Wednesday, December 25, 2019
5:45 pm
Daniel J. Summers
As I stated in my last post, I have realigned my political affiliation. I set out to find previous posts I've written here which no longer reflect my opinions, and I didn't find much. Most of the things I would write differently if I were writing them today would differ in tone more than content. This confirms my suspicion that it wasn't me who changed as much as it was my party.
To be fair, I'm quite happy with many of the things the current administration has done. The Supreme Court has a nice balance now, regularly confounding people who expect party-line votes from what is supposed to be a non-partisan institution. There are now enough strict-constructionist justices that the Constitution is being followed much more closely. And, for as much scorn as I've heaped on “the resistance,” it's been nice to have a press that sees how unjust many of the things our government has been doing is. It's a shame they lose interest when it's discovered that prior administrations also did those things - or they choose to ignore that, acting like every shame is a new shame that should be borne solely by the current administration.
What changed (or what was revealed) is the character of those in the party, not just the guy at the top of the ticket. It is a perfectly defensible position to say that you agree with the political job that someone is doing, and still lament their character. Pro-life judges don't excuse callous mocking of deceased political opponents. Increasing religious freedom doesn't eliminate adultery and hush-money payments. Yet among the vocal Republican majority, it does. For the “character matters” warriors from the Clinton administration, this is hypocritical; among Christians, this is absolutely devastating to our witness.
(begin evangelical Christian-targeted rant)
Yes, King David was anointed by God to lead Israel; that doesn't mean his adultery with Bathsheba and murder of Uriah were fine, because he was “God's anointed.” For those making the “Trump is appointed by God” argument - you're not wrong, but I don't think that argument makes the point you think it does. I wrote on my devotional blog about Paul's writing to the Romans; his words in Romans 13 were written about Nero. Remember, too, that the only reason Israel had kings was due to their rejection of God as their ultimate ruler. King David is a terrible analogy to use if you're wanting to speak positively about our current President while ignoring his personal and professional misconduct; maybe you could draw a parallel about pride, but that's not really what I think you're wanting to highlight.
(end rant)
As a faithful Christian, I can no longer maintain a political affiliation with the Republican party. And, while I'm still part of the “vast right-wing conspiracy” against Hillary Clinton (which, of course, is tongue-in-cheek; there is no such thing, as much as she'd like to blame them for her failures), that is no longer the best description of my views. So, the new tagline here is “Conservatarian at Large” (a nod to Jon Gabriel and Stephen Miller's podcast portmanteau), indicating both a conservative (AKA “classically liberal”) and libertarian viewpoint.
I will also unequivocally state that I do not think that Christians who make a different choice are somehow going against what God wants them to do. There are many different ways to parse our current nuanced environment. Those who believe just as I do may land on continued support for Donald Trump, and advocate for giving him 4 more years at the helm of the good ship USA. As long as they are not seemingly blind to his faults, in my view, they are following a path which they feel God has directed them. That's the nice thing about a proper view of God's sovereignty; He can make His followers have different viewpoints - sometimes to call others to change, and other times to cause them to think.
As for me and my conscience, though, I cannot continue with the GOP. As I alluded in my last post, I'll be exploring the relationship between conservative Christianity and libertarianism in the near future. That won't be the only thing about which I'll write here, but it will probably be the first thing (unless I find some time to resurrect the “good, bad, and ridiculous” thing for 2019).
Housekeeping-wise, the college football posts from 2012-2014 have been removed; those URLs will return a 404. If anyone misses them, you can turn this site's URL into an e-mail address and let me know.
Lost amid the race vs. gender war that is the Democrat primary season and the focus on the next administration is the pure genius in the current administration. Sure, they say Bush is still the mindless dolt that somehow managed to outsmart them twice; and yes, he's certainly given them enough anguished English ammunition to come up with quite a rotation for their “Bushism of the Day” quote machines. However, Bush has flashes of political genius, and one of them cam during his speech to the Knesset, the Israeli governing body, celebrating 60 years of Israeli independence. (The below quote is found about half-way down the page.)
Some seem to believe that we should negotiate with the terrorists and radicals, as if some ingenious argument will persuade them they have been wrong all along. We have heard this foolish delusion before. As Nazi tanks crossed into Poland in 1939, an American senator declared: “Lord, if I could only have talked to Hitler, all this might have been avoided.” We have an obligation to call this what it is - the false comfort of appeasement, which has been repeatedly discredited by history.
There are no names in this. Really, it could apply to a host of people who call for diplomacy even once diplomacy has failed, or those who call for diplomacy with terrorist organizations or terrorist-supporting nations. However, as Jeff Foxworthy once said, “There's no sense confessing to something she don't know about yet.” (This is in response to an upset wife - do you start saying “sorry” for everything she might be mad about, or do you simply ask "What's wrong?")
Being all sophisticated and everything, the Democrats must not be aware of this technique, and through their responses showed us that President Bush struck a nerve. Barack Obama (D-IL) was livid, blaming the current administration for strengthening Iran. Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) said that such words were “beneath the dignity of the office of the president.” Joe Biden (D-DE) threw the BS flag (literally), and Harry Reid (D-NV) said that Bush should explain the “inconsistency between his administration's actions and his words today.”
So, basically, here's how it went down:
Bush: "Appeasers are dangerous." Obama, Pelosi, Biden, and Reid (in unison): “No we're not!”
Wednesday, November 10, 2004
11:10 pm
Daniel J. Summers
There is word today from the fight for Fallujah that we have now uncovered a kidnapper's area where they housed, and eventually butchered, innocent civilians. (Story linked here) This is the place we couldn't find back when they were taking what seemed like a hostage a day, in a mostly futile attempt to get nations to pull their troops or businesses out of Iraq.
This makes my blood boil, and I'm tired of skirting the issue. Our pre-election policy on Iraq was driven by what appeared, to the President, to be an unwillingness on some parts of our nation to continue a large push - plus, had he started the Fallujah offensive before the election, he would have been accused of wagging the dog. Thanks to this delay, several people who were not combatants (oil truck drivers, reporters, construction workers) have been kidnapped, their families tortured beyond belief by seeing their loved one on Al-Jazeera, and eventually killed. There has also be a toll we've paid in servicemembers' lives, due to ambushes that have been set up by holdouts in Fallujah.
Those who oppose our troops when they are on the ground are traitors. Debates over what plan to use are valid, but this “wrong war, wrong place, wrong time” rhetoric wasn't intended to spark policy debate - it was intended to pander to anti-war and anti-American people here and abroad, while still trying to pander to those who feel that a strong defense is essential to our national security. Now, we find that if we'd just pressed into Fallujah the way we did in Baghdad, no matter what “sacred” landmarks may be there, we would have denied these kidnappers their capability to carry out these dastardly acts.
Whether you're for or against the war - whether you like or don't like President Bush or Secretary Rumsfeld - it is vitally important that, now that we're there, we don't tie our military's hands, especially with partisan political concerns. The only way out of Iraq that will keep us safe is to go through it - anything less will be seen by the terrorists as “the point” up to which we can be pushed, at which point we'll back down. I'm all for “bringing the troops home” - but not in a way where we'd have to send more over in a few years. Fight on!
By the way - they just came on the news and said that Yassir Arafat has died. That's the best news for peace in Israel we've gotten this century. The man was an avowed terrorist who did nothing but foment hate among his people against the rightful occupants of that land. Let's hope that their next leader will put an end to violent groups such as Hezbollah, and denounce rogue terrorists.