The Walls Conservative Evangelicals Have Built That Caused the March on Washington in 1963 Are Still Standing

Baptist News Global: Author Rick Pidcock Provides Insights into White, Evangelical Perspectives on Race 

In The Signal Press, I've frequently referenced a verse in the small, but powerful New Testament book of Jude.  Jude is not a common text among most conservative Evangelical preachers, especially those who don't necessarily use the Common Lexionary or the Christian calendar in their planning of sermons.  It's verse 4 which I have frequently cited as a prophetic word, especially for those who are blending far right wing politics with conservative Evangelicalism in both its Pentecostal and Fundamentalist forms. 

For certain intruders have stolen in among you, people who long ago were designated for this condemnation as ungodly, who pervert the grace of our God into licentiousness and deny our only master and Lord, Jesus Christ.  Jude v. 4, NRSV

These words had a specific application to a church not long after the time of Jesus.  In its early days, the church was subject to intrusion by pagan philosophy and false doctrine, in some cases having to rely on short epistles providing guidance and direction from the Apostles, like Jude, while they were becoming more familiar with the Christian gospel.  So these words are not a specific "prophecy" for today, as some Christians believe about parts of the Bible, but they are "prophetic" in that they resonate with much of what has happened in many churches where far right wing politics have become indistinguishable from church doctrine and theology.  

Certain intruders have stolen in among today's conservative Evangelical churches, replacing sound doctrine and theology with right wing political rhetoric, turning churches into cults with a political mission and purpose and in some cases, replacing Jesus with loyalty to a political "savior" which completely subverts the Christian gospel.  Fear, says Rick Pidcock, the author of the piece linked at the top of this article from Baptist News Global, fear of change is the underlying motivation, while opposition to change, especially from a hard line Calvinist approach, represents God to the far right.  

These are blemishes on your love feasts, says the Apostle Jude, while they feast with you without fear, feeding themselves.  They are waterless clouds carried along by the winds; autumn trees without fruit, twice dead, uprooted; wild waves of the sea, casting up the foam of their own shame; wamdering stars for whom the deepest darkness has been reserved forever.  Jude 12-13

These words of Jude resonate with me as I relate them to the far right wing politics of our time.  It is such an apt description of the far right, that I almost marvel that the ink is dry on the page, and that Jude is an ancient apostle, and not a columnist or editorial writer for a progressive Christian publication like Baptist News Global.  

These are grumblers and malcontents; they indulge their own lusts; they are bombastic in speech, flattering people to their own advantage.  Jude 15

It's hard to believe this was written in the late first century and not right after a Trump rally.  

I'll stop here, and point you to Rick Pidcock's piece in Baptist News Global.  It's an eye opener.  

Why Don't Journalists Call Out Bad Talking Points?

Washington Post: The Truth About Russia, Trump and the 2016 Election 

Vivek Ramaswamy slips it into his talking points as if it were fact.  The Democrats lied about Russian collusion in the 2016 election, therefore it justifies the lies Trump has told since then.  He slipped that statement into his comments on Meet the Press Sunday morning, and Chuck Todd didn't bat an eye, offered no question about it and let it slide.  That's expected with much of the main stream media. 

But this morning, on a talk show in Chicago, during a discussion about whether these indictments and charges against Trump are politically motivated, Santita Jackson had a guest on her program who stated flatly that Trump, as a former President, shouldn't be charged with crimes under the administration of his successor, but that the people ought to determine whether he is guilty of insurrection by the manner in which they cast their ballots.  I get it, with Jackson's program, she goes out of her way to be fair, and to represent various viewpoints, but this guest also mentioned the fact that Democrats pulled a similar "stunt" in 2016, getting the CIA, according to this guest, involved in trying to "overturn" Trump's election.  

It was nothing of the sort.  Except for the fact that the DOJ came under Trump's control and therefore would not pursue the conclusive evidence of Russian interference and Trump campaign collusion that Robert Mueller found in his investigation.  Primary evidence came from the FBI, but it is clear that this had nothing to do with any effort to prevent Trump from being inaugurated.  Those are all right wing talking points that we haven't heard until now, with Trump's back to the wall and the very real evidence of his attempts to overturn the results of a legitimate election.  

I give Jackson's other panelists this morning credit for pushing back, though no one actually corrected the statement that it was just a Democratic political ploy, and that there was plenty of evidence that it happened.  Mueller, in fact, left the door wide open for an indictment, practically writing it himself.  There's no evidence whatsoever of any strategy on the part of either President Obama or his DOJ to use this to stop the peaceful transfer of power. That's become a right wing talking point since the Trump indictments, an example of right wing "whataboutism."  

The problem they have with their "Democrats did it too," rhetoric, including what now involves the President and his son in their business dealings in Ukraine, is that the facts don't point to anything illegal, or, for that matter, "seditious."  More than two years have gone by, with scrutiny of Hunter Biden's business details under a microscope, and some unpaid taxes is all that can be found.  They love to point to phone calls and meetings, but pointing to them is one thing, their contents is quite something else.  Trump's phone calls and meetings involve openly seditious, conspiratorial statements and directions.  There's nothing at all implicating the President.  

And good journalists can cover this without letting the false narrative go unchallenged.  

  

Are You Angry Enough Yet?

One Dead, Several Injured in Shooting at Oklahoma High School Football Game 

Ironic, wasn't it, that the anti-woke governor of Florida, the guy whose attacks on teacher classroom autonomy, local school board control, Critical Race Theory, student freedom of conscience and just about every other constitutional right except, of course, unrestricted and unregulated gun ownership, had a statement to make about the tragic and racially motivated shooting in a Dollar General store in Jacksonville, Florida this past week.  It's hard to take his remarks seriously, as it appeared those who heard them not only failed to applaud, but actually booed the guy.  

I don't think I've ever seen a statement made by a governor in a more resistant, unemotional, "do I have to do this?" attitude than Ron Desantis when he was making his obligatory remarks.  We're seeing exactly how unfit and unqualified he is to be the governor of Florida, much less President of the United States, something he will never get to do.  

Florida might be the capital of mass shootings, along with Texas, where going to an outlet mall in the suburbs can be fatal.  But in yet another red state, Oklahoma, a sacred high school football game, a community ritual, was interrupted by gunfire, taking the life of one person and injuring multiple others.  Lots of tongue clicking, head shaking and "thoughts and prayers" with that one, but will it make a difference?  Will Jacksonville?  Not any more than the shooting at Marjorie Stoneman Douglas High School in Ft. Lauderdale, Florida did, or, for that matter, Columbine.  

Even Though This Hits Home for Some Republicans, They Will do Nothing About it

Last spring, a heavily armed shooter entered The Covenant School in Nashville, Tennessee, shooting up the building and leaving three students and three adults, along with himself, dead in its wake.  There were close connections between one of the teachers who was murdered, and the wife of current Tennessee governor Bill Lee, and the school and church where the shooting happened had close ties with the Presbyterian Church in America (PCA) congregation just a few miles away where Tennessee Senator Marsha Blackburn is a member.  It did not matter that this tragedy hit so close to home, both Republican politicians were unmoved, offering nothing to assure anyone this would not happen again.  

That kind of calloused indifference is characteristic of both Governor Lee and Senator Blackburn, wealthy people who really aren't moved by much of anything.  

Football is the social life of most Oklahoma communities.  So a shooting at a game would almost certainly hit close to home, disrupting the social life and threatening the very heart of the community.  I'll wait to see if anything comes of the incident except blaming someone else.  The two schools involved in the game, Del City and Choctaw, are in the Oklahoma City suburbs, both overwhelmingly white and relatively affluent communities, though Choctaw still retains some of its rural characteristics.  The superintendents of both school districts issued a statement that their "thoughts and prayers" were going out to the victims of the shooting.  

Yet Another Racially-Motivated Shooting Encouraged by Today's Political Rhetoric

Neither the governor of Florida, not the former failed President 45 of the United States pulled the trigger in the Jacksonville shooting.  But their rhetoric has encouraged violence, it's been open and clearly stated, and it doesn't matter whether there's a specific statement that prompted it, or whether it was just an overall attitude of racial bigotry that devalues the lives of black people.  Their racist attitude and their obligation to support the gun lobby because of all the money they've taken from them, is to blame.  That's up to we, the people, to rectify.  

Freedom of speech and expression, guaranteed in the constitution, covers despicable, disgusting, and to use a word that the failed President 45 overuses, disgraceful racist bigotry.  They can be racist if they want to, they can say what they want to say, they can wear hoods and robes if they're too ashamed for people to know who they are.  But they can't commit murder, intimidation, inflict physical or psychological harm.  Crimes committed by racists should have separate sentences designed to discourage the practice and make sure these racists are not released back out into society, ever again.  

For the politicians who downplay this, claim it's not happening, or seem indifferent to it, and especially those who want to eliminate the educational objectives designed to fight against systemic racism, the effect of not having any support from its victims should drive the point home.  Systemic racism exists, is a real thing, and can be eliminated with education and time.  If Evangelicals put the energy into fighting against this, instead of letting it invade their congregations and drive their political loyalty, that they did into their opposition to Roe v. Wade, they might have also made a difference.  It's a sin, but not one they want to avoid.  

The Means to "Vote 'Em Out" Exists, Even in Deep Red States

Using Texas as an example, the numbers work for voting out bigots, racists and politicians owned by the gun lobby.  People of color, including the African-American and Latino population, make up 53% of the total.  Non-Hispanic whites make up 39.7%, while Hispanics make up 39.3% of the population.  If you calculate the percentage of votes for Republicans and Democrats among whites, compared to Hispanics, they are almost mirror images of each other, with whites coming in at 67.5% Republican, and Hispanics at 68.5% Democrat, according to exit polls in the 2022 election.  That should offset each other, with African Americans delivering the difference for Democrats.  

But here's another important difference.  Voter registration and participation is much higher among the white population than it is among Hispanics and blacks in Texas.  The percentage of white, Republican voter turnout bested both white Democrats and Hispanic Democrats by more than 15%, with an African American turnout that was slightly lower, the numbers just weren't there.  There's a lot of voter intimidation in Texas, lots of fear, that keeps a percentage of the minority population away from the polls, and from even registering to vote.  If we want change, that's where it has to happen and those disenfranchised voters, mostly minorities, in Texas, Florida and elsewhere, have the wherewithal to change the outcome of elections.  We have to find a way to get the message out, and help by motivating them to vote, and supporting them when they do. 

A Bold Proposal is Exactly What We Need

As an educator myself, I see schools as a means of providing necessary instruction which will give students the facts about systemic racism that they need to be discerning in their voting, and in the other aspects of their life, including bringing down the racial barriers that exist in this country.  When they've been given a chance, they've done exactly that.  I would like to see the federal government get creative, think out of the box and find ways to bypass Florida's restrictions on educational objectives.  Cutting federal funding off sounds drastic, but money talks.  But there's a lot of money for getting the information into the hands of students who are being denied the truth in their school classrooms. 

California Governor Gavin Newsom has come up with a proposal to put gun control into the constitution without violating the second amendment.  Part of that requires interpreting the second to mean exactly what the founders intended, not the unrestricted chaos that we now have, courtesy of the NRA and gun manufacturer money.  The other part rests on raising the minimum age to own a gun to 21, running universal background checks on all purchasers, instituting a waiting period for gun purchases, and restricting civilian access to military weapons that the founders did not have in mind when they wrote the second amendment.  

America fights tyranny at the ballot box, and we have the best equipped, best trained military in the world.  We don't need private citizens with arsenals of arms for any reason, including internal security.  The states take care of all of the weapons needed by the "well ordered militia," or national guard.  

My Dad always used to say that when people get angry enough at politicians, they take action and vote them out.  So, are you angry enough yet?  We got angry and kicked Trump and his swamp rats out.  Are we ready to start on these red states?

 

Texas School Board Member Searches School Library, Convinced it Contained Pornography

 "Vengeance is Mine" Says School Board Member who Snuck into the Library to Look for Pornographic Books

What in the world does one do when reading about ignorance this extreme?  Laugh?  Cry?  Or get angry?  

A school board member in Granbury, Texas, about an hour southwest of Ft. Worth, entered a school library to search for pornographic books she was certain were in there.  According to the report, she lied to the assistant principal who encountered her, told him that the superintendent had instructed her to go there and look.  She spent about an hour in the library.  

So, first of all, what we have here is a liar.  That goes to her lack of character, as far as I am concerned.  And that should disqualify her from the school board.  

Five of the seven board members agree with that, because they voted to censure her.  Several suggested that she resign, and she defiantly refused.  So that sets up an effort to oust her the next time there's an election.   And this is a really great illustration of why no one should ignore or think it's too much bother to vote in local, minor elections.  

And the whole issue brings up this question.  If she was so certain there was pornographic material in the library, did she find any in her search?  Apparently not, and that also makes her a conspiracy theorist.  That goes hand in hand with being a liar.  

Critical Race Theory All Over Again

When Trump floated his undefined and completely inaccurate version of Critical Race Theory, and claimed this was being taught everywhere in public schools, it made fools out of a lot of school board members who sought to eradicate it from the curriculum, and then they found out, the Trump version of it wasn't an accurate description of Critical Race Theory, and it wasn't being taught in the public school system.  

An outside political group attempted to write a resolution to be adopted by the Southern Baptist Convention at its annual meeting, until members of the resolutions committee realized how much of an embarassment it would be to the denomination to pass a resolution against something that didn't exist, at least, not in the form that the resolution stated it did, and changed the wording to reflect a more accurate definition of CRT, along with modifying hysterical, hateful rhetoric that a Christian denomination shouldn't be using.  

Enough people were convinced this faulty version of CRT was real, and was being taught in schools, to get Glen Younkin, a ridiculously unqualified conspiracy theorist, elected Governor of Virginia.  From what I hear, his term in office has convinced most Virginians not to make that mistake again.  

Stand Up for Freedom

It was disappointing to discover that a person similar to the board member in Granbury, Texas had been elected to our local school board on the same platform.  There are 45,690 people in the school district where I live in suburban Chicago.  A grand total of 930 registered voters cast ballots in the school board election.  I wonder how many of those were members of the megachurch to which this board member belongs, with a bellowing, far right wing fundamentalist pastor.  When I voted, I was the only person in the room.  

So I determined, when some of this nutcase stuff began being reported in the board meetings, to start going to them.  I don't have children in school, but I thought it might be a good idea to find out if it is possible for citizens to speak.  And it is.  But when the Critical Race Theory issue came up, I had to get in line to get a spot to address it in the meeting.  I wondered how many of the nearly 30 people who showed up were individuals who regretted not voting, because they gave the school board an earful, and they leaned into this particular member like nobody's business.  

In the course of the discussion, it was discovered that this board member had not even looked at a single curriculum map belonging to the district.  How could they know what was being taught if they hadn't bothered to review the district's curriculum objectives?  

People, this is the kind of ignorance we are dealing with here.  

Good for the Board Members who Voted for Censure

The board members who voted to censure this woman for her unethical actions, unfounded accusations, failure to abide by school district policy and for lying about it did a good thing.  In a small, Texas town in a conservative part of the state, censorship and bullying people who don't think and act like the white majority of the population is commonplace.  I've lived in three small towns in Texas, and I can provide first hand accounts of racism, bigotry, bullying and even violence committed by the people who sit in the church pews listening to sermons on Sunday.  They know neither the constitution, nor the Bible.  

But the best thing we can do is vote.  Always be registered, always vote.  I looked it up, and found the turnout in the school board election where this woman was elected was just under 12% of the registered voters in the school district.  And one of the local newspaper articles called that "high."  

There is no excuse for not voting, and when we don't, this creeping fascist authoritarianism wins.

A Vote for Cornell West is a Vote for Trump

Cornell West is Also Running for President 

Cornell West has an outstanding liberal resume.  A graduate of Harvard University, with a B.A. and Princeton University, with an M.A. and a Ph.D, the first black to earn a Ph.D. in philosophy, he taught at both institutions, and currently is the Dietrich Boenhoffer Professor of Philosophy and Christian Practice at Union Theological Seminary.  I've read several of his books, heard him speak on more than one occasion and I find little in the statement made in this piece in Baptist News Global with which I disagree.  

Except that he doesn't seem to see himself running for President on the Green Party ticket is only going to benefit whomever the Republican party nominates, including Trump.  And if Trump wins again, Cornell West, everything he stands for and everything he is running to achieve, will become a lost cause.  West himself would very likely become a target of Trump's intended and publicly announced revenge.  

Somebody please explain to me why American liberals keep doing this to ourselves?  

In the political atmosphere that we have in this country right now, the best thing the Democratic party can do is to become as pro-active as its principles will allow in stamping out third party candidacies that have the potential to take away voters from Joe Biden's re-election effort.  I'm not familiar enough with all of the behind-the-scenes negotiation and work that gets done in this area, if there actually is anything like that going on, but there's never been a time that Democrats needed a more united front than they do now.  And one of the ways of doing that is to set aside whatever differences or nuances or messaging that attracts people like Cornell West out of the party, and make a place to include them and their supporters.  

Didn't we learn our lesson in 2016, when Jill Stein drew off just enough votes on the far left in at least three states to cost Hillary Clinton the election?  

After seeing recent polling data, which is probably not significantly accurate at this point, that the No Labels party has the potential to draw off more GOP votes than Democratic ones, and seeing their agenda and what they want to achieve, there's a strong message there for either major party to pick up and use if they want to do it.  The Republicans do not seem to be capable of being a political party any more, they're much more of a personality cult and issues are well beyond their grasp.  The names being thrown around as potential "No Labels" candidates would ciphon off a lot of GOP votes from Trump, and unknown number since it seems like half the party is looking for a way out of their nightmare.  

But the Green Party is far left.  That's our territory, and those people are potential Democratic voters.  I'm a regular, monthly contributor to both the DNC and the Biden campaign.  Shouldn't I be able to expect that the party is doing something to avoid a repeat 2016 election disaster?  

Other than abolishing the electoral college, something that I am completely in favor of doing, but which isn't going to happen anytime soon, as long as that's the way we elect a President, Democrats must figure out how to maximize the size of the party, keep the majority of Independent voters we have won over because of their adverse reaction to Trumpism, and make sure the Green Party's potential supporters know that voting for their own candidate will not lead to their ability to achieve their agenda, but will be a futile attempt which will result in their getting absolutely nothing in return for their work.  

An Old Ideology in a New Setting: Christian Nationalism and White Supremacy in Current American Politics

Robert P. Jones: Christian Nationalism is a Moral and Spiritual "Cancer" Eating at the Heart and Soul of the American Church

"If there is any hope that Christianity is going to find its way to health in this country, it's only going to be by white Christian churches facing the root causes of its ill health, which includes its complicity in the idea that the entire continent was a divinely promised land for exploitation by European Christians--by white Christians."--  Robert P. Jones, Author of The Hidden Roots of White Supremacy and the Path to a Shared American Future.

One of the core doctrines of conservative, Evangelical Christianity is the belief that the Bible, the sixty-six books of the Protestant Bible sans the apocrypha, is the sole authority for doctrine, theology and practice of the Christian faith.  The Old Testament is included because it is referenced so many times by the writers of the New Testament, and it is important to the context of Christianity because of that.  But in Christian theology, it is the gospel of Jesus Christ, which is presented in the four gospel accounts in the New Testament record, along with his words, that becomes the interpretive criterion for all of the rest of the Bible.  

Jesus not only clarified the places where the institutional religion of his time, the Judaism practiced in Palestine under Roman rule, had departed from its own scriptural principles and practices, but he completely re-interpreted faith in God, noting that the old covenant was giving way to a new covenant that he would establish.  Much of what Jesus taught and preached included the phrase, "You have heard that it was said," followed by what people commonly believed, but he would add a new intepretation to the concept by saying, "But I say to you...."  That got him into trouble with the religious establishment in Jerusalem, who saw him as a threat.  

The gospel writer and apostle, Matthew, records Jesus as saying, "Do not think that I have come to abolish the law and the prophets: I have come not to abolish, but to fulfill."  That was a remarkable statement which set the religious leaders in the Sanhedrin on their ears, and got them plotting his death.  In one short sentence, Jesus is saying that he is the fulfillment of prophecy, meaning that he was declaring himself to be the Messiah, promised in the Old Testament.  In fulfilling both prophecy and law, Jesus was claiming for himself the authority given to him as God in the flesh, and to the Messiah in accordance with Old Testament prophecy.  

There is no Christian "Political Theocracy" Comparable to the Israel of the Old Testament

Jesus intended for Christians to be gathered into "ecclesia," or churches, declaring to the high priest and the Sanhedrin after his arrest, that his Kingdom was not an earthly one, but a spiritual one.  The Christian authors of the New Testament brought down the racial, ethnic and religious barriers that existed, opening the church up to receive converts who were not Jews.  Among the first of the "gentile" converts to Christianity were the Samaritans in the village of Sychar, converted when Jesus encountered them while travelling through Samaria, instead of around it like most Jews did.  

There is no instruction, no teaching, no doctrine or theology, and no prophetic word anywhere in the New Testament that remotely suggests God engaging in a covenant relationship with a country, because some of its citizens, a majority of them in our case, have either converted to Christian faith or are culturally identified by it.  To interpret the Old Testament promises to Israel, which was, and which remains, the only covenant relationship God ever initiated with a nation, as being applicable to any other place, is an inaccurate and incorrect interpretation of scripture.  The "kingdom" or "nation" that is the fulfillment of the Abrahamic Covenant in the Old Testament, through Jesus, is the universal Christian church.  

Christian Nationalism Rests on a Faulty Interpretation of the Bible 

Jones says that white supremacy, and the idea that Christians were the "chosen people" originated with the Vatican and the 15th century "Doctrine of Discovery."  This was the church's attempt to "evangelize" the rest of the world, and gave its moral and religious authority to support of colonial domination of people in areas all around the world by western European powers.  In America, combined with frontier revivalism and the lack of trained clergy to pastor churches, it developed into a theology known as "Anglo-Israelism," equating white people with the Israelites, and extending the Old Testament's Abrahamic Covenant to justify the subjugation of native Americans and the enslavement of Africans, both of whom were considered inferior people, and savages, in the same way the Old Testament described the Israelite subjugation of the Cananite people in Palestine following their exodus from Egypt.  

The problem with this perspective, which has morphed into several variations of white, Christian nationalism that seem to be experiencing revival today, is that it rests entirely on a flawed, distorted, erroneous interpretation of the Bible.  And it is dangerous, because when people think they are God's chosen, they believe they are agents of God's judgment against those he has deemed to be "inferior" people.  American history is full of such brutality, according to Jones, and he lists as examples the murder of Emmett Till, the mistreatment, disenfranchisement and murder of native Americans in events like the Trail of Tears, the Tulsa Race Riot, the lynchings and burnings of Jim Crow.  All of this is tied to the influence of the Doctrine of Discovery.  These are things that were done by white Christians who have distorted and twisted the meaning of their only source of faith and practice, the Bible. 

Nowhere in the gospel of Jesus Christ, which is the interpretive criterion for the rest of the Bible, is anything like this justified or endorsed by God.  The Christian gospel broke down the religious, racial and ethnic exclusion practiced under the Old Covenant, and reached out to people of all races from the very beginning.  Jesus made it crystal clear that Christians are to love their enemies, and pray for those who oppose them, not wipe them out, burn their homes and exile them a thousand miles away.  He taught his followers to turn the other cheek when confronted with violence, to love their neighbor as themselves, to forgive without being asked, up to 490 times, if necessary.  

In defining the Christian gospel as the new covenant, in addition to his use of the phrase "You have heard that it was said, but I say to you," there is a lot of direct instruction and symbolic acts which took place to show the passing of the old covenant and its replacement by the new.  Jesus brought outcasts, like lepers, and in at least one case, a prostitute, back into society.  Forgiveness of sin and conversion was changed from the sacrifice rituals of the temple to a personal act of conviction, repentance, and an individual faith of conscience.  Jesus identified the churches which were forming as the Kingdom of God, language previously reserved for Israel under the Abrahamic covenant.  He linked the existence of the church to specific prophecies from the Old Testament that had been previously interpreted as applying to some future political re-establishment of Israel, something his Messiahship permitted him to do.  The worship of God moved from a Temple ritual to the local church.  

Ultimately, as the Jewish religious rulers grew more and more angry over Roman rule, and over frustration that no Messiah had appeared, in their mind and vision, to overthrow their polirical rule, they decided to rebel against Roman rule.  The result was that in 70 AD, the last remaining symbol of the old covenant, and the last piece of the Israelite theocracy, was destroyed.  It hasn't been rebuilt..  

Christian Nationalism Exists Because of Ignorance

Several years ago, I attended a doctrine and theology conference sponsored at a church in Texas.  A local minister's alliance of mostly African American pastors did this annually to help people get a better grip on interpreting the Bible, and understanding the context and meaning of a text they claimed to be without error, infallible, and the "sole authority for faith and practice." "If that's the case," this pastor once said, "then why do so many people believe so many things that are not found in the Bible, and leave out believing in so many things that are?"

One of the breakouts focused on all of the scriptures, misinterpreted and taken out of context, that had been used to justify not only the enslavement of Africans, but also the subjugation of native Americans and there were references to sermons preached, articles written and even books published justifying war, including what was passed off as a "Christian" defense of the bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki.  I knew that stuff existed, but still, I was stunned to see the evidence of its having been preached from pulpits of churches in Sunday services.  

Why It's So Hard to Eradicate This Ideology

There's a method of repression of freedom of conscience and expression that exists inside most conservative churches and denominations, not just in the United States, but around the world, that makes dissent a very costly and traumatic experience for those who dare to undertake it.  It's a mechanism that traps people inside a closed community and makes them dependent on it for their livlihood, and in some cases, to protect their family and keep them together.  

In waging their culture war, Christian values get tossed out the window.  I've seen people lose their jobs because someone used their position, or a friendship, or gossip and innuendo, to attack a dissenter.  I've seen divorce happen because a false accusation became a weapon against dissent.  I've seen groups of people in churches organize boycotts of the offering plate to force leadership to dismiss a pastor or minister because he doesn't get on their political bandwagon.  Roots and relationships go deep, and when you have people who believe they are engaged in a righteous cause for God, and he is holding their coat-tails and cheering them on, they will stop at nothing to prevent the truth from being told.  

Recently, a friend of mine was asked to pray at the beginning of a church potluck on the fourth of July.  I know him well, he has a master's degree, working on a doctorate, has a clear understanding of politics and history and is the superintendent of a school district.  He referenced "Christian America" and "a nation founded on Christian principles" in his prayer.  I was concerned enough to ask him when I had a chance to say something and his response was, "job security."  And I get that.  

When all the conspiracy theories about Critical Race Theory popped up a few years ago, they had an angry group of parents show up at one of their board meetings, complaining about it and threatening action if they didn't stop teaching it "right now!"  Pointing out that there were no objectives related to CRT in their district curriculum was not enough.  Finally, the board chair asked the parent leading the group to cite a specific example of CRT that they could point out and where, how and by whom was it being taught.  They didn't have one.  Nor could they find a single example in either the state curriculum objectives, or the districts curriculum maps when they were asked to produce one.  That did not stop the threats.  

"It's Like Living With Cancer and Thinking That's Normal" 

"Christianity in this country, particularly white Christianity, is in a crisis moment and has been for some time.  The symptoms of it are undeniable," says Jones.  "It's like living with cancer and thinking cancer is normal, while in fact the disease is destroying your body."  

The irony of this is that Christianity in America has enjoyed unprecedented growth, experienced revivals and has prospered in a way that the church hasn't experienced throughout its history because of the constitutional guarantee of religious liberty and freedom of conscience.  And yet, within its ranks is an aberrant, false doctrine, based on error produced by ignorance, that threatens the very democracy which allows it to exist in freedom.  There's no instance in world history where the church, linked to a civil government, has prospered, or has not been corrupted by the influences of politics.  We're already seeing the effects of that now.  

According to recent research, the decline in attendance and membership among Evangelical churches and denominations which began in the early part of the 21st century has steadily increased.  Major denominations, like the Southern Baptist Convention and the Assemblies of God, are reporting membership losses and attendance declines in excess of 3% per year.  Southern Baptist membership has dropped by just over 3 million since 2006, almost 2 million of that coming since 2015.  Polling data from Gallup and information from the 2010 and 2020 census show that the number of people self-identifying as Evangelicals, or who attend a church that identifies as Evangelical has dropped 16% in a decade.  Since 2020, the decline has reached 7%.  

This isn't going to go away.  But it is being challenged, and it can be prevented from destroying democracy and shredding the constitutional right to religious liberty and freedom of conscience.  According to Jones, awareness of the danger and the error, and active efforts to challenge deep rooted white supremacy and Christian nationalism are all effective ways to make sure that error is exposed and freedom is preserved. Some Evangelicals have noticed the not-so-subtle effort to distort, or dismiss, parts of the Christian gospel that don't fit the political agenda of the far right.  

The Signal Press writes about these topics to create awareness and provide perspective, especially for readers who do not have a background in Christian faith, or understand all of the nuances and cultural points of Evangelicalism.  We support the Constitution, the democratic principles on which this country was founded, and the religious liberty and freedom of conscience that it provides.  We have seen the damage done in the past when bigotry and ignorance have power and control.  If we don't pay attention and be diligent, we give this evil an opportunity.  

Hey, Republican Candidates! Here's How to Get My Vote

For whatever reason, I decided to tune in to the Republican party's Presidential candidate debate last night out of curiosity to see if there's anything they'd say, or can say, to change the disastrous direction the party has gone since the failed 45th President has been its political leader.  There are quite a few candidates still trying to convince voters to support them rather than the former failed President, and I thought there might be an outside chance that one of them might be able to articulate a vision for the country that would be worth considering.  

I didn't hear anything at all that would get even the most remote consideration of my vote.  This was, perhaps, the single most disconnected, disinterested, unimaginative, draconian gathering of politicians that I have ever seen.  They demonstrated zero interest or initiative in trying to get the votes of their fellow Republicans, much less any other voters.  If that group of candidates is the cream of the crop then the GOP is in deep weeds.  

It would be difficult for a Republican candidate to get my vote, I admit, because their party is so far to the right of where I am politically, that they have nothing to offer than interests me.  So if they happen to stumble on this blog, perhaps I can help put them where most of us average, everyday, common people live, work and spend out money.  I'm not hard to please.  Give it some thought and get back to me.  Here's my list...

Admit Trump lied, instigated the January 6th insurrection, and is guilty of attempting to overturn a legitimate election.  Make a public declaration that the 2020 election was legitimate and secure and that Biden won.  

I honestly don't believe there was a single person on that stage last night who actually believes the 2020 election was "stolen" from Donald Trump. They, along with the executives at Fox News who emailed their disgust with Trump and his lies, know the truth. What's wrapped up in their refusal to say it, and make it part of their campaign is courage, or their lack of it is their lack of courage and integrity.  And that's why I wouldn't vote for any of them.  Those are qualities which are foreign to them.  

Well, there's Chris Christie.  An opportunist who sticks his finger up to see which way the wind is blowing, Christie has discerned that Trump doesn't have the nationwide support he will need to win and has positioned himself to get his attention by beating up on the Donald.  He, too, has known this all along but it didn't stop him from sucking up to the mendacious bully when he thought it would give him a boost.  So he wouldn't ever get my vote either.  But it is kind of fun to watch, because he clearly annoys Trump and gets under his skin.  

So come out and say that Trump lied, that he should be prosecuted for using violence to try and overturn a legitimate election, that he incited the riot on January 6th for his own purposes, and that he is responsible for the highly illegal attempt to overturn the legitimate election with a "fake electors" scheme.  Tell your supporters, however few they may be, that Trump should go to prison for this and should not be eligible to run for office and that you are supporting party efforts to keep him off the ballot.  

Then, we'll see. OK? 

The NATO alliance is the cornerstone of all American foreign policy so if you declare your support for America's role in NATO, are 100% supportive of our efforts to keep Ukraine free, refuse to cuddle up with dictators like Kim Jong Un, and understand that Putin is an anti-American, fascist dictator, then that's a condition of my support.

Any candidate who sees American foreign policy resting on an unshakeable alliance with NATO has my vote.  So do those who believe that the freedom of conscience Ukraine is fighting for is worth our wholehearted support and that it should culminate in their NATO membership is on the right track as far as I am concerned.  There was a little bit of that last night, in response to the hateful comments of one of the candidates, and the yawns of a few others.  

This is America's leadership in the world and we are a democracy, always have been and always will be.  We do not support dictators, oligarchs and anti-American, anti-democratic demagogues.  And we need to lead by example.  

The financial interests of Americans like me had better be your priority! 

I'm headed quickly to social security and it is long past time to increase these benefits and make this program work again.  I'm tired of being told I can't take prescription medication because it costs me $500 for a month's supply.  I'm tired of seeing people I know struggle with a decision to go out to eat a couple times a month, or fill their gas tank.  I'm tired of corporate greed snatching profits out of their worker's hands, those who actually earned the profit for them, and I'm tired of attempts to disband and diminish the influence of labor unions, who are the backbone of the labor force. 

And how about supporting a national minimum wage of $15 an hour, and with the inflation we've experienced, take that on up to $17?  If people are willing to work, they should earn a living wage. 

Be committed to making the tax system fair.  

By fair, I mean the wealthy paying the same tax rate I do, or, given the fact that they earn their wealth because of the nation's infrastructure, security and position in the world, they should pay a higher rate to cover the costs for those things that they generate, which are higher than what it costs to protect and help the rest of us be prosperous.  

Get away from the culture wars, stop trying to dictate matters of conscience and support equal protection under law.  In other words, be woke.  

As Thomas Jefferson once said, it made no difference to him if his neighbor believed in many gods or in no got, it neither picked his pocket nor broke his leg.  Any loss of personal freedom is a danger to everyone, including the advocates of removing the personal freedom of others.  

Where's the tyranny experienced by those who claim they want to "take this country back."  How is it that anything done by the political left takes away any of their freedom or personal rights?  I am not going to vote for a candidate who thinks their American vision is better than my American vision and wants to impose theirs on everyone else.  

Finish the health care reform started by President Obama. 

Whatever it is called, Medicare for all, socialized medicine, a single payer, government operated health care payment system and health care system, that's what I want.  Canada has one, and all the bugaboos raised by Americans who are opposed to that kind of system are present in our health care system too, in many cases much worse than in Canada, and we pay double for the privilege of not being able to get it.  Obamacare was a great start, but he wanted more and so do I.  If we can spend $7 trillion in four years of a presidential term, a huge chunk of that in tax cuts for the wealthy, we can surely find a way to operate a decent, national health care system. 

And since supply and demand is not how the pharmaceutical system operates, I'd just prefer for the government to take that over, too.  There's a lot of profiteering on pain and suffering, and it's the government's responsibility to protect its citizens from that.  

None of the GOP candidates on that debate stage would ever get my vote.  

No Republican could meet these conditions and do these things, not a single one.  They'd have to become an independent or join the Democratic party.  None of those candidates on the debate stage would come close.  And just for the record, Chris Christie was an enabler of the failed 45th President for a long time before he became a critic.  He'd never go here, anyway.  

There is, in fact, just one person now running for President who meets my criteria and that candidate is Joe Biden.  

Makes it kind of simple, huh? 

Newsweek Misses the Point on the Democrats and the 14th Amendment

 Newsweek Calls 14th Amendment Appeals "Democrats Hail Mary"

Newsweek has never been anything more than a weekly national newspaper in magazine form.  Even when I was studying journalism in college, a long time ago, it was not considered a career destination by anyone who took working in the media seriously.  And it's not hard to see why. 

Democrats are obviously looking for ways to prevent the former failed President 45 from getting back into the White House.  That's politics, folks.  And within the limits the party imposes on itself when it comes to avoiding using conspiracy theories, sticking with facts, emphasizing policy, thinking rationally and logically and comparing what the party offers to the people in the way of government leadership as opposed to what the other party offers, we do a good job.  

We do not think like, or act like Republicans.  Maybe sometimes a little bit more of a drammatic flair like this would be a good thing.  But it's not the Democrats who are speculating about the use of the 14th amendment, nor are the Democrats using the indictments and potential trials and verdicts as a plan to keep Trump from the Presidency.  The Democrats' plan is very, very simple.  It is getting behind Joe Biden's re-election campaign, supporting it, helping fund it, and running to win back the White House in 2024 against whomever the GOP nominates.  That's the Democratic party plan.  Everything else is just media speculation.  

Appealing to the 14th Amendments is Not the Democrats' "Hail Mary" Plan

The Newsweek article is actually a pick-up of an citation by Jonathan Turley in The Hill, who is responding to recent comments by a variety of legal experts who have appeared on various media outlets to answer questions and discuss the 14th amendment possibilities related to Trump against the backdrop of his large lead in polls among potential Republican primary voters.  Turley, a law professor at George Washington University, tries to connect these scattered legal opinions to Democratic party strategy to keep Trump out of the White House by arguing that the charges against Trump related to January 6th wouldn't make him subject to the 14th amendment, even if he is found guilty.  The legal experts with whom he disagrees here would seem to be Republican, and cite facts to support their contention.

But the discussion isn't part of any Democratic party plan.  Turley's criticism focuses on William Baude and Michael Paulsen, law professors at the University of Chicago and St Thomas University, of the conservative Federalist Society.  They've been cited in the media recently, claiming that the charges against Trump are relevant to the 14th amendment, and do indeed disqualify him from elected office, if he is convicted.  Their opinion is supported by Lawrence Tribe, emeritus professor of constitutional law from Harvard, who has pointed out exactly how the 14th amendment would apply in this case.  

Turley's assertion that Trump did nothing more than sulk in the Oval Office during the insurrection ignores a lot of facts.  And it undermines the credibility of his assertion by identifying his own biased opinion.  Tribe, who is perhaps the leading expert in the country on constitutional law, carries a lot more credibility, and focuses on a lot more of the details of Trump's activity on January 6th which Turley more or less ignores.  If there are convictions in this case, I'm sure there will be consideration of applying the 14th amendment, since the Constitution is the law of the land. 

No doubt there are Democrats who, with their grasp and understanding of how the Constitution works, are thinking about what applying the 14th amendment to Trump might happen.  If we are to take the Constitution seriously, and it has this provision, a product of the Civil War, in place to protect the government of the United States from seditious insurrection, which is exactly what the Civil War was, then it should be followed when a situation arises that requires its application.  And this situation certainly appears to fit the bill.  

 An Argument in a Vacuum 

The Newsweek piece is written from the perspective that Trump would not be facing trials for his organizing and conducting the January 6th insurrection, the fake elector scheme, the attempted election fraud in Georgia by using his office to pressure the secretary of state into "finding" votes that didn't exist, if he weren't the GOP front runner for the presidential nomination, something the writer mentions more than once.  They've done a good job of taking up Republican talking points to avoid any responsibility being required for breaking the law.  And that's more or less taking the Republican, Conservative and Evangelical Christian position that a privileged person doesn't need to be under the enforcement of the law if they are in leadership.  

But that's a political opinion, something newsmagazines like Newsweek are professionally supposed to avoid.  The political affiliation of both prosecution and defendant is irrelevant here.  Evidence strongly suggests that Trump broke the law, and regardless of whether he is running for President or playing golf at Bedminster, this is about holding a lawbreaker accountable, like every other American would be.  And if Trump weren't a candidate for the GOP nomination, he would still be subject to the investigation, the grand jury indictments, and would still be brought to trial.  Congress launched their investigation long before Trump announced he would run again.  

Of course, if I were President Biden, I'd certainly be interested in observing how this was going.  If I were a Democrat in a swing district, I'd be interested.  But the lack of any citation from a Democrat within the party's governing structure to support this contention is evidence that this is not an election strategy of the Democratic party.  Not by a long shot.  

And Then There's This

I had to laugh, watching a well-known and once credible Sunday news host proclaim, after the indictments were handed down in the January 6th investigation, that Trump's approval numbers and poll numbers among Republican voters against the other candidates in the GOP Presidential field were unchanged following the indictments.  There, on the screen, was the poll he was using, a Quinnipiac poll that was taken three days prior to the indictments.  This isn't some first year journalist just out of college making the mistake of thinking he was doing his job by finding a poll tu support the contention as fact.  This was an experienced journalist who knows how to manipulate a story and make people believe what amounts to political propaganda.  

And, in fact, Trump's poll numbers among Republicans haven't moved very much, if at all, except in New Hampshire, where one poll showed him just one point ahead of Desantis following the Janiary 6th indictments.  But that's not where to look to see whether the indictments are hurting him politically.  There's a big difference between the needle not moving much among the mindless, ignorant, and blind Republicans, and the voters he really needs to win the Presidency, which would include independents, and the moderate slice of his own party, the 15% of Republicans who now say they won't support Trump at all under any circumstances.  

In several polls, according to Five Thirty Eight, his disapproval rating average, whatever they call it, the percentage of voters who say they will not vote for Trump, has bumped up to 67% from 61% prior to the indictments.  It's been as low as 58% since he left office.  The percentage of independents who do not approve of the orange headed buffoon is 57%.  The Washington Post has a poll out showing that if Manchin and Huntsman are the "No Labels" candidates, Biden's lead over Trump increases.  This is all post-indictment data.  This news is still sinking in and there's plenty of evidence that it is shaking a lot of Republicans out of their fog, and waking them up to the reality that their party sits on the brink of a disaster.  

To be frank, I'm really not convinced Trump has enough support to win the GOP nomination, especially as the field narrows down quickly.  They have a qurky way of allocating delegates to the nominating convention.  Most Republicans won't be critical of him openly, because they fear Maga retribution, but there are some powerful Republicans who are working pretty hard to keep him from winning the nomination.  I'll be curious to see what they come up with, and what he does if it appears he's not going to have enough convention support to win the nomination.  

And, thanks to Lawrence Tribe, not to Newsweek, I'll be waiting to see, when he is convicted, exactly how the 14th amendment is applied.

No Wonder it Takes Courts Years to Make Decisions

 Arizona Attorney Continues to Seek to Overturn 2022 Mid Term Election

From my own personal perspective regarding legal matters, which is informed but not expert, I am failing to understand why the court's time can continue to be effectively wasted on matters where evidence was submitted, decisions on the legality of whatever was to be decided has been made, fairness was established and those involved become prepared to live with the conclusions.  Continuing to file cases, when multiple courts with multiple judges have looked at a matter from every possible angle and it is clear that the prior decisions were correct, is more than a waste of time.  It's a waste of taxpayer dollars.  The fact that supporters of a Republican candidate for governor of Arizona continue to do this not only underlines their hypocrisy, it sends a very clear message that the candidate was not competent or capable of performing the duties of the office they were seeking, and the voters made the right choice by rejecting their candidacy. 

Kari Lake lost.  That is a fact that is now very well established by going over and over and over to courts, confirming that every ballot counted, that there was no fraud, that the few mistakes that may have been made will not change the outcome of the election, or even change any actual votes, and by repreated audits and checking of all possible avenues by which fraud could have been committed.  Arizona owes a debt of gratitude to Ms. Lake for her efforts, which proved, beyond the shadow of any doubt that the ability of Maricopa County in particular, to count its ballots with virtually 100% accuracy, is an established fact.  She and her supporters have filed enough lawsuits and made the county prove its case, which it has done flawlessly, for so many times that she eventually got sanctioned for the problems she created.  

In fact, the meticulous accuracy of Maricopa County's election board has been so credibly affirmed by Lake and her supporters and their accusations, that it will have a bearing on any potential case involving the fake elector plot in Arizona relate to the 2020 election.  

What have we learned from all of Lake's ridiculous waste of taxpayer dollars and her own donated campaign funds? 

We know that election reports from the state of Arizona are flawlessly accurate and reflect the will of the voters, down to literally the last ballot.  The comedy of errors known as the Cyber Ninjas helped point this out in 2020, when they spectacularly failed to prove allegations of election fraud out of the mess they made.  The Lake campaign now joins them in the Loser's Hall of Shame, for wasting taxpayer dollars while affirming the accuracy and fairness of Arizona elections, and particularly ballot counts in Maricopa County, which have switched from red to blue over the last two election cycles, also flipping the state.  

It has made several election officials in Arizona, including newly appointed Cochise County elections supervisor Bob Bartelsmeyer, and two county supervisors, Peggy Judd and Tom Crosby, look very foolish and wasteful for spreading election fraud conspiracy theories and trying to make hand-counting of ballots the manner in which election results are tabulated, because they don't trust the machines.  Oh, the election supervisor who ran elections flawlessly in Cochise County for over thirty years, Lisa Marra, is now the Deputy Director of Elections for Arizona Secretary of State Adrian Fontes.  

Along with all of the fraudulent Trump claims of rigged elections, what Lake has done has emphasized the fact that American elections are, in fact, accurate and secure, that if there is cheating, or fraud, it will be caught and will not affect the outcome of an election and the ballot counts will be flawlessly accurate, with results that can be completely trusted to reflect the will of the people.  Though it has taken these frivilous lawsuits to make the point, tying up the court's time that could be spent on other matters should involve passing some of the cost on to the plaintiffs who knew they didn't have a case because they had no evidence in the first place.  Lake's actions prove she was never fit for office.  

Laws need to be changed, especially with regard to election challenges.  Give a candidate who is delusional and can't handle a loss one chance in court, after that, they pay for the case filings and wait to have their case heard like everyone else.   

I Want to Be This Optimistic

Salon: Folks the Wait was Worth it, Donald Trump is Going to Prison 

Thank you for the optimism, Brian Karem.  It is encouraging to read such an upbeat piece.  I share some of the optimism of this piece, and I would be really happy if it all turns out this way.  There are always naysayers and Debbie Downers, right?  And they turned out to be wrong about whether or not he was ever going to be indicted.  Through all the long wait, while the Department of Justice was admittedly and deliberately dragging its feet, after being practically handed its case and evidence by Congress, we finally saw the indictments.  

I expected that the indictments in Fulton County, Georgia would take longer.  They had to gather evidence, question witnesses and operate with a governor and secretary of state who are Republicans, and who, in spite of their being treated as Trump enemies, still can't pull away from partisan loyalty or be realistic and rational enough to understand that standing up for a free and fair election, whihc is the cornerstone of democracy and the bedrock of American patriotism, would be the right thing to do. 

Why I Share at Least Some of This Optimism 

My optimism is supported by the competence of the prosecution.  Clearly, Jack Smith and Fani Willis know exactly what they are doing, and at least two of the judges appear to understand the need to expidite these trials, in part to protect people from potential violence.  Trump himself, with his inability to keep his mouth shut, is going to help guarantee that these trial dates are expitited, and happen well before the 2024 election.

It's possible, but not likely, that a rogue juror could throw a monkey wrench in all of this.  Not likely, I think, because the prosecution has the resources to check the backgrounds of potential jurors, including things like social media posts, and the expertise to tell whether they're getting someone honest or not.  Attempts to intimidate, bribe or otherwise tamper with potential jurors, which are already happening and already being handled, will ensure that these trials are secure and completely fair based on the evidence.  Those attempts will only make a conviction more certain. 

There are multiple witnesses, and mountains of damning evidence.  The Congressional investigation, which, along with public pressure, very likely prompted the Justice Department's appointment of a special prosecutor and got the ball rolling on the January 6th indictments, was anything but a partisan witch-hunt, and it presented an overwhelming amount of irrefutable evidence, much of it from Republican sources. The only disappointment in the January 6th indictments was the fact that the Justice Department took so long to get a special prosecutor and convene a grand jury, to which they admitted, but offered no explanation.  

I'm almost disappointed that Trump cancelled his Monday press conference which would have been the "big reveal" of his alleged "irrefutable" evidence of election fraud in Georgia.  It's kind of funny that we haven't seen this "evidence" until now, after he's been indicted himself. Up to this point, their definition of "irrefutable evidence" has been nothing more than conspiracy theories and speculation without any factual evidence to show that anything actually occurred.  Trump apparently thinks that the jury will be made up of people who are just as ignorant of the way elections are conducted and ballots counted and accounted for as his own followers appear to be.  The fact that his lawyers got him to back off is an indication that they are aware at how bad things look for them.  

But I will interject a measure of caution with my optimism.  The system has held up so far against this onslaught of conspiracy theories and lies, and I don't have any reason to believe it won't continue to do so.  But this has created the sharpest political divisiveness that I've seen in my lifetime in this country.  And the pressure that creates can cause distored thinking when it comes to our sense of right and wrong.  Continuous probing and pushing often leads to the discovery of weak links, and that's always a danger in situations like this.  Our past history on the rule of law is not 100% favorable when it comes to rich, powerful defendants.  

Confidence in the Will of the People Through the Ballot Box

The divisive nature of American politics right now is bringing incredible pressure to bear on the electorate.  When it comes to choosing a President, and selecting the members of the House of Representatives, our democracy has some screwy quirks that open the door to failure in elections that truly represent the will of the people.  If it weren't for unenforced laws and court orders regarding gerrymandering, and the antiquated monstrosity of the electoral college, there never would have been a Trump.  And the shrill voices of screechers like Matt Gaetz, Marjorie Taylor Greene, Lauren Boebert and other extremist radicals would be minor annoyances in the far distance.  

In spite of tilting the playing field in their direction, the voters are swinging back the other way.  Four years of a Trump Presidency resulted in an eight million vote victory for Joe Biden, and the after effects of Trump were felt in the mid-term elections, the worst performance for the party not in power in the White House in decades.  What's happened since then, including a series of special elections and ballot initiatives, has gone almost completely to the left.  

Media coverage keeps focusing on polling data which they say isn't really moving as a result of all of these indictments. But on two different occasions, following the Mar-a-Lago indictments and then again after the January 6th indictments came down, the polling data cited by at least two networks, CNN and CBS, was from dates too soon to have factored in the effects of the indictments.  The more recent data shows a significant majority of voters favoring prosecuting the former failed President, an increasing percentage of voters saying they do not approve of him and definitely will not vote for him.  Both of those figures are now well into the upper 60% range in credible, higher rated polls.  

It's anecdotal, but I have noticed much less discussion of politics and much less mention of anything conservative, right wing, or "Trumpie" from the conservatives in my workplace and who I can still see and with whom I still interact on social media.  There's one in particular, the son of a prominent, well-known, late Baptist pastor and author, who blogs mostly on theology and doctrine, but occasionally gets into politics, who recently declared he would not be supporting Trump for the GOP nomination.  I'm not really surprised that he's announced this publicly, since he was never really openly supported Trump and I suspect he never voted for him.  

What surprised me was that the comments from those who follow him overwhelmingly echoed and supported his announcement.  Back around the mid-term elections, that wasn't the case.  The discussion has clearly shifted.  Most of those who comment on his site are obviously Republican and Evangelical.  The number of Biden supporters hasn't grown by much, though I've seen a few more positive posts that are left without attacks or comments from conservatives. But what has clearly changed is that Trump support is evaporating, and the shift has been to discussions about which GOP candidate currently in the race is the best to support, and the most likely to win.  

That's not hard, scientific polling data, but it is certainly evidence of a shift in thinking that has been obviously affected by these indictments.  It is an indication that some conservative Republicans are thinking that if their party wants to have a chance to win the White House, someone other than Trump needs to be its nominee.  

With the Media Reporting we Get Now, Something Positive is a Good Thing

Salon is, by their own admission, a tabloid style presentation of opinion on a limited range of topics.  What I like about their political writers in particular is that they don't hold anything back and their approach to dealing with the far right is every bit as confrontational and "in your face" as the stuff that the far right puts out.  It uses facts for credibility, and for shock values, which is somewhat different from the conspiracy theories and speculative outcomes of far right propaganda.  On days when I have my doubts, it's what I want to read.  I include a few links and references here, depending on the subject matter, because I have some conservative readers who argue with me via email, or occasionally in the comments, and they are an accurate source.  

I really want to believe that justice will be done and that the work of preserving and protecting American democracy is achieving its ends.  I'd really like for us all to wake up one morning and this nightmare is over, we've learned from our mistakes, it won't happen again, and where we go from here makes us stronger.  But the struggle to protect and defend democracy will never end, because democracy is a higher order development, and humanity isn't really geared toward natural acceptance of freedom of conscience for all people.  We don't seem to be completely comfortable when there's not a mechanism or system in place to control the behavior of those who are different.  

Have a nice day!  

So, About the President's Children Using Their Family Name to Make Money...

If I were a Republican, I'd be really disappointed in the fact that the party leadership can't come up with anything more than the name "Hunter Biden" every time indictments rain down on Trump.  To have as little as they do for all of the noise they've made over it has to be a huge disappointment, especially when it no longer gets nearly the kind of attention the coverage of the Trump indictments is getting.  If that's all they've got, and we know that if they had anything else we'd have heard about it a long time ago, it's going to be an uphill climb to convince any voter who isn't a hard core Trump supporter to make much of an issue out of it.

So Hunter Biden may have benefitted from his family name, due to his father's being a Senator and Vice-President of the United States while he worked for Burisma which had dealings with Ukraine.  Other than a few tax oversights, there's nothing criminal in anything he did.  There's some immoral behavior, and bad judgment on his part, milquetoast stuff, really, compared to the morality and misbehavior that the Republicans have completely ignored and excused and makes them hypocrites in this matter. 

So, is it Possible That Someone in the Trump Family Benefitted From His Presidency, During His Presidency 

In the middle of hundreds of sound bytes from media during the course of the day, there are some things that catch your attention and then, sink in.  It took just about ninety seconds of the Thom Hartmann program today to connect the dots for me and compare Hunter Biden to Jared Kushner, not in any way except in the fact that they may have something in common that, if Republicans are to avoid appearing politically motivated, and like hypocrites, needs to happen.  And that's the fact that the former failed President's son-in-law, somehow managed to reverse his troublesome financial situation by benefitting from his in-law family name while his father-in-law was President of the United States.  

Please excuse my simple-mindedness, but isn't this what has made the Republicans so hopping mad about Hunter Biden? That he may have financially benefitted from his family name when his father was Vice-President?  If they weren't political hypocrites, then they wouldn't object to Congress launching an investigation, compete with special counsel, into these activities to make sure there was no criminal activity involved.  

Granted, though the appearance may be that these two issues are similar, to be fair, they really aren't.  Hunter Biden has disclosed all of the financial records involved. We know nothing about how Jared Kushner acquired $3 billion, from mostly foreign sources, whether he paid taxes or evaded them, or any details at all about the business dealings that produced it. We do know the most finite details of Hunter Biden's finances.  The President hasn't fired the justice department special prosecutor on his son's case, appointed by his predecessor, though he certainly could.  He's not using the powers of his office for personal benefit, as his predecessor did.  

So If Congress is Willing to Waste Its Time on This Kind of Investigation, Shouldn't They Open an Investigation on Jared Kushner? 

I'm not convinced we will ever have a Congress that will be genuinely interested in fairness, openness, or honesty.  But that being said, it would seem to me that to avoid being labelled as politically motivated and hypocritical, the members of Congress should be as interested in where Jared Kushner got his $3 billion during his father-in-law's Presidency as they are about where Hunter Biden got his much, much smaller income during his father's Vice-Presidency.  

Since the Republicans are not interested in avoiding those labels, or flatly don't care right now, and they control the house, they're not going to launch an investigation.  They do not, however, have control of the Senate, and Senator Schumer most definitely could launch an investigation which, like other Congressional "investigations," would likely not lead to much more than making headlines.  Except, Democrats are in control of the Justice Department, and uncovering and exposing evidence through hearings that Merrick Garland could use to justify seating a grand jury and getting to the bottom of the business dealings that led to such copious amounts of cash flowing from Saudi Arabia to Mr. Kushner during his father-in-law's Presidency.  

Thanks to Thom Hartmann for mentioning this today.  It's tempting to call Senator Schumer's office and leave a message supporting the launching of an investigation into Jared Kushner's business dealings as the former failed President's son-in-law.  

The Party of Decency, Integrity and Honesty 

Sometimes I get frustrated with what I see as an unwillingness on the part of Democratic politicians to engage the Republicans with their own ground game, so to speak, and fire back at them at point blank range.  We are, after all, fighting to save our democracy.  But the dirty, corrupt manner in which Republicans are subverting American patriotism, and undermining democracy, is something that underlines the lack of integrity that grips their party.  

Democrats are not perfect people and everyone makes mistakes when their motivation and ambition becomes a driving force in their life.  But, the contrast between the Presidency of Joe Biden, and that of his predecessor, with this particular issue serving as an example of the standards of conduct, it's no contest.  President Biden hasn't used the powers of the Presidency on behalf of his son, something which, considering what he's been through in his private life, is an exercise of amazing restraint. Republicans wouldn't criticize one of their own who did this, so they have no valid complaint about this President or his children.  

But the decency, integrity and honesty exhibited by most Democrats, and particularly by the President, stands in contrast to the opposition party, which talks a lot about it, but doesn't exhibit any of it.  That's not painting with a broad brush either.  I'm willing to acknowledge Republicans who are still people of integrity, aside from their political views.  Well, go ahead, I'm waiting........

It will be very difficult to put this genie of political threats, animosity, and hatred, back into the bottle.  And that's one reason I'm glad Democrats aren't giving in to the temptation to get down on the level of the opposition party and lose the integrity that they have in order to do it.  We can win, and have won, without having to do that.  We are good at grumbling, at complaining about and criticizing our party leadership, and we have a tendency to spend a lot of time justifying our position with endless minutia, which sometimes misses the point and allows the other side to control the agenda.  But we are still the party of decency, integrity and honesty, and we are the best hope America has for staying free and democratic.  

No "Jill Steins" for Democrats in 2024: The Party Must be United

After the 2016 disaster of an election, I was hoping that the Democratic party had learned its lesson and its leadership would become aware of potential problems along the party's fringes which, in the politics of our time, can be fatal to election campaigns, as the Green Party candidacy of Dr. Jill Stein did to Hillary Clinton.  I still have trouble understanding what this fringe, third party thought they would accomplish by investing in the nomination of a candidate who undermined the only major party candidate in the election that would have actually addressed their interests.  It's not inaccurate to say that the Green Party's nomination and support of Jill Stein caused a decisive defeat of their own interests. 

It would have been insane, literally, for anyone to think that Stein would get enough votes in any state to carry it, not even close as it turned out.  However, her presence on the ballot in at least three states, possibly four, was all that Trump needed to pick up the narrow margin of electoral votes he needed to win.  What would have been in the best interests of the Green Party would have been for Stein and the party leadership to recognize where things stood in August or September of 2016, and then call a press conference and get as much media attention as possible while ending the campaign and endorsing Clinton.  There's no question that Clinton represented the best chance for any of the Green Party's political goals to be achieved, electing Trump was a bigger defeat for them and for their perspective than it was for the Democrats.  

"No Labels" Appears to Help, Rather than Hurt, Biden's Re-election Chances

The recent inaccuracy of polling data when compared with election results keeps me suspicious of polls, but there is data which shows that a "No Labels" party candidate, someone along the lines of West Virginia Senator Joe Manchin, would take far more votes from Trump than from Biden.  The GOP fringes are much more desperate to shed their potential nominee than Democrats are when it comes to their desire to see the President get a second term.  

But "No Labels" is not on the far left of the Democratic party.  The main problem that particular group has politically is figuring out exactly what it is they support and what constitutes their platform and reason for running.  Just to be a generic political party is not enough.  And since most third parties have no chance at all at winning, and they know it, their goal is to impact the election of one of the major party candidates.  Given Manchin's position in the party, and the manner in which he has conducted himself as the senate's "swing vote", it is easy to see why far more Republicans, especially the half of the party that is disgusted with Trump, might lean in his direction.  He's given few, if any, Democrats reason to support him. 

Am I correct in assuming that the Democratic National Committee has people who stay on top of all of this and have the political savvy to figure out plans to neutralize stuff like this, or is that a false impression?  Some of where the money is coming from suggests very strongly that the Trump campaign itself may be involved in helping make the No Labels party a reality, thinking that it may be able to pull of a Jill Stein scenario.  

Turning the Tables 

Surely the thought has crossed the minds of more than myself and a few other people that this kind of political strategy works both ways.  Dissatisfaction with Trump among the GOP runs at 15%, at least, and that's probably a low ball number, given their tendency not to answer those kinds of questions.  That's a lot higher figure than the percentage of votes Stein took from Clinton.  There's got to be someone, even one of the announced Republicans in the field, who would agree to long-term support in exchange for running third party to siphon off votes from orange hair.  

Democrats need to start thinking this way.  Whatever the party is thinking now, the favor won't be returned by the other side, those days are over and gone.  It might be kind of fun to see some reasonably conservative Republican with appeal to traditional Republican values and who hates MAGA, pull a Jill Stein in reverse.  It might also be just as effective.  

Which Party is Most Likely to Accept any Liberal, Democratic Values? 

Everything that the Green Party stood for, politically or practically, lost itself after 2016.  Trump was the one candidate in the election who openly identified, and pointedly hated the Green Party.  It wasn't just that he wasn't going to help them out, it was that he intended to suffocate them, deny them anything and hope they died out before they got going.  He was their worst enemy, and I still have trouble seeing why they were willing to shoot themselves in the foot rather than take their chances with Hillary Clinton.  

But this is the Democratic party's advantage and strength.  It represents a broad diversity of opinion and perspective.  And if we can get past the thought that everybody should get everything they ask for, we can work together to make sure we are not facing a Jill Stein in a critical election like 2024.  We can't afford it, nor can the potential third party groups, who get nothing at all if the President doesn't get re-elected. 

Are you listening to this, DNC?  Pulling everyone together, including the Bernie Bros, Green Party along with moderate Independents and even a few moderate Republicans needs to be a priority and those of us out here in the "grass roots" are perfectly fine with doing whatever we need to do politically to make sure there are no more Jill Steins in presidential politics.  

Should We Be Surprised? I'm Not.

Newsweek: Russell Moore, Former Southern Baptist ERLC Leader, says Evangelicals are Rejecting Jesus' Teachings as "Liberal Talking Points" 

I'm not surprised.  I grew up in an Evangelical church, in a Southern Baptist church, as a matter of fact, and I know exactly how this works.  So does Dr. Moore, I suspect, from his upbringing in a Southern Baptist church and from what he has seen and experienced during his own rise to prominence within the denomination.  

Just for the sake of discussion, to become an executive director, or president, of entities in the Southern Baptist Convention takes an awful lot of knowing the right people, saying the right things and going along with the small oligarchy of self-appointed leaders who call the shots and run the denomination in spite of its constitution calling for that to happen at the annual convention meeting.  In becoming the Executive Director of the Ethics and Religious Liberty Commission, which is the denomination's political lobby in Washington, D.C., Dr. Russell Moore had to know, and gain the confidence of some of the more important members of the SBC's inner circle.  

Once there, in any SBC executive leadership position, which includes the presidency of each of its six seminaries, the CEO's of its two mission boards, the President of Lifeway Christian Publishers and the single most powerful officer, the President of the Executive Committee, the occupant must tow the denominational party line.  This includes its staunch defense of its belief in the inerrancy and infallibility of the Bible as the "written word of God."  It also includes, not openly talked about but tacitly expected, being a loyal Republican.  

The inner circle Southern Baptist leader who helped Dr. Moore get to the leadership of the ERLC was Dr. Al Mohler, the President of the Southern Baptist Theological Seminary in Louisville, the largest of the SBC's six theological schools and its flagship institution.  That's pretty high level influence.  So it was quite surprising, when Trump announced he was running for President in 2016, that both Dr. Mohler and Dr. Moore came out in opposition to him as a candidate, mainly because they could not support a candidate for leadership of the nation who gave off such an un-American ethos, and for Evangelical Christians, who was so immoral and unethical in the worldly limage he projected.  

It's been even more surprising that someone as steeped in Southern Baptist doctrine, theology and church culture as Dr. Moore, and who has such an extensive Southern Baptist pedigree would buck the political status quo, the "party line," if you will, and stick to his original position that a man of the kind of worldly, unethical, unscrupulous character and actions of Trump was completely unqualified to serve in American politics.  He is staying loyal to a conclusion that the Christian gospel is incompatible with Trump Republicanism and that Christians supporting Trump are going against the principles of their faith in order to do so.  On top of that, Trump's own words continue to identify him as unrepentant and non-Christian, claiming to never have done anything requiring God's forgiveness.   

Moore is the kind of person whose network of influential, powerful friends in the religious world help him land on his feet when there's controversy or problems.  Ultimately, as his unrelenting stance against Trump's candidacy, which extended through the four years of his Presidency and has continued, unabated, since then, led to his resignation from both the ERLC and from his membership in a Southern Baptist church, his talents and his convictions got him on staff of Christianity Today, and also on to the ministry staff of Immanuel Church Nashville, platforms from which he can continue to point out the inconsistency between Trumpism and Biblical Christian faith and practice.  

Churches in Shambles

Moore has observed that the fading distinction between the church's theology and doctrine, and right wing politics, in most white Evangelical churches has led the churches into a crisis.  My own conclusion calls this a crisis of apostasy.  Moore has found pastors who tell their congregations about the teachings of Jesus found in the Sermon on the Mount are being asked where they got those "liberal" ideas.  His conclusion is that if members of churches are asking that question, then that's a sign the church is in crisis.  

It's my opinion, based on my own personal observation and experience, that this might be an understatement.  The crisis started when Jerry Falwell, Pat Robertson and James Robison embraced Ronald Reagan, a secular politician whose religious views turned out to be much more New Age, according to his wife, rather than Christian, over Jimmy Carter, who is without doubt the most sincere and sound born-again Evangelical Christian to occupy the White House.  Rather than following the Biblical guidance and principles they claim as inerrant and infallible when it comes to choosing their leaders, political Evangelicals seem to prefer religious liberals like George H.W. and W. Bush, and "nones" like Reagan and Trump.  

Embracing Trump has opened the door to apostasy.  

For certain intruders have stolen in among you, people who long ago were designated for this condemnation as ungodly, who pervert the grace of our God into licentiousness and deny our only master and Lord, Jesus Christ.  Jude v. 4

Moore's observations and reports of what is happening in conservative churches make these words from the Apostle Jude, in his short but very pointed epistle, extremely prophetic for churches that are still holding the line against this heresy.  Moore seems somewhat surprised to see this kind of thing happening among Evangelicals, but I'm not.  Trying to make the Bible fit one's preconcieved ideas and beliefs is a very common practice.  It happens from the pulpits of churches all the time.  So when an intruder comes along, in the form of a politician, it's not hard to make themselves the savior and throw Jesus under the bus.  

 

American Democracy has Turned a Corner

Ohio has always been one of those "other places" in my life.  I was about 2 years old the first time I was ever in the state, but I don't remember much about that experience.  We had relatives there, some of my Dad's family had migrated there from West Virginia, in the post-war period, including my grandmother.  They lived in and around Cleveland, so I do have memories of being there.  I do remember that there was quite a contrast between the grity, inner city of Cleveland, where three of my Dad's cousins were raising their families, while working in the steel mills and being very, very active in the unions, and the town of Wooster, in rural Wayne County, where my grandmother had settled with her husband, my Dad's step-father, who was born and raised there.  

They were 40 miles apart, but two different worlds.  And it's still like that.  

It's one of the political quirks of American history that no Republican has been elected President of the United States, since World War 2, without carrying the state of Ohio.  It has an interesting history that has made it an influential state in American politics, being in the "Western Reserve," territory opened for settlement on what was the far western frontier during the colonial period.  The climate and landscape make it ideal for agriculture, it's geographic location, accessible to Lake Erie and the Ohio River, as major transportation routes, also made it ideal for industry.  

I think it is also a political quirk that President Obama carried the state both times he ran, in 2008 and 2012, and in fact, in 2012 it was Ohio that put him over the top with enough electoral votes to win after the state was called, but Donald Trump carried it on his way to the White House in 2016.  The political dynamics which changed the outcome there, as much as it was changed, had to be quite an inexplicable abnormality.  Even now, commentary on what happened there in 2016 is not easy to find.  

Was the Special Election in Ohio This Week a "Bellwether"? 

There's been a lot of talk about Ohio this week on radio talk shows and news programs, especially those I listen to on progressive radio and on mostly MSNBC on television, or satellite feeds.  It's the latest in a series of red states where the issue of abortion rights has produced a result that has shocked, and frightened, Republicans and encouraged Democrats.  And I've heard everything from this being a clear indication of the coming blue landslide, to extreme caution, noting that there's still an actual referendum to be voted on regarding abortion, that this was just a preliminary tactic to try and make it harder for the votes of the people to count down the road.  

This is really a double hurrah for Ohio Democrats.  Not only does it protect the will of the people by keeping the referendum standard at a simple majority, which is huge and an open door for democracy to work well, especially when a single party has manipulated the system, but it also subjects the incredible gerrymandering that has been done, worse than just about any other state, to referendum as well.  Republican leadership in the state has been livid since the outcome was announced, and I mean livid.  Only the govnernor, who is kind of an old-line Republican, was realistic about it.  Everyone else was the victim of exploding heads. 

And yes, it is a bellwether.  

Democrats, in a state where the party's fortunes haven't been promising since 2012, fought against dark money from outside the state and won a difficult special election by getting their voters to turn out, and by controlling the narrative in such a way as to get a reasonably high turnout of independent voters to take their side and vote with them.  It was simply a referendum to raise the threshold required for constitutional referendums from a simple majority to an impossible 60%, but Democrats tied it to necessary changes coming up which need to be made to the Ohio Constitution.  So this was an issue to protect the will of the people, and in an odd year, August special election, it got over 3 milllion voters to the polls.  

How Did They Get it Done? 

Election Results August 8 Referendum in Ohio by County

This wasn't supposed to be identified as a partisan vote, but it most certainly was. Democrats would be pleased with a map of Ohio that looks like this one for the 2024 election.  Two things happened. One, the turnout in heavily Democratic counties with the larger cities was a good bit over the threshold needed to win statewide with the turnout for this particular vote.  But, the Democrats got a larger than their usual percentage of voters out in suburban counties as well, and picked up half a dozen counties that usually vote Republican, like Delaware County north of Columbus, and Medina County south of Cleveland.  In fact, all across the Lake Erie shoreline, from Toledo to the Pennsylvania border, the No vote carried every county.  That bodes well for Democrats. 

And I think the big key here is getting Democrats to turn out even in deep red counties where local races might not be competitive, or where there might not be Democrats running for some offices.  The party needs to encourage and help candidates run everywhere because the 16,015 voters who cast a "no" ballot in Clark County, a rural area in west centra Ohio, outnumbered the 16,014 voters who cast a "yes" ballot.  In the Presidential election, or a statewide Senate election, getting that many Democratic votes out of what is normally a 65% Republican county would significantly dent a Republican's chances of winning statewide.  

Democrats win when the voter turnout is high.  This is some kind of record for an August special election in Ohio.  Looking at other recent special elections in red states, most over abortion rights, it's been a clean sweep for Democrats.  

Is There Significance Beyond Ohio 

This makes me pretty optimistic looking ahead at the election season as it shapes up for 2024.  I tend to agree with Edwin Eisendrath, the Saturday afternoon host on WCPT 820 in Chicago, that Democrats are on the political offensive, the relentless removal of individual rights by far right wingers, and the echoes of the past from the Trump Presidency, along with their current approach to politics, which is to put failure at the high point in the party, have taken their toll on voters.  Democrats are getting hold of the messaging and the narrative, and this cluster of local and regional electoral successes will be reflected nationally as the 2024 election approaches.  

I'm personally hoping that Trump is disqualified from running for office by conviction on the indictments that have rained down on him.  But I have growing confidence that 2024 is shaping up to be a blue wave, and that following the victory, Democrats double down on the legislative precautions that need to be put in place to keep these kind of shenanigans from happening again. The United States is not immune to ideological attacks on its democracy.  It must be constitutionally and legally protected.  The idea that someone could incite an insurrection against Congress, interfere with the process of counting ballots in a legitimate election, solicit and accept foreign interference in a Presidential campaign and still be allowed to run for office is abhorent in a country that claims to be a nation of laws.  

It's not just the danger posed to abortion rights by the Supreme Court's overturning of Roe v. Wade that is causing this surge.  That's certainly a big part of the picture.  But voters are seeing this draconian agenda of censorship and cutrailment of individual rights and freedom of expression, much of it coming from news about what's going on in Florida, and it's waking up a younger generation of voters who are determined to keep their freedom in tact.  

In spite of obstacles which include getting network news time and media coverage, the other side of this issue contains the whole picture of Joe Biden's accomplishments as President of the United States.  And in spite of hard-line partisan thinking which makes it impossible to compliment someone from the other party, because of the hatred and the lies that divide us, the fact of the matter is that we are living in one of the most effective Presidential administrations since World War 2.  That also gives me confidence that whatever we might have to put up with during the next presidential campaign, Trump won't ever again see the inside of the White House.