10-31-16<\/p>\n
One of the opportunities afforded blog essayists is to see how many \u201chits\u201d we
\nattract; how readers find you; and what links they wander to. Some people respond with messages; some to the blog\u2019s address, some to my personal address; some readers appreciate the music tie-ins; many ignore them.<\/p>\n
And I can tell when people click on messages from years past. That is satisfying to me, because I intend that most messages be \u201cevergreen\u201d \u2013 as pertinent today as, say, seven years ago. Just (I hope) as the Bible\u2019s lessons have the same relevance to God\u2019s children as they did in millennia past.<\/p>\n
Over the past week I have purposely focused on the presidential election, not a typical pattern here. But I think the issues are so critical that we should take special notice. Moreover, the issues (as in the larger American culture) relate to biblical principles, biblical warnings, and horrible consequences of \u201cbiblical proportions.\u201d<\/p>\n
I have read some of my essays from years ago, and I think that most still are relevant. Even points I shared during the previous presidential campaign seem to me (as I attempt to be objective) neither moldy nor mistaken. But in the 2016 election cycle, things \u2013 not only facts but factors \u2013 change in days. Or hours. This is a campaign that is unprecedented for vituperation, lies, irrelevancies, numerous endorsements and abandonments, and, of course, scandals.<\/p>\n
I might enter the previous sentence in the sweepstakes for Greatest Understatement Of the Year.<\/p>\n
Through this political year I have written articles, as a historian, for national newspaper about previous political controversies \u2013 where bigamy, murder (Jackson); drunkenness (Andrew Johnson and Grant); an illegitimate child (Cleveland); an illegitimate child while president (Harding); sexual affairs (FDR, Kennedy, Clinton) \u2013 were commonly discussed. Et cetera. In other words: \u201cNothing new here.\u201d And I never got close to the frequent charges of imbecility over 240 years.<\/p>\n
Early in our campaign, this was a valid set of reminders; pacifiers, perhaps. But things are different, very different right now.<\/p>\n
I am not being an alarmist. One who legitimately rings an alarm technically is not alarmist. An alarmist is a Chicken Little, one who falsely spreads fear and unnecessary warnings of impending doom. No, there is doom. It impends.<\/p>\n
America has become two \u2013 or more \u2013 nations. I truly think that whether Trump or Hillary is elected, there will be riots here or there; no, here AND there. And not only on election night, but on Inauguration Day. And when major initiatives are undertaken by either putative president. (I use the word \u201cputative\u201d carefully \u2013 not \u201ceventual\u201d or \u201clikely\u201d president, but \u201cgenerally assumed\u201d president, because the legitimacy of Trump or Clinton surely will be challenged.)<\/p>\n
Major questions, serious scandals, and hitherto disqualifying revelations have been commonplace this year. Our heads spin. Seismic civic explosions are forgotten scandal after scandal, because they are eclipsed by worse ones \u2013 always more bizarre. I believe that we long ago passed the point of a Hollywood studio accepting any recent news stories as possible treatments for a political thriller\u2026 or comedy: too unlikely!<\/p>\n
OK, you know all this. I must remember to get over the astonishing and unprecedented events (partly because the two remaining weeks are bound to drop more bombshells). We must, all of us, come to grips that we very possibly are coming face-to- face with a constitutional criss.<\/p>\n
Can a president pardon herself? Possibly\u2026 but, then, would the hundreds of millions of the \u201cgoverned\u201d be governable?<\/p>\n
Can institutions once regarded as sacrosanct (the \u201cmost scared of holies\u201d), for example the FBI and great charities, ever redeem their integrity?<\/p>\n
Will personal probity ever return as a standard of public officials, or be demanded by a moral public?<\/p>\n
Look at what has happened to us in this campaign. Except for the lurid flashes in the pan, the \u201cbreaking news,\u201d the debates have largely centered on polls, trends, voting blocs, daily charts \u2013 in other words, the game<\/em> more than the issues. Surely, the three \u201cdebates\u201d centered more on name-calling than national challenges. We have come to assume the worst, including the worst motives, to our opponents. Hence, the two Americas: we have come to assume hatred\u2026 and adopt hatred.<\/p>\n I have suggested we Americans have deserved all this, and surely we do. What are we supposed to do, blame it on the Russians? We held primaries and caucuses (interminable, at that) and the voters spoke. At least in the Republican primaries there was a huge crop to choose from and a clear winner, and unlike elsewhere, no charges of rigging. So the system worked like systems do. To challenge the winner is to insult the voters.<\/p>\n As I also have suggested, Christians ought to look at likely results \u2013 desirable policy outcomes \u2013 instead of candidates\u2019 personality tics or appearances.<\/p>\n Very slowly, but surely, Donald Trump\u2019s speeches have featured fewer boasts and paranoid fantasies. More and more he ticks off his checklist: opposition to abortion; defending Christians overseas; reaffirming the First Amendment (freedom of religion) and Second (the right to bear arms); championing home schools, parochial schools, charter schools; ending Federal Government interference in education; and so forth.<\/p>\n He has fine-tuned his policy on immigrants. Not that all Mexicans are thieves and rapists, but unchecked floods of people at the borders might allow such to enter. The same with unvetted Muslim immigrants vis a vis terrorism. And so forth. Eventually, he has made sense.<\/p>\n This weekend Phil Robertson of Duck Dynasty<\/em> spoke directly of how he recently witnessed to Donald Trump. Explained the Gospel as nobody else has done. He believes that Trump accepted Christ, and he sees a work in progress.<\/p>\n But no matter how the election goes, voters must remember that the \u201cperfect might be the enemy of the good.\u201d In any event, as vital as this election is\u2026 there are many, many, many deep, deep, deep problems with this society. From schoolyards to the Supreme Court; from those who make movies to those who watch them; from those who reject Christ to\u2026 those who are faithful church-goers. One man cannot change all, so we should work with those who will try. And One who knows.<\/p>\n How far have we drifted? Are \u201cdamned if we do and damned if we don\u2019t\u201d \u2013 is it that late? Have we slept through our alarms?<\/p>\n + + +<\/p>\n