progressive involvement

On Allen Fieldhouse as home court advantage

"It's so loud," said (Missouri guard Michael) Dixon, who scored 17 points for Missouri. "When they scored a basket, it felt like they scored 10 baskets."

Beware the Phog

The sound level at (Phog) Allen Fieldhouse hit 120.2 decibels today, roughly the sound of a 727 taking off.

Jayhawk surge nips Missouri in OT

Great players get it done at crunch-time.  Over the final eight minutes or so of regulation and overtime, Thomas Robinson and Tyshawn Taylor put the team on their back and KU gutted out a wrenching victory against Missouri.  The win gives the Jayhawks at least a tie for the Big 12 championship, their 8th straight.

MU went up 19 about four minutes into the second half, and I started thinking about playing with the cat, or maybe straightening out the sock drawer.  Then chipaway, chipaway, chipaway, and, before you know it, they're down only 3 with 3 minutes to play.  Robinson was a monster inside, and Tyshawn made the two biggest free throws of his life.  

 

Newt Gingrich says he has a plan for civil service reform that would save $500 billion per year

Which is pretty amazing considering that the entire federal payroll is $433 billion.

Methinks thou dost protest too much

Rick Santorum must have read one too many Frank Peretti novels.  In Peretti's books, the Eee-vil One is usually an academic and a liberal who is ultimately defeated by a devout sweater-vested evangelical.

Santorum appears to be living in a Peretti-style Bizarro-World.  According to Santorum, President Obama is not in denial about climate change, which makes him an earth-worshipping radical environmentalist--and he used to be a member of the liberal United Church of Christ.  What more do you need to know?  The man is in league with the devil!

That was nutty enough, but someone found this little gem today.  Said Santorum in 2008: 

“Woodstock is the great American orgy. This is who the Democratic Party has become. They have become the party of Woodstock. The prey upon our most basic primal lusts, and that’s sex. And the whole abortion culture, it’s not about life. It’s about sexual freedom. That’s what it’s about. Homosexuality. It’s about sexual freedom.”

This reminds me of a conversation I had with an evangelical pastor in the spring of 2004, and a subsequent conversation that was reported to me regarding the same individual.  Literally within seconds of meeting this guy, he smiled a spooky smile and began talking about sex-trafficing in Asia.  This is a legitimate issue, but generally not one you smile about or bring up right off the bat with a person you've just met.

When this same individual found out that I was a delegate to the Democratic National Convention in 2004, he later said to a common friend, "Do you know what these people do there?"

So I was pretty hyped up at the possibility of going to a real-live orgy, but this was Boston, 2004, and the Bostonians have apparently never gotten over their puritanical past.  I searched high and low for an orgy and the best I could do was that one of John Kerry's step-sons flirted with my wife.  This was disappointing.  These are Democrats, after all.  He should be flirting with me.

Alas, then in 2008, I signed up for the Orgy Caucus at the Denver convention, but it didn't meet even one time.  I was forced to walk up and down the 16th Street Mall asking perfect strangers where the orgy was, but got no help at all until I ran into a member of the Fred Phelps family who told me where to go--or better, where I was going to go--but not where to go for the orgy. 

The upshot was that I'd been to two national conventions of the libertine party, and never once even met a single libertine.  I was forced to this incontrovertible truth:  The Democrats ain't sexy.  To their credit, however, at least they don't obsess about it.

It made me appreciate the truth of Martin Luther's remark:  "I'd rather be governed by a smart Earth-worshipping liberal than a dumb altar boy culture-warrior."

The "best construction"

Luther's explanation of the 8th commandment encourages us not only not to bear false witness against our neighbor but also to defend our neighbor, speak well of them, and "put the best construction on everything".

The respective press offices of the Lutheran Church - Missouri Synod (LCMS) and the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America (ELCA) did just that.

The two sides met February 8 in Chicago to discuss the LCMS's ending of their cooperative ministries with the ELCA.  They're opting out because the ELCA approved partnered gays in the ministry.

At their 2010 convention, the LCMS passed a wordy 15-page document--"Principles for Cooperation in Externals with Theological Integrity"--which basically asserts that the ELCA is so far gone down the road of perdition that good self-respecting people can no longer find any way of doing good with them. 

How did the respective head offices spin the recent meeting?  LCMS:  "LCMS, ELCA reps discuss cooperation."  ELCA:  "ELCA and Missouri Synod leaders continue conversations together."

 

Photo:  ELCA News Service

Lectionary blogging: Mark 1: 9-15

In those days Jesus came from Nazareth of Galilee and was baptized by John in the Jordan. ¹⁰And just as he was coming up out of the water, he saw the heavens torn apart and the Spirit descending like a dove on him. ¹¹And a voice came from heaven, ‘You are my Son, the Beloved; with you I am well pleased.’

12 And the Spirit immediately drove him out into the wilderness.¹³He was in the wilderness for forty days, tempted by Satan; and he was with the wild beasts; and the angels waited on him.

14 Now after John was arrested, Jesus came to Galilee, proclaiming the good news of God, ¹⁵and saying, ‘The time is fulfilled, and the kingdom of God has come near; repent, and believe in the good news.

Translation:  And it happened in those days, Jesus from Nazareth of Galilee, and he was baptized into the Jordan by John.  And immediately, rising up out of the water, he saw the heavens being split open and the Spirit, like a dove, descending into him.  And a voice happened out of the heavens, "You are my son, the beloved.  In you, I am pleased."

And immediately, the Spirit threw him out into the wilderness.  And he was in the wilderness forty days, tempted by Satan, and he was with the wild beasts, and the angels served him.

But after John was delivered over, Jesus came into Galilee, proclaiming the good news of God, and saying, "The time has been fulfilled, and the kingdom of God has come near.  Turn and trust in the good news."

Ranking the First Ladies

The First Ladies of my lifetime have been Bess Truman, Mamie Eisenhower, Jackie Kennedy, Lady Bird Johnson, Pat Nixon, Betty Ford, Nancy Reagan, Barbara Bush, Hillary Clinton, Laura Bush, and Michelle Obama.  

I like Hillary the best, of course, and Jackie Kennedy second, but my other favorites might surprise my friends.

I have a high regard for Pat Nixon and Nancy Reagan.  Pat Nixon put up with more than any woman should have to, and she did it with grace and class.  Nancy Reagan was an astute politician who put the interests of her husband over ideology. 

Laura Bush seems like a nice person, but I never cared for her mother-in-law.

Ranking the presidents

The presidents of my lifetime have been Truman, Eisenhower, Kennedy, Johnson, Nixon, Ford, Carter, Reagan, G.H.W. Bush, Clinton, G.W. Bush, and Obama.  

Leaving off Truman and Obama--the former because I was 2 years old when he left office, and the latter because he's still in office, I'd rank them thus, from worst to best:  Nixon, Reagan, G.W. Bush, Ford, G.H.W. Bush, Carter, Eisenhower, Johnson, Kennedy, Clinton.

I ranked Nixon last because of his general malignity and noxiousness.  That said, he was actually one of the more interesting people on this list.  Who could ever figure out Dick?  Best books on Nixon:  Nixon Agonistes, by Garry Wills, and Nixonland, by Rick Perlstein.

Reagan has had a more pernicious long-term effect than Nixon, though the Reagan that is invoked today often seems to refer to someone other than him.  The real Reagan was conservative, yes, but would be considered a liberal in today's GOP.  I've not read a biography on Reagan for two reasons:  (1)  the ones available are hagiography, not biography, and (2) I just don't find him a very interesting person.

Ford, G.H.W. Bush, and Carter are in the next rank.  They all share a measure of G.H.W. Bush's "prudence."  We'd be in better shape today if we'd pursued Carter's energy policies, and the Egypt-Israel peace accord engineered by Carter is the most successful middle east accord in modern times.

Ike is "near great," in my view.  He handled various foreign crises without hysteria.  This is a major achievement in American politics.  He also attempted to steer his party into the mainstream.  If the GOP today used Eisenhower as their model, they'd be more successful.

Kennedy and Johnson should both get credit for some of the signal achievements of American government--NASA, Peace Corps, Medicare, Medicaid, civil rights, voting rights--and that's for starters.  The Great Society and the War on Poverty worked.  

In addition, Kennedy led the USA through the most dangerous chapter of the cold war, the Cuban missile crisis, and he did it by ignoring the nuts in his own military.  Most recent scholarship on Kennedy says that he was planning to get out of Vietnam.  

Kennedy has become an icon, but Clinton gets the top notch in my own personal estimation.  The Clinton administration featured the longest period of prosperity in the nation's history.  People had jobs and money in their pockets.  Construction cranes dotted the topography of our cities.  Life was good during the Clinton administration.

 

 

Otagosh has a fine piece on canon development

Here.  Teaser:

The canon of the Bible, then, did not drop out of the heavens one day, fully formed and divided tidily into proof texts. A basic knowledge of the process of canonization ensures that any concept of inerrancy is untenable, a weakness of those who have (to quote Luther) "swallowed the Holy Spirit feathers and all".

Even today, there is clearly no single Christian canon of scripture, and in fact there never has been.

UPDATE:  And see Brant Clements on the distinction between believing in God and believing that evolution is true.  

1000

Jayhawks notch their 1000th conference victory, the first college program in the nation to reach that milestone.  Jayhawks 83, Texas Tech Red Raiders 50.

50 years ago

 

Big government perverts

Talk about intrusive government.  The Virginia legislature has passed a bill saying that women who want to get an abortion must first have a "transvaginal ultrasound."  The ultrasound is medically unnecessary except for all but a few cases, which means that women have to get their bodies invaded for no good reason at all, except to humiliate them for having sex in the first place.

The idea is to get a picture of the fetus so it can be waved in the woman's face in order to deter her from getting an abortion, an approach which, incidentally, almost never results in the woman changing her mind about the abortion.

Why is it that the very people who rail against "big government" love, love, love the use of government power to shame and humiliate people for having sex?  

Let's call it what it is:  sadism.  Worse, not only are these sadists in denial about their own perversion and cruelty, they actually think they're swell people doing the Lord's work!  What is it about male-dominated heirarchies that generates the toxic mixture of self-righteous posturing and cruelty to women?

Young Kennedy starts with a lead

 

Esteemed Catholic, who knows what he's talking about, begs to differ

Garry Wills, one of the nation's most prominent historians, and also one of the nation's most prominent Roman Catholics, slices and dices the bishops in a blog post at the New York Review of Books.  Here's what he had to say about the phony "religious freedom" argument:

The bishops’ opposition to contraception is not an argument for a “conscience exemption.” It is a way of imposing Catholic requirements on non-Catholics. This is religious dictatorship, not religious freedom.

Contraception is not even a religious matter. Nowhere in Scripture or the Creed is it forbidden. Catholic authorities themselves say it is a matter of “natural law,” over which natural reason is the arbiter—and natural reason, even for Catholics, has long rejected the idea that contraception is evil.

That's merely a teaser.  Read the whole thing.

 

Krister Stendahl's three principles for interfaith relationships

Forrest Wickman has an article at slate.com that explores the question:  "How do you get on the Mormon's 'do not baptize' list?"  (Short answer:  You can't, unless you're a holocaust victim.)

In the course of exploring the question, Wickman noted the views of the late Krister Stendahl, former bishop of Sweden.  When a Mormon temple was erected in Stockholm in the 1980's, Stendahl was asked for his reaction.

The Lutheran bishop called a press conference and held it in an LDS stake center. There, he outlined for the Swedish press three principles that should govern discussions of the religious beliefs of other people:

1. If you want to know what others believe, ask them. Don't ask their critics or enemies.

2. Compare your best with their best, not their worst with your best.

3. Always leave room for "holy envy."

 

In other words, they could approve it if they wanted to, but they clearly don't want to

David Gibson parses the bishops' argument on payment for contraception, and finds that their current logic does not match their past logic.  

They've found ways to "cooperate with evil" before, such as when Catholics vote for a pro-choice candidate because of considerations other than their position on abortion.  In such a case, "remote material cooperation" may be permissable, or so said then-Cardinal Ratzinger in 2004.

There is also a second distinction--"mediate" versus "immediate."  "Immediate"--paying directly for contraception--would be worse than "mediate", which is somehow participating, in some distanced way, from enabling contraception.  (The HHS compromise is nothing if not "mediate.")

"Mediate" participation in (whatever they may call) "evil" also happens all the time with investment portfolios.  It also happens when ordinary people pay taxes for government policies they don't like.

See Gibson for more detail.  Meanwhile, this sums it up nicely:

"This is Moral Theology 101," said one moral theologian who, like several others interviewed, spoke on condition of anonymity for fear of angering the hierarchy on such a sensitive topic.

"I do not think the bishops and their advisers have thought all the way through the entire bundle of values at stake," said another. "The bishops do not seem to be able to take yes for an answer."