The Grey Lady's Gray Lady Loses Her Marbles

Each time I waste five minutes reading one of her columns, I'm amazed that Maureen Dowd has a column. Then again, she writes for the left-wing dishrag, so I suppose I shouldn't be shocked. But her latest column, where she compares Pope Benedict XVI to Vice-President Cheney, had me wondering whether she's totally lost her mind...

And just like the vice president, the new pope is a Jurassic archconservative who disdains the "if it feels good do it" culture and the revolutionary trends toward diversity and cultural openness since the 60's.

The two leaders are a match - absolutists who view the world in stark terms of good and evil, eager to prolong a patriarchal society that prohibits gay marriage and slices up pro-choice U.S. Democratic candidates.

... They are both old hands at operating in secrecy and using the levers of power for ideological advantage. They want to enlist Catholics in the conservative cause, turning confession boxes into ballot boxes with the threat that a vote for a liberal Democrat could lead to eternal damnation.

... Just as the vice president acted to solidify the view of America as a hyperpower, so the new pope views the Roman Catholic Church as the one true religion. He once branded other faiths as deficient.

Somebody call the cops! What a scoop! The Pope of the Catholic Church believes that other faiths are deficient -- talk about news!

Seriously, perhaps the new Pope is supposed to think that other religions are co-equals to his Catholic faith, but I'm lost as to why it's so awful if he believes his faith is superior. I'm pretty certain John Travolta thinks that Catholicism is inferior to Scientology, and Dowd's not complaining about that, or comparing Travolta to Cheney.

But the funniest part is when she claims that Cheney and Benedict XVI are similar because they beleieve in absolutes with regard to good and evil. Again, a news flash that we have a religious leader who believes in good and evil. Even better, a political leader who thinks the same way. Dowd seems to contemplate these things as somewhow terrible -- I think her real problem is where these men draw the line between good and evil, but she looks equally offended that they're willing to draw a line at all.

I'm also lost as to why it's a bad thing to reject certain ideas from the 1960's. Some things from the 1960's -- like the civil rights movement -- were clearly good. Others -- like the sexual revolution or the anti-war movement -- well, let's just say the jury's still out on those things. The Catholic Church is about 2,000 years old. Changing on a whim because Dowd's generation enjoyed free love and bong hits in the 1960's would be a tad out of character.

I'm going to skip the inane ranting about the Church trying to destroy the Democratic Party. The Democrats are perfectly capable of accomplishing this feat on their own, without assistance from the divine.

In the end, I'm left wondering, again, why Dowd has a column. We're probably going to be wondering for a long time.