I really enjoyed this article. It is quite good at showing the absurdities of some current political correctness/free speech issues. I don't know who the guy who wrote it is. He's probably some right wing scary person who I'd disagree with on almost everything. However, I liked this article. I'm pretty on board with freedom of speech. Even if someone wants to say terrible things about my back hair, my faith or my family, I'll be sad, and hurt, but I don't think the government should tell us what we can and cannot say. And I don't think people should get in trouble from the law for the things they say which are offensive. I don't want people to say things that offend me or my friends but I want the right to say things which offend them.

So I say, let's all speak freely and offend liberally. Except perhaps politicians and the political correctness thought police, I think we can all agree those guys should shut up, they've said enough.

"On 9/11 I thought, For the most powerful, militarized nation in the world also to think of itself as an innocent victim is deadly. It was a rare prophetic moment for me, considering Presidents Bush and Obama have spent billions asking the military to rectify the crime of a small band of lawless individuals, destroying a couple of nations who had little to do with it, in the costliest, longest series of wars in the history of the United States. The silence of most Christians and the giddy enthusiasm of a few, as well as the ubiquity of flags and patriotic extravaganzas in allegedly evangelical churches, says to me that American Christians may look back on our response to 9/11 as our greatest Christological defeat. It was shattering to admit that we had lost the theological means to distinguish between the United States and the kingdom of God. The criminals who perpetrated 9/11 and the flag-waving boosters of our almost exclusively martial response were of one mind: that the non-violent way of Jesus is stupid. All of us preachers share the shame; when our people felt very vulnerable, they reached for the flag, not the Cross. September 11 has changed me. I’m going to preach as never before about Christ crucified as the answer to the question of what’s wrong with the world. I have also resolved to relentlessly reiterate from the pulpit that the worst day in history was not a Tuesday in New York, but a Friday in Jerusalem when a consortium of clergy and politicians colluded to run the world on their own terms by crucifying the Son of God.” - Bishop Will Willamon

From here.

I was happy that the High Court told the Government they couldn't do offshore processing. If it drives them into the arms of the Libs so they can legalise more inhumain ways of dealing with asylum seekers, I'm not so pleased. If only the High Court was able to rule on the morality of the issue and not just the legality. I don't really what the High Court ruling on the morality of things. But just this once it would have been nice.

I've been enjoying reading Don Miller's blog lately.

I just read this post where he stuck up a video of Bill Hybels announcing that Howard Schultz, the CEO of Starbucks, had pulled out of the Willow Creek Global Leadership Summit. Schultz pulled out of the event because of an online protest threatening to boycott Starbucks because Willow Creek is perceived to be anti-gay.

I really appreciated the way Hybels was so gracious to Mr Schultz and even to the people who had started the petition. I also appreciated that he stated Willow Creek's view on homosexuality positively and without judgement.



In contrast to Hybels' comments I saw this on ABC news today. And while obviously biased and heavily edited, I wish Christians didn't say dumb stuff like this in public. (Also see if you can notice Richard Dreyfus sitting next to Bob Katter.)



I hope when people let me down and misrepresent me I can be as gracious as Hybels.

I like the carbon tax.

I'm happy to pay more for my pollution, though I might end up ahead because of this scheme.

I'm excited about the innovation into clean energy that this should promote.

I wish we weren't so selfish and the questions weren't "How much will this cost me?" but "How can we do the right thing?"

I think Julia did well on Qanda tonight. Especially the last 10 minutes, though I think perhaps that may have been set up the the producers. Letting the last question come from that kid who is "the future", pure political gold. But she still did well, and I enjoy a big finish anyway.

I think I might eat less meat.

I'm also planning on catching the train to work tomorrow. But that might be because I enjoy the sleep in the train gives me.

It's been interesting watching everyone's reactions to the death of Osama. It's rather distressing to see scenes of Americans waving flags and rejoicing in the death of another human. I take no joy in the death of anyone. I have no feeling that justice has been done.

How does shooting and killing Osama make payment for the thousands of lives he took? Death seems too easy. He deserved worse.

However I do feel like his death is an inevitable consequence of a life lived at war with the most powerful nation on earth. I have no dreams of the US capturing him and locking him up and reforming him. The US could not change his heart. They could not bring back the thousands who he killed. They could only take his life. They could only execute their role to be "agents of wrath to bring punishment on the wrongdoer." It was justice done man's way.

Messy problems require messy solutions.

But this isn't really a solution, is it? Terrorism will go on. War and violence will continue. Atrocities will continue on both sides. No one will win.

With this in mind, once again the violence and tragedy of this world points me to the God of this world, who brings justice not through a gun but through a cross. The life of one evil man cannot atone for the lives of the thousands of people he killed. But the life of one innocent God-man can, and does, atone for all the terror and atrocity done and to be done. The killing of an infinite God is justice for the sins of a finite race. And those who put their trust in this cross are put to death with Jesus, that they might also be given new life in the risen Jesus. It's a mercy undeserved through a death undeserved.

But justice does not just come through the cross. And Jesus will come again, and he will wield the sword. He will not let the unrepentant escape with just a simple death. Evil will meet its match.

One way or another the evil will be put to death, either at the cross of Christ, or at the sword of Christ. Justice will be done. Fear will end. Pain will cease. Life will reign. Goodness will prevail. God has won.

But until that day, I will not celebrate the death of the wicked at the hands of the wicked because I know that I too am wicked, and I too deserve a death worse that of being killed by a gun.

I will work for peace in this world. I will seek to do no violence and I will not encourage violence to be done in my name. But when evil is done, and terrible solutions are sought, I will look forward to the new and better world to come.

A new day is coming. God has won.

So I had a coffee today with one of my friends who is a staunch Liberal supporter. I always enjoy meeting up with him because politically we tend to disagree on almost everything while theologically we agree on almost everything. It's always amazing to me that two people can have such similar views of faith, and of what we want the final outcome in society to be, and such vastly different views on how to get there. We have very enjoyable conversations. I like people who can disagree and argue their case well. I think he argues better than me. One day he could be Prime Minsiter. I hope so.

At one stage I mentioned that I'd consider voting Greens in this state election. I wasn't saying that I was voting Greens, merely expressing that I was an undecided voter and I like some of the Green policies. Anyway, he was pretty firm in letting me know that voting Green is a terrible idea for a Christian. He was telling me that the Australian Christian Lobby doesn't support any party they just tell you not to support the Greens. Good Christians don't vote Greens.

I often think about how in politics the Christian is generally faced with the issue of choosing between voting for conservative parties which are strong on individual morality, or the leftist parties which are strong on corporate morality. No parties seem to be able to handle being both, from a Christian point of view.

Anyway, I'm not sure who to vote for this state election. I told him he was allowed to send me whatever he wanted to show why I shouldn't vote Greens.

Meanwhile, I'm gonna try and work out who to vote for. This state election is even more uninspiring than the federal, which is a real shame because I like politics when you have good choices to make. Feel free to give me some voting advice.

I was going to vote for my friend Chris Simpson but it turns out I miss out on his electorate by a street. But if you're in Willoughby, I reckon, vote for Chris, he's a good guy, and he's not a Green.

Prime Minister Gillard was on Q and A tonight, and it was a ripper of a show. Gillard was on fire. She did a really impressive performance. Political skills wise, it was kinda like watching John Howard at work, she was that good, plus, unlike with Howard, I didn't feel dirty afterwards.

I'm still not sure I'm a Gillard fan, but I think I have more respect for her. And I agreed with her on most stuff. I enjoyed her pragmatism and willingness to answer questions. I didn't ever really feel like she avoided the questions, even the tough ones. She didn't always seem like she was giving the most genuine answer, when have you ever felt that with pollie?

Even if you don't like Gillard, you can be impressed by some quality question handling, just like I'm impressed by Howard's skills. If you haven't seen the show, go watch it on iview. It was a cracker.

Just so you know, the image isn't from this Qanda, it's from last year, but tonight's one isn't around the web yet.

So here's a question we were pondering tonight, what happens with hens and bucks nights in gay marriage? I know everyone is debating about gay marriage at the moment but this is an issue that nobody is talking about.

Say two gay men decide to get married. Is Groom One allowed to go to the bucks' night of Groom Two? Or do they stay away? And are their male friends obligated to go to two separate bucks nights? Or do they just have to choose the groom they like the most?

Also, what about the men's female friends? What party do they go to? They don't have a party to go to. The men get two parties and the girls get zero. I know people feel that not allowing gay marriage is discriminatory, but allowing gay marriage is potentially discriminatory for all those who will be left out of bucks and hens nights everywhere. It's a catch-22 really. Someone's gonna have their rights impinged, the question is just who?

Dear Women,

If I was a CEO I'd give you equal pay (or 90% at the very least) because I care.

Just make sure you don't go and get pregnant.

Love,

Tom

I read this blogpost on Ed Stetzer's blog about how huge amounts of evangelicals in the US are in favor of cutting foreign aid, welfare, unemployment benefits and education in the federal budget, as opposed to spending on the military and security.

I don't understand how a Christian can arrive at a view like that. Like if you said to Jesus "Should the government spend $10 on clean water for an African village or should it buy some bullets?" I feel like I know what Jesus' answer would be.

But Stetzer poses the question about how the church should be responding to the talk of the federal budget and the responses he got were enlightening.

Basically, the people who were in favour of budget cuts to aid and education seem to be saying that it's wrong for the Christian to be outsourcing their individual responsibility to help the poor to the government. Christians should be changing the world, not getting their government to do it for them. When we support aid we're just avoiding what we should be doing ourselves.

Now this idea makes more sense than just saying "Stuff poor people, let's buy tanks!" (Though tanks are awesome!)

The advantages to aid coming from the church and individuals is that it can bypass the government's political agenda, money doesn't have to be spent on propping up government backed dictators, or doing aid work to ultimately benefit the donor country. It means that aid can go where it's needed, with no agenda or a gospel agenda. Both agendas I think would be more appealing to Jesus.

However my view is that if the government is going to take the money that God has entrusted me with then I would like them to be spending it on things that seem to be more in-line with God's Kingdom values that nuclear submarines. Plus as a member of a democracy when the government that represents me spends money they do it on my behalf. So it is my responsibility to urge them to spend the money on the things that align with my values. As a Christian that falls more in the camp of aid and education than national security. I'm not shirking my responsibility by seeking that my government helps the poor and marginalised, I'm fulfilling it. And with the money that is left over after tax I still have a responsibility as a Christian to spend my money on helping the poor and marginalised. It's not either/or, it's both.

That's what I think. I might put some of that in a comment.

Anyway, what I am pleased about is that now I have a better understanding of why people disagree with government aid and it's not as loony as it first seemed.

Personally I'm happy to pay a levy to rebuild Queensland. I won't because I don't earn enough, but if they decided to take 0.5% of my pay to go get a car out of a creek or something, that'd be fine by me.

I can't see what everyone's complaining about.

Well I'm pretty pleased we have a government now. That was, however, a very enjoyable 17 days.

I think Rob Oakeshott is a bit of a dude.

I was amused that right after Oakeshott and Windsor announced their intentions my Facebook feed filled up with people proclaiming the imminent ruin of Australia. I'm pretty sure, whoever they sided with, Australia wouldn't get ruined. As far as I can tell neither Labor or the Liberals would set about turning Australia into a police state, or legislating forced abortions, euthanasia and gay marriage. Neither of them are going start burning books or merging Australia with North Korea. They're just going to plod along making good decisions and bad decisions none of which will immediately send Australia into Zimbabwean territory. We're rather blessed to live in a country where we can survive in a country where we have no government for 17 days and there are no riots, no military coups, no assassinations, we just keep going on our way and make amusing websites.

I was similarly amused by the article on SMH that said that Rob Oakeshott "held Australia hostage" because he took 15 minutes to tell the press conference that he was siding with Labor. Giving the man 15 minutes after he's spent the last 17 days trying to sort out the next three years of Australian government for the country is a small ask. I'm very thankful for the diligence and care that Katter, Windsor and Oakeshott put into their decision. I don't think anyone should accuse them of taking their role lightly, though I'm sure they will.

What has interested me in all this is the vast difference of opinion that Christians can have in politics. You can get a bunch of Christians together who all have basically the same views on the Bible, on persona morality, on their theology - but then you get them to talk about politics, and they'll be people all over the political spectrum.

In my house there are three of us, we are all pretty much of the same view of things in our faith, we all believe in the authority of the Bible, we're all pretty much reformed in our theology, as far as the churches practice and message goes we probably all have the same view on abortion, gay marriage, care for the poor, etc. But I think we each voted Liberal, Labor and Greens or maybe one of them should be changed to Family First. This makes me happy. I love that loving Jesus doesn't make you vote one way or the other. And I love that it's rare that people will question your faith just because of who you choose to vote for.

I'm thankful for democracy. I'm thankful for politics. And I'm still thankful for Mike Kelly's moustache.

I'm really looking forward to a hung parliament. That would be the perfect outcome. Two good election results in row. I hope so.

Mike Kelly has an awesome moustache. If only I could have voted for him.

I had a really good time voting today. I almost numbered 1-84 below the line for the Senate, but I wasn't inspired enough this year. I went with Gem and Jem. We voted at the RSL so rewarded ourselves with lunch. We met Lesley in the line to vote so she joined us for the celebratory lunch.

Now I'm settling in now for a night of election coverage with Jem and Lesley with Gem joining us latert. From what's been a pretty unimpressive election lead up from both major parties, it means that the election will be close. I'm excited because I like a close election. I may be unhappy with both the major parties, but I'm quite happy to watch a battle of the mediocres. Plus I'm hoping for something new to happen, like a hung Parliament, or perhaps the Greens to take Government by some freak voting event. I'd love a freak voting event. Maybe even the Sex Party will hold the balance of power in the Senate. I really doubt it, but wouldn't that be good for a laugh?

I love elections.

I love Wednesday nights. It's all politics on the ABC, and one of the programs is even funny (Thank you Gruen Nation). It's good because this election has been pretty dull. Since my last post on the election the only really interesting thing that has happened is the Libs absurd broadband plan. Actually it's not totally absurd, it's just mediocraty, spun as a good idea. "Our answer to a high quality but expensive plan, is a low quality but cheap plan." It's like everyone was thinking we were going to get a new car and now the Liberals want us to get excited about 1984 Datsun.

Not that I'm too worried, because I don't think the Libs will win, and even if they did I don't think their broadband plan is sustainable in the long term, it'll only be viable for a little while before Australia is forced to catch to the rest of the developed world.

And I really enjoyed seeing Tony Abbott getting schooled by Kerry O'Brian on the 730 Report.

Other than that I guess Latham has been mildly entertaining but he hasn't really been part of the campaign, just part of the side show. And I did enjoy seeing Julia getting asked lots if questions from loyal Kevinists at the People's Forum in Brisband tonight even if her answers were as dull as concrete. Actually duller than concrete, sorry Dad.

I still don't know who to vote for. I have noticed that if I donkey vote in my electorate Joe Hockey will get my vote and I'd like to avoid that. Maybe I'll do a reverse donkey. That sounds vaguely rude, but it's not, you've all just got dirty minds.

I love elections. Too bad this one's boring.

At least it was boring but all these Labor leaks are spicing things up. I'm not feeling all that compassionate. If you stab your people in the back, you can't expect them to behave while you live of their demise. Labor came out looking strong when they dumped Rudd. Now it's all looking like a bit of a shambles. The Libs are looking good, because Labor is just falling apart.

I kinda hope Labor don't win, just to punish them for their selfish dumping of their leader that brought them to power. Their fear of losing the election, is now manifesting itself all over the place as they just seem to be playing everyone's fear and prejudices. They're going right on immigration, refugees, gay marriage. They're ignoring mental health needs. No one is talking about the war. And they're trying to impress everyone with their balanced budget. None of this sounds like strong moral leadership, it seems to be playing to conservative agenda.

It seems particularly absurd that they have an openly gay Senator who has to speak out about her opposition to gay marriage. That doesn't make the party look united, it just makes them look like their stomping on the individual beliefs and convictions of their people.

I guess all this means that I'm not really finding this boring at all. I'm just finding it uninspiring. At least uninspiring is less likely to let me down.

I was so happy when Kevin became our Prime Minister. Now I'm sad that he's not our Prime Minister.

I think I'm feeling rather let down by Labor today. I voted for Kevin. Well technically I think I voted the Labor person in my electorate. But I voted for a Labor party with Kevin as its leader. I liked that he seemed to care more about people that pleasing big business. I liked that he was going to say "Sorry". I liked that he was going take action on climate change.

So when Labor won, I was excited by the prospect of a new government. I liked that Julia was his Deputy. I was happy to see so many women in prominant positions of power.

Over the past few years, I can't say Kevin has made all my dreams come true. Though I thought he probably would be a little of a let down. Politicians always are. Actually, he was quite a lot of a let down at times.

But the past 24 hours have been most depressing. I'm sad that Kevin didn't get a chance to lead when things got tough. I'm disappointed that our politicians are so scared of losing an election that they'll oust their leader when things don't look good for them. I'm sad that Julia stood by her leader right up until she had him kicked out of the Prime Ministership. None of this makes me believe that they really believe in leadership at all. Only power, fear and job security.

Lots of people have been excited about the fact that we have our first female PM. I was looking forward to that prosect. But I don't want it this way. I don't really care about the gender of the Prime Minister if they get in through disloyalty.

But then again, that's politics. It's not like Kevin got in to leadership in any better fashion. And Julia will probably lose her leadership that way too, if she doesn't lose the election and step-down as a result.

Ahh. It's a shame.

Still, all the best Julia. I hope you lead us well.

Tomorrow the Socceroos could be out of the World Cup and Kevin Rudd out of office.

Could be a big day for Australia.

My guess is more people will be paying attention to the soccer.