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STATE OF TEXAS PROPOSITION NO. 1 "The constitutional amendment protecting the right to engage in farming, ranching, timber production, horticulture, and wildlife management." STATE OF TEXAS PROPOSITION NO. 2 "The constitutional amendment authorizing a local option exemption from ad valorem taxation by a county or municipality of all or part of the appraised value of real property used to operate a child-care facility." STATE OF TEXAS PROPOSITION NO, 3 "The constitutional amendment prohibiting the imposition of an individual wealth or net worth tax, including a tax on the difference between the assets and liabilities of an individual or family." STATE...

It strikes me that relative newcomer around the Holy See Press sector, listed as CNA‘s “senior Rome correspondent” – which as I get older strikes me as amusing – Hannah Brockhaus should rethink her priorities. Francis had an audience with a bunch of editors of European Jesuit journals – imagine what that was like. In the Vatican News piece relating what was exchanged in their Q&A there are some 2400 words. The section Hannah chose to report on is 188 words of the whole. La Civilità Cattolica HERE. What was her game? Click-bait? The topic: Francis criticized, belittled, “restauratori”, “restorers...

The world outside or before the U.S. was and is not a pretty thing. Even in rare consensual societies, factions and inequality under the law persisted—whether the plebs and populares of early Republican Rome, the greens and blues of Justinian’s Constantinople, or the Guelphs and Ghibellines of thirteenth-century Florence. Belonging to the wrong ethnic group or religion or political clique translated into a diminished political existence—or often far worse. Institutionalized persecution required the use of mass violence, in the way that governments today have systematically oppressed Chinese Uyghurs and Tibetans, Iraqi Kurds, Rwandan Tutsis, or Serbian Bosnians. https://victorhanson.com/what-made-us-go-crazy-part-two/

“History is strewn with the wrecks of nations which have gained a little progressiveness at the cost of a great deal of hard manliness, and have thus prepared themselves for destruction as soon as the movements of the world gave a chance for it.” —Walter Bagehot, Physics and Politics I write on the 20th anniversary of the Islamic terrorist attacks against New York and Washington, D.C. No matter where you turn, it seems, the message is the same, a combination of injunction and protestation: “Never forget,” “We remember,” the sentiment invariably bolstered with reminiscences of loss and heroism. The loss...

Implementation of Traditionis Custodes within the Archdiocese of Galveston-Houston SEPTEMBER 1, 2021 Daniel Cardinal DiNardo To all Priests and Deacons, and to All the Lay Faithful of Galveston-Houston, The liturgy is not only the gathering point into unity of all that is scattered, but also the summons home to the Father through the action of Jesus Christ and the work of the Holy Spirit in that gathering, thus creating harmony from among diverse and even occasionally discordant voices. There Grace is given to all the members of the liturgical assembly to go forth and to sanctify the world in which...

How Trump voters formed an ugly—and accurate—view of America’s ruling regime. I’ve had discussions at this point with a wide range of Trump supporters who believe the 2020 election was fraudulent. I think I can extract a general theory about their perspective. It is also the perspective of most of the people who were at the Capitol on January 6, and probably even that of Trump himself. Most of these people believe some or all of the various theories involving midnight ballots, voting machines, etc. But what you find when you talk to them is that, while they’ll defend those...

As Catholic Bishops in the United States, we join with the Tyler Clementi Foundation in standing up for at-risk LGBT youth in our country. As we see in the Gospels, Jesus Christ taught love, mercy and welcome for all people, especially for those who felt persecuted or marginalized in any way; and the Catechism of the Catholic Church teaches that LGBT people are to be treated with “respect, compassion and sensitivity.” All people of goodwill should help, support, and defend LGBT youth; who attempt suicide at much higher rates than their straight counterparts; who are often homeless because of families...

After bishops endured several days of contentious debate over the Church’s Eucharistic disciplinary norms, a group of 60 U.S. Congressional representatives have weighed in, forcing the issue for some bishops from a theoretical debate to one far more practical, immediate, and closer to home. One congressman’s tweet poses a vexing test of leadership for U.S. bishops’ conference president Archbishop Jose Gomez of Los Angeles, with similar tests for other bishops likely to follow. And for Gomez and the congressman, a clock is ticking, and the stakes are high. Archbishop Jose Gomez of Los Angeles. Credit: USCCB Share The Pillar The...

The Real Threats to Our Democracy Electoral shenanigans and the abdication of judicial responsibility are the real threats to our democracy. Let the audits proceed. In the Wall Street Journal of June 10, Peggy Noonan captured the kernel of the crisis of national division that afflicts America: Donald Trump and opposed perceptions of last year’s presidential election. Equitable person though Noonan is, she qualifies as a Trump-hater, whose invective against Trump has only escalated over time. Noonan’s premise today is that any question about the 2016 presidential election is unfounded conspiracism, but that suspicion is growing, spread by “the Trump...

The claim of a unified America, and not a war against a modern-day version of Southern secessionists, is what links the Republican Party to its past. In a commentary about present-day Democrats and the secessionists whom Lincoln battled, Jeremy Carl offers the following observation: Today’s Republicans, like Lincoln, find themselves in a regime-level conflict with the Democrats. The Democrats are firing again and again on our Constitutional order, our history, and our traditions—our metaphorical Fort Sumter, if you will—but unlike our forebear Lincoln, our elected leadership seems either to be aiding the insurgent Left or, at best, feebly invoking constitutional...

It was appropriate that news of the Democrats’ plans to pack the Supreme Court broke in April, just a couple days after the 160th anniversary of the Confederate attack on Fort Sumter, the shots that began the Civil War. Unlike President James Buchanan, who dithered in responding to obvious Confederate aggression, the newly inaugurated Abraham Lincoln acted decisively upon taking office. He informed South Carolina Governor Francis Pickens that he would be resupplying the fort, forcing South Carolina’s hand. Lincoln’s actions did not start the war—they made it clear that war was already underway. From that point on, Americans, even...

The new American Middle East policy is an extension of the new American domestic policy. By Victor Davis Hanson More than 2,500 rockets have landed in Israel over the past week. Some Arab Israeli citizens are terrorizing Jewish Israelis. Apparently, as the rockets fall, these citizens are to be Arab Islamic nationalists first, and Israelis last—even if they wisely prefer to live on the Israeli rather than the Palestinian side of Israel’s hated wall. The usual Hamas sympathizers are promising death to the Jews on social media (so much for the idea that Twitter and Facebook are “shocked, shocked” by...

When the No. 3 House Republican gets the high jump this week, the real loser will be the attempt to suppress any real examination of what happened in the last election. By Conrad Black The vote this week on Representative Liz Cheney’s (R-Wyo.) status as House Republican conference chairman vastly transcends her. All sides are correct that it is a battle over the “Big Lie.” Cheney, the Democrats, and NeverTrumpers all say the Big Lie is the contention that 2020 was not a fair election. They argue further that Donald Trump tried to promote the violent overthrow of the government...

The brute fact is that the GOP today—unlike its original incarnation—has no rootedness in any specific moral conception of political life. It is an unmoored, mercenary instrument for hire. By Tal Bachman Once upon a time, the Republican Party didn’t suck. Actually, there were lots of times it didn’t suck. It didn’t suck when, at its founding in the late 1850s, it declared slavery an inhumane, barbaric practice, and eventually ended it. It didn’t suck when it ended repressive and predatory Mormon polygamy a few decades later. It didn’t suck when it declared late 19th-century corporate monopolies to be injurious...

The Thin Façade of Authority As we continue to debate about numerators and denominators in determining the real impact of this virus, one common denominator remains certain about the elites advising, crafting, and developing our response: they aren’t touched by the impact of their decisions. The virus will teach us many things, but one lesson has already been relearned by the American people: there are two, quite different, types of wisdom. One, and the most renowned, is a specialization in education that results in titled degrees and presumed authority. That ensuing prestige, in turn, dictates the decisions of most politicians,...

The case for Barack Obama, in broad strokes: He has within him the possibility to change the direction and tone of American foreign policy, which need changing; his rise will serve as a practical rebuke to the past five years, which need rebuking; his victory would provide a fresh start in a nation in which a fresh start would come as a national relief. He climbed steep stairs, born off the continent with no father to guide, a dreamy, abandoning mother, mixed race, no connections. Obama and the Runaway Train The race, the case, a hope for grace. He rose...

CLARIFICATION FROM THE RECTOR OF THE SHRINE OF FATIMA THE CHURCH OF THE MOST HOLY TRINITY WILL NOT BE AN "ECUMENICAL TEMPLE" 1) The readers of "Voz da Fátima" may remember a communiqué from the Rector of the Shrine, published in January of 2004, under the headline "FATIMA SHRINE OF ALL RELIGIONS ?". 2) The movements which came out in opposition to our October Congress, as mentioned in that communiqué, then took advantage of the arrival of a group of Hindus, as reported in "Voz da Fátima" of May 2004, in order to launch a massive new campaign which is...

Like Sherlock Holmes' dog that did not bark, the most remarkable aspect of last week's Senate Intelligence Committee report is what its Democratic members did not say. They did not dissent from the committee's findings that Iraq apparently asked about buying yellowcake uranium from Niger. They neither agreed to a conclusion that former diplomat Joseph Wilson was suggested for a mission to Niger by his CIA employee wife nor defended his statements to the contrary. Wilson's activities constituted the only aspects of the yearlong investigation for which the committee's Republican chairman, Sen. Pat Roberts, was unable to win unanimous agreement....

Cardinal Dulles on Communion and Pro-Abortion Politicians Outlines What Actions Should Be Taken NEW YORK, JUNE 29, 2004 (Zenit.org).- Cardinal Avery Dulles is encouraging U.S. bishops to dialogue with dissenting Catholic politicians about their moral responsibilities before advising them to not receive Communion. Cardinal Dulles, the Laurence J. McGinley Professor of Religion and Society at Fordham University, shared with ZENIT what important steps need to be taken to defend human life, protect the sacraments, uphold the teachings of the Church and respond to pro-abortion politicians. Q: What are the practical steps a bishop could or should take to encourage a...

Preparing for the Ecumenical Patriarch "I Invite All to Pray for the Full Unity of Christians" VATICAN CITY, JUNE 27, 2004 (ZENIT.org).- Here is a translation of the address John Paul II gave today before praying the Angelus with the thousands gathered in St. Peter's Square. He gave the address in Italian. * * * 1. The day after tomorrow, on June 29, we will celebrate the solemnity of Saints Peter and Paul, and during this happy feast day we will have the joy to receive in the Vatican His Holiness Bartholomew I, ecumenical patriarch of Constantinople. We want to...