Posted on 03/02/2014 2:06:40 PM PST by Kaslin
Regular readers of my column know that I usually don’t use the words “conservative” and “liberal.” Why is that?
Because those words in today’s lingo—like the words “love” and “democracy”—can mean almost anything you want. Unlike past times when precision in meanings was important, we have now produced a generation that no longer understands the historic or political meaning of those words.
Within the population of the confused, however, my greatest disappointment is held for those who describe themselves as economically conservative, but socially liberal. But do they even know what that means?
On the economics side, this is what I think they mean:
• They believe in capitalism and the free market economy.
• They believe in hard work and accomplishing (financially, at least) the American dream.
• They believe in smaller government and private enterprise.
• They believe in fewer taxes and more opportunities for creating jobs.
On the social, or moral, side, I think it normally boils down to two issues:
• They believe in abortion-on-demand.
• They believe that homosexual marriage should be equal to heterosexual marriage.
However, there’s a major problem in trying to fit those two sides together. In God’s economy, total acceptance of Judeo-Christian morals has usually accompanied true blessings and economic prosperity.
As American history has shown, when people are committed to God and His moral laws, they become fully blessed. Likewise, a review of God’s history with the Israelites reveals this principle: Obedience to God’s moral absolutes brings about economic prosperity, but ignoring them brings economic disaster. The two are intertwined.
Scripture shows us a glaringly obvious trend—when God’s people dismissed His moral absolutes, the scourge of violence by the Assyrians, Babylonians, and Persians was their fate.
Sometimes the judgment wasn’t immediate. God is patient and long-suffering, and He would sometimes wait a long time for them to turn away from their foolishness. But eventually the judgment would come.
Make no mistake about it, God is consistent. He will not bless a nation that sheds the blood of innocents and shakes its fist at His purpose for the gift of human sexuality.
Of course, such a tight correlation may prompt one question: How can countries like China and Japan prosper without even a thought of God?
The answer is the same as to why God judged His people more strictly than the pagan empires of the time—His people should have known better. To be in covenant with God and then disregard that covenant carries a far greater judgment than not knowing God at all.
For America, the $100 trillion unfunded liability and the soon to be $20 trillion debt is only the beginning of the judgment we have brought upon ourselves. We have bought the fallacy that we can be economically-oriented without regard to God’s moral laws, and we will have to pay the price.
We should have known better.
You are generally correct.
Conservatives of the last century often weren’t economic liberals. Chesterton and his circle advocated semi-socialist policies, and of course we Catholics have Rerum Novarum and its later teachings. 19th century conservatives were even less libertarian. If you will recall, Bastiat’s most famous work is a response to Thiers, who supported high tariffs. Thiers was the man who crushed the Paris Commune.
All of which just goes to show that when you attempt to equate modern political position to those of the past you are constantly tripping over your own feet. At least if you are willing to recognize the realities of history instead of just projecting present-day concerns into the past.
Maybe some do. How many of those social liberals also accept that government is the source of charity and as such must take from some and give to others such charity? To go even further, how many social liberal believe government can create special rights that when imposed by government tend to limit god given rights?
The U.S. Constitution limits the Federal government both fiscally & socially and as such, to limit government, conservatives must be both fiscally & morally conservative.
The Left rarely promotes its policies based upon saving money or reducing government; the left almost always talks social issues. IMHO it's called a culture war instead of a fiscal war for a reason. From my perspective in this war, the fiscal only conservative crowd are simply bystanders as the Left amasses power & imposes it's 'social' will upon the people. In essence the fiscal only conservative crowd are at best irrelevant & at worst actually helping the Leftists.
exactly, they always want to raise taxes because they are stealing
First you need to learn the difference between an agnostic and an atheist.
Second no one can prove a negative so the burden of proof that your selected god exists is on you.
Third all of this is a straw man argument. My comment was to the absolute numerical fact that most of the world does not believe in your god. You want to change that discussion. I stand by that statement 100%.
Strawman setup to fill up his blog.
Exactly. They are joined at the hip, you cannot have one without the other....When you remove the traditional family, Government will fill the void.
Tens of millions of "Americans" endorse in the strongest possible terms the right of, if not themselves, then of their hapless neighbors to kill their unborn children. It's the way Americans are wired these days, and so shall they remain.
I feel extremely lonely and have a hard time circulating among all the pagans
That’s what we have, pagans, many of whom are too uninformed even to define the word.
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