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"Though the cause of evil prosper . . ."

"Hi, guys. We're Piccolo and Fiona, John Paul II's bosom pigeons," goes the script of the Vatican's message of suffering and redemption embodied in a visually stunning Disneyesque animated life of Karol Józef Wojtyła available on DVD. Compare and contrast the Vatican's message to the younger generation with that of the Palestinians ["Seek death for Allah (Shahada)"]. Discuss.

"Though the cause of evil prosper, yet the truth alone is strong," goes James R. Lowell's "Once to Every Man and Nation," often quoted here. This morning two stories in the news exemplify -- one as beacon, the other as black hole -- the choice for all of us "’twixt that darkness and that light." First the beacon:

"They disagree on many points. But they also criticize those Muslims who want to impose, with violence, 'utopian dreams in which the end justifies the means,'” reports www.chiesa in "The Regensburg Effect: The Open Letter from 38 Muslims to the Pope":

One month after his lecture at the University of Regensburg, Benedict XVI received an “open letter” signed by 38 Muslim personalities from various countries and of different outlooks, which discusses point by point the views on Islam expressed by the pope in that lecture . . .

“We must state that the murder on September 17th of an innocent Catholic nun in Somalia -- and any other similar acts of wanton individual violence -- 'in reaction to' the lecture at the University of Regensburg, is completely un-Islamic, and we totally condemn such acts.”

The authors of the letter appreciate Benedict XVI’s desire for dialogue and take very seriously his theses. “Applaud” pope's “efforts to oppose the dominance of positivism and materialism in human life,” while contest him on other points, adding their reasons for their opposition.

Take that, ye of so little faith in the deep and abiding wisdom of this pope, those of our fellow citizens who dismissed the invitation to dialogue of his Regensburg lecture as the naive maunderings of a fool out of his depth.

"He inhabits an intellectually rigorous and emotionally rich world of faith and ritual we will never know," we wrote of Papa Ratzi during the cartoon wars last winter. Likewise the world of his predecessor, John Paul II, gorgeously portrayed in the animated version of his life now available on DVD.

Now the dark hole "In the strife of truth with falsehood, for the good or evil side" in the news today:

"With its Al Manar television station launched in 1991, the Lebanese terrorist group Hezbollah has pioneered the use of mass media as a weapon," write Mark Dubowitz and Jonathan Snow in today's Opinion Journal:

It uses the broadcaster to recruit suicide bombers, raise money for terrorist operations, conduct pre-attack surveillance and incite violence. This fall, the Palestinian terrorist group Hamas is poised to follow in Hezbollah's footsteps.

Until now, Hamas's Al Aqsa television has been broadcast only within the Gaza Strip. But this month it will begin satellite distribution via the Nilesat satellite, the Palestinian News Agency (Ramattan) reported in August. This would allow Hamas to spread its message of hatred across the Middle East, North Africa and most of Europe . . .

Children are specifically targeted. Hamas produces radio and television shows and publishes an online magazine geared at preteens. A recent issue of the magazine opens with a cartoon of a smiling child riding a rocket while the previous issue glorified suicide bombers and other "martyrs" in cartoons and poetry.

You've heard of cartoon wars, but now from the light side come two white doves (photo at top) with a message "intended to appeal particularly to children," created by animation producer and director Jose Luis Lopez-Guardia in collaboration with the Vatican Television Center:

A cartoon version of the life of Pope John Paul II, telling the story of his life and death in animated form, is to be released on DVD by the Vatican.

The film, subtitled The Friend of All Humanity, will be the first cartoon account of a Pope's life.

Producer Lope-Guardia wins our heart and mind with his rationale:

"There are two reasons why this film was so important for me -- it was a tribute to Pope John Paul, and also for my mother, who adored him," he said.

He said he chose a pair of pink-beaked doves, Piccolo and Fiona, to narrate the story as Pope John Paul II was so often photographed surrounded by them.

"His life story is so serious, grave and even sad that I needed some funny characters to appeal to children and to lighten the story," he explained.

Maybe it's time to go out and purchase a DVD player. We were totally smitten by the beauty of the trailer to the John Paul II cartoon.

"This one-of-a-kind production reveals the untold story and the human side of John Paul II . . . [who] was the driving force behind great social and political changes, and his papacy had far-reaching effects on the history of humanity," says the voiceover in the trailer at "The Friend of All Humanity" website. Beautiful stuff, highly recommended.

Not only extreme but inhuman

Had things worked out between the People's Republic of North Korea and the Land of the Free and the Home of the Brave as fantasized by the happy campers of the Clinton White House back when Maddy met Kim in October of 2000 (above left), her shimmering patronym -- Albright -- as contrasted to his [first/last?] name -- Il [Ill?] -- would have been metaphorical fodder for the blogger's mill. But as it turned out, we're using the PRNKs recent new-Q-lar unpleasantness as an opportunity to tout a new category for this blog, "Take your pick." This is the third time we've asked ourselves that very question. It's starting to look like a meme. In this case, it's Kim Jong-Il vs. Boston's warm and wise and user-friendly Cardinal O'Malley (above right, Cardinal Seán's Fall Trip to Rome photo): Take your pick. Previous take your picks here and here.

Our sis is forever lightly scolding us with the epithet "too soon made glad." No doubt we are, and in that spirit we now confess that Boston's own Cardinal Seán O'Malley makes us smile with our heart. He blogs at Cardinal Seán’s Fall Trip To Rome, where the comments confirm the Capuchin monk chosen by Papa Ratzi to lead the oft beleaguered Archdiocese of Boston out of the desert is really on to something. Here's what we asked His Eminence today via the comments there:

Your blog is truly warm and wonderful and inspiring, and I’m not even catholic. As the late Oriana Fallaci said, “If an atheist and a pope [Papa Ratzi] think the same things, there must be something true.”

My question for you, should you find time and interest to respond in a future post, is what are we to make of the Amish community’s forgiveness of the torturer and murderer of their children? My thinking is that their response is only the other side of the coin of Islamic radicals’ violent response to the slightest offense. In my view, both -- presumably justified by religious arguments -- are not only extreme but inhuman. The Amish response amounts to appeasement of bad behavior, which would seem to encourage rather than restrain future bad acts.

We invite our readers' thoughts.

"Previous years' plumpest, most succulent dates were the Osama bin Laden and the Saddam Hussein"

The two faces of Lebanon: Gynophobe "Nasrallah [above left] is the talk of the town and hot date this year" as the Islamic holy month of Ramadan shifts into high gear and "date stalls in the Egyptian capital are packed with 'Nasrallahs' and 'Nasrallah rockets,' priced at about $2 a pound [while] previous years' plumpest, most succulent dates were the Osama bin Laden and the Saddam Hussein," reports the WaPo. Market forces will out. Meanwhile, another son of Lebanon, Detroit shining star Yousif Ghafari (above right) -- Chairman of the American powerhouse Ghafari, Inc. -- is putting his money where his mouth is (see below).

"The risk of action is a much better alternative to the risk of inaction," said Cisco Chief Executive John Chambers, one of a select group of corporate leaders tapped by President Bush "to lead a private-sector rebuilding effort in Lebanon similar to ones the White House launched last year in Pakistan and Central America," reports the Wall Street Journal (subscription only):

While earlier campaigns followed natural disasters, the Lebanon effort aims to help the country recover from Israel's bombing during the war with the Islamic militant group Hezbollah.

. . . in an interview after meeting with President Bush, [Chambers] dismissed the idea that postwar Lebanon might be a politically tricky place for a CEO to represent the U.S. government . . . describing Lebanon as "the linchpin to many other opportunities around the world" . . .

The four executives handling the Lebanon project chipped in $1 million of their own money to the new U.S.-Lebanon Partnership Fund, while Citibank and the federal Overseas Private Investment Corp. created a $120 million loan facility to offer financing for home repairs, small businesses and long-term mortgages.

One of the four executives is Yousif Ghafari, a Lebanese Christian who came to the United States in 1972:

For years Mr. Ghafari donated to the Republican Party, but this year [2004] he stepped up the pace, raising $350,000 to become a Ranger. He said that "the 9/11 situation was a bad situation for us" but that he supported Mr. Bush for "taking the initiative" to oust Saddam Hussein and believed that Mr. Bush had the capacity to resolve the Palestinian-Israeli conflict.

"The Western-educated and business-motivated know that the whole Middle Eastern region has to change," said Mr. Ghafari, who collected donations from non-Arabs as well.

Nasrallah or Ghafari? Take your pick. Ghafari, who has served on several U.N. committees, floats our boat. This from his October 2004 "Statement on Human Rights":

We urge all governments in the region to fulfill the promise of the Doha Declaration for Democracy and Reform, which calls on all Arab countries to adopt modern, democratic constitutions, regularly hold free and fair elections, place limits on executive power, guarantee freedom of association and expression, permit the full participation of women in political life, and end extra-judicial procedures, emergency laws and torture.

However, in some countries in the Middle East region we continue to see no abatement in authorities’ use of torture; in the repression of free speech and of independent political and religious activity; no tempering of overreaching executive power, which works to the detriment of political and religious pluralism, civil society development, independent judiciaries and governmental accountability.  The need for concrete reform continues in Syria.  Iran’s already poor human rights record worsened when regime hardliners manipulated this year’s Majlis elections to ensure victory.  We have encouraged Libya to demonstrate the bold leadership it evidenced in eliminating its weapons of mass destruction and MTCR-class missile programs, by undertaking fundamental reforms in the areas of human rights and political freedom.  As President Bush stated last December, when welcoming Libya’s commitment to eliminate WMD, “should Libya pursue internal reform, America will be ready to help its people to build a more free and prosperous country.”

Hearts and minds come to mind.

The truth will out

"Once to every man and nation comes the moment to decide, In the strife of truth with falsehood, for the good or evil side," goes the rousing anthem penned by one of our own local boys, James R. Lowell, published in the Boston Courier December 11, 1845 "as a poem protesting America’s war with Mexico." Take your pick: ROP demonstrators in Kashmir (AP photo) left, or the man Fallaci loved, Papa Ratzi (AFP photo).

"It's good to have come to something approaching the end of this saga, whose lessons are worth remembering." writes Cyrus Nowrasteh, screenwriter of the famously defamed TV miniseries "Path to 9/11," in his thoughtful Opinion Journal piece "The Path to Hysteria," subtitled "My sin was to write a screenplay accurately depicting Bill Clinton's record on terrorism":

The hysteria engendered by the series found more than one target. In addition to the death threats and hate mail directed at me, and my grotesque portrayal as a maddened right-winger, there developed an impassioned search for incriminating evidence on everyone else connected to the film . . . In the era of McCarthyism, the merest hint of a connection to communism sufficed to inspire dark accusations, the certainty that the accused was part of a malign conspiracy. Today, apparently, you can get something of that effect by charging a connection with a Christian mission . . .

It gave us, for one thing, a heartening glimpse (these things don't come along every day) of corporate backbone in the face of phenomenal pressure -- and an infinitely more chilling one testifying to the power and reach of politically driven hysteria. A ripe subject for a miniseries, if ever there was one.

Change "corporate" backbone to "papal" backbone and "politically driven" hysteria to "religionistically driven" hysteria, and the same can be said about Papa Razi's polite but firm refusal yesterday to bow down in dhimmitude before the howling heresimachs of the Religion of Peace™:

At this time, I wish also to add that I am deeply sorry for the reactions in some countries to a few passages of my address at the University of Regensburg, which were considered offensive to the sensibility of Muslims.

These in fact were a quotation from a medieval text, which do not in any way express my personal thought . . .

I hope that this serves to appease hearts and to clarify the true meaning of my address, which in its totality was and is an invitation to frank and sincere dialogue, with great mutual respect.

ScrappleFace, with only slight exaggeration, goes for the jugular:

A day after violent Muslim riots spurred Pope Benedict XVI to apologize for implying that Islam has brought more evil to the world, the Pontiff today agreed to consider a petition to add the name of Islam’s founder to the pantheon of Roman Catholic saints. Vatican researchers said the application is already being processed and they need only find one more verifiable after-death miracle attributed to Muhammad . . .

“We already have ample evidence that the long-dead prophet miraculously caused a major religious leader, with a reputation for infallibility, to apologize for telling the truth.”

Whether it's the Keepers of the Clinton "Legacy" trying to repress free speech by pressuring a network to cancel a miniseries here at home or the ululating phantasists of the Ummah calling for Benedetto's head over there, as we blogged awhile back:

The totalitarian impulse runs deep and dark in our species. The dustbin of history is filled with fiery-eyed idealists who saw the one true way and, rationalizing that ends justify the means, took it upon themselves to give thumbs up or down to mere mortals like ourselves.

Just ask George Soros, the hedge-fund billionaire "dedicated to transforming our constitutional republic into a socialist hive," according Richard Poe, co-author with David Horowitz of The Shadow Party, who tells Jamie Glazov in a FrontPage interview [via Atlas Shrugs via Maggie's Farm]:

The Shadow Party operates through deception.  It uses the Democratic Party as camouflage. By posing as ordinary Democrats, Shadow Party candidates trick mainstream voters into supporting them.  Their true agenda remains concealed.  As Soros writes in The Age of Fallibility, “[T]he Democratic Party does not stand for the policies that I advocate; indeed, if it did, it could not be elected.”

When you know what's best for the rest of us, truth need not apply.

Update: Pajamas Media links.