Guest Post by Cardinal Egan:

The picture on this page is an untouched photograph of a being that has been within its mother for 20 weeks. Please do me the favor of looking at it carefully.

Have you any doubt that it is a human being?

If you do not have any such doubt, have you any doubt that it is an innocent human being?

If you have no doubt about this either, have you any doubt that the authorities in a civilized society are duty-bound to protect this innocent human being if anyone were to wish to kill it?

If your answer to this last query is negative, that is, if you have no doubt that the authorities in a civilized society would be duty-bound to protect this innocent human being if someone were to wish to kill it, I would suggest—even insist—that there is not a lot more to be said about the issue of abortion in our society. It is wrong, and it cannot—must not—be tolerated.

But you might protest that all of this is too easy. Why, you might inquire, have I not delved into the opinion of philosophers and theologians about the matter? And even worse: Why have I not raised the usual questions about what a “human being” is, what a “person” is, what it means to be “living,” and such? People who write books and articles about abortion always concern themselves with these kinds of things. Even the justices of the Supreme Court who gave us “Roe v. Wade” address them. Why do I neglect philosophers and theologians? Why do I not get into defining “human being,” defining “person,” defining “living,” and the rest? Because, I respond, I am sound of mind and endowed with a fine set of eyes, into which I do not believe it is well to cast sand. I looked at the photograph, and I have no doubt about what I saw and what are the duties of a civilized society if what I saw is in danger of being killed by someone who wishes to kill it or, if you prefer, someone who “chooses” to kill it. In brief: I looked, and I know what I saw.

But what about the being that has been in its mother for only 15 weeks or only 10? Have you photographs of that too? Yes, I do. However, I hardly think it necessary to show them. For if we agree that the being in the photograph printed on this page is an innocent human being, you have no choice but to admit that it may not be legitimately killed even before 20 weeks unless you can indicate with scientific proof the point in the development of the being before which it was other than an innocent human being and, therefore, available to be legitimately killed. Nor have Aristotle, Aquinas or even the most brilliant embryologists of our era or any other era been able to do so. If there is a time when something less than a human being in a mother morphs into a human being, it is not a time that anyone has ever been able to identify, though many have made guesses. However, guesses are of no help. A man with a shotgun who decides to shoot a being that he believes may be a human being is properly hauled before a judge. And hopefully, the judge in question knows what a “human being” is and what the implications of someone’s wishing to kill it are. The word “incarceration” comes to mind.

However, we must not stop here. The matter becomes even clearer and simpler if you obtain from the National Geographic Society two extraordinary DVDs. One is entitled “In the Womb” and illustrates in color and in motion the development of one innocent human being within its mother. The other is entitled “In the Womb—Multiples” and in color and motion shows the development of two innocent human beings—twin boys—within their mother. If you have ever allowed yourself to wonder, for example, what “living” means, these two DVDs will be a great help. The one innocent human being squirms about, waves its arms, sucks its thumb, smiles broadly and even yawns; and the two innocent human beings do all of that and more: They fight each other. One gives his brother a kick, and the other responds with a sock to the jaw. If you can convince yourself that these beings are something other than living and innocent human beings, something, for example, such as “mere clusters of tissues,” you have a problem far more basic than merely not appreciating the wrongness of abortion. And that problem is—forgive me—self-deceit in a most extreme form.

Adolf Hitler convinced himself and his subjects that Jews and homosexuals were other than human beings. Joseph Stalin did the same as regards Cossacks and Russian aristocrats. And this despite the fact that Hitler and his subjects had seen both Jews and homosexuals with their own eyes, and Stalin and his subjects had seen both Cossacks and Russian aristocrats with theirs. Happily, there are few today who would hesitate to condemn in the roundest terms the self-deceit of Hitler, Stalin or even their subjects to the extent that the subjects could have done something to end the madness and protect living, innocent human beings.

It is high time to stop pretending that we do not know what this nation of ours is allowing—and approving—with the killing each year of more than 1,600,000 innocent human beings within their mothers. We know full well that to kill what is clearly seen to be an innocent human being or what cannot be proved to be other than an innocent human being is as wrong as wrong gets. Nor can we honorably cover our shame (1) by appealing to the thoughts of Aristotle or Aquinas on the subject, inasmuch as we are all well aware that their understanding of matters embryological was hopelessly mistaken, (2) by suggesting that “killing” and “choosing to kill” are somehow distinct ethically, morally or criminally, (3) by feigning ignorance of the meaning of “human being,” “person,” “living,” and such, (4) by maintaining that among the acts covered by the right to privacy is the act of killing an innocent human being, and (5) by claiming that the being within the mother is “part” of the mother, so as to sustain the oft-repeated slogan that a mother may kill or authorize the killing of the being within her “because she is free to do as she wishes with her own body.”

One day, please God, when the stranglehold on public opinion in the United States has been released by the extremists for whom abortion is the center of their political and moral life, our nation will, in my judgment, look back on what we have been doing to innocent human beings within their mothers as a crime no less heinous than what was approved by the Supreme Court in the “Dred Scott Case” in the 19th century, and no less heinous than what was perpetrated by Hitler and Stalin in the 20th. There is nothing at all complicated about the utter wrongness of abortion, and making it all seem complicated mitigates that wrongness not at all. On the contrary, it intensifies it.

Do me a favor. Look at the photograph again. Look and decide with honesty and decency what the Lord expects of you and me as the horror of “legalized” abortion continues to erode the honor of our nation. Look, and do not absolve yourself if you refuse to act.
Edward Cardinal Egan
Archbishop of New York

Wandering through Barnes and Noble at Colonie Center today, I came across Bill O’Reilly’s frankly charming new book (I read fast when I find a comfortable chair in a book store), a memoir of sorts, A Bold Fresh Piece of Humanity, the title coming from a nun’s description of him in parochial school in 1957. The cover photo is a a great shot from his First Holy Communion. It brought back quite a few memories of my own.

Including some I share with O’Reilly.

We had a mutual friend in Joe Spencer, a classmate of my brother Tim, who went on to become a correspondent for ABC News and died in a helicopter crash in 1986 while covering a story.

Joe’s birth name was Spaletta. His dad Phil ran our local radio station and a regular lunch companion of my father’s and later of mine, long after I had ceased working for him as a weekend DJ and jack of all trades. My first recollections of him were of a chubby, but gregarious 14 year old. Among other things, he was a customer of Mom’s after supper tutoring service, a whole-family operation. Private lessons (mostly in math) were two bucks an hour, group lessons a dollar apiece. Joe was bright and didn’t need a lot of extra help, but I’m sure Phil recognized a bargain.

My little brother Sean had problems saying Spaletta as a three year old and usually called him Joe Spaghetti.

Joe became my sidekick when I was a senior and student varsity baseball manager and scorekeeper. Eventually he replaced me when I retired midway through the season ( causing a precipitous drop in the batting averages of Joe Riley and Jim LaBate). He eventually filled my shoes on the radio as well, though he had been born into that. He had an engaging style and for a while was known as Joe “Saturday” Spencer.

Then he went on to media school, by and by landing in Denver where he and O’Reilly became fast friends. Read the book for their hilarious adventures together.

Fast forward to the 1980 GOP convention in Detroit.

You couldn’t get on the floor without the proper credentials, of course. But by the second or third day a couple of us delegates conspired to share credentials for an hour or so to allow our wives to come down out of the balcony and join us. No sooner had Mary sat down with me (looking incredibly guilty, as I recall) then a real official looking guy came to the end of our row, pointed to me and signaled for me to come over.

I froze.

“Bob! It’s me, Joe Spencer!”

I laughed heartily. No longer the pudgy kid, he was strikingly handsome with a $50 haircut and All-American smile.

Joe was then working for a tv station in Detroit and his dad had asked him to look me up and record my thoughts for the folks back in Amsterdam.

Once we got that out of the way, we made up for lost time and brought each other up to date. He was a man on the way up.

“Seriously, Bob, my goal is to be back here in four years as a floor correspondent for one of the networks.” I had no doubt he could do it, though it took him just a little bit past the four year cycle to get to ABC. 1988 would have been a sure thing.

*******

The two principal eulogies at St. Michael’s Church in Amsterdam were given by Peter Jennings and Bill O’Reilly. (Peter Jennings, by the way, called Phil and Fran Spencer every year thereafter on the anniversary of Joe’s death). O’Reilly tells the story well. According to what Phil told me some time later, Roone Arledge was so impressed with O’Reilly’s off the cuff remarks that he decided to hire him, which happened a few months later.

Joe was 31 years old and recently married.

The whole town was numb, of course.

I thought back on our last conversation, sometime when he had come home for Christmas. He told me how he envied his younger brother, Phil, Jr.

“Phil will never leave Amsterdam. He loves it here. He’s perfectly happy hanging out with his friends at a sports bar on the south side every Friday and Saturday night. You don’t know how much I wish I could be like him. But I can’t.

“I’ve got this driving ambition. It’s all-consuming. I have to be the best. I have to go as far as I can go.”

He shook his head, as though he didn’t understand it.

And I remembered the happy-go-lucky 14 year old and his happy-go-lucky little brother.

Sometimes there are just no explanations.

With a few notable exceptions, I have had a great fondness for the English teachers of my formative years, among whom was Sister Marietta Kuczynski, CSJ, who graduated to glory on September 19 at the age of 92.

Sister Marietta presided over us at SMI in eighth grade, 1964-65. I recall her as being personally delightful, full of whimsy, and if there was a hard edge to her anywhere she never revealed it. She was a native Amsterdamian, though she hadn’t attended St. Mary’s. One of her classmates at Wilbur H. Lynch High School had been a fellow named Isadore Demsky, Izzy to her and Kirk Douglas to you.

Under her tutelage I produced an epic one page novella, The Monster Visits the World’s Fair, which would have made a terrific Ed Wood movie (perhaps I’ll post it in the comments section after I get home if I still have it). Her continuing encouragement caused me to break out in new directions on my own, and in an incredible burst of genius I also authored that year my first musical, Don’t Cry Over Spilled Nitro, or Bye Bye Laboratory. Characters in that play, Russian spies Gherman Shnitova and Vladimir Isnovitch, moved to England the following year in my magnum opus musical North Atlantic, music by Richard Rodgers, book and lyrics by moi.

Eighth grade marked the last vestiges of childhood innocence, transitioning rapidly to puberty and high school. Perhaps that is why I remember it so fondly. But it helps to have fond people to remember.

Her printed obituary states, “A diligent worker with a generous spirit, Sister Marietta leaves a legacy of devotion to faith and family and kindness and compassion to all.”

That’s about right.

Eternal rest grant unto her, o Lord, and let perpetual light shine upon her.

Today is the feast day of Padre Pio, the beloved and remarkable 20th century saint and mystic (much background here).

Last year I read a story about a young Bishop Karol Wojtyla writing to him through diplomatic channels to pray for a particular person’s health. When Pio learned of the author of the letter he told the bearer to preserve it, because it would be important one day, as of course it was when the bishop became Pope John Paul the Great. There was a remarkable news wirephoto from John Paul’s last hospital stay, clearly showing the unmistakeable reflection of Padre Pio in the window glass of the pope’s hospital room several stories up.

For fifty years he bore the wounds of Christ. My late pastor, Monsignor Glavin, told me of having served Mass for Padre Pio when he (Glavin) was a young seminarian at the North American College in Rome.

“His hands were all bundled in bandages, and when he pronounced the words of consecration they began to bleed, which was only visible to those of us closely attending him.”

Monsignor, who bore many infirmities of his own in his last years, had learned from the master to bear them gracefully.

Gracefully.

Well, I see that Mr. Obama has characterized the truth that he supports allowing live-birth abortion victims to be neglected to death as “despicable lies”.  He’s used this tactic before, and it’s wearing a little thin. The fact remains that he led the fight in Illinois against protecting the most vulnerable of our live citizens, a position that was not taken by a single member of the United States Senate when an identical bill was passed unanimously and which takes him beyond even NARAL, making his the most extreme anti-life position ever taken by a major candidate for any office in this country.

That he would continue to lie about his own record is understandable, because it is a position that is as repugnant and repulsive as almost any imaginable.

Everybody please read Mona Charen’s Deniers for Obama.

Here’s the money quote:

Barack Obama is a charming and intelligent man. But there is no other way to interpret his position on BAIPA than this: A woman who chooses an abortion is entitled to a dead child no matter what. That is an abortion extremist.

*******

Far be it for me to presume to advise Mr. Obama on how to run his campaign, but running on death issues is a loser. I’m not just speaking of the above wacky position, but rather the conscious and concerted effort by Obama to inject abortion as a campaign issue. This tactic has been tried time and time again and it always fails. Pro-abortion candidates are encouraged by polls which show that a majority of voters support a right to abortion under some circumstances. The various caveats to that I will ignore for the moment and just accept the general premise.

What the polls don’t show is that when it comes to the voting booth, the general philosophic acceptance of abortion does not translate into votes for an assertive pro-abortion candidate. The reasons are many. Part of it is that the pro-life vote is far more focused on the issue, far more likely to treat it as a make or break decider.

And part of it is simply that most voters feel extremely uncomfortable with candidates promoting death, whether they agree with the “right” or not. This reality is not limited to abortion or party. Republicans have made he same mistake over and over themselves by assuming that general public support for the death penalty will translate into votes for a pro-death penalty candidate. I remember several losing campagns in New York along these lines. Mario Cuomo stated right out that he would not enforce a death penalty in New York even if one passed. People disagreed with that, but respected him for it, because it was grounded in  morality. And there was just something creepy about running for office proclaiming you will put more people to death than the other guy. That is something I’ve never been fond of George W. Bush for, and I recall Bill Clinton establishing his “moderate” credentials by running back to Arkansas during his first campaign to ensure a criminal would be put to death before the election.

And I truly can’t think of a single pro-life legislator who was thrown out of office on that issue. Despite all the talk of suburban Republican women eagerly protecting their right to choose, it just never happens that way. Sure, the most pro-life guy in the Senate, Rick Santorum, got tossed a couple of years ago, but only after the Democrats cynically recruited the son of the nation’s most revered pro-life Democrat (an admittedly small field, but Bob Casey Senior was a good guy) to run against him.

So keep bringing it up, Obama. Keep reminding us.

I’m Bob Going and I approved these despicable lies.

Several people have wondered why I have yet to post about the 2008 Amsterdam High School graduation, the last one for our family for a long time, when my darling Louisa Marie walked across the makeshift stage and beamingly accepted her diploma. It certainly ranks as a great and wonderful moment for me.

But something else was happening. Absent from the stage was Assistant Principal John Davey, who ordinarily might have been expected to be up there when his kid brother graduated. Bryan Davey went through with the ceremony, and the handsome, popular star athlete received a well-deserved ovation, took a deep breath and walked quickly down the aisle to his seat, exhaling only once.

A week earlier and he might have been awaiting with fond anticipation the raucous cheers of his younger sister and his fourteen older siblings, but no shouts came from the Davey family on Saturday. Instead, Bryan’s dad Jack and the others sat numbly in the upper bleachers. Bryan’s mom had been found dead a couple of days earlier at 61.

*********

It is impossible to calculate how many lives Joanne Davey touched over the years, directly or indirectly. She produced by far the largest Amsterdam family of her generation. And she raised those kids well, every one a credit to their parents and the community.

And she did it while maintaining her career as a nurse at St. Mary’s Hospital. Not just a nurse, but the best nurse in the place: caring, compassionate, competent beyond words. Organized.

Organized! But then she’d have to be. I remember running into her in the supermarket about midway through her brood and seeing her cart stacked with three gallons of milk, multiple loaves of bread and all kinds of other stuff.

“Joanne, just out of curiosity,” (the whole town was curious),”how often do you have to shop?”

“Oh, every day.” There just wasn’t enough storage room anywhere  to hold food enough for that many.

When we were having kids ourselves (they already had about eleven) Joanne served as the head night nurse and often participated in the deliveries. Mary was going through the usual trauma with one of ours and when she looked up and saw who was in the room she said, “Oh, thank God you’re here, Joanne! Knowing how many times you went through this makes it easier for me to get through this once!”

I’ve seen her tired many times. I never once saw her slow down.

She was a very pretty woman when she married Jack at 21, and her beauty endured and grew deeper and deeper until it extended to the very core of her being.

********

Forty years after their marriage, Jack and the kids received hundreds of mourners in a line that extended from the chapel of St. Mary’s Church, down the hallway, through the church proper, out the main door and back down East Main Street.

The wait gave me some time to reflect.

Jack Davey was a high school junior basketball star when I first attended St. Mary’s Institute in 4th grade. Mom, his English teacher, used to comment on what a nice boy he was.

Jack was my hero. I’d follow him around the school and even took his picture once on the basketball court at the Armory, with a cheap plastic camera and a flash bulb. It came out pretty good. I gave it to his oldest son when he was seventeen to remind him that beneath every father is a seventeen year old kid.

By the time I was getting ready to turn seventeen myself, Jack was coaching varsity baseball at Bishop Scully High School (and I think already in the early years of his long teaching career at Fonda-Fultonville), and I was the team manager and scorekeeper (I helped Jim LaBate and Joe Riley into the record books). Jack and I ended up talking a lot of baseball and about pretty much everything else.

Very often he would give me a ride home to Trinity Place after a game. “Bobby, don’t ever stop with your education. Get as much of it as you can. Education is its own reward. Remember that.”

You could just tell that he was looking forward in fond anticipation to his pending nuptials  with the 21 year old beauty Joanne. The baseball season ended just a few weeks before the ceremony.

“Have a nice marriage!” I said to him as I exited the car after the last game.

********

I looked around the church. Sixteen baptisms, first communions, confirmations, weddings, then starting all over again with the grandchildren. They had a big van, but after a while they would take the kids to Mass in shifts.

Parents were required to attend special classes prior to the big sacramental occasions. I’d laugh to see Joanne there in later years. “I think maybe you should be teaching this.”

But an obligation is an obligation, and she dutifully participated each time.

Aisle shuffling companion turned to me.

“You know, Bob, Joanne is a saint. Everybody knows it. You should start a committee for her canonization. Skip all the preliminaries. Tell the Vatican not to wait. Get it started now.

“Put it on your blog.”

*********

Your Holiness, on behalf of the parishioners of St. Mary’s Parish, Amsterdam, NY USA, I present to you the cause of Joanne Davey: wife, mother, nurse, friend. She led a life of heroic virtue, kept God first, and by her work, teaching and example provided a perfect archetype of the Christian life, such that many have profited and will profit from her shining goodness.

Santo subito!

Sainthood now!

With the completion of the railroad and the death of the Western movie genre, unemployed cowboys desperate for work turn to Professional Synchronized Swimming.

Inspiration courtesy of Fra. Alessandro

Growing up Catholic pre-Vatican II we had a multitude of learning aids at our disposal (though the “cheat cards” for the Latin responses at Mass were never to be used by altar boys except in case of dire emergency). 

One of the most wonderful for the middle grades was a comic book called Treasure Chest which educated us twice monthly on the finer points of the Catholic religion, its history and tradition, and the application of the principles thereof to the modern world.

Happily a great many years of this magazine are now on-line and I was able today to relive some of those long-forgotten gems.  The home page is here.

One of the recurring features concerned the fictional  Chuck White and his friends.  At random I came across this episode which would drive the eco-nuts crazy today.  Take a glimpse back to the not so distant past when ridding the land of swamps and mosquitoes and disease seemed more important than “protecting our wetlands”.  I have renamed it Chuck White Fails to File an Environmental Impact Statement.

And, at random, an episode of This Godless Communism.

Those were the days, by God.

On his first evening in New York City, His Holiness Pope Benedict XVI received a special nighttime tour of the New Yankee Stadium, now under construction adjacent to the site of the House that Ruth built (that’s Babe, not the Jewish Matriarch).

He was personally greeted by Yankees owner George Steinbrenner, who attempted to slip the Pope a pair of 2008 World Series tickets in hopes of obtaining a Plenary Indulgence at the moment of death.  Instead, he received a copy of the Catechism of the Catholic Church and a chuckle.

Pope Benedict, sometime affectionately called “Big Papi”, then dug a hole in the turf beneath the future third base and placed a small object therein before covering it and extending what was believed to be a special Papal Blessing.

When asked what exactly he had left behind, the Pope simply replied, “All things shall be revealed in the fullness of time,” with a decided twinkle in his eye.

I have previously written about the beautiful Eucharistic hymn of Thomas Aquinas, Pange Lingua Gloriosi, its origins and meaning.  I have since heard that Aquinas wrote this hymn at the request of the Pope for the Office celebrating the feast of Corpus Christi, and that he threw in O Salutaris Hostia and Panis Angelicus for good measure in a burst of genius I don’t think the world has ever seen since.

Once I realized that I was getting a fair number of hits on the original post, I began to fear that my limited knowledge on the subject might contain error which could be repeated, so I decided to ASK THE EXPERT and imposed upon Father George Rutler for additional information, which he very kindly provided, and which I pass along on this Holy Thursday evening:

Dear Mr. Going,   St. Thomas Aquinas did indeed write Pange Lingua - and much more. He based it on a sixth century hymn of Fortunatus.  It is part of a longer sequence “Lauda Sion” which is amply explained on the website “New Advent” - look up under L for Lauda Sion.  The following (see below) is from the Cath Encylc. -  I also mention this in my book “Brightest and Best.”

Fr. George Rutler
___________________________________

Pange Lingua Gloriosi

The opening words of two hymns celebrating respectively the Passion and the Blessed Sacrament. The former, in unrhymed verse, is generally credited to St. Venantius Fortunatus (6 cent.), and the latter, in rhymed accentual rhythm, was composed by St. Thomas Aquinas (13 cent.).

I. THE HYMN OF FORTUNATUS

The hymn has been ascribed to Claudianus Mamertus (5 cent.) by Gerbert in his “Musica sacra”, Bähr in his “Die christl. Dichter,” and many others. Pimont, who cites many other authorities in his support, is especially urgent in his ascription of the hymn to Mamertus, answers at great length the critics of the ascription in his Note sur l’auteur du Pange … prœlium certaminis (Hymnes du brév. rom. III, 70-76), so that it seems hardly correct to say with Mearns (Dict. of Hymnol. 2nd ed., 880), that “it has been sometimes, apparently without reason, ascribed to Claudianus Mamertus.” Excluding the closing stanza or doxology, the hymn comprises ten stanzas, which appear in the manuscripts and in some editions of the “Roman Missal” in the form:

Pange lingua gloriosi prœlium certaminis
Et super crucis tropæo dic triumphum nobilem,
Qualiter Redemptor orbis immolatus vicerit.

The stanza is thus seen to comprise three tetrameter trochaic catalectic verses. In the “Roman Breviary” the hymn is assigned to Passion Sunday and the ferial Offices following it down to and including Wednesday in Holy Week, and also to the feasts of the Finding of the Holy Cross, the Exaltation of the Holy Cross, the Crown of Thorns, the Five Wounds. In this breviary use, the hymn is divided into two, the first five stanzas being said at Matins, the second five (beginning with the words “Lustra sex qui jam peregit”) at Lauds; and each line is divided into two, forming a stanza of six lines, e.g.:

Pange lingua gloriosi
Lauream certaminis,
Et super crucis trophæo
Dic triumphum nobilem:
Qualiter Redemptor orbis
Immolatus vicerit.

The whole hymn is sung during the ceremony of the Adoration of the Cross on Good Friday, immediately after the Improperia or “Reproaches”, but in a peculiar manner, the hymn being preceded by the eighth stanza (Crux fidelis) while the stanzas are followed alternately by the first four and the last two lines of the (divided) eighth stanza.

It will have been noticed that in the six-lined stanza quoted above, “lauream” has not commended itself to hymnologists, who declare that no pleonasm is involved, since “prœlium” refers to the battle and “certamen” to the occasion or cause of it; so that “prœlium certaminis” means the battle for the souls of men (see Kayser, “Beiträge zur Gesch. und Erklärung der ältesten Kirchenhym.”, Paderborn, 1881, p. 417). He very aptly instances St. Cyprian (ep. ad Ant., 4): “Prælium gloriosi certaminis in persecutione ferveret”, and adds that “certamen” reveals the importance and length of the strife and renders salient the master thought of the whole poem. In the hands of the correctors the hymn suffered many emendations in the interest of classical exactness of phrase and metre. The corrected form is that found today in the Roman Breviary. The older form, with various manuscript readings, will be found in March (Latin Hymns, 64; with grammatical and other notes, 252), Pimont (Les Hymnes etc., III, 47-70, with a note on the authorship, 70-76), etc. The Commission on Plain Chant established by order of Pius X in many cases restored older forms of the liturgical texts. In the Gradual (the Antiphonary has not appeared as yet) the older form of the “Pange lingua” is now given, so that it can be compared with the form still used in our Breviary. For the variant readings of manuscripts see “Analecta Hymnica” (Leipzig, 1907), 71-73. Dreves ascribes the hymn to Fortunatus. See also the “Hymnarium Sarisburiense” (London, 1851), 84.

It will be of interest to give here some specimens of Catholic translations of some stanzas of the hymn.

i
Sing loud the conflict, O my tongue,
   The victory that repaired our loss;
Exalt the triumph of thy song
   To the bright trophy of the cross;
Tell how the Lord laid down his life
   To conquer in the glorious strife.
(J. T. Aylward, O. P.)
ii
Eating of the Tree forbidden,
   Man had sunk in Satan’s snare,
When his pitying Creator
   Did this second Tree prepare;
Destined, many ages later,
   That first evil to repair.
(Father Caswall.)
v
Thus God made Man an Infant lies,
   And in the manger weeping cries;
His sacred limbs by Mary bound,
   The poorest tattered rags surround;
And God’s incarnate feet and hands
   Are closely bound with swathing-bands.
(Divine Office, 1763.)
vi
Soon the sweetest blossom wasting,
   Droops its head and withered lies;
Early thus to Calvary hasting,
   On the cross the Saviour dies;
Freely death for all men tasting,
   There behold our sacrifice.
(R. Campbell.)
ix Bend, O noble Tree, thy branches;
   Let thy fibres yielding be,
Let the rigid strength be softened
   Which in birth was given thee.
That the limbs of my dear Jesus
   May be stretched most tenderly.
Amer. Eccl. Rev., 1891.)

     The selected stanzas do not exhaust the examples of Catholic versions, but offer some variety in metre and in rhyming schemes. They represent neither the best nor the worst work of their authors in the translations of this hymn. In the preface to his “annus Sanctus” Orby Shipley declared that “the love of Catholics for their hymns is no recent … fancy … and that the results achieved are not less wide in extent, not less worthy in merit than attempts of Protestant translators, facts overlooked even by Catholic translators.” His thought is worthy of much consideration in view of the fact that the English version in the Marquess of Bute’s translation of the Roman Breviary (I, 409), in the (Baltimore) “Manual of Prayers” (614), and Tozer’s “Catholic Church Hymnal” (p. 48), was the work of an Anglican

It may well be doubted if any translator has expressed better in English verse the strength and nobility of the original Latin than did the unknown Catholic author of the version found in the Divine Office of 1763 (given in stanza v above). Daniel gives the following stanza (Thes. Hymnol., I, 168):

Quando judex orbis alto vectus ave veneris,
Et crucis tuæ tropæum inter astra fulserit,
O sis anxius asylum et salutis aurora.

which Neale translates (Medieval Hymns, 3rd ed., p. 5) and thinks ancient though not original; but Daniel’s source is the “Corolla Hymnorum” (Cologne, 1806). The text reads “salutis anchora”. Daniel also gives (IV, 68) four stanzas which Mone thought might be of the seventh century; but they would add nothing to the beauty or neat perfection of the hymn. For first lines, authors, dates of translation, etc., see Julian, “Dict. of Hymnol.”, 880- 881, 1685. For Latin text and translation with comment, see “Amer. Eccles. Review”, March, 1891, 187-194, and “H. A. and M., Historical Edition” (London, 1909, No. 107).

II. THE HYMN OF ST. THOMAS AQUINAS

Composed by the saint (see LAUDA SION) for the Office of Corpus Christi (see CORPUS CHRISTI, FEAST OF). Including the last stanza (which borrows the words “Genitori Genitoque”–Procedenti ab utroque, Compar” from the first two strophes of the second sequence of Adam of St. Victor for Pentecost) the hymn comprises six stanzas appearing in the manuscripts

Pange, lingua, gloriosi corporis mysterium,
Sanguinisque pretiosi quem in mundi pretium
Fructus ventris generosi Rex effudit gentium.

Written in accentual rhythm, it imitates the triumphant march of the hymn of Fortunatus, and like it is divided in the Roman Breviary into stanzas of six lines whose alternating triple rhyming is declared by Pimont to be a new feature in medieval hymnody. In the Roman Breviary the hymn is assigned to both Vespers, but of old the Church of Salisbury placed it in Matins, that of Toulouse in First Vespers only, that of Saint-Germain- des-Prés at Second Vespers only, and that of Strasburg at Compline. It is sung in the procession to the repository on Holy Thursday and also in the procession of Corpus Christi and in that of the Forty Hours’ Adoration.

With respect to the metre, M. de Marcellus, quoted in Migne’s “Littérature”, remarks that the hymn is composed in the long trochaic verses such as are found in Catullus, Seneca, Sophocles, and Euripides. In addition to the felicitous rhythm chosen bySt. Thomas, critics recognize its poetical and hymnodal values (thus Neale: “This hymn contests the second place among those of the Western Church with the Vexilla Regis, the Stabat Mater, the Jesu dulcis memoria, the Ad Regias Agni Dapes, the Ad Supernam, and one or two others …”) and “its peculiar qualities, its logical neatness, dogmatic precision, and force of almost argumentative statement” (Duffield, “Latin Hymns“, 269), in which qualities “it excels all these mentioned” by Neale.

The translations have not been many nor felicitous. Generosi in the first stanza is not “generous” (as in Neale’s version) but “noble” (as in Caswall’s). But, as Neale truly says, “the great crux of the translator is the fourth verse” (i.e., “Verbum caro panem verum, etc.”), so full is it of verbal and real antitheses. To illustrate the question of translation we select from the specimen versions the fourth stanza, since its very peculiar condensation of thought and phrase, dogmatic precision and illuminating antitheses, have made it “a bow of Ulysses to translators”. Its text is:

Verbum caro panem verum
     Verbo carnem efficit;
Fitque sanguis Christi merum;
     Et si sensus deficit,
Ad firmandum cor sincerum
     Sola fides sufficit.

A literal translation would be: “The Word-(made)-Flesh makes by (His) word true bread into flesh; and wine becomes Christ’s blood; and if the (unassisted) intellect fails (to recognize all this), faith alone suffices to assure the pure heart”. Sensus (singular) is taken here to indicate the inner sense, as distinguished from sensuum (plural) of the following stanza, where the word directly refers to the external senses. Perhaps the word has the same implication in both stanzas. “Sincere” (in its modern meaning) may be a better word than “pure”. Taking first the old versions found in books of Catholic devotion, we find in the “Primer” of 1604:

The word now being flesh become,
     So very bread flesh by the word,
And wine the blood of Christ is made,
     Though our sense it not afford,
But this in heart sincere to fix
     Faith sufficeth to accord.

It is not in the rhythm of the Latin, and contains but three monosyllabic rhymes instead of the six double rhymes of the Latin. The “Primer” of 1619 makes an advance to six monosyllabic rhymes; and the “Primer” of 1685 arranges the rhymes in couplets. The “Primer” of 1706 retains the rhythm and the rhymic scheme, but is somewhat more flowing and less heavy:

The Word made flesh for love of man,
With words of bread made flesh again;
Turned wine to blood unseen of sense,
By virtue of omnipotence;
And here the faithful rest secure,
Whilst God can vouch and faith ensure.

A distinct advance in rhythmic and rhymic correspondence was made in more recent times by Catholic writers like Wackerbarth, Father Caswall, and Judge D.J. Donahoe.

At the incarnate Word’s high bidding
     Bread to very flesh doth turn.
Wine becometh Christ’s blood-shedding
     And if sense cannot discern,
Guileless spirits never dreading
     May from faith sufficient learn.
(Wackerbarth, 1842)
Word made flesh, the bread of nature
     By his word to flesh he turns;
Wine into his blood he changes:–
     What though sense no change discerns?
Only be the heart in earnest,
     Faith her lesson quickly learns.
(Caswall, 1849)

Neale criticizes the version of Wackerbarth: “Here the antithesis is utterly lost, by the substitution of Incarnate for made flesh, and bidding for word, to say nothing of Blood-shedding for Blood”; and declares that Caswall “has given, as from his freedom on rhyme might be expected, the best version”. He remarks, however, that Caswall has not given the “panem verum” of St. Thomas.

By his word the bread he breaketh
     To his very flesh he turns;
In the chalice which he taketh,
     Man the cleansing blood discerns.–
Faith to loving bosoms maketh
     Clear the mystic truth she learns.
(D. J. Donahoe, 1908)

Some of the more recent translations take little account of the nice discriminations of antithesis pointed out by Dr. Neale, who when he attempted in his day a new version, modestly wrote that it “claims no other merit than an attempt to unite the best portions of the four best translations with which I am acquainted–Mr. Wackerbarth’s, Dr. Pusey’s, that of the Leeds book, and Mr. Caswall’s“. His version is:

Word made Flesh, by Word He maketh
     very bread his flesh to be;
Man in wine Christ’s Blood partaketh,
     And if senses fail to see,
Faith alone the true heart waketh
     To behold the mystery.

The present writer rendered the stanza in the “Amer. Eccles. Review” (March, 1890), 208, as follows:

Into Flesh the true bread turneth
     By His word, the Word made Flesh;
Wine to Blood: while sense discerneth
     Nought beyond the sense’s mesh,
Faith an awful mystery learneth,
     And must teach the soul afresh.

Neale’s version is given in the Marquess of Bute’s “Roman Breviary“. The Anglican hymnal, “Hymns Ancient and Modern”, declares its version “based on tr. from Latin by E. Caswall“; but, as Julian points out, most of it is based on Neale, four of whose stanzas it rewrites, while a fifth is rewritten from Caswall (i.e. the third stanza), and the fourth stanza is by the compilers. The arrangement found in the Anglican hymnal is taken bodily into the (Baltimore) “Manual of Prayers”–a rather infelicitous procedure, as the fourth stanza is not faithful to the original (Neale, “Medieval Hymns and Sequences,” 181). The last stanza and the doxology form a special hymn (see TANTUM ERGO) prescribed for Benediction of the Most Blessed Sacrament. The Vatican edition of the Graduale gives its plain-song melody in two forms, both of great beauty.

Publication information

Written by H.T. Henry. Transcribed by WGKofron. With thanks to Fr. John Hilkert and St. Mary’s Church, Akron, Ohio

The Catholic Encyclopedia, Volume XI. Published 1911. New York: Robert Appleton Company. Nihil Obstat, February 1, 1911. Remy Lafort, S.T.D., Censor. Imprimatur. +John Cardinal Farley, Archbishop of New York

Bibliography

JULIAN, Dict. of Hymnol., 2nd ed., s. v., 878 and 1085, for first lines of translations; HENRY in Amer. Cath. Quarterly Review (April, 1893), 288-292, for difficulties of translation; IDEM in Amer. Eccles. Review (March, 1890), 206-213, for text, verse-translation, comment, and notes; PIMONT, Hymnes du bréviare romain, III (Paris, 1884), 164-176. A list of hymns beginning with the words “Pange lingua” is given in the Analecta Hymnica, IV, 70; IV, 257; and indexes passim.

Copyright © 2007 by  Kevin Knight (EMAIL).

It doesn’t get more solemn than the Solemn Palm Sunday Mass we attended yesterday in New York, from the grand opening procession, through the chanted Passion of Our Lord Jesus Christ According to Matthew, the incense, the Gregorian Chants by that spectacular choir and organist and the stunning silence of the recession.

Sanctus! Sanctus! Sanctus!

I said to Mary afterwards, “I love this church. It’s the most peaceful church I have ever been in anywhere.”

********

Father George Rutler is a most remarkable man.  He mixes easily in the highest councils of the land.  He thinks, and he writes wonderful books containing great thoughts.  He conveys his message globally on EWTN.  It is not unusual to spot famous people at his Masses.  He is, among other things,  the “unofficial chaplain of National Review.“

And he is the pastor of a church, just like hundreds and hundreds of other priests.  He guides his parish flock.  He pays attention to detail and is a respecter of the great traditions of the Catholic Faith.  When he preaches the Gospel, you know he believes every word of it.  When he consecrates the host, you know he knows that he is in the presence of Almighty God.

His parish church, the Church of Our Saviour on Park Avenue in New York City, four blocks south of Grand Central Station, exudes sanctity at any time of day.  In slightly over an hour last Friday, Mary and I experienced quiet reflection, the Angelus, noon Mass with a fine little sermonette on the life of St. Patrick, Stations of the Cross and Exposition of the Blessed Sacrament.  Father Rutler has his congregation well-trained. As he gently swung the thurible back and forth, the incense carrying his prayers to heaven, he alternated between English and Latin, with multiple voices echoing the responses in the appropriate tongue. (I did pretty good except for the middle of the second half of the Pater Noster, which I can never get right, though I present a strong finish.)

Afterwards he slipped gently out of the sanctuary, leaving the Blessed Sacrament exposed for worship, and quietly stepped into the confessional, where a long line soon formed.

For all his fame, he seems at heart a humble parish priest as we used to know them, bringing the mercy of God to his people one soul at a time.  And that’s what I really like about him.

*******

And after the Solemn Mass on Palm Sunday he said to me, “Are you still judging?  Justice Scalia had a bunch of us over Friday night for brandy and cigars.  I had a great time! Didn’t get home until after midnight!”

Frankly, I like that part of him too.

We interrupt the affairs of the day for a trip to the attic, and a look back at the teaching methods of Sister Anna Roberta, CSJ, of blessed memory, who made every class a sing-along.  Those of you who were never exposed to this may find it astonishing and perhaps incomprehensible, but Omicron Delta alumni will, I suspect, hum along joyfully.  Herewith, the Latin I song:

To the Tune of the MARTINS AND THE COYS

1. Now in Latin there are only five declensions
All the endings you must memorize and say:
“a” is for the NOMIN-A-TIVE.  “ae” GENITIVE AND DATIVE
“am” ACCUSATIVE. The ABLATIVE long “a”.

Chorus:
Start with
a-ae-ae-am-a…….then ae - arum - is - as - is
And repeat the first declension every day:
“a” is for the NOMIN-A-TIVE, “ae” GENITIVE and DATIVE
“am” ACCUSATIVE,The ABLATIVE long “a”.

2. Now the second one is very very simple:
us - i - o - um –o…….i - orum - is - os - is
And the neuter starts with bellum - belli - bello - bellum - bello
Plural: a- orum - is -a -is.  

Chorus :
Start with:
us-i-o-um-o. Then i - orum - is - os - is.
It is masculine. Remember five apiece.
And the neuter starts with bellum - belli - bello - bellum - bello
Plural a- orum - is –a- is.

3. You will find that when you come to third declension
Nouns’ll end in l….and . . . .r….and….s….and….x
Dux and ducis duci ducem duce…….lucis, luci lucem luce
CONSUL…… IMPERATOR….. MILES…. REX.

Chorus:
Start with:  
blank -is -i -em -e.  Third declension for today
es - um - ibus - es - ibus. Say it next:
dux and ducis duci ducem duce…. .lucis luci lucem luce.
CONSUL. . . . ..IMPERATOR….. MILES. . . . .REX.
 
4. One….two….three….and then we come to Fourth Declension
us - us - ui - um - and - u. It’s Just a ball
Plural us - uum. - ibus - us accusative and ibus.
Now we’re ready for the fifth and that is all.

Chorus:
Start with:
es - ei - ei - em - e……then the plural right away:
es and erum ebus, es - ebus……..too
First you SAY IT then you PLAY IT. But be sure you EVERY DAY IT
And with all the five declensions you are through.

5. NOW YOU HAVE TO LEARN YOUR VERBS AND CONJUGATIONS
Present o - as -at and -amus -atis - ant.
The imperfect starts with -abem –abes -abat.Then -abamus    
-batis, ending up third plural vocabant.

Chorus:
Start the future
vocabo … .vocabis … and vocabit
Vocabimus, vocabitis, vocabunt. 
Start the perfect: with vocavi… .vocavisti. …. and vocavit
Vocavimus.. ..vocavictis, and -erunt.

6. To the perfect stem add: -eram -eras -erat
Then -eramus.,. then -eratis….. then -erant
When you’ve ended the pluperfect——Future Perfect:
-ero -eris -erit –erimus  -eritis and erint

Chorus:
Start:
ille, illa, illud…..qui, quae, quod….and hic, haec, hoc
Is and ea id….acer, acris, acre
Ego, mei, mihi, me, me…Tu and tui tibi te te
That’s the end and now it’s time to shout HOORAY!

Q. 621. What is Baptism?

A. Baptism is a Sacrament which cleanses us from original sin, makes us Christians, children of God, and heirs of heaven.

*************

On Sunday, the feast of the Baptism of the Lord, in the Church of her ancestors, St. Mary’s of Amsterdam, wearing the same white gown worn by her mother and grandmother, Miss Laura Ann Porcello was cleansed from original sin and became a child of God and an heir of heaven.

And made her Grampa very happy.

Somewhere around three centuries ago a branch of the Going family left Ireland for Australia and later wandered over to New Zealand where they encountered Mormon missionaries, sometime in the 19th century, and converted.  One of them ended up in southern California a few miles from my brother.

Our branch of the family settled in Upstate New York in the mid-19th century, less than three hours via the Thruway from Palmyra where Joseph Smith began the whole thing, but the Mormons had gone by then and we missed the whole thing. 

The better part of thirty years ago the last Going in Ireland, also Robert, put me in touch with the old fellow in California, Lionel Going, and we kept up a lively correspondence for a while.  If you like genealogy, and it’s one of my favorite hobbies, there’s nothing like having a Mormon 12th cousin, and Lionel Going was invaluable in my research, sending me acres of hand-written charts.

Along the way he also let me borrow original manuscripts of both his and his wife’s autobiographies, and they were fascinating.

Mrs. Lionel Going, then pushing 90, as I recall, had been born into a polygamous Mormon sect in Mexico.  Part of the deal for Utah entering the Union involved giving up polygamy, and those who held to it as an article of faith fled the country and managed to live unbothered south of the border.  Another child born into that sect was George Romney, whose monogamous parents returned to the United States at the time of the Mexican Revolution.

George, of course, grew up to run (and rescue) American Motors and got himself elected Governor of Michigan.  He was, in the parlance of the time, a “me too” Republican, that is, essentially a Democrat in philosophy who knew how to run things better.

In 1964 he became a stalwart in the STOP GOLDWATER movement, in which a triad of big state liberal Republicans, Romney, Nelson Rockefeller of New York and William Scranton of Pennsylvania, pooled their resources in an attempt to prevent the conservatives from taking over the Republican Party, caused a ruckus at the convention in San Francisco, walked out while Goldwater was speaking and then sat on their hands in the fall.

I may have been only thirteen at the time, but I sure recognized that George Romney was not a guy I had any use for.  He was not only belligerently anti-conservative, but humorless as well, a handsome man to be sure, but with all the charm of John Kerry.

He was the leading candidate of the “moderates” for the 1968 election (Rocky was lurking in the background hedging his bets, several times announcing his “active non-candidacy”), but blew it all in a famous flip-flopping double-barreled  suicide  when he announced his opposition to the war in Vietnam, claiming that his previous support had been due  to “brainwashing” by the generals.

A compassionate Richard Nixon rescued him from total oblivion by making him Secretary of Housing and Urban Development, a position for which he was well-suited.

***********

So what’s all this have to do with his son Mitt? 

Well, I’m just outlining my prejudices so you know where I’m coming from.  I’m no natural fan of the Romney family.

Clearly the administrative skills of the father were inherited by the son.  Mitt Romney’s ability to muscle the Olympic bureaucracy for the Salt Lake City games demonstrated mastery bordering on genius.  The political skills honed there served him well in Massachusetts, a state  where it’s hard to put together a dinner party if you’re only inviting Republicans.

Mitt is comfortable with today’s conservatives, though personally I don’t consider him “one of us” in the sense that there are quite a few clearly defined “movement conservatives” who, though disagreeing on any number of things, lend a hand to each other with various causes and certainly recognize each other as natural allies.

Romney, I think, is more of a loner than a joiner.  He is certainly conservative in temperament, values, virtues and for the most part philosophy. He has leadership skills, but he is not a Conservative Leader, in the sense of a Taft, Buckley, Goldwater and certainly Reagan. 

One can imagine him running the federal government competently, but not making the major changes or waves that some of us would like to see.  He’s really just a friendlier version of the old man, tolerant and maybe even affectionate toward the conservative wing of the party, but not of it.

No problem voting for him in November, and nobody would look more like a president than Mitt, but for right now I don’t think he makes my top three.

This is where I met Rudy Giuliani on November 11, 2001, at Ground Zero. I’m somewhere in the lower right, I think.  The occasion was a tribute to all the nations who lost citizens on September 11, something like 92 as I recall.  The Secretary General of the UN was there, the Secretary of State, Colin Powell, numerous ambassadors, New York’s two senators, including her, the Governor and the President of the United States.

We were the receiving line. They came to shake our hands.

President Bush was most gracious and took his time with everyone, as did Governor Pataki.  Rudy followed, friendly, relaxed and considerate.  He signed my hardhat, right where I wanted: over a photo-sticker of those guys raising the flag.  It remains one of my proudest possessions.

Whether I end up voting for Rudy or not, I have long been a fan, going back to his days as District Attorney in Queens.  Better never try to tell him that something can’t be done.  He took on the Mafia, for crying out loud.

I remember New York City before Giuliani.  He changed it utterly.  Today it is one of my very favorite places to visit.  Those who pooh-pooh his involvement and deny him the credit he is due are self-delusioned idiots.

Oh, he’s done some things to annoy the hell out of me from time to time. He’s that kind of guy, after all.  He never seemed particularly interested in advancing the Republican Party beyond himself in New York City, but then there weren’t too many elected Republicans in city government once you got past the mayor.

I sure wish he was truer to his church’s teachings on life issues.  I don’t think, though, that I imagined the twinkle in his eye at Cardinal O’Connor’s funeral when Cardinal Law praised O’Connor’s defense of human life from conception to natural death, a remark which caused a thunderous standing ovation which Rudy joined in way ahead of the squirming Clintons in front of him. 

But he hasn’t been good on that issue, and that means a lot to me.  Of course, his duty as president would only rarely coincide with life issues, and then primarily in the selection of judges, and on that score I like the kind of judges he likes, and I trust his sincerity in that regard.  So as far as that goes he is not a typical liberal Republican, certainly not in the mold of Rockefeller or Lindsay or Gerald R. Ford.

On economics and trade and defense and foreign policy, he’s pretty dead on with conservative principles.  On immigration, a bit all over the lot.  As are most of the candidates.

He’s articulate and a proven leader.  He eclipsed every politician in America after 9/11.  His calm, steady hand at the helm kept us together, and not only kept his city from falling apart, but brought it back to life.

He may not end up being my first choice, but there is a whole lot that I like, and if he makes it through the nomination process I will have no trouble in the slightest pulling his lever.

He may not be the guy you want on the news every night for four or eight years, but if there is a crisis, there’s no man in America I would feel safer with.

The Republican nominating process is getting more and more interesting as it’s getting more and more splintered. The early caucus/primaries  (when the country is not yet fully focused) and the compressed primary season, lead to the real possibility of the first genuinely brokered Republican convention in my lifetime.

Brokered conventions used to be the norm, back when state party leaders would actually get together and decide the nominees.  Classic examples from both parties are found in David Pietrusza’s excellent 1920: The Year of the Six Presidents.

Back in the olden days, there were only a handful of primaries, which provided some interest and momentum, but rarely decided the final outcome.  There were close conventions in 1952 and 1976, and Nixon’s 1968 nomination wasn’t  entirely in the bag until convention time, but those were at most two or possibly three-men races at the end.  Today we have so many cross-currents pushing and shoving their way through the Republican coalition that anything can happen. 

The sudden surge for Huckabee seems to be fueled mostly by Baptists and Evangelicals flocking to one of their own, much as they ran to Jimmy Carter in 1976, ignoring some of his less than conservative positions.  Romney’s strong in a lot of places, and should get a fair lift from New Hampshire, but maybe he just ends up as a regional candidate.  Rudy leads the field in the polls nationally, and will doubtless carry quite a few delegates from the northeast and Florida and some other places.  McCain has enough strength to carry a few states. Fred Thompson should catch on here and there. 

You want a pro-life candidate, you skip Giuliani, unless you want strict-constructionist judges, in which case you  will actually support Rudy if you trust Ted Olson’s opinion, and I generally do, except that Robert Bork says Romney’s the guy, but you may be worried about his flip-flopping and besides Thompson has the Right to Life endorsement and McCain’s record is quite acceptable in that area, but he formed the gang of 14 which may have messed up getting some better judges and some of the professional evangelicals don’t like him because, well, he doesn’t particularly like them, and then there’s all those other guys.

If defense is your big issue you might go with Rudy because of his leadership and proven skills and pretty clear-headed foreign policy, or McCain because of his experience or Romney because he’s got executive ability, or Thompson because he’s articulate and knows his way around a submarine. You’d probably avoid Huckabee unless you’re an evangelical and Ron Paul’s not on your radar.

Like supply side economics? You’ve got Rudy, except he’s from New York, McCain, except he voted against the tax cuts though he opposes repealing them, but wants to rein in spending, which is ok, and Thompson.  Romney’s record is hard to figure, since he governed Massachusetts with a democratic legislature. Not saying he wouldn’t be good, just no way to demonstrate it.

Hate McCain-Feingold enough to decide your vote? Well, McCain’s not for you and Thompson voted for it.

Immigration your issue? Take your pick. lots of nuances, not a whole lot of demonstrated conviction.

I just don’t see the scenario where one of these guys suddenly pulls way ahead of the pack.  And if no one pulls ahead, everyone stays in, one way or another.

And why not?  If the convention goes multiple ballots, all bets are off and the real give and take begins.

So now maybe it comes down to who impresses the heck out of the delegates at convention time.  Who is their second choice if their first choice falters?  How many of the delegates are driven by ideology and how many are party “professionals”?  How high do the negatives get?

The latter is a real concern, because the rough and tumble of this election is already taking its toll, and things are being said about each other that will not be forgotten next summer, even if necessity makes strange bedfellows.

And maybe it will just come down to the state of the world at the time of the convention. 

It’s early, but my guess at this point is that a brokered convention favors Fred Thompson.  He’s likable, strong, in tune with the major branches of the coalition, and not making too many enemies. 

If Mr. Pietrusza can take a few minutes away from his upcoming book on the 1960 election, I’d be interested in whether he sees a comparison to the 1920 Harding strategy.  And I’d like to hear from the rest of you, too.

Let’s face it: there are quite a few annoying things about John McCain, and some of them are good and sound reasons why he should not be the Republican nominee for President of the United States.

For example, he talks too much.

There are times when it seems like he is on every single radio and television news and comment show every single day.  He expresses an animated opinion about everything.  Too much. Too much.

Of course, I’ve never spent five and a half years in a North Vietnamese prison camp.  Nor do I know what it’s like going years with no one to speak to, trying to work out tapping signals in Morse Code just so you can maintain the barest semblance of sanity and social connection.  I suppose if I had, I might be able to appreciate a guy who exercises his right to free speech even more than I do.  I suppose that for him just being able to open his mouth must be a never-ending thrill.

But he’s stiff.

Yeah, well, I guess having your shoulders smashed to smithereens by your captors and your legs broken and knees shattered and being routinely beaten three times a week, that can make you a little stiff.

Too old. 

He’s always looked too old. Must be that white hair that grew in when his torturers left him for dead.

Divorced and remarried.

His Penelope waited for him all those years, all those years when they should have been growing together and instead, through no fault of their own, they grew in separate ways.  He reached his mid-life crisis with a long period of lost youth behind him.  I think maybe we can avoid judging him too much on that one.

McCain-Feingold: bad law.  It is. It really is.  Bad judgment on his part, thinking he can reform a corrupt system of pay to play that’s been going on for centuries.  Instead of making things right, all they did was open up new ways to pass the sleaze.  Mr Hsu and his pals, for example.  In the process, the first amendment is trampled upon.  Of course, in McCain’s world trying to make politics honest is a good thing, and I’m sure that’s what he thought he was doing.  I won’t hold it against him very much.

He’s wrong on immigration. 

He has a very real position on immigration, one he’s willing to vote for, one he believes in.  He’s wrong, but I have to say I admire, truly admire his willingness to fight for what he believes in, even in the face of overwhelming popular disapproval, especially among Republican primary voters.  He was willing to let his poll numbers tank on an issue that he wasn’t going to win anyway.  That’s character, I’m pretty sure.

Likewise, while other politicians are sucking up to the locals in Iowa, McCain is telling them that farm subsidies are not good for America.

*******

I’m not voting for McCain.  There are many good reasons not to.

I’m just starting to forget what they are.

It’s really the strangest thing.  I haven’t changed all that much in recent years in philosophy or outlook.  And yet, less than four years ago I was gung-ho for a person who I thought would be a fairly obvious candidate for president, one whose life story, guts and patriotism would bring her right to the top and in the process change America forever.

Then she became Secretary of State and instead Condoleezza Rice faded from the political scene forever.

How is this possible?  Even if she lacked the burning desire for the office, wouldn’t she at least be talked up as the one who got away? Her predecessor, Colin Powell, made something of a career out of being a non-candidate.

But Condi? She holds the most important appointed position in the most important government on the face of the earth during a critical period of war and peace, and there is NOBODY saying “DRAFT RICE!”  It was not all that long ago that Dick Morris wrote a book predicting the big show down between Hillary and Condi.  The scenario seems almost laughable now.

What happened?

A big part of it, I think, is that she is perceived to have risen a step too high for her talents.  I don’t know whether that’s fair, but she certainly hasn’t left  a deep impression of having brought the world or even her department under control.  Her initiatives have been both over-reaching and under-achieving.  Perhaps if she had not played with such high expectations, the lack of results would not have seemed so obvious.  But that’s all part of the diplomacy game, a game that a president needs to be able to play, and one in which she has displayed startling ineptitude.

Which brings me to another big point.  When, in anyone’s political memory, has there been a presidential election in which absolutely no one associated with the incumbent administration is even being considered for the job?  I’m not talking only about major figures like the Vice President. I’m talking NOBODY, not even a candidate polling at .0003.

George W. Bush has headed the Republican Party for seven years and there is absolutely no Bush bench. Zero.

We have lots of competent people running, but not one served as so much as a file clerk in this administration.

Even in the closest historical parallel I can think of, the Democrats in 1952 when incumbent Harry Truman dropped out after being upset in the New Hampshire primary by Estes Kefauver, 74 year old Vice President Alben Barkley was still gathering votes at the wide-open convention and Truman was still a major mover and shaker behind the scenes.

No, I think this election is without precedent, and it is truly the strangest thing.

Herewith some thoughts on the race for the presidency, 2008 edition, coming soon to a voting booth near you.

I’m a political junkie.  The first election I can recall was when I was 5 in 1956.  By 1958 I was waking up the morning after election day and asking Dad who had won the election for Governor.  “Brown!” he spat out bitterly, which I though odd at the time since the race was between Nelson Rockefeller and Averill Harriman.  (I was many years a grownup before I realized he had been commenting on the California race, where his hero Bill Knowland had gone down).

By 1960, all of nine, I was having my picture taken with Vice President Nixon at the Schenectady Airport.  In 1964 I participated in Goldwater Victory Parades, made phone calls, and handed out copies of None Dare Call It Treason in front of Johnson-Humphrey-Kennedy headquarters on East Main Street.

I worked on the Buckley for Senate campaigns (met him and most of his siblings, even took his wife to lunch).  In 1976 I followed Reagan around New Hampshire for a couple of days, and by 1980 got myself elected in a contested race as a delegate to the Republican National Convention, where I met all kinds of famous people.  Al D’Amato even hung with us.

And now here we are again with the voting about to start and I have to confess that this political junkie has not watched a single debate. Oh, I’ve followed them well enough.  I read the reports and analyses. I know what the candidates have been saying and not saying. I just haven’t felt the slightest urge to actually WATCH them do it. Not once.

And so I had to go to Google Images tonight for this:

Yeah.

This guy has snuck into the top tier of Republican candidates for president and I didn’t have the slightest idea what he looks like.  That’s Mike Huckabee from Hope, Arkansas, they say. He used to be Governor. Or he is Governor. I don’t even know.

So here’s my theory:  If Mr Judge Political Junkie has no idea what Mike Huckabee looks like, how deep can his support really be?  My guess is that he is where he is because of who he is not, not because of who he is or particularly what he says.

I’m told he’s witty and relaxed in the debates. Good. I like that.  I’m told he’s pretty good on life issues and that’s a big plus.  But his tax record ain’t so hot, his trade policy might be deemed demagogic, or the polite word, “Populist”.  Running a corner drug store doesn’t prepare you to be CEO of WalMart as H. Ross Perot once said of another Arkansas Governor.

Doesn’t excite me.

Even now that I know what he looks like. 

My prognostiscope says: Can’t Happen.