accusations that they had molested boys and covered up innumerable cases of abuse during his 26-year papacy have cast a cloud over his path to sainthood.

The most serious claims related to Cardinal Hans Hermann Groer, an Austrian friend of John Paul’s who abused an estimated 2,000 boys over decades but never faced any sanction from Rome. [...]

Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger — who became Pope Benedict — had tried to investigate the abuses as head of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, according to Schönborn. But his efforts had been blocked by “the Vatican”, an apparent reference to John Paul.

Asked by The Sunday Times whether John Paul’s role in the cover-up of abuse should be investigated, Schönborn said: “I have known Pope Benedict personally during 37 years of amiable acquaintance and I can say with certainty that ... he made entirely clear efforts not to cover things up but to tackle and investigate them. This was not always met with approval in the Vatican.” [...]

Michael Tfirst, 54, one of Groer’s victims, claims to have reported the abuse to highranking church officials from the 1970s onwards. He says the church paid him £3,300 in 2004 under a contract that obliged him to keep quiet.

“There is no question that Ratzinger knew all the details of reports on abuse within the church, as there is no doubt that John Paul, his superior, took part in a massive and systematic cover-up,” Tfirst said.

John Paul also faced criticism last week from Poland for protecting Archbishop Juliusz Paetz, who was accused of abusing trainee priests. Letters detailing the charges were sent to John Paul’s office and to Ratzinger in 2000 but were ignored. Paetz resigned in 2002 when the allegations became public.

Stanislaw Obirek, a Polish theologian and a former Jesuit priest, said: “I believe John Paul is the key person responsible for the cover-up of abuse cases because most of it occurred during his papacy. How can someone who is to blame for this be beatified?”

In America critics pointed out that although Benedict has borne the brunt of criticism over ignoring the scandal of Father Lawrence Murphy, accused of molesting 200 deaf boys at a special school in Wisconsin, Ratzinger had acted on the authority of John Paul.

Another beneficiary of John Paul’s discreet approach was Marcial Maciel Degollado, a Mexican priest known as Father Maciel, who founded a conservative religious order. He was accused by former members of abuse in 1998. John Paul blessed Maciel in the Vatican in late 2004, at a time when Ratzinger was investigating him. A year after Ratzinger became pope, the Vatican ordered Maciel to lead “a reserved life of prayer and penance”, effectively removing him from power.

Thank God all this came out before they beatified John Paul II. Right? Right?!

Um...

Giancarlo Zizola, a leading expert on the Vatican, said the church officials who had gathered documents and questioned witnesses about John Paul’s suitability for sainthood had examined “negative” aspects of his papacy, including his handling of abuse cases.

“There’s no chance of Benedict delaying the beatification because of the abuse scandal,” Zizola said. “On the contrary, I expect he’ll accelerate it.”

Teabaggers still have to answer

For this:

“Rep. Andre Carson, D-Ind., told a reporter that as he left the Cannon House Office Building with Rep. John Lewis, D-Ga., a leader of the civil rights era, some among the crowd chanted “the N-word, the N-word, 15 times.” Both Carson and Lewis are black, and Lewis spokeswoman Brenda Jones also said that it occurred.

“It was like going into the time machine with John Lewis,” said Carson, a large former police officer who said he wasn’t frightened but worried about the 70-year-old Lewis, who is twice his age. “He said it reminded him of another time.”

Kristie Greco, spokeswoman for Democratic Whip Jim Clyburn, D-S.C., said a protester spit on Rep. Emanuel Cleaver, D-Mo., who is black and said police escorted the lawmakers into the Capitol. Cleaver’s office said he would decline to press charges, but Sgt. Kimberly Schneider of the U.S. Capitol Police said in an e-mail later: “We did not make any arrests today.”

Clyburn, who led fellow black students in integrating South Carolina’s public facilities a half century ago, called the behavior “absolutely shocking.”

“I heard people saying things today that I have not heard since March 15, 1960, when I was marching to try to get off the back of the bus,” Clyburn told reporters.

Sad

And, I fear, true. Courtesy of intrepid reader G.

Great ad

Teabagger basketball!

They call it "fundamental," of course. It's the signature of conservatism around the world (particularly religious conservatism) to take simple bigotry and pretend that it's a return to tradition, when in fact it might be something altogether new.

In this case, however, it actually is a return to the "fundamental" values of 60 years ago, values held not just by Southern white Republicans but, sadly, the mainstream of the modern Republican party, nationwide.

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More Good Friday fun from the Vatican

It never ends with this crew, does it? From the Jerusalem Post:

On Good Friday, two days before Easter, a prayer titled “Let us Pray for the Conversion of the Jews” was recited in Latin by traditionalist Catholic congregations in Italy, plus 16 sections of the Society of Saint Pius.

The ultra-conservative society, whose excommunication was lifted by Pope Benedict XVI last year, has yet to be fully reintegrated into the Catholic Church, because of its refusal to accept the reforms of the Second Vatican Council.

In 2007, in an effort to bring the traditionalist elements of the Church back into the fold, Benedict issued a “Motu Proprio” declaration allowing wider use of the 1962, pre-Vatican II Roman Missal containing this prayer, which was previously restricted to small groups. Three years ago only 30 Italian churches were affected by that decision, as opposed to the 118 that regularly use the liturgy today.

The word “conversion,” however, was not supposed to have been part of the title of this traditionalist Good Friday prayer. The official text, personally revised by the pope after Israel’s Chief Rabbinate expressed concerns regarding its content, was circulated in a note by Cardinal Bertone, the Vatican’s secretary of state, in February 2008, bearing a new official title – “Oremus et pro Iudaeis,” or “Let us Pray for the Jews.” However, quite unexpectedly, that title has been changed to “Let us Pray for the Conversion of the Jews” in the brand new luxury re-edition of the missal currently flying off the shelves in Vatican bookstores.

For months, Vatican officials assured representatives of Jewish organizations that the error in the draft would be amended, and during recent bilateral meetings it seemed that they were unaware of the fact that a new edition had already been published bearing the “mistaken” title.[...]

The question remains, however, how and why did the reissue of the Good Friday prayer appear without a correction of the problematic title?

A Vatican spokesmen told The Jerusalem Post that “the printing of this title was an error which will be rectified”; however, considering that the expensive new edition was made available only a month ago, the correction may be long in coming.

Shocking revelation

Unpaid interns have apparently not been paid! For years now!

With job openings scarce for young people, the number of unpaid internships has climbed in recent years, leading federal and state regulators to worry that more employers are illegally using such internships for free labor.

Jewish reaction to the papal Good Friday liturgy

From Haaretz:

"Shame on Father Cantalamessa," said Elan Steinberg, vice-president of the American Gathering of Holocaust Survivors and their Descendants.

"The Vatican is entitled to defend itself but the comparison with anti-Semitic persecution is offensive and unsustainable. We are sorely disappointed," he told Reuters.

And from the Jerusalem Post:

Stephan Kramer, general-secretary of Germany's Central Council of Jews, said Cantalamessa's remarks were "a so-far-unheard-of insolence."

"It is repulsive, obscene and most of all offensive toward all abuse victims as well as to all the victims of the Holocaust," Kramer said. "So far I haven't seen St. Peter burning, nor were there outbursts of violence against Catholic priests. I'm without words. The Vatican is now trying to turn the perpetrators into victims."

Rabbi Gary Greenebaum, US director of inter-religious relations for the American Jewish Committee, called the comments "an unfortunate use of language."

"The collective violence against the Jews resulted in the death of 6 million, while the collective violence spoken of here has not led to murder and destruction, but perhaps character assault," Greenebaum said.[...]

Peter Isely, the Milwaukee-based director of SNAP, the Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests, denounced the anti-Semitism analogy as "reckless and irresponsible."

"They're sitting in the papal palace, they're experiencing a little discomfort, and they're going to compare themselves to being rounded up or lined up and sent in cattle cars to Auschwitz?" he said. "You cannot be serious."

The Vatican goes positively insane

At the Good Friday liturgy, no less.

A senior Vatican priest speaking at a Good Friday service compared the uproar over sexual abuse scandals in the Catholic Church — which have included reports about Pope Benedict XVI’s oversight role in two cases — to the persecution of the Jews, sharply raising the volume in the Vatican’s counterattack.

The remarks, on the day Christians mark the crucifixion, underscored how much the Catholic Church has felt under attack from recent news reports and criticism over how it has handled charges of child molestation against priests in the past, and sought to focus attention on the church as the central victim.

In recent weeks, Vatican officials and many bishops have angrily denounced news reports that Benedict failed to act strongly enough against pedophile priests, once as archbishop of Munich and Freising in 1980 and once as a leader of a powerful Vatican congregation in the 1990s.

Benedict sat looking downward when the Rev. Raniero Cantalamessa, who holds the office of preacher of the papal household, delivered his remarks in the traditional prayer service in St. Peter’s Basilica. Wearing the brown cassock of a Franciscan, Father Cantalamessa took note that Easter and Passover were falling during the same week this year, saying he was led to think of the Jews. “They know from experience what it means to be victims of collective violence and also because of this they are quick to recognize the recurring symptoms,” he said.

Reaction has been swift:

A leading advocate for sex abuse victims in the United States, David Clohessy, called comparing criticism of the church to persecution of the Jews “breathtakingly callous and misguided.”

“Men who deliberately and consistently hide child sex crime are in no way victims,” he said. “And to conflate public scrutiny with horrific violence is about as wrong as wrong can be.”

The comments could cause a new twist in Vatican-Jewish relations, which have had ups and downs during Benedict’s papacy.

Rabbi Riccardo di Segni, the chief rabbi of Rome, who hosted Benedict at the Rome synagogue in January on a visit that helped calm waters after a year of tensions, laughed in seeming disbelief when asked about Father Cantalamessa’s remarks.

“With a minimum of irony, I will say that today is Good Friday, when they pray that the Lord illuminate our hearts so we recognize Jesus,” Rabbi Di Segni said, referring to a prayer in a traditional Catholic liturgy calling for the conversion of the Jews. “We also pray that the Lord illuminate theirs.”

It doesn't help that Benedict's tenure has been blemished by several questionable decisions with regard to Judaism:

In 2008, Benedict ruffled feathers with Jewish groups when he issued a ruling making it easier to use the Latin Mass including that Good Friday prayer, which had fallen out of widespread use after the liberalizing reforms of the Second Vatican Council. In January 2009, he stirred outrage when he revoked the excommunication of four schismatic bishops, one of whom turned out to have denied the scope of the Holocaust.

The legacy of the wartime pope, Pius XII, has been another sticking point. Some say he didn’t do enough to save Jews during the Holocaust; on a visit to the Rome synagogue in January, Benedict said that the Holy See had “provided assistance, often in a hidden and discreet way,” to help Jews.

Who needs April Fools

When you've got stories like this:

Lawyers for Tiger Woods are reported to be trying to halt the sale of a series of sex toys which exploit the golfer's new-found reputation as a sex maniac. They include a 'Take Home Tiger Love Doll' and packages of 'wood cover' super-size condoms.

An Easter story

Every congregation should hear it this Sunday:

Here I am reminded of a story about civil rights legend and Christian iconoclast Reverend Vernon Johns, Martin Luther King Jr.’s predecessor at Dexter Avenue Baptist Church in Montgomery, Alabama. In 1960, white Southern Baptists and black National Baptists gathered at the Seventh Baptist Church in Baltimore to discuss racial tension in the city. During the worship service, historian Taylor Branch recounts that Vernon Johns sat visibly annoyed as he listened to the white preacher preach on salvation and being “washed in the blood of the Lamb.” When it was Johns’ moment to address the assembly, to the consternation of white preachers and the humiliation of most black preachers in attendance, the ecclesial journeyman went right after the preacher who went before him. “The thing that disappoints me about the Southern white church,” Johns said, “is that it spends all of its time dealing with Jesus after the cross, instead of dealing with Jesus before the cross.”

He then turned directly to the preacher and said, “You didn’t do a thing but preach about the death of Jesus. If that were the heart of Christianity, all God had to do was to drop him down on Friday and let them kill him, and then yank him up again on Easter Sunday… You don’t hear so much about his three years of teaching that man’s religion is revealed in the love of his fellow man…That is what offended the leaders of Jesus’s own established church as well as the colonial authorities from Rome. That’s why they put him up there [on the cross]… I want to deal with Jesus before the cross. I don’t give a damn what happened to him after the cross!”

Quote of the day

Jeffrey Goldberg: "I've previously defined "philo-Semitism" as anti-Semitism for people who like Jews, but that was a joke, (mostly.)" Via Andrew Sullivan.

Andrew Sullivan

On fire.

I think that kind of shifting of responsibility makes sense in a large corporation, or even in a corrupt government (see: Abu Ghraib), but I also believe - mirabile dictu - that the church has a moral duty to behave better than a large, self-interested corporation or corrupt, secretive government. I actually believe it should lead by example in cases like, er, the rape of children by its own employees covered up by its own officials.