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.  

Did anything happen last week? I just can’t recall. Oh there was some business somewhere about someone getting impeached or some nonsense like that, but I’m sure it’s nothing…or everything…or something. Let’s find out shall we?

Q: Daniel asks: “What are your thoughts on Adam Schiff’s commentary as part of the impeachment hearings?”

A: Let me say this at the outset, sorry to momentarily dodge your question Daniel. I realize there is value in a calm, neutral exposition of the facts, and that’s the part of me that I really hope wins out over these impeachment proceedings. If Trump has something nefarious and impeachable, let him be impeached. If not, let the Democrats suffer the blow-back for their actions. On the other hand, I have a rank, partisan bone in me which I am regularly trying to kill with prayer and fasting. That bone would just love to see this whole thing backfire on the Democrats in spectacular fashion, preferably with lots of fireworks and walks of shame that end in electoral disaster. But I digress.

Daniel, to answer your question directly, yes, I thought Schiff’s “summary” was utterly ridiculous. It is one thing to say that you think the president has done something wrong and point to specific points in the text where you think malfeasance has occurred. It is quite another thing to wantonly fabricate a conversation which, by all available accounts, does not resemble the one that actually happened. So shame, shame, shame, on Mr. Schiff for doing so, but after the Russian debacle I’ve come to expect this of the old codger.

Q: Daniel also asks: “I myself plead guilty to not doing this, but do we pray for President Trump? Speaker Pelosi? Representative Schiff? Senator McConnell? Just something to reflect on when we get testy about things. They’re human beings created in God’s Image, in God-ordained positions of leadership.”

A: Yes, and you’ve more or less realized that in the wording of your question. We Christians don’t have much of a choice in this situation; we should pray for our leaders whether we want to or not. Now, that being said, I don’t take that to mean we always pray for them to succeed in what they’re doing, as their actions may be genuinely wrong. Prayers can be for blessing or repentance; we should use both with our leaders. And, just to put a bow on this, I wouldn’t be afraid of being specific. If you want to pray to God about trade policy, go right on ahead. I doubt it’s the weirdest request He’s ever gotten.

Q: Samwise asks: “What are your thoughts on Greta Thunberg? How would you feel if you were scolded by a 16 year-old?”

A: I think we should feel sorry for Greta Thunberg because she is being utterly used by climate activists. Rich Lowry has a great piece on her over at National Review, and his main point is the same as mine. You don’t listen to kids because they generally don’t have anything valuable to say. They’re children; their brains have not fully developed yet; they have no experience. No, of course you don’t want to belittle or disrespect them, but in no way do they have the prerequisites to speak authoritatively on matters of national and international concern. I agree with her on one point; she should be in school. She has no business speaking at the UN.

As a general rule, be suspicious of proclamations of apocalypse. Dedicated readers will know that I am a fan of the phrase, “Don’t immanentize the eschaton,” and I think end-times speak on matters like these are just the nastier side of this phrase. There have been numerous doomsday warnings like these before, and they have all passed with a rather disappointing amount of upheaval. There probably is some effect from climate change going forward, but I assure you it is not as bad as the activists make it sound. We can work on solutions, but the histrionics are not going to solve anything, however entertaining and YouTube-worthy they may be. Not only that, but it’s also incredibly ungrateful and misdirected to be this paranoid about climate change. You are living in the most prosperous time in human history. Be thankful.

Q: Samwise also asks: “What do you think of the globalism that is the current space industry?”

A: Well, far be it from me to call myself any sort of expert on space relations, though I will say that I have heard a lot of promising things starting to come out of SpaceX, so good things could be coming down the pipe. More to the question, I like my globalist friends as much as the next guy, but I do have to wonder about the budding buddyness (how’s that for alliteration?) over space exploration. If Russia is really threatening to ground astronauts and jeopardize our operations, I’m quite fine with bypassing. Putin is and always has been a thug, and I’m not keen on putting ourselves in a situation that could give the Russians some sort of foothold.

Q: Joel asks: “Is America headed for universal healthcare in the event of a Democratic presidency?”

A: Well, I think that largely depends on two things. (1) Who’s the Democrat? (2) What the Congress look like? If Biden becomes President, we’ll build on Obamacare, but I don’t think we’ll end up with some sort of “Medicare for All” plan. If Warren gets into the Presidency, we may see some slightly more drastic measures, but even with her I wonder if her leaps leftward are more campaign-driven than actually substantive. It would not surprise me to see her moderate once she gets into office. You can be as idealistic as you want on the campaign trail, but once you start encountering obstacles in office, the calculus changes to favor more pragmatic, “git-er-done” solutions.

The other wildcard, of course, is the Congress. Democrats would certainly need both houses to do anything related to universal healthcare, and I think they’d need to coerce the moderates into joining the leftward march. Maybe if the country continues to trend leftward, we’ll see universal health care, but I doubt it’s coming down the pipe just yet.

A Final Reflection:

I was privy to what we’ll call “an internal dialogue among conservatives” the other day, and I was reminded of why conservatives are often accused of being prickly or lacking a caring heart. The topic of discussion was free trade, one commentator making the case for it, and the other not opposing it but pointing out the short term damage it can do to a community. As I listened I discovered my mind going with the proponent of free trade; the logic and empirics of it are pretty airtight. Yet, the whole time my mind was going with the free trade proponent, I found my heart being tugged at by the one was spreading the cautionary tale.

Here’s the thing. Conservatives have to be a little bit like Thanos on some of these positions; it’s a political position that requires the strongest of wills. I don’t know how many times we’ve been accused of just being data crunchers and not caring about real people, but that does at least signal a concession from the other side right? We’ve got good policy solutions; we’re just always accused of being heartless. Well, we’re not, but it does require some chutzpah to see some of these policies through to the end, seeing as they’re generally more focused on the long run over the short run. Free trade creates short-term disruptions, but it is an absolute net-positive over the long-run.

So what’s the problem? Well, we’re Thanos, and you gotta stop Thanos right? Moreover, with a media that also calls you Thanos, you’ve got a bit of an uphill battle. How we go about remedying this isn’t fully clear to me, though I think Arthur Brooks and Andrew Klavan are on to something. It’s possible, though, that is just something we’re not practically going to get past. I simply have my doubts about whether or not we can actually build an image of the conservative heart, as Brooks puts it, in such a hostile climate. It’s an open-ended question for me, and I’m open to comments on the matter. What I do know is that we have to keep our noses to grindstones on policy as it may be the only thing we have left. The never-Trumpers have a point to make on the damage Trump has done to our policy positions; I just don’t go as far as they do. If it comes down to a better public image vs. maintaining our policy platforms, I think we need to go with the policy. But again, I’m open for comment on this.