How, Then, Should Christians Vote? And do Evangelicals owe Bill Clinton an apology?

RajeshG has some helpful comments.

Characterizing the discussion here as either pro-Trump or anti-Trump unnecessarily places the positions debated here into only 2 categories. Tyler’s comment about Trump being “our thug” mischaracterizes my position and probably the position of several others. As far as “bully” and “thug”, the political party which desires to replace Trump has its own way of bullying and thugish behavior, albeit perhaps more subtle at times. Tyler is not living in another moral universe. We all live in the same messed up and complicated moral universe.

[Larry]

Many of them may well pass the character test, but I cannot vote for a person who would put in place policies I believe are harmful and potentially destructive—especially to unborn life.

Perhaps this says all that needs to be said about the judgment of David French. A person who can say that there are Democratic candidates that “may well pass the character test” is a person who has disqualified himself or herself from any public voice.

Here’s the things that people like French and Aaron, for all their talking, still don’t get: We will be governed by a person of bad character. Which kind of bad character do you want? One with better policies or worse policies?

It is hard to imagine any reasonable person preferring bad character and bad policies to bad character and better policies. Such abdication of moral responsibility is staggering. And make no mistake about it: It is an abdication of moral responsibility. Multiplying words with philosophical sounding arguments will not change that. The emperor will still have no clothes .

This is the problem to me. Can you really say emphatically that there is not one Democrat that could pass a character test? Being a libertarian, I am disgusted slightly more by the policies of the democrats than I am the republicans (or at least what they advocate; since both sides do about the same) but I see no better character in the Republicans. It amazes me that you believe a person is not worthy of a political voice to think otherwise. Since you believe there is such a disparity between the moral standing of the parties can you list a few republicans of character? This kind of rah rah for “our team” is so off base to me.

I am grateful that Christians in democracies have the ability to choose their leaders. This is a luxury the apostles did not have in 1st century Judea, Galilee and Samaria. As long as we have the ability to choose, some of us will disagree.

Josh:

First: This is not a “rah rah for our team”. I have voted in Presidential elections (and other elections) since 1976 and am not registered with any political party. My category would be Independent, although I usually vote Republican in elections.

Second: The immediate point of this discussion concerns suitability of Presidential candidates, not an evaluation of every Democrat or Republican office holder. Concerning those running for the Democratic nomination, consider -

Sanders: socialist who hasn’t accomplished any significant legislation in his entire Senate career

Buttigieg: homosexual mayor of South Bend who believes he is morally superior to those who believe homosexuality is morally wrong and who accomplished … what as mayor?

Klobuchar: classic liberal with liberal moral views on social issues

Biden: Obama’s VP - need I say more?

Warren: Flake

Bloomberg: billionaire trying to buy the Presidency, willing to consider Hillary Clinton as VP (THAT should scare you)

Republican of character: Mike Pence, not perfect but I know people who know him, since he was governor of Indiana - decent man, despite his caving on religious freedom legislation in Indiana.

[WallyMorris]

Josh:

First: This is not a “rah rah for our team”. I have voted in Presidential elections (and other elections) since 1976 and am not registered with any political party. My category would be Independent, although I usually vote Republican in elections.

Second: The immediate point of this discussion concerns suitability of Presidential candidates, not an evaluation of every Democrat or Republican office holder. Concerning those running for the Democratic nomination, consider -

Sanders: socialist who hasn’t accomplished any significant legislation in his entire Senate career

Buttigieg: homosexual mayor of South Bend who believes he is morally superior to those who believe homosexuality is morally wrong and who accomplished … what as mayor?

Klobuchar: classic liberal with liberal moral views on social issues

Biden: Obama’s VP - need I say more?

Warren: Flake

Bloomberg: billionaire trying to buy the Presidency, willing to consider Hillary Clinton as VP (THAT should scare you)

Republican of character: Mike Pence, not perfect but I know people who know him, since he was governor of Indiana - decent man, despite his caving on religious freedom legislation in Indiana.

Yes I see now that his statement had only to do with the current candidates. I would like to point out that policies do not necessarily equal character flaws. As an example, I think Trump’s liberal policies are reprehensible but I can’t quite go so far as to say they are immoral. It’s just sillly imo to dismiss everyone on the other side as not meeting a character threshold without even listing what the problem is. Abortion of course is terrible and those who advocate it do not meet a minimum threshold but it seems to me the people supporting Trump here were not willing to acknowledge the concept of a character threshold applied to him.

Can you really say emphatically that there is not one Democrat that could pass a character test?

Yes, with reference to the current candidates. All of the support abortion. That is a major character flaw. It is not just a policy issue. Then they are multiple other issues on top of that.

It amazes me that you believe a person is not worthy of a political voice to think otherwise.

That was a strong statement to be sure, and I don’t mean it in a legal way or even a political way. I mean it in a moral way. If one believes that there is a Democratic candidate of moral character, then he or she clearly has bad judgment.

Since you believe there is such a disparity between the moral standing of the parties can you list a few republicans of character? This kind of rah rah for “our team” is so off base to me.

I am not sure there are many republicans of character. The nature of politics seems to me to rule out high character people. I don’t have much use for Republicans either. My point is that we are going to have a leader with bad character. Let’s at least have one with better policies. Refusing to vote for one won’t change that. It will simply give you no voice in the future.

[Wally] My voting for a particular candidate or not voting for a particular candidate doesn’t enable him as far as his character. He will be that way regardless of what I do.

Nobody is making this claim. The claim is that (a) when you put a man of poor character in charge of something, the impact of his poor character is — obviously — significantly expanded, (b) being president of the US has character requirements, (c) Christians should not try to put men of poor character in charge.

[Wally] I fail to see the moral rightness of how not voting for a poor Republican candidate is better morally than allowing a worse Democratic candidate to become President.

Yes, you do fail to see it.

[Wally] But when a homosexual or socialist becomes President because Christians couldn’t bring themselves to vote for a poor Republican candidate, don’t complain about what the new President does.

This is all outcome reasoning. I’ve already proven that Christians aren’t supposed to look at choices and ask first “What will be the results of my action or inaction?” The first question is, “Would any of the options on the table normally be wrong?” (I’ve also proven that it’s normally not right to help a man of very poor character gain a position of leadership. See my post on the Proverbial fool, for example… but really, it’s obvious.) The second question is “Can doing this action be justified by circumstances?” Sometimes the answer is yes. If the answer is yes, then we’re ready to ask the question, “Do the circumstances, including both long term and short term outcomes, both big-picture as well as focused area of interest outcomes, justify this action?”

[Wally] Tyler’s reference to the City of God is helpful. But if “voting for Donald Trump will only hasten the moral chaos and filth that is our society”, then wouldn’t a homosexual President “hasten the moral chaos” even more?

The answer is “Quite possibly, yes.” Even more importantly, though, the answer is “When we do the right thing the outcomes are not our responsibility.” It’s important to frame the whole thing in terms of “What is my responsibility?” before looking at cause and effect. Framing it simply as “What will happen?” is not a Christian way to approach it.

[Wally] Nevertheless, as citizens of a representative democracy which uses voting to choose leaders, we have to make SOME choice in November. The current choices are not ideal. Yet someone will be President regardless of what you do. Would I like to see someone like Pence as President. Sure. But I prefer to have Trump as President than a homosexual or a socialist. And I can live with that very well.

This is a pretty widespread perspective, so it’s not my purpose to pick on you personally, Wally. But this analysis ignores so, so many factors even if we just look at outcomes—which I’ve labored to show we should not. But just looking at outcomes, there’s widespread neglect of the ideological context of the conflict.

• We really are in a culture war, and a culture war is a war of ideas.
• Winning positional and policy victories doesn’t advance toward victory in the culture war if there is no actual movement in how Americans think.
• Winning positional and policy victories by electing a leader who belies our core principles in the war of ideas—who is a living sermon against those ideas—cannot produce positive movement in how Americans think. It makes the whole effort appear to be a sham. In fact, huge swaths of the right now don’t merely appear to be a sham—they clearly are a sham, and Trump is their banner. This kind of leadership basically says “Let’s accomplish these policy objectives because we want them… even though our leader’s character loudly declares that they are utterly meaningless.”

Outcomes? Isn’t that the whole point of voting for someone? Voting is about what someone will do, which is “outcome”.

You can argue ideology and philosophy all you want. Bottom Line: Someone will be elected in November. Of the entire group, Trump, although very flawed, is the best “outcome”.

For those who will not vote for Trump, EXACTLY what ARE your standards which you look for in a candidate and how will you make a decision? Where is the point where you decide “OK, I can vote for this person.”? What are your objective criteria? Some set the criteria so high that they couldn’t vote for anyone other than Christ Himself. From what I’ve read here, the criteria is so high that no one could qualify as an acceptable candidate. Ronald Reagan? Well, he cussed, divorced, and had a wife involved in the occult. Don’t forget the Iran-Contra scandal. The Bush’s? Both had a foul mouth and caved to the political left. My point is setting standards so high eliminates just about everyone. Yes, we can sit in our chair and console ourselves that we are abiding by our selective principles while the political left continues to cater to people’s sin nature in order to gain and keep power.

Don’t misunderstand: Principles are necessary; they guide practical decisions. And eventually there are lines which no Christian can cross (Caesar as God, for example). But someone can stick to principles so strongly that they allow evil to outmaneuver them.

Victory in the culture war? I’m not voting for someone who can promote victory in the culture war. That’s for the gospel, not the President. At best, a good President can delay the deterioration by certain policies, even if that person himself is seriously flawed (which itself is part of the problem).

I am amazed that Christians are willing to allow someone worse than Trump to be President because they cannot vote for Trump because of their “principles”. Yet those same “principles” can allow a homosexual or socialist to be President. Astounding!

I’m not going to comment further on this topic. Probably everything has been said that really needs to be said.

To all those complaining about the radical left and their terrible immorality, I would like to propose that many in this thread would vote for that homosexual man that advocates abortion under the right circumstances. After all it’s all about outcomes and if the other option was bad enough he would get the vote of those who believe it’s is all about preventing something worse. The Republican Party has moved so far left and ridiculous that many people can’t even recognize how much of a farce the party has become. When the openly gay pro abortion candidate is the republican, the “right” will dutiful check the box to put him in office to prevent a worse outcome.

All actions have meaning apart from their outcomes. This is easy to demonstrate. Compare these two actions:

• Bob smacks his son on the head because he mistakenly thought the son had a mosquito feasting on his forehead (poor lighting… campfire)
• Bob smacks his son because because Bob’s an ornery brute and his son annoyed him

Assuming the smack itself has the same force, the outcomes are visibly identical. Son get’s a bit of pain. But the acts have very different meanings because motivation matters, and because in one scenario the act is justified and in the other it isn’t.

So, the acts have different ethical significance because of the need to justify the act. Using the grid I mentioned earlier, a good way to analyze the ethics is like this:

1. Is it normally wrong to smack your kid on the head? (Is it an act that would need justifying?) … yes
2. Can smacking your kid on the head be justified? (Could there circumstances that would make it the right thing to do?) Yes.
3. Do the circumstances justify it? Well, in the case of annoyance, no; in the case of killing the bug, probably… assuming an appropriate level of force.

With a small simple act like that it’s not hard to do steps two and three. If you’re a reasonably kind person, you don’t have to do any step by step contemplation at all.

With something as precious as the ability to have a role in choosing who will govern your nation, “pondering the path of our feet” (Prov 4.26) is pretty clearly indicated. Prov. 4.27 elaborates: we’re supposed to try to determine what the straight path is and not veer to the left or the right, but turn our feet away from “evil.”

So is a vote “all about outcomes”? Well, nothing we do is all about outcomes. Nothing. It’s also about motivations, purposes, meaning (what the act communicates), principles.

But as I alluded to in my previous post, even if we choose “outcomes alone” as the playing field, looking broadly and deeply at the outcomes makes voting for someone so far below the character a conservative president ought to have highly questionable, at best. (I think outcomes alone are enough to take that option off the table, but I don’t think “outcomes alone” is how Christians should evaluate their choices.)

But speaking of outcomes…

What I’m trying to claim in that area is that conservatism used to be about preserving the best wisdom of the West. In the 90s we insisted that holding leaders to high character standards was an essential part of conservatism. David French asks, were we wrong then or are we wrong now?

His answer is that we’re wrong now. I heartily agree. Without basic good character (not perfect character, overall good character) as a requirement in leaders, conservatism really has no claim to having a better way to approach society and public policy. It can only claim to have different preferences… if even that. About all movement conservatism can claim right now is that it prefers to defeat the other guys… by the lowest of means, if that’s what’s at hand. Public discourse and policy might as well be a checkers game. Black isn’t better than red, it’s just “our side” and the whole point is “winning,” and nothing else. But add in that cheating is perfectly fine as long as you win.

So to put it yet another way: if conservatism doesn’t have the moral high ground, it doesn’t have anything. Zip. And when a movement puts leaders of this sort at the top, it not only loses credibility with the undecided, it also loses self respect. A movement that abandons its most important principles in order to “win,” stomps on the flame of its own soul.

Today’s right is already dead and decaying. It just doesn’t know it yet… or much care, apparently.

I’ve been reading “Christians shouldn’t support Trump” posts for two or more years now. When you get down to the bottom line, it becomes a very subjective choice based upon selective principles. It boils down to, “I won’t support him because I don’t like him.” Lofty reasons are given, but they cannot be explained in consistent behavior applied equally to all candidates in every election.

How does a Christian decide when the “line” has been crossed? No candidate is perfect. Failing to support the candidate of one of the two major parties helps elect the nominee of the other party. One may find a candidate so faulty that they cannot bring themselves to vote for him, but reality dictates that such a choice will help elect another candidate whose policies are seriously destructive. Why is that considered a noble and principled stand? That may seem principled to some. It looks more like short-sighted pettiness to me.

Can you honestly read this comment https://sharperiron.org/comment/114942#comment-114942 and say it’s just “I don’t like him”? Seriously?

Well, either way, there are actual arguments there, and waving them off as “just don’t like him” is not a counterargument. It doesn’t engage the premises and reasoning at all.

Beyond the issues of other Presidents with equally bad character (Kennedy, Clinton) and the fact that part of the issue is that nobody’s “covering” for Trump in the way the media and politicians routinely do for Democrats, one thing that strikes me is that the vilification of Trump also results from the elevation of some of our hot button personal issues over other measures of immorality.

We’re worried about his philandering and lying—I am, too—but isn’t it also a moral issue when someone expresses support for abortion even going into infanticide, or allows his supporters to threaten his rivals (Sanders), or tries to buy his way into the election (Bloomberg), endorses gun control policies used by all governments involved in the great genocides of the 20th century (all Democrats), endorses welfare policies that are 100 times more lethal to blacks than was the Klan, or provides billions of dollars to the world’s biggest purveyor of terror?

Really? I’m no huge fan of Trump (though I like many of his results), but this just seems myopic.

[josh p]

To all those complaining about the radical left and their terrible immorality, I would like to propose that many in this thread would vote for that homosexual man that advocates abortion under the right circumstances. After all it’s all about outcomes and if the other option was bad enough he would get the vote of those who believe it’s is all about preventing something worse. The Republican Party has moved so far left and ridiculous that many people can’t even recognize how much of a farce the party has become. When the openly gay pro abortion candidate is the republican, the “right” will dutiful check the box to put him in office to prevent a worse outcome.

Nope. If the choice was a Republican Buttigieg or a Democrat, you would see a serious conservative third party alternative.

[Mark_Smith]

josh p wrote:

To all those complaining about the radical left and their terrible immorality, I would like to propose that many in this thread would vote for that homosexual man that advocates abortion under the right circumstances. After all it’s all about outcomes and if the other option was bad enough he would get the vote of those who believe it’s is all about preventing something worse. The Republican Party has moved so far left and ridiculous that many people can’t even recognize how much of a farce the party has become. When the openly gay pro abortion candidate is the republican, the “right” will dutiful check the box to put him in office to prevent a worse outcome.

Nope. If the choice was a Republican Buttigieg or a Democrat, you would see a serious conservative third party alternative.

Doesn’t matter. The point is that if there wasn’t one, the “outcome only” folks would be forced to vote for him. If there ever was going to be a serious third party option it would have happened already. The problem is that conservatives refuse to “allow a democrat” by voting for someone who has no chance of being elected.