Bill Whittle - exemplar of the power but weakness of mainstream US secular Conservatism

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If you don't know journalist Bill Whittle's video segments called Afterburner or previously Firewall - then you have missed a minor modern art form taken to just about its perfection.

This funny, but telling, example is Han Shot First!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ns1m_aXJa58

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Whittle is a mainstream secular Conservative in his basic stance. He is a relatively pure and principled mainstream Conservative - but not a reactionary; and his assumptions are secular not Christian.

In fact I do not know, and have not been able to find-out, whether Whittle is himself a Christian.

He is certainly pro-Christian, and seems to get close to saying he is a Christian in the following segment - but he never actually says so:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z9w_PK_ZEbU

And here is the problem.

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Pretty much everything that Bill Whittle argues is predicated on Christianity being true - that is in fact the premise from which he is arguing. But, presumably, because he wishes to appeal-to and ally-with non-Christians, he does not set out these premises.

Therefore in practice he argues on the only-non-religious premises which are available - that is utilitarianism - policies aiming to promote the greatest happiness of the greatest number, over the long-term.

And this is exactly the same premise as the ruling secular Leftists argue from - so the whole debate reduces down to wrangling over optimal means to identical ends... which policies are most practical and effective, what is the boundary of those whose happiness is being promoted, how long-termist can we be without sabotaging the chance of success etc.

All of which reduces to day-by-day political wrangling, expediency, point-scoring, electioneering, media manipulation and the rest of it. And this is a game which (sadly) Bill Whittle cannot win - although he is unsurpassed at playing the game.

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What I am saying is that if he hasn't yet crossed the line and become a Christian, that is the priority for Bill Whittle. If he has crossed the line, he needs to be explicit about it. If he is explicit about it, he needs to state it upfront in his analyses...

And when he starts stating it upfront in his analyses, he will pretty soon recognize that none of what he wants is going to happen without a Christian revival, another Great Awakening.

So, that then becomes the priority.

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