Live Coverage of the Coleman - Franken Election Trial

Live coverage of the Coleman - Franken election trial available here, at the Uptake.

Pope Benedict Lifts Excommunication of Holocaust Denying Bishop

Pope Benedict continues the rightward-lurching of the Catholic Church.

From AP:

Pope Benedict XVI has lifted the excommunications of four bishops consecrated without papal consent 20 years ago by the late French ultraconservative Archbishop Marcel Lefebvre, the Vatican announced Saturday.

One of the four bishops was shown this week in an interview saying that the Nazi gas chambers probably didn't exist. The report prompted Rome's chief rabbi to ask the Vatican to halt plans to rehabilitate him.

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Richard Williamson said in a Swedish state TV interview that historical evidence "is hugely against 6 million Jews having been deliberately gassed." The Vatican had no comment on the report.

Ruth Gledhill, the Religion correspondent for the Times of London notes the disaster of bringing Williamson back in as a representative of the church:

If he brings them back in with Williamson on board, then truly it will be a disaster. Vatican II might as well never have happened and it won't just be the Jewish community that would be justifiably disgusted.

The Times of London reports on the sense of dismay as the Pope acts to reinstate Williamson and his Society of St. Pius X (SSPX) bretheren, who opposed the reforms of the Second Vatican Council:

Some Vatican officials are also saying privately that although the Pope’s stated aim was to unite the Church by bringing the rebels back into the fold, his move would have the opposite effect. “The Church will pay a price for this” one Vatican prelate said. “The Pope is undermining the legacy of John Paul II.”

The denial of the existence of Nazi gas chambers, and of the holocaust itself are not Williamson's only anti-Semitic acts. According to Gledhill of the Times:

In an earlier story in the Catholic Herald, Bishop Williamson was exposed as endorsing the forgery, the Protocols of the Elders of Zion.

Pope Benedict has taken other steps to move the church to the right, and to move away from the raprochment achieved through Vatican II.

This month Elia Enrico Richetti, the chief rabbi of Venice, said Jews had been deeply offended by the reintroduction by the Pope in March of a Good Friday Latin prayer for the conversion of the Jews as part of the revived Tridentine Mass. “We are moving toward the cancellation of 50 years of Church history” the rabbi said

The Catholic Herald story on Williamson is well worth the read for anyone who wishes an understanding of the broad anti-Semitism preached by now-Bishop Williamson.


h/t: Andrew Sullivan at "The Dish", whose article contains a video of Williamson speaking on the Holocaust.

Kennedy Released From Hospital

Senator Edward Kennedy was released this morning from Washington Hospital Center, where he had been taken after collapsing in convulsions during an inaugural luncheon yesterday. Kennedy, who was diagnosed with a malignant brain tumor last May, had undergone brain surgery last year.

According to the New York Times:

Dr. Edward F. Aulisi, the hospital’s chairman of neurosurgery, said Tuesday that the seizure had probably been brought on by “simple fatigue” after a long morning in the cold at the inaugural ceremony. Medical experts said a seizure in a brain cancer patient was not unusual and ordinarily had no serious consequences.

(Photo credit.)

Kennedy, Byrd Stricken, Taken From Capitol By Ambulance

Senator Edward T. Kennedy was stricken during the post-inaugural luncheon in Statuary Hall, and, after immediate medical attention by Congressional medical staff, was taken by ambulance to Washington Hospital Center.

Senator Kennedy, who had surgery for brain cancer last year, apparently suffered convulsions or a seizure. Earlier reports that Senator Robert Byrd was also stricken were turned aside by some in attendance at the event, according to the Washington Post:

Sen. Robert C. Byrd (D-W.Va.), who was sitting at the same table with Kennedy, was taken from the room by staff moments before medical personnel arrived to assist Kennedy. Byrd's exit from the room was related to Kennedy's condition and not any medical problems of his own, said [Sen. John] Kerry. "He was concerned about what was happening with Senator Kennedy," Kerry told reporters.

Early indications are that Senator Kennedy was alert and in no substantial distress after his attack.

Further coverage by the Washington Post, New York Times, MSNBC.


Editorial changes made at 1:55 p.m., particularly to clarify the involvement of Sen. Byrd.

Live Streaming Video - Inauguration

Live stream from MSNBC:

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/21134540/vp/22887506#22887506

Moderate Earthquake Hits San Bernardino, California

Update: Magnitude downgraded to 4.5 on the Richter Scale.
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A moderate earthquake, preliminarily rated 5.0 on the Richter Scale, has hit one mile south of San Bernardino, California at 7:50 p.m. this evening, January 8. The epicenter is some 55 miles east of the Los Angeles Civic Center.

Light ground swaying was felt where we sit, just east of Santa Monica, some 65 miles west of the epicenter, and was also reported in the southwest San Fernando Valley.

Further info available at California Integrated Seismic Net . A map of the area, including graphic representation of the quake, is available here.

Additional reporting at the local paper, the San Bernardino Sun, under "breaking news." (Click on headline for story, comments by locals.)

(Slight editing for readability and to add information, at 8:45 p.m.)