I Think, Therefore I Rant!

Today is election day in much of the US.  It isn’t a Presidential Election so many people won’t vote. Most municipalities will have a few referendums, some school board officials, and maybe a judge or city councilman on the ballot.  Since it is not a big election with a lot of TV time, the turnout was relatively low and so conversations start to theorize about voting online.

The argument goes that I can buy many things if not everything that I need online, why can’t I vote? This is much the argument that CNN made today. Unfortunately one cannot make this comparison and even if that comparison was valid, we still shouldn’t do it.

1. Ecommerce is not as safe as you think it is.
2. It is inherently unfair to the poor.

Ecommerce is not as safe as you think it is  

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Dominionist teachings have been in the news quite often lately. The Houston based meeting, The Response, brought quite a bit of attention to this issue. Various cable TV commentators such as Matthews and Maddow ran stories on the more extreme preachers that are proponents of dominionism. They also tried to tie Republican nomination candidate, Rick Perry, to these aggressive preachings (Maddow’s clip is even called, “Rick Perry, conduit to radical Christian overthrow of US government?”).

I have no idea if Rick Perry is a dominionist. I sincerely hope not since, as you will see in this article, this is a false teaching. If Mr. Perry’s goal is to govern the US as a theocracy where punishment is delivered due to lack of adherence to biblical teachings then he would be failing to follow the teachings of Jesus. I have tried to find evidence that Gov. Perry is dominionist by his actions as Governor or scripted speeches (I try to avoid non-scripted off comments in political analysis as these are frequently misspoken, mistakes of wording, or simply out of context comments). As of this writing, while I am not sure that Gov. Perry is qualified to be the President of the United States, I find no evidence of dominionism aside from some people that are dominionists were at a religious gathering that he helped kick-start.

First, what is dominionism? It isn’t the worship of dominion. Well, actually, it is kind of close to that. According to the best definition that I can find (Wikipedia) it is:

"the tendency among some politically active conservative Christians to seek influence or control over secular civil government through political action, especially in the United States. It is also known as subjectionism. The goal is either a nation governed by Christians, or a nation governed by a conservative Christian understanding of biblical law."

The key point of this definition is the concept of a nation governed by Christian understanding of Biblical Law.

I will dig into the concept of Biblical Law in a bit but first a bit of understanding to the viewpoint. In a world where several influential nations are governed by Islamic Law (or Sharia), it is not surprising that in a nation that has a large population of another religion (Christianity) for those people to feel threatened and therefore try to entrench. Also, in times of hardship, it is easy to think back on younger days when everything is remembered (or rumored) to be wonderful and blame the changes in religion for the hardship. I don’t want to dismiss the frustrations of many people that feel that our government could be more ethical or more fair and think that if there was more religious observation in the world, that could be a good thing. However, the ends doesn’t justify the means – a government or a empowered constituency cannot make others be Christians. It just doesn’t work that way.

Sympathies to the concerns aside, the major fallacy of dominionism is the lack of understanding that there is no such thing as Christian Biblical Law.  Yes, Christians are required to keep the 10 Commandments but only because, as Jesus interpreted for us several times, they are all based on one simple commandment: love God above all else and love one another. This interpretation is most obvious in the book of Matthew in the verses 34-40 of the 22nd chapter:

"34 But the Pharisees, when they heard that he had put the Sadducees to silence, gathered themselves together. 35 And one of them, a lawyer, asked him a question, trying him: 36 Teacher, which is the great commandment in the law? 37 And he said unto him, Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy mind. 38 This is the great and first commandment. 39 And a second like unto it is this, Thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself. 40 On these two commandments the whole law hangeth, and the prophets."

So we see that the 10 Commandments and the laws of the Torah are subset to these two commands.  Jesus is saying that if you keep these two commands then you will keep the rest of the commands of God and all of the laws. But He doesn’t say that punishment will be given to you if you fail. In fact, He says the opposite – He gives a carrot and not a stick in John 15:10 where he says that "…ye shall abide in my love…." if we love God and one another.  This is different than a law. A law delivers punishment not reward.

Your local government may make a law that says you cannot drive your car faster than 20 mph in on a certain road at a certain time. You receive no reward for keeping this law. The police officer doesn’t stop you and give you a coupon for a free oil change if you don’t speed. Instead, if you drive the car over the speed limit and break the law then the police officer can give you a moving vehicle violation ticket that punishes you with a fine or worse. Laws deliver punishment for breaking them but Jesus speaks of reward for doing an action.

Soon before His death, Jesus gave a great deal of advice to His disciples. He knew that He would be dead in a very short time so it was His time to give the strongest and most urgent advice.  He didn’t recite the 10 commandments or the many rules of the Old Testament but instead simply told them (us) to love one another.

John 13:34

"A new commandment I give unto you, that ye love one another; even as I have loved you, that ye also love one another."

And then in John 15:9-17

"9 Even as the Father hath loved me, I also have loved you: abide ye in my love. 10 If ye keep my commandments, ye shall abide in my love; even as I have kept my Father’s commandments, and abide in his love. 11 These things have I spoken unto you, that my joy may be in you, and that your joy may be made full. 12 This is my commandment, that ye love one another, even as I have loved you. 13 Greater love hath no man than this, that a man lay down his life for his friends. 14 Ye are my friends, if ye do the things which I command you. 15 No longer do I call you servants; for the servant knoweth not what his lord doeth: but I have called you friends; for all things that I heard from my Father, I have made known unto you. 16 Ye did not choose me, but I chose you, and appointed you, that ye should go and bear fruit, and that your fruit should abide: that whatsoever ye shall ask of the Father in my name, he may give it you. 17 These things I command you, that ye may love one another."

We can now make the conclusion that Biblical Law really doesn’t exist for Christians. Law implies punishment, for law breaking is punishable. In this case, Christian teaching is not about punishment but reward and being like Jesus. A Christian should love all others because Jesus loved us (an example not a law) so that the Christian can have joy and love as Jesus enjoyed love (an example not a law or punishment).

With this understanding, dominionism starts to fall apart but I doubt if I have you convinced yet so I will do a bit more. Let’s discuss why dominionism is not compatible with Christian teachings.

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Now that it appears that the Democrats and Republicans agree on how to increase our US deficit by $500B-$1T, it is time to talk about throwing out the old tax code. With the passing of the unemployment extension, the Bush tax cuts and other deficit growing measures, we have succeeded in making our tax code even more unwieldy and unfair.

Eliminate the loopholes and eliminate the tiered system. Make it fair and make it easy.  Here is a great video explaining one way that this might be possible.

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The massive mid-term election of 2010 is now over. My phone won’t ring 25 times today with some computer imploring me to vote for one candidate over another. The signs that are all along the streets in my town can come down (hopefully the candidates come out and clean up their mess). Life can now go back to some sort of normal.

The Republicans evidently picked up approximately 60 seats in the House of Representatives. They also made major increases in the Senate and that house appears to be split nearly 50/50 (the exact count probably won’t be known for a couple days as Alaska will probably take a while to count due to the write-in candidate).  

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I once again find that I am commenting on the laws of another nation where I am not a citizen. I recently read a story that Uganda has publicly “outed” 100 gays. Not only did the paper publicize the names of the homosexuals but placed a banner on the newspaper saying “Hang Them”. At the time of the article in The Washington Post, at least 4 men on the list have been attacked.

This is reprehensible conduct. What is worse is our support of a society that allows this. The US will give approximately $400M to Uganda in aid in 2010. We need to put strings on this money. It doesn’t come free. The recipients of this aid must not have laws that will cause more hardship to some of its citizens. We can enhance the benefit of that aid to more than just children that need medicine by requiring these countries to adopt standards that approximate the realities of human rights in the 21st century.  

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I earlier wrote that I didn’t have an opinion regarding the Senatorial race in Delaware.

After seeing Ms. O’Donnell screw up the conversation regarding the separation of church and state in the debate with her opponent, I must conclude that she does not currently have the required skills to be a US Senator.

I encourage you to view this video from CNN if you are a citizen of Delaware. If the video doesn’t play below (CNN’s embed technique is not up to par), you can jump over to CNN and watch it directly: http://www.cnn.com/video/#/video/politics/2010/10/20/ac.odonnell.constitution.gaffe.cnn?hpt=C2

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I don’t live in Delaware so I don’t have a dog in this hunt. I think it is amusing the amazing heat that Christine O’Donnell is taking from everyone outside of the state of Delaware.

Maybe it is the fact that I really don’t like Bill Maher. I think he is not funny and an idiot. Whenever I watch his show, I am absolutely amazed at the stupid things that he says. When he is trying to be funny, I rarely crack a smile. When the audience laughs at his monologue I keep wondering if there is some big, mean-looking guy standing beside the “LAUGH” sign with a baseball bat ready to bash anyone that can think an intellectual thought.  

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President Barack Hussein Obama has been talking about his new plan to invigorate the economy and move us out of a double-dip or very long recession. I have to admit that I am confused by his logic.

First, a bit about myself. I hate taxes. I know that I need to pay them. I know that I make a good living (not from this blog mind you) and I need to pay into the system more than some others that don’t work as hard as I work. I get all of that.  

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I am perplexed by President Obama’s speech last night. He spoke to the American people from his Oval Office to announce the end of Operation Iraqi Freedom. While that declaration is not confusing, this paragraph is:

And so at this moment, as we wind down the war in Iraq, we must tackle those challenges at home with as much energy, and grit, and sense of common purpose as our men and women in uniform who have served abroad. They have met every test that they faced. Now, it is our turn. Now, it is our responsibility to honor them by coming together, all of us, and working to secure the dream that so many generations have fought for — the dream that a better life awaits anyone who is willing to work for it and reach for it. (taken from the transcripts on CNN)

 

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Isn’t it logical that if a group enjoys a privilege that they would self-police themselves to a great deal to protect that right? Shouldn’t a group of journalists being extremely hard on one of their own that pontificates opinion as being fact and deliberately distorts the facts of their investigation to imply something significantly different?

I think this is logical. By challenging the journalists that hurt the Freedom of Press right or cause it to be abused, the journalists of the world are self-policing themselves. They are saying that with a Right comes a Responsibility. Abuse of the responsibility for fair reporting risks the rights of all journalists and, by extension, the rights of all US citizens.  

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