I'm with Albert Brooks on the Syrian question:
I don't know the right decision on Syria, but basically telling them Saturday between 3 and 4 seems stupid.Obama says it'll just be limited, a "shot across the bow." So he's going to try to miss?
— Albert Brooks (@AlbertBrooks) August 29, 2013
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Heheheheheh. Bottum. That is all I really have to say about that (other than 10,000 words to not make one's position clear is itself a crime against nature -- no wonder he's having difficulty embracing the natural law).
Oh, ok, two quick things. Now that Bottum's gone on record that he accepts magisterial teaching and didn't intend to suggest otherwise, I'd like to point out that what's really at issue is the "weakness" of natural law arguments in the public square and that Bottum isn't the first past or present First Thing-er to wrestle with the question -- there's a whole symposium on the future of First Things in the current issue. Here's George Weigel uncharacteristically hand-wringing for example. He hasn't lost his faith (neither has Jody Bottum), but he admits he doesn't know what to do next. More on this another time -- bluntly, I am going to try to sell an essay on this topic, so $$ for the family first, self-indulgent blogging later.
Bottum's piece was dis-spiriting in one way (if you have kids, you think about them when people frame arguments), but the blogospheric reaction to it was equally so (though I did like this one -- tough and funny --so I am not being consistent). Is it not safe to pose a question to a Catholic anymore? If the Left makes an argument ad hitleram about everything, must the Catholic Right make an argument ad heresiam about everything? Can't a guy admit he's struggling with an issue and meet with an argument to persuade him instead of a lot of angry denunciations of his character?
I find that so dreadfully tedious, and it's everywhere. Raise a question, and so many Catholics respond with moral indignation and their favorite magisterial proof-text. Yes, I get it, I know what Church teaching is and that I'm bound by it. Now could you please answer my question because I am wrestling to understand it or wrestling to find a way to articulate it to my atheist neighbor? All you are saying, effectively, is Shut Up.
Update: Here's a nice post, the best that can be said in Bottum's defense while still critical -- and it takes him seriously instead of just flying off the handle.
Update: Here's a nice post, the best that can be said in Bottum's defense while still critical -- and it takes him seriously instead of just flying off the handle.
Toll House cookies? Yuck! You may find this to be heresy, but some years ago we were converted to Holy Cookie-ism. Tonight we were out of oatmeal so Middle Weed made Toll House. Uck. Too sickly sweet, couldn't stand them. Even if you are uninterested in cookies, you must go read about the Holy Cookie, which is as much about the antics of naughty boys as anything else.
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We discovered Dr. Who this summer. Therefore we now say everything in Dalek voices. Currently Girl Weed is reciting the tomorrow and tomorrow and tomorrow soliloquy from Macbeth as a dalek.
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It was murder.
It was murder.
While out walking the dog Wednesday I came across this beautiful blue dragonfly spread-eagled and being murdered by a cicada hawk (remember them?). I caught the wasp in the act and it was ashamed and tried to drive me off, which is why I didn't get a picture of her stabbing her hapless victim. But apparently I shamed her enough not to take the carcass to her lair, because it was still here today -- and I think the same bug flying around patrolling the area.
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