Are There Zero-Sum Games?

 While looking for a new source for material to review, I visited an old web haunt where I use to post comments until I was blocked. Later on, that blog site eliminated the ability to comment on their articles. This has been a common occurrence in religiously conservative Christian websites. Some of these sites include Denny Burke's blog and The Gospel Coalition website. The article being reviewed today was posted the Acton blog. 

The article being reviewed was written by Joseph Sundee (click here for info) and is about what is called a win-win denial because of the belief that business transactions rely on a zero-sum game (click here for the article). We should note here that the Acton Institute, which hosts the Acton blog articles, more-less promotes free-market economic views. At the same time, the people at the Acton Institute claim that such an economic view is supported by Christianity.

In this article, Sundee wants to challenge our natural tendency to think of businesses transactions as engaging in zero-sum games where one group's gain is another group's loss. Sundee cites a study from the American Psychological Association (APA) and talks about the belief that the most successful for-profit ventures are 'less socially responsible.' Sundee claims that the opposite is true without any showing any documentation.

The study that Sundee uses asks whether both buyers and sellers were better off after voluntary exchanges. The tendency was to think that sellers benefited more than buyers. The belief tendency was attributed to limiting the position of a party solely to the monetary value rather than including the value of the goods or services purchased.

The name given to the view that can only see zero-sum games in business exchanges was called 'win-win denial' by the authors of the study Sundee cites. The study came from the American Psychological Association (APA). Sundee's point is that this win-win denial unfortunately interferes with social trust in our businesses and such. That this win-win denial must be countered to expand our trust in our economic institutions. 

In the end, Sundee calls the belief in the zero-sum game a fallacy and I think he does that without realizing one of the definitions of that word. A fallacy isn't necessarily advancing something that is false. A fallacy can be the misleading marketing of the logic involved to prove a claim. Here, a claim that rests on a fallacy could be true, but one cannot logically conclude that the claim is true because of the logical problems that exist in the argument. If Sundee is not employing that definition of the word 'fallacy,' then he is claiming that there are no zero-sum game instances in our economic system.

What we should note is the kind of black-white thinking involved in Sundee's framing of the issue of the zero-sum game. For example, the number of participants included in determining whether a business exchange was a win-win or a zero-sum game are reduced to two: the buyer and the seller. Later, Sundee mentions other two-party relationships such as employee-employer. In the buyer-seller interaction, participants and other stakeholders who are excluded when determining whether an interaction is a win-win include the workers who produced the goods, the communities they live in, and/or the environment. And what else is excluded is the notion that we are working with the finite resources of all of the parties involved. After all, when finite resources are involved, one person's gain can become another person's loss. 

And so the value of any business transaction is not necessarily good or bad for each person involved, but it is mixed. Yes, a buyer will most likely benefit from the goods or services that they purchase, but their purchase could reduce their ability to voluntarily purchase something else in present or future desired exchanges. In addition, the deal used to make and exchange beneficial to both the buyer and seller may come at the expense of either the workers who produced what is purchased, the environment, or other stakeholders. This ignoring of the effects that a purchase can have on those other stakeholders and the economic system itself can be called ignoring externalities.

When one considers that our current form of capitalism, neoliberalism, which is today's implementation of a free market economy, has for decades produced growing disparities in wealth and income between races and between economic classes, has contributed to a growing political disparity between the economic classes (click here), and has had greater negative impacts on the environment, one does not need economic studies to show that we have both win-win scenarios and zero-sum games coexisting in our economy.

If all Sundee was saying is that we cannot assume that any given transaction is a zero-sum game, then I can agree with him. We should not assume that any purchase is a zero-sum game, otherwise we could stare good opportunities in the face without benefiting from them. But if he is saying that there are no zero-sum games at all either in any individual business purchase or business venture or in our economic system, I'm afraid that there are plainly observable facts on the ground contradict that notion. And because not all opportunities are either win-win scenarios or zero-sum games, we have to look at each purchase or business transaction on a case by case basis. The same could be said of our economic system. We can't assume that our current economic system, neoliberal capitalism, is a a win-win for us as a nation or for the parts of the world that employ it.

Furthermore, if we reduce the results to just win or loss, we will be oversimplifying what is going on in any purchase or transaction. Many of the results we see from business being conducted in our nation's economy either on the individual level or local, regional, and national levels have mixed results. And whether there is a net gain from how business is conducted can only be clearly seen later on. Thus looking at each business transaction as either a win or a loss does not encourage or enable us to thoroughly examine the final results of doing business.

So yes, we should not assume that all business transactions are zero-sum games. But neither can we assume that  those business transactions provide win-win scenarios either. Business and economics are far more complicated than what Sundee seems to given them credit for.

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Comments Which Conservatives Have Blocked From Their Blogs For October 29, 2019

Oct 18

The comment below is put in the sometimes eternal status of pending. It was posted and then put on pending. A shorter version of this comment was posted.

To Gene Veith and his blogpost on the tendency for multiple sides to lean towards totalitarianism. This appeared in Cranach.

Unfortunately, the conservative perspective partially sabotages the argument against totalitarianism here. That is immediately seen in the claim that Communists and Nazis agreed on totalitarianism. We should note then that totalitarinism can come from the left and the right, that was one of the points that came from Orwell's book, 1984.

Regarding communism, it was the Bolsheviks who wanted totalitarianism. But the Bolsheviks were not the only communists. THe Mensheviks and others, such as the Kronstadt sailors, wanted a bottom-up democracy that the actual soviets could provide. The Bolsheviks were oppotunists who ruled in a similar way that the Tsars ruled.

But regarding the problem with the conservative perspective here, conservatives can only see the threat of totalitarianism as coming from government. They don't see how private elites can rule over society either directly or by making government their proxy. And we should note that the controlling motivation for many of those elites is to maximize personal profits. That motivation comes from the belief that pursuing self-interest is one's only moral obligation. Again, we should consult 1984.
Another problem with the conservative approach here is perception. Take the following paragraph as an example:

So is there anything outside of the scope of the government in the United States? Today the government is a prime mover in the economy, decides moral issues, finances the arts, operates a vast educational system, sponsors scientific research, has a say in what you do with your private property, regulates how business must operate, supervises our food supply, approves what medicine we can take, and insinnuates itself into other areas of life

The conservative approach says that the role of the government is to protect its people from 'crime and conquest' and other social spheres whose growth and success are needed by society. But isn't government protecting us when it regulates our property like our cars and isn't government protecting us when its regulations prevent businesses from poisoning the environment or exploiting the people? Do we want only private sector elites to control research? Just remember how scientists representing the tobacco industry denied that smoking posed significant health risks. We should also note that in most of the spheres mentioned, government is not the only participant. Government's participation in the arts, education, research and so forth coexists with participation from the private sector.

Note that in the basic conservative premise are the seeds of totalitarianism. Government's job is to protect people, not represent.them. That was the approach of Lenin, Stalin, Hitler, Castro, Hugo Chavez, Kim Jung-un, and past leaders of Red China. We can look at any government that is strongly controlled by single ideological group as being on its way to totalitarianism. That is because those who sieze control become the final judges as to what protects the people.

I agree with Veith when he says that democracies can become totalitarian. But then why not accept the, from what I am told is, the cultural Marxist view of democracy? That democracy is not just a set of political procedures, it is a state of being where all people equally share society and the state. To view government as representing all of its people instead of just some majority, is to hold the silver bullet that can kill any totalitarianism.

The real indicator of possible totalitarian possibilities for any government is not found in government's size, but in its fidelity to all of its people. A government that has other lovers than all of its people will venture off into totalitarianism. And the question is whether an ideology that has a penchant for authoritarianism, like conservatism has, can adequately battle totalitarian urges by itself.

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Oct 29

To Rev Ben Johnson and his blogpost that calls the Chicago Teacher strike immoral. This appeared in the Acton blog.

Actually, the opposite argument could be better made. To underfund public schools is immoral because it sabotages government's attempt to adequately educate public school students. One way of underfunding is to divert funds from charter schools, which by themselves could never replace public schools. In addition, private charter schools lie outside most of the constraints of a community's democratic processes.
Underfunding results in attacks on teacher morale, increased class sizes,  reduced resources, and attacks on student morale.  in an age where public education must respond to the infringements from poverty on the educational experience of the students both at school and at home, diverting funds from the public schools to charter schools where the later could never replace the former in terms of serving all students is both illogical and morally questionable because it sabotages the attempts to educate the vast majority of students.

And we should note one other thing. The push for charter schools by conservative religious sources could very well be an anti-government? Why sabotage such government services? It is because the government lies outside of the power of the Church to influence. And that is a fearful prospect when it comes to educating children. In short, the religious support for charter schools could be nothing more than another theater in the turf war between the Church and the secular world.

Comments Which Conservatives Block From Their Blogs For August 9, 2019

Oct 8

To Michael Matheson Miller and his blogpost on how to combat consumerism. This appeared in the Acton blog.

We need to face the fact that consumerism is a product of Capitalism. That doesn't meant that consumerism needs Capitalism to exist, but the converse is true. Markets must always expand if Capitalism is to survive. Thus, people need to buy more and more and what is it that they are buying but goods and services that are designed to feed our pleasures and ensure our comfort.

Thus, Capitalism promotes a consumerism that is not only bad for us as people, it is harmful to the environment and contributes to climate change. The drive to maximize profits is incentivized by an increased ability to consume. And thus either curbing or replacing Capitalism could help reduce consumerism, but then again it might not. For we should note what Martin Luther King Jr. observed in that both Marxism and Capitalism promoted their own unique kinds of materialism.
Now the rules for combating consumerism listed in the above article might give temporary help to some, but it was what Martin Luther King Jr. said that provides the stake in the heart of consumerism. In speaking against the Vietnam War, King said the following:

We must rapidly begin the shift from a "thing-oriented" society to a "person-oriented" society. When machines and computers, profit motives and property rights are considered more important than people, the giant triplets of racism, materialism, and militarism are incapable of being conquered.

Unless we learn to count people, remember those creatures each of whom is made in the image of God, as being more important than our possession and wealth, we will never defeat the 3-headed monster that included materialism. And unless we become a person-oriented society, the rules listed above will provide no permanent relief from consumerism.
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To Rev. Ben Johnson and his blogpost that talks about how St. Nikolas thinks Christians should view technology. This appeared in the Acton blog.

While Johnson states that technology is morally neutral, that has not been regarded as being always true by scientists. The creation of the atom bomb, for example, was seen as being wrong once it was completed even by some who participated in its development. In fact, the development of the atom bomb caused Bertrand Russell and Albert Einstein to write a manifesto that declared that because of that bomb, people must choose between either relying on fighting wars or survival.

We should also consider that just because something is morally neutral doesn't mean that it a wise choice. When I taught my introduction ot Information Technology class, the first term I would teach my students is the word 'trade off.' The term means that when choosing a particular option, there are benefits and detriments that come with that choice. And that the mature adult way of deciding between options is to compare the trade offs for each choice. Unfortunately, too many of us want to fall in love at first sight with each new piece of technology than to measure its trade offs.

Then there come something that a fellow activist and very important friend of mine, Rita Corriel,  said to me. She said that we often measure progress by how far we can distance ourselves from nature. This perspective helps point to the trade offs that we should look for in each new technological product. For when our reliance on technology separates us too far from nature, we will pay a severe price both physically and personally.

Thus, there are other concerns besides the morality of using a new piece of technology that determines whether we should use it.


 

Comments Which Conservatives Block From Their Blogs For September 25, 2019

Sept 21

To Bradley Birzer and his article on who was the American of 1775. This appeared in the Imaginative Conservative blog.

One should note the following from the article above. First, there was no one American in 1775. There were various Americans from those who owned no land to farmers. From bondholders to slaveholders, From who lived in the cities and those who didn't. There was no one American because Americans were not a monolith. Even those who lived on the farms or in the cities were diverse just as slave holders were a diverse group. And perhaps Birzer acknowledges this when he mentions

Second, guess who wasn't an American in 1775. Those who weren't Americans were Native Americans who land America stole and blacks many of whom were enslaved, all of whom were considered to be inferior to white Americans. I guess that that could be chalked up to the new prejudices that Americans embraced. We should note how American Blacks were in 1775 by noting when they were respected as having the right to vote.

So was America really a world unto itself? Were we really that unique or just narcissistic for thinking so? Benjamin Barber wrote in his book Fear's Empire that the claim to uniqueness, especially in terms of being the unique source of good in the world, has been the claim of multiple nations, not just the US--remembering that America is really a hemisphere divided into North America, Central America, and South America. Perhaps that tells us about the status of our claim to being unique source of good in the world.

Conservatives, in an effort to preserve tradition, like to selectively look at the past. And in so doing they either erase or minimize our past atrocities. But those past atrocities should not feel special because of the treatment they receive. Too much loyalty blinds all of us to the atrocities and other faults that we practice in our groups regardless of the groups we belong to. That is true for conservatives, liberals, and leftists.

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To Rev Ben Johnson and his article that challenges claims that cuts in government funding was responsible for 120,000 people dying from inadequate healthcare. Johnson goes on to support a free market approach to healthcare. This appeared in the Acton blog.

In other words, don't change how we do things here is the message of this article. But whether the claims being examined above are true or not doesn't affect our need to change.
First, let's talk about austerity in general. That and the movement of capital is part of neoliberal capitalism. But the IMF states that in a choice between debt and austerity measures, it is better to choose debt. Austerity measures hurt the economy because they amount to a consolidation of wealth rather than true growth in wealth. The short of it is that Neoliberal capitalism has not delivered on its promises and has been viewed and harmful (see https://www.imf.org/external/pubs/ft/fandd/2016/06/ostry.htm  ), not helpful, to both a nation's economy and its political life.
If memory serves, in a another report the IMF also stated that the growing wealth disparity caused by Neoliberal capitalism, not only hurts economic grown, but causes political distrust and unrest. We only need to look at our nation as providing evidence in supporting that claim.

Second, here is the real kicker. Political conservatives constantly cry fiscal responsibility when public funds under the government's control mostly go to people as individuals. But they act like drunken sailors when it comes to spending public funds that things provided by corporations. What we see in this article as well as other Christian defenses of Neoliberal Capitaism is a near fatal repeating of history where the Church sides with wealth an power in times that eventually saw revolutions. The pre-revolutionary times of France, Russia, and Spain serve as examples once their revolutions took place.
Third, we might want to look into the specifics of the claim that cuts in funding contributed to, not caused the deaths of 10s of thousand of people in Great Britain. There is a difference between saying that a factor contributed to from saying that it caused.
Fourth, the free market approach to healthcare has provided sterling results for the wealthy and those fortunate enough to have garnered good healthcare. But for many others, the free market approach has either denied them adequate healthcare to their physical detriment or has caused others to suffer significant financial hardships and even bankruptcy. 




 

Comments Which Conservatives Block From Their Blogs For September 18, 2019

Sept 16

To Rev. Ben Johnson and his blogpost that uses quotes from the UN’s new chief of the World Meteorological Organization to downplay the threat that climate change poses to us. This appeared in the Acton Blog.

Besides some misquoting and quoting from questionable sources, a selective focus was employed by the writer of the article. One UN Climate Chief, that is the Executive Secretary of the UN Framework on Climate Change, seems to be passing a different message than the one above, and she is not alone . She states that the world's way of life as it is now will lead to 'catastrophe' (see https://apnews.com/a0baaad17de744ca875711d92e173442 and https://phys.org/news/2019-04-climate-chief-current-path-catastrophe.html ). Though not joined by all top scientists, she believes that we have 12-year period of opportunity to avoid a climate change of no return. The disagreement among experts should at least raise red flags about climate change to those who are truly objective. We should note that there are others, especially some religiously conservative Christians, who see conspiracy theories of a new call to socialism behind the warnings.
We should note that current effects of climate includes the displacement of millions of people from severe weather to the risks that come with an increased number of heatwaves. Heatwaves not only pose multiple health risks from stress to diseases especially to the vulnerable, but they can also cause increases in the disruption of basic services like electric power and thus water infrastructure. Heatwaves can also increase the number wildfires. In addition, we have already seen a dramatic spike in Category-5 hurricanes during the early part of the 21st century--13 to be precise. No other 20-year span has seen even close to as many such storms as have occurred during this part of the 21st century.
Other environmental factors include the destruction of coral reefs from coral bleaching, a reduction in oxygen in the oceans, a threat to peatlands and a rise in sea level. Climate change is seen as playing a role in the recent increase in global hunger as it affects food supplies. Climate change is seen as playing a role in increases in ocean acidification which threatens marine life and increases in sea and atmospheric temperatures (see https://library.wmo.int/doc_num.php?explnum_id=5789 ). The increases in those temperatures is seen as main factors in the decrease of ice in both polar regions. We should note that continual increases in sea levels threaten the health and even safety of those who live near the oceans especially those who live in large urban areas located near the oceans. Changes in temperatures causes a loss of permafrost which, in turn, causes increased emissions of greenhouse gases.

It isn't that we can see precisely into the future, but we can accurately see the present and we have more than adequate understanding of the dynamics involved with what affects the climate and the oceans. And none of the signs we see are promising. But perhaps the biggest obstacle we have is the perspective we gain from the financial world. For the financial world under the control of our present day neoliberal capitalism has taught us to only look at short-term returns. The problem emphasizing short-term returns when it comes to climate change is that by the time those returns overwhelmingly convince us that there is a problem, the trap has sprung and it is too late. The Scriptures are right in saying: ' For the love of money is a root of all [g]sorts of evil, and some by longing for it have wandered away from the faith and pierced themselves with many griefs>' (see I Timothy 6:10, https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=I+timothy+6%3A10&version=NASB )

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Sept 17

To Bruce Frohnen and his blogpost on the purpose of The Constitution. Frohnen projects a conservative idealism in both the document and its framers. This appeared in the Imaginative Conservative Blog.

Besides the small contradiction that exists in the article, Frohnen kind of projects conservative idealism when describing the purpose of and the context in which The Constitution was written.
The small contradiction can be seen in his statements that The Constitution was written because Americans were seeking less government and that it was written because the American people blamed a weak federal government.for trade and tax wars. To be specific, it was those with wealth who blamed a weak government for the widespread dissent and weak response to Shays Rebellion. One only needs to compare the demographics of the rebels in that rebellion with the participants at the convention that produced The Constitution to understand the true context of the document.

One could also look at Madison's fear of opening the electorate to all classes of people in England. He was afraid that this would lead to agrarian reform. Thus he said that the purpose of government was to:

protect the minority of the opulent against the majority

Remember that initially senators were not elected by the people. That and their length of term in office was immunize the Senators from the opinions of the voters according to Madison. And there we should remember that only a very small percentage of the people could vote then.

Conservative idealism paints a similar picture of the framers of The Constitution as the Scriptures do of the Apostles. In reality, many of the framers of The Constitution were driven more by self-interest than idealism--that is many, not all. The tax revolts didn't cause one state to threaten another. Again, those revolts threatened the place that the wealthy had in society. Federalist Paper #10 shows the disregard that people like Madison had for democracy as well as those who disagreed with policies established to favor the wealthy.

 The influence of factious leaders may kindle a flame within their particular States, but will be unable to spread a general conflagration through the other States...A rage for paper money, for an abolition of debts, for an equal division of property, or for any other improper or wicked project, will be less apt to pervade the whole body of the Union than a particular member of it

and following shows the preference for the Union over the states:

Hence, it clearly appears, that the same advantage which a republic has over a democracy, in controlling the effects of faction, is enjoyed by a large over a small republic,--is enjoyed by the Union over the States composing it.

Finally, we should note that Frohnen only recognizes power in the government. What he doesn't seem to understand is that power can centered in the elites from the private sector. And that is what can occur when the government is under the control of the wealthy regardless of its size.




 

Comments Which Conservatives Block From Their Blogs For September 11, 2019

Sept 10

To Greg Weiner and his article about conservatism in The Constitution and how it should guide how the different branches of our government should act today. This was posted in the Imaginative Conservative blog.

Though the article is mostly concerned about the procedural approach by certain parts of our government and those parts of article merit a certain level of applause, there are other issues that come into play.

First and foremost, conservatism is presented as the ideal or standard of perfection as is The Constitution. The problem is that such an approach makes a religion out of conservatism and ignores the history of The Constitution and its framers.
To make a religion out of conservatism usually results in making it into a cult because it causes conservatism to serve as its only external reference point. As for The Constitution, we need to remember that most of the contributors to The Constitution were wealthy and were in the process of writing this document in fear losing their place in the nation because there was widespread dissent over the recession at the time and there was Shays Rebellion. Thus what the framers of The Constitution wanted was a stronger federal government that could respond to future rebellions while forming a new kind of government that would still serve their interests.
Spreading democracy was not the concern of the framers of The Constitution. Rather, they used the term 'democracy' as a pejorative on those who espoused specific policies that challenged the place of the then elites in America. And we could say, though to a lesser degree, of the above article's use of the term 'presentism.' The framers wanted to guard against impulsive decisions but called  certain ideas they opposed impulsive and dangerous. In other words, they were merely speaking as politicians like today's politicians do. And losing sight of the frailties and human faults of the framers is a weakness of the article above.

We should note that The Constitution as originally written supported white male supremacy as well as upper class supremacy. While the latter is not stated as explicitly as the former, it is found in how it silently supported the conditions of its time where, for the most part, only white landowners could vote while Blacks in general could not vote until almost 100 years later and women could not vote until well after that.

Some other matters of concern was the description of Trump as a populist. In reality, Trump has always been an elitist who campaigned in populist clothing. Both Trump's past and his policies bear witness to that. Trump's past clearly shows that he has always been well connected to political and financial elites. And the primary beneficiary of his present policies as well as many of the people he has put into power over government agencies have been financial and corporate elites or those who serve them.

Something else to note, that the above article could serve as a source of criticism over the Republican lawmakers who so obstructed President Obama during his presidency.  Mitch McConnell didn't care as much for creating policies as he did for trying to make Obama a one-term President.

We should also note that the conservative approach to trade was, for the most part, not close to being followed until the latter half of the 20th century. For our nation used protectionism from its beginning to build and make its industries competitive with those from the rest of the world. That protectionism does not necessarily endorse Trump's protectionism, but it shows that the conservative approach to trade wasn't followed for most of our history and with good reason.

Finally, again, there are parts of the above article that deserve praise. Not that those parts describe what is perfect, but those parts do help in telling the different branches of government what some of their proper roles are. It is that other parts of the above article also merit criticism for their distorted view conservatism, and The Constitution and its framers.
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To Rev. Ben Johnson and his blogpost that attempts to link the Left with witchcraft. This appeared in the Acton blog.

Besides falsely describing the Left as a Monolith, Rev. Johnson's article misses an important question. That question is, what happens when unbelievers show more interest in biblical concerns more than Christians do? How does that reflect on the Gospel.

I suppose that Rev Johnson wants to associate all of the Left with witchcraft. Such is an authoritarian approach because such attempts to discredit the Left by attacking its credentials rather than responding to the specific points made by those on the Left. We should note that many from the Left, both past and present, have never been involved with witchcraft. Some of those people include those involved with Liberation Theologians, Martin Luther King Jr, Noam Chomsky, Howard Zinn, or Karl Marx to name a few. But by associating witchcraft with the Left, he gives an excuse to Christians to pre-emptively dismiss the Left before having to judge the facts and logic of their their claims. Again, such an approach is authoritarian because authoritarians tend to believe that truth is more determined by the credentials of the source rather than by the logic and facts of what they say.

Perhaps Rev. Johnson should read what Martin Luther King Jr. said about communism (see pages 93-94 of http://nationalhumanitiescenter.org/ows/seminars/aahistory/Pilgrimage.pdf ):

The late Archbishop of Canterbury, William Temple, referred to communism as a Christian heresy. By this he meant that communism had laid hold of certain truths which are essential parts of the Christian view of things, but that it had bound up with them concepts and practices which no Christian could ever accept or profess. Communism challenged the late Archbishop and it should challenge every Christians—as it challenged me—to a growing concern about social justice. With all of its false assumptions and evil methods, communism grew as a protest against the hardships of the underprivileged…The Christian ought to be challenged by any protest against unfair treatment of the poor, for Christianity is itself such a protest, nowhere expressed more eloquently than in Jesus’ words: “The Spirit of the Lord is upon me, because he hath anointed me to preach the gospel to the poor, he hat sent me to heal the brokenhearted, to preach deliverance to the captives, and recovering of sight to the blind, to set at liberty them that are bruised, to preach the acceptable year of the Lord.”

And he should finally read what Romans 2:1-3, 12-15 says (see https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Romans+2%3A1-3%2C12-15&version=NASB ):

Therefore you have no excuse, everyone of you who passes judgment, for in that which you judge another, you condemn yourself; for you who judge practice the same things. 2 And we know that the judgment of God rightly falls upon those who practice such things. 3 But do you suppose this, O man, when you pass judgment on those who practice such things and do the same yourself, that you will escape the judgment of God?…12 For all who have sinned without the Law will also perish without the Law, and all who have sinned under the Law will be judged by the Law; 13 for it is not the hearers of the Law who are just before God, but the doers of the Law will be justified. 14 For when Gentiles who do not have the Law do instinctively the things of the Law, these, not having [o]the Law, are a law to themselves, 15 in that they show the work of the Law written in their hearts, their conscience bearing witness and their thoughts alternately accusing or else defending them

Finally, we should note that the authoritarian approach to persuasion is one that relies on manipulation rather than on asking people to make up their own minds by first fully examining the facts and logic of what others say.

Comments Which Conservatives Block From Their Blogs For July 24, 2019

July 17

To R. Scott Clark and his blogpost that quotes a portion of a Chris Gordon article that compares the use of the rainbow by the LGBT community with that used by God after God delivered Noah from the flood. In that article, Gordon seems to lament over the legalization of same-sex marriage as well as the rejection of God’s Word shown in their sexual preferences. This appeared in Heidelblog.

Chris Gordon’s article:  https://www.agradio.org/what-the-gay-marriage-movement-should-know-about-gods-rainbow.html

The writer of the article, Chris Gordon, talks about the Christian weeping over how people are rejecting what God has said about marriage in the last part of his article. But is there only one kind of sin that Christians should weep over here?

Shouldn't Christians also weep over any society that seeks to punish the LGBT community because of their sexual sins? After all, we American Christians would easily weep over the denial of religious freedom for those who worship false gods. Why should we not also weep when those in the LGBT community are punished by society rather than treated as equals. Wanting the LGBT community to be treated as equals in society is not more an endorsement of their sexual sins than wanting those who follow other religions to be treated equal in society an endorsement of their false gods.

Yes, we Christians need to share the Gospel and what God says about human sexuality with the LGBT community. And we need to do that in love. But we are not showing love when we speak kindly to them while demanding that society must marginalize them.



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July 23

To Joe Carter and the video he posted in a blogpost that talks of the emerging crisis from our ever growing national deficit and debt. This appeared in the Acton blog.

The bias of the video presentation is beyond being disingenuous. Claiming that self-funded programs like Social Security and Medicare contribute to the debt is lying. The only way that Social Security contributes to the debt is for the fund to demand that the federal gov't pay back what it has borrowed from the fund.

In addition, we might want to note that defense spending in spread through several budgets including the DOD  budget, Treasury budget, and the DOE and has been approaching or exceeding $1 trillion for a while. We should also note that there are corporations that receive more in gov't subsidies than they pay in federal taxes and those that pay no taxes at all. We could also include how the pharmaceutical industry exploits Medicare spending. And we could go on.

We could raise taxes on corporations but we are threatened with the loss of jobs when that option is considered. Why? Because we live in a shareholder economy where business's primary interest is to feed the greed of the shareholders. Traditionally speaking, the definition for the term 'stakeholder' was that all who are impacted by a business serve as stakeholders for that business. But today's working definition of the the term 'stakeholder' has become synonymous with the word 'shareholder.' It isn't that some businesses don't recognize other stakeholders in addition to shareholders. It is that the predominant business ethic is to conflate the definitions of the two words. And such an ethic helps drive the every growing wealth disparity and shifting tax burden that exist in our nation.

What really drives our deficit today is that too many corporations see the public fund as something to receive from than to give to. And so whether it is through the military industrial complex, the prison industrial complex, pharmaceutical companies exploiting medicare, and so on, too many big corporations are acting as parasites until there is nothing left to gain. And we might want to inform those who want to cut social safety nets that austerity programs and an ever growing wealth disparity in a nation hinders economic growth. That is according to the IMF.




 

Comments Which Conservatives Block From Their Blogs For June 26, 2019

June 21

To Joseph Mussomeli and his blogpost about the pardon of an American soldier who, in revenge for the death of his friend, disobey orders by taking an enemy combatant prisoner to an isolated area where he stripped the prisoner and then interrogated him. When the prisoner fought back, the soldier killed the prisoner. The article was written because this soldier, who was sentenced to 25 years in military prison, received a Presidential pardon. This appeared in the Imaginative Conservative blog.

We need to distinguish between what is understandable and justifiable. We could easily understand the 9/11 atrocities if we note that they were in response to our almost carte blanche support for Israel's atrocities against the Palestinians and to our sanctions against Iraq that took the lives of hundreds of thousands of Iraqi children. That is we could understand those atrocities unless tribalism has prevented us from doing so. Unfortunately, tribalism, a.k.a., strong group loyalty, often prevents us from seeing the sins of our own group. Instead, the ethic that comes with tribalism is that right and wrong depends on who does what to whom. Thus the atrocities that our group does can be described as understandable but not the atrocities of others. BTW though the 9/11 atrocities are understandable, they are in no way justifiable and neither could the actions of Behenna. BTW, for critics, I am well aware that the 9/11 attacks were on a scale far greater than Behanna's killing of the prisoner. That is not the point of comparison being used here. The point is to distinguish how an atrocity can be understandable but not justifiable.

Regarding the events that led to the prisoner's killing, against orders, Behenna took the prisoner to an isolated area where he stripped the prisoner to interrogate him. But when the prisoner attacked Behenna, why wasn't the prisoner's attack described as self-defense? If the roles were reversed and a lone enemy combatant had taken Behenna out to an isolated location, stripped him and started to interrogate him, would we describe Behenna as acting in self-defense if he attacked his captor?  Instead, Behenna's reactions to the attack are the only actions described as self-defense.

War certainly corrupts everyone involved. It is inevitable. War enables tribalism to flourish. In fact war is steroids for tribalism. And in tribalism moral relativism wins the day. And that should be the Christian's problem with the above article even though Mussomeli complains about America's strong tendency to admit no wrong doing. Behenna's actions were in no way justifiable and thus they become a stain on the conscience of both our nation as well as Behenna. Even though what he did was understandable, it can in no way be justified. And though we don't know how Behenna will respond to this stain on his conscience, many of our troops who fought in the War on Terror have reacted to their own stains by taking their lives at rates not seen since the Vietnam War. Recognizing that Behenna's actions were understandable does not wash out the stain. Recognizing that his actions were unjustifiable begins the process of washing out that stain. Unfortunately, according to the above article, Behenna has not completed that stage. And his pardon, though bringing him temporary comfort, might even cause the stain to be set in deeper.
Fighting a war and, to a lesser degree, fighting crime show some with the most power weapons we allow people to have. To allow them to give into tribalism means that we are taking away an important motivation for those with these powerful weapons to exercise self-restraint. So are we fully informed if we give into tribalism for those who have the most powerful weapons people can have? Or are we just kidding ourselves when thinking that our side will always prevail when atrocities win the day?
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June 22
To Joseph Sunde and his blogpost claiming that Socialism and Christianity do not mix. His blogpost contains a video presentation of Socialism by Russell Moore from the Gospel Coalition. This appeared in the Acton blog.

The problems that almost always occur when religiously conservative Christians, especially American ones, talk about socialism is that that they talk about it mostly in static, monolithic terms. By static I mean that they never have read  or listened enough to hear the evolution that occurs in socialist thinking. And by monolithic, I mean that socialism is always described as being the same without acknowledging key differences between Socialists. And we might add that religiously conservative Christians, especially those from America, are opportunistic in terms of what they point out as its examples.


Russell Moore is guilty of having all 3 problems when talking about Socialism. And one has to wonder how limited has been his view of of the subject.

In terms of talking about socialism statically, while the popular Christian assessment of socialism is that it occurs when we have state owned means of production in order to arrive at some utopian end, that is not the view of all socialists today. Some now believe in relying on socialism not to reach utopia, but to improve on a failing Capitalist system. Some now are emphasizing non-elite centered rule and worker-owned and controlled means of production--one can see this in Ezequiel Adamovsky's book, Anticaptialism. And, starting with Trotsky and continuing with Khrushchev and Gorbachev, many socialists have condemned Stalin's totalitarianism. Noam Chomsky also included in that condemnation of Stalin was a claim that Lenin was not a socialist in terms of how he ruled Russia. Like other systems, Socialism has evolved and gone through some changes.

Next, Moore describes socialism, even for democratic socialism, as a monolith where the state owns and controls the means of production. But such does not qualify as socialism from the Marxist tradition. Why? Because the most basic tenet of Marxist Socialism is that the workers replace the bourgeoisie as the ruling class. Thus, even if the state does own the means of production, which is not necessary for Socialism to occur,  it is not Socialist if the workers are not in control of the state. And the workers gain those positions of authority by being democratically elected by their peers. That is an extremely important part of the definition of Socialism from the Marxist tradition. In fact, based on that criteria, Rosa Luxemburg, a contemporary of Lenin, declared that Lenin was not ruling as a Socialist because he relied on a small elite committee to help rule rather than on the workers. We should note here that Lenin came from the Petite Bourgeosie class, he was never a member of the proletariat--the workers. Therefore, according to Luxemburg, Lenin's rule over Russia resembled a Bourgeoisie dictatorship rather than a Socialist rule. And Moore  would know that if he was adequately exposed to socialist thinkers. But he wasn't and thus was ignorant of that fact. But Luxemburg gave Lenin a Hall Pass because of Russia's internal conflicts at the time. And Luxemburg was not the only Socialist who was challenging Lenin's Socialist crednetials..

BTW, Moore's Democratic Socialism isn't the only variation of  Socialism. Libertarian Socialism doesn't even believe in the existence of the state and yet it is a form of socialism. And yet Moore does not account for that.
Finally, religiously conservative Christians are opportunistic in their labeling of Socialist regimes. While they are more than happy to include the Soviet Union, Cuba, China, North Korea and alike as examples of Socialism, they overlook the fact that non-dictatorial, democratically elected and left-leaning  regimes were replaced by the US with tyrannical dictators who served the interests of American businesses. Had they been given a chance, who knows what positive examples of Socialism would have emerged. Rather, Moore and others only point to those "communist" regimes that emerged from revolutions that sought to overthrow dictators who, far too many times, were supported by the West.

IN addition, Moore overlooks one nation that is both economically successful and the closest example of Marxism today. That nation is Germany. Why is Germany the closest example to Marxism in the world today? It is because just as Marx believed in redistributing power to the workers, so has Germany partially implemented that redistribution of power. However Germany uses a hybrid system with its codetermination laws that combine worker-controlled means of production with bowner-controlled means of production. For example, if a company has at least 500 to around 2,000 employees, then around 1/3 of the executive board of the company must be made up of workers who were elected by their peers. And if memory serves, if a company has over 2,000 employees, then the percentage of worker representation on the executive board approaches 50%.
If we want to want to read one of the best Christian assessments of Socialism/Communism, we need to read what Martin Luther King Jr. wrote in his book: Strive Toward Freedom. It isn't that King doesn't commit some of the same errors that Moore has. Rather, King's objections to Socialism/Communism are far more biblically based than Moores as King strikes at more of the most bssic elements of Socialism that Moore overlooks.




 

Comments Which Conservatives Block From Their Blogs For June 19, 2019

June 15

To R. Scott Clark and his blogpost warning parents not to let their children be educated by TV. One of the reasons for his warning is that Hollywood will corrupt our children’s minds by having us accept homosexuality as normal rather than as the mental illness Clark says it is. This appeared in Heidelblog.

Cited article:   https://www.agradio.org/why-you-should-not-let-hollywood-catechize-your-children.html

The above post and the article from which it quotes goes well beyond the Scriptural description of homosexuality as being sinful and against as we are created to be (Romans 1). And there are two interesting observations to bring up here. First, homosexuality should not surprise in the unbelieving world. That was part of Paul's point in Romans 1 and we should note that what was normal and abnormal before the fall have, in some cases, switched places. Second, there are heterosexual sins that are considered to be worse than homosexuality. Whereas Romans 1 depicts a scene where homosexuality should not surprise us in the unbelieving world, having sex with one's step-mom (I Cor 5) should surprise us according to Paul.

With pride, Clark claims, and quite falsely so, that there is no unambiguous science that would challenge the pre-1793 DSM categorization that homosexuality is a mental illness--this is where Clark goes beyond the Scriptures and gives ground for the hatred and following marginalization of homosexuals. We should note that Clark doesn't cite any scientific study that supports the classification of homosexuality as a mental disorder. Clark seems unaware of how some Native American tribes saw 3 to 4 different genders among their people and they didn't marginalize them as Clark seems to desire for us to do. Neither does Clark  even mention the fact that homosexuality has having played a beneficial role in approximately 1,500 species (see https://www.news-medical.net/news/2006/10/23/1500-animal-species-practice-homosexuality.aspx ).

While pointing to the changes in the 1973 DSM categories, even there he make serious mistakes. First, DSM did not completely eradicate homosexuality from DSM until 1987. Second, Clark is not honest is acknowledging that previous DSM classification of homosexuality as a mental illness could have easily been due more to Christianity's influence on society and the scientific community rather than scientific study (see  https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/hide-and-seek/201509/when-homosexuality-stopped-being-mental-disorder and https://psychology.ucdavis.edu/rainbow/html/facts_mental_health.html ). And while Clark states that the change in the 1973 DSM classifications were due to political pressure by the gay community, the APA put the issue up to a vote where 5,854 Psychiatrists voted to remove homosexuality from DSM while 3,810 voted to retain it. And despite that approaching a 2-1 ratio to remove that classification of homosexuality, the APA relied on a compromise solution by replacing homosexuality with a category for those in personal conflict over their sexual preferences. And of course, none of that includes the scientific evidence that attributes homosexuality to DNA and 'nonsocial environmental factors' (see  https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/pdf/10.1177/1529100616637616 ).

Of course there is scientific evidence that points more to social factors as causing homosexuality. But in either case, the issue of mental illness and homosexuality is not mentioned.  In fact, more recent studies refute the connection between homosexuality and mental illness (see  https://psychology.ucdavis.edu/rainbow/html/facts_mental_health.html ).

In Clark's articles, he goes way beyond the clear Scriptural mandates against homosexuality to that of inflating the differences between homosexuality and heterosexuality to the extent that Christian readers of his articles can easily be encouraged to first fear homosexuals and then, out of that fear, hate homosexuals. That hatred may not come across with verbal or physical violence, but it can easily come across in believers attempting to marginalize homosexuals with or without the help of legislation.

Yes, we must clearly preach that the Scriptures speak against homosexuality. But if we go beyond what the Scriptures say on the matter, not only will we be hurting innocent people in society, including homosexuals, we will put Post Modernism Christians who rightly oppose the marginalization of homosexuals in society into a dilemma of either accepting or rejecting what the Scriptures say about homosexuality. Many Millennial Christians have begun to reject what the Scriptures say to avoid the sin of marginalizing homosexuals. And even non-Millennial Christians, like Nicholas Wolterstorff, have joined them.

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June 18

To Stanley Schwartz and his blogpost that opposes new rent regulations passed by the NY State legislature. One way in which Schwartz describes those regulations is as an attack on economic liberty. This appeared in the Acton blog.
Reading the article leads one to believe that any regulations over those who rent property to others would stifle the ability of those owners from making improvements on their rental properties and thus these owners never make any significant profits from their properties. At least that is what one is led to believe. But I suspect that case-by-case studies on those who rent properties to others might reveal something different.


The principle laid out in the article above is that the NY legislature should not put regulations on those who rent properties to others because that infringes on their economic freedom. And thus, it logically follows that Schwartz's is arguing that the NY legislature, or in fact all legislatures, should only represent the interests of owners, not of the other stakeholders. So while the legislature represents owners only,  the rest rely not on democracy but on those benevolence of those owners . So it is Democracy for owners but not for the rest of us. Something similar occurs when the idea of workplace regulations or environmental regulations passed by legislatures are portrayed as enemies of economic liberty. The message being passed is that  our government is to represent only those with wealth while it leaves the rest of us to live by the benevolence of those with wealth.

It isn't that all regulations are good. But regulations in principle are valid. And thus any examination over the validity of regulations must be made on case-by-case basis only lest only the wealthy among us enjoy living in a democracy--and I think that the lest is what the founding fathers intended in a nation when only white male landowners could vote during the writing of The Constitution.

Comments Which Conservatives Block From Their Blogs For May 15, 2019

May 14

To Joe Carter and his blogpost on tyranny and how younger people have forgotten about the tyranny of Communist regimes. His comments about that were made in reviewing a book by Yale professor Timothy Snyder. This appeared in the Acton blog.

Carter rarely provides a balanced view of an issue. And he fails to disappoint here. For in talking about tyranny, Carter not only presents a brief accounting of communist tyranny, he avoids mentioning the context of communist tyranny or the tyranny that has sprung in Capitalist economic systems.

If we want to talk about Soviet Union Communism, then we need to mention the tyranny of the Tzars which preceded the Russian Revolution. We also need to remember the strong criticisms that were made by fellow Marxists of Lenin's hijacking of the Russian Revolution. If we want to talk about the repression of people that is so much a part of Cuba's political system, we need to remember not just the US supported but corrupt and tyrannical Batista regime that preceded Castro's revolution, we also need to mention the American military attacks on civilian targets that pushed Castro into the arms of Khrushchev and the constant American attempts to assassinate Castro. If we want to talk about Nicaragua and the Sandinistas, we must first talk about the US supported tyrannical Somoza regime and the US supported terrorism that took place after the Sandinistas took power.

There are exceptions. The Nicaragua revolution didn't lead to tyranny in the 1980s despite its beginnings. In fact, it led to a democracy. And Chavez's rising to power was not the result of a revolution against tyranny. But his reign not only repeated the same economic mistakes made by previous Venezuelan regimes, he never followed through on the first and most vital tenet of Marxist Socialism--the implementation of a proletariat dictatorship. That dictatorship includes democratic processes but those processes are restricted to the proletariat.

Nor does Carter mention how left-leaning regimes that were arising from democratic processes were overthrown and replaced with dictators who were friendly to American business interests. In fact, before Cuba's Batista became the corrupt tyrant he ended up being, when he initiated workers' rights in Cuba, the US would try to correct him.

Finally, Carter fails to recognize the success of the most Marxist government in the world. For if redistributing power to the proletariat is the first and foundational tenet of Marxism, then Germany's codetermination laws where democratically elected workers are made members of a business's executive board qualifies as being the most Marxist system. Its codetermination laws have not produced a proletariat dictatorship, and yet by redistributing some power to the proletariat, Germany's system is perhaps the closest attempt we have ever seen of Marxist Socialism.

Carter's view of tyranny suffers from partial blindness. For he either is unable or refuses to see the tyranny that has been promoted by his own side, his own tribe. And he fails to see context in the tyrannies he rightfully mentions.

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To Joe Carter and his article on how we benefit from Billionaires. The family that owns Walmart is focused on in making that case. This was published in the Acton blog.

There are two problems with Carter's article here. The first problem rests with the incomplete data on Walmart provided by his source material (see https://mises.org/wire/billionaires-arent-quite-rich-we-think-they-are ). For as the writer of that article relied solely on Walmart's own report, other information provides disturbing or contradictory information.

The disturbing information not included by the report used by the article referenced is the actual state of Walmart Employees. For one thing, Walmart relies on anywhere between $5 to $7 Billion of government assistance for low-wage employees to subsidize its payroll. (see http://www.msnbc.com/msnbc/walmart-government-subsidies-study#51652 ). We should also note that around half of its workforce consists of part-time workers whereas the average percentage of part-time workers in the the kind of business Walmart is involved is 30% (https://www.reuters.com/article/us-walmart-workers-idUSKCN1IQ295 ).

In addition, there seems to be some misinformation that comes from the sources that the referred article used. For it was reported in the article Carter cited that the family that owns the majority of shares of Walmart only earned 0.02% (or 0.0002 *) of the Walmart's 2018 $514 Billion dollars in sales. But other sources report a far greater share going to the family that owns it. For according to the article, the family that owns Walmart would have garnered only 0.0002 * $514,000,000,000 in sales which equals $102,800,000. However with the NASDAQ report showing that the dividend payment for 2018 was around $2.08 per share and with Walmart's proxy statement reporting that the family owning Walmart owns 1,508,965,874 shares, that family's cut from Walmart in shares alone is over $3 Billion (see https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2019/02/19/does-walton-family-earn-more-minute-than-walmart-workers-year/?utm_term=.0eb7f8a63db1 ). And that doesn't include the family's other sources of income from Walmart which puts their earnings between $3-$5 Billion for one year (see https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2019-02-19/walton-family-fortune-increases-3-3-billion-on-walmart-earnings ).

The problem with Carter's source is that it provided a one-sided research regarding the income and welfare of Walmart's workers as well as easily disputable claims on the cut that the family that owns Walmart receives.

But there is a second problem with Carter's article. That is a problem with consistency. We are told time and again by conservatives like Joe Carter that the consolidation of power is dangerous for the rest of us. Here, Carter and others refer to the consolidation of government power. But what about the consolidation of power in the private sector? Isn't the consolidation of power there just as threatening? After all, in a capitalist economy that claims that relies on democratic processes, power follows wealth. And thus the consolidation of wealth leads to the consolidation of power--even political power in the private sector. And if we need any more verification of that point, then realize that some have already reclassified America as an oligarchy (see https://www.bbc.com/news/blogs-echochambers-27074746 ).




 

Comments Which Conservatives Block from Their Blogs For May 8, 2019

May 4

To Joe Carter and his blogpost criticizing Millennials for preferring to live in a Socialist or Communist nation despite the history of certain nations. This appeared in the Acton blog.

2 points should be made here. Just as Millennials might prefer to live in a Socialist or even Communist nation because they don't know what one is from experience, neither do conservative critics of Marxism, Socialism, and Communism. That fact that the majority of Millennials prefer a kind a nation in which they have never lived to a Capitalist nation in which they live is very telling. That preference is, in and of itself, a huge indictment on Capitalism and a significant indicator that Capitalism has failed them. And the details of their disillusionment with Capitalism should be looked into.

But Conservative apologists would rather divert everyone's attention to their view of Marxism, Socialism, and Communism--which many, not all, Conservatives tend to blend together in the forms of the Soviet Union, Red China, Cuba, North Korea, and Venezuela. They opportunistically scapegoat Marx for the totalitarianism of those states. But what they don't mention are the conditions and type of leaders who were replaced by the "Communists." And they neglect the backgrounds and contexts of those Marxist states with good reason. In the cases of the Soviet Union and Cuba, the "Communist" overthrew the totalitarian and corrupt governments. The Batista government in Cuba was supported by the US. In the case of China and North Korea, both were emerging from Japanese totalitarian rule. China broke away from Japan both in the 1920s and the end of WW II while North Korea broke away at the end of WW II.
The history of Venezuela was different in that the Socialist leader was elected to power. However, 2 factors should be considered here. First, Chavez never followed Marx in terms of redistributing power to the proletariat. Instead, like Lenin did when he hijacked the Russian Revolution, Chavez consolidated power. Here Rosa Luxemburg's criticism of Lenin's Bourgeoisie dictatorship is more condemnatory of Chavez because Chavez didn't have a subsequent Civil War to fight. Though Chavez called himself a 'socialist,' by not empowering the proletariat, he broke away from the fundamental tenet of Marxism. In addition, though some of Venezuela's economic problems could possibly be due to US intervention, much of its economic problems stem from following the failed history of the past: basing the economy on oil. While prices rise, that seems like a good idea, but when prices drop, the economy collapses. That occurred during the late 1980s and into the 1990s before socialism, and that also occurred under Chavez.

What conservatives conveniently forget are those nations that through democracy started to lean left only to end up in dictatorships. Examples of those nations include Iran ('53), Guatemala ('54), Greece ('67), and Chilé ('73). Why these examples are conveniently forgotten is because in each of those cases, the US had a significant hand in overthrowing the governments of those nations and replacing them with dictatorships. Other examples could have also been mentioned.

We should note that history shows that no one political-economic system guarantees eternal success and prosperity. But what we can look at is the location of power in a given political system. And one criteria by which we should fairly apply to all governments and political systems is to measure the degree to which a government is under elite-centered control or democratic control. Here, we cannot judge any nation simply by the label given to its political system. For elite-centered control governments can exist in nations that actually have "fair" elections in that people are freely voting for the candidates of their choice. Why? Because even here in the US, our system has now been fairly recategorized by some as an oligarchy (see https://www.bbc.com/news/blogs-echochambers-27074746 and https://theintercept.com/2015/07/30/jimmy-carter-u-s-oligarchy-unlimited-political-bribery/ ). And the reason why its status has changed is because power is not defined by the political office one holds, but by the degree of influence one has. And it has become measurably clear that those with the most wealth have the greatest political power in our nation. And that is despite, or perhaps because of, our Capitalist economic system.
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May 5

To Bradley Birzer and his blogpost on democracy. In that article he talked about the need to reduce, but not eliminate democracy in a given nation. This appeared in the Imaginative Conservative blog.

Why is it that the negative comments about democracy were not vetted here. Certainly the founding fathers opposed democracy. But why? Was it not because many of them replaced British leaders as the new elites of America? Was it not because the people were protesting and even tried a rebellion that threatened the place of these new elites and thus prompted the writing of The Constitution? And did not the founding fathers associate those populist ideas that challenged their position in society with democracy but did so in a derogatory fashion. And don't we see a significant arrogance by those who claimed that the general population did not want virtue and thus implying that the new elites had a monopoly on virtue?

Those above spoke against democracy not necessarily because they knew what it would become. They spoke against democracy our of self-interest and in opposition to popular ideas that could have alleviated some of the suffering of the people, ideas that would have cost the new elites some wealth and position.

Authoritarians don't like democracy. Neither do tribalists. Why? Perhaps it is because democracy is the rule of the people, it is the rule of all the people, not just the majority. Democracy, when looked at as being more than just the sum of certain political processes, can actually be a state of being. It is a state of being, as Jefferson envisioned it, where the nation belongs equally to all its citizens. Democracy is a state of being where society is shared equally by all. When, if ever, we reach democracy as a state of being, we will have greatly reduced, if not eliminated rule by either a few elites or by an ethnic group that assumes its own superiority.

We should note that like any other form of government, democracy does not produce some form of utopia. No political or economic system can do that. But what democracy as a state of being does do is that it prevents the centralization of power whether the centralization of that power be located either in the public or private sectors. And those who are concerned about the rise of tyranny should favor democracy over any other form of government.

Comments Which Conservatives Block From Their Blogs For May 1, 2019

April 15

To Alexander Zubatov and his blogpost on the inadequacies of both our society and its leaders. This appeared in the Imaginative Conservative blog.

Apartheid groups are competing in a king-of-the-hill battle to rule over America. They are apartheid because each group believes that, using the words of Martin Luther King Jr., they have everything to teach others and nothing to learn from them. These groups are apartheid because by each of them, while claiming to be the true reflection of America, have turned American Exceptionalism inwards. And on the spiritual front, each group has embraced the role of the Pharisee from the parable of the two men praying.

We could also blame our cherished economic system. For there are two institutional sources of secular values in society: Democracy and the Market. And which one has the greater influence over society is indicated by which institution has the greater influence over the other. While Democracy promotes a certain egalitarianism, the Market promotes competition to the point of both conquering and then ruling over others. Furthermore, our economic system promotes a materialism that teaches our society to value things over people.

While both rulers and revolutionaries follow the Market's base impulses, people are told that loyalty to their tribes is the highest virtue. That lesson was first learned in patriotism.

Finally, promoters of orthodoxies are puzzled as to why they no longer have the sway over others that they use to have. They lost their power is because, unrecognized by those promoters, the skeletons of our orthodoxies have come out of their closets.

All in all, what is complained about above in America is nothing more than the chickens coming home to roost. We should have recognized that but we are blinded by the image we see in our magic mirrors. We can't see that because of our early religious heritage, we have always been too authoritarian to have given Democracy a chance. For the central word of Democracy is the antithesis to what America has been about since its beginning: SHARING.. And that sharing does not apply that much to the to sharing wealth and possessions, we can tolerate some of that. What we Americans are most afraid of sharing is power. Again, that comes from our American Exceptionalism being turned inward.

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To Michael Matheson Miller and his blogpost that asks if Capitalism always leads to crony Capitalism. This appeared in the Acton Blog.

Articles, like the one above, always neglect some basic parts and information. For example, workers are ignored. Another missing link is lack of well-defined, important terms. What else is missing is the everlasting conflict between democracy and the Free Market. Democracy is where the people rule. And governments that qualify as working democracies write regulations for businesses with the concerns of all who are in society in mind. That means that the more we have free markets, the less we have democratic control those markets. In addition, the writer's definition for economic liberty is not economic liberty. He provides no real, working definition for the term. Though what will be quoted is not the definition, it does shows the bias used to define the term:

Economic liberty is important because it creates space for people to live out their freedom, take care of their families, and fulfill their responsibilities. Economic freedom is necessary because it allows people to take risks and create material prosperity for a flourishing life. Economic liberty is needed because without it there can be no political liberty

What is clear from the quote is that the writer of the article believes that economic liberty is the source of all that is good. However, that isn't economic liberty. Economic liberty is the allowance to engage in economic activity. Economic liberty is a morally neutral term that doesn't express any notion as to what people should do. In addition, suffice it to say that since some can undertake more economic activity than others, we are not really talking about economic liberty as much as we are talking about economic privilege. And if we are really talking about economic privilege rather than liberty, then don't economies that are based on privilege embrace an economic or social Darwinism where we have the survival of the fittest. And with part of that survival of the fittest comes Capitalism's cannibalizing ethic: the maximization of one's profits.

Are there any real differences in outcomes between crony capitalism and economies where we have small, impotent governments? With small, impotent governments, government cooperation by business is not needed by business to do what it wants. The real problem with the perspective above is that the only players it recognizes as participating interaction between business and government business experts and government officials where government representatives pursues self-interest in the same way that many businesses do. The rest of society, including workers, is left out of the decision making process and must hope that those who make decisions are kind and merciful. I wonder if it has occurred to commentators like the author of the above article that the means of Capitalism are at odds with the idealistic results they hope for.

Morals are necessary for any economic system to benefit all of the people. But, again, Capitalism's basic ethic is a cannibalizing one. If the maximization of one's profits is the bottom line, then all other ethical concerns only exist when they serve that ethic. The maximization of one's profits directs participants to only pursue self-interest. And with the free market, these participants are told that they are protected from exploiting others by the rules of the Free Market. Thus, these participants are taught that their only moral obligation is to pursue self-interest. If they want to care about others, that commendable; but it isn't necessary. So how can morals prevent abuse in such a system?


What is needed are political and economic structures that force all stakeholders with different concerns and interests to have to collaborate. The hopeful result is that decisions both in government and in the business world serve the interests of as a wide variety of stakeholders as possible rather than the interests of just a few. And that is where a democratic-based socialism can help. Because it is only such a socialism that can provide the necessary structures that listens to more than just a few voices.

Comments Which Conservatives Block From Their Blogs For February 6, 2019

Feb 4

To R. Scott Clark and his blogpost and its rejection of this age's reliance on feelings to define oneself. This appeared in Heidelblog

see also https://www.thepublicdiscourse.com/2019/02/49239/

That the world has overemphasized the role of feelings in how we define ourselves cannot be argued against. But many overreactions are legitimate responses to abusive situations and that is the issue that the Church must also deal with. It isn't enough to point out the log in someone else's eye; one must also acknowledge and deal with one's own logs. Otherwise, we will, however tragically ironic, be acting as the Pharisee from the parable of the two men praying.

For centuries, the authoritarianism promoted and practiced by the Church, especially the conservative Church, is partly responsible for the overemphasis that today's culture placed on therapy and on one's own feelings. And by authoritarianism, I am not talking about society's responses to God, I am talking about how resistance to overreach by human authority figures in the Church is responded to with hostility and aggression by those in the Church. Unfortunately, the result of the Church's authoritarian response to Psychology resembles more of a turf war for the hearts and minds of those who need healing rather than attempts to correct points of error.

BTW, regarding Trueman's article, it reinforces the above interpretation the Church's authoritarian approach and its unfortunate reaction to today's Psychology. For his model of thought is similar to the model of thought used in the pre modernism/modernism/post modernism division of history but with a few exceptions. One key exception neglects to mention that post modernism rejection of the metanarratives from both pre modernism and modernism comes from the authoritarian use of those metanarratives by many to enslave or even slaughter others. To condemn post modernism, which is analogous to the combination of Trueman's Second and Third World descriptions, is to act as that Pharisee from the parable of the two men praying (Luke 18:9-14, see  https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=luke+18%3A9-14&version=NIV  ). How ironic a position to taken by those whose faith is solely in God's mercy and grace rather than in their own merit.
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Feb 5

To Rev Ben Johnson and his blogpost that condemns Socialism as being based on envy, ignorance, and faith. This appeared in the Acton blog.

The first problem with the above article is its factual accuracy. When asked what should replace what Amazon's project, the response was not a "guillotine.' It was one of several responses, not the response. Another response was 'public housing.' In addition, how literally we should take the guillotine response is unknown. Further inquiries and examination of the context of the statement are needed to know what was meant.


The next problem is how much we should generalize the answer of a few to a diverse group like young socialists is problematic. Why? Socialists, even if they are in the same age range, do not make up a monolith. Yes, there are nasty socialists who, as Johnson claims, dehumanize their opponents. There are others who don't. But how does the dehumanization of opponents make socialists, young or old, unique in today highly tribal political culture? Noting that one doesn't have to call for another person's execution to dehumanize them, conservative pop media centers have been dehumanizing their opponents for decades by describing them as having nothing but sabotage to bring to our society and political landscape. Here we should note that marginalization is significantly  dehumanizing just as other actions can be.


And the resistance to Bezos isn't solely because he is offering people jobs. The resistance to Bezos involves how many of his employees are treated as well as the negative impacts that Amazon has brought to the American marketplace. Of course, one needs to expand the participants of that marketplace beyond the conservative model of buyer-seller to see the harm Amazon does. But that doesn't include all of the reasons to resist Amazon's proposed location in NYC. One was the tax breaks being offered to Amazon to locate there. While consuming all sorts of taxpayer funded infrastructure, one must examine whether Amazon  shareholders were getting a free lunch out of what they were called on to pay in taxes vs what the company would consume. When companies get significant tax breaks to locate in any area, the tax burden to support that infrastructure is shifted more and more to workers who don't have as much wealth to support the local tax base as wealthy executives and shareholders have.


What is the alternative to the young socialists or the free market recommend by Johnson? First, we should realize that if the Scandinavian model is what the young socialists are calling for, we know Bernie is calling for it, it isn't socialism, at least not from the Marxist tradition (see https://www.forbes.com/sites/jeffreydorfman/2018/07/08/sorry-bernie-bros-but-nordic-countries-are-not-socialist/#628d9eaf74ad ). Marx's first concern was not the redistribution of wealth, it was about the redistribution of power in what Marx called the 'proletariat dictatorship.' Thus we should note that a command economy does not socialism make. If power is not redistributed to the proletariat, then there is no socialism regardless of any command economy. The nation whose economic system approximates what Marx wanted the most is Germany. That is because though it has no proletariat dictatorship, its codetermination laws redistribute power in businesses with 500+ employees to the workers by seating democratically elected workers to executive boards.


Finally, Johnson understates the problems with the Free Market. Besides not making any distinction between the different forms of Capitalism, he fails to mention the ever growing wealth disparity that today's form of Capitalism, which is Neoliberalism, is producing both within nations and between nations. Apparently, self-enforce virtue is not rule of the day. And why should we expect it to be when the basic ethic of Capitalism itself is to maximize personal profits? We should note that since political power follows wealth in Capitalist economic systems, as wealth disparity grows, so grows the disparity in political power between the highest economic class and the rest. This has already been observed in America (see https://www.bbc.com/news/blogs-echochambers-27074746 ).


What is sad about the Acton blog articles is this: in the name conservative Christianity, there is an well-intended and focused venture to tightly binding conservative Christianity solely with an economic system that far benefits the wealthy at the expense of all other economic classes. The contradictions involved with conservative Christians engaged in this kind of undertaking are exposed in the Scriptures such as in James 5:1-6, see https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=James+5%3A1-6&version=NIV ) and in (Jeremiah 22:13-17, see https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=jeremiah+22%3A13-17&version=NIV ). At the same time, only Socialism is said to be based on envy, ignorance, and faith. The first part of that statement seems to condemn the desire for more weath by those who live in poverty while remaining silent on those who already have more than enough who then look to accumulate even more even thought it is at the expense of those who have much less. Doesn't such a view rely on ignorance and faith?