The end of a republic draws nigh when a majority of the people figure out ways to vote themselves money out of the public treasury, so opined a New York banker some time ago. His name was Alexander Hamilton and he was speaking at the inauguration of United States Department of the Treasury where he was to become the architect of the Republic’s financial system. Well may we pay heed to Mr. Hamilton's observation or else we would have taken another step on the path that the erstwhile Roman Republic took..into luxurious nothingness.

Whether or not you agree with his bold approach, it is hard not to be impressed with the courage of Father J. Scott Newman of Greenville. Frankly, I am not sure that his public  missive to those who voted for Obama-Biden is the best approach to an embarrassing problem bedeviling the American Catholic Church for two decades now: how to handle radical promoters of abortion who claim to be Roman Catholic and shamelessly hide behind the flimsy “personally I am prolife but…” argument.  

I have had the honor of meeting the learned gentleman and hearing him deliver a fine homily from his pulpit at St. Mary’s Church. Succinct, articulate, and well versed in the fine art of communicating with 21^st century parishioners, Reverend Jay Scott Newman is the embodiment of the confident young men of faith and purpose who came into the priesthood encouraged by the servant zeal of the late John Paul II. These relatively young men are slowly replacing  priests and prelates like former Congressman Father Bob Drinan and Boston Cardinal Bernard Law whose permissive sinecures of cushy comfort gave rise to a generation of fallen away Catholics and triggered scandals that shook the very foundations of America’s biggest Christian denomination. An instinct for compromising with the establishment is wired deep into the fiber of the American Catholic Church, a legacy of being a distrusted ‘alien’ entity for at least the first hundred and fifty years of the Republic’s existence. It is not surprising to recall that the Chief Justice who famously declared that black people were nothing more than commodities of trade was himself a Roman Catholic. In true fashion of subsequent ‘have my cake and eat it too’ Catholic politicians, however, Chief Justice Roger Taney protested to the end that while he ‘personally’ agreed with his Church’s teachings that slavery was evil, he couldn’t impose those beliefs on the rest of the country. Where have I heard that before?

Priests like Scott Newman and bishops like Bruskewitz (Lincoln, NE) and Chaput (Denver) have the faculties of logic functioning in their well trained minds, unlike their predecessors whose reasoning abilities seem to have been compromised by all that 1960s era funny weed. The Roman Catholic Church is crystal clear about its non-negotiable social justice issues: sanctity of innocent life, racism, marriage, and slavery. A Catholic who promotes, by word or deed, death, slavery, racism, polygamy or gay marriage, is automatically placing himself/herself outside of the farthest boundaries of the Church. It can be certainly argued, though by stretching logic somewhat, that politicians like Vice President-elect Joe Biden and Rudy Giuliani can logically support the ‘right’ to  infanticide by others and remain Catholics in good standing. What is beyond logic, nonetheless, is to posit that you can remain a Catholic and want to actively remove existing protections for innocent life while seeking to publicly fund what the Church considers infanticide. At that point, it moves from being ‘pro choice’ (whatever that meant in the first place) to being squarely ‘pro infanticide’.

Father Newman has taken a stand for preserving the integrity of the Catholic social gospel. He may be in error as to his zeal and his methods, but at least he is doing more than most of his own bishops who seem to have abandoned the New Testament in favor of an honorable mention in the New York Times.

Those who don’t like the Catholicism of Father Newman can do the simple, American thing: find another church or create their own. Nobody is forcing anyone to be a congregant at St. Mary’s in Greenville, South Carolina. Or they can petition Congress to nationalize the Catholic Church as tyrannical legislatures like the Roman Senate, the German Reichstag, and the Chinese People's Congress have all attempted to do at various times in history.

As a priest, Scott Newman seemed to have chosen the Mother Teresa version of Catholicism over the Teddy Kenendy version of the same. Do you blame him?

Ninety years ago, the guns fell silent on the bloody Flanders fields as the First World War came to an end at the 11th hour of the 11th day of the 11th month of the calendar. Four of the bloodiest years in human history mercifully concluded with the armistice between the Austro-German empires and the Allied forces of the British Commonwealth and the United States. We said then, 'never again'...and promptly forgot. The result was another war, a much bigger one, between the same protagonists within one generation of the November 11, 1918 armistice. Therein is a lesson for every generation, beautifully captured by Thomas Jefferson's dictum that 'the price of liberty is eternal vigilance'. Only seven years removed from the most horrific attack on our soil, we already seem to be letting down vigilance, losing the appetite for fighting, ready to turn over to the lawyers the affairs of the realm.

Fighting wars is ugly and preparing for them costly in material and emotional terms. President Reagan said it well that while there is no guarantee that wars will bring peace, there is only one sure guarantee of peace: surrender. Thankfully, successive generations of Americans have resisted the temptation to fall for that temptation of peace. This is not a good time to be a serviceman for either you are facing enemy bullets or you are used as props in political campaigns by cynical politicians who have never seen a battlefield except on their plasma tv. And if you happen to be one of those decent politicians who actually has suffered and endured mightily, then elite effiminate journalists are likely to mock you war wounds and disheveled appearance.

How quickly we forget, as an old veteran put it:

That it is not the poet, but the soldier who maintains our freedom of expression;

It is not the journalist, but the soldier who maintains our freedom of speech;

It is not the lawyer, but the soldier who maintains the greatest system of justice in the world;

And it is not the politician, but the soldier who provides for our life, liberty, and pursuit of happiness.

Beautiful, simple words..way above the pay grade of the august members of the National Press Club or the American Bar Association.

The immediate task ahead is to salve the low morale of the faithful. And by that I do not mean wishful thinking and empty soothing words. We must take quick, substantive, and concrete steps to come back into a competitive mode so that morale isn’t eroded any further. The first place to do a come back is that heartbreaker of Old Dominion where a big race for a gubernatorial open seat is coming up in 2009…yes that is next year.

Now, the good news is that all elements of the Virginia GOP have already coalesced around the candidacy of Bob McDonnell, the popular current attorney general of that state. The Democrats, on the other hand, are likely to have a primary involving at least three significant candidates.

Virginia is where Democrats are hoping to showcase the end of the Republican ‘Solid South’, now that they have capped their two cycles of statewide wins with the ultimate prize of the first presidential win since 1964. Virginia must, therefore, also be the symbolic place where conservatives break that myth and start our recovery as early as next year. In Attorney General McDonnell, we have a candidate who has a popular record, solid credentials, and roots in Northern Virginia which has become a Democrat stronghold. So far, so good. We have a good start.

What we need is a good going from the very beginning. Today, I am adding the website of Bob McDonnell to the blog (on the right hand panel) as a token of my strong support and endorsement for his candidacy for the highest office in the Commonwealth of Virginia. His campaign is the symbol of the continued vibrancy of the GOP brand in the era of the socialist Obama-Pelosi one party tyranny in Washington DC. If you are as concerned about the morale of the conservative movement and the direction of this country as I am, please go to Bob’s website and sign up to volunteer or make a contribution. You can be sure that the entire weight of the federal government, Congressional earmarks, Justice Department high handedness, and ACORN fraud will be lined up a mile thick to defeat Bob McDonnell. The question is, are we up to the task of fighting back?  I believe we are and I believe that Bob McDonnell and Virginia are worth fighting for.

Show them that reports of the demise of the Republican Party are grossly premature. Fight! Fight!! Fight!!!

The election results are not unprecedented, as painful as they maybe. And most of the  prognosticators you can dismiss…they said the same thing about structural problems in the Democratic Party in the aftermath of the 2004 elections.

Now then, the election results were torturous and we all want to see some light at the end of the tunnel. That means autopsying the results without hyperbole of one kind or another. Towards that end I will offer short commentaries on several elements of the 2005 and 2008 disasters and the possible approaches to solutions. Here is the first commentary -not inappropriately- focusing on the media. .

We can wish and whine all we want but the mainstream media is not going to be neutral. By its inherent biases (geographic location, demographic of journalists etc), it will always be hostile to conservatives candidates. That said, what conservatives can do is avoid providing the press hounds with candidates whose biographies are red meat for the liberal baiters. It is unfair and patently absurd but the fact is that in our youth obsessed, technology worshipping, ‘talk it out’ pop culture, a candidate who seems aged, who is unfamiliar with gizmos like iPods and GPS, who cannot talk the glib language of an over-therapied suburban society, is open prey for the journalist class. That is not to say that elegant sounding youthful Republicans will be treated fairly by the East Coast reporter class; but a ‘hip’ conservative will make the liberal journalists more likely to look for policy and issues to bash the conservative about. A small difference but then that saves the conservatives the small margin of energy that can be used elsewhere to fight.

Next commentary over the weekend. Until then,

I write tonight as a realist who isn't even sure that my blog will continue next year. There will be a new dispensation in Washington and one party in power. Those coming to power in a euphoria fueled by frustration, bankrolled by shadowy money, and aided by Third World style election fraud and intimidation, are no friends of free speech or free choice. In the short term, the first call to battle for conservatives is at the courts: we need seasoned, honorable, and capable legal practitioners to defend the liberties which will come under the attack of the federal government on January 21. The right of radio and television stations to have conservative talk show hosts, the right of believing Christians to practice medicine and pharmacology, the right of workers to fair elections for union organizing..all of these rights will come under the gun in 78 days. And that is just the beginning. It is time to round of good lawyers for the good fight.

There are those of 'moderate' hearts who perhaps think I am overreacting. They, but, have a very limited knowledge and even lesser understanding of history.

God Bless America.

'Twas the night before elections
And all through the town
Tempers were flaring
Emotions all up and down!
I, in my bathrobe
With a cat in my lap
Had cut off the TV
Tired of political crap.
When all of a sudden
There arose such a noise
I peered out of my window
Saw Obama and his boys
They had come for my wallet
They wanted my pay
To give to the others
Who had not worked a day!
He snatched up my money
And quick as a wink
Jumped back on his bandwagon
As I gagged from the stink
He then rallied his henchmen
Who were pulling his cart
I could tell they were out
To tear my country apart!
'On Fannie, on Freddie,
On Biden and Ayers!
On Acorn, On Pelosi'
He screamed at the pairs!
They took off for his cause
And as he flew out of sight
I heard him laugh at the nation
Who wouldn't stand up and fight!
So I leave you to think
On this one final note-

IF YOU DON'T WANT SOCIALISM
GET OUT AND VOTE!!!!

In an earlier post I had talked about fighting till he end for a cause that is just, even if all the signs indicate a sure defeat on the horizon. John McCain is a warrior and knows that sometimes you just have to fight till the end, if only to be able to say to those who come after us that, in the words of Ronald Reagan, ‘we did all that could be done’. So, while the chorus of professional naysayers and soy latte drinking sophisticates of both parties becomes louder screaming ‘bow out honorably (this from people who wouldn’t recognize honor if it hit ‘em with the weight of the Sunday edition of the New York Times), McCain fights on.

So do committed Republicans across the country, even in places that have been all but written off. This weekend I was privileged to spend time in the western part of Iowa, a state which has been already awarded to the Democrats by the media. Steadfast in the face of the gloom and doom predicted by the mainstream media, stalwart Republicans were campaigning, organizing, rallying…giving everything they have for candidates from the top down the line. Some were even on offense…including the college teacher who is taking on the entrenched Iowa State Senate majority leader who heads the national Democratic state legislative committee. The local party chairman, a redoubtable woman who superbly blends national insight with down to earth demeanor, was right there holding the fort and cheering the faithful.

Watching with admiration these Iowans, I was reminded of reading somewhere that this is the state that provided the most troops per capita for the Union during the War of the Rebellion.

They fight.