UPDATED: Benedict XVI: The Whole Holy Package

Christianity, Intellectualism, Intelligence, Reason

Compared to Pope Benedict XVI, Pope John Paul II was the Lady Diana of the papacy; a well-meaning populist, bereft of Pope Benedict’s intellectual gravitas.

With his brilliant mind and beatific smile, Benedict XVI was “the whole holy package.”

Via The Vatican Today:

Dismay, surprise, amazement and emotion at the words of Benedict XVI who announced his decision to “renounce the ministry of Bishop of Rome”. These sentiments were etched on the faces of the cardinals, bishops and prelates – assembled for the Ordinary Public Concistory on Monday morning, 11 February, in the Concistory Hall of the Apostolic Palace – who heard the unexpected announcement in the Pope’s own voice.
Everyone’s eyes met, a light murmur swelled in the hall and astonishment faded into sorrow. Yet, after the first few moments of confusion, the unanimous recognition that the Pope’s act was a very lofty act of humility made headway among those present – who included the papal masters of ceremony, representatives of the postulations, choristers of the Sistine Chapel Choir, papal chair bearers and technicians.

In a 2005 column, “Unlearned Rabbi Rages at Ratzinger,” I defended my favorite Pope, Benedict XVI, from the insufferable sanctimony of an unlearned Rabbi called Michael Lerner. And in “Benedict The Brave” I chronicled his courage.

UPDATE: “Text And Video Of Pope Benedict XVI’s Resignation Announcement.”

A Corrective On Canada

Business, Canada, Economy, IMMIGRATION

Fellow Canadian Kathy Shaidle gave one of her American readers a reality check about Canada, one you’ve also received from me more than once:

I’m afraid I can’t agree. Our corporate tax rate is lower than yours, we have a simpler tax code and fewer weird regulations — I hear it can take even wealthy movie stars years to get “permission” to put a swimming pool in their own L.A. backyard.
Our Mexican migrant workers live in all male, booze free barracks and are shipped back home at season’s end. We ingeniously decided to pick our own cotton — that is, we have none of the fallout from slavery that hobble the U.S.
We also cleverly declined to hand mortgages to welfare bums. Our personal debt levels are lower and [we] have more disposable income.
Last year we deported more criminal aliens than we had in the previous twenty years combined.
The “Canuckistan” stereotype really doesn’t hold true anymore. We’re just hoping Justin won’t get elected and undo it all.

In For The Kill

Crime, Government, GUNS, Law, Liberty, Private Property, The State

Loc­al, state and fed­er­al assassins are hunting for LAPD of­ficer and Navy veteran Christopher Jordan Dorner, 33, who is alleged to have shot­ three po­lice of­ficers, one fatally, in River­side, and committed a double hom­icide on Sunday, in Irvine, murdering “the daugh­ter of a re­tired LAPD cap­tain and her fi­ance.”

Not only have the authorities and their SWAT teams been locking down businesses and invading private homes in the course of the manhunt—the once-bustling winter resort of Big Bear, in Southern California, is one example—but they have been firing on bystanders in the process.

Oops. “Mistaken identity” is what the police perps are calling this collateral damage.

More like “unbridled police lawlessness,” says Robert Sheahen, an attorney of one of the victims. “These people need training and they need restraint.”

Via the LA Times:

In the first incident, LAPD officers opened fire on another pickup they feared was being driven by Dorner. The mother and daughter inside the truck were delivering Los Angeles Times newspapers. The older woman was shot twice in the back and the other was wounded by broken glass.
In Perdue’s case [the latest victim of the state’s assassins], his attorney said he wasn’t struck by bullets or glass but was injured in the car wreck, suffering a concussion and an injury to his shoulder. The LAX baggage handler hasn’t been able to work since, and his car is totaled, Sheahen said.
“When Torrance issues this ridiculous statement saying he wasn’t injured, all they mean is he wasn’t killed,” his attorney said, referring to a press release reporting “no visible injuries” to Perdue.

Gun violence? As Vox Day (who, sadly, called it a day on WND) pointed out, in December of 2012,

800,000 law enforcement officers have killed 525 unarmed citizens with guns so far this year. Approximately 310 million private citizens killed an estimated 10,500 of their fellow citizens with guns over the same period of time. Given that a law enforcement officer is 19.4 times more likely to shoot and kill an unarmed American than a private citizen, if you genuinely care about reducing gun deaths, why aren’t you calling for the disarmament of law enforcement?

Welcome to the militarize, police-state USA.

‘Slavery Is The Price I Paid For Civilization’

Intellectualism, Old Right, Paleoconservatism, Paleolibertarianism, Political Correctness, Race, Racism

The words in this post’s title were spoken by “famed black writer” Zora Neale Hurston. She was “what today we are inclined to call a ‘paleoconservative’ or ‘paleolibertarian,’” who was “born in the early 1890s in the lower South.”

Thanks to Jack Kerwick’s profile of Zora Neale Hurston, timed for Black History Month, we know something about this brilliant (black) member of the Old Right.

Hurston resented the efforts made by black and white intellectual alike to make of black Americans a new proletariat, a victim class perpetually in need of an all-encompassing national government to ease the “lowdown dirty deal” that “nature has somehow given them.” Hurston was adamant that she was “not tragically colored.” She insisted that “no great sorrow” lies “damned up in my soul, lurking behind my eyes,” and she placed a world of distance between herself and “the sobbing school of negrohood who hold that nature somehow has given them a lowdown dirty deal and whose feelings are hurt about it.”
For what contemporary black commentator Larry Elder refers to as the “victicrats” among us, Hurston had zero use. “Someone is always at my elbow reminding me that I am the granddaughter of slaves,” she remarked. Much to their chagrin, though, “it fails to register depression with me.” Furthermore, she stated bluntly that “slavery is the price I paid for civilization.”
Our increasingly joyless generation is oblivious to another of Hurston’s insights: A sense of humor can bear most, if not all, painful things. Regarding racial discrimination, she noted that while she “sometimes” feels “discriminated against,” she does not get “angry” about it. Rather, the experience “merely astonishes me,” for how, Hurston asks, “can any deny themselves the pleasure of my company? It’s beyond me.”

… Pearls before swine.

MORE.