Comments Which Conservatives Block From Their Blogs For May 17, 2023

 May 16

To R. Scott Clark and his article that addresses the desire of some American Christians who want a Christian king or prince to rule over America. Clark compared the desire for a Christian king with the Israelites' desire for a king during the days of the prophet Samuel.

There are a few points to be made. I fully agree with Clark on supporting religious pluralism in America. But the comparison between the Israelites who wanted a king during the days of Samuel with what today's Christian theocrats want is problematic. For while the Israelites of Samuel's day wanted a king to be like other nations, the Christian theocrats of today want a king because they want America to be unlike the other nations. They want to replace what is left of our democracy with a Christian king or prince in order to legislate Church laws for unbelievers and believers alike.

We saw the much lighter form of this legislation of Church laws for everyone during Christendom. Here we should note that Christendom here and then did not take the form of the institutional Church telling the government what to do here, but rather Christendom exerted control over the government indirectly through its influence on culture.

Here we should note that while Christians might have been in more agreement with the government during Christendom, their blessings were at the expenses of unbelievers. And this is a point that is often overlooked by many of us religiously conservative Christians when we look at the changes taking place in society. While we are quick to point out how unfair or are against our interests many of the laws are now, the laws during Christendom were just as unfair, if not more so, to many unbelievers back then.

Finally, there is good reason to challenge the American Revolution. One of the reasons why it was fought was because the British were prohibiting the colonists from advancing westward. In other words, the  British were protecting Native American lands from being seized and stolen. There is also evidence, though not conclusive evidence, that continued British control spelled the end of slavery in the US. 

In addition, we need to understand that the context for the writing of the Declaration of Independence and the Revolutionary War was different from the context for the writing of The Constitution. Whereas many of the colonists fought in the Revolutionary War to oppose the control that British elites exerted over them, The Constitution was written because many Americans were expressing dissent to and rebelling against American elites. One only needs to look up all of the Constitutional references to the Militia and realize that Shays Rebellion helped trigger the writing of The Constitution

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To John Horvat and his blog article the praises the conservative reliance on Natural Law and the Left's fear of it. This appeared in the Imaginative Conservative blog.

There are problems with Horvat's article. While at least suggesting that Natural Law is universal, there is no consensus on what Natural Law says about certain issues. In addition, while denying that employing Natural Law would bring a religious rule to America, he states that the 10 commandments are summary of Natural Law. But what is in the first table of the 10 Commandments but commandments regulating the worship of God. 

There is no consensus regarding what Natural Law says about sex for example. For while the 10 Commandments and its context would dictate that sex must only occur between a man and a woman in marriage, we see in nature both same sex behaviors (SSB), which occurs in around 1,500 species, and different ways of performing sex not all of which lead to reproduction. To counter that one must rely on the Christian interpretation of creation and the fall. But America is made up of people from all sorts of religions. And even among Christians, especially among liberal Christians, there is no consensus on what Natural Law says.

Also, the Left does believe in universal principles. The Principle of Universality is such a principle. Equality is another universal principle that the Left passionately believes in.

Certainly, relying on Natural Law would not bring a Christian Theocratic rule over the US. But an authoritarian, Christian ethnocracy, as opposed to a democracy, it would bring. And we already saw what Christendom did to the reputation of the Gospel. Critical Theory and Post Modernism are, in part, reactions to the abuses and atrocities committed by Christendom.

Comments Which Conservatives Block From Their Blogs For October 13, 2021

 Around Oct 5

To R. Scott Clark and E. J. Hutchinson for Clark's blogpost that cites hutchinson's article that calls for the 2nd table of the Decalogue to become the law of the land. This appeared in the Heidelblog.

Hutchinson's article can be found at:

https://www.theamericanconservative.com/articles/yes-bring-back-the-decalogue/

Let's see, according to what some Christian commentators and writers have said before,  Christians should reject the teachings of social-justice warriors because these warriors don't understand the law/Gospel distinction but let's have the government prosecute or let citizens sue (a.k.a., civil court vigilantism) those who commit adultery because there is a prohibition against adultery is in the Decalogue. But wait, there's more. Some these same Christians believe that the use of musical instruments in the worship of God is passed because it only belongs in the Old Testament and thus this provides another confusion between the law and the Gospel.

Or let Christian businesspeople exercise their freedom of religion by refusing to fully serve the LGBT community, but because many Christians believe that the 2nd table of the Decalogue should be the law of the land, then the prohibition against adultery and related sins should be the law of the land. But wait, there is more. We should not, according to 2Kers, want a return to Christendom.

But what about those who do not, because of their religion or lack thereof, believe that not all of the Ten Commandments should be law of the land? Also, remember how adultery is defined in the Scriptures. How much of that definition should become law of the land? Or what about the other parts of the 2nd Table? Should we prosecute each instance of a person who, either as a child or adult, does not honor their parents as the Scriptures have defined that? Or how should we enforce a law that prohibits coveting?

Of course, the response from some Christian leaders have to any objections because of our guaranteed freedoms is that governments should enforce the 2nd Table of the Decalogue because it is Natural Law. But Natural Law as defined by whom? Is it Natural Law as defined by the Church? After all, if we look to nature as a source for Natural Law, then homosexuality should be accepted because of the number of species of animals, approximately 1,500, in which homosexuality is practiced. Also, for my fellow Christians, is it the New Testament that tells us that the Christian definition for Natural Law should become the law of the land or is it our theology that says that? What can we learn here from I Corinthians 5?

And if we are going to enforce the 2nd Table of the Decalogue, why shouldn't we include the 1st Table, or at least parts of it, too? Oh, we did that with the Blue Laws. 

Of course, the real problem here is in the title and subtitle of the above article: 'Two Millenia of Western History' is speaking to the Michigan AG, and to the rest of the nation. Also,  'We all expected the Magistrate to enforce the 2nd table of the Decalogue.' Is that a according to I Corinthians 5; Mark 6:7-11; and Matthew 20:25-28? Was that true of all Christians for two Millenia?

One of the problems here is that many of us religiously conservative American Christians refuse to see the contradiction that exists between the desire expressed in the above article and the 1st Amendment guaranteeing the freedom of religion. Another problem is that many of us religiously conservative American Christians refuse to see how our desires for making the 2nd Table of the Decalogue the law of the land, especially with their focused concern on sexual sins, all but confirms our tendency to passionately embrace the authoritarian personality type. And the problem there is that it was Germans with that personality type who supported and remained loyal to person who was not just a dictator, but a monster. 

What the above article also says to me is that too many of us religiously conservative American Christians want a controlling hand over America. We want a return to the 'good ol days' of Christianity having a place of supremacy over society. And the above article reveals something else. It reveals why many of us religiously conservative American Christians interpret opposition to our control over society as persecution. Many of us interpret opposition to our control over society that way because we feel exclusively entitled to determine what should and should not the law of the land.

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Oct 8

To John Horvat and his article on why Christians are not responsible for the fall of our liberal society even though they judge people and seek to stop certain types of immorality the way they do. He says this because of GOd's anger toward sin. This was in the Imaginative Conservative blog.

The Liberals are right and Horvat is wrong. Why? It isn't because the lifestyles of those in the LGBT community should be rejected by believers nor that CRT has flaws. The real  problem is that Horvat and some other fellow believers in Christ cannot make an adequate distinction either between society and the Church or the roles of today's society in New Testament times and those of Israel in the Old Testament. Church discipline is for those who claim that they are members of the Church via their faith in Jesus Christ. Church discipline is not to extend to society either directly or through a proxy. 

The Scriptures that deal with Church discipline are very helpful here. Read what I Cor 5: 9-13 says about a Church disciplinary case:

I wrote to you in my letter not to associate with sexually immoral people—not at all meaning the people of this world who are immoral, or the greedy and swindlers, or idolaters. In that case you would have to leave this world. But now I am writing to you that you must not associate with anyone who claims to be a brother or sister but is sexually immoral or greedy, an idolater or slanderer, a drunkard or swindler. Do not even eat with such people.

What business is it of mine to judge those outside the church? Are you not to judge those inside? God will judge those outside. “Expel the wicked person from among you.”

It is not for us to shun or seek to marginalize sexually immoral unbelievers. According to Paul, to do so would mean that we would have to leave the world or rule over it by what is implied by our actions. And those who leave the world cannot help carry out the Great Commission. Those who seek to force certain morals on unbelievers are not following Jesus's instructions that he gave to His disciples.

It is a rigid intolerance, much of it shown by conservative elements of the Church, that is significantly responsible for destroying society today. When we demand that people who do not share our faith must, nonetheless, follow our rules, we are exhibiting our own control issues, which are sometimes driven by our own fears and weaknesses. And that desire to label others as evil and ourselves as good is used to make us feel entitled, or even obligated, to seek to punish unbelievers who cross the red lines we have drawn for them.

Elective abortion must be stopped, but we must also be careful in how we stop it. But CRT is evil? Marx had nothing worthwhile to contribute? The LGBT community is evil has no relative giid, compared to us, good in it? Do we understand the pedestal we have put ourselves on when we believe those things? That pedestal alone is a big enough stumbling block that shuts the ears of many unbelievers from listening to the Gospel. Now we want to add our trying to control society so that it does what we command it to do in God's name? 

We need to look in a non-magic mirror to see what we really look like. For when we build such pedestals for ourselves and look to punish unbelievers for being different from us, we might very well resemble the Pharisee from the parable of the 2 men praying (Luke 18:9-14). For that Pharisee, like us, was very zealous for the law and following the commandments.

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Oct 9

To R. Scott Clark and his blogpost that links to a YouTube Project Veritas report on a whistleblower report from Pfizer on the use of cells from a human cell line in the production of Covid-19 vaccines. This appeared in Heidelblog.

This is all old news. This is news that has already been out there. And some of the reasons why Pfizer did not want people to know that cell lines were used in testing are demonstrated by the above video. That is to discourage the use of the Covid vaccines.

We should note that what was used were cells from a fetal cell line, not the fetal cells of an aborted fetus (see  https://www.science.org/content/article/abortion-opponents-protest-covid-19-vaccines-use-fetal-cells   )--that article also addresses religious objections to using cells from cell lines. And that those cells in that cell line were used in testing, not in the manufacturing, of the mRNA vaccines. We should note that the Youtube presentation started to use cells from an aborted fetus with cells from a fetal cell line interchangeably.  That using cells from fetal cell lines is a long standing practice and has been used in other vaccines and some medicines. And as long as cells from an already established cell line are used, there is no incentive to use cells from an aborted fetus and thus no incentive for any fetuses to be aborted.

So what is the violation here? Are we celebrating a certain unnecessary level of sensitivity or are we trying to magnify that sensitivity? Or are we telling people  that one's sensitivity to the use of cells from cell lines should be self-examined or are we exploiting what could be a hypersensitivity for other purposes? For example, this blog, Heidelblog, has already published articles that, at least indirectly, promote the use of Ivermectin as a preventative medicine and/or cure for Covid-19. That is despite the fact that Ivermectin is not a proven medicine in the fight against Covid-19.

In addition, we need to consider the source. The factual reporting rating for Project Veritas, the news source of the story is below:

https://mediabiasfactcheck.com/project-veritas/

Comments Which Conservatives Block From Their Blogs For September 22, 2021

 Sept 16

To Gene Veith and his blogpost that criticizes Biden's social infrastructure bill especially in reference to its social aspects of providing child care and education that includes the 1st two years of community college for anyone. This appeared in the Cranach blog on Patheos. The comment below was put on pending. But there is a hack that allowed the comment to be posted against the algorithm that made the comment pending. The point is that it was blocked and would continue to be blocked without the hack.

And to think that Veith complained about my calling out his Okhahoman conservatism.

But his educational concerns assume several things. First, that the vast majority of community colleges are teaching leftist propaganda while gen-ed courses in universities do not with their courses in great books and history. Didn't some Christians complain earlier about how classic education was being forsaken earlier at schools like UPenn when they were throwing out the writings of Shakespear because of Post Modernism concerns?

Second, there is Veith's assumption that the first two-years of community college will automatically transfer in to universities, to both biblical and unbiblical--somewhat like the old regular and unleaded gas--colleges, and put those students into their 3rd year. I have worked with analyzing the transfer of credits from community college to 4 year schools to know that is not the case. If anything, the 2-year community college education means that a student will likely add a 5th year of college because not all of the credits will transfer in. And since it is unlikely that religion courses in community colleges rarely transfer into Christian colleges, I don't think that the transfer of course credit from community college to universities will work like what Veith imagined. Heck, even as a student at ORU, there were specific religion courses that transfer students had to take including the one transfer student we had from Rutgers.

Third, if Veith is so concerned about the poor quality of education in areas where there are poor and disadvantaged people. Of course he doesn't mention anything about how the shortage of funds for education and the lack of living wage jobs play a role in creating inadequate educational facilities and unstable homes.

What is Veith's main concern here? It is that the gov't might be more involved than it already is in our lives. But why is that a concern when the gov't is necessarily involved in our lives, that we are not keeping pace with many other 1st world nations in terms of education, and that we have the problem with student debt that we have? His Oklahoman conservatism, and this is not just a conservatism that is specific to Oklahoma, is suspicious of government involvement in anything other than punishing the bad guys and making sure that our military can kick any other nation's butt, If we have a working democracy, isn't gov't going to represent the people and thus we should not assume that its involvement is bad? But that is the key question here. Do we have a working democracy? And if not, how can we get one should be Veith's concern rather than assume that any big government is bad government because it is socialist leftist. BTW, big gov't ≠ leftist or socialists gov'ts. Such is a conservative myth.

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Sept 18

To R. Scott Clark and his very brief blogpost that quotes Ignatius about how the Church is at its best when it is hated by the world but the title of the blogpost is about how the Church should avoid seeking a new Christendom. This appeared in Heidelblog.

Not all hatred from the world should be desired by the Church. I believe it is Peter who points that out.

But the title of the blogpost does not seem to match up well with the content of the blogpost.  One can comment on the title by saying that while avoiding Christendom, the Church must also avoid failing to speak prophetically to the world about its corporate sins. 

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To John Horvat and his blogpost calling for Americans, primarily Christians, with [true] grit to stop up and replace government programs in the solving of America's problems. Here it is implied that these Christian Americans should be replacing government programs that address many of our social problems. This appeared in the Imaginative Conservative blog.

A couple of the common retorts that conservatives often give to us socialists include socialism cannot work because there are not enough Christians or that socialism cannot work because people are sinners. And yet, we have the above article on how to solve America's problems. We just need Christians with '[true] grit' to step up to solve our problems.

Of course there is an agenda behind the above conservative approach. That agenda is to cut government spending so that we either can reduce or even eliminate taxes on the wealthy.

What is not considered in the above article is that the reason we have government programs, which btw have a mixed record, is because of the systemic and personal failures that included human pride, greed, or fear. 

So Christian [true] grit is to replace government programs to solve our problems? There are at least two questions that need to be answered here. First, does the Church have the resources to solve all of the problems that the government is trying to mitigate? Second, does the Church have the will to solve the problems that government is trying address?

Of course, if we took the above article seriously, we could eliminate our defense department and law enforcement because all we need is Christians with [true] grit to step up and solve the problems they try to tackle. Of course everyone can see how laughable such an idea is. Then why don't we see how replacing government programs with Church solutions is also laughable? Don't we see that the Church lacks the desire to address all of the problems government is trying to address when we see church after church move out of the urban areas and into the comfortable suburbs? What percentage of megachurches exist in troubled urban areas?

There is also another agenda behind the above ideas expressed in the above article. That agenda is that the government should give special treatment to the Church so it can demonstrate its [true] grit. For perhaps centuries, religiously conservative Christians have looked to receive special treatment from the government. An example of that special treatment today is when the religiously conservative Christians want the legal right to discriminate against those in the LGBT community. During the Jim Crow era, many, not all, conservative Christians wanted, and got, the right to practice racial discrimination. And here we should note that racial discrimination still exists only it must be practiced in more subtle or marketable ways. Such an example is the current attacks on voting rights marketed as 'secure' elections.

When the government gives the Church special treatment, it often results in the Church gaining some level of supremacy or even domination over society. Why would conservative Christians favor that? It is because we religiously conservative Christians have a quite a penchant for hierarchy and authoritarianism. And so it is difficult for us to exist in an environment where equality and egalitarianism reside.

BTW, there is one more problem with the above article. What it says is that government is there only to represent some, not all, of the people. And the above article implies that government is there to represent a certain group of the haves so they can help the have-nots. And again, what is being asked for is discrimination with no evidence that the [true] grit haves would have either the resources or desire to address the problems that government is trying to address.

Yes, many government programs cannot solve our problems. But here we need to add the word alone to the end of that sentence. But government programs often mitigate the suffering of many people and they can do more when  they are joined by those in the private sector. But currently, there doesn't seem to be enough interest in the private sector to help solve those problems, many of which have been either created or greatly added to by some elites from the private sector.

Comments Which Conservatives Block From Their Blogs For January 20, 2021

 Jan 18

To Pat Buchanan and his article that attempts to criticize the House’s 2nd impeachment of Donald Trump. This appeared in the Imaginative Conservative blog.

Buchanan gives a tribal response to the reimpeachment of Donald Trump. And because it is tribal, it is also  authoritarian. And because it is authoritarian, it will employ aspects of all-or-nothing thinking like employing a black-white worldview and selective focus.

The issue revolves around whether Donald Trump incited insurrection. And in denying that he did, Buchanan did not report on everything Trump and his co-speakers said. Buchanan did not mention the claim that has been rejected by all of the courts, even those presided over by Trump appointed judges, that the election was stolen. and that people needed to 'take America back." And Buchanan not did report how Trump told the audience how to do what he wanted them to do, they had to show strength, not weakness. And we don't hear Trump contradicting Rudy Giuliani who said that there must be trial by combat or Mo Brooks who told the audience to kick butt. Nor does Buchanan remind us what Trump said to the Proud Boys during his last debate that they were to 'Stand back and stand by.'

Now ties are being found between the Trump campaign the the event that led to the invasion of the Capitol. Those ties are being discovered by the AP as it matches names on permits with those being paid by Trump's 2020 campaign (see https://apnews.com/article/election-2020-donald-trump-capitol-siege-campaigns-elections-d14c78d53b3a212658223252fec87e99 ). And none of that includes Trump's initial reaction to the invasion of the Senate.

And neither does Buchanan mention that the reason for the "hatred" of Trump starts, if that is to be believed, swith Trump's action to incite insurrection. In fact, there were sufficient grounds to remove Trump because of the charges in the first impeachment but the Republican held Senate restricted evidence and witnesses from being considered by the Senate.

Buchanan's article is not written to engage with the evidence, it is written to keep the sheep  in line. His inadequate evidence makes impotent the logic Buchanan attempts to employ when defending Trump

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Jan 19

To John Horvat and his article that seeks to redefine religion from having freedom of choice to that of having control over one’s passions. This appeared in the Imaginative Conservative blog.

The above article doesn't recognize the contradiction of Ryszard Legutko's statements on freedom. On the one hand, freedom that recognizes our right to do what we want but is limited by the harm that we do to others is accused of only promoting self-interest. In addition that freedom is said to promote doing 'whatever, whenever. and wherever.'

Likewise, the other definition of freedom is not freedom because it does not deal with the liberty to choose. Rather, latter definition of freedom is defined by the ability to escape the consequences of wrong choices.  Of course the defense for that definition is that true freedom is the ability to control the passions. But what about following the passions is wrong? Isn't part of what is wrong about following the passions is when following them leads to hurting others? If so, isn't that part of the first definition of following freedom? And if so, then don't these two definitions have something in common?

Religiously speaking, there is a point to defining freedom in terms of having the ability to control one's passions. But we can be so vigilant in controlling the passions that we come to believe that some legitimate natural passions are evil.

At the same time, not all who live in a society where we have the freedom of religion agree on which passions should be and how they are to be controlled. Thus, if the above article could lead to the threatening of our freedom of religion since a given religion would be given a place of supremacy over other religions in determining which passions should be controlled.

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

Dec 13

To John Horvat and his article that reviews a publication by The Atlantic that tells us how to avoid a another civil war. In his article, Horvat uses what was published in the Atlantic as seemingly a picture of the left. And that picture paints the left as having nothing new to say and having no contribution to make regarding the divisions in our nation. This appeared in the Imaginative Conservative blog.

Unfortunately, article that portray opposing groups as monoliths where one side is represented has being all evil or having nothing to offer appeals to the simple minded. It appeals to the passive authoritarians. And that is how active authoritarians like it whether the authoritarians are on the left, are liberals, or on the right. Simple black-white thinking where the only one side has everything teach and the world consists of us vs them is part and parcel of authoritarianism whether it is capitalist authoritarianism or socialist authoritarianism.

For heaven forbid that people look at the different capitalist and socialist ideologies and regimes in terms of shades of gray. Heaven forbid that capitalists and socialists have things to teach each other. For if that was case, then people would have to think for themselves when listening to or reading others. That is why if one can paint the other group as all wrong or evil, the audience does not have think for themselves, they just have to take the speaker's or writer's word for it.

And thus we have the above criticism of The Atlantic's publication on how to avoid a Civil War. From the perspective of what was written in the Atlantic, all of those on the left are portrayed as monoliths. And that saves the speaker or writer a lot of work and plays to the sentiments of those who just want to feel.

We should note that The Atlantic and the left is not the only side that has mentioned the possibility of a  new civil war. Conservative Robert Jeffers, one of Trump's staunchest defenders and spiritual advisors, has warned the nation of a 'civil war-like fracture' should Trump be removed from office. There the division that would make up that fracture is based on religion instead of economic class or race. Would Horvat belittle the division by religion as he does the divisions that occur by economic class or race?

And while Horvat makes light of drawing attention to those divisions, we should note that The Constitution was written in response to the economic class struggle that existed during that time in the midst of a recession. And the Civil War was fought, in part, over the issue of race-based slavery that resurrected itself into becoming Jim Crow.

We should also note that for the past several decades wealth and income disparity has grown between the economic classes and the races and that as that wealth disparity continues to grow, America is becoming oligarchy (see https://www.bbc.com/news/blogs-echochambers-27074746  ). But even before the 21st century, American labor history is replete with violent oppression orchestrated by many, not all, wealthy business owners.

So with today's news and our history, how is it that Marx's observations can no contribution to today's issues?

We should note one other fact. As Horvat complained about the Marxist notion of the 'progress of history,' it was Martin Luther King Jr. who referred to the progress of history as a way of offering hope to both those  Blacks who had been oppressed by American white supremacy and those who lived in poverty. And it was Martin Luther King Jr. proposed that we create a hybrid between what is best in capitalism and what is best in communism. For he noted that each side had something to contribute but was also deficient in its perspective.

And talking about the failures of the left, we should note that many of those failures were the result of Western, especially American, interventions that replaced disobedient democracies with brutal dictatorships that racked up quite impressive statistics in terms of murder and oppression. And even in the US, much of our nation has been built either on stealing land from America's indigenous peoples and by enslaving those who were kidnapped and stolen from another continent. That adds to the list brutal oppression seen in our interventions.

The problem with recognizing the good and bad in each side is that it puts the audience to work. It requires those in the audience to think for themselves on an issue-by-issue basis to see how each side can contribute resolving our problems. And that is why authoritarians paint each side as being either good or evil but not both. Because once the good and evil labels are adhesively applied to each side, active authoritarians have much less work to do in convincing their audiences to agree with and follow them.
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Dec 14

To R. Scott Clark and his blogpost that quotes part of another article that corrects a false claims of the number of women who died from undergoing an illegal abortion in 1972. This appeared in Heidelblog.

Quoted source:  https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2019/12/13/biggest-pinocchios/

The above statistic about the number of deaths from illegal abortions doesn't paint the whole picture about the abortion issue. For example, in 1972, it was estimated that approximately 130,000 women sought an illegal abortion (see  https://www.jstor.org/stable/2133995?seq=5#metadata_info_tab_contents  ). Before 1972, the number of women seeking illegal abortions was higher. In 1955 it was estimated that the number of illegal abortions ranged between 200,000 and 1.2 million (see https://www.jstor.org/stable/2133995?seq=5#metadata_info_tab_contents ). What saved many women who underwent illegal abortions was hospital care afterwards. And what should also be included are the horrifying tools and methods used in the performance of illegal abortions back then.

So though the cited CDC statistic is correct and corrects the use of an incorrect statistic, it doesn't tell the whole story. And if we pro-lifers are to maintain any credibility and show the appropriate care and respect for women who wrestle with the abortion issue, then we must present as much of the whole picture as we can.

While one can safely say that only 39 people died from abortions in 1972, tens of thousands of women risked death by undergoing an illegal abortion in 1972. And far more did that prior to 1972. Those stats, as much as the stats cited from the CDC in the article above, must be included when correcting false claims about abortion.

Comments Which Conservatives Block From Their Blogs For January 29, 2019

Jan 26

To R. Scott Clark and his 2nd blogpost that criticized Gillette’s commercial on what it means for men to be the best they can be. This appeared in the Heidelblog.

There are many good things that Clark said in the article above that describe how men should be. They are taken both from Jesus's examples and from Paul's teaching. Except for exclusive Psalter singing to remind each other of God's redemption, such singing is important. We should note that OT contained only a shadow of what was to occur in the NT and thus to restrict singing about God's redemption to the Psalters only can become counterproductive and comes from legalism.

But the problem with this article is found in the over-generalizations about  unbelievers. One of those over-generalizations claimed:

The pagans construe everything in terms of power politics, domination, and control. Christians do not look at other human beings as opportunities to exercise power.

First, what information did Clark use to come to this conclusion. Has Clark talked to all unbelievers and read every unbeliever's political beliefs? Or did he use other research resources? Or did he use deductive reasoning to come to that conclusion?

Second, if the latter is used to support Clark's claim about unbelievers, does his claim stand the scrutiny of inductive investigation? Let's take the Gillette commercial for example. How would Clark prove that Gillette's commercial had objectified all groups involved? Did Gillette objectify every group in that commercial? Did Gillette even objectify one group in that commercial? Should we be concerned about bearing false witness here against Gillette? On the other hand, have Christians never voted for unworthy candidates in order to gain at least some control over government?

Third, if Clark's claim is true, then how is it that we could afford to let any unbelievers participate in government seeing that all unbelievers can only objectify people is in the laws they passed?

Fourth, if Clark's claim is true, how can we Christians even partially adopt any ideology that was written or contained contributions by any unbelievers? For to do so, we could only follow their example of objectifying others. For example, Marx clearly showed how Capitalism objectifies workers. So we can't accept Capitalism. But applying Clark's conclusion, we can't accept anything from Marx either without objectifying people because he is an unbeliever.

Finally, how does Clark's contrasting claims about how Christians and how pagans relate to people sound any different from the Pharisee in the parable of the two men praying? How can we honestly claim that we are sinners like unbelievers are if Clark's contrasting claims are true? In addition,  is Clark in danger of bearing false witness against any unbelievers with his claims?

Whenever we see sweeping generalizations, like the ones Clark made about unbelievers, most of our red flags should be immediately raised and fly high in the wind. For one implication of Clark's claim is that we can neither borrow ideas from nor work side by side with unbelievers in any public works lest we too become influenced by them and start to objectify others as they automatically do. This makes the Christian community insular which tells the world that we have everything to teach unbelievers but nothing to learn from them. Is that our good news? Is our good news about us or Christ?

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Jan 28

To John Horvat and his blogpost that claims that a nation alone cannot save us from globalism. Rather, Horvat claims that it is a return to a former status quo where the Church was a leader in society that can save us from globalism. This appeared in the Imaginative conservative blog.

The trouble with the above article is that we are asked to restore what was working for some but was horribly broken for others. The absolutes that the Church brought didn't remedy white supremacy and Jim Crow. And if I remember correctly, the Church did little to correct labor abuses, labor unions had to do that. And yes, we had the sexual revolution. But before that was sexual repression that contributed in causing some to practice sexual abuse.

And then there was the Vietnam War. It was an immoral war just as the coups that we supported around the world both before and after the Vietnam War.

The article forgets that we had orders that benefited some groups at the expense of others. Whether one remembers the good old days sometimes depends on which group one belonged to. And the Church was not addressing those problems.

So what can save us from globalism? Here we should note that we are specifically speaking of the kind of globalism that benefit financial elites at the expense of those who are considered to be disposable. Should we return to a yesteryear that saw different groups of elites and marginalized people all under control of any church that history has taught us is vulnerable to all kinds of corruption. And perhaps one of the reasons that churches are open to corruption is because they ask their subjects to trust and obey rather than to participate in leading. Such also describes our politicians. For it seems that many of us want to vote for officials whom we can ignore until the next election.

Yes, we need a change in the morals of our nation. But changing sexual mores alone will do nothing to save us. Changing morals must revolve around recognizing that people are more important than things like profits, property rights, and gadgets--at least that was the change Martin Luther King Jr. called for. And, unfortunately, just calling for a return to former sexual morals and the leadership of the Church have never facilitated the revolution that King saw was necessary.

An Innocent Appearing Post That Point To Dreams Of Control

Conservatives, especially religiously conservative Christians, almost always find it inevitable to succumb to authoritarian personality types and authoritarianism. Other ideological sides also succumb but not as inevitably as conservatives have. And if we want to understand why our nation is so divided, we need to understand how those with authoritarian personality types promote authoritarianism.

An example can be found in John Horvat's (click here for a bio) blogpost lamentingly claiming that America no longer has a true elite class (click here for the article). But before going into Horvat's blogpost, we need to show why Conservatives have such a penchant for authority personality types and authoritarianism.

We should note that the two most important words to conservatives regarding society and culture are 'tradition' and 'control.' Tradition provides guidelines for us while control enforces those guidelines. And let's face it, some of conservative's traditional guidelines would be helpful to everyone. But the problem with Conservatives is that they look solely to the parts of the past they revere to understand today and to solve its problems. And that is at the root of Conservatism's love affair with authoritarianism.  For breaking from tradition, according to Conservatives, provides a threat to the present and future.

Now we can dig into Horvat's article for he is lamenting the fact that yesteryear's elites no longer have their place in society and society is struggling because of that.

However, Horvat's attempt to revive the social elite class from the past is is rooted in idealism, not reality. Horvat starts with how the old, true elite class was replaced with a meritocracy. That meritocracy recognizes talent rather than character and doesn't measure one's contribution to society. According to Horvat, these new elites  consolidate their wealth and recognizes fewer restraints from civic responsibilities. The emergence of today's meritocracy was significantly rooted in the protests of the 1960s. Many established practices and traditional views were challenged back then. And yet despite the search for justice back then, Horvat points out that the opposite happened.

This new set of elites is being targeted, according to Horvat, simply because they are elites. Then Horvat challenges such targeting by saying that all healthy societies have elites. In essence, Horvat complains that people should not be targeted simply because they are elites. Horvat then defines true elites of the past as those exceptional people who seek the common good and make sacrifices for the community. Horvat also mentions that true elites could include some who are rich but true elites don't have to be wealthy. True elites can have ordinary jobs because it's the quality of their work that makes them elites.

According to Horvat, the true elites from the past have suffered the same fate as the proverbial baby who is tossed out with the bathwater. That was done all for the sake of promoting egalitarianism and individualism.

But Horvat's problem here is rooted in his idealism. By declaring that the true elites from the past can be ordinary people who do ordinary jobs in an extraordinary way, he challenges the notion of the term 'elite.' For such a term carries with it the idea of being superior. So how could such ordinary people be regarded as superior to the rest?

In addition, we might ask Horvat if all egalitarianism and other challenges from the 1960s were bad. After all, the 2 main forms of egalitarianism promoted back then were race and gender based. Why should we condemn equality between the races and the sexes in society? Here we might ask, how could one, according to Horvat's notion of the true elites from the past, not include those who worked for racial equality and equality for men and women? And if those who promoted such equality could be considered significantly similar to those whom Horvat considers to be elites, then how could the notion of egalitarianism always work against the creation of people whom Horvat regards as elites?

We should also note that one of the major concerns of those protesting in the 1960s was America's participation in the Vietnam War. For those who were protesting that war, they considered the war to be immoral and thus they believed they had a just cause. Again, how does protesting against an immoral war disqualify one from Horvat's definition of true elites?

We should note the state of America when Horvat's true elites roamed free in society. That that state of America went way beyond what Horvat described as having defects. After all, this was during the height of the Jim Crow era in our nation. And if the true elites of the past existed then, why didn't they challenge Jim Crow as effectively as those who promoted egalitarianism during the 1960s?

In addition, America's labor history strongly indicates that the meritocracy that followed the upheaval of the 1960s also strongly existed during the time when we had true elites living among us. How is it that those true elites did not mount an effective campaign against the meritocracy of their own times?

Basically, Horvat wants a return of the good old days. Back then, the Church had a greater influence on society than it does today. But again, where was the Church when Jim Crow loomed large and the meritocracy of those times thrived? Where was much of the Church when our nation was waging an immoral war in Vietnam?

Back then, people recognized the authority of the true elites who lived among them. And this shows how Horvat's conservatism advances authoritarianism. For rather than wanting today's people to decide for themselves what is right and wrong, Horvat wants them to submit to the guidance of his his true elites from the past. But for all of the positive qualities that Horvat saw in them, those true elites did little to undo the social injustices of their time.

It's not that Horvat has no legitimate complaints about today's world and those who are considered to be the elites of our time. Our society is in a downward spiral because of its propensity for self-indulgences. But another contributing factor to society's downward spiral is found in the efforts of society's many diverse ideologically based groups to attempt to seek control over society. And this includes many who hold to conservative ideology. For many from those ideological groups cannot see their way to sharing power with each other. Rather, they believe that, for society's good, they need to conquer all other groups and control society. And here we might ask if that was as true with Horvat's true elites from the past as it is with the today's meritocracy of which he complains.

Comments Which Conservatives Block From Their Blogs For April 4, 2018

March 29

To R. Scott Clark and his blogpost that relates Marxism with today’s Opioid crisis. What is focused on is Clark’s analysis of Marx and Marxism. this appeared in Heidelblog

The characterization of Marxism, which is the collective thoughts of Marx and his followers, is overly simplistic in Clark's article. For while we could accuse Marx of pursuing a failed eschatology, the same is not true for all of his followers. In fact, Marx's failure is simply a response to many of his correct observations about the de facto Capitalism of his day. His observations about Capitalism were factually based. And even though we have a different form of Capitalism today as what existed during Marx's time, many of his observations still ring true for us. In particular, that, generally speaking, workers are counted as disposable objects of profit in the Capitalist system. And this view of workers is described in another way by Martin Luther King Jr. (see   http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article2564.htm ):

 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.

Clark's  reaction to Marx and Marxism has the same fault as Marx's reaction to Capitalism, both throw the baby out with the bathwater. Unfortunate for Clark's views, people follow Marx to various degrees and thus offer partial solutions to the current problems we face. In addition, if Clark believes that neither Marx nor any other non-capitalist have anything to offer that could improve today's Capitalism, then he has implied that today's capitalism has provided a relative utopia and thus Clark would  exhibit some of the same faults that others who promote utopias exhibit.

Though I am not going to comment on everything Clark wrote here, I will say that if he really remembered Marx well, he would realize that what Lenin instituted in the Soviet Union was not Marxism, it was bourgeoisie dictatorship. Says who? Says Lenin's contemporary and fellow socialist, Rosa Luxemburg (see  https://www.marxists.org/archive/luxemburg/1918/russian-revolution/ch08.htm  ):

The basic error of the Lenin-Trotsky theory is that they too, just like Kautsky, oppose dictatorship to democracy. “Dictatorship or democracy” is the way the question is put by Bolsheviks and Kautsky alike. The latter naturally decides in favor of “democracy,” that is, of bourgeois democracy, precisely because he opposes it to the alternative of the socialist revolution. Lenin and Trotsky, on the other hand, decide in favor of dictatorship in contradistinction to democracy, and thereby, in favor of the dictatorship of a handful of persons, that is, in favor of dictatorship on the bourgeois model. They are two opposite poles, both alike being far removed from a genuine socialist policy...

“We have never been idol-worshippers of formal democracy.” All that that really means is: We have always distinguished the social kernel from the political form of bourgeois democracy; we have always revealed the hard kernel of social inequality and lack of freedom hidden under the sweet shell of formal equality and freedom – not in order to reject the latter but to spur the working class into not being satisfied with the shell, but rather, by conquering political power, to create a socialist democracy to replace bourgeois democracy – not to eliminate democracy altogether.

But socialist democracy is not something which begins only in the promised land after the foundations of socialist economy are created; it does not come as some sort of Christmas present for the worthy people who, in the interim, have loyally supported a handful of socialist dictators. Socialist democracy begins simultaneously with the beginnings of the destruction of class rule and of the construction of socialism. It begins at the very moment of the seizure of power by the socialist party. It is the same thing as the dictatorship of the proletariat.

Yes, dictatorship! But this dictatorship consists in the manner of applying democracy, not in its elimination, but in energetic, resolute attacks upon the well-entrenched rights and economic relationships of bourgeois society, without which a socialist transformation cannot be accomplished.

One should read Marx's On The Jewish Question to see whether it is Luxemburg or Lenin, who actually belonged to a bourgeoisie class, who best represents Marx:

Is not private property abolished in idea if the non-property owner has become the legislator for the property owner? The property qualification for the suffrage is the last political form of giving recognition to private property.

Nevertheless, the political annulment of private property not only fails to abolish private property but even presupposes it. The state abolishes, in its own way, distinctions of birth, social rank, education, occupation, when it declares that birth, social rank, education, occupation, are non-political distinctions, when it proclaims, without regard to these distinction, that every member of the nation is an equal participant in national sovereignty, when it treats all elements of the real life of the nation from the standpoint of the state. Nevertheless, the state allows private property, education, occupation, to act in their way – i.e., as private property, as education, as occupation, and to exert the influence of their special nature. Far from abolishing these real distinctions, the state only exists on the presupposition of their existence; it feels itself to be a political state and asserts its universality only in opposition to these elements of its being.

Certainly, there are basic teachings of Marx that must be rejected by all Christians: his belief in a utopia on earth, his materialism, and his reliance on class dictatorship--the proletariat dictatorship. And yet, if one takes his abolition of religion and property to mean that there is no privileged group based on religion and economic class in society, then Marx has much more to contribute to our political and economic approaches than what any religiously conservative Christian I know of has. Perhaps the best, though not without error, criticisms of Marx come from Martin Luther King Jr (see  pg 92ff from  http://nationalhumanitiescenter.org/ows/seminars/aahistory/Pilgrimage.pdf  ). But in his criticism of Marx, King levels an equal salvo at Capitalism as he did against Marxism because of its reliance on materialism.

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April 2,

To Joe Carter and his blogpost citing the work of law professor Ozan Varol Varol claims that democracy can be undone by allowing government to regulate the media while neglecting to note how democracy can be undone by having fewer companies own media outlets. This appeared in the Acton blog.

Carter and Varol make the typical conservative error in examining the relationship between power and the public sector. He assumes that power can only be consolidated in the public sector.. And the evidence they are citing contradicts that assumption. For they say, without showing an ounce of concern, that 90% of the media is controlled by 6 companies.

Don't Carter and Varol know the distinction between power and governmental authority. Not all who have governmental authority have power. And the converse is just as true. Just think how much power those 6 companies have because of their control over most of the media. And the effects of corporate power on control of the media was well examined by Chomsky and Herman in their book Manufacturing Consent. For in that study, Chomsky and Herman documented how our news is often filtered according to the business interests of the corporate owners. And those interests revolve around making advertising dollars more effective and efficient as well as what stories best serve the interests of the corporate owners. Chomsky has multiple times commented on how the self-censorship of media outlets done to serve the interests of the media's corporate owners can rival the government censorship practiced in authoritarian states. And there are fewer corporate owners of media now than when they published their study.

It's not that Carter and Varol don't have a point, they do especially with our current President. It is that they are blind to the consolidation of power in the private sector that can come from having media being dominated by so few companies. And when government is a working democracy, then it well represents its people to competing foreign and domestic interests. And what Carter Varol have failed to see is that corporations can wield much power and work against the best interests of the people in its pursuit of ever increasing profits for themselves..

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April 3

To John Horvat and his blogpost that blames our federal debt on the state being too involved by providing social safety net programs for those in need. Here he states that such programs are a result of the state interfering with other institutions, such as the family and Church, that were to guide people and provide assistance and guidance for them. This appeared in the Imaginative Conservative blog.

Horvat's view of the problem of national debt is flawed. For he doesn't first examine federal spending and, especially, who is benefiting the most from federal spending. Rather, he blames federal debt on its social safety net spending without, again, examining who is benefiting the most from federal spending.

Thus, Horvat doesn't look at military aid given to other nations. For if he had, he would realize that those in the military industrial complex benefit the most from such aid. For our military aid to other nations does not come in the form of a check, but in hardware produced by businesses in the military industrial complex. Nor does he look at America's military budget and see how much that might contribute to the debt. If he had, he would realize that those in the military industrial complex benefit the most from defense budgets. Nor does he consider how laws preventing Medicare from negotiating prices of pharmaceuticals or that Obamacare first benefited the Health Insurance and Health Care industries. because of how the Affordable Care Act was written.
Instead, while blaming social safety nets, he includes Social Security which is not only self-supported and thus does not add to the National Debt, but has lent more to finance that debt than any other source including China. Similarly, part of Medicare is also self supportive and thus does not to the federal government's debt.

In short, America's corporations are the prime beneficiaries of our National Debt and Horvat, instead their role in increasing the National Debt, reduces all blame for that debt on social safety net programs and on those who rely them. Why? Because such programs causes people to rely more on the government than Horvat thinks is good. It also because as people rely more on the government, they rely less on the Church. And the part of his blaming social safety net programs only is due to a turf battle between his beliefs about how much the state should be involved in people's lives vs the Church.

In the meantime, his subsidiary philosophy is not  being usurped by government assistance programs. Instead, our maximize profits economic system has made families more dependent on the government for survival. That system makes workers into disposable objects of prophet as, for many them, their jobs are taken away by either foreign workers or machines.

By only blaming the state's social safety net programs and those who rely on them for the federal debt problem, Horvat has distracted our attention from the real beneficiaries of federal debt and has, instead, scapegoated government assistance programs as well as their beneficiaries in order to promote his subsidiary ideology.

Comments Which Conservatives Block From Their Blogs For March 28, 2018

March 23

To John Horvat and his blogpost on a Christian approach to the tariff issue. In his article, Horvat sees the tariff issue as being argued over by two groups: those who promote free trade with the fewest possible restraints vs those who want to control trade according to how it impacts culture. This appeared in the Imaginative Conservative blog.

Though Horvat makes a useful distinction between the economics of those who favor as much free trade as possible vs those who want to check economics at the door of culture, he misses a basic point about economics. That being that those who favor more and more unrestricted free trade are not approaching the subject as economists; instead, their only interest here is in commerce. For commerce is defined as (see  http://www.businessdictionary.com/definition/commerce.html  ):

Exchange of goods or services for money or in kind, usually on a scale large enough to require transportation from place to place or across city, state, or national boundaries.

On the other hand, economics is defined as (see  https://www.britannica.com/topic/economics   ):

[the] social science that seeks to analyze and describe the production, distribution, and consumption of wealth.

What is missing from the free trade perspective is the paying of attention to production. For production involves workers and then the society and the culture that depends on those workers. Production also involves the environmental impact of production as well. What the advocates of free trade focus on are the immediate returns from the exchange of goods. This feeds the embracing of the ethic that calls for maximizing profits. And the maximizing profits ethic focuses first on the welfare of the owners. A secondary focus is paid to the consumers but only to the extent that it serves the owners. For the maximizing profits ethic is a cannibalizing ethic that devours all other ethical standards and values. For all other standards and values must be sacrificed when one makes one's goal the creation of as much profit as possible.

The emphasis on maximizing profits makes Horvat's suggestion of Natural Protectionism DOA. For Natural Protectionism is nothing more than Adam Smith's teaching on the Invisible Hand, if memory serves. So once owners, and then consumers after them, embrace the maximizing profits ethics, concern for local preferences is easily sacrificed just as all other standards and values are to serve the maximizing of profits.

Aside from  what has just been noted above, Horvat's description of those who want to at least somewhat control economics because of its impact on culture is a portrayal of those who want democracy to control economics, which includes commerce.

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To Dan Hugger and his blogpost on self-deceit, utopian ideologies, and Communism. This appeared in the Acton blog.

Not knowing how the the term Communism is being used above, I will offer the following points.

First, Communism/Socialism is not a monolith. And note that not all Socialists have utopian expectations. How can that be? It is possible because not all who follow Marx fully agree with him or interpret him the same way.

Second, those who claim that their pet political-economic system is the best of all time and cannot improved on or be beat by another system have already implied that they hold to a utopia of their own. Unlike Marx's utopia, their utopia is a relative one as its results are compared with the results of other systems. Thus, those who believe that free markets are the all time best way of doing commerce, note I wrote 'commerce,' not 'economics,' and that they cannot be improved on have already implied that we have entered a utopia of sorts. And then what was said above about utopian ideologies applies to systems that are promoted as producing relative utopias.

Third, conservatives who portray the Communism/Socialism practiced in the Soviet Union, Red China, Cuba, etc. as the only form of Communism/Socialism that exists are either being disingenuous or have deliberately limited their reading about Communism/Socialism to sources that are wholly antagonistic to Marx and Marxism. That means that they are being either deliberately deceitful or they are speaking out of ignorance. Those who have never read Marx and the writings of his various followers are free to say what they want to about Marxism, they are just unqualified to do so.

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March 24

To Joe Carter with his blogpost that cites Samuel Gregg’s attempt to make a patriotic case for free trade. This appeared in the Acton blog.

Whether a patriotic case can be made for free trade depends on what we identify as being American and thus what we call patriotic. According to the cited article by Samuel Gregg (see http://www.thepublicdiscourse.com/2018/03/21211/  ), embracing free trade is good for commerce, allows America to be more innovating, and forces America to be more flexible and adaptable. All of that goes into what Gregg, and Carter, think of as making America great and it is that search for America's greatness that Gregg calls patriotic.

But there are problems with what free trade apologists advocate. For one thing, and Gregg's article provides an example for this,  free trade apologists fail to give America's past protectionist policies their due. Yes, there were trade-offs with those policies, but those policies allowed America to develop its own industries survive foreign competition. For free trade allows foreign nations with more developed industries to compete in a developing nation with domestic industries and those domestic industries often have less chance to survive (see  https://www.independent.co.uk/news/business/comment/ha-joon-chang-protectionism-the-truth-is-on-a-10-bill-5334137.html  ), Thus free trade can partially enforce an economic caste system as more developed nations are found 'kicking away the ladder' of protectionism from developing nations (see  http://www.paecon.net/PAEtexts/Chang1.htm ).

In addition, as Gregg sees free trade calling on workers to be more 'adaptable and plan for the future more carefully, workers are more likely to see the work place as being more volatile as the continual switching from job to job becomes the norm. This puts many American workers in a bind for not only must they make enough to pay for immediate expenses, they are also expected to prepare for sizable fuure expenses such as college education for their children and their own retirement. In the meantime, those who benefit most from the free trade that is meant to provide lower costs for the consumer are benefiting the most from the deal. This might serve as a partial explanation for why America has seen a steady increase in wealth disparity over the past few decades. All of that shows that free trade apologists are more concerned with a tunnel view of commerce as opposed to the wide-angle picture that is provided by the discipline of economics. For economics is not only concerned with  commerce, but it is concerned with production as well.

Also, those who define America by its performance in commerce might have grounds for wrapping the flag around free trade. But those who place a high value on democracy cannot. For free trade continually severs business's  accountability to the government. And when that government is a working democracy, then we find that free trade makes businesses less responsive to democracy.

Finally, those who condemn "Communism" for the unintended consequences of its quest for utopia while promoting free trade for all nations in all circumstances are themselves promoting their own utopia. In reality, both free trade and protectionism are human models of thought with neither one being neither a monolith nor perfect. Free trade and protectionism stand on opposing poles on the same continuum. And varying degrees of each one works at different times for different nations. Those who believe otherwise are the ones who show themselves to be least flexible and adaptable.

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March 27

To R. Scott Clark and his blogpost that uses the myth of a frog that refuses to leave a pot of slowly boiling water with the scientific consensus on climate change. This appeared in the Heidelblog.

What I learned from this article is that frogs who reside in slowly boiling water can still demonstrate more intelligence than some humans. I also learned that theologians struggle with logic. Take the comparison of the past accepted truth that earth was the center of the universe and that science is settled on climate change used in order to give an example of how a once accepted truth was exposed as being false. Besides the fact that the latter is stated too ambiguously to make a legitimate comparison, the data on which each accepted truth is based is significantly different in terms of sources and amount of data. Such differences makes the comparison invalid for the point being made.

However, the association of religiously conservative Christianity with a rejection of the warnings about climate change does harm the reputation of the Gospel to both political non-conservatives and even some political conservatives. And considering that businesses stand to lose profits when acting on the available scientific consensus on climate change, we should remember the times in Church history when the dominant branch of the Church sided with wealth and power during pre-revolutionary times of nations like France, Russia, and Spain. That is because when their respective revolutions came, not only was the reputation of the Gospel harmed, Christians suffered unnecessary persecution for the alliance.

Comments Which Conservatives Block From Their Blogs For March 7, 2018

March 5

To John Horvat and his blogpost that blames liberalism for all of our nation’s problems. This appeared in the Imaginative Conservative blog.

I can only speak to the above review and not the book, but it seems the diagnosis of liberalism is another call to some form of authoritarianism. In particular, it is a call Christendom.

The problem is that we never had Christendom here in America. We have had varying levels of Christian paternalism, but not Christendom. So one has to ask if the above analysis of liberalism applies to the US or to the West. Here we should note that, unlike how the book is portrayed as describing it, there are several differing forms of liberalism. From what was written in the review, the liberalism referred to seems to a combination of Cultural Liberalism, which frees people from cultural norms, and a Social Liberalism that ties freedom with health, education, and escape from poverty. Social liberalism looks to government to take the lead in protecting people's rights to health, education, and an adequate income. Here we should note that Social liberalism stands in stark contrast with Classical liberalism regarding the role of the state in providing that protection (see https://www.philosophybasics.com/branch_liberalism.html ). That is because that government provision relies on the state making claims on the economic freedoms of those who are more prosperous from the middle class on up. And we should note that political conservatives very much tend to support Classical Liberalism and its derivatives such as Neo-Liberalism.

The real question is this: Are our nation's conflicts and problems due to liberalism's internal contradictions or is there a civil war between liberalism and conservatism. The polarization of ideologies and political affiliations suggest the the latter though the former could play a minor or even cameo role in the conflict. However, we should consider other factors as playing a role in our nation's troubles such as corruption and bribery.

We should note that the kind of conservatism that gave way to liberalism seems to be a Paleo-Conservatism. We could then add a Fiscal Conservatism to the mix from the expressed concern with our nation's debt. We should note that the former conservatism emphasizes the tight binding of a given religious tradition with set traditions and even identity of a given nation or civilization while the latter emphasizes fiscal responsibility in government spending (see https://www.philosophybasics.com/branch_conservatism.html ).
The reason why I believe that the current societal turmoil is due more to a civil war than the internal contradictions of liberalism is found in the scapegoating of liberalism for the turmoil we see before us and for our nation's debt. In addition, a significant number of our problems are due to corruption. Regarding the civil war as a cause for turmoil, it is Paleo-Conservatives who strongly object to the current changes from the legalization of same-sex marriage to the existence of illegal, and, for a few political conservatives all, immigrants in our nation. And that resistance to immigration is high especially when the immigrants they find most offensive are not White Europeans.
Likewise, Social Liberalism is being scapegoated for our nation's debt problems despite the fact that much of that debt is due to policies favored by a combination of Neo-Conservatism, which is supported by a coalition of some political liberals and conservatives, and Classical Liberalism, which is supported by and tied to Fiscal Conservatism. We should note that the 2003 invasion of Iraq as well as the approaching 1,000 US military bases spread around the world stems significantly from Neo-Conservatism and its pre-existing tenets and have greatly contributed to our nation's debt. But Classical Liberalism and Neo-Liberalism alone, which receives its strongest support from political conservatives, along with a corporate welfare system, which, again, receives its strongest support from political conservatives, has also added significantly to our nation's debt.
 
We should note here that when business is the primary beneficiary of policies, then the culprit is neither liberalism nor conservatism. It is corruption. And that corruption has a bipartisan participation.
And yet, there is still another reason why I believe that nation's current turmoil is due more to a civil war than an implosion of Liberalism has to do with how our successes  are solely attributed to Christendom. Here we should note that all of liberalism's early success was attributed to Christendom. And yet, there is no mention of the problems that came with Christendom's era with its emphasis on faith and family. Those problems included religious wars, colonialism, anti-Semitism, ethnic cleansing, slavery, persecution of scientists, and segregation. See, Christendom was about more than just faith and family; it was about the Church having more control over the people than the government And we should note that, all too often, those who ascribed to a different faith met persecution and even death from leaders in the dominant religion. But I guess we should be consoled by the fact that, during those times, society was more homogeneous.

The above does not provide a nuanced criticism of liberalism, something that is needed. That is indicated by how liberalism is regarded as a monolith that has does not have differing groups. Rather, liberalism's weakness is described in the absolute freedom it gives to people even though it is some forms of Anarchism, not liberalism, that tries to deliver such absolute freedom. And thus there exists yet another reason why our turmoil should be attributed more to a civil war than liberalism's implosion; liberalism is not accurately defined. And instead of providing such a criticism of liberalism, by demonizing liberalism and calling, by implication, people back to Christendom, what is advocated by the above article is what is really tearing our nation apart.
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To Joe Carter and his blogpost hat poses a mock debate between Donald Trump and Milton Friedman over Trump’s protectionism vs Freidman’s Free Trade. This appeared in the Acton Blog.
One problem with the whole protectionism vs free trade debate is that at least one option is presented as the tower of babel was: A way of reaching heaven and making a name for oneself.  Free Trade is presented as providing a relative utopia. However, history has produced many positive results for protectionism. After all, our nation used protectionism to build many of its industries from our nation's beginning to FDR's Presidency. And while what is called 'Free Trade' (a.k.a., 'neoliberalism') has supposedly reduced the number of people living in abject poverty around the world, it has also increased wealth disparity both within nations and between them. And it wasn't until recently that the IMF discovered that wealth disparity hurts economic development.

We should note that  Free Trade does not exist as a discrete point on a line, it exists as a continuum on a couple of lines. Yes, there is a continuum that accommodates both protectionism and Free Trade. But there is another line where Free Trade is at one end and government control of the economy is at the other. We should note that not all government control has to do with protectionism. Government control can have to do with taxes and protective regulations. And when government control is exercised by a working democracy, then what we have is a contest between today's Free Trade or neoliberalism and Democracy. Here we should note that one of the first nations to employ neoliberalism was Chilé. And in order to install neoliberalism there, the US helped first to destabilize the nation and then support a coup where the democratically elected leader of the nation was overthrown by a military dictator in 1973. Neoliberalism was introduced to Chilé during the next decade and eventually Pinochet was democratically removed from office. However, Chilé has been operating under the same constitution was passed during Pinochet's reign and Chilé suffers from a growing wealth disparity.

What seems to be consistent with many of the defenses given for Free Trade is that they revolve around the short-term returns enjoyed by a limited number of stakeholders. For examples, when it is said that Free Trade decreases consumer prices, it is true that that occurred in Great Britain during Mercantilism. But today's Free Trade has resulted in the offshoring of jobs. A significant number of those jobs that were offshored resulted in sweatshop labor conditions for many people in other countries. Meanwhile, the offshoring of jobs has reduced the consumer power of many of the victims of offshoring. Or when Freidman states that when those from other nations who have become enriched by Free Trade buy properties and other assets here, there is no discussion about the ramifications of those purchases. But those foreign investors who are able to grab a larger financial piece of the pie here, also have the opportunity to buy political influence in our government. Why? Because in Capitalism, power follows wealth.

It's not that all forms of Free Trade have come in the form of neoliberalism. Nor is it the case that either Protectionism or Free Trade have spotless records. It is the case that today's version of Free Trade or neoliberalism has weakened democracies, especially in the US, and has not only increased wealth disparity, as already noted, it has transferred political power of many given participant nations to wealthy foreign investors. Thus neoliberalism shifts political power from the hands a given nation's people to the hands of wealthy foreign investors.

Will Trump's version of protectionism work? Who knows? But what we do know are the current trends of neoliberalism some of which have been listed in this comment.

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March 6

To Shannon Holzer and his blogpost about how liberals abuse languages especially when talking about rights. This appeared in the Imaginative Conservative website.

If definitions mean anything, then Holtzer should know that he should not describe liberals as belonging to the Left. There is a pretty clear demarcation between liberals and the Left. While the former believes in Capitalism, the latter does not. That doesn't mean that the two groups do not agree on some issues. It is that the liberal elites do not represent the Left.

Now let's take a look at rights. What is a right? A right describes what a person ought to have. And the Declaration Of Independence declares that all men have the inalienable right of life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. Now note that the Declaration states that only men have these rights, and here we are sticking to the essence of what it means to be a man. The problem becomes about the rights of women and children. Do men have rights that women and children do not have? Or, do only men have natural rights while women and children do not? According to Jefferson and his colleagues, such was the case. So if Holtzer is going to fault nonconservatives with not recognizing what are natural rights, will he do the same with Jefferson et. al.? Or are we going to attribute Jefferson's shortsightedness to then cultural values? And we might ask Holtzer if Jefferson implied that only white men deserved the natural rights he specified since, though not mentioned in the Declaration Of Independence, only white men were the de facto recipients of the rights Jefferson listed. Again, are nonconservatives the only ones who struggle with recognizing the natural rights of people?

We could talk about another important definition. That is the logical definition of the word 'imply.' The logical definitions says that one statement implies another if the second statement must be true when the first statement is true. So when nonconservatives talk about the right to a job or a living wage, is that implied by the right to life spelled out by Jefferson? For if a sufficient wage is necessary to live and we get wages from working, how is it that living wages or gov't assistance programs are not implied by the right to life? If adequate healthcare is necessary for life, how is it that affordable access to healthcare are not implied by the right to life?

And why do women chant, 'my body, my choice'? Doesn't the right to liberty imply that they have a right to control what happens with their bodies? Please note that I object to the right to an elective abortion. But challenging a women's right to control what happens with her body because it isn't a natural right ignores what is implied by the right to liberty.

And as for the right of same-sex couples to marry, before using to using natural law to argue against it, we should note that animals from around 1,500 species engage in homosexual actions with beneficiary effects to the species. Who is to say that natural law should be determined solely by a view of design that revolves around reproduction? Christians and people from certain other faiths do. But the Bill of Rights says we have the freedom of religion. So how is it that the people from one set of faiths can deny marriage to same-sex couples because of how the religious people understand natural law? And who says that sex organs are designed for one purpose only? And if marriage is common practice in the pursuit of happiness, how is it that same-sex marriage is not implied by that right?

Though the Declaration of Independence is not a legally binding document, it does describe the rights, natural rights according to Holtzer, that belong to people. And we've already noted with Jefferson how some natural rights might not be easily perceived.

What Holtzer is at least suggesting with tying rights to God is that only those who truly understand what God says can accurately identify the rights we have. But such an approach contradicts the freedom of religion in the 1st Amendment. And noting the definition of the word 'imply' and how that helps us read our founding documents and noting that what is a natural right  is not always recognized even by those who were our nation's founders, it seems that Holtzer is too eager to spell out for all others what our rights are and are not let alone to use his discussion on rights as an opportunity to demonize nonconservatives.