Welcome to the Compass. I hope your fourth was wonderful

>> Rick Beggs: Welcome to the Compass. Navigating the public square together with faith, truth and conviction. Well, we have reached the second week of July. I hope your fourth was wonderful. We had a great time doing the show last week, did we not?

>> Debbie Wuthnow: We had great memories to share.

>> Rick Beggs: Yes, we did. It was wonderful. Welcome to the Compass. I'm Rick Beggs and Debbie Wuth now the president of ivoterguide is my co host.

Rick: We should talk about voting, but not just voting

>> Rick Beggs: Hey Rick.

>> Rick Beggs: Hey Debbie. And I was wondering, what direction do you want to go on the Compass today?

>> Debbie Wuthnow: Direction with the compass. Okay. You know what? I think we should talk about voting, but not just voting. That's pretty much our topic every week. But, a little bit about why we vote. But something we haven't talked about yet is how do you make this the choice?

>> Rick Beggs: Or better yet, why don't we start with why should we vote?

>> Debbie Wuthnow: Well, that's not bad. Yeah, it's good. I like it.

>> Rick Beggs: I mean, that's a good idea. Do you have any thoughts about that?

>> Debbie Wuthnow: Well, I do because there's a scripture,

>> Debbie Wuthnow: there's Proverbs 14 which says righteousness exalts a nation, but sin is a reproach to any people. but you know, voting is not, it's not merely a political act. It's an opportunity to exercise stewardship. We are stewards. God has given us everything. And this is our ability to exercise stewardship over society, to restrain evil, to perpetuate good. because Christians are called to be salt and light in every area of our life. And that includes civic engagement and voting.

>> Rick Beggs: And voting.

>> Debbie Wuthnow: And voting.

>> Rick Beggs: So we're supposed to be responsible to the Lord for that stuff, for everything. Okay. That's what being a steward is. And we did talk about that two shows ago. Yeah, we actually talked about, being good stewards, not just of your resources.

>> Debbie Wuthnow: So if you want to hear more, go back and listen to previous episodes

>> Rick Beggs: afr.net or you can get us on the app.

>> Debbie Wuthnow: Or you know what, ivoterguide.com has a little floater thing and you can click on the compass and watch it from ivoterguide.com we have so many ways to get to it. So easy.

>> Rick Beggs: It is. We've made it really easy.

Why Christians should vote: Government was God's idea, Christian says

Well, as we talk about with, that why Christians should vote, I think some good talking points would probably start that government was God's idea.

>> Debbie Wuthnow: Yeah, he kind of created it.

>> Rick Beggs: Yeah. I mean, it's not like it's man's invention. We, we are supposed to live under authority.

>> Debbie Wuthnow: Yeah. God created the structure for every level of government, self government, family, Government, church government, civil government.

>> Rick Beggs: And the reason we have authorities like that is so that we, could be restrained from evil, from ourselves, or actually the added attraction that we could do good.

>> Debbie Wuthnow: Oh, yes.

>> Debbie Wuthnow: Well, because.

>> Debbie Wuthnow: And we have talked about the way for evil to flourish is for good people to do nothing. So that is part of our stewardship, responsibility.

>> Rick Beggs: So it, it begs the question, if you don't vote, are you sort of throwing away the idea that you don't want to participate in finding good men and women to legislate over us?

>> Debbie Wuthnow: Yeah, you're, you're, you're burying your talent. You're acquiescing authority. And actually you're giving the authority to. If godly people don't vote, they're giving the authority to the ungodly. And if that's what we see in government, that's because we.

>> Rick Beggs: And we have plenty of that in this country. So, Christians really should care about government. And because God cares about justice and righteousness, those things should be forefront in our mind.

>> Debbie Wuthnow: Yep. Yep.

Even if you don't like a candidate, you still need to pray for them

>> Rick Beggs: do we have any scripture to back some of this stuff?

>> Debbie Wuthnow: So, you know, we've talked of different scriptures, different weeks. this one, this. This week, because, you know, it's, it's throughout God's word. this time I'm going to pull from second first Peter, chapter two, starting in verse 13, says, Submit yourselves to the Lord for the Lord's sake, to every human institution, whether to a king as the one in authority, or to governors who sent as sent by him for the punishment of evildoers and the praise of those who do right. For such is the will of God that by doing right you may silence the ignorance of foolish men.

>> Rick Beggs: Honor authority.

>> Debbie Wuthnow: Yeah.

>> Rick Beggs: You know, it's interesting. Every time you read scripture in regards to government and authority over us, there's always this balance of good and evil.

>> Debbie Wuthnow: It's like by design.

>> Rick Beggs: It seems rather obvious, doesn't it? But there's always, but there's always that tension. thus we always talk about if you don't do good, you're allowing evil

>> Debbie Wuthnow: to come, and we don't want that to happen.

>> Rick Beggs: my scripture I'm reading today is out of Daniel, and It is the second chapter, and the verses are 20 and 21. Let the name of God be blessed forever and ever. For wisdom and power belong to Him. It is he who changes the times and the seasons. He removes kings and establishes kings. He gives wisdom to wise men and knowledge of men of understanding. I am so enamored by. He removes kings and establishes kings I know.

>> Debbie Wuthnow: And he does it through us, through voters, but he really is the one in authority and in power. So even godly kings. Yep. Ungodly kings. Yep.

>> Rick Beggs: And we're called to pray for all of authority over us. It doesn't matter if they're good or they're bad, at least in our minds.

>> Debbie Wuthnow: And it's so that we can live peaceful lives.

>> Rick Beggs: Yeah, yeah, yeah. And we should pray for people in authority, but sometimes when we so, vehemently disagree with somebody, we will not pray for them. That is actually sin.

>> Debbie Wuthnow: That's wrong. Even if you don't like the person you elect that represents you, if you didn't vote for him, you still need to pray for them. You know, I. I live in a urban city that does.

>> Debbie Wuthnow: Has.

>> Debbie Wuthnow: people who die don't necessarily always believe with, you know, believe, share their values, but I still am commanded to pray for them.

>> Rick Beggs: And sometimes it's very hard to get on your knees and do that. especially when you do disagree or especially when they are trying to put forth things that really appear to be evil.

>> Debbie Wuthnow: I. Ungodly. Yeah.

>> Rick Beggs: And so you have to pray against what they're doing and pray that God would change their hearts always.

>> Debbie Wuthnow: Because God loves the people, not the sin.

>> Rick Beggs: Yeah, well. Yeah, yeah. And I'm so grateful for that in my own life.

>> Debbie Wuthnow: Yep.

>> Rick Beggs: but there's this thing that happens when we go to vote because, I. Voter guide, as we have discussed often on the show, is really about bringing truth to the voter so that they have an understanding of what that candidate is all about, whether.

>> Debbie Wuthnow: What will they do, if we give them authority, what.

>> Rick Beggs: Or what they have already done. Based positions. But. So we take them through all of this stuff and we do deep dive social media. We do deep dives on how they voted or who. Who gave to them, who's endorsed them. M. Yeah. Who gives to them, who they give to? All that's public record and what we've just done is aggregate it to one place so you could make a good decision based on the information we can gather. But there are a couple places we can't measure.

>> Debbie Wuthnow: They're just hard. They're just difficult. And those two are. One would be character. men measuring character is. It's kind of subjective. Different people look for different things in the character of a candidate. So we just very specifically say that's up to voters to discern for yourself. Character.

You need to start with prayer before deciding on which candidate to vote for

And I want to talk about that more. So character's one of those, and the other is winability. Do they have A viable chance to win this race.

>> Rick Beggs: let's take one of them today.

>> Debbie Wuthnow: Yeah, they both could be pretty big topics.

>> Rick Beggs: Yeah, let's take character today, and try to work through, at least what the voter might, feel when they're looking. And let's say they've come to and read everything that they can find in I voter guide. And they've, all the research has been done for them and now they are going to go vote and they have this scenario when they walk in. How about two good candidates and I don't know who to choose.

>> Debbie Wuthnow: Well, and I would even say you go to get your personalized ballot in the primary election and you know, we have, we assign those ratings and maybe you've got two candidates that have the same rating. So they're both. We. Our projection is that they'll both govern similarly. But how do you choose between them? Because you gotta vote for one, which means you have to pick one.

>> Rick Beggs: Yeah. And sometimes that's very difficult. So I think we always talk about that. you need to start with prayer.

>> Debbie Wuthnow: Oh, 100%. ask for the wisdom because we know God will give it and help, you know, guide you to what that decision point will be.

>> Rick Beggs: So political research is really important. But above that, once we've sort of sat in our decision, the next thing, or maybe that we start with praying about it before we do find out the research. But then we give it to God and say, God, here are two choices. Actually they're both pretty good and I'm not sure what direction to go. So now what? Because I'm about ready to go into a booth and I haven't made a decision about two decent candidates.

>> Debbie Wuthnow: Well, it's kind of like, you know, when you have a decision to make for your family and you make a pro con list, you have to figure out what. How can I differentiate these two candidates? It could be you have one issue that is really important to you. Maybe it's the pro life and you just. I don't want any exceptions to abortion. I protect all the babies. So you look at their position on that issue. It could be immigration, it could be some other economic issue. But decide what that issue is and dive deep, deeper into that issue to help you differentiate. And it could be, their character that you use to differentiate. So, you can dive deeper into that. And certainly that takes some prayer to discern. Yeah.

>> Rick Beggs: and I would say let's talk about that in depth in just a moment. But if we've prayed and we've asked God for wisdom. And we've looked at all the research that, ivoterguy.com has done for us, and we're still stuck. And even maybe characters pretty similar. We really have to trust that God is going to give us some direction between now and the day we go vote.

>> Debbie Wuthnow: Yeah.

>> Rick Beggs: Because you need to vote one or the other.

>> Debbie Wuthnow: Yes, you do. And, can I throw out. There is one thing that I've used. So I had this dilemma myself earlier this year in the primary, candidates that were rated the same. And, and we came out with a new feature that I find really helpful. In those instances, these candidates were rated the same. And it's a comparison feature. Kind of looks like if you've been on the Best Buy website looking at laptops and you can check the ones you want to compare, and then you compare them side by side. We call it our side by side comparison. You can compare up to four candidates in any one race. And then we'll segment and show you side by side of their background. There's little tabs you can, navigate in between. You can compare their contributions, you can compare their voting records. the thing I find the most helpful is to compare their endorsements because sometimes an endorsement can be really key because, you know, I trust that person that has really dove deeper in identifying the candidate. And if they've stepped through and said this is their favorite candidate, that might be what helps me choose between the two candidates. So the compare feature, or if it's an issue thing, compare their surveys. If they've answered. If both candidates have answered the survey, you can see their questionnaire side by side to see how they differentiated themselves in. Maybe it's their values. That is frequently my tiebreaker question.

>> Rick Beggs: Yeah, sometimes my tiebreaker is if they seem equal to all of that. And I'm on ivoterguide.com, one of them has answered the survey and one of them has not answered the survey. Now, I know just because they didn't answer the survey doesn't mean they're a bad person. They may have been coached.

>> Debbie Wuthnow: They may have been coached. A lot of times incumbents will say, my record speaks for itself. And so they say, look at your voting record. And honestly, it does. But the questionnaire will ask questions that won't be clear in legislation. So we encourage every candidate. I would ask you to do the same. When you ever encounter candidates in a forum or knocking on your door, encourage them to answer ivoterguides questionnaire because it really is helpful, insightful information to help voters choose who they want to vote for.

There are some states that have jungle primaries where there are two candidates

>> Rick Beggs: Okay, so there's another scenario that can happen in the ballot.

>> Debbie Wuthnow: okay. This one happen to you?

>> Rick Beggs: Yes, it has. you're. You're ready to vote. You've prayed, you've done all these things. You know, you're getting ready to go to your precinct, and both of these candidates are bad.

>> Debbie Wuthnow: Yeah. There. Well, we hear from. There are some states that have jungle primaries. And when it gets to be the November election, they're like, I got two people. I don't like either of them. None of them. I don't want any of them to. I really wouldn't choose either of them, but yet I need to choose one to be a good steward of the responsibility that God has given to me. So who do I pick? I don't like either of them. And that's where sometimes we'll lean into which one will restrain evil more or which one is. You know, we're never going to get 100% candidate that agrees with us. Jesus is not on the ballot. Darn it. but men are. So, you know, I'd love 100% of somebody who aligns with me, but if one candidate's 30%, one candidate's zero. That kind of is a guidance.

>> Rick Beggs: Yeah. Yeah. And so many things are swayed by political campaigns and all the junk you see on tv, all the negative ads. Yeah. I'm telling you what, I can't wait to get through primary season because I'm so tired of the political ads.

>> Debbie Wuthnow: I'm so tired of text messages.

>> Rick Beggs: Yeah. I'm also very, tired of pharmaceutical commercials. I kind of put them on.

>> Debbie Wuthnow: That's going to be a topic for another show.

>> Rick Beggs: I kind of put them on the same level.

>> Debbie Wuthnow: I just don't want just to watch daytime tv. What are you doing, Rick?

>> Rick Beggs: The bon bons is why I do it. So that's exactly why I'm doing it. But when you're in that predicament and you have two candidates, you really. You have to dig really deep to find what of the two is the lesser of evil.

>> Debbie Wuthnow: Yeah. What do you lean into? What has been the thing that you've used?

>> Rick Beggs: Well, I go back to who. Who really supports them or who they gave money to. Sometimes I put more weight on who they gave money to. Because if you give money, you've put part of yourself out there.

>> Debbie Wuthnow: Accepting money is easier than choosing who to give money to, even if it's from your, leadership campaign.

>> Rick Beggs: Well, and sometimes you're accepting money, but you're accepting it. It's not that you're 100% with that group. But my goodness, anybody that they give to. And I can see the difference in those two candidates, if I don't like either one, I'll use that sort of my bell cow. Yeah. To do that.

So let's go back to character. Um, you know, God really is the one that judges man's hearts

So let's go back to character.

>> Debbie Wuthnow: Okay.

>> Rick Beggs: Because that's a big one.

>> Debbie Wuthnow: That's hard.

>> Rick Beggs: It is.

>> Debbie Wuthnow: you know, God really is the one that judges man's hearts. I mean we're told to be discerning.

>> Debbie Wuthnow: Judging is kind of, you know, in there, but it, it's. We also need to be wisest serpents and innocents as doves. So we need to pray for that discernment and then do our deep dive. You know, I hate to break it to you, but just because you hear a negative ad about it, about something doesn't make it true. What I know. So sometimes you gotta dig a little deeper into what really the truth is. There's sometimes though a nugget, of truth will be taken and spun out of context. You know, somebody's been indicted, but they were found innocent. But the opponent doesn't say they were found innocent, they just said they've been indicted. Which is just one side of a story. It's really the final ruling that hits at the truth. So dig a little deeper. When you get all those little flyers in the mail and the text messages and the radio ads of what really, what's the real truth that's going on here?

>> Rick Beggs: Okay, so what are some ways, let's walk through some ways that we could go discern character that are out there and readily available. Let's just say you and I can't go sit with that politician and hear them. There are places we can go to hear them. Even though we may not have a one on one. And we could hear more about.

>> Debbie Wuthnow: Well, especially because if they're, you know, if they're running for my vote, they should be going out to meetings, they should be appearing in candidate forums. If you have an opportunity to go to a candidate forum or to attend a time where the candidate is speaking and you can ask them questions.

>> Rick Beggs: A town hall.

>> Debbie Wuthnow: A town hall, that's an example of that. I would encourage you to go and be prepared to know what to ask them. You can go to ivoterguide.com we actually have articles that talk about that, can give you questions. You could ask the candidates. If you get that opportunity, I would encourage you to be familiar with the questions IVoterguide asks candidates on our candidate survey for that level of office. That can be a guide of what you ask them and you don't want to ask them. Yes, no questions.

>> Rick Beggs: Make them at work.

>> Debbie Wuthnow: Yeah, let them, I call them open text or you know, make them express their thoughts more. That's where they really can kind of reveal what they're thinking, which can be. That help you decide. so you could also, you know, if you can't go in person, a lot of times things are videoed and you can watch them online. You can watch a candidate debate. Sometimes that will be on your local TV station or local newspaper. Do some Internet searching for, times that this candidate has been interviewed or written an article or spoken. Not just what they put on their social media. Kind of go a layer beyond that.

>> Rick Beggs: Well, I would even suggest that you go back in time a little bit and go dig up some stuff from earlier days that allow you to hear sort of how they've progressed. Thinking like a PI. Yeah, that's right.

>> Debbie Wuthnow: Go detective.

>> Rick Beggs: Go grandma.

>> Debbie Wuthnow: Go grandma. Sleuthen.

>> Rick Beggs: That's right. But don't you, I know I have some friends, they love this stuff.

>> Debbie Wuthnow: I'd love to have those friends that love to do that stuff and have them dig.

>> Rick Beggs: Well, okay, what do we call that?

>> Debbie Wuthnow: We call that I Voter guide.

>> Rick Beggs: Yeah. But we actually do have people who will do that for us. They're called panelists. Panelists.

>> Debbie Wuthnow: And those are everyday volunteers just like you guys listening. If you love to dig, we got a job for you.

>> Rick Beggs: Okay, so how would they go about doing that?

>> Debbie Wuthnow: Well, if you go to ivoterguide.com in the very top menu. So instead of entering your address in getting your personalized ballot, we have a take action menu tab up in the blue bar at the top. And on that page are various ways you can take action. the first one over on the left is to apply to be a panelist. So, the way that we land on that rating for candidates is volunteers. If you click on that page, it will give you the details of what's involved. You have to apply. We're going to call your references, we're going to train you in what to look for, we're going to answer any questions that you have, teach you the criteria of what the different ratings mean. and that's all just self paced online training. And then we'll assign you about 30 to 35 candidates to really do the deep dive on, ideally in your area that you might even have been able to go to a Canada forum. But just to do that Internet search, to read Their website and all the issue statements that they make there to read their social media and use, the discernment that God has given you to. To assign a rating. And so it is the. The. Those volunteer panelists of which we need about a thousand every election cycle in people in every state. And so we're always looking for, volunteers, especially as we hope to expand our school board coverage. That's going to require a lot more, volunteer panelists.

>> Rick Beggs: And the only way you can get information about that, really, is to be at a school board meeting.

>> Debbie Wuthnow: Yeah. There are recordings sometimes of school board meetings, but they don't have recorded votes, like, of who voted what way. You have to, like, watch the. Or listen to it to know what's going on. So that's part of why we lean into panelists because, evaluating school board candidates is truly like finding the needle in the haystack.

>> Rick Beggs: Yeah. And I can't encourage anybody enough to go, if you're interested and want to do some digging, we're interested in you, come take the jump and be a part of the.

>> Debbie Wuthnow: Apply [email protected].

>> Rick Beggs: yeah, we could use you at any time.

Character is hard to measure, isn't it?

Okay. So we've talked about maybe showing up at a town hall or watching debates. We talked about going back in time maybe and listening to some interviews that these candidates have done. we did talk about meeting somebody in person, but that tends to be.

>> Debbie Wuthnow: Sometimes they'll knock on your door.

>> Rick Beggs: Yeah, I guess if it's more local. Yeah, they would do that and talk to them. one of the ones I like watching people is how they treat other people.

>> Debbie Wuthnow: That can indicate character. I know there's some anecdotes of some Washington people and how they treat and I mean, it's indicative of their values. And we don't want to vote on personality, but it does factor into how well can they accomplish the things we're putting them in power to do.

>> Rick Beggs: do you put any validity in looking into longtime associates, business associates, family members? I don't know. How deep do you go on this stuff?

>> Debbie Wuthnow: I think that whatever you need to. To determine who to vote for. But to me, that's in a way, like a reference on a job application. And you would check what somebody said else said about them. Yeah, because they've had. They've interacted with them when you have not. So I would. I would factor that in. I wouldn't give it 100 weight, but it's certainly something to look at.

>> Rick Beggs: Yeah. I also have found that sometimes I will go to Media outlets that are opposite of what I.

>> Debbie Wuthnow: Get out of your bubble. Get out of your.

>> Rick Beggs: And go hear what other people are saying. And sometimes you can find the real nugget on our side based on very little information that's given from the other side.

>> Debbie Wuthnow: Could be that the truth is somewhere in between what both sides are saying.

>> Rick Beggs: that's what I used to tell my kids when they would argue and they would go back and forth, and I go, well, somewhere in here is the truth.

>> Debbie Wuthnow: Uh-huh. Nobody's saying 100, but it's somewhere in there.

>> Rick Beggs: Yeah.

>> Debbie Wuthnow: So pray for discernment.

>> Rick Beggs: Okay. We also do a survey.

>> Debbie Wuthnow: We do.

>> Rick Beggs: And sometimes that's very revealing.

>> Debbie Wuthnow: It can be. And we call it a questionnaire. it's about 35 questions. There are different questions for every level of office. And even if it's a statement that we ask the candidate to agree or disagree to, they have the opportunity to, add a qualifier. We call it annotation. And that can be very illuminating of where their brain is and their position stands. So when candidates have answered the questionnaire, and if you go to get your ballot, you will see a green check mark next to questionnaire. If they've answered the questionnaire. And I would encourage you to take a read. It takes the candidates a long time to answer that questionnaire, and we want them to do that. So encourage candidates that you talk to to answer it. And when they have, take a look and factor that into who you vote for.

>> Rick Beggs: character is hard to measure, isn't it?

>> Debbie Wuthnow: It's super, super hard. It's very subjective, and we all kind of look at it differently.

>> Rick Beggs: We do.

>> Rick Beggs: Well, Debbie, you know what that sound is.

You can do some early voting in a bunch of states this coming week

It's time for the election update for this coming week. What do you got for us?

>> Debbie Wuthnow: Well, this coming week, Arizona, your time has finally arrived. Your primary is on Tuesday, July 21st. So if you live in Arizona, head to ivoterguide.com, get your personalized ballot, print it off, take it to the polls, and you can get there darn early. Opens at 6am Polls close at 7pm so make sure you get that done. If you live in Arizona, but also in this coming week, you can do some early voting in a bunch of states. Georgia, you have early voting that is underway for a special election. So only for those of you in CD13, and that election will be on July 28th. Virginia, early voting is still underway for your election. That's getting closer. It's going to be August 4th. Kansas, early voting is underway for your primary. That's also on August 4th. And remember, it includes this important ballot measure on, electing your Supreme Court judges. Tennessee, early voting is underway for your election. That will be on August 6th. Vermont, your early voting is underway. Your primary will occur August 11th. Can you tell we're coming out of the hurricane. We're getting ready for a lot more elections. Missouri, early, no excuse. In person. Absentee voting begins next Tuesday on the, the 21st for your election. That will be on the 4th of August. And in Wyoming, early voting also starts on Tuesday for your primary. That will be on August 18th.

>> Debbie Wuthnow: That's what's going on in elections, Rick.

>> Rick Beggs: Well, that's amazing. It sounds almost like you have that memorized, but I know you're reading it.

>> Debbie Wuthnow: Yeah.

>> Rick Beggs: My goodness, there are so many, so many going on. I feel like we've been voting in Georgia for six months.

>> Rick Beggs: It feels like it never seems so ongoing.

>> Rick Beggs: I know.

The Compass is the radio show of Ivoterguide.com

Well, as we close up, this, segment of the Compass. We just want to remind you that this is the radio show of Iboaterguide.com and you can find us on the AFR app we love. If you'll download that, you can listen to us anytime. You can go get the Compass when it's airing or you can get it anytime you want. Debbie, where can they write to us if they have a question? Question?

>> Debbie Wuthnow: If you have a question, email it to compassivoterguide.com Our team will answer you directly. And if you have a question you want Rick and I to answer on

>> Debbie Wuthnow: the air, pose that to that team

>> Debbie Wuthnow: and they'll let us know.

>> Rick Beggs: Well, we want to thank you for joining us, this week and we hope you'll come in next week, too. We're going to talk about, some more things about how to get candidate elected. And as always, we are, the Compass, which is a radio show for ivoterguide.

>> Rick Beggs: Com.

>> Rick Beggs: Our producer is Brent Austin. And, we always want to remind you that on the Compass, true north is Jesus.

00:00  Welcome to the Compass. I hope your fourth was wonderful

00:33  Rick: We should talk about voting, but not just voting

02:20  Why Christians should vote: Government was God's idea, Christian says

04:02  Even if you don't like a candidate, you still need to pray for them

08:21  You need to start with prayer before deciding on which candidate to vote for

13:48  There are some states that have jungle primaries where there are two candidates

16:33  So let's go back to character. Um, you know, God really is the one that judges man's hearts

22:10  Character is hard to measure, isn't it?

25:09  You can do some early voting in a bunch of states this coming week

26:53  The Compass is the radio show of iVoterGuide.com