Loading ...Glenn Beck: ‘Run’ from churches that tout ‘social justice’
flockwoodGlenn Beck is a member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints and a famous conservative talk show host.
He’s created a stir by denouncing churches that trumpet social justice:
“I beg you, look for the words ‘social justice’ or ‘economic justice’ on your church Web site. If you find it, run as fast as you can. Social justice and economic justice, they are code words. Now, am I advising people to leave their church? Yes!”
Somewhat coincidentally, (after I’d seen a headline about the controversy, but before I’d read the above quote about checking out church Web sites), I went to the Mormon Church’s official Web site and searched for the terms “social justice”, “economic justice” and “social gospel.”
I can sum up what I found in four words: Run, Glenn Beck, Run.
Elder James E. Faust of the Church’s Quorum of the Twelve, writing in the church’s Ensign magazine, said the following:
“It is unfortunate that it is taking so long to bring full economic justice to women. The feminization of poverty is both real and tragic. That is why you should work very hard to prepare for your future by gaining some marketable skills.
The struggle to improve the place of women in society has been a noble cause, and I sincerely hope the day will come when women with equal skills will be fully equal with men in the marketplace.”
Not just “economic justice” but full economic justice.
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For women!!
Head for the hills, Mr. Beck. Hurry!
All kidding aside, Glenn Beck is making today’s headlines by resurrecting yesterday’s ecclesiastical controversies. On his program, last week, he suggested the Social Justice is a code phrase for the Communists.
That claim has been around for a long, long time.
Charles Edward Coughlin preached a sermon about “Social Justice and Communism” in about 1940.
But if you do a Google search, you’ll discover nineteenth-century rabble rousers were also trying to link God Almighty and “Social Justice.”
Which rabble rousers? The ones that won the Civil War.
The official “Decoration Day” order of services for the Grand Army of the Republic in 1881.
As they stood in the cemeteries of Arlington and Gettyburg and elsewhere, surrounded by Republican emancipators, the Northern chaplains asked God to give His wisdom “to those steadfast in the cause of human rights and liberty, of law and order, of social justice and national rectitude…”
Criticism of the social gospel has been around a long time. And it’s not just Glenn Beck who has criticized the social gospel — or at least a type of gospel that is exclusively social and not spiritual as well.
Mormons, as well as many Protestants and Catholics would object to any gospel that places a higher priority on politics than on souls, on the temporal instead of the eternal.
March 10th, 2010 at 1:59 pm
I suspect Beck will be okay; I don’t imagine the Mormons are sufficiently into social justice to hurt anything. This does sound like something he’d say, though. I have never understood why the right wing so hates poor people; it’s certainly not Christian.
March 10th, 2010 at 2:10 pm
It’s not very American either, if you take seriously the ideals set forth in the preambles to the Declaration of Independence and the US Constitution. Justice, equality, welfare..they’re all mentioned. Why DOES Beck hate America?
March 10th, 2010 at 2:20 pm
I imagine for the same reason that Rush Limbaugh does, Jose: We can’t make cigars as good as those made in Cuba, that capitalist paradise.
March 10th, 2010 at 2:59 pm
As someone who has had first hand experience with a church which has, in all but official vote, replaced the Decalogue with the Millennium Development Goals, Beck is absolutely right. Churches exist first and foremost for salvation. Caring for others is a consequence of that. However, if ALL you want to do is care for the poor, there are certainly plenty of agencies and groups who do that and don’t want 10% of your gross. The problem I and Glenn see is when the social gospel becomes predominant over the Gospel, the action which churches are uniquely able and bound to do gets lost. Keeping your eye on the ball of salvation can not reasonably be confused with “hating the poor.” Remember when reading about the social gospels of the past, that the speakers were in most cases, first and foremost, believers in the Gospel. That is often not the case today.
March 10th, 2010 at 3:22 pm
Tregonsee says: “Churches exist first and foremost for salvation.” Really? I thought that churches existed first and foremost to feed God’s sheep, and that salvation was a consequence of THAT.
March 10th, 2010 at 3:54 pm
Isn’t Glenn Beck, Rush Limbaugh twin?
March 10th, 2010 at 3:57 pm
Treg, you are taking a rather inventive interpretation of the Gospel according to Beck. It’s not that he wants social justice to be secondary. He doesn’t want it to be ANY-ary. Social concerns are not a nice byproduct of Christian living. They are Communist and Socialist and other nasty stuff. Beck had a good opportunity to repriortize things as you suggest. He did not. Emphatically.
I only became aware of Beck’s religious affiliation a few weeks ago. It turns out that he’s been active in the LDS church for years. Well, at least one high profile personality wasn’t a victim of the much ballyhooed and unfair Mormon stigma. Then again, Beck manages to appear nuts without any assistance.
March 10th, 2010 at 4:07 pm
Me, too, Jose. I knew Beck was crazy, but didn’t know he was a Mormon. If the Mormons have not rejected his views, they need to, or they will be tarred with his brush, and will have no one to blame but themselves.
March 10th, 2010 at 4:48 pm
It is interesting that this is the only instance on the Mormon Website where “economic justice” is mentioned, that I could find. And it is a massive, massive Website, containing virtually all the official published speeches and writings (owned by the Church) for at least the past 30 years. And there are no cases of “social justice” that I could find. Not bragging, nor ashamed, just interesting.
Elder Faust did not insinuate in this speech that it was the government’s responsibility to ensure such justice for women, though he may have personally believed such (he was a Democrat, Caleb—granted, the only one among the Quorum of Twelve at the time).
Read the whole speech and see if you get a feeling of hatred or disgust with America or social programs. Does he ridicule anyone or accuse the government for not doing more? I believe he is speaking, for the most part, to the members of the Church to voluntarily do more and be more.
What Beck was referring to, I think, was the use of these “code words” to really mean: Proactively MAKE people do the right thing (or what we the leaders of this church, in our infinite intellectual wisdom, think is right, because we have taken in every comprehensible variable and consequence), instead of persuading people to do right. The key word here is “proactive” action as opposed to reactive action. The right way to handle, say murder, is a reaction or consequence of a prior action.
There are cases where proactive intervention is necessary, of course, but usually the best “judge and jury” in such things is the economy (in as far as it is unencumbered by artificial influences), and a statistically viable community structure. For instance, I may think it was unfair for a certain woman to be paid less. What I may not know is that she continually showes up late, takes sick leave at the merest sniffle, sows discord among other employees, is not trustworthy, is not sufficiently organized, or etc., etc., etc. The variables are endless, and though basic standards of decency, as far as they touch inalienable rights, should be enforced, making blanket laws in the name of “social justice” will always, in the long run, lead to tyranny in some form. Case in point is France where recent unrest was caused when employers sued for the “government-granted right” to more easily hire and fire. Some of the restraints dictated to them by law could be considered quite unreasonable to most in this country.
There are basic rights inherent in the person. Government does not grant these rights, and neither does the church. Where the limit to these rights may be is up for some debate, but in must be understood that when we ever go beyond and violate someone’s freedom, even in the name of what we might think is “justice,” the snowball starts rolling and we may be the next to be violated.
March 10th, 2010 at 4:56 pm
Mr. Hamilton, you’re correct. There are very few references to the “social gospel”, “social justice” or “economic justice.” And most of the references to “social justice” are critical in nature.
The key role of the Church, in the eyes of the Mormon Church, is spiritual in nature. Winning converts, testifying to the truth as revealed by the Bible, Book of Mormon and modern-day Prophets. Good works, feeding the hungry and clothing the naked, etc., are a natural byproduct of the church and its Saints. But social services are not the end-all and be-all of the people of God.
This position, by the way, is very similar to the position shared by many evangelical denominations.
March 10th, 2010 at 5:21 pm
“Read the whole speech… I believe he is speaking, for the most part, to the members of the Church to voluntarily do more and be more.”
I cannot find a transcript and cannot bear to listen to the thing. What exactly did Mr. Beck say to endorse the principle that people of faith are called to work for social and economic justice? The few statements that are quoted seem to indicate quite the opposite.
March 10th, 2010 at 5:38 pm
We should definitely work hard for social justice and economic justice. No arguments there. I think what Mr. Beck was talking about was that the use of government means tends to produce more harm than good and that many churches really mean petitioning the government to do more instead of themselves. They think they’re doing good by campaigning to make laws, when they are really doing nothing themselves to directly help those in need. I don’t know for sure from this particular instance, but judging from the past positions he has taken I think that is the gist of it.
Keep in mind he is partially an entertainer, to keep the audience interested, therefore some allowance should probably be made for exaggerated statements like, “Run for the hills, when you see such and such!”
March 10th, 2010 at 5:40 pm
José,
I’m sorry, I meant the whole speech Elder James E. Faust gave on the Mormon Website, not Glenn Beck’s. Sorry about that.
March 10th, 2010 at 7:41 pm
I don’t have a problem with a wide social safety net. Large social safety nets, high taxes on the richest 1%, strong protections for organized labor, heck, that’s what the New Deal was all about. The fifties, sixties, and seventies were the most prosperous three decades out of this country’s entire existence. Wages grew faster in this era for the median income earner than at any other point in our history. The middle class held the reins of power, the rich weren’t that much richer than everyone else, and the poor weren’t that much poorer than everyone else. When the wealth wasn’t so polarized, the politics weren’t so polarized. Politicians could actually compromise on most issues and spend their time solving problems rather than seeking reelection. I know all this stuff we godless liberals say seems to violate every principle of “Econ 101″, Adam Smith, Ayn Rand, and the other free market fundamentalists, but it’s worked before, and I think it can work again.
March 11th, 2010 at 9:49 am
I think your view of the 50s, 60s and 70s may be a little too rosy, Cheese. We had plenty of economic strife. The “Great Society” was a dismal failure by any standard. The seventies were a decade most of us want to forget. Remember oil embargoes and double digit inflation? Union-made American automobiles were of terrible quality and led to the rise of imports.
The “safety net” became the “dependent net” with whole generations living their lives on the dole, with the consequent astronomical rise in “fatherless” children and crime. Public housing projects herding and degrading whole classes of society in the name of some wise and benevolent government.
The economy may have rose DESPITE all of this (life finds a way), but innovation was stifled and could not build upon itself when the government was taking up to 90 percent of your earnings when they thought you earned to much. The government, taking the money by force, obviously knows better how to effectively use that money than the man who actually earned it. Right? Remember, there is only so much a rich man can eat. If Bill Gates were born about 15 years sooner, I dare say we wouldn’t have the personal computer today.
You fall into this trap of thinking all evil resides with those damned rich. The reality is, evil resides everywhere and is equally prevalent among the poor. And in some cases may actually be the cause of the poverty. Shocker, huh!
I’m not saying there shouldn’t be allowances made for the unfortunate. Those allowances must be made, as much as possible by actual “people on the ground” and funded by those who have a stake in their communities and not by force and coercion “from on high.” Two wrongs rarely make a right. We grew much faster economically in the 80s and 90s once more freedom was somewhat reestablished.
March 11th, 2010 at 7:26 pm
“The ‘Great Society’ was a dismal failure by any standard.”
Maybe, unless you were black or poor.
March 11th, 2010 at 8:51 pm
John,
My view of the 50′s, 60′s, and 70′s may be a little rosy. I wasn’t alive during any of them, which probably gives you some indication as to my age. (Hint: I’m 25). But I would contend that your view of the 80′s and 90′s is no less rosy. The US economy did grow during the 80′s and 90′s, but all the gains were made by the richest 1%. The median income earner actually earns less now. In the fifties, one blue collar worker could act as breadwinner and provide for his entire family. Today, both parents must work full-time to achieve the same level of purchasing power. Ergo, despite the gains made by the whole economy, few, if any, “trickled down” to the middle class.
The “safety net” did not become the “dependency net” because of some decline in morals as standard conservative doctrine would have you believe. The welfare ranks did skyrocket in the seventies, but it has more to do with civil rights than the degeneration of social norms. Before the civil rights movement, minorities in need of assistance could not get on welfare. You know why this was. After civil rights, blacks and other minorities were allowed to get on welfare, and many did as a result. I would contend that this in and of itself does not lead to more children being born out of wedlock nor to more crime. To be sure, no one really knows what causes the crime rate to rise and fall. Everyone’s caught by surprise whenever it rises or falls, and we all think we know why, but really we just don’t.
I disagree that high taxes stifle innovation. As the saying goes, necessity is the mother of all invention. People with less have more cause to be innovative; people with more tend to become complacent and satisfied with the status quo. After all, once you have already earned a fortune, what reason do you have to innovate? It’s far easier to use your money to drown out competition than it is to really invent something new and groundbreaking. Innovation requires curiosity, perseverance, and ingenuity, qualities that cannot be bought with money. So, no, high taxes do not stifle innovation.
I categorically reject your insistence that I’ve fallen into the trap of believing that all rich people are evil. Part of the reason I became an atheist in the first place is because I wholeheartedly reject the notion, fundamental to the Book of Revelation, that the world is caught between some grand, cosmic battle between the forces of good and evil. Good and evil do not exist as concrete realities; they can only be defined subjectively. Rich people are neither good nor evil. They, like everyone else, are motivated by their own self interest. You, however, by asserting that poor people are evil, seem to have fallen into a trap of your own making. Poor people are neither good nor evil either. I suggest you shy away from labeling people evil altogether; it really doesn’t help anything.
P.S. You’re right that Bill Gates would not have been able to invent the personal computer had he been born fifteen years earlier, because his personal computer relied upon technology stolen from Xerox. No Xerox, no Microsoft. Becoming wealthy does have an element of luck to it; it’s not all a matter of hard work and moral purity.
March 12th, 2010 at 10:49 am
Well, Cheese, I really think Bill Gates IS evil! He stole all his good ideas from the Mac. I got a look at Windows 7 the other day and I about fell down laughing! It is such a blatant copy of my Mac’s OS X that’s been around for years! Yeah, I know—a conservative using a Mac, a little shocking, huh? (I also watch the Simpson’s. I’ve got a lot of repenting to do.)
Don’t get me wrong. Having money does not make you any more or less susceptible to evil inclinations. I think those attributes are there in every one of us with absolutely no regard to money. Money usually only serves to accentuate the character flaws and strengths that are already there. That said, when taken into full account with all other attributes (if that is truly possible), it can be an indicator of certain qualities in a person. That is if he worked and earned it himself. I deal with rich and poor all the time, many within my own family. I have two uncles from the same family. One is quite wealthy and the other is quite poor. I knew them before either was this way. They were both of equal talents. The one took personal responsibility seriously, was faithful to his wife, struggled and sacrificed for the future, picked himself up after failure (of which he had plenty), and has become happy and quite wealthy, though wealth was never the main goal. The other was lazy, self-obsessed, blames everyone for his problems, couldn’t keep is hands off other women, and just an all-around bum. He is now living off the charity of the rest of us in the family. Luck certainly plays a role, especially more so among the “obscenely” wealthy, but, like when someone smells good it is safe to bet they shower regularly, someone who is doing okay financially usually has a critical number of his ducks in a row.
Cheese, I was once like you. I thought the idea of a God at least unlikely, if not absurd. As I’ve gotten older, had children and observed human nature through my careers and schooling, I’ve come to see that true good does exist. You are right in saying that evil does not exist as its own entity. Evil is merely the corruption of truth. Truth being defined as “what works” for lack of a better phrase. Adolph Hitler, an example of the embodiment of evil, in my book, merely took worthy virtues like honer, duty, patriotism, even freedom and twisted them, took things out of order, to his own corrupt ends. You believe in the reality of good already, you just don’t know it. Your ideas of “social justice” and so forth (though misguided) are an example of this. Now the reality of truth necessarily infers its corruption. This is what evil is. Satan, wether you believe in him or not, is of all people the most miserable. Not because he is in some sort of conflict with a supreme God, but because he has disorganized Truth. I can’t explain Truth adequately, just like I can’t explain God, but I know it exists. Took me awhile to acknowledge it. We’re all on our own journeys. I wish you success.
March 12th, 2010 at 3:16 pm
Wow, cheese, I thought you were at least 70-75 to be as hard as you are. I also felt like the world must have used as a porta-potty. Its good know you have a chance!
March 12th, 2010 at 4:14 pm
Just a note on Bill Gates. In many ways, he embodies American business.
First, he did NOT invent the personal computer. He developed an operating system, DOS. I had a pre-DOS computer myself, and it worked quite well with no input from Mr. Gates. The way he developed DOS was by buying an operating system called QDOS, for “quick and dirty operating system” for $75,000. I’m not making this up. He then modified this slightly into DOS.
The reason he did this is because IBM was in the process of developing its PC, the first 16-bit operating system. My old Kaypro was an 8-bit system, and ran like one. IBM, still in monopoly-mode, became the best selling PC, and therefore, DOS became the bestselling operating system. This was a huge mistake on IBM’s part. If they had developed DOS themselves (which they easily could have), they’d have taken the market, and Microsoft wouldn’t exist.
DOS and its later incarnation Windows became successful not because they were inherently good systems; they weren’t at first, though they got better over time. They became successful because IBM allowed other computer companies to “clone” its system — and use DOS. This was also a huge business error; by allowing other companies to enter the market, IBM essentially gave its business away, and what was once arguably the strongest corporation in the world withered away to the nothing that it is today.
Now, could Gates have done what he did in a world of high taxation? Sure, why not? None of the things I laid out here had anything to do with taxes, and everything to do with the stupidity of American business, which didn’t think personal computers were going to last.
March 12th, 2010 at 4:24 pm
Just another note about the Great Society.
John, if you think the Great Society was a failure, then as Jose says you’re neither poor nor black, and as I’ll add, you don’t remember what it was like to be poor or black before the Great Society.
I grew up in a county that has been named one of the five poorest counties in Kentucky, a state with lots of poor counties, and one of the fifty poorest counties in America. My family was one of those old mountain families that had hundreds of years of tradition, but no money. And yet I went to nice new brick schools, staffed with good teachers, and equipped with libraries and other facilities that no doubt weren’t world class, but were far better than what had come before. And that was all done by the Great Society programs.
Had I lived a generation earlier, I’d have had schools, but they wouldn’t have been very good, and I wouldn’t have gotten anywhere near the education that I got. Despite the poverty of my county and my family, I was able, through these same governmental programs, to attend a pretty decent college and the best law school in the world. Beat that with a stick.
March 12th, 2010 at 6:19 pm
It is funny how two people can come from the exact same background and have a totally different world-view. My Dad, from the same hills of Kentucky, didn’t even have an outhouse. Didn’t know what a telephone was and thought electricity came in bottles like kerosine. He knows poverty only too well. He can’t remember a single night growing up where he didn’t go to bed hungry. And yet, he saw first-hand the effects of government aid. The loss of personal responsibility, the blame and accusations coming from people on the dole and consequent underdeveloped self-wroth. Communities that formerly looked out for each other now bitter neighbors because of corrupt standards of decent behavior, “something-for-nothing” mentalities and dormant talents.
Better roads, newer textbooks, those are fine, when local citizens band together and produce them, but the decisions of the “enlightened” few to give out other people’s earned money in the name of what they think is “fair,” whether it actually is or is not, that is what I mean by failure. It is an offense to the morality of freedom. Redistributing earnings (I wouldn’t call it “wealth” because it usually isn’t) based on whatever they feel is right. Well, we all know how varied people’s ideas of “right” really are.
Caleb, I assume you are smart and talented. You used these programs to your advantage. Likewise I can pilfer from my boss’s earnings and send my kids to better schools as well. How much better it would be, however, if we could do it on our own, with aid of family and neighbors instead of the rule of “law” so called. When my Dad left the army after WWII, the state of Kentucky gave each veteran $500 as a sort of “thank you” for serving. This is fine, they were drafted and deserve compensation for protecting their country. My father, as young as he was, started wondering where they were getting this money. Seems they had to institute a “temporary” sales tax on food to pay for it. He refused the $500, though he could have certainly put it to good use. He knew intuitively this was going beyond the proper role of government and would only serve to insert government’s power more deeply into each of our lives. Well, the food tax is still there, and one can’t do or be much of anything anymore without some sort of government “oversight” and meddling. My father still became successful. A dentist who raised 11 children in relative comfort. He has even owned a Cadillac or two by his own earnings. No “Great Society” did this for him. He was the first in his family to get an education and this was long before Lyndon Johnson had his “vision” of moving the puzzle pieces around on the national economy map, as if moving weather patterns around to make it a little sunnier in Minnesota won’t have any adverse effects on the precipitation in Florida.
Truth is, Caleb, our poverty rates are as high as they’ve ever been. Crime is still with us. Racial tensions are still there. In other words people are still people. The Great Society fixed nothing. A leader of our Church once said, “We need to help take the ghetto out of the people, not the people out of the ghetto. Then, they will bring themselves out.” Government, the rule of force and law, by it’s very nature cannot do this. Religion or moral resolve on the part of the individual is the only way to do this and have peace. My Dad is serene and comfortable in his old age knowing, despite the hard struggles, he never willingly compromised his principles and took unwarranted “aid” from another. In the end, he hopes he gave more than he took in this life. All too many people in the “Great Society” do not.
March 12th, 2010 at 6:48 pm
John,
I had a feeling that when I revealed my age, people would write my opinions off as follies of youth. Your condescending assertion that my views are “misguided” confirms that. You haven’t addressed most of the points I’ve made, and if my views truly are as misguided as you seem to believe, pointing out their flaws should be no sweat off your back. Your correct views should be no match for my misguided views, if that truly is the case that your views are right. It would also be very constructive for me to have my wrong views shattered, so that in my later years, if I turn out to be conservative and Mormon, I’ll let you say: I told you so. But if you’re just going to parrot Econ 101 according to Fox News, then you may not want to waste your time. I’ve heard most of their arguments, and they have yet to prove to my satisfaction that cutting taxes, killing welfare, deregulating the market, and emasculating organized labor will lead to prosperity and freedom. To my mind, lowering taxes empowers the wealthy, deconstructing the social safety net leaves the poor to fend for themselves (thereby increasing crime), deregulation makes fraud easy, and crushing unions gives management all the power when it comes to negotiating labor contracts and establishing business practices. Republican economic policy leads to greater inequality between the rich and poor, not more “freedom,” which, for the record, is not really a quantifiable factor anyway. I know conservatives value rugged individualism and self-reliance, both solid traits to have in and of themselves, but we don’t live in Lake Wobegon where everyone is above average, we live in a world of haves and have-nots where wealth is increasingly becoming more concentrated amongst the haves at the top of the ladder. I believe our economic policies ought to focus on restoring the middle class to the size it was during the fifties, sixties, and seventies. A good start would be to allow Wal-Mart employees to unionize. Yes, those always low prices will go up, but the ranks of the middle class would swell, other retailers would be in a better position to compete with the Wal-Mart juggernaut, and Wal-Mart would finally have to offer health benefits to its full-time employees instead of telling them to apply for MedicAid (yes, the taxpayer funds Wal-Mart’s health benefits plan). Sam Walton’s children will survive.
As for Bill Gates, he is not evil. Yes, he stole other people’s ideas to make his fortune, but he’s just following his own self interest like everyone else. In his mind, he’s behaving rationally, and if you were in his shoes, you might make many of the same decisions he has. He also donates much of his wealth to charity, which I respect. However, Bill Gates also illustrates my point about innovation. Microsoft grew so large, not because they used all their residual income to make Windows better and better (you know that didn’t happen). They became top dog in large part because their size and bankroll afforded them the ability to buy out and crush small start-up companies that threatened to compete with them in the future. Once the federal government (yes, that evil federal government) recognized Microsoft held a monopoly, it split them up, and Microsoft began to lose its market dominance. It was the interference of the federal government that forced them to compete on a level playing field, not a free market. Monopolies are proof that there exist problems in the economy that a free, unregulated market cannot always fix. Therefore, there will always be a place for government intervention. The real question is: how much do we need?
As for Hitler, he, like Bill Gates, was not evil incarnate and before people begin labeling me a neo-Nazi, let me finish. I don’t believe that Hitler was consciously taking good virtues and willfully twisting them to serve the forces of evil; that may seem to explain what he did, but it doesn’t really explain why he did what he did. Hitler, in his own mind, identified Jews and non-Aryans as evil. I’m almost positive he believed that he was doing his god’s will, that history would thank him when “evil” was eradicated, and a lasting peace would be the ultimate result. Hitler believed destroying that “evil” presence could redeem his nation in the eyes of his god, who would reward him with a thousand-year era of prosperity. We know now that that was not the case. Violence does not beget peace. Hitler foolishly and stupidly miscalculated how the rest of the world would perceive his violent actions, he overestimated the strength of his cause, he underestimated the strength of his enemies, and he doubled down on Russia when he should have folded. Hitler was not evil; he and his co-conspirators probably thought we were the evil ones, because we were trying to stop his holy crusade. Hitler and the Nazis were blind to the contradictions inherent in their own ideology, an ideology based on hate and stereotypes. You see, John, the problem with this whole good-versus-evil mentality is that everyone believes they’re on the side of good and that their enemies are all on the side of evil. It equates compromise with appeasement and diplomacy as a sign of weakness. It views democracy as an impediment and vigilante justice as the only reasonable response.
Perplexed,
Thank you for the compliment, but don’t hold your breath on that hope thing. I’m an atheist because I believe our universe can be better understood as the product of impersonal natural forces, instead of personified supernatural ones. I’m not that angry person who labels themselves an atheist because they’re PO’ed at God or their parents or certain parts of our society. I don’t think the angry ones ever really stop believing; they’re just trying to make a point. After they make amends, they go back to theism. But I’ve found that letting my belief in God slowly die has been rather liberating. The world is not nearly as fatalistic. I decide for myself what is moral and immoral, and there’s no hell. God died; the world didn’t fall apart, and there’s still a lot that remains. So I think I’m going to continue to be beyond hope for still a while yet.
March 12th, 2010 at 8:08 pm
John speaks so highly of “communities that formerly looked out for each other” and the wonderful progress that spontaneously happens when “local citizens band together”. Sounds too good to be true. It was.
He dreams that if government just got out of the way then hordes of Rotarians guided by the sacred forces of the free market would take care of every problem. Well, we saw how that worked! The Great Society, the Civil Rights Act, welfare– none of these were dreamed up out of thin air by an evil government for no purpose other than to oppress the masses. No, We The People elected these representatives. We told them to debate and devise real rememdies to social problems that were not being solved any other way.
Honestly! I can imagine John’s ancestors, years ago, pleading with the abolitionists. “It’s not right for the government to interfere”, they would say. “Let the good people of the community decide for themselves that they want to stop owning slaves. Denying small business owners of the right to own slaves, well that’s socialism.”
Bah.
March 13th, 2010 at 6:04 am
John and Caleb, my connection to “them there hills” has led me to beleive that there exists in the mountains of Eastern Kentucky an element of professional victimism. Some parents train their children to deny any responsibility for their actions and in turn blame their surroundings on their inaction. Others in the same family will get that education, move away, and struggle with life in a “normal” fashion. They have no desire to move back “home”. Its my belief its a choice in the path you choose in life.
I thought Bill Gates and the guy that runs Macintosh started out as partners.
Somebody mentioned life going back to 50′s, 00′s and the 70′s. Well kids are a lot smarter these days, they have concerning life, many more choices of entertainment than the days of before when the main focus was on living and surviving rather than being entertained.
Cheese, life will test you, in that test you will find the need to beleive in something, whether it is yourself or not believing, I think your opinion over the years will change. The pieces will fall together, you will walk in your parents shoes sometime in your life and the wisdom you gain from that can very well affect how you will view life.
March 13th, 2010 at 2:59 pm
So let me get this straight, John. My education, and the social programs that helped me were theft because they came from tax money, the moral equivalent of your pilfering from your employer. If this is your world view, I suspect your own middle class upbringing as the son of a dentist who no doubt, from your comments, was quite conservative, has not given you any insight into poverty, and that is to your disadvantage. I don’t know your father. However, I do know many good honest people in Eastern Kentucky who, like me, have benefited greatly from government programs, as have we all.
No doubt your father went to college and dental school with the benefit of the GI bill, and perhaps even did so at one or more state supported colleges funded primarily by that stolen tax money you hate so much, as did many veterans of that generation. This widespread education of the unwashed masses created much of the expansion of the economy we saw during the later ’40s and early ’50s, before the Eisenhower recession of the late ’50s. No doubt, living as the son of a dentist and no doubt in a middle class neighborhood, where those Cadillacs wouldn’t look out of place, you had good public schools, all paid for by taxes. And with eleven children, no doubt your father got the benefit of his school tax money. I think it ironic that you would now want to deny those things to others on the ground that taxes are theft. And, I would imagine that he has treated a good number of poor people over the years and been paid by Medicaid or Medicare, those thieving tax dollar programs.
Jose is exactly right: You have no sense of history, or of what real people have gone through. I listened to a lecture years ago on fundamentalism and conservatism, and one of the points it made is that the basis of most fundamentalist and conservative world views is that there was a time, and it’s always far enough in the past so that the person expounding on it didn’t actually live through it, that was better than the current time. And of course that is a flat fallacy of the highest order. As Jose points out, there’s a reason we passed the reform legislation of the Roosevelt, Truman and Johnson administrations: They were necessary. Your man Herbert Hoover tried out free enterprise and high tariffs and they caused the nation to almost starve to death during the depression. Why would these outdated ideas work any better today? No other civilized nation has re-adopted them.
Of course, those ideas worked great for the rich. The cost of labor was low, and so profits were high. There were few taxes, and few do-gooder government organizations to object to whatever the rich wanted to do. If this is paradise to you, John, fine, but it’s not to me.
March 13th, 2010 at 6:20 pm
A few more observations.
There’s a fallacy in John’s arguments that needs dissecting. To paraphrase John, “When it comes to fixing social problem there are failures in SOME of the actions of government and there are successes in SOME of the voluntary actions of individuals. Hence we should discard the notion of government having ANY involvment in social programs.” It’s obvious that some of what John says is true. It doesn’t take much to find government programs which were wasteful or had undesirable and unintended effects. What is sorely missing from John’s retelling of history, though, is the fact that there are plenty of real examples where public projects helped to alleviate suffering and make better living conditions for millions who were being neglected by their fellow citizens for so long. I would never stoop so low as to take the opposite extreme as John, arguing that because of the failures of a few bad companies that we should eliminate private enterprise, or because of the sins of a few churches that we should eliminate religion. So let’s accept this truism, that government is never perfect but government can surely be good.
As for the worry that government handouts rob people of dignity, personal responsibility, and self worth, I wonder why that isn’t also true for private programs. Does a hungry child eating a free breakfast at school really care whether it came from the government instead of a church? Our church works with a charitable community organization to provide food and essentials to needy families. Are we being foolish liberal enablers because we take Matthew 25 seriously?
I’m also struck by John’s assumption that government is fundamentally different from any alternative, especially organized religion. He consistently portrays government officials as isolated autocrats, taxation as theft, and laws as arbitary and onerous demands. well, there are indeed differences but let’s ponder for a moment the similarities between how government and church work, both at the local and national levels. As a member of my community and my church, I have a say in what happens. No, that’s not strong enough; I have a real vote in what happens, and that votes matters in a very direct way. Sometimes we decide to start a new program or ministry. We meet, discuss, research, and deliberate. If there is money involved then we set a budget and decide how to fund it from the membership. We sometimes make tough decisions to disapprove a good and beneficial program because there just isn’t the money for it. This is all done publicly, and everyone gets a chance to voice their opinion. In many cases the final voting is done by representatives (city council or administrative council at the local level, Congress or the General Conference at the national level) but our representatives are always selected by the people and are accountable to them.
John makes a big deal about how church membership is different from citizenship because church is strictly voluntary. Like many of the rest of you I am a member of the denomination in which I was raised. As a youth I made a decision to join the church, and when I left home I made a decision to stay in the church and become an active member. I do not always agree with the positions of the national church, nor with with decisions made by my local congregation, but I choose to remain with them nonetheless even though I could leave at any time. Now, this is also true about my citizenship. I was born an American and I choose to be an active citizen. I registered for the draft, registered to vote, and I pay my taxes. Sometimes I attend the City Council meetings and often I write my Congressman and Senators. I do not always agree with the decisions made by my government but so far I have chosen to remain a citizen of this great nation. Our government was established by good people who pledged to work together as a community. For all of you who denigrate this institution let me remind you that being an American is a choice. If you don’t like it, please do us all a favor and leave.
March 13th, 2010 at 6:24 pm
Not to “replay” the same story that John gave regarding his father, but my father’s story is much the same. He grew up in a small Idaho farm town and watched as his neighbors lined up to receive the free cheese, oranges and other foodstuffs given by the federal gov’t during the post-depression era. He watched as his friends wasted the free food, throwing half-eaten oranges around the neighborhood, and wishing his dad would except some for his own family. However, my grandfather took much the same view as John’s father and refused any of the aid. He knew that things handed out for free would become expected by too many citizens and that the dole was then, and is now, something that weakens a society.
My own experience working at the Health and Welfare Department of the State of Idaho confirmed those ideas in my own mind. During my time there, I worked with over 300 families who requested government assistance. During that same time, only 2 ever voluntarily stopped receiving the assistance. One was a single girl who had been raped and chosed to give birth to the child, and by doing so was kicked out of her home. She told me when we did the first “intake” interview that she would be finished with school and off assistance in 90 days. She came in and turned in her food stamp card to me about 5 days before the deadline we never saw her again.
From my experience, for every 1 Caleb and those like this young woman I knew, there are dozens who allow gov’t assistance to become a way of life in a country that has as many opportunities as there are people, if those people are willing to seize those opportunities.
There will always be those who use government programs to better themselves. However, in my experience these are very few and far between compared to those who continue to use such assistance year after year and pass this way of life to their children and grandchildren because nothing is done to promote work and self-reliance. In fact, saving is actually discouraged because the amount a person/family can save and still be eligible for assistance is so minimal that in effect, families will go out and spend money they have saved on frivilous things before their upcoming eligibility interviews so that their bank statements do not make them ineligible for food stamps and medicaid. They get so used to being on the systems that they feel they can’t ever live without the assistance.
A sense of entitlement, which is what government programs promote, will never be the best thing for a society.
One thing I’d like to point out regarding Hoover’s system of “free enterprise and high tariffs” that you pointed out Caleb. This is a major problem I see with most so-called conservatives. They say they believe in free enterprise, but they never let it work. They try to control it, with artificial means such as high tariffs, or other such protectionist policies, and restrict the free trade and enterprise just as someone of liberal or socialist beliefs would. Whether restrictions come from Republican or Democratic policies they are restrictions just the same.
March 13th, 2010 at 6:25 pm
*accept some for his own family.
March 14th, 2010 at 1:56 pm
Naturally my views would vary somewhat from David’s, but I agree on one thing he said: “A sense of entitlement, which is what government programs promote, will never be the best thing for a society.”
I would extend it one more step, though. Those who have done well economically in what passes for a free market in America also feel a great sense of entitlement. That sense of entitlement is largely what led to the current economic downturn: It wasn’t welfare mothers that crashed the economy, it was little spoiled frat boys and sorority girls buying houses they couldn’t afford and cars they didn’t need.
Although I am the one on here always wanting to look beyond the Bible, a couple of Biblical principles come to mind. First is that EVERYTHING is a gift from God. Everything. If I have done well with my education, it is because God gave me the ability to do so. If John’s father did well as a dentist, it is because God gave him the ability to do so. Conservatives are always big on saying that so and so EARNED the money he received. Not true. We all do the things we are able to do because of a gift from God, and gifts aren’t earned.
I once heard a sermon by Billy Graham (who profited very little materially from his ministry), who suggested that the real analysis for a Christian is not how much of YOUR money to give back to God, but how much of GOD’S money you need to live on yourself.
Second, I fully believe that at least one thread of belief in early Christianity is that we are, first, to give to others, and second, to do so with a spirit of generosity rather than a spirit of poverty. You get the idea that to most conservatives, any help they give the poor, either through taxes or through actual charitable giving is like swallowing a bitter pill. They will do it, because even they acknowledge that it’s what God wants them to do, but boy they resent it. I heard Neil Boortz, who is like the poor man’s Rush Limbaugh, go on and on once about how he didn’t like poor people; he got into it by saying that everyone accused him of not liking poor people, and that this charge was correct. And he went into a tirade about how he didn’t like the way poor people looked or smelled or acted. If you go into this trying to help people to whom you feel morally superior, you’ve already missed the point. Jesus called us not just to feed his sheep, but to love them as well. Most of the time, I get the idea that most conservatives, like Neil Boortz, don’t even like poor people, much less love them.
I don’t know; maybe because I grew up poor, I can understand poor people better than people who grew up around Cadillacs and swimming pools and golf courses. And if so, that’s a gift from God, too.
March 15th, 2010 at 11:57 am
Wow! I seemed to have unleashed a firestorm here. Or at least I arrogantly think I did. I don’t know if I can address all the specific issues brought up right now, but I’ll make a few general observations:
First of all, I did not grow up rich. The Cadillacs were the one indulgence my father was able to acquire. Raising 11 children in Utah, where there is a dentist on every corner (very weird how Mormons and dentistry seem to go together) was quite difficult. We would have been considered quite poor in many respects by today’s standards. And I did go to bed hungry at times. With one exception, those Cadillacs were always used, and my Dad often had to sell them to pay the bills. My Dad struggled through school. He never learned to read well, but worked his way through dental school by being a night security guard where he could take the time to read the textbooks that would have taken most people much less time.
Truth is, Caleb, none of us is that separated from being “poor” ourselves. I deal with poverty in my own family and neighborhood. Unless you are among the super rich, like Ted Kennedy or George W. Bush, most of us have had periods in our lives where we wondered where our next meal was going to come from, or nearly so. I know I certainly have.
What David Duke illustrated so well is the folly of direct aid to the poor. Some “social” programs are okay in their nature because they are compensation for services rendered or are a quantifiable investment in the security of our nation. The GI Bill could be an example of this. Specific effort was expected on the part of the participants in such programs and as such they could be looked upon as rendering a service to the public, like a temporary government employee of sorts, getting training that will aid the economy in the future. So many government programs, particularly on the federal level with virtually no local oversight, do not do this. My Dad did NOT take Medicaid until very late in his professional practice. He never had an aversion to the poor. He grew up poor. He wisely knew, however, that most (yes, most) of it’s recipients would be and are morally deficient in some way or another. If they weren’t before they took the handouts, they certainly become so after prolonged justifications for living off of the work of others. They have children out of wedlock, they don’t have good work ethics, they make poor health decisions (based on short-sighted selfishness) like becoming alcoholics or obese or smoking and such. Not saying we should love them any less, we all have made and can always easily make poor decisions, but we do need to recognize their consequences. Honestly helping them and not simply enabling their follies is what they need. That said, there are many, however, who do take advantage of these programs because they don’t have a better alternative anymore. The communities and churches have abdicated much of the responsibility they used to carry in favor of them.
This brings me to the point made my José. The church’s efforts in charitable programs are voluntary and therefore much more efficient. No, the young child does not have the foresight to care where his “free” breakfast is coming from, but his parents do. If the person serving that breakfast is also the one who paid for it, he would also be more careful, out of necessity because of his own limited resources, if nothing else, to make sure it is going to the most needy and doing the most good possible. Not so if he is just the middle man way down the chain where the actual wealth that created the “free” breakfast is so far removed. If my Church does something with my contributions I don’t agree with, I am free to no longer contribute. They cannot do anything about that. They cannot send the Sheriff to my door to make me pay my tithing or contribute to some feed the needy program. That, my friends, is a HUGE difference from a government program, even if my neighbor voted for the representative that started it. I didn’t, but must abide and pay anyway.
Private programs do not rob people’s dignity, if they are truly in need. The Mormon Church’s Welfare Program provides the recipients with the genuine opportunities to earn their assistance whenever possible. The administrators of such programs are volunteering their time, in most cases, and are only too aware of the supply chain’s vulnerability if they misuse such “sacred” resources voluntarily entrusted to them. The likelihood of such resources be “squandered” and enabling of bad behavior are therefore greatly reduced, though it surely still happens from time to time.
It is true that all of our resources, talents and circumstances are a gift from God. Nothing is truly ours. We are all unprofitable servants to Him. But we are still of infinite worth, or He wouldn’t have laid down His life for us. The family is in some ways a little microcosm of the relationship we have with God. My children have earned nothing that they have right now on their own. They are, at the moment, 100 percent dependent on my care. If one of them used that as an excuse, however, to take a toy from their brother to give it to their sister, I would be a bit disturbed. I can’t help but feel that God would feel the same way. I would rather see them voluntarily give their “own” toy to their sister.
Caleb, the reverse of what you are saying about the conservatives views of the “good old days” can also be applied to the liberal view. That view entails that there was a time when most people were starving to death on the streets. That life was almost universally squalid and miserable. True there was great suffering at times, (and if you go back far enough, it was really bad) and I am not justifying them, but being beholden to the Manor in medieval serfdom is not any different than being unduly forced to be subservient to the will of your neighbors through the government.
March 15th, 2010 at 12:03 pm
John if you truly believe that “being beholden to the Manor in medieval serfdom is not any different than being unduly forced to be subservient to the will of your neighbors through the government,” then I’m not sure I can do anything for you; you’ve not only drunk the Kool Ade, but digested it.
March 15th, 2010 at 3:37 pm
Yup, and it was pretty yummy. Should try it some time!
March 15th, 2010 at 3:47 pm
Thanks, John, but I’m happy thinking for myself.
March 15th, 2010 at 4:26 pm
Yeah, and you gotta get over that gag reflex, too. Don’t blame ya.
March 15th, 2010 at 6:10 pm
Remember that what started all this was Glenn Beck saying that social justice and economic justice were code words for Communism, Nazism, and maybe a few other unpleasantries, and that any church who supported those ideals should be rejected outright. Note carefully that Beck was indiscriminate. He could have said that churches were wrong for putting too much emphasis on helping the needy. He could have argued that churches were being ineffective or unwise or unfair in the way that they sought to live out the teachings of Jesus Christ. But he didn’t. His message was simple and clear: you can be for American, or you can be for social justice, but you can’t be for both.
It’s this kind of reactionary and blunt message that is present in the responses of our friends John and David. To them, public assistance destroys dignity, but private programs do not. Government funding is theft from unwilling taxpayers, while private programs (including those that are subsidized by the government by using tax exempt organizations and tax deductible contributions) are entirely uncoerced. The people who run the public operations have no accountability or sense of compassion, while every cook and clerk in a private non-profit is a cheerful and caring saint. Guys, you are living in a Jack Chick cartoon book.
It’s appalling, really, the shallowness of this simplistic black and white view of the world. John criticizes recipients of public welfare as being morally deficient, having illegitimate children, abusing alcohol and tobacco, and otherwise living unhealthy lifestyles. He might be surprised to discover that these sins are readily found among those who are far, far above the poverty line.
Gentlemen, you could easily redirect your criticisms to the actual problems, things like waste and arrogance, regardless of who sponsors the program. Perhaps those problems ARE more common in government activities than private, and then again perhaps they are not. I don’t know. But I do know that government social projects can be a very good thing and that sometimes they are necessary to fill needs that are being ignored. I also know that volunteer organizations are sometimes ineffective and corrupt. It makes no sense, to promote this ideology of Beckism by insisting– repeatedly and without convincing rationale and in the face of arguments to the contrary– that government is inherently bad, and that private activities are naturally superior and sufficient to solve the ills of our fellow people.
March 15th, 2010 at 6:56 pm
Caleb, I agree totally with your statement about entitlement being a bad thing whether it comes from the rich or the poor.
This reminds me of a sermon preached anciently and recorded in the Book of Mormon. From a prophet named Benjamin we read:
“And also, ye yourselves will succor those that stand in need of your succor; ye will administer of your substance unto him that standeth in need; and ye will not suffer that the beggar putteth up his petition to you in vain, and turn him out to perish. Perhaps thou shalt say: The man has brought upon himself his misery; therefore I will stay my hand, and will not give unto him of my food, nor impart unto him of my substance that he may not suffer, for his punishments are just—But I say unto you, O man, whosoever doeth this the same hath great cause to repent; and except he repenteth of that which he hath done he perisheth forever, and hath no interest in the kingdom of God.
For behold, are we not all beggars? Do we not all depend upon the same Being, even God, for all the substance which we have, for both food and raiment, and for gold, and for silver, and for all the riches which we have of every kind? And behold, even at this time, ye have been calling on his name, and begging for a remission of your sins. And has he suffered that ye have begged in vain? Nay; he has poured out his Spirit upon you, and has caused that your hearts should be filled with joy, and has caused that your mouths should be stopped that ye could not find utterance, so exceedingly great was your joy.
And now, if God, who has created you, on whom you are dependent for your lives and for all that ye have and are, doth grant unto you whatsoever ye ask that is right, in faith, believing that ye shall receive, O then, how ye ought to impart of the substance that ye have one to another. And if ye judge the man who putteth up his petition to you for your substance that he perish not, and condemn him, how much more just will be your condemnation for withholding your substance, which doth not belong to you but to God, to whom also your life belongeth; and yet ye put up no petition, nor repent of the thing which thou hast done.
I say unto you, wo be unto that man, for his substance shall perish with him; and now, I say these things unto those who are rich as pertaining to the things of this world.
And again, I say unto the poor, ye who have not and yet have sufficient, that ye remain from day to day; I mean all you who deny the beggar, because ye have not; I would that ye say in your hearts that: I give not because I have not, but if I had I would give. And now, if ye say this in your hearts ye remain guiltless, otherwise ye are condemned; and your condemnation is just for ye covet that which ye have not received.
And now, for the sake of these things which I have spoken unto you—that is, for the sake of retaining a remission of your sins from day to day, that ye may walk guiltless before God—I would that ye should impart of your substance to the poor, every man according to that which he hath, such as feeding the hungry, clothing the naked, visiting the sick and administering to their relief, both spiritually and temporally, according to their wants.”
(Book of Mormon, Mosiah 4:16-26)
Getting back to the topic of this post in the first place…
I will admit that I watch Glenn Beck’s program off and on, enough to understand that the message he is trying to get across is one that is in line with what our Founding Fathers taught and not one of hate of the poor and afflicted, as some would want us to believe. I think the worst that can be said of him is that he is sometimes over the top, as are most commentators on TV, be they liberal or conservative (I mean, have you watched Olbermann or Maddow?) I would suggest that those who have called for his head are those who probably don’t watch him at all or not enough to reasonably make a judgement call as to what he actually meant. His meaning of the words “social justice,” from what I saw and read are not the same as say, Catholics would take that word compared to “Catholic social teaching” or even what Elder Faust said regarding the social equality of women. I think we have to be intelligent enough to understand that the same words can be used for different meanings and we have to give the speaker of those words the benefit of the doubt when explaining what HE meant by them, not what they were interpreted to mean by someone else.
I think this is a serious flaw in our news gathering today and in our society in general; we look for ways to attack our supposed enemies by “strain[ing] at a gnat” (pulling a couple of words and putting them into OUR context in order to discredit someone) instead of trying to “swallow the whole camel” (understand those words in the whole context of what that person actually meant) because it’s just easier to attack than try to understand and give them the benefit of the doubt that they might just want the same result as we do, but want to go about it a different way.
I would also like to believe that all of us on this forum, no matter our beliefs of how it is to be accomplished, would like to see our fellow man receive the best that our society can manage. Heaven help us to do so.
March 15th, 2010 at 7:08 pm
“The people who run the public operations have no accountability or sense of compassion, while every cook and clerk in a private non-profit is a cheerful and caring saint.”
Jose, these all or nothing statements from you are no more acceptable than what you accuse John and myself of believing. Like I said, I’ve seen some (very few, let me make that clear) people who have used gov’t programs to better their lives. And in no way did I ever say, nor did John, that those who run public operations “have no accountability or sense of compassion.” I have friends who still work for the state of Idaho, one of them my former supervisor, who is just the opposite of that sentiment. However, he would agree with me that our church welfare program is far superior to that run by the state by way of federal funds.
And yes, they are run much more efficiently than government programs. In fact, it’s not even close. Having experience with both, I can say that as a matter of fact, not as a guess. Not sure what your work/ecclesiastical experience is in welfare programs, but I’m sure of my own so I don’t have to guess.
And as far as those “cooks and clerks?” All I can go off of is my experience at our local welfare programs; farms, cannery and such. Yes, pretty much all of those volunteers are “cheeful and caring saint[s].” If they were not, they wouldn’t be there because they are CHOOSING to be there, my friend. Can’t say for programs in other churches.
March 16th, 2010 at 11:24 am
Well said, David. I’m certainly not against helping the poor, let me get that strait. And no, the “poor” certainly don’t have a monopoly on immoral behavior. However, it is interesting that obesity, for example, is much higher among the poorest segment of society in America. One would think it would be those rich bastards that would be the fattest!
And I’m not saying these government-run programs don’t help people, they do. But I think it would take someone with incredible will power to not take advantage of the system once entrenched in it for very long. I don’t think I would have the will to pull away either.
The key thing to be observed in the quote from the prophet Benjamin’s sermon in David Duke’s post above is that no one is being compelled to give to the poor. Each individual must make that decision to help someone else on their own. It is no better of a sin to compel others to give to the poor, even though it is something you think they should be doing.
As far as tax deductions and write-offs for charitable institutions: IT IS THEIR MONEY! It is not the government’s in the first place! You are acting like all our earnings, both individually and institutionally are the government’s in the first place and it somehow just lets us keep most of it. In truth it is not a “deduction” or a “write-off” but an agreement not to take money that is not being used to profit a person, church or institution in the first place. It is not a “benefit.” Their earned wealth predates government. Their right to earn wealth was here BEFORE government existed to tell them what to do with it. We do not “benefit” from the government in this case, we are only selectively relieved from its impositions.
Getting to the point made by Cheese about Wal-Mart above: They do offer affordable health insurance for all of their full-time employees. If fact, it is much better than many of the rest of us get. I have many friends and family that have and do work for Wal-Mart and they all say their health insurance is good. That said, I never said Wal-Mart or any free-market business is anywhere close to being immune to the same corruption and evils that government can be susceptible too. They just have a “closer to the ground” outside force keeping them in check called the market. The consumer “votes with their feet” much more effectively than an election process. Many of the evils conducted by business involve the government, however. As an example with Wal-Mart: A few years ago there was a big campaign to raise the minimum wage. Wal-Mart was at the fore petitioning Congress to actually raise the minimum wage! One would think they would be against it. Why not? Because the lowest-paid full-time employees of Wal-Mart in the U.S. were already making nearly double the minimum wage at the time. Wal-Mart attempted (and partly succeeded) to drive out lower-paid competition—businesses that couldn’t afford to pay their employees like Wal-Mart could. I’m not saying Wal-Mart is a paradise to work for, but if it gets too out of control it will fall, just like many of the other businesses thought to be too big to fail.
This does not mean I’m against any form of government regulation. We need laws that are adaptable to changing circumstances as they arise to keep businesses honest and humane. Unions can also be an effective method of accomplishing fair business practices, as long as the pendulum is kept from swinging too far in their favor as well. Many of today’s unions are big bureaucratic institutions about as bad, or worse, than the businesses they are attempting to “correct.”
Government, all government, is not a benign force even when it is selected by the people it governs. It is POWER! And like all power, it can be abused. It must be continually checked. History provides too many examples of the government, even at the consent of its people (Nazi Germany, for example—at least at first) using that power to oppress others within and without its jurisdiction.
March 16th, 2010 at 5:09 pm
Here’s an explanation to the tax deduction thing. The government sets an amount of money that it needs to raise through taxes. If one person pays less then another person has to pay more. Pretty simple, right? That means when the government grants a church a tax exemption then someone else has to make up for it. For every dollar that someone gives to the Catholic or Mormon Church and then claims as a deduction, then my tax burden goes up incrementally even I don’t approve of that church’s use of the funds. To paraphrase, the government is subsidizing someone’s religious beliefs, and I am stuck with the bill (along with millions of others).
As for whose money it is, I’ll remind John that it is his choice to remain a citizen of these United States. Just consider taxes a kind of user fee, or dues, whatever works. Maintaining freedom carries a price, you know. Whether or not you admit this, your annual dues help to pay for a lot of good things and probably a lot of things that you don’t think are necessary or beneficial. Me too. But compromising on the bad with the good is part of the whole enchilada. I happen to like enchiladas so I’ll stay right here. You, on the other hand, seem to cranky with a bad tummy ache so you may want to consider whether this is the right place for you. I’m serious; there’s no sense for anyone to stick around if they only want to take the goodies but not give back in return. That’s true for a church, too.
March 16th, 2010 at 7:02 pm
What’s with bringing Olbermann and Maddow into the debate? That looks suspiciously like an attempt to draw fire away from the man who attacked our nation’s churches for heeding the words of Christ. If you want to assert an equivilancy between the MSNBC duo on one side and Beck with the other right wing pontificators, please explain yourself. While it’s true that Olbermann tends to be dramatic, I’ll wager that his conspiracy warnings have more factual backing than the tin foil hat tomfoolery of Beck. And why put Ms. Maddow in the same league? Sure, she might make the Beck fans uncomfortable since she is smart, articulate, attractive, successful, and more popular with the ladies than them. But other than the fact that she is left and Beck is way out in right field, I don’t see the parallel. Whenever I’ve seen Maddow interview folks with very different political leanings, and she treats them with courtesy and allows them the opportunity to state their arguments. Beck draws curious figures on a chalkboard and spins fantastic tales with no substance. That’s being over the top?
As for whether Beck represents the Founding Fathers, that may depend on which version you uphold, the fact or the fable. If you haven’t done so yet, take the time to read McCullough’s fine biography of John Adams. In my eyes there was no other man more responsible for the success of the American independence movement and founding of our nation. While Adams was surely no ancestor of Karl Marx socialism, neither can he be upheld as a forerunner of Ayn Rand objectivism. What you will find is a man who had the intelligence and vision to see the challenges of the day and the courage and tenacity to face them. He was a man of principle but still practical enough to use whatever means necessary to invent creative solutions, even if that meant overstepping his authority to help cobble together the outline of a brand new form of government. You may well argue that Adams would be shocked at the way our nation has evolved. Perhaps, but it would surely be true that he would be shocked at many of the excesses promoted by those on the right. It’s impossible to predict how he would react, largely because the USA of the 21st century is so different from the American colonies of 250 years ago. Nonetheless, I believe that if Adams were alive today, and if he had the same context and understanding of these times, that he would be working tirelessly to remedy those problems. Sure, he would welcome and encourage the actions of private individuals to make society better. So do I. But I also believe that, given our actual situation where the choice is often between private inaction or public action, that Adams would use the institution of democratically elected government. As the Declaration of Independence says, we have:
“…certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness. That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed…”
Amen!
March 16th, 2010 at 7:37 pm
Oh, John, the things you don’t know could fill textbooks! I’m kidding. I’ve heard about this poverty-obesity link on NPR before. Poor people are generally heavier than the rest of the population, but it’s not because they’re eating more food than the rest of us. It’s a matter of quality, not quantity. People with means can afford healthy food, and due to the fact that they eat at pretty regular intervals, they eat less at each meal, knowing that they’ll have another chance to eat relatively soon. Poor people, however, truly poor people, will put off eating for sometimes days at a time, and then when they do get a chance to eat a meal, they tend to eat the cheapest, unhealthiest food on the market, and they binge eat. They splurge on those single meals, because they don’t know when the next will come, and they’ve grown hungry since the last one! Eating slower is better for your digestion; eating quickly will cause you to gain more weight. So, please, do not continue to spread this myth that poor people should logically be thinner than the rest of the population. You now know better.
You describe welfare as though it were more addictive than heroin, but unless you provide something more than anecdotal evidence, I just can buy in to it.
I haven’t read the whole Book of Morman, but I interpreted that passage to mean that God commands all people to give to those in need. Those who choose not to will be condemned. I get no sense from it that God considers it a sin to compel other people to give money to the poor; he does it himself. Plus, we have a system of courts that compel people to do the right thing every day. Who says we can’t make people do good things?
Churches may more efficient with the money they use. They don’t have to pay employees to administer their charity work, but they cannot raise enough money to help everyone who needs it. Volunteerism does not swell the ranks of the middle class; policy does. Republican policies expand the gap between the rich and poor; it’s why most rich people vote Republican and that expansion is all we’ve seen since St. Reagan. Liberal policies coupled with a progressive tax code compress that gap. Yes, this does sound like a redistribution of wealth, but all economic policy moves wealth in some direction. The real question is which direction improves the status of the nation as a whole? Republicans believe wealth should be concentrated at the top and allowed to “trickle down” in the form of wages; I think it works best if it’s funneled to the bottom first and allowed to “trickle up” to the rich.
March 17th, 2010 at 3:59 am
Cheese , I beleive your partially right about the poors eating habits. If you go to the grocery and you can purchase olive oil for 10 bucks for a liter vs a tub of off brand shortening for 5 bucks, what are you going to buy? If you can get a bag of pasta for a buck vs a can of green beans for 2 what are you going to buy? I don’t think its as much binge eating as its poor choices because of economic reasons. The bottom line is what fills you up and how much does it cost, not what’s good for you.
I do agree with you about Reagan and Bush, but you have to remember, they are the front men, its who put them in power that are responsible for overall policy.
March 17th, 2010 at 6:18 am
Couple of other things, just because your poor doesn’t mean your stupid. I’ve had guys working for me in the past that had achieved their masters yet worked for me for minimum wage. They suffered from burn out, or any of numerous reasons that basically made their education worthless. As for being poor, talk to the people that trusted Bernie Madoff. People who have lost a child or had some sort of emotional meltdown that leaves them in a state of perpetual mourning, waiting and praying to die, they have no desire to continue with this life but feel like through religion they must continue on but without any type of drive. You also have people that don’t know their poor, they are happy, loved, have employment that fulfills them, you could argue who has the best their. You guys use the term poor inn a derogatory sense and I just don’t think its an appropriate description. I would strongly suggest some of you take the time to acquaint yourself with the so called ‘poor” you label, you may be startled to find the only thing different between the two of you is money.
March 17th, 2010 at 10:15 am
First of all, José, the government should first see how much money it has collected, and then decide how to spend it. That’s the way it is done in business, home economies and everywhere else except government. Why? Because they have the guns.
People can deduct from their earnings what they are not going to personally benefit from. I have no problem with that. Except for the good feeling I get by giving 10% of my gross income to my church for it to use to help the poor and such, I derive no real benefit from it. It would be similar to the government making us do public service, like cleaning roadways or something, and then making us pay for the privilege of doing so. These churches and other recognized charitable institutions do much good and in the long run make government’s job easier by reducing the things, like crime, that government was created to regulate.
As for my U.S. citizenship, if I don’t like it here where do you suggest I go? There is still no other place on the planet more free than the good old U.S. of A. I am happy here, and as a citizen I have every right to express my views on how to improve or correct my government. I vote, so that gives me the right. I accord you the same right. But, unlike me, if you don’t get enough of the socialism you like here, you have plenty of other places to go. Sooo… why don’t YOU move, José? (Really a pointless argument in my opinion.)
Cheese, I heard that same program, or a similar one, on NPR as well. I don’t remember all the details, but they do have a point to some extent. However, the poor also buy more of the most obvious bad stuff, like Cheetoes and such, that are not necessarily cheap, but offer a cheep thrill. I’m not talking about being merely fat here, that would include me, sadly, but “obese” meaning quite excessively overweight. I don’t care how much pasta you eat, you don’t get obese without consuming excessive amounts of fats and calories. Yes, the Crisco instead of the olive oil can contribute, but not on such a scale needed. I’ve been truly poor myself (because I didn’t take government or even church assistance). I ate the cheap stuff like beans and rice and potatoes, even without butter, and I was probably healthier then, to some extent, than now. Of course I was younger with a more efficient metabolism and couldn’t afford the Slim Jims I get now.
I’m not speaking in complete ignorance here, people. I’ve dealt with and lived among the poor. Also, my siblings and other family members have done so. One brother and a close brother-in-law spent two years as a missionaries in the Philippines. They say we have no idea, not even a clue, what poverty really is here in America. My wife served her mission for our Church in Korea. She too worked and lived among poverty on a scale not seen here in the U.S. Another brother of mine served his two years in Argentina, out in the rural areas. He knew sickness and want first hand. And there are other examples, I could go on.
All of this has made them, and myself somewhat, well aware of poverty and what causes much of it, as well as what passes for “poverty” in this great nation. That same brother that went to Argentina later became a dentist like my Dad and volunteered his entire day, every Thursday, to do free dental work at a homeless shelter in Salt Lake City for years. My Dad, now that he is semi-retired and in his 80s does free, unpaid dental work for the needy at our county’s health department building two days a week. He would do more, if his health allowed. Could I be doing more? Sure. I do volunteer at my Church’s cannery for the poor from time to time, but I am struggling to feed and clothe my young family at this time.
Keep in mind folks, just because I don’t think government is the answer, does not mean I don’t think there are answers. These answers come from each individual and not through force. Although government has the responsibility to protect and defend, it does not have the right to decide for people how much they are allowed to earn or keep of what they earn. Even if the majority of the people think it is okay to regulate someone else’s earning power, like slavery did, it is still fundamentally wrong. And I think it is only fair, within the system as far as possible, to strive for such freedom.
March 17th, 2010 at 10:58 am
One other thing, Perplexed. There are surly many reasons for poverty out there. Each story is probably unique. I simply believe Churches and private charitable organizations do a better job of truly helping such persons. That does not mean government does not have a role to play in protecting the innocents, like children and the mentally and physically deficient where it is quite clear that they had no hand in their predicament. It is when the government uses its powers to “punish” the rich for being successful in the name of these in need, especially when many of these “needy” are not at all uncomfortable by the world’s standards, is where I have a problem. It all may work well for now when fairly good people are in charge of such redistribution, but what scares me is that the infrastructure is in place for whenever a Hitler or Chavéz or just some bureaucrat with a burr in his butt decides to wreak havoc with our freedoms. None of that can happen within a Church that doesn’t have guns and people are free to go to another organization at the very moment any abuse occurs.
March 17th, 2010 at 3:52 pm
Brother Caleb and I agree on many things but not in our assessment of economic systems. Caleb is the resident socialist here, not me. In fact I earned a professional degree in capitalism (aka MBA) which I value greatly. It has helped me in my career and even my personal finances. In my graduate work we studied all about capitalism, but we looked at it critically and objectively. We learned about both the advantages and disadvantages of free enterprise and of government controls. The impression that I get from John and David is that they view capitalism as an ideology, almost reverentially. Big difference.
As our saintly brothers might observe, there are some who think that government is the answer to every problem. And there are many who think that government is NEVER the solution, except perhaps for a few limited services. From a more realistic view of the world, both of those extremes are just plain wrong.
March 17th, 2010 at 6:34 pm
A number of people have commented on Glenn Beck’s attack on social justice as ministry. Many of them are people of faith who heartily disagree with Beck. (What else would you expect for them to do?) One such critic is Jim Wallis, the evangelical Christian who founded Sojourners magazine. Wallis has been an advocate for social issues for decades so it’s only natural that he began a public conversation on the matter. When Beck backpeddled a bit on his attacks, Wallis gave him credit but continued to pursue the topic.
Wallis says to Beck:
“Now that you’re willing to admit that social justice is more than just a code word, we have a wonderful opportunity for the two of us to sit down together and have an open and public discussion on what social justice really means…Why don’t we do that, on your show, or in some other venue. And let’s make this a civil dialogue…”
Glenn Beck replies on his radio show:
“So Jim, I just wanted to pass this on to you. In my time I will respond — my time, well, kind of like God’s time, might be a day, might be a week to you, I’m not sure. But I’m going to get to it in my time, not your time. So you go ahead and you continue to do your protest thing, and that’s great. I love it. But just know — the hammer is coming, because little do you know, for eight weeks, we’ve been compiling information on you, your cute little organization, and all the other cute little people that are with you. And when the hammer comes, it’s going to be hammering hard and all through the night, over and over…”
Will any of Beck’s apologists care to comment, and perhaps clarify what he meant to say?
March 18th, 2010 at 9:07 am
I don’t know exactly what Glenn is saying here, José, I don’t watch him that much, and I’ve never listened to his radio show. I suspect that Beck’s staff, made up of hundreds of researchers and investigators, I hear, has uncovered some dirt on Wallis’ organization that may counter Wallis’ claims that social justice is not the code word Glenn said it was.
Again, I think the code word Glenn means is that these Churches campaign and spend money on getting the government to force people to do more for “social justice” (whatever their idea of social justice might be), rather than doing direct work with the victims of whatever they perceive to be injustice themselves. They get a warm fuzzy feeling by this without actually doing or sacrificing themselves down in the trenches to help and inspire the needy. That’s my take on it. If that is what Glenn means, than he has a point. As a rule, I think Churches should steer clear of trying to unduly influence social policy through government (I know, I know, there is the pesky Prop. 8 thing) and focus their efforts of doing the work in their own communities or wherever they can themselves. Many organizations, including Churches, try to grasp more power than they actually have. It is frustrating to not be able to do more for your “cause,” and the power of government and law is a tempting avenue to get your ideas disseminated. Problem is there are others with pesky contrary ideas that may want to do the same thing.
I think what Beck is getting at is that many Churches wrap themselves in the “flag” of doing God’s work when it is always possible that they may not be doing so. I don’t deny them the freedom to do so, just like the Mormons with Prop. 8, but one should be cautious they don’t end up supporting a program through their church that they may not agree with. Beck was probably a bit over the top in his statement, but he has a point. I can imagine it would be hard to be on the air as much as he is and not make some imperfectly stated arguments from time to time. I’VE certainly never done that. Maybe I should start my own show.
March 18th, 2010 at 6:15 pm
“I suspect that Beck’s staff, made up of hundreds of researchers and investigators, I hear, has uncovered some dirt on Wallis’ organization that may counter Wallis’ claims that social justice is not the code word Glenn said it was.”
I honestly do not understand what that is attempting to say and it sure doesn’t seem to justify Beck’s response. Wallis is asking– begging, in fact– for a open and honest discussion about social justice and the church. What is very clear is that Beck and his staff are threatening Wallis on something other than the issue at hand. His behavior is hardly a model of decency according to my way of thinking. Understand that Beck isn’t getting in trouble for saying things imperfectly. He’s being called to account for saying imperfect things, which is that people should abandon their churches because of his nutty prejudices. Beck cannot be excused for a slip of the tongue or a careless phrase when he basically stands by his original statements. Instead of making personal attacks he could explain or correct his comments but so far he has rejected the opportunity. Instead of having his supporters interpret his bizarre statements, why should not Beck himself do so?
Here’s more of Beck, speaking of Congress and the proposed healthcare legislation:
“Here is a group of people that have so perverted our faith and our hope and our charity, that is a– this is an affront to God.”
Maybe in his religion, but many Christians favor passing the measure. They notably include the vast majority of Catholic nuns in America, most Catholic hospitals in America, the Catholic Health Association, and the National Catholic Reporter. (A smaller but nonetheless influential group which calls itself the US Conference of Catholic Bishops opposes the bill.)
March 19th, 2010 at 11:07 am
I’m not sure exactly what aspect of the health care bill Glenn is referring to in the instance of the “Here is a group… ” quote above. I would like to get the whole thing in context. There are surly parts of the bill that I think are an assault on true freedom and personal accountability, in which case I believe it is an affront to God. I know, I know, you’ll say, “How is helping the needy an affront to God?” My answer is that it is not the “helping the needy” part but HOW you help the needy. I’ve explained this all before, but I’m afraid it will continue to be lost on someone who thinks the government has the “right” to declare how much I’m able to earn or keep of what I’ve worked for. I mean, who gave the government that “right” anyway? And did they have that “right” to give in the first place? I certainly can’t tell my neighbor what to do with his earnings, but somehow electing a government to do so makes it okay?
I’m sure these Catholic groups have full “religious” reasons for favoring or opposing the bill. So does Glenn Beck. It’s a matter of different sets of morals and which morals you choose to allow to trump other morals. You, José, I surmise, value equality more than freedom, I and Glenn Beck value freedom more than equality. This is in line with Mormon theology. You see, me and Glenn believe in a pre-mortal existence where a great war was fought between the followers of God’s plan for mortal life, where we would all have free agency to choose between good and bad and abide by the consequences of those choices both in mortality and beyond, and Lucifer’s plan where all would be forced to choose the right and there would be no suffering and all would be brought back to God’s presence. Satan (Lucifer) and 1/3 of the “hosts of heaven” were cast out in this battle and are now here trying to enslave the human race in the opposite direction by influencing us to suppress choice and free agency. And they have been pretty damn successful at it over the centuries. For the first time in human history true and stable enough freedom had finally been achieved with the American Revolution and the other revolutions that incrementally preceded it and the many that followed. This has allowed God’s Church to finally be permanently established again in these last days, again according to Mormon theology.
You don’t have to believe any of this, but please understand where Glenn Beck is coming from. And there are many who agree with him, most of which are outside the Mormon faith, but have a similar reverence for freedom. The health care bill as in now stands and many of the ideas of “social justice” are an affront to the sacred choices that we must make in this mortal life. God WILL NOT FORCE us to do the right thing, ever. When we force others we are not following His plan but Satan’s, and that will inevitably fail and lead to tyranny in the name of “justice.” Would I love to have “free” health care? Sure! But, I will never learn to be truly responsible for my actions when I force my neighbors to pay for it. I have a brother-in-law that is self-employed and claims he cannot “afford” health insurance for his kids, and yet he goes and buys his wife a $40,000 SUV that she didn’t need, has a home much larger than he needs, and buys a new and bigger work truck every year. The TRUTH is he simply does not want to buy health insurance.
Most, if not all of us, will choose pleasures over responsibilities every time if we were not influenced by the harsh realities of this mortal and corruptible world. Ever see the movie Wall-E? The writer’s, typical of Hollywood, blame big business corporations for the lazy and fat people on the spaceship that left planet Earth. I think it would be much, much more plausible that a government would be to blame for such irresponsibility among the masses. Corporations have competition and multiple variables to keep them in check. The government simply has raw power, if we choose to give it such.
Minimal regulations to ensure honesty and fair play are fine. But here is the problem most advocates of “social justice” don’t seem to ever come to terms with: Competition is absolutely inseparable with free agency, and competition by its very nature, if it is pure, is always, always, always “unfair.” At any given moment there will be “haves” and “have-nots.” Everyone in this life needs to be constantly looking over his shoulder to see if he is doing the right thing. If everyone is doing this, all will be getting ahead in the long run. We have jumped thousands of years ahead in development in the last couple centuries in a major part because we’ve had the freedom to do so. The industrial revolution, for instance, could never occur under the structure of the the Roman Empire. There have been many false starts in ancient and medieval China and elsewhere, but the government, or the raw power of it, always put them down.
Getting back to Beck’s reaction to Wallis’ offer of an “olive branch:” Beck is implying that Wallis is being misleading from the get-go and that such a discussion must be predicated on an honest base of facts. Glenn Beck may very well meet and discuss “social justice” issues with Wallis, and I hope it happens, but if Wallis has mislead us on what he really means by “social justice” then Glenn feels he needs to set that record strait first, and he may not have all the facts verified satisfactorily at this moment. Once the grounding has been established and the “spin” as stopped, according to Glenn, then they may meet. Glenn is certainly not immune to “spin” himself, but it is his show and he is not going to give Wallis a platform to declare what Beck feels to be inaccuracies. That’s my take on it anyway.
March 19th, 2010 at 2:37 pm
Jose notes: “A smaller but nonetheless influential group which calls itself the US Conference of Catholic Bishops opposes the bill.” They also opposed bills extending the statute of limitations on childhood sexual abuse; they’re protecting home and hearth. Remember, this is the bunch that propogated the so-called Dallas statement on childhood sexual abuse, which did nothing but whitewash the coverup.
March 19th, 2010 at 5:26 pm
Glenn Beck is a tool. His ridiculous statements (“progressivism is a cancer”) and his bogus conspiracy theories are not meant to educate and inform. They’re meant solely to demonize the left and scapegoat them as the source of all the nation’s problems. Instead of hosting an honest debate about issues, Beck castigates liberals, misrepresents their positions, and invents stories that place them behind every awful moment in history. His goal is to empower the right by making people hate the left. He is a sower of discord, he is working to divide this country, and he is a tool.
March 20th, 2010 at 4:56 am
Cheese, you are right about Beck being a tool. His purpose is to generate controversy that gets viewer ratings. His rhetoric has bearing only on his ratings, otherwise he wouldn’t be on TV, the same with Nancy Grace. Shock TV sells for now.
March 20th, 2010 at 6:34 am
It’s been said that peace is not just the absence of war. Similarly, freedom means something other than the absence of legal mandates and restrictions.
Our founders understood this. As quoted previously, they affirmed in the Declaration of Independence that we humans have rights– pretty broad ones, actually– and that government is charged with securing those rights. Now that’s really interesting. They could have stated first that government is supposed to butt out of our lives but instead they said something very different, that government is a part of the order of our society.
FDR understood this. In 1941 we Americans continued to suffer from the Great Depresssion and we watched anxiously from across the ocean as World War II began. In his address to Congress and the American people the President identified what he called “four essential human freedoms”:
- freedom of speech and expression
- freedom of worship
- freedom from want
- freedom from fear
You’ll recognize the first two, of course, from the first amendment to our Constitution. What FDR goes on to explain is that the latter two are not just beneficial on their own merits but are also protective measures for preserving our way of life, that “Life, Liberty, and Pursuit of Happiness” stuff that is so prominent in the Preamble to the Declaration.
Now this is quite different from the concept of freedom attributed to Beck as divined by John. Any good Libertarian would be comfortable with that “go it alone” philosophy. So would Marie Antoinette, who was happy to encourage the hungry masses to eat food that they were denied because of social injustices.
Paradoxically, many of the laws in our country are restrictions that help to keep us free. I for one will choose freedom that is secured by the community of citizens working together with the machine of democratic government. You may continue to worship the so-called freedom that comes from worshipping individualism.
March 20th, 2010 at 2:28 pm
Well said, Jose. There’s a reason that FDR will go down in history as our greatest president.
March 21st, 2010 at 9:38 pm
Guys, unlike freedom of worship or speech, the freedom from want and fear are not found in our constitution, unless you wish to stretch the “general welfare” clause through simple linguistics beyond anything it was ever intended. FDR took upon himself power that was never his nor could ever be granted to him by the electorate, because they didn’t have it to give him in the first place. This is the very definition of tyranny. We could give the government stewardship over freedom of worship and freedom of speech BECAUSE WE ALREADY HAD THOSE RIGHTS. Freedom from want or fear are not inalienable rights. How about pain? Does the government or even you or I have the power, by whatever means we choose, to eliminate all pain? What about death? Is freedom from death an “inalienable” right? God never granted us freedom from want or fear. In fact, we’re supposed to “fear” God. Evolutionarily speaking, a healthy fear was essential to our species’ survival. “By the sweat of thy brow, thou shalt earn thy bread all the days of thy life,” God said to Adam. What, other than hunger, would motivate Adam to do the sweating?
Nobody disputes the greatness of Abraham Lincoln or George Washington. But, after nearly three quarters of a century, FDR is still considered by many to be one of the worst presidents in U.S. history. We are still battling over the fundamentals of some of his policies in many arenas. He instigated a massive power-grab by government that we are still grappling with almost every day today. There was a time when politics and party didn’t play much of a role in people’s daily lives. Since FDR the general public has had to be constantly in the fray of government either overstepping its bounds into their lives or becoming so dependent on it that they would be at a loss as to what to do with their lives if government were to ever step back.
You see, freedom of worship and speech are also relatively easy to define. Granted with occasional gray areas. But “fear” and “want” are much more ambiguous. My daughter has an unreasonable fear of spiders, I don’t. Should the government “free” her from that fear? And make me pay for doing so, especially when I think the fear is stupid? Last time I checked, nobody actually starved to death during the Great Depression. And I’ve never heard of anyone actually starving to death on the streets today, though it was and is certainly possible. Now, if this is my definition of “want” (the actual starving to death), and I’m not saying it is, who the hell are you to tell me I’m wrong? Most people, of course, wouldn’t go to such an extreme definition, but what about the “poor” neighbor who is in “want” of more cable channels, or a better car? Want and fear are quite relative, speech and worship are not.
You can put the government in charge of policing speech and worship rights because you have those rights WITHOUT HAVING TO EARN THEM OR DO ANYTHING TO RETAIN THEM. You were born with them. You cannot but the government in charge of satiating your hunger or making the scary decisions you must make in life. Once you step too far out of these bounds, you enter such a field of arbitrariness that fights ensue over “free” school lunch programs and “corporate welfare” grants that should never have anything to do with a public that just wanted freedom.
March 22nd, 2010 at 10:27 am
All I can say to that right wing diatribe, John, is first, take a breath. The sky is (probably) not falling.
Second, you have a rather rosy view of the great depression for someone who didn’t live through it. I didn’t, either, but I grew up with people who not only did, but in the case of my grandfather, who’d been county judge of our county throughout most of it, someone who was in charge of the “relief” efforts, as they were called. Your rhetoric rather reminds me of that of the Holocaust-deniers. I suppose as each generation passes on, we lose some of the wisdom and experiences of the past.
I grew up with real stories about how FDR’s governmental programs helped real people. And I am old enough to remember seeing the pictures of FDR on the walls of poor people’s houses all over my home county. I went to the schools that Kennedy’s and Johnson’s anti-poverty programs created. It is easy to mock poor people from a position of comfort and privilege, but it’s a little harder when you’re on the ground with them.
March 22nd, 2010 at 11:04 am
Well, I grew up with a lot of survivors of the Great Depression as well. My grandparents, like yours, were raising their young families right through it. They were as poor as the rest of them, and they all had a different take on it than you. Not everything FDR did was bad, likewise not everything Abraham Lincoln did was good, but I’ll tell you this, if someone took my neighbor’s “extra” cow and gave it to me while convincing me it was all legal-like and morally right, I’d have his portrait on my wall as well. I’d probably have candles lit under it too.
Oh, one of the candles just went out on my shrine to Ronald Reagan. I’ll have to continue this later.
March 22nd, 2010 at 11:21 am
I don’t know of any pictures of Ronald Reagon on any poor people’s walls, though the rich seem to love him, though why I don’t know; he was no more conservative than I am, and considerably less so. He was a good actor, though, which I suppose fooled the masses.
March 22nd, 2010 at 12:41 pm
“They [big business and its allies] are unanimous in their hatred for me, and I welcome their hatred.” FDR, 1936
A man is known by who his enemies are, and I’ll take those of FDR over those of any other politician who ever lived.
March 23rd, 2010 at 9:44 am
Yup, big businesses and especially their allies (me?) are the most evil conception ever devised my man or devil. FDR should be deified for standing up to those hell-spawned bastards, because we all know FDR was God’s own embodiment of all virtue.
March 23rd, 2010 at 9:45 am
Just ask Eleanor.
March 23rd, 2010 at 1:19 pm
That reminds me of a comparison one used to read, John.
It was the tale of two leaders. One was rather Mormon-like in his daily habits. He didn’t smoke, didn’t drink, and was a vegetarian. Whether he drank caffeine, I don’t know. He passed rules against indoor smoking because he feared the effects of second-hand smoke fifty years before such laws went into effect in the US. He was widely supported by business leaders in his country, and built up a government that was the envy of the world in its new construction, its military might, and its people’s love for him.
The other was a rat. He smoked two packs of cigarettes a day, drank most of a quart of gin every night, constantly played poker and had numerous extramarital affairs. He was accused by his country of being a traitor to his class, and put programs in place that the business leaders of his nation said would bankrupt it. He allowed his nation’s military to decline to the point that many felt it couldn’t defend itself.
The first leader was Hitler, and the second was FDR. I know which one I’d take, virtue, vice, and all.
March 23rd, 2010 at 2:58 pm
The only reason I mentioned FDR was because of his famous speech which defined the Four Freedoms. This was to expand upon the discussion of what freedom really means. In reply to the rather simplistic and naive comments of others I offered this observation:
“Freedom means something other than the absence of legal mandates and restrictions.”
That’s an interesting proposition and I was hoping for some kind of a mature and intelligent response. Silly me.
The facts surround FDR’s personal life may be tittlating to some but it’s hardly pertinent to the topic at hand, which was Glenn Beck and his comments about social justice. Beck linked social justice to Nazis and Communists, and by extension he maligned many good churches in our country. We do not need Beck’s fans to hypothesize what he really meant. We deserve to have Beck explain himself. Beck needs to apologize or else make plain to the world that he is an ignorant and dangerous agent of lies.
John has grumped about Mormons being singled out unfairly. He is correct that it happens too often. In this case, however, Beck has made serious charges about American churches and therefore his own religious beliefs are relevant. Given that Beck has earned the title of Most Listened to Mormon in America, one hopes that the Latter Day Saints will see fit to distance themselves from his wild accusations by issuing statements which uphold their commitment to social justice.
As for Roosevelt, it is worth noting that he was much more familiar with Communists and Nazis than Mr. Beck. Certainly one of the major achievements of his presidency was that he understood the threat of fascism, unlike many of his political opponents from the right. FDR helped to sustain the British before our entry to war, and he successfully and energetically prosecuted the war to his dying day. No other American leader was as fiercely anti-Nazi while simultaneously such a strong advocate of social justice. Beck ought to be ashamed for conjuring up rumors that social justice means Nazism.
March 23rd, 2010 at 3:51 pm
Not only that Jose, but the only reason that we don’t have either a Communist or Nazi government in America today is because FDR’s reforms, however unpalatable they may have been to the rich, were what kept us a democracy when so many other nations fell to either Communism or Fascism in the ’30s. Remember, the US Communist Party had its greatest vote ever in 1932. There might well have been a peasants’ revolt if the Republicans had won in 1932, because of the discontent over government policy.
March 23rd, 2010 at 4:17 pm
Funny that you should mention that. When contemplating FDR’s greatest achievements I came up with three things. Standing up to world fascism and managing the war effort is an obvious one. The other two are things that did NOT happen because of the President’s efforts. The banking and securities infrastructure did not completely fail, due in part to things like the FDIC and the SEC. And we did not have a populist revolution, overthrowing the democratically elected government. As you say, Communism was uncomfortably popular with the disenfranchised at that time. FDR comforted and calmed the public in a way that his predecessor did not. If you don’t like the social programs that soothed and fed the public, you dang sure wouldn’t like one of the very real alternatives.
March 23rd, 2010 at 5:53 pm
Spare us the high-minded rebukes, Jose. We don’t need to be nagged about how your naive expectations of mature and intelligent responses are not being realized. This isn’t a book club; it’s the internet. Attention spans are short. If you want others to discuss a specific point that you feel is poignant, timely, and interesting, then focus solely on it and cut the fluff. No one is going to comb through everything you say and discuss each and every point you make. It just isn’t going to happen. If your “what freedom is not” comment was so important to you, then you should have limited yourself to it and saved FDR for later (or at least come back to it after discussing FDR). Nobody remembers what you say first; they remember what you say most often and last. If the responses you receive here are too simplistic and naive, then feel “free” to take your comments elsewhere.
March 23rd, 2010 at 6:02 pm
I think John is wrong when he says that the “provide for the general Welfare” clause in the Constitution could not be logically extended to include providing a social safety net for the less fortunate. But I think he makes a good point that government cannot provide us the right to be free of want and fear. Want and fear are emotions that exist solely within our own minds. The government can’t regulate our desires or suspicions.
March 23rd, 2010 at 8:34 pm
Cheese, there are several things in blogging that particularly irk me. Two of them can be found above– immature tantrums, and the logical fallacy known as the false dichotomy. It’s not so much that an interesting argument was ignored as the fact that someone wasted time and effort to fill up space with a childish fit. We are grownups and we can be better than that, even when freewheeling on a blog.
This is Frank’s forum to moderate as he sees fit, and if Frank allows John the freedom to fly off the handle like that then so be it. At the same time I am free to call John out for his poor behavior, just as I might to a neighbor’s child. And of course you are free to scold me.
March 24th, 2010 at 11:12 am
Well, glad it’s still a free country. At the moment anyway.
I don’t see how my “fits” are any more “childish” than anyone else’s here. I could make the same claims about your views that I happen to disagree with.
Glenn Beck explained in detail what he means by the code word of “social justice” on his show Monday and before that. If you care to watch this show or a follow-up one, I’m sure you can find them on the Net. After watching the whole show and getting a clear idea of what he means, then we can talk. You don’t have to agree with him, but you need to know his position clearly if you choose to malign him. Otherwise you just look like a fool.
I don’t like the way this whole discussion is going, and I’m to blame as much as anyone. I don’t look upon any of you as my enemy, I just have a differing, but still valid, point of view. That said, I’m not against a “safety net” or the goals of many government programs. I’m really only against social engineering. I don’t believe any person or group of people is capable of taking into account and analyzing all factors in every situation of pain or want or any other negative aspect of life we all deal with. Therefore, when action is needed (truly needed) it is best handled by those “on the ground.” If all politics is local, all “relief” should be local as much as possible. Social “injustice” is always relative, in my opinion. One person’s definition may be, “Are you going to starve to death?” and another’s may be, “Oh, you have to go to a local community college because you can’t afford or are not smart enough to go to Harvard. How sad.” To make these often faulty assessments government interferes too much with personal lives and responsibilities, in my opinion. You may feel differently. In some ways our two views are mutually exclusive, and therefore I feel the need to fight for what I feel is right. If this offends you, I’m sorry, really. I don’t wish cause anger, but I will defend what I feel is right. Otherwise, there really is no point to all this, at least for me.
March 24th, 2010 at 12:56 pm
John, my only problem with your views is that they’re based on a rather sugar-coated view of the past, and of the motives of those you would entrust with our wellbeing today. Nothing personal was meant.
March 26th, 2010 at 11:17 am
I would like to clarify my statement about “general welfare” in the Constitution. The key word in this phrase is “general.” It does not state “individual” welfare. Congress the the Federal government needs to avoid extending direct aid to individuals—not that they couldn’t help individuals, but the loss of individual liberty and the establishing of direct influence to an entity only charged with the general welfare of the states would be an unwise concentration of power. The individual, family, community, region, and state need to take care of matters of aid or relief IN THAT ORDER before petitioning the Federal government.
Almost all of human misery in world history, when it was caused by man, was the product of a concentration of power, whether in the person of a king or warlord, or even in an elected parliament that takes upon itself to “fix” too many things that are really not their responsibility.
March 26th, 2010 at 11:21 am
And what about the concentration of power in a few big businesses, John. Is that a good thing? Apparently not, given that the few large businesses who control the investment markets have fairly effectively wrecked our economy, all without any help from the government.
And that’s the problem with conservative thought when you get down to it. It extols the virtues of private business, when private business has created almost all the ills of our modern society.
March 26th, 2010 at 12:50 pm
“Without any help from the government.” Oh, I beg to differ! A sizable cause of the current financial crisis was the explosion in the housing market a few years ago brought on by two government-backed agencies, Fannie and Freddie, that would buy up almost literally any loan, no matter how bad. All the banks profited big-time, for awhile, by making unreliable and risky loans and then pawning them off onto these pseudo-private entities for a profit. Eventually, the “bundling” of potential bad debt with stable debt that was the goal of the government to make it easier for risky debtors to get into home ownership (a noble idea, of course) backfired by causing an artificial market that escalated the housing market beyond sustainability. If the government would stop trying to manipulate the markets in the first place, always in the name of the less fortunate, we would not have had much of the problem we are dealing with now.
Unlike the government, none of these “big businesses” have an absolute power over their markets. Except where monopolies are granted by the government. If they do, like Standard Oil did about 100 years ago, it is safe to bet they are doing something illegal, or at least extremely shady, like Standard Oil certainly was. As much as you despise Walmart, there is still a K-mart and Target out there. There will always be a Lowe’s to the Home Depot, a Macintosh to a Window computer, if there is no artificial protection or manipulation. That is the nature of a critical mass competitive environment. It’s called a free market and it’s a beautiful thing. Regulation and laws are necessary, of course, to keep businesses honest and to ensure the field is always open to all, but anything beyond that will artificially favor one over another and will lead to amplifying rather than leveling the ups and downs of the natural business cycle. Government thinks it can do a rain dance to make it always rain, not taking into account the need for a dry parching sunshine at times.
This all does not preclude unions or a “safety net.” These, however, need to be also “environmentally driven” as much as possible and are therefore most effectively handled on the local level.
March 26th, 2010 at 2:01 pm
John, buddy, you just don’t get it, do you? I realize that conservatives want to blame everything, even the sins of big business, on the Democrats, but here it just doesn’t wash. I used to do consumer bankruptcies, and the things that lenders allow people to use their credit cards for is a disgrace, and as far as I know not required or condoned by any form of federal law. It’s interesting that you blame the excesses of these lenders on regulation, but the lenders themselves are fighting tooth and nail against any type of legislation that would make them toe the line, and are scared to death that Obama will appoint Elizabeth Warren, of Harvard Law School, as the new consumer finance czar, because she’s smart, aggressive, and understands their business methods. Big business can stand anything but being required to be honest, and no doubt they’ll scream like a stuck pig when we make them accountable.
The economic crisis was caused by far more than consumer mortgages, and most of what caused it had nothing to do with government regulation. Certainly credit swaps, and paying big bonuses to brokers who churned accounts are practices that were not fostered by any type of regulation; quite the opposite. John, admit it: Big business and the concentration of power it represents is just as bad as power concentrated in the hands of government, and probably worse, because most of us work for and have most of our transactions with private businesses, not the government. I never thought I’d say this, but this whole discussion makes that crazy old Barry Goldwater, who at least had the honesty to decry concentrations of power in private hands as well as public hands, as tyranny. Of course, he was ready to blow up the world, too, so maybe we shouldn’t entirely go there.
March 26th, 2010 at 5:00 pm
Aahh, Barry is a saint of the highest order. I’m sure he’s earned his wings by now while FDR still has a few more centuries of shoveling brimstone for what he did with our gold market, among other things. But I digress. I agree that regulations are necessary, especially when it comes to consumer debt. These laws should always be preventative and in reaction to the creative and deceitful ways of the lenders, but not proactive in the way they try to “help” borrowers purchase a home outside their affordable range. Don’t get me wrong, my wife and I made a killing on our home in Las Vegas six years ago when we moved to Utah. Our house there appreciated by more than 33 percent each year for the four years we lived in it. I said at the time of the sell that something was not right here, but hey, I’ll take the money! Our sell almost didn’t go through because the people buying our house had trouble getting the credit. Turns out that their real estate agent and bank bent every rule they could to get them in (it was so lucrative for them somehow, you see). If I wasn’t the greedy bastard of a conservative that I am I would have called the whole thing off, saying it wasn’t morally right. But, what’cha gonna do? Umm… don’t answer that.
The bank had a guaranteed buyer of this bad loan. And despite all the heaps of regulations already in place, when the incentive is corrupted by a force outside and above the checks of the market, they will always find a way around the regs. If the banks stood to loose their shirts if a loan goes bad (as they would in an unhindered natural market), they would have been much more careful, and we would still be living in that tiny house in Vegas. But, Big Brother was there to rescue them, on both ends it turns out. Credit swaps and the like used to hide risk and debt, along with payoffs for brokering such deals need to be tightly monitored, especially when such transactions actually create money put produce nothing. The government has every right to police business practices to keep them honest.
Anyway, we’re arguing in circles here. I don’t think either of us wants to necessarily “stick it” to anyone. We both want a fair and just world. We just seem to have opposite ways of approaching it.