Bill Donohue and the Catholic League don't like my advice to Archbishop Chaput

Well, I guess I didn't expect this:

There's a database connection problem at the site, currently, but luckily the Catholic League e-mailed me a press release chastising ... me.

ARCHBISHOP CHAPUT WILL NOT BE SILENCED

Catholic League president Bill Donohue comments on an article that appears today as a post on the Philadelphia magazine blog site by Joel Mathis:

Joel Mathis isn’t Catholic, but that doesn’t stop him from giving some heady advice to Philadelphia Archbishop Charles Chaput: just tend to the problems in the archdiocese and drop your criticisms of the Obama administration. Mathis is angry that Chaput has a new e-book coming out tomorrow, A Heart on Fire: Catholic Witness and the Next America, that addresses recent attacks on religious liberty. Mathis counsels Chaput to “concentrate on fixing the Catholic Church in Philadelphia,” adding that the archbishop’s alleged “anti-Obama crusade” amounts to “a distraction.”

Catholics like to lecture the outspoken archbishop as well. Last September, no sooner had Archbishop Chaput taken over in Philly when Catholic attorney Nicholas Cafardi offered his instructions. Noting that Chaput likes to comment on the big issues of the day, he said, “Chaput would be well-advised to leave politics aside.”

But Archbishop Chaput will have none of it: he will not be silenced. Indeed, he is delightfully insubordinate—nothing will stop him from opining on anything he wants, and nothing will stop him from faithfully serving his archdiocese. That’s precisely why the Catholic League loves him—he’s a man of steely determination and incredible fortitude.

This, of course, being a response to my column today at The Philly Post. I suggested that Chaput's priorities—which seem to come down mostly to "making war" on Obama—probably weren't doing much to fix a diocese afflicted with pedophile scandals and lawsuits, massively declining enrollment in the parochial schools, and declining attendance at mass. That still seems true to me.

I wasn't really trying to silence the archbishop—I doubt, in fact, that I have any ability to do so. That said: "Delightfully insubordinate?" To whom is Chaput actually subordinate and cheeky? Is he sassing the pope? No? Maybe Donohue's comments are a bit outlandish.

Then again, it's Bill Donohue, last seen in the New York Times urging bishops to treat the victims of priest sex abuse as enemies of the Catholic Church. “The church has been too quick to write a check, and I think they’ve realized it would be a lot less expensive in the long run if we fought them one by one,” Mr. Donohue said. That's a Christ-like ethic, no? If I've irritated Bill Donohue, then it's frankly a happy day.

About the Constitution, divinity, and Mennonites

The latest edition of The Ben and Joel Podcast is, well, kind of weird. In it, we interview Larry Arnn about his new book, "The Founders' Key: The Divine and Natural Connection Between the Declaration and the Constitution and What We Risk by Losing It." Arnn's main point is that the Declaration and the Constitution don't have opposing philosophical foundations—despite what some scholars say—but I got hung up on the "divine and natural part" and you can hear so in the podcast.

The word "God" appears in Arnn's text 64 times. He references the Declaration's appeal to "the laws of nature and of nature's God" 21 times. And so, for me, the book reads much like a theological declaration as much—or more—as it is a work of history or political science. Is there room for a secular-minded person in a "divine" understanding of government? What's wrong with believing the Founders were a group of smart men—but also human and imperfect, people whose work was great but still leaves room for improvement? You can hear Arnn's answers in the podcast.

You can also hear him, jokingly, refer to me as a "defector" from the principles of my alma mater, Tabor College. And, well, guilty as charged. Tabor is a largely conservative, evangelical Christian college. I fit none of those descriptions anymore.

But after we finished recording, as I continued to digest Arnn's work and the podcast, I realized I'd still find his constant invocation of the divine troubling, even if I were not a "defector."

The Mennonites I grew up around had an interesting history. They were pacifists, believing that the example of Jesus precluded them from taking up arms. Because of that theology, the fled as a group from Germany, their original home, to Russia. And then from Russia, in the late 1800s, to Kansas, where I grew up.

The mix of theology and experience—recent enough that churches in my hometown were still worshipping in a Russian-inflected version of German into the 1950s—led many of the Mennonites to be skeptical of nationalism, in particular, but certainly any brand of patriotism that seemed to claim God on its side. As Christians, the felt duty-bound to be respectful of the authority of government--but I'm dubious they'd spend much time reflecting on the "divine" foundations of man-made government. Even when that argument is made, as Arnn does, in the service of limited government.

The problem with invoking "divinity" as the source of a form of government is that it really ends the discussion. You can't argue with God, usually. But there are plenty of arguments to be had, as evidenced by our discussion. Arnn seems like a good and pleasant man; I've no wish to quarrel with him! And he's right that the Founders referenced God quite a bit in their discussions; what that proves is that ... they referenced God quite a bit in their discussions. It doesn't mean the Constitution is marked with divinity.

John McCain never wants to leave Afghanistan

I feel like most of today’s McCain-Lieberman-Graham op-ed about the need to stay the course in Afghanistan could’ve been written four or five or six years ago. But I really want to focus on this particular paragraph:

At the strategic level, our effort continues to be undermined by the perception that the United States will again abandon Afghanistan. This suspicion makes everything our troops are trying to achieve significantly harder. It creates perverse incentives for the Taliban to keep fighting, for the Pakistani army to hedge its bets by providing support to the Taliban, and for our Afghan allies to make counterproductive decisions based on fears of a post-American future.

But here’s the thing: Eventually the United States will leave Afghanistan. The Afghans will remain, and Pakistan will be next door. Everybody knows this.

Now, I don’t know how long it will be before that exit takes place. It might be next year, 10 years from now, or even another 100 years. But history seems to suggest that America will not occupy another country halfway around the world from its own soil infinitely into the future. At some point we will withdraw.

The wisest thing to do is to figure out the best way to withdraw, a manner that best mitigates the possibility of future attacks on America originating from Afghanistan. To hope that we can guarantee 100 percent safety is futile—but there’s a cost-benefit ratio to these things, and if a cash-strapped America has decided that ratio is out of whack after nearly 11 years, well, that’s not unreasonable.

McCain, in particular, would have more credibility if he’d ever demonstrate that there was a war he didn’t want, or want more of. But he’s always urging more, more, more. I get frustrated with President Obama often, but McCain does his best to remind me that we avoided a much worse president, one with a propensity to over-commit American troops to never-ending action.

Is Obama the 'affirmative action president?'

Though his politics are not mine, I'm friendly with and very much like Steve Hayward, a prolific conservative writer who these days blogs at Power Line. Ben and I had him on our podcast this weekend to discuss his new book, "The Politically Incorrect Guide To Presidents," in which Hayward gives each president from Woodrow Wilson on a letter grade for their constitutional fealty. Democrats, as you might surmise, don't do well.

I let myself sound a bit exasperated at one main point during the discussion. In the book, Hayward says that President Obama can be fairly called the nation's first "affirmative action president." He suggests that Obama had a thin resume, and benefited from the nation's desire to elect a black man to the country's highest office.

Today, at Power Line, Steve affirms that stance by quoting Jim Geraghty at National Review:

It ties to a theory I’ve had for a while, that most apolitical voters desperately want to avoid concluding that the first African-American president of the United States is a failure, on par with a second term for Jimmy Carter. As a result, they will give Obama until the very last minute to demonstrate an ability to get the job done, to demonstrate that he can generate tangible improvements in their lives. But, if around October 2012, people don’t see tangible improvements in their lives, well, the bottom may fall out of his numbers. He’ll still have his loyal base, but the vast majority of independents will decide he just can’t get the job done.

There's an interesting discussion to be had about the role of Obama's race in his political fortune. But labeling him an "affirmative action president" is loaded terminology, suggesting that Obama's accomplishment in being elected is somehow tainted. Steve, I suspect, knows that. Interestingly, it doesn't just insult the president—it also insults the voters, who are presumably so fuzzy-headed with political correctness that they'll ride a sinking ship until it's too late. Obama's approval numbers over the last two years, I think, indicate otherwise.

In any case, the underlying conceit here is that Obama only benefits politically from his race. That's probably not the case: One study suggested the president lost as much as 5 percent of the 2008 vote based purely on his race. Certainly, the desperate attempts by Breitbart-style conservatives to link the president to the most obnoxious sorts of black nationalism—despite no real hint of such leanings in the president's actual governing record—suggest they're aware of the dynamic.

Like lots of black men, Obama had to overcome a racial headwind to achieve what he has, politically. (We have, thankfully, arrived at a point in our nation's history where that headwind was not determinative.) And like lots of black men, there are a few whites who tend to attribute those accomplishments to coddling and bleeding hearts rather than smarts and hard work. But it's a strange idea that a black man can only win politically, and almost never lose, because of his race. We haven't come that far, yet.

Bluegrass in West Philadelphia

How I spent my Friday evening:

Rendell and Iran: Why no mention of his media activities?

Over the last month, former Philadelphia Mayor/Pennsylvania Governor Ed Rendell has mostly been in the news for leading a group of investors trying to buy the Philadelphia Daily News, Inquirer, and Philly.com. Late last week, though, he abruptly dropped out of the group bidding on those news properties.

And then it became public that Rendell was under investigation by the feds for taking speaking fees from an Iranian (alleged) terrorist group.

Since then, we've had several stories in the Inquirer and one today in the Daily News about Rendell's troubles with the feds ... and not one of them mentions that he was just days ago the leader of the group trying to buy those newspapers.

I don't mean to impugn the hard-working reporters at either newspaper, some of whom I'm Twitter-friendly with. But it's an odd omission—particularly in light of the very public in-house battles about those papers' coverage of their own sale. It's perhaps a minor thing, but it doesn't really create confidence in those papers, does it?

CORRECTION: There is a mention at the end of this story. But most of the coverage has omitted such mentions.

When Does Adulthood Begin?

One possible byproduct of the economic challenges today's young adults face may be shifting societal norms about when adulthood begins. When asked what age children should be financially independent from their parents in a 1993 survey, 80% of parents said children should be self-reliant by age 22. In a survey conducted in December 2011, only 67% of parents (with children age 16 or under) say their children have to be financially independent by age 22.

via pewresearch.org