Goines On: Getting to agreeing to disagree

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Goines’ relative who slipped an evangelical pamphlet in with his Christmas card refused at first to discuss politics with Goines. Curbe (his name was pronounced the same as Kirby) insisted at first that they would just have to “agree to disagree.” But Goines nevertheless managed to engage Curbe in more than a dozen email exchanges in which they told each other their primary political principles. Perhaps surprisingly – and reassuringly, for the sake of family relations – they seemed to pretty much agree on the ones they actually discussed:

1. Social justice (proposed by Goines, which he loosely defined as equal protection under the law: civil rights for all [not just white people, or landowners, or very rich people, or Christians, or “straight” people, or men], and equal access to the polls for elections),
2. Freedom to worship however you wanted (proposed by Curbe, who agreed when Goines asked him whether this included freedom not to worship and excluded practices harmful to others, such as worship involving human or dog sacrifice),
3. Fair distribution of wealth (Goines), and
4. Environmental protection (Goines).

    They were pleased at being able to agree on that much, but their so far indissoluble differences over Trump himself brought their discussion to an end, at Curbe’s request. Curbe had at first been reluctant to tell Goines what he liked about Trump, but he finally admitted he had hesitated because he wanted to avoid an argument. All his spoken reasons for approving Trump had to do with Trump’s policies and achievements, so far as Curbe was concerned (as informed by watching lots of TV news programs, including Fox). As for how Curbe felt about Trump personally, he wouldn’t say any more than that he followed the example of Jesus: not to hate anyone.
    How like Nancy Pelosi, Goines thought, itching to tell Curbe (and Speaker Pelosi too) that he didn’t think Jesus could ever condone a man in Trump’s position (President of the United States) who used his office to con and take advantage of the very people Jesus championed: the meek, the weak, the poor, the powerless.
    But Goines agreed, finally, to let it go and just disagree, and never got to question Curbe on his three other principles:

5. No abortions (except in case of rape),
6. Marriage between a man and a woman only, and
7. The Christian Bible to guide all life decisions.

    Since Curbe offered these beliefs in a political context – the U.S. Constitution and U.S. laws – he seemed to be suggesting that laws should prohibit most abortions and all same-sex marriages, and promote Biblical Christian religion, even though the first two contradicted the principle of social justice they said they agreed on, and the third contradicted Curbe’s own principle of freedom of worship.
    Curbe hadn’t mentioned the appointment of judges as among Trump’s policies and accomplishments he approved. But mightn’t Trump (and Mitch McConnell’s) commitment to packing federal courts and the Supreme Court with “conservative” judges be the key reason why Curbe (and other self-styled Christians) voted for Trump?

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