Slough Off To Caesar That Which Is God's

I am amazed at the populist Bible interpretations being tossed about today by officials who otherwise only think of religion at times when they wish to hobble it or when they desire a furtive strategy in which to get what they perceive to be a reluctant, low-intelligence audience, to fall in line.

This is how, in the same week that President Obama's HHS gave notice that it will become mandatory for all health insurance providers to grant free access to birth control and abortive services, that he could also come forward to lecture US citizens on the Godlike status of benevolent government.

Jesus would want high taxes. Jesus would demand that the rich give to government. Jesus would want you to pay forty percent more for good highways than is necessary (and Jesus would especially want government to erect signs glorifying its benevolence to passengers stuck in stop and go traffic in a Cincinnati construction zone.)

Jesus would deem whatever inclinations the government has to be those of near holiness. Holy bike paths. Holy bankrupt green energy companies. Holy Kirtland's Warbler viewing areas. Holy cowboy poetry gatherings. Holy studies on whether Chinese prostitutes practice safe sex. In fact, its almost a wonder why Jesus hasn't cast the anti-government anti-tax demons right out of our bodies! (These, I believe, are all religious theories Obama arrived at sitting next to his anti-American wife in a pew while completely ignoring the sermons of Rev. Jeremiah Wright.)

Yet, there is nothing even plausible about a government that routinely denies children the right to pray prior to sporting events also being a worthy vessel of God's charity.

Then again, none of this is even meant to be plausible to Obama's loyal minions. After all, these people can in theory celebrate a woman's right to choose to kill a just-born infant, that is, provided that it comes out feet first and the unwanted human tissue isn't thrown into a dumpster--'cause that would be illegal. This isn't a message for that crowd at all, for that crowd shares his selective cynicism. That crowd would gasp at and then lament the coming theocracy whenever George W. Bush would talk of God or Jesus, yet they didn't even bat an eye when Bill Clinton did it, and don't today when Obama does it. This occurs because they know this is not a message crafted for their sensitivities, and they know Obama is unserious about the particularities of the propaganda.

It is, however, meant to be plausible to Christians. And here he makes a mistke. He tries to project what he and his speech writers believe to be plausible Christianity onto an audience that knows what practicing not "God damn America" Christianity is all about. (Oddly, even in projecting Christianity they tend to overlook that rather obvious old saw--"thou shalt not covet" thing.)

When God told man to care for the widows and orphans, he told men to do so as individuals. He did not give man the latitude to pay dues to some faceless mob-club to take care of the responsibility for him. Yet, after many decades and ever creeping government offered benevolence, we have rendered unto Caesar the responsibility that God gave to us.

As a result of this, and the nature of government to ever expand, our government has become so providing that it has taken responsibility for the raising of children, the care of the elderly, and the benefaction of millions of able bodied Americans from cradle to grave in between. Not only have we taught millions of people how to be dependent on government, but we have taught even more millions of people that they can ignore those who are suffering because of their pitiful contributions to the erection of an even more pitiful government safety net.

And pitiful it is. Let us not forget, that not only is government charity immoral at its core, but from a practical standpoint, it is the worst vehicle ever invented to provide service.

Government requires that about three times more money be spent to achieve the same level of service provided privately. Why? Because it counts on seventy percent of all monies received to be eaten away through bureaucratic administration of the funds. A quarter, hand delivered to the local soup kitchen, has as much impact as a dollar sent to Washington that finally drips out of the spigot at the same kitchen. How much impact would the dollar have if it were hand delivered to the kitchen?

The immoral aspect of government benevolence is that it allows citizens a seemingly honorable excuse through which they can abdicate their God given command to care for orphans and widows. This is precisely why John Kerry can donate zero to charity all year long but can still feel himself a worthy spokesperson to lecture other Americans on how the rich are not paying their fair share. He has abdicated his personal responsibility by sloughing it off on government. He gave at the office.

This is how Joe Biden can scrape together about two percent of his magnificent salary to give to charities directly. Biden feels completely exonerated of all charges that he is a two-bit skin flint and abdicator of his God given responsibilities to the parentless and spouseless, because his government, who he pays taxes to, is taking care of all of that for him. It is something that his government club membership takes care of. He too gave at the office.

We have taught people to be dependent on one hand while on the other we've taught many of those who remain to let someone else worry about it.

This was the message of Barack Obama yesterday when he merged the concept of government giving and religion. It is a message that can only be true after government becomes God. For many it has.