Senator Kaine has no clue what he’s talking about
Article adapted from episode content.
This week, a sitting U.S. Senator uttered remarks so fundamentally misguided and perilous that they have been described as “one of the dumbest and most dangerous and stupidest things” a politician could say. During a U.S. Senate hearing for a nominee to the U.S. Foreign Relations Committee, Senator Tim Kaine expressed profound discomfort with the foundational American principle that human rights originate from God, our Creator, rather than from government or laws. This stance, far from being a mere political disagreement, threatens to undermine the very bedrock of our Republic’s foundation.
The controversy began when a nominee quoted Senator Marco Rubio, asserting that “Our rights come from God, our creator, not from our laws, not from our governments”. Senator Kaine found this statement “very, very troubling,” claiming that “the notion that rights don’t come from laws and don’t come from the government but come from the creator… That’s what the Iranian government believes”. He painted a picture of a theocratic regime that bases its rule on religious law and persecutes minorities, implying that grounding rights in a creator is akin to such oppressive systems.
This comparison, however, is a transparent attempt to “poison the well”. It’s a “ploy,” not grounded in rational reason, designed to make it seem as though only “religious fundamentalist[s] who want to trample on the rights of others” would appeal to a transcendent source for rights. Yet, the American system, as conceived by its founders like Thomas Jefferson and Benjamin Franklin, explicitly grounded natural rights in a transcendent source: God. The Declaration of Independence is “very clear that we are endowed by our creator with certain fundamental rights that are not the product of legislation or court cases, what we call positive law”.
Understanding Natural Rights: The American Foundation
Natural rights are those rights individuals possess “in virtue of being human”. They are “prepolitical,” meaning government does not invent them; rather, government’s “job is to recognize and protect them for the sake of the human individual”. To illustrate, consider a U.S. citizen traveling to the United Kingdom. While that individual has no legal right to vote in a British election because they are not a British citizen, they inherently possess a natural right “not to be gunned down in the middle of Trafalgar Square”. This right is not granted by the American or British government but exists “in virtue of [their] humanity,” regardless of nationality.
Pro-lifers, too, invoke this concept when speaking of the “natural rights of the unborn,” arguing that these rights exist “in virtue of being human, not to be unjustly killed”. Senator Kaine’s rejection of this foundational understanding of rights is not just a semantic disagreement; it represents a dangerous departure from the principles upon which the United States was built.
Senator Kaine’s Glaring Inconsistencies
The senator’s position quickly unravels when confronted with his own past statements and actions, revealing a profound lack of consistency.
The Roe v. Wade Contradiction: If, as Senator Kaine suggests, government is the “highest source of authority for our basic human rights,” then a critical problem emerges: “The same government that grants rights can do what? Obviously, take them away”. By this logic, Kaine should have been perfectly content when the Supreme Court struck down Roe v. Wade and Planned Parenthood v. Casey in 2022. After all, the courts and legislatures, in his framework, are the ultimate authority.
However, the source notes that Senator Kaine was “all over the media along with every other Democrat screaming that women’s fundamental right to an abortion had just been infringed upon”. This outcry directly contradicts his stated principle. If rights emanate solely from the government, then the government’s highest judicial body had merely exercised its authority. Kaine’s complaint, therefore, implicitly appeals to a higher, unenumerated right, undermining his own argument that rights derive purely from statutory law. His anger at the court’s decision, when viewed through his stated worldview, is inexplicable.
The Immigration Paradox: Another significant inconsistency arises from Senator Kaine’s stance on immigration. He has been a vocal critic of policies under the Trump presidency, particularly ICE raids and deportations, claiming they violate the “fundamental rights” of undocumented migrants. Yet, if government is the “highest source of rights,” as his position implies, then the same government that might open borders can also shut them, and the same government that once welcomed can later deport. The question becomes: “Where do those fundamental rights come from?” if they do not originate from a source higher than the government itself?. Kaine’s complaints here again demonstrate a selective invocation of “fundamental rights” when it suits his political agenda, without acknowledging their true, transcendent origin.
Flawed Logic: Disagreement and False Equivalency
Kaine further attempts to dismiss the concept of natural rights by arguing that if people from different religious traditions were to debate natural rights, there would be “significant differences in the definitions”. This, he contends, suggests an arbitrary nature to such rights. This is a common “playbook of relativists who try to make it look like the absence of agreement means nobody is right”. However, the source points out that “the fact that people disagree does not mean there are no right answers”. This argument is “self-refuting”; if disagreement invalidates a position, then Kaine’s own argument is dismissed because others, including a majority of senators like Ted Cruz, disagree with him.
Moreover, Kaine makes a deeply problematic comparison between the God of Christianity and the God of Islam, suggesting they are somehow equivalent religious systems. This “very common tactic on the left” is often seen in movements advocating for “coexist” bumper stickers. While America rightly tolerates religious differences, ignoring the profound theological distinctions is “ridiculous” and “ignorant”.
The Christian worldview posits that “all humans have value because they bear the image of God,” regardless of their religion, politics, development, cognitive abilities, or any other characteristic. This inherent value means Christians are called to love their fellow human beings, even those with whom they disagree, and not to harm them. The “God of Islam,” however, is described as a “very vindictive God, a God who wants to destroy any who oppose him,” commanding followers to wage “jihad” against those who defy Islam. To claim there is “no correlation between the Christian worldview that stresses toleration” and the Islamic worldview is to overlook fundamental theological realities. Therefore, invoking natural rights grounded in a Christian theistic God poses “no threat to the concept of human dignity, human toleration”.
The Dangerous Path of Arbitrary Rights
Senator Kaine’s worldview, if adopted, would inevitably lead to a system where rights are not objective truths but are instead “arbitrarily defined” by government elites. If there is “no natural order, if there is no natural rights that we get in virtue of our humanity objectively, then the government will determine arbitrarily who has rights and who doesn’t”. This means individuals like Kaine and other government officials would decide fundamental aspects of human existence, such as the “right to own property, a right to happiness, a right to pursue your own individual interests, a right to life even”. Such rights would not be inherent but bestowed, subject to removal at governmental whim.
The political left, it is argued, has for decades been “plucking rights out of thin air,” such as a “right to an abortion even though it’s nowhere found in the constitution,” a “right to die,” or a “right to be whatever gender you identify is as”. These purported rights lack any grounding and stand in stark contrast to the founders’ careful limitation of rights to “life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness,” which were grounded in a “transcendent creator”.
This erosion of objective, transcendent rights creates a “very dangerous place” where “the same government that feels I am a human being with rights could later feel I’m not a human being with rights”. This ideological push, the source contends, is an attempt to “undermine that [foundational] worldview so he could push his agenda forward about gays, lesbians, um, uh, transgendered individuals having rights that are plucked right out of thin air that have no grounding at all”. Kaine seeks to divorce rights from any “natural order to things” that ought to be valued.
The Self-Refuting “Ought”
Perhaps the most compelling argument against Kaine’s position is its inherent self-refutation. When Senator Kaine states that “we shouldn’t have laws based on religion, we ought to have laws based on the government,” he uses the word “ought”. This very word, however, “invoked the language of natural rights and natural liberties and natural law more specifically”. Moral obligations, such as the idea that laws ought to be a certain way, cannot originate from a purely relativistic, government-centric view.
To make such moral claims, Kaine “has to borrow from the natural law tradition,” which posits that “moral truths are real and knowable and that we can get in line with them and ought to get in line with them”. These truths are “transcendent that come outside of us and our job is to align with them,” not dictate them by preference or political philosophy. His argument, therefore, collapses under its own weight, relying on the very principles it attempts to discredit.
Two Rival Views of Human Value
Ultimately, the debate boils down to “two rival views of the human person in our culture today”. The first is the “endowment view,” held by the founders and “theologically conservative prolifers”. This view asserts that an individual’s rights are “not based on your capabilities” or “immediately exercising visible functions like self-awareness or having uh self-consciousness”. Instead, “your rights are grounded in your human nature,” acquired “the moment you began to exist”. This is the conviction that human value comes from being made in the “image of God”.
The competing view, which Senator Kaine demonstrably holds, particularly in his stance on abortion, is a “performance view of human value”. This perspective suggests that “being human means nothing”. What truly matters is “having cognitive function,” such as “self-awareness, like the ability to feel pain, like having viability, the ability to live independent of another human being”. Until these functions can be “immediately exercise[d],” an individual “has no value that we have to respect,” and therefore, “no right to life, so to speak”.
These “two world views are warring against each other now in the Western world”. Senator Kaine’s rejection of rights grounded in a transcendent creator and his promotion of a government-centric, performance-based view of human value is not merely misguided; it is a dangerous ideology that threatens the inherent dignity of all human beings and the foundational principles of liberty and justice. His arguments reveal not only a profound misunderstanding of America’s philosophical heritage but also a dangerous inconsistency that, if widely adopted, would leave all rights vulnerable to the arbitrary whims of those in power.