[Oe List ...] Fwd: 9/01/11, Spong: Political Gridlock and Presidential Politics

[RICHARD HOWIE]

Bob Luidens is pastor at Altamont Reformed Church.
Ellen

Begin forwarded message:

> From: Altamont Reformed Church <altamontreformed at yahoo.com>
> Date: September 5, 2011 10:23:03 AM EDT
> To: RICHARD HOWIE <rhowie3 at verizon.net>
> Subject: Re: Fwd: [Oe List ...] 9/01/11, Spong:  Political Gridlock  
> and Presidential Politics
> Reply-To: Altamont Reformed Church <altamontreformed at yahoo.com>
>
> Thanks, Ellen.
> I believe Spong is dead-on correct in his analysis. Oy, what a mess  
> we have made.
> Interestingly, I had a fascinating conversation recently with a man  
> in Altamont who made the following, shocking statement: "I don't  
> get why we're in such a financial mess in America. Fighting wars  
> has always been the best way to get out of financial problems, like  
> back in the 30's and 40's. I kinda always figured that fighting in  
> Iraq and Afghanistan would really help our economy." At first I  
> thought he was being overtly satirical, and was prepared to chuckle  
> with him at his gallows humor; then I realized he was being totally  
> forthcoming and honest. It blew me away. I then tried to think out  
> loud with him about the absurdity that engaging in what is patently  
> destructive -- war -- is not going to "re-construct" a nation, much  
> less its economy. He seemed curious about such an possibility, and  
> shrugged it off as "an interesting idea"; he then went on to say  
> that with "the right President" fighting the war in Afghanistan the  
> economy will surely "turn around".
> Why, after 58 years, am I finding myself still struck dumb by the  
> human capacity for upside down and backwards rationality?
> Anyways.
> I do appreciate your forwarding Spong's remarks. (I also enjoyed  
> his wonderful words about goats and sheep!)
> Blessings.
> Bob
> P.S. Thanks for your help with the reception yesterday -- and for  
> Dick's comments during the service. How delightful to hear Roger  
> respond to Dick that Dick doesn't have to "wait until I leave for  
> AZ" to bring him some cookies!
>
> From: RICHARD HOWIE <rhowie3 at verizon.net>
> To: Altamont Reformed Church <altamontreformed at yahoo.com>
> Sent: Friday, September 2, 2011 9:39 AM
> Subject: Fwd: [Oe List ...] 9/01/11, Spong: Political Gridlock and  
> Presidential Politics
> Hi Bob, FYI
> Ellen
> Begin forwarded message:
>> From: elliestock at aol.com
>> Date: September 1, 2011 10:11:25 AM EDT
>> To: Dialogue at wedgeblade.net, OE at wedgeblade.net
>> Subject: [Oe List ...] 9/01/11, Spong:  Political Gridlock and  
>> Presidential Politics
>> Reply-To: Order Ecumenical Community  <oe at wedgeblade.net>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>      HOMEPAGE        MY PROFILE        ESSAY ARCHIVE       MESSAGE  
>> BOARDS       CALENDAR
>>
>> Political Gridlock and Presidential Politics
>> As I watch political gridlock creating recession in the United  
>> States, I find myself at a loss for words.  It does not help that  
>> I have just finished reading William D. Cohan’s book House of  
>> Cards, based on the collapse of Bear Stearns in 2008.  In that  
>> book, I discovered that the behavior of many Wall Street  
>> establishment types was barely legal and was overtly immoral.  The  
>> very ones who violated the rules for their own gain still today  
>> continue to lift their voices against any government regulations.   
>> Of course regulations can be counter-productive and destructive,  
>> but every fact of history screams that they are essential.   
>> Somehow there is an unwillingness to recognize that the purpose of  
>> government regulation of the financial markets is not to make the  
>> lives of those who work on Wall Street more difficult, but to  
>> guarantee their honesty that was blatantly missing in the sub- 
>> prime buildup to the economic disaster of 2008.
>> To complicate this difficult time, we have now entered the silly  
>> season of presidential politics where insults, sometimes with a  
>> germ of truth in them, now mark our political rhetoric.  We listen  
>> to one candidate call the Fed Chairman Ben Bernanke, a George W.  
>> Bush appointee, a traitor.  Another denies the reality of global  
>> warming. Another dismisses evolution as an “unproven theory,”  
>> apparently unaware that modern medicine today assumes its truth at  
>> every level.  Still another claims that homosexuality can be  
>> cured, despite the denial of this possibility by every reputable  
>> medical board and professional association.  We see candidates  
>> railing against government spending without mentioning that they  
>> are major recipients of government largesse.  When all of this is  
>> put together, it is more than most rational minds can tolerate.   
>> The one economic reality in the developed world today is that over  
>> the past 50 years, the wealthy have become wealthier, the middle  
>> class is overtly shrinking and the poor are getting visibly poorer.
>> In case people haven’t noticed, the anger level in this nation is  
>> also rising.  We saw anger first sweep the Middle East.  It was  
>> born in Tunisia, moved to Egypt, Yemen, Libya, Bahrain, Syria and  
>> now has even engulfed Great Britain and China.  Then moving much  
>> closer, we watched riots break out in Wisconsin, Ohio and  
>> Michigan.  Riots are always a destructive political tactic that  
>> increases in fury and intensity when people begin to perceive that  
>> no one is either willing or capable of redressing their grievances  
>> through the normal political processes.  Much of the anger in  
>> America today is actually directed against the government.   
>> Depending on how one defines government it has a deep partisan  
>> bias.  The facts are that increasingly the masses of the citizens  
>> in this nation are hurting economically. We Americans have paid  
>> dearly for the tactics of the banks and investment businesses in  
>> that our houses are now worth less, our 401Ks are deflated, our  
>> health care is more expensive, jobs have disappeared and  
>> unemployment is at an unsustainably high level.  Governmental and  
>> individual belt-tightening is now essential. Federal spending does  
>> need to be curbed, but in that act we must not lose sight of that  
>> fact that all government spending has been authorized by a  
>> majority vote of both the Senate and the House and these votes  
>> occurred with both parties in the majority.  It is not a partisan  
>> issue.
>> The first blow to the balanced budget, which George W. Bush  
>> inherited when he was elected president in 2000, came in the cause  
>> of national defense.  This nation underwent a terrorist attack of  
>> huge proportions on September 11, 2001.  This attack necessitated  
>> a rise in both the size and function of government.  New York City  
>> and the Pentagon absorbed the primary damage, but the nation  
>> itself was attacked and the nation stood as one to help absorb the  
>> costs of this attack.  No one was either a liberal or a  
>> conservative when the vote to aid the victims of the first  
>> responders and their families was passed.  To guarantee that  
>> another attack would not occur or be successful, the Department of  
>> Homeland Security was created and defense spending was rapidly  
>> increased.  These were the issues that caused the deficit to begin  
>> to rise and the federal bureaucracy to expand. That occurred with  
>> almost unanimous bi-partisan support.
>> Since the conventional political wisdom is that a major power  
>> cannot absorb an enemy attack without retaliation, our leaders  
>> promised to strike at those who had attacked us. Deciding which  
>> nation was responsible for launching this terrorist strike was,  
>> however, not easy to do.  Most of the 9/11 terrorists were  
>> citizens of Saudi Arabia, but Saudi Arabia was a staunch ally,  
>> having allowed American forces to deploy in that country during  
>> the first Iraqi war.  It made no sense militarily or politically  
>> to attack the Saudis.  Afghanistan was the nation where the  
>> terrorists had trained and its government had supported Osama Bin  
>> Laden and Al-Qaeda, so it became the logical place for  
>> retaliation.  The Afghanistan war was thus launched by a  
>> Republican president with the approval of large majorities of both  
>> parties in Congress.  Wars in foreign lands are expensive, but  
>> surprisingly no provision was made to fund this war.  It became an  
>> extra-budgetary item and inevitably contributed to the rising  
>> deficit.
>> There was, however, something unsatisfactory about the Afghanistan  
>> war.  Defeating the Afghans made no great contribution to  
>> America’s well-being or to its image.  There were no national  
>> resources to be gained.  Afghanistan was primarily an opium-based,  
>> drug economy.  Perhaps the United States military could disrupt  
>> the opium traffic, but that did not meet the national desire to  
>> proclaim our might and to satisfy our outrage at being attacked.
>> So a concerted political effort was made to associate Saddam  
>> Hussein and Iraq with the terrorist attack as a preliminary to the  
>> desire to finish what many still regarded as an unfinished war in  
>> Iraq.  To remove Saddam Hussein, to create a democracy in the  
>> Middle East and to insure a continued flow of oil to oil-thirsty  
>> America became reasons enough for war.  For months this campaign  
>> was orchestrated to show what a threat Iraq was to the security of  
>> America.  Vice President Cheney spoke regularly about the  
>> perceived Iraqi links to Al-Quaeda.  Secretary of State  
>> Condoleezza Rice, seeking to enhance her charges that Iraq had  
>> weapons of mass destruction, spoke of the next terrorist attack  
>> being fueled by an Iraqi created “mushroom cloud.”  It worked and  
>> the country was prepared to resume the war in Iraq.  Again, it was  
>> a Republican president, with bi-partisan support in the Congress,  
>> including such well-known Democratic senators as Charles Schumer  
>> and Hillary Clinton, who plunged this nation into another Middle  
>> Eastern conflict.  The assumption was that this war would be swift  
>> and brief.  No greater miscalculation ever occurred in American  
>> history.  Our forces are still in Iraq nine years later!  The  
>> sectarian split in that country still borders on civil war.  There  
>> were no weapons of mass destruction.  Once again, no financial  
>> sacrifices were asked of the American people.  The cost of the war  
>> was simply added to the expanding deficit.  Both parties were  
>> guilty of malfeasance.
>> While this deficit was exploding, in what was surely an act of  
>> political irresponsibility, President Bush called for and the  
>> Congress passed with bi-partisan support, a second tax cutting  
>> bill, this one heavily weighted toward the wealthy.  The argument  
>> was that this tax cut would stimulate jobs.  That did not happen.   
>> Jobs were largely stagnant in the eight years of the Bush  
>> administration.  Executive pay and corporate bonuses, however,  
>> skyrocketed.
>> Then came the subprime housing crisis that compromised the  
>> integrity of our banking system, filled as it was with toxic  
>> mortgages and worthless debts, and ultimately creating the “Great  
>> Recession” of 2008.  Led by Republican Secretary of the Treasury  
>> Hank Paulson, the Federal Government began to rescue the banks,  
>> the automobile industry, the insurance industry and the bond  
>> industry, once again adding immeasurably to the deficit, even as  
>> capital losses in the stock markets sent government revenues  
>> down.  This stimulus money, designed to save the nation from a  
>> depression, also sent government spending to a new high.
>> My point is that we did not get into this economic maelstrom  
>> without the participation of both parties.  Unwise political  
>> decisions were piled onto unwise economic decisions made by a  
>> greedy corporate world, almost killing America’s future.  Now the  
>> time has come to pay the piper and everyone is going to have to  
>> pay.  The idea that there can be no revenue increases to address  
>> this crisis is ludicrous.  The idea that the total burden must  
>> fall on cuts in Social Security, health care, educational  
>> scholarships and other parts of the American safety net is  
>> immoral. The fact is that the standard of living for all Americans  
>> is going to go down for the next few years.  Democrats must be  
>> willing to allow cuts in domestic spending.  Republicans must be  
>> willing to increase revenues from the top 10% of this nation’s  
>> earners.  Bickering over this, attempting to hold the nation  
>> hostage to the threat of default is not only irresponsible, it is  
>> almost criminal.
>> Our present economic predicament is the gift of both of our  
>> political parties. All of us must now take the strong medicine  
>> that our present circumstances require.  Those who think that the  
>> problem will be solved if President Obama is not re-elected are  
>> naïve.  Even if the most conservative Republican becomes president  
>> in 21012, this problem will still have to be addressed.  If the  
>> Republicans try to solve this problem on the backs of the poor and  
>> the middle classes, they will be risking a social upheaval the  
>> likes of which this nation has not seen since the Civil War.  If  
>> the Democrats try to solve this problem by excessive taxes without  
>> sacrifices from all, the stagnation that will grip our nation will  
>> be severe and decades long.
>> The future of this nation now rests in the hands of a Super  
>> Congressional Committee of Twelve – six Democrats and six  
>> Republicans – six senators and six representatives.  They have  
>> three months to reach a conclusion.  That conclusion is far more  
>> important than whether anyone is elected or re-elected in 2012.   
>> This is the time for genuine American leadership to arise.  The  
>> only question is who will provide it.
>> ~John Shelby Spong
>> Read the essay online here.
>> Question & Answer
>> Debbie Medves from Waxhaw, North Carolina, via the internet writes:
>> Question:
>> I heard you speak in Charlotte last October at Myers Park Baptist  
>> Church and thoroughly appreciated you and your books.  I have  
>> bought two sweet young pygmy goats to help me with the weeding on  
>> our four acres.  I have never had anything more than a dog or a  
>> cat as a pet so this is an adventure of sorts.  I know many folks  
>> raised around livestock do not have the same appreciation that I  
>> do for this inquisitive, alert creature.  I have even started a  
>> goat blog to share our experiences. (Don’t worry, I am a middle  
>> school counselor during most of the year and my husband is in law  
>> enforcement. - we do have other things to do in our life!)  My  
>> concern is how the Bible characterizes goats as opposed to sheep.  
>> Don’t laugh, okay, laugh if you must…but I don’t think from what  
>> I’ve found they are getting a fair personality assessment.  YOU  
>> are the man I’d like to hear from about how this negative  
>> reputation for goats in the bible came to be. I bet it’s another  
>> of man’s distortions or perceptions at the time scripture was  
>> written.  I’d love to see your response to this—wonder if your  
>> audience would be interested.  I enclose a picture of my goats for  
>> your enjoyment.  Keep on with your marvelous work.
>> Answer:
>> Dear Debbie,
>> I’ve never been asked about the image of goats in the Bible  
>> before, so thank you for forcing me to expand my thinking.  In my  
>> career there are very few questions that I haven’t had to confront  
>> previously, but yours is quite new.  My sources turned up very  
>> little, but I will share what I have learned.
>> Goats are more independent than sheep, more adventuresome and thus  
>> harder to manage and control.  That may be the source of some of  
>> the negativity.  Goats are strong minded creatures and are,  
>> therefore, not good followers.  The Church and its leadership have  
>> always preferred passive sheep-like lay people and clergy.  Goats  
>> seem to like freedom and do not like being confined.
>> The reason the sheep and the goats have to be separated at night–  
>> as the shepherd was said to do in the parable of the Judgment in  
>> Matthew 25 – is that goats need to be kept warm at night and are  
>> therefore housed inside while sheep prefer the open air.  In  
>> biblical times, sheep also cost more than goats since sheep had  
>> more uses, producing both wool and meat, so they were thought of  
>> more highly.  Economic value, I suspect, is part of the biblical  
>> system that accorded a higher worth to a sheep than to a goat.
>> I have also read that goats are symbolic of sexuality, sexual  
>> desire and even lechery.  This reference came to me from one who  
>> is supposed to be an authority on dreams and dream analysis and I  
>> do not know how to evaluate its correctness, but if that is true  
>> the church has historically tried to repress and to devalue all  
>> sexual feelings..  Perhaps we see an echo of this when a man who  
>> makes women feel sexually uncomfortable is referred to as “an old  
>> goat.”
>> In the Bible a goat is also mentioned in Leviticus as part of the  
>> Yom Kippur Liturgy.  The goat is the creature upon which the sins  
>> of the people are symbolically laid before it is driven out of the  
>> assembly.  The goat is thus the sin bearer that carries the  
>> people’s sins with it into the exile of the wilderness, leaving  
>> the people sinless and virtuous.  This image may also have led to  
>> the biblical negativity toward goats.
>> We refer in our vernacular to a grouchy person as someone from  
>> whom another has “gotten his goat.”  In tracing down this image, I  
>> discovered that it came from the custom of placing a goat into the  
>> stall of a nervous horse because of the goat’s calming influence.  
>> If the goat was removed prematurely the horse became or remained  
>> irritable.  So we say of a nervous and irritable human being that  
>> “someone must have gotten his goat.”
>> Boil all of this down and perhaps we might find some clues to  
>> explain the Bible’s negativity toward goats.
>> For what it is worth, I also learned in my research that the tail  
>> of the sheep is made up primarily of suet.  I do not know what  
>> that proves, but it was something I did not know before and so I  
>> pass it on.
>> I’m not sure that sheep come off in the Bible or in our culture  
>> with a very positive reputation either.  They are not considered  
>> to be particularly bright.  Sheep are followers not leaders and  
>> are referred to as “dumb sheep.”  I’m not sure that the  
>> traditional image of clergy as shepherds and the congregation as  
>> sheep is a very positive image!
>> Hope this helps.  Enjoy your new pets.  Thanks for sending me  
>> their pictures and yours.
>> ~John Shelby Spong
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