www.dailycorinthian.com
Reece Terry, publisher
Opinion
Mark Boehler, editor
4A • Tuesday, June 23, 2015
Corinth, Miss.
Pope Francis goes off rails A quasi-religious movement now has a genuinely religious leader. The pope’s encyclical on the environment is being hailed for its embrace of science, although it is about as scientific Rich as the Catholic hymnal. Lowry Pope Francis writes that Sister Earth “now cries out because National Review of the harm we have inflicted on her by our irresponsible use and abuse of the goods with which God has endowed her.” Really? Is that what the United Nations’ Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change says? The Catholic Church brings comfort and meaning to the lives of countless millions. That doesn’t mean that climate science, economic policy and cost-benefit analysis are its core competencies. No one has ever said: Yes, but what did Gregory VII do to fight the onset of the Medieval Warm Period? All that matters to the media, though, is that Pope Francis has taken an apocalyptic climate alarmism and given it the imprimatur of the Vatican. The same people who dismiss the pope on more central moral matters, like the dignity of life, are now attributing to him an authority that might have made Pope Innocent III, who challenged kings, blush. The document could have benefited from an editor cutting out the bizarre ramblings. The pope writes of “harmful habits of consumption,” including “the increasing use and power of air conditioning.” He argues that “an outsider looking at our world would be amazed at such behavior.” That’s assuming the outsider lives in a very cool climate, or doesn’t mind sweating. Anyone not so lucky probably thinks the inventor of air conditioning should be canonized. While the pope pays lip service to technological advances, he doesn’t truly appreciate their wonders. The Industrial Revolution was a great boon to humankind. Consider the unrelieved misery – disease, poverty, illiteracy – before around 1800, when if you weren’t an aristocrat, a general or a bishop, your life was probably nasty, brutish and short. “The average person in the world of 1800 was no better off than the average person of 100,000 B.C.,” Gregory Clark writes in his book “A Farewell to Alms: A Brief Economic History of the World.” “Life expectancy was no higher in 1800 than for hunter-gatherers: 30 to 35 years. Stature, a measure both of the quality of diet and of children’s exposure to disease, was higher in the Stone Age than in 1800.” But at least when everyone died at a much earlier age, we weren’t engaging in the ravages of the planet that so exercise Francis. This sinful assault on the Earth, by the way, largely consisted in taking otherwise completely useless glop from the ground and using it to power economic and technical advances that enriched average people beyond anyone’s imagining. This is obviously a secular miracle of the highest order. And the bounty hasn’t ended. Something like a billion people have been lifted out of poverty in places like India and China in recent decades as they have embraced markets and global trade. The pope should be delighted, except he has a blinkered view of capitalism as a zero-sum game benefiting only the privileged. In this vein, he writes of the “ecological debt” that exists “between the global north and south.” Well, if we are going to speak of debts, the global north gave the global south the modern world. (You’re welcome.) The best thing that can happen to developing counties now is that they can follow our example of economic growth driven in part by cheap energy. For all that the pope portrays modern development as a long exercise in environmental devastation, it is the advanced countries that have the cleanest water and air, and are best prepared to adapt their way around any far-off environmental challenges. His encyclical will be portrayed as the best thing the church has done since Pope Leo dissuaded Attila from sacking Rome, but on climate change, it merely bends to the fashions of the hour. (Daily Corinthian columnist Rich Lowry can be reached via e-mail: comments.lowry@nationalreview.com.)
Prayer for today Lord God, reveal to me my selfishness if I am receiving much and giving little to satisfy life. May I be grateful and considerate of all those who labor to give me comfort and happiness. Amen.
A verse to share “A merry heart maketh a cheerful countenance: but by sorrow of the heart the spirit is broken.” Proverbs 15:13
Shooting highlights intersection of mental illness STARKVILLE — In the wake of the stunningly senseless murders of nine worshipers at one of the nation’s most historically significant black churches in Charleston, South Carolina, the debate again rages over the cause of this tragic crime. So where does the debate begin? Racism? Access to guns? Mental illness? More to the point, should the shooter in the Charleston mass killings be able to opt out of responsibility for his despicable crimes by hiding behind mental illness or an insanity defense when he admits that “a race war” and the extermination of blacks was his goal? As it was in the case of Adam Lanza in Newton, Connecticut’s 2012 school shooting tragedy and others like it, the immediate response from the Charleston shootings from the streets of the city to the White House is that guns are too accessible to those with evil intent. And given the fact that the alleged shooter, Dylann Roof, has supposedly confessed to a crime in which survivors have quoted a racist commentary Roof delivered to his victims during the shooting, the blame is also quickly formulating on the nation’s racial divide. Baltimore and Ferguson, Missouri, are but the fresh-
est national wounds in that long, sad drama. Hattiesburg, Mississippi is still sorting Sid Salter out a police Columnist shooting with racial connotations. There is an obvious mistrust between police and African Americans who feel targeted by profiling or worse. There is no way to ameliorate the hurt from a young white man spewing racist bilge and pumping bullets into innocent, unarmed people whose sin was gathering in a house of worship to study God’s word. But as in Aurora, Colorado, and Pearl, Mississippi – communities visited by the scourge of mass shootings that forever change them – the reaction that the solution rests in stronger gun laws again seems a rush to judgment. In the case of the majority of mass shootings, the underlying common denominator is some form of mental illness. Yet it’s rare that the reaction to tragedies like this include calls to expand access to the diagnosis and treatment of mental illness. But on what planet is deciding that racial differences justify mass murder not defined as a form of mental illness?
The fact is that more people are killed each year by random lightning strikes than by mass shootings in the U.S. The fact is that school shootings are decreasing, not increasing. One positive thing that the tragedy of school shootings have produced is, on balance, safer and more prepared schools. Perhaps even more disturbing than the thought of our children’s safety being threatened in schools is the thought that we aren’t safe in the house of God. But churches can’t really operate as bunkers. Churches with closed doors can’t serve. And in truth, churches are no more safe havens than convenience stores. The narrative that passing stronger gun control laws will somehow close the safety gap in schools, churches, and other venues in which we all should be safe is a false narrative. As long as America funds the diagnosis and treatment of mental illnesses as a second or third tier functions of government, the mentally ill will continue to wreak havoc and take lives. How many stories have I written over the years about the fact that Mississippi has a long, sordid history of simply jailing the mentally ill because it’s cheaper to lock them up than to treat them?
That’s as much a decision by local governments as it is one by state government. Few states have had more experience with life at the crossroads of racial strife and untreated mental illness than Mississippi. Listening to accounts of Dylann Roof’s justification for murdering parishioners at a church Bible study, one is easily transported to the bad old days of racial violence in the South. During my childhood a half-century ago, racism in Mississippi was almost universally offered with a sprinkling of religious fervor and scriptural underpinnings – hence the burning crosses that littered the landscape of school integration and the pursuit of the right to vote in the Deep South. In short, the building blocks of senseless violence in our streets, in our schools, and, yes, our churches, are more complex than relatively easy access to guns. The insanity that is the kind of racism Roof espouses should not excuse the clear commission of a hate crime. But offering the argument that stronger gun laws will keep racists like Roof from acting out on their impulses is a fool’s errand. (Daily Corinthian columnist Sid Salter is syndicated across the state. Contact him at 601-507-8004 or sidsalter@sidsalter.com.)
Student loan debt shows no hint of slowdown OXFORD — In two years, Mississippi has moved from 29th place to 19th, but it isn’t good news. The ranking is for average debt of people who leave college with a bachelor’s degree and student loans to repay. The topic comes up from time to time. There were headlines when combined student debt hit $1.2 trillion, more than Americans owe on all their credit cards. There were headlines when President Obama said he was going to fix this and help young people unburden themselves. There was a dust-up earlier this month when a writer, Lee Siegel, described in The New York Times his decision not to repay his loans. He said, essentially, that he had a choice between a happy life and repaying his debt, and that he chose happy life. He encouraged others to do the same and suggested that college should be free to students anyway. But whatever the news about student loans, we tsktsk and move on. Most of us don’t have loans anyway, right?
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Mark Boehler
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Well, no. Not right. The loans are federally guaranteed. That means tax funds are Charlie used to pay Mitchell banks when the borrowColumnist ers don’t. The current default rate is about 12 percent, including Mr. Siegel. It is truly great, not to mention smart and wise, when families and students avoid college debt altogether. In Mississippi, 43 percent of students do. Because they are wealthy, because they are frugal and have saved or because they worked diligently to avoid taking out loans, these people have given themselves gifts of great value. As for the other 57 percent, well, it’s going to be tough. The Institute for College Access and Success says the average bachelor’s degree recipient with debt in this state in 2013 picked up a diploma and a notice to start repaying $27,571. That was up $4,000 from 2011, hence
Mississippi’s rise in national rankings. Now under traditional repayment, the note, accumulated interest and future interest would be divided into 120 bites and payable once per month for 10 years. The interest rate is variable, but let’s say it averages 6.8 percent. That’s $320 per month or about $38,000 (including interest) to be repaid. Obama’s “help” can prove more costly. Annual payments are capped at 10 or 15 percent of a debtor’s disposable income — which makes the payments affordable — but the payback period is extended to 20 years or to 25 years. Not all Mississippi’s public universities reported their data. Jackson State, Delta State. Mississippi Valley and University Medical Center were not on the institute’s list. And, importantly, it doesn’t include students who left with debt and no degree. Alcorn was the leader with 90 percent of graduates having debt, 77 percent receiving federal Pell grants of up to $5,500 per year
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that are not repayable and, on top of that, an average debt of $32,755. Following, in order, were Mississippi State University, the University of Southern Mississippi, the University of Mississippi and Mississippi University for Women. As grim as any of that sounds, the class of institutions known best for real-sounding names and abundant advertising on TV, in magazines and on billboards is the real disaster zone of debt. Back to Lee Siegel. He says a happy life is important. Most will agree. Most will not agree, however, that walking away after knowingly accepting loans is a moral action even if the purpose is to be happy. That leaves one crystal clear course of action: Avoid debt like the plague it can be. Not everyone can avoid borrowing. Having loans available is a good thing. But those who borrow the absolute minimum will be glad they did. (Charlie Mitchell is a Mississippi journalist. Write to him at cmitchell43@yahoo. com.)
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