Redistribution and Values Dilemma for Liberals

 

The question liberals must begin to face and answer is if redistribution of wealth is acceptable because of Obama’s belief that it reflects our long term values as Americans, what is the source of those values and are they constitutional as a source of values?

What secular source of values can be cited that all have agreed to in the past that see a societal responsibility exiting for supporting the poor through government? Now remember this must be traditional “American” in nature. It must be long term and agreed upon by the basic membership of the nation. Karl Marx does not qualify. Franklin Roosevelt is too recent.

The problem is no secular source has long term standing and wide acceptance as policy to occupy this position. The source is Christian values. [Of course, Islamic values are even stronger in supporting giving to the poor via the zakat, but this has neither of the factors on its side.] If one just asks the simple question “why” when quizzed about supporting the poor, the values of faith have to be involved. What else carries such a wide charge to people?

All this raises a dilemma for those supporting income redistribution as it must be clearly unconstitutional being based in religion. And, do note they would be the first to want religion separated from government and society.

Being religious and not secular, the Democratic Party is oddly putting Christian values into to play for their own purposes. These are the people least likely to support anything Christina being a part of American life. Indeed the sworn enemies of religion in its totality.

So if the Obama regime continues to make the case that view we must support this given our values, then all those values deserve support or the partial use for this action must be unconstitutional. If supporting the poor is a national value based in faith, then abortion must go, too.

Freedom of Religion, A Second Side

 

The often looked at view of Freedom of Religion deals with imposition of religion by the government and a limiting of government’s ability to impose religion.  We see this clearly in the “separation of church and state” debate and rulings.  The government cannot pick and impose.  This has massive support even among religious groups who were, of course, a part of its source.

The question to think about is whether this imposes a denial of religion and its values on government.  If denial of anything based on the faiths is a driving force and goal to the country, what else might have to be lost? 

The current focus of such can show the implications of this.  Rick Santorum is clearly the most religiously focused of the candidates.  If one listens to the left the ridicule is immense.   Check Jay Leno along.  Leno would have been fined an arrested for just the public mention of the topics of his jokes about Santorum in the 1950s.  NBC would have faced loss of licenses, stations would have dropped the show, and Leno might have been forced to leave television.   Now it is just show biz and acceptable.  For Santorum, as was true of John Kennedy, the question of the day is whether these values will be a part of his judgment and decision-making as president.  

If values of decency, self-respect, self-control, support for life, and decency are to left at the gate to the White House, what is left for one to take in?   If these values of decency and concern are to be ignored and left out of public debate—meaning that one’s beliefs have no place in public government and debate—what of the other values brought to society by religion?  If these are not proper for public debate and policy, what else remains?

1. Helping the poor is a clear message of the Christina Church.  It is also a clear sentiment of the Islamic faith given its place as one of the Five Pillars of the faith.  Islam takes it a step further by requiring it for salivation.  If religious values are to be denied, then can this remain as a public focus.  Its history and source are religion.  Under current public doctrines, it cannot be a value the government subscribes to.  It is religiously based.

2. The Bible is clear that one should not kill.  If one follows the liberal practice of taking things to the extreme, then this is a religious value that cannot be apart of public and government life and policy.  It is relious and it is just plain decency, but none of this has a part in public debate and policy.  If one looks to the current craze of The Hunger Game one can easily see that government intent on the removal of religious values could see murder as religious and, therefore, not the business of government to enforce a ban.

As the left continues its drive for a removal of religion from society and a ridicule of anything that hints of religious values, the end results must be assessed early.  Can one go back?  Can a value lost be retrieved?  Ask anyone if we can go back to the 1950s and live like the media describe people lived and the answer is a no.  No equivocation t all.  One cannot go home again.  Once lost these values are gone.   Anything considered decent and reasonable that comes from religion is subject to ridicule and attack.  We must ask the question now before the total underpinnings of society are taken from us by liberal purity.

 

America the Unhappy

 

The gang was watching Bhutan: Middle Path to Happiness the other day.  The video on PBS looked at how Bhutan has been trying to take a middle path to living in the postmodern world.    Bhutan has faced the development question and looked seriously at the damage potential of development. It has chosen a “Middle Path” encompassing the desire to develop, but not to alter tie culture and way of life. This is the Middle Path. Not the past, but not a future focused on being a different kind of place to live.

They seek a balance.   How can one work with the world’s pressure to conform and produce while maintaining the beauty of life. This is a balance they seek to maintain.  They believe the path to happiness is to maintain their lifestyle and its adjustment to the mountains, but take steps into the 21st Century only as they can be taken without damage.  Build a hydroelectric power plant, but have it underground.  It sonly outward signs are the rocky tunnerls at each end as the water enters and leaves the process.  It appears like a mountains stream.  The look to the outside is one of nature, while getting access to power.

Their King stepped down in favor of his son so that the country could engage in democracy.  While some citizens seemed ignorant of the process in the video, the impact was a life that conformed, not to the outer world’s desires, but the world they know and are content with.

The goal is to be content.  They have been so, and they will be so.

Which brings this to the gang’s issue.  While one finds various attempts at showing national happiness indicate America must be a happy place, the reality of America is that this is one massively unhappy nation [Example at New Scientist].  Argument, discord, murder, hate, and more go on without end from coast to coast.  If happiness is being content, the inner values of America hold no importance to being content.  Change and contentment are not likely bed mates.  They could be, but the chances are very poor.

The Hippies of the 1960s maybe had it right.  American society is too high speed and driven by poor human values.  People are important, not goods.  A society that is driven on growth and change cannot bring contentment except in media driven mesmerization that one is content if one is confirming to the current themes of life in society in making money and doing the “right” things.  Is that contentment if one is up to date on what the stars are doing and which politician is in trouble today?  Is a nation ahppy if the values of some are the laughing stock of others?  Is one content if one knows which people where have been killed by which lunatics?  Can contentment ever occur in a world of constant unsettling change.

The sad answer is a no.  The hippes and the Bhutanese may have it right.  Change only what is good and let the things one is content with alone.  Those concepts have no place in postmodern America.  Sad.

The Leftward Drift and Its Limits

The American media is rife with talk of the inability of the current Congress to work out compromises coupled with the dominance of ideology. The media moans that the public is dissatisfied with the Congress over this inability to compromise. In a nation where the familiar phase describing the work of Washington has been “compromise, compromise, compromise,’ since President James Madison uttered the comment [Rogers 2011], why now does the inability to compromise come with such strength and clarity?

This historic shift to ideology and away from compromise must mark a fundamental break in the American system. The public seems to expect compromise. The system has prided itself on achieving such compromise. Yet now, compromise eludes the players on all sides. This is significant, not just in failing to solve the current disastrous problems that beset America, but in the shift it marks in American political practice.

The polarization of the American people is fairly clear. For example, in voting Americans may have shifted to the more extreme positions. The CBS Evening News [2011], citing the National Journal, provided some support for this concept by noting that the number of senators identifying themselves as “moderate” has declined from 60 in 1982, to 36 in 1994, to 9 in 2002, to one in 2011. Given the centrist view of the electorate, this marks a shift toward the poles indicative of a significant alteration of the political landscape.

At the same time it is indicative of a barrier to compromise being reached. Compromise may have its limits and it is possible the line in the sand has been reached and the sides are not in positions to compromise any longer.

Further evidence for a significant change is found in the language of the times. We have both a “Culture War” and a “Class War” going on with members of both sides using the terminology of war. In the words of von Clausewitz, “War is merely the continuation of policy by other means.” But those “means” imply conditions from a vicious clash to total victory and demolition of a side by another. It is not meant to imply a condition of compromise.

This was seen at the 1992 Republican Party Convention when Patrick Buchanan said that, "There is a religious war going on in our country for the soul of America. It is a cultural war, as critical to the kind of nation we will one day be as was the Cold War itself” [Buchanan]. The notion of a great battle with significant consequences and cost is implied in statements like this.

The “Class War” rhetoric accomplishes the same. While denied by the Obama Admiration, the messages of the Administration and its supporters are decidedly one of “Class War” [Kinsley]. The Left’s support of the “Occupy Wall Street” movement involves the elements of a war. Street action and the blockade of business are war by the simple means of the Left. They are confrontational, not elements of peace.

If we look at the underlying pattern of this, we find that the nation has slowly shifted left since the 1932 election [see chart]. Decades are marked by strides forward to the left without corresponding strides right. A constantly shifting line heading left is bound to reach a point where compromise is no longer possible. That line exists and has been reached.

If you begin with the “New Deal,” take a break for World War II, you find the Warren Court decisions moving left, followed by the “Great Society” and its leftist programs. A period of adjustment is followed by the Sexual Revolution and the Abortion rulings, followed by a period of adjustment, then the Gay Rights Movement and changes followed by the socialist looking Obama Health Care Plan, clear statements of redistributionist policy goals by the Obama Administration [in spite of his denials of this, actions louder than words], and the socialist sounding “Occupy Wall Street” movement.

An example of this shift is the adjustment to gay marriage among Americans noted by the Gallup Poll [2011]. Their results show a continual slow increase in support for gay marriage among Americans. The push left is a slow pressure to accept the new directions for old values and beliefs. It forces those not shifting further away from the center. It is a continual step by step move away in the name of change.

That the media push this is illustrated by a Fargo Forum headline and story on the push to have gay marriage banned in the Minnesota state constitution [Associated Press 2011]. The sub-headline for the article proclaims “St. Cloud State study finds public’s attitude changing, but slowly.” Yet in the long column article that follows there is no mention of this being a trend at all. A poll found support for not banning gay marriage, but that change is not clearly established by the supporting article. The prominence of the headline to the non-reader/analyzer of the article is all that counts. Unless careful analyzed, the article supports the Left’s goal in the debate.

In terms of strategy suggestions, the most significant one to be made to the Right is to be incremental. The leftists have slowly moved America to the left by incrementally suggesting and implementing programs and policies when they get the chance. Senator Ted Kennedy pushed for health care reform for decades before the chance to implement them came. Take heed and push a piece at a time. The political correctness movement arose word by word and offended group by offended group. Become offended, seek its protection and find tiny cuts. A 1% cut is minimal in sound to everyone. Make them.

A problem may be that the demands of the Right are much more based in absolutes. Liberty, decency, and freedom are much more absolute in nature than paying for day care or buying prescription medicines. But many battles have been lost by allowing the slow implementation of leftist policies. The Right needs to adopt the same piecemeal approach. Rather than attack abortion, work on it in pieces. Find useless operations or outrages in spending in government programs over which opposition will be light. Close or restrict them. If the Justice Department gets national attention for waste by spending $16 per item for doughnuts, cut the budget for the Department by 1%. A news item of note coupled with a small change. If the Left cries that criminals will take over the country, let them take the heat of the mainstream press over $16 doughnuts.

A second alternative was proposed by Paul D. Weyrich to the Conservative Leadership Conference in 1999. His proposal was for the Christina Right to pull out of the Culture Wars, separate themselves by admitting defeat. I am reminded of the line Robert Graves gave Claudius in I, Claudius [1976], “Let all the poisons that lurk in the mud hatch out.” Faced with a situation in which nothing can be done to solve, just let things go and the enemy forces will punish and destroy themselves.

On the other hand, the Left might recognize their role in reaching the line in the sand and pull back from their socialist agenda. They need to pull back to a position from which compromise is possible. Their endless demands need to be abandoned as unattainable without ripping apart the society in which they intend them to prosper. A society that makes all equal in their degradation and uselessness is no victory. If the talented are diminished by what sense does one expect the average person to make up the loss of those people’s ingenuity. If those average people were capable of producing the postmodern society’s wealth, required by Marx to stage the socialist move in the first place, then why do they need government help to survive the simplest demands of life?

As we evaluate the problem we face we find a traditional process of American government has changed. In the quest to answer why, the possibility that a barrier or line in the sand has been reached beyond which compromise is no longer possible. Given the growth in the importance of ideology and the use of “war” oriented terminology, a crisis is clearly marked as significance. Given the one sided march of the country, it behooves that group, the Left, to decide if ruin is worth their fight and goals. They might take a lesson from their fellow Communist Chinese. They found that socialist farming would mean ruin and began a massive capitalist program to change that situation. We now face such ruin. They turned to individualism based on the family to save them. They turned to capitalism to save them. There is a line in the sand.

Associated Press. 2011. Poll: More against ban on gay marriage. Fargo Forum (November 12): A6.

Buchanan, Patrick J. 1992. “1992 Republican National Convention Speech in Houston, Texas”, http://www.buchanan.org/pa-92-0817-rnc.html.

CBS Evening News. 2011. Congress by the Numbers. New York: CBS: (November 21).

Gallup, Inc. 2011. For First Time, Majority of Americans Favor Legal Gay Marriage. Online: http://www.gallup.com/poll/147662/first-time-majority-americans-favor-legal-gay-marriage.aspx

Graves, Robert. 1976. Quoted in Old King Log. I, Claudius. Video. London: BBC.

Kinsley, Michael. 2011. When Obama’s Music Stops, Class Warfare Starts. Bloomberg Views. Online. http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2011-12-09/when-obama-s-music-stops-class-warfare-starts-michael-kinsley.html

Rogers, Kathleen. 2011. Seeking One Principled Person from Each Side of the Aisle. NJTODAY.net. Online. <http://njtoday.net/2010/09/16/seeking-one-principled-person-from-each-side-of-the-aisle/>

Weyrich, Paul M. 1999. Letter to Conservatives. Online. Washington: National Center for Public Policy research. http://www.nationalcenter.org/Weyrich299.html

Ponderings

It is presidential election time we hear.  The gang is naturally a set of Ron Paul.  His appearance on Jay Leno last night (Dec 16, 2011) only confirmed that.  Alive and active and the most supporter believer in the abilities of people among all of the candidates.  While most candidates of both parties believe people are useless and stupid,  only capable of being guided through life, Paul believes in people.  Think for yourself.  Do it yourself.  The Bob Villa of the political campaign.  A winner to us.

The balanced budget amendment is tempting, but a waste of time.  It merely provides a financial rule to avoid debts.  It does nothing to stop spending and government growth like many seem to think.  A balanced budget can just result in justification for raising taxes, too.  Higher taxes will balance any budget.  Supporters seem to ignore this possibility.  The war on spending will not be stopped by this toy.

Note on CBS News

The gang at the lake as been taking a look at the new trend at CBS Evening News after liberal Katie Couric left.  The show made it clear it was going to try and regain the sparking sense of journalism it had when Walter Cronkite was in charge.  Scott Pelley seems wonderfully suited for the task and has done the job.  The news appears far more balanced and centrist.  While achieving the aura of Walter Cronkite’s period of work is perhaps unattainable, the CBS crew has made some nice strides in that honored journalistic direction.

Putting Them on the Spot

On the Today Show, Monday November 7, 2011, it was wonderful--and near stunning--to see Newt Gingrich put liberal Ann Curry in her place. She kept questioning him about Herman Cain’s sexual harassment issues and he politely tried to put the discussion back to issues impacting his campaign, like jobs. He finally pointed out the anonymous nature of the complainants at the time and how it violated the ethics of journalism to use anonymous and unverified sources. Curry was shook that someone would question her ethics while working in support of the liberal cause.. She nearly huffed on to another topic. One does have to wonder if Curry actually knows what he was talking about?