OMB 2011 Long term Outlook - Page ix (Summary)

Today the Office of Management and Budget (OMB) released it's 2011 long term outlook for the United States Federal Budget.  In it we find that according to the accountants and actuaries that the governement depends on to interpret our overall budgetary positioning.  To be fair this is an outlook based on assumptions that are certain to change. 
Following the logic of any governement document you'll note that page ix starts on page 11 which is the Summary of the budget.  Here are some interesting quotes:
"...At the end of 2008 the debt equaled 40% of our gross domestic product (GDP) (a little above the 40 year average of 37%).  Since then the figure has shot upward: by the end of this year the congressional budget office (CBO) projects, federal debt will reach roughly 70% of GDP -- the highest percentage since shortly after World War II..."

"...As the economy continues to recover and the policies adopted to counteract the recession phase out, budget deficits will probably decline markedly in the next few years.  But the budget outlook, for both the coming decade and beyond, is daunting...."

"...baby boom generation portends a significant and sustained increase in the share of the population receiving benefits..."

"...per captita spending for health care is likely to continue to rise faster than spending per person on other goods and services..."

The remainder of page ix explains that their are 2 scenerios that were used to explain what our Long Term scenerio debt picture looks like.

 
As a point of comparison the US national debt was around 120% after the end of World War II.  When put into that perspective debt equivalent to 70% of GDP doesn't sound so bad does it.    This increase in spending in the 1940's is what makes the likes of Paul Krugman and other Keynsian economists believe that we should be spending even more dollars as a government in order to bring our nation out of recession.  Their belief is that while in the early 1940's we spent on wars as a percentage of our GDP we should spend likewise in wars, and spending programs in order to create a positive economic environment.  An interesting argument but begs the question; if the governement is spending the money on social programs, bailouts, what is being produced that will result in a sustained and profitable (prosperous) recovery? 

We will find out - one way or the other. 

Where are all the Little Girls

A follow up from the Wallstreet Journal to my post, "What to do with all the Little Boys" regarding a new book on the market.  This from the perspective of those who are no longer with us; the female victims of China's one child policy.  A sample from the article:

"...Late in "Unnatural Selection," Ms. Hvistendahl makes some suggestions as to how such "abuse" might be curbed without infringing on a woman's right to have an abortion. In attempting to serve these two diametrically opposed ideas, she proposes banning the common practice of revealing the sex of a baby to parents during ultrasound testing. And not just ban it, but have rigorous government enforcement, which would include nationwide sting operations designed to send doctors and ultrasound techs and nurses who reveal the sex of babies to jail. Beyond the police surveillance of obstetrics facilities, doctors would be required to "investigate women carrying female fetuses more thoroughly" when they request abortions, in order to ensure that their motives are not illegal.

Such a regime borders on the absurd. It is neither feasible nor tolerable—nor efficacious: Sex determination has been against the law in both China and India for years, to no effect. I suspect that Ms. Hvistendahl's counter-argument would be that China and India do not enforce their laws rigorously enough.

Despite the author's intentions, "Unnatural Selection" might be one of the most consequential books ever written in the campaign against abortion. It is aimed, like a heat-seeking missile, against the entire intellectual framework of "choice." For if "choice" is the moral imperative guiding abortion, then there is no way to take a stand against "gendercide." Aborting a baby because she is a girl is no different from aborting a baby because she has Down syndrome or because the mother's "mental health" requires it. Choice is choice..." <emphasis mine>

The book is written by a pro-choice advocate for abortion. 

Mullah's Against Mullets

I thought this was quite funny as long as you don't think about the deeper implications of those living under such a regime.

by Richard Robbins , Washington Times

As Iran attempts to become a nuclear power with global reach, at home the Ayatollahs are mounting a fashion offensive. In an effort to blunt the "invasion" of western culture, Iran has implemented a "moral security plan" that bans men from wearing necklaces, short pants, and "glamorous hairstyles" such as ponytails and the mullet. 70,000 "morality police" have been deployed in Tehran and other cities to enforce the edict.

It's hard to understand why the Islamic Republic considers gold chains and mullets to be key emblems of western culture, but when you add the pre-existing ban on disco dancing it is clear that Iran has declared total war on the 1970s. They just never got over the Carter administration.

Love Wins through Grace

I just finished reading Rob Bell's controversial book, Love Wins.  I must be living under a rock, because I innocently picked up the book sitting at an office I was visiting, while doing some work thinking that it might offer some marriage guidance.  I didn't know who the owner of the book was and I didn't know the author. Little did I know what I was in for.  I am one who, given the time and circumstance loves to discuss and think about the more esoteric matters of faith, theology and apologetics, but for better or worse in recent years, find myself just trying to live life as the good Lord intends.  Consequently, anything of substance I read tends to be related to marriage or family or a work project (this generously assumes this blog counts as "work").  My initial interest in improving marriage was quickly supplanted with an old curiosity and an intellectual excursion unlike anything I've visited since my college years.  This book was as fascinating as it was frustrating.

First of all let me give my read on Bell's perspective.  Bell often emphasizes what we can't know over what we can.  Like the bible this is a book that you should not read or critique by the page.  It should be consumed as a whole. And critiquing a book as a whole is a very difficult thing.    The critics want to focus on his statements regarding hell to imply he believes there is no Hell as evangelicals believe Hell to be.  He starts easy and simple, just like we like it:  "Do I believe there is a literal Hell?  Of course." (p71)  Then he eases into a literal hell as seen in the "empty eyes" of a drug attic, the depression resulting from sexual abuse or the angst and confusion of an innocent young child whose father has committed suicide.  In doing so, he seems to suggest that Hell is here on earth and it is comprised of choices that are made apart from God's best.  His final definition of Hell is when "...we choose not to live in God's world, in God's way...".  (p93)  I have to say that biblically I would agree both temporily and eternally that hell is the absence of God and the increasing misery that comes with an increasing absence of all that is good.  If Bell were saying that there is no Hell, as the evangelical community thinks of it, then I would say there is heresy.  I am not convinced that this heretical claim is being made, at least not here.  The critics seem to ignore the fact that not only does he never make the statement that there is no hell, quite the opposite he  later states to the question of Hell's existence, "There is hell now, and there is hell later, and Jesus teaches us to take both seriously."  (p79)  Additionally, he has clearly and unequivocally stated that he is not a Universalist.  He also indicates both in the book and other places that it is not irrelevant how we respond to the person of Christ.  In fact,  he indicates that it is “terribly relevant”.  These are all statements to which mainline evangelicalism would respond positively.

Now my read on the evangelical perspective. Where my evangelical friends will begin to “raise concern” with Bell, to put it gently - and approach “heresy” to state it boldly - is in what Bell is not willing to say.  And this is where 2 items Bell brought together struck me as food for prayer and consideration.  First, Bell brings the story in the old testament (Exodus 17) where the Israelites have been complaining, as they frequently did, to Moses as they head in their self-directed and meandering way, toward God's promised land.  Their primary concern - at least this time, is  about there being no drinking water.  God tells Moses to take a handful of the leaders to Horeb and strike the Rock, where water will flow.  Moses strikes the rock, water flows. Secondly, Bell notes that the apostle Paul then ties this episode referenced in First Corinthians 10 to the person of Jesus Christ.  Paul ties Christ not as a "type" of Christ, but the very literal Rock by stating, "They all ate the same spiritual food and drank the same spiritual drink; for they drank from the spiritual rock that accompanied them and that rock was Christ."  Bell ties this new testament warning to the old testament story and notes that "...Christ was present in that moment....giving, quenching sustaining..." through a rock. Now I'm no theologian, but if the apostle Paul is suggesting that Christ was sustaining the Old Testament Israelites spiritual condition (even as they were under the law) through a rock that was Christ, then is it perhaps possible that same Christ can communicate a gospel message toward an unsaved spiritual condition through other means as well?  Does not Romans 1 tell us his eternal power and divine nature can be seen in nature?  Does the bible not say that if we seek, He will be found?  (Deuteronomy 4:29, Matt 7:7)  I see no heresy here in what Rob Bell says. The heresy lies in what we hear and how we attach to it something he does not say.  Which begs another question, can there even be heresy in what he “does not” say?

To ponder that question let's see what Bell does "not say", that evangelicals hear so clearly. The fuzziness occurs, and the evangelical red flags start waving when he postulates, "...As soon as the door is opened to Muslims, Hindus, Buddhists, and Baptists from Cleveland, many Christians become very uneasy, saying that then Jesus doesn't matter anymore, the cross is irrelevant, it doesn't matter what you believe and so forth...." (p155)  The statement is complicated even more by an earlier reference to a  difficult to explain  verse often used to espouse Universalism where Jesus says, "...I have other sheep who are not of this sheep pen...". (John 10:16)    Does Rob Bell say that a Muslim can go to heaven?  Yes.  Does Rob Bell say a Hindu can go to heaven?  Yes.  Buddhist, Baptists?  Yes and Yes. Do we all agree with this? Well, while we may not want to - as it sits in this context - the answer is actually a resounding "Yes". Think about it. Evangelicals spend hundreds of billions of man hours and untold billions in resources evangelizing Muslims, Hindu's, Buddhists and ... Baptists don't we?  What we react to in his statement is something Bell does not say.  We attach to his statement the idea that something “other” than Jesus will save.  Does Bell say the doctrine of Islam will save?  No. We suggest he does. Does Rob Bell say that Hinduism will get you to heaven?  No. We suggest he does. Buddhism, Baptist Theology saves?...you get the point? Can evangelicals agree that "Jesus Saves"?  Can we agree that God might use a person's search (in Islam, Hinduism, Buddhism, Baptist doctrine) to draw him to the person of Christ?  Rob Bell says that Jesus is the only way to heaven. His answer to this is an unequivocal Yes.  just like evangelicals.  The way is as "...narrow as and as wide as the universe...". (p155)  What Rob Bell does not narrowly define is "how" God might communicate the message of the gospel - and further he commits an even more egregious faux pas in evangelical terms by avoiding explanation in a way that is comfortable, and definitive to evangelicals.  Leaving us to answer the question for ourselves.

And therein, lies the element of frustration that I feel upon finishing his treatise. He approaches the question, but backs away.  He focuses on God's Love, but explains not Justice.  To watch him explain it one get's the feeling that he actually enjoys the process of making us chase the truth.  Is that what Christ did?  As unsatisfying as it is, Bell holds both in the book and elsewhere that "Those are questions, or more accurately, those are tensions we are free to leave fully intact.  We don't need to resolve them or answer them because we can't...." (p115)  Or that those are things that remain "firmly in the realm of speculation".  I'm sorry but that leaves me feeling short changed.  After all, I want an answer.  I suspect that part of what is unsatisfying is that there are those questions, that I won't be able to answer on this side of God's grace.  But then, didn't God tell us that, while His grace is sufficient for us, we won't see Love clearly for "...now, we see but a poor reflection...then we shall see face to face.  Now I know in part; then I shall know fully, even as I am fully known..." In this, then I would suggest that it is a frustration that God has allowed us to experience and that in Him, perhaps, we can extend our own grace to Pastor Bell where we feel short-changed, to others where they seem to fall short or rest in their own journey and to ourselves where we know not our heart:  accepting the grace that is His to offer and ours to receive. Can we be content in that?

What to do with all the little Boys

For over 30 years the Chinese governement has been demanding that the vast majority of it's citizens adhere to a policy of no more than on child.  Is anyone besides me concerned about all the little boys? 

The Brookings Institute estimates that there are almost 30 million more boys than girls in mainland China.  This means that for  every 100 baby girls born, 120 baby boys arrive on the scene.  It is further reported by the Chinese controlled media that by 2020 there will be over 37 million chinese men unable to find wives. The media and news reports make a big issue over the demographic impact of this reality as it relates to caring for the elderly and producing the revenue required to care for an aging population.  Where are the articles detailing what an autocratic regime that has been willing to crush decent, and murder millions of babies over the last 30 years might choose to do with so many unattached, strong, verile males?  Is it any wonder that a government that snubs it's nose at our concerns for civil liberties would desire to keep a lid on the growth of it's military?  

We are a nation that is in debt to the Chinese government beyond all other governments, aside from our own.  (Figure that one out.)  As China starts to call us out on our trek toward default, will they soon begin to exact a self-determined "collateral" by tapping into the resources of our staunchest allies or even nominal friends?  Does it makes sense to anyone that the Chinese government has every reason in the world to create war, not for some military industrial complex or even for what it might gain, but for the simple logic that they have more men than women?  Think of it this way, even they lose a battle they initiate, say,  for land or conquest, demographically they still WIN.  It answers the question:  "What to do with all the little Boys."  What exactly is to stop a nation that unconcerned with any "right" not affirmed by "the state".  What's to lose by pursuing, maybe Taiwan or South Korea?  Why not take that leap toward establishing a stronger presence in Africa? Maybe a hostile takeover to acquire natural resources that will be necessary for 21st century survival?  They have a demonstrable intrest in Africa, which offers a continent of nation-states that, at least hypothetically, offer little resistance to an Army with the size, scale and sophistication of mainland China.  Some time ago the US was the only nation that had both the moral authority and the military prowess to defend agains such an attack.  Today?  Certainly our moral authority can be called to task simply by virtue of our massive debt to the Chinese government, and while our military prowess remains strong - how long can that strength remain if the Chinese refuse to finance it? 

They have the human resources to spare and,  from a purely utilitarian perspective, the need to winnow their XY chromosone resources.  We have a diminished moral authority and will lack the resources to defend whatever agressive action they may chose to initiate.  Is it just me or is some Chinese offensive military action inevitable?