Posted on 11/07/2012 8:26:03 AM PST by annalex
These are a few thoughts that I have, as a Catholic layman and American nationalist. I am also a monarchist, and so I recognize the basic futility of a democratic political process in a culturally divided electorate: the country has been for the past several election cycles largely ungovernable because it has lost a common ethical consensus. However, even in this predicament, elections serve a useful purpose. That is because regardless of the efficacy of the democratic process, politics remain one tool available to us to forestall a national collapse, and, possibly, cause a cultural revival and reunification. These two are our fundamental political objectives. More precisely, a Catholic Conservative should, I think, espouse these medium-term commitments:
There is nothing a monarchist would change with respect of these goals. We, monarchists, understand that a monarchy can only happen as an organic development in the political life of a unified nation under God. I believe that given American political culture with its respect for self-government and property rights, a form of new feudalism will evolve constitutionally, and the new feudalism will give rise to a monarchy when this nation is sufficiently unified around our unique national idea.
Did the re-election of Obama set back these goals?
I believe that our goals were set back not last Tuesday but during the primary process. Governor Romney was perhaps, most “presidential” of the field of candidates, but even so, he structured his campaign on several false propositions: he avoided social issues and failed to propose an economic agenda that would captivate the American middle class. He correctly identified Obamacare as most odious feature of Obama’s policies, but he failed to link it to its impact on the religious freedom, which was its most vulnerable element. Having instituted something at least vaguely similar to Obamacare in Massachusetts, he was in no position to attack Obamacare’s central premise of government takeover of the medical industry.
I further believe that had Romney been elected, the conservative goals would have been set back worse than they are set back now. That is because a Romney’s victory would have vindicated the idea that the Republican Party can win elections without the social conservatives and without the conservative libertarians such as Dr. Ron Paul. Let us hope that the GOP learns the lessons of this year:
In the meanwhile, we are left with what the collective wisdom of the American people gave us: four more years of divided and therefore bounded by its partisan divisions federal government. This is, I believe, the best we could have hoped for. Let us use these years to grow the Tea Party, make it a better-rounded political force by engaging it more fully in our culture war, and be firm and brave defending our glorious Church from the enemies on the Left.
I understand that Romney’s candidacy was morally acceptable for the pro-life perspective, since in fact, had his position been legislated, we’d be eons ahead in defense of life. It just was not wise: if you profess such position, — as opposed to acquiesce to it in order to pass a law, — then clearly you have not thought your pro-lifer philosophy through, or you are lying about it to maximize votes. That is a major reason he lost, and my foremost reason not to vote for him.
Which leads me to my second point, about the numbers. Leadership matters. Pro-life with exceptions is just not a position from which to lead. Conservative Christians have not had a political leader for generations, so what numbers we have now does not speak to the real number that will emerge when and if a Christian Conservative politician runs as such and explains his Christian Conservative position with vigor.
This being said, should that real number prove to be 20%. or even 10%, this is still enough to form a congressional block that would be good for defensive action and can decide elections between larger blocks.
And the reason not to vote for Romney can be summarized in these terms: unless we deny him or politicians like him leadership, a leader we need won’t emerge.
Oh, and about a racial white party: that is something Darbyshire, an atheist, could think up. It is, for a Christian, complete nonsense.
Here is the problem with your argument:
“And the reason not to vote for Romney can be summarized in these terms: unless we deny him or politicians like him leadership, a leader we need won’t emerge.”
That sums it up nicely.
It is based on the false premise that our renewal as a nation will come from a political leader.
It will not.
It will come from the Holy Spirit.
How He will work, I don't know. But he will NOT do his work through our politics. If God chooses to call us to repentance and conversion as a nation, it will be through our culture. He will renew us through cultural change, not through political change.
When He (IF He decides to) has changed our hearts sufficiently, our politics will change almost naturally. Not without great strife and battle. The minions of Satan (i.e., the Party of Satan - the Dammocraps) won't give up easily. At least, I'd be kind of surprised if they did.
On November 5, the best we could have hoped for from our politics is that we would elect sufficiently-decent leaders who would hold off the flood a little longer from the great damage done to us as a society by our collapse of social values. The deficit is a symptom. The debt is a symptom. Our declining global power (which is a good thing, by the way, not a bad thing - the Pax Americana has been very kind to the world, overall) is a symptom. Declining educational results are a symptom. Increased poverty is a symptom. Increasingly dysfunctional health care financing (ironically in the nation with the best-functioning health care system in the world) is a symptom. Intermediate causes are: things that cause the breakdown of the family, including illegitimacy, divorce, widespread acceptance of the homosexual lifestyle, abortion, and yes, contraception. The ultimate cause is the rejection of the Creator's place in our lives by most people.
On November 5, politics could treat the symptoms in the short run. We would have still needed to be called to repentance and conversion as a nation.
On November 7, politics can no longer hold back the flood. We will be inundated. We will enter the time of suffering. Politics can be used to ameliorate, maybe, some of the harsher edges of what is here and what is coming.
But no amount of monkeying around with the configuration of political parties, or jimmying around with nominating processes, or jury-rigging shifting political alliances or anything like that is going to address the fundamental, underlying disease of our country.
To disdain the candidacy of Gov. Romney because he was not the Hope of Renewal needed for our country borders on idolatry. THE SALVATION OF OUR COUNTRY WILL NOT BE FOUND IN POLITICS. It will be found in God, alone. If he chooses to save us. Which he may not.
“It just was not wise: if you profess such position, — as opposed to acquiesce to it in order to pass a law, — then clearly you have not thought your pro-lifer philosophy through, or you are lying about it to maximize votes.”
Not in the case of Gov. Romney. LDS theology has different premises than orthodox Christian theology. Making the case for some limited allowance of some abortions can fit comfortably into LDS theology, to the degree that their theology is sufficiently-developed to even address the question.
Finally, I'll end by remembering that it is Pope Blessed John Paul II who taught me that although politics can, to a limited degree, drive culture, if you let it, that ultimately, culture trumps politics, and ultimately, politics flows from culture. Working on politics can be an honorable thing to do, but working on culture is the more important thing to do.
In our country, we have entirely, completely forgotten this lesson, as we have allowed the minions of Satan to capture each one of our cultural institutions, one after the other, in turn. The Enemy understood the game much better than we did. We did not do our jobs.
sitetest
“Oh, and about a racial white party: that is something Darbyshire, an atheist, could think up. It is, for a Christian, complete nonsense.”
It is complete nonsense. But it is nonsense that drives the politics of many places. Humans often behave, even in large numbers, nonsensically. Don't write off Mr. Derbyshire’s assessment. His views, his “reality,” so to speak, is a lot closer to the average American’s “reality” than is yours or mine.
Most folks are no longer Christian, at least not in a substantive way.
sitetest
About leadership — this is quietism. Then more consistent would be to not participate in politics at all. Insofar as we live in a society at large, we have political movements and political movements are lead by men. That is what elections are about: choice between human leaders. Romney was not capable of leadership among Christian Conservatives.
If his Mormonism meshes in logically with being semi-pro-life, then well, another reason for Christians not to elect a Mormon.
About Darby, agree completely with your comments. A corollary, again, is that human leadership matters as we surely won’t want a racist leader at this point — because he very well may succeed.
It isn’t quietism. I’m not suggesting disengagement with politics. Why would it be more consistent to withdraw from politics? Because we now recognize that things are so far gone in our society that politics will offer little more for now than amelioration of the horrors to come?
As I've said repeatedly, we're not going to fix this stuff through politics because the real problems aren't political.
The guy who only has a hammer thinks every problem is a nail. So, too, with politics.
Of course we need to stay politically engaged. But a pagan society will not be led to a generally Christianity-congenial politics. Not by choice.
The culture has been captured by the enemies of God. From that post-Christian, Gospel-rejecting society flows a toxic, evil democratic politics. Pope Blessed John Paul II taught that democracy not founded in recognition of the Creator is tyranny. That's where we are. You wanna change the politics? You'll have to fight to regain the culture.
The problem is that we're not in a pre-Christian society, open to the Gospel, readily converted to the Good News of Jesus Christ. We are in a society that has rejected God, rejected the Gospel. We are no longer able to persuade, even if we must keep trying. We are no longer able to evangelize, even if we cannot cease our efforts.
Only if the Holy Spirit comes to renew the face of our American society and culture will we be lifted up from the awful fate that awaits us.
sitetest
Yes, of course. I find nothing to disagree about in your last post. But observe: compromise is inherent to politics. It is poison to culture. This is why, in my analysis, our chances are best not in a big tent where secularist pragmatists will dominate, but as a small ideological party lead by people with clear Christian convictions. You preserve a culture by keeping it pure.
While you are off creating your chimerical dream party, the Party of Satan has locked in misery, destruction, economic decline, almost-guaranteed default of the United States, uncontrolled deficits, more crony capitalism, military weakness, foreign policy failure, and persecution of Christians for at least a generation to come.
I'd have been happy to have been stuck with the imperfect candidate that might have reversed Obamacare, would have reversed all the energy-independence killing regulations and decisions (did you see the anti-Christ put ANOTHER 1.6 million acres of prime shale oil federal lands off-limits?), would have reduced other burdensome regulations, would not have threatened Second Amendment rights (did you see the anti-Christ wants new gun bans?), would have fought for lower taxes with lower deductibility, resulting in better economic performance, would have reduced federal spending from nearly 24% of GDP to 20% of GDP, would have reversed the Mexico City policy of the anti-Christ, would have defunded Planned Parenthood, would not have nominated orthodox, doctrinaire liberals to the Supreme Court, would not have persecuted the Catholic Church with the HHS mandate.
I know it doesn't quite immanentize the eschaton, but I'd have happily settled!
You admit that politics is about compromise, and your cure is to create a “pure” political party. LOL! The form your party takes is a form of idolatry, the reduction of Christian philosophy and culture to ideology. You, at once, want to distort and destroy Christianity by identifying it with a political party and ideology, while castrating Christians politically by herding them all into one stupid, feckless, immoral permanent party.
Your “solutions” are not only infinitely worse than electing Mitt Romney, as well as deeply intrinsically evil, they're actually possibly even worse than the election of the anti-Christ.
sitetest
I’d be happy with either of the two outcomes: moving the GOP to the right or, failing that, creating a third party that has a conservative rather than less-tax-and-regulation agenda.
Either developments would serve the American culture well. Romney election might have served the less-tax-and-regulation political agenda but it would do so at the expense of the cultural agenda, and I chose what is a greater priority.
“Romney election might have served the less-tax-and-regulation political agenda but it would do so at the expense of the cultural agenda, and I chose what is a greater priority.”
This is demonstrably false. The opposite of this is true.
First, it's not so easy to separate out fiscal and social issues. Folks who are progressives and favor “social justice” programs will ultimately drive fiscal policy to bigger government, higher taxes, greater government control. Folks who approach from the other end - restraining government spending, working to bring down the deficit, reining in tax rates, while not explicitly challenging the progressive agenda - are working from the wrong direction, and thus have the greater, more difficult struggle.
Nonetheless, a president who successfully brought down federal spending as a percentage of GDP would, by necessity, curb the progressive social agenda, if not reverse it.
Second, Gov. Romney, though I don't believe would have been a strong advocate of social and cultural conservatism, would not have furthered the progressive social agenda, and would have at least given formal, if not much material, support to grassroots efforts to reclaim the culture.
Third, even if the only thing President Romney achieved was a maintenance of the status quo, or perhaps a slower slide, we are now facing a four-year, unrelenting, rapid blitzkreig of progressivism against social conservatism. What has gone before will seem mild compared to what is about to come. The anti-Christ has no more elections to win. He has laid the fiscal, governmental and “constitutional” groundwork for the assault he is about to unleash. He is successfully changing the values, beliefs and attitudes of a people already half given over to paganism. In four more years, it will be far, far worse than it is today.
Catastrophe is upon us.
sitetest
The catastrophe Romney would have brought us is worse: that a GOP can win national elections without a conservative candidate. I am glad he lost. Now we can work toward electoral victories. I thought I made it clear in previous posts on this thread; I apologize if I sound repetitive.
Gov. Romney ran as a conservative. Is he truly a conservative in the recesses of his heart? Probably not. But he endorsed many conservative policies and had an overall conservative framework to his campaign, even if imperfectly so.
You have made the perfect the enemy of the good. We now will all get to pay for it.
“Now we can work toward electoral victories.”
There is no reversing via the electoral process the damage done by re-electing the anti-Christ. We are now beyond the ability of politics to undo the europeanization of our government and society.
Obamacare is here to stay. Thus, so are high taxes. So is government control of health care. So is the new relationship between government and subject (our citizenship is highly attenuated through the nationalization of our health care, and as a result, we are now more subjects than citizens, on the way to becoming serfs - but I guess you'll celebrate the regression toward the new feudalism?), as the government will now be able to successfully assert the right, with no mediation, to define who will receive what health care under what conditions. This is the power of life and death. Having successfully asserted this power, there are no other powers reserved to the people or mediating institutions.
Now it's "Everything for the state, nothing outside the state, nothing above the state."
The persecution of the Church is set in stone. As people become increasingly comfortable with the government as final arbiter of reality, folks will become increasingly hostile to the idea that the Church has its own sphere that is outside the proper jurisdiction of government. This way of thinking had been eroding over time, but this election puts the final nails in that coffin.
Within a few years, it will be illegal to openly speak about homosexual activities as deviant. Laws protecting the innocent and the vulnerable will all be washed away, as there will be no legitimate spokesman to make the argument to keep them. We have entered a time of government of the strong. The strong will have what they want, whether it's money, power, sex (either natural or unnatural, with old or young), and the weakest will suffer most.
This election was for all the marbles.
The left succeeded. They now have sufficient control to increasingly turn us into a society of damned welfare-statist euroweenies. They don't need any more legislation. They don't need any more votes. All the pieces are in place. Just a matter of driving the bus.
We lost.
Game over.
Time to attend to re-building the culture, time to ask God for forgiveness and for repentance, and the grace and strength to endure through the persecution, the economic ills, the abuse of the weak and vulnerable, the want of the poor, the violence and destruction to come. The use of politics now is to soften the blows as they come, one-by-one. We will not regain what has been lost, politically, in terms of our fundamental rights and civil rights, via that route. Not until long after God has brought us to repentance. If he chooses to do so at all.
sitetest
What a great but if writing. I have a Catholic friend who loves Obama who I would love to pass this on to.
But the lesson to the GOP that you don't win elections without a truly conservative candidate stays, too. On balance, good outcome, that builds the necessary foundation for the rollback of the leftwing government.
Please do, I like readership.
Your postings have become internally incoherent.
“’Obamacare is here to stay. Thus, so are high taxes.’
“But the lesson to the GOP that you don’t win elections without a truly conservative candidate stays, too. On balance, good outcome, that builds the necessary foundation for the rollback of the leftwing government.”
That Obamacare is here to stay means that left-wing government is here to stay. Gov. Romney promised to roll back federal spending from the current approximately 24% of GDP to something on the order of 20% of GDP. The new “conservative” Maginot Line will be to keep it from growing further beyond 24%.
The more the government controls the economy, the more it controls the society. The more it controls the society, the more social conservatism is marginalized and ultimately driven out.
That is now guaranteed.
You have rejected the two birds in the hand for the possible existence of a mirage of a bird in the bush, because you were unhappy that you couldn’t get the whole flock of birds in one election.
sitetest
That Obamacare is here to stay means that left-wing government is here to stay
And Romney's election, whatever his promises, would have meant that conservatives would be disenfranchised in America for the foreseeable future and obamacare be tweaked a bit. I'd rather have obamacare, which a truly conservative president and congress will repeal instantly, and a prospect of my vote mattering.
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