Notes from Underground – December 2022

12/31/22 – 2022 was a good year in a strange way! Our hearts break for Ukraine and its people. That said. It was the year Ukrainians reminded the world of the value of freedom and democracy and showed us all how resilient we can be. It was the year we emerged from the pandemic having learned the value of relationships and communities. It was the year the world’s emperors, from tech titans to dictators, showed us that they wear no clothes. The world learned a lot about ourselves and each other. May God bless you and keep you in 2023.

12/31/22 – All Russia has to offer is terrorism: death and destruction. What a waste of a country.

12/31/22 – May he rest in peace. It’s interesting he said it in Latin. Perhaps he knew it would come as a shock and psychologically it was easier for him to say it in this relatively “neutral” language. (It’s also such a great language.) “Many people at the meeting did not understand Latin…. Pope Benedict, 95, died Saturday in the Mater Ecclesiae Monastery in the Vatican. His death was announced by the Vatican. The first resignation of the spiritual leader of the Catholic Church in 600 years would crystallize the full weight of the crises then battering the world’s largest Christian denomination. An intellectual giant and rock of moral certitude who had spent a lifetime defending the faith from outside forces, Pope Benedict would ultimately see his tenure as pope undone in large part by a rot within.”
Pope Benedict XVI, who resigned the papacy, dies at 95

12/30/22 – Younger people aren’t always better than older people. A more reasonable assessment is that they might be better in certain respects but worse in others.

12/30/22 – “Quiet quitting” has been going on for a long time, likely since the concept of work began. Would also say it’s the default approach for the labor force, many of whom hate their jobs but need the income and/or benefits. What’s arguably new is prostituting your personal life to make a buck, which is truly a pathetic way to live. “[T]his new generation embraced a voyeuristic digital vérité, characterized by the short video of a subject talking straight to camera about both everything and nothing at all.… For this generation, the personal had become intertwined with the economic.” Healthy, productive people live rather mundane lives. Take even Michelangelo, a genius who lived during a turbulent period, his daily life was likely quite boring and routine. He would never have wanted to film his every waking minute, and the world is better off for it. Your life is not your work, but your life is also not a body of work. His body of work is his legacy. This type of “work,” voyeuristic digital verité, is totally worthless.
The Year in Quiet Quitting

12/30/22 – Small dick energy needs to be put behind bars for the rest of his life.
Andrew Tate, brother charged in Romania with human trafficking

12/30/22 – Grade inflation and coddling students need to stop.

12/30/22 – The Midwest is definitely the warm center of the country at least. Nowhere better to live. The important thing is to keep your feet on the ground, put your heads down and do the work. Serve your communities. People talk too much. Just do the work. “[T]he Midwest when it was seen as (in the words of Minnesotan F. Scott Fitzgerald) [the] ‘warm center of the world.’”
In unsettled times, look to Midwestern values

12/30/22 – Obvious statements that still need to be made. Power is powerful. Be careful to whom you give it.

12/30/22 – The world’s warriors. God bless them. “We are fighting for Ukraine, for the values that unite Europe and the democratic world, for the global value of life. For everything that the terrorist state is trying to destroy.

It is not easy, it is hard, but I am confident that we will pull through and Russian aggression will fail so that all other potential aggressors of the world do not dare to repeat what russism does.”
Zelensky – The World’s Warriors

12/30/22 – The deranged lunatic who should be charged with war crimes and executed needs to get the f—k out of Ukraine. “He has gone no further than saying conditions in the four Ukrainian territories that he claims to have annexed, illegally, are ‘extremely difficult,’ and that his government would try to end the conflict ‘the faster, the better.’” And those who “want to escalate” are f—king psychotic morons.
Putin, unaccustomed to losing, is increasingly isolated as war falters

12/30/22 – The GOP likes liars. They got another pathological one. “They pledged only to enact whatever policies President Donald Trump might propose, ceding their political philosophy to a man who, by Post count, told more than 30,000 lies during his four years in the White House…. If you can ‘own the libs’ on Fox News and on Twitter, you can raise a lot of campaign cash; and if you can raise tons of money, you can have tons of power.” GOP voters like being conned. As long as they hear what they want to hear, they’re good. There’s a lot of money to be made with a base like that.
In George Santos, the GOP gets the representative-elect it deserves

12/30/22 – Overall, Boomers are the worst generation in recent American history. They did make good music though. Millennials and Gen Z listen to and have made the worst music in recent American history. Could they fix this? It’s embarrassing for us as a country.
America’s genius lies in its respect for rebellion

12/29/22 – Fella.

12/29/22 – Apparently, the GOP wants to back the blue while attacking the blue. The complete contradiction is entirely on point for them.

12/29/22 – We should accept more migrants, and empty buildings, such as offices, hotels/motels, restaurants, religious structures, etc., should be turned into housing for them and for other homeless people. If for no other reason, such as it’s the right thing to do, our economy needs the people, and we need to house all people.

12/29/22 – The great irony is that Musk bought Twitter thinking he could use it to make himself richer. He’s ending up considerably poorer because of the purchase. Also, if you want to stay a healthy, happy person, don’t become super rich. “Sifting through the desiccated wreckage of Twitter is raising endless questions about the fate of the platform and what it means for us all. But one question we don’t need to ask is how we got here. For that, we have Exhibit H.”
Elon Musk’s Text Messages Explain Everything

12/28/22 – As a thought experiment, if a state has say 500 people, what about 50, what about 5, should it still get 2 senators?

12/28/22 – Ken Griffin is an American parasite.

12/28/22 – Just because Christmas is over, doesn’t mean one can’t still get gifts. Is Tuckyorose still wetting himself with jealous rage about Zelensky? If so, please do share.

12/28/22 – So true! “Our warriors are not just servicemen. Not just soldiers and sailors, not just sergeants, not just officers and generals. They are the hope of millions of people for life. They are Europe’s hope for peace. They are the hope of the world that the era of empires cannot return.”
Zelensky – Warriors are not just servicemen.

12/28/22 – They showed everybody! Love those people. “Thanks to our unity, we have achieved what almost no one in the world believed possible. Hardly anyone except us. Ukraine has become one of the global leaders.

Our national colors are today an international symbol of courage and indomitability of the whole world. In any country, on any continent, when they see blue and yellow, they know that it is about freedom. About the people who did not give up, who endured, who united the world. And who will win.

Thanks to Ukraine, the world believed that values give strength. This belief emerged following our struggle. The world became convinced that tyranny will lose. Following our faith. The world saw that freedom can be victorious. Following our achievements on the battlefield. And all our warriors. It will definitely happen. Ukraine will definitely win.”
Zelensky – Ukraine is a leader.

12/28/22 – “Wanderlust,” such a great word. “[T]he desire to explore — ‘to lean forward to the next crazy venture beneath the skies,’ as Kerouac wrote — is the American impulse that dominates…. Ozden told us, his voice urgent. ‘Our common traits are way, way bigger and more fundamental than our differences.’”
Millions of Americans have left the country. Where are they going, and why?

12/28/22 – If all you have to offer the world is hate, just sit the f—k down.

12/28/22 – All Americans (with legit exemptions) should have some military training. It will be good for us a nation. Discipline and patriotism are important.

12/28/22 – Cheney and Thompson showed why one should never bet against the USA. If war comes to us, we will never surrender, and we will annihilate you.
Bennie Thompson and Liz Cheney are the Jan. 6 committee’s unusual dynamic duo

12/28/22 – Russia is a terrorist and barbaric state. Psycho, the evil Russian sh-t needs to be taken out.

12/28/22 – Is anybody (hello, international organizations whose job it is to deal with this!) going to do anything at all about these horrific war crimes, or are they completely impotent? In that case, why pay a bunch of worthless bureaucrats’ salaries? “While the number of children taken is not clear, Daria Herasymchuk, Ukraine’s top children’s rights official, has estimated that nearly 11,000 Ukrainian children have been taken by Russia without their parents…. This is specifically prohibited by the 1948 United Nations Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide.”
Russia’s abductions of Ukrainian children are a genocidal crime

12/28/22 – The evil monsters keep targeting maternity hospitals. Is the west going to continue to allow this madness? “President’s Office: Russia shells maternity hospital in Kherson. Russian forces have shelled a hospital maternity ward in the liberated city of Kherson in southern Ukraine, Kyrylo Tymoshenko, a deputy head of the President’s Office, reported on Dec. 27. ‘They shelled a place where two children were born today. Before the attack, doctors managed to complete a caesarean section. There are five women after childbirth at the institution,’ he said, adding that ‘miraculously’ there were no casualties.”
Kyiv Independent – Maternity Hospitals

12/27/22 – The evil one, trump, needs to get one or the other punishment. “If the 14th Amendment had been rejected, he would almost certainly have been convicted of treason and immediately executed.”
Criminal prosecution is the wrong idea. Use the 14th Amendment on Trump.

12/27/22 – Such a great guy! Can’t wait to watch it. “‘Happiness happens when you mix different people and different colors and different places all in one plate,’ José Andrés says onscreen. In another moment, he offers this wonderful challenge: ‘Tell me what you eat, and I will tell you who you are.’”
José Andrés and his daughters eat their way through Spain

12/27/22 – “Ukraine holds its lines and will never surrender,” Zelensky said.

12/27/22 – “Vladimir Putin is counting on America and NATO to tire and to falter. It is up to us to prove him wrong, and to warn the other dictators on the planet that they will never extinguish human liberty while America and its allies in this great battle—including Ukraine—are still standing.”
Ukraine’s Fate and America’s Destiny

12/27/22 – Just because the Republican Party has a high number of MAGA morons, that doesn’t mean the average American voter is a moron. “I’ve never really believed the president, no matter who it is … ever really controlled the inflation. They may have had an effect on it, but they didn’t really control it one way or the other.” Exactly. Does the right have anything but hate and fear to sell? No, it doesn’t.
GOP stumbles with independents contributed to midterm woes

12/26/22 – The west needs to give Ukraine the best weapons and all the weapons it needs to win completely. The west also needs to decapitate the Russian poop.

12/26/22 – Wow! It reads like fiction, but it’s real life. Reminded me of Hemingway. Incredible reporting and photography. They are so brave. “More than any other foreign volunteer I met, Doc seemed to be genuinely motivated by a conviction that the conflict was ‘a clear case of right and wrong.’”
Trapped in the Trenches in Ukraine

12/26/22 – Boebert didn’t learn anything because she’s not about learning. She’s also not about governing. She’s just about having power to have power. MAGA are an embarrassment to humankind.
Boebert ‘learned absolutely nothing’ – The Durango Herald

12/26/22 – Really hope advancements in AI, such as ChatGPT, lead to the revival of bluebook exams. They are hard, and that’s great. We need to be a nation that values and nurtures academic excellence.

12/26/22 – You would think Abbott, who’s in a wheelchair, would understand something about vulnerability. These migrants are vulnerable, and even on Christmas Eve, he treated them as Herod would and definitely not as Jesus would. Without putting their lives in danger, these cruel Republican governors can keep sending the migrants to the northern states. We have inclusive, caring communities. We will train and educate them, and they will contribute greatly to our communities, our culture and our economy.
More migrants dropped off outside vice president’s home in freezing weather on Christmas Eve

12/26/22 – This definitely should happen. “Ukraine has called on United Nations member states to deprive Russia of its status as a permanent member of the UN Security Council and to expel it from the UN, Ukraine’s Foreign Ministry said in a statement on Dec. 26.”
Ukraine seeks to have Russia expelled from UN.

12/26/22 – Obvious fact that still needs to be said. White people have enslaved other white people throughout history. Simply being white does not protect white people from enslavement by their own people.

12/26/22 – Apparently, it needs to be said. Y’all, don’t travel in extreme weather conditions, such as a blizzard. Exercise some commonsense. You just hunker down. If you live in the northern states, invest in warm clothing, wear layers, and have food, bottled water, candles, and if you have a house, firewood, on hand. You can always collect snow or rain for water. Previous generations didn’t have electricity or running water. Prepare and plan, and toughen up. We can’t become a decadent nation of lazy whiners. We are Americans. We need to be disciplined, tough, hardworking and positive.

12/26/22 – “Shalom” and “inshallah” are such great words. Just because you have one mother tongue doesn’t mean you can’t incorporate words from other languages into your own. All languages, including English, does this. Free feel to make your mother tongue your own. God made us free so that we can fully express ourselves.

12/26/22 – Christians have the creeds for a reason. If you can say the Nicene or Apostles’ Creed and believe it, you can be a Christian. And there is nothing in them about abortion, homosexuality, etc. Just find a church that works for you. People love Jesus because Jesus knows how to love. Don’t give him up because others don’t know how to love.
Transgender or devoutly Christian? An Iowa teen refuses to choose.

12/26/22 – From poopy, the Russian sh-t, look at how unreasonable the west is. I want to negotiate, meaning give me all of Ukraine and let me enslave its people, and they won’t negotiate. I will keep repeating the word “negotiate,” like liberals keep repeating the word “science,” as if the word itself is an argument.

12/26/22 – “[T]he identity of the alternative is less important than the existence of an alternative.” The existence and identity of the alternative should be clear to all Christians. If you’re going to actually practice Christianity, your hope needs to reside in one person, Jesus Christ. Placing hope in anyone else is going to be misplaced. I see Christians of both parties doing this. Certain politicians, the narcissistic, AOC to the evil one, Trump, develop a cultlike following based on personality and promises. What does it mean to place your hope in Jesus? It means actually following him and doing what he asked of us.
How Much Longer Can Trump’s Con Endure?

12/26/22 – It’s cold and snowy, but people have to deal with it. The snow has been a Christmas gift. It will melt and give our land much needed water. God is great.

12/25/22 – If you are blessed to have a genuine conversion, it’s the most powerful thing in the world.

12/25/22 – One God, One Church, One Family.
Christmas Around the World

12/25/22 – If you’ve never gone to a Christian service in another language or a different rite and language, really recommend it. You will better understand the breadth and depth of the universal church. One God, One Church, One Family.

12/25/22 – Very popular series. I run into people all the time who love it. (Bigger cities aren’t as godless as the elites on the coasts like to pretend they are.) It’s crowd-funded. Episode 3 of Season 3 will be playing tonight. “The Chosen is the first-ever multi-season series about the life of Christ. It’s the free show that tens of millions of people won’t stop talking about.”

12/25/22 – From a Christian in the persecuted church where they have to celebrate Christmas secretly. If they are caught, they could be put to death. “It’s important that just as we received the greatest gift of God to save mankind, we should also have a giving heart, and love and serve. Thank you for praying for us—your prayers mean so much, knowing that you’re standing with our church. We pray for you, too. This season, I pray you will experience Christ’s love and peace anew. Elahe in Iran”

12/25/22 – “If we want it to be Christmas, the Birth of Jesus and of peace, let us look to Bethlehem and contemplate the face of the Child who is born for us! And in that small and innocent face, let us see the faces of all those children who, everywhere in the world, long for peace.

Let us also see the faces of our Ukrainian brothers and sisters who are experiencing this Christmas in the dark and cold, far from their homes due to the devastation caused by ten months of war. May the Lord inspire us to offer concrete gestures of solidarity to assist all those who are suffering, and may he enlighten the minds of those who have the power to silence the thunder of weapons and put an immediate end to this senseless war!” Pope Francis.

12/25/22 – Christianity has never belonged to the west, and it will never belong to the west. It’s God’s gift to the whole world, to all people of all backgrounds. People love the story of Jesus’s birth because it’s beautiful and moving. It’s a story of humble beginnings and God’s goodness and greatness. Today, our savior is born. Merry Christmas to all, and may God bless the persecuted church today and every day.

12/25/22 – Why is this considered an “inclusive approach”? They’re specifically choosing a Nordic holiday (so inclusive…), whose origins are in one of the most genocidal countries on the planet, Germany. Why not Hannukah with its beautiful symbolism, which would also help combat antisemitism, or is that too religious for them? No wait, maybe it’s just not cool enough. European pagans, you know those warring barbarians with no value for human life, are so much cooler! Also, I have no interest in “blurred imagery” (what does that even mean), and it has nothing to do with inclusion. Buy hey, who needs to make sense when you’re so cool. And please spare us the BS. There are many liberals and atheists who hate Christmas because they are religious bigots. It has nothing to do with their inclusion or exclusion and has everything to do with hate.
The war on ‘Happy Holidays’ isn’t about Christmas

12/24/22 – The Latin Rite at the Vatican. Urbi and Orbi is at noon Vatican City time. Merry Christmas!

12/24/22 – To the Russians, leave all Ukrainian land, including Crimea. It is not your land. You have a big country, with more than enough land. Go back to it, get rid of putin, and build a nation that’s actually worthy of your lives.

12/24/22 – To the Russians, stop listening to the evil voices of your leaders, and start listening to the divine voice of the Holy Spirit. Listen to the pleas of children, to the weeping of Rachel. Lay down your arms. Give yourself to the Lord, to the Prince of Peace.

12/24/22 – To refugees and migrants throughout the world, including our Ukrainian brothers and sisters, Jesus was also a refugee. God is with you.

12/24/22 – “Creche” is from Latin, meaning nativity scene. (In French, it also means nursery.) They are wearing Jerusalem crosses. (There are many different crosses.)

12/24/22 – From the comments, “Praying that everyone around the world may have a blessed Christmas, and that love, compassion, and peace may win over evil.”

12/24/22 – It’s OK to cry, even weep. God understands, and we understand. It’s been a hard few years, but the Lord has not forsaken us, and we have not forsaken each other.

12/24/22 – For the people who can’t go to church for whatever reason, Christmas Eve – Lessons and Carols at Washington National Cathedral. There are many other gatherings around the world of the universal church this Christmas 2022, and as always, our churches are open to all. Welcome, and peace be with you, friends!

12/24/22 – Seeing images of terrorism is always hard, but on Christmas Eve, it’s really hard. “Wherever we are, we will be together today. We make a wish. One for all. And we will feel joy. One for all. And we will understand the truth. One for all. We will celebrate our holidays! As always. We will smile and be happy. As always. The difference is one. We will not wait for a miracle. After all, we create it ourselves. Christ is born! Let’s praise Him!”
Merry Christmas to Western Rite Orthodox Christians!

12/24/22 – This Christmas eve, let’s pray that every Russian soldier surrenders to the Ukrainians and that the Ukrainians respect their humanity and treat them, their enemies who have waged an unjust war against them, with compassion.

12/24/22 – “Hitler followed his father’s religious path straight into infamy. He hated Judaism, gleefully murdering 6 million Jews. But he loathed Christianity, too. In Hitler’s eyes Christianity was a religion fit only for slaves.” The greatest honor one could bestow on true Christians is to say that we are God’s slaves. Only a godless, evil man wouldn’t understand this.
Hitler hated Judaism. But he loathed Christianity, too.

12/24/22 – To the pagans, atheists and other detractors, the world isn’t celebrating a bacchanalia pagan holiday. It practices that, debaucherous hedonism, most of the rest of the year to disastrous effects on the world, such as war and climate change. If you want to take away this gift of joy to the world that is Christmas simply because it’s associated with Christianity, then you’re seriously f—ked up, and I feel sorry for you.

12/24/22 – “Nearly universal association of Christmas with love, generosity and compassionate community.” Let that sink in. If Christians are “losing,” a terminology better suited to war than to faith, then what does “winning” look like? “[T]he unpopularity of these grumblers and naysayers speaks to the nearly universal association of Christmas with love, generosity and compassionate community — and the consensus that these should be embraced.” The whole world “won” by the birth of this baby in a manger. Emmanuel, God is with us whether or not we deserve it or believe it.
The wise men who helped me understand Christmas

12/24/22 – What is incredible is not the “secularization of Christmas.” It’s that a religious holiday associated with a small Jewish sect who later came to be known as Christians is celebrated the world over by people of various religious backgrounds and non-religious people alike because it is joyful. It’s the only holiday I can think of that fits this description. I would like to ask Christians: What is the point of saying that you believe in our Christian God, but then not acting like it? If you are worried about the decline in the numbers of practicing Christians, then you have no real faith in our God. Faith expressed is trust. There are Christians, right now and all over the world, the persecuted church, who are risking their lives to practice our faith and celebrate our holidays with us. They have put their faith and trust in our God, and you are worried about the power of our religion. Stop worrying. Start trusting.
The War on Christmas Is Winning

12/24/22 – And if people could remind the NatKKKons as much as possible that Zelensky is a Jew and draw comparisons to David, that would be the bow on this year’s Christmas present.

12/24/22 – This Christmas, let us keep our Ukrainian sisters and brothers in our prayers and hearts. Let us remember that Jesus, the Son of God, was born in a humble manger. Light up Ukraine. Donate generously to them. Pray for them.
EU buildings turned lights off in solidarity with Ukraine
Light Up Ukraine
After missile strikes, Ukrainians persist without electricity, water, heat

12/24/22 – Ah, no. This would put the evil one, Trump, above the law. “But banning him from seeking the presidency now could turn him into a martyr and benefit his cause, just as growing numbers of Republicans are showing a willingness to turn the page.” The only consideration is: Did he violate Section 3 of the 14th Amendment? He clearly did. And in a nation of laws that applies them without fear or favor, his punishment, which in this case is to never hold any public office again, must be applied. The WaPo Editorial Board is superimposing their political considerations where there should be the simple application of the law.
Jan. 6 committee recommendations would (mostly) help preserve democracy

12/23/22 – If someone could read all of these articles and endless words of praise of Zelensky to the NatKKKons and record their rage, it would be quite edifying, well actually quite entertaining, for the rest of us. He made history in the best way. They are making history in the worst way. And 99.9% of the world, oh wait, who are we now, the sanity party, no wait, the uniparty, right because unity, it’s so normie, who would want unity when you can have KKKrazy, well, the boring monolith that we are, we’re here for it.
Rising to a historic destiny, Zelensky embodies America’s values

12/23/22 – Don’t watch TV, so had no idea that the deranged rage of the what are they called now NatKKKons was so deep and broad. As a gift to ourselves this Christmas, we get to own the KKKons and the KKKonned. If the reporters could provide more details about how their hate affected them physically, we’d much appreciate it. Did their makeup artists need to wipe the froth away from their mouths? Perhaps their hair became ablaze and fell to the ground? Did horns grow out of their heads? Did they have any accidents? Nothing would be too much for us to handle. Please share. In any case, thank you all for this reporting. Such a hot gift at an otherwise cold Christmas time.
The Oddly Intense Anger Against Zelensky, Explained

12/23/22 – Cassidy Hutchinson’s attorney should be disbarred. He was definitely not acting ethically or in her (his client’s) interests.
Tapper: Hutchinson’s transformation from MAGA supporter to whistleblower is historic

12/23/22 – Clarence Thomas is the Kanye West of the Supreme KKKourt.

12/23/22 – Curious minds want to know: What are the ties between Eastman and Thomas?

12/23/22 – Put in the category of obvious things that are nice to get around Christmas: “This just in: McConnell says Trump’s political clout has ‘diminished’….’The former president may have other things to do,’” translated, f—k off, loser. (WaPo)

12/23/22 – Would Congress actually do something this practical? “It absolutely should be done. And at some point, the administration might simply announce that the Constitution obligates us to guarantee debts, so a congressional vote is superflous. It’s pure madness to allow Republicans to hold the national debt hostage, risking an economic calamity.”
WaPo, Rubin, QA

12/23/22 – The evil one, Trump, is never going to come right out and say, “Hey MAGA, I want to be a dictator and enslave you,” although that is what he wants. Instead, he appeals to their vanity by saying, “I will subjugate only the inferior people and elevate only you, superior people.” Understandably, reasonable people find MAGA revolting for finding this ploy appealing. However, they should keep in mind that MAGA is the one that is being manipulated, not the people who find the ploy (and MAGA) revolting. E.g., who is in a worse situation: the stupid Russians who believe Putin’s lies or the smart Russians who can’t stand him but are stuck with him because of the stupid Russians?

12/23/22 – Tucker Carlson, aka Tuckyorose, is a Kremlin sympathizer who should be arrested and tried for treason. In addition to many of the valid points in the article and aside from being on Russia’s payroll, as is the evil one, Trump, it’s also plain jealousy. Zelensky got everything the evil one and Tuckyo want – the world’s adoration. He was Time magazine’s man of the year. He is admired for his leadership. Jealous people make ridiculous characterizations of the person they are jealous of. (The irony is that this makes their jealousy entirely transparent.) Where I somewhat disagree is that Tuckyo and the evil one are not actually against something, “wokeness” or even immigration, as being for something – autocracy. They want absolute power. That’s what America first has been about all along. It’s a ploy intended to use hatred to rise to power only to subjugate the people who put them in power, the white racists and bigots who think they will benefit. They will turn them into slaves as dictators always do.
Tucker Carlson’s rage at Zelensky caps a year of getting things wrong

12/23/22 – To the Europeans who are complaining about their energy bills and other inconveniences, screw you. You were short-sighted, selfish and naïve, and now, you’re paying the price for your foolish choices. You have no one to blame but yourselves. You should thank God that the Ukrainians aren’t like you, or you’d be in an even worse situation than you’re in now.

12/23/22 – Dictators of the world unite!

12/23/22 – So that means that poopy is planning to annex Belarus. “Russian President Vladimir Putin’s visit to Belarus on Dec. 19 didn’t deliver any particular results. Routine statements about joint exercises, a new round of nuclear blackmail, and assurances that Russia will not annex Belarus were among the key talking points during Putin’s press conference in Minsk. Russia again began increasing its military presence in the country, delivering more than 100 pieces of equipment to Belarus’ where Russian troops are stationed as part of the joint military command.”
Belarus Weekly: Russia transfers more military equipment to Belarus, deploys closer to Ukrainian border

12/23/22 – Are Russia, China, Iran and North Korea the new axis of evil? In any case, they are likely planning to wage war on the west. Stop worrying about provoking them. Start defending us. We must get rid of the evil one and his enablers now. Quit f—king around.

12/22/22 – How did American greatness come to be? We were a mere colonial outpost in an unforgiving climate. (Do we need to be reminded of the weather right now?) It’s not technology, industry, innovation, commercial enterprise, etc. It’s simply our people – all of our people in our glorious diversity. It’s the people who wake up every day and do their jobs well, jobs we need to function as a nation. It’s the people who serve their communities without fanfare. It’s the people who believe in and practice basic values like honesty and compassion. It’s the people who give their time, talent and treasure because they know it’s the right thing to do. Just the other day, I thought to myself how blessed I am to live in a place with so many good people. Some among us have given in to the forces of darkness. They think that this will “make America great again.” It won’t. If we’re going to stay a great nation, we need to be a great people. It’s as simple as that.

12/22/22 – The Federalist Papers sometimes feels like a crystal ball from the past looking into our present. “By a steady adherence to the Union we may hope, erelong, to become the arbiter of Europe in America, and to be able to incline the balance of European competitions in this part of the world as our interest may dictate.” Do we as Americans aspire to this position of arbiter? Personally, I do not, but arguably, this is the role Americans have found ourselves in. I would like to say to Hamilton, be careful what you wish for, what you strategize for, but also, if there must be a world arbiter, biased as I am, I trust America more than any other country because I have faith that its people, flawed as we are, can exercise a generosity of spirit and a sense of sacrifice that would be required of a country in this role.
Federalist Nos. 11-20

12/22/22 – I was (and still am) sick of Europe’s dependency on us, but I have fully supported Ukraine from day one. What’s different? They genuinely need us and deserve our help. In return, Ukrainians rekindled Americans’ fighting spirit. Let’s admit it. The years of the evil one exhausted us, but if we had given up, he would have won. Even though it’s not stated explicitly, the election outcomes are in part a reflection of Ukrainians’ positive effect on us. We fought for our own democracy because their existential fight for it reminded us, at least subconsciously, to never take it for granted. “‘So much in the world depends on you.’ Sometimes, Americans forget that. Zelensky reminded us. He came to say thank you. It’s a little embarrassing to hear that thanks, because what Americans gave, fundamentally, was just money. Zelensky’s people have given blood, home, comfort, and security—every precious thing that human beings can sacrifice. The answer we owe Zelensky, the answer Zelensky should hear from this country, revived by his visit, his cause, and his country’s heroic fight, is: No, no, no—thank you.”
Zelensky Recalled Us to Ourselves

12/22/22 – Not a war strategist, but it seems to me if you can’t figure out how to get blankets and basics to your troops, you might want to quit the war (before it quits you).

12/22/22 – Just when you think MAGA are the biggest chumps on the planet, they get stiff competition. Not only did poisonous poopy (alliteration is my thing) steal almost all of their money, engage them in a war that has cost them whatever national reputation they had and won them the world’s ire, a war in which they have become cannon fodder, but now, he has conned them into spending their own money to fund the war. They are funding their own deaths. Truly pathetic and sad.
Russians buy boots and body armor for the troops

12/22/22 – March to the beat of your own drummer. Do justice to the individuality God gave you.

12/22/22 – Elites of both parties, are you better than this man because of your status, profession or money? You’re not. Books saved and made him, as they did me. That’s the power of the written language. “‘To me, anything that starts to dominate everything about you — when you can only interact with an ideal instead of have a conversation — I’m skeptical.’ But what was most insulting to him of all was the assumption that he would go along with all of it because of how he looked and where he lived…. And that was who Cody Johnson had become by the time he rolled up to Beulahland Baptist Church on the day of the midterm elections: an Emerson-reading troublemaker who was not going to let things slide, and instead was going to cast a ballot for only the second time in his life.” The country owes people like them (him and his wife) a debt of gratitude. They are helping us save our democracy.
In rural Georgia, an unlikely rebel against Trumpism

12/22/22 – It is clearly genocide. “AP: At least 10,300 new graves dug in occupied Mariupol since March. The total area occupied by the new graves is more than 51,500 square meters, according to AP estimates. The video footage reviewed showed that Russian occupying authorities used heavy machinery to dig long trenches there, which were then backfilled.”
Genocide of the Ukrainian people

12/22/22 – This is now a great Christmas tradition that the next Pope should maintain. “Francis has long used his Christmas address for an annual dressing down of Vatican bureaucrats, taking them through a typical Jesuit-style ‘examination of conscience’ to help them repent in the run-up to Christmas.” And where are the atheists’ corrective mechanism, or do they not need it because they are holier-than-thou, because they are so superior and evolved? Spare us the BS. They are and have always been sinners too. The main difference is that they make no effort to acknowledge or atone for their sins. They are effectively devoid of a process for an examination of conscience or repentance, and they fill that vacuum with an insatiable and unhealthy self-love.
Pope warns Vatican staff an ‘elegant demon’ lurks among them

12/22/22 – Power Engineers Day! Who knew. Poetic timing. Such a tough people! Slava Ukraini!

12/22/22 – Apparently, the SEC is not going to do anything about the institutional investors who are clearly manipulating the market and likely window dressing.

12/22/22 – Absolutely! If you care at all about future generations, you will support Ukraine until they and we are victorious. “[Zelensky] may be saying thank you, but it is the free world that should be thanking Ukraine. Ukrainians are fighting a battle for freedom, democracy and the very notion of national sovereignty…. If Americans get tired of supporting Ukraine, if they listen to the ugly voices disparaging Zelensky, Russia could ultimately win, and the world as we know it would change. It would be a victory for autocracy and a grievous loss for democracy.”
Opinion: Zelensky’s powerful message to Putin

12/22/22 – Many atheists, especially the militant ones, like to hate religious people because atheists are just as likely to be immoral and sinful as anybody else. It is part of the human condition. The fact is that the Nazis were opposed to all religions, including Christianity. This is why they also murdered Christians. They were not Christian nationalists. They were a godless people who worshipped a false god, the evil one, Hitler, much like MAGA worships a false god, the evil one, Trump, now. The fact is that many of the people who defeated fascism in Europe were Christians who did so in part because they felt a moral obligation based on their religious convictions. They helped save the Jewish people, among other minorities, such as the Roma, who were neither Christian nor white. So, go ahead, hate religions all you want, atheists. It doesn’t change the facts, and the facts are not on your side.

12/22/22 – More important than the computer languages are the written languages. In this era, it’s vogue to think that a computer can write text. It can write text, but the quality of the text is primarily dependent on the quality of the ideas. And anyone who writes knows that coming up with original ideas is the hardest part. There are no real ideas in writing code. You write to execute a function or perform an action. You don’t write code to change the hearts and minds of people. Let us not deceive ourselves as to which type of writing matters more and what is harder to do.
What Elon Musk failed to understand about Twitter

12/22/22 – There are clearly many unethical atheists, and many of them work in technology. They do things they shouldn’t be doing because they, like Elon Musk, have thin skin, can’t handle the truth and want to control other people. They are also good at justifying their immoral actions. They should also be held accountable.

12/21/22 – Washington, like all people including the self-righteous atheists and other liberals who think they are perfect when they are not, was a complicated figure. He was a sinner like we all are. Being a slaveholder will remain a stain upon his character as it should be. “But in this case, the most esteemed American of his time plainly saw beyond the common prejudices of his era. For that reason, he earned a special place in the hearts of American Jews.” Like Zelensky is now, Washington put his life on the line for American freedom and democracy. Forget the degenerate “white Christian nationalist” crowd. They are crazy morons. How many liberal virtue-signalers are willing to do that? How many of them are willing to unequivocally support the Jewish people’s freedom of religion? The answer and the truth is: not that many.
Think America is a ‘Christian nation’? George Washington didn’t.

12/21/22 – History was made tonight. What a moment for the free world! So proud of our Ukrainian friends and President Zelensky.
Ukrainian President Zelensky visits the USA

12/21/22 – It’s in Americans’ interest to support Ukraine. Ukrainians’ sacrifice is saving democracy and freedom around the world. “President Volodymyr Zelensky profusely thanked the United States for its continued support in a brief but emotion-filled address to U.S. Congress. Speaking alongside House Speaker Nancy Pelosi at the Capitol, Zelensky said the speech he’ll deliver before members of Congress on Dec. 21 is not only for lawmakers but for all Americans.”
Zelensky thanks Americans for their support in brief remarks to US Congress

12/21/22 – “‘[O]ur weapon is truth, and our truth is that this is our land, our country, our children, and we will defend all of this.’… As you watch Zelensky on the podium before Congress, imagine the rage that Russian President Vladimir Putin must be feeling: His bets are losing.” Oh, we’re watching with delight. It is particularly gratifying that his evil Manchurian candidate bet is also losing. They are such losers, and it’s delicious. What will be even more delicious is when their judgment comes, and it will come. They will lose then too. Betting against God is always a losing proposition.
Zelensky’s role on the Washington stage is Ukrainian fighter

12/21/22 – Tears, tears. Love of country, freedom and democracy. In the future, history will ask, what did you do to help Ukraine in their time of need, and Americans can say, we did more than any other country. Such a great people! Slava Ukraini!
Stand with Ukraine.
Americans are inspired by Ukrainians.

12/21/22 – God’s plans are always greater. “At long last, Zelensky gets his White House meeting,” CNN. Granted the circumstances are hard, but this is way better than meeting with the evil one.

12/21/22 – Notes from prison. “‘Do you think you just printed leftist money? – the detective shouted. – No! You, bitch, got into Putin’s pocket!’ Poor Putin.”

12/21/22 – Most rich people would have been better off if they had lived simpler, more wholesome lives.

12/20/22 – Always keep in mind that most rich people are stupid and crazy.

12/20/22 – Elon Musk says that he can’t find someone who can keep Twitter alive who wants the job, implying that the only people who would want the job couldn’t keep Twitter alive. Perhaps he’s forgotten that he wanted the job before he didn’t want it, but now, he owns it. What does that say? Maybe it says that if Twitter weren’t doomed before, it’s doomed now.

12/20/22 – “Do not be anxious, saying, ‘What shall we eat?’ or ‘What shall we drink?’ or ‘What shall we wear?’ For the Gentiles seek after all these things, and your heavenly Father knows that you need them all. But seek first the kingdom of God and his righteousness, and all these things will be added to you.”

12/20/22 – The evil one, Trump’s empleomania nearly cost Americans their democracy.

12/20/22 – Learning different languages, including learning more about one’s own native tongue, is one of the most enriching things to do. Don’t listen to the people who push nothing but STEM. Love them, study them, use them. They are never a waste of time.
Beautiful, useless, obscure-words

12/20/22 – While pussy pooty tries to deflect responsibility, in Zelensky we have a profile in courage and leadership. “President Volodymyr Zelensky greets Ukrainian fighters on the front line in Bakhmut in Donetsk Oblast during an unannounced visit on Dec. 20.” He and other Ukrainians are helping save democracy, and the world owes them a debt of gratitude for it.
President Volodymyr Zelensky greets Ukrainian fighters on the front line in Bakhmut

12/20/22 – Semantic bleaching, what an awesome term.

12/20/22 – Will they, no, but every day, MAGA should thank the Lord above, our Founding Fathers, and Democrats for saving their a—es from becoming slaves in Trumpistan.

12/19/22 – What’s sadder: the MAGA morons who actually gave the evil grifter money or the pretend “White House” at Mar-a-Lago with the lonely, crazy evil one?
“[T]he $99 that each gullible purchaser sent in went not to any political cause but to Trump himself.”
‘Conspiracy to defraud’ is the perfect charge against the grifter Trump
“A longtime Trump confidant termed his Mar-a-Lago existence, where he has tried to re-create the trappings of the presidency, as ‘sad.’ Comparing it to life at the White House, this person added, ‘It’s like a Barbie Dream House miniature.’”
How Trump jettisoned restraints at Mar-a-Lago and prompted legal peril

12/19/22 – Gee, where are the capital inflows coming from? “But it has tripled its trade with Russia, and capital inflows from unknown sources to Central Bank coffers — in the vicinity of $28 billion — have prevented an expected balance-of-payments crisis. That, in turn, has enabled the government to disburse new handouts to the public.”
Erdogan may have just made the biggest mistake of his political career

12/19/22 – MAGA are a disgrace to humankind. They will be remembered in history as traitors to the United States of America.

12/19/22 – The evil one, Trump, is unfit for any office.
WATCH LIVE: Jan. 6 Committee hearings – The Final Report

12/18/22 – Henry Kissinger is a menace to mankind, and when that monster, who terrorized innocent people in Southeast Asia, finally dies, the world will be a better place. F—k him and what he thinks about anything. The war criminal’s “wisdom” is worthless or even worse.

12/18/22 – The American education system – at all levels – has an administration problem. There is far too much of it. Can we focus on learning and on the people who actually make that happen?

12/18/22 – Union strong. Union proud. (FYI, being a professor is a s—t ton of work, and it’s hard, so f—k the colleges and universities for their exploitation of highly educated labor. Also, f—k prestige. They can take their elitism and shove it. Prestige and elitism don’t pay the bills.) “Labor victories managed to organize more than 43,000 workers — ‘more than double the number of workers organized in first-half 2021,’ Bloomberg Law said.”
Distinguished persons: Unions break through in 2022

12/18/22 – Elon Musk, I am now conducting a poll. Be careful what you say: Do you think I have thin skin?
After backlash, Elon Musk is staking his leadership on a Twitter poll

12/18/22 – Jealousy and love are incompatible. God is never jealous of you. Give yourself to God. He knows how to love. Happy final Sunday of Advent.

12/18/22 – May the devil’s abettor burn in hell. “Pavone had been laicized — he can no longer present himself as a priest — after being found guilty in a canonical proceeding ‘of blasphemous communications on social media and of persistent disobedience of the lawful instructions of his diocesan bishop.’”
Anti-abortion priest Pavone defrocked for blasphemous posts

12/18/22 – Republicans who speak out against the evil one, Trump, aren’t “RINOs.” They are simply not totally crazy and unpatriotic. MAGA morons are not more “conservative.” They are f—king crazy traitors. “‘I have heard from many, many formerly very pro-Trump voters that they think it’s time for our party to move on,’ Toomey told CNN’s Jake Tapper on ‘State of the Union.’”
Retiring GOP senator says Trump’s influence on party is ‘waning’

12/18/22 – Like much of the Middle East, the Qataris don’t give a s—t about human beings and human rights. F—k them, and f—k FIFA. Oh and f—k you too for watching the World Cup and being total hypocrites.

12/18/22 – “As the 2022 World Cup wraps up, there is an overarching takeaway: Holding it in Qatar was a huge mistake. FIFA, soccer’s global governing body, had numerous chances to take a stand for basic human dignities. It didn’t.”
This was a World Cup of human rights horrors

12/18/22 – FIFA is a corrupt organization.

12/18/22 – On this International Migrants Day, remember that people died so that you could scream stupidly for your team while you were being entertained. How different is this from screaming as Christians or others were being eaten alive by lions in Rome’s colosseum? Tell us again about human evolution. You are so evolved! Sign the petition.

12/18/22 – Russia, a nation that once contributed to arts and culture, has become nothing more than a terrorist state and has humiliated itself on the world stage.

12/17/22 – The Federal Reserve wants to plunge our economy into a recession because it wants to help the plutocrats enslave the American people.
US recession a growing fear as Fed plans to keep rates high

12/17/22 – Once we don’t need these terrible countries’ fossil fuels any longer, a day that will come sooner than some might think, they will have nothing the majority of the world wants. Stop buying their drugs, which hurts not just them, but also you, and they will be forced to find better ways to engage economically and otherwise with the world. “The elements needed are available in seawater. It’s also a process that doesn’t produce the radioactive waste of nuclear fission, Kammen said.”
EXPLAINER: Why fusion could be a clean-energy breakthrough

12/17/22 – Everywhere one looks, democracy is under attack. “She said the Parliament and European democracies were ‘under attack’ by ‘malign actors, linked to autocratic third countries.’… [P]olice in Belgium’s capital carried out multiple raids as part of the investigation and reported seizing cash, computer equipment and mobile telephones…. ‘There has never been such a massive corruption scandal hitting the Parliament’.”
Police raid more EU Parliament offices in corruption probe

12/16/22 – Integrity. Patriot. “Our democracy is not functioning…. Americans deserve a democracy that values truthful leaders and real dialogue between our parties.”
Representative Adam Kinzinger (R-IL) Farewell Speech

12/16/22 – It’s not about 2024. It’s all about 2042.

12/16/22 – White people are superior at sociopathology, and that’s it.

12/16/22 – And the Oscar goes to…. “I have already applied to the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the Russian Federation so that it initiates the procedure for declaring France a state sponsor of terrorism, as well as conducting a thorough investigation of the terrorist methods of France and its Western allies – the United States and others.”
Russian linked to Wagner badly hurt in assassination attempt in Central African Republic

12/16/22 – Basically, McCarthy is a marshmallow who just wants the House gavel and will grovel to get it. Spell that right, OK, did I? Moron.
Is Kevin McCarthy okay?

12/15/22 – Absolutely! “‘Let’s have a more humble Christmas, with more humble gifts, and send what we save to the Ukrainian people, who need it,’ [Pope Francis] said.”
Pope urges to spend less on Christmas, send difference to Ukrainians

12/15/22 – This is what the Russian people are indifferent to. This is what they support when they support the Kremlin. This is what MTG and other MAGA are supporting. “Ukrainian authorities discovered a room that Russians used to detain and torture children during the occupation of Kherson, Dmytro Lubinets, the Human Rights Commissioner of the Verkhovna Rada, said on Dec. 14. According to testimonies from locals, other torture victims in the facility knew that Ukrainian children had been kept there by Russian security services, who had called the room ‘a children’s cell.’”
Children’s torture chamber found in liberated Kherson

12/15/22 – The British “monarchy” like all monarchies everywhere and across time are a lie and a farce. They should all end forever. “‘[R]eally what they’re doing is blocking a grandson from seeing his grandmother,’ added Meghan.” The only King is Jesus.
Prince Harry says William ‘screamed’ at him over royal split with Meghan, in final episodes of Netflix documentary

12/15/22 – Liberals are as guilty as conservatives of associating Christianity with white people. Fact: The first Christians were brown people, and there are millions of Christians who are not white.

12/15/22 – The global church, which includes persecuted Christians, is a gift from God. “‘[H]ere, (there are) different nationalities and then they have different cultures,’ Gonzaga said. ‘I could feel the real spirit of the church, the universal church,’ he said, adding the different communities learn from each other.” Human beings should never be treated as slaves. Their dignity must always be respected. “Pope Francis lamented that much labor can be ‘dehumanizing’ and encouraged the promotion of equal rights for workers.” “‘It gives more peace and happiness in my life,’ she said. ‘Christmas is coming and when this is going on, we should … beautify our hearts to receive our Jesus Christ.’”
At ‘Church City,’ a taste of Catholic life in Qatar

12/15/22 – In practice, laïcité is self-imposed government dependency and control and individual isolation.

12/15/22 – Americans, we are weird, a pain in the a-s, but also great. “In her remarks, Pelosi thanked Boehner, who was teary at times, and noted that she would have been ‘a little disappointed if he did not get emotional.’” (Catholics….) “Pelosi’s portrait was created by artist Ronald Sherr, who died last week.” May he rest in peace.
Boehner’s tears, Obama’s tribute highlight Pelosi’s Capitol portrait unveiling

12/14/22 – Twitter is a toxic cesspool. By staying on it, you’re legitimizing the illegitimate, and you’re part of the problem. “Since launching his $44 billion takeover of the company, Musk has become so popular in QAnon circles that some regard him, not Trump, as the savior-like figure they had been waiting on to usher in ‘the Storm,’ a quasi-biblical moment in which the cabal that runs the American government, media, technology industry and education system would be vanquished through public executions.”
QAnon, adrift after Trump’s defeat, finds new life in Elon Musk’s Twitter

12/14/22 – This is absolutely ridiculous and a violation of Americans’ rights. “As the county prosecutor, he said, he would be ‘proud’ to bring a case against someone caught violating the abortion ban, a felony punishable in Texas by up to life in prison.” These organizations are “violating the law” because the law is violating women’s rights.
Antiabortion movement seeks to jail people for ‘trafficking’ illegal pills

12/14/22 – This is obvious. “‘Because Russia won’t stop until big blood is spilled, until everyone dies. Soldiers are cannon fodder to them. They don’t respect them,’ he said.” The question is: Do Russians respect themselves? People who have self-respect don’t act like this. They do not support someone like Putin. They do not act as if other human beings don’t matter. They do not seek empire. They do not commit war crimes.
‘There are maniacs who enjoy killing,’ Russian defector says of his former unit accused of war crimes in Bucha

12/14/22 – If Putin had been winning in Ukraine, how would the Russians be reacting? How would the world be reacting? Food for thought.

12/14/22 – The Hindu caste system is institutionalized slavery. The Dalits are the most original to the land of India. Seizing the current Hindu Nationalist zeitgeist, they should kick the foreigners, all other castes, out of India, and liberate themselves from their foreign oppressors, the Aryan colonialists. They can move back to where they came from, the Middle East/Central Asia.

12/13/22 – Never take freedom and democracy for granted. Fight for it. “Indeed, on a continent poisoned by revanchism and polarization, Castillo pulled off something remarkable: uniting the entire country — against him. Compatriots on the left, right and center rallied to reject his ham-fisted coup attempt.”
More than a new government, Peru needs one that can last

12/13/22 – Like so many other things, the Boomers destroyed the American higher education system.
How progressive can a college be when instructors make poverty wages?

12/13/22 – Absolutely! “Gaining access to longer-range ‘fires’ will enable the Ukrainians to more effectively strike such military targets across the width and breadth of Russian-occupied territory. That includes Crimea, which remains out of HIMARS range. Such strikes, in turn, will enable future offensives that can bring this awful war to a conclusion.”
Give Ukraine the ability to strike every inch of Russian occupied territory

12/13/22 – Elon Musk is an a—hole, and if you like him, you’re an a—hole too.

12/12/22 – Emmer is not a congressman. He’s a lobbyist for the crypto industry. “A nonprofit known as the Coin Center, which is funded by crypto companies and investors, claimed to help lawmakers form the blockchain caucus in 2016. It previously described its input in chartering the group as ‘instrumental.’ Emmer became its co-chair two years later, promising then to help Congress ‘embrace and support’ cryptocurrency for ‘the next generation and beyond.’… Emmer also worked to make it easier for crypto allies to contribute — in digital tokens — to GOP campaigns.”
Meet Tom Emmer, a powerful crypto advocate in a crypto-wary Congress

12/12/22 – Keep your traditions alive, whether of African, Asian, European or whatever descent.

12/11/22 – Jesus is our Lord and our Redeemer.

12/11/22 – Nip India’s democratic backsliding now before it’s too late and much harder to fix. “At the same time, manufacturers trying to bolster vulnerable supply chains are turning to Vietnam or India instead of China. ‘There’s a huge shift going on,’ said Andrew Collier, an economist with GlobalSource Partners in Hong Kong.”
U.S.-China economic ties continue to fray, despite Biden-Xi meeting

12/11/22 – If you’re still on Twitter, you’re a fool.

12/11/22 – India’s plutocrats are conspiring with the Hindu Nationalists, headed by Modi, to ruin the country and turn it into Russia and China. They turn newsrooms into “lapdog media” to pump out propaganda. Is the west going to do anything? Hello, Biden administration! India is too important of a country to allow it to fall into authoritarianism. “‘India never had a golden period of journalism,’ Kumar continued in his message, which quickly accumulated some 6.7 million views. ‘But it also didn’t have a devastating period like there is today. Every good thing about this profession is being destroyed’…. ‘The violence against journalists, the politically partisan media and the concentration of media ownership all demonstrate that press freedom is in crisis in “the world’s largest democracy,”’ it read.”
In India, warnings that independent news media are teetering on a precipice

12/10/22 – The plutocrats own the technocrats, the Federal Reserve.

12/10/22 – There is nothing more important for the world right now than Ukraine definitively winning this war. Go all out to help them and quit f—king around.

12/10/22 – Don’t be pennywise and pound-foolish. Not only is “slinking away” not the right thing to do morally speaking, but it would be a stupid thing to do practically speaking. We would be endangering ourselves. “While some in Congress contemplate penny-wise-and-pound-foolish economizing at Ukraine’s expense, Ukrainians are dying, freezing, starving, enduring torture and the targeting of civilians, and seeing their children kidnapped to Russia.”
Slinking away from aiding Ukraine would be a major strategic error

12/9/22 – Putin wants genocide. Instead, the world is learning Ukrainian and about its arts, culture, history and people. “Duolingo: Over 1.3 million people start learning Ukrainian after Russia invaded Ukraine. The number of people who started to learn the Ukrainian language has increased by over 1.3 million since Russia launched its full-scale invasion of Ukraine on Feb. 24, Duolingo, an American tech company with a language-learning app, said. The biggest trend of 2022 was the global spike in the number of people learning Ukrainian, according to the 2022 Duolingo Language Report. Duolingo said the number of people who learn Ukrainian in Germany and Poland has increased by over 16 times this year, compared to last year.”
Duolingo: Over 1.3 million people start learning Ukrainian

12/9/22 – Ukrainians, what a people! Congratulations to them, and thank you for reminding the world of the value of freedom and democracy and not to take them for granted. “TIME names Spirit of Ukraine and Zelensky ‘person of the year.’ President Volodymyr Zelensky was named Time magazine’s person of the year on Dec. 7, acknowledging his leadership amid Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. At the same time, the magazine recognized the ‘spirit of Ukraine,’ which was embodied by countless individuals contributing to the fight against Russian aggression.”
TIME names Spirit of Ukraine and Zelensky ‘person of the year

12/8/22 – Whether it is the Bible or secular law, liberals tend to take a big picture approach while “conservatives” like to cherry-pick the text to support their personal views.
Supreme Court majority questions massive shift of election authority

12/7/22 – Our founding documents are a thing of beauty. God bless America.

12/7/22 – White people are so superior that they have evolved beyond procreation.

12/6/22 – The evil one is just showing the world more of who he has been all along. If this kind of person got “conservatives” the policies and the people they want, why aren’t they questioning the quality of those policies and people?
With his call to ‘terminate’ the Constitution, Trump is spinning out of control

12/6/22 – The Russians are abducting Ukrainian children. It is pure evil. Russia is not just a terrorist state, but it is also a barbaric state. Human beings, especially children, are not spoils of war.
Ukrainians hid orphaned children from Russian deportation

12/6/22 – So well-deserved! “‘The president of Ukraine embodies the resilience of his people and has become a standard bearer for liberal democracy,’ Financial Times wrote. ‘The 44-year-old Zelensky has earned a place in history for his extraordinary display of leadership and fortitude,’ the newspaper added.”
Financial Times names Zelensky ‘person of the year

12/5/22 – This Christmas, donate to Ukraine. “The famous Ukrainian carol ‘Shchedryk,’ also known as ‘Carol of the Bells,’ was performed at Carnegie Hall in New York City on Dec. 4.”
Shchedryk

12/5/22 – Amazon’s best product is the simple Kindle, which is still second to printed books and local bookstores, and the only thing the rest of the company is good for is finding hard-to-find items by connecting buyers and sellers. Does everything have to be a relentless march to more and more consumerism, or can we just be content with simple improvements to our lives?

12/5/22 – Netflix started out as a revolutionary company. Now, it’s just another s—t corporation like all the rest.

12/5/22 – The evil one, Trump, should be arrested and given the maximum penalty for treason.

12/5/22 – Was the Jan 6 “chaos” glorious too? “‘I love Elon Twitter so far,’ tweeted a user who goes by the name Some Dude. ‘The chaos is glorious!’”
As Musk is learning, content moderation is a messy job

12/4/22 – The preferred gauge of inflation should almost always be core PCE. It’s not supposed to be PCE. Some members of the Fed board seem to have been using alternative measures to justify their likely politically motivated decisions. (Also, there has long been talk about raising the inflation target to give policymakers more room.)
BEA – Core PCE

12/4/22 – So the supposedly apolitical Fed doesn’t expect to reach its inflation target until after the election. Right. “The central bank does not expect to reach its inflation goal until 2025.” Is the Fed’s interest rate setting related to this? “The cost of sending a standard 40-foot container from China to the U.S. West Coast is $1,935 — down more than 90 percent from its September 2021 peak of $20,586, according to the online freight marketplace Freightos.” All the Fed did was cause poor people who were already paying more for goods and services to pay more in interest. They just unnecessarily inflicted more economic pain on poor people when they could least afford it. Class warfare to help the rich. Was it also intended to affect the 2022 elections in Republicans’ favor?
From chicken wings to used cars, inflation begins to ease its grip

12/4/22 – The economics profession is narcissistic white men being overpaid to come up with bad theories that hide behind unnecessarily complicated math to hide the enslavement of the masses. The domination of white men in the profession isn’t really about Me Too. It’s about class domination, in which rich parasites control and oppress the working class. The sexism and the racism in the profession are just a natural extension of this entrenched enslavement of the working class.
Harassment in Economics Doesn’t Stay in Economics

12/4/22 – All countries need to make protecting democracy the first priority.

12/4/22 – The trend is your friend. The trend is up.

12/4/22 – A blank paper can say everything.

12/4/22 – That’s just what our democracy needs. “‘The bottom line is the impact of this fringe theory would be terrible,’ said former Attorney General Eric Holder, chairman of the National Democratic Redistricting Committee. ‘It could unleash a wave of gerrymandering from both parties.’”
Supreme Court weighs ‘most important case’ on democracy

12/3/22 – The evil one – the leader of the Republican Party – suggests that Americans throw out the document that our military, our leaders and all naturalized citizens swore an oath to – that little thing called our Constitution.
Trump calls for the termination of the Constitution in Truth Social post

12/3/22 – He’s kidding, right? Of the three branches of government, every single one of them reflects minority rule. For the Legislative branch, let’s set aside the House with its gerrymandering, the Senate: two senators for every state no matter the population; the Executive branch: electoral college, and the Judicial, which is affected by the Senate: nothing more needs to be said about it.
The midterms have busted the myth of conservative ‘minority rule’

12/3/22 – It’s not censoring. It’s sensible. It’s the right thing to do. “It all leads back to the same pathetic belief that abstract prejudices (usually rooted in personal grudges) are righteous and deserve to be enforced. A civilized society minimizes such ideas not just because they are displeasing but because they get people killed.”
Kanye West Finally Says What He Means

12/3/22 – People also listen to the godless Communists who worship themselves.

12/3/22 – The Christian God was the Jewish people’s God, and his son was a Jew. If you hate the Jewish people, you hate the Christian God. The GOP hates the Christian God. “Everything that happened to the Jews of Europe, to the African-Americans during the lynching terrors of Jim Crow, to Native Americans as their land was plundered and their numbers decimated, to Dalits considered so low that their very shadow polluted those deemed above them – happened because a big enough majority had been persuaded, centuries ago or in the recent past, that these groups were ordained by God as beneath them, subhuman, deserving of their fate.” (Caste, I. Wilkerson) That wasn’t God speaking. That was the devil, and these people listened.

12/2/22 – White people can’t get over the fact that the greatest man who’s ever walked the earth was a brown Jew, Jesus. Yes, God chose to take on human form as a Jew. At least subconsciously, this is one of the reasons they are jealous of the Jewish people. “His conclusion: ‘I find it impossible to defend Pat Buchanan against the charge that what he did and said during the period under examination amounted to anti-Semitism, whatever it was that drove him to say and do it.’”
The GOP is stuck in a doom loop begun 30 years ago

12/1/22 – A who’s who in degenerate morons. “Lake, Finchem, Dershowitz and other attorneys involved in the case did not respond to requests for comment. The case was financed largely by MyPillow CEO Mike Lindell, who has promoted debunked claims about voter fraud.”
Ariz. county ordered to certify election as GOP lawyers are sanctioned

Notes from Underground – November 2022

11/30/22 – The American people need to stop glorifying rich, stupid a—holes and start demanding better compensation. The US is the most anti-labor country in the western world, and that’s one of the key reasons we have so many problems. “The idea that a job is fundamentally a generous favor granted to you by your boss is woven deeply into American law and culture, and one president can’t unwind it completely. But Biden could give voice to the Americans who know there’s something deeply wrong with how we think about work.” (Also, the shallow, sell-out Boomers are the worst generation in recent American history.)
Biden is averting a railroad strike but missing an opportunity

11/30/22 – “It’s profit over people in America, and it’s very frustrating.” We must bring an end to the plutocracy.
Railway union organizer has a message for Biden

11/30/22 – So true! If the evil one, Trump, becomes the Republican nominee again (God-forbid), they will all fall behind him. “What’s really going on here is something once explained to me (in a different context) by a China-watcher: ‘They say that an official who has done wrong will lose power. But what really happens is that an official who loses power will be accused of doing wrong.’” They are just trying to get rid of him because they think he’s a political loser not because they are outraged by any of his outrageous actions. The GOP is morally bankrupt.
A Ploy, Not a Principle

11/30/22 – Absolutely! “Both the impulse and the means [to steal an election] remain alive. That should be cause for action. Trump’s brazen effort to overturn U.S. democracy has created fleeting and unusual bipartisan urgency for [ECA] reform. It would be the height of folly to let that slip away.”
New Trumpist threats in Arizona make electoral college reform urgent

11/29/22 – What the f—k?
Russia’s Wagner Group recruits prisoners in Africa to fight against Ukraine

11/29/22 – Of course, the evil monster Hitler used a sacred symbol for the profane. The Nazis also called themselves, “Aryans,” even though that term has been used to describe the Aryans (basically Persians) who invaded India. Don’t let Hitler destroy a religious symbol as he tried to destroy a religious people, the Jewish people. Don’t let him win anything. “‘You cannot call it a symbol of evil or (deny) other facts that have existed for hundreds [thousands, actually] of years, just because of Hitler,’ he said…. Jain wishes people would differentiate between their symbol of peace and Hitler’s swastika just as they do with the hateful burning cross symbol and Christianity’s sacred crucifix.”
Asian faiths try to save swastika symbol corrupted by Hitler

11/29/22 – Wow, are these crazy people dumb! “If votes from this Republican stronghold somehow went uncounted, it could flip two races to Democrats.”
Rural Arizona county delays certifying midterm results as election disputes persist

11/28/22 – Fully agree! The West needs to give a full-throated defense of and material support to the Iranian protesters. “Now the talks are widely regarded as dead — and rightly so. Democratic leaders need to rethink their relationship with a barbaric regime that has no compunction about killing its own citizens. For too long, rather than placing the emphasis on Iranians’ human rights, the West has naively prioritized short-term goals of containing the Islamic republic’s nuclear ambitions through diplomacy.”
The West is finally waking up to the real problem in Iran

11/28/22 – Sanity is saving the Democrats and democracy.
Suburbanites are saving the Democrats in Georgia — and elsewhere

11/27/22 – Happy Advent! “China might not immediately come to mind when you think of Advent, but roughly 5.1% of the population of 1.41 billion is Christian. Chinese Christians light up their homes with colorful paper lanterns during Advent, and you might find red paper pagodas cut out and placed in windows. They follow many of the traditions that were brought by Western missionaries. An emerging Christmas tradition is the giving of apples, sometimes sold in stores wrapped in colored paper.”
What is Advent? And what traditions do people follow worldwide?

11/27/22 – Voter: What are you for? GOP: We’re for lower taxes for the rich, taking away your rights, and authoritarianism. Voting should be easy because that’s how democracies should work. Republicans want to suppress the vote because they know that when the people speak, it won’t be for this. “Griffin, a Republican, said she is concerned that the extra day will help Democrats. ‘I’m afraid it will. It is a fear, and Sunday also, because then they can bus the church people,’ she said.” If you’re afraid of the people’s voice, then your party and candidates have a problem. “‘We’ll do it again and again and again,’ said Robert Schofer, a Warnock supporter from Kennesaw. ‘And again.’” Vote blue Georgia, and shut out the crazy!
Early voters in Georgia head to the polls Saturday for Senate runoff

11/27/22 – Why are so many “conservatives” corrupt? SupremeKKKourt “Americans want the court to be above partisan politics…, but a growing number of voters think that the court is a partisan institution. Now, it seems the justices are not just delivering policy wins to one side of the aisle but have developed inside relationships with conservative organizations…. (The Code of Conduct for United States Judges provides ethical guidance for lower court judges but specifically does not cover Supreme Court justices.) The court seems convinced that it can continue on its current trajectory no matter how unhappy Americans are…[which] would be dangerous for American democracy.” Supreme Court justices should also be required to follow the Code of Conduct.
Opinion: Bombshell report deals another blow to the Supreme Court’s reputation

11/27/22 – Russia’s terror strategy is backfiring. Instead of reversing course, it’s doubling or tripling down. Genius. “But hope, resilience and defiance? Kyiv has all those in abundance. And perhaps more so now than at any time since Russia invaded Ukraine nine months ago…. ‘Anger turned into donations to charities to defeat the enemy as soon as possible,’ she says. ‘I plan to stay in Kyiv, work, study and donate to the armed forces.’… ‘The birth of a girl,’ says Mandrygol, ‘brings us peace and victory.’”
Hardship and hope: Winter, missile storms show Kyiv’s mettle

Never underestimate a group of people this tough.
Bombed, not beaten: Ukraine’s capital flips to survival mode

“He scoffed at Moscow’s attempts to intimidate Ukrainian civilians, saying that was the Russian military’s only option after a string of battlefield setbacks. ‘Either energy terror, or artillery terror, or missile terror — that’s all that Russia has dwindled to under its current leaders,’ Zelenskyy said.” Ukraine. Respect.
Europe scrambles to help Ukraine keep the heat and lights on

11/26/22 – Holodomor, 90th Anniversary “On Nov. 26, amid Russia’s war, Ukraine commemorated the victims of another tragedy: Holodomor, a man-made famine that killed millions of Ukrainians in 1932-1933.

Holodomor was imposed on Ukrainians, primarily Ukrainian villagers, by the Moscow-based Soviet authorities led by dictator Joseph Stalin. Ukraine has been fighting to get Holodomor recognized globally as an act of genocide against Ukrainians.

‘Ukraine has gone through one genocide,’ President Volodymyr Zelensky said in his address on Nov. 26. ‘And today we are doing everything possible and impossible to stop Russia’s yet another genocidal policy – although a new one, it is so similar to the one that killed millions of people in the 20th century.'”

11/26/22 – White people in particular are drawn to atheism because they love worshipping themselves.

11/26/22 – If there’s one group of people you can count on to do the wrong thing, it’s Germans. They are the worst of the worst.
Too many German voters are gravitating to the political extremes

11/26/22 – No matter how the disgraceful Ilhan Omar, who is not a congresswoman but an opportunist with no principles or values, votes, the Ottoman-era slaughter of Armenians was also a genocide.

11/26/22 – Academic opinion can go f—k itself. Pope Francis is right. The Holodomor was a genocide. Russia’s current terrorism is also a genocide. “Saturday [today] marks the 90th anniversary of the start of the famine, which Ukraine commemorates every fourth Saturday of November with a Day of Memory.” Pray for Ukraine. Слава Україні
Pope links plight of Ukrainians today to Stalin’s ‘genocide’

11/25/22 – The plutocrats are an abomination.

11/25/22 – The evil one, Trump, needs to be treated like everyone else. Lock him up.
Legal experts in new report conclude there’s a ‘strong basis’ to charge Trump

11/25/22 – It’s just a matter of time before Elon Musk’s selfishness and irresponsibility gets someone killed if it hasn’t already.

11/25/22 – What kind of an ally is this? “He said that the United States has an ‘ethical responsibility to protect the Kurds from being ethnically cleansed from this region.’ He urged U.S. officials to pressure Turkey to de-escalate its attacks before there is a disaster.” The US absolutely has an obligation to protect the Kurds. Do your jobs, Gen. Mark A. Milley, Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin, President Biden!
Turkey is playing with fire in northern Syria

11/25/22 – “Now a holiday has no connection with using a man either by beating or feeding him. When you give a man a holiday you give him back his body and soul.” G.K. Chesterton

11/24/22 – We’re thankful for freedom, democracy, and always and above all else, God. Happy Thanksgiving!

11/23/22 – “The French historian Ernest Renan said a nation is a ‘daily plebiscite.’ Ukrainians cast their votes daily by putting their lives in mortal peril. It does not diminish their individual heroism to note that they are well led. ‘In no field of man’s activities,’ Churchill wrote, ‘is the tendency to mass effects and the suppression of the individual more evident than in modern war.’ On this day, give thanks that you have lived to be reminded by Zelensky that some pugnacious individualism is magnificently resistant to suppression.”
Be thankful for the pugnacious Zelensky’s magnificent resistance to suppression

11/22/22 – “Musk’s ‘decisions over the last month have been erratic and alarming, but this decision is dangerous and a threat to American democracy,’ tweeted Anti-Defamation League CEO Jonathan Greenblatt. ‘We need to ask — is it time for Twitter to go?’” Yes.
Advertisers are dropping Twitter. Musk can’t afford to lose any more.

11/21/22 – DeSantis is not as evil as the evil one, but DeSantis is an autocratic monster. This is also the state of the GOP. “DeSantis’s contempt for dissent and his crackdown on critics should not be discounted. This is the profile of a constitutional ignoramus, a bully and a strongman. Voters should be forewarned.”
Beware, DeSantis is as much a threat to America as Trump

11/21/22 – It wasn’t the racism, sexism, religious bigotry, extortion, treason, traitorousness, evilness, incitement of insurrection, calling on other politicians to be murdered, authoritarianism, or attack on our democracy. It was that he has been losing. All else equal, if he hadn’t been losing, Paul Ryan and other Republicans would still support the evil one, Trump. This is the state of the GOP.
Paul Ryan invents a new category of anti-Trumpism

11/20/22 – Until it touches the Russians personally, they don’t care. “Sokolova said that the relatives of mobilized men ‘realize what is going on but people whose relatives were not mobilized see the world through rose-colored glasses. They have no idea what’s going on and they’re not interested.’”
And even when it touches them, they still believe the lies. This is MAGA. “She said she fears for her husband’s life but said she does not blame Putin, ‘because he is a smart person.’ ‘We are absolutely confused, at a loss and we feel abandoned,’ she said. ‘We’re crying from morning till night.’”
Angry families say Russian conscripts thrown to front line unprepared

11/20/22 – Don’t be deceived by the lies. (See Josh Hawley et al.) The GOP wants to enslave American workers and undermine the power of labor and the labor movement.
How the pandemic ended America’s bad romance with work

11/20/22 – Democracy is threatened by MAGA and the GOP. It is Americans’ civic obligation to step up and save it.

Listening to the Devil’s Whispers

devil

The human mind is a beautiful thing. It is also a dangerous thing, enough so to bring about our own extinction. People who put their faith in evolution do not understand the nature of human beings. We do not evolve beyond our fundamental nature, and it has not changed since we came into existence. They simultaneously want to believe that we are the same as other animals while being superior in our intelligence to other animals. It is oxymoronic or perhaps simply moronic. What makes human beings dangerous is not the potential for genius, of which we are, on an objective basis, incapable. Only God is truly capable of genius. What makes human beings dangerous is our infinite potential for stupidity, pride, jealousy, greed and all other manner of sin and evil, driven, in great part, by our egos.

Adam and Eve

In the story of Adam and Eve, the devil whispers in Eve’s ear, and she listens. The devil says, “‘You will not certainly die,’ the serpent said to the woman. ‘For God knows that when you eat from it your eyes will be opened, and you will be like God, knowing good and evil.’” She trusts the devil and disobeys God. Adam and Eve’s demise is driven by their own hubris, and their fall from grace is humankind’s original sin. Some atheists might find the story irrelevant, even absurd. On the contrary, Adam and Eve’s sin is the same one that bedevils us today, not just in the United States, but in most of the world.

Much like the beautiful planet humans have been privileged to inhabit, God gave Adam and Eve everything, but they did not appreciate what he had given them. Instead, they wanted more. They wanted to be like God himself. However, they did not become like God. The devil also said that they would not die, but they did. He lied to them, and they believed him. God then evicts them from the Garden of Eden. In the story of their first two sons, Cain and Abel, we witness the first murder. What motivates Cain is similar to what motivated Adam and Eve: jealousy. Cain, a farmer, is jealous of Abel, a shepherd, whom God favors. So, Cain murders his own brother. God then punishes Cain to a nomadic life.

The Devil

Pandering to our narcissism, the devil whispers many things in our ears. All of them are deceitful. The Latin word for “I” is “ego.” “Ego” is defined as “the self especially as contrasted with another self or the world.” In psychological terms, “ego” is “one of the three divisions of the psyche in psychoanalytic theory that serves as the organized conscious mediator between the person and reality especially by functioning both in the perception of and adaptation to reality.” The ego, whose function has always had a double-edged nature, serving survival but often yielding destruction, has become terribly imbalanced. For many, its sole function now is as an agent for mutual or self-destruction.

Taking on various human forms, the devil whispers all over the world, in Russia, North Korea, China, India, the Middle East, South America, Africa, and yes, also in the west, and many listen. In the United States, the devil’s human form is an ugly, soulless, traitorous man called Trump who has not a single redeeming quality. His hate and lies have made derangement as common as drunkenness. His MAGA followers’ brains have become intoxicated with the double drugs of demagoguery and conspiracy.

The Authoritarian Whispers to MAGA

One of the great ironies of this historical moment is that this particular derangement of the self, of the “ego,” is facilitated, in part, through an abandonment of one’s own agency. The strongman, or authoritarian rule, more generally, has always had an appeal. It is an abdication of personal responsibility that seems to make life easier. In fact, it not only makes life harder but also requires a relinquishment of personal freedom and dignity, which would presumably also injure one’s ego. This exchange does not achieve the objective of making life easier, and it also surrenders our God-given attributes in the process, making slaves and fools of us all.

At this historical moment, one could point to a variety of problems: the immoral levels of inequality, the last financial crisis, the rich’s unwillingness to moderate their destructive greed, climate change, the pandemic, technology and its negative psychological effects as causes for an erosion in people’s confidence in democracy and in their willingness to do the hard work of self-governance. The people might believe that it is “all rigged,” and in some ways, it is. However, handing over the levers of government to the very scoundrels who rigged it is the kind of folly to which only those who heed the devil’s whispers would fall prey. The sane and responsible response is resistance.

Putin, Trump and the other authoritarian “leaders” do not care about the values they pretend to care about. All they care about is power and money, and like the devil himself, they lie, lie and lie to obtain and retain both. The rich scoundrels who support these demagogues also care only about power and money. These rich supporters have amplified the dangerous authoritarians’ lies to enrich themselves while impoverishing the feeble minds who have purchased the devil’s siren song. These immoral rich traitors have concocted conspiracy theories with escalating levels of absurdity. In believing them, MAGA has effectively gone insane and has even engaged in violence, which has, in several cases, resulted in injury and death. 

What’s “New” Is Perennial

None of these “new” developments in the human drama should be surprising to anyone who has read the Bible. Despite their religious chest-thumping and their proclamation of “Christian nationalism,” which is, in reality, neither about God nor country, MAGA is also often entirely ignorant of Scripture. Our present condition is just the latest manifestation of the perennial sickness of the human soul. Are we our brother’s keeper? We are supposed to be, but we will not be if we listen to the dark voices who spew hate and lies to appeal to narcissism and ego.

Despite their seeming predilection to believe conspiracy theories, it is entirely possible, even likely, that at least some MAGA do not believe that Trump won the election. In other words, the problem for them is not a detachment from reality but an unwillingness to accept reality. They might know that he lost. However, accepting this fact might also mean accepting the fact that they are not superior simply because they are white. It might mean accepting a pluralistic society in which they are no worse than but also no better than others and in which they have to share power and wealth. It might also mean accepting that they have been lying to themselves their whole lives about their superiority and that their entire self-worth has been colored by this self-delusion. 

No matter how rich, no matter how poor, humans are, one and all, susceptible to the devil’s ploys because he knows well how to stroke our egos and how to lie to us. Elon Musk, the present owner of Twitter, feel into this trap just recently. Ultimately, it is not the devil who is to blame, but the fallen humans who have chosen to listen to him and his lies. So, Happy Halloween, MAGA and others who have listened to the devil’s whispers. He tricked you into a Faustian bargain. You were convinced that you were saving your country, “America First,” or some other delusion. Instead, your egos were being seduced at the expense of your soul and your sanity.

The End of the United States of America

United States of America

These words might be jarring, but that is the state of the disunion: a steady dissolution of the United States of America that is leading to its end in its present form – its democratic form. Some might think this is an alarmist assessment. I would suggest to those skeptics that they are not paying attention and that they make unwarranted assumptions about the resilience of the country’s democracy, its institutions and its norms.

Until relatively recently, the United States of America’s national identity had been centered around one concept – democracy. With the rise of the evil one (aka the former guy), half the country, obviously, the Republicans have abandoned democracy in its stated form in our founding documents. This is well-documented, and links are provided below for edification. The purpose of this essay is to assert the unalienable rights of the other half of the country, the Democrats.

The opening of the Declaration of Independence, which was adopted on July 4, 1776 and whose original draft was written by Thomas Jefferson, is as follows:

When in the Course of human events, it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bands which have connected them with another, and to assume among the powers of the earth, the separate and equal station to which the Laws of Nature and of Nature’s God entitle them, a decent respect to the opinions of mankind requires that they should declare the causes which impel them to the separation.

We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.–That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed, –That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness.

The Declaration of Independence is the nation’s covenant, and the Republicans are breaking it. For this reason alone, the Democrats are entirely justified in asserting the following: “That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government.”

In other words, the Declaration of Independence gives Democrats the right to invoke the dissolution of the union if the form of government forced upon them violates these self-evident truths: “that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.”

An authoritarian form of government is clearly in violation of these self-evident truths and is the antithesis of democracy, yet this is the form of government that the Republicans are pursuing and effectively imposing or trying to impose upon the other half of the country, the Democrats. What shall the remedy be? The Declaration of Independence continues as follows:

Prudence, indeed, will dictate that Governments long established should not be changed for light and transient causes; and accordingly all experience hath shewn, that mankind are more disposed to suffer, while evils are sufferable, than to right themselves by abolishing the forms to which they are accustomed. But when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same Object evinces a design to reduce them under absolute Despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such Government, and to provide new Guards for their future security.–Such has been the patient sufferance of these Colonies; and such is now the necessity which constrains them to alter their former Systems of Government.

It is the right, in fact, it is the duty of Democrats to throw off such a government for which a “long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same Object evinces a design to reduce them under absolute Despotism.” In keeping with the spirit of our preeminent founding document, a decent respect for prevailing powers compels an explanation of such abuses and usurpations.

Premier among said abuses and usurpations is a violation directly related to the legacy of slavery and to the greatest truth held within the document: “all men are created equal.” A document restrained in its references to divinity made an exception in this regard and for good reason. Our equality in our creation is asserted by God himself. No matter which god one worships, the assertion that all human beings are created equal does not invoke an earthly order. Instead, it is divinely ordained and thus irrevocable.

The Democrats, the most diverse of the country’s citizens, are not being treated according to this clearly stated recognition of our God-given equality. Instead, we are treated as second-class citizens. For those who find this language hyperbolic, I present as evidence the structure of the government itself. It, particularly the Electoral College and the Senate, is designed to perpetuate minority rule. Let us not delude ourselves into thinking that this entirely undemocratic structure was for some noble reason. It was not. It was to placate former slaveholding colonies, whose participation in the revolution against the British was necessary, and it came at the expense of the integrity of the union as a whole.

It is without question that the stated ideal in the Declaration of Independence that “all men are created equal” was compromised in the Constitution, to which there have been numerous amendments, in part, to correct this foundational wrong. As is well-documented, the corruption of this ideal among others was mainly to appease slaveholding colonies who held a depraved understanding of humanity. It was not a view of mankind based on facts or science but on a self-delusion of racial superiority and on all manner of barbarity in the pursuit of money and power. It is now better understood as our original sin. Indeed, reminiscent of Adam and Eve’s fall from grace, this original sin still stains every aspect of our society.

The United States of America’s Electorate

How shall we understand the current polarized electorate? It is more accurately understood as the derivation of a bifurcation along more or less the same fault lines that marred the inception of the nation. I also argue that it is best understood in terms similar to the Civil War era leader of a Republican Party that no longer exists, Abraham Lincoln’s realization in a moment of divine inspiration as a battle of good and evil. If this characterization sounds too antiquated or religious to modern ears, I suggest that you tune your ears to the truth because the truth will set you free.

The hard truth for white Americans is that if they are more interested in preserving and protecting their whiteness and their positions of privilege than in preserving and protecting our democracy, then they are more aligned with white supremacists and violence, which is evil, than with democracy and peace, which is good. No matter what other policies are being debated, often ad nauseum, this is the only choice on the ballot that actually matters: democracy or autocracy.

The moral clarity of right and wrong, good and evil that Lincoln found was neither easily achieved nor easily pursued. He did so nonetheless; he prevailed, and he ended the institution of slavery. Following God’s call often comes at a personal price. This was the case for Lincoln and for many other white abolitionists, such as Elijah Lovejoy and John Brown. If white Americans are unwilling to sacrifice, not their lives but simply their (often ill-begotten) comfort and wealth, then please do not present yourselves to an enlightened, diverse society as anything but the modern manifestation of antebellum white oppressors.

Republican “leadership” often in the appeasement of their rabid and radicalized base but also in self-serving pursuits of the most vulgar variety, such as personal enrichment, and at the expense of our democracy would do well to remember certain truths about the other half. The Democrats, who they are alienating at best to outright vilifying, are the country’s brains and its purse. This statement is verifiable. Republicans would also do well to remember that, despite decades of decadence and indiscipline, Americans, particularly Democrats, are collectively some of the toughest people in the world.

America is a nation of immigrants. Recent immigrants, in particular, have often risked everything, including their lives, to come to this country. Descendants of former slaves and indigenous people know well past and present cruelties. Drawing upon their collective memories and experiences, they can call on a trial-tested fortitude to defend against new oppressors. Even those Democrats who have been softened by years of inherited wealth will likely be able to rekindle the noble spirit of their ancestors to fight on behalf of the nation’s eternal ideals and against the tyranny of despotism.

Unlike many other countries, often ancient civilizations that are both enriched and encumbered by the past, the United States of America is a relatively new nation. It is also an idealistic one that continues to believe in itself and, in spite of the flawed execution of its ideals as contained in the Constitution, is accustomed to a certain respect for the inherent dignities of its people. A people like these should not to be underestimated and should not be tested.   

The imposition of the evil one, a person who is entirely unfit for any political office or position of authority, on the Democrats will lead to an irreparable fissure. Democrats will not accept it, and the nation will be torn asunder into two parts: democratic and autocratic. The warning is as follows: the Republican Party allows or enables the evil one to become its presidential candidate at the country’s and the democracy’s peril.

The pro-democracy half of the country, the Democrats will fight to protect the rights and the freedoms that are our birthright and for the full recognition of these rights and freedoms and of our humanity as stated in the Declaration of Independence: “all men are created equal.” As our Founding Fathers did, we will submit our facts to a candid world, and we will throw off the despots that aim to subvert our will and oppress us.

https://www.nytimes.com/2022/01/03/opinion/us-democracy-constitution.html

https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2022/01/january-6-insurrection-trump-coup-2024-election/620843/

https://www.motherjones.com/media/2021/12/war-on-democracy-media/

Paradise Lost, Party Found

Paradise
Luca Iaconelli on Unsplash

At the gym, I was subjected to a music video called “Paradise.” It starts with two fully clothed men riding their bikes while two bikini-clad women strike pornographic poses on a beach. It ends with Chris Brown singing, “See you on the other side,” while surrounded by scantily-clad women raising their glasses and dancing at a full-blown beach party. Paradise lost; party found.

I don’t know what has happened or is happening to this country, but it’s lost its way. The right has weaponized the majority religion, Christianity, while appealing to more “conservative” factions of other religions and libertarians, to hold onto power, money and white privilege. The left has weaponized hatred of religion, mainly Christianity, while appealing to more “liberal” factions of other religions and libertarians to gain power, money and to further place themselves in positions of privilege. Both extremes are disgusting and dangerous.

I have held a reverence for and have unwaveringly pursued a truly intellectual and artistic life since I was a teenager. My life is my bona fides, and it is incontestable. Given who I am and how I have lived, the left’s trajectory has repulsed me. It has divorced itself from anything resembling the search for truth, which is my life’s commitment. Instead, it is simply in pursuit of itself and the imposition of itself on a society that is struggling to define who it is and what it believes.

Although I have always been a Christian, I have not always been a deeply religious person, but I have also never harbored any hatred for Christianity or for any other religion. Instead, I have always been fascinated by religions. I have read various religious texts, artistically engaged with diverse religious art and visited many places of worship.

I would view any other approach as a betrayal of my objectivity, which is absolutely necessary in the pursuit of truth. These religions have also added a critical spiritual dimension to my intellectual and artistic pursuits that gave them depth. Without my spiritual journeys, my understanding of the human experience and of truth would be incomplete and superficial.

The left has become a grotesque caricature of an “enlightened” person. It has replaced genuine curiosity and the often endless and frustrating search for truth with no search at all. It is not trying to find paradise. It is not questioning if we have lost paradise. It is not even genuinely questioning if an otherworldly paradise exists. It is just a party that wants to party. It is shallow, stupid and self-centered.

It has easy answers for hard questions, which effectively means that it has no answers at all. The left has also engaged in various forms of revisionism that are basically lies it conveniently peddles to support its narrative and its agenda. It has become the opposite extreme of everything it claims to hate on the right, so much so that there is, in fact, a considerable overlap between extreme right and left.

Let me put this as succinctly as I can. Both of these extremes are an intellectual and artistic failure. The left, which considers itself “enlightened,” actually has nothing meaningful to offer to either an individual who is genuinely seeking a deeper understanding of him or herself or to our society as we navigate a period of considerable change and uncertainty.

Power and Professionalism

Power differentials as an integral part of an institution’s structure are not as common as people might assume. In some respects, power differentials are pervasive, such as in employment situations. Most people have a boss, and he or she does have power over his or her employees. However, a boss’s power is relatively limited in scope. If abused, typically, the worst that can happen is losing the job and the associated finances. Also, there is usually a human resources department or some type of accountability mechanism in place to prevent or deal with abuses of power, however moderately effective they might be.

Conversely, teaching at the post-secondary level has almost no checks on a professor’s power, and yet, it is, by and large, a remarkably ethical profession. Professors have considerable latitude in the structure of their courses, in their policies, and in their application of them, and the grades they assign remain on their students’ transcripts for the rest of their lives.

This level of professionalism in academia is particularly striking since most professors do not get any training in teaching, aside from teaching assistantships, which are not necessarily required, or even in ethics. Granted, it usually takes a minimum of a decade of full-time study to earn a doctorate degree, which is its own form of training. Nonetheless, the ethical standard is unspoken yet implicitly understood by all professors – treat your students fairly.

As an aside, it is this consistent level of professionalism that led to the medical profession, which has been plagued by various ethical scandals, most recently, its role in the nation’s opioid epidemic, adopting the academic title of “doctor.” It is and will always be an academic title. Even though the ultimate culpability lies with the police officers, it should also be noted that the opioid epidemic, fueled by the medical and the pharmaceutical industries, was a contributing yet overlooked factor in the murder of George Floyd.

A key aspect to treating all students fairly is having a clear policy in place and applying it uniformly. In considering any one student’s request, the question to ask is: given the student’s situation and the policy, would granting the student’s request be fair to the student and to the rest of the class? One needs to consider both the student making the request and the other students in the class.

It is also understood that no matter how the student might have treated the professor or the professor’s personal feelings regarding the student, his or her grade must be based strictly on his or her performance in the class. Needless to say, the student’s performance in any other class or any other behavioral issues cannot factor into the professor’s assessment of the student’s performance or the professor’s treatment of the student, which always needs to be mature, professional, and proportional.  

Law enforcement does not share academia’s reputation for professionalism, and its implicitly understood guidelines do not seem to be followed, despite the explicit training for police officers, but they should be. Equal treatment is the cardinal rule that must be observed when power differentials exist, particularly as part of an institutional structure.

There is a clear power differential between the police and the people they are called to serve and protect. Police brutality is fundamentally an abuse of power. Instead of the equal treatment that is simply taken for granted in academia, in policing, there are often clear biases and reactions that are grossly disproportionate to the offense. Also, as we have seen sadly too many times, unlike in the academic context, a police officer’s abuse of power can be deadly for the victim.

This article suggests that Derek Chauvin’s defense argues that fear was a motiving factor for his conduct. I would argue that the correct expectation is the academic standard and that the police’s feelings, no matter what they are including fear, should never be a factor. Police officers are to completely separate their emotions from the execution of their duties.

Instead, we see that particularly for Derek Chauvin, but also for J. Alexander Kueng, Thomas Lane and Tou Thao, their emotions governed their every action and that from the very beginning of their interaction with George Floyd and his companions, the police were completely out of control of themselves and of the situation. Within minutes of approaching the parked car George Floyd was sitting in, responding to nothing but the alleged use of a counterfeit $20 bill, a police officer pulled his gun and aimed it at Floyd.

How could this reaction possibly be equal treatment? It was not. It was prejudicial treatment, based on Floyd’s appearance, who was a big, black man. His prior record, if even known to the police at the time, was completely irrelevant to the potential petty offense they were called to resolve. It was emotional and egotistical. It was about their assertion of their power. It was about forcing someone, who is made in the image of God and granted by him with free will, to submit to their will.

It was uncontrolled. Floyd’s altered state of mind was equally irrelevant to the potential offense. If anything, his state placed more burden on the police officers to act in a controlled and calm manner instead of what we saw, which was the opposite. Their reaction was also grossly disproportionate to the potential offense. It was unprofessional, and, unfortunately, it was deadly. It was none of the things one would expect of a professional police response, and it resulted in the police murdering George Floyd.

Police culture needs to change. There needs to be the expectation for police officers that with great power comes great responsibility. As in academia, the onus is on the person with the power to always be in control of him or herself and to use that power judiciously and fairly. If one cannot do this, the person should simply not become a police officer. If one does not do this and abuses one’s power, as in this case, the person should be punished to the fullest extent of the law.

True Christians vs Devil Worshippers

Christians

It is a privilege to write about the persecuted church, who are true Christians, and one I certainly do not deserve. I feel that this should be done by someone holy, which I am not. I am an ordinary sinner. Their stories of great persecution and of great faith often reduce me to tears and make me more aware of how much I take my religious freedoms for granted and how undeserving I am of God’s tremendous grace and love.

I desperately want to help them. I would like to reach through my computer screen and lift them out of their misery and restore them in every possible way. On a tangible level, I am limited to giving what I can. I encourage everyone to give generously to the persecuted church. Our brothers and sisters often sacrifice everything to follow Jesus Christ, and they need our help. As Christians know though, our power is really in our prayers and petitions to our God. It is in my prayers for them, which are the most frequent and the most intense of all my prayers, that my hope ultimately resides. I would like the Lord to hear these above all others, hear his people’s tears and suffering, and with his powerful hand do what I cannot.  

Christ Suffered, True Christians Also Suffer

When Christians pray, we often ask for many things. We ask to be granted various forms of aid and to be relieved of suffering for ourselves and for others. This is quite understandable, and we should continue to do so. However, we also need to remember that the story for Christians is the story of Christ, and his story is one of suffering. Jesus died a brutal death, executed by crucifixion under false charges. It was also a death he freely accepted. We can remember his journey and allow his tremendous sacrifice, which is our salvation, to also be our comfort as we endure our own trials and tribulations.

“I Have Chosen You Out of the World”

The following words applied to Jesus’s disciples then and still apply to the persecuted church throughout the world today. Jesus said, “If the world hates you, realize that it hated me first. If you belonged to the world, the world would love you its own; but because you do not belong to the world, and I have chosen you out of the world, the world hates you…. And they will do all these things to you on account of my name, because they do not know the one who sent me.” (John 15:18-19, 21)

A Story of a True Christian

There are so many stories of persecution that deserve our attention, and they span the globe, from the Middle East to Asia to Africa to South America. To highlight one story, there is nothing more painful for a parent than to lose his or her child. As shared by Christopher Summers with Open Doors (2019), Neelesh’s 7-year-old Christian son was beaten to death by Buddhist boys at his boarding school in India.

After his death, his depressed father resorted to alcohol to self-medicate and, on one occasion, ran into his former pastor. “Gazing right into my eyes, he said, ‘Neelesh, do you want to meet your son?’ I was so very angry. I said, ‘Are you mocking me? You know he is long dead!’ To my astonishment, the pastor replied gently, ‘If you drink like this and leave Jesus, you will never meet your boy, who is now in heaven.’

‘His answer shook me to the core. Here was the truth! My son was just seven when he died, but he loved Jesus. He sang hymns wholeheartedly whenever I led in worship. My martyred son is surely in heaven. I would never see him if I left Jesus.

‘That night I had a vision. I saw my son playing in a beautiful garden. As I went towards him he stopped me and said, “Dad, you should not come here now. It is not yet your time. See, I am very happy here.”’

Neelesh says that after that night he felt an extraordinary peace in his heart. He comforted his wife and restarted his ministry. ‘It was as if God had revived me totally,’ he says. ‘I moved on with more faith and zeal than ever and have been continuing still.’”

Christians who are born again can often point to a moment when grace penetrated their heart, mind and soul and soon thereafter redirected their lives to fulfill God’s will. This is not to suggest that they magically transform into a different person or that they experience no doubts or spiritual setbacks afterwards but that their faith becomes solidified in a way it had not been before and that they gain renewed clarity and purpose for their lives.

The truth of Neelesh’s life is that his suffering, the loss of his only son because he followed Jesus, could have made him a bitter man, but instead he became a better man and a better Christian through grace. This is what it means to be a Christian.

Desecration of Christians’ Sacred Symbols

It feels almost sacrilegious to write of the holy and the unholy in the same post, but it is important to place them next to each other to see the obvious contrast of true Christians with devil worshippers. It is easy to hold the Bible high, and we recently witnessed this profanity by the dear leader of the devil worshippers, the supposed president of the United States. This sacrilegious act made headlines for all the wrong reasons, yet it was defended by certain people of whom we will speak shortly.

Mariann Budde, the bishop of the Episcopal Diocese of Washington, wrote on June 4, 2020, “I was outraged by…Trump’s use of the Bible and the backdrop of St. John’s Church for his political purposes. I was horrified to learn that while he was threatening to use military force across America, peaceful protesters were being forcibly removed from Lafayette Park so that he might pose before the church for a photograph. I wasn’t alone. My phone lit up with messages from people across the country who, like me, couldn’t believe what we were seeing. But if we keep the focus of our outrage there, we allow ourselves to be distracted from the issues that are compelling Americans to take to the streets in large numbers. I wonder if that’s the intention.”

Indeed, the nation is wondering a good many things. Predominant among them should be: how did we get here, where a satanic cult leader is also the leader of the free world? Perhaps the most important reason is: the “Christian right.”

The Opposite of Christians – Devil Worshippers

The Gospel Coalition recently wrote a piece on QAnon, which they described as a satanic cult. Carter (May 20, 2020) wrote, “As Adrienne LaFrance writes, ‘To look at QAnon is to see not just a conspiracy theory but the birth of a new religion.’” Indeed. That new religion is a satanic cult that bears no resemblance to Christianity. Carter follows with, “(…Trump has frequently retweeted QAnon-related accounts on Twitter, and some parenting and lifestyle ‘influencers’ promote the views on Instagram, YouTube, and Facebook.) Although it’s still on the fringe, Christians should be aware of the threat this political cult poses to the global church.”

What The Gospel Coalition and Carter should have said is that they are actually describing the “Christian right,” i.e. self-proclaimed “Christian conservatives,” although there is nothing either Christian or conservative about them, and that QAnon is just a more extreme expression of the very ideas and the culture that is mainstream in their churches. The “Christian conservatives” will take great umbrage at this characterization and protest (of course, they doth protest too much), but it is an accurate description.

As just one example, Eric Martin (August 2020) wrote, “One of the alt-right’s biggest political influences is former presidential candidate Pat Buchanan, communications director under Ronald Reagan. He and fellow Catholic Joe Sobran served as inspiration for a blog referred to as ‘the alt-right’s favorite philosophy instructor,’ and his comments on immigration and questioning the Holocaust are the type of kinder, gentler white nationalism that provides oxygen for the more obvious forms. Buchanan has claimed that Jews hold the ‘real power’ in the U.S., that not as many died in the Holocaust as reported, and that ‘this has been a country built, basically, by white folks.’ When an interviewer suggested that white people had held power in the U.S. for years, Buchanan bristled. ‘I don’t know where you grew up,’ he retorted. ‘I grew up in a Catholic ghetto.'”

As another example, Franklin Graham is the son of Billy Graham, and he has inherited a legacy he does not deserve. What was the supposed high priest of the “Christian right’s” reaction to the repugnant desecration of a church? Franklin Graham took to Facebook with the following message, “President Donald J. Trump made a statement by walking through Lafayette Park to St. John’s Episcopal Church that had been vandalized and partially burned Sunday night. He surprised those following him by holding up a Bible in front of the church. Thank you President Trump. God and His Word are the only hope for our nation.” What would compel Franklin Graham to defend the indefensible?

Simple. Franklin Graham does not worship Jesus Christ. He worships himself and Donald Trump. He is power hungry. Similarly, Eric Metaxas does not worship Jesus Christ. He worships himself and Donald Trump. He is a careerist. Another, Jerry Falwell, Jr. does not worship Jesus Christ. He worships himself and Donald Trump. He is an opportunist. The list goes on. They worship false gods. They are devil worshipers since they all worship Donald Trump. They are not Christians, and they need to stop claiming to be Christians. Do not be led astray by these pretenders, these worshippers of false gods.

Christians’ One True God

Let us return to our one true God. Jesus fulfills the word, and what he said of the unbelievers who knew Moses’s laws and words and could recite them quite well but never understood their meaning still applies today to other self-proclaimed “believers.” Jesus said, “’I do not accept human praise; moreover, I know that you do not have the love of God in you. I came in the name of my Father, but you do not accept me; yet if another comes in his own name, you will accept him. How can you believe, when you accept praise from one another and do not seek the praise that comes from the only God?” (John 5:41-44)

The false prophets do not love Jesus or the Father, and they do not have the love of God in them. We know this because if they did, it would show clearly to the rest of us. Instead, when we hear them or see them, we cannot see Jesus because he is not there. Jesus is one of the most loved and admired figures in the world. Even those who do not believe in his divinity can see his goodness because it is clear who Jesus loves. He loves the Father and us. He is one with the Father, and every word he spoke and every action he took reflected who he was and who he loved.

When in the garden at Gethsemane, Jesus says, “Father, if you are willing, take this cup away from me; still, not my will but yours be done.” (Luke 22:42) This is what real love of God looks like, and it is also obvious in the persecuted church. Do not mistake false prophets for men of God. Men of god love God; they seek his praise and his love; they seek to do his will. In Neelesh, we can see Jesus. Summers writes, “The anguish of losing his son has not passed—and never will—but the hope has returned. ‘I have made up my mind now,’ Neelesh says. ‘I will live for Christ and if He wants, I will die for him. Because what I lose for Him, I will actually gain in the end.’”

Martin Luther King, Jr.

In Martin Luther King, Jr., we can see Jesus. In his famous, I’ve Been to the Mountaintop speech, he said, “All we say to America is be true to what you said on paper….  Somewhere I read of the freedom of assembly. Somewhere I read of the freedom of speech. Somewhere I read of the freedom of press. Somewhere I read that the greatness of America is the right to protest for rights….

We’ve got some difficult days ahead, but it really doesn’t matter with me now because I have been to the mountaintop. And I don’t mind. Like anybody, I would like to live a long life. Longevity has its place, but I’m not concerned about that now. I just want to do God’s will, and he’s allowed me to go up to the mountain. And I’ve looked over, and I’ve seen the Promised Land. I may not get there with you, but I want you to know tonight that we as a people will get to the Promised Land. So, I’m happy tonight. I’m not worried about anything. I’m not fearing any man. Mine eyes have seen the glory of the coming of the Lord.” He was assassinated the next day.  

The “Christian Right” Are Not Christians

Instead, what do people see when they look at the “Christian right”? Nothing holy and nothing resembling Jesus. There are so many damning statements. I am surely missing some of the most biting, but here is a sampling nonetheless.

“Evangelicals use the cloak of Christianity to disguise their true nature like klansman use their hoods. They share the same God, a racist vengeful God, a God made in their own image, a God who supports their worst fears, hate and prejudice. They see trust and love as an abyss.”

“A Born-Again Karen…”

“Jesus wasn’t white or American or Republican. Something tells me you’d be less enthusiastic if you met him in the flesh.”

“The fact that so many conservative Christians have interpreted many people’s desire to eradicate white supremacy as a precursor to canceling Christianity in America is incredibly telling …”

You get the idea. It is like trying to escape one’s racist past while still being racist in the present. No amount of cute marketing gimmicks, such as “weird [insert denomination or denomination] Twitter,” can change that.

The Satanic Cult Leader

Christianity Today’s retired editor in chief Mark Galli (December 2019) wrote a powerful statement regarding Trump’s impeachment, in which he declared that Trump should be removed from the office because of his character weaknesses and his conduct. Galli’s statement took courage, and he deserves credit for it. However, you know what else was powerful? The backlash against it from white evangelicals and other “Christian conservatives.”

More recently, Christianity Today published a piece that wholly lacked Galli’s moral clarity. Jayson Casper (June 30, 2020) wrote, “… ‘Trump’s executive order will make the commitment to international religious freedom more robust,’ said former congressman Frank Wolf, arguing the Trump administration has been markedly stronger on the issue than those of either party. ‘If you care about religious freedom, this is an issue to vote on.’”

Indeed, if you care about religious freedom, it is an issue to vote on, but it would be decidedly against Trump, the man who gave the green light to Xi’s concentration camp for Uighurs, in which all manner of evil occurs including rape. Religious freedom means religious freedom for all, not just for Christians.

What Christianity and Christians Look Like

While the “Christian right” morally contorts themselves into pretzels to avoid what is clearly a difficult choice for them between Jesus and Trump, the persecuted church has no such difficulties. They, like Martin Luther King, Jr., like the recently deceased John Lewis, like Elijah Cummings, like so many good Christian men and women around the world choose Christ over everything including themselves. That is love for and faith in our Lord, Jesus Christ. That is what Christianity and true Christians look like. Do not be deceived by anything or anybody else. Look for the Lord in those who claim to be Christian and if you cannot find Jesus, you could very well be looking at the devil in disguise.

White Culture Is No Culture

Culture

Without ethnic minority groups, the United States would have no culture because white Christian culture by itself is no culture. Given its various characteristics, such as location, population, economics, etc., the Midwest is a good region to analyze to better understand the country as a whole.

The midwestern states are: Illinois, Indiana, Iowa, Kansas, Michigan, Minnesota, Missouri, Nebraska, North Dakota, Ohio, South Dakota, and Wisconsin. The Midwest can be divided into two subregions: the Northwest Territory (also known as the Old Northwest) and the Great Plains. States in the Northwest Territory are Indiana, Illinois, Michigan, Ohio, and Wisconsin, and the rest, Iowa, Kansas, Minnesota, Missouri, Nebraska, North Dakota, and South Dakota, belong to the Great Plains.

Based on the July 2017 census, the largest city in the entire Midwest is Chicago, Illinois, which unsurprisingly also has the largest metropolitan area. Given its sheer size and diversity, Chicago is more similar to New York City or Los Angeles than other midwestern cities. It is also part of the Northwest Territory.

Minneapolis Culture

Outside of Chicago, arguably no other midwestern city boasts a truly vibrant culture aside from Minneapolis, Minnesota. It ranks eighth among the largest cities and third for the largest metropolitan area. Minneapolis is actually one of the two “Twin Cities,” with Saint Paul being the other city, which ranks twelfth.

Minneapolis has grown and changed dramatically in its recent history, and it now ranks among the most cultured cities in the country. Where does this culture come from? The answer is that it does not come from white Christians. It comes from its ethnic minorities.

Food Culture

Without its ethnic minority groups, again the people who are not white Christians, the city of Minneapolis and its inhabitants would still be eating lefsa and lutefisk, not that there is anything wrong with them as cultural legacy, but there is just not much demand for the rather crude culinary offerings.

Neither is there much culinary sophistication in “hotdish,” also known as casserole, hotdogs and burgers, the last two being originally German fare. They are all now standard American fare, but they so ubiquitous that they, by themselves, cannot create a culinary culture.

Eat Street, which runs along Nicollet Avenue, starting just outside its downtown district, is one of the most well-known streets in Minneapolis for food. It hosts a variety of restaurants but is dominated by Asian ones.

The restaurants are supported by farmers markets and a growing farm-to-table movement, giving minority groups, such as the Hmong, a way to maintain their traditional livelihoods. (Obviously, many restaurants in the city have come under financial pressure due to the shutdown in response to the pandemic.)

Nelson (2019) writes, “Restaurants have always been on the front lines of the melting pot in this country. Twin Cities diners can circumnavigate the globe several times over and never leave the seven-county metro area. Culinary traditions spanning every continent — Indonesia to India, Morocco to Mexico, Somalia to Singapore — are represented here in restaurants and markets, a breadth and depth unimaginable 20 years ago.”

Long Live the Arts

However, food alone does not a culture make. There are many cities in diverse parts of the country, for example Southern California, with well-developed food cultures that still lack a strong overall culture. Also, many Americans mistake entertainment for culture. Sports are entertainment. They are not a key contributor to a city’s culture.

The arts and a vibrant arts community are absolutely critical to creating an authentic local culture. The Minneapolis arts scene thrives in all forms: fine arts, theater, music, dance, local activities and festivals, often using its well-maintained public parks and lakes, which are also an investment, as its venues. It is not just about art for art’s sake but art for the sake of having a living city, a city that has a sense of cultural purpose, not just a city in which one lives.

Minneapolis Music Culture – Bob Dylan and Prince

The two most famous people to come out of the state are Bob Dylan and Prince. Bob Dylan, originally named Robert Allen Zimmerman, was born to a Jewish family in Duluth, MN and raised in Hibbing, MN. He later moved to Minneapolis to study at the University of Minnesota. After dropping out of college, he moved to New York City, where he started and made his musical career. As an aside, Bob Dylan was inspired by Woody Guthrie, whose life and music should be reflected upon more, particularly as it relates to class, race relations and equality.  

Prince was born Prince Rogers Nelson in Minneapolis. He rose to stardom on sheer tenacity, savvy and talent, as a racist music industry once refused to allow him and other black musicians, such as arguably the most famous musician in the world at the time, Michael Jackson, to air their music videos on MTV. Prince’s exploitation by said music industry led him to change his name from his birth name to a symbol (a combination of male and female symbols) in 1993 until he changed it back in 2000.

Unlike Dylan, who left Minneapolis, Prince maintained his residence in the city, technically the suburb of Chanhassen, where his home and studio, Paisley Park are located. He hosted parties there, and he would sometimes show up at them or other music events in the city. He loved Minneapolis, and the city loved him. His untimely passing in 2016 at the age of 57 was one of the city’s great heartbreaks.

It is poetic justice that the city’s and state’s proudest native sons are a black man and a Jewish man, respectively. As the racist-tweeting, Eric Metaxas even somewhat concedes, Martin Luther, for his justified opposition to the corrupt Catholic Church was unjustifiably opposed to the people who actually gave us Christianity.

Given the large Lutheran population in Minnesota, it is sadly unsurprising that Minneapolis was once known as the “capitol of anti-Semitism,” and the city has also had a history of discrimination against its black residents, particularly related to housing. Dylan’s song Desolation Row starts by referring to the lynching of black men at the hands of depraved white people in Duluth, Minnesota.  

Update: Their murder occurred 100 years ago today, June 15, 2020. A message from Gov. Walz: “To truly be One Minnesota, we need to dismantle the systems of oppression that led to the deaths of Clayton, Jackson, and McGhie 100 years ago, and that led to the death of George Floyd just 3 weeks ago. Today I met with Duluth leaders to discuss how we can and will move forward.” On June 12, 2020, “the Governor [had] issued the state’s first posthumous pardon to Max Mason, who was wrongfully convicted and used as a scapegoat for the lynching.”

American Culture Is Color and Cool

Bazelon (2018) wrote, “Being white in America has long been treated, at least by white people, as too familiar to be of much interest. It’s been the default identity, the cultural wallpaper — something described, when described at all, using bland metaphors like milk and vanilla and codes like ‘cornfed’ and ‘all-American.'”

Another way of describing it is actually no culture, the absence of anything that gives life dimension, and frankly, some sense of cool. White people need to get over themselves and their “white fragility,” which as Waldman (2018) writes, DiAngelo argues in her book “holds racism in place,” because frankly, my dear, I don’t give a damn and accept the fact that the collective minority groups bring coolness and culture to the country. They can justifiably throw their stake into American soil and claim its culture to be their own because it is.

We Are Releasing Evil’s Death Grip

Death Grip

George Floyd was murdered by the Minneapolis Police on Memorial Day, May 25, 2020, a national holiday dedicated to mourning our military personnel who have died while serving our country. Surrounded by death from Covid 19, his singular death, on a day marked to pay our respects to prior deaths, seemed to paradoxically release the death grip on our country, as we threw ourselves into resurrecting it and rejecting evil.

This paradox was alluded to on our first brief post, “The specter of death now looms over the world as nature enters a period of rebirth. It might seem paradoxical, until one considers that it is also Lent, and life, death and rebirth have been married together in that context for approximately 2,000 years.”

Our nation’s rebirth has also overlapped with Pentecost Sunday, which was May 31, 2020, a day when the Holy Spirit descended on the Apostles and gave them the fortitude, comfort and aid that they would need to spread the truth and the faith.

We are apostles of a different sort, as we take our demands for justice, our messages of love, peace, equality, of everything good and holy to a country that has been darkened by power, greed, corruption, betrayal and all manner of sin, in short, to a country that has fallen prey to the forces of evil.

Today, June 6, 2020 is the 76th anniversary of D-Day, when Allied forces stormed the beaches of Normandy, France in Operation Overlord during World War II. It is a day when the forces of good staged a pivotal battle in their war against the forces of evil, a day when Allied forces started to release the Nazi’s death grip on Europe, and anti-fascists faced down fascists and eventually won the war.   

For Americans, the past almost two weeks, starting May 26, 2020, when many of us first found out about George Floyd’s murder, have been some of the most emotionally taxing days in our memory. His murder was the catalyst for the outpouring of anger, frustration and sadness that had been building for many of us for years about the gross injustices our black sisters and brothers face on a daily basis.

As Wortham wrote in an essay titled, A Glorious Poetic Rage, “Rashad Robinson, the president of the civil rights organization Color of Change, speculated that it was the stark cruelty of the video of George Floyd’s death that captivated the country.”

The poetry of the moment is part of the country’s collective poetic anthology. Many on the right have tried to frame the present protests as unpatriotic or un-American, as an assault on “law and order,” but their characterizations could not be further from the truth. They are lies, and they are liars.

Following in the footsteps of honorable generations upon generations of Americans who have fought to defend our country, our protests are our psalms of communal lament for and our songs of love to our nation. They are our latest expressions of patriotism, and we are our country’s present defenders.

Let us not minimize the critical nature of this moment. We are the defenders of good, and we are in a battle against evil. We are fighting to unclench the fist that has been squeezing the breath and life out of our country and its people. (See this post for context.)

Just as our country’s citizens change, the poetic language of our citizens change. “Give Me Liberty or Give Me Death,” “Americans Will Always Fight for Liberty,” have taken on a more personal tone, as our cries repeat the final words of the victims of state-sanctioned violence, “I Can’t Breathe,” “Hands Up, Don’t Shoot,” to the simple assertion of black Americans’ humanity, a statement that had once been (and perhaps still is) the subject of controversy, “Black Lives Matter.”

Good Against Evil’s Death Grip

As in World War II, Americans are in a life and death battle against the forces of evil. Our lives are literally at stake, as is our democracy. We need to do everything we can to protect it from tyranny and fascism. Let us speak directly of this evil. As we spoke all of the names of the victims of police violence, let us speak the name of this evil that is destroying our country.

The devil does not just reside across an ocean, in a foreign country, speaking in a foreign tongue, but, our dear Americans, it lives in the people’s house. It has taken hold of our sacred national spaces and tried to force upon our country’s capital its death grip under the guise of relatively innocuous-sounding phrases, such as “flood the zone.”

Hiding in a bunker within the White House, fortified with fences upon fences, this evil man turned the country’s military, which is meant to protect us against our foreign enemies, against its own citizens, sometimes supplemented with unidentified men in heavily-armed riot gear.

These various armed forces have been attacking and harming peaceful protesters. In one case, this evil man did so to desecrate a sacred Christian house of worship while brandishing the Bible, which he never reads. This evil is trying to impose a fascist death grip on our nation’s capital and on our country.

This evil inhabits a soulless man named Donald J. Trump. Conway writes, “As a New Yorker profile of Trump put it nearly a quarter-century ago, Trump lives ‘an existence unmolested by the rumbling of a soul.’ That’s Donald Trump’s problem yesterday, today and tomorrow.”

It is his eternal problem because as a child of darkness, he seems incapable of emitting one ounce of light. Instead, like a black hole, Trump functions by sucking everything into the demonic, empty, narcissistic shell of his person.

Trump’s Death Grip and His Satanic Cults

Let us not fool ourselves into thinking that the devil walks alone. He is accompanied by secular sycophants and religious mercenaries who have sold their professed “Christian” faith for their own personal ambitions.

In particularly, many white evangelicals stopped being about anything resembling Jesus. Instead of making themselves more like Jesus, they made Jesus more like themselves. Some of them have given themselves fully over to the dark side. QAnon is a satanic cult that is pretending to be Christian nationalists, which are a form of evil themselves.

However, the problem is not limited to just white evangelicals. Within the Catholic Church, which has had numerous engagements with the unholy while holding high its mantle of holiness, there are abettors of this evil. Most recently, the devil in the Catholic Church takes on the form of a petty man with gloriously meaningless turns of phrases that he recently weaved into a public display of idolization for a false god, Donald Trump.

Against these forces of evil, we are an army of good. We have each other, which is really all we need. We will prevail. We will save our country and ourselves from this present death grip so that it can breathe and so that we can truly live free. As Patrick Henry declared, so do we, “Give us liberty or give us death” because “Black Lives Matter.” We rise and fall together. E pluribus unum.

George Floyd – Murdered by the Minneapolis Police

George Floyd
Josh Hild on Usplash

Minnesota calls itself the Land of 10,000 Lakes, and Minneapolis was known for its harsh winters and its good quality of life, including its well-maintained parks and lakes. Now, it is known as the city in which George Floyd, a 46-year-old black man, was cruelly murdered by the Minneapolis police, the men and women in whom we entrust with the great privilege and responsibility of protecting and serving our communities.

The Events Resulting in George Floyd’s Murder

The purported reason for George Floyd’s arrest was a suspected $20 white-collar crime, a fraudulent payment. The real reason was the color of his skin. Thanks to Darnella Frazier, whose account Twitter suspended for an unknown reason, we have the true story, the video of George Floyd’s death, instead of the deceptive story provided in the police report. We thank Darnella, who is only 17-years-old, for her courage, conscience and presence of mind to record it. She was traumatized by the experience, and we pray for her.

George Floyd died with an officer pressing his knee against his neck for over 9 minutes. Floyd’s tortured face pressed into the asphalt, he pled with the officer(s), speaking words that brought back the memory of Eric Garner, “I can’t breathe.” “I can’t breathe,” Floyd says; “I can’t breathe.” He calls out for his mother, “mama,” he says. He urinated on himself. (The graphic video can be found on the Internet.)

There were numerous witnesses. Their panicked concern was palpable, and they begged the officer(s) to release him, to take his knee of the visibly distressed man. The officers did not. You can hear the officers joking as George Floyd is dying. Floyd’s body slowly becomes lifeless, and when the medics came, he no longer had a pulse. He was dead. (A timeline of the events is provided here. )

This is how an American citizen, our brother, a broken man (as we all are) of faith, a human being, a child of God, died. He was treated like an animal, like his life had no value, like his person had no dignity. This is how the men we gave the privilege and responsibility of protecting and serving our communities treated one of our own. They heartlessly murdered George Floyd, and we are angry; we are traumatized; we are heartbroken, and we are fed up. We want peace, justice and revolution – not just change – but a complete transformation of our society.

Our Country Is Broken

The country, which had been suffering under decades of economic mismanagement and rising inequality, reached a fever pitch under the physical and mental stress of the pandemic, the associated shutdown, and its economic devastation. The country was (and still is) a tinder box. This was the spark that lit it on fire, in many cases, literally. Since May 25, 2020, the day George Floyd was wantonly murdered by the Minneapolis Police, there have been protests.

These protests often started out peacefully but, towards evening, would erupt into violence, as a combustible mix of opportunists, anarchists, implementing a modern version of propaganda of the deed, and/or Antifa (a violence-prone, left-wing anti-fascist group) and/or white supremacists (violent right-wing groups) looted, vandalized and terrorized the city, damaging many minority-owned businesses in the process.

Starting Friday, May 29, 2020, the city of Minneapolis was put under curfew from 8PM until 6AM, with violations being a misdemeanor punishable by up to 90 days in jail or a $1,000 fine. On the first night of the curfew, the violence had not really abated. (Images of the protests can be found here.)

The absurdity of the autopsy report is just more proof (as if we needed it) that the problem of systemic racism in our country is not simply about the police department but also a failure of our entire system of “justice.” It is an insult to our intelligence and a disgrace to our country. As Petri wrote, “[I]t is always at the moment that their knee is descending on a human neck, or their bullet is flying toward a man, or they have him in a chokehold, when this human being’s own system decides to turn against him. It is a horrible curse.”

George Floyd to the System Reforming Itself?

The key question is: can the system reform itself, to paraphrase Cornell West, who thinks it cannot. It is understandable why he would think so. It is understandable why the people, particularly younger people, who have been completely failed by the country, its supposed leaders and its institutions, would have no faith in any system within the country being capable of self-reformation.

In fact, despite everything in the news, the protests across the country for which the incident in Minneapolis was the catalyst, the following video was posted on Twitter today.

The justifiably angry driver says to the cop, “Dad a criminal?” Nope. “Dad a thug?” Nope. “Dad shot dead by a cop made a mistake cuz you want to come with your gun drawn.” In other words, even with protests exploding across the country in response to police brutality, as the man explains, the cop came to the car with his gun drawn over the driver not using a turn signal.

We are all too exhausted and emotionally drained to do more than try to process our pain, frustration and anger. It is hard to not feel a deep sense of despair and hopelessness about the state of our country right now. We must keep fighting though, and we have our faith to give us strength. Our deepest condolences to George Floyd’s friends and family. He was known to us, and he will be deeply missed. Fellow Americans, we say this with love – Jesus’s way – the way of peace – is the only way.