Category: Current Affairs

I think it’s a good one.

EXCERPT:

This week’s column is a question, a brief one addressed with honest curiosity to Republicans. It is: When George W. Bush first came on the scene in 2000, did you understand him to be a liberal in terms of spending?

The question has been on my mind since the summer of 2005 when, at a gathering of conservatives, the question of Mr. Bush and big spending was raised. I’d recently written on the subject and thought it significant that no one disagreed with my criticism. Everyone murmured about new programs, new costs, how the president "spends like a drunken sailor except the sailor spends his own money." And then someone, a smart young journalist, said, (I paraphrase), But we always knew what Bush was. He told us when he ran as a compassionate conservative. This left me rubbing my brow in confusion. Is that what Mr. Bush meant by compassionate conservatism?

That’s not what I understood him to mean. If I’d thought he was a big-spending Rockefeller Republican–that is, if I’d thought he was a man who could not imagine and had never absorbed the damage big spending does–I wouldn’t have voted for him.

I understood Mr. Bush to be saying, when he first came on the national scene, that he was the kind of conservative who cared very personally about the poor and struggling, who would take actions aimed at helping them, and that those actions would include promoting policies aimed at keeping the economy healthy and capable of pumping out jobs. I also understood Mr. Bush to be saying–and he often said it–that he meant to allow and encourage faith-based programs that helped young men who were getting in trouble with, or at risk of getting in trouble with, the law. It was clear by at least the 1990s that local programs run and staffed by the religious and their organizations had a higher rate of success than did programs that excluded religion. Under Mr. Bush, the feds would no longer funnel money exclusively into nonsectarian programs. The inner-city pastor would now be able to get a portion.

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Guestblogger Ed Peters writes:

Lately it seems that ripping Dale Vree and the New Oxford Review has become many people’s favorite past time. Of course, Vree is no stranger to intellectual street-fighting, so knocking NOR is nothing new. But to this observer, the pile-on looks like it’s getting out of hand. For example, just recently, Pete Vere, an early-30s, fairly well-known, orthodox Catholic blogger from Canada, thrice taunted Dale Vree (who is twice Vere’s age) for virtually being at death’s door and therefore practically out of time to repent of his publishing sins lest he go to hell. (I am not making this up). That does it. Somebody, hold my glasses. I’m going in.

Dale Vree is not omniscient, his logical skills are not perfect, and sometimes he fails in patience and charity. In other words, he’s a lot like me. But also, I’m guessing, like Pete Vere. Furthermore, Vree’s New Oxford Review has all the strengths and all the weaknesses of an opinion journal dominated by one man’s opinions.

This means, when Dale Vree is right, he is very, very, Churchill-in-the-1930s-right; but when he is wrong, he is very, very, Chamberlain-back-from-Munich-wrong. While Dale Vree has often shown deep courage by standing up against powerful persons and forces for what is right, even when that stand costs him dearly—and some of Vree’s righteous fights have cost him dearly—at other times he seems unable to get off the merry-go-round of his own arguments long enough for the spinning to pass and his arguments to clear.

If I need to say it, I disagree with several positions Vree and the NOR have taken over the years. I have regretted seeing him go after some people I greatly respect and with whom I largely agree. But by the same token, some people I respect have gone after Dale Vree in unprofessional—and lately quite uncharitable—ways; that too causes grief. Was Rodney King all wet when he pleaded “Why can’t we all just get along?”

I’ve been reading NOR off and on for some 25 years—almost as long as Pete Vere has been alive—and there’s an old saying I just made up: “Blessed are the believing GenXers, for theirs is a world with abundant outlets for orthodox expression.” They can’t remember the bad ole days, when virtually every organ of religious and secular media was dominated by the monolithic chant of “Burn, baby, burn. The future belongs to therapy, not theology.” And, as if the flowering of alternative print and broadcast media were not enough, anybody with a keyboard and modem (technology that Vree has been slow to exploit, to his disadvantage in modern debate) can broadcast their opinions around the world in seconds. Fewer people remember when, for his articulate defense of Catholic principles, Dale Vree was perhaps the loneliest man in Catholic publishing. But I remember those days, and say that if, in the twilight of his career, Dale Vree is making some unnecessary enemies, that is a genuine matter for concern and individual confrontation by his peers, not for disrespectful rebukes from youth.

Has Vree brought some of this on by going after the wrong people, or at any rate going after the right people in the wrong way? Maybe so. But at the same time, the information age never forgets one’s earlier error: if, for example, Vree erred in publishing a critique of so-and-so’s writings, few bothered to read fairly Vree’s second, much more sophisticated, critique of the same person’s work, and instead immediately, and loudly, excoriated Vree for publishing “more of the same.”

Midway though the mediocre movie, Separate Tables (1958), there is a gem of a line: “The trouble about being on the side of right is that often one finds oneself in the company of such very questionable allies.” In a huge world made suddenly very small, I think of that line often. We who participate in public debates often find ourselves being joined by questionable allies; for that matter, we cause others to worry about being associated with us. That analysis applies to Dale Vree and NOR as much as it applies to any of us. But in the meantime, the tone of the NOR debate needs to change.

Consider: even if every criticism made against Dale Vree’s person and publication were sound—there are obviously questions about that—would that legitimate responding to him in kind and implying judgments about the state of his soul that even the holiest pope in history would not presume to make?

Everything You Ever Wanted To Know About Picking A Marriage Partner But Were Afraid To Ask Of Your Commanding Officer — otherwise known as a U.S. Army chaplain program called "How to Avoid Marrying a Jerk."

"’Being in the military certainly raises the stakes when you choose a mate,’ said Lt. Col. Peter Frederich, head of family issues in the Pentagon’s chaplain office.

"The ‘no jerks’ program is also called ‘P.I.C.K. a Partner,’ for Premarital Interpersonal Choices and Knowledge.

"It advises the marriage-bound to study a partner’s F.A.C.E.S. — family background, attitudes, compatibility, experiences in previous relationships and skills they’d bring to the union.

"It teaches the lovestruck to pace themselves with a R.A.M. chart — the Relationship Attachment Model — which basically says don’t let your sexual involvement exceed your level of commitment or level of knowledge about the other person.

"Maj. John Kegley, a chaplain who teaches the program in Monterey, Calif., throws in the ‘no jerk salute’ for fun. One hand at the heart, two-fingers at the brow mean use your heart and brain when choosing."

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"Don’t let your sexual involvement exceed your level of commitment or level of knowledge about the other person."

Translation from Military-Speak: "Save sex for marriage."

Here is a picture from Bahrain.

The person in the middle is wearing the standard, total-covering clothing traditionally worn by Bahraini women.

A mother out for a stroll with her children?

Then why is the child on the right wearing a black head covering?

That’s not traditional.

So what’s going on here?

It’s the latest in the bizarre permutations of American pop star Michael Jackson–who is known for putting face-concealing coverings over his children in public.

He’s a real freakazoid.

I mean, the kind you don’t take home to mother. (Or get within a hundred yards of, yourself.)

For years there have been jokes that Jackson, an African American male, decided that he wanted to become a caucasian female for some reason.

Now it looks like he’s decided to become a Middle Eastern woman instead.

I don’t know how well that will go over in the Middle Eastern environs where Jackson has recently ensconced himself.

We’ll have to see what happens.

In the meantime,

GET THE STORY.

We need to pray for this guy.

And his children.

Canonist Edward Peters will be on Theresa Tomeo’s radio show this morning at or a bit after 8:15 a.m. Eastern (5:15 a.m. Pacific) to discuss the Michael Schiavo-Jodi Centonze marriage and the canon law issues pertaining to its validity.

LISTEN UP.

Tim J here.

One-time head of the Coalition Provisional Authority in Iraq, L. Paul Bremer, gives some interesting comment on the reconstruction in Iraq in THIS N.Y. TIMES ARTICLE. (there was no registration requirement when I was there).

He touches on just a few of the many complex difficulties in trying to rebuild, from the ground up, the economic, political and physical infrastructure of an entire country… one that had been ravaged by a ruthless dictator, grinding (yet tragically ineffectual) U.N. sanctions, and decades of war (with both Iran and the U.S.-led coalitions).

In all this, there is a balance to be struck between those who will admit no flaw in the U.S. effort there, and those who see it all as one ghastly mistake, or worse.

I see it as a job that needed doing sooner or later, and that no one else was going to do. I therefore disagree with the Buchananites who would have us withdraw into a fortified bunker within our borders and wait until we are invaded. I think the present world situation is far more like a game of chess than it is like a wrestling match. The reality of Islamo-fascism makes the old pattern of clashes between nation-states too simplistic a model. I don’t know (perhaps can’t know) whether this is ultimately a just war, but it can legitimately be argued either way.

That said, I think it is obvious that blunders were made in the aftermath of the initial military campaign. This happened because our enemy employed an old, but unexpected tactic, called "running away", for which we were not prepared. The Bush administration was geared up for a longer military conflict and had only a vague occupation plan. When they found themselves in downtown Baghdad a few weeks later, they were like a dog that has been chasing a car that suddenly stops… what do I do with it now?

Bremer’s article argues that real progress is being made, in spite of the obvious setbacks.

Pray for our troops. Pray for the people of Iraq.

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Even some with firmly established liberal credentials are taking note of how pointless the way the Democrats are handling the Alito confirmation hearings.

E. J. Dionne writes:

A listless intellectual fog had fallen over the Senate hearing room on Tuesday, the first full day of questioning for Judge Samuel Alito before the Judiciary Committee. As one Democratic senator strode out to the hallway during an afternoon break, he leaned my way and said: “We have to hit him harder.”

The senator was expressing frustration over a process that doesn’t work. It turns out that, especially when their party controls the process, Supreme Court nominees can avoid answering any question they don’t want to answer. Senators make the process worse with meandering soliloquies. But when the questioning gets pointed, the opposition is immediately accused of scurrilous smears. The result: an exchange of tens of thousands of words signifying, in so many cases, nothing — as long as the nominee has the discipline to say nothing, over and over and over.

That doesn’t stop Dionne from criticizing Alito or saying what he thinks the Dems should do to try to stop his confirmation, but he acknowledges how empty the exercise has been.

GET THE STORY.

Meanwhile, on the other side of the political divide, the Wall Street Journal notes that "Borking as lost its bite":

The grand hulk of Ted Kennedy ranted that he wanted to subpoena the papers of former National Review publisher William Rusher to get to the bottom of Samuel Alito’s membership in the Concerned Alumni of Princeton. At this moment, one sensed that perhaps at last the ghost of Robert Bork had finally been laid to rest [JIMMY NOTES: Bork is quite alive, so this is an odd metaphor as phrased]. Borking was once a Democratic smear tactic. This week–amid intellectually exhausted and politically befuddled Democrats–it became a laugh track.

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I have to confess that, as much of a Supreme Court afficionado as I am, I really haven’t watched any of the hearings for then-Judge Roberts and now-Judge Alito. I mean, I have a job, and I don’t watch TV news (I get my news on the Internet), and–although I tried to watch a bit of the Alito hearings on web video–I had technical problems.

I have, though, been following Internet press accounts of the Alito hearings, as well as commentary on them from the blogosphere and the pundits.

I have to say that the performance of the Democratic members of the Judiciary Committee has been shocking to me, even without seeing it on TV.

The pictures alone tell an amazing story, and I wonder how much the Dems on the JC realize how horrible they’re looking to the public. I mean, they’re coming across as a bunch of self-important, disingenuous, hyprocritical, McCarthyite blowhards.

Y’know: Just plain Evil.

I know they’ve got to phone in a performance for their base, but this just makes them look horrible to the public. There’s an election later this year. Do the Dems really want John Q. Public going into the voting booth with memories of the jackbooted thugs of their party trampling all over that nice, quiet Mr. Alito and making his poor wife cry?

I know, I know, public memories are short, but the more you confirm a negative stereotype of you that is out there, the worse off you are.

And the performance is especially phony this time because, as I predicted long before the hearings began, there simply will not be a filibuster this time–barring an act of truly jaw-dropping, preternatural stupidity on somebody’s part (either Alito’s or a Democratic senator’s)–because to filibuster Alito would (unless he is the one who was stupid) result in the exercise of the constitutional option meaning that the filibuster WON’T BE AVAILABLE FOR JUDICIAL NOMINEEES when the next justice retires and there is a new nominee.

That new nominee will be the fifth vote to overturn Roe (assuming that Roberts and Alito join Scalia and Thomas in opposing Roe–as the Forces of Babykilling must presume they will), and so the Forces of Babykilling need to preserve the filibuster for next time AT ALL COSTS.

So what’s going on up on the Hill right now is just a hypocritical dog and pony show with hypocritical dogs and hypocritical ponies.

Barring something massively unexpected, Alito will be confirmed, and the thuggish performance by the Thugocrats on the Judiciary Committee is just an empty ritual being enacted for the benefit of their Moonbat base.

And all America–including the Moonbat base–knows it. The Moonbats–many of whom have already recognized the inevitability of Alito’s confirmation–simply want their Blood Sport first.

So those are some thoughts I’ve been having about the Alito confirmation.

Now. . . .

The occasion for me presenting them is that I want to point you to an exceptionally well-written column by Peggy Noonan.

Mickey Kaus has a little thing at the bottom of his blog in which he links and comments on various other folks in the blogosphere, and his remark on Peggy Noonan is "gold in every column."

Quite so.

And Kaus is well qualified to say so, as he’s a very good writer himself.

But Peggy’s most recent column doesn’t just have gold in it. It’s CHOCK-FULL of gold in terms of how well it’s written.

I mean, you may have thought that last week’s piece with the STEAMROLLER METAPHOR was outstandingly written, but in terms of style this week’s column totally rocks! Agree with her politics or not, Noonan is just a darn good writer.

GET THE STORY.

Kim Jong Il, North Korea’s Supreme Dictator and all-around nut job, may have disappeared on his way to Beijing from Pyongyang, according to THIS STORY over at Monsters and Critics (via Catholic Exchange).

I haven’t verified it through any major news outlets, though.

If true, it is a fascinating scenario, involving the Asian Mob, the island of Macao (which is kinda like a modern-day Casablanca), money laundering, counterfeiting in the tens of millions of U.S. dollars, noo-que-lar weapons, intrigue, the inscrutable Chinese government… and starring Kim Jong Il (that iron-fisted, but loveable psychopath) as himself.

Someone should get right to work on a screenplay.

Is it possible that Kim Jong Il has gone to visit Jimmy Hoffa?

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(JIMMY ADDS: If so, no floral basket for the Asian Mafia!)

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CHT to the reader who e-mailed.