Conservative Doldrum vs. Christian Hope

Not by choice, but not by coercion neither, have I been watching a lot of FOX News lately; particularly O'Reilly, Hannity, and Beck. And here's my question. Is not FOX News as ridiculously biased on the conservative perspective as is CNN the liberal? Now I understand that talking heads are what they are. Everyone has the right to an opinion, and the right to share it, and if they can get paid to have people watch it, that's fine by me. But when it comes to just reporting News, does anybody do that anymore? (besides the local news of course.) Another problem is that people like Beck are extremely influential in people's lives. He must express many Americans sentiments, otherwise he would not be so popular. But it seems that FOX News is now the alternative for conservatives. It's Nirvana to CNN's Guns and Roses. Maybe the press is so overwhelmingly liberal that this is necessary, but I'm a little concerned about conservatives today. I've spent the last two weeks of my life with people more conservative than the people I am accustomed to being around, and while I deeply appreciate these people, I am becoming infected by their apocalyptic paranoia. Today's conservatives seem perfectly content to consider the war (against our country's increasing liberalism; a debatable position itself)lost and have resigned themselves to fear mongering, complaining, and waiting for the ball to drop. Conservatism, in my life time, has never been so depressing.
Here's the impression I get of today's conservative viewpoint: Our country is headed towards inevitable socialism, which in their minds means totalitarianism. Socialism+national debt= fall of our nation. Our youth culture has no ambition or morals. We must get back to the way things used to be.
The problem here is twofold. One, there's seems to be no plan on how to get things back to the way they used to be, other than preaching to to the choir, and fear mongering. Two, no real attempt is made at dialogue with liberals or the youth culture, and thus my generation has no idea why things so much better then, and why things are comparatively worse now. Then was the the Great Depression. Then was two World Wars, and the Holocaust. Then was Vietnam. Now is all sorts of bad too, but its all sorts of good as well, as well as was then. I wish divorce wasn't prevalent. I wish violence was not so volatile. I wish abortion wasn't on the rise. I wish our government wasn't so big and didn't spend so much money. But is it really all a part of a giant Obama/socialist conspiracy that started all the way back in the 60's? Attempts to explain how we got where we are have their merit, certainly. They can help us moving forward, but what about the future? What do we do to curb all this badness? If I hear a conservative who thinks in those terms I might not feel so stifled and lethargic.
Now it's no secret that the American conservative is generally speaking, a religious person, and is most likely Christian. I am a deeply committed Christian myself, and so the religious angle matters to me. It is inconsistent with Christianity's message of hope to be so despairing, is it not? Don't we know that we win? Society must go down the tubes. That's its natural course, so why would we want to return to a better time, when one, regardless of what time you find yourself in a society, its regressing, two, its still not the optimal situation which is the kingdom of God, and three, regardless of what age we find ourselves in we have the keys of the kingdom, and a message that applies to our neighbors, an urgent message at that? Isn't the call to return to better days, a call to return to something that is not the kingdom of God as much as looking forward to better days (like progressives) is the same thing. Call out abortion, I say, but not in the name of the Constitution, but in the name of what's right. And if we live under a socialistic, totalitarian government, yeah it sucks, but either way we have God on our side, and a gospel that not even the government can contain. (Besides we still are considered a center-right nation. Republicans are going to win the house and senate. How close to socialism can we be?)
Some Christians attachment to an American ideal seems to be a form of idolatry. Perhaps this because I was born in 1982, received a public education, and didn't grow up in Christian home. Perhaps I learned a different history than some in previous generations did. The idyllic age is unfortunately not a part of my experience. Hence, my lack of sympathy. I can see that it probably feels pretty crappy to see a generation of folks destroy everything you fought for, believed in, and cherished.
A wise man told me something. He said the problem today is that young people do not listen to experience, and that older folks do not listen to developing perspectives. A healthy society does both. Trust me when I say I've listened to "the old" perspective, and I'm genuinely trying to be sensitive to it, mostly because I think it would be foolish not to. But I ask you to look at mine. As a young person who has no attachments to the things of the past, but who wishes that the government wasn't so big, the borders were not so open, and the debt wasn't so high, who is a Christian and a Biblicist, let me lead us to a perspective of hope, let me call all people liberal and conservative to move past discussions that depend on man's wisdom, to faith that believes that God wins, despite all contrary evidence. Let us focus on the task, saving people, so they will be on the right side of society's salvation. Patriotism and nostalgia are a distraction from that.

Lebron and the Distinction Between Disappointed and Angry

Anger is the result of felt injustice. Injustice is the breech of a moral contract, spoken, or written, or unspoken, or unwritten. Do we as Cleveland fans have a right to be angry at Lebron James? It depends on what we're angry about. Because just because it feels unjust doesn't mean that it is, and as it pertains to Lebron's decision as a free agent, he broke no rules, written or unwritten. He never promised the city of Cleveland that he would stay for his career. He may have promised owner Dan Gilbert. We'll never know, but that would explain his anger at least. Of course, before Gilbert goes out calling people disloyal he needs to have a conversation with Mike Brown, the the winningest coach, percentage wise, in Cleveland Cavaliers history. Perhaps we are angry about the way that he went about it, carving out a one hour time slot in prime time just to take a piece out of our hearts. That was mean, granted. It was classless and ill-conceived. It added fuel to the fire, but how much less angry would we have been if he had made the same decision quieter. I think we might not have reacted so emotionally so quickly, but I think the burning of all things James would have been inevitable, and it might have squelched a Dan Gilbert email that he is now regretting forever. The seat of our anger comes from our belief turned expectation Lebron not only would stay in Cleveland, but more importantly wanted to win a championship in Cleveland. We gave our hearts to him. We wouldn't have done that had we not been convinced that he wanted to be for Cleveland what Jordan was for Chicago. The story was set up beautifully. James was being criticized for all the same stuff Jordan was in roughly the same period of his career, and then Jordan got Pippen, and Jackson, and the rest is history. All Lebron needed was "Pippen" and "Jackson", and the Cavs could be a dynasty. Alas, it seems that James had a different idea. No doubt, James decision was based on wanting to win championships. He took less money to go to Miami. He also wanted to stay in Cleveland. He wanted Bosh to come and be his "Pippen". Bosh wouldn't come. Lebron looked at the roster, post Bosh signing with Miami, and said, "to win the title, we have to get through Boston, Orlando, Miami, and Los Angelas". Gosh, I'm just one guy" This was the identical thought that went through his mind in the Boston series. He just didn't have it in him to carry them through the playoffs. He believed it in '07, '08, and '09, but not in '10, and you could see it on his face, the last three games of the series. I agree with Dan Gilbert, Lebron quit in the Boston series. He felt the burden of an entire city and folded underneath the pressure, and when Bosh sided with the Heat, Lebron decided he couldn't take that again. This is interesting because we're really hard on our athletes that lack a competitive spirit, but in some sense, it was Lebron's drive to win that led him to despair, and led him to choose Miami. Regularly we declare cynically that players always go where the money goes, and we kill them when they go to inferior teams for more money. Well, Lebron went to a superior team (with him on it)for less money, and we kill him for being disloyal. I point out this double-standard adding one caveat. A truly competitive spirit tries to win, always. Even if he's down two games to Boston in the second round, and he still has to get through Orlando, and the Lakers. Losing brings out character. I appreciate that Lebron hates losing. At least he didn't just smile and peace out, but he was a sore loser, and still is. He has to still play hard in Miami to win, not to mention with 9 summer league bench warmers. Winning is hard no matter where you are, and one would've have liked to see Lebron stay in Cleveland in sheer recognition of that fact. I mean, they did have the best record in the NBA two years in a row. (Combined Record- 127-37!)Perhaps there's stuff going on with management we'll never know. You can take this rant as an outsider's opinion, but this is how things appear to me given the facts that I have. What hurts is that through deciding to go to Miami, Lebron James communicated that he was not as enthusiastic or optimistic about Cleveland as we had believed him to be. The jury's still out for me whether this was misguided. I think it was spurred mostly by the media constantly comparing Lebron to Jordan. I think we were self-deceived. Lebron is a great basketball player who truly wants to win, but something's missing, that thing that Jordan, Kobe, Magic, Bird, and Wade have. The Derek Jeter factor if you will. He never had that look in his eye. He's actually a perfect Pippen to Wade's Jordan. We should've saw it coming. As second fiddle, Lebron doesn't have the pressure of a city's expectation and cursed history. He can be his goofy self and let Wade lead. He can make pretty passes, nasty dunks, and put on a show while Wade brings the necessary leadership. He wasn't who we thought he was. We should've known that championships are more appealing than Ohio, or where you grew up. We should've known that Lebron wasn't the King, but the Knight. But we wanted to be witnesses of the next legend, the next greatest player, the next dynasty. Lebron didn't see it that way, and he left, and it hurts.
If Lebron was unjust he was unjust in the way he went about leaving Cleveland. But this is not the issue is it? To call him disloyal assumes a moral imperative, and that loyalty is morally imperative. Only when the spoken/unspoken,written/unwritten contract is breached,is anger justified. Truly loyalty is nice. But in this situation, is it imperative? What loyalty are we asking Lebron to hold? He was drafted. He didn't have a choice to come to Cleveland. Is he disloyal to his word? What word did he give that he would stay in Cleveland. He finished out his contract without ever asking to be traded. Was he morally obligated to stay here? If he was, what's the meaning of "free agent". Of course he's not obligated to stay in Cleveland. Loyalty is based on a promise, and he fulfilled his. We feel betrayed because we let ourselves believe things that weren't true, but Lebron never shared them. A little look at recent history makes that clear. So somebody turned out not to be who we thought they were, but he never led us on, we led ourselves on, therefore, the anger, the bitterness, is unjustified. But the disappointment, the shock, and the loss of respect, well, at least that's how I feel for now.