Apparently so, which is something I’m not sure could be said for some of the Popes who came before him, who seemed more interested in gathering wealth, sitting in gold-covered thrones, and hiding pedophiles.
This new Pope appears to have even read the Bible.
Today, he released a treatise where he basically called trickle-down economics evil, and called governments who protected the rich at the expense of the poor (that’s us, in case you weren’t paying attention) as not serving Jesus’ teachings. “How can it be that it is not a news item when an elderly homeless person dies of exposure, but it is news when the stock market loses 2 points?” he asked. No, seriously, he really said that.
This is a guy who said he really didn’t care that much about prosecuting gays (“Who am I to judge?”) and worried that the Church had lost its way fighting over things like abortion when the real issue was fighting injustice and poverty.
I mean, he still has a way to go — for instance, he refuses to let women be priests — but it looks as if he is taking the Church in a good direction.
No, I’m not forgiving them for paying their employees minimum wage when they could easily pay them $11 an hour and give them all health insurance and still make a hefty profit. Not only would that be the right thing to do, it would also help the economy (money trickles up, after all — if people have money, they spend it. Amazing, but true). Instead, Wal-Mart admits their employees are basically living in poverty, and some stores are even holding food donation drives for the employees. 
However, instead of criticizing them for that (which is well deserved), today I want to defend them against the “closing on Thanksgiving” thing. There is a boycott proposed against them (and other stores) for making their employees work on Thursday.
Lots of places are still open on Thanksgiving, because we the people want them to be open. Someone always remembers a last minute thing they need and they run down to the grocery store and are happy when it’s there. (Remember: Wal-Mart has groceries, too.) Many gas stations remain open (which you will be thankful for when you get halfway to grandma’s and realize the tank is empty). And of course, some people never get holidays off (hospital workers, police, emergency services).
But really, we’re the ones to blame. If we didn’t create the demand, they wouldn’t be filling it.
So the protests I see now asking people not to shop on Thanksgiving are good — because it puts the onus on us. We’re the ones ultimately responsible for stores opening on holidays and at 12 am on Black Friday and so on.
Of course, one of the reasons for the protests is that Wal-Mart treats their employees terrible. If they paid them well and gave them overtime for working holidays, you probably wouldn’t be seeing these protests. So while we can blame ourselves for wanting these places open, we also need to keep in mind that the companies themselves can soften the blow to the point where employees will want to work on the holidays for all the extra benefits and money.
Republicans are angry that the rules have been changed to allow for a simple majority to decide judicial nominations in the Senate (where that had been the norm for more than 200 years). Democrats responded:
“Any President’s judicial nominees should receive careful consideration. But after that debate, they deserve a simple up-or-down vote”.
“Let’s get back to the way the Senate operated for over 200 years, up or down votes on the president’s nominee, no matter who the president is, no matter who’s in control of the Senate”.
“[W]e can’t find anywhere in the Constitution that says a supermajority is needed for confirmation”.
“I believe [filibustering judicial nominees] is in violation of the Constitution”.
“I will vote to support a vote, up or down, on every nominee. Understanding that, were I in the minority party and the issues reversed, I would take exactly the same position because this document, our Constitution, does not equivocate”.
“Why not allow the President to do his job of selecting judicial nominees and let us do our job in confirming or denying them? Principles of fairness call for it and the Constitution requires it”.
Oh! Wait! My bad. Those are all quotes from Republicans arguing against using filibusters at all to stop judicial nominee votes, made at a time when Bush was President and before there was that 60 vote rule.
Clearly, things are much different today. Because, um … well, there must be some difference. Or else all these Republicans would be flaming hypocrites now, wouldn’t they?
In the rest of the civilized world, health care is not a profit-making venture. Oh, sure, doctors are well-paid, but your health decisions aren’t made based on money. While everyone else realized that making sure their citizens needed health care in the same way they needed fire departments, America moved in the opposite direction — and now we pay more for health care than anywhere else and don’t get any advantage from it.
Just look at this chart (click on it to make it bigger and easier to read) … you’d think with the amount of money we’re spending, we’d be the healthiest people ever. 
But no, we have lower life expectancy and higher childhood deaths than any comparable country. Partially that’s because a ton of that money goes to insurance companies, who provide no health care whatsoever, and partially it’s because we don’t cover preventive care. Instead, the insurance companies only concentrate on treating you after you’re sick.
Capitalism does not solve everything. The market clearly does not solve everything. There are many examples of this, especially in the area of health care.
And that’s why I get so frustrated with people who say the government should stay out of health care. Are these people not paying attention? We’ve done that. It hasn’t worked. All the evidence is against you.
Mostly it’s just people who have this ridiculous libertarian view that all government is bad. If only the government got out of our lives, they think, we’d all live in a utopian paradise. This despite the fact that this has never happened in the history of the world and whenever these sorts of things are tried, we end up with an unhealthy and broke populace (like now) and with markets that collapse and go into recession every twenty years or so. Yet these idealists continue in their dream for a world that has never exist and never could.
It’s the 50th anniversary of the Kennedy assassination and the conspiracy theories continue.
When I was young, I loved reading about conspiracies. 
UFOs, the Kennedy assassination, the Loch Ness Monster — they all interested me. I was completely skeptical about the official version of the story.
As I grew, I realized what a hypocrite I was being. I was not subjecting the conspiracy theories to the same skepticism I applied to everything else. Because I wanted to believe in these things so bad, and because they were often easy answers to complicated issues, I was nieve and accepted things without significant proof. (Insert your own comment about religious beliefs here.)
I’ve also learned, as a lawyer, that every incident will have various stories that contradict each other and make things seem different than what they appear. Anything you look at in enough detail will provide things that make it ripe for conspiracy theories.
Plus there are many conspiracy books out there that are just full of lies. Exciting lies that sell books. I used to love reading books by John Keel — “The Mothman Prophecies” was one of his. His books were with all the UFO books in the library and were presented as researched factual accounts. I later learned he was laughing all the way to the bank, and had made up most of his evidence. When they finally made a film of “The Mothman Prophecies” they made no pretense of it being anything other than fiction. But for a long time when I was a kid, I was sure it was all real.
Of course, there really are secret conspiracies. Usually they are money-related conspiracies, involving insider trading, banks conspiring to sell worthless mortgages, and bribes to get around regulations. But, as I pointed out before, huge conspiracies of this type are really hard to hide.
If Oswald was innocent, then why did he run after the assassination? Why did he kill the cop who confronted him? It’s not as if it is impossible for him to have done the shooting …
Does that mean there wasn’t something else going on? No, because there are still too many unanswered questions, such as why Jack Ruby, who really had no stake in this, would go out of his way to shoot Oswald. Looked more like a mob silencing to me.
But these days I won’t jump to conclusions without knowing for sure. Just because something is possible doesn’t mean I should believe it.
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