Sharing and Bearing the Economic Burden

What is economic security?
What is economic insecurity?
What causes both?
Do we understand these issues and the causations behind them?

We are living, as Americans, as well as citizens of other country's, in an environment of economic instability which pits one against another like we've seen all too many times before. Left against right, religious against irreligious, white versus black, or any other ethnicity, and of course, the rich versus the poor. But these various partisan contrasts are all too convenient distractions and diversions from deeper issues driving our economic lives.

If we stand still for a moment (admittedly very difficult to do in this hyperactive internet culture we live in) and look for a moment at some wise voices from our past, just as our former President Dwight David Eisenhower, in his farewell address to the nation in 1961, where he spoke of the danger of the Military Industrial Complex, we'll hear a deeply needed wisdom we desperately need today.

But while he spoke of a military/economic threat from within in this speech, he also was working from a framework that assumed a certain baseline that we now no longer see assumed. For instance, in Ike's day, the income tax was extremely graduated. The top earners paid over 90% of their income to the feds, and as the income went down, the tax rate also went down. And yet, strangely enough, this was for many considered to be a "golden era" of America's economic prowess.

Was this era as "golden" as some would have it be? No. As in anything the picture is of course more complicated. But we should remember that this "golden" period was also the time when unions were also at their strongest, both public and private. At that decisive time, both corporations, government, and the power of workers through their unions were much more evenly divided. This division of power exemplified perfectly the political philosophy so well expressed by our founders in the Federalist Papers which I so highly regard.

But an issue which the American founders didn't fully consider (understandably so) was the full expression of the industrial revolution combined with legal corporatism as understood by the US Supreme Court. This legal issue of corporate "personhood" (please check out the amazing DVD "The Corporation") is, to this day, an unresolved question of what it means to be a "person" under the US Constitution.

Till we deal with this issue both politically and legally and constitutionally, the problem of sharing and bearing the economic burden will not be dealt with adequately. Either we are all equal under the law or we are living under a Huxleyan world where some are more equal than others.

Terrain

Would you want to live in a world of only plains? Or maybe a world filled with only mountains? Or even a world filled with only cities? Or only small towns? Or only the ocean? Would you want to live in a world with only vast stretches of desert? And of course we can extend this image to other areas of life: Would you want to only taste sweet foods? Only spicy foods? Only salty foods? Would you want to live in a world filled with only extroverts? Or introverts?

And here it starts getting trickier. Should we want to live in a world filled with only Christians? Muslims? Jews? Atheists? Liberals? Conservatives? Post-Modernists? Libertarians? And then what about those within our particular "camp" who still disagree? Shall we only live in a world filled with our particular "vision" of atheism, Christianity, Judaism, Islam, etc, etc, etc.

We have a very natural human tendency to want to shape the rest of reality to our own already set beliefs and behaviors (can we say confirmation bias?). Thus we also tend to want the rest of reality to reflect our own sensibilities. We can do this either by outright rejecting any competing claim to the epistemological terrain or by reframing (and usually distorting) those competing narratives so that they end up suiting our own desires. I know this tendency well, since I've engaged in it on a regular basis myself.

I've lived in a number of different "terrains" both physically and ideologically and spiritually and emotionally. If I only ever saw a city landscape, I'd either get bored with it or see it as the only possible reality. And my all too natural instinct would be to either deify it or demonize it. In that sense, I guess I'm extremely grateful that though I did grown up in NYC, I also grew up on the south shore of Staten Island, which was and is still quite wooded and rural. So while we climbed trees and traversed many wooded paths, we also were a stone's throw from the concrete canyon of Lower Manhattan.

I often only half jokingly say we were the Beverly Hillbilly's of NYC.

But along with being culturally rural so close to a city environment, my family was also quite politically liberal in a very conservative neighborhood. We learned early on that not being in sync with the political majority held it own costs.

Another beautiful benefit of my very broken family was that we knew and interacted with those different than us. I was exposed to friendships with Jews, blacks, Latinos, Asians, the developmentally disabled, the homeless, etc. from early childhood. Though, in the midst of our own brokenness, it was always tempting to retreat into an interior reality blocked off from outside experience, experience, and I believe God, gave me a sense what it's like to walk in other people's shoes.

So again I appeal to my conservative friends to get to know and learn from liberal friends. And likewise, my liberal friends need to truly listen to what conservatives have to say and why. And on another spectrum, my atheist friends need to know more religious folks, so that you don't only see the caricatures presented by the supposedly "new" atheists. And of course, my religious friends also need to know, as in actually know, those who don't share your own convictions, and listen with a spirit of generosity to those who deeply differ.

So, for me at least, I choose to walk a path that includes mountains and plains, oceans and rivers, cities and towns, liberals and conservatives, atheists and believers. It doesn't mean I deny a particular sense and sensibility of reality. But it does mean that, even though we may deeply disagree, I will listen to you, because you do have something good and important to say to me.

So in this spirit, let's talk. Truly and truthfully.

What Do We Mean By Economic Rights?

How should we consider the ethics of economics? Ask an economic
"conservative" what they mean by "economic rights" and ask an
economic "liberal" the same question (at least in the American
context), and you'll get an affirmative answer from both. Yet
both will mean deeply different things in their seemingly identical answers.
To the "conservative", "economic rights" means individual liberty
in our individual interactions with other individual actors.
To the "liberal" this same term means something quite different.
To the modern liberal, to speak of economic rights is to speak of a baseline of equality that presupposes commonalities that sees social systems as being as much involved as individual actors.

Since I speak as both a conservative and liberal in different respects, in so much as I'm deeply conservative in my anthropology (seeing us a deeply fallen species), but also deeply liberal in so far as I see us as deeply bound together as one species recognizing that we are united, tied together, ultimately envisaged as all human, ultimately equal.

In light of this disparate reality, let's explore how we can move forward. We can differ in all of this without becoming disparaging?

Moving Forward Politically

We live in tumultuous times. Gee, what a surprise! The partisans of the doctrinaire certainties tell us that absolute certitude is the only way. My friends on the left, who are many, tell me that anything from a "conservative" perspective is automatically wrong. And likewise, my friends from the right, who are also many, tell me that anything from the left is automatically wrong.

I understand this impulse. I do. It's all too easy to see reality in starkly black and white terms. Us/them, either/or, all or nothing possibilities. However, when we engage in this behavior, we allow ourselves to become captive to a construct that ends up imprisoning us to the frameworks presented to us. It doesn't have to be that way. Each of us can make a choice to break out of this false dichotomy.

Here's how:

Make friends with people who disagree with you. Listen to opposing voices. Consider opinions based on different assumptions than yours. If you're liberal, make a conservative friend and do the hard work of listening to them. If you're conservative, make a liberal friend and do the same. If you're secular, make friends with a person of faith and listen to what they say and how it guides their life. And likewise, if you're religious (like me), make friends with a secular person, whether an agnostic or an atheist, and take the time to listen to what they say and why they say it.

Wisdom exists beyond our own shores. Sights can be seen beyond our own horizons. Are all views equal? No. I'm not a thorough going relativist. I believe in basic human equality against those who argue otherwise. So some arguments must be engaged forthrightly.

But even in this, we must acknowledge our common humanity among those with whom we deeply disagree. In the days ahead, we must seek truth, engage truthfully, and engage firmly with those we seek to both convince and learn from.

Drowning Lake, Baptism, Death, Water

Scene 1: Drowning Lake
I almost drowned in this lake when I was around seven years old. It's just down the street from where I grew up on Staten Island and we always called it the Dismal Swamp, though in this picture it's quite pretty. A group of us were hanging out at the lake and I was standing on the outside of the railing alongside the road at the edge of the lake when I slipped on the rock I was standing on and went completely under the water. I didn't know how to swim (I still don't) and so I had to be pulled out of the water by someone else. I think it was one of my siblings, though I'm not sure. All I know is that it terrified me and left me phobic about water for many years after this traumatic event occurred.

My fear of water made taking baths a constant ordeal and I didn't take a shower till I was a teenager because having water even touch my face seized me with terror even years later. If my face went under water in any circumstance I was panic stricken. It took my cousin Betsy in North Carolina to finally get me to overcome my fear and step into a shower for the first time. I think the only reason she could get me to take such a drastic step (to me at least) was because I had a serious crush on her.

Scene 2: Baptism
When I was twenty one years old in the summer of 1986 I was baptized in the Atlantic Ocean at New Dorp Beach by a Messianic Rabbi/Pastor as jellyfish floated menacingly nearby. My heart was pounding, not only because of the spectacle of being publicly baptized in a rather crowded venue, but because being forcibly submerged under water three times in a row (Father,Son and Holy Spirit, remember?) scared me to death. It's a good thing I didn't know about the jelly fish floating nearby till only after the baptism or I never would have gone through with it. Even now I only half jokingly tell my baptism story as being nearly a baptism of fire if I'd been stung. But my fear of water was overcome by my sense of calling to be identified with Christ's death and resurrection, symbolized by baptism.

Scene 3: Death
It was July 27, 1998 and I had worked at Project Hospitality that day on nearly no sleep because I had spent the previous night till 5am with Gwenn who lived next door to me in our apartment building. We had talked, wept, held each other, ands struggled through a long night of trying to figure out who she wanted to be. I had my own struggle of loving her more than anyone I had ever known, and yet knowing that she was involved with someone else. And yet we loved each other deeply in our own way. In some ways deeper than even her other relationships. We saw into each other's souls.

Well, when I came home from work I found police cars swarmed around our apartment building. As I walked around the side to walk up the three flights of stairs cops were along the whole way, each looking at me with eyes of suspicion. When I got to the top steps, halfway between my apartment and hers, with her door open and cops standing guard, I asked what was going on to no avail till Gwenn's father heard my voice and cried out that she's dead. She's dead. She had drowned in their back yard in-ground pool just a little bit earlier. Her mom had discovered her in the pool. Apparently she had taken her car to their house but had run out of gas on the way (her gas gauge was broken) so she had to walk about a mile to the house in high heat and high humidity. All while wearing her dancing outfit underneath her outer clothes because she was a dancer and had planned on going to dance class that day. When she got to the house, she couldn't get the front door lock to work. We know this because her key was still in the lock after she was found. She then went around back to get in through the back door, but that was locked as well. She must have sat at the edge of the pool to cool off. Apparently the coolness of the water combined with her exertion from the long walk and heat retaining outfit she was wearing was enough to cause her to faint. She fell into the water and drowned.

When I was driven to their house, she was still there. I collapsed once in the front driveway, but made it to the back and saw her lying, stiff, at the side of the pool, covered to protect her dignity. I staggered towards her lifeless body and knelt down beside her and touched her hair. She still had the most beautiful hair in the world. In the days that followed, hazy as they were, I sat Shiva with her family, attended the funeral, which was a traditional orthodox funeral. I was allowed to see her even though I'm a goy, because her family saw me as family. She had clay tablets on her eyes from Israel so that in the resurrection she'll see Israel first. I gave her my Star of David necklace that lies with her to this day because she held it that last night in her hands as I wore it and told me how much she liked it. I knew it had to be with her as a piece of me since when she died a part of me died too. And I wanted to be with her, even in burial.

These three scenes, all involving water, have deeply shaped me. To this day water exercises a primordial power over me. It both terrifies me and enchants me. In my darker moments of depression, when Darkness Itself stares me in the face, water beckons, both as friend and foe. Feared enemy and comforting friend. This September I wrote a poem where water played a vital if only a seemingly supporting role:

Dancing on the Cliff

When depression and addiction
do their deadly dance
the waves beckon below
as the melancholy music plays.

In each others grip
we dance and twirl and spin about
laughing and crying
ourselves to death.

The fog horn blows
and the train whistle sings
as the night descends
and the dance begins.

The wind blows in our hair
and sings a tune blue and true.
A lulling tune that grips us tight
and sees the pebbles fall below.

The ocean below roars
and sings its own song
low and deep forever
lapping at my heels.

And we dance and dance again
to a tune that plays every day.
I know the tune all too well
in its sultry slippery notes.

Cold soil against my feet
warm my soul and keep
me grounded knowing that
the Earth is my friend.

So we dance
and twirl about
in a moonlit sky
as waves and wind blow.

So we dance
and twirl about
in a moonlit sky
as waves and wind blow.

Pebbles and rocks
call out to each other
as our steps intermingle
with ocean spray.


So water still plays its part in my life, even today.It rises up and calls my name over and over again, beckoning me both to death and life. These liquid demons need to be redeemed by a drowning savior.

THE CLASH OF CIVILIZATIONS AND THE REMAKING OF WORLD ORDER: Samuel Huntington Chapter 1 The New Era in World Politics

Sam Huntington opens his Clash of Civilizations in chapter 1 on the heels of the collapse of the Soviet Union and the Iron Curtain that had separated Communist East with Capitalist West for over a generation. The old Cold War dichotomy was dead, and it looked like the “free world” had won the final battle and we were headed toward an era of peace and prosperity, that if not quite the millennium, was seen by many Western academics as the “end of History” (Francis Fukuyama).

            Huntington though, ever the realist, saw things differently. He recognized (I agree with him here) that the era of ideological divide was over; the era of intra-Western debate about forms of government or what economic model to follow, but that this wasn’t going to usher in some secular eschaton. In fact, what this collapse/victory did was open up the field to long suppressed senses of identity that had been smothered but never extinguished by the 20^th century’s ideological divide.

            This dormant but not dead sense of identity regained prominence almost immediately in places like Yugoslavia, Chechnya, Rwanda, the Sudan, etc. where civil wars broke out often along tribal and religious affiliations. Now certainly there were these kinds of conflicts of “culture” during the Cold War era as well, and many thousands were killed and displaced because of them. But because these conflicts didn’t involve potentially world ending weapons of mass destruction, and the Cold War antagonists did, these “lesser” conflicts were relegated to back burner status.

            Once this “new era” in world affairs occurred after the collapse of the Soviet Union and the Eastern Bloc, there were several ways of viewing the world that Huntington describes next.

Two Worlds: Us and Them. This other dichotomy replaced the Cold War us/them dichotomy along similar lines and has a simple elegance to it that’s very appealing; the modern democratic West versus the rest of the world. And yet its simplicity is also its downfall. The non-West is just not unified in the way the modern West is and so there’s no neat and simple contrast to posit.

184 States, more or less. This reflects the realist perspective that “States” are the main actors in world affairs and history. And while that is still largely true, it ends up being a less than satisfactory explanation for the complexity of world affairs, since we are faced with not just non-state actors, such as al Qaeda, Muslim Brotherhood, and the power of multinational corporations, and more traditional supra-national entities like NATO and the UN, not to mention civilizational identifying.

Shear Chaos. The end of the Cold War leaves a world in a state of geopolitical anarchy. This view, like the states view is close to reality, but also suffers from being too simplistic. It’s accurate in describing a world filled with violence and various states and other entities trying to acquire weapons of mass destruction. But it isn’t just a chaotic world, but one still reined in by competing impulses that restrict the most outlandish behaviors among world actors. Not always of course, but often enough that the world doesn’t descend into some Dante’ like inferno.

Finally in chapter 1, Huntington explains that while each of the paradigms described above have their strengths and weaknesses, his civilizational model better serves not only to describe the current post Cold War reality, but also can serve as a predictive tool in seeing how our near future may go. He follows that up with a list of events just from 1993 to illustrate his point of how the world is reorienting itself along civilizational lines. I was struck at how some of these conflicts described from 1993 were so similar to what we see today, both in Europe and here in the US.

In response to this initial analysis from Huntington concerning the post-Cold War reality, I find myself largely agreeing with him contra Fukuyama and other more idealistic thinkers. I wish I didn’t! I’d love to believe in a world where knowledge trumps passion. Where we see more of what unites us versus what divides us. But like the example he gave from the novel Dead Lagoon, we still live in a world governed to a large degree by sensing our identity by what we’re not as much as by what we are.

In a similar vein, I’ve recently been reading a book by Cass Sunstein called Going to Extremes, which argues along similar lines that extremism is driven by that same us/them dichotomy, a dichotomy which needs an enemy to be better able to define who our friends are and who we are. As Christians, can we surpass this basic human impulse more effectively in the face of international tensions, ethnic tensions, and yes, even religious tensions? As a Christian, I’m forced in a way to be both a hard-nosed realist, but also an eschatological optimist. And as a Reformed leaning Christian, my eschatology doesn’t have to wait for Jesus to come back for things to get better. But we can begin the new creation work now, even if we know it won’t its ultimate fulfillment until the eschaton.

Grateful

I am grateful for faithful friends. I'm reminded that this is how God usually speaks to my deepest needs.