Personal Asides: Ed Meese was a Guest in Chicago at Closed Luncheon…Fred Barnes Is Proud His Son Wants a Political Career (God Help Us!).

Ed Meese

The 75th attorney general of the United States was guest of an organization I serve as program chairman, “Legatus,” a group of Catholic CEOs who meet in the Chicago area for dinner with their spouses once a month. Meese was introduced by a good friend of mine, Ed Feulner, president of the Heritage Foundation in Washington, D. C. where Meese serves as Ronald Reagan Distinguished Fellow. He spoke to us on the recent decisions of the Supreme Court, something many other CEOs would have given their eyeteeth to hear.

As Meese’s remarks were off the record, not to be quoted but able to be paraphrased (the way White House correspondents summarized an interview with the president, showing no direct quotes), let me summarize some of the main points he made but again they must not be taken as verbatim.

On the decision of one of his top former aides, Douglas Kmiec, to endorse and campaign for Barack Obama. There has been a good deal of countervailing opinions about the Kmiec decision from people who worked with him. Given that Kmiec was such an intensive opponent of “Roe v. Wade” and foremost Catholic scholar and definitive defender of unborn life, his coming out for just another abortion rights crusader…not just one who voted against the partial birth abortion ban…not just one who voted not to confirm the last two Supreme Court justice…but as one by reason of his status as judiciary chairman of the Illinois state senate tops all other members of the Democratic Senate in his opposition of the “Born Alive” bill which would allow born baby victims of botched abortions to receive needed emergency medical attention….the turn-around is indecipherable. For reasons of comparison, try these (with some hype but equally shocking to those of us who have followed Kmiec):

Augustine leaves his bishopric in Hippo and returns to his mistress and their illegitimate baby, saying he had re-thought the whole thing and having been a pro-family Manichean wasn’t half bad.

Thomas Aquinas says that on reexamination his proofs for the existence of God are goofy and he’s going to embrace the Big Bang theory but as to what produced the Big Bang he shrugs and says who knows?

Mother Teresa says she’ll retire and go to Vegas where she’ll buy a penthouse condo from the subscriptions of well-wishers and launch a new career as a flamenco dancer.

These things would first call into question their mental stability as it does only to a slightly lesser degree with Doug. The word is that insensate ambition for the judiciary is behind it…but behind THAT is nuttiness.

Second, what happens with some Supreme Court nominees that no matter their vetting, turn sour? Dwight Eisenhower later said the worst decision he ever made was to name Earl Warren as chief justice. John Kennedy rued his appointment of Byron (Whizzer) White, one of his top advisers in the campaign and who was close to Bobby Kennedy, who after he was appointed turned right and became one of the mainstays of the conservative side of the Court. Reagan named Sandra Day O’Connor and Anthony Kennedy who were supposed to be conservatives but who ended up being swing votes, tipping things to the Left. True he appointed Antonin Scalia was named a justice and William Rehnquist chief justice along with the excellent appointment of Robert Bork whose nomination was defeated by the Democratic Senate. This was not construed as a criticism of Meese or Reagan by me but a simple question over what went wrong. I asked: did they lie?

The answer seemed to be no, they didn’t lie but reaffirmed something that people have long believed about the human condition and have written about extensively. The Washington, D. C. social mill is insidious and some people, once they hear the siren call of the opportunity to Stand Tall in Georgetown with the liberal intelligentsia, the “Washington Post” and “New York Times,” fall susceptible. As soon as they cast a vote that is to the liking of the intelligentsia the news media report “they are showing growth in office.” It is as fallacious to try to ferret out this indication to be liked by one’s liberal peers as it is to repeal the multiplication table. It comes down to the human condition.

Scalia and Clarence Thomas were approached but did not get tempted. Harry Blackmun, named by Nixon, had a wife who was hot to trot in the Georgetown social circle; it meant very much to her to be lionized there and she took Harry by the hand and he meekly went along. That and the fact that Harry was chafing as being seen as the slow-witted half of the “Minnesota Twins”—joined at the hip with Warren Burger. That desire for praise and insecure feeling at being taken for granted caused him to try to Stand Tall in Georgetown. Aside from barring a justice from going to cocktail parties, there is no foreseeable way of obviating the human condition. One can only try to see ahead by studying the potential nominee’s weaknesses. Kennedy evidently was seduced when he accepted a commission to teach overseas and gratified intellectuals over there by accepting an international code of law that is not ours…despite the fact that Kennedy had been hard-line.

Third—somewhat surprising but gratifying—the long disused provision of the Constitution to have both Houses vote on a formal declaration of war is troublesome and has been caused by the Left’s often refusal to support war…something unknown before Vietnam. The formal declaration should be returned however and there are ways to do that consistent with immediacy.

Fourth—the Supreme Court decision overturning Louisiana’s enactment of the death penalty for raping a child was an abrogation of Court power. The decision should have been left to the states—but one must understand that the legislation itself is a complicated one…in that coming from the experience of law enforcement authorities, when a person is confronted with the inevitability of getting the death penalty if one is caught, the temptation is to go ahead and kill the child since nothing worse can happen. Makes sense.

Fifth—confirmations to the Supreme Court and the federal judiciary have turned controversial since the abortion decision has been so inflammatory. Traditionally the Senate always regarded the job of confirmation to center only on the nominee’s qualifications for the job, not his or her philosophy of the law. The situation turned ugly with the confirmation battle over Abe Fortas’s nomination as chief justice of the United States—but the situation turned on certain payments Fortas received from a foundation that were made while he was a Justice for very little work which looked suspiciously like a payoff. No ideology or philosophy was challenged there but Fortas withdrew after it was clear he could not win confirmation.

Then the see-saw battle devolved into legal philosophy with the fights being waged over abortion although often the issue wasn’t raised. Robert Bork was “borked” and the Republicans were enraged. It is significant to note that when Clinton named Ruth Bader Ginsburg to the high court Republicans accepted her credentials while disagreeing with her stridently liberal views but she was confirmed easily. This did not happen with George H. W. Bush or George W. Bush.

Fred Barnes.

I forgot to report something that struck me, at least, as interesting. When Fred Barnes spoke earlier at a Chicago meeting of Heritage, he said that if he had to do it over, he would embrace a political career…by which I assume he means a career leading to elective office…than a journalistic one. And second that he is proud that his son now in college is pointing himself to a career in elective office.

Shows how different we are. I have steadfastly and until now successfully discouraged my kids to even think of running for elective office. Not that anyone has—but I would regard that choice the same way as I would if my boys told me they were about to work on a riverboat casino…or if my girls told me they were thinking of being interns to ex-president Bill Clinton. Not that I don’t want them knowledgeable and even involved in the political process in volunteer or even staff positions if they wish—but that should be the extent of it. Reason: without being too churchy about it, I think pointing oneself to elective office is running perilously close to having to make compromises with money and principles as to lose one’s soul. With look and if I am still around, I should be able to dissuade great-grandchildren to do the same thing. It strikes me that for all his sophistication as a journalist, Barnes who has never been involved in a campaign first hand and has only covered them, doesn’t understand the first thing about the bargaining that goes with politics.

My own experience as campaign manager, publicist, staffer in party, state governmental, federal and corporate life has led me to this conclusion since as I approach the age of eighty I have seen enough to split the planets and to make the patriarch Abraham an infidel. The best advice I ever had in my life came when I was importuned to run for congress in Minnesota many years ago and I went to my old boss, Elmer L. Andersen, who had been a very successful governor of Minnesota. A self-made multi-millionaire businessman and entrepreneur, he had served one very memorable term, having lost reelection by 91 votes out of 1,250,000 cast (largely paper ballots). He asked my net worth which was then lamentably insignificant. He said something I shall long remember: elective office is very perilous to the soul (he was a Lutheran) and he did not venture out as a candidate until he had a net worth of some $20 million (which by 1952 standards would amount to about $70 million today). His reason is that to forage around for money is to endanger your very integrity for what you will feel constrained to do to pay the campaign bills.

I have seen candidates rent huge chunks of their souls this way over 50 years…seen them in two states. The ones who did not merchandise their souls were all multi-millionaires, including Peter Fitzgerald one of the most integrity-filled in either state. I once told a very promising young man now in university who wants to do this that he should first make $50 million in the private market. This doesn’t mean he shouldn’t serve in volunteer capacities, on candidatorial search committees and fund-raising assignments, research and speech-writing activities…anything BUT candidacy. But as for himself being a candidate without those resources, he is courting moral as well as economic disaster and probably incipient jail-time. That is why I will not support anyone for major office in this state in 2010 with my endorsement…insignificant as it may be… who does NOT have the wherewithal to finance his own campaign and hence be free of morally crippling conditions that would involve him/her in Faustian bargains. For openers: the George Ryan career and the Rod Blagojevich career. Enough said?

Flashback: Learning to Admire Heroes from Beowulf as Taught by Steve Humphrey…on Death and Being Ready when God Calls Us from Fr. Emeric Lawrence OSB… All Leading to a Lesson Learned from the German Nuns.

[Going on 80 with memories for my kids and grandchildren].

The Core Curriculum of Classical Studies.

Like a crash of a tidal wave for this writer as he turned 19 came the drowning with culture from the old Saint John’s. Steve Humphrey, a tiny man, impeccably dressed short-cropped, graying hair, Windsor knotted tie, deep-set eyes and an idiosyncratic way of leaning his head on his shoulder as he reflected, was a professor who introduced me to the classics. Long dead, he still possesses my deepest admiration and love. So powerful was he when he read aloud in class that we began to understand immediately the import of the words—only to discover when we were left on our own to read in our rooms and did not have him to read to us, we foundered.

I remember going to his room on first floor Benet with a lack of understanding of a tract from “Beowulf” only to find that Maury Mischke, an ex-GI and then sports editor of “The Record,” the school newspaper had arrived first with a problem from “The Canterbury Tales.” I’ll take him first, said Humphrey, an ex-GI, in deference to Mischke’s status as an ex-GI (in those days they were preferential in respect by the university). As I watched, Mischke handed him the book and Humphrey read aloud from it, slowly, sonorously. Not only did Mischke get it on that first reading by Humphrey but I did as well despite that I hadn’t tackled it yet. Humphrey returned the text to him with a slow smile and asked: What’s so difficult? Nothing, said Mischke, but if I had you at my elbow to read it aloud to me, I’d get it easier! No sooner had Mischke left than Humphrey did the same for me.

He said as he reclined his head to the left where it almost touched his shoulder: “Now listen as I read--Beowulf the Geat goes to Denmark to help Hrothgar, king of the Danes, get rid of a monster dwelling on the bottom of the sea called Grendel and here”—citing a passage—“Grendel gets hungry and returns for a snack, grabbing Beowulf for a dainty course!” I exulted: Now I got it! I GOT IT! And hurried back to my room to devour the rest of the assignment.

All the while we learned that Europe’ glories were created by the Catholic Church from early western civilization taught by Fr. Dunstan Tucker, OSB, a handsome, prematurely white haired cleric fighting asthma when the weather was soggy…sometimes taken to the infirmary doubled up so he could breathe in short gasps… who had been a naval officer in the recent war, who was also an expert on Dante and the university baseball coach. And concurrently the meaning of death from a man who was theologian and my French professor, Fr. Emeric Lawrence OSB, an ex-GI who had seen a lot of action in the South Pacific as a chaplain, a cogent writer as well, he telling us that Christ’s words for us to be ready when He visits us as a thief in the night and His emphasis on the minor worth of riches and fame in comparison with the grace of God being as valid as when He spoke them first in Palestine. Not to be confused with the enthusiasm of our American history professor, Fr. Vincent Tregater OSB with patent leather shiny black hair and an always beaming countenance whom we called “Smiling Jack” after a cartoon character of that era, who informed us that a 28-year-old scholar had just written a definitive biography of Andrew Jackson and had received the Pulitzer prize for it, Arthur Schlesinger, Jr.

And then art appreciation from Fr. Angelo Zankl OSB, then a ruddy, black-haired dynamo, who died earlier this year at 105…no, that’s not a typo, who taught us that Leonardo took so long to complete “The Last Supper” because his faith mattered more to him than artistic perfection and he strained the utmost of his talents to make his masterpiece served God perfectly.

All of these things cascaded upon my 19-year-old brain at the same time while I heard my classmates, some grey-haired ex-GIs ask questions seemingly as deep as the lectures themselves, leading me to go deferentially to the interrogator after class and ask what he meant. But ex-GIs were not always intellectual. We held our Ethics class in a wooden barracks that had been built to accommodate the overflow of students in this first year after the war, a building whose windows seemed sealed shut. Okay in the winter but unless it was zero or below outside, it was always stifling hot and the windows didn’t budge when you tried to open them. Bede Hall, an ex-GI and scion of a well-known lumber products family in Saint Cloud, the Matthew Hall Lumber Company, struggled with the window as class was getting ready to start, groaning to a presence that stood behind him, “Christ! It smells like a French bordello in here!”

He turned his head to be nose-to-nose with the professor of Christian Ethics, Mr. Emerson Hynes (later to become Gene McCarthy’s legislative assistant when McCarthy served in the Senate). Hynes smiled and said softly—but in a tone that carried throughout the room—“well, Mr. Hall, we presume you know just how a French bordello smells but rather than making it public, take your seat and keep that confidence to yourself and your confessor.”

The Early Concentration on Sexual Ethics.

At that early time—1947, twenty six years before “Roe v. Wade”—Hynes lay down the principles governing abortion, not by consulting a book about it but by beginning with Augustine and his uncertainty as to when life began (he thinking it started with “quickening” or the movement of the unborn child in the womb) through Aquinas down to the present doctrines propounded by Pius XII: it is lawful to extract from the mother a womb that is dangerous diseased i.e. cancerous which is not the same as a direct abortion, Catholic morality allowing this kind of rare surgery according to what has come to be known as the “principle of double effect”—my seatmate nudging me at that point and saying “that’s a question sure to come in the semester exam.”

It assuredly did. “Give an example of the principle of double effect.” Answer: The action, removal of the diseased womb, is good, consisting in excising an infected part of the human body and which saves the life of the mother albeit this eliminates the possibility of her having children in the future—but understand this is very rare.” Follow-up—now give an example of wrongly applied principle of double effect. Answer: “If the unborn child were to be aborted through artificial means because it’s birth would be inconvenient, or to save the reputation of an unwed mother or father or both.” Then, suppose the unborn baby is slated to be born retarded or with some serious deformity—is abortion permitted as a humane act? Answer, the same in 1947 when legal abortion was almost inconceivable as now when so-called “therapeutic” means is applied—no.

The exam questions continued: Does the Church teach that it prefers the life of the child over the life of the mother? What to do in that regard? Answer: Neither the life of the mother nor the life of the child can be subjected to an act of direct suppression. In one case as with the other, there is only one obligation under Catholic ethics—make every effort to save the lives of both mother AND child.

Finally, “wherein lies the sinfulness of abortion?” Answer—It consists of the homicidal intent to kill unborn life which is the sin of murder by intent.

Lectures dealing with reproduction were highly stressed by Hynes. Ex-GIs and we teeners were confronted with the doctrine stressed by the Decretals of Pope Gregory IX which summarize Aquinas: contraception is ethically wrong and a grave sin because it contradicts human nature. Question: “what did Pius XI say about contraception?” Answer—two things: he condemned the essential sinfulness of contraception and promulgated the Church’s absolute right in modern times as over the centuries to pronounce on the morality of human behavior.

It is ironic to note that while we dumb ones were taking philosophy and ethics from two authenticist scholars—Fr. Ernest Kilzer OSB for philosophy and Emerson Hynes for ethics—the “brighter ones” as adjudged were taking both from the leading scholar of so-called liturgical revival, the heir to the late Fr. Virgil Michel OSB, Fr. Godfrey Diekmann OSB. Twenty-two years later Godfrey was a signer of a document by modernist theologians protesting Paul VI’s “Humanae Vitae,” the pope’s condemnation of artificial birth control. A number of men who took theology from the dynamic, spectacularly colorful Godfrey ran into serious intellectual problems when the so-called “spirit of Vatican II” came into conflict with authentic theology and a number of them, confused, left the Church for which Someone Higher than earthly authority will render judgment on Godfrey…and indubitably already has.

Personal Aside: High Sources (but Anonymous) Confirm Daley-to-George Agreement to Keep Pfleger.

Daley & George.

It started with a high clerical source telling me that Mayor Daley called Francis Cardinal George on the phone and urged the prelate not to remove Fr. Michael Pfleger permanently. It was seconded when another knowledgeable (not high but well placed) source with connections in the city administration confirmed the call was made. It confirms what this column has maintained—that Pfleger is an important albeit ad hoc leader in Daley’s Democratic party who has been to Daley’s summer cottage and has shared the mayoral private box at White Sox games. Pfleger’s command of thousands of troops (most of them non-Catholic) who go to his church for Sunday (railing and screaming hate for whitey notwithstanding) is a home for political activism which is indispensable to the party. And as we know, the lay chancellor, Jimmy Lago, is an ex-precinct captain with heavy-heavy Democratic and liberal ties. And as we also know, “it can be said the Republican party never had a soul.”

One of the major law firms in this town is Daley & George…Michael Daley, the mayor’s brother and Jim George a partner. Daley & George may stand for another partnership. Can I prove the phone call was made? Nope. But was the suspension harmful to Pfleger and the Democratic party? Far from it: it gave Pfleger a new lease on life. It is not the first time the Catholic church here in Chicago and elsewhere has been made a pawn in politics courtesy of partnerships such as this. The Kennedys and Richard Cardinal Cushing of Boston; the Democrats in the Congress and Theodore Cardinal McCarrick who spared them embarrassment by willfully subverting Ratzinger’s letter opposing pro-abort Catholic politicians being allowed to receive the Eucharist.

Earlier, George Cardinal Mundelein and FDR. FDR to Attorney General Francis Biddle to the IRS to threaten Dubuque archbishop Francis Beckman which got rid of a pesky independent-minded and anti-war prelate by threatening him with IRS action on paintings he had purchased as an investment for the archdiocese, leading to pressure for his forced recall by U. S., Catholic hierarchy including Mundelein. FDR to Thomas (Tommy the Cork) Corcoran to Mundelein, getting Mundelein’s approval on the nature of an appointment to the Vatican, not for an ambassador (that would be too risky in the anti-Catholic climate) but a special emissary, the retired U.S. Steel president (and a Protestant) Myron C. Taylor. FDR to Edward Cardinal Mooney of Detroit via Mundelein silencing Fr. Charles E. Coughlin because he was irritating Roosevelt. Note: Coughlin was an early day Pfleger and should have been silenced as a hate monger.

Earlier in the 20th century it goes back to Theodore Roosevelt and St. Paul archbishop John Ireland, Ireland giving the president political advice and the president lobbying for Ireland to get the red hat (which didn’t work and in fact killed any chance Ireland had).

OBAMA’S AFFECTION FOR “CRITICAL LEGAL STUDIES” MAKES HIM THE MOST RADICAL CANDIDATE FOR PRESIDENT YET.

Last week’s column in The Wanderer with updating. More about Doug Kmiec and a whole lot more about Critical Legal Studies.

By Thomas F. Roeser

CHICAGO—A meeting here last week at 55 east Monroe between 30 evangelical Protestant leaders and Sen. Barack Obama included a sharpie working on Obama’s side: ex-Reagan aide, constitutional scholar and supposedly Catholic social conservative Douglas Kmiec. I wrote about Kmiec before in The Wanderer and have known him for several years. He and I both wrote Op Eds for the Tribune before my contract was not extended because I was too conservative. Doug stayed on and remained in the good graces of the paper’s editorial board, witness his prominent appearance on the paper’s editorial page last week in passionate defense of Obama.

If he is successful at his trade, Doug won’t have to lie about Obama’s record on abortion—just obfuscate it, minimizing its effect, saying that getting rid of legalized abortion requires far more than a constitutional amendment but also non-governmental things (true)—so no big deal. In a column for the Trib he says “he [Obama] intends to ask government and non-governmental entities—and you and me—to do our part. Frankly, it’s more than a little exhilarating to be given that much faith and trust.” How touching. Then he rhapsodized about Obama’s brimming good will, a sly hint that he may be amenable to softening his pro-abort stand. It’s a very tough sell. Kmiec must convince the churchmen and the liberal secular media to equate Obama’s pro-abort record with McCain’s pro-life one…blanding both out with so many fine legal distinctions as to make both equivalent on the issue. If it works, he will likely be in for a fine reward from President Obama.

Kmiec, a native Chicagoan whose father was a foot soldier for old Mayor Richard J. Daley before Douglas turned conservative and Republican, is the brilliant constitutional scholar who was head of the prestigious Office of Legal Counsel for Ronald Reagan and George H. W. Bush, performing excellently as a pro-life advocate in that position. His resume in the law is impeccable: former dean and St. Thomas More professor of Catholic University of America (the Thomas More name rings hollow now), director of the Thomas White Center on Law & Government at Notre Dame; now chair in constitutional law at Pepperdine University’s school of law.

However richly he deserved it, Kmiec missed being appointed to the U.S. Supreme Court by George W. Bush. Former White House colleagues tell me why. It had nothing to do with Kmiec’s abilities but because the George W. Bush people felt (rightly in my view) that since Kmiec has had such a lengthy paper trail in support of pro-life that a Democratic senate would be sure to deny him confirmation. As it was, getting John Roberts and Sam Alito confirmed was tough enough (Doug’s new found patron, Obama didn’t vote for them for instance) and they didn’t have the voluminously long record of public writings in behalf of pro-life that Kmiec had.

But former fellow law professors who know Kmiec well, say getting on the Supreme Court has long been his life’s objective. Nothing wrong with that since he has the intellectual resources to be a brilliant jurist. After Bush left him in the lurch (he feels), he started out the political year supporting Mitt Romney’s presidential bid, explaining adroitly Romney’s move from pro-abort to pro-life, a tough job in itself. But when Romney’s effort fizzled, Kmiec jumped to Obama, stunning some of his colleagues but not one in particular at Notre Dame who told me he’s not surprised by Kmiec’s opportunism.

Kmiec’s rationale seems to be that if he gives his all to the Obama candidacy and succeeds, he (Kmiec) will likely be nominated by a President Obama to the high court. Given the likelihood of an enlarged Democratic majority in the Senate, Kmiec might be able to cobble together enough votes from pro-aborts and forgiving pro-lifers to make it through. He may well be right. Believe it or not there are some pro-lifers who feel that if Kmiec were named by Obama, the slippery professor could revert to pro-life; thus he could be a double agent. Or maybe a double-double agent. If I were Obama, I would be suspicious too —for nothing is intellectually simple with Kmiec.

The Obama-Kmiec Team.

The Obama-Kmiec meeting with evangelicals was not to convince them that Obama was suddenly hit by a lightening bolt on the way to Damascus and has become pro-life…but to demonstrate that while adamantly pro-abort, his door is ever-open for a deal and negotiation with the full contingent of evangelical leaders, a meeting Kmiec assuredly will be handling.

Among those crowded into a conference room was a group that was far from stolidly pro-life to be sure—but mostly black ministers who favor Obama anyhow and might importune their more conservative brothers to hop on the train. The gathering was a closed-door propaganda event designed to show Obama’s openness.

Attendees included Cameron Strang, founder and CEO of Relevant Media (not to be confused with Catholic Relevant Radio) but the publisher of the hip Christian magazine in liberal terminology with a big kid audience; Bishop T. D. Jakes, the black leader of a Dallas mega-church; best-selling author Max Lucado; Paul Corts, president of the Council for Christian Colleges and Universities; Rev. Stephen Thurston, president of the National Baptist Convention of America and black pastor on Chicago’s south side.

Also, Rev. T. Dewitt Smith, president of the Progressive National Baptist convention, Inc. and AME Bishop Phillip R. Cousin, Sr. But the dessert, whipped cream with a cherry on the top, was the presence of the Rev. Franklin Graham, son of Billy and head of the Billy Graham Evangelical Association. If either one of the Grahams might tell the media, for instance, “we should consider this young man because he has a good heart,” a major battle would be won and Doug Kmiec would be the victor. And with Obama’s election, Doug would be on his way to the high court.

Stumbling Block: Obama’s Opposition to “Born Alive.”

All the same, Kmiec has endorsed for the presidency not your average liberal Democrat pro-choicer but the man who has certifiably the worst pro-abort record of anyone in the Senate and of anyone who has ever sought the presidency [italics mine]. Obama is not only a vehement advocate of abortion rights and opponent of the partial birth abortion ban. In the Illinois legislature as senate judiciary chairman he personally killed all efforts to pass a “Born Alive” bill that would save the lives of babies born from botched abortions who were still struggling for breath. Obama’s veto certified that such babies will die unattended, writhing in pain, because to save one would jeopardize, he and his wife Michelle wrote, abortion rights for women, in that it could aid legislative efforts to make abortion more difficult to get.

Before he came to the U. S. Senate, that body, while under control of the Democrats voted on the same legislation and passed the “Born Alive” bill which Obama had opposed as a state lawmaker. Those voting for it included the laundry list of most leading pro-abort senators including Sens. Ted Kennedy (D-Mass.), Barbara Boxer (D-Calif.), Diane Feinstein (D-Calif) and Hillary Clinton (D-N.Y.)

An almost insuperable task for Kmiec is, with Obama unrepentant of killing “Born Alive,” to parse the necessary rationale to obfuscate and downgrade a simple black and white pro-life distinction on unborn life between his new boss and John McCain. He does not abjure pro-life but writes as a pro-lifer with legalistic distinctions. McCain as you know favors a constitutional amendment that overrules Roe and sends the abortion issue to the states. Obama does not favor such an amendment. Now, take this masterpiece of twisted logic from Kmiec’s recent “Catholic Online” column where he tackles the question “whom should Catholics vote for vis-à-vis pro-life?”

“Given that abortion is an intrinsic evil without justification, thinking the overturning of Roe `solves’ the abortion problem, when it does not, can mislead Catholics into the erroneous conclusion that any candidate unwilling to pledge reversal of Roe is categorically unworthy of support.”

Reasonable-sounding to some, but hold on! But how about one who has voted in favor of leaving born alive babies, maimed through abortion, to suffer in agony and die in pain rather than have a hospital treat them humanely and giving them medical attention because abortion rights would be trammeled on?

That’s very tough even for smart, savvy lawyer Doug Kmiec to handle so he ignores the issue. But if any serious pro-lifers are convinced to vote for Obama, only deception and duplicity will sway them.

Kmiec’s “Martyrdom” for Conscience.



A major weapon used by Kmiec to court favor with the secular media and Obama supporters is his supposed punishment by the Catholic Church because he has announced for Obama. He announced that at Mass sponsored by Catholic businessmen whom he was to address later at dinner that he approached the altar to receiving the Eucharist—and was denied. The priest shook his head and declined to offer Kmiec the host. Kmiec then reportedly said: “You’re making a mistake, Father.” The priest replied calmly, “No I’m not.” Kmiec returned to his pew. His wife rushed out of the church in tears. Then Kmiec went on a media campaign, reporting that he was denied to various liberal media sources including E. J. Dionne, a Catholic and longtime liberal Op Ed writer for the Washington Post, a former Rhodes scholar and holder of a doctorate in political science from Harvard. Kmiec’s argument: horrors! By denying him, the priest turned the Eucharist into a “political weapon.” Obviously Kmiec knows better than that.

Dionne broke the story in his column on June 3, writing “Word spread like wildfire in Catholic circles: Douglas Kmiec, a staunch Republican, firm foe of abortion and veteran of the Reagan Justice department, had been denied Communion. His sin? Kmiec, a Catholic, who can cite papal pronouncements with the facility of a theological scholar, shocked old friends and adversaries alike earlier this year by endorsing Barack Obama for president. For at least one priest, Kmiec’s support for a pro-choice politician made him a willing participant in a grave moral evil.

“Kmiec was denied Communion in April at a Mass for a group of Catholic business people he later addressed at dinner. The episode has not received wide attention outside the Catholic world but it is the opening shot in an argument that could have a large impact on this year’s presidential campaign: Is it legitimate for bishops and priests to deny Communion to those supporting candidates who favor abortion rights?...Kmiec says he is grateful because the episode reminded him of the importance of the Euchari8st in his spiritual life, and because he hopes it will alert others to the dangers of `using Communion as a weapon.’” (Italics mine).

The issue quickly gained publicity speed as Kmiec wished. Nina Totenberg of National Public Radio and dean of the Supreme Court press corps, used it last week on the air. Totenberg is the reporter who broke the Anita Hill story that almost lost Senate confirmation for Clarence Thomas in December,1991 hours before his Senate confirmation vote.

Totenberg interviewed Kmiec and conferred the garland of martyrdom on his brow which he accepted modestly, saying he would not identify the priest who denied him out of charity. Just the thing to win support for Kmiec from liberals who incardinate refugees from conservatism to Stand Tall in Georgetown, the liberal sanctuary in Washington, D. C. and polish his image so as to become an overnight liberal hero. Also, Totenberg found a liberal theologian at Georgetown (not difficult) who railed that the offense to Doug Kmiec by the priest punished him, was an attempt to arm-twist Kmiec’s conscience, attesting that no priest has the right to deny anyone Communion without checking with his bishop.

Never? How could a Catholic theologian seriously stand by that statement? Suppose a drunk weaves into the sanctuary and approaches the priest in the act of distributing the Eucharist. Must the priest interrupt the Mass and call his bishop on the phone to ask him what he should do? Ridiculous. The answer from those skilled in theology with whom I’ve talked is this: the priest on the altar must make the judgment. If, in fact, the priest has doubts as to the validity of the communicant, he makes the call.

But that’s not Doug’s worry. He’s a certifiable liberal martyr now. So, invested in the toga and regalia of full martyrdom as a turned-away communicant, Kmiec wrote his Op Ed for the Chicago Tribune last week. His byline carried the prime identification: “Douglas W. Kmiec, who was denied Communion by a priest for endorsing Barack Obama is a professor of constitutional law at Pepperdine University and was an assistant U. S. attorney general during the Reagan administration.” [Italics mine]. Thus Obama’s hometown newspaper should solidify the impression that Doug Kmiec is a man of conscience willing to be used as a test case for
conscience” in behalf of Obama’s campaign. In his Op Ed, Kmiec skipped Obama’s pro-abortion views, certainly his “Born Alive” kill and gave a sugary flavor to his new boss’s meeting with evangelicals: “Why would the presumptive nominee of the Democratic party devote so much time talking faith rather than politics? [sic]. Quite simply, because it is the senator’s deep personal faith that explains his audaciously positive hope for his country.”

Hurdle 2: “Critical Legal Studies” Influencing Obama.

But Kmiec will also need more than his sugared words to get Obama’s true views on legal construct through to the public. The dirty little secret which I discovered after several sessions interviewing him on ABC Radio in Chicago, is that full-blooming with his credentials as the first black president of the Harvard Law Review and lecturer in constitutional law at the University of Chicago, Obama has been all but an announced exponent of what is known as “Critical Legal Studies” that was fashionable in the `80s, the view that legal language is, in fact, a false discourse that perpetuates hierarchies—men over women, rich over poor, majorities over minorities whereas the object of law is to not merely determine “constitutionality” but force-feed “equality” whether the law requires it or not.

The old Doug Kmiec of a few months ago would be expected to stand opposed to that view. As recent as last year, Obama gave ample demonstration that he was enlisted in the new view which comes as close to enunciation of Critical Legal Studies as has been made by any public official. .

On July 12, 2007 Obama addressed the Planned Parenthood Action Fund in Washington, D. C. Here are some excerpts where he answers questions. I have taken the liberty to parse it.

Obama: Well, the first thing I’d do as president is, is sign the Freedom of Choice Act [Applause].

Fact: The Freedom of Choice Act was introduced in Congress one day after the Supreme Court upheld the Partial Birth Abortion act on April 19, 2007. The FOCA would invalidate many federal, state and local anti-abortion laws including the Partial-Birth Abortion Act and would create an absolute right to abortion overriding any federal, state or local law that simply “interfered with” that right, no matter how compelling the justification..

Obama: That’s the first thing that I’d do. Um, but the, okay, but, but your question about the federal courts is absolutely on target. I taught Constitutional law for ten years and I have to say after reading this latest decision and the series of decisions that the Supreme Court has been putting forward that I find it baffling… Because sometimes they are striking down acts of Congress like the Violence Against Women Act, showing very little deference to congressional decision-making and that somehow when it comes to a piece of legislation that is not taking into account clear doctrine that the Supreme Court has laid out, they say, “Oh, that’s fine. Congress can make those decisions.” There is an inconsistency and I believe a hypocrisy in terms of how we see many of those decisions issued.

Fact: He’s for congressional “decision-making” when it suits the liberal agenda and for the Court overruling congressional “decision-making” when it doesn’t. Sophistry. Finding the Partial Birth Abortion ban constitutional is in accordance with its powers as defined by John Marshall in Marbury v. Madison (1803).

Obama: And one way is a cramped and narrow way in which the Constitution and the courts essentially become the rubber stamps of the powerful in society. And then there’s another version [sic] of the court that says that the courts are the refuge of the powerless. Because oftentimes they can lose in the democratic back and forth. They may be locked out and prevented from fully participating in the democratic process.

Fact: “Powerful” and “Powerless” is Critical Legal Studies language.

Obama: That’s one of the reasons I opposed Alito, you know, as well as Justice Roberts. When Roberts came up and everyone was saying, “You know, he’s very smart and he seems a very decent man and he loves his wife [Laughter]. You know, he’s good to his dog [laughter]. He’s so well qualified. I said, `well, look, that’s absolutely true and in most Supreme Court decis--, in the overwhelming number of Supreme Court decisions, that’s enough. Good intellect, you read the statute, you look at the case law and most of the time the law’s pretty clear. Ninety-five percent of the time, Justice Ginsberg, Justice Thomas, Justice Scalia, they’re all gonna agree on the outcome.

Fact: Meaning something else is required beyond the “mere” reading of the law which might deviate into Originalism, horrors…, the pretext of Critical Legal Studies.

If he’s going to make this sale, Doug Kmiec has to wrestle with Obama’s support of the essentials of Critical Legal Studies well as his own conscience.

OBAMA’S AFFECTION FOR “CRITICAL LEGAL STUDIES” MAKES HIM THE MOST RADICAL CANDIDATE FOR PRESIDENT YET.

Last week’s column in The Wanderer with updating. More about Doug Kmiec and a whole lot more about Critical Legal Studies.

By Thomas F. Roeser

CHICAGO—A meeting here last week at 55 east Monroe between 30 evangelical Protestant leaders and Sen. Barack Obama included a sharpie working on Obama’s side: ex-Reagan aide, constitutional scholar and supposedly Catholic social conservative Douglas Kmiec. I wrote about Kmiec before in The Wanderer and have known him for several years. He and I both wrote Op Eds for the Tribune before my contract was not extended because I was too conservative. Doug stayed on and remained in the good graces of the paper’s editorial board, witness his prominent appearance on the paper’s editorial page last week in passionate defense of Obama.

If he is successful at his trade, Doug won’t have to lie about Obama’s record on abortion—just obfuscate it, minimizing its effect, saying that getting rid of legalized abortion requires far more than a constitutional amendment but also non-governmental things (true)—so no big deal. In a column for the Trib he says “he [Obama] intends to ask government and non-governmental entities—and you and me—to do our part. Frankly, it’s more than a little exhilarating to be given that much faith and trust.” How touching. Then he rhapsodized about Obama’s brimming good will, a sly hint that he may be amenable to softening his pro-abort stand. It’s a very tough sell. Kmiec must convince the churchmen and the liberal secular media to equate Obama’s pro-abort record with McCain’s pro-life one…blanding both out with so many fine legal distinctions as to make both equivalent on the issue. If it works, he will likely be in for a fine reward from President Obama.

Kmiec, a native Chicagoan whose father was a foot soldier for old Mayor Richard J. Daley before Douglas turned conservative and Republican, is the brilliant constitutional scholar who was head of the prestigious Office of Legal Counsel for Ronald Reagan and George H. W. Bush, performing excellently as a pro-life advocate in that position. His resume in the law is impeccable: former dean and St. Thomas More professor of Catholic University of America (the Thomas More name rings hollow now), director of the Thomas White Center on Law & Government at Notre Dame; now chair in constitutional law at Pepperdine University’s school of law.

However richly he deserved it, Kmiec missed being appointed to the U.S. Supreme Court by George W. Bush. Former White House colleagues tell me why. It had nothing to do with Kmiec’s abilities but because the George W. Bush people felt (rightly in my view) that since Kmiec has had such a lengthy paper trail in support of pro-life that a Democratic senate would be sure to deny him confirmation. As it was, getting John Roberts and Sam Alito confirmed was tough enough (Doug’s new found patron, Obama didn’t vote for them for instance) and they didn’t have the voluminously long record of public writings in behalf of pro-life that Kmiec had.

But former fellow law professors who know Kmiec well, say getting on the Supreme Court has long been his life’s objective. Nothing wrong with that since he has the intellectual resources to be a brilliant jurist. After Bush left him in the lurch (he feels), he started out the political year supporting Mitt Romney’s presidential bid, explaining adroitly Romney’s move from pro-abort to pro-life, a tough job in itself. But when Romney’s effort fizzled, Kmiec jumped to Obama, stunning some of his colleagues but not one in particular at Notre Dame who told me he’s not surprised by Kmiec’s opportunism.

Kmiec’s rationale seems to be that if he gives his all to the Obama candidacy and succeeds, he (Kmiec) will likely be nominated by a President Obama to the high court. Given the likelihood of an enlarged Democratic majority in the Senate, Kmiec might be able to cobble together enough votes from pro-aborts and forgiving pro-lifers to make it through. He may well be right. Believe it or not there are some pro-lifers who feel that if Kmiec were named by Obama, the slippery professor could revert to pro-life; thus he could be a double agent. Or maybe a double-double agent. If I were Obama, I would be suspicious too —for nothing is intellectually simple with Kmiec.

The Obama-Kmiec Team.

The Obama-Kmiec meeting with evangelicals was not to convince them that Obama was suddenly hit by a lightening bolt on the way to Damascus and has become pro-life…but to demonstrate that while adamantly pro-abort, his door is ever-open for a deal and negotiation with the full contingent of evangelical leaders, a meeting Kmiec assuredly will be handling.

Among those crowded into a conference room was a group that was far from stolidly pro-life to be sure—but mostly black ministers who favor Obama anyhow and might importune their more conservative brothers to hop on the train. The gathering was a closed-door propaganda event designed to show Obama’s openness.

Attendees included Cameron Strang, founder and CEO of Relevant Media (not to be confused with Catholic Relevant Radio) but the publisher of the hip Christian magazine in liberal terminology with a big kid audience; Bishop T. D. Jakes, the black leader of a Dallas mega-church; best-selling author Max Lucado; Paul Corts, president of the Council for Christian Colleges and Universities; Rev. Stephen Thurston, president of the National Baptist Convention of America and black pastor on Chicago’s south side.

Also, Rev. T. Dewitt Smith, president of the Progressive National Baptist convention, Inc. and AME Bishop Phillip R. Cousin, Sr. But the dessert, whipped cream with a cherry on the top, was the presence of the Rev. Franklin Graham, son of Billy and head of the Billy Graham Evangelical Association. If either one of the Grahams might tell the media, for instance, “we should consider this young man because he has a good heart,” a major battle would be won and Doug Kmiec would be the victor. And with Obama’s election, Doug would be on his way to the high court.

Stumbling Block: Obama’s Opposition to “Born Alive.”

All the same, Kmiec has endorsed for the presidency not your average liberal Democrat pro-choicer but the man who has certifiably the worst pro-abort record of anyone in the Senate and of anyone who has ever sought the presidency [italics mine]. Obama is not only a vehement advocate of abortion rights and opponent of the partial birth abortion ban. In the Illinois legislature as senate judiciary chairman he personally killed all efforts to pass a “Born Alive” bill that would save the lives of babies born from botched abortions who were still struggling for breath. Obama’s veto certified that such babies will die unattended, writhing in pain, because to save one would jeopardize, he and his wife Michelle wrote, abortion rights for women, in that it could aid legislative efforts to make abortion more difficult to get.

Before he came to the U. S. Senate, that body, while under control of the Democrats voted on the same legislation and passed the “Born Alive” bill which Obama had opposed as a state lawmaker. Those voting for it included the laundry list of most leading pro-abort senators including Sens. Ted Kennedy (D-Mass.), Barbara Boxer (D-Calif.), Diane Feinstein (D-Calif) and Hillary Clinton (D-N.Y.)

An almost insuperable task for Kmiec is, with Obama unrepentant of killing “Born Alive,” to parse the necessary rationale to obfuscate and downgrade a simple black and white pro-life distinction on unborn life between his new boss and John McCain. He does not abjure pro-life but writes as a pro-lifer with legalistic distinctions. McCain as you know favors a constitutional amendment that overrules Roe and sends the abortion issue to the states. Obama does not favor such an amendment. Now, take this masterpiece of twisted logic from Kmiec’s recent “Catholic Online” column where he tackles the question “whom should Catholics vote for vis-à-vis pro-life?”

“Given that abortion is an intrinsic evil without justification, thinking the overturning of Roe `solves’ the abortion problem, when it does not, can mislead Catholics into the erroneous conclusion that any candidate unwilling to pledge reversal of Roe is categorically unworthy of support.”

Reasonable-sounding to some, but hold on! But how about one who has voted in favor of leaving born alive babies, maimed through abortion, to suffer in agony and die in pain rather than have a hospital treat them humanely and giving them medical attention because abortion rights would be trammeled on?

That’s very tough even for smart, savvy lawyer Doug Kmiec to handle so he ignores the issue. But if any serious pro-lifers are convinced to vote for Obama, only deception and duplicity will sway them.

Kmiec’s “Martyrdom” for Conscience.



A major weapon used by Kmiec to court favor with the secular media and Obama supporters is his supposed punishment by the Catholic Church because he has announced for Obama. He announced that at Mass sponsored by Catholic businessmen whom he was to address later at dinner that he approached the altar to receiving the Eucharist—and was denied. The priest shook his head and declined to offer Kmiec the host. Kmiec then reportedly said: “You’re making a mistake, Father.” The priest replied calmly, “No I’m not.” Kmiec returned to his pew. His wife rushed out of the church in tears. Then Kmiec went on a media campaign, reporting that he was denied to various liberal media sources including E. J. Dionne, a Catholic and longtime liberal Op Ed writer for the Washington Post, a former Rhodes scholar and holder of a doctorate in political science from Harvard. Kmiec’s argument: horrors! By denying him, the priest turned the Eucharist into a “political weapon.” Obviously Kmiec knows better than that.

Dionne broke the story in his column on June 3, writing “Word spread like wildfire in Catholic circles: Douglas Kmiec, a staunch Republican, firm foe of abortion and veteran of the Reagan Justice department, had been denied Communion. His sin? Kmiec, a Catholic, who can cite papal pronouncements with the facility of a theological scholar, shocked old friends and adversaries alike earlier this year by endorsing Barack Obama for president. For at least one priest, Kmiec’s support for a pro-choice politician made him a willing participant in a grave moral evil.

“Kmiec was denied Communion in April at a Mass for a group of Catholic business people he later addressed at dinner. The episode has not received wide attention outside the Catholic world but it is the opening shot in an argument that could have a large impact on this year’s presidential campaign: Is it legitimate for bishops and priests to deny Communion to those supporting candidates who favor abortion rights?...Kmiec says he is grateful because the episode reminded him of the importance of the Euchari8st in his spiritual life, and because he hopes it will alert others to the dangers of `using Communion as a weapon.’” (Italics mine).

The issue quickly gained publicity speed as Kmiec wished. Nina Totenberg of National Public Radio and dean of the Supreme Court press corps, used it last week on the air. Totenberg is the reporter who broke the Anita Hill story that almost lost Senate confirmation for Clarence Thomas in December,1991 hours before his Senate confirmation vote.

Totenberg interviewed Kmiec and conferred the garland of martyrdom on his brow which he accepted modestly, saying he would not identify the priest who denied him out of charity. Just the thing to win support for Kmiec from liberals who incardinate refugees from conservatism to Stand Tall in Georgetown, the liberal sanctuary in Washington, D. C. and polish his image so as to become an overnight liberal hero. Also, Totenberg found a liberal theologian at Georgetown (not difficult) who railed that the offense to Doug Kmiec by the priest punished him, was an attempt to arm-twist Kmiec’s conscience, attesting that no priest has the right to deny anyone Communion without checking with his bishop.

Never? How could a Catholic theologian seriously stand by that statement? Suppose a drunk weaves into the sanctuary and approaches the priest in the act of distributing the Eucharist. Must the priest interrupt the Mass and call his bishop on the phone to ask him what he should do? Ridiculous. The answer from those skilled in theology with whom I’ve talked is this: the priest on the altar must make the judgment. If, in fact, the priest has doubts as to the validity of the communicant, he makes the call.

But that’s not Doug’s worry. He’s a certifiable liberal martyr now. So, invested in the toga and regalia of full martyrdom as a turned-away communicant, Kmiec wrote his Op Ed for the Chicago Tribune last week. His byline carried the prime identification: “Douglas W. Kmiec, who was denied Communion by a priest for endorsing Barack Obama is a professor of constitutional law at Pepperdine University and was an assistant U. S. attorney general during the Reagan administration.” [Italics mine]. Thus Obama’s hometown newspaper should solidify the impression that Doug Kmiec is a man of conscience willing to be used as a test case for
conscience” in behalf of Obama’s campaign. In his Op Ed, Kmiec skipped Obama’s pro-abortion views, certainly his “Born Alive” kill and gave a sugary flavor to his new boss’s meeting with evangelicals: “Why would the presumptive nominee of the Democratic party devote so much time talking faith rather than politics? [sic]. Quite simply, because it is the senator’s deep personal faith that explains his audaciously positive hope for his country.”

Hurdle 2: “Critical Legal Studies” Influencing Obama.

But Kmiec will also need more than his sugared words to get Obama’s true views on legal construct through to the public. The dirty little secret which I discovered after several sessions interviewing him on ABC Radio in Chicago, is that full-blooming with his credentials as the first black president of the Harvard Law Review and lecturer in constitutional law at the University of Chicago, Obama has been all but an announced exponent of what is known as “Critical Legal Studies” that was fashionable in the `80s, the view that legal language is, in fact, a false discourse that perpetuates hierarchies—men over women, rich over poor, majorities over minorities whereas the object of law is to not merely determine “constitutionality” but force-feed “equality” whether the law requires it or not.

The old Doug Kmiec of a few months ago would be expected to stand opposed to that view. As recent as last year, Obama gave ample demonstration that he was enlisted in the new view which comes as close to enunciation of Critical Legal Studies as has been made by any public official. .

On July 12, 2007 Obama addressed the Planned Parenthood Action Fund in Washington, D. C. Here are some excerpts where he answers questions. I have taken the liberty to parse it.

Obama: Well, the first thing I’d do as president is, is sign the Freedom of Choice Act [Applause].

Fact: The Freedom of Choice Act was introduced in Congress one day after the Supreme Court upheld the Partial Birth Abortion act on April 19, 2007. The FOCA would invalidate many federal, state and local anti-abortion laws including the Partial-Birth Abortion Act and would create an absolute right to abortion overriding any federal, state or local law that simply “interfered with” that right, no matter how compelling the justification..

Obama: That’s the first thing that I’d do. Um, but the, okay, but, but your question about the federal courts is absolutely on target. I taught Constitutional law for ten years and I have to say after reading this latest decision and the series of decisions that the Supreme Court has been putting forward that I find it baffling… Because sometimes they are striking down acts of Congress like the Violence Against Women Act, showing very little deference to congressional decision-making and that somehow when it comes to a piece of legislation that is not taking into account clear doctrine that the Supreme Court has laid out, they say, “Oh, that’s fine. Congress can make those decisions.” There is an inconsistency and I believe a hypocrisy in terms of how we see many of those decisions issued.

Fact: He’s for congressional “decision-making” when it suits the liberal agenda and for the Court overruling congressional “decision-making” when it doesn’t. Sophistry. Finding the Partial Birth Abortion ban constitutional is in accordance with its powers as defined by John Marshall in Marbury v. Madison (1803).

Obama: And one way is a cramped and narrow way in which the Constitution and the courts essentially become the rubber stamps of the powerful in society. And then there’s another version [sic] of the court that says that the courts are the refuge of the powerless. Because oftentimes they can lose in the democratic back and forth. They may be locked out and prevented from fully participating in the democratic process.

Fact: “Powerful” and “Powerless” is Critical Legal Studies language.

Obama: That’s one of the reasons I opposed Alito, you know, as well as Justice Roberts. When Roberts came up and everyone was saying, “You know, he’s very smart and he seems a very decent man and he loves his wife [Laughter]. You know, he’s good to his dog [laughter]. He’s so well qualified. I said, `well, look, that’s absolutely true and in most Supreme Court decis--, in the overwhelming number of Supreme Court decisions, that’s enough. Good intellect, you read the statute, you look at the case law and most of the time the law’s pretty clear. Ninety-five percent of the time, Justice Ginsberg, Justice Thomas, Justice Scalia, they’re all gonna agree on the outcome.

Fact: Meaning something else is required beyond the “mere” reading of the law which might deviate into Originalism, horrors…, the pretext of Critical Legal Studies.

If he’s going to make this sale, Doug Kmiec has to wrestle with Obama’s support of the essentials of Critical Legal Studies well as his own conscience.

Personal Asides: See How the Archdiocese Cowed Pfleger? Back Bigger than Ever and on “Good Morning America!”…Fr, Andy Greeley Explains It All for You—Russert and Hesburgh Should Have Been Bishops. Figures.

Pfleger Agonistes.

Bigger, bolder and tougher than ever, a made-man now that he has cowed the Jimmy Lago-run archdiocese, Fr. Michael Pfleger scores his biggest media triumph by appearing on the ABC network show “Good Morning, America” this AM, all but thumbing his nose at the wilted, pathetically impotent archdiocese which parses instead of performs as a cleric figurehead does the ceremonials while a big-shot Democratic layman chancellor-pol joins it at the hip to the abortion party. Lago, Eddie Vrolyak’s best precinct captain, isn’t worried; the archdiocese has been humiliated, not him, although he’s called all the shots, puffing Pfleger bigger than he has ever been in his life.

This was all but predicted here as soon as the news of Pfleger’s “suspension” came out. A namby-pamby statement suggested that the dissident priest take a sojourn, reporting that he disagreed (oh my!), saying that two weeks off would allow him to leave the limelight. But a two-week leave to a demagogue just gave him breathing room. Now it’s Pfleger Agonistes a reprise of John Milton’s “Samson Agonistes” where the blind hero struggles against fate, going eyeless in Gaza, his fists upraised in anger—exactly the kind of billing the Sta-Comb blonde in roman collar needs.

As result of this flop, the Jimmy Lago-run archdiocese has given an object lesson to every liberal priest, every other do-it-yourself experimenter that the archdiocese can be rolled by any liberal crank…as indeed it can and has. And will be. Rolled by DePaul University which teaches students the rubrics of how to be gay while the archdiocese shakes a manicured finger at it and then retreats under a desk with its p.r. mavens rather than threaten to use the only weapon it has—the stripping of the name Catholic from the institution. Rolled by Loyola University which also celebrates the gay lifestyle. Rolled by the Mercy Home for Boys & Girls that brazenly invited a Democratic presidential candidate to raise funds for it while the archdiocese conflictedly avers and then denies it knew about it and sanctioned it.

Pew Poll Tells Why.

But the fizzle on Superior street doesn’t tell even a fraction of the story. The answer is contained in a poll taken by the Pew Forum on Religion and Public Life released this week. Thirty-six thousand adults were interviewed. Get this: Percent of each religion saying that their holy book is the word of God and literally true…(holy book as applied to Catholics means the New Testament and Tradition): Black Protestant—62% believe that what the church teaches is true…Evangelical Protestant—59% believe their churches teachings are true…Muslim (here’s a surprise, and I rather doubt the figure)—50%. Now the big one.

Catholic—23%....only 23d%...believe their church teachings are true.

Mainline Protestant—22%. Jewish—10%.

You know what that tells us about the pitifully low Catholic affirmation that their church’s beliefs are true? The lamentable decline of courageous teaching about the Faith which is first and foremost the job of the bishops.

Take a look at a good 80% of the Catholic bishops today. Spineless, relativistic, politically-craven, androgynous, unmanly, supine…read: McCarrick. Do you expect these creatures to muster the force to convey needed behind any belief?

Father Andrew Greeley Explains It All for You.

In his “Sun-Times” column yesterday, Andy Greeley explained it all for us. Tim Russert should be canonized. And his qualities should be incardinated in bishops. The man who led in Judas-goat fashion Daniel Patrick Moynihan and Mario Cuomo to eschew pro-life and become pro-aborts (from which stricture Moynihan broke free and voted his conscience on the partial birth abortion ban) had the qualities that Rome should look for in bishops. Also Fr. Ted Hesburgh, the president emeritus of Notre Dame…noted for his saying “my view is, you don’t make decisions because they’re easy. You make them because they’re right!” Under whom Notre Dame took on a flagrantly secular character…and who doubled as president of the Rockefeller Foundation which stepped up its lavish donations to the abortion industry. What was that about decisions again?

What Andy really means is that he…Andy Greeley…should have been given first the purple monsignori, then the crimson of a bishopric and then the blood red cardinalate…signifying the blood of martyrdom a cardinal must be willing to shed for his faith,..allowing him to be called Andrew Cardinal Greeley, archbishop of Chicago. Ah! What a waste that was.

Ah! What a time we would have under Cardinal Greeley! He wouldn’t need a Jimmy Lago to make the tough decisions or a white helmet-coiffed p. r. maven-circuit judge’s wife to tackle the press, I’ll tell you that. We’d call him “Cardinal Andy.” He’d handle is own p. r. Oh how sweet it would be. And do you know what would happen to Pfleger when he tried the Agonistes crap? I mean moving in on Cardinal Andy’s media preserve…getting on “Good Morning America” instead of Cardinal Andy? Well Pfleger would just disappear, that’s all. He’d be a sacristan to the Sisters of Charity at Our Lady of Sorrows.

Not all bad would it be. At least we’d know who’s running things.

Personal Aside: Buchanan’s “History” Books Are Like Fantasy Baseball Trades…and Just as Meaningful.

Some people collect old baseball cards, others match-covers. Pat Buchanan writes “what if” scenarios where he carefully selects the options and comes to the judgment that modern wars—since World War I—were unnecessary…all done with the aim of proving that the George W. Bush he despises and his Iraq War are follies, the War being a waste that could have been avoided. It’s an innocent enough hobby…not unlike Fantasy Baseball…except that he loses his equilibrium, appropriates to himself a rear-view mirror of historical infallibility, producing what he hopes is a godlike view of world history in a foolish “what if?” scenario in his latest “Churchill, Hitler and the Unnecessary War: How Britain Lost Its Empire and the West Lost the World” which was preceded by the direly pessimistic “The Death of the West.”

Wait—what the hell is this “LOST the World” and “Death of the West” stuff? Didn’t the West win the Cold War? That pesky fact is inconvenient to him so it’s not registered in the book. Now I must make a confession here. I have known Buchanan well—since we both served Richard Nixon--and have until recent years thought him prescient. I used to hire him to make speeches in Washington to sales meetings of Quaker executives, thought he served Ronald Reagan as director of communications very well. Moreover, I appreciate that like me, he had a father he loved dearly who was imbued with American nationalism. My own instructed me faithfully during the 1930s and early `40s about how evil Franklin Roosevelt was.

The more I restudy New Deal economics—especially the books written by Amity Shlaes--the more I think Roeser pere was ahead of his time. As for our entry into World War II, the elements surrounding the Pearl Harbor “attack” are so suspicious as to defy credibility. I think a reasonable case has been made by Thomas Fleming (the historian not the president of the Rockford Institute) that our entry into the war was needless, begotten originally by Woodrow Wilson’s insensate drive to push us into World War I after he was reelected on the pledge “He kept us out of war.” And since I served a statesman of the grocery products industry who was for many years as CEO of The Quaker Oats Company and who as a Yale Law grad headed America First, where he teamed with the young John F. Kennedy, Sargent Shriver ands others, you might say I should be with Pat.

Moreover, I think there are some foreign-defense policy revisions that can and should be made that are distinct from George W. Bush’s Wilsonian second inaugural address—but clearly Bush will be venerated after I am gone for his courage to defend America by moving against Iraq. It is immaterial in retrospect as to whether Iraq had something going with the Al-Qaeda. Bernard Lewis, the nation’s greatest expert on the Middle East is right when he says that the attack on Iraq was imperative because for the first time in modern history, someone took the battle to militant Islam. There is little doubt in my mind that we have been spared further attacks on our soil because of Iraq.

What disturbs me about my old friend Pat is that increasingly he is indistinguishable from moveon.org in his attacks on this country’s foreign policy. While it can be argued that our entry into both world wars could have been avoided, my father as well as my beloved old boss Robert D. Stuart, Jr., now 93, understood that no matter the exigencies of our entry into the two global wars of the 20th century, Communism was a great threat to our existence and that we should do what we reasonably can to defeat it. Ronald Reagan pretty much overthrew the USSR and Pat was part of that administration. Wherefore comes this dire Oswald Spengler-like view that we have “lost the world” and are plodding to oblivion? Whence comes this Buchanan hatred of Winston Churchill whom he acknowledges was a great man…very big of Patrick to acknowledge this…but under whom “Britain lost an empire.”

Ridiculous historical short-hand. Britain was horribly overextended and due for shrinkage. Pat’s xenophobia …his fear of immigration…including ALL legal immigration by the way…his abhorrence of free trade…his support of protectionism because it was emblematic of the founders of 1789…tied with his barely concealed worry that Caucasians will lose domination of this country by the races of color…all coincide to product an exceedingly eccentric view of history. Still in all, I share the view of the late Hunter Thompson that of all the people I’ve met, I would rather have a cold one with Pat Buchanan than anyone else, because of his rich humor and great imagination. Unfortunately, his imagination has run away with him in foreign affairs.

Pat is on a tear concerning “unnecessary war.” The answer is that a case can be made that all the wars we have been engaged in were unnecessary. Pat either doesn’t know this or supports the right kind of war he believes in. Take the major theses of the Stamp Act crisis was the Virginia Resolves of 1765, the seven resolutions outlining the colonies’ position on the Stamp Act. The first two were reasonable enough—proclaiming that the colonies had all the rights of Englishmen. The third was specious: maintaining that the principle of colonial self-taxation coincides with the British constitution. The British constitution was and is unwritten. Now get ready for the fourth—one which was definitely usurpative and war-fomenting from a British perspective, that Virginia and all the colonies have the right to be governed solely by laws passed by their own legislatures with a sop saying that they would have to be approved by the royal governor. You could have debated that one since the colonies were not independent and joined with the British empire.

Following the 4th came the 5th which involved Britain having to take a giant swallow mandated by the arrogant little colony. The “General Assembly of this colony have the only and sole exclusive right and power to lay taxes and imposition upon the inhabitants of this colony” and that any attempt to usurp it undermines colonial—and British—freedom. Now wait a minute! These were colonies, not part of the British mainland. Applying Pat’s prescription, if the 4th and 5th were not passed as an insult to the crown and negotiations substituted by wise men, the break with England might never have occurred. But obviously Pat shares the view that we were correct to break with England. It’s all in how you look at it. His shuffling of the cards in history and presuming other pretexts…the Kaiser would have been deterred from acting had he known the Brits were plotting to send troops to the Franco-Prussian war—is ridiculous.

See how ridiculous Pat’s recasting of history is? I might just as well recast the War of the Roses, the war between the houses of York and Lancaster in medieval times, focusing on what might have been a failing of the house of York. Or let us fantasize how it would work out if the war was conducted only at night. Useless time-waster.

Let’s look at one thesis in his “Churchill, Hitler and the Unnecessary War.” He writes “…it was the colossal blunders of British statesmen, Winston Churchill foremost among them, that turned two European wars into world wars that may yet prove the mortal wounds of the West.” The first blunder was “a secret decision of the inner Cabinet in 1906 to send a British army across the Channel to fight in any Franco-German War. Had the Kaiser known the British Empire would fight for France, he would have moved more decisively than he did to halt the plunge to war in July,1914.” How, I ask, does my friend Pat know this? This pro-German mind-reading stuff is endemic throughout the book. Nineteen six was the year Churchill was first elected to the parliament so he is spared that “colossal blunder,” if in fact there was a private decision (unverified).

In Contrast, Britain’s Sagacity to Align with the U.S.

Now let’s consider his thesis that by engaging in these wars, Britain lost an empire. While the small island deservedly had to retrench from its glory days, Britain was prescient…prescient under Churchill as his predecessors and successors…for joining with the United States to compose a grand strategy that has brought the two English-speaking nations to a pinnacle of prestige unmatched in world history. The culture blended from both has been susceptible to capitalism under which both nations grew prosperous. As result, the union of these two nations…one endowed with almost matchless resources, the other not so but wisely cooperating…has created the democratic system that continues over outside threats to dominate and expand throughout the world. Far from committing serious blunders, Churchill was wise to enlist this nation’s help in building that bond. Whether we were wise to be beguiled by his oratory and personal friendship with FDR is another question—but, com’on Pat, pal, lighten up.

More later. Read Buchanan if you must but don’t take the gas-pipe route just yet. He’s full of beans.

Personal Asides: Ditch the Gloom, this Campaign Will Take Many Twists and Turns Before Completion… An “Event” that May Hurt McCain…Bob Creamer’s Ignorance of “Born Alive” Seems Phony.

The one thing to remember about this campaign is the axiom I cited months ago, the wary view of Prime Minister Harold Macmillan who at the top of his game, having restored Britain’s prowess to some extent as a world power…and when asked dubiously what bad end the Tories could come to in Britain…said that the future depended on “events, my dear boy, events.” And as we know now while he was uttering that remark, unbeknownst to him, his secretary of state for war John Profumo was enjoying a dandy little tryst with a raven-haired vixen who secretly was also having a love affair with a USSR agent…following which Macmillan government plunges into crisis…he wins parliamentary confidence by one vote…but is told by his physician, courtesy the British socialist medical scheme, that he—Macmillan—is dying of prostate cancer…whereupon Macmillan resigns, turns the premiership over to a real dud Sir Alec Douglas-Home…and flies to America for a second opinion at Mayo…which finding overturns the British death sentence, allowing that Macmillan has only an enlarged prostrate that could be remedied with a one-night stay at St. Mary’s hospital where the prostate is shaved to attain reduction in size…allowing Macmillan to live twenty more years as a healthy senior citizen, god-damning the British medical scheme.

Events my dear boy, events.

Before we get to possible events, let’s look beyond the mainstream media hype. Item 1: Obama did not get the traditional bounce in thepolls after defeating Hillary Clinton. The immediate bounce, leading John McCain by 48 to 42 is puny. Item 2: McCain has a 20 point lead over Obama among married white women. Item 3: Only half the voters say Obama has the necessary experience to be president. Item 4: Independent voters are breaking in half.

An Event that May Hurt McCain.

But lest Republicans get too optimistic, consider Charlie Black, the highly paid and largely overrated senior strategist to McCain. He said yesterday that a terrorist attack or foreign policy crisis would be of great benefit to McCain. Right he is—but stupid he is as well to say it. Stupid because it comes very-very close to just about the only mechanism that can elect McCain: a foreign policy crisis. Such a crisis can be manufactured by those who wish to see the election tip to McCain—including two former presidents of the United States and a current president. That would be a variant of the October Surprise.

But cynicism of an October Surprise could backfire.

Charlie Black should be fired forthwith. That stupid crack could constitute an “event, my dear boy, an event” that can backfire.

Do you ever wonder why these guys ever get hired in the first place?

Bob Creamer: Culpable Ignorance?

Many complaints have come in about John Powers and my failure to bring up Bob Creamer’s (the husband of Congresswoman Jan Schakowsky) incarceration while he was a guest on my show. I say it would be tacky and needless to rehash this. Once a guy pays for a crime, he should not have to be dunned forever about it. Sorry if you don’t agree. Put it down to the fact that…strange to say it…I’m a helluva nice guy.

But let me say I was stunned by Creamer’s professed ignorance of Barack Obama’s action in killing the Born Alive bill while he was in the Illinois legislature. The specifics are so horrific that I think Creamer didn’t want to wrestle with the hard facts. The bill would supply nourishment and medical care for a grievously injured baby born alive as result of a botched abortion. Obama not only voted against it but as chairman of a senate committee killed the bill. Later the same kind of legislation was voted on by the U. S. Senate before Obama got there…and was supported by all the leading pro-aborts: Kennedy, Kerry, Feinstein, Boxer.

It proves that Obama is far from a reaching-out-to-others moderate but a hard-shell pro-abortion sadist who used the justification for his action…as did Michelle (remember: another a Harvard lawyer?) to prevent the undoing of abortion rights.

Creamer is anything but an uninformed surrogate for Obama. He is skilled, well-versed and makes a good presentation, emphasizing the politician’s skill of seizing cudgels in debate. To say he was not informed of the matter got him off the hook.

This shows that the Born Alive issue may very well be the determinate one in the campaign. I note that McCain referred to Obama’s opposition to the partial birth abortion ban today. I hope he is saving the most heinous legislative act perpetrated by this fraud for later.

It is nothing less than support for infanticide and the fact that a smoothie like Creamer declines to defend it, pleading ignorance, shows that the Obama people cannot face the music on this issue.

Personal Asides: Tribune Editorials of Highest Quality, Truly Top-Rate…Steve Huntley’s “Sun-Times” Columns on Obama a Mark of Courage…A Reader Writes

Trib Editorials.

“Tribune” editorials have moved…seemingly for the indefinite future…from the vague, on-one-hand basis that embodied their wishy-washyness for many years…to high caliber with verve, straight-from-the-shoulder opinionating based on unemotional and courageous analysis of the facts. The heightened quality of the editorials have marked the advent of the new ownership although assuredly on occasion they were on the way previously.

My favorite was the firm denunciation of the Daley effort to bull-con the people to believe that his transgression of the pristine nature of Grant Park to build an underground Children’s Museum was a humanitarian and even a racially progressive step. What ever happened to Lois Wille who used to be a defender of the open lakefront lands, I don’t know but she has been obviously beguiled and made servile by the little demagogue on the 5th floor who surveys his own greatness.

Daley’s flamboyant use of demagoguery to assume his opponents didn’t want to see black children was outrageous but par for the course for the Sultan of Bluster and Bravado. In the old days, the “Trib” would gesticulate feebly and try to move to a middle ground. Now the paper boldly opposed the move and did something else that made its editorials really masterfully persuasive: they outlined many alternatives for the Museum location. The fact that the mayor whom John Kass correctly called Little Big Man forced fed his views on a supine City Council notwithstanding, the “Trib’s” editorials were outstanding and were among the best the paper ever published—including through the reign of the late Robert R. McCormick, frequently right, sometimes wrong but never, ever in doubt--and that’s really saying something for this correspondent to aver.

Another editorial of the highest rate was the one opposing impeachment for Gov. Blagojegvich, specifying that it supported putting recall on the ballot, a move which was stymied by Emil (“I gotta have a raise! I’m on food stamps!”) Jones.

Digression here: Jones’s audacious insolence resembles only in lessened degree true legislative tyrants in U.S. history including Speaker Joseph (Uncle Joe) Cannon and Czar Tom Reed. Jones’ swaggering rhetoric illustrating his view that with an all-black constituency he can never be replaced makes one think of a series of strongmen in Africa who have descended from democratic leader to dictator. With one exception: the strongmen over there are superior in handling the English language to the guttural practiced by Emil Jones as he works his will. Jones’s arrogant ownership of the Senate and blatant violation of legislative procedure constitutes one of the worst exhibits of U.S. legislative history. If seeing this former sewer patronage hack elevated to the senate presidency is the embodiment of what early civil rights struggles were all about, one must become very cynical. It is no different from the era of white boss rule of the Louisiana legislature in the `30s. End of digression.

Back to the subject: the “Trib’s” editorials on state issues are balanced, fair and perspicacious.

Huntley’s Courageous Op Eds.

This space regularly blistered Steve Huntley when he was “Sun-Times” editorial page editor…for which an anonymous writer calling himself “Aesop” (Huntley in disguise) shot back that my criticism was caused by my being let go by Huntley. But I would not allow that circumstance to hobble criticism of the paper’s leftward lurch under the too obedient Huntley who was too solicitous of pleasing his bosses. But happily, now to bring the score up to date, Huntley is an Op Ed writer and not editorial page editor and is once again his own man…preserving what little remains of intellectual integrity to the city’s fast-fading pablum-spewing Democratic newspaper of record. How long can Huntley survive when the schlock editor wants to turn it into a crusading huckster paper for Barack Obama in order to entice black readers? Probably not long. But as he goes down, Huntley is fighting gallantly and we hereby welcome him as he will be in the future to the reputable army of the soon to be “Sun-Times” unemployed.

A Reader Writes.

A reader asks an interesting question. Given that I am a pro-lifer and believe that the issue of overturning “Roe v. Wade” and saving unborn life the most salient one of our times, why do I offer such intemperate opinions of…let us say…Mayor Daley, the Madigans, Judy Baar Topinka, Doug Kmiec and Dan Hynes et al while taking a decidedly less hostile view of such pro-choicers as Democrat Jack Franks, Republican Tom Cross and a number of others?

Simple.

Franks and Cross aren’t Catholics. The rest are.

I am far more critical…exceedingly more… of Catholics who are pro-aborts than I am to members of other faiths since Catholics are willing to deny the old faith to ingratiate themselves with other publics and gain by endorsing the practice. For a knowledgeable Catholic to embrace abortion is the height of moral failure which makes one’s entire life a failure. Catholicism opposed abortion from early history while Jews did not and many Protestants who came later did not (some never had). The only Torah reference that could possibly be stretched to include anti-abortionism is in Exodus where it says, “when men have a fight and hurt a pregnant woman, so that she suffers a miscarriage but no further injury ,the guilty one shall be fined as much as the woman’s husband demands of him and he shall pay in the presence of judges. But if injury ensues, you shall give life for life, eye for eye, tooth for tooth, hand for hand, foot for foot, burn for burn, wound for wound, stripe for stripe.” This is casuistic law, a model used frequently in the book of the covenant but is a long-long way from being a tradition.

In contrast, abortion was always wrong to Catholics i.e. the early Christians whether the fetus was formed or not. True, there is no reference to the practice in the New Testament (because it was addressed to a Jewish audience that did not have this practice or tradition) but it begins with Paul’s condemnation of “pharmakeia,” the use of abortifacient drugs, in his epistle to the Galatians, proceeding through the “Didache,” a work published in apostolic times as an instructional to would-be Christians which explicitly condemns infanticide and abortion all the way through the life of the Church, ratified by Pius XII, John XXIII, Paul VI, John Paul I, John Paul II and Benedict XVI. None of the great scholars, Thomas, Augustine, Anselm viewed abortion as a choice. Augustine was confused as to when life begins; he thought it began with “quickening”—but his view was the same as all others: from its very inception of life, abortion is an evil.

Therefore since anti-abortionism is part of the heart and soul of the Catholic fabric, rupture of that belief for partisan political advantage is personally repugnant to me and far different from other strategic accommodations which I have seen and even participated in. Not so to others, evidently but it colors my views of the betrayers.

Take Richard M. Daley, for instance. He was reared in the Catholic tradition, nurtured by his parents and utilized it in his voting as a state senator. He abandoned it later because he wanted to do whatever it takes, wishing to garner as many votes as possible, notwithstanding that he probably could have gotten elected by exhibiting a modicum of courage as mayor—but he betrayed his faith and chose not to endanger himself. There is no doubt that with his machine backing that has given him a 70% reelection rate, had he remained true to his faith he would probably have scored 66%. But 66% is not enough for one who sees his total life’s purpose as winning elections. He seeks to drown out his obvious guilty conscience with loud squawking or…when need be…weeping. But at bottom he is a fraud and no one knows it better than he.

Last week he had the chutzpah to go to Northwestern and tell the graduates they should emulate him and become idealists. That the roof did not cave in on him for enunciating this outrageous hypocrisy is astounding. Daley jumped the traces out of pure ambition for election to office with no problems as did the Kennedy family and a host of others with Irish surnames (which under Bobby and Ted hired rogue theologians to try to rationalize their defection for use in future presidential years). Daley was the first big Catholic Democratic name in Illinois to jump the traces begetting the Madigans, Hynes, Durbins and Quinns and hosts of minor league Catholics who rise above principle every day. Had he held firm others might have been tempted to join him. But to do so he would have had to risk losing which to this tin-pot Little Man is inconceivable.

Of course these defections of Catholic politicians have been immeasurably aided by the manifold weaknesses of the Catholic hierarchy across the nation with very few exceptions…starting with a precedent set by Richard Cardinal Cushing of Boston who was greatly influenced by the Joe Kennedy contributions to the archdiocese. Cushing sold out first on the matter of state support for contraceptive services, saying that Catholic lawmakers were on their own. This followed when all major Democratic Catholics fell off the wagon on abortion without so much as a blink from the hierarchy in Massachusetts or anywhere else. In Chicago, it must be said that Joseph Cardinal Benardin who winked at the defections remained with his anti-abortion posture. The day he received the presidential medal of freedom from President Clinton, he picketed in behalf of life. In the current archdiocesan leadership being laity-run in all but the ceremonials, political pragmatism rules; there can be no discipline meted out by the faint of heart where parsing substitutes for performance.

Nowhere has the betrayal of theological principles by Catholic politicians received greater behind-the-scenes support than it has from Theodore Cardinal McCarrick, the former archbishop of Washington, D. C. McCarrick still trots around in retirement interfering in diocese decisions making sure Democratic mammon is well served. He is a living equivalent to Thomas Cardinal Wolsey for his willingness to bend to popular political trends and which is to him the privilege of being chummy with the Kennedys, Kerrys and others. He is famous for hiding a letter from then Cardinal Josef Ratzinger to the U.S. bishops urging them not to give the Eucharist to pro-abort Catholic politicians who are unrepentant. His hiding the full text of the letter was a distinct service to the Democratic party which feared embarrassment to its candidates. For that reason, I would not want to be in the crimson-embossed slippers of any androgynous (in style as in character) prelate who, senior in life, is readying himself for appearance before the Just Judge.

Flashback: Unsuspected Benefits from Being Campused for a Month.

More than 50 years of living written as a memoir for my kids and grandchildren.

As the days and nights wore on under house arrest for a solid month of not going to town on weekends and having to clean biology department test tubes and catalog biology specimens, some hitherto unsuspected hidden benefits came to the fore. One NON-BENEFIT was having to list the various subcategories such as Drosophila melanogaster, just another bug that looked like a tiny lobster, or feeding the live termites and labeling the Praying Mantis Egg case or pressing a dead Giant Hissing Cockroach into the leaves of a book and spraying it with some kind of vile smelling preservative or tending the Mealworm Larvae Living specimen—all in Fr. Adelard’s antiseptic odorous biology lab. But the unforeseen benefits were

1. Getting to know and becoming a kind of friend to the Bull of the Woods insofar as he tolerated friendships with students he continued to browbeat. He started the tradition of us playing ping-pong in the deserted gym on Saturday nights…enthusing over beating me at the game…while everyone of my classmates was recreating in Saint Cloud…after which we would go to a deserted Snack Shack and have coffee/coke and a chocolate brownie each. I would pay; as a Benedictine pursuing the vow of poverty, he got his free.



2. Getting to hear Abbey scuttlebutt from one truly on the inside of the Monastery i.e. the fact that aged Fr. Sylvester Harter, OSB, my 82-year-old professor of English grammar, the last real master of sentence diagramming, would spend each evening after vespers propping an air rifle on his window ledge and popping off noisy birds and other harmless wild life in the pristine Abbey garden three stories below. And the fact that the Abbey had lost one priest, suspiciously named Fr. Valentine, to a nurse in the infirmary whereupon the name Valentine was withdrawn from circulation on the abbey clericate. Yet another was the episode 10 years earlier when an old Brother turned dotty and kept asking his colleagues if they liked or hated him. Then it turned to “you hate me, don’t you?”
On one Christmas Eve, a brother, tired of this routine answered, “yes, I hate you!” trying to shut him up. He shouted “I thought so!”, pulled a pistol from his long, floor-length habit and shot the guy to death…necessitating the Abbot to have to re-consecrate the Abbey church. Fascinating.

3. More important and something which certified my career in writing, the Bull of the Woods decided to recommend me to my English lit professor who was also the faculty moderator of the university newspaper, “The Record” as a student reporter for the paper, something I dearly desired but had figured would have to await my sophomore year. The English lit professor was Stephen Humphrey, a layman, who powerfully impressed me because he could make a point not only with superb diction…choosing the right word to express the nub of an idea in the English classics…but that he could express an opinion by the mere raising of an aristocratic eyebrow, something that only the actor David Niven could do as effectively. Steve Humphrey of which more much later was one of the very-very few hugely determinate influencers in my life.



4. Of subordinate benefit was to hear the Bull of the Woods’ views on vocations to the priesthood, brotherhood and sisterhood. He had influenced his fellow Ping-Pong player, Fr. Malachy Murphy OSB on the importance of becoming a priest, Malachy at one point not being sure and Adelard pushing him into it whereupon Malachy became a valued, happy and thoroughly productive Benedictine monk.



Adelard had the view that no one ever woke up in the morning and wanted to be a religious because of the doctrine of Original Sin which promotes pleasure and satisfaction over sacrifice and the unutterable tedium of celibacy. He argued that one who was hesitant should undertake to fulfill the vocation right away by going to the novitiate and seeing if the studies would “take.” If not, nothing lost. If yes, everything gained. It turned out without his telling me that not only was Malachy inducted into the Benedictine Order in this way but the Bull had put great stress on Malachy to encourage his comely sister, Mildred, to do the same—at least try it out, the sisterhood being far less formidable than the priesthood so that a postulant could easily leave before taking final vows with nothing the worse for wear.

“I think it is a very wise thing for Abbot Alcuin to do, to insist that all incoming freshmen this year take four straight years of Thomistic philosophy and theology as if they were going into the priesthood,” he said. “That should happen always.”

I asked him: Father, are you saying that everyone is originally pointed to the religious life from the cradle on but is somehow diverted?

“Yes, basically. I suppose I would make an exception for you.”

Do you contemplate what would happen if a person not oriented to the religious life just followed through and joined it—the unhappiness that would cause?

“Well, there’s a built-in correction for that. When and if a person gets to a convent or monastery and is unhappy—before final vows—they, he and she, take off. I was unhappy for the first week here and Saint John’s but haven’t had an unhappy day since. The same with Malachy.”

He talked of Malachy’s sister Mildred without any reference to me although both of us knew that there was a connection, but the Bull of the Woods was enjoying nuance here.

“And the same with his sister,” said The Bull of the Woods. “She’s due to go in and will find out whether she likes it or not.”

Then he asked archly, “how long do you think she’ll last?”

Eighteen months, tops, Father.

“Why?”

Because she is a very womanly woman, warm, sweet, responsive, soft, caring, not at all like so many of the shriveled, antiseptic types I’ve met in the convent.

“I beg your pardon. My own sister is a very, as you say, womanly woman and she is--.”

I know, Mother Superior in Pierre, South Dakota. That may be. There are always exceptions. I understand Saint. Catherine of Siena was one.

“She was. Malachy is bringing her here tomorrow, Sunday, for Mass--”

“Saint Catherine of Siena?”

“--before she says goodbye,” said Adelard ignoring it. “ Would you want to meet her?” Here he said “meet her” deceptively as he knew full well the reason I was campused was because I sneaked out to take her to the movies. Rather needlessly duplicitous, thought.

No, thank you, Father. Then I thought I’d zing him back.

I still give her eighteen months.

“A cynical view.”

A realistic one.

“This because she gave you some womanly affection, I take it.”

This was his first and only reference to the reason I was campused.

Yes, if you must know.

“You’ve been so wrong about so many things, so we’ll see.”

She was out of the nunnery in seven. Out and enrolled this time at Saint Benedict’s as a freshman where we met at a Mixer but I steered away. I never quite got over the fact that she blurted everything to her big brother who alerted The Bull of the Woods who pretended he didn’t see me at the bus depot, slunk down in his bus seat as to feign slumber while I sneaked off the bus and then campused me for a month.

But all things considered, I am indebted to her and to the Bull for yet another unforeseen consequence of being campused. That was

5. Thanks to the Bull’s recommendation of me to my English lit professor, Steve Humphrey, I was recruited as a feature writer for “The Record,” the first in a string of journalism jobs.



“You know what I mean by feature writer?” Steve Humphrey said.

“That means I want you to write some light stuff—something that relates to the readers. Not hard news.”

What shall I write about?

“I think it would be instructive for you to write about being campused for a month. After all, so far this year you’re the only one who ever tried to break out during mid-week—and that goes for all the world-weary ex-GIs here.”

Would that not worsen the situation for me with Adelard?

“No. I’ve already talked to him about it. He thinks it would be a scream.”

I could not imagine The Bull of the Woods thinking anything that required his exertion of discipline a scream—but I did. And the story really took off. Headlined across page 2 “30 Days Hath September—and Roeser!” it rather elevated me from an inconspicuous 18-year-old freshie to a journalist…which eventuated into another unexpected good consequence which was

6. …at the semester break when table assignments were changed for the three meals in the refectory, the invisible line of demarcation…the ad hoc rule that we teen-aged freshmen eat at tables by ourselves and the ex-GIs, men of the world, ate at their own tables, changed. A graying, grizzled ex-GI came to me and said, “a number of us who liked your article about being campused wondered if you would move over to our table.” My fellow teen-aged freshmen overheard, were hotly envious. I feigned coolness and said, “sure why not.”



From that time on I was the only teen-ager, non-World War II freshman who fraternized with ex-GIS including invited to go to Saint Cloud with them when my time of imprisonment ended. We rode on the Johnny bus together, I with the raucous group of irreverent veterans and my classmates with their young fellows who were just starting to shave. And we, the ex-GIs and I, drank seriously, as only ex-GIs can …some 23 to 28 years old…could do at the Hotel Spaniol Bar. The very first Saturday night I had to watch myself for I was getting tipsy but the bartender understood and and after the first legitimate ones, mixed drinks for me that were mainly ginger-ale, mixed with apple juice (not a very appetizing confection) while my colleagues would whoop it up with what they called Boilermakers and their Helpers—Glueck Stite beer, 12% and a shot. In that way I was given the appearance of keeping up with them, although to my discomfiture the bar bill amounted to the same as theirs. But then I heard stories and roared with laughter at inuendos I could not fathom, with one eye cocked to see if my fellow teened colleagues were enviously watching. They were and hated me for it which I savored.

Double-dating with them was somewhat of a problem since most of them in their 20s, even 30s, wanted the companionship of women their own age and the schema was to double-date and thereby share the cost of the movies. But here I was a problem because what woman in her 20s wants to go out with a kid of 18? They tried to accommodate by fixing me up with their girls’ friends but there is a great gap between an 18-year-old and a, let us say, 25 year old woman. We never, really solved that problem and whenever I socialized seriously I did it without the ex-GIs who were quite more sophisticated in the world’s ways than was I. But that was only a slight inconvenience. Associating with them for a lad my age was worth it.

The ex-GIs put the pressure on Steve Humphrey, my English prof, who was an ex-GI himself, to give me a regular column which I took proudly. Then when young Kenneth, my roommate, decided to move from Saint John’s, having reconsidered a priestly vocation much to the Bull of the Wood’s displeasure, I was invited down to the first floor Benet where I was a roommate to three ex-GIs where the Prefect was Fr. Walter Reger OSB, an elderly, cigar-smoking realist, a grandfatherly type who, unlike Adelard, did not think all men should try out for the priesthood—and who felt marriage and family life were at least equal to the consecrated life.

Even so, rooming with ex-GIs and having Father Walter as Prefect while classmates of my own age were struggling under the Bull of the Woods was to die for. I ask you: even today as I approach 80, I say to myself, was that heady or not?

In the second year, my fellow ex-GIs at my table—notice how I preen when I say that?--decided to try to improve the quality of the food, especially at dinner. All meals were served family style, prepared by German Benedictine nuns who had been imported from the old country. Unwisely and to my unremitting regret, I signed up for that ex-GI-based consumer revolt which taught me a great deal after conferring some pain on all of us.

That painful story anon.