Rants, reviews, and reflections

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Monthly Archives: June 2002

UNDER GOD

Posted on by Posted in Current Events, Politics, Religion

There has certainly been plenty of reaction to the recent decision by the United States Court Of Appeals Ninth Circuit, in the case Newdow v. US Congress, whereby the Pledge of Allegiance, containing the words “under God” is unconstitutional. In fact, Alfred T. Goodwin, the wonderful jurist who wrote the opinion, stayed the three-judge panel’s decision, just two days afterward, pending a review by the full 11-member Court of Appeals. No doubt, he was surprised by the volume of outrage his ruling generated, and is looking for a way out, quicker than the all but assured reversal by the US Supreme Court.

The mind-numbingly boring and loopy opinion is followed by a concurrence/dissension written by Judge Ferdinand F. Fernandez. However, this sounds more conciliatory than it is, since the concurrence portion concerns the issues of Jurisdiction, the status of the State of California as a defendant, and the standing of the plaintiff. The dissension is on the Establishment Clause issue, which, of course, is the meat and potatoes of the case.

Aside from a few legal “scholars,” such as crypto-commie USC law professor Erwin Chemerinsky, it is virtually impossible to find anyone in favor of the decision. Even most atheists, except the so-called evangelical atheists, are against it, since they know it will be a lightning rod against them, and trivialize their cause.

So, you might ask, who is behind this case?

The plaintiff is 49-year-old Michael Newdow, trained as both a physician and attorney, who has put his career (not specified in any media outlet) on hold, to pursue the glorious cause of atheism. At least he believes in something!

Newdow says he is defending the rights of his 8-year-old daughter, but he would do far better to protect her from idiots like himself, who see nothing wrong with whoring their own offspring in pursuit of national media attention, not to mention the permanent effects on a little girl’s psyche. May God help and deliver this poor child from her parents who never married, and don’t even live together at this point. Then again, since God is the source of all morality, what’s morality to an atheist, or a former pair of them, for that matter?

Acting as his own attorney, Newdow has minimized his expenses, but it is still hard to believe that he isn’t getting help from somewhere. While it is not the ACLU’s style to operate in stealth, the overwhelmingly negative nature of this case would have caused just about any champion to go underground. Moreover, the very location of the proceedings is suspicious. This case could have been brought anywhere in the country, but it is only in the notoriously left-wing Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals where the plaintiff would have had any chance at all of winning.

We see the tell-tale earmarks of some group forum shopping, and then searching for a local fire-breathing plaintiff.

It is a well established technique of the Left to promote its destructive agenda on the backs of worthy “rights” causes. First it was the rights of the worker, then it was civil rights of the minorities, then minorities got expanded into new horizons with gender, sexual preference, and disabilities. Today’s victim group is atheists.

Yet, from all this bad news comes the good news. By some cosmic arrangement between God and Satan, the other side must always show its hand. It is forced, through some pre-ordained compulsive exhibitionism, to reveal its worst trait, for no apparent reason.

Whether it is Al Gore lying just for the sheer joy of it, thuggish Clinton staffers trashing the White House on their last day, Martha Stewart greedily acting on an illegal stock tip even though what she saved would be dwarfed by what she lost in reputation, Roger Mahony relentlessly pursuing self-aggrandizement and then voicing repentance in a manner that was laughingly disingenuous, or just a sinfully misguided father exploiting his precious daughter as he himself is exploited, we need only watch, remember, learn, and act.

BABY STEPS ON THE ROAD TO HELL

Posted on by Posted in Uncategorized

On June 20th, a Santa Barbara, California jury found David Attias, 20, who killed four pedestrians and seriously injured another with his speeding car, insane when he committed these second degree murders. Not surprisingly, Tony Bourdakis, father of one of the victims, reacted bitterly when the decision was announced. “You can’t know how incredibly disappointed we are in this verdict. Once again, the state of California has shown the nation how you can twist the facts and get away with murder.” True enough, Attias will avoid the state pen, and will instead be confined to a state mental hospital for 10-15 years, before he would have a chance of release.

Since a charge of second degree murder, rather than manslaughter, means that Attias acted with malice, the insanity finding was not expected. After all, the key component for an insanity plea is not knowing right from wrong. Malice is “the intentional doing of a wrongful act without just cause or excuse, with an intent to inflict an injury or under circumstances that the law will imply an evil intent.”

While it strains credibility to explain how one can intentionally do wrong, without knowing right from wrong, it absolutely destroys the English language to hold that one can perform this act without just cause or excuse, and then obtain an excuse from the very jury panel that said there WAS no excuse.

On the same day, the US Supreme Court ruled 6-3 that “mentally retarded” perps could not be executed. Dissenting Justice Antonin Scalia mocked the majority ruling, and predicted that it would cause chaos. “The symptoms [of retardation] can be feigned…This will turn the process of a capital trial into a game,” he noted.

So, being judged insane means you don’t serve hard time in a jail, and being retarded means you can commit horrific crimes and not get executed. It certainly seems as if the Law is very interested in getting into the heads of the perpetrators of criminal acts, for the express purpose of going easy on them, or so you might think.

Which brings us to the heady notion of “Hate Crimes.”

What if one or more of the group killed by Attias were gay or some other “oppressed” minority? Care to take any bets on an insanity plea then?

And what about the two guys who got the death penalty in the truck-dragging torture execution of black Texan James Byrd? I’m quite sure that neither of them would have broken 100, or maybe even 80, on an IQ test. Will the ACLU be rushing over to Huntsville, Texas to administer IQ tests to these worthy perps? Don’t hold your breath.

It’s very simple to make sense out of these apparent contradictions, even if the answer is as tragic as it is disgusting.

The liberal cryptocracy has no interest in getting into anyone’s head for any reason, regardless of what they may tell you. The retardation exemption is merely one more step in their incrementalism strategy for eliminating the death penalty, while unjustified insanity findings are another step in eliminating what little respect is left for our system of jurisprudence. “Hate crimes” is a designation intended to award protected status to homosexuals, but is cloaked in the acceptability of providing this status to blacks and certain other groups, as well.

Incrementalism has served these career Leftist America-haters well for a good long time, even if some of their bad medicine such as antitrust, the income tax, and the United Nations sprung up all of a sudden. Considering only the modern, enlightened era of the 1960’s, civil rights legislation led to affirmative action, which led to quotas. Griswold v. Connecticut (1965), that made it legal to sell contraceptives in Connecticut under a penumbra of privacy, led the way to Roe v. Wade (1973), which legalized abortion.

Anti-discrimination laws protecting homosexuals have led to virtual gay lifestyle advocacy in everything from series television and public education, to parades, that formerly had nothing whatsoever to do with gender or sexual preference.

I don’t deny that there are kind souls out there who really believe in some of these causes, free from any other agenda. Unfortunately, they are still, to use Lenin’s term, “useful idiots.”

It remains to the rest of us, a group strong in numbers, to counteract this poison, even if with traditional media and most of the government co-opted, it already appears to be a lost cause.

GODFATHER GOTTI: A FATHER’S DAY MESSAGE FROM THE GRAVE

Posted on by Posted in Uncategorized

With the death, on June 10th, of mobster John Gotti, the era of the celebrity gangster has likely also come to an end. Gotti, raising himself up from poverty in the South Bronx, to become boss of the Gambino crime family, beat enough raps to be nicknamed the “Teflon Don.” The Teflon would turn to Velcro, though, and in 1992, he was finally convicted of murder and racketeering, based in large measure on the testimony of his former close ally Sammy “The Bull” Gravano.

For his part, Gravano, who admitted to murdering 19 people, got into the federal witness protection program, starting a new life in Arizona. This new life, however, soon became a new life of crime, as Sammy re-invented himself as a desert drug lord. The Bull, who was given his nickname as a youngster, by wise guys who observed him fighting off several older and bigger kids who had stolen his bike, is now incarcerated, and no longer under federal protection.

If it makes any difference, the 19 individuals murdered by Gravano were all fellow thugs, and he maintains to this day that he wouldn’t have ratted out Gotti, had he not thought that Gotti was going to do the same to him.

What is it about the gangster mythology, as popularized by dozens of movies, that grabs those of us, especially men, outside “the life”? What is it about guys like Gotti, who had “the IQ of a mothball,” according to veteran NYPD detective Joseph Coffey, or Sammy The Bull, who was supposedly so classless that he spit on the floor inside friend’s homes, that demands our attention?

Even if we look beyond the cinematic image, we do see a collection of bona fide tough guys–alpha males, if you will. There is also plenty of excitement, and quick deadly justice. It’s probably true that the major source of their wealth is from illegal activities that many people want nonetheless, such as drugs, prostitution, gambling, hard core pornography, and loan sharking.

For those of us who think we are alpha males, or want to be such, 21st century life holds few opportunities to express this status. Most of us don’t play professional contact sports, and most of us do not belong to elite military or police units. And, certainly, few of us can become faux alpha males like Bill Clinton, whose every outrageous move, from oral sex in the Oval Office, to stealing White House furnishings upon his exit, was cheered by a hallelujah chorus of pathetic sycophants.

And, let’s not forget, until the monstrous egos of the last Bosses were exploited by the Feds, the wise guys had a Code. They were loyal, they were family, and they stuck together. Just where can we find that now, outside the old Cosa Nostra?

The very sacred vows of marriage and the priesthood seem to mean little to many who took them. The very public accounting firms that exist primarily to protect investors appear to do just the opposite. And the very Government that should be protecting its people, is far more caught up in the sick morass of political correctness.

We see a world class terrorist being exalted to high position, and little old ladies being carefully searched at airports, while those who should most obviously be profiled walk on by. As a Christian country, we know very well who are enemies are, even if our “leaders” are too cowardly to admit it.

I have a feeling that if the mythic incarnations of John Gotti and Sammy The Bull were president and vice president, things might be far different in this country after September 11th–and I don’t mean worse. Think about it: Stand up guys in positions of civil authority, who could cut through the crud, and get the job done. No pencil necks need apply.

Some tough talk for all the fathers, and those who love them, on this Father’s Day week.

SURPRISE! IT ALL COMES DOWN TO MISTER ROGERS

Posted on by Posted in Current Events, History

re·spon·si·ble
1 a : liable to be called on to answer b (1) : liable to be called to account as the primary cause, motive, or agent <a committee responsible for the job> (2) : being the cause or explanation <mechanical defects were responsible for the accident> c : liable to legal review or in case of fault to penalties

So, the dictionary definition notes that there are attendant consequences when one “takes responsibility,” voluntarily or involuntarily. Let’s examine how this theory proves out in real life.

In 1974, after Watergate, President Richard Nixon created a new rhetorical standard when he accepted the “responsibility, but not the blame” for the break-in and cover-up. As it turned out, there was plenty of blame to go around, and he and many other perps resigned. A few did jail time. Unfortunately for the late former president, his gambit of verbal chicanery was about 20 years ahead of its time.

The earliest recorded success in destroying the meaning of “responsibility” occurred when former Attorney General Janet Reno took “full responsibility” for the carnage at Waco, Texas. Do you remember what happened next? NOTHING. Understand that this miserable woman took full responsibility for the preventable deaths of scores of Americans. She didn’t resign, she wasn’t fired, she wasn’t brought up on charges, and she was barely investigated. There were no consequences whatsoever.

Thus “taking responsibility” and “NOT taking responsibility” would now amount to the same thing, and the number of public figures who would shamelessly take advantage of this partial destruction of the English language is growing every single day.

In the ongoing Church scandals, even though Cardinals Law and Mahony have admitted culpability in various matters, don’t look for them to resign anytime soon, although it would help tremendously in the healing process. That this unrepentant posture flies in the face of Catholic theology doesn’t seem to matter–at least here on Earth. If Pope Alexander VI is to be forever excoriated for bringing scandal to the Church by bribing his way into the papacy, what should happen to Mahony and Law, who have hurt far more people?

In the corporate world, we see case after case of executives resigning or being fired in disgrace, only to receive enormous golden parachutes. Indeed, they benefit much more from failure than success. What a concept!

How can anyone have confidence in the financial markets when formerly trusted firms such as Merrill Lynch and Andersen commit grotesque acts, absolutely contrary to their fiduciary responsibilities?

Our government even penalizes success, with its truly Fascist antitrust prosecution of Microsoft, and its sick notion of basing its most major tax on income. The point is not that the rate is 5 percent or 90 percent. The point, rather, is that whatever amount you do get to keep is SOLELY at the pleasure of the government.

Do standards and old notions of responsibility still apply anywhere?

Law 12 of the Laws of Soccer stipulate that if a player commits a serious infraction, he is to be shown the red card, and be sent off the field. Note that he is NOT to be replaced, and his team must play shorthanded for the duration of the match. Moreover, in many cases, this player is barred from participating in the next scheduled match. Clearly, the player and the team pay a serious and immediate price for bad conduct.

Cold comfort that we must go to the world of sports to get a dose of basic morality, as long as we don’t look too carefully.

With most institutions on the scrap heap, is it any wonder that after an extensive search, Dartmouth chose Mister Rogers to deliver the main address at its 2002 commencement exercises?

CARDINAL SINS

Posted on by Posted in Current Events, Religion

After multimillion dollar payoffs, cover-ups, and errors in judgment that should not have been tolerated from a parish secretary, much less the Cardinal archbishop of the largest diocese in the United States, you would think that even Roger Mahony would have run out of ways to dig himself a deeper hole. But, talent will out, and Mahony has without a doubt crossed the line from destructive liberalism into functional atheism.

It was announced last week that the archdiocese had retained the expensive Los Angeles PR firm of Sitrick and Co., best known for doing damage control for the likes of troubled companies Dynegy and Global Crossing, actress Halle Berry and comedian Paula Poundstone. Allan Mayer, senior partner at Sitrick, said that “Our task is to figure out what the reality is, and what the public perception is, and then to do what we can to make sure that the public perception reflects the reality.”

Mahony could have saved the estimated $500,000 fee by simply talking to any informed member of the laity not afraid to speak his mind. If anything, the public perception is less negative than the reality! Most salt-of-the-earth mass going Catholics are quite unaware how the cancer of liberalism has ruined the local seminary (St. John’s), and are probably not current on the extent of the “outreach” to the gay and lesbian community, or the Byzantine lavender mafia that exists throughout the American Church. They may not have noticed that friends of Mahony get plum parish assignments, and MANY older priests, still able to serve, are put out to pasture.

Exactly how did our Cardinal determine that it is worth half a million dollars to publicize that our archdiocese NOW has a “zero tolerance” policy on sexual abuse, and that the archdiocese does a lot of charitable work? One might also ask to whom is this PR blitz being directed? Potential jurors? Non-Catholics? Catholics who have been donating less each week?

The only PR campaign worth that kind of money and more, would be one that started to deflect a bit of the blame back to the “victims” of all this sexual abuse. While I’m not defending the pervert priests for one moment, it seems prudent to question the actions of able-bodied teenage boys who would more or less cooperate with being molested, and then decide that it is worth big bucks years later. The vast majority of boys 12 or older would have fought off the homosexual moves. In fact, it would have required extreme physical force, probably involving two or more perps, to get most normal American boys to succumb.

That leaves you with the inescapable conclusion that most of the victims are mercenary, gay, or both. And therein lies the problem. After nearly two decades of bringing liberal poison, including excessive understanding of homosexuals into the archdiocese, how does Mahony pursue this PR agenda, which is really the only one worth pursuing?

The Church is IN the world, but not OF the world. If Our Founder were interested in good PR, he would not have enraged the Jewish establishment, or would have at least toadied up to the Roman rulers. The history, of course, is quite different, and it took nearly 300 years, and thousands of martyrs, before the Church became the official religion of Rome.

Instead of resigning and doing public penance, which is what Mahony should have done if he still were a practicing and believing Catholic, he has gone into the secular world about as much as he can, by hiring a PR firm to deal with his many blunders.

So blinded by egotism that he does not even realize that merely hiring a PR firm in this instance is bad PR, he continues to build on his sorry legacy. Had this abuse scandal not existed, his insistence on absurd liturgical “reforms” that have gone a long way in removing moments of contemplation and spirituality from the Mass–especially as practiced by his most admiring pastors–would have been damage enough.

Not many Angelenos will forget how he stood in front of the much shorter Pope John Paul II in the Popemobile, making it difficult for the thousands of onlookers to even see the Pontiff, during his visit in 1987. And, not many Angelenos will forget how he has done his level best to bring untold harm to this archdiocese, PR or no PR.