Archive for April, 2010

Yesterday, 2 bodies were found hanging from a bridge in central Cuernavaca… Presumably, the victims are drugdealers and the killers are a competing gang… things are getting ugly here… Calderon needs to get his shit together right now, or things will turn ever uglier soon.

http://www.cnn.com/2010/POLITICS/04/07/virginia.confederate.history/index.html?hpt=T1

(CNN) — Virginia Gov. Bob McDonnell apologized Wednesday for leaving out any reference to slavery in his recent proclamation designating April as Confederate History Month, calling it a “major omission.”

“The failure to include any reference to slavery was a mistake, and for that I apologize to any fellow Virginian who has been offended or disappointed,” McDonnell said in a written statement.

“The abomination of slavery divided our nation, deprived people of their God-given inalienable rights, and led to the Civil War,” the statement said. “Slavery was an evil, vicious and inhumane practice which degraded human beings to property, and it has left a stain on the soul of this state and nation.”

McDonnell also announced Wednesday that he would add language about slavery to the proclamation.

“(I)t is important for all Virginians to understand that the institution of slavery led to this (Civil) war and was an evil and inhumane practice that deprived people of their God-given inalienable rights,” the new language says, “and all Virginians are thankful for its permanent eradication from our borders.”

McDonnell’s statement noted that while Virginia was home to the Capital of the Confederacy, it was also the first nation to elect an African-American governor, L. Douglas Wilder, who McDonnell called “my friend.”

In an interview with CNN on Wednesday, Wilder said that McDonnell’s apology and his introduction of additional proclamation language was “the right thing for him to have done.”

“Most people recognize that slavery was the cause of the (Civil) war,” Wilder said, noting that McDonnell had called him Wednesday. “The war was not a glorious thing in our past. It was something that we were able to withstand in terms of tearing the country apart. … Thank God that war ended with the Confederacy losing.”

Not all Democrats were willing to forgive McDonnell on Wednesday.

“He has a right to apologize,” Virginia State Sen. Henry Marsh III, a black Democrat, told CNN. “But I don’t accept that as a good answer because this is a pattern of this governor.”

“He says the wrong thing, he sends a signal to his base and then he makes an apology,” Marsh said, “It’s a question of whether or not he’s sincere or not.”

Other Democrats accepted McDonnell’s apology.

“My great, great grandparents, their offspring and others were split up in the Commonwealth of Virginia & sold into slavery,” Democratic strategist and CNN political contributor Donna Brazile said on Twitter. “Apology accepted

McDonnell is the first Virginia governor in eight years to issue a proclamation declaring April as Confederate History Month in the state, a move that drew criticism from Democrats and a civil rights group.

Former Virginia Gov. Tim Kaine, now Democratic National Committee chairman, issued a statement Wednesday blasting McDonnell’s exclusion of slavery from the original proclamation.

“Governor McDonnell’s decision to designate April as Confederate History Month without condemning, or even acknowledging, the pernicious stain of slavery or its role in the war disregards history, is insensitive to the extraordinary efforts of Americans to eliminate slavery and bind the nation’s wounds, and offends millions of Americans of all races and in all parts of our nation,” Kaine wrote.

“A failure to acknowledge the central role of slavery in the Confederacy and deeming insignificant the reprehensible transgression of moral standards of liberty and equality that slavery represented is simply not acceptable in the America of the 21st century,” he continued.

McDonnell quietly declared April Confederate History Month after two previous Democratic administrations refused to do so.

“It is important for all Virginians to reflect upon our Commonwealth’s shared history, to understand the sacrifices of the Confederate leaders, soldiers and citizens during the period of the Civil War, and to recognize how our history has led to our present,” the proclamation reads in part.

Virginia Delegate Kenneth Alexander, chairman of the Virginia Legislative Black Caucus, said the governor’s proclamation was offensive.

It “offered a disturbing revision of the Civil War and the brutal era that followed,” Alexander, a Democrat, said in a written statement. “Virginia has worked hard to move beyond the very things for which Gov. McDonnell seems nostalgic.”

The Virginia chapter of the NAACP also condemned the proclamation, The Washington Post reported. The group did not immediately return phone calls to CNN.

The Sons of Confederate Veterans asked the governor to declare April Confederate History Month in Virginia, which had seceded from the Union on April 17, 1861.

Brandon Dorsey, a spokesman for the group, told CNN Radio that Confederate History Month isn’t about slavery or race, but about studying the four-year history of the Confederacy. He said it will also help draw visitors to the many Civil War battle sites in Virginia, helping to boost tourism.

“The proclamation’s main goal is to call attention to the fact that there is Confederate history in the state of Virginia, of course, across the South,” Dorsey said. “It’s simply a tool to expose individuals to that history. … It’s not meant to discriminate against anybody.”

Other Southern states have issued similar proclamations for April. In Alabama, Republican Gov. Bob Riley declared April, the month the Civil War began, as Confederate History and Heritage Month. His statement condemned slavery.

So I guess slavery needs to be mentioned forever. Even 150+ years after it ended. We should mention some other issues as well then… the displacement and eradication of American Indians for instance… but that isn’t as important, apparently. The atrocities taking place in Afghanistan and Iraq. The killing by US forces all over the globe… but no… slavery has to be remembered forever. It is a joke. Reminds me of the jews’ never ending claims for “always remember the holocaust”… Now is now… yesterday was yesterday. Yes, whatever happened was awful and hopefully it won’t happen again… The end.

The Pope was drawn directly into the Roman Catholic sex abuse scandal last night as news emerged of his part in a decision to send a paedophile priest for therapy. The cleric went on to reoffend and was convicted of child abuse but continues to work as a priest in Upper Bavaria.

The priest was sent from Essen to Munich for therapy in 1980 when he was accused of forcing an 11-year-old boy to perform oral sex. The archdiocese confirmed that the Pope, who was then a cardinal, had approved a decision to accommodate the priest in a rectory while the therapy took place.

The priest, identified only as H, was subsequently convicted of sexually abusing minors after he was moved to pastoral work in nearby Grafing. In 1986 he was given an 18-month suspended jail sentence and fined DM 4,000 (£1,800 today). There have been no formal charges against him since.

The church has been accused of a cover-up after at least 170 allegations of child abuse by German Catholic priests. The scandal broke in January but the claims, which continue to emerge, span three decades. Critics say that priests were redeployed to other parishes rather than dismissed when they were found to be abusing children.

The Archdiocese of Munich and Freising said that there had been no complaints against the priest during the therapy at a church community in Munich. It said that the decision to let him continue working in Grafing was taken by Gerhard Gruber, now 81, who was vicar general of the archdiocese.

The Vatican said that Mgr Gruber had taken “full responsibility” for the priest’s move back into pastoral work but did not comment further.

Mgr Gruber said that the Pope, who was made a cardinal in 1977, had not been not aware of his decision because there were 1,000 priests in the diocese at the time and he had left many decisions to lower-level officials. “The cardinal could not deal with everything,” he said. “The repeated employment of H in pastoral duties was a serious mistake … I deeply regret that this decision led to offences against youths. I apologise to all those who were harmed.” He did not indicate whether the convicted paedophile would be allowed to continue working in the church.

An American group, Survivors Network of Those Abused by Priests, said it “boggles the mind to hear a German Catholic official claim that a credibly accused paedophile priest was reassigned to parish work without the knowledge of his boss, then-Archbishop Joseph Ratzinger”. Any expulsion of a priest from the Church, however, must go through the Vatican.

The Pope was Archbishop of Munich and Freising from 1977 to 1982 and then moved to Rome as Prefect of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, a post that he held until his election as pontiff five years ago after the death of John Paul II.

Priest H worked in an old people’s home for two years after his conviction. He then moved to the town of Garching, where he became a curate and later a church administrator. In May 2008 he was removed from his duties in Garching and was not allowed to work with young people. He still works in the diocese, according to the newspaper Süddeutsche Zeitung, which broke the story.

Archbishop Robert Zollitsch, the head of Germany’s Catholic bishops, apologised yesterday to the victims of clerical sex abuse after meeting Pope Benedict. He said that the German-born Pope had expressed “great dismay” over the scandals and had encouraged him to take “decisive and courageous steps” to tackle the problem.

Mgr Zollitsch, Archbishop of Freiburg, said that the German Church would investigate abuse allegations and take measures to prevent a recurrence. He said that the Pope had been “deeply moved” by his report of sex abuse cases in Germany, and had praised the naming of a bishop to act as a clerical sex-abuse watchdog. He added that paedophilia was not confined to the Roman Catholic Church.

Mgr Gerhard Müller, the Bishop of Regensburg, said there was “not even a minimal link” between paedophilia and priestly celibacy, which would “not be modified”.