Feast of St. Jane Frances de Chantel*
You Must Remember This… …a kiss is just a kiss, a sigh is just a sigh. Also to the supercilious critics and grammarians who love to correct typos on this blog—I write this usually in the dead of night (it’s now 12:20 p.m.) and have no proof save myself. So while it’s fun to note that St. Teresa Benedicta of the Cross (Edith Stein) couldn’t have been gassed to death at Auschwitz in 1949 because the war ended in 1945—offer a silent prayer for this octogenarian and give me a break will ya? I know when World War II ended even better than you because as a 17 year old I was at the corner of State and Madison celebrating. With this, my finger hit the wrong numeral key.
Edgar’s Cliché Fountain.
Hold the presses. Jim Edgar has been working overtime manufacturing hoary clichés. But the mystery is: why does the media give him so much attention when he spews trite truisms that are self-evident to a 4th grade class? Here are just a few in yesterday’s Associated Press dispatch by David Mercer:
- “[Blagojevich] runs around and talks so much, he’s so visible. It’s really unfortunate for the state for a variety of reasons.” Does anyone think it’sfortunate for the state? No I didn’t think so.
- “Our place, in terms of being considered one of or the most corrupt state is pretty secure.” Wow. There’s a matchless epigram.
- “The budget is not an easy thing to deal with.” Is that right? I thought it was duck soup.
- “There’s a huge cost of a corrupt system. There are all kinds of economic and social costs.” God! That’s a great insight!
- About Blago: “I think if he’s found guilty of anything, he’s found guilty.” Hold that thought. Let me take it down for posterity!
- “If he’s acquitted (entirely) they [the people] might just shake their heads and say `what’s going on here?’” Do you really think so?
- Back to the state budget: “Unless there’s a lot of pressure put on [lawmakers] probably nothing’s going to get done.” This ranks with Calvin Coolidge’s “When men are out of work, unemployment exists.”
This guy has been getting away with murder with unchallengeable blah comments like this while scribes scribble these pearls which drop from his lips furiously. I haven’t seen or read one meaningful comment about state government from this guy before, during and after his governorship—yet whatever bland self-evident statement gets huge treatment from the media i.e. “The sage of Charleston has just spoken!”
Every time an old congressional crook dies, the media rushes out to say that they “represent a colorful era” and “they were giants in their time.”
Bobby Byrd was so crooked he couldn’t lie straight in bed. What was so great about him? He started as a Klansman and became Grand Vizer and Wizard in order to get elected to Congress. After which when the times changed, he shut up about race. He became a hero to the media late in life because he purposely decided to: He challenged the Iraq War which the media hated. Thus all his support of segregation was washed away by the mainstream press and TV.
Ted Stevens as president pro-tem of the Senate was the guy who said to Henry Hyde about a chance for a Clinton conviction (having been impeached by the House): “Henry, he’s not going to be convicted even if he raped a woman and shot her dead before our very eyes!” He meant that he had worked out a deal with Clinton to get even more money for Alaska from the government trough if he opposed conviction.
Rosty was a general for The Squid and that’s it. He spent so much time on the Hill he became a baron and thought he could get away with anything and everything. A pro-life Catholic, he switched to pro-abort in the last few years because it was popular with a growing number of his constituents…and so the hell with Natural Law, moral law and unborn life.
Someone wrote recently (I wish I could remember who it was) that there’s a great difference between those who lionize veteran congressmen and senators for being “great guys” and “great men.” The other day I was stunned to hear Bill Kristol on FoxNews say that it is a great injustice that Charlie Rangel has to undergo this humiliation. Huh? Meaning Charlie’s a “great guy.” Then the next day, Charles Krauthammer said the same thing…only “everyone does this in Washington.” Again: Charlie’s a great guy. Makes me think that these gentlemen feel they owe something to Charlie. I don’t want to know what it is.
By the way, with Rangel we have yet another pro-abort Catholic who rises above principle: good old Charlie Rangel who trips up to the altar rail every Sunday to receive the sacrament….served by political clerics who don’t care if they cause scandal…knowing his pro-abort stance…but they fork over the Eucharist anyhow which he takes in his stained hands.
Good ol’ Charlie.
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*: St. Jane Frances de Chantal [1572-1641]. Her father was president of the parliament of Burgundy. In 1592 she married Baron de Chantal and lived in the feudal castle of Bourbily. After her husband was killed, the young widow of 28, mother o four, took a vow of chastity. She founded the Congregation of the Visitation after a long and thoughtful correspondence with St. Francis de Sales. At the time of her death the Congregation had grown to eighty-six and to 164 when she was canonized in 1767.
"They criticize me," Coolidge said, "for harping on the obvious. Perhaps someday I'll write On the Importance of the Obvious. If all the folks in the United States would do the few simple things they know they ought to do, most of our big problems would take care of themselves."
ReplyDeleteI am sure glad I have bitten my tongue and quelled my key stroke when I have seen typos. Being not yet quite an octo, I feel Tom's pain nonetheless. And if he did have an editor, what then? Who knows what abominations he might commit?
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