The "Debates"

I wish we really had debates, where pro and con was forensically argued, instead of opportunities for people to say "I am for good things and against bad things."  If we had debates, pro and con, it would have been Ron Paul vs. Newt Gingrich, and America might have learned something.

But Ron Paul, a dissenting voice, got 86 seconds to speak.  Jon Huntsman actually did a better job of articulating why torture is wrong, although Ron Paul had the better facts.

The debates showed the world that the Republicans are for unprovoked attack and torture in foreign policy, and bribery before all else.  The idea of zero based foreign aid (I like it, as long as it stays at zero) until foreign powers tell us what they can do for USA means anyone who takes USA money is a traitor to his own country.  Well, it is true now, but it has cover.  I guess republicans are into transparency.

There was Bachman, Paul, Cain and Perry who are Protestants, Gingrich and Santorum are Catholics, and Huntsman and Romney are Mormons.  100% of the Catholic candidates endorse pre-emptive war, murder and torture as foreign policy, in spite of the fact that all three are expressly condemned actively by church teaching.  Santorum, the "pro-life" Catholic, was particularly hopeful that we do far more torture and murder than to which we admit. Perhaps one reason Gingrich converted to Catholicism was because one can claim to be a Catholic and at the same time reject its teaching, without fear of contradiction at the immediate level (Rome is high above and far away, and scandal is a local bishop's problem.  Or no problem, apparently.) The protestants did better, with 25% (Ron Paul) decrying crime as foreign policy, and Mormons better yet at 50% (Huntsman) decrying crime as foreign policy.  Of course these statistics are not reliable, but the debates are silly too.  What is clear is if you are decent and go into politics, you will not get heard.

Local bishops will sometimes timorously step forward and caution a Catholic candidate who promotes abortion, which always causes harm and never does any good, but never step forward to caution a candidate on torture, pre-emptive war and murder, which always causes harm and never does any good.

500 years ago the Catholic Church was not a voluntary organization, today it is.  As a voluntary organization, it is safer to be around.  But voluntary goes both ways, people are free to join, people are free to disassociate, and the Church is free to say "mustn't darken our doorway."

There was a point when Jesus lost most of his followers.  Voluntary organizations that speak the truth run that risk.

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