Ron Paul FTW
- Thread starter Reign in Acai
- Start date
skyrefuge
Member
I'm not sure about that...if we lived in such a world where Jesus (or the government) had removed the need for all acts of charity and selflessness, then what would be the point of preaching their religion anymore? The whole point of the fear-of-Hell/promise-of-Heaven thing is to encourage people to perform good works and instill morals. When the government takes the decision to be charitable out of your hands, by forcing you to give (an oxymoron), then where is the need for moral education? Jesus's teachings become meaningless, because you no longer have the free will to follow them or not.
No, they are not! They are against THE GOVERNMENT providing the sick with health care. That's a hugely important difference, and the key point that I'm trying to make.
I'm not saying that all Evangelicals who are against socialized medicine have such principled reasons; I'm sure many would be FOR socialized medicine, if that's what the anti-abortion party happened to support. But it's clearly the "conservative" position.
Neil
Conspicuously Absent
Linguistically Confused
General Zod
Ruler of Australia
Everything you said would be true, if evangelicals were against trying to turn their beliefs into legislation. However, they're not against legislating their beliefs. As a matter of fact, they vote in favor of the government enforcing an evangelical belief system every time the opportunity presents itself. And the fact that they have no desire to legislate their most Christ-like belief, is the reason it's hypocrisy.
Zod
skeptik
Member
- Feb 7, 2003
- 24,413
- 71
- 48
I really fucking hate when people make the broad, sweeping claim that universal healthcare is "taking your neighbor's money and giving it to the sick kid across the street." Universal health care is you putting in money to a healthcare system that you benefit from, along with everyone else. It's NOT CHARITY.
skyrefuge
Member
Ah, yeah, I totally agree with that. I guess that's why I included the last paragraph in my previous post.
My main point originally was to dispute your claim that government-provided healthcare is not "socialist"; it is in fact quite "conservative" to be against such a thing.
So the odd part is really that Evangelicals identify so closely with the conservative party, but as I said, the abortion issue can be all-powerful.
To expand a bit on an earlier point, I'm now seeing even more logic in Evangelicals (at least the church leaders) being against universal healthcare. Churches often act as a safety net for people, and that's one reason that people join up and contribute. It's essentially a community-based insurance plan. If the government was to greatly increase its role as a health-insurance provider, the demand for such church-based insurance would almost vanish, which means there would be less reason for people to join up and contribute, and that's certainly not what church leaders want to see!
Neil
skyrefuge
Member
It sucks that you hate to hear that, but that doesn't stop it from being logically true.
The only case where it's not true is if everybody takes from the system equally, and everyone contributes equally. But if that was the case, there would be no need for such a system at all; everyone would just pay for themselves.
Now, whether or not redistribution of wealth is an acceptable role for government is a completely different discussion, for which reasoned arguments could be made. But the claim that universal healthcare does NOT involve government-forced redistribution of wealth is simply false.
We certainly agree on that!
Neil
skyrefuge
Member
To bring this thread back to metal a bit, I recently listened to a few songs that made me think: Rage's "Supersonic Hydromatic" (decrying crazed consumer culture), Rage's "Who Dares" (decrying political extremes and war-before-diplomacy), and Queensryche's "Resistance" (decrying environmental destruction).
All sound like they could have been written yesterday about current events, but they were written 20, 18, and 15 years ago. And certainly there are many songs about the same topics written much earlier.
That tells me that things probably sound a lot worse than they actually are. If we have another 20 years ahead of us that are "as bad" as 1988-2008, I don't think many people will be complaining.
Neil
General Zod
Ruler of Australia
Agreed. However, the term "socialist" is thrown around to scare people. Which is especially ironic in a country that has been heading towards fascism during the last seven years.
Couldn't agree more.
Zod
NAD
What A Horrible Night To Have A Curse
Rather than getting into any political argument, of which I really could over the past page , I'll ask one question:
Does anyone really think a black dude can become president of this country? And if he does, would he still be alive in a week?
Would I like to see it? Yes. Will it happen? I really don't think so.
, I'll ask one question:Does anyone really think a black dude can become president of this country? And if he does, would he still be alive in a week?
Would I like to see it? Yes. Will it happen? I really don't think so.
Conspicuously Absent
Linguistically Confused
Rather than getting into any political argument, of which I really could over the past page
Does anyone really think a black dude can become president of this country? And if he does, would he still be alive in a week?
Would I like to see it? Yes. Will it happen? I really don't think so.
Sadly I'm at the same point as you. Nothing quite like watching the KKK storm washington to "Lynch a nigga"
skyrefuge
Member
Yeah, I guess that's the reality of it in the US, but that's annoying. Tons of other countries have actual political parties with "socialist" in their name, many of them quite major, and that presumably doesn't scare those people. Someone on wikipedia wrote "The United States and Japan are the only first world nations which do not possess a competitive social democratic or democratic socialist party", and I have no reason to disbelieve that.
Well, from an economic perspective, they aren't exactly opposites.
Neil
skyrefuge
Member
I don't know, it doesn't seem too far-fetched to me. There have been lots of black mayors in major cities, a couple black governors, and three black senators (including a woman, and Obama himself), and none of them have been murdered.
I mean, c'mon, Bush has made it through nearly 8 years ok, so Obama would be just fine.
And he's half white! (not that that matters in racial mathematics, of course...)
Neil
A month or two ago I was saying the same thing, more along the lines of "does anyone think Mississippi will not secede if we elect a black president?"
Lately I actually have some of this, as the kids call it, "hope." Over the past few years I've become so disillusioned with the American Political process that I basically fall in the "the system is fucked, tear it down and start over" category now. While Obama is not advocating drastic changes to our government and political structure, he is offering the most deviation from the status quo at this time, and thus is getting my vote.
Similar threads
