By David Gushee
All eyes are on the November 2 elections, which appear likely to sweep Democrats from control of the House of Representatives and perhaps the Senate. Republicans also appear poised to make gains at the state level, especially in gubernatorial races. Many news stories feature President Obama’s relentless but weary efforts to shore up Democratic candidates through coast-to-coast campaigning. Many wonder about his own political future.
Regardless of the actual outcomes, there are reasons to be concerned about developments that have taken place during this election season. First on my list is the flood of money from vaguely named and anonymously financed outside groups. All of this money threatens to distort both the outcome of elections and the loyalties of those elected. The lack of transparency means that citizens will be unable to determine precisely who owes what to whom, deepening the sense of powerlessness of the average person in a system that seems designed to cut us out of real influence.
Meanwhile, it is hard not to wonder what actual benefits for real people in our society could be gained if some of these billions of dollars spent on elections were actually spent for something of value. Our school systems can’t afford to buy cleaning supplies, but we can spend millions for attack ads.
The Democrats are campaigning, in part, on their legislative achievements. These include a stimulus package to jump-start the economy, health-care reform, bailing out the auto industry and financial-regulatory reform. Republicans denounce what Democrats celebrate. If they win, they will try to starve or reverse health-care reform and will undoubtedly weaken financial regulations. Beyond this agenda of repeal they promise the usual litany of smaller government, lower taxes and reduced deficits — without any serious plan to cut the government’s expenses. We may face two more years of gridlock and fixation on the next presidential election, with little actual progress in addressing our nation’s problems.
Government exists to advance the well-being and common good of the nation. Everyone knows that those who seek to serve in government are motivated by personal ambition and not just civic duty. They want to win; they want to make a name for themselves; they want glory and power. Hopefully somewhere in all of that pride and ambition they care about the nation they fight so hard to lead, and will actually make policies that advance the common good.
These days it seems especially hard to see the sense of civic duty and commitment to national well-being among many who run for office, and among the parties. Sometimes it seems that they are mainly motivated by a thoroughgoing hatred for one another as individuals, as well as hatred for the opposition party. A desire to win for the sake of accomplishing something for the nation easily gives way to a desire to destroy the enemy for the sake of some Manichean victory of good over evil. I see our nation as something like a big sturdy old ship. It was built with care a long time ago and was set out into the world by those who loved it and had a vision for its unique possibilities. The hand on the rudder changed from time to time but there was still a sense that we were glad to be on the same boat and that we were heading generally in the same direction.
Now this old ship feels directionless. Elections, even when they give a clear numerical winner, do not seem to settle anything. Many hands grapple at all times for control of the wheel, and all hands below deck appear too busy slugging each other to do anything else.
And so we drift along with a foreign policy of constant intervention in other nations in order to gain an illusory security through the control of peoples that don’t want our control, all at the low, low price of $700 billion a year and thousands of young lives. We drift along with a federal budget that is way out of balance because no one is willing or able to make the hard decisions that would balance it. We drift along with an increasingly weak educational system. We drift along with a nearly 10% unemployment rate. We drift along with a retirement system that is showing alarming signs of future insolvency. We drift along with a deadlocked environmental policy.
Christians are called to “seek the peace and prosperity of the city to which I have carried you into exile. Pray to the Lord for it, because if it prospers, you too will prosper” (Jer. 29:7). Our American Babylon needs our prayers. And it needs from us not thoughtless participation in partisan combat, but a uniquely Christian moral witness of commitment to the common good and love of every neighbor.