Month: January 2021

      We all do it.  That is, we all turn to authority figures for guidance.  We look to people with the needed experience, the right training, the appropriate knowledge.  Sometimes they have a pedigree we’re looking for.  That is, MD, Ph.D., JD, CEO of this or that company, etc.  Sometimes they are famous because of their name or because of their accomplishments.  Sometimes they are simply people who have been placed in positions of authority.  The problem is – they’re not always right.  Sometimes they’re really not competent to adequately advise on the situations they’re speaking about.  Even worse is when the people in authority abuse that authority with lies and manipulation to deceive their followers.  And one of the means by which they do this is scare tactics.

      At about the end of President Obama’s first term, I watched a video by Christian apologist Dinesh D’Souza offering a frightening vision of what Obama’s plans for America were, according to D’Souza.  Supposedly, Obama was going to usher in socialism – lock, stock, and barrel.  Funny thing – four more years passed and there was no attempt to nationalize American industries, no talk of it, zero, zip, nada.  Scare tactics.  Was this the genuine belief of D’Sousa, or was it disingenuous hype, designed to move the electorate in another direction, for some self-motivated purposes?  Four years later, a wealth of evangelical leaders zealously advocated for the election of President Trump, presumably based on his support of pro-life policies, including the extremely important tasks of appointing judges who would support this world-view, as well as other conservative positions.  (While I didn’t vote for Donald Trump because of his profound character issues, I understood the importance of those issues).  But the manner in which some of these church leaders framed their support, I believe, gave impetus to their followers’ unconditional support of Trump, no matter how bad his behavior.  At least one Evangelical leader framed Donald Trump’s 2016 election as a “work of God”.   This same leader before the 2020 election warned that socialism would “come full force” if Joe Biden were elected.  President Trump’s speech the night before the Capitol riots was replete with all manner of hyperbolic fear-mongering.  Here’s a bit of that speech.  “If the Democrats are elected, all of your savings will be gone, your laws will be gone, your freedom will be gone……The socialists and Marxists will be in charge of our country……The democratic candidates will attack our heroes, destroy our economy, and betray you and your family and it will happen very quickly.”  When such prominent leaders posit these notions in such frightening ways, you can fully expect a great many of their followers to take extreme actions.  But caveat emptor!  People need to be much shrewder in their listening.  Have you heard of “confirmational bias”?  It’s where a person only listens (reads, pays heed) to those views and ideas they already believe in.  These people never let their existing world-view be challenged.  It scares them too much.  Of course, we all have biases, and we all nurture those biases.  I am hugely guilty of this.  But we all need to listen to the perspectives and viewpoints which are opposite ours.  Often, it may only confirm our views, while sometimes, if really open, it may alter or change our viewpoint altogether.

        Why is it that Fascists, Dictators, Communists, all try to control the media (or to assert that everything but what they say is ‘fake news’)?   Because to control the media is to be able to control the people.  How can one find the truth if the very facts are distorted by the media or whomever controls them?   Do I think that the “liberal media” sometimes distorts the truth?  I do, because I have seen them do it just by deciding what events/issues to cover, and which ones to ignore.  But what about Fox News.? I use to think that (in spite of their insistence of the purity of their journalism), that Fox was biased, but in a way that somewhat balanced the liberal media bias.  Today, I think their bias is worse than anything the mainstream media puts out.

      To be frank, I am very seriously disappointed in many of our present evangelical leaders.  So many seized upon the idea of Donald Trump as some kind of savior of the American way of life, some kind of “God -chosen man” who would protect all of our cherished Christian ideals.  But the church should never enter so deeply into the defense of a single candidate or even party.  Like it or not, there are many Christians who have been opposed to the Trump presidency, and all that he represents.   Billy Graham once warned of the dangers of the church becoming one with the Republican Party, saying that, “the hard right has no interest in religion except to manipulate it.”  The most serious consequence however might be the loss of respect for people of faith and as well for certain valid conservative ideas and ideals due to the association of people of faith and conservative ideals with the person of Donald Trump. 

A retrospective analysis, based on President Trump’s four years in office.

       A little over four years ago, evangelical leaders across America overwhelmingly offered up their support and advocacy for Donald Trump, largely based on the idea that a candidate’s political platform is more important than his character.  In spite of being quite conservative on a number of issues, I felt that this idea was sorely wrong-headed.  Especially concerning the case of the extreme character deficits of Donald Trump.  Narcissistic to the point of believing only what he wants to believe, he has split this country like no other public figure in recent memory.  Insisting he won an election (contrary to all evidence), he urged his loyalists to take this ‘rigged’ election back, inciting a mob to swarm the Capitol, resulting in five deaths.  (Ironic that he thought voter fraud was perpetrated by the left.  If I were to guess who would be the most likely person to attempt to cheat the system, based on their character, it would be Donald Trump!) 

      I’m sure Trump’s evangelical supporters would cite his loyalty to the anti-abortion platform, appointing and confirming two conservative Supreme Court Justices.  Yet his pushing through the nomination of Amy Coney Barrett at the end of his term gave the Democrats just the justification needed to pack the court if they should later so choose (Trump commented that winning elections, i.e, control of the Senate, carried with it the benefit of doing as they should so choose).  Did Trump ever care about the death of unborn children?  I believe he adopted the anti-abortion stance just so he could secure a large voting block from Catholics and Evangelicals.

      And what about his leadership during Covid?  I think there is something seriously wrong that America, arguably the most developed, most technologically proficient country in the world, leads the world in total infections and total deaths!   Yes, the infection numbers in other countries, and even deaths attributed to Covid may not be as accurately counted in these countries, but consider India.  It has three times the population, yet has experienced only approximately 40% of the infections and deaths that we have.  Even accounting for what might be poorer tracking and statistics in India, we should have done far better.  But to Trump, Covid was initially, “no big deal”.  He and Pence flaunted the idea of not wearing masks, setting the worst example imaginable for the general public during this crisis….resulting in far many more deaths than what might have been.  And it is my belief that during the last six months he has had little on his mind but his reelection.  That’s the way it is when you elect someone for whose whole life has been characterized almost solely by his own self advancement.   How would you ever expect someone like this to place the well-being of the citizenry above his own?  He couldn’t even be loyal to those who had displayed almost fawning loyalty to him the moment they no longer played to his liking.  (He called Mike Pence a coward the moment when Pence chose to do what was absolutely required of him by our constitution).

      The unconditional support of Trump has greatly, in my opinion, sullied the reputation and character of evangelical leaders and evangelicals as a whole.  Being an evangelical, I am greatly angry and disappointed with these church leaders, many well-known.  I believe they need to issue an apology to their followers and to the American people as a whole.  And what about those eight Senators and 147 House members who called on Congress to actually overturn the results of the election – overturning the democratic process itself, presumably for reelection’s sake?!!!  I feel they should be campaigned against the next time they come up for reelection, regardless of who’s running against them.  It doesn’t matter who’s running against them…anyone who hasn’t sold their soul like they have is OK with me.

      As for a candidate’s platform being primary, there will always be situations, threats, difficulties which cannot be predicted, and a president’s handling of them will depend on more than what he outlined in his plans for his administration.  His preparation, experience, knowledge, wisdom, and character will be called into play.

      It’s very hard to really know some people’s character….what really matters to them, what they are willing to risk or sacrifice to do the right thing.  The best we can do is look at their history, their behavior, and try to see if their actions have shown self-sacrifice or self-promotion: respect and concern for others or indifference, apathy, or even antipathy:  leadership qualities like wisdom in one’s decisions, or failures due to lack of vision, etc.  In Donald Trump’s case however, a great deal of his character could be readily seen from his past, and even in his campaign rhetoric and behavior.  There was no excuse for putting him forward as a candidate for the Presidency, and even less for the kind of unconditional support he received from some quarters.  Character was supposed to be unimportant.   Character matters maybe more than anything in a candidate.