David Bentley Hart's "Is, Ought and Nature's Laws" - (Compilation of Reactions and Discussions)

Is, Ought, and Nature’s Laws, by David Bentley Hart. First Things March 2013:

There is a long, rich, varied, and subtle tradition of natural law theory, almost none of which I find especially convincing, but most of which I acknowledge to be—according to the presuppositions of the intellectual world in which it was gestated—perfectly coherent. My skepticism, moreover, has nothing to do with any metaphysical disagreement. I certainly believe in a harmony between cosmic and moral order, sustained by the divine goodness in which both participate. I simply do not believe that the terms of that harmony are as precisely discernible as natural law thinkers imagine.

That is an argument for another time, however. My chief topic here is the attempt in recent years by certain self-described Thomists, particularly in America, to import this tradition into public policy debates, but in a way amenable to modern political culture. What I have in mind is a style of thought whose proponents (names are not important) believe that compelling moral truths can be deduced from a scrupulous contemplation of the principles of cosmic and human nature, quite apart from special revelation, and within the context of the modern conceptual world. This, it seems to me, is a hopeless cause. [...]

[I]nsuperable problems arise when—in part out of a commendable desire to speak to secular society in ways it can understand, in part out of some tacit quasi-Kantian notion that moral philosophy must yield clear and universally binding imperatives—the natural law theorist insists that the moral meaning of nature should be perfectly evident to any properly reasoning mind, regardless of religious belief or cultural formation.

Reactions, Assents and Rebuttals

• 02/03/13 - Michael Potemra (National Review), heralds the post as "A Bracing Challenge to Conservative Natural-Law Theorists":

  Hart’s approach is an important and welcome one, because it challenges the political use of natural law at its most vulnerable point — the shibboleth one so often encounters, usually in a form along the following lines: The moral desiderata of the American political Right are not an attempt to impose religious views in the public sphere, but a desire to make public morality conform to truths accessible to pure reason. But if these truths are in fact accessible to pure reason, why do so many people deny them?

• 02/20/13 - Rod Dreher (The American Conservative) concurs, in Why Natural Law Arguments Fail:

  You have to believe so that you may understand, Hart argues, following St. Anselm. Anything else is question-begging.

  This is why I don’t have any faith in the natural-law-based arguments against same-sex marriage. It’s not that I disagree with them necessarily; it’s that a) they are hard for ordinary people conditioned by our culture’s modes of thought to grasp, and b) partly because of this, they (understandably) prompt a, “So what?” response. This is Hart’s point.

• 02/20/13: Ditto for Alan Jacobs (More on Natural Law Arguments The American Conservative):

  ... some people say that natural law arguments do work with people whose reason is functioning properly, and if those arguments fail, then the fault is with the listener, not with the defender of natural law. Let me, per argumentum, grant that point. My question then is: Now what?

  The unpersuaded people are still there; the social or political problem you’re trying to fix is still there. Is it really the best we can do to say “You fail to meet my standards of rationality; therefore I refuse to debate with you further”? [...] That, in my view, would be neither good politics nor good Christianity.

  So, as I see it, those of us who believe in certain political and moral truths that we see as guaranteed by natural law need to pursue two courses. In the short term we need to find ways to commend our strongly-held views without recourse to natural law arguments; and in the long term we need to think about how the existence of natural law can be made both plausible and appealing to people who now see nothing in it. I don’t see a responsible way out of either pursuit.

• From R.J. Snell, associate professor of philosophy and director of the philosophy program at Eastern University, a two-parter in the Public Discourse, arguing from the contemporary natural law camp, Understanding Natural Law: A Response to Hart and Potemra 02/27/13:

  As a proponent of natural-law thinking, I ought to be somewhat concerned by these “bracing” criticisms. Instead I find myself wondering what theory Hart and Potemra are bludgeoning, for it certainly isn’t one with which I’m familiar. In fact, perhaps Hart insists that “names are not important” when identifying his targets because no one exists to be named. Certainly his objections are non-responsive to “self-described Thomists” such as Germain Grisez, John Finnis, Joseph Boyle, Martin Rhonheimer, and several scholars on the First Things masthead.

  In today’s article I explain how Hart and Potemra misunderstand natural law thinking. [In Natural Law is neither Useless nor Dangerous: A Response to Hart and Potemra 02/28/13], I argue that natural law thinking is neither useless nor dangerous, even in the “modern conceptual world.”

• 03/01/13: Brandon (Siris) on Hart's Kantian Argument:

  I'm utterly baffled by the argument. Hart argues that natural law theory cannot provide either categorical or hypothetical imperatives adequate to morality, but the two branches of the argument don't seem to cohere. His argument on the categorical imperative side is purely Kantian. But his argument on the hypothetical side is a sensible knave problem put in such strong terms that it would, if problematic for natural law theory, be equally a problem for the Kantian, who also cannot persuade Nietzsche. Perhaps this is why he also sometimes uses language suggesting not Kantianism but fideism? But it seems a little harsh to insist that a theory of practical rationality, which is what natural law theory is, can only be adequate if it is a completely compelling Kantian refutation of Nietzsche. This is a very specific thing to demand, and I'm not sure why it's being demanded.

  (See also: on Hart, again).

• 03/06/13: A Christian Hart, a Humean Head, by Edward Feser. First Things "On the Square":

  I have nothing but respect for Prof. Hart and his work. But this latest article is not his finest hour. Not to put too fine a point on it, by my count he commits no fewer than five logical fallacies: equivocation, straw man, begging the question, non sequitur, and special pleading.

  He equivocates insofar as he fails to distinguish two very different theories that go under the “natural law” label. He also uses terms like “supernatural” and “metaphysical” as if they were interchangeable, or at least as if the differences between them were irrelevant to his argument.

  These ambiguities are essential to his case. When they are resolved, it becomes clear that with respect to both versions of natural law theory, Hart is attacking straw men and simply begging the question against them. It also becomes evident that his conclusion—that it is “hopeless” to bring forth natural law arguments in the public square—doesn’t follow from his premises, and that even if it did, if he were consistent he would have to apply it to his own position no less than to natural law theory.

  Let’s consider these problems with Hart’s argument in order. ...

• 03/07/13: Why Natural Law Is ‘Hopeless’, by Samuel Goldman. The American Conservative.

• 03/07/13: Dylan Pahman – Natural Law, Public Policy, and the Uncanny Voice of Conscience: An Orthodox Response to David Bentley Hart, by Dylan Pahman:

  On the one hand, I am sensitive to Hart’s critique—morality is more than solely what can be deduced by a properly reasoning mind, as some seem to believe. Nevertheless, while I would not necessarily describe myself as a Thomist (like Hart, I am an Orthodox Christian), I take issue with his critique for (1) failing to account for the role of conscience in traditional natural law theory and for (2) confusing the role of reason in natural law theory as a result. ...

• 03/08/13: Natural Law, Bentley Hart, Feser, Et Al. Winged Keel and Crumpet:

  In rejecting a shared, universal rationality, how can Hart and others of his and Milbank’s ilk not avoid, in Steven Wedgeworth’s words, a ”hopeless contest of competing ultimate worldviews.”

  I think Hart’s answer would be a broadly MacIntyrean one: rationalities are always already traditioned and particular, and this precisely does not mean the hopeless end of true dialogue, but rather its beginning. Rival traditions, as MacIntyre argues, will show their superiority by appeal to their own–to coin a bad phrase–particular universality. A tradition will succeed by explaining its rivals’ aporias better than they can themselves, which is quite different to an Enlightenment appeal to universal reason. ...

• 03/14/13: Hart Has Reasons That Reason Cannot Know, by Thaddeus Kozinski. Ethika Politika:

  What is at the heart of the debate over Hart? It is this: both the classical and new natural law schools are wrong if they think that the natural law can be known, lived, and legislated in abstraction from tradition and culture, which is, at heart, theological. The classical view of metaphysics, at least as articulated by Edward Feser, presupposes an extrinsicist understanding of the relation of nature and grace, and reason and Faith, and is, therefore, not Thomistic. It’s as if Feser has not read, or just not digested, the work of John Milbank, Tracey Rowland, and Alasdair MacIntyre. Of course, the error of the new natural law theorists is grave compared to such extrinsicism, namely, the adequacy of practical reason alone to ground and explain ethical theory and practice. But I think David Hart is pointing to the need to transcend both the classical, dare I say, rationalist natural law school, and the Grisezians. In my view, both the classical and the new traditions neglect these four realities: 1) the mutually dependent relation of speculative and practical reason; 2) the subjectivity-shaping role of social practices; 3) the tradition-constituted-and-constitutive character of practical rationality; and 4) the indispensability of divine revelation in ethical inquiry and practice.

• 04/03/13: Reply To Kozinski, by Dr. Edward Feser.

• Nature Loves to Hide, by David Bentley Hart. First Things May 2013:

  ... There is an old argument here, admittedly. Somewhere behind Feser’s argument slouches the specter of what is often called “two-tier Thomism”: a philosophical sect notable in part for the particularly impermeable partitions it erects between nature and grace, or nature and supernature, or natural reason and revelation, or philosophy and theology (and so on). To its adherents, it is the solution to the contradictions of modernity. To those of a more “integralist” bent (like me), it is a neo-scholastic deformation of Christian metaphysics that, far from offering an alternative to secular reason, is one of its chief theological accomplices. It also produces an approach to moral philosophy that must ultimately fail.

• Sheer Hart Attack: Morality, Rationality, and Theology, by Dr. Edward Feser. Public Discourse April 24, 2013:

  In my first piece, I claimed that Hart was guilty of several fallacies. His new article repeats some of the same (though he pleads innocent). Worse, where Hart’s arguments are non-fallacious, they are also nonexistent. The article is full of unsupported assertions, put forward in prose so purple that its imperial gravitas is evidently supposed to stand in place of argument.

  But assertions without arguments to back them up are like spitballs: Anyone can make them; anyone can fling them; and while they can annoy their target, they draw no blood whatsoever. ...

  See also: Discerning Thoughts and Intents of Hart 04/29/13:

  In the Letters section of the May issue of First Things, he makes a number of other remarks intended to clarify and defend what he said in his original article on natural law (which I had criticized here). The section is behind a paywall, but I will quote what I think are the most significant comments. Unfortunately, they do nothing to make Hart’s position more plausible, nor even much clearer. ...

Let me state the obvious. This should be front page news. When Rush Limbaugh attacked Sandra Fluke, there was non-stop media hysteria. The venerable NBC Nightly News' Brian Williams intoned, "A firestorm of outrage from women after a crude tirade from Rush Limbaugh," as he teased a segment on the brouhaha. Yet, accusations of babies having their heads severed — a major human rights story if there ever was one — doesn't make the cut.

You don't have to oppose abortion rights to find late-term abortion abhorrent or to find the Gosnell trial eminently newsworthy. This is not about being "pro-choice" or "pro-life." It's about basic human rights.

The deafening silence of too much of the media, once a force for justice in America, is a disgrace.

Kirsten Powers: Philadelphia abortion clinic horror: "We've forgotten what belongs on Page One" USA Today April 11, 2013.

* * *

Here is incontrovertible proof that Kirsten Powers and Conor Friedersdorf are correct in arguing that the murder trial of Philadelphia abortionist Kermit Gosnell has received insufficient media coverage: On Friday, Snopes.com was compelled to publish a page confirming that the story is real, not merely an urban legend.

James Taranto: From Roe to Gosnell: The Case for Regime Change on Abortion. Wall Street Journal

If I'm not blogging here ...

Don't have a great deal to say personally. Have been catching up on reading. But if I'm not blogging here, you can still find me at:

• "The Benedict Blog"
• [Pontificate of] Pope Francis

First a Polish philosopher-pope (John Paul II), then a German theologian-pope (Benedict XVI) -- and now a Latin-American Jesuit with an appreciation for St. Francis. Interesting times.

White Smoke.

Can the Free Market Adequately Care for the Poor? A Debate Between Rev. Robert Sirico and Mr. Michael Sean Winters

A debate held at the Aquinas Institute for Catholic Thought, University of Colorado Boulder. January 28th, 2013.

Choose Your Pope.

‎"From the dawn of the Republic, America’s quest for freedom has been guided by the conviction that the principles governing political and social life are intimately linked to a moral order based on the dominion of God the Creator. The framers of this nation’s founding documents drew upon this conviction when they proclaimed the 'self-evident truth' that all men are created equal and endowed with inalienable rights grounded in the laws of nature and of nature’s God. The course of American history demonstrates the difficulties, the struggles, and the great intellectual and moral resolve which were demanded to shape a society which faithfully embodied these noble principles. In that process, which forged the soul of the nation, religious beliefs were a constant inspiration and driving force, as for example in the struggle against slavery and in the civil rights movement. In our time too, particularly in moments of crisis, Americans continue to find their strength in a commitment to this patrimony of shared ideals and aspirations."

Pope Benedict XVI, Welcoming Ceremony at the White House, April 2008.
Excerpt from: Pope Benedict in America.
[Credit to, and lifted from, Ignatius Press]

Required Reading on the 'Assault Weapons Debate'

DarwinCatholic writes:

News reporting on any specialized topic tends to be pretty bad. With the new already flooded with stories relating to "assault weapons" and doubtless more coming as congress takes up the topic, I couldn't resist writing a series of posts on the topic.

• Assault Weapons Part 1: Battle Rifle to Assault Rifle"
• Assault Weapons Part 2: Assault Rifles vs. "Assault Weapons"
• Assault Weapons Part 3: Gun Control

You could learn more from the 30 minutes (or less) it takes to digest these three posts than a month watching CNN (Piers Morgan, take note).

"Make Room at the Inn"

Inevitably the question arises, what would happen if Mary and Joseph were to knock at my door. Would there be room for them? And then it occurs to us that Saint John takes up this seemingly chance comment about the lack of room at the inn, which drove the Holy Family into the stable; he explores it more deeply and arrives at the heart of the matter when he writes: “he came to his own home, and his own people received him not” (Jn 1:11).

The great moral question of our attitude towards the homeless, towards refugees and migrants, takes on a deeper dimension: do we really have room for God when he seeks to enter under our roof? Do we have time and space for him? Do we not actually turn away God himself?

We begin to do so when we have no time for him. The faster we can move, the more efficient our time-saving appliances become, the less time we have. And God? The question of God never seems urgent. Our time is already completely full. But matters go deeper still.

Does God actually have a place in our thinking? Our process of thinking is structured in such a way that he simply ought not to exist. Even if he seems to knock at the door of our thinking, he has to be explained away. If thinking is to be taken seriously, it must be structured in such a way that the “God hypothesis” becomes superfluous. There is no room for him. Not even in our feelings and desires is there any room for him. We want ourselves. We want what we can seize hold of, we want happiness that is within our reach, we want our plans and purposes to succeed. We are so “full” of ourselves that there is no room left for God. And that means there is no room for others either, for children, for the poor, for the stranger.

By reflecting on that one simple saying about the lack of room at the inn, we have come to see how much we need to listen to Saint Paul’s exhortation: “Be transformed by the renewal of your mind” (Rom 12:2). Paul speaks of renewal, the opening up of our intellect (nous), of the whole way we view the world and ourselves. The conversion that we need must truly reach into the depths of our relationship with reality. Let us ask the Lord that we may become vigilant for his presence, that we may hear how softly yet insistently he knocks at the door of our being and willing.

Let us ask that we may make room for him within ourselves, that we may recognize him also in those through whom he speaks to us: children, the suffering, the abandoned, those who are excluded and the poor of this world.

Pope Benedict XVI, Christmas 2012.

Fr. Schall's last lecture: "The Final Gladness"

The legendary Father James Schall, SJ delivers his last lecture entitled, "The Final Gladness" before retiring from teaching at Georgetown University.

Sponsored by the Tocqueville Forum on the Roots of American Democracy in collaboration with the Berkley Center for Religion, Peace & World Affairs.

Father James V. Schall, S.J. was Professor of Government at Georgetown University. He entered the Society of Jesus in 1948 and was ordained a Roman Catholic priest in 1963. After obtaining his Ph.D. in political philosophy from Georgetown in 1960, he taught there for 34 years before retiring in 2012. He is the author of over thirty books, including Another Sort of Learning and The Modern Age.

[Blogger's note: Although I'm certain for a priest as prolific as Fr. Schall, he'll still be publishing an essay, or two, or twenty. "Retirement" simply affords more time to read and write].

Related

• Kan Masugi's annual advent conversation with Fr. Schall - Since 2002 Ken Masugi, a senior fellow of the Claremont Institute and lecturer in Government at Johns Hopkins University, Washington DC, has conducted Advent interviews with James V. Schall, S.J. (Claremont Review of Books)

On the Newtown Massacre

The senseless massacre of innocents at Newtown provokes not only cries of mourning but the age-old exercise in theodicy theodicy -- the theological attempt to reconcile belief in a just and loving God with the evidential evil, whether manifested in often-incomprehensible acts of human violence (as witnessed in Newtown) or "acts of nature" with an even greater capacity for destruction.

Whether it be earthquakes in the Middle East, tsunamis in Japan, tornadoes in the American Midwest, hurricanes in New Orleans, New York and New Jersey . . . or the occasional mass shooting or bus bombing or drone-attack or terrorist incident, the same questions reassert themselves from the surviving members of the victims: why?

Looking back at prior reflections, I discovered a post from 2003, after the BAM earthquake in Iran (puzzling my way through an "act of nature" that resulted in a death toll amounting to 26,271 people and injuring an additional 30,000).

At the time I cited the Catechism, which remains a concise compilation of Catholic teaching on the question of evil:

[309] If God the Father almighty, the Creator of the ordered and good world, cares for all his creatures, why does evil exist? To this question, as pressing as it is unavoidable and as painful as it is mysterious, no quick answer will suffice. Only Christian faith as a whole constitutes the answer to this question: the goodness of creation, the drama of sin and the patient love of God who comes to meet man by his covenants, the redemptive Incarnation of his Son, his gift of the Spirit, his gathering of the Church, the power of the sacraments and his call to a blessed life to which free creatures are invited to consent in advance, but from which, by a terrible mystery, they can also turn away in advance. There is not a single aspect of the Christian message that is not in part an answer to the question of evil.

310 But why did God not create a world so perfect that no evil could exist in it? With infinite power God could always create something better. 174 But with infinite wisdom and goodness God freely willed to create a world "in a state of journeying" towards its ultimate perfection. In God's plan this process of becoming involves the appearance of certain beings and the disappearance of others, the existence of the more perfect alongside the less perfect, both constructive and destructive forces of nature. With physical good there exists also physical evil as long as creation has not reached perfection.

[311] Angels and men, as intelligent and free creatures, have to journey toward their ultimate destinies by their free choice and preferential love. They can therefore go astray. Indeed, they have sinned. Thus has moral evil, incommensurably more harmful than physical evil, entered the world. God is in no way, directly or indirectly, the cause of moral evil. 176 He permits it, however, because he respects the freedom of his creatures and, mysteriously, knows how to derive good from it:

For almighty God. . ., because he is supremely good, would never allow any evil whatsoever to exist in his works if he were not so all-powerful and good as to cause good to emerge from evil itself.

[312] In time we can discover that God in his almighty providence can bring a good from the consequences of an evil, even a moral evil, caused by his creatures: "It was not you", said Joseph to his brothers, "who sent me here, but God. . . You meant evil against me; but God meant it for good, to bring it about that many people should be kept alive." From the greatest moral evil ever committed - the rejection and murder of God's only Son, caused by the sins of all men - God, by his grace that "abounded all the more", brought the greatest of goods: the glorification of Christ and our redemption. But for all that, evil never becomes a good. [...]

[314] We firmly believe that God is master of the world and of its history. But the ways of his providence are often unknown to us. Only at the end, when our partial knowledge ceases, when we see God "face to face", will we fully know the ways by which - even through the dramas of evil and sin - God has guided his creation to that definitive sabbath rest for which he created heaven and earth.

It's hard to believe that post was written nine years ago. If it is a sign of progress in Christian faith "as a whole" that that passage acquires greater and personal meaning, then I confess I have not progressed very far.

What can you say to a mother whose son goes missing on his walk home from school, only to receive the news that the police have recovered his dismembered body?

What can you say to a mother trapped in rising floodwaters, whose toddlers were ripped from her arms by the current and swept away?

What can you say when a killer walks into a classroom of an elementary school and systematically leaves a pile of bodies on the floor?

The talk that this was in some way "God's plan" or, in other evangelical circles, "God's judgement" is offensive to the ear. To say that God is at once "master of the world", omniscient and omnipotent, and to say that he in some manner limits himself and permits this to happen . . .

It is just that: incomprehensible.

And as a parent, the impact of reading the news is so much greater, the realization that it could have been your child; the urge to reach out and console, fighting for words when no words can be said.

Of all the posts out there, nothing rings as true to me right now as Matt Spotts, SJ: "Damn this."

• Telegram for a "senseless tragedy" at Sandy Hook elementary school. Pope Benedict XVI.
• Telling the parents - a priest's horrible job in Newtown

The Cold War: A New History, by John Lewis Gaddis

Finished reading The Cold War: A New History by John Lewis Gaddis (Penguin Books, 2005).

As Gaddis notes, the students he now teaches at Yale were only five years old when the Berlin Wall came down. "Stalin and Truman, Reagan and Gorbachev, could as easily have been Napoleon or Caesar or Alexander the Great." I could relate in part as, being rather young myself, the significance of December 22, 1989 and other momentous events in that era failed to register. One of the best Cold-War memories I took from childhood was the incredible experience of watching a collective of high-schoolers fend off the Russian invasion of America in Red Dawn (1984) (a nostalgic cinematic pleasure which, incidentally, should never have re-made).

At any rate, it was with the intent of repairing my personal ignorance of those decades that I set out to acquire greater knowledge, and Gaddis being "the dean of Cold War historians" seemed a good place to start as any.

Gaddis' work is populated with some great insights -- for example how the Russian's anticipation of victory upon signing the Helsinki Accords (resolving postward boundaries) turned into dismay with the recognition that their signatures also committed them (if on paper) to certain standards of human rights:

Helsinki became, in short, a legal and moral trap. Having pressed the United States and its allies to commit themselves in writing to recognizing existing boundaries in Eastern Europe, Brezhnev could hardly repudiate what he had agreed to in the same document - also in writing - with respect to human rights. Without realizing the implications, he thereby handed his critics a standard, based on the universal principles of justice, rooted in international law, independent of Marxist-Leninist ideology, against which they could evaluate the behavior of his and other communist regimes. What this meant was that the people who lived under these systems -- at least the more courageous -- could claim official permission to say what they thought.

Or of the seldom-recognized role Ronald Reagan played to ending the arms race:

"[Reagan] was the only nuclear abolitionist ever to have been President of the United States. He made no secret of this, but the possibility that a right-wing Republican anti-communist pro-military chief executive could also be an anti-nuclear activist defies so many stereotypes that hardly anyone noticed Reagan's repeated promises, as he put it in the "evil empire" speech, "to keep America strong and free, while we negotiate real and verifiable reductions in the world's nuclear arsenals and one day, with God's help, their total elimination."

Or how the collapse of the Berlin Wall was instigated in part by a botched press conference:

After returning from Moscow [Egon] Krenze consulted his colleagues, and on November 9th they decided to try and relieve the mounting tension in East Germany by relaxing -- NOT eliminating -- the rules restricting travel to the West. The hastily drafted decree was handed to Gunger Schabowski, a Politburo member who had not been at the meeting but was about to brief the press. Schabowski glanced at it, also hastily , and then announced that citizens of the G.D.R. were free to leave "through any of the border crossings." The surprised reporters asked when the new ruling went into effect. Shuffling through his papers, Schabowski replied: "[A]ccording ot my new information, immediately." Were the rules valid for travel to West Berlin? Schabowski frowned, shrugged his shoulders, shuffled some more papers, and then replied: "Permanent exist can take place via all border crossings from the G.D.R. to [West Germany] and West Berlin, respectively. The next question was: "What is going to happen to the Berlin Wall now?" Schabowski mumbled an incoherent response, and closed the press conference. Within minutes, the word went out that the wall was open.

The final chapter, with the implosion of the Communist Empire under the weight of its own rule, the grudging recognition of its leaders of the hypocrisy and futility of the socialist dream in the face of one citizen uprising after another, and the cascading surrender of governments with a helpless shrug of from the party's leadership (Ceasescu complaining to Gorbachev about 'grave danger not just to socialism . . . but also the very existence of communist parties everywhere." Gorbachev: "You seem concerned about this.") makes for a thrilling and fast-paced conclusion after the plodding detente of the Nixon and Ford administrations.

Gaddis eschews a strictly chronological linear approach to history, highlighting the major events to bolster his personal reflections on why events unfolded. So it's helpful to come to the book with a preliminary knowledge of the timeline, and be attentive to Gaddis' jumping around.

He also indulges in some unique creative license, which took me by surprise: beginning chapter 2 with a straightforward account of the nuking of Korea . . . revealing in subsequent pages his indulgence in speculation of what MIGHT have happened had MacArthur actually gone forward with the President's promise to "employ every weapon we have" [including the atomic bomb] at a 1950 Presidential press conference. Which is entertaining perhaps, but not what I expected from a historian.

Still, with the voluminous amount of writing on the subject I wanted a concise, readable introduction to the subject which I could digest on my commute to work, and Gaddis delivers. (I am, as always, open to the additional recommendations from my readers).

Black Friday.

Thanksgiving

Whereas it is the duty of all Nations to acknowledge the providence of Almighty God, to obey his will, to be grateful for his benefits, and humbly to implore his protection and favor-- and whereas both Houses of Congress have by their joint Committee requested me to recommend to the People of the United States a day of public thanksgiving and prayer to be observed by acknowledging with grateful hearts the many signal favors of Almighty God especially by affording them an opportunity peaceably to establish a form of government for their safety and happiness.

Now therefore I do recommend and assign Thursday the 26th day of November next to be devoted by the People of these States to the service of that great and glorious Being, who is the beneficent Author of all the good that was, that is, or that will be-- That we may then all unite in rendering unto him our sincere and humble thanks--for his kind care and protection of the People of this Country previous to their becoming a Nation--for the signal and manifold mercies, and the favorable interpositions of his Providence which we experienced in the course and conclusion of the late war--for the great degree of tranquility, union, and plenty, which we have since enjoyed--for the peaceable and rational manner, in which we have been enabled to establish constitutions of government for our safety and happiness, and particularly the national One now lately instituted--for the civil and religious liberty with which we are blessed; and the means we have of acquiring and diffusing useful knowledge; and in general for all the great and various favors which he hath been pleased to confer upon us.

and also that we may then unite in most humbly offering our prayers and supplications to the great Lord and Ruler of Nations and beseech him to pardon our national and other transgressions-- to enable us all, whether in public or private stations, to perform our several and relative duties properly and punctually--to render our national government a blessing to all the people, by constantly being a Government of wise, just, and constitutional laws, discreetly and faithfully executed and obeyed--to protect and guide all Sovereigns and Nations (especially such as have shewn kindness unto us) and to bless them with good government, peace, and concord--To promote the knowledge and practice of true religion and virtue, and the encrease of science among them and us--and generally to grant unto all Mankind such a degree of temporal prosperity as he alone knows to be best.

Given under my hand at the City of New York the third day of October in the year of our Lord 1789.

Thanksgiving Proclamation of President George Washington

Election Night 2012 - Words of wisdom from Fr. Richard J. Neuhaus

"For those whose primary allegiance is to the City of God, every foreign country is a homeland and every homeland a foreign country. America is our homeland, and, as the prophet Jeremiah says, in its welfare is our welfare. America is also—and history testifies that this is too easily forgotten—a foreign country. Like every political configuration of the earthly city, America, too, is Babylon. It is, for better and worse, the place of our pilgrimage through time toward home. Until the human pilgrimage reaches that destination, which I expect is no time soon, we cannot help but, through our tears, sing the songs of Zion in a foreign land."

Fr Richard John Neuhaus (American Babylon: Notes of a Christian Exile; HT: Patrick Langrell, FB)

* * *

• One Election Cannot Fix what Ails Us, by Fr. Robert Sirico (National Review)
• Difficult Days Ahead for the Church, by Msgr. Charles Pope, Archdiocese of Washington.
• What Happened, by Fr. Philip De Vous (Acton Institute).
• "To all my weepy Republican friends, who are disconsolate... grow a pair.", by Peter Sean Esq. (Lex Communis)

Election Night 2012 - quick thoughts for our President

• "This was the moment when the rise of the oceans began to slow and our planet began to heal..." -- messianic rhetoric of 2008 won't cut it.
• "There is not a liberal America and a conservative America - there is the United States of America..." -- glossing over ideological divisions won't cut it.
• And to borrow a remark from a Facebook friend (Patrick Langrell):

  But, man, Obama will inherit a mess from the current president. At least next time round he can blame it on the previous press…oh…

The Virgin of Breezy Point

A statue of the Virgin Mary sits amid rubble in the Breezy Point neighborhood of Queens, N.Y., Tuesday. Fire destroyed at least 80 homes there as Sandy hit the beachfront community. Source: Wall Street Journal

Hurricane Sandy

To who are inquiring, myself and family are safe, fortunately with power throughout. Prayers requested for those less fortunate. I think many of us in New York and New Jersey, having no real experience with hurricanes (and "Irene" being rather 'overhyped'), simply did not anticipate Hurricane Sandy being as bad as it was.

Some photos from last night's "Storm of the Century":

Source: Gothamist - "Will the owner of a 40-foot white boat called the "Gral Sper" please come remove it from the Metro-North tracks ASAP?"

Source: Gothamist: GreenPoint during the Surge

Source: Gothamist: A TANKER on Staten Island Street

Source: Gothamist: Flooding happening all over the city

Source: Gothamist: Flooding happening all over the city

Source: Facebook - Taxi terminal in Hoboken, NJ.

Source: Tumblr: "The River that was the N Train"

Source: Gothamist: Lower Manhattan Loses Power

Source: "Breezy Point from Above" Chris Heller, (Twitpic)

Related

• Hurricane Sandy: The Aftermath (The Atlantic)
• WHOA: The Weather Channel Meteorologist Just Completely Freaked Out About Hurricane Sandy (Business Insider 10-28-12)
• Sorting the Real Sandy Photos From the Fakes (The Atlantic) + Photos of Sandy that are actually real
• Hurricane Sandy’s Breakout Star: Mayor Bloomberg’s Sign Language Interpreter - As serious as this storm is, Michael Bloomberg's frequent press conferences have also provided New Yorkers a legitimate reason to smile: Her name is Lydia Calas, and she's the mayor's official sign language interpreter.

  See also Lydia's twitter feed, on which she remarks: "Anyone watching Gov. Christie? I've signed for him once. Great guy, but I always felt like I was 'signing angry.'"

Ralph McInerney: "Praeambula Fidei: Thomism and the God of the Philosophers"

Every once in a while you encounter a book that reorients your perspective and forever changes you. Dr. McInerny's Praeambula Fidei: Thomism and the God of the Philosophers is one of those books -- any further reading of Henri DeLubac and particularly Etienne Gilson (one of my erstwhile favorite 20th century Thomists) will be through the critical lens of McInerny's 'Praeambula Fidei'. There is no going back.

A summary from the publisher:

In this book, renowned philosopher Ralph McInerny sets out to review what Thomas meant by the phrase and to defend a robust understanding of Thomas's teaching on the subject. After setting forth different attitudes toward proofs of God's existence and outlining the difference between belief and knowledge, McInerny examines the texts in which Thomas uses and explains the phrase "preambles of faith." He then turns his attention to the work of eminent twentieth-century Thomists [De Lubac, Gilson, Chenu] and chronicles their abandonment of the preambles. He draws a contrast between this form of Thomism and that of the classical Dominican commentators, notably Cajetan, arguing that part of the abandonment of the notion of the preambles as philosophical involves a misreading and misrepresentation of Cajetan. McInerny concludes with a positive rereading of Aristotle's Metaphysics and Aquinas's use thereof. In the end, the book argues for a return to the notion of Aristotelico-Thomism--Thomistic philosophy as the organic development of the thought of Aristotle.

As somebody who has read a considerable amount of Gilson's work (and with an interest in neo-Thomism in general) McInerny's exquisite and thorough dismantling of Gilson's reading of Aguinas, and Cajetan-on-Aquinas, made for some painful reading at times.

Reviews

• Review: Praeambula Fidei: Thomism and the God of the Philosophers, by Anthony J. Lisska, Denison University. Notre Dame Philosophical Reviews 8/19/07.
• Neo-Neo-Thomism. Review by Romanus Cessario. First Things May 2007.
• From Ralph McInerny himself interview with Harm Goris, Thomas Instituut te Utrecht. (July 15, 1998):

  In acknowledging that Thomas in primarily a theologian, we are also acknowledging that he is a philosopher. Any effort to remove Aristotle, or philosophy, from Thomism puts me in mind of the joke about two men painting a wall. One says to the other, “Hang on to your brush, I’m taking away the ladder.”

• Ralph McInerny (1929-2010)

Political Roundup

Romney's 47% Gaffe

• Russel Reno (First Things) vents about "absurd Republican rhetoric" (9/18/12)
• Ramesh Ponnuru thinks The Right Is Wrong to Pin Obama’s Edge on Welfare State (Bloomberg 9/17/12)
• DarwinCatholic (The American Catholic) thinks I think this particular media tizzy is particularly silly, and the pundits declaring Romney to be badly hurt by this are mostly reflecting the beliefs of a bubble in which the GOP is already hated. Thoughts?
• Henry Olsen, vice president of the American Enterprise Institute reflects on Romney’s drift from the true heart of conservatism (Washington Post 9/19/2; hat tip: Wheat & Weeds):

  It wasn’t so long ago that mainstream conservatism represented these values. We indexed income brackets and personal exemptions to inflation in the early 1980s to protect middle- and low-income families. Conservatives created the child tax credit in 1997 and expanded it in 2001 to reduce the tax burden for parents. In the past decade, we championed a flat tax that contained a generous exemption for a family of four, precisely so those least able to pay would not be forced to.

  I believe the mainstream conservative still believes in these things. But when Romney divides the world into makers and takers and presumes that our ability to pay federal income tax is a measure of which group we belong to, he sends a different message. He implicitly tells average Americans that their quiet work doesn’t “make” America unless they are entrepreneurs who make enough money. Worse, he tells them that their lives aren’t even dignified, that they are “takers” who are unable to exercise personal responsibility over their lives.

  I don’t know if my dad, who never graduated from college and who worked on his feet for 40 years, ever had a year in which he didn’t pay federal income taxes. Perhaps in 1970, when he was laid off during a recession and had a mortgage, two children and a third on the way. But I know he and millions like him “made” America because they made the things we buy and, more important, they made people like me.

  I will vote for Romney despite his flaws. The alternative is unacceptable: In this matter, I really have no choice. But in broader political action I do have a choice, and I choose to rededicate myself to building that shining city on a hill that Reagan evoked when he brought conservatism out of the wilderness.

Speaking of "gaffes"

• How the media turned Obama's foreign policy bungle into a Romney gaffe, by Philip Klein. Washington Examiner 9/12/12.

• "I like being able to fire people" -- you've heard this quote attributed to Romney numerous times during the Democratic National Convention in a negative manner, as a capitalist robber-baron with a penchant for sticking it to the working class. Context provides a different story, and who would disagree with his point?

  "I like being able to fire people who provide services to me," Romney said at a Monday breakfast in New Hampshire, when talking about health care. "You know, if someone doesn't give me a good service that I need, I want to say, 'I'm going to go get someone else to provide that service to me.'"

  "I want individuals to have their own insurance. That means the insurance company will have an incentive to keep you healthy. It also means if you don't like what they do, you can fire them," he said.

... revisionist history

• "Obama saved the auto industry." At least that's what we are led to believe from everybody up to Michelle Obama and the President himself. From Daniel Ikenson (Cato @ Liberty), Details of the Auto Bailout You Won’t Hear in Charlotte; for the entirety of Daniel's congressional testimony, see: Lasting Implications of the General Motors Bailout Subcommittee on Regulatory Affairs, Stimulus Oversight and Government Spending Committee on Oversight and Government Reform United States House of Representatives. 6/22/11.

... and flat out lies

• Is Barack Obama America's most dishonest politician? - Powerline on Obama's appearance on David Letterman, his attribution of $1 trillion in national debt to his predecessor (false) and all too convenient "forgetting" of the total debt, when asked by his host how much was actually his.

More on Medicare and Health Reform

• Why Medicare Must be Reformed, in One Chart, by Veronique de Rugy. (National Review's "The Corner" 9/4/12). Speaks for itself.

• Obama More Flexible on Medicare Than Rhetoric Suggests (National Journal):

  In his convention speech in Charlotte, President Obama vowed to block the Republican Medicare reform plan because “no American should ever have to spend their golden years at the mercy of insurance companies.”

  But back in Washington, his Health and Human Services Department is launching a pilot program that would shift up to 2 million of the poorest and most-vulnerable seniors out of the federal Medicare program and into private health insurance plans overseen by the states.

Some Reading

• Economist Thomas Sowell has published a new PDF pamphlet on “Trickle Down” Theory and “Tax Cuts For the Rich” - timely reading for this election.