Matt’s Marvelous Mailbag seeks to provide marginally adequate answers to much better questions about politics, economics, social life, theology, or any potpourri you see fit to have answered. Send questions to mailbag.bereans@gmail.com.  

I was talking with a friend this week about Star Wars, and we came to the obvious conclusion that John Williams’s music is the one consistently great part that the sagas and spin-offs brought us. I’ve been re-listening to the soundtracks, and, not only is his music technically excellent, he also has this tremendous ability to marry the story and the soundtrack together. Just listen to the Anakin vs. Obi-Wan piece. All at once, you get a piece of music that (a) sounds like everything is falling apart [which it is both literally and metaphorically], (b) is reaching to the sequels to reinforce Anakin’s transformation into Vader [with the Imperial March], and (c) gives a ray of hope for the future [with Luke’s theme]. One piece of music, and Williams is signaling so much to us with it. God bless John Williams. Ok, on to the mailbag.

Q: James Forrestal asks: “Is Beto O’Rourke’s ability to raise large amounts of money a significant factor in his potential in the Democratic primary or the general election? How important is money in general to electoral success in your opinion?”

A: I’ve got a bit of a funny story related to this question, something Mr. Forrestal probably knows already. About a year ago, I made a last-second decision to hike out with some friends to a college-level political science conference just for fun because that’s what you do when it’s senior year and you have friends you like spending time with. First session I go to there is a young buck presenting on the effect of money in Senate elections, and he found a positive correlation between spending and winning, which is to be expected. But then, he turns around to the audience, having just shown the least amount of money spent in a winning reelection bid was (it was Mike Lee by the way), and he says, “So, as you can see, it is impossible to win reelection in the Senate unless you spend this amount of money (~$1 million).” “Oh, really?” say I to myself. One of my good chaps was on the panel waiting to give his presentation at the time, and I knew we were thinking along the same lines because he was visually straining to stifle a large grin and/or chuckle. In the end, I couldn’t help myself. I raised my hand and asked, “So, let’s suppose Chuck Schumer is running for reelection, and he spends just below $1 million, and his Republican opponent spends just above $1 million. Does Chuck Schumer win reelection?” Without blinking, he responds, “Nope, he would lose. It is impossible to win without spending this much.” By golly, you could not fault him for inconsistency. I can only imagine his answer had I asked what would happen if both men spent under $1 million. Guess we just wouldn’t have a Senator…

Back to the question, 538 has a very good summary of this question. In a nutshell, winning and spending are correlated but probably not causally so, at least in the general election. Anymore, most people tend to vote straight party-line, and your ad probably is not going to have that great of an effect, and, even if it does, the research suggests that boost wears off the moment you stop running ads. All is not in vain, however. When you get into the primaries where partisanship is less of a factor, the question becomes more interesting, especially if it’s a smaller race. Early donations in those cases can be quite influential, especially if you have less name recognition, but I have to wonder in Beto’s case if that matters. We will certainly find out soon. In short, I wouldn’t discount his fundraising capacity. It’s early enough to have an impact, but he’ll still need to do more than good fundraising to capture the nomination.

Q: James also asks: “Given the recent scandals surrounding academics and sports recruiting, what is the state of the American education system? Is there a single particular thing you would change if you could?”

A: I had a genuinely excellent college experience, so I’ve always been biased against harping on universities, but many universities deserve the ‘harp.’ The question, as you’ve pointed out, is what to do about that. I’m perfectly fine with letting universities sort out their own houses, and if parents want to bring suits, we have courts for that. The main thing I would change is to stop the glut of federal aid for sending students to college. All you need to really combat federal subsidy spending for college is a supply and demand chart to show it’s inefficient and inflates the price for everyone else. It distorts people’s incentives on the college choice and often pushes them away from more productive choices. There is nothing inherently good or bad about going to college. For some, it’s a good choice; for others it’s not. The important thing is to not bias people towards making a decision that will do more to put them in massive debt rather than teach them a useful job skill or genuinely refine their mental process.

The other thing I would encourage conservatives in particular to consider is to start playing the long game on academia much like the Federalist Society did with the legal arena 40 years ago. The reason we have such liberal universities right now is because the liberals focused on academia starting in the ’60s, and they now own the commanding heights of research and thought which inevitably trickles down to the masses at some point. It’s the same problem we are facing in the arts; you can’t just watch Turner Classic Movies forever and expect the culture to follow you. I’ll say it thrice: Narrative, narrative, narrative. It’s an area we are not doing too well in.

Q: James finally asks: “Thoughts on this year’s Lakers and Lebron? Is it possible that the grass was greener in Cleveland, Ohio than in Los Angeles, California?

A: Apparently, which I am admittedly surprised at. The Lakers were a sub-par team last year without Lebron, but they were not a disaster by any stretch. The Cavs on the other hand have been a disaster without Lebron, which just goes to show how powerful a force he was at Cleveland. So, with that being the case, you would expect the Lakers, a middling team without Lebron, to be a dominant team with Lebron. As our President is prone to say, “Wrong.” I understand Lebron has missed a chunk of this season, but the Lakers shouldn’t be this bad without him. In the end it doesn’t matter too much for me. The Cavs will get a good draft pick (dear Lord, please let it be #1 so we can get Zion Williamson), and we’ll rebuild from the ashes.

Q: Sam asks: “What would you like to see happen in the last movie of the new Star Wars trilogy?”

A: One thing. I ask for one thing that covers all my wishes; just pretend like Last Jedi never happened. Bring back my mythos, make Snoke relevant again, make a meaningful connection with Rey’s parents, get rid of the SJW crap, and for heaven’s sake please use Luke Skywalker for something other than a throwaway gag. I’ve said before that Last Jedi is an abomination of desolation, so I might even be ok if the last film was a Disney executive just reading a long apology letter and promising to excommunicate that film from the franchise. Force Awakens may have been too similar to A New Hope, but at least it was building on the mythos and the saga as a whole. Last Jedi was a 2.5 hour, “throw the toys out of the pram” temper-tantrum that destroyed basically everything we know and love about Star Wars.

Q: Marcus Aurelius asks: “In followup to last week’s question, if it is by definition impossible for a deity, in your case the Judeo-Christian god, to be anything other than good, why then is it significant that Jesus committed no sin? It seems to me he could have done anything and you would still consider him blameless. What use is this infallibility for episodes such as the temptation of Christ in the desert? If he would be good regardless of what decisions he made there, what is the point? It’s clearly not to overcome anything as he is by definition never going to be wrong. Or does this in any way diminish the divine character of Christ if it is possible for him to do ill? Take care that you do not stray into early church heresies here ;)”

A: Interestingly enough, I actually had a professor in theology class who asked us what kind of heretic we would have been most susceptible to being with regards to the person of Christ. Mine was Nestorianism, which solves the deity/human question, but you end up with a “schizo Jesus” as he put it. Now to the question(s):

1. “…if it is by definition impossible for a deity, in your the Judeo-Christian god, to be anything other than good…” – Important point here to note. Only Yahweh has that capacity. It’s not just any old deity, it is Yahweh and Yahweh alone.
2. “…why then is it significant that Jesus committed no sin?” – Well, because he is our atonement for sin, he offers hope for overcoming sin having defeated it, and to say he gave into sin would mean that he failed. Thank God he didn’t. I love the line in ‘Crown Him with Many Crowns’ on this point: “He died eternal life to bring and lives that death may die.” Poetic, theological, and linguistically symmetrical to boot.
3. “It seems to me he could have done anything and you would still consider him blameless.” – Well, not anything. He wouldn’t be blameless had he truly sinned. What if he murdered someone in cold-blood? That wouldn’t be blameless. “Aha, now I’ve got you! What about the genocide God committed in the Old Testament?” What about it? “Well, wasn’t that evil?” Not if he’s meting out justice to the nations he’s given several centuries to repent and would have accepted repentance from even to the last minute (see Rahab the prostitute). Suppose in sparing those nations, more people would have ended up dying than had they been extinguished? Isn’t that a possibility? Do you have all the relevant knowledge? Also, where do you get your basis for good and evil for the nine billionth time? “Well, I don’t understand his actions. They look really bad.” Welcome to the human race. You’re a clump of dirt being kept alive by grace and God’s own breath trying to dictate the terms of the universe to its all-knowing and all-powerful Creator. Try humility out for once; it’s much less stressful.
4. “What use is this infallibility for episodes such as the temptation of Christ in the desert? If he would be good regardless of what decisions he made there, what is the point? It’s clearly not to overcome anything as he is by definition never going to be wrong. Or does this in any way diminish the divine character of Christ if it is possible for him to do ill?” – Assuming the full deity and humanity of Christ, we can easily say that he certainly was tempted just like we were (see Hebrews), but he succeeded in beating that temptation every time. Yes, he could have sinned because of his human nature, but he didn’t because the divine nature within him was powerful enough to beat sin every time. Every time, he resisted the temptation to surrender to the corrupt forces of power, sex, wealth, fame, etc. and opened the way for the new humanity to come about. You can view the divine backstop (as some call it) as cheating, but I think it’s better to rejoice at the fact that since Jesus was able to beat sin every time, we too through the power of the Holy Spirit have that capacity too. Tangentially, there’s a really cool callback to the Exodus going on in the wilderness temptation scene, but that’s outside the scope of this question I think.

Q: Marcus also asks: “What do you think about people getting into colleges and universities on the basis of athletic abilities rather than academic qualifications? I understand that the schools have to make money from college sports but it seems to me that an institution of higher learning should give preference to those who are there for higher learning. And maybe this is would be different for different kinds of schools. I have less of a problem with it for big state schools who are a sporting institution anyway but if someone gets into an Ivy League or comparable school for sports and takes the place of someone who would otherwise be more academically suited than them, this doesn’t seem right. Thoughts?

A: Really good question, and I think you’re hinting at the answer already. I think it would be wise for the NCAA to just allow colleges to pay their athletes like normal athletes because that is what they are. The way things are currently set up, colleges have to jump through all these hoops (no pun intended) to comply with the rules, and you end up getting these ridiculous work-arounds to compensate the players (tutors upon tutors to speed up the academics, facilities designed for the gods, full scholarships, etc.). My advice? Bifurcate the academic and sports divisions of colleges completely. If colleges are already functioning as development leagues and sorting mechanisms for players, we might as well fully realize that and pay/hire players as such. Will that affect the purity of college sports? Nah, they’re already tainted; much better to focus sports players (specifically the cream of the crop) on sports instead of keeping this mirage and tacking on unnecessary academics. Let players go to colleges to specifically play sports if they want to and leave the academic spots open for people who want to focus on academia. Intermural and club sports are still a thing for those who want to do both, right?