Tag Archives: Steve Bannon

The New Elites

We common people watch as the new government elites, those who won political power in 2016, battle among themselves.

Will the family clan, represented by Jared Kushner, win? Will they defeat the ultra conservatives, led by Steve Bannon? Or will Bannon’s group claim victory and bring down government as we have known it since our recovery from the 1930’s Great Depression?

Yet the battle over healthcare suggests an outside chance for ordinary Americans to influence outcomes. How will their interests fare in the looming battle over tax reform?

Will tax changes benefit mostly the wealthy, including the Trump family? Or will changes lead to the wealthy paying their fair share and taking some of the burden off working and middle class families?

Will popular government programs like social security, benefitting ordinary Americans, survive or will we continue our slide toward the inequality of the robber baron era?

Will tax breaks, sometimes used by big corporations to pay little or no taxes, continue to feed our deficit? Or will we ask for a level playing field for the small businesses that provide so many of our jobs?

In the 2016 election, voters supposedly defeated government elites. Now we will see if they can defeat business elites.

What Are Those Judo-Christian Values?

According to “Talking Points” in The Week (February 10, 2017), Steve Bannon, formerly of Breitbart.com, is the power behind the throne of President Donald Trump’s administration.

Named as the President’s key advisor, he “has described Christian civilization as under mortal threat from unassimilated immigrants and radical Islam.”

Judo-Christian values are under threat, many fear. They go further: they must be defended by any means possible.

What are Judo(Jewish) Christian values?

Hebrew writings became the Christian Old Testament. They stressed care for the aliens and the poor. Landowners were told not to reap their fields to the very borders but to leave gleanings for the less well off. In other words, to care for the poor rather than squeeze every last bit of profit from their holdings.

As the Jewish religion developed, prophets became even more concerned with justice and right dealing with the poor. “But let justice roll down like waters and righteousness like an everflowing stream.” (Amos 5:24, NRSV)

Another prophet distilled the teachings into three things God required of his people: “to do justice, and to love kindness, and to walk humbly with your God.” (Micah 6:8 NRSV)

As for Christians, they were a powerless minority in their early centuries, but their lives and practices attracted others.

The early Christian missionary, Paul, sent a letter by a slave to one of Paul’s friends to remind the friend that the slave was, in fact, a brother. Eventually, slavery died out in European lands, unable to exist among brothers and sisters.

Christ himself told his followers, “. . . the greatest among you must become like the youngest, and the leader like one who serves.” (Luke 22:25-26, NRSV)

As Christianity grew and attracted even those in power, the story is told of one European tribal chief who was baptized into the Christian faith. However, he held his sword out of the water, signifying that it was not under Christ’s lordship.

Such an outlook has warred with the servanthood taught by Jesus through the centuries. The Crusades of the Middle Ages, whose atrocities reverberate to this day, were an outgrowth.

One of the greatest values Christians have given the world is servanthood. When Christians ally with power to favor their religion, they risk losing their souls.