{"id":4036,"date":"2009-01-19T08:41:56","date_gmt":"2009-01-19T13:41:56","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.shotinthedark.info\/wp\/?p=4036"},"modified":"2009-01-19T08:42:47","modified_gmt":"2009-01-19T13:42:47","slug":"minnesota-independent-news-politics-media-%c2%bb-vatican-body-minnesota-professor%e2%80%99s-sin-worse-than-genocide","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.shotinthedark.info\/wp\/?p=4036","title":{"rendered":"Hail Soros, Full Of Cash. MoveOn.org Is With Thee."},"content":{"rendered":"

For the past couple of years, we’ve gone to the Minnesoros Monitor <\/em>and “Independent”<\/em> for shrill, frequently inaccurate<\/a>, often risible <\/a>lefty propaganda.<\/p>\n

Fastidious fact-checking?\u00a0 Naaah.<\/p>\n

Now, as I’ve noted before, I’m not Catholic.\u00a0 I’m a committed Protestant.<\/p>\n

But when I see Paul “Not The Dumbest Writer The Mindy <\/em>Has” Schmelzer writing a story with a hed like “Vatican body: Minnesota professor\u2019s sin worse than genocide<\/a>“, I figured it was “worth” a read (where “worth” equals “barely”, and “read” means “mining for fisking material”); emphasis added by me:<\/p>\n

While Catholic bishops and priests can hear confessions about sins as severe as murder or genocide, the Vatican\u2019s 830-year-old Apostolic Penitentiary is \u201creserved for crimes which are viewed by the Church as even more serious,\u201d writes the UK\u2019s Telegraph. In Rome this week, this secretive \u201ctribunal of conscience\u201d held a two-day panel to discuss what it does and how it works. Crimes so grave they can only be absolved by the pope include attempting to assassinate the pontiff, directly participating in (or funding) abortion or desecrating the Eucharist. The inclusion of that last sin seems to put University of Minnesota professor PZ Myers in a worse class of sinner, in the eyes of Catholics, than genocidal dictators<\/strong>. The Telegraph even mentions the atheist biology professor, who blogged about his desecration of a communion wafer last summer, although it\u2019s not clear from the article whether his case was specifically discussed by the Apostolic Penitentiary:<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

So in other words, the headline creates a misleading impression that there’s a connection between Myers’ act of sophomoric vandalism <\/a>and the Vatican’s discussion…<\/p>\n

…but no matter.\u00a0 It’s not unknown for “local” news sources to dig too hard for the local angle.<\/p>\n

But here’s the real question – and I’m gonna need your help, especially were “you” are Catholics.\u00a0 As when the Mindy<\/em> tries to “report” about guns, economics, history, crime, money, or facts, their reporting about religion has always been not only one-sided, but usually wrong.\u00a0 Schmelzer’s graf tickles my “stink test” sensor, but I don’t know why – because, again, I’m a Protestant.
\nSo I’ll open this up for a group fisk by the assembled commentariat.\u00a0\u00a0 How does Schmelzer (or, one might reasonably presume, his overlords in DC) get this wrong?<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

For the past couple of years, we’ve gone to the Minnesoros Monitor and “Independent” for shrill, frequently inaccurate, often risible lefty propaganda. Fastidious fact-checking?\u00a0 Naaah. Now, as I’ve noted before, I’m not Catholic.\u00a0 I’m a committed Protestant. But when I see Paul “Not The Dumbest Writer The Mindy Has” Schmelzer writing a story with a […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[26,63],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-4036","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-faiths-and-their-followers","category-lefty-alt-media"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.shotinthedark.info\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4036","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.shotinthedark.info\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.shotinthedark.info\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.shotinthedark.info\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.shotinthedark.info\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=4036"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"http:\/\/www.shotinthedark.info\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4036\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.shotinthedark.info\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=4036"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.shotinthedark.info\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=4036"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.shotinthedark.info\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=4036"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}