FROM THE BARREL OF MY PEN
By Gonzalo “Jun” Policarpio


THE RETURN OF THE CONSERVATIVES IN AMERICA


The American political pendulum may swing to the right during this coming midterm elections in November. When I say to the right it means back to the Conservative Republicans with full backing from the nation-wide right-wing Tea Party Movement. One of their prominent promoters is a Filipino American blogger and newspaper columnist, Michelle Malkin.

There are 138 Conservatives running for Congress, 129 for the House and 9 for the Senate. There is a near possibility that the Republicans may take back Capitol Hill this year.

Life in this world is truly cyclical. It’s like a wheel. That’s why we call it the “wheel of life.” You may be up, one time and down, another time. Only God in Heaven is always up in His throne forever. We, mortals, are all at His disposal and mercy. But always remember, God loves His children.

Why did Christ, the Son of God, teach His flock to be “moderate in all times” as written in the Bible? Because God hates extremism. His way is always the optimum.

Back to American politics. President Obama’s approval rating among the voters is at a very low point because he insisted in applying the failed socialistic policy of Karl Marx: take the money of the rich and give it to the poor or in other words, spread the wealth. This is way far from the economic idea gleaned from the biblical “Parable of the Talents.”

According to the parable, a Master of a household before he left for a journey, gave his money to three of his slaves. Two slaves worked and double the money. But one slave did not work and gained nothing from the money. When the master returned, he even punished the slave that did not work and gained nothing. He rewarded the two slaves who invested their money wisely. This is the American way of free enterprise that makes our country the greatest financial power in the world.

When I first campaigned for the U.S. Congress in 2004, I told CBS News Anchor, Cindy Hsu, that my economic platform was “help the poor get rich and the rich richer.”

It’s not a sin to be rich even though it’s hard for a rich man to enter heaven. It surely would be hard in this sense if the rich cannot follow Christ. When Christ challenged a rich man to give up his wealth and follow him, he admitted he could not do it. He failed the test of faith. He proved that gold is his god. So he is doomed to hell.

Joseph of Arimathea during the days of Jesus’ crucifixion was one the richest men in Judea. After Jesus’ death at the Cross, there was no place for his dead body to be buried. But Joseph offered his expensive catacomb for Jesus. So Joseph proved that he valued Jesus more than his wealth.

What I am trying to say simply through my religio-economic polemics is that capitalism is still the best economic system in the world. China is on a financial boom because of it.

Yet the liberal Democrats in control the government is pushing our country to the brink of bankruptcy through wasteful spending and heavy taxation especially on those sectors that create jobs.

I therefore welcome the return of the Conservatives where I belong.

FROM THE BARREL OF MY PEN
By Gonzalo “Jun” Policarpio

AS TIME GOES ON


Two political phenomena the world has recently known recently met at the United Nations General Assembly Meeting in New York City. They are President Barack Obama of the United States and President Benign “Noynoy” Aquino of the Philippines.

The meeting of the two leaders was not a formal one but something what the media terms as a “pull aside” meeting. Nobody really heard what they talked about except one who can read lips.

Anyway the political neophyte duo seemed to like each other based from their body language. Well, both politicians were plucked from the shadows and then hoisted by their peoples to the highest post in their governments.

I’m still waiting to see why God chose a mixed race brown-skinned young man born in a far-away multi-ethnic state like Hawaii to rule over America, the most powerful country in the world. Is it to confound the Caucasian segment of American society who always think and feel that they own the United States? Some of them even desire to deny American citizenship from those born in American soil to illegal aliens. Or perhaps just to be true to the biblical saying, “the last shall the first and the first shall be the last in the United States of America?

What about the mixed brown yellowish skinned young man from the Philippines who can traced his family roots from his mother’s side to the Fujian province in China? Remember, the Chinese in the Philippines have suffered years and years of persecution and discrimination going back to the Spanish times. He won this year’s election with a landslide victory despite the rumors spread by his political opponents that he belongs to a mental hospital. He just celebrated his first 100 days as president with a 70 per cent approval rating from the Filipino people. What should be in God’s mind to put him in charge of a country where almost 80 per cent of the population live on squalor? Can he save his people from death and starvation?

Now is the time to wait and see what God in Heaven has planned for the United States and the Philippines in the near future.