On Why Evangelicals Typically Vote Conservative

Evangelicals often view compassion differently then left of center voters.  Compassion, we believe, comes from our mind and will having a concern for the well-being of others and moving to action for their benefit.  We further believe this as an act of our free will.  We believe we are to live a life of compassion as a cornerstone to our relationships, finances and time.  We believe that by demonstrating this compassion, others will be loved and cared for.  We often believe (even if we don’t always articulate this), that left wing governments claim to have a heart of compassion, but skew the meaning and therefore debase the value of what they do.  Liberals at their core think compassion is an act of the collective state - not the individual; therefore, the finances, time and relational structures of acting compassion out should (they argue) be through a government planned body.  We don’t think this is compassion.  Forcing people to pay money for needs that a central planner thinks best is not what we are taught with the simplicity of the parable of the Good Samaritan.  Seeing a need and personally using your own resources to meet that need is the basis of compassion; not forced giving to an inefficient central planner.  

Evangelicals view the household (aka. Oikos) being developed, restored and built as central to a healthy family which in turn leads to a strong economy. Conservative budgets (often but not always) look to reduce taxes on households, where liberal governments look for spending on state intervention to further run or control our household (ex: state run child care, state run graphic sex-ed, several social programs that intervenes or attempts to socially engineer and shape our household).  The family should develop our family; governments should not. Thus we often vote for those who stand in solidarity with this position.

Liberalism is fundamentally opposed with the Evangelical position of man’s “sin nature” and therefore misses entirely the problem and solution to many problems that arise (possibly at no fault of the one hurting): selfishness, broken homes, broken hearts, poverty, unemployment, income gaps and many more. You cannot legislate a man’s heart to wholeness…although Justin Trudeau’s dad thinks he can:

Liberal philosophy places the highest value on freedom of the individual. The first consequence of freedom is change. A Liberal can seldom be a partisan of the status quo. He tends to be a reformer attempting to move society, to modify its institutions, to liberate its citizens. The liberal is an optimist at heart who trusts people. He does not see man as an essentially perverse creature, incapable of moral progress and happiness. Nor does he see him as totally or automatically good. He prizes man's inclination to good but knows it must be cultivated and supported. While understanding as well as any other man the limits of government and the law, the liberal knows that both are powerful forces for good, and does not hesitate to use them.
-The Right Honourable Pierre Elliott Trudeau, April 1974

Man is not inclined to good; we are inclined to be those hellions in Lord Of The Flies. Tell me, did you teach your child to say “no” or did they kinda just pick it up?  We are bent towards evil: all of us.  We believe the Liberals are wrong to think that billions in state planned social expenditures will solve man’s broken heart. We believe the liberals use a flawed premise (government = powerful force for developing good in people) to further damage what is already hurting despite any good intentions. Conversely; we believe strengthening the family is the cornerstone to seeing social change for the better. Love is our “powerful force” not the government; therefore we seek to strengthen families by loving them best we can: not strengthen governments.  Governments are not our partner in building and strengthening our household through large programs and social planning and therefore are not at liberty to extract 100’s of billions of Canadians dollars for such estranged purposes. We typically vote unashamedly for a party that reflects this value.

We often believe a conservative vote best empowers us to love others without draining our resources into an inefficient and often disastrous outfit that is based on laws, programs, perpetual debt and gross neglect.  Our vote for conservativism does not suggest 100% agreement with a particular party, but it does reflect our desire to maintain our personal freedoms to love others as we have capacity and resources to do. We say vamoose to any government using our tax dollars to undue the message of compassion we are best trying to practice through a message of hope and love.

 

Thank you for taking the time to read this note. If this blog speaks to your values, would you consider sharing it? If it does not, you are welcome to speak your mind in the comment section below. 

Trudeau: Le Master Of Disguise

Trudeau does a masterful job capturing the collective ignorance of the masses.  With the help of a wildly biased and determined left wing media, we are witnessing the withdrawal of reason and the impending emergence of a tired, tested and failed Keynesian model of economics.   In Trudeau’s naiveté we are beholding the “change” and billions this change costs without any mention of cost; other than Trudeau telling the reporter to whip out his calculator and do the math himself.  Sadly, no intelligent discussion is possible when the leader has no clue of the systemic damages caused by Keynesian economics.

The basic flaw of Trudeau’s economic model is he presupposes he and his team are smart enough to manage and strengthen the economy through debt based investment. The idea that the free market is either too evil, stupid or a breeding ground for tax cheats like those sneaky small business owners, Trudeau has a fundamental distrust in the choices of Canadians and therefore he proclaims a need to intervene in the economy and do the building himself (no wonder he likes China dictatorship; because they can turn their economy around on a dime).  This will invariably result in the malinvestments, cost over runs, nepotism in issuing bids and jobs to contractors (which Liberals have always been experts at) and misguided direction of investments that come with central planning.  An inevitable fallout from the nature of his investments will be: capital exiting our country, increased trade deficits (we will export less and be less competitive), sustained budget deficits that compile our debt and therefore damage our debt to GDP ratio; likely resulting in a downgrade of our AAA credit (as we have seen with the Ontario Liberals) which will result in higher borrowing costs and the opposite effect of the Liberals benevolent heart: a shrinking middle class.  Do you notice how Mr. Trudeau never compares his plan against a debt to GDP ratio or any set of economic key indicators?  Are the voters to stupid to process the data? Or, would voters then see the economic damage and be less interested in a spending frenzy that Trudeau heralds as the coming change?  I suspect a bit of both.  If you look at the economies of Greece and Ontario we can see what an unmeasured Keynesian approach to economics does to a region.

Make no mistake, Greece like damage wont hit right away; even Greece took decades for the wick to run out and the country to blow up.  My argument is that Trudeau’s promises of today will contribute to your children’s debt load, credit downgrade and smaller middle class of tomorrow.  All his promises will cost a lot of money.  All his promises will need a slew of bureaucrats to manage.  Who will pay for these promises? The promises will be paid for in part via bonds that our kids will eventually have called due, by large corporations, the tax cheating business owners and those rich people who have way too much money.  As frustrated as several Canadians are (and some bitter and jealous) with those who do well, there will be great damage if we manipulate the markets to the degree Trudeau is proposing. Trudeau controlling, monitoring, selecting which industries do well, regulating beyond measure and having his team decide how the economy will grow is likely going to result in the exit of many earners. Earners produce a return on their capital and time.  Trudeau will make this a very unwelcome place for those earners to get their return and they will eventually stop filling the piggy bank with tax revenue from their exploits. And when they do, who is going to pay for all the promises?  This is when things spiral out of control and the saying is more obvious than when times are good: socialism is great until you run out of other people’s money. Alberta is learning this the hard way. Pressing change by electing a central planning government isn't so cool now, eh?   A centrally planned Keynesian economy is at the heart of the Liberal plan and NOT the change Canada needs or can afford.  Don’t be fooled by the Obama mantra of change redux that Trudeau is recycling. We already got an idea of what that change meant in the USA: $7 trillion in new debt and an unstable currency.

  I will be demanding change for more freedoms, less taxes, more accountability and a stronger economy.  Pressing the Conservatives for this change is the best hope for our families and country.