Rightwords... Prudent Conservatism

Litmus tests appear to be continuing

Many decry so-called social “litmus tests” for citizens to be included in the conservative movement. So do I. If you sign up to the core principles of conservatism, and support conservative politicians, that is all anyone should require.

The two litmus tests -–anti-abortion, and anti-gay marriage---however, are derived from religious tenets stated in or derived from the Bible, which many Christians sign up to and include in their conservatism. They do tend to resent non-believers or those who choose to ignore the tenets of the church or the Bible, despite their other tenets of good will to all men and the Golden Rule.

Obviously, for the 2% to 10% of the population that do not believe in Christ or a God, such tenets are onerous and wrong-headed, and it sets them apart from their religious Christian brethren, sometimes very vocally and nastily. So we have a fundamental religious belief based conflict that is rather difficult for some to pass over simply for the sake of the conservative movement.

When the federal government steps in and passes laws that enforce tenets that are diametrically opposed to the religious tenets of many Christians (RvW, for instance), some Christians see that as blasphemy and a direct challenge to their belief system. Litmus testing is one result; you are either with them, or against them, and they will not compromise their religious beliefs. Hence, we find that provisions in many states have been passed by large majorities that codify into law anti-abortion and anti-gay marriage statutes. Thus we have a state versus federal law conflict as well, where the federal position does not seem to be at all reflective of the majority will.

Conservatives must find the right answers to such conflicts, and others of similar gravity, if inclusiveness is to be achieved for the movement. If this was easy to solve, it would have been done long ago.

Perhaps we need to redefine what inclusiveness really means. What exactly are the minimum tenets of conservatism one must believe in to be accorded full status? What tenets of religion must you give up or sublimate in order to be inclusive? What kind of movement or party is it that in effect coerces its members to give up or sublimate some of their closely held religious beliefs in order to grow the membership? How do you secularize the current conservative movement? Is that a wise thing to try?

I am not encouraged that the conservative movement can resolve these conflicts in the few years before further elections take place.

Labels: Abortion, Conservatism, Gay Rights, Government, Home Security

Labels: Abortion, God, Obama

For some time, I have been mulling a special problem. It goes like this: my blog posts have focused on subjects that anger me, or bring out the contrariness in me. This means that I am always in the attack mode, or complaint mode. At times, I get carried away into worse—hate mode!

Now, it isn't the people I hate so much as the ideas they have somehow gotten fixed in their heads. It isn't the small, irritating things either. I get upset at ideas that could develop into a movement or a cause that hurts me, my family, my city and my country. Many of these hurtful ideas are pursued for reasons of power-grabbing, influence, or making a lot of money, or all three.

Today's example is Global Warming aka Climate Change, which is a lot of hot air. Everyone is a weatherman, you know, so the entire population can get involved in commenting how much hotter it has been, and how storms seem to have gotten worse, and hurricanes more frequent—none of which is actually true. The ice is melting at the poles and threatens to raise the oceans by feet, they say, while the sane scientific community calmly reports that yes, some ice is melting, but far more has been created. No one pays attention to these reports when TV show pictures of huge chunks of ice falling into the sea from one point, and does not show pictures of the vast new ice fields around the corner. This whole idea is supported wildly by Un'ers, because it argues for a World dictatorship to solve the (non-existent) CO2 problem.

Yesterday, it was the Liberal mindset, and the grave damage liberals may do to our way of life, because in their arrogance they believe that their ideas are best for all of us. You know, abortion, which has resulted in over 50 million deaths; or gay marriage, that would disrupt the millennium-old Biblical tradition of man marrying woman, just to name a few of their curve ball ideas.

The other day, it was the concept of giving the UN 0.7% of our GNP yearly, which, if the past is any indication, means the US taxpayer will create several thousand millionaires, and probably a few billionaires in the bargain, in such places as Zimbabwe and Botswana, the Marshall Islands, and Tahiti. I just cannot understand why some politicians think the UN is an honorable institution, or why we should kick in our money knowing that it will be misused, thus continuing the fraud. The UN should be downplayed and starved. We can put our charities to work ourselves.

For the longest time, my ire has been up because of Islam. No one seems to understand what they are about, which is to conquer the world for Allah. If anyone takes the trouble to study Islam, the first reaction they have is: “Damn! These people are a bloodthirsty bunch of warriors!” After they figure out that all of the sweetness and light of the early Koran has been subsequently abrogated (canceled) by the clerics and Muhammad himself, they begin to realize that we have a fearsome enemy on our hands. What's more, over 6 million of them are already inside the US, and every one of them is a potential insurgent. Then too, one only has to read the newspapers to discover that Muslims are busy around the world killing, maiming, and trying to establish Sharia Law. This Islam thing is not a minor little problem for us, yet a large number of people are against the GWOT. Go figure!

Yes, this is a rant. That is my problem: how to turn my rants into useful screeds. I am convinced that my ideas about these issues are correct, but it is virtually impossible to prove them to be so. All I can do is is to continue to add my words to the pot, and hope that they have some small effect.

Labels: Abortion, Global Warming, Liberalism, Muslims, UN

Does Life Begin at Conception?

To my knowledge the bible is silent on the matter of life at conception. My belief was sparked by the unfolding of the various cell phenomena connected with conception and growth. The creation of a human being is one continuous explosion of cells, guided by information contained in genes of many types. If it is so continuous and explosive, and if it is guided by the information content within cells, then incremental division between non-life and life, or non-human and human is simply not possible. It must be registered as starting with conception. Life begins at conception, in this view.

If this isn’t so, then where is the real dividing line? Where is that point where life does not exist? Does someone have a meter that registers the lack of turn on of life in a fetus? Then too, why is it an issue? Why is it necessary to call one stage non-human-life and the very next stage human life? How does one find the precise point here in a maze of developing cells in the womb to perform a rational cut, and how do we know we have found it? Is it only because there are vested interests in having the option to abort? If so, that is not a particularly good reason—it is a horrible reason, in fact.

Of course I must grant that others believe differently. It is very difficult to understand why others believe that way, however, since we are talking about lives to be lived—or not. I vote for life, and in a real sense, I grieve for the some 14 million aborted lives in the last ten years. It must be so that others do not grieve, do not hurt. They may be the lucky ones.

It is not for me to judge them, either.

Update: If you take the viewpoint that life begins at conception, you open the door for some agonizing thoughts:

The 14 million abortions in the US over ten years, brought down to six years duration, results in 9 million deaths. This should be compared to:

--six years of auto deaths exceed: 250,000.

--six years of drowning events: 19,000.

--six years of soldier deaths in Iraq: 3,700.

--six years of gunshot deaths: 4,200.

Versus –six years of abortion deaths: 9,000,000.

We seem to grieve more for the soldiers nationally than for all other deaths, especially the 9 million aborted lives. There is a terrible disconnect here.

Labels: Abortion

A few comments for today

Abortion: When you abort a fetus, you erase all of the structural information the fetus cells contain that would have completed a human being in its growth cycle from conception to adulthood. That is surely murder.

There should be both a moral and a legal prohibition of that act, as well as social disgrace for the one who commits it. The GOP will surely lose voters if they fail on the abortion issue.

Gay Marriage: As I remember the situation, well over 60% of the total population of the US was in favor of banning gay marriage, as well as abortion, back in 2004. In fact, some 11 states passed negative provisions at that time regarding these issues, as I recall. Is someone claiming that these issues have now under 50% of the population’s support? Seems a stretch to me.

The GOP will likely stick to its guns here, don’t you think?

People, I seem to gather, like to watch porn, fornicate without penalty, play with the same sex, cheat on their income tax (if they pay anything at all), get money free from the government, or get free services such as medical care, schooling, college, home bailout loans, a job for life, a government retirement pension vested after 10 years, superb roads, rail and bus transport, zero smog, pure water, and jolly companions—also for life. But only if they don’t have to pay for it or work hard for it, or defend their nation for it.

They want someone to tell them that there is no global warming to worry about; it will be fixed by the government.

This is the script for a Democratic election campaign, and far too many voters will be taken in by it, sad to say. They will not read the fine print that says we need to raise taxes to do all of these wonderful things for you. That is because Dems will localize the raises to the well-to-do, the filthy rich, the robber barons of Wall Street, and those CEO’s that make mega millions, all of whom collectively now pay over 70% of all taxes.

When that starts a negative economy spiral, and layoffs, who will they blame? The Republicans, of course!

Labels: Abortion, Citizenship USA, Comments on the day, Gay Rights