Category Archives: politics

We need to plan for the hardest Brexit

Posted on by

gib eu

So the EU have thrown the future of Gibraltar into the Brexit negotiations. What a googly (curve ball for readers from across the pond). I trust that the British government will not give any ground on Gibraltar’s sovereignty – how to revive UKIP in one easy move!

If there is a mutually satisfactory and fully agreed settlement between the EU and Britain within the next two years then I will see it as a contender for the greatest diplomatic triumph in human history. Theresa May would deserve any and all accolades that would come her way.

Which is another way of saying – this is very unlikely to happen. To agree a trade deal with the EU – who don’t have a good track record of agreeing free trade deals – alongside settlement of bills and agreements on defence co-operation and all the rest of it – and then to get that deal agreed in each of the 27 nations (including sub-nation elements like Wallonia) – and to get the substance agreed within the next 18 months (so that there is time to get it legally ratified before the deadline kicks in) – I can’t see it happening.

Which means we need to start actively planning and preparing to shift to trading with the EU on the basis of WTO rules (which is what the United States does, for example).

This doesn’t actually worry me. I see this as being a much greater shock in the short-term, but probably much better for our national future, and economy, in the long term. Let’s get on with agreeing trade deals with the Anglophone community, India and Africa – there’s a very big world out there that we can now start playing in.

It will also add to the pile of burdens on the existing EU. Will it cause a final collapse? Probably not – but at some point there will be a straw added to the camel’s back. Britain is, at least, getting a head start on learning to live without the EU which will hold us in good stead and help us help other nations pick up the pieces when the collapse comes.

The dilemma facing British Muslims after Westminster

Posted on by

isis barbarity
I write these words the day after the horrific terrorist atrocity in Westminster. Khalid Masood was a person who subscribed to a militant form of Islamic thought. As such, the attack on the civilians walking along Westminster Bridge fits with the pattern of other recent ‘attacks-in-the-name-of-Islam’ in Berlin and Nice.

The British Council of Muslims released a statement saying “We are shocked and saddened by the incident at Westminster. We condemn this attack and while it is still too early to speculate on the motives, our thoughts and prayers are for the victims and those affected. We pay tribute too to the police and emergency services who handled this with bravery. The Palace of Westminster is the centre of our democracy and we must all ensure that it continues to serve our country and its people with safety and security.” The head of the Council, Harun Khan, said: “This attack was cowardly and depraved. There is no justification for this act whatsoever.”

There are no grounds for doubting the sincerity of these words. From the earliest times of Islamic military conquest there have been clear guidelines prohibiting the use of force against non-combatants. The companion of Mohammed and the first Caliph, Abu Bakr, taught the Muslim army “You must not mutilate dead bodies. Neither kill a child, nor a woman, nor an aged man.”

Even more than this, surprise attacks – which the attack in Westminster certainly was – are explicitly forbidden. Does this mean, then, that we can share in the liberal consensus as articulated by Western leaders like George W Bush and trust that Islam is a religion of peace? That those who commit ‘attacks-in-the-name-of-Islam’ simply do not understand what it is that they are claiming to protect?

I believe that the situation is more complex than this and that British Muslims are slowly being impaled upon a painful dilemma.

In August 1996, Osama bin Laden was careful to issue a declaration of war against the United States, which was published in the London newspaper Al Quds al Arabi; bin Laden knew his theology! This fatwa (religious proclamation) can be seen as initiating our present experience of ‘attacks-in-the-name-of-Islam’. It was followed two years later by a further fatwa issued by bin Laden and co-signed by several others, amplifying and expanding the declaration of war, and including the following sentence: “to kill the Americans and their allies — civilians and military — is an individual duty for every Muslim who can do it in any country in which it is possible to do it…”

Given that bin Laden was scrupulously trying to keep to Islamic law and theology, how could he come up with such a conclusion? His answer, when pressed on this, was to say that killing of innocent lives was legitimate if it was understood as retaliation for the killing of innocents by the United States. The Koran is quite clear that proportionate retaliation is fully acceptable, surah 2.178 stating “O believers! retaliation for bloodshedding is prescribed to you: the free man for the free, and the slave for the slave, and the woman for the woman”.

There is therefore a debate within Islam about whether bin Laden and those who have followed in his footsteps are in fact theologically justified to apply the rule of retaliation to the question of murdering innocent civilians. It is surely beyond dispute that the United States and its allies (including the United Kingdom) have been killing innocent people across the Middle East, most recently through the extensive use of drones. Where this situation obtains, what is the response of a faithful Muslim to be?

Some Muslims believe that bin Laden is not justified in applying the rule of retaliation in this situation, some do. Within Britain, according to the most thorough recent survey (ICM for Channel 4, April-May 2015) some 4% of British Muslims believe that it is acceptable to use terrorism for political ends, including suicide bombing. This works out to around 100,000 people.

Khalid Masood was one of them.

The dilemma that British Muslims face is that the theological debate is not some abstract matter without practical consequence; rather it is one that will govern their relationship with the wider British society. Moreover, the need for that community to make a very clear decision and act on it will only become stronger over time, as more and more terrorist atrocities take place.

When the ICM poll results were announced, Trevor Phillips, former head of Britain’s Equality and Human Rights Commission, wrote this: “There is a life-and-death struggle for the soul of British Islam — and this is not a battle that the rest of us can afford to sit out. We need to take sides… There is one truly terrifying finding [of the ICM poll]. Muslims who have separatist views about how they want to live in Britain are far more likely to support terrorism than those who do not. And there are far too many of the former for us to feel that we can gradually defeat the threat… Muslims want to be part of Britain — but many do not accept the values and behaviors that make Britain what it is; they believe that Islam offers a better future. And a small number feel that these sincerely held beliefs justify attempts to destroy our democracy. Britain’s liberal Muslims are crying out for this challenge to be confronted. The complacency we’ve displayed so far is leaving them to fight alone, and putting our society in danger. We cannot continue to sit on the fence in the hope that the problem will go away.”

If we wish to fully address the problem of our home-grown terrorism we need to be much more robust in the assertion of our values. That will mean saying that some values are better than others, and therefore some belief systems – those systems through which values are taught and embodied – are better than others. We cannot combat terrorism without a vigorous reassertion of our own inherited beliefs and values. Ultimately, that means Christianity. It is a sign of the painful nature of the dilemma facing British Muslims that the peaceful majority will only be able to root out the violent minority if the wider community becomes much more devoted to a non-Islamic faith.

Understanding the problem of immigration requires spiritual intelligence

Posted on by

The most successful movie ever made is a story about resistance to immigration. The movie in question is Avatar, a movie that does not have a particularly original story. In large part it mimics Kevin Costner’s Dances with Wolves, simply with the location shifted from the 19th Century American West, with American Indians, to the far future, when we have colonised other planets.

The core story runs like this: there is a native population, which carries on its distinctive life with all the joys and sorrows that intelligent life is usually suspect to. Into this settled environment comes an invasive force which is aggressive and disruptive, and which threatens the existing order. Through a process of struggle and growth the native community comes together in order to resist the invaders and repel them. The status quo ante is restored, leaving behind a strong residue of community cohesion, identity and integrity.

net migration to june 2016

It is unarguable that the native population of Britain has experienced a huge influx of migration, with an especial acceleration of immigration following the election of Tony Blair in 1997 (see chart). It is therefore unsurprising that this has caused a great deal of concern, and that this concern has been expressed in both healthy and unhealthy ways. My question would be – is the situation in Britain analogous to the one portrayed in Avatar, and all the other great stories about indigenous resistance?

After all, whenever indigenous resistance is seen anywhere else around the globe, it is portrayed by our media as heroic. When we read of tribes in the Amazon seeking to preserve their environment from developers we cheer them on.

The only native tribe that is never cheered on is that of the white Anglo-Saxons. As with Avatar, the white Anglo-Saxon tribe is always the villain doing the immigrating and disrupting other cultures, it is never the one being disrupted.

Historically this is perfectly accurate. Despite the liberal shibboleths about Britain always having been a nation of immigrants, we are far more accurately characterised as an emigrant culture. Stories which portray the invaders as white males are simply describing what has so often happened.

So are we simply now getting our ‘come-uppance’? Having invaded so many areas around the world, is it simply now our turn to be invaded by others? Perhaps.

What I wonder is whether there is anything left worth saving in our indigenous culture; first and foremost I wonder whether any sense of the British inheritance of Christianity can be salvaged.

In Avatar, the invading culture is driven by economic interests. There is a substance called ‘unobtainium’ which is ridiculously named and ridiculously valuable. Economic interests have also been the principal driver behind immigration into Britain (alongside, if Andrew Neather is to be believed, some deeply cynical electoral manipulations by the Blair administration).

Essentially, lower cost workers have been imported into this country in order to drive down the wages (and therefore the costs) of those employing them. The upper and middle classes have enjoyed cheaper services whilst the lower classes have been pushed to one side to live on welfare. This was clearly one of the major factors behind Brexit, when the lower classes came together to say ‘enough!’

I cannot help but see this reaction as a healthy one, and a spiritual one – which again links in with stories like Avatar. The resistance to the invading forces can only ever work when there is a spiritual element involved; that is, when the resisting culture is able to call upon a greater power to aid their purposes.
eywa
So how might such a spiritual element apply in the present British context?

In Avatar, the hinge of the story is the conversion of someone from the invading culture to the native culture. The invader comes to see the higher quality of the host culture, that it provides a richer and more fulfilling path for their life. Most especially, the spiritual dimensions of life are a key element driving the conversion – the invader comes to see that their own culture is explicitly lacking in a vital aspect of life.

At present, in Britain, the domestic ‘host’ culture could not fairly be described as a spiritual one. Our cynical society, knowing prices but not values, offers very little that might appeal to the deeper parts of human nature. We offer an environment which makes it fairly straightforward to make money, if you have the luck or the advantages to develop such opportunities, but we offer little else.

Our cultural elite are blind to such considerations, and have been so for many decades. As such, it is not simply that they cannot develop appropriate and relevant solutions to the immigration crisis, it is that they would not be able to recognise such an appropriate solution even if one were to be presented to them already formed.

Unless spiritual aspects are taken seriously by our government, all those elements which depend upon such spiritual aspects will pass by unseen. Those elements are community cohesion, the practice of particular virtues, all that makes a common life harmonious and viable. Without the spiritual glue that binds a community together there is no basis for resistance to an invading community. The unobtainium is therefore easily obtained.

All that will happen is that the invading spirituality, showing itself to be stronger than the native spirituality, will supplant that native spirituality. To many minds this will seem unconcerning. If the economic processes could continue, what would it matter if the idols in the corner of the living room are named one thing rather than another, that the holy books are written in one language rather than another? Who cares?

That is the voice of the blind, one that cannot contemplate the consequences of their own myopia.

In the end, to be concerned about immigration is to be concerned with spiritual issues; ultimately, our concerns are with what is ultimate, what is of most value. Any culture coheres around a common awareness and appreciation of what is held to be most important; in this society we have historically called that God, and we have developed the language for understanding those ultimate values through our Christian inheritance. It is not wrong to be concerned about immigration; on the contrary, to be concerned about immigration is to be concerned about the most important human issues that there are.

Now it may well be that our culture has decayed too far to be rescued, that all is lost. That would be a different story to the one told in Avatar, and so many like it. I rather think that there is still some spiritual life in our nation, and it is beginning to wake up. For my part I shall do my very best to assist that process!

Torture

Posted on by

Torture is wrong.
It’s also blasphemous (defacing the image of God).
It doesn’t work – indeed it is deeply counter-productive for strategic purposes.
Real-life is not an episode of 24.
Close Guantanomo.
Support Amnesty International.

I thought that needed saying, as I do like Trump in many ways, including ways that are deeply politically incorrect – but I vehemently and emphatically disagree with him on this.

Brexit is about more than economics

Posted on by

The American academic Jonathan Haidt published a book called ‘The Righteous Mind’ in 2012. It performs the remarkably useful task of explaining progressive and conservative outlooks to each other.

At the heart of Haidt’s argument is that there are several different grounds for the human moral ‘sense’. In just the same way that the human sense of taste can be broken down into several different components – sweet, salt, bitter and so on – so can our sense of morality. Haidt specifically advances five different grounds on which human beings base their sense of moral judgement. These five are care, fairness, loyalty authority and sanctity.

Haidt’s book explains how he reaches one particular conclusion (and it is very persuasive) – those on the left of the political spectrum tend to rely heavily upon only two of these five different grounds, those of care and fairness. In contrast to this, those on the conservative end of the political spectrum rely upon all five when reaching their moral judgements.

haidt chart

To put that differently, both conservatives and progressives see care and fairness as important when it comes to making moral decisions. However, the difference between conservatives and progressives comes when considering issues that relate to the three other grounds for our moral sense: loyalty, authority and sanctity. There are issues which relate to these latter which are of great moral importance to conservatives which simply have very little value to progressives.

One example is the nation.

For a conservative, the nation is a focus for all three grounds of loyalty, authority and sanctity. In the case of the United Kingdom, this is centred on the Queen, to whom all public officials (authority) have to swear an oath (sanctity) of obedience (loyalty). There are equivalents in every other nation – consider how sensitive the question of ‘flag burning’ is in the United States.

However, for the progressive point of view, none of this makes much sense. These things which conservatives value are not seen as having much value at all. Unless these things impinge upon questions of care and fairness then progressives do not have much interest in them.

This difference underlies so much of our political debate, and can be seen most clearly in questions around immigration. To the progressive the most important questions are around care and fairness – how can we take care of the immigrant or refugee? What is a fair response? However, for the conservative, although those questions carry weight, there are other questions relating to loyalty, authority and sanctity. They will perceive significant harm from immigration if those entering into the nation have divergent values on these questions, and this may prove more important in coming to a decision than the questions of fairness or care.

This is why I believe a great deal of the analysis about Brexit has fallen short. Much of the analysis – especially on the left – has treated the question of Brexit as being principally a matter of economics or social justice. That is, there is the question of whether our economy will benefit or be hindered by a Brexit; then there is the question of who might benefit or who might be harmed as a result of no longer being a member of the European Union. This is as far as much analysis has gone.

Yet to the conservative perspective such an analysis is proof of the poverty of progressive thought. The crucial questions have been about ‘sovereignty’ – that is, the independence of the nation on which centre those values of loyalty, authority and sanctity. To the conservative perspective it may well be the case that the economic argument for Brexit is weaker than the economic argument for staying, yet that does not carry much weight when compared to the prospect of a restoration of national sovereignty and independence. The more conservative perspective would be prepared to take a very sizeable economic ‘hit’ in the interests of the other values being affirmed.

The sadness of our time – and the great gift that Haidt’s research offers to us – is that the progressive side of the political divide, which has been dominant for many decades, simply does not see the nature of the conservative perspective. So often the arguments devolve into caricatures, that the conservative is unfeeling and heartless (ie deficient on the ‘care’ and ‘fairness’ criteria for moral judgement). The consequence that flows from denying a healthy respect and affirmation for the moral needs of authority, loyalty and sanctity is that this desire takes on darker and more destructive forms.

We are in an environment now where the progressive emphases of the last few decades are going to be subject to immense scrutiny, as the blowback from progressive over-reach comes home. We need to ensure that those benefits that have been gained are not lost by a return to an over-rigid and authoritarian affirmation of the nation. Yet we will not gain that happy medium by being terrified of all expressions of national pride. On the contrary, without a healthy sense of British national pride, we will end up being subject to unhealthy forms and much that is good would be lost.

Ultimately, we do not have to be afraid of the nation. The twentieth century did show us what happened when national identity was pursued to an evil and absurd extreme, yet it is possible for there to be an equal and opposite error – to pretend that a nation is simply an optional extra, of no significance or moral value. Such a view is dehumanising and a product of a very specific set of cultural circumstances in the modern, technocratic and rationalistic West. That excessive view is what has now reached an end point, and which will die out within the next generation. The challenge that faces us is how to manage that ending without too much collateral damage.

The task that faces us is how to affirm our sense of national identity without at the same time reverting to an authoritarian politics. I believe that we can navigate these waters successfully, but to do so we have to allow an honoured place for the moral sense about what is worth being loyal to, giving authority to, or considering sacred.

Why are people making such a fuss about Russia?

Posted on by

The Central Intelligence Agency of the United States Government has alleged that the Russian government ‘hacked’ the US election in order to ensure that Donald Trump became president.

Several thoughts occur to me on reading this.

The first is: this production is brought to you by the same team that told you about the weapons of mass destruction held by Saddam Hussein, in order to justify the second gulf war and trigger the overall destabilisation of the entire Middle East that so many people are suffering from.

The second is: this production is brought to you by the same team that developed and financed a coup in the Ukraine which toppled President Yanukovych and triggered a long civil war that has immiserated the entire nation.

The third is: this production is brought to you by the same team that has – over a period of decades – sought to put sympathetic regimes in place throughout the world, in order that the interests of the US ‘deep state’ are catered to.

So, before thinking ‘the CIA said it, therefore it must be true’, let us simply bring to mind this history and ask ourselves not ‘was Trump helped by the Russians?’ but instead ‘why is the CIA seeking to undermine the outcome of this democratic election?

I believe it is because the CIA – rightly – perceives Trump to be an existential threat.

After all, one of the most salient differences between Clinton and Trump in this last election was their foreign policy. Clinton was the establishment candidate – the one that sought to continue the framework kept by GW Bush and Obama for the last sixteen years. That framework has several key features, such as: continued drone warfare in the Middle East and elsewhere, reliance on Guantanamo bay to hold undesirables (deplorables?), hostility towards Russia and China as rival great powers. In sum, this is the ‘neo-conservative’ agenda, as put in place in the immediate aftermath of the 9/11 attacks.

The principal locus for this struggle between the American intelligence establishment and other world powers has shifted from the Ukraine to Syria, for the simple reason that Putin’s Russia decided to intervene militarily (at the invitation of the Syrian President Assad). The media are full of stories about the tremendous human suffering that the people of Syria are experiencing, and it is appalling, yet what is not so readily apparent is that it is the Russians who are most likely to achieve a lasting peace. If the US establishment gets its way, the war in Syria will carry on for generations more.

Consider that the worst thing to happen to any country is for the rule of law to collapse. (There is a very interesting TED talk on why this is so appalling – search on line for ‘TED talk Gary Haugen locusts’ – it is well worth twenty minutes of your time).

The Syrian civil war is between President Assad (recognised as the legal ruler of the state, supported by Russia, also widely recognised as a very bad man) and ‘moderate’ Islamists (basically a branch of IS but supported by the US and Saudi Arabia, so we don’t get told such things). At this moment in time, with Russian forces fully engaged, there is absolutely no chance whatsoever for President Assad to be driven out of power.

Our choices are therefore: a) escalate the conflict by seeking to establish a ‘no-fly’ zone – the choice advocated by Hillary Clinton, and which would almost certainly have led to a shooting conflict with Russia, or b) allow Russia to cement Assad in power, ending the civil war, and concentrate on defeating IS – this is the course advocated by Trump.

There are those with a vested interest in keeping Oceania at war with Eurasia and with the astonishing election of Trump they can see that their desires are about to be throroughly thwarted. Trump is clearly planning to radically recalibrate the foreign policy of the United States, as can be seen by his various appointments to his Cabinet.

If we are concerned to preserve our way of life, we need to pay attention to what truly threatens it, the enemies both internal and external. Externally, the greatest threat that we face is located in the Middle East, not because of the ‘hard power’ controlled by IS, but because of the soft power. In other words, here is an ideology which cannot be compromised with, and which is steadfastly committed to the elimination of all that we value in our own ways of life. We need to take this seriously, and where there are clear allies in our struggle against them – and Russia is certainly that – let’s not get distracted.

Yet the internal threats are most evident at this moment in time. After all, if you believe that Trump is going to be a disaster, from where do you get this idea? Might it be from the mainstream media by any chance? The same media that – in addition to completely misunderstanding Trump – has consistently been used as a mouthpiece for the views that the CIA have most wanted to be accepted; as with the weapons of mass destruction in Iraq, the ‘popular revolution’ in the Ukraine; the establishment of Pinochet in Chile… need I go on?

Truly, if we are to preserve our way of life, perhaps the most important thing is to exercise the values of our way of life more effectively in our own lives: to think critically about what we read, to exercise free speech (and notice what and whom can and cannot be criticised with impunity), to strive for the ways of peace and not war. Those things are only worth defending where they actually exist.

2016: the year the bubble burst

Posted on by

islemmophobic-reduced

One of my favourite jokes is: a hundred thousand lemmings can’t be wrong! I like it because it is absurd, it is closely related to a philosophical type of argument called a reductio ad absurdum, and I like it because – once the requisite irony of the delivery is appreciated – it contains an immense and important truth.

That truth is simply this: just because everyone you know agrees with you, that doesn’t mean that you are right. You might simply be joining in with a crowd of small mammals joyfully committing suicide by jumping off a cliff, in obedience to long-defunct biological imperatives.

The interesting thing happens when a lemming realises that they are in fact a human being and stop and say ‘is this really the way that we want to go?’ (Doubtless many will say that this is a good metaphor for Brexit – that by deciding to leave the European Union the British population have decided to jump off a cliff, and the result will be messy and bloody. That is the sort of comforting lie that we tell ourselves when reality becomes too painful to be coped with immediately.)

After all, what 2016 has demonstrated, on both sides of the Atlantic, is that those in positions of power and authority and influence do not have any clue what is going on. They have manipulated the levers of power in order to maintain the status quo, in order to ensure that the world remains safe for global corporate capitalism, and yet the results have not reflected their choices.

I would say: the bubble within which they have been operating has finally burst. That bubble, that echo-chamber, that closed circuit has been dominant for many decades. It has been marked, as all religions are marked, by clearly expected standards of speech and behaviour, with shibboleths relating to the treatment of minorities and women, where transgressions lead to expulsion from the community.

What has happened this year is that the illusion of dominance and inevitable victory for that religious perspective has been shattered. The world does not operate according to the central tenets of political correctness. There are people whose suffering was not taken account of by that dominant ideology, and their numbers – of those who suffer and those who care about those who suffer – are now large enough to cause electoral earthquakes.

Earthquakes that were not seen; at least, not seen by those who have relied upon the official prognosticators and opinion formers and tea-leaf readers commonly known as pollsters. Why not? Simply because, as mentioned above, if you believe something that falls outside of the bubble then the bubble will react angrily and aggressively against you. You will be bullied at escalating levels of intensity until you repent of your transgressive thoughts. You might lose your job; you will at least lose some friends. In this sort of environment is it surprising that people keep their views to themselves until that one private space wherein their preferences might actually have some impact?

The reason why the bubble has burst, why the illusions have shattered, why the genie will never get back into the bottle is that all those of us on the outside of the bubble, who have watched the creeping madness and group-think take over and destroy so much of virtue and value in Western society – we now know that we are not alone. On the contrary, we have the momentum, we have the numbers, we have reality on our side. We refuse to go over the cliff.

Such language might alarm. Does this mean that we are going to watch a replay of the 1930s, with Trump as Hitler, and Farage as his bag-carrier? No, it really doesn’t – and the dominance of that narrative simply shows what the principal factors were which formed the politically correct bubble in the first place. These are the long-defunct biological imperatives that are driving the lemmings over their cliff. Put simply, the West was so traumatised by the experience of the Third Reich that it has chosen to do everything possible to prevent a recurrence, up to and including cultural suicide.

The paradox is that there is an ideology abroad today which has very clear and direct philosophical and cultural links with the Third Reich, which insists upon traditional roles for women, which is radically anti-semitic and excludes ethnic minorities from all positions of power and influence, which prescribes the death penalty for homosexuality, and which is committed to the path of violence and terrorism in order to pursue those objectives.

It is because more and more people are aware of the threat that this ideology poses to us that the bubble has burst. The bubble has prevented a full and vigorous engagement with the threat; it has instead acted to incubate the threat within our own society; and people have had enough.

Yes, there are direct economic interests in play as well. The promises of the bubble have not been kept; whole communities have been cut off from any increase in prosperity – rather the reverse; and all the while the spectacle of fat cats filleting their company’s pension systems before pushing their employees over a financial cliff has fostered the disaffection that is now too obvious to ignore.

This crisis has been decades in the making, and will take many years yet to fully unravel. It will not be a gentle time. What are our tasks for the months and years ahead?

Those of us who have been outside the bubble for some time have, I believe, to ponder one essential question: how can we remain civilised in the context of the coming conflict? To put that slightly differently, and more personally, how can we remain Christian and not succumb to Nazism? How can we insist upon the priority of one form of life in this nation – one that actually does preserve all the progressive achievements of our culture – without scapegoating a minority? On that question will this generation be judged.

For those who have been within the bubble, I am bold to offer some advice. The first and most important advice is simply: don’t assume that those who disagree with your views are racist, homophobic, sexist reprobates. That has been the default assumption for so long that those words have lost their power in the same way that they have lost their accuracy. If you reflexively reach for those insults in discussion with Brexiters and Trumpers then you simply commit yourselves to leaping from the cliff with greater conviction.

The second bit of advice is simply: listen. Those of us outside the bubble don’t have all the answers, and if we are to preserve a civilised society in this land then the polarisation of argument is not going to help us achieve that end. We have to work together. Yet that cannot happen if one side believes that the other is morally beyond the pale, an incarnation of barbarism, a return to fascism. No, we need you to listen. We need you to recognise that the bubble has burst, that there might be truth outside your world-view, and that a little humility on your part would go a very long way.

If this does not happen; if bubble-dwellers double-down on the rightness of their perspective; if they continue to turn towards violence and anti-democratic methods in order to insist upon the rectitude of cliff-leaping – then, in that case, I am gravely concerned for the future of our country and our civilisation. The stakes here are very high, and it is the lack of awareness of those stakes that seems to me to most characteristic of the bubble.

We have a future to build, a future which may yet be much better than what has been before. If we want that future to be bright, we are going to have to build it together, outside the bubble.

The simple Christian argument for Trump

Posted on by

In the light of many comments on yesterday’s post…

1. Christians believe that war is evil.
2. Clinton is much more likely to pursue, initiate or trigger a major war than Trump.

If 1 and 2 are true, then Christians must prefer Trump to Clinton.

There’s a bit of wiggle room on 1, and more on 2 – though not much. To disagree on 2 is perfectly possible, and many Christians would argue that Trump is more risky than Clinton in this area. I think the evidence for that is slight-to-vanishing, but it is at least a spiritually serious engagement, and there can then follow a shared assessment of the facts of a situation in the light of an agreed moral framework.

However, to accept both 1 and 2 but then say that Trump cannot be supported because he is vain, obnoxious, rude to women etc – this is not a spiritually serious argument, and does not qualify as Christian engagement in the political process. All those things are (probably) true, yet their significance pales in comparison to the violence of war. All those evangelical leaders who now disavow Trump on such grounds simply demonstrate how completely they have been captured by the principalities and powers; they are whitewashed tombs. Whilst it would undoubtedly be a good thing to have a morally exemplary character as the occupant of the White House, that is not an available option. This is simply a choice between two evils, and unless 2 above is wrong, it is really very clear which is the greater evil.

Beelzebub knows his own
Yes, I really do want Trump to win, and this is why

Posted on by

Let me begin by saying that I do not see Trump in the way I saw Palin, as someone of substance and virtue. There are many things which a Christian might see as less than ideal with Trump, which are too familiar to need listing here. However, I do wonder whether those things which seem such strong flaws, such as his narcissism, are in fact essential characteristics that shield him from the immense assaults that he is facing – that, in other words, if there was to be a presidential candidate who might succeed in taking on the entrenched principalities and powers that have so disfigured our world, it could only be someone like Trump.

I rush ahead of myself.

Clinton is the candidate of the establishment. That establishment encompasses both sides of the standard Rep/Dem divide. As an establishment candidate, Clinton embodies the policies that have become embedded in the ‘deep state’ since the collapse of the cold war, and would continue to implement them were she to assume office. These include: a reckless and ill-considered foreign policy that has caused havoc across the Middle East and in the Ukraine; protection for financial vested interests and ‘too big to fail’ banks like Goldman Sachs; and more power and protection for the surveillance state and torture.

Broadly speaking, if you believe that, in the light of the situation in Syria and elsewhere; the financial collapse; and the revelations about the NSA from Snowden et al; that the United States is a beacon of virtue lifting up the world towards the light, then Clinton is undoubtedly the best candidate. If, however, you believe that vested interests have taken charge of the United States and have led it away from its destiny, that have turned it into an oppressive Empire, and that it needs to reformed and returned to its foundational values – then, perhaps, there might be a question as to Clinton’s suitability for leadership.

Those questions have greater purchase when considering Clinton’s own character and fitness for office. The director of the FBI has assessed her as being extremely careless with state secrets, and quite clearly, were she not a presidential candidate, she would be in the midst of a prosecution and facing jail for serious breaches of security. Her actions throughout the Benghazi story are deeply disturbing for anyone who takes the idea of public service seriously. There is evidence that she has abused her office for the purposes of personal enrichment through the Clinton Foundation. There are serious questions about her personal integrity and the way in which she will mouth feminist platitudes whilst having protected her husband from all questions of sexual assault. In addition to these, there are serious questions about her health and her possible alcoholism.

Of course, these may all be considered simply as standard attributes of those who have sought and attained high office in the United States, and therefore unremarkable. I am not in a position to comment authoritatively on that.

However, it is possible to see behind Clinton the shape of the principalities and powers that are opposed to the Kingdom of God, against which all Christians are called to stand. That is, if we are to take our Scriptures seriously, Christians are baptised into a situation of spiritual warfare, where that spiritual struggle is necessarily political – and the political struggle is necessarily spiritual. To separate out the two is ultimately to deny the incarnation, and anti-Christian.

What Christians refer to as the ‘principalities and powers’ are the deep structural forces that keep human beings in subjection and oppression; that pursue and worship the exercise of power, eternally seeking to extend it; and which always seek to suppress dissent and the voices of the prophets. These are the forces of injustice which choose to crucify those that oppose them.

In today’s world, those forces can most aptly be seen at work in the ‘deep state’ of the United States. I say most aptly simply because they are most clear there – I do not wish to say that the United States is uniquely prone to wickedness. If pushed, I would rather say the opposite, that the constitution of the United States, the idea of a ‘proposition nation’ to which all are welcome – this seems to be a step forward in the history of humanity, an outgrowth of the gospel itself. My concern is that the United States has forgotten itself, and become captured. (For more on this, see here.)

This deep state would include what Eisenhower christened as the military-industrial complex, but also the mainstream media, which operates as a directed chorus to generate assent for what the deep state chooses to do. More broadly I would include within the principalities and powers all the habits of mind and speech that fall under the heading of political correctness, the ways in which we censor ourselves for fear of being excluded. It is such a fear which is the fuel that allows the principalities and powers to maintain their power within the world, subject only to the directions of the prince of this world.

That is the broad context in which I understand this election. That for the first time there is a candidate against whom all of the established principalities and powers are united. This should, at the very least, cause Christians to give sustained attention to that candidate and wonder whether the Lord is doing something particular here.

This does not mean that the person struggling against the principalities is a saint, let alone one without sin. The notion that a political candidate might be such is a reflection of both spiritual and political immaturity, and the failure to recognise Jesus as Lord. It can mean that we are called to pay close attention, and remember that God is able to use frail and weak human nature to accomplish something miraculous.

After all, what is at stake in this election? What is most at stake for the world?

In my eyes, the most important issue relates to Syria – the civilisational clash with ISIS, and the way in which great power relations are at stake. If this is handled wrongly – that is, if the United States continues to behave in the way that it has been doing – then what might have been an opportunity for all the civilised nations of the world to unite against barbarism will instead become a catastrophic war between great powers.

In the second presidential debate this issue was raised, and the differences between the candidates were very clear. One candidate spoke about ISIS as the most important enemy, and the need for cordial relations with Russia. The other spoke about Russia as being a greater threat than ISIS. One candidate sees the issue clearly and neutrally. The other sees through the lenses manufactured by the deep state and would act accordingly.

Those latter actions, in my view, would be utterly devastating to the world, and lead to immense misery and suffering. What most disturbs me about almost all coverage and analysis of this election is that these weighty matters are ignored in favour of the equivalent of celebrity culture and gossip.

I believe that all Christians have a duty to vote, and to vote in such a way that the Kingdom of God is brought forward. Those forces which are in eternal opposition to the Kingdom are now united against Donald Trump. The principalities and powers do not wish you to pay attention to the serious matters of life and death, of war and peace. They would far rather that people were concerned about lewd behaviour, potential rudeness, arrogance and egotism, vulgarity and bad taste. I do not see how any spiritually serious Christian could consider voting in favour of the principalities and powers. That is why I want Trump to win.

Or, to put it all into one single image: Beelzebub knows his own.

hillary-fly-head

I support a basic income

Posted on by

In this time of flux after Brexit, when all sorts of futures seem possible, it’s worth arguing for some fundamental changes. One that I am particularly keen to see is a basic income.

There are many ways of establishing this – see the wikipedia page.

For me, the principal attraction is that it is a way of saying to every member of a society “there is a point below which we will not allow you to fall”. In other words, it is a matter of social inclusion. If you are a member of our society, you will be given the means to participate in that society.

There are of course lots of positives and negatives associated with such a development, but I tend to view most of the opposition as special pleading. I believe that a basic income would make for much greater economic resilience through troubled times.

I am also, of course, thoroughly conditioned in my approach to this by my Christian context – a basic income would be a concrete expression of grace, and a means to give effect to the ‘bias to the poor’ evident in Scripture.

Fortunately, this is an idea that is gaining traction in many different places. Let’s hope that England can be one of them.