The Government is not your God

There are two opposite problems in Christian culture when it comes to government today (not to say that these are the only two problems, just two that I can see exist). First is the problem that I often discuss about those who don't seem to care enough about what goes on in the political system.

But the second is equally a problem, and that is simply putting too much stake in what goes on in the political system. Simply, it becomes quite easy to find security in the way current political structures are set up, rather than in the Lord. 

I want to make it clear up front - this is not a big government problem per se. It is just as easy for someone in favor of limited governments, like me, to find too much stake in the political process.

 If my security is founded in the fact that Rand Paul is going to do awesome things and win awesome elections, and then revolutionize this country, then I am placing my trust in the political process. 

This of course is a problem because our trust should be firmly in God and not in the devices that God uses to ensure blessings upon His people (I think it's fair to call good governance a blessing, right?). I should feel secure in the fact that I know who holds sovereign control over all the earth. And to put this in the perspective of our last politics post, I should feel secure in the God who ordained the government, not the God-ordained government. 

But God is under no obligation to work out His plans through the government itself. He can decide to make our government like the government in China, and work to give Himself glory. I mean, it's His sovereign control.

So yes, God is in control, and as much as I care about politics, and love Rand Paul, God > Rand Paul. Rand Paul and the entire political system can only do so much, and it would be foolish to stake your security in that. 

Instead, we Christians need to ensure our trust is in the One who controls not just ALL of the political system, but all other elements that are outside our control too!

Ukraine, Moral Agents, and the Justification of United States Intervention

About 5 months ago, I wrote a post about how speculation about where the situation in Ukraine is going might be a bit premature. That is very quickly changing at the moment. As more and more developments occur, and more blood is shed, a serious discussion of what the United States should do is in order.

I think we should make one thing clear. Despite how the President misspoke last Thursday, a tragedy has occurred and is occurring in Ukraine. Forget geopolitics - there is not anything that could be said that could write off the loss of human life that has been experienced in Ukraine.

Still a tragedy is not the only necessary ingredient to justify United States involvement in an international conflict. Sure, if we were talking about people, a tragedy would instill an obligation for anyone with the capacity to help to assist in every way they can.

But government is not a person. Further, government is not accountable as a moral agent, the same way that we as human beings are. So we cannot necessarily use the same logic and moral rationale that we would for people when we are discussing government decisionmaking.

Government instead is an entity created by people of a nation for a specific purpose. Generally considered the social contract theory, the people of a nation come together to form an entity designed to protect them from natural disasters (not to help clean up the damage from a natural disaster though), external threats to national security, and internal threats to the rights of the citizens (i.e. criminals). Any action taken outside this purpose is a violation of a contract.

Consider this analogy, quoted here from my prior post "Not Yours to Give: Unconstitutionality and Injustice of Redistribution," 

"When we hire a business to put in a home security system, we would be much annoyed to say the least if we heard the company had decided instead to use our money to redecorate our house, as they considered that a wiser use of our money."

I daresay it wouldn't matter to us nary a bit if we still got our home security system if they took more money from our bank accounts to buy us new furniture or generally use for purposes other than that which we have contracted them. With that in mind, we ought to consider whether the situation in Ukraine is actually considered a part of  our contract.

I think it is not too much of a stretch to say that the situation in Ukraine is not likely to affect our national security. If the situation proves that it will escalate from a simple border conflict and actually harm United States situation, then obviously we must act.

That is actually what I believe President Obama was trying to say when he said that a "tragedy may have occurred." And I must give him credit that he understands that not every geopolitical conflict requires his involvement (I obviously don't have to give him credit for his skills in communication).

But that might raise a question in your minds. Why should it matter that the security of our nation isn't at stake? Why can't our government act in charity to assist other nations in their struggles? Is not Ukrainian life worth as much as American life?

The answer to the latter question is obviously yes. But we must once again realize that governments are not moral agents, and should never participate in charity, especially on an international level. Let me remind you of the words of Horatio Bunce summarized by Davy Crockett in his speech "Not Yours To Give," Note that while this specifically pertains to money, the same principle would refer to any type of military involvement.

"The power of collecting and disbursing money at pleasure is the most dangerous power that can be intrusted [sic] to man, particularly under our system of collecting revenue by a tariff, which reaches every man in the country, no matter how poor he may be... So you see, that while you are contributing to relieve one, you are drawing it from thousands who are even worse off than he. If you had the right to give anything, the amount was simply a matter of discretion with you, and you had as much right to give $20,000,000 as $20,000. If you have the right to give to one, you have the right to give to all; and, as the Constitution neither defines charity nor stipulates the amount, you are at liberty to give to any and everything which you may believe, or profess to believe, is a charity, and to any amount you may think proper. You will very easily perceive what a wide door this would open for fraud and corruption and favoritism, on the one hand, and for robbing the people on the other. No, Colonel, Congress has no right to give charity."

So yes, a tragedy has happened, but no, the United States government, since it is not a moral agent is under no obligation to act. Indeed, it is under a strict obligation to remain neutral in this particular affair.

National Security, Immigration, and the Great Melting Pot

America truly would not exist without immigrants. However, these same immigrants have come to know this land as their own now, and some would like to refuse access to future immigrant.

Of course, their intentions are not quite as diabolical as that image makes us think. The vast majority of people who are against immigration don't simply want to deprive hard-working immigrants from the advantages of the United States and its economy. Instead they are concerned with the economic and national security risk associated with immigration. 

After all, our fathers weren't exactly the nicest to the native people when they immigrated here to America. So how are we to know that the immigrants that come into America will have the best interest of Americans at heart? How do we know that they aren't just terrorists who are taking the opportunity to enter America to cause havoc? 

This is indeed why we have a screening process. This is why illegal immigration can be such a big deal. We do need to ensure that the immigrants have pure motives of pursuing the American dream, enjoying liberty, bettering themselves, and not motivations to take down the government or the people within. 

But somewhere along the way, our screening process has become a bit too restrictive. You see, in addition to this legitimate concern about the the intent, the government has decided to that it needs to keep the immigrant community from taking over the economy. 

It seems simple enough, right? If too many immigrants enter into the country, then they will take up jobs that Americans need in the market, and thus cause problems in the economy of America. 

But Judy Gans, Director of the University of Arizona’s Immigration Program at the Udall Center for Studies in Public Policy, explains that these workers are not taking jobs away from the American worker. 

"Noncitizens are filling some real gaps in the work force. This is a complementary workforce, not a replacement workforce. We have a larger workforce, so the economic pie is bigger.” 

Not only are immigrants not a burden on the economy, but indeed they support and strengthen our economy in very essential ways. As the Cato Institute reported,  

"Immigrants, today as in the past, come to America to work, save, and build a better life for their families. They make our economy more productive, boosting output by billions of dollars and filling gaps in our labor market. Large sectors of our economy, from tourism and health care to education and high tech, would be crippled if our borders were closed to immigrant workers. According to the National Research Council, the typical immigrant family and its descendents will pay $80,000 more in taxes during their lifetimes than they consume in government services."

Immigration is a boom to our economy, and great for our society. After all, without immigration, we would be without pizza, tacos, and hamburgers!

There is limited reason to limit immigration except for terrorist threats. It is paramount that we work in this area to secure the borders to keep armed assailants from entering into the country. But is that currently a significant problem in our nation today?

As of March 2012, the Pew Research Center found that there are 11.7 million illegal immigrants in our country today. Scary yes but let's look at the whole picture here. These illegal immigrants don't seem to be committing acts of terrorism, or increasing the number of crimes.

Indeed a 2010 report by Stuart Anderson of the Cato Institute found that immigrants (legal and illegal alike) commit far fewer crimes than their natural-born counterparts.

But still these people broke the law to enter into this country, so surely they will break the law again once they are here. Well, not exactly. Immigrants become illegal for various reasons.

Yes, some may have been denied a visa and found their way across the border. Others though fall into a far more innocuous category. Let's say someone entered into this country legally on a work visa, and then overstays that visa. Guess who's now an illegal immigrant? Let's say someone entered into this country legally, and moves within the same area without reporting a change of address to the INS. Guess who's now an illegal immigrant? 

Indeed the aforementioned Judy Gans explains,

"Our immigration laws are more complex than the tax code, which is something of an accomplishment. It is an inordinately complicated system that is expensive to comply with... These are the realities that are driving this: We don’t provide adequate legal channels for economic migration. If the legal channels aren’t there, there is tremendous pressure for workers to come in through another source.” 

We need to simplify our screening process and allow for a greater opportunity for those from other countries to enter legally. Yes, we do need to protect our borders and view illegal immigration as a crime and punish it accordingly. But let's be reasonable in our screening process. We are a nation of immigrants; thus, we should make it easier for foreigners to enter this fine country legally. Our economy (and our food) will be better off if we do.

A Needle in a Haystack: Privacy

Secrets. We all tend to have them. Why we have them varies from person to person. Some people keep secrets because they are afraid that people will be hurt by the truth. Some people like myself just really like to keep their lives private.

Of course, there are also the people who keep secrets because they have impure motivations. Perhaps even motivations to take down the government. 

It was precisely for these secrets that the National Security Administration (hereafter NSA) was created. Through their much publicized efforts, the NSA has created its own databases of all telephone calls in the United States. 

I know that this topic area has pretty much dropped from main coverage. However, I believe that to be an injustice. The NSA is still operating today, and it is not anymore respectful of our rights than when it first came out. We should be just as concerned now as we were then. 

With this organization, the government has access to the sensitive secrets they desire, but at the same time, all of the innocuous secrets that you and I keep and decide to share only with one another are known. 

Our plans for courtship/dating, our job situation, our greatest fears. None of these things may seem harmful for the government to have, but the question shouldn't be why not. The question we ask when we give power to the government needs to be why. 

So why should arbitrarily selected bureaucrats being given access to these areas of our private life? We only entrust certain trusted friends with them as a whole, so why would strangers have this information stored where they can reach it? 

Before we even consider the real fact of abuse within the NSA, we should question the logistics behind the situation completely. We have a right to keep our information private. From anyone we choose. 

But of course, one could argue that to get the national security information, it is necessary to make this sacrifice of this innocuous privacy. If you don't have anything to hide, don't worry about it. 

But to what extent would we carry this anyway? Is every part of our lives just commodities to be used in the government in the name of national security? God forbid. 

That though ignores the point that this database actually isn't helping national security at all. 

I'm not joking. The database that is violating all of our privacy is helping national security nary a bit. 

I am aware that such a huge claim requires some support. As such I am prepared to provide some. 

Looking for sensitive information for national security in private telephone records is like looking for a needle in a haystack. By adding in more innocent people's conversations into the mix, you are simply piling more hay into that stack, making it that much more difficult to find the needle. As Adrienne Kinne who worked with the NSa for 3 years and was recognized with a NSA Joint Service Achievement Medal explains,

"By casting the net so wide and continuing to collect on Americans and aid organizations, it's almost like they're making the haystack bigger and it's harder to find that piece of information that might actually be useful to somebody. You're actually hurting our ability to effectively protect our national security."

So really, all our secrets are being taken only to hinder national security. We are sacrificing our rights and getting nothing in return.

And this has all been under the assumption that the government would always seek our best interests. Nevermind the fact that should they ever turn truly tyrannical, they will have at their disposal everything they could possibly need to manipulate us. Our desires, our dreams, our decision-making processes, our very fears, all that makes us tick as individuals - all there to coerce us to their will should they so desire.

At least we have a relief in knowing that they have a large haystack to sort through to find our needle of information. That's something I guess.

Theme Beyond the Screen: Captain America: Winter Soldier

Movies. They are great entertainment and can give friends and strangers alike something to converse about. But movies are probably most intriguing for their subtle (and not so subtle) teachings about people, life, God, or politics.

Today, I would like to examine and really explain the themes of Captain America: The Winter Soldier. 

I will admit that comic book movies don't usually make a stand on anything at all. Thus, when this installment in the Marvel Universe established the theme of liberty's importance, it naturally made me pretty excited (even more so than I was just by the fact that it was, you know, Captain America).

In the movie, Captain America finds himself working for S.H.I.E.L.D., a bureaucracy which he believes has too much power and is veiled in too much secrecy. His main problem with this is not that it is inherently bad, but just that he refuses to trust a bureaucracy so large.

Director (of S.H.I.E.L.D.) Fury of course wants to calm his fears about S.H.I.E.L.D., but instead of trying to persuade him that S.H.I.E.L.D. does not endanger liberty, he argues that the slight infringement of liberty is necessary to protect security.

He even goes so far as to show Captain America three highly weaponized helicarriers to demonstrate how they can "Neutralize threats before they even happen."

Captain America responds (all of this is before the Winter Soldier is introduced in case you were wondering),

"I thought the punishment usually came after the crime...This isn't freedom; this is fear."  

Benjamin Franklin would approve of Captain America's sentiment. Remember this popular quotation,

"Those who would give up essential Liberty, to purchase a little temporary Safety, deserve neither Liberty nor Safety."

For the movie, it will turn out that both of these men would be right. During circumstances in the movies that I would rather not spoil for my wonderful readers, the "Bad guys" get a hold of these deadly weapons. The rest of the movie is centered on how to prevent them from using them.

But the bad guys want to absolutely destroy freedom because they believe that freedom is inherently self-destructive. You see, man just can't be trusted with his own freedom, and thus, he needs to be told what to do.

It's a generic and cliche motivation for a villain, but there is a reason for that. It's an argument that has been around for a while and that many intelligent people have fallen prey into believing. Unfortunately, the argument fails for a simple reason. If we can't trust men with their own lives, how are we to trust the same men with the lives of others.

This is what the bad guys show us in their entire scheme. Their means to international security and peace are heinous at best. Trusting them with the power of S.H.I.E.L.D. is not wise at all.

But the Captain makes the case that trusting S.H.I.E.L.D. with its own power is also not very wise. He believes that S.H.I.E.L.D. is trying to govern the lives of others just as much as the bad guys do. Though they may still argue for freedom, they have forgotten what that actually looks like in their pursuit of security and interstellar peace.

Captain America sees no real difference between the tactics of S.H.I.E.L.D. and the tactics of the bad guys except whom is targeted. He does not believe that we should trust any bureaucracy with that power.

In fact, at a crucial point, S.H.I.E.L.D. wants to simply regain their own access to their deadly weapons, instead of destroying them. But Captain America refuses to stand for that!

He understands that we have to prepare for government at its worst, not at its best. Not just because that power can be commandeered by those with evil motivations, but because all men can make mistakes, or be corrupted by the seductiveness of power.

Captain America understands that liberty is important and must be protected by limiting the power of the government entirely. We must be careful not to surrender too much power and give away too much liberty to our government in hopes of security.

This may seem costly, but as the Captain says in a really cheesy, yet incredibly awesome monologue:

"The price of freedom is high, but it's a price I'm willing to pay."