We had a primary election in Illinois this last Tuesday. It was the first of the 2010 season. There was an interesting race for governor and for the U. S. Senate seat once held, for only four years, by President Barack Obama. Illinois is a heavily Democratic state. This was not always the case but it is now. It has been blue for some years now and the Republican Party has again and again made huge mistakes in selecting candidates. Of 29 Illinois members of the Congress (House and Senate) only seven are Republicans. With the exception of a few congressional seats outside of Chicago these seven congressional members come from downstate as we call the rest of Illinois.

This state is in almost as bad of shape (economically and otherwise) as California. Yet we hear about tax increases, spending more money on social services, etc. almost every day. Our state government is a mess and people on both sides tend to agree. Chicago is noted for machine politics and corruption of power and has been for my whole entire life. The county in which I live is only a little better. Four governors have gone to prison and one former governor will be tried in June.

You would think an election would stir up the base, bring out the vote and open up some new avenues for reform minded people. Such was not the case this last week. We will have a choice in November, but it will be between more of the same or a little less than more of the same. Real reformers are simply not to be found, at least not from what I can see. Both parties talk about it a great deal. One Democrat, who won the nomination for president of the Cook County Board, said that the era of crony politics is over. I laughed out loud! So did the people on the radio who were the commentators last Tuesday evening. It is all a really sad joke in the end.

This is the closest I have ever come to not voting in a major election in my entire life. By the end the campaigns were so negative, the charges so rampant and disgusting, and the candidates so uninspiring and clueless, that I began to realize there really is a lack of earnest, competent, effective leadership in this nation, or at least Illinois. I am not a cynic about politics, at least not generally. But I am becoming one more every day if this trend continues. If ever I realized that the answers will not be found in electing new officials this primary race did it for me. And the turnout rate proves my point. All excuses aside it was one of the lowest turnouts for statewide elections in memory. What happened to the great protest movement about our government? I think most people simply do not care. So long as they are comfortable, and some are not that comfortable since they are out of work, they do not really care. Even those who are out of work generally get a lot of aid, at least in many instances. What would change all of this? I do not know.

What I do know is that culture is not changed through elections. It is still changed one person, one family, one community at a time. It is changed both in small groups and at the top of a social order where decisions are made that are not primarily about those elected to office. I think we will change elected officials when we actually change culture and I do not see culture rapidly changing anytime soon.

Am I a pessimist about our future? Not at all. We are not seeing a huge groundswell of revival in the churches but we are seeing a serious and thoughtful spiritual movement among young Christians like I have rarely seen in my sixty years. I will say much more about this encouraging development in another post.

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Comments

  1. Albert Anthony Cota February 7, 2010 at 4:12 am

    In the Old Testament, some of the most chilling verses in the entire Bible had to do with weak and ineffectual kings of Isreal.
    It it not hard to understand what is going on in Illinois, because it is going on in the rest of the U.S., and the world as well. We have had a long string of ineffectual leadership, regardless of the party….because God is not at the center of it. God does not favor the Republican or the Democratic party. He favors the persons in any party that worships Him with his whole heart!
    When politicians do not have God as the center of their lives….it does not matter what party that they belong to….you might as well stay home and not vote…because it is going to be about greed…and very ineffectual!

  2. Gene Redlin February 7, 2010 at 5:07 am

    You must live in a very different part of Illinois than I do. Turnout WAS low but not among people who cared about electing Candidates who could stand for good. Candidates who have values at the core like I do.
    If we are to have a representative government, we must have people who represent ourselves. People who are like us.
    You are correct, candidates, politicians, elected officials can’t change a drifting culture. But if a culture is to change, some of that must be firewalled or fired up by people who will stand up and say no or YES to obvious inanity.
    I walked my precinct to elect the man who will become your and my new congressman in the fall. I wrote and worked for a man who’s votes helped put in probable place a man who most likely will become our next governor. He is a man like you, like me who cares about the things you care about. He is far from same old, same old.
    Cook County is a mess…. It may collapse. The city may do the same. Like California, like Illinois, Like Pennsylvania.
    Who will be there to reorganize after the collapse to make sound decisions. It will matter.
    I’m glad the voter turnout was low. High Voter Turnout gave us Barack Obama. Only the most motivated voted. And we ended up with some pretty competent people taking their places in position to matter.
    I’m optimistic, for revival, I look forward to your perspective on revival.
    We may differ on that as well.
    I have hope right now for Illinois. First hope I have had any hope for a long time.
    I hope you will find it too.

  3. Joe Schafer February 7, 2010 at 4:00 pm

    Michael Craven posted an excellent article today on why we can expect to change society without ever building political majorities:
    http://www.battlefortruth.org/ArticlesDetail.asp?id=373

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