Pope Benedict XVI

Now that we have a new pope, it is time for everyone to stop treating the Catholic Church like it is a democracy.

The Catholic Church follows a very fine line: life and charity. It is not time to start breaking these important traditions. Not now, not ever. If American Catholics have a problem with the tradition of the Church, they can always fall out, convert or become excommunicated.

New NY Times Columnist

This morning, the New York Times newest opinion columnist, John Thierney, wrote about a recent book detailing New York's drop in crime over the past decade. You may recall that Mayor Rudolph Giuliani ran a campaign to "clean up the city." He kicked porn vendors and "Squeegie Men" off the street, particularly Times Square. Due to hiring additional cops and being tougher on crime than his predecessors (David Dinkens, Mario Cuomo, etc.), crime dropped, or so thought many public policy analysts.

Fortunately, however, the real reason comes out, as Mr. Thierney reluctantly seems to agree. Abortion. Yes, because abortion became legal in the early 1970's, less would-be criminals existed because of abortions, and therefore, the crime rate dropped. Because, obviously, these aborted children would have been unloved, spent their entire youths in foster-homes, taking drugs and committing crimes.

Whew, am I glad we solved that! And New Yorkers want to know why people don't like them? Thomas Frank, what's the matter with New York?

New Name

I decided to turn down the flaming rhetoric and make this more of a site describing my daily life. So the blog's name is now Vandyblog.

I won't change my passions, but I will try to speak more about my ordinary life.