A return to virtuosity - on the election

It has been a while since I last wrote, and my good friend and brother in law Keith Martel just encouraged me to write, so here I am.

On the election. It seems like old news now, but W won, and the republicans have a greater control of the house and senate. As I think back over my experience the week before voting, I remember many people trying to convince me that one candidate was better than the other, with no regard for the political system as a whole. Now, I am not political scientist, but some things seem clear to me
1. The system was set up the way it was to provide checks and balances
2. That system does not work so well when it is partisan (that is, there are no checks and balances)
3. I keep hitting the tab button, and it doesn't tab, it moves me to the little button on the bottom of the screen (frustrating)
4. The judge issue is important
5. President Bush has had tonsonofa (that is Korean mother in law for "a lot of") trouble appointing pro-life judges
6. The number of abortions in America decreased, even when Bill Clinton was in office
7. Neither guy is a great candidate (for a little political incorrectness, a student mentioned that on South Park a week or two ago, there was an election for school mascot. One was a turd, and the other was a penis (or some other not-so-publicly accepted object). The punchline was, "how do you choose between a turd and a dick?" or something to that effect. They are not gentle, but writers of South Park, your point is well made.

On to my analysis. No matter what happens, God is in control. With on candidate, the poor are looked over, with another, public morality is a non-issue. People in the past have been judged either way, and America's day will come, whether we like it or not.

Anyway, I walked into the booth, still undecided. What I was decided on, was that I wanted to vote a split ticket, to at least try and represent what I wanted to happen. I voted for the president last. I voted for Dave Reed (R for house), Bob Casey (D), Jim Clymer (C - Senate - the only independent with a chance althought that didn't prove so fruitful), and the rest Democrats. That left me with Bush and Cheney for President. I felt good about that vote until I noticed that lots of Republicans were winning, and now, economic decisions have less checks and balances than before. Partisan politics could be the plight or flight of the country. Time will tell.

Hey, I figure that this may mean more money in my pocket next year, but it may also mean less money in a poor persons pocket, and still less life sustaining jobs for those who lost theirs from outsourcing. I wasn't very happy with Bush's answer to job creation - it was education. I love education and all, but a 50 year old man going back to college with a mortgage payment to make and a family to feed means that there is probably not a paycheck for the house and family. Senor Bush, this doesn't make sense. Nor does the No Child Left Behind Act. Let's take away money from poorly performing schools, so that they can do better. Try paying inner city teachers more, it seems easy. Try redistributing property taxes to fund a more "equal" public education. If the rich don't like it, raise their taxes. They would cry for a property tax. Those are my thoughts.

In another conversation with some parishoners of the church for which I work, the idea of property was huge. They felt that work meant that they had every right to own property, and the government had no right to tax them for what they make, and no right to enforce rules on them. It is amazing how far the assumption goes that humans will work for the good of their fellow humans. I was talking about corporate greed a bit, and asking why it is okay socially for a CEO to have a 3000 dollar leather chair, a 50,000 dollar Christmas bonus, and a 500,000 dollar a year paycheck, yet people have to be cut back to make processes more efficient. Is this a faithful form of business? I don't think so, but a lot of business men out there do, and by they way, those businessmen are often our Sunday School teachers.

On reductionism and politics. Abortion was a key issue this year. I am super pro-life. What does this mean for me economically? That is the question not too many people ask. An article was published recently about abortion rates rising under Bush, even though he passed the Partial Birth abortion ban. To me, this says something. How do we create an atmosphere in America that is conducive to life? Maybe this a little of Marx in me saying economics, but hey, it makes sense. If a young couple gets pregnant, and one has a job, and the other can't find one, it may seem financially impossible for them to raise a child, so what would they do? Abort it, unless there are programs that can support families that are having children but can't afford it. So the answer to me is two-fold. The first thing we have to do is make sure that there are enough support services to care for pregnancies and children. The second, is provide an economic system that helps families be families - and this economic system would also include health insurance that doesn't cost 800 bucks a month once you have a baby. It makes sense to me, how about you?

Well, I have gotton on a soapbox, and my closing statement is this. "We need to move toward a more caring, nurturing America, one that encourages life and its abundance. The only problem is, partisan politics has never done this, and free-market capitalism hasn't helped much the past four years. Keep praying."
David Whitcomb - In his office - November 10, 2004