Liberals heralded this group of life-long scammers, sleaze merchants and con artists as noble men of conscience, enabling them to fleece and deceive the public.
Am I the only one who thinks that our complete abandonment of religion in our society might be backfiring on us in real time? Almost our entire class of “elites” are some of the most arrogant, prideful, dishonest, and all around terrible people on the planet. Seems like lust, anger, envy, gluttony, sloth, greed and pride take over when we stop teaching chastity, patience, kindness, temperance, diligence, charity, and humility.
There's nothing ethical about a system that uses fear of eternal punishment (no matter how great or small the "sin") in the afterlife. If a person needs such a basis for morality to do what's "right" then they, and it, are not moral.
God is watching certainly worked better than the SEC or The Hague are watching. God doesn’t care about publicity nor can he be bribed.
And as far as the Holocaust there have been many genocides - so many. Genocide is actually the normal course of war in Asia and Africa - the term itself only gained any traction in the USA in WW2.
The only place it ever would have gained traction.
The Nazis rejected Christianity in favor of neopaganism mostly, although at least Rosenberg thought he was continuing Luther’s work.
At least the Nazis knew they needed a replacement, and psychology and legal positivism weren’t the replacements.
In any case its a moot point; God is Dead, at least the Christian God. Certainly very dead in America ~ and look, there’s antiwhite genocidal speech and behavior.
Right, and morality is inevitably metaphysical because "meaning" and "value" are metaphysical and you cannot discuss morality without resting on some meaning of "meaning" and some way to measure "value".
The problem is not really that we have lost religion, but we have largely forgotten what it is FOR. As discussed by Plato and Aristotle, a key value is that it is a structured way to convey morality and ethics to the next generation. This has to be done systemically because kids need morality and ethics in the form of rules they can learn and apply LONG before they can explore epistemology and develop philosophy on their own. Heck quite a few adults never get to that point, just as someone mentions below that many people taught math never become mathematician. Early on, of course, this instruction is and should be in the form of stories.
So some such structured system is needed and any number of systems would "do" at that early stage. Mostly, if a system won't "do" for even that purpose, it doesn't survive. But although this is A crucial use of religion, it is not its real end value. Good religious instruction includes the teaching of TOOLS for ethical thought for personal spiritual exploration and a structure for collective exploration. At that level, not all religions are equal and the key difference lies in the way they frame the questions: what is the Good and the Beautiful? What is virtue? How do we achieve Justice and what is it? WHY are we here? What are our duties? Those are not just meaningful questions but the quite literally THE existential questions.
As Aristotle states, all human activity is aimed at +some+ good. But +which+ good and how good a good matters. If we do not teach the tools for evaluating and weighing goods, we have failed to do the most basic thing that civilization, society, and law ought do. Given that we were handed those hard won tools by past generations on a sheepskin platter, that is a pretty +spectacular+ failure.
Well, you don't always need religion for this, but it can help (or hurt) because there is at least some belief in some higher good, less hubris. Possibly. But culture and tradition are important. Definite requisites. And history. You don't erase it -- even bad history. You incorporate it into the future as happens in ALL human experience. You build on it and you admit and accept human frailty. But very often there are good things about culture that need to be retained. "Fundamental change" is usually problematic. Though there are exceptions, I imagine. But I get your point.
"you don't always need religion for this" - but you would need something still, wouldn't you? That something would necessarily be flawed as everything is, so why not religion? It has been proven over the ages, as has a wheel.
Yes, you need culture and tradition, history, that can include religion-- which can be good or bad as it all can. All part of ethics and rules and responsibility we pass down to our children.
Sure. Our own limits introduce flaws into our relationship with the divine. So we have to keep looking higher to find a better definition for the Good and the Beautiful. When we make a messiah out of some mere personality, deify the State, or make our pet ideology everything, we set flawed standards that we can +actually touch+ and limit our growth. That is dangerous and always leads to evil, to pain: what is truly divine is ineffable.
The verb we translate as "praise" from Hebrew is from a root that simply means "to look up". That is what should mark our core relationship with the divine: always looking up and trying to see past the small, the petty, the temporary confusions to something more. We can never reach or become God; we can only continue trying to follow where God leads. God does not change, but our relationship with Him does. That is the way it ought to be.
Prayer, in particular, is (or ought be) our mechanism to discipline ourselves to keep looking up. Muttering words is not the point. When we pray from the heart, we need to lower ourselves and raise our gaze.
It does play a significant role, though CS Lewis' book Abolition of Man provides some interesting thoughts on why what we view as basic morals seem to appear in all the major religions. From my recollection (been a few years since reading it) he posits that those were there from the beginning of time. From there one can argue whether it was God that instilled them or if there is some other reason...I choose to believe they were instilled by God, but others may argue differently.
Lulu: Thanks for mentioning that book; I'll try to read it. You may be interested in William James's "The Varieties of Religious Experience" if you haven't already read it. He also tries to distill what's common to various religious experiences and belief systems, and he ends by discussing what this might tell us about the nature of "that which is greater than ourselves" and our connection to it.
Thank you for the suggestion! I just ordered it. I have an MA in psychology, so it will be interesting to read about religion from a psychological perspective. :-)
Jesus (Yeshua)'s morality was not from religion but from relationship. The first years of my 30 year marriage were tough, but we both worked at it and stayed because Yah was the third partner, we were in covenant.
We do not equate being good with not being faulty as all humans are. Religious people recognize it in themselves, acknowledge and admit it, fight it, and strive not to perpetuate it. Thereby being good.
Religious frauds will do as they please and claim anything.
Suppose I'm a bad actor, a priest molesting children. Knowing best what I should do as a supposed "believer" as soon as I did it the first time I should fight it. What would be a true fight as far as that? Giving up your post, surrendering to the authorities. If I didn't do that - I'm not a believer, I'm a fraud.
You wanna claim to be properly religious, you get to deal with the fact some of your cohorts - whether you consider them frauds or not - are some real class A shitheads.
Besides, look at your own life. Lay it our here, if you dare. I'm sure we'll find out you're a fraud too. We all are, on some level.
Frankly, we probably found the first evidence of your fraud: such nice, easy, tidy judgements.
"If you're truly religious then you are good by definition. "
Myriad examples, past and present, put the lie to that. Almost any (not all) belief system -- political, philosophical or religious -- includes bad (and good) actors.
Name a single true religious example that is a lie? Or did you just want to continue the long standing tradition of not offering examples to support your arguments?
While I see what you're saying here, and that there are plenty of good religious people, I seriously question anyone that relies on a system so irrational and lacking in evidence for its claims.
Being honestly wrong doesn't make it less wrong, in other words.
What portion of the universe's phenomena yield to reason? It's not self-evident that human reason should be our guiding star. We've only been following it for a few hundred years and it's already placed us in danger of extinction on multiple fronts.
"What portion of the universe's phenomena yield to reason?"
Yeah, why investigate, study and analyze when it's so much easier, and so much more fun, to simply say, "God did it."? If you and yours ran the world, we'd be killing cats to stop Covid.
I think you are misapplying the word reason. Every advance made since the beginning, when man first appeared, has been made because man is able to reason, remember and duplicate actions. Reason is the reason we are more advanced than other animals. Just because it didn’t have a name or official system or method applied before the Middle Ages doesn’t mean it didn’t exist. It did. Reasoning gave us writing, math, astrology, medicine...well, everything can be traced back to some person using their knowledge to improve their world. That is reasoning.
The danger of extinction is much less than it was even a hundred years ago. Only an asteroid hitting the earth at high speed could do that and we surely would not be the cause of that.
What if the evidence was how the religious world worked in the West?
What if the evidence is how other parts of the world still religious work?
If you're demanding empirical evidence perhaps you can look there?
The point of Religion is to lead a good life. Confucianism for instance doesn't have any kind of God we'd recognize but does that mean it has no value? Even Sam Harris found the value of Eastern Religions, which leads me to my final points- that we've unconsciously replaced Religion with POLITICS.
And I say: Politics makes a poor religion.
Power a poor God.
Government a poor Church.
And Lawyers are absolutely the worst priests in human history.
No, Dear Sir. God moved your hand across the keyboard, do not spurn his inspiration. Let Alate stand, Jeweled or not.
[Also- I went to the trouble of wiki'-ing it]
Alate: An alate refers to a winged reproductive caste from a social insect colony in its winged form. Their common behavioural function is starting a new colony, to expand their mother colonies etc. Colonies of termites and ants produce alates. It is a flight-based form of reproductive technique.
No true religious person would ever even make it known they believe. There is no need for it. Only showoffs and frauds would flaunt it. Hence, no "effects" should be of concern to any "rational" person out there.
Seth, of course there are "false prophets" and "wolves in sheep's clothing". There are also many whose religion motivates and guides them in a sincere effort to make our world more loving, and to alleviate suffering. In our time, Martin Luther King, Jr., Thich Nhat Hanh, Dorothy Day, the Berrigan Brothers, and others were prominent examples, but there are many more who are unknown to us.
I think it's safe to say that if a being had perpetrated the kind of horror described in the Noah story we would be well within our rights to judge them in the harshest terms imaginable.
And then take them out back to be shot.
If that's too "judgmental" then where to I buy the t-shirt?
Noah? From the Bible? Not all religious people are the same or believe the Bible is the literal word of God. Or that religion can define "God." Still, you are confusing religion with faith and spirituality -- people are manipulated by lots of influences and many are secular. "There are more things in heaven and earth, Horatio, than are dreamt of in your philosophy." Shakespeare
Maybe Religio - "Bonds" literally isn't about being a good person.
Maybe it's about having a decent society?
A self policing society that doesn't need cops, lawyers and now soldiers to restrain the human animal we all have to keep tethered ?
And who watches the Watchmen? well... GOD.
Hence our Sacred Oaths...we're afraid of breaking them...cuz GOD.
That of course was and always has been one of the two main purposes of religion, along with regime legitimacy and stability.
The Operative phrase is 'God is watching' which has saved more lives than all the hashtags ever typed....
Tom Holland, avowed atheist has some excellent books on the subject.
Islam for instance was the Arab's solution to beating back the Dark Ages encroaching on the Arabian peninsula from all points of the compass and within...and whatever one may say where Islam conquered the Dark Ages stopped. Iliterate Bedouins or not they built Civilization wherever they marched.
The so-called "Islamic Golden Age" is one of the great myths shoved down the throats of unsuspecting children and "liberal-progressive" dolts trying to be woke.
The problem isn't the abandonment of religion, its that people have replaced superstitious religion with secular religion. Russiagate is a perfect example of this. Faith-based belief that Trump is a Russian spy, that our intelligence agencies are noble warriors for truth and justice, that evil Russians have been controlling our elections and countless officials. Just like superstitious religions, calls for evidence or skepticism are considered heresy. All non-believers are suspect. Instead of spending all day at church listening to a priest, they spend all day on MSNBC listening to their high priestess Rachel Maddow.
And the analogy doesn't stop there - just like with the superstitious religion, the "high priest(ess)" gets away with tons and tons of money (I believe Maddow to the tune of $10 million per year?)
If there's an American popular religion, and I suspect there is, what do we think it is? What are it's beliefs? It's dogma? How does it express itself out there?
It's definitely nationalist and xenophobic. Celebrates form over function. It's indulgent, selfish, but has some pretty good perks.
Atheist here - I agree completely. Not so much the absence of religion itself, but the absence of anything to take its place. But I think it's more true of regular society than of our elites. Among normal ham-and-eggers like me (and presumably you), the normal, neighborhood churches that were a social bond as well as a spiritual one have been replaced by the consumption of mass media and increased alienation. While people of different social strata, different political views etc. would have once sat side by side in the pews, they now don't, and there are precious few levelers to replace churchgoing. OK, we must acknowledge that the churches weren't perfect, that there were still social divisions, that there was often mistrust among the sects, that there were coverups of abuse etc. But we threw the baby out with the bathwater in a huge way that I didn't appreciate until it actually happened.
Our elites, though, would just be using religious bodies the same way they do now - to amass more power. I don't think anything can restrict elites except for fair application of law.
And we don't now? They just played the Super Bowl. Are you that far "off the grid"? Pro sports is one of the biggest scams (still a distant second from Christianity) ever perpetrated on a willfully ignorant public. Billionaire team owners sucking resources and tax dollars from communities (funny that you rightists -always on the hunt for wasteful spending- don't seem to care about it) so people can wear sports jerseys to work and be part of the "winning team" by proxy.
No you "lefties" have politicized everything from taking a breath of air to going to the bathroom. There is nowhere we can be free from your constant whining and virtue signaling. Wasteful--like John Kerry saving the planet, right?
And p.s. Right now I am taking care of 90 year old father with Parkinson's and COPD and more--so the state doesn't have to in his home, but I live off the grid on solar power. I use a fraction of the energy most of you "waste" because I can see every watt and amp I use on an inverter screen. You could stop TALKING and WHINING all the time which would spread much less virus and less carbon dioxide -- which BTW, it's PLANTS that cause people to to fart, NOT meat.
Don't fool yourself. It was the same in the "good ol' days." Are you not aware, for example, of the many evangelical and otherwise grifters who fleeced the flock? Have you forgotten the priests (and other men of cloth) molesting children? Do you know that politics has always been the springboard for theft and deceit? Do you remember the hatred for "the other" among the religious and pious up to the very recent future? I think I should stop now.
Judge them frauds if you want. The gist of X-ray's post seemed to be that if only we had religion again, this stuff wouldn't happen. Just not true. There may be arguments for religion, but this isn't one of them. Elites, whether religious or faux religious, have always sought power and money. Humans being what they are.
As a conservative Catholic living in Los Angeles (go figure), I go to church every Sunday and know I am surrounded by liberal Catholics (go figure) who voted for a party that supports abortion. I don't get up and leave because I am not there for them. However, I am grateful that even liberal Catholics are seeking some spirituality however strongly I may disagree with them on their rite to life hypocrisy.
Thats the irony with a lot of people today. They pick and choose the laws of god or man they feel are worth following. You see this with the tattletale mafia about masks even though they are the same people drinking 2 glasses of chianti and then driving, or speeding, or jaywalking, or doing anything illegal. When its something they want to to do its "oh that law is stupid anyways" but when you are doing something they dont like its "well the law says you cant do that". They pick and choose the word of god they want to follow and pat themselves on the back for being good christians when they are anything but.
True, the but difference is, at least for those of us who believe in God (and I'll speak also as a conservative Catholic), the ultimate punishment or mercy/grace comes from God. Hopefully the lawbreakers are punished for breaking the law but that's nothing compared to God's grace or justice. My job is to get to heaven.....cuz I don't want the alternative. Too bad more don't see it this simplistically.
Momento- I appreciate the comment. I am not for mandated religion, only that I do believe that we have lost something over the past 20 years, and that the rise in non-religious may play a part. I admit that there are many hypocrites in all faiths, and that the powerful prey on the weak (even in the church), but for me, going to church on a regular basis is a reality check and reminder of how often I fall from my own ideals.
"if only we had religion again, this stuff wouldn't happen." - that certainly would be a grand claim. But I don't think anyone is naïve enough to expect that.
What can be claimed is that there would be _less_ of that "stuff". Since at least some of those taught would take it seriously and carry it throughout their lives and have a positive impact.
"The point is that those you list as bad examples are not religious or believers to begin with."
You would do well to understand this fallacy:
>>no true scotsman
You made what could be called an appeal to purity as a way to dismiss relevant criticisms or flaws of your argument.
In this form of faulty reasoning one's belief is rendered unfalsifiable because no matter how compelling the evidence is, one simply shifts the goalposts so that it wouldn't apply to a supposedly 'true' example. This kind of post-rationalization is a way of avoiding valid criticisms of one's argument.
Example: Angus declares that Scotsmen do not put sugar on their porridge, to which Lachlan points out that he is a Scotsman and puts sugar on his porridge. Furious, like a true Scot, Angus yells that no true Scotsman sugars his porridge.<<
"relevant criticisms or flaws of your argument" which are? That there are:
- "many evangelical and otherwise grifters who fleeced the flock"
- "priests (and other men of cloth) molesting children"
- "hatred for "the other" among the religious and pious up to the very recent future"
Are the above "criticisms"? Do I argue that there are no such cases? Of course, not. I do argue, though, that these scum are not believers or religious at all since they do wrong things knowingly and have no intention of fixing it, starting at least with acknowledging it as their weakness.
"Furious, like a true Scot" describes the hypothetical Angus's view of himself as a "true Scot", not Mona's opinion of Scots. To be more precise, what Mona wrote doesn't tell us anything about her personal opinion of Scots.
In any case, it's always nice to see the word "porridge".
Rather rich you calling anyone infantile, given your rhetoric is reminiscent of the sandbox.
I bet you've read as much Chesterton as you've read Sowell.
One can only imagine the leftist nonsense you take as gospel.
"What is worth knowing, he doesn’t know and doesn’t want to know; what he knows is not true. The cardinal articles of his credo are the inventions of mountebanks; his heroes are mainly scoundrels."
It is always amusing to read leftists criticize the faithful for their faith.
Irrational, don't you know. No evidence, don't you know. All those terrible things done in God's name, don't you know. And on and on and on.
And yet, the leftist possesses a burning and unshakeable pseudo-theological faith of his own in the benevolence and efficacy of the State.
There may be no empirical evidence of God's existence, so perhaps it is accurate to call faith irrational.
But what is one to call the faith of the leftist, given the overwhelming and indisputable amount of evidence, going back to the beginning of recorded history, that the State is the most murderous, destructive criminal organization to ever afflict humanity?
States slaughtered some 250 million souls just in the last century, most of them their own citizens. Socialist States have dispatched more innocents in a good afternoon than all the Holy Inquisitions combined.
The number of people killed for religious reasons throughout history would constitute a productive afternoon for the socialists. The almost incomprehensible horror of the gulags and concentration camps make anything done in the name of religion child's play by comparison.
And yet despite all this we must endure to the present day those that worship, defend and empower the State, which has never been anything but coercion and exploitation of the many by the few, while they attack the belief systems that created the civilization they are in the process of destroying.
And just so you don't get the misimpression that this is an isolated incident, here is a video of brainwashed babes singing hymns to Obama, a.k.a. Chocolate Jesus:
You admit that faith is irrational, then say that "leftists" are MORE irrational (i.e. MORE FAITHFUL) because of their "unshakeable pseudo-theological faith (whatever that is) of his own in the benevolence and efficacy of the State." IOW, "I'm a poopy head...but a leftist is a BIGGER poopy head than I am." No wonder "religious nones" are one of the fastest growing segments of the population.
"unshakeable pseudo-theological faith (whatever that is"
Yes, yes, I know. Such big words for a leftist brain. Why don't you break the phrase into words and look them up individually, then think about what they might mean when put together.
But then again, perhaps just keep using the term "poopy head", which is a perfect indication of your intellectual development.
"unshakeable pseudo-theological faith (whatever that is"
Yes, yes, I know. Such big words for a leftist brain. Why don't you break the phrase into words and look them up individually, then think about what they might mean when put together.
But then again, perhaps just keep using the term "poopy head", which is a perfect indication of your intellectual development.
"for Lincoln, the most tyrannical and bloodthirsty president in U.S. history"
Oh goodness gracious, you're one of those. Thanks for letting us know exactly who, and what, we're dealing with. Please, PLEASE tell me you have a "NOT FOR HIRE" bumper sticker on your "vessel" that you "travel" down the road in, and you spend your free time being a 1A "auditor". That would be just TOO perfect.
BTW, Lincoln's biggest mistake was not allowing Sherman to continue his march.
Oh yes I am. We call it the reality-based community. One way or another, we've managed to rise up out of the oceans of collectivist-statist bullshit the vast herds of useful idiots wallow in, copiously imbibe and then regurgitate at every opportunity.
We know history. We know economics. We know that the sole purpose of the State is so that a powerful few can live at the expense of the many, and it has always been so.
And we know about Lincoln. Of course he is placed highly in your pantheon.
"I will say then that I am not, nor ever have been in favor of bringing about in any way the social and political equality of the white and black races, that I am not nor ever have been in favor of making voters or jurors of negroes, nor of qualifying them to hold office, nor to intermarry with white people; and I will say in addition to this that there is a physical difference between the white and black races which I believe will forever forbid the two races living together on terms of social and political equality. And inasmuch as they cannot so live, while they do remain together there must be the position of superior and inferior, and I as much as any other man am in favor of having the superior position assigned to the white race."
~ Abraham Lincoln, Debate with Stephen Douglas, Sept. 18, 1858
Cue the statist bullshit regurgitation excuse reflex.
It looks like there is a particular Thought Police Squad - a pack of goons on patrol of this forum out for anyone who has a "wrong" idea. Their viciousness and venom depends on the topic but the amount of snot they possess is always copious and on full display.
No wonder groceries experience shortage of napkins now and again. These guys and girls need plenty to keep their snot from soiling their keyboards.
Ideas rise and fall on their own merits when they are allowed to compete in the open marketplace of ideas. Religion -in particular, organized religion- is dying because it cannot compete on its own merits - no matter how many times it tries to shed its skin.
Remember, the troll badge you were just rewarded is of the entry level. To reach platinum you have to study a certain @e.pierce. In particular, work on expanding your vocabulary. Your F-word usage has nothing on that guy's pithy one-liners. His is the record you strive for. Go get him!
"Fuck the left. Fuck the right. Fuck authoritarianism."
You are getting close, but miss a crucial truth: the entire political system of the Western world has been left for quite some time, and it has most certainly devolved into authoritarianism.
What is truly right-wing is extremely limited, decentralized government (no income tax or central bank), free-market laissez-faire capitalism (e.g. actual capitalism) with property rights sacrosanct.
What we have now are all-powerful mega-states that are completely fascist (that is to say, socialist, that is to say leftist), although Mussolini preferred the term corporatist to describe his infernal invention.
Large, all-powerful states are a feature of leftism, not a bug. As is the inherent authoritarianism they inevitably inflict upon the population.
Given what has occurred over the past year, the truth of what I say should be glaringly obvious to all but the irredeemably obtuse.
Or forgiveness. The greatest of the Christian virtues, apparently.
I am a bit reserved when it comes to religion but I've heard compelling enough arguments that a marked difference between the modern woke left and previous progressive movements is that the decline of practicing Christianity has led to a decline in the notion of forgiveness, which is critically important in any society or social movement. And we too easily see a complete lack of forgiveness all around us. That's why the parallels between the woke movement and soviet totalitarianism is eerie, because the Rousseauesque communism also practiced no forgiveness either. And we saw what happened in Russia and China.
Many word twists and qualifications in the responses to your post, but you are correct. Religion, believing in good over evil, decency over depravity, in morality, encouraging ethics, more, is the accumulated experiences of many societies and many religions, even without the enforcement of Holy recitations. We humans seem to have to keep relearning these basic truths. If the cycle now is near the trough and starts to climb toward reason again, we’ll look back and sigh. If.
I don’t think it’s the PRACTICE or BELIEF of religion that’s a problem in America today. I think the slowly losing the Right to worship as one sees fit is worse. Critical theory pulls people away from everything and anything that gives them roots- CT depends on you giving up the ideas that have given us a relatively stable society for 200+ yrs. this is a revolution and most people don’t even realize it so we debate about god and religion and who is and isn’t but we’re all missing the bigger picture and this is how the radical left is stripping America of well, America
First off - it seems as though you have made a ridiculous though not uncommon assumption that only Christians have religious freedom. I Am A Jew by birth. Secondly I am speaking about the fact that I see increasingly remarks that judge practice of religion an YES belief in a God as something for small minds. Obviously these judgemental radicals (you?) think they know whats best for everyone and perniciously ignorant. Do you realize how much studying Jews must do in order to be completely observant? Do you know how many times Jews have been persecuted (before and after the Holocaust)? Even in this country today we are blamed for every social I’ll and corruption there is. Do you realize that just as the now martyred and victimized Arabs in Gaza have been violently attempting to take over land that was CONTRACTUALLY promised to Jews over 4000 years ago and it wasn’t until 1947 that we won The Right to live in our home. Do you realize that anti-semitic hate crimes in AMERICA are on the rise while Muslims and blacks.
So NO it’s not about Christians and your statement makes you seem like you need some education on the topic of religious freedom as a whole. Highly recommend you start by reading the Constitution
You're not texting and driving are you? Sorry, it's not my burden to try to make sense of your incoherent rambling. Plus, you lost all credibility when you used the term "radical left" and this gem, "to take over land that was CONTRACTUALLY promised to Jews over 4000 years ago". Please don't say it was promised to you by Yahweh, please don't.
You're not alone. Not that the Christian religion, as practiced by many of its most prominent claimed adherents (the names Bush, Biden and Obama come to mind), doesn't have a lot to answer for. But I've known many fellow Christians who practice -- traceably to their faith -- an admirable degree of restraint, fortitude and moral clarity, and the best do so non-judgmentally.
While it's true that non-believers across society often exhibit superior behavior by comparison with Christians (non-Christian divorce rates are lower, for example), the loss of what was always a faint thread of belief among our elites may be a different matter. As far as I can see it has not been beneficial in any way, notably with the spreading rot of hyper-judgment that we've come to know as cancel culture.
There's been a change in how religion itself is practiced in the last 50 years. It's been overtaken by a "gospel of prosperity" that is devoid of ethics. I can remember the nuns making it very clear to us that much was expected of us -- it was not a free lunch of God's grace with no sacrifice or conscience. Yes, we were forgiven our transgressions but had to stop them.
Personally I am an atheist / agnostic, but I believe religious values are valuable. I believe our democracy will not survive if people do not behave buy the basic human decency touted by the Bible.
The idea that the USA was more "moral" or "righteous" (whatever the assumed underlying cause) at some time in the past is simply ludicrous. Newsflash: the "elites" were scum buckets LONG before the Lincoln Project. And remind us, again, what group of people in this country work furiously to deny the inalienable rights of traditionally marginalized groups. Hint: It ain't the atheists and secular humanists.
What "society" are you talking about? Certainly not the USA. We're the most "religious" society on the planet. And if you took envy, gluttony and greed out of the equation, Capitalism would cease to exist.
A silly comment -- Trump voted himself out not only because of his utter incompetency in handling virus but also by bringing into government religious extremism and racism. The numbing number of religious extremist is too long to list -- starting with bible-idiot Ben Carson ("pyramids were build by St. Joseph to store wheat")
The opposing group of oligarchs, was simply much more skillful in "winning" the vote count than his group of oligarchs
President Trump actually did an excellent job in handling the virus. Early on he stopped travel from China and put together an excellent task force reporting directly to Vice President Pence. It included six excellent doctors, one of them Dr Carson, who is probably the most admired doctor in the U.S. today. Dr Deborah Birx led the task force, based on her service in leading the US World AIDS effort in the Obama administration. He attended the daily task force briefings, getting them 100 times the attention they otherwise would have gotten (up to 10 million viewers!).
He held meetings with governors, and quickly responded to their requests by meeting with industry CEOs to get them to produce the needed supplies. He sent fully staffed naval hospital ships to New York and Los Angeles.
He personally met with leaders in the pharmaceutical industry to get them to work together on vaccines. It was said in April that it would take 12 to 18 months to get a vaccine, yet after 8 months millions of doses were already administered.
He listened to the medical specialists before commenting on aspects of the situation. He brought up value of HCQ for treatment after being told of peer-reviewed articles that pointed out its value (and its safety), one being in 2005 from the CDC. Political opponents attacked him, and even got papers published claiming HCQ didn't work that were later retracted because they were fake (remember SurgeSphere?). Today it is considered the standard treatment for early cases (with of course Zinc and an antibiotic).
Does anyone imagine that Hillary Clinton could have done any of this if she had been President???
Insufficient media coverage is on the extent of just how much evangelical fundamentalists (the Rupture End-Time Christians) dominated ALL levels of Trump's government. Corona virus human and economic catastrophe in the US will likely end up being called – the Trump virus.
• Evangelical anti-science idiot, Trump’s VP Mike Pence, has been installed to lead the pandemic fight as Corona virus tsar
• Evangelical Mike Pompeo, Secretary of State insane war clown who considers Trump as the coming Christian King
• Evangelical Jerome Adams, now US Surgeon General was the state health commissioner under Governor Mike Pence during AIDS epidemic (he acts like he already “Ruptured” to another world
• Evangelical Bible idiot Ben Carson, Housing Secretary – famous for stating that Egyptian pyramids were built by St. Joseph for wheat storage; always reassuring when he stands next to Trump during our Great Leader blabbers
• Evangelical Robert Redfield, installed to run critical organization CDC (Center for Disease Control and Prevention) as its director in 2018 (he immediately increased his salary to almost $0.5M) decided to develop an American, hence superior test kit (despite that Chinese scientists in a record short time provided full virus genome and Germans and others developed a test kit adopted by WHO). The new “superior and our” test kits failed and much delayed testing – resulting that in the entire February only 256 people were tested?!? – the crime of a century. Redfield was on a board of the largest evangelical anti-gay organization while for a decade unsuccessfully developing AIDS vaccine (and fabricating results)….
• Evangelical Deborah Birx, White House Corona virus response coordinator managed anti-AIDS international $6.3B fund – like Redfield focusing on – abstinence
• Evangelical Betsy DeVos, Education Secretary and a sister of evangelical Eric Prince (founder of Blackwater – runs Trump’s private army)
• And an endless number of government and military evangelical officials financed by now almost limitless government resources
Trump lost election because of catastrophic mishandling of virus. China has about 4 times larger population -- it lost about 5K people -- we are losing that many every day - soon we will have 500K dead. Testing and tracing was not done whole first five months.
Your Dr. Ben Carson is a grifter and bible idiot -- "pyramids were built by St. Joseph to store wheat" and selling oleander extract as a cure for Covid-19 (together with My-Pillow charlatan
About Hillary -- Tulsi Gabbard brilliantly said everything about her:
"Great! Thank you @HillaryClinton . You, the queen of warmongers, embodiment of corruption, and personification of the rot that has sickened the Democratic Party for so long, have finally come out from behind the curtain. From the day I announced my candidacy, there has been a concerted campaign to destroy my reputation. We wondered who was behind it and why.
Now we know — it was always you, through your proxies and powerful allies in the corporate media and war machine, afraid of the threat I pose. It’s now clear that this primary is between you and me. Don’t cowardly hide behind your proxies. Join the race directly."
Please try some rudimentary thinking for yourself before parroting nonsense "arguments". I am sorry to say -- you are publicly embarrassing yourself
Boris. What is it.... exactly.... Trump should have done? You think Communist China is some sort of a model for the US? Do you understand we are a country founded on individual liberty and constitutional protection? It looks like you are the one parroting nonsense.
Also, has anyone ever told you have anger problems? Your posts are unnecessarily nasty.
He should have followed science. We know how to handle viruses. masks, distancing, TESTING and contact TRACING - from day one.
For five months that was not done -- in February 256 people were tested -- in South Korea tens of thousands per day.
We have 500K dead because of idiotic incompetency and our economy is collapsing. Without M4A like the rest of the world, without $4K/month for duration of Covid like the rest of the world.
We are a failed country -- of course, Democrat cabal of oligarchs are equally bad but at least they are not incompetent in using basic science. They are also more skillful in stealing elections... (ask Bernie in Iowa)
Boris you are just wrong about this. Your hatred of Trump (e.g. "his idiotic incompetency") has created a short circuit in your brain. If you look at the statistics, if have seen plenty, comparing western countries and comparing states here in the US. They all end up looking about the same. It didn't matter... mask no mask, lockdown no lockdown. The virus ended up spreading and spiking. And you should stop saying things like "should have followed science". Scientists disagree all the time about almost everything. So when you hear someone say "follow the science" it really means "follow the scientists I believe in and STFU".
So short of total CCP style draconian lock down measures regarding; masks (unless n95 not much help afaic tell), distancing (are you going to arrest people?), testing (are going to force people to be tested?), and tracing (is this mandatory?), It didn't make any difference. Besides I suspect (certain?) that China has under-reported and we in the US have certainly over-reported (financial incentive to do so for hospitals) CV19 deaths. And can you imagine if Trump, the supposed little dictator, had gone all authoritarian on us and we ended up with a similar death count (most likely afaic tell). YOU would, most likely, be trashing Trump for being an authoritarian idiot. So the economic damage could have been avoided by opening up nationwide when we realized the vulnerable populations were very old, and sick people. God help you if you are both old and sick, you better isolate yourself.
I will close with my thoughts about not just Trump's but everyones response to this pandemic. I will not be partisan. It reminds me of the Vietnam War. You had well meaning people coming to very very different conclusions. Support or not support. If drafted; serve, dodge, move to Canada? I understand the logic for all of it. It was a crazy time, no one knew exactly what was going on. Everyone took their best shot at it. Same thing with this pandemic. It's a god damn pandemic of a novel CV. No one knew exactly what to do, with all, due respect to your opinion. But there's no way you should be placing 500K deaths at the feet of the president. It's just not right. You don't like the guy. I get it.
If you do think CCP style draconian lockdowns is the way to go? Sorry I can't go there.
Boris, he should have followed the science? What science? WHO repeated China's lies that the virus didn't transmit human to human, didn't declare a pandemic, produced a model calling for 3.5% IFR. Said masks weren't appropriate. That's the science available on day one. Whoever on the Asia Desk in State responsible for Taiwan needed to send a FLASH OVERRIDE message when Taiwan closed its borders on January 1.
We ignored what we knew about viruses; your list is a DNC talking point. We knew that the best place for someone to avoid infection was outdoors. Sunlight damages viruses, and the mist left from a cough or sneeze can be dissipated by a light breeze. So, power-hungry governors ordered people to stay indoors.
Power-hungry governors spread the panic-inducing message of Comply or Face Mass Death. This is a coronavirus, not the Andromeda Strain. Most common cold viruses are upper respiratory infections; COVID19 is a lower respiratory infection. It has an unfortunate tendency to trigger immune system over-reactions, resulting in cytokine storms. Hydroxychloroquine works well at preventing immune system over-reactions, and its use should have been left up to patients and physicians to decide.
You missed a few other things. Lower respiratory infections are worse the older one is. We needed to focus resources on those we knew were most vulnerable, not arresting people for letting their kids play outdoors. Speaking of kids, we knew by April that youngsters would largely be unaffected. Treating everyone as though they are at equal risk is simply stupid.
We cannot do contact tracing in the US so long as there are eleven million illegal aliens in the country who don't want to answer questions, the southern border is wide open with invitations to come here and get free health care and stimulus checks, and New Yorkers ride the subway every day.
The nations that have done remarkably well are small island nations. M4A is the worst idea since the Democrats nominated Hilary Clinton. Hospitals lose an average of $2K for every Medicare or Medicaid admission. When every patient is Medicare (that's M4A) they all go bankrupt. Then what?
In February Nancy Pelosi was attending a Chinatown festival without a mask and reassuring everyone that it was all perfectly safe. I wonder about the IQ of the 256 people who got tested. For what? A disease that can't spread human to human, and everything's fine, come dance with Nancy. Bernie Sanders was still calling for open borders in April. Democrats were incompetent in using basic science.
The rest of the world does not get $4K/month. According to the IMF, only nineteen countries have per capita GDP above $4K/month. More than twice that number - 45 countries - have annual GDP per capita below $4K. Please do a little research next time.
There are other medical factors you're not mentioning, such as the contribution of a healthy diet to staving off infection, and the roles of Vitamins C and D.
Donald Trump 'wants FDA to approve oleander plant extract as a drug to cure Covid-19' after it was promoted by Ben Carson and MyPillow founder - despite no proof that it works
• Housing and Urban Development Secretary Ben Carson and MyPillow boss Mike Lindell, a big Trump supporter, have urged Trump to look at the botanical extract
• Meeting arranged by the pair with a director at company developing the product
• Andrew Whitney, of Phoenix Biotechnology, claims he is '100%' sure it's a cure
• But there is no peer-reviewed study to support the claim
• Lindell says that in the meeting, Trump 'basically said the FDA should approve it'
• Senior administration official expressed deep concern that Carson and Lindell were 'pushing a dubious product at the highest levels' during the pandemic
Todays comments are ridiculous.... The same people arguing with you about those people being religious
1. Aren't religious themselves, at all, and are therefore in no way an authority on any religion, let alone the ones in question.
2. Keep listing and saying people who aren't religious at all.
3. Keep listing "religious" media figures as any way indicative of actual religious people.
4. Are not typically admitting their own anti-religion bias up front. Dig a little bit, you'll see most of these people have contempt for anyone who supports organized religions.
I'm an agnostic myself but there are a lot of good, (whichever) god-fearing people out there, and I feel the negativity towards religion the media is peddling does these people a disservice.
And the ensued argument quickly devolved into the "merits" of faith: irrationality, lack of evidence, etc., examples of bad actors which are plentiful and so on, whereas:
the point of the OP as I understood it was that existence of religion in our lives would promote better persons so that bad behaviors we are discussing had less chance of being so prevalent, bold, in-your-face, and shameless as they have become.
They teach math to kids, some of them will become brilliant mathematicians, most will be comfortable with it, and a few will just have heard about it. But if it wasn't taught then no one would even have a chance.
You are correct -- Trump government was full of such charlatans and grifters -- I hope they will "rupture" soon... ;-))
Donald Trump 'wants FDA to approve oleander plant extract as a drug to cure Covid-19' after it was promoted by Ben Carson and MyPillow founder - despite no proof that it works
• Housing and Urban Development Secretary Ben Carson and MyPillow boss Mike Lindell, a big Trump supporter, have urged Trump to look at the botanical extract
• Meeting arranged by the pair with a director at company developing the product
• Andrew Whitney, of Phoenix Biotechnology, claims he is '100%' sure it's a cure
• But there is no peer-reviewed study to support the claim
• Lindell says that in the meeting, Trump 'basically said the FDA should approve it'
• Senior administration official expressed deep concern that Carson and Lindell were 'pushing a dubious product at the highest levels' during the pandemic
You have to wonder whether the saga of the Lincoln Project will not be an apt symbol of the Biden administration from its inception. By its own admission in Time magazine successfully conspiring to fix the election and deny Trump a second win, the "Cabal" has installed the improbable Joe Biden and the even more improbable Kamala Harris as president and vice-president, on false pretenses (for example, a hidden candidate protected from examination, a VP selection catapulting the least popular candidate in the primaries into the likelihood of actually becoming president because of Biden's obvious dementia and competency issues). The whole establishment is so corrupt and grift-ridden--for example, look at how corporate media deliberately polarized the country for the sake of profits over four long Trump years--that it's ready to unravel at the seams. It's "overdetermined" with corruption; it cannot but spill out. The Biden years I suspect may be the great unravelling. And does anyone think Harris has the character or competence to hold things together?
On the left hand we have the vicious incompetent Democrats, and on the right hand we have the Elmer Fudd Republicans. Meanwhile, those of us focused on policy over personality are fucked.
Thank you, Glenn for this: “What this sorry episode reveals above all else is that much of American liberalism, including its all-but-official arm in corporate media, replicated, in the name of combatting Trump, every unethical tactic, every deceitful method, and every toxic assault on basic decency that they insisted Trump singularly represented.” Wow. I used to try to warn my Trump hating friends that when you demonize someone you become a demon yourself. How about going forward in a positive way? Like, spending your energy and money figuring out why so many Americans are fed up with their elite rulers, Dem and Republican. One friend called me Eva Braun for defending Hitler (Trump, who I wasn't defending, that wasn't the point), and most just stopped talking to me. But I can say this absolutely honestly: had I been a politician in the Capitol during the break-in I would have walked out to the protestors and asked them to tell me what they want and why they loved Trump over me. That none of the narcissistic psychos did that is like the prelude to the French Revolution. They have a let them eat cake attitude. All the Trump hating people I know are now demonically possessed. I'm not religious but I now feel they should seek exorcism. They are even more psychotic now he's gone.
Oh my God, that would have been so amazing. I just wish that Josh Hawley, Ted Cruz and all those standing firm for at least the investigation of election fraud would have walked out there and calmed everyone down. That would have been one bad ass move.
"When you demonize someone you become a demon yourself." Polly, those are truly wise and profound words! I wish we had a host of politicians with your attitude.
Doesn't it amaze you that none of these swamp creatures who claim how traumatizing this was and how they had to hide and now need guards around the capitol - that they couldn't just walk out to the protestors and say “Let's talk”? And instead they surround themselves with militia? These swamp creatures are possessed. And again, I'm not religious and I laughed at the movie The Exorcist. But now I'm not laughing.
And the vast majority of Trump supporters would have LOVED to engage in a serious discussion--not a violent fight! That likely includes those who broke into the building, and differentiates them from protestors such as Antifa, who have no interest whatsoever in an examination of the issues.
Thank you, Polly. I, too, was vilified as a Trump supporter when I criticized the erosion of civil and constitutional rights "because Trump." The precedents established in the shared delusion that he was evil incarnate will come back to bite those who established them.
Hi Bill - I think this delusion will evaporate slowly, but maybe before two years. Biden will do the work to undo it. I'm old enough to have seen this mass hysteria/delusion come and go. When I was a teen my brother dated a woman who hid under a sheet because her “guru” demanded it. Years later I ran into her and she was just another suburban woman shopping for her family. I've known women who accused men of rape, or day care centers of Satanic ritual abuse, or their own families - only to find that years later they've completely forgotten they did it.
I wish I shared your optimism. I'm old enough to remember the same things. Unfortunately, I think the erosion of civil and constitutional rights has been building for a long time. As long as power is derived from it it's not going away. It will only get worst. The only thing that will slow it, or turn the tide, is if enough american stand up to it.
"But I can say this absolutely honestly: had I been a politician in the Capitol during the break-in I would have walked out to the protestors and asked them to tell me what they want and why they loved Trump over me."
Doesn't really matter anyway. They were only a "thing" so they could oppose Trump "from the right." In reality, it's just the neo-cons still doing their Never Trump thing. Now that Trump is gone they are useless, so it's time for them to be fed into the cancel culture woodchipper. This isn't going to stop.
Why does no one ever mention that these Lincoln Project characters were featured by CBS Sixty Minutes AFTER the allegations about John Weaver first surfaced in June 2020? And I never hear anyone talk about the fact that Steve Schmidt (of the Lincoln Project) managed the McCain/Palin presidential campaign in 2008.
First of all, thank you so much for your continued exposes and outings of the absolute horrific vile sociopathy that is metastatic across this country if not the entire globe. Second, I think it’s time that people stop trying to rationalize tolerate and condone this level of hate and wretched disdain for life that is pandemic among the scum that rule and manipulate us, and try to influence us with such despicable disreputable dishonest rhetoric and narratives.
Evil, it truly is so prevalent. The relentless lying, pathological hypocrisy, causing endless harm chaos and death, showing no remorse for the consequences caused, and the never ending mocking and disdaining of healthy accepted boundaries set by society.
If we don’t fight back, this selfish shameless soulless plague will utterly decimate humanity, and I don’t write this to be provocative, I write this to open peoples eyes.
Thank you again, look forward to your next article/post.
I am a solid Trump supporter. My thoughts for the “other side” is that they would elevate the discourse, exemplify the norms, act with honor and in that way demonstrate to the country how they believe one should comport oneself. Instead they lied, incited violence, committed crimes and destroyed all norms. They vastly out-trumped Trump. A truly disgusting decision. You reap what you sow.
"But their lucrative scheme could never have succeeded without the knowingly fraudulent cooperation of liberal networks such as MSNBC and CNN. Over and over, those Democratic Party spokespeople masquerading as TV journalists — knowing exactly who these bottom-feeding GOP operatives have always been — encouraged their misguided and trusting viewers to regard the Lincoln Project as a selfless and noble bulwark against Trumpism rather than the scamming, grifting, lowlife con it so obviously was from the start."
Amazing the ease with which the Lincoln Group made money off of liberals fear and loathing of Donald Trump. As W.C. Fields famously said, "A sucker is born every day." Can't think of anyone better qualified to tell this revelatory story than Glenn Greenwald. Thanks again, Glenn.
Someone made a map of everyone who supported Trump or the GOP in the last 4 years, and encouraged people to locate nearby Trump supporters and go give them a piece of your mind. (But don't be violent of course, wink wink.)
W.C. Fields may have repeated it, but the phrase was coined by P. T. Barnum. It seems that the pandemic and post-pandemic era will be owned by the scammers. Organizational disruption in every agency, large and small, has become the cherry on top of decades of deregulation, and it has opened up the landscape to all forms of fraud. Add to that, extra time for swindlers to develop new and more creative schemes, and you have a perfect recipe for the age of exploitation.
The real story behind the story that Glenn is pointing to is how quickly things unravelled with Trump gone. For four years, an utterly corrupt establishment--more corrupt and more lying than Trump, and less competent too, strange as that may sound--was able to deflect everything from itself thanks to the Trump McGuffin. And now it's gone. How are they going to hold it together? What is there to hold it together? Everyone's grifting off of everyone else--that's what the Lincoln project shows. The ruling elites can thrive only. by stiffing the rest of us. That's why they need to divide us. They no longer have the ability to create the wealth that would lift everyone's boat. Trump was the best thing that every happened to them--it gave them another four years. Now, just weeks after his inauguration, it's clear that Biden has no plan, no ideas, and nothing to do except mindlessly negate everything his predecessor did good or bad. They are so uncoordinatedly they've already sold off parts of the store without even realizing it.
Everything, except of course all the goodies given to Israel - the very first act of Senate (as the country is literally dying and falling apart) was to re-affirm US Embassy in Jerusalem explicitly, and implicitly the Golan and West bank land grabs. And who does Anthony Blinken call first, probably even before arranging his desk? You guessed it... to profess undying love and loyalty. It is beyond grotesque, but they are slowly really overplaying their hand.
The Swamp is deep and wide. There are no Democrats or Republicans only politicians that get coopted and corrupted by money and power. Pretty disgusting. How this will ever get corrected is beyond me.
The Qtards tried telling us that pedos run everything(mixed in with a bunch of bat shit insane stuff). But no one listened and of course, like clock work, Q had to be labeled terrorism.
My comment was a joke. But seriously, I wouldn’t be surprised if they started rounding up Q supporters so you should be more careful. Best of luck to you.
Maybe if people stopped complaining and started proposing solutions.
The biggest problem is money, period.
Here's a proposal: political contributions from U.S. Citizens only (i.e., no corporations, no foreigners, no illegals), limited to $25, and can only go to a politicians campaign organization. No money to parties. No transfers between campaign organizations.
Or just make all campaign contributions illegal, period.
Jim...it is not necessary to give money directly to the candidate or the party. They, big donors, strategically persuade with independent media events, ground game activities, giving buses or equipment to local leadership for facilitating the voting process in focused socio/focused/neighborhoods. The viewers of mainstream and even the smaller/newer media sites are influenced by the particular bias of site ie...the MSM refusing to publish anything negative about Biden. Then there are the questions remaining about the voting machines being connected to the internet and whether the voting results can be manipulated. I understand there are still many legal cases working their way though the various levels of the legal system as well as the disputes working their way through the individual state’s congresses. In light of all this effective campaign finance reforms will be quite complicated.
Term limits are the solution. An end to Dark Money is the solution. Allowing individuals to have 0 limits on individual candidate donations is the solution. Blocking out of state funding for in-state elections is the solution.
It is already illegal for foreign nationals to donate to US political candidates or their committees, however this is sadly not enforced the way it should be. For example, 501(c) organizations can give unlimited amounts of $ to political causes, and don't have to reveal their donors due to the NAACP v. Alabama precedent. This creates a situation that allows someone to circumvent FEC regulations about foreign donations, since 501(c) organizations dont have to disclose their donors (who could be foreign). This was brought to the IRS' attention back in 2007? but Lois Lerner and her IRS flunkies only looked at Conservative Dark Money groups. This is why DNC Dark money group Majority Forward is one of the top donors in the last cycle and doesn't have to say where it got any of its money from.
Oh, and that pesky 501(c) requirement that Dark Money groups spend more than 50% of their funding on "non-political donations"? I am sure the IRS is gonna get on that right away. Majority Forward spends 100% of its $ on salaries and donations and has never contributed a cent to anything BUT political causes. I am sure the Mueller investigation over Dark Money is gonna be tomorrow, right?
lol whatever makes you think corporate donations are the problem? Go look at who the real election donors are. Dustin Moskovitz gave more than any corporation did. Stop drinking the New York Times bullshit water. Citizens united is far from the problem. The real problem is NAACP v. Alabama and dark money not having to reveal its donors (who could be foreign, in violation of FEC law) but oh wait the IRS is in charge for some reason with dealing with anything about 501(c) organizations and not the FEC.
Term limits are the wrong solution to lazy, complacent, ignorant voters.
They are voters passing the buck and pointing fingers in the mirror.
They are nothing but a huckster's salve.
Things would be MUCH better without limits, including for POTUS.
Then the voters would realize, within their lifetime, the truth that nothing can save them from their own bad decisions except themselves and a constant vigilant skepticism of anything "public."
I agree with everything you say here but term limits means the same piece of shit politician cant weasel themselves into the equation for self-profit because they are uber-connected after 50 years of deal-makings.
Term limits would only encourage politicians to pack money in as much as possible in a shorter period of time. It would put them in hyper-overdrive. The solution, to me, is grassroots, neutral, locally funded voter education/resources.
Agree 100%....my Dad was born during the depression....he had an inside joke whenever he would get together with my uncleabout someone knocking at the door saying I am from the government and I am here to help.....I think today's version would go more like....Hi, I am a politician and I am here to help (line my pockets with money)
Good to see you back, Glenn!! We missed you. Conservatives always knew the Lincoln Project Group was filled with scammers but, hopefully, you'll reach some liberals / never trumpers who were duped. Not that it matters much now unless someone decides to sue.
If it was known that this collection of grifters were frauds, con artists, scammers, even maybe a pedophile thrown in, then how did they raise $100 million? They found the right marks. Sufferers of TDS.
Glenn...thank you for continuing to uncover/report on all these political scammers.......it is a compliant media that "protects" those who deserve no protection. Thank you for taking a stand when it seems so few are willing!!!
I was always a democrat, never a republican, but sometimes I just didn't vote. I don't care what anyone has to say about that, but in the last election I voted for Trump. Why, well, it was a big F. You to the democrats, and these kinds of groups who spread propaganda and are incredibly self serving, as the democrats have become. Anyone who knows Biden's record could not hold him in any esteem. In reality it is so obvious that others are calling the shots, because he certainly is not, which doesn't make it better, just the same.
Am I the only one who thinks that our complete abandonment of religion in our society might be backfiring on us in real time? Almost our entire class of “elites” are some of the most arrogant, prideful, dishonest, and all around terrible people on the planet. Seems like lust, anger, envy, gluttony, sloth, greed and pride take over when we stop teaching chastity, patience, kindness, temperance, diligence, charity, and humility.
I sort of see what you're saying, but you don't have to be religious to be a good person. And being religious doesn't make you good, either.
I suppose we can agree that moving away from the pressure to be a good person is backfiring. :)
It is very difficult to act morally and ethically without a basis for morals or ethics. This is where religion plays a huge role.
There's nothing ethical about a system that uses fear of eternal punishment (no matter how great or small the "sin") in the afterlife. If a person needs such a basis for morality to do what's "right" then they, and it, are not moral.
Well, possibly. I fear you yourself are being a little too dogmatic.
"I fear you yourself are being a little too dogmatic."
IOW, you can't logically refute a single thing I wrote.
System?
Choice.
You are the product of modern alinsky to conquerers of peoples.
YOU worship things, too.
"fear off eternal punishment" is YOUR way of juggling ethics, phil:
Murder: pay a consequence (either feuds between families, or, in civilized structured societies, meted out by law enforcement/judges)
YOU can choose no religious framework, phil. Que Sera sera.
Phil, God and religion are social technologies.
God is watching certainly worked better than the SEC or The Hague are watching. God doesn’t care about publicity nor can he be bribed.
And as far as the Holocaust there have been many genocides - so many. Genocide is actually the normal course of war in Asia and Africa - the term itself only gained any traction in the USA in WW2.
The only place it ever would have gained traction.
The Nazis rejected Christianity in favor of neopaganism mostly, although at least Rosenberg thought he was continuing Luther’s work.
At least the Nazis knew they needed a replacement, and psychology and legal positivism weren’t the replacements.
In any case its a moot point; God is Dead, at least the Christian God. Certainly very dead in America ~ and look, there’s antiwhite genocidal speech and behavior.
That was quick!
So relax Phil, God is DEAD.
We really are free, so free.
No wonder God’s chief Lieutenant rebelled!
FREEDOM!!!
Right, and morality is inevitably metaphysical because "meaning" and "value" are metaphysical and you cannot discuss morality without resting on some meaning of "meaning" and some way to measure "value".
The problem is not really that we have lost religion, but we have largely forgotten what it is FOR. As discussed by Plato and Aristotle, a key value is that it is a structured way to convey morality and ethics to the next generation. This has to be done systemically because kids need morality and ethics in the form of rules they can learn and apply LONG before they can explore epistemology and develop philosophy on their own. Heck quite a few adults never get to that point, just as someone mentions below that many people taught math never become mathematician. Early on, of course, this instruction is and should be in the form of stories.
So some such structured system is needed and any number of systems would "do" at that early stage. Mostly, if a system won't "do" for even that purpose, it doesn't survive. But although this is A crucial use of religion, it is not its real end value. Good religious instruction includes the teaching of TOOLS for ethical thought for personal spiritual exploration and a structure for collective exploration. At that level, not all religions are equal and the key difference lies in the way they frame the questions: what is the Good and the Beautiful? What is virtue? How do we achieve Justice and what is it? WHY are we here? What are our duties? Those are not just meaningful questions but the quite literally THE existential questions.
As Aristotle states, all human activity is aimed at +some+ good. But +which+ good and how good a good matters. If we do not teach the tools for evaluating and weighing goods, we have failed to do the most basic thing that civilization, society, and law ought do. Given that we were handed those hard won tools by past generations on a sheepskin platter, that is a pretty +spectacular+ failure.
Well, you don't always need religion for this, but it can help (or hurt) because there is at least some belief in some higher good, less hubris. Possibly. But culture and tradition are important. Definite requisites. And history. You don't erase it -- even bad history. You incorporate it into the future as happens in ALL human experience. You build on it and you admit and accept human frailty. But very often there are good things about culture that need to be retained. "Fundamental change" is usually problematic. Though there are exceptions, I imagine. But I get your point.
"you don't always need religion for this" - but you would need something still, wouldn't you? That something would necessarily be flawed as everything is, so why not religion? It has been proven over the ages, as has a wheel.
Yes, you need culture and tradition, history, that can include religion-- which can be good or bad as it all can. All part of ethics and rules and responsibility we pass down to our children.
"...something would necessarily be flawed..."
Sure. Our own limits introduce flaws into our relationship with the divine. So we have to keep looking higher to find a better definition for the Good and the Beautiful. When we make a messiah out of some mere personality, deify the State, or make our pet ideology everything, we set flawed standards that we can +actually touch+ and limit our growth. That is dangerous and always leads to evil, to pain: what is truly divine is ineffable.
The verb we translate as "praise" from Hebrew is from a root that simply means "to look up". That is what should mark our core relationship with the divine: always looking up and trying to see past the small, the petty, the temporary confusions to something more. We can never reach or become God; we can only continue trying to follow where God leads. God does not change, but our relationship with Him does. That is the way it ought to be.
Prayer, in particular, is (or ought be) our mechanism to discipline ourselves to keep looking up. Muttering words is not the point. When we pray from the heart, we need to lower ourselves and raise our gaze.
Thank you. Well said.
It does play a significant role, though CS Lewis' book Abolition of Man provides some interesting thoughts on why what we view as basic morals seem to appear in all the major religions. From my recollection (been a few years since reading it) he posits that those were there from the beginning of time. From there one can argue whether it was God that instilled them or if there is some other reason...I choose to believe they were instilled by God, but others may argue differently.
Lulu: Thanks for mentioning that book; I'll try to read it. You may be interested in William James's "The Varieties of Religious Experience" if you haven't already read it. He also tries to distill what's common to various religious experiences and belief systems, and he ends by discussing what this might tell us about the nature of "that which is greater than ourselves" and our connection to it.
Thank you for the suggestion! I just ordered it. I have an MA in psychology, so it will be interesting to read about religion from a psychological perspective. :-)
Jesus (Yeshua)'s morality was not from religion but from relationship. The first years of my 30 year marriage were tough, but we both worked at it and stayed because Yah was the third partner, we were in covenant.
For some people, sure.
Others don't need the threat of eternal damnation to love their neighbor.
Why's it gotta be violence, too?
The promise of a good snuggle goes a long way with me. Just sayin'.
I don't have any difficulty at all. You are assuming that I cannot, because you cannot see how you, could.
Nobody was more pious than Islamic State - such a great example of morals and ethics!
It can play a huge role. Or it can be horribly destructive. Like anything else. I've witnesed plenty of both in my lifetime.
"And being religious doesn't make you good, either."
If you're truly religious then you are good by definition. If you a religious show-off then you're not religious to begin with.
"If you're truly religious then you are good by definition."
You managed to jam two logical fallacies into just ten words. Most impressive.
Sure, now tell me where I placed those goalposts and how I'm going to be moving them.
Summarily responding to critics here:
We do not equate being good with not being faulty as all humans are. Religious people recognize it in themselves, acknowledge and admit it, fight it, and strive not to perpetuate it. Thereby being good.
Religious frauds will do as they please and claim anything.
Thereby TRYING to be good, MAYBE.
If you fight and lose you're still evil.
Hence not truly religious and indeed, evil.
Suppose I'm a bad actor, a priest molesting children. Knowing best what I should do as a supposed "believer" as soon as I did it the first time I should fight it. What would be a true fight as far as that? Giving up your post, surrendering to the authorities. If I didn't do that - I'm not a believer, I'm a fraud.
This is horseshit, plain and simple.
You wanna claim to be properly religious, you get to deal with the fact some of your cohorts - whether you consider them frauds or not - are some real class A shitheads.
Besides, look at your own life. Lay it our here, if you dare. I'm sure we'll find out you're a fraud too. We all are, on some level.
Frankly, we probably found the first evidence of your fraud: such nice, easy, tidy judgements.
You're assuming your conclusion.
"If you're truly religious then you are good by definition. "
Myriad examples, past and present, put the lie to that. Almost any (not all) belief system -- political, philosophical or religious -- includes bad (and good) actors.
Name a single true religious example that is a lie? Or did you just want to continue the long standing tradition of not offering examples to support your arguments?
While I see what you're saying here, and that there are plenty of good religious people, I seriously question anyone that relies on a system so irrational and lacking in evidence for its claims.
Being honestly wrong doesn't make it less wrong, in other words.
What portion of the universe's phenomena yield to reason? It's not self-evident that human reason should be our guiding star. We've only been following it for a few hundred years and it's already placed us in danger of extinction on multiple fronts.
If we're going to survive, we're going to need reason.
That sun ain't lasting forever, bud. Aren't you glad we figured that out?
And poetry ...
If left to reason, humanity will be long gone by then.
"What portion of the universe's phenomena yield to reason?"
Yeah, why investigate, study and analyze when it's so much easier, and so much more fun, to simply say, "God did it."? If you and yours ran the world, we'd be killing cats to stop Covid.
My kind? You know you're in a good place when that of language rears its head.
It's not an argument against investigation, etc. Just a recognition that these tools are profoundly insufficient to live by.
I think you are misapplying the word reason. Every advance made since the beginning, when man first appeared, has been made because man is able to reason, remember and duplicate actions. Reason is the reason we are more advanced than other animals. Just because it didn’t have a name or official system or method applied before the Middle Ages doesn’t mean it didn’t exist. It did. Reasoning gave us writing, math, astrology, medicine...well, everything can be traced back to some person using their knowledge to improve their world. That is reasoning.
The danger of extinction is much less than it was even a hundred years ago. Only an asteroid hitting the earth at high speed could do that and we surely would not be the cause of that.
Climate change? Nuclear weapons? AI? None of these strike you as existential threats?
What if the evidence was how the religious world worked in the West?
What if the evidence is how other parts of the world still religious work?
If you're demanding empirical evidence perhaps you can look there?
The point of Religion is to lead a good life. Confucianism for instance doesn't have any kind of God we'd recognize but does that mean it has no value? Even Sam Harris found the value of Eastern Religions, which leads me to my final points- that we've unconsciously replaced Religion with POLITICS.
And I say: Politics makes a poor religion.
Power a poor God.
Government a poor Church.
And Lawyers are absolutely the worst priests in human history.
I reread comment threads hoping to find late arriving jewels.
Eureka!
No, Dear Sir. God moved your hand across the keyboard, do not spurn his inspiration. Let Alate stand, Jeweled or not.
[Also- I went to the trouble of wiki'-ing it]
Alate: An alate refers to a winged reproductive caste from a social insect colony in its winged form. Their common behavioural function is starting a new colony, to expand their mother colonies etc. Colonies of termites and ants produce alates. It is a flight-based form of reproductive technique.
Poetry is irrational ...
What's your point?
Duhhhhh
We should not worry about anything being "irrational and lacking in evidence". We appreciate what the effects of such beliefs are.
You're not concerned about the effects of irrationality?
Which might be what?
No true religious person would ever even make it known they believe. There is no need for it. Only showoffs and frauds would flaunt it. Hence, no "effects" should be of concern to any "rational" person out there.
Oh! Like worshipping a God who, according to the Story of Noah, was the world’s first and most prolific mass murderer?
Of men...and children...and women...and the foetuses that they carried(being that they were sinning)?
Emphasized "truly"
"you don't have to be religious to be a good person."
In theory.
Yahweh murdered (except for Noah and his family) every living thing on the planet. How would me worshipping him make me a "good" person?
"You'll know them by their works." Lol, yeah, we sure do.
Seth, of course there are "false prophets" and "wolves in sheep's clothing". There are also many whose religion motivates and guides them in a sincere effort to make our world more loving, and to alleviate suffering. In our time, Martin Luther King, Jr., Thich Nhat Hanh, Dorothy Day, the Berrigan Brothers, and others were prominent examples, but there are many more who are unknown to us.
https://www.catholicworker.org/
https://kingsbayplowshares7.org/
now
I read that Whitman piece. It's good stuff.
But look, all that stuff you linked is great. My folks work with Catholic Workers on the regular, and have told me all about. It's great.
But part of getting to Whitman's vision is rejecting authority, making our own way, and realizing we don't need God to make it happen.
Not unlike a child learning to walk
It wouldn't. But being a little less judgmental might. :)
I think it's safe to say that if a being had perpetrated the kind of horror described in the Noah story we would be well within our rights to judge them in the harshest terms imaginable.
And then take them out back to be shot.
If that's too "judgmental" then where to I buy the t-shirt?
Noah? From the Bible? Not all religious people are the same or believe the Bible is the literal word of God. Or that religion can define "God." Still, you are confusing religion with faith and spirituality -- people are manipulated by lots of influences and many are secular. "There are more things in heaven and earth, Horatio, than are dreamt of in your philosophy." Shakespeare
Now...wag your finger.
"But being a little less judgmental might. :)"
You're the kind at work that reports a coworker to HR for pointing out another coworkers stupid, unprofessional behavior.
I agree with you. My point is that we do not teach any of the virtues any longer, and I don’t think they has been a good thing.
Way to straddle your fence, corporal.
Your feewlings were damaged
(you are too young to remember influence of faith girdled instinctual human unhealthy desires, but hey! now you are experiencing it!)
Cool story?
Maybe Religio - "Bonds" literally isn't about being a good person.
Maybe it's about having a decent society?
A self policing society that doesn't need cops, lawyers and now soldiers to restrain the human animal we all have to keep tethered ?
And who watches the Watchmen? well... GOD.
Hence our Sacred Oaths...we're afraid of breaking them...cuz GOD.
That of course was and always has been one of the two main purposes of religion, along with regime legitimacy and stability.
The Operative phrase is 'God is watching' which has saved more lives than all the hashtags ever typed....
Tom Holland, avowed atheist has some excellent books on the subject.
Islam for instance was the Arab's solution to beating back the Dark Ages encroaching on the Arabian peninsula from all points of the compass and within...and whatever one may say where Islam conquered the Dark Ages stopped. Iliterate Bedouins or not they built Civilization wherever they marched.
"The Operative phrase is 'God is watching' which has saved more lives than all the hashtags ever typed"
Poppycock. If there was a "god watching", there'd have been no Holocaust.
Since questioning the Holocaust is for some a crime, for those that don’t, what consequence?
The so-called "Islamic Golden Age" is one of the great myths shoved down the throats of unsuspecting children and "liberal-progressive" dolts trying to be woke.
The problem isn't the abandonment of religion, its that people have replaced superstitious religion with secular religion. Russiagate is a perfect example of this. Faith-based belief that Trump is a Russian spy, that our intelligence agencies are noble warriors for truth and justice, that evil Russians have been controlling our elections and countless officials. Just like superstitious religions, calls for evidence or skepticism are considered heresy. All non-believers are suspect. Instead of spending all day at church listening to a priest, they spend all day on MSNBC listening to their high priestess Rachel Maddow.
And the analogy doesn't stop there - just like with the superstitious religion, the "high priest(ess)" gets away with tons and tons of money (I believe Maddow to the tune of $10 million per year?)
If there's an American popular religion, and I suspect there is, what do we think it is? What are it's beliefs? It's dogma? How does it express itself out there?
It's definitely nationalist and xenophobic. Celebrates form over function. It's indulgent, selfish, but has some pretty good perks.
Thoughts off the top of my head, anyway.
the prosperity gospel is America's religion
America is best understood as a secular religion, an exceptional god ...
Atheist here - I agree completely. Not so much the absence of religion itself, but the absence of anything to take its place. But I think it's more true of regular society than of our elites. Among normal ham-and-eggers like me (and presumably you), the normal, neighborhood churches that were a social bond as well as a spiritual one have been replaced by the consumption of mass media and increased alienation. While people of different social strata, different political views etc. would have once sat side by side in the pews, they now don't, and there are precious few levelers to replace churchgoing. OK, we must acknowledge that the churches weren't perfect, that there were still social divisions, that there was often mistrust among the sects, that there were coverups of abuse etc. But we threw the baby out with the bathwater in a huge way that I didn't appreciate until it actually happened.
Our elites, though, would just be using religious bodies the same way they do now - to amass more power. I don't think anything can restrict elites except for fair application of law.
We used to at least have sports. But the leftists have ruined nearly everything that brought us together. On purpose. Destabilizing society.
"We used to at least have sports."
And we don't now? They just played the Super Bowl. Are you that far "off the grid"? Pro sports is one of the biggest scams (still a distant second from Christianity) ever perpetrated on a willfully ignorant public. Billionaire team owners sucking resources and tax dollars from communities (funny that you rightists -always on the hunt for wasteful spending- don't seem to care about it) so people can wear sports jerseys to work and be part of the "winning team" by proxy.
No you "lefties" have politicized everything from taking a breath of air to going to the bathroom. There is nowhere we can be free from your constant whining and virtue signaling. Wasteful--like John Kerry saving the planet, right?
And p.s. Right now I am taking care of 90 year old father with Parkinson's and COPD and more--so the state doesn't have to in his home, but I live off the grid on solar power. I use a fraction of the energy most of you "waste" because I can see every watt and amp I use on an inverter screen. You could stop TALKING and WHINING all the time which would spread much less virus and less carbon dioxide -- which BTW, it's PLANTS that cause people to to fart, NOT meat.
Sorry, can you speak up a bit, please? I can't hear you over the virtue honking.
Pro sports...a bunch of ‘roidheads cheating away and sucking in the rubes.
You people are so freaking unhappy. And your goal is to make everyone else as miserable as you are. You've made a good stab at it.
And here’s one now.
I just love the fact that he claims to "live off the grid". Oh, irony, where is thy sting?
Reminding them now and again what an angry mob looks like works too.
Don't fool yourself. It was the same in the "good ol' days." Are you not aware, for example, of the many evangelical and otherwise grifters who fleeced the flock? Have you forgotten the priests (and other men of cloth) molesting children? Do you know that politics has always been the springboard for theft and deceit? Do you remember the hatred for "the other" among the religious and pious up to the very recent future? I think I should stop now.
The point is that those you list as bad examples are not religious or believers to begin with. They are frauds.
Judge them frauds if you want. The gist of X-ray's post seemed to be that if only we had religion again, this stuff wouldn't happen. Just not true. There may be arguments for religion, but this isn't one of them. Elites, whether religious or faux religious, have always sought power and money. Humans being what they are.
What we need is spiritual humility, and you can get that from atheists. It is the arrogance of the elites that is the problem.
Agree. We benefit greatly from a combination of humility, introspection and skepticism. Those once were pillars of liberalism.
You sure can.
I look up at the sky. Boom, job done.
As a conservative Catholic living in Los Angeles (go figure), I go to church every Sunday and know I am surrounded by liberal Catholics (go figure) who voted for a party that supports abortion. I don't get up and leave because I am not there for them. However, I am grateful that even liberal Catholics are seeking some spirituality however strongly I may disagree with them on their rite to life hypocrisy.
Thats the irony with a lot of people today. They pick and choose the laws of god or man they feel are worth following. You see this with the tattletale mafia about masks even though they are the same people drinking 2 glasses of chianti and then driving, or speeding, or jaywalking, or doing anything illegal. When its something they want to to do its "oh that law is stupid anyways" but when you are doing something they dont like its "well the law says you cant do that". They pick and choose the word of god they want to follow and pat themselves on the back for being good christians when they are anything but.
True, the but difference is, at least for those of us who believe in God (and I'll speak also as a conservative Catholic), the ultimate punishment or mercy/grace comes from God. Hopefully the lawbreakers are punished for breaking the law but that's nothing compared to God's grace or justice. My job is to get to heaven.....cuz I don't want the alternative. Too bad more don't see it this simplistically.
Momento- I appreciate the comment. I am not for mandated religion, only that I do believe that we have lost something over the past 20 years, and that the rise in non-religious may play a part. I admit that there are many hypocrites in all faiths, and that the powerful prey on the weak (even in the church), but for me, going to church on a regular basis is a reality check and reminder of how often I fall from my own ideals.
"if only we had religion again, this stuff wouldn't happen." - that certainly would be a grand claim. But I don't think anyone is naïve enough to expect that.
What can be claimed is that there would be _less_ of that "stuff". Since at least some of those taught would take it seriously and carry it throughout their lives and have a positive impact.
"The point is that those you list as bad examples are not religious or believers to begin with."
You would do well to understand this fallacy:
>>no true scotsman
You made what could be called an appeal to purity as a way to dismiss relevant criticisms or flaws of your argument.
In this form of faulty reasoning one's belief is rendered unfalsifiable because no matter how compelling the evidence is, one simply shifts the goalposts so that it wouldn't apply to a supposedly 'true' example. This kind of post-rationalization is a way of avoiding valid criticisms of one's argument.
Example: Angus declares that Scotsmen do not put sugar on their porridge, to which Lachlan points out that he is a Scotsman and puts sugar on his porridge. Furious, like a true Scot, Angus yells that no true Scotsman sugars his porridge.<<
"relevant criticisms or flaws of your argument" which are? That there are:
- "many evangelical and otherwise grifters who fleeced the flock"
- "priests (and other men of cloth) molesting children"
- "hatred for "the other" among the religious and pious up to the very recent future"
Are the above "criticisms"? Do I argue that there are no such cases? Of course, not. I do argue, though, that these scum are not believers or religious at all since they do wrong things knowingly and have no intention of fixing it, starting at least with acknowledging it as their weakness.
I am a tree.
Furious, like a true scot? Nice bit of racism there. Are we all angry people due to our race?
"Furious, like a true Scot" describes the hypothetical Angus's view of himself as a "true Scot", not Mona's opinion of Scots. To be more precise, what Mona wrote doesn't tell us anything about her personal opinion of Scots.
In any case, it's always nice to see the word "porridge".
They are frauds, you are correct.
"When men choose not to believe in God, they do not thereafter believe in nothing, they then become capable of believing in anything."
~ Attributed to G. K. Chesterton
Chesterton. Rowling. Two pushers of kiddie lit.
Chesterton was describing people like you.
You just keep deifying the State. It is really working out well, wouldn't you say?
Chesterton "kiddie lit"?????? His writings were for adults, whether they were non-fiction or fiction. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/G._K._Chesterton_bibliography
Infantile babble for infantile adults.
Rather rich you calling anyone infantile, given your rhetoric is reminiscent of the sandbox.
I bet you've read as much Chesterton as you've read Sowell.
One can only imagine the leftist nonsense you take as gospel.
"What is worth knowing, he doesn’t know and doesn’t want to know; what he knows is not true. The cardinal articles of his credo are the inventions of mountebanks; his heroes are mainly scoundrels."
~ H.L. Mencken
I've read this comment five times now. I think it's a Rorschach Test. Haha!
It is always amusing to read leftists criticize the faithful for their faith.
Irrational, don't you know. No evidence, don't you know. All those terrible things done in God's name, don't you know. And on and on and on.
And yet, the leftist possesses a burning and unshakeable pseudo-theological faith of his own in the benevolence and efficacy of the State.
There may be no empirical evidence of God's existence, so perhaps it is accurate to call faith irrational.
But what is one to call the faith of the leftist, given the overwhelming and indisputable amount of evidence, going back to the beginning of recorded history, that the State is the most murderous, destructive criminal organization to ever afflict humanity?
States slaughtered some 250 million souls just in the last century, most of them their own citizens. Socialist States have dispatched more innocents in a good afternoon than all the Holy Inquisitions combined.
The number of people killed for religious reasons throughout history would constitute a productive afternoon for the socialists. The almost incomprehensible horror of the gulags and concentration camps make anything done in the name of religion child's play by comparison.
And yet despite all this we must endure to the present day those that worship, defend and empower the State, which has never been anything but coercion and exploitation of the many by the few, while they attack the belief systems that created the civilization they are in the process of destroying.
For a recent example of leftist worship, have a look at Disney's latest agitprop slobbering over Comrade Kamala.
Should you be overcome with nausea, skip to about 0:37 where the narrator intones that Kamala "became part of a divine group of leaders".
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DHB1L_YdVw8
And just so you don't get the misimpression that this is an isolated incident, here is a video of brainwashed babes singing hymns to Obama, a.k.a. Chocolate Jesus:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9gtfizIbBDI&t=10s
Just despicable.
You admit that faith is irrational, then say that "leftists" are MORE irrational (i.e. MORE FAITHFUL) because of their "unshakeable pseudo-theological faith (whatever that is) of his own in the benevolence and efficacy of the State." IOW, "I'm a poopy head...but a leftist is a BIGGER poopy head than I am." No wonder "religious nones" are one of the fastest growing segments of the population.
"unshakeable pseudo-theological faith (whatever that is"
Yes, yes, I know. Such big words for a leftist brain. Why don't you break the phrase into words and look them up individually, then think about what they might mean when put together.
But then again, perhaps just keep using the term "poopy head", which is a perfect indication of your intellectual development.
Where do you people go to school?
You should go back and demand a refund.
"unshakeable pseudo-theological faith (whatever that is"
Yes, yes, I know. Such big words for a leftist brain. Why don't you break the phrase into words and look them up individually, then think about what they might mean when put together.
But then again, perhaps just keep using the term "poopy head", which is a perfect indication of your intellectual development.
Where do you people go to school?
You should go back and demand a refund.
Ad Hominen = no logical refutation. They taught you that in school, right?
Ad hominen is a logical fallacy where one uses personal insults in lieu of factual and/or reasoned argument.
It does not apply to mocking you for your lack of wherewithal and/or intellectual capacity to look up and/or comprehend the meaning of my words.
Yet another of the endless examples of leftists having no idea what they are talking about.
...as is redefining terms and shifting the goal posts.
The left just had the advantage of industrialization. Remember the smallpox blankets they gave the Indians?
Y'all know they would've delivered 'em by drone, if they had it.
"Remember the smallpox blankets they gave the Indians?"
You do you who "they" were, right?
They were the military men that fought for Lincoln, the most tyrannical and bloodthirsty president in U.S. history. And that is saying something.
He did not manage to free a single slave, but caused the death of some 750,000 souls.
The soldiers that slaughtered the natives cut their teeth rampaging, raping, looting and burning their way through the South on Lincoln's orders.
Rather telling that the band of vile cretins Glenn describes here named themselves after him.
"for Lincoln, the most tyrannical and bloodthirsty president in U.S. history"
Oh goodness gracious, you're one of those. Thanks for letting us know exactly who, and what, we're dealing with. Please, PLEASE tell me you have a "NOT FOR HIRE" bumper sticker on your "vessel" that you "travel" down the road in, and you spend your free time being a 1A "auditor". That would be just TOO perfect.
BTW, Lincoln's biggest mistake was not allowing Sherman to continue his march.
"Oh goodness gracious, you're one of those."
Oh yes I am. We call it the reality-based community. One way or another, we've managed to rise up out of the oceans of collectivist-statist bullshit the vast herds of useful idiots wallow in, copiously imbibe and then regurgitate at every opportunity.
We know history. We know economics. We know that the sole purpose of the State is so that a powerful few can live at the expense of the many, and it has always been so.
And we know about Lincoln. Of course he is placed highly in your pantheon.
"I will say then that I am not, nor ever have been in favor of bringing about in any way the social and political equality of the white and black races, that I am not nor ever have been in favor of making voters or jurors of negroes, nor of qualifying them to hold office, nor to intermarry with white people; and I will say in addition to this that there is a physical difference between the white and black races which I believe will forever forbid the two races living together on terms of social and political equality. And inasmuch as they cannot so live, while they do remain together there must be the position of superior and inferior, and I as much as any other man am in favor of having the superior position assigned to the white race."
~ Abraham Lincoln, Debate with Stephen Douglas, Sept. 18, 1858
Cue the statist bullshit regurgitation excuse reflex.
It looks like there is a particular Thought Police Squad - a pack of goons on patrol of this forum out for anyone who has a "wrong" idea. Their viciousness and venom depends on the topic but the amount of snot they possess is always copious and on full display.
No wonder groceries experience shortage of napkins now and again. These guys and girls need plenty to keep their snot from soiling their keyboards.
Ideas rise and fall on their own merits when they are allowed to compete in the open marketplace of ideas. Religion -in particular, organized religion- is dying because it cannot compete on its own merits - no matter how many times it tries to shed its skin.
I guess 1+1 = pack of goons now.
Nah, don't flatter yourself. You two are in a supporting role. The big guns are stocking up napkins.
You're just mad I hit the nail of your idea on the head with an enormous hammer.
Remember, the troll badge you were just rewarded is of the entry level. To reach platinum you have to study a certain @e.pierce. In particular, work on expanding your vocabulary. Your F-word usage has nothing on that guy's pithy one-liners. His is the record you strive for. Go get him!
You're mad about me using the work fuck? lol
I want to see you grow. That hammer you boasted about - you should the size of @e.pierce's.
Almost as amusing as watching Libertarians deify and worship the non-existent god of the "free market".
Fuck the left. Fuck the right. Fuck authoritarianism.
God is the original authoritarian, so fuck him especially so.
"Fuck the left. Fuck the right. Fuck authoritarianism."
You are getting close, but miss a crucial truth: the entire political system of the Western world has been left for quite some time, and it has most certainly devolved into authoritarianism.
What is truly right-wing is extremely limited, decentralized government (no income tax or central bank), free-market laissez-faire capitalism (e.g. actual capitalism) with property rights sacrosanct.
What we have now are all-powerful mega-states that are completely fascist (that is to say, socialist, that is to say leftist), although Mussolini preferred the term corporatist to describe his infernal invention.
Large, all-powerful states are a feature of leftism, not a bug. As is the inherent authoritarianism they inevitably inflict upon the population.
Given what has occurred over the past year, the truth of what I say should be glaringly obvious to all but the irredeemably obtuse.
Tell it, libertate!
Articulate anyone? Good news: dictionaries are now free online. Check it out.
Here's a word to look up: laconic.
I expect a five page report, double spaced, by Tuesday morning.
Nancy and Joe are Catholics or so they profess. But I wouldnt credit them with patience, kindness, temperance, diligence, charity, and humility.
They're not Catholics. They're frauds.
Don't you remember Nancy prayer every night for President Trump. So devout........
Nancy is so pious she sleeps upside down in the belfry.
She's Batman? Fuckin' sweet.
She’s Batsh*t crazy
😆
Believe me, they are praying that there is no afterlife!
Or forgiveness. The greatest of the Christian virtues, apparently.
I am a bit reserved when it comes to religion but I've heard compelling enough arguments that a marked difference between the modern woke left and previous progressive movements is that the decline of practicing Christianity has led to a decline in the notion of forgiveness, which is critically important in any society or social movement. And we too easily see a complete lack of forgiveness all around us. That's why the parallels between the woke movement and soviet totalitarianism is eerie, because the Rousseauesque communism also practiced no forgiveness either. And we saw what happened in Russia and China.
A lot of government school "teachers" are child abusers so...
Fuck the state, private and public?
Many word twists and qualifications in the responses to your post, but you are correct. Religion, believing in good over evil, decency over depravity, in morality, encouraging ethics, more, is the accumulated experiences of many societies and many religions, even without the enforcement of Holy recitations. We humans seem to have to keep relearning these basic truths. If the cycle now is near the trough and starts to climb toward reason again, we’ll look back and sigh. If.
I always felt like religion is what people came up with when they realized the laws of man would never keep people in line enough.
"Am I the only one who thinks that our complete abandonment of religion in our society might be backfiring on us in real time?"
Hasn't happened, not even sort of: "About three-quarters of Americans identify with a Christian faith - 37% are highly religious;" https://news.gallup.com/poll/224642/2017-update-americans-religion.aspx
Further, I'm an agnostic who practices some Buddhist philosophy, and as with some of my like-minded colleagues, we are morally developed people.
I don’t think it’s the PRACTICE or BELIEF of religion that’s a problem in America today. I think the slowly losing the Right to worship as one sees fit is worse. Critical theory pulls people away from everything and anything that gives them roots- CT depends on you giving up the ideas that have given us a relatively stable society for 200+ yrs. this is a revolution and most people don’t even realize it so we debate about god and religion and who is and isn’t but we’re all missing the bigger picture and this is how the radical left is stripping America of well, America
"I think the slowly losing the Right to worship as one sees fit is worse."
If, by that, you mean that "Christians" are no longer allowed to legally discriminate against others...then we're in total agreement.
First off - it seems as though you have made a ridiculous though not uncommon assumption that only Christians have religious freedom. I Am A Jew by birth. Secondly I am speaking about the fact that I see increasingly remarks that judge practice of religion an YES belief in a God as something for small minds. Obviously these judgemental radicals (you?) think they know whats best for everyone and perniciously ignorant. Do you realize how much studying Jews must do in order to be completely observant? Do you know how many times Jews have been persecuted (before and after the Holocaust)? Even in this country today we are blamed for every social I’ll and corruption there is. Do you realize that just as the now martyred and victimized Arabs in Gaza have been violently attempting to take over land that was CONTRACTUALLY promised to Jews over 4000 years ago and it wasn’t until 1947 that we won The Right to live in our home. Do you realize that anti-semitic hate crimes in AMERICA are on the rise while Muslims and blacks.
https://www.nytimes.com/2019/11/12/us/hate-crimes-fbi-report.html
So NO it’s not about Christians and your statement makes you seem like you need some education on the topic of religious freedom as a whole. Highly recommend you start by reading the Constitution
I’m typing this while in my car and in my haste missed some words etc but I think you can fill them in
You're not texting and driving are you? Sorry, it's not my burden to try to make sense of your incoherent rambling. Plus, you lost all credibility when you used the term "radical left" and this gem, "to take over land that was CONTRACTUALLY promised to Jews over 4000 years ago". Please don't say it was promised to you by Yahweh, please don't.
You're not alone. Not that the Christian religion, as practiced by many of its most prominent claimed adherents (the names Bush, Biden and Obama come to mind), doesn't have a lot to answer for. But I've known many fellow Christians who practice -- traceably to their faith -- an admirable degree of restraint, fortitude and moral clarity, and the best do so non-judgmentally.
While it's true that non-believers across society often exhibit superior behavior by comparison with Christians (non-Christian divorce rates are lower, for example), the loss of what was always a faint thread of belief among our elites may be a different matter. As far as I can see it has not been beneficial in any way, notably with the spreading rot of hyper-judgment that we've come to know as cancel culture.
There's been a change in how religion itself is practiced in the last 50 years. It's been overtaken by a "gospel of prosperity" that is devoid of ethics. I can remember the nuns making it very clear to us that much was expected of us -- it was not a free lunch of God's grace with no sacrifice or conscience. Yes, we were forgiven our transgressions but had to stop them.
Personally I am an atheist / agnostic, but I believe religious values are valuable. I believe our democracy will not survive if people do not behave buy the basic human decency touted by the Bible.
The idea that the USA was more "moral" or "righteous" (whatever the assumed underlying cause) at some time in the past is simply ludicrous. Newsflash: the "elites" were scum buckets LONG before the Lincoln Project. And remind us, again, what group of people in this country work furiously to deny the inalienable rights of traditionally marginalized groups. Hint: It ain't the atheists and secular humanists.
What "society" are you talking about? Certainly not the USA. We're the most "religious" society on the planet. And if you took envy, gluttony and greed out of the equation, Capitalism would cease to exist.
lol. Does America even make the top 10?
Just about every country in the Middle East beats the USA, including Israel.
India, Japan, Tibet, the countries of N. Africa...
A silly comment -- Trump voted himself out not only because of his utter incompetency in handling virus but also by bringing into government religious extremism and racism. The numbing number of religious extremist is too long to list -- starting with bible-idiot Ben Carson ("pyramids were build by St. Joseph to store wheat")
The opposing group of oligarchs, was simply much more skillful in "winning" the vote count than his group of oligarchs
President Trump actually did an excellent job in handling the virus. Early on he stopped travel from China and put together an excellent task force reporting directly to Vice President Pence. It included six excellent doctors, one of them Dr Carson, who is probably the most admired doctor in the U.S. today. Dr Deborah Birx led the task force, based on her service in leading the US World AIDS effort in the Obama administration. He attended the daily task force briefings, getting them 100 times the attention they otherwise would have gotten (up to 10 million viewers!).
He held meetings with governors, and quickly responded to their requests by meeting with industry CEOs to get them to produce the needed supplies. He sent fully staffed naval hospital ships to New York and Los Angeles.
He personally met with leaders in the pharmaceutical industry to get them to work together on vaccines. It was said in April that it would take 12 to 18 months to get a vaccine, yet after 8 months millions of doses were already administered.
He listened to the medical specialists before commenting on aspects of the situation. He brought up value of HCQ for treatment after being told of peer-reviewed articles that pointed out its value (and its safety), one being in 2005 from the CDC. Political opponents attacked him, and even got papers published claiming HCQ didn't work that were later retracted because they were fake (remember SurgeSphere?). Today it is considered the standard treatment for early cases (with of course Zinc and an antibiotic).
Does anyone imagine that Hillary Clinton could have done any of this if she had been President???
Insufficient media coverage is on the extent of just how much evangelical fundamentalists (the Rupture End-Time Christians) dominated ALL levels of Trump's government. Corona virus human and economic catastrophe in the US will likely end up being called – the Trump virus.
• Evangelical anti-science idiot, Trump’s VP Mike Pence, has been installed to lead the pandemic fight as Corona virus tsar
• Evangelical Mike Pompeo, Secretary of State insane war clown who considers Trump as the coming Christian King
• Evangelical Jerome Adams, now US Surgeon General was the state health commissioner under Governor Mike Pence during AIDS epidemic (he acts like he already “Ruptured” to another world
• Evangelical Bible idiot Ben Carson, Housing Secretary – famous for stating that Egyptian pyramids were built by St. Joseph for wheat storage; always reassuring when he stands next to Trump during our Great Leader blabbers
• Evangelical Robert Redfield, installed to run critical organization CDC (Center for Disease Control and Prevention) as its director in 2018 (he immediately increased his salary to almost $0.5M) decided to develop an American, hence superior test kit (despite that Chinese scientists in a record short time provided full virus genome and Germans and others developed a test kit adopted by WHO). The new “superior and our” test kits failed and much delayed testing – resulting that in the entire February only 256 people were tested?!? – the crime of a century. Redfield was on a board of the largest evangelical anti-gay organization while for a decade unsuccessfully developing AIDS vaccine (and fabricating results)….
• Evangelical Deborah Birx, White House Corona virus response coordinator managed anti-AIDS international $6.3B fund – like Redfield focusing on – abstinence
• Evangelical Betsy DeVos, Education Secretary and a sister of evangelical Eric Prince (founder of Blackwater – runs Trump’s private army)
• And an endless number of government and military evangelical officials financed by now almost limitless government resources
Doing a better job than Hillary Clinton is not exactly a ringing endorsement.
I accept your point!
Trump lost election because of catastrophic mishandling of virus. China has about 4 times larger population -- it lost about 5K people -- we are losing that many every day - soon we will have 500K dead. Testing and tracing was not done whole first five months.
Your Dr. Ben Carson is a grifter and bible idiot -- "pyramids were built by St. Joseph to store wheat" and selling oleander extract as a cure for Covid-19 (together with My-Pillow charlatan
About Hillary -- Tulsi Gabbard brilliantly said everything about her:
"Great! Thank you @HillaryClinton . You, the queen of warmongers, embodiment of corruption, and personification of the rot that has sickened the Democratic Party for so long, have finally come out from behind the curtain. From the day I announced my candidacy, there has been a concerted campaign to destroy my reputation. We wondered who was behind it and why.
Now we know — it was always you, through your proxies and powerful allies in the corporate media and war machine, afraid of the threat I pose. It’s now clear that this primary is between you and me. Don’t cowardly hide behind your proxies. Join the race directly."
Please try some rudimentary thinking for yourself before parroting nonsense "arguments". I am sorry to say -- you are publicly embarrassing yourself
Boris. What is it.... exactly.... Trump should have done? You think Communist China is some sort of a model for the US? Do you understand we are a country founded on individual liberty and constitutional protection? It looks like you are the one parroting nonsense.
Also, has anyone ever told you have anger problems? Your posts are unnecessarily nasty.
He should have followed science. We know how to handle viruses. masks, distancing, TESTING and contact TRACING - from day one.
For five months that was not done -- in February 256 people were tested -- in South Korea tens of thousands per day.
We have 500K dead because of idiotic incompetency and our economy is collapsing. Without M4A like the rest of the world, without $4K/month for duration of Covid like the rest of the world.
We are a failed country -- of course, Democrat cabal of oligarchs are equally bad but at least they are not incompetent in using basic science. They are also more skillful in stealing elections... (ask Bernie in Iowa)
Boris you are just wrong about this. Your hatred of Trump (e.g. "his idiotic incompetency") has created a short circuit in your brain. If you look at the statistics, if have seen plenty, comparing western countries and comparing states here in the US. They all end up looking about the same. It didn't matter... mask no mask, lockdown no lockdown. The virus ended up spreading and spiking. And you should stop saying things like "should have followed science". Scientists disagree all the time about almost everything. So when you hear someone say "follow the science" it really means "follow the scientists I believe in and STFU".
So short of total CCP style draconian lock down measures regarding; masks (unless n95 not much help afaic tell), distancing (are you going to arrest people?), testing (are going to force people to be tested?), and tracing (is this mandatory?), It didn't make any difference. Besides I suspect (certain?) that China has under-reported and we in the US have certainly over-reported (financial incentive to do so for hospitals) CV19 deaths. And can you imagine if Trump, the supposed little dictator, had gone all authoritarian on us and we ended up with a similar death count (most likely afaic tell). YOU would, most likely, be trashing Trump for being an authoritarian idiot. So the economic damage could have been avoided by opening up nationwide when we realized the vulnerable populations were very old, and sick people. God help you if you are both old and sick, you better isolate yourself.
I will close with my thoughts about not just Trump's but everyones response to this pandemic. I will not be partisan. It reminds me of the Vietnam War. You had well meaning people coming to very very different conclusions. Support or not support. If drafted; serve, dodge, move to Canada? I understand the logic for all of it. It was a crazy time, no one knew exactly what was going on. Everyone took their best shot at it. Same thing with this pandemic. It's a god damn pandemic of a novel CV. No one knew exactly what to do, with all, due respect to your opinion. But there's no way you should be placing 500K deaths at the feet of the president. It's just not right. You don't like the guy. I get it.
If you do think CCP style draconian lockdowns is the way to go? Sorry I can't go there.
Boris, he should have followed the science? What science? WHO repeated China's lies that the virus didn't transmit human to human, didn't declare a pandemic, produced a model calling for 3.5% IFR. Said masks weren't appropriate. That's the science available on day one. Whoever on the Asia Desk in State responsible for Taiwan needed to send a FLASH OVERRIDE message when Taiwan closed its borders on January 1.
We ignored what we knew about viruses; your list is a DNC talking point. We knew that the best place for someone to avoid infection was outdoors. Sunlight damages viruses, and the mist left from a cough or sneeze can be dissipated by a light breeze. So, power-hungry governors ordered people to stay indoors.
Power-hungry governors spread the panic-inducing message of Comply or Face Mass Death. This is a coronavirus, not the Andromeda Strain. Most common cold viruses are upper respiratory infections; COVID19 is a lower respiratory infection. It has an unfortunate tendency to trigger immune system over-reactions, resulting in cytokine storms. Hydroxychloroquine works well at preventing immune system over-reactions, and its use should have been left up to patients and physicians to decide.
You missed a few other things. Lower respiratory infections are worse the older one is. We needed to focus resources on those we knew were most vulnerable, not arresting people for letting their kids play outdoors. Speaking of kids, we knew by April that youngsters would largely be unaffected. Treating everyone as though they are at equal risk is simply stupid.
We cannot do contact tracing in the US so long as there are eleven million illegal aliens in the country who don't want to answer questions, the southern border is wide open with invitations to come here and get free health care and stimulus checks, and New Yorkers ride the subway every day.
The nations that have done remarkably well are small island nations. M4A is the worst idea since the Democrats nominated Hilary Clinton. Hospitals lose an average of $2K for every Medicare or Medicaid admission. When every patient is Medicare (that's M4A) they all go bankrupt. Then what?
In February Nancy Pelosi was attending a Chinatown festival without a mask and reassuring everyone that it was all perfectly safe. I wonder about the IQ of the 256 people who got tested. For what? A disease that can't spread human to human, and everything's fine, come dance with Nancy. Bernie Sanders was still calling for open borders in April. Democrats were incompetent in using basic science.
The rest of the world does not get $4K/month. According to the IMF, only nineteen countries have per capita GDP above $4K/month. More than twice that number - 45 countries - have annual GDP per capita below $4K. Please do a little research next time.
There are other medical factors you're not mentioning, such as the contribution of a healthy diet to staving off infection, and the roles of Vitamins C and D.
SQ: Which “science” should he have followed?
Bla bla bla bla
Donald Trump 'wants FDA to approve oleander plant extract as a drug to cure Covid-19' after it was promoted by Ben Carson and MyPillow founder - despite no proof that it works
• Housing and Urban Development Secretary Ben Carson and MyPillow boss Mike Lindell, a big Trump supporter, have urged Trump to look at the botanical extract
• Meeting arranged by the pair with a director at company developing the product
• Andrew Whitney, of Phoenix Biotechnology, claims he is '100%' sure it's a cure
• But there is no peer-reviewed study to support the claim
• Lindell says that in the meeting, Trump 'basically said the FDA should approve it'
• Senior administration official expressed deep concern that Carson and Lindell were 'pushing a dubious product at the highest levels' during the pandemic
By ROSS IBBETSON FOR MAILONLINE
PUBLISHED: 05:03 EDT, 17 August 2020
It looks like it's guys like these you consider religious and believers: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OSIrQBGfUtw
Todays comments are ridiculous.... The same people arguing with you about those people being religious
1. Aren't religious themselves, at all, and are therefore in no way an authority on any religion, let alone the ones in question.
2. Keep listing and saying people who aren't religious at all.
3. Keep listing "religious" media figures as any way indicative of actual religious people.
4. Are not typically admitting their own anti-religion bias up front. Dig a little bit, you'll see most of these people have contempt for anyone who supports organized religions.
I'm an agnostic myself but there are a lot of good, (whichever) god-fearing people out there, and I feel the negativity towards religion the media is peddling does these people a disservice.
And the ensued argument quickly devolved into the "merits" of faith: irrationality, lack of evidence, etc., examples of bad actors which are plentiful and so on, whereas:
the point of the OP as I understood it was that existence of religion in our lives would promote better persons so that bad behaviors we are discussing had less chance of being so prevalent, bold, in-your-face, and shameless as they have become.
They teach math to kids, some of them will become brilliant mathematicians, most will be comfortable with it, and a few will just have heard about it. But if it wasn't taught then no one would even have a chance.
You are correct -- Trump government was full of such charlatans and grifters -- I hope they will "rupture" soon... ;-))
Donald Trump 'wants FDA to approve oleander plant extract as a drug to cure Covid-19' after it was promoted by Ben Carson and MyPillow founder - despite no proof that it works
• Housing and Urban Development Secretary Ben Carson and MyPillow boss Mike Lindell, a big Trump supporter, have urged Trump to look at the botanical extract
• Meeting arranged by the pair with a director at company developing the product
• Andrew Whitney, of Phoenix Biotechnology, claims he is '100%' sure it's a cure
• But there is no peer-reviewed study to support the claim
• Lindell says that in the meeting, Trump 'basically said the FDA should approve it'
• Senior administration official expressed deep concern that Carson and Lindell were 'pushing a dubious product at the highest levels' during the pandemic
By ROSS IBBETSON FOR MAILONLINE
PUBLISHED: 05:03 EDT, 17 August 2020
So, "charlatans and grifters" or religious and believers? Despite what they might claim?
Are you saying that organized religion is not a con job? I mean both in spiritual and financial terms?
You have to wonder whether the saga of the Lincoln Project will not be an apt symbol of the Biden administration from its inception. By its own admission in Time magazine successfully conspiring to fix the election and deny Trump a second win, the "Cabal" has installed the improbable Joe Biden and the even more improbable Kamala Harris as president and vice-president, on false pretenses (for example, a hidden candidate protected from examination, a VP selection catapulting the least popular candidate in the primaries into the likelihood of actually becoming president because of Biden's obvious dementia and competency issues). The whole establishment is so corrupt and grift-ridden--for example, look at how corporate media deliberately polarized the country for the sake of profits over four long Trump years--that it's ready to unravel at the seams. It's "overdetermined" with corruption; it cannot but spill out. The Biden years I suspect may be the great unravelling. And does anyone think Harris has the character or competence to hold things together?
On the left hand we have the vicious incompetent Democrats, and on the right hand we have the Elmer Fudd Republicans. Meanwhile, those of us focused on policy over personality are fucked.
If she does, she'll be a Gorbachev - too little, too late.
Louis Bingo, You have made the best, clearest statement of our problem as a country. Thank you!
Thank you, Glenn for this: “What this sorry episode reveals above all else is that much of American liberalism, including its all-but-official arm in corporate media, replicated, in the name of combatting Trump, every unethical tactic, every deceitful method, and every toxic assault on basic decency that they insisted Trump singularly represented.” Wow. I used to try to warn my Trump hating friends that when you demonize someone you become a demon yourself. How about going forward in a positive way? Like, spending your energy and money figuring out why so many Americans are fed up with their elite rulers, Dem and Republican. One friend called me Eva Braun for defending Hitler (Trump, who I wasn't defending, that wasn't the point), and most just stopped talking to me. But I can say this absolutely honestly: had I been a politician in the Capitol during the break-in I would have walked out to the protestors and asked them to tell me what they want and why they loved Trump over me. That none of the narcissistic psychos did that is like the prelude to the French Revolution. They have a let them eat cake attitude. All the Trump hating people I know are now demonically possessed. I'm not religious but I now feel they should seek exorcism. They are even more psychotic now he's gone.
Oh my God, that would have been so amazing. I just wish that Josh Hawley, Ted Cruz and all those standing firm for at least the investigation of election fraud would have walked out there and calmed everyone down. That would have been one bad ass move.
"When you demonize someone you become a demon yourself." Polly, those are truly wise and profound words! I wish we had a host of politicians with your attitude.
Doesn't it amaze you that none of these swamp creatures who claim how traumatizing this was and how they had to hide and now need guards around the capitol - that they couldn't just walk out to the protestors and say “Let's talk”? And instead they surround themselves with militia? These swamp creatures are possessed. And again, I'm not religious and I laughed at the movie The Exorcist. But now I'm not laughing.
And the vast majority of Trump supporters would have LOVED to engage in a serious discussion--not a violent fight! That likely includes those who broke into the building, and differentiates them from protestors such as Antifa, who have no interest whatsoever in an examination of the issues.
Thank you, Polly. I, too, was vilified as a Trump supporter when I criticized the erosion of civil and constitutional rights "because Trump." The precedents established in the shared delusion that he was evil incarnate will come back to bite those who established them.
Hi Bill - I think this delusion will evaporate slowly, but maybe before two years. Biden will do the work to undo it. I'm old enough to have seen this mass hysteria/delusion come and go. When I was a teen my brother dated a woman who hid under a sheet because her “guru” demanded it. Years later I ran into her and she was just another suburban woman shopping for her family. I've known women who accused men of rape, or day care centers of Satanic ritual abuse, or their own families - only to find that years later they've completely forgotten they did it.
I wish I shared your optimism. I'm old enough to remember the same things. Unfortunately, I think the erosion of civil and constitutional rights has been building for a long time. As long as power is derived from it it's not going away. It will only get worst. The only thing that will slow it, or turn the tide, is if enough american stand up to it.
"But I can say this absolutely honestly: had I been a politician in the Capitol during the break-in I would have walked out to the protestors and asked them to tell me what they want and why they loved Trump over me."
Brilliant.
Doesn't really matter anyway. They were only a "thing" so they could oppose Trump "from the right." In reality, it's just the neo-cons still doing their Never Trump thing. Now that Trump is gone they are useless, so it's time for them to be fed into the cancel culture woodchipper. This isn't going to stop.
You have to hand it to Trump. No matter what else he did or didn't do, he brought the rats out into the open. All the rats.
Why does no one ever mention that these Lincoln Project characters were featured by CBS Sixty Minutes AFTER the allegations about John Weaver first surfaced in June 2020? And I never hear anyone talk about the fact that Steve Schmidt (of the Lincoln Project) managed the McCain/Palin presidential campaign in 2008.
Good evening Mr. Greenwald:
First of all, thank you so much for your continued exposes and outings of the absolute horrific vile sociopathy that is metastatic across this country if not the entire globe. Second, I think it’s time that people stop trying to rationalize tolerate and condone this level of hate and wretched disdain for life that is pandemic among the scum that rule and manipulate us, and try to influence us with such despicable disreputable dishonest rhetoric and narratives.
Evil, it truly is so prevalent. The relentless lying, pathological hypocrisy, causing endless harm chaos and death, showing no remorse for the consequences caused, and the never ending mocking and disdaining of healthy accepted boundaries set by society.
If we don’t fight back, this selfish shameless soulless plague will utterly decimate humanity, and I don’t write this to be provocative, I write this to open peoples eyes.
Thank you again, look forward to your next article/post.
Appreciative reader.
The French (the FRENCH!) are waking up to idiotic American wokeness.
I am a solid Trump supporter. My thoughts for the “other side” is that they would elevate the discourse, exemplify the norms, act with honor and in that way demonstrate to the country how they believe one should comport oneself. Instead they lied, incited violence, committed crimes and destroyed all norms. They vastly out-trumped Trump. A truly disgusting decision. You reap what you sow.
"But their lucrative scheme could never have succeeded without the knowingly fraudulent cooperation of liberal networks such as MSNBC and CNN. Over and over, those Democratic Party spokespeople masquerading as TV journalists — knowing exactly who these bottom-feeding GOP operatives have always been — encouraged their misguided and trusting viewers to regard the Lincoln Project as a selfless and noble bulwark against Trumpism rather than the scamming, grifting, lowlife con it so obviously was from the start."
Michael Avenatti reportedly had no comment.
Every single person who worked against Trump in some way will be releasing a book with a nice signing fee and no one ever investigates them.
I believe he's brainstorming with Brian Stelter about his upcoming run for 2024.
Amazing the ease with which the Lincoln Group made money off of liberals fear and loathing of Donald Trump. As W.C. Fields famously said, "A sucker is born every day." Can't think of anyone better qualified to tell this revelatory story than Glenn Greenwald. Thanks again, Glenn.
I'd be happy to post every single person's name who donated to this group if Glenn doesn't mind :) The wonders of the FEC data laws!
Someone made a map of everyone who supported Trump or the GOP in the last 4 years, and encouraged people to locate nearby Trump supporters and go give them a piece of your mind. (But don't be violent of course, wink wink.)
W.C. Fields may have repeated it, but the phrase was coined by P. T. Barnum. It seems that the pandemic and post-pandemic era will be owned by the scammers. Organizational disruption in every agency, large and small, has become the cherry on top of decades of deregulation, and it has opened up the landscape to all forms of fraud. Add to that, extra time for swindlers to develop new and more creative schemes, and you have a perfect recipe for the age of exploitation.
The real story behind the story that Glenn is pointing to is how quickly things unravelled with Trump gone. For four years, an utterly corrupt establishment--more corrupt and more lying than Trump, and less competent too, strange as that may sound--was able to deflect everything from itself thanks to the Trump McGuffin. And now it's gone. How are they going to hold it together? What is there to hold it together? Everyone's grifting off of everyone else--that's what the Lincoln project shows. The ruling elites can thrive only. by stiffing the rest of us. That's why they need to divide us. They no longer have the ability to create the wealth that would lift everyone's boat. Trump was the best thing that every happened to them--it gave them another four years. Now, just weeks after his inauguration, it's clear that Biden has no plan, no ideas, and nothing to do except mindlessly negate everything his predecessor did good or bad. They are so uncoordinatedly they've already sold off parts of the store without even realizing it.
Everything, except of course all the goodies given to Israel - the very first act of Senate (as the country is literally dying and falling apart) was to re-affirm US Embassy in Jerusalem explicitly, and implicitly the Golan and West bank land grabs. And who does Anthony Blinken call first, probably even before arranging his desk? You guessed it... to profess undying love and loyalty. It is beyond grotesque, but they are slowly really overplaying their hand.
The Swamp is deep and wide. There are no Democrats or Republicans only politicians that get coopted and corrupted by money and power. Pretty disgusting. How this will ever get corrected is beyond me.
The Qtards tried telling us that pedos run everything(mixed in with a bunch of bat shit insane stuff). But no one listened and of course, like clock work, Q had to be labeled terrorism.
- a non QAnon believer except for the pedo part
Podiatrists? Now it all makes sense!
This evil must be defeeted!
Maybe this will convince you...
https://paulfurber.net/qinside/
Ha! Nice try Mr FBI. I won’t be downloading any Kompromat thank you very much.
It’s Ms. No need to get nasty. The truth will come out soon. Thought you might want a heads up.
My comment was a joke. But seriously, I wouldn’t be surprised if they started rounding up Q supporters so you should be more careful. Best of luck to you.
Maybe if people stopped complaining and started proposing solutions.
The biggest problem is money, period.
Here's a proposal: political contributions from U.S. Citizens only (i.e., no corporations, no foreigners, no illegals), limited to $25, and can only go to a politicians campaign organization. No money to parties. No transfers between campaign organizations.
Or just make all campaign contributions illegal, period.
Jim...it is not necessary to give money directly to the candidate or the party. They, big donors, strategically persuade with independent media events, ground game activities, giving buses or equipment to local leadership for facilitating the voting process in focused socio/focused/neighborhoods. The viewers of mainstream and even the smaller/newer media sites are influenced by the particular bias of site ie...the MSM refusing to publish anything negative about Biden. Then there are the questions remaining about the voting machines being connected to the internet and whether the voting results can be manipulated. I understand there are still many legal cases working their way though the various levels of the legal system as well as the disputes working their way through the individual state’s congresses. In light of all this effective campaign finance reforms will be quite complicated.
You miss my point completely. Everybody complaining, nobody proposing solutions, and you knock my proposal but don't put forth a solution of your own.
No wonder we're so effed. Thanks for being part of the problem.
Term limits are the solution. An end to Dark Money is the solution. Allowing individuals to have 0 limits on individual candidate donations is the solution. Blocking out of state funding for in-state elections is the solution.
It is already illegal for foreign nationals to donate to US political candidates or their committees, however this is sadly not enforced the way it should be. For example, 501(c) organizations can give unlimited amounts of $ to political causes, and don't have to reveal their donors due to the NAACP v. Alabama precedent. This creates a situation that allows someone to circumvent FEC regulations about foreign donations, since 501(c) organizations dont have to disclose their donors (who could be foreign). This was brought to the IRS' attention back in 2007? but Lois Lerner and her IRS flunkies only looked at Conservative Dark Money groups. This is why DNC Dark money group Majority Forward is one of the top donors in the last cycle and doesn't have to say where it got any of its money from.
https://www.influencewatch.org/non-profit/majority-forward/
https://www.opensecrets.org/political-action-committees-pacs/majority-forward/C90016098/independent-expenditures/2018
Oh, and that pesky 501(c) requirement that Dark Money groups spend more than 50% of their funding on "non-political donations"? I am sure the IRS is gonna get on that right away. Majority Forward spends 100% of its $ on salaries and donations and has never contributed a cent to anything BUT political causes. I am sure the Mueller investigation over Dark Money is gonna be tomorrow, right?
Sure but first you have to get Citizens United struck down. Good luck w that
lol whatever makes you think corporate donations are the problem? Go look at who the real election donors are. Dustin Moskovitz gave more than any corporation did. Stop drinking the New York Times bullshit water. Citizens united is far from the problem. The real problem is NAACP v. Alabama and dark money not having to reveal its donors (who could be foreign, in violation of FEC law) but oh wait the IRS is in charge for some reason with dealing with anything about 501(c) organizations and not the FEC.
Labor unions usually have donated more to campaigns than business groups.
https://www.influencewatch.org/labor-union/service-employees-international-union-seiu/ is a great writeup of just one of them.
Term limits was a good start but what did the lifer politicians do about that?
Term limits are the wrong solution to lazy, complacent, ignorant voters.
They are voters passing the buck and pointing fingers in the mirror.
They are nothing but a huckster's salve.
Things would be MUCH better without limits, including for POTUS.
Then the voters would realize, within their lifetime, the truth that nothing can save them from their own bad decisions except themselves and a constant vigilant skepticism of anything "public."
I agree with everything you say here but term limits means the same piece of shit politician cant weasel themselves into the equation for self-profit because they are uber-connected after 50 years of deal-makings.
Term limits would only encourage politicians to pack money in as much as possible in a shorter period of time. It would put them in hyper-overdrive. The solution, to me, is grassroots, neutral, locally funded voter education/resources.
Give the majority exactly what they want at any given time, that they do what humans do: learn.
Agree 100%....my Dad was born during the depression....he had an inside joke whenever he would get together with my uncleabout someone knocking at the door saying I am from the government and I am here to help.....I think today's version would go more like....Hi, I am a politician and I am here to help (line my pockets with money)
Good to see you back, Glenn!! We missed you. Conservatives always knew the Lincoln Project Group was filled with scammers but, hopefully, you'll reach some liberals / never trumpers who were duped. Not that it matters much now unless someone decides to sue.
If it was known that this collection of grifters were frauds, con artists, scammers, even maybe a pedophile thrown in, then how did they raise $100 million? They found the right marks. Sufferers of TDS.
Hate always has an audience, some willingly pay!...
As long as the sociopaths produce...
Some folks have more money than brains. And TDS a definite factor.
Glenn...thank you for continuing to uncover/report on all these political scammers.......it is a compliant media that "protects" those who deserve no protection. Thank you for taking a stand when it seems so few are willing!!!
I also can't wait to hear your thoughts on the Cuomo Scam
2nd
Inside the Lincoln Project. 60 minutes. Leslie Stahl https://www.newsandguts.com/video/60-minutes-inside-the-lincoln-project/ Leslie and the Lincoln project deserve each other. I wander if she still holds them in esteem? Both Leslie and this group make me sick. Not Covid sick just sick.
I was always a democrat, never a republican, but sometimes I just didn't vote. I don't care what anyone has to say about that, but in the last election I voted for Trump. Why, well, it was a big F. You to the democrats, and these kinds of groups who spread propaganda and are incredibly self serving, as the democrats have become. Anyone who knows Biden's record could not hold him in any esteem. In reality it is so obvious that others are calling the shots, because he certainly is not, which doesn't make it better, just the same.