Is this the lost D Day film?

in an earlier post, I discussed John Ford's iconic film about the Battle of Midway. In that post I mentioned that he also was on the beach on D Day and filmed there, but the film was lost: supposedly Ford explained in a 1964 interview that the US Government was "afraid to show so many American casualties on the screen" so put the film into storage, and the film was never seen again.

which brings to mind this iconic scene from Indiana Jones:

one of the things about storing stuff is that, often years later someone manages to find it.

Which is probably what happened to the D Day Film.

From National Archives (Sept 2014 article):

In a recent search for combat moving image footage to complement the Eisenhower Library’s commemoration of the 70th anniversary of the D-day landings, I identified four reels of a documentary on the landings prepared by the “SHAEF [Supreme Headquarter Allied Expeditionary Forces] Public Relations Division.”

..

the filming included many different viewpoints suggesting several photographers were involved in the filming.

The production, with no ambient sound, music or effects, includes a single monotone narrator and gives the impression of a military briefing set to film. This film is probably the first film documentary of the events of the first four days of the D-day assault, created within days of the invasion.

the article goes on to note that a letter in Ford's OSS file mentions Ford did not shoot the entire film, but edited the work of several photographers to make a coherent film.

“The returning film was assembled under his directions, and an overall D-Day report, complete with sound, was competed on D plus 5, and was shown to Mr. Winston Churchill. Copies were also flown to President Roosevelt and Mr. Stalin.”

Is this Ford's lost film? probably.

But Ford was not the only famous film director in the area: George Stevens also was there.

Then 37, Stevens was already a famous American director who had made Hollywood classics like “Gunga Din” and “Swing Time.”... felt compelled to enlist in the U.S. military after seeing the power of Nazi propaganda films including Leni Riefenstahl’s “Triumph of the Will.”

“The next day he started calling up to find out how he could get into the service. He couldn’t sit on the sidelines in Hollywood, and wanted to make his contribution,” his son said. General Dwight Eisenhower assigned Stevens to head up the combat motion-picture coverage. From D-Day on, Stevens and his team stormed through France and across Europe following U.S. forces.

years later, his son discovered, edited and combined the films his father took and released it as: George Stevens D Day to Berlin

note taking about the TSP board and china

I know nothing about stock market so am taking notes on the TSP article here.which names the names behind the decision.

This is note taking for my own information, which is why it is not really an essay or blog post.

Senators on both sides of the aisle are trying to stop the board from taking retirement funds from US gov't and military employees and investing it in china (see previous post).

At a FRTIB meeting Monday, Aon presented an updated study of the TSP's I Fund benchmark and recommended the board move forward with the change.

In 2017, the Federal Retirement Thrift Investment Board voted unanimously to change the index upon which the I Fund is based, from the MSCI Europe, Australasia and Far East Index to the MSCI All Country World Ex-US Investable Market Index, beginning sometime next year. The move marks a shift from a predominantly Euro-centric index, along with Japan, Hong Kong, Australia and New Zealand, to investments in 48 markets around the world, most notably including Canada and China.;;;

only 8 percent is supposed to be for Chinese companies.

this article in pensions and investment newsletter also stresses the change was due to AonHewitt.

At a meeting of the TSP board last month, consultants from Aon Hewitt, who originally recommended moving to the broader index in 2017, reaffirmed their recommendation.

 more links from that site:

Group petitions lawmakers to stop TSP's China investment

Federal Retirement Thrift presses on with TSP China investment

Bill introduced to block TSP investment in China

Sponsors change focus to holding on to assets

Sponsored Content: Investing in China: Tapping into Long-Term Opportunities

Who is AonHewitt: Wikipedia article says an investment firm that cares for retiree funds. all over the world. Hewitt expanded into "China" in the early 2000s, before it merged with Aon.

Chinese website here.

The firm was investigated and cleared by the SEC/DOJ in 2011.

charges included money used in a way that the feds suspected they were bribing government officials because the books were not clear on how the money was being spent so they paid a14.5 million dollar fine.

they also got in trouble with the Brits in 2007 for the same reason, paying a 5 million pound fine.

(they aquired the Hewitt part of the company in 2011).

the board is advised by something called the employee thrift advisory council, so presumably this means popular input, right?

“The legislative history is quite dense, but when drafting the statute, Congress discussed the fact that, unlike a defined benefit program, the funds [in the TSP] would remain the property of the account holders, not the federal government,” said TSP general counsel Megan Grumbine. “They also worried that as the fund grew, it could be the subject of even more pressure . . . Now, the board does take advice from another body, but that’s the Employee Thrift Advisory Council.”

and who is on the employee advisory council? Gov't website;

(a) The Board shall establish an Employee Thrift Advisory Council. The Council shall be composed of 15 members appointed by the Chairman of the Board in accordance with subsection (b).

so they are from various labor organizations but are appointed by the chairman of the board. How convenient.

and hey, they agree:

ETAC Chairman Clifford Bailey said that both the council members and their constituencies have discussed the controversy over broadening the I Fund index, and that they developed a consensus that federal employees should have the same 401(k)-style investment opportunities as their private sector counterparts.

“Our group said, ‘I’d like to have that option, not withstanding political issues and the reasons presented by the senators,' ” Bailey said. “Leave it up to individual participants to have the options to invest how they choose, based on their beliefs and opinions. They just want the same options as those in the private sector.”

yes, but did anyone bother to ask the "individual participants" about this?

ah but a nameless bureaucrat is the "arbiter" of this:

“The Treasury Department’s Office of Foreign Asset Control is the arbiter of the investible universe, of what international securities are available to be invested in in the U.S.,” Bilyeu said. “The foreign asset control list—that’s the screen that’s applied to all investments available to Americans . . . It seems to me that this is a good conversation to have, but the right people to have that conversation [are officials at the Office of Foreign Asset Control] . . . Then it would apply to all U.S. investors, not just a subset of those who happen to be employed by the federal government.”

they won't be pushed around in the name of political correctness

“When I think about it, this all goes back to the role of the board in terms of what we’re responsible for as fiduciaries,” he said. “Congress was very intentional in providing guard rails around this so that we as a board make decisions solely for our beneficiaries and participants. Over the years, people have talked about adding funds based on [environmental, social and governance principles] and other things, but we’ve always maintained our focus on Ps and Bs.” 

wikipedia on the office of foreign assets control.

Sometimes described as one of the "most powerful yet unknown" government agencies,^[5][6] OFAC was founded in 1950 and has the power to levy significant penalties against entities that defy its directives, including imposing fines, freezing assets, and barring parties from operating in the United States. 

translation: They do economic warfare against America's enemies or against people who are corrupt, associated with bribery or money laundering.

for example, they sanctioned a Chinese shipping company for smuggling oil from Iran illegally.

and the NYTimes in August reported sanctions against some Chinese individuals for their involvement with Fentanyl which is being smuggled into the US and killing people.

and this shows how corrupt people/countries can fool you;

In April, China announced that it would ban all variants of fentanyl. However, it did not ban all precursor chemicals that are used to make it, leaving open the ability for traffickers to ship those components to other countries where the drug can be produced.

so ship the precursors to Mexico and they can mix it up... and of course, a ban is useless if you can bribe officials to look the other way.

more about getting around sanctions using Hong Kong companies here. lots of shennanigans going on, and the article ends with this warning:

Companies that are concerned about unwittingly abetting illicit activity must implement risk-based controls for due diligence and transaction monitoring to detect SDNs and others who may be engaged in sanctions evasion or high-risk activities. Certain areas — for example, trade finance, petroleum and shipping — are inherently higher risk and require greater attention.

yes. but it's not their money so why worry.

do you really think that when money is involved, that someone is going to be diligent that the money won't be used for military, human rights violations, or in breaking sanctions against Iran or North Korea etc.

and don't forget the supply chain.

This Chinese company got in trouble because it had imported North Korean false eyelashes and got caught.

This is not the first time that OFAC has explored possible violations associated with Chinese companies, including cases violating other sanctions regulations. For example, OFAC has investigated both ZTE Corporation and Huawei Technologies Co. Ltd. for potential violations of the Iranian Transactions and Sanctions Regulations. OFAC encourages companies to have an in-depth due diligence program regarding Chinese suppliers, as this is a region that is considered to have a higher risk of violating North Korean Sanctions Regulations.

yes, this sounds absurd until you read that the eyelashes were worth 4 million dollars.

NYTimes says the fight is between Wall Street and the government.
\
Politico article says it's all about Trump's anti Chinese trade war.

The Trump administration is considering expanding its trade fight against China by targeting Beijing’s ties with Wall Street and American investors, according to two people familiar with internal discussions. The measures being weighed would force Chinese companies to delist from U.S. stock exchanges if they don’t meet U.S. auditing requirements.

The administration is also contemplating banning U.S. government pension funds from having investments in market indexes that list Chinese companies. ...

SCMP article on the Senator's attempt to stop the pensions becoming involved with Chinese companies. and has another article about stopping the MSCI from adding so many Chinese companies to their list including those like Hikvision, who are directly involved with human rights violations.

but my main worry is corruption: They lie, cheat and you can't believe the books.

From Investopedia:

First and foremost, China is still a communist country. So despite the free-market principles, China has adopted, the rules that govern a public company in China are different than those in the U.S. Chinese stocks trade on the Shanghai Stock Exchange and the Hong Kong Stock Exchange.

Both exchanges have similar listing requirements to those of U.S. exchanges. Companies have to report financial statements regularly, have audits performed, and meet other requirements of size and capitalization.

Beyond that, however, rules and norms differ, which is where things get murky....

italics mine. the article then goes to mention stuff like insider trading is common despite laws against it. And later they note:

Many Chinese companies are also listed directly on U.S. stock exchanges. Many years ago, these companies were market darlings. In recent years, however, virtually all of them have come under intense scrutiny due to the inability of investors to trust their financial statements.

----------------------
yahoo news NOV 14 2019 (Bloomberg)\

U.S. Retirement Fund Okays China Investment After Senate Threat

The board that oversees retirement savings for U.S. government employees will allow one of its funds to invest in an international index that includes Chinese companies, despite the threat of legislation from lawmakers who say the investments will undermine national security and contribute to China’s economic and corporate growth. The Federal Thrift Retirement Investment Board finalized the decision in its Wednesday meeting and informed the Senate sponsors of a bill that would ban such investments.

The board said a review by an outside investment consultant concluded that the move would be in the best interests of plan participants.

blame China

Duterte puts his VP in charge of the drug war (she is from a different party and would become president if they get rid of him).

So today we read she's pointing the finger at China as being responsible for the drug problem here.

Not exactly a big secret.

Part of this is to shame Duterte,who has tried to make nice with China who is threatening war against us in order to take over our fishing grounds/oil in the West Philippine sea.

but then there is this:

She said the US officials, including representatives from the Federal Bureau of Investigation and Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA), shared with her information on drug syndicates operating in the Philippines, as well as information on transnational crime.
Some of the details they provided were already known to the Philippine government, Robredo said.

Read more: https://newsinfo.inquirer.net/1190149/leni-check-china-as-top-drug-source#ixzz65JsjJuuaFollow us: @inquirerdotnet on Twitter | inquirerdotnet on Facebook

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the bad news: she's so naive that she thinks talking about it with China will fix things up.

and no, the problem here is not fentanyl, but meth (shabu).

A report from American think-tank group Rand Corp. said that the Asian superpower is becoming a leading source for methamphetamine chemicals — which are being used to make methamphetamine hydrochloride or shabu, a cheap drug usually consumed by people in poor sectors.
Read more: https://newsinfo.inquirer.net/1189850/fwd-robredo-on-chinese-nationals-involvement-in-drugs-its-something-we-should-look-into#ixzz65JtiLHWeFollow us: @inquirerdotnet on Twitter | inquirerdotnet on Facebook

according to the WAPO, China is going after those making Fentanyl and other opioids. They actually sentenced 9 people to jail.

The timing of the highly publicized sentencing appeared propitious: 

timing was "propitious"? Ya think? why?

Negotiators from Washington and Beijing this week are working toward a “phase one” trade deal that could forestall or reverse tariff increases.

more at the BBC.

and they explain the backstory of why China is behind pushing dangerous drugs: Money.

Drugs policy expert at the Rand Corporation in the US, Bryce Pardo, describes their regulatory capacity as "limited". "Gaps in regulatory design, the division of responsibility between provincial and central governments, and lack of oversight and government and corporate accountability, increase opportunities for corruption," he says.

translation: Rule of Law is not strong in China, so just a little gift will make it okay.

some of this is the backstory about Hong Kong, where rule of law makes it a safe area for investment etc.

China is right now blaming the protesters for the violence: 

One problem is that their disrupters speak a different Chinese language than the people of Hong Kong, so locals know what is going on.

So tell me why my TSP retirement account is now being invested in Chinese banks?

not only is this investing in risky companies, but it is worse than that:

Many Chinese companies included in MSCI indexes are state-owned or state-directed enterprises Beijing uses to undermine American workers. They are also involved in China’s military, espionage, human rights abuses, and “Made in China 2025” industrial policy.

TSP website here. 

DaveRamsey explains how the TSP works here:

and more stuff about TSP investments here.

not a lot of information there (and no, the TSP hasn't asked me if I want my money invested in China). But apparently Congressfolk on both sides of the aisle are trying to stop them from doing it.

So what is going on here? Don't ask me: I'm a physician not an investment banker, and a lot of this is written in financial jargon/gobblygook.

 But when Gillibrand, Rubio and Romeny agree on something, maybe someone should notice that there may be a problem.

So let's go to the fake news/right wing outlet, the Epoch times for background:

The TSB met on Oct. 28 and opted to continue as planned as a result of its decision to move its International Fund Index to the MSCI All Country World ex-U.S. Investable Market Index. That index includes multiple Chinese companies currently subject to multiple U.S. sanctions and export bans. As much $50 billion could be headed to China as a result of the TSB decision...

Putting TSB funds with the new index would directly benefit “military contractors to the People’s Liberation Army (PLA), such as the Aviation Industry Corporation of China (AVIC) and China Unicom, which supply military aircraft and telecommunications support to militarized artificial islands in the South China Sea,” the senators told the TSB in the letter.

So when China uses the islands to take over our resources, block the sea routes to Japan/Korea, and take over the economy (or more) in Luzon, I will have the knowledge they did it with my money.... 

“It also includes firms like Hangzhou Hikvision Digital Technology, which was recently added to the U.S. Department of Commerce’s Entity List and produces surveillance equipment the Chinese government currently uses to oppress and detain approximately one million Uighur Muslims and other religious minorities.”

and if you read the entire article the authors point out that dirty little secret about China's funny business practices that make investment risky. 

Hey, Forget it Jake, it's Chinatown, so what could go wrong?

update: I finally found who is doing this: and the article names names: LINK

ETAC Chairman Clifford Bailey said that both the council members and their constituencies have discussed the controversy over broadening the I Fund index, and that they developed a consensus that federal employees should have the same 401(k)-style investment opportunities as their private sector counterparts. All 10 of the largest publicly traded U.S. companies include access to the Chinese investment market in their 401(k) packages, and the same is true for the 10 top awarded federal contractors, as well as the 20 largest public sector pension programs.

their "constituencies"? Moi? No, I've never been asked about it.

Sweetness and light (bah humbug)

no, it's not about the impeachment.

It's about this

whenever anyone brings up Wuerl, my blood pressure goes up: NOT because of his close association with pedophile McCarrick, but because he did nothing while bishop of Pittsburgh when I lived in the Altoona area in the 1990s, at a time when conservative (usually Democratic) blue collar Catholics were leaving the church en mass over the abuse coverups, and when every gay in western Pennsylvania knew about priests cruising the bars, (how bad was it: some gays I knew were scandalized about it. I mean it's one thing to find a bar safe to socialize in, it's another to find your priest there making a pass at you.)

and then there is the Pope and his magic statue, which morphs from Mama Mary to Mother Gaia to an Incan idol that rerpesents a earth goddess who used to get kids sacrificed to bribe her to stop volcanoes.

This, like the Pope's response to the "dubia" questions (about divorce and remarriage and receiving communion while living in sin), or did he really say Jesus wasn't God, and he didn't actually rise from the dead, or if he said there is no hell, etc etc.

The answers keep changing. he gives a nice speech that is orthodox Catholicism, but never corrects what previous press reports he said elsewhere...causing confusion, and if you object, well, you are wrong.

There is a word for this: Gaslighting.

and yes, I am listening to ann Barnhardt again....
things must be bad because what she is saying almost sounds logical.

---------------
I should add that no, I didn't care for any of the victims of Catholic priests, but when I was in private practice, as the only woman doc in town, I saw most of the young underaged girls in the area who had been abused ....

Musical interlude of the week

headups link

someone was bored

Cat item of the day

BBC reports:

Mikhail Galin, 34, took his cat Viktor on board flight SU1702, from Moscow to Vladivostok, Aeroflot said. Under Aeroflot's rules, pets weighing more than 8kg (17lb) must be placed in the luggage hold. 

 Because Viktor was too heavy for the passenger cabin, Mr Galin devised a cunning plan. ...

A day later Mr Galin returned to the airport with the smaller "cat double", which passed the weight limit test at the check-in desk. Mr Galin then gave the smaller cat back to its owners at the airport before boarding the plane to Vladivostok with Viktor.

the bad news? He got caught after he posted the story on his facebook page, and was punished by losing his frequent flier miles. 

The Quiet Man at Midway

the buzz on the chat rooms about Midway,  the latest film about the crucial World War II battle of Midway, says that the film is good:

Just ignore the low rating by the PC critics at Rotten Tomatoes, who hate anything patriotic: the audience approval even there is high.

Which is ironic, since it wasn't financed by Rah rah  Hollywood patriot  I mean an anti American PC left wing Hollywood, but partly with Chinese money, and hey, here in Asia, a lot of old people still remember the war, not to mention their relatives, both military and civilians, who were killed in that conflict) so I guess they don't care if it makes ordinary American soldiers look good because hey, we were both allies fighting a murderous enemy back then.

the background of Midway is that it was a turn around in the Pacific War, since if America had lost that battle, the fleet would not have been able to stop the Japanese from taking over Hawaii and maybe even bombing the west coast.

this vlog discusses the history behind the film (actually their impression from the previews, since the film hadn't yet been released), and the narrator mentions two previous films made about the battle.
:



the 1976 film is a classic that still is shown on TV now and then... but the narrator then he goes on to mention that a lot of the photography of the airplanes attacking actually came from  an earlier film, the award winning short film released in 1942 (usually dismissed nowadays as a "propaganda film" of course).

So who filmed that 1942 short film about the Battle of Midway, and more importantly: how did they film all those special effects for the 1942 film?

And the answer: It was filmed by director John Ford, best known of his westerns and for the film The Quiet Man, about his parent's beloved Ireland.

As to special effects: DUH. What special effects: That was the real thing.

In this interview, from the Naval History Blog, Ford himself explains how he ended up on an isolated island in the middle of the Pacific, filming gooney birds and documenting the exciting boring life of the Navy personnel on a typical backwater tropical island, only to have a battle drop in on him.

the interview is fascinating, so if you are a military history buff, read the whole thing.

Wikipedia has a summary of Ford's work during World WarII ...
it notes he also was present during the D Day landings and took a lot of film there, but which was never released because 

Ford explained in a 1964 interview that the US Government was "afraid to show so many American casualties on the screen"

And that film was put in storage, and lost.

Sigh.

However, his film about Midway is available on Youtube, and yes, the gooney birds are in it (fast forward to 2:20).





-----------------
update: A lecture on the battle of Midway at the Naval War College

Gratuitous Lady Gaga parody of the month

a good introduction to the customs and scenes from ordinary neighborhoods here in the Philippines can be seen in this parody of our beloved Lady Gaga ( LadyGaga is very popular here).

Space, Inc.

StrategyPage has an essay that discusses NASA vs SpaceX.

SpaceX offers lower prices, even without the self-landing booster, and more flexibility than most government (usually military) developed launchers. As a privately owned company, SpaceX has less bureaucracy and is quicker to adapt new technology for launch services. Many existing and potential SpaceX customers see this as the future of space transportation.

...
part 2
part3\
part 4
part 5

here is a book about ElonMusk.



of course, Elon Musk is not the only one in the race for space: Jeff Bezos and Richard Branson are in the race too:




this is one of the biggest stories of the decade that few except we geeks have heard about.

------------------
update: Space X plans to send up 60 more satellites for Starlink.

what is Starlink?

SpaceX is developing a low latency, broadband internet system to meet the needs of consumers across the globe. Enabled by a constellation of low Earth orbit satellites, Starlink will provide fast, reliable internet to populations with little or no connectivity, including those in rural communities and places where existing services are too expensive or unreliable.

We had satellite for our tv and for our internet 20 plus years ago when I worked on remote rural Indian reservations in the USA, and of course, the US military have long used internet and phone via satellite. But apparently this is an expansion for the rest of the world to have such access.

Ebola? What about measles (or diarrhea)

StrategyPage writes about the Ebola epidemic in the DRC/Central Africa.

The good news:

international and Congolese health workers have a new weapon in their arsenal. Two days ago 11,000 doses of the new American Ad26-ZEBOV-GP vaccine arrived in North Kivu province. North Kivu, South Kivu and Ituri are the three provinces in the epidemic’s epicenter. Another 39,000 doses will arrive shortly. As of October 20, there were 3,243 Ebola virus cases and 2,185 deaths in Congo. Uganda has had four confirmed cases and three deaths. 

the bad news:

 Sadly, in 2019 measles has killed more people in Congo than Ebola. So far over 4,100 Congolese have died this year from measles. Estimates are that Congo had over 200,000 total measles cases in 2019. Over 140,000 of those cases were children under the age of five years. (Austin Bay) 

there was a push to eliminate measles from the world (similar to how smallpox was eradicated in the recent past).

This 2014 article discussed some of the problems of getting the vaccine into the chaotic DRC (Democratic Republic of the Congo).

So what are some of these bottlenecks? First, access to routine vaccination services is extremely limited. The population is spread over large geographic areas with very limited road and public transport networks. Second, in several provinces, health clinics perform poorly due to shortages of health staff, ill-equipped health structures, irregular supplies of vaccines and inadequate cold chain equipment for vaccine storage.8,9 Third, the logistics challenge of accessing children in distant areas is overwhelming.

the article goes into details about the logistical problems.
One problem with measles vaccine is that since it is a "live" attenuated virus, it needs refrigeration. So if it gets warm, it deteriorates and doesn't work. That alone is a major problem.

and when I read in the article that there are reports of a alot of measles despite the reports of a high rate of vaccinations.

I not only wonder if the vaccine had been kept cold and had been given properly, but if the health care workers just faked the data to get paid.

and that doesn't even mention little things like roaming gangs who steal medical equipment, rob health care workers, and terrorize locals, or that many people are fleeing the war between insurgencies and government troops.

nor does it mention the propaganda war against vaccinations. This has been notorious with both polio and measles, usually in Muslim countries where the Mullahs take a half baked anti vax conspiracy theory from the web and tell their people not to get their kids vaccinated.

But these rumors are also complicating the ability to control the ebola epidemic. (something mentioned in the SP article)

The government and medical aid organizations are battling rumors that Ebola is a hoax. ... Many locals refuse to believe Ebola is what local and foreign doctors say it is. Traditional healers and the few Islamic terror groups in the area also oppose efforts to use modern medicine to treat Ebola. The traditional healers see it as a threat to their livelihoods while the Islamic terrorists believe Western medicine is really an infidel (non-Moslem) plot to poison Moslems or Africans in general.

Opponents to Ebola treatment encourage violence against those providing this treatment and that has led to some deaths and a considerable amount of violence.

Then we have this complaint: the upsurge in measles cases might have been partly because health resources have switched from vaccinating for Ebola rather than routine childhood vaccinations.

A combination of factors – increased violence, growing mistrust towards medical teams in the wake of the Ebola outbreak as well as the diversion of resources to deal with Ebola – have resulted in reduced vaccination coverage in general.

....Community mistrust towards the outbreak response team has been cited as one of the challenges. Another is the high levels of insecurity due to battles between the army and armed groups. This has affected access to health services by communities.

you don't say.

and from my experience, a lot of the "measles" deaths won't be reported: often the children would die of croup, pneumonia a week or two after the measles rash disappeared.

And then there is the problem of tuberculosis: Measles causes "anergy", meaning your resistance against tuberculosis goes down, and then you can die of TB. TB also is seen when the immune system is weakened by malnutrition, HIV, malaria, or other infectious diseases. 

and yes, malaria remains a major killer of children and adults in the area.

and don't forget that one of the major killers of young children is various forms of gastroenteritis, or diarrhea disease, usually viral, which usually is because of lack of clean water.

Sigh.

There are ways to fight all these diseases (been there, done that: baby clinics, digging wells, village health workers with WHO rehydration fluid, supplying chickens and cheap protein supplements and nutrition villages), but when there is a war and the roads are not safe, when clinics are robbed or medical personnel are killed, then the plan collapses.

and of course, the collapse of the infrastructure due to corruption and incompetence and political shennanigans is alas partly to blame in many countries. 

been there, done that too. 

Sigh.

Schism or civil war in the Catholic church

I have written a lot about this, but George Weigel, a biographer of John Paul II, has a long analysis in the journal First Things that summarizes what is going on.

...as of October 28, 2019, it is impossible for anyone in a position of ecclesiastical responsibility to deny what is at stake, save for reasons of inattention, indifference, or fear.

And what, precisely, is at stake, after this synod and its predecessors during the current pontificate?... 

...At stake is the very nature of the Church: Is the Catholic Church a communion of disciples in mission, sacramentally constituted and hierarchically ordered, or is the Church to understand itself primarily by analogy to the world, as a non-governmental organization (NGO) dedicated to good works in aid of the poor, the environment, migrants, etc.?

Read the whole thing.


Headsup GetReligion

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Destroying the sacred/sacramental/spiritual nature of the church is opposing God, and l am not an expert on this, except to say if there is another dimension where spirituality rules, then this synod means the bad guys (i.e. the ones seeking their own will, not serving the will of the deity) win.

But I'm a doctor, not an expert at spirituality, and from a purely pragmatic viewpoint, the takeover of a huge institution like the church would have ramifications in the geopolitical sphere, especially here in the third world. Because if we learn anything from the 20th century, it is that when you destroy the religious impulse (that encourages people to see the numinous and to fill the God sized hole in their heart), it leaves a vacuum to be filled with the man made political utopias: utopias that have led to the deaths of 100 million people in the 20th century and many more in the wars spawned by those utopian regimes.

But even hijacking the church to become a man made NGO has risks: among them by making the agenda of the world's elites a priority.

I'll give one example that I am familiar with.

The Amazon synod said a lot about the "green" agenda, and implied that letting people remain poor and ignorant was a good thing. What's wrong with this picture? 

But it gets worse. The "green" agenda  pushed by the Catholics here in the Philippines mean the government encourages organic rice (good for us, since we've been in that business for 20 years, before the gov't started the push).

But it also means by default they discourage the use of Genetically modified rice, which would cut the use of chemical pesticides, lowers the cost of growing rice, and give farmers a higher yield while keeping the price of rice low for slum dwellers. 

And maybe, just maybe, we could become self sufficient in food and be able to stop importing cheap rice from other countries.

the "Studies" about the "dangers" of GM food are exaggerated: monoculture is a problem, but there is no reason that you can't encourage both organic/traditional strains being grown by some farmers, and the more prolific monoculture. Indeed, when you have a capitalistic economy (as opposed to central planning) this is exactly what will happen.

so what's wrong with that (aside from making profit making Big Agri and the farmers rich)?

The back story: The crooked politicians/businessmen make a bundle importing rice (legally and illegal smuggling, both associated with bribery), and diverting funds that are supposed to go to help small farmers directly or indirectly by divering funds meant to build up the infrastructure to modernize rice growing.

and their kids can feel self righteous by opposing the evil GM food (while ignoring the street malnourished street kids who eat garbage).

And of course it means we import chemically grown probably GM rice from VietNam and China, who make the profit too. So it's not exactly "protecting" ordinary folks from eating this rice.

In other words, the church is involved in pushing a "green" religion that has little or nothing to do with it's goal of forming people to live a holy life, and might even be harming the poor that they claim they are trying to help.

Indeed, it is diverting energy from the very real problems we have here: Corruption that keeps people poor, encouraging people to work overseas because there are no local jobs due to corruption (and when parents work overseas, the children suffer), and opposing a well funded western sexual agenda that encourages promiscuity, resulting in family breakdown, children without fathers, street kids who are easily exploited by perverts, abortion and HIV.


Sigh.

The sexual agenda is especially pernicious in poor countries where the extended family, not the state, is the main source of support for the poor.

The "divorce is okay" as was pushed and snuck in during a previous "synod" sounds nice, but what about the kids? What about the wife left to support the children without her husband's help?

But after this stealth attack on marriage in the previous synod, a lot of people suspect more of the same "sexual liberation" is part of the Amazon agenda, but this time being pushed under the guise of "married priests". (and later, openly gay priests and women deacons who will quickly morph into women priests).

Probably allowing older married men to be priests in the Philippines would mean our deacons would become priests, so no problem behind that. (our priests, like those in the USA, are mostly pious and keep their vows, but some don't, and there is a long tradition of having girlfriends that taints the priesthood).

But why is there a shortage of priests? Part of it is the high level of education required (a reform that goes back to the middle ages).

So is it a good idea to have semi educated priests? That's not even in the discussion here.

nor is there a discussion about the reason for this tradition: as Paul says, an unmarried person is free to serve God full time and time spent in prayer.

Weigel notes:

Celibacy only makes sense as an expression of the Church’s eschatological self-awareness: the Church’s confidence in the Lord’s proclamation that the Kingdom of God is now among us (Mark 1:15), and the Church’s faith in the capacity of the baptized to live the most radical form of Kingdom-life here and now, with the aid of divine grace. To abandon celibacy as normative for the ordained ministry would thus be another step toward turning the Church into a global NGO. 

 
Ironically, in the west, the priest shortage is somewhat artificial. Ignoring homosexuality in the seminaries caused many good men to leave . 

There has been a turn around here in the last 15 years: the seminaries in the USA have been cleaning up their filth...meaning many of the younger priests are more traditional, and that this revival of faith at a time when the "nones" are often fallen away Catholics, is spreading.

and the "reformers" are not pleased. 

if you read Weigel, the source of the "reform" money is a German church without Christians, and many international organizations. Read the whole thing and shudder.

I'd say sarcastically "place conspiracy theory here", (Maureen Mallarkey's essay is especially sarcastic about the agenda)...but Weigel is a scholar and no conspiracy theorist, and his warnings suggest that maybe something is going on that is being ignored by the MSM in the USA: and it bodes badly for ordinary Catholics.

Yes, I have spent my life in the "active" life, as a do gooder. But the dirty little secret is that prayer and faith is the power that keeps us working and not burning out or getting diverted while we work out the duties of our daily lives.




Sigh.

Syria backstory

................

podcast about this two weeks ago gives more background.

mp3link

mp3 link2

lots more stuff on their site about the war in Syria. 

remember, Turkey has 3 million Syrian refugees, and historically their president would like to revive the idea of the Ottoman Empire.

Not my area of expertise, but they do get thing correct on places I know about, such as Colombia and the Philippines (link2), which is more than I can say for much of the MSM.