Links for 07/21/15 | National Catholic Reporter

Links for 07/21/15 | National Catholic Reporter by MSW. MGB: There has been no mileage on the Planned Parenthood video because tissue gathering for any kind of late term termination, living or dead, has to protect tissues for research or post-mortem analysis, not for sale.  If the Catholic bishops want more humane later term abortion, they should offer the service (induction only) or shut up.  Hoping a 20 week ban will pull enough mushy middle Catholics into the embrace of the pro-life movement, if only for one bill, is self serving by Schneck and his DFLA.  The truth is that the seemless garment and DFLA are for morally squeamish Catholics to use to vote Democratic, in hopes that the GOP will go along on issues to make things marginally better for the unborn - like the 20 week ban.  That 20 weeks shows a pain stimulus response is interesting, but not proof of either intelligence or viability - indeed, unless you wish to birth permanently disabled kids, stick to 28 weeks as the milestone and get everyone to agree.  The last to get on board would be the GOP, because such a compromise (even at 20 weeks - a number designed to keep Democrats from saying yes) would end both National to Right Life and DFLA as organizational entities.  DFLA would love that, not so much the GOP and NRLC.  If you want progress on abortion, either lean on NRLC to agree to some number between 20 and 30 weeks or sever ties between the bishops, all of them, and NLRC.  Without their profit motive and the Church's participation in their scam, they won't last long and neither will the issue.



I love that Think Progress found the letter from JEB and his brother's campaign to the Swifties thanking them for their attack on now-Secretary Kerry.  Of course, I suspect that in both the tweet and the letter, things are being done in JEBs name, though not necessarily without his consent.  Aides do this kind of thing for candidates and their main staff.  What this may show is that the W. Campaign may not have been wholly independent of the Swift Vote Veterans for Bellicose Slander.  That is where there should be consequences.



I wonder if it is too late to walk back Robert Barron's elevation to Auxiliary Bishop after his screed last week.  Of course, the answer to Fr. Robert's question is yes, Francis is Marxist Prophet - thank God and finally!  I don't think one column is enough to cancel his consecration and it should not.  Still, I think he knows he is now on a leash, starting with his Archbishop.  He may find that having is not so good a thing as wanting, to quote Spock of Vulcan.