Uncovering a "wealth" of destroyed lives in the Netherlands

A final report on rampant sexual abuse by members of the Dutch Catholic clergy has been issued, and -as usual - it's about as horrifying as you can imagine just in terms of sheer numbers alone:

The report estimates that 10,000-20,000 minors were abused in the care of Catholic institutions between 1945 and 1981, when the number of Church-run homes dropped. In the years between 1981 and 2011, several more thousands suffered at the hands of priests and others working for the Church.

Most of the cases involved mild to moderate abuse, such as touching, but the report estimated there were "several thousand" instances of rape.

As usual, we can probably look forward to one of Bill Donohue's predictably brain-damaged screeds (a previous example of which is dissected here) on the subject. He's never failed to disappoint before, so why should he stop now?

"Santorum" also means "ass-backwards", apparently

The other Clueless Rick running for President drives his tricycle northbound down a southbound one-way highway, this time on the subject of science and politics. What a surprise.

Christopher Hitchens, 1949-2011

I disagree with some of what he wrote - particularly his contrarian opinions concerning Iraq - but no good polemicist can be agreed with all of the time. The Beeb's obituary can be found here.