Martin Meenagh blog

Just You Wait, PanaMcCainiac

I've just watched Barack Obama's presidential-class pick lay into his Panamanian-born opponent as only an old-time Irish, catholic, socially just, security minded man of the people can. It's Fulton J. Balboa time in Springfield, as far as I can see. I look forward to a Truman-style campaign against PanaMcCainiac and whatever plutocratic tool, put forward by big lobbies to complete the fall of the modern Rome, whom he chooses to assault the republic alongside.

All blogs posted from this site will, of course, remain completely impartial. I have Republican friends. They don't like the Republican ticket either, as far as I can tell, and it's only half-full as I write. Corriere della sera seems to have run with the embargoed story that PanaMcCainiac has picked Mitt Romney, though my pidgin Italian may be mistaken.

PanaMcainiac and Moonchild McSquillionaire. He may be McCain--but are they able?

Here, a propos of nothing, is an old video from a master communicator, Bishop Fulton J. Sheen, in the tradition of Archbishop John Hughes. In it, he tells a very tall story about how God delivered a young woman to his hotel room, and saved her from a busload of Dutch atheists who drove off a bridge. He also alludes to the purchase of souls with a life-sacrifice, which, frankly, is not Catholic doctrine. Tangentially, this story formed part of his lifelong campaign against psychoanalysis and psychiatry.

Constantine or Theodosius, I forget which, once missed the point of contemplating the cross by noting how much he would like to avenge Jesus by killing everyone associated with his crucifixion. In that oecumnical spirit, watch this video, build up your holy points, then return to watch Joe Biden knock seven forms of bejeesus out of John McCain.

Comments

Popular posts from this blog

William Orpen There are four major Christian traditions, which are of course Catholic, Orthodox, Armenian and Coptic. Some sects and cults also exist, like the Moonies or Anglicanism. Yet in some bizarre way this weekend, protestant contributions to something other than the seizure of churches have been making their way into my consciousness. I suppose that the first indication of this trend was a reflection in an old copy of Gibbon that he actually became cultured because of Calvinism. Packed off to Switzerland because he went Catholic at an otherwise boring Oxford, Gibbon fell in love with Suzanne Cuchod, and with Greek because of instruction from a Calvinist mentor. It's an odd thing--I keep coming across indications of Calvinists who could have fun, though they doubtless thought that they would pay for it later, and whose political intelligence was second to none. Althusius springs to mind, for instance. But then what am I thinking, I thought to myself? I've sat on balconi...

Dublin's New Land War There are some lessons for free market ideologues, not the least of whom is Guido Fawkes (a blogger whose posts I like a great deal), in what is happening in Ireland. You'll recall that NAMA plan . It was a plan to set up a National Asset Management Authority, a bit like McCain's 'toxic bank scheme' in 2008. The idea is that the state could buy, transfer and underwrite toxic mortgages, and move those assets to a new body. The banks would also support the new body minimally, leaving themselves free to lend and to rebuild their balance sheets without being nationalised. State payments for the new assets would move money to the banks, and put a floor under losses. Many of those who hate and despise the idea of government actually asserting control over things it pays for liked this idea. It was contrasted to Gordon Brown's 'cash for shares' deal, and to Barack Obama's 'subsidy plus levy' plans. When accompanied by a bank-f...

The Latest Encyclical of Pope Benedict XVI My fiancee has just excitedly told me that the man she refers to as 'Pope Benny' (well, she is Italian-American) has published a new encyclical to 'the Christian People of Europe'. It is on the theme of hope (his last was on love) and, though as dense as one would expect from the world's leading public intellectuals it appears to be a major disquisition on love and hope, and the link of Jewish people and Israel to those themes. It's been ages since anyone dared do that in politics. I think Martin Luther King and Robert Kennedy were the last, and the media would laugh at anyone who tried it now. We need more of it.