Month: March 2010

A reader writes:

I appreciate your insights about how repression of sexuality helped create the climate fostered both the abuse and the cover-up.  I think it played in another way as well, by ensuring that no one in position of authority to respond to these situations had a "typical" (i.e., parental) relationship with children.  I can't help but think that if even one person sitting in those rooms, deciding what to do about an offending priest, had been somebody's mother, or even somebody's father, the outcome would have been different.  This is not to say that non-parents can't have fiercely protective and sincerely empathetic feelings for children (I don't have them myself, and I certainly "get it"), but just to note that the parent perspective would have been an important part of the conversation.

Another writes:

I was a gay teen in rural Utah in the 1980s; miserable is far too inadequate a word to describe my teenage years in that place.  I escaped to attend a Catholic High school where a priest everyone assumed was gay was one of my saviors – compassionate, funny, profoundly spiritual; he treated students with such dignity that in a few conversations he saved my soul – and my life.

He was handsome and charming and we called him “father what a waste.”  A catholic priest saved my life – the Catholic church saved my life.  He never once laid a hand on me – and I pray to God he never once laid a hand on anyone else.  As the seemingly endless flood of revelations of sex abuse emerge, I weep for the church, I weep that I find myself hoping against hope that the priest I so respected never abused a child. 

Maybe, just maybe, the spirit of God is working in the world – that these revelations are occurring in Lent should suggest it is time for the church to reflect on what truly matters, to give up what it must give up in order to bring itself back into accordance with the spirit of God.

Scott Morgan follows up:

I seriously doubt any of this has anything to do with concerns about the impact of marijuana use on an athlete's performance…The real issue is that you have to worry about these guys failing drug tests or getting arrested and then having to deal with seismic media attention and pissed off corporate sponsors. It's all about money, but you can't say that without revealing the mindlessness of marijuana policy in general, which the NFL isn't about to weigh into. Instead, we're stuck with marijuana-in-sports coverage that remains ubiquitous, yet utterly devoid of substance.

"[Conservative and Republican critics of Obama] cannot point to any decrease in Obama’s actual support for Israel, because there has been no decrease of any kind, so they are reduced to talking about “subtle shifts in perception,” feelings, moods, and changes in style. These shifts are so subtle that they can only be seen by the trained eye of the ideologically-motivated pundit. As I have said before, Obama’s critics were once obsessed with his supposed superficiality, and now it is they who cannot stop talking about purely superficial things when criticizing him," –Daniel Larison.

A Golden Headed Lion Tamarin monkey, native to the Amazon rainforest, experiences its new home in the living rainforest enclosure at ZSL London Zoo, in London, on March 25, 2010. 'Rainforest Life', built inside a bio-dome, is a breeding facility for free-roaming monkeys, sloths, tree anteaters and birds. It includes, real rain, living trees and tropical climates in what is hoped to be a love nest for a host of endangered animals. The Zoo's new flagship experience for 2010 opens on Saturday March 27.By Ben Stansall/AFP/Getty.

Marian Wang interviews Walter Robinson, who covered church abuse in Boston for the Globe:

I’ve always maintained that the problems that were so obvious and widespread in the Boston Archdiocese were no different than any other diocese in the United States, or really anywhere in the developed world. It isn’t that there was something strange in the water in Boston that made priests abuse children. It’s just that because of our good fortune, and our collective good fortune in getting the courts to order the church to release all the personnel files, we got a much better idea in Boston of how common and widespread the problem was. And this part is important, given how focused the church has been everywhere in keeping this covered up.

Erick Schonfeld passes along Visible Measures' updates to the Hundred Million Views Club:

Soulja Boy’s Crank Dat might be the most-watched viral video of all time, with a collective 722 million views, but Lady Gaga just became the first artist to surpass one billion online video views across her three most popular videos: Poker Face (375 million views), Bad Romance (360 million views), and Just Dance (273 million views). Not far behind are the two trailers for the Twilight Saga movies, which have combined views of 984 million.

"I thought I’d said no about as many ways as I could. I really do mean no. We have all these artful ways of doing it. I’ve tried Shermanesque responses, which everybody goes and finds out what Sherman said was pretty unequivocally no. I’ve done several different ways. I’ve tried quoting the country song, ‘What Part of No Don’t You Understand?’ I mean, I really do mean that. I feel very privileged to be able to serve our country. I’m honored to continue to do that as long as I can contribute, but I will not, ever, run for political office, I can assure you. And again, we have said that repeatedly and I’m hoping that people realize at a certain point you say it so many times that you could never flip, and start your career by flip-flopping into it," – David Petraeus, declining to run for president for the nth time.

(Hat tip: Weigel)

Brain and Craig Wansink's latest study has been getting a fair amount of attention. Brain Wansink discusses it over at the Food Channel:

[N]one of the three descriptions of [the Last Supper] in the New Testament say anything about the food. This would mean that an artist's depiction of the food would be sort of a Rorschach food test of what he thought was normal and appropriate for his day.

My brother—a religious studies professor at Virginia Wesleyan College—and I indexed the sizes of all of the entrees, loaves of bread, and even plates in the 52 most famous Last Supper paintings from the past millennium featured in Last Supper (2000, Phaiden Press), based on the sizes of people's heads. Through plagues and potato famines, the average size of entrees increased by 69 percent, plates by 65 percent, and bread by 23 percent. (The only thing that didn't continually increase with time was the number of wine bottles on the table—that peaked in the apparently party-happy 16th century.)

David posts his resignation letter and insists it had nothing to do with his recent scathing criticism of the GOP. Bruce Bartlett sympathizes:

I don't know all the details, but I presume that his Waterloo post on Sunday condemning Republicans for failing to work with Democrats on healthcare reform was the final straw.

Since, he is no longer affiliated with AEI, I feel free to say publicly something he told me in private a few months ago. He asked if I had noticed any comments by AEI "scholars" on the subject of health care reform. I said no and he said that was because they had been ordered not to speak to the media because they agreed with too much of what Obama was trying to do.

It saddened me to hear this. I have always hoped that my experience was unique.

But now I see that I was just the first to suffer from a closing of the conservative mind. Rigid conformity is being enforced, no dissent is allowed, and the conservative brain will slowly shrivel into dementia if it hasn't already.

Sadly, there is no place for David and me to go. The donor community is only interested in financing organizations that parrot the party line, such as the one recently established by McCain economic adviser Doug Holtz-Eakin.

I'm lucky I have a blog.

From Haaretz:

The prime minister leaves America disgraced, isolated, and altogether weaker than when he came. Instead of setting the diplomatic agenda, Netanyahu surrendered control over it. Instead of leaving the Palestinian issue aside and focusing on Iran, as he would like, Netanyahu now finds himself fighting for the legitimacy of Israeli control over East Jerusalem.

And yes, the passage of healthcare seems to have emboldened Obama with respect to Netanyahu:

The revolution in the Americans' behavior is clear to all. On Sunday morning Obama was still anxiously looking ahead to the House of Representatives vote on health care – the last thing he wanted was a last-minute disagreement with congressmen over ties with Israel.

The moment the bill was passed, however, a victorious Obama was free to deal with his unruly guest.

The Americans made every effort to downplay the visit. As during his last visit in November, Netanyahu was invited to the White House at a late hour, without media coverage or a press conference. If that were not enough, the White House spokesman challenged Netanyahu's observation at AIPAC that "Jerusalem is not a settlement."

The Americans didn't even wait for him to leave Washington to make their disagreement known. It was not the behavior Washington shows an ally, but the kind it shows an annoyance.