Ireland Gets It

STEVE FORBES, Forbes magazine (1/12/09): If the incoming Obama Administration is serious about squeezing more money from businesses, it should follow the example of Ireland and slash corporate tax rates. The U.S. has one of the highest profits levies in the developed world: 35% at the federal level, with another average of 5% from state and local taxes. Only Japan has worse. In contrast, Ireland's rate is a mere 12.5%. Imagine the howls from congressional Democrats if Barack Obama were to suggest enacting such a low corporate tax rate in the U.S.

But the accompanying table tells an eye-opening tale: Ireland's corporate tax take as a portion of its economy is higher than that of the U.S. High rates breed pressure for ever more complicated exemptions and ever more ingenious ways to avoid Uncle Sam's tax bite. But an Irish-like rate leaves companies to focus brainpower on growing their businesses instead of on jousting with tax collectors. A general flat tax, such as Yours Truly has been advocating for decades, would give just such a benefit to both individuals and businesses. Alas, misbegotten populist ideology still trumps fairness and common sense.

The Obama White House is pushing a massive stimulus plan that will do little to reinvigorate the recessed economy. Government spending does not create prosperity. If it did, the Soviet Union would have won the Cold War. Low tax rates positively change incentives: Entrepreneurs, venture capitalists and investors are induced to take more risks; businesses become more expansion-minded; and individuals positively adjust their own behavior, knowing that they can keep more of what they earn and that success will not be punished.

Up-Front: A Perspective for 2009

What I see… By Shirley Weaver

I thought it important to share concerning the presidential election season that just ended and wrote my impressions below on my last flight from Washington. I have compared my views with those of others –a check for balance sake - and offer it to you as my perspective to begin 2009.

There are three foundational pillars to our ministry: 1) Prayer, 2) Discipleship & 3) the Nations. Realizing there are many ways in which we each extend ourselves into the places where the Lord sends us when I read our position with a critical eye it is the ‘big picture’ that concerns me. This month we begin our 20th year (1989-2009) and it is the overview—the composite image—that I question. As a group, much of what we do reminds me of baby steps—small, small, small—too little, too late; as a group we are sluggish, moving only as fast and as far as the least can move. We have GOT to “get it” – all of us!

Besides this ministry, I am amazed generally with the silly operation of faith in the church. Members operate as believers in the same way they might as astronauts—they do not operate. Instead, something else is going on.

First, faith has become another word for Christianity - or any other religion - as though by the term faith I describe religious preference. Of course that is not faith; faith is power—faith is power to establish what we have been sent to establish and it is not working well for us. I believe the reason is that the minds of people of faith and the words they speak contradict the very thing they say they mean to establish, a schizophrenic approach.

Secondly, Bible studies and group meetings are now so me-centered they blind the Body to what is at stake—there is no actionable result that impacts the lifestyle of the members, only short-term mission outreaches designed to add that part of the model to the resume. Worldview is not a dynamic for us, it is a topic of conversation; and if the ability to converse on just the obvious worldview issues is a measure, the score is painful, shallow to the point of boredom—the hearer is bored, not the one speaking; the one speaking is stimulated to the max to hear themselves carry on and on in terms gleaned from someone else, with opinions they have no historical basis or measure of well-rounded information.

Third - multiply the condition to include homes, congregations, places of power and we see the nation is in a soup of words and opinions that produce little in places of power where worldview is shaped. We are talking to hear ourselves talk and apparently do not intend to do the hard part – to step into the soup and speak up.

Thankfully, those who are serious understand that faith is power, that worldview is Jesus’ model to shift the individual, the home and the nations for the Gospel, and that our work has a window of time, after which the window closes. But not enough believers get it and it is shocking that today is another day in our future in which we fail to convey as one voice, with clear and impressive reality, that the Son of God is Lord – that besides Him there is no other lord, that we are ministers of, and ambassadors of His, that we are not whispers, heavy breathers, or empty-headed wanderers, but are strategic, focused and determined.

In my view…

I explained in last month’s letter that I believe we have squandered a critically historical season in which the United States was given a two-term leader whose relationship with the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob guided him. Among other things, President George W. Bush boldly put his foot on the head—one head, many expressions—of partial birth abortion, embryonic stem cell research, and a heaven-earth alignment of spiritual forces against our national future—our children. There are many serious issues our government faces but only a few of those pivot us toward blessing or curse. For example, despite the fact that for decades no one could slow the momentum of a literal culture of death—its guns aimed squarely at changing America’s future as a Christian nation once and for all—President Bush’s unpopular leadership in other policy areas provoked a surge of words of doubt, impatience, contempt, despising. Even from the church, those with God-given power of the spoken word to advance the Kingdom utilized that same power against God’s man. The spiritual battle that ensued, I believe, made confusion the rule: north appeared to be south, up to be down, and wrong received the nod to be right; confusion ruled sufficiently to overwhelm and outclass righteous effort. Though many were praying it is obvious that a contradiction of prayer emerged: How it is that something so certain in the excitement of the prayer meeting is – possibly by morning—questioned, doubted and all but counted down, and out without so much as a fight. How can we be so glad one minute and so sad the next? Perhaps the equilibrium thing is the problem – no wonder many are so medicated.

Question: Do we have the spiritual guts to stay the course with guarded hearts and words? Armies in battle and under command do not shift and twist with the battle—they stay in the battle, “keep the faith”; lives are laid down in the process because the object of the battle is worth the battle. If we cannot decide what we believe, or how to proceed, we are not sufficiently spiritual to be in uniform-- much less in the battle.

Conclusion
So, if we were given a godly man to stand spiritually against the spirit-battle, and against terrorism in the natural—forces most of us can only imagine—why did WE step back; or should I say backward? The tendency is that we do not know what we are talking about, but present our opinions as those who know a great deal. Our knowledge of history is pitiful, and our knowledge of current events often from sources whose agenda is devastating to everything we value; we are narrow-minded, uninformed and silly—we do not study, do not grow, and are content to settle for what we can get instead of the vast territory believers were meant to occupy. Our prayers are nullified by doubt and speculation, sometimes before the amen is said. More and more, I carefully choose who to join in prayer since often it is religious, repetitious, simple-minded, uninformed and worst of all, without faith—meaning without power. Too many pray with out-dated mindsets and prayers often are little more than a report to God of imaginary facts with suggested ways in which He should handle the situation. If it does not happen the way we prescribe and preferably immediately, we change out of our giant suits and into something else—discouraged, oppressed, needing prayer, cannot go on, do not know what to think, guess I missed it—blah, blah, blah.
To balance this I must say that some do step up—single-minded, steady, articulate, confident, clear about prayer, not fainting; others do not.

Reposition…
We have been sidelined to some extent since, as has been said, often we simply do not know what we are talking about and are shallow in our understanding; we have been dull spiritually and have not realized the full weight and gravity of the main issue – that death is a spirit and once the door is opened, everyone is game—even you.

#1 - We must speak to the misinformation but also we have to do it better than we have so far--wiser, sharper, and in terms the non-believing world can understand. If those who ridicule our values throw a fit, throw one back—tell them the truth but tell them in words they understand.

#2 - We need to change our approach—less willing to wait and more exacting. For starters, we should not be patient with absurd misinformation like the mark placed on our president—that our strongly Christian president is “that way” because he is unlearned, not savvy. The protest was difficult to hear.

#3 - How will we respond as the same mocking and perception are applied more and more to you and me—that an intelligent, educated, experienced person would never think like we do; that we are too simple and unsophisticated to compete in the American newly-being-created-culture that craves religion with a European flair and a renaissance mindset concerning which god.

#4 - We can reposition. Each person needs to gather ten others to disciple and help them understand that we can change the momentum of the problems we are faced with, many of which are foreign and domestic doors that have been opened by abortion, the taking of innocent life. We need to speak clearly and often but our increase of influence comes with increase of those who have been discipled and trained.

#5 - What we do we must do quickly.

Shirley Weaver
A Clear Trumpet
January 1, 2009