Author Archive for: respectfulconversation

President Obama is inciting “class warfare.” That is the charge of numerous Republicans in the wake of Obama’s Jobs Bill that proposes increasing tax rates for millionaires. The war that is feared is between the wealthy and the rest of us. Whether Obama’s proposal amounts to class warfare depends on your response to a prior question: What does it mean to be a human being?

My views on human nature are deeply informed by my Christian faith. I embrace “individuality,” by which I mean that each human being is a unique individual, endowed with gifts that he or she ought to be able to exercise. That is part of my understanding of what it means to be created in the “Image of God.” 

Advocating for comprehensive immigration reform that provides a pathway to citizenship for illegal immigrants is often viewed as “being soft on the law.” As a strong form of the argument goes, those entering the USA illegally broke the law and they should therefore be punished to the full extent of the law, which currently calls for deportation. To do otherwise is to provide “amnesty.”

I agree that illegal immigrants have broken the law, and therefore some form of punishment is appropriate. Therefore I am not in favor of “amnesty,” if what you mean by that word is “no punishment whatsoever.” But I question the prevalent truncated view of criminal justice, which suggests that such justice is accomplished when someone who has broken the law is given suitable retribution by government.

A richer view of the meaning of justice is provided by the “restorative justice” movement. The vision of restorative justice does not preclude some form of punishment. But it is broader in scope than just punishment. It focuses on meeting the needs of all persons affected by the breaking of a law, not just the offender, but also those who are victimized by the breaking of the law, and the communities in which both the offender and the victims live. And the ultimate goal is to restore harmonious relationships between all persons involved and promote the flourishing of all these persons. A tall order indeed (two excellent books on the Restorative Justice movement are Changing Lenses by Howard Zehr and Beyond Retribution by Christopher Marshall).

“Are there issues where compromise is justified, but others where it is not?” That is a question that my friend Tom Tiahrt asked me in response to my most recent musing (Forfeiting Today for a Political Tomorrow). 

It depends on what you mean by the word “compromise.” In my very first Blog musing (Compromise: A Good or Bad Idea in Politics?), I suggested that “compromise is a temporary yielding in an ongoing political process,” quoting with approval President Obama’s definition: “Compromise means yielding on something each of us cares about to move forward on something all of us care about.”

The recent action of Congress dealing with debt reduction and the raising of the debt limit enables me to provide a good concrete illustrative example of when I think compromise is a good idea in politics, in preparation for my response to Tom’s question.

The airwaves are filled with charges and counter-charges as to which politicians are, or are not, providing leadership in attempting to resolve the impasse relative to the need to reduce the federal budget deficit. As we seek to sort through these contrasting voices, we do well to reflect on the nature of effective leadership. 

An effective leader is driven by a vision, a dream as to how bad things can become good and good things can become better. To be always satisfied with the status quo is to settle for being a manager and not a leader. Rather than saying “if it ain’t broke, don’t fix it,” an effective leader says “whether it’s broke or not, let’s work to improve it.” 

The recent exchange between Israeli Prime Minister Netantahu and President Obama did not bode well for the possibility of renewing conversations toward the ultimate goal of a two-state solution in which a state of Israel lives in peace and security with a contiguous Palestinian state. 

But against all odds, I believe that conversation can be resumed if both sides will commit to two pre-conditions for conversation. I don’t mean pre-conditions as to what the results of the conversation should be. That is anathema to me because you cannot predict beforehand the results of a genuine conversation. Rather, I refer to two pre-conditions that, if not met up-front, will make it impossible to have a fruitful conversation.

The first pre-condition is that there needs to be general agreement as to the purpose of the conversation. Both Israelis and Palestinians need to agree that the ultimate goal is to create two states that can live in peace and security with one another. It does not appear that this pre-condition has been met.