Should Secular Gov't Show Christian Virtue?

Left-leaning politicians and pundits tend to be squeamish about the Bible. Whenever a right-wing opponent appeals to the Bible as a moral authority, their typical knee-jerk response is to yell "theocracy!" However, as a caravan of thousands of migrants approaches the southern border of the United States, we should expect to see a sudden resurgence of piety on the Left. Biblical commands aimed at Christian communities (share resources; have no borders; turn the other cheek, etc.) will suddenly be interpreted as policy recommendations for America's federal government.

Such piety is false, of course—and the faux-piety springs from the old Democratic Party playbook created by Saul Alinsky. According to Alinsky's "rules for radicals," successful progressives must "make the enemy live up to its own book of rules." For Reagan/Bush-era Republicans, that "book of rules" was the Bible. Using the Bible as a political weapon, Democrats successfully pressured Ronald Reagan into accepting amnesty and George W. Bush into lax enforcement of immigration law. In fact, George W. Bush's "compassionate conservatism" is best understood as the Republican establishment's wholesale submission to Alinsky pressure on nearly every issue other than foreign policy.

As I previously explained, in this space, the era of "compassionate conservatism" is over. President Trump is immune to the old Democratic playbook. His supporters are, too. When the Left tries to quote the Bible in support of immigration, these days, Trump-supporters have an invincible response:

"Wait... are you telling me that America is a Christian nation?"

The Left has no good answer to this question. They cannot answer "yes." But, if they answer "no," their appeal to biblical morality loses all meaning.

The remnants of the Religious Right, however, are still vulnerable to old-style political pressure from the Left. This is why you see evangelical immigration advocacy organizations springing up with deep fiscal ties to Alinsky-acolyte George Soros. Well-meaning evangelical Christians have been convinced by the Left that the federal government is a vehicle for expressing the collective compassion of the American People—and, thus, that America is collectively sinning whenever federal immigration policy is not based on compassion.

According to the Constitution, however, the federal government was set up to accomplish six purposes:

1) to keep the Union of the States intact

2) to create a Court that could preside over the States

3) to stifle rebellion

4) to provide military protection

5) advance the interests of the United States as a unit

6) ensure that America remains free.

Imagine that you hire a security guard to protect a school, and empower him to break up fights between students and keep intruders off the premises. However, you find out later that he has been letting homeless people sleep on campus. He argues that these people lack food and shelter and have nowhere else to go, and that he believed helping them was the right thing to do. What should your response be? The correct answer is: "you're fired." This is exactly the message that the American People sent to both Bush Republicans and Obama Democrats by electing Donald Trump. And the message is sound. The federal government's primary responsibility is national security and national unity. When the federal government abandons this purpose, even in the interests of compassion, it has failed to do its job.