No Sale, Mr. McCain
I don’t understand the giddiness over Sarah Palin. I get it on a political level, I suppose. It’s a right cross right to the kisser of the Obama campaign. But I don’t get why evangelicals are peeing on the rug like a bunch of excited puppies.
It seems that Voddie Baucham has been thinking about it, too. READ THIS. AND THIS.
Al, you may be voting for McCain to get Palin, but I might be changing my vote from Al Sends to Voddie Baucham. I mean, I love you and all…but I’m with Voddie on this one.
[HT: Jonny]
September 3, 2008 at 9:22 pm
I don’t think I said I was voting for McCain. Not yet anyway.
I like Pastor Baucham very much. His stance on Christian education is a model, worthy of adoption by pastors across the country. May his tribe increase.
I won’t be voting along with you though Rob. Pastor Baucham’s views here may be good pastoral counsel. And if Sarah Palin’s pastor wanted to advise her if she should run for this office he just might be doing just fine to give her pastor Baucham’s admonition.
Of course her decision to run has been already been made. The counseling sessions are over and now we have to vote. Can we support, with a clean conscience, this woman for VP?
Perhaps I will talk a bit about that in my next couple of posts.
al sends
September 3, 2008 at 9:52 pm
If I were to have voted for McCain before Palin, it would have been whilst holding my nose. If I were to vote for McCain with Palin, it would have to be whilst holding back tears. This is a tragic choice.
And the reason the evangelicals are for it is because it will give overturning Roe a shot. But here’s what I see from the cheap seats. She never gets an opportunity to do anything that does anything in connection with Roe. McCain will probably make it just fine through his first term, so Mrs. Palin will have no hope of influence unless she breaks a tie in the senate. And if McCain doesn’t run for a second term, it will become clear that she’s simply not qualified to be the president of the United States.
She never comes near Roe. She’s a prop. And props are dangerous.
September 3, 2008 at 9:59 pm
Looks like Al Mohler blogged about this yesterday. It was also the topic of his radio program (that is the MP3 download link).
I’m sympathetic to Voddie Baucham’s message about her as a wife, but I’m less sure about his Biblical grounds for rejecting her as VP. Unless we are prepared to say that government should be run just like the church. Which I doubt anyone would.
September 3, 2008 at 10:10 pm
Did you watch her speech tonight?
al sends
September 4, 2008 at 4:18 am
Gummby,
I haven’t listened to Al Mohler’s radio program yet, but have read his blog. While he says he is “thrilled” with Palin, his hand seems to be shaking as he reaches for the lever. There is good reason for this. He is not opposed to a woman taking such a leadership position but it “presupposes that women — and men — have first fulfilled their responsibilities within the little commonwealth of the family.” There are legitimate grounds for raising the question as to whether Palin has fulfilled the Biblical responsibilities for her little commonwealth, whether she can fulfill them as Vice-President, and whether we should be promoting this approach that a woman can fulfill them in such an office. But it seems that a lot of this hinges on how we define the Biblical responsibilities of a wife and mother, doesn’t it?
September 4, 2008 at 4:26 am
Rob,
What’s the matter? Don’t you like the thrill of rolling the dice in an attempt to beat the odds? Oh yeah, I forgot, evangelicals are supposed to be opposed to gambling.
September 4, 2008 at 4:38 am
evangelicals are supposed to be opposed to gambling.
Man, I have got to check my evangelical bona fides… Where did I put that union card?
al sends
September 4, 2008 at 5:24 am
I fully realize that I’m swimming against the evangelical current on this one. But it seems that the battle for the family has been reduced to the abortion issue. (I know no one would say that, but that is very much how it occurs to me.)
Don’t be mistaken, I desperately want Roe overturned. I’m just not willing to resort to the desperate measure of sacrificing family in order to save the baby. There is much more wrong with this than right.
McCain’s choice as a running mate is calculated and cynical. He’s getting exactly what he would have hoped for. Evangelicals are swooning, women are empowered, and McCain gets the holy grail of the oval office.
But I wonder if people have really stopped to think about what they’re hoping for. Is it that McCain will gack in office and Palin will ascend to the highest office in the land? Really? Would anyone vote for Palin to be president today? And if so, on what basis? Her vast foreign policy experience? Her extensive administrative skills? Being a city council member, a mayor and a first-term governor is what you want as the president of the United States? Forget that she’s a pro-life woman for a moment (if you can). She’s not qualified for the job.
She is evangelical bait. Looks like we’re biting.
September 4, 2008 at 5:43 am
The church has lost its prophetic voice.
Political power is alluring.
September 4, 2008 at 9:46 am
Hey Rob, don’t say that stuff about “Who would vote for Palin for Pres right now?” It’s too scary. Besides, how many Presidents have actually croaked in office? 5 maybe?
I mean, who in the world would vote for Biden for Pres? Not even the DNC would vote for him when he actually ran for nomination. I mean, even Ron Paul got more votes than him.:)
September 4, 2008 at 9:47 am
Drat. I said “I mean” too much. I hate it when that happens. It’s worse than “and um”.
September 4, 2008 at 11:16 am
Okay, let me preface this by saying that I’m but a youth, and a rather unwise one at that. But here’s my two cents.
I admire Pastor Baucham beyond words. He, in my opinion, is the man. But I believe he’s making a narrow decision here. I do wonder what he would have said about Deborah at the time that that all went down. She, the wife of Lappidoth and a mother of Israel, was the judge of the land. And my guess is that she spent quite a few hours a day judging all the problems Israel had. Not only that, she ended up going out into battle with the men. In reading the passage, there is no shame about a wife and mother judging Israel. Rather, the shame comes when she must go out into battle because the men are all weak-kneed pansies. Perhaps, as Pastor Stout might or might not have meant to imply, God has given us another Deborah to counter another Barak.
As far as Roe vs. Wade goes, I’m somewhat ignorant on the inner political workings, but my thought is that McCain is going to find he has what Wodehouse likes to call a “pippin” on his hands if he tries to relegate Palin to high-school graduation speeches once in office. But again, I’m not necessarily going to vote for McCain (or, rather, Palin) come November. More than likely I’ll write some random person in. Like Stephen Colbert.
September 4, 2008 at 11:36 am
Al,
I just noticed the question about the speech. I didn’t watch it last night, but I did catch much of it this morning. I felt like I was being worked.
September 4, 2008 at 5:34 pm
Hello.
Here is a link to a blog that has published a letter written by Mrs. Rebecca Morecraft. I read it today and thought you might like to read it too.
http://www.visionforum.com/hottopics/blogs/dwp/