Hey, they had almost 97% voter turnout in the election in the Communist dictatorship to the south of Florida – but does it really count as an election?

Justice Minister Roberto Diaz Sotolongo, who presides over the National Electoral Commission, said nearly 8.2 million Cubans, or 96.66 percent of those registered, went to the polls Sunday to elect 169 municipal assemblies across the island of 11 million.

"I don't think any other country has such a high voter turnout," Cuban President Fidel Castro said in a televised address after Diaz presented the results.

Cuba consistently defends its system as democratic, but critics of Castro's government argue that tight state control, a heavy police presence and neighborhood-watch groups that report on their neighbors prevent any real political freedom.

Though it is not obligatory to vote, pressure to participate is high. Municipal and national elections always have a high turnout.

The municipal elections, dubbed "the most democratic in the world" by Castro after he voted Sunday, take place every 2 1/2 years. The turnout in the last municipal elections was reported to be 95.75 percent.

Under Cuba's one-party system, municipal, provincial and national representatives are elected by citizens on a local level. Anyone can be nominated to these posts, including nonmembers of the island's ruling communist party — the only one recognized in Cuba's constitution.

So when it comes right down to it, the dictator allows a modicum of freedom and the people exercise it. But in the end, this freedom amounts to nothing, because the only legal party wields the real power.

Supporters of affirmative action know they have only tenuous public support for these programs. Most Americans believe that non-discrimination is a policy that should be worked both ways – protecting the rights of both whites and minorities. That is why the opponents of the Michigan Civil Rights Initiative are seeking to knock the measure off the ballot, despite the fact that supporters turned in petitions with more than 160% of the required signatures.

A pro-affirmative action group says some voters were tricked into signing a petition they thought would protect affirmative action when the initiative would actually hurt those programs. The group filed a challenge with state election officials Monday afternoon in an attempt to block a proposed constitutional amendment targeting the November 2006 election.

"People were deceived," said Luke Massie, chairman of Operation King's Dream, a campaign affiliated with the Coalition to Defend Affirmative Action, Integration & Immigrant Rights and Fight for Equality by Any Means Necessary (BAMN). "There is an overwhelming pattern of fraud specifically with black voters, but it extends beyond black voters to white and suburban voters."

The group backing the proposal — the Michigan Civil Rights Initiative — successfully defended the wording of its petition in state courts last year. The next fight could be certifying enough of the 508,000 signatures of Michigan voters collected in its petition drive.

The group must have at least 317,757 valid signatures of Michigan voters to qualify for the ballot. Michigan Civil Rights Initiative executive director Jennifer Gratz said she was confident her group has enough signatures to make the ballot, and that the claims made by BAMN and Operation King's Dream were without merit.

Ultimately, the question is this – why are supporters of affirmative action so unwilling to let the people of the state of Michigan have a say on this matter of public importance. If their case for affirmative action is so strong, they won’t have any problem in defeating the MCRI. -- or is that the crux of the problem?

One of the more egregious acts of antiquities theft was the removal of an obelisk dating back to the Axumite kingdom from the ancient city of Axum by Mussolini. It is in the process of being returned, seven decades later.

A teenage Abebe Alenayehu watched Italian soldiers haul away Axum's revered obelisk nearly seven decades ago and never thought he would live to see its return.

But if the weather cooperates, he will see the dream he shares with his nation come true Tuesday when a giant cargo plane returns the 82-foot monument's top section to this wind-swept town that was the seat of the ancient Axumite Kingdom.

"The memory still leaves a bitter taste in my mouth," Abebe said about the loss of a monument that Ethiopians consider the symbol of their nation. "Every day for the last 67 years I have thought about the obelisk."

The Italian Foreign Ministry said Monday that the two other pieces of the 176-ton obelisk should be back by the end of April. Lattanzi, the Italian company organizing the return, says no one has attempted to fly such a massive monument before.

Abebe, 81, vividly recalls the day the masterpiece of the Axum civilization was taken away and shipped to Rome.

"All the adults in the town were under curfew," he said. "But we played with the soldiers who gave us sweets and sugar. We didn't realize what was happening, but our parents were hiding their faces and crying."

The restoration of this ancient monument is a fitting end to the evils committed by Mussolini and his forces against the Ethiopian people during the occupation of their nation from 1936-1941. And it sounds like it will be even more of an engineering nightmare than its removal was in 1937.

God has given us Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger as the new Pope Benedict XVI.

He was elected in only four ballots, which tells me that the Cardinals are pretty firmly united behind him. I also cannot help but suspect that this is the man who John Paul the Great would have chosen as his successor.

As I expected, Joseph Ratzinger did not choose to be called John Paul III. I had a funny feeling that Benedict would be the choice, and have said so repeatedly over the last few days. Many are linking him to the shy Pope Benedict XV, who tried so hard to end World War I. I think another model to consider would be Benedict XIV, who was concerned about the accommodation of Christian truth to the practices of non-Christian cultures.

I find the new pontiff’s words to the faithful inspiring and appropriate. Pope Benedict, for all his gigantic intellect, remains a humble man of deep spirituality.

"Dear brothers and sisters, after our great pope, John Paul II, the cardinals have elected me, a simple, humble worker in God's vineyard.

I am consoled by the fact that the Lord knows how to work and how to act, even with insufficient tools, and I especially trust in your prayers.

In the joy of the resurrected Lord, trustful of his permanent help, we go ahead, sure that God will help, and Mary, his most beloved mother, stands on our side.

Thank you."

We shall see how this papacy will develop. Will he be a pope in the image of John Paul the Great? Or will he be something completely different?

Update: I commented on the London Times piece on Pope Benedict’s youth in Nazi Germany. His detractor’s are already making scurrilous comments about him in relation to his brief – and legally mandated – membership in the Hitler Youth and military service. The Jerusalem Post provides some excellent insight into the issue – and also the important work of this pope in his predecessor’s reconciliation with the Jewish faith.

NOTE: I finished this as white smoke rose over the Vatican. The election of the new Pope Benedict XVI is a great blessing to the Church, and to the world. I hope that the new pontiff will follow the path of ecumenical contact with the churches of the East, and will strive to honor the Eastern Rite Catholics and their heritage of faith.

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As a kid, I first heard the term “uniate” used to describe the Maronite Christians of Lebanon. Later, I heard the term describe Ukrainian Catholics. I didn’t understand what the term meant at the time, but later study – especially during my seminary years at Mundelein – brought me to a deep appreciation of those in the Catholic Church who follow the rituals of Eastern Christianity while being in union with Rome. By extension, I also learned to appreciate the rich spiritual history of the Orthodox churches of the East. To this day, I wonder if they might serve as a bridge between the two halves of Christianity split asunder in 1054.

Joseph P. Duggan raises the same issue in a column on the possibility (however unlikely) of the election of an Eastern Rite pope. Two cardinals in the current conclave are of the Eastern Rite leaders, not Latin Rite. It is not inconceivable – though highly improbable – that one of them could appear on the balcony overlooking St. Peter’s Square, clad in white. It would be a magnificent step towards full equality and respect for the Eastern Rites within the Catholic Church, and towards reunion between the oldest extant strains of Christianity. It would also be in keeping with one of Pope John Paul the Great’s fondest desires and most precious dreams.

John Paul visited numerous countries where the Orthodox Church is dominant and spoke of the Catholic and Orthodox Churches as equals, expressing hope that Christianity once again may "breathe with both lungs." He implored Orthodox Christians to forgive and set aside the schisms of the second Christian millennium and take inspiration from the first millennium, when the Churches of East and West were united. John Paul's encyclical letter Ut Unum Sint ("That All May Be One,") offered a bold invitation to all Christians for their ideas on how the papacy might be transformed to be more effective in promoting Christian unity. Even before Pope John Paul, some four decades ago, Orthodox and Catholic prelates rescinded their mutual excommunications, and the churches recognize the full validity of one another's ordinations and sacraments.

Duggan, of course, notes that one of the great changes that would necessarily be wrought by such an election would be the rethinking of mandatory clerical celibacy. While forbidden in the Latin Rite (and in the United States by a wrong-headed papal decree sought by American bishops n the nineteenth century), the Eastern Rites ordain married men as priests. It is hard to imagine that a pope from among the non-Latin Catholics would long retain the mandatory celibacy that dates back a millennium. Priests would not be able to marry, but married men could become priests. Precedent exists for this in the early history of the Church, and in the special dispensation granted to some Anglican and Lutheran converts over the last couple of decades. When one considers that the church historically has had a father and son serve as popes (in the sixth century – St. Hormisdas, the 52nd Bishop of Rome, and St. Silverius, the 58th), not to mention the married Simon Peter who is reckoned the first, this would be a return to tradition rather than a departure from it.

The election of an Eastern Rite pontiff would be a significant step for the Catholic Church, one that reaffirms its catholicity every bit as much as the election of a Polish cardinal to that office did in 1978. Duggan envisions a pope celebrating a liturgy using the vestments and rituals of the Byzantine or Syriac Church. And yet, there is nothing to stop that from happening now – and a strong argument for encouraging the practice no matter who the next pope is. After all, a pope leads a church which claims the hallmark of catholicity – universality – and as such he is called to be a shepherd to those who worship in the styles of the East every bit as much as those whose rituals are those of the West. Such actions would serve as a healing gesture of fraternal love for Eastern Catholics and Eastern Orthodox. May we live to see the day when the seeds planted four decades ago by Popes John XXIII and Paul VI and Patriarch Athenagoras in Jerusalem, seeds tenderly watered and nurtured by Pope John Paul the Great during his papacy, bring forth a harvest of unity for the glory of the Risen Savior.

There have been two votes taken, assuming the cardinals have stuck to their announced schedule. Shortly before noon in Rome, dark smoke billoed from the chimney over the Sistine Chapel. There is no new pope yet.