Do We Understand What an Allegation Is?

                  Do We Understand What an Allegation Is?

               Published in Marietta (GA) Daily Journal 11/19/17

            Anyone who wants to tell Alabama citizens how they should vote had better get in line.  The line of out-of-state know-it-alls is already quite long.  Let us say too many cooks have run down to the Alabama kitchen.

            Never has outside meddling, condescension, and arrogance been on such display as with those who are telling Alabamians what to do about their December 12 senatorial election.  Republicans in the U.S. Senate, including one of our Georgia senators, have deigned to tell Alabamians what they should do.

            Need we remind these outsiders? Our Constitution’s federalism means Alabama gets to choose her own senators.  Imagine Senate leader McConnell saying, “There are options we are looking at regarding the election.”  And who is “we”?  It’s Senate members who don’t get to vote in Alabama.  Add to them the media stars who are trying to pick or keep Alabama from picking the candidate they choose.

            For instance, who is Sean Hannity to tell any candidate, “You have 24 hours to clear up your mess?”  Wow!  Being recently crowned the most-watched cable news anchor on television, Hannity is really feeling the power.  He’s sounding like the pompous U.S. Senators he has long critiqued.   How disappointing.

            Yes, it’s still relevant, so let’s ask it.  Where were the feminists, the media, and Gloria Allred when Bill Clinton’s victims charged him with assault and rape?  Clinton’s victims also went on television and cried, only to be ignored and forgotten.  Why the selective rage?  We know the answer.  It all depends on who is being accused and which election you are trying to influence.

            It isn’t the task of Alabamians to “do what’s best for the nation.”  Their civic task and privilege is to elect candidates they prefer to elect.  The guilt of their Republican nominee has not been established, so why all the moral high horses?

            Easy question.  The answer is that for Republicans, climbing upon a moral high horse is easier than fighting.  I have quite a few Democratic friends and not one of them is hesitant to fight for what they believe.  Most Republicans leaders won’t fight.  They run from the thought of trouble, spurning anyone less genteel than they.  They get spooked by seeing a Republican candidate riding a horse and wearing a hat.  They probably freaked years ago when the iconic Charlton Heston, speaking against gun control, held his gun high and said, “From my cold, dead hands.”  Their most feared enemy is the northeastern media who is also trying to school the voters of Alabama.

            Allegations, allegations, allegations.  And just weeks before an election.  Everybody reading this has seen this movie before.

            Be careful if you’re a male, especially a male college student, a male teacher, or a male candidate.  Examples abound of “guilty until proven innocent.”  Ask the Duke University lacrosse team, or Richard Jewel, the innocent security guard who during the 1996 Olympics was dragged through career-ending mud by the Atlanta papers and NBC.  Ask the exonerated male janitor and male special education teacher with whom I worked years ago.  Ask Herman Cain.

            Ask me.  I’ve been accused not of sexual impropriety but of misusing public funds.  Guess when, moviegoers.  Three weeks before an election.  The investigation by the State Ethics Commission (after I was re-elected) wasn’t fun.  A good friend called to ask if I was guilty.  Had he been the accused, I would have called him to lend my support.  See what allegations can do to people’s heads?

            What, then, are we to do about a litigious society that allows allegations to morph into truth before the ink dries?  First, we can honor “innocent until proven guilty” again.  Secondly, we should acknowledge that while smoke does indicate fire, there are lots of arsonists in the world, especially in politics.  Political fires are often ignited by a lie and fueled by the piling on of allegations.

            Allegations are often a dog’s breakfast of charges designed to smear someone.  It’s American to hear the charged one out, particularly when the accuser’s defenders are self-serving and as suspect as the timing of their charges.

            Moral superiority is the refuge of the immoral.  Just as Trump supporters are viewed as deplorable, so are “those Alabamians down there” being viewed as less than intelligent. They are also being besieged by arrogant smarter-than-you media types and Republican senators who are simply acting uppity about it all.

 And all because of yet unproven allegations.  Resistance is in order.

Roger Hines

11/16/17

What’s Dark or Dangerous about Of the People, By the People and For the People?

What’s Dark or Dangerous about Of the People, By the                                     People and For the People?

    Published in Marietta (GA) Daily Journal 11/11/17

Pundits are calling it populism, nationalism, and when they really wish to diminish it, nativism and tribalism.  Whatever it’s called, the growing movement in America and Europe that argues for putting national interests before globalism is well afloat.

“Globalism” has always sounded trendy and non-substantive.  It is the political term for the ideology that is in a struggle with nationalism.  It is expressed musically by the jingle, “We are the world / we are the people.”  Google it and hear the jingle’s pleasant tones.  Wallow in its love and goodwill.

There’s nothing wrong with Stevie Wonder, Kenny Rogers and others bunching up to sing about peace and brotherhood.  There’s everything wrong with governmental policy that benefits cronies and destroys jobs.

Let’s back up and grant “globalism” a measure of credibility.  We doubtlessly live in an interconnected world.  Free trade, which all Americans benefit from, requires signing trade deals with other nations.  International commerce has helped build America. 

Even so, America and Europe’s populist outrage, their cries for their governments to attend to national needs first, and their demand for secure borders all indicate that the globalist outlook has extended too far.  Surely this is the chief reason that Trump’s slogan, “America First,” took hold.

This slogan has merit.  To have national sentiments is natural.   Why the media denigrates such sentiments is a puzzle.  Or maybe it isn’t.

Why can’t television’s talking heads understand that tribes preceded nations and that families preceded tribes?  Maybe they didn’t take Sociology 101.  But could they not read a little bit of history and ponder human nature?

Here are a few questions for those who consider President Trump’s “America First” policies dark and dangerous.  Why did Britain exit the European Union?  Why the Catalonian effort to exit Spain?  Why the secession of America’s southern states?  The separation of the colonies from Britain? Why the eternal Quebec question in Canada or the breakup of Yugoslavia into at least 5 tiny nations?  Etc., etc.

It’s secession for self-determination, dude!  It’s that birds of a linguistic, ethnic, and creedal feather flock together.  Globalists, a la Stevie Wonder and friends, central bankers, tech titans, corporation CEO’s, and many politicians seem not to understand that the rest of us understand that nobody is a citizen of the world. “The world” doesn’t grant citizenship or zip codes.  Our citizenship is in nations.

Donald Trump didn’t fire up the nationalist/populist locomotive.  He only acknowle stoked the fire, asked to be the engineer/conductor, and was granted his wish.  In doing so he confounded our political terminology (liberal vs. conservative), turning our eyes and emphasis to globalism versus nationalism.  He raised high the poetic line of Robert Frost, “Good fences make good neighbors.”  He also signaled either a post-party era in American politics or at least an identity crisis in both parties.

Ironically, Trump was a Democrat turned Republican, a fact that didn’t seem to bother Rust Belt union members or evangelical Republicans.  Since 63 million voters ain’t no chicken feed, it’s obvious he struck a chord with the vast middle class.  This is populism, the result of one of Trump’s earliest speeches in which he said, “The GOP will be the party of the American worker.”  Currently the employment rate testifies to his claim.

No wonder the media and Democrats have shifted from shock to anger to daily efforts to stymie a duly-elected president.  Embarrassed, they now tout polls that claim he is not liked.  If the polls were so wrong about his chances of election, however, why should we believe what they say about his favorability rating?

Globalism has been good for the globalists, but a job-sucking monster for Joe Lunchbox. Manufacturing, where art thou?   Globalists need not ask for whom the bell tolls.  It tolls for them.  Trumpism is making sure of that.

America is a creedal nation.  Our creed is enshrined in law books, documents, on plaques, and on statues, or on those not pulled down.  Among other great ideals, that creed says E pluribus Unum, or “Out of many, one.”  To that we can now add Vox populi, or “the voice of the people.”  That’s populism too.  And it is not a cloak for anyone’s ethnic or religious bigotry as the talking heads claim. 

It’s simply a re-claiming of what Lincoln said 154 years ago.  It’s a reflection of a poem penned by a Lincoln admirer, Walt Whitman: “The People, Yes!”

Roger Hines

11/8/17

      

            

Our Babies and the Nanny State

                                   Our Babies and the Nanny State

               Published in Marietta (GA) Daily Journal 11/5/17

I’ve always been troubled, even saddened, by the expression “pre-K.”  PRE-kindergarten?  PRE-5 year olds in school? 

            For public educators and policymakers so anxious to get hold of our babies, one tiny question:   Is it your aim to one day stand in delivery rooms waiting for babies to be placed in your charge?

            The picture isn’t about to change soon, but still, a few more questions for all citizens: Where are mothers?  Why in the world are we thinking about formal learning for 3 and 4 year olds? What’s wrong with the informal learning a child gets from parents, brothers and sisters, and even pets?  What happened to “free play” without structure from adults?

            We know the answer to the question about mothers.  Mothers are working, some who must, others who don’t have to.  As for academic achievement, educators have almost convinced us that formal education, started early, is the key to success.  It is not. Good parents and strong families are the key to a child’s success.

            Educators often use “socialization” to argue their case.  Small children must have it, else they will land in prison.  No, both children and teenagers need to spend more time with adults.  One might ask educators, “What kind of socialization are you offering?  Can you assure us it will be positive?”

            My half-century observation (and participation) says the strongest influencers of children are other children.  The strongest influencers of teenagers are other teenagers.  Parents might want to consider this when educators emphasize socialization.  Children of all ages need more socialization with parents and grandparents and less with their peers.

            The desire for Trophy Children has fueled the rush toward academics, but academics are not the foundation on which to shape Trophy Children.  Character is.  All children need moms and dads who talk with them, not tests administered in hopes that early testing will boost SAT scores in high school, or boost prospects for getting into a Trophy Child university.

            I know how the educational establishment views the position I am advancing here.  They argue that most working parents and single moms are unqualified to give children what they need to succeed. That argument is elitism at its worst.

            Over twenty years ago psychologist David Elkind stirred controversy with his book, “The Hurried Child.”  Arguing that much of what schools are doing is not age-appropriate, Elkind bemoaned the fact that children are actually hindered by the rush into academics.  The results, he claimed, are stress, confusion, and even aggression. 

            More recently, psychoanalyst Erica Komisar expanded Elkind’s thesis in her new book, “Being There: Prioritizing Motherhood in the First Three Years Matters.”  Komisar asserts that respect for mothering is steadily waning.  She states that for a child’s first three years, mothers should be with their children because according to many neuro-scientists, a baby’s central nervous system is supplied and developed by its mother.

            Denying that men are equally equipped to attend to babies, Komisar argues that women have a “nurturing hormone” that men don’t have.  Dads are equally important but in different ways.

            Guess what. Komisar is a liberal Democrat.  Yet, neither the liberal press nor National Public Radio will grant her an interview, and her own professional organization ignores her.  That’s probably because Komisar says things like “Day care is over-stimulating for ages 1 through 3, given their neurological un-development.”  Her colleagues accuse her of making women feel guilty.

             Elkind and Komisar argue that mothering is denied respect and common sense is being abandoned.  Small children need mothers and mothering, not classrooms full of children.

            Educators will argue that modern social realities (single moms, absent fathers, etc.) have led to the need for early childhood education.  Actually it’s nanny state intrusion, derelict fathers,  and the decline of mothering that led to these social realities in the first place.  Are we any better off since the inception of Head Start 52 years ago?  Have the social realities improved? 

              If only for at least the first three or four years of our children’s lives we could let Dad go kill something and drag it home while Mom works her magic.  It worked for centuries.  There’s something about the human heart that yearns for it, still, and there are more and more young parents who are pursuing it.  For moms who just can’t do so, research indicates that grandmothers and wisely chosen small settings are best for small children.

            The triumph of nanny state culture has eroded old values, and a thoughtful, liberal, female psychoanalyst has pointed it out.

Roger Hines

11/2/17

           

           

Two Men, Two Revolutions, One True Change

               Two Men, Two Revolutions, One True Change

               Published in Marietta (GA) Daily Journal 10/29/17

The river of history is sometimes gentle, sometimes boisterous.  We often consider it a force beyond our control.

  Historian Arthur Schlesinger once remarked that “history is to the nation what memory is to the individual.”  However we define history and whether or not we enjoy its study, we cannot say that man has no control over it.  This very month, October of 2017, is the anniversary of the actions of two men who gripped history in their hands and slung it forward, affecting many nations, many centuries, and millions of lives.

            October 31 is the 500^th anniversary of the Protestant Reformation.  Specifically, it is the anniversary of the actions of one individual, Martin Luther.  This October is also the 100th anniversary of Russia’s Bolshevik Revolution, specifically the anniversary of the actions of Nicolai Lenin.

            Luther’s actions are well known.  By tacking his 95 theses on the church door in Wittenberg, the German monk bravely challenged the most eminent authority in the western world, the Roman Catholic Church. 

Lenin did not act alone.  One of many in a bevy of radicals, he became the leader and the face of the Bolshevik (Communist) Revolution.  As dangerously as Luther, Lenin challenged not a state church but a family, the Romanovs, who had ruled Russia for precisely 300 years.

            In 1517 Luther plunged Europe into religious wars that continued for centuries.  In 1917 Lenin led Russia into a 74-year socialist experiment that severely curtailed freedom and left millions in poverty.  Such has been the plight throughout the world of those living under socialism’s central planning, a bloody recipe that has everywhere left blood in its wake.

            As social/political upheavals go, nothing is comparable to these two events except the American Revolution and perhaps the 1948 Communist takeover of China.  Our misnamed Civil War aside, we Americans, thankfully, know little about internal upheaval that leads to hunger, displacement, or endless strife.  Our 222-year history, a brief one indeed, has been marked neither by constant religious wars nor by the designs of any singular, would-be tyrant.

            In Luther’s case, it was religious conviction that sparked the flame that set Europe afire.  Luther’s indictment of the medieval Catholic structure and its practices struck a chord.  The sale of indulgences was evil. The Church’s doctrine of salvation was amiss.  “Sola Scriptura” (Scripture alone), Luther pleaded.  And then, “Here I Stand. I cannot and will not recant.” Luther didn’t reform the Catholic Church, but he reformed the religious landscape of the West by bringing attention to Rome’s raw power.

            There has come unity between Catholics and Protestants, not in respect to theology but in diplomatic relations and in working for common goals.  Recently, Southern Baptist leader Russell Moore was invited by Pope Francis to a Vatican meeting of religious leaders.  Catholics and many Protestant groups have always worked together to fight abortion and to preserve the sanctity of marriage.

            There has been far less healing between the masses of Russia and its political class.  Russia now has elections and casts itself as a democracy; however, the nation is still drying off from Leninism and Stalinism.  Putin, for sure, has not reckoned with his communist past.  The irony of Lenin’s actions in 1917 is that a bad system of aristocratic, totalitarian rule was replaced with a bad system of party totalitarian rule.   Luther brought about change; Lenin did not.  Tyranny is tyranny, whether foisted on us by a family dynasty of aristocrats or a band of socialist radicals posing as deliverers of the peasants.

            And what can we learn from Luther and Lenin?  From Luther we can learn courage.  At the Diet of Worms he presented his case, facing excommunication and the threat of execution.  From Lenin we should learn that socialism by any name is a losing proposition.

            From Luther we can learn to keep a list of 95 theses in our pocket, ready to proclaim them when events and conscience so dictate.  From Lenin we can learn that socialism/Marxism/communism is little more than shared poverty and that sometimes history turns on those who try to advance evil.

            T.S. Eliot wrote, “We know little of the future except that from generation to generation the same things happen again and again.”

            Yes and no.  Lenin’s statues have been toppled, and now the city of Leningrad is St. Petersburg again.  Luther is revered around the world.

            Sometimes history does make sense and turns out well.

Roger Hines

10/25/17

            

Two Men, Two Revolutions, One True Change The river of history is sometimes gentle, sometimes boisterous. We often consider it a force beyond our control. Historian Arthur Schlesinger once remarked that “history is to the nation what memory is to the individual.” However we define history and whether or not we enjoy its study, we cannot say that man has no control over it. This very month, October of 2017, is the anniversary of the actions of two men who gripped history in their hands and slung it forward, affecting many nations, many centuries, and millions of lives. October 31 is the 500th anniversary of the Protestant Reformation. Specifically, it is the anniversary of the actions of one individual, Martin Luther. This October is also the 100th anniversary of Russia’s Bolshevik Revolution, specifically the anniversary of the actions of Nicolai Lenin. Luther’s actions are well known. By tacking his 95 theses on the church door in Wittenberg, the German monk bravely challenged the most eminent authority in the western world, the Roman Catholic Church. Lenin did not act alone. One of many in a bevy of radicals, he became the leader and the face of the Bolshevik (Communist) Revolution. As dangerously as Luther, Lenin challenged not a state church but a family, the Romanovs, who had ruled Russia for precisely 300 years. In 1517 Luther plunged Europe into religious wars that continued for centuries. In 1917 Lenin led Russia into a 74-year socialist experiment that severely curtailed freedom and left millions in poverty. Such has been the plight throughout the world of those living under socialism’s central planning, a bloody recipe that has everywhere left blood in its wake. As social/political upheavals go, nothing is comparable to these two events except the American Revolution and perhaps the 1948 Communist takeover of China. Our misnamed Civil War aside, we Americans, thankfully, know little about internal upheaval that leads to hunger, displacement, or endless strife. Our 222-year history, a brief one indeed, has been marked neither by constant religious wars nor by the designs of any singular, would-be tyrant. In Luther’s case, it was religious conviction that sparked the flame that set Europe afire. Luther’s indictment of the medieval Catholic structure and its practices struck a chord. The sale of indulgences was evil. The Church’s doctrine of salvation was amiss. “Sola Scriptura” (Scripture alone), Luther pleaded. And then, “Here I Stand. I cannot and will not recant.” Luther didn’t reform the Catholic Church, but he reformed the religious landscape of the West by bringing attention to Rome’s raw power. There has come unity between Catholics and Protestants, not in respect to theology but in diplomatic relations and in working for common goals. Recently, Southern Baptist leader Russell Moore was invited by Pope Francis to a Vatican meeting of religious leaders. Catholics and many Protestant groups have always worked together to fight abortion and to preserve the sanctity of marriage. There has been far less healing between the masses of Russia and its political class. Russia now has elections and casts itself as a democracy; however, the nation is still drying off from Leninism and Stalinism. Putin, for sure, has not reckoned with his communist past. The irony of Lenin’s actions in 1917 is that a bad system of aristocratic, totalitarian rule was replaced with a bad system of party totalitarian rule. Luther brought about change; Lenin did not. Tyranny is tyranny, whether foisted on us by a family dynasty of aristocrats or a band of socialist radicals posing as deliverers of the peasants. And what can we learn from Luther and Lenin? From Luther we can learn courage. At the Diet of Worms he presented his case, facing excommunication and the threat of execution. From Lenin we should learn that socialism by any name is a losing proposition. From Luther we can learn to keep a list of 95 theses in our pocket, ready to proclaim them when events and conscience so dictate. From Lenin we can learn that socialism/Marxism/communism is little more than shared poverty and that sometimes history turns on those who try to advance evil. T.S. Eliot wrote, “We know little of the future except that from generation to generation the same things happen again and again.” Yes and no. Lenin’s statues have been toppled, and now the city of Leningrad is St. Petersburg again. Luther is revered around the world. Sometimes history does make sense and turns out well. Roger Hines 10/25/17

               Two Men, Two Revolutions, One True Change

               Published in Marietta (GA) Daily Journal 10/29/17

The river of history is sometimes gentle, sometimes boisterous.  We often consider it a force beyond our control.

  Historian Arthur Schlesinger once remarked that “history is to the nation what memory is to the individual.”  However we define history and whether or not we enjoy its study, we cannot say that man has no control over it.  This very month, October of 2017, is the anniversary of the actions of two men who gripped history in their hands and slung it forward, affecting many nations, many centuries, and millions of lives.

            October 31 is the 500^th anniversary of the Protestant Reformation.  Specifically, it is the anniversary of the actions of one individual, Martin Luther.  This October is also the 100th anniversary of Russia’s Bolshevik Revolution, specifically the anniversary of the actions of Nicolai Lenin.

            Luther’s actions are well known.  By tacking his 95 theses on the church door in Wittenberg, the German monk bravely challenged the most eminent authority in the western world, the Roman Catholic Church. 

Lenin did not act alone.  One of many in a bevy of radicals, he became the leader and the face of the Bolshevik (Communist) Revolution.  As dangerously as Luther, Lenin challenged not a state church but a family, the Romanovs, who had ruled Russia for precisely 300 years.

            In 1517 Luther plunged Europe into religious wars that continued for centuries.  In 1917 Lenin led Russia into a 74-year socialist experiment that severely curtailed freedom and left millions in poverty.  Such has been the plight throughout the world of those living under socialism’s central planning, a bloody recipe that has everywhere left blood in its wake.

            As social/political upheavals go, nothing is comparable to these two events except the American Revolution and perhaps the 1948 Communist takeover of China.  Our misnamed Civil War aside, we Americans, thankfully, know little about internal upheaval that leads to hunger, displacement, or endless strife.  Our 222-year history, a brief one indeed, has been marked neither by constant religious wars nor by the designs of any singular, would-be tyrant.

            In Luther’s case, it was religious conviction that sparked the flame that set Europe afire.  Luther’s indictment of the medieval Catholic structure and its practices struck a chord.  The sale of indulgences was evil. The Church’s doctrine of salvation was amiss.  “Sola Scriptura” (Scripture alone), Luther pleaded.  And then, “Here I Stand. I cannot and will not recant.” Luther didn’t reform the Catholic Church, but he reformed the religious landscape of the West by bringing attention to Rome’s raw power.

            There has come unity between Catholics and Protestants, not in respect to theology but in diplomatic relations and in working for common goals.  Recently, Southern Baptist leader Russell Moore was invited by Pope Francis to a Vatican meeting of religious leaders.  Catholics and many Protestant groups have always worked together to fight abortion and to preserve the sanctity of marriage.

            There has been far less healing between the masses of Russia and its political class.  Russia now has elections and casts itself as a democracy; however, the nation is still drying off from Leninism and Stalinism.  Putin, for sure, has not reckoned with his communist past.  The irony of Lenin’s actions in 1917 is that a bad system of aristocratic, totalitarian rule was replaced with a bad system of party totalitarian rule.   Luther brought about change; Lenin did not.  Tyranny is tyranny, whether foisted on us by a family dynasty of aristocrats or a band of socialist radicals posing as deliverers of the peasants.

            And what can we learn from Luther and Lenin?  From Luther we can learn courage.  At the Diet of Worms he presented his case, facing excommunication and the threat of execution.  From Lenin we should learn that socialism by any name is a losing proposition.

            From Luther we can learn to keep a list of 95 theses in our pocket, ready to proclaim them when events and conscience so dictate.  From Lenin we can learn that socialism/Marxism/communism is little more than shared poverty and that sometimes history turns on those who try to advance evil.

            T.S. Eliot wrote, “We know little of the future except that from generation to generation the same things happen again and again.”

            Yes and no.  Lenin’s statues have been toppled, and now the city of Leningrad is St. Petersburg again.  Luther is revered around the world.

            Sometimes history does make sense and turns out well.

Roger Hines

10/25/17

            

Departed Voices That Still Whisper

                        Departed Voices That Still Whisper

               Published in Marietta (GA) Daily Journal 10/22/17

            For a century or more, three men have ruled over us from their graves.  We still bear their mark. We live under their influence.  The ideas of Charles Darwin, Karl Marx, and Sigmund Freud don’t just linger.  They dominate.

            In America and Europe, Darwinian theory is science education’s default position.  In America’s science classrooms, Darwinism is the gospel.  If you question it, your intellect is in question and you’re as backward as those who doubt that humans cause global warning.

            As for Marx, don’t think socialism is dead.  The vast Union of Soviet Socialist Republics is no more – thanks to Ronald Reagan, Margaret Thatcher, Pope John, and the enlightened Soviet Premier Gorbachev – but active socialists are still everywhere.  In China, parts of Europe, Venezuela, and in pesky Cuba, to name only a few, socialists persist.

            And Freud?  The father of today’s talking industry (psychoanalysis, Dr. Phil, etc.) may be losing ground in psychologists’ offices, but you wouldn’t know it from examining college psychology textbooks.

            Darwinists still reject Aristotle’s time-honored scientific method, as do most science teachers who teach and preach Darwinism.  Aristotle insisted that the scientific approach to all questions and research should be to observe, record, and theorize, or draw a hypothesis.  He taught and practiced experimentation.  If the question is whether or not ivory soap floats, place it in water – many times – and see.  Theorize therefrom: ivory soap floats, or it doesn’t.

            Yet, regarding the origin of man, who was present to observe and record?  Not Darwin or anyone else we’ve been able to locate.  So Darwinists speculate and theorize without observation, record, or repeatable experiment.  How scientific or reliable is that?  Darwinists are people of great faith.  Does anyone truly think man’s origins can be either verified or falsified by any imaginable evidence?

            Darwin is not dead.  Or maybe he is and is being propped up by the field of education which, one would think, should teach us to examine more than one theory.

            Known, professing Marxists (socialists) are alive and well in America, and are neither secretive nor quiet.  Can we all say Bernie Sanders?  Never in presidential politics has an avowed socialist attracted and aroused as many voters as Sanders did.   Whether he practices what he preaches is being called into question.  He is doing well financially.  It’s fair to ask if he is distributing his wealth.  He wants the rest of us to do so.

            Turns out, there is a great difference between Democrats and Republicans after all.  Does anyone think Sanders could have run as a Republican?  What does the Democratic Party’s embrace of Sanders say about the Democratic Party?

            Karl Marx lives and whispers through Sanders and his socialized medicine, fake equality, and forced charity.  (Why should governments at any level subsidize the arts or non-profit charities?  Let individuals decide for themselves where they shall give their money.)  Marx is neither dead nor propped up. 

            It wasn’t Playboy Magazine publisher Hugh Hefner who began the sexualization of America.  It was Freud.  Hefner only commercialized Freud’s philosophy.  Yes, let’s call Freud a philosopher.  Like Darwin and Marx, he initiated a belief system, a religion as it were.  Denying the power of the territorial imperative (the desire for one’s own place, house, or territory), or the power of selfless love, Freud posits sex as the strongest human impulse or drive.

            Since the 1960s, college students have fed on Freudian thought.  If Hefner’s salacious pornography wasn’t available in the campus bookstore or somewhere nearby, the titillating ideas about sexuality from Freud and all the “sexologists” he spawned could be found in textbooks.  Adamantly opposed to religion, particularly his parents’ Judaism, Freud copied Darwin and Marx and created his own.  Whether or not psychologists still employ Freud’s message and methods, his religion still covers the earth.

            Freud is not dead.  Neither does he whisper.  He shouts from Hollywood and the seedy mansions of pornographers.  He is transported into the populace by hotel chains and into homes by AT&T.  The porn he birthed is ubiquitous.

            Darwinism, Marxism, and Freudism enjoy a stronghold granted them by academia.  All three are academia’s orthodoxy.  Darwin set out to find who we are and where we came from; Marx aspired to empower the proletariat by demonizing capitalism.  Freud sought to loosen us from our supposed “sexual bonds of sexual repression.”

            High atop their pinnacles they perch.  Wise we would be to rope them and give the rope a substantial tug.  The future of our children would be well served.

Roger Hines

10/18/17  

Rules? What Rules? Community? What’s That?

             Rules? What Rules? Community? What’s That?

               Published in Marietta (GA) Daily Journal, 10/8/17

             America is increasingly showing evidence of spiritual emptiness.  If the Las Vegas killer of this past week was a millionaire, a successful gambler, an independent figure with no political or religious affiliations, and a citizen with no known ax to grind, why did he commit such an evil act?

            As is our therapeutic habit, we are again asking why, as though there is no such thing as an evil act committed by an evil mind.  He must be ill, we say.

            Perhaps the killer’s non-affiliation with political or religious groups begins to shed some light.  Our nation was built not on therapy but on self-reliance and on a can-do spirit that eventually showed the world what political and economic freedom can produce.  Simultaneously we have been a nation of communities, neighborhoods, faith groups, Rotary Clubs, and political parties.  Our self-reliance and ruggedness have, from our beginnings, been tempered by a genuine social ethic, that of helping our neighbor and of joining with people of like mind to achieve worthy goals.

            This social ethic, especially its political and religious aspect, has its roots in the Greco-Roman tradition and the Judeo-Christian faith.  This doesn’t mean we necessarily like the Greeks and the Romans or that we are all Jews or Christians.  It is only to say that Americanism is primarily informed and shaped by ideas, institutions, and laws that originated in Greece, Rome, and Israel as opposed to, say, China, India, or Saudi Arabia.

            In spite of any shortcomings of Europe, America, and any other areas of the world that sprang from Greco-Roman / Judeo-Christian values, it remains true that the western world has produced more individual liberty, more groceries, more material prosperity, more help for the needy than any other political or ethical system known to man. 

            Why then are America and Europe having so much protest, mass killings, and general unhappiness? Why is campus unrest intensifying?  The answer could well be that we, or at least young adults, have become empty of purpose and meaning. 

Denying the faith of our fathers, we seek meaning in other things.  Politics we have found wanting.  Pleasure has left us sated.  Science can provide a description of the universe but offers no consolation for suffering and no meaning for human existence.  Though we have always had a measure of violence, more and more young adults incredibly share a manic joy in disturbance and destruction.   Their Internet-driven contagion spreads.  No longer impressed or delighted by the mysteries of life – friendship, beauty, sacrifice, babies, sunsets, faith, love – they seek something else.  They stroke their sense of grievance.  They cry.  They are empty.

            Western man’s loss of faith and hope is a topic which even secular thinkers and writers have addressed.  In his poem “Dover Beach,” Matthew Arnold wrote, “The Sea of Faith was once at the full, but now I only hear its long withdrawing roar.”   Another Englishman, G.K. Chesterton, wrote, “When a man chooses not to believe in God, he does not choose to believe in nothing; he believes in anything.”

            America has never had a President who did not profess faith in God.  Yet people of faith are more and more being marginalized and told to keep quiet.  They who say “Give faith a chance” have become pariahs.  They are dwellers in the past.  They don’t have fun.  They lack sophistication.  They are Bible-thumping throwbacks.

            There are many scriptural admonitions that point us toward a path that can cure self-absorption and emptiness: “Love your neighbor as yourself,” “Be kind to one another,” “Esteem others better than yourself,” “Children obey your parents,” and “Put away bitterness, wrath, and anger.”  These admonitions were once instilled in children and youth.  They were not necessarily religious, but cultural.  In a sense they were our rules. They promoted community.

            Our nation had better start obeying the old rules.  It is apparent that many18 to 21 year-olds were not taught them.  Whence comes our rules if not from homes, churches, synagogues, and schools?  Where are they being taught now?  Where and what is our rudder?

            Spiritual emptiness is not as prevalent among youths who enter the workforce after high school as it is among college and university students.  But then colleges and universities are not known for perpetuating America’s traditional values. 

            There’s hope for the spiritual vortex in which we find ourselves.  It lies in reformation, in reclaiming that which has always made better people and better nations.  The old rules, in other words.  A full Sea of Faith.

Roger Hines

10/4/17