Gingrich a Grinch

I have held off saying anything for as long as I could. I have been …meditating …on how to talk about …Newt.

You know, as in Gingrich. The now-leading GOP presidential candidate hopeful.

I nearly ran off the road when I heard his comments on the radio – something to the effect that poor kids have no work ethic because they don’t see anyone who works, and that they should become janitors in their schools, or maybe junior janitors.

My first thought was, “How arrogant! Has he been in a poor neighborhood, where parents often work 2-3 jobs, usually minimum wage with no benefits – and still can’t make ends meet? Has he been in poor neighborhoods dominated by slum landlords who charge exorbitant rent for habitats that are one step removed from shanties? Has he been in neighborhoods where there is no local supermarket and where many people cannot afford cars, so children are forced to eat horrible food gotten from the local corner store …which also charges too much?

I would bet not.

But then, I thought along a different line. If the children in poor neighborhoods became the janitors, where would the current janitors work – people who are trying to make a living and provide for their families?

Did he think of that? Would he even think to think of that?

The fact is, Gingrich, like so many white and privileged people, relies on stereotypes and generalizations. He, and others like him, speak on what they assume to be true. The “poor people” of whom he speaks (he and people like Limbaugh, Hannity, Bachmann, Coulter and others) are not even worthy of a personal investigation of why they are where they are, and how difficult it has been to get out and move up in a society which spurns them.

The fact is, many kids seldom see their parents because those parents do have a work ethic and they work their fingers to the bones, at the expense of their families. How many poor kids have come up saying that their parents worked two and three jobs, that their mothers were so tired after working that they would sit at the kitchen table and fall asleep? No, everyone doesn’t have the same work ethic, but some of them do not because they have given up. They have tried and tried to get good employment, to no avail and have stopped trying.

All kinds of people these days, who would not call themselves “poor,” or wouldn’t have called themselves “poor” before now, know what it feels like to try to work and get rejected, over and over. After a while, people stop trying.

Gingrich might be an intellectual, but he’s an insensitive and calloused and prejudiced intellectual who has no business wanting to be president of a country where there are more and more people who do not have work. A president is supposed to care for everyone, including “the least of these.” Donald Trump defended Gingrich’s statements, and said Barack Obama had not done anything for “people in the ghetto.”

Oh, how the cries of “socialist” would have been even louder had the president put his focus there!

Michelle Bachmann says that “the American people” are gravitating to the views of Hannity, Limbaugh, and people who, I suppose, think like Gingrich. Clearly, “the American people” of whom she speaks are white, privileged Americans who think the poor – primarily black and brown people – are not worthy of time or respect.

Gingrich was out of line. His arrogance is repugnant …and surely, “the American people” would not want such a divisive character to lead this country, the so-called, “land of the free and home of the brave,” poor people included.

A candid observation …

God and Government, Really

It occurred to me that we humans treat God and government in much the same way.

When times are good, we tend to marginalize God and we rail against “big government.”

But when the bottom falls from beneath us, we run to God or government or both, depending on the situation.

Nicholas Kristoff wrote an article in The New York Times about a former employee of Chase Bank whose job it was to award sub prime loans to people whom the bank knew were poor risks. If things fell apart, the bank reasoned, the government would bail the banks out …and no one would be the wiser.

Things did fall apart and the government (that would be big government) did in fact bail banks and corporations out, and the people who had been granted loans the banks knew they’d never be able to pay were left out in the cold – some of them literally.

Big government did what a government is supposed to do, right?

In times of economic prosperity, however, big government is spurned and scorned. It is pushed to the side; a government too involved in the life of the masses of people makes it too “socialist.” Whatever America is, it is not socialist. God forbid.

The same type of marginalization of God tends to be a reality. When times are good, for way too many people God is an afterthought, or if not an afterthought, an unwelcome reminder that there is a God who is the same whether times are good or not.

In Biblical literature, the Israelites, over and over, rejected God when times were good, when they were enjoying economic prosperity and benefited from all that money gives. They failed to understand that God doesn’t like to be marginalized and they failed to appreciate God’s anger against such insensitive treatment.

When times got bad, however, and they always got bad – these same people would fall before God and ask for forgiveness and mercy and relief from their dilemmas.

Government doesn’t much care, one would suppose, if it is marginalized. Government, though it is supposed to be “of the people, by the people and for the people,” doesn’t have a personality with which adherents have to deal. Government takes its knocks; some politicians do what they can for “the least of these” when the anti-big government cries are loud, and they see that those whose voices cannot be heard are those who are themselves marginalized, with seemingly no voice.

God, on the other hand, according to the Bible, doesn’t take very well to being marginalized. If we are to believe the Biblical texts, then God must be fuming because the recent spate of prosperity encouraged way too many people, some of them church-going believers – to push Him/Her to the side.

But that’s how we treat God and government. We consider them our tools, our property, really, to use when we need them, but to be pushed onto a nice shelf when we are doing all right.

A candid observation …

God Help America

I keep hearing things, reading things, from GOP members entering the race for president, and I am bothered.

Michele Bachmann thinks that slavery was probably all right. According to a recent article in the New Yorker she agrees with Steven Wilkins, author of a biography of Robert E Lee, who wrote that the Civil War was a “holy conflict between the godly South and heathen north.” Wilkins’ idea – which Bachmann apparently supports – is that “most southerners strove to treat their slaves with respect and provide them with a sufficiency of goods for a comfortable …existence.” She apparently agrees with Wilkins’ theory that the institution of slavery “bred mutual esteem between races as slaves adopted Christianity.”

Seriously?

Another one of Bachmann’s favorite authors is Frances Schaeffer, a theologian who according to Ryan Lizza, the author of the New Yorker piece, disapproves of just about everything that isn’t defined by evangelical Christianity as being worthy and good.

Texas Governor Rick Perry, who is now entering the GOP race for the presidential nomination, thinks that the country ought to get back to “biblical principles.” In a report I heard on National Public Radio, Perry thinks that God would want the United States to stop spending all its money, “trying to take care of everyone.” The reporter says that Perry thinks a government taking care of everyone is “slavery.”

What is troubling is not that Perry and Bachmann and probably a lot of the GOP contenders think this way, but that they are playing to a base of people who believe the same way. That being the case, of whom do they propose to govern? Black people, who should understand that slavery wasn’t so bad, that it was a holy institution of some sort? People who love the arts, something that one of Bachmann’s favorite authors decries as being anti-Christian?

What God do these people serve? What Jesus? And how do they propose to govern a pluralistic country when clearly they are only interested in white Christians, and evangelical Christians at that? I heard a news report that said one of the contenders thinks that religious freedom is meant only for Christians. Seriously? I hate to be redundant, but how can a person be a citizen of America and want to govern that same nation, whose legacy is one that celebrates diversity, when it is clear that at least some of the contenders would rather shove diversity to the curb?

Is that what they mean, “Let’s take our country back?” Do they want it to go back to the time when good ol’ white boys had their way, good ol’ rich boys, at that? Is it American to not be concerned with “the least of these?” Doesn’t Christianity say we as believers are supposed to do that? Then what the hell is Governor Perry talking about? He just had a prayer gathering, for goodness’ sake! For whom was he/they praying? For white Christians with money, at the exclusion of white Christians who are struggling? Were they not praying for the black and brown and other minorities of this country who are in need of hope and help? Do the least of these, the struggling masses, not mean anything to these contenders?

I am being very careful to listen, but it is hard stuff to swallow. I shudder to think of what happens to “the rest of us” if any of these GOP contenders win the 2012 election. God bless America, please. Better…God help America!

Just a candid observation …

On the ‘Race Card’

While I am not happy with the “deal” reached as concerns the debt ceiling, what I am more unhappy about is the elephant in the room that nobody wants to talk about.
Racism.
What I have seen and heard from lawmakers, Democrat, Republican and Tea Party, has given me pause. When you have seen, tasted, experienced and lived racism, you have to watch yourself and make sure that you are not being too sensitive, too defensive.
But from the moment President Obama has taken office, the racism – in the form of disrespect for him as a man, a person and as president of this nation – has been rampant. The ugly comments made on talk radio, the crude caricatures of him and Mrs Obama drawn by God knows who – have all felt uncomfortably familiar. When the Tea Party emerged, some of their signage and their words stung; when some of them reportedly spit on Civil Rights icon Congressman John Lewis, none but racism could be blamed.
Alabama Senator Mitch McConnell has had little success hiding his disdain for President Obama. It is his goal, he has said publicly, to make sure Mr. Obama is a “one term president.” Even in the midst of the recent debacle over the raising the debt ceiling, Sen. McConnell warned Republicans and Tea Partiers to be careful; their refusal to budge might help get President Obama back into office, and he said he wasn’t going to do anything that might make that happen.
It must go against everything Sen. McConnell and others in this country were brought up thinking, that a black man could be the leader of the United States. When Democrats controlled both houses of the legislature, I found myself wondering why the President couldn’t get more support. When, at his first State of the Union address, a member of Congress yelled out, “You lie!” I cringed. The audacity! This was the president of the free world speaking. The blatant disrespect for President Obama and for the office of president, as well as the arrogance that accompanied it, blew my mind. Are all bets off as concerns protocol and decency, just because the president is African American?
Like I said, I don’t like the deal that has been made as concerns the debt ceiling. There were no tax increases on the wealthiest people in this nation, or on huge corporations. As usual, those who can least afford it will end up paying the biggest costs in terms of loss of benefits and services. I don’t like it that President Obama compromised as much as he did – although I am glad he DID compromise.
But I like less the fact that racism is still alive and kicking. Its virulence is showing, and nobody wants to talk about it. But for those of us who have lived it, we can see it, feel it, hear it and taste it.
That would be a candid observation.

Let Them Eat Cake?

I have been listening with interest the talk from Republicans and Tea Party reps that says the deficit must be reduced, meaning there must be big spending cuts. “People are going to complain,” they say, “but it’s for the good of the country.”

People will do more than complain; they will hurt – and that is to be expected when a budget is tightened. I have no problem with that.

But why is it that the Republicans and Tea Party people don’t mind if the middle class and poor people cry and complain, while at the same time they are going out of their way to make sure the wealthiest one percent of this nation doesn’t cry and complain?

The battle cry is that lowering taxes, or keeping taxes low, creates jobs. I think not. I heard today that people in the United States pay the lowest taxes of people in all the major countries, and yet, jobs are had to be found, if at all. It seems that the Republicans and Tea Party people are holding fast to Ronald Reagan’s “trickle down” theory of economics, but it is not working, not for the masses.

The cuts and changes that Republicans are making are affecting the middle class in a frightening way. I have heard firefighters, police officers and teachers say that with new anti-labor laws that have been passed in Ohio, their take home pay has diminished significantly, making it hard for them to make ends meet.

Yet, the wealthiest people, even in this economic down-turn, have gotten wealthier. Corporations have reported record profits, and are sitting on money, not hiring people. What is up with that? And, though the rich are getting richer, they don’t want to pay what would be their fair share of taxes – and Republicans are protecting them with all their might.

So, it boils down to this horrible gridlock between the President and the Republican-dominated Congress. The Congress wants these huge spending cuts – and no tax increases. The people who will suffer under Republican plans will be the middle class, the poor, young people – you know, “we the people.” Corporations have been out-sourcing jobs for several years now; they are not likely to stop doing that. Oh, wait – the restrictions on collective bargaining might encourage them to hire more Americans than foreigners because they will be able to get more labor for less money. Is that the plan?

It seems that Republicans and Tea Party members have the attitude of aristocrats. Let them eat cake – that would be us, the “we the people” mentioned in the Preamble to the United States Constitution. Let them eat cake, but the cheaper the better – while the rich eat boneless ribeye steaks and drink champagne.

There is something really wrong with what’s going on. Rich people can afford to pay the taxes they owe. Bigger than that – rich people OUGHT to pay the taxes they owe.

That would be a candid observation.