Some Roman Catholics are scratching their heads about David Brat, the economics professor who defeated Eric Cantor in Virginia Congressional primaries. Brat describes himself as a Calvinist Catholic Libertarian. For some, Roman Catholicism is as incompatible with Calvinism as it is with libertarianism, though you don’t hear as much about Calvinist theology as you do about economics (except among Jason and the Callers but they are so far off the Roman Catholic reservation that they don’t count). Whether Calvinism and libertarianism are compatible is something more often assumed than proved.
Be all that as it may, one Roman Catholic writer has no trouble with Brat at Calvinist, Catholic, and Libertarian:
It’s doubtful that Brat is Catholic in the way readers of this column are likely to be Catholic. He states that he “attends” a Catholic church, St. Michael’s, but also lists other churches as “affiliations” — Christ Church Episcopal, Third Presbyterian, and Shady Grove Methodist. He earned his bachelor’s degree from Hope College, a Christian liberal arts college in Holland, Mich., which is historically affiliated with the Reformed Church in America, a Protestant denomination that sprouted during the 17th century. He earned a master of divinity from Princeton Theological Seminary, a Presbyterian school. Perhaps Brat will clear up what these “affiliations” signify in the coming weeks.
Until then, I suggest we not get overwrought about what he means when he calls himself a “Catholic Calvinist libertarian,” even though many have been reacting with alarm.. . . I don’t know Brat. I hold no brief for him, but I am convinced that his description of himself as a Catholic Calvinist libertarian is one that most Catholics who identify themselves as “conservatives” or “on the right politically” would feel comfortable with. I include myself in that category.
I submit that Brat’s point is that he is not a doctrinaire Calvinist or economic libertarian. That is why the word “Catholic” is part of his self-designation. He is saying that he is attracted to certain positions that are taken by Calvinists and libertarians that do not clash with Catholic teaching. There are such things.
Brat is not the only so-called Calvinist on the political “right” to be worshiping on both sides of the Tiber as it were. Hugh Hewitt has also recently admitted to double-dipping liturgically. In a piece that suggests Hewitt will be leaving the PCUSA for its vote to divest of companies that do business with Israel, he also admits to going to mass on Saturdays before worshiping with Presbyterians on Sunday:
Now the PCUSA, as its members call it, has taken an official position against Israel and so I, as an elder in the PCUSA — no longer a “ruling” elder in my congregation, having wrapped up my second such stint last year — have to take a position for or against the PCUSA based on it.
Many PCUSA congregations across the country are already engaged in the process of “discerning” whether to remain within the splintering denomination, and this new assault on Israel and the virulent language employed — “occupation” — will no doubt make that process much easier for hundreds of thousands of us. If their congregations don’t leave, they will. They will not be part of the American intifada against Israel.
The PCUSA has raised its hand against Israel. So now either my congregation must depart the PCUSA or I must depart my congregation. I will not be a part, however small, in any campaign against Israel. No Christian who knows how the Church largely stood silent during the Holocaust should be. No thinking person who reads beyond the fringes of the Left would reason as this letter does. If a denomination insists on being ruled by a majority of ill-educated posers, it deserves the withering that has already set in and will now accelerate.
Strong language that, and I have never used it in any of the theological debates to date. Jesus was angry only with the Pharisees and the money-changers. . . .
It seems likely that most of the PCUSA’s General Assembly voters are wholly ignorant of most of this, being anti-intellectual as well as anti-Israel.
This is not a theological dispute. As a guy who goes to Mass on Saturday afternoon and to the PCUSA on Sunday morning, I am not easily riled over theological disputes.
One could well quibble with Hewitt about the theological dimensions of the PCUSA’s decision, especially if he had ever encountered the doctrine of the spirituality of the church during his stint as a PCUSA elder. Some, like me, would argue that for the church to take a political position — which, ahem, the PCUSA has been doing for a long time now — the church is pretending to speak for God (read minister the word) on matters about which God has remained silent. The irony, in addition, is that Israel is both a theological (think Old Testament) and (since 1948 a) political topic. So Hewitt’s attempt to separate theology (where he’s easy going) from politics (where he’s adamant) is not as easy as he might think. But why would he consider leaving a church for the wrong politics? Is the Church of the Latter Day Saints now attractive for its conservative politics or does the deity of Christ matter for church membership?
So where’s the trend? In the long run, it is the social gospel momentum of churches speaking about matters over which they have no authority. (And please note the historical coincidence of Protestants getting in the Progressive politics business at roughly the same time that Leo XIII was cultivating Roman Catholicism’s taste for social teaching.) We continue to see this trend played out 125 years later.
The short-term trend is for this social gospel mindset to blur lines that used to keep Calvinists and Roman Catholics apart. Granted, Evangelicals and Catholics together is almost two decades old now, but Calvinists were a pretty small piece of that effort unless you want to count Chuck Colson’s Kuyperianism. But now with Calvinism’s popularity, it’s possible for political candidates and pundits to have it all.
Is this a pretty good country or what!
Old Life 
Indeterminate Monotheistic Deity bless America!!
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Of all the things to leave PC(USA) for, Hewitt is going to (likely) choose this? Oy vey.
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One question one might ask of the first guy: are you, you know, a Christian?
As for the second guy, took his time deciding to leave, no? I mean, the PCUSA didn’t just decide to become anti-Semitic with this vote.
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Oh, Dr. Hart, I’d pay to see you come out of your OLTS bunker here and take your chances with Hugh Hewitt in front of a national audience of millions!
As you well know, Larry P. Arnn, the president of your employer, Hillsdale College, is almost a weekly guest on the Hugh Hewitt Show. He could set you up with Hugh in a flash.
Even though Hewitt will put up a good polemic angainst your own “radical” Two Kingdoms theology, you’ll win enough stragglers like your flock here to increase your book sales and perhaps even bring some bodies into your “Orthodox Presbyterian Church” microdenomination.
Go for it, dude. Who knows? You might even win Hewitt away from the papists, or have him pull up a chair at the Front Porch Republic with all the paleo-Buchananites and Wendell Berryites and crypto-Anabaptists and whatnot.
Now that would be cool. Sure beats straining at gnats. Go eat a camel, DG!
[C’mon, home crowd. Surely Team Darryl can win on the road!]
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Doesn’t Dr. Brat now fulfill the confessional test to be YRR? Viz., call himself a Calvinist.
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I agree with your assessment of Brat but I disagree with Hewitt’s assessment of divestment. Divestment from Israel is no more an attack on Israel than divestment from South Africa was an attack on that country. It is merely a way of providing economic pressure in order to change Israeli behavior toward the Palestinians. That there are Israelis who support the larger program of BDS (boycott, divestment, and sanctions) provides evidence that contradicts Hewitt’s interpretation. And we might ask what Hewitt is doing to protect innocent Palestinians.
The two controversial decisions made by the PCUSA on divestment and same-sex marriage shows both a mixed message and something everybody can learn from. The positive that came from the PCUSA was to stand with those who are being marginalized. The negative is that taking such a stand sometimes causes one to make compromises on what the Bible teaches–as seen in the PCUSA’s decision on same-sex marriage.
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vd, t, why did I think you’d be a Hugh Hewitt regular?
And why also do you usually avoid the substance and go for style points? Mebbe because you don’t have an answer.
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Curt- and what the Bible says about the Jews.
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Tom – Oh, Dr. Hart, I’d pay to see you come out of your OLTS bunker here and take your chances with Hugh Hewitt in front of a national audience of millions!
As you well know, Larry P. Arnn, the president of your employer, Hillsdale College, is almost a weekly guest on the Hugh Hewitt Show. He could set you up with Hugh in a flash.
Erik – Tom channels Old Bob.
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I picked up a recent “Imprimis” that I had thrown in a box and learned that if terrorists take out our utility grid I should plan on being dead in a matter of weeks.
Doom and gloom like this must make it hard to build up the endowment. Why invest in a college when you can invest in a bunker and an AK-47?
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curt, but if you appeal to the sentiment of those being marginalized, doesn’t that work for recognizing gay marriage?
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ec, I wonder how old Bob’s grandchildren are doing and what their July 4th plans include.
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ec, unless you raise enough money to create you’re own grid.
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God hasn’t spoken on the politics?
BTW, I wrote about gay marriage multiple times. Basically I believe that society should recognize gay marriage while the Church should not.
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Curt – The positive that came from the PCUSA was to stand with those who are being marginalized.
Erik – I was reading a CT article from a few years ago about Brian McLaren and the Emerging/Emergent church last night. It was interesting to see how the “all of lifeism” with a left-wing tint has moved into more “conservative” groups like the PCA in the time since the article was written. The problem with notions like “those who are being marginalized” is that inevitably the “marginalized” quickly become the “marginalizers” once they get the chance. It’s human nature, and naive Christians who think they are going to change “social structures” with a few pious gestures (like boycotts) are just revealing their naivete. In the end this stuff is just about people wanting to feel self-righteous and looking down their noses at those they consider “less enlightened”. Just deal with individual people as you come across them in day-to-day life and leave politics and economics to the professionals.
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In the West, the way that the marginalized escape from their marginalization is by going out and kicking ass in spite of the obstacles that are in their way. Does everyone start from the same point? No, but they never have and never will. Find a way to outwork and out-think 90% of the people you compete with and you will rise. It’s the American way, and it’s largely what we are celebrating on this 4th of July. There is still opportunity here and we should thank God for that every day.
If you’re in a context where everyone around you is blaming someone else for their problems, you need to escape that mindset, even if there is some truth to it. Few will be able to do it, but for those who can, there’s a fighting chance to escape and rise above what even you think you are capable of.
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Alexander,
In the New Testament, it is more important to see what the Bible says about the descendants of Abraham who are to receive the blessing promised by God.
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Erik,
Actually, historically speaking, kicking ass is the way of oppressors regardless of whether they were victims. But you might be bringing up an important point here. Let’s suppose that the way of the West is for the marginalized to kick ass. That doesn’t seem to be the way of the God’s people in the New Testament who are told that vengeance belongs to the Lord. So perhaps you are proving that the way of the West and the way of the Bible are not the same.
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Curt,
When Paul made a nice tent and sold it to someone for a fair price he was kicking ass. When Jesus built someone a nice house he was doing the same.
The ass kicking is figurative and is the opposite of literal whining, complaining, blaming everyone else, and feeling sorry for oneself, which is what Marxists do. That’s why they’re losers.
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Erik,
That is not kicking ass. In addition, there is a higher degree of coupling in today’s economy than what existed back then. And while what you write might make sense to you, that could be because you are living in a bubble shielded from all those who “kicked butt” but were robbed of pay because of those who were in control of the free market.
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Curt – there is a higher degree of coupling in today’s economy than what existed back then
Erik – Hey, watch it. This is a family friendly website. There will be no talk of “coupling” here.
Let me guess, you’re a frustrated Ph.D. in Medieval French Poetry who’s pissed off that he’s working at Starbucks.
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Erik,
I doubt if computer science terms are not family friendly, They might be family boring, but they are far from being offensive.
And you can guess all you want about me. Your first guess, btw, was wrong.
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Curt,
I was just kidding. I clicked through to your blog so I am familiar with your bio. You must have a hard time at parties. When you’re with your Christian friends they detest your left wing politics and when you’re with your leftist friends they detest your Christianity.
I can respect being an oddball, though. Carry on.
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Erik,
One has to go to parties to have a problem with them. The wife and I have been too busy to go.
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Curt,
Indeed, saving the world from capitalism takes time, especially with everyone except for North Korea and France embracing capitalism.
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Oops – except for North Korea, France, and President Obama.
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I actually need to be nicer to Curt. A Christian Marxist at Old Life is like a rare, colorful bird that perches on your bird feeder. You want to keep very quiet and observe it as long as possible before it gets spooked and flies off.
Feed on the suet, Curt.
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Erik, I’m actually enjoying your quips on here being held responsible for all that has been done good and bad in the name of Christianity and Capitalism.
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Curt, sometimes it’s all about our biography. In mine, I run into employers who scheme on how to underpay employees and willfully expose them to deadly hazards if it helps the profit margin. Sin finds its expression in both employees and employers.
A contrast of quotes:
This, then, is held to be the duty of the man of wealth: First, to set an example of modest, unostentatious living, shunning display or extravagance; … and, after doing so, to consider all surplus revenues which come to him simply as trust funds, which he is called upon to administer… to produce the most beneficial results for the community—the man of wealth thus becoming the mere trustee and agent for his poorer brethren, bringing to their service his superior wisdom, experience and ability to administer, doing for them better than they would or could do for themselves.”
—From “Wealth,” by Andrew Carnegie, North American Review (1889)
“Law? Who cares about the law. Hain’t I got the power?”
—Comment alleged to have been made by Cornelius Vanderbilt, when warned that he might be violating the law
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I remember in my “20th Century European Crisis” class (best class I had in college) hearing about how the Soviets, in their haste to accomplish building quotas to meet the goals of the latest Five Year Plan, would “accidentally” leave people up on a roof all night in the dead of winter. In the morning they had frozen to death. Oops.
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Then there was Mao’s resounding success during the “Great Leap Forward”:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Leap_Forward
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Erik,
Actually, I belong to the new left rather than the old. The new left is a bottom extension of democracy to be applied at the workplace as well as the community and society. The old left is elite centered rule that cannot possibly follow the first tenet of socialism: worker control. Don’t know if that derarifies me.
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Mikelmann,
Actually, what the left, the new left, wants first is a redistribution of power, not wealth. And in that redistribution, workers and others get to run things, including businesses, democratically. Now that structure is not a panacea but redistributing power does minimize the wrongs being done. Without recognition of a legitimate collectivism, redistributing power just doesn’t address all of the problems.
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Soviets claimed nobody died of cancer in their hospitals, because they’d throw the patients out into the cold winter for their last hours on earth.
and people like Curt laughed and defended all of this…..
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Curt,
In Zimbabwe Mugabe has thrown out most of the whites so that “workers and others get to run things.” The problem is, they haven’t the slightest clue how to run things. What happens is that the economy goes down the crapper and the poorest people get even poorer.
Sometimes “workers” are “workers” for a reason.
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The best story in all of western literature of workers running a workplace democratically is The Story of the Twentieth Century Motor Company in “Atlas Shrugged”:
http://thesnarkwhohuntsback.wordpress.com/favorite-passages-from-atlas-shrugged/the-story-of-the-twentieth-century-motor-company-atlas-shrugged-part-ii/
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An example:
In my workplace we’ve replaced a process that was very rote and rigid with one that is more subjective and requires some wisdom and judgment. A long-time, faithful employee with a limited education has had a great deal of difficulty adapting to the new process. She simply lacks those skills that people with more education and frankly, brainpower, can handle without much difficulty.
What if she was running the place?
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Curt, money is power, power is money. Anyone who gets power will use it to get money. To not realize this is to open the door wide open for abuses.
And, echoing Erik, intelligence and expertise is not evenly distributed among the people.
Has your model ever worked on a large scale anywhere?
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And I don’t disagree with MM that abuses take place under capitalism — they do. I think we do a pretty good job of policing those abuses in the U.S., though, both through the government and through the plaintiff’s bar.
A big factor in alleviating poverty, however, is using the system that creates the biggest pie. That is definitely not socialism or communism. It’s probably not rule by unions or rule by the oppressed, either. We’re witnessing a living laboratory of those latter two theories with the unwinding of Detroit.
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Here are three serious problems we face in the U.S.:
(1) We want our unskilled workers to live at a level far beyond the level that unskilled workers live at nearly everyplace else in the world.
(2) The greatest obstacles we have to creating skilled workers is our public school system that does not insist on excellence and indeed seeks to hinder it in many ways.
(3) The social pathologies of our people that make learning & increasing human capital very difficult. This one is largely a spiritual problem.
#1 will somewhat take care of itself over time — we’ll either fix (2) and (3) or economic reality will eventually trump politics and the lifestyles of the unskilled will drop.
#2 will only get fixed when liberals who protect the failing system finally stop their obstruction. There are signs that maybe this is happening as liberals are beginning to fight with liberals over the issue.
#3 is one that churches have a role in. If churches will get serious and move away from the triviality that they appear to be embracing more and more (even Presbyterian & Reformed churches), they can have a hand in remedying some of these social pathologies. They, along with the family, are really the only institutions that can.
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D. G. Hart
Posted July 4, 2014 at 9:11 am | Permalink
vd, t, why did I think you’d be a Hugh Hewitt regular?
And why also do you usually avoid the substance and go for style points? Mebbe because you don’t have an answer.
As for the “substance” of your post, not one of your favored commenters got anywhere near whatever your point was either. Perhaps you should restate your point in the form of a point. If you do, I promise to faithfully engage it.
And actually, it’s your “boss” Dr. Larry Arnn at Hillsdale College who is a Hugh Hewitt regular, appearing several times a month on his show.
So as for avoiding the substance, ’twas you who wussed out on responding to my challenge, that you come out of this bunker and take your act on the road.
Hewitt would gladly offer you an audience of millions. Instead you strain at gnats like me. Camel up.
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Erik Charter
Posted July 4, 2014 at 9:37 am | Permalink
I picked up a recent “Imprimis” that I had thrown in a box and learned that if terrorists take out our utility grid I should plan on being dead in a matter of weeks.
Doom and gloom like this must make it hard to build up the endowment. Why invest in a college when you can invest in a bunker and an AK-47?
Oh, I wish Darryl would punk his employer like this. Then again, he’d be like 98% of all other professional academics out there. Then again again, anyone who hates Hillsdale expands his job prospects exponentially!
Since Imprimis is free, I signed up recently. Not terribly interesting so far, although the most recent one
http://imprimis.hillsdale.edu/current
is by the estimable “Theodore Dalrymple” and should not be missed.
The Worldview that Makes the Underclass
Anthony Daniels
Writer and Doctor
[By “worldview” here, we assume Daniels means “worldview” as used by normal people, not Darryl.]
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Erik Charter
Posted July 5, 2014 at 9:43 pm | Permalink
And I don’t disagree with MM that abuses take place under capitalism — they do. I think we do a pretty good job of policing those abuses in the U.S., though, both through the government and through the plaintiff’s bar.
A big factor in alleviating poverty, however, is using the system that creates the biggest pie. That is definitely not socialism or communism. It’s probably not rule by unions or rule by the oppressed, either. We’re witnessing a living laboratory of those latter two theories with the unwinding of Detroit.
Darryl had some motive in quoting this article
http://thewandererpress.com/featured-today/david-brat-calvinist-catholic-libertarian/
but the money quote was quite where you’re going here.
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Kent,
Where did I defend the Soviet Union either here or on my blog?
In addition, you’ll find Socialists who were contemporaries of Lenin who criticized his hijacking of the Revolution. In fact, you’ll find Lenin himself criticizing the Leftists of the Soviet Union’s Communist Party. The short of it is that what we saw in Lenin and those who followed in his footsteps was a turn to the Right.
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Erik,
Workers know more than you think. And instead of picking workers from some far off place, why not pick some from here? We already have worker cooperatives that are run democratically. Plus, giving workers more say gives them more ownership, and thus involvement, and moves them to greater thinking. For those Adam Smith fans, realize that one of the criticisms he had of any strict division of labor is that such had a dumbing down effect on employees.
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Mikelmann,
Power follows wealth. After that, it can become cyclic. But also realize that the love of money is the root of all kinds of evil– that comes from the book of somewhere in the Bible. And it is the job of God’s people to preach repentance unto faith regardless of the power, wealth, and status of the audience. And when we preach repentance only to individual sins it shows that we treat people with preference. We show that preference by preaching to individuals about their sins while leaving the system untouched. This is why many on the Left look at the Church as being just another institution of indoctrination to maintain the status quo for the benefit of those with wealth and power.
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Erik,
Our system’s most immediate problem is that those with wealth and power are continually looking to the public sector for a free lunch–such as having payrolls subsidized by gov’t assistance programs while doing all they can to avoid paying taxes. Such a system is not self-sustaining.
From a broader view, we are killing our society because we embrace the as fact what the free market promises which is that all we need to do is to pursue self-interest and the market will make the necessary corrections. So our basic ethic has become the reductionist ethic of maximize profits.
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The System. Must be like, The Man. Neither one is available to take the Lord’s Supper.
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The old left is elite centered rule that cannot possibly follow the first tenet of socialism: worker control. Don’t know if that derarifies me.
The 8th commandment still applies to both. Thou shalt not steal. If it ain’t your business, you ain’t runnin/controllin it. It’s not that hard to unnerstan, capiche?
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Bob,
So it isn’t our business if businesses use trafficked or sweatshop labor? It isn’t our business if businesses use government assistance programs to subsidize their payroll while trying to avoid taxes? And James 5:1-6 has nothing to say us along with Isaiah 58-59, Amos, and the rest of the Old Testament?
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Sean,
The system is created by, managed by, and made up of people. Or did the old Communist system started by Lenin and continued by Stalin & Co. didn’t need to hear any preaching to repent?.
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Curt, but wasn’t the Old Left once the New Left and “a bottom extension of democracy to be applied at the workplace as well as the community and society”?
Don’t you mean the New New Left? Wasn’t the Weather Underground the New Left?
Odd how similar this sounds to New Calvinism and New Life Presbyterianism.
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vd, t, someone actually got the point.
Natural Law says don’t lie. Why do you?
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vd, t, when was the last time you punked Joker’s Wild?
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D.G. Hart,
Depends about whom you are talking. Some old left were the new left but some remained the new left.
Running a Leftist revolution is very difficult because there are two parts with the first part occurring more easily than the second. The first part is, of course, the unseating of those in power; the second part is establishing and maintaining a participatory gov’t.
Realize that Leftist revolutions don’t have a monopoly on power struggles. We currently have one in the US where it seems that financial elites are the ones in control of our gov’t and for the same reason why Leftist Revolutions fail. THere is not enough participation in gov’t by all of the people. In fact, our economic system is designed to minimize popular participation in government.
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Curt,
Whatever you’re on, send me some.
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Report on URCNA Synod Visalia 2014:
http://literatecomments.com/2014/07/06/report-on-united-reformed-churches-in-north-america-synod-visalia-2014/
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Getting Depressed About U.S. Success
By JOEL KURTZMAN
May 4, 2014 6:35 p.m. ET
This is not the right time to be an optimist. In my experience, if you say something good about the long-term prospects of the U.S. economy—especially its potential for growth—it’s like you’re barking at the moon. I’m finally getting the message. I’m changing my views.
If the U.S. happens to be sitting on the world’s largest reserves of energy, which are now reachable thanks to innovative American technology, and if emissions of carbon dioxide are declining because we are shifting away from coal to natural gas, then we should focus instead on studies showing that some old wells, and some types of valves, have been leaking methane. Perhaps 1% of wells in the U.S. are in that situation. So, rather than repair these wells, and replace the valves, we should simply stop hydraulic fracturing—aka “fracking”—which has helped make this energy revolution possible.
The same is true with manufacturing. Even though machinery overseas, and even some entire manufacturing plants are being dismantled, put on ships and sent back to the U.S., we should view signs of an American manufacturing revival realistically. New factories, along with their new, more efficient processes, including the amazing world of 3-D manufacturing, are likely to require employees to have at least a community-college degree to operate. That leaves out some people.
The fact that housing prices have pretty much recovered, means—sadly—some people are again unable to get into the housing market. Other reasons to worry: Pension funds, which have recovered in value to their pre-financial-crisis levels, remain risky and could be poised for another fall. And all of that investible capital sitting on the sidelines in the nation’s banks and on deposit with the Federal Reserve—trillions of dollars of capital—could somehow trigger inflation.
There is no end to the power of negativity. For instance, the stunning drop in the U.S. crime rate over the past two decades is nothing to crow about if it meant that the police had to increasingly stop, question and frisk likely suspects. What about education? The math and English scores in many inner-city schools are going up, but too many of those schools are charters with nonunion teachers. And, besides, U.S. schools are still well behind Finland’s. And the fact that American consumers have less debt than in the past 35 years—once upon a time that would have been good news, but now it means people are still mistrustful about spending. That’s also why savings rates have soared.
We all know that the U.S. recovered from the 2008 financial crisis while Europe is still struggling. Not much we can do about that. But looked at the right way, the Europeans are actually faring better. Their laid-off workers get unemployment insurance that never ends. Our form of capitalism is too cutthroat—it takes Congress to extend unemployment benefits.
And don’t get too carried away about American ingenuity. It has made the U.S. the center of the biomedical, robotics, big-data and self-driving-vehicle universe. It has also given America dominance in Internet search, and remarkable products like energy-saving thermostats that can be adjusted remotely with a smartphone. But there’s a problem. An awful lot of these advances were made by immigrants who studied at American universities.
Though we’ve put every obstacle in these people’s pathways and tried to discourage them, we can’t seem to prevent the most talented of them from staying in the U.S. and starting companies and creating jobs. Four of the six top people who started PayPal are immigrants. Still more immigrants started companies like Google, YouTube, Intel, eBay, Tesla, SpaceX, Yelp, Yammer, SolarCity and many others. Good thing U.S. immigration policy prevents more of these folks from coming here.
Being optimistic about the U.S., as I have learned, means you are naïve, simple-minded, even deluded. Being pessimistic means you’re worldly, seasoned, even downright smart. Nobody can put anything over on a pessimist. Just ask all those people who sold their stock when the financial crisis hit. They understood that the U.S. would never come back. And, for them, it never did.
Mr. Kurtzman, a senior fellow at the Milken Institute, is the author of “Unleashing the Second American Century” (PublicAffairs, 2014).
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Erik,
I am on aging, and I don’t mean that as a synonym for maturing. Plus I read outside the Reformed box.
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Curt,
Groovy.
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D. G. Hart
Posted July 6, 2014 at 8:21 am | Permalink
vd, t, someone actually got the point.
Natural Law says don’t lie. Why do you?
Oh, Uncle Screwtape, I thought we had an understanding. That this was to be a cold war, not a shooting war with just calling each other liars and stuff. How boring.
The liberals and the pagans do that like breathing. You confess to being neither. [Although sometimes I wonder.]
D. G. Hart
Posted July 6, 2014 at 8:21 am | Permalink
vd, t, someone actually got the point.
https://oldlife.org/2014/07/trend/comment-page-1/#comment-142594
________________
JASitek
Posted July 3, 2014 at 2:28 pm | Permalink
Of all the things to leave PC(USA) for, Hewitt is going to (likely) choose this? Oy vey.
_________________________
Well, only sort of, really. I think he agreed with your point in spite of your success in obscuring it I bet not even Erik Charter can tell me what your point actually is. Israel?
No, nah. Not really. You still don’t know why I’m here, do you?
D. G. Hart
Posted July 6, 2014 at 8:23 am | Permalink
vd, t, when was the last time you punked Joker’s Wild?
I have no idea what this means, Darryl–that was over 20 years ago and you and Erik are the only ones who ever talk about it. I’m not embarrassed to have been one of the all-time champions of Joker’s Wild, but I got a much bigger kick out of winning on Win Ben Stein’s Money. [I didn’t just win, I kicked his ass.]
[Heh heh.]
And you should really stop calling me “VD.” Not nice. Nobody will think less of you if you do.
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D. G. Hart
Posted July 6, 2014 at 8:12 am | Permalink
Curt, but wasn’t the Old Left once the New Left and “a bottom extension of democracy to be applied at the workplace as well as the community and society”?
Don’t you mean the New New Left? Wasn’t the Weather Underground the New Left?
Odd how similar this sounds to New Calvinism and New Life Presbyterianism.
Actually it’s all straight down the alley of Michael Sean Winters, your new favorite Catholic, Dr. Hart.
http://ncronline.org/authors/michael-sean-winters
I guess you’d already have fixed Curt up with the radical-left Catholics except you knew y’d probably never see him again.
Ooops, too late. Dang, sorry to give away the game, D. Good luck and godbless, Curt. Liberal Catholicism is indistinguishable from a Howard Dean meetup or an abortion rally, except for the religion and God stuff.
Fortunately, the religion and God stuff is optional as long as you bring your sense of social justice. You’ll love it.
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Tom,
Actually, the new left has been around for as long as the old left only they did not have a predominant place in politics. People like Rosa Luxemburg, a contemporary of Lenin, from the old Soviet Union and Eugene Debs represent the new Left. The new left sees the extension of democracy in both the workplace and civic life while the old left relied more on the interpretation of ideology by a vanguard. And we see the new left cropping up all over the place but still not in great numbers.
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Curt,
With Barack Obama in the White House I’d say you’re doing quite well.
Viva la revolucion!
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