Societal Cohesion

“A second problem with pluralism as a goal for our society concerns the need for social cohesion. Sociologists widely agree that a common religion is necessary to hold a society together. When the religious base of a society is undermined, or its unifying vision is lost, the fragmentation of life and the polarization of society is likely to occur. Our society’s confessional pluralism, however, prevents foundational biblical principles from being the basis of social cohesion. And, thus, the issues of public policy are becoming increasingly intractable.”

David M. Carson
God & Politics — pg. 118

The resolution commonly pursued to the problem of pluralism that Carson notes is to create a pagan civil religion with the intent of serving as the unifying glue to hold a society together. The success of such a civil religion to serve as social glue is its ability to borrow enough from the competing religions in the society to satisfy all the adherents of the different religions. The result is a civil religion that is characterized by pagan syncretism. In America this civil religion was most clearly seen in the Chapel service in Washington DC following 9/11.

The observation here is important because one clear implication is that as long as there are religions out there who insist that confessional pluralism is something that we need to institutionalize are in reality working to insure that the civil religion of pagan syncretism will be the religion of the nation. Radical two Kingdom virus people should take special note of this.

Without some religion providing the glue which makes for social cohesion the result will be cultural disintegration and balkanization.

Reflecting On The Powell Endorsement

All his life African American Colin Powell has seen his career advanced by white Republicans who typically gain, each election cycle, about 6-8% of the vote of the black community. This means that Powell had to live with the perception among large percentages of the black community of being an Uncle Tom. This accusation has followed many many black people like Walter Williams, William Grigg, Clarence Thomas, Ward Connerly, J.C. Watts and Thomas Sowell, whose convictions found them being to “white” according to the majority black report. One only has to remember the foul things said by black people against Clarence Thomas when he was nominated to the Supreme Court.

When Colin Powell came out in favor of Barack Obama, Colin Powell did two things. First, Powell, got his blackness back. Second, Powell advanced his chances to ride the anticipated black Barack wave.

One thing that people should learn in this Powell endorsement is that most people’s loyalty (and their certainly are exceptions) to their people is stronger than their loyalty to foreigners who advance their career. This simple observation has for centuries been taken for granted by people as can be seen by people in leadership surrounding themselves with family members placed in important positions. (Think of John Kennedy putting Bobby in charge of the Justice Department as just one example.)

Another thing that should be learned from the Powell endorsement is that multi-culturalism doesn’t work. When push comes to shove people will gravitate towards their natal culture.

Critiquing Noonan

Peggy Noonan is a gifted writer. Unfortunately she is also a Republican elitist who, like so many of her “inside the beltway media” friends, thinks that the problem with Palin is her lack of intelligence.

http://www.peggynoonan.com/

Noonan was against Palin from the beginning as this youtube clip reveals.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZyN9UG2og_U

The problem with Noonan isn’t that she is wrong about Palin’s lack of knowledge, experience or familiarity with some basic core political philosophy. I’ve been making these same observations since shortly after Palin was nominated. I think Noonan is spot on in that analysis.

No, the problem with Noonan, in the true spirit of elitism, is that she seems to think that Palin, because of these deficiencies could perform any worse as a leader of America then most of the leaders that are currently running this country who have the knowledge, experience and familiarity with some basic core political philosophy which Peggy thinks is so important.

The point here is that the elitist experts running the country have bollixed things up royally, and this despite their so called “expertise,” which Noonan seems to believe is currently present in our leaders. Given how bollixed things are in the political realm, the question has to be asked if, ‘it is even possible that Sarah Palin could do any worse then those whom the elitist Noonan fawns over so readily.’ For that matter, I seriously wonder if the special education class at the local government school could perform any worse then Peggy’s “experts” who have been leading us.

Noonan, essentially makes the case that Palin is a novice who has no business being in the world of high stakes political leadership. In a normal world I would agree, but from where I’m sitting in the cheap seats the current parade of fools that we style leaders, couldn’t possibly be underperformed — not even by someone with the name of Forrest Gump.

So the fact that Palin’s isn’t qualified, is no reason to take Noonan’s warning seriously. We are awash in unqualified people (including former speech writers making their careers in journalism) serving as our leaders. What difference could it possibly make if a unqualified commoner were elected versus an unqualified elitist?

The ship of state is being run by fools. When such a situation obtains it hardly matters which fool, elitist or commoner, is serving as Captain of the Ship.