Links for 3/31/20
For a Catholic position on COVID, ignore the bishops and ask the Sisters at CHA. A cure for COVID would be a cure for the common cold. The only cure is being sick. The $600 UI payment sets the stage for a $15 minimum wage in the long run. For house cleaners too. Not a bad thing unless the supply of labor and goods is diminishing and Amazon is running a futures market on toilet paper.
Arroyo is best ignored the way Trump should be. Mnuchin and his former associates are getting paid because they are on the hook for rental properties. The bailout saves their bacon, at least until inflation hits. Nikki needs to quit dissing congressional pork. It is how things get done in a democracy.
Tuesday, March 31, 2020
Monday, March 30, 2020
Will Trump be the first president reelected during a full-blown recession?
Will Trump be the first president reelected during a full-blown recession?
No. Unless the nation goes back to work soon, inflation is going to be really bad; lots of money, not much to buy. Media polls like to show a horse race. Campaigns don't correct them because the perception you can lose gets people to vote. Generally, any poll this far out that includes Rasmussen, or any similar polls, is biased by at least four points toward the right. As for Biden, when the crisis fades, he needs to take time to educate voters on the reality, economics and politics of abortion. The pro-life movement must be defanged. No more October surpises.
No. Unless the nation goes back to work soon, inflation is going to be really bad; lots of money, not much to buy. Media polls like to show a horse race. Campaigns don't correct them because the perception you can lose gets people to vote. Generally, any poll this far out that includes Rasmussen, or any similar polls, is biased by at least four points toward the right. As for Biden, when the crisis fades, he needs to take time to educate voters on the reality, economics and politics of abortion. The pro-life movement must be defanged. No more October surpises.
Friday, March 27, 2020
Links for 3/27/20
Links for 3/27/20
In this case the Idiot-in Chief is right. Most young people will not notice they are sick, others will get a bad cold and really old people, who are as likely to die of the flu, will succumb. The response is to give money to those who won't even get sick and whose labor backs a global economy that is about to come to its knees because distributors are hoarding toilet paper.
We may hate Trump, but he is correct. The danger in throwing money at this fire is that it is based on exchanged labor and rich people gambling about the results of that labor. When economies collapse, authoritarians who make Trump look like a choir boy tend to come to power.
The heart of this crisis is that older doctors who are justifiably afraid of getting sick so that younger doctors who won't will assume their leadership positions and, after the crisis, won't give them back.
Georgetown would have had to pay a much higher unemployment tax. The rate will go up, regardless, because it must support funding recipients. Avoiding layoffs avoids this.
Lent is an environmental season and dealing with COVID is part of the environment. Having had the virus, I could do an essay on the experience. Before COVID, giving up driving should be the practice for those who habe adequate bus service. That would be solidarity.
If you really want to talk solidarity, do a story about whether meat packing employees are getting COVID time off. Some of these workers are Somali.
The IMF simply did a write down on uncollectible debt. It should keep going.
In this case the Idiot-in Chief is right. Most young people will not notice they are sick, others will get a bad cold and really old people, who are as likely to die of the flu, will succumb. The response is to give money to those who won't even get sick and whose labor backs a global economy that is about to come to its knees because distributors are hoarding toilet paper.
We may hate Trump, but he is correct. The danger in throwing money at this fire is that it is based on exchanged labor and rich people gambling about the results of that labor. When economies collapse, authoritarians who make Trump look like a choir boy tend to come to power.
The heart of this crisis is that older doctors who are justifiably afraid of getting sick so that younger doctors who won't will assume their leadership positions and, after the crisis, won't give them back.
Georgetown would have had to pay a much higher unemployment tax. The rate will go up, regardless, because it must support funding recipients. Avoiding layoffs avoids this.
Lent is an environmental season and dealing with COVID is part of the environment. Having had the virus, I could do an essay on the experience. Before COVID, giving up driving should be the practice for those who habe adequate bus service. That would be solidarity.
If you really want to talk solidarity, do a story about whether meat packing employees are getting COVID time off. Some of these workers are Somali.
The IMF simply did a write down on uncollectible debt. It should keep going.
Thursday, March 26, 2020
Give me liberty, or give me (grandma's) death!
Give me liberty, or give me (grandma's) death!
I do not think anyone wants to kill Grandma or ask her to sacrifice herself for the common good. Mine died of the flu in 1993 at the age of 97. So did her roommate at their nursing home. Should society have forced her care givers to rush her to the hospital, hook her to a ventilator in the ICU in an induced coma as her organs fail? Praise God that this did not happen. Had she been an active jogger with no dementia, a ventilator could have gotten her back on the road, but she was not.
My other grandmother died two years earlier of heart disease. When I arrived she was on O2, but no vent and her childhood TB had returned. She was not coherent at first, but rebounded when her favorite grandson arrived. We had a nice few days until she began to fade and I had to go back for a new term at American U. Grad student homework does not grade itself. She lasted another week and died peacefully at age 83 and then months and no vent.
My Mom had a vent after asphyxiation in a gas leak. We took her off in 2 days and she died peacefully an hour later. My father lasted a week after a heart attack subsequent to diverticulitis and smoking. If he had been cooled quickly, as my brother was after his MI, he may have made it. My brother was on a vent for two days and is very much alive.
I just got over COVID after 26 days of symptoms. No vent needed. I am now immune and can visit or care for elderly or infected patients with no mask or socialize with old people without fear of their safety.
Being all better by Easter is stupidity one expects from Trump. Charity demands we ignore the old fool. He is correct, however, as I pointed out yesterday, that we cannot spend months on idle while throwing money on the fire.
What we need is a pool of healthcare workers who have gotten sick and recovered. They won't need masks to care for grandma. The way the medical establishment, the governors, the libertarians and the egalitarian are reacting is typical if you understand cultural theory. I wrote a piece about it while in quarentine last Saturday after an ill-fated trip to Safeway. You can read it here.
Trump may be an embarrassment to himself and to us, but he knows enough about inflation to realize that giving out money with few working will be a disaster.
I just found a deal on the scariest supply out there. $19 for six rolls and $8 for delivery and tax. Mine comes in 10 days. Most cannot be ordered for delivery before May. Late April for delivery from Japan or China. I am sure that the Army is sitting in a pile of it, but good luck in getting out of them. Not even Radar O'Reilly can swing that deal. That is what we face if we let the doctors not get sick and then recover.
I do not think anyone wants to kill Grandma or ask her to sacrifice herself for the common good. Mine died of the flu in 1993 at the age of 97. So did her roommate at their nursing home. Should society have forced her care givers to rush her to the hospital, hook her to a ventilator in the ICU in an induced coma as her organs fail? Praise God that this did not happen. Had she been an active jogger with no dementia, a ventilator could have gotten her back on the road, but she was not.
My other grandmother died two years earlier of heart disease. When I arrived she was on O2, but no vent and her childhood TB had returned. She was not coherent at first, but rebounded when her favorite grandson arrived. We had a nice few days until she began to fade and I had to go back for a new term at American U. Grad student homework does not grade itself. She lasted another week and died peacefully at age 83 and then months and no vent.
My Mom had a vent after asphyxiation in a gas leak. We took her off in 2 days and she died peacefully an hour later. My father lasted a week after a heart attack subsequent to diverticulitis and smoking. If he had been cooled quickly, as my brother was after his MI, he may have made it. My brother was on a vent for two days and is very much alive.
I just got over COVID after 26 days of symptoms. No vent needed. I am now immune and can visit or care for elderly or infected patients with no mask or socialize with old people without fear of their safety.
Being all better by Easter is stupidity one expects from Trump. Charity demands we ignore the old fool. He is correct, however, as I pointed out yesterday, that we cannot spend months on idle while throwing money on the fire.
What we need is a pool of healthcare workers who have gotten sick and recovered. They won't need masks to care for grandma. The way the medical establishment, the governors, the libertarians and the egalitarian are reacting is typical if you understand cultural theory. I wrote a piece about it while in quarentine last Saturday after an ill-fated trip to Safeway. You can read it here.
Trump may be an embarrassment to himself and to us, but he knows enough about inflation to realize that giving out money with few working will be a disaster.
I just found a deal on the scariest supply out there. $19 for six rolls and $8 for delivery and tax. Mine comes in 10 days. Most cannot be ordered for delivery before May. Late April for delivery from Japan or China. I am sure that the Army is sitting in a pile of it, but good luck in getting out of them. Not even Radar O'Reilly can swing that deal. That is what we face if we let the doctors not get sick and then recover.
Wednesday, March 25, 2020
One small step for economic recovery, avoiding one giant leap toward Putinism
One small step for economic recovery, avoiding one giant leap toward Putinism
This is not a Putin economy. It is a Brezhnev economy. Money is not a real thing. It is a social construct used to exchange labor. When no one can or will work real jobs, they work on side jobs under the table. This causes the official economy to break down, leading to inflation and shortages. It is why I can get food, but not delivery. To get anything done, you have to know someone and pay a premium for their services
The stimulus currently being passed will go to pay bills. It will not be able to buy labor. Households will be able to pay their rent and credit card bills. Unemployment will be used to buy food. Mnuchin and his friends made their bones flipping these properties, which were then securitized. To really understand Mnuchin and his cronies did it, read Homewreckers by Aaron Glantz.
The reason the bailout got done is that the demand to have the Fed distribute loans (it was longer Mnuchin) is that they issued credit and started buying mortgage backed (and probably credit card) debt securities. To understand why central banks issuing credit does nothing for Main Street, read Collusion by Nomi Prins.
We must learn from Obama's mistakes and have the Fed forgive the credit card debt (eliminating the money) and writing down the mortgage debt if sold to the renters or the prior residential owners or their heirs (not flippers). This also destroys the money. Keeping that money in the finance sector as monopoly money is harmless. Letting it circulate in the real economy is hyperinflation.
Trump is right. We cannot stay idle. Those who won't get sick or who will recover (almost all workers) should go back to work. Isolate those who are likely to die, give them pneumonia shots and only let them have contact with people who have gotten sick and recovered. Trump may babble like an old man, but he understands the risks and benefits of inflation. It may be the entire sum of his useful knowledge.
This is not a Putin economy. It is a Brezhnev economy. Money is not a real thing. It is a social construct used to exchange labor. When no one can or will work real jobs, they work on side jobs under the table. This causes the official economy to break down, leading to inflation and shortages. It is why I can get food, but not delivery. To get anything done, you have to know someone and pay a premium for their services
The stimulus currently being passed will go to pay bills. It will not be able to buy labor. Households will be able to pay their rent and credit card bills. Unemployment will be used to buy food. Mnuchin and his friends made their bones flipping these properties, which were then securitized. To really understand Mnuchin and his cronies did it, read Homewreckers by Aaron Glantz.
The reason the bailout got done is that the demand to have the Fed distribute loans (it was longer Mnuchin) is that they issued credit and started buying mortgage backed (and probably credit card) debt securities. To understand why central banks issuing credit does nothing for Main Street, read Collusion by Nomi Prins.
We must learn from Obama's mistakes and have the Fed forgive the credit card debt (eliminating the money) and writing down the mortgage debt if sold to the renters or the prior residential owners or their heirs (not flippers). This also destroys the money. Keeping that money in the finance sector as monopoly money is harmless. Letting it circulate in the real economy is hyperinflation.
Trump is right. We cannot stay idle. Those who won't get sick or who will recover (almost all workers) should go back to work. Isolate those who are likely to die, give them pneumonia shots and only let them have contact with people who have gotten sick and recovered. Trump may babble like an old man, but he understands the risks and benefits of inflation. It may be the entire sum of his useful knowledge.
Tuesday, March 24, 2020
Links for 3/24/20
Links for 3/24/20
The Trump Administration is loaded with people who made their bones in flipping houses into rentals and leveraging them. They have skin in the game. Hannity does too. Sadly, finance guys think they know everything. Nope. Leonhardt is shooting fish in a barrel. The press need to simply ignore Trump for the good of the nation. Even Hannity.
Warren would be a good White House Chief of staff. Her campaign staff, not so much. She adds to the ticket if Bernie throws his supporters behind her. If not, the optics of two East coast candidates is not good. Amy does not have that issue. She would certainly help in the iron range in Minnesota.
The Trump Administration is loaded with people who made their bones in flipping houses into rentals and leveraging them. They have skin in the game. Hannity does too. Sadly, finance guys think they know everything. Nope. Leonhardt is shooting fish in a barrel. The press need to simply ignore Trump for the good of the nation. Even Hannity.
Warren would be a good White House Chief of staff. Her campaign staff, not so much. She adds to the ticket if Bernie throws his supporters behind her. If not, the optics of two East coast candidates is not good. Amy does not have that issue. She would certainly help in the iron range in Minnesota.
Monday, March 23, 2020
Time is now for Democrats, Joe Biden to shape this narrative
Time is now for Democrats, Joe Biden to shape this narrative
Gerson is right about authoritarians, but he ignores the role of fear and the medical establishment in enabling them.
Biden needs to coordinate his response with Pelosi and Schumer (as should Sanders). Not subsidizing billionaires directly is important. Insisting that the deal not include direct aid for the housing and financial services industry is as vital; probably more so. Mnuchin has or had his fingers in that pot. Any help for them must come through tenants and card holders. Watch the Tax Policy Center's coverage for the best analysis.
Gerson is right about authoritarians, but he ignores the role of fear and the medical establishment in enabling them.
Biden needs to coordinate his response with Pelosi and Schumer (as should Sanders). Not subsidizing billionaires directly is important. Insisting that the deal not include direct aid for the housing and financial services industry is as vital; probably more so. Mnuchin has or had his fingers in that pot. Any help for them must come through tenants and card holders. Watch the Tax Policy Center's coverage for the best analysis.
Friday, March 20, 2020
Competent coronavirus management matters, and it's political
Competent coronavirus management matters, and it's political
Moderates have already left the GOP and support Biden. Fox News key audience cannot argue with what will be a near death experience. The villain is Pence. He is running the show while letting Trump bloviate, rather than removing him. No moral courage. Agnew II.
Moderates have already left the GOP and support Biden. Fox News key audience cannot argue with what will be a near death experience. The villain is Pence. He is running the show while letting Trump bloviate, rather than removing him. No moral courage. Agnew II.
Thursday, March 19, 2020
Links for 3/19/20
Links for 3/19/20
Intelligence officers serve the nation, not the President. They will not give classified to a Putin puppet.
If Strickland does not listen to science, he will return to the Lord sooner than most. Reno too. The inequality of power is more telling than that of wealth. It's about the people, not the toys. Illness is the great leveller in times like these. This is the essential part of the Gospel that Strickland and Reno missed.
Note to MSW, confiscating money is called taxation. It is as sure a thing as death. So is the unmasking of the pro-life movement as a Republican front. Newman saw that, Lipinski did not. Steven's findings show why she will win in November.
Intelligence officers serve the nation, not the President. They will not give classified to a Putin puppet.
If Strickland does not listen to science, he will return to the Lord sooner than most. Reno too. The inequality of power is more telling than that of wealth. It's about the people, not the toys. Illness is the great leveller in times like these. This is the essential part of the Gospel that Strickland and Reno missed.
Note to MSW, confiscating money is called taxation. It is as sure a thing as death. So is the unmasking of the pro-life movement as a Republican front. Newman saw that, Lipinski did not. Steven's findings show why she will win in November.
Wednesday, March 18, 2020
Rightwing conspiracies swirling around coronavirus cost lives
Rightwing conspiracies swirling around coronavirus cost withoon
It is cruel to cover a senile old man in a crisis. It is even worse that he has not been removed by the Vice President. Behind the scenes, there was likely a battle between the Secretaries of Health and Human Services on one side and Treasury and Commerce on the other.
The debate was not about the common good but about workers paying rent so that the mortgage backed securities on their homes do not crash. Mnuchin and Ross are the landlords. This is why Mnuchin had the lead in negotiating the bailouts. He has skin in the game.
Evangelical pastors are more conservative than libertarian. They truly believe that not going to Church means going to Hell. That and huge mortgages on their mega churches do not pay themselves. Poverty is not their thing. They made their choice between God and money long ago and chose poorly.
It is cruel to cover a senile old man in a crisis. It is even worse that he has not been removed by the Vice President. Behind the scenes, there was likely a battle between the Secretaries of Health and Human Services on one side and Treasury and Commerce on the other.
The debate was not about the common good but about workers paying rent so that the mortgage backed securities on their homes do not crash. Mnuchin and Ross are the landlords. This is why Mnuchin had the lead in negotiating the bailouts. He has skin in the game.
Evangelical pastors are more conservative than libertarian. They truly believe that not going to Church means going to Hell. That and huge mortgages on their mega churches do not pay themselves. Poverty is not their thing. They made their choice between God and money long ago and chose poorly.
Tuesday, March 17, 2020
Links for 3/17/20
Links for 3/17/20
This disease is not the Black Death. Old people dying of it means less if them dying of influenza. I have the thing. My asthma meds handle it. Robitusin would too. The bad part is feel in weak and watching the coverage on TV. Note to MSNBC and CNN: leave the old fool in the White House alone. He has nothing to add worth listening to. Trump was likely serving the interests of the landlords in his Cabinet, especially Mnuchin. They want to make sure they get rent so that they can service the mortgage backed securities against their properties. It is why Steve negotiated the bailout. The Masters of the Universe in Wall Street probably also have their hands in this. Both parties.
The Good Samaritan takes many forms. He can be Black or Gay or Female. I dare Cardinal Sean to address them all.
The wealth tax is doubling down on capital gains taxes. Wealth taxes also legitimate wealth. Good social democracy, lousy socialism. Sometimes popular positions are wrong. Bernie needs to get out and start the move to unity.
We need a president that will listen to outside voices and move to compromise. Sanders and Warren had staffs who are too sure of themselves to listen. Policy is a dance, not a war. Biden's tax plan is not perfect, but much of it will pass. How it looks in the end is up to staff on Ways and Means and Senate Finance. The other important issue is Defense. Trump is an idiot and no one is sure about Bernie. Joe will be ready on Day One. He is ready now.
This disease is not the Black Death. Old people dying of it means less if them dying of influenza. I have the thing. My asthma meds handle it. Robitusin would too. The bad part is feel in weak and watching the coverage on TV. Note to MSNBC and CNN: leave the old fool in the White House alone. He has nothing to add worth listening to. Trump was likely serving the interests of the landlords in his Cabinet, especially Mnuchin. They want to make sure they get rent so that they can service the mortgage backed securities against their properties. It is why Steve negotiated the bailout. The Masters of the Universe in Wall Street probably also have their hands in this. Both parties.
The Good Samaritan takes many forms. He can be Black or Gay or Female. I dare Cardinal Sean to address them all.
The wealth tax is doubling down on capital gains taxes. Wealth taxes also legitimate wealth. Good social democracy, lousy socialism. Sometimes popular positions are wrong. Bernie needs to get out and start the move to unity.
We need a president that will listen to outside voices and move to compromise. Sanders and Warren had staffs who are too sure of themselves to listen. Policy is a dance, not a war. Biden's tax plan is not perfect, but much of it will pass. How it looks in the end is up to staff on Ways and Means and Senate Finance. The other important issue is Defense. Trump is an idiot and no one is sure about Bernie. Joe will be ready on Day One. He is ready now.
Monday, March 16, 2020
Catholics have been intertwined with US politics for decades
Catholics have been intertwined with US politics for decades
Boss Tweed loved Catholics. Wherever Catholic voters are a key block, they get love. In 2008, Catholics were with Obama because he ignored abortion and under the surface Obama Catholics went with the meme that the pro-life movement was a GOP front. Hillary forgot the lesson, defended partial birth abortion and lost Midwestern Catholics in a ten point shift. Blame them for Trump.
The reason 19th Century politics was anti-Catholic was because the popes were actively against democracy, especially the American sort. John Cortland Murray was persecuted by the hierarchy for his defense of it. At the Council, there was opposition to Dignitatis Humanae. Among the Coucil traditionalists was a certain Polish priest who would later be pope and whose encyclical, Veritatis Splendor, is hardly a paen for freedom of thought. Blaine was wrong, but his reasons were not devoid of truth.
Boss Tweed loved Catholics. Wherever Catholic voters are a key block, they get love. In 2008, Catholics were with Obama because he ignored abortion and under the surface Obama Catholics went with the meme that the pro-life movement was a GOP front. Hillary forgot the lesson, defended partial birth abortion and lost Midwestern Catholics in a ten point shift. Blame them for Trump.
The reason 19th Century politics was anti-Catholic was because the popes were actively against democracy, especially the American sort. John Cortland Murray was persecuted by the hierarchy for his defense of it. At the Council, there was opposition to Dignitatis Humanae. Among the Coucil traditionalists was a certain Polish priest who would later be pope and whose encyclical, Veritatis Splendor, is hardly a paen for freedom of thought. Blaine was wrong, but his reasons were not devoid of truth.
Friday, March 13, 2020
Biden needs support of young people, Latinos to unite the Democrats
Biden needs support of young people, Latinos to unite the Democrats
Sanders people only want Sanders. If the GOP implodes, they will form a second party with Warren at the helm. Biden will win the never Trumpers. If he can tag Pence with Trump, he may keep them to win. As for gaffes, they are already built in to the Biden brand.
Sanders people only want Sanders. If the GOP implodes, they will form a second party with Warren at the helm. Biden will win the never Trumpers. If he can tag Pence with Trump, he may keep them to win. As for gaffes, they are already built in to the Biden brand.
Thursday, March 12, 2020
Links for 3/12/20
Link's for 3/12/20
Being against the union was likely the Bishop's idea. Unions with women are pro-choice. The Church has also been anti-woman since Augustine.
Northport's sister city is Moscow. Red Hook's us Ma-aha, Palestine. NYC is partnered with Beijing. Sanders did like old Russia, which is odd for a social democrat.
Never-Trumpers like Joe over Trump. Not sure about Pence.
The Christian Right emerged to justify slavery in religious terms. They have believed in controlling the underclass. See comment about the Bishop's. Few are like Francis, which gives them bad dreams. Vive il Papa.
The Cross is about Divine Humility, not Divine Vengeance. Not understanding that casts a shadow on the whole Church.
Being against the union was likely the Bishop's idea. Unions with women are pro-choice. The Church has also been anti-woman since Augustine.
Northport's sister city is Moscow. Red Hook's us Ma-aha, Palestine. NYC is partnered with Beijing. Sanders did like old Russia, which is odd for a social democrat.
Never-Trumpers like Joe over Trump. Not sure about Pence.
The Christian Right emerged to justify slavery in religious terms. They have believed in controlling the underclass. See comment about the Bishop's. Few are like Francis, which gives them bad dreams. Vive il Papa.
The Cross is about Divine Humility, not Divine Vengeance. Not understanding that casts a shadow on the whole Church.
Wednesday, March 11, 2020
Progressive Catholics should vote for Bernie Sanders
Progressive Catholics should vote for Bernie Sanders
God gets a vote this time. All three candidates plus Pence have likely been exposed to COVID-19. All could die. Pelosi too. And Grassley. Can an acting cabinet member ascend to the Presidency? Will there be enough Supreme Court justices left alive for a quorum to decide?
Hunter is not an issue. If Joe won't bring up Ivanka, others will. The key is still who can beat Pence. The likely impact of Trump v. Vance is Trump's indictment and arrest. The attack on Hunter us also Putin propoganda. It should not be repeated.
Joe will be a better President. He will likely pick Harris as VP, who is as or more progressive than Sanders. Joe may also finally explain Roe to the Bishops and defang the pro-life movement forever. This is worth the price of admission. Finally, Joe has the foreign policy chops. Bernie does not. Elections are about who can do the job. Bernie cannot.
God gets a vote this time. All three candidates plus Pence have likely been exposed to COVID-19. All could die. Pelosi too. And Grassley. Can an acting cabinet member ascend to the Presidency? Will there be enough Supreme Court justices left alive for a quorum to decide?
Hunter is not an issue. If Joe won't bring up Ivanka, others will. The key is still who can beat Pence. The likely impact of Trump v. Vance is Trump's indictment and arrest. The attack on Hunter us also Putin propoganda. It should not be repeated.
Joe will be a better President. He will likely pick Harris as VP, who is as or more progressive than Sanders. Joe may also finally explain Roe to the Bishops and defang the pro-life movement forever. This is worth the price of admission. Finally, Joe has the foreign policy chops. Bernie does not. Elections are about who can do the job. Bernie cannot.
Tuesday, March 10, 2020
Links for 3/10/20
Links for 3/10/20
Trump needs to quit talking in public and we should stop covering the old fool. He was probably told that for most people, this is a cold. Probably true, but he has no credibility to say anything.
Amy, et al, left the race as much to stop Bernie as Bloomberg. Arroyo seems to be just another Trumpster. Biden has now consolidated - and with less money than Sanders. Maybe it is his turn, if he stays healthy. I still think both are too old. No one now running will be on the ballot in 2024.
Warren's staff experience was not about social issues. It was because neither she nor her staff were nimble in tax policy.
For Chuck, it is all about election stunts. This is why Trump is still President. The reality is that June v. Gee being heard is a win for legal abortion. So is hearing the Obama care case and Trump v. Vance.
Race is always in the background in American politics and economics. Looking woke is not enough. You must show up. It is why Bernie and his earnest supporters have no chance against Joe.
Sainthood has been as much about P.R. as sanctity. It used to be as much about the living as the dead. Also politics. All things EWTN are about the GOP. All things anti-gay in the Church are all about sour grapes over gay marriage.
The legality of abortion is about whether the state can project violence against women. Misusing nonviolent memes will not change this.
Trump needs to quit talking in public and we should stop covering the old fool. He was probably told that for most people, this is a cold. Probably true, but he has no credibility to say anything.
Amy, et al, left the race as much to stop Bernie as Bloomberg. Arroyo seems to be just another Trumpster. Biden has now consolidated - and with less money than Sanders. Maybe it is his turn, if he stays healthy. I still think both are too old. No one now running will be on the ballot in 2024.
Warren's staff experience was not about social issues. It was because neither she nor her staff were nimble in tax policy.
For Chuck, it is all about election stunts. This is why Trump is still President. The reality is that June v. Gee being heard is a win for legal abortion. So is hearing the Obama care case and Trump v. Vance.
Race is always in the background in American politics and economics. Looking woke is not enough. You must show up. It is why Bernie and his earnest supporters have no chance against Joe.
Sainthood has been as much about P.R. as sanctity. It used to be as much about the living as the dead. Also politics. All things EWTN are about the GOP. All things anti-gay in the Church are all about sour grapes over gay marriage.
The legality of abortion is about whether the state can project violence against women. Misusing nonviolent memes will not change this.
Monday, March 9, 2020
Warren lost her ascendancy, but she did something wonderful for the Democrats
Warren lost her ascendancy, but she did something wonderful for the Democrats
Carter was a wonk too. Warren was done when DSA decided Bernie or Bust. She needs to get really active in his campaign so that his minions become hers in 2024. If the GOP dies and the Sanders wing is big enough, she should follow him into a new majority party. Until then, its Joe time. He needs to reach out to Catholics (especially bishops) and give them the courtesy of an explanation if why legal abortion is not nor will it go away. He also needs a radical plan to increase incomes for families with children by a six-fold increase in the child tax credit, making it refundable and distributing it with wages or tuition stipends.
Carter was a wonk too. Warren was done when DSA decided Bernie or Bust. She needs to get really active in his campaign so that his minions become hers in 2024. If the GOP dies and the Sanders wing is big enough, she should follow him into a new majority party. Until then, its Joe time. He needs to reach out to Catholics (especially bishops) and give them the courtesy of an explanation if why legal abortion is not nor will it go away. He also needs a radical plan to increase incomes for families with children by a six-fold increase in the child tax credit, making it refundable and distributing it with wages or tuition stipends.
Monday, March 2, 2020
Review: MSW on Christ and Culture
A step back to look at 'Christ and Culture' for a week Part 1: Christ against culture
We must remember that Christianity has its own culture. All sects are a cultural. The challenge for the individual Catholic is to be counter-cultural WITHIN the Church. We must be dependent on Jesus, not the bishops, especially when they behave abhorently toward women, gays and people who do not think of sex as an evil to be overcome. It takes a solid relationship to Christ to speak against them.
Christ-of-culture thinking presents a too-tidy view of Christianity
Christianity is expert at cultural dominance. Indeed, by coopting existing custom, it has become the popular culture. It's leaders have consistently sought the convenience of using the state as an instrument of conversion. Too often, and even into the middle of the 20th Century, the Church was a leader in cultural censorship. Some sects are still as instrumental in organized racism as most were before the Civil Rights movement.
This rewards economic interests rather than bringing the Kingdom of God about, not the ethereal next-world, but for justice within this one. The Catholic Worker Christ is not at one with the bishops. It rejects the feudal arrangements that kept the serfs in line. This hearkens to the prophets and is inconvenient to the dominant culture.
Jesus of the poor is also Jesus of the sinner rather than Jesus the cultural enforcer. Jesus came not to discipline the sinners but to identify with their pain. This does not serve those who want to impose cultural hegemony.
Synthesists are one of three 'church parties' for Niebuhr, with Christ above culture
Thinking that there will never again be an Aquinas us a lapse into nostalgia. The Distributists also pine for the 13th Century. That Century also laid the ground for the emergence of Protestantism and later, the Enlightenment. Remember that Niebuhr was not Catholic. Indeed, Pius X would have called him a modernist. The Church is a community for Christ, but it is not Christ.
Christ and culture in paradox, and Christ as transformer of culture
Paul was expecting the imminent return of the Kingdom, as did Luther, as did many of the Catholics and Protestants in the 20th Century. I used to be one of them. The irony of Luther is that he was an Augustinian Friar. Either he or his spiritual director did not understand the purpose of his spiritual labors as a monk - they are to convert the comfortable to an attitude of dependence on God. Those of us with addictions and afflictions need no such discipline - life has done it for us.
Paul, Luther, et al are more Christ as codependent. It is the Christianity that has to go to confession every week and confess all mortal sins lest they be damned - who must go to Church every week for the same reason. It is the culture of the self-absorbed. They are easy to find in the Church. They are the one's who think Vertitatis Splendor is infallible and Amoris Latetia is heresy.
Augustine was culture over Christ. His view of sexuality came from Hellenism, not scripture, and perverted the Genesis myth into permanent work for the Church in fighting sexuality, adopting the asexual ideal as the highest form of love, rather than the province of those who others call odd ducks. Glorifying asexuality with immaturity (maturely developed asexuality is a charism, as are maturely developed heterosexuality and homosexuality) fuel our abuse crisis. It is ours because we have left our thinking to Synthesizers.
The Trads who also reject Vatican II believe the theory of evolution must be wrong because it is not consistent with the Genesis myth. The reality is that the Eden story is an allegory on blame. We disobey God not in seeking a conscience in violation of some purported innocence, but because we seek knowledge of the evil of others. God cannot look upon evil - that is the moral code of the Paradoxers. The reality is that God does not see it in us. He sees only what is in Him - our Good. His desire for us is that we look at ourselves and others in the same way. Only when we refuse to forgive (or accept) ourselves and others that problems occur.
Niebuhr left out a possibility that likely did not occur to him (unless it is in the conclusion) - Christ below culture. By Christ, I mean us. Instead of trying to dictate culture, escape it or conform to it, we give it an example by loving both each other and those who oppose us. If we do speak up, it is in defense of those that Christ defended - the poor and the outcast. This is the Christ who truly shares our humanity. Indeed, the purpose of Christ was for all of the Trinity to do so (they go everywhere together).
A God of Love is also a God of Humility. This is more fearful than a God of Power and Awe. This God demands the same of us. God does not worry for Themselves. They are without fear of how all will turn out. To them it is a whole and it is Good. They did not create the world for their own glory because Their Glory, Happiness, Being, Beauty, Love and Knowledge is perfect in Themselves. They have nothing to prove. Ever. That we wish them to is a reflection on us, not God. God is meek and humble of Heart, His yoke is easy and His burden light. Christ in and below culture is about its conversion, but it is to perfect our humanity - not as we hope it to be but as it was created as good.
What that "it" is should be the focus of our ethics. This is where Jesus meets Jeremy Bentham, except that it is not the greatest good for the greatest number but providing good to all. This is not the cop out of Christ in culture. Working for human dignity for all is much more of a challenge than focusing on the state of one's soul.
In our day, in the US, we are all Christ-of-culture accommodationists
I am fairly sure that there are few accomodationists. That would be progress, but I am getting ahead of myself. Niebuhr's description of culture is excellent, though out of date. When he was giving his lectures, Mary Douglass was writing and releasing Purity and Danger, which was the tip of the spear in the Cultural Theory movement she later shared with the great Aaron Wildavsky (from whom I learned it). Later works were her work Leviticus as Literature and Elaine Pagels more recent tome Revelations: Visions, Prophecy, and Politics in the Book of Revelation. Any understanding of Christianity or culture is incomplete without reference to this overall theory. Also necessary are familiarity with Daniel's Dennett's Breaking the Spell, which treats God as meme and is similar to Hegel's theodicy (which is about the meme rather than the experience of God). Perspective can also be added with Diarmaid MacCulloch's Christianity: The First 3000 Years, including his account of Vatican II and St. John Paul's part in it. There is quite a bit of further reading to do on this topic.
Probably the most influential spiritual author of that era, who riffs off of William James' Varieties of Religious Experience (whom Niebuhr mentions and who uses his brother's famous Serenity Prayer) is Bill Wilson. He is the Aquinas of this era and is essentially a philosophical pantheist (as is the recovery movement - the real source of spiritual but not religious). Ironically, his work is based on the Spiritual Exercises of St. Ignatius Loyola, which he learned from Rev. Sam Sheppard and more thoroughly from his spiritual mentor, Fr. Ed Dowling, S.J. Bill considered conversion to Catholicism, but felt it would disrupt AA if he had done so.
Understanding all of these (some of which are still on my reading list) explains how we got to where we are, in union with Christ and Culture. Niebuhr is a good Calvinist, which stresses as much as Catholicism, the sovereign prerogatives of God. Doing so only gets one so far. As I wrote yesterday (above), Christ comes below culture at his best. It is the only place real conversion can come from. The irony is that a God who is not humble is not worth worshiping because such a God is flawed by an agenda for Its (or Their) own sake. It is precisely where the Church needs to come from for a revival to occur.
Going back to the current state of the Church, Christ In Culture would be an improvement. The reality is that the St. John Paul clergy (especially the bishops) have lapsed into Christ Against Culture, reacting to the loss of Christ Above Culture in all of its forms. The hegemony of the 1950s was a brief golden age. It was not ghetto. It tried to put progress into a ghetto they called Modernism. The evolution of culture and Vatican II simply fought back.
The period of St. Pius X and its revival under St. John Paul stressed the Culture of Paradox where everyone was pressured to go to Mass on a weekly basis, rather than transform their inner life. As Dennett noticed, a belief in the belief in God was more common than actual faith. It always is. The culture of frequent (if not weekly) confession of all (natural) thoughts sexual could not continue. Humanae Vitae was its natural boiling point and it is where many got off, even if they continued to attend Mass. Instead of attacking the economic conditions which cause the use of birth control, the Church stressed sexuality as the cause at its own peril. The combination of this reaction to Augustine's asexual ideal and the lack of cultural pressure to look Catholic has led to the rise of the Nones. A culture of accommodation would at least have people in the door. That would imply actually caring about the life of the Church.
As luck would have it, Bernie Sanders is running for President and some of his campaign is tinged with thuggery (which in recent days has received attention in their treatment of Senator Warren). The entire movement is tainted by what can politely be called attitude or more accurately, a persecution complex rivaling Russia after the Great Patriotic War or Germany after the Treaty of Versailles. The Millennial generation has a point. There privileged upbringing has not prepared them for the vicissitudes of capitalism, which are not fair - especially to them. Their reaction to these are natural and explainable, but do not bode well for our future. They seem to be copying the College Republican alumni in the GOP blow for blow in nastiness. I hope that there is a silent majority to overcome both toxic strains.
This is where the Church could come in. If we were smart, we would buy and forgive their student loans and make Catholic college free. We would be more vocal about the rights to families to a living wage, both a higher minimum and a much higher Child Tax Credit (each should be tripled) and should set an example by offering these benefits to employees. It should also lay off the sour grapes over gay marriage, quit firing gay employees who marry - indeed, it should celebrate their unions with a Mass. This is where the humility of God comes into play. As a Church, we are not really following Christ down that path. Also, ordain women and abandon the toxic misogyny of Hellenism that has plagued the Church since St. Augustine. We must take the initiative in converting the culture by first converting the Church. Calling for this takes the courage that only comes through Grace.
Catholics in politics, including and especially our Catholic politicians, need to be open to the courage to call for conversion by the Church. While it was perfectly fitting to rest on Digntatis Humanae and its stress on freedom on conscience in society in justifying not imposing criminal penalties for abortion, the path of courage is to explain publicly and privately why the social decisions from Roe v. Wade to Webster v. Texas and Perry v. Brown were rightly decided. Indeed, Dignitatis would allow no other option. The majority cannot impose its moral preferences on individuals or classes of individuals. Further, the law is not a social statement - it is the use of violence by the state to enforce its wishes. A better use of such violence would be the above steps to use tax policy to provide for the economic well-being of families. The Right to Life's resistance to such solutions must be called out - and the Church with it. Doing so would involve not rebellion against the Church or accommodation to culture, but the kind of loving correction oft practiced by the Christ of Scripture, Sacrament and Encounter.
We must remember that Christianity has its own culture. All sects are a cultural. The challenge for the individual Catholic is to be counter-cultural WITHIN the Church. We must be dependent on Jesus, not the bishops, especially when they behave abhorently toward women, gays and people who do not think of sex as an evil to be overcome. It takes a solid relationship to Christ to speak against them.
Christ-of-culture thinking presents a too-tidy view of Christianity
Christianity is expert at cultural dominance. Indeed, by coopting existing custom, it has become the popular culture. It's leaders have consistently sought the convenience of using the state as an instrument of conversion. Too often, and even into the middle of the 20th Century, the Church was a leader in cultural censorship. Some sects are still as instrumental in organized racism as most were before the Civil Rights movement.
This rewards economic interests rather than bringing the Kingdom of God about, not the ethereal next-world, but for justice within this one. The Catholic Worker Christ is not at one with the bishops. It rejects the feudal arrangements that kept the serfs in line. This hearkens to the prophets and is inconvenient to the dominant culture.
Jesus of the poor is also Jesus of the sinner rather than Jesus the cultural enforcer. Jesus came not to discipline the sinners but to identify with their pain. This does not serve those who want to impose cultural hegemony.
Synthesists are one of three 'church parties' for Niebuhr, with Christ above culture
Thinking that there will never again be an Aquinas us a lapse into nostalgia. The Distributists also pine for the 13th Century. That Century also laid the ground for the emergence of Protestantism and later, the Enlightenment. Remember that Niebuhr was not Catholic. Indeed, Pius X would have called him a modernist. The Church is a community for Christ, but it is not Christ.
Christ and culture in paradox, and Christ as transformer of culture
Paul was expecting the imminent return of the Kingdom, as did Luther, as did many of the Catholics and Protestants in the 20th Century. I used to be one of them. The irony of Luther is that he was an Augustinian Friar. Either he or his spiritual director did not understand the purpose of his spiritual labors as a monk - they are to convert the comfortable to an attitude of dependence on God. Those of us with addictions and afflictions need no such discipline - life has done it for us.
Paul, Luther, et al are more Christ as codependent. It is the Christianity that has to go to confession every week and confess all mortal sins lest they be damned - who must go to Church every week for the same reason. It is the culture of the self-absorbed. They are easy to find in the Church. They are the one's who think Vertitatis Splendor is infallible and Amoris Latetia is heresy.
Augustine was culture over Christ. His view of sexuality came from Hellenism, not scripture, and perverted the Genesis myth into permanent work for the Church in fighting sexuality, adopting the asexual ideal as the highest form of love, rather than the province of those who others call odd ducks. Glorifying asexuality with immaturity (maturely developed asexuality is a charism, as are maturely developed heterosexuality and homosexuality) fuel our abuse crisis. It is ours because we have left our thinking to Synthesizers.
The Trads who also reject Vatican II believe the theory of evolution must be wrong because it is not consistent with the Genesis myth. The reality is that the Eden story is an allegory on blame. We disobey God not in seeking a conscience in violation of some purported innocence, but because we seek knowledge of the evil of others. God cannot look upon evil - that is the moral code of the Paradoxers. The reality is that God does not see it in us. He sees only what is in Him - our Good. His desire for us is that we look at ourselves and others in the same way. Only when we refuse to forgive (or accept) ourselves and others that problems occur.
Niebuhr left out a possibility that likely did not occur to him (unless it is in the conclusion) - Christ below culture. By Christ, I mean us. Instead of trying to dictate culture, escape it or conform to it, we give it an example by loving both each other and those who oppose us. If we do speak up, it is in defense of those that Christ defended - the poor and the outcast. This is the Christ who truly shares our humanity. Indeed, the purpose of Christ was for all of the Trinity to do so (they go everywhere together).
A God of Love is also a God of Humility. This is more fearful than a God of Power and Awe. This God demands the same of us. God does not worry for Themselves. They are without fear of how all will turn out. To them it is a whole and it is Good. They did not create the world for their own glory because Their Glory, Happiness, Being, Beauty, Love and Knowledge is perfect in Themselves. They have nothing to prove. Ever. That we wish them to is a reflection on us, not God. God is meek and humble of Heart, His yoke is easy and His burden light. Christ in and below culture is about its conversion, but it is to perfect our humanity - not as we hope it to be but as it was created as good.
What that "it" is should be the focus of our ethics. This is where Jesus meets Jeremy Bentham, except that it is not the greatest good for the greatest number but providing good to all. This is not the cop out of Christ in culture. Working for human dignity for all is much more of a challenge than focusing on the state of one's soul.
In our day, in the US, we are all Christ-of-culture accommodationists
I am fairly sure that there are few accomodationists. That would be progress, but I am getting ahead of myself. Niebuhr's description of culture is excellent, though out of date. When he was giving his lectures, Mary Douglass was writing and releasing Purity and Danger, which was the tip of the spear in the Cultural Theory movement she later shared with the great Aaron Wildavsky (from whom I learned it). Later works were her work Leviticus as Literature and Elaine Pagels more recent tome Revelations: Visions, Prophecy, and Politics in the Book of Revelation. Any understanding of Christianity or culture is incomplete without reference to this overall theory. Also necessary are familiarity with Daniel's Dennett's Breaking the Spell, which treats God as meme and is similar to Hegel's theodicy (which is about the meme rather than the experience of God). Perspective can also be added with Diarmaid MacCulloch's Christianity: The First 3000 Years, including his account of Vatican II and St. John Paul's part in it. There is quite a bit of further reading to do on this topic.
Probably the most influential spiritual author of that era, who riffs off of William James' Varieties of Religious Experience (whom Niebuhr mentions and who uses his brother's famous Serenity Prayer) is Bill Wilson. He is the Aquinas of this era and is essentially a philosophical pantheist (as is the recovery movement - the real source of spiritual but not religious). Ironically, his work is based on the Spiritual Exercises of St. Ignatius Loyola, which he learned from Rev. Sam Sheppard and more thoroughly from his spiritual mentor, Fr. Ed Dowling, S.J. Bill considered conversion to Catholicism, but felt it would disrupt AA if he had done so.
Understanding all of these (some of which are still on my reading list) explains how we got to where we are, in union with Christ and Culture. Niebuhr is a good Calvinist, which stresses as much as Catholicism, the sovereign prerogatives of God. Doing so only gets one so far. As I wrote yesterday (above), Christ comes below culture at his best. It is the only place real conversion can come from. The irony is that a God who is not humble is not worth worshiping because such a God is flawed by an agenda for Its (or Their) own sake. It is precisely where the Church needs to come from for a revival to occur.
Going back to the current state of the Church, Christ In Culture would be an improvement. The reality is that the St. John Paul clergy (especially the bishops) have lapsed into Christ Against Culture, reacting to the loss of Christ Above Culture in all of its forms. The hegemony of the 1950s was a brief golden age. It was not ghetto. It tried to put progress into a ghetto they called Modernism. The evolution of culture and Vatican II simply fought back.
The period of St. Pius X and its revival under St. John Paul stressed the Culture of Paradox where everyone was pressured to go to Mass on a weekly basis, rather than transform their inner life. As Dennett noticed, a belief in the belief in God was more common than actual faith. It always is. The culture of frequent (if not weekly) confession of all (natural) thoughts sexual could not continue. Humanae Vitae was its natural boiling point and it is where many got off, even if they continued to attend Mass. Instead of attacking the economic conditions which cause the use of birth control, the Church stressed sexuality as the cause at its own peril. The combination of this reaction to Augustine's asexual ideal and the lack of cultural pressure to look Catholic has led to the rise of the Nones. A culture of accommodation would at least have people in the door. That would imply actually caring about the life of the Church.
As luck would have it, Bernie Sanders is running for President and some of his campaign is tinged with thuggery (which in recent days has received attention in their treatment of Senator Warren). The entire movement is tainted by what can politely be called attitude or more accurately, a persecution complex rivaling Russia after the Great Patriotic War or Germany after the Treaty of Versailles. The Millennial generation has a point. There privileged upbringing has not prepared them for the vicissitudes of capitalism, which are not fair - especially to them. Their reaction to these are natural and explainable, but do not bode well for our future. They seem to be copying the College Republican alumni in the GOP blow for blow in nastiness. I hope that there is a silent majority to overcome both toxic strains.
This is where the Church could come in. If we were smart, we would buy and forgive their student loans and make Catholic college free. We would be more vocal about the rights to families to a living wage, both a higher minimum and a much higher Child Tax Credit (each should be tripled) and should set an example by offering these benefits to employees. It should also lay off the sour grapes over gay marriage, quit firing gay employees who marry - indeed, it should celebrate their unions with a Mass. This is where the humility of God comes into play. As a Church, we are not really following Christ down that path. Also, ordain women and abandon the toxic misogyny of Hellenism that has plagued the Church since St. Augustine. We must take the initiative in converting the culture by first converting the Church. Calling for this takes the courage that only comes through Grace.
Catholics in politics, including and especially our Catholic politicians, need to be open to the courage to call for conversion by the Church. While it was perfectly fitting to rest on Digntatis Humanae and its stress on freedom on conscience in society in justifying not imposing criminal penalties for abortion, the path of courage is to explain publicly and privately why the social decisions from Roe v. Wade to Webster v. Texas and Perry v. Brown were rightly decided. Indeed, Dignitatis would allow no other option. The majority cannot impose its moral preferences on individuals or classes of individuals. Further, the law is not a social statement - it is the use of violence by the state to enforce its wishes. A better use of such violence would be the above steps to use tax policy to provide for the economic well-being of families. The Right to Life's resistance to such solutions must be called out - and the Church with it. Doing so would involve not rebellion against the Church or accommodation to culture, but the kind of loving correction oft practiced by the Christ of Scripture, Sacrament and Encounter.
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