Islamism Series: Fort Dix and Beyond

Two headlines blared across the tops of the front pages of Philadelphia's two major newspapers within the past four days.

The Bulletin was first when last Thursday their front page headline read "Islamic Terrorists Forming Cells in US", and the Inquirer followed suit on Sunday when in reference to the Fort Dix case the headline read "They were going to do it".

Here are the cold, hard facts for everyone who has not yet caught on to what this 'Islamism Series' is all about: organized Islamic forces with the full backing of some Arab nations and with the tacit support of others are at war with the West. They see the United States, Great Britain, and Israel as their main enemies in this war.

The war did not end with the election of Barack Obama, just as it did not begin with the election of George W. Bush. It will not end with the closing of Guantanamo Bay. It will not end with the withdrawal of American troops from the Middle East. It will not end with the death or capture of Osama bin Laden.

The leadership and forces of Islam have made it abundantly clear how this will end: with the end of our civilization, or theirs. Their dream is to reestablish what they call the Islamic Caliphate under Sharia Law, that Islamic rule by Muslim religious, legal, and cultural laws.

Nearly Everybody Reads the Bulletin

In the city of Philadelphia, the Bulletin is back, and just in time to save local newspaper readers from the quagmire of liberal junk for which we had no alternative for years. Actually, the Bulletin has been back since 2004. I had heard something about it, but didn't know the story and didn't pay much attention to it. I just figured that someone else was coming out with yet another newspaper. Same old same old. However this all began to change when I attended a Christmas party a few weeks ago. At the party, my wife and I were introduced to some of the party-goers as "the Republicans", almost as if to say "the vampires." There was another such couple at the party, and we were naturally introduced, paired up, and left at the dining room table together. It was the wife in this couple who told us that we simply had to try The Bulletin. She stated that it was nothing like the liberal hogwash pushed everyday in repetitive fashion by the Daily News and Inquirer. She said that we would enjoy the fresh, fair, slightly conservative slant in which the news was portrayed, and especially the editorial section. When the woman told us that The Bulletin would deliver to you free for thirty days as a trial offer, I was sold. I made the call during the following week and the deal was that they would indeed deliver to you free for a month. You would be billed during that time in order to continue your subscription. If you didn't want to continue, you just ignored the bill. It was a deal too good to pass up. The only problem is that The Bulletin has not yet grown in circulation to the point where it has a carrier in every section of our area. The woman at the party said that her Bulletin comes in the morning via the same carrier who delivers her Inquirer. There was no such arrangement in my area of Somerton, and so the paper would be delivered daily with my regular mail. This seemed a bit odd, but it has worked out. The paper does indeed arrive every day with my mail. More importantly, the content is everything that I was told it would be. It is informative, well written, and largely conservative. Back in 2004, investment banker Thomas G. Rice had the great idea that I had thought of for years. A conservative slanted newspaper to counter the overt liberal bias of the current local newspapers. Rice bought the naming rights of the old Evening & Sunday Bulletin from the McLean family and began publishing on November 22nd of that year. With receipt of the new version of The Bulletin daily at my home, much has come full circle. Back in the early-late 1970's, I was a newspaper delivery boy for the old Bulletin, as well as eventually becoming an assistant branch manager. The old Bulletin was the first company from which I ever received an official paycheck. Now I am back with The Bulletin as a regular subscriber and reader, and I whole-heartedly endorse the paper to anyone out there. The Bulletin presents the news clearly and concisely, fully covering all of the major stories of the day, and does so with that conservative slant that many of us have hungered for years to read. It will take you a week or so to get used to the paper's format. It does not cover all of the 'fluff' of the other papers, but also does not have as much advertising to wade through. I believe that you will find The Bulletin a great addition to your daily newspaper reading, and eventually may find that it is the only paper you want and need. There is no specific weekend edition, publishing from Monday to Friday, so if you like just order the weekend Inquirer and the Bulletin as your daily. You absolutely will not regret it. The news will be much easier to digest. Blood will stop shooting from your eyes when you read these editorials. You will remember what a great newspaper was like. Back in its former heyday when for 76 years it was the largest circulated evening newspaper in the United States, the old saying for the paper was "Nearly Everybody Reads the Bulletin". The new version of the paper may not have grown to that level yet, but it has the content and the potential. Give it a try, and if you are like me you will find a reason to believe that perhaps the newspaper business is not dying. The Bulletin should be read by nearly everybody, and certainly by anyone who leans to the right-of-center culturally and politically. Just call 215-735-9150 to start your free trial subscription.

New Life in Death for a Moral Compass

"He has now been gathered by the Lord, in whom he trusted."

Those are the words of Fr. George Butler, who administered the last rites of the Church on Thursday to one Richard John Neuhaus.

At age 72, the former Lutheran clergyman turned Catholic priest died after a short battle against the cancer with which he had been diagnosed in late 2008.

If you moved on after having caught a blurb of his passing on the TV news, or having seen a headline in a newspaper the past couple days, wondering why the big deal about a priest's death from cancer, you moved on too quickly.

This was not simply the death of your Average Joe after one of life's most common end games. This was, as Philadelphia's great newspaper The Bulletin called it, the loss of a "moral compass."

Fr. Neuhaus was one of the leading voices in the Church and in the country in defense of the millions of innocent children butchered each year in abortion procedures.

He was said to be an articulate defender of Catholic orthodoxy, and perhaps the leading conservative Catholic voice in the country.

Fr. Neuhaus also had a vision, the dream of many of today's Catholics, to see the Lord's Church whole again.