Defending the 12th century since the 14th; blogging since the 21st.

Catholicism, Conservatism, the Middle Ages, Opera, and Historical and Literary Objets d'Art blogged by a suburban dad who teaches law and writes stuff.


"Very fun." -- J. Bottum, Editor, FIRST THINGS

"Too modest" -- Elinor Dashwood

"Perhaps the wisest man on the Web" -- Henry Dieterich

"Hat tip: me (but really Cacciaguida)" -- Diana Feygin, Editor, THE YALE FREE PRESS

"You are my sire. You give me confidence to speak. You raise my heart so high that I am no more I." -- Dante

"Fabulous!"-- Warlock D.J. Prod of Didsbury

Who was Cacciaguida? See Dante's PARADISO, Cantos XV, XVI, & XVII.


E-mail me

 
Brits test invisible tank. "Yes, we in Special Crime Squad have been using wands for almost a year now. You find it's easy to make yourself invisible. You can defy time and space, and you can turn violent criminals into frogs. Something which you could never do with the old truncheons." (Monty Python sketch)

FoxNews warns:

Before bloggers start making comparisons to Harry Potter and Romulan spacecraft, it must be noted that the "technology" relies on heavy use of camera and projectors.

Basically, a camera films the background, which is then projected upon a special surface applied to something in the foreground — in this case, a tank.

Yes, well, even the Invisibility Cloak works on some principle, dudn'it? Muggles just aren't in the ordinary way of finding out what it is.

Anyway this is a great step ahead for the good guys. What's the other side doing to compete -- rubbing lamps?

EDITED TO ADD: I acknowledge a possible downside: the Brown government could exaggerate its defense spending by claiming that it is so building x-number of new tanks -- it's just that y-percent of them are invisible!

posted by Cacciaguida at 2:40 PM

 
I don't want to prolong Buckbeak-Mountain-gate unnecessarily, but just a few links and loose ends:

* Gay writer John Cloud analyzes Dumbledore's personal saga much the way I do, except of course he sees it as a Bad Thing. (Hat-tip: Mark Shea)

* Exception Day for our NY Times ban, 'cause they printed this. Read the whole thing, but above all, picture NYT readers trying to comprehend the following:

[T]here seems to be no compelling reason within the books for her after-the-fact assertion. Of course it would not be inconsistent for Dumbledore to be gay, but the books’ accounts certainly don’t make it necessary. The question is distracting, which is why it never really emerges in the books themselves. Ms. Rowling may think of Dumbledore as gay, but there is no reason why anyone else should.

Yes, of course, Dumbledore acknowledges that at the bleakest moment of his life, when he was still a teenager and feeling “trapped and wasted,” the appearance of a charismatic friend “inflamed me” and lured him into fantastical dreams of power and influence. “Two clever, arrogant boys with a shared obsession,” he recalls, resulted in “two months of insanity.” But his regrets lasted a lifetime.....

As for his later celibacy, it has the echo of a larger renunciation and a greater devotion. That is, after all, what the fantasy genre is all about. The master wizard is not a sexual being; he has shelved personal cares and embraced a higher mission. And if he indulges in sex, it marks his downfall, as it did, so legend tells us, with Merlin, the tradition’s first wizard, who is seduced by one of the Lady of the Lake’s minions. Tolkien’s wizards — both good and evil — are so focused on their cosmic tasks that sexuality seems a petty matter. Gandalf eventually transcends the physical realm altogether.

Ms. Rowling quite consciously makes Dumbledore a flawed, more human wizard than these models, but now goes too far. There is something alien about the idea of a mature Dumbledore being called gay or, for that matter, being in love at all. He may have his earthly difficulties and desires, but in most ways he remains the genre wizard, superior to the world around him.

(Emphasis mine. Is Edward Rothstein always this good? If so, I'll have read him more often, no matter where he publishes.)

* The IOLANTHE thing. I did it in re Larry Craig (see Aug. 29 post here); only fair if I do it here too. I refer to the scene in which the Fairy Queen -- no, it's a contralto role, and she really is a Fairy Queen, sort of a cross between Shakespeare's Titania and Wodehouse's Aunt Agatha -- confronts the Lord Chancellor over a perceived slight to her nephew, Strephon. The LC dismisses her curtly, realizing only too late that she is no ordinary intruder. In the original it goes like this:

QUEEN
Oh! Chancellor unwary
It's highly necessary
Your tongue to teach
Respectful speech-
Your attitude to vary!
Your badinage so airy,
Your manner arbitrary,
Are out of place
When face to face
With an influential Fairy.

LORD CHANCELLOR
A plague on this vagary!
I'm in a nice quandary!
Of hasty tone
With dames unknown
I ought to be more chary;
It seems that she's a fairy
From Andersen's library,
And I took her for
The proprietor
Of a Ladies' Seminary!

All right, let's have a go:

JK (through publicists)
O readership unwary,
It's highly necessary
Your tongue to teach
Enlightened speech
Your attitude to vary.
A worldview more inclusive
A politics intrusive
Are de rigueur
When a characteur
Is an influential fairy!

US
A plague on this vagary!
We're in a nice quandary!
Of hasty tone
With microphone
She ought to be more chary.
It seems that there's a fairy
In Dumbledore's library,
And by your leave
We're asked to believe
It's that very luminary!

posted by Cacciaguida at 1:00 PM

 
Tory press busts sweatshop
posted by Cacciaguida at 12:51 PM

 
They say sin makes you stupid; sometimes the effect (whether it's stupidity or something else) is on other people, as suggested by the case of Prof. Luke Timothy Johnson in this exchange with our own Eve, wherein the Scripture scholar (that would be Prof. Johnson) throws over the authority of Scripture rather than face the admittedly grievous prospect of a serious rift with his daughter.

For the good-parts version, courtesy of Fr. Neuhaus, click here and scroll down.
posted by Cacciaguida at 6:14 PM

 
Sunni and Shiite sheiks kidnapped in Baghdad on way home from reconciliation meeting. But cheer up: at least they weren't being protected by Blackwater!
posted by Cacciaguida at 6:10 PM

 
Would like to get this onto a T-shirt/mug/sticker:
posted by Cacciaguida at 12:06 PM

 
Dallas Morning News: Harry Potter and the Author Who Wouldn't Shut Up
posted by Cacciaguida at 11:17 AM

 
Top Ten Rejected Titles for the Post Before This One

10. Boybatons
9. Those warts aren't from hogs, my friend
8. Dear me, is that what my hair looks like from the back?
7. Gayvenclaw v. Hufflepoof
6. Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Secrets
5. Harry Potter and the Half-Dyed Perm
4. Mad-Eye for the Straight Guy
3. No #3 -- writer on 24/7 JK watch to find out what "happens" "next"
2. Pottery Barn

and the Number One Rejected Title for the Post Before This One:

BUCKBEAK MOUNTAIN
posted by Cacciaguida at 10:57 PM

 
Dumbledore: that father-absence thing is a killer

Most of what I would want to say on this has already been said by me and others in the comments underneath my two most recent Potter posts (one on HP and the Christian theme, and one on the name "Pius Thicknesse"), but b/c people may be looking here for a post directly on the "Dumbledore is gay" thing (and that's why I just wrote it out: hello, search engines!), I thought I'd pull together some comments and links here, to express some views that are "for the editors," as they say.

1. My good friend Publius commented (and I trust implicitly in his memory of the past content of JK's web site):

Personally, I've taken what she says extra-canonically with a huge helping of salt since she totally reversed herself on what happens when a Secret Keeper dies. On her website she said (and it was a really big deal) that the secret dies with the keeper, i.e., that knowledge of it is limited to those already told and no one else can ever learn of it. In DH, of course, that is totally blown out of the water with everyone knowing the secret becoming Secret Keepers.

2. Elinor says:

Dumbledore is not homosexual, although he may, like many people, suffer from SSA to a certain degree. (He is English, after all.) The intense friendship with Grindelwald is no evidence at all of even emotional inversion. Why are people so ready to accept the homosexual lobby's assertion that any affection between men indicates an erotic attraction? Boys have dedicated friendships the same as girls have, although boys seem to demand less time and confidence from their friends than girls do, and consequently have fewer quarrels and hurt feelings.

To which I would only add: not only are there dedicated friendships that are non-erotic (and more so among boys); there may also be friendships that are eros-tinted but nonetheless free from penetration and consummation. I assume the idea is now rattling around the planet that Dumbledore and Grindelwald would routinely unwind with a little sodomy after a tough day of planning a wizard dictatorship over muggles. At the rate this is going, that may be JK's press conference tomorrow; but as of today, the operative (though post-canonical) word about the D/G relationship is "smitten," and"smitten" does not, of itself, go beyond "puppy love" or the Shakespearian "greensickness."

Put it this way. If the only "straights" among us are those who reached age 20 or so without so much as a brief and innocent fixation on a co-genderist, then, well, it's a big, big "Easter parade" out there, that's all I've got to say.

3. I myself wrote (and I endorse my views w/o reservation):

[T]he theory of D/G as British schoolboy crush makes perfect sense, esp. given D's vulnerability due to his mother's death. Anyway, in later life he can hardly be said to view that relationship as any sort of wonderful, sentiment-worthy thing, can he? Nor did he ever (within the canon) pursue any other "gay" relationships....

Like many, I too have long viewed Voldy as a flamer. Fwiw, every one of my teenage sons, in succession, has cringed at young Riddle in the CoS movie.

Grindelwald, otoh, was apparently repentant, at least of his tyrannical ways. He accepts the "political" penance of incarceration in the prison he built for others, and (so we may now read it) the "gay" penance of old age and ugliness. Thus accoutered, he eventually defies Voldemort -- "There is so much you don't understand!" -- and dies, manfully.

4. Have a look at this story from ABC News. Now granted, people aren't necessarily at their smartest when a microphone is suddenly shoved in their face. This applies to J.K. Rowling, and as far as we know it may also apply to "Potter fan Patrick Ross, of Rutherford, N.J." We do not know how "Potter fan Patrick Ross, of Rutherford, N.J." was chosen for this interview. Perhaps, like "Warlock D. J. Prod of Didsbury," he was simply willing to endorse the product. Perhaps it was a random choice. Perhaps he's the reporter's steady. We just don't know.

Whatever the explanation, how thick (in the head, I mean) do you have to be to say, in the context of Albus Dumbledore, that "a gay character in the most popular series in the world is a big step for Jo Rowling and for gay rights"? One would think a self-described Potter fan would notice, even if others don't, that the relationship with Grindelwald, which according both to the canon and to Rowling's recent comments is the only instance of gay "smitten-ness" in Dumbledore's life, is regarded -- by him, and by us, unless we're partisans of Dark Wizards -- as the moral nadir of his life? That his delay in combatting Grindelwald -- caused, we are now asked to believe, by lingering affection for the pretty blond dictator -- is a source of lifelong shame and regret to Dumbledore?



Grindelwald? What was I thinking of?

But perhaps I'm being too subtle. Perhaps the argument is a simple application of the transitivity principle to cultural warfare: Dumbledore = good, Dumbledore = gay, therefore gay = good.

But the first of those equations has been under assault by the books themselves since somewhere in the middle of the cycle. Oh to be sure, he's the leader of the anti-Voldemort forces, and his is the party to stick with in a conflict. But he's not Gandalf, and never was. He makes mistakes, and usually but not always realizes them and 'fesses up to them. His last grand stratagem -- what has aptly been called "magician-assisted suicide" -- is morally inadmissible. (So were some things done by the Allies in World War II -- yet I do not therefore wish the other side had won.)

Even more to the point, Dumbledore knows where he is vulnerable to temptation, and generally avoids the near occasions of sin. One of those vulnerabilities is power, so he declined to become Minister of Magic. That one we're told about. How about the other -- namely, Harry?

In light of the new theory (and that's all I'll concede it to be, since I don't believe an author's opinions about her characters, once the canon is closed, have any more force than anyone else's; even her statements about what she "meant" can have only as much validity as can be proved from the canon), perhaps D's unwillingness to confide adequately in Harry (for which he reproaches himself at the end of OoTP) is part of a general effort to avoid getting too close to Harry, if you follow me.

Only in HBP does D start to take H into his confidence in a way that brings them together for large chunks of time. And that's after D is already dying, because of his horcrux-induced hand injury. And even so, all of his long journeys away from Hogwarts that year are without Harry, except for the last, the one to the "Birdbath from Hell."

So: our new poster-boy for "gay rights" is a man whose one known experience with gay "smitten"-ness was a moral catastrophe; who practiced celibacy ever after (so far as the canon shows, and nothing else counts), and who exercised extreme, even excessive, caution with regard to the only other boy he may be said to have, in some sense, "loved."

Doesn't sound like "gay rights" to me; sounds like Courage.
posted by Cacciaguida at 7:16 PM

 
Gov.-elect Bobby Jindal!! Not only is this a conservative political victory of a sort that has been much too rare lately, but it also puts in scoring position someone who could plausibly fill the long-vacant -- and noticeably still-vacant -- role of "next Reagan."



This is also the first time in like a gajillion years that Louisiana has produced a majority, and therefore a victory, in its October all-party primary, eliminating the need for a run-off. (Mr. Jindal narrowly lost a run-off to Kathleen Blanco in 2003.)

More specifically, Jindal could be a unifying conservative leader for the 21st century: conservative, a Catholic convert yet able to beat back the Democrats' attempts to use this against him with Evangelical voters, an ethnic Indian yet able to overcome the Democrats' tawdry reminders of his ethnicity in areas not known for voting for dark(er)-skinned people, a Louisianan with a "good government" record (details in this pre-victory report in The Weekly Standard) -- the matchings of improbables go and on.

As will the partying of young conservatives tonight.
posted by Cacciaguida at 4:04 PM

 

'Harry Potter' Author J.K. Rowling Opens Up About Books' Christian Imagery

'They almost epitomize the whole series,' she says of the scripture Harry reads in Godric's Hollow.

...That was the plan from the start, Rowling told reporters during a press conference at the beginning of her Open Book Tour on Monday. It wasn't because she was afraid of inserting religion into a children's story. Rather, she was afraid that introducing religion (specifically Christianity) would give too much away to fans who might then see the parallels.

"To me [the religious parallels have] always been obvious," she said. "But I never wanted to talk too openly about it because I thought it might show people who just wanted the story where we were going."...

But if she was worried about tipping her hand narratively in the earlier books, she clearly wasn't by the time Harry visits his parents' graves in Chapter 16 of "Deathly Hallows," titled "Godric's Hollow." On his parents' tombstone he reads the quote "The last enemy that shall be destroyed is death," while on another tombstone (that of Dumbledore's mother and sister) he reads, "Where your treasure is, there will your heart be also."

While Rowling said that "Hogwarts is a multifaith school," these quotes, of course, are distinctly Christian. The second is a direct quote of Jesus from Matthew 6:19, the first from 1 Corinthians 15:26....

(HT: Mark Shea, whose own Harry Potter post on the First Things website can be found here.)

EDITED TO ADD: Many, many thanks to NewAdvent.org for the link, and welcome to the many who are visiting as a result. But let's make sure credit goes where it's due: as the link makes clear, the story comes to us from, of all things, MTV.com. As for me, I learned of it from Mark Shea -- but he gets many more hits and comments than I do, so he won't begrudge me some! And again, do see his own Potter post at First Things.

I'll add an opinion of my own to Ms. Rowling's remarks: it's wonderful to have her say all this publicly, but if she had never done so, I'd have been prepared to go on interpreting the books this way just the same. The scriptures deployed in Deathly Hallows speak for themselves. The Christian themes elsewhere in the saga are less explicit, but, as a "New Criticism" partisan who rejects the personal-expression theory of literature and who (with Eliot) doesn't believe that an author's own interpretation of his work is of intrinsically greater value than anyone else's, the author's endorsement of my interpretation is welcome but not essential.

That said, there is a certain triumphant sensation is hearing JK affirm what was widely gathered from previous interview snippets and the books themselves themselves: that she is a Kirk member, grounded though not quite solid in her faith, and profoundly engaged in at least some of the questions Christianity answers.

Also: scroll down a few posts to see whether the name "Pius Thicknesse" is a hit on Pope Pius XII. Spoiler: it isn't.

posted by Cacciaguida at 10:43 AM

 
The new cardinals. Only one current American ordinary, and not one anyone was expecting: Archbp. Daniel DiNardo, of Galveston-Houston. What gives? Even gossipy Whispers can only say "Don't Mess With Texas" and attribute the choice -- as everyone else is doing -- to the growing influence of Hispanics the the "American Catholicism's gravitational shift to the south."

Anything special about Cardinal-elect DiNardo?

Also: new cardinals for Bombay and Senegal.
posted by Cacciaguida at 6:46 PM

 
Michael Barone says the tax issue is back, favoring both Britain's Conservatives (Gordon Brown shrank back from a snap election because of it) and U.S. Republicans (a Republican is now competitive in a special election in a district in Massachusetts last won by the GOP in 1972, the year of the McGovern debacle).

Of course, it's going to take more that "the tax issue" being "back" to found The Next Conservatism. Still, I pass this on fwiw.

EDITED TO ADD: Dem held to 51%, in Massafrickinchusetts.
posted by Cacciaguida at 5:35 PM

 
Conversation chez Cacciaguida: famous drug tests

CACCIAGUIDA: It's so fall-like out, Marion Jones tested positive for cider. [Hat-tip: Letterman]

ELINOR: Who's Marion Jones?

CACCIAGUIDA: Olympic star; had to turn in her medals 'cause she tested positive for something.

ELINOR: When you said "Marion," I thought you said Marion Barry. Lord knows what he's tested positive for.

CACCIAGUIDA: He's the control.

ELINOR: Why did they used to use rabbits for pregnancy tests?

CACCIAGUIDA: There were too many of them.

ELINOR: You'd think they'd have no trouble standing up to pregnancy hormones.
posted by Cacciaguida at 6:37 PM

 
Gertrude Stein: Pigeons on the grass, alas
Snoopy: Beagle on the roof, aloof
Washington Shakespeare Theater: Taming of the Shrew, review
posted by Cacciaguida at 8:34 PM

 
How thicke can you get?

Returning, however, to Harry Potter. Some people are exercised over whether the naming of the last Minister of Magic before the death of Voldemort, "Pius Thicknesse," is a swipe at Pope Pius XII. "Hogwarts Professor" John Granger ("no relation"), though ultimately dismissing this notion, grants it much too much credibility along the way.

It's all very well for Catholics to be on the lookout for slights, especially with the "Pius wars" (originating, as Rabbi Dalin has argued, not from Jewish sources but from dissident Catholics and other opponents of the Church, and having the Church's authority per se, rather than Pius himself, as its true target). But this is just silly. Stop it.

You have to take the name Pius Thicknesse as a whole. When you do that, you immediately realize that, yes, you've certainly known some "pious thicknesses" in your life. I distinctly remember remarking once in the comment boxes at E-Pression that I have met Umbridge at various parishes, usually as DRE or music minister. Well, in any parish, wherever there's an Umbridge, there is at least one, and usually two are three, pious thicknesses.




Ministry of Magic:
a certain "thickness" is favored

Don't take my word for it, and don't make me post links to prove it: do a Google image search for "director of religious education." Numerous Umbridges will appear immediately. Not as numerous, but present too (especially as you click through the pages) are their male enablers, the pious thicknesses.

Come on, you know exactly whom I mean. He's the thin guy with the peninsular Adam's apple and the pectoral cross brushing against his pocket protector, who takes a lot of notes, especially when someone asks why we're doing things a certain way. Or, he's the great big bear of a guy, his arms crossed with his fingers caressing his opposite biceps, with a lobotomized grin and a ready laugh whenever Umbridge signals, by her own "laugh," that she wants one.

He isn't only in parishes, of course. If only. He's the guy in any setting who gets with the program and roots for the causes du jour as signalled by those in power. (Yes, those of us who support the Bush Administration's current Iraq policy need to make real sure that we are not doing so merely as pious thicknesses!) He avoids "inappropriate laughter" or any other speech code violation, and he is gravely concerned about the things the media (any media) tell him he should be gravely concerned about. A totalitarian system thrives on people like him, as they are naturally sycophants and climbers. They man the world's interrogation chambers, and it's not the least of torture's social harms that it tends to encourage and empower pious thicknesses.

Obviously the "piety" of pious thicknesses is a sham. It's the "piety" that, in another century, might consist of pressing hands together around a rosary just to impress Father; I tend to think that today it's more likely to take the form of holding hands and swaying just to impress Sister. (And what kind of piety can you see that is not a sham? That's just it: real piety isn't seen; doesn't try to be, anyway. It would rather be suspected of secrecy than be caught out as self-exhibiting.)

Pius Thicknesse hardly needed to be placed under the imperius curse. Yaxley, remember, is a rank bungler. He breaks through the fidelius charm around No.12 by luck, and even then, our heroes escape him. One wonders whether his imperius curse on Mr. Thicknesse even matters. People like Thicknesse sort of come pre-imperiused.

Want to meet a real-life Pius Thicknesse? Georgi Markov, a Bulgarian dissident murdered in London in1978, recalled in his memoirs how one day, when the Communist regime in his country had recently taken power, a minor figure identified by the regime as a dangerous capitalist sympathizer was executed, and an aspiring apparatchik emoted to Markov that this was, thanks to that execution, the "happiest day of his life." There went a true pious thickness.

In a democracy the syndrome is less dangerous -- as long as the democracy more or less remains one. Want to meet a democratic example? They aren't all men, you know. During the Robert Bork nomination to the Supreme Court, Elinor and I were living near, and I was working in, Washington. (Dead people are eligible for this, though normally one has to wait until 5 pm to find out who they are.) Our community was sharply divided between those families in which at least one member was a Washington commuter (and thus, as it were, "inside the Beltway") and those who were not, and who therefore might as well have been in Kansas.

One day the subject of Judge Bork came up between Elinor and a casual acquaintance who was (trust me on this) neither an inside-the-Beltway-ite, nor a lawyer, nor a CSPAN junkie, nor a public policy junkie, nor, forgive me, out-of-the-ordinary bright. Elinor and I were, of course, strong supporters of Judge Bork, both out of legal principle and personal acquaintance. Elinor's friend, however, said she was "not sure about his record on civil rights."

Something about the CBS Evening News phrasing struck Elinor as not quite ringing true, so she asked -- nicely, of course: you know Elinor! -- just what it was about Judge Bork's "record on civil rights" that gave this nice lady pause. Of course, the rest was awkward silence -- because this basically nice lady was a pious thickness. She had absorbed "nice" views from whatever news program she watched (this was 1987, remember); what might she have absorbed in some other time and place?

Obviously, it's Georgi Markov's rejoicing careerist -- or, rather, millions like him -- who is the model for Deathly Hallows's Pius Thicknesse, not Elinor's "nice" friend. But my point is: if Catholic Potter readers fasten on the first name in the un-disappointable hunt for something to get annoyed at, we will have missed something of importance in the name as a whole, as well as demonstrating that our heads are too deep into the grievance industry.

(Hat tip: Signe)
posted by Cacciaguida at 9:31 PM

 
Romanian MPs reject sale of Dracula's castle. Of course I disagree with their Communist-influenced views of Hapsburg's title to the property. But then I warned Vlad several times not to sell to the Hapsburgs in the first place, but would he listen? No-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o. Always something about needing to get home; couldn't stay all night and finish the conversation.

Now Hapsburg says the place is "not suitable as a home." I never liked it either -- damn wolves keep you up all night. But then, napping during the day is not frowned upon there; positively encouraged, I'd have said. Had to time my visits to avoid Sundays, though, 'cause I could never find a Mass within a day's ride of the place.
posted by Cacciaguida at 5:55 PM

 
Are they sure this wasn't a homework assignment?

Parent: "My mouth flew open when you told me just a few minutes ago." I'm sure it did, ma'am, but a few seconds invested in finding a different expression would not have been wasted.

To me there are a host of problems and I think it starts at home," Ray said....

"I think there should be more supervision. If that's the case and they have enough time to do such things, obviously there's not people there to supervise them," Crockett parent Gerry Banez said.

So some parents are programmed to blame parents, others are programmed to propose solutions that involve hiring more (public school) teachers.

"Campus and district counselors have talked with the students who were in the class and will be available in the future if those students need to talk." When -- between viewings of Superbad?

Still, some parents said it all boils down to a lack of respect. "No respect for authority, no respect for themselves, (and) not for the other kids in the classroom," Munson said.

You mean all that "you're special" stuff and the self-esteem curriculum didn't work? More likely it did, and that's the problem.... Any case, and joking aside, respect for sex is distinct from (though related to) "respect for authority," "respect for self" and even "respect for others." It's not a freebie automatically thrown in with them, even if public schools do manage to teach those nice things, which quite obviously they don't.



posted by Cacciaguida at 10:44 PM

 
Btw -- Haloscan (my commenting service) is acting weird. I am investigating. Meantime, if you're having trouble posting comments, please be patient. And if you're getting a message that says you've been banned -- no, the system is lying to you: you haven't been banned.
posted by Cacciaguida at 9:16 PM

 
Many thanks to those who took the point of the "new secessionist" post and comments. I will continue, as and if needed, to do mark-and-snark on this dangerous movement -- an alliance of the Birkenstock Left and the Birkenau Right.
posted by Cacciaguida at 8:10 PM

 
Passive-secessive

Here is the AP story on the new secessionist alliance of the extremes, referenced in the comments underneath the previous post. And here's who's happy about it. Like I said: the looney left and the paleocons. Actually, survey this list of contributors to LewRockwell.com and see if you can even tell the difference.

The loss of Vermont, admittedly, would be a major sweetener for any deal. Just think of a Senate without Leahy or Sanders! I'd certainly trade Mississippi for that! But no one's telling us how many southern states we'd lose, or which ones -- or why we should indulge this particular set of losers in the first place.

*SLAP* *SLAP* *SLAP* Listen up, Billy-Bob! And you too, A. Whitney Brainfree IV! We kicked a$$ in Fallujah and Ramadi and (pahdun me, ma'am) Chattanooga. We could take Burlington on our lunch break, seeing as you guys up there don't even know which end of the f'in' gun the f'in' bullet comes out of. Now go home and...


posted by Cacciaguida at 11:33 AM

 
Sinking The Anchoress

This post by The Anchoress got the honor of an Instapundit mention and a link on RealClearPolitics. Glenn Reynolds is no social-conservative, so I don't know whom she thinks she has impressed.

Anyway, her argument -- that pro-lifers must not go third party under any circumstances, because anything's better than Hillary -- is as fine an example as you could want of the kick-me-oh-mighty-GOP attitude that threatens to make prolifers politically irrelevant, as they already are in, e.g., Britain, where they are spread about evenly across all the major parties, and are accordingly ignored by them all.

The Anchoress (not a lawyer, evidently -- sorry, but one of the reasons I took the trouble of becoming a lawyer was so that when I catch non-lawyers writing ignorantly about law, I could say "Not a lawyer, evidently") supports her fears about near-term developments in the Supreme Court, re "compassionate" or "environmental" euthanasia, with links that involve legislative and policy proposals in the U.K. What she needs to make her point are examples of current litigation (not legislation) in the U.S.

Of course rights-claims such as the ones she fears, and others, are on the Left's long-range agenda. But not in the next eight years. They know the public isn't ready. And even if it were, the Court isn't -- which brings me to another fact The Anchoress appears unaware of: at present, the Court's conservatives are relatively young, while its liberals are various combinations of old, sick, and bored.

The next Justice to resign because of age will be Stevens; the next to resign for reasons of health will be Ginsburg; the next to reason just because he feels like it and wants to have a like-minded successor will be Souter. Roberts, Scalia, Kennedy (for better or worse), Thomas, and Alito will all (barring the very untimely and improbable) still be in office in 2017, regardless of who takes office in 2009.

Yes of course it would be a shame to miss the chance to fill those seats. But The Anchoress writes specifically about the Court becoming solidly leftist. Actuarially speaking, that is specifically not what is going to happen: a liberal President replacing liberal Justices will keep the Court where it is now, not move it to the left.

Now, about those news stories about Dobson, the Council for National Policy, and a "Christian" "third party" candidate -- the stories that caused The Anchoress to set sail.

Much ado about nothing. The press loves stories about shadowy rightwing Christians pulling strings. Anything rather than admit that lots of voters will decide, quite on their own, that they can never vote for a scuzzball like Giuliani. The only influence Dobson and the CNP could conceivably have is in tipping those discontented voters toward one protest candidate rather than another.

Weigh anchor, Ma'am.

See also: NCRegister on Rudy
posted by Cacciaguida at 9:28 PM

 
Feast of the Guardian Angels. Clearly a devotional gift of Spain:

It was not one of the feasts retained in the Pian breviary, published in 1568; but among the earliest petitions from particular churches to be allowed, as a supplement to this breviary, the canonical celebration of local feasts, was a request from Cordova in 1579 for permission to have a feast in honour of the guardian angels....Toledo sent to Rome a rich proprium and received the desired authorization for all the Offices contained in it, Valencia also obtained the approbation in February, 1582, for special Offices of the Blood of Christ and the Guardian Angels.

...but reflecting an idea with older roots in the Church:

There are five proper collects and prefaces assigned to this feast in the Leonine Sacramentary (seventh century) under the title "Natalis Basilicae Angeli in Salaria" and a glance at them will show that this feast included a commemoration of the angels in general, and also recognition of their protective office and intercessory power. In one collect God is asked to sustain those who are labouring in this world by the protecting power of his heavenly ministers (supernorum . . . . praesidiis . . . . ministrorum). In one of the prefaces, God is praised and thanked for the favour of angelic patronage (patrociniis . . . . angelorum). In the collect of the third Mass the intercessory power of saints and angels is alike appealed to (quae [oblatio] angelis tuis sanctisque precantibus et indulgentiam nobis referat et remedia procuret aeterna" (Sacramentarium Leonianum, ed. Feltoe, 107-8).

posted by Cacciaguida at 11:24 AM

 
Conversation chez Fellowship of Catholic Scholars conference

REV. MSRG. MICHAEL J. WRENN (to the group): ....seeing as Archbishop Wuerl is Archbishop of Washington and likely to become a cardinal this November.

CACCIAGUIDA (aside, to Msgr. Wrenn): Even with two cardinals still living?

MSGR. WRENN (aside, to Cacciaguida): No, Cardinal Hickey died.

CACCIAGUIDA: I was thinking of Cardinal Baum.

MSGR. WRENN (pause, then): You're right!

CACCIAGUIDA: Always the tone of surprise!
posted by Cacciaguida at 12:09 PM