60 Votes

Welcome to Senator Arlen Specter who today joins the Democratic Party. Al Franken will be the 60th Democratic vote in the Senate in June and a new era will be truly underway. Can we say universal health care? Can we say rational Supreme Court? Find an empty lap for Brother Specter!

Sir Paul in the Backyard

The Coachella Music & Arts Festival is a very big deal in these parts and the 10th anniversary was celebrated last weekend. We live less than a mile from the site and when Paul McCartney took the stage Friday night we knew just what to do--head for the chairs on the patio and take in a free concert. The sound carried very well and, bundled in blankets, we sat back and let Paul takes us back to Beatle-land. He finished with Sgt. Pepper's and put The End from Abbey Road ("the love you take is equal to the love you make") on top. I saw the Beatles at Met Stadium in Minneapolis in 1965 and could never have imagined that the next time I would hear Paul McCartney live would be in 2009 in my California backyard. I must say that he and his band were the perfect guests and our welcome mat stays out for them.

Ratzinger Strikes Again

Word has come that Caroline Kennedy--life-long Catholic, daughter of America's only Catholic President--has been vetoed by the Vatican as U.S. Ambassador there because of her position on abortion, the same position that, polls repeatedly show, is shared by a majority of the American people. Apparently a Catholic must agree with Church policy to represent her country at the Vatican city-state. Suppose Obama appoints a Protestant or Jew who does not agree either, is the veto power still in effect? I don't recall that Soviet ambassadors to the U.S. were required to believe in our policies before they got through the door. The Vatican demands an exceptionality that cannot be sustained; the Church must begin to accept individual conscience in her own members.

Franken Wins

The three judges overseeing the Senate recount in Minnesota said today that Al Franken had the most votes. At most times--the 2000 Presidential election being an exception--the candidate with the most votes is referred to as the winner of the election and is duly sworn into office. If Norm Coleman has had only a mere glimpse of what the Minnesota ethos is all about he will know that now is the time to give up the ghost. Let us assume that the people doing the work over the past months do know how to count, that they have gone over the results 10,000 times--once for every lake--and that there is no reasonable case for appeal. Let it go, Norm, and start your new life.

Steve Cannon

The best radio man in Minnesota history--Steve Cannon--has died tonight in Minneapolis at age 81. The joy of hearing the Eveleth City Dogs in chorus bring Steve-o on the air at 3:00 pm every day will stay with me forever. His love of the U of M and Stadium Village, all Gopher sports, bouts with Sid Hartman, and his Mess buddies Morgan Mundane, Ma Linger, and Backlash La Rue are now part of the Minnesota genome and will enhance every walk around Lake of the Isles forevermore.

Steve Cannon was a reader and often mentioned on air what he was reading at the time. I remember one interview with Roy Smalley, a star player with the Minnesota Twins, which Cannon ended by asking Smalley what he was reading these days, and Smalley responded with a superb account of his current book. No other sports interview in the Twin Cities, other than Cannon's, would end that way. Not then and not now.

I saw him in person only once--in the mid-80's standing behind me in the check-out line at Lund's on West Lake St. Steve had a half-smile, clearly amused at all around him. He had a few items in his hands and I got the impression that he was going to a party.

You got the money, Steve.

Notre Dame

Let's give our moral support to Fr. Jenkins, the president of Notre Dame. His invitation to President Obama to speak at the May Commencement has rattled the cages of the rc (religiously correct), who object to Obama's views on abortion and stem cell research. Where were these rcRC's (religiously correct Roman Catholics) when W spoke in South Bend in 2001? As governor of Texas he proudly presided over his state's no. 1 ranking in prisoner executions. Was the Cardinal in Chicago embarassed then, did the new Archbishop of Mpls-St.Paul object? As I remember, W campaigned with a Catholic priest front and center in his entourage in 2000, what had got that guy's tongue?

Cheer, cheer for old Notre Dame and for President Obama when he speaks there next month.

Irving R. Levine

This great NBC newsman has died aged 86. As a boy I thought listening to his authoritative reporting was like hearing the voice of God, especially his famous sign-off, "Irving R. Levine, Rome." He had voice, presence, style, and brains like his contemporaries Sevareid, Collingswood, Kendrick and Burdette. And he became hip in the 80's when Johnny Carson regularly joked about his bearing and sober delivery. I thought Irving R. was one of the coolest guys who ever was and I'm sorry he's gone.

Catholics Today

In today's church bulletin the faithful will note the following:

1. Mr. Newt Gingrich, thrice married, who calls politics "war by other means," who had affair with a young employee while married to wife no. 2 and while working to impeach Bill Clinton for the Lewinsky affair, became, on Saturday, 28 March, 2009 a member of the Roman Catholic Church. He apparently did this because wife no. 3 (the above mentioned desk jockey) is Catholic and sings in some choir in Washington, D.C. Conversion makes Newt's life more rounded somehow. Who is the idiot-priest responsible for this travesty?

Can you picture fat Newt kneeling in a pew and making the sign of the cross? I can, just, and it makes me think of some cartoon elephant trying to swing on a trapeze as an audience watches in horror. Hello to Newt and goodbye to one more shard of respectability in Ratzinger's pathetic contemporary church.

2. Days before his conversion ceremony Newt attacked the administration at Notre Dame for inviting President Obama to speak at this year's commencement. The President has "anti-Catholic values," that is to say, he thinks abortion should be legal and safe for those who chose it and that stem cell research can proceed with federal funding. Get ready for future gaseous Newtonian emissions to have a patina of Catholic imprimatur about them (he will claim this as a new Defender of the Faith). As a life-long Catholic I ask again, who is the idiot-priest responsible for this travesty?