Abortion and Red Herrings

Before we even get into it, I want to highlight a few things that are important:

A Super-Cute Newborn

I know that life situations can be very hard, sexual problems can be intensely difficult, unplanned/unwanted pregnancies will often change lives drastically, and that many people seeking abortions are hurting in big ways; they need help. I have committed my life to the service of Jesus Christ and, therefore, to the service of other people. I am quite interested in helping people, but not all “help” helps. Because I follow Jesus and try to live according to his Word, the Bible, I firmly maintain that abortion IS murder and should be illegal, punished just like any other murder. The modern/current discussions surrounding abortion are, like a freshly brewed mug of coffee, almost always too hot to hold for very long. I am not interested in the heat, but I am interested in reasoned, substantive and honest discussion. Mostly, I’m interested in ministering to and helping people in a moral, Christ-honoring (and therefore helpful) way.

Okay, let’s get into it. Any casual observer of pro-abortion polemics would think that rape and incest are two major factors leading to a goodly number abortions. In fact, if we add those two reasons to the big mama, the life/health of the mother, we have the three-legged foundation of a “reasonable” approach to keeping abortion “safe and legal.”

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Emotions and Gun Laws

Can We Discuss This?

At the risk of beating the same drum (I’m no John Henry Bonham), I want to post another little ditty on the issue of gun control. In a word, this post is a plea for some clearheaded thinking in the discussion.

The furthest thing from clearheaded thinking would be insanity; politics is full of insanity. As it comes to this issue, there are plenty on the right side of the aisle who simply chant (read: scream), “FROM MY COLD, DEAD HANDS!” It’s hard to have a clearheaded discussion with someone who simply screams a mantra back in your face. On the other side of the aisle, we have some who view firearms as items just waiting to kill (note that they will almost never say murder) someone. It’s hard to have a clearheaded discussion with someone who is filled with both irrational fears and “righteous” indignation. What I’m saying, here, is that both sides paint each other as unreasonable and, to some degree, both sides are correct in that assessment. This unfortunate reality will stop the discussion from moving forward. It will not, however, stop public policy from moving forward.

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The Logic of Gun Laws

AR-15

I don’t pretend to be a specialist or to have any sort of extensive knowledge in this (or any) area. I’ll admit to being a gun enthusiast. Like most things that I’m enthusiastic about, I’ve read a little about guns and crime. I consider the unspeakable tragedies of late to be wicked, debased, and utterly odious. I have been (both in private and in pubic) in prayer for the families of the victims of the recent shootings. These were not “killings”; they were murders. So, hopefully nothing in this post is misconstrued. As one who very recently lost a child, I can sympathize with our countrymen in Connecticut and here in Oregon, too. These tragedies necessarily bring up questions about how these sorts of tragedies can be stopped. That is a worthy and necessary discussion. Let’s have that discussion honestly and without rancor.

Nearly 100% of the population in our country wants to stop these vicious murders in malls, schools, and the like.

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Homo ‘Marriage’ and Christians

Dr. D.G. Hart

A good friend of mine told me to get a load of D.G. Hart’s post… you should get a load of it, too. If you don’t read it, this post won’t make much sense. However, if you do read it, this post may still not make sense… let’s see.

For those of you who do not know Dr. Hart, he’s a stud. I read Recovering Mother Kirk in seminary, and I loved it. He’s a wonderful historian. I have enjoyed his work on American Presbyterianism and on Machen. I have wanted to read his work on Nevin for a number of years, but evidently not bad enough to do so. So, when we’re dealing with Hart, we’re dealing with an accomplished scholar, a seminary professor, and an ordained elder in the Orthodox Presbyterian Church. The man even smokes tobacco. Not. Too. Shabby.

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GOP: Look in the Mirror

Having just got my first cup o’ coffee this morning, I was met by The Oregonian, which proclaimed: “Conservatives: With a bad election hangover, Republicans are taking a long look in the mirror”. The author of this article, William Douglas, quoted a former GOP political director in Iowa as saying, “The biggest problem isn’t President Obama. It’s ourselves.” This is, no doubt, true. It can, however, be pushed in the wrong direction. This Republican self-assessment has all the potential to go horribly wrong.

Let’s face it: the GOP took it in the shorts on Tuesday. Why? Was our candidate not “centrist” enough? Did his policies and plans not have “broad enough appeal” to the American people? Should the GOP’s naval-gazing end up producing  some new candidates who “better reflect the diversity of the American population”? In other words, should the GOP become more like the nation? OR… OR… OR should the GOP actually attempt to lead this nation?

Grab your socks and hose and pull – we should expect our leaders to lead. When they give up leadership and exchange it for buying votes, when they leave off principles and speak only of pragmatics (which, ironically, seem not to work), they deserve nothing but to be thrown out and trampled underfoot by men. Those trampling men, when that job is done, should turn to their party and insist upon a candidate who will lead their country.

What are historic Republican principles? Let’s just start with economic and civil liberties and political freedom with limited government under the rule of law. How have the past number of GOP presidential candidates worn these principles? I don’t pretend to be an expert in this, but take Bush (41), Bob Dole, Bush (43), McCain, and Romney as your test group. These are the leaders of the GOP for the past quarter century. What do you think? Do these men tend to represent the increasingly liberal, egalitarian, and “pragmatic” society of the United States, or do they tend to represent those strong, old, historic Republican principles?

When we Republicans (that’s right, WE – I’m one of us) look in the mirror, I hope we see what we once were, I hope we find our lost principles, and I hope we, then, clearly see what we have to offer to our country. I hope we can BE Republicans and thus lead our country.

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America… The Hope of the Earth

So, presidential hopeful and devout polytheist, Mitt Romney, declared twice in his closing statement in tonight’s final presidential debate, that America is the hope of the earth. I ask you, as a Christian, what in the hell could that possibly mean that is in any way Christian?

Romney might be a devout polytheist, but he’s nowhere near a devout Christian based upon that repeated remark. In the first place, polytheism isn’t quite Christian.

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Biden on Abortion

I made a couple of comments on FB toward the end of the Vice-Presidential debate the other night. The comments have been very interesting. One fairly common notion came up in a discussion of abortion and legislation. (Please note: ordinarily I prefer to call “abortion” by what it properly is, that is, the wholesale murder of helpless infants, but I will use the accepted euphemism of “abortion” in this post. It’s nice how we can use words as smoke screens to disguise abject atrocity and out-and-out bloodletting.) This common notion, which is, I think, an obvious fallacy, is that one should never impose one’s morality on other people by way of public legislation.

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Romney a Plutocrat? Or Bodacious Politicin’

So, I’m on record that I’m not a fan of Mitt. For what it’s worth, I’m hardly a fan of the GOP, and I loathe the Democratic Party. Alright, then, there are some of my cards on the table. I don’t publish this as a defense of Mitt or the GOP. I publish it because it is a clear illustration of common political speak, or, to put it another way, bald-faced lying.

A number of days ago, Mitt had hisself a “gaffe” – take a look-see (don’t worry, it’s a short video!). Now, when I heard Mitt, I couldn’t disagree with him. The reasons are that 1) what he’s saying is true, and 2) it’s simply dye-in-the-wool, historic Republican talk. I, therefore, like it.

Here’s the rub: political pundits get this into their hands and mold it into something entirely other than what it is. Jonathan Chait of New York (a magazine I do not read, but the name of a city that I love) wants to pretend that Romney’s words reveal something about him that Chait didn’t already know, something far more sinister than was expected. Check out his little article. Chait, working himself into an amusing little frenzy, unloads thusly: “Here is the sneering plutocrat, fully in thrall to a series of pernicious myths that are at the heart of the mania that has seized his party. He believes that market incomes in the United States are a perfect reflection of merit.” What do Mitt’s comments have ANYTHING to do with Chait’s? Chait is simply making it up as he goes along. One can almost hear him foaming at the mouth.

This is how politics seems to go. Maybe Romney is a plutocrat. Maybe he does think that market incomes in the US are a perfect reflection of merit. Maybe Chait is correct. What is certain is that none of those things could be ascertained from Romney’s “gaffe.” Chait’s just engaging in some bodacious politicin’. It might be par for the course, but it’s still odious.

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Clinton’s Shell Game

You don’t have to watch more than eight minutes into this video to hear President Bill Clinton say that, in the last 52 years, the American economy has produced 66 million private-sector jobs. “So, what’s the score? Republicans 24 million; Democrats 42.” What’s a poor soul to do with this overwhelming fact? Does Democratic policy really foster the free market and the private sector? I think not.

It doesn’t take a degree in political science to know how these two parties view the growth of jobs in the private sector. One party (at least in its pure and historic form) favors lower taxation to allow private investing and growth. This might be termed a “natural” growth of private-sector jobs. The other party tends to work “with the government” to create jobs. That is, they create stimulus packages and the like to throw public money (YOUR money) at various industries in the private sector and *PRESTO* there are private-sector jobs! Jobs can be “created” all day long by taxing folks and putting that money back into the marketplace here and there (where ever is most, well, expedient). I can “create” a job for my kids by stealing my neighbor’s money and funding their lemonade stand. Anyone can see, however, that this policy just might be counter productive. It is certainly so in the long run.

President Clinton’s shell game is plain for anyone to see. I know… I know… he was so “full of facts” that everyone’s back voting for Obama again. The problem is that these “facts” are too often simply sleight-of-hand style political tricks. Folks who fall for them deserve what they get.

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The Last Jihad by Rosenberg

The Last Jihad by Joel C. Rosenberg
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

What’s good about The Last Jihad (TLJ)? It is fun to read, for it moves along at a good clip. The characters are interesting and not flat. The action is exciting and even a little gory. It has some overtly Christian stuff in it, but isn’t preachy.

What’s not so good about TLJ? Rosenberg’s method of telling a story is scattered. He likes to have little soundbites (even as small as a page or less) on one part of the story, then skip to another soundbite, then again to another. This style is, to me at least, quite irritating and can be confusing. What’s more, this book (though an interesting take on politics in the Mid-East [and the US's involvement in them]) offered me no profound opening into the culture or political attitudes. It focused mostly on the Americans; it might have been far more interesting if more focus was put on the other points of view represented in the book.

So, altogether, I give TLJ three stars. It is fun, but it’s nothing too special nor worthy of the many must-read lists (Rush Limbaugh notwithstanding).

View all my reviews

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