Romney Doubles Down on 47% Rhetoric: Joan Walsh Responds

Joan Walsh's rejoinder to Mitt Romney's beyond-shabby self-defense after he lost the election is fantastic.  As many folks will know, in a call to his super-rich donors, Romney has just echoed his 47% remark from the campaign (doubling down on dumbness just like the American Catholic bishops), claiming that President Obama was re-elected because he dished out "gifts" to minorities.  Gifts, as in forgiveness of student loans to young folks, contraceptives for women, Obamacare to people of color and Latinos, and citizenship for children of "illegals". . . .  The only thing Romney failed to leave out of his checklist was Obamaphones!

Abby Zimet on a Tale of Two Men

Abby Zimet at Common Dreams on how the two presidential candidates spent last Tuesday night and Wednesday morning:

Gerald T. Slevin: Is Pope Leading a New "Children's Crusade" to Help Romney Win?

Another outstanding piece this morning by Jerry Slevin.  In this essay, Jerry sketches the historical and political background to the intervention of the Vatican and the U.S. Catholic hierarchy in the 2012 elections, noting the connection of papal politics (and the politicking of the USCCB) to the sex abuse scandal in the Catholic church.  Jerry's essay follows:

Romney's Stance on Abortion and Contraception: Unmasking the Catholic Bishops' Pro-Republican Politics

This past February, I wrote:

Politicians and Pundits Talking (or Not) about Global Warming Following Sandy

Politicians and pundits talking about climate change and global warming (or not talking, as the case may be) following megastorm Sandy:

Doug Wright to His "Moderate" Republican Friends: "Simply Be Honest" about Homophobia

Doug Wright to his Republican friends who intend to vote Romney-Ryan for "economic" reasons, and who don't, of course, intend anything discriminatory at all as they vote GOP:

Gerald T. Slevin: After Elections, Who Will Prosecute More Predatory Priests? Constitutional Lawyer Obama Or The Three R's---Romney, Ryan & Ratzinger? And Why Does It Matter?

Another hard-hitting and exhaustively researched essay by the Harvard-trained former Wall Street lawyer Jerry Slevin today.  Jerry looks at the two U.S. presidential candidates in light of their records in dealing with issues of child abuse and of church and state, and challenges Catholics to inform our consciences as we select a candidate by thinking carefully about why the Vatican and U.S. bishops appear to be playing very overt partisan politics in this election cycle--to assure that the candidate (Romney) more likely to be lenient to Catholic officials prosecuted for criminal activity with child abuse cases is elected.  What follows is Jerry's essay:

Talking about Race (and Republicans, Mormons, and Catholics): Important Recent Discussions

Several very important articles this morning that I recommend readers read side-by-side with each other, since each glosses the other in significant ways:

Andrew Sullivan, "Religion, Race, and Double Standards," at the Dish

Joanna Brooks, "Andrew Sullivan Is Right and Wrong on Racism, Romney, and the Book of Mormon," at Religion Dispatches

Ta-Nehisi Coates, "The Burden of a Black President," at The Atlantic

Chauncey Vega, "The Real Burdens of a Black President?  Double Standards and Polite White Racism" at Alternet

Salt Lake Tribune Endorses Obama: Too Many Mitts

This strikes me as significant news: Utah's flagship newspaper The Salt Lake Tribune has just endorsed Obama.  The reason?  There are too many Mitts.

Margaret Farley's Just Love: The Personal as Political (and Applications to U.S. Presidential Debate)

Several days ago, when I told readers I had begun reading Margaret Farley's book Just Love: A Framework for Christian Sexual Ethics (NY: Continuum, 2006), I noted that I find Farley's work a valuable corrective to a tendency among Catholic theologians of the center (and even among many liberation and political theologians) to dismiss issues of sexual ethics and the profound questions of justice these raise as less-than-serious diversionary questions that can be quarantined from the rest of theology.  I noted that many theologians of the solid center (and, I'd add, theologians in the liberationist and political theological movements as well) appear to think that the questions raised by sexual ethics can be safely quarantined from the discussion of issues of marginalization, oppression, and injustice we consider, say, when we talk about the abuse of the poor by the super-rich, or of the peoples of the developing nations by those of the developed nations.

Rosie Perez on Mitt as a Gay Latina

And because I can't help myself--because this video produced by the Jewish Council for Education and Research and the American Bridges SuperPAC says so much that I had hoped to say in what I just posted about love and about who still continues to control the center-defining and power-allocating conversations of the center--I offer this today for readers who may be interested.

The Softer and Gentler Mitt Romney? Testimony from the Mormon Community

And, again, not unrelated to the excerpts I have just posted from Joanna Brooks's The Book of Mormon Girl and Margaret Farley's Just Love: Geoffrey Dunn's article at Huffington Post yesterday reporting on what various Mormon women for whom Mitt Romney has been a pastoral leader have to say about him and his pastoral leadership is must-read testimony.  Dunn discusses the case of Carrel Hilton Sheldon, a Mormon woman in Massachusetts whose doctor informed her in 1983 that her life was at stake if she continued her pregnancy.  She was 8 weeks pregnant at the time.

Adam Levin on Mitt Romney and Liar Loans: Be Very Afraid

And speaking of liars (piggybacking here on what I just wrote about Cordileone's installation as archbishop of San Francisco): Adam Levin writes at Huffington Post about what Mitt Romney and liar loans have in common.  An excerpt: 

Last Night's Debate: Mr. Romney as Soft Kitty

About last night's debacle show:

Big News: Obama and Democrats Enjoying Wide Lead Among Catholics

The big news now vis-a-vis Catholics and politics in the U.S.: as Daniel Burke reports at Religion News Service, a Pew Research Center poll conducted on 16 September shows Obama leading Romney among American Catholics by 54-39 percent.  As Burke notes, this widening lead is despite the U.S. bishops' "fortnight for freedom" shock-and-awe events this summer, and despite Romney's having selected Catholic Paul Ryan as his running mate.

Midweek News: Women Breaking for Obama, GOP Extremism, Spanish Rallies

And another midweek selection of articles--these commenting on political issues discussed previously here:

Midweek News: Maryland Marriage Equality, Mel White, Sr. Simone Campbell and Romney-Ryan

A midweek miscellany of articles commenting on topics we've been discussing here of late--the following religion-and-politics themed:

Nicholas Cafardi on Cardinal Martini, Attack on Liberation Theology, and U.S. Elections

Nicholas Cafardi at America's "In All Things" blog on Cardinal Carlo Maria Martini, the suppression of liberation theology by Pope John Paul II and Cardinal Ratzinger (now Pope Benedict), and the current U.S. elections: 

Romney, Healthcare, and God-Talk: The Marketplace Will Save Us

And a final postscript to what I wrote earlier in the morning about Paul Ryan and the moral dimensions of his budget: I do want to give credit where credit is due.  I don't want altogether to discount the GOP's insistence on keeping God front and center in the public square.

John Nichols on Romney's Rejection of Moderate Path (and of Integrity and Principle)

John Nichols points out that George Romney walked out of the 1964 GOP convention when the party "went all-in for extremism" and rejected platform planks proposed by Romney that would have committed it to the struggle for racial justice.  But his son Mitt, by contrast:

Unlike his father, Mitt Romney will make no effort to guide his party back toward the mainstream. The man who just a decade ago was identified as the brave new champion of the centrism, even liberalism, that his father once espoused will make no demand for moderation. There will be no stance on principle. No show of integrity.