All News is Just News

One thing I enjoy about reading news online is getting to read the comments that people leave after they’ve read the article (or scanned, or ignored the article). I do sometimes get infuriated about what people write in the comments and that prompts me to write in my blog. No, I don’t leave comments because I don’t want to be critiqued or applauded by some of those same yahoos that leave comments. Needless to say, some people should just keep their comments to themselves. It’s almost embarrassing how often simple word are misspelled or the wrong syntax is used. Some of those people may have English as a second language, so those types of things can be forgiven, but the rest of them who were educated (I would hope) at some point in their lives should be able to write clearly and coherently. But, that may be a lot to ask. Anyway, I’ve just read some things that I felt I needed to comment about, so they are going in my blog.

First, I have been keeping abreast of the child abuse situation with the church and wrote about that already in a blog last week, but I just have to say something. I have come to the conclusion that maybe it is time for another Vatican Council. In the sixty when the church realized the world was changing and they need to keep up with that change by revamping some practices the Second Vatican Council was formed. I was born in ’82 so I don’t know what live was like before Vatican II except from what my parents and religious education teachers told me. Themes of ecclesiology, liturgy, scripture, and the rule of bishops were discussed, researched and modified to fit a more modern world. The most present and apparent change from Vatican II was the increased involvement of lay people in the liturgy. Making this change brought people closer to their faith than they ever had been before. Well, with the increase in scandal among the Church it seems apparent that there needs to be another council. Sweeping change not just handed down by the Pope but by a council where ideas are freely shared and debated is what is needed to drive action. The First Vatican Council was held nearly a century before the Second Vatican Council and it would be fitting that the Third Vatican Council come only a half century after that.

Second, the Anglicans are at it again. Ireland has been a land contended over by Anglicans and Catholics for a long time and now that there is scandal in the Catholic Church in Ireland, the Anglicans are putting their two cents in. I’ve said that I respect and admire all paths to God, so I’ll try to be brief and uncontroversial. As I see it, that idea of accepting all faiths means that when one faith or another is in peril, then we should back them up. Well, the Archbishop of Canterbury Rowan Williams does not agree. "I was speaking to an Irish friend recently who was saying that it's quite difficult in some parts of Ireland to go down the street wearing a clerical collar now," Williams told the BBC. "And an institution so deeply bound into the life of a society, suddenly becoming, suddenly losing all credibility — that's not just a problem for the church, it is a problem for everybody in Ireland, I think." Excuse me? Losing all credibility? I don’t recall the church losing all credibility in the United States when this happened, but apparently it is different in Ireland. I admit that Catholicism and the Irish are deeply intertwined, but that should only strengthen the resolve of the Irish to get past this dark time. I’d appreciate that if the Anglican Church has nothing positive to say about the Catholic Church, then they say nothing at all. Trust me, I could come up with some disparaging remarks about Anglicans if I wanted to (like they couldn’t pick a side during the Reformation, so they just stayed in the middle) but I won’t. 

Lastly, let me broach the subject of financial overhaul in the United States. One of Obama’s next points of contention is creating financial overhaul legislation he hopes will prevent the actions that caused the recent economic downturn. Who is in charge of coming up with this legislation? Who came up with the health care reform bill? Well, health care professionals, insurance agency officials, and doctors weren’t included in that decision, so I’m guessing economists and financial professionals are not being involved in the financial overhaul decision. So, what are we going to get out of this little gem? Who the hell knows?! Right now, Democratic leaning legislation would give the government authority to split up big financial companies and force the industry to pay for its most massive failures. This means more regulation and bigger penalties. Republicans have offered alternative legislation that calls for new bankruptcy proceedings to dismantle failing institutions. This means keeping current regulation, but facilitating failing business’ exit from the market, softening the blow to the economy. Some of you may know this but most may not, I have a degree in economics with a focus on finance and international markets. In my opinion, both of these are wrong, but the idea of pure capitalism is wrong, so it’s hard to pin down what could work. Honestly, as a Republican, I don’t believe in increased regulation, but as an economist it is hard to argue against some level of legislation to maintain market stability. There has to be a middle ground between the supposedly lack regulation we have now and the extremes that the Democrats want to go to. There has to be compromise based on sound economic principle. I don’t have time to crunch the numbers, but there are economists out there that do, so why are they not involved in the legislation process? Answer me that.