Article Archive
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Cosmopolitan Si, Multicultural, No!
Yes, we are members of communities of faith. But there is common humanity, and, in various places and at various times, common civilizations have flourished, each articulating that common humanity in its own unique way. Our own civilization has been fairly unique in offering hospitality to those who come to us from other civilizations and their outskirts, trusting to our common humanity and to a set of institutions and traditions designed to allow members of different communities to collaborate as neighbors, clients, and colleagues. And this has worked remarkably well, at least in America. When I think of 9/11 I recall how my glass fortress diagonally opposite the World Trade Center complex was locked down by security... [Read More]
A Martyr for Peace
A week before George W. Bush arrived in Rome for their first meeting, Benedict XVI put his signature to a document proclaiming the Austrian farmer Franz Jägerstätter a Christian martyr for refusing to serve in an unjust war, such as Benedict and John Paul the Great insisted the Bush war against Iraq has been from the beginning. The beatification will take place on October 26 -- just about the time that some observers expect a departing, lame-duck President Bush to launch a Pearl Harbor style pre-emptive attack (perhaps a nuclear one) against Iran. [Read More]
Remembering Kent State: The President as Street Thug
The Ohio war protesters are shot and killed on Monday; Friday is set aside as a day of mourning. On Wall Street organized gangs of men dressed as construction workers converge on peaceful demonstrators, beating them with tools and stomping them with work boots. They attack a line of New York City police at Federal Hall, where Washington was sworn in in 1789, and proceed to storm City Hall, where the flag has been at half mast, in order to raise it, and to denounce the Mayor as a Communist. On May 20, a grateful President receives a delegation from the leaders of New York's construction unions, accepting from them the “hard hat” of Commander in Chief. He tries it on, grinning for a photograph in the National Archives, though not for the press. One of union leaders, James Brennan, becomes Secretary of Labor after the 1972 election. These people are shameless: they glory in their very shamelessness; they expect Americans to abase themselves before it. Burke saw it in France long ago... [Read More]