May 21, 2019

What subject does the average voter know more about?

The plot of Game of Thrones, or what actually happened in the 2016 election between the Russians and Trump?

My guess is that the average voter knows far more about the Game of Thrones than about Trump's conduct.

My guess is that the average voter knows far more about their favorite sports team than the 2016 election.

My guess is that the average voter knows far more about nearly any non-political subject than the 2016 election.

And THAT is why impeachment hearings should begin soon.

May 21, 2019

Who will be our Rachel now?' Progressives reflect on movement without Held Evans

From the article:

To read more:

https://religionnews.com/2019/05/20/who-will-be-our-rachel-now-progressive-christians-reflect-on-movement-without-held-evans/

For Evans, as for many Christians, faith represents a journey, not a destination. We often take many turns on our path, with the goal of living in accordance with the message of Jesus.

May 20, 2019

How can the US have a two Party system when one Party does not agree?

I think that it is obvious, beyond obvious, that the GOP is led by politicians who do not believe in the concept of two Parties, or of sharing power, or of meaningful oversight of their own Party.


And many of their voters agree.

We have the white racial separatists, a substantial and deplorable bunch, who are still fantasizing about slavery and the luxury life of a plantation owner. Even when their ancestors connection to actual plantation life, if any, was living in shacks and working for the master as a free white worker.

We have the Nazis, and the proud boys, and the various types of deplorable fascists who also dream about the all white country where they would be rich.

We have the deplorable crooks, who see in Trump a fellow crook.

We have those deplorables who see the demographic downfall of the GOP, and are doing all that they can to suppress and marginalize non-white voters.


We have the uninformed and aggressive deplorables who get their reality on FOX news.


All of these groups, for sometimes overlapping reasons, have no real interest in a two Party system.

May 20, 2019

The US corporate media created Donald Trump.

Yes, the Russians certainly worked to elect Trump, a man they rightly judged to be unstable and easily fooled.

And yes, the GOP has worked for many years to suppress and disenfranchise groups that they see as trending Democratic.

And yes, James Comey deliberately tried to influence voters with his last minute announcement about HRC's emails.

But Trump, the person, the so-called, self described business genius, was, in fact, created by the US corporate media.

If the media had not uncritically covered and presented Trump as entertainment, he would have been exposed as the fraud that he always was. His many bankruptcies, his thousands of lawsuits for non-payment of bills, his predatory and nearly pedophilic behavior toward women would all have been common knowledge.

Trump is not the first GOP President to be so treated by the US media. Reagan was also treated as more celebrity by the media. Like Trump, Reagan was an open racist, and an idiot, but Reagan was enough of an actor that he could pretend to be normal.

And this media bias must be accounted for when looking at the way that the US media will cover the 2020 race.

The US media has no interest in actually covering the real economy that working people live in.

One example: Coverage of unemployment numbers presents a false picture because so many people are employed at sub-living wage jobs that the mere fact of being employed is no assurance that one is making a living wage. But the media prefer the simple narrative that the "official" unemployment numbers indicate a healthy economy.

As to the why of Trump's support:

Trump, like Reagan before him, won by appealing to fear. The fear, of course, is fear of the non-white other.

And the corporate media, with its endless focus on violence, especially violence involving non-white actors, feeds that race based fear. It does not matter that violent crime rates have declined. Fear sells, and fear is what will be presented.

And the corporate media, by the way that they cover campaigns, will avoid talking about policy and instead focus, when covering Democratic candidates, on who is more likeable.

The actual results of Trump's insane policy decisions will be ignored and the media coverage will allow Trump to frame his opponents with no criticism from the media personalities that we call reporters.

On a positive note:

in spite of all of what I wrote above, Trump actually lost the popular vote. The US media can claim that the economy is robust, but an increasingly indebted population knows that this is a lie.

The challenge is to show people that the 1% prefer a debt economy, and prefer that workers have no expectations of a better life. The 1% who actually own the country want people to be afraid because a frightened population is easier to control.

May 15, 2019

How Oxford and Peter Singer drove me from atheism to Jesus

From the article:

Meaning
Popular

I grew up in Australia, in a loving, secular home, and arrived at Sydney University as a critic of “religion.” I didn’t need faith to ground my identity or my values....

King’s is known for its secular ideology and my perception of Christianity fitted well with the views of my fellow students: Christians were anti-intellectual and self-righteous....

.
After Cambridge, I was elected to a Junior Research Fellowship at Oxford. There, I attended three guest lectures by world-class philosopher and atheist public intellectual, Peter Singer...

I remember leaving Singer’s lectures with a strange intellectual vertigo; I was committed to believing that universal human value was more than just a well-meaning conceit of liberalism. ….. I began to realise (sic) that the implications of my atheism were incompatible with almost every value I held dear....

One Sunday, shortly before my 28th birthday, I walked into a church for the first time as someone earnestly seeking God. Before long I found myself overwhelmed. At last I was fully known and seen and, I realised, unconditionally loved – perhaps I had a sense of relief from no longer running from God. A friend gave me C.S. Lewis’s Mere Christianity, and one night, after a couple months of attending church, I knelt in my closet in my apartment and asked Jesus to save me, and to become the Lord of my life.

To read more:

http://www.veritas.org/oxford-atheism-to-jesus/

Thoughts?

May 11, 2019

Support For Trump Impeachment Rises 5% In Less Than A Month

From the article:

To read more:

https://www.politicususa.com/2019/05/09/support-for-trump-impeachment-rises-5-in-less-than-a-month.html

Only 45%

May 11, 2019

Vatican law: Priests, nuns must report sex abuse, cover-up

From the article:

To read more:

https://religionnews.com/2019/05/09/vatican-law-priests-nuns-must-report-sex-abuse-cover-up/

May 11, 2019

Oppression, and what it says about humanity.

I recently wrote a post, one of a series, dealing with the well know oppression that the Chinese Government is directing at the Uighur Muslim minority in eastern China.
One of the responses was as follows:

Edited:
https://www.democraticunderground.com/?com=post&forum=1218&pid=313602

Let us deconstruct this reply, starting here:

So, when the US and China confront religious, Muslim terrorism? We might honor much of Islam; but not if or where it links to what we consider murder.

The poster has apparently decided to classify all of these victims of persecution as terrorists. Thus, providing no actual proof of the truth of his assertion, he can ignore what is being done by the Chinese Government.

Second, we have this bit of creative framing:

Since the Chinese live in very close. even overlapping proximity to terrorist Islamic factions, they have chosen to "re-educate" some Chinese Muslims. Emphasizing one hopes the peaceful side of Islam.

So, having framed all of the Uighur Muslims as members of “terrorist Islamic factions”, we can again ignore the reality of what is happening in China.

And the acceptance of the Chinese Government line that these are “re-education camps” allows the poster to blame the victims for their own persecution.

I have posted numerous articles detailing what is being done to the Uighur Muslims by the Chinese Government. The poster has provided zero evidence to rebut what numerous sources have detailed. The poster has chosen instead to accept the Chinese Government line at face value.

The point of my articles about the brutal oppression of the Uighur Muslims in China is to show how autocrats oppress people. And how autocrats divide people, and demonize factions as a way of facilitating the oppression.

In this case, the autocrats in question are atheists, and the victims are theists.

And that fact, in my view, is why these posts provoke such a strong reaction.

May 9, 2019

Rachel Held Evans, Christian writer of honesty and humor, dies at age 37

From the article:

To read more:

https://religionnews.com/2019/05/04/rachel-held-evans-christian-writer-of-honesty-and-humor-dies-at-age-37/

May 4, 2019

Hate is losing in the US.

Remember that.

Yes, the news is filled with stories of racists openly promoting their brand.

And yes, Trump dominates the media with his open hatred and vicious attacks on anyone who does not share his hate.

And yes, the clash between the House and Trump is like a slow motion train wreck.

But remember, and repeat to yourself, that Trump lost by over 3 million votes. In spite of all the GOP cheating, in spite of the suppression, in spite of Comey's lying right before the election, in spite of the corporate media creating and normalizing Trump, HRC beat Trump by over 3 million votes.

The haters are losing.

The racists are losing.

This country is changing and the white racists do not like the changes, but they cannot stop them. No walls can stop the demographic changes.

2018 showed what an energized electorate can accomplish.

2020 is the next step.

Keep hope, and be energized for the election.

Guillaume