November 17, 2017

Mayor Cathy Sheehan

City Hall

24 Eagle Street

Albany, NY 12207

RE: TV is good except when it is bad. Some comments on your Tucker Carlson appearance last night.

Mayor Sheehan,

Having read your bio I must do some housekeeping.

One of my 2 favorite teachers ever was Bernard Sternsher, Ph.D. He was a classmate of Coach Bear Bryant at Alabama. I had the pleasure of taking 6 credits of American History with him at Seton Hall University. This was back when Lyndon Johnson

led our country into 2 wars. One of them ended with 58,000 names on a wall in Washington while the other, the hugely popular and very successful War on Poverty, is still being fought. And yes, the term exit strategy is still valid.

Professor Sternsher wound up at Bowling Green from which you were graduated. Perchance, did you have him?

The other shot in the dark is Dick Campbell, Esq. His law degree is from Albany. He represented me faithfully in U.S. Tax Court during my travails with Uncle Sam’s bean counters. It did not end well. Since your degree is also from Albany the slim chance exists that you shared torts with him. Just asking.

Now comes the nettlesome part. 

How do Catholic politicians square the circle on abortion? And yes, it does apply to the chimeric Sanctuary City soufflé that had you phumphering on TV last night.

Since you are in Albany, I must tell you that I have been asking Governors Cuomo, pere et fils, a simple question. Mario, AKA the Hamlet of the Hudson, gave a speech at Notre Dame where he said that while he was personally opposed to abortion, he had no choice but to permit, allow, countenance, acquiesce, in it because it was the law of the land. 

I asked them both what would have happened if Dred Scott had been captured on their watch. Would they have honored the writ of rendition and put his fugitive ass on the midnight train to Georgia or would they have said, “Not on my watch”? I still await an answer. [The operative part of the Constitution is Article 4, Section 1. You may wish to familiarize yourself with it.]

Saint Augustine said, “Love God and do what you will.” It was Chesterton who said, “Catholicism has not been tried and not found wanting, rather it has been tried and found difficult.” Saint Thomas More said, “When statesmen forsake their private conscience for the sake of their public duties they lead their countries by a short route to chaos.” All of which brings me back to you last night doing the modern American Liberal 2 step on why not enforcing Federal law is a good thing, a moral thing.

Except when it isn’t.

“Eclectic indignation”, the illogical construct without which modern American Liberals would surely go mad, enabled you to appear on national TV and say that up is down and wet is dry. Hopefully, your pants did no go ablaze. Also, and it may have been an internal prosthetic device, but no one could call you Pinocchio.

The sound you hear may be the Hound of Heaven gaining on you.

Kevin Smith

PS – As one RC to another, have you made your Easter duty? [That’s inside baseball talk for Catholics only] If you did, how difficult was the walk up the aisle?