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So where are the headlines, splashed across every newspaper and television in America? How come we aren't hearing Olberman and Matthews screaming about the violent outbursts from the left? We certainly hear about the violent outburst from the Tea Party members, even though there haven't been any.
Most Americans that pay attention know what's happening and how we're lied to. We expect it now.
That doesn't make it any less aggravating.
"Close to 20 businesses were damaged after what started as a peaceful immigrants' rights march in downtown Santa Cruz turned violent, requiring police to call other agencies for help, authorities said.
Police spokesman Zach Friend said an estimated 250 people started marching through the city around 10:30 p.m. Saturday.
It was a harmonious but "unpermitted and unsanctioned event," he said, until some in the crowd started breaking windows and spraying paint on retail shops that line the downtown corridor.
Friend said he wasn't sure if the damage was caused by people marching in support of immigrants' rights, or if the group was "infiltrated by anarchists."
Anarchy signs were spray-painted on some of the buildings.
"They're a group of people who seem to fancy themselves as revolutionaries, but what they really are are a group of morons," Friend said."
Google
In San Jose, thousands of marchers headed to an evening rally at city hall. In San Francisco, a separate demonstration wrapped up in the afternoon, but not without a bit of trouble.
Three people were attacked and at least two others were arrested. The people assaulted were part of the Minutemen demonstration, a group in favor of Arizona's new immigration law.
They said a large group of immigrants' rights supporters followed them to the BART station on Market Street and started punching and kicking them, and calling them names.
"They said we were racists, and we were against them, and against their town, and against San Francisco," said Parker Wilson with the Bay Area National Anarchists. "What they were saying, they said we need to get out and called us racists, and that we need to go home. And then they just attacked my friends and me."
ABC
"Protest organizers said on Wednesday outrage over the Arizona law -- which seeks to drive illegal immigrants out of the state bordering Mexico -- has galvanized Latinos and would translate into a higher turnout for May Day rallies in more than 70 U.S. cities.
"The marches and demonstrations are going to be far more massive than they otherwise would have been," said Juan Jose Gutierrez, a Los Angeles rally organizer who runs an immigration assistance company."
Reuters
May Day. Why does that sound so familiar?
"Lubyanka Square was swamped in red. The countless silk, velvet and other banners, embroidered with sequins and glass beads were quite dazzling to the eye. One focus of attention was the metal workers vehicle, draped in red material and bearing a huge globe with a portrait of Marx on it.
The vehicles of the workers' collective were also striking. On one a band played, while the other was covered in greenery and flowers arranged in the shape of an arch.
Another wonderful spectacle was the Sokolniki District lorry, decked out from top to bottom in flowers. Invalids walked on crutches behind the maimed soldiers' lorry.
Next came the machine-gunners, on foot with their guns loaded onto horses. They were followed by the Alexandrovsky College Training School. A detachment of sailors, smartly dressed in black, marched past, followed by firemen and then a float displaying emblems of agricultural work. Children paraded past all holding little red flags. ... Detachment after detachment of the army of labour, the army of the Revolution....
Speeches were given and a series of meetings held on Skobelev Square in front of the Moscow Soviet. [This square, with the former Dresden Hotel, was decorated by a group of artists under A. I. Ivanov.] The column of the stage workers' trade union was particularly interesting; on the front lorry, beneath a poster reading 'Free Worker', representatives of the most important kinds of labour stood at their machines; on the second lorry was a band, and behind it an allegorical group depicting Russia heralding peace to all peoples.
There were performers in the costumes of all nationalities, a peasant woman with a sheaf of rye in her arms, boys holding rakes and sickles, and nearby the courageous figures of soldiers holding red banners. And above them all stood Russia with a palm sprig in her hands.
In front of the Moscow Soviet, the participants in these pictures sang the 'Internationale', the 'Marseillaise' and other revolutionary songs to the accompaniment of the band."
Marxists.org
All last year we had Tea Party protests, culminating in over a million people in Washington D.C. on one day with no arrests. So, how do you think these coming demonstrations will compare? And I wonder, will we see men wearing the Roman collar in the middle of it?
To Archbishop Doaln and the rest at the USCCB; may I suggest you cast your gaze just a bit further South?
"Amnesty International called the abuse of migrants in Mexico a major human rights crisis Wednesday, and accused some officials of turning a blind eye or even participating in the kidnapping, rape and murder of migrants.
The group's report comes at a sensitive time for Mexico, which is protesting the passage of a law in Arizona that criminalizes undocumented migrants.
The Interior Department acknowledged in a statement that the mainly Central American migrants who pass through Mexico on their way to the United States suffer abuses, but attributed the problem to criminal gangs branching out into kidnapping and extortion of migrants.
Rupert Knox, Amnesty's Mexico researcher, said in the report that the failure by authorities to tackle abuses against migrants has made their trip through Mexico one of the most dangerous in the world.
"Migrants in Mexico are facing a major human rights crisis leaving them with virtually no access to justice, fearing reprisals and deportation if they complain of abuses," Knox said.
Central American migrants are frequently pulled off trains, kidnapped en masse, held at gang hideouts and forced to call relatives in the U.S. to pay off the kidnappers. Such kidnappings affect thousands of migrants each year in Mexico, the report says.
Many are beaten, raped or killed in the process."
Yahoo
"Archbishop of New York Timothy Dolan has criticized Arizona legislation targeting illegal immigrants as “mean-spirited” and “counterproductive and harmful.” Viewing the measure as a manifestation of historic American nativism, he said immigrants should be welcomed and their legalization and citizenship should be advanced.
Writing in an April 27 entry on his blog “The Gospel in the Digital Age,” Archbishop Dolan said at times of social turmoil the immigrant “unfailingly becomes the scapegoat.”
He then listed what he described as “periodic spasms” of anti-immigrant “fever”: the Nativists of the 1840s who led mobs to torch Irish homes and Catholic churches; the Know-Nothings of the 1850s; the American Protective Association of the late 19th century who feared the arrival of immigrants from Italy, Poland, and Germany; the Ku Klux Klan who fomented hate against blacks, Jews, Catholics and foreigners; and the eugenics movement."
Catholic News Agency
To Archbishop Dolan and all the other apologists for illegal activities; we do welcome immigrants to this country. Legal immigrants.
Somehow suddenly, in the minds of American Church leadership, asking someone from another country to follow our laws has become synonymous with Nazism and eugenics.
1897 "Human society can be neither well-ordered nor prosperous unless it has some people invested with legitimate authority to preserve its institutions and to devote themselves as far as is necessary to work and care for the good of all."
By "authority" one means the quality by virtue of which persons or institutions make laws and give orders to men and expect obedience from them.
1898 Every human community needs an authority to govern it.16 The foundation of such authority lies in human nature. It is necessary for the unity of the state. Its role is to ensure as far as possible the common good of the society.
1899 The authority required by the moral order derives from God: "Let every person be subject to the governing authorities. For there is no authority except from God, and those that exist have been instituted by God. Therefore he who resists the authorities resists what God has appointed, and those who resist will incur judgment."
Catechism of the catholic Church
The question, as far as the bishops should be concerned, is whether or not the elected government in America is legitimate? Because if it is then it has the authority to create laws protecting its citizens and the citizens have the responsibility to obey those laws. Not just the citizens but anyone on American soil.
1903 Authority is exercised legitimately only when it seeks the common good of the group concerned and if it employs morally licit means to attain it. If rulers were to enact unjust laws or take measures contrary to the moral order, such arrangements would not be binding in conscience. In such a case, "authority breaks down completely and results in shameful abuse."
Catechism of the Catholic Church
So now I see the reason for the name calling; the bishop is creating a straw man argument, trying to paint the law as unjust so he can argue for disobedience. But is it? All Arizona is asking is that if a person comes to Arizona from another country they come through legal channels and have their paperwork in order. Is this unjust? Is it unjust to arrest someone that has broken the law if the law itself isn't unjust?
Now if Arizona really was run by Nazis and all illegals were immediately rounded up and taken to death camps, truthfully, I'd have to side with Archbishop Dolan. But that's not the case, is it? So is this law based on race? No. The fact is that the problems along the border are being caused by Mexican nationals, who surprisingly tend to be overwhelmingly Mexican. My guess is that if a Norwegian is caught in Arizona living illegally he'll be treated the same way. Of course, I doubt that there are too many Norwegians living in Arizona illegally. And even fewer of them will be involved with gangs in the drug trade, killing ranchers and making Phoenix the city with the second greatest number of kidnappings in the world.
So what's in this for the Church? Increased membership? Certainly possible. Most Mexicans are Catholics. But does that justify disobedience and working against the common good of a free society?
Is it because of "social justice"? Do the Progressive members of the Church believe that moving this distortion of true Catholic teaching forward justifies demonizing a state and its citizens? Do the ends always justify the means?
I don't know the answers to these questions. What I do know is that something is wrong with this public stance of the Church in America. And it is causing scandal among the faithful. And confusion.
Do the ends justify the means?
Now, I'll admit I'm not often accused of being the sharpest pencil in the box but, to my simple mind anyway, it appears that the bishops are upset because Arizona has made it illegal to break the law.
Besides, wasn't it already a crime to be in the state illegally?
"In a statement released April 27, the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops (USCCB) denounced a recently signed law in Arizona which criminalizes undocumented immigrants, calling the legislative move “draconian” and saying it “could lead to the wrongful questioning and arrest of U.S. citizens.”
Writing on behalf of the USCCB, Bishop John C. Wester of Salt Lake City, chairman of the U.S. bishops' committee on Migration noted that he joins the Arizona bishops in “strongly opposing” the implementation of SB 1070, which was signed into law by Arizona Gov. Jan Brewer last Friday.
According to ABC news, the new Arizona law makes it a crime to be in the state illegally and allows police to arrest and question suspected individuals about their status without a warrant. It also criminalizes transporting illegal immigrants anywhere in Arizona, even if by family members.
“This new law, although limited to the State of Arizona, could have impact throughout the nation, in terms of how members of our immigrant communities are both perceived and treated,” Bishop Wester said."
Catholic News Agency
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