The meaning of the name he chose should not be underestimated. Cardinal Bergoglio is a Jesuit and the Jesuits were founded by St. Ignatius Loyola, who said he wanted to be like St. Francis of Assisi.
One of the most famous moments in St. Francis’s life is the day he was passing by the church of St. Damiano. It was old and near collapse. From St. Bonaventure’s “Life of Francis of Assisi”: “Inspired by the Spirit, he went inside to pray. Kneeling before an image of the Crucified, he was filled with great fervor and consolation. . . . While his tear-filled eyes were gazing at the Lord’s cross, he heard with his bodily ears a voice coming from the cross, telling him three times: ‘Francis, go and repair my house which, as you see, is falling into ruin.'” Francis was amazed “at the sound of this astonishing voice, since he was alone in the church.” He set himself to obeying the command.
Author Archives: Zach Cochran
Sources: Olbermann’s inability to get a job cited in Current TV settlement – POLITICO.com
Maybe it doesn’t pay to be a jerk to everyone who’s ever given you a chance.
“One of the cards his people played was hardship,” the source, who spoke on the condition of anonymity, told POLITICO. “He spent last fall talking to all the major networks, and he couldn’t get a job. The idea was, this could be the last money he ever earned.”
The source said Olbermann’s lawyers used this as “a bargaining chip” to “appeal to the sympathy” of Current TV executives, but said it was unclear if that factored into Current TV’s decision to agree to a settlement.
Olbermann did not respond to a request for comment regarding the discussion; his manager Michael Price declined to comment, citing confidentiality. Current TV spokesperson Tony Fox also declined to comment, citing confidentiality.
POLITICO has confirmed that Olbermann approached numerous cable and broadcast news channels, including ABC News, in pursuit of a job while still on contract with Current TV. Olbermann has also approached non-news networks, including ESPN and AMC, the channel that broadcasts “Mad Men” and “Breaking Bad,” sources told POLITICO.
But when representatives from Current TV complained in mediation that Olbermann had violated his contract by pursuing other employment opportuntities, Olbermann’s representatives responded by pointing out that nothing had come of those talks, according to the sources.
“No one would hire him, and that became a negotiating ploy,” a source told POLITICO.
via Sources: Olbermann’s inability to get a job cited in Current TV settlement – POLITICO.com.
Angry McCain ups ante, calls Paul, Cruz ‘wacko birds’ | WashingtonExaminer.com
It’s not really very “maverick” to go along with everyone else, John. Also, please watch out for power lines when flying low.
Elder Sen. John McCain, who this week engaged in friendly fire when he launched his “maverick” missiles at fellow Republicans seeking clarification on the administration’s drone policies, has upped the ante, deriding Tea Party-backed GOP lawmakers as “wacko birds.”
McCain, who hit the Senate floor Thursday to belittle Sen. Rand Paul’s filibuster, which succeeded in getting an answer from President Obama that drones won’t be used to kill Americans on U.S. soil, even suggested that the Kentucky senator and his allies, like Texas Sen. Ted Cruz and Michigan Rep. Justin Amash, don’t represent the GOP mainstream.
“It’s always the wacko birds on right and left that get the media megaphone,” McCain told Huffington Post’s Jon Ward in a story titled “John McCain: Getting Back To Maverick, With An Eye On Retirement.”
via Angry McCain ups ante, calls Paul, Cruz ‘wacko birds’ | WashingtonExaminer.com.
Newt Gingrich Schools Piers Morgan on Catholic Church ‘Reform’ | NewsBusters
GINGRICH: I am amazed at how much western elites translate reform into sex. If it doesn’t relate — if it doesn’t relate to sex, it doesn’t count. I think he’s going to challenge all of us in terms of dealing with the poor. I think he’s going to challenge all of us in terms of spirituality. I think he’s going to wrestle more than any Pope has in modern times with a part of your question, which is if Christ loves everybody, and that certainly includes people of different sexual identities, then what is the church’s relationship to everybody? And I don’t know that he’s going to come up, Piers, with what you would think of as enlightenment. But I think he may come up with some answers that are profoundly spiritual and that lead all of us to new dialogue and new conversation, in ways that, frankly, without him as Pope, we might never have imagined.
via Newt Gingrich Schools Piers Morgan on Catholic Church ‘Reform’ | NewsBusters.
Kid saves his mom and sister from sexual assault | khou.com Houston
A boy broke from his binding and grabbed a handgun that sent the suspects fleeing from the Webster home invasion, which started about 4:30 a.m. Wednesday in the 18400 block of Anne Drive.
Webster police arrested Charles Allen Jacobson III, 33, near the home, and Dickinson police arrested James Ellis Barnett, 56, in a traffic stop.
Jacobson was charged with two counts of aggravated sexual assault of a woman and her daughter and with two counts of aggravated kidnapping, according to a Webster police statement issued Thursday afternoon by Chief Ray Smiley.
What Liberals Need to Understand About ‘Gun Guys’ – Hope Reese – The Atlantic
From the Atlantic, a good interview with a liberal who gets guns:
At one point in your trip, you switched from open carry to concealed carry. What was that like?
In some ways I really liked it. It’s physically uncomfortable, it’s heavy and it digs into you, and you have to be very conscious of your clothing to make sure you’re not displaying it, because you really don’t want anyone knowing you’re carrying it. But it kept me vigilant. You really have your shit together when you’re carrying a gun. You never forget you’re wearing it. Maybe cops who’ve been wearing a gun for 30 years forget they’re wearing it, but I certainly never did, and I wore it for about 18 months.
It also made me really calm. When you’re wearing a gun, you do not get upset if someone takes your parking space, or if someone cuts you in line. You have this quite noble sense of being the sheepdog, being the protector. And I liked that.
But then you start wondering — what is my responsibility here? It’s really complicated. Say you’re in a shopping mall and somebody starts shooting. What do you do? If you run away, are you like a doctor who doesn’t respond when someone starts choking in a restaurant? If you’re wearing a gun, do you have an obligation to run towards the sound of the guns?
via What Liberals Need to Understand About ‘Gun Guys’ – Hope Reese – The Atlantic.
Corker: ‘Appalling’ waste and abuse in Iraq reconstruction efforts – The Hill’s Global Affairs
This is troubling especially in light of the oil money that’s been flowing into Iraq.
An “appalling” report on the misuse of U.S. reconstruction funding for Iraq shows the need for a “top-to-bottom” review of the State Department and its aid agency, the top Republican on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee said Wednesday.
“The extent of waste and abuse in the $60 billion of Iraq reconstruction funds coupled with the instability still evident in Iraq is appalling and highlights real failures of planning and execution that must be corrected to make U.S. foreign assistance a more effective tool for advancing the national interests of our country,” Sen. Bob Corker (R-Tenn.) said. “At the same time, this final Iraq reconstruction report also highlights some approaches that worked and could be applied to future reconstruction efforts, especially the billions of dollars in remaining reconstruction funds for Afghanistan.”
via Corker: ‘Appalling’ waste and abuse in Iraq reconstruction efforts – The Hill’s Global Affairs.
UN: Colo., Wash. legal pot violates drug treaties | Nation & World | The Seattle Times
This might not be the best hill to die on, but up yours, UN. And get lost, DC. This is the State of Washington, and we can manage our own affairs.
A United Nations-based drug agency urged the United States government on Tuesday to challenge the legalization of marijuana for recreational use in Colorado and Washington, saying the state laws violate international drug treaties.
The International Narcotics Control Board made its appeal in an annual drug report. It called on Washington, D.C., to act to “ensure full compliance with the international drug control treaties on its entire territory.”
U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder said last week that he was in the last stages of reviewing the Colorado and Washington state laws. Holder said he was examining policy options and international implications of the issue. Marijuana is illegal under federal law.
The federal government could sue the states over legalization or decide not to mount a court challenge. Washington and Colorado became the first states to pass laws legalizing the recreational use of marijuana in last fall’s elections.
via UN: Colo., Wash. legal pot violates drug treaties | Nation & World | The Seattle Times.
Surrogate offered $10,000 to abort baby – CNN.com
This is the society we live in. I know babies are expensive, especially sick babies. But this young woman did the right thing. As the surrogate mother (a Ms. Kelley) said, the baby deserved a chance.
In a letter to Kelley’s midwife, Dr. Elisa Gianferrari, a maternal fetal medicine specialist at Hartford Hospital, and Leslie Ciarleglio, a genetic counselor, described what happened next.
“Given the ultrasound findings, (the parents) feel that the interventions required to manage (the baby’s medical problems) are overwhelming for an infant, and that it is a more humane option to consider pregnancy termination,” they wrote.
Kelley disagreed.
“Ms. Kelley feels that all efforts should be made to ‘give the baby a chance’ and seems adamantly opposed to termination,” they wrote.
The letter describes how the parents tried to convince Kelley to change her mind. Their three children were born prematurely, and two of them had to spend months in the hospital and still had medical problems. They wanted something better for this child.
“The (parents) feel strongly that they pursued surrogacy in order to minimize the risk of pain and suffering for their baby,” Gianferrari and Ciarleglio wrote. They “explained their feelings in detail to Ms. Kelley in hopes of coming to an agreement.”
“I told them that they had chosen me to carry and protect this child, and that was exactly what I was going to do,” Kelley said. “I told them it wasn’t their decision to play God.”
Now things get really horrible. The attorneys get involved:
“You are obligated to terminate this pregnancy immediately,” wrote Douglas Fishman, an attorney in West Hartford, Connecticut. “You have squandered precious time.”
On March 5, Kelley would be 24 weeks pregnant, and after that, she couldn’t legally abort the pregnancy, he said.
“TIME IS OF THE ESSENCE,” he wrote.
Fishman reminded Kelley that she’d signed a contract, agreeing to “abortion in case of severe fetus abnormality.” The contract did not define what constituted such an abnormality.
Kelley was in breach of contract, he wrote, and if she did not abort, the parents would sue her to get back the fees they’d already paid her — around $8,000 — plus all of the medical expenses and legal fees.
Next? The parents threaten to seize custody of the child, only to abandon her to be a ward of the State of Connecticut, rather than let the surrogate mother care for her. Ms. Kelley fled to Michigan, where surrogacy is not recognized, and the woman who bears the child gets legal custody. After consideration of her means and the needs of her other children, Ms. Kelley decided to give the child for adoption to a couple who had helped her with her move to Michigan, and who were knowledgeable about children with needs of this sort.
As to the baby’s condition today, her adoptive parents are optimistic.
If Baby S. does survive, there’s a 50% chance she won’t be able to walk, talk or use her hands normally.
In some ways, Baby S. looks different from other 8-month-olds babies. In addition to the facial abnormalities, she’s very small, weighing only 11 pounds and she gets food through a tube directly into her stomach so she’ll grow faster.
Her adoptive parents know some people look at her and see a baby born to suffer — a baby who’s suffering could have been prevented with an abortion.
But that’s not the way they see it. They see a little girl who’s defied the odds, who constantly surprises her doctors with what she’s able to do — make eye contact, giggle at her siblings, grab toys, eye strangers warily.
“S. wakes up every single morning with an infectious smile. She greets her world with a constant sense of enthusiasm,” her mother said in an e-mail to CNN. “Ultimately, we hold onto a faith that in providing S. with love, opportunity, encouragement, she will be the one to show us what is possible for her life and what she is capable of achieving.”
Privatize Airport Security « Commentary Magazine
Rather than use sequestration to trim waste, the Obama administration has viewed the deadline—and the Republican desire to curtail spending—as an assault on big government. If it’s a choice between defending big government and hurting the individual, President Obama appears much more inclined to punish the individual, hoping that a backlash against government-instigated inconvenience will lead Republicans to cave.