February 1
To Kevin DeYoung, Collin Hansen, and Trevin Wax and their blogpost that plays a recording of their discussion on when we should use the law to legislate Christian morality. This appeared in the Gospel Coalition website.
What I see is missing from the discussion is a good definition of democracy and our place as Christians in society. Democracy has sometimes been reduced to its political mechanisms, which is what I think was done in this discussion. However, the literal definition of democracy is that the people rule. And there are certain egalitarian overtones in that statement so that when a subset of people seize power, even if its by using democratic mechanisms, and rule over all other groups of people, we don't have the people ruling, we have a subset of people ruling and thus we don't have a democracy. Jeff Halper, an Israeli activist and founder of the Israeli Committee against House Demolitions, has provided this helpful distinction between what is called democracy and what he called an ethnocracy when the subset of people who seize power belong to some kind of ethnic classification in a diverse society (see page 74 of his book An Israeli In Palestine).
Second, when examining our role in society, the question we most often fail to ask is this: How will we Christians share society with others? Will we share society as those who seek to have privileges and thus control over all other groups or will we share society as equals? If we share as the first group, then aren't we flying in the face of both Democracy and Jesus's warning not to 'lord it over' others?
Third, there is a problem with prohibiting same-sex marriage based on natural law and/or the belief that marital law should revolve around supporting what is best for human flourishing. Regarding natural law, we should note that homosexuality exists in 1,500 species and its existence is beneficial to the species. Regarding what is best for human flourishing, should the law only allow what is deemed best or can it allow for all other options that do not violate the rights of or harm others?
Finally, the statements made about how Christianity was not the only frame of reference for prohibiting same-sex marriage was rather shallow. For one thing, the thinking of some Christian churches regarding same-sex relationships and marriage has changed. Also, there have been societies that have allowed same-sex marriage and other same-sex living relationships. In addition, the history of Western Civilization has been up until recently dominated by what would be considered today as conservative forms of Christianity. And that Judaism and Islam also prohibit same-sex marriages does not imply that we don't have freedom of religion issues in prohibiting same-sex marriage.
Yes, laws are there to protect us and that can help change us. But when one group gains control of the government to force its way of life on a diverse society, then laws can become oppressive on various levels to those who do not belong to the group that is in control. And if we Christians are that group, then again what we are doing is flying in the face of both Democracy and Jesus's prohibition not to be like the Gentiles who like to 'lord it over' others. We also unnecessarily provide stumbling blocks to the hearing of the Gospel for many a nonChristian.
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To David Platt and his blogpost on how we should respond to the Refugee Crisis. This appeared in the Gospel Coalition website.
Regarding the exhortation to act justly, does that imply that we should demand that our government cease from all actions that further injustice and cause more and more people to become refugees? After all, we are not living in the Roman Empire that Apostles lived in; we live in a Democracy where we have the right and responsibility to tell our government what to do.
BTW, one more point should be made. Both the Syrians and the Jordanians demonstrated some of the greatest generosity ever seen by how they took in Iraqi refugees who felt they had to flee their nation because of the US invasion. How is it that we who believe in the Gospel and live in the richest nation in the world should show less generosity and compassion than what the Syrians have already shown others?
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February 2
To Joe Carter and his blogpost interview with Matthew Soerens as they talk about Trump’s Refugee policy. This appeared in the Gospel Coalition.
There are some good points made in this article. However, like immigration policies, there is one missing factor in Trump's latest EO that is a part of our refugee policies. That missing factor are US policies that create refugees. We should remember, or research, that many refugees were created by the US invasion of Iraq. The people of Jordan and Syria, nations that do not have our economic resources, put Americans to shame in how they helped Iraqi refugees during this time.
We should note that most of the nations in the ban are nations that have been attacked by the US--some of them saw the US overthrow their governments. And now, having created or significantly contributed to the refugee problem, we are closing our doors to these refugees to protect ourselves, we display a dangerous, that is dangerous to both ourselves and the world, lack of awareness regarding our actions, especially in how we use our military.
If we want to limit the number of refugees coming into the US, then we must adjust your policies so that we are not creating refugees.
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Feb 3
To Dwight Longenecker and his blogpost that claims that the “left” and media response to Trumps ban is over the top. This appeared in the Imaginative Conservative blog.
It is true that the more bullets nonconservatives fire at Trump, the more support they instigate for him. Such is the nature of political tribalism in our nation. However, the hysteria about immigration and refugee policies belongs with the Trump Administration and those supporting the ban. To say that a ban on predominantly Muslim countries is not a Muslim ban is premature. To say that the ban targets potential terrorists overlooks details. The only Muslim terrorists who have attacked America on American soil are those who come from nations not included in the ban. In addition, since 1980, around 3 million refugees have been admitted to the US and none of them have conducted any acts of terrorism (see https://www.thegospelcoalition.org/article/what-should-christians-think-about-trumps-refugee-policy ). The frenzied rush of support for the ban also ignores the vetting process in terms of who does the vetting and how long the vetting process takes place.
Also, I have not seen religiously conservative Christians or other supporters of Trump propose that we tie foreign policies to immigration and refugee policies. We should note that for the majority of the nations on the ban, they have suffered attacks by the US military and/or been targeted for regime change by our government. The instability caused by these actions is a major reason why we have as many refugees in the world as we have. And it is more than just a cruel joke to both pursue foreign policies that significantly increases the number of refugees while reducing the number of refugees who are allowed to enter our nation.
Finally, why not ban all immigrants and refugees from Israel and allowing exceptions for persecuted religious minorities while insisting that such a ban is not a Jewish ban? Trump's ban is not a Muslim ban? How can we say that such a statement comes from hysteria when part of Trump's campaign included a promise to institute a Muslim ban along with the lack of need for a ban while Trump institutes kind of the ban that he has?Also, Hillary is no leftist; she is a liberal Democrat. As such, she supports capitalism, Leftists are anti-capitalists.
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Feb 7
To Joe Carter and his blogpost on why Christians should support school vouchers. This appeared in the Acton blog.
Here is the problem with supporting school vouchers. Some schools are already underfunded, vouchers will add to that problem. As public schools get less revenue, they will perform more poorly and the system will collapse. And there will be no schools that will be able to take up the slack because for profit charter schools will not have the resources to provide for the demand should public schools collapse.
It seems that the conservative approach to eliminating government programs, such as education, is to under fund them so that they will under perform. In the end, what eliminating federal programs does is to free businesses from having to meet their social responsibilities since businesses, especially successful ones, are the primary benefactors of these programs. It is all done in the name of maximizing profits. The Scriptures refer to that ethic as the love of money. And the Scriptures are quite clear in declaring that the love of money is the root of all kinds of evil. And history is quite clear in pointing out that when the Church sides with wealth, it often sides with tyranny.
www.flamingfundamentalist.blogspot.com
(Only one person pictured is a Christian Fundamentalist. And so which one pictured is not like the others)
Showing posts with label Gospel Coalition Website. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Gospel Coalition Website. Show all posts
Wednesday, February 8, 2017
Wednesday, December 7, 2016
Comments Which Conservatives Block From Their Blogs For December 7, 2016
Nov 30
To Mike Edmonson and his blogpost on Evangelicalism’s 4 unique perspectives on politics. This appeared in the Gospel Coalition website
Christianity does not revolve around our own uniqueness, it revolves around the uniqueness of Christ and the Gospel. To focus on our own uniqueness merely imitates those from any other group where tribalism is strong. To show this, all we need to consider is the concept of American Exceptionalism and how people from other nations have also seen their own nations as being exceptional.
Another way of showing that our uniqueness is not unique is to look at each of the 4 perspectives on politics and show that they are not unique. Take the first perspective, which is our governmental perspective, for example:
Sorry but Howard Zinn made an activist career of putting elections and their leaders in their place. Anarchism and bottom-up forms of Socialism also regard elections as not being ultimate.
On the other hand, the belief that elections are ultimate in that we depend too much on our elected leaders to manage the government while we tend to our own business is a mark of embracing an authoritarian relationship with the government. And guess which institution is one of the greatest teachers on authoritarianism is. It is the Church where most of our relationships with others and God use authority figures as a center part of each relationship.
Take the second perspective, which is our moral perspective, as another example:
Hate to bust Edmondson's bubble here but Socialists have him beat. For Socialists are not just concerned for the well-being of Christian migrant workers and refugees, they are concerned for all migrant workers and refugees. What Edomondson seems unaware of is that he is replacing self-interest with tribal interest. And what group, where tribalism is present, is not concerned with all of its members?
As for the third perspective which is our perspective on pain:
Here we need to compare how those in a Christian nation, especially Christians who tend to be politically conservative, with those from other nations. Until its Civil War, Syria was one of the leading nations in caring for refugees. Ironically here, most of the refugees whom Syrians took care of became refugees as a result of America's invasion of Iraq. Currently Jordan is one of the world's leaders in taking in and caring for refugees. As for Christian America, we only need to look at its political conservatives, who have more than their fair share of religiously conservative Christians, and their position on taking in refugees. That is because their position is not very good and this is especially evident by the support conservative Christians gave to Donald Trump in the election. There is no need here to mention Trump's views on immigration or the Republican Party's opposition to societal safety nets.
As for the forth perspective, if the beliefs expressed there were so strongly held, why did the majority of religiously conservative Christians vote for a candidate like Donald Trump? Issues like controlling immigration, changing the Supreme Court, and wanting to make America great again were reasons that greatly influence Christian voters.
Again, pointing our uniqueness as a way of proving Christianity to either ourselves or others is problematic. It is flawed because as people, we are not always as unique as we perceive ourselves to be or should be. And once our lack of uniqueness is outed, our credibility as witnesses for Christ is greatly damaged.
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To Jason Baxter and his blogpost about what the humanities can contribute to the modern world in the light of how our politicians are trying to make education more of a tech school experience. This appeared in the Imaginative Conservative blog.
Every time I read a conservative reference to the founding fathers which describes them as trying to limit government's power, I wonder if such conservatives have heard of decontextualization. That is because The Constitution was written with the intention of strengthening government power so that the Federal government could, in the future, better respond future insurrections. And the point of being better prepared to handle future insurrections was to maintain the status quo for the sake of the bondholders and the landowners and slaveholders where wealth was consolidated at that time. The then current insurrection that prompted the writing of that document was Shays Rebellion. And all one has to do to realize that The Constitution was written to strengthen the federal government's power is to look up all of the references made to the militia. For the militia was to be armed and trained with funds from Congress and was to be under the command of the President. And one of the state purposes of the militia was to put down insurrections.
Furthermore, with the powers granted to the Senate, we should note how Senators originally received their office. They were appointed by their respective state legislators. That, along with their term in office, made Senators pretty much immune to popular opinion and with good reason. In arguing for the length of a Senator's term, it was Madison who said that the purpose of government was to 'protect the minority of the opulent from the majority.'
Along with the fact that only White, male, property owners could vote when The Constitution was ratified, we see a government that is as not limited as conservatives want to portray it. In fact, since The Constitution was written to preserve the status quo for the sake of America's own elites, Baxter's statement that Rubio and Walker are closer to Clinton than to our nation's founding fathers is a bit more problematic than Baxter realizes. For in that Walker, Rubio, and Clinton are striving to preserve a status quo that serves those with wealth and power, they are all in fact following in the footsteps of the majority of those who wrote The Constitution.
Thus, their, that is Walker, Rubio, and Clinton, wanting education to serve the welfare of the money-interests is in line with the intentions of our founding fathers. And so there is a certain irony when Baxter uses our nation's founding fathers to challenge the current deemphasis on the humanities in education. Baxter is completely correct in challenging the current emphasis on technology. He just does so from the wrong basis.
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Dec 3
To Greg Forster and his blogpost that describes both America’s signs of death and its signs for hope. This appeared in the Gospel Coalition website.
I heartily agree with much, though not all, of the description of the problem. The solution, however, is problematic. But there is also a problem with the description of the problem. The problem with the description of the problem is that it doesn't tie together the similarities between what Hillary was offering and what Trump was offering. Those similarities could be described with two labels: neoliberalism and neoconservatism. Yes, their versions of both were different, but the general direction was the same. With neoliberalism, both wanted to cut big businesses' social responsibilities and give them free reign in society. Hillary wanted to do that on the global scene with open markets and free trade; Trump wanted to do that on the domestic scene by reducing taxes and regulations. This somewhat illustrates why their versions of neoliberalism are different. While the Repubs want an express train to corporate rule, the Dems want a local train that offers amenities. But in the end, they destination is the same. After all, how different is Trump's promise to reduce regulations from trade agreements like the TPP that allow corporations to sue governments for any financial losses incurred by the laws a government passes? And yet, open markets would rely on trade agreements like the TPP. And both Hilary and Trump have expressed the same concern over these agreements: it is American jobs not this corporate control. Plus, we also have to realize that with the presence of foreign investors, we really don't have any true American big businesses anymore
As for their shared neoconservative leanings, the only real difference between Hillary's and Trump's view of America's leadership in the world is that Trump wants America's allies to pay protection money for its military services and presence. Plus we also have to ask ourselves why a free world needs a leader? For if the free world has a leader, is it truly free?
Despite missing their similarities, the identification of battle between technocrats vs tribalists has much merit. But we also have to realize that patriotism is an exercise in tribalism as well. So if we are going to complain about Trump's economic nationalism, which is something not necessarily mentioned here, or his other forms of tribalism we have to complain about our military tribalism as expressed in patriotism as well. And we need to accurately define tribalism in the context of the world we live in. Tribalism is when group loyalty is so high that it trumps, no pun intended, any commitment to morals and absolute values. And tribalism can be based on what's listed above as well as ideology and economic class. Thus, we could say that Hillary's favoring of technocrats was a form of tribalism.
The solution resented is problematic for two reasons. First, the Church has, since the time of Constantine, generally stood with and supported wealth and power. Yes, there have been some intramural battles between wealth and power where the Church was split, but it still has, for the most part, stood with wealth and power. This was true prior to the French, Spanish, and Russian Revolutions as well as many other modern revolutions. It is most certainly true for the conservative Church in modern America. After all, the conservative Church in modern America was slow to even recognize our nation's problem with racism. And it wasn't the conservative Church that took the lead in battling racism. We should note that King was no conservative Christian theologian. The conservative Church in America, under the banner of patriotism, has been even slower in recognizing the immorality of many of America's wars. And where does the conservative Church stand in relation to unions and workers' relationship with employers? The conservative Church predominantly supports small gov't and low taxes and few regulations and all of that favors those with wealth. And the conservative Church is not a big supporter of social safety nets because it believes that the Church should be in charge of providing relief and help, not the government.
Or we could go back to what was written in a report called The Crisis of Democracy where the Church is listed, along with the family, schools, and the military as institutions whose job was to teach people how to fit into society and take orders from those with authority. Here it would be helpful to note that that report was the liberal view of the role of the Church which was in response to the radical exercises of democracy during the 1960s. The The Crisis of Democracy called those radical exercises in democracy an 'excess of democracy.'
But it isn't just our history that makes the proposed solution problematic. What the above solution proposes is that the Church must have a place of supremacy in society that is based on the freedom of religion. And this is done by having society look to the Church for its temporal salvation. In such a scheme, where does the LGBT community fit in? And how about those whose suffering is prolonged by the Church's slowness in recognizing their problems just like the conservative Church was slow in recognizing our nation's problem with racism? And how can we call for a public discipleship while the Church shares society with others as equals? And if it doesn't share society with others as equals, then what other position than a place of supremacy does the Church want in society?
Yes, we need to share the Gospel to all. But we have to both acknowledge our past failures and look at how we can share society with all sorts of unbelievers as equals so that if a large number of people become converted, they will not be a part of marginalizing some group like the Church has for all America's history.
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Dec 4
To Kyle Hanby and his blogpost that cites an article by Samuel Gregg which claims that protectionism is bad for us in the long run. This appears in the Acton blog.
Link for the article cited: http://www.csmonitor.com/USA/Politics/2016/1201/Can-economic-nationalism-keep-more-jobs-in-US
Just as location is everything in real estate, so labels are in persuasive articles.The 'economic nationalism' and 'free trade' labels serve as such examples. We should note that economic nationalism can mean economic self-rule. We should also note that if free trade is not popularly accepted, it becomes forced trade with the free part describing how those who benefit the most experience it.
We should also note that economic globalism has produced more than the alleged effect of lifting more people out abject poverty. It has caused a loss of many manufacturing and even service jobs in America causing a glut of people applying for low skilled labor jobs. That glut means less in wages for many people which is why over a billion dollars goes into subsidizing corporate payrolls via government assistance for the working poor. We should also note that economic globalization has involved the trafficking of people and to sweatshop factories. In addition, in the two nations that have allegedly seen the biggest decrease in poverty, which are China and India, we have seen slight to significant increases in slavery. In the mean time, Jeff Halper notes that the wealth disparity between nations has sharply increased.
Certainly any kind of self-rule that is based in some kind of tribalism is not good for anyone. But the reliance on the rule of economic elites as opposed to self-rule produces even worse results in the long run. For the rule of economic elites which we see in today's economic globalism not only increases wealth disparity in and between nations, in many of the nations which have embraced this kind of globalism, it destroys democracies and all of that occurs for the love of wealth. So why is a Christian blog encouraging a system that revolves around the love of wealth and the weakening of national sovereignty?
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Dec 6
To Joe Carter and his blogpost on profits, wealth, and well-defined property rights. This appeared in the Acton blog.
We should first note that the Scriptures don't label money as being intrinsically evil; but they do call the love money the 'root of all kinds of evil.'
But second, what is said above about property rights is pretty much contradicted by Martin Luther King Jr. when he spoke against the Vietnam War:
So while well-defined property rights are a key to the common good according to the article above, King states that while property rights and other things are more important than people, then the triplets of 'racism, materialism, and militarism' will forever plague us. We should note that well-defined property rights does not imply just property rights. A question that would be involved in determining just property rights would be this: Did all of James Madison's wealth belong to him seeing that much of it was the product of slave labor? We might ask the same when it comes to corporations that pay poverty wages to workers here and/or use workers from sweatshop factories abroad. We might also ask, why, if there is this economy of mutuality, do we have a growing wealth disparity within many nations as well as between nations?
To Mike Edmonson and his blogpost on Evangelicalism’s 4 unique perspectives on politics. This appeared in the Gospel Coalition website
Christianity does not revolve around our own uniqueness, it revolves around the uniqueness of Christ and the Gospel. To focus on our own uniqueness merely imitates those from any other group where tribalism is strong. To show this, all we need to consider is the concept of American Exceptionalism and how people from other nations have also seen their own nations as being exceptional.
Another way of showing that our uniqueness is not unique is to look at each of the 4 perspectives on politics and show that they are not unique. Take the first perspective, which is our governmental perspective, for example:
Although elections are important, as believers we uniquely understand that elections are not ultimate.
Sorry but Howard Zinn made an activist career of putting elections and their leaders in their place. Anarchism and bottom-up forms of Socialism also regard elections as not being ultimate.
On the other hand, the belief that elections are ultimate in that we depend too much on our elected leaders to manage the government while we tend to our own business is a mark of embracing an authoritarian relationship with the government. And guess which institution is one of the greatest teachers on authoritarianism is. It is the Church where most of our relationships with others and God use authority figures as a center part of each relationship.
Take the second perspective, which is our moral perspective, as another example:
Wealthy business-owning American citizens baptized in Christ, for example, must deeply consider the practical wellbeing of the undocumented migrant worker and refugee also baptized in Christ. Christian civil engagement is not fundamentally self-interested.
Hate to bust Edmondson's bubble here but Socialists have him beat. For Socialists are not just concerned for the well-being of Christian migrant workers and refugees, they are concerned for all migrant workers and refugees. What Edomondson seems unaware of is that he is replacing self-interest with tribal interest. And what group, where tribalism is present, is not concerned with all of its members?
As for the third perspective which is our perspective on pain:
One of the most significant distinctions we have as God’s people is our compassion for the distressed. Deuteronomy 10:18 says God “executes justice for the fatherless and the widow, and loves the sojourner, giving him food and clothing” (see also Exod. 22:22–23; Deut. 27:19; 2 Chron. 19:7; Ps. 68:5; and Ps. 146:9). Throughout Scripture, the Lord makes himself known through his practical care and concern for the most vulnerable and distressed
Here we need to compare how those in a Christian nation, especially Christians who tend to be politically conservative, with those from other nations. Until its Civil War, Syria was one of the leading nations in caring for refugees. Ironically here, most of the refugees whom Syrians took care of became refugees as a result of America's invasion of Iraq. Currently Jordan is one of the world's leaders in taking in and caring for refugees. As for Christian America, we only need to look at its political conservatives, who have more than their fair share of religiously conservative Christians, and their position on taking in refugees. That is because their position is not very good and this is especially evident by the support conservative Christians gave to Donald Trump in the election. There is no need here to mention Trump's views on immigration or the Republican Party's opposition to societal safety nets.
As for the forth perspective, if the beliefs expressed there were so strongly held, why did the majority of religiously conservative Christians vote for a candidate like Donald Trump? Issues like controlling immigration, changing the Supreme Court, and wanting to make America great again were reasons that greatly influence Christian voters.
Again, pointing our uniqueness as a way of proving Christianity to either ourselves or others is problematic. It is flawed because as people, we are not always as unique as we perceive ourselves to be or should be. And once our lack of uniqueness is outed, our credibility as witnesses for Christ is greatly damaged.
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
To Jason Baxter and his blogpost about what the humanities can contribute to the modern world in the light of how our politicians are trying to make education more of a tech school experience. This appeared in the Imaginative Conservative blog.
Every time I read a conservative reference to the founding fathers which describes them as trying to limit government's power, I wonder if such conservatives have heard of decontextualization. That is because The Constitution was written with the intention of strengthening government power so that the Federal government could, in the future, better respond future insurrections. And the point of being better prepared to handle future insurrections was to maintain the status quo for the sake of the bondholders and the landowners and slaveholders where wealth was consolidated at that time. The then current insurrection that prompted the writing of that document was Shays Rebellion. And all one has to do to realize that The Constitution was written to strengthen the federal government's power is to look up all of the references made to the militia. For the militia was to be armed and trained with funds from Congress and was to be under the command of the President. And one of the state purposes of the militia was to put down insurrections.
Furthermore, with the powers granted to the Senate, we should note how Senators originally received their office. They were appointed by their respective state legislators. That, along with their term in office, made Senators pretty much immune to popular opinion and with good reason. In arguing for the length of a Senator's term, it was Madison who said that the purpose of government was to 'protect the minority of the opulent from the majority.'
Along with the fact that only White, male, property owners could vote when The Constitution was ratified, we see a government that is as not limited as conservatives want to portray it. In fact, since The Constitution was written to preserve the status quo for the sake of America's own elites, Baxter's statement that Rubio and Walker are closer to Clinton than to our nation's founding fathers is a bit more problematic than Baxter realizes. For in that Walker, Rubio, and Clinton are striving to preserve a status quo that serves those with wealth and power, they are all in fact following in the footsteps of the majority of those who wrote The Constitution.
Thus, their, that is Walker, Rubio, and Clinton, wanting education to serve the welfare of the money-interests is in line with the intentions of our founding fathers. And so there is a certain irony when Baxter uses our nation's founding fathers to challenge the current deemphasis on the humanities in education. Baxter is completely correct in challenging the current emphasis on technology. He just does so from the wrong basis.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Dec 3
To Greg Forster and his blogpost that describes both America’s signs of death and its signs for hope. This appeared in the Gospel Coalition website.
I heartily agree with much, though not all, of the description of the problem. The solution, however, is problematic. But there is also a problem with the description of the problem. The problem with the description of the problem is that it doesn't tie together the similarities between what Hillary was offering and what Trump was offering. Those similarities could be described with two labels: neoliberalism and neoconservatism. Yes, their versions of both were different, but the general direction was the same. With neoliberalism, both wanted to cut big businesses' social responsibilities and give them free reign in society. Hillary wanted to do that on the global scene with open markets and free trade; Trump wanted to do that on the domestic scene by reducing taxes and regulations. This somewhat illustrates why their versions of neoliberalism are different. While the Repubs want an express train to corporate rule, the Dems want a local train that offers amenities. But in the end, they destination is the same. After all, how different is Trump's promise to reduce regulations from trade agreements like the TPP that allow corporations to sue governments for any financial losses incurred by the laws a government passes? And yet, open markets would rely on trade agreements like the TPP. And both Hilary and Trump have expressed the same concern over these agreements: it is American jobs not this corporate control. Plus, we also have to realize that with the presence of foreign investors, we really don't have any true American big businesses anymore
As for their shared neoconservative leanings, the only real difference between Hillary's and Trump's view of America's leadership in the world is that Trump wants America's allies to pay protection money for its military services and presence. Plus we also have to ask ourselves why a free world needs a leader? For if the free world has a leader, is it truly free?
Despite missing their similarities, the identification of battle between technocrats vs tribalists has much merit. But we also have to realize that patriotism is an exercise in tribalism as well. So if we are going to complain about Trump's economic nationalism, which is something not necessarily mentioned here, or his other forms of tribalism we have to complain about our military tribalism as expressed in patriotism as well. And we need to accurately define tribalism in the context of the world we live in. Tribalism is when group loyalty is so high that it trumps, no pun intended, any commitment to morals and absolute values. And tribalism can be based on what's listed above as well as ideology and economic class. Thus, we could say that Hillary's favoring of technocrats was a form of tribalism.
The solution resented is problematic for two reasons. First, the Church has, since the time of Constantine, generally stood with and supported wealth and power. Yes, there have been some intramural battles between wealth and power where the Church was split, but it still has, for the most part, stood with wealth and power. This was true prior to the French, Spanish, and Russian Revolutions as well as many other modern revolutions. It is most certainly true for the conservative Church in modern America. After all, the conservative Church in modern America was slow to even recognize our nation's problem with racism. And it wasn't the conservative Church that took the lead in battling racism. We should note that King was no conservative Christian theologian. The conservative Church in America, under the banner of patriotism, has been even slower in recognizing the immorality of many of America's wars. And where does the conservative Church stand in relation to unions and workers' relationship with employers? The conservative Church predominantly supports small gov't and low taxes and few regulations and all of that favors those with wealth. And the conservative Church is not a big supporter of social safety nets because it believes that the Church should be in charge of providing relief and help, not the government.
Or we could go back to what was written in a report called The Crisis of Democracy where the Church is listed, along with the family, schools, and the military as institutions whose job was to teach people how to fit into society and take orders from those with authority. Here it would be helpful to note that that report was the liberal view of the role of the Church which was in response to the radical exercises of democracy during the 1960s. The The Crisis of Democracy called those radical exercises in democracy an 'excess of democracy.'
But it isn't just our history that makes the proposed solution problematic. What the above solution proposes is that the Church must have a place of supremacy in society that is based on the freedom of religion. And this is done by having society look to the Church for its temporal salvation. In such a scheme, where does the LGBT community fit in? And how about those whose suffering is prolonged by the Church's slowness in recognizing their problems just like the conservative Church was slow in recognizing our nation's problem with racism? And how can we call for a public discipleship while the Church shares society with others as equals? And if it doesn't share society with others as equals, then what other position than a place of supremacy does the Church want in society?
Yes, we need to share the Gospel to all. But we have to both acknowledge our past failures and look at how we can share society with all sorts of unbelievers as equals so that if a large number of people become converted, they will not be a part of marginalizing some group like the Church has for all America's history.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Dec 4
To Kyle Hanby and his blogpost that cites an article by Samuel Gregg which claims that protectionism is bad for us in the long run. This appears in the Acton blog.
Link for the article cited: http://www.csmonitor.com/USA/Politics/2016/1201/Can-economic-nationalism-keep-more-jobs-in-US
Just as location is everything in real estate, so labels are in persuasive articles.The 'economic nationalism' and 'free trade' labels serve as such examples. We should note that economic nationalism can mean economic self-rule. We should also note that if free trade is not popularly accepted, it becomes forced trade with the free part describing how those who benefit the most experience it.
We should also note that economic globalism has produced more than the alleged effect of lifting more people out abject poverty. It has caused a loss of many manufacturing and even service jobs in America causing a glut of people applying for low skilled labor jobs. That glut means less in wages for many people which is why over a billion dollars goes into subsidizing corporate payrolls via government assistance for the working poor. We should also note that economic globalization has involved the trafficking of people and to sweatshop factories. In addition, in the two nations that have allegedly seen the biggest decrease in poverty, which are China and India, we have seen slight to significant increases in slavery. In the mean time, Jeff Halper notes that the wealth disparity between nations has sharply increased.
Certainly any kind of self-rule that is based in some kind of tribalism is not good for anyone. But the reliance on the rule of economic elites as opposed to self-rule produces even worse results in the long run. For the rule of economic elites which we see in today's economic globalism not only increases wealth disparity in and between nations, in many of the nations which have embraced this kind of globalism, it destroys democracies and all of that occurs for the love of wealth. So why is a Christian blog encouraging a system that revolves around the love of wealth and the weakening of national sovereignty?
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Dec 6
To Joe Carter and his blogpost on profits, wealth, and well-defined property rights. This appeared in the Acton blog.
We should first note that the Scriptures don't label money as being intrinsically evil; but they do call the love money the 'root of all kinds of evil.'
But second, what is said above about property rights is pretty much contradicted by Martin Luther King Jr. when he spoke against the Vietnam War:
I am convinced that if we are to get on the right side of the world revolution, we as a nation must undergo a radical revolution of values. 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.
So while well-defined property rights are a key to the common good according to the article above, King states that while property rights and other things are more important than people, then the triplets of 'racism, materialism, and militarism' will forever plague us. We should note that well-defined property rights does not imply just property rights. A question that would be involved in determining just property rights would be this: Did all of James Madison's wealth belong to him seeing that much of it was the product of slave labor? We might ask the same when it comes to corporations that pay poverty wages to workers here and/or use workers from sweatshop factories abroad. We might also ask, why, if there is this economy of mutuality, do we have a growing wealth disparity within many nations as well as between nations?
Wednesday, July 20, 2016
Comments Which Conservatives Block From Their Blogs For July 20, 2016
Please remember that some of the comments that were blocked and are listed below do have some errors due to the lack of sufficient editing.
July 14
To Bradley Birzer and his blogpost on how the founding of our nation had many parts, some of which were in conflict with each other. This appeared in the Imaginative Conservative blog.
That we don't look at the founding of America as a singular event and that we don't consider our nation's founding fathers to be a monolithic group are very valid points made in this article. Also the observation that the Federalists and the Anti-Federalists had more in common, Frohnen's observation, than they had in contrast is also an important point made here.
But if we reduce the founding of America to the conflict between the Federalists and the Anti-Federalists, we would have, however inadvertently, taken a racist view of the founding of our nation. For by reducing our nation's beginning to just the conflicts and agreements that existed between the two groups, we have left out all people of color who were involved in the founding of America. After all, Native Americans were already living here when the first colonists arrived and they not only eventually fought against those who founded America, they assisted them when they first arrived. And the desire for their land was a key consideration in declaring independence since, at a certain point in time, the British had prohibited further westward expansion. Likewise, the British were growing leery of slavery, both in terms of its trade as well as its use, and it is possible that the colonists sensed that that would eventually become an issue here. But regardless of the validity of that point, our nation's founding greatly benefited, economically speaking only, from the allowing of people owning slaves and counting others as mere property. And yet, Blacks are also left out of the mix when talking about the founding of our nation.
Likewise, we just can't afford to reduce the issues of the creation of our federal government to that of the need for more Federal control and power vs concerns about the overreach of government on the states and the lives of individuals. What was well practiced but not considered to be an issue among the founders was how individuals abused and infringed on the rights of other individuals. And our founding fathers were quite aware of how individuals could infringe on the rights of other individuals because many of them, from both the Federalist and Anti-Federalist camps, owned slaves. And so it should not be surprising that our founding fathers did not put provisions into our Constitution or push for such provisions to be made in the Bill of Rights. The 13th Amendment was the only Amendment that directly protects the rights of individuals from being infringed on by other individuals. And yet, there are so many other ways besides slavery in which individuals could deny other individuals their rights.
In the end, even though there is an admission to messiness in the founding of our nation, that is an admission that our founding had warts, such is used to maintain the pedestals on which authoritarians make use of in talking about our founding. And they do so to prevent what the Federalists wanted to prevent from happening: the adoption of innovations. We should note that innovations were the ideas of those who were not in power just prior to the writing of The Constitution. In the end, The reduction of our nation's founding to the concerns of just the Federalists and the Anti-Federalists has one other flaw. That flaw is that it prohibits us from questioning the self-perceptions of these men regarding what they were trying to accomplish.
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July 16
To Joseph Pearce and his blogpost on how imperialism and democracy don’t mix. This appeared in the Imaginative Conservative blog.
We should note here that not all of our Founding Fathers were not lovers of Democracy. Some actually feared it because it had the power to change the status quo that so benefited them at the time. In fact, articles on this website are not always fond of Democracy as well.
But there should be a revision made to this article. Democracy is not at odds with big government and big government does not have to result in remoteness. If government is charged with protecting the people from their enemies both foreign and domestic, then government's size will be determined by the size and power of the enemies of the people. For here, government is like love in that size doesn't matter, fidelity does. And a government's fidelity often depends on whether the people can compete with the love of money in winning over the affections of their government.
Some think making all of our groups small is the answer to our problems. The problem with this thinking is that it is useless to close the barn door after the horses leave. When society must accommodate as many people as we have, you can't always get associations where there is a small number of people.
Having said all of that, I agree with Pearce's assessment of Britain's Brexit vote. The trouble Britain faced was not that the decision making in Brussels was remote; the problem is that the decision making there is not about people first, it is about wealth. And it is about the consolidation of wealth for an ever decreasing number of people. Greece's periodic debt relief aid packages paired with an increasing number of austerity cuts proved that. I also agree that imperialism and democracy do not mix well. This is a point that has been made by historian Chalmers Johnson a while ago. Though he didn't see the government becoming remote as posing a threat to democracy. Rather, the overhead of our that comes with fulfilling the ambition of those seeking power as well as the love of wealth and power were seen as the enemies of democracy.
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To Joe Carter and his blogpost that cites an article from The Federalist which states that our rights come from Natural Law. The article cited states that the Left, by what it promotes especially regarding the redefining of marriage, is denying Natural Law. This appeared in the Acton Blog.
The article from The Federalist from which the quote in the blogpost above comes says that our unprecedented prosperity has come from our leaders' recognition of natural law. That article states that the recognition of unalienable rights was a reference to natural law. And what this natural law does is to provide rights for us by building fences that govern our behavior.
But history tells us that much of our nation's prosperity comes from denying other people their unalienable rights. For the rights spelled our Declaration of Independence were people of color when we ethnically cleansed the land of Native Americans and enslaved Blacks both before and after the Civil War. Their enslavement afterwards was part of our Jim Crow era. And now, Michelle Alexander points to a new Jim Crow era as having dawned on America. And it took a long time before these rights were fully extended to women and some would contend that they have yet to be so fully extended. But not only that, our leaders have quite often denied people from other nations their unalienable rights through foreign policies that often replaced democracies with tyrannies because the tyrants were enriching our nation's coffers. So when the cited article from The Federalist appeals to natural law, the question becomes: Who is the keeper of natural law?
The article cited by this blogpost complains that when the Left works for the recognition of rights and equality for the LGBT community, that it is taking down the fences of Natural Law that preserve our rights. So, in other words, natural law is being appealed to by that article as a vehicle for denying some the same rights and equality which are suppose to have come from natural law. So who is the keeper of natural law here? Here we should note that that homosexuality is practiced by animals from 1,500 species and that it brings benefits to those species?
When it comes to sexual issues, natural law has become a vehicle by which the religious views of some have been imposed on the lives of all including those who do not hold to those views. And all of this has been done while we all are said to support the freedom of religion for people. In reality, when it comes to sexual issues, the appeal to Natural Law, which really does exist, by some conservatives who oppose same-sex marriage is a backdoor attempt to deny some people their freedom of religion. And to ensure that we submit to this effort to impose the religious views of some on all, those claiming to be the keeper of Natural Law assume the role of Chicken Little by saying that all that our nation has worked for and possess will become at risk if we take down the fence provided by their version of Natural Law as it pertains to sex. But History contradicts claims about our past being built on a recognition of Natural Law. So how is it that what we have becomes at risk now because our new sexual mores, supported by the Left, is denying Natural Law?
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To Tyler Groenedal and his blogpost stating that Christians should support markets and Churches rather than the big government of social democracy. This appeared in the Acton Blog.
While this article works to accurately describe Social Democracy and even Socialism, about which it is not entirely accurate, it never backs up its claim that Social Democracy is not the best way to promote human flourishing. Why isn't Social Democracy the best way to promote human flourishing? It is because of its reliance on government regulate things the economy. Rather, the claim made is that problems like poverty and and social issues are best solved by individuals collaborating through free markets and civil society. Thus, this article is rather empty.
At the same time, this article assumes the meaning of certain terms rather than provide definitions for them. For example, what is human flourishing and how do we measure it? What is government and what are the different ways government can interact in society? We should note that most conservative articles that speak against government intervention into entities like the market seem to assume the same meaning for government regardless of whether that government is democratically based or revolves around despots. For a government that is democratically chosen represents the people when working properly. And when that is the case, what is wrong with government intervening in society?
Also, a word must be said about the description of socialism given in this article. Socialism doesn't revolve around state control of things if we look at it from the Marxist tradition. Here we should note that Libertarian Socialism doesn't believe in the state. And the type of governing Lenin employed after the Russian Revolution was not considered to be socialism by a number of his contemporaries. Socialism, from the Marxist tradition, revolves around the control that workers have over the workplace and government. Thus, the existence of a strong centralized government does not imply Socialism because not all such governments give leading roles to workers.
In the end, all the above article provides is some assumed definitions and an unsubstantiated claim. And it seems to be in a long line of conservative articles that oppose a changing of the status quo.
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July 18
To R. Scott Clark’s blogpost quote from Star Parker that lamented the belief that laws are no longer based in truth. This appeared in the Heidelblog.
At least the quote is better than the article from which it is taken. It might true that no force or gun-control legislation can helpwhen law is not based in truth; but that doesn't rule out the need for gun-control legislation for when law is based in truth.
If we are going to really focus on law, then we need to be consistent. We need the principle of universality where what we permit ourselves to do to others is what we give permission to others to do to us; and what we forbid others from doing to us, we prohibit ourselves to do to others. This principle has been absent from our foreign policies since almost at the time when we first became a nation. And we should note that the approach taken by our government in its foreign polices is becoming more and more the approach that domestic law enforcement is taking to us. That approach is for those in authority to assume impunity for their actions.
I believe it was JFK who said the following:
Those who make peaceful revolution impossible will make violent revolution inevitable.
Read more at: http://www.brainyquote.com/quotes/quotes/j/johnfkenn101159.html
For the most part, movements like the antiwar protests of 2003, Occupy Wall Street (OWS), and Black Lives Matter(BLM) have been peaceful attempts that call for change for change. However, the response from both society and the state has been minimal at best. Now individuals outside of those groups are taking matters into their own hands and they are doing to the state what the state did to them. And now is the time to quote the old adage 'two wrongs don't make a right.' Perhaps it is time to start listening to those who nonviolently call for change. Not that these groups are without faults, but they do have truths to contribute to the discussion.
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July 19
To Kevin DeYoung, Russell Moore, and Tim Keller and their discussion on evangelizing and influencing culture. This appeared in the Gospel Coalition website.
There are two points that need clarification here. The first point concerns how should Christians seek to influence culture. It was said how Christians can accidentally influence culture as they become professionals in certain occupations and then beginning to influence culture by becoming elites or by working with them. But what should a Christian influence on culture look like?
Should Christians' influence on culture result in a new culture look more Christianized? Or should a culture influenced by Christians settle for looking more humane? Should a new culture work to marginalize certain groups of people like the LGBT community as was done in the past? We should note that as Christians do work to influence culture, the more we Christians can celebrate our agreements with nonChristians, the more opportunities we will have to share what the Bible says to them.
The second point has to do with Tim Keller's division between evangelicals and liberals. As I have been involved in nonconservatives causes and protests, I sometimes where clothing that identifies me as a religiously conservative Christian. And I've had quite a few comments by political nonconservatives stating that they would like to see more people like me protesting joining them in their causes and protests. So there isn't always this sharp divide between political liberals and evangelicals which Keller suggested.
July 14
To Bradley Birzer and his blogpost on how the founding of our nation had many parts, some of which were in conflict with each other. This appeared in the Imaginative Conservative blog.
That we don't look at the founding of America as a singular event and that we don't consider our nation's founding fathers to be a monolithic group are very valid points made in this article. Also the observation that the Federalists and the Anti-Federalists had more in common, Frohnen's observation, than they had in contrast is also an important point made here.
But if we reduce the founding of America to the conflict between the Federalists and the Anti-Federalists, we would have, however inadvertently, taken a racist view of the founding of our nation. For by reducing our nation's beginning to just the conflicts and agreements that existed between the two groups, we have left out all people of color who were involved in the founding of America. After all, Native Americans were already living here when the first colonists arrived and they not only eventually fought against those who founded America, they assisted them when they first arrived. And the desire for their land was a key consideration in declaring independence since, at a certain point in time, the British had prohibited further westward expansion. Likewise, the British were growing leery of slavery, both in terms of its trade as well as its use, and it is possible that the colonists sensed that that would eventually become an issue here. But regardless of the validity of that point, our nation's founding greatly benefited, economically speaking only, from the allowing of people owning slaves and counting others as mere property. And yet, Blacks are also left out of the mix when talking about the founding of our nation.
Likewise, we just can't afford to reduce the issues of the creation of our federal government to that of the need for more Federal control and power vs concerns about the overreach of government on the states and the lives of individuals. What was well practiced but not considered to be an issue among the founders was how individuals abused and infringed on the rights of other individuals. And our founding fathers were quite aware of how individuals could infringe on the rights of other individuals because many of them, from both the Federalist and Anti-Federalist camps, owned slaves. And so it should not be surprising that our founding fathers did not put provisions into our Constitution or push for such provisions to be made in the Bill of Rights. The 13th Amendment was the only Amendment that directly protects the rights of individuals from being infringed on by other individuals. And yet, there are so many other ways besides slavery in which individuals could deny other individuals their rights.
In the end, even though there is an admission to messiness in the founding of our nation, that is an admission that our founding had warts, such is used to maintain the pedestals on which authoritarians make use of in talking about our founding. And they do so to prevent what the Federalists wanted to prevent from happening: the adoption of innovations. We should note that innovations were the ideas of those who were not in power just prior to the writing of The Constitution. In the end, The reduction of our nation's founding to the concerns of just the Federalists and the Anti-Federalists has one other flaw. That flaw is that it prohibits us from questioning the self-perceptions of these men regarding what they were trying to accomplish.
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
July 16
To Joseph Pearce and his blogpost on how imperialism and democracy don’t mix. This appeared in the Imaginative Conservative blog.
We should note here that not all of our Founding Fathers were not lovers of Democracy. Some actually feared it because it had the power to change the status quo that so benefited them at the time. In fact, articles on this website are not always fond of Democracy as well.
But there should be a revision made to this article. Democracy is not at odds with big government and big government does not have to result in remoteness. If government is charged with protecting the people from their enemies both foreign and domestic, then government's size will be determined by the size and power of the enemies of the people. For here, government is like love in that size doesn't matter, fidelity does. And a government's fidelity often depends on whether the people can compete with the love of money in winning over the affections of their government.
Some think making all of our groups small is the answer to our problems. The problem with this thinking is that it is useless to close the barn door after the horses leave. When society must accommodate as many people as we have, you can't always get associations where there is a small number of people.
Having said all of that, I agree with Pearce's assessment of Britain's Brexit vote. The trouble Britain faced was not that the decision making in Brussels was remote; the problem is that the decision making there is not about people first, it is about wealth. And it is about the consolidation of wealth for an ever decreasing number of people. Greece's periodic debt relief aid packages paired with an increasing number of austerity cuts proved that. I also agree that imperialism and democracy do not mix well. This is a point that has been made by historian Chalmers Johnson a while ago. Though he didn't see the government becoming remote as posing a threat to democracy. Rather, the overhead of our that comes with fulfilling the ambition of those seeking power as well as the love of wealth and power were seen as the enemies of democracy.
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
To Joe Carter and his blogpost that cites an article from The Federalist which states that our rights come from Natural Law. The article cited states that the Left, by what it promotes especially regarding the redefining of marriage, is denying Natural Law. This appeared in the Acton Blog.
The article from The Federalist from which the quote in the blogpost above comes says that our unprecedented prosperity has come from our leaders' recognition of natural law. That article states that the recognition of unalienable rights was a reference to natural law. And what this natural law does is to provide rights for us by building fences that govern our behavior.
But history tells us that much of our nation's prosperity comes from denying other people their unalienable rights. For the rights spelled our Declaration of Independence were people of color when we ethnically cleansed the land of Native Americans and enslaved Blacks both before and after the Civil War. Their enslavement afterwards was part of our Jim Crow era. And now, Michelle Alexander points to a new Jim Crow era as having dawned on America. And it took a long time before these rights were fully extended to women and some would contend that they have yet to be so fully extended. But not only that, our leaders have quite often denied people from other nations their unalienable rights through foreign policies that often replaced democracies with tyrannies because the tyrants were enriching our nation's coffers. So when the cited article from The Federalist appeals to natural law, the question becomes: Who is the keeper of natural law?
The article cited by this blogpost complains that when the Left works for the recognition of rights and equality for the LGBT community, that it is taking down the fences of Natural Law that preserve our rights. So, in other words, natural law is being appealed to by that article as a vehicle for denying some the same rights and equality which are suppose to have come from natural law. So who is the keeper of natural law here? Here we should note that that homosexuality is practiced by animals from 1,500 species and that it brings benefits to those species?
When it comes to sexual issues, natural law has become a vehicle by which the religious views of some have been imposed on the lives of all including those who do not hold to those views. And all of this has been done while we all are said to support the freedom of religion for people. In reality, when it comes to sexual issues, the appeal to Natural Law, which really does exist, by some conservatives who oppose same-sex marriage is a backdoor attempt to deny some people their freedom of religion. And to ensure that we submit to this effort to impose the religious views of some on all, those claiming to be the keeper of Natural Law assume the role of Chicken Little by saying that all that our nation has worked for and possess will become at risk if we take down the fence provided by their version of Natural Law as it pertains to sex. But History contradicts claims about our past being built on a recognition of Natural Law. So how is it that what we have becomes at risk now because our new sexual mores, supported by the Left, is denying Natural Law?
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
To Tyler Groenedal and his blogpost stating that Christians should support markets and Churches rather than the big government of social democracy. This appeared in the Acton Blog.
While this article works to accurately describe Social Democracy and even Socialism, about which it is not entirely accurate, it never backs up its claim that Social Democracy is not the best way to promote human flourishing. Why isn't Social Democracy the best way to promote human flourishing? It is because of its reliance on government regulate things the economy. Rather, the claim made is that problems like poverty and and social issues are best solved by individuals collaborating through free markets and civil society. Thus, this article is rather empty.
At the same time, this article assumes the meaning of certain terms rather than provide definitions for them. For example, what is human flourishing and how do we measure it? What is government and what are the different ways government can interact in society? We should note that most conservative articles that speak against government intervention into entities like the market seem to assume the same meaning for government regardless of whether that government is democratically based or revolves around despots. For a government that is democratically chosen represents the people when working properly. And when that is the case, what is wrong with government intervening in society?
Also, a word must be said about the description of socialism given in this article. Socialism doesn't revolve around state control of things if we look at it from the Marxist tradition. Here we should note that Libertarian Socialism doesn't believe in the state. And the type of governing Lenin employed after the Russian Revolution was not considered to be socialism by a number of his contemporaries. Socialism, from the Marxist tradition, revolves around the control that workers have over the workplace and government. Thus, the existence of a strong centralized government does not imply Socialism because not all such governments give leading roles to workers.
In the end, all the above article provides is some assumed definitions and an unsubstantiated claim. And it seems to be in a long line of conservative articles that oppose a changing of the status quo.
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
July 18
To R. Scott Clark’s blogpost quote from Star Parker that lamented the belief that laws are no longer based in truth. This appeared in the Heidelblog.
At least the quote is better than the article from which it is taken. It might true that no force or gun-control legislation can helpwhen law is not based in truth; but that doesn't rule out the need for gun-control legislation for when law is based in truth.
If we are going to really focus on law, then we need to be consistent. We need the principle of universality where what we permit ourselves to do to others is what we give permission to others to do to us; and what we forbid others from doing to us, we prohibit ourselves to do to others. This principle has been absent from our foreign policies since almost at the time when we first became a nation. And we should note that the approach taken by our government in its foreign polices is becoming more and more the approach that domestic law enforcement is taking to us. That approach is for those in authority to assume impunity for their actions.
I believe it was JFK who said the following:
Those who make peaceful revolution impossible will make violent revolution inevitable.
Read more at: http://www.brainyquote.com/quotes/quotes/j/johnfkenn101159.html
For the most part, movements like the antiwar protests of 2003, Occupy Wall Street (OWS), and Black Lives Matter(BLM) have been peaceful attempts that call for change for change. However, the response from both society and the state has been minimal at best. Now individuals outside of those groups are taking matters into their own hands and they are doing to the state what the state did to them. And now is the time to quote the old adage 'two wrongs don't make a right.' Perhaps it is time to start listening to those who nonviolently call for change. Not that these groups are without faults, but they do have truths to contribute to the discussion.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
July 19
To Kevin DeYoung, Russell Moore, and Tim Keller and their discussion on evangelizing and influencing culture. This appeared in the Gospel Coalition website.
There are two points that need clarification here. The first point concerns how should Christians seek to influence culture. It was said how Christians can accidentally influence culture as they become professionals in certain occupations and then beginning to influence culture by becoming elites or by working with them. But what should a Christian influence on culture look like?
Should Christians' influence on culture result in a new culture look more Christianized? Or should a culture influenced by Christians settle for looking more humane? Should a new culture work to marginalize certain groups of people like the LGBT community as was done in the past? We should note that as Christians do work to influence culture, the more we Christians can celebrate our agreements with nonChristians, the more opportunities we will have to share what the Bible says to them.
The second point has to do with Tim Keller's division between evangelicals and liberals. As I have been involved in nonconservatives causes and protests, I sometimes where clothing that identifies me as a religiously conservative Christian. And I've had quite a few comments by political nonconservatives stating that they would like to see more people like me protesting joining them in their causes and protests. So there isn't always this sharp divide between political liberals and evangelicals which Keller suggested.
Wednesday, July 6, 2016
Comments Which Conservatives Block From Their Blogs For July 6, 2016
July 2
To Albert Mohler and his blogpost that was a reaction piece to Mika Edmonson's article comparing Blacks Lives Matter to the Civil Rights Movement of the past. This appeared in the Gospel Coalition website
There are two points to be made here. The first point is that while Mohler points out the distinctions Edmondon made between the Civil Rights Movement of the 60s and the Black Lives Matter movement, he neglected to point out the similarities between the two. According to Edmondson, the similarities were the tactics used, the near-term goals, and the rejection of social passivity.
The second point is a criticism of Edmonson's recognition of who belonged to the CIvil Rights Movement. For while Edmondson forcussed on King and the SLC, other groups were involved too such as SNCC, NAACP, the Black Panthers, Malcolm X, those who riioted and others. All of them worked for Civil Rights and are part of the Civil RIghts Movement.
All of this points to is the bar we set for individuals and groups who would be recognized as valid challengers to the status quo reflects our resistance to change. Quite often we set the bar unreasonably high so that unless those challenging the status quo appear as saints, we often reserve the right to discount what they have to say and what they are trying to do. All we have to do is look at the Palestinian struggle for life against Israel's Occupation as an example. Since the Palestinian struggle for freedom is marred by the use of violence, many of us have sided with the Occupation despite its brutality and the injustices that are carried out. The same applies here.
The Civil Rights Movement encompassed a variety of groups, some of which would be difficult for us to discredit while others were not. But if our tendency is to first discredit those who are seeking to change the status quo in order to relieve some suffering and injustice, then we are acting just like those who resisted even the best parts of Civil Rights Movement.
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To Joe Carter and his blogpost on a court ruling that struck down a pro-life law passed in Indiana. This appeared in the Gospel Coalition website
What today's abortion issue brings up are the faults of those on both sides of the issue. Of course, the one side has promoted the position that the determination of what is human life worthy of rigths can be a subjective judgment depending on the group that life infringes on. Roe V. Wade must be overturned and Federal law correctly defining what human life is should be written.
On the other hand, many pro-life supporters use the abortion issue to play the role of the pharisee from the two men praying. For while they point to their opponents' sin of not caring for human life in the womb, they fail to see how America's policieis, both foreign and domestic, share the same lack of concern for human life regardless of the location of that life. Policies that impoverish regions where people live or that involve violence cause hardships and death. To not at least question those policies and the violence is to show the same lack of concern for human life that they accuse pro-choice supporters of having.
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To Kyle Hanby and his blogpost on Capitalism, Cronyism, and Socialism. This appeared in the Acton blog.
The first problem with this article is that both socialism and capitalism are spoken of as monoliths. Though undoubtedly, Hanby is thinking of Socialist examples like the Soviet Union, China, Cuba, North Korea, and possibly Venezuala as not being heroic. And his view of not seeing them as heroic is probably based on comparing them with the West, and the United States of the 20th century in particular.
But what is often missed in those comparisons is context and I say this as not being a fan of the political outcomes of most of these nations. What Hanby misses is the context of those revolutions. Whether you are talking about the severe suffering that took place in totalitarian regimes that preceded the revolutions in Soviet Union, Cuba, and partly in China, one has to look at the revolutions as heroic. What is missed in all of that are the hardships some of the "socialist" nations have had endure from other nations, some of them Capitalist, that 20th century US did not have to endure. For example, after winning the Revolution, the Russian gov't had to fight against counterrevolutionaries and that also included having to fight against several western nations that joined the fight. In addition, America's significant losses during WW II are almost insignificant compared to Russia's losses. That America emerged from WW II as a superpower was due in part to the location of the theaters in which it fought in WW II. Russsia lost tens of thousands of villages and tens of millions of people because of Germany's invasion. In addition, it was forced into an arms race which it didn't want by the United States. That arms race contributed to growing the authoritarianism and economic problems experienced by Russia were contributed to by Western actions.
Now we should note what happened to Cuba. We essentially fought a terrorist war against Cuba attacking civilan targets and later on enforcing an embargo.
In Venezuela, there is evidence that we supported the attempted coup of 2002 and historical precedents that say that their current eonomic problems might have been created partially by other nations. After all, before the 1973 coup in Chile, we attempted to destabilize the nation as Britain did after Mossadegh started to nationalize oil resources in Iran. We also supported terrorist attacks, for which we were convicted, Nicaragua in order to influence their elections.
So the aftermath of many socialist revolutions have not worked out, but we should note that most of those revoutions were against dictators before the revolutions only to be met with hostile policies by the United States.
There are examples where Socialism did not result in tyranny and offered economic promise but it was prevented from meeting that promise because it savagely attacked afterwards by others in a number of nations, especially by Capitalists. Such examples include the Paris Commune, The Spanish Revolution, Chile in the early 70s, Iran in the early 50s, and Nicaragua in the 1980s. And what was found with some of those examples along with Venezuela is that there were those who were helped, in particular, some of the poor.
The claim of today's capitalists is that their system has contributed more to human flourishing than any other system in history. But what is overlooked in that claim is that the bar they had to meet to make that claim includes increasing the number of people who were living on more than around $1.35 per day--not a very high bar at all. Try living in a western nation on that. Another problem is that the two nations where the largest number of people who have been lifted out of abject poverty by global capitalism are the two nations that have the most slaves in the world: India and China. And the number of those enslaved there is either stagnant or increasing.
But the biggest problem Hanby has in making his case here is that while on one hand, Capitalism measures itself solely by its materiistic results. On the other hand, Hanby says that a combination of free-market Capitalism and moral values is what helps people. Here, we should note that the moral values Hanby says are needed are hostile to materialism and vice-versa. In addition, free-markets reject the imposition of moral values. As a result, we have a global economic system that is increasing wealth disparity in many nations. But not only that, it invites conflicts, it also is significantly contributing to the destruction of our environment
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To R. Scott Clark and his blogpost that reposted the Declaration of Independence. This appeared in the Heidelblog.
I think that we sometimes become too easily enamored by the wrong set of actions. For example, we are in awe of how our founding fathers regarded and treated themselves by declaring that all men are created equal. But if we judged their words and actions by how they regarded and treated others, would we come to the same conclusion? Here, we should note Frederick Douglass's speech on what the 4th of July meant to slaves (see http://teachingamericanhistory.org/library/document/what-to-the-slave-is-the-fourth-of-july/ ):
What, to the American slave, is your 4th of July? I answer: a day that reveals to him, more than all other days in the year, the gross injustice and cruelty to which he is the constant victim. To him, your celebration is a sham; your boasted liberty, an unholy license; your national greatness, swelling vanity; your sounds of rejoicing are empty and heartless; your denunciations of tyrants, brass fronted impudence; your shouts of liberty and equality, hollow mockery; your prayers and hymns, your sermons and thanksgivings, with all your religious parade, and solemnity, are, to him, mere bombast, fraud, deception, impiety, and hypocrisy — a thin veil to cover up crimes which would disgrace a nation of savages. There is not a nation on the earth guilty of practices, more shocking and bloody, than are the people of these United States, at this very hour.
Go where you may, search where you will, roam through all the monarchies and despotisms of the old world, travel through South America, search out every abuse, and when you have found the last, lay your facts by the side of the everyday practices of this nation, and you will say with me, that, for revolting barbarity and shameless hypocrisy, America reigns without a rival.
Yes, slavery is now illegal here though that has not been completely eradicated in our nation. Also, we should note that the above words seemed not include the plight of Native Americans. Finally, we should note that there are others who have received and still do receive injustice after injustice as a result of our domestic and foreign policies. So while we celebrate ourselves and our founding fathers for what was written and done in history, we might rephrase Douglass's question of what Independence Day meant to the slaves of his time to the following: What does our Independence Day mean to today's marginalized and vulnerable who are the victims of our domestic and foreign policies? For it is their numbers that give the best indication of how much we really believe in the statement, 'all men are created equal.'
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July 3
To Caroline Roberts and her blogpost on how Socialism has and will bring economic destruction. This appeared in Acton's blog.
What best indicates the fear Conservatives have of Socialism is demonstrated by what regimes they label as being socialist. This article provides no exception to the rule since the Nazi economics was described as being socialist and is used to counter the renewed interest in Socialism in our society. Why the interest in Socialism? It is because the failure of our economy both with the collapse of 2008 as well as the disparity that existed in the recovery from that collapse and the wealth disparity that exists in general. In addition, supporters of our current economic system view the mere recognition of climate change as a threat to our economic well-being. In addition, our economic system is uncomfortably symbolized by the society from the Hunger Games movies. In that movie, there was the Capitol where life was good and the Districts where people lived in economic subsevience to the wants and whims of those living in the Capitol. What has made people more aware of the similarities here is that we are creating more and more domestic districts. This was one of the reasons why Occupy Wall Street took off in 2011.
The Nazis could, in no even remotely reasonable way, be labeled as Socialists from the Marxist tradition. And that shows the first error of how socialism is described in this article. For here, Caroline Roberts talks of Socialism as a monolith even though neither Socilaism nor Capitalism are monliths. Libertarian Socialism, for example, is a kind that is neither described nor mentioned. In fact, there is no Marxist related Socialism described or mentioned in the article above. Rather, what the Nazis tried to install is treated as if it was the epitome of Socialism
Another problem with the above article is that it is suggested that Socialism was the Nazis' problem. Here we should note that Hitler did lift the nation out of its economic woes. What reintroduced those economic woes was the losing of the war. And, btw, it was nationalism that caused Nazi hubris to result in the utter destruction of the nation. That Gregg, the person whom Roberts cites, would attribute to one variable the post war economic timeline of Germany shows an inadequate understanding of economics as well as an opportunistic attitude. Why didn't the German economic take off right after the war? Such should be a rhetorical question.
The next problem is that Roberts, following Gregg, made the Nazi economy the epitome of what happens when you have Socialism. If Roberts and Gregg are following the principle of universality here, then they should not mind if people used the overthrow of Allende and the installation of Pinochet's reign of terror as a predictor of what happens when you force free markets onto a nation. Chile is still trying to recover from that 1973 coup and its after effecs.
We might want to note that perhaps our economy has more similarities with Nazi Germany's economy than any socialist economy has. After all, Hitler's policies were supported by industry leaders, not workers. In a real socialist economy, workers would have control. And here we should note that present day Germany employs some Socialist mechanisms here because in all companies that have 2,000 or more workers, workers get a substantial amount of direct representation on the board of directors.
In short, what is labeled as socialism in the above article doesn't even remotely resemble it as it comes from the Marxist tradition. Thus, one has to ask what is Roberts really writing about.
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To Joe Carter and his blogpost entitled Is The Declaration Of Independence A 'Christian Document'? which was really about how only social conservatives literally believe in the line that declares 'all men are created equal.' This appeared in the Gospel Coalition website
This seems to be one of those bait-and-switch articles. That is that it uses the title to draw in those whose focus would be on the Declaration of Independence while surprising them by spending too much time on building a pedestal for social conservatives on which to stand. So in essence, this article is more of a marketing tool to sell social conservatism.
The question is this: Do social conservatives deserve the pedestal provided for them by this article? This pedestal is the claim that only social conservatives literally believe that 'all men are created equal'? One only needs to examine both the present and the past to answer the question. To believe those words to be literally true would include not having an opinion on equality for women. But suppose we include women in the mix. Have or do social conservatives literally believe that all men are created equal? Let's test that by looking at what they have and currently support.
When we go back to the days of the Civil Rights Movement, we at least find an absence of support for it from social conservatives. The reaction from social conservatives to the movement ranged from apathy to opposition. And there was a belief among at least some social conservatives that Whites should maintain a privileged place of supremacy over Blacks in society. Some opposed the movement because they feared that civil liberties would be violated by laws that acquiesced to the demands of the Movement. Here we should note the difference between civil liberties and civil rights. The former stressed liberatiranism and freedom from gov't coercion while the latter stressed the need for gov't intervention to prevent racially-based oppression from the private sector.
In response the claim that social conservatives either opposed or were apathetic to the Civil Rights Movement, many conservatives would point to the suppport Republican lawmakers gave to Civil RIghts legislation. But consider the following. First, not all Republican lawmakers were social conservatives. Second, voting on Civl Rights legislation was determined more by location than party affiliation so that the highest correlation for lawmakers who supported Civil Rights legislation was for those lawmakers who represented northern states. Third, after the passage of Civil Rights legislation, we saw a great migration of Southern Democrats over to the Republican Party as a backlash to President's Johnson's support of the Civil Rights and Voting Rigths Acts.
We might also ask how social conservatives feel about LGBT rights today. Do social conservatives support or oppose those state laws that allow people to be fired because of their sexual orientation? Do social conservatives support the legalization of same-sex marriage? Are social conservatives supporting or opposing the current wave of anti-LGBT laws?
Finally, we might ask social conservatives how they feel about our foreign wars and interventsions. Why ask about that? Because their belief in the equality of all men could be, at least partially, measured in their concern for the welfare of non-white civilians and whether it rivals their concern for the safety of American citizens and American troops.
When we address these three tests that would measure the claims that social conservatives literally believe that all people are created equal, we find that the pedestal built for social conservatives in this article is unwarranted. Thus Carter's claim that only social conservatives literally believe the words 'all men are created equal' seems to have insufficient grounds.
Wednesday, June 15, 2016
Comments Which Conservatives Block From Their Blogs For June 15, 2016
June 5
To Bradly Birzer and his blogpost that cites a work by a James Otteson and Thomas Smith which declares the end of Socialism and how Socialism can never work. This appeared in the Imaginative Conservative blog.
While Professor Otteson would like to pronounce the end of socialism and condemn it at the same time, the trouble that exists in this article is defining socialism. For the definition given here is not very precise or accurate. It is defined by example as well as the notion of centralized control.
The problem with the definition is that examples such as the Paris Commune, the Spanish Revolution, and Nicaragua are not at all represented by the examples given nor is a form of Socialism called Libertarian Socialism represented by either the definition of central control or the examples given. Libertarian Socialism actually oppose the existence of the state. But Otteson insists on equating the models provided by people like Lenin-Stalin, Mao, Castro, and the rulers from North Korea with Socialism. However, not all Socialists would agree that these examples were examples of Socialism. As Chomsky pointed out, that both the West and the Soviet Union wanted to call what was practiced there Socialism was motivated by two different reasons and both were wrong. The reason why Chomsky saw the Socialism label as being wrong was because the necessary ingredient to Socialism from the Marxist tradition, the proletariat dictatorship, was missing. In fact, at a session on Stalin presented at the Left Forum this year, I challenged the leaders of the session on this point. I asked about the breakdown of the central committees that existed during the times of Lenin and Stalin. And the response was to note that Lenin was not even a worker, he was petty bourgeoisie. And thus they could not show that workers were in control of these governments.
To make a long story short, Marxist Socialism does not equal centralized government. Centralize governments that were run by elites is what the Socialist and contemporary of Lenin, Rosa Luxemberg called a bourgeois dictatorship. Why is Marxist Socialism not a part of such an organization? It is because workers are not in charge. And if the workers are not the ones with power, it is not Socialism from the Marxist tradition.
If the workers were in charge, they would rule by a partial democracy consisting of workers. Though the exclusion of the bourgeoisie from this democratic form of governing is the weakness I see in Marxist Socialism, we are not talking about weaknesses, we are talking about definitions. Thus, only the Paris Commune and the Spanish Revolution serve as examples where workers had the political power. Nicaragua would be more socialist leaning, but it deserves mention because, despite the terrorist war the US supported against the Sandinistas, Nicaragua not only provided programs to help with the various needs of the people, it relied on democratic procedures for determining its leadership as evidenced by the fact that the Sandinistas have been voted both out of power and then into power.
Though while employing a continuum between Socialism and Capitalism as evidenced by the concepts of Socialist-inclined and Capitalist-inclined are strong positive contributions made by the writers Birzer is relying on; in the end, this blogpost is simply another attempt to scare people out of an honest look at Socialism and it employs an imprecise and faulty definition of Socialism to accomplish that task. In addition, what is never mentioned here are the governments that either Socialism replaced in the places used by Birzer or the governments installed by US interventions to replace elected Socialist-inclined governments in places not mentioned here. For these were dictatorships in the vast majority of cases. And for its interventionists efforts, what the US has become is a centralized planning committee for much of the world. In other words, by Birzer's working definition of Socialism, the US has run much of the world employing Socialism
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June 7
To Tim Keller and the Gospel Coalition Staff as their blogpost consists of a podcast discussion on revival. This appeared in the Gospel Coalition website.
Praying for revival and praying for others to believe can be two different things The former could be a sign of being insular and waiting for God to prove we are right. Praying for the latter shows an interest in another person. I think revival has become a combination of both our Godot and the Holy Grail that keep us distracted from some important issues that are being ignored.
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To Joseph Pearce and his blogpost on multiculturalism and what makes for creating a successful melting pot of people and cultures. This appeared in the Imaginative Conservative blog
We should note here that some of the melting pots celebrated in the article above came into existence through the rule of force. Does such suggest that we adopt an ends justify the means ethic or some form of moral relativity? In addition, it isn't as if Europe and America are the only melting pots in the world, global capitalism itself is creating some melting pots in other areas of this world and perhaps some of the refusal of some Muslims to fit in here in the West has to do with what is being forced on them in their own homelands.
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The official status of the comment below has been changed from awaiting moderation to published.
June 9
To Thomas Kidd and his blogpost that defended the Declaration Of Independence from accusations of being systematically racist. This appeared in the Gospel Coalition website.
Was the Declaration systematically racist? With race not being a key issue, I think that the sparse comment about Native Americans and Blacks slaves indicates that it was a racist document. But more important than to question the Declaration is to question our Founding Fathers. For when we see how our founding documents were implemented, we have ample evidence that the nation they had created was not only racist, it was sexist and based on economic class.
As for the Declaration being sexist, we should note that not only did Jefferson say that all men were created equal, a woman's right to vote didn't come until well over 100 years later. In fact, women still feel the sting of sexism in society.
As for racism, we only need to note the emerging British attitudes on slave trading at the time and question whether the Founding Fathers thought that continued allegiance to Great Britain would threaten our nation's use of slaves in the future. Perhaps this was a contributing factor to our declaring independence and the fighting of the Revolutionary War. We should also note that during that time, the predominant view was that Blacks were not viewed as being equal to Whites. That belief even carried through to some who opposed slavery during Lincoln's time.
We should also note that economic classism played a significant part in the founding of our nation. Though not apparent in documents like The Declaration Of Independence, we should note that The Constitution was written in response to widespread dissent and Shays Rebellion. It was written to give the Federal government power to put down such insurrections--the latter point is evident in The Constitution's references to the militia. So while the Declaration of Independence was written in protest of the actions of British elites, The Constitution was written in order to maintain the status quo for the American elites who replaced them.
We should also note the awareness of class distinctions discussed during the Constitutional Debates (see http://avalon.law.yale.edu/18th_century/yates.asp ) and we note how Charles Pinckney listed 3 economic classes of the time--Professional men, Commercial men, and the Landed Interest--and how the first two classes must forever depend on the last class while saying how these classes should not be able to infringe on the rights of the other classes. Here, research is needed to determine the definition of those classes especially since many people were not included in that list as evident from Federalist #10 (http://www.constitution.org/fed/federa10.htm ). Or perhaps we should quote James Madison while expressing his fears that Great Britain might open their elections to all classes of people (see http://avalon.law.yale.edu/18th_century/yates.asp ):
Here we should note that around 5% of Americans could vote when The Constitution was ratified and that was based on class. We should also note that what was called innovation were the demands of those from the lower economic classes.
Despite the talk of equality by our Founding Fathers, it was never intended to apply to all whether that all was based on gender, race, or class. That we have started to approach equality for all is due to people demanding it; it is due to activism. And it is only with this understanding, rather than romantic views of both our Founding Fathers and Documents which would place both on pedestals, that we could properly interpret both and then go beyond what they said to accomplish what is just.
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June 10
To Joe Carter and his blogpost on what Christians should know about Crony Capitalism. This appeared in the Acton Blog.
Though I agree with Carter in that we should reject crony capitalism and that such has been going on for a while, his criticism is wanting because it is overly simplistic. It is overly simplistic because it looks at this form of Capitalism from a limited perspective: the view of the consumer. And while mentioning the producer, the seller, and the buyer, what is missing are the other stakeholders in the Capitalist venture. Those other stakeholders include the workers, the community in which a business is located, the environment, and vendors to the business. Thus, to solely focus on what happens to the consumer when crony capitalism is practiced forgets these other stakeholders. And because these other stakeholders are forgotten, they are more vulnerable to being exploited. And such exploitation can happen even when it provides the lowest prices for the consumer.
There are other names for crony capitalism. One such name state capitalism. In state capitalism, the state ensures the survival or even the prosperity of a business by becoming a valued customer and thus a valued consumer. The Defense Industry, for example showers its blessing on many kinds of businesses from those that expand technology to business that produce means of transportation to the arms industry to those businesses that provide basic goods and services to our troops.
In addition, to state capitalism, there are many times when foreign policies are pursued that protect business interests ahead of the rights of the people of a given nation. So, when we orchestrated a coup in Chile (1973) to prevent the democratically elected government from nationalizing communications, our policies helped ITT. When we jointly orchestrated a coup in Iran (1953), we not only helped our oil companies, we helped our arms manufacturers because Iran, under the Shah, bought weapons from us. When we orchestrated a coup in Guatemala (1954), it was done to protect the interests of United Fruit. That is just a small sample of over 50 interventions we have practiced since WW II. We should note all of the ways that crony capitalism paid off for businesses during the Iraq invasion of 2003. And one only needs to look at the pre WWII interventions described by former Marine Corp Major General Smedley Butler to see how they were used to benefit banks, the oil industry, and other businesses.
See, crony capitalism has been a way of life for us at least since the 20th century if not earlier. And all incidents of crony capitalism, both the ones listed here and the ones not mentioned lead us to ask this question: Can we have Capitalism without Crony Capitalism?
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To Anthony Bradley and his blogpost on how the funding of our justice system is hurting the poor. This appeared in the Acton blog.
Anthony Bradley brings up an important issue about the cost of justice in society. But we shouldn't be surprised because many of those who benefit the most from society, private sector elites, find more and more ways, many times with the cooperation of elected officials, to reduce or even avoid contributing to the society, through the paying of taxes, from which they benefit and could not exist without. If we are really concerned and interested in stopping the problems that come from how justice is funded, then private sector elites must step up to the plate and contribute their fair share in taxes.
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To Joe Carter and his blogpost containing a video tape comparison of Milton Friedman’s statements with those of Bernie Sanders. This appeared on the Acton Blog.
So according to Friedman, Roosevelt's economic initiatives didn't help the nation back then? And would Friedman celebrate the greed-based speculative economic system that led to both the stock market crash of 1929 and the economic collapse of 2008? After all, wasn't it people acting out of their own self-interest that led to both economic crises?
And what does Russia and China have to do with Sanders' Democratic Socialism when we know that Sanders is basically an FDR New Dealer?
And has Friedman ever looked at the Paris Commune or the Spanish Revolution? After all, in neither of those cases did we have either Capitalism or a dictator. Or should we examine how his economic theories were installed in Chile or Argentina where a military coup and dictatorship paved the way for the implementation of his economic theories? How much freedom does a military dictator allow?
This post is so overly simplistic and ill-fitting in its comparisons of Friedman to Sanders that it misrepresents both people. Friedman warned that that a market participant could get so big as to disrupt the Free Market. And isn't that what happened in the economic crisis of 2008? And Friedman explicitly stated that it is the government's job to prevent the players of the market from gaining such an advantage. And as said before, Sanders is an FDR New Dealer. That makes Friedman's references to Russia and China inappropriate when describing Sanders' views.
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June 11
To Suzanne Sherman and her blogpost that laments how revisionist history has dominated the telling of our founding fathers at the historical sites of their homes. This appeared in the Imaginative Conservative blog.
People's political values and beliefs are not just made evident by their words, but they are also demonstrated by their actions. And if the focus on the slave owning penchant of our founding fathers seems to be revisionist history to Sherman, we should note that the validity of history revisionism depends on the quality of the original accounts of history. And with what Conservatives consider to be the original accounts, at least some revisionism is in order. And perhaps Conservatives might consider the writings of Frederick Douglas on slavery to be revisionism as well (for example see http://www.masshumanities.org/files/programs/douglass/speech_abridged_med.pdf ).
What seems to be the problem experienced by the writer of the above article is that the pedestal many of us put the founding fathers on is not merited by the accounts of how they treated people from other groups, such as from other races. For the treatment of nonWhites by our founding fathers should be cause for national shame rather than something that can be glossed over while we gush over their political ideas where the beneficiaries of those ideas depended on the race and even class of the person back then. In fact, this is still the case.
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To Joe Carter and his blogpost about the Church of England’s assessment of Margaret Thatcher’s Christian faith. This appeared on Acton’s blog.
Here, we might want to ask if Thatcher's support for Pinochet was also guided by her Christian faith. Or we could ask what part of her Christian faith told her to denationalize certain British industries and to attack unions. Or, returning to the subject of Pinochet, we could ask what part of her Christian faith led her to embrace the kind of Neoliberal Capitalism that Pinochet first installed in Chile when he was ushered into power through a military coup. See, it just wasn't provisions that she objected to. it was a more democratic society she guided the nation away from. Because that is what she did when she embraced Neoliberal Capitalism. For this kind of Capitalism relieves private elites from more and more of their social responsibilities. The result is that there is greater consolidation of wealth and power into the hands of private sector elites. Here we should compare the degree of democracy the British now enjoy vs the degree of democracy they experienced before Thatcher came into power.
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June 13
To Bruce Frohnen and his blogpost on the West’s War on the family.This appeared in the Imaginative Conservative blog.
It would be interesting to see who is at war against whom here: Is Christianity at war against Western society and culture or is it the West at war against Christianity and the family?. For I don't remember our society and its culture forcing Christians to do anything outside of their Christian values while I see some Christians trying to force unbelievers in society to try to adhere to Christian values. And outside of the abortion issue, there is no compelling reason for Christians to press for laws to ensure that nonChristians adhere to Christian values. Thus, wouldn't it make sense to answer the question of who is at war with whom by examining who is trying to use laws to force the other to comply?
But I guess in an age of victimization, the mere presence of counterexamples to Frohnen's model of the family with its male and female roles could be considered to be a firing of shots of sort. But doesn't that tell us something about the degree of control Frohnen expects Christianity to have over society?
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June 14
To R. Scott Clark and his blogpost interview of Nebraska Senator Ben Sasse on what government is and how it should function. This appeared in Heidelblog.
I listened carefully to the interview between R. Scott Clark and Nebraska Senator Ben Sasse and this is what I came up with. There seems to be a lack of awareness of the ease in which we can easily call the ways we grew up or live in exceptional or special. The references to the desire to return to what is Tocquevillian along with claiming that the job of gov't is to provide an environment so that we can live while focusing on what is going on in our local communities are such examples. We should note that when Tocqueville is mentioned by conservatives, it done uncritically. There is no mention of Tocqueville's, what would now be considered to be, racist views toward Blacks and Native Americans. Likewise, there is no mention of why Tocqueville regarded British society as the most superior society in the world. Nor is there mention of how society and our nation's economic system has changed since Tocqueville's time. All there was were positive comments on Tocqueville and how he saw the dynamism of American society and its economic system.
But in the glowing comments of the past, which those in rural states would naturally relate better to than those from more urban settings, one of the main factor's for America's economic dynamism was the use of exploitation of people. One of the reasons why America grew was because it ethnically cleansed the land of Native Americans. Another reason why America grew was because of our use of slavery and child labor. We should note that in 1820, over half of factory were children under 10 (see https://www.apstudynotes.org/us-history/topics/a-growing-national-economy/ ). These workers were often abused. And children were not the only ones who were exploited for their labor. Of course, what enabled this exploitation of people by business is the emphasis on individualism and a disdain for government interference. We see a continuance of worker exploitation today only the means of exploiting workers have changed some.
Something else we should note about the interview is this: the conservative view of government as expressed by Sasse is that government is almost considered to be a foreign entity to its people rather than an instrument of self-rule. Thus, not only is there a certain detachment between government and its people, so that the people can be free, government should be limited to certain duties such as protecting the people from foreign enemies. At the same time, government should take special care not to infringe on personal freedoms of individuals and business owners and this is one of the reasons why Sasse opposes raising of the minimum wage and makes a disparaging remark about the EPA.
Here we should note that such a conservative view of government plays well in midwestern states like Nebraska and thus we have another example of seeing the settings in which one grew up to be exceptional. For both Clark and Sasse are from Nebraska. But in discussing the minimum wage issue, what is neglected is the fact that many businesses use government assistance programs to subsidize their payrolls. How this works is that because many of the wages, such as minimum wage, are too low to live on, workers must apply for government assistance to survive. In fact, there is a significant number of full-time workers who, because of their income, are homeless. Of course, conservatives like Clark and Sasse wouldn't want this foreign entity called government to infringe on the individual rights of employers to pay their workers as they deem fit. However, such an approach to the individual rights of employers helps continue the dependence on exploitation our economic system maintains.
Thought there should be limits on government actions in society, if we viewed government as an instrument of self-rule, government would speak for the people in determining how we will live with each other. This puts a different perspective on how much government should intervene in the society of people who it represents.
Other things could be said, but to stop here allows one to connect the historical dots between where we are today and the past. The views expressed by Clark and Sasse, since they are both religiously conservative Christians, makes the Conservative Church a supporter of wealth and power over the individual. Clark and Sasse would disagree here but only because both associate power with government authority. But those who have studied or worked in the business world know that power and authority are not the same. Now this support of wealth and power by American Conservative Christianity has historical parallels in the times leading up to the French, Russian, and Spanish Revolutions where the Church, in each of those cases, stood with wealth and power. And during and in the aftermaths of those revolutions saw a persecution of the Church and a dishonoring of the Gospel. And the question becomes for us religiously conservative Christians, are we contributing to the present and future dishonoring of the Gospel by political positions that support wealth and power?
To Bradly Birzer and his blogpost that cites a work by a James Otteson and Thomas Smith which declares the end of Socialism and how Socialism can never work. This appeared in the Imaginative Conservative blog.
While Professor Otteson would like to pronounce the end of socialism and condemn it at the same time, the trouble that exists in this article is defining socialism. For the definition given here is not very precise or accurate. It is defined by example as well as the notion of centralized control.
The problem with the definition is that examples such as the Paris Commune, the Spanish Revolution, and Nicaragua are not at all represented by the examples given nor is a form of Socialism called Libertarian Socialism represented by either the definition of central control or the examples given. Libertarian Socialism actually oppose the existence of the state. But Otteson insists on equating the models provided by people like Lenin-Stalin, Mao, Castro, and the rulers from North Korea with Socialism. However, not all Socialists would agree that these examples were examples of Socialism. As Chomsky pointed out, that both the West and the Soviet Union wanted to call what was practiced there Socialism was motivated by two different reasons and both were wrong. The reason why Chomsky saw the Socialism label as being wrong was because the necessary ingredient to Socialism from the Marxist tradition, the proletariat dictatorship, was missing. In fact, at a session on Stalin presented at the Left Forum this year, I challenged the leaders of the session on this point. I asked about the breakdown of the central committees that existed during the times of Lenin and Stalin. And the response was to note that Lenin was not even a worker, he was petty bourgeoisie. And thus they could not show that workers were in control of these governments.
To make a long story short, Marxist Socialism does not equal centralized government. Centralize governments that were run by elites is what the Socialist and contemporary of Lenin, Rosa Luxemberg called a bourgeois dictatorship. Why is Marxist Socialism not a part of such an organization? It is because workers are not in charge. And if the workers are not the ones with power, it is not Socialism from the Marxist tradition.
If the workers were in charge, they would rule by a partial democracy consisting of workers. Though the exclusion of the bourgeoisie from this democratic form of governing is the weakness I see in Marxist Socialism, we are not talking about weaknesses, we are talking about definitions. Thus, only the Paris Commune and the Spanish Revolution serve as examples where workers had the political power. Nicaragua would be more socialist leaning, but it deserves mention because, despite the terrorist war the US supported against the Sandinistas, Nicaragua not only provided programs to help with the various needs of the people, it relied on democratic procedures for determining its leadership as evidenced by the fact that the Sandinistas have been voted both out of power and then into power.
Though while employing a continuum between Socialism and Capitalism as evidenced by the concepts of Socialist-inclined and Capitalist-inclined are strong positive contributions made by the writers Birzer is relying on; in the end, this blogpost is simply another attempt to scare people out of an honest look at Socialism and it employs an imprecise and faulty definition of Socialism to accomplish that task. In addition, what is never mentioned here are the governments that either Socialism replaced in the places used by Birzer or the governments installed by US interventions to replace elected Socialist-inclined governments in places not mentioned here. For these were dictatorships in the vast majority of cases. And for its interventionists efforts, what the US has become is a centralized planning committee for much of the world. In other words, by Birzer's working definition of Socialism, the US has run much of the world employing Socialism
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June 7
To Tim Keller and the Gospel Coalition Staff as their blogpost consists of a podcast discussion on revival. This appeared in the Gospel Coalition website.
Praying for revival and praying for others to believe can be two different things The former could be a sign of being insular and waiting for God to prove we are right. Praying for the latter shows an interest in another person. I think revival has become a combination of both our Godot and the Holy Grail that keep us distracted from some important issues that are being ignored.
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To Joseph Pearce and his blogpost on multiculturalism and what makes for creating a successful melting pot of people and cultures. This appeared in the Imaginative Conservative blog
We should note here that some of the melting pots celebrated in the article above came into existence through the rule of force. Does such suggest that we adopt an ends justify the means ethic or some form of moral relativity? In addition, it isn't as if Europe and America are the only melting pots in the world, global capitalism itself is creating some melting pots in other areas of this world and perhaps some of the refusal of some Muslims to fit in here in the West has to do with what is being forced on them in their own homelands.
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The official status of the comment below has been changed from awaiting moderation to published.
June 9
To Thomas Kidd and his blogpost that defended the Declaration Of Independence from accusations of being systematically racist. This appeared in the Gospel Coalition website.
Was the Declaration systematically racist? With race not being a key issue, I think that the sparse comment about Native Americans and Blacks slaves indicates that it was a racist document. But more important than to question the Declaration is to question our Founding Fathers. For when we see how our founding documents were implemented, we have ample evidence that the nation they had created was not only racist, it was sexist and based on economic class.
As for the Declaration being sexist, we should note that not only did Jefferson say that all men were created equal, a woman's right to vote didn't come until well over 100 years later. In fact, women still feel the sting of sexism in society.
As for racism, we only need to note the emerging British attitudes on slave trading at the time and question whether the Founding Fathers thought that continued allegiance to Great Britain would threaten our nation's use of slaves in the future. Perhaps this was a contributing factor to our declaring independence and the fighting of the Revolutionary War. We should also note that during that time, the predominant view was that Blacks were not viewed as being equal to Whites. That belief even carried through to some who opposed slavery during Lincoln's time.
We should also note that economic classism played a significant part in the founding of our nation. Though not apparent in documents like The Declaration Of Independence, we should note that The Constitution was written in response to widespread dissent and Shays Rebellion. It was written to give the Federal government power to put down such insurrections--the latter point is evident in The Constitution's references to the militia. So while the Declaration of Independence was written in protest of the actions of British elites, The Constitution was written in order to maintain the status quo for the American elites who replaced them.
We should also note the awareness of class distinctions discussed during the Constitutional Debates (see http://avalon.law.yale.edu/18th_century/yates.asp ) and we note how Charles Pinckney listed 3 economic classes of the time--Professional men, Commercial men, and the Landed Interest--and how the first two classes must forever depend on the last class while saying how these classes should not be able to infringe on the rights of the other classes. Here, research is needed to determine the definition of those classes especially since many people were not included in that list as evident from Federalist #10 (http://www.constitution.org/fed/federa10.htm ). Or perhaps we should quote James Madison while expressing his fears that Great Britain might open their elections to all classes of people (see http://avalon.law.yale.edu/18th_century/yates.asp ):
In England, at this day, if elections were open to all classes of people, the property of the landed proprietors would be insecure. An agrarian law would soon take place. If these observations be jsut, our government ought to secure the permanent interests of the country against innovation. Landholders ought to have a share in the government, to support these invaluable interests, and to balance and check the other. They ought to be so constituted as to protect the minority of the opulent against the majority.
Here we should note that around 5% of Americans could vote when The Constitution was ratified and that was based on class. We should also note that what was called innovation were the demands of those from the lower economic classes.
Despite the talk of equality by our Founding Fathers, it was never intended to apply to all whether that all was based on gender, race, or class. That we have started to approach equality for all is due to people demanding it; it is due to activism. And it is only with this understanding, rather than romantic views of both our Founding Fathers and Documents which would place both on pedestals, that we could properly interpret both and then go beyond what they said to accomplish what is just.
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June 10
To Joe Carter and his blogpost on what Christians should know about Crony Capitalism. This appeared in the Acton Blog.
Though I agree with Carter in that we should reject crony capitalism and that such has been going on for a while, his criticism is wanting because it is overly simplistic. It is overly simplistic because it looks at this form of Capitalism from a limited perspective: the view of the consumer. And while mentioning the producer, the seller, and the buyer, what is missing are the other stakeholders in the Capitalist venture. Those other stakeholders include the workers, the community in which a business is located, the environment, and vendors to the business. Thus, to solely focus on what happens to the consumer when crony capitalism is practiced forgets these other stakeholders. And because these other stakeholders are forgotten, they are more vulnerable to being exploited. And such exploitation can happen even when it provides the lowest prices for the consumer.
There are other names for crony capitalism. One such name state capitalism. In state capitalism, the state ensures the survival or even the prosperity of a business by becoming a valued customer and thus a valued consumer. The Defense Industry, for example showers its blessing on many kinds of businesses from those that expand technology to business that produce means of transportation to the arms industry to those businesses that provide basic goods and services to our troops.
In addition, to state capitalism, there are many times when foreign policies are pursued that protect business interests ahead of the rights of the people of a given nation. So, when we orchestrated a coup in Chile (1973) to prevent the democratically elected government from nationalizing communications, our policies helped ITT. When we jointly orchestrated a coup in Iran (1953), we not only helped our oil companies, we helped our arms manufacturers because Iran, under the Shah, bought weapons from us. When we orchestrated a coup in Guatemala (1954), it was done to protect the interests of United Fruit. That is just a small sample of over 50 interventions we have practiced since WW II. We should note all of the ways that crony capitalism paid off for businesses during the Iraq invasion of 2003. And one only needs to look at the pre WWII interventions described by former Marine Corp Major General Smedley Butler to see how they were used to benefit banks, the oil industry, and other businesses.
See, crony capitalism has been a way of life for us at least since the 20th century if not earlier. And all incidents of crony capitalism, both the ones listed here and the ones not mentioned lead us to ask this question: Can we have Capitalism without Crony Capitalism?
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To Anthony Bradley and his blogpost on how the funding of our justice system is hurting the poor. This appeared in the Acton blog.
Anthony Bradley brings up an important issue about the cost of justice in society. But we shouldn't be surprised because many of those who benefit the most from society, private sector elites, find more and more ways, many times with the cooperation of elected officials, to reduce or even avoid contributing to the society, through the paying of taxes, from which they benefit and could not exist without. If we are really concerned and interested in stopping the problems that come from how justice is funded, then private sector elites must step up to the plate and contribute their fair share in taxes.
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To Joe Carter and his blogpost containing a video tape comparison of Milton Friedman’s statements with those of Bernie Sanders. This appeared on the Acton Blog.
So according to Friedman, Roosevelt's economic initiatives didn't help the nation back then? And would Friedman celebrate the greed-based speculative economic system that led to both the stock market crash of 1929 and the economic collapse of 2008? After all, wasn't it people acting out of their own self-interest that led to both economic crises?
And what does Russia and China have to do with Sanders' Democratic Socialism when we know that Sanders is basically an FDR New Dealer?
And has Friedman ever looked at the Paris Commune or the Spanish Revolution? After all, in neither of those cases did we have either Capitalism or a dictator. Or should we examine how his economic theories were installed in Chile or Argentina where a military coup and dictatorship paved the way for the implementation of his economic theories? How much freedom does a military dictator allow?
This post is so overly simplistic and ill-fitting in its comparisons of Friedman to Sanders that it misrepresents both people. Friedman warned that that a market participant could get so big as to disrupt the Free Market. And isn't that what happened in the economic crisis of 2008? And Friedman explicitly stated that it is the government's job to prevent the players of the market from gaining such an advantage. And as said before, Sanders is an FDR New Dealer. That makes Friedman's references to Russia and China inappropriate when describing Sanders' views.
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June 11
To Suzanne Sherman and her blogpost that laments how revisionist history has dominated the telling of our founding fathers at the historical sites of their homes. This appeared in the Imaginative Conservative blog.
People's political values and beliefs are not just made evident by their words, but they are also demonstrated by their actions. And if the focus on the slave owning penchant of our founding fathers seems to be revisionist history to Sherman, we should note that the validity of history revisionism depends on the quality of the original accounts of history. And with what Conservatives consider to be the original accounts, at least some revisionism is in order. And perhaps Conservatives might consider the writings of Frederick Douglas on slavery to be revisionism as well (for example see http://www.masshumanities.org/files/programs/douglass/speech_abridged_med.pdf ).
What seems to be the problem experienced by the writer of the above article is that the pedestal many of us put the founding fathers on is not merited by the accounts of how they treated people from other groups, such as from other races. For the treatment of nonWhites by our founding fathers should be cause for national shame rather than something that can be glossed over while we gush over their political ideas where the beneficiaries of those ideas depended on the race and even class of the person back then. In fact, this is still the case.
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To Joe Carter and his blogpost about the Church of England’s assessment of Margaret Thatcher’s Christian faith. This appeared on Acton’s blog.
Here, we might want to ask if Thatcher's support for Pinochet was also guided by her Christian faith. Or we could ask what part of her Christian faith told her to denationalize certain British industries and to attack unions. Or, returning to the subject of Pinochet, we could ask what part of her Christian faith led her to embrace the kind of Neoliberal Capitalism that Pinochet first installed in Chile when he was ushered into power through a military coup. See, it just wasn't provisions that she objected to. it was a more democratic society she guided the nation away from. Because that is what she did when she embraced Neoliberal Capitalism. For this kind of Capitalism relieves private elites from more and more of their social responsibilities. The result is that there is greater consolidation of wealth and power into the hands of private sector elites. Here we should compare the degree of democracy the British now enjoy vs the degree of democracy they experienced before Thatcher came into power.
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June 13
To Bruce Frohnen and his blogpost on the West’s War on the family.This appeared in the Imaginative Conservative blog.
It would be interesting to see who is at war against whom here: Is Christianity at war against Western society and culture or is it the West at war against Christianity and the family?. For I don't remember our society and its culture forcing Christians to do anything outside of their Christian values while I see some Christians trying to force unbelievers in society to try to adhere to Christian values. And outside of the abortion issue, there is no compelling reason for Christians to press for laws to ensure that nonChristians adhere to Christian values. Thus, wouldn't it make sense to answer the question of who is at war with whom by examining who is trying to use laws to force the other to comply?
But I guess in an age of victimization, the mere presence of counterexamples to Frohnen's model of the family with its male and female roles could be considered to be a firing of shots of sort. But doesn't that tell us something about the degree of control Frohnen expects Christianity to have over society?
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June 14
To R. Scott Clark and his blogpost interview of Nebraska Senator Ben Sasse on what government is and how it should function. This appeared in Heidelblog.
I listened carefully to the interview between R. Scott Clark and Nebraska Senator Ben Sasse and this is what I came up with. There seems to be a lack of awareness of the ease in which we can easily call the ways we grew up or live in exceptional or special. The references to the desire to return to what is Tocquevillian along with claiming that the job of gov't is to provide an environment so that we can live while focusing on what is going on in our local communities are such examples. We should note that when Tocqueville is mentioned by conservatives, it done uncritically. There is no mention of Tocqueville's, what would now be considered to be, racist views toward Blacks and Native Americans. Likewise, there is no mention of why Tocqueville regarded British society as the most superior society in the world. Nor is there mention of how society and our nation's economic system has changed since Tocqueville's time. All there was were positive comments on Tocqueville and how he saw the dynamism of American society and its economic system.
But in the glowing comments of the past, which those in rural states would naturally relate better to than those from more urban settings, one of the main factor's for America's economic dynamism was the use of exploitation of people. One of the reasons why America grew was because it ethnically cleansed the land of Native Americans. Another reason why America grew was because of our use of slavery and child labor. We should note that in 1820, over half of factory were children under 10 (see https://www.apstudynotes.org/us-history/topics/a-growing-national-economy/ ). These workers were often abused. And children were not the only ones who were exploited for their labor. Of course, what enabled this exploitation of people by business is the emphasis on individualism and a disdain for government interference. We see a continuance of worker exploitation today only the means of exploiting workers have changed some.
Something else we should note about the interview is this: the conservative view of government as expressed by Sasse is that government is almost considered to be a foreign entity to its people rather than an instrument of self-rule. Thus, not only is there a certain detachment between government and its people, so that the people can be free, government should be limited to certain duties such as protecting the people from foreign enemies. At the same time, government should take special care not to infringe on personal freedoms of individuals and business owners and this is one of the reasons why Sasse opposes raising of the minimum wage and makes a disparaging remark about the EPA.
Here we should note that such a conservative view of government plays well in midwestern states like Nebraska and thus we have another example of seeing the settings in which one grew up to be exceptional. For both Clark and Sasse are from Nebraska. But in discussing the minimum wage issue, what is neglected is the fact that many businesses use government assistance programs to subsidize their payrolls. How this works is that because many of the wages, such as minimum wage, are too low to live on, workers must apply for government assistance to survive. In fact, there is a significant number of full-time workers who, because of their income, are homeless. Of course, conservatives like Clark and Sasse wouldn't want this foreign entity called government to infringe on the individual rights of employers to pay their workers as they deem fit. However, such an approach to the individual rights of employers helps continue the dependence on exploitation our economic system maintains.
Thought there should be limits on government actions in society, if we viewed government as an instrument of self-rule, government would speak for the people in determining how we will live with each other. This puts a different perspective on how much government should intervene in the society of people who it represents.
Other things could be said, but to stop here allows one to connect the historical dots between where we are today and the past. The views expressed by Clark and Sasse, since they are both religiously conservative Christians, makes the Conservative Church a supporter of wealth and power over the individual. Clark and Sasse would disagree here but only because both associate power with government authority. But those who have studied or worked in the business world know that power and authority are not the same. Now this support of wealth and power by American Conservative Christianity has historical parallels in the times leading up to the French, Russian, and Spanish Revolutions where the Church, in each of those cases, stood with wealth and power. And during and in the aftermaths of those revolutions saw a persecution of the Church and a dishonoring of the Gospel. And the question becomes for us religiously conservative Christians, are we contributing to the present and future dishonoring of the Gospel by political positions that support wealth and power?
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