Friday, March 29, AD 2024 11:01am

PopeWatch: Merchants of Death

One of the more distressing aspects of this Pontificate is how firmly Pope Francis believes things that simply are not true.  A prime example of this is his oft repeated contention that most wars are caused by arms merchants, the old “merchants of death” theory of international conflict.

This was a fairly common meme in the thirties of the last century when it was argued with a straight face, in the wake of World War I disenchantment and the growth of pacifism in the democracies, that World War I had been caused by arms dealers and by governments eager to profiteer from war.  Alas it was complete and utter rubbish and it is rubbish still.  Of course it is important to the Pope that wars be caused by sinister cabals of greedy men who initiate conflicts to make money.  This helps the Pope ignore the fact that most wars occur due to intractable differences between nations and people that are not amenable to negotiation.  Such reality does not fit into the Pope’s ideological world view, and when reality comes into conflict with what the Pope believes, so much the worse for reality.  Such a refusal to face facts can be harmful for an individual, it is disastrous for the Vicar of Christ.

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Philip Nachazel
Philip Nachazel
Monday, June 5, AD 2017 4:09am

Automobile manufacturer’s… watch out!

http://blog.spiritdaily.com/news-links/van-mows-down-pedestrians-on-london-bridge

I hope it’s not an American made van.
( Gun’s don’t kill people….Van’s do. )
Meanwhile. Prayers for the injured are forthcoming.

Prayers continuing for our Pope.
God help him.

T. Shaw
T. Shaw
Monday, June 5, AD 2017 6:09am

The problem with liberals is that they actually believe all that leftist crap.

Seen elsewhere some liberal is hugely concerned that the US (Thank God) still has 8,600 nuclear weapons. No mention is made of the nuclear weapons others have.

DJH
DJH
Monday, June 5, AD 2017 6:48am

Wars happen because people do not/will not convert to Christ, and this current crop of Church princes seems fine with not spreading the news that Jesus is the Way, the Life, and the Truth. Jesus ought to know how things Ought to Be because He was instrumental in their creation. If people just do what he says, thinfs will be much better here on Earth.
.
I suspect the current chaos in the world is a direct result of broken marriages and broken families-polygamy in the Middle East, and “serial polygamy” in the West (and Asia).

Mary De Voe
Monday, June 5, AD 2017 7:17am

Czar Nicholas II sent his soldiers onto the battlefield with on egun for every nine men. The idea was that when the first man fell, the gun was to be used by the second man and so forth. Death, war, famine and pestilence, the four Horsemen of the Apocalypse will only be stopped by Mary’s Holy Rosary.
Pope Francis ought to be calling for and on his knees praying the Rosary

Philip Nachazel
Philip Nachazel
Monday, June 5, AD 2017 7:48am

Mary De Voe.

Amen!

Art Deco
Monday, June 5, AD 2017 8:52am

Such reality does not fit into the Pope’s ideological world view,

The American Universities Field Staff put together in 1963 a collection of essays on political economy abroad, including an assessment of Argentina. By the author’s account, the political culture of Argentina was such that civic life was conceived of as a zero-sum conflict over resources between the working-class and the bourgeoisie, with the winners expected to redistribute income to their clientele. This was the climate in which that man came of age, and it does not appear that anything that has happened in Argentina or anywhere else in the intervening years persuaded him that businessmen were anything but thieves conning people and stealing from them.

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Monday, June 5, AD 2017 12:30pm

[…] FRANCISMERCHANTS OF DEATH […]

Robbins Mitchell
Robbins Mitchell
Monday, June 5, AD 2017 8:46pm

Well,I knew that when I heard that Frankie was wetting the papal panties over a bunch of bogus “global warming” computer models that he had finally snapped one mackerel too many

CAM
CAM
Monday, June 5, AD 2017 9:23pm

The generous donations to Peter’s Pence from Catholics in “war mongering”, capitalistic countries aren’t rejected by the Vatican.

G. H.
G. H.
Monday, June 5, AD 2017 11:50pm

Hopefully, there won’t be questions about the van’s motivation!?! The press might be concerned about people blaming extremist terrorist vans and becoming vanophobic!!! Later, they may have a meeting with all vans to talk about giving peace a chance, while singing superficial feel good pacifist peace loving ditties.
Sheesh.

Michael Dowd
Michael Dowd
Tuesday, June 6, AD 2017 2:04am

Pope off base as usual. We have an age old war going on right now: Islam against Christianity. The big problem is that most Christians, others, and especially Pope Francis don’t seem to know it is going on and don’t seem interested in finding out what it’s about. This is an indication of how dark the minds of Western man have become in the false Liberal attitude of political correctness. Niceness (feminization) is going to kill us all unless we face the truth about ourselves and our world. Let us pray to Our Lady of Fatima for insight and strength and especially for our misguided Pope.

Michael Paterson-Seymour
Michael Paterson-Seymour
Tuesday, June 6, AD 2017 4:12am

Writing during WW1, G K Chesterton had this to say of Krupp, the great German arms manufacturer: “Now here comes in the real and sinister significance of Krupps. There are many capitalists in Europe as rich, as vulgar, as selfish, as rootedly opposed to any fellowship of the fortunate and unfortunate. But there is no other capitalist who claims, or can pretend to claim, that he has very appreciably helped the activities of his people in war. I will suppose that Lipton did not deserve the very severe criticisms made on his firm by Mr. Justice Darling; but, however blameless he was, nobody can suppose that British soldiers would charge better with the bayonet because they had some particular kind of groceries inside them. But Krupp can make a plausible claim that the huge infernal machines to which his country owes nearly all of its successes could only have been produced under the equally infernal conditions of the modern factory and the urban and proletarian civilisation. That is why the victory of Germany would be simply the victory of Krupp, and the victory of Krupp would be simply the victory of Capitalism. There, and there alone, Capitalism would be able to point to something done successfully for a whole nation—done (as it would certainly maintain) better than small free States or natural democracies could have done it. I confess I think the modern Germans morally second-rate, and I think that even war, when it is conducted most successfully by machinery, is second-rate war. But this second-rate war will become not only the first but the only brand, if the cannon of Krupp should conquer; and, what is very much worse, it will be the only intelligent answer that any capitalist has yet given against our case that Capitalism is as wasteful and as weak as it is certainly wicked. I do not fear any such finality, for I happen to believe in the kind of men who fight best with bayonets and whose fathers hammered their own pikes for the French Revolution.”

Mary De Voe
Tuesday, June 6, AD 2017 8:14am

I refuse to buy and have refused to buy KRUPP coffeemakers. Capitalism in action. God’s Justice is as fine as gold. The longer it takes the finer it gets.

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Tuesday, June 6, AD 2017 8:09pm

[…] Blog The American Catholic comentando el reciente video de Bergoglio señala que las visión  ideológica del mundo […]

Philip Nachazel
Philip Nachazel
Tuesday, June 6, AD 2017 10:21pm

“God’s Justice is as fine as gold. The longer it takes the finer it gets.” MDV.

Damn girl…… that’s good.
I’m a country bumpkin and don’t get out much so I must ask…..is that yours?
Regardless. I like it. Great quote!

Mary De Voe
Wednesday, June 7, AD 2017 9:50am

The saying may be in the Bible. My dad used it all the time.

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