#Evangelical Christians' alliance with Donald Trump

[carolinemillerbooks]

New Post has been published on Books by Caroline Miller

New Post has been published on https://www.booksbycarolinemiller.com/musings/the-rapture-and-the-inferno/

The Rapture And The Inferno

Some people can be fooled some of the time, but not all of the people can be fooled all of the time unless they want to be.  Evangelical Christians seem to be among the latter. They have every reason to doubt Donald Trump’s religious convictions.  The number of fraud cases he has lost should be a clue: Trump University, his charitable foundation, and the E. Jean Carroll rape charge. The 91 current criminal indictments ought to be a red flag, too. Nonetheless, if polls speak true, a majority of the religious right gives the former president their unwavering support. Why they put their faith in him is unfathomable. Until  2016 when he ran for President, he had little commerce with them and identified as a  Presbyterian.  Even now, what he seems to admire most about evangelicals is the ability of their pastors to squeeze vast sums of money from the flock. “They’re all hustlers,” Trump says of them, the highest form of praise a con man can give to someone he believes is in the trade. In private, however, his remarks are anything but flattering. Despite his duplicity, evangelical pastors struggle to create what amounts to a squared circle, allying themselves with a man whose shenanigans rival those of Bernie Madow.  Instead, they turn a blind eye to his conduct or choose to see him as a “flawed vessel of God’s will.” An equivocation like the last one is a confession.  They know they have made a Faustian bargain, but given their priorities, they have no choice.  Under Trump’s leadership, they hope to drag the United States into the past, a period when women had few rights and LGBTQ was no more than a set of alphabet letters. So far, aligning themselves with an “infidel” has had its rewards. Trump chose an evangelical as his 2016 Presidential running mate, and after winning the election, he filled his Cabinet with people like Mike Pompeo who believe in the Rapture. Then he gave them the jewel they sought most.   He appointed three Supreme Court judges who were happy to overturn Rove v. Wade and deny women sovereignty over their bodies. When opposites conspire with one another, outcomes are unpredictable.  Trump and the pastors have cobbled together a wide net meant to ensnare an army of true believers. They’ve forgotten, however, that the same net circumscribes their boundaries and failed to foresee how a changed environment would alter their flock. One pastor complains his parishioners have begun to reject Christ’s teachings, finding them to be too weak. They seem to prefer the strum and dang of their new savior, Donald Trump. He not only embodies righteousness but also promises revenge. No doubt the former president thrills to the roar of the crowd, but the stage upon which he struts is a narrow one. The audience that gathers at his feet comes not to praise him but to hear their worst instincts validated. Moderate the message to the slightest degree and will they boo, as they did when he urged them to get a Covid 19 vaccine. Trump and the pastors have come to realize that their suppliants are more to be feared than exhorted. No longer a disorganized band of malcontents, they swell with the promise of the coming Rapture. To be ready, they’ve formed themselves into mindless hammers and are prepared to crush anyone who fails to share their frenzy. Trump’s rhetoric has grown more violent in response to their bloodlust. They may hurry him along the path he has chosen, but these suppliants demand of him a never-ending cycle of extremes, a demand that may appall some of the unscrupulous pastors and ambitious politicians who have been dragged within his wake like Marley’s chains. Having pledged their troth to a flawed vessel, these former luminaries must tread in their master’s footsteps or lose all import. Surely, a  compact this perfidious begs for a circle in Dante’s hell.

[ingek73]

Celebrity·Posted on Aug 9, 2024

Republicans Voting For Kamala Harris Over Donald Trump Are Sharing The Reasons Why, And This Makes So Much Sense

"Donald Trump is destroying the GOP, and the only way to stop that is to help Kamala Harris defeat him."

by Morgan Sloss

BuzzFeed Staff

Since President Biden dropped out of the race and endorsed his VP, I've seen quite a few social media posts from Republicans announcing that they'll vote for Kamala Harris over Donald Trump.

Kamala Harris smiling in a suit next to Donald Trump in a suit and red tie

Andrew Harnik/ Brandon Bell / Getty Images

Naturally, I was curious why so many conservatives are willing to vote against their party. So, I recently asked the Republicans in the BuzzFeed Community and got nearly 600 responses in one day! Here's what they had to say:

1. "Because I'm voting against MAGA, not for Harris. I believe in small government, personal freedoms, balanced budgets, and strong alliances. I used to vote Republican until 2016 when that party I voted for stopped existing. I'm willing to lend my vote to the Democrats for as long as the GOP continues to be the party of forced religion, forced patriotism, forced birth, white nationalism, and isolationism."

—purplesnail73

2. "I’m a Texan, a born-again Evangelical Christian, and a gun owner. I'm also a Navy veteran who proudly served. I cannot and will not vote for Donald J. Trump. His words and actions are antithetical to Christ’s teaching. His willingness to lie and wildly exaggerate is off-putting at best. As a veteran, his denigrating remarks toward senior brass undermine the good order and discipline required for a strong and effective military. His praise of dictators and autocrats is abhorrent."

—ancyghoul56

3. "I consider myself a conservative moderate, but I strongly believe in reproductive rights, so I’ll be voting for Harris. I wasn’t going to vote for Biden though, so I’m happy she’s the ticket now."

—laurieh4d6629bb4

4. "I became a registered Republican when we were in the days of Mitt Romney and John McCain — people who deeply cared about our country, had relevant leadership experience, and seemed capable of reviving and maintaining our economy. I was terrified of the socialist agenda being pushed by Bernie Sanders and wanted anything but that. But I’ve realized that the only thing scarier than the extreme left is the extreme right."

"Being a 'New England Republican,' it’s more about libertarian values (states’ rights and a free market) than social conservatism based in religion. I am not a religious person and do not want my (or anyone else’s) rights dictated by others’ religious beliefs. Project 2025 and the decrease in women’s rights are now some of my greatest fears — along with genuine questions about Trump’s mental state, criminal record, and his ability to work with other nations. I would not only be scared to have him as president but embarrassed, so at this point, I’ll vote for anyone else."

—Anonymous

5. "I am a registered Republican. However, I have never voted for Trump. In 2016, I couldn’t get past the Access Hollywood tape. In 2020, I knew he was only interested in what the presidency could do for him. In 2024, Trump SCARES ME TO MY CORE."

—Anonymous

6. "I am a lifelong Republican. Jimmy Carter is the only Democrat I have ever voted for. I voted for Trump twice because I am a Republican, but mostly because he looked to me to be the lesser of two evils. I just can’t bring myself to vote for him again. He has become the greater of two evils! I’m not thrilled by the Democratic platform or many of their priorities. But Trump is just too divisive, and as a nation, we desperately need to come together and find shared solutions to the problems our country is facing."

—charmingkid887

7. "I consider myself fiscally conservative and feel strongly about smaller, more efficient government, less regulation, and fewer entitlements. Let's be real: Trump's idea of fiscal responsibility is giving more to the 1%. Repeatedly, Trump's government handed money to the rich! Throughout the pandemic, large companies were allowed to reap benefits from the government that smaller businesses did not have the resources to explore. Less regulation and freedom have always been a cornerstone of the Republican party, yet laws were passed regulating what a woman can do with her own body."

"Freedom to Trump and the current makeup of the Republican party seems to be giving your money to the rich. Lastly, Trump is a liar and a convicted felon and belongs behind bars, NOT in any position of power."

—Anonymous

8. "I care about the future of my grandchildren. I’m a white woman, and my grandchildren are Black. I am very proud of who they are. I want them to have freedoms and choices, not hatred and racism. Former president Trump's views do not line with my views; the future of this country depends on us making a major change. I believe in Kamala Harris and what she stands for and our country. As for our gay communities, people's choice to love who they choose is also very relevant to my family. I love them — male, female, or undecided. We are all people; we all bleed. This country has bled enough. We will win. God bless Kamala Harris."

—Anonymous

9. "I am an Eisenhower/Kinzinger Republican with three sons serving in the US military. How is this a difficult choice for any educated, ethical human being? Trump is a horrible person, utterly devoid of any political vision, ethical compass, or personal integrity. He’s a convicted felon. Adjudicated fraudster. Indicted for multiple other felonies. A vocal supporter of the world’s worst megalomaniac dictators. For real? I have to explain why no one should ever support him, regardless of party affiliation? Is that what we’ve come to? That’s what MAGA has done to our country in general and the GOP in particular. It’s elevated crass and criminal behavior to a level of normalcy."

—Anonymous

10. "Trump is a wannabe dictator, and Vance doesn’t respect my existence as a single, childless dog mom! Project 2025 scares the crap out of me, and we need decency in the White House! We are fighting for our LIVES here!"

—Betherick85

11. "I’m a former US Marine and was a registered Arizona Republican until 2021, when I switched to Independent. I reluctantly voted for Trump in 2016 and 2020, but after January 6, I was done with him. Donald Trump is destroying the GOP, and the only way to stop that is to help Kamala Harris defeat him. A defeat would break Trump’s grip on the GOP and signal a shift in American politics. It would mean that Trump’s brand of politics no longer holds the same influence, which is crucial for the future of our democracy."

—youngpear70

12. "I’m voting for Harris because I like the level-headedness I see in her and Walz. I’m hopeful that she’ll be our first woman in the Oval Office. I detest Trump, who seems to be an unethical, arrogant bully and threatens the progress made in human rights over the last 100 years. It boggles my mind how Americans are cool with his lies and crimes. He has been both a joke and a danger to the world. I vote based on research, not my party."

—heathere4b60bc97b

13. "I have been a Republican since before I could vote, back when I enlisted in the National Guard as a 17-year-old. At that time, and throughout my 23-year military career, I swore an oath to the Constitution, not the president. I believe in democracy, I believe in God, and I believe in a lot of what Republicans say they stand for. But I absolutely do not believe in Trump and his supporters. They have clearly demonstrated that their only objective is power and control, not democracy, truth, or honesty. Oh, and they are weird!"

—Anonymous

14. "I am scared of what will happen to women and the LGBTQ community under another Trump presidency. I couldn't live with that on my conscience if I voted for Trump, and he won."

—Anonymous

15. "Trump is a convicted felon who has turned the GOP into a MAGA cult. He tried to steal the 2020 election. He lies about the legal system and law enforcement. He attempts to destroy anyone not 100% loyal to him. His entire administration says he is unfit to serve. Vance is a fraud. Harris and Walz are normal people who care about America."

—Anonymous

16. "Registered Republican since 1996 at 18, and 2016 was the first year I did not vote for a Republican for president (also did not for him in 2020 and definitely not in 2024). The constant belittling of those who don't like him, the number of blue-collar workers he and his cronies have screwed over the years, and the hijacking of faith (when he is clearly one of the most godless people by his deeds and words)."

—Anonymous

17. "I voted Republican for 40 years. I don’t recognize the Republican Party anymore. Where are the fiscally conservative, free enterprise, foreign policy hawks of the past? All I hear now is hate. And while I fully support free enterprise, we can’t deny the science of climate change and need to find ways to reduce our impact on the planet before it is too late."

—Anonymous

18. "I did not like how former president Trump attacked Vice President Harris’ race. That crossed a line for me as I have a family member of mixed race. I do not see Trump as a sensitive human. I’m seeing hate from the former president, and I don’t think he can control his temper. I like Tim Walz."

—Anonymous

19. "I don't support dismantling the Department of Education. I do not support policies that would limit the ability of public schools to do their jobs. A voucher or tax credit system for 'school choice' is the death knell of a society. Public school serves as a baseline which all other forms of education are held to. Eliminating public schools will lead to the rise of schools with wacky and potentially dangerous ideologies. Public school is the fabric of our society and must be preserved."

—Anonymous

20. "I will be voting for Kamala Harris. I have not and will not vote for Donald Trump. I was raised as a Catholic in a Republican household and taught to be responsible for my own actions. Donald Trump has no concept of personal or social responsibility. Mr. Trump has lied, used, manipulated, and gaslighted everyone in his realm for personal gain. This type of person has no place in a leadership role for this country or any position of management and responsibility, for that matter. Mr. Trump does not understand the concept of accountability."

"My first impression of Mr. Trump was his role in The Apprentice, which was appalling. Mr. Trump's public behavior and lack of ability to address growth and social issues critical to the well-being of the citizens of this country or the world community is unacceptable. The framers of our Constitution must be rolling in their graves!"

—Anonymous

21. "Trump is the worst thing to happen to the Republican Party since Nixon and Watergate! The man is obviously unfit for public office. The only person Donald Trump cares about is Donald Trump. He knows next to nothing about the Constitution or democracy. The way he acted about the 2020 election results was absolutely DISGRACEFUL!"

—Anonymous

22. "I’m raising a daughter in this world, and I would never leave her in Trump's care. That means something to me. I don’t like Kamala, and I’m not happy to vote for her. But if I can’t even trust you around innocent children, how can I trust you to run a country?"

—Anonymous

23. "I haven't voted for a Republican since Trump got nominated the first time, despite being a registered Republican. I am okay with every Democrat and Republican who has ever held the office of president in my lifetime except Trump. I haven't always agreed with them or voted for them, but I respected them and believed they were doing what they thought was right. I think Harris will be similar. I think she knows that her job will be to do what is right. Trump has always believed his job was to take from everybody else. He was never qualified for the job."

—Anonymous

24. "Because Trump and Vance are both creepy. Trump was the worst president this country has ever had."

—c49a679543

25. "I am a Republican who served seven terms as the elected prosecuting attorney of a county in Missouri. I voted for Donald Trump twice. I will never, under any circumstances, vote for him again. I became a Republican during the Reagan years. We were the party of strong law enforcement, tough national defense, and limited government. Neither party was interested in making abortion a criminal offense. Donald Trump made a cult of the party. His reaction to the January 6 riots, his trashing of the FBI, his vow to pardon rioters who violated the Capitol building, and his 34 felony convictions have made it impossible for me to respect him. The only vote I would cast for him would be GUILTY if I ever got to sit as a juror in one of his cases."

—Anonymous

26. "Foreign policy: Stand by Ukraine. Stand by NATO. We can always deal with differences in domestic policy and legislation. Foreign policy is driven by the president, and the current GOP is dangerously enamored with dictators. Trump praises Putin and insults our own allies, making future conflicts more likely."

27. "There are a lot of things to not like about Trump. The thing that really gets me the most is what he manages to bring out in people. I’m slowly seeing people I love and highly respected turn into hypocritical, dramatically angry morons who can’t seem to see past themselves. I just can’t sit by and participate in letting that type of hatred keep growing."

"If I’m going to use my vote, then I’m going to use it towards making history in a positive way. And I would love to be able to say I voted for the first female president. I like Harris a lot more than I’ve ever liked Hilary."

—Anonymous

28. "Christian nationalism poses a threat to my Christian faith, my LGBTQ friends, and to the fabric of our nation. It’s terrifying to see what’s become of my family members who tout Christian beliefs but are posting photos with a convicted felon and convicted sexual predator as a new messiah. Horrific."

—Anonymous

29. And finally, "I will vote for Kamala Harris and Tim Walz for two reasons. 1) I despise Donald Trump. He lacks character, dignity, morals, and empathy. He’s one of the worst humans on the planet and never should’ve been a presidential candidate, let alone a president. 2) I like the message of hope and a brighter future that Harris and Walz are bringing. They are good and decent people the American people can be proud to have as our President and Vice President."

—Anonymous

Note: Some responses have been edited for length and/or clarity.

[qidynamics]

“It’s an outlined program for Christian supremacy."

“That’s not a 501(c)(3) activity.”

A network of ultrawealthy Christian donors is spending nearly $12 million to mobilize Republican-leaning voters and purge more than a million people from the rolls in key swing states, aiming to tilt the 2024 election in favor of former President Donald Trump.

These previously unreported plans are the work of a group named Ziklag, a little-known charity whose donors have included some of the wealthiest conservative Christian families in the nation, including the billionaire Uihlein family, who made a fortune in office supplies, the Greens, who run Hobby Lobby, and the Wallers, who own the Jockey apparel corporation. Recipients of Ziklag’s largesse include Alliance Defending Freedom, which is the Christian legal group that led the overturning of Roe v. Wade, plus the national pro-Trump group Turning Point USA and a constellation of right-of-center advocacy groups.

EXCERPTS:

“We are in a spiritual battle and locked in a terrible conflict with the powers of darkness,” says a strategy document that lays out Ziklag’s 30-year vision to “redirect the trajectory of American culture toward Christ by bringing back Biblical structure, order and truth to our Nation.”

Ziklag was the brainchild of a Silicon Valley entrepreneur named Ken Eldred. It emerged from a previous organization founded by Eldred called United In Purpose, which aimed to get more Christians active in the civic arena, according to Bill Dallas, the group’s former director. United In Purpose generated attention in June 2016 when it organized a major meeting between then-candidate Trump and hundreds of evangelical leaders.

After Trump was elected in 2016, Eldred had an idea, according to Dallas. “He says, ‘I want all the wealthy Christian people to come together,’” Dallas recalled in an interview. Eldred told Dallas that he wanted to create a donor network like the one created by Charles and David Koch but for Christians.

The group’s stature grew after Trump took office. Vice President Mike Pence appeared at a Ziklag event, as did former Housing and Urban Development Secretary Ben Carson, Sen. Ted Cruz, then-Rep. Mark Meadows and other members of Congress. In its private newsletter, Ziklag claims that a coalition of groups it assembled played “a hugely significant role in the selection, hearings and confirmation process” of Amy Coney Barrett for a Supreme Court seat in late 2020.

The Christian nationalism movement has a variety of aims and tenets, according to the Public Religion Research Institute: that the U.S. government “should declare America a Christian nation”; that American laws “should be based on Christian values”; that the U.S. will cease to exist as a nation if it “moves away from our Christian foundations”; that being Christian is essential to being American; and that God has “called Christians to exercise dominion over all areas of American society.”

The Seven Mountains theology embraces a different, less democratic approach to gaining power. “If the Moral Majority is about galvanizing the voters, the Seven Mountains is a revolutionary model: You need to conquer these mountains and let change flow down from the top,” said Matthew Taylor, a senior scholar at the Institute for Islamic, Christian and Jewish Studies and an expert on Christian nationalism. “It’s an outlined program for Christian supremacy."

A driving force behind Ziklag’s efforts is Lance Wallnau, a prominent Christian evangelist and influencer based in Texas who is described by Ziklag as a “Seven Mountains visionary & advisor.” He was one of the earliest evangelical leaders to endorse Trump in 2015 and later published a book titled “God’s Chaos Candidate: Donald J. Trump and the American Unraveling.”

One key document says that “the biblical role of government is to promote good and punish evil” and that “the word of God and prayer play a significant role in policy decisions.”

Other internal Ziklag documents voice strong opposition to same-sex marriage and transgender rights. One reads: “transgender acceptance = Final sign before imminent collapse.”

A prominent conservative getting money from Ziklag is Cleta Mitchell, a lawyer and Trump ally who joined the January 2021 phone call when then-President Trump asked Georgia’s secretary of state to “find” enough votes to flip Georgia in Trump’s favor.

Mitchell now leads a network of “election integrity” coalitions in swing states that have spent the last three years advocating for changes to voting rules and how elections are run. According to one internal newsletter, Ziklag was an early funder of Mitchell’s post-2020 “election integrity” activism, which voting-rights experts have criticized for stoking unfounded fears about voter fraud and seeking to unfairly remove people from voting rolls. In 2022, Ziklag donated $600,000 to the Conservative Partnership Institute, which in turn funds Mitchell’s election-integrity work. Internal Ziklag documents show that it provided funding to enable Mitchell to set up election integrity infrastructure in Florida, North Carolina and Wisconsin.

EagleAI, which has claimed to use artificial intelligence to automate and speed up the process of challenging ineligible voters.

Now Mitchell is promoting a tool called EagleAI, which has claimed to use artificial intelligence to automate and speed up the process of challenging ineligible voters. EagleAI is already being used to mount mass challenges to the eligibility of hundreds of thousands of voters in competitive states, and, with Ziklag’s help, the group plans to ramp up those efforts.

According to an internal video, Ziklag plans to invest $800,000 in “EagleAI’s clean the rolls project,” which would be one of the largest known donations to the group.

Operation Checkmate

Ziklag lists two key objectives for Operation Checkmate: “Secure 10,640 additional unique votes in Arizona (mirroring the 2020 margin of 10,447 votes), and remove up to one million ineligible registrations and around 280,000 ineligible voters in Arizona, Nevada, Georgia, and Wisconsin.”

In a recording of an internal Zoom call, Ziklag’s Mark Bourgeois stressed the electoral value of targeting Arizona. “I care about Maricopa County,” Bourgeois said at one point, referring to Arizona’s largest county, which Biden won four years ago. “That’s how we win.”

Targeting Transgender

Operation Watchtower

For Operation Watchtower, Wallnau explained in a members-only video that transgender policy was a “wedge issue” that could be decisive in turning out voters tired of hearing about Trump.

The left had won the battle over the “homosexual issue,” Wallnau said. “But on transgenderism, there’s a problem and they know it.” He continued: “They’re gonna wanna talk about Trump, Trump, Trump. … Meanwhile, if we talk about ‘It’s not about Trump. It’s about parents and their children, and the state is a threat,’” that could be the “target on the forehead of Goliath.”

As preacher and activist John Amanchukwu said at a Ziklag event, “We need a church that’s willing to do anything and everything to get to the point where we reclaim that which was stolen from us.”

“I am troubled about a tax-exempt charitable organization that’s set up and its main operation seems to be to get people to win office,” said Phil Hackney, a professor of law at the University of Pittsburgh and an expert on tax-exempt organizations.

“They’re planning an election effort,” said Marcus Owens, a tax lawyer at Loeb and Loeb and a former director of the IRS’ exempt organizations division. “That’s not a 501(c)(3) activity.”

“It’s an outlined program for Christian supremacy."

“It’s an outlined program for Christian supremacy."

[mariacallous]

Democrats are in a state of shock. Former U.S. President Donald Trump’s decisive defeat of Vice President Kamala Harris in the Electoral College and the popular vote has been disillusioning. The fact that Trump has grown his coalition feels like a rebuke of what Democrats have stood for since the 1960s.

In the months ahead, Democrats will engage in a grueling process of soul-searching and finger-pointing. The party needs to reimagine its strategy if it hopes to regain control of the White House and cut into the significant gains that the GOP made throughout the electoral map.

There will be strong pressure for Democrats to veer more sharply toward the center on several key issues, including taxes, regulation, energy, and immigration. One of the historical examples that will be showcased as a model for moving to the middle will be the Democratic Leadership Council (DLC), a small group of insiders who came together in 1985 to rebuild their party following the wreckage of President Ronald Reagan’s landslide victory against former Vice President Walter Mondale. While the DLC provides reason to believe that centrism can help pave a roadway back to the White House, which it did in 1992 and 1996, it also offers a warning of the potential long-term costs that centrism can pose to the health of a party.

Following Reagan’s 1984 reelection victory (winning 49 out of 50 states and around 59 percent of the popular vote), many Democratic officials and voters were scrambling. Reagan’s agenda had marked a sharp shift to the right in U.S. politics. During his inaugural address in 1981, Reagan had reset the terms of the debate by proclaiming that the government was the problem, not the solution. During his first four years in office, Reagan pushed national debate toward conservative positions that were once considered extreme, and he united a rightward alliance of evangelical Christians, neoconservatives, hawkish anti-communists, and business elites around the twin themes of anti-communism and lower taxation. Democrats, some of whom half-joked they would move overseas, didn’t know what to do next as they looked at the election returns. In an article for the Wall Street Journal, reporter James Perry wrote, “The agonizing and the hand-wringing already have begun. It will be a long and painful process.”

In 1985, Al From launched the DLC. He had previously served as executive director for the House Democratic Caucus from 1981 to 1985, which was chaired by Louisiana Rep. Gillis Long at the time. As Kenneth Baer recounts, their collaboration on the Committee on Party Effectiveness gave birth to the idea for the DLC. In 1982, they published “Rebuilding the Road to Opportunity,” a report that outlined the need to turn away from economic redistribution and toward economic growth and opportunity. From’s ambition was to revive the fading influence of moderate Democrats such as Long, who, in the 1960s and 1970s, had helped bridge the divide between Northern liberals and Southern conservatives. From was also inspired by the work of Washington Sen. Henry “Scoop” Jackson, who had broken with his party in the 1970s over foreign policy, believing that his colleagues had become too dovish after Vietnam.

From and Will Marshall, who was a speechwriter and analyst for Long, joined a group of distinguished Democrats in launching the project, including Missouri Rep. Richard Gephardt, Georgia Sen. Sam Nunn, and some governors, including Virginia Gov. Chuck Robb, and Arizona Gov. Bruce Babbitt. “We Democrats can’t continue to blame bad candidates, bad tactics, and bad luck,” Nunn warned. Several younger politicians were attracted by some of the ideas that From and Marshall were working on through this small organization. In 1988, the DLC was shattered when Vice President George H.W. Bush walloped Massachusetts Gov. Michael Dukakis in the presidential election, after a blistering campaign that smeared the moderate technocratic governor as a far-left liberal by tapping into nationalistic patriotism and race-baiting. In 1989, Marshall established a think tank called the Progressive Policy Institute to advance DLC ideas and attempt to reframe the debate before the next presidential election.

At the heart of the DLC agenda was the imperative to shift toward the center. On domestic policy, this meant promoting market-based solutions to economic intervention, as well as reforms to the social safety net, to promote individual responsibility and work incentives. On foreign policy, the DLC called for more military intervention and support in targeted conflicts. The DLC came under intense political fire from liberal Democrats who warned that these arguments would erode the party’s best traditions, echoing Massachusetts Sen. Ted Kennedy’s warning, which he made at the 1980 Democratic National Convention, against forgetting the fight for “the cause of the common man and the common woman.” Historian Arthur Schlesinger Jr. wrote in the New York Times that “me-too Reaganism” would be disastrous. The DLC vision, Schlesinger argued, overstated the popularity of Reaganism and promoted wrong-headed policies. Moreover, he wrote, “If American voters are in a conservative mood, they will surely choose the real thing and not a Democratic imitation.”

But From and his colleagues felt that if Democrats did not shift dramatically, then the White House would remain in Republican hands for decades to come. From said the talking points from figures such as Schlesinger were “advanced by the standpatters in our party, who yearn for a return to the pre-Reagan status quo at home and advocate a neo-isolationism abroad.”

Of all the politicians who the DLC worked with, none was as important as Arkansas Gov. Bill Clinton. When From and Clinton met in Little Rock in 1989, the DLC put an offer on the table that the governor could not refuse: “If you agree to become chairman of the DLC, we’ll pay for your travel around the country, we’ll work together on an agenda, and I think you’ll be president one day, and we’ll both be important.” Clinton served as the DLC chairman from 1990 to 1991. From followed through on his promise to help elevate Clinton. The DLC established chapters in numerous states and launched a national convention, branding itself as the “mainstream voice of the Democratic Party.” During his campaign in 1992 against Bush, Clinton reminded voters and the media of his reputation as a New Democrat with great pride. The DLC helped Clinton raise money, round up endorsements, and knock off primary challengers. The governor chose Tennessee Sen. Al Gore as his running mate, resulting in two young southerners at the top of the ticket who shared an affinity for the centrist vision. The party platform included text about a “new covenant to repair the damaged bond between the American people and their government, that will expand opportunity, insist upon greater individual responsibility in return, restore community, and insure national security.”

To be sure, Clinton didn’t totally jettison older Democratic ideals. His relationship to the DLC, as historians Judith Stein and Nelson Lichtenstein argued in their 2023 book on Clinton’s presidency, was “far more ambiguous.” Clinton simultaneously returned to core Democratic arguments about the role of government in the economy and stressed his commitment to working families. Nonetheless, the influence of the DLC loomed large as Clinton attempted to position himself as a Democrat who mainstream voters could accept in a more conservative era. The plan worked. Clinton won the presidency, and he would be reelected four years later over Kansas Sen. Bob Dole, a Republican.

The DLC model will tempt Democrats in 2024 as they confront the governing coalition that MAGA Republicans have put into place. After all, the DLC helped Democrats win the White House in 1992 and 1996. Some argue that Barack Obama followed the DLC template, as well, particularly on economic and financial policy, which was important to his victories in 2008 and 2012.

As tempting as this historical model might be, Democrats will do well to understand the costs that were also a result of the strategy—costs that Democrats are still paying today in painful ways. One of the signature decisions in the first year of Clinton’s presidency was to sign the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA). The agreement, which opened the flow of commerce between the United States, Canada, and Mexico, had been worked on by Bush before the end of his term. Clinton, who saw NAFTA as a way to brandish his New Democrat bonafides, stressed that free trade was an inevitable reality and that it would lift all boats.

Not everyone agreed. During the 1996 presidential campaign, third-party candidate Ross Perot, who received over 19 million votes, said the “giant sucking sound” U.S. workers heard was well-paying jobs being moved abroad. Many liberals and progressives joined Perot in his critique as Congress considered what to do. In 1993, Vermont Rep. Bernie Sanders, an independent, said, “NAFTA may be a good deal for the people who own our corporations, but it is a bad deal for American workers, for our family farmers, and it is bad for the environment.” Gephardt, who was also House majority leader at the time, led a campaign against the bill, as did Michigan Rep. David Bonior, House majority whip.

Clinton pushed back, sending his vice president, Gore, to appear on CNN’s “Larry King Live” in a televised debate against Perot in November. Gore won. The House and Senate passed the NAFTA within a few weeks. The new Democratic vision was triumphant. In his signing statement, Clinton proclaimed, “We cannot stop global change. We cannot repeal the international economic competition that is everywhere. We can only harness the energy to our benefit. Now we must recognize that the only way for a wealthy nation to grow richer is to export, to simply find new customers for the products and services it makes.”

By 2000, the U.S. economy was roaring, and the emergence of a vibrant high-tech sector seemed to promise a new era of economic growth. The fact that Clinton ended his time in power with low unemployment, minimal inflation, and federal surpluses seemed reason to cheer.

Looking back, however, it has become clear that many working families suffered greatly as a result of NAFTA. The middle way didn’t provide economic hope or security. It was part of a switch to what some historians, such as Gary Gerstle, have called the “neo-liberal order” that privileged unfettered markets regardless of the impact on average Americans. “Deindustrialization has diminished the wealth, power and health of working-class Americans arguably more than any other single culprit,” Dan Kaufmann recently wrote in the New York Times. “The passage of NAFTA remains one of the most consequential events in recent American political and economic history.” While deindustrialization was well underway by the 1970s, the historic trade agreement greatly accelerated these destructive processes.

Now, a reimagined Republican Party rests on a foundation of working-class voters. And this year they were joined by working Latino and Black voters, who are likewise feeling the squeeze of long-term economic security. Along with other Republicans, they have forged a governing coalition that keeps growing and has thrown the Democrats into disarray. Surveying the results from last week, journalist Ezra Klein said on his show that the “Obama coalition is over. It is defeated and exhausted. What comes next needs to be new.”

For all its political benefits, the history of the DLC reveals two fundamental problems that centrist politics can create. First, it can result in a party leaving behind traditions that remained at the heart of its appeal to most supporters. Second, they can dissuade parties from the hard work of really reimagining their ideas and constituencies in bold ways that are usually essential to realignments.

With an eye on 2028, Democrats must watch for policy decisions that could help them at the electoral level in the near future but harm their long-term potential to create a new governing coalition to supplant the one Obama built.

[justinspoliticalcorner]

Peter Montgomery at RWW:

Christian nationalist leaders want to force Americans to live in accordance with their religious and political beliefs, and they have a plan to make it happen. They are demanding that future Republican presidents and senators consider only potential Supreme Court justices who meet the American Family Association’s “biblical worldview” standard. Yes, it is that brazen. Religious-right leaders who have endorsed the project want to impose a de facto religious test on the Supreme Court, a violation of constitutional principles and the American values of religious freedom and pluralism.   Right Wing Watch broke the story about this Supreme Court scheme last year after Phillip Jauregui presented it during a breakout session at the Family Research Council’s 2023 Pray Vote Stand conference.  Jauregui, a longtime activist in support of right-wing judges, now runs the Center for Judicial Renewal as a project of AFA Action, the American Family Association’s political advocacy arm. 

At this year’s Pray Vote Stand conference on Saturday, Jauregui presented the Supreme Court plan from the main stage, with a giant screen showing the name of other religious-right leaders that have endorsed it, including FRC President Tony Perkins, former Rep. Michele Bachmann, First Liberty’s Kelly Shackelford, and relentless purveyor of false Christian nationalist history David Barton.  When it comes to the Supreme Court, it’s not good enough to get conservative justices, said Jauregui, they have to be “great.” So the Center for Judicial Renewal has spent “thousands of hours” evaluating people whose names have been floated as possible future justices.  The first criteria Jauregui uses to evaluate a possible nominee’s potential for greatness as a “constitutionalist” justice is their “biblical worldview.” 

Otherwise conservative judges who don’t meet AFA’s “worldview” are put on Jauregui’s “red list” of unacceptables. Jauregui suggested that he is publicizing AFA’s “red list” to try to keep Donald Trump from including any of the four judges on the list of potential Supreme Court nominees Trump has said he will release before the election.  Among the things that have landed conservative judges on that list are using a transgender person’s preferred pronouns. The dossier on Judge Neomi Rao characterizes her “faith and worldview” as problematic, noting that she was “raised in an immigrant family of Zoroastrian tradition and converted to Judaism when she got married.”

[...] To be clear, this is not just a demand for only conservative Christian justices. It goes even further. “Worldview” is a hot topic on the religious right, and was the focus of its own breakout at Pray Vote Stand. The Family Research Council’s Center for Biblical Worldview, which employs evangelical pollster George Barna, makes it clear that a tiny fraction of Christians—even a small minority of church-going evangelicals—meet their exacting standards for having a “biblical worldview.”

[...] In June, AFA Action asked supporters for money to expand the project to include lower federal court judges, but at Pray Vote Stand, Jauregui kept the focus on the Supreme Court. Jauregui noted that Justices Clarence Thomas and Samuel Alito are the oldest sitting justices, which he said makes his team’s work even more important. “God’s done work at the court, and it’s not time to lose that ground.”  AFA’s list of acceptable potential justices includes three right-wing appeals court judges, along with Kristen Waggoner, president of the religious-right legal giant Alliance Defending Freedom, and Mark Martin, former dean of the law school at Pat Robertson’s Regent University and now dean of the law school at High Point University. Right Wing Watch has previously noted that one of those AFA-approved Judges, Fifth Circuit MAGA Judge James Ho, “has become notorious as a virtual parody of a right-wing activist, whose extreme opinions read like far-right ideological diatribes.”

Christian Nationalists seek to impose a biblical worldview test on future judicial nominees for the highest court in the land by imposing a very narrow definition for acceptable court nominees by their standards.

[hcaballeros]

Trump as a Mercenary Defender: Navigating the Evangelical-Trump Nexus: A Personal Reflection

In the intricate tapestry of American politics, few phenomena are as perplexing as the unwavering support extended by numerous Evangelicals to Donald Trump. How did a man seemingly at odds with traditional Christian values become the chosen champion of the Evangelical community?

Allow me to share a personal perspective. As a lifelong Christian, my identity has been shaped by my connection to the Christian community. However, upon moving to the US during Trump's presidency, I witnessed a pronounced shift in values and priorities. While a gradual transition from Bible-oriented churches to a more market-oriented approach had been underway for years, this change was distinctly political in nature. It was a shift toward associating the concept of leadership from a pastor to President Trump, and I found it challenging to comprehend.

Initially, I grappled with the apparent contradiction between Trump's behavior and the principles of faith, humility, and piety. The success of the Republican Party's branding, portraying the Democratic Party as "satanic," played a significant role in shaping perceptions. Trump took this polarization to an extreme, leaving me questioning whether I, as a Christian, could genuinely support him.

Examining Trump's actions, such as multiple divorces, extramarital affairs, lack of humility, absence of compassion, and an unwillingness to forgive, highlighted a misalignment with Christian values. Despite these concerns, the Evangelical community continued to rally behind him.

After much contemplation, discussions, and even losing acquaintances over this issue, I stumbled upon a partial answer. The timing of Trump's rise to power proved crucial in understanding this alliance. The post-9/11 era created an atmosphere of fear, pessimism, and distrust, sentiments that deeply resonated within the Evangelical community. Feeling that their culture and country were slipping away, Evangelicals sought a savior who could guide them back to what they perceived as a more secure and familiar past.

This period introduced an "Armageddon complex" within the Evangelical movement, fostering a belief that drastic measures were necessary to reclaim a nation slipping away from its grasp. The Obama presidency, marked by economic turmoil and sweeping demographic changes, heightened this fear and discontent. Evangelicals, grappling with the challenges of adapting to a rapidly changing world, found solace in Trump's unapologetic, confrontational, and aggressive approach.

The conversation delves into the profound fear experienced by those born in the 1950s and 1960s, witnessing a cultural transformation challenging their conservative values. The rapid acceptance of same-sex marriage, for instance, felt like an unwelcome intrusion into their worldview. In their pursuit of a defender against perceived threats, Trump emerged as an unconventional yet appealing choice.

Evangelicals embraced Trump as a mercenary defender, someone unbound by the moral norms they felt obligated to follow. Trump's divergence from Christian principles allowed them to justify their support, creating cognitive dissonance within the community. The paradoxical nature of this support is not despite Trump's controversial behavior but rather because of it.

In this line of thought, Trump becomes a feature rather than a bug for Evangelicals. His brash rhetoric and disruptive behavior are perceived as tools to combat perceived enemies at the gates. Evangelicals, in embracing Trump, find an ally who doesn't adhere to the same rules of engagement they feel bound by, enabling them to rationalize their alliance.

This mercenary relationship is the consistent thread in the Evangelical-Trump connection. It offers a distinctive perspective on why, despite Trump's divisive behavior, many Evangelicals not only stick with him but actively support him. The Evangelical-Trump alliance, as discussed, provides a nuanced understanding of the complex interplay between politics, fear, and faith in contemporary American society.

Do I find it sad? Yes, very much. But rather than that, I find it alarming. This "blinding" devotion, fueled by the powerful influence of social networks and their capacity to channel people into their own beliefs, makes Evangelicals susceptible prey.

Allow me to finish with an example: I recently spoke with a Christian leader who accepted to me “almost blind loyalty” (his actual words) to Trump, and that he believed Trump was the solution to a country on the brink of disaster. When I inquired why he held this view, he cited job scarcity, economic downturn, open borders, and cultural decay. Seeking an open dialogue, I countered with facts—job openings were up nearly 25%, economic growth had increased by 2.5%, and apprehensions at the US-Mexico border had risen by 300%. Yet, despite presenting these facts, he remained unswayed, brushing them aside as inconsequential. This encounter exposed a concerning trend of blind loyalty, a refusal to engage in due diligence, or question prevailing beliefs. It reflects a troubling mindset akin to blind faith, reminiscent of what one might find in religious leaders.

This kind of unwavering allegiance, devoid of critical thinking, is both troubling and saddening. I believe we may be too late, and we will be witnessing the consequences of this phenomenon within the Christian community, with the potential for this demographic group to lose relevance in society. The impacts of this trend might only become fully apparent decades from now, and I am concerned that we, as a group, will look back at this time with profound sadness.

[newsworld-nw]

Republican presidential candidates will pledge allegiance to Israel in the fight against Hamas

Donald Trump on the 2019 Republican Jewish Coalition Annual Assembly in Las Vegas.Jacqueline Martin (AP)Ron DeSantis was final 12 months's sensation in Las Vegas. Loads has occurred because the Republican Jewish Coalition (RJC) final met within the gaming capital in 2022. Florida's governor got here into a gathering of the influential Jewish foyer as the favourite to beat Donald Trump within the race for the White Home. . The previous president leads the selection regardless of a complete of 91 prices within the 4 prices opened in court docket. This Saturday, nonetheless, candidates will be capable to reverse their views whereas pledging allegiance to Israel in an assault in opposition to Hamas."At the moment we're with Israel greater than ever." Friday evening's occasion started with phrases from Norm Coleman, one of many presidents of the group. "This 12 months, Israel is going through the best devastation because the Holocaust (...), we're damage, however we all know find out how to transfer ahead and see higher days," mentioned the previous senator from Minnesota. The significance of his message was underlined by a pair of movies of Israeli Protection Power fighters, which had been broadly praised by the general public.Beginning Saturday morning, the RJC occasion in Las Vegas will change into a discussion board the place the eight Republicans operating for president, in addition to different high-profile politicians, will parade throughout the stage to make commitments to the Jewish trigger.Organizers introduced Friday morning that Mike Johnson will attend the occasion. Johnson grew to become chief of the Home of Representatives on Wednesday after 4 candidates, exhibiting 22 days of chaos and inner tensions amongst Republicans. Johnson, an ultraconservative near Trump, will ship a speech Saturday evening. Earlier than that, conservative Home Majority Chief Steve Scalise will take the stage, and who was added on the final minute "to indicate his solidarity with the folks of Israel and the American Jewish group."The presence of Johnson, probably the most not too long ago anointed political chief in Washington, will sign how the occasion digests the Center East battle. The chief of the Home of Representatives is an evangelical Christian, a bunch that represents probably the most loyal base throughout the conservative institution. The battle in opposition to Hamas has fallen among the many most pressing considerations of evangelical voters, as some polls have mirrored in Iowa, the place the Republican caucuses shall be held subsequent January and the place spiritual folks have a major presence.It was in Iowa that Nikki Haley, Trump's former ambassador to the United Nations, described the battle between Israel and Gaza that started on October 7 as "a battle between good and evil." "We should have a frontrunner who has the readability to know the distinction," the South Carolina governor mentioned this month.Each Haley and DeSantis, who're operating for second place in Trump's shadow, have positioned the Center East battle on the middle of their worldwide coverage narratives. This Thursday, CNN and the Related Press reported that Florida is facilitating third-party procedures to ship drones, ammunition, fight armor and helmets to Israel to be used by protection drive parts. The knowledge was confirmed by a spokesman for the DeSantis marketing campaign, who indicated that the state didn't use assets to buy these objects and that the help was restricted to expedite transportation permits.The annual assembly of the Republican Jewish Alliance can also be one of many largest fundraising occasions. The group is likely one of the most related foyer teams for Israel. Its members characterize third in funding energy after the American Israel Public Affairs Committee and J Road. Cash from the group has grown considerably since 2018, from $130,000 final 12 months to greater than $320,000, in keeping with the group Open Secrets and techniques.

Donald Trump is coming again

Final 12 months the previous president attended the occasion electronically. In a video, Trump assured the viewers that no administration has carried out extra for Israel than his. Among the many actions he highlighted, in keeping with the calls for of probably the most hard-line sectors of American Jewry, had been shifting the embassy from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem and formally recognizing Israeli settlements established within the Golan Heights.Trump has previously supported one in all RJC's most influential figures, billionaire Sheldon Adelson, proprietor of the Sands On line casino and a significant donor to the Republican Celebration. Adelson died in 2021, however his widow, Miriam, stays the corporate's central determine, value practically $30 billion. Not like her husband, she prefers to remain on the sidelines and doesn't publicly help any candidate.Observe all worldwide data Fb And Xor between Our weekly publication. #Republican #presidential #candidates #pledge #allegiance #Israel #battle #Hamas Read the full article

[cavenewstimes]

Some critics see Trump’s behavior as un-Christian. His conservative Christian backers see a hero

(AP) — For eight years, Donald Trump has managed to secure the support of many evangelical and conservative Christians despite behavior that often seemed at odds with teachings espoused by Christ in the Gospels. If some observers initially viewed this as an unsustainable alliance, it’s different now. Certain achievements during Trump’s presidency – notably appointments that shifted the Supreme…

[foreverlogical]

American organized religion is facing a downward spiral crisis of its own creation. The latest effort by conservative Catholic bishops to use abortion as a cudgel to deny President Biden communion is a perfect example of this self-sabotage:

The Roman Catholic bishops of the United States, flouting a warning from the Vatican, have overwhelmingly voted to draft guidance on the sacrament of the Eucharist, advancing a push by conservative bishops to deny President Biden communion because of his support of abortion rights.

The decision, made public on Friday afternoon, is aimed at the nation’s second Catholic president, perhaps the most religiously observant commander in chief since Jimmy Carter, and exposes bitter divisions in American Catholicism. It capped three days of contentious debate at a virtual June meeting of the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops. The measure was approved by a vote of 73 percent in favor and 24 percent opposed.

It’s honestly astonishing. President Biden is devout Catholic who attends church with uncommon regularity. He wears his faith on his sleeve and uses it to guide his moral decisions. He has suffered personal tragedies that would break many people, and somehow maintained an almost maddening optimism about America, his fellow human beings (even his Republican opponents) and the Divine itself. A religious organization suffering dramatic declines that was serious about maintaining its influence on this earth should be elated to have such a person as arguably the most powerful person in the world.

But not the leadership of the Roman Catholic bishops, which stands well to the political right of the laity. They aligned themselves strongly with Donald Trump, one of the most personally reprobate men imaginable, an inveterate avoider of church with a personality so far from that of the textual Jesus Christ that conservative Christians had to rationalize their support for him as an “imperfect vessel” or a modern-day Cyrus—the unbeliever who nonetheless helped the faithful. It would be difficult to imagine a more cruel, mean-spirited, narcissistic and vainglorious person than Trump, a more perfect icon of the seven deadly sins.

They took no action to attempt to deny communion to Trump despite his offensive personality and his heresies on nearly every point of Christian doctrine in the New Testament–including, notably, the death penalty. But they’ve decided to draw the line against Biden on abortion, an issue that famously does not actually appear in the Bible and requires tortured textual interpretations to justify doctrinal enforcement. This despite the fact that Catholics split their votes for Biden and Trump almost evenly.

The decision by the bishops to take greater offense to a fellow Catholic over abortion than, say, the abuse of migrant children or the the state murder of prisoners by a grinning philanderer illustrates their real motivations. The bishops are not acting in the interest of their faith or their flock; they’re acting as agents of the warped moral morass that is American Conservatism, Inc. They are prioritizing control of women’s bodies over every other spiritual or secular importance. In so doing, they are rapidly alienating at least half of what remains of the American church’s adherents.

Relatedly, protestant pastors are struggling to control the growth of QAnon conspiracies in their congregations. The QAnon cult is partly just the latest gloss on Satanic panic and Great Awakening movements in the past. But it is also a form of apostasy, a bizarre heretical substitution of Donald Trump for the avenging Jesus of the Book of Revelation, come to punish the wicked in a fallen world, vindicate the ostracized true believers, and usher in the Kingdom of Heaven on earth.  In the case of the Q faithful, the flaming sword of Jesus wreaking havoc against the devotees of the Antichrist has been replaced with the mass executions of Hillary Clinton, Barack Obama and fellow liberals at Gitmo by secret military tribunals.

Much like the conservative Catholic bishops, QAnon adherents substitute their profane racial and sexual insecurities and temporal partisan allegiances for authentic spiritual connection and compassion. But the pastors of America’s white evangelical churches largely have only themselves the blame: they have allowed their culture to become dominated by the hard right with little pushback. White evangelical America is now a very distinct subculture on social and economic issues from most of the rest of America, including even other Americans of faith. It was only a matter of time before lashing their beliefs to the altar of partisan culture wars would end up with the sacrifice of their faith itself to the golden idol of Donald Trump.

It is no surprise, then, that an increasingly progressive America has recoiled in horror, fleeing churches and abandoning the religious organizations that have set themselves squarely at war with multicultural democracy.

Religion could find a footing even in a socially liberal world where science and technology have supplanted so much of what was previously the mystery of the divine. Young generations beset by existential environmental and economic crises in the face of an intransigent political system have little secular grounding for hope in the future. Faith could provide some irrational courage in the face of despair, much as it has done for President Biden.

But that would require religious leaders to abandon the American revanchist conservative project. For the time being, however, it appears they would prefer to take a Hail Mary pass at an authoritarian theocracy to gain the world even if it means losing their soul—and their faithful—in the bargain.

If you enjoyed this article, consider making a donation to help us produce more like it. The Washington Monthly was founded in 1969 to tell the stories of how government really works —and how to make it work better. More than fifty years later, the need for incisive analysis and new, progressive policy ideas is clearer than ever. As a nonprofit, we rely on support from readers like you.

YES, I'LL MAKE A DONATION

[eretzyisrael]

CAMERA is calling on PBS to investigate "Til Kingdom Come," an upcoming documentary on the relationship between evangelical Christians and Israel that will be broadcast on March 29 over concerns regarding quotes that the watchdog groups say may be fabricated or in error.

After comparing the documentary's video and audio content, it found that the filmmakers had cobbled together wording from statements made on Jan. 28, 2020, by former President Donald Trump to Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.

It pointed to three different instances of the president's prepared comments with a spliced-together quote that contradicts the overall focus of his remarks.

The film also transformed an expression of hope conveyed in a passage about Jews, Christians and Muslims visiting holy sites "in the West Bank described so vividly in the Bible" into a phrase suggesting Israeli takeover of land.

"The manipulation is indefensible," said CAMERA's executive director, Andrea Levin. "Altering a presidential statement to misrepresent the content of a key policy address is obviously a blatant violation of journalistic ethics. It appears the filmmakers felt the measured language of the actual quote was insufficient to reinforce their storyline so they spliced together separate and different passages to create a more extreme – and false – message. The alteration clearly will deceive viewers."

The Jan. 28 event was the public announcement of a presidential peace plan that focused heavily on the creation of a Palestinian state and benefits to Palestinians through revived negotiations and independence. "There is, however, no hint in the documentary that a Palestinian state was extensively discussed in the session," according to CAMERA.

"Manipulation of the quote calls into question the veracity and credibility of every interview and assertion in the video," added Levin. "PBS needs to vet the documentary very closely. What other interviews have been altered to promote the filmmakers' political perspective? Obviously, the fabricated quote must be removed from the documentary before it's aired – and anything else that's fraudulent."

The documentary, released last year, was produced and directed by Grammy Award-winning Maya Zinshtein. It was included in numerous film festivals in the past few months.

"Not only does the fabrication demonstrate a breach of trust with the audience, it reveals contempt for the other people interviewed in the film," said Dexter Van Zile, Shillman Research Fellow for CAMERA, who also denounced allowing Palestinian Christian leader Munther Isaac to posit an equivalence between biblically rooted support for Israel and jihadism.

Rev. Dr. Tricia Miller, Christian Media Analyst for CAMERA, said that "Zinshtein's film uses a fabricated quote to advance a hackneyed, biased and ugly view of gun-toting evangelical Protestants supposedly engaging in an 'unholy alliance' with Israelis living in the West Bank to advance an anti-peace agenda in the Holy Land aimed at bringing on Armageddon at the expense of the Jewish people."

She noted that "the need to fabricate and distort suggests the narrative doesn't hold up very well relying on facts. Christian Zionists in the United States have been devoted and reliable supporters of the cause of Zionism since the 1800s, exhibiting genuine concern for the welfare of the Jewish people."

[antoine-roquentin]

interesting comparison in how the nytimes and wsj report on international affairs in their articles on the seoul mayoral election

new york times: Election Rout Signals a Shift in South Korea’s Political Scene 

Mr. Moon was elected ​in 2017, ​filling the power vacuum created by Ms. Park’s impeachment. As a former human rights lawyer, he enthralled the nation by promising a “fair and just” society. He ​vehemently criticized an entrenched ​culture of privilege and corruption ​that he said had taken root while conservatives were in power, ​and vowed to create a level playing field for young voters who have grown weary of dwindling job opportunities and an ever-expanding income gap.

Mr. Moon spent much of his first two years in power struggling to quell escalating tension between North Korea and the United States, successfully mediating diplomacy between the two countries. He shifted more of his attention to domestic issues after the two summit meetings between North Korea’s leader, Kim Jong-un, and President Donald J. Trump failed to produce a deal on nuclear disarmament or the easing of tensions on the Korean Peninsula.

But things quickly turned sour on the home front ​as well.

In 2019, huge outdoor rallies erupted ​over accusations of forgery and preferential treatment in college and internship applications​ surrounding the daughter of Cho Kuk, Mr. Moon’s former justice minister and one of his closest allies.

The scandal flew in the face of Mr. Moon’s election promise of creating “a world without privilege,” and prompted outrage against the “gold-spoon” children of the elite, who ​glided into top-flight universities and cushy jobs while their “dirt-spoon” peers struggled to make ends meet in South Korea’s hobbled economy.

​South Koreans expressed their growing cynicism over what they considered the hypocritical practices of Mr. Moon’s progressive allies with a popular saying: naeronambul. It roughly translates to, “If they do it, it’s a romance; if others do it, they call it an extramarital affair.”​

Nonetheless, the Democratic Party won by a landslide in parliamentary elections last year as Mr. Moon leveraged his surging popularity around South Korea’s largely successful battle against the coronavirus. But Mr. Moon’s virus campaign has lost its luster.

In recent months, South Koreans have grown frustrated with prolonged social-distancing restrictions, a distressed economy and the government’s failure to provide vaccines fast enough. On Wednesday, the government reported 668 new coronavirus infections, the highest one-day increase in three months.

Mr. Moon’s most devastating setback came last month when officials at the Korea Land and Housing Corporation — the state developer — were accused of using privileged insider information to cash in on government housing development programs. Kim Sang-jo, Mr. Moon’s chief economic policy adviser, stepped down last month when it was revealed that his family had significantly raised the rent on an apartment in Seoul just days before the government imposed a cap on rent increases.

“People had hoped that even if they were incompetent, the Moon government would at least be ethically superior to their conservative rivals,” said Ahn Byong-jin, a political scientist at Kyung Hee University in Seoul. “What we see in the election results is the people’s long-accumulated discontent over the ‘naeronambul’ behavior of the Moon government exploding. Moon has now become a lame duck president.”

wall street journal: South Korean Conservatives Are on the Rise a Year Before Presidential Election 

South Korea’s political right and left have widely different foreign-policy views. Under Mr. Moon, the government has given priority to inter-Korean cooperation, avoided zero-sum language about the U.S.-China rivalry and taken a pro-diplomacy approach that has had a “net stabilizing effect in the region,” said Jessica J. Lee, a Korea specialist at the Quincy Institute for Responsible Statecraft, a Washington-based think tank

South Korea’s conservatives in the past have taken a more confrontational stance with North Korea and expressed skepticism about China. Right-leaning presidents have also aligned more with Washington on security, showing more appetite for large-scale military exercises with the U.S. or greenlighting the installation of an American missile-defense system that angered Beijing and Pyongyang.

A right-leaning South Korean president adopting a traditional foreign-policy playbook “will likely increase tensions on the peninsula and make denuclearization less likely,” Ms. Lee said.

South Korean conservatives have lately appeared more supportive toward Washington’s growing concerns about Beijing than their liberal counterparts.

Last month, the conservative party’s chairman said South Korea should join forces with the U.S., Japan, Australia, and India—a grouping known as the Quad—to work together against an increasingly assertive China, just as U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken was visiting Seoul.

“South Korean conservatives have found their political legitimacy through Seoul’s alliance with the U.S.,” said Kim Meen-geon, a professor of politics at Kyung Hee University in Seoul.

“This now means more support for policies on China that align closer to Washington,” she said.

South Korean public opinion is firmly behind the conservatives when it comes to China, recent opinion polls show. More than 80% of South Koreans view China as a national security threat, while 60% see it as an economic threat as well, according to a poll released by the Chicago Council on Global Affairs, a think tank, this week.

the breakdown in voting patterns by gender and age is pretty interesting, with the 20-something men breaking harder for the conservative party than the 60-somethings. in large part, this has to do with a. the doubling of property prices in seoul since 2014, while wage growth has slown to 0% b. ahn cheol-soo, a south korean tech millionaire with a centrist bent (progressive domestically, hawkish in foreign policy), who previously threw his weight behind moon while the conservatives were in charge, pushed the conservative candidate this time to maintain his centrist credentials. i don’t know if this is replicable nationally. south korean conservatives seem to have rallied around the only person not tainted with the stain of the dictatorship and its corrupt apparatus, a sergio moro type named yoon seok-youl. the popular liberal candidate is gyeonggi governor and proponent of universal basic income, lee jae-myung. one thing not mentioned in any of the articles is the betrayal over lgbt rights. moon jae-in, while seen as being more conservative, was expected to shepherd an anti-discrimination bill favoured by 90% of koreans into law. instead, evangelical christians have managed to halt the process, helped by the fact that korea’s first big covid outbreak was caused by a gay man (although an even bigger outbreak was caused by evangelical protests against church restrictions). in the face of high profile suicides by trans figures, as well as the fact that this seoul election was caused by the suicide of the seoul mayor (the first lawyer to ever win a sexual harassment case and a promoter of women’s rights) over a sexual harassment scandal, leftist youth has abandoned the major centre-left parties (including the one widely seen as the biggest alternative, as the leader resigned over a sexual harassment case) in favour of numerous breakaway parties. whether these voters would return to moon’s party in a national election, especially under an economic populist, remains to be seen.

[acalltocivility]

White evangelicals are the core of Trump’s political support, and while the overwhelming number of the president’s evangelical supporters may not be racist, they are willing to back a man who openly attempts to divide people by race. That would be enough of an indictment, but the situation is actually a good deal worse than that, since Trump’s eagerness to inflame ugly passions is only one thread in his depraved moral tapestry." and... "Much of the evangelical movement, in aligning itself with Donald Trump, has shown itself to be graceless and joyless, seized by fear, hypocritical, censorious, and filled with grievances. That is not true of all evangelicals, of course, and it’s not true of all evangelicals who are Trump supporters. But it’s true of enough of them, and certainly of the political leadership of the white evangelical movement, to have done deep injury to their public witness. I know this firsthand, from pastors around the country who have talked about the catastrophic effects of the unholy alliance between evangelicals and Donald Trump. One pastor of a large church on the Pacific Coast told me: “There are many reasons why young people are turning away from the Church, but my observation is, Trump has vastly accelerated that trend. He’s put it into hyperdrive.” This pastor, a lifelong Republican who declined to be quoted by name because of the position he occupies, wrote that “for decades Hollywood has portrayed conservative Christians as cruel, ignorant, greedy, and hypocritical. For 20 years I have worked, led, and sacrificed to put the lie to that stereotype, and have done so successfully here … Because of how we have served the least of the least, city officials, school officials, and many atheists have formed a respect for Jesus and his church. And I’m watching all that get washed away.” He added, “Yes, Hollywood and the media created a decidedly unattractive stereotype of Christians. And Donald Trump fits it perfectly. Made it all seem true. And sadly, I now realize that stereotype is more true than I ever knew. It breaks my heart. In volleyball terms, Hollywood did the set, but Trump was the spike that drove the ball home. He’s everything I’ve been trying to say isn’t what the church is all about. But sadly, maybe it is.

The Atlantic

It’s time to have an open dialogue with family and friends regarding hate and exclusion. Many people don’t even recognize it in themselves, but it’s everywhere. We can do better. Please spread the word!

[stephenjaymorrisblog]

Free Donald Trump

(The Post-Trump  Era)

October 10th 2020

©Scientific Morality

If the Gods permit it, or “Luck Be a Lady Tonight,” 2020 will be the end of the Trump administration. If not, then we will all have to wait, in a post-Trump era, until 2024. By then, people’s bellies will be so bloated with politics that the American population will embrace an apolitical attitude. Apathy will become the latest fad. Whenever the political right is in power, most people develop this credo of, "Never talk about religion or politics in mixed company.” That was a popular sentiment in 1950's America. Why? Because if you said anything leftist then, you were suspected of being un-American—a communist. The political right started cancel culture 68 years ago! In the post-Trump era, however, this attitude will prevail because of political fatigue syndrome, not because of fear.

I find Trump supporters more interesting than Trump himself. It's a fascinating study of sociology, or even abnormal psychology.  Am I being condescending? Fuck, yeah, I am! Anybody that supported Trump is not entitled to an opinion. They are entitled to euthanasia! Trump’s base supporters are obnoxious, white trash, not angelic followers of Christ. They are the proverbial ugly American. They are not only latent racists, but blatant xenophobics and, like their leader, Bibliophobics. You know? Anti-intellectual shit-heads!

And, let's not forget about the evangelical Christians. You remember them, don't you? Their Bibliolatry degenerated into idiotic heresy. Donald Trump thinks they are morons. They, in turn, believe he was sent by God to save the world! We need to never, ever again wonder why why there are so many Atheists in the USA! This is the explanation.

Most likely, Trump will be the first president that ends up in jail. He will be the most corrupt president who ever graced the White House. Trump will become a martyr to the Alt Right—like Che Guevara is to the left. They’ll protest in front of the prison he's in and chant, “Free Trump!”

Meanwhile, America will lick its wounds and rebuild. After the mass destruction by the Trump administration, the progressives should evict corporate Democrats from their party. The ultra left should organize a united front to implement a third American revolution. A third party should be established. Forget the Green Party or The Democratic Socialist Alliance; they are both a bad joke. Enter the “Democratic Socialist Party USA.” The Anti-Authoritarian left should be focused on educating and organizing in the post-Trump years.

As for me?  Who in the hell knows what will become of me?!

[justinspoliticalcorner]

Michelangelo Signorile at The Signorile Report:

When Jacob Reitan was a student at Mankato West High School in Mankato, Minnesota, where Tim Walz taught social studies in the 1990s—long before a political career that would eventually take him to the Minnesota Governor’s Mansion, and now as the VP running mate on a presidential ticket—Reitan was a student in Gwen Walz’s class.

Reitan was closeted in a time when being gay, lesbian, bisexual or transgender was deeply shunned by many Americans, particularly in rural and small-town America. Bullying in schools was rampant from big cities to the most remote parts of the country, and it was often dangerous to be openly queer as hate crimes escalated. “Gwen was my English literature teacher in 10th grade,” Reitan told me in an interview on my SiriusXM Progress program. “And in 10th grade, I knew that I was gay, but I was living in the closet of one. It was an echo chamber. I was out to no one, but I was wrestling with this reality. That was difficult because not only did I not tell anyone that I was gay, I also knew no one who was gay.” Reitan, who would go on to become a gay activist in later years and an attorney, remembers feeling very lonely in the small city of Mankato, the county seat of Blue Earth County, 82 miles south of Minneapolis. On the first day of class with Gwen Walz, she said something at the beginning that stirred Reitan.

“She started the class by saying that this was a safe place for gay and lesbian students,” Reitan vividly recalls. “I had never heard any teacher say anything positive about gay kids from the front of the class. My heart was beating out of my chest. I thought, Does she know that I'm gay? Is that why she's saying this? And it stuck with me.” Reitan soon decided to come out as gay, telling his sister and a good friend first. The third person he came out to was Gwen Walz. “Gwen and I had long conversations about being gay, and she talked about being supportive of a previous student of hers who was openly gay when [she and Tim] were teaching in Nebraska and things that they had done to support that student,” he recounted. “And so I knew that Tim and Gwen were supportive people that I could go to.” Within the year, Reitan, the first student at Mankato West to come out as gay, worked with other students and created the gay-straight alliance at Mankato West. As Vice President Harris noted in her introduction of her running mate in Philadelphia two weeks ago, Tim Walz, the social studies teacher and football coach, became the faculty adviser to the group.

Both Tim and Gwen Walz became lifelong friends of Reitan and his family. Reitan told me about how their faith is what guided them in supporting LGBTQ people. “Tim's core is the concept of treating people with compassion, equality, and justice,” Reitan said. “And it's in Gwen's core too. Gwen, in high school, would talk to me about why it was important to her because of her faith.” “We talked about how I come from a Lutheran family. My grandfather was a Lutheran minister, and she would say that it's because of her Lutheran faith that she does this. They're very religious people. Gwen prays every day. Their concept of religion includes treating people equally and justly.” That is enormously powerful to hear at a time when Donald Trump courts Christian nationalists in the evangelical base who demonize LGBTQ people. He’s promised them, as he did in his first term, to strip the rights of LGBTQ people. much of which is outlined in Project 2025.

Trump’s running mate, JD Vance, calls LGBTQ people “groomers"—a grotesque and dangerous lie that implies we are pedophiles—and is opposed to marriage equality and gender-affirming care for transgender people. So the fact that the Walzes supported marriage equality in 2006 as Tim Walz was embarking upon a run for a congressional seat in a rural, red Minnesota district is pretty astounding. That was a time when President George W. Bush was pushing for a federal marriage amendment, and many states had banned same-sex marriage. Even most Democratic elected officials, including those from urban areas, publicly opposed same-sex marriage. In fact, they saw the middle ground—the safe space—in opposing the federal marriage amendment while opposing marriage equality. It was pretty cowardly. But not Tim Walz. Reitan relayed a story from 2006, when Tim and Gwen Walz were mulling over Tim’s possible run for the U.S. House, and they came to his home for dinner.

Jacob Reitan came out as gay in Gwen Walz’s English Lit class in 1999 at Mankato West High School in Mankato, Minnesota. Reitan helped form a gay-straight alliance that year with Gwen and her husband Tim, who taught social studies.

In 2006, when Tim was gearing up for a Congressional run, he supported marriage equality in a time where many elected Democrats still didn’t support marriage equality or LGBTQ+ rights.

In 2004, his ticketmate Kamala Harris fought for marriage equality in California and refused to defend Prop 8 as Attorney General.

See Also:

Public Notice: Tim Walz's remarkably courageous stand for LGBT youth

[allthebrazilianpolitics]

Is Brazil becoming an Evangelical theocracy?

Since being elected, the Brazilian far-right president, Jair Bolsonaro, has positioned evangelical fundamentalists in key positions within his government. He has supported a foreign policy that aims to construct a conservative Christian alliance of sorts – with the United States’ Donald Trump, Hungary’s Viktor Orbán, Poland’s Law and Justice Party, and others.

In April, Jair Bolsonaro sent his son, Eduardo Bolsonaro (also a federal deputy) to Hungary and Italy, with the aim of strengthening ties with both countries and their respective leaders, Viktor Orbán and Matteo Salvini - who left office months later. The president's first official visit after being elected was to see Donald Trump in the United States, a visit in which he also had time for a dinner with Steve Bannon, a strategist of the global far right whose plan for an alliance between leaders and parties from this ideological spectrum fits the ambitions of the Brazilian president.

After a visit to Chile with President Sebastián Piñera, a conservative figure dealing with social unrest in his own country, Bolsonaro had an embarrassing visit in Israel, where he and his chancellor, Ernesto Araújo, declared that Nazism would be a left-wing ideology.

These first visits denote Bolsonaro's attempt to build a network between nations with conservative governments and allegedly founded on Christianity. The inclusion of Israel is part of the logic of evangelical fundamentalism because they believe this state is strategic to the fate of Christians and the world.

At a recent event in Hungary, the Brazilian secretary of National Sovereignty and Citizenship Affairs, Ambassador Fabio Mendes Marzano, presented the Brazilian government’s official vision to the world: The [Christian] religion is now a determining factor in the process of public policy formulation.

Almost immediately, Bolsonaro forced Brazil to “change its position on human rights (notably, on sexual and reproductive rights for women and on gender identity), started to vote in favor of Israel (which, in some circles, is considered the fulfilment of the biblical prophecy of Christ's return to earth) and formed a broad front of conservative countries,” explains Guilherme Casarões, professor of Political Science and International Relations at Fundação Getúlio Vargas (FGV-EAESP). Multiple members of Bolsonaro’s government have declared that they are in a Christian "crusade" against the left, human rights, and minorities, while defending “family values.” 

“Jair Bolsonaro relates to religious fundamentalists in three ways: by distributing positions, by producing public policies, and by appropriating extremist discourses,” Casarões explains.

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