So the New Hampshire primary was held yesterday, and I went to do my civic duty and vote. I hadn’t felt terribly passionate about any one candidate, knowing only that I’m determined to defeat Donald Trump in November. My wife has been all-in for Pete Buttigieg, though, and on reflection, I gave him my vote as well.
This post is less to tell people to vote for Mayor Pete as just to share some reflections on some of the issues the current discussions raise, which Buttigieg seems to figure at the center of. Most of this will be cutting-and-pasting things I’ve already posted on Facebook, but just to try to pull them together and have them accessible rather than buried down a social media feed.
Maybe I can start here, with an opinion piece from Michael Gerson in the Washington Post: Oddly, the title appears on the website as “By Any Measure, Buttigieg is Trump’s Proven Superior,” but the url shows a title of “Pete Buttigieg’s Talent and Character May Not Be Enough.” I wonder what happened there.
Gerson’s money quote, perhaps, is this:
“By any measure of public or private character — basic honesty, service to country, family values, tolerance, concern for the vulnerable, commitment to the common good — Buttigieg is the president’s demonstrated superior. Just ask: Which human being would you, as a parent, want your son or daughter to grow up to be like? The question answers itself.”
Several friends chimed in to point that, given the utter depravity of Donald Trump, claiming superiority for Buttigieg is a pretty low bar. That’s true. But when I thought about it, this was my response:
“Actually, let me throw out a more audacious headline than Gerson did: Buttigieg is Obama’s superior.
He has the intelligence, eloquence, and educational credentials to match. But Obama, in my opinion, carried an ambition with him that was always “jumping the line.” He moved to Chicago not because Chicago mattered to him but as a place to boost his political career, then when the city’s political machine moved its more long-term members into office rather than him, he jumped to the suburbs to go straight to the Senate. With only two years’ experience as a junior senator and no executive experience he ran for president. In my opinion, while the hate he got from the Right was unwarranted, and he had some good achievements, he was still relatively mediocre.
Buttigieg stayed to serve in his home state, rather than moving someplace more politically advantageous for him like Obama or Clinton did. He actually has more executive governing experience than any major figure in the race, including Trump as of 2016, except Biden, whose experience in that regard is as VP. He’s also the only major candidate in either party with any military experience.”
The next chain of thoughts arose when a pro-Trump person shared an article from the Federalist, which lumped Buttigieg together with Alexandra Ocasio-Cortez (AOC) and teen gun-control activist David Hogg as “shallow young people.” I’ll not repeat the full critique of the article. The Federalist, as I understand it, was founded to be a powerful, intelligent voice for contemporary conservatism, but it certainly is not living up to those aspirations any more and the flailing around by this author was an embarrassment.
In follow-up comments, however, the Trump supporter shared this blog post by “Christian” writer Michael Brown, in which Brown comes right out to say that Christians shouldn’t support Buttigieg because he’s gay.
My response:
“OK, so I’ve run across Michael Brown once or twice before but never paid much attention to him. I’m looking around a bit now. Here’s what I’m observing:
In the article you linked, Brown argues that electing Mayor Pete would be bad for American morality because Pete is gay and having a gay president would be an unbiblical, immoral example to the country, to young people, etc.
He insists that Trump’s immorality is different because Trump doesn’t promote or express pride publicly in his sexual abuses, while Buttigieg is out, proud, married, and devoted to his spouse.
Brown further insists that he isn’t excusing or defending Trump’s immorality, but in fact claims credit for criticizing it. For instance, at the recent National Prayer Breakfast, Brown confirms that Trump’s vindictive rant does, in fact, totally contradict the teachings of Christ.
He links the blog entry in which he says he does that, so I took a look. The line of reasoning there is… cunning. Yes, Jesus said, “Love your enemies.” Yes, Trump did the opposite. So Trump is anti-Christ (my choice of words, not Brown’s, but Brown effectively grants it). BUT, Brown reasons, the nature of gospel teaching is precisely that it’s not what people do naturally, it’s hard to do, and hey, Trump has been treated so unfairly and attacked so viciously, maybe he’s not a perfect Christian example but you can’t blame him for lashing out, can you?
Brown strikes a pose that, by writing that, he doesn’t “excuse” Trump’s unchristian behavior AT A PRAYER BREAKFAST. But if that isn’t making excuses, I really don’t know what is.
And yes, actually, you CAN blame him. Because part of the political life, part of life as a public figure in general, is that you expose yourself to criticism, some of it fair, and some of it unfair. Bill Clinton, hardly anyone’s saintly paragon, went through a process of impeachment that was, shall we say, no fairer than Trump’s, and though also acquitted in the Senate, went on to express regret and reconciliation. Ancient pagans understood full well the importance of keeping one’s head above the fray, being the bigger man, showing clemency. You can’t pretend to even desire unity if you can’t do that. You don’t have to be a saint. You just need to have a bare minimum of class. But class was never Trump’s strong suit, his entire life.
Suffice to say there, that Brown’s pretense of being an impartial moral umpire here rings pretty damn hollow.
But even a broken clock is right twice a day, and the fact that Brown is special-pleading hypocrite doesn’t automatically mean he’s wrong about Buttigieg. Let’s look at his argument about Mayor Pete on its merits and not on Brown’s lack of them.
I’m not going to debate biblical morality of sexuality; I believe in the first amendment, in freedom of conscience, and that if people’s religion holds that homosexual relations are a sin, they are entitled to believe that. So I’ll grant that Mr. Brown can think Buttigieg is a sinner in that regard if he wants to.
The issue here, however, is the relationship of faith to politics and to public life, and what one should or should not expect in the morality of a public figure like a president.
Brown’s whole argument rests, in effect, on a distinction between public and private sins. Trump’s career of rampant sexual self-gratification shouldn’t count against him AS a president because it’s private and he doesn’t publicly promote it (forget about him having a strip club in one of his casinos, before it went bankrupt, or making cameos in Playboy videos). Buttigieg’s faithful marriage to a man SHOULD count against him because it’s public and he makes positive public statements about it.
But what Brown avoids is how the distinction between public and private sins, and virtues, actually apply to public figures. In other words, what virtues should a Christian demand of a political leader, and what sins should a Christian condemn, in a sufficiently robust way to actually hold them accountable to consequences and to refuse a vote on the basis of those sins?
Ideologues of a “Christian America” are wrong (and heretical, in my view): Christ’s kingdom is not of this world (rather, it is embodied in this world as the Church, not any earthly nation or government): the ruling authorities Paul commanded the Church to submit to in Romans 12 were pagan authorities: Cyrus the Great of Persia, though an unbeliever, could be used by God for His purposes.
It follows that the virtues one demands of rulers are not the virtues of salvation or the special requirements of the saved (e.g. to follow the crucified Christ). Rather, they are the virtues proper to the offices to which God has called them, whether they acknowledge God’s calling or not.
What virtues are those? That they dutifully perform the public trust: that they govern according to law, with justice, punishing the guilty and rewarding the good: that they show compassion to the poor and marginal: that they strenuously seek wisdom and understanding: that they speak, and reward, the truth, even to their own disadvantage, rather than lies and flattery. These are biblical values, but again, even pagan rulers understand them perfectly well and expect them of their officials.
Sexual morality plays essentially no role in all this. It is right and good for the Church to preach sexual morality to its congregants; if a politician were a member of a church or wished to join one, it would be totally appropriate for the church to examine that area. But we don’t have hereditary kings who need to beget heirs as part of their leadership of the realm any more. That a political leader should follow the sexual mores we hold is, of course, desirable; but if they differ in their mores in their private lives, they can yet be good and effective leaders. Conversely, be their private morality ever so squeaky clean, they can yet be dishonest, corrupt, foolish, unjust and vindictive, and those sins will make them unfit to govern.
So the thing about Mayor Pete is that, whether one approves of his private life or not, he manifestly champions and exemplifies the essential public virtues we need in a president. Trump, on the other hand, manifestly transgresses against ALL of them and has no moral legitimacy of any kind, wallowing in every kind of depravity. The choice is obvious to me.”
I’ll add a final observation. As I said, my wife became an activist for Buttigieg, attending events and canvassing neighborhoods for the primary. She was deeply impressed by the campaign’s insistence on “rules of the road”:
What was striking was that the relatively anodyne list of values was taken so seriously. There was absolute insistence on not speaking negatively of any other candidates or engaging with arguments while out canvassing, but maintaining respect and discipline throughout the process.
One hopes that the values will persist.
The Pelican's Eye 
Excellent.
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