Category: Old Dish

“It’s like a Jew wearing a Nazi uniform. I could no longer stay in that institution with any amount of integrity.” – the Rev. Leonard Walker, a Catholic priest in Arizona, who has just resigned after the latest wave of bigotry from Rome. Again, I’m frustrated at not being able to fully address the latest document and the astonishing accompanying piece in L’Osservatore Romano today. But my doc says I’m improving, and should be back in the saddle soon. In the OR piece, however, the echoes of the Vatican’s previous views on Jews are unmistakable: gays/Jews as a destabilizing force in society, a threat to the family, danger to children, and so on. The pain inflicted by this pope on so many good and faithful people still shocks even me; and the radicalism of the new doctrine – demonizing gay people for who they are, not for anything they might do – still amazes. The notion that my relationship destabilizes society, and threatens my own family is impossible not to take as a vicious personal attack on people the hierarchy has no desire to understand, let alone love. More soon.

“That McCain broke under torture doesn’t make him any less of an American hero. But it does prove he’s wrong to claim that harsh interrogation techniques simply don’t work.” – from an article titled, “John McCain: Torture Worked on Me,” on the right-wing website, Newsmax. Just when you think the pro-torture right cannot sink any lower, they do.

(Charles Krauthammer’s recent essay deserves a serious response. I’m not ignoring it, just waiting till I feel well enough to do it justice.)

If the guiding mantra of the last Pope was “Be Not Afraid!”, the lodestar of the current one is, arguably, the opposite. Everywhere, there are reasons to be afraid: the great work of celibate, faithful gay priests, the insights of independent lay women, inter-faith communication, theological debate, the new frontiers of science, and on and on. The spirit of a saint like St Francis – so open, so confident, so unafraid – is obviously one that Benedict needs to control and silence, as he must control and silence every other aspect of the Church that does not conform to his views. And so another window closes. Eventually, the darkness will be perfect.

It’s a pitiful interview, so clogged with internal contradiction and unpersuasive non-denial denials that you almost feel sorry for the guy. Kudos to ABC News for asking the following question, though:

You know what water-boarding is though, right?

GOSS: I know what a lot of things are, but I’m not going to comment.

GIBSON: Would that come under the heading? Would that come under the heading of torture?

GOSS: I don’t know. I have-

GIBSON: Well, under your definition that you just gave to me of inflicting pain?

GOSS: Let me put it this way, I’m not going to comment on any individual techniques that anybody has brought forward as an allegation, or dreamed up or anything like that. What we do, as I said many times, is professional, it’s lawful, it yields good results and it is not torture.

No aadministration official I have directly asked about waterboarding has denied it. At the same time, Goss insists that torture is ineffective as an interrogation tool. Go figure.

On the one hand, we have clear signs that progress is occurring, if slowly, especially in the training of the armed forces. On the other hand, we’d be nuts not to be deeply troubled by growing reports that the new army is infiltrated not just with Sunni sabotage-merchants but also with sectarian Shiite militias, committing atrocities against Sunni civilians. Allawi is not reassuring on the latter point. Of course, both could be true. Which argues for a far more careful and gradual disengagement than some are now arguing for.

A reader does some research:

A little digging turns up some fascinating background on “The Right Brothers.” (Yes, I’m bored at work!) The two guys themselves, Frank Highland and Aaron Sain from Florence, Alabama, seem like pretty straightforward good ol’ boys, and God bless ’em. They both chased a songwriting career in Nashville in the 90’s, and while Aaron did all right Frank had left the music business and was running a pool cleaning company by 2001. The two of them hooked up after 9/11 and started writing the occasional bar-room conservative anthem to cheer on the troops. Maybe a gimmick, but who can point fingers?

What turned things around for them was a connection, in 2003, with an outfit called RightMarch.com, and here’s where it gets creepy. RightMarch is an internet fund-raising organization run by Dr. William Greene, a veteran of various “Take Back Christmas” fundraising appeals, and an established if low-flying email fundraiser for hard-right causes (he was a chief online fundraiser for Alan Keyes’ Senate campaign). Greene is also a former VP of Richard Viguerie’s ConservativeHQ.com — where he learned his trade, no doubt, from the best. RightMarch is partly a general-purpose conservative activist site, presumably to build lists, and partly a PAC targeting moderate Republicans as well as Democrats. Greene also runs Strategic Internet Campaign Management (SIC’M!), a political consultancy and another online list-builder.

Greene took charge of promotion for The Right Brothers, put them in touch with Hannity in 2003 to promote a song called “Hey Hollywood,” then rolled them out big time during the Terry Schiavo fiasco, featuring their new antiabortion song and video, “I want to live.” That whole episode wasn’t a brilliant success, but they ended up playing the Georgia Republican convention in 2005 and now they seem to be making another bid for word-of-mouth marketing with “Bush Was Right.” Their own website includes a signup feature for their email list, and I wouldn’t be shocked if the info were shared with RightMarch.

Not that there’s anything wrong with that! Right? Except — it’s sort of sad to see guys who used to write country tunes about how their old family home got plowed under for a strip mall, coming out with un-ironic lyrics like “The rich man keeps the working man working and alive.” (“Trickle Down.”) Or writing a song against illegal immigration that’s so nuanced and qualified and racially inoffensive it might have been edited by a Karl Rove focus group. Or, for that matter, writing a song about the Iraq war that ends up a paean to Bush’s economic policy. My bullshit-detector just got sad and stopped registering.

So how much is still authentic about two guys who sing about supporting the troops, spanking their children, liking big trucks, and feeling mildly confused by all those gay people wandering around? Who the hell knows? But it’s clear that they’re in pretty deep with some fairly high-powered hard-right activists who are experts in crafting fundraising messages. Nice to see that they’ve finally made it.

And the beat goes on.

Sad but true:

I certainly agree with Zalmay that stakes are high in Iraq – precisely because we’ve put all of our chips, so to speak, on this wild gamble in the Middle East. But Bush has nobody to blame for dwindling public support but himself. This is a President that refuses to acknowledge that there is such a thing as “the American people” and that he is accountable to them. And he shows no signs of this changing. Every significant speech is made to cherry-picked crowds at military academies. Scott McClellan’s briefings have become unintentional comedy sketches. And his surrogates just buzz and strafe Sunday morning talk shows every so often to parrot the same useless talking points. Imagine how much public opinion could be shaped and how much criticism could be defused if he simply addresses the American people to tell us what ‘the course’ that we must supposedly ‘stay’ is. What IS the mission? How many Iraqi battalions being independent and battle-ready will it take before we can at least begin to draw down? When can we expect this to occur? What is he doing to draw the Sunnis more into the political process and away from the insurgents? What is he doing with neighboring nations like Iran to stop their meddling and to seek their help in securing the borders? There are countless other questions – the answers of which could be used to explain in detail our progress, our plan, and a clear direction for America in the Middle East.

But when he is silent and hiding away from his critics, it’s only reasonable for people to begin to assume that he has no progress to report, no plan, and no direction. It would be sad if the hard work of people like Gen. Casey and Zalmay is all for naught because their boss was too much of a fool to explain the rather significant benefits of what they’re now doing in Iraq.

There are times when I wonder if the president is capable of such an address. And the reason I say that is that any candid, credible discussion of where we are now would require an acknowledgment of a series of previous misjudgments and errors. I don’t think Bush is psychologically capable of this. It requires nuance, self-criticism, an abandonment of Manichean rhetoric, and a political decision to unite the country rather than dividing it. All these things he has so far refused to so. Alas, I see no evidence that he has changed, or is even capable of change. And so we stagger on.

Good news from Iran.

More details on the musicians behind “Bush Was Right.”

THE VATICAN BAN: I don’t want to comment at any length until the actual document is released and I’m feeling well enough to tackle it properly. Please be patient. Here’s an interesting take, however, from an influential Catholic leader, Timothy Radcliffe. My own view is that Radcliffe is too sanguine. I’ll explain why soon.

AIDS MORTALITY IN AMERICA: The good news continues.

ISLAM VERSUS GAYS: Another horrific story from the Middle East.

BOOK NEWS: The only silver lining from Michael Oakeshott’s death is that interest in his thought is cresting again, and much formerly buried writing and lecturing is being published. Here’s the latest. Here’s also a new review of “Father Joe,” a book I gave a rave review for in the NYT. It’s by one of the sharpest young Catholic critics out there, Grant Gallicho. I’m relieved Grant sees the enduring merits of the book. I am and was appalled at the subsequent accusations of incest and child abuse made against Tony Hendra by his daughter. I cannot help but feel to some extent conned by the book, if the daughter’s account is correct. At the same time, I wonder if the Holy Spirit doesn’t work in strange ways. That this astonishing account of grace came from a soul still deeply compromised by sin should not surprise Christians. God chooses often very flawed vessels for his message of love and redemption. That, at least, is my hope. My heart goes out to the obvious pain felt by Hendra’s daughter. I hope my review did not in any way intensify it. It was obviously not my intention.

A neocon hard-rock anthem for dispirited Republicans. I’m not sure if it’s a parody, but I suspect not. Whatever it is, it’s a beaut.

QUOTE FOR THE DAY I: “People need to be clear what the stakes are here. If we were to do a premature withdrawal, there could be a Shia-Sunni war here that could spread beyond Iraq. And you could have Iran backing the Shias and Sunni Arab states backing the Sunnis. You could have a regional war that could go on for a very long time, and affect the security of oil supplies. Terrorists could take over part of this country and expand from here. And given the resources of Iraq, given the technical expertise of its people, it will make Afghanistan look like child’s play.” – Zalmay Khalilzad, telling it like it is. As I have been writing for a while now, the paradox is that, as domestic support plummets, we seem to be making some progress in key areas: training Iraqi troops, peeling off Sunni elites, rebooting the economy. A sudden collapse of support for the war effort and peremptory withdrawal would be the worst of all worlds: the Bush-bots will simply revert to a Weimar-style “stab-in-the-back” narrative, with the mainstream media being the villains; al Qaeda will rejoice; the sectarian militias that are already a problem would strengthen and start preparing for the coming power vacuum. Patience, please. Which does not mean, of course, no criticism.

QUOTE FOR THE DAY II: Money quote from a helpful piece in yesterday’s WaPo:

“‘We don’t torture’ means that we don’t use worse tactics than [‘cruel, inhuman and degrading treatment’] — except when we do. Waterboarding (in which a prisoner is made to believe he is drowning) and withholding pain medication for bullet wounds cross the line into torture – and both have allegedly been used. So does “Palestinian hanging,” where a prisoner’s arms are twisted behind his back and his wrists are chained five feet above the floor.
A Nov. 18 ABC News report quoted former and current intelligence officers and supervisors as saying that the CIA has a list of acceptable interrogation methods, including soaking naked prisoners with water in 50-degree rooms and making them stand for 40 hours handcuffed and shackled to an eyebolt in the floor. ABC reported that these methods had been used on at least a dozen captured al Qaeda members. All these techniques undoubtedly inflict the “severe suffering” that our law defines as torture.

It seems to me that the press has not been specific enough. Why hasn’t somebody asked McClellan if the president believes that “waterboarding” is “torture.”