Surely, One of the Grandest Fisks Ever Written

Don't miss it.

On a closely related note, I almost had a hernia trying to restrain my laughter while reading this.

(Thanks, Michael.)

Lane Core Jr. CIW P — Thu. 07/08/04 09:27:46 PM
Categorized as Political.

"Catholic" Politicians and Public Policy

"Why is it important to have Catholics in public life if, once there, they're no different from anybody else?"

Non-Democrat, non-Catholic, non-theologian John Rosenberg has blogged several times at Discriminations on "the tension — and I believe ultimate incoherence — of liberal Catholics' attempt to have their cake and eat it too on the abortion question".

First, Califano Would Confess ... But He's Innocent, Jun. 28, about a recent article by "Catholic" politician Joseph Califano:

About two months ago I posted some critical comments about Mario Cuomo, widely regarded as something like the secular Catholic sage of the Democratic party. Cuomo had recently published a Bush-bashing gloss on Lincoln, and I took that occasion to note at some length that his famous speech at Notre Dame, "Religious Belief and Public Morality: A Catholic Governor's Perspective," was, ironically, almost identical in rhetoric and underlying values to the views on slavery expressed by Lincoln's famous antagonist, Stephen A. Douglas....

Although many are accustomed to thinking of the Republicans as the party with the religous problem (you know, "the Christian Right," etc.), these days it's the Democrats whose water is being roiled with controversy over faith and politics — specifically, whether Kerry in particular and pro-abortion Democrats in general should be allowed communion. Now comes former-everything Joseph Califano who in a long restatement of the Cuomo-Douglas position (both unacknowledged) in the Outlook section of the Sunday Washington Post, "The Bishops and Me: How I Squared Church and State," announces in effect that he had already solved the problem. Thus, alas, it is necessary to visit this topic once again....

I would like to argue, however, that whatever one's positions on the above matters, and despite his assurances of having solved the vexing question of church-state relations (or, where solution proved impossible, soothed them with the salve of wise and widely acclaimed compromise), Mr. Califano's article does not succeed in rescuing his fellow Catholic pols from the occasionally conflicting demands of their faith, party, and personal ambition....

The simple fact is that in every single tug of war between what he proclaims to be his religious beliefs and public policy, public policy always won. He may have balanced his "Catholic convictions" against his obligations as a public servant, and that balancing may well have been "wrenching," but once the balancing was done those convictions never interfered with his actions. In short, it is not possible to distinguish his actions at all from what they would have been, in each instance, had he not been a Catholic at all....

I suppose what I'm saying is that Cuomo's and Califano's convictions aren't what they think they are. As I either said or implied in my earlier post on Cuomo, the arguments they offer to justify their acquiescence to abortion, sterilization, etc. were also employed to justify acquiescence to slavery. I suspect the simple fact is that neither of them think abortion is as bad as slavery. If they did, they wouldn't have been so willing to go along with it....

Second, a follow-up, Life Begins ... Life Ends, Jul. 6:

.... Astute readers will have noticed that I haven't myself taken any position on abortion itself. It is a wrenching issue, and I believe reasonable, principled people can disagree about it. I am also not unsympathetic to the bind pro-abortion Catholics find themselves in. Still, I believe that trumpeting both "personal" opposition but active political support is an unsuccessful, pusillanimous, straddling cop-out, reminiscent as I argued in my earlier posts of Stephen A. Douglas's "personal" opposition to slavery while working as hard as he could politically to enable its expansion. Can you imagine Cuomo/Califano/Kerry saying they "personally" don't like slavery, would never themselves own a slave, but don't feel they have the right to legislate that belief "on" an actual or would-be slaveholder?...

Last, a preliminary blog, Cuomo Praises Lincoln But Sounds Like Douglas, Apr. 30:

.... I have, however, read, and just now re-read, Cuomo's most widely known and regarded work, his September 13, 1984, speech at Notre Dame on "Religious Belief and Public Morality: A Catholic Governor’s Perspective." This speech was widely regarded as the profound last word on how Catholic politicians should treat the issue of abortion, and by implication on how the public should regard Catholic politicians as they grappled with this issue.

I thought at the time, and still think, that that speech did not deserve the lavish praise it received (although re-reading it just now one line in the beginning did strike me as just and true: "I do not speak as a philosopher; to suggest that I would, would be to set a new record for false pride." Harcourt, take note.) I write now, however, not to give you my evaluation of the speech, and certainly not to give my opinion (if I have one) as to how Catholic politicians, or anyone else, should deal with the abortion issue. My point here is that, for better or worse, the whole tone and thrust and substance of Cuomo's speech can be read — in fact, should be read — as a restatement of the stance Lincoln's great opponent, Stephen A. Douglas, took on the issue of slavery. Nothing in the publisher's blurb on Why Lincoln Matters: Today More Than Ever suggests awareness of this irony, and I would be surprised to see it noted in the book....

Why can't we manage to find more than a handful, it seems, of bishops as good-sighted, clear-thinking, and straight-shooting as John Rosenberg is?

Lane Core Jr. CIW P — Thu. 07/08/04 06:02:03 PM
Categorized as Religious.

Happy Blogiversary

SecretAgentMan.

Lane Core Jr. CIW P — Thu. 07/08/04 07:48:34 AM
Categorized as Other.

Buchanan on Reagan

Pat Buchanan writes a tribute to Ronald Reagan at The American Conservative, Jul. 5:

“Hopeful, big-hearted, idealistic — daring, decent and fair.” So Ronald Reagan said of America in his second inaugural. And so it shall be said of him.

He came from another time and place, Ronald Reagan did, a time long ago when love of country was as natural for a boy growing up in Illinois as was a faith that nothing was beyond the capacity of the great and good people whence he had come.

He had a lifelong love affair with America, with her history, heroes, stories, and legends. Now he is one of those legends....

(Thanks, Earl — who has apparently been holding out on us.)

Lane Core Jr. CIW P — Thu. 07/08/04 07:41:16 AM
Categorized as Ronald Reagan.