When congressional stenographer Dianne Reidy got pulled from the House floor for screaming “prophetic pronouncements” at voting representatives, most of us simply viewed her as someone worthy of pity.
But to others she was the victim of “religious persecution,” because, they believe, she spoke what the Spirit led her to say—that being, of course, that the government is run amok (since, as everyone knows, the Holy Spirit is a fiscal conservative). To these folks, slavery, Civil War, two world wars, and decades on the brink of possible nuclear annihilation were not enough to bring about the End Times. For that, it took a debate about health insurance.
But this is not really about Obamacare; it’s not about whether the government should provide health care at all; it’s not about the proper role of government in people’s lives. Legitimate philosophical debates about the role of government have been around since (before) the founding of the republic.
But one subgroup on one side of that debate has now decided that such discussions must always be about something much larger than that. And in retrospect this turn of events was inevitable. Fiscal conservatives have been courting religious conservatives for decades, and now, finally, they have now successfully wedded the two. So we can’t be too surprised that, for some, whether the government sets up private insurance exchanges or outlaws policy rejections based on pre-existing conditions—whether the government does anything at… [Read more…] about Christian "politicians" and the end of time
