Giving Thanks

We are thankful for the blessings we've received. We know we have been given much. We also have been forgiven much and promised even more.

Can we live our lives every day in light of that thankfulness? Can every decision be an expression of our thanks for all God has given us? Today, every today, is a good day to find out.

Don't Rock the Vote

I've been trying to figure out the results of this election. Nothing really changed.

If one party or another had seen a real shift in power, you could argue that the American people accepted their approach and rejected the other's. But that didn't happen.

Instead President Obama was re-elected by a comfortable margin and the House remained comfortably Republican. How do we process this?

There are a certain number of people in this country who will vote for whatever Democrat/Republican is on the ballot. The parties spend a good amount of energy trying to get these people to actually go vote, but their choice is pretty predictable.

Then there's that last 20% or so who go back and forth. They make up their minds based on how they feel about their situation and the candidates in question. If they feel secure, they tend to vote for the status quo. If they don't feel secure, they vote for the candidate who scares them the least.

I think these "moderates" voted for the status quo:

The economy has sloooowly gotten a little better. Unemployment is down a little. The price of gas is down from recent highs. Did Mr. Obama's economic policy cause this? Maybe, maybe not. But it didn't screw things up too badly. Would Romney's policies do better? Maybe, maybe not. But if what's going on right now isn't that bad, why take a chance?

The same applies to the GOP in the House. Whatever you may think about them, they haven't burned the place down, so why stir up trouble?

  If that's the case, what does that say about the future? I don't think anyone was voting for gridlock, per se. But since one side ran on tax increases and the other on tax cuts, neither side can really claim a mandate for their policy. They're going to be expected to meet in the middle. 

So what happens in four years? If people feel they're doing ok, they may vote the status quo again. President Biden? Yikes!

Election Day Subliminal Messages

Well, it's game time. The debating and demagoguery culminates in decision day. I hope everyone will make sure to vote. (I hope the conservatives will vote and the liberals will wash their cars.)

Tomorrow we will know the results of the game. (Tomorrow we'll know who's suing whom.) And no matter who wins, the next day the sun will rise. (Unless the Lord punishes us for inventing turducken by having the sun eat us.)

Whoever wins will only have four years of influence (Have you heard of the Supreme Court?) and then we'll be able to undo anything we don't like. (Have you heard of Daylight Saving Time?)

The most important thing to remember is that no matter what happens, Joe Biden won't be the president. (Pray for Obama's health!)

And God is still on His throne.

Play ball!

What is Pro-Life?

Thomas Friedman argued in a recent column that liberals should take the term "pro-life" back from conservatives as a way to win the abortion debate. He says being pro-life requires "respect for the sanctity of life. But I will not let that label apply to people for whom sanctity for life begins at conception and ends at birth."

Friedman is fine with you killing your children as long as it's not where he can see it, but he is pro-life, he says, because he supports gun control, the EPA, and Head Start.

Huh?

Yes, that old canard again. You're not "pro-life" if you don't believe in top-down state control of every aspect of your life — except over your reproductive choices, of course. He praises NY Mayor Michael Bloomberg as "the most 'pro-life' politician in America" because of his bans on smoking and large sugary drinks and his support for gun control, "climate change" regulation, and early childhood education.

It doesn't matter that the ban on sugary drinks is largely illusory, that most "climate change" regulation would punish the poor more than anyone, or that neither early childhood education nor gun control works. He cares about everyone — except unborn children.

As I have argued before, most of our political debates are over how to help people. Everyone's heart is in the right place; we just disagree about what will actually work or what is necessary.

But the abortion debate is over whether it is OK to kill unborn human beings. There is no logical argument than can make anyone who says "yes" to that question "pro-life."