Evangelical Christianity Has Become Sociopathic

With evangelical Christians having risen to support Donald Trump in the last presidential election despite his moral depravity, their continuing support for Trump, and now seemingly steadfast support of Roy Moore, one has to wonder what has happened to those who claim to be Christian yet seem to utterly ignore that Gospel social message, not to mention the message to love others.  Conservative Christianity now seems best defined by who is hated - and the targets of hatred is lengthy indeed - a levels of hypocrisy that would have embarrassed the Pharisees of the Bible.  A piece originally published in Huffington Post and reprinted in the  British organization Church and State which supports the separation of church and state in the United Kingdom raises the question of whether or not evangelical Christianity has become sociopathic.  My answers is a resounding "yes," especially when studies have found that atheists and agnostics (i) know more about the Bible than Bible thumpers and (ii) display far more empathy than the "godly folk."  Indeed one study noted in a past blog found that children raised in fundamentalist Christian homes to be the most likely to exhibit cruelty towards others.   Here are article highlights:

Since Evangelical Christianity began infiltrating politics, officially in the late 1970s, there has been a disturbing trend to limit or remove rights from those who don’t meet the conservative idea of an American. Many of these initiatives come in the form of “religious freedom” laws, which empower discrimination, while other legislation targets immigrants who believe differently. The result has been a sharp division in American culture, and the redefinition of Christian theology.

Evangelical speaker, author, and university professor, Tony Campolo, said Christianity was redefined in the mid-70s by positions of “pro-life” and opposing gay marriage. “Suddenly theology fell to the background,” he said. And somewhere in the middle of all the change, Evangelical Christianity crossed the line of faith and belief to hatred and abuse. 

Is it fair to call it sociopathic?

Psychology Today listed sixteen characteristics of sociopathic behaviors, which include: Untruthfulness and insincerity, superficial charm and good intelligence, lack of remorse or shame, poor judgment and failure to learn by experience, pathologic egocentricity and incapacity for love, unresponsiveness in general interpersonal relations, specific loss of insight, and general poverty in major affective reactions (in other words, appropriate emotional responses).

We see examples of these kinds of behaviors in church leaders and followers. Franklin Graham, for example, stated that immigration was “not a Bible issue.” His stand fits well with his conservative politics and vocal support of Donald Trump, but his callousness toward immigrants and those seeking asylum in the United States goes against everything he says he believes (Lev. 19:33-34, Mark 12:30-31). Yet, Graham doesn’t see one bit of irony between his political stance and his religious belief. Nor does he seem to notice the horrific casualties in war-torn countries these immigrants are desperately trying to flee.

Pastor Roger Jimenez of Verity Baptist Church in Sacramento said after the Orlando, Florida terrorist attack on a gay nightclub, “The tragedy is that more of them didn’t die. The tragedy is — I’m kind of upset that he didn’t finish the job!” This “minister of God” showed no compassion for the families of the men and women who died.  And recently, Kim Higginbotham, a minister’s wife and teacher with a master’s degree in special education, according to her website, wrote a public blog called “Giving Your Child to the Devil.” She claimed, “Being a disciple of Jesus demands our relationship to him be greater than our relationship to our own family, even our own children.” . . . . In a self-righteous, self-aggrandizing, martyr’s rant, she claims her son turned his back on God, and she was left with no other option but to abandon him.

The 2016 election demonstrated an especially high level of insincerity, shamelessness, poor judgment and pathological egocentricity among Christian evangelicals. 

The evangelical Christian message is loud and clear. They care for no one but themselves. Their devotion is to the version of Christianity they have created, which calls for ruthless abandonment of immigrants, women, children – even their own – and anyone else who doesn’t fall inline with their message. Social justice, which is mentioned in Bible verses over two thousand times, has been replaced with hardline political ideology. Principle over people. Indifference over involvement. Judgment over generosity.

Between the misogynistic aspects of my Catholic upbringing and what evangelicals have turned Christianity into, I truly do not want to be labeled as "Christian" if it means being lumped with such people.  Yet, despite this revulsion, I adhere to the social message of Christ far more than the self-congratulatory "godly folk."  Victoria Cobb, president of The Family Foundation - a hate group in all but formal designation - has called me a "godless homosexualist" yet I, not Ms. Cobb support government social programs for the poor and children, equality under the law, oppose de facto re-institution of the Jim Crow era, oppose the disenfranchisement of racial minorities, and oppose religious based discrimination.  Which of us more closely follows Jesus' gospel message?   

Has Evangelical Christianity Become Sociopathic?

Over the last two decades, the Republican Party has become more and more sociopathic.  The change for the worse is something that, in my view, directly correlates to the rise of the evangelical/fundamentalist Christians - those I refer to as the Christofascists - within the GOP. The result has been the transformation of the GOP from a party that honored knowledge and learning to one that embraces ignorance and a party that is defined by hatred of minorities and those who do not conform to Christofascist dogma.  Most disturbing is today's GOP's disdain for the poor and less fortunate. If one takes a good look at evangelicals and fundamentalists one sees the same pathology as now exhibited by the  Republican Party. A piece in HuffPost undertakes this examination of the self-styled "godly folk."  Here are excerpts:

Since Evangelical Christianity began infiltrating politics, officially in the late 1970s, there has been a disturbing trend to limit or remove rights from those who don’t meet the conservative idea of an American. Many of these initiatives come in the form of “religious freedom” laws, which empower discrimination, while other legislation targets immigrants who believe differently. The result has been a sharp division in American culture, and the redefinition of Christian theology.

And somewhere in the middle of all the change, Evangelical Christianity crossed the line of faith and belief to hatred and abuse. Those who cruelly implement the actions of their faith are oblivious to the destruction they cause to their religion, or the people their beliefs impact. Is it fair to call it sociopathic?

Psychology Today listed sixteen characteristics of sociopathic behaviors, which include: Untruthfulness and insincerity, superficial charm and good intelligence, lack of remorse or shame, poor judgment and failure to learn by experience, pathologic egocentricity and incapacity for love, unresponsiveness in general interpersonal relations, specific loss of insight, and general poverty in major affective reactions (in other words, appropriate emotional responses).

We see examples of these kinds of behaviors in church leaders and followers. Franklin Graham, for example, stated that immigration was “not a Bible issue.” His stand fits well with his conservative politics and vocal support of Donald Trump, but his callousness toward immigrants and those seeking asylum in the United States goes against everything he says he believes (Lev. 19:33-34, Mark 12:30-31). Yet, Graham doesn’t see one bit of irony between his political stance and his religious belief. Nor does he seem to notice the horrific casualties in war-torn countries these immigrants are desperately trying to flee.

Pastor Roger Jimenez of Verity Baptist Church in Sacramento said after the Orlando, Florida terrorist attack on a gay nightclub, “The tragedy is that more of them didn’t die. The tragedy is — I’m kind of upset that he didn’t finish the job!” This “minister of God” showed no compassion for the families of the men and women who died. He appeared incapable of laying aside his religious beliefs for even a moment of shared human connection to a tragic event.

And recently, Kim Higginbotham, a minister’s wife and teacher with a master’s degree in special education, according to her website, wrote a public blog called “Giving Your Child to the Devil.” . . . . In a self-righteous, self-aggrandizing, martyr’s rant, she claims her son turned his back on God, and she was left with no other option but to abandon him. It turns out her son is gay and - it turns out - the day the diatribe was posted was his wedding day. Sharon Hambrick, a Christian writer, posted a wonderful response to this mom.

But mostly, rather than calling these people out for sociopathic behavior fellow Christians agree.

[W]hen we choose our “truth” while coldly watching a fellow human being suffer, we’ve crossed a line of mental health.

The 2016 election demonstrated an especially high level of insincerity, shamelessness, poor judgment and pathological egocentricity among Christian evangelicals.

The evangelical Christian message is loud and clear. They care for no one but themselves. Their devotion is to the version of Christianity they have created, which calls for ruthless abandonment of immigrants, women, children – even their own – and anyone else who doesn’t fall inline with their message. Social justice, which is mentioned in Bible verses over two thousand times, has been replaced with hardline political ideology. Principle over people. Indifference over involvement. Judgment over generosity.

Religious ideologies, interpretations, and doctrines are fluid. But whatever it is, or whatever it becomes, is made by the people who belong to the religion and what they collectively decide to make it.

Donald Trump is the product of this sociopathic nature of the evangelicals.

Trump's Fact Free World and Why It Matters

Frighteningly, we are already seeing evidence where Trump, a/k/a Der Fuhrer, lives in a fact free fantasy world where objective reality and empirical facts simply do not matter.  Worse yet, he wants the rest of us to inhabit the same bizarre world that only serves to satiate his ego and narcissism. Something as simple as the size of the inauguration crowd on January 20, 2017, is open to debate - at least in Der Fuhrer's mind.  By all reports and based on countless photos, transit system numbers and other provable measures, Trump had a lousy turn out for his inauguration yet the man boasts that it was the largest turn out ever.  His claim, like most of what Trump says, is an outright lie.  To admit the reality that he is NOT liked and NOT popular with a majority of Americans is impossible for a narcissist like Trump.  Meanwhile, unprecedented numbers of protesters turned out yesterday in Washington, DC, that dwarfed the inaugural turn out. What is most frightening is the fact that this rejection of fact and reality will spill over into everything this dangerous sociopath does while in office.  A piece in NPR looks at the lies being put out by Der Fuhrer's henchmen.  Here are highlights:

The Trump Administration spent its first full day in office taking shots at the media and arguing about crowd sizes at Friday's inauguration.

Press Secretary Sean Spicer delivered a fiery broadside against the Fourth Estate from the White House Briefing Room Saturday evening, claiming that reporters had engaged in "deliberately false reporting" in the past 24 hours since President Trump took the oath of office. And, after berating the press, he walked away without taking any questions.

He blamed new floor coverings on mall areas that "had the effect of highlighting any areas where people were not standing, while in years past the grass eliminated this visual." And Spicer claimed that fences and magnetometers going further back than ever prevented "hundreds of thousands of people from being able to access the mall as quickly as they had in years past." However, CNN reporter Ashley Killough tweeted out a photo showing that floor coverings had in fact been used at Obama's second inauguration.

But then Spicer went on to make his own estimate on the crowd size and incorrectly claimed that the number of people who used the Washington D.C. Metro on Friday had outpaced the number of people who used the service during President Obama's second inaugural.

In 2009, 317,000 people had, in fact, used the Metro by 11 a.m., according to WMATA, as Spicer cited. But the White House press secretary then claimed that 420,000 people had used the Metro on Friday; by 11 a.m. only 193,000 people had ridden Metro. For the whole day on Friday, 570,000 people used the system, but in 2013 there were 782,000 riders and 1.1 million riders in 2009 — both much larger than Trump's inauguration.

Why dispute something that people could see with their own eyes?  It all plays into the insanity of the occupant of the White House and his effort to discredit the media which will otherwise try to hold him accountable and expose the endless tide of lies that we can expect going forward.  An activist friend shared some thoughts on Facebook that seem to describe the coming disinformation campaign:

If you are puzzled by the bizarre "press conference" put on by the White House press secretary this evening (angrily claiming that Trump's inauguration had the largest audience in history, accusing them of faking photos and lying about attendance), let me help explain it. This spectacle served three purposes:

1. Establishing a norm with the press: they will be told things that are obviously wrong and they will have no opportunity to ask questions. That way, they will be grateful if they get anything more at any press conference. This is the PR equivalent of "negging," the odious pick-up practice of a particular kind of horrible man (e.g., Donald Trump).

2. Increasing the separation between Trump's base (1/3 of the population) from everybody else (the remaining 2/3). By being told something that is obviously wrong—that there is no evidence for and all evidence against, that anybody with eyes can see is wrong—they are forced to pick whether they are going to believe Trump or their lying eyes. The gamble here—likely to pay off—is that they will believe Trump. This means that they will regard media outlets that report the truth as "fake news" (because otherwise they'd be forced to confront their cognitive dissonance.)

3. Creating a sense of uncertainty about whether facts are knowable, among a certain chunk of the population (which is a taking a page from the Kremlin, for whom this is their preferred disinformation tactic). A third of the population will say "clearly the White House is lying," a third will say "if Trump says it, it must be true," and the remaining third will say "gosh, I guess this is unknowable." The idea isn't to convince these people of untrue things, it's to fatigue them, so that they will stay out of the political process entirely, regarding the truth as just too difficult to determine.

This is laying important groundwork for the months ahead. If Trump's White House is willing to lie about something as obviously, unquestionably fake as this, just imagine what else they'll lie about. In particular, things that the public cannot possibly verify the truth of. It's gonna get real bad.

A piece in Vox elaborates further on this effort:

Delegitimizing the institutions that might report inconvenient or damaging facts about the president is strategic for an administration that has made a slew of impossible promises and takes office amid a cloud of ethics concerns and potential scandals. 

It also gives the new administration a convenient scapegoat for their continued struggles with public opinion, and their potential future struggles with reality. This kind of “dishonesty from the media,” Spicer said, is making it hard “to bring our country together.” It’s not difficult to imagine the Trump administration disputing bad jobs numbers in the future, or claiming their Obamacare replacement covers everyone when it actually throws millions off insurance.

 Be very, very afraid for the future.

Trump Bombs at First Debate, Shows Ugly Self

While some folks we know did not watch last night's presidential debate - some said it was too painful to watch, especially Donald Trump's behavior - the husband and I watched every minute of it. Overall, I thought Hillary Clinton was the clear winner, which seems to be the majority view, but more on that below.  Perhaps the most laughable/frightening moment was when Trump said he thought his temperament - that of a petulant first grader -  best qualified him for the presidency.   Trump surrogates had claimed that he had prepared for the debate "in his own way" and had criticized Clinton for the time she took to prepare.  The result?  Trump came across clueless and unprepared on many points and reverted back to some of his tried and true lies. The problem for Trump is that what works at rallies filled with his demented followers does not work on an internationally viewed one on one debate. The following is a sampling of some of the critiques of last nights debate.  First, the liberal perspective from Jonathan Capehart from the Washington Post:

For 90 minutes, we watched one candidate for president display the seriousness the office demands while the other did what was once unthinkable: show up unprepared for a globally televised job interview. . . . . Trump brought the vaudeville shtick that worked for him in the primaries to the main stage and bombed.

Trump’s performance was the rhetorical equivalent of hurling garbage on the lawn. A question about x would lead to mentions of y, z and whatever else came to mind. For instance, a response about Hillary Clinton’s emails led to a mention about the sorry state of New York’s LaGuardia Airport. And then there were the gasp-worthy moments that would sink any other presidential aspirant.

Clinton said the only time Trump’s tax returns were seen was when he sought a casino license. “[T]hey showed he didn’t pay any federal income tax,” the Democratic nominee charged. Trump’s response? “That makes me smart.” Neither average Americans nor the Clintons (who have released more than three decades of tax returns) could get away with that.

If there was one undeniable truth spoken by Clinton at the debate, it came in response to Trump’s dig at her for “stay[ing] home” last week. “I think Donald just criticized me for preparing for this debate. And, yes, I did,” Clinton said. “And you know what else I prepared for? I prepared to be president.” Kaboom.

On the conservative side from the Post, Jennifer Rubin, until this year typically an apologist for the GOP, let loose on Trump as well:

[L]like Super Bowl games to which the Hillary Clinton vs. Donald Trump debate was frequently compared, it was not as competitive as one might have imagined. Clinton came away the winner, accomplishing what she set out to do.

She wasn’t warm and fuzzy, but she was calm, cool and in command of her facts. She hit more than once his “Trumped up trickled down” tax plan, a winner with her supporters. She made a pitch for gun control, extolled African American families and urged anti-bias training for police. She prodded Trump to agree that we should take guns away from people on the no-fly list. (The National Rifle Association won’t be pleased.) She slammed Trump when he accused her of preparing for the debate. . . . . she reamed him for his statements on nuclear weapons and willingness to allow other countries to get the bomb.

Trump was soon back to classic Trump —  inveighing  against trade and making bizarre comments. . . . He incorrectly stated that “stop and frisk” had not been ruled unconstitutional. At times he seemed to babble, running out of material. He still has not bothered to flesh out proposals or to broaden his grasp of issues. His meandering answer on first use of nuclear weapons suggested he had no idea what the issue was. Trump blundered accusing Clinton of lacking stamina, giving her an opportunity to boast of her own travels and recount his insults against women.

His worst moments came as he continued to defend raising the birther issue and claimed credit for prompting President Obama to produce his birth certificate. Clinton laid into him, slamming him for starting his political career by trying to de-legitimize the first African American president. “A racist lie” is what she called it. She raised the lawsuit from the 1970s for housing discrimination. 

Trump needed to conceal his temper, avoid queries on his taxes and dalliance with birtherism, and appear ready to be president. He didn’t. . . . . The first debate win goes to Clinton.

Going over to the arguably less "liberal" Politico, the "insider" verdict on Trump's loss of the debate was similar. Here are highlights of that:

Score round 1 for Hillary Clinton.  That’s according to The POLITICO Caucus — a panel of swing-state activists, strategists and operatives who watched the first debate here Monday night. The insiders’ bipartisan verdict: Clinton dispatched Donald Trump in their first of three nationally televised meetings.

Overall, roughly 80 percent of insiders — with equal numbers of Democrats and Republicans responding to the post-debate survey — said Clinton did the better job at the debate, including 99 percent of Democrats and 57 percent of Republicans.

Democrats said Clinton was prepared and succeeded in provoking Trump — who began the debate speaking so quietly the audio engineers struggled to raise his volume to a comparable level in the debate hall but quickly became more animated in the face of Clinton’s attacks.

“No contest,” said an Iowa Democrat — who, like all respondents, completed the survey anonymously. “Trump held it together for 16 minutes and fell apart.”

Among Republicans, the tally was closer — but that speaks to a divided party as much as actual ambivalence about which candidate performed better on Monday night.

“Trump was an embarrassment,” an Iowa Republican said. “I'd hate to be the guy in the spin room lying about how Trump won the debate.”

“It wasn't close,” a Virginia Republican added. “Sure, our tribal politics will force it to seem somewhat close, but even the most committed of Trump supporters know, deep down, that did not go well.”

The vast majority of all insiders, 88 percent, said Clinton met expectations going into Monday night. That includes nearly three-quarters of Republicans: One Florida Republican called Clinton “calm in the face of an insane person.”

“Put plainly: he failed the presidential test,” a Virginia Republican added. “And hiding out on Fox News isn't going to fix it for him.”

The views at the New York Times were similar, even among more conservative columnists.  Here is a sample from one column:

Trump lost. Really, I think we can work under the assumption that when a candidate is accused of cheering for the housing crisis, it’s not a good plan to reply: “That’s called business, by the way.”

There had been some speculation that all Trump needed to do was speak in complete sentences to beat expectations, and if that was the bar, the man did great. When Hillary Clinton suggested he might be withholding his federal returns because he never paid any taxes, he responded: “That makes me smart.” Complete sentence.

There’s something terrifying in the way Trump can’t admit error, even in a case where the incorrect statement in question has become world-famous. There are undoubtedly people in Chad who know that Trump supported the invasion of Iraq before it happened. But when it came up on Monday, he denied it once again, arguing that his much-quoted interview on “The Howard Stern Show” was something else entirely:

Both of these candidates have a lot of baggage and Clinton got past her email burden by admitting she was wrong and saying she was sorry. Not the perfect apology, but it got her through the night.

Trump, for his part, could have anticipated that the business of calling women pigs, slobs and dogs would come up. The correct answer, as his advisers undoubtedly hinted, was to say he regretted it, and hoped he’d be a better example for his 10-year-old son. His actual response was to: 1) Claim that nobody likes Rosie O’Donnell; 2) Congratulate himself for not saying “something extremely rough to Hillary, to her family"; and 3) Point out that the polls are looking good.

People tuned in to see Trump and he didn’t disappoint. Not every politician would respond to a comment about how he got his start in business with $14 million in family money with: “My father gave me a very small loan.”

Remember when we made fun of Mitt Romney for his privileged background? Hahahahaha.

Trump in Trouble Over "Second Amendment" Threat to Hillary Clinton

As I write this post, Rudy Giuliani is mouthing a bullshit explanation for Trumps remark seemingly encouraging his NRA extremist supporters to use violence against Hillary Clinton in order to stop her from winning the presidential election in November.  If one watches the video clip of Trumps remarks, it is beyond clear that Trump was NOT saying what Giuliani is now trying to put in Trump's mouth.  If suggesting the assassination of one's opponent isn't the final straw for the Republican Party to remove Donald Trump from the position of its standard bearer, then the GOP truly deserves to die and die quickly.  First these highlights from Politico:

Donald Trump on Tuesday said "the Second Amendment people" may be the only way to stop Hillary Clinton from getting to appoint federal judges if she wins the presidential election in November.

“Hillary wants to abolish, essentially abolish, the Second Amendment,” he said as an aside while smiling. “By the way, and if she gets to pick her judges, nothing you can do, folks. Although the Second Amendment people, maybe there is, I don’t know. But I’ll tell you what, that will be a horrible day.”

Trump was speaking at a rally in Wilmington, North Carolina, where he repeated his regular claim that Clinton intends to “abolish” the Second Amendment, presumably by appointing liberal justices to the Supreme Court. But Trump punctuated that line with an aside, suggesting that Second Amendment supporters might be in a position to stop her even if she’s elected.

The Trump campaign rejected the notion that Trump was inciting violence against Clinton or anyone else with his aside at the Wilmington rally. Instead, the campaign said the Manhattan billionaire was simply appealing to the collective political muscle Second Amendment supporters possess.

Clinton did not take any questions after her event in Miami on Tuesday, but reached for comment, Clinton campaign manager Robby Mook condemned the comments. "This is simple—what Trump is saying is dangerous. A person seeking to be the President of the United States should not suggest violence in any way," he said in a statement.

Following Trump's remark, the main super PAC supporting her, Priorities USA Action, immediately circulated the clip with the subject line, "Donald Trump Just Suggested That Someone Shoot Hillary Clinton."

Congressional Democrats piled on. Sen. Elizabeth Warren tweeted that Trump "makes death threats because he's a pathetic coward who can’t handle the fact that he’s losing to a girl."

Rep. Eric Swallwell, a California Democrat, called on Twitter for the Secret Service to investigate. “Donald Trump suggested someone kill Sec. Clinton. We must take people at their word. @SecretService must investigate #TrumpThreat,” he wrote.

Sen. Chris Murphy, a Democrat from Connecticut, launched a series of tweets criticizing the comments: "Don't treat this as a political misstep. It's an assassination threat, seriously upping the possibility of a national tragedy & crisis," he wrote. "This isn't play. Unstable people with powerful guns and an unhinged hatred for Hillary are listening to you, @realDonaldTrump."

A column in Esquire takes a look at the larger issue of FTF is wrong with the Republican Party that no one has the spine to do an intervention and strip Trump of the GOP presidential nomination.  Here are column excerpts:

OK, is hinting that maybe your political opponent should get shot The Line?

If she gets to pick her judges, nothing you can do, folks. Although the Second Amendment people, maybe there is, I don't know.

Is that The Line?  You know, The Line, the one that He, Trump has to cross before the entire Republican Party, not to mention a good portion of the human race, finds him too revolting for their delicate stomachs? What say you, Paul Ryan? Is that the line? John McCain? Mitch McConnell? All you clowns in the tricorns and the Watering The Tree Of Liberty tank tops? What say you all? Do you stand by this?

How about the elite political press? Is this enough to push you over the line to admitting every day in your coverage that this is not a normal election because the Republican Party has nominated a public sociopath for President of the United States?

What he said on Tuesday is something Donald Trump does every day of his life, on purpose, as a matter of policy and a perfect expression of everything he stands for. It seems one could stoop even lower than Nixon to be president. 

If that isn't The Line, then what in the hell is The Line? Actually doing it?

Mitt Romney’s Campaign Insults and Deceive Voters

Living in Virginia which is being blanketed with campaign ads, I want to scream at times.  Especially when I hear Romney ads.  As I've noted before, I've been active in politics for a long, long time (I was on the GOP City Committee in Virginia Beach for 8 years quite a few years ago) and never in my recollection have I seen a campaign as blatantly dishonest and untruthful as that of Mitt Romney.  Worse yet are the Crossroads GPS ads orchestrated by nasty, sleazy Karl Rove.  They are simply devoid of truth.  There was a time when the Republican Party stood for integrity and some level of honesty.  Those days are clearly gone.  Today's Romney/Rove campaign tactics make the tawdriest whore look like a paragon of honesty and virtue.  Indeed, they make me ashamed to every have been a Republican.  It its main editorial yesterday, the Washington Post vented on Romney's lies and deceptions.  It is worth a full read.  Here are excerpts:

THROUGH ALL THE flip-flops, there has been one consistency in the campaign of Republican presidential nominee Mitt Romney: a contempt for the electorate.  How else to explain his refusal to disclose essential information? Defying recent bipartisan tradition, he failed to release the names of his bundlers — the high rollers who collected hundreds of thousands of dollars in donations. He never provided sufficient tax returns to show voters how he became rich.

How, other than an assumption that voters are too dim to remember what Mr. Romney has said across the years and months, to account for his breathtaking ideological shifts? He was a friend of immigrants, then a scourge of immigrants, then again a friend. He was a Kissingerian foreign policy realist, then a McCain-like hawk, then a purveyor of peace. He pioneered Obamacare, he detested Obamacare, then he found elements in it to cherish. Assault weapons were bad, then good. Abortion was okay, then bad. Climate change was an urgent problem; then, not so much. Hurricane cleanup was a job for the states, until it was once again a job for the feds.

The same presumption of gullibility has infused his misleading commercials (see: Jeep jobs to China) and his refusal to lay out an agenda.

And then there has been his chronic, baldly dishonest defense of mathematically impossible budget proposals. He promised to cut income tax rates without exploding the deficit or tilting the tax code toward the rich — but he refused to say how he could bring that off. When challenged, he cited “studies” that he maintained proved him right. But the studies were a mix of rhetoric, unrealistic growth projections and more serious economics that actually proved him wrong.

This last is important — maybe the crux of the next four years. History has shown that it’s a lot easier to cut taxes than to reduce spending.

Now Mr. Romney promises to reduce income tax rates by one-fifth — for the rich, that means from 35 percent to 28 percent — and to raise defense spending while balancing the budget. To do so, he would reduce other spending — unspecified — and take away deductions — unspecified. One of the studies he cited, by Harvard economist Martin Feldstein, said Mr. Romney could make the tax math work by depriving every household earning $100,000 or more of all of its charitable deductions, mortgage-interest deductions and deductions for state and local income taxes.  Does Mr. Romney favor ending those popular tax breaks? He won’t say.

Mr. Obama has a record; voters know his priorities. His budget plan is inadequate, but it wouldn’t make things worse.   Mr. Romney, by contrast, seems to be betting that voters have no memories, poor arithmetic skills and a general inability to look behind the curtain. We hope the results Tuesday prove him wrong.

Romney: Elect Me Or Else the House GOP Will Wreck The Economy

It's a bizarre closing argument for any campaign, but here's part of Mitt Romney's effort to close the deal: elect me or else the GOP controlled House of Representatives  will force a debt ceiling disaster. Yes, it is truly bizarre, but then again today's GOP is way past bizarre.  Rather than allow Barack Obama to be successful in a second term, Romney states that the House Republicans would rather force a debt crisis and drive the nation (and possibly the world) into a new economic depression.  It's an example of the spoil brat syndrome that is today's GOP.  It's akin to a spoil, undisciplined child who cannot have his/her way who then destroys whatever they can get their hands on.  Sadly, in this case what will be destroyed is the lives and finances of millions of Americans.  The GOP has clearly discarded any sense of wanting what's best for the nation or everyday Americans.  

Of course, what makes it all even more perverse and hypocrisy filled is the fact that the GOP claims to be the party of "family values" and "Christian morality."  The GOP simply no longer cares what harm it inflicts on millions of hard working Americans and their families.  It's part and parcel with the desire to repeal the Affordable Health Care Act and leave millions without insurance and the sick Romney/Ryan desire to disband federal emergency relief programs and leave relief and recover work either to the states or vulture like private contractors.  In the wake of Hurricane Frederic in Mobile back in 1979, I saw first had how rapacious contractors can be in desperate situations such as those currently in New York and New Jersey.  Yet this is what Romney in the past says he favors.  But I digress.  Here are highlights from Talking Points Memo where Romney's threat to voters is reviewed:

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In what his campaign billed as his “closing argument,” Mitt Romney warned Americans that a second term for President Obama would have apocalyptic consequences for the economy in part because his own party would force a debt ceiling disaster.  “Unless we change course, we may well be looking at another recession,” Romney told a crowd in West Allis, Wisconsin.

Romney said that Obama “promised to be a post-partisan president, but he became the most partisan” and that his bitter relations with the House GOP could threaten the economy. As his chief example, he pointed to a crisis created entirely by his own party’s choice — Republican lawmakers’ ongoing threat to reject a debt ceiling increase. Economists warn that a failure to pass such a measure would have immediate and catastrophic consequences for the recovery. 

“You know that if the President is re-elected, he will still be unable to work with the people in Congress,” Romney said. “He has ignored them, attacked them, blamed them. The debt ceiling will come up again, and shutdown and default will be threatened, chilling the economy.”

With four days left, Romney may need an exceptionally strong close to overcome the president in the electoral college. The overwhelming majority of polls show Obama with a modest but stable lead in critical swing states, most notably Ohio, and other potentially decisive states like Virginia and Colorado remain tossups at best. 

Many in the GOP seek to describe Obama as "un-American."  One can only assume is what is really happening is that they are looking at themselves in the mirror.  

Why Mitt Romney Is the Wrong Man for America

The list of reasons why Mitt Romney and the GOP need to be defeated next Tuesday is a long one and this blog has looked at many of these reasons which range from Romney's pathological lying, to his contempt for 47% of the population (perhaps the only true thing we have seen from the man) and to his reckless plan to slash taxes for the wealthy while going on a defense spending binge that would make the budget deficit explode.  A piece in The Daily Beast that includes the summary "The candidate lies to women, manipulates the truth about his taxes and his tax policy, and covers for racists"adds to the litany of why Romney is wrong for America.  Here are some excerpts:

Mitt Romney is a pimp. He’s pimping his base, lying every opportunity he gets with the hope that the uninformed—as well as those who are supporting him because they just want to get that black man out of the White House—will spread his ill will and surrender to his lack of compassion for those who have suffered because of what President Bush and corporate America have done to Americans. If I thought for one minute that Romney would be better for this country than President Obama, I would vote for him.

I’ve talked about, ranted about, and even tweeted regularly about just how racist this entire campaign season has been and how so many people either don’t see, or refuse to see, the real truth behind the Republicans and Mitt Romney.

From day one of the Obama administration, Republicans agreed not to support any legislation he proposed that would have improved the economy, especially the Jobs Bill, which would have created almost 2 million jobs.  .  .  .  .  They didn’t mind when Bush was spending trillions on wars, did they? In their quest to embarrass and humiliate the president, Republicans have harmed our country.

I’m so glad the Times, along with many other news organizations, is able to see through Mitt Romney as well as the B-movie performances he relies on to fool his base. Even a fifth-grader should be able to see clearly what those truths are: Mitt Romney is a phony, arrogant, dishonest, manipulative, pompous, elitist human being who lacks genuine compassion, and, as a result, is ill-equipped to run the United States of America.

He lies about things a presidential hopeful shouldn’t be lying about. Three of my favs: his bogus tax policy, Medicaid, and, the biggest of all: that he’s a magician and can create 12 million jobs in four years! 

There also is another major truth about Romney that no woman in her right mind should ignore. He seems downright excited about having the power to throw women off the bridge and setting us back 40 years. Mitt and his posse—Todd Akin, Paul Ryan, and now Richard Mourdock (along with 13 other white male senators and even two females)—have decided to use “big government” to impose their religious beliefs on us.  

Church and state are supposed to be separate. Elected officials should not be allowed to use the Senate, the House of Representatives, and especially the White House as a platform from which to impose their religious beliefs on women. Period. I’d really like to know why they are so preoccupied with what women do with their bodies.

In his willingness to “expose” his policies affecting women, Romney has made it clear that he wants to eliminate Planned Parenthood and repeal Roe v. Wade and yet he has not been as forthcoming when it comes to releasing his taxes. (Even a 3-year old would know he’s hiding something that would make us see how slick he really is.)

Republicans have done everything possible to pass laws to suppress the vote: they are losing their grip. This Club they’re obviously honorary members of is one where honesty, dignity, and fair play take a backseat to winning at all costs, and they feel not one ounce of shame when their tactics are exposed.

Many do not want to hear this truth - including neighbors on my street - that racism and a fear of a permanent loss of white privilege and entitlement is what motivates far too many in today's GOP.  It's all about maintaining power in the hands of white, heterosexual conservatives who believe that the rest of us should be forever subservient and be forced to live in accordance with their dictates.  This arrogant contemptuous attitude are personified in Mitt Romney who will engage in any and every lie and deception to further himself.  Personally, I think the man is amoral or perhaps even a sociopath.  The man scares me.

Romney Versus the Automakers and the Truth

Throughout this presidential campaign Mitt Romney's dishonesty has been shocking. Many say they have never seen a candidate so willing to lie and make up stories out of thin air.  Sadly, too often the media has aided Romney by lacking to call him what he is: a liar.  Perhaps some of Romney's most incredible lies have involved the auto industry - an industry that Romney was willing to utterly collapse and die.  As noted yesterday, both Chrysler and General Motors have felt compelled to speak out because Romney is running ads and making statements that simply are not true.  And Romney knows they are untrue.  The man simply cares nothing about the truth.  His sole values seem to be amazing more money and power for himself.  Literally not else matters, especially honesty and telling the truth.  I am honestly coming to believe the man is a sociopath.  A column in the New York Times looks at Romney's lies about the auto industry.  Here are excerpts:

When General Motors tells a presidential campaign that it is engaging in “cynical campaign politics at its worst,” that’s a pretty good signal that the campaign has crossed a red line and ought to pull back. Not Mitt Romney’s campaign. Having broadcast an outrageously deceitful ad attacking the auto bailout, the campaign ignored the howls from carmakers and came back with more. 

Mr. Romney apparently plans to end his race as he began it: playing lowest-common-denominator politics, saying anything necessary to achieve power and blithely deceiving voters desperate for clarity and truth. 

This started months ago when he realized that his very public 2008 stance against the successful and wildly popular government bailout of G.M. and Chrysler was hurting him in the valuable states of Ohio and Michigan. In February, he wrote an essay for The Detroit News calling the bailout “crony capitalism on a grand scale” because unions benefited and insisting that Detroit would have been better off to refuse federal money.

When that tactic didn’t work, he began insisting at the debates that his plan for Detroit wasn’t really that different from President Obama’s. (Except for the niggling detail of the $80 billion federal investment.) 

That was quickly discredited, so Mr. Romney began telling rallies last week that Chrysler was considering moving its production to China. Chrysler loudly denounced it as “fantasies,” saying it was only considering increasing production in China for sale in China, without moving a single American job. 

The Romney campaign ignored the company, following up with an instantly notorious ad saying President Obama “sold Chrysler to Italians who are going to build Jeeps in China.”  

Nearly 1.5 million people are working as a direct result of the bailout. Ohio’s unemployment rate is well below the national average. G.M.’s American sales continue to increase, and Chrysler said this week that its third-quarter net income rose 80 percent. These companies haven’t just bounced back from the bottom; they are accelerating. 

What Mr. Romney cannot admit is that all this is a direct result of the government investment he would have rejected. It’s bad enough to be wrong on the policy. It takes an especially dishonest candidate to simply turn up the volume on a lie and keep repeating it..  .  .  .  .  Mr. Romney is providing a grim preview of what kind of president he would be.

What I find deeply disturbing is that Romney claims to be a deeply religious man.  Yet he lies with impunity.  As with the Christofascists and the Catholic Church hierarchy, the truth simply doesn't matter.   No wonder the younger generations are fleeing organized religion in record numbers.  Increasingly, being a Christian or in Romney's case, Mormon, is synonymous with being a liar.

Disingenuous Mitt: Romney to Stop Mentioning Navy SEAL After SEAL's Mother and Friend Slam Him

Proving yet again that he's a sleazy liar who will stoop to virtually anything in his quest for the White House, Mitt Romney had been mentioning a former Navy SEAL killed in the attack on the American consulate in Libya.  Or he was until the dean man's mother and a friend slammed Romney for politicizing the man's death and his shallowness at the time he actually met the former SEAL.  Glen Doherty's friend stated on Rachel Maddow's show last night that when Romney had met Doherty at a function, Romney had introduced himself four times not even remembering that he'd already introduced himself just minutes earlier.  The friend described Romney as shallow and insincere.  With Mitt, it's all about Mitt and no one else.  Doherty's mother summed it up well when she said "I don't trust Mitt Romney."  Neither do I.  The man is truly reprehensible.  The Washington Post looks at Romney's slap down by Doherty's mother.  Here are highlights: 

Mitt Romney will stop mentioning a former Navy SEAL killed in the attacks on the U.S. Consulate in Libya last month in his campaign speeches, according to aides, after the man’s mother said the GOP presidential candidate should stop invoking her son’s name.

“I don’t trust Romney. He shouldn’t make my son’s death part of his political agenda,” Barbara Doherty said in a statement broadcast Wednesday on WHDH-TV in Boston. “It’s wrong to use these brave young men, who wanted freedom for all, to degrade Obama.”


Barbara Doherty’s son Glen was killed last month in the consulate attack.

Think Progress reports on what Glen Doherty's friend had to say about Romney which is equally bad:

Romney’s not only telling the story against the wishes of Doherty’s family, he’s also mischaracterizing his encounter with the former SEAL. According to Glen Doherty’s longtime friend, Doherty said Romney had introduced himself four times in the span of less than 30 minutes, saying it was”pathetic” that Romney didn’t know the two had just met:

“He said it was very comical,” [Doherty friend Elf] Ellefsen said, “Mitt Romney approached him ultimately four times, using this private gathering as a political venture to further his image. He kept introducing himself as Mitt Romney, a political figure. The same introduction, the same opening line. Glen believed it to be very insincere and stale.” [...]
“He said it was pathetic and comical to have the same person come up to you within only a half hour, have this person reintroduce himself to you, having absolutely no idea whatsoever that he just did this 20 minutes ago, and did not even recognize Glen’s face.”

Ellefsen said it makes him “sick” that Romney is using the story out on the stump. “Glen would definitely not approve of it,” he said, adding, “He probably wouldn’t do much about it. He probably wouldn’t say a whole lot about it. I think Glen would feel, more than anything, almost embarrassed for Romney. I think he would feel pity for him.”

I suspect that most prostitutes have more integrity than Mitt Romney. I can only hope that voters open their eyes to the shallowness of this man and his rank dishonesty before November 6th.