The Petra Zone

With the 2012 presidential election, as i wouldn't know where to start on this subject... what would the zone want to see happen?

I know this question is very vague, but i just want to know where peoples minds are at.

I'm not likely to vote for president. I'm not rich or poor enough for that to matter. Will probably vote when it comes to city and state.

Matthew RJ wrote:I honestly thought Christians in the US don't have a choice.

How does one balance free will with the sovereignty of God? Maybe that's a matter for a different topic.

God deposes kings and sets them up, according to the prophet Daniel. However, He placed some in the United States of America where our voice may be heard through voting. Are we not, therefore, responsible for what happens on our watch? God still determines the outcome.

Give to Caesar what belongs to him. Give to God what belongs to Him.

Tongue in cheek... No, I guess Christians don't have a choice, and so we vote pro-life.

I imagine the Zone is pretty much divided... conservative, liberal, and Passafist, um, pacifist.

In general most Americans on the zone are conservative and the foreigners are liberal.

p-freak wrote:In general most Americans on the zone are conservative and the foreigners are liberal.

Do you consider yourself a liberal or conservative?

Personally, I'd like to see Trump beat up on Obama some more, and then someone with better answers than Trump get voted in. I'm done with devaluing our dollar and making it costlier to live in America. I didn't vote for Obama to pay my mortgage, or put gas in my car, because I'm a little smarter than that. I'd love to hear from those who voted for him and thought things were going to be magically great, what they think now?

It actually has nothing to do with what party you support or vote for; it has to do with being a Christian and making your beliefs known and count.
You can fault or lay blame with any Christian that votes for either party, and the majority of the time I vote Republican because their values are somewhat closer to a Bible Outlook then the Dems. but in reality they both have overwelming faults that are hard to overlook.

There are more than two parties. It's not hard to find third party folk with "stronger" biblical values and beliefs. They aren't trying to compromise principles to be popular, and I don't have to vote for the lesser of two evils (which is still a vote for evil).

In my opinion, if I vote as an expression of my faith (which would be the most value I could ascribe to a vote), then I believe I have expressed my desire for who I want in office before God, whether it matters to God who I vote for or not. It doesn't matter if I take away votes from one guy so the other wins. If I go into the booth and vote straight "D" or "R" without any consideration, I deserve what I get.

Since I don\'t live in the States, the distinction between conservative and liberal has no relevant meaning for me. Fortunately we have more than two major parties and there are lots of nuances. I would probably be on the christian social side if that means anything to you. If I would live in the States I would probably be in Jonathan\'s camp.

p-freak wrote:In general most Americans on the zone are conservative and the foreigners are liberal.

Glad to be an exception.

I suspect this is because most evangelical Christians are conservative, and Petra's audience is mainly evangelical Christians.

At some point, the Republican Party convinced a lot of Christians it has the monopoly on biblically supported social policy, which I find pretty astounding, considering that the GOP, other than on abortion, doesn't really do much standing up for the poor, needy or downtrodden, which is probably the single most overriding theme of the Bible.

Anyway, Obama's done pretty much what he promised to do with a few exceptions, and since I voted for him in 2008, I don't see much reason not to vote for him in 2012.

CatNamedManny wrote:

p-freak wrote:In general most Americans on the zone are conservative and the foreigners are liberal.

Glad to be an exception.

I suspect this is because most evangelical Christians are conservative, and Petra's audience is mainly evangelical Christians.

At some point, the Republican Party convinced a lot of Christians it has the monopoly on biblically supported social policy, which I find pretty astounding, considering that the GOP, other than on abortion, doesn't really do much standing up for the poor, needy or downtrodden, which is probably the single most overriding theme of the Bible.

Anyway, Obama's done pretty much what he promised to do with a few exceptions, and since I voted for him in 2008, I don't see much reason not to vote for him in 2012.

It's not the gov'ts job to care for the poor, it's our job. To the extent that we as individual Americans get regrounded in values and principles, and reclaim our responsibility, we can demand that the gov't get out of our way. We allow the Gov't to confiscate our money in the name of the poor while all they do is grow the poor class; keep the man down if you will, and screw everybody else. Then we pat ourselves on the back and say look at how great we are because we voted for a Gov't that will take care of the poor, while we do squat ourselves. Myself indicted as much as anyone else.
And really, only the middle class is getting screwed, because, for the time being the rich can still take the hit. Another decade or two of republican and democrat early 20th century progressivism might fix that though.

What's going on with Radical Islam is neither solely political or solely religious. It is both. But that's another topic. We could spend days slogging through everything on that subject.

I agree, it's not the Gov't's job to care for the poor, it's our job. That said..... the Democrats and Republicans are really two wings of the same bird.

And what happens when we fail to do our job?

Tough luck, poor guys. The church was supposed to take care of you, but since they haven't, it looks like your children won't make it this winter. I'm sure Jesus is OK with that because, see, it's not the government's job to help you. And I know you've been too busy trying to feed your family to go to church or spend much time thinking about theology, but since we're certain that anyone who dies in their sins is going to a literal hell for all eternity, it looks like you're really out of luck.

And we wonder why people aren't too thrilled with Christianity these days?

It seems we care a lot about limiting the government's "proper role" when it comes to taking care of the poor — an unmistakable priority of God's throughout the entirety of the Bible, for nations and individuals (Ezekiel 16:49, for example) — but don't think twice about wanting the government to enforce our religious convictions about homosexuality, abortion and the teaching of the world's origins in public education. This is pure hypocrisy; don't think the world doesn't notice.

Anyway, that rant aside, if we want to look at it from a purely cost-benefit, role-of-government perspective, there are economic costs to not helping the poor. Emergency room costs, police costs, costs imposed by loss of property value. It is in our interest as a society — and therefore government's interest — to keep people from falling through the cracks, if for no other reason than because it creates a happier, more contented society, which the founding fathers considered one of the primary purposes of federal government.

When we pursue policies of deregulation and tax cuts for the wealthy, the burden falls heaviest on the poor. The rich can always afford to have high-quality medical care, safe food, clean water and live in safe neighborhoods. The poor cannot. My opinion is it is the government's job to make sure people have access to these things, and yes, that means taxing the people who can most afford it to do so.

I'm not so sure individuals or the church have failed, or would fail, to do their job if Gov't were not involved. I believe that the administrations that really started us down the road of Gov't help did so not to provide a helping hand up to those struggling to make their way, but rather an enslaving hand out; for a variety of reasons including the creation of a useful political tool.
I'm not sure I buy the cost benefit stuff either, but I'll leave that for someone more educated than I to pick apart and flesh out a worthy defense. Is it even the Gov'ts job to provide cost benefit? Doesn't the suck-o-meter run pretty high when it comes to the Gov't and cost effectiveness on a great many things?

CatNamedManny wrote:My opinion is it is the government's job to make sure people have access to these things, and yes, that means taxing the people who can most afford it to do so.

I have to disagree the govt. should only provided laws, law enforcement & schooling.

The rest should be worked for, it shouldn't be a wealthy persons fault if someone is lazy, doesn't want to work to earn their own damn health care.

Govt. and health need to stay the heck away from each other! I lived in Australia for years under that system, it is a failure.

Maybe if some Americans were not waisting money on ipads, iphones, imacs,Android phones and 140" LED TV's they could pay for health care them-self.