When SS Doesn't Work

The GOP Conmen are doing to Social Security what they've already done, in large part, to American Public Education - impoverish it.

And then shout at the top of their itty bitty lungs, "Social Security is bankrupting America. And besides that, it won't work much longer."

After beating their "We're so poor" drum, they'll offer in place of SS a shoddy investment plan which will:

1) Always benefit those who own the instruments of investment.
2) Benefit even some of the investors.
3) Leaving most of America all the poorer.

America, you're being duped.

And most pitiable of all, the Evangelicals, who've not only been duped, but have convinced themselves that the con game is God's will.

Social Security: How I Choose It!

January 27, 1970, ordained by the Grand River Presbytery (now, Lake Michigan), in the First Presbyterian Church of Holland, MI ... and from there, back to the West Virginia Mountain Project and two of its churches, Camp Creek and Ridgeview, where I had begun January 1.

My wife and I ... newly minted.

With a choice to make,

A choice granted to the newly minted,

Ministers of the Gospel, or something like that.

To continue in SS, if already in.

Or, if already in, resign.

If not, sign up.

A choice.

That could not be undone.

We choose Social Security.

I received my first SS Card when I was 14, working for my father, at the Milwaukee Cheese Company, where else, Milwaukee.

D (she was already in SS, too) and we thought:

"On our meager salary, how would we invest?"

"Given what we didn't know, about just about everything money-wise, how would we decide?"

Neither of our families were wealthy.

Nor invested.

Just hard working. Comfortable, but that's all.

So, we decided, on SS.

"It was the American thing to do," we thought. To play our part, stand with working Americans, and assure ourselves something for retirement. For us, it was the right thing, something good for the country, even patriotic. We felt good about it. We felt right.

And so it was ... for the rest of our working lives.

That's how I came to be in SS.

I have only gratitude about it ... it was right then, and it's still right.

Thank God for SS, and FDR who put it together, before we showed up.

When Christians Feel "Persecuted"

From many an evangelical pulpit come the the thundering words: "We are being persecuted by a powerful lobby of liberals and secularists who would silence us and take away our rights. We must stand up as followers of Jesus and defend the gospel and claim our rightful place in in our great land of faith and freedom."

One should rightly ask: Who's persecuting whom, and just exactly how can anyone be sure that, as 1 Peter 4 puts it:

¹²Beloved, do not be surprised at the fiery ordeal that is takingplace among you to test you, as though something strange werehappening to you. ¹³But rejoice insofar as you are sharing Christ’ssufferings, so that you may also be glad and shout for joy when hisglory is revealed. ¹⁴If you are reviled for the name of Christ, you areblessed, because the spirit of glory, which is the Spirit of God, isresting on you. ¹⁵But let none of you suffer as a murderer, a thief, acriminal, or even as a mischief maker. ¹⁶Yet if any of you suffers as aChristian, do not consider it a disgrace, but glorify God because you bear this name. ¹⁷For the time has come for judgment to begin withthe household of God; if it begins with us, what will be the end forthose who do not obey the gospel of God?

For many an evangelical Christian, it's comforting to believe in persecution as a badge of honor, a confirmation of faithfulness. 

But is persecution for the sake of gospel, for the sake of Christ, or simply simply because of "mischief" and worse?

From  Psalm 94:

¹O LORD, you God of vengeance,

you God of vengeance, shine forth!

²Rise up, O judge of the earth;

give to the proud what they deserve!

³O LORD, how long shall the wicked,

how long shall the wicked exult?

Thus far, in the reading, there is no definition of the "proud" for whom the Psalmist wishes judgment. 

But the Psalmist doesn't leave us hanging:

⁴They pour out their arrogant words;

all the evildoers boast.

⁵They crush your people, O LORD,

and afflict your heritage.

⁶They kill the widow and the stranger,

they murder the orphan,

⁷and they say, "The LORD does not see;

the God of Jacob does not perceive."

Who are the proud?

They are identified by their deeds:

They kill the widow, the stranger and murder the orphan.

Reminiscent of Jesus when he warms against those "who take widow's houses and then say long prayers" … the very same who then prance around the Temple Treasury throwing in large sums of money out of their "spare change" while creating a system that takes the last few pennies a widow has to live on (Mark 12.38-44).

The widow, the stranger, the orphan - the three most vulnerable social categories of Israel - victims of wealthy interests (for a devastating critique on those "who borrow and never pay back," spend some time with Psalm 37).

What systems in our land create hardship for "the widow, the stranger and the orphan"?

What would the Psalmist says about Food Stamps, Social Security, health care, pensions, children in poverty, crushing debt for college students and a host of other burdens created by the wealthy to game the system in their favor, and why would Christians cheer any of their nefarious schemes in the light of Scripture?

Such Christians, when criticized, are quick to label themselves "persecuted." But I would label them "dupes of the wealthy," many of them, like the widow Jesus notes at the end of Mark 13 - a victim of some of kind of "prosperity message"? - give your last penny to "god," and miracles will come your way. Even as she gave her pennies, she was standing beside the wealthy who perhaps congratulated her, smiled at her, for her faithfulness even as they schemed to take her house.

Evangelical Christianity has been short on compassion for a long time now, a victim of a misconstrued gospel mostly the tool of the powerful to further their own vested interests even as they "say long prayers" or have others do it for them. 

For Scripture, then, there is is a litmus test: the wellbeing of the "widow, the stranger and the orphan," and how well society cares for them!

It is what we own to one another (Romans 13.8-10).

Vision for America

In a recent Facebook post, I wrote the following:

I think we have some mighty good leaders in Washington, but the GOP has a choke hold on our necks - we can't breath, we can't get legislation passed - the only priorities tolerated by the GOP is tax cuts, fund the military and screw the people, as long as they're not wealthy. We have good leadership, but enough of it. We can make a difference in 2014 and send more leaders to Washington.

To which a friend replied:

I think we have some mighty good leaders in Washington, but the Democrats have a choke hold on our necks - we can't breathe, we can't get legislation passed - the only priorities tolerated by the Democrats is spend money that you take from people who work hard to get it, and give it to people that don't work. We have good leaders in Washington, but enough of this. We can make a difference in 2014 and send more leaders to Washington.

It all depends on what vision for America we hold dear. 

I stand for a woman's right to make personal medical choices regarding her pregnancy, and I stand against an overly zealous government regulating a woman's health-care options. I stand for marriage equality, and I stand against those who would impose upon the nation a singular religious viewpoint, for which we once fought a Revolution against Great Britain and the Anglican Church. 

I stand for a strong and vital safety net, including SS, Medicaid and Medicare, and I stand against those who would cut these programs to pay for tax cuts for the wealthy and to fund our already-bloated military budget. 

I stand for those who recognize, along with 95% of the world scientists, that human activity is negatively influencing global warming, and I stand against those who retreat into creationist notions of a young earth and God protecting the earth from harm. 

I stand with those who defend workers' rights for good wages and benefits, and against those who would gladly do away with unions and all other laws protecting workers from the avarice of American Capital. 

I stand against Paul Ryan and his Ayn Rand dream for America, and I stand with those who honor the vision of Abraham Lincoln and Martin Luther King, Jr. 

For me, all of this is rooted in my reading of the Bible and my understanding of the christian tradition of justice. A vision of America's greatness, determined by social kindness rather than economic domination. A vision that welcomes and never excludes. A vision grounded in the Beatitudes and that small and powerful little letter from James, both of which have mostly been ignored or twisted out of shape by conservative christians who refuse to give heed to the larger vision of "thy kingdom come, thy will be done, on earth as it is in heaven." 

I no longer argue with evangelicals on any of this. God will work it out in their hearts. And when it comes to these visions, I doubt very much if both can be right. Paul's Ryan's vision for America is not the same as mine. I doubt if we both can be right.  

All Economies Behave the Same

All economies behave in much the same way - like the game of Risk: sooner or later, there's only one player left, and they have it all. Without regulation to sustain good wages and jobs for the middle class, money migrates to the top - the wealth concentrated in the hands of the few and the rest of the society struggling to make ends meet.

The genius of FDR was to provide the "artificial" constraints that allowed the development of the Middle Class. Yes, WW2 was a huge boost, along with strong unions and Social Security, both of which are deeply hated by the wealthy who see unions and SS as an affront to their initiative and rights.

It's a sad, sad, day for America. We are witnessing the unravelling of our greatness, and the GOP is cheering it on for reasons that make no sense, not to even then - hence all of their strained rationales and bizarre grandstanding, while hiding behind "their love of the newborn," "their regard for motherhood and marriage," "their faith in American," and "their desire to restore our greatness."

What Evil Has Been Wrought by the GOP

Read and weep.

Read and get ready to do something about it.

Thanks to Paul Krugman.

Proud to be a Liberal

A good FB friend asked me what I mean by the world liberal ... in terms of the root meaning, as in liberal education or in terms of the progressive agenda these days in politics.

Here's my response - quick and dirty:

Hi John ... I think both ... a freedom to think broadly, experimentally - but clearly, for me, the term represents the best in America's political story - that which gave us the National Parks and child labor laws; that which abolished slavery and established civil rights for people of color and women. The liberal spirit busted the trusts under Teddy Roosevelt, gave us Social Security under FDR and promoted unions to protect the working class and build the middle class. John, you ask good questions: For the church, a place of free inquiry because of a solid faith, not in spite of it, with less emphasis on "winning souls" and a lot more emphasis on living the faith, and letting God do the winning through our witness (my Calvinism is showing!). I think the struggle today for Gay Rights is akin to the struggle for civil rights and women's suffrage and ordination. Why the church tends to be last in line on so many of these things astounds me. We talk of heaven, but seemingly close our eyes to the hell in which so many millions are forced to live their days. Socially, a safe society - where aliens have an easier time of it, where employers are penalized for illegal hiring rather than gathering up these poor families late at night and deporting them. We have to recover our manufacturing basis - if there were a crisis and the shipping lanes disrupted, we couldn't make our own refrigerators anymore. We need to sever the link between employment and health care and put it where it belongs - in government. We need a major public transportation effort to curb our fuel usage and rebuild our cities around it rather than freeways (and I live in LA) We have to learn how to curb our spending, learn to live with less, pay more for what we have to support our middle class and keep jobs here in America. Our corporations have to be leashed; and super-wealth taxed! Junk food and corn syrup banned! Feed McDonald's executives their own crap three times a day for a month, take away their cars and make them use public transportation. Oh well, you asked ... a lot of random thoughts. John, tell me more about your vision, for the church and for our society.

"Let's Privatize Social Security, Shall We?"

At the height of the Reagan-Bush economic bubble, Wall-Street Jockeys and the young and the restless were championing the end of Social Security and the onset of an entrepreneurial new world of privatization, and everyone-for-himself under the ever-present, watchful eye, of the glorious no-one-can-lost stock market guided by Big Brother, I mean Big Biz.

Who needs the government? they asked!

Government is the problem.

Government is inefficient and Big Biz knows how to run the country.

Less government, and more unregulated free-market driven capitalism, driven by the needs and interests of the “ruling class.” After all, their position and power reveal the rightness of their ideas, if not the righteousness of their souls. They’re different than the rest of us. Smarter. Better. And we’d better do as they as they say, and there’s enough greed in all of us to spin our heads and make us think, hope, that maybe, just maybe, we, too, can be stinking rich.

And, then, the House of Cards comes crashing down.

The vaunted Wonder Kids of Wall Street prove to be just as dumb as the rest of us – dumb for ever believing the lies and illusions of the ruling class: that they know better than the rest of us how to govern life and run the world – that if we just listen to them, fancy their needs, and do as we’re told, we all get rich.

Any talk lately about privatizing Social Security?

I haven’t heard a whisper, have you?

What happened?

The vulnerability of an unregulated free-market system reared its ugly head.

The curtain was pulled aside, and the wizard in the cloud proved to be an ordinary little man pulling levers and working smoke machines to frighten the peasants and manipulate the world into thinking that the rich and the powerful are different than everyone else, and the rest of us can just take a hike on their magnificent coattails.

What we’ve discovered, in the nick of time, is our need something better and brighter than Wall Street and the machinations of Board Rooms forty-stories removed from the real world.

We need something reliable in the best of times and the worst of times.

We need a real cushion, a safety net.

For millions who aren’t rich, who will never be rich, and millions more who are likely to spend most, if not all, of their life on the margin.

In other words, we need a mutual assurance of brother/sister-keeping responsibility.

We need a moral framework that’s real and dependable.

We need good government.

We need a federal conscience.

The rich and the powerful have always hated this.

And most will continue to hate it.

They, too, have bought their own fabrications.

A family like the Kennedys had a higher vision.

They proved the exception.

But there are plenty of people of wealth and power who buy into the bigger and better picture of the United States of America.

Yet in recent years, their faithful voices have been drowned out by the shouting of the right wing, accusing them of disloyalty to The Republic, being hare-brained, bleeding-heart, liberals and generally unfit to govern anything.

James Dobson and “The Family” and the likes of Beck and Dobbs won the day, but, thank God, they lost the battle.

Yet millions of dollars, our hard-earned dollars, are being poured into the smoke and mirrors of their house of horrors, and the peasants are responding, as they always have – even as the master of the manor takes the women and children, even as the lord of the realm impresses the peasant into service and hangs him from the highest tree, the peasant bows and curtsies, for the master knows better what’s right and what’s good.

There is a sickness in the land, a sickness created in the early days of American industrialization when millions were made in steel, coal and railroads, creating an entitled class of people who forgot their roots and the basic biblical truth:

The rich and the poor have this in common:

the LORD is the maker of them all.

We’re all in this together.

It’s terribly hard to remember.

It’s vital that we do!