“What is wanted is not the will to believe, but the will to find out, which is the exact opposite.” ---Bertrand Russell
Big Money Republicans learned from their mistakes in 2012. They “plan to change the public perception that the GOP doesn’t care about people….It is time to smartly change course…and learn once again how to appeal to more people.” Their candidates in competitive states will campaign on populist issues, “talking in normal, people-oriented terms.” Their methodically constructed image will be that of a “compassionate” person concerned with the welfare of the middle class. Corporate-owned television, websites, radio, newspapers and magazines will gloss over or fail to cover the candidate’s past and present actions contradicting his/her image.
Have we advanced the plutocrats’ expectations and chances of success this November by demonstrating the incredible effectiveness of this type of campaign?
Progressives know that U.S. bishops are zealous advocates for the Republican Party whether or not they know how and why the Religious Right was created, that the last two popes who appointed these hierarchs also appointed the cardinals who elected Pope Francis and that the corporate media is a dedicated tool of the plutocracy. Yet the vast majority have believed the methodically selected photos, quotes and sound-bites about the pope and have no “will to find out” that Pope Francis’ actions (see below) are the polar opposite of this carefully constructed image.
New York Cardinal Timothy Dolan, the prelate of Wall Street, confidently stated only months after Pope Francis’ election that the pontiff “has boosted the ‘reputation and credibility’of the Church, making it easier for bishops to move the [political] ball on many fronts.” A recent CBS poll shows that “more people than ever feel the Church is in touchwith their needs.”
Can the Republican “brand” be similarly transformed? We can consider the corporate media’s omission of the following information in creating Pope Francis' image before deciding this important question.
Background
Jorge Mario Bergoglio was promoted up the ecclesial ranks from priest to Argentina’s only cardinal by the last media-created superstar pope, John Paul II, because he shared his hostility to liberation theology and progressive government. As a hierarch, Bergoglio acted pretty much the same as his American confreres. He bitterly opposed legalization of same-sex marriage. When the Fernandez administration “pushed for mandatory sex education in schools, free distribution of contraceptives in public hospitals, and the right for transsexuals to change their official identities on demand,” Bergoglio accused the president of “demagoguery, totalitarianism, corruption and efforts to secure unlimited power” in a 2012 address.
Cardinal Bergoglio led by example in giving hand-outs to the poor but steadfastly opposed a government which wanted to eliminate the causes of poverty. Victims of clerical sex abuse were denied assistancefrom Cardinal Bergoglio and the prelate also “slowed victims in their fight to expose and prosecute their assailants.”
After Pope Benedict’s resignation, American prelates brought their sophisticated and extensive media resourceswith them to Rome. They waged a successful campaign to formulate and advance the “issues” which would become paramount to the other cardinal/electors resulting in the defeat of the candidate preferred by Italian and curial prelates – the only serious opposition to Bergoglio.
George Weigel, a founding theocon of the Religious Right and head of one of the first neocon think-tanks, the Ethics and Public Policy Center, told Chris Matthews the day Bergoglio became pope. “I spent an hour talking with Cardinal Bergoglio in Buenos Aires last May….The thing that needs to be said here. This is a man very much formed by the pontificate of John Paul II, who loved him to pieces. And I think we`re going to see a little bit more of that in this pontificate as it goes forward.”
At least two Latin American theologians agreed. “Even though his name is ‘Francis,’ the pope is a medieval Roman monarch. The image has changed, only the image. The power structure is the same; its interests, the same. In Argentina and on the continent, the right-wing sectors, both political and religious, will be strengthened. They're already celebrating,” noted Fr. Nicolas Alessio. “The See of Peter and the Vatican State are positioning their pieces in the world game of chess in order to empower the political projectschampioned by the North and its allies in the South,” wrote the Brazilian, Ivone Gebarra.
Two siblings of Argentines denied assistance by Fr. Bergoglio during the Dirty War (1976-83) were also dismayed by Bergoglio's election. “He is a good actor” and his media-constructed image “makes me indignant,” said Estela de la Cuadra, 77, whose sister, Elena, was “disappeared” by the military junta when she was five months pregnant. “Pope Francis is a marketing phenomenon,” stated Rodolfo Yorio, brother of a Jesuit priest kidnapped and tortured while under Bergoglio’s supervision.
First Days as Pope
Cardinal Bergoglio said he was taking the name “Francis” after St. Francis of Assisi and said he wanted a “poor Church.” St. Francis gave away everything he owned and lived in complete humility. None of the saint’s biographers suggest St. Francis would have accepted a position making him rich as Croesus, an absolute dictator of sovereign state and head of a global financial empire.
Pope Francis has taken no steps to divest the Vatican of its inestimable wealth, nor has he directed any of his diocesan bishops or heads of religious orders to do so. The goal is to look poor, not be poor.
In the future, however, there will be more press releases about the pope and his bishops giving money to charity to enhance their “reputation and credibility,” the reports carefully timed to offset some negative news.
Pope Francis lives in St. Martha’s House but has a personal staff of two private secretaries and two valets. Meanwhile, the Apostolic Palace still must be fully staffed since, by necessity of space and privacy, most meetings and audiences are held in that building.
The morning after his election, Pope Francis “cordially greeted" Cardinal Bernard Law, run out of Boston because of his responsibility in the torture of hundreds of victims of clerical sex abuse.
The Pope’s Privy Council
The worst fears of those who were alarmed at Bergoglio’s election were realized when, exercising his first prerogative as absolute dictator, he named a group of cardinals to advise him in the governance of the universal Church. Its members include:
Boston Cardinal Sean O’Malley, the only American. O'Malley said Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney “was a better friend to the Catholic Churchthan any other Massachusetts governor in decades, and he was about the only one that wasn't Catholic” and invited the governor to accompany him to the Vatican when he was installed as cardinal.
O’Malley is a leader in the U.S. bishops' attacks against Obamacare although the cardinal had not objected to Romneycare which provides insurance coverage for abortion and “specifically forced Catholic hospitals” to provide the Plan B emergency contraception to rape victims, not just pay an insurance premium which covers it.
Scores of Catholic and evangelical organizations have filed suits against the Affordable Care Act, “desperate attempts to do in courts what Republicans have failed to do in the political arena,” (New York Times editorial) and at tremendous expense to taxpayers.
Pope Francis is supportive of the bishops’ attempts to deprive Americans of health care.
Days after discussing the U.S. Catholic bishops’ fight over contraception with President Obama, Pope Francis met Monday (March 31) with members of the Green family, the Oklahoma billionaires whose company, Hobby Lobby, took their challenge to Obama’s contraception mandate to the Supreme Court last week.
“The pope askedhow the (Hobby Lobby) case was progressing.”
Other Republican operatives such as George Weigel and Carl Anderson, Supreme Knight of the Knights of Columbus, have also met privately with the pope while, other than Pres. Obama, not one American Democrat, liberal or progressive has been granted a similar privilege. Neither could any of the scores of officials this pope has appointed so far be described as liberal or progressive.
O’Malley is also a champion of Opus Dei which supports a global network of graduate business schoolsand student centers at the world’s leading universities to train and recruit a continuous supply of professionals dedicated to building up the Catholic plutocracy. In the U.S., this includes Harvard, Princeton, Stanford, Brown, Columbia, UCLA, Georgetown and at least ten other American colleges. In addition to supporting Harvard’s Opus Dei student center, O’Malley sponsored the canonization of Fr. Jose’ Luis Muzquiz who established an Opus Dei presence among students and professorsat Harvard and Massachusetts Institute of Technology between 1946 and 1956.
In May 2013, O’Malley refused an invitation to attend the Boston College commencement because Irish PM Enda Kenny was the speaker. “Mr. Kenny is aggressively promoting abortion legislation,” O’Malley declared. After the tragic death of Savita Halappanavar, an Indian-born dentist who died of sepsis after doctors in Galway refused to terminate her non-viable fetus despite her desperate pleas to do so, the Irish government was trying to change its total ban on all abortions.
Pope Francis called abortion an “abominable crime” and has never suggested that any allowances be made to save a woman’s life.
Australian Cardinal George Pell is another member of the pope's council. After becoming archbishop, Pell also “championed” the establishment of Opus Dei in Melbourne and Sydney. Pell has maintained a close relationship with Australia’s conservative PM, Tony Abbott, and his party for decades. The week before Pell was appointed by the pope to his council, he attended a “Gala Dinner” celebrating the “ultraconservative think tank,” Institute of Public Affairs. Rupert Murdoch was guest of honor and Abbott the keynote speaker. After the pope made Pell head of all the Vatican’s finances and administration, Murdoch tweeted the news about the “brilliant” cardinal.
The sexual abuse of children in Australia was so egregious that Labor PM Julia Gillard instituted a Royal Commission several years ago to investigate. As head of the Australian Church, Pell was called as a witness in April. According to victims’ advocate, Thomas P. Doyle, J.C.D., C.A.D.C., “The reaction of most decent people to his testimony probably runs from revolting to infuriating to disbelief.” Last month, the Abbott government was questioned about the “the redirection of $6.7m previously earmarked” for the sex abuse commission into an inquiry it was conducting about a Labor program.
Chilean Cardinal Francisco Errazuriz Ossa. When the former dictator, Augusto Pinochet, was arrested in London in 1998 on orders of a Spanish magistrate investigating atrocities committed against Spanish citizens, Errazuriz said the arrest of Pinochet was a barbarity, British justice was defective and the British themselves uncivilized. (Hugh O’Shaughnessy Pinochet: The Politics of Torture, 2000 pp 77-78) “He later criticized human rights lawsuits in Chile against Pinochetand other officials of the former regime, saying, ‘Excessive justice could be detrimental to reconciliation and social peace.’” In a 2003 interview, Errazuriz praised Pinochet’s dictatorship (1973 – 1990) : “Chilean coup leaders left the economy in the hands of experts…Such changes can only be implemented during a dictatorship.”
Errazuriz made headlines in Chile for protecting Fr. Fernando Karadima, spiritual leader of Santiago’s most influential families. The first reports of child sex abuse by Karadima reached Errázuriz in mid-2003 but, as he explained in an e-mail, “I judged that the accusations were not credible at the time.” In 2006, one of Errazuriz’ aides made a report to the cardinal stating that he believed “the accusers to be credible and suggesting certain courses of action.” The prelate suspended the investigationfor more than three years, but removed Karadima and consulted with the Vatican and two canon law experts. The Vatican “sanctioned” Karadima by ordering him to a life of “penitence and prayer,” but he remains a priest in good standing and was photographed in 2014as still being actively engaged in ministry.
Honduran Cardinal Oscar Rodriguez Maradiaga is head of the Privy Council, “some might say vice pope.” Rodríguez Maradiaga is “the leader of Opus Dei” in Honduras which “participated actively in the 2009 coupagainst the constitutional president, Manuel Zelaya.”
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Zelaya had raised the minimum wage from about $1.20 per hour to $1.70 per hour, angering sweatshop owners, the restaurant owners, Chiquita, and others who rely on low wages (Honduran minimum wage laws are complex, and beyond the scope of the present work.)
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Zelaya had refused to illegalize the "morning after" pill, angering the Roman Catholic hierarchy, as well as most evangelicals Zelaya had resisted privatization of the electrical and phone companies, angering those who hoped to profit from privatization Zelaya had ended the Byzantine regulation of gasoline, which had boosted prices, obtaining cheap gas through Petrocaribe, and angering international oil companies and those who profited from the existing system.
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Zelaya wanted to convert Palmerola airbase to civilian use (the runway at Toncontin airport is too short for civilian aircraft to safely land), angering the US military. Z
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Zelaya wanted to fulfill the campaign rhetoric on an Asamblea Nacional Constituyente (Constitutional Convention), and was laying the framework by holding a non-binding poll to put political pressure on Congress to act. Since the power of the oligarchy requires that the political system frustrate any possible reform, this threatened their interests.
Last week, the New York Times printed the following headline and lede: “Lawmakers Ask State Dept. to Review Support for Honduras - More than 100 members of Congress, outlining the deteriorating human rights situation in Honduras, called for pressure on the Honduran government.”
Described as a “notorious anti-Semite,” Rodríguez Maradiaga blamed "the Jews" for the scandal of clerical sex abuse.
Although not a member of the Privy Council,Cardinal Pietro Parolin was appointed by Pope Francis as Secretary of State. Karol Wojtyla became Pope John Paul II in 1978, “as right-wing death squadswere gaining momentum across Latin America.” The first media super-star pontiff directed his Church’s resources, including his travel itinerary and personal appearances, in support of the butchers of hundreds of thousands. Pope John Paul II allied with the Reagan administration, the Knights of Malta and Opus Dei to defeat the “anti-clerical leftists” in Latin America.
John Paul was advised on Latin American affairs by his Secretary of State Angelo Sodano, during “an era in which the universal Church was constantly of core geopolitical importance... With the struggle againt Liberation Theology as background, Sodano built a network of papal nuncios and bishops from which he exerted his influence over Latin America.... There is a whole generation of nuncios, diplomats and bishops who owe their rise to Cardinal Sodano. The star of Jorge Mario Bergoglio starts rising in the 90s."
Parolin, described as a “protégé of,” “raised by” and “close to” Sodano, the pope has further increased Parolin’s power by appointing him to the supervisory commission of the Vatican Bank and to the most important Congregations of the Doctrine of the Faith, for Bishops, and for the Evangelization of Peoples.
There really can be no doubt about Pope Francis’ commitment to Latin American oligarchs. He advanced the ecclesial career of his friend, Uruguayan Guzman Carriquiry Lecour, to first to secretary and then vice president of the Pontifical Commission for Latin America. As an “activist” member of Opus Dei, Carriquiry is committed to working on behalf of landowners and other business elites.
The Pope Appoints Vulture Capitalists to “Clean Up” Vatican Finances.
The pope has said a lot of really nice stuff about economics. As usual, the pope’s actions contradict his words.
As head of the Buenos Aires archdiocese, Cardinal Bergoglio “transferred its funds to international banks such as HSBC and UBS,” two banks which have paid enormous fines for illegal operations.
The essential fact about this pope’s efforts to “reform” Vatican finances is that he has no choice. “Worldwide banking and financial activities” is one of the Vatican City State’s “industries” according to the CIA Factbook. Wth no external demands for moral business practices, both Popes John Paul and Benedict (initially) did nothing to curb Vatican financial corruption. “But the euro crisis changed all that,” noted the Financial Times. Pressure from Europe’s financial oversight agencies began to “crackdown on states that failed to comply with international rules.” Regulators required financial institutions to stop doing business in countries without similar laws. Since the Vatican conducts its business on a global basis, the pope has no choice but to meet international standards. “The pursuit by [Italian] prosecutors and regulators of the Vatican created a shift in mood among [multinational] bankers to the Holy See. It was the bankers’ fear of being tarnished by their links with the Vatican Bank after the credit crisis – and fears of fines from emboldened regulators – that led them to take steps that forced [the Vatican] to clean up its act.”
The process was begun by Pope Benedict but the corporate media used this as another opportunity to create a “reform” image of Bergoglio although not one of the scores of advisers and consultants the pope has appointed has any track record in fiscal ethics. In fact, just the opposite is true.
(Two officials of the Vatican Bank - aka IOR for the Institute of Works of Religion - director Paolo Cipriani and deputy director Massimo Tulli resigned on July 1, 2013, but “the decision came after the embarrassing revelation of an inquiry” by Italian magistratesinto a Vatican official’s “use of his Vatican bank accounts to carry out risky financial operations, all of which were approved by the IOR’s directors.”)
The only action in this pontificate so far as regards financial reform is cleaning up the IOR so that it can continue to function in international financial markets. The pope hired the Promontory Financial Group to screen every account holder so that only clergy, religious, Vatican officials and diplomats are permitted to do business there. Two Promontory employees, Rolando Marranci and Antonio Montaresi, replaced Cipriani and Tulli.
“Promontory’s activities focus heavily on the adept circumvention of regulations,” according to an article on how Promontory “attempted to suppress evidence that [U.S.] borrowers had been harmed by the false and deceptive practices of the mortgages lenders.”
From a March 2013 article in American Banker:
When banks, at the behest of regulators, turned to the consultants, Promontory was chief among them. Bank of America, Wells Fargo, and PNC picked Promontory to do the work for them, covered the tab for its services and promised to abide by its findings. Promontory developed detailed metrics and hired more than 1,000 contractors to review individual loan files….Yet the program failed. Nearly a year and a half into the process, the reviews, which cost banks a whopping $10,000 or more per loan file, had produced no relief payments to borrowers…..Promontory and the other consultants involved in the program had received a combined $2 billion in misspent cash.
Presumably on the advice of his advisers and consultants, Pope Francis instituted a “super agency” to control all Vatican finances and administration and moved Cardinal Pell from Australia to Rome as its head. Pell brought his business manager, Danny Casey, to work with him. Casey was called to testify before the Royal Commission in March:
Sydney's Catholic Archdiocese, thought to be the richest in the country, controls funds with assets of $1.24 billion and generates annual multimillion-dollar surpluses, according to evidence at the child sex abuse royal commission.
As the commission explores the church's handling of sex abuse claims, an unprecedented glimpse of the books was provided by the archdiocese's business manager, Danny Casey....
Since George Pell's appointment as archbishop in 2001, the archdiocese has received 204 claims and paid out just under $8 million to victims of child sexual assault, the commission has been told. Payments to “non-school victims” were $5.4 million. This included $740,000 for “boundary issues with adults.”
As the New York Times noted, what Bergoglio is doing is “consolidating his power.” This past week, he dismissed the Pope Benedict-appointed-five-man board of the Vatican’s Financial Information Authority, instituted by Benedict as his first measure to comply with international financial regulations. Their replacements are a female Italian business executive, a Swiss financial consultant, a former security adviser to Pres. George W. Bush (keeping the pope's perfect record that every American who holds a Vatican position is a Republican) and Joseph Pillay, “who helped build up Singapore’s economyas a top civil servant and businessman.”
What makes Pillay’s appointment interesting is that another official from Singapore was recently named to the Vatican’s Council for the Economy. George Yeo was Minister of Finance for Singapore and a Brigadier-General in the Singapore Armed Forces. He is on the advisory board of Harvard Business School and Opus Dei’s graduate IESE Business School. Do these appointments indicate a need for “connections” inside the Vatican to this Asian financial market?
World Affairs
With confidence in the Catholic Church restored, plutocrats can once again dream of a parallel UN under their control. Pope Benedict had called for “a world authority…with limited jurisdiction.” Describing it as “primarily a moral force,” it was clear he had the Vatican in mind. Regarding the summit meeting at the Vatican with Israeli Pres. Shimon Peres and Palestinian Pres. Mahnoud Abbas, the New York Times noted: “Pope Francis is attempting to position the Vatican as an independent, global diplomatic player.”
The event is also meant to draw a comparison to the failure of Pres. Obama and Sect. of State Kerry to arrange a similar meeting, a victory for Church leaders sweetened by the massive effort and money they spent trying to defeat both as presidential candidates.
Similarly, although the massacre of civilians had been ongoing since the day he was elected, the pope waited until the U.S. president proposed a limited air strike to "hold the Assad regime accountable for their use of chemical weapons, deter this kind of behavior and degrade their capacity to carry it out" to hold a massive peace rally in St. Peter’s Square where he could denouce all use of force.
Among those "who truly rule the world," Vladimir Putin is No. 1 and Pope Francis No. 4 behind Barack Obama and Xi Jinping according to Forbes’ October edition. In March, another business publication, Fortune, named him the “World’s Greatest Leader.”
So, can the Republican “brand” be similarly transformed? That depends on our "will to find out."
(Betty Clermont is author of The Neo-Catholics: Implementing Christian Nationalism in America (Clarity Press, 2009))