Uncommon Knowledge: America’s Will to Lead

Cardinal Arinze: It's about the Ten Commandments

Rad Trads in DC: Bannon, Burke and the SSPX

Iditarod 2017: Restart moved to Anchorage

From Iditarod News today:

The Latest Iditarod News! 

The Iditarod Restart has been moved to Fairbanks. The Board of Directors of the Iditarod Trail Committee voted unanimously to move the Iditarod Trail Sled Dog Race restart location from Willow to Fairbanks due to the poor conditions of critical trail areas in the Alaska Range.

The ceremonial start in downtown Anchorage will take place as scheduled on Saturday, March 4, beginning at 10 a.m. The restart will now take place in Fairbanks on Monday, March 6, beginning at 10 a.m.

This marks the third time in the history of the Iditarod that the restart has been moved to Fairbanks due to poor conditions in the Alaska Range. The first was in 2003, and second in 2015.

To view the mushers registered for this year's Iditarod, click on the link:

http://iditarod.com/race/2017/mushers/

Our pick, as usual: Aliy Zerkel (that's her on top)

Click on the below link to volunteer:

http://iditarod.com/resources/volunteers/

Trump is another Truman

Read the below review by the Washington Post Music Critic, Paul Hume, and the response of President Truman, and tell me President Trump is not the second coming of President Truman.  If only Twitter had been available to Harry Truman.



In response to Washington Post Music Critic Paul Hume's December 6, 1950, review of Margaret Truman's singing performance at Constitution Hall, stating,
   

"Miss Truman is a unique American phenomenon with a pleasant voice of little size and fair quality � (she) cannot sing very well � is flat a good deal of the time�more last night than at any time we have heard her in past years � has not improved in the years we have heard her � (and) still cannot sing with anything approaching professional finish."

    

President Truman responded with the following letter to Hume:

THE WHITE HOUSE

WASHINGTON

Dec. 6, 1950

Mr. Hume:
I've just read your lousy review of Margaret's concert. I've come to the conclusion that you are an "eight ulcer man on four ulcer pay." 
    
It seems to me that you are a frustrated old man who wishes he could have been successful. When you write such poppy-cock as was in the back section of the paper you work for it shows conclusively that you're off the beam and at least four of your ulcers are at work.
Some day I hope to meet you. When that happens you'll need a new nose, a lot of beefsteak for black eyes, and perhaps a supporter below!
Pegler, a gutter snipe, is a gentleman alongside you. I hope you'll accept that statement as a worse insult than a reflection on your ancestry.
H.S.T.

Fr. Rutler: The issue is ILLEGAL Immigration NOT Immigration.

                                                                          

FROM THE PASTOR
February 5, 2017
by Fr. George W. Rutler

In the margin of a public speaker’s manuscript was the notation: “Weak point. Shout.” Such is the rhetoric of those who place emotion over logic and make policy through gangs rather than parliaments. In Athens 2,400 years ago, Aristophanes described the demagogue as having “a screeching, horrible voice, a perverse, cross-grained nature and the language of the marketplace.” That marketplace today includes the biased media and the universities that have become daycare centers.

   The recent action of our government’s executive branch to protect our borders and enforce national security is based on Constitutional obligations (Art. 1 sec 10 and Art. 4 sec 4). It is a practical protection of the tranquility of order explained by Saint Augustine when he saw the tranquillitas ordinis of Roman civilization threatened. Saint Thomas Aquinas sanctioned border control (S. Th. I-II, Q. 105, Art. 3). No mobs shouted in the marketplace two years ago when the Terrorist Travel Prevention Act restricted visa waivers for Iran, Iraq, Syria, Sudan, Somalia, Libya and Yemen. The present ban continues that, and only for a stipulated ninety days, save for Syria. There is no “Muslim ban” as should be obvious from the fact that the restrictions do not apply to other countries with Muslim majorities, such as Egypt, Indonesia, Pakistan, Malaysia, Bangladesh and Turkey.

   These are facts ignored by demagogues who speak of tears running down the face of the Statue of Liberty. At issue is not immigration, but illegal immigration. It is certainly manipulative of reason to justify uncontrolled immigration by citing previous generations of immigrants to our shores, all of whom went through the legal process, mostly in the halls of Ellis Island. And it is close to blasphemy to invoke the Holy Family as antinomian refugees, for they went to Bethlehem in obedience to a civil decree requiring tax registration, and they violated no statutes when they sought protection in Egypt. Then there was Saint Paul, who worked within the legal system, and invoked his Roman citizenship through privileges granted to his native Tarsus in 66 B.C. (Acts 16:35-38; 22:25-29; 25:11-12) He followed ordered procedure, probably with the status of civis Romanus non optimo jure—a legal citizen, but not allowed to act as a magistrate.

   It is obvious that the indignant demonstrators against the new Executive Orders are funded in no little part by wealthy interests who would provoke agitation. These same people have not shown any concern about the neglected Christians seeking refuge from persecution in the Middle East. In 2016 there was a 675% increase in the number of Syrian refugees over the previous year, but while 10% of the Syrian population is Christian, only one-half of one percent of the Syrian Christians were granted asylum. It is thankworthy that our changed government now wants to redress that. The logic of that policy must not be shouted down by those who screech rather than reason.
        

Sundays are for Beauty: The First Rosary

For those who would question the repetitive nature of the "Hail Mary" while reciting the Holy Rosary.

H/T: Molly

WHO'S HE TO JUDGE? Bishop Barron & the Church of Accompaniment