Religion, politics, and sex remain difficult topics for discussion in America. The three are forbidden in most civil conversations, or in conversations that struggle to remain civil. Because American Evangelical Christians have had it drummed into their Puritan psyche that they should "Render unto Caesar what is Caesar's, and render unto God what is God's," they have great difficulty with being anything but ultra-conservative but still pro-government. Part of their conservative group identity is what makes church attendance important to them. Regretfully, by interpretation from conservative pulpits, this means that for many church-attending Evangelical Christians, especially in politically conservative white churches, and unlike many less conservative black churches, there is no room for questioning anything preached from the pulpit, and the passive resistance of Gandhi or Martin Luther King is disallowed, even when the political process is failing or producing intentionally misleading information and promises.
Politicians on the campaign trail say that voters can not trust Washington, without pointing out that they ARE the Washington we can't trust, or that they will BECOME the Washington we won't trust. Candidates seem to enjoy insulting themselves or other members of their own political party, and thereby insult the political process of the Congress, to garner votes. Some candidates talk of wanting less government while others talk of NO government. Anarchist movements are nothing new, but they can be scary. Voters aren't even hearing that logic when they listen to the candidates. And because voters aren't listening, political leaders now find themselves in a bi-polar political world of not being trusted, so that most of what they say must lack clarity, and can neither be researched, confirmed, or verified, but rather MUST be blindly trusted, based on political party affiliation, if nothing else.
This bi-polar thinking leaves great room for the total disappointment that Americans are now experiencing in the political process. Do we really want less government and possible anarchy? Evangelicals, with their commitments to the conservative political party, are confused. Politicians now spend campaign monies trying to reach the "uncommitted" independent voters, who apparently have maintained some of their ability to think and reason, unlike conservatives and liberals. Conservative, Evangelical, and Fundamentalist votes are a "done deal" for the Republican Party, and Liberal votes are a "done deal" for the Democratic Party. It's only those uncommitted free-thinking independents that matter in 2012.
If Republicans want more votes in 2012, they know they will have to bring out the rhetoric of being Pro-Christian, Pro-Marriage, Anti-Abortion, Anti-Gun Control, and the Anti-"Gay Agenda" to get lazy Republicans to the polls. They have yet to deliver on any of those five issues in the past fifty years, but what does that matter? Those laws continue relatively unchanged. Democrats must bring out Pro-Choice and Women's issues, limits to gun possession in our culture, give support to Gay Rights and Marriage Equality, and support some much smaller semblance of social programs for the poor to bring lazy Democrats out to the polls.
No political party has a real plan to create jobs, although they talk about proverbial "job creators" as if they are just waiting in the woodwork for some more tax breaks so they can create those jobs. No political party dares have much concern for the poor, as programs for the poor were the first to be cut in this recession economy. What a joke. Sadly, an impatient American electorate voted for the Candidate of Hope in 2008, and because it has not seen any momentum to that hope, they may now vote for the other candidate in the 2012 election cycle, simply to see if there is any resulting momentum for hope. There won't be any momentum change, but the electorate would not believe that if an honest politician said so. The game is to publish disinformation in the press, and preach disinformation from our pulpits and from the campaign trail. The game is working.
We once had a free Press! When the American Press, not controlled by corporations was actually FREE, it acted as a political third party, and confirmed, researched, and verified or denied anything politicians said or promised. This is no longer the circumstance. News research has all but disappeared. Mention Fox News, CNN, National Public Radio or Television, or MSNBC, and most Americans know what bias their so-called news sources have. Americans actually WANT a political bias when they ingest their news. News sources, along with politicians and pastors, become intentional sources of disinformation, upon which the public forms opinions, without researching, confirming, or verifying. Americans go to the press, not for a good third-party view of truth, but to confirm their previously formed political opinions, whether liberal or conservative.
Look at the disinformation surrounding the Affordable Health Care Law. Few people have read the law or any reasonable synopsis of the law. They trust the disinformation published by the two political parties. They trust a so-called "fair and balanced" Press, which is neither fair nor balanced. They trust what they are told from their sadly misinformed pulpits. In American Christendom there is actually an intense denial of the fact that most pulpiteers are poorly informed, and will teach and preach things that have no basis in facts. How many churches have messages that inappropriately comment on gun-control? What would Jesus do? Would he carry a gun? How many churches have messages that condemn social programs because of their wastefulness? What would Jesus do? Did he have any waste in His social programs? Many pulpits remain a conduit for a constant stream of disinformation in order to support the shrinking middle class which is struggling to hold onto wealth. Sadly, many middle class Evangelical Christians will secretly admit that they don't know what they believe, but they believe what their pastor preaches, simply because they can not sort through the dichotomy of Scriptural demands and their impending loss of wealth. "Come, let us reason together" indeed! Shall we discuss the eye of the needle?
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