Asia Times: The world according to Hillary
Speaking on Capitol Hill, Senator Hillary Clinton, United States president-elect Barack Obama's choice for secretary of state, said that the use of "smart power" would differentiate the new administration from the unpopular foreign policies of President George W Bush. Obama supporters, however, are worried that the new team will bring much talk, little change, and delay to a US withdrawal from Iraq. - Jim Lobe

Jim Lobe's blog

Asia Times: Japan: The price of normalcy
The Japanese military has used its cuddly comic book mascot Prince Pickles, nubile women on recruitment posters and misleading defense rhetoric to assure the pacifist public that its aggressive post-World War II transition is "normal". Japan's resurgent neo-nationalists have a grander design, one that endangers regional security and makes an East Asian arms race much more likely. - John Feffer

Post Carbon Institute proposes "Real New Deal" to Obama administration

Staff, Post Carbon Institute

Post Carbon Institute today announced the release of "The Real New Deal: Energy Scarcity and the Path to Energy, Economic, and Environmental Recovery," a proposal to the incoming Obama Administration. The plan calls for responding to the current economic crisis with a massive policy and investment shift towards a fossil fuel-independent economy. The plan has been endorsed by Bill McKibben, Michael Moore, Randy Udall and Lester Brown. The 24-page report is available online.

pdf for the proposal

Advice to President Obama: an actuary's impractical perspective

Gail Tverberg, The Oil Drum

Several steps come before energy policy: we need to get the worst of our financial problems behind us and we need to understand where we are, before we can make intelligent decisions going forward.

Mike Whitney, Why the Stimulus Alone Won't Work
The Big Contraction

AICN: Patrick McGoohan Is Gone...

RIP. No cameos, then, for any future The Prisoner movie.

Links:
Patrick McGoohan information page

Thoughts about season 7 of 24

*some spoilers ahead*

1. All in all, the first 4 hours of 24 were a good start for season 7. But I think they revealed that Tony Almeida was truly working undercover too quickly. It is said that he was originally going to make an appearance at the end of the 24th hour on Day 6, after Jack left the home of Secretary Heller. That would have been bad, since usually some time passes between the 'days' of 24, and so it wouldn't make sense to show the conversation between Jack Bauer and Tony Almeida at the beginning of Day 7, unless Day 7 took place right after Day 6. Still... I think the scriptwriters could have drawn the dramatic tension with this plot point out more a bit. (And if quality of the story for the last 6 hours of Day 7 starts dropping to the level of the terrible family soap opera of Day 6, this criticism will be brought back.)

2. It is hard, at this point, to see how the writers and creators are not pushing for torture as an acceptable way to get information. In the past it has been claimed that torture dehumanizes the one doing the torturing, and that these effects on Jack Bauer are visible. What exactly was the redemption that Jack Bauer was looking for in his travels all over the world and in Africa? Was he really looking for validation from the American people by testifying in the Senate hearings? Jack may have been loathe to use torture for a few hours, after what he experienced in a Chinese prison, but he seems to be back to his old self. He may understand that he is often a tool of those in power, who do not appreciate him and are quite willing to sell him out to further 'the public interest,' but this is what Jack Bauer is, and he does whatever is necessary to stop the threat facing the country.

*Cue song using the melody for the G.I. Joe cartoon theme: Jack Bauer, "a real American hero."*

3. It seems to me that we are supposed to approve of the way CTU has done things in the past , especially when we are shown the contrast between CTU and the FBI, which follows Federal rules and procedures and respects the rights of suspects, and the results they are able to get. The FBI is ineffectual--Jack Bauer is not. Agent Walker appears to agree that extraordinary circumstnaces may require extraordinary measures. She even goes so far as to torture one suspect, Tanner, while he is in the hospital recovering from being shot by her and the consequent surgery. When her first attempt fails to elicit the information that she needs, she looks away from Tanner and begins to cry, realizing that she has taken a monstrous path. But after he laughs, mocking her ineffectiveness, she tries again and succeeds. But at what personal cost?

At least The Unit (and by implication CAG) recognizes that torture is ineffectual.

4. Can the corruption in the Federal Government be taken care of by Jack Bauer, Tony Almeida, and two individuals reconstituting CTU (Bill Buchannan and Chloe O'Brian)? And will the show ultimately take a shot at a critique of the corporatism (nay, even 'fascism') that characterizes the American political structure? The 'rule of law'--bringing those responsible to justice, and having them judged by a court--is this sufficient? As we have seen in the 24 universe, bad guys are brought down, but new ones take their place. Can the corruption really be eliminated, unless the American citizens are willing to restore republican government and protect economic freedom?

5. As for the proposed intervention by the U.S. military in the fictional African country of Sangala under the new administration of President Allison Taylor--naturally, this action is being endorsed, in the name of humanitarianism. (We have the power to stop genocide; therefore we have the moral imperative to do so. I'm not going to rewatch the episodes to get an actual quote from President Taylor.) With the threat of CIP device in the hands of agents of the Sangalan government to 'innocent American lives,' at least President Taylor does not actually say that the lives of Sangalans are of equal consideration as American lives. It would be interesting if the show actually takes a stance against American interventionism, but I think this is unlikely to happen.

Too bad Ron Paul can't make a cameo appearance in the show--what would he say about various aspects of the story?

Hey Sarge, from the wiki entry on season 7:

United States Navy SEALs helped battle terrorists at Camarillo Airport during filming of an episode on August 12-13 2008.^[18]

More Ron Paul links:
Ron Paul .com
Campaign For Liberty — Home
Daily Paul

Thomas Dilorenzo responds to Kevin Gutzman. (via CHT)

Gutzman's rejoinder (via CHT).

Thomas Fleming, Politics of Dante II

The way to begin to understand this is to subject one’s self to the evidence and not to impose preconceived opinions. Pilate as procurator–and not a very good one, it would seem–was an officer of the Empire. Neither he nor the little territory he ruled were important enough for him to be a governor. What I said was that the Empire of Augustus was a federation of city-states. In Italy, this simply meant that the major towns preserved the traditional internal authority of the Italian civitates. In the cities of the East, the Romans gradually extended the same privileges. In more barbaric Gaul they treated the tribal confederacies that had major towns as civitates and where they found none, they constructed them and built theaters, baths, public basilicas, etc. This is not a controversial point, though one might debate the limits of the autonomy. The writers of the Scriptures, I am sorry to have to say, are not the best authorities on how the Roman Empire was governed, since none of them was every in a position of real authority and the only way they made the acquaintance of members of the ruling class was by running afoul of the law. That is how Paul met Gallio, the half-brother of Seneca. What Dante may or may not have understood of the Empire may never be learned, but what we do know is that he would have understood how a very similar, albeit looser structure existed when Tuscany was nominally ruled by a Count or Margrave. Again, I cannot tell the whole story of the Roman Empire here, much less the history of Medieval Tuscany. I must ask readers who have not studied to accept more or less the historical reconstructions I have outlined as a means of understanding Dante. If I am knowingly presenting a private and controversial opinion, I shall let you know. But neither the federative structure of the principate (Augustus to Marcus Aurelius) nor the highly decentralized feudal structure of West-Imperial Italy are matters of controversy.

Sarge, did you see these photos? Alte Fotos aus der Trappistenabtei Mariawald

Related links: Trappistenabtei Mariawald

Twitch: She’s Cute But Deadly! The HIGH KICK GIRL Returns!

Quint on A Bridge Too Far.

I can't remember if I saw the movie on TV or if I read the excerpt from the original book by Cornelius Ryan in Reader's Digest first when I was a child. But it has remained one of my favorite WW2 movies. I remember looking at the TV guide that accompanied the SJ Mercury and seeing that the movie received 2 stars. Only 2 stars? How was that possible!?! Certainly the movie does require some patience and attention, as it does not focus on any person in particular.

Berkeley Symphony Orchestra
Cal Performances

Still haven't made up my mind about going to the Freight & Salvage Coffee House on Thursday or Friday... I doubt I'll be attending the Tallis Scholars concert, or any of the other events of the Music Before 1850 Series this year.

Her Sexual Experiences, Part 1
by John Thomas

Part 2

The Unit meets... Indian Jones?

Their latest mission? To recover the Spear of Destiny. Watch here. (I hope this isn't the episode that nukes the fridge.)

Oh dear. Not only is the monastery something you might find out of a Quentin Tarantino movie, but it's also harboring various secrets. (A Shaolin-like martial arts training grounds?) Who oked this script? Seems like a joke someone is playing more than anything else.

Then again, in one of his fevered dreams, Mack is praying the rosary in Latin... it can't be that bad right?

Wow... the Anima Christi too... at least part of it. (The "In saeculam saeculorum" didn't make sense.) With incensations.

Edit. The Spear of Destiny story was a bit weird. It is similar in some ways to Indiana Jones: The Last Crusade. Besides the overt 'Catholicism' of the monastery and the religious practices seen in the episodes, there was the emphasis on being held accountable to a higher authority, which sometimes makes non-compliance to orders from a direct superior (or the government of a nation-state).

I liked Bob's story, and the questions regarding "extrajuridical justice."

Kevin Gutzman, The Birth of a Notion—National “Purpose”

(Includes a review of Hamilton’s Curse: How Jefferson’s Arch Enemy Betrayed the American Revolution—and What It Means for Americans Today by Thomas DiLorenzo)

The Distributist Review: Distributist Radio Begins on Monday!!!!

Related links: THE PALEOCRAT TRIBUNE (alt)
The Paleocrat

Our Collapsing Economy, by Paul Craig Roberts
US's Negative Net Worth at $59.3 Trillion

The Only Answer to Modernity’s Impiety, John Attarian (from Modern Age 44:1, Winter 2002)

Actual sin is disobedience, or rebellion. And even those who are not guilty of sins against faith may nonetheless rebel against tradition, natural law, or human authority. But should we characterize modernity as being "all about rebellion: against God, against restraint, against the limits of the human condition, and even against reality itself"

Dr. Fleming on Dante's De Monarchia:

Dante de monarchia
Dante’s De Monarchia is not a work of political theory in the strictest sense but is more what we might term a work of moral theology directed towards political understanding. It shares the general aim of all his later major works, which is to show men the way out of misery and toward happiness. Two great instruments toward happiness, the Empire and the Church, had both fallen short of divine their missions. Thus his political message can only be understood in an ethical and spiritual co–ntext.

For Dante, the unity of the universe, as designed by its Creator, is a given. Man, by contrast, has a dual nature, ministered to by these two institutions, the one secular and the other spiritual. In this work, concentrating on the secular—as in the Commedia he will focus on the spiritual—he lays out a vision of universal Empire that brings peace to world. Since the end of life, in the Aristotelian/Thomistic sense, is contemplation of the good/divine, and this requires peace, only universal Empire can provide the peace that is necessary for study, prayer, and contemplation. Thus Dante’s approach to the distinct purposes of Church and Empire most be kept separate from modern anti-Christian argument—one quite alien to Dante’s mind and purpose–for the separation of Church and state. Dante is obviously thinking much of the time of Boniface VIII’s ambitious and, he would say, quite wrong-headed plan (e.g., in Unam sanctam) to make the Church supreme in the secular as well as in the spiritual realm—a notion quite alien from the spirit of Gregory I or even of Gregory VII.

And this:

Following Aristotle in the Ethics, Dante argues that man’s distinctive character is his intellect, whose function is to understand, to know. Let me summarize the argument: Peace is prerequisite for the happiness that requires contemplation (4); While there may be various agents who would promote peace, when there are multiple organs for fulfilling a function/purpose, one takes precedence and rules the others. Thus the paterfamilias rules the household.(5) Partial orders in the human race are subsumed by the greater and more inclusive power (6). Please observe that he leaves out the Eastern, more legitimate Empire from consideration. By 1300, after the devastating effects of Turkish advances and Western Crusades, the “Greeks”—as our ancestors were now calling them—could be dismissed as a failure. Empire is to kingdoms what God is to man. (7) Because of man’s nature, a supreme judge is needed. (10) The beest order in the world depends on the workings of justice, (11) and the human race is best ordered when it is most free (12) [“potissime liberum”], but the exercise of free will requires judgment (iudicium) as an arbiter between apprehension (that is understanding that something exists and can be sought) and desire. Man is most free when he is existing for his own sake rather than for another’s (say, a master’s or lord’s), thus he is most free under the Empire, because the Emperor, if he is truly emperor, rules for our sake, while other the rulers of other forms of government are crooked and self-seeking, working for the good of the king, the aristocracy, or the lower classes. Dante cites Aristotle to show that under bad governments, the good man is a bad citizen while under a good government, the good man=good citizen. Why a single universal empire? Because, that which is best is unity, just as God is a unity. (15) Concord is best. Note that as a Trinitarian, Dante must conceive of the godhead as a collaboration of three partners, and if we really understand the political reality of Thomas’s and Dante’s time, we shall not fall into the trap of imagining that Dante is an advocate for a unitary—as opposed to federative/feudal–state. The excellence of unity is shown by the fact that Christ was born when the world ready, that is, unifed under the great Augustus. (Dante would not have known, but Augustus’ Empire was a federation of autonomous city-states.) The world has gone to Hell, he says, since Roman unity was shattered.

Did the Roman Empire understand itself to be more of a federation than a unitary state under the leadership of a central authority? Or is this just how things played out in fact? (How did the Byzantine Empire understand itself and its authority?) There can be a just reaction against the unjust usurpation of power or wrong claims to authority; how much of modernity was correct in its reaction against royal absolutism and the supposed divine right of kings? And how much of it was wrong in its understanding of the origin of authority and how it is transmitted? (As well as the relationship between justice and the assigning of rulership?)

Sarge, you can find promotional photos of s7 of 24 at Yahoo. There's this photo for Annie Wersching:

wiki
Yahoo TV

On Baptism and the World Family Meeting

On Baptism and the World Family Meeting

"You Are My Sons and Daughters, My Beloved"


VATICAN CITY, JAN. 11, 2009 (Zenit.org).- Here is the address Benedict XVI delivered today before praying the Angelus with those gathered in St. Peter's Square.

* * *

Dear Brothers and Sisters!

On this Sunday, which follows the solemnity of the Epiphany, we celebrate the baptism of the Lord. This was the first act of his public life and all four Gospels give an account of it. At the age of 30, Jesus left Nazareth and traveled to the Jordan River and, along with many other people, had himself baptized by John. The evangelist Mark writes: "On coming up out of the water, he saw the heavens opened and the Spirit, like a dove, descending upon him" (Mark 1:10-11). In these words: "You are my beloved Son; with you I am well pleased," the nature of eternal life is revealed: It is the filial relationship with God, as Jesus lived, revealed, and gave it to us.

This morning, following tradition, in the Sistine Chapel, I administered the sacrament of baptism to three newborn children. To the parents, the godfather and the godmother, the celebrant customarily asks: "What do you ask of the Church of God for your children?" They answer "baptism," and the celebrant replies: "And what does Baptism give us?" They answer: "Eternal life." This is a stupendous thing: Through Baptism the human person is brought into Jesus' unique and singular relationship with the Father, in such a way that the words that are spoken from heaven about the only-begotten Son become true for every man and woman who is reborn from the water of the Holy Spirit: You are my sons and daughters, my beloved.

Dear friends, how great is the gift of baptism! If we make ourselves fully aware of it, our life will become a continual "grace." What a joy for Christian parents, who have seen a new creature blossom from their love, who have brought this child to the baptismal font and seen the child be reborn in the womb of the Church, for a life that will never end! Gift, joy, but also responsibility! The parents, in fact, together with the godparents, must bring up their children according to the Gospel.

This brings to mind the theme of the 6th World Meeting of Families in Mexico City, which will take place next week, "The Family as Educator in Human and Christian Values." This great meeting of families, organized by the Pontifical Council for the Family, will unfold in three parts: first the theological and pastoral congress, in which the theme will be explored and in which there will also be a sharing of significant experiences; then there will be a moment of celebration and testimony, which will bring to light the beauty of the meeting of families from every part of the world, united by the same faith and by the same commitment; and finally the solemn Eucharistic celebration, as a thanksgiving to the Lord for the gifts of marriage, the family and life.

I have asked Cardinal Tarcisio Bertone to represent me, but I myself will also follow the extraordinary event with lively participation, accompanying it with prayer and through a televised talk.

Until then, dear brothers and sisters, I invite you to implore an abundance of divine grace for this important international meeting of families. Let us do so invoking the maternal intercession of the Virgin Mary, Queen of the Family.

[Translation by Joseph G. Trabbic]

[After praying the Angelus, the Holy Father greeted the people in several languages. In English, he said:]

To all the English-speaking visitors and pilgrims here today, I extend affectionate greetings. On this feast of the Lord's Baptism, Jesus descends into the waters of the Jordan, taking on himself the weight of our sins. When he rises from the water, the Spirit comes down upon him and the Father's voice declares: "This is my beloved Son". Let us rejoice that the Son of God came to share our human condition, so that we might rise with him to everlasting life. Upon all who are here today, and upon your families and loved ones at home, I invoke God's abundant blessings.

© Copyright 2009 - Libreria Editrice Vaticana

Papal Homily for Mass With Baptisms

Papal Homily for Mass With Baptisms

"We Restore to God That Which Has Come From Him"


VATICAN CITY, JAN. 11, 2009 (Zenit.org).- Here is the homily Benedict XVI gave today when he celebrated Mass and administered the sacrament of baptism in the Sistine Chapel.

* * *

Dear Brothers and Sisters!

The words that the Evangelist Mark recounts at the beginning of his Gospel: "You are my Son, my beloved: in you I am well pleased" (1:11) bring us to the heart of today's feast of the baptism of the Lord, with which the Christmas season concludes. The cycle of Christmas solemnities brings us to meditate on the birth of Jesus announced by the angels suffused with the luminous splendor of God; Christmas time speaks to us of the star that guided the magi from the east to the house of Bethlehem, and it invites us to look to the heavens opened above the Jordan as the voice of God resounds.

They are all signs through which the Lord does not tire of repeating to us: "Yes, I am here. I know you. I love you. There is a road that leads from me to you. And there is a road that leads from you to me." In Jesus, the Creator assumed the dimensions of a Child, of a human being like us, who we may see and touch. At the same time, in making himself small, God made the light of his greatness shine -- because, by lowering himself to the defenseless impotence of love, he shows the nature of true greatness, indeed, what it means to be God.

The meaning of Christmas, and more generally the meaning of the liturgical year, is precisely that of us drawing near to these divine signs, to recognize in them the events of every day, so that our hearts will open to the love of God. And if Christmas and Epiphany serve above all to make us capable of seeing, to opening our eyes and hearts to the mystery of a God who comes to be with us, the feast of the baptism of Jesus introduces us, we could say, to the everydayness of a personal relationship with him. In fact, through the immersion in the waters of the Jordan, Jesus united himself to us.

Baptism is, so to speak, the bridge that he has built between him and us, the road by which he is accessible to us; it is the divine rainbow over our life, the promise of the great yes of God, the gateway to hope and, at the same time, the sign that indicates the road we must take in an active and joyous way to meet him and feel loved by him.

Dear friends, I am truly happy that this year too, on this feast day, I have been given the opportunity to baptize children. Today God's pleasure is upon them. From the time that the only-begotten Son of the Father was baptized, heaven has truly opened and continues to open itself, and we can entrust every new life that blossoms to the hands of God, who is stronger than the dark powers of evil. This in effect leads to baptism: We restore to God that which has come from him. The child is not the parents' property, but is rather entrusted by the Creator to their responsibility, freely and in an ever new way, so that they help him to be a free child of God.

Only if the parents cultivate such an awareness will they succeed in finding the right balance between the pretence of being able to dispose of their own children as if they were a private possession, forming them according to their own ideas and desires, and the liberal attitude that expresses itself in giving them total freedom, satisfying all their desires and aspirations, seeing that as the right way to develop their personality.

If, with this sacrament, the newly baptized infant becomes an adoptive child of God, object of his infinite love that safeguards and defends him, then he must be taught to recognize God as his Father and to know how to relate to him with a filial attitude. For this reason, when, following the Christian tradition, as we do today, we baptize children, bringing them into God's light and his teachings, we are not doing violence to them; rather we are giving them the wealth of divine life in which true freedom is rooted, which is that of being children of God; a freedom that must be educated and formed with the passing of years, so that it become capable of responsible personal choices.

Dear parents, dear godfathers and godmothers, I greet you with affection and I share your joy over these little ones that today are reborn into eternal life. You are conscious of the gift that has been received and you do not cease to thank the Lord who, with today's sacrament, introduces your children into a new family, greater and more stable, more open and numerous than your own: I am talking about the family of believers, the Church, a family that has God for Father and in which all gather as brothers in Jesus Christ.

Today, therefore, you entrust your children to the goodness of God, who is power of light and love; and they, though they will face difficulties in life, will never feel abandoned if they remain united with him. Concern yourselves with educating them in the faith, with teaching them to pray and to grow as Jesus did and with his help, "in wisdom, age and grace before God and men" (cf. Luke 2:52).

Turning now to the Gospel passage, we will try to understand still further that which is happening today. St. Mark says that, while John the Baptist preached on the shores of the Jordan, proclaiming the urgency of conversion in view of the coming of the Messiah who is now drawing near, Jesus, mixed in with the crowds, presents himself to be baptized.

John's baptism of repentance is certainly quite different from the one Jesus will institute. Nevertheless, at that moment, the mission of the Redeemer is glimpsed, for, when he comes out of the water, a voice from heaven resounds and the Holy Spirit descends upon him (cf. Mark 1:10). The heavenly Father proclaims him his beloved Son and publicly bears witness to his universal mission of salvation, which he will fully accomplish with his death on the cross and his resurrection. Only then, with the Paschal sacrifice, will the remission of sins be made universal and total.

With baptism we do not merely immerse ourselves in the waters of the Jordan to proclaim our commitment to conversion, but there is poured out upon us the redemptive blood of Christ that purifies us and saves us. It is the beloved Son of the Father, in whom he is well pleased, which reacquires for us the dignity and the joy of calling ourselves and truly being "children" of God.

Soon we will relive this mystery evoked by today's solemnity; the signs and symbols of the sacrament of baptism will help us to understand that which the Lord works in the hearts of these little ones of ours, making them "his" forever, a dwelling place chosen by his Spirit and "living stones" for the building up of the spiritual edifice which is the Church.

May the Virgin Mary, Mother of Jesus, beloved Son of God, keep watch over them and their families, always be with them, so that they may realize the project of salvation that baptism accomplishes in their lives.

And we, dear brothers and sisters, let us accompany them with our prayer; let us pray for the parents, godfathers and godmothers and for their relatives, that they help them to grow in the faith; let us pray for all of us here present that, devotedly participating in this celebration, we will renew the promises of our baptism and give thanks to the Lord for his constant help. Amen!

[Translation by Joseph G. Trabbic]

Edward Feser, America, empire, and conservatism:

But imperialism is neither inherently immoral nor inherently unconservative, and it is false to assume that the fact that some American policy might plausibly be described as “imperialist” is ipso facto a reason for a conservative to disapprove of it.

Mr. Feser has not yet given a definition of imperialism, though one of the commentors has cited this definition: "the policy of extending the rule or authority of an empire or nation over foreign countries, or of acquiring and holding colonies and dependencies."

Is it possible to justly acquire authority over another nation or community? If it is just, is it always prudent?

Why You Should Never Take Me Christmas Shopping, by Rob Hopkins, Transition Culture

(via EB)

That bastion of American socialism by Dmitry Orlov (original)

AICN: ‘Every Second You Help The Government You’re Spitting On Teri’s Grave!!’ - Herc’s Seen The First Four Hours Of 24 7!!