Still the weekend.. ;) 24 May 2009
Posted by marisacat in 2010 Mid Terms, Abortion Rights, DC Politics, Democrats, Inconvenient Voice of the Voter, SCOTUS, Sex / Reproductive Health, WAR!.59 comments
A new collection of bathtubs designed to look like women’s shoes have gone on sale. The tubs cost up to £17,000. The user reclines with their feet at the toe end of the shoe and their head towards the heel. Water trickles from a jet at the heel Picture: SOLENT
Jeff Cohen of FAIR has a post up about the coming SCOTUS pick…
[O]n this topic (like others), Obama speaks eloquently. . . out of both sides of his mouth.
In revealing comments to the Detroit Free Press last October about his models for Supreme Court picks, Obama praised liberal lions Thurgood Marshall and William Brennan of the Warren Court as “real heroes of mine.”
Then he added: “But that doesn’t necessarily mean that I think their judicial philosophy is appropriate for today.”
After noting the Warren Court’s powerful role in taking on racial segregation, Obama added a typically frustrating caveat:
“I’m not sure you need that. In fact, I would be troubled if you had that same kind of activism in circumstances today. . .
“So when I think about the kinds of judges who are needed today, it goes back to the point I was making about common sense and pragmatism as opposed to ideology.” …snip…
It’s so cute the way they call him “pragmatic”…
Less important than his direct quotes, but very interesting, is the set up Cohen provides for the article… let me just give a ringing, GOOD LUCK!
[T]he centerpiece of the Times article was a fascinating study conducted by two University of Chicago law professors (one of whom is a conservative federal appeals judge) analyzing the judicial records of the 43 justices who’ve served on the Supreme Court since 1937.
Four of the five most conservative judges of the last seven decades (Thomas, Scalia, Roberts, Alito) now sit on the Court. With Anthony Kennedy at number ten, five of the ten most rightwing judges are currently on the Court. The current majority, in other words, is almost a conservative all-star team.
By contrast, among the ten most liberal judges since 1937, the only sitting justice is Ruth Bader Ginsburg – she’s number nine. Today’s other three “liberal” justices (Stevens, Breyer, Souter) are in the top 15, but outside the top ten.
All in all, that’s a rightwing-dominated Supreme Court.
The study gives credence to the claim of Justice John Paul Stevens (age 89) that he hasn’t moved left since being appointed by President Ford in 1975, but that the Court has moved right.
And it backs Stevens’ assertion that “every judge who’s been appointed to the Court” since 1971 “has been more conservative than his or her predecessor” – with the exception of Ginsburg (who recently underwent surgery related to pancreatic cancer).
The question facing Obama: Will he continue this trend of shifting the Court rightward?
Unfortunately, from what we’ve seen of Obama’s general penchant for “moderate” appointees who don’t inflame Republicans, it’s quite possible the Court will continue trending rightward – if liberals get replaced with less liberal appointees. …snip…
…it’s quite possible the Court will continue trending rightward…
More than possible…
Brings up that old question about used cars…. 15 January 2009
Posted by marisacat in 2010 Mid Terms, Abortion Rights, Culture of Death, DC Politics, Inconvenient Voice of the Voter, Israel/AIPAC, Italy, Sex / Reproductive Health.65 comments
Visitors pose next to a lifelike wax figure of US President-elect Barack Obama at Madame Tussauds in Berlin (Tobias Schwarz/Reuters)
Reading over the massively depressing news.. I am thinking maybe we could just make the 50 stars on the US flag into depictions of the Star of David… or maybe one big SoD, surrounded by a sprinkling of a few Crucifixion images… and call it appropriate. I see 44 is properly displayed with his lapel flag… and made sure he wore one for the official photo taken the other day, and soon to be displayed in Post Offices and Embassies.. and so on.
Truly, we are blessed.
…. Speaking of blessed! This is so delicious, thanks to the Telegraph, that I simply cannot snip nor clip nor whip it to some truncated dimunition.
”The Apostolic Penitentiary, or “tribunal of conscience”, has been shrouded in secrecy ever since it was established by Pope Alexander III in 1179 and until now has never provided details of the cases it scrutinises.
They are considered so heinous by the Catholic Church that only the Pope can grant absolution to those who perpetrate them.
But in an effort to present a more transparent image and to encourage more people to make confessions, the tribunal held a two-day conference in Rome in which it discussed its purpose and inner workings.
“Even though it’s the oldest department of the Holy See, it’s very little known – specifically because by its nature it deals with secret things,” said Bishop Gianfranco Girotti, the tribunal’s second most senior official.
While priests and bishops can deal with confessions of sins as grave as murder or even genocide, the tribunal is reserved for crimes which are viewed by the Church as even more serious.
They include attempting to assassinate the Pope, a priest abusing the confidentiality of the confessional by revealing the nature of the sin and the person who admitted to it, or a priest who has sex with someone and then offers forgiveness for the act.
A third type of case that comes before the tribunal involves a man who directly participates in an abortion – even by paying for it – who then seeks to become a priest or deacon.
“That is an irregularity and it means he should not receive the ordination without a dispensation from the Pope,” said Cardinal James Francis Stafford, the American who heads the Apostolic Penitentiary.
Defiling the Eucharist, which Catholics believe is the body and blood of Christ, is also considered a sin of extreme gravity and one which is on the increase, the high-ranking members of the tribunal said.
Cardinal Stafford said there had been a rise in incidents in which people would receive Communion and then spit it out or otherwise desecrate it, sometimes in Satanic rituals.
In July last year an American academic, to make a point about freedom of thought and religion, drove a nail through a Communion wafer and then threw it in a rubbish bin.
Paul Myers, from the University of Minnesota, said later: “I pierced it with a rusty nail. Then I simply threw it in the trash. Question everything. God is not great, Jesus is not your Lord.”
Such sins, which can only be dealt with by the Pope, acting through the tribunal, bring automatic excommunication from the Church. If the Pope decides to grant absolution, the excommunication is lifted.
A study by Italy’s Sacred Heart University found that 47 per cent of Italians either never go to confession or last did so a long time ago.”
* * * *
OK! I read it twice… and I think I got it. Defiling the Eucharist is the Tops. Tippy tops! Top top tippy tippy top top!
While priests and bishops can deal with confessions of sins as grave as murder or even genocide
A mere mortal can forgive the sin of genocide… dispensed by your local priest or Msg or Bishop or Archbishop. Any old thing in a cassock! Excommunication is not even part of the punshment! They probably do that one by telephone. Or both sides can assume forgiveness… even speedier!
The immortal soul… You have to love it!
Light from above… 20 December 2008
Posted by marisacat in 2008 Election, 2010 Mid Terms, Abortion Rights, Inconvenient Voice of the Voter, SCOTUS, Sex / Reproductive Health.97 comments
The aurora borealis, or Northern Lights, shine over the town of Stedman east of Fayetteville, N.C [Picture: AP]
One of nine pictures of the Aurora Borealis, Northern Lights from a gallery at the Telegraph…
W/R/T Pappas (raised in classic disjointed fashion, by me, in the previous thread):
That’s a far cry from what Pappas said about Kennedy, in part:
“Women have forgiven Kennedy, stuck up for him, stood by him, hushed the fact that he was late in his support of Title IX, the ERA, the Family Leave and Medical Act to name a few.”
When reached in her Albany office, Pappas said she was “inundated” with calls from reporters and would get back to me.
I like it anytime, for what ever reason, someone breaks out of the locked classroom and, even if babbling and feverish, just speaks.
He’s an old goat, the sooner he dies the better and the Kennedys are clearly attempting (probably successfully) to buy the junior senate seat from NYS… It sounds, but I can only guess, that the amounts of monies promised for her self funded run(s) will release enough bucks back to the party, that people will fall in line. If the voters do too, it’s a lock.
But I am far away and I just guess…
Red in the ice storm… 19 December 2008
Posted by marisacat in 2008 Election, Abortion Rights, Divertissements, Sex / Reproductive Health.100 comments
Mickey Patel sent us this photograph from Hanover, New Hampshire. “The storm made everything plenty depressing, but the trees and plants looked stunning”, he says. [BBC]
If the Warren story is worn out for you or was always boring and one dimensional… employ the eyelids or allow the seasonal haze to insert itself and scroll on by…
None other than Sully’s nookery served up this remarkable email (among his 25 or so posts on Warren) from a reader of his… who, as a young and confused pastor at a church near Warren’s, put himself thru the Warren ministry that seeks to heal the gay (bold is mine)…
[S]o when I send emails to my otherwise liberal friends telling them to send an email expressing their disapproval of the choice of Warren, and they send me emails back acknowledging the political symbolism of why Obama did what he did, please understand my frustration.
It’s obvious what Obama is trying to do by having Warren give the convocation at his inauguration, and it is understandable – but for me as a human being who was personally damaged by Warren’s theology and his church specifically, it is unforgivable.
And to cover it over with vague rhetoric about a politics of inclusion and unity is similarly unforgivable.
Some friends have told me that my “personal issues” make me too emotionally involved with this issue, and of course they do – but perhaps that is precisely what gives me the right to be upset about this decision. [...]
Why is it so few care when the so called religious do great harm?
It affected Sully for a bit, but soon he was back to:
Dish readers will know my own conflicted feelings about the selection of Rick Warren for the Inaugural Invocation. But feelings must at some point cede to reason. And I sense an understandable but, the more I think about it, misjudged response on the part of my fellow gays and lesbians. In our hurt, we may be pushing away from a real opportunity to engage and win hearts and minds. [...]
I think the earnestness and sincerity of his campaign, and its generational force, have given us a chance for something new, and I fear that in responding too viscerally to the Warren choice, we may be throwing something very valuable away far too prematurely.
He ends up referring to the selection of Warren as nothing more than a “symbolic slight”
But we should also understand Obama’s attempt to bridge some gaps in America that the Clintons, with their boomer baggage and Dick Morris cynicism, couldn’t and didn’t. This is what matters. Do gays and lesbians want to be a part of this – or sit fuming on the sidelines at symbolic slights?
And lobs this whopper – someone inform him he is ONE GAY, he does not speak for all, no more than I speak for all women (italics are mine)…
The greatest distortion of our politics in this respect is the notion that gays are in some way opposed to faith and in some way that our cause is a function solely of the left. Neither is true.
****
Malcolm Gladwell goes rather too ga-ga (imo) for Warren’s “cellular” approach… who effing cares? I am as interested in the way all manner of things sort themselves out and arrange themselves as most are… but that is NOT really what Warren is up to… some cellular building block launch pad to Jesus (fly me to the moon!)… In light of another article today in the Guardian, this from the 2005 Gladwell New Yorker piece is revealing:
[W]arren has made repeated trips to Africa. He has sent out volunteers to forty-seven countries around the world, test-piloting experiments in microfinance and H.I.V. prevention and medical education. He decided to take the same networks he had built to train pastors and spread the purpose-driven life and put them to work on social problems.
“There is only one thing big enough to handle the world’s problems, and that is the millions and millions of churches spread out around the world,” he says. “I can take you to thousands of villages where they don’t have a school. They don’t have a grocery store, don’t have a fire department. But they have a church. They have a pastor. They have volunteers. The problem today is distribution. In the tsunami, millions of dollars of foodstuffs piled up on the shores and people couldn’t get it into the places that needed it, because they didn’t have a network. Well, the biggest distribution network in the world is local churches. There are millions of them, far more than all the franchises in the world. Put together, they could be a force for good.” …snip…
Spare me.
[A]t the Anaheim stadium service, Warren laid out his plan for attacking poverty and disease. He didn’t talk about governments, though, or the United Nations, or structures, or laws. He talked about the pastors he had met in his travels around the world. He brought out the President of Rwanda, who stood up at the microphone—a short, slender man in an immaculate black suit—and spoke in halting English about how Warren was helping him rebuild his country. When he was finished, the crowd erupted in applause, and Rick Warren walked across the stage and enfolded him in his long arms. ♦
Have a hug from Jesus…
Reminds me of how Bill C trots out his usual mouthpieces at his annual CGI in Manhattan.. one of which is Sirleaf, the woman president from Liberia. The Johnsons, together or apart, of BET fame, Rania of Lebanon… and so on. Mannequins.
Gladwell was utterly uncritical. Again I think, The New Yorker is all too often the Sears Roebuck catalogue of this century. Hang it in the outhouse.
Madman sent me this today, from the Guardian… and I think in this passage the author, Michelle Goldberg, gets to the nut of what should be happening, if a different party than the national Dems were to reach out to organised religious leaders (bold is mine)…
Recently, Democrats have been much concerned with wooing religious voters, and with pushing back against the conservative calumny that they are a party hostile to faith.
But the way for a progressive party to do that should be to enlarge the scope of discussion about morality in American life, not to pander to the same prejudices as the religious right. Democrats could foreground religious leaders who articulate the moral imperative of fighting poverty, torture and inequality.
They don’t need to get religion by becoming more hostile to gay people and to reproductive rights. Rather, they need to empower the many religious voices who support both.
There’ s a thought!
Here Goldberg gets to what is happening in Uganda in the wake of Rick Warren (and Bush and PEPFAR and all the movie stars and Democrats and religious who slobber for the great good Bush has done…):
Warren is sometimes credited with broadening evangelical activism to transcend religious right preoccupations, but that’s a bit deceptive. Much has been made of his work on HIV/Aids in Africa. In fact, though, Warren has taken the standard Christian conservative approach to the epidemic, which favours abstinence and prayer over condoms and sex education.
I once attended Sunday services at the church of Martin Ssempa, one of Warren’s protégés in Uganda and a major force in that country’s devastating move away from safe-sex campaigns. It is a heartbreaking thing to watch a tongue-speaking faith-healer promise a room full of sobbing people – many of them poor, many infected with HIV – that Jesus can cure them, if only they believe in him unconditionally (belief demonstrated, of course, in part by tithing generously).
Obster and Warren, imo, are marketeers – and whatever else… And, as Moss who followed Wright at TUCC refers to the business, pulpiteers. What a shame.
Blown 18 December 2008
Posted by marisacat in 2008 Election, 2010 Mid Terms, AFRICOM, Abortion Rights, DC Politics, Democrats, Inconvenient Voice of the Voter, Italy, Lie Down Fall Down Dems, Sex / Reproductive Health.99 comments
Pope Benedict XVI’s skull cap is blown away in a gust of wind prior to his weekly general audience in St. Peter’s Square at the Vatican, May 24 [Picture: AP]
He’s OK, Ganswein is right there to his right (where else) to reassemble the parts and pieces of papa…
This ditty from BHHM from the previous thread:
During the Advent of St Ob’s Innaug
Unprecedented in its scope,
The Vatican is now coordinating with US Central Banking moves
Both have agreed to move Christmas and the current End Of Quarter to January 20, 09.“Shopping, shoes in particular, always has been an issue for me,” the Holy Father confessed in rare candid press conference from the Holy See.
Questioning Papal Authority, A Greek Reporter attempting to remind the Pope of the great Schism of the East was then interrupted by a younger shoe throwing Anarchist Greek, shouting Shut The Fuck Up! to both, while beanballing a shoe at Benedict, who, amazingly, snagged it like a Rock Star OutFielder, and immediately began sniffing it..
The shocked Greek Reporter was then hit by the second incoming size 10, neither as agile nor fully orgasmic as the Pontiff was at the time.
Vatican Security seemed thoroughly prepared , as they efficiently ushered the semi-spasmodic Pope from the room. Dragged towards the safety the Papal Residence, Benedict was still seen to be clutching the younger Greek’s shoe to his nostrils.
Speaking of things clerical, and things BLOWN
… via TPM Election Central, the group statement from People for the American Way:
It is a grave disappointment to learn that pastor Rick Warren will give the invocation at the inauguration of Barack Obama.
Pastor Warren, while enjoying a reputation as a moderate based on his affable personality and his church’s engagement on issues like AIDS in Africa, has said that the real difference between James Dobson and himself is one of tone rather than substance. He has recently compared marriage by loving and committed same-sex couples to incest and pedophilia. He has repeated the Religious Right’s big lie that supporters of equality for gay Americans are out to silence pastors. He has called Christians who advance a social gospel Marxists. He is adamantly opposed to women having a legal right to choose an abortion.
I’m sure that Warren’s supporters will portray his selection as an appeal to unity by a president who is committed to reaching across traditional divides. Others may explain it as a response to Warren inviting then-Senator Obama to speak on AIDS and candidate Obama to appear at a forum, both at his church. But the sad truth is that this decision further elevates someone who has in recent weeks actively promoted legalized discrimination and denigrated the lives and relationships of millions of Americans.
Rick Warren gets plenty of attention through his books and media appearances. He doesn’t need or deserve this position of honor. There is no shortage of religious leaders who reflect the values on which President-elect Obama campaigned and who are working to advance the common good.
But just for a taste of what a lonnnnngggg 4 years it will be, the mouthpiece Ambinder (emphasis mine):
From experience, one can presume that the decision to invite Rick Warren was made because (a) Obama likes the guy, and (b) he knows it would send a message to groups like the HRC, and to conservative Christians who might be wary of the new president. Not so much pandering as it is Obama’s deft manipulation of the politics of symbolism. Obviously, Obama disagrees with Rick Warren on important issues. He has said so, many times, and publicly. And he agrees with him on other important issues. And ignoring something like Warren, a mainstream figure who commands the respect of million of Americans, would be foolish.
Obama’s message is: Rick Warren is a part of Obama’s America, too.
Delighted not to be part of Obama’s America. Any more than I was part of Bush’s America. Or Clinton’s. We’re here at the same time, but we are not alike.
Another example of what a long, bad, tired blow job the years will be… this from Sully (who by the way is still on Palin and, specifically, the Trig pregnancy):
I think the choice of Warren is almost certainly designed, in fact, as a unifying move – and it is a signal that Obama has every intention of reaching out to Christianists who have some liberal leanings on poverty, the environment, and heterosexual HIV and AIDS. (Check out the last time Rick Warren reached out to gay people with HIV or AIDS.) I understand where Obama’s coming from, and I don’t think
this is an inherently bad idea.Building such a liberal Christianist coalition is something I saw coming, and sadly see no way to avoid.
But not on the backs of gay people, please, Mr president-elect. Wedge politics is wedge politics, whether practised by Clintons, Bushes, or, yes, Obama.
Sully also says UGH. But before “ugh”, before the news of the Warren selection was announced today, he had several posts today calling out Warren (one linking him to the hated Palin). Now, Warren is clearly a BFF of ObLand. So very clear it is, that Sully fusses but genuflects to his dear-president elect.
“Liberal christianist coalition”? IN WHAT UNIVERSE?
Get a clue, Ob likes Warren. His kind. A long line of cassocked users hang off Ob, Meeks, Phleger and Wright, all of the SS Chicago world, Donny McClurkin, others … Ob liked to join in the weekly “prayer circle conference call”, held by his cadre of “ministers”. FIGURE IT OUT.
And the likes of Glen Reynolds just laugh, and why not.
Grow up FFS, throw a shoe.
IOZ:
What never ceases to amaze and astound me, and what is true of patriots of all stripes, whether Progs or Blue Dogs, Christian Conservatives or Lou Dobbs, is that they all profess an undying love for some country that has never existed.
Should ride at the top of the bullet points of life… 11 December 2008
Posted by marisacat in 2008 Election, Abortion Rights, Democrats, Inconvenient Voice of the Voter, SCOTUS, Sex / Reproductive Health.105 comments
Abandoned factory – Brooklyn – Reuters – The full graffiti is: No More Corporate Bullshit! Fuk Wall Street!
works for me…
Someone just popped me this by email (the bolding and coloration from the emailer, italics are mine)… My own guess for some time now is that there is an outright, but never to be publicly admitted to, deal. Not that the best known of the womens’ rights, or abortion rights, orgs are all that much (they are not), but I would guess they have been told:
Don’t embarrass Ob and the Democratic majority congress. This is the best we will ever get, get over yourselves, sell T-Shirts and raise cash on the specter of Palin. Good luck and don’t call.
Not, as I said, that the orgs care.
But what makes this year different from the last time a Democratic president took over from a Republican is that beyond those immediate changes, abortion-rights groups say, they may not press for more sweeping changes that would take legislative action by Congress.
Those include actions like repealing the Hyde Amendment, which bars federal funding of abortions for poor women, or pushing for passage of the “Freedom of Choice Act,” which is intended to write the protections of Roe v. Wade into law, but which would also eliminate many abortion restrictions the court has allowed over the years, such as parental notification or consent laws.
“You’ve got to be practical, you’ve got to be realistic here,” says Keenan of NARAL. “You have to look at the votes. And I just don’t believe the votes are there” for some of the things abortion-rights groups would like to do.
Douglas Johnson, federal legislative director of the National Right to Life Committee, agrees with Keenan. He says that while his side may be playing defense next year, don’t count it out.
“We’re going to mount a very vigorous defense of the existing pro-life policies,” he said. “The ban on partial-birth abortions, the Hyde Amendment, and these other policies have broad popular support and they were won with great effort, and we certainly are going to defend them to the best of our ability.”
Meanwhile, Cecile Richards of Planned Parenthood said abortion-rights groups are taking seriously Obama’s pledge to try to change the tone of the debate.
“I think the American people are ready for us to get ideology out of the government and focus on solving problems,” she said. Richards says her group will be happy to focus on things like providing preventive health services to women, including birth control, which is far more popular among lawmakers.
But the biggest abortion fight of all could come in a relatively unexpected venue, as part of the effort to overhaul the nation’s healthcare system. If there is a national health plan, abortion-rights groups will want to make sure abortion is a covered benefit and anti-abortion groups will want to stop that. It could make most previous abortion fights pale in comparison.
Crash 18 September 2008
Posted by marisacat in Abortion Rights, California / Pacific Coast, DC Politics, Inconvenient Voice of the Voter, Italy, Lie Down Fall Down Dems, Paris, SCOTUS, San Francisco, Sex / Reproductive Health, WAR!.82 comments
Dollar Bill Origami Scorpion by Nano
A few days ago, before all that has been stewing and brewing hit big, I read that US visitors to Paris are running 20% off usual numbers. Prepare for fewer visitors I would say…….
Dollar sinksThe dollar fell sharply Wednesday as Treasury yields collapsed, despite getting a boost from the Fed’s rate-holding decision Tuesday.
“Foreign governments move trillions of dollars into Treasurys, but now they have yields that don’t make up for inflation,” Sousa said. “Everyone is worried about systemic risk, so they are investing in countries that offer higher yields.”
The 15-nation euro cost $1.4349, up from $1.4120 in the previous session. That’s a whopping 1.6% drop – the dollar usually trades in a range of just tenths of a percent on a daily basis. The British pound bought $1.8211, up from $1.7831 Tuesday – a 2.1% drop.
Against the Japanese yen, the dollar fell to ¥104.80, down 0.8% from ¥105.65.
Wall Street’s woes also weighed heavily on the dollar. Investors feared that the rising number of government bailouts will force the government to print more dollars, devaluing the U.S. currency.
“The market is concerned that the Fed will intervene if there is a new AIG,” said Sousa. “Investors are worried that the Fed will run out of cash.”
^^^^^^^
ALESSANDRO DI MEO/ ANSA /BGG
And… apropos of nothing to do with Wall St turmoil, but this dicey opinion piece ran in the San Francisco Chronicle. So far, just one comment (pro).
The last grafs:
[A]nd yet, Catholics for Choice has the audacity to challenge the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops on the church’s teaching related to abortion. O’Brien’s final line states that “the bishops would better serve American Catholics by acknowledging their true priorities.”
It is the responsibility of Catholic bishops to teach clearly what Christ in his church teaches about faith and morals, and to oppose erroneous, misleading and confusing positions when they are advanced. The Catechism of the Catholic Church states: “Human life must be respected and protected absolutely from the moment of conception. Since the first century the Church has affirmed the moral evil of every procured abortion. This teaching has not changed and remains unchangeable. Direct abortion, that is to say, willed either as an end or a means, is grossly contrary to the moral law.”
In matters of faith and morals – proclaimed either “fallibly” or “infallibly” by the Catholic Church – the bishops have an authoritative role as teacher. The faithful have the responsibility of accepting the teaching and adhering to it with a religious assent. The reason for this is eternal salvation. The idea that politicians can usurp this teaching authority is ridiculous.
Vicki Evans is the Respect Life Coordinator for the Office of Public Policy & Social Concerns for the Archdiocese of San Francisco.
I don’t even know who is Archbishop of San Francisco anymore*… Our last was Levanda, now ascended to the spot Ratzinger used to hold in the Vatican, global doctrinal enforcement. It was said that Levanda and Ratzy-Nazi are “close”. Levanda was sent to keep a lid on us (because thru the parochial schools here the Church has more power than merely over the Sunday parishoners and collection plate donors). And Levanda’s job was to clean up and clean out the diocese swamp after the Archbishop before him, John R Quinn.
You can search high and low there is no written, accessible record of what Quinn did while in office. I originally heard about it, as it was ongoing around ‘91, from gay friends.
Quinn was not a paedophile (well, at least I never heard that he was) but he had a taste for very young looking, tough young men. Not just a passing fancy, or a night out in a controlled and private place… oh no. Quinn had quite a few he kept, several of whom he set up in private homes, dotted around the Bay Area. Why he had a taste for suburban enclaves I will never figure out. But he did. He did not just rent them homes on the Catholic collection plate ticket, oh no. He BOUGHT them homes. Talk about leaving a trail…
Eventually the outflow of monthly cash for mortgages was a visible drain, and a crisis developed, a cash crisis, for the Catholic Church in San Francisco. Much wailing and crying for many months… as what was available to sell to recoup the lost money? Did they sell their investment rental property in some of the poorer parts of the City? Noooooo… they wrangled for months, contentious meetings with parents and priests over which parish properties, some with beloved parochial schools attached, to sell – not necessarily of value in themselves, but large plots in good locations, often on corners.
Quinn had been approaching retirement and had planned, as he was known to be “close” to JPII, to finish his days in ducal luxe at some fabulous ancient property in Italy, was, instead, summarily off shored to………. Oxford. And recently, at least part time, shared a very comfortable home [scroll down] on the premises of a peninsula seminary, south of the City, with a paedophile (oh just “accused”) priest who also consults for the church on abuse cases. Well, no real surprise there!
But.. you know, we should conform to the US Conference of Catholic Bishops… whether or not we are Catholic. Who cares if the pope is Catholic – or Italian or Polish or German – the Supreme Court is.
^^^
Listening to chatter about Morgan Stanley and Wachovia in “talks”, sounds a lot like the Church… all you can do is laugh. I am also hearing Jim Cramer (why is he credible? about anything?), that screaming loon, say, “if you can’t take the pain, it’s OK to sell something”. You “can take something off the table”, just don’t leave the church.
Permission permission. Fucking stop needing their permission.
^^^^
* I see it is Niederauer, a former HS classmate of Levanda. LOL Here is a quote from Archbishop Niederauer, via Wikipedia:
“Our belief is that we have to hold up the standard of abstinence, and we do that in all of our teaching about sexuality by saying that sexual activity outside of marriage is wrong. Now that’s a very high bar to set and I understand that. And I don’t regret that – I subscribe to it and I teach it. I understand why people find it difficult and disagree with it. I understand why they do. I don’t agree with them…. What I would say is that people who disagree with us can disagree without being disagreeable.“
Oh I don’t know… I feel like getting out a broad brush of “disagreeable”, Just for .. FUN.
^^^^^^
In my inbox tonight is a beg… yes a beg, from Keenan of NARAL, to please contact congress so that:
Right now, members of Congress are writing next year’s budget bill, and determining what programs get funded at what levels. We need as much political will behind pro-choice priorities as possible, given President Bush’s persistent veto threats.
- Fix the birth-control price crisis. Congress must bring down the price of birth control to $5 or $10 instead of $50 or more for students and low-income women.
- Improve women’s health by increasing funds for the federal family-planning program.
- Cut taxpayer dollars on fraudulent “abstinence-only” programs.
I am pretty sure if I keep reading Kathryn Jean Lopez, that vigilant pro-life Catholic eagle eye, at NRO’s The Corner, I will know more than if I wait for the Dems to “let” me know. It was she who let me know (I read her cackling joy at congress shafting Planned Parenthood funding) that the congress had slashed funds for subsidised birth control as the budget worked its way along…
Everything is working out so well………..
Turkey – carvings on street paver stone indicating the route to a bordello
So… little girl… 17 September 2008
Posted by marisacat in 2008 Election, Abortion Rights, DC Politics, Inconvenient Voice of the Voter, Italy, Sex / Reproductive Health, WAR!.112 comments
Cat Mouse – AFP/Getty
So.. little girl… how will you be voting?
That seems to be the atmosphere all about. Tho I read that white men in Ohio are shifting to, or back to, Ob. I am wondering if those men have whiplash… perhaps they did not like Hillary a few months ago, talked their way to McC, then whoops the VPessa pick (for real) and now have to talk themselves into Ob.
It all could get tiring… this is much more complicated than ordering a dessert with three flavors of ice cream, of your choice…. Or is it?
McClatchy put up a run thru of some recent Leno stabs (in addition to relating that SNL had the highest viewership in 6 years for the Palin Clinton skit, not sure what, if anything, that means)… here are the last 4 or 5
They also revealed that Sarah’s husband Todd, who works in the oil field…His Secret Service code name is “driller.” I guess they figured Bill Clinton wasn’t using it anymore.
And as you know they’ve already come out with a Sarah Palin action figure. Today the Democrats released a Joe Biden action figure, and it talks…and talks…and talks… You can’t get the thing to shut up.
And the other day while talking to a group of supporters, Joe Biden said that Hillary Clinton might have been a better pick for vice president than him. Yeah, that’s one way to get the base fired up, huh? Tell them they picked the wrong person.
And according to an AP article in the paper today, Sarah Palin’s church in Alaska is promoting a conference that promises to convert gays into heterosexuals through the power of prayer. They call it “pray away the gay.” It’s a lot better than the original title: “Think outside the bun.”
And Charles Rangel, Chairman of the Ways and Means Committee, the guy who writes the tax codes. He has been found to be in default on taxes on income of a beach villa that he owns in the caribbean. Rangel blamed it on his accountant and then said he didn’t understand the law. Didn’t understand it? He wrote it! If he don’t understand it how screwed are we?
We are surrounded by and with slap happy half dead spin. Need better comics. When the first Gulf War was going, in ‘91, I dropped in on Saturday Night Live, which I had not seen in years. Imagine my shock… when the jokes were essentially pro war.
I don’t remember anymore what year Sinead O’Connor tore up, on camera, before a live audience on SNL, a photo of JPII. Who better than an Irish woman? It seemed minor to me as I watched her do it, but very appropriate. Imagine my surprise the next day.
I see imdb says it was ‘92
Love the sense of panic in this short take on it at imdb and the quick move to revisionist history…
In the 3 October 1992 episode, musical guest Sinéad O’Connor caused a huge international stir when, after singing an a capella version of Bob Marley’s War, she tore up a photograph of Pope John Paul II and shouted, “Fight the real enemy!”. The audience sat in stunned silence, and in the control room Lorne Michaels ordered that the “Applause” sign NOT be turned on. The incident prompted over 6,000 viewer complaints. The following week (10 October 1992), host Joe Pesci held up the restored photo during his opening monologue. In the repeats of the infamous episode, O’Connor’s performance of “War” has been replaced with the dress rehearsal version in which she held up a picture of a little girl, then smiled and bowed after finishing the song. Numerous times after this fiasco, the Saturday Night Live cast would pay mocking tribute to O’Conner by having cast member Jan Hooks play O’Conner, and other characters trying to lighten her up. more
“a huge international stir”… wow… the world itself has bad spin down. Sounds like a B horror movie from the 50s. And only 6K in complaints. Janet’s tit got 200,000 emails. Well, we knew the loons were organising, all these years.
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A quick way to snag information on the bombing of the Embassy in Yemen is… right off the page at The Page!
Blasts Rock U.S. Embassy in Yemen
A car bomb targeting the U.S. Embassy hit the front gate of the compound in Yemen’s capital Wednesday.
Two suspected car bombs detonated and there was an exchange of gunfire between embassy guards and unidentified attackers, according to eyewitnesses. Hundreds of heavily-armed troops have now been deployed around the U.S. embassy compound.
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file photo – afp/getty
From the CNN report:
[T]rev Mason, a British citizen who witnessed the attack told CNN there was a large explosion and a ball of flames. He said there were reports of lots of casualties.
Mason who lives in a compound opposite the building said he saw “a massive fireball.”
Listen to witness describe attack »
“We heard the sounds of a heavy gun battle going on,” he told CNN. “I looked out my window, and we saw the first explosion going off — a massive fireball very close to the U.S. Embassy.
“The gun battle went on for a further 10 to 15 minutes, followed by two further loud explosions.”
Mason said emergency services had been on the scene putting out fires.
“The situation is quiet now but obviously very tense,” he said. ::snip::
Shouldn’t we invade Yemen now? Or, at least air bomb it? Just to be sure? Isn’t that it is the “ancestral home of bin Laden” enough?
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Intermittent Bystander just added these to the previous thread:
BBC :
A car bomb and rocket attack on the US embassy in Yemen has killed at least 16 people, including civilians and Yemeni security guards, Yemen officials said.
::snip::
Security sources said six members of the Yemeni security forces, six attackers, and four bystanders were killed in the attack, which occurred at about 0830 (0530 GMT).
WaPo:
“It shook everything in my home,” said Saddam Hussein, a Yemen man living about 200 yards from the embassy. “One big explosion, then smaller explosions, and gunfire.”
The vehicle bomb exploded at the main gate, said embassy spokesman Ryan Gliha. There did not appear to be any major damage to the embassy building, Gliha said.
::snip::
The Yemen embassy has been the target of numerous attacks since 2002. In the most recent assault, three mortar rounds hit a nearby school for girls in March, killing a security guard and injuring about 20 girls and others. Other attacks include one in 2006, when a man armed with an automatic weapon opened fire outside the embassy, saying he wanted to kill Americans. Security forces shot him and captured him, without other injuries.
The acceptable woman 5 September 2008
Posted by marisacat in Abortion Rights, Democrats, Inconvenient Voice of the Voter, Sex / Reproductive Health.97 comments
Catholic nuns from the Missionaries of Charity order in Calcutta sing hymns on the 11th anniversary of the death of Mother Teresa [Picture: REUTERS]
I went to Angry Arab to see if he still had his easy side bar link to a Mother Theresa take down, a la Hitch’s (one thing I do agree with Hitch on is MT and Kissinger) and saw this while there.
“Ever since it bombed the Taliban from power in 2001, America has relied on air power in Afghanistan to make up for a shortage of troops. As the Taliban and other militants have gained strength, America has dropped more bombs, killing more civilians. Usually, as in Azizabad, the strikes are called in by American special forces, who are part of a counter-insurgency force that operates independently from Afghanistan’s NATO-led peacekeepers. According to American military figures, civilian deaths in airstrikes increased from 116 in 2006 to 321 in 2007. Over the same period, the number of American air-raids in Afghanistan increased by a third, and the number of bombs dropped doubled. Afghan officials say that in the past two months at least 165 civilians have been killed in four American airstrikes.”
Earlier tonight I heard that the death toll for US soldiers in Afghanistan, this past month, was 22. Ever rising. Rising to meet Jesus surely.
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Just saw this from Madman at the tag end of the last thread… and since I am bats on what lame slime the Dems are:
RFLMAO: Harry Reid Puts Lieberman On Notice After GOP Convention Speech
Senate Democrats hinted at payback Thursday for Sen. Joe Lieberman, who called Barack Obama an untested candidate beholden to Democratic interest groups in a prime-time Republican National Convention address.
Lieberman, a Democrat-turned-independent and a close friend of Republican presidential candidate John McCain, still caucuses with Democrats, which allows them to control the Senate with a 51-49 majority . A spokesman for Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev., indicated Thursday that Lieberman may no longer be welcome.
“Lieberman went too far when he distorted Sen. Obama’s record,” said Reid spokesman Jim Manley. “From Reid’s perspective, (Lieberman) has every right to give a partisan speech to whomever he wants. But he doesn’t have the right to distort Sen. Obama’s record like that. Sen. Reid was very disappointed in Lieberman’s speech.”
Added Manley: “The Democratic caucus will likely revisit Lieberman’s situation after the November elections.”
Asked if Reid was putting Lieberman on notice, Manley replied: “Without overplaying it, the answer is, yes.”
Manley refused to discuss what options Democrats might consider in dealing with Lieberman.
“There is no plan,” Manley said. “I assume this is something the Democratic caucus will discuss after the elections in November.”
Basically, when it no longer matters.
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Mcat… yeah why bother. I have also caught the drift that the Dems plan virtually nothing for the waning days of the 110th. They will basically return home, gird their quivering mouse loins and prepare to govern.
Oh don’t make me laugh.
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At KGO when there is a quake they suspend whatever is the topic and open the lines to calls and reports on the quake (we are good at extended death watch, we are, LOL) and others are saying, how odd and different this quake was. Short fast hard jolt. I am in a pre quake, 1903 wood frame house and I am on solid rock (and I do mean solid) so I naturally ride it as a roll usually…. but it was unsettling. Normally I love them.
Anyway the final take is 4 pt on the Richter… 10 miles deep N/NE 2 miles out of Alamo – East Bay – with aftershocks from 1.9 …
Can there be a malevolent quake.. LOL? Maybe.
Looking safer than the silly season… 3 September 2008
Posted by marisacat in 2008 Election, Abortion Rights, DC Politics, Democrats, Inconvenient Voice of the Voter, Sex / Reproductive Health, The Battle for New Orleans.118 comments
A sheriff’s truck drives around downed power lines after Hurricane Gustav stormed through Monteguet, La., on Monday, Sept. 1, 2008. (AP Photo/Amy Sancetta)
I will be listening to Palin tonight, I would not miss it…
Just remember, if you need an abortion, or the tampax machine or the condom machine, raise your hand, ask nicely, and you will be issued a nice pink hall pass. Specially treated to be visible at night, like lights on a bicycle. Proof that you have permission is a big blue dot on the nice pink pass. Clerics, male members of your family (this includes a son of the age of majority), physicians, other non-specific males in authority, have these passes available for you…
Say thank you… nicely.
