Forgive me if someone else mentioned this as I admit I didn't read all the comments, but how does Lopez or anyone else know these nuns planned to vote Democratic? Presumably, Republicans like Lopez expected the ID law would hurt just the Democrats they intended to disenfranchise, so if these nuns were caught by it, they must be Democrats, right? Thus the question of how nuns could vote Democratic? It didn't even occur to Lopez until an update that they might have voted Republican. By contrast, forgive the patting ourselves on the back, I've seen no Democrats or liberals comment on the nuns' likely party preference. In my case at least, that's because their preference is beside the point. Their right to express it is the issue. I'm sure liberals have tried to protect the voting rights of plenty of people who didn't even know they were ever threatened with disenfranchisement and voted for the disenfranchisers. However, maybe these nuns, like so many other people whose voting rights are under attack, are smart enough to figure out that one party tries to protect their vote and one tries to take it away, and therefore which party to vote for is clear.

I'm not in a position today to look any of this up, but if my memory serves me the Vatican weighed in on the criteria for just wars a few pontiffs back. Again, I can't remember the name of the pope--I'm half muslim, half catholic, so cut me some slack. I'm also pretty sure that the Iraq war, and every conflict that we've had since World War II (and probably every one that came between that and the Revolutionary war) does not fit the bill. Does anyone know/remember this? Or have a link?

I haven't read all of the comments yet, so don't know if you've corrected this, but Douglas Kmiec is at Pepperdine Law School, NOT Notre Dame.

Glenn knows that, because I emailed him as soon as I saw his update, and as I suspected he already was aware of where Kmiec currently teaches. Glenn's phrasing is ambiguous since he meant the word "formerly" to modify both Catholic University and Notre Dame. But, Kmiec did teach Con Law at Notre Dame when I went to law school there 15 years ago. He was my second fave prof.

Addressing a few other points: Catholic doctrine is that at conception all human beings acquire Original Sin. As for war v. abortion, I believe unjust war is considered just as "intrinsically evil" as is abortion, per my former Church's doctrine.

I think this is an important question for Catholics. Some Catholics (both laity and clergy) want to focus on the personal details of individual's lives, and demand authority and control over practices like birth control, abortion, homosexuality and marriage. But others are concerned about social and political problems-- human rights, poverty and deprivation, war and aggression. It's an interesting difference in ethical focus-- on one side, we have people who want to control others' lives on a very small scale, whose picture of immorality is someone doing something they disapprove of, and whose idea of a solution is to pass legislation telling others what to do in their private and personal lives-- a hopeless project, as the failure of prohibition and the war on drugs (not to mention the practice of illegal abortion, which continues everywhere that legal and safe abortions are banned); on the other side, we have people concerned about social problems that cannot be resolved without collective action, whose idea of immorality focuses more on what we do (and fail to do) collectively. On these issues, I believe the Church's voice could actually contribute to solving (or at least improving) things.

Cestmoi,

Apologies- my post on p10 wasn't clear. What I meant to say was how many Catholic votes will be lost by the Republican'ts once McCain's ties to Hagee become known during the general campaign.

The difference a lousy preposition makes.

This might be what you're looking for:

"Would war on Iraq be just? Pope John Paul II and other Catholic leaders say no."

http://www.americancatholic.org/News/JustWar/Iraq/

As you probably know, there has been a long-lived academic school of philosophy called 'Just War Theory'. Two of the most well known American political philosophers who've written about it are Michael Walzer, who made his bones with 'Just and Unjust Wars', and Jean Bethke Elshtain. Both were part of a CFR symposium on Just War Theory in the run-up to the Iraq disaster.

Wikipedia on JWT:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Just_war

Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy entry:

http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/war/

Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy entry:

http://www.mtholyoke.edu/acad/intrel/pol116/justwar.htm

This is so true, and needs to be said, over and over again until it enters meme of all Catholics.

It is unbeliavable how cavalier and indifferent many U.S. Catholics, like Ms. Lopez, can be about the carnage our country visits on foreign people in the name of national security. Hundreds of thousands of innocent Iraqis, children, women, the aged, the invalids, all killed in furtherance of our President's policies.

Begs the question, who is more Catholic, Ms. Lopez or the Vatican?

We get caught up on our own American arrogance, that Lopez-like Catholics actually instructed the Vatican how the Vatican should support the Iraqi invasion.

I recall that after the Vatican expressed its opposition to the imminent invasion of Iraq by George Bush, Mr. Michael Novak, a Catholic scholar, travelled to the Vatican to instruct the Vatican that indeed the Iraq invasion was a just cause, and that they should get in line and support it.

How about the illustious Catholic Mr. Bill O'Reilly, who stated that the Vatican had "Chutzpah" for opposing the Iraqi invasion?

Where do we get such people?

Now I understand better. My brother-in-law went to Notra Dame. He rarely steps outside of New York City. When he comes to the rural areas, he is always cranky because of flying gnat's in his ears, bees buzzing, ants crawling up his pants legs, cats purring at his legs, crowing chickens, and poor TV receptions.

He only sits and watches sports. He's been a insider, internal, Wall Street accountant forever.

He'll give all his money to his alma matter and none to me. He is sometimes generous.

He'll take a visitor to NYC to The Palms Restaurant and go to Pubs for $8:00 gin drinks.

He swears at the cab driver, but tips everyone well.

The worst idiosyncrasy is this:~;

If you are a visitor and wake up at 2:00AM to relive yourself, Uncle Tom (His first name is Tom) is passed out on the bathroom commode. He runs from his bedroom to the bathroom with no clothes. Serious.

I wonder if all Notra Dame graduates are the same-same? Probably not. I hope not.