Which is the Real Catholicism?

This post duplicates the content of a response I have posted at The Orthosphere in Alan Roebuck's thread, Roebuck's Standard Orthosphere Disclaimer --

Echoing Leo, which is the real Catholicism -- the US Conference of Catholic Bishops (as a whole) or individual bishops (such as Chaput) or the commenters here (playing at being "reactionaries")?

Here is an official statement by the US Conference of Catholic Bishops concerning (the political joke known as) "comprehensive immigration reform".

Those who refuse to admit that The One True Bureaucracy is at war with our nation, and indeed with all Western nations, will seize upon the portion I will quote first, while totally ignoring the portion I will quote second (which is the reason for the order in which I quote).

Under the heading: Catholic Social Teaching --

"The Catholic Catechism instructs the faithful that good government has two duties, both of which must be carried out and neither of which can be ignored. ...

The second duty is to secure one’s border and enforce the law for the sake of the common good. Sovereign nations have the right to enforce their laws and all persons must respect the legitimate exercise of this right: "Political authorities, for the sake of the common good for which they are responsible may make the exercise of the right to immigrate subject to various juridical conditions, especially with regard to the immigrants' duties toward their country of adoption. Immigrants are obliged to respect with gratitude the material and spiritual heritage of the country that receives them, to obey its laws and to assist in carrying civic burdens." Catholic Catechism, 2241."

That sounds so good, doesn't it? Well, unless one looks too closely at what is actually said.

Consider: "Political authorities, for the sake of the common good for which they are responsible may make the exercise of the right to immigrate subject to various juridical conditions ..." But, of course, if they may, then they may not; that is, according this quotation from the Catholic Catechism, the enforcement of the "second duty[, which] is to secure one’s border and enforce the law for the sake of the common good" is not a matter of the duty of officials to uphold the laws of their "sovereign nation", but rather is a matter of the discretion of officials whether they will uphold the laws of their "sovereign nation".

Consider: "Immigrants are obliged to respect with gratitude the material and spiritual heritage of the country that receives them ..." Really? And who is going to make this law and enforce it? Does the USCCB allow that the "political authorities" may deport immigrants who do not meet their "oblig[ation] to respect with gratitude the material and spiritual heritage of the country that receives them"?

Right!

Even in this part, which those who refuse to admit that The One True Bureaucracy is at war with our nation will seize upon, what is actually said is inimical to the interests of the citizens of the United States (and of all Western societies).


Now, for the second quote from the USCCB's stance paper --
"The Catholic Catechism instructs the faithful that good government has two duties, both of which must be carried out and neither of which can be ignored. The first duty is to welcome the foreigner out of charity and respect for the human person. Persons have the right to immigrate and thus government must accommodate this right to the greatest extent possible, especially financially blessed nations: "The more prosperous nations are obliged, to the extent they are able, to welcome the foreigner in search of the security and the means of livelihood which he cannot find in his country of origin. Public authorities should see to it that the natural right is respected that places a guest under the protection of those who receive him." Catholic Catechism, 2241."

According to the USCCB, the *first* duty of "good" government "is to welcome the foreigner out of charity and respect for the human person". According to the USCCB, the *first* duty of "good" government is not to safegaurd the security and well-being of the society of human persons over whom it asserts authority to rule, but rather it is to welcome the alien, over whom it does not assert the authority to rule, who chooses to intrude upon the society over which it does assert the authority to rule.

According to the USCCB, "[p]ersons have the right to immigrate", from which it follows that "thus government must accommodate this right to the greatest extent possible" ... and, of course, "the greatest extent possible" is throw open the borders, which happens to be precisely what the USCCB is shilling for.

But, look at that assertion again: "[p]ersons have the right to immigrate". Really? Since when?

The Founders of the US government asserted that "[p]ersons have the right to emmigrate" -- which, let it be noted, was a novel and revolutionary assertion by those who would rule over a people. But to say that "[p]ersons have the right to emmigrate" is a very different thing than to say that "[p]ersons have the right to immigrate".

Our Founders asserted that neither they nor any other set of rulers owned the human persons over whom they ruled. The Roman Denomination asserts that no existing human society (especially the ones which are "prosperous") has the right to limit, much less refuse, aliens intruding into its midst.

It's a matter of simple logic: IF "[p]ersons have the right to immigrate" -- if persons have the right to come into a society -- THEN societies have a corresponding "duty is to welcome the foreigner out of charity and respect for the human person ... to the greatest extent possible".


Further notice, this isn't *just* the damned (and I mean that word most literally) "liberals" of the USCCB -- and who happen to be the spiritual overseers of you American Catholics -- simply making these assertions; they are directly quoting the Catholic Catechism. This call to national suicide is made not just by the USCCB, but by The One True Bureaucracy as a whole.

He was not supposed to die like this

Trigger Warnings: Trevon’s Dilemma: How To Pay For School And Clothing - So far, I haven't been able to watch the video all the way through -- and it's only 2 minutes long.

[edit: the above link no longer works, as Mr Warnings has taken down his site]

This is what "liberalism" has brought us -- and it will only get worse unless the nation repents of all manner of things.

=====
Edit, after having viewed the entire video -

The video presents -- sympathetically (*) -- two entitled black women (**) as being the dead thug's sister and cousin, without identifying which is which. Neither one seems all that choked up about his death, and certainly not at all abashed at how he caused his own death (***).

(*) - Though, I do allow for the possibility that the presentation is intentionally subversive to The Narrative of leftism. At the same time, on a practical level, the clip serves yet another important leftist agenda, which is to increase hostility between the races.

(**) - Now, of course, this sense of entitlement -- I can do to you anything that I want to do, and for you so much as object, to say nothing of trying to thwart me, is a moral offence -- is the thread running through all variants of leftism. It just seems to be especially strong with black chicks.

(***) -- And if you know anything about this sort of black chick, you know that the one yammering on -- all but accusing the (black) woman who justifiably killed him of murder -- might tomorrow have murdered him herself, for no other reason than that she was angry with him about something someone else said he said.

====
Star Parker: Black Americans and Reagan Ideals -- "The civil rights movement was supposed to be about freedom. The dream, in the words of Dr. King, was "free at last, free at last, thank God almighty, we are free at last."

Then instead of it being about freedom, it became about payback. It became about government, welfare and diversity as an ideal unto itself."

Black America is stuck in spite mode; not all black Americans, of course, but more than enough to override those who are not. Black America will destroy itself just for the "pleasure" of "sticking it to the man".

Black America needs to repent of its spite, of its hatred, of its littleness, of its willingness to be used as catspaws.

Residual Christianity Syndrome

Theodore Dalrymple: Sorry Excuse

Refusing to see what's right in from of your face

William Vallicella: Does Evil Prove the Nonexistence of God? --

I'll grant you that it does if you grant me that truth, existence, order, conscience and twenty of so other phenomena prove the existence of God. And let's not leave out the moral heroism of Maximilian Kolbe.

You can reasonably ask how there could be a God given the fact of natural and moral evil. You can also reasonably ask how there could not be a God given the transcendent moral heroism and selflessness of Kolbe and others like him.

I'll grant you that evil argues the nonexistence of God if you grant me that evil also argues the existence of God. (Click on the first hyperlink and locate the argument from evil for the existence of God.)

My point is that there are no rationally compelling arguments for or against the existence of God.

Whatever it may be, it is not his *point* that "there are no rationally compelling arguments for or against the existence of God."

Consider -- "I'll grant you that evil argues the nonexistence of God if you grant me that evil also argues the existence of God."

What Vallicella is referring to here is that 'evil' is utterly meaningless if atheism is the truth about the nature of reality.

IF there is no Creator (*) -- if the world just randomly happened -- THEN there can be no "way things ought to be"; that is, there is no such thing as 'good'. AND, if there is no "way things ought to be", then there can be no violation of the "way things ought to be"; that is, there is no such thing as 'evil'.

Contrary to all the confused (when not merely dishonest) bleating of 'atheists', far from being evidence against the reality of God, the reality is evil is evidence *for* the reality of God.

Now, Vallicella does actually know this, but he will not see it and he will not acknowledge it, because he has a prior commitment to the falsehood that "there are no rationally compelling arguments for or against the existence of God."

In other words, the man is a fool.


(*) Not only must it be the case that there is some entity which may be called 'God', but this entity must be the cause of the world -- this 'God' cannot be an item in the world, but is rather "outside the world" -- this 'God' must be transcendent and immaterial and eternal. At the same time, it is not enough that 'God' be the cause of the world, 'God' must be the deliberate cause of the world -- this 'God' must be personal.

In other words, even before he can appeal to 'evil' as his rationale for denying the reality of God, the so-called atheist must make the logically prior appeal to a transcendent, eternal, immaterial and personal Creator-God.

The mask *always* slips

Recently, someone using the screenname 'justgin1978', and whom I understand to be a woman, and who calls herself(?) an 'agnostic', had inserted herself into a discussion (such as it was) that I had tried to have with a LiveJournal "friend", Jordan Bassior (who is an 'atheist' and who declines to understand what atheism means), on his Live Journal blog.

Here is the most recent response (in this case, I think "shot" is the word to use) by 'justgin1978' at me --

How's it working? It's working fine.

The only problem here is talking to you and I've been patient with you long enough.

Why don't you go join one of those theology debate websites? You'd fit right in with those goddamned hypocrites. You think you're never wrong; you think you have all knowledge, but you don't have love.

So, let's back up, and duplicate my interaction with 'justgin1978', which starts with my reaction to a claim made by Jordan Bassior about himself --

"... I am also an agnostic, in that I do not acknowledge proofs of any gods, since no valid proofs have been offered."

The truth is that you will not even examine the evidence for God.

Hell, you're so afraid of encountering even God's shadow that you *refused* to examine with me what, exactly, "an establishment of religion" means.

Now, 'justgin1978' made a response directly to my post. And, due to the way conversations (such as they are) on LiveJournal are presented, this is where it can immediately get confusing to try to follow the conversation, especially the more others add their own comments. Due to the nature of how LiveJournal presents the comments and responses to a thread, and due to my desire to present the responses 'justgin1978' and I made to one another as near as possible to the posts to which they are a response, the following is not in strict chronological order --

'justgin1978' post #1, response to the above --

We all have blind spots. We are all biased in some way and to some degree. There are things we are afraid might be true if we dare to look more closely. As someone who now considers herself an uncomfortable agnostic, that thought comforts me and terrifies me at the same time. I recall a saying that goes something like this: Man's capacity to be deceived by others is eclipsed only by his capacity to deceive himself.

Ouch.

Thoughts?

My response #1 to 'justgin1978' post #1 --

"There are things we are afraid might be true if we dare to look more closely."

I can't say that this is true of *every* person, but it certainly works as general rule of thumb.

"Man's capacity to be deceived by others is eclipsed only by his capacity to deceive himself."

Indeed.

Here is one way that I already know, and that you and Jordan himself may know, that his atheism is a self deception --

Jordan is forever making moral assertions and arguments; a great deal of what he says is meaningless without the moral premises on which he is standing.

Now, though it is true that most of the moral premises on which he is standing come from Biblical religion, it is also true that that fact doesn't mean that either Judaism or Christianity is true. However, the fact of where he is standing *ought* to motivate him to put his atheism to critical rational evaluation.

Furthermore, and here's the thing: if atheism is the truth about the nature of reality, then there *are* no true moral premises. If atheism is the truth about the nature of reality, then Jordan isn't standing even on quicksand when he makes the moral assertions and arguments he makes; he's standing on nothing. If atheism is the truth about the nature of reality, then Jordan's moral assertions and arguments -- including the assumption (and implicit assertion) that men *ought* to be rational -- have exactly as much force, and are exactly as binding on his readers, as the opposite assertions by Moslems.

'justgin1978' post #2, response to the above --

Hi!

First, please don't use my post to make potshots at Jordan. He's one of the kindest and most thoughtful atheists I know.

Second, I realize you are passionate, but your profane language doesn't help make your point, even though you have good points to make! I'm pretty sure Jesus didn't have to be bleeped out every other word during any one of his sermons, lol. I know of 2 people who are devout about not cussing, ever. Yet they do not treat people well. Both of them are "Christians", yet they neglect "the weightier matters of the law." It would be better for them to let a bad word or two slip ever so often and pay much more attention to loving thy neighbor. So I don't hold your words against you so much, but they are an unnecessary distraction that does not compliment your belief.

I agree with your thoughts about moral premises. If there is no true ultimate authority to whom we answer, then what does it ultimately matter?

My response #1 to 'justgin1978' post #2 --

"First, please don't use my post to make potshots at Jordan. He's one of the kindest and most thoughtful atheists I know."

I did no such thing.

'justgin1978' response to the above --

"Ok. What I meant is if you have something to say to Jordan, say it to him directly and leave him out of our conversation, please.

My response to the above -- keep in mind that, chronologically, this response followed many (perhaps most or even all) the exchanges duplicated below --

"say it to him directly."

And how's that working for you?

"and leave him out of our conversation"

Our conversation? As I recall, *I* commented -- based upon long experience and many interactions with him -- upon a claim Jordan made about himself, and *you* joined in the conversation, such as it was and will be, between the two of us.

And that was all it took for 'justgin1978' to let slip the mask, as seen in the quoted response at the top of this post. *My* patience with *her* (as shown below); Jordan's misrepresentations of some things I had said in the thread; his sneering, chest-pounding responses to some things I had said in the thread; and his disinclination to engage some of the things *she* had said ... well, none of that matters!

My question to her, "And how's that working for you?" is a reference to her quite lengthy back-and-forth with Jordan, much of it before I was even aware of her first response to me, and some of it, from his direction, being of the character she falsely attributes to my responses to her.


My response #2 to 'justgin1978' post #2 --

"Second, I realize you are passionate, but your profane language doesn't help make your point, even though you have good points to make! I'm pretty sure Jesus didn't have to be bleeped out every other word during any one of his sermons ..."

I'm not passionate -- I have a very low opinion of passion.

As for my profanity, I'm not Miss Grundy: I'm not going to use an archaic word for 'shit' when I mean 'shit'

As for Jesus' profanity, well, he does use a word that continues to be translated as 'dung'; which is to say, in his time and place, and at the very least, he said 'shit'.

Sometime -- if you dare (as I'll explain) -- check out Ezekiel 23, and especially verse 20. This is presented as the word of Jehovah (YHWH), with whom the New Testament identifies Christ. If my calling 'bullshit' on Jordan's claim about his reasoning about God mildly offends you, then understanding what that verse says, stripping away the Bowdlerism which is these days generally applied to it, might cause your head to explode.

My response #3 to 'justgin1978' post #2 --

"I agree with your thoughts about moral premises. If there is no true ultimate authority to whom we answer, then what does it ultimately matter?"

This is actually a different thing from what I was saying. Not that what you've said here is false, but it goes in a different direction than I was going, and I believe it is a less complete understanding than what I had in mind.

"If there is no true ultimate authority to whom we answer ... "

The situation can be put that way, it's certainly not false to do so. But another way to put it, which I believe is a more complete way to put it, is that when a person denies the reality of God, he's also denying the reality of moral standards -- *not* because God decreed "This is moral" and "That is immoral", such that if there is no one to make and enforce the decrees they don't exist, but rather because God *is* the moral standard.

God is the "ultimate authority" about morality not because he's the strongest being (*) and thus able to force other beings to accept his decrees as objective (as people like to say) truth, but because he is Being Itself, he is Truth Itself, and he is Love Itself (**).

Ayn Rand thought she had disposed of God with her dictum, "Existence exists". But all she was doing was talking about the truth that God is Being Itself in de-personalized language.


(*) as though he were just one more being among beings

(**) and Love is where true morality is grounded

My response #2 to 'justgin1978' post #1 --

"As someone who now considers herself an uncomfortable agnostic ... "

Think about this, will you?

Agnosticism about God is *really* the assertion that we cannot know anything about anything. This is because the question of whether God is is what I call the First Question. By this, I mean that all other questions one may ask about reality, and thus all other answers one may give to those questions, depend upon the answer one gives to the First Question.

But, when one ascribes to agnosticism, one's "answer" to the First Question falls somewhere between "I can't answer that question" and "That is a meaningless question". Thus, when one ascribes to agnosticism, one's "answer" to *any* question about the reality in which we find ourselves, which reality *includes* ourselves, falls somewhere between "I can't answer that question" and "That is a meaningless question".

Agnosticism about God -- carefully cultivated ignorance about God -- turns out to be ignorance about everything.

"There are things we are afraid might be true if we dare to look more closely. As someone who now considers herself an uncomfortable agnostic, that thought comforts me and terrifies me at the same time."

Mind you, this next statement is a general statement about people in general; if it's not true about you, well then it's not true about you. It seems to me that the "comfort" you derive from "There are things we are afraid might be true if we dare to look more closely" might also be put this way, "Since lots of other people, perhaps even most people, have ideas or propositions they are afraid to look at too closely for fear of them being true, the fact that *I* do not examine very closely the proposition that 'God is' isn't such a big deal; I mean, look at all those other people!"

But, no person's reconciliation/union with God, which is what salvation is, has anything to do with what anyone else does. And no person's ultimate separation fomr God, which is what damnation is, has anything to do with what anyone else does. God is Life (that's not *all* he is, but that is what he is), God is Life Itself -- when a person rejects God, whether actively as in Jordan's case or passively as in your case, what he is rejecting is his own life, his own existence, and his own being.

'justgin1978' post #3, response to the above --

"Mind you, this next statement is a general statement about people in general; if it's not true about you, well then it's not true about you. It seems to me that the "comfort" you derive from "There are things we are afraid might be true if we dare to look more closely" might also be put this way, "Since lots of other people, perhaps even most people, have ideas or propositions they are afraid to look at too closely for fear of them being true, the fact that *I* do not examine very closely the proposition that 'God is' isn't such a big deal; I mean, look at all those other people! "

No, it's not true of me at all. Thank you for not just assuming it was. What I meant is I am unhappily stuck in agnosticism because I see no other way out, honestly, to truly believe in God, no matter how much I want to believe, and I do. (I'm sure I exceeded the comma limit in that last sentence. So sorry officers!)

If it's true there is no God, then there is no reason for being, other than selfish pursuits which will all rot. All we are doing individually is distracting ourselves while the clock ticks down and that last day comes when we are no more. If there is no ultimate authority then ultimately nothing we do really matters. If the sum total of all my actions either add to or subtract to future generations, what difference does that make to me? I'll be dead anyway. Maybe I might feel differently if I had children. But even if I did, they too will be dead one day.

Not believing in God causes me pain. I once believed, and even though I had so many questions, I was at peace. For a time.

It also terrifies me that IF there is a God to whom I will answer, I know I will have to answer to so much. I hate my sisters, with good reason. I'm judgemental as HELL. I'm not perfect.

My response #1 to 'justgin1978' post #3 --

"What I meant is I am unhappily stuck in agnosticism because I see no other way out, honestly, to truly believe in God, no matter how much I want to believe, and I do."

I'm the very last person who would "answer" your dilemma by saying, "Well, then, just choose to believe".

"... If the sum total of all my actions either add to or subtract to future generations, what difference does that make to me? I'll be dead anyway. Maybe I might feel differently if I had children. But even if I did, they too will be dead one day."

Even if we were not, after all, "immortal souls", our lives can still matter if God is and remembers us. Frodo is not an "immortal soul", but his life (and suffering) isn't absolutely meaningless, because you and countless other "immortal souls" remember him.

Future generations may remember one, or they may not. But, if atheism is the truth about the nature of reality, then in the end, "not" will prevail; in the end, *everything* dies; in the end, nothing at all matters.

"It also terrifies me that IF there is a God to whom I will answer, I know I will have to answer to so much."

It's not so much that you will have so much to answer for to God, and that as you lack an answer he will reject you, as that in rejecting God now, you are rejecting living directly in his presence, unmediated by the physical world.

Imagine that you continue you life on its present trajectory, and then you eventually die. And, imagine that God is, and that you find yourself -- vastly aware of your moral imperfection, yet not repentant of it -- standing before him in judgment. And imagine that all this judgment amounts to is your admission that you had violated morality, not a repudiation of the violations, but merely acknowledgement of them. And imagine that having ackowledged, but not repudiated, your violations of morality, you are "in".

That is, imagine that no one *really* "goes to Hell", as people put it. Do you really imagine that you will, or could, be happy "going to Heaven", as people put it, without repudiation of your immorality, without *loving* God?

If a person has not rejected his immoralities, then for that person "being in Heaven" would be like being lost out in the middle of the Sahara ... and the sun never sets! It's *not* that God is torturing the person, it's that his very presence is torture to that person; much like merely being forced to be in the presence of a person one hates is torturous, even if both ignore the other.

Far from being a place of deliberate torture, "being in Hell" is a mercy. It's still a horrible state of being, but not nearly as horrible as "being in Heaven" would be for the persons who do not love God.

The reason Hell is torture for its inmates is because, even there, God is: God is Being Itself ... *everything* that is has being by virtue of sharing in the Being of God. The only "peace" that those who reject God *can* have is the "peace" of not-being. The other side of this is that unless God withdraws Being from them, that is, he utterly destroys them, then God himself experiences all the horribleness of "being in Hell".

Hell is a mercy toward its inmates and a torture to God -- that is how much God loves you even before you love him, even if you never love him. Our lives, right now, are a torture to God; he created us because he loves us, he endures the torture of our existence because he loves us ... and he will, reluctantly, "send" some of us "to Hell" because he loves them and will not force them to be directly in his presence when their hatred toward him makes that an even worse torture than being "in Hell".

'justgin1978' post #4, response to the above --

Yeah, weiI I did in fact try to "just believe" and it didn't work. I don't pretend very well.

I wouldn't say that I am rejecting God outright. That's not how it happened. I held on tooth and toenail to my dwindling faith. For years. I tried with all my might to not let go. But I did. Not happily either. It's not as though I have embraced incontrovertible evidence and then calmly decided to reject it. If that were so, I wouldn't be in pain now. It's true I was once so much more sure. But I had to ask questions, didn't I? Is that so bad though? Perhaps this desert I've found myself wandering around in may lead to a much more stable place than the one from which I started out years ago. A more mature belief based on, yes, logic and reason. I can only hope. For now my hope lies in the knowledge that I don't know all things. I need help connecting the dots, but I'm not about to rush to do that. I want to be careful, after all the bottom line is finding the truth, whatever truth really is.

And I understand all the arguments about why God sends people to hell. I used to make these arguments myself.

So, having digested all the above, let's look again at 'justgin1978's' parting shot at me --

How's it working? It's working fine.

The only problem here is talking to you and I've been patient with you long enough.

Why don't you go join one of those theology debate websites? You'd fit right in with those goddamned hypocrites. You think you're never wrong; you think you have all knowledge, but you don't have love.

Really?

By the way, the above exchange is a good illustration of *why* I never try to justify myself -- go on the defensive -- when people make the various false accusations so many of them like to make about me.

Look at her accusations. Not a single one of them has anything at all to do with *anything* I said. Rather, they are statements about *her* mental state.

When she accuses "you think you're never wrong; you think you have all knowledge", what she *means* is that it "offends" her that I speak as a man; I don't play the post-modernist (and academic ... and womanly, when you get down to it) game of making unfounded assertions, pretending that I haven't made any assertions, and then "going postal" when those assertions are criticized.

When she accuses "you don't have love", what she *means* is that as I am "brutally logical", I do not leave any space for her to cling to "yes-and-no simultaneously".

When she accuses "Why don't you go join one of those theology debate websites? You'd fit right in with those goddamned hypocrites", what she *means* is that she hates God, but also fears to admit it to herself. What she means is that I have spooked her with God's shadow.

The Handmaiden

James Hannam at Quodlibeta: Ethics and its importance to ancient Greek science -- "...The primacy of ethics and the belief in objective moral values explains both the multiplicity of Greek natural philosophies and the differences between them. It also shows us how utterly unlike modern science Greek natural philosophy was. Finally, it illustrates that the Greek attitude towards science was identical to that of early and medieval Christians. David Lindberg was fond of a metaphor he found in the work of Roger Bacon – that natural philosophy was the handmaiden of Christian theology. For the pagan Greek philosophers, whether they were theists or not, science was the servant of ethics."

29/31 by Garfunkel and Oates

A YouTube video: 29/31 by Garfunkel and Oates

Thinking with your "little head"

Gavin McInnes: Rescuing America From Itself --

Last week, Kurdish authorities rescued 16-year-old Marlin Stivani Nivarlain at the behest of the Swedish government. Like something out of an SNL sketch, she had emigrated to northern Iraq because her boyfriend joined ISIS and she thought it would be fun. ...

Why do you think it is that people are able to recognize when a man is "thinking with his little head" -- and not only laugh at his foolishness, but take pleasure at laughing at his foolishness -- but that to notice, much less openly state, that women do it too is to commit a major thoughtcrime?

Why is it that women get a free pass on endangering not only their own lives, but the lives of countless others, with their foolishness?

Why is it that you go along without demur with the claim that a woman "can take care of herself" -- and, in fact, should anyone scoff at the claim, you will attack him as viciously as any feminist or other leftist would -- but as soon the inevitable happens, you demand that some man, who doesn't even know that "strong, independent woman", must put is life at risk to save her from the easily foreseen consequences of her own deliberate folly?

Why is it that, having learned nothing, you dance this dance again?

Why is it that now that the leftists who rule us are openly admitting their goal of putting women into combat, the strongest response you can come up with is to sputter, "Well, they'd better not think about drafting *my* daughter!"

Why is it that if I were to say, as in fact I do say, "Even if it is her heartfelt and lifelong desire, your daughter does not belong in the military forces -- or in the police or fire forces -- at all" you will attack me as viciously as any feminist would?

Why is it that manly virtues are now denigrated as crimes, but womanly vices are now elevated to the mandatory?

Why are you *offended* at the questions I have asked?

Irony!

Quite accidentally, I happened to notice a comment (in this thread) on 'The Other McCain' blog made by 'Wombat_socho' (who has 'moderator' authority on the blog) --

His problem is going to be going somewhere else if he keeps up this nonsense. Birthers are obnoxious no matter what party they belong to.

to explain: 'Wombat_socho' is telling someone else that he is going to ban me from commenting on that blog ... because he doesn't like me presenting arguments (to the extent that one can do such in the commbox of a blog so organized) that Ted Cruz is not a natural born US citizen.

Now, what's ironic about this is two things:
1) At this very moment, 'The Other McCain' himself has become a minor cause célèbre amongst those who consider themselves to be conservative over having been banned from Twitter for presenting rational arguments against feminism, based on quoting what feminists actually say and do;
2) A number of the regular commenters on that blog have been quite vicious in their denunciations of me and in their "refutations" (you do see me rolling my eyes, don't you?) of my arguments -- you know, acting just like leftists almost always do when they encounter ideas that they do not wish even to rationally examine -- and 'Wombat_socho' has never once said anything about *that*.

Here is the response I posted to 'Wombat_socho' --

Two points:
1) How ironic is it that you threaten to ban me for stating truths -- and presenting arguments to support those truths -- that you do no wish to hear?
2) I am not a "birther"; I am a Constitutionalist.
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But, go ahead and ban me if that's really what you need to do to create or maintain your safe space.

In fact, I'll probably save him the trouble, because I don't have time for fools.

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On the bright side, I now have a free slot on my blogroll.

That's all very well ... but you've overlooked something

Tony M, at What's Wrong With the World, has a three-part series on his attempt to untangle the question of whether Ted Cruz is or is not Constitutionally qualified to occupy the office of US president --
Part 1: Natural Born Citizen
Part 1I: Natural Born Citizen, Part II
Part II1: Third Time's the Charm, Naturally

Here is the text of a response I emailed to him:

A partial quote of what you wrote (to stand in for all of it) –

(J) Current statutory law makes only 1 distinction in citizenship types, and that regards those who are “citizens at birth” versus those who are naturalized(tm). And does not require of a child born abroad that both parents or the father be American citizens, only one parent.

Does Congress -- or the supreme Court, for that matter -- have Constitutional authority to redefine the terms used in the Constitution? To put it another way, does Congress (or the supreme Court) have the legal authority to modify the Constitution on the fly?

I do trust that you will say, emphatically, “Of course not!” For, if you do not, there is no more the two of us can say to one another.

Now, the Constitution explicitly gives Congress the power to "establish an uniform Rule of Naturalization ... throughout the United States". The Constitution *also* explicitly declares that Congress has only those powers explicitly granted it in the document.

ERGO: Congress does not have the legal power to change the meaning either of "citizen" (this is why it required a Constitutional Amendment to grant the franchise to women) or of "natural born citizen".

Now, as these laws to which you appeal concerning the US citizenship of the children of aliens born in the US (in the case of Obama, Jindal, Rubio or Nikki Haley) or of citizens and non-citizens born outside the US (in the case of Cruz) are Acts of Congress, if they are indeed Constitutional, then that is so by right of Congress' power to "establish an uniform Rule of Naturalization ... throughout the United States". THAT IS, either: these are laws dealing with naturalization ... or else they are unConstitutional.

SO, either:
1) these Acts of Congress *are* Constitutional, in which case Ted Cruz is a naturalized US citizen, and thus Constitutionally unqualified to occupy the office of US president;
OR 2) these Acts of Congress are unConstitutional, in which case Ted Cruz is in no wise at all a US citizen.

It could be Heaven, or it could be Hell

What if it were always April, but it was never Tax Day?