The State of the Union is...divided

Some quick thoughts while being glad I didn't throw away two hours of my life - particularly since we "spring forward" tonight.

Passing the flag at the “Emergency House Call” back in 2009. That was part of our division.

I think I have said this before, but it’s been years since I’ve watched a State of the Union address. My preference is to read the remarks because I don’t have the patience for long speeches like that anymore - didn’t matter if it was Bush 43, Obama, Trump, or Biden. (I think the one SotU highlight I did watch was when Donald Trump gave the late Rush Limbaugh the Presidential Medal of Freedom back in 2020.)

Of course, the reaction to our latest rendition went along ideological lines: if you’re into massive government influence in your life, denying God-given rights to our most vulnerable population, and don’t mind elder abuse, you probably loved it. On the other hand, if you like freedom and liberty, a laundry list of what the government feels powerful enough to do likely isn’t appealing, particularly when it’s being shouted at you. Constitution? What’s that?

But part of the reason the State of the Union seemed to some like a campaign speech was that, for the most part, the competitors for November are determined barring divine intervention: it’s Trump-Biden part 2. It’s a battle of the only candidates each of them can beat, although for one of them the data point will be false. It’s mean Tweets vs. mean streak, Orange Man Bad vs. the hairy-legged child sniffer. We can regret our choices as much as we want, but the duopoly of a political system we have will come to this.

If you ask me - and since you’re reading this I believe you are asking me - I think all this division began with the 2000 election. The elections I lived through as an adult prior to that were generally decided by enough of a margin that there wasn’t any doubt. Maybe the only controversy was regarding Ross Perot and whether he took enough votes from Bush 41 to deny him another term in 1992. (I know he took mine from Bush, but I think I also talked my ex out of voting for Clinton to support Perot. So it was even at my house.)

But that was the election we began hearing about “selected, not elected.” We went through 8 years of that, even with the temporary unity of the aftermath of 9/11. Then the War on Terror divided us some more, particularly as things there went south in Bush 43’s second term.

Then we went through the Great Recession, which was a crisis Barack Obama couldn’t waste. Those who objected became the TEA Party, those who didn’t think we went far enough became the Occupy movement. And this political wedge kept driving us further and further apart, particularly when the Democrats and media - who basically gave us Donald Trump as the GOP candidate perceived as the weakest and saw him somehow upset the Hillary Clinton apple cart - couldn’t accept the fact that Hillary lost and decided to sabotage the Trump presidency with a fake scandal. Trump Derangement Syndrome has been the latest blow in cleaving our once-united republic. So here we are.

It’s no secret that I prefer a government that doesn’t tell me how to wipe my bum, or do whatever else they think I should. Our Founding Fathers declared independence, fought a revolution against the most powerful nation in the world, and worked through an ineffective Articles of Confederation before writing a Constitution that extended the Declaration of Independence’s creed that we had inalienable, God-given rights. We were split into Federalists and Anti-Federalists back then, but we came together, compromised, and made ourselves into a great nation. So why can’t we unite for liberty?

The phrase “a house divided against itself cannot stand” is generally attributed to Abraham Lincoln, but he was quoting Scripture:

And Jesus knew their thoughts, and said unto them, Every kingdom divided against itself is brought to desolation; and every city or house divided against itself cannot stand:

and if Satan cast out Satan, he is divided against himself, how shall then his kingdom stand? (Matthew 12:25-26, KJV)

In the end, our division is simple: we have faith in government, or we have faith in God. We’d be better off on the Lord’s team, so pray with me for revival.

P.S. I read this from my friend

David Wolosik

last night (right after I finished this) and it goes in well with the division theme.

"Christian Nationalists" The New Bogeyman Enemy Of The State Before The 2024 Presidential Election