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	<title>FrontPage Magazine &#187; Joseph Hippolito</title>
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		<title>Black Friday Eve</title>
		<link>http://www.frontpagemag.com/2012/joseph-hippolito/black-friday-eve/?utm_source=rss&#038;utm_medium=rss&#038;utm_campaign=black-friday-eve</link>
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		<pubDate>Thu, 22 Nov 2012 04:54:19 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator><![CDATA[Joseph Hippolito]]></dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[Daily Mailer]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[FrontPage]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[America]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[black friday]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[entitlement]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[materialism]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Thanksgiving]]></category>

		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://frontpagemag.com/?p=166293</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[How entitlement and materialism are killing Thanksgiving.]]></description>
				<content:encoded><![CDATA[<p><a href="http://frontpagemag.com/2012/joseph-hippolito/black-friday-eve/black-friday/" rel="attachment wp-att-166308"><img class="alignleft size-full wp-image-166308" title="black-friday" src="http://cdn.frontpagemag.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/11/black-friday.jpg" alt="" width="330" height="165" /></a>Nothing summarizes the current condition of the quintessential American holiday more succinctly than a recent <a href="http://www.politicalcartoons.com/cartoon/8e0ef098-361b-412a-af39-a75c6e866f4c.html" target="_blank">political cartoon</a> from John Darkow of Cagle Cartoons.</p>
<p>Seated around a wooden table in a forest clearing are three Indians. Stuffed turkey and corn cobs are waiting to be served. But the Indians wear quizzical, forlorn expressions on their faces as their chief rises to address them.</p>
<p>&#8220;The Pilgrims will <em>not</em> be attending the meal,&#8221; the chief says. &#8220;They started their Christmas shopping early!&#8221;</p>
<p>So it goes with Thanksgiving. A holiday dedicated to honoring the nation&#8217;s roots and acknowledging blessings gratefully has become nothing more than an inconvenient speed bump in the clogged race toward self-gratification.</p>
<p>That assessment goes beyond the modern markers of the holiday: hustling to airports, overdosing on turkey and watching hours of football &#8212; and, if true, threatens the soul of a nation.</p>
<p>At one time, <a href="http://www.lqaf.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/11/Thanksgiving-Norman-Rockwell-Freedom-From-Want.jpg?9d7bd4" target="_blank">Norman Rockwell&#8217;s painting</a> of an elderly woman serving a huge turkey to her multi-generational family symbolized Thanksgiving. Now, two obese women fighting over the latest Singing Elmo at 7 a.m. the next day represent what can only be called Black Friday Eve.</p>
<p>Electronic signs over an outlet mall southeast of Los Angeles make the fictitious chief&#8217;s address virtually prophetic:</p>
<p>&#8220;Eat Thanksgiving dinner. SHOP at 9 p.m.&#8221;</p>
<p>Target stores nationwide will join that mall, called The Citadel, and open at 9 p.m. Wal-Mart and Sears outlets throughout the United States plan to open one hour earlier. K-Mart hopes to overwhelm its competition by opening at 6 <em>a.m</em>.</p>
<p><a href="http://images.onset.freedom.com/ocregister//mdsk99-mdsk8bblackfriday1120.gif" target="_blank">Statistics support the retailers&#8217;strategy.</a> Consumer spending on Black Friday rose from $400 million in 2006 to $816 million in 2011. Purchases on Cyber Monday, four days after Thanksgiving, surged from $600 million to $1.25 billion during the same period.</p>
<p>Yet <a href="http://images.onset.freedom.com/ocregister//mdsk99-mdsk8bblackfriday1120.gif" target="_blank">only two years ago</a>, Wal-Mart opened at midnight on the day after Thanksgiving. Sears and Target unlocked their doors at 4 a.m.</p>
<p>&#8220;It&#8217;s no longer Christmas creep. It&#8217;s the Christmas crush,&#8221; Marshal Cohen, who analyzes shopping for The NFD Group, told the <em>Orange County Register</em> on <a href="http://www.ocregister.com/articles/black-378219-retail-friday.html" target="_blank">Nov. 20</a>.</p>
<p>Moreover, it&#8217;s going to get worse.</p>
<p>As the <em>Register&#8217;s</em> Lisa Liddane wrote: &#8220;Get used to Black Friday beginning on Thursday, <a href="https://www.npdgroupblog.com/black-thursday-black-eye-for-retailers-not-so-fast/" target="_blank">Cohen said</a>. Thanksgiving Day is a traditional holiday, not a religious holiday, and for stores, being open on that day is not different from being open on other non-religious holidays such as Independence Day.&#8221;</p>
<p>The same <a href="http://www.ocregister.com/articles/black-378219-retail-friday.html" target="_blank">article</a> quotes ChainLinks Retail Advisors as stating it is &#8220;only a matter of time before Thanksgiving Day becomes the new Black Friday.&#8221;</p>
<p>The materialistic sense of entitlement such trends reflect not only contradicts Thanksgiving&#8217;s purpose. It corrodes the meaning of the holiday and threatens to make it irrelevant.</p>
<p>Entitlement is the polar opposite of gratitude. Why give thanks for something if one feels entitled to it? Besides, how much does one feel entitled to, and why?</p>
<p>Materialism forces a person to define oneself by what one has, not who one is. In such a case, how much is enough?</p>
<p>The last of the Ten Commandments forbids coveting another person&#8217;s spouse or goods. Covetousness is the ultimate expression of an entitled, materialistic self-perception. Government and business can exploit such an attitude but cannot create it out of nothing.</p>
<p>Designating Thanksgiving as a non-religious holiday misses the point. At its best, Thanksgiving is a national sabbatical designed for people to consider the nature and benefits of Providence. Religiosity can only complement &#8212; not replace &#8212; a personal commitment to contemplate and appreciate life&#8217;s blessings in the midst of life&#8217;s cruel rudeness.</p>
<p>Yet as the economy deteriorates &#8212; with the help of inflation caused by reckless government spending &#8212; so will the perceived value of such a sabbatical. More Americans will need to work during the Thanksgiving weekend just to survive financially.</p>
<p>&#8220;We had so many team members who wanted to work on Thursday that hundreds of our stores are now keeping lists of volunteers who want to work if shifts open up,&#8221; said <a href="http://abullseyeview.com/target-talks-thanksgiving-and-black-friday/" target="_blank">Tina Schiel,</a> Target&#8217;s executive vice president for stores.</p>
<p>If Thanksgiving’s original intent dies &#8212; and it is dying at Mach speed &#8212; the United States will complete its transformation from a society of free individuals into a mass of automatons subservient to public and private entities that prey upon desire and fear.</p>
<p><strong>Freedom Center pamphlets now available on Kindle: <a href="http://www.amazon.com/s/ref%3dnb_sb_noss?url=search-alias%3Ddigital-text&amp;field-keywords=david+horowitz&amp;rh=n:133140011%2ck:david+horowitz&amp;ajr=0#/ref=sr_st?keywords=david+horowitz&amp;qid=1316459840&amp;rh=n:133140011%2ck:david+horowitz&amp;sort=daterank" target="_blank">Click here</a>.</strong></p>
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		<title>Tyranny of the Healthy</title>
		<link>http://www.frontpagemag.com/2012/joseph-hippolito/tyranny-of-the-healthy/?utm_source=rss&#038;utm_medium=rss&#038;utm_campaign=tyranny-of-the-healthy</link>
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		<pubDate>Wed, 31 Oct 2012 04:30:07 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator><![CDATA[Joseph Hippolito]]></dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[Daily Mailer]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[FrontPage]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[american health care]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[NHS]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Obamacare]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[single payer]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Steven Rattner]]></category>

		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://frontpagemag.com/?p=163227</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[How ObamaCare will sacrifice the elderly and chronically ill.]]></description>
				<content:encoded><![CDATA[<p><a href="http://frontpagemag.com/2012/joseph-hippolito/tyranny-of-the-healthy/obamacare29/" rel="attachment wp-att-163294"><img class="alignleft size-full wp-image-163294" title="obamacare29" src="http://cdn.frontpagemag.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/10/obamacare29.jpg" alt="" width="300" height="200" /></a>As he begins his <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2012/09/17/opinion/health-care-reform-beyond-obamacare.html">commentary</a> in the <em>New York Times</em>, a former Obama administration official offers a breathtaking suggestion for American health care.</p>
<p>&#8220;We need death panels.&#8221;</p>
<p>Having arrested his readers&#8217; attention, Steven Rattner explains.</p>
<p>&#8220;Well, not death panels, exactly, but unless we start allocating health care resources more prudently — rationing, by its proper name — the exploding cost of Medicare will swamp the federal budget.&#8221;</p>
<p>Rattner, a former Treasury Department counselor who helped design the $82 billion bailout of General Motors and Chrysler, has extensive experience on Wall Street and in journalism &#8212; but none in medical practice or administration.</p>
<p>Nevertheless, Rattner offers an <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2012/09/17/opinion/health-care-reform-beyond-obamacare.html">example</a> for American health care to follow.</p>
<p>&#8220;Take Britain, which provides universal coverage with spending at proportionately almost half of American levels,&#8221; Rattner writes. &#8220;Its National Institute for Health and Clinical Excellence uses a complex quality-adjusted life year system to put an explicit value (up to about $48,000 per year) on a treatment’s ability to extend life.&#8221;</p>
<p>That example &#8212; which President Obama&#8217;s Affordable Care Act (aka ObamaCare) imitates &#8212; will produce devastating social consequences.</p>
<p>Britain&#8217;s National Health Service (NHS), the single-payer model Rattner endorses, routinely sacrifices the elderly and the seriously ill on the altar of cost containment.</p>
<p>British newspapers constantly expose the NHS. In <a href="http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2161869/Top-doctors-chilling-claim-The-NHS-kills-130-000-elderly-patients-year.html">June</a>, the <em>Daily Mail</em> reported that about 130,000 elderly patients &#8212; many of whom could be saved &#8212; die every year after doctors arbitrarily impose a treatment protocol for the terminally ill. That protocol, the Liverpool Care Pathway, allows doctors to replace water and intravenous feeding with automatic morphine injections that cause death in an average of 33 hours.</p>
<p>&#8220;Patients are frequently put on the pathway without a proper analysis of their condition,&#8221; said Dr. Patrick Pullicino, a consulting neurologist and professor of clinical neurosciences at the University of Kent.</p>
<p>&#8220;Very likely, many elderly patients who could live substantially longer are being killed by the LCP,&#8221; Pullicino told the Royal Society of Medicine. &#8220;If we accept the Liverpool Care Pathway, we accept that euthanasia is part of the standard way of dying as it is now associated with 29 per cent of NHS deaths.&#8221;</p>
<p>The article elicited 462 comments on the Daily Mail&#8217;s Web site.</p>
<p>&#8220;I have a very good understanding of the L.C.P,&#8221; writes Alyson White from Yorkshire. &#8220;My Nan was still able to eat and drink small amounts, until a Syringe Driver was placed in her arm. She never woke again after that&#8230;.My Nan was not terminally ill, the L.C.P. is misused and sadly so many thousands of vulnerable people are dying prematurely and unnaturally.&#8221;</p>
<p>Bea from Manchester saw the LCP applied to &#8220;a relative who simply suffered a small stroke and was fully alert, able to converse and move her right side of her body,&#8221; she writes. &#8220;&#8230;  we witnessed all food and fluids removed, morphine in large amounts introduced and the family left to watch her die, not in 33 hours, but over a week of suffering.</p>
<p>&#8220;If I did that to my dog I would be reported and taken to Court.&#8221;</p>
<p>Both the <a href="http://www.dailymail.co.uk/health/article-2161489/Nine-10-NHS-Trusts-rationing-operations.html"><em>Daily Mail</em></a> and the <a href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/society/2012/jun/20/nhs-restricting-elderly-care-harman"><em>Guardian</em></a> also reported in June that 90 percent of NHS hospitals limit the number of surgeries their doctors perform to save money &#8212; including hip and knee replacements, and cataract removal. Both newspapers cited reports from <em>GP Magazine</em>, a periodical for British doctors, and the Labour Party.</p>
<p>With waiting lists for surgeries routine in Britain, the policy &#8220;means patients face joining a waiting list to even get on the surgery waiting list,&#8221; wrote the <em>Daily Mail&#8217;s</em> Claire Bates.</p>
<p>Andy Burnham, the secretary of state for health in Labour&#8217;s shadow cabinet, said the Labour Party is &#8220;presenting new evidence of crude, random rationing across the NHS in England, going far wider and deeper than &#8230; suggested.&#8221;</p>
<p>Such restrictions affect not only the elderly, as Linda from Scotland wrote on the Daily Mail&#8217;s site (lack of punctuation in original):</p>
<p>&#8220;I Am in my 30s have a young family to look after in constant pain for over a year suspected slipped discs denied MRI and surgery even though i can barely walk or work and told all they can do is send me on my way with codeine and other addictive drugs . I am struggling to keep my life together not easy when i can barely lift my baby son. thanks Nhs for nothing.&#8221;</p>
<p>Not only does the NHS effectively prohibit many surgeries. In 2005, the <a href="http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/3322438/Patients-left-in-the-dark-about-life-saving-drugs.html"><em>Telegraph</em></a> reported that NHS consultants refuse to recommend new cancer treatments and drugs &#8212; though they have passed clinical trials, can save lives and could be purchased privately.</p>
<p>Why? Because Britain’s National Institute for Health and Clinical Excellence &#8212; which Rattner praises &#8212; had yet to review them.</p>
<p>&#8220;We have been begging the health service to make the latest cancer drugs available,&#8221; said <a href="http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/3321808/NHS-officials-refuse-to-pay-for-breakthrough-cancer-drug.html">Dr. Harpreet Wasan</a>, an oncologist at London&#8217;s Hammersmith Hospital. &#8220;They allow patients to survive longer and it seems unfair they are not available. These drugs are superior to existing drugs and patients should have access to them.&#8221;</p>
<p>NHS even limits traditional cancer treatments. The <em>Telegraph</em> again <a href="http://www.telegraph.co.uk/health/healthnews/9325667/Doctors-face-ban-on-denying-treatment-to-elderly.html">reported</a> in June that women older than 65 are less likely to receive chemotherapy or radiation therapy, and are more likely to die from breast cancer. Women older than 70 are less likely to have breast tumors surgically removed.</p>
<p>In the same article, the <em>Telegraph</em> reported that a 2009 study by the King&#8217;s Fund, a charitable health foundation, revealed these findings:</p>
<p>&#8211; Elderly patients waited longer in emergency rooms, went to intensive care less often and underwent surgery after a traumatic injury less often.</p>
<p>&#8211; Elderly patients who suffered heart attacks and strokes received fewer examinations and less treatment.</p>
<p>As a result, victims of cancer and cardiac arrest are <a href="http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1234276/Britain-sick-man-Europe-Heart-cancer-survival-rates-worst-developed-world.html#ixzz29Ocja000">far more likely to die</a> in Britain than in almost any other developed nation.</p>
<p>According to the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development&#8217;s 2009 survey on health-care standards, a British woman stands a 78.5 percent chance of surviving breast cancer after five years; the percentage for an American woman was 90.5, best in the group. A British victim of bowel cancer has just a 51.6 percent chance of surviving after five years compared to 65.5 percent in the United States &#8212; again, best in the category.</p>
<p>Finally, 6.3 percent of Britons who have heart attacks will die within 30 minutes of admission to a hospital. Only South Korea, Luxembourg and the Netherlands have worse rates.</p>
<p>Sir William Wells, a former NHS regional director, <a href="http://www.city-journal.org/html/17_3_canadian_healthcare.html">diagnosed the fundamental problem</a>: “The big trouble with a state monopoly is that it builds in massive inefficiencies and inward-looking culture.”</p>
<p>Yet even the Church of England <a href="http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-416003/Outrage-Church-backs-calls-severely-disabled-babies-killed-birth.html">supports NHS at the expense of the vulnerable</a>. Bishop Tom Butler, vice-chairman of the church&#8217;s Mission and Public Affairs Council, said in 2006 that letting severely ill or disabled newborns die would be more compassionate &#8212; and less expensive.</p>
<p>&#8220;The principle of justice,&#8221; Butler wrote, &#8220;inevitably means that the potential cost of treatment itself, the longer term costs of health care and education and opportunity cost to the NHS in terms of saving other lives have to be considered.”</p>
<p>Compare the bishop&#8217;s remarks to <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2012/09/17/opinion/health-care-reform-beyond-obamacare.html">Rattner&#8217;s belief</a> that &#8220;elderly Americans are not entitled to every conceivable medical procedure or pharmaceutical.&#8221;</p>
<p>Compare them to those made at the NHS&#8217;s 60th anniversary in 2008 by <a href="http://www.pnhp.org/news/2010/may/a-transatlantic-review-of-the-nhs-at-60">Dr. Donald Berwick</a>, former administrator for the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services who resigned in December.</p>
<p>&#8220;I am romantic about the NHS; I love it,&#8221; said Berwick, who added he &#8220;cannot believe that the individual health care consumer can enforce through choice the proper configurations of a system as massive and complex as health care. That is for leaders to do.&#8221;</p>
<p>Compare them to the current president&#8217;s views. While running for the Senate in 2003, <a href="http://www.pnhp.org/news/2008/june/barack_obama_on_sing.php">Obama told</a> the Illinois AFL-CIO:</p>
<p>&#8220;I happen to be a proponent of a single payer universal health care program&#8230;.But as all of you know, we may not get there immediately&#8230;.&#8221;</p>
<p>During the 2008 presidential campaign, Obama subtly expressed his <a href="http://www.pnhp.org/PDF_files/CAP_Presidential_hc_forum.pdf">desire to end private health insurance</a> to the SEIU in 2007:</p>
<p>&#8220;&#8230;I don&#8217;t think we&#8217;re going to be able to <em>eliminate</em> employer coverage <em>immediately.</em> There&#8217;s going to be potentially some transition process. I can envision a decade out or 15 years out or 20 years out where we&#8217;ve got a much more portable system&#8230;.And I think we&#8217;ve got to facilitate that and let individuals make that choice to <em>transition out of employer coverage.&#8221;</em> (emphases added)</p>
<p>But as the NHS illustrates, universal coverage through a government monopoly is a lie. What good is such &#8220;coverage&#8221; when patients&#8217; legitimate needs constitute threats to state accountants and bureaucrats?</p>
<p>In the zeal to expand coverage, do we want patients and their families to have as many choices as possible in deciding how to manage their own care? Or do we allow Berwick&#8217;s &#8220;leaders&#8221; to make those decisions for us &#8212; and, ultimately, decide who lives and who dies?</p>
<p><strong>Freedom Center pamphlets now available on Kindle: <a href="http://www.amazon.com/s/ref%3dnb_sb_noss?url=search-alias%3Ddigital-text&amp;field-keywords=david+horowitz&amp;rh=n:133140011%2ck:david+horowitz&amp;ajr=0#/ref=sr_st?keywords=david+horowitz&amp;qid=1316459840&amp;rh=n:133140011%2ck:david+horowitz&amp;sort=daterank" target="_blank">Click here</a>.</strong></p>
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		<title>The Propagandist Strikes Back…and Strikes Out</title>
		<link>http://www.frontpagemag.com/2012/joseph-hippolito/the-propagandist-strikes-back%e2%80%a6and-strikes-out/?utm_source=rss&#038;utm_medium=rss&#038;utm_campaign=the-propagandist-strikes-back%25e2%2580%25a6and-strikes-out</link>
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		<pubDate>Fri, 20 Apr 2012 04:15:55 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator><![CDATA[Joseph Hippolito]]></dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[Daily Mailer]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[FrontPage]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Anti-Semitism]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Iran]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Israel]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Left]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Mark Shea]]></category>

		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://frontpagemag.com/?p=129141</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[Catholic author Mark Shea's unconvincing bombast coddles Mideast terrorists.]]></description>
				<content:encoded><![CDATA[<p><a><img class="alignleft size-full wp-image-129143" title="shea" src="http://cdn.frontpagemag.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/04/shea.jpg" alt="" width="323" height="267" /></a>Why does a respected Catholic author indulge in rhetorical venom that could give aid and comfort to sworn enemies of the United States and Israel?</p>
<p>Mark Shea, whom FPM exposed March 8 in <a href="../2012/03/08/a-catholic-writers-propaganda-for-iran/" target="_blank">&#8220;A Catholic Writer&#8217;s Propaganda For Iran,&#8221;</a> offered this defense on his blog:</p>
<blockquote><p>&#8220;In point of fact, I affirm Israel&#8217;s existence and think Jews, like Palestinians, deserve a homeland. I&#8217;m big on people having a home. I merely reject the propositions that a) Israel is immaculately conceived and preserved from all sin, both original and actual b) it&#8217;s our job to defend Israel (or Germany, Japan, Korea and the scores of other countries our Empire extends to)and c) we need to pound the drums for war with Iran.&#8221;</p></blockquote>
<p>Let&#8217;s examine these propositions.</p>
<p>Regarding Israel, <em>nobody </em>would regard it as &#8220;immaculately conceived and preserved from all sin, both original and actual.&#8221; This rhetorical straw man caricatures pro-Israel opinion, and allows Shea not only to disregard Israeli concerns about self-defense but also the likelihood of an independent Palestinian state dedicating itself to <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hamas_Charter" target="_blank">Israel&#8217;s</a> <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fatah" target="_blank">destruction.</a></p>
<p>In addition, Shea uses his &#8220;immaculate conception&#8221; meme to <a href="http://www.patheos.com/blogs/markshea/2012/02/sheldon-adelson-finds-in-newt-gingrich.html" target="_blank">browbeat</a> Israel&#8217;s supporters. On <a href="http://www.patheos.com/blogs/markshea/2012/03/people-sometime-ask-what-i-mean.html" target="_blank">March 30</a>, Shea condemned Benjamin Kirstein’s <a href="http://pjmedia.com/tatler/2012/03/29/is-all-criticism-of-israel-antisemitic-put-simply-yes/" target="_blank">assertion</a> that criticizing Israel &#8220;is either subjectively anti-Semitic, in that it consciously and intentionally furthers the goals of the campaign (to destroy Israel); or it is objectively anti-Semitic, in that it unconsciously and unintentionally does the same thing.&#8221;</p>
<p>Shea labeled Kerstein&#8217;s assertion &#8220;a particularly idiotic act of idolatry&#8221; and accused Kerstein of calling Israel a &#8220;sinless utopia,&#8221; which Kerstein <em>never even implied</em>.</p>
<p>Besides, since when did opposing anti-Semitic genocide &#8212; even clumsily &#8211;become a particularly idiotic act of idolatry?</p>
<p>Also, since when did the United States become an &#8220;empire&#8221;? If the United States is an &#8220;empire,&#8221; why did it withdraw troops from Iraq? Why didn&#8217;t it turn Iraq into a colony when it had the chance? Why does Iraq have an independent government? Why is the United States contemplating withdrawing troops from Afghanistan?</p>
<p>Moreover, why did the United States close military bases once the Cold War ended?</p>
<p>Yet Shea persists and contends that any pre-emptive attack against Iran would result in world war. As Shea declared <a href="http://www.patheos.com/blogs/markshea/2012/03/it-turns-out-the-former-head-of-mossad.html" target="_blank">March 12</a>, while linking to comments from <a href="https://www.google.com/search?sourceid=ie7&amp;q=russia+teheran&amp;rls=com.microsoft:en-us:IE-Address&amp;ie=UTF-8&amp;oe=UTF-8&amp;rlz=1I7ACAW_enUS400" target="_blank">Russian</a> and <a href="https://www.google.com/search?sourceid=navclient&amp;ie=UTF-8&amp;rlz=1T4ACAW_enUS400US347&amp;q=China+warns+us+over+iran" target="_blank">Chinese</a> generals:</p>
<blockquote><p>&#8220;And if Russia doesn&#8217;t appreciate your chickenhawk class&#8217; election year need to look tough and throw some crappy little country against the wall just to show you mean business, you might discover that China wasn&#8217;t just whistling dixie when she warned of WWIII as a result of your rash pre-emptive war.&#8221;</p></blockquote>
<p>On the same day &#8212; in a post sarcastically entitled <a href="http://www.patheos.com/blogs/markshea/2012/03/todays-pro-mullah-propaganda.html" target="_blank">&#8220;Today&#8217;s Pro-Mullah Propaganda&#8221;</a>&#8211; Shea linked to a <a href="http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2058579/Russia-China-warn-America-Iran-nuclear-strike-tensions-rise.html" target="_blank">story</a> on the Chinese and Russian foreign ministers&#8217; warnings to the United States about attacking Iran.</p>
<blockquote><p>&#8220;Actually, it’s just the common sense proposition that pre-emptive war is unjust, not to mention stupid and dangerous. One need not support the goons in Iran to see this.&#8221;</p></blockquote>
<p>Shea believes pre-emptive attacks violate Catholic ethics. Logically, he cites for support the military and diplomatic leaders of two nations that not only are tone-deaf to Catholicism but also are cavalier about human rights.</p>
<p>Shea reinforces the &#8220;empire&#8221; myth by exploiting the travails of American troops. On <a href="http://www.patheos.com/blogs/markshea/2012/03/the-real-criminals-will-never-be-charged.html" target="_blank">March 14</a>, Shea posted about Staff Sgt. Robert Bales, accused of murdering 16 Afghan civilians:</p>
<blockquote><p>&#8220;The real criminals will never be charged in the mass murder in Afghanistan. These would be the members of our Ruling Classes who sent a brain-injured soldier back into battle for yet another tour of duty (his fourth!)&#8230;Sending this valiant and deeply self-sacrificial all-volunteer force back into battle again and again and again in order to maintain the empire&#8211;and in such a massive exercise in futility as our Afghan experiment in nation-building &#8212; is the real crime here&#8230;.Leave Afghanistan. Now.&#8221;</p></blockquote>
<p>Shea amplified that theme <a href="http://www.patheos.com/blogs/markshea/2012/04/one-american-soldier-has-been-killed.html" target="_blank">April 10</a>:</p>
<blockquote><p>&#8220;Not surprisingly, our armed forces, stretched to the breaking point by ten years of being used as lab rats in our ongoing experiments, are now massively medicated. You would be too if you and your family were shoveled around like concrete and your life was being thrown away on a colossal exercise in futility. Not one more drop of blood from our young men and women. Get us out of Afghanistan now.&#8221;</p></blockquote>
<p>Shea ended with a hysterical, violent demand:</p>
<blockquote><p>&#8220;Strip our legislative and executive branches of all wages and earnings except their pay for their office, and give it as a fund for wounded vets. If they complain, jail them until their experimental wars are over.&#8221;</p></blockquote>
<p>Shea&#8217;s patronizing rhetoric demeans and insults American soldiers. It portrays them as slaves and dupes of an ostensibly evil political system. It is subtle, manipulative, cynical and beyond despicable.</p>
<p>It also ignores the reason for the invasion and occupation: to prevent Islamic terrorists from establishing a base for more attacks against civilians.</p>
<p>&#8220;Al-Qaeda is still present in Afghanistan,&#8221; U.S. Ambassador Ryan Crocker told London&#8217;s <a href="http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/al-qaeda/9177408/Al-Qaeda-plotting-another-911-from-Afghanistan.html" target="_blank">Daily Telegraph</a>, which reported that about 100 al-Qaeda irregulars have returned, according to NATO estimates, with hundreds stationed in Pakistan.</p>
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		<title>A Catholic Writer&#8217;s Propaganda For Iran</title>
		<link>http://www.frontpagemag.com/2012/joseph-hippolito/a-catholic-writers-propaganda-for-iran/?utm_source=rss&#038;utm_medium=rss&#038;utm_campaign=a-catholic-writers-propaganda-for-iran</link>
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		<pubDate>Thu, 08 Mar 2012 04:00:32 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator><![CDATA[Joseph Hippolito]]></dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[Daily Mailer]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[FrontPage]]></category>

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		<description><![CDATA[The destructive political rhetoric of Mark Shea.]]></description>
				<content:encoded><![CDATA[<p><a href="http://cdn.frontpagemag.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/03/mark-shea.jpg"><img class="alignleft size-full wp-image-124754" title="mark-shea" src="http://cdn.frontpagemag.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/03/mark-shea.jpg" alt="" width="400" height="434" /></a></p>
<p>During World War II, a renowned American poet broadcast pro-Fascist propaganda from Mussolini&#8217;s Italy. Seven decades after Ezra Pound, a respected Catholic writer is following Pound&#8217;s example.</p>
<p>Mark Shea is an author and commentator for the National Catholic Register, a conservative newspaper owned by the Eternal Word Television Network (EWTN). His personal blog, &#8220;Catholic and Enjoying it,&#8221; is <a href="http://catholicism.about.com/od/Readers-Choice-Awards-2012/ss/2012-About-Catholicism-Readers-Choice-Awards-Finalists.htm" target="_blank"><span style="color: #000080;">one of About.com&#8217;s five nominees for the Catholicism Readers&#8217; Choice Awards 2012.</span></a> Shea passionately opposes American military action against Iran.</p>
<p>In expressing that passion on his blog, Shea engages in such vile attacks, distortions, and fear mongering that one wonders whether he gives aid and comfort to a sworn enemy of the United States.</p>
<p>Take his blog post from <a href="http://www.patheos.com/blogs/markshea/2012/01/its-sad-when-the-writers-of-cracked.html" target="_blank"><span style="color: #000080;">Jan. 13, 2012</span></a> in which Shea links to that revered outlet for serious foreign-policy analysis, Cracked.com.</p>
<p>In <a href="http://www.cracked.com/article_19461_6-b.s.-myths-you-probably-believe-about-americas-enemies.html" target="_blank"><span style="color: #000080;">&#8220;6 B.S. Myths You Probably Believe About America&#8217;s &#8216;Enemies,&#8217;&#8221;</span></a> Cracked.com&#8217;s Mark Hill wrote that 1) Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad&#8217;s comment about obliterating Israel was mistranslated and taken out of context 2) Iran has a smaller military budget than either Greece or Australia and 3) Ahmadinejad can be overruled by his superiors and has no significant power.</p>
<p>&#8220;It&#8217;s sad when the writers of Cracked,&#8221; Shea wrote, &#8220;know more about the Imminent Threat that is not Iran than the warmongers of the Right and the combox cowards who&#8230;defend their rhetoric in favor of cold-blooded murder of innocent human beings.&#8221;</p>
<p>Shea ended by asserting that &#8220;all the panic about Ahmadinejad with his finger on the button is pure provincial ignorance&#8230;using his stupid blather as a justification for praising cold-blooded murder of civilians as &#8216;wonderful&#8217; is both ignorant and evil.&#8221;</p>
<p>However, the German newspaper <em><a href="http://www.welt.de/politik/ausland/article13366204/Iranische-Raketenbasis-in-Venezuela-in-Planungsphase.html" target="_blank"><span style="color: #000080;">Die Welt</span></a></em> reported in May 2011 that Iran was building bases in Venezuela for intermediate-range missiles, complete with anti-aircraft batteries and commando facilities. Engineers from a firm owned by Iran&#8217;s Revolutionary Guard visited the site three months earlier.</p>
<p>The purpose, reported <em>Die Welt</em>, was to attack Iranian enemies &#8212; likely the United States &#8212; if Iran itself was attacked.</p>
<p>Since Shea&#8217;s post, the <em><a href="http://www.washingtonpost.com/world/national-security/iran-is-prepared-to-launch-terrorist-attacks-in-us-intelligence-report-finds/2012/01/30/gIQACwGweQ_story.html" target="_blank"><span style="color: #000080;">Washington Post</span></a></em> reported on Jan. 31 that &#8220;Iran is prepared to launch terrorist attacks inside the United States,&#8221; according to intelligence officials testifying before Congress. On Feb. 24, the <a href="http://www.washingtonpost.com/world/national-security/un-sees-spike-in-irans-uranium-production/2012/02/24/gIQAnc83XR_story.html" target="_blank"><span style="color: #000080;">International Atomic Energy Agency</span></a> reported on Iran&#8217;s accelerated production of enriched uranium that could be converted easily into weapons-grade stock.</p>
<p><a href="http://www.wnd.com/2012/02/ayatollah-kill-all-jews-annihilate-israel/" target="_blank"><span style="color: #000080;">The Revolutionary Guard&#8217;s own news service</span></a> published an article on Feb. 4 by Alireza Forghani, a strategic analyst who advises Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, Iran&#8217;s supreme leader. Forghani called Israel &#8220;this corrupting material&#8221; and stated that &#8220;it is a &#8216;jurisprudential justification&#8217; to kill all the Jews and annihilate Israel, and in that, the Islamic government of Iran must take the helm.&#8221;</p>
<p>So who are these &#8220;innocent human beings&#8221; Shea mentions? Among them are Iranian nuclear scientists, one of whom was assassinated Jan. 11 in Tehran. Afterward, Sen. Rick Santorum, seeking the Republican presidential nomination, remarked: &#8220;On occasion, scientists working on the nuclear program in Iran turn up dead. I think that&#8217;s a wonderful thing, candidly.&#8221;</p>
<p>Shea responded in his Jan. 12 post, <a href="http://www.patheos.com/blogs/markshea/2012/01/murderers-for-jesus.html" target="_blank"><span style="color: #000080;">&#8220;Murderers for Jesus,&#8221;</span></a> by assailing Santorum&#8217;s Catholic credentials:</p>
<blockquote><p>&#8220;&#8217;100% Prolife&#8217; candidate Rick Santorum&#8230;dissenting from two millennia of Catholic teaching which says that you may never, for any reason, deliberately take innocent human life&#8230;is now on record in favor of the murder of civilians on the chance that something or other might happen years from now to justify it.</p>
<p>&#8220;Some people will try to make the claim that he was not a civilian. Sorry, but we are not at war with Iran. The scientist is part of the military-industrial infrastructure of Iran &#8212; just like the occupants of the World Trade Center and the Pentagon were. If you say it is legitimate to murder him, you are saying it was legitimate for Osama bin Laden to murder his victims on 9/11.&#8221;</p></blockquote>
<p>Stephen White, a fellow in the Ethics and Public Policy Center&#8217;s Catholic Studies Program, wrote his rebuttal <a href="http://www.patheos.com/blogs/markshea/2012/01/murderers-for-jesus.html" target="_blank"><span style="color: #000080;">Jan. 23</span></a>:</p>
<blockquote><p>&#8220;&#8230;Santorum&#8217;s own remarks clearly indicate that he was talking about Iranian scientists who are working on nuclear <em>weapons </em>capability &#8212; a decidedly military endeavor &#8212; not just making electricity (emphasis in original).</p>
<p>&#8220;The Iranian regime invests large amounts of resources in killing Americans. Its president has publicly stated a desire to wipe our ally Israel off the map (something Mark Shea seems to scoff at)&#8230;.The point is that while Mark Shea may judge that building nuclear weapons for such a regime constitutes innocent behavior, I do not.&#8221;</p></blockquote>
<p>White also described as &#8220;badly flawed&#8221; Shea&#8217;s attempt to equate the death of the scientist with the 9/11 deaths:</p>
<blockquote><p>&#8220;Under the Just War tradition, the right to use force&#8230;does not grant the right to use indiscriminate or disproportional force&#8230;his definition of what can constitute a legitimate military target is either so narrow as to exclude those who manufacture WMDs (weapons of mass destruction) or so broad as to include the accountants, janitors, firemen, paralegals and insurance agents who died in the WTC.  Neither strikes me as a morally responsible position.&#8221;</p></blockquote>
<p>Santorum is not the only Republican to face Shea&#8217;s wrath. On <span style="color: #000080;"><a href="http://www.patheos.com/blogs/markshea/2012/02/a-reader-asks-about-whether-obamas-war-on-the-church-is-a-reason-to-vote-gop-this-fall.html" target="_blank">Feb. 10</a></span>, Shea linked to a <a href="http://caelumetterra.wordpress.com/2012/02/10/aspiring-war-criminals/" target="_blank"><span style="color: #000080;">blog</span></a> that pictured Gov. Mitt Romney, Rep. Newt Gingrich and Santorum as &#8220;Aspiring War Criminals,&#8221; and wrote:</p>
<blockquote><p>&#8220;We are, after all, talking about a field of candidates &#8212; Ron Paul doesn&#8217;t count since he will never be nominated &#8212; who <a href="http://www.cbsnews.com/8301-503544_162-57323686-503544/romney-gingrich-at-gop-debate-wed-go-to-war-to-keep-iran-from-getting-nuclear-weapons/" target="_blank">aspire to be war criminals</a>.&#8221;</p></blockquote>
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