I was amazed during the waning weeks of the Bush administration how little
protest I heard from evangelicals of the $700,000,000,000 + bailout plan. I am
amazed how much complaint I hear now of the only slightly bigger bailout plan of
the Obama administration, and especially how rarely the critique is based on
biblical principles...
I'm reminded, too, of the dramatic
contrast between the national response to the Great Depression as it led into
World War II--the calls first to save and then to give--and the Bush appeal a
few years ago to spend money, thereby fueling the economy, as an act of
patriotism! Again, I can only imagine how a Democratic president saying such a
thing would have come in for scorn and outrage from the very evangelicals who
were silent while a Republican president was saying it...
If it is inevitable that living within our means, spending only that which we have, and saving frugally while continuing to give generously ruins the recovery, then so
be it. It is biblical stewardship. Worshiping at the shrines of materialism and
instant gratification played a large role in getting us into the economic mess
we are in, so it can scarcely be the answer to getting us out!
Dr. Blomberg is right on here. But just to show that he's not the only one, I'm an equal opportunity critic of faulty financial plans that aren't in biblical accord. For proof that I thought Bush's plan was foolish, see An American Parable, the Common Sense Fix, and Thinking Long-Term in chronological order. Blomberg grounds his biblical foundations in Romans, but I appeal mostly to Proverbs.
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3 comments:
Right on Dave, and I side with Dr. Blomberg in his criticism of so many evangelicals for being silent when "their" guy acted irresponsibly. It's why I'm willing to make use of a political party when it achieves that which is good, but I have no qualms with abandoning a party when they circle the wagons around their men behaving badly. (Though to be fair -- and to respond to the throngs of people complaining that Republicans had no problem with spending when Bush did it -- there was a massive defection of conservatives from the Republican ranks under Bush.)
Kev,
I agree as well. In this political climate, it's hard to be an "issues" voter because the television and the internet make people want to rush to the image-oriented candidate. We rally around broken people instead of truthful ideas. People forget that Bush was the image candidate over Gore and Kerry because he was "one of us" and someone we could drink a beer with. He was a sports owner after all. And then along comes this guy who can communicate well with the masses (albeit he's a terrible interviewer because he doesn't have a teleprompter- see old Meet the Press for proof). Obama is an image oriented candidate.
He can say something like, "We don't need to be driven by ideology," and then spend the rest of his speech outlining liberal ideology. He'll say, "we need pragmatic solutions," and then give you a pork-laden, ideological, and mostly non-stimulus bill. And yet people believe him merely because he starts off a phrase with something he'll negate for the rest of the speech. It's truly maddening, but that doesn't mean Bush was mister good communicator either.
I meant to say Obama WAS an image oriented candidate. He's now the President of course, and I respect his office.
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