State budget for 2010 won't be OK

The OK Policy Blog has the details.

In spite of all the attention paid in Oklahoma in recent weeks to such urgent matters as the Ten Commandments, stem cells, and the Flaming Lips, the real work of the 2009 legislative session has been unfolding largely behind the scenes as key legislative leaders from the House and Senate try to hammer out an agreement on the budget for the upcoming year, FY ‘10. From conversations I had last week at the Capitol with a number of legislators, fiscal staff, lobbyists, and agency personnel, it appears that the main outlines of the budget have been decided, although some key issues and details remain to be determined.

Apparently, most state agencies will be facing budget cuts of 7.5 to 10 percent in fiscal year 2010.

So what did you expect?

Okay. To start out with, I want to say that I'm a bit distracted lately from paying attention to the complicated events of the amazing, frightening, and hopeful times that we are all living through. I am a very lucky woman. I am going to buy a cheap little house. The picture is on the left. Posting may be a bit erratic for the indefinite future while the complicated details of buying and starting to fix take place.

That being said, one of the news items that has floated to my attention is the fact that right-wing pastor and media darling Rick Warren has been invited to give the invocation at Barack Obama's inauguration on January 20. Warren is unusual in his focus on issues such as poverty, global warming, and AIDS. But he's entirely traditional in his support for male domination and his opposition to gay rights and abortion rights. Feminists and gay rights activists are understandably upset that Obama has chosen Warren to open the inauguration by praying to Warren's right-wing version of God.

On the one hand, I find myself feeling almost indifferent to this controversy. Obama, the consumate centrist political wheeler-dealer, is pretty much behaving as I would expect him to behave. Obama is brilliant, competent, and entirely focused on holding the existing order of things together, although in a more humane fashion than the Republicans did. He wants to win over the religious right, and figures he can take the rest of us for granted. Did anyone really expect anything better? With the economy at home and abroad still going down the toilet, maybe there are other places to direct our energy?

On the other hand, janinsanfran at happening here? and Echnide at Echidne of the Snakes each has a brilliant analysis of this issue.

Echidne points out that Obama should not minimize the importance of "social issues" such as gay rights and abortion in his efforts to create national unity:

Here's where I see the task of the future for us dirty fucking hippies and feminazis and such: To teach politicians that 'social issues' is not about what we eat for Thanksgiving or how we arrange flowers. Those issues are about freedom, justice, economics, dignity and respect.

janinsanfran points out that Obama's former pastor, Jeremiah Wright, understood the situation very well:

He claimed to have said to Obama:

'If you get elected, November the 5th, I'm coming after you, because you'll be representing a government whose policies grind under people.'

Sounds about right to me. Obama will be as a good a president as aroused people make him be -- not one whit better.

If you'd like to express an opinion to the Obama transition team about his invitation to Rick Warren -- or about other matters -- you can do that here.

Rick and Kay Warren at Saddleback

A friend of mine recently mentioned Rick Warren, pastor of Saddleback Church in California, as an interesting change from old style right-wing Christian leaders such as Sally Kern. I hadn't heard of him before, but this is the guy who sponsored the forum where Barack Obama and John McCain both spoke recently.

This morning I accidentally heard the last few seconds of this public radio program:

Rick and Kay Warren at Saddleback [Speaking of Faith-- from American Public Media]

What I heard was Rick Warren saying something like, if you're asking why God isn't stepping in to fix serious problems in the world, God is asking the same thing about you. And Warren said that in order to work on these problems, his church was willing to work with believers, agnostics, atheists, gays...

Yup, that sounds different than Sally Kern all right.

I don't know if I'll have time to go back and listen to the entire show. But I did poke around on the Speaking of Faith website page about this particular broadcast.

I'm sorry to say that in many ways, Saddleback Church sounds like a typical, authoritarian evangelical church, in ways that creep me out a little bit. They say "you were made for God's pleasure." I don't know what I think about God. But I do think that any God(dess?) worth believing in would create beings for their own pleasure, and take pleasure in those beings being themselves.

I don't know what position they take on the role of women, but I'm wary. Kay Warren does seem to play a prominent role in the enterprise. (The pastor's wife seems to play a well-publicized role in many evangelical churches.) She has recently published a book, Dangerous Surrender. This may be about her view of Christian discipleship in general, but the title reminds me of all those books trying to convince us that wives should submit to their husbands and men should be the ones who take leadership roles in church and society.

Nevertheless, the Warrens and their church do seem to represent an interesting shift away from the right-wing evangelical politics of the past.