The Tennessean from Nashville, Tennessee • Page 11

Wdn UyMACH 27. tWI THE TEHWESSCAH ltA T7 A 1 Carl 1 Rowan A campai hatred Gays, lesbians wage war against the church, while the press ignores the Catholic-bashing sn of "II TELL, Holy Week is about as 1 Patrick chanan Waging the 'drag war' on campus: i WASHINGTON Just when it appeared that our govern- ment had run up the flag of sur- render in the war on drugs, law I 15 JV' ffW' hi A if to 2 of the national press are practicing Catholics. Studying news reports from Time, CBS, The New York Times and Washington Post, Lichter finds a predictable pattern: "On most controversies involving Catholic teachings, the Church came out on the losing side of the issue debate reported in the media. These included heated controversies over birth control, clerical celibacy, the role of women and minorities in the Church, and its response to internal dissent and issues involving freedom of expression." While dissidents like Charles Curran and Archbishop Raymond Hunthausen get friendly treatment, "The Church was overwhelmingly portrayed as an oppressive or authoritarian institution." Among the reasons Catholicism is more reviled than ever is its refusal to endorse two of today's most fashionable social causes "Gay Rights" and "Reproductive Rights" where the media do not maintain even a pretense of neutrality. Still, the press co-verup of Catholic-bashing is remarkable.

The Right-to-Lifers of Operation Rescue have consistently been treated far more brutally by cops than civil rights demonstrators of 30 years ago, but their maltreatment is widely ignored. And militants in the homosexual community no longer bother to disguise their hatred. In Los Angeles alone, six churches have been broken into or vandalized by homosexual extremists. One mass at St Patrick's Cathedral was WWg good a time as any to bring itup: A campaign of hatred is being conducted against the Catholic Church in the United States; and much of the American media, where it is not condoning it, is deliberately covering it up. Good for Cardinal John O'Connor for having the guts to say so.

"Columnists and editors who are censored for ethnic slurs or attacks on virtually any other people," the Cardinal writes in his ar-chdiocesan paper, "can romp all over the place at the expense of Catholics who dare to publicly uphold their faith." Triggering the Cardinal's rebuke was the press reaction to the anti-Catholic indignity at the annual St Patrick's Day Parade. Whatever one thinks of male sodomy and lesbianism, the traditional teaching of Catholicism on this score is well known. That the mayor of New York would surrender his place at the head of that Irish parade, to march up Fifth Avenue in the company of men flaunting their perversions, was a deliberate affront to Roman Catholics comparable to men donning Nazi uniforms and waving swastikas in front of Jews celebrating a religious holiday. gay groups' marshal," John Leo writes in U.S. News World Report, "had a long string pf pearls over a black motorcycle jacket and his T-shirt read Queer Boy.

He had a purple pansy in his ear." In cavorting with Queer Boy, David Dinkins showed an utter lack of respect for the Catholic endorsement of sodomy, the simulated anal and oral sex the level of harassment outside the church. Some of the Act-Up angries swarmed around one newly ordained young priest and his elderly mother, pelting them with condoms until police intervened and escorted them away." Not since the days of the Know Nothings has anti-Catholic bigotry been so prevalent so public, so popular. To the trendy bishops who worked so hard to make Catholicism "relevent" to our decadent age, a question: And what did it profit But then, Christians were warned long ago, were they not that the "world will hate you." (Buchanan is a syndicated columnist and TV commentator.) SMW MAS LA families at that parade, and for the Church. Though it is he who owes an apology to the Cardinal and the Catholics, the mayor is out posturing like some wounded moral hero for having been booed and jeered. And the press is supporting him.

New Yorfe Times columnist Anna Quindlen said opposition to homosexuals parading on St Paddy's Day confirms the stereotype of Irish as "antediluvian bigots." Newsday's Sydney Schanberg chides the Cardinal for a "failure to teach," wondering if his doctrinal allegiance was so strong he "cannot bring himself to feel love for those who are gay and lesbian." Although the Catholic Church has done more for dying AIDS victims than the Gay Rights Movement ever thought of doing for dying Catholics, Cardinal O'Connor does not have the power to alter an iota of church teaching that sodomy is sinful. Why does the press side with the Catholic-bashers? Well, who are the press? In Media Coverage of the Catholic Church, a new study done for the Knights of Columbus and the Catholic League for Religious and Civil Rights, Dr. S. Robert Lichter notes that only 1 Bush doesn't want the Shiite fundamentalist rebels to topple Saddam; that would make Iran top dog in the Middle East and it was to avert that outcome that we tilted toward Saddam in his war with Iran. On the other hand, we don't want the Kurds, a brave and warlike people who have been fighting for their freedom for generations, to prevail either that would disturb our new best friends, the Syrians and Turks, who fear that their Kurdish populations would rise up and demand to join a separate Kurdestan.

We apparently assumed that the Iraqi military would take care of Saddam. But we bombed them mercilessly in retreat and may have knocked off the very officers who could have run a coup against him. But now the monster whom Bush proposed to try as a war criminal looks like a compro 1 Mary Bush has no clue about what next needs to be done desecrated, with consecrated hosts spit on the floor and taken outside as trophies. In off-Broadway shows, and "gay" nightclubs, the figure of Jesus Christ is mocked in a manner rivaling the barbarians who sacked Rome. Transvestite "nuns" are popular features of gay parades.

Not only do the media rarely condemn such hate crimes, it does not even cover them. John Leo writes: "An Act-Up attempt to shout down and drown out an ordination ceremony in Boston was described rather carefully in the Boston Globe as 'colorful, loud and Readers were not told of the parody of the communion rite featuring condoms as hosts, the mocking of Jesus' Sermon on the Mount as an tion centers and tortured and beaten. Washington Post correspondent Nora Boustany reported on the beating of two Palestinians in the emergency room of a Kuwait hospital. A paramedic told her, "What the Kuwaitis faced during occupation, now the Palestinians are facing" It seems a most inopportune beginning for a new world order. But Bush has had nothing to say about the morality of it His press secretary, Martin Fitzwater, was asked about the President's concern about these grisly events, and he talked about the "many problems of Kuwait" and his regret about threats to close a local newspaper.

Then he offered an explanation of sorts for the violence. "There is a lot of anger because of the torture that was heaped upon them. cases of Iraqis gouging out their eyes with spoons and cutting off people's noses and dominated mock you nonsense. wouldn't new unladylike I it back course enforcement authorities dropped a "bombshell" on the University of Virginia at Charlottesville. In raids on three fraternity houses on this prestigious campus, police seized 12 sandwich bags of marijuana, three bags of halluci- nogenic mushrooms, a bag of LSD tabs and scales, pipes and bongs that are used to smoke marijuana and other drugs.

Twelve students have been indicted on charges of selling or distributing illicit drugs, including an amphetamine called "ecstasy." This is an extremely important raid because it tells us a lot about -why we have failed so far to wipe out a drug curse that has taken many thousands of lives, de- stroyed political careers, corrupt- ed law enforcement officials and thrown the stench of crime over many in the banking industry. The University of Virginia raids highlight two truths that most Americans have not wanted" to face: 1. Drug abuse is not merely a curse upon gneno kios wno are mostly black or Hispanic, but is a serious problem among affluent white youngsters. 2. There can be no solution until we start locking up the "respect-able" users who really finance the drug cartels, instead of concentrating on "busting" penny-ante peddlers in our inner cities.

Some of the parents of the in dicted students are complaining in ways that make it clear why this society hasn't eotten serious about drug abuse. Fred Carter, ta mer oi James, a i-year-oia uva student indicted on two counts of drug distribution, says the lawmen were "using a cannon a gnat." 1 Gnat? A hallucinogenic mushroom is a peril anywhere. But distributing illicit drugs isn't a big deal to Fred Carter when his son is charged with spreading the dope. Fred asks why the cops didn't raid "the University of Richmond or Norfolk State." Sure. Norfolk State is predominantly black, and the University of Richmond has a far higher percentage of minority students than does the Charlottesville school.

Carter thinks it was "politically motivated and badly advised" to intrude upon a high-falutin' campus that was supposed to be a sanctuarv into which the lawmen dared not tread. We've targeted the "drug war" on the Norfolk State Universities of America, leaving the UVAs as safe havens for users and distributors, for much too long. Some in Charlottesville complain that the raids, in which the feds seized three rat houses, tarnishes the whole university's reputation. Now they understand that when the drug busters were arresting mostly black kids they were ruining the reputation of all of black America's youngsters, stereotyping and punishing law- abiding children of great promise. Most colleges in America want to be a secret oasis, a sort of refuge whose leaders conceal the reality that students and professors rape and steal and abuse drugs, and even kill.

No campus should be granted such sanctuary status. The "war on drugs" is infinitely more important to the future of America than the desert fracas that is being so widely celebrated. A generation of our youngsters is in more peril in our frat houses than was ever the case in the sands of Arabia. It's easier politically to fight the drug war on some ugly city street rather than on some deceivingly beautiful campus. But I applaud the drug warriors if they finally have decided to fight the drug problem wherever they find it.

(Rowan is a syndicated columnist THE war was perfectly planned; the peace, it seems, not at all. The so-called fighting stopped only a month ago, but that has been enough time to show that George Bush has not a clue about what to do with his victory. Liberated Kuwait choking on the fumes of its burning oil wells, is indulging in an orgy of recriminations; Iraq, with 100,000 dead and, according to the United Nations, bombed back to a "pre-in-dustrial age," is racked by disease, want and civil war. Saudi Arabia is gratefully reverting to feudalism and Israel to intransigence on the Palestinian question. The only thing unarguably improved is Bush's standing in the polls.

The problem in Iraq is familiar to anyone who has engaged in politics anywhere and come up against the rock-hard maxim "You can't beat somebody with nobody." Bush repeatedly has urged the Iraqi people to rise up and eliminate Saddam Hussein. Alas, the people of Iraq are among the few Middle Easterners who have no weapons no smart bombs, tank-eating planes, or mise candidate to us at least preferable to a new ayatollah or to a Kurdish strongman romping across borders. Kuwait offers another example of George Bush, the lion in war, as lamb in peace. Not so long ago, the President insisted that we join him in indignation about what was transpiring in Kuwait He told of "ghastly atrocities" that "turn your of Kuwaitis subjected to "routine torture," "senseless suffering" and "systematic assault on the soul of a nation." The horrors formed the moral basis for massive military intervention. Now, in liberated Kuwait, ghastly atrocities are occurring, but a curious detachment has set in at the White House.

Palestinians and Iraqis are being subjected to "routine torture." Andrew Whitley of the Middle East Watch spoke of between 30 and 40 people being killed after torture, of 400 to 500 people taken to deten things like that So there's some pretty horrible stories on both sides. We certainly hope that that would not be exacerbated by any other torture or any retaliation." That sounds more like rationalization than condemnation. Bush understandably is not anxious to dwell on the destruction and ghastliness liberated by war. He is basking in the glow of military victory. He watches the soldiers' homecomings that have so many towns in transports, and he promises the mother of all celebrations on the Fourth of July.

It doesn't get much better than that for a president, and Bush wants to keep it going. But the Democrats, who tried to avert what they did not foresee the burning oil wells, the starving children, the mass graves are being severely punished by the voters and currently are as prostrate as the Iraqis. (McGrory is a columnist for the Washington Post.) By MARNIE FERREE I despise being helpless when confronted with mechanical objects. Trying to survive in a world by mechanical monsters that 1 I hate the sense of stupidity I feel when I turn the key in the ignition and the car fails to start. I am awed by the VCR, whose control panel looks like it belongs more in a 747 jet than in my den.

I'd love to meet himher; it take long for me to explain graphically the best use for his manual! (This printer has made me say some very things.) know the simplest solution is to hightail to the store for another demonstration. What I really need is a full-fledged in operation maybe 16 weeks would do it. But as I explained, I despise being a "helpless female," and I loathe more the mechanical objects that make me feel that way. Hmmm maybe I can coax a little more life out of my old printer. A new ribbon, perhaps? After four years, that at least I've learned to manage.

I think this new model would do nicely as a plant stand for my desk it's about the right size and the color is perfect. FERREE justing the print head gap. I can even change the font or size. My problem is much more basic: It's loading the paper that has me stymied! (Unfortunately, I'm discovering how useless is the best printer in the world without benefit of paper.) The operating manual, tucked neatly into its niche in the styrofoam, is completely useless. Instead of "Operating Instructions," a more apt title for this piece of garbage is "Frustration Guide." Who writes these things, anyway? Someone nulls down hie hnrks to nrenare this The print quality grew poorer by the page, and it issued decidedly unprinter-like groans.

It seemed a new printer was the most economical and practical choice. I ventured to the computer store and returned home (triumphantly, I thought) with a new, better model. I'm a sucker for a good sales pitch, and this printer probably can do all the wonderful things the salesman outlined. The problem is that I can't make it do them! The maddening thing is that I figured out how to oerform the finer ootnts. such as ad Dutifully, I fight to maintain my composure, muster all my wits and take manual in hand, determined that this time will be different In this encounter, I will But once again, my valiant effort is in vain.

I stand defeated by yet another mechanical monster in this case, wearing the guise of a computer printer, My old workhorse had finally given up th Phnst after vpars of faithful service. (Ferree and her husband own and operate Mid South Filter Service. She also writes articles and i.