Re: David Cross on Health Care

Wow.  You are really going off on this Paul

-----Original Message-----
From: [email protected] [mailto:[email protected]] On Behalf
Of pcg
Sent: Monday, October 25, 2010 11:48 AM
To: DADL (off topic)
Subject: Re: [DADL-OT] David Cross on Health Care

>> I know you're sharper than this. Of course he does not mean to imply that
>> America is a Christian state. He means that America is a Democratic
>> Republic, and when a bill that supports Christian values is up for debate,
>> it's odd to see so many Christians vehemently oppose it.
>
> So we're back to my question:  Since when is statism a "Christian value"?

As I explained before, "statism," as you define it, is already what we
have. The government provides us with *all sorts* of services, and
uses our tax money to do it. Nobody's debating whether whether or not
the government should use tax money to provide services, it's a
question of which services they provide.

> I mean, surely Cross can't be asking why Christians don't contribute to
> healthcare-oriented charities or support hospitals etc.,

I'm quite certain he isn't.

> Actually, no, it *doesn't* ignore that fact.  Christians were paying taxes
> in Caesar's day too.  The question is why we should assume that raising
> taxes and giving people any particular set of benefits with that public
> money is necessarily a "Christian value".

You're twisting the question. It's *not* a question of whether raising
taxes and providing benefits is a Christian value. It's a question of
whether taking care of the poor and sick is a Christian value.

If the answer is yes, then one would expect Christians to support
those who want to undertake such an endeavor. The only thing that
could give them pause would be if supporting such an endeavor would
cause them to break another commandment. Is that the case here?

> Especially when the "universal
> health care" program in question supports abortion and other services that,
> historically, have been *anti*-Christian values, etc.

If Christians (in general) threw their support and resources behind
the movement, they would have a voice on these issues.

>> There's no good reason why health care shouldn't or couldn't be a similar
>> entitlement.
>
> There may or may not be a good reason to raise taxes, but that's not the
> issue here.  The issue here is why one side of this debate should claim it
> has "Christian values" on its side and the other side does not.

Raising taxes has nothing to do with it. I would respect any Christian
who supported universal health care, but wanted to work to ensure that
it could be done by slashing useless programs instead of raising
taxes.

Here's a question: I wonder if the all the churches and religious
organizations across America would give up their tax exempt status if
all the tax revenue generated would go providing health care for those
in need.

> No one is questioning whether "health care" is something that Christians can
> agree with.  It's the "universal" part that's at issue here.

Do you mean to suggest that a possible Christian value might be "take
care of some of the sick, but not others?"

--
-pcg
 [email protected]

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