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Republicans in the Senate are gearing up to battle the Obama administration over the high-priority plan to finish a new arms-control treaty with Russia before the end of the year.

Sen. Jon Kyl, Arizona Republican and No. 2 Republican Senate leader, recently identified a key issue that is likely to complicate the administration's plan: Russia for years has been violating the current Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty (START), which is set to expire Dec. 5.

Can the Church of England be doomed? Would it matter if it were?

These questions are prompted by the news that Pope Benedict XVI is attempting to persuade Anglican clergy and even entire parishes to defect en masse to the Roman Catholic Church.

Writing in the Catholic Herald, Archbishop Nichols said: "This is an
extraordinary moment. It is a challenge and an opportunity on many fronts."

He claim the Pope had made the decision because he wants worshippers to unite
in the face of increasing secularism rather than form numerous smaller
churchers.

The Pope's desire to reconcile Christians "estranged from the Catholic
Church" was "clearly one of the priorities of his pontificate",
the archbishop wrote.

When it comes to elegant funerals, no one can beat the Vatican. Look at the phrases with which it buried all hopes of reunion, or even significant negotiations, with the Anglican Communion, by announcing that it would now welcome whole groups of Anglicans, with their own bishops, liturgies, and even – if they must have them – wives, to become Roman Catholic priests. "Without the dialogues of the past 40 years, this recognition would not have been possible, nor would hopes for full visible unity have been nurtured. In this sense, this apostolic constitution is one consequence of ecumenical dialogue between the Catholic church and the Anglican Communion."

It's not just one consequence. It is the only lasting one. One of the things that this development means is that the Roman Catholic church is no longer even pretending to take seriously the existence of the Anglican Communion as a coherent body.

It cannot be long before progressive opinion begins to look back on communism with nostalgia. Whatever they may have been like in practice, communist states were established to embody ideas that progressives understood and to a large extent shared. The Soviet Union and Maoist China were seen as advancing the cause of humanity and many on the left judged it best not to make too much of any crimes these regimes committed along the way. However imperfectly, communism continued an authentic tradition of European radical humanism.

One of the many virtues of David Priestland's The Red Flag is that it places communism squarely in this tradition. Citing Marx's description of Prometheus as "the most eminent saint and martyr in the philosophical calendar", Priestland shows how Marx's Promethean world-view has animated communist movements and regimes throughout their history. In the preface to his dissertation, Marx wrote, in the words of Aeschylus: "In sooth all gods I hate. 'Tis better to be bound on a rock than bound to the service of Zeus." In Marx's variation on the Promethean myth, heroic humanity wages war against religion, inequality and subservience to nature.