Loose Canon Archive: January 2005

We Are the World--Yuck
January 25, 2005 | 4:00 p.m.

Loose Canon was no less touched by the plight of tsunami victims than any normal human being--but the showy compassion of celebrities quickly palled. We are the world and we are wonderful--that sort of stuff. In a fine piece on "gesture politics" in Sunday's New York Times, Christopher Caldwell, who usually hangs his chapeau at the Weekly Standard, reveals how confusing and often empty public displays of compassion can be:

"The world's governments, churches and even terrorist-affiliated groups have thrown themselves into the tsunami relief effort. You would expect that passing judgment about which kinds of aid and which modes of delivery work best would be a complicated matter.

"But you would be wrong. In Europe, at least, the public has separated the heroes from the scoundrels with a simple yardstick -- lost vacation time. Chancellor Gerhard Schroder of Germany stands among the winners. He rushed back from a post-Christmas vacation in his native Lower Saxony to set up a crisis center in Berlin, and has since been a whirlwind of activity, pledging more than half a billion dollars in aid and devoting his New Year's address to the disaster.

"Prime Minister Tony Blair of Britain, who chose not to cut short his own vacation in Egypt, finds himself cast as the arch-goat. Blair's government was quite active during the days that followed the tsunami. But even though Britain has offered substantial assistance to the wave-damaged region, that is somehow insufficient. For the past month, the British news media have savaged their prime minister for his 'colossal act of disrespect.' According to an editorial in The Independent, 'Blair has failed to grasp the essence of leadership.'

"If that accusation is fair, then the essence of leadership has changed into something that is less and less about significant undertakings and more and more about dramatic stunts. ..."

Is There a V-Chip?
January 25, 2005 | 4:00 p.m.

USA Today reports that Rolling Stone magazine has switched and will run a Bible ad it previously rejected:

The ad, which will run unchanged in mid-February, doesn't mention God. But it describes the Bible as 'real truth' and carries the new translation's slogan: 'Timeless truth: Today's language.'"

And the Oscar for the Worst Movie Goes to...
January 25, 2005 | 4:00 p.m.

One of the worst movies I've seen in a long time has been nominated for best picture--yep, "Million Dollar Baby," "a brutal euthanasia film slyly billed as romance by sympathetic critics," has been nominated for best picture. Also nominated in this category is the delightful "Finding Neverland," the life-affirming story of J.M. Barrie's friendship with the family that inspired Peter Pan and his realm of fantasy.

Why didn't Michael Moore's "Fahrenheit 9/11" get a nomination? My guess is that Hollywood is trying to cool it. They don't want normal folks to realize they inhabit another planet. The nihilism of MDB is not apparent to many denizens of tinsel town or others who aspire to be chic. Despite the evidence to the contrary, they find this perverse film positively uplifting. FYI: Instapundit has an alternative theory on the Moore shut-out: "I think some people are unhappy with him for giving the election to Bush."

The Associated Press further reports:

"Also nominated for the best-actress Oscar were Catalina Sandino Moreno as a Colombian woman imperiled when she signs on to smuggle heroin in 'Maria Full of Grace'; Imelda Staunton as a saintly housekeeper in 1950s Britain who performs illegal abortions on the side in 'Vera Drake'; and Kate Winslet as a woman who has had memories of her ex-boyfriend erased in 'Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind.'"

Let's see, I count one drug smuggler and an abortionist (though one of my favorite movie critics, Jim Bowman, hails "Vera Drake" as a worthy movie.)

The Associated Press also reports:

"Mel Gibson's religious blockbuster 'The Passion of the Christ' missed out on main categories, but did pick up nominations for cinematography, makeup and original score."

I understand it has an interesting plot, too.

Why Nicole Kidman Will Never Play Flannery O'Connor
January 25, 2005 | 4:00 p.m.

Flannery O'Conner was weird. So why hasn't she made it into the pantheon of chic writers? Catholic blogger and National Catholic Register columnist Kathy Shaidle answers the question:

"The influence of Flannery O'Connor's (1925-1964) small oeuvre of bizarre, violent 'Southern Gothic' fiction (a term she loathed) is wide-ranging and uneven: think of Slingblade, The Cramps, Wild at Heart, John Waters, Raising Arizona, The Texas Chainsaw Massacre, Diane Arbus, Quentin Tarantino and the white Northern hipster's condescending fascination with Elvis, 'outsider art', televangelists and triple-named serial killers. For better or worse, all are hard to imagine without the example of Wise Blood or 'Everything that Rises Must Converge.'

"Yet biographies of O'Connor are as 'hard to find' as her titular 'good man.' Unlike literary icons Sylvia Plath and Virginia Woolf, O'Connor didn't live a dissolute, suicidal existence of madness and adultery. She was sane and sober, lived with her mother and died a virgin--of an unglamourous disease at that.

"Nicole Kidman or Gwenyth Paltrow won't be playing O'Connor in a big budget Hollywood biopic."

And then, notes Shaidle, there was her Catholicism...

Don't Be Sashy with Cardinal Arinze!

January 25, 2005 | 4:00 p.m.

Cardinal Arinze--whom Loose Canon is seriously considering nominating for pope--is having a feud with an American Archbishop who has publicly claimed that the cardinal told him it was okay to give communion to those who show up wearing sashes that proclaim their opposition to the Church's teaching on homosexuality.

In a letter sent to a columnist named Barbara Kralis, Arinze says 'taint so:

"Dear Ms. Kralis, His Eminence, Francis Cardinal Arinze, asks me to thank you for your communication regarding a news release from the 'Catholic News Service' dated December 14, 2004. It concerns the Cardinal's private discussion with the Archbishop of St. Paul and Minneapolis, His Excellency Archbishop Harry J. Flynn.

"Cardinal Arinze wants you to know that the report was not exact and does not show his stand. He has written Archbishop Flynn about it.

"Rainbow Sash wearers, the Cardinal says, are showing their opposition to Church teaching on a major issue of natural law and so disqualify themselves from being given Holy Communion.

"I wish you a happy New Year. Sincerely."

And a happy reign--oops! I mean New Year--to you, Eminenza.

(Many thanks to Catholic World News for posting this story.)

Can Larry Summers Really Say That?
January 24, 2005 | 5:20 p.m.

Did you harbor illusions that the groves of academe allow free inquiry? Surely you put away this fantasy when you heard the squawks that greeted Harvard President Lawrence H. Summers' remark that there may--repeat: may--be "innate" differences between men and women with regard to math and science talent.

The National Organization for Women is calling for Summers' resignation. But was what he said so bad?

Andrew Sullivan, who has the best piece on simmering Summers so far, thinks not:

"Women make up 35% of the faculty in US higher education (and a majority of students). But they make up only 20% of top positions in science. Summers prefaced his remarks by saying they were designed to provoke. [Summers] spoke of the fact that some women might prefer to spend critical research years bringing up children.

"Then he made the mistake of pointing to some interesting research by the University of Michigan sociologist Yu Xie and his University of California-Davis colleague Kimberlee A Shauman. Their hypothesis was that in science tests the median score for men and women was roughly the same. But for some reason men were disproportionately represented at the very bottom and the very top of the table.

"Or, as the Harvard Crimson reported: 'There are more men who are at the top and more men who are utter failures.'

"One possible explanation for this is genetics. Summers raised the possibility that this might have something to do with male preponderance at the very top of research science. And he immediately added: 'I'd like to be proven wrong on this one.'"

If this does turn out to be the case, it doesn't mean that Madame Curie should have been chased out of her lab--it simply means that a smaller percentage of women than men are interested in pursuing a scientific career.

To our credit, we are rendered uncomfortable by the notion that some people are smarter than others. Sullivan makes a very important point about about this:

"[T]here is a distinction between moral and political equality for all - the bedrock of a liberal society - and unavoidable natural inequalities between human beings and, in a few narrow areas, between social groups. This cannot and should not mean that any individual should be prejudged or denied opportunity. But it does mean that some imbalances in certain professions may not be entirely a function of prejudice or bigotry."

Loose Canon was pleased to note that some of the feminist reaction to Summers' statement was pilloried (particularly hilariously by Jonah Goldberg). Perhaps this is a welcome sign that the PC is losing its grip.

Life Goes On
January 24, 2005 | 5:20 p.m.

Perhaps it was the inaugural festivities or the cold, but the March for Life seemed to come and go this year. But here's a piece from a London newspaper about a baby girl whom doctors deemed too defective to live. She refused to die:

"A premature baby that the High Court ruled should be left to die by hospital doctors has survived against the odds. So remarkable is the little girl's progress that lawyers for her parents will this week go to court and ask for the ruling to be lifted.

"Charlotte Wyatt, who weighed just 1 lb when she was born prematurely, was given only months to live after a hospital won the legal right last autumn not to resuscitate her if she stopped breathing.

"Doctors secured the ruling, against the wishes of Charlotte's parents, on the grounds that she was brain-damaged and it was in the baby's own interests not to be resuscitated since it would prolong her suffering and would be 'purposeless'.

"Doctors expected that Charlotte, now 15 months old, would succumb to an infection that would prove fatal without emergency intervention. However, she has survived 3½ winter months since the ruling; there is also evidence that her breathing is becoming stronger and she is less dependent on an oxygen supply - an improvement confirmed by hospital sources. The family claims she has some sight and can hear clapping."

Don't Call Me Mister
January 24, 2005 | 5:20 p.m.

Loose Canon has already expressed fascination with "Road Less Traveled" psychiatrist M. Scott Peck's use of exorcism. The interest is coupled with a fear that nobody should be performing exorcisms except under the auspices of the Church.

But a Christianity Today review of Peck's new book, "Glimpses of the Devil," notes that...

"Peck criticizes the Roman Catholic Church's formal screening criteria for exorcisms because they focus too tightly on supernatural signs. Though strange things happened during Peck's exorcisms, what tipped him off to the patients' possession were subtle aspects of their behavior that could not be accounted for by standard psychological mechanisms."

Peck does use words from the Christian baptismal ritual and the Eucharist (I imagine it's an Episcopal Eucharist) in his exorcism. I was interested in his attitude towards the Devil:

"Throughout Glimpses of the Devil, Peck treats Satan with the kind of respect a child learns to have for fire. Nevertheless, Peck doesn't inflate the importance of Satan and demons: Satan is the lesser spirit and its footprints in this world are less visible than God's. Satan is limited: It needs to work through human bodies. It is not all-wise, and can be tricked by appealing to its vanity.

"Peck calls Satan 'it' rather than 'he,' because Satan is neither male nor female. 'Sexuality has to do with creation,' Peck explains to the patient named Jersey. 'The Devil doesn't create anything, it only destroys.'"

Catfight in the Cathedral Close
January 24, 2005 | 5:20 p.m.

Classical Anglican dubs it "Desperate Bishops Wives," but the Telegraph compares a feud over perks by wives of C of E bishops to Trollope:

"Celia McCulloch, the formidable wife of the Bishop of Manchester, is being compared to Mrs Proudie, the domineering spouse of the fictitious Bishop of Barchester, for her no-nonsense response to criticisms of her role."

Mrs. McCulloch has been accused of being bossy in her role on the Bishoprics and Cathedrals Committee, which is part of the Church Commissioners, which manages the property of the Church. Her email has found it into the prints:

"[Mrs. McCulloch] dispatched a round-robin e-mail full of indignation after being rebuked by Lydia Gladwin, the wife of the Bishop of Chelmsford, for becoming 'too close' to the Commissioners who, in the words of one Church official, 'are God when it comes to deciding the perks - palaces, cars and the like - for bishops and their wives.'

"Such is the Commissioners' authority that they decide if official residences can be enlarged or redecorated, and even whether an oven or carpet can be replaced. These powers give ample room for tensions and disagreements, particularly when one bishop and his wife are considered to have received preferential treatment."

A God-Drenched Speech?
January 21, 2005 | 5:55 p.m.

Loose Canon disagrees with Peggy Noonan, who thought that there was way too much God in George W. Bush's second inaugural address:

"It was a God-drenched speech. This president, who has been accused of giving too much attention to religious imagery and religious thought, has not let the criticism enter him. God was invoked relentlessly. 'The Author of Liberty.' 'God moves and chooses as He wills. We have confidence because freedom is the permanent hope of mankind ...the longing of the soul.'"

In an age when the words "under God" in the Pledge of Allegiance are considered offensive by many, the president did well to invoke the deity. One of the instances cited is actually quite modest--Bush is refuting the notion that he believes God has chosen the United States for some messianic purpose or that we could discern such a choosing:

"We go forward with complete confidence in the eventual triumph of freedom. Not because history runs on the wheels of inevitability; it is human choices that move events. Not because we consider ourselves a chosen nation; God moves and chooses as He wills. We have confidence because freedom is the permanent hope of mankind, the hunger in dark places, the longing of the soul."

But, as reporter Julia Duin notes, there was more God in this inaugural address that Bush's first:

"Four years ago, Mr. Bush, a born-again Methodist, had referred to God in vaguer terms as a 'higher power' and 'author'; used such words as 'democratic faith'; and referred to a saying by Mother Teresa and the parable of the good Samaritan to bolster his doctrine of 'compassionate conservatism.'

"This time, he called Americans to the kind of character necessary in wartime and according to high standards of greatness and morality set by God."

Duin goes on to note that Bush told editors of the Washington Times last week in an interview that he will continue a faith-based presidency. It was in this interview that he uttered the now-infamous words that he didn't see "how you can be president, at least from my perspective ...without a relationship with the Lord."

There was a time when an American president who claimed a relationship with God would not have been regarded as Dr. Strangelove.

W and Wilson
January 21, 2005 | 5:55 p.m.

But I have figured out what it was about the inaugural address that made me nervous--it was Wilsonian. Start with Fourteen Points and pretty soon you've got a United Nations...

New Criterion editor Roger Kimball, writing in National Review, found the speech influenced by both Woodrow Wilson and Francis Fukayama. Kimball fretted:

"In some ways, the president's speech reminded me of Francis 'end-of-history' Fukuyama. You remember his thesis: liberal democracy was bustin' out all over. Hegel was right: freedom was near the end of its necessary march through the world..."

Loose Canon Misfires: In my blog on the speech yesterday, I incorrectly attributed the authorship of one of the commentaries--James Robbins, not former Reagan speechwriter Peter Robinson, wrote the excellent column on why the speech made him nervous. I don't know what I was thinking. Mea culpa.

Valid but Vapid
January 21, 2005 | 5:55 p.m.

Loose Canon attended a beautiful Midnight Mass with relatives who belong to the Reformed Episcopal Church. It was a tiny chapel but all was done reverently, with the priest (my cousin's husband) facing the altar when talking to God.

I was warned that the Catholic church to which I repaired Christmas day would disappoint. The best that can be said of the Mass was that it was valid but vapidly celebrated. Somehow the words "And here's Mary Katherine Barker on the keyboard" just didn't strike the right note.

Oh, and where was that tabernacle (the repository of a consecrated host, the focal point of a Catholic Church)? So many of us have forgotten the purpose of a church; that is why contemporary churches are so awful.

Catesby Leigh, who frequently writes on architecture, deals with the hard-to-find tabernacle and other aspects of modern church design in today's Opinion Journal. He compares an Episcopal church with a Catholic cathedral in Milwaukee:

"The renovators retained old stained glass and architectural ornament and recycled old liturgical furnishings. But the apse now boasts nothing more than new organ casework. It looks pretty naked. The cathedral's original design allowed the main axis to integrate celebration of the Eucharist with adoration of the Real Presence. But the renovators have discarded this sound logic in order to put the 'faith community,' whose members behold one another during the 'sacred action,' in the spotlight. The new arrangement undermines the idea of worship as something focused on a reality that transcends the self."

Good Thing Nobody Believes Them Anymore
January 21, 2005 | 5:55 p.m.

Congratulations to Rather-busting Powerlineblog for finding what Jonathan Last calls "one of the most egregious bits of media bias yet recorded."

It was this item posted on ABC's web site:

"For a possible Inauguration Day story on ABC News, we are trying to find out if there any military funerals for Iraq war casualties scheduled for Thursday, Jan. 20. If you know of a funeral and whether the family might be willing to talk to ABC News, please fill out the form below:"

Powerline comments:

"Note that only the families of Iraqi war dead need apply. If a soldier died in Afghanistan, or aiding tsunami victims in Indonesia or Sri Lanka, or in a training exercise, never mind. That isn't the 'balance' ABC is looking for."

I noticed the story on ABC last night, but having to report on the inaugural festivities made Peter Jennings look as if he were attending his own funeral.

Toon Fan
January 21, 2005 | 5:55 p.m.

Loose Canon had never heard of Peter Toon, an Anglican clergyman, until linking to a piece by him the other day. But now I'm a Toon fan. I loved his remarks on dying as a baptized believer. Like most believers, I love the part about eternal life but worry about repentance.

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