extreme Catholic 

New York Daily News - News & Views - Daily News Exclusive: Cops pay respects, get none in N.C.

NYPD cops who flew to North Carolina to bury fallen Detective Robert Parker were forced to undergo humiliating airport searches - enraging Police Commissioner Raymond Kelly, the Daily News has learned.

The incident took place on Sept. 19, just hours after 33 of Parker's brethren from Brooklyn South watched his coffin being lowered into the ground at a cemetery near his family's home in Salisbury, N.C.

The officers were unarmed, wearing NYPD dress blue uniforms, and had been issued "Exempt" passes by Port Authority Police at Kennedy Airport that allowed them to bypass metal detectors and be screened by hand by Transportation Security Administration agents.

Second opinion.

Winston-Salem Journal Security officials deny mistreating NYC officers

GREENSBORO - Transportation Security Administration officials denied yesterday an accusation by the New York City Police Department, which claimed that the agency mistreated city police officers during a security check at the Piedmont Triad International Airport in September.

According to a report by the New York Daily News, TSA agents screened some city police officers - despite officers' claims they were given passes exempting them from such searches by the Port Authority Police in New York.

Ernest Howard, the airport's federal security director, said that one police officer objected to the routine screening procedures. The TSA honors "exempt" passes only from passengers with diplomatic credentials, he said.

The officers were "flying as any other passenger coming through the airport," Howard said. "They were treated with the utmost respect."

New York City Police Officers act with a sense of entitlement, one set of rules for the public, and another set of rules for them. This works out just fine in New York City and nearby communities.

It seems obvious that the Piedmont Airport TSA Screeners were unfamiliar with the credentials the police officers presented and rather than make phone calls to confirm their validity, I suppose they thought it simpler to put them through the procedures the public endures.

How disrespectful.

On the other hand, I wouldn't want to present to an NYPD officer in New York City an id showing I was employed by the Piedmont Airport TSA on traffic stop.

posted by Patrick Sweeney at 10:58 PM   Permalink  

NRO Andrew Apostolou: The U.N.’s Greatest Failure

Saddam’s Iraq evidently passed Turtle Bay’s global test.

Wednesday's report by Charles Duelfer demonstrated not only that United Nations weapons inspections in Iraq were a bust, but also the fundamental failure of the U.N. system. Consistently, the U.N. conceded and compromised, while Saddam Hussein corrupted and connived. Instead of containing and disarming Saddam, the U.N. became his lobbyist and financier.

Hell will have frozen over before the Vatican realizes what a threat to the world the United Nations has been, is now, and could be.

Unaccountable bureaucrats, secrecy, and money changing hands: this is not bringing about the Kingdom of God but bringing about the culture of death.

posted by Patrick Sweeney at 10:34 PM   Permalink  

...Well now, Arab League, here you have your long-sought-after dream: The United States spent its own blood to take out a fascist, committed billions in aid to jump start democracy, and lobbied the world to forgive Iraqi debt — only to find either silence from the region's dictators or their active help for the beheaders and car bombers seeking to inaugurate an 8th-century fascist caliphate. The point? The Iraqi people and the Arab Middle East will soon have to go on record either accepting or rejecting the chance for democracy. If they choose theocracy, anarchy, or autocracy, well, the United States can say at least it tried to offer them a way out of their self-induced misery — but the region turned out to prefer the Dark Ages after all and must be left alone to suffer the consequences of that decision.

posted by Patrick Sweeney at 1:35 PM   Permalink  

Our enemy in the war on terror will see a Bush victory as a loss for them and a Kerry victory as a victory for them.

posted by Patrick Sweeney at 10:31 AM   Permalink  

In a detailed telephone interview with Shiba Pillai-Diaz, your EdWonk has learned that she will be returning to the classroom. After a week in the full glare of national publicity, she told the EdWonk that she is looking forward to being out of the limelight.

More political correctness run amok. I didn't get a chance to blog her story earlier.

Command Post has the entire press release from the teacher. I've posted what I think is the key portion.

The question that should be asked is why the School District chose to publicize supposed accusations by parents that should have been handled discreetly and confidentially between the School District administration and me. The School District was under an obligation to me not to disclose such matters publicly. Despite requests by my attorney to document the alleged parent and student complaints cited in the press release, the School District has steadfastly refused to provide any proof whatsoever of the allegations. Superintendent McCartney has responded that the alleged complaints were tendered in confidence and he will not provide proof of the allegations to the public or to me without a court order or legal action on my part.

Superintendent McCartney cannot have it both ways by asserting those purported complaints are confidential while making them the focus of his attack on my character and professional reputation. If he were truly concerned about not involving parents and students in the public forum, he should not have publicized the alleged statements in his press release.

posted by Patrick Sweeney at 10:06 AM   Permalink  

New York Post: Granny in Bush Whack

October 4, 2004 -- An Upper West Side woman says she was am-Bushed by a cane-wielding 86-year-old woman who apparently isn't fond of the president.

Linda Fuda, 62, told The Post she was waiting in the lobby of a friend's Central Park West building yesterday carrying a Bush/Cheney sign and bumper stickers when Ruth Spitz, who was also in the lobby, suddenly accosted her.

Spitz told her "get out of here with that trash, you don't belong here," Fuda said.

Fuda answered, "It's not your building, it's everyone's building," at which point, she says, Spitz ripped the sign and threw it down.

"I bent down to pick it up, and she hit my backside with her cane and then she tried to push me out the door." Fuda said.

Reached at her apartment last night, Spitz said she'd been in the lobby waiting for her dinner companions and acknowledged asking Fuda to leave.

But she insisted she never hit her with the cane or ripped the sign.

She did say the two political combatants "shoved each other."

"She didn't belong in the building," Spitz said. "She doesn't live here. She was carrying this great big sign, as if she were in a parade.

"I'm 86 years old — I'm sure I'm not capable of hurting anybody," Spitz said.

Fuda, who sells advertising space and who recently registered as a Republican, called cops, even though she wasn't hurt.

She said cops told her to call back today if she wished to pursue the matter.

"I wanted to file a report because someone in her state shouldn't be living alone," she said.

Spitz, a retired college professor, said, "I'm not a Bush supporter," but wouldn't reveal whom she supports.

She added she's not worried about the cops.

"There's nothing I can do about it. I felt she had no business carrying that sign," she said.

See also Michelle Malkin

If there's incidents of Bush partisans going after Kerry supporters with the same degree of violence, somehow, even the mainstream media which is wholly in Kerry's camp isn't publicizing it.

posted by Patrick Sweeney at 9:22 AM   Permalink  

Lepanto From the Catholic Encyclopedia

Occupied by the Turks in 1498, Lepanto is chiefly celebrated for the victory which the combined papal, Spanish, Venetian, and Genoese fleets, under Don John of Austria, gained over the Turkish fleet on 7 Oct., 1571.

The latter had 208 galleys and 66 small ships; the Christian fleet about the same number. The crusaders lost 17 ships and 7500 men; 15 Turkish ships were sunk and 177 taken, from 20,000 to 30,000 men disabled, and from 12,000 to 15,000 Christian rowers, slaves on the Turkish galleys, were delivered.

Though this victory did not accomplish all that was hoped for, since the Turks appeared the very next year with a fleet of 250 ships before Modon and Cape Matapan, and in vain offered battle to the Christians, it was of great importance as being the first great defeat of the infidels on the sea.

Apart from the signal defeat of the Albigensian heretics at the battle of Muret in 1213 which legend has attributed to the recitation of the Rosary by St. Dominic, it is believed that Heaven has on many occasions rewarded the faith of those who had recourse to this devotion in times of special danger.

More particularly, the naval victory of Lepanto gained by Don John of Austria over the Turkish fleet on the first Sunday of October in 1571 responded wonderfully to the processions made at Rome on that same day by the members of the Rosary confraternity. St. Pius V thereupon ordered that a commemoration of the Rosary should be made upon that day, and at the request of the Dominican Order Gregory XIII in 1573 allowed this feast to be kept in all churches which possessed an altar dedicated to the Holy Rosary.

In 1671 the observance of this festival was extended by Clement X to the whole of Spain, and somewhat later Clement XI after the important victory over the Turks gained by Prince Eugene on 6 August, 1716 (the feast of our Lady of the Snows), at Peterwardein in Hungary, commanded the feast of the Rosary to be celebrated by the universal Church.

A set of "proper" lessons in the second nocturn were conceded by Benedict XIII. Leo XIII has since raised the feast to the rank of a double of the second class and has added to the Litany of Loreto the invocation "Queen of the Most Holy Rosary". On this feast, in every church in which the Roman confraternity has been duly erected, a plenary indulgence toties quoties is granted upon certain conditions to all who visit therein the Rosary chapel or statue of Our Lady. This has been called the "Portiuncula" of the Rosary.

posted by Patrick Sweeney at 11:11 PM   Permalink  

Pop Goes the Psychology: The Dr. Phils Meet the Kerrys (washingtonpost.com)

"Did you ever hope you would have a daughter?" Mrs. Dr. Phil asked Heinz Kerry.

"Yes, I lost a couple -- I had some miscarriages."

"Oh," said Mrs. Dr. Phil, momentarily surprised to find her foot in her mouth.

"I have several pinkies in heaven. I call them pinkies," Heinz Kerry explained.

"And now you have two daughters," responded Mrs. Dr. Phil brightly.

posted by Patrick Sweeney at 3:34 PM   Permalink  

Now in power, the Socialists/secularists are paving the way for dhimmitude (i.e. subjection of a Catholic nation to Islam). UK Guardian: Funding for Church to be slashed by Spanish

The Spanish government sparked a furious row yesterday after it emerged that it had drawn up a timetable to halve state funding of the Roman Catholic Church and to ban crucifixes from public buildings.

But rather than making the government religiously neutral, the Socialists believe this will help as well:

Further enraging conservatives, the government has drawn up plans to finance the teaching of Islam in state-run schools and to give funds to mosques on the grounds that it will create greater understanding of the country's one million Muslims.

It's a reward to the 3/11 bombers. Thanks guys, for getting us elected.

We have this sort of leading edge in American society with public school history texts that when it comes to Islam and Jihad, they appear to have been written by the Imans or at least a white-washer like Karen Armstrong.

The shorthand that I've seen for this is the "Red-Green" anti-Christian anti-Jewish alliance. The cooperation (intentional or unthinking) between secularists and Muslims to advance the Muslim agenda.

Unlike the United States which has deist/multi-demoninational Christian foundation, Spain's foundation and identity is based on the exclusion of religions other than the Catholic faith. For a country like Spain to abandon its Catholic identity the parallel would be Kuwait or Iran abandoning its Muslim identity.

posted by Patrick Sweeney at 8:56 AM   Permalink  

I admired Rodney Dangerfield. He was persistent over decades to show his talent for comedy. He believed in himself and he often talked about his faith in God.

It's amazing to think that it wasn't until he was 59 did he get a significant role in a movie, Caddyshack, which today is regarded as a classic.

posted by Patrick Sweeney at 11:43 PM   Permalink  

In the face of unexpectedly bloody and costly engagements with enemy forces, the President encountered severe criticism from his Democrat opponents, who wanted "peace" more than they wanted victory. They mocked him as some kind of primitive creature, unable to straighten-out the mess he had created. The year was 1864.

Glaring error in Matt's article: it is William Tecumseh Sherman not John Sherman. His great statue is a few blocks away from my office: on horseback, facing Fifth Avenue, looking south, and ready to ride off again if we should need him.

posted by Patrick Sweeney at 1:15 PM   Permalink  

I hinted that something was coming that would limit my time available to add to the blog. I can reveal it now. I am going to be one of the hosts of a radio talk show on the Catholic faith to be broadcast in the New York metropolitan area.

This is the start of an New York-originated English language service of a global Catholic radio apostolate, Radio Maria which has been broadcasting in the New York area in Italian and Spainsh for some time. (Press Release)

The content will be on the Catholic faith and the Catholic experience in New York, so if you are able to tune in, don't expect a Limbaugh or Hanity-style show.

It's a call-in show, but I don't have the call-in number, and there's no over the Internet access to the show.

Please keep me in your prayers as I start this new outreach to Catholics.

posted by Patrick Sweeney at 8:28 AM   Permalink  

In the presidential campaign's closing weeks, Democrats are bracing for an "October Surprise," an event so dramatic it could influence the election's outcome. The capture of Osama bin Laden, for instance.

It's part of American political lore: the party out of power worries about a last-minute surprise engineered by the party in power. Now that October has arrived and the election is just a month away, speculation is rife among Democrats that President Bush and political mastermind Karl Rove have some tricks up their sleeves.

"I assume that it will be something," said House Democratic leader Nancy Pelosi of California. "We have to be ready for that."

Maybe the October Surprise will be no suprise.

posted by Patrick Sweeney at 1:48 AM   Permalink