The close votes on recent major legislation have underscored once again how critical it was in the first year of the Obama Administration to have a filibuster proof Senate. Despite a solid, unwavering bloc of “nay” votes from the Republicans, the President was able to get a stimulus bill passed early in his term that enabled the country to avoid a deeper and more prolonged recession— perhaps, as several noted economists feared, even another Great Depression.
Likewise, he had to rely on his strong majorities in the House and Senate to ram through comprehensive health care legislation because Republicans chose to sit on the sidelines and sulk, rather than get in the game and propose reasonable alternatives. To their credit, three Republicans had the courage to break ranks and cast a vote for common sense and the public good on the financial reform bill.
In his fascinating, and instructive, book on the first year of the Obama Administration (“The Promise: President Obama, Year One”), author and national affairs analyst for Newsweek, as well as political analyst for NBC News and MSNBC, Jonathan Alter reminds us just how deeply entrenched the Republican opposition was — and is — no matter what the issue or the cause. On the stimulus package, for example, when six Republican Senators wanted to cooperate with the Democrats to get legislation passed, Senate minority leader Mitch McConnell “made it clear that any cooperation with Obama was prohibited.” House Minority Leader John Boehner was equally adamant in his opposition and the House ranks held firm for him. This despite the fact that the stimulus bill, as passed, gave middle income taxpayers the largest tax cut since the Reagan Administration.
Alter says the Republicans’ logic, from a purely selfish political point of view, made sense. If the Republicans cooperated and Obama got what he wanted, he would get all the credit. If they cooperated and he failed, they would be tagged with failure as well. But, if they didn’t cooperate and he failed, then they would be home free. Some kind of logic. The same logic applied to health care and the other legislative initiatives the President put forth. And, from all indications, it doesn’t appear the Republicans will budge in their opposition to other major legislation to be put forth by the President coming up this year, including immigration reform and energy and climate change legislation. Their agenda is clear. They are not interested in helping the White House govern the country; they simply want to make sure that Obama doesn’t succeed. Period. At least you have to give them an A+ for doggedness and clarity of purpose.
Where are the Everett Dirksens and other moderate Republicans of yesteryear, who fought hard for Republican core principles, but were willing to join with the Democrats when matters of national importance were at stake? Sadly, there are none left. They became an endangered species with the rise of Barry Goldwater and Ronald Reagan and now, because of the likes of Tom DeLay and his type, they have become virtually extinct. As a result, when Democrats gain control of the White House and Congress, as they did in 2008, they have to amass an overwhelming majority just to get anything done. That’s not what the forefathers had in mind.
It is not surprising that the electorate, which voted for change overwhelmingly in 2008, giving President Obama the largest majority for a Democratic president since Lyndon Johnson in 1964, is frustrated and is looking around for scapegoats. But, it’s ironic that they want to throw everyone out and start anew, egged on by the Tea Party with its call to “take our country back.” Back from “whom” and to “where” is not clear, but it sounds ominous coming from the likes of Sarah Palin and Rush Limbaugh.
How this will play out in November and in 2012 is still anything but clear. But, wouldn’t it make more sense for voters, frustrated with the lack of action and cooperation in Washington D.C., to target those most responsible for the stalemate? It doesn’t take much to figure out who they are if one pays scant attention to any news outlet other than Fox News and right-wing radio. As President Obama once said plaintively, “Can you imagine how much we could have accomplished with a little help from the other side?”
Gerald E. Lavey
Thursday, July 29, 2010
Maybe It’s the Hats and Dresses
Recently, in a quick visit to New York, Queen Elizabeth of England was shown on television and in news photos wearing her traditional flowery bonnet and a conservative print dress. Not surprising for a person her age – she has been Queen since 1952 – she looked matronly. But, more than that, she looked quaint. So, yesterday, as Carly Fiorina might say.
Nothing wrong with quaint. It can even be charming, as it is in the case of Elizabeth II. The monarchy in England is a mere remnant of a long-gone era, and the Queen as figurehead has played her ceremonial role impeccably for almost six decades. Today all the real power in the U.K. is vested in the Prime Minister and the Parliament. The only time we hear anything about the Queen is when one of her children is naughty and the tabloids get all breathless and atwitter.
Too bad the Vatican can’t get the flick that Elizabeth understood from the time she was crowned Queen more than a half century ago. Nothing more quaint than the Vatican — from the Pope and the Cardinals on down to many of their hand-picked bishops and archbishops throughout the world. All of them wear funny looking hats and dresses, too, but presumably they think these trappings are a sign of real power and authority, a power they are desperately clinging to in the face of growing indifference on the part of the Catholic faithful, especially in Europe and the United States.
Sadly, they are mistaken. They have become quaint and so yesterday, and they seem to be the only ones who don’t know it. Hoping to avoid a schism and hold the Church together as it was in some mythical bygone era, they don’t realize that a major schism has already occurred. The only difference these days is that dissidents no longer tack their theses on cathedral doors. They just shrug their shoulders, walk away, and get on with leading their Catholic lives as they see fit, paying scant attention to the anathemas and excommunication threats of the Vatican, cardinals, and bishops. The Vatican has largely squandered its moral authority, and virtually every week it seems to get worse. When I read about Vatican spokesmen equating the moral gravity of priestly pedophilia with ordaining women as priests, I shudder with sadness and embarrassment, wondering how these presumably educated people could become so clueless.
Perhaps the hidden grace in all this upheaval is that over the last few decades the locus of power has shifted in the Church and the laity is realizing more and more that we are the Church and we must carry out our responsibilities without looking to higher authorities for inspiration and moral guidance. Not all Church authorities, of course. Many priests and Catholic writers, for example, are serving the Catholic community extraordinarily well, but you need to shop around because from where I sit these appear to be more the exception than the rule.
Ultimately, I hope and pray that the Vatican one day wakes up, sends its funny hats, dresses, and other trappings of bygone power to the Vatican Museum, and begins to refocus its attention on the unfinished agenda of love and compassion that Jesus so clearly left in our hands.
Gerald E. Lavey
Nothing wrong with quaint. It can even be charming, as it is in the case of Elizabeth II. The monarchy in England is a mere remnant of a long-gone era, and the Queen as figurehead has played her ceremonial role impeccably for almost six decades. Today all the real power in the U.K. is vested in the Prime Minister and the Parliament. The only time we hear anything about the Queen is when one of her children is naughty and the tabloids get all breathless and atwitter.
Too bad the Vatican can’t get the flick that Elizabeth understood from the time she was crowned Queen more than a half century ago. Nothing more quaint than the Vatican — from the Pope and the Cardinals on down to many of their hand-picked bishops and archbishops throughout the world. All of them wear funny looking hats and dresses, too, but presumably they think these trappings are a sign of real power and authority, a power they are desperately clinging to in the face of growing indifference on the part of the Catholic faithful, especially in Europe and the United States.
Sadly, they are mistaken. They have become quaint and so yesterday, and they seem to be the only ones who don’t know it. Hoping to avoid a schism and hold the Church together as it was in some mythical bygone era, they don’t realize that a major schism has already occurred. The only difference these days is that dissidents no longer tack their theses on cathedral doors. They just shrug their shoulders, walk away, and get on with leading their Catholic lives as they see fit, paying scant attention to the anathemas and excommunication threats of the Vatican, cardinals, and bishops. The Vatican has largely squandered its moral authority, and virtually every week it seems to get worse. When I read about Vatican spokesmen equating the moral gravity of priestly pedophilia with ordaining women as priests, I shudder with sadness and embarrassment, wondering how these presumably educated people could become so clueless.
Perhaps the hidden grace in all this upheaval is that over the last few decades the locus of power has shifted in the Church and the laity is realizing more and more that we are the Church and we must carry out our responsibilities without looking to higher authorities for inspiration and moral guidance. Not all Church authorities, of course. Many priests and Catholic writers, for example, are serving the Catholic community extraordinarily well, but you need to shop around because from where I sit these appear to be more the exception than the rule.
Ultimately, I hope and pray that the Vatican one day wakes up, sends its funny hats, dresses, and other trappings of bygone power to the Vatican Museum, and begins to refocus its attention on the unfinished agenda of love and compassion that Jesus so clearly left in our hands.
Gerald E. Lavey
Stand By Your Man
It’s hard to get a fix on the Tea Party movement It's all over the lot. Its supporters just seem to be mad – period – and in a nasty anti-government mood. From what I can gather, the one common complaint among its diverse backers is their outrage over soaring Government spending and the growing deficit.
The irony of that is rich and abiding. In 1980 when Reagan ran on a ticket of increased defense spending, cutting taxes, and balancing the budget, he won going away. I recall my friend Tony Morris and I standing in the kitchen of a neighborhood friend who was hosting an election night party. The rest of the crowd was in the front room cheering Reagan’s victory while Tony and I, beers in hand, scratched our heads and said to each other: It’s not possible to do what Reagan promised. Of course, the math didn’t make any sense then, and it still doesn’t. Not surprisingly, Reagan ran up record deficits for the time, and we didn’t hear a peep from the Tea Party folks, who are just right-wing Republicans in new garb, that’s all.
Likewise, in 2000, George Bush fils “won” the Presidency on a platform of compassionate conservatism and promises to cut taxes. He barely “won” and proceeded to cut taxes even in the aftermath of 9/11 and in the face of two wars, asking no one but the troops to sacrifice. For the rest of us, he asked us only to go shopping. Even though he inherited a massive surplus, he managed to squander that and created massive budget deficits that in no time dwarfed Reagan’s by comparison. What’s did we hear from the Tea Party types? Not a word.
But, then, Barack Obama comes to town, inheriting the challenge of a major recession. He and the Democratically-controlled Congress enact a stimulus package that keeps the country from plunging into another Great Depression. They also pass health care legislation, which was at the core of his campaign, and which several Presidents starting with Teddy Roosevelt at the beginning of the 20th century had tried in vain to accomplish.
Health-care legislation was not just a big-spending, do-good, social program, as conservatives are alleging. Every serious economist and budget analyst of any political stripe agreed that the current health care system in America was broken and was unsustainable over time from a budget perspective. The President’s budget director, who had been head of the Congressional Budget Office, said that within a relatively short time the country would be paying so much in health care costs, Medicare and Medicaid, that it would overwhelm the Federal budget, leaving virtually nothing left for anything else, except for Defense and Homeland Security.
So, difficult as the timing was, health care reform was critical to long-term budget health and time was running out for us to continuing to kick that can down the road. Moreover, the health care legislation provides 30 million more Americans with health care, prohibits insurance companies from rejecting those with pre-existing conditions, and keeps children on their parents’ insurance plans until age 26. These are just a few of the immediate benefits with other major benefits kicking in later. All this, plus reducing the costs of insurance premiums which had become so expensive that millions of American citizens could no longer afford them. When these people got sick, they had the option of getting treatment or going bankrupt.
So, what did we hear from the Tea Party movement? Outrage – full throated outrage. Give them tax cuts, throw in a little old time religion, show a bit of the flag, and they’re content. But, ask them to sacrifice to keep the country from going off the rails and to help 30 million of their fellow citizens? Well, that’s another matter altogether. The irony is hard to miss. Here is a segment of society that is largely church-going, that professes to believe in the Bible, will fight to get prayer in the schools restored, and will be the first to join rallies against abortion and same-sex marriage. Yet, they draw the line when it comes to spending public money to help the poor and the disadvantaged in our society, conveniently forgetting that helping the poor is the greatest single moral mandate in both the Hebrew Scriptures and the New Testament. No other mandate comes even close.
I fear we are becoming a voting population of consumers rather than citizens, and both mainstream political parties are aiding and abetting the decline. The one, with perfect pitch for the worst instincts in all of us, appeals to our selfishness, resentment, and greed. The other party, timid and afraid it will lose the next election, trims its sails, distances itself from the President, and fails to speak out for the core principles that made the Democratic Party such an attractive force for good in our society and the world. If Profiles in Courage were written today, I fear it would have precious few chapters.
Gerald E. Lavey
The irony of that is rich and abiding. In 1980 when Reagan ran on a ticket of increased defense spending, cutting taxes, and balancing the budget, he won going away. I recall my friend Tony Morris and I standing in the kitchen of a neighborhood friend who was hosting an election night party. The rest of the crowd was in the front room cheering Reagan’s victory while Tony and I, beers in hand, scratched our heads and said to each other: It’s not possible to do what Reagan promised. Of course, the math didn’t make any sense then, and it still doesn’t. Not surprisingly, Reagan ran up record deficits for the time, and we didn’t hear a peep from the Tea Party folks, who are just right-wing Republicans in new garb, that’s all.
Likewise, in 2000, George Bush fils “won” the Presidency on a platform of compassionate conservatism and promises to cut taxes. He barely “won” and proceeded to cut taxes even in the aftermath of 9/11 and in the face of two wars, asking no one but the troops to sacrifice. For the rest of us, he asked us only to go shopping. Even though he inherited a massive surplus, he managed to squander that and created massive budget deficits that in no time dwarfed Reagan’s by comparison. What’s did we hear from the Tea Party types? Not a word.
But, then, Barack Obama comes to town, inheriting the challenge of a major recession. He and the Democratically-controlled Congress enact a stimulus package that keeps the country from plunging into another Great Depression. They also pass health care legislation, which was at the core of his campaign, and which several Presidents starting with Teddy Roosevelt at the beginning of the 20th century had tried in vain to accomplish.
Health-care legislation was not just a big-spending, do-good, social program, as conservatives are alleging. Every serious economist and budget analyst of any political stripe agreed that the current health care system in America was broken and was unsustainable over time from a budget perspective. The President’s budget director, who had been head of the Congressional Budget Office, said that within a relatively short time the country would be paying so much in health care costs, Medicare and Medicaid, that it would overwhelm the Federal budget, leaving virtually nothing left for anything else, except for Defense and Homeland Security.
So, difficult as the timing was, health care reform was critical to long-term budget health and time was running out for us to continuing to kick that can down the road. Moreover, the health care legislation provides 30 million more Americans with health care, prohibits insurance companies from rejecting those with pre-existing conditions, and keeps children on their parents’ insurance plans until age 26. These are just a few of the immediate benefits with other major benefits kicking in later. All this, plus reducing the costs of insurance premiums which had become so expensive that millions of American citizens could no longer afford them. When these people got sick, they had the option of getting treatment or going bankrupt.
So, what did we hear from the Tea Party movement? Outrage – full throated outrage. Give them tax cuts, throw in a little old time religion, show a bit of the flag, and they’re content. But, ask them to sacrifice to keep the country from going off the rails and to help 30 million of their fellow citizens? Well, that’s another matter altogether. The irony is hard to miss. Here is a segment of society that is largely church-going, that professes to believe in the Bible, will fight to get prayer in the schools restored, and will be the first to join rallies against abortion and same-sex marriage. Yet, they draw the line when it comes to spending public money to help the poor and the disadvantaged in our society, conveniently forgetting that helping the poor is the greatest single moral mandate in both the Hebrew Scriptures and the New Testament. No other mandate comes even close.
I fear we are becoming a voting population of consumers rather than citizens, and both mainstream political parties are aiding and abetting the decline. The one, with perfect pitch for the worst instincts in all of us, appeals to our selfishness, resentment, and greed. The other party, timid and afraid it will lose the next election, trims its sails, distances itself from the President, and fails to speak out for the core principles that made the Democratic Party such an attractive force for good in our society and the world. If Profiles in Courage were written today, I fear it would have precious few chapters.
Gerald E. Lavey
“Power Corrupts, Absolute Power Corrupts Absolutely”
This now famous phrase was coined by Lord Acton, a prominent 19th century British Catholic scholar and sometime politician, in a letter to a Catholic bishop expressing his deep concern over the Church’s doctrine of papal infallability that was adopted by the Vatican Council of 1870.
Lord Acton was dead right then, and his observation about ecclesiastical abuse of power is equally applicable today. Not necessarily in the form of ex cathedra pronouncements from the Pope or a Church council, but in the form of wrong-headed, obtuse behavior by bishops and other members of the church hierarchy, including Vatican spokesmen. Weekly, even daily, we are subjected to inane reactionary statements from Church leaders, usually in response to the priesty abuse scandal or about abortion or gay marriage, the only other two issues they seem to care about.
As a long-time practicing Catholic, I used to be embarrassed, even apologetic, by the official Church’s statements, even willing to believe press coverage often betrayed an anti-Catholic bias in American society at large, but the pathetic reaction by the hierarchy to the priestly abuse scandal changed all that. Now, I am heartened by the news media throwing the spotlight on this idiocy in hopes that the hierarchy will become embarrassed enough seeing its statements in the press to wake up. But, there’s no hope on the near horizon, as far as I can tell.
The latest episode of the Phoenix bishop underscores just how bad things have gotten. In case you missed it, check out Nicholas Kristoff’s Op Ed piece in the May 27 New York Times, which thankfully brings the situation to light for a national and international audience. Basically, the bishop excommunicated a hospital nun, Sister Margaret, because as a member of the hospital’s ethics committee, she assented to terminating the 11-week pregnancy of a woman whose life was in danger if she had continued the pregnancy. As a hospital statement reads, “This decision was made after consultation with the patient, her family, her physicians, and in consultation with the Ethics Committee.”
Why did the bishop single out the nun for “automatic excommunication” when presumably other Cathoics served on the Ethics Committee and also assented to the decision? Because he could. Pure and simple. Nuns have always been the whipping posts of the clergy, abused and treated as second-class citizens. The most recent evidence of this are the two Vatican investigations. One, called an "apostolic visitation," is looking into the quality of life" in sisters' religious communities. The other reportedly targets the Leadership Conference of Women Religious, an organization that represents 95 percent of the nation's 59,000 nuns. Both of these investigations were launched, albeit rather quietly and mysteriously, at the height of the publicity over the priestly abuse scandal.
Over the years, no single group in the Catholic Church has distinguished itself and covered itself with more honor than nuns. They are the people quietly going about the work of the Gospel, caring for sick and elderly in hospitals and nursing homes, running first-rate elementary schools in inner cities, serving the poorest of the poor in this country and around the globe.
So, the irony of this misplaced focus by the Vatican couldn’t be more breathtaking in its hypocrisy and moral obtuseness. To paraphrase General Omar Bradley: “It’s the wrong focus, at the wrong time, against the wrong enemy.” For all its presumed learning and knowledge of Ethics and Moral Theology, the Church leadership has still not learned a fundamental step toward honest self-awareness that Pogo taught us many years ago: “We have met the enemy and he is us.”
Gerald E. Lavey
Lord Acton was dead right then, and his observation about ecclesiastical abuse of power is equally applicable today. Not necessarily in the form of ex cathedra pronouncements from the Pope or a Church council, but in the form of wrong-headed, obtuse behavior by bishops and other members of the church hierarchy, including Vatican spokesmen. Weekly, even daily, we are subjected to inane reactionary statements from Church leaders, usually in response to the priesty abuse scandal or about abortion or gay marriage, the only other two issues they seem to care about.
As a long-time practicing Catholic, I used to be embarrassed, even apologetic, by the official Church’s statements, even willing to believe press coverage often betrayed an anti-Catholic bias in American society at large, but the pathetic reaction by the hierarchy to the priestly abuse scandal changed all that. Now, I am heartened by the news media throwing the spotlight on this idiocy in hopes that the hierarchy will become embarrassed enough seeing its statements in the press to wake up. But, there’s no hope on the near horizon, as far as I can tell.
The latest episode of the Phoenix bishop underscores just how bad things have gotten. In case you missed it, check out Nicholas Kristoff’s Op Ed piece in the May 27 New York Times, which thankfully brings the situation to light for a national and international audience. Basically, the bishop excommunicated a hospital nun, Sister Margaret, because as a member of the hospital’s ethics committee, she assented to terminating the 11-week pregnancy of a woman whose life was in danger if she had continued the pregnancy. As a hospital statement reads, “This decision was made after consultation with the patient, her family, her physicians, and in consultation with the Ethics Committee.”
Why did the bishop single out the nun for “automatic excommunication” when presumably other Cathoics served on the Ethics Committee and also assented to the decision? Because he could. Pure and simple. Nuns have always been the whipping posts of the clergy, abused and treated as second-class citizens. The most recent evidence of this are the two Vatican investigations. One, called an "apostolic visitation," is looking into the quality of life" in sisters' religious communities. The other reportedly targets the Leadership Conference of Women Religious, an organization that represents 95 percent of the nation's 59,000 nuns. Both of these investigations were launched, albeit rather quietly and mysteriously, at the height of the publicity over the priestly abuse scandal.
Over the years, no single group in the Catholic Church has distinguished itself and covered itself with more honor than nuns. They are the people quietly going about the work of the Gospel, caring for sick and elderly in hospitals and nursing homes, running first-rate elementary schools in inner cities, serving the poorest of the poor in this country and around the globe.
So, the irony of this misplaced focus by the Vatican couldn’t be more breathtaking in its hypocrisy and moral obtuseness. To paraphrase General Omar Bradley: “It’s the wrong focus, at the wrong time, against the wrong enemy.” For all its presumed learning and knowledge of Ethics and Moral Theology, the Church leadership has still not learned a fundamental step toward honest self-awareness that Pogo taught us many years ago: “We have met the enemy and he is us.”
Gerald E. Lavey
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)