Fair is Fair.

Before you dig into the meat and potatoes of this theological dinner, perhaps an appetizer is in order.  I can’t stand it when people quote me out of context, so I am not about to do that to the subject of this novella.

To understand the context of my rant you need to read some of Brian McLaren’s material for yourself. Go on, pop over to his blog and read his postings straight from the horse’s keyboard.  The last thing I want is to be labeled a hate-monger because I select snippets of McLaren’s thoughts and words and then laid waste to them under the skewer of a sarcastic, judgmental pen.

To anyone who has has actually read the Bible through – cover to cover and in context – McLaren’s writings expose him to be a theologically shallow, intellectually vague, convolutingly-confusing shaman.

But enough about my opinion.  Click this link to get an eyeful for yourself.

Brian McLaren’s Latest Post about Ramadan

How’d you do?  Was it a tasty read?

Okay, now let’s get out the A1. 

It’s time to cut us up a nice, juicy slice of theological counterpoise to McLaren’s warmed-over, lovey-dovey oatmeal.

Christian?  You Say You’re a Christian?

Anyone who has read anything here at NoMoreGreed knows that I often find myself conflicted in my walk as a Christian.  I often find myself bumping up against gray boundaries as I go through my daily labors.  How do I really love the sinner but not the sin?  What is sin?  Is sin defined by “hard” boundaries like murder, adultery, and theft or is sin defined by “soft” boundaries like lust, greed, and self-interest?  Or is it a little of both.  And if it is both, how am I loving to someone with whom I may strongly disagree over an excursion across one of those gray boundaries?

My age, if not my decades-old theological training at a Christian college, reminds me that the word “gray” is often just another way to say, “vague.”  I also know that when I react to “vague” theology or squishy boundaries my reaction is just-as-often driven by emotion as it is intellect.  How do I “feel” about a topic regardless of what the Scripture says on the subject?  What about abortion in those narrow, infrequent cases where a mother’s life is in danger?  What about abortion in cases of rape or incest?  What about homosexuals in the church?  How do I love the sinner but hate the sin when I am the greatest sinner of all?

Perhaps I ought to come clean for you right out of the chute?  By now you might be wondering…  “Is this guy a ‘conservative,’ a ‘liberal,’ or a nut job?”

I like to think I am a “conservative” Christian.  I believe that God’s word is inspired and that it says what it says for some pretty simple reasons.  I believe that it’s not up to me to understand every confusing passage of Scripture, but that a little mystery about the nature of the Creator of the universe is healthy.  I believe that there are some clear B&W boundaries but that God gives us the Bible to help us navigate through the ones that aren’t.

What that word “conservative” means to me, however, is an entirely different thing than it might mean to some of my brothers and sisters who worship at a certain independent, fundamentalist Baptist church just around the corner from our house.  I love these guys deeply, but I cringe every time I drive by that place and see their Montana-sized American flag in the front window.  To my thinking, faith and citizenry do a sort of uneasy dance in this post-modern world.  When our civil government and society honors God with our choices and actions, I believe God blesses us.  When we dishonor God or – worse – disavow God with our greed-laced choices and actions, God scorns us.

Iraq?  Bad choice.

Darfur?  Slight redemption.

Universal health care?  Another debate for another day.

Though it might seem irrelevant to the McLaren discussion, I think one question has significant import.  We need to stop and ask ourselves a simple question to understand why guys like McLaren are being given pulpits from which to utter vague platitudes and convoluted theo-speak.

Is America a “Christian” country?

From my viewpoint, even if we once were – and that’s a big if – we aren’t any more.  I don’t think we have been for a long, long time.  And that opinion has a lot less to do with debates over abortion and homosexuality than it does with our attitude toward preemptive war and turning back the clock on regulation of the (har-dee-har-har) “free-for-all” market economy.  (I’m a capitalist.  I’m just a capitalist who realizes that capitalism left to its own devices = unregenerate greed.)

It is into this abyss of embarrassment over America’s slip from a holistic Christianity that guys like McLaren dive.  Were the excesses of the Bush era not as grand or as ill-begotten as they were, perhaps the embarrassment that bred Brian McLaren and Rob Bell would not be as strong.  As it is, though, when you wallow in filth you can expect someone to bring the fire hose over to clean you off.

To put Brian McLaren and his guru-esque love-in with world religions into perspective, I think you need to see him in light of a pseudo-Christian Bush-ian backlash.  I think McLaren and other well-intentioned, so-called “evangelicals” got mighty tired of seeing Christianity and Republicanism going hand-in-hand.

So they rebelled.  They started the “Emergent Conversation” (and I still have no idea what that means).  Well intentioned, to be sure.  McLaren, Bell, and others of their ilk decided it was time for someone to regain control over the Christian message and yank it clear of the spiraling vortex of greed and power-hunger that had become the Christo-Republican political machine.

It is now well documented (by Kevin Phillips and others) that Karl Rove (aka: “Bush’s Brain”) slickly leveraged the social power of conservative Christianity to further a singularly obsessive political power trip.  Karl Rove is no devout Christian.  Listen to the man sometime.  What a schmuck.  I watched the guy on Fox News one night (the only place where he gets a pulpit these days) and I just about choked on my orange juice. Let’s just say that if I wanted to point my kids in the direction of a Christ-like role model, Rove wouldn’t be the first guy on the list.  Check the dictionary.  Next to the word “arrogance” is a picture of Karl Rove.

‘Nuff said.

I think Bush was (and probably still is) a genuinely compassionate, concerned guy.  I think he also tries to be a Christian.

What he also was (and probably still is) is a genuinely ill-educated puppet who can be manipulated by anyone who knows how to appeal to his emotions.

Karl Rove figured that weakness out and worked it for all it was worth.

Rove just happened to be in the right place at the right time and latched onto just the kind of “awe shucks” rube that it took to grab power at 1600 PA Ave. in the waning years of the “can’t keep it in his pants” Clinton Presidency.  We wanted honor in the White House after the filth and stain of Slick Willy and his favorite Intern.  Rove just figured out how to leverage the passion points of homosexuality and abortion in ways that blinded historic Christianity to its obligations to be about much, much more than narrowly defined moralism.

Barack Obama, on the other hand, tapped into that pent-up disgust with America’s cowboy gun-slinger, every-man-or-woman-for-him-or-herself style and rode it to the White House.  What Rove did to (or was it “for”?) “conservative” Christianity, Obama has done for post-modern agnostics and neo-evangelicals.  Obama has so far done a pretty good job of swinging the social pendulum forcefully in the other direction and appeals to those for whom a loving embrace of one’s enemy is better than a slap in the face any day of the week.

This is where McLaren fits into the puzzle.

Brian McLaren and his bland-brand of theology are clearly a response to the Christians-for-Bush years now passing in our wake.  Where Bush appealed to fans of Oswald Chambers – “The more I get bashed and trashed the more I must be doing for God” – McLaren appeals to a kinder, gentler brand of Christendom interested in sharing and caring, not hording and cavorting.

For people who seek a response to the likes of Rove-ian Christianity, McLaren is a god-send.  (That ain’t a typo, friends.)  McLaren’s particular brand of self-effacing, soft-spoken, peaceful inclusiveness appeals to people for whom the hard-edge of orthodox, salvation-focused Christianity is a little too visceral.  Listen to McLaren for 15 minutes and you hear a guy who really works hard to be like Christ.

Correction.

Listen to McLaren for 15 minutes and you hear a guy who really works hard to be like one side of Christ; the soft, warm, fuzzy, cuddly “love is a warm teddy bear” Christ.

I think if McLaren bumped into the “you brood of vipers!” Christ or the “turn over the tables of the money changers” Christ he might lose his dentures.  That Christ, the one who said, “your momma and your papa may wind up hatin’ you because of me” would not be a Christ who McLaren could wrap his arms around.  THAT Christ might be just a little to…  what’s the word we’re looking for…  divisive, yeah, that’s the word!…  “Divisive,” for the likes of Brian McLaren.

I have never been a huge fan of McLaren for one central reason.  He is probably the sloppiest theologian I’ve ever heard.  No…  The more I think of it, he’s actually pretty incomprehensible.  Sloppy doesn’t do justice to his convoluted double-speak on his infrequent trips through the core of the Gospel.

Pop quiz time. 

If Jesus once called the religious leaders of his own faith “vipers” because they had shackled the faithful to a morass of hyper-ritualized observances, how do you think Jesus might have reacted to the absurd morass of hyper-ritualized observances commonly found in Islam?

Didn’t think about that one, didya Brian Mc?

If Jesus said something along the lines of, “Don’t go around announcing to the world that you’re fasting” and then Brian McLaren goes around and announces to the world that he’s fasting, what do you think that warm-n-fuzzy, cute-as-a-teddy-bear Jesus might say to old BDM?

Brian McLaren washes all these stumbling blocks away with one word.

“Love.”

The Bible is about Love.  The Gospel is about Love.  The word “Love” almost always gets a place of reverence in Brian McLaren’s thinking even to the point where the “judgmental” passages of Scripture get overlooked.

Problem is, McLaren misses the point of the SUPREME LOVE spoken about in the Bible.

In the Bible, a person’s works are not a mere act of generic love for humanity.  They are the EVIDENCE of the SUPREME act of love carried out at the cross!

In the Bible, it is equally loving to rebuke and correct a brother as it is to accept rebuke and correction in turn.

In the Bible, it is loving for Paul to correct numerous churches for borderline heresy, drawing them back to core theological tenets upon which the early church (and the historical church up until recent years) has been based.  When teachers started watering down the core of the Gospel message, making it more palatable to the ears of those who found the Gospel a little too stark, he tells Timothy to stay true to sound doctrine!

And that, my friends, is why Brian McLaren is celebrating Ramadan.

Huh?  How’d you get to this conclusion after all that, Pearlie?

As Charles Stanley would say, “Now listen…!”

BDM doesn’t know what to do about the fact that Heaven might exclude people like good, decent Muslims, Hindus, or Buddhists.

BDM doesn’t know what to do about the fact that Jesus said that people might not like us very much if we proclaim the one, true Gospel and the notion that Jesus said, “I am the way, the truth, and the life.  No man comes to the Father but through me.”

BDM doesn’t know what to do about the fact that there are a lot of perfectly pleasant and loving homosexuals out there who get specific mention in the Bible and not always in a particularly complimentary way.

So Brian McLaren needed to come up with a solution.  The Bible Brian McLaren read was a little too sharply delineated for his taste, so he came up with ways to make it more palatable.

“Hey, the Bible talks about fasting!  Muslim’s fast!  Maybe we should just join the Muslims in celebrating Ramadan and it will make us all seem like we’re headed to the same God!”

Uhh…  Brian…  I think we still have a problem with that whole, “Nobody comes to the Father but through Me” line.

The danger in McLaren celebrating Ramadan is not that he’s fasting and then going directly against the Scriptures by announcing his act to the world.

The danger in McLaren celebrating Ramadan is not in him blogging about his prayer time, even though the Bible also warns against us proclaiming our prayers for the rest of the world to hear.

The danger in McLaren celebrating Ramadan is in the tacit support it gives to Muslims to believe that their devaluing of the God-Head in Christ Jesus is legitimate.

The danger in McLaren celebrating Ramadan is that in ways both big and small he is chipping away gradually at a healthy respect for God’s holy anger when we bow to the idols and rituals of other world religions.

Perhaps what bothers me most about McLaren is that instead of putting his time and energy into proclaiming the saving message of the Cross, the ONE saving moment in time when individual sins were carried away for eternity and eternal life was offered to those who would believe in JESUS – not Allah, or Muhammed, Buddha, or whomever – he spends all his time trying to show the world how Christianity is just one more option among many options.

I am left to ask a hard question.

Why did Jesus DIE if it wasn’t to be the one, true way to eternal life?

As Brian McLaren celebrates Ramadan, I encourage the entire Christian community to show him that he no longer represents core, orthodox faith.  I encourage all of you to draw the boundary around him and pay no further heed to his writings.  It’s time to stop buying his books and time to start treating him as the universalist that he has become.  Brian is no longer any more a Christian than I am a Swede.

(Although I have to tell ya, I just love those little horsemeatballs over at Ikea.)

Enough already with the “I’m so open minded everyone else’s ideas are irrelevant,” Brian.  Come back to Christ.  Get over your embarrassment about the shanghai the Republicans pulled on Christianity and just get true to the core of the Gospel.

Jesus died for my sins.  I have a message of salvation to share.  I do my acts of service not out of some fear that I won’t usher in the Kingdom of Heaven (as the Emergent movement says) but because God calls me to care for the widows, the orphans, and the infirm.

You want a real challenge, Brian?

The challenge isn’t in somehow making Christianity less offensive to other faiths.  The challenge is in somehow making the TRUTH of Christianity more penetrating to people of other faiths.  We are to “go make disciples of all nations,” Brian.

Go get busy, brother!

(John 14:5-12) in which are found the following words:

“I am the way and the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me.  If you really knew me, you would know my Father as well. From now on, you do know him and have seen him.”

(Matt. 21:12-13):

Jesus entered the temple area and drove out all who were buying and selling there. He overturned the tables of the money changers and the benches of those selling doves.  “It is written,” he said to them, “‘My house will be called a house of prayer,’ but you are
making it a ‘den of robbers.’”

(1 Timothy 6:3-4)

If anyone teaches false doctrines and does not agree to the sound instruction of our Lord Jesus Christ and to godly teaching, he is conceited and understands nothing.

(2 Timothy 4:2-4)

Preach the Word; be prepared in season and out of season; correct, rebuke and encourage - with great patience and careful instruction.  For the time will come when men will not put up with sound doctrine. Instead, to suit their own desires, they will gather around them a great number of teachers to say what their itching ears want to hear.  They will turn their ears away from the truth and turn aside to myths.

And numbers are kind of my passion.  I love stats.  Gimme numbers to describe a situation and I see things form up in beautiful, geometric fashion, all blocky and triangly and quadralateraly.

So in the spirit of numbers and brands, (how’s THAT for a forced segue?), this is my 2012 Election Wrap-Up.

The Number 1.

This is the precise number of votes I personally cast in the election.  Ironically, so did most other Americans, unless they happen to suffer from split personality disorder.  Which I guess makes me wonder why some folks spend so much time worrying about so-called “voter fraud.”  The answer isn’t laws, it’s better systems.  Create citizen-friendly systems that ensure a single vote for each registered voter and all will be well.

The number 6.

As in BILLION dollars.  This is ABSURD!  NO election should cost that much money!

Could we cure cancer with another SIX BILLION DOLLARS?  Could we eliminate part of the national debt with SIX BILLION DOLLARS?

Is it just me, or is buying a Presidency just not worth that much money?

Time to replace a few Supreme Court justices and get some legislation passed that reigns in WILD campaign spending, UNBRIDLED Super-PACs, and anonymous FAT CAT donors.  It’s time to take the cash incentive out of the electoral process, level the playing field, and take “Citizens United” back to the scrap heap.

The number 2.

As in the number of days after the election and #ThirdWorldFlorida STILL doesn’t have its vote tallied.  Thank God we didn’t need that banana republic’s vote to count in the final analysis.

The number 0.

This the chance that the Republican Party has of winning Latino votes until the caucus gets its head out of its nether regions and realizes that “building a bigger wall” and “self-deporting” are NOT immigration policies that work.  The number of old, white, rich guys in this country is dropping every day.  Brown is the new Blue and you better get used to reaching out to these hard-working, dream-seeking people – illegal and otherwise – or you risk losing every national election from now till Armageddon.

The number 10,587.

As in the number of robo-calls that didn’t sway my vote one iota.

The number 1.

This is the number of times I actually tuned into either Fox or MSNBC for my election coverage.  Both times I laughed.  On Fox, I watched as Britt Hume stumbled and fumbled, trying to explain to Megyn Kelly why Fox WHIFFED on its stridently consistent insistence that Romney would somehow pull a rabbit out of his hat and win this thing.  Even funnier was watching Kelly meander around the set like a lost bloodhound hunting for someone to blame for the numbers just not being what she wanted them to be.  Over on MSNBC I watched for 30 seconds, sniffed the sense of pure glee in the air, and ran for the clicker.

ENOUGH!  CNN isn’t perfect, but at least they put on the air of caring about a fair and balanced discussion of the details.

(BTW…  John King is the new Tim Russert.  All he needs now is a whiteboard and a low-odor dry-erase marker.)

This election is brought to you by, “The Gap.”

As in the BIG, VACANT SPACE between the ears of two Tea Party faves who proclaimed that, A) there is such a thing as “legitimate rape” and B) that rape is God’s will.

This election is brought to you by, “Banana Republic.”

As in the peninsula to the south where rigged elections, 12-page paper ballots, and voter suppression tactics run amok are the norm, not the exception.

This election is brought to you by, “Zamboni.”

As in the way NBC had to clean off its election results “board” after a fresh, snowy Nor’ Easter whacked upper New Jersey and New York less than a week after the entire region got hit by a superstorm.  There was the Zamboni machine, dutifully scraping the ice at “Democracy Plaza” (really?) to show that indeed there were red states, blue states, and a lone gray state known as #ThirdWorldFlorida still not reporting.  Yo, ComCast.  Drop a sheckle or two and actually get NBC’s news division some really spiffy touch displays like CNN.  That ice rink board was an embarrassment.  ”Cute” is fine for Barney and Friends, but NOT election night coverage.

This election is brought to you by, “The Nitrous Oxide Suppliers of America.”

Take one look at Joe Biden during the one and only VP debate and you have to wonder what the man was snorting before he hit the platform.

This election is brought to you by, “Cliff’s Notes.”

After all the recent talk about how we’re about to drive right off the “Fiscal Cliff” in a couple of months, I figured I ought to go grab the Cliff’s Notes for “The Art of War,” ’cause something tells me that in spite of all the lovey-dovey talk I heard the morning after, this fight ain’t quite over.

This election is also brought to you by, “Sesame Street.”

Now that Mitt Romney can’t wipe out PBS and Big Bird, perhaps another Grover (Norquist) might want to pay a quick visit to his equally-furry namesake and refresh on basic math.  1+1 will ALWAYS equal 2.  2-1 will NEVER equal to 3.  Spending cuts alone will NOT dig us out of our fiscal mess.  Even conservative economists are suggesting that a gradual return of pre-Bush tax rates may be necessary to help us dig our way out of our fiscal garbage can.  (Sorry, Oscar.)  Even Ronald Reagan (who?) raised taxes when he had to dig out of his failed trickle-down policies.

It’s time for Grover – the furry human, not the furry monster – and his buddies to remember history as it was written, not as it was fabricated for them by Fox.

This election is brought to you by, “Kleenex.”

When “journalists” cry more tears than the candidates over the election results, you know something is out of kilter with the news media.

It is time to recognize the “Sunshine State” for what it is.  A backwater, third world, banana republic that can’t run a decent election!  We must rise up as a citizenry and FIGHT the corrupt, banal bureaucrats in that failed state who CANNOT PUT ON AN ELECTION TO SAVE THEIR VERY LIVES!

And if you live in Florida and you want to complain, here’s where to go…  http://www.fec.state.fl.us/  CALL THEM!  Let them hear your voice with a megaphone, Floridians.  You are good and decent, hard working people!  I have family I love in Florida.  It’s a great place to visit.

Your legislature, however, is A WORLD CLASS EMBARRASSMENT!

ARE YOU KIDDING ME?  7 HOURS IN LINE TO VOTE?  You want evidence of corruption and voter intimidation?  Look no further than the state that can’t get people in and out of the voting booth in less than 30 minutes.

And WHY, you may ask, are they waiting 7 hours in line to vote in Florida?

‘Cause that cabal of TEA PARTY BULLIES they call a state legislature LOADED UP the ballot with 11-pages of FULL TEXT amendments and resolutions!  IN COMPLICATED LEGALESE, NO LESS!  Florida’s Supreme Court already smacked these miscreants once for making ballot initiatives confusing, you would think they would learn by now.

ARE YOU KIDDING ME?  12 PAGES OF BALLOT INITIATIVES?

In WHAT universe would any SANE person consider it a GOOD USE of taxpayer money, NOT TO MENTION THE HARDSHIP IT IMPOSED ON THE ENTIRE UNITED STATES, to create a 12-page-long ballot!

You mean to tell me that one of the most diverse, most populated states in the union CANNOT GET THEIR ACT TOGETHER and conduct an election like CIVILIZED people?  REALLY?

What kind of government are they running down there?  NORTH KOREA?

Today is Thursday, TWO DAYS after the close of the election, and the ONE STATE still COUNTING VOTES, is FLORIDA!

RISE UP, AMERICA!  RISE UP AND MARGINALIZE #ThirdWorldFlorida.  

Use that hash tag, Tweet it to the world, and let’s show Florida for what it is…

A state run by corrupt, inept politicians who CAN’T FIGURE OUT HOW TO RUN AN ELECTION without inconveniencing the ENTIRE COUNTRY!

It is time to embarrass and KEEP embarrassing that failed state until the citizenry gives their BRUTE SQUAD legislature the boot.  These guys make Andre the Giant’s “Fezzick” look like Princess Buttercup.  It is time for the hard-working, good people of #ThirdWorldFlorida to muster some collective will and THROW THOSE BUMS IN TALLAHASSEE OUT THE FRONT DOOR OF THE STATE HOUSE!

Think about this for a moment.  

This election was a LOT closer than the pundits would have you believe.  

If Obama hadn’t shot himself in the foot with that LAME first debate performance, it might have been more of a walk-over.

It wasn’t.  

Forget that 303 Electoral College win.  That number makes this thing look a lot more lopsided than it was when you get right down the POPULAR vote.  Less than 3 million votes separate the winner from the loser.  That might sound like a lot until you consider it was a 50/48 split.  We are STILL a fractured, divided country.  In our winner-take-all Electoral College system, the reality is that if three “swing” states hadn’t fallen every-so-slightly for Obama, and Romney hadn’t shot himself in the foot with the auto workers in Ohio, Florida might actually matter.

(Really, Mitt?  Suggesting that the auto companies want to ship their jobs to China?  I know that was a Super-PAC doing your dirty work, but c’mon buddy.  You had this thing sown up until you dropped that dung pile on the airwaves.)

How would you feel right now if this election actually HINGED on Florida!  And it COULD HAVE!  Ohio went for Obama, but it might not have.  If Paul Ryan had done a little more work in Wisconsin, it might have flipped.  And if this all came down to Florida we would STILL be waiting for the outcome of the election because #ThirdWorldFlorida STILL wouldn’t have its final vote tally reported.

IT IS TIME FOR A NATIONAL REVOLT AND COLLECTIVE SPANKING OF FLORIDA’S LEGISLATURE!

Join with me and HOUND that backwater banana republic until your friends and family who live there get up the collective backbone to actually DO SOMETHING about their miserable election process!  If this happens again in four years – and it just might given that we’ve been dealing with it since Bush -v- Gore in 2000 - I say we ought to just stretch the border from Mexico straight across the gulf, up the Florida panhandle, and CUT THAT MISERABLE PENINSULA OFF from the rest of the United States.

THIS SITUATION IS OUT OF CONTROL AND IT IS INFURIATING ME!

Okay…  I’m breathing now.  I’m taking a breath.  I’m moving on for a few minutes.

BUT I’M NOT LETTING THIS ONE GO!  Until Florida decides to stop HURTING the rest of this country with its moronic election procedures I will CONTINUE to call it for what it is…

#ThirdWorldFlorida

I’m not kidding.  I was so sold-out to the notion that every vote counted and that the political system could help solve problems I helped co-found a political action committee for youth in my home town.

I sweetly believed in the quaint notion of “majority rule” because I believed that “The Majority” (whomever it may be) might give a hoot about listening to the minority after taking power.  After all, we claim to be a country based on Judeo-Christian ethics and morality.   The last I checked Jesus actually engaged and talked with people who hated his guts.

Well, the Democrats abused their power soon after winning 2008.  In 2010, Mitch McConnell made his now famous “one term President” statement about Obama.  Though his comments were much more mild than is often quoted by partisan Dems, McConnell did declare the equivalent of an obstructionist nuclear war in response.  The “Party of No” was born.

Ahhh…  Partisan bickering, how we loathe thee.

Remember what George W. said after he won reelection in 2004?  He said something along the lines of…

“That’s what you do with political capital.  You spend it.”

As I warned Georgie then, don’t abuse your power.  Engage the Democrats.  Build bi-partisan spirit.

Yeah right.  George and his buddies rammed through a LOT of junk in the eight years of his presidency, including huge portions of “the other white meat,” earmarks, unwise reduction and restriction of Wall Street watchdogs, and unwise tax slashing.  The Dems weren’t happy, but they didn’t have much choice.  Someone else was driving the car.

Well, what goes around comes around, so all the hand-wringing and finger pointing by the Republicans, blaming the Democrats for gridlock in Washington, is crocodile tears.

But now we have a problem.  This time we’re heading for a real crisis and more gridlock is the last thing we need.  

The so-called “Fiscal Cliff” is at the end of the road.

So what’s my point?

I’m tired of sitting on the sidelines and wringing my own hands, saying “Woe is me!”  People who know me best know I’m full of weird ideas.  They know I’m trying to be a conservative Christian with moderate social views in a RED region where everyone automatically assumes the moniker “Christian” means  you have an elephant on your front lawn.

So I’m using my voice.  Well, I’m using my keyboard, actually.  I want to start a NEW dialog, a dialog that brings Christians of good conscience – and anyone who wants to stake out new turf – to a new middle point in American Politics.  I want to see us speak prophetically  to the powers of our government, both Democratic and Republican, not so much foretelling the future as warning them of the dangers of hard-line intransigence.  I want to see us rip ourselves away from political ideologies and put ourselves in the other guy’s shoes, holding our rightful role in the political process as thoughful informers, not shrill partisans.

When a guy says he’s worried about leaving a legacy of crushing debt for his kid, we need to listen to him.

When a woman says she’s worried that her kid could graduate college with $120,000 in student loans, we need to listen to her.

When a person says they’re unemployed and don’t know how they’re going to keep oil in their heater, we need to listen to them.

When one section of the country suffers a catastrophic disaster, we need to show up to help because some day it could be us in the cross hairs.

This is my take on a decidedly centrist platform, a platform that cuts so strongly toward the center not a SINGLE candidate would ever touch it.  Why?  Because it’s not partisan.  It’s about empowering people, not pandering to powers.  It’s about embracing real-world, malleable philosophies and facing thorny challenges head on with an eye toward compromise, not strident, “my way or the highway” ideologies masquerading as bi-partisan solutions.

It’s based on ten, simple principles:

1. Free speech is sacrosanct, even if I don’t like it.
2. Like it or not, I am my brother’s keeper, especially the poor and the disadvantaged.
3. All people are endowed with certain unalienable rights, among which are life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.
4. People should receive the benefit for their hard work and hard work is to be admired.
5. A level playing field in business is in everybody’s interest.
6. Affluence is not a sin, unrepentant greed is.
7. Taxes are a necessary evil in a civil society.  Wield them sparingly but do not be afraid to wield them.
8. The Constitution and Bill of Rights are the Centrist’s political Bible.  THE Bible is the CHRISTIAN Centrist’s spiritual compass.
9. The majority might rule, but that doesn’t mean they get to ignore or abuse the minority.
10. A free, independant, and resolutely unbiased press is the watchdog of a healthy democracy.

So since you didn’t ask, here are my meandering, centrist, hopefully-Christ-honoring ideals.  Feel free to give me both barrels for naivety and wishful thinking.

1. An educated electorate is a powerful electorate.  Education is the root of our democracy and a big differentiator between the democratic industrialized world and all those banana republics that still exist out there.  Ensure that every person no matter how poor has a shot at a decent, safe education and you ensure an informed, eager electorate.
2. Focus on the educational basics but respect the need to teach people how to THINK CRITICALLY.  Take Fox News and MSNBC out of the classroom and teach students how to ask HARD questions when people present simple answers to tough questions.  Demand that your journalists treat EVERY politician with an equally jaundiced eye.  Republicans don’t walk on water and Democrats aren’t always on the side of the little guy.
3. If a person shows their willingness to work hard to achieve and earns the grades it takes to succeed in college, make a publicly funded college education available and within their financial grasp no matter how poor they might be.  If you really want to supercharge the next generation of entrepreneurial spirit, start it by equipping the next generation of boot-strap entrepreneurs.
4. Address the burgeoning income inequities between CEOs and other executives and the lowest paid employees in their firms.  In a world where average CEO salaries are now 400 TIMES the lowest paid employee, in a country where they ONCE were more like 40 TIMES the lowest paid employee, press for financial reforms to ensure that EVERY employee gets a fair slice of the organizational income pie.
5. NO MORE GOLDEN PARACHUTES.  If a CEO drives a company into the ground and shareholders are left holding the bag, that CEO ought to find themselves without a hefty severance.  You want to take the risk in the private marketplace?  Take the risk.  You crap out your company?  Expect a crap payout.
6. I AM my brother’s keeper.  Some people can pull themselves up by the bootstraps and they should reap their fair  reward for their hard work.  Some people, though, simply can’t lift themselves up.  They might have Down’s syndrome, or be autistic, or be a veteran with PTSD, or a person whose health is failing.  Civil societies do not jettison their weak and poor.  They lift them and care for them.  Or, as we Christians like to say, we must care for “widows” and “orphans.”
7. Render unto Caesar what is Caesar’s.  Like it or not, money is the lubrication of civil society.  Roads must be built.  Schools must be maintained.  Army’s must be armed.  FEMA must be prepared for the next major disaster, no matter where it might strike.  Some things can’t and shouldn’t be privatized.  Human greed just makes some endeavors too risky to put into the hands of private organizations.  A fair level of taxation is to be expected and supported.  Onerous taxation is not.
8. As an individual, I turn the other cheek.  As a country, we must defend our freedom.  Defense of freedom, however, does not always translate into war and wars are not always a true defense of freedom.  When precious human life is on the line, you deploy your human assets with as great a level of fear and trepidation as possible.
9. The Constitution and Bill of Rights are both our bedrock and our lifeblood.  They are not  static documents, embodying immovable, detailed responses to every challenge we might face as a country.  The Constitution and Bill of Rights are, however, like the Bible of democracy, a fixed point in time, a tangible, spiritual device by which “intent” is measured and solutions are crafted.  If we respect the core tenets of that Constitutional Bible, and protect EVERY person’s right to free speech and EVERY person’s right to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness, there will be no need for special classes of citizen.  Citizens will simply “be” citizens, each person endowed with the right to equal pay, equal treatment under the law, and equal access to the privileges of civilized society.
10. Term limits must be enacted.  Anyone who makes a profession of representing the people who pay for their elect-ability is a person who no longer represents “we the people.”  Turnover in House and the Senate is good.  In a world where cash swings elections more than honest debate and credible ideas, it is time to take away the power of the king-and-queen makers and boot entrenched powers out at predetermined intervals.
11. Corporations are not “people” and should not be endowed with the rights of people.  One person, one vote.  One person, one donation.  Corporations are nameless, faceless entities whose sole purpose is accumulation of wealth at all costs, not service to the community above all else.  Corporations are also not created equally, with all contributing equally to the good of the community.  The right of ALL corporate entities to contribute to political campaigns should be stripped and stripped immediately.  If a person does not publicly donate to a candidate, then they are conducting backroom shenanigans that must be exposed to the light of day.
12. Campaign spending is out of control and must be capped.  Adjusted for inflation, NO political campaign should get away with spending unlimited sums of money to buy an office.  Every campaign should be limited to the same cap.  If it is a national campaign, such as for the Presidency, then that cap will be high, perhaps $1,000,000 adjusted for inflation, but other than that, excessive spending does NOTHING to contribute to the vitality of our democracy.  It is time for us to restrain ourselves for the greater good of our society and future generations.
13. Super-PACs must be abolished.  The ability for a privileged few to buy enormous sums of airtime without disclosing their identities fully must be restrained.  Individual contributions must be sufficiently high to permit people of great wealth to participate in the process but low enough to ensure that NO person can BUY an office.
14. We must return the nobility of public service to its rightful place in our society.  We must laud people who give their talents to the rest of society through their service in comparatively low-paying, civil service roles.  Once upon a time we encouraged people of great talent to serve in our halls of justice, in our regulation of Wall Street, in libraries, work placement offices, and in the military.  Now we laud the ultra-wealthy and suggest that working for “the government” (aka: YOU AND I) is to be avoided like the plague.
15. The facts matter.  Truth matters.  Some ultra-wealthy, big-time billionaire ought to endow a national, non-partisan institute in perpetuity to do nothing but hold BOTH parties accountable.   As a matter of decency and fairness, if an organization chooses to air an ad that maligns a candidate using shady, dubious facts, the corresponding truth must be aired.  For every campaign ad that is aired that does not pass the fact-check of the non-partisan group, air time should be reserved to indicate that the previous claims cannot be substantiated by public records.
16. Keep politics out of the church, keep the pulpit out of politics.  When people of faith mistakenly believe that Christ would have permitted himself to be a political activist, they forget that the Lord of the universe willingly went to the cross rather than foster an insurrection against Rome.  His kingdom was NOT of this earth, and neither should ours be.  Our eyes must be fixed on HEAVEN, not the next election cycle.  Our fellowship should be based on our beliefs in the triune God, not our devotion to this candidate or that.  There are good Christians who lean one way and the other in every Christian church.  It is perfectly acceptable for Christians to run for office, to participate in the political spectrum, and even be completely open with their faith.  It is entirely another thing for Christians of good conscience to mistakenly believe that God endorses one political party over another.  God honors those who honor Him, and with all the lies and half-truths that are uttered in the name of politics it is hard to imagine that God is honoring all but the most pure of political candidates.
17. Balancing a budget requires a backbone of steel.  Someone will lose, someone will win, but in the end the entire country should benefit.  Compromise is not a filthy, dirty word, but a part of a healthy, bi-partisan process of doing what is in the greater good for the entire country.  If members of Congress cannot do such hard, bi-partisan work without succumbing to the persona of children on a school playground, then the Constitution must do the work for them, slashing all budgets equally and raising all taxes automatically.  A balanced budget amendment is essential to ensuring that people with weak constitutions do not punt hard decisions down the line to the next generation.
18. Fundamental access to basic healthcare should not be an afterthought but a civil right.  For every under or un-insured person who shows up at a hospital ER without insurance, there is a consequence.  It should not be incumbent upon hospitals to simply write-off such visits, but a smoothly functioning society must anticipate and plan for such a reality.  Whether such coverage is provided through the private market or the government is ultimately irrelevant; the need is tangible.  Coverage for pre-existing conditions must anticipate the fact that a fluid, entrepreneurial society must make barriers to labor movement as low as possible.
19. Members of Congress who miss more than 25% of their votes should resign.
20. Members of Congress should have no greater benefits than those received by the bulk of the American electorate.
21. Greed is bad.
22. Selflessness is good.
23. The Electoral College perpetuates Red State/Blue State partisanship and country-wide polarization.  Even within given states, minority voices can be ignored.  The Republican in New York or the Democrat in South Carolina feel disenfranchised as candidates go after “Electoral College” winner-take-all blocks of votes.  If a direct election were held, candidates would be required to reach out to more, dissimilar voters in more areas of the country, being forced to embrace hard messages and thorny challenges in every outpost and every burb across the land.
24. Members of Congress may not lobby the government for a minimum of four years after leaving office.
25. The salary of members of Congress should be fixed at no more than 6 times the national poverty level.
26. Like corporations, unions are NOT individuals and should NOT be permitted to contribute to political campaigns.  If individual union members wish to contribute, their contribution should come from their pockets and NOT from the coffers of the union by way of their dues.
27. We’re all a bunch of immigrants.  If someone is contributing to society and doing work that no other citizen wants to do, why would I vilify them?  If a person jumps the fence, send them back.  If they’ve managed to integrate into our way of life and become a contributor to the greater good, then why would I throw them back over the fence like a drug dealer, homicidal maniac, or greed-monger?  Immigration law must be robust, must be enforced, and must be adequate to the task of protecting our borders.  Common sense immigration practice must also remember that every one of us started out as a newbie and if it weren’t for a little grace here and there we’d all be swimming in the Atlantic or Pacific.
28. I’m not a big fan of homosexuality.  The Bible I read and try to obey says the homosexual lifestyle is a sin.  I am also fanatical about the Constitution and the Bill of Rights.  These documents make my legal responsibility clear.  If someone denies a person a legitimate civil right, even if my moral compass says that part of what they do in their private life is “sinful,” then I must defend the person being denied their civil right.  If someone attacks a person with whom I might have theological or even moral disagreement, then I must defend that person.  In fact, I think that’s even kind of a Biblical message.  Consider the parable of the good Samaritan and the unmerited grace that person bestowed on a tortured traveler.  May God have mercy on my soul  for the times when I err on the side of upholding my Constitutional responsibilities as a citizen of this country.
29. Next to education, NOTHING is as vital to the smooth functioning of democracy as an independent, infectiously curious news media.  When news media is partisan, it fails the electorate.  When news media is constantly searching for the truth in a story, even if that truth might make the investigator personally squeamish, it functions in the best interest of the citizenry.  Thank God there are still a few stridently curious news outlets out there.  They make up for the ones who pander to narrow interests.
30. There is nothing wrong with accumulating wealth and enjoying its benefits.  As an economic and political philosophy, socialism is a dead-end.  But greed exists in this world and by our nature our DNA craves selfish pleasures.  A healthy set of business regulations that ensure a level playing field for all players, coupled with an appropriately applied tax code that ensures that the ultra-wealthy are not able to make themselves into untouchable kings or queens, are essential to maintaining the health of our democracy.  There are too many loopholes, too many tax credits, and not enough predictable gradations in the tax structure.  I do not deny the appeal of stripping away loopholes and reducing tax rates.  I DO have a problem with changing the tax code if it means a back-door reduction in taxation for the wealthiest among us.
31. There was nothing wrong with the Estate tax before and there is no reason to perpetuate the Bush era estate tax cuts now.  The ultra-wealthy weren’t ultra-poor before those tax cuts.  I don’t remember any of the people in central Montgomery County hurting for a second BMW in the driveway of their $750,000 McMansions.  Now the wealthy are just getting obscenely wealthy and the gap between the rich and poor widens more with each passing day.  It’s one thing to want to pass your kids a nest egg.  It’s entirely another when you have to be passing at least $4million before the taxman gets the cut AND even then you’re only paying a pittance.
32. I still am the President of an S-Corp consultancy.  It is time for the Chamber of Commerce (of which I was a multi-year member) to stop whining about the unfairness of the tax code toward small businesses.  Although I didn’t have the stomach to be a cut-throat businessman, for a while I did enjoy the benefits of a tax code that is SLANTED heavily in  favor of small business.  The tax deductibility and the tax reduction options available to S-Corps and LLC’s are mind-boggling.  So stop whining, people.  The reason you’re not creating jobs isn’t because the tax code isn’t in your favor.  There is still plenty of money to be made if people with entrepreneurial grit roll up their sleeves, even WITH this confusing, complicated tax code.

I am certain there is much more to add.  I’ll keep building on this as time goes on.  Feel free to shoot me a note with a recommendation and I’ll add it to the list with your name attached.  If you want to tell me I’m nuts, I’ll post that to.  Just please be respectful and intelligent.  No name-calling, please.

Well, the Democrats abused their power soon after winning 2008 and Mitch McConnell declared the equivalent of partisan nuclear war in response, saying, more or less, that his sole mission in life was to ensure that every Republican would vote AGAINST everything the President might put forward from that day forward.

Ahhh…  Partisan bickering, how we loathe thee.

Remember George W. saying something along the lines of…

“That’s what you do with political capital.  You spend it.”

What goes around comes around, so all the hand-wringing and finger pointing by the Republicans blaming the Democrats for gridlock in Washington is crocodile tears.  The Republicans shafted the Democrats in 2004, the Dem it to the Republicans in 2008.

I am so soured on the process and so disgusted by this political season I’m thinking about checking out completely.

I said “thinking about.”  On election day, just like every other lemming who naively believes that this cash-rich electoral process amounts to anything of value, I waltzed up to the polling place and cast my vote for the lesser-s of what I considered many evils.

After every negative, self-serving ad I saw come across my TV screen I felt like taking a long, hot shower.

After seeing that this campaign for the Presidency cost BILLIONS of dollars, I felt like vomiting.

After watching Chris Christie tap dance around the fact that his heart wanted to praise the President but his party affiliation meant that he had to publicly pronounce his vote for the other guy, my heart broke.

Politics hits the fan yet again.  Even in the middle of a disaster, where the guy already in the office proved he could lead effectively, the partisan message pushed its way back to the surface.  Better for Christie to have said nothing than to undermine the one, gleaming moment of bi-partisan hope in the midst of acrimony.

Here’s the bottom line…

I have a simple platform developing in my mind’s eye, a platform that cuts so strongly toward the center not a SINGLE candidate would ever touch it.  Why?  Because it’s not partisan.  It’s about people, not powers.  It’s about embracing real-world, malleable philosophies and facing thorny challenges head on with an eye toward compromise, not strident, “my way or the highway” ideologies masquerading as bi-partisan solutions.

Since you didn’t ask, here are my meandering, centrist, hopefully-Christ-honoring ideals.  Feel free to give me both barrels for naivete and wishful thinking.

1. An educated electorate is a powerful electorate.  Education is the root of our democracy and a big differentiator between the democratic industrialized world and all those banana republics that still exist out there.  Ensure that every person no matter how poor has a shot at a decent, safe education and you ensure an informed, eager electorate.
2. Focus on the educational basics but respect the need to teach people how to THINK CRITICALLY.  Take Fox News and MSNBC out of the classroom and teach students how to ask HARD questions when people present simple answers to tough questions.  Demand that your journalists treat EVERY politician with an equally jaundiced eye.  Republicans don’t walk on water and Democrats aren’t always on the side of the little guy.
3. If a person shows their willingness to work hard to achieve and earns the grades it takes to succeed in college, make a publicly funded college education available and within their financial grasp no matter how poor they might be.  If you really want to supercharge the next generation of entrepreneurial spirit, start it by equipping the next generation of boot-strap entrepreneurs.
4. Address the burgeoning income inequities between CEOs and other executives and the lowest paid employees in their firms.  In a world where average CEO salaries are now 400 TIMES the lowest paid employee, in a country where they ONCE were more like 40 TIMES the lowest paid employee, press for financial reforms to ensure that EVERY employee gets a fair slice of the organizational income pie.
5. NO MORE GOLDEN PARACHUTES.  If a CEO drives a company into the ground and shareholders are left holding the bag, that CEO ought to find themselves without a hefty severance.  You want to take the risk in the private marketplace?  Take the risk.  You crap out your company?  Expect a crap payout.
6. I AM my brother’s keeper.  Some people can pull themselves up by the bootstraps and they should reap their fair  reward for their hard work.  Some people, though, simply can’t lift themselves up.  They might have Down’s syndrome, or be autistic, or be a veteran with PTSD, or a person whose health is failing.  Civil societies do not jettison their weak and poor.  They lift them and care for them.  Or, as we Christians like to say, we must care for “widows” and “orphans.”
7. Render unto Caesar what is Caesar’s.  Like it or not, money is the lubrication of civil society.  Roads must be built.  Schools must be maintained.  Army’s must be armed.  FEMA must be prepared for the next major disaster, no matter where it might strike.  Some things can’t and shouldn’t be privatized.  Human greed just makes some endeavors too risky to put into the hands of private organizations.  A fair level of taxation is to be expected and supported.  Onerous taxation is not.
8. As an individual, I turn the other cheek.  As a country, we must defend our freedom.  Defense of freedom, however, does not always translate into war and wars are not always a true defense of freedom.  When precious human life is on the line, you deploy your human assets with as great a level of fear and trepidation as possible.
9. The Constitution and Bill of Rights are both our bedrock and our lifeblood.  They are not  static documents, embodying immovable, detailed responses to every challenge we might face as a country.  The Constitution and Bill of Rights are, however, like the Bible of democracy, a fixed point in time, a tangible, spiritual device by which “intent” is measured and solutions are crafted.  If we respect the core tenets of that Constitutional Bible, and protect EVERY person’s right to free speech and EVERY person’s right to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness, there will be no need for special classes of citizen.  Citizens will simply “be” citizens, each person endowed with the right to equal pay, equal treatment under the law, and equal access to the privileges of civilized society.
10. Term limits must be enacted.  Anyone who makes a profession of representing the people who pay for their elect-ability is a person who no longer represents “we the people.”  Turnover in House and the Senate is good.  In a world where cash swings elections more than honest debate and credible ideas, it is time to take away the power of the king-and-queen makers and boot entrenched powers out at predetermined intervals.
11. Corporations are not “people” and should not be endowed with the rights of people.  One person, one vote.  One person, one donation.  Corporations are nameless, faceless entities whose sole purpose is accumulation of wealth at all costs, not service to the community above all else.  Corporations are also not created equally, with all contributing equally to the good of the community.  The right of ALL corporate entities to contribute to political campaigns should be stripped and stripped immediately.  If a person does not publicly donate to a candidate, then they are conducting backroom shenanigans that must be exposed to the light of day.
12. Campaign spending is out of control and must be capped.  Adjusted for inflation, NO political campaign should get away with spending unlimited sums of money to buy an office.  Every campaign should be limited to the same cap.  If it is a national campaign, such as for the Presidency, then that cap will be high, perhaps $1,000,000 adjusted for inflation, but other than that, excessive spending does NOTHING to contribute to the vitality of our democracy.  It is time for us to restrain ourselves for the greater good of our society and future generations.
13. Super-PACs must be abolished.  The ability for a privileged few to buy enormous sums of airtime without disclosing their identities fully must be restrained.  Individual contributions must be sufficiently high to permit people of great wealth to participate in the process but low enough to ensure that NO person can BUY an office.
14. We must return the nobility of public service to its rightful place in our society.  We must laud people who give their talents to the rest of society through their service in comparatively low-paying, civil service roles.  Once upon a time we encouraged people of great talent to serve in our halls of justice, in our regulation of Wall Street, in libraries, work placement offices, and in the military.  Now we laud the ultra-wealthy and suggest that working for “the government” (aka: YOU AND I) is to be avoided like the plague.
15. The facts matter.  Truth matters.  Some ultra-wealthy, big-time billionaire ought to endow a national, non-partisan institute in perpetuity to do nothing but hold BOTH parties accountable.   As a matter of decency and fairness, if an organization chooses to air an ad that maligns a candidate using shady, dubious facts, the corresponding truth must be aired.  For every campaign ad that is aired that does not pass the fact-check of the non-partisan group, air time should be reserved to indicate that the previous claims cannot be substantiated by public records.
16. Keep politics out of the church, keep the pulpit out of politics.  When people of faith mistakenly believe that Christ would have permitted himself to be a political activist, they forget that the Lord of the universe willingly went to the cross rather than foster an insurrection against Rome.  His kingdom was NOT of this earth, and neither should ours be.  Our eyes must be fixed on HEAVEN, not the next election cycle.  Our fellowship should be based on our beliefs in the triune God, not our devotion to this candidate or that.  There are good Christians who lean one way and the other in every Christian church.  It is perfectly acceptable for Christians to run for office, to participate in the political spectrum, and even be completely open with their faith.  It is entirely another thing for Christians of good conscience to mistakenly believe that God endorses one political party over another.  God honors those who honor Him, and with all the lies and half-truths that are uttered in the name of politics it is hard to imagine that God is honoring all but the most pure of political candidates.
17. Balancing a budget requires a backbone of steel.  Someone will lose, someone will win, but in the end the entire country should benefit.  Compromise is not a filthy, dirty word, but a part of a healthy, bi-partisan process of doing what is in the greater good for the entire country.  If members of Congress cannot do such hard, bi-partisan work without succumbing to the persona of children on a school playground, then the Constitution must do the work for them, slashing all budgets equally and raising all taxes automatically.  A balanced budget amendment is essential to ensuring that people with weak constitutions do not punt hard decisions down the line to the next generation.
18. Fundamental access to basic healthcare should not be an afterthought but a civil right.  For every under or un-insured person who shows up at a hospital ER without insurance, there is a consequence.  It should not be incumbent upon hospitals to simply write-off such visits, but a smoothly functioning society must anticipate and plan for such a reality.  Whether such coverage is provided through the private market or the government is ultimately irrelevant; the need is tangible.  Coverage for pre-existing conditions must anticipate the fact that a fluid, entrepreneurial society must make barriers to labor movement as low as possible.
19. Members of Congress who miss more than 25% of their votes should resign.
20. Members of Congress should have no greater benefits than those received by the bulk of the American electorate.
21. Greed is bad.
22. Selflessness is good.
23. The Electoral College perpetuates Red State/Blue State partisanship and country-wide polarization.  Even within given states, minority voices can be ignored.  The Republican in New York or the Democrat in South Carolina feel disenfranchised as candidates go after “Electoral College” winner-take-all blocks of votes.  If a direct election were held, candidates would be required to reach out to more, dissimilar voters in more areas of the country, being forced to embrace hard messages and thorny challenges in every outpost and every burb across the land.
24. Members of Congress may not lobby the government for a minimum of four years after leaving office.
25. The salary of members of Congress should be fixed at no more than 6 times the national poverty level.
26. Like corporations, unions are NOT individuals and should NOT be permitted to contribute to political campaigns.  If individual union members wish to contribute, their contribution should come from their pockets and NOT from the coffers of the union by way of their dues.
27. We’re all a bunch of immigrants.  If someone is contributing to society and doing work that no other citizen wants to do, why would I vilify them?  If a person jumps the fence, send them back.  If they’ve managed to integrate into our way of life and become a contributor to the greater good, then why would I throw them back over the fence like a drug dealer, homicidal maniac, or greed-monger?  Immigration law must be robust, must be enforced, and must be adequate to the task of protecting our borders.  Common sense immigration practice must also remember that every one of us started out as a newbie and if it weren’t for a little grace here and there we’d all be swimming in the Atlantic or Pacific.
28. I’m not a big fan of homosexuality.  The Bible I read and try to obey says the homosexual lifestyle is a sin.  I am also fanatical about the Constitution and the Bill of Rights.  These documents make my legal responsibility clear.  If someone denies a person a legitimate civil right, even if my moral compass says that part of what they do in their private life is “sinful,” then I must defend the person being denied their civil right.  If someone attacks a person with whom I might have theological or even moral disagreement, then I must defend that person.  In fact, I think that’s even kind of a Biblical message.  Consider the parable of the good Samaritan and the unmerited grace that person bestowed on a tortured traveler.  May God have mercy on my soul  for the times when I err on the side of upholding my Constitutional responsibilities as a citizen of this country.
29. Next to education, NOTHING is as vital to the smooth functioning of democracy as an independent, infectiously curious news media.  When news media is partisan, it fails the electorate.  When news media is constantly searching for the truth in a story, even if that truth might make the investigator personally squeamish, it functions in the best interest of the citizenry.  Thank God there are still a few stridently curious news outlets out there.  They make up for the ones who pander to narrow interests.

I am certain there is much more to add.  I’ll keep building on this as time goes on.  Feel free to shoot me a note with a recommendation and I’ll add it to the list with your name attached.

I’ll say it again.

Mitt Romney is NOT a follower of the one Lord, the only Son of God, God in human form, Jesus Christ.  Mitt worships at a place that may “include” the name of Jesus in its title, but make no mistake, he is NOT a Christian.

If there were any doubt before, there is little now.

Take a full, unedited listen to his off-the-cuff comments at a big-wig fundraiser.

The man who spoke those words knows NOTHING of Matthew 5.

Dripping with disdain, condescension, and arrogance, Mitt Romney lumped nearly 50% of the American public into a single pile.  He thinks the vast middle and lower-middle class in this country is comprised of nothing but tax-dodging, welfare-loving, uneducated, handout-taking, lazy bums.

Mitt pretty much made his desires clear.

He wishes 50% of the American populace would just disappear so he and his ultra-wealthy buddies could just get rid of their oppressive, onerous tax burdens.

As if the guy doesn’t have enough luxury automobiles and Cayman Island bank accounts to go around already.

Mitt Romney, you disgust me.  You don’t deserve to lead this country and the 47% who are counting on you to think with something more than your hyper-extended wallet, your Swiss bank accounts, and your Cayman shelters.

And please…  Until you’ve stopped to consider the full import of Christ’s admonition that it is “easier for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle than a rich man to enter the Kingdom of Heaven,” please stop portraying yourself as some kind of compassionate Christian looking out for the underdog.  You’re not.  You’re just a greed monger heaping filth upon the name of our Lord.

Plenty.

Consider this tidbit.

When Paul Ryan, Mitt Romney’s presumptive VP nominee, recently released his tax returns, it was MOTS. (That’s shorthand for, “More of The Same.”) Lots of money earned, low tax rate paid. In one of his recent filing years Ryan earned around $350,000, paying an effective tax rate of not-quite 16%.

I expected Romney, an ULTRA-wealthy dude, to pay an even lower nominal tax rate since so much of his money comes from investments.  He did.  In his most recent year, Romney earned something like $20,000,000 in a single year and paid a tax rate of around 14%.

(Thank you, George W. for slashing taxes for people who have TONS of money in investments.)

What I didn’t expect was to learn that after earning $350,000 Ryan gave somewhere around $2,600 to charity.

That’s less than 1% of his adjusted gross income in charitable giving.

Pathetic.

Ryan spouts the line that government should be smaller, that people should care for each other more, that government shouldn’t meddle in the lives of private citizens and we should be able to do whatever we want with our money, including keep it in our pockets at the expense of someone else falling through the cracks.

Of course he does.  Ryan evidences by his charitable giving that he doesn’t give a flying fig about people who need a helping hand.  His nauseating lack of beneficence speaks volumes.

News flash to the Republican party…

If you want me to respect your tax-cutting obsession then start showing me that you’re doing something more valuable with your money than just buying up another Beemer or mansion.  INVEST IT IN HUMANITY, for crying out loud!  GIVE SOMETHING to charity!

Until then, all I hear coming out of your mouths is so much blah, blah, blah.

‘Nuff said. I’m out.

Now, conservative shill Ann Coulter has proclaimed that the children of candidates are no longer off-limits for personal attacks.

On Sean Hannity’s March 21, 2012 broadcast, Coulter said, among other insipidness…

“So maybe it’s time to start imitating liberals in another way and go after the Obama children,” she added. “By the way, that has been done grotesquely and viscously over the years by the left.”

ENOUGH!

It is clear that these people do not know JESUS!  If they did, they’d start focusing more on what THEY are going to do for the country than on ways to ATTACK their opponents, often in the most personal, most vicious of ways.

“Get the plank out of your own eye…”

“Turn the other cheek…”

There is no room for the kind of behavior Coulter espouses.  Her tit-for-tat, “they do it so we can, too” childishness in a healthy society.  It’s one thing to attack a person’s political positions with intellectual fervor, offering what one considers a better slate of ideas.  It’s entirely another to excuse bad behavior – if not outright sinfulness – under the guise of, “The other guy is doing it, so shall I.”

Is it ever right to attack a political opponent by going after their family?

No.

Ann…  Your 15 minutes of mic time are up.  You just wore out your welcome.  There may be some people out there who love the kind of sick-hearted tactics you espouse.  I’m not one of them.

Independent voters.

Mitt Romney’s failure to latch in with the Republican base says more about Romney’s failings than it does the “any other comer” way in which long-time Republicans have swung from one “self-professed-conservative” to another over the past six months.  Each time an alternative rises, he (or she) gaffs his (or her) way out of existence.  Then attention shifts back to Romney because he is, for lack of a better word…

Safe.

Romney is the epitome of electoral blandness.

He’s about as warm and snuggly as a brick, but at least he’s an electable brick.

Romney represents the very real potential of Republican electability in a country where the vast majority of the public doesn’t listen to – or care about – the likes Rush Limbaugh or Rachael Maddow.  Romney’s policies are mainstream, his career baggage is relatively well known, and his propensity for campaign-ending, humiliatingly public gaffs is usually kept in a moderate degree of check.

Romney is a king-sized loaf of white bread in a split-top, whole wheat world.  He’s predictable.  Despite his laughable, “severely conservative” claim, he’s actually an ever-so-slightly right-leaning mirror image of what Barack Obama “claimed” to be when he stormed the castle gates at 1600 PA avenue.  Romney-care was Obama-care’s inspiration, for crying out loud.

Which is why “old school” Republicans – mainstream Republicans – are voting for the guy.

No, Santorum’s latest status as the hot ticket for conservative Republican hearts speaks more to the evangelical right’s not-so-quiet distaste of a Mormon candidate.  Evangelicals are, after all, the heart and soul of the Republican party. It is tough for self-professing evangelical Christians to vote for a guy they don’t think is smart enough to realize his religion is a tad wacky.  Romney’s faith says Jesus was the physical product of a physical God who dropped down to earth and then promptly got physically intimate with Mary.

Christians?  Well, there’s this little sticking point of theology called, “The virgin birth…”

Yes, Santorum draws voters to the ballot box because he just happens to be the most viable “non-Mormon” Jesus Freak left in the race.

I know some people like this guy, but I just don’t get it. He may have been a thoughtful conservative once upon a time, but any more he just sounds like a bombastic, “I don’t care about facts, I’ll just choose to believe what I want to believe” blow-hard.  The truth of the matter is crystal clear; Rush never met a Democrat he liked and if that’s the party on your voter registration card you are branded a mindless, “big government,” neanderthal.

Do I have a ton of love for the Prez? Nah. I do confess, I issued the “NoMoreGreed” endorsement to Obama when he ran.  At times I have also found Obama just as partisan in tone as the flack who preceded him at 1600 PA Ave. Recently, particularly in the speech he offered harkening back to the elder Roosevelt cousin, (Teddy), he seems to have grown a spine and a sense of urgency. That’s refreshing.

For the most part, though, Obama is often just as guilty as Karl Rove’s prodigy, “W,” when it comes to the “perpetual campaign” style of governing. Make the other guy look as bad as you can whenever you can and let an emotionally-driven electorate sort out the results.

So when I hear Rush wax paranoid about the Prez and his party, I usually just pinch my nose and turn my head. (Or is it plug my ears and look the other way?  Whatever.) I generally ignore the guy. He says so many half-baked things these days it’s kind of like the 13-year-old who just got a dictionary for his birthday and then reminds you at every opportunity that he’s all-kinds-of smart and oh-so-intellectually-talented and has a real gift for smart-sounding words.

Today, however, Rush went positively nutsy-koo-koo over some sinister Democratic effort to ban incandescent lights and throw people in jail if they didn’t move over to Compact Fluorescent Lights, or some other energy saving technology. To hear Rush describe it, this is all more evidence of some Obama-ian plot to inject government into every crevice of our private lives.  ”I am a criminal,” Rush proclaimed, because he would dare the government to throw him in jail for using an incandescent light.  Rush just loves proclaiming himself the antagonistic champion of the ultra-wealthy underdog.

Whoopsie daisy, Rush-o, you seem to have forgotten some rather important details.

The Big O didn’t do the deed on outlawing incandescent lights.  That wasn’t done by executive order, Rushy-baby.

Congress did the deal.

Oh yeah… One more tidbit…

Congress did it during W’s second term, 2007 to be exact.

Ahhh…  Who cares?  Why let a little thing like a historical FACT interfere with a good anti-Obama rant?

Rush whined on and on about the quality of CFL light. It’s not as warm as an incandescent, he said. He’s right. I have yet to see a cheap-o CFL that produces nearly the quality of light of a 100 watt incandescent bulb. Further, as someone who gets a nice, whopper headache when I’m exposed to fluorescent bulbs for an extended period of time, I’m not the biggest fan of the technology.

Therein lies the key word in this battle. Technology.  That’s “technology,” as in, “Thomas Edison died a long, long time ago and lighting technology is marching forth,” “technology.”  CFLs, love ‘em or hate ‘em are 70% more efficient at producing light than incandescents. A 13 watt CFL produces “almost” as much light as a 60 watt incandescent and lasts about 10x longer. That means burning less fossil fuels to light our homes and offices, cutting down on power plant emissions as we slowly cut back on electric use, and less landfill waste as we throw out fewer lights over time.

I’m sure Rush doesn’t give a darn about landfills, though.  Landfill management is an “out of sight,” out of Republican mind issue.  Let the people who actually live near landfills care about managing those nasties.

Yes, there are some concerns over the mercury from fluorescent lights making its way into landfills and back into the food and water stream. That’s not a small concern.  I don’t think we’ve done nearly enough planning before throwing the waste from CFLs into the ecosystem.

But how much mercury are we dumping into the atmosphere when we burn coal to run all those spiffy incandescent lights?  Something tells me this is all a big wash in the end, but I’m no scientist.  I just play one on YouTube.

So, Rush, please accept this heart-felt little note, intended in the dearest of fashions…

Please, I’m beggin’ ya…  Shut up once in a while and climb out of the dark ages.  Technology marches forward, my friend.  The Luddite caucus is the third door to the left as you exit the convention hall.

Image of CFL Bulb: Master isolated images / FreeDigitalPhotos.net