McAtee contra Doug Wilson on Voting Trump – 2020

Over here

https://dougwils.com/books-and-culture/s7-engaging-the-culture/an-evangelical-case-for-four-more-years.html?fbclid=IwAR1qqrI5hhQJLs_kY7rINzgomGkD9r5AsB4vTX6sOc9c4JUAwW8r0-r_k3Y

Rev. Doug Wilson offers explains why he intends to vote for Trump this Fall. In this piece I intend to challenge the Man from Moscow’s “reasoning.” You will want to read the whole article. I have hit only what I believe are the high points.

Rev. Doug Wilson (hereinafter RDW) wrote,

“We all have authority over the content of our vote, but we also all have authority over the meaning of it. “

BLM responds,

Really?

And here I thought that God was the one who had the authority over the content of our vote and what it might or might not mean.

It turns out as one reads this article by RDW one discovers this idea expressed in RDW’s quote above provides the central pillar of reasoning for RDW. RDW’s reasoning boils down to, “I get to vote for whoever I want to and I get to assign whatever meaning I might want to my vote.”

This is a shocking statement for a theonomist to make. Theonomists used to think that God was the one who gave meaning to everything.

More on this later.

RDW wrote,

“So a person could vote for Luther’s apocryphal wise Turk without idolatry”

Bret L. McAtee

Seriously? One could vote for a complete Christ hater and that vote not be idolatrous?

Here is the difference between myself and RDW. RDW is practicing a teleological ethic when it comes to his voting. This means that RDW sees an end that he wants to get to and based on that desired end he is voting based on what he thinks (he can’t know) will get him to that end. This is also known as Consequentialism. Consequentialism, like teleological ethics, holds that the consequences of ones conduct (in this case the anticipated positives of voting for Sir Don) is the standard for adjudicating the morality or immorality of the contemplated conduct. A good result justifies the rightness or wrongness of the action in question (voting for the Big Orange).

On the other hand I am practicing what is called a “De-ontological” ethic when it comes to my vote. This ethic states, “what is right is right and I can’t deviate from that even if it might be seemingly to my advantage to deviate from this ethic.” Deontological ethics abides by the nostrum that the rightness or wrongness of an action should be based on whether that action is itself right or wrong per God’s law, rather than being based on the possible negative consequences of the action contemplated.

Believe me when I tell you that I feel the pull of Consquentialism here. I agree that from where I stand and from what I can see voting for “Mr. Apprentice” has strong appeal. The only way I resist that appeal is by being very deep in American history. A familiarity with American political history suggests that candidates seldom are what they represent themselves as being. I know it will come as a shock, but candidates lie. As much as I might want to vote for the incumbent I do not believe he is who he says he is, and I do not believe he will do what he has promised to do.

More on that later.

RDW writes,

I intend to vote for Donald Trump in the fall, as I did not do in 2016. But this is what such an action does not mean. It does not mean that I have gotten on the Trump train,

Bret responds,

This is an odd statement. It’s like saying “I intend to vote for Trump but I don’t support Trump.” By voting for Trump RDW is buying the ticket which means RDW is on the Trump train?

All aboard.

RDW writes.

… It does not mean that I own a MAGA hat, it does not mean I have abandoned my conservative principles,

BLM

Well, sure it does RDW. When you vote for a guy who supports placing sodomites in his cabinet, and when you vote for a guy who has said we need more legal immigration, and when you vote for a guy who has never met any pork in his fat budgets that he doesn’t like you are abandoning, by definition, your conservative principles. If you vote for a chap who is liberal on sodomy, on spending, on increasing legal immigration you are abandoning your conservative principles and embracing progressive principles – and that no matter how much you shout to the contrary that you are not.

This article demonstrates how Trump is playing both sides on Immigration.

https://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2020/mar/2/an-immigration-report-card-for-president-trump/?fbclid=IwAR0pIEaWdqRN2J7k0TmTkXGPujDpZ4py0tX2MaJh_VN3rv-pdb2KSQFJiBU

RDW.

Put not your trust in princes.

BLM

But by voting for Trump with your teleological ethic which essentially says the ends in voting justifies the means in vote, you are putting your trust in Princes. To put your trust in God would mean you would vote for someone who didn’t’ appoint sodomites to his cabinet, who didn’t advocate for more legal immigration, and who didn’t spend like a drunker sailor on shore leave.

RDW

I have authority over what my vote means.

BLM

This seems to be the central failure of RDW’s post.

If it is true that I have authority over what my vote means I could argue that it is legitimate to vote for Bernie because what that vote means, per my authority, is that it will lead faster to the breakup of the US. Therefore it is a God-honoring vote. If I have authority over what my vote means then no one can challenge me on any vote. I can vote for Pete Buttigieg because I say that vote would mean that I don’t want an old dude to die in office.

This “I have authority over my vote,” sounds absolutely postmodern. I can make reality whatever I want it to be. I can my vote to mean anything I want it to mean.

Really, how could anyone ever argue against that type of reasoning. If your vote is what you say it means and that is that how could anyone ever contradict that? After all, your the authority over your vote. Sucks to be God.

RDW writes,

I have said before, using Victor David Hanson’s metaphor, that Trump is chemo-therapy. He is toxic, but he is more toxic to the disease that has been killing our body politic than he is to the body politic, which is the whole idea behind chemo. At the same time, once that disease is gone, evangelicals should be fully prepared to fight the downstream effects of that toxicity. And they will not be inconsistent or hypocritical in doing so.

BLM

Bad illustration RDW. It is routine for people to die from Chemo-therapy. Indeed, I would say that as a minister I’ve seen more people die of their chemo-therapy than I have seen people survive the chemo-therapy. By your voting for the Big Orange, RDW, you are the Doctor applying the Chemo. As the patient I’m not particularly confident you know what you’re doing RDW.

Secondly, on this score, it does seem hypocritical to vote for a guy whose administration has campaigned for the end of anti-sodomite laws throughout the world only to turn around and fight the guy on his Log cabin Republican appointees.

RDW writes,

If the Democrat wins, we will be in a very different place in 2024 than we will be if Trump wins. And I can see a route to where we ought to be from a post-Trump era, in a way that I cannot see from, say, a post-Sanders administration.

BLM

Here is the Consquentialist argument again. Voting Trump is not ideal but it is a better non-ideal then the non-ideal that Bernie would give us.

As I said earlier, I consider this the most convincing thing DW has said. It has all the trappings of making good sense. Still not good enough of a reason to violate God’s Word which is what gives meaning to our vote.

God’s word says,

I Corinthians 6:14 “Do not be unequally yoked together with unbelievers. For what fellowship has righteousness with lawlessness? And what communion has light with darkness? 15 And what accord has Christ with Belial? Or what part has a believer with an unbeliever? 16 And what agreement has the temple of God with idols? For you are the temple of the living God.”

Now, I have taken plenty of heat over the years to applying this text to the habit of voting. However, I remain convinced that a vote is a yoke. A yoke is a tying together of parties to end of accomplishing a particular task. When I vote I am yoking myself to the candidate I am voting for. I am transferring to him my authority to act on matters. I am lending him my strength. When he acts, I act in him. Some will remember this is the old idea of federalism.

There is no doubt that Trump is a better evil man then Democrat evil men, women who want to be men, and men who act like women, but where does Scripture allow me to vote for men who are not quite as evil as other men? Particularly when I’m expressly told “be ye not unequally yoked.”

RDW

Offers that a vote for Trump will lead to,

“the crown jewel of a remade judiciary will be the possible reversal of Roe.”

BLM

At this point I am wondering if Idaho has made Marijuana legal.

Seriously though, how many times have we been led down this path? Reagan is now 40 years in the rear view mirror. Reagan was going to give us “a remade judiciary with the possible reversal of Roe.” two of the three SCOTUS justices that the Gipper appointed voted to support Roe. Bush I appointed one pro butcher and one pro life.

Every four years since 1973 we have been told we have to vote for the Republican for President so that Roe could be overturned. That is now almost 50 years ago and there is no indication that Roe is going to be overturned. Fool me once, shame on you. Fool me twice, shame on me. Fool me for 50 years and I’m a fool.

RDW

RDW next suggests that the deep state might go to jail for their crimes if Trump is re-elected.

“a number of people who ought to be in jail will be given a fair trial toward that end.”

BLM

A handful of far lesser lights went to jail for Watergate.

Does anyone really think that Hillary, Comey, Brennan, Clapper are going to be put on trial? For Pete’s sake Doug, they didn’t even put McCabe on trial.

I suppose someone will accuse me of being overly cynical but after knowing that Col. Edwin House, Harry Hopkins, Owen Lattimore, Henry Morgenthau Jr., Harry Dexter White, Lauchlin Currie, the Dulles Brothers, etc. ad nausea never served well deserved jail time then you’ll excuse me if I see a pattern that suggests that RDW is as high as a kite when he thinks any of the Russia Pee story contributors are going to jail. I think I’m merely being a realist.

RDW’s last paragraph reads like stand up comedy.

RDW writes,

And last, the Trump era has exposed the real divide in America. This divide is not between Republican and Democrat (although the two parties have served as platforms wherein different factions try to manipulate the divide). The real divide has been between an elite and unaccountable ruling class, on the one hand, and the ruled taxpayer, on the other. But the problem is not the existence of elites, which is inescapable. The problem is the existence of unaccountableelites, which is the kind of thing our original constitutional framework was designed to prohibit and exclude. For every check, there must be a balance, and for every balance there must be a check. Our divided America is not an America divided between to rival political parties. Our America is now divided between two rival constitutions. One is the Constitution drafted by the Founders, and the other is an upstart constitution assembled out of various bits and pieces — erratic decisions by progressive judges, the implicit tyranny of the regulatory agencies, the apparatus that has been built up on the 1964 Civil Rights Act, a kennel-fed media, and so on. While Trump does not represent the originalist approach, he does represent an existential threat to the other approach, which explains the state of high panic, and all the dirty deeds being done out in the open. Trump represents that kind of threat for all kinds of reasons, mostly having to do with the divine sense of humor.

BLM responds,

I know Marijuana must be legal in Idaho.

Does RDW think this is something new? We’ve been living with this since the Lincoln Administration. Is he not familiar with the unaccountable elites of the Wilson, FDR, LBJ etc. administrations. We haven’t been living by our original Constitution since 1861. And Doug thinks voting for the Big Orange is going to change that.

I remain convinced that the Democrats and Republicans represent two sides to the same Elite coin. I’ve seen nothing that proves absolutely that Trump is any different. On the most important issues Trump continues to pursue the long established agenda. Trump is even more avidly Israel than any of our previous Presidents. Trump continues to grow the State as seen in his reckless spending. Trump as recently as 8 weeks ago publicly advocated increased legal immigration. Trump is pushing the sodomite agenda. The refugee problems remains untamed. (See Ann Corcoran’s website). These are indisputable facts.

Trump has talked the talk but like so many “conservatives” he doesn’t walk the walk so well.

Let me round off by saying that I think there is a chasm between who Trump is and what Trump symbolizes. If Trump really was what Trump symbolizes I’d vote for him in a skinny minute. But I’m convinced that what Trump symbolizes is the schtick that keeps the RDW’s on the Trump train.

I will defend Trump to the hilt when the discussion is on what Trump symbolizes. This is why I loathe “Never Trumpers.” They don’t get it that Trump is a symbol. Symbols are important and should be defended. But neither can I lock arms with the Trump fan-boys, who don’t seem to get that Trump isn’t what Trump symbolizes. It is an odd position to be in.

I don’t think Rev. Wilson’s argument for the Reformed voting for Trump is a good argument. In point of fact I think it is a particularly awful argument.

Believe me, I gain very little advantage in my circles by opposing Reformed folk voting for Trump.