Gosh, whose supporters would do such a thing?

"I’m sorry to hear that but I will continue on what I believe is the mission of the church in the world today.” Trump can't touch the Pope. A pope from Chicago won't be bullied, and any successor of Peter is on a mission Donald Trump can't possibly comprehend. Poor Don. Sad.

Will Cardinal Dolan and Bishop Barron resign from President Trump's religious freedom commission over the President's attacks on Pope Leo—attacks which seem a lot like attacks on Catholic faith?

The effort to paint Leo as a political hack made by Catholics clinging to Trump after last night will work for some, but it's actually very weak tea that exposes a lot of vulnerability. The AI apotheosis and attacks on the Pope will gnaw quietly even at MAGA Catholics. Trump's grip has slipped.

The Trump Admin has all the cleverness and toughness of a bad guy on Police Squad! What I can't understand is why more institutions aren't at least as smart as Frank Drebin.

I don't take the Avignon-Pentagon story all that seriously. I don't think it tells us much we didn't know. Street thugs in govt were probing for weakness, trying to find out if the Holy See can be muscled as in a protection racket. You can see how far that got them with Pierre.

I've had to say this in class. There is only one person in the US with executive power, and the American ppl have the solemn duty to determine who will be the person who has that vast power. Blame the voters. Trump is only doing what we (as a group) told him he could do. That's how it works.

It's impossible to exaggerate how broken our constitutional system is. Actually, the system is fine. Everything we need is there and can work. We lack ppl in Congress & Cabinet to use those mechanisms. Most important, we lack voters who see past party ID and grasp their own civic duty.

So. Tacos for dinner?

The military need not obey an order to end a civilization by striking civilian infrastructure at mass scale. The order would be illegal (18 USC 2441). If the order is obeyed the last bulwark is gone. If the order is not obeyed we will be in an unprecedented crisis anyway. TACO is the best hope.

Buying a billboard in Tehran that says "You're winning, I'm desperate" would be more subtle.

Simply luminous. Caesar’s Time and Wonder | Commonweal Magazine share.google/Owt8Ffo85Gb4...

Deploying ICE to airports to harrass travelers hardly diminishes my resolve to oppose DHS funding until ICE is reformed, restructured, restored to a law enforcement agency. This is what a thwarted, desperate tyrant does. So keep the pressure on Trump, it is working.

Idiocy. The assumption that I've spent my working years spending freely, not saving for retirement because I had a choice, simply is indefensibly false. Don't take my word for it. Look at real personal income since the 80's. Madness. Lies heaped on lies. share.google/yc8JizFgruA0...

We are stuck in a dumb war of choice. Gas is up 23% in 3 weeks. The TSA is broken and soon air travel will be. The economy is headed for recession. Healthcare costs are way up. ICE menaces people in our streets. All this propped up by the partisan delusions of a committed 30% of us. It's amazing.

2yrs ago several good friends and I entered through an East Wing entrance that's gone, sat with an undiminished Pres Biden, and had an extraordinary St Patrick's gathering of Catholics in the White House that celebrated immigrants. It seems like 20yrs ago.

Some of the best Irish music you can hear this wknd isnt cheerful, its abt the senselessness of WWI—a war an older generation blundered into not comprehending how technology had changed war. In the process they lost a rising generation. What are they marching for? music.youtube.com/watch?v=o3NW...

"...of a heart that doesn’t close itself in the dark, doesn’t stop in the past, doesn’t scrape along in the present, but can clearly see tomorrow. Restless and joyous, this is how we Christians must be." Pope Francis Hope (2025)

"...and that woman can be you. Then there is another 'you,' and yet another 'you,' and then we become a 'we.' For we Christians, the future has a name and this name is hope. To have hope doesn’t mean being naïve optimists who ignore the tragedy of human evil. Hope is the virtue...

🧵"Fear is the origin…of every form of dictatorship, because it is on the exploitation of popular fears that indifference and violence grow. It is a cage that excludes us from happiness and snatches away the future. But one single man, one single woman, is enough for hope to exist, and that man...

This was a great event, it was a privilege to be there. And do yourself a favor, find Cardinal Cupich's homily and listen to it. 🔥 religionnews.com/2026/02/19/a...

Wow.

Teaching the guts of Locke's Letter Concerning Toleration tomorrow where he tells us abt the Magistrate's duty in the business of toleration. The state's duty is to let us be different. That is the "common culture" we got from the English, Irish, and Scots. And I'm just gonna go for it tomorrow.

A great essay about something else. But this is a breathtaking sentence. lareviewofbooks.org/article/as-h...

💯💯💯

The New York Times reports that the Department of Homeland Security has sent Google, Meta, and other media corporations subpoenas for the names on accounts that criticize ICE enforcement. The department wants to identify Americans who oppose what it’s doing. I’ll save them time.

Some thoughts on the political importance of empathy and the strange road empathy has traveled in these recent years. religionnews.com/2026/02/12/4...

If you're paying any attention to governing, you don't need a poll to tell you Biden was better today any more than you did on Nov 5, 2024. Biden had the most successful presidency of my lifetime. The better question is—What the hell's wrong with voters? www.axios.com/2026/02/12/t...

Polling has been quite destructive to representative self-government. This is a positive development. We need more like this. thehill.com/homenews/med...

I don't know Susan Ostermann or her work. I have nothing at stake with @notredame.bsky.social, no ties there at all. But isn't it dispiriting in 2026 to find there's a gaggle of noisy Catholic bishops who still want trampling academic freedom to be part of the Catholic brand?

I and millions of Americans believe exactly the same thing Kasparov does. Too many troops, too many new prisons, too much money not under Congressional supervision. We're not just witnessing a mass deportation scheme anymore. This is something significantly bigger and scarier.

Call-ins to CSPAN open forum on D and R lines are preoccupied by Epstein acctability. Something is shifting. But also. The Epstein stuff is intersecting 50yrs of antigovt rhetoric, paranoia, conspiracism. Institutions already are suffering. I wonder what mere anarchy awaits us after Epstein.

That consuming a Superbowl halftime show can seem like an act of effective resistance is powerful evidence of how much distorted by entertainment and consumerism our political sense has become.

🧪 I AM SO PROUD OF MY BLUE STATE! Governor @govpritzker.illinois.gov is a lifesaving HERO! Thank you. Illinois Joins WHO’s Global Disease Network ground.news/article/illi...

I'm delighted now to be a regular contributor to @flashesinsight.bsky.social. flashesinsight.com/2026/02/03/t...

all these conservative men who bleated on about their "legacy" will watch their children grow up and change their names when they realize the true horror of what their fathers supported

@nytimes.com @nytimesoped.bsky.social If you're looking to fill a slot -- I have over 100 bylines, can turn copy around fast, as secretary of the Edmund Burke Society I am a conservative and also a Catholic, but not with Douthat's voice and never for Trump. I could be your guy. DM if interested.

I'm never with the pile-on-the-natl-Dems crowd that prevails here. But the Don Lemon arrest is as much a confirmation that there's no "pivot" as the ongoing, unchanged ICE operation in MN. We have no signal an investigation into Alex Pretti's murder is active. Dems really need to hold out here.

The death of Joe Ely snuck past me last month. A huge loss to American music. With the Flatlanders and on his own, he gave us melodies that rose up from the landscape like they were stolen from the soundtrack of a... Joe Ely, Influential Texas Songwriter, Dead at 78 share.google/5U6ixcVFAp77...

Has any superpower ever become so irrelevant so quickly? www.msn.com/en-us/politi...

“The world has changed, Washington has changed. There is almost nothing normal in the U.S. now and that’s the truth." Mark Carney

I wrote this song on Saturday, recorded it yesterday and released it to you today in response to the state terror being visited on the city of Minneapolis. It’s dedicated to the people of Minneapolis, our innocent immigrant neighbors and in memory of Alex Pretti and Renee Good. Stay free

If you are in or near Chicago and want to show solidarity with Minnesota, pray for our nation, consider this event Fri night. Tony Pizzo, OSA (provincial of the Augustinian Chicago province) will preside. Everyone welcome, its not just for Catholics. Please share.

This can't be repeated enough. Trump killed the Emergency National Security Supplemental Appropriations Act of 2024. He needed his issue so he could be elected and send goons to MN. Now he is POTUS, 2 citizens are dead. And we still have a broken immigration system.

...tick...tick...tick...tick... www.newsweek.com/chart-showin...

Two former presidents felt compelled to comment publicly

Seen in Los Angeles (Credit: Zurita Carpio)

A federal district court judge (appointed by Trump) has ordered the Trump Administration not to destroy evidence in the Alex Pretti investigation. This is subtle but think about it. No other US president has ever achieved this. His Administration had to be stopped from covering up a killing.

Man, I bet the NRA is going to be furious when they hear that jack-booted thugs from the federal government executed a law-abiding citizen for exercising his Second Amendment right to carry a handgun. Any second now, I'm sure. He was a white guy, if that helps? Hello? NRA?