More on the "Blessed" Season . . . .

As Rodney King would say:  "Why can't we all get along?"

From the CBC and other sources today:

Clergymen brawl at Bethlehem church

Fight erupts at traditional site of Jesus' birth

The annual cleaning of one of Christianity's holiest churches deteriorated into a brawl between rival clergy Wednesday, as dozens of monks feuding over sacred space at the Church of the Nativity battled each other with brooms until police intervened.

The ancient church, built over the traditional site of Jesus' birth in Bethlehem, is shared by three Christian denominations — Roman Catholics, Armenians and Greek Orthodox. Wednesday's fight erupted between Greek and Armenian clergy, with both sides accusing each other of encroaching on parts of the church to which they lay claim.

_______________

A fragile status quo governs relations among the denominations at the ancient church, and to repair or clean a part of the structure is to own it, according to accepted practice. That means that letting other sects clean part of the church could allow one to gain ground at another's expense.

_______________

Although the roof has needed urgent work for decades, and leaking rainwater has ruined much of the priceless artwork inside, a renovation has been delayed all these years by disagreements among the denominations over who would pay.

Why is this not at all surprising?

How very moral and upright of them . . . .

bennie Speaks . . . .

But should anyone listen?

From Global Post yesterday:

Pope Benedict XVI urges faithful to see through "superficial glitter" of Christmas

Pope Benedict XVI lamented the commercialization of Christmas during the traditional Christmas Eve Mass at St Peter's Basilica in Rome.

“Today Christmas has become a commercial celebration, whose bright lights hide the mystery of God’s humility, which in turn calls us to humility and simplicity,” he said, Euronews reported.

He went on to urge worshippers to "see through the superficial glitter of this season" and to discover its true meaning, "the child in the stable in Bethlehem," according to the BBC.

 

Of course, he was surrounded by the glittering gold in the pic above and in the article itself while making this astute observation.

No doubt wearing the nifty little red numbers to the left, also.

His hypocrisy knows no bounds . . . .

Bennie's Bedazzled . . . .

Check out Bennie's leer at the 0:56 mark and tell me he's not having impure thoughts . . . .

Clean Catholic Cash . . . .

bennie and his Jerks are the gift that keeps on giving.

Check this out via The Guardian UK today:

Vatican bank chief investigated over money laundering claims

In unprecedented move, judge freezes €23m held in account at financial institution with close church links

* John Hooper in Rome* guardian.co.uk, Tuesday 21 September 2010

The head of the Vatican bank has formally been placed under investigation in an inquiry into a suspected violation of Italy's money-laundering laws, judicial sources said today.

At the same time, a judge in Rome ordered a freeze on €23m (£19.5m) held in an account opened by the Vatican bank, the Institute for the Works of Religion (IOR), at another financial institution in the Italian capital. It was thought to be the first time such action had been authorised against the IOR in Italy.
_______________

The Vatican has a long history of withholding co-operation from Italian investigators seeking access to its bank's books. The IOR was involved in a major scandal in 1982 arising from the fraudulent bankruptcy of Banco Ambrosiano, then Italy's largest private bank.

Well.

Maybe now we have the definitive answer as to how bennie affords all those fabulous pumps he struts around in . . . .

Matt Weighs In . . . .

Matt Taibbi weighs in on the "Vati-scum" - aka, "bennie and the jerks" - in action.

A sample:

That’s all the church is. They’re a giant for-profit company using predatory salesmanship to sell what they themselves know is a defective, outmoded, basically unnecessary product.

The full article here.

As usual, his writing is on-target and verbiage more than entertaining . . . .

The Chris and Stephen Show . . . .

Christopher Hitchens and Stephen Fry fire shots across the bow at the catholic church.

These are two clips from the BBC's Intelligence Squared presentation of "The catholic church is a Force for Good." Hitchens is up first followed by Ann Widdecombe - a recent convert to catholocism - and Fry finishes up.





bennie and the jerks: 0

Our side: 1 . . . .


H/T BTO

bishop Kiddie Porn . . . .

Another of pope bennie's jerks makes the news.

CBC reports today:

Former N.S. bishop charged with possession of child porn
Wednesday, September 30, 2009 - CBC

A former Roman Catholic bishop from Nova Scotia is facing child pornography charges.

Raymond Lahey, the former bishop of the diocese of Antigonish, is known as the man who oversaw a $15-million settlement with people who said they had been sexually abused by priests in the diocese dating back to 1950.

He was returning to Canada from the United States when he was arrested at the Ottawa Airport last week after members of the Canada Border Services Agency performed a random check of his laptop computer.

Lahey has been charged with distributing and selling child pornography. No court date has been set.

_______________


On Saturday, Lahey, 69, announced his resignation as bishop of the Antigonish diocese, which the Vatican accepted.

"We are grateful to him for his dedicated and generous service to the diocese," said Anthony Mancini, archbishop of Halifax, in a statement on Saturday.

In a letter to parishioners, Lahey said he needed time for "personal renewal."

I'm guessing some of that "personal renewal" may be renewing acquaintances with an attorney or two from those settlement days. Those were good times, weren't they, raymond?

Poor bennie.

His jerks just keep messin' up . . . .

Southern Baptist Morality Police to the Rescue . . . .

Rednecks, gays and religion.

As Rodney King would say: "Why can't we all get along?"

Per the Star-Telegram.com:

Southern Baptists cut ties with Fort Worth’s Broadway Baptist

June 23, 2009 | By LEE WILLIAMS | Star-Telegram.com

The Southern Baptist Convention kicked out Fort Worth’s Broadway Baptist Church on Tuesday, saying its stance on homosexuality is too lenient.

Convention delegates, known as messengers, voted to end the 127-year relationship with the historic Fort Worth church during the annual convention being held in Louisville, Ky.

_______________


The impasse came to a head last year during a public debate over whether Broadway should allow photographs of same-sex couples in its church directory. The photographs eventually were rejected in favor of group pictures of all church members.

One reason for not allowing photographs of gay couples was to emphasize that the church is in line with the Baptist constitution, which does not include churches that "affirm, approve or endorse" homosexual behavior, according to a letter written to the Southern Bapist Executive Committee.

_______________


Stephen Wilson, a member of the Executive Committee and vice president for academic affairs at Mid-Continent University, said the issue with Broadway is about the church allowing members who are openly homosexual and unrepentant.

"If churches are ministering to homosexuals, they are doing nothing more than what our own convention’s task force has asked us to do," Wilson said. "But in Broadway’s case … the church was in effect saying that it was OK to have members who are open homosexuals."

Dana Carvey's Church Lady might put it this way:

"Well, isn't that special ? ? ? ? "

rick warren "Sick With Exhaustion" . . . .

Does the good pastor really expect us to believe that one?

Per Huffington Post:

Rick Warren Cancels ABC Appearance "Moments Before," Claims "Exhaustion"
The Huffington Post | Rachel Weiner | April 12, 2009

Pastor Rick Warren who last week denied ever supporting California's anti-gay marriage Proposition 8 despite evidence to the contrary, has now bailed on an opportunity to explain himself.

Warren canceled an Easter Sunday appearance on ABC's "This Week" just "moments before the scheduled interview," host George Stephanopoulos told viewers.

Even 2008's winner of the Nobel Prize for Economics Paul Krugman weighs in on this one.

The next time the rev. is preachin' the ten commandments, he may want to pay particular attention to the ninth one . . . .

Beehive State Abuzz in Pornography . . .

Apparently the practise of polygamy isn't the only sexual anomaly in the Beehive State of Utah. The fine residents rank at the top of online porn consumers.

Per The Salt Lake Tribune:

Utah is No. 1 - for online pornography consumption
By Dawn House | The Salt Lake Tribune | 03/03/2009

Besides its political bent, Utah's per capita appetite for online pornography makes it the nation's run-away red-light state.

A study by a Harvard Business School professor shows that Utah outpaces the more conservative states -- which all tend to purchase more Internet porn than other states.

Online porn subscription rates are higher in states that enacted conservative legislation banning same-sex marriage or civil unions and where surveys show support for conservative positions on religion, gender roles and sexuality, according to an analysis published in the Journal of Economic Perspectives.

_______________


Utah's No. 1 score may have to do with its demographics, said the author of the study, Benjamin Edelman.

For instance, Internet porn subscriptions are particularly widespread in states with young populations, in the 15 to 24 age group, while people over 65 are less likely to subscribe. Income can be a another factor, with each $1,000 increase in average household income pushing up the number of subscribers. Rates also go up with a college education and among people who are divorced, although marriage and graduate degrees have the opposite effect.

______________


Although Utah is headquarters for The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, Edelman found that regions where people regularly attend religious services are not statistically different from their counterparts in more secular regions. But users who do attend religious services tend to shift their adult entertainment sessions to other days of the week than the day of services.

_______________


Daniel Weis, spokesman for the Colorado-based Christian group, Focus on The Family, said the study "is credible only for what it is studying, which is very little."

"My caution is that people do not extrapolate that this is a report for the entire nation," he said. "The fact that conservative-minded people are fighting porn doesn't mean that they go home and look at it."

The Focus on The Family spokesman was also quoted as saying "There is a Santa Claus and a pot of gold at the end of every rainbow."

OK, OK, that last line I made up.

But is it really that much of a stretch ? ? ? ?

Can You Say "Photo Op" ? ? ? ?

"Every Picture Tells a Story" - apologies to Rod Stewart.

Talk about your cheesy photo ops to promote your home renovation tax break:

Photo Credit: Reuters

Too bad it's not the last nail in the coffin of his government that stevie's workin' on there.

Feel free to enter your captions . . . .


UPDATE: Rex Murphy's take on "Tool Time" . . . .

Taibbi = 1. Friedman = 0 . . . .

Matt Taibbi on AlterNet today gives the definitive "burn" to Thomas Friedman.




Go.

Read.

You too can fully understand the relationship between the size of Valerie Bertinelli's Ass and Happiness . . . .

H/T Lloyd

"Goodbye George" from McClatchy . . . .

McClatchy's Washington Bureau bids an early farewell to george bush today.

Commentary: Bush makes a farewell tour. Good riddance

Joseph L. Galloway | McClatchy Newspapers

December 18, 2008

We've been treated to a real spectacle this week as President George W. Bush and Vice President Dick Cheney limped into the home stretch of their Magical History Tour, employing distortions, half-truths and untruths in a final, desperate attempt to pervert or somehow prevent history from judging them accurately.

_______________

The great gray eminence himself, Dick Cheney, of no known address, went on national television pleading guilty to committing a war crime. Yes, Cheney said, he participated in the White House discussions on the use of torture in the interrogations of suspected terrorists. Yes, he said proudly, he approved the use of such outlawed practices as water-boarding, the simulated drowning of bound and helpless prisoners to make them talk. So what?

Photo credit: Kevin Seirs of the Charlotte Observer

_______________

Over in the White House, the president was busy signing a flood of executive orders opening the gates to oil drilling on massive chunks of previously protected public lands in the West; protecting big corporations from lawsuits in state courts when their products harm or kill innocent Americans, and generally giving his fat cat friends one last shot at looting a national Treasury of any remaining table scraps.

The president and his spinmeisters keep talking about how, with the passage of time, historians will come to judge his presidency a huge success, much as history has come to judge the administration of Harry S. Truman.

Balderdash. Or as I much prefer to say in situations like this: Bullshit!

_______________


Bush told his War College audience that of all the things he loved about the job, he was proudest of all of his role as their commander-in-chief.

Why then did he and his minions oppose virtually every attempt to reinforce their numbers and shorten the time they spent in Hell? Why did they oppose virtually every attempt to increase their pay and their benefits, and those of millions of American veterans of these and other wars?

How could so proud a commander sit idly by while soldiers and Marines were sent off to war without the armored vehicles and body armor they so desperately needed in this new kind of war?

How could his administration pinch pennies when it came to funding and manning the military hospitals that treat the thousands of wounded troops flowing home from his wars?

How can this man talk about making the world a safer and freer place by his actions when so much innocent blood has been shed by civilians in Iraq and Afghanistan? When millions have been turned into homeless refugees inside and outside Iraq? When America is left with far fewer friends and allies among the nations of the world?

The only good news left to us this gloomy, cold December is that we only have to put up with this wretched spectacle for another 30 days or so.

George W. Bush should make a hurry-up call to his architect and see if it's not too late to substitute firing slits for the ground floor windows in his new Presidential Library in Dallas.

Good-bye George, and good riddance.

Well done, Mr. Galloway.

Well done . . . .

Goose, Gander, etc., etc., etc. . . . .

Per Reuters:

China spying on Olympics hotel guests: U.S. senator
Tue Jul 29, 2008 - By Richard Cowan


WASHINGTON (Reuters) - China has installed Internet-spying equipment in all the major hotel chains serving the 2008 Summer Olympics, a U.S. senator charged on Tuesday.

"The Chinese government has put in place a system to spy on and gather information about every guest at hotels where Olympic visitors are staying," said Sen. Sam Brownback.

The conservative Republican from Kansas, citing hotel documents he received, added that journalists, athletes' families and others attending the Olympics next month "will be subjected to invasive intelligence-gathering" by China's Public Security Bureau. He said the agency will be monitoring Internet communications at the hotels.

_______________


The senator called on China to reverse its policy, but said the hotels are advising guests that "your communications and Web site activity are not private" and that e-mails and Web sites being visited are accessible to local law enforcement.

Exactly how is this any different from the US government with the "new and improved" FISA legislation passed by a democratic Congress and signed by gwbush?

What a bunch of hypocrites . . . .

Money for Nuthin' . . . .

Per Reuters today:

Clear Channel in $400 million deal with Limbaugh

Thu Jul 3, 2008
(Reporting by Pratish Narayanan in Bangalore; Editing by Erica Billingham)

(Reuters) - Conservative talk radio host Rush Limbaugh signed an eight-year contract extension worth as much as $400 million with Clear Channel Communications Inc, The New York Times said on its website on Wednesday citing an interview with Limbaugh.

Clear Channel said on Wednesday that Limbaugh renewed his contract with units Premiere Radio Networks and Clear Channel Radio, but did not disclose financial details.

Limbaugh's paycheck of $50 million a year represents a raise of about $14.4 million a year over his current contract, which was paying him $285 million over eight years and was set to expire in 2009, the newspaper's website said.

Separately, Clear Channel's Premiere is in advanced talks with another conservative talk radio host Sean Hannity to try to sign him for an eight-year contract worth about $200 million, The Wall Street Journal said, citing a person familiar with the situation.

Clear Channel was not immediately available to comment. Limbaugh and Hannity could not be immediately reached for comment.

I guess you can put a price on Stupid after all . . . .

god, Gays, and Billable Hours . . . .

From McClatchy today:

Episcopal church split headed to court in California
Brad Branan - Fresno Bee - April 26, 2008

The U.S. Episcopal Church has filed a lawsuit to reclaim property from the Diocese of San Joaquin, which voted last year to leave the national church largely over differences with the national body's approval of same-sex blessings, ordination of a gay bishop, the role of women in the church, and how to interpret the Bible over such issues.

In a 30-page lawsuit filed this week in Fresno County Superior Court, the church argues that the vote by 42 of the diocese's 48 parishes doesn't entitle them to keep any property. The national church wants all the diocesan property, including titles to its church buildings, including the diocesan headquarters, St. James Cathedral of Fresno.

The lawsuit asks John-David Schofield, whom the national church deposed March 12 as bishop of the Diocese of San Joaquin, to vacate his Fresno office and turn over the property occupied by parishes that voted to leave. A Schofield spokesman, the Rev. Van McCalister, speaking on his behalf, said the diocese will likely fight the legal action.

The lawsuit raises the question of who makes up the diocese and who's the bishop. Six of 48 parishes voted to stay with the national church and later elected Jerry Lamb as bishop. The smaller diocese has set up temporary offices in Stockton. The breakaway diocese has aligned with the Anglican Church of the Southern Cone of South America, based in Argentina.

'Ya gotta love it when the go-godders get in a pissing match with each other that includes lawyers.

A happy ending is doubtful.

Snicker, snicker . . . .

Smak 'em Down . . . .

H/T "The Olde Goat":

$$$'s vs. Political "Alliances" . . . .

Via Reuters today:

Saudi arms sale may spark Bush-Congress battle
Thu Dec 27, 2007 - By Jim Wolf

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - A plan to sell Saudi Arabia highly accurate Boeing Co bomb-guidance kits is roiling Israel's backers in the Congress, setting up a potential clash with President George W. Bush.

The administration could formally notify lawmakers as soon as January 15 of the possible sale to Riyadh of Joint Direct Attack Munitions, or JDAM, technology.

As many as 253 members of the 435-seat House of Representatives have signed bipartisan warnings to Bush about such a sale to Saudi Arabia, still in a formal state of war with Israel.

_______________


The JDAM sale would be part of a combined $20 billion or so in fresh U.S. arms sales to Gulf Arab states described by Washington as a strategic drive to counter Iran's growing might.

Rep. Anthony Weiner, a New York Democrat, said he and 35 other House members plan to introduce a measure aimed at blocking a JDAM sale "the minute Congress is officially notified."

In the Senate, Foreign Relations Committee Chairman Joseph Biden of Delaware, a candidate for the Democratic presidential nomination, also has voiced qualms.

"My committee's looking very closely into this," he told reporters in a December 4 conference call. "Thus far, the justification for the sale has not been made to me."

_______________

Oh, and guess what? Our old buddy Israel is not happy, either. Apparently, what's good for the goose is not good for another religion's gander:

_______________


Israel became the first foreign buyer of JDAMs in 2000. Since then, 18 countries have followed, according to Boeing's Web site. The weapon has been used widely in the U.S.-led wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.

Saudi Arabia remains the top regional buyer of U.S. weapons, including Boeing F-15 fighter aircraft, United Technologies Corp Black Hawk helicopters, and General Dynamics Corp light armored vehicles, night-vision goggles, thermal weapons sights, and long-range radios.

Riyadh also has bought advanced weapons from Britain's BAE Systems, France's Dassault Aviation and Europe's EADS among other European suppliers.

How much 'ya wanna bet that military equipment sales $$$ trumps political alliances?


Nobody wants a piece of that action?

I thought not . . . .

'Nuther repuglican Pervert . . . .

What's up with this crew ? ! ? !


Compliments of the LA Times:

Orange County attorney pleads guilty to molesting teens

The former aide to Rep. Dana Rohrabacher says he met one boy on the Internet and lived with the family of the other.
By David Haldane, Los Angeles Times Staff Writer - December 6, 2007

A Ladera Ranch attorney and former congressional aide pleaded guilty Wednesday to molesting two teenage boys. In exchange for the plea, authorities said, Jeffrey Ray Nielsen, 37, is expected to be sentenced April 18 to three years in state prison.

_______________

Nielsen, a former aide to Rep. Dana Rohrabacher (R-Huntington Beach) who has also worked for Orange County GOP Chairman Scott Baugh, was arrested in 2003.

Westminster police had found thousands of images of child pornography on his home computer, laptop and a computer at his Costa Mesa law office. Prosecutors contended that Nielsen had met the 14-year-old victim on a gay Internet site and driven the boy to his Ladera Ranch condominium, where the two engaged in oral sex.

Can they not keep it in their pants? And how about finding someone your own age?

Unbelievable . . . .

Larry & Matt's Top Ten . . . .

Compliments of PoliticsTV:




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