Disciplinary charges have been lodged against two San Francisco Lutheran congregations for the ordaining of homosexual priests. The denomination requires celibacy of its homosexual priests but not of its heterosexual ones, but on the other hand, does not permit homosexual priests, and therefore there is no double standard.
An Israeli businessman who helped a retired Israeli military officer who helped train guards who helped defend Colombian drug cartel leaders has been found dead in a car trunk in Miami. The man, who was recently interviewed by U.S. Secret Service agents, was named Arik Afek, which translates roughly as Jack Ruby.
President Bush has unveiled his plan to cut the federal deficit in half in one year. The plan includes a 20% increase in expenditures for Star Wars, described as urgently needed to protect the United States from Libya and from voodoo lords led by Nicaragua’s first lady, along with cuts in domestic social services. There had been talk of increased social spending due to the “peace dividend” expected from the end of the Cold War, but such talk was criticized by Management and Budget director Richard Darman as a selfish, “How can I get mine?” approach that didn’t suit Americans in this case. Darman said peace had come because of our military buildup and our commitment to the free market, and it would be ironic if, just as the rest of the world is turning toward market and investment‑oriented principles, we were to do the opposite and give money to people to satisfy their needs. Darman concluded, “Think not of a peace dividend but rather of a growth dividend—to make America even more like it is now.”
The budget includes plans for five more Stealth Bombers. Darman justified this by denying that they would be deployed in America’s cities to house the homeless, saying they will be busy in other countries, helping the homeless there to increase their numbers.
Another progressive part of the budget is the Bush plan for trees, allocating money to encourage volunteer tree‑planting on private property. The project is intended to offset the volunteer tree‑cutting on public land, and is seen as a way to strike a careful balance between the human rights of logging companies and the survival of the other species on the planet.
The latest polls indicate that Sandinista Communist Leftist President Daniel Ortega has increased his lead over the democratic opposition as a result of the US Rescue of Panama. The opposition, known as UNO, suffers from the perception that it is close to the Contras and would reverse land reform.
The first lady of Nicaragua has called for a conference on witchcraft in Managua. Rosario Murillo, who wears skin‑tight black clothing and tramp jewelry, is a suspected member of the Voodoo Cartel, a shadowy cabal that counts among its members Manuel Noriega, Moammar Khadafi, Fidel Castro, and Sammy Hagar, and has been cited by the U.S. as the reason for recent increases in the Star Wars budget.
Iran‑Contra figure Richard Secord received a stiff sentence for lying to the US Congress about his role in the Iran‑Contra affair. He was sentenced to two years in prison, but the sentence was suspended because the judge felt he had suffered enough. On a sterner note, the judge ordered him to pay a fine of $50 and said he would accept no excuses for late payment. One small detail was left unresolved: the government of Costa Rica declared two months ago that the bombing of a renegade Contra press conference in 1984 was the work of the CIA, who hoped to blame the deaths of journalists on the Sandinistas and launch a retaliatory invasion of Nicaragua. The bombing was a startling development at the time but went virtually uncovered by the major news media because it couldn’t be proved. In other words, it wasn’t censored, just left out.
Televangelists are moving into the former socialist bloc to ply their trade among millions of new viewers. Word has leaked of plans for a Heritage USSR theme park, complete with hotels, to be financed by advance subscriptions to a Christian TV station. Meanwhile, PTL is moving its ministry to Concord, California. Angry Berkeley residents launched a protest against the move, saying it constitutes an evangelist beachhead on the mainland of the Bay Area and will be followed by the massive distribution of Bibles translated into the many local indigenous languages spoken there.
President Bush told the National Religious Broadcasters Association that “one cannot be America’s President without a belief in God.” Damage Control Officer Marlin Fitzwater clarified the statement, saying it was a general guideline and not yet a federal law.
Continuing his campaign against AIDS, former President Reagan has made a TV spot in which he breaks new ground by actually uttering the name of the affliction, saying “I’ve learned that all kinds of people can get AIDS, even people who matter.”
Vice President Quayle’s upcoming visit to Latin America will not include Mexico or Venezuela because of expected protests of the Panama Rescue by citizens unclear on the concept. Quayle will go to Honduras and Panama to reassure the governments there that the action was justified. The Panamanian government in particular is known to be independent‑minded, if not in fact.
The World Bank is to propose an environmental fund to protect the ozone and promote conservation, prompting vigorous responses from the leading members of the Bank. Britain expressed misgivings, Japan was less than enthusiastic, and the U.S. non-committal. A spokesman for the three powers said the Bank should let the planet go about its business and let business go about its planet.
It’s official: a group of American philosophers has affirmed that “Read My Lips: No New Taxes” is, in fact, a philosophy. At a press conference, a spokesman for the White House Wise Men, a society dedicated to the search for convenience in truth, asked the philosophical question, “If a tax falls on the people and no one notices it, is it really a tax?” The President, meanwhile, called on all citizens to do their part in combatting the deficit, saying the government had used up its resources in creating it.
TV Marti is up and running. President Bush says the channel represents the free flow of ideas, at least in one direction, and the right of a free nation to liberate an enslaved nation through free TV. It is an unbiased station, he said, because it represents America.
Secretary of State James Baker says the U.S. will grant most favored nation trading status to the Soviet Union, but has declined to say whether the U.S. will sell the Soviets nuclear weapons to help them combat our common enemy, who was not identified.
According to a new poll, two out of three Americans no longer consider the Soviet Union a military threat to the U.S., while 60% believe the Soviets are still bent on world domination. 68% said they formed their opinions by reading opinion polls in the newspapers, and 56% said they would not be likely to change their views unless 56% of the other respondents did so first.
President Bush came to the Bay Area today to celebrate the end of the Cold War by visiting the Star Wars lab at Livermore and defending his defense budget at the Commonwealth Club. Protests were held, as usual, led by the Hate America First Club, who proceeded to burn American flags instead of Libyan babies.
The President said he had reduced the military budget by three billion dollars as well as increasing it by four billion dollars, so everyone should be satisfied. The budget comes to $306 billion, or approximately the price of the Soviet Union. The President said we are the richest nation on Earth and many small drug‑crazed nations that have nuclear weapons hate us, and he would commission a $45 million study to find out why.
Channel 4 News reports that illegal U.S. aid to the Nicaraguan Contras may have been financed through bad loans from Savings and Loan institutions, helping to bankrupt 22 S&L’s in Texas. The Houston Post reported finding “numerous links among organized crime figures, people with ties to the CIA, and substantial loans from the 22 failed S&L’s.” One of the S&L directors involved is First Son Neil Bush, so prosecutors are expected to deal firmly with the case.
In East Germany, thousands of citizens continue to pour through the newly cut holes in the Berlin wall in pursuit of the Freedom to Shop. The Soviet Union has promised not to intervene, and the United States has responded forcefully by warning the Soviets not to intervene.