No More Political Ads

    I am writing this on election/primary day morning, March 6, 2012.  My heart is rejoicing because this is the day that negative political ads stop.  Through these ads, I have heard over and over again that Romney lies and is not a true conservative and how Santorum has become a Washington insider over the last 20 years.  What is most disturbing about these ads is that they are not paid for or coordinated by a candidate.  They are produced and paid for by a PAC which has total control over each ads’ content.
      On January 24, 2012, I listened to National Public Radio as I was driving to Epiphany.  As one of their segments, David Greene reported on the senatorial race in Massachusetts between Senator Scott Brown and Elizabeth Warren.  These two individuals had signed an agreement on how their campaigns would be conducted.  The agreement was that no PAC ads were allowed on their behalf.  If a PAC aired an attack ad against the candidate’s opponent or an ad supporting the candidate, the candidate would write a check to a charity from his or her campaign funds in the amount of the cost of the ad.  It was reasoned that writing such a check would hurt the candidate’s effort to be elected thus forcing PACs to stop advertising in Massachusetts.  In essence, each candidate would be held responsible for whatever ads were produced to attack their opponent or describe themselves.
    Since January, I have wondered how this agreement has worked.  I have been intrigued with the novel idea that a candidate should be held responsible for his or her own thoughts, words, and behaviors.  No blaming others for what has been put into print, aired on radio or television, or sent through the social media.  If this idea really worked, we would have a much better picture of who a candidate really is, how they think, and what is of value to him or her.  And, since the agreement between Brown and Warren was done voluntarily, the Supreme Court’s ruling that PACs are legal does not come into play.
    I have also wondered what would happen if Christians would make the same agreement among themselves?  What would happen if we did not use third parties to relay our feelings (mostly negative) about another person who we feel has wronged us?  What would happen if we followed Luther’s explanation of the 8th Commandment, “We should fear and love God, and we should not tell lies about our neighbor, nor betray him, but should apologize for him, speak well of him, and interpret charitably all that he does.”?  What would happen if we talked to each other face to face and not behind another person’s back as Luther suggests?  If we could do this, we would witness to the world a radically new way in which people can live together in peace.  If we would follow what our faith teaches us maybe the agreement between Brown and Warren would not be such a novel agreement.
    As I said above, I am rejoicing that the negative political ads will be over by this evening.  In their place, I will once again be told if only I use the right shampoo, I will be popular and all the world will love me.
Pastor Pete