Of all the reasons to resent the tortured outcome to the 2000 election mess in Florida with its hanging chads strong-arm politics and less than convincing Supreme Court decision the absence of presidential leadership on environmental issues is one of the biggies This morning rsquo s Washington Po

My old boss the Archbishop of Westminster will not unusually be leading the annual diocesan pilgrimage to Lourdes which begins Sunday This in spite of it being the 150th anniversary of the apparitions and Cardinal Cormac Murphy-O rsquo Connor rsquo s last Lourdes pilgrimage as Archbishop of We

nbsp Here I am in Los Angeles about to start a retreat when I pick up today rsquo s The Los Angeles Times carrying stories about mortgage-bank woes gay weddings forest fires and the like nbsp Buried in the Arts section is a thumbnail review of the new documentary about Roman Polanski ldq

As some of you may have noticed you can now share America s articles on Facebook and other networking sites Simply click share in the upper right hand corner of an article page and your favorite article from America will appear on your Facebook page The best part if you re a subscriber a

ldquo What rsquo s the matter with Texas rdquo This morning rsquo s Houston Chronicle headlines the news that the Governor of Texas Rick Perry has refused to acknowledge an order from the World Court to stay the planned August 5th execution of a Mexican citizen convicted of murder ldquo The w

The July 11 edition of Religion amp Ethics Newsweekly included a nice feature on the 150th anniversary of Lourdes Among those interviewed was Fr Jim Martin who has written about his trips to Lourdes in America here and here You can watch the R amp E piece and read the transcript here Tim Rei