The Anchoress

I started doing this back in April, and for some reason people like this Q&A format and keep asking for more, and more, so…here’s more.

Q: Anchoress, you wrote a frivolous piece about your soul and coffee; does that mean you’re feeling better?

A: Praise God, yes, I am finally emerging from my exhausted fog and my numbers this morning were markedly better. Thanks for your kind notes and prayers (which always leave me touched and humbled.) If this is the worst thing going on in my life, my life ain’t bad at all, and I know it.

Q: Is that why you changed the end of this piece, which originally had a snarky line about how Jenna Bush was not working for a hedge fund?

A: Oh, you caught that, did you? I took the line out because it was a cheap, easy shot at Chelsea Clinton, who seems like a very nice young woman; I try not to do the “cheap, easy” thing here, and I didn’t like myself writing it. That said, I will say the snark was precipitated by reading several obnoxious press accounts of Jenna Bush’s upcoming wedding and thinking about how - were she the daughter of a Democrat - her choice to teach inner-city school children would accompany every sentence written about her, and every article about her would not include the obligatory revelation that while she was in college, she acted like most college students. I just get damn tired of the needlessly spiteful way the press writes about anyone connected to a president with an R after his name, while anyone connected to a president with a D after his name is a paragon of virtue, intelligence and unselfishness. I say that as someone with an I after her name.

I mean, God-forbid a little balance? Can you imagine, fer instance, the press actually noting which party has members saying things like “I have the votes of hard-working white Americans?” and referring to “white n-words?” How come the press will sneer (and cry about “church-and-state”) when Christians gather to pray for peace (and for our troops) but they don’t have the same conniption when Code Pink takes their charms, spells and boas to the street?

Why no balance, that’s all I’m asking. And I ask it even as I admit, I have an affection of sorts for those amusing Code Pink Performance Artists.

Q: Well, but the Republicans are all privileged people; it’s the party of the rich, so the press would naturally be harder on them, than on the middle-class loving, blue-collar-respecting Democrats, right?

A: Hmmm, that’s a good question. Betsy Newmark wonders which is the party of the rich:

It’s funny. The Democratic politicians like to portray the Republican party as the party for the rich. Yet the rich are going with the Democrats this year. The Democrats don’t seem to think it’s as odd that those wealthy donors are voting against their supposed economic interests as they do when Kansans vote for Republican candidates.

As near as I can tell, the Democrats are heavily supported by the rather wealthy folk who own the coastal enclaves you and I can’t afford, but if you google rich republicans and wealthy democrats you see that the press has a one-way narrative. That is possibly because, hanging out at Nantucket and Martha’s Vineyard, Malibu, Southampton or Myrtle Beach, with their kids in the same private schools the children of politicians attend, the folks in the press are simply so out of touch they think they are not wealthy democrats…or something.

This is another reason I momentarily succumbed to a temptation to the ignoble snark referenced above, which I quickly regretted. A lot of people like to say “Jenna Bush should be in the army fighting her father’s war,” but they never say Chelsea should be in Bosnia or Rwanda working with the Peace Corp to restore those areas. They don’t suggest that since Hillary enthusiastically supported and voted for the war and Bill Clinton (in 1998) initiated the policy of Regime Change in Iraq, Chelsea should be doing her part over there. It’s just damned tiresome. Chelsea Clinton is not a bad person for choosing to work in hedge funds, but there is an irony there, that shouldn’t be ignored.

Q: Ironies supporting Bushes or GOPers or Conservatives are always ignored; find one people will listen to.

A: Umm, people are all plugged into their iPods or their echo chambers, so they don’t listen to anyone, and certainly not to me, but another important irony might be that those “gun-free cities” that are supposed to be havens of safety? The police want assault rifles to function within them. Not getting much coverage.

Q: You don’t like the press much, do you?

A: Hush you, I love the free press - it is the hardy spine of liberty:

“…Liberty lives only when the press is free and unencumbered - when it is detached from events instead of entwined in them. That Liberty lives when people refuse to be intimidated into silence or acquiescence, whether in the workplace or within the community.

Journalists were my first heroes. I simply deplore the fact that our free press seems to be no longer free, and that they have not been overtaken…they’ve simply handed their freedom over to their own agendas. For heaven’s sake, this worries me so much, that I even fret about it when I am over-medicated:

I personally think every American should be concerned with her press - the great and remarkable treasure of her free press - which is being subsumed by advocates and partisans who do not seriously question anyone whom they do not hate, and who therefore betray the public trust (and themselves) and leave the whole nation wide open for something which by the prickling of my thumbs something wicked this way comes.

Some days, now, I’d rather read the Onion.

Q: Well, thank God, you’re at least off the Bush/Clinton rant. What WILL you write about in 2009? It does feel, though, like we’re never going to get out from under these two families, doesn’t it?

A: No, they’re never going to go away. Eventually you’ll see Chelsea running against George Prescott Bush. I have officially declared that we should have no more Bushes or Clintons in the White House because it renders the country mad-beyond-saving, but no one will listen because I am not an influential conservative - which makes sense, since I’m a classical liberal, and we have no home. I do think Ed Morrissey should have been on that list, though.

Also, apropos of nothing, except that someone sent me the video clip - I have always admired the class, intelligence and dignified mien of Dem operative Donna Brazile, even though I hardly ever agree with her! She’s a bright, cool customer, and if I were anyone important, I’d want her on my side. Don’t you watch that clip and wish she could just reach through her screen smack that watery smile off of Paul Begala’s face?

Q: Hmm, you don’t like Paul Begala, and you sound like you have a girl-crush on Donna Brazile.

A: Well…Brazile is gorgeous. And I love her hair. But I love her manner, more - I wish I could be that collected. I completely believe that she’s had more beers with those “working class whites” than any of her white counterparts. And I must say, as a little aside, I winced to hear Begala call the GOP “monochromatic” but that is still largely true, and if you notice, he just casually subsumed the Latino vote into the Democrat side, which is probably wrong…but the GOP has not done anything to ingratiate itself with the largest-growing voting bloc in the nation.

Q: But which ones are smarter? Republicans or Democrats?

A: I won’t say Democrats are smart; they do too many oddball things like scrapping trade with our allies in Colombia while helping the thug Chavez. But…having said that, the GOP really is stupid-beyond-saving. Gateway Pundit here spells out an enormously winning tactic for them for ‘08, and they are either too stupid, too spineless or too beholden to lobbyists to follow the lead. And count on it, they won’t have the testicular fortitude to call Al Gore on his opportunistic attempt to hijack a human tragedy for his own agenda. Like there were never tornados, typhoons, tsunamis or catastrophic floods before manbearpig made its appearance. Going green may kill people but it sure is profitable, so it is credible, right? Hoo-hah.

Q: Okay, so, who are worse, far-left folks who want to stomp on free speech and silence any opposition to their beliefs, or far-right folks who freak out when a teacher performs a magic trick and have him fired for wizardry?

A: They deserve each other, and our nation can and should do better than either of them. They both embody and re-inforce the worst stereotypes on both sides. But perhaps we need them, if only to shine a light on the fact that zealots always - ultimately - weaken their “own side.”

Q: So, this miserable ranter of a post…this is what you’re like when you’re feeling better?

A: I’m not wholly well, yet. A little grouchy. Sorry. I’ll be better soon. As Queen Victoria said when she was an eleven-year old Princess confronted with her future: “I will be good.” Here, I’ll even end on a generous happy note and tell you that Laura Ingraham has adopted a baby girl! Congrats to Ms. Ingraham.

Q: I thought she called you a termagant, once?

A: Well, that’s what I was told, but I don’t know it, and anyway, she wouldn’t have been the first. I wish her all good things and many blessings on her daughter, Maria Caroline. Lovely name.

Q: Anchoress, if someone tells you that you cannot be credibly pro-life until you adopt a sick baby, and then you go out and adopt a sick baby (and then a second) and that person - who promised to become “pro-life” if you did it - never kept his end of the bargain, what does that mean?

A: It means you can’t form a conscience in fits and starts. You cannot become “pro-life” because of what someone else does, unless you are really willing to let their actions open up within you what you have previously closed and locked tight. And since Jim Caviezel gives witness that picking up on this friend’s cynical prompting has enriched his life and blessed him, it also means that God speaks to us through anyone - in any way - he chooses, even if they seem unlikely candidates for the job, so you might as well listen up respectfully and be sweet to everybody.

Q: Will there always be an England?

A: Starting to look a little doubtful, isn’t it? Within the last week we’ve seen the nation all but cancel St. George’s Day for fear of insulting their Islamist population, and they allowed the EU to issue a map without Great Britain. Note “The English Channel” is now “The Channel Sea.” My Celtic ancestors must be spinning in their graves. Brits at their Best has more on all that.

Q: So, Anchorage is digging out from yet another massive snowjob snowfall. But these folks say global warming is not cooling. Do you still say it’s all hoo-hah?

A: Yes, I say whether we are in any sort of “preventable” weather cycle is debatable, whether we can actually affect the earth’s weather is dubious (we can’t even predict next week’s weather accurately) and whether any of the interesting weather anomalies is “manmade” is hoo-hah, especially since we steadfastly ignore the sun. Mark Steyn is looking at ethanol ethics, as I did last week and last month. IBD wonders if we can undo the ethanol mistake. There’s all kinds of inconvenient truths out there, but the really troubling one, to my way of thinking, is people going hungry.

Q: Why do you refer to “Manmade” Global Warming as “hoo-hah” - don’t you know that’s a slang for a woman’s private parts?

A: Not in my neck of the woods. I don’t know who calls vaginas and vulva’s “hoohah’s;” on this blog we just call them what they are, and routinely mock the vulvic-worship. I learned “hoo-hah” at the knee of my Jewish neighbors, and I love the way it dismisses nonsense with beautiful and semitic simplicity. Kipling said “a woman is only a woman, but a good cigar is a smoke.” I say a vagina is just a vagina, but a surpassing bit of absolute blarney is a hoo-hah!

Q: Are you missing William F. Buckley?

A: Actually I do mean to read God and Man at Yale, but as with Ronald Reagan, I came to appreciation of Buckley rather late. However, there is a new piece up on the man by Fr. George W. Rutler. Rutler, you may remember, was the man who said to Christopher Hitchens, “you will either die a Catholic or a madman…”. Rutler offered to tell Hitchens the difference at that point, and I wish Hitchen had allowed him to, because I really want to know what it is. Hitchens, however, busily plugging his book with a “Whack-a-Christian” tour, did not allow Rutler to explain. This disappointed me. I think as a rule Hitchens’ very curious mind (and his sense of humor) would have looked forward to the answer as a whole new point of debate; but strangely, he didn’t want to know. Speaking of atheism, I notice that Pajamas Media has a feature piece on the Scientific embrace of Atheism, which looks like a good read. I have no problem with atheists, myself. I just think they should be as tolerant of my creed as I am of theirs, and stop trying to force their beliefs on me..

Q: Last week you were unhappy with Lisa Miller at Newsweek for her piece about Pope Benedict; do you like them any better this week?

A: You mean that incredibly tone-deaf piece on why Benedict didn’t “connect” with people? Too funny in retrospect, isn’t it? I have no animus toward Miller or Newsweek; I just think the magazine’s writers are supremely out-of-touch - almost endearingly so - with a huge portion of the country. They prove it again this week with this startlingly bigoted piece by Michael Hirsch in which he basically disses and dismisses people who are not like him and don’t live in the elitist coastal enclaves:

“…what we know today as Red State America. This region was heavily settled by Scots-Irish immigrants–the same ethnic mix King James I sent to Northern Ireland to clear out the native Celtic Catholics…Southern frontiersmen never got over their hatred of the East Coast elites and a belief in the morality and nobility of defying them. Their champion was the Indian-fighter Andrew Jackson. The outcome was that a substantial portion of the new nation developed, over many generations, a rather savage, unsophisticated set of mores. Traditionally, it has been balanced by a more diplomatic, communitarian Yankee sensibility from the Northeast and upper Midwest.

He also calls his fellow countrymen “yahoos” and goes on blathering like that for a while. Well, goldarnit, Barack shure did warned us ’bout folks like this ol’ boy, clingin’, bitterly, to his’n identity n’his secular-humanist creed!

Q: Um, aren’t you a New Yorker?

A: I am, born here and live here now, but there was that whole adolescence spent in the unnamed place among the cowpokes and prospectors, and I will forever have some real perspective into the south and west which allows appreciation. Hirsch should get out more and broaden his horizons a little. There is a whole interesting world beyond the Smuppity West Side.

Q: Aw, did you just invent a word? Smuppity?

A: Why yes, I did. Smug & Uppity = Smuppity. My word, as of right now. But you can use it.

Q: You’re awfully quiet on the Hillary-front, lately.

A: Well, I am busy inventing new words for the lexicon, but Hubbard is both amusing and smart on Hillary today.

Q: So, Anchoress, then you’ve had your fill of writing about Pope Benedict XVI?

A: Well, actually, I am going to be quoting rather extensively from his tremendous book God and the World (which is actually a three-day conversation with writer Peter Seewald, and it’s fascinating) during the week, but for now others are doing Benedict, or things papal, very well indeed. Check out Deacon Greg’s links about the book of victim names which Cardinal Sean O’Malley handed the pontiff in Washington DC (somehow I’d envisioned a yellow legal pad, but I’m not artistic), and this interview with a Jewish journalist covering the pope’s visit. Never forget to check out the Deac’s homily for the week, which is always an insightful gift.

Then check out Irene Lagan’s coverage of the pope’s Regina Caeli address to the audience following his ordination of 29 new priests, during which he mentioned some trouble spots in the world (particularly Africa) and also his recent visit to the US:

I thank God who greatly blessed this unique mission and allowed me to make be an instrument of hope of Christ for the Church and for the country. At the same time I thank him because I myself was confirmed in the hope of American Catholics: I found it a great vitality and determination to live and bear witness to the faith in Jesus.

The tireless Rocco Palmieri has the full text of the address.

Most surprisingly - and worth mentioning in light of Benedict’s ongoing, full-on engagement of both Islam and the Arab peoples - one of the newly-ordained is an Iraqi.

Meanwhile, I totally agree with this comparison between John Paul II and Benedict. And I agree with Rod Dreher that this is a great “commercial” for Catholicism.

Q: Well, you just live in a sunny, “everything-is-beautiful” la-la land, dontcha?

A: No, I don’t, and I’ve had my forays into the darkling company, but I’ve never written about it with Gerard’s power and unstinting honesty. And for a sad but also rather lovely and uplifting story, check out Okie on the Lam’s tribute to his late mother-in-law. The greatness of the Greatest Generation was not gender-exclusive.

Q:Get any interesting review copies, lately?

A: Well…yes and no, but mostly no. I have an advance of A Persistent Peace by Fr. John Dear, S.J., which will soon be released by Loyola Press, (forward by Martin Sheen) and I will talk more about it when I’ve finished it, but so far…well, I’m trying very hard to appreciate the good father’s ultra-pacifist philosophy (and I’m sure some regular readers of the blog may enjoy it) but - perhaps because I am Irish - I don’t quite get it. I know all the intellectual arguments for pacifism (it reduces us to the behavior of the aggressors, violence begets violence, love is the answer) and I even agree with that to a point. There there is that point, where I must say that “yes, love, love, love is the answer but it is not expedient.” And sometimes - as when you have people plotting to release poison in a subway, or something, expedience is the other answer. This is why I can never fully embrace either the “full pacifist” stance or the warrior mentality. Too much of either seems out-of-balance to me, and Fr. Dear’s book - page after page of noble pacifism drenched with hero-worship of Ghandi and Tutu - after a while makes me feel rather clammy. Oh. I guess I did just review it!

On the other hand, Instapundit has received a review copy of a book I wish they’d have sent me: Chesterton on War and Peace: Battling the Ideas and Movements that Led to Nazism and World War II. Insty calls it: A collection of essays, including one on a particular breed of pacifist that Chesterton saw as new in the 20th Century: “He does not so much believe in his own conscience as disbelieve in the common conscience which is the soul of any society. His hatred for patriotism is very much plainer than his love for peace.”

Indeed. Heh.

Speaking of Chesterton, Maureen Martin has some fun with him, here:

Chesterton joked that while his friends Dorothy Day and Thomas Merton led lives that convinced people to help the poor and commune with God, that he, Flannery O’Connor, and Walker Percy were quickly becoming the patron saints of people “who just read all the time.”

Very cute.

Q: Don’t you think Chesterton and Antonin Scalia would have hit it off?

A: Absolutely. I’d love to have seen Stahl interview both of ‘em.

Q: Was that you I saw last Friday night at Carnegie Hall singing Molly Malone with Bryn Terfel?

A: Yep! I agree with Nordlinger, too, that his Mozart was the unintended highlight of the night. Bryn’s voice and Mozart are a match made in heaven.

see more crazy cat pics

The other day - for reasons I don’t understand - I tripped through the blogosphere Q & A style, and people seemed to like that.

So, here are some more:

Q: What is Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi’s motto for this session of Congress?

A: Well, I am not privvy to the great-woman’s thoughts, but it would appear to be, “Mr. President, tear down any economic advantages you might be pursuing for us, and while you’re at it, please make us as vulnerable to the oil-producing nations as you possibly can. Also, get this stuff put into the bible, ASAP!”

Q: Bill Clinton said Saddam had nukes, but it turned out he didn’t. But that wasn’t a lie, like it was when Clinton and all Democrats Bush said Saddam had WMD…but now it looks like Syria had gotten ‘em, somehow and um…North Korea helped. But I thought North Korea was on board with the Clinton/Albright “framework” which was all “we give you nuke stuff and you stop making war noises and go dance a foxtrot with Maddy” or something and now…how…what?

A: I know, I know, it’s confusing. I don’t fully understand it either but Syria and NoKo were building something bad - heaven only knows how they got the materials - and Israel had to go over there and blow the thing up for us, which they did, Shalom, Israel! There is only one narrative you have to take out of this whole strange story: George Bush cannot pronounce the word “nuclear” and so obviously, this was, is and always will be his moronic fault and failing.

Q: If Obama has to talk about his Weather Underground pal, shouldn’t Hillary have to talk about her husband’s Weather Underground pardons?

A: Now, you stop picking on Hillary, she never knew what Bill was up to in that Oval Office because she was, you know, dodging sniper fire and solving the troubles in Northern Ireland! And besides, Bill pardoned a-lots of people and some other far worse terrorists, so, you know, you be cool. Nobody wants to hear that crap! Besides, the Clintons version 2.0 is totally transparent-like and Hillary’s all down with Mary and stuff, right now.

Q: If you don’t support Barack Obama’s presidential candidacy, does that automatically mean that you are suffering from a toxic form of cynicism?

A: Of course not. If you don’t support Barack Obama it means you are a racist; unless you are a woman over 55, in which case you are both racist and age-ist and a man-hating victim of oppression who wears comfortable shoes. And as far as I am concerned, and I don’t care who knows it - there is NOTHING WRONG WITH WEARING COMFORTABLE SHOES. I do so, myself, and I have pretty feet, with no corns or bunions.

Q: What’s the deal with these monks getting a recording contract and now these singing priests and all that? Are those damn Catholics fixing to infiltrate popular culture again? Is a remake of Going My Way in our future?

A: As to “Going My Way,” never having been a fan of Der Bingel, I hope not. As to the rest of it, I highly doubt that Hollywood will be expending any dough making inspiring or uplifting stories including beautiful and efficient nuns who impact wayward girls, or manly, faithful priests who make a difference, when the more negative and sensational stereotypes - though unprofitable - are so very tantalizing and much more in line with their bleak worldview, which permits neither wonder nor joy. Although, if a buck is to be made, all bets may be off. “Toxic Cynicism” is more rampant in the entertainment industry than in Washington DC, although it’s a near thing.

Q: Is there any good news coming out of Iraq? Or Afghanistan?

A: Yes and yes. And yes.

Q: Is Jimmy Carter (for whom you voted in 1976) the most repellent ex-president, ever?

A: Gosh, let me think. Bill Clinton went overseas and criticized our efforts in Iraq, but he’s still Bill, you gotta love/hate him; and Jimmy Carter has said much worse things and may be in violation of the Logan act, besides, so yes. I say yes.

Q: Are “peace” activists really peaceful people?

A: Some are. I have on my desk a review copy of a book by a Jesuit priest who is so pacific he’s making me feel clammy, but having lived through 1968 and that whole era where people went around glassy-eyed saying, “Peace! Love, man,” while saying and doing some profoundly graceless and unpeaceable things, I’d say, a lot of them are just phoneys looking to belong to something, or for something to be angry about.

Q: Is Cinnamon the new cure-all that’s “good for what ails you?”

A: I’m sorry, your urethra cannot like it!

Q: On a personal note: cats or dogs?

A: I like them both very much, but there are differences.

I’m kinda pooped from all the Benedict blogging of late. Meanwhile, a quick lookaround:

From the Dept. of Silly Quesitons:

Q: Did Laura Bush wear white to host the pope at the White House because she believes she is a monarch’s wife or because she is signaling an assent to the rampant rumors that President Bush will become a Catholic when he leaves office?

A: Cueing the Twilight Zone music, I’m going to hazard a guess: Mrs. Bush and Jenna Bush both wore black skirts to meet Benedict at the airport, and then Mrs. Bush changed to what I would call a creme-colored pantsuit. I’m betting she got back to her house and decided to slip into something more comfortable and that’s all it meant, except to snippy reporters desperate to snark.

Q: Why don’t we hear any more gnashing of teeth about the government not funding Embryonic Stem Cell Research?

A: Because ADULT Stem Cells are proving to be wildly promising and successful - so much so that the dismal and nightmarish failures of Embryonic SCR are going to simply be allowed to fade away from memory. Here is a simple rule to remember: once a bat is no longer useful for pounding on W, it is summarily retired and not heard from again.

Q: Does the whole nation hate President Bush?

A: Doesn’t seem like it. Not the whole nation.

Q: Who gave Bill Clinton the idea of putting his offices in Harlem?

A: Actually, it was Jonah Goldberg. Recall, Clinton’s first instinct was Central Park West.

Q: Does Rush Limbaugh owe Bulldog Pundit some props for the concept of Operation Chaos?

A: Well, he BP has been supporting Hillary for a while!

Q: Would you vote for Obama if he were Adlai Stevenson?

A: Well, I wouldn’t. My birth dad - a staunch Democrat and classical liberal - loved Adlai but voted Ike. Twice. E.J. Dionne asks a thoughtful question and Brian Saint-Paul takes it further.

Q: Have we really thought-through socialized medicine?

A: No.

Q: Does the NY Times have honest issues with their front page?

Q: Are bloggers prisoners of their venue?

A: Speaking only for myself, three days into going wall-to-wall on Benedict’s visit I felt like I would stroke out if I didn’t move around, get some fresh air and look at something different. For others, it appears to be worse.

Q: Is Stephen Colbert hard to make laugh?

A: This priest seems able to do it pretty easily.

Q: Hey, How ’bout those BoSox?

A: Bite me you miserable bastard!

Q: Do the rich snobs who support the likes of John Kerry, Ted Kennedy and Obama realize how ironically this plays?.

A: What do you think?

Q: Is “Manmade” Global Warming still hoo-hah?

A: Why yes. Yes it is. And Entrepreneurial Gore still won’t suffer impertinent questions or debates over it. Terrorists, however are getting onboard with the greenies, while some greenies are jumping ship.

Q: How come you don’t post in crotchety prospector speech anymore?

A: So wearying. Maybe for Christmas.

Q: Heard any good jokes lately?

A: Well, only one, and maybe its not that good but I’m a little punchy, and I laughed:

From a Danish associate:

“We in Denmark cannot figure out why you are even bothering to hold an election. On one side, you have a b*tch who is a lawyer, married to a lawyer, and a lawyer who is married to a b*tch who is a lawyer. On the other side, you have a true war hero married to a woman with a huge chest who owns a beer distributorship.

Is there a contest here?” H/T reader Pianogirl