The Dish

“Whether it is an ill-specified axis of evil, or a decision to make tactical nuclear war thinkable, or a domestic ”shadow government,” or deliberately leaked plans to attack Iraq, George W. Bush in his own way is as frightening as Al Qaeda… There is only so much we can do about the risk of random assault, but we can at least reclaim our own democracy. Terrorism, unfortunately, is all too real. But so is one’s terror of the Bush presidency. Every reckless scheme will have to be challenged with the only means we have: democratic opposition. Right after Sept. 11, there was no place for a popular movement against the Afghan War. But there must now be one against the administration’s ill-considered sequels. Otherwise, the daily risk will only increase, not just because of Them but because of Us.” – Robert Kuttner, equating president Bush with al Qaeda and calling for a Vietnam-like resistance to the war on terror.

INSIDE THE JESUITS: A balanced and helpful review by Garry Wills in the latest New York Review is definitely worth reading. It deals with what some have called “the gaying and graying” of the Society of Jesus in non-hysterical, non-homophobic terms. It’s of a book, Passionate Uncertainty: Inside the American Jesuits that also looks like well worth a perusal.

Kofi Annan fails to scare anyone; Mike Tyson succeeds in scaring Washingtonians; Texas mom found sane, guilty, evil; Blair re-launches re-branded party; Roger Clinton deeply implicated in brother’s pardon scam; BBC chairman accuses his critics of being white and middle-class.

THE ANTI-WAR DEMOCRATS: They’re not exactly shouting from the rooftops. But they sure have their wetted fingers hoisted in the air. Janet Reno says in Florida that “I have trouble with a war that has no endgame and I have trouble with a war that generates so many concerns about individual liberties.” Notice she doesn’t say that the war has violated individual liberties, or that she believes that, but merely that there are “so many concerns” about it. Has there been any war in which such concerns have not been raised? The Richmond Times-Dispatch also reports that “the former U.S. attorney general said she thinks the government would be hard-pressed to find a legal basis to prosecute many of the Taliban and al-Qaida prisoners being detained at Guantanamo Bay.” Oh, let them go, then. Back to Sandy Berger and letting bin Laden escape from Sudan to Afghanistan. Do these people ever learn? And then there’s Senator John Kerry. As a Vietnam vet, he’ll be the front man for those Democrats desperate to dispel the war atmosphere that could realign American politics away from dovish liberals for decades. Senator Hillary Clinton spelled out the formula in Boston at a Kerry fund-raiser: “John’s leadership is critical to where we plan to go in this world. We need people of the stature and the experience of John Kerry … asking the hard questions. We are having the debate Congress is required to have – where to go, what to do.” Like most things Senator Clinton says, this is unobjectionable on its face. But its intent is clear. Some Democrats are simply uncomfortable about America having a strong and unapologetic role in the world. This isn’t treason; it’s weakness. And weakness in the dangerous world we face is an invitation for more terror. Be warned.

THEY STILL DON’T GET IT DEPT: On the anniversary of September 11, don’t you think a major newspaper might focus on the victims, the progress of the war, the remaining terrorist threats or some such confluence of stories? Not at the San Jose Mercury News. A reader points out that their Monday front page had two September 11 stories – one was titled: “BACKLASH ANXIETY”. The slug read: “Hate crimes against Arab Americans, Muslims and people simply mistaken as Middle Eastern have largely subsided. But six months after the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks, many Bay Area residents still carry a lingering anxiety that violence and discrimination could resurface at any moment.” The second story was called: “Failed council bid raises question of intolerance,” about a Sikh candidate for office who might have been subject to anti-Sikh prejudice fueled by 9/11. Liberal bias? Ludicrous.

HAVE BLOGS REACHED THE ‘TIPPING POINT’?: An interesting article from John Hiler – the guy who figured out how blogs have hijacked Google – showing how weblogs are beginning to be the online version of what Malcolm Gladwell called “connectors” and “mavens.” Weblogs may soon become one of the most effective ways of getting a new idea out not just to other blog sites, but beyond them to the wider world.

MEDIA NUKE SHOCK HORROR: You thought yesterday’s asinine “America-as-rogue-state” New York Times editorial was bad enough? Scott Shuger has an inventory of other dumb and knee-jerk coverage of the recent shift in U.S. defense policy.

DERBYSHIRE AWARD NOMINEE: “Eugenics, as advocated by kindly figures such as its pioneer, Sir Francis Galton, or its most eloquent exponent, Dean Inge, was simply the notion that the useful and intelligent classes should be allowed, indeed encouraged, to breed, and the murderous morons, who are never going to contribute anything except misery to themselves and others should be discouraged. No one need be killed. The eugenic case is made simply by looking at the pedigrees of the criminals who appear in court, and contrasting them with those of the judges. The overwhelming number of judges (however idiotic we may pretend they are) come from intelligent, decent families, and the overwhelming number of criminals come from stock that is violent and stupid.” – A.N. Wilson, in an article titled, ‘Our Future Lies With Eugenics,” in the Daily Telegraph.

ROD DREHER’S GAY PROBLEM: There’s no question in my mind that National Review’s Rod Dreher is not a homophobe. He’s always been extremely civil to me; he has good gay friends; he’s a brave journalist. He’s also an intelligent Catholic who knows, for example, that Navarro-Valls’ recent statement that gays should be barred from the priesthood was an outrageous distortion of what Rod would call “authentic” Catholicism. To see why, you only have to remember that amazing footage of Father Judge praying in the World Trade Center, about to meet his death. If the Vatican has its way, Father Judge would never have been allowed to be ordained. But Rod doesn’t seem to see good men like Judge when he writes. All he sees is something he calls a “lavender mafia” allegedly running the Church, controlling seminaries, discriminating against good straight Irish-Catholic boys, and the rest of it. Yes, that’s right. Gays are not victims of this Church, they are a cliquish cabal secretly running it! The evidence? Hearsay, mainly. Dreher laments a “swishy priest” whose homily led a New York cop to walk out of mass, he recommends a book whose blurbs complain about “effete” homosexuals taking over seminaries, aka gay “brothels.” He reprints letters from priests who end by proclaiming, “Stop letting the homosexual bishops and their friends pick our new bishops!” and blames the appointment of child molesters on gay bishops and cardinals. He even goes after the Jesuits: “The vindictiveness of the faithless liberals who run the heavily gay Jesuit order is staggering.” Notice the casual attempt to equate faithlessness with homosexuality. Elsewhere, Dreher insists on calling the defrocked Bishop O’Connell “this homosexual ephebophile,” as if his homosexuality is relevant in such an instance. Imagine if he had spat out the phrase “this Jewish ephebophile.” Charming, isn’t it?

THE CHURCH’S FUTURE: Then prompted by the one calm contributor to the discussion, Romesh Ponnuru, Dreher backtracks to say that he has no problem with celibate orthodox gay priests, as long as they are struggling with their “homosexuality.” (I think he means desire to have gay sex. There’s no teaching that says gay or straight Catholics should struggle against their orientation.) But what about celibate, orthodox happily gay priests? Dreher ducks the question by defining gay priests as “those that reject Rome’s teaching on both celibacy and sexuality.” But what of all the others? What about those who are celibate and support the Church’s teaching on sexuality? What of those who are celibate and privately differ with the official teaching but do not publicly challenge it? What of those who are celibate but privately offer help and guidance to gays and straights struggling to deal with the Church’s teachings on sex? What about those who would like to reconcile their faith with their sexual orientation but, faced with no middle way, are forced into the hands of radicals? And what about those who, like many straight priests, struggle to be celibate but occasionally fail? Should any priest who strays once or twice be expelled? These are the difficult practical questions that cannot be explained or discussed in the context of paranoid rants about “lavender mafias” and seminarian brothels. What we need is firm discipline of any priest – gay or straight – who violates the trust of minors, greater guidance and counseling for gay candidates for the priesthood, and a period of reflection about the meaning of priesthood itself – and how we can rescue what is obviously a deeply troubled vocation for the enormous challenges of the future. And less hysteria and paranoia. Please.

It’s a huge relief to find that the Long island priest shooting is not apparently related to the current controversy over pedophile priests. It isn’t such a relief to read the story in the Catholic News Service about the context for Joaquin Navarro-Valls’ outburst ten days ago against gay priests, celibate or otherwise. Unidentified “Church leaders,” whoever they are, are apparently “pressing harder so that people of permanent homosexual orientation are screened out as candidates for the priesthood. So far, this has been handled through prudent local decisions rather than explicit orders issued from the Vatican, they said.” In the United States, it’s a fair bet that the bishops will simply ignore this initiative. Ominously, though, some of the forces now running the Church in the pope’s senescence are considering a new letter to institutionalize the discrimination. They cite a 1961 document on selection of candidates for the priesthood, ignoring the critical 1976 and 1986 letters on homosexuality and Catholicism that significantly altered the Church’s teaching on such matters. But what’s more amazing is the justification for this new blanket zero-tolerance policy. Here’s the relevant passage:

In response to questions by Catholic News Service, Navarro-Valls declined to elaborate on his comments. He said he did not want to draw more attention to this topic, especially while U.S. church leaders were dealing with the more immediate problem of sex abuse by clergy. Yet many at the Vatican see the two issues as related — if not causally, then at least circumstantially. Most publicized cases of sex abuse by clergy against minors have involved homosexual acts.

That’s what it comes down to: gays, even celibate, orthodox ones, are guilty of pedophilia in advance thanks to mere “circumstantial” evidence. So much for basic notions of fairness and justice. It’s also true, of course, that all the instances of priestly sexual abuse have been committed by men. By the Vatican’s logic, that’s even more compelling “circumstantial evidence.” You think the Vatican will start questioning its policies with regard to exclusively male priests now? Yeah, right.

THE PRICE OF FREE TRADE: “How is the U.S. steel industry supposed to compete with steel industries that pay inhuman wages and poison the environment, and which have the government available to pay for medical needs of workers and retirees? Why should it?” This and other rejoinders to me – on Israel, for example – are now up on the letters page.

A priest and another person have been shot dead this morning at the altar in a church in Long Island. I hope to God this isn’t an outcrop of the latest crisis in the Church. I guess we will soon find out.

We’re smoking them out of their caves; Bush reaches out to the allies; Zimbabwe’s opposition leader fears for his life; Letterman stays at CBS; one of Anglo-America’s greatest actresses, Irene Worth, dies.

TWO OFF-HAND COMMENTS: One from the proverbial administration official. He told me over the weekend, “On September 10, I believed that the terrorists probably had a nuclear capacity, but that they weren’t crazy enough to use it. Now, I believe the complete opposite. They probably don’t have any yet, but the minute they do, they’ll deploy it.” Another person involved in the administration told me that an attack on Iraq was inevitable – and that it would be much sooner than most of us expect.

RAY OF LIGHT: What a brilliant concept. When I first saw the New York Times Magazine cover of September 23, my breath was taken away with the idea. The towers reach to heaven, they dominate the sky-line, they are full of light. “Seeing those huge monoliths, as seemingly timeless as the pyramids, vanish taught us something about our buildings, our institutions, and ourselves,” one of the designers, Gustavo Bonevarti, writes in Slate. “We learned how ephemeral life really is. Light is ephemeral, but it is also universal-that’s what we wanted this project to be.” Whatever replaces this should never substitute it entirely. I hope that every September 11 from now on, those lights are re-lit. Every September 11 – a ritual and memorial of light.

BEAM ME UP, BLOGGER: Yep, William Shatner’s got one. Should the rest of us retire immediately?

DEPORTED TO HELL: A while back, I mentioned a story I’d read in the British press about a forced deportation of 27 Somali immigrants by the INS. The immigrants were picked up on minor charges, from years ago, some drug-related, but many had cleaned up their acts and were living productive lives. Many had no idea what Somalia was, had no family or friends there, and had been in the U.S. for close to twenty years. After reading my site, an editor at Canada’s National Post decided to check the story out. It’s true. One of the deportees, Fuad Ismail, was described as a model employee who recovered from a drug habit in a six-month rehabilitation program at the Salvation Army, and was working legally in the United States. “He was determined to get better and he did,” said one Salvation Army Major. “He is one of the most gentle, religious people I’ve ever met.” His reward? Dumped into a war-zone by the U.S. government, with no possible appeal or escape. Read this horrifying tale of the U.S. government’s brutality toward immigrants in the wake of the legislation passed in the 1990s. I hope Bush finds a way to moderate some of the cruelty of the Clinton-Gingrich immigration laws. It would do a lot to put the compassion into his conservatism.

CORRECTION: I described the Boston Herald’s columnist Joe Fitzgerald in an earlier post as a Catholic. It turns out he isn’t. I’m not sure whether to be appalled or relieved. I think I’m relieved.

AN INTERESTING POINT: From an emailer today:

The church I attend, Metropolitan Community Church, is a Christian church with a primary ministry to Gay people. Nearly all of our denomination’s religious leaders are Gay, Lesbian, Bisexual and/or Transgendered. Yet, to my knowledge, none of our religious leaders are under investigation for pedophilia, ephebophilia, or whatever you want to call it. Now, if the presence of Gays in religious leadership puts children at risk for sexual abuse, why doesn’t this problem affect our church, too?

Good question, huh?

THE GENERATION GAP: The Onion nails it. Perhaps I should support a budget-busting senior drug entitlement. They might just spread some wealth around.

DERBYSHIRE AWARD NOMINEE: “Let’s say that Washington really was incinerated. As difficult and alarming as this sounds, we live in times when horrible realities confront us every day. It is time that we deal frankly and honestly with the ugly prospect. The first thing that would happen is that your personal income would rise equal to the 40 percent you currently pay Washington in taxes. Because there would be nowhere to actually send the checks – excise taxes, income taxes, and payroll taxes would be meaningless. Instead of having to wait for politicians to give us “private accounts” for some portion of Social Security, we’d get real privatization with no FICA at all. The country would be immediately vulnerable to attack by terrorists! On the other hand, there would be no one to enforce sanctions against Iraq, pay the troops in Saudi Arabia, or fund the settlements on the Gaza Strip, so the terrorists would lose their rationale for suicide bombings and the like. They might just choose to go home to their wives and kids.” – Lew Rockwell, looking on the bright side of the nuclear destruction of the capital. As sick as Ted Rall – but from the far right.

Flipping through the channels late the other night I came across a somewhat sad spectacle. There was Sir Ian McKellen on “Politically Incorrect,” a late-night gabfest in which pretty anchors and West Coast political consultants try and make part-funny and part-serious comments about current events. God, it’s awful. I should know. I’ve been on it a couple of times. But Ian McKellen? The greatest actor of his generation? And then it dawned on me. He’s on a campaign swing. This is primary season… [Continued in my latest piece opposite.]

THE COMING CATASTROPHE: “But we must now contemplate the possibility of a surprise attack taking out all of Washington, leaving nobody in line for the presidency and a situation of chaos, with dozens perhaps jumping up to say “I’m in charge here.” The best option is to include governors in the line. The Constitution requires those in line of succession to the presidency to be officers of the United States. Attorney Miller Baker has suggested allowing the president to deputize several governors as heads of their state militias, making them officers, and allowing him some say in the succession to his own office.” – Norm Orenstein in a Wall Street Journal piece today that is necessary but still horrifying to contemplate.

GAYS ARE A ‘PLAGUE’: That’s the view of Joe Fitzgerald, the Boston Herald columnist now claiming heroism for blaming sex with minors on homosexuals, rather than pedophiles. For people like Fitzgerald, of course, there is no real distinction between celibate and non-celibate gays or between gays and child-molesters, either in principle or in reality. But that is not the authentic view of the Church. Doesn’t Fitzgerald see that his Church teaches that the issue here is not orientation? It’s firstly breaking a vow of celibacy and secondly doing so with a minor. It is completely possible to abhor both things, whether done by straights or gays, and yet support the presence of celibate gays in the priesthood. That’s my view, at least. And it has far more backing from the Church’s authoritative teachings than Fitzgerald’s un-Catholic rant.

Anaconda, nearing success, continues; recession’s end wounds the Democrats; Colombians, and Zimbabweans risk their lives for democracy; Washington insiders make fun of themselves in annual jamboree.

AFTER THE DOCUMENTARY: I feel drained now, just with the images of it. The playful innocence of that morning; the boyish enthusiasm of the “probie” fire-fighter; the sudden noise of a plane too low; the confusion of the first hit; the denial; the helplessness in the lobby of Tower 1; Father Judge muttering his last prayers, as he paced the floor; the dread in the eyes of so many fire-fighters, about to enter the inferno; the foul, heart-stopping sound of bodies plunging to the ground; the dazed group of workers emerging from a suddenly-released elevator; the unforgettable footage under a car as dust – human dust – swirled through the air, turning it black, and then darting around like specs of plankton under water; the crowds of bewildered, terrified people running and walking and screaming and pointing on the streets; a strong man and experienced fire-fighter vomiting into the Fire House trash-can upon his return; the ashen quiet of white-powdered streets in the aftermath; the bemused, almost deranged, calm of an old, heavy businessman slowly walking away from Tower 1, not thinking even to wipe his dust-covered glasses; the strained and numbed relief of those finding their brothers are alive; the bleakness of those who weren’t so lucky. I would say I’m glad to be reminded, as one fire fighter put it, of “how evil evil can be.” But there is no gladness. It is simply a good thing that we remember that we are still at war; that the enemy launched it with a callousness that should banish any doubts about the morality of our cause; and that, when resolve falters, we remember the people and civilization we’re fighting for and the thousands of victims who have already paid the price. In an odd way, having seen it all again, I feel less afraid of what lies ahead, and more eager to get on with it. The simple virtue of those rescuers remind us of what human beings are capable of, and the invincible character of the civilization they are a part of, however ruthless the evil arrayed against it.

NO FALTERING: A new poll tells us largely what we knew. The Nation may be gaining subscribers, but the vast majority of Americans still get what happened six months ago today. Eighty percent believe, as do I, that the worst is yet to come, and seem to have no intention of letting down their guard. And the president can be reassured to know that, whatever ever else his administration accomplishes, if it defeats this enemy then it will need no other legacy. The president clearly knows this, and it’s by far his most admirable quality. As a retired plumber tells the Washington Post, “Bush is doing good; he’s doing real good. He ain’t going to take nothing from anybody. That’s the way it has to be done.” Amen.

BEST EUPHEMISM OF THE DAY: “But all the signs, including the exhausted but jubilant soldiers returning, profanely triumphant at blows inflicted on the enemy, pointed to a seemingly hopeless situation for a dwindling band of perhaps a few hundred Islamic militants holed up in caves and other pockets of resistance.” – John Burns, New York Times, today, (my italics).

THE POINT OF TERRORISM: The awful chaos in Israel will be described, as it usually is, as a new low-point in an ancient struggle between two warring peoples. But what we need to understand is that it is, in fact, the consequence of a deliberate strategy. The strategy of the PLO and its more radical allies is to negotiate a better deal with Israel than the one outlined at Camp David. Arafat knows that the people he represents will never be satisfied with a modest state in the West Bank and Gaza. He’s also terrified of trying to govern one. So he quit Camp David in order to try war as an alternative. It’s working. The mayhem Arafat has unleashed and the mayhem Sharon has sponsored in response has forced the U.S. to intervene again, and has thus set the parameters for Israel’s self-defense. Since those parameters do not allow for a real destruction of the PLO and its allies, Israelis must now choose between a lot of terrorism under the current stalemate – or almost as much terrorism and a more dangerous Palestinian state, armed to the teeth, on its border. That’s a pretty unpalatable choice. But, in the veiled threat issued last night, it is also Israel’s “last chance.” As Edward Said has recently, and candidly, written, that’s the whole idea:

The point here is that … even though Israel commands Bush’s support for the moment, Israel is a small country whose continued survival as an ethnocentric state in the midst of an Arab-Islamic sea depends not just on an expedient if not infinite dependence on the US, but rather on accommodation with its environment, not the other way round. That is why I think Sharon’s policy has finally been revealed to a significant number of Israelis as suicidal, and why more and more Israelis are taking the reserve officers’ position against serving the military occupation as a model for their approach and resistance. This is the best thing to have emerged from the Intifada. It proves that Palestinian courage and defiance in resisting occupation have finally brought fruit. [my italics]

If you substitute murder and fanaticism for “courage and defiance,” you have a very shrewd analysis of the situation. Barring a miracle, Israel’s future as a free and independent state is now very dark, if it has a future at all.

BRITS ON DOPE: One of the three major parties in Britain has now called for the legalization of marijuana and a full retreat in the failed and failing drug war. Will libertarian Tories follow suit? I sure hope so.

NERVES OF STEEL: A useful primer from Businessweek on the politics of Bush’s shamelessly political steel tariffs decision. More revealing is Francis X. Clines’ reporting from Ohio on electoral college politics. Broder seconds Clines. I think this call should be placed in the roster of Bush’s dark side. Like most of Bush’s unnerving decisions – like going to Bob Jones University, barely campaigning in the last days before the election, or spinning his travel itinerary on September 11 – this one was inspired by Karl Rove. Rove seems to think that cynical, purely political decisions make a president strong
er. Mark Steyn sums up my feelings pretty much in his Telegraph column. The Brits, in particular, are furious. And Bush now wants them to deliver 25,000 troops for Iraq?

LOWERING THE RHETORIC: A low-key and interesting analysis of Bush’s budget in the Washington Post. The philosophy behind it seems less skeptical of government than Reagan or Gingrich, but more results-oriented than Clinton.

BACK AT MASS: Cardinal McCarrick presided over the evening mass at my local, St Matthews, last night. There were no bidding prayers about the scandal, only a veiled reference in his homily to “these dark days” for the Church, and a call for more to enter the priesthood. But I wondered if his presence at a mass that many gay men attend wasn’t a sign of his commitment to us and his inclusion of us. The Gospel was the wonderful story of the blind beggar who sees for the first time when Jesus heals him. The Pharisees interrogate the man contemptuously. Jesus seeks him out gently and exposes him to the light of day. And then there was this passage from Ephesians:

Try to discover what the Lord wants of you, having nothing to do with the futile works of darkness but exposing them by contrast. The things which are done in secret are things that people are ashamed even to speak of; but anything exposed by the light will be illuminated and anything illuminated turns into light. That is why it is said: Wake up from your sleep, rise from the deal, and Christ will shine on you.

How good it felt to be home again, and welcomed too.

The latest story out of Florida seems a little fishy to me. All the protestations that no one could possibly have known of a past incident of under-age molestation by a priest who subsequently became a bishop are a little strained. If true, how could such important information be buried? If untrue, who knew and appointed him anyway? My gut tells me that this scandal will end up in Rome. Hence their damage control already. On a brighter note, I thought Bill Keller’s essay in today’s Times struck all the right notes. I share his pessimism.

Blogger was down today for a long, long time. Here’s our new batch of letters – from a member of Opus Dei, among others. Enjoy. Oh, and to all those of you who had trouble reading some of the purple links against the blue background, we heard ya. The new links are cool, huh? And, er, visible.

NOISE IN THE HOOD: Busy day on my block. At 5am today, a young Latino guy was shot dead down the street having parked in front of my building. He was brandishing a big toy gun, apparently. I slept through it. Then a little later, the driver of a big Cadillac swerved onto my street, saw the police lines, tried to reverse out of the block, hit the accelerator by mistake and took out my next door neighbor’s wrought iron fence, a gas main, and landed in a tree trunk. I slept through that as well. I guess I’ll hear about a dirty bomb from the news.

You know what? I agree with almost everything in Paul Krugman’s column this morning. Including his praise of president Clinton’s free trade legacy. Amazing what Karl Rove has accomplished, innit?