Recently on NPR Radio’s All Things Considered [Trusted Advisor Recounts Obama’s Evolution], David Axelrod, chief strategist for Senator Barack Obama, was asked whether Obama was ‘tough enough’ to win the presidency. Echoing doubts about Obama’s toughness, the show’s host, Michelle Norris, said: “Success in politics sometimes, in fact often, means having to close your eyes or even hold your nose and do something you might not like to do but have to do if you keep your eye... Read more
On Friday, former British Prime Minister Tony Blair was received into full communion with the Catholic Church by Cardinal Murphy-O’Connor. Welcome home, brother! BBC – Tony Blair Joins Catholic Church Times Online – Tony Blair Converts to Catholicism Telegraph – Tony Blair Converts to Catholicism Reuters – Blair Converts to Catholicism Sky News – Blair Converts to Catholicism Read more
John Allen is worth quoting in full on this one: “It would probably be pushing things a bit far to suggest that Tuesday’s vote in the General Assembly of the United Nations in favor of a global moratorium on the death penalty is a victory for the Catholic church. It is, however, a result difficult to imagine without the Catholic contribution. Consider the following footprints of Catholic influence: * The principal NGO lobbying for the measure, the World Coalition Against... Read more
I’ve received several e-mails now from the Catholic blogosphere asking to support Fred Thompson financially. Now, you guys who support him are going to have to tell me WHY in the world people still support Thompson? I simply do not understand it. Why? Well, I think a character in SNL summarized well Thompson’s attitude in his campaign when he played Thompson and said: “Well, I ‘sort of want’ to be your president.” I guess I just don’t care for him... Read more
When I see Mike Huckabee speak about his faith, something doesn’t quite sit right. Something feels a little off, and it makes me more than a little uncomfortable. This has nothing to do with him being a Republican or his policy positions; I’m talking simply about how he talks about his faith. And it is not specific to Huckabee either, as I feel the same qualms when I hear any American public figure (of any party, but nearly always Protestant) talk about... Read more
A 17-year old girl suffering from leukemia died yesterday in the UCLA hospital a few hours after her insurance company, CIGNA, approved a liver transplant that had been denied before due to the lack of evidence that the transplant would help her condition. Her parents removed her from life support, because they deemed her condition as “hopeless.” CIGNA initially declined to pay for the transplant for Nataline because her plan did not cover “experimental, investigational and unproven services,” her doctors... Read more
Like many political conservatives – and, also, like more than a few political liberals — I have, in recent weeks, found much to like about Gov. Huckabee. (Full disclosure: I support Fred Thompson for the GOP nomination.) I liked it, that is, that he seemed (for a while, anyway) not to endorse base anti-immigrant rhetoric; that, as Governor, he was willing to commute the sentences of, and pardon, convicted criminals; and that, for a while, he avoided Giuliani-esque over-the-top statements about how... Read more
This story will lead you to despair. Read the whole thing. It is the harrowing tale of a young woman from Iceland, one of the most friendly and laid back countries in the world, who came with some friends for a pre-Christmas shopping trip to New York. It turned out that she had overstayed a visa by 3 weeks in 1995. For her crime, she was arrested, shackled, verbally abused, jailed, denied the use of her phone, subject to degrading personal questions,... Read more
Uninsured cancer patients more likely to die than insured patients. Read more
Today, presidential hopeful Rudy Giuliani told Wolf Blitzer that water-boarding, a technique considered by many human rights groups to be torture (not to mention Senator John McCain who knows a thing or two about torture), might be called for in a “once in a lifetime situation, once in a decade situation.” He held that in a “general manner,” however, waterboarding would be “inappropriate.” Of course, this raises the question as to how such torture methods would be practiced, how frequently... Read more
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