NOT #elxn41 news: Pedophile Catholic Priests

From here:

"In one of the largest monetary payouts nationwide in the Roman Catholic Church's sexual abuse crisis, and the largest one by a religious order, the Jesuit order in the Northwest has agreed to pay $166.1 million to about 500 abuse victims as part of its bankruptcy settlement," The Seattle Times writes.

As The Associated Press adds, the payments will go to "hundreds of American Indians and Alaska Natives who were abused at the Catholic order's schools around the region. The settlement also asks the order to provide a written apology to the victims and to share documents with them such as their personal medical records."

There are MASSIVE resources at this website, about various forms of abuse by members of the Catholic clergy: news, updates, groups, connections, discusions - BishopAccountability.org

Pedophile priests, hockey coaches, and state senators

The people power movement in Wisconsin has moved on to the next stage -- recalling the state senators whose payments come from loyalties lie with corrupt billionaires and not their constituents.

When I saw this post from my virtual roomie, I thought she was already on the topic I wanted to address. In that she highlights the frustrations of prosecutors who want to go after child molesters but are hung up by statutes of limitations on the crimes, she is.

Let's have a look at one of those Wisconsin ReThugs touting those Family Values allatime and targetted by the recall effort.

Randy Hopper is a real piece of shit work.

Protesters were outside his house in Fond du Lac when his wife came out to tell them that the 45-year-old Hopper didn't live there anymore, but rather with his 25-year-old mistress in Madison.

The blogger reports that his maid -- ooh, he has a maid! -- signed the recall petition and suggested that his soon-to-be-ex-wife would probably also sign it. (The couple filed divorce papers last year.)

In addition to exposing the usual FV hypocrisy, this situation raises an interesting legal question of being a representative from one district while living in another.

But, wait, there's more. Like all FV creeps, he natters on about protecting children.

So, how is his record there?

Not good.

It was State Senator Hopper who arranged for the controversial testimony of businessman and Catholic Right ally, now U.S. Senator Ron Johnson (R-WI), opposing the Child Victims Act.

The bill, which would have extended the statute of limitations for victims of child sex abuse to file lawsuits against their attackers, was vigorously opposed by the Catholic Church and the insurance industry. Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel columnist Daniel Bice fingered Hopper as the recruiter who persuaded Johnson to help kill the bill.

Friend to the Vatican Taliban and the insurance industry? Check.

Crusader for Family Values and children? Not so much.

Pedophile priests and hockey coaches

Holding up photographs of girls and boys who were sexually violated by Catholic priests, parish members in the diocese of Philadelphia demonstrated outside the basilica to denounce church officials who engineered a deliberate cover-up and evasion of crimes perpetrated against children.

From here:

[...]the Philadelphia Catholic Archdiocese placed on leave 21 priests accused of sexual abuse of minors [...] The leaves followed a grand jury report last month that lambasted the archdiocese for allowing 37 priests to remain around children despite "substantial evidence of abuse." That report and the investigation that led to it were made possible because the diocese had supplied prosecutors with information following an earlier grand jury report in 2005.

The earlier report concluded that dozens of priests had sexually abused children dating back at least a half-century. But prosecutors were powerless to bring criminal charges because statutes of limitations had expired.

While prosecutors can't bring charges against the 37 priests due to statutes of limitation, prosecutors say the cases "show a pattern of the church looking the other way when it came to investigating these charges," said Tasha Jamerson, spokeswoman for the district attorney's office. [...]Critics [...] said church leadership continued to show a lack of understanding about child sexual abuse in the way it handled the suspensions. The archdiocese drew condemnation for, among other moves, declining to release a list of the priests, choosing instead to inform each parish. Local news outlets gathered and published the names this week.

The grand jury found that an archdiocesan board that reviewed allegations often judged as "incredible" or "unsubstantiated" allegations against priests who had been independently accused or flunked a lie detector test.

"These are simply not the actions of an institution that is serious about ending the sexual abuse of its children. There is no other conclusion," the report said. That the church provided the district attorney's office with information "is some sign of progress," although "much has not changed," the grand jury said.

"It's not unlike a chemical company that has toxic spills in 21 places around Philadelphia," and it won't say where they are, said Barbara Blaine, president of Survivors Network of Those Abused by Priests. "The priests only get removed when there's public pressure or publicity to make that happen, and we see that across the U.S. as well," she said.

More here.

Corporate types in the business of *creating wealth* for themselves - as recently observed from the actions of the Kochs and their koch-suckers in Wisconsin - will interven in government in order to protect their interests and increase their profits. When there is resistance and even push-back, they will fight tooth and nail to discredit their critics and to crush people who don't fall into line.

Institutions such as the Catholic Church and the NHL follow the same business and risk-management models. (In other news recently yet another adult survivor of adolescent sexual abuse suffered at the hands of Graham James stepped forward to tell his story.)

Pope Maledict, Gary Bettman and the Kochs have a lot in common, it seems.

To paraphrase yet again Mark Steyn: It must be convenient to have canon and business laws that oblige all your pathological greed.