By David Gushee
Augustine’s “Two Cities” theology of politics and history seems apropos today. The churches, motivated by love of God and neighbor, are called to join with their neighbors in pursuit of the contingent but significant common goods of the earthly city. We act as fellow human beings working for a modicum of peace, order and justice along with others. We do not invest ultimate hopes in earthly politics but we do care about the peace of the city in which we have been placed. We are neither utopian nor despairing about earthly politics.
Most political debates in a reasonably well-functioning democracy involve clashes in prioritizing what are all “goods.” Economic prosperity, access to health care, quality education, fiscal responsibility, growing social equality, security of person and property and a healthy and sustainable environment — these are all goods, and most of us want all of them. Sometimes we clash over which of these goods should take precedence, who is responsible for securing them and how they are best pursued.
From January 2009 to November 2010, the Democrats (sometimes with Republican help) sought economic prosperity through the $700 billion stimulus plan and by bailing out the banks, financial industry and auto industry; access to health care through a massive reform law; quality education through huge increases in federal spending and shifts toward greater accountability for teachers; growing social equality through a progressive tax structure; national security through ramping up the troop level in Afghanistan and changing the strategy in both Afghanistan and Pakistan; and a healthy environment through cap-and-trade legislation related to carbon emissions. Most of these approaches involved (or would have involved) spending more federal government money, but no new revenues were raised. Budget balancing was postponed until the economy recovered. Deficits soared.
The Democrats became hugely vulnerable politically because the fiscal outlays were not matched in the short term by sufficient visible results. The stimulus did not turn the economy around; the bailouts mainly seemed to benefit the bailees; education reforms look promising in the long term, but the numbers evidence a general decline in relation to other nations; the health-care law has not yet controlled costs or brought many visible benefits; nobody wants their taxes raised; the infusion of troops to Afghanistan has not yielded much good fruit, only more deaths; the cap-and-trade bill died in Congress; and we face annual deficits in the low trillions.
On come the Republicans to claim control of the House with a smashing victory. Listening to their victory speeches over the last few days, one does not find a universally shared positive vision. Here are the questions I find myself asking about their prospective contribution to governance:
- How serious are you about bringing the federal government’s budget into balance? Will you cut federal spending by 25 percent (as new British Prime Minister David Cameron is trying)? We know you will try to cut discretionary domestic spending. But what about the largest budget areas? Will you look at cutting costs for Social Security by raising the retirement age or changing indexing? Will you cut the Pentagon’s budget of $700 billion? Will you bring our troops home? Will someone establish a penny-pinching culture in Washington that tries to stretch every single dollar to its maximum effect? If you really do these things, you will find plenty of support, including from me.
- You railed against all the bailouts. But are you any less friendly or beholden to our nation’s big-money interests? Who paid for all those anonymous campaign ads in our $4 billion election campaign? What do they want in return? Hundreds of billions in bailouts made us suspect that there is a corporate-political crony system going on in Washington, with regular folks paying the price in taxes and our 401(k)s. Why should we believe that you will break this system? If you deregulate and the banks and the industry crashes again, will you really refrain from bailing your contributors out?
- Do you really believe, as Rand Paul suggested on election night, that in America there is no “rich” or “poor,” and there is no conflict of interests between people in different social strata? Will you really try to flatten the tax code so that everyone pays the same rate no matter how much they make? Is that fair to those on the bottom? Is it good for the country? How will budgets be balanced that way?
Presumptive future House Speaker John Boehner says that we need to have an “adult conversation” about our nation’s problems. Are any of you, Republicans or Democrats, capable of doing so? If not, given your extra-constitutional stranglehold on our nation’s political system, how do everyday Americans reach out and grab control of their own government?
Meanwhile — hoping against hope as Americans who want to see progress in Washington — let the church be the church. Whether the politicians succeed or fail, we will still be out here, working with our neighbors for a measure of peace, order and justice in the earthly city.