Tikkun Daily Blog Archive (https://www.tikkun.org/tikkundaily/category/politics/page/65/)
Posts about politics and social change, from a spiritual progressive perspective
During these holiest days of the Jewish year, we have issued an urgent appeal to all members of our community to take action now on behalf of the Syrian refugees fleeing grave violence and systematic persecution in their country.
This is a new era; Congress and the Administration have demonstrated that they can defy the Israel lobby when it comes to key issues of international diplomacy. The same courage is needed to chart a new course towards ending decades of repressing Palestinian rights and freedom.
For the many of us – clergy and laypeople, academics and plain citizens, in the U.S. and throughout the world – who for decades have been saying that the environmental crisis calls for a religious perspective and an activist religious response Pope Francis’ bold words are a wonderfully welcome addition. At least three things give those words special weight: first, as the years pass the reality of both global warming in particular and the other dimensions of the crisis (including the vast scale of pollution, species loss, and environmental illness) have become increasingly clear. Second, Pope Francis has established himself as a humble, intelligent, and authentic spiritual leader. If political conservatives resent his critique of capitalism, and cultural conservatives wish he would condemn homosexuals, an awful lot of other people (Catholic or not) see him as a man trying to live up to the traditional Christian virtues of love, forgiveness, and humility. Third, and perhaps most important: Francis is clearly and unambiguously (for the most part, at least, skirting population control) calling a spade a spade: he rejects consumerism and unfettered capitalism, anthropocentrism and turning the earth into “an immense pile of filth.”
Along with many Jews sitting in synagogue this Yom Kippur, I read what I consider to be one of the more fascinating biblical narratives: that of the scapegoat. And as I read, seated in a cavernous sanctuary, analyzing rabbinic commentary in the shadow of stain-glass-adorned walls, a strange thought surfaced. Or rather, a name: Donald Trump.
This year, perhaps more than in years past, as we contemplate the spiritual process of Yom Kippur as ritually signified by white rainment, white clothing, the special white Torah ark covers used for these days, we should meditate upon the true nature of white light, a light made up of all the possible colors of the spectrum.
In the past week, Republican presidential candidates have turned hatred for Muslims into a principle campaign platform. Donald Trump gave sanction to a questioner calling for the United States to “get rid of” all Muslims, and Ben Carson said Muslims are inherently unfit to lead this nation, a notion with which 40 percent of Americans agree.
You, Dr. Carson, in fact, appear to practice the same sort of despicable tactics as Donald Trump (as well as many others with whom you share the debate stage and the clown car as you all drive down the path toward the presidential primaries). I see an underlying philosophical trend among many of you Republican candidates, whether on issues around immigration, issues of equity between genders and sexual identities, and issues of religion.
Robert Heinlein, a Libertarian Science fiction writer, popularized the phrase “TANSTAAFL.” He was expressing colloquially, by the words “There ain’t no such thing as a free lunch,” a principle popularized in economics by Milton Friedman. The principle, somewhat oversimplified, is that whenever there is an exclusive choice whichever alternative is taken has an opportunity cost associated, the opportunity to choose another alternative. Reality is often a little less simple. There is no free lunch but there are many relatively governmentally highly subsidized lunches and many much lower or totally unsubsidized ones. That is the case with seeking to reduce harm from the presence in America of between its’ possibly 270 – 300 million firearms. A gun redemption program can only be successful under the motto “Go Big, or Go Home.”
The dialog over harm reduction from firearms is stagnant.
Thank you so very much for your help in making it possible for the the major powers of the world, the U.N. and most of the people of the world to confirm the deal with Iran which will prevent them from developing nuclear weapons for the next ten to fifteen years.
The two perspectives articulated here by Uri Avnery and Rabbi Arthur Waskow deserve to be well known and discussed. We at Tikkun have a slightly different approach: we believe that the hate-filled and barbarous approach of ISIS will continue to manifest in a world that is fundamentally unjust, creates huge amounts of suffering in daily life for at least 2 of the 7 billion people on the planet, and privileges military power over kindness in its expenditures of money and in the organization of nation states.