Red Mosquito

this is my favorite pope

He just implied that contraceptives were a reasonable response to Zika virus dangers. He speaks in favor of environmental protectionism, humanitarian responses to Muslim refugees, and inequity resolutions. He softened the church's stance on homosexuality and allows priests to absolve people for abortions. At this point he's basically a few gender equality stances away from being the best thing to happen to that goofy, goofy religion.

At this point they're only 100 years behind reality, instead of 5 or 6.

He's said a lot of nice things, many of which have already been said by other Popes before him. But he also has some pretty heinous stances, has actively campaign against gay rights, has been downright hypocritical on a number of topics he gets all kinds of progressive kudos for. Knowing his record as archbishop of Buenos Aires, and his very shady history during Argentina's military dictatorship, I can't see his platitudinous pandering as much more than a (admittedly very successful) rebranding campaign by the Church. I don't trust him, and neither do a lot of people in Argentina.

He's a hypocrite most obviously on gay rights. We had a referendum about gay marriage here in the fall (my idiot co-nationals voted for the wrong choice) and he made a public statement a couple of days before it took place for us to vote against it.
His popularity in Europe is falling mainly because he is a hypocrite.
I find it very interesting that he doesn't have an impeccable reputation in Argentina considering how he's been portrayed here.

I haven't heard much about his background in Argentina but gotta find out more.

Can't take this Pope seriously at all, as Jorge said, he's not just flip flopped, he's changed skipped from one extreme to the other on things like gay rights..

what will all this do, if anything, to Trumps chances though?

theplatypus wrote:He's said a lot of nice things, many of which have already been said by other Popes before him. But he also has some pretty heinous stances, has actively campaign against gay rights, has been downright hypocritical on a number of topics he gets all kinds of progressive kudos for. Knowing his record as archbishop of Buenos Aires, and his very shady history during Argentina's military dictatorship, I can't see his platitudinous pandering as much more than a (admittedly very successful) rebranding campaign by the Church. I don't trust him, and neither do a lot of people in Argentina.

What's the general state of Catholicism in Argentina these days?

well that settles it. I'm not voting for the pope.

McParadigm wrote:He just implied that contraceptives were a reasonable response to Zika virus dangers. He speaks in favor of environmental protectionism, humanitarian responses to Muslim refugees, and inequity resolutions. He softened the church's stance on homosexuality and allows priests to absolve people for abortions. At this point he's basically a few gender equality stances away from being the best thing to happen to that goofy, goofy religion.

At this point they're only 100 years behind reality, instead of 5 or 6.

Consider there's been a strong resistance to legalize gay marriage in Italy. They've been delaying to make, not even marriage, but what they call civil unions legal for a long time and there are 2 movements happening. The pro-gay rights being the strongest by far.
They had a high profile explicitly homophobic protest in Rome called Family day recently which is strongly supported by the Vatican and the political right.

dimejinky99 wrote:Can't take this Pope seriously at all, as Jorge said, he's not just flip flopped, he's changed skipped from one extreme to the other on things like gay rights..

I think he just lied.

dimejinky99 wrote:what will all this do, if anything, to Trumps chances though?

It's 22% of the population and it's my understanding they have less of an attachment to the figure of the Pope than we do here.
It may even help him with the other Christian branches.

Catholics aren't very popular in the USA right?

Thats a shame, Mine.


Italy forgets the Vaticans very recent rent boy/male prostitution scandals it seems..and that's just the ones that got found out!

That reminds me of something i saw recently. There's a priest, nicknamed don Euro in his 60's, who ripped off a lot of people, we're talking hundreds of thousands of Euros with the excuse that the church needed repairs and similar. Sick people were not off limits.
Guess what he was spending the money on? Male prostitutes and cocaine of course.
He was of course awarded a luxurious house by his superiors after he was more or less kicked out of his church.

dimejinky99 wrote: what will all this do, if anything, to Trumps chances though?

It'll probably have very little impact. Lots of old-line Catholics in the US are tucked up in the northeast, which skews blue anyway, and Trump's barely got a foothold up here (except New Hampshire, which many call "the South of the North"). With the growth of Hispanic populations in the US comes an increase in the number of Catholics (especially the south and southwest), but they weren't going to vote for Trump anyways.

Simple Torture wrote:

dimejinky99 wrote: what will all this do, if anything, to Trumps chances though?

It'll probably have very little impact. Lots of old-line Catholics in the US are tucked up in the northeast, which skews blue anyway, and Trump's barely got a foothold up here (except New Hampshire, which many call "the South of the North"). With the growth of Hispanic populations in the US comes an increase in the number of Catholics (especially the south and southwest), but they weren't going to vote for Trump anyways.

*anyway

Simple Torture wrote:

dimejinky99 wrote: what will all this do, if anything, to Trumps chances though?

It'll probably have very little impact. Lots of old-line Catholics in the US are tucked up in the northeast, which skews blue anyway, and Trump's barely got a foothold up here (except New Hampshire, which many call "the South of the North"). With the growth of Hispanic populations in the US comes an increase in the number of Catholics (especially the south and southwest), but they weren't going to vote for Trump anyways.

Probably exactly what his 'advisors'said to him before he replied to the Pope's remark.

theplatypus wrote:He's said a lot of nice things, many of which have already been said by other Popes before him. But he also has some pretty heinous stances, has actively campaign against gay rights, has been downright hypocritical on a number of topics he gets all kinds of progressive kudos for. Knowing his record as archbishop of Buenos Aires, and his very shady history during Argentina's military dictatorship, I can't see his platitudinous pandering as much more than a (admittedly very successful) rebranding campaign by the Church. I don't trust him, and neither do a lot of people in Argentina.

and he hates the first four PJ albums but loves Backspacer and LB so you just know he can't be trusted

The blowing up the Vatican remark...stop giving them ideas you asshole...be more likely to think they'd go for a Trump Towers somewhere and see how that feels ye dick..

not sure if this was mentioned before

http://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2016 ... e-new-york

Guys, the SC GOP primary is tomorrow.

Projected media stories coming out of SC:

If Trump wins big-ish--by 12-15 percentage points, which is still less than the 20% cushion he had in NH--the media narrative really starts to ramp up with: "We all used to laugh at Trump, but doesn't it look like he's the nominee now?" Trump slowly begins to shift his public persona in response--that is, no more arguing with the Pope. If his margin of victory somehow shrinks to fewer than 10 points, the story becomes that he's fading.

If Cruz finishes 2nd, no one will really care. If Cruz finishes 3rd, people will start to talk about how his days are numbered.

If Rubio finishes 3rd, no one will really care; if he finishes 2nd, he'll regain some of that post-Iowa attention and begin to take on the mantle of Trump-defeater once again.

Even if Carson triples the support he received in New Hampshire--where he got 2.3% of the vote--he's still below 8%, and people will actively call for him to drop out (which would benefit Cruz, slightly, I think). If he gets below 5%, I don't see how he could move on, except as a Joaquin-Phoenix-like performance art piece.

Kasich probably won't do well, and he probably won't get a lot of press coming out of the state.

Jeb! is such a fucking loser.