The Left to be Disappointed Again?

According to the Blogs I read and some commentary I heard replayed, the left is really hoping their kind of guy gets elected as the new Pope. Not likely to happen, as Pope John Paul II wasn't their kind of guy and he has appointed all of the Cardinals except for three! In addition he made it possible to elect a new Pope without needing a 2/3 vote. They start out looking for a 2/3 vote and after 30 attempts, a simple majority (1/2 of the cardinals + 1) can call for a simple majority vote.

This means those hoping for a leftist Pontiff can resist for 30 votes and after that it is up.


Note:

To be elected Pope, one Cardinal must receive more than two-thirds of the votes. Except that, under the new rules established by Pope John Paul II, if 30 ballots have taken place without any Cardinal being elected Pope, then the Cardinals may then elect by simple majority. This is an important change and may well be the most important change made. In the past, it has often been the case that a particular candidate has had solid majority support but cannot garner the required two-thirds majority, eg, because he is too conservative to satisfy the more moderate Cardinals. Therefore a compromise candidate is chosen, either an old Pope who will die soon and not do much until the next conclave (which is what was intended with John XXIII!) or someone not so hard-line wins support. The difference now will be that if, in the early ballots, one candidate has strong majority support, there is less incentive for that majority to compromise with the cardinals who are against their candidate and they simply need to sit out 30 ballots to elect their man. This may well see much more "hard-line" Popes being elected, and given the conservative trend of most appointments to the College by Pope John Paul II, it is almost certainly going to be a man cut from the same cloth. There will also be far less incentive for the Cardinals to finish quickly as in the past. After such a long papacy, they may need time to arrive at a strong consensus on what type of papacy the Church now needs. They will also be staying in comfortable lodgings, rather than sleeping in foldaway cots in hallways and offices in the Sistine Chapel.

From Catholic Pages

So the odds are while the next pope may not a white European he is very unlikely to be unsympathetic to leftist complaints about the Church's positions on celibacy, women priests, abortion, sexuality and so on.