As Much As I Respect David French...

Normally David French does a terrific job at the National Review (I'm a HUGE fan of his Gun Violence Restraining Order piece) but... he is off the rails with his follow-up to this tweet:

By the way, the porn affairs and hush money payments by themselves are enough for me to never, ever vote for Trump. And that’s just one thing, of many. I remember the days, like way back in, say, May 2015, when that would have been a consensus Evangelical position.

That provoked this somewhat off-message response:

The difference is, unlike you, the evangelicals started thinking politically rather than moralistically. Moralism has its place, of course, but prudence must inform it and direct it. Aristotle (or even Aquinas!) should be our guide. You seem to prefer Kant.

Why is this off-message? Because it creates a false dichotomy between "thinking politically rather than moralistically".

Dealing with a lesser of two evils situation is a moral question that, believe it or not, precedes Trump. Here for example, is a Christian minister citing Aquinas and "the moral principle of double effect":

Saint Thomas Aquinas, in his Summa Theologiae, established the moral principle of double effect. (II-II.64.7) Four conditions must be met for someone to act righteously despite bad consequences. First, the act itself must be good or at least amoral. One could argue that voting is a good deed or at least morally indifferent. Secondly, the good effect cannot be achieved by means of the bad effect. The Machiavellian policy that the end justifies the means is wrong; nothing justifies sinful methods. Thirdly, one must intend only the good effect. The other is an involuntary repercussion.

To illustrate, physicians routinely prescribe medicines to patients notwithstanding unfortunate side-effects. Finally, the good effect must be proportionately greater than the evil effect. For instance, driving through a red light when there is no traffic in the middle of the night is better than waiting for it to turn green when rushing someone urgently to a hospital.

Do I need to tell you the station stop for this train? Evangelicals were not casting a 'pro-adultery' vote; they were casting an 'anti-abortion' vote. Can it be morally defensible to choose one bad thing over another?

 

We might be in an even better place if evangelical leaders would pound the table on this point, denouncing Trump's adultery while defending his policies. God sending flawed men to advance His designs is described here.

 

The WaPo went down to Alabama to describe how one congregation dealt with this. A snippet:

There was Terry Drew, who sat in the seventh pew on the left side, who knew and agreed with Trump’s position, and knew that supporting him involved a blatant moral compromise.

“I hate it,” he said. “My wife and I talk about it all the time. We rationalize the immoral things away. We don’t like it, but we look at the alternative, and think it could be worse than this.”

The only way to understand how a Christian like him could support a man who boasted about grabbing women’s crotches, Terry said, was to understand how he felt about the person Trump was still constantly bringing up in his speeches and who loomed large in Terry’s thoughts: Hillary Clinton, whom Terry saw as “sinister” and “evil” and “I’d say, of Satan.”

“She hates me,” Terry said, sitting in Crum’s office one day. “She has contempt for people like me, and Clay, and people who love God and believe in the Second Amendment. I think if she had her way it would be a dangerous country for the likes of me.”

Not a Hillary fan. The minister also wrestled with his support for Trump but settled on the notion that God sometimes uses flawed messengers:

The dilemma was that Trump was an immoral person doing what Crum considered to be moral things. The conservative judges. The antiabortion policies. And something else even more important to a small Southern Baptist congregation worried about their own annihilation.

“It encouraged them that we do still have some political power in this country,” said Crum.

When he prayed about it, that was what the voice of God had told him. The voice reminded Crum that God always had a hand in elections. The voice told him that God used all kinds of people to do his will.

“Nebuchadnezzar,” Crum said, citing the pagan king of Babylon who was advised by godly men to tear down an old corrupt order. “Even sometimes bad leaders are used by God.”

No spoiler on how the minister talked about Trump during the sermon.

 

Comments

[henry]

do you guys own stock in Dissenter (or GAB)? TM would lose all the page views and sweet ad revenue if he flipped the comments.

[henry]

Jay Weber @JayWeber3
2m

This is a good and important point: Right to Work has led to a reversal in WI immigration patterns. Starting in 2017, we now have more people coming into this state for jobs, than leaving to find them. Evers would reverse that flow again.

WMC
@WisconsinMC

WMC’s @Kurt_R_Bauer talking to @JayWeber3 on @newstalk1130: “Data shows that right to work states have better in migration...and Wisconsin last year finally had positive migration.” #wibudget

https://twitter.com/JayWeber3/status/1101489883934265346

[Rocco]

Good morning, loved that Gable Grip piece, thanks. Imagine they were thinking about eliminating wrestling from the Olympics, an event that dates back to the Ancient Olympic Games in 708 BC. And now it appears we have break dancing?

I have a friend who hunts coyote at night, until midnite per the regs. He told me he'd tape a small cyalume glow stick to his barrel so he could see the bead and call them in with a tiny squeek call imitating a wounded mouse. He had several pelts hanging in his archery store.

[President-Elect Jim,SunnyvaleCA]

When I moved to CA from Michigan one of the strongest first impressions was "hey, front yards here are the size of a postage stamp!"

[Extraneus]

Just checking it out, henry. It seems fairly primitive so far. Replies work but aren't shown by default, embedded tweets are worse than they are here.

I do support the idea of GAB, though.

[Extraneus]

Can't even post images.

[MissMarple2]

henry,

I am glad you brought that up. I think TM gets a lot of ad revenue (from me, anyway) because every time I refresh there are different ads on my page. Right now I have eBay and Consumer Cellular.

I understand the impetus behind Dissenter, but I would only use it for sites which either don't have comments or which are lefty sites which wouldn't allow a comment of mine to stand.

[henry]

Interesting review of Singapore reclaiming land from the sea (and using losts of fossil fuels). Compared to CA nuttiness at the end.

https://wattsupwiththat.com/2019/03/01/singapores-highly-successful-economic-evolution-in-an-era-of-irrational-global-climate-alarmism-propaganda/

[Narciso79]

I included that link about where roddenberry got those ideas for atar trek even onto the last project.

[Ignatz Ratzkiwatzki]

--you-cant-take-on-climate-change-without-tackling-sprawl--

"Sprawl" being defined as the freedom to live where you want.
What is it with progs?
They go far beyond just coveting their neighbors stuff so it is more than simple greed. What the hell is wrong in their brains that they aren't happy unless they are controlling and dictating how their neighbors live and even more importantly think?
All progs, liberals, leftists or whatever you want to call them are at heart totalitarians; the only difference is to what degree the culture they swim in allows them to show it.

[Catsmeat]

Glad you liked the time machine explanation, Ext and Jack!

daddy, thank you for the appreciation--I love that math example as it proves that Carroll was up to many things besides writing a charming children's fantasy. I don't think he expected anyone to work out that puzzle (and it took almost a hundred years before anyone did)--he probably put it in to amuse himself. He liked his jokes to be multi-layered, with the more layers the better. That's why it was so interesting to figure out his jokes.

Why is it that I have never, never seen an ad at JOM? I am grateful, of course, but all I see is the blog roll to the right and left of the comments.

[Captain Hate]

Oh boy, our favorite taxpayer funded musical hobbyist, Ken Burns, will concentrate on that noted hotbed of racial diversity, country music. Indeed "the influence of African Americans in country music is brought into sharper relief. Many a monumental country figure was mentored by or collaborated with African American artists."

How could we properly appreciate music without this maven?

[Narciso79]

I thought something looked faniliar:

https://www.marxists.org/archive/james-clr/works/1937/04/trials.htm&ved=2ahUKEwjVxOyKneHgAhUHvVkKHWfrD3IQFjAMegQIARAB&usg=AOvVaw3YqdCKJq4YJq0TCiPIZ5WV

[henry]

Hmmm:

Mike Shellenberger
@ShellenbergerMD

I used to believe innovation could reduce the massive ecological impacts of solar & wind farms

Then I realized that we can't make the sun/wind more energy-dense, or reliable

Thus, I can no longer support them

My newest essay is 20+ years in the making

https://quillette.com/2019/02/27/why-renewables-cant-save-the-planet/

[Narciso79]

So Germanys emissions are rising so are their electricity rates, it's like they have no xlue.

[President-Elect Jim,SunnyvaleCA]

So ... does this mean the state of California is helping the NY Times stay afloat by providing "free" access for all residents?

From my local library--
"Thanks to the California State Library, we are pleased to announce that we now offer The New York Times online for free with your Sunnyvale Public Library card!"

[Extraneus]

Catsmeat, do you have Adblock or something similar loaded? I'm using Brave, which blocks ads by default, but before that I used Adblock with Chrome and never saw the ads. (I don't know if this affects TM's revenue, btw, since I wouldn't have ever clicked on one anyway.)

[MissMarple2]

https://twitter.com/STUinSD/status/1101508380865298433

This is an excellent thread by my pal StuinSD about Pakistan, China, and a province of Pakistan, Baluchistan. Highly recommend reading, as there is stuff going on there that our lame media isn't covering.

[President-Elect Jim,SunnyvaleCA]

Ext, your dissenter image didn't post correctly..
Nor did mine LOL.

They give this hint in the documentation

Images
Inline style

[Jim Eagle]

Meanwhile, out in the Kuiper Belt:

Mysterious 'Planet Nine' Is Probably 5 to 10 Times the Size of Earth

https://www.livescience.com/64884-planet-nine-where-is-it.html?utm_source=ls-newsletter&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=20190228-ls

Paging Capt. Kirk!

[Porchlight]

So ... does this mean the state of California is helping the NY Times stay afloat by providing "free" access for all residents?

Sounds like it. Like USA Today boosting circulation by providing free papers at motels.

[Old Lurker]

Or CNN having screens in every airport.

[henry]

Latest narrative, "It's Trump's fault that Mueller's report is disappointing"

Renato Mariotti
@renato_mariotti

Mueller's report will almost certainly disappoint you, and it's not his fault. It's your fault for buying into Trump's false narrative that it is Mueller's' job to prove "collusion," a nearly impossible bar for any prosecutor to clear.

[Narciso79]

Ah the baloch who have been the leading figures in alqueda through both trade center bombings one even popped up in zero dark 30

[Extraneus]

That Markdown "lightweight markup language" is pretty lame, Jim. I think I'll check back after they spend some more time working on Dissenter. Nice idea, especially for NYT or other lefty MSM sites.

[Old Lurker]

"It's Trump's fault that Mueller's report is disappointing"

Well that is true. Trump did nothing wrong.

[Extraneus]

Ocasio-Cortez Cites Debunked Michael Cohen Testimony In Don Jr. "Gotcha" Fail

Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez is catching major heat after she tweeted fake news about Donald Trump Jr. being the "second executive involved in criminal conspiracy," a misstatement by Michael Cohen that the Wall Street Journal corrected shortly after it happened.

[hrtshpdbox]

New thread.

[Extraneus]

Aw.

DUCHESS MEGHAN MARKLE REPORTEDLY PLANS TO RAISE ROYAL BABY GENDER NEUTRAL

“Her exact word was ‘fluid,'” a source told Vanity Fair. “She said they plan to raise their child with a fluid approach to gender, and they won’t be imposing any stereotypes.”

[Porchlight]

New gender fluid thread