Maybe the most persuasive argument against America's growing wealth disparity is not a moral one, but a practical one: extreme wealth disparity doesn't work well because concentrating spending power in the hands of a few is a recipe for economic turmoil. Michael Lund thinks so:
[H]istory makes it clear that when economies mutate into plutonomies they become dangerously volatile. Just as a ship with a broad base is more stable than a top-heavy boat, so an economy in which well-paid workers create mass consumer markets for the goods and services they provide is more stable than a top-heavy plutonomy.
Ned Resnikoff criticizes (what he perceives to be) a reliance by conservatives on moral desert for their tax-cutting arguments. Does the hard-working billionaire deserve more than the hard-working waitress? What about the billionaire who inherited all his money? Etc. etc. He concludes that tax policy should "balance the state’s ability to provide needed services for all citizens, including its most needy, while preserving a capitalist system which rewards achievement, and therefore (one would hope) innovation, productivity and excellence." I tend to agree with Resnikoff's conclusion, but I think he mischaracterizes mainstream conservatism's tax arguments. He writes:
The only thing this debate about who deserves what really tells us is that very few people are willing to admit just how insubstantial and malleable our innate character really is. When you control for environmental, genetic, social, historical, and biological factors, what differentiates my own distinguishing features from Charles Manson’s -- or, for that matter, Obama’s, Palin’s, Lincoln’s or yours -- is either imperceptible or completely nonexistent. And if that’s the case, I don’t see how you can argue that either of us deserve more or less than any of those people.
What this suggests to me is that the only way you can coherently argue that a person inherently deserves a certain level of privilege or material comfort is to also argue that all persons deserve it, by virtue of their personhood. We already have language to describe these things that all persons innately deserve: we call them rights.
I find his degree of determinism a bit disturbing, but I think he also misses conservatives' main point. I don't think most conservatives focus on moral desert as the linchpin of tax policy. I think they focus on freedom. They're not the same thing. (I think economic freedom tends to get overplayed by conservatives, but that's another story . . .)
The European Centre for Law and Justice (HT: Volokh) reports on the Spanish government punishing a company for airing a promotional advertisement in defense of the traditional family.
Time Magazine has published an eyebrow-raising article about the Church's refusal to ordain women as priests (eyebrow-raising because of its one-sidedness, not because of the subject). Greg Kandra comments, as does Get Religion.
Human Rights Campaign has launched a new website called "NOM Exposed" dedicated to uncovering the "truth, lies, and connections about the so-called National Organization for Marriage." I'm all in favor of providing the public with information about important political issues, but one look at this website makes clear that the primary motivation is not to provide information, but to paint opponents of same-sex marriage in the most sinister light possible, a sort of public shaming targeting anyone with the gall to stake out a position in support of traditional marriage. Consider the "Rogues' Gallery" of various people involved with NOM, complete with unflattering photos. Or the scarlet and black color scheme for the entire site. Or the ominous revelation that "NOM's deep pocket" is filled by "Mormon Church, Catholic Church, Opus Dei," and . . . [insert blood-curdling scream here] Evangelical Christians!" Or the news that NOM associates with groups like the Knights of Columbus and people like Carrie Prejean!
As someone who is sympathetic with some of the concerns aired by the LGBT rights movement, I consider this website to be a huge step in the wrong direction. Reasonable people can disagree in good faith about the wisdom of same-sex marriage. One argument against SSM has been the fear that, once SSM becomes the law of the land, opponents of SSM will be driven from the public square and relegated to the margins of society currently reserved for unabashed racists. Those fears find fertile ground in this website. The push for SSM has seen some remarkable successes in recent months. It is especially troubling that, in the wake of this success, one of the largest and most influential pro-SSM organizations decides to ratchet up the nastiness of their advocacy. It does not bode well for the climate that HRC intends to foster once their victory is complete.
Michael Perry has posted a new paper based on his recent book. Here's an excerpt from the abstract:
On September 22, 2010, Florida’s Third District Court of Appeal – an intermediate appellate court – affirmed a ruling by a Florida trial court that a Florida statute banning adoption by homosexuals violates the Florida constitution. As it happens, the ruling by the Florida trial court was the principal subject of the Conclusion to my recent book, The Political Morality of Liberal Democracy (Cambridge Univ. Press, 2010). In the Conclusion, I wrote:
The Florida law not only violates the political morality of liberal democracy. The law – according to which, again, no one otherwise eligible to adopt under Florida law ‘may adopt if that person is a homosexual’ – is unconstitutional. The law is unconstitutional even from the perspective of Thayerian deference: Given the robust social-scientific consensus that has emerged to the effect that parenting by homosexuals is no less healthy for children – no less in the ‘best interests’ of children – than parenting by heterosexuals, Judge Lederman was right to conclude that no lawmaker could any longer plausibly think that the Florida law serves a legitimate governmental interest.
I cannot personally vouch for the "robust social-scientific consensus" regarding parenting by homosexuals, but I believe that bans on adoption by same-sex couples are problematic for an additional reason: in many cases, they amount to a refusal to recognize parent-child relationships that already exist. Second-parent adoptions by the partner of a child's biological (and legal) parent are increasingly common. Banning these adoptions does not end the caregiving relationship between the parent's partner and the child, but it does foreclose the stabilizing and protective role that the law can play within the relationship.
We regularly discuss school choice on MoJ, and in the past we've noted the tendency of political leaders who oppose school choice to choose private schools for their own kids. This morning President Obama at least was candid about his selection of Sidwell Friends for his daughters, opting not to hide behind a justification such as security needs, admitting that private school offers a better education.
Yesterday was Pulpit Freedom Sunday, the day designated to challenge IRS restrictions on political speech by churches. I'm guessing that the day went by unnoticed in most churches (especially Catholic churches), but Chuck Colson thinks that the time is right for a court challenge. My own view is that the Johnson Amendment (by which the restrictions were attached to tax-exempt status) did churches a favor by forcing them focus on issues rather than on particular candidates, though I admit that I'm not a fan of the state "forcing" a church to focus on anything in particular. Further, I do not view tax-exempt status as a government benefit, but as one of the last remaining shout-outs to a meaningful notion of sphere sovereignty in our system. If churches were given the authority to decide on their own speech, though, I would recommend that they keep up the current practice. We have a hard enough time not letting our churches be defined by the surrounding culture, and I fear that bringing partisan politics into the pulpit (rather than the underlying issues that may have partisan implications) simply exacerbates that trend. Thoughts?
I just received a postcard today for a Wake Forest Law School symposium titled "Patriarchal Religion, Sexuality, and Gender." The symposium happened last week and I have no direct knowledge of what transpired, but I have a good guess as to the tone and direction of the conversation that took place. Just for the record, if we want to have a rollicking discussion of the pitfalls of patriarchy, count me in. I get the feeling, though (in part from my past encounters with the work of one of the keynotes, David A.J. Richards), that the "patriarchy" label was being invoked early and often at Wake Forest, and that most of the ills of human history were pinned to it. Just from the blurb on the postcard, I learn that patriarchal religion "has been the chief guarantor of straight male power," and that "fundamentalist religions continue to claim authority over the principal social and legal issues of today." (Until relatively recently, of course, the fundy Protestants were faulted for dropping out of society and using law as a hedge to keep out the wilderness, not for trying to rule the wilderness!) I also missed out on the opportunity to hear how "patriarchal religious myth" is responsible for "the proliferation of pornography and woman-hating in Western popular culture." (I guess Jerry Falwell shouldn't have sued Larry Flynt -- apparently he spawned Larry Flynt!) It's not unusual to come across specific papers along these lines, but I don't often read of an entire symposium (apparently) devoted to this extreme sort of criticism. Nothing like a fair-minded and balanced engagement with the issues . . .
Since we regularly discuss the mission and function of Christian higher education on MoJ, readers might be interested in this reflection by Philip Yancey (one of my favorite writers) about his experience at bible college in the 1960s.
