Injustice Anywhere

I am stunned.

It's an emotional response, because I'm an emotional person.  I can't quite comprehend the reality of the situation.

By a fluke, I checked out the "Bash Back" news blog this morning and discovered that the radical gay-rights terrorist group (if they want to dress and act the part, then I'll play along) attacked a local Mormon church on Sunday, scrawling their messages of hate and intolerance in the early morning:

The Mormons are an atrocious bunch and, well, it just felt amazing to f*** up their holy place, especially on an early Sunday morning with the snowflakes glistening in the street lamps.

I've read about Bash Back and their hateful actions against religious people of all stripes who support the institution of marriage, but that was all in California and some mid-western state.  This happened in Olympia, in the land of Evergreen College and happy live-and-let-live hippies.  Except, of course, the militant ones.

This is the same weekend someone -- no one has claimed responsibility at this point, but give the next William Ayers time -- set fire to Sarah Palin's church in Alaska, while a group of women were having a craft party and two children played inside.

I have such a hard time believing that this is even real.  The story on Palin's church is receiving some coverage, of course, and it should -- but there is no clear motive in that case yet. 

For the Mormon church, on the other hand, the motive is pretty freaking clear.  As they brag on their blog, Bash Back is sounding a call for more intolerance and "finding meaning in attacking systems of misery":

Around the world people are breaking away from their dreary slumber, rejecting the tediousness of their boring lives and finding meaning in attacking systems of misery. Let this be a call out for more actions, bigger ones, and bigger still. We want nothing from their world to stand, we want to create our own world, where everything is possible and everything is permitted. (emphasis mine)

This is hate speech.  It's a direct threat to this church, to the people of this church, and to their right to peacefully assemble and hold their sacred beliefs.  I may (and in fact, I do) disagree with the people who attend this church and their beliefs which were attacked -- but these rights are what our grandfathers fought and died for, and I'll be damned if I'm going to sit here and pretend I can ignore this attack on them because no one's threatening me or attacking my non-controversial church.  I cannot stand this, and I will not take this.

A group of religious leaders last week put an ad in The New York Times in response to the attacks on Mormon churches in the wake of Proposition 8.  It's part of the "No Mob Veto" campaign, and I encourage everyone who shares the view that religious liberty is a fundamental right to sign their name to the ad here:

We’re a disagreeable lot. We differ about a great many important things. Most, but not all of us, are religious believers. We likewise differ on important moral and legal questions, including the wisdom and justice of California’s Proposition 8, banning same-sex marriage.

Nevertheless we’re united in this: The violence and intimidation being directed against the LDS or “Mormon” church, and other religious organizations—and even against individual believers—simply because they supported Proposition 8 is an outrage that must stop.

Of course, when a religious organization enters the public policy arena, it must be prepared for disputes. Religious groups can’t claim some sort of special immunity from criticism.

Nevertheless, there’s a world of difference between legitimate political give-and-take and violent attempts to cow your opponents into submission. Violence and intimidation are always wrong, whether the victims are believers, gay people, or anyone else.

Some of the violence is being stoked by public statements denouncing the LDS for merely participating in the debate at all—as if that were somehow illegal. The question isn’t even close. Participating in ballot initiatives is legally different from politicking for candidates. It is perfectly lawful for charities, including religious ones. It is perfectly appropriate as well that all voices be heard. That is a basic point of democracy: The proper response to free speech you disagree with is your own free speech in reply, not attempting to coerce your opponents into silence.

Regrettably, some public voices have even sought to excuse the threats and disruptions simply as “demonstrations” that got out of hand. Perhaps that’s true in some cases. Far too many, however, seem never to have been demonstrations in the first place, but more nearly mobs, seeking not to persuade but to intimidate. When thugs send white powder to terrorize any place of worship, especially those of a religious minority, responsible voices need to speak clearly: Religious wars are wrong; they are also dangerous. Those who fail to condemn or seem to condone that intimidation are at fault as well. Consciously or not, they are numbing the public conscience, which endangers all of us.

Let’s be clear: even the crudest anti-religious propaganda isn’t illegal, and may not constitutionally be outlawed. But it’s nevertheless wrong. It has no place in civilized society.

Therefore, despite our fundamental disagreements with one another, we announce today that we will stand shoulder to shoulder to defend any house of worship—Jewish, Christian, Hindu, whatever—from violence, regardless of the cause that violence seeks to serve. Furthermore, beginning today, we commit ourselves to exposing and publicly shaming anyone who resorts to the rhetoric of anti-religious bigotry—against any faith, on any side of any cause, for any reason.
                                                                                     Signed,
Kevin J. “Seamus” Hasson
The Becket Fund for Religious Liberty

Nathan J. Diament
Union of Orthodox Jewish Congregations of America

Rich Cizik
National Association of Evangelicals

Ronald J. Sider
Evangelicals for Social Action

Chuck Colson
Prison Fellowship

Chris Seiple
Institute for Global Engagement

Dr. Alveda C. King
Civil rights activist

William A. Donohue
Catholic League for Religious and Civil Rights

Robert Seiple
Former U.S. Ambassador-at-Large for
International Religious Freedom

Douglas Laycock
University of Michigan Law School

Marvin Olasky
The King’s College, New York City

Roger Scruton
writer and philosopher

Armando Valladares
former U.S. Ambassador to the U.N. Human Rights Commission

Finally Proud to Be an American?

One of the interesting things about social networking is how quickly it allows you to sample the zeitgeist.  I knew that my friends on Facebook, many of them Obama supporters, would be happy with the news today -- some of them were literally dancing in the streets last night, after all -- but I'm troubled by a few revelations.

Facebook has the nifty "status update" feature by which users tell all their friends exactly what they're doing, how they're feeling, or their deepest thought at that particular moment in under 80 characters.  It gives a quick glimpse into the lives and thoughts of the people you "know."  Today the status updates were spectacular.  I might post a few later, but for now I just want to focus on the general theme from many of my more liberal/formerly politically apathetic friends.

Sarah Fluffenheimer is finally proud to be an American

It came in a few variations, such as adding, "Feels good for a change!" but the sentiments were fairly uniform.

I was shocked.  I really have no way to relate to any such sentiment and am trying really hard to understand it.  I have always been proud of my country.  I haven't always been proud of her leaders.

I was proud when I first prayed for my country at 8 years old and witnessed the defeat of incumbent president George H.W. Bush by Bill Clinton.  I remember Clinton's DNC speech that year and being very alarmed at that young age by his stance on abortion.  I remember feeling like the world as I knew it was over (and, since I was born under Reagan, in many ways, it was).  But I was still proud to be an American.

I remember sending my first campaign contribution to Dole/Kemp in 1996, $25 from a paper carrier.  I knew no one thought Dole had a chance, but I wanted to help.  I fasted that day for the first time.  When the results came in, I wore black for a week in mourning.  Then I pressed on.  I was still proud to be an American.

I remember the hotly contested 2000 election and the partisan bickering on both sides.  I remember Al Gore's angry "concession" speech after the verdict was in.  I sighed and prayed for grace and peace.  I was still proud to be an American.

I remember campaigning in 2004, meeting all sorts of good-natured and ill-tempered South Carolinians, taking part in a study program with energized and engaged Republicans and Democrats, watching Fahrenheit 911 and Journeys With George and Bush's Brain together, along with the debates.  I remember feeling my friends' genuine sorrow and fear with Kerry's loss even as I experienced my own thanksgiving and relief.  I was still proud to be an American.

Last night, I watched a war hero give the most gracious concession speech I have ever heard and was overwhelmed by his humility and sense of honor as he rebuked any comments in the crowd disrespectful of the President-Elect.  I watched with concern as crowds coalesced in giant parades, planned and unplanned, with the sort of fervor and massiveness that reminded me of Middle Eastern mobs venerating their leaders and shouting over their victory in a coup.  I am still proud to be an American.

I can't shake this nagging question -- why are my friends proud of America or proud to be Americans only when their candidate is elected?  The answer points to demagoguery and ultimately, the end of democracy in America.

I am proud of America because I know -- I have been taught from a young age -- that America is not defined by who currently is in a position of power.  America is a dream.  America is a miracle.  The Founders understood the importance of what they wrote in the Declaration of Independence, government only by "the consent of the governed," because "all men are created equal and endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights, and that among these are life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness."  America is a gift from God.  In the words of James Madison, my "fellow Americans must perceive in the Constitution a finger of that almighty hand which has been so frequently extended to our relief in the critical stages of the revolution."

I would add that the almighty hand is evident when one considers the many times our nation was pulled back from the precipice of destruction -- slavery, the Civil War, World War II.  I am not proud of America because I can take credit for it, or because any man can take credit for it.  I am proud -- perhaps a better term is grateful -- because America is a gift that must be cherished, regardless of who is in power.  We are not a perfect nation, but we are a special nation.  I don't think my friends, who are only celebrating their nation today, understand that.

I think that they understand America to be the Oracle who speaks on the television screens and smiles for the cameras.  For the past 8 years, they've hated that America -- uncouth, inelegant, unattractive.  Today they have a different America -- sleek, sexy, refined.  It is not their choice that makes me tremble (though I do shudder a bit); it's their trust and veneration in a man and not a Nation.

"But war and torture are ok with you?"

I just got a Facebook message from someone responding to a video I included with my posted items about Barack Obama and his protection of infanticide in Illinois. The comment was brief and quickly retracted:

"But war and torture are okay with you?"

In other words, if I am voting against Obama this November because he supports abortion (and protects infanticide, which should be chilling to anyone who hears of it), then (in this individual's logic) I must be voting for "war and torture," whatever that means.  (I think it was supposed to be a sweeping indictment of President Bush, but it's a little vague, even for a non sequitir.)

As an aside, I don't think anyone is for "war," in the abstract, unless they delight in death and destruction (which some truly evil people might).  I do think America needs to keep its promise to the Iraqi people and preserve the gains made there, especially over the past several months as the situation has turned with the surge.  But that's really neither here nor there.

That's right.  Your position on the war, whatever it may be, isn't really my concern here.  What's going on in our country, the the slaughter of millions of children and the destruction of the same number of women, is evil on a massive scale.  I don't know of any theologian who ever came up with a "just abortion" theory, because abortion is not like war.  The nuance of fighting wars and grappling with issues of international justice and peace do not translate to the systematic murder of millions of innocent lives.  That these are the weakest and most vulnerable members of society -- mothers and children, both -- doesn't seem to occur to many people in this debate.  That class warfare begins in the womb, where minorities and the poor are aborted in far greater numbers, also gets lost in the bumper sticker rhetoric of Planned Parenthood and NARAL. 

I am puzzled as to why it's awesome when Bono claims that our response to the AIDS crisis in Africa is a moral issue for Christians in America (which I believe it is, btw), but the community of Christians around me sits idly by saying NOTHING about abortion.  Nothing.  We can save the planet (and we should be good stewards, please don't get me wrong), but we don't care to stop infanticide.

Something is wrong.

Where is our moral courage?  Why does it seem like no one cares about the unborn?  Is it the prevailing cultural vanity that we're so beholden to?

Wesley J. Smith once said that the right likes to argue facts, the left likes to argue narrative, and the middle likes to argue style.  "Don't talk about abortion," they tell us, "it's so... gauche."  It's distasteful, you see, bringing up something as unpleasant as the killing of abandoned children.  That's so 1988.  It's much more fashionable to discuss your support for universal health care and alternative energy sources.  That's where the classy people are going...

Meanwhile, how will we approximate justice this November?   "Of course, abortion is wrong," my friends say, "but so is war/not providing health care to children/global warming/insert socially acceptable cause here.  It just doesn't matter as much to me."

My friends are missing something here, which Bishop Chaput addressed in response to Roman Catholics for Obama:

But [Catholics who support pro-choice candidates] also need a compelling proportionate reason to justify it. What is a “proportionate” reason when it comes to the abortion issue? It’s the kind of reason we will be able to explain, with a clean heart, to the victims of abortion when we meet them face to face in the next life—which we most certainly will. If we’re confident that these victims will accept our motives as something more than an alibi, then we can proceed.

I don't know about you, but I can't think of a single reason I would be able to give to an aborted child.

I'm proud to be an American

where at least I know I'm free...



Bush Heckled During a 4th of July Speech At Monticello

Boumediene v. Bush

Last week’s Supreme Court decision to allow detainees at Guantánamo Bay the right to challenge detention in U.S. civil courts is a chilling sign of the politically correct times. The decision struck down portions of the 2006 Military Commissions Act, which, though denying detainees the explicit privilege of habeas corpus in federal courts, did provide a similar privilege within military tribunals. While there was significant debate as to whether military tribunals supplied adequate due process of law for the detainees, the Supreme Court’s decision to render them entirely ineffective, thereby transferring military jurisdiction over detainees of war to the civilian courts, is unsettling.

In his dissenting opinion, Chief Justice Roberts “concluded that ‘this decision is not really about the detainees at all, but about control of federal policy regarding enemy combatants.’ The ruling, said Roberts, did nothing to advance the rule of law, ‘unless by that is meant the rule of lawyers, who will now arguably have a greater role than military and intelligence officials in shaping policy for alien enemy combatants,’” reported Tony Mauro of the Legal Times. A decision that should have fallen under the separation of powers became a convoluted interpretation of the system of checks and balances, whereby judges on benches believed themselves better arbiters than the President, Congress, and military leaders at home and abroad in the dealings of war.

Senator McCain rebuked the decision; Senator Obama hailed it. In an interview three days after the decision, Obama talked of the “unnecessary” situation – that is, holding potential terrorists at bay (no pun intended) in Guantánamo: “not only have we never actually put many of these folks on trial, but we have destroyed our credibility when it comes to rule of law all around the world, and given a huge boost to terrorist recruitment in countries that say, “Look, this is how the United States treats Muslims.”

It is astonishingly naïve of Senator Obama to think that the treatment of “Muslims” at Guantánamo has been the sole cause for galvanized terrorist recruitment. By his simplistic reasoning, stories like the following should cause the terrorists to lay down their arms at any moment: “Iraqi detainees 'refusing to go home.'” Apparently the education programs are of such high quality in U.S. military prisons in Iraq that detainees are requesting to remain in prison even after their sentences are up, and relatives of detainees are asking to be put in prison in order to benefit from the educational system. If the U.S. news media had done a better job of circulating this story, maybe the war would be over.

It is worrisome that the potential future Commander in Chief could encourage such sloppy logic, for the dealings at Guantánamo are how the U.S. treats terrorists and probable terrorists who are a grave threat to our national security, not how it treats Muslims. The more we blur this distinction, the more we believe being politer to enemies of war will make them politer towards us, the more we lend the terrorists the rope by which they can hang us.

I am not saying by any means that prisons like Guantánamo should be allowed to be “black holes for the rule of law.” Military leaders must absolutely be held accountable to acting with integrity under legal standards. Negotiations and diplomacy are paramount. But those who need the power to make swift decisions and take decisive actions should not be held back by the political correctness of the bureaucratic bog.

In his book Faith, Reason, & The War Against Jihadism, George Weigel talks about the need for understanding the enemy (the jihadists), and this includes calling things by their right names. “Murderers in Iraq are murderers and terrorists, not insurgents or sectarians; suicide bombers are, in fact, homicide bombers; and so forth.” The judges and politicians leading this nation, as well as the news outlets, would do well to remember what we’re dealing with.

Political Affiliation and Personality

When the Republicans won in 2004, the media (not being Republican, for the most part, and not able to understand why anyone would be) went looking for answers. Red state/blue state was the Seussian refrain, and the quest for explaining political differences as emotional/psychological profiles began. What sort of person would live in Kansas, anyway? What makes a person "go red"?

Behind all this analysis lies an assumption that should insult anyone who thinks about it long enough: the assumption that it is not because you are a rational creature (as Plato would argue) making your voting choices based on what you have reasoned and discerned, but rather that you are a slave to your emotions or, in other cases, your genetics or your environment. This line of thinking tends to pigeonhole people based on their personality (internal factors beyond one's control) or their level of education or religion (external factors).

Besides being insulting, this also makes for some silly conclusions. This article in Newsweek a few months ago asserted that you could tell someone's political preference just by looking at their desk.

According to Wray Herbert, a cluttered desk = a liberal mind, and this amazing data shows how political preference is actually shaped by personality.

As anyone who has ever had to live with me knows, I disprove this theory immediately. My workspace is almost always in some sort of disarray, though I strive to clean and organize once or twice a year. I keep contact information on post-it notes and, at home, my space is crowded with piles of articles and papers and books. I am not a neat person. In fact, the definition of a liberal's workspace seems to fit my own:

The conservatives' rooms were not only tidy and orderly, they were full of utilitarian stuff like cleaning supplies, calendars and postage stamps. The liberals' rooms were painted in bold colors and cluttered with books and art and travel brochures. The Red rooms, if you will, were places to hole up and be safe, while the Blue rooms felt more like staging areas for exploration.

Basically, the author is arguing that conservatives are boring and conventional while liberals are exciting and expressive:

Again these are our stereotypes, but now there is a deeper psychological explanation for these predictable tastes and attitudes. It's human nature to crave certainty and structure. But individuals crave security to varying degrees, depending on how fearful they are. People who are the most fearful see safety in stability and hierarchy, where more emotionally secure people can tolerate some chaos and unpredictability in their lives. The psychologists gathered data from 12 different countries to test this out, and they found that conservative politics were inextricably linked to several measures of emotional insecurity: intolerance of ambiguity, need for structure, desire for closure, and so forth. They also found that conservatives had a more intense existential fear of death.

Where to begin? First, the idea that liberals are more emotionally secure than conservatives is absurd. Take a random sample of Republicans from Chattanooga and a random sample of Democrats from Seattle, and compare their emotional security -- heck, forget security, let's just check their emotional stability -- and see what you find.

Second, linking conservatism to fear is short-sighted at best and likely self-serving on the author's part. (At least he's upfront about his political bias before he graciously dismisses anyone on the other side of the aisle as a coward.) That conservatives favor order in society is true -- because order brings beauty and goodness with it. As G. K. Chesterton wrote, "The rare, strange thing is to hit the mark; the gross, obvious thing is to miss it . . . Chaos is dull; because in chaos the train might indeed go anywhere . . . I tell you that every time a train comes in I feel that it has broken past batteries of besiegers, and that man has won a battle against chaos . . . it is things going right that is poetical."

There are reasons to favor order that have little to do with fear. Love of poetry is one of them.

"Ah, but it's the conservatives who argue that the world is coming to an end soon, that we must fight an endless war against terrorism and secure the border at all costs!" you say. Of course, that is true -- but that a man locks his door at night does not mean he is given to unreasonable fear. The Greatest Generation may have been called many things as they marched off to defend American soil against the Axis powers -- fearful was not one of them. It is not the coward who stands guard and arms himself, but the brave and calm man. To point out a danger and insist that it is real and needs to be addressed is NOT a trait of fearfulness.

Of course, there may be some truth to the whole "conservatives are neat and liberals are messy" paradigm. I don't fit it myself, but I know one or two people who might. The problem is not that I'm the exception that proves the rule, but that the accountant who fits the conservative desk stereotype is.

Why I Support John McCain

Come November, I'm not going to be wincing as I pull the lever for McCain. I'm going to campaign for the man as best I can, and mostly because he can say something like this:

There is a tendency in our age to accede to the spurious excuse of moral relativism and turn away from the harshest examples of man's inhumanity to man; to ignore the darker side of human nature that encroaches upon our decency by subtle degree. There are many reasons for this. Blessed with opportunity, and intent on the challenges of work and family, our own lives often seem too full and hectic to take notice of offenses that seem distant from our own reality. There is also the threat in a society passionate about its liberty that we can become desensitized to the dehumanizing effect of the obscenity and hostility that pervades much of popular culture. It is in our nature as Americans to see the good in things; to face even serious adversity with hope and optimism. And yet, with so much good in the world, for all the progress of humanity, in which our nation has played such an admirable and important role, evil still exists in the world. It preys upon human dignity, assaults the innocence of children, debases our self- respect and the respect we are morally obliged to pay each other, and assails the great, animating truths we believe to be self-evident – that all people have a right to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness -- by subjecting countless human beings to abuse, persecution and even slavery.

Confronting evil has never been easy – in our age or any other. But the failure to do so affects even those who are complacent with our own blessings and secure in our human rights. Accepting the degradation of values we believe are universal is to relinquish some of our own humanity. America was founded on the belief in the inherent dignity of all human life and that this dignity can only be preserved through shared respect and shared responsibility. We can retain our own freedom when others are robbed of theirs, but not the sense of virtue that made our revolution a moral as well as political crusade, and which recognizes that personal happiness is so much more than pleasure, and requires us to serve causes greater than self-interest.

There is no right more fundamental to a free society than the free practice of religion. Behind walls of prisons and persecuted before our very eyes in places like China, Iran, Burma, Sudan, North Korea and Saudi Arabia are tens-of-thousands of people whose only crime is to worship God in their own way. No society that denies religious freedom can ever rightly claim to be good in some other way. And no person can ever be true to any faith that believes in the dignity of all human life if they do not act out of concern for those whose dignity is assailed because of their faith. As President, I intend to make religious freedom a subject of great importance for the United States in our relations with other nations. I will work in close concert with democratic allies to raise the prominence of religious freedom in every available forum. Whether in bilateral negotiations, or in various multi-national organizations to which America belongs, I will make respect for the basic principle of religious freedom a priority in international relations.

Call it McCain's Wilberforce speech–he invokes the abolitionist hero of evangelical political activists at the beginning and the end of his speech, committing himself to fighting human trafficking and child pornography, in addition to standing for international religious freedom.

I haven't heard a lot of reporting on it yet, but if McCain can keep making this call, Evangelicals need to listen. He's not flouting his religion or forcing it on anyone–but here is a man who stands for honor, for human dignity, and for America:

We must remember that our freedoms are not only defended by our diplomacy and military power but, very importantly, by the decency and respect with which we treat one another, and by our belief that as we our dignity is entitled to respect so are we obliged to respect and defend the dignity of others. Ours is a nation with a conscience, and thank God we are. As William Wilberforce said so many years ago, "When we think of eternity, and of the future consequences of all human conduct, what is there in this life that should make any man contradict the dictates of his conscience, the principles of justice, the laws of religion, and of God?"