Patterico's Pontifications

4/20/2005

NPR on the new Pope

Filed under: General,Media Bias — See Dubya @ 12:34 am



The Big P has asked that I stop in to water the plants while he does something or other somewhere over the upcoming weekend. So you can look forward to some more hard-hitting, incisive geopolitical analysis like this. Belmont Club, watch out!

I’ll begin by kicking the liberal media. Courageous choice on a conservative blog, I know, thank you, especially when the medium in question is NPR. Caught their take on the elevation of Benedict XVI in the car this AM. I have a pretty good stereo and I could pick out the grinding of the little gears in their heads as they fought furiously to remain professional and unbiased and not just burst out with a hearty OH COME ON YOU GOD-BOTHERING FASCISTS WHY DON’T YOU AND YOUR NEW OBERSTURMPOPENFUHRER JUST PLASTER UP MY CERVIX WITH BONDO RIGHT NOW AND CONSIGN ALL THE GAYS TO SLAVE LABOR IN YOUR SILLY SUPERSTITION FACTORY! And they did a pretty good job of holding it in. Except.

Neal Conan summed up Joseph Ratzinger as–and this is transcribed from my own spotty memory here–as very well educated, a professor, yet also very conservative.

Yet also. A man of contradictions, this Ratzinger. Smart enough to know better than this. What’s his problem?

But then his correspondent in Rome–whom I believe was Emily Harris–described Ratzinger as very soft spoken, and very mild mannered, but also a stickler for the rules.

But also.

That rankles more, I think–on a level outside of politics. Someone who pays careful attention to the rules presumptively does so because of a sadistic streak–and for that reason a contrast is drawn with his soft-spokenness. This man cares about these God-given rules, and yet surprisingly is not a martinet about it. It is surprising, that is, if you believe that hoary stereotype that bitterness and not love motivates the traditionally religious.

It reminds me a little bit of the John Bolton confirmation hearings going on right now. Of course the man must have a temper, he must be brutal and thuggish, even though eyewitness Thomas Fingar said the “soft-spoken” Bolton merely “stood up” and “put his hands on his hips” when chewing out a subordinate. The left’s script script calls for the conservative nominee to be a martinet and a thug. But in both cases they find themselves struggling through their lines with a badly miscast villain.

These are relatively small (though telling) slips, and the live, ad-libbed exchange seems to have been edited out of the archived versions of the election coverage at NPR’s site. I don’t blame them for cutting it out, since it had no place in a taxpayer-funded broadcast in the first place.

14 Responses to “NPR on the new Pope”

  1. Well thanks a bunch for notation up front that press bashing is a nobrainer for conservatives. Please see: http://news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&u=/uclickcomics/cx_tr_uc/latest
    While Mr. Rall is a dependable leftie if nothing else, there is too much truth in his read occasionally.

    As to the Pope, from viewing the commentary which was saturation above the extreme leading up to the choice by the Conclave of Cardinals, it seems the Catholic Church is suffering from a dearth of priests, empty cathedrals and defections in the third world which this pope must speak to. the choice of a conservative shows a denial of the importance of seeking to mend the rifts that cause this, and intensifies the dissatisfaction that grows these trends. Rome hasn’t shown a willingness to expand the church, more of a regretable tendency to shut itself inside the Vatican and let the devil take the hindmost. which the devil has shown great willingness to deal with.

    Ruth (2502e0)

  2. “That rankles more, I think–on a level outside of politics. Someone who pays careful attention to the rules presumptively does so because of a sadistic streak–”

    He is the guy in charge of the inquisition.

    actus (ebc508)

  3. Actus, I think they’ve dialed back on the pit-and-the-pendulum just a smidgesince the 1600’s.

    See-Dubya (85b967)

  4. “Rome hasn’t shown a willingness to expand the church, more of a regretable tendency to shut itself inside the Vatican and let the devil take the hindmost. which the devil has shown great willingness to deal with.”

    Yes, it is regrettable that Rome has not expanded the church. Its rigid adherence to ideology is so limiting. Perhaps it could absorb the Buddhists, or maybe the Nation of Islam?

    Or maybe Rome could call a Vatican Council to make the liturgy more relevant to modern audiences and encourage lay participation and all that. How could that fail?

    Hondo (3dd3d0)

  5. Not to pile on, but Ruth’s point is a non sequitir. I take it Ruth is not Catholic. Church size is not important. There is no magic ratio of priests to laity. The job of the Church is not “to expand,” but rather to offer the Sacraments and preserve the faith. It’s pretty simple. As St. Peter Canisius said:

    “Better that only a few Catholics should be left, staunch and sincere in their religion, than that they should, remaining many, desire as it were, to be in collusion with the Church’s enemies and in conformity with the open foes of our faith.”

    This is not to say that evangelization should be abandoned. Quite the contrary, it remains a moral obligation. But all we can do is offer our message. And since it really is not “ours” (it’s you-know-whos) we cannot change it.

    Mike (41e87f)

  6. Caught their take on the elevation of Benedict XVI in the car this AM.

    The pope has an elevator-seat in his car?

    Dafydd

    Dafydd (df2f54)

  7. Many liberal commentators have much information but little wisdom on the matter.

    ras (f9de13)

  8. Daf–

    Have you ever tried getting into that Popemobile?

    See-Dubya (85b967)

  9. See-Dubya, I always thought what it really needed is something I’m a lot more familiar with: an ejector seat!

    Dafydd

    Dafydd (df2f54)

  10. Sorry. Here’s an extra:

    Dafydd (df2f54)

  11. Yeesh. It won’t even print the angle-bracket stuff, even if there’s no tag to close.

    My previous comment reads…

    Sorry, here’s an extra: [/b]

    (please mentally substitute the angle-bracket for the square one)

    Dafydd

    Dafydd (df2f54)

  12. here’s an extra: [/b]

    Dafydd, does this [/b] with “v” on horizontally work for bold as it does for underlining with a “u”? I tried underlining, but cannot get it to work. 🙂 What gives?

    Yi-Ling (9d70c9)

  13. Anyone who claims the Catholic church can thrive through compromise is unobservant at best and may well have shady motives.

    The mainline Protestant churches tearing themselves apart in their eagerness to drop their standards low enough — that is, to be sufficiently “tolerant” — to please the lefty fringe. Meanwhile, Evangelical churches grow and thrive, and their members don’t seem to mind at all being ghettoized and mocked.

    Even if the Catholic church loses membership with a move toward greater conservatism (and I don’t believe it will), those who stay will know why they’re there and exactly what they believe. Which will put us considerably ahead of where we are now.

    Apassionata (bdce7c)

  14. Steve Lopez managed to mention “Hitler Youth” by the second paragraph of his anti-Benedict screed today. Didn’t read it all, though.

    Kevin Murphy (6a7945)


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