Marriage is not a right . . .hear! hear!

Contrary to what we hear incessantly, marriage is not a right; it is an
estate, a condition. There are conditions of life that have nothing to do with
rights. One doesn’t have a right to go through puberty. One either does or
doesn’t. What is the condition of being married, and what makes it possible to
attain it? Franz Rosenzweig’s anthropology—in which religion is a response to
man’s sentience of death, and the sentience of death is not only an individual
but also an communal characteristic—may help answer that question. Humankind
fights mortality in two ways. The first is to raise children who will remember
us, and the second is to seek eternal life through divine grace. The estate of
marriage involves both.

snip

It is not the nature of some of the other mammals to breed in captivity; it is not the nature of homo sapiens to breed in the absence of the hope of eternal life. The first principle of Augustine’s anthropology, that we are made for God and restless until we come to him, coheres well with what we observe in societies that abandon God. Our restlessness in that terminal case can reach levels that tear us to pieces. It is entirely possible to devise other means of perpetuating the species than marriage, for example, the collective raising of children as in Plato’s dystopia and the various attempts to realize some of its features. But none of them has taken, not even for short periods of time. They have no interest for human beings. It is not only that people want to raise their own children, rather than the state’s children: Without the expectation of eternal life within a faith community, mating couples do not evince interest in reproducing at replacement levels. An often-cited exception to this rule seems to be Sweden, where only sixty percent of women will marry at current rates (compared to eighty-five percent in the United States), and fifty-six percent of births occur outside of marriage, compared to thirty-five percent in the United states. Twenty-eight percent of all Swedish couples cohabit without marrying, compared to eight percent in the United States. Swedish fertility, to be sure, is an unsustainable 1.6, so the problem will liquidate itself over time.
Marriage as an institution that fulfills our nature: It is a holy estate that permits the mating pair of humans to embed their reproductive activity in the eschatological hope of their faith community.

Mike Huckabee and John Stewart on abortion

Stewart pressed Huckabee: "Do you think that on the side of choice, that
they don't believe that every human life has value?"

"I don't think
there's anybody that wakes up and says, 'I really think abortion is a wonderful,
wonderful thing," Huckabee replied. "I don't truly believe that even people who
would consider themselves 'pro-choice' like abortion - I think that they haven't
thought through the implications and the logical conclusion."

Noting
that 93% of abortions in America are elective rather than health-based, Huckabee
pointed out the consequences of training future generations "that it is OK to
take a human life because that life represents to us an interference, or an
interruption to our lives either economically or socially."

"What
happens when our children one day look at us and we're old?" he asked. "I do not
want to give my kids the opportunity to say, 'Dad, you are an interference.
Coming to see you in the nursing home is really messing up my social life. You
are very expensive, Dad.'"

Stewart, who questioned the comparison,
softened his objection by admitting his affection for his own children before
birth.

"Look, I have kids, and I think it is very difficult when you
look at an ultrasound of your child and you see a heartbeat - you are filled
with that wonder and love and all those things," he said. "I don't just feel
personally that is a decision I can make for another person."

Huckabee
also pursued the question of equal rights in a parallel to slavery, asking:
"Does a person have a right to own another person? ... Can the mother totally
own the child?"

"I just think our culture ought to do everything it can
to support and encourage her to make a life decision and to be honest with her
and to explain to her: this is a heartbeat, this is a child," he said.

Flying the friendly skies of United when your luggage goes AWOL

I flew to Phoenix, Arizona yesterday.

The problem is my luggage went to Denver, Colorado. So I am sweltering in the Phoenix 'burbs without a change of clothes other than a pair of my son's old gym shorts and a t-shirt. I jumped in his pool this morning, wearing the clothes I wore on the plane.

I am not amused. Especially since for the first time in my life I had to PAY for bringing the suitcase on the plane. So, what do I get for the $11 CDN per suitcase? This, folks, was the one suitcase each that most airlines (still? used to?) allowed you to bring aboard for free.

That $11 per is the price if you don't have the savvy to pay online in advance. At the airport, they ding you for $15 a bag. And what a glum bunch of people at the United counter at the Ottawa airport. They should be happy those stupid kiosks you have to use to get your boarding pass from (unless you got yours online first) haven't put them out of a job. No they were slow, sullen, not giving a poutine curd that the line was extending to Quebec. I estimated they spent about 15 minutes with each customer. Not because they were giving extra special attention, but because they were not going to let anything rush them. I recalled what my mom and aunt told me about their trips to the Soviet Union and how "great" customer service was when you had to get in line for a coupon to buy an onion, then get in line for the onion, then get in line to pay for it. It might take two hours to get a simple staple that one could never predict could be found on the usually empty store shelves. When my great aunts came to the United States in the 1970s, they wept when they saw an American supermarket. They could not believe the aisles of fresh produce and other goods. Are we trending in the wrong direction?

We had a short time between flights when we arrived at Dulles yesterday from Ottawa, so I can understand that maybe there was a bit of a problem loading the bag onto the Phoenix flight. The lady at the airport in the missing baggage area said the bag had gone to Denver.

DENVER?

Why Denver? Because there is only one flight a day from Dulles, but lots from Denver. Okay. I could deal with that if my bag arrived this morning. But no.

So I called several times today and the bag was still sitting in Denver, despite the fact that four flights had left already for Phoenix. They have one of these automated voices that tells you to spell out the missing baggage code that is a combination of letters and numbers. It makes you try three times until it passes you on to an attendant, by which time you are either ready to shoot yourself or shoot someone. And pressing zero does not work, so you can't short-circuit your frustration.

Why don't they have a code that you can punch in with your phone keypad? Maybe my accent is too Canadian or something, eh? EH? I feel sorry for the many travelers who have very strong accents trying to deal with crappy voice recognition software probably set in some third world country by an exploited engineer who doesn't speak English himself as a first language.

The people who have answered the phone have all been polite and as helpful as they could be, but all they have are their little bar code tracking thingies and it doesn't sound like there's a lot they can do. And the website they have? Hopeless. According to that my luggage has not even been located.

Flying used to be kind of fun, but increasingly it is becoming a nightmare. The airline that starts to get customer service instead of dinging you right and left for a bit of luggage here and leg room there is going to turn a smart profit.

The last time I called they said the luggage had arrived in Phoenix and was with the delivery service. They say it will be here by 9 p.m. tonight.

I do not think they have any idea of what an inconvenience it is to be luggageless. You know, if that $11 paid for a crackerjack system of locating and expediting my suitcase to me then maybe
I would not mind so much.

But I feel dinged for inferior service. So I am not amused. Anyone else have an airline nightmare they want to share?

Use the comments section.

UPDATE:

The luggage just arrived. 9:57 p.m. (which is almost midnight Ottawa time).

And everything seems to still be intact. So, United is spared the irate phone calls I had started rehearsing for tomorrow.

Stories that are a joy to write

My work places me in a privileged position to be able to write stories like this. Being around such ministries blesses me so much and I hope you will find reading this as encouraging as I found writing it. From this week's Western Catholic Reporter:

OTTAWA - NET Ministries Canada
founder James Mikulasik calls himself a "logger of men," instead of "a fisher of
men" because of his 12 years in the logging industry in his native British
Columbia.
That's why NET alumni gave him an axe with their signatures on the
handle June 7, as the ministry marked its 15th anniversary in Canada with a
weekend of celebrations and worship in Ottawa.
"I am logging men for
Christ," Mikulasik told the 100 alumni from across Canada who attended.
"It's so beautiful to see the youth evangelizing youth," Mikulasik said,
noting how that evangelization spread to families, from priest to priest, to
evangelizing one's fellow workers in the workplace.
"This is the new
evangelization the popes lately have been talking about," he said. He praised
their "ministry of hope" that gives people "hope in the Lord Jesus Christ."
Mikulasik, 46, and Tiffany Scott, 37, originally from Anola, Man., were the
first NET Ministries team to minister in Canada 15 years ago.
Since then,
400 people have participated as members of the National Evangelization Teams
(NET) in Canada and have touched thousands of lives across the country through
parish and school ministry.
Scott, who is now finishing up a doctorate in
clinical psychology, said she learned how a ministry reaching many lives could
grow from something very small, from simple beginnings.
"When the two of us
just started, we didn't know if this was what God wanted," she said. "Looking
back now, it was really blessed by God and inspired by the Holy Spirit."
Ottawa Archbishop Emeritus Marcel Gervais, who served as NET's president
from 1994 to 2007, recalled how he first met Mikulasik.
"I don't know this
man. I have never seen him before," Gervais said. "He comes to the archbishop of
Ottawa and says, more or less, I want to change the world."

Short hiatus

Hello all,

I'm going to take a short hiatus from blogging. So check out Free Canuckistan for the latest on the fight for freedom of expression. The Binksmeister has links to all the important blogs.

I may check in from time to time, but I hope to get a bit of a spiritual rest from anything but the Good News.

See you soon.

Oswald Chambers on the fact of sin

Many years ago a friend gave me a copy of Oswald Chamber's My Utmost for His Highest.

I often found these devotionals uncanny in how they, as the Quakers say, speak to my condition or give me a profound spiritual insight.

Today's devotional goes like this:

June 24th.
	RECONCILING ONE'S SELF TO THE FACT OF SIN
This is your hour, and the power of darkness." Luke 22:53 It is not being reconciled to the fact of sin that produces all the disasters in life. You may talk about the nobility of human nature, but there is something in human nature which will laugh in the face of every ideal you have. If you refuse to agree with the fact that there is vice and self-seeking, something downright spiteful and wrong in human beings, instead of reconciling yourself to it, when it strikes your life, you will compromise with it and say it is of no use to battle against it. Have you made allowance for this hour and the power of darkness, or do you take a recognition of yourself that misses out sin? In your bodily relationships and friendships do you reconcile yourself to the fact of sin? If not, you will be caught round the next corner and you will compromise with it. If you reconcile yourself to the fact of sin, you will realize the danger at once - Yes, I see what that would mean. The recognition of sin does not destroy the basis of friendship; it establishes a mutual regard for the fact that the basis of life is tragic. Always beware of an estimate of life which does not recognize the fact that there is sin. Jesus Christ never trusted human nature, yet He was never cynical, never suspicious, because He trusted absolutely in what He could do for human nature. The pure man or woman, not the innocent, is the safeguarded man or woman. You are never safe with an innocent man or woman. Men and women have no business to be innocent; God demands that they be pure and virtuous. Innocence is the characteristic of a child; it is a blameworthy thing for a man or woman not to be reconciled to the fact of sin.

The Nativity of John the Baptist

Here is the Liturgy of the Word from our Mass today in the Anglican Catholic cathedral in Ottawa, June 24. May you find these words edifying and soul-stirring.

THE COLLECT.

ALMIGHTY God, by whose providence thy servant John Baptist was wonderfully born, and sent to prepare the way of thy Son our Saviour, by preaching of repentance: Make us so to follow his doctrine and holy life, that we may truly repent according to his preaching, and after his example constantly speak the truth, boldly rebuke vice, and patiently suffer for the truth's sake; through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.

With the following, for CANADA, if desired.

O GOD, who didst lead the fathers of our nation into this land of Canada, and hast increased us by thy favour: Grant, we beseech thee, that we who now enter into their inheritance, may prove ourselves a people mindful of thy mercies and ready to do thy will; through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.

THE LESSON. Isaiah 40. 1.

COMFORT ye, comfort ye my people, saith your God. Speak ye comfortably to Jerusalem, and cry unto her, that her warfare is accomplished, that her iniquity is pardoned; for she hath received of the LORD'S hand double for all her sins. The voice of him that crieth in the wilderness, Prepare ye the way of the LORD, make straight in the desert a high-way for our God. Every valley shall be exalted, and every mountain and hill shall be made low, and the crooked shall be made straight, and the rough places plain. And the glory of the LORD shall be revealed, and it all flesh shall see it together: for the mouth of the LORD hath spoken it. The voice said, Cry. And he said, What shall I cry? All flesh is grass, and all the goodliness thereof is as the flower of the field. The grass withereth, the flower fadeth, because the Spirit of the LORD bloweth upon it: surely the people is grass. The grass withereth, the flower fadeth; but the word of our God shall stand for ever. O Zion, that bringest good tidings, get thee up into the high mountain: O Jerusalem, that bringest good tidings, lift up thy voice with strength; lift it up, be not afraid: say unto the cities of Judah, Behold your God. Behold, the Lord GOD will come with strong hand, and his arm shall rule for him: behold, his reward is with him, and his work before him. He shall feed his flock like a shepherd; he shall gather the lambs with his arm, and carry them in his bosom, and shall gently lead those that are with young.

THE GOSPEL. St Luke 1. 57.

ELIZABETH'S full time came that she should be delivered; and she brought forth a son. And her neighbours and her cousins heard how the Lord had showed great mercy upon her; and they rejoiced with her. And it came to pass, that on the eighth day they came to circumcise the child; and they called him Zacharias, after the name of his father. And his mother answered and said, Not so; but he shall be called John. And they said unto her, There is none of thy kindred that is called by this name. And they made signs to his father, how he would have him called. And he asked for a writing-table, and wrote, saying, His name is John. And they marvelled all. And his mouth was opened immediately, and his tongue loosed, and he spake, and praised God. And fear came on all that dwelt round about them; and all these sayings were noised abroad throughout all the hill-country of Judaea. And all they that had heard them laid them up in their hearts, saying, What manner of child shall this be? And the hand of the Lord was with him. And his father Zacharias was filled with the Holy Spirit, and prophesied, saying,

Blessed be the Lord God of Israel:
For he hath visited and redeemed his people,
And hath raised up an horn of salvation for us
In the house of his servant David;
As he spake by the mouth of his holy prophets,
Which have been since the world began;
That we should be saved from our enemies,
And from the hand of all that hate us;
To perform the mercy promised to our fathers,
And to remember his holy covenant;
The oath which he sware to our father Abraham,
That he would grant unto us, that we, being delivered out of the hands of our enemies,
Might serve him without fear,
In holiness and righteousness before him all the days of our life.
And thou, child, shalt be called the Prophet of the Highest:
For thou shalt go before the face of the Lord to prepare his ways;
To give knowledge of salvation unto his people,
By the remission of their sins,
Through the tender mercy of our God,
Whereby the day-spring from on high hath visited us;
To give light to them that sit in darkness and in the shadow of death;
To guide our feet into the way of peace.

And the child grew, and waxed strong in spirit; and was in the deserts till the day of his showing unto Israel.

Doesn't that verse from Isaiah make your heart sing?

The Roman Catholic Archbishop Terrence Prendergast has this to say in his homily at Notre Dame Cathedral today:

John's prophetic call to serve both Israel and the nations lay hidden within the designs of God. It was issued before his birth, as he was being carried in the womb of Elizabeth: "The Lord called me before I was born; while I was in my mother's womb He named me".

The majority of Israelite names, like ancient Semitic names in general, had readily understandable meanings. Parents consciously chose such names, which could be translated into sentences, to describe the identity of, or aspirations they had for, their child. The name "Zechariah" means, "The Lord remembers", while "John" means "God has been gracious".

John's name was assigned him by the angel Gabriel when Zechariah was told that his wife would conceive and bear a son in her old age. Though Zechariah had been rendered mute for his momentary unbelief, Elizabeth in a wondrous manner had arrived at the divinely appointed name. She insisted on naming her son John.

John's birth is mentioned only cursorily so that attention may be given to the drama of his naming and the end of Zechariah's speechlessness. When Zechariah wrote "His name is John", people were amazed, Zechariah's tongue was loosed and he began praising God, uttering the Benedictus (Luke 1:68-79), which the Church prays at Lauds every morning.
In the passage from Acts, Paul described the closing of John's preaching career as a selfless one, his humility leading him to speak thus about Jesus: "'What do you suppose that I am? I am not He. No, but one is coming after me; I am not worthy to untie the thong of the sandals on His feet'".

Just as at the time of the winter solstice—December 25—when the course of the sun begins to rise in the northern hemisphere, the Church celebrates the birth of Christ, the shining sun born from on high and the true light of the world, so, at the summer solstice—June 24—when the course of the sun begins to decline, the Christian community recalls the birth of John the Baptist, who, though not himself the light, bore witness to the light (cf. John 1:6-9).

John himself testified, "He must increase, but I must decrease" (John 3:30), a saying that the Church's liturgy has applied to the location of these feasts in the solar calendar.

There's more. Go on over to the archbishop's blog to read the rest.

I am going to buy this CD, I promise

Third Day does it with this song:



Wouldn't you like to feel born again?

Remember what it felt like to be born again?

Would you like to be born again?

Some after-birthday thoughts . . .here's one for you Jennifer

I went to mass the morning of my birthday, June 19, where we celebrated the Sacred Heart of Jesus. I arrived early and had some time to recollect and I remembered the Psalm I chose as "my psalm" years ago because it so expressed my debt to Jesus Christ.
It goes like this:

Psalm 116

I love the Lord, because he hath heard my voice and my supplications.

²Because he hath inclined his ear unto me, therefore will I call upon him as long as I live.

³The sorrows of death compassed me, and the pains of hell gat hold upon me: I found trouble and sorrow.

⁴Then called I upon the name of the Lord; O Lord, I beseech thee, deliver my soul.

⁵Gracious is the Lord, and righteous; yea, our God is merciful.

⁶The Lord preserveth the simple: I was brought low, and he helped me.

⁷Return unto thy rest, O my soul; for the Lord hath dealt bountifully with thee.

⁸For thou hast delivered my soul from death, mine eyes from tears, and my feet from falling.

⁹I will walk before the Lord in the land of the living.

¹⁰I believed, therefore have I spoken: I was greatly afflicted:

¹¹I said in my haste, All men are liars.

¹²What shall I render unto the Lord for all his benefits toward me?

¹³I will take the cup of salvation, and call upon the name of the Lord.

¹⁴I will pay my vows unto the Lord now in the presence of all his people.

¹⁵Precious in the sight of the Lord is the death of his saints.

¹⁶O Lord, truly I am thy servant; I am thy servant, and the son of thine handmaid: thou hast loosed my bonds.

¹⁷I will offer to thee the sacrifice of thanksgiving, and will call upon the name of the Lord.

¹⁸I will pay my vows unto the Lord now in the presence of all his people,

¹⁹In the courts of the Lord’S house, in the midst of thee, O Jerusalem. Praise ye the Lord.

So before the Blessed Sacrament, all I could do is weep because I am so thankful and because I deserve none of the grace and love that He continually pours down on me.

Around three that afternoon, a dear friend sent me a Catholic electronic greeting card featuring the Sacred Heart and it quoted this from Catholic and Loving It.

Sacred Heart of Jesus

The central truth of the heart of Jesus is that God loves us with a human heart and a human love.

—Catholic and Loving It

Think about that for a moment. God's love is not some kind of impersonal force. Our names are carved in the palm of His hand. To Him, we are each individual, unique, special, and loved beyond our comprehension---yet still loved in a way that we can recognize as divinely human.

One of the readings at mass that day was this:

THE EPISTLE. Ephesians 3. 14.

FOR this cause I bow my knees unto the Father, from whom the whole family in heaven and earth is named, that he would grant you, according to the riches of his glory, to be strengthened with might by his Spirit in the inner man; that Christ may dwell in your hearts by faith; that ye, being rooted and grounded in love, may be able to comprehend with all saints, what is the breadth, and length, and depth, and height; and to know the love of Christ which passeth knowledge, that ye may be filled with all the fulness of God. Now unto him that is able to do exceeding abundantly above all that we ask or think, according to the power that worketh in us, unto him be glory in the Church and in Christ Jesus, throughout all ages, world without end. Amen.

That is a beautiful passage to pray, inserting the name of whomever you wish to pray for at the "you" and the "ye" portions. And I pray this for my readers today. Even you, Jennifer Lynch, I pray this for you, too. You can put that in your file, okay? I genuinely wish you well. I pray you will have the wisdom, the strength and the courage to do the right thing.

I pray for another Great Awakening of the Christian faith in North America. I pray this for Canada. I pray this for America, my two homelands. Imagine how much we would not need human rights commissions to monitor our respect for others if a critical mass abided in Christ and were filled with His love. Then how would we treat the stranger in our midst, the prisoner, the unborn child, the frail elderly, the disabled, the person of another race or religion?

Remember, God's love is not a mushy, spoiling and corrupting love that let's you get away with anything. He is a Father and He can be stern and correcting. I used to lament that I never had anything that I wanted---the boyfriend I wanted at the time, the job I wanted so desperately---whatever, and while other people were allowed things, I seemed to have a strange hedge about me. Unless I was putting God first, nothing in my life worked out. Did I ever suffer! I would look around with quasi-envy at how everyone else seemed to be getting their way, but not me. I'd head off in my headstrong, rebellious direction and boom! I would experience God's chastisement. Yet at the same time, He protected me in circumstances that might have killed me.

Do you realize what kind of love it takes to risk correcting someone?

I think of the Father as so much wanting us to love Him back and yet even in the Church we walk around a lot of the time with stony faces and cold hearts, nursing this and that little grievance against someone, perhaps shaking our inner fist at the sky.

The Binks has this interesting Father's Day meditation:

We’re in the midst of endless hateful social engineering seeking to undercut and replace fathers in general and male in particular.

In the end, it’s all about fighting with THE Father. God the Father, maker of heaven and earth. His rule, his will, his Kingdom, his love and purpose. After all, these days we’re told that all human family and roles are social constructions, amenable to engineering and fiddling according to the powers of the experts. But what it– just if– it’s the other way around, and our earthly institutions are the reflections of a transcendent order which we express in our moral and social ordering.

That’s certainly the Judeo-Christian model– as St. Paul says in Ephesians 3:15, “For this cause I bow my knees unto the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, Of whom the whole family in heaven and earth is named”– it’s a right-side up thing.

To those who will then bring up abusive, negligent, or deadbeat dads, that’s the dark side– the absence of a great and necessary good, for which Our Heavenly Father is also the answer, since he is faithfulness, love, and wills all good for his children. Earthly fatherhood is– and should be– an image of The Father.

Yeah, this is pretty funny

New JibJab 'Obama' video (pretty funny)

H/t FFoF

Big Sister is watching you!

Jennifer Lynch has a file! Joseph Brean reports in the National Post:

"Please, please, look. We have experienced 16 months of invective hurled at us, and at any time when anybody has tried to speak up and correct misinformation, gross distortions, caricaturizations, then the very next day there's been some full-frontal assault through the blogs, through mainstream media. I have a file. I'm sure I have 1,200, certainly several hundred of these things," she said.

He gives her plenty of time to hurl her accusations. Then he adds:

While rebutting what she calls outright lies, the report makes barely any reference to the more sober criticisms of her hate speech mandate from mainstream critics, such as the Canadian Civil Liberites Association and Jewish advocacy groups, and also almost every newspaper editorial board in Canada. These include the lack of a legal defense of truth or scholarly or journalistic intent; the practice of accepting identical complaints simultaneously in different jurisdictions; controversial online investigative procedures such as joining white supremacist discussion groups to investigate targets; and the potential for human rights tribunals to be hijacked as political platforms.

He adds some interesting points by Richard Moon. Read the whole thing.

I'm sorry, folks. I was going to resist making fun of Jennifer Lynch because I am not crazy about personalizing this debate. There really are substantive problems with HRCs that existed long before she arrived. She just makes herself such an irresistible target of mirth.

Admitting that you Google yourself on a regular basis is, I dunno, not cool.

It's funny, but she is as guilty of personalizing this debate as any of the victims of HRC abuses. Yet she is strangely unable to step into their shoes. Here she is taking in a $300K ? salary and having to bear criticism on Google that pales in comparison to the abuse that someone like Kathy Shaidle's name might dig up if she bothered to check her name out, but she has no conception of how unjust it is to be prosecuted in three separate jurisdictions for the same complaint. For her, the dismissals are evidence the system works, not proof the process is the punishment. And narry a mention of Barbara Hall's drive by verdict.

Jennifer insisted to John Oakley the other day that he not use prosecutorial language to describe the CHRC, since they are a "remedial" institution. Yeah, and the remedies they mete out---make some criminal prosecutions and punishments look like a walk in the park. Life time speech bans, computers seized, remedy-payments for hurt feelings to third parties who complained on behalf of victims groups to which they do not belong.

People like me and the people I quote in the news stories I write, or the debates I used to book when I was a TV producer at the CBC did deal with the substantive issues.

I've been on this for years. But it's taken the satire, the ridicule, the occasional hyperbole for effect (that anyone with any literary training and an ear for popular culture and a sense of humor understands as hyperbole, satire, etc.) to catapult this issue to the public square.

Jennifer, instead of trying to demonize your opponents, how about showing some leadership and answering some of the substantive complaints about your CHRC? Your report does not address them. Be a big girl and ignore the baiting. Instead of making blanket accusations about "misinformation, gross distortions, caricaturizations" be specific. But please, make allowances for such things as humor, sarcasm and fair comment. Where the facts are wrong, tell us. Otherwise you are sounding pretty scary.

Victor Davis Hanson nails it

If anyone is wondering why Obama has taken so long to say anything about the Iran crisis, Victor Davis Hanson has the best explanation I have seen. Here's an excerpt. Please read it all and support National Review Online.

Of all the puzzling reasons one can adduce both for Barack Obama recent serial apologies abroad, and now his strange silence about human rights abuses from Venezuela to Iran, I think one of the most likely is his Manichean notion of world affairs—one also reflected in most of the curricula of our major universities.

The binary oppressor/victim narrative goes something like this: the United States for the last half-century—through its embrace of neocolonialism and imperialism, and then again through its birthing of globalized capitalism—is at fault for most of the mess outside the West.

We as the bad guys impose, dictate, exploit, ignore, and manipulate the more noble Other to such a degree that he is forced to lash out in understandable, though often dangerous ways.

This is a sort of all-inclusive worldview that in postmodern fashion pits those with “power” against those without it. And in such a simplistic bipolar world, only a few gifted Western elite intellectuals, of superior intelligence, empathy, and insight, can reach across the divide, understand the Other, and find common ground, by accommodating the West to alternate paradigms of politics, culture, and economic and social life—different of course, albeit not intrinsically in any sense inferior.