The Evangelicals Who Pray for War With Iran

Most sane people, be it in America or around the world, are in no rush to see the end of the world. Nor are they eager to see the Middle East explode in war.  The term "sane people," in my view, rules out extreme evangelical Christians who cling to a bizarre reading of the Bible - a book totally composed by unknown authors who lacked any modern knowledge - that makes them want the world and life as we know it to end.  They want the "End Times" to Armageddon to come.   And to make this happen, they need a war in the Middle East involving Israel even though it would mean all but a few members of the Jewish nation perish.  Frighteningly, two such evangelicals are in positions of power that make their lunacy very dangerous: Mike Pence and Mike Pompeo.  Both are in tight communication with some of the most extreme Christian dominionists who, despite occasional disavowals when exposed by the media, want a theocracy in America.  These zealots are anti-LGBT, want women in subordinate roles to men, and would impose their beliefs on all Americans.  A piece in New Republic looks at Pence and Pompeo's disturbing alliances.  Here are excerpts:

Last Friday, a day after Iranian Maj. Gen. Qassem Soleimani and nine others were killed in a U.S. drone strike in Iraq, the Christian Zionist advocacy group Christians United for Israel emailed its millions of supporters to praise President Trump’s move. “This Decisive Action Will Save Countless Lives,” read the subject line, echoing the assessment delivered that morning by Secretary of State Mike Pompeo on Fox and Friends.

Pompeo and Pence reportedly were the top officials pushing Trump to kill Soleimani. They’re also devout evangelicals and major allies of CUFI. This is not a coincidence. While the organization is best known for its unflagging “support” for Israel—that is, for Israel’s expansion of settlements in the occupied West Bank and protracted erasure of the possibility of a future Palestinian state—it has, since its founding in 2006, depicted Iran as an existential threat to Israel.

Televangelist John Hagee launched CUFI in 2006, calling for military action against Iran, then led by President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, whom Hagee compared to Hitler. At the time, Hagee had been claiming that Iran would soon “have the nuclear capability to make a bomb, a suitcase bomb, a missile head, or anything they want to do with it.” That was untrue, given contemporaneous expert assessments of Iran’s projected nuclear advances. But for Hagee, a more militaristic approach was necessary in order to avert “an American Hiroshima.”

In his 2006 book, Jerusalem Countdown, Hagee imagined an elaborate scenario in which a U.S. or Israeli strike on Iran would trigger an “inferno [that] will explode across the Middle East, plunging the world toward Armageddon.” Faced with scrutiny over his apocalyptic theology, he strained to create a discrete image for his new political organization, insisting that his extensive writings on biblical prophecy about the Rapture and Second Coming were distinct from CUFI’s lobbying agenda. But it was a rocky start for the organization. In 2008, while running for president, John McCain first accepted, then rejected, Hagee’s endorsement. The rebuff was seen as damaging to the political neophyte and a brave stance by McCain against fringe elements within the GOP’s evangelical base. At CUFI’s annual Washington Summit, held just two months later, only three members of Congress attended.

But one of those three members was a certain congressman from Indiana: Pence. He continued to maintain close ties with the organization, and in 2014 CUFI paid for then-Governor Pence and his wife to travel to Israel to celebrate Christmas. With Pence as vice president, Hagee’s star has risen even more. He has claimed a role in convincing Trump to move the American Embassy in Israel from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem, . . . . Hagee delivered the benediction at the embassy dedication, a day Hagee described as “nothing short of a divine miracle!”

On matters of Iran, too, there has been a seamless relationship between CUFI and the Trump administration. In 2017, just a few months into Trump’s presidency, Pence addressed the CUFI Washington Summit, assuring attendees that “President Trump has put Iran on notice: America will no longer tolerate Iran’s efforts to destabilize the region and jeopardize Israel’s security,” and promising that under Trump, “the United States of America will not allow Iran to develop a useable nuclear weapon.” Trump’s subsequent actions have only elevated the specter of chaos in the region.  . . . . and yet, his evangelical supporters consider this one of his top accomplishments.

Pompeo, in a political career spanning three terms in the House of Representatives, a brief stint as CIA director, and now, as the country’s top diplomat, has promoted intertwining his Christian faith with his public service. But he has scoffed at charges that evangelicals promote theocracy. In a March 2019 interview with the Christian Broadcasting Network, while visiting Israel, Pompeo was asked whether Trump “has been sort of raised for such a time as this, just like Queen Esther, to help save the Jewish people from the Iranian menace?” “As a Christian,” Pompeo replied, “I certainly believe that’s possible.” . . . and then thanked God for President Trump—“an immovable friend of Israel.” “We’ve implemented the strongest pressure campaign in history against the Iranian regime,” Pompeo said, “and we are not done.”

Personally, if one is a science denying, theocracy supporting evangelical, you should not be allowed to hold any important political position, not because of your "faith" but rather due to you dangerous embrace of ignorance. 

The Religious Right Wants to Destroy Democracy

The so-called Christian Right - which in my view is neither right on issues nor Christian - has always had its element who wanted to over throw America's democracy to establish a theocracy with, of course, themselves in charge and dictating what others are allowed to think and how they are allowed to live their lives. Not that many years ago, huckster and scam artist Mike Huckabee - the father of the loathsome and  perpetually lying Sarah Huckabee Sanders - stated on Morning Joe that he wanted the Bible, not the U.S. Constitution, to be the governing factor in America's government.  Now, more and more of the ranks of the evangelicals - the Christofascist, if you will - are ready to overthrow democracy if they cannot inflict their will on the country through any other means. They look longingly at how Vladimir Putin has re-empowered the Russian Orthodox Church (which has a horrible record on its support of dictators) as a means to shore up his power.  Meanwhile, the Trump/Pence has promised the moon to evangelicals who have thrown principle and morality out the window in exchange for power. A lengthy piece in The Atlantic looks at this frightening trend of illiberalism and a longing for authoritarian rule.  Here are highlights:

By the tail end of the Obama administration, the culture war seemed lost. The religious right sued for détente, having been swept up in one of the most rapid cultural shifts in generations. Gone were the decades of being able to count on attacking its traditional targets for political advantage. In 2013, Chuck Cooper, the attorney defending California’s ban on same-sex marriage, begged the justices to allow same-sex-marriage opponents to lose at the ballot box rather than in court. Conservatives such as George Will and Rod Dreher griped that LGBTQ activists were “sore winners,” intent on imposing their beliefs on prostrate Christians, who, after all, had already been defeated.The rapidity of that cultural shift, though, should not obscure the contours of the society that the religious right still aspires to preserve: a world where women have no control over whether to carry a pregnancy to term, same-sex marriage is illegal, and gays and lesbians can be arrested and incarcerated for having sex in their own homes and be barred from raising children.

The religious right showed no mercy and no charity toward these groups when it had the power to impose its will, but when it lost that power, it turned to invoking the importance of religious tolerance and pluralism in a democratic society. That was then. The tide of illiberalism sweeping over Western countries and the election of Donald Trump have since renewed hope among some on the religious right that it might revive its cultural control through the power of the state. Inspired by Viktor Orbán in Hungary and Vladimir Putin in Russia, a faction of the religious right now looks to sectarian ethno-nationalism to restore its beliefs to their rightful primacy, and to rescue a degraded and degenerate culture. All that stands in their way is democracy, and the fact that most Americans reject what they have to offer.The past few weeks have witnessed a nasty internecine fight among religious conservatives about whether liberal democracy’s time has passed. Sohrab Ahmari, writing at First Things, attacked National Review’s David French for adhering to a traditional commitment to liberal democracy while “the overall balance of forces has tilted inexorably away from us.”Many religious conservatives see antidiscrimination laws that compel owners of public accommodations to serve all customers, laws that might compel priests to break the seal of confession if they are told of child abuse, and the growing acceptance of trans people as a kind of impending apocalypse. It is no surprise that among their co-partisans, Ahmari seems to have the upper hand here; in such circles, “Crush your enemies” almost always plays better than “The other side has rights too.”

The concerns Ahmari airs are not wholly without merit: Religious conservatives are not paranoid to imagine themselves pariahs someday in the future because of their views; it was not so long ago that liberal champions such as Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton held public positions that today would be described by the left as bigotry.

In spite of their disagreements, Ahmari and French are in accord about a great deal when it comes to abortion, women’s rights, and LGBTQ rights. French’s adherence to liberal democracy is a commitment to a set of rules under which these goals can be pursued in a pluralistic society: through public discourse, the courts, and the ballot box. For Ahmari and his ilk, this is insufficient. He seems to believe not only that the state should always settle such disputes in his favor, but that it should prevent cultural and political expressions he finds distasteful.This isn’t an exaggeration. In a since-deleted tweet, Ahmari praised Alabama Public Television for refusing to air an episode of the cartoon Arthur in which the titular character’s male teacher marries another man; his attack on French was preceded by another since-deleted eruption, over Drag Queen Story Hour at a public library, in which he cried, “To hell with liberal order”; and he has since suggested the humanities should be defunded because “they may be lost to us for good.”

If this is where Ahmari and his cohort are while the GOP still controls the courts, the Senate, and the presidency, imagine what they’ll be willing to countenance should they lose them. Ahmari’s demands here outline the United States that illiberals would like to see: one that resembles Orbán’s Hungary, where rigged electoral systems ensure that political competition is minimal, the press is tightly controlled by an alliance between corporations and the state on behalf of the ruling party, national identity is defined in religious and ethnic terms, and cultural expressions are closely policed by the state to ensure compliance with that identity. It is no surprise that the vast majority of black and Latino Christians see a secular but pluralist left as more trustworthy allies than conservatives who rail against “poisonous and censorious multiculturalism,” and darkly warn of a plot to “displace American citizens.”

The illiberals see the wealthy and upper-middle classes getting married, forming families, and raising children much as they did in the 1950s, and conclude that the problem with working-class Americans is not the diminished political power relative to their bosses, but the absence of a sharp enough lash, whether from the state or from a culture that has escaped the religious right’s grasp. Gillette should be making commercials about women staying at home and fathers going off to work, not dads teaching their trans sons to shave for the first time.

This understanding also helps illuminate the right’s eruption over YouTube’s decision to demonetize (but not remove) the channel of Steven Crowder, a conservative YouTuber who called the Vox reporter Carlos Maza a “lispy queer,” among other slurs. A world in which one can refer to gay people as “lispy queers” without repercussion is one in which the illiberal right is winning the culture war, so it matters little that YouTube is no less a private business than Masterpiece Cakeshop, and has a right to define the rules for using its platform. The same sort of protests that the right decries as illiberal when deployed against right-wing speakers on college campuses are suddenly a legitimate tactic when used against Drag Queen Story Hour.

The objective here, in Ahmari’s words, is to defeat “the enemy,” not adhere to principle, and that requires de-stigmatizing anew the kind of bigotry that was once powerful enough to sway elections.

[T]he illiberal faction in this debate retains Trump as its champion precisely because the president is willing to use the power of the state for sectarian ends, despite being an exemplar of the libertinism to which it is supposedly implacably opposed, a man whose major legislative accomplishment is slashing taxes on the wealthy, and whose most significant contribution to the institution of the family is destroying thousands of them on purpose. It is power that is the motivator here, and the best that could be said for these American Orbánists is that they believe that asserting an iron grip on American politics and culture would offer the greatest good for the greatest number of people. Every authoritarian movement has felt the same way.

The question of whether the Republican Party would abandon liberal democracy for sectarian ethno-nationalism was decided in the 2016 primary, and all French and Ahmari are doing is arguing about it after the fact. The commercial and social incentives for conservative writers to succumb to Trumpism are vast. . . . And the support Ahmari has drawn suggests that the conservative intelligentsia will offer less resistance to authoritarianism than it did in 2015 and 2016.

Trump is the symptom of the Republican Party’s turn toward illiberalism, not its cause; even before Trump ran for president, some Republican elites were plotting to diminish the political power of minorities and enhance those of white voters. Whatever their disagreements, the leaders of both the populist and establishment wings of the Republican Party have concluded that they cannot be allowed to lose power simply because a majority of American voters do not wish them to wield it. The president speaks of imprisoning his political rivals, and his voters cheer. He valorizes political violence, and his followers take note.Trump’s supporters exult in the head of state attacking private citizens who demand equal rights, then wave the banner of free speech exclusively in defense of expressions of bigotry. In the end, Trump will dictate the course of his party on these matters, and his base will do whatever he gives it license to do.

Writers such as French and Ahmari cannot shape this course; they can only argue about it after the fact.[T]his faction did not abandon its faith in liberalism’s capacity to solve problems during the decades of Jim Crow. It did not cry, “To hell with the liberal order!” over mass incarceration. It did not erupt in fury over the shattering of Latino families at the border, or the Trump-made aftermath of the catastrophe in Puerto Rico. It did not question whether liberalism had failed after the first, third, fourth or 15th mass shooting at a school, or because it is typical for Americans to beg strangers on the internet for money to cover their health-care costs or after an untimely death.

The state of emergency occurred when, and only when, liberal democracy ceased to guarantee victory in the culture war. The indignity of fighting for one’s rights within a democratic framework is fine for others, but it is beneath them.

[W]hat they describe as a crisis of liberal democracy is really just them not getting exactly what they want when they want it.

Trump/Pence to Grant Health Care Workers License to Discriminate

As previous posts have stressed, the one group to whom Der Trumpenführer has kept his promises are the Christofascists and evangelical Christians to whom he owes his occupancy of the White House.  Key among those promises is the right to discriminate against others under the guise of "religious belief."  The attacks on the LGBT community have been unrelenting and now Politico looks at the disturbing plan to allow Christofascists to refuse health care services to those they dislike, something that has been a wet dream for evangelical leaders for years.  The effort puts one religious group above above all others and makes a mockery of the right to religious freedom for all citizens, no solely hypocrisy-filled, ignorance embracing bigots who wrap themselves in the cloak of religion.  No doubt some will say to themselves "I'm not gay" or "I haven't had an abortion" but for the Christofascists this is just the beginning of their agenda to have a de facto established religion in America.  Contraception rights could be next.  Here are highlights from Politico:

The Trump administration is poised to overhaul the HHS civil rights office as part of a broader plan to protect health workers who don't want to perform abortions, treat transgender patients seeking to transition or provide other services for which they have religious or moral objections.

Under a proposed rule — which has been closely guarded at HHS and is now under review by the White House — the civil rights office would be empowered to further shield these workers and punish organizations that don’t allow them to express their religious and moral objections, according to sources on and off the Hill. That would be a significant shift for the office, which currently focuses on enforcing federal civil rights and health care privacy laws.

That's alarmed advocates for LGBT patients, who say they're already fighting to overcome stigmas and discrimination and who warn that the policy shift will only worsen their situation.

"This is the use of religion to hurt people because you disapprove of who they are," said Harper Jean Tobin of the National Center for Transgender Equality. "Any rule that grants a license to discriminate would be a disgrace and a mockery of the principal of religious freedom we all cherish."

The pending rule, which could be released as soon as this week, has been described to POLITICO as establishing a new division of the HHS civil rights office that would conduct compliance reviews, audits and other enforcement actions to ensure that health care providers are allowing workers to opt out of procedures when they have religious or moral objections. The new division would be a third, co-equal branch with the office's existing two divisions that focus on federal civil rights laws and the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act. Patient groups and legal organizations vowed to challenge HHS if providers are allowed to deny care based on criteria like a patient's gender or gender expression. "Should the administration choose to move forward to implement a discriminatory policy, we will see them in court," Louise Melling, of the American Civil Liberties Union, said in a statement.

The new rules — a priority for anti-abortion groups and supporters — could come just days before Friday’s March for Life, the annual gathering in Washington marking the anniversary of the Supreme Court’s Roe v. Wade decision. Republicans have typically timed votes on anti-abortion legislation to the event, the nation’s largest anti-abortion rally.

"Religious Right" Overjoyed by New License to Discriminate

Trump with Christofascists

The most dedicated core of Donald Trump's base is made up of evangelical Christians lead by leaders of hate groups, many of which have strong white supremacist overtones (e.g., Family Research Council, The Family Foundation, etc.), who shed any veneer of decency and morality when they rallied to Trump's support.  While Trump has largely failed to keep any of his major campaign promises, he has continued to deliver for these false Christians whom I refer to as the Christofascist.  One of his ways of delivering has been to wage a relentless war against LGBT citizens as most recently embodied in Jeff Sessions release of a directive which gives Christofascists an almost unlimited license to discriminate against gays, but also many others if they mere allege that the targets of their bigotry somehow offend their claimed religious beliefs.  As a piece in The  Advocate notes, the Christofascists are celebrating.  Here are excerpts from the piece:

The Trump administration’s Friday issuance of “religious freedom” guidance and rollback of the Affordable Care Act’s contraceptive coverage mandate appalled progressives and many other Americans — but members of the religious right are over the moon. The “religious freedom” guidance, issued by the Department of Justice, assures federal grantees and contractors, and employees of federal agencies, that they don’t have to serve clients who pose a conflict with their religious beliefs — for instance, by being LGBT, a single parent, or a believer in a different religion. It also allows faith-based organizations to discriminate in employment without losing federal contracts or grants, and shapes the stance the federal government will take in court cases regarding discrimination.

A sampling of religious right reactions to Friday’s actions:

“This morning … another concrete step was taken toward undoing the anti-faith policies of the Obama administration. While the Obama administration quarantined religious beliefs as if they are a plague — the Trump administration is restoring our First Freedom to where it’s belonged since the founding of our country.” — Tony Perkins, president, Family Research Council [a hate group whose leader has documented ties to white supremacy organizations] 

“We commend President Trump for instructing Attorney General Jeff Sessions to send a strong message to the rest of America that religious freedom must be protected. The President has reversed the Obama-era policies and committed to protecting and promoting the religious freedom upon which this nation was founded. The Department of Justice must now vigorously enforce all Americans’ civil right of free exercise of religious liberty. This is an extremely positive step in the right direction.” — Mat Staver, founder and chairman, Liberty Counsel [a certified hate group]

“The American Family Association is heartened to see strong action taken on two issues that have long troubled those with closely held religious beliefs. No one should be forced to either pay for a service or perform a service that violates their faith. . . . . Tim Wildmon, president, American Family Association [a certified hate group]

“The story should be that this is a president who is truly committed to liberty. He is committed to America, and he is working to keep his word to the American people. That is incredibly honorable and noble.” — Penny Nance, president and CEO, Concerned Women for America [a certified hate group]

The guidance that the Trump administration issued today helps protect that First Amendment freedom. As CEO of the largest religious freedom legal organization in the world, I commend the president for taking another step to honor his campaign promise to make religious liberty his ‘first priority’ by directing the Department of Justice to issue this guidance, which simply directs the federal government to adhere to its legal and constitutional obligation to respect existing religious freedom protections.” — Michael Farris, president, CEO, and general counsel, Alliance Defending Freedom [a certified hate group] 

When these hate groups and Christian dominionists are celebrating, decent Americans should be truly fearful.  These groups and their leaders want nothing less than a white Christian theocracy.  Be very afraid.

The Frightening Ascendancy of the Christofascists Under Trump

Trump with white supremacist and hate group leader Tony Perkins

I have written about the Christofascists and the threat they pose to America for as long as this blog has existed and first came face to face with individuals like Pat Robertson and Ralph Reed back during the latter phase of my eight (8) year period  as a member of the City Committee for the Republican Party of Virginia Beach.  These people have a single minded agenda of making their toxic religious beliefs supreme in America.  They seek to end the separation of church and state and mold government policies and laws to their beliefs.  They have contempt for the religious freedom rights of others and, if give the opportunity, would make contraception illegal nationwide.  They are that extreme.  Sadly, most white, Christian heterosexuals are unfamiliar with the Christofascists' agenda. We in the LGBT community have battled them for years.  Now, Der Trumpenführer has surrounded himself with right wing Christofascists and has given easy access to a veritable who's who of hate group leaders who masquerade as proponents of "family values."  Not only are these folks religious extremists, but beneath the surface a majority are white supremacists as well.  The New York Times looks at the ascendancy of this dangerous and toxic element under Der Trumpenführer.  Here are highlights:

The people who filled the pews of St. John’s Episcopal Church for a private service on the morning of the inauguration were a testament to the ascendancy of the religious right in Donald J. Trump’s Washington: James Dobson, the founder of Focus on the Family; Tony Perkins, the president of the Family Research Council [a certified hate group]; James Robison, the Christian television preacher.

Right after Mr. Dobson blessed Mike Pence, and just before the congregation sang “Onward, Christian Soldiers,” Mr. Robison took to the pulpit and asked Mr. Trump to rise.

The religious right’s influence is evident in the policies the new administration has prioritized in its first weeks, from Mr. Trump’s clampdown on federal funding that could indirectly support abortion to his directive to give persecuted Christians special dispensation to enter the United States. His pick to fill the vacancy on the Supreme Court, Judge Neil M. Gorsuch, has written opinions favorable to businesses that have religious objections to government mandates. And the White House has told leaders of the movement that the president will select nominees for the lower courts who are opposed to expanding abortion rights.

A group that has felt shunted aside by the Republican establishment is finding doors open more quickly and willingly than it did even under friendly presidents like Ronald Reagan and George W. Bush.

Now that he has the movement’s support, he has good reason to keep its adherents happy. He needs them to preserve his cobbled-together base of voters. And given how few votes put him over the top in the Electoral College — 77,000 total in Michigan, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin, where socially conservative Republicans are a key constituency — he may indeed owe them the election.

This close relationship has consequences not only for how policy will be shaped over the next four years on issues like health care, education and free speech, but also for how the federal courts will decide cases for a generation or more.

What the religious right wanted, perhaps above all else, was the nomination of a solidly conservative judge to the Supreme Court. And Mr. Trump delivered with his selection of Judge Gorsuch, whom he picked from a list of 21 candidates blessed by conservative groups.

The Trump administration has moved fast to enact new policies that the religious right considers important, including vowing to “totally destroy” a law known as the Johnson Amendment that restricts the activities of tax-exempt entities like churches in politics.

Mr. Trump’s cabinet is filled with deeply religious people who hold conservative views on religion, morality and social policy.

Attorney General Jeff Sessions, a Methodist, has questioned the wisdom of separating church and state.

Mr. Robison, the televangelist who was among those who spoke at St. John’s, spoke later that day to a crowd gathered for the Faith, Freedom and Future inaugural ball. He told a story of how he had called Mr. Trump’s cellphone just to see if he would still pick up after he had won the election.  Mr. Trump, he said, answered.

Trump and His Supporters See Only Whites as Full Citizens

Numerous writers have noted the sense of depression and/or stress that many Americans are experiencing as the regime of Der Trumpenführer rolls out it policies that aim to make white, heterosexual right wing Christians true citizens.  The rest of us are relegated to an inferior status under this selfish and hate driven world view.  Indeed, any restriction on the ability of the preferred class of whites to abuse and marginalize others is described as "persecution of Christians" and/or "white oppression."  It takes a very sick and evil mindset to view not being allowed to abuse and mistreat others as "persecution," but that is now the governing policy template that reigns at the White House. A piece in Salon looks at this toxic reality and what it bodes for many Americans.  Here are excerpts:

Woody Guthrie was one of the United States’ greatest folk singers and activists. Most Americans can recite the following lyrics from memory:

This land is your land, this land is my land
From California to the New York island;
From the redwood forest to the Gulf Stream waters
This land was made for you and me.

These beautiful words were both a slogan and a demand.  Donald Trump does not share such egalitarian values.

Last week, Trump was the featured guest at the annual National Prayer Breakfast in Washington. where he outlined a vision of Christian nationalism. A twice-divorced man, repeat adulterer, professed sexual predator who has said he grabs women by their genitals, liar and fraud, guest star in a pornographic video and a person who is neither pious nor modest speaking on matters of God and faith might be seen as comedy gold. Likewise, Trump’s promises to tear down the boundaries between church and state could also be mocked as boilerplate right-wing talking points that only resonate with the ignorant or the politically unhinged.

In this historical moment, these matters are too serious to be greeted with laughter, however. Trump’s comments at the prayer breakfast are part of a much larger and very dangerous pattern.

Donald Trump used overt white racism as well as white racial resentment to secure his victory over Hillary Clinton. The narrative of “economic anxiety” among working-class whites is largely incorrect. White identity politics and ginning up fear about “white oppression” won Trump the White House.

Two of Donald Trump’s most senior and trusted advisers are Stephen Bannon and Stephen Miller, long associated with white nationalist causes and publications.

Donald Trump has ordered that federal resources be diverted away from tracking white supremacist organizations.

Donald Trump’s administration does not view protecting the civil rights of non-whites as a priority. He has threatened to unleash the police and military on black and brown people who live in cities such as Chicago. Trump’s personal behavior is replete with examples of bigotry and racism.

This is a vision of America as a Herrenvolk society where democracy, freedom and opportunity are centered around the principle that white people are the in-group to be privileged and protected, while nonwhites are to be treated as second-class citizens. This vision of America also embraces what white supremacists and white nationalists have referred to as “ethno-nationalism”: the idea that the modern nation-state should be defined by “ethnicity,” and that there are certain core values that must be protected at all costs against “outsiders.”

But “ethno-nationalism” is no more than racist doublespeak. It is a somewhat more acceptable reframing of the white supremacist belief that America and Europe should be “white” by law, habit and tradition. By implication, people of color (and those who are not Christian — especially Muslims) are pollutants to be expunged, by whatever means necessary, from the white body politic.

Last week, Donald Trump doubled down on his embrace of these racist Herrenvolk and ethno-nationalist values when it was announced that former George W. Bush speechwriter Michael Anton would be joining his administration.

Writing for the New Yorker, Jonathan Chait elaborates:

Anton describes the government (pre-Trump) as “the junta.” This cannot be dismissed as mere rhetorical exaggeration. To Anton, the rising share of the nonwhite population is a foreign invasion: “The ceaseless importation of Third World foreigners with no tradition of, taste for, or experience in liberty means that the electorate grows more left, more Democratic, less Republican, less republican, and less traditionally American with every cycle,” he writes.

Anton apparently now occupies a central advisory role in the White House and will be helping shape American foreign policy.

In his role as the white nationalist in chief of the United States, Donald Trump wants to make clear that America is a white man’s country and that everyone else permitted to live here is just a guest, permanently “on notice.” This is revanchism of the worst kind, and a desperate effort to turn back the clock to the wrong side of history.

Donald Trump and his minions will soon discover that black and brown people built America. Indeed, many of them were in the United States long before “white” Europeans arrived and tried to claim it exclusively as their own.

Yes, this agenda is similar to the Nazi myth of the Aryan Race.  To my "friends" who voted for Trump/Pence, it may hurt your feelings to call you out, but this mindset is what in my view motivated your vote.  All I can say is shame on you!

Ted Cruz’s Christian Dominionist Vision for America

At times it is difficult to decide which of the Republican presidential candidates poses the most frightening threat to America and religious freedom for all in particular.  But, as a piece in the Washington Post lays out, the prize may go to Ted Cruz who is not only borderline repulsive to look at, but also harbors very anti-democratic Christian Dominionist views.   Dominionist like Cruz want nothing more that an overthrow of the United States Constitution and its replacement by a Christian theocracy with, of course, the Dominionists making all of the rules. It is no accident that in Iowa Cruz garnered the endorsement of every extreme right wing Christian organization, a number of which are registered hate groups.  Here in Virginia he will likely get the backing of The Family Foundation, another Dominionist organization that has strong white supremacist undercurrents.  Think of the religious extremism of the Puritans on steroids and that gives a hint of what Cruz and company want to impose on America.  Here are column highlights:

Now that Ted Cruz has an Iowa victory under his belt, it is time to take a deeper look at his Christian approach to politics. What is his real vision for America? Cruz likes to talk about “taking back” or “reclaiming” the United States. What does he mean by this?

Cruz’s shoe leather campaign in Iowa targeted the state’s large number of evangelical Christians. But not all evangelicals are the same.

Donald Trump appeals mostly to those connected with the Christian prosperity movement, a form of evangelicalism that celebrates the accumulation of wealth as a sign of God’s blessing.

Marco Rubio appeals to suburban, educated, middle- and upper-middle-class evangelicals. These evangelicals normally avoid the Pentecostal prayer meetings of the prosperity crowd and change the channel when televangelists show up on their big screens.

Cruz resonates with the evangelical culture warriors. He mixes what New York Times columnist David Brooks describes as political “brutalism” with a belief that he is engaged in a fight with the devil for the soul of the nation. It is only a matter of time before Cruz assumes the role of the Old Testament prophet Elijah and tries to cast down fire from heaven to destroy the “prophets of Baal” who oppose his campaign.

When Cruz says he wants to “reclaim” or “restore” America, he does not only have the Obama administration in mind. This agenda takes him much deeper into the American past. Cruz wants to “restore” the United States to what he believes is its original identity: a Christian nation. . . . .
That is why he has David Barton on his side.

For several decades Barton has been a GOP activist with a political mission to make the United States a Christian nation again. He runs “Keep the Promise,” a multimillion-dollar Cruz super-PAC. He’s one of Cruz’s most trusted advisers.

He writes books and hosts radio and television shows designed to convince evangelicals and anyone else who will listen that America was once a Christian nation and needs to be one again. But his work on the history of the American founding has been discredited by historians, many of whom are his fellow evangelicals. This does not seem to stop him.  

Barton’s work is an important part of Cruz’s larger theological and political campaign to take back America. If Barton can prove that the United States was once a Christian republic, then Cruz will have the historical argument he needs to sustain his narrative of American decline.

Anyone who has watched Cruz on the stump knows that he often references the important role that his father, traveling evangelist Rafael Cruz, has played in his life. During a 2012 sermon at New Beginnings Church in Bedford, Texas, Rafael Cruz described his son’s political campaign as a direct fulfillment of biblical prophecy.

The elder Cruz told the congregation that God would anoint Christian “kings” to preside over an “end-time transfer of wealth” from the wicked to the righteous.
According to his father and Huch, Ted Cruz is anointed by God to help Christians in their effort to “go to the marketplace and occupy the land ... and take dominion” over it. This “end-time transfer of wealth” will relieve Christians of all financial woes, allowing true believers to ascend to a position of political and cultural power in which they can build a Christian civilization. When this Christian nation is in place (or back in place), Jesus will return.

Rafael Cruz and Larry Huch preach a brand of evangelical theology called Seven Mountains Dominionism. They believe Christians must take dominion over seven aspects of culture: family, religion, education, media, entertainment, business and government.
Seven Mountains Dominionism is the spiritual fuel that motors Cruz’s campaign for president.
Cruz wants to defund Planned Parenthood because it threatens the traditional Christian understanding of the family, one of the seven “mountains.”

When Cruz talks about the Free Exercise Clause of the First Amendment, he almost always discusses it in the context of persecution against Christians, such as Kentucky county clerk Kim Davis.

He is not interested in crafting new models of American pluralism to respond to the country’s ever-growing religious diversity. Rather, religious liberty is a code word for defending the right of Christians to continue to hold cultural authority and privilege.

Cruz’s approach to politics is inseparable from this theology. His goal is to lead a Christian occupation of the culture and then wait for the Second Coming of Christ.

These people - and Cruz - are very, very scary.

Right-Wing Extremist Calls For Global ‘Inquisition’ To Kill Gays:

Theodore Shoebat: kill all the gays

While the international community struggles to come up with a plan to irradiate the Islamic extremist organization known as ISIS (see the prior post), here at home in America we see far right Christofascists calling for the murder of gays much along the lines of the atrocities being conducted by ISIS in the area it currently controls.   What makes the anti-gay harangue more frightening is that it represents a mindset to which the Republican Party now prostitutes itself to on a daily basis.  The unfortunate truth is that fundamentalist religious belief and fundamentalist religions in and of themselves are an evil.  They thrive only by spreading hatred an seeking to impose their toxic beliefs on all.  Right Wing Watch has details on this latest sign that fundamentalist Christianity is dangerous and needs to be treated as such.  Here are excerpts:

Theodore Shoebat, who was among the dozens of anti-gay activists, Republican members of Congress and GOP presidential hopefuls to be featured in Janet Porter's recent anti-gay "Light Wins" documentary, posted a new video over the weekend calling for a global "Inquisition" to eradicate homosexuality once and for all.

Outraged over reports that a doctor had been let go by Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center for repeatedly spreading anti-gay material to colleagues, Shoebat posted a video declaring that "sodomite homo Sharia" was being imposed on America by "sodomite bastards" and "faggots" who do nothing but "go around spreading AIDS."

The only solution, he declared, is the imposition of a global law criminalizing homosexuality that will be enforced by a modern-day Inquisition with the power to put gays to death.

"I'm sick and tired of the homo tyranny," he said. "What the world needs is a collective law ... What we need is the laws of God, the virtues of Heaven to become the law of the world. That is the bottom line. Do I believe in Christian world domination? Absolutely. I would be a liar if I said I didn't. Do I believe in Christian supremacy? Absolutely. Do I believe in democracy? Hell no.  

Do I believe in some sort of a democratic socialist republic? Hell no. I believe in monarchy, I believe in Inquisitions, I believe we need to revive the system of the Middle Ages that we had; we had no fag problems, we didn't have a lot of serial killers back in those days, we didn't have frickin drug cartel problems, we had none of the crap. We didn't have no fags asking to be married. None of that garbage."

"It's homo tyranny and it needs to be destroyed," Shoebat continued, "Christian world domination needs to be established and homosexuality needs to be deemed as a crime. And the homos need to be told, hey, you gotta stop that and if they don't stop that then, I'm sorry, we have an Inquisition and that Inquisition will enact the death penalty, as Scripture tells us."

As I said, there really is not much difference between Shoebat and  his fellow "godly Christians" and the leaders of ISIS in terms of their ideology of imposing their beliefs on all and killing those who do not conform.  I guess the only question I find myself having is: how the f*ck did these folks get so crazy?  Are they really that fearful of thinking for themselves and/or what severe psychosis is behind their need to cling to far right extremist dogma.  Normal, sane people do not act this way.  Far right Christian belief in my view is synonymous with deep mental illness.