In Defense of Politicians

In a poll surveying popular feeling about the trustworthiness of persons in various vocations politicians ranked next to the bottom of the scale, just above car salesmen.

Skunks and wolves were off the bottom of the scale, although there are pet skunks, pet wolves and pet politicians. Owners of such subhuman pets are few in number, but almost everyone tries to own a piece of a politician with clout. There is an old adage, People get the government – and the politicians – they deserve. Politicians are put in office to serve the wants of those who put them there.

Years ago, in the early 1900’s, Lincoln Steffens did a series of case studies of corruption in government. One such study, in the city of Boston, analyzed the political machine of Boss Martin Lomasney. Lomasney explained to Steffens exactly how the thing worked – who got and who gave. Steffens challenged the boss and his machine to try to give Boston honest government. The challenge was accepted and the crew studied the possibilities, but after a year they gave up. They learned that if they gave honest government they would be thrown out of office by some of the people who complained about graft. A corrupt government results from the demands made on politicians by people who want special favors outside the law.

A few years ago I was talking with a businessman in Miami about a zoning variance which ruined the symmetry of a residential neighborhood. I asked him how it happened. He replied that there were some payoffs. I wondered why they didn’t elect honest officials, to which he answered, “If officials stayed honest in this city, they couldn’t be reelected.”

Politicians know the attitudes and the wants of their constituents, and try to work out compromises to satisfy their conflicting interests. They do this by catering to as many requests as possible and accumulating a bunch of IOU’s to be redeemed on Election Day. Politicians are no better nor worse than the voters who put them in office.

To paraphrase Cassius in Shakespeare’s “Julius Caesar”, the fault, dear Brutus is not in our stars, but in ourselves that we have corrupt government. Or to quote Pogo (only people over 40 knew him), “We have met the enemy and he is us.” The prostitutes, the shady hustler, the traffic law violators push through the precinct committeemen or the ward chairmen to have their misdemeanors overlooked by police and judges. They are joined by developers and builders who want building codes eased and violations ignored, and by business owners and managers who want health and safety regulations, and environmental protection requirements, forgotten.

Huge defense contractors bill the government for hundreds of millions of dollars in excess and illicit costs, and if a low level government worker whistles down the deal, he is shipped off to bureaucratic nether land, responding to pressure from the corporate executives and their well-placed stooges. To top it off the president of a major brokerage firm invites the attorney general of the United States to lunch and discusses the problem of the government’s discovery of more than 2,000 dishonest deals which cheated banks out of millions of dollars of earned interest. The result of the discussion: no person is charged with any offense.

It reminds me of the story in the New Testament (John 8:1-11) according to which a woman taken in the act of adultery was brought to Jesus for judgment. “Now in the law Moses commanded us to stone her.” Jesus replied, “Let him that is without sin among you first cast a stone.” One by one the accusers slunk away.  Jesus asked the woman, “Did no man accuse you?” “No one,” she answered. “Neither do I condemn thee,” was the Master’s judgment.

Passing judgment on the honesty of politicians too often demands that we point a finger at ourselves.

Soothsayers and Prophets

Would-be leaders always arouse a bit of skepticism in me.

A cartoon I saw pictured a man running around and saying, "The people are on the march. I am their leader. I must find out where they are going , so that I can lead them." A more pointed observation was made in a recent article, "A leader tells the people what they want to hear." Perhaps the essence of leadership is the ability to articulate the crowd's desires.

Franklin D. Roosevelt did this with his comforting "The only thing we have to fear is fear itself", and "Happy Days Are Here Again." Ronald Reagan played on the popular mood with "Government can't solve our problems, government is the problem", and his promise to minimize government so we all could get rich. Hitler promised Germans wealth and power by eliminating the Jews from German society. Lenin and Trotsky, in 1917, won the support of the Russian people who, hungry and disheartened by the slaughter of their armies by the Germans, rallied to the slogan, "Bread and Peace."

Here at home, Carter and Mondale fell short because, instead of presenting a glittering future, they presented to the voters problems to be solved. The voters - or a majority of them - chose what they wanted, including horrendous government deficits, an increasing number of citizens condemned to miserable poverty, and a mounting promise of mass suicide in nuclear war in a world wide shoot out. Any ethical criticism of the government now becomes a criticism of ourselves and therefore is unacceptable.

This business of telling people what they want to hear brings to mind a story in the Bible (I Kings 20:1-40). Ahab, King of Israel, had a state visitor, Jehoshaphat, King of Judah, and asked his guest to bring his army to help Ahab recapture Ramoth-Gilead, an Israelite city held by Syria. Jehoshaphat agreed, but suggested they first ask fortune-tellers to prophesy concerning the expedition. Four hundred of the seers met and told Ahab, "Go up, for the Lord will give it into the hand of the King." Jehosaphat was skeptical of such unanimity and asked whether a prophet of the Lord was anywhere available. Ahab replied there was one, named Micaiah, who also spoke evil of him. But, nevertheless, he sent for the prophet.

The messenger found Micaiah and said to him, "Micaiah, the King wants to go to war to recapture Ramoth-Gilead. He is going to do it, and four hundred seers have told him he will be victorious. Now, Micaiah, have a little sense. You're one against all of them. What you say won't change a thing. Be agreeable, go along with the crowd. Speak favorably of the King's venture and don't be a trouble-maker."

Micaiah replied, "What the Lord says to me, that will I speak." In a dramatic confrontation with Ahab and the soothsayers Micaiah predicts that Ahab will be killed, his army scattered, and Israel left leaderless. Ahab was infuriated and orders the governor of the city, "Put this fellow in prison, and feed him on scant bread and water until I come in peace." He went up to Ramoth-Gilead and was killed by a random arrow. The only words Ahab heard were those he wanted to hear.

It is interesting to note that with all the acclaim whipped up for the present political administration's programs as it moves to recapture a past - a figurative Ramoth-Gilead - the most consistent evaluation and critique of them comes from the leadership of Churches, both Protestant and Catholic, and the Synagogues which put loyalty to God above self-interest and popular pressures. The basis for that criticism is the dearth of ethical concern in those programs.

An English divine of the seventeenth century, Bishop Butler, once told his flock, "I do not want to make you happy, for to make you happy I would have to pamper your vices."

It's comforting to choose soothsayers over prophets, but it can have tragic results.

A Source of Shame - and a Remedy

The Reagan administration continues to be a source of embarrassment, if not shame, to the American people.

After the CIA, following administration orders, supervised the mining of Nicaraguan territorial waters, that nation filed suit against the United States in the World Court at the Hague. It asked for an order to the United States to stop the illegal mining, and the illegal sponsorship of the guerrillas fighting to overthrow the Nicaraguan government. It also sought damages for injuries allegedly inflicted.

The first issue went to the UN, but the United States vetoed any consideration of the dispute. When Nicaragua took the controversy to the World Court Reagan's crew announced its refusal to permit the Court to consider any American actions of the last two years. The Court heard arguments regarding its jurisdiction, and decided by a vote of 15 to 1 that Nicaragua had a right to sue and the the Court had jurisdiction. Only the American judge voted for the Reaganite position. The judges of all the countries allied with us politically voted for Nicaragua.

Why?

Senator Barry Goldwater, a conservative Republican, defined the situation. "This is an act violating international law," he wrote to CIA Director William Casey, "I don't like it one bit, from the President or from you."

America was a prime mover in establishing the World Court, and codifying international law. We used both in suing Iran after that nation had seized the hostages in 1979. The World Court decision at that time marshaled support for pressure on Iran, and eventually secured release of the hostages without loss of life. Now we have the spectacle of a government that denounces terrorism, as Reagan does, refusing to allow a Court of law to pass judgement on its own terrorist acts.

Reagan has put America in the same gang of international outlaws as Khomeini put Iran. Iran did try its case before the Court. Reagan won't even do that. The administration is like the mugger who won't obey a law that prohibits mugging, because such a law limits his freedom of action. Reagan says that submitting to the World Court would limit our freedom of action.

Perhaps none of this is shocking. Perhaps the observers who say - some with satisfaction and others with sorrow - that America now has a society and a government it wants, are right. A government devoid of ethical sensitivity and dedicated to greed, camouflaged as self-interest, the rallying cry of Ayn Rand, the guru of right-wing conservative dogma. Perhaps we are like the street gang, which, with guns and knives, takes freedom to terrorize its community.

We are in the Christmas season. Christians celebrate the coming of God into the world in the person of Jesus of Nazareth, the Messiah. We find hope in the angelic proclamation, "Glory to God in the highest, Peace among men of goodwill."

The first step toward the peace we want is to get an understanding of what an opponent wants, why he wants it and a knowledge of the experiences that have molded his thinking. Listening to an opponent is a lost art for the ideological fanatics of both the right-wing conservatives and their counterparts in the leftist crowd. Honest peace seekers will take the necessary steps and listen.

A top official of a certain labor union once told me of an experience he had in dealing with a national corporation with about fifty operating units throughout the country. The Chairman of the Board of the Corporation came to him with a problem. The union and management were squabbling in labor disputed to such an extent that, despite negotiations, about three hundred such disputes were going to arbitration each month. Could they cut back on that number? The two men developed a program in which they would go as a team of two to each plant for a series of seminars. The Board Chairman would lead the management team in an in depth study of the working man's point of view and attitudes. At the same time the union leader would conducts an in depth study of management problems and attitudes with the local union officials and stewards.

They took a little over a year to implement the idea. But at the end of that time the number of disputes going to arbitration had been reduced from three hundred to about twenty. The key factor was that each side listened to the other. The union got a superb contract and management got a stable, cooperative operation.

Instead of shouting epithets and making threats, adversaries (a favorite term in the Reagan administration) might try a little listening to minimize the disputes that go to the World Court, and might try a little listening to minimize the disputes that go to the World Court, and might contribute to a mutual understanding that will help achieve "Peace, goodwill among men."

Our Roots and Economy

Our civilization’s roots are in Greece, Rome and Palestine. The major root stock is of Jewish origin, and of its offspring Christianity. The cross-fertilization of Biblical ethics, Roman law and Greek philosophy has determined our social goals.

Even our economic life was stimulated by religious ideas. “Tawney’s Religion and the Rise of Capitalism” makes this point. He notes that in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, after the Reformation, certain nations developed more rapidly than others. They were the nations in which John Calvin’s theology was dominant. Calvin laid down a basic dogma: God had chosen, before the beginning of the world, those who would go to heaven and those who would go to hell. Nothing one could do for good or evil could change his fate. How did anyone know where he would go? The answer was easy. If God prospered you, you were saved; if he did not prosper you, you were damned. Everyone wanted to be saved and set out to prosper. The commercial revolution of the seventeenth century and the industrial revolution of the eighteenth century flowered. In France, which had been a commercial rival of England and Holland, a Church oriented government slaughtered and expelled the Calvinistic Huguenots. After that France’s commercial power declined.

Adam Smith studied the pattern of events and wrote his “Wealth of Nations”. He theorized that the free market place was the key to economic progress and laid down a set of principles as economic law, as immutable as the law of Medes and the Persians. Karl Marx went a step further and declared that all human actions were determined by economic factors. Marx was a Communist, but non-communists seemingly endorsed his premise. In college I was taught that enlightened self-interest was the ultimate control of human behavior. A whole school of philosophy grew up, glorifying selfishness. Ayn Rand was its guru. Unfortunately self-interest is rarely enlightened, and degenerates into cunning greed. The ultimate extreme is a statement by a few conservatives politicos that, “Some people may have to go hungry to improve the economy.”

The economy is not sacred. Useful it may be, but not holy. People are sacred.

The whole idea of human rights has its origins in the Biblical record. Nathan stands before David and Elijah stands before Ahab to pronounce doom upon them because they have murdered humble men in order to get their victims’ property. In the Great Books seminar, the first unit of study combined the story of Naboth’s vineyard and our own Declaration of Independence. The spiritual kinship is unmistakable. The prophets of Israel, with increasingly incisive insight, expand the range of human rights. Societies, governments and systems exist only to meet the needs of persons, - of all persons. Jesus capped it in the story of the last judgment. Even the poorest, the weakest and the least is a child of God.

Some Modest Proposals, with Apologies to Jonathan Swift

In his satire, “A Modest Proposal”, Jonathan Swift suggests that the poor peasants of Ireland might add to their pitiful incomes and alleviate their poverty by selling their small children as tender meat to intrigue the epicurean tastes of their rich landlords feasting at banquet tables. Trying to adjust myslef to the current political goal of deregulating all industrial and commercial transactions, leaving everything to the whimsies of the law of supply and demand in the free market, I offer some “Modest Proposals” of my own.

First, let the National Collegiate Athletic Association lift all restrictions on how much an aspiring athlete may charge to provide his skills to any of the colleges which may want his prowess on the gridiron, the basketball court, or the baseball diamond. At present, of he accepts more than tuition, books, board, room, and $300 a month in cash he becomes ineligible. How unfair. The poor guy needs a car, some walking around money, and provision for his future when he will be just a poor, uneducated has-been. I remember George Plimpton’s story about “Night Train” Lane, who, after four years of college football and five years as a star cornerback for the Detroit Lions, lay awake nights worrying about what he could do when he couldn’t play football. If some college wants to prostitute itself and its academic status by paying some young fellow $50,000 a year for ten touchdowns a season or ten baskets a game, what right do that college’s competitors have to set a cap on the earning power of a high-school kid?

On the other hand, why limit a college’s willingness to pay for a winning team? A 9-1 season for a football team may entice a Bowl game offer worth as much as $7,000,000 to the school. If the school wants that prize money, it, or its wealthy alumni, will have to buy the best players available, with payment either under the table or across it, openly. Academic ethics and standards should not stand in the way of commercially profitable deals between consenting adults.

Another element in the picture should be the repeal of all laws and rules prohibiting deals between athletes and professional gamblers. This is all part of the open market in the purchase and sale of services, all according to the laws of economics. That is one “Modest Proposal”.

A second “Modest Proposal” is to deregulate the drug business; repeal all laws concerning the production, sale, purchase and use of marijuana, cocaine, heroin and other mind shattering substances. Leave it all up to the open market, the laws of supply and demand. Think what this would do.

a. It would reduce process by making drugs available at lower cost.

b. It would release thousands of persons convicted of drug crimes, reduce demand for prison space, reduce prison costs and save taxes.

c. It would make unnecessary the crew of federal, state and county drug law enforcement officials, and further reduce taxes.

d. It would provide jobs for hundreds of unemployed people to refine raw materials into useable form, and thus reduce the welfare rolls.

e. It would produce increased income taxes from dealers operating in the open, and help reduce the federal deficit.

f. It would help the real estate market. Every dealer would rent a store rather than peddle the stuff from a car or on a street corner.

g. It would reduce the number of burglaries, muggings and robberies, because fewer crimes would be needed to finance the habit with lower priced drugs.

h. It would eliminate gang wars for control of the drug business.

i. It would harmonize with the prevalent political philosophy of letting the market govern our social patterns.

The “Modest Proposal” is nonsense. Does it irritate you? Good!

Ethics and economics have nothing in common, though ethicists and economists may be friends. Jesus said, “You cannot serve God and Mammon.”

In each of us a tug-of-war goes on between cash and conscience. Sometimes cash wins. Sometimes conscience. One of the tragedies of life occurs when we try to marry the two into one unity. 

Fairness in Media – The Con Game

P.T. Barnum and Jesse Helms have one thing in common. Both accept Phineas T.’s dictum, “There’s one (a sucker) born every minute.” Barnum’s heirs, following the maxim, offer a surgically altered goat as a legendary unicorn. Jesse tries to sell the illusion that his personal prejudices are acceptable standards for “Fairness in Media”. Both deals are flim-flam operations.

One difference between the two con men appears. Phineas T. understood what he was doing and found a bit of humor in outwitting his patrons. Jesse is entirely serious in his efforts to hoodwink his victims. He wants to silence the publication of any unfavorable information, true or not, which might affect his political future or his friends’ accumulation of wealth. He wants to buy Columbia Broadcasting System, and fire its news broadcaster, Dan Rather. He asks his public to buy CBS stock, and vote it according to his dictates in order to accomplish his goal.

There is plenty of evidence that CBS newscasts are fair, so far as any news broadcast can be 100% objective and fair. Academic studies of news broadcasts place CBS in the center between liberal and conservatives. It attracts listeners, in competition with other broadcasts. If people perceived it to be unfair, they would turn it off. In the market place of cash values CBS news, under Dan Rather, measures up as a good bargain for advertisers. What it would be, if Jesse adulterated its output through censorship, is open to question. If Jesse’s investors follow his advice they may find they have out their money in a sinking ship. Profits, not political prejudices, govern the broadcast business. CBS news makes profits.

If the Senator wants a different news broadcast he can start a TV station and see if his newscast can compete with the newscasts he wants to destroy. Or he might try to persuade his cohorts not to listen to CBS. In the light of the Senator’s past record of bias, his protestations remind one of Matthew’s gospel (7:3-5). “Why do you see the speck that is in your brother’s eye, but do not notice the log that is in your own eye? – First, take the log out of your own eye, and then you will see clearly to take the speck out of your brother’s eye.”

One fact must be faced: no person who tries to inform or influence another person is unbiased. Each of us has a mind-set, slanted and bent by the pressures if our past experiences. A scientist sees the universe as a mathematical formula. An artist sees it as a beautiful harmony of shape and color. Lovers see in each other beauty and charm. To outsiders they appear plain and ordinary. Lovers will never suffer much disillusionment, but the rest of us need to be aware of our prejudices. I have a bias in favor of Jesus of Nazareth, His teachings and His way of life. I interpret events and experiences in accordance with my understanding of Him. But I never try to gag those who disagree with me.

The motto of the ancient Greek Sophists, “Know Thyself”, is pertinent. When you are aware of your own bias and prejudices you become more tolerant of those with different attitudes. You contest the validity of their ideas; you do not demand that they be silenced, nor deprived of their livelihood.

Like Senator Helms, we want “Fairness in Media”. We have no reason to believe we can get it from him.

Hunger and Easter

Two news stories published during the Easter week carry an extra significance when matched against one of the episodes in the Biblical account of Easter (Luke 24:13-35).

The first item, in the Wall Street Journal, reported that in 1981 there were 31,800,000 Americans forced to live below the poverty level. That was the largest number of persons so classified since 1965. The number was still larger in 1982.

The second story cites testimony before a United States Senate Committee that due, in large part, to Reagan’s budget cuts, the number of children suffering from malnutrition has radically increased. The result is less brain growth in the children who will be permanently damaged by the reduced nourishment. The Committee is chaired by Senator Robert Dole of Kansas, a Republican, who is trying to hold the line against further ill-advised cuts in food stamps and child health care programs, as such cuts are demanded by the Reaganites.

It is amusing and disgusting to see the TV commercial showing the well-groomed woman in expensive clothes with every hair locked in place by a high priced hairdresser, walking through an upper middle class home, telling us how good it is for President Reagan to refuse the “quick fix” to provide jobs for the unemployed, help the homeless families whose homes were seized by foreclosures, and provide adequate school lunches for the children about whom the Senate committee if hearing. There is no hint of social sensitivity or social responsibility.

It is also a bit disturbing that no great army of “right-to-life” proponents are coming forward to protest the damage done by the short sighted programs of this administration. The highly touted retraining programs will be helpful to people a couple years from now, but homeless and hungry families need help now, today, “quick”.

All of which brings to mind the story of the walk to Emmaus, as told by Luke. Two followers of Jesus were walking from Jerusalem to that village on that Sunday, talking about the crucifixion and the empty grave. A stranger joined them and asked about what they were discussing. They informed him of the events involved and he related those events to Old Testament Jewish writings. As the two reached their home at dusk they invited the wayfarer to stop and have supper with them. As they broke bread together and shared their food with the stranger – and only then – were their eyes opened and they saw Jesus. What a lesson for those who profess to be Christians: “Inasmuch as you have done it unto the least of those, my brethren, you have done it unto me.”

The doctrine of separation of Church and State bars the use of Biblical writings in the public schools. However, a course in English and American literature can highlight these same set of values and even excite interest in the Bible. James Russell Lowell’s poem, “The Vision of Sir Launfal”, parts of which we memorized when I was in school, is illustrative.

The knight, Sir Launfal, strong, rich, handsome (as all good knights were), resplendent in shining armor, rode his charger out from his castle to begin a search for the Holy Grail, the cup from which Jesus drank at his last supper. The quest was fruitless. After two score years he returned on the way to his home on foot, impoverished, wrinkled and aged, garbed in shabby rags. By the roadside, as he trudged along at eventide, sat an old beggar. The knight stopped for a sparse evening meal, a few crusts of bread shared with the beggar. Then he took an old battered cup, filled it from the roadside stream, and offered it to the beggar. And lo, the cup shone with a brilliant glow, - it was the Holy Grail. The Last Supper was observed again at that roadside.

Quite possibly we shall experience a renewed spiritual fervor in America, when we are as concerned about sharing with the hungry as we are with profit and loss statements. If that requires cancellation of tax reduction – so be it.

The Death of Conscience

“I wrestled with my conscience, and I won,” the man said. It was not clear whether he was admitting or boasting; at least he did have a conscience with which to wrestle. If he won his matches often enough his worthless conscience could be discarded like a pair of worn out shoes, or would shrivel up like a dead leaf.

The story of Jacob’s nightmare, in which he wrestled with an angel (Genesis 32:22-32), so violently he was permanently crippled, illustrates how intense and painful struggle may be. It is a question, though, whether Jacob’s conscience was awakened by his fear of meeting his brother Esau on the morrow, or remorse for having swindled his brother out of his birthright.

There is a fad among some psychotherapists that conscience is the source of all neuroses and emotional disturbances. I have a friend whose counselor advises him to throw off all inhibitions and do whatever he feels like doing. Peace and contentment, he says, comes from returning to the Garden of Eden when Adam and Eve had no conscience. When they are of the forbidden fruit, acquired knowledge of good and evil, rose above their previous animal-like existence, and got a sense of guilt – that is when all human troubles began.

All the above ruminations are triggered by a gratifying news story. It recounts the efforts of a number of companies to bring a keener sense of ethics into business practice. Every businessman is forced almost daily into contests with conscience. Should he ship out a product which is faulty or may have serious side effects? Should he meet expectations of a customer’s agent for a bribe, and for what service? How is he to dispose of toxic waste? What about pollution emissions? For economy’s sake, should he slight safety programs and health endangering conditions in his facilities? Evidently these companies believe a little sense of guilt can be a good thing.

According to the story several corporations are holding seminars, not to lay down rules, but to study ethics as a personal concern. Leaders in religion and philosophy conduct the studies to try to develop sensitivity in the minds of management personnel toward ethical principles and standards. Instead of writing out generalized codes of behavior, these companies are seeking to create in managers an ethics element in their management decisions. DePaul University, in Chicago, now offers a Master of Arts degree in philosophy combined with a Master of Business Administration degree. Institutes in Cambridge, Mass. and Washington, DC are setting up educational programs for other companies which have intelligent and conscientious leadership.

It is a ray of sunshine in a dark world. We still have clouds. Stockholders still offer resolutions at annual meetings forbidding corporate charitable gifts. Skeptics are critical, saying profits are endangered by ethical decisions. The furor raised by conservatives against the Catholic Bishops’ pastoral letter concerning ethical social values tells us that the enlightened leaders of the “ethics in business” movement are in the minority. But we rejoice in the fact that such leaders are here. The ray of sunlight may break into a new day if the religious leadership in America will proclaim the dawn.

The modern corporation, in which management is divorced from ownership, and both see customers as “market” and see “labor” instead of individual workers, makes it easy to smother ethics. In smaller businesses the personal relationships are more immediate and ethical issues become more apparent.

The problem creeps over into government. In 1980, the Reaganites charged that President Carter was too much concerned with ethical matters to give the country the leadership it needed. By implication, they suggested they would not be troubled by considerations of morality. They have kept that implied promise. Did the American people really buy that policy?

The two latest examples of amorality are the efforts of the Reagan Administration to postpone, emasculate and sidetrack any action stopping the use of cancer causing dyes in foodstuff and cutting back on smokestack emissions which produce acid rain. Appropriate action would cut profits for Administration friends, and would “disturb the economy”. Human lives can be sacrificed, and rivers, lakes and forests can be damages to keep industrial costs down and profits up.

Administration officials sometime wrestled with their consciences and defeated them. Now those consciences are suffering from terminal illness.

Balaam’s Ass

President Reagan told a Savings and Loan officials convention that he would “stay the course”. Since then he has suggested speeding up the pace by advancing the next tax cut from July 1 to January 1.

According to most political analysts the voters commanded him to try some different routes to his goal of a balanced budget. He insists the analysts are wrong. His Director of the Budget and the Chairman of his Council of Economic Advisers warn him such an action would add to the deficit and make the depression worse. He rejects their wisdom. The leaders of his own party in Congress tell him the “course” is blocked; they can’t get the votes. He vows to beat down all opposition. He will not bend to alleviate the suffering of the unemployed shivering in the shacks and tents of the “Reagan Ranches” in the SunBelt to which he urged them to migrate.

All this reminds me of the story of Balaam’s ass, in the Bible (Numbers 22:21-35). Don’t stop reading. The President is not the ass. The ass is the intelligent character in the story.

Balaam was a man with a reputation for ability to call down supernatural powers from heaven. Balak was the king of Moab, who sent for Balaam to put a curse on the invading Israelites. Balaam saddled his ass, and went with the princes of Moab to make a deal. According to the story God’s anger was kindled against him, and sent an angel of the Lord with a fiery sword to block his way. The ass saw the angel in the road and turned aside into a field, but Balaam struck the ass with a club and drove it back on to the “course”.

Balaam rode on until he came to a narrow path and the angel with the sword stood there. The ass saw the angel and crowded to one side of the path, pressing Balaam’s foot against the wall. Balaam clubbed the ass again. They came to a narrow place where there was no room to turn aside, and there was the angel waving his sword. The ass simply laid down and refused to move. Balaam beat the beast, accusing it of making sport of him, while the animal cried out in protest at the unwarranted abuse. The ass saw the angel, but Balaam was blind, intent on “staying the course”.

Then Balaam’s eyes were opened. The angel informed him that only the donkey’s turning aside had saved Balaam from death. Balaam started to return home, but the angel sent him on his way with a message different from the one with which he began his journey – a message of blessing rather than cursing.

It is quite a coincidence that the wise ass of the story if the symbol of the Democratic Party.

The Conservatives Sanctify Greed

“Greed has become respectable.” So proclaims right wing conservative William Safire, with a shout of triumph, in an article published last week in hundreds of newspapers. Like the homosexual emerging from the closet, Safire comes out from behind the camouflage of “profit motive” and “free enterprise” to announce that “greed turns out to be the best engine of development.”  He bewails five millenniums of moral teaching which called greed a sin, and undertakes to sanctify the lust for wealth. He takes the motto of Rotary Cluns, “He profits most who serves best”, and turns it upside down to profane it to read, “He serves best who profits most.”

To support his contention he points out that greed has inspired the turn around from recession to what he calls prosperity in the last two years, as well as stimulate all economic growth in centuries past. He says that “greed” is derived from “hunger”, and is the greatest force to motivate mankind. He suggests that luxurious material possessions are the highest values known to man and greed for luxuries is the supreme virtue. Leave aside the fact that greed for luxuries and hunger for food are not the same thing. Leave aside the present mania for leveraged mergers which generate huge profits for speculators do not produce one bushel of wheat nor suit of clothes nor house or apartment. He overlooks a whole litany of troubles.

Greed is the driving force behind the drug traffickers, the Mafia, gang wars, embezzlers, crooked business operators in General Dynamics, General Electric, E.F. Hutton and hundreds of other dishonest enterprises.

Greed is the underlying cause of the warfare that threatens the existence of the human race and perhaps all earthly life. The struggle to possess the wealth of India and China precipitated World War I. The similar contest for the riches of China, Indonesia and the Middle East brought on World War II. At least fifty million persons were slaughtered needlessly to attempt to satisfy greed.

Greed results in acid rain in our water (as Haywood County is experiencing), poison in our air, and contamination in our food. The Reagan-Regan duo in Washington appoint a commission to study the effects of acid rain and then refuse to act on the recommendations of the report because such implementation will hamper the greed for profits. So much for the corruption which greed spawns.

We are grateful to Safire for one thing; he takes the mask off the pious faces of the right-wingers (including Jesse Helms) who he so vigorously represents, to reveal their basic motivation – naked greed.

What is most disturbing is the fact that some self-styled Christian preachers, flying the flag of “Moral Majority” have rallied around the right wing pirate banner of greed and find the two groups are brothers under the skin. It is a tragedy that the supposed disciples of Jesus Christ find their spiritual home in the temple of the worshippers of greed. They pass over the words of the Master, “You cannot serve God and Mammon” (Matthew 6:24), and Paul, “The love of money is the root of all evil” (I Timothy 6:10).

These Biblical statements are true, not because God dictated or wrote them. If God did dictate or write them, He did so because they are true. The battle between right-wing preachers and their political partisans on the one side, and the disciples of Jesus of Nazareth on the other side is made clear by William Safire.

We Believe in God – But Which God

We believe in God, therefore we are a great people. President Reagan proclaims this dogma to the world, supposedly to explain our superiority to other nations and cultures. The pious phrase, “Belief in God”, sounds good, and assures us the President is a good man.

The awful thing about the phrase, though, is that it is meaningless, and neither the President nor any of those who chant the same words, realize how meaningless it is. The real question is not whether you believe in God, but in which God do you believe. What is His (or Her) name?

The missionaries back from India, when I was a boy, told us about the devout worship of the God, Kali, to whom mothers tossed their babies in the crocodile filled waters of the Ganges River. They believed in Kali. Saul of Tarsus believed in Jehovah when he functioned at the stoning of Stephen. As St. Paul, he tells the Athenians, who had a whole stableful of Gods – Zeus, Aphrodite, Minerva, Dionysius, and others – that they were very religious, but he announced to them one whom they worshipped as “the unknown God”. St. James writes that the devils believe in one God, but they are still devils. The Jews exalted Jehovah, who was supposed to have chosen them as his special people to live in his own land, Palestine. He was a tribal God. The prophet Amos revealed a Jehovah freed from Jewish nationalism, declaring him to be a universal divinity, establishing worldwide ethical principles. Mohammed preached Allah – Allah is one, Allah is great. The Ayatollah Khomeini believes in Allah, the one God.

The early Christians said simply, “Jesus is God”. The Christians believed that we know God as we know Jesus. “God is in Christ.” Belief in God is significant only when the God is named and His character set forth.

In our Christian tradition we honor “the golden rule”. “Whatsoever ye would that men do unto you, do you even so unto them.” Let’s look at some of our national actions in the light of this rule.

Suppose the Cubans mined the waters just off New York harbor. How is this different from Reagan’s orders to mine Nicaraguan waters?

Suppose some Libyan terrorists invaded New Jersey and set fire to the huge fields of oil tanks around Bayonne and Jersey City. How does this differ from CIA terrorists, under Reagan, invading Nicaragua to set fire to that country’s oil tanks?

Suppose the Chinese, when they visit the United States next year, lecture at the University of North Carolina, extolling the virtues of communism, which has raised the standard of living for the masses of the Chinese people, reduced illiteracy, improved health care, and then urge Americans to change over to a communist society, How does this differ from Reagan’s lectures to the students at a Chinese University?

The President is so blind and insensitive to the demands of Christian ethics that he simply doesn’t comprehend that his actions are exactly the same as those he condemns in so-called godless societies. And such actions on his part are futile. St. Paul gives a bit of advice in Romans 12:21: “Do not be overcome of evil, but overcome evil with good.”

Reagan promised to secure world respect for America. He criticized the weakness of President Carter who got the hostages out of Iran alive. Reagan sent the marines to Lebanon and got hundreds of them killed. Is this a mark of respect? We refuse to let the World Court judge our actions according to law and we have become the bully on the block whom everyone hopes will get knocked down. Who wants that kind of respect? Former President Ford, in an understatement, says that the Reagan administration is “ethically careless”. Mr. Reagan needs to tell us which God he believes in.

The last stanza of Kipling’s “Recessional” is pertinent.

For heathen heart that puts her trust

In reeking tube and iron shard;

All valiant dust that builds on dust,

And guarding, calls not Thee to guard.

For frantic boast and foolish word

Thy mercy on Thy people, Lord.

Kipling’s poem is English Literature, and might be taught in schools.

Holy Week is Re-enacted Again and Again

We are celebrating Holy Week – the last week of Jesus’ life in human form.

It began, centuries ago, with what Christians call Jesus’ triumphal entry into Jerusalem on Sunday and ended in His arrest on Thursday, His trial and execution on Friday, and an empty grave on Saturday.

Forget the theological speculations that have clouded our view of the week and look at it as a contemporary news reporter observing the events develop.

For background, the observer should be aware of Zechariah’s prophecy, “Tell the daughter of Zion, Behold your king is coming to you, humble and mounted on an ass, and on a colt, the foal of an ass.” This king will throw out the foreign rulers and restore the Israelite kingdom.

Jesus arrives at Jerusalem for the week of the Passover. He arranges to ride into the city in a style fulfilling Zechariah’s prophecy. The entry is a protest march against and a challenge to the rulers in the Sanhedrin. It culminates in the arrival of the marchers at the temple, where the event known to Christians as the cleansing of the temple takes place. To the merchants and the authorities it looks like a riot with the illegal and violent destruction of private property (Matthew 21:1-12)

Jesus proclaims a new kingdom. He brings good news to the poor, proclaims release to the captive, and sets at liberty “those that are oppressed.” (Luke 4:18-19)

God is concerned about His children – the weak, the poor, the lowly, the neglected and the outcast. He is also concerned about the rich fool whose barns are bursting with hoarded grain (Luke 12:16-21); and about the self-righteous older brother of the prodigal son (Luke 15:25-32). It is a kingdom ruled not by force of arms but by a spirit of mutual sharing and a sense of personal worth and belonging to a great fellowship of God’s children.

The authorities try to discredit Him with trick questions, but fail. In turn, He bursts forth with a harsh indictment of their hypocrisy, greed, and smugness. The issue is joined. Trouble is imminent. “If we let Him go on thus, everyone will believe in Him, and the Romans will come and destroy both our holy place and our nation;” Caiaphas, the high priest announces. “It is expedient that one man should die and not that the whole nation should perish.” He is a threat to our position, our power, our prestige and our possessions. (John 11:48-50)

In their eyes Jesus is not the sinless Son of God, but a menace to all right thinking people. He must be put to death. They bribe one of His followers to reveal His hiding place, seize Him in the middle of the night, rush Him off to a farce of a trial, organize a demonstration to cry, “Crucify Him,” and lead Him off to Calvary.

So they dispose of the troublemaker.

Does this sound familiar? It is the scenario for a universal, cosmic drama, repeated time after time all over the world. The arrest of Lech Walese in Poland and the attempted suppression of Solidarity in order to forestall Russian interference is practically a replica of the original performance.

Wherever Jesus’ teachings on human worth and human rights interfere with the plans of authoritarian rulers jealous of their power and wealth, Holy Week is re-enacted again and again. It goes on in Chile, in El Salvador, in the Philippines, and wherever there is oppression and neglect of the weak and powerless.

“Were you there when they crucified my Lord?”

If you are alive, you are there.

The Moral Majority’s Mission

The Moral Majority’s mission to Waynesville (NC) at Mt. Lyn Lowery raises some questions.

First, it sharpens the issue of Church and State. Our Constitution sets up a wall between the two as formal institutions. No organized sect, based on religious dogma can take power in government. Government, in turn, cannot legislate concerning, nor control, religious beliefs.  Every legal system mirrors morals or lack of morals of the society it governs. The “Moral Majority” members have a right to try to influence law making, just as do other persons with different or fewer or no moral principles.

There is an oddity in the “Moral Majority” in this matter. It has identified itself with a political crew that attacked Jimmy Carter in 1980 for his ethical concerns. They demand that he be more practical and pay less attention to right and wrong.

Some years ago I made a proposal to the Board of Directors of a human services organization suggesting a new special project. A minister of the Board asked, “Howard, can we afford it?” Before I could reply, a banker broke in, “It isn’t a question as to whether we can afford it. It’s a question of the right thing to do.” It was odd to find the clergyman being practical and the layman being ethically sensitive. The Board voted to do the right thing.

The basic issue for Christians is always, “What is the right thing to do?”

It is possible that the political outfit with which the “Moral Majority” has allied itself gas actually taken over the “Majority” as a tool for self perpetuation in office. I remember well the 1920’s when, in a neighboring state, a group of rascals seized on the prohibition movement to capture the Church vote to keep themselves in power.

One must always be suspicious of any individual or group that prides itself on its righteousness. Oliver Cromwell, three centuries ago, chided his fellow Puritans with this bit of wisdom, “I beseech you, brethren, by the mercie of the Lord Jesus, to remember that you may be mistaken.”

The present government in Iran shows what happens when the self-righteous get power. The efforts of the “Moral Majority” to destroy our Constitutional form of government by denying to the courts the power to decide questions of law and constitutional issues. The “Majority” this poses a threat to our basic liberties.

Jesus faced a “Moral Majority” in His day – the scribes and Pharisees. They were the good people. But in bitter terms he denounced them (Matthew 23:13-36). “Woe unto you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrite, for you tithe mint, dill and cumin, and have neglected the weightier matters of the law, justice and mercy and faith. You blind guides, straining out a gnat and swallowing a camel.”

For Jesus and the prophets morality calls for feeding the hungry, providing shelter for the homeless, strengthening the weak and the afflicted, healing the sick (even if they can’t pay), giving the poor equal justice in the courts, seeing that all children regardless of circumstances get a good start in life, reconciling enmities and enemies, and restoring the outcast and despised to a sense of dignity and worth as children of God.

These are the Major elements of Morality.

On Entertaining Angels Unawares…

I was there to get a gift for the Community Chest, the predecessor of the United Way. I was in a 9 x 12 room in a small house four blocks away from the nearest cluster of shops. The room was a grocery store with an inventory of about 60 cans of vegetables and several dozen packages of beans, flour and cereals.

A little, elderly man came from another room and in a voice with a foreign accent asked what I wanted. I explained briefly about the Community Chest and half apologetically asked for a gift – whatever he thought he could afford. His reply was startling, “It’s not what I can afford; it’s what I ought to give.” With that he found some currency and made, by comparison with others, a substantial gift.

I left, refreshed in mind and spirit.

•

It was 1936. Wage rates ran from 25 to 60 cents an hour. The rate on government work relief was 50 cents per hour for 30 hours - $15 a week for support of a family.

I was soliciting for Community Chest again. I met with an employee group, spoke about the Chest, distributed pledge cards, returned three days later to get the pledges. They varied in size from $2 to $5, with one exception – a pledge of $52. I knew the woman who made the pledge. Her earnings were $12 per week. I spoke to her, suggested her gift was unduly generous.

She replied, “Mr. Lytle, a year ago I was lying in the hospital, lying between life and death. I prayed, ‘God, if you have nothing for me to do, let me die. But if you have work for me, make me well and I will give you one tenth of whatever I get.’ Well, I recovered and got this job, and I’m giving God one tenth of what I get. How much I give is none of your business. It’s between me and God.”

I had nothing more to say.

•

The man was head of a family owned business employing 600 people. He was reputed not to be generous. He and I had become friendly, and he was generous in his support of our work with the handicapped and the underprivileged. On one occasion I told him this story.

A 16-year-old boy was paralyzed when he was three as a result of polio. When he was four, he lost both his parents. For 12 years he was a ward of the state. Now, at 16, he would be on his own. He was scared. Twice, he faked epileptic seizures on the street to get institutionalized to assure himself of maintenance care.

The state referred him to our program for training. We put him at some simple assembly tasks to evaluate his abilities. He wouldn’t come to work, or he would come in late. He offered the whole battery of excuses – he overslept, he missed his ride, he had a stomachache. He wanted to be fired and institutionalized.

In a morning’s work he would equal or better standard production, but when he found he had done that, he goofed off for the afternoon. He deliberately failed in order to persuade us to give up on him. In spite of this, we kept him on, paying him according to his productivity.

One day, in a conversation with his supervisor, he burst out, “You think I’m no good, don’t you.”

“You haven’t shown anything else.”

“All right. Tomorrow I’ll show you.”

The next day his production was eight to ten percent above standard, and he maintained that rate day after day.

We had a great day, beginning one morning after a six-inch snowfall during the night. Our boy was at work at 8 am. He lived six miles from the city. He got a call that his ride to work wasn’t coming. With legs encased in heavy braces he hobbled on his crutched from the house down to the roadside, crawled onto the bus that came by, and was at work on time. Three months later, we placed him in private industry, and he embarked on an independent, self-supporting life.

I explained to my friend that the whole program had cost us and the taxpayers who subsidized his living probably about $1500, but that it would be recovered through income taxes on his earnings and savings in welfare payments. To which the man replied, “Yes, Howard, perhaps. But for $1500 you made a man. No community ever made a better investment.”

Quite a set of values for a cold-blooded, hard-hearted, tight-fisted fellow!

•

Three angels I entertained unawares. It was much later that I recognized them as such.

They came in human form.

They gave me mild, gentle, kindly rebukes. Angels answer needs, not necessarily wants.

They brought a bit of divine wisdom into mundane events.

Oddly enough, none of them thought of themselves as angels.

“God moves in a mysterious way.” (Hebrews 13:2)

The Devil in Our Midst

It is disturbing, and depressing, to note the contradictions of so many theological and political conservatives who fill the airwaves with their mutually exclusive preachments. On one hand they demand that the criminal pay the full penalty of extended imprisonment for his misdeeds. On the other hand they announce that the sinner never has to pay for his sins if only he mouths the proper magic words, “The blood of Christ – Jesus paid it all.” It’s an easy way out of accepting responsibility.

The visit of Pope John Paul to the prisoner who tried to kill him dramatizes the issue. The Pope forgave his assailant, but the legal system keeps the man in jail to pay the stated penalty. One question comes up, “Where does God stand in the matter?” Isaiah 55:8-9 may shed some light on the affair. “For my thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are my ways your ways, says the Lord. For as the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways, and my thoughts than your thoughts.” The Bible spells out some troublesome ideas.

This is particularly true in our relationships with the rest of the world. The administration in Washington tells us we have won the world’s respect by our invasion of Grenada. In that invasion our forces bombed a hospital for mentally retarded persons, killed a dozen or more of the helpless inmates, and injured another score of innocents. We showed our power to coerce others to conform to our will. We have power.

In our pride of conquest we ignore the dictum, “Power tends to corrupt, and absolute power corrupts absolutely.” Centuries earlier, the same idea was set forth in simpler terms by a young man in Galilee, as told in the book of Luke 4:6-7. “And the devil took him (Jesus) up, and showed him all the kingdoms of this world in a moment of time, and said to him, ‘To you I will give all this authority and their glory, for it has been delivered to me, and I give it to whom I will. If you, then, will worship me it shall all be yours.”

The choice is clear. If you want power over others you must worship the devil. Conversely, if you have power over other peoples and nations, you have worshipped the devil to get it. Whether you believe in a real devil from a fiery hell or a devil who is merely the symbolic embodiment of evil, the processes are all the same. Worship of the devil and power to control others through coercive force go hand in hand.

So many of the more frequently quoted TV preachers insist vigorously that God dictated every word in the Bible. Then they proceed to ignore most of the Biblical teachings. They reduce the gospel to a lot of abracadabra. They adulterate the gospel with a batch of pious, magic phrases. They water it down to a nebulous glob. They mouth the slogan on our currency, “In God We Trust.” But practically, for the moment say “Let’s forget all that and look for salvation in MX and Pershing missiles, and more and bigger nuclear warheads.”

Christianity has a cutting edge. It calls for change in our way of looking at things, change in our attitude toward even our enemies, change in our way of life. We may accept or reject Christianity, but it can’t be ignored in the market places nor in the halls of statecraft throughout the world. We must choose between Jesus and Mars, between Christ and the devil.

Medicare Could Use Some Surgery

Medicare is on the rocks, financially. So says President Reagan.

The dollar amount of charges made by hospitals to Medicare is much greater than the funds appropriated for such costs. President Reagan is appointing a study commissioned to do for Medicare what special Social Security Study Commission did for that program. 

I have a limited knowledge of what hospital costs are, but I have acquired some knowledge of what hospital charges are. Last December I had an emergency operation at Memorial Mission Hospital in Asheville for a detached retina. Before I went to the hospital, the doctor gave me an estimate of charges for a seven-day stay, amounting to $2,300. The actual hospital bill was for $3,475. The discrepancy is substantial.

One item in the bill was shocking - a pharmacy charge of $677. The doctor's estimate for pharmaceuticals was $100. I did get some medication over and above the doctor's foreknowledge, but I was still disturbed. I wrote the hospital and asked for an itemized statement - and got another shock.

One medication I take daily, under doctor's orders, cost me just under seven cents, at retail. The hospital charge for the same medication was $3.04. In one case the charge was listed at $6.08. A third medication which I buy for 15 cents was billed at $6.60 for two units.

An aspirin tablet was billed to me at $3.12.

To get some comparative prices, I asked a druggist friend to note each item with which I was unfamiliar, and to also note his comparable price. The hospital charges run from 300% to 4000% of retail prices.

There is other confusion. One item for which my druggist friend charges $9.90 was billed to me at $63.28 on two occasions and at $31.06 on three occasions. Another item, no retail price listed, was billed at $35.20 on several occasions and at $17.60 on other occasions. There is no indication in the service code of the hospital that the higher price was for a double dose.

I spoke to my doctor about these charges and he said to take the matter up with the hospital authorities - no other comment. I wrote asking the hospital administrator for his comments. In reply I heard from the Director of Pharmacy Services: "We charge the actual costs of the items plus a fee which includes the following: inventory costs, drug profile screening, dispensing drugs on a daily basis, personnel necessary for 24 hour pharmacy operation and other overhead costs."

My retail druggist friend carries an inventory, keeps a drug profile on each customer and dispenses drugs on a daily basis. He is not open 24 hours a day, only 12.

The hospital pharmacist says his inventory is five times that of the community drug store. That may be so, but on the basis of my experience his inventory turnover and cash flow are just as rapid as that of the community druggist, and are therefore his inventory costs are little, if any, more expensive.

Two other categories of charges on my bill seemed high, but I have no adequate basis for reaching any conclusion about them.

I have been told not to worry about the bills - Medicare and my health insurance paid them all. However, I shall have increased taxes to make up the Medicare deficits, and shall have an increased Medicare deductible to add to my insurance company costs, all of which will increase  my insurance premiums.

It is also suggested that pharmacy charges are inflated to compensate for losses in providing other hospital services. Medicare pays whatever charges the hospital makes to Medicare patients, without raising questions about the propriety of such charges. In any case, a more thorough exploration of the reasons for escalated pharmacy prices might suggest methods of doing some surgery on Medicare deficits.