So when Jesus commanded us to give what we have to the poor, according to you this wasn't for their benefit, but rather for ours?
Is that what I said? I thought I said that, so far as mortality is generally concerned, Jesus never taught a doctrine, and never made a foray into politics or social policy requiring the "abolition" of poverty.
Poverty is on earth so those who have will be given the opportunity to be charitable?
This implies a further, ultimate metaphysical or theological question of why any defects or unhappy circumstances are on the earth at all. Suffice it to say that poverty exists because the human condition exists, and the human condition exists because of the Fall, and all of this is a part of the plan of salvation, in which all of us are participating.
Keep in mind I'm not talking about your whacked out Skousenesque Mormon gospel,
Well, thank you for making that clear.
I'm talking about what Jesus taught according to the New testament.
Now you're talking like a Protestant fundamentalist who believes he is in the possession of
the correct interpretation of biblical texts, all other possible interpretations being heretical.
Jesus Christ discouraged all aspirations to be wealthy in the worldly sense.
In context and taking all of his teachings as a system, he did nothing of the kind (and keep in mind here that most of his teachings are not found in the synoptic gospels, but in the teachings of the apostles who continued spreading his gospel after his death.
To Jesus, there was a worldly sense of wealth and a heavenly sense of wealth. He encouraged his followers to abandon the former and aspire to the latter.
He did nothing of the kind. He encouraged his followers to
emphasize and
concentrate upon spiritual wealth, and told them that, if they seek the Kingdom of God first, all other things of a temporal nature would be "added unto" them as they lived righteously.
In fact he taught them that seeking the latter could only come about by abandoning the former.
Unbiblical.
You were either hot or cold he said. Those who were "lukewarm" he would spit out. Hence, it is impossible for a rich man to enter into heaven.
This is not only a non sequiter but a mixing of scriptural concepts that are not related. Those who are either hot or cold, or lukewarm, are the Saints mentioned in Revelation who are not valiant in their living of the gospel, and who have become complacent and spiritually slothful. The only economic reference in that section is Rev. 3:16, but here again, wealth itself, wealth creation, affluence, and economic abundance are never criticized (or mentioned), only materialism is on the chopping block here, and its children greed, avarice, selfishness, covetousness and envy, this last being the emotional and psychological basis of socialism
Except Churches today act as corporations, and give very little by comparison.
CFR.
BIblical Churches gave well beyond their means(2 Corinthians 8:1-5), which is anathema to conservative philosophy.
Christian churches, 2000 years ago in ancient Palestine, existed under very different conditions than we do today, which the Biblical account does not venture into. The verses above give no socioeconomic context or detail surrounding the conditions Paul mentions. As is always the case, it is the leftist, driven by his burning desire to impose his own interpretations upon the scriptures, thereby, so he believes, transferring the imprimatur of divinity to his ideological nostrums, who is projecting onto others his own motives and agenda.
I see that you have well absorbed the Bokovoy concept that the only Christianity that is true Christianity is that Christianity that is economically destructive of its own adherents.
Yes, he was rooting for everyone of course, but the rich were sent to hell simply because they were rich.
Unbiblical. Jesus' teachings regarding "the rich" and their inability to enter the Kingdom of of their being "sent to hell" is hyperbolic in nature and cannot be sustained when the Bible as an entire Judeo-Christian corpus of scriptural texts is used as a reference to the larger context behind teachings relating to economic concerns. Indeed, the verse in revelation you yourself posted indicates the core of Jesus ideas here:
Because thou sayest, I am rich, and increased with goods, and have need of nothing; and knowest not that thou art wretched, and miserable, and poor, and blind, and naked:No one, I would posit, not already riven with a prexisting ideology to impose on this text could see it as anything else than a condemnation of pride; the effects of which are the sense of human self sufficiency and independence grounded in temporal wealth. It is a condemnation of materialism and worldliness, not wealth itself - to which you cannot provide a single plausible scriptural source - that is in question.
The poor had a huge advantage simply because they were poor.
Unbiblical. The poor,
who obey the commandments and comply with the requirements of the gospel, have specific blessings promised to them, but have no class or group advantage over anyone else at any other socioeconimc level. No such teaching exits in the Bible, nor it the restored gospel (and its "rock" or foundation, revelation) without which there is significant ambiguity and question regarding the actual interpretation of many biblical concepts and texts.
Indeed, such a concept, if taken seriously, would utterly obviate the entire concept of the plan of salvation in which our individual agency and freedom to choose between a range of alternatives determines our movement toward or away from God, our group status having nothing to do, in and of itself, with our individual ontological relation to God. Group status does have, in some provisional and conditional senses, some bearing on one's spiritual condition, in the sense that certain lineages or family lines have certain blessings associated with them. But in all such cases, the blessings are predicated upon worthiness and compliance with the requirements of the gospel, and do not inhere in the individual simply because of group membership.
As Paul said, God so loved the world that
whosoever would believe, obey, and comply with his commandments and teachings, would have everlasting life. The term "whosoever" indicates each and every unique individual encountering the gospel and choosing, according to the free agency he has been given, his response to it and Christ's offer of salvation. There is no group salvation, as this concept would logically negate the core elements of the plan of salvation that form its central ideas regarding the purpose of mortality.
Now there's the droopy we all know and love! I stand by my statement. Point to any form of proposed legislation, determine who benefits the most and least, and I can almost tell you 100% of the time which side the Republicans are on.
I don't have the time or inclination to take you to the woodshed here.
But the fact is the majority of Americans do not want the Right Winger idiots touching Social Security because they are entitled to it since they've been paying into it all their lives.
Its pointless attempting to answer Graham's waterfall-like Olbermannesque tirade here beyond a few salient points to be made, just briefly and as food for thought.
What one should notice here is that Kevin's statement above regarding Social Security imply that American workers are getting back money they have paid in to some kind of personal investment portfolio similar to a private sector portfolio, and are simply getting back the principle and interest they have earned on "their" money. Nothing could be further from the truth.
Further, the clear implication here that American citizens have an entitlement and preemptive claim upon the property and fruits of the labor of their fellow citizens, their children and grandchildren, is indicative of precisely, not just the economic, but ethical problems faced by the collectivization of economic life.
Economy crushing taxes
ROFL! I guess you fall into the category of "special" Right winger, since you obviously haven't heard the news that taxes are
lower now than they've been in sixty years. Even taxes under Reagan were much higher than they are under Obama.
What kind of mentality does it require to promulgate this kind of thing? The USA Today propaganda piece (which one can be satisfied is the case, not only by looking at the obvious logical and empirical gaffs in the piece, but at its source, the Soros created Center for American Progress) for the Obama reelection campaign is so full of obvious whoppers and errors that the mind locks up just contemplating any attempt to cut through its tangled undergrowth. A few points are in order though. In the first place, the source the USA Today propaganda piece uses is
the Bureau of Economic Analysis, which considers Social Security as an "insurance payment," and hence, does not calculate it as part of the federal tax burden. Thus, at the outset add 11% to the Breaues 9%. It also does not include Medicare and Medicaid as a part of the tax burden. Add another 3% for a total average tax burden of 23%
But there are other problems. The American tax system is not a flat one but a progressive one, with marginal tax rates from 10% to 35%. There is no "average" tax rate. These are federal tax rates, and do not include state and local taxes, property taxes, sales taxes, and countless taxes hidden in virtually everything we buy and that is a part of our "cost of living" (54% of every gallon of gas we buy is tax overhead). It also does not include general price inflation, which is a government policy created phenomena and is also a tax, essentially a tax on the value of the currency.
Federal taxes
alone, as a percentage of GDP, are not at 20%, just a bit lower than the 21% they reached under Clinton.
Raising taxes is what helped pull us out of the Great depression...
Perhaps you could explain for us how his works in actual practice.
Medicare was never meant to be self sustaining, but as
I already told you before, the government controlled VA health system is the best and most efficient system in the country.
http://www.cato-at-liberty.org/if-you-l ... um=Twitterhttp://www.cato.org/pub_display.php?pub_id=8140The VA system does apparently have some benefits, but this flows from its focus on the treating of veterans, not from its socialized model of care delivery, which feature the same problems - low care quality, dangerously long waiting times to receive care, and the scarcity and rationing of care.
Yes, Kevin cherry picks carefully everything he posts as evidence, and does not appear to be very well read on much of anything in the political or historical arena (which he makes up for in spades with his passionate excoriation of all the stupid morons around him).
Now, take a look at this:
We attack the American public school system because is the laughingstock of the world and America is has been at the bottom of all industrialized nations for nearly 30 years in all basic subjects.
Yes, and this is due to the poverty levels in America, which is also a laughingstock for the industrialized world.
1. No, poverty levels have nothing to do with it.
2. Its far better to be poor in this country than in any social democracy in Europe. Very similar social programs are available for "the poor" (whoever they are at any given time) as in Europe, but the real reason is that our relatively much freer, more dynamic and energetic economy puts within the reach of the poor many of the temporal things the affluent enjoy, and used to enjoy exclusively, and provides a much better chance to alleviate one's economic situation than in Europe, in the only way it can be alleviated over the long term.
A job.
Your argument is easily refuted by pointing out government run schools that are some of the best in the country.
Some are, yes. The American public education system, collectively speaking, however, presents us with a sea of intellectually hollow, politicized mediocrity on a vast scale. It is well and long understood that it is not economics that lies at the root of this state of affairs, but politics, culture war, and what is probably the single greatest barrier to educational reforms, the teacher unions.
Oh yes, attack and blame the unions again, and do so without a shred of evidence.
I've got a mountain rage of evidence, facts, and history. In fact, its one of the subjects I've taken a concerted interest in since the mid-eighties. Start a union thread and we'll give the anti-Schryver thread a run for its money. I'll deploy the Austrians to dig that intellectual grave for you at the outset, and then move on to salient modern conservative philosophical analysis.
Snip, and snip again. Nothing to see here.