Journal - Day 6 02/22/2003

Ralph Reed - Active Faith

1983 - Ralph's conversion, Conservative values reevaluated
Changed style, tactics
- Break bread with foes and political rivals
Christ's message of Love and Redemption transcends politics
History shows harm done in Christ name because they believed they had a monopoly on truth
Being Christian doesn't mean you are never wrong, rather, you are forgiven.
Invalid Claims of dangers of Christian political activism
- Claiming WE have that monopoly on truth from God
  - Implicit is all who oppose are damned by God
- Racist, anti-Semitic
- Intolerant
Christianity has role to play in politics
- Values / Morality
- Family
- Possible to separate our Faith from our Political views?
  - Christianity is suppose to change how we live.
History of role of Christianity in American Politics
- Nation vibrant religious background
- Most social movements founded by people of faith
- Christianity has served both the left and the right in the past
  - Slavery and Racism
  - Plight of Labor and Poor
  - Rights of unborn
- Great Awakening
  - Dissenting religions from England and Europe came to America
  - George Winfield across cross America in 1740 - 1760 speaking on God's pending judgement
  - New Ideas about liberties and government
  - Preachers talked about freedoms, rights, and no distinction between elite and common man.
  - Real Great Awakening started a century earlier in the Reformation in northern Europe.
  - When the hearts of people change, political change follows
  - Great Awakening deal with most issues but left the issue of Slavery on the table.
- Next Great Awakening
  - Christians freed their slaves
  - Civil disobedience as Christians helped in Underground Railroad
  - Founded American Anti Slavery Society
  - Dispatched 70 evangelist to preach the Good News and also freedom for slaves
  - Adopted doctrine that slavery was a sin and should be abolished
  - Theodore Wells was chief tutor.
    - 1836
  - Christians were persecuted for standing up against slaves.
  - Single issue activists driven into politics for this single reason
  - 1840 - Abolitionist candidates did best in evangelical church areas
  - Before 1850 - Most evangelical Christians were Democrats
    - Democrats as defenders of rights of workers.
    - Republicans took a bold stand against Slavery
      - Evangelical Christians switched from Democrats to Republican
      - Republican party born in Revival
        
        Danger to Republican Party is to forget its roots and leave moral issues on table.
- Temperance Movement
  - May be considered a failure today, but was a huge impact at turn of the century.
  - Women's Christian Temperance Union 1874
  - Crossed parties
  - After 1900s it became more radical
  - 1919 passed 18th Amendment
  - It took 40+ years to work the changes through society, incremental, not big leaps
- Late 1900s, Urbanization and immigration
  - Religious reformers tackled issues and integrated with Democrat party
  - Walter Rothenbush, evangelized the poor
    - Started saving souls
    - Later to shepherding those who were victims of social indifference, political corruption, and greed.
    - Social gospel
    - Christians to build just social justice based upon moral law
    - Labor Unions, Anti Trust, Minimum wage....
  - Trade Union Movement and passage of Labor Laws was not passed initially with secular help
  - Labor uprisings motivated Christians
  - Preached gospel of Labor unions from the pulpit
  - Democratic party grew by identifying with Christians and their issues
    - This brought the Catholics into the Democratic party
- New Deal
  - Stock market crashed
  - Roosevelt had deep religious views, Christian Democrat
    - Presented himself as a Christian
    - Call to Christian servanthood
- Communism
  - Opposed Communism not only for politics, but for Atheism
  - Cold War
- Racial
  - Separate but equal determined to be unconstitutional
  - Black Church bore the new Christian movement
    - Martin Luther King, Baptist preacher
      - Not a secular leader, but Christian leader
      - World wants to paint King as secular leader in the order of the Hindu, Ghandi
    - Used persuasion, not violence, as the way to achieve goals
    - King used his Christian message to persuade
    - Christian Faith became an issue between King and Press, Elite
    - Christian message stirred troubled conscience of white middle class
- Abortion
  - Fundamental Christians are attempting to pursued people today
Religious harmony still evades us
Each time, when the Christian movement succeeds in converting their agenda into laws, the Christians movement then ceases to exist.
- The Christian movement lives for the purpose of making a change, not for sustaining the change
Conservative Christian Right
- 1970s
- Jerry Fallwell
- Pat Robertson
- Southern Baptist
- This is not a threat to Democracy, but a signal of its renewal.
Lesson is persuade, changing the hearts and minds of society.
- We need to change the culture (philosophy)
  - Then Laws will change.

The Cost of Freedom - Bonheffer

2 Kingdom's theory
- Martin Luther believed Church should not meddle with state bruises and state should not meddle with Church business
How can the Church be silent while the government is systematically persecuting the Jews?
Hitler said he would not interfere with Church but behind the senses, he is.
- Elect Nazi to key Church positions
- Ludwig Mulla the Arch Bishop
- Hitler do whatever he wants to do
State has right to be oppressive?
- Church must demand state JUSTIFY its policies
- Does the state have a legitimate claim against the Jews?
- Regardless of answer
  - Church must be responsible to victims in any social order
  - Is it enough for Church to help victims
    - or should Church be a spoke in wheel itself.
Frederick Boshivink backed against Hitler even though he was neutral on Jewish Issue
Capitulation on some issues to reach compromise
- Is that a good thing?
- Should we stick to moral ground, unceasing, always?
- What would be the pragmatic thing to do?
- What would be the right thing to do?

Journals are still nothing but questions. No reactions by anyone yet.

We spent a lot of time, in fact, all of our time, talking about last weeks questions and finishing up last weeks chapter, Chapter 4 - The Reformation, which consisted of 2 closing questions.

The best interaction I get is when I can come up with an analogy. Since I've thought of the analogies on the fly, I sometimes get myself in a box so I it would probably be helpful if I came with a couple analogies already thought up and ready for them. Perhaps that is the ticket.

I continue to be the talker and they the listeners. In the very first audio sound byte we learned of the 3 different ways we learn things. The third way was prescription and we were definitely not going to use that method. So far, being as prescription is one sided discussions, we have learned by prescription.

We did discuss the past questions. I had trouble remembering my answers which I had written only days ago so I am sure the students did not remember the context of which the questions were asked. None the less, we persevered.

One analogy we had was if one student was drowning in a river with a stiff current, would you jump in to save them. At issue was Free Will and if the consequence was stiff enough, did that remove Free Will.

Another analogy had one of the students crawling off into a rabbit hole as a baby and, having lost his parents, finds himself raised by rabbits? Once found years later, what sort of moral code might he have, if any? Would he make any moral choices or just selfish choices with an eye towards rewards and punishment. The issue here was whether it is true "morals" are innate.

Reaction to Question #1 - What is Polybian Republicanism? (from Greek named Polybius 198-117 bc) page 112 par 1

Polybius noted types of governments seemed to follow a cycle which is noted above. He noted the early Roman Empire had addressed this problem with a system of checks and balances. He documented the Roman Empires system of government with its checks and balances.

It is Polybius' Republicanism which the US Constitution is based upon more than any other. Below is Polybius briefly describing the Roman Empires system of checks and balances.

Reaction to Question #2 - What does the author mean by this? "... political freedom which the return to biblical Christianity gradually brought forth. ... ... results did not come all at once." page 105

Any change which is going to occur in society's laws is going to require time. If you look at the changes which have been wrought on society in the past, it takes a generation to bring most new philosophies to fruition. Ideas must be expressed and these ideas must gain acceptance. Beyond acceptance, you have the way things are, or have always been. Traditions do not change without pain and upheaval.

Even if all of society came to the same conclusions over night, the HOW to implement is another question entirely. When the Articles of Confederation was written, it took how many years? From there, a new Constitution was written. No. These changes do not occur over night.

In a society which has been aristocrat and elite for centuries, what sort of obstacles do you think there might be to adopt a concept that all men are equal?

Reaction to Question #3 - What is Florentine Republicanism? page 112

When America's founding fathers were debating what form of government we would have, the Florentine Republicanism model was available. Although it was a failed experiment, there are those who can learn from failures. Florence, by the way, is in Italy.

Niccolo Machiavelli is one such person who learned from history. Machiavelli was of the Renaissance and demonstrated the humanist philosophy with all this new learning was going to bankrupt. In reaction to the Florentine Republicanism, he wrote the Prince, which some of the more notorious leaders have accepted as their model.

America took in the lessons of Florentine Republicanism and also The Prince and steered away from both.

In the Florentine Republicanism model, there were 2 groups, guilds (which aggregate into guild counsels and the Mercanzia, which was judiciary) and neighborhoods (which aggregate into neighborhood councils and the Priorate).

The Mercanzia set foreign-trade policy and their counsels took care of their inner guild disputes. Meanwhile, the Priorate took care of noneconomic foreign policy. Between the two "parties", the Priorate held the trump card.

Think of the guild or Mercanzia as the business party.

Think of the neighborhood or Priorate party as the populace party.

It was a 2 party system, but there were no checks and balances.

Reaction to Question #4 - The "Justice Lifts the Nations" painting. Why is justice unblindfolded? page 106

Themis is the ancient Greek goddess of Justice. She stands with a scales, sword, and is blindfolded. Now, let us think for a moment. Should we have the goddess Themis present in this painting? A painting pointing out the Bible's significance? On contrare!

Removing does not mean we now have partiality and biased outcome. Rather, with our eyes wide open, we use the Bible as our basis of laws. There is a difference of outcome here.

Which is better. To judge fairly based upon illogical and inconsistent laws or to judge fairly based upon biblically based moral laws?

For example, there is a case in San Francisco currently where Dr. Brody refused to artificially impregnate a lesbian because she believe it to be wrong.

Reaction to Question #5 - What is the Conciliar Movement? page 109 par. 1

You can probably guess "conciliar" comes from the word "counsel". There was some struggle as to how the Catholic Church would be governed. By a counsel of elders or by Peter's heir?

Reaction to Question #6 - "The Roman law secured certain freedoms for Roman citizens -- i.e. from the apostle Paul's experiences." What does this mean? page 106

From the Bible we read about a few basic rights available to Roman citizens. The right not to be punished without trial. The right to appeal a criminal case to Caesar.

The point the book is taking is during the Reformation, the concept that all men have fallen and all are basically sinful. The ramifications of this is the other side of the coin. It is not that we are all groveling on the floor, but rather, the aristocrat, the elite, those with power and wealth and control, are all just like us. There is no difference.

"All men are created equal." is a new concept in thinking. No one is "more equal" than others. With this new thinking come a host of rights for ordinary men, for, are we not all, ordinary?

Reaction to Question #7 - What is Heterodoxy? page 108 par. 3

Although Heterodoxy means unorthodox, the term is mostly used during the time the papacy was in controversy (1307 - 1377) and had some very worldly men in the papacy. The papacy transferred to Avignon, France for a time, then back to Rome (Gregory XI), and then both Rome and Avignon and then, finally, a third Pope came on the scene. The question comes of the Apostolic descendents, or, Peter, as head of the church, and his direct descendents. Are any of these wayward men, or when there were 2, and then 3 papacies, all direct descendents of Peter?

Later Heterodoxy are identified as groups or organizations which are not mainstream Church. A particular Heterodoxy group might be accepted by the Catholic Church because they wish to keep in contact with these people. The One Church's options are acceptance (with hopeful, later reconciliation), or kicking them out of the Church (with less hope of reconciliation).

It is in the later sense the author refers to the nation's monarchs would use the Catholic Church to control religious factions within their nation. The Religious faction can't be considered "Catholic", but they are controllable to a certain extent by the Catholic Church.

Reaction to Question #8 - What is a deist? page 110 par. 2

Reaction to Question #9 - Why were "There are many areas where Bible was not followed as it should have been, but two are outstanding?" page 113 bottom

I just wanted to point out here, up front, that there are way more than two issues which can be addressed when we are speaking of where the Bible was not followed as it should have been. The author, of course, was speaking of those issues which have more impact on society, world history, and were more troubling.

Why there are two area pointed out by Mr. Schaeffer which are outstanding has a lot to do with Political Correctness and the assignment of guilt. The gist of what Mr. Schaeffer was writing of is most probably accurate. However, his choice on what issues to pick on and the assignment of guilt is a product of the Politically Correct times we live in. You can just imagine Mr. Schaeffer struggling over this particular chapter.

The assignment of guilt through Political Correct doctrines is a method used long before the term of Politically Correct was used. It is used to control "undesirable thought" or "indoctrination tool". Ever hear of "Sensitivity Training"?

You might perceive this is an effort at mind control. You would be incorrect to perceive Mr. Schaeffer if making an attempt at mind control here. Mr. Schaeffer, even while telling us about victims and submitting who is guilty, is also a victim. I am sure Mr. Schaeffer had a troubled heart while going through this part of American and Reformation history - caught in a guilt ridden Political Correct web.

Reaction to Question #10 - Why is this said to be so? "... yet the church, as the church, did not speak out sufficiently against them (slavery and the noncompassionate use of wealth)." page 113 bottom

This statement, though true, strikes a harsh response from me. Our author, Francis Schaeffer, seems to be very "sensitive" to what is politically correct in our current day. Instead of a reporting of facts and events with their probably causes, we suddenly have this vision of a modern day Christian, with hat in hand and shuffling feet, looking down and muttering about what was going on.

There were many events which were good or bad, but in these politically sensitive areas, our author has escalated them to over shadow all history in the magnitude of their sins. Sins, it would appear, which have no redemption and no forgiveness possible, for 150 years later, when we are baptized into Christ for the forgiveness of sins, we are also baptized into slave owner, bigot, and money barons. This is, unless we are black, in which case we are baptized into Christ for the forgiveness of sins and join a great American Heritage in the Black Church.

Through much of the chapter, Mr. Schaeffer lets us know about the injustice which was perpetrated against the black man and those who were in a position of wealth during the Industrial Revolution. As a Christian nation, the Church should never have allowed for slavery. Slavery should have been rejected during the writing of our Constitution. Because it wasn't, Christians are just as guilty of slavery as the slave owners themselves.

After beating up on how the Church was unfaithful to the Word of God and failed to act when it should, Mr. Schaeffer began to elaborate on some other events. Isn't interesting Christians are horrible for not opposing slavery while non-Christians were busy rounding up slaves, selling slaves, and even today, have their own slaves. Yes, slavery exists today. The new world order nor Humanism seems to concerned about slavery except where Christians are concerned. Now isn't that interesting?

Mr. Schaeffer does admit it was Christians in England who ended slavery in 1807. This doesn't absolve Christians thought because they should have come to this earlier, perhaps at the Westminster Confession. Mr. Schaeffer seems embarrassed England arrived at this point before America did.

Mr. Schaeffer does admit there is was, and always is, a secular corruption in the Church and also many non-Christians who call themselves Christians, out there doing or not doing which is harmful to Christ's Church. (These corrupting, non-Christian influences are, of course, blameless.) He even admits the Church and Christians were very instrumental in the movement against Slavery so the greatest sin seems to be not what Christians believe but that they were late to the party.

The Industrial Revolution was something new which was changing the world by storm. Changes were occurring at a frightening pace which was completely changing everything. As these changes worked their way though they were reacted to, both by the Church and by society. The Church was instrumental in taking a moral stand once the issues crystalized.

We know that entirely different solutions were provide in, say, Japan, whose culture was very different from our own. I would not presume in a philosophy class, that all the right steps were taken. Not then nor in our current day. I certainly have an opinion in both cases. Valid, worthwhile Christians, even today, differ in their opinions on political and economic positions. What Mr. Schaeffer presupposes is, if everyone behaved like a Christian should have, there would have been no difficulty and there would have been no need for any additional laws to have been created.

Unfortunately, because this is a politically sensitive issue, then today's Christians seem compelled to rush forward to embrace the guilt by association.

That is the word, isn't it? Guilt? That's the thing Mr. Schaeffer laid out in Chapter 5. We were there and we are guilty still. No baptism can remove this guilt and shame.

Unless we are black, of course. They are absolved from guilt of any sort. Like I said, the chapter is PC sensitive.

Reaction to Question #11 - What does this statement mean?

John Locke was a skeptic. He was one of the better skeptics of his time, but in the 21st century, skeptics are a dime a dozen. That is, they can look at anyone's philosophy and their idea of what is right, wrong, true, and false, and then subsequently blow holes it. A skeptic, by definition, does not have to provide their own ideas of right, wrong, true, and false. They must only demonstrate the weakness of your own argument.

In this case, John Locke claims there are no innate universals. That is to say, there is no truths out there which we can determine if we were given enough time by reason alone. If you recollect, this was the premise in the Renaissance. Man was the center of all things and reason plus time would divulge everything.

These two expressions are logically the same

John Locke said it verbally, but I also repeated it here logically. Dr. Ravi Zacarias spoke of this in the "Either / Or or Both Hands" audio. The point being, this is the most simple logic construct there is. Upon it other, more complex thought structures are built.

If this is the most simple logic construct, it must be innate, or universal. If this be so, then every child, no matter how young, should understand this concept and agree with it.

Our experience is, we must teach the child these simple constructs. It is not innate.

My problem with David Hume's skeptical proposition is, given all of his examples, he cannot prove the child does NOT know these simple things (especially and nonspeaking child). On the contrary, most all his examples are hard to prove either way. But being a skeptic, he only needs to attack a concept where it is weak without proving or suggesting any alternative to take it's place.

David Hume MIGHT be right, but any notions he has of better models fail the same tests.

Reaction to Question #12 - What does this sentence mean?

Let us see. A few years ago I studied Causality views from David Hume, and in my journal, I wrote this statement down as something I just haven't quite come to grips with yet. I set it aside then. Now, a couple years later, a student encourages me to go pick up this issue and wrestle with it some more. I consider this "ornery" of said student.

Essentially, Causality says everything was caused. If we go back far enough, we find every reaction is to something which caused it. If you just rolled the world and the Universe back far enough, why somewhere, there has to be something which caused it to come into existence. If there was a big bang, then there must be something which caused the big bang and whatever the big bang came from, it had to be something. We can't have something coming out of nothing.

Since we cannot prove anything was ever caused by something outside our sense experience, then how can we prove God created the world, much less anything else? God is outside our sense experience as a transcendent being. The same laws do not apply to God. What proof have we that God ever crosses the border from transcendent into our world?

So, according to David Hume, we are left with speculation. We cannot know God caused anything to happen or come into being.

Aside from the STILL open questions from David Hume, we have this nice quote which would be fun to resolve....

If you applied the idea of conceptualism to this question, you might determine the Causality theory has an ideal value, but you are now uncertain if it really has a REAL value.

Reaction to Question #13 - What are realism, nominalism, conceptualism?

Realism is our discerning morality, which already existed before man, by reason.

Nominalism does an about face with Realism. There are no universals and there are no dualism mind - body issues. The mind only has refined thoughts of our existential experiences. With out our experiences, there would be no thoughts. What Plato missed in his example above is if there is anything universal about 1+1=2 it is our common name for it. We call one, one, and we call the answer two. We named this an example of math. That common element is the name we put on the particulars. Nominalism might be better referred to as NAMEanilsm, which is not a word, but it is certainly what Nominalism means.

The made up label is universal, which was just something made up. There is nothing real by which the mind may deduce.

With Conceptualism, there are no universals, but rather, Aristotle was right and our mind is able to decipher the "form" from the physical object with our sense experience. What results is a concept, or an idea. We do not know from this if this conceptualized idea has real value but we are sure it has ideal value, that is, the value we give it.

What are the significance of these three concepts on moral truths, moral right and wrongs?

Reaction to Question #14 - Why did Amendment XVIII turn some cultural values towards liquors into a Constitutional Amendment (law)?

Such a question.

Isn't the thrust of Chapter 5 all about societies cultural values being integrated into law? Here the students would have me give my opinion before they gave their own? I am compelled to answer, but we'll do such in a way which may help promote discussion rather than stifle it.

In our discussion this past week we asked if Abortion was morally wrong, should it not be made illegal.

This is in England, but it holds the same concept. The general population began to hold a particular point of view. This point of view was then galvanized into a change of lifestyle. A change in philosophy.

At first, we presume these workingmen had come to the conclusion alcohol consumption was a bad idea.

Later, in 1832 they are so sure of it they determine to change their lifestyle. This would seem to be the logical outworkings of their personal philosophy towards alcohol.

The next step is others come to the same conclusion as our first workingmen. Their philosophical views are adopted by others.

Finally, their views towards alcohol becomes strong enough they no longer want to be associated with the alcohol industry. For example, if you disagreed with Abortion, would you drop your neighbor off at the abortion clinic on your way to work? If you believe SUVs steal energy from future generations and are immoral use of wealth, would you ride one to a concert or Church? If you believe cigarettes are very horrible and habit forming, would you get groceries in any grocery stores or buy gas at any gas pump which makes a profit from the sale of cigarettes?

There where those who lived just after WWI who did indeed take such a strong stand. In fact, so many people that it became possible to create situation #2 described above, where the law of the land was passed to abstain from alcohol or any association with it. Many did not see the new law was morally right or wrong and others had other reasons, such as financial, and so the law was broken by many people until its repeal.

Reaction to Question #15 - What does this saying mean? "Forty acres and a mule"

Simple justice was equal freedoms for blacks as white also had. Well and fine, but the civil war wasn't entirely about slaves and slave rights. A half a decade of war had kills hundreds of thousands of American's and created havoc in every fabric of society. There were also issues of healing, winners, losers, devastation, and rebuilding. The events of the civil war shaped the philosophy and priorities of an entire generation.

From our perspective it is difficult to look at the issues and events of the 1870s as those living in the time had. But we might make an attempt to.

We might notice a decade later, we still refer to those who live in the south not as Americans or Southerners, but rebels. We still have an adversarial attitude, perhaps?

Also, it might be good to know that slavery wasn't the rallying cry of the "Rebel South" or the reason for the war to break out in the first place. The central issue was about "State's Rights". An open issue which is still bantered about even today. The Civil War did not decide the issue of States Rights, no matter what the loss of life was. Slavery, on the other hand, was just one of those issues "State's Rights" advocates believed a State could decide on their own.

Slavery became a central issue because, in any war, you need something to rally the general population around. So Slavery became the lightning rod. Even today, we argue about Abortion but is also is not the real issue, but, rather, the lightning rod to rally people around.

That said, the next thing you will notice is there are only 70,000 landowners, or rebels. These land owners are not ALL the rebels. Most of those who fought and died in the confederacy were not slave owners. The significance here is, by taking away a "financial asset" from a relatively small portion of the Southern population they could nearly destroy the financial underpinnings of the southern states. How better to complete the civil war then, after having declared victory, then to destroy the southern states culture and nearly completely through the use of law (Federal Law, I might add).

In the process, they could provide for those in the black community who could take advantage of this. Would that not be wonderful? Why, they'd give each black man 40 acres out of the 394,000,000 acres and one mule out of the former land owner's stock.

Well, this raises some other issues.

Reaction to Question #16 - What is meant by this statement? Poverty like wealth is intergenerational, inherited?

(Reparations - advocate argues for redressing America's debt to blacks - handout, bottom page 1)

Mr. Randall makes a host of presumptions here which are not substantiated. This gap between blacks and whites. Is it static? The last I heard there are more blacks in the Middle Class and who are millionaires than ever -- both numerically and as a percentage.

Furthermore, Mr. Randall is asserting those who are born with black skin (as opposed to those who get dark skin by spending many hours under a sunlamp), have been raised in a culture which makes it impossible for them to make good decisions and to keep their wealth. It just slips though their fingers. Here we have examples in his statement where black youths are educated, have money and, presumably, consumer assets, but these same blacks are unable to accumulate fixed assets. By "intergenerationally inherited", Mr. Randall means they are not stupid, but their personal philosophy they have learned from their parents and in black culture, makes it impossible for them to make the right decisions.

What Mr. Randall is asking is for the sin of making slaves of many people, that ALL of society which pays taxes should redistribute their wealth (weather they be white, black, Indian, Chinese, Sudanese, or Iranians) to all the black folk as payment for the sin committed against some black ancestors.

The most logical question begging to be asked (we're not accepting Mr. Randall's premise here, but just supposing for a moment) is, if it were true black folks can not make good financial decisions even after having graduated from college, then won't they immediately blow away all their newfound riches with additional bad decisions? Won't it all be wasted away?

If the answer is no, then I suppose this means "good decision" capabilities come with "large sums of money from taxpayers" but "good decisions" do not come from "large sums of money from good jobs".

I must admit, I am confused.

Let me tell you a story about myself and a son call Scott, just to make a point about this "intergenerationally inherited" idea.

I attended the University of Missouri, Columbia back in the 1970s. Disregarding advice to the contrary, I moved out of the dorms and into my first apartment. I remember this first apartment pretty well as would you.

The apartment had a small living room, tiny kitchen (2 people could hardly be in there at the same time) and a bedroom about 3' higher. You could lay on the bed and see a tall person coming in the front door almost eye to eye. There were also 6 cement blocks next to the short stairs.

What's the purpose of cement blocks? I put the concrete blocks out the door.

The first time it rained I found the living room filled with 6" of water. Ah. If I had those blocks by the stairs, I could have had stepping stones leading from the stairs to the front door and not gotten very wet. The wall furnace, by the way, was 7" up, so sometimes even it also got drowned.

Financial Assets? Really? One semester later I dropped out of college for lack of funds. I intended to return, but I never had enough money to do so. Had I not been so white I might have had some additional options, but, it just didn't work out. To be sure, there were some decisions I made, but I would have sworn I had no real choices but was compelled to make whatever choices I made.

At 20 I had returned home with nothing but a 10 speed bike, stereo, and maxed out credit cards. Nope. No financial assets yet. At 32 I was on the verge of bankruptcy and lost my home. A couple decades later with some good choices made for a change, I do have some financial assets. A dozen years of good choices counters 30 plus years of bad choices. Believe me when I tell you this change in my personal philosophy is not something "inherited".

My oldest son went off to a Bible College a couple decades later. After a couple semesters he found he was in the same boat I was. He called home to say he was out of money and needed some help or he'd have to drop out of college. My advice was basically the same I had gotten. "You're young. Drop out for a while and work and you can always go back later. So - NO."

He was not pleased, but he said his good byes and we really didn't hear much more from him concerning finances anymore. A few years later he graduated. Now, how come I couldn't have been smart and stayed in the dorm and found a way to finish college and Scott could? We were both broke (I had actually saved more money going in) and wrestled with the same youthful decisions.

Choices

When Mr. Randall claims poverty is "intergenerationally inherited", he is admitting to cultural and philosophical conditions which make this to be true. If this is indeed true, then the solution must be to change the philosophy and culture of the black people, just as I presume he has done (he appears to have a few fixed assets which I presume he will claim to have earned either by virtue of his choices or charity).