France's Chirac Advocates a World Tax.

France's Chirac: Tax the World to Help the Poor. Is this development a surprise to anyone?

Vox Blogoli: Jonathan Rausch Compares Religious Conservatives to Bombers in the Atlantic Monthly.

HughHewitt in his Vox Blogoli forum has invited bloggers to weigh in on Jonathan Rausch's Atlantic Monthly article in which Rausch seems to imply that religious conservatives are just a political loss away from bomb throwing. Hewitt took Rausch to task in an article about the impact of new media, specifically blogs, on mainstream media in his article in the Weekly Standard, Big Media's 40 Days and 40 Nights. As Hewitt says, Rausch subsequently "pleads hasty writing and objects that the focus [Hewitt] put on [the few offensive sentances] is unfair to the intent of his piece."

The full text of Rausch article is now posted on Hewitt's blog. And to be fair to Rausch, his point is that "red" staters and "blue" staters are not as bitterly divided as has been reported (as an aside, shouldn't the left really be red...its traditional color).

The offending language in Rausch's article reads in part as follows:

polarized activists have been taken over by the mainstream parties. The Republican Party has acquired its distinctively tart right-wing flavor largely because it has absorbed in fact, to a significant extent has organizationally merged with the religious right. As Hanna Rosin reports elsewhere in this package, religious conservatives are becoming more uniformly Republican even as their faiths and backgrounds grow more diverse. On balance it is probably healthier if religious conservatives are inside the political system than if they operate as insurgents and provocateurs on the outside. Better they should write anti-abortion planks into the Republican platform than bomb abortion clinics.

Rausch then goes to make the inapt comparison of the "religious right" to Michael Moore. Where Hewitt is right on target is in pointing out the offensiveness and the inaccuracy of suggesting that the religious right is a political platform plank away from becoming killers. But even had Rausch omitted that reference, he would still be inaccurate and offensive. Moore is in fact a "polarized activist". Religiously traditional Americans are not. It was the failure of the Democrats to understand this that lost them the last election. Indeed, prior to the McGovernization of the democratic party, the values of religiously traditional people were the mainstream in both parties. As difficult as it is for the effete denizens of Manhattan, San Francisco and West L.A. to understand, traditionally religious Americans still are the mainstream in America, not to mention the GOP.

Rausch responded to Hewitt that he just as easily could have suggested that "left-wing environmentalists" were a Democratic Party platform plank away from becoming killers. But he didn't. And he would not have done so, because mainstream media portrays the religious as extremists, not their own fellow travelers. You constantly see religious folks being characterized in the major media as extremists, but when was the last time you saw in the mainstream media the characterization of the radical secularist? You know, the folks who want God off our currency, out of the pledge and banished in every single vestige from the public sphere...like the school district which sanctioned a teacher for assigning the reading of the Declaration of Independence because it mentioned the Creator. Now these people are radicals, resembling more Stalin or Robespierre than any American political model. But are they characterized as such by big media? Never.

Politics
Religion

ACLU Takes Liberties With The Constitution.

This from Richard John Neuhaus in his column, The Public Square, from the January issue of First Things: "If you don't like the Constitution, you can always rewrite it. Or resort to the creative use of ellipses. The American Civil Liberties Union has an impressive website on free speech. The opening paragraph introducing the website is this: 'It is probably no accident that freedom of speech is the first freedom mentioned in the First Amendment: 'Congress shall make no law . . . abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press, or of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.' The Constitution's framers believed that freedom of inquiry and liberty of expression were the hallmarks of a democratic society.' The first freedom mentioned in the First Amendment is, of course, the free exercise of religion. It appears that among the liberties championed by the ACLU is that of taking liberties with the text of the Constitution. "

Wrongheaded Lawsuit by Americans United for Separation of Church and State Challenges Federal Funding of California Missions.

Americans United for Separation of Church and State, in their ongoing effort to ensure a tortured reading of the U.S. Constitution's establishment clause, is challenging the California Missions Preservation Act, a federal law which provides $10 million to restore the historic and beloved remnants of California's past. The California Missions Foundation explains why the lawsuit is wrong: Response to the Lawsuit Filed by Americans United for Separation of Church and State. The missions were founded in the 18th century by Spanish friars. A statue of the founder of the state's mission system, Junipero Serra, who has been beatified, stands in the Capitol rontunda in Washington, D.C., along with other prominent historic figures, two from each state.

The missions, after Disneyland, are the second greatest tourist attraction in the state. Study of their history is required as part of the 4th grade curriculum and most fourth graders visit a mission and build a model of one as part of their study. Although all but a few of the twenty some missions now have Catholic churches where Mass is celebrated, a huge part of their function is nonreligious, to service the historic and cultural interests of students and tourists.

Strangely, the Rev. Barry Lynn, executive director of AUSCS, who apparently never tires of being wrong, is quoted in the Orange County Catholic, a diocesan paper, as admitting that the funding serves a public purpose. Not surprisingly, the bill, which according to Lynn violates the establishment clause, was sponsored by non-Catholics, Democrat Barbara Boxer in the Senate and Rep. Sam Farr, D-Carmel, in the House.

This recent brouhaha follows on the tail of the L.A. County Board of Supervisors folding under pressure from other radical secularists and removing the small cross from the L.A. County seal. Ironically, the cross was replaced by a mission (albeit a mission conspicuously devoid of a cross).

The astute Dennis Prager, a nationally syndicated talk show host and author, who happens to be Jewish and is almost as consistently right as Barry Lynn is wrong, opposed the removal of the cross from the L.A. County seal, noting that those who seek its removal are like the Taliban. Where the Taliban sought to destroy Afghanistan's Buddhist heritage, radical securarists in California seek to destroy its Catholic heritage.

Tipping for Counter Service: Does the Starbucks "Barista" Deserve a Tip.

I have a very quotidian pet peeve, the proliferation of tip jars in establishments that provide no substantial service. If I stand in line at McDonalds I'm not going to tip the guy taking my order, and he wouldn't expect me to. Why does the nitwit at Starbucks expect a tip? It's not like I can sit down at a table where my order is taken and then brought to me, where I am attended to if I need anything else. I have to stand in line and then carry my drink and food to my table. If I want anything else, I have to get up, get back in line and do the same thing again.

And it's not just Starbucks. All kinds of places that provide no real service now have tip jars. There it is on the counter of a Chinese take-out or a submarine sandwich shop. Let me respond to those nitwits and their tip jars this way, "If you really deserve a tip, a tip jar would not be necessary. People would know you deserve it."

The waiter at a restaurant deserves a tip. The guy who delivers my pizza deserves a tip. They have provided a service and brought my food to me. If I have to go to you to get my food...no tip for you! There's even a drive-through cofee place in my neighborhood that has a "karma jar" at the drive-through window. They're not driving to me to deliver my coffee! They're not providing any more service than the hamburger drive-through restaurant. And by the way, I don't believe in karma.

Some times these folks standing at the register will stare at you after you pay, as if to say, "Hey, buddy where's my tip?" I just want to respond, "Hey, nudnik, where's my service?" I have to admit, sometimes I have been coerced by their attempts to induce an ill placed guilt and dropped some cash in the jar. But no more. I will gladly and generously tip those who have traditionally received tips and who provide a service. No tips for those who provide no service.

Newdow Challenges the Constitutionality of Prayer in the Presidential Inauguration

Michael Newdow, the atheist and opponent of the rights of religious exercise and expression who brought the constitutional challenge to the words "under God" in the pledge of allegiance, has now brought suit to prohibit prayer in the U.S. Presidential Inauguration. Jay Sekulow of the ACLJ American Center for Law & Justice says Newdow's challenge is legally flawed. Not only has God's help been sought at the inauguration of every single American president, but the ACLJ cites the 1983 Supreme Court decision, Marsh vs. Chambers, which held that the "opening of sessions of legislative and other deliberative public bodies with prayer is deeply embedded in the history and tradition of this country." The ACLJ calls the suit "a blatant attack on our country’s cherished heritage, religious foundation, and personal freedoms."

Santhome Cathedral in India, Site of the Apostle Thomas' Tomb, Spared from Tsunami by Miracle?

Indian Catholic reports that the Santhome Cathedral Basilica, one of two basilicas in the world built on the tomb of an Apostle, now housing hundreds of tsunami victims, was spared in what some say was a miracle. The Cathedral sits within view of the sea (see a photo of the Cathedral with the sea in the background at Cruxnews.Com).

According to Indian Catholic, St. Thomas the Apostles was buried at the site close to the sea in 72 A.D. All the buildings around the church were hit by the tsunami. According to lore, St. Thomas planted a post in front of the Cathedral, saying the sea would not pass that point. The post is said to be from a log which had fallen in a river causing flooding. When an elephant was unable to move the log, St. Thomas provided his girdle from around his waist to a man who miraculously moved the log with ease.

Thomas, sometimes called the Apostle to the Orient, travelled to the farthest flung area of any of the Apostles, establishing a Christian community in India which continues to this day. Many non-western sources give reports of him. Indian tradition maintains that he was martyred when stabbed to death July 3, 72 A.D. by Brahmin priests of Mylapore who sought to halt the growth of Christianity.

Tolkien: Liberal or Conservative

Professor Bainbridge, following the lead of TCS: Tech Central Station - Ringing in a Liberal or Conservative New Year asks whether Tolkien's Lord of the Rings is a liberal or a conservative work, ProfessorBainbridge.com: Tolkien: Liberal or Conservative. His anlysis concentrates on technology and capitalism. Putting progress and economics aside for the moment, we should not forget that Tolkien maintained that the novel was, as noted here and here, "a fundamentally religious and Catholic work". Considering the increasing hostility of the American (and European) left to Christianity and Catholicism in particular, it would be difficult to say that the work was not conservative, at least in some regard.

Back to the questions of progress, nature and economics. Mark Shea rightly tells us that Tolkien "had a view of the sacredness of creation which was sacramental and Christian and yet, if articulated by any Catholic today, would in all likelihood be derided without trial by 'conservative Catholics'." Peter Mirus writing for Catholic Culture tells of "Tolkien's use of trees as symbols of life and goodness, and the corruption of trees as symbols of evil and death." When I first read Mirus' article, I was reminded of Georg Orwell's essay "A Good Word For The Vicar of Bray", where Orwell, at a time when England's forests had been quite devastated, praises that much maligned flip-flopping cleric for having planted a yew tree which Orwell came upon centuries later. You could say Tolkien had liberal sentiments.

Of course, the Catholic view of the world does not always fit easily into the modern boxes of liberalism and conservatism. After all, Leo XIII's encyclical Rerum Novarum is critical of both collectivism and unfettered capitalism. It is for this reason that folks such as Chesterton advocated a third way in concepts such as Distributism. (A Distributist Page.) Despite Francis Fukuyama's assertion that we had reached the end of history, we may yet reach an economic model that resembles such a third way, where politics are highly localized, property ownership more widely distributed and man lives in better harmony with nature. Small government, small busines and responsible stewardship don't sound liberal to me. Perhaps this was Tolkien's view. I would not be the first to say it was.

p.s. Bush's talk of an "ownership society" has to me echoes of Distributism.

Patterico's Pontifications: Patterico's Los Angeles Dog Trainer Year in Review 2004 -- Part One: The 2004 Presidential Election

I recently came across Patterico's Pontifications. Patterico, still a subscriber to the L.A. Times, although not surprisingly they have not delivered his paper lately, has done his second annual review of the LAT's performance: Patterico's Pontifications: Patterico's Los Angeles Dog Trainer Year in Review 2004 -- Part One: The 2004 Presidential Election.

Personally, I quit subscribing to the Times, or the Dog Trainer as Patterico calls it, when it spent the very week before the California gubenatorial recall election campaigning on its front page against Schwarzenegger with articles about his peccadillos, most of which they had known about for months or even years before the election. For me that was the straw that broke the camel's back and I had to cancel my subscription, but then I don't have a dog.

The 100 Best Movies Ever.

The 100 Best Movies Ever in no particular order (If you disagree, leave a comment and tell me why I'm wrong):

DR. STRANGELOVE (1964, Stanley Kubrick)
APOCALYPSE NOW (1979, Francis Ford Coppola)
2001:SPACE ODYSSEY (1968, Stanely Kubrick)
THE FISHER KING (1991, Terry Gilliam)
JACOBS LADDER (1990, Adrian Lyne)
A RIVER RUNS THROUGH IT (1992, Robert Redford)
PSYCHO (1960, Alfred Hitchcock)
REAR WINDOW (1954, Alfred Hitchcock)
CITIZEN KANE (1941, Orson Welles)
IT'S A WONDERFUL LIFE (1946, Frank Kapra)
AMADEUS (1984, Milos Foreman)
WHO’S AFRAID OF VIRGINIA WOOLF? (1966, Mike Nichols)
THE BEST YEARS OF OUR LIVES (1946, William Wyler)
SONG OF BERNADETTE (1943, Henry King)
COOL HAND LUKE (1967, Staurt Rosenberg)
WILD STRAWBERRIES (1958, Ingmar Bergman)
INDIANA JONES AND THE RAIDERS OF THE LOST ARK (1981, Steven Spielberg)
FORREST GUMP (1994, Robert Zemechis)
PLANES, TRAINS, AND AUTOMOBILES (1987, John Hughes)
BRAVEHEART (1995, Mel Gibson)
DEAD MAN WALKING (1995, Tim Robbins)
LAWRENCE OF ARABIA (1962, David Lean)
CLOCKWORK ORANGE (1971, Stanely Kubrick)
ANNIE HALL (1977, Woody Allen)
CASABLANCA (1942, Micheal Curtiz)
TWELVE MONKEYS (1995, Terry Gilliam)
GROUNDHOG DAY (1993, Harold Ramis)
THE WIZARD OF OZ (1939, Victor Fleming)
GONE WITH THE WIND (1939, Victor Fleming)
ON THE WATERFRONT (1954, Elia Kazan)
SINGIN' IN THE RAIN (1952, Gene Kelley & Stanley Donen)
THE BRIDGE ON THE RIVER KWAI (1957, David Lean)
STAR WARS (1977, George Lucas)
THE AFRICAN QUEEN (1951, John Huston)
THE GRAPES OF WRATH (1940, John Ford)
TO KILL A MOCKINGBIRD (1962, Robert Mulligan)
DOUBLE INDEMNITY (1944, Billy Wilder)
NORTH BY NORTHWEST (1959, Alfred Hitchcock)
SNOW WHITE AND THE SEVEN DWARFS (1937, David Hand and Perce Pearse)
VERTIGO (1958, Alfred Hitchcock)
MUTINY ON THE BOUNTY (1935, Frank Lloyd)
A PLACE IN THE SUN (1951, George Stevens)
GUESS WHO'S COMING TO DINNER (1967, Stanley Kramer)
THE SEVENTH SEAL (1956, Ingmar Bergman)
BABETTE'S FEAST (1987, Gabriel Axel)
BEN-HUR (1959, William Wyler)
WILLY WONKA AND THE CHOCOLATE FACTORY (1971, Mel Stuart)
THE HEIRESS (1949, William Wyler)
TOUCH OF EVIL (1958, Orson Wells)
THE NIGHT OF THE HUNTER (1955, Charles Laughton)
LA PASSION DE JEANNE D'ARC (1928, Carl Theodor Dreyer)
FIGHT CLUB (1999, David Fincher)
THE QUIET MAN (1952, John Ford)
HOW GREEN WAS MY VALLEY (1941, John Ford)
THE GREEN MILE (1999, Frank Darabont)
BLADE RUNNER (1982, Ridley Scott)
BLACK HAWK DOWN (2001, Ridley Scott)
BLUE VELVET (1986, David Lynch)
A MAN FOR ALL SEASONS (1966, Fred Zinneman)
GOING MY WAY (1944, Leo McCarey)
CHARIOTS OF FIRE (1981, Hugh Hudson)
IL POSTINO (1995, Michael Radford)
LIKE WATER FOR CHOCOLATE (1992, Aldonso Arau)
NOTORIOUS (1946, Alfred Hitchcock)
A FISH CALLED WANDA (1988, Charles Crichton)
NATIONAL LAMPOON’S ANIMAL HOUSE (1978, John Landis)
IT'S A MAD, MAD, MAD, MAD WORLD (1963, Stanley Kramer)
A SHOT IN THE DARK (1964, Blake Edwards)
THE PASSION OF THE CHRIST (2004, Mel Gibson)
YANKEE DOODLE DANDY (1942, Michael Curtiz)
PATTON (1970, Franklin J. Schaffner)
LORD OF THE RINGS (2001-2003, Peter Jackson)
THE MATRIX (1999, Andy and Larry Wachowski)
A CHRISTMAS STORY (1983, Bob Clark)
MY DINNER WITH ANDRE (1981, Louis Malle)
THE WORLD ACCORDING TO GARP (1982, George Roy Hill)
OLIVER TWIST (1948, David Lean)
IN AMERICA (2002, Jim Sheridan)
MY LEFT FOOT (1989, Jim Sheridan)
BLISS (1985, Ray Lawrence)
GALLIPOLI (1981, Robert Stigwood, Pat Lovell)
THERE'S SOMETHING ABOUT MARY (1998, Bobby and Peter Farrelly)
THE MALTESE FALCON (1941. John Huston)
THE SECRET OF ROAN INISH (1994, John Sayles)
MARY POPPINS (1964, Rober Stevenson)
AROUND THE WORLD IN 80 DAYS (1956, Michael Anderson)
WUTHERING HEIGHTS (1939, William Wyler)
ETERNAL SUNSHINE OF THE SPOTLESS MIND (2004, Michael Gondry)
SIDEWAYS (2004, Alexander Payne)
GANDHI (1982, Richard Attenborough)
WHEN HARRY MET SALLY (1989, Rob Reiner)
IT HAPPENED ONE NIGHT (1934, Frank Capra)
THE EXORCIST (1973, William Friedkin)
PLANET OF THE APES (1968, Franklin J. Schaffner)
THE YEAR OF LIVING DANGEROUSLY (1983, Peter Weir)
DARK CITY (1998, Alex Proyas)
RAISING ARIZONA (1987, Joel Coen)
MINDWALK (1991, Berndt Capra)
BARCELONA (1994, Whit Stillman)
THE BROTHERS MCMULLEN (1995 Edward Burns)
THE MANCHURIAN CANDIDATE (1962, John Frankenheimer)

Muslim Nations Stingy with Tsunami Aid. NewsMax.com: Inside Cover Story

NewsMax reports that Muslim nations are donating only a pitance to aid tsunami victims in south Asia. NewsMax.com: Inside Cover Story: "Surely U.N. officials will be calling a press conference any minute now to complain that wealthy Muslim nations are being too stingy with relief dollars."

For example, Saudi's are pledging only $2 million, Iran less than $700k. After all the whining in the mainstream media about the U.S.'s original pledge and the fact that it has now pledged $350 million, I supposed the mainstream press will point out the Muslim penny pinching? I won't hold my breath.

TSUNAMIS, THEODICY, TERRORISTS AND THURSDAY (The Man Who Was ...) . The Corner on National Review Online.

A recent thread on The Corner on National Review Online about the human carnage brought to us by the tsunami in south Asia, in what is sometimes called "an act of God", raised the sticky theological question of theodicy. Theodicy is the question of God's goodness - indeed his very existence - in light of the existence of evil, particularly natural evil, which unlike human evil is not as easily laid at the foot of man's free will. It raised for me, what the question of theodicy will forever raise with me since reading the novel, thoughts of - along with the Book of Job - G. K. Chesterton's "The Man Who Was Thursday".

Thursday's plot concerns the members of the Central Anarchist Council, each of whom for reasons of secrecy is named after a day of the week, and most of all Sunday the immense and threatening leader of the Council. (For those who have not read the book and would like to do so with out any foreknowledge, a bit of a spoiler follows).

As the story becomes progressively more surreal, each of the six lesser plotters discovers that each other is not in fact a terrorist but an undercover agent. They proceed to hunt down the horrible and menacing Sunday. When one of his pursuers questions him about his identity, who and what he is, Sunday answers, "I am the Sabbath. I am the peace of God." Chesterton tells us that Sunday can be taken to "stand for nature as distinguished from God." But also that when "you tear off the mask of Nature ... you find God". So this recent tsunami emanating from the sea near Sri Lanka, Leviathan from the sea, slaughtering more than 100,000 people, is the wet finger of God? I've read in one news piece that a tsunami warning system could cost as little as $2,000,000. So we would place a hook in the mouth of this Leviathan? I'm not saying we should not protect ourselves from the ravages of Nature, only that we should not delude ourselves by the purely materialist viewpoint that we will ever make a pet of it. There is no compromise with this mystery and only one resolution.

It is theodicy, the question of evil, which, it is said, has driven many people to atheism. And which is probably its only seemingly good argument. The problem is, ultimately, it is a flawed argument.

I have read that Chesterton's Sunday is the "backside of God" (I don't recall if it was Chesterton himself who said this). The subtitle of the novel is "A Nightmare". I guess the nightmare is that God is the author of all the carnage, or that this very proposition means he could not exist. Yet Nature as the backside of God, glimpsed only briefly through the corner of the eye, makes sense in only one framework. In the cup partaken of on that Thursday long ago and its physical manifestation on the following day.

Still, the grasping of this completeness is not accomplished with reason. It lies in a mystical paradox, the glimpsing of the backside of things, where the angst of human existence is in fact joy.

An excellent treatment of this subject can be found at THE TUMBLER OF GOD: Chesterton As Mystic, By Robert Wild, Chapter 12