Apologia Pro Ann Coulter

(With apologies to Cardinal Newman, author of "Apologia Pro Vita Sua".)

From a post on another thread:

{{___There was a time in my memory when there was a measure of civility and respect in our nation's politics }}

Return with me now to the days of yesteryear when the supporters of one candidate reminded the voters of the rumor that his opponent was secretly supporting an illegitimate child by chanting loudly as they marched in torch-lit parades throughout this favored land:

Ma, Ma. Where's my pa?

Where's my pa, Ma?

Where's my pa?

The opposition fought torch-lit fire with torch-let fire and reminded the voters of the documented lies, fraud and corruption of the other candidate:

Blaine! Blaine! James G. Blaine!

Continental liar from the state of Maine.

"Burn this letter"!

The fraud revealed in the letter was rather normal, but the instruction in the postscript to burn the letter was a new twist that caught the public imagination.

So the man thought to have an illegitimate child was elected President of the United States. And in torch-lit parades throughout this favored land, his victorious supporters shouted the opposition chant with a new twist:

Ma, Ma. Where's my pa?

Gone to the White House!!!

Ha! Ha! Ha!

I am not a student of the subject, but undoubtedly there was a period of pseudo-civility that is now departed. The high hypocrisy of the Victorian age, the rise of literacy, the rise of newspapers and then radio which communicated in a more rational manner than sound bites are obvious suspects.
We do not like to be reminded of our slavery to our inventions. We would rather believe that it is our cultural high (or low) moral purpose that accomplishes either good or evil through our works.

{{___ but if it remains it's very hard to see. Nowadays political debate is marked by denigration, contempt and hatred of the opposition. }}

Theological debates before the Reformation featured vituperation of the opposition. Jerome famously declared that Pelagias had a head full of Scotch pudding. It is a way of making the heart felt nature of one's convictions obvious.

The test in debate is the rationality of the approach to the issues, including the aptness of the insults.

{{___ They do little to enhance the character of this country. }}

But, of course, lack of public disagreement about the doings of government effects the character of a nation in the negative way.

{{___ Indeed, I'm convinced that some see the destruction of the other party more meritorious than the security of the nation. }}

Depends the party being destroyed. The advancement of those who are obviously out to elevate the state above all other forms of authority and moral value is unlikely to make the nation more secure in any sense.

{{___ Ann Coulters style of writing and speaking is heavy on sarcasm and ridicule. }}

Sometimes that is the most effective way to bring the truth to public attention. Gilbert and Sullivan, George Bernard Shaw, etc., attacked the pretensions of the British Empire. The errors of the crypto-Marxist godlessly-religious left are much more serious and dangerous.

{{___ On the other side of the fence Howard Dean is more than her match. }}

Are you serious? This is like comparing the king of the Yahoos with the king of the satirists who invented him. Ann Coulter has similar fun playing with the enthusiastic brainlessness of the great liberalarian herd.

{{___ The end result is that our politics are plan nasty and debate on the issues get lost in the muck. }}

The issues get lost for those who (semi-consciously usually) are afraid to face them. Ann Coulters books are available for those who wish to understand her views.

Has there been anyone on the left who has written a worthwhile book since Marx and Engles?

But, of course, history as well as common sense has proven them wrong, nothing is left except sound bites promoting unreasoning prejudice against America, her President, her armed forces, Israel, …, and Ann Coulter.

Making Up Law Without Restraint

Whatever happened to the doctrine of judicial restraint?

Some are suggesting that the "al Queda Five", the Supreme Court majority, that held Guantanamo detainee military tribunals to unconstitutional, should be hung from the top of the Capitol dome.

This is a bit extreme. It would be hanging them higher that Haman (see Esther 6-7). They are probably not as rotten as Haman.

But it is of note that Justice Clarence Thomas for the first time in his long years of service, read part of his dissent from the bench.

It is clear that, in his view, the majority was without a fig leaf of reasonable support from either law or precedent.

And to many observers a new level of judicial lawlessness has been attained.

The following quotes are transcribed from a pdf file at the Supreme Court site, providing the opinions of the justices in the Military Tribunal case.

Scalia, joined by Thomas and Alito in dissent:

[…] the Detainee Treatment Act […] unambiguously provides that, as of [December 30, 2005], "no court, justice, or judge" shall have jurisdiction to consider the habeas corpus application of a Guantanamo Bay detainee. Notwithstanding this plain directive, the Court today concludes that, on what it calls the statutes most natural reading, every "court, justice, or judge" before whom such a habeas application was pending on December 30 has jurisdiction to hear, consider, and render judgment on it. This conclusion is patently erroneous. And even if it were not, the jurisdiction supposedly retained should, in an exercise of sound equitable discretion, not be exercised.

[…] An ancient and unbroken line of authority attests that statutes ousting jurisdiction unambiguously apply to cases pending at their effective date.

Thomas in dissent, joined by Scalia and partially by Alito:

[…] [The Court's] opinion openly flouts our well-established duty to respect the Executive's judgment in matters of military operations and foreign affairs. The Court's evident belief that it is qualified to pass on the "military necessity" to employ a particular form of fource against our enemies is so antithetical to our constitutional structure that it simply cannot go un answered. I respectfully dissent.

Our review of petitiioner's claims arises in the context of the President's wartime exercise of his commander-in-chief authority in conjunction with the complete support of Congress.

[…] The structural advantages of the Executive Branch---namely, the decisiveness, "'activity, secrecy and dispatch'" that flow from the Executive's "'unity'" […] ---led the Founders to conclude that the "President has primary responsibility--along with the necessary power---to protect the national security and to conduct the Nations's foreign relations."

[…] the President hat the authority to "employ the Nation's Armed Forces in the manner he may deem most effectual to harass and conquer and subdue the enemy"

[…] But "Congress cannot anticipate and legislate with regard to every possible action the President may find it necessary to take or every possible situation in which he might act" and "such a failure of Congress … does not, 'especially … in the areas of foreign policy and national security' imply 'congressional disapproval' of action taken by the Executive."

[…] When the President acts pursuant to an express or implied authorization from Congress," his actions are "'supported by the strongest of presumptions and widest latitude of judicial interpretation, and the burden of persuasion … rests heavily upon any who might attack it.'"
[…] In the present conflict, Congress has authorized the President "to use all necessary and appropriate force against those nations, organizations, or persons he determines planned, authorized, committed, or aided the terrorist attacks that occurred on September 11, 2001 … in order to prevent any future acts of international terrorism against the United States by such nations, organizations or persons."
[…] the "capture, detention, and trial of unlawful combatants, by 'universal agreement and practice' are 'important incidents of war,'" […] and are therefore "an execise of the 'necessary and appropriate force' Congress has authorized the President to use."
[…] In such circumstances, our duty to defer to the Executive's military and foreign policy judgment is at its zenith; it does not countenance the kind of second guessing the Court repeatedly engages in today.

More Junk Science from U.S. Government

From a Town Hall article, Killing the passive smoking debate:

Killing the passive smoking debate [\] By Michael Fumento [/] Jun 29, 2006

“Secondhand smoke debate ‘over.” That’s the message from the Surgeon General’s office, delivered by a sycophantic media. The claim is that the science has now overwhelmingly proved that smoke from others’ cigarettes can kill you. Actually, “debate over” simply means: “If you have your doubts, shut up!”

But you definitely should have doubts over the new Surgeon General’s report, a massive 727-page door stop. Like many massive reports on controversial issues, it’s probably designed that way so nobody (especially reporters on deadline) will want to or have time to read beyond the executive summary. That includes me; if I had that much time I’d reread War and Peace. Twice. But the report admits it contains no new science so we can evaluate it based on research already available.

First consider the 1993 EPA study that began the passive smoking crusade. It declared such smoke a carcinogen based on a combined analysis (meta-analysis) of 11 mostly tiny studies. The media quickly fell into line, with headlines blaring: “Passive Smoking Kills Thousands” and editorials demanding: “Ban Hazardous Smoking; Report Shows It’s a Killer.”

But the EPA’s report had more holes than a spaghetti strainer. Its greatest weakness was the agency’s refusal to use the gold standard in epidemiology, the 95 percent confidence interval. This simply means there are only five chances in 100 that the conclusion came about just by chance, even if the study itself was done correctly.

Curiously, the EPA decided to use a 90 percent level, effectively doubling the likelihood of getting its result by sheer luck of the draw.

Why would it do such a strange thing? You guessed it. Its results weren't significant at the 95 percent level. Essentially, it moved the goal posts back because the football had fallen short. In scientific terminology this is know as “dishonesty.”

Two much larger meta-analyses have appeared since the EPA’s. One was conducted on behalf of the World Health Organization and covered seven countries over seven years. Published in 1998, it actually showed a statistically significant reduced risk for children of smokers, though we can assume that was a fluke. But it also showed no increase for spouses and co-workers of smokers.

The second meta-analysis, published in the British Medical Journal (BMJ) in 2002, likewise found a statistical significance when 48 studies were combined. Looked at separately, though, only seven showed significant excesses of lung cancer. Thus 41 did not.

Meta-analysis, though, suffer from such problems as different studies having been conducted in different ways – the apples and oranges conundrum. What was really needed was one study involving a huge number of participants over a long period of time using the same evaluation.

We got that in the prestigious British Medical Journal in 2003. Research professor James Enstrom of UCLA and professor Geoffrey Kabat of the State University of New York, Stony Brook presented results of a 39-year study of 35,561 Californians, which dwarfed in size everything that came before. It found no “causal relationship between exposure to [passive smoke] and tobacco-related mortality,” adding, however “a small effect” can’t be ruled out.

The reason active tobacco smoking could be such a terrible killer while passive smoke may cause no deaths lies in the dictum "the dose makes the poison." We are constantly bombarded by carcinogens, but in tiny amounts the body usually easily fends them off.

A New England Journal of Medicine study found that even back in 1975 – when having smoke obnoxiously puffed into your face was ubiquitous in restaurants, cocktail lounges, and transportation lounges – the concentration was equal to merely 0.004 cigarettes an hour. That’s not quite the same as smoking two packs a day, is it?

But none of this has the least impact on the various federal, state, and city agencies and organizations like the American Lung Association for a very good reason. They already know they’re scientifically wrong. The purpose of the passive smoking campaign has never been to protect non-smokers, but rather to cow smokers into giving up the habit.

It’s easy to agree with the ultimate goal, but inventing scientific outcomes and shutting down scientific debate as a means is as intolerable as it was when Nazi Germany “proved” the validity of eugenics.

Michael Fumento is a senior fellow at Hudson Institute in Washington, D.C., the author of BioEvolution.

POLL: Describe Ann Coulter. 20 Choices!

Sources of most choices in article below. Vote at Adult Christian Forum Thread 99246. Choices also given after article below.

From a New York Observer article, Ann Coulter Ecstatic:

Ann Coulter Ecstatic: [/] Enemies Stoke Sales- [/] 'They're Like My Pets'

By: George Gurley [/] Date: 7/3/2006 [/] Page: 1

June was a very good month for Ann Coulter. Was it a good one for her millions of enemies and the future of the world? Hard to say. [/] On June 6, the day her fifth book, Godless: The Church of Liberalism, arrived in bookstores, Ms. Coulter appeared on NBC's The Today Show.

[...] Mr. Lauer read Ms. Coulter's words: "These broads are millionaires, lionized on TV and in articles about them, reveling in their status as celebrities and stalked by grief-arazzis. I have never seen people enjoying their husband's death so much." [/] As Ms. Coulter tried to explain "the left's doctrine of liberal infallibility," Mr. Lauer hammered away, until she interjected: "Look, you're getting testy with me!"

[...] By Sunday, June 25, Ms. Coulter's book was No. 1 on the New York Times nonfiction best-seller list. [/] And that was thanks largely to Mr. Lauer's interview, and the ensuing liberal firestorm. Ms. Coulter made the cover of the Daily News, the New York Post and The National Enquirer. Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton-the front-runner for the Democratic 2008 Presidential candidacy-called Ms. Coulter "vicious" and "mean-spirited." (Ms. Coulter fired back: "Before criticizing others for being 'mean' to women, perhaps Hillary should talk to her husband, who was accused of rape by Juanita Broaddrick and was groping Kathleen Willey at the very moment Willey's husband was committing suicide.") Referring to Ms. Coulter's comments about the widows, NBC News anchor Brian Williams asked, "Have you no shame?" Newspaper headlines seemed to have all been written by the same editor: "Coulter's Cruelty Has No Bounds" (Seattle Post-Intelligencer), "Coulter's Crudeness" (The Boston Globe) and "Pray for Ann Coulter" (Arkansas Democrat-Gazette). After Ms. Coulter sat down with Jay Leno, The New York Times' TV critic Alessandra Stanley called her "the mean girl of the moment" and lamented that Mr. Leno had failed to deliver a "much deserved public swat."

Even conservatives got in on the spanking. Bill O'Reilly called her "over the top." Andrew Sullivan ran eight Coulter items on his blog, calling her "a drag-queen-fascist-impersonator."

Other pundits assured readers and viewers that the 44-year-old, New Canaan-bred and Cornell-educated Ms. Coulter doesn't really believe what she says: It's just a marketing ploy. So ignore her! Or, they said, Ms. Coulter was just a cunning satirist. Meghan Daum, in the Los Angeles Times, praised Ms. Coulter's "subtly arch commentary" and asserted: "The woman isn't a pariah, she's a comic genius, an anthropologist with an edge, the adopted love child of Oscar Wilde and Gore Vidal."

Meanwhile, the legions of Ann Coulter haters were breathing sighs of relief: Because of the widow comments, she would surely, at last, be forced to slink away. "Is This the End for Ann Coulter?" a Salon article asked, fingers crossed.

It had been almost two years since I'd seen Ms. Coulter, and though I'd been getting nostalgic for our interviews, I wasn't so sure if it was still in my interest to turn on that tape recorder. I'd had enough of being called a "moron" and "Ann Coulter's handmaiden" by prissy left-wing blogger Eric Alterman. I wasn't sure if I wanted to be invited over to Al Franken's Riverside Drive apartment again for another two-hour reprogramming session. Was another Coulter interview worth the price?

I met Ann for lunch [...] "I put a book out-and liberals were hysterical!" she said, cackling away. "Much like the last four books." [/] How did she think her Today show appearance had gone? [/] "That was great. I could've kissed Matt Lauer after that interview," she said. [...] So I was kind of nervous. If they just said, 'Tell me what your book is about,' I would babble incoherently. But an argument that I can do my sleep! That's easy for me to do."

I mentioned the things she'd written about the four widows-such as "How do we know their husbands weren't planning to divorce these harpies? Now that their shelf life is dwindling, they'd better hurry up and appear in Playboy." Did she think her comments would set off such an explosion? [/] "No, but we can keep this party going all summer," she said. "Anyway, it's clearly been completely misportrayed. But, you know, the media misportrays it, people become curious about what it really is, and they buy the book and the message gets out."

So why can't liberals stop attacking her? [/] "Actually, they can't help themselves," she said. "They're like my pets."

What do liberals want? [/] "It's just so horrible to contemplate-that's why I'm laughing. Apparently the total destruction of the United States. But they get to keep their houses in Amagansett."

[...] How did it feel to be known as the "mean girl of the moment"? [/] "When did that enter the public debate, that someone is 'mean'?" she said. "We're having an argument, I'm winning-and they sit back and cry and say, 'Oh, you're mean.' When did that happen?"

"I think the public perception of my book is slightly different," she said. "I mean, this was the establishment's attack; it wasn't normal people. Everywhere I go, people are treating me like a returning war hero. Every place. It's stunning, the people coming out of the woodwork. On e-mail, other 9/11 widows have been tracking me down, because they're really seething with anger at these harpies for claiming to speak for all widows."

[...] Some critics don't think Ms. Coulter believes the things she says, I told her. [/] "Yes, liberals would like to think that-as the entire country turns my way," she said. "Let them comfort themselves with that little fantasy. It's not only 'Are you a satirist?', but 'Did you really mean that? Was that a joke? Are you saying that to get a reaction? Is that hyperbole?'

[...] Why is it, I asked, that liberals tend to get away with over-the-top remarks, like when Cindy Sheehan called President Bush "the biggest terrorist in the world"? [/] "Because they send out victims as spokespeople!" she said. "Not any more, I might add! I think I ended that little trick. Oh, they'll still do it, but everyone's going to be sitting back in their living room rolling their eyes now."

Do you think that if Ms. Sheehan's son Casey could see her now, he might wish she- [/] "Wish that she'd shut up? Pipe down? Yes. I write about him in the book," she said. "He is an amazing American hero-that was the story that was being lost in all of this. As she becomes Dennis Rodman and just makes a spectacle of herself, he was a great American patriot. For one thing, he had already re-enlisted. He didn't have to go; he died on a mission he was volunteering for to help save his buddies-he was incredibly heroic. And I think it's too bad that most people don't know that."

[...] "Yes, well, all three networks [had power]," she said. "That's why liberals are going crazy now. They're becoming like the Sunni insurgency without the physical courage."

Do you think we have more to fear from Democrats than Iraqi insurgents? [/] "Oh yes," she said. "Fifth columnists at home. Our boys can handle these savages. But every time there is some question about a mission, when you have Democratic Congressmen accusing our boys of being cold-blooded killers, and then we bust up a terror plot in Miami, and Ron Klink is saying it's because Bush lied about weapons of mass destruction! [...] It's a huge problem-liberals are like New York cabdrivers who never see the red light coming. Other people slow down as they see the yellow. New York cab drivers are going 60 miles an hour-ahhhhhhhh! That's the Democrats with an imminent threat: 'No, it's not imminent, it's not imminent-oh, there's a missile headed for Chicago!' Now they'll say it's imminent. Well, thanks! Thanks for that. Thank you. At what point would Democrats say it's imminent? When they're threatening to build weapons of mass destruction? When they're lunatics denying the Holocaust? When they're doing a passable imitation of Bea Arthur leading a country and claiming to have nuclear missiles that can land on American soil? At what point is it imminent?"

What about those who complain about how the U.S. has treated our war prisoners? [/] "Well, I made it clear on my Web page last night," she said. "I posted a little link with pictures of what they do to our guys, and then some Arab with underwear on his head. I linked to this wonderful Web page-he has all of the burnt bodies hanging from trees, from bridges, he has right before Al-Zarqawi slices off Nick Berg's head. And then you have an Arab standing there with underwear on his head. So I think a little visual comparison is helpful."

At what point would you want to pull out of Iraq? [/] "Once we've completed the mission-and the mission's going perfectly well. When you think about the one war liberals belatedly supported, because we were fighting to defend Mother Russia-World War II-you just can't imagine, 'O.K., at what point that a number of soldiers have died do we pull-?' No, we leave when we're done."

What do you see as Bill Clinton's legacy? [/] "That he never denied raping Juanita Broaddrick. And Hillary Clinton has the audacity to accuse me of being mean to women. The one tip I'll give you about Hillary Clinton's future-because I read The New York Times like a Kremlinologist reading Pravda-and I think they're turning against her, the way they turned against Howard Dean. I think The New York Times is going to stop Hillary from being the candidate. We'll see, but that article a few weeks ago on the front page about the family-and this past weekend, they had a very nasty Hillary cartoon. I think the clergy of the liberal religion, i.e., the editorial board of The New York Times, has decided that Hillary can't win, and they're going to find an electable candidate. Exactly like they threw Howard Dean off the boat last time. He was sailing to victory, and The New York Times turned against them with a big magazine piece making fun of, you know, his idiot supporters. It was hilarious. But they wouldn't have done that if they wanted the Dean train to keep going. They ended Dean, and liberals are good followers and they do what The New York Times tells them. We don't have anything like that, by the way, on the right. You can't get us to be followers."

John Kerry? [/] "Oh, he's so pathetic. I'm so happy to hear he's running again," she said. "He and Gore I consider very comedic. With Kerry, no matter what the photo is-he's always trying to look like Mr. Cool, wind surfing or relaxing or golfing, whatever. No matter what pose he's in, no matter what he's wearing, he is always dorkus erectus."

Let's say you were the Emperor of United States. [/] "Oh, I like that!" [/] What would you do your first 100 days? [/] "Deport all liberals." [/] Where would you send them? [/] "It doesn't really matter. Just get them out. And then I wouldn't need to do anything else, because it's really a great country. Oh, it would be so magnificent. It would be like New York during the Republican National Convention. We do have fun playing with liberals, but they can get a little irksome."

Is it fun being a Christian in New York? [/] "Yes! And it's growing and growing." [/] I mentioned that I went to see Tim Keller give a sermon at the Church of the Redeemer, at her suggestion. [/] "Isn't he magnificent? Keller is life-transforming."

I confessed I was worried about being called a brown-noser for even interviewing her. [/] "They said the same thing about Jay Leno," she said. "Apparently, unless you call me a rotten slut, you're sucking up to me. Merely being polite and giving an honest interview to Ann Coulter, yes, you must be sucking up."

[...] Could you tell me a story from childhood that might explain how you became Ann Coulter?

"You know I hate talking about myself. It all seems normal and natural to me. I went to a nice high school. Mostly I was boy-crazy, and I just wanted to hang out with my boyfriends. I wasn't in a particular group. I played lacrosse. I liked the lacrosse girls. I was always political, even in high school; it was always just fun to tweak liberals. In college we started the Cornell Review and, of course, we got all the nasty letters: 'racist,' 'fascist,' 'we'll kill you,' blah blah blah. We'd collect all the letters, go out for drinks, and read them aloud and take great joy."

Not everyone who attacks you reads your books, right? [/] "That's right. That's something I would like liberals to answer-if I am so outrageous, why will they never quote me? Why do they always twist it into me always saying something I didn't say?

[...] But did she hear about the vulgar comment Mr. Penn made in the article about his Ann Coulter doll, and how he liked to burn its private parts with a cigarette? [/] Well, I was not surprised to find out that Sean Penn plays with dolls. I did think they'd be larger and inflatable."

[...]"Right, but he also viciously attacked you for quoting him accurately," she said. "That's the difference between conservatives and liberals. I'm ticked off when people don't quote me accurately. They're ticked off when people do quote them accurately." [..] [My ellipses and emphasis]

Poll Question: Describe Ann Coulter. 20 Choices! Let your opinion count! | Poll choices:

1. Vicious / 2. Mean spirited / 3. Shameless / 4. Unbounded cruelty / 5. Crude / 6. A drag-queen-fascist-impersonator / 7. Mean girl of the moment / 8. Over the top / 9. Does not believe what she says. / 10. Says whatever sells books. / 11. Cunning satirist. / 12. Comic genius / 13. Anthropologist with an edge / 14. Adopted love child of Gore Vidal and Oscar Wilde / 15. Disrespects liberals unfairly / 16. Accurate social observer and scholar / 17. Defender of the Constitution and common sense / 18. Honest and joyous / 19. Sincere patriot / 20. New sort of war hero / 21. No comment. / 22. No opinion. / 23. This poll is worthless. / 24. This poll is of negative value. / 25. Other.

Vote at Adult Christian Forum Thread 99246

Episcopal Break-Up Accelerates

In the wake of a quasi-chaotic national convention, which further left behind scripture, tradition, morality, common sense, and Roberts Rules of Order, adding also to its defects, in-your-face gratuitous insults of the parent Anglican Communion, particularly its titular head, the Archbishop of Canterbury and the third world traditionally minded Anglican Communion majority. (See Delphi Adult Christian Forum thread Plain Truth About Episcopal Convention and conservative Episcopal site, virtueonline.org.)

Also yesterday, the Episcopal Diocese of Pittsburgh standing committee voted to join the Diocese of Fort Worth in rejecting the leadership of Presiding Bishop-elect Katharine Jefferts Schori. They will ask Archbishop of Canterbury Rowan Williams to provide them with a more conservative leader to oversee a new province that will be separate from the Episcopal Church.

From a Washington Times article, Virginia churches plan diocese exit. More below:

Virginia churches plan diocese exit [/] By Julia Duin [/] THE WASHINGTON TIMES [/] Published June 29, 2006

Two of Northern Virginia's largest and most historic Episcopal churches -- Truro and the Falls Church -- informed Virginia Bishop Peter J. Lee yesterday that they plan to leave the diocese and that as many as two dozen other parishes may follow suit. [/] And the Rev. Martyn Minns, rector of Truro Church, was elected a bishop yesterday by the Anglican province of Nigeria with the mandate to oversee a cluster of U.S. parishes that minister to expatriate Nigerians.

Mr. Minns was driving north on Interstate 95 from Richmond when he got the news on his cell phone from Anglican Archbishop Peter J. Akinola. The archbishop then put him on a speaker phone to address a gathering of Anglicans in Abuja, the country's capital. [/] "I said I was honored by their willingness to place their trust in me," said Mr. Minns, 63, who earlier this year had announced plans to retire. [/] Instead he will oversee the Convocation for Anglicans in North America, which includes more than 20 Anglican churches that cater to Nigerian immigrants in the U.S. but could be enlarged to include Episcopal congregations fleeing the 2.2-million-member denomination.

"We have deliberately held back from this action," Archbishop Akinola said in a statement, in the hope that the Episcopal Church would turn back from its 2003 consecration of Canon V. Gene Robinson as the world's first openly homosexual bishop. But the actions of last week's Episcopal General Convention "make it clear that far from turning back, they are even more committed to pursuing their unbiblical revisionist agenda."

Diocese of Virginia officials were surprised by the news. [/] "The fact of Martyn's election raises a host of issues that will be addressed in due course," spokesman Patrick Getlein said. [/] Truro and the Falls Church have a combined $27 million in assets. Situated on some of Northern Virginia's most valuable real estate, both churches are having 40-day "discernment" periods of prayer, fasting and debate, starting in September and ending just before Thanksgiving, before announcing a final decision.

Officially, the 40-day period has "no predetermined outcome," said the Rev. John W. Yates, rector of the Falls Church, but it's clear that "the growing crisis and dysfunction in the Episcopal Church" is pushing the orthodox toward the exit doors. [/] "It's certainly a step no church -- especially one with a history we've had -- takes without the greatest humility," he said in an interview at the parish where George Washington once worshipped. "But so many Episcopalians in the pews are so irate over what's happened, and it's harder and harder to call on people to wait."

The Falls Church and Truro Church presented their plan in Fairfax on Saturday to a meeting of officials representing 20 to 30 Episcopal churches around Virginia. Thirteen to 14 churches already have agreed to have their own 40-day period, he said. [/] Rectors of two other large Northern Virginia parishes also told The Washington Times yesterday, on condition of anonymity, that they, too, may be leaving. One is involved in secret negotiations with the diocese over property issues; another says his vestry, or governing board, approved the 40-day idea Tuesday night, but his parish needs to vote on it Sunday.

Before he received the phone call from Nigeria, Mr. Minns met Bishop Lee early yesterday to inform him of the 40-day plan. [/] "He's still saddened by the whole development," Mr. Minns said. "But he understood what we're doing." [/] In two previous interviews with The Times, Bishop Lee has said he will sue any church that tries to leave the 90,000-member diocese, the country's largest. However, two mission congregations who left the diocese several months ago have not landed in court.

Episcopal canon law mandates that departing churches turn over all their assets to the diocese, and Mr. Yates is part of a six-person team of negotiators trying to figure out how conservatives can depart without bankrupting themselves or the diocese through lawsuits.

[…] Also yesterday, the Episcopal Diocese of Pittsburgh standing committee voted to join the Diocese of Fort Worth in rejecting the leadership of Presiding Bishop-elect Katharine Jefferts Schori. They will ask Archbishop of Canterbury Rowan Williams to provide them with a more conservative leader to oversee a new province that will be separate from the Episcopal Church. [My ellipses and emphasis]

Treason at the New York Times?

From a Human Events Online article, When Will NYT Reveal One of al Qaeda's Secret Programs?:

When Will NYT Reveal One of al Qaeda's Secret Programs? [/] by Ann Coulter [/] Posted Jun 28, 2006

When is the New York Times going to get around to uncovering an al Qaeda secret program? [/] In the latest of a long list of formerly top-secret government anti-terrorism operations that have been revealed by the Times, last week the paper printed the details of a government program tracking terrorists' financial transactions that has already led to the capture of major terrorists and their handmaidens in the United States.

In response, the Bush Administration is sounding very cross -- and doing nothing. Bush wouldn't want to get the press mad at him! Yeah, let's keep the media on our good side like they are now. Otherwise, they might do something crazy -- like leak a classified government program monitoring terrorist financing.

National Review has boldly called for the revocation of the Times' White House press pass! If the Times starts publishing troop movements, National Review will go whole hog and demand that the paper's water cooler privileges be revoked. Then there's always the "nuclear option": disinviting Maureen Dowd from the next White House Correspondents' Dinner.

[…] We've got a lot of liberals who hate the country and are itching to aid the enemy, so what are you going to do? Indict the entire editorial board of the New York Times? (Actually, that wouldn't be a bad place to start, now that I ask.)

Maybe treason ended during the Vietnam War when Jane Fonda sat laughing and clapping on a North Vietnamese anti-aircraft gun used to shoot down American pilots. She came home and resumed her work as a big movie star without the slightest fear of facing any sort of legal sanction.

Fast forward to today, when New York Times publisher "Pinch" Sulzberger has just been named al Qaeda's "Employee of the Month" for the 12th straight month.

Before the Vietnam War, this country took treason seriously. [/] But now we're told newspapers have a right to commit treason because of "freedom of the press." Liberals invoke "freedom of the press" like some talismanic formulation that requires us all to fall prostrate in religious ecstasy. On liberals' theory of the 1st Amendment, the safest place for Osama bin Laden isn't in Afghanistan or Pakistan; it's in the New York Times building.

Freedom of the press means the government generally cannot place a prior restraint on speech before publication. [/] But freedom of the press does not mean the government cannot prosecute reporters and editors for treason -- or for any other crime. The 1st Amendment does not mean Times editor Bill Keller could kidnap a child and issue his ransom demands from the New York Times editorial page. He could not order a contract killing on the op-ed page. Nor can he take out a contract killing on Americans with a Page 1 story on a secret government program being used to track terrorists who are trying to kill Americans.

What if, instead of passing information from the government's secret nuclear program at Los Alamos directly to Soviet agents, Julius and Ethel Rosenberg had printed those same secrets in a newsletter? Would they have skated away scot-free instead of being tried for espionage and sent to the death chamber?

Ezra Pound, Mildred Gillars ("Axis Sally") and Iva Toguri D'Aquino ("Tokyo Rose") were all charged with treason for radio broadcasts intended to demoralize the troops during World War II. Their broadcasts were sort of like Janeane Garofalo and Randi Rhodes on Air America Radio -- except Tokyo Rose was actually witty, and Axis Sally is said to have used a fact-checker.

Tokyo Rose was convicted of treason for a single remark she made on air: "Orphans of the Pacific, you really are orphans now. How will you get home now that your ships are sunk?" For that statement alone, D'Aquino spent six years in prison and was fined $10,000 (more than $80,000 in today's dollars).

Axis Sally was convicted of treason for broadcasts from Germany and sentenced to 12 years in prison. Pound avoided a treason trial for his radio broadcasts by getting himself committed to an insane asylum instead (which I take it is Randi Rhodes' "Plan B" in the event that she ever acquires enough listeners to be charged with treason).

There was no evidence that in any of these cases the treasonable broadcasts ever put a single American life in danger. The law on treason doesn't require it.

The federal statute on treason, 18 USC 2381, provides in relevant part: "Whoever, owing allegiance to the United States ... adheres to their enemies, giving them aid and comfort within the United States or elsewhere, is guilty of treason and shall suffer death, or shall be imprisoned not less than five years and fined under this title but not less than $10,000."

Thanks to the New York Times, the easiest job in the world right now is: "Head of Counterintelligence -- al Qaeda." You just have to read the New York Times over morning coffee, and you're done by 10 a.m.

The greatest threat to the war on terrorism isn't the Islamic insurgency -- our military can handle the savages. It's traitorous liberals trying to lose the war at home. And the greatest threat at home isn't traitorous liberals -- it's patriotic Americans, also known as "Republicans," tut-tutting the quaint idea that we should take treason seriously. [My ellipses and emphasis]

Actually, in my opinion, the people at the New York Times are inherently incapable of committing treason. It would be very difficult to convince a reasonable jury that, beyond a reasonable doubt, these folks had ever "adhered" to an enemy of the United States. They are obviously too wishy-washy and fluffy to have ever adhered to anything.

"Juno and The Paycock"

Such is the fate of plays which deal seriously with serious subjects. "Life is a comedy to those who think, a tragedy to those who feel." The playwrights felt tragedies, but the audience insisted upon comedies. O' Casey calls his plays tragedies, but they are played and accepted as comedies. - Malone on new playwright, 1926, N.Y, Theatre Magazine

THE two longer plays are tragedies of disillusionment; they were played and accepted as comedies of errors. [...] Juno and the Paycock is modern tragedy at its best, almost at its greatest. [...] Juno and the Paycock has its superficial qualities verging upon the melodramatic, but it is lifted and ennobled by the character of Juno. Juno is the greatest, the universal mother, as great as the greatest mother in drama, even though her sphere of influence be limited to two rooms in a tenement house in a Dublin slum. The tragic significance of Mrs. Alving in Ghosts is small when compared with the tragic significance of Juno. Her son dead "for his country"; her daughter betrayed by a worthless liar and deserted by a coward; her husband a boasting, drunken, lying wastrel, she rises superior to her slum surroundings and prepares to begin her life struggle anew. - ibid

Nevertheless Juno is a great play, in the first rank of its kind, and if O' Casey's genius be great enough and strong enough to equal it, or to surpass it, in the future the praise may be justified. - ibid.

__________________________________

Bound by the traditions of men which artificially separate comedy and tragedy, the critic, like the Greeks, fails to recognize the tragi-comic mixture which is the hallmark of experienced human life and is recognized as such by the common sense that men are endowed with. Tragedy and comedy are perceptions of human inconsistency. In children, inconsistency is comic. In grown-ups, it is tragic. As viewed by the wise, it is both.

The greatness of Juno as a mother is enhanced, not diminished, by her fervent prayer, after the death of her son to the "mother of God", pleading that the killing be stopped.

Luke 2:34-35 KJV And Simeon blessed them, and said unto Mary his mother, […] (Yea, a sword shall pierce through thy own soul also,) […]

Two Reporters, One Secrets Leak Article?

'Why does it take two reporters to write this "article"?'

Bush Condemns Report on Bank Records

Watch for the TV clip. You'll never see him madder

Above from Lucianne.com "Must Reads of the day". Read L dot comment thread below to discover answer to:

'Why does it take two reporters to write this "article"?'

(Source article at The New York Times, article link, Bush Condemns Report on Bank Records)

Bush Condemns Report on Bank Records [/] The New York Times, by ANNE E. KORNBLUT and JOHN O'NEIL

[From] Original Article [/] Posted By:Thorn, 6/26/2006 1:50:06 PM

WASHINGTON, June 26 — President Bush today condemned as "disgraceful" the disclosure last week of a secret program that seeks to investigate and block terrorists by tracing financial records through a banking consortium in Brussels.

Comments: And that's putting it mildly.

Reply 1 - Posted by: paboo, 6/26/2006 1:55:09 PM

This, and similar, security breaches demand prosecution. Otherwise, we will continue to suffer more damage to our war effort. It is a war, and our nation's survival is at stake. If we loose this war, we'll never win another.

Reply 2 - Posted by: GoPack, 6/26/2006 1:55:38 PM

Why, in leftoid thinking, is leaking a secret like Valerie Plame's identity (which was of no consequence to anything) a crime, but publishing a secret like how we track terrorists, not? My head hurts.

Reply 3 - Posted by: Cavallodifiero, 6/26/2006 1:56:18 PM

While he has is condemning pen in his hand why doesn't he write Mexico's name on the pad and for good measure start evicting illegal invaders from Mexico on a regular basis. Not 2000 here and 2000 there thinking that people will shut up and go away.

Reply 4 - Posted by: ZurichMike, 6/26/2006 2:04:29 PM

Why does it take two reporters to write this "article"?

Reply 5 - Posted by: Thorn, 6/26/2006 2:07:53 PM

One to write it and the other to email it to Bin Laden.

It is only fair and compassionate to give deranged victims of severe oppression, presently cut off from normal communication by insensitive Bush policies of unknown legality, some compensating compassionate communication in the name of fairness and niceness and of complete and comprehensive cultural and personal equality.

No Liberal Is a True Deadhead!

My theory is that the "Grateful Dead" were very much in tune with nominal Christian beliefs.

The godless liberal religion, "liberalarianism", has nothing in common with any sort of theistic believer, even those having merely human and merely natural intellectual belief and affectionate trust in the traditions of Christendom.

The dead are supposedly grateful to have left this world.

This is not a scriptural belief.

The dead are in Hades, like the rich man in the parable. They are thirsty now, and have the Great White Throne and the lake of fire, the second death, in their future. Opportunity for repentance is forever gone. The dead are definitely not grateful.

Deceased meta-nominal Christians, like the patriarchs, are not dead and grateful, but living and grateful. (Only the body is dead, awaiting resurrection.)

[… H]ave ye not read that which was spoken unto you by God, saying, I am the God of Abraham, and the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob? God is not the God of the dead, but of the living. - Jesus, Matthew 22:31-32 KJV

From a jambands.com article, An Interview with Ann Coulter:

"Deadheads Are What Liberals Claim to Be But Aren't": [/] An Interview with Ann Coulter [/] [by] Taylor Hill [/] 2006-06-23

[..] I discovered a secret that I will reveal despite the damage to her reputation that it may cause: Ann is really cool and really funny. […]

What followed was the most surreal interview I have ever done in my life. It involves smearing oneself with purple Crisco, Kanye (Ann's a fan), slews of Reagan and Bush appointees leaving the Justice Department to go to Dead shows, lamentation for the neglected "Pride of Cucamonga," getting inside info on the Monica Lewinsky scandal by being a Deadhead, and saying goodbye to Jerry in Golden Gate Park. Some of her answers WILL %%%% people off, but there's no doubting her tie-dyed credentials – even if the dye is much more red than blue. Her latest book, Godless: The Church of Liberalism, was published earlier this month.

[… Ann Coulter:] Oddly enough, I like the music. No one believes that I never took drugs at Dead shows (except for the massive clouds of passive marijuana smoke) but I went because I really liked the music. There are various groups I get enthusiastic about for awhile, but of all the music I've listened to over the years, the Grateful Dead is the one band I never grow tired of. Apparently, the same is true of me for ski-lift operators.

Moreover, I really like Deadheads and the whole Dead concert scene: the tailgating, the tie-dye uniforms, the camaraderie – it was like NASCAR for potheads. You always felt like you were with family at a Dead show – a rather odd, psychedelic family that sometimes lived in a VW bus and sold frightening looking “veggie burritos.” But whatever their myriad interests, clothing choices, and interest in illicit drugs, true Deadheads are what liberals claim to be but aren't: unique, free-thinking, open, kind, and interested in different ideas. Also, excellent dancers! Watching a Deadhead dance is truly something to behold.

[…] The one time I missed not being able to go to Dead shows more than any other since Jerry died was during the Clinton impeachment. There was so much viciousness - killed cats, punctured tires, threats, investigations and slander against those of us favoring impeachment. (Anthony Pellicano, you'll recall – the Hollywood private investigator now accused of criminal conspiracy, attempted murder, and making criminal threats – was working for the Clintons during the Monica Lewinsky investigation.) I don't really care what people say about me – I'm a Christian so there's nothing anyone can ever do to me – but I kept thinking: “Boy, would I like to go to a Dead show and dance with happy, friendly deadheads for just one night!”

[…] By the way, you did not ask me what my favorite bumper sticker or button is . . . and I know the answers to those questions! Bumper sticker: “Dead For Life”; button: “Jews For Jerry.”

[…] AC: Apart from Al Gore, Al Franken is the most un-Deadhead like person I know of who purports to be a Deadhead.

[…] The Deadheads I just met casually and not through conservative politics were almost always right-thinking, whatever they called themselves. Deadheads believe in freedom – not a government telling people how much water they can have in their toilets or where they can smoke or whether they should be allowed to own a gun. (Remember the photos of Jerry testifying before some Congressional committee while chain smoking? Yeah, he'd really bond with Henry Waxman.)

[…] Also there was a big Deadhead Christian group that handed out terrific pamphlets at Dead shows. Admittedly, many of them found God staring into a puddle while high on LSD, but whatever the path, they were very serious Christians – they made Jerry Falwell sound like a secularist.

Either Bobby or Jerry was asked by a Rolling Stone interviewer to denounce all the Young Reaganites attending their concerts in the 80's, and whichever one it was not only refused to attack the young Republicans, but said he liked some of those “rightist” ideas. Consider that when the Dead decided to do something to save the Rain Forest, they didn't harangue poverty-stricken Third Worlders to give up washing machines and electricity. They did it the free market way: buying up parts of the Rain Forest, parcel by parcel.

And they provided the Lithuanian basketball team – recently liberated from the Soviet yoke – with totally cool uniforms so they could play in the 1992 Olympics.

After Jerry died, U.S. Senator Spencer Abraham (R-MI) gave an incredibly touching tribute to Jerry Garcia and the good work the Dead's Rex Foundation had done promoting the arts privately – in contradistinction to millionaire actresses standing up in $50,000 gowns at the Oscars and demanding that hardworking waitresses and truck drivers be forced to support the arts through government taxation.

[…] When I worked at the Justice Department during law school, I'd be leaving with a whole slew of Reagan or Bush political appointees to see the Dead at RFK. Finally, I believe the great New York subway vigilante Bernie Goetz was a Deadhead. […] [My ellipses and emphasis]

POLL: "Redeploy" U.S. Forces Now In Iraq? - III

See article in three posts on this thread and Vote at Adult Christian Forum Thread 99048 (Choices also given after each of three article section posts).

U.S. can't 'redeploy' its way out of Iraq

The biggest kid on the block has responsibilities:

For rulers are not a terror to good works, but to the evil. Wilt thou then not be afraid of the power? do that which is good, and thou shalt have praise of the same: For he is the minister of God to thee for good. But if thou do that which is evil, be afraid; for he beareth not the sword in vain: for he is the minister of God, a revenger to execute wrath upon him that doeth evil. - Paul (Romans 13:3-4 KJV)

------------Beginning--Section III--of III--------------

Historical Note: The "redeploy" strategy was attempted on the large international corporation level in the 1980s. Even the word "redeploy" was used. Employees relocated as part of corporate "redeployment" were referred to as "redeploys".

The disaster that followed led the big time investment community to force an outside chief executive on the corporation for the first time in its history.

The aim of the strategy in that case was to return to a fondly remembered past of local branch office massive support of business customers who were using the cutting edge products of the mid twentieth century.

Somehow, the top executives did not realize that the latest generation of those same cutting edge products had facilitated effective and efficient customer support worldwide from a single location. (It is now becoming apparent that the ideal single location is in India.)

My own explanation, based on observation of internal corporate telecasts, was that those responsible top executives had the look of men who occasionally used adult beverages.

Although the contemplated national "redeployment" is in the opposite direction, toward the center rather than away from the center, --

The direction in time is the same: toward a fondly remembered past.

When will people learn that one can turn back the clock, but not reality. "Time Marches On" as the Henry Luce empire used to tell us in its movie feature.

Full disclosure I worked for the "un-redeployed" corporation as a computer architect, and, two decades later, for the "redeployed" corporation as a top level problem solver for an artificial intelligence software product of the knowledge base variety, helping support two hundred customer installations implemented in nine different languages in a dozen or two countries.

------------End--Section III--of III--------------

Poll Question: "Redeploy" U.S. Forces Now In Iraq? | Poll choices:

1. Yes. Only rabid right wing attack dogs think otherwise. [/] 2. Yes. Iraq for the Iraqis. [/] 3. Yes. Our soldiers have suffered enough. [/] 4. Yes. The Iraqis have suffered enough. [/] 5. Yes. Our international reputation has suffered enough. [/] 6. Yes. More oppression will only drive the victims to greater atrocities. [/] 7. Yes. Americans have the real needs for more government help. [/] 8. Yes, Let niceness reign in both foreign and domestic policies. [/] 9. Yes. [/] 10. Possibly. Should be investigated. [/] 11. Possibly. But bigger government more important. [/] 12. No. But stop attacking those made psychotic by oppression. [/] 13. No. [/] 14. No. Support Iraq's elected government. [/] 15. No. Keep our promises and commitments. [/] 16. No. Support law and order directed toward real freedom. [/] 17. No. The biggest kid on the block has responsibilities. [/] 18. No. Use big stick on world's thugs whenever needed. [/] 19. No comment. [/] 20. No opinion. [/] 21. This poll is worthless. [/] 22. This poll is of negative value. [/] 23. Other.

Vote at Adult Christian Forum Thread 99048

POLL: "Redeploy" U.S. Forces Now In Iraq? - II

See article in three posts on this thread and Vote at Adult Christian Forum Thread 99048 (Choices also given after each of three article section posts).

U.S. can't 'redeploy' its way out of Iraq

The biggest kid on the block has responsibilities:

For rulers are not a terror to good works, but to the evil. Wilt thou then not be afraid of the power? do that which is good, and thou shalt have praise of the same: For he is the minister of God to thee for good. But if thou do that which is evil, be afraid; for he beareth not the sword in vain: for he is the minister of God, a revenger to execute wrath upon him that doeth evil. - Paul (Romans 13:3-4 KJV)

------------Beginning--Section II--of III--------------

From a Chicago Sun Times Mark Steyn column, U.S. can't 'redeploy' its way out of Iraq:

U.S. can't 'redeploy' its way out of Iraq [/] June 25, 2006 [/] BY MARK STEYN SUN-TIMES COLUMNIST

[...]

If you were a 5-year-old boy standing in the London streets in 1897 for Queen Victoria's Diamond Jubilee parade and marveling as the hussars and lancers of the mightiest empire the world had ever known passed before your eyes, it would have seemed inconceivable that you'd be celebrating your 80th birthday in a decrepit ramshackle broken-down strike-bound basket case of a state. Permanence is the illusion of every age. And, if you're interested in a "dignified retirement," you might want to give some thought to the shape of the world the day after tomorrow.

Today, lots of experts crank out analyses positing China as the unstoppable hegemon of the 21st century. But the real threat is not the strengths of your enemies but their weaknesses. China is a weak power: Its population will get old before it gets rich. Russia is a weak power: If Africa has health crises, the Middle East has Islamists and North Korea has nukes, then Russia's got the lot: a dying population whose men have a lower life expectancy than Bangladeshis with a Muslim separatist movement sitting on top of the biggest pile of nukes on the planet. Europe is a weak power, remorselessly evolving month by month into Eurabia.

Islam is a weak power: In the words of Dr. Mahathir Mohammed, the former prime minister of Malaysia, one of the least worst Muslim nations in the world, "We produce practically nothing on our own, we can do almost nothing for ourselves, we cannot even manage our wealth." But in Iran they're working full-speed on nukes that will be able to hit every European city.

North Korea is a weak power: Its population is starving but it's about to "test" the latest variation on its aptly named No Dong missile. I mean "test" in the sense that I test my new shotgun by firing it through your kitchen window. They're going to launch it and see where it comes down -- maybe Tokyo, maybe San Diego; maybe they'll aim for Los Angeles but it'll fall in Vancouver. Hey, that's why we call it a "test," right?

The danger we face is not a Chinese superpower or an Islamist superpower: If it's a new boss, you learn the new rules and adjust as best you can. But the greater likelihood is of a world with no superpower at all in which unipolar geopolitics gives way to nonpolar geopolitics, a world without order in which pipsqueak thug states that can't feed their own people globalize their pathologies. There would be more stories like that one the other day about the three decapitated policemen whose heads were found in the Tijuana River. But Pelosi would carry on talking about college tuition as the world sinks into economic decline, arbitrary bombings and kidnappings, and the occasional nuking.

Kerry gets all huffy if he thinks you're questioning his patriotism, so let's be charitable and assume the Defeaticrats are simply missing the point: For the rest of the world, what's at issue in the Iraq war is not the future of Iraq but the future of America. Can the world's leading nation still lead or is Kerry's Vietnam Syndrome "seared" (as he'd say) into its bones? Luxembourg can be Luxembourg. America doesn't have that option. In a nonpolar world, there's nowhere to redeploy to. [/] (c)Mark Steyn 2006 [My ellipses and emphasis]

------------End--Section II--of III--------------

Poll Question: "Redeploy" U.S. Forces Now In Iraq? | Poll choices:

1. Yes. Only rabid right wing attack dogs think otherwise. [/] 2. Yes. Iraq for the Iraqis. [/] 3. Yes. Our soldiers have suffered enough. [/] 4. Yes. The Iraqis have suffered enough. [/] 5. Yes. Our international reputation has suffered enough. [/] 6. Yes. More oppression will only drive the victims to greater atrocities. [/] 7. Yes. Americans have the real needs for more government help. [/] 8. Yes, Let niceness reign in both foreign and domestic policies. [/] 9. Yes. [/] 10. Possibly. Should be investigated. [/] 11. Possibly. But bigger government more important. [/] 12. No. But stop attacking those made psychotic by oppression. [/] 13. No. [/] 14. No. Support Iraq's elected government. [/] 15. No. Keep our promises and commitments. [/] 16. No. Support law and order directed toward real freedom. [/] 17. No. The biggest kid on the block has responsibilities. [/] 18. No. Use big stick on world's thugs whenever needed. [/] 19. No comment. [/] 20. No opinion. [/] 21. This poll is worthless. [/] 22. This poll is of negative value. [/] 23. Other.

Vote at Adult Christian Forum Thread 99048

POLL: Redeploy U.S. Forces Now In Iraq? I

See article in three posts on this thread and Vote at Adult Christian Forum Thread 99048 (Choices also given after each of three article section posts).

U.S. can't 'redeploy' its way out of Iraq

The biggest kid on the block has responsibilities:

For rulers are not a terror to good works, but to the evil. Wilt thou then not be afraid of the power? do that which is good, and thou shalt have praise of the same: For he is the minister of God to thee for good. But if thou do that which is evil, be afraid; for he beareth not the sword in vain: for he is the minister of God, a revenger to execute wrath upon him that doeth evil. - Paul (Romans 13:3-4 KJV)

------------Beginning--Section I--of III--------------

From a Chicago Sun Times Mark Steyn column, U.S. can't 'redeploy' its way out of Iraq:

U.S. can't 'redeploy' its way out of Iraq [/] June 25, 2006 [/] BY MARK STEYN SUN-TIMES COLUMNIST

Last week John Kerry revealed his plan to "redeploy" U.S. forces from Iraq. This plan is different from fellow Defeaticrat Jack Murtha's plan to "redeploy" U.S. forces from Iraq to Okinawa, which Congressman Murtha seems to think is in the general neighborhood of Iraq. Iraq's in the Middle East, Okinawa's in the Far East: C'mon, how far can it be to get from the Far to the Middle? After all, the distance between the farthest fringe of the kook left and the center of the Democratic Party seems to be closing up every week.

Anyway, Sen. Kerry doesn't want to waste time "redeploying" to Okinawa. When America "redeploys," it's not going to take a connecting flight via Japan and risk its luggage getting "redeployed" to Bratislava. No, sir, in John Kerry's America, we "redeploy" nonstop, straight back to Main Street in time for the Redeployment Day parade.

You gotta hand it to these guys: "Redeployment" is ingenious. I'll bet the focus-group consultants were delirious: "surrender," "lose,","scram," "scuttle ignominiously," "head for the hills" all polled poorly, but "redeploy" surveyed well with all parts of the base, except the base in Okinawa, where they preferred "sayonara" -- that's "redeploy" in any language. The Defeaticrats have a clear message for the American people. Read da ploy: No new quagmires.

This is the most artful example of Leftspeak since they came up with "undocumented immigrant." In fact, if it catches on, I'll bet millions of fine upstanding members of the Undocumented-American community now start referring to themselves as Redeployed Mexicans.

The only teensy-weensy problem is this: If America ever adopts the Kerry plan, the Murtha plan or some variation thereof, does anyone think al-Jazeera, the BBC, Le Monde, Der Spiegel et al will be using the word "redeploy" in their headlines? Or will they use a word closer to what's actually going on?

In a sense, the Democrats have already psychologically redeployed. Last week they unveiled their "New Direction for America." It's a six-point plan, two of whose points are "Cut College Costs" and "Ensure Dignified Retirement." On the first point, it's true the education system remains a problem: Many hardworking Americans are trapped in low-paying dead-end jobs as U.S. congressmen because an inadequate education left them with the impression Okinawa's in the United Arab Emirates. On the second point, I'm all in favor of a "dignified retirement": Why not try it on Kerry as a pilot program? As for the other four points, none has anything to say about national security or foreign policy.

The Defeaticrats' "New Direction for America" foresees a future for this country as a kind of Lesser France. That would be problematic enough: The dependency culture favored by the Dems has mired much of Europe in permanent double-digit unemployment, a moribund economy and unsustainable social programs. Presumably, Nancy Pelosi and Co. would respond by saying that their pledge to "give America a raise" -- i.e., increase the minimum wage -- shows that their party is in tune with real people's real needs rather than a lot of foreign adventuring that's got nothing to do with how real people really lead their really real lives. Sorry, it doesn't work like that. Not even the Democrats can redeploy from the whole planet.

[…] [My ellipses and emphasis]

------------End--Section I--of III--------------

Poll Question: "Redeploy" U.S. Forces Now In Iraq? | Poll choices:

1. Yes. Only rabid right wing attack dogs think otherwise. [/] 2. Yes. Iraq for the Iraqis. [/] 3. Yes. Our soldiers have suffered enough. [/] 4. Yes. The Iraqis have suffered enough. [/] 5. Yes. Our international reputation has suffered enough. [/] 6. Yes. More oppression will only drive the victims to greater atrocities. [/] 7. Yes. Americans have the real needs for more government help. [/] 8. Yes, Let niceness reign in both foreign and domestic policies. [/] 9. Yes. [/] 10. Possibly. Should be investigated. [/] 11. Possibly. But bigger government more important. [/] 12. No. But stop attacking those made psychotic by oppression. [/] 13. No. [/] 14. No. Support Iraq's elected government. [/] 15. No. Keep our promises and commitments. [/] 16. No. Support law and order directed toward real freedom. [/] 17. No. The biggest kid on the block has responsibilities. [/] 18. No. Use big stick on world's thugs whenever needed. [/] 19. No comment. [/] 20. No opinion. [/] 21. This poll is worthless. [/] 22. This poll is of negative value. [/] 23. Other.

Vote at Adult Christian Forum Thread 99048

Plain Truth About Episcopal Convention

Plain Truth About Episcopal Convention

A Pakistani born Church of England bishop, calls them as he sees them.

And, to the best of my knowlege, calls them as they are.

From a Telegraph [U.K.] "op-ed" article, Truth should be more important than unity:

Truth should be more important than unity [/] By Michael Nazir-Ali, Bishop of Rochester [UK Church of England] [/] (Filed: 25/06/2006)

In many ways, the United States is a study in contrasts. It is full of clashing colours and jangling messages. Socially and politically, it is very divided. The "neocons" have clear views on everything from Iraq to abortion, and the "progressives" have the opposite - but also equally clear - opinions on such matters. We would expect, then, to find these divisions reflected in broadly-based organisations such as the Churches and we would not be wrong. All of the so-called "mainline" Churches have this fault-line running through them.

Why, then, should I have been shocked on entering the Greater Columbus Convention Centre in Ohio, where the General Convention of the Episcopal Church (the Anglican Church in the USA) was being held? Should I not have expected tension, difference and debate? There was, first of all, culture shock. It felt to me like a trendy exhibition put together by some ultra-politically-correct organisation, with all the favourite causes of the fashionable prominent. There was, however, a more profound reason for feeling uncomfortable: it became plain quite quickly that this was not a conflict merely of styles, attitudes or even opinions but of two quite different views of religion.

One tendency that was informing the culture of the convention, in a major way, was to do with the diffuse religiosity of the present-day West. Such religiosity, in my view, has much in common with New Age ideas, vague as these often are, such as nature mysticism, or a sense of oneness with the world around, and pantheism, the belief that everything is divine: God is identified with Mother Nature and also with our own souls. Jesus then becomes just a special example of a god-self. Such a world-view is likely to be optimistic, inclusive and non-judgmental. It regards the world and the people in it as more or less as God intended them to be. Such people should be accepted as they are and, if they wish to be, fully included in the life of the Church without further question.

My natural friends in ECUSA, however, are those who want to hold on to the historic, Biblical and catholic faith as it has been received through the ages and in every part of the world. Such a view sees the value of God's creation and regards human beings as made in God's image but it also takes seriously what is wrong with the world and ourselves. We need to be saved from the consequences of our own thoughts and deeds as well as from the "wrongness" of the world. People need not just acceptance and inclusion but conversion and transformation. The work of the Spirit is not formless, vague and without direction, as some "progressives" would have us believe. It is, rather, that of witnessing to Christ, making plain the words and works of Jesus to us and glorifying both Christ and the Father who sent him. The Spirit is continually forming us so that we attain to the fullness of life in Christ.

Such a view of the Christian faith and of the Church that holds it need not be backward-looking. It should be able to engage with the moral and spiritual issues of the day. It can, for instance, uphold fundamental human dignity in the debate about beginning and end of life issues. Because we are in God's image, from the earliest to the last moments, there is an inalienable dignity that cannot be taken away. The abortion debate, for example, is showing us that change as a result of increasing knowledge need not always be in the permissive direction. A properly Christian view of marriage is desperately needed for the sake of family stability and the bringing up of children. Single parents can be heroic in what they do but it is generally recognised that a two-parent family is best for children. The prophetic books in the Bible and the ministry of Jesus himself enable Christians to give sacrificially to charity, to be involved in caring for the poor, needy and ill and to struggle for justice, compassion and peace.

Because Anglicanism has been a broad Church, these two ways of understanding faith have somehow continued to co-exist under one umbrella. But now the issue is not just about opinion but practice. One school of thought is wanting to change Church teaching on marriage as being a lifelong union of a man and a woman for the sake of mutual affection, support and the bringing up of children in the best circumstances possible.

There is a serious breakdown of marriage discipline and, while I was there, the ECUSA bishops passed a resolution indicating their advocacy of same-sex marriage. This happened without any debate on the nature of marriage and how the Church contributed to a public understanding of such a vital social institution. Some in the Church are willing to abandon catholic order, which Anglicans have continued to maintain under pressure from other Churches, and also to revise requirements regarding life-style for those to be ordained deacon, priest or bishop. There are others who are compromising the Church's belief in the uniqueness of Christ's person and work in the cause of multi-faithism. Such views are affecting the integrity of Christian worship and sacramental discipline.

In a broad Church, comprehensiveness must be principled, otherwise there is the risk of disintegration. It is this risk which is becoming actual as more and more people argue that the Anglican Communion is just a loose federation with few, if any, firm doctrinal and moral moorings. In the past, Anglican comprehensiveness has been grounded in acknowledging the supremacy of the Bible, the authority of what Christians have always and everywhere believed, and of the Anglican formularies, such as the Book of Common Prayer, the Articles of Religion and the Ordinal, which bear witness to this faith. Such foundations are more and more dispensable these days, and it is this which has produced our present crisis.

What then is to be done? Unity for Christians is precious and not easily given up but we cannot have unity at the expense of truth. If the truth is seen so differently by the various groups, and there is little hope of convergence, let alone agreement, would it not be better to take different paths rather then pretending to be on the same one? I sincerely pray that it does not come to this and that, even in the face of such differences, there will be the determination to walk in the same way. But if not, separation may actually lead to less bitterness, a greater willingness to converse and, perhaps, even some scope for cooperation in areas where this is possible.

As Christians, it is our duty to pray for the unity of all those who call themselves followers of Jesus but unity does not come at any price and it as well to be prepared for the worst. [My ellipses and emphasis]

Major Democrat Backs Pre-Emptive Strike

1984 Democratic Presidential Nominee Supports Pre-Emptive Strike

Walter Mondale would have been, in my opinion, the best Democratic president since Andrew Jackson.

He is a man who would not tell a lie to further his presidential campaign.

Full disclosure: I once took his niece, Ellen, to lunch.

From a KARE 11 [Minneapolis] News article, Mondale: Force an option for stopping North Korea:

Mondale: Force an option for stopping North Korea

[1984 Democratic Presidential Nominee (and f]ormer Vice President[)] Walter Mondale says he supports a pre-emptive U.S. strike against a North Korean missile that is raising nuclear fears around the globe.

Earlier this week North Korea announced it was preparing to test a missile that could reach United States mainland. Tensions rose further when the North Koreans put fuel into the missile, and continued to insist that a test firing was imminent.

Mondale said on WCCO-AM Friday that the United States should tell North Korea "[D]efuel that missile. It has three boosters. Dismantle it and put it back in the sheds. Because if you’re getting ready to fire this, we’ll take it out."

Mondale, who's also a former U.S. ambassador to Japan, calls the North Korean missile "one of the most dangerous developments" in recent history.

"Nuclear weapons can destroy hundreds of millions of people in one strike — destroy major cities —it is the danger of our time," Mondale said. "Here’s this bizarre, hermit kingdom up there, with a paranoid leader getting ready to test a missile system that can hit us. We’ve got to stop it."

The tensions are over North Korea's apparent preparations to test-fire a Taepodong-2 missile, and the possibility that the missile could eventually carry a nuclear warhead.

Analysts do not agree on how far the missile can travel —Jane's Defense, for example, said last year that the Taepodong-2's maximum range was probably about 3,700 miles. A Russian report said it was about 5,600 miles, and an American report suggested 6,200 miles. Other reports have quoted U.S. officials as saying the 116-foot-long missile has a firing range of 9,300 miles.

Despite the confusion, Mondale and other former top Democrats are convinced apparently that action is the key to ending the standoff.

"This is such a legitimate thing for the United States to do," Mondale said. "The nature of the threat is so serious that I think we should knock it out right there if they won’t stop."

President Clinton's defense secretary, William Perry, advocated such a pre-emptive strike in The Washington Post. Current National Security Adviser Stephen Hadley brushed aside Perry's suggestion, saying he hoped that North Korea would see the unanimously negative reaction from the international community to the test and return to the negotiating table. [My ellipses, additions, substitutions, and emphasis]

N.Y. Times Illegally Helps Terrorists

But will the mainstream, elite media, tell the truth about their fearless leader?

And will American citizens and their elected representatives continue to allow illegal aid to terrorists who aim to kill us to go unpunished?

Stay tuned.

From a National Review Online article, The Media’s War Against the War Continues:

June 23, 2006, 1:58 a.m. [/] The Media’s War Against the War Continues [/] The New York Times and Los Angeles Times expose a classified anti-terrorism program. [/] By Andrew C. McCarthy

Yet again, the New York Times was presented with a simple choice: help protect American national security or help al Qaeda.

Yet again, it sided with al Qaeda.

Once again, members of the American intelligence community had a simple choice: remain faithful to their oath — the solemn promise the nation requires before entrusting them with the secrets on which our safety depends — or violate that oath and place themselves and their subjective notions of propriety above the law.

Once again, honor was cast aside.

For the second time in seven months, the Times has exposed classified information about a program aimed at protecting the American people against a repeat of the September 11 attacks. On this occasion, it has company in the effort: The Los Angeles Times runs a similar, sensational story. Together, the newspapers disclose the fact that the United States has covertly developed a capability to monitor the nerve center of the international financial network in order to track the movement of funds between terrorists and their facilitators.

The effort, which the government calls the “Terrorist Finance Tracking Program” (TFTP), is entirely legal. There are no conceivable constitutional violations involved. The Supreme Court held in United States v. Miller (1976) that there is no right to privacy in financial-transaction information maintained by third parties. Here, moreover, the focus is narrowed to suspected international terrorists, not Americans, and the financial transactions implicated are international, not domestic. This is not data mining, and it does not involve fishing expeditions into the financial affairs of American citizens. Indeed, few Americans even have information that is captured by the program — though there would be nothing legally offensive even if they did.

And unlike the last vital program the New York Times compromised — the National Security Agency’s Terrorist Surveillance Program, which the same reporters, James Risen and Eric Lichtblau, exposed last December — there is not even a facially plausible concern that the TFTP violates statutory law. The provisions germane here (mainly, the Right to Financial Privacy Act that Congress enacted in 1978 in reaction to Miller) do not even apply to the nerve center at issue, the Society of Worldwide Interbank Financial Telecommunication.

That’s because SWIFT, as it is better known, is not a financial institution at all. It is a consortium, centered not in the U.S. but in Belgium, which simply — albeit importantly — oversees how funds are routed globally. It is a messenger, not a bank. Nevertheless, in an abundance of caution, the government uses administrative subpoenas — which were expressly provided for by Congress in the aforementioned Financial Privacy Act and the Patriot Act — when it seeks SWIFT information. That’s not just legal; it’s hyper-legal.

Nor is there any credible worry that the Bush administration is secretly and dictatorially running roughshod over privacy interests. Prominent members of Congress — including elected officials from both parties who serve on the House and Senate Intelligence Committees — have been briefed on the program since its inception after the 9/11 attacks.

The administration, moreover, has worked closely with SWIFT managers, who are led by the National Bank of Belgium and include such other independent financial powerhouses as the Bank of England, the European Central Bank, and the Bank of Japan, as well as the U.S. Federal Reserve. The resulting collaboration has both narrowed the information gathered and ensured that its use is limited to counterterrorism purposes — not the prosecution of ordinary crimes. As if that were not enough, the TFTP is regularly subjected to independent auditing as an additional safeguard ensuring that information is accessed only for terrorism-related purposes.

No, the most salient thing we learn from today’s compromise of the TFTP is that the program has been highly effective at keeping us safe. According to the government, it has helped identify and locate terrorists and their financial backers; it has been instrumental in charting terrorist networks; and it has been essential in starving these savage organizations of their lifeblood: funding.

The TFTP was evidently key to the capture of one of the world’s most formidable terrorists. Riduan bin Isamuddin, better known as “Hambali” — the critical link between al Qaeda and its Indonesian affiliate, Jemaah Islamiya, and thus at the center of the 2002 Bali bombing in which 202 people were slaughtered — is now in U.S. custody rather than wreaking more mayhem. He was apprehended in Thailand in 2003, thanks to the program, which identified a previously unknown financial link to him in Southeast Asia.

[…] It was in view of the TFTP’s palpable value in protecting American lives, its obvious legal propriety, and the plain fact that it was being responsibly conducted that the administration pleaded with the newspapers not to reveal it after government officials despicably leaked it. Exposing the program would tell the public nothing about official misconduct. It would accomplish only the educating of al Qaeda — the nation’s enemy in an ongoing war; an enemy well-known to be feverishly plotting new, massive attacks — about how better to evade our defenses. About how better to kill us.

Appealing to the patriotism of these newspapers proved about as promising as appealing to the humanity of the terrorists they so insouciantly edify — the same monsters who, as we saw again only a few days ago with the torture murder of two American soldiers, continue to define depravity down.

The newspapers, of course, said no. Why? What could outweigh the need to protect a valid effort to shield Americans from additional, barbarous attacks? Bill Keller, executive editor of the New York Times, smugly decreed that the Bush administration’s “access to this vast repository of international financial data” was, in his singularly impeccable judgment, “a matter of public interest.”

And you probably thought George Bush was the imperious one. And that the public’s principal interest was in remaining alive. Wrong again.

The blunt reality here is that there is a war against the war. It is the jihad of privacy fetishists whose self-absorption knows no bounds. Pleas rooted in the well-being of our community hold no sway.

The anti-warriors know only the language of self-interest. It is the language that tells them the revelation of the nation’s secrets will result, forthwith, in the demand for the revelation of their secrets — which is to say, their sources in the intelligence community — with incarceration the price of resistance. It is the language admonishing that even journalists themselves may be prosecuted when their publication of national secrets violates the law.

Bluntly, officials who leak the classified information with which they have been entrusted can be prosecuted for theft of government property. If the information is especially sensitive, they can be prosecuted for violating the Espionage Act. In either event, the press has no legal right to protect such lawlessness.

That is our simple choice: Strong medicine we will either take or persist in declining … while resigning ourselves to more of the same. [/] — Andrew C. McCarthy, a former federal prosecutor, is a senior fellow at the Foundation for the Defense of Democracies. [My ellipses and emphasis]

Can a woman be a good priest?

Brown Bear's Interesting answer:

A woman can never be a good priest !

A woman never forgives anything !

From a Lucianne.com , Must Reads of the day thread (scroll down to Reply 20 by Brown Bear for quote above) commenting on [London] TimesOnline.co.uk article, Anglicans 'are close to anarchy' in dispute over female bishop:

The Times June 20, 2006 [/] Anglicans 'are close to anarchy' in dispute over female bishop [/] By Ruth Gledhill, Religion Correspondent and James Bone in Columbus, Ohio

THE Anglican Church descended into “ecclesiastical anarchy” last night as American traditionalists refused to accept the authority of a woman and asked the Archbishop of Canterbury to lead them instead.

Liberals celebrated the election of Bishop Katharine Jefferts Schori as Presiding Bishop of the Episcopal Church while the traditionalist Fort Worth Diocese appealed to Dr Rowan Williams for “alternative primatial oversight”.

The appeal, being mulled over at Lambeth Palace, is expected to be the first of several. It represents the first formal step towards a schism that evangelicals say began with the consecration of the openly gay Gene Robinson as [the living with a partner in homosexual relationship] Bishop of New Hampshire in 2003.

The crisis was heightened as resolutions being debated over gays fell short of the “repentance” and “moratoria” demanded by the Windsor Report set up by [Archbishop of Canterbury and head of the Anglican Communion] Dr Williams. One well-placed conservative source said: “We are in uncharted waters. The Church is descending into anarchy.”

Last night representatives of the [American] Episcopal Church rejected suggestions that they broke with the worldwide Anglican Communion when they elected Bishop Robinson. In its first action, the 843-member House of Deputies rejected language expressing regret for “breaching the proper constraints of the bonds of affection” by his [(the homosexually co-habiting bishop's)] election. Instead, the deputies approved wording expressing regret merely for “straining” the bonds of affection with the Anglican Communion.

Dr Williams issued a guarded welcome to the new Presiding Bishop, referring to the difficulties the election represents for Anglicans. “I send my greetings to Bishop Katharine and she has my prayers and good wishes as she takes up a deeply demanding position at a critical time,” he said. Bishop Schori will be instituted in November.

Bishop Schori [(the American Episcopal Presiding Bishop elect)] told CNN yesterday that she did not believe homosexuality was a sin, adding: “I believe that God creates us with different gifts.”

Fort Worth is one of three US dioceses not to accept women priests. These and a further seven evangelical dioceses belong to a network of orthodox parishes and dioceses that represent 10 per cent of the US Episcopal Church.

If Dr Williams agreed to provide alternative oversight and the entire American Anglican Network followed, there would be two Anglican Churches within the US. Both would be in communion with the Archbishop of Canterbury, although not with each other. […] [My ellipses substitutions, additions, and emphasis]

Read the whole article, including the time line at the end.

Sore Losers: Sign of U.S. Moral Decay?

Back in the days of yesteryear, the Boy's Club of Trinity Episcopal Church in Bethlehem, Pennsylvania, had a motto:

Lose with a winning smile.

But, today, for our cultural elites "winners and losers" have become "oppressors and victims".

So the (Anglican) Episcopal Church USA, having been "victimized" by criticism from the tradition-oriented worldwide Anglican majority, responds to their "oppressors" (mostly Africans and Asians, actually) by the "in your face" selection of a woman as their Presiding Bishop. (See Delphi Adult Christian Forum thread 98726: Episcopal Train Wreck Ahead .)

And in the sports-winners-oriented state (and onetime independent nation) of Texas, which in yesteryear had the motto:

A good little man can beat a good big man anytime, if he is in the right, and he keeps a' coming.

(Both mottoes are echoes of Gospel Truth: the God-given Faith of the Born Again in the ultimately beneficial provision of a Sovereign God to His children and their persistent God-given Faith in the Eternal Salvation of His chosen ones.

(Those are, by far, the best reasons to keep smiling and persisting. Full disclosure: it was a probably non-Christian friend who first gave me the nickname: "Smiling Jim". She could not understand, I believe, why an obviously defective person like myself should be always smiling.)

Now, in Texas, a new level of hysterical response to alleged National Basketball League "oppression" of an allegedly "victimized" Dallas, Texas, team has been attained.

From a MiamiHerald.com article, Official [cover-up]? Conspiracy theories no excuse for Dallas:

Posted on Tue, Jun. 20, 2006 [/] Official [cover-up]? Conspiracy theories no excuse for Dallas [/] gcote@MiamiHerald.com

[…] There was [the Dallas, Texas, Mavericks owner], whose billions can buy just about anything but a mortal slump by D-Wade, careening onto the court in a blue Jerry Stackhouse jersey after the final buzzer, screaming profanely at referee Joe DeRosa.

[The Dallas Mavericks owner] then turned to [National Basketball League Commissioner David] Stern and other NBA officials who were seated at the scorer's table and was overheard to shout venomously in the jubilant din, "[Bleep] you! [Bleep] you! Your league is rigged!''

MAVS COME UNHINGED [/] That was just after The Incredible Shrinking Dirk Nowitzki -- who began the series as a 7-foot [Dallas] superstar but has seen the series turn him into his own bobblehead doll -- punted the basketball up into the 300-level seats after the buzzer and marauded off the court, slamming a water cooler and kicking a stationary bicycle in the hallway en route to the visitors' dressing room.

A bit after that is when [Dallas] coach Avery Johnson conducted a news conference that, if it were any stranger, might have seen him restrained and fitted with a straitjacket by men in White Hot coats.

[…] [The Dallas coach's] performance seemed applicable to the phrase ''cracking under pressure'' to a degree that left you worried the coach was going to suddenly split in two, like a coconut that met a machete. […] [My ellipses, substitutions, and emphasis]

The Bible in Basic English

Thanks for using the Bible in Basic English and for providing a link to the chapter to provide easy access to context.

Both the Bible in Basic English and Basic English itself are too much neglected treasures that can provide information in what is correct English to those whose knowledge of the language is limited. Like many of those here and abroad with access to the web today.

What many do not realize is that the Bible in Basic English is direct translation from the Greek and Hebrew by highly qualified scholars. Basic English is the product of a linguistic genius. It is both a subset of English with a limited vocabulary and word senses. And a complete language in its own right, capable of transmitting quite precise meanings in a wordy and sometimes clumsy way.

For the skilled speaker of English, the Bible in Basic English provides a way to speed read while retaining most of the thought.

For children, I prefer the New Life Study Testament. Making the language simple as in Basic English does not bring concepts learned later in life to a child's understanding. And copious study helps are a significant advantage.

Episcopal Train Wreck Ahead

The "in your face" election of the Bishop of Nevada as Presiding Bishop of the Episcopal Church, USA, brings the collision closer and makes it almost inevitable.

Separation from the worldwide Anglican Communion and massive loss of membership seems very likely.

From a Telegraph.co.uk [London] article, Anglican crisis as woman leads US Church:

Anglican crisis as woman leads US Church [/] By Jonathan Petre, Religion Correspondent, in Columbus, Ohio [/] (Filed: 19/06/2006)

A woman was last night elected as the first female leader of the American branch of Anglicanism in a historic but divisive development that could hasten the break-up of the worldwide Church.

The Bishop of Nevada, the Rt Rev Katharine Jefferts Schori, who is a leading liberal on homosexuality, is the first women primate in the history of Anglicanism.

Her role as Presiding Bishop is the equivalent of the Archbishop of Canterbury.

Her surprise election was greeted with whoops of joy by pro-women campaigners at the General Convention of the Episcopal Church, where she was chosen by her fellow bishops in four hours of voting.

But conservatives predicted that she would lead the Episcopal Church further along its liberal path on issues such as homosexuality, and her election will dismay traditionalists opposed to women priests.

One leading traditionalist, the Bishop of Fort Worth, the Rt Rev Jack Iker, said: "She will be the only woman among 38 primates [(primates are the national heads or chief bishops in episcoply organized denominations or communions)] and the majority of them do not even recognise women bishops. This is going to be very difficult for the Archbishop of Canterbury."

Her election followed a warning by one of the Church of England's senior bishops yesterday that efforts to prevent a schism in worldwide Anglicanism were now futile as it had become "two religions".

In an outspoken interview with The Daily Telegraph, the Bishop of Rochester, the Rt Rev Michael Nazir-Ali, said that divisions between liberals and conservatives were so profound that a compromise was no longer possible.

He increased the pressure on the Archbishop of Canterbury, Dr Rowan Williams, to take firm action against the liberal American leadership.

"Anglicans are used to fudging things sometimes, but I think this is a matter of such seriousness that fudge won't do," said Bishop Nazir-Ali.

"Sometimes you have to recognise that there are two irreconcilable positions and you have to choose between them.

"The right choice is in line with the Bible and the Church's teaching down the ages, not some new-fangled religion we have invented to respond to the 21st century.

"My fear is that the Church of England has made a number of moves in the liberal, Protestant direction. That gives me concerns that the Bible will become less important and that the Church is moving away from its traditional Catholic order.

"If you move in that direction you become a kind of options Church, where you live by preferences."

The Pakistan-born evangelical bishop has the ear of powerful conservative leaders in Africa and Asia and his comments at the convention, in Columbus, Ohio, will be a blow to Dr Williams, who has expended much energy holding the warring factions together.

But they will be welcomed by those who fear that Dr Williams will do everything he can to avoid expelling the liberal Americans from the worldwide Communion. Bishop Nazir-Ali suggested that the US Church was already beyond the pale, irrespective of how it voted on resolutions designed to test whether it was prepared to dilute its liberal agenda.

He said an unconnected decision by its House of Bishops on Friday to back civil if not religious marriages for gay couples was so significant it made issues such as gay bishops "an interesting footnote".

The [US] Church has been given until the end of the convention on Wednesday to toe the conservative line on homosexuality or face expulsion.

It has been asked to express regret for defying the official policy of the 75-million strong Communion by consecrating Gene Robinson as the first openly gay bishop in 2003. It has also been asked to impose a moratorium on public blessings of same-sex "marriages".

But Bishop Nazir-Ali said that, whatever the outcome, the Americans had already become detached from the roots of Anglicanism.

"Nobody wants a split, but if you think you have virtually two religions in a single Church something has got to give sometime," he said.

He suggested the point of no return had been passed, and effectively challenged Dr Williams to recognise the fact. [My ellipses and emphasis]