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We have blogged before about how Marquette’s Les Aspin Center has a pattern of honoring members of Congress who not merely take positions contrary to Catholic teaching, but extreme positions contrary to Catholic teaching.

Two egregious cases: Congresswoman Gwen Moore and Congressman John Lewis. (Check here for more on Moore.)

Now what have Moore and Lewis done?

They are cosponsoring a bill by California Democratic Pete Stark (H.R.3827) that would “prohibit discrimination in adoption or foster care placements based on the sexual orientation, gender identification, or marital status of any prospective adoptive or foster parent.”

In short, it would force Catholic and other Christian adoption agencies to give children to homosexual couples. In Massachusetts, the Catholic Church got out of the adoption business rather than than comply with a demand that fundamentally violated its religious conventions.

This bill, if it is passed, would have the same effect all across the nation, even in conservative states that would never impose the gay agenda on Christian social service agencies.

While the notion of “prohibiting discrimination” might sound nice, the fact is that Christian social service agencies would equally “discriminate” against potential adoptive parents engaged in adulterous relationships, those with a history of drug abuse or domestic abuse, or a whole host of other things that make them less than the best parents for a child.

Even if one thinks there is nothing wrong with homosexual acts, in a tolerant society one should not try to impose that view on people with different views.

And morality aside, there is every reason to believe that every child needs both a male and a female parent, since every child needs both a male and a female role model.

This bill, by the way, would prohibit discrimination on the basis of marital status. But heterosexual couples who won’t make the commitment that marriage involves are poor candidates to be parents.

Of course, black people in general aren’t keen on the gay agenda, as the voting on California’s Proposition 8 showed. So Moore and Lewis, who are black, aren’t representing the black community very well. This may be because they are trying to placate gays and liberal yuppies that are part of their electoral coalitions, or it may be that they simply think like white liberals.

Either way, the Aspin Center showed bad judgment honoring either of them. Whether this was a reflection of the liberal views of the leadership of that institution or an attempt to curry favor with Washington politicians is hard to tell. It was probably both. But it wasn’t what any part of a supposedly Catholic university should do.

Never has an American president been so smitten with himself.

Or if one has, he was smart enough to conceal it.

The truth is, Obama is pretty much an empty suit. Yes, he has the standard liberal/left views of community activists and academics. He can seem like a good orator if his teleprompter doesn’t break down.

But mostly the mania for Obama has been the result of people projecting on him their own hopes. For liberals, he was going to be the “transformative” president who bought European-style socialism to America. For blacks, it was going to be a huge historical breakthrough. (They were right about that, but when it becomes obvious that being black does not by itself make a president very capable, the achievement looks less lustrous.)

For a lot muddle-headed youth he represented “hope” and “change,” and they weren’t inclined to look beyond naïve hopes.

But increasingly, the illusions drop away, and the callow narcissist becomes more transparent.

The Muslim faith of Fort Hood assassin Nidal Hasan so obviously played a part in the murders he committed that even the mainstream media have covered the evidence in detail.

Facts have overcome political correctness.

But in academia, especially sociology departments, facts have little traction against ingrained assumptions about who is the “victim” and who is the “oppressor.”

Thus we have Louise A. Cainkar, who is a professor in Marquette’s Sociology Department, insisting that “Questions abound as to what drove him to commit these acts, but a rush to connect his actions with Islamic extremism is irresponsible.”

Even worse, she summarizes by saying:

The media’s coverage of these killings thus far appears to be another effort to reduce complexity to stereotype, to demonize Islam, and to shift the focus of public thought away from a deep questioning about war, American military activity, and the damage these are doing to people (including “our own” people), and to refocus it on the ubiquitous, evil “them.”

Right. Don’t ask questions about jihadist Islam, just question “the damage we are doing to people.” It’s really America that is at fault.

It’s always America that is at fault.

Unfortunately, a dangerous number of Muslims have decided to define themselves as “them.” It’s nowhere near a majority of Muslims, and fewer in the U.S. than in Europe, but Islamic radicalism is an enemy of America. We didn’t make them the enemy. They chose to be the enemy.

Sociology, as a discipline, is stiflingly politically correct. Perhaps that’s why the number of students enrolled in sociology courses has declined. Even academics, comfortably ensconced in tenured positions and free to spew nonsense with complete impunity, eventually face a market test.

It’s high time.

Unaffordable or Unavoidable:
A Forum on Health Care Reform

A town hall forum featuring:
Dr. Susan Giaimo
Panelist: Visiting Assistant Professor of Political Science
Dr. John McAdams
Panelist: Associate Professor of Political Science
Dr. Robert Kraig
Panelist: Executive Director, Citizen Action of Wisconsin
State Rep. Leah Vukmir
Panelist: Representative for Wisconsin’s 14th Assembly District

Wednesday, November 11, 6 p.m. in
Marquette Hall, Room 200
Here is the flyer for the event.

This ought to be pretty good, especially since we are talking about legislation that could radically change a sixth of the U.S. economy, and affect the quality of health care that Americans get for the rest of their lives.

The “20/20” segment below was produced before the Fort Hood tragedy, but it’s especially relevant now.



This point is explicitly address on the Reason blog.

When Maj. Nidal Malik Hasan started shooting up the Soldier Readiness Processing Center at Fort Hood, Pfc. Marquest Smith dove under a desk. A.P. reports that “he lay low for several minutes, waiting for the shooter to run out of ammunition and wishing he, too, had a gun.”

Neither Smith nor the other victims of Hasan’s assault had guns because soldiers on military bases within the United States generally are not allowed to carry them. Last week’s shootings, which killed 13 people and wounded more than 30, demonstrated once again the folly of “gun-free zones,” which attract and assist people bent on mass murder instead of deterring them.

Judging from the comments of those who support this policy of victim disarmament, Smith’s desire for a gun was irrational. According to Paul Helmke, president of the Brady Campaign to Prevent Gun Violence, “This latest tragedy, at a heavily fortified army base, ought to convince more Americans to reject the argument that the solution to gun violence is to arm more people with more guns in more places.”

Note how the reference to “a heavily fortified army base” obscures the crucial point that the people attacked by Hasan were unarmed as a matter of policy. Also note the breathtaking inanity of Helmke’s assurance that “more guns” are not “the solution to gun violence.” In this case, they assuredly were.

The first people with guns to confront Hasan, two local police officers, were the ones who put a stop to his rampage. And while Sgt. Kim Munley and Sgt. Mark Todd acted heroically, they did not arrive on the scene until a crucial 10 minutes or so had elapsed and Hasan had fired more than 100 rounds.

If someone else at the processing center had a gun when Hasan started shooting, it seems likely that fewer people would have been killed or injured. Furthermore, the knowledge that some of his victims would be armed might have led him to choose a different, softer target in order to maximize the impact of his attack.

There would have been plenty of targets to choose from: any of the locations in Texas, including public schools, universities, and shopping malls, that advertise their prohibition of gun possession. The problem is that crazed killers tend not to follow such rules.

The liberals’ antipathy toward guns is not based on any kind of sound policy analysis. It’s the outgrowth of cultural bias.

In the first place, there is the belief that crime should be dealt with by more government welfare programs, social workers, rehabilitation and so on. The kind of things the liberals do, and have a class interest in seeing expanded.

But perhaps more important is the fact that gun owners, at least stereotypically, don’t drink lattes, don’t drive Priuses, don’t shop at Whole Foods and just generally ignore the yuppie culture of self-righteousness. They are even likely to vote Republican. Thus they are the kind of people who need to be put in their place by being dictated to by their “betters” in newsrooms, on college faculties, and in liberal interest groups and foundations.

It really, at the very bottom, has nothing to do with wanting gun violence reduced.

From Bob Hamer on Biggovernment.com:

Earlier this year as I was filling up at the gas station I noticed a faded bumper sticker - vintage Bush 43 - on the car next to me: “Dissent is Patriotic.” When I pointed to the bumper and asked the driver if she still believed that, she suggested I do something to myself which I am certain is physically impossible. I just laughed and said, “I’ll take that as a no.”

It does seem to matter a lot who is doing the dissenting, doesn’t it?

It now seems pretty obvious that what we had was a lone nut.

That’s not to say that there was no political content to the act. The guy had a sharp Islamic grievance, and he was acting on that. Yet he appears to have been part of no sort of organized terrorist plot. A malcontent, he had gotten a poor performance evaluation at Walter Reed Medical Center. The act was clearly planned in advance, since he had been giving his furniture away.

Something very like this happened decades ago. But then, when the killer was confronted by Officer J.D. Tippit, the killer got the drop on Tippit and killed him.

This time, the killer confronted an officer named Sgt. Kimberly Munley. He hit her with one shot through both legs. She hit him with four shots. She is in stable condition. He is on a respirator.

Way to go, Sgt. Munley.

[Update]

It appears that another officer aided Munley in taking down Hasan. But she was every bit as brave (being the first to confront the shooter), and every bit as effective (shooting Hasan in the chest) as the early reports imply.

It’s more than just one school.

The Obama Cult of Personality has apparently become pretty common in public schools.

All the more reason to push for school choice.

Right now on the Boston Store website, they are selling Minnesota Vikings Brett Favre replica team jerseys.


We don’t actually mind, but it is interesting that their commercial calculation is that people in the Milwaukee area do still like Favre, and are willing to overlook his antics in recent years and remember all those great years with the Packers.

I’m sure a lot of readers know snobby liberals who insist that all the well-informed people agree with them, and only know-nothings could possibly be Republicans.

Well . . . from the Pew Research Center, data that won’t be new to anybody who knows about public opinion. It shows Republicans more likely to give the right answer on a broad range of politically-relevant knowledge issues.

First, issue by issue.


Then we have a summary scale that shows the number correct out of the twelve items on the test.


The partisan gap is biggest for knowing who Glenn Beck is. This might seem natural, since Republicans are more likely to watch Glenn Beck. But shouldn’t liberals at least know who Glenn Beck is, especially given that he’s being vilified by the White House?

The most politically incorrect vacation one can imagine, but then all the fun things are these days!

UCC supposedly stands for “United Church of Christ,” but the old jibe is that it really stands for “Unitarians Considering Christ.” A very liberal denomination, its ruling elites (and to a considerable extent, the members who haven’t yet left) use Christian rhetoric, but they won’t assert anything that rankles the secular politically correct sensibility -- opposing abortion or gay marriage, for example.

But they do oppose “hate speech.”

And their definition of “hate speech” is terribly vague and broad. For example:

Hate speech takes various forms, from words inciting violence, to those creating a climate of hate towards vulnerable groups. Hate speech has one common outcome: it creates an environment of hate and prejudice that legitimizes violence against its targets.

The presence of hate speech so widely in media creates a climate that makes it impossible to have reasonable policy discussions on issues like immigration reform, and cultivates a climate that condones violence against targeted groups.

Categories of hate speech:

• False Facts consist of incorrect, exaggerated, or de-contextualized facts.
• Flawed Argumentation is rooted in hidden assumptions, guilt by association, and appeal to fear.
• Divisive Language creates and/or encourages an “us vs. them” mentality. Hard times often incite blaming “others” as the source of trouble. Catholics, Jews, and African Americans have been routinely targets as scapegoats for those wishing to further their own agendas.
• Dehumanizing Metaphors evoke messages relating to warfare, heroism, disease, and biblical characters.

Of course, what are “false facts” is often a matter of opinion. And so is the proper “context.” The last thing governent should do is decide that “facts” are allowed to be broadcast.

And of course, “divisive language” aimed at conservative Christians, or white males, or the military, or insurance companies is apparently fine.

The statement makes it entirely clear that it’s only “vulnerable groups” that get protection.

The statement is addressed to the Federal Communications Commission.

The National Telecommunications and Information Administration released a report in 1993 on The Role of Telecommunications in Hate Crimes. Members of the So We Might See Coalition are encouraging them to update this report.

The National Hispanic Media Coalition has filed a Petition for Inquiry in the Matter of Hate Speech in the Media at the Federal Communications Commission. Members of the So We Might See Coalition support this petition.

Then we get a really Orwellian formulation:

The First Amendment does protect even the most vile speech. The government, however, can play a role in compiling statistics and adopting rules that will help members of the public form their own opinions and hold broadcasters and other media outlets accountable for purveying this speech.

So, they are against censorship but in favor of “holding accountable” broadcast outlets that allow “hate speech.”

This is what happens when a Christian denomination gets taken over by a secular clerical elite. While people in the pews drift away, they engage in a series of moralistic crusades.

Further news on an issue we have blogged on before.

From The Times:

AN 80-year-old grandmother who doctors identified as terminally ill and left to starve to death has recovered after her outraged daughter intervened.

Hazel Fenton, from East Sussex, is alive nine months after medics ruled she had only days to live, withdrew her antibiotics and denied her artificial feeding. The former school matron had been placed on a controversial care plan intended to ease the last days of dying patients.

Doctors say Fenton is an example of patients who have been condemned to death on the Liverpool care pathway plan. They argue that while it is suitable for patients who do have only days to live, it is being used more widely in the NHS, denying treatment to elderly patients who are not dying.

Fenton’s daughter, Christine Ball, who had been looking after her mother before she was admitted to the Conquest hospital in Hastings, East Sussex, on January 11, says she had to fight hospital staff for weeks before her mother was taken off the plan and given artificial feeding.

Ball, 42, from Robertsbridge, East Sussex, said: “My mother was going to be left to starve and dehydrate to death. It really is a subterfuge for legalised euthanasia of the elderly on the NHS. ”

Fenton was admitted to hospital suffering from pneumonia. Although Ball acknowledged that her mother was very ill she was astonished when a junior doctor told her she was going to be placed on the plan to “make her more comfortable” in her last days.

Ball insisted that her mother was not dying but her objections were ignored. A nurse even approached her to say: “What do you want done with your mother’s body?”

On January 19, Fenton’s 80th birthday, Ball says her mother was feeling better and chatting to her family, but it took another four days to persuade doctors to give her artificial feeding.

Fenton is now being looked after in a nursing home five minutes from where her daughter lives.

Peter Hargreaves, a consultant in palliative medicine, is concerned that other patients who could recover are left to die. He said: “As they are spreading out across the country, the training is getting probably more and more diluted.”

A spokesman for East Sussex Hospitals NHS Trust, said: “Patients’ needs are assessed before they are placed on the [plan]. Daily reviews are undertaken by clinicians whenever possible.”

Well that’s reassuring. Just how often is it “possible” in a system starved for resources.

In a separate case, the family of an 87-year-old woman say the plan is being used as a way of giving minimum care to dying patients.

Susan Budden, whose mother, Iris Griffin, from Norwich, died in a nursing home in July 2008 from a brain tumour, said: “When she was started on the [plan] her medication was withdrawn. As a result she became agitated and distressed.

“It would appear that the [plan] is . . . used purely as a protocol which can be ticked off to justify the management of a patient.”

Deborah Murphy, the national lead nurse for the care pathway, said: “If the education and training is not in place, the [plan] should not be used.” She said 3% of patients placed on the plan recovered.

Of course, even 3% is a large number of people who are literally being starved and dehydrated to death.

But nobody knows how many would have recovered had they never been placed on the plan to begin with.

Even if “the education and training” is in place, no assessments from even well-trained people can be perfect, and the inevitable effect will be to kill patients who could recover and live a year or two or five years of meaningful life.

And, under any system of socialized medicine, budgetary constraints will bias the assessments toward the option that releases scarce resources for other uses, that is, which lets people die.

The phrase “death panels” just can’t be avoided here.