Of Popes And Blind Eyes

There ain't no Jesus gonna come from the sky. Now that I found out I know I can cry.
- John Lennon


The arrival of Pope Francis to the United States this month has caused the country to go absolutely ape shit. The major television networks might as well rebrand their initials thusly: American Broadcasting Catholics, National Broadcasting Catholics, Catholic Broadcasting System, Catholic News Network and Fatima Over Xenophobia.

Throughout it's history, the United States of America has routinely turned the blind eye, even if it means strained neck muscles. A classic example of turning the blind eye is the amazing number of our very own saintly Presidents who owned slaves! A history class blind eye. Yet, the Pope's visit may expose this blind eye as the festering puss hole it really is.

Leading the blind eye brigade (with more and more frequency as this century of horror continues) are people who otherwise identify themselves as progressives and/or free thinkers. Did the Catholic Church suddenly come out for abortion rights? Did the Pope marry a stadium full of same-sex couples? Well, one would think so as the country turns that blind eye to the obvious hatred of the Catholic Church toward gays and women in these cases alone. Hello? Even evangelical Republicans are pissing their pants because President Obama has invoked the names of Jesus, Lord and dammit, God, more times in the last 48 hours than the top ten Republican candidates have in the last four months combined. On top of that, John Boehner must be bawling his eyes out, chain smoking cigarettes and downing pints of booze because everyone has turned a blind eye to the fact that he was the one who invited the Pope to speak before Congress in the first place.

A couple of Pope Francis' more overt actions while in the United States include a canonizing and riding around in a Fiat. I guess Fiat needed some serious god-like intervention rebranding. Ever checked the history of Fiat? Do so, it is quite illuminating. The word fiat itself might also be something worth looking into, because, well, the Pope.

More egregious is the canonizing of Father Junipero Serra, or in Catholic Church parlance, the guy is now a Saint. Serra, working for the ever popular Inquisition, arrived in Mexico in 1749 and it wasn't long before he settled up north near present day Monterey, California. He established missions so he and his sadists could covert natives he said were guilty of, "...the most detestable and horrible crimes of sorcery, witchcraft and devil worship." Guilty of torture and murder is a saintly pursuit of course and defenders have actually used language to excuse the priest's savagery by claiming all the native peoples were voluntarily led to the word. To top it off, Serra has been rebranded as well, he now has been, in a Church/Orwellian revisionism, labeled "evangelizer of the West" by Pope Francis. Native Americans have used different and certainly more accurate descriptions such as "monster" and "for the pope to accord sainthood is such an obscene gesture on the part of the Catholic Church." It's all turning one big blind eye to old and new atrocities.

Lest we forget, Argentina's "Dirty War", propagated by a military dictatorship in the 1970s and early 1980s. Supported of course by the United States Government because of, well, communism! There's some question of then Father Jorge Mario Bergoglio's (now Pope Francis) involvement in helping the dictators round up "undesirables". But, where there is white smoke there's a Pope.

I implore the few remaining actual progressives and/or free thinkers to rise up and open their blind eyes. When some critical thought is applied, President Obama and Pope Francis are a perfect match, perhaps made in heaven as it were. Obama was ordained with the Nobel Peace Prize and has wage the Endless Wars which continue to kill thousands of civilians every year. He has openly bragged about extra-judicially murdering American citizens and kisses the asses of corporate America and the military/industrial complex. But, because he tosses out a few bromides about climate change, health care and the war on women he is drooled over by the blind eye left. Is it just too difficult to reconcile images of burned, crushed children with the peace president? Is it simply a road not traveled because once trod upon there is never going back to that misperceived comfort of constantly turning a blind eye?

One thing, beyond mindless Pope fawning and massive turning of the blind eye, is that there will be NO press coverage of dissenting viewpoints. No long interviews with agnostics or atheists will be condoned or allowed. I only hope that the constant turning of the blind eye has not led us so far down the slippery slope that we can not as a country ever climb back up.

(Obama meets the Pope at a military airport and they laugh and laugh how people still haven't figured out they're Bankster puppets. Image from Getty Images under Fair Use.)

 

Unanimous Supreme Court Decision Recalls Memories

The Supreme Court has been in the hot seat, as it were, recently, but one decision in particular had me recalling a painful and at the same time, rewarding experience. I'm speaking of the Court's decision regarding buffer zones around the entrances to women's clinics. They decided the zones were bad and unlike the recent 5 to 4 vote in favor of Hobby Lobby, this decision was unanimous. I couldn't fathom that.



(An example of what the Supreme Court considers 'sidewalk counselors'. All photos under Fair Use.)

Many moons ago I was an escort at the Portland Women's Clinic. There was a line drawn on the sidewalk to keep the protestors 25 feet away from the entrance. An escort is someone who literally escorts the woman patient from her car or the bus stop to the entrance to the clinic. We wore orange vests with the word "escort" on it. We had to escort the women because of the constant crowds that would verbally abuse them as they walked to the clinic.

Free speech is one thing, but spewing vile, vicious hatred is quite another. We had to escort these women through the crowd and into the building. A MAJORITY OF THE WOMEN GOING TO CLINIC WERE THERE FOR HEALTH CARE FOR THEIR PREGNANCY - NOT AN ABORITION.
But that didn't matter to those hateful swine also known as protesters and what the Supreme Court now defines as "sidewalk counselors"! I heard the most horrible shouting at these women, such as "baby killer", "satan's spawn" and shit like that. I saw my supervisor punched in the mouth by a large man. There was a woman who dragged bloody baby dolls behind her. Another had graphic pictures of dead babies (which were claimed to be aborted fetuses). I was singled out every time for special abuse because I was a male escort. A rarity. I frequently was accused of having a shit stained cock or enjoyed fucking my boyfriend's butt. Most of the time, I had to make sure that the boyfriends or husbands of the women going in for a DOCTOR'S APPOINTMENT did not lash out physically against the protestors. It was a fucking nightmare. I lasted a year.

But I'm glad I did it. I was happy to help these women get to their doctor appointments safely, however incongruous it is to use the phrase "doctor's appointments safely" in this day and age. They were always, of course, grateful. It does bare repeating that the vast majority of these women were going to the clinic for health care and not abortions. That is something the Court ignored as well.

 

 

Of "Honest Rapes" And Abortions

These male politicians running around wanting to control women's bodies have said and/or done some pretty inhumane things over the years, but this election cycle has brought out perhaps the most inhumane statements.

The latest comes from Ron Paul, who is the darling of some because he's so anti-war; yeah, well so what? During an interview recently, Dr. Paul, who is decidedly anti-abortion, actually said this regarding abortion and rape:

"If it's an honest rape, that individual should go immediately to the emergency room, I would give them a shot of estrogen."

An honest rape? What the fuck does he mean? Later we find out, when he offers a straw man story about a woman who is seven months pregnant and wants an abortion because she was raped, well, that's a "different story". Different perhaps, but definitely what Dr. Paul considers a dishonest rape! Luckily, there are still some folks who haven't fallen under the Dr. Paul spell and can call this sort of talk for the inhumanity it is.

Another inhumane and down right dangerous comment comes from the Right's frothiest candidate, Rick Santorum. He has a plan when it comes to abortions:

"I believe that, that any doctor who performs an abortion--that--I would advocate that any doctor that performs an abortion should be criminally charged for doing so. I don't--I've never supported criminalization of abortion for mothers, but I do for people who perform them."

Apparently, Santorum makes no distinctions between honest and dishonest rapes.

The current occupant of the White House, President Obama, while a devout Christian, has tossed a few bones to his liberal admirers when it comes to abortion. While he doesn't believe that federal money should be used for abortion except in cases of rape, incest or health of the mother, he did sign an Executive Order removing barriers to responsible scientific research involving human stem cells. In his capacity as a democratic president, of course, he is obligated to uphold the Constitutional right to abortion.

And we don't know where he stands on honest or dishonest rapes.

RIVITING TESTIMONY BY FETUS

Late last winter, 2011, legislators from the state of Ohio invited a fetus to give testimony before one of their committees. While the public part of the testimony merely had a pregnant woman and an ultrasound, my sources have found the transcript of the PRIVATE testimony actually given by the fetus!