In 2015 I penned a post on Proverbs 29:18, commonly quoted as “Where there is no vision, the people perish.” Today I think it’s time to come back to that theme. In my original post, I argued that the common meaning from the KJV doesn’t capture the Bible’s intent, with the ESV (and NASB/NIV/NKJV) translation more accurately capturing the meaning, which is that if there is no proclamation of the truth of God’s will, the people will cast off restraint.” In the subsequent years, we have only seen this trend accelerate. Public hostility to Christian values has dramatically increased, with a cacophony of voices shouting down anyone who dares challenge the new secular orthodoxy.

Nowhere is this more important than the ongoing moral revolution and the identity cancer that has completely metastasized within the body politic. Moral norms are not only being thrown off, the very idea that any moral norm is appropriate–other than the central tenet that the autonomous individual must pursue their true (subjectively perceived) identity–has been “cast off.” Further, this identity, which can be openly embraced by departing from previous cultural norms, is permanent and unchangeable, unless it can progress to a yet-to-be-defined fuller realization of individual identity. Then it is allowed to change. In the words of the Eagles, “you can check out any time you like, but you can never leave.”

Christians have been on their heels for years, as well as conservatives more generally, albeit for different reasons. The left demonizes anyone that disagrees with the current (and ever-changing) progressive zeitgeist as being filled with hate, causing the Christian significant confusion. “I don’t hate them, but would like to love them by showing them salvation in Jesus Christ, which is only possible with repentance and faith in Jesus Christ.” But to call someone to repent is to say they are on the wrong path, and this is the cardinal sin for progressives: the idea that there is any external moral authority that can judge their individualized autonomy. And most certainly not a sovereign God who they should bow down and worship. Conservatives, however, want to conserve and once the status quo is overthrown, they don’t want to be reactionary. If you don’t believe this, ask this question: where is there a public voice to repudiate the 5-4 Obergefell repudiation of biblical marriage?* So there are fewer and fewer voices willing to speak truth to the culture.

Yet we should not be so foolish as to think the casting off of restraint will be limited. Our world now almost feels like a bunch of children whose parents have not returned and they are eating cake and ice cream with reckless abandon. After all, there is no one to tell them no. So it is with the Democrats latest proposal to spend $3.5T. There is no adult in the room, but indeed they think they are being very responsible–after all, they really wanted $6T of additional spending. Why $3.5T? Why not $1.5T? Why not $10T? The obvious answer is: the right number is as much as we can get now why we have the chance** We are almost $30T in debt, but there is no discussion of this, since we’re going to have the rich pay for it. This is preposterous, of course, as there are not enough rich people to fund this effort. And the plan deliberately undercuts the costs to create the fiction that it will work. For example, the gargantuan child tax credit is only expanded through 2025, so costs in the out years simply aren’t there, all the while the Democrats count on the fact that once you give Americans another free goodie, it will be politically impossible to have them put the car in reverse. As the WSJ notes:

Extending the $3,000 to $3,600 per-child payments for a decade would cost roughly $1.1 trillion. That’s as much as all of the income tax increases on individuals passed by the House Ways and Means Committee. Democrats have hidden the real cost by extending the allowance only through 2025. Even if Republicans gain control of Congress and the White House in 2024, Democrats and their media allies will bludgeon them to extend the payments, which will cost another $110 billion each year. The GOP will be accused of raising taxes on middle-class families.

Senator Manchin of West Virginia wisely challenged this view a couple of weeks ago, but will he keep his nerve?

The nation faces an unprecedented array of challenges and will inevitably encounter additional crises in the future. Yet some in Congress have a strange belief there is an infinite supply of money to deal with any current or future crisis, and that spending trillions upon trillions will have no negative consequence for the future. I disagree.

An overheating economy has imposed a costly “inflation tax” on every middle- and working-class American. At $28.7 trillion and growing, the nation’s debt has reached record levels. Over the past 18 months, we’ve spent more than $5 trillion responding to the coronavirus pandemic. Now Democratic congressional leaders propose to pass the largest single spending bill in history with no regard to rising inflation, crippling debt or the inevitability of future crises. Ignoring the fiscal consequences of our policy choices will create a disastrous future for the next generation of Americans.

And it’s not just progressive politicians who have cast off restraint. Our Federal Reserve, after months of high inflation they promised was transitory, are still unwilling to stop their massive $120B/month asset purchase program. They have over doubled their balance sheet since the Pandemic hit. But hey, we like our 401k’s higher! And we wonder why there is such amazing wealth growth of billionaires when the Fed continues to print money like there is no tomorrow. Yes they may taper next time around. Or the next. Or the next. But will they follow through if markets react negatively? The one Fed nominee who would have said something about this insanity was rejected by both Democrats and Republicans. We have cast off all monetary restraint and seem to think inflation is good.

We used to think that working, saving and investing was good. But not in America today. We enable people being anti-social (by their refusal to work while continuing to consume) with our generous transfer payments, and we wonder why there are so many open jobs and so many people unemployed and out of the labor force. We discourage savings by keeping interest rates at zero. If people invest to escape the financial repression we practice, we’ll raise their taxes.

There is no willingness to hear either a prophetic witness or the necessity of sound economics. And to no surprise, we collectively have cast off all restraint. Anybody know what’s streaming on Netflix tonight?

* Contrary to all democratic state initiatives and state legislatures that had codified marriage as between a man and a woman. Progressives are not in favor of democracy generally; only in the limited way it might be a tool to implement their policy preferences.

** Before we lose our majorities next year.