Monday, April 27, 2009

NO, SHE DOESN'T PARTICULARLY HAVE "GUTS"

Unless "guts" has changed meaning without my knowing it...



Story here:

...It now turns out that Mary Ann Glendon, the former U.S. Ambassador to the Vatican, will NOT speak at the Notre dame Graduation.... The pro-life, Harvard professor was set to receive the Laetare Medal which is the annual award given in recognition of outstanding service to the Roman Catholic church and society. She was to speak to the students on the same day as President Obama. But President Obama’s appearance was just too much....

More:

Glendon is staunchly anti-abortion, and she expressed disappointment that Notre Dame was awarding someone -- in this case the president of the United States -- whose position on abortion is so starkly different from Catholic Church's and the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops'.

That takes guts? It takes guts to turn yourself from a relatively obscure academic into the latest A-list wingnut victim/folk hero? It takes guts to put yourself in a position to be lavished with praise by Michael Gerson and William Bennett and Sean Hannity and William Donohue, and (in all likelihood) to experience a significant boost in your future speaking fees and book advances? (I'm sure she could crank out a "my years in the belly of the beast" memoir about being an abortion and gay marriage opponent at Harvard, even though she seems to be whiling away her time there undisturbed by liberal fascists.) Damn, if I were right-leaning, I'd be brainstorming day and night trying to figure out how I could become the next wingnut celebrity victim, the next Miss California. In this tough job market, people are going to be lining up to declare themselves aggrieved in this way. Fox could do an elimination miniseries to find the most tearjerking victim of liberalism, with Glenn Beck shedding tears every time a winner is announced.

Let me note for the record that this great woman of principle, this fine Catholic who won't even appear at a commencement if it's defiled by Beelzebub Hussein Obama, delightedly accepted a medal and a couple of jobs from that great torturer and death penalty fan George W. Bush.

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