The best observation of the campaign season.

And it comes from the ever-wise, always-witty pen of Mark Steyn, commenting on the weirdness of Rick Santorum:

Well, okay, say the Santorum detractors, but you guys are supposed to be the small-government crowd. Why is this any business of the state? A fair point, but one that cuts both ways. Single women are the most enthusiastic constituency for big government: A kiss on the hand may be quite continental, but statism is a girl's best friend. One can argue about whether the death of marriage leads to big government or vice versa, but simply raising the topic shouldn't put one beyond the pale, should it?

Let's take it as read that Rick Santorum is weird. After all, he believes in the sanctity of life, the primacy of the family, the traditional socio-religious understanding of a transcendent purpose to human existence. Once upon a time, back in the mists of, ooh, the mid–20th century, all these things were, if not entirely universal, sufficiently mainstream as to be barely worthy of discussion. Now they're not. Isn't the fact that conventional morality is now "weird" itself deeply weird? The instant weirdification of ideas taken for granted for millennia is surely mega-weird — unless you think that our generation is possessed of wisdom unique to human history. In which case, why are we broke?

Look, I get the problem with a Santorum candidacy. And I get why he seems weird to Swedes and Aussies, and even Americans. If you're surfing a news bulletin en route from Glee to Modern Family, Santorum must seem off-the-charts weird, like a monochrome episode that's been implausibly colorized from a show too old even for TV Land reruns. It would be healthier to thrash these questions out in the culture, in the movies and novels and pop songs. But Hollywood has taken sides, and the Right has mostly retreated from the field. And somebody has to talk about these things somewhere or other. Our fiscal crisis is not some unfortunate bookkeeping accident that a bit of recalibration by a savvy technocrat can fix. In the United States as in Greece, it is a reflection of the character of a people. The problem isn't that Rick Santorum's weird, but that a government of record-breaking brokeness already busting through its newest debt-ceiling increase even as it announces bazillions in new spending is entirely normal.

That ship sailed long ago. Then it was torpedoed, hit an iceberg, and was swamped by a series of rogue waves before being eaten by the Kraken.

Fr. Thomas Massaro would like you all to calm down.

I'm not going to fisk this, because it's an admirable sentiment, as far as it goes. Which means it stagged a step or two before dropping in a messy heap.

Yes, it would be nice if things in the world were more civil and respectful. That's fine.

But the problem with his call for civility is that he sees the white-hot anger as the problem rather than the symptom. It's not--the real problem goes far, far deeper than that, and has been savaging the Body of Christ for decades now.

The HHS mandate is just the catalyst causing it to explode to the surface.

The real problem is that the Church in America has fractured into at least two churches. If it hadn't been this issue, it would have been a dispute over the language of the liturgy, or the latest pronouncement from the Vatican, some university conferring honors on someone who is an open enemy of Catholic teaching or even the renovation of the local cathedral church. The struggle--more bluntly, low-grade civil war--between the churches has been going on since the last bit of incense dispersed at Vatican II. We don't agree on how to worship, what our schools should teach, what laws should be enacted/opposed, what canons apply and when or even what our parish church should look like. In fact, we can't even agree on whether or not Jesus actually rose from the dead.

And for forty five years, our shepherds have been trying to keep it together by careful tacking, including soothing rhetoric, trying to give everyone half a loaf or so (depending on the year, bishop and constituency) and generally trying not to see the coal pile in the ballroom.

But there's no avoiding it here. Every. Last. One. of the episcopate has weighed in against the assault on the Free Exercise Clause. Yet many self-identified Catholics see no problem with the attack, and significant numbers even support it. Which means those Catholics are in the wrong, and need to be called to account.

No amount of soothing rhetoric can do anything other than paper over what have become irreconcilable differences. Calling for a time-out, and a mutual affirmation of The Other not only misses the point, it actively makes things worse by forcing a suspension of moral judgment.

Winston Churchill once said "I decline utterly to be impartial as between the fire brigade and the fire." However well-intentioned, that is precisely what Fr. Massaro is trying to be, and worse, he is ignoring the facts on the ground.

The time for mediation has passed. It is now time to choose sides.

Feasibility studies and you.

Admiral Miklos Horthy was the dictator of Hungary from 1920 until was deposed in a pro-Nazi coup in 1944. He had served as a reasonably competent officer in the Hapsburg Empire's navy, and declared himself "Regent of the Kingdom of Hungary," despite not wanting to let the Hapsburg claimants back in. The Hungarian joke was that Hungary "was a kingdom without a king, ruled by an admiral without a fleet, in a country without a coastline."

For a moment, Wyoming was threatening to resurrect that joke in an American setting. The context was the study of a doomsday continuity-of-government bill--not a crazy idea in a world of fast-moving disease, weapons of mass destruction and EMP. However, an early draft of the bill provided for a feasibility study for Wyoming's acquisition of strike aircraft and...an aircraft carrier.

An aircraft carrier.

For...Wyoming.

Wyoming.

WYOMING.

I hate to bring this up, Utah, and I'm not trying to get all rumory, but I think the folks in Cheyenne might have some long-term designs on the Great Salt Lake. You might want to consider some way to maintain naval superiority starting right...now.

Fortunately, the attempt to float a Nimitz class carrier in the nation's Mountain West has been axed from the current reading.

Or...has it?

Watch your back, Utah.

A choice, not an echo.

Today's the day Michigan votes in the Presidential primary, and for once, it matters a lot.

I'm not under any illusions about the field--it's not the A team, it's the B- team. But each of the candidates has one great virtue: at least they decided to show up. That counts for something, even for the ones I don't like all that much.

I won't pretend that Senator Santorum was my first choice. I've always liked him, especially up close and personal. But I was looking for a candidate with solid executive experience, and he didn't have it. Never the less, the Pawlenty "Brave Sir Robin" act and Rick Perry's inexplicable flameout took those options off the table.

I still think Santorum needs to develop the discipline to steer away from hot-button trap questions he really wants to answer, but at least you know what's on his mind.

As an aside, for those wetting themselves over fears of "theocracy": (1) not going to happen. (2) If you're worried about how a President is going to behave in office, then perhaps the problem is with the over-assumption of executive power--the office itself--and not the particular occupant. "It's OK when my guy wields it" is not how it is envisioned to operate.

Back to the Senator: yes, he's got pork and massive entitlement (Medicare Part D) issues, but he also is someone who can take the credit for ending a lifetime entitlement with welfare reform. He also has a vision supportive of more limited government, with support for a civil society with its "mediating institutions." He has also shown the ability to win over voters in a purple-blue state, which says something for his campaigning skills. He's aware that America is faced with people in the world who wish her ill, and he feels the HHS assault in his guts. There will be no backdown on that. No, he's not a perfect candidate (I'd like him softer on certain issues like immigration, for a start), but I'm surprised by how well he laps the field.

Speaking of which.

Newt Gingrich. I actually like big vision-thing ideas, inspiring, reach for the sky plans. But he invariably couples them with not-so-good ideas suggestive of spitballing (local boards handling immigration?). He's actually better than the rest of the field on immigration in general, but oddball ideas combined with an inability to parry negative attacks make him unelectable. And, yes, Santorum has a deficit with women voters generally, but a thrice-married politico is toxic with that rather important segment. He blew it after South Carolina, and hasn't been a threat since.

Ron Paul. I'm not going to call him nuts or anything like that. My problem is less with the candidate (though he is a greatly flawed politician), but rather with his fan base. There are serious Paul supporters who admit to the problems with his ideas or practices. I have no beef with them. But the ones who treat his every word and deed like secular ahadith do him and his movement no favors. These are the ones who proliferate on the 'net. Look, he's a patriot, a genuinely good community servant with his medical practice and an unimpeachable family man. In a general sense, he is absolutely right about the constitutional imbalance of our current system and the monstrosity of federal spending and deficits.

But his more fanatical supporters refuse to admit he's a politician. Earmarking? "Why, its the Constitutional way to protect the taxpayer!" Alliance with Romney, the figure who should, on principles alone, receive his greatest ire? "What alliance?" Paul rolled over and played dead in Maine, despite profound irregularities and the consistent knock that he can't win--because Romney would lose. "What alliance?" "Santorum's the fake!" Despite the fact he actually succeeded with entitlement reform? Sigh.

He's helped his constituents in his sixteen years in office and has been able to use the office as a platform for a newsletter writ large. Which brings me to my final problem--he has no executive skills in a crunch.
I believe him when he says he didn't write the race-baiting nonsense in the newsletters. But if I credit his claim that he did not know who wrote that bilge, then he is to executive leadership what Stephen Hawking is to mixed-martial arts: out of his depth.

Finally, Mitt. What can be said about Governor Romney? My friend Jay Anderson has plenty of thoughts, none of them good. Here's the positive: he, too, is a good family man, a solid supporter of his church, and to his friends an absolute rock. I think his business experience is a plus, but not the plus it is claimed, otherwise why not nominate Warren Buffett? Finally, I think he's basically of center-to-slightly-rightish instincts, but they have been ruined by his sail-trimming to fit Massachusetts politics.

No, the main problem with Romney is that he neutralizes three essential issues in this race: (1) the health care legislation, (2) energy production (he signed cap and trade as governor), and (3) the HHS mandate (he ordered Catholic hospitals to provide abortifacients). Yet, there's every chance he's going to be the nominee? So, it will be a summer and autumn filled with special pleading, hand-waving, and fielding the "he was for it before he was against it, eh?" counterattacks. Yeah, that's a recipe for victory.

I'm looking for a choice, not an echo. Santorum for President.

Here's a sign that Santorum is a threat to Romney.

Jen Rubin, Mitt's ever-reliable blogging mouthpiece, has turned on him.

She actually was very complimentary to Santorum early on, but no more. He's now a genuine nemesis to Mr. Electable, so out comes the shiv. No longer an appealing populist, but a fire-breathing extremist.

Intellectual integrity is overrated in politics, and political blogging, it seems. Or maybe it's just another example of the dangers of prolonged exposure to Romnium.

I think the EPA needs to look into this, stat.

Last Man Standing?

Rick Santorum continues to amaze me with his resiliency. The primary hat trick was astonishing, given the relative paucity of resources and organization, and has shot him at least temporarily into the lead.


Jay, Paul, and Don have a lot of useful commentary worth reading.

One caveat, though--a commenter on a political blog pointed out that Santorum a couple of weeks ago that Sanrotum was something of a proxy for "generic Republican" in the polls. He hadn't had a crapstorm hurled at him by either the media or his opponents. But it's hitting him now, and I'm worried.

The President's Loyalist Media Auxiliary is already starting to soundbite him to death. The oily crapweasel Charlie Rose's interview was a case in point. Even though Santorum kept trying to shift it to economic issues, Rose was able to frame the narrative.

That can't keep happening. Even if it's just one question in an interview, five minutes out of an hour, that's what going to be highlighted in the reporting. He has to fight the culture war--the President certainly is--but he can't be painted into a corner on it. He can't abandon it, either--it is a winner, as Jay notes. But it's a winner as part of an overall package, one that frames the other guy as an out of touch extremist. The populist angle can work, if he can keep hammering it. Leave the culture war stuff to the proxies for now.

He has to frame the narrative and not let others do it for him. Otherwise, the rise is just another not-Romney  boomlet that will pass.

Fox News: "We don't report if the Saudi royals decide otherwise."

A Saudi journalist ran for his life after mild criticism of Islam's founder. Interpol collaborated in the arrest, which is even more disturbing. Not that you'll read this on Fox News, though.

As I mentioned a few weeks back, the number two shareholder at Fox (after NewsCorp) is Alwaleed bin Talal, a member of the Saudi royal family whose bottomless pockets back various American projects designed to cast sharia law in a favorable light — such as Islamic studies programs at Georgetown and Harvard. In 2006, Accuracy in Media reported that Prince bin Talal had pressured Fox into downplaying the Muslim role in rioting in France. And it just so happens that, late last year, bin Talal plunked down $300 million for a stake in Twitter, the social media service that published the tweets that have Mr. Kashgari in such dire straits.

Probably just a coincidence.

Oh, almost certainly.

In Iceland, the blind banjo player strums Bjork tunes.

Iceland: Let's Try Not to be Shelbyville, People.

 [W]hen you live in an isolated nation with a population roughly the size of Pittsburgh, accidentally lusting after a cousin is an all-too-real possibility. But a search engine called Íslendingabók (the Book of Icelanders) allows users to plug in their own name alongside that of a prospective mate, determining any familial overlap.

The moment the Archdiocese has been dreading.

The announcement of parish closures happens this month. The City and the inner ring suburbs are getting the worst of it.


Detroit Archbishop Allen Vigneron is reviewing recommendations to close up to 20 churches in Detroit, Highland Park and Hamtramck, and about 30 more in the suburbs. The pending closures -- which are expected to be finalized this month -- could shrivel the church's urban footprint to nearly one-third of the 112 parishes that existed in Detroit and its enclaves in 1988.

Since 2000, about 25 parishes have closed in Detroit and the surrounding suburbs. Recently, at least seven parishes in the suburbs have decided to close or merge in the next year or two. But unlike the pending suburban closures, many of the urban parishes didn't ask to be closed.

Many of the threatened urban parishes provide services to poor and homeless people. They are beacons of stability. And they are fighting to stay open.

"If it is providing food services, helping the homeless, closing (a church) is really a symbolic death knell of a neighborhood," said demographer Kurt Metzger, who directs Data Driven Detroit and shared population trends and statistics with the Archdiocesan Pastoral Council, which made the closure recommendations.

Priorities.

My favorite Seger tune, hands down.