18 | February | 2009

Not that they were ever on a tight rein, but let’s face it, now that they have a kindred spirit in the White House, ACORN’s radical lawlessness will rule the day.

Michelle Malkin has this distressing report out, today:

Fresh off the trillion-dollar porkulus bill signing in Denver, President Obama immediately launched into his next New Raw Deal expansion: A massive mortgage entitlement program forcing lenders to refinance at an initial cost of $50 billion to $100 billion. That’s in addition to the bipartisan-supported $50 billion in the “stimulus” bill to bail out homeowners underwater on their mortgages and the $2 billion in “neighborhood stabilization” funds to alleviate the foreclosure crisis.

The very definition of insanity.

In tandem with the White House Bad Borrowers Bailout, Obama’s old friends at the Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now (ACORN) are launching a new campaign of their own: the “Home Savers” campaign. What a coinky-dinky, huh? As with most of the bully tactics of the radical left-wing wing group, it ain’t gonna be pretty. They are the shock troops on the streets doing the dirty work while the Community Organizer-in-Chief keeps his delicate hands clean.

Trumpets ACORN: “On Feb. 19, ACORN members will launch a new tactic in fighting foreclosures: civil disobedience. Participants in the ACORN Home Savers campaign nationwide will simply refuse to move out of foreclosed homes, or in some cases, will move back in. ACORN homesteaders intend to squat in their homes until a comprehensive, federal solution for people facing foreclosure is put in place.”

Michelle reminds us of Obama’s promise to let ACORN help shape his agenda:

Read the entire report. The inmates are now running the asylum, folks.

This is a bright spot in an otherwise dreary week of God-awful political news. You’ve got to hand it to Nancy, though; it takes an amazing amount of chutzpa to request an audience with Pope Benedict VI with her extreme pro- abortion views, and after she was publicly rebuked by Washington Archbishop Donald W. Wuerl in that embarrassing incident, just last August.

LifeSiteNews reports:

VATICAN CITY, February 18, 2009 (LifeSiteNews.com) – The Vatican Press Office released a note this morning detailing part of the conversation which Pope Benedict XVI had with Nancy Pelosi, the Speaker of the House of Representatives. Vatican insiders inform LifeSiteNews.com that such releases are always phrased in diplomatic language and thus the correction of the Speaker who fancies herself a faithful Catholic despite her abortion advocacy can be taken as a rebuke.

The text of the note reads: “His Holiness took the opportunity to speak of the requirements of the natural moral law and the Church’s consistent teaching on the dignity of human life from conception to natural death which enjoin all Catholics, and especially legislators, jurists and those responsible for the common good of society, to work in cooperation with all men and women of good will in creating a just system of laws capable of protecting human life at all stages of its development.”

Not the photo op she was hoping for, I’m sure.

Hat tip: Gateway Pundit

UPDATE:

Last summer in that disastrous Meet the Press interview, Pelosi had said, “I would say that as an ardent, practicing Catholic, this is an issue that I have studied for a long time”.

Ed Morrissey at Hot Air characterizes the Pope’s words as, “Study more”.

Heh. Something tells me that ain’t gonna happen.

UPDATE II:

The Anchoress has a great roundup of blog reactions to Pelosi’s audience with the Pope. Do not miss The Corner’s fictional account of what the meeting may have looked like.

Also, read John Allen, from The National Catholic Reporter:

While the Vatican typically puts out brief declarations after the pope meets with a head of state, encounters with lower-level officials are generally considered private. Doing so in this case thus suggests that the pope wanted to make a point.
…
Not only was it unusual to issue a statement after a meeting with an official who’s not a head of state, routine Vatican declarations after diplomatic meetings also generally sum up the range of issues discussed rather than concentrating on a particular point.

In that sense, the statement can only be read as a rejection of Pelosi’s statements last summer, and, in general, of her argument that it’s acceptable for Catholics in public life to take a pro-choice position.