A Song about Calvinist Republicans

The Republican Party has been taken over by old school Calvinists who despise everything President Eisenhower stood for. Today’s Republican leaders share some of their ethical convictions with Prescott Bush, who profited from making financial deals with the Third Reich.

Allow me to explain the beliefs of 21st Century Republicans in rhyming verse. These lyrics are set to the tune of Old Hundredth, also known as The Doxology. An instrumental recording of this song is provided for your sing-a-long pleasure.

This arrangement of Old Hundredth features violin, oboe, bassoon, trombone, and harpsichord; it was prepared by Ben Hubbell and is based on sheet music for the piano from Wikipedia. This music was rendered on a computer with Garritan Personal Orchestra.

View sheet music for piano

A definition of Calvinism

The term Calvinist has two contradictory definitions. In its strictest sense, it refers to people who accept a doctrine set forth in the 1500s by wealthy people who hated the poor. However, sometimes members of the modern Presbyterian Church, which loves the poor, call themselves Calvinists. I do not intend to insult kind-hearted Presbyterians by using the term Calvinist as a label for people who hate the poor.

The Calvinists are most famous for their doctrine of Unconditional Election. The essence of this doctrine is that God decided before he created the Earth which souls would believe in him and which souls would reject him. Whether or not a person is saved depends on God’s mercy alone; free will on the part of humans does not enter into the equation.

The Calvinists call people predestined for salvation the elect, and they call people predestined for damnation the unelect. According to Calvinists, the elect are always wealthy, and all poor people belong to the unelect. However, upon occasion, a member of the unelect strikes it rich. This line of reasoning allows the Calvinists to consider anybody they want to hate to be on God’s list of people who cannot be saved.

When the Calvinist Puritans fled England, they claimed to be seeking freedom of religious expression. The freedom that had been denied to the Puritans by the King of England was the freedom to persecute people who weren’t Puritans. For example, the Puritans ran afoul of the law in London after they beat the Mayor’s wife with sticks, because they thought she was dressed like a prostitute.

The settlers of Jamestown considered growing crops to be a job for the unelect, so most of their food was imported from England. When expected shipments of food did not arrive, the settlers would have starved, if not for the mercy of Native Americans, who gave the settlers food, as well as seed stock, so the settlers could grow their own food. The arrogant settlers ate the seed stock instead of planting it, because they were the elect, and growing crops was a job for the unelect!

An Appeal to the President

Here is a link to a White House Web page where you can send a message to President Obama. If you agree with the statement below, please copy and paste it into the White House contact page, then sign it with your name.

This letter uses three terms with which some people may be unfamiliar:

Consensus

In contrast with majority rule, consensus requires that a group arrive at decisions that everybody in the group finds acceptable.

CETA

Comprehensive Employment and Training Act. This program provided government subsidized jobs to people who had been unemployed for 6 out of 8 weeks. CETA was killed by President Reagan.

The Great Society

This is what President Lyndon Johnson called his vision of economic and social justice. President Johnson dreamed of an America in which people who could not earn a decent living would receive subsidies from the government to keep them above the poverty line. Medicare is one of the legacies of The Great Society.