America the Secular

The Sunday following Veteran's Day, before worship begins, we usually have all the veterans stand, and we applaud them for their service. We did this today. It was a suitable tribute. Later during the service, we pray for our leaders, that they be wise, and lead the country in ways that promote compassion, peace, and security for all within her embrace. That is proper.

But this morning, the Sunday after Veterans Day 2016, our opening hymn was “America the Beautiful.”

I. Just. Couldn't.

I stood, but I did not sing. Don't get me wrong. I consider myself patriotic. And “America the Beautiful” is a glorious song. I so wanted to sing it. It's one of the best songs ever. The poetry alone is an amazing, beautiful word painting: Amber waves of grain, purple mountains majesty, sea to shining sea. It tells of our history. It honors the sacrifices of our predecessors. And it cautions our nation to balance law and liberty. In addition to the message, it's a great melody for an aging soprano - high, but not too high. Uncomplicated. Familiar. I wish they'd sing it more at ballparks.

But not in church.

I can hear gasps all around as I write this. Why not sing it in church? A great Christian nation should acknowledge God's amazing gifts. Should be thankful for what God has bestowed upon us. Should sing praises to this great gift that God has given us.

Whoa. Hold the phone. That's it. Right there.

Never mind whether or not you think we are a Christian nation. That's a whole 'nother long and circular discussion, and many folks might be surprised to learn which side of that debate I come down on (and others might not).

And never mind the whole question of whether our history is 100% something to be proud of. Again, a subject so dense with potential that it generates its own gravitational field.

I really, really don't want to focus on any of that.

What bothered me this morning is that our opening hymn, our call to worship, did not worship God. It worshiped America the Beautiful. And to me, that is disturbing.

The song “America the Beautiful” is about America. More to the point, “America the Beautiful” is a song to America. Not to God, asking for his grace, or thanking Him for our bounteous land. Yes, it references God, but as a bystander. As if God is off in a distant corner, and we're saying to America “Gee, sister, sure would be awesome if God sheds some grace on thee for Christmas.”

So ok, it’s not a song to God, but clearly it’s about God, in that it mentions God, and praises one of God's blessings. I’ll give you that. But to me (and maybe I’ve been wrong all these years), that's not what church is for: to come together to talk about God, as if God wasn’t even in the room. Or to worship his blessings. We don't go to church to worship the great American Craftsman God gave us to live in. Or to sing praises to the meal we ate last night. Or even to worship the awesome parents, spouse, or children that God gave us. We don't worship God's gifts.

We worship the God who bestowed them upon us.

“America the Beautiful,” as much as I love it, praises America. That's maybe a fine thing to do. But not in church. Not in a service meant to praise God. Because among other things, it elevates the state to a place that should be preserved for God alone.

Also consider that there are people who come to church who may not agree with the sentiments of “America the Beautiful.” Who are visitors from another country, or who live in this country, and maybe even think it has a lot of potential, but who aren't all that enamored of the pilgrim's feet or the alabaster cities. And that is their right. Absolutely that is their right. The state does not get to dictate their feelings or opinion. And when it comes to feelings or opinions about the state, neither does the church.
People come to church to praise God. They come to a Lutheran church to praise God in a way that has been defined by the Lutheran church. It should be fairly predictable. If they have sought out a Lutheran worship service, then the hymns, the readings, the liturgy, should be pretty much in line with how they themselves feel about God. But they should not be expected to feel the same way about America as Katharine Lee Bates did. Again, don't get me wrong: Despite our many sins, I swell with pride at being an American. But I don't assume that everyone who comes to my church does. Or at least they shouldn't have to. Their sentiment about the state should not be an issue in a worship service. In the same way that my child should not have to say “Hail Mary, full of grace” at a public school basketball game (or risk feeling conspicuous by not saying it), neither should someone at a their church feel compelled to sing a secular song praising a secular thing that is not part of church doctrine. 

You may think I'm splitting hairs here. Maybe I am. But I was raised in a tradition that did not sanctify things. I'm so hard-line separation-of-church-and-state that I don't think an American flag belongs at the altar. I think Christians should lead by example, not by law. And I have a few problems with the federal tax code, while we're at it. That's not to invite discussion on those points so much as to let you know where I'm coming from.

When you look back at the history of the Lutheran Church, you would have to admit that mine is a very Lutheran perspective. In Luther's time, church and state were so intertwined that Luther's “heresy” put his freedom and his very life in peril. So this is not some new-fashioned wacko liberal nonconformist agnostic apostasy I'm spouting. It's me, as a Christian and a patriot, wanting as much protection for the House of God as I expect for my house on Main Street. It’s not just about protecting the state from the church. It's also about protecting the church from the state.

So if it happens again, I will once more stand and be respectful. But I will not sing. And I will probably mention this to the ministers - not in hysterical tears, accompanied by threats to leave, etc. There are bigger battles ahead. But I will mention it because I am a Christian, and a patriot, as much as I have heard lately that I cannot possibly be either of those things. But that is precisely the point, perhaps: I do not want to have either one of those qualities defined for me by the other.

Dignity is the New Fairness

Ok, I’ve been busy.

Over the past handful of years, my writing skills have been funneled into pursuits other than blogging, such as professional reports, technical responses on forums, and still - yes, still - my decades-in-the-making, sci-fi-fantasy epic. So I’ve not been blogging much.

But yesterday, that button got pushed. You know that button. The one that makes you go “Whaaaaa? That can’t be right!” and after you read it for the fifth time, you boot up your laptop and righteously just go off. That’s what I did when I heard a portion of Justice Clarence Thomas’s dissenting opinion regarding Obergefell v. Hodges, the landmark US Supreme Court decision which has granted legal status to gay marriage throughout the nation.

It’s not just Thomas that has me going. There’s consternation aplenty to be found within the dissenting opinions of all four members of the SCOTUS anti-rainbow coalition. John Roberts, for example, insists that inter-state recognition of marriages “should rest with the people acting through their elected representatives.” I might find this quaint, were it not coming from the mouth of a 21st century Chief Justice. I mean, I’m sure he went to law school somewhere, so perhaps he knows more about such matters than I do, but haven’t we seen over time that “the people” don’t always have the best interest of everyone else in mind? We’ve left to “the people” such questions as whether or not a person can own another person. Or if it’s reasonable to lock workers on the tenth floor of a fire trap to ensure productivity. Or whether a woman should be allowed to sign contracts and have nice things like bank accounts and property. Unless she’s married, in which case her fully-enfranchised husband can cover those bases for her. Unless, of course, he’s a different color than she is, in which case he can’t be her husband. To extend Roberts’ premise, such issues were working out just fine, thankyouverymuch, when they were left to the collective wisdom of the local majority (including, I suppose, the question of whether or not that majority should include people with vaginas).

But the thing that brought me to my now-smoking keyboard is this particular harrumph from Justice Clarence Thomas:

When the Framers proclaimed in the Declaration of Independence that “all men are created equal” and “endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights,” they referred to a vision of mankind in which all humans are created in the image of God and therefore of inherent worth. That vision is the foundation upon which this Nation was built.

The corollary of that principle is that human dignity cannot be taken away by the government. Slaves did not lose their dignity (any more than they lost their humanity) because the government allowed them to be enslaved. Those held in internment camps did not lose their dignity because the government confined them. And those denied governmental benefits certainly do not lose their dignity because the government denies them those benefits. The government cannot bestow dignity, and it cannot take it away.

(Although most coverage of Thomas’s opinion does not include the earlier paragraph, I added it as context for Thomas’s reference to “that principle.” But I’ll set aside the whole discussion on the legitimacy of citing the Declaration of Independence in a dissent on a constitutional matter, or on how much Thomas misses his own point regarding the vision upon which our nation was founded. Except to say - WTF??)

To distill it down into its basic elements, then, Justice Thomas is saying that no matter how egregiously the government treats you, so long as you’re a sport about it, it’s all good. Seriously, just hold your head up, and don’t go making a federal case out of it, because - you know - dignity is the new fairness.

So yeah, lock me up in chains and ship me off like cargo, in my own filth and sickness, so you can sell me as property and use whips to compel me to work myself to death. In my heart, I know I’m human, whether you recognize that by law or not, so what’s all the fuss about?

And sure, round up my family, and put us into barbed-wire camps, and treat us like prisoners because we have those funny-shaped eyes, and when you let us go, remind us that our homes now belong to someone else. But you can’t take away my dignity, so no skin off my nose, right?

And while you’re at it, government, go ahead and keep me out of law school, and forbid me to sit for the Bar, and tell me I can’t marry a white woman, because you know what? I’ve still got that dignity around here somewhere. As long as I keep singing “No, no, they can’t take that away from me,” then all of those unpleasant things that are legal to do to me aren’t really all that appalling.

The fact that Obergefell v. Hodges was such a squeaker, and that we are still hearing refrains of “let the people decide about rights” from persons in such elevated positions, should tell us that we can’t put away our marching shoes just yet. Gay rights, women’s rights, civil rights of any kind, all remain subject to re-examination. So yes, we have cause to celebrate, but it’s not over. It’s never over.

In the meantime, in one final irony among so many, Justice Thomas seeks to console the Hodges of this land by reminding them of their own dignity:

[The court’s] rejection of laws preserving the traditional definition of marriage can have no effect on the dignity of the people who voted for them. Its invalidation of those laws can have no effect on the dignity of the people who continue to adhere to the traditional definition of marriage.

So in the end, it’s all good. Right, Clarence?

__________________________________________________


I must add:  I heartily recommend reading George Takei's submission to MSNBC on this topic. Mr. Takei has been married to his husband Brad Takei since 2008, which gives him an obvious interest in the cause of equal marriage rights, a cause for which he has fought many years. But when I read Justice Thomas's words "Those held in internment camps did not lose their dignity," I said to myself "I sure hope Uncle George weighs in on this!"

Yep, he did:

http://www.msnbc.com/msnbc/george-takei-clarence-thomas-denying-our-rights-denies-our-dignity?ts_pid=2

.

Not in my name!

As long as the justice system is run by politicians whose reelection depends upon a body count, we should not have the death penalty.

As long as standards such as "egregious" and "monster" are left up to humans to decide, we should not have the death penalty.

As long as people make judgments based upon the color of someone's skin, we should not have the death penalty.

As long as the system can be rigged, we should not have the death penalty.

As long as there is something to be gained by anyone involved, whether it is "closure" for the victims, fame for the prosecutor, ratings for the media, or power for the politicians, we should not have the death penalty. Some otherwise social-justice-oriented folks among us say that the death penalty is allowable, even worthwhile, so long as the standard for imposing it is "beyond reasonable doubt." But as long as the death penalty exists, there will always be someone who has a motivation to move that line of "reasonable doubt" one way or the other to suit their purposes. It appears that someone may have done exactly that in Troy Davis's case.

At the same time that Troy Davis was scheduled to be executed, the state of Texas proudly put down Lawrence Russell, a white supremacist who chained James Byrd, Jr., to the back of a truck and dragged him along the road until all that remained of Mr. Byrd was shredded meat. It was brutal. Inhuman. Insufferable. I do not want anyone who would do such a thing to live among the rest of us. But what I want is not the point. When dispensing justice, we cannot be driven by how pissed off we are. Otherwise, we would break an arm for a broken arm. We would rape to pay back for rape. We would torture as justice for torture. There are societies that do that. But we don’t. Why? Because, we say, we are better than that. But we do not appear to be better than this, do we?

I am not insensitive to Mark MacPhail’s family’s pain. But if executing a potentially innocent man will bring his family peace, then it comes at the expense of our own collective humanity, and that is asking too much. It is done in our name. But despite the bravado with which some cheer the dispensing of this ultimate "penalty," I wonder if, like jury duty, we handed over the switch, the trigger, the needle, the bullet, to those of us in whose name this is done, how many of us would actually follow through? Asking the prison officials to do it for us instead is a convenient form of cowardice that I want no part of.

Please do not do this “in my name.” It diminishes me. It diminishes us all.

Never give a debt ceiling saga an even break.

There aren’t too many situations arising in the world today that don’t call to mind a Star Trek episode. CIA drones? “A Taste of Armageddon.” Big PHARMA? “Operation: Annihilate!” Xenophobia? “Balance of Terror,” “The Devil in the Dark,” and, oh heck, pretty much any original series episode with Spock in it (which would be all of them, you green-blooded hobgoblin!).

But the entertainment reference that our most recent “crisis” over the debt ceiling conjures up is a scene from Mel Brooks’ “Blazing Saddles.” (No, not that one! Although if you’ve ever watched C-SPAN for too long, I can see why you would think that.) It’s the scene in which Bart, after every citizen in town has drawn guns on him, pulls out his revolver, presses it to his own temple, and says “Drop it, or I swear I'll blow this n*****'s head ALL OVER THIS TOWN!” The punch line is that the townspeople fall for it and drop their guns.

Although it’s not a punch line in the real-world. The GOP is pulling out their majority, pointing it at their own country, and saying “Drop it, or we swear we’ll blow this nation ALL OVER... well, THIS NATION!” And like the townsfolk in Brooks’ fictional Rock Ridge, many of the Dems are dropping things: Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid, and the return of the saner tax policies that were in place when this country was running surplus - just to name a few. But unlike Rock Ridge, this is not a movie. Although it is fiction.

The fiction of it is that this problem needs to be solved this very minute! Numerous times in our history, the debt ceiling has been raised in a simple up-or-down vote, not tied to long-term issues like the budget deficit. This is the first time, though, that it has been used as a hostage. I realize that in our current political climate, words like “thug” get thrown around so much as to be meaningless, but what else would you call someone who threatens to harm those you hold dear if they don’t get their way? If we have to return to the good old days of poor houses, robber barons, and Triangle Shirtwaist fires, at least we won't have that pesky debt ceiling hanging over our heads. Unfortunately, Mr. Boehner is so out of touch with those American People he likes to reference, he either does not realize or does not care that if he gets his way, a few more of them will have nothing over their heads.
What I am desperately hoping for is intervention from an entity more powerful than Congress! Mightier than the White House! A more weighty and influential constituency than the American People themselves!

Wall Street.

Goodbye, Grant Park. I'm Done.

I have run the gamut of emotions today, from disgusted to really, really disgusted. But sadly, I have ended up at resigned. Over the past several days, I have been calling, writing, railing against the insanity going on in Washington DC, regarding the budget deficit, and the false allegation that cutting Social Security and Medicare will do anything to defray it. I have written and called my Senators and my Representative. I have written and called Senators and Representatives from other states. I have written and called my Senators and my Representative again. And I have written the White House repeatedly. I keep hoping it would matter.

As of this evening, I have exhausted any capacity to care.

I’ve done a lot of writing on this issue to The Powers in DC, but here is today’s output, which I think says whatever needs to be said.

To the White House, this morning:
Do not cut Social Security, and do not undercut it by using the Chained CPI. I figure you have stopped listening by now, but I cannot stop talking. If I do, I feel too much sadness and despair. You may think that you have the Democratic vote for 2012, and all you need is to persuade some in the middle or the right. But take a lesson from what you called the "shellacking" of 2010: a lot of people will be staying home. That will also affect the "down ballot" votes. We feel betrayed, and it seems pointless to vote for anyone because of the lies. Sen. Sanders, Rep. Peter Defazio, and other progressives are the exception, but you are hurting them, too, because people will throw up their hands and stay home. And your telling us not to give up will not carry any weight now. You have given up, and given us over. Why should we not throw in the towel?

To Senator Bernie Sanders, mid-day:
Thank you for standing up for the Big 3! What more can I say? Yours is the one voice that keeps me sane. Yours is the one voice that gives me hope. I cannot believe how tone-deaf others are in WDC. I cannot believe how the main stream media continues to ignore the fact the that SS is not part of the deficit! (And yes, I write to them about this.) They are misinforming the public, and are not serving their own mandate to act "in the public interest." Keep fighting for us. I do not live in Vermont, but I feel like you are truly representing me.

And finally to the White House again, this evening:
Today, I asked to be removed from your email list. I am tired of being lied to, and I don't need it in my email inbox as well as the radio/tv/newspaper. I am tired of getting updates that tell me how much the Administration has done for me, despite the damage being done to the middle class. I was a supporter, but no more. If the contract of Social Security means nothing to you, then Grant Park no longer means anything to me.

And then I clicked “Unsubscribe” on the email I got today from the White House. If 80% of the public is telling the President to stand his ground on Social Security, etc., and he can’t do it, then it must be intentional. He must be one of Them.

Goodbye, Grant Park. Goodbye.

What about the Logic Deficit?

Will someone please explain to the Deficit Commission that Social Security is NOT funded by the general budget? I’m aware of the creative number shifting, instituted under Reagan, used to make the general treasury fund look less in-the-red than it actually is. (Al Gore’s much-maligned “lockbox” was actually right on target.) And the core of Medicare is funded by dedicated taxes and premiums - again, NOT part of the general treasury fund. So how does cutting a program that does not affect the deficit help balance the budget?

And IF the government decides to cancel those two contracts, will my (self-employed) income rise by the roughly 13% that is currently being paid out in those dedicated taxes? Somehow, I doubt it.

This is nothing but war on the lower classes (and the middle class is a lower class in the eyes of the whiners who think that 15% is a burdensome amount to pay in a capital gains tax for passively-earned money). Have the upper crust eaters stopped to think about what would happen with the loss of the “Security” portion of the Social Security program? Never mind the starving widows and orphans, or the grandmothers freezing to death in store doorways. (Talk about a “death panel”!) If the well-washed masses truly think that we are all better off without Social Security, they also need to consider whether they can set aside enough provisions so that they never have to leave their gated communities and venture into the chaos of the streets to purchase food, clothing, or theater tickets.

When will we be done with this failed trickle-down philosophy? By the most common definition of insanity, our nation has truly gone crazy. For thirty-plus years, we have done the same thing over and over again, and keep expecting a different result. But the far right just keeps repeating the top-down mantra as though it were true, and it is swallowed whole by the efficiently consolidated and corporately-owned media, no longer run by Adam Smith’s “invisible hand of the market.” Oh, the far right loves to quote Adam Smith, and also Jesus, when convenient. But if they studied either of these gentlemen more closely, they’d brand both of them socialist lunatics.

There is also a quote from Kennedy that the right likes to trot out from time to time, with the gleeful intent of using words uttered by one of the left’s own heros to prop up their right-wing pursuit of this economic insanity. “A rising tide floats all boats.” What the modern-day robber barons on the far right don’t appreciate, however, is that a rising tide floats those boats from the bottom up.

We're Winning the War - On Ourselves

"We have more now on that explosion yesterday in downtown Chicago. Mexico’s civilian intelligence agency, the Centro de Información de Seguridad Nacional (CISEN), had determined that Henry Samuels, the owner of a local chain of convenience stores, was a key kingpin in the illegal drug market in the US. CISEN released a statement today saying that the United States’ insatiable appetite for drugs constitutes a clear and present danger to Mexico’s national security. CISEN has therefore initiated a program of identifying those people believed to be key personnel in the American illegal drug trade, and neutralizing them using predator drones. Although this also results in the destruction of surrounding property, and the death of several innocent civilians, including children, the American government has issued a statement that despite the collateral damage, the United States stands firmly in support of Mexico, a key partner in the War on Drugs."

Ridiculous, right?

Not so much.

Replace "Mexico" with "United States," "CISEN" with "CIA," "Chicago" with "Khyber," and "War on Drugs" with "War on Terror," and you have a thumbnail sketch of modern-day Pakistan. Based strictly on their own secret intelligence, and in the absence of due process, our CIA, supported by the tax dollars that we can't seem to spare for schools, libraries and fire departments, picks out the bad guys in Pakistan and blows them up using remote control drones. Never mind that there are also a few wives, aunts, uncles, and kids nearby, and even some neighbors that don’t have any relationship to the "bad guy." Never mind that there might be someone driving by who turned down the wrong street looking for a birthday party. And don’t even fret about the whole "What if we’re wrong?" scenario. This is War, people! War on Terror! And we won’t stop fighting it until we’ve won!

Unfortunately, a war footing justifies a lot of things that people would not otherwise tolerate. Spending, hardship, and the sacrifice of those near and dear to us are all burdens our nation has been willing to bear during wartime. Whip up enough fervor for it, and those things which we otherwise consider atrocities seem downright moral when framed in the context of war. Like blowing up kids. And given our new, modern style of war, with non-military agencies driving remote missiles into far-away sovereign nations, where we don’t even have to look at the mess we’ve made, it all seems just that much less atrocious. So it’s all good, right? If it keeps us all safer here in Seattle, Boston, Dallas, etc., it’s all worth it, right? We’re the USA, after all. Nothing trumps that card!

Arguments about morality and effectiveness aside, let’s do some simple math: Pressing a button to send a predator drone raining down on a Pakistani birthday party costs between $4 million and $15 million a whack. We say we do it because we certainly don’t want another 9/11. Over 3,000 people died on 9/11. It was awful. So naturally we spend billions of dollars now in the War on Terror to prevent another such terrorist attack.

Now let’s look at the other side of the ledger. What if we skipped a dozen or so of those drone attacks, and hired some police and some school teachers, buy health insurance for some kids, and kick-start some green industries? How many lives would that save? The statistics for murder in the US appears to have been pretty steady over the past 10 years: between 15,000 and 17,000 a year. I’m just guessing that better policing might at least have put a dent in that statistic. Lack of health insurance claims another estimated 45,000 lives annually. Asthma, cancer, and other illnesses related to fossil fuel pollution also carry costs with them in lost lives, not to mention lost productivity. The cost of a gallon of gas does not include what we pay in both blood and treasure to support the Pentagon’s oil-driven mission. And BP promises to "pay all legitimate claims" for the latest Oops in the Gulf of Mexico, but when asked in Senate hearings whether that included tax revenue lost by local governments due to decimated seafood and tourist industries, the president of BP America answered "Question mark." I kid you not, that’s a quote. What kind of benefits would we see in lives saved and revenue generated if we had the will to slide some of those fossil fuel tax subsidies over to renewable energy enterprises? So again, never mind the questions of morality, or whether we have effectively deterred another 9/11. If anyone in charge truly started crunching the numbers, our War on Terror not only looks like a bad investment - it looks downright suicidal.

But at least the War on Education is going well.