Chicago Daily Observer

Wow, when was the last time the people of San Francisco—“the gentle people with flowers in their hair”—turned out to protest in such numbers the actions of a commie country?

I don’t keep track, but there they were last week, thousands fussing over how Red (as it used to be called) China is oppressing Tibet and adding to the miseries of Darfur. Even in Chicago there were protests.

The Chicago Tribune, the newspaper that did not have space to publish Fr. Pfleger’s death threats last summer, found the space to run a tired op-ed from Robert McClory conjuring up a ghostwriting assignment for Pope Benedict XVI visit to the US this week.

McClory imagines that speaking from “the heart”, the Pope’s top priorities are “its position on the ordination of women, homosexual acts, marriage after divorce, stem cell research and artificial birth control”. McClory speculates that a lack of focus on media friendly issues is what is responsible for a shortage of Catholic churchgoers. So McClory has the Pope jettisoning the missions of the Catholic Church so that he can promote the principles of the secular media and Hollywood like an episode of the Phil Donahue show in 1979 while disregarding the interests of the vast majority of practicing Catholics.

I am a Roman Catholic, involved in ... Read More...

Clinton and Obama are slamming each other and the oil companies in dueling radio ads in Pennsylvania. Both ads exaggerate and twist the facts. Both ads say, in effect, that the opposing candidate is reluctant to offend oil companies due to campaign donations. The truth is they both propose energy plans that are similar, and which the oil giants won’t like.

• Obama’s ad claims, “Clinton’s taken more from big oil and other PACs and lobbyists than any other candidate, Democrat or Republican.” Actually, Clinton is fourth and Obama is a close fifth when it comes to donations from oil and gas industries.

• Clinton’s ad says that “she’s the one who will make oil companies pay” to support her clean-energy initiatives. In fact, both candidates propose to spend $150 billion for energy improvements over 10 years, and both propose to pay for some part of that through higher ... Read More...

Gee Barack, I wish you’d checked with me before you let slip that the small towns of America are chock-a-block with bitter gun fanatics nursing their wounded pride with a thick salve of religion and xenophobia.

Because I’d have cautioned against saying that.

Not that it isn’t true. Of course it’s true—you left out “mean,” by the way. But so what? The sharpest insults are usually true. Truth is a defense in libel, not a strategy in politics. Not that you planned this. Obviously, it was an off-the-cuff remark, because it’s plain that unhappy small-town people are certain to respond negatively to a mirror being held up to themselves, particularly a mirror in the hands of a city-slick college fellah in a necktie.

Proving that you can never glance away from Gov. Rod Blagojevich and the Illinois Legislature and remain safe from a sneak attack, they have just passed a law requiring Illinois to turn its presidential electoral votes over to the rest of the country.

That’s not how supporters of the National Popular Vote bill would describe the new law, but that’s precisely what they’ve done. Under it, Illinois promises to award its 21 Electoral College votes in the presidential election to the candidate that wins the popular vote nationwide. So, if the voters of Illinois choose a Democrat to be president, but the nation’s popular vote goes to the Republican candidate (perish the thought), the state’s electoral votes will go to the Republican.

Perhaps that scenario seems too remote to Democrats who run the state; but the fact is that it could turn Illinois into a red state from blue.

If ... Read More...