OPINION:
Barack Obama, speaking before a crowd of Global Food Innovation Summit participants in Milan, suggested the left needed to get more engaged in the political process because, frankly, he said, “You get the politicians you deserve.”
Ain’t that the truth. Only not in the way he meant it.
Obama intended the quip as a means of rallying his leftist base to fight the President Donald Trump effect — to fight off, really, any conservative, free-market, individual-first, government-second type notions springing and coursing in nations around the world.
Funny thing is: That’s the same line that served as the undercurrent of his own presidency, at least in the minds of conservatives, constitutionalists and Christians who watched his heavy-handed intrusions into personal liberties with wide-eyed alarm.
Under Obama, that’s what we said — while sighing about the moral decay of the country, and the corrupt and burdensome political process that ensued.
Under Obama, that’s what we whispered, while suffering his unilateral opening of girls bathrooms to boys, his closed-fisted approach toward pressing through socialized health care.
At least, some of us did — the wise ones. The ones with common sense, because in an “of, by and for the people”-type of governance, it’s only natural: You get the government you deserve. So this is a rally call for Christians and those of faith.
If Christians sit out the electoral process out of some kind of biblical calling to live in this world, but not of it — to respect the leaders as appointees of God — then what you get is a government that reels out of control. What you get is a government that has no boundaries, no respect for higher authority, and therefore, certainly no respect for the rule of law and the concerns of the little guy.
Politics becomes all about serving self.
Congress becomes all about gimme, gimme.
The executive — as Obama aptly demonstrated — becomes more kingly than servant-minded.
As Founding Fathers warned, the democratic-republic they put in place would only survive with a moral, virtuous people. So goes the culture, so goes the politics.
And just look at our culture. Look at it from the point of view of biblical principles — the wide acceptance for abortion, adultery, promiscuity. The false gods of materialism; the all-too-willing embrace of debt. The out-of-wedlock pregnancy rates, the sexually transmitted diseases’ rates, the fatherless homes’ rates, the drug and alcohol abuse rates. The deceptive and radicalized LGBTQ movement. The loss of simple courtesies, tactful discussions, respectful discourse. The all-too-common cheering of sin in the name of tolerance — the complete flipping of right for wrong, moral for immoral, good for evil.
Into this, Obama stepped, bringing with him all his regulatory force — his clamp-downs on freedom through environmental orders, through anti-business and growth rhetoric, through social engineering in the military, through executive demands to open borders. And he was given free reign with much because the country, mired in a culture of mud and unsteady on the path of good moral governance, let him get by with much.
But that’s how it works.
Politicians only represent what we’ve all accepted — what we’ve all raised on the home-front from infancy to adulthood.
This is why patriotic Americans in general, and Christians and others of faith in particular, can’t afford to sit on the sidelines, content that, say, Donald Trump, not Hillary Clinton, won the White House, or that Republicans currently hold the majority in the House and Senate.
It’s not an “R” and “D” thing. it’s a “God’s in charge, not government” thing.
Remember: In this nation, our greatest asset is that our rights come from God, not government. But removing God from our culture — ignoring or outright denying the Judeo-Christian principles upon which our nation was built — leaves a void that’s going to be filled by something. Enter, government.
Without the faith element, though, it’ll be a government without moral compass, one guided by self-interest. From this, came Obama. From this, truly, comes all our political ills. So let’s take the warning as issued from the lips of Obama, one of America’s most heavy-handed presidents, that we do indeed get the politicians and political systems we deserve, and use it not as he intended — as a warning against conservative ideology — but rather as a force for true freedom.
Let’s make sure the future political system of America is as far removed from the Obama effect as possible, and as close to what Founding Fathers envisioned as can be — one based on virtue, Judeo-Christian principles, and both humble regard and healthy respect for the Almighty’s leadership and teachings.
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