OK - Never Trump, Never say Never

Not so long ago I indicated I was a "never-Trumper".   I thought then (and still think) the tactics of his campaign were unconscionable and destructive.  It went beyond political "hardball" and veered into ridicule and character assassination.   And I was not convinced his policy points, vague as they were, would be the best for the country compared to the other candidates.  I had no reason to trust that his presidency would lean conservative.

Today, I still wince at every tweet and wish he would stop the outbursts.   That does not mean I think he should be soft on those who have unfairly attacked him - only more articulate, specific and less personal. 

But when it comes right down to it, in spite of a congress stocked with Republicans who once again have betrayed their own campaign promises on immigration, tax reform and health care, Trump has quietly done a number of things that any conservative should be cheering.

President Trump

I have to admit I am a bit shocked.

As one who would have wished for someone other than Trump to oppose the lawless and radical Alinskyite Hillary Clinton, I did not believe Trump had a chance.  What does it mean?

For starters it means that Hillary really was a worse candidate than Trump.   Her baldfaced lies about just about everything, her clear corruption in using the Clinton foundation as part of a massive pay-for-play scheme, her utter incompetence on foreign policy and her reckless disregard for both the law and national security with her email server fiasco clearly had an effect.

It also means that a good chunk of the American public are sick and tired of being told that only politically correct left wing ideals can qualify as "justice" or "compassion".   I have no doubt that the race baiting of the left upsets a lot more people than the charges of racism hurled at everyone to the right of Al Sharpton.

But it means as well that both parties have lost touch with a majority of Americans.  The reason Trump was the candidate was in part because significant numbers of voters on the right simply did not want another Bush, another establishment Republican or anybody at all who was part of the system.

While that can be a good thing, it can also be a dangerous one.   Fixing the corruption, cronyism, and inertia that is Washington is necessary - but no doubt some want to burn it down altogether.

We'll see what happens.   My hope is that with Republicans controlling both houses and the presidency, at least the Supreme Court will not become a tool of the left and that some of the illegal executive actions the current president has taken can be rolled back.  I hope that the guiding principles will be the restoration of the Constitution to its rightful place and not the principles of retaliation or mere populism.

I will say with Trump there is hope for that.  With Hillary I truly believe the Republic the founders had envisioned would have been lost.   For that I am grateful, if cautious.

Kingdom - Not of This World

A lot of focus is placed in progressive circles on the "here and now" implications of the "kingdom of God".  A number of themes emerge, most of which made me vaguely uneasy.

One theme seems to be positing the Kingdom of God as a counter to the "Constantinian" view of the church, in essence to say that Christians (read conservatives) shouldn't be on a quest for political power.  (This misses the point of conservatism altogether which is largely a quest for the limitation of power.)

Another theme suggests that the Kingdom of God means the church is its own political force in exemplifying a nonviolent society committed to social justice and radical equality.

But what exactly is the Kingdom?   (More)

Ben Shapiro on Bullies

Not sure I relish all of Ben's recommendations or the notion we have to embrace tactics that lean toward "incivility", but there comes a point where self-defense requires a bit of force. Long video, but worth watching. Bright mind, brave soul.

Guns 3 - The Good, The Bad and the Progressives

Jim Wallis presented the progressive view of the NRA's Dangerous Theology over at "God's Politics".  He tries to respond to Wayne LaPierre's cute little formula "“the only thing that stops a bad guy with a gun is a good guy with a gun.” by suggesting LaPierre has a simplistic view of human nature where people are either good or bad.  I'm quite sure LaPierre understands that human beings are a bit more complex than white hats and black hats, but that is hardly the point.  At a given moment, if a guy who is very bad at that moment has a weapon, it is a good thing for a cop, a security guard, a soldier or a conscientious citizen to be able to stop him - if necessary with a weapon.

But the real howler of an argument Wallis proposes goes like this:

When we are good, we want to protect our children — not by having more guns than the bad people, but by making sure guns aren’t the first available thing to people when they’re being bad.

The utter absurdity of that argument is very simple.  Gun laws do not accomplish that goal.  Gun laws do not prevent mass murderers from having guns.   (More)

Guns 2

 The New York Times, hardly a right-wing handmaiden of the NRA lobby, published a surprisingly honest story on Obama's plans for gun control, plans that go "beyond mass shootings".  Ah.  So the plan is not limited to ending mass murder, but control of firearms that goes somewhere "beyond"...

Key quotes: 

"The semiautomatic rifle that Adam Lanza used to shoot 20 schoolchildren and 6 adults complied with Connecticut’s assault weapons ban, the police said, and he did not buy the gun himself." 

and "In 2011, 6,220 people were killed by handguns, and 323 by rifles"

and "Better background checks would have had little effect on several recent mass shootings"  (more)

Guns

The tragic shooting of schoolchildren in Connecticut has led to a significant call for more gun laws, including the absurd trial balloon floated by Joe Biden that president Obama can take some sort of action by Executive order.  Such a call shows contempt for the constitution these men are sworn to defend.

Once again, as has happened so often in the past, emotions are set forth as arguments while reason and principle are smothered.  (More)

Conservatism - Judeo Christian Foundations

Two key ideas are essential to the existence of a functioning democracy.  One is the notion that there is a higher law that all - from the highest office-holder to the lowest citizen - is subject to.  The other is that belief that every individual has "inalienable rights" that are "endowed by their creator” and as such are not granted by nor taken by the state.  The twin anchors of the rule of law coupled with the security of basic human dignity provide for the necessary checks on human corruption to make democracy viable.  Our US Constitution was intended to limit the powers of centralized government on one hand and to prevent the chaos of mob rule on the other. There was intended to be a balance between law and freedom.  

This is why those who wish to denigrate the “Christian” roots of our form of government not only miss the mark historically, but enable the continued erosion of Western civilization and hasten the death of Constitutional democracy.  Jefferson, Franklin and Washington need not have all been explicitly “Christian” by evangelical standards to understand that Laws that are not based on unchanging universal truths are inevitably malleable tools in the hands of tyrants, and that individual rights dependent only on the whims of those in power have no lasting relevance at all.  Without a generalized belief that there was an eternal and good Creator who stood behind the very concept of Law and in whose image individuals are made, the balance between form and freedom is impossible to articulate, much less maintain.  If foundational standards change and shift the definition of “rights” must also change.  (More)

Why I Am Conservative - Economics

I find it odd that issues surrounding macroeconomics divide Christians.  The Christian left seems primarily concerned with social justice issues and the disparity between rich and poor and the Christian "right" seems more concerned with personal responsibility and limited government.  To be clear, neither side thinks the poor should be ignored, the question is how to best manage a national and global economy - debates about helping the poor are about the balance between government program and private charity and that would require a different post.

For me, the matters related to economy and government are fairly simple.  But I need to be clear that I do not believe there is a prescribed economic system in the Bible.  The Old Testament deals with Jews under a theocracy, the New Testament deals with Jews and Christians living under Roman rule. Neither is directly parallel to being citizens of a constitutional democratic republic.  Theories about Capitalism, socialism, Marxism, had not been developed.  Neither Adam Smith nor John Maynard Keynes  nor Milton Friedman were around in the 10th century B.C.  (More)

Why I am a Conservative - The Sword

One of the key planks in conservative thought is a strong national defense.  Critics on the left, including the Christian left, often suggest the conservative position is nothing more than feeding a lucrative war machine at best and a direct contradiction of Jesus command to turn the other cheek at worst.  And typically the accusation against Christian conservatives is that they are dupes of the Republican party on this issue as well as others.

But I have to disagree.  Once again, I think the position of the Christian conservative has a matter-of-fact view of humanity as fallen and in rebellion against what is true and good, and because of the fall, because of the corruptibility of human nature, it is necessary to have both a police force at the local level and a standing army at the national level precisely because there are those whose aggression cannot be restrained by anything less.  (More)

Why I Am a Conservative - Original Intent

Since it has become fashionable for some to portray politically conservative evangelicals as either unthinking lemmings who have been duped by the Republican Party or worse power hungry theocrats bent on establishing a fundamentalist theocracy, I thought I should get back to a topic I started long ago on Why I am a Conservative.  

My only post on the topic so far dealt with the concept of limited government as it is related to the Christian concept of the fallen nature of human beings.  (I had also written on why I fear theocracy). (More)