I don't know if Benjamin Netanyahu has used the word 'surrounded' although I imagine that he has as he is warning that Iran is trying to use Yemen to attack Israel from yet another direction. Iran is certainly using the word. God's Word....with Jesus speaking in the Olivet Discourse.....has ominous words concerning the surrounding of Israel by enemies...."But when you see Jerusalem surrounded by armies, then know that its desolation has come near." How many times can I post these thoughts....these are serious times.....and we should regard them as such!
Donald Trump has led his entire life as a bull goose loony who barges in and takes control....and if things go bad....real bad....which they have on occasion.....he just files for a bankruptcy.....using as many loopholes as he can.....and moves on.....leaving a oil slick of people who lost money in his wake.....of whom he cares not a bit. How many people around him in the White House have already regretted being a part of his administration....and there will be more.....and he won't care.....because he is the only one of importance....but he can't do that in this job....his blunders effect whole nations....and the equivalent of a bankruptcy in this project....is a resignation.....or at the very least not seeking a new four-year contract.
Republicans.....(we)....brought impeachment proceedings against President Clinton on charges that were less important to national security than what Democrats....(they)....are doing right now to President Trump. Yet we are channeling Stalin in trying to purge anyone and everyone and their brother who has the audacity to give an opposing opinion. Otherwise intelligent and honorable men have been rendered totally incapable of even acknowledging any of Trump's many blunders. (I voted for the man Rush....and celebrated....we're out here and want another candidate!) Four decades involvement with Russia followed by Putin's efforts in favor of candidate Trump....clues everywhere that Donald Trump worships riches and fame often at the expense of ethics....serial lying as never witnessed before in an American politician let alone a president....obvious threatening and cajoling of potential witnesses over Twitter along with a refusal to even let people testify....stupid lame-brained shenanigans with the Ukraine followed by a weak defense that he somehow is a champion for anti-corruption....and a malignant narcissism that borders on unfitness for office if not already over the boundary line....all these things and his recent slew of nonchalant comments ($45 million a month) on our military possibly fighting and dying for oil that we don't own nor do we even need if our economy is as the President constantly tells us...."the envy of the world"....all these at the very least make impeachment proceedings legitimate....yet we are daily inflaming everyone and everything by calling it a coup....when more than anything else his outrageous antics and grossly overblown daily....almost hourly attacks on others....have consistently and purposely made a bad situation much worse.
News update: When we were told that the Ukraine conversation transcript given us was 'non-verbatim' I said....here we go....it's just like the Mueller redactions....they're going out of their way to tell us this....there are words missing....and that's exactly what the NSC Ukraine expert testified to yesterday....so it's SOP....standard operating procedure....destroy the person giving testimony not favorable to the President....how far we have fallen!
Breitbart's evening radio show interviewed President Trump spiritual adviser Paula White for about forty minutes in their eleven to midnight hour. If I heard her correctly she said that she was with the President today....praying for him....along with about thirty other ministers. I'm not even going to hazard a guess on what percentage of Christians listening in might have been shaken somewhat in their support for President Trump after the interview.....because they would have recognized the positive-thinking gospel of Norman Vincent Peale that was very clearly stated as that which Donald Trump was raised on and probably believes is related to the gospel of Jesus Christ. They might even be aware of the prosperity teaching of Paula White. So....whatever that percentage is....and I fervently hope it is high....some tonight are definitely questioning just what they may have gotten themselves into.
"When these pundit fools who have called the Middle East wrong for 20 years ask what we are getting out of the deal, I simply say. THE OIL, AND WE ARE BRINGING OUR SOLDIERS BACK HOME, ISIS SECURED!"
SNAP!....SNAP!....COME OUT OF IT....THINK ABOUT WHAT HE IS DOING!....."What I intend to do, perhaps, is make a deal with an ExxonMobil or one of our great companies to go in there and do it properly.....and spread out the wealth." Fox reported that the president said that the U. S. "may have to fight for the oil.....it's OK" and it would be a "helluva fight." Folks...."It's OK"...."helluva fight"....he has gone mad.....have we also? These comments should make you ill.
WHERE IS THE OUTRAGE? Does our military still support Donald Trump? I don't know....but they certainly should not. His flippant unguarded comments on oil demonstrate his disregard for human life. What happened to his outrage on the Kurd issue over "this bloodstained sand?" What he is saying here folks is that he will send your sons and daughters to war....(to keep the strait of Hormuz open?....No!)....to add to his sick quest for glory, profits and fame. We may regret not spotting these very obvious clues. Do we not even think about the lives of our military anymore....as we cheer on this madman?
"We're keeping the oil. Remember that. I've always said that: Keep the oil. We want to keep the oil-$45 million a month. Keep the oil."
According to Andrew McCabe in his book The Threat....the president said this on Venezuela in a meeting...."That's the country we should be going to war with. They have all that oil and they are right on our back door." If he does.....he'll be using humanitarian issues as the excuse.
"There's a scene from Ted Turner's Gettysburg where Brigadier General John Buford, played by Sam Elliot, scans rocky heights and farm land that would in one day become a battlefield, and he literally spews out these words as he foresees carnage in the Union army if the politicians and generals play their war games as usual...afterwards men in tall hats and gold watch fobs will thump their chests and say 'what a brave charge it was..... I've never seen anything as brutally clear as this.... It's as if I can actually see the blue troops in one long bloody moment....as if it were already done....as if tomorrow already happened and there ain't nothin you can do about it. He went on to lay out a plan to change that, 'We can block that road till the main body gets here, and deprive the enemy of the high ground'!" Folks....the above paragraph is from a 2012 post. I can see American troops fighting somewhere....anywhere....because Donald Trump....who falsely claims to be so concerned about the loss of human life...(150 casualties in Iran)....has our troops fighting to clean up some mess that he made....some deal in his mind that fell through. We can stop this.....and get back on the high ground that we were once on before he lured us off....by letting it be known that we no longer support him....and that we demand a legitimate challenger in primaries.
NOT YOUR GRANDFATHER'S IMPEACHMENT: As we all know....removing a president through a senate trial is more than difficult....and this only exacerbated in a society whose fringe is growing at an alarming rate.....but this needs to go to trial nonetheless....and senators will be forced to go on record. As one whose prayer is that God would open our eyes to Donald Trump and his armor-bearer Rush Limbaugh....I would advise that the already voluminous evidence of at least abuse of power.....be presented primarily to the public....in time to nominate someone else....that no matter how the senate votes.....the people will wind up heavily on the side that four additional years of a man such as Donald Trump is not wise.
"NO NEWSPAPERS FOR YOU....ONE YEAR....UNTIL ELECTION!": The President of the United States today let it be known that he was going to direct all federal agencies to end subscriptions to the New York Times and the Washington Post. Those around him think that they will be able to control him....they won't....we Americans today have a front row seat to the original reality show of Big Brother....we are to read only what we are permitted to read. (Update: Retired four star general Barry McCaffrey's tweet on this news story...."No room for HUMOROUS media coverage. This is deadly serious. This is Mussolini.) This just out....a new book claims that President Trump called the Secretary of Defense James Mattis to tell him to "screw Amazon" out of the "opportunity" to bid on a $10 billion cloud computer contract. According to the book....Mattis said he would bid this contract the right way. Jeff Bezos owns the Washington Post and is president of Amazon. It was announced yesterday that the contract was awarded to Microsoft.
"AND NO PRAYER EITHER!": A Trump hotel in Washington D. C. abruptly cancelled......A Night Of Prayer For The Kurds....that was to be hosted by a religious non-profit that sends medical help to the Middle East. Reason.....security concerns. Attorney General Barr has already booked a Family Holiday Party for December....(I thought we were allowed to say Christmas once again?)....no security concerns there. Evangelicals....you are empowering a man with no conscience. You have let your guard down....jettisoned vigilance....closed your eyes and covered your ears as to who Donald Trump is....and pastors....many of you....you have opened the door and invited a false prophet into the church....and for what reason....the cross of fake news that the President has to carry. You should be more concerned about the cross of Christ.
An answer to a reporter's question on bolstering his impeachment defense team...."Here's the thing. I don't have teams. Everyone's talking about teams. I'm the team....." No...here's the thing....a president makes the final decision....but he/she had better at least be seeking the thoughts of others.
BALD-FACED LIES BY THE SCORE: Candidate Trump vowed to "cut the national debt....very quickly"....but instead he's blowing it up like that blimp of him that appears in the skies now and then. He tore Obama apart for all the golfing he did....and said that he wouldn't have time to golf....but has golfed more than twice as much as Obama. These are bald-faced lies that he told....not regular lies....but bald-faced lies....said to get the nomination....(and there are many of them!)....and to be honest.....it speaks more to our own lack of character that we don't even care that he is a serial liar....for he has dragged conservatives off the high ground down into his own personal swamp and darkened mind. He brags on not taking a salary....(right?)....but even an ultra-conservative estimate of what his golfing costs the government (us) is in the tens of millions of dollars! I'd say that was one terrific deal he made for himself!
PARTY WITHOUT PITY: Folks....on the Ukraine situation....it's not just that act itself....holding off on aid for a returned favor. Even Trump's supporters say that everyone does that....it's what that act entailed. The Ukraine....a nation fighting for its independence from Putin....asks for assistance to defend itself....but Donald Trump has no heart or soul to even look at this beyond a deal that could benefit him. Can you not understand this evangelicals? Has your heart become so hardened in pursuit of patriotism that you cannot even pick up on what is wrong with this situation....or with that of the Kurds....where hundreds have already died....women and children also....and there have been atrocities....while Donald Trump somehow thinks this was such a great deal. We may be about to find out what a man without pity can do.
ICHABOD....THE GLORY HAS DEPARTED: There is a passage in Jeremiah that we in America might want to reflect upon. He was given a vision after Nebuchadnezzar carried away captives to Babylon...two baskets of figs.....one full of very good figs and the other of very bad figs. What may seem surprising is that Jeremiah is told that the good figs were those taken away captive....and the bad figs were those that remained behind in Jerusalem and Judah and even Egypt. We in America have gone astray from obedience or reverence to God who gave us our very existence. The 'Make America great again' ethnos are not the good figs....but are rather those that fight to keep a rebellious culture that only uses God's name as some sort of talisman....or as an Ark of the Covenant that protects simply by being there. Ichabod...The Glory Has Departed. Those who have seen that we have fallen short....all of us....myself being among the greatest offenders....have been forced into a humility that leads us to once again....as in the beginning of this nation....to rely only upon His wisdom and His will and His guidance....no matter how it may appear on the world's stage.
THE CULT OF TRUMP: My first years as a Christian were spent in the study of apologetics....the defense of the doctrines of God.....specifically the divinity of Christ.....and therefore including research on what are called 'Christian cults'....religious sects that proclaim to be Christian but deny essential truths of Christianity.....most particularly those on Jesus Christ. At the time I put ads in the newspaper trying to persuade Jehovah Witnesses....and those studying with the Watchtower....to call me. So I spent a number of years involved in the study of 'Christian' cults. Steven Hassan is obviously a biased Progressive....and also a mental health professional who was many decades ago a Moonie....but today works to free.....from the perspective of psychology....and from first-hand experience....people who are or were harmed by destructive cults. If you are indoctrinated already in not reading any books that are critical of President Trump then this is not for you.....but if you are able....as I am able....to read something like this and recognize what is helpful and what is incorrect....then this is a book you should read. The title is The Cult Of Trump...A Leading Cult Expert Explains How The President Uses Mind Control....and once again the author is Steven Hassan. The book is much more than a primer on what techniques cults use to capture their followers as there is valuable information on that part of Christianity....emanating primarily although not exclusively from charismatic theology....that leads us into following 'ministries' that use many of the techniques explained in the book
CHARISMATIC HERMENEUTICS:.Every week or so I check to see if Messianic Rabbi Jonathan Cahn....author of best sellers The Harbinger and The Paradigm and most recently The Oracle....has posted a new video. He had....apparently an older teaching he gave at Kenneth Copeland's church in Newark, Texas. He started out saying nothing more than I have written many times on America's rebellion against God.....and then he made this statement...."There have only been two civilizations in human history that had been founded solely for the purposes of God. The first was called Israel...the second was called America.....it was founded after the pattern of Israel...to be an Israel of the new world." This teaching is so egregiously in error that it should shake any scripturally sound Christian to the core. It is this biblically unwarranted elevation of America that has spawned wayward doctrines....weakened evangelicalism....placed politics and trusting in princes ahead of trusting in Christ alone....and also spirited the near adoration of the false prophet Donald Trump. Pastor....it would be wise to wake up for this is no small phenomenon that has entered the core of evangelicalism....most likely your church also....and is reaching into households and enabling a president whose risky impetuous often nocturnal decrees and injunctions are becoming more erratic.
DUH!: The overarching concern that I have had for quite a while about President Trump has not revolved around the possibility of his resigning or being forced out of office....or even deciding not to seek that second term after all....although I mentioned that fairly often in these posts. My concern then and now is how he will react when faced with the ultimate of challenges. I am closing in fast on fifty books on Donald Trump....with four at my elbow right now....these books encompassing his life and many career endeavors....and one thing that comes out perfectly clear is that he has no empathy for anyone and never has....no personal belief system beyond seeking glory for himself....and that there is nothing that he would ever say that I would believe without outside verification. He mesmerizes and he bewitches....always leaving a trail of wounded or destroyed individuals behind him. Evangelical ministers keep telling us that God put Donald Trump in office....my response each and every time.....Duh! The pertinent question is why has God done this. I've likened Trump to Nebuchadnezzar...."Is not this great Babylon, which I have built by my mighty power as my royal residence and the glory of my majesty?" Now that's a Trump tweet if I ever heard one! Just after saying this the king went crazy. Donald Trump is either crazy right now or he will be there soon....but God....when Nebuchadnezzar had completed his time in the fields....gave him a proclamation of praise to utter....but we do not read God's Word as a template....as in The Paradigm....or The Oracle....as so many have mistakenly have fallen for today....but rather we read in passages like this....examples to meditate upon. Although President Trump claims that his goal is keeping our military out of war.....his risky actions.....east and west....are increasing that likelihood. He has shown little to no wisdom at all in foreign affairs....and that's not a good sign....and far from being brilliant....he seems extraordinarily inept....blundering all the time....but still we do not know God's plans for America other than we are being judged.... that we brought this judgment upon ourselves even as God has warned us time and time and time again....and that we have only as of yet seen the beginning of judgment. One last thing to add here....that 'ultimate of challenges' is quite possibly very near....and all of these highly-charged political investigations may be moot. So yes.....pray for Donald Trump....that God might restore some semblance of sanity....not to make the Hanging Gardens of America great again....but that we might humble ourselves before our Creator....that He might be with us in this coming storm.
Mr. Secretary (Mike Pompeo)....I would still like to know exactly what your advice was to the President as he was dictating orders on Syria....not a redacted transcript of your comments as was the Mueller Report....or a non-verbatim transcript as in the Ukraine call....but your exact advice....(it's going to come out in a book some day anyway)....because we know what you are saying now.....and we need to know if you are being ordered to say this. (update: When I heard the term 'non-verbatim transcript' what came to my mind was that there were words missing....and they were covering themselves.....and yesterday the NSC Ukraine expert testifying to Congress said just that.
Radio talk show hosts....you had the opportunity back in early 2017 to hold President Trump accountable but you turned from being leaders to simple-minded followers of a Pied Piper....and now you are sinking in a quagmire of lies and obfuscations and gross exaggerations.
PREPARE TO MEET YOUR GOD, O AMERICA: God had told Israel through the prophet Amos that He had given them warning after warning...."Yet you have not returned to me." Then came this....."Prepare to meet your God, O Israel." God had warned us increasingly over upwards of a half century....through Billy Graham and others....yet we ignored Him and turned to MAGA for our help. The warnings have stopped.....have you noticed that? "Prepare to meet your God, O America".....would surely go in one ear and out the other.
"I'll SEE YOUR TARIFFS AND RAISE YOU WORLD PEACE! President Trump uses the power of his office to apply pressure to anyone who does not do what he wants....attempting to destroy the economies of enemies...taking this risk not because our economy is hurting....but because he wants to build his own personal glory greater and greater and greater! These are not well-conceived plans....with all the boxes on consequences checked........but crap shoots. He is in effect pushing the world to the brink of war. His Achilles Heel may be that these enemies have more than forty years of dossiers and psychological profiles on him to work with.
Whenever trade relations between the US and China become threatening you can always find an article on what would happen if China retaliated by dumping US treasury bonds....(over $1 trillion.). The articles always leans on the security that such retaliation would hurt China as much as the US....but there is more to this problem than meets the eye. If China's economy tanks it could very well be followed by civil unrest.....of course President Trump would probably be laughing....because that's what he does when he gets the better of someone....but the world markets could also go under. China would have a difficult time with civil unrest if the US and everyone else are stable.....but if the world economy is collapsing then....one....the Chinese people might not be so incensed....and two.....if they were then the communist government....with the world economies already in a tailspin....could react much harsher. My concern....one of them....is that China....now on the defense....might initiate chaos in order to take the offense to better position themselves for a situation....many of the world's economies collapsing....that one segment of economists are already predicting.
Donald Trump has led his entire life as a bull goose loony who barges in and takes control....and if things go bad....real bad....which they have on occasion.....he just files for a bankruptcy.....using as many loopholes as he can.....and moves on.....leaving a oil slick of people who lost money in his wake.....of whom he cares not a bit. How many people around him in the White House have already regretted being a part of his administration....and there will be more.....and he won't care.....because he is the only one of importance....but he can't do that in this job....his blunders effect whole nations....and the equivalent of a bankruptcy in this project....is a resignation.....or at the very least not seeking a new four-year contract.
Republicans.....(we)....brought impeachment proceedings against President Clinton on charges that were less important to national security than what Democrats....(they)....are doing right now to President Trump. Yet we are channeling Stalin in trying to purge anyone and everyone and their brother who has the audacity to give an opposing opinion. Otherwise intelligent and honorable men have been rendered totally incapable of even acknowledging any of Trump's many blunders. (I voted for the man Rush....and celebrated....we're out here and want another candidate!) Four decades involvement with Russia followed by Putin's efforts in favor of candidate Trump....clues everywhere that Donald Trump worships riches and fame often at the expense of ethics....serial lying as never witnessed before in an American politician let alone a president....obvious threatening and cajoling of potential witnesses over Twitter along with a refusal to even let people testify....stupid lame-brained shenanigans with the Ukraine followed by a weak defense that he somehow is a champion for anti-corruption....and a malignant narcissism that borders on unfitness for office if not already over the boundary line....all these things and his recent slew of nonchalant comments ($45 million a month) on our military possibly fighting and dying for oil that we don't own nor do we even need if our economy is as the President constantly tells us...."the envy of the world"....all these at the very least make impeachment proceedings legitimate....yet we are daily inflaming everyone and everything by calling it a coup....when more than anything else his outrageous antics and grossly overblown daily....almost hourly attacks on others....have consistently and purposely made a bad situation much worse.
News update: When we were told that the Ukraine conversation transcript given us was 'non-verbatim' I said....here we go....it's just like the Mueller redactions....they're going out of their way to tell us this....there are words missing....and that's exactly what the NSC Ukraine expert testified to yesterday....so it's SOP....standard operating procedure....destroy the person giving testimony not favorable to the President....how far we have fallen!
Breitbart's evening radio show interviewed President Trump spiritual adviser Paula White for about forty minutes in their eleven to midnight hour. If I heard her correctly she said that she was with the President today....praying for him....along with about thirty other ministers. I'm not even going to hazard a guess on what percentage of Christians listening in might have been shaken somewhat in their support for President Trump after the interview.....because they would have recognized the positive-thinking gospel of Norman Vincent Peale that was very clearly stated as that which Donald Trump was raised on and probably believes is related to the gospel of Jesus Christ. They might even be aware of the prosperity teaching of Paula White. So....whatever that percentage is....and I fervently hope it is high....some tonight are definitely questioning just what they may have gotten themselves into.
"When these pundit fools who have called the Middle East wrong for 20 years ask what we are getting out of the deal, I simply say. THE OIL, AND WE ARE BRINGING OUR SOLDIERS BACK HOME, ISIS SECURED!"
SNAP!....SNAP!....COME OUT OF IT....THINK ABOUT WHAT HE IS DOING!....."What I intend to do, perhaps, is make a deal with an ExxonMobil or one of our great companies to go in there and do it properly.....and spread out the wealth." Fox reported that the president said that the U. S. "may have to fight for the oil.....it's OK" and it would be a "helluva fight." Folks...."It's OK"...."helluva fight"....he has gone mad.....have we also? These comments should make you ill.
WHERE IS THE OUTRAGE? Does our military still support Donald Trump? I don't know....but they certainly should not. His flippant unguarded comments on oil demonstrate his disregard for human life. What happened to his outrage on the Kurd issue over "this bloodstained sand?" What he is saying here folks is that he will send your sons and daughters to war....(to keep the strait of Hormuz open?....No!)....to add to his sick quest for glory, profits and fame. We may regret not spotting these very obvious clues. Do we not even think about the lives of our military anymore....as we cheer on this madman?
"We're keeping the oil. Remember that. I've always said that: Keep the oil. We want to keep the oil-$45 million a month. Keep the oil."
According to Andrew McCabe in his book The Threat....the president said this on Venezuela in a meeting...."That's the country we should be going to war with. They have all that oil and they are right on our back door." If he does.....he'll be using humanitarian issues as the excuse.
"There's a scene from Ted Turner's Gettysburg where Brigadier General John Buford, played by Sam Elliot, scans rocky heights and farm land that would in one day become a battlefield, and he literally spews out these words as he foresees carnage in the Union army if the politicians and generals play their war games as usual...afterwards men in tall hats and gold watch fobs will thump their chests and say 'what a brave charge it was..... I've never seen anything as brutally clear as this.... It's as if I can actually see the blue troops in one long bloody moment....as if it were already done....as if tomorrow already happened and there ain't nothin you can do about it. He went on to lay out a plan to change that, 'We can block that road till the main body gets here, and deprive the enemy of the high ground'!" Folks....the above paragraph is from a 2012 post. I can see American troops fighting somewhere....anywhere....because Donald Trump....who falsely claims to be so concerned about the loss of human life...(150 casualties in Iran)....has our troops fighting to clean up some mess that he made....some deal in his mind that fell through. We can stop this.....and get back on the high ground that we were once on before he lured us off....by letting it be known that we no longer support him....and that we demand a legitimate challenger in primaries.
NOT YOUR GRANDFATHER'S IMPEACHMENT: As we all know....removing a president through a senate trial is more than difficult....and this only exacerbated in a society whose fringe is growing at an alarming rate.....but this needs to go to trial nonetheless....and senators will be forced to go on record. As one whose prayer is that God would open our eyes to Donald Trump and his armor-bearer Rush Limbaugh....I would advise that the already voluminous evidence of at least abuse of power.....be presented primarily to the public....in time to nominate someone else....that no matter how the senate votes.....the people will wind up heavily on the side that four additional years of a man such as Donald Trump is not wise.
"NO NEWSPAPERS FOR YOU....ONE YEAR....UNTIL ELECTION!": The President of the United States today let it be known that he was going to direct all federal agencies to end subscriptions to the New York Times and the Washington Post. Those around him think that they will be able to control him....they won't....we Americans today have a front row seat to the original reality show of Big Brother....we are to read only what we are permitted to read. (Update: Retired four star general Barry McCaffrey's tweet on this news story...."No room for HUMOROUS media coverage. This is deadly serious. This is Mussolini.) This just out....a new book claims that President Trump called the Secretary of Defense James Mattis to tell him to "screw Amazon" out of the "opportunity" to bid on a $10 billion cloud computer contract. According to the book....Mattis said he would bid this contract the right way. Jeff Bezos owns the Washington Post and is president of Amazon. It was announced yesterday that the contract was awarded to Microsoft.
"AND NO PRAYER EITHER!": A Trump hotel in Washington D. C. abruptly cancelled......A Night Of Prayer For The Kurds....that was to be hosted by a religious non-profit that sends medical help to the Middle East. Reason.....security concerns. Attorney General Barr has already booked a Family Holiday Party for December....(I thought we were allowed to say Christmas once again?)....no security concerns there. Evangelicals....you are empowering a man with no conscience. You have let your guard down....jettisoned vigilance....closed your eyes and covered your ears as to who Donald Trump is....and pastors....many of you....you have opened the door and invited a false prophet into the church....and for what reason....the cross of fake news that the President has to carry. You should be more concerned about the cross of Christ.
An answer to a reporter's question on bolstering his impeachment defense team...."Here's the thing. I don't have teams. Everyone's talking about teams. I'm the team....." No...here's the thing....a president makes the final decision....but he/she had better at least be seeking the thoughts of others.
BALD-FACED LIES BY THE SCORE: Candidate Trump vowed to "cut the national debt....very quickly"....but instead he's blowing it up like that blimp of him that appears in the skies now and then. He tore Obama apart for all the golfing he did....and said that he wouldn't have time to golf....but has golfed more than twice as much as Obama. These are bald-faced lies that he told....not regular lies....but bald-faced lies....said to get the nomination....(and there are many of them!)....and to be honest.....it speaks more to our own lack of character that we don't even care that he is a serial liar....for he has dragged conservatives off the high ground down into his own personal swamp and darkened mind. He brags on not taking a salary....(right?)....but even an ultra-conservative estimate of what his golfing costs the government (us) is in the tens of millions of dollars! I'd say that was one terrific deal he made for himself!
PARTY WITHOUT PITY: Folks....on the Ukraine situation....it's not just that act itself....holding off on aid for a returned favor. Even Trump's supporters say that everyone does that....it's what that act entailed. The Ukraine....a nation fighting for its independence from Putin....asks for assistance to defend itself....but Donald Trump has no heart or soul to even look at this beyond a deal that could benefit him. Can you not understand this evangelicals? Has your heart become so hardened in pursuit of patriotism that you cannot even pick up on what is wrong with this situation....or with that of the Kurds....where hundreds have already died....women and children also....and there have been atrocities....while Donald Trump somehow thinks this was such a great deal. We may be about to find out what a man without pity can do.
ICHABOD....THE GLORY HAS DEPARTED: There is a passage in Jeremiah that we in America might want to reflect upon. He was given a vision after Nebuchadnezzar carried away captives to Babylon...two baskets of figs.....one full of very good figs and the other of very bad figs. What may seem surprising is that Jeremiah is told that the good figs were those taken away captive....and the bad figs were those that remained behind in Jerusalem and Judah and even Egypt. We in America have gone astray from obedience or reverence to God who gave us our very existence. The 'Make America great again' ethnos are not the good figs....but are rather those that fight to keep a rebellious culture that only uses God's name as some sort of talisman....or as an Ark of the Covenant that protects simply by being there. Ichabod...The Glory Has Departed. Those who have seen that we have fallen short....all of us....myself being among the greatest offenders....have been forced into a humility that leads us to once again....as in the beginning of this nation....to rely only upon His wisdom and His will and His guidance....no matter how it may appear on the world's stage.
THE CULT OF TRUMP: My first years as a Christian were spent in the study of apologetics....the defense of the doctrines of God.....specifically the divinity of Christ.....and therefore including research on what are called 'Christian cults'....religious sects that proclaim to be Christian but deny essential truths of Christianity.....most particularly those on Jesus Christ. At the time I put ads in the newspaper trying to persuade Jehovah Witnesses....and those studying with the Watchtower....to call me. So I spent a number of years involved in the study of 'Christian' cults. Steven Hassan is obviously a biased Progressive....and also a mental health professional who was many decades ago a Moonie....but today works to free.....from the perspective of psychology....and from first-hand experience....people who are or were harmed by destructive cults. If you are indoctrinated already in not reading any books that are critical of President Trump then this is not for you.....but if you are able....as I am able....to read something like this and recognize what is helpful and what is incorrect....then this is a book you should read. The title is The Cult Of Trump...A Leading Cult Expert Explains How The President Uses Mind Control....and once again the author is Steven Hassan. The book is much more than a primer on what techniques cults use to capture their followers as there is valuable information on that part of Christianity....emanating primarily although not exclusively from charismatic theology....that leads us into following 'ministries' that use many of the techniques explained in the book
CHARISMATIC HERMENEUTICS:.Every week or so I check to see if Messianic Rabbi Jonathan Cahn....author of best sellers The Harbinger and The Paradigm and most recently The Oracle....has posted a new video. He had....apparently an older teaching he gave at Kenneth Copeland's church in Newark, Texas. He started out saying nothing more than I have written many times on America's rebellion against God.....and then he made this statement...."There have only been two civilizations in human history that had been founded solely for the purposes of God. The first was called Israel...the second was called America.....it was founded after the pattern of Israel...to be an Israel of the new world." This teaching is so egregiously in error that it should shake any scripturally sound Christian to the core. It is this biblically unwarranted elevation of America that has spawned wayward doctrines....weakened evangelicalism....placed politics and trusting in princes ahead of trusting in Christ alone....and also spirited the near adoration of the false prophet Donald Trump. Pastor....it would be wise to wake up for this is no small phenomenon that has entered the core of evangelicalism....most likely your church also....and is reaching into households and enabling a president whose risky impetuous often nocturnal decrees and injunctions are becoming more erratic.
DUH!: The overarching concern that I have had for quite a while about President Trump has not revolved around the possibility of his resigning or being forced out of office....or even deciding not to seek that second term after all....although I mentioned that fairly often in these posts. My concern then and now is how he will react when faced with the ultimate of challenges. I am closing in fast on fifty books on Donald Trump....with four at my elbow right now....these books encompassing his life and many career endeavors....and one thing that comes out perfectly clear is that he has no empathy for anyone and never has....no personal belief system beyond seeking glory for himself....and that there is nothing that he would ever say that I would believe without outside verification. He mesmerizes and he bewitches....always leaving a trail of wounded or destroyed individuals behind him. Evangelical ministers keep telling us that God put Donald Trump in office....my response each and every time.....Duh! The pertinent question is why has God done this. I've likened Trump to Nebuchadnezzar...."Is not this great Babylon, which I have built by my mighty power as my royal residence and the glory of my majesty?" Now that's a Trump tweet if I ever heard one! Just after saying this the king went crazy. Donald Trump is either crazy right now or he will be there soon....but God....when Nebuchadnezzar had completed his time in the fields....gave him a proclamation of praise to utter....but we do not read God's Word as a template....as in The Paradigm....or The Oracle....as so many have mistakenly have fallen for today....but rather we read in passages like this....examples to meditate upon. Although President Trump claims that his goal is keeping our military out of war.....his risky actions.....east and west....are increasing that likelihood. He has shown little to no wisdom at all in foreign affairs....and that's not a good sign....and far from being brilliant....he seems extraordinarily inept....blundering all the time....but still we do not know God's plans for America other than we are being judged.... that we brought this judgment upon ourselves even as God has warned us time and time and time again....and that we have only as of yet seen the beginning of judgment. One last thing to add here....that 'ultimate of challenges' is quite possibly very near....and all of these highly-charged political investigations may be moot. So yes.....pray for Donald Trump....that God might restore some semblance of sanity....not to make the Hanging Gardens of America great again....but that we might humble ourselves before our Creator....that He might be with us in this coming storm.
Mr. Secretary (Mike Pompeo)....I would still like to know exactly what your advice was to the President as he was dictating orders on Syria....not a redacted transcript of your comments as was the Mueller Report....or a non-verbatim transcript as in the Ukraine call....but your exact advice....(it's going to come out in a book some day anyway)....because we know what you are saying now.....and we need to know if you are being ordered to say this. (update: When I heard the term 'non-verbatim transcript' what came to my mind was that there were words missing....and they were covering themselves.....and yesterday the NSC Ukraine expert testifying to Congress said just that.
Radio talk show hosts....you had the opportunity back in early 2017 to hold President Trump accountable but you turned from being leaders to simple-minded followers of a Pied Piper....and now you are sinking in a quagmire of lies and obfuscations and gross exaggerations.
PREPARE TO MEET YOUR GOD, O AMERICA: God had told Israel through the prophet Amos that He had given them warning after warning...."Yet you have not returned to me." Then came this....."Prepare to meet your God, O Israel." God had warned us increasingly over upwards of a half century....through Billy Graham and others....yet we ignored Him and turned to MAGA for our help. The warnings have stopped.....have you noticed that? "Prepare to meet your God, O America".....would surely go in one ear and out the other.
"I'll SEE YOUR TARIFFS AND RAISE YOU WORLD PEACE! President Trump uses the power of his office to apply pressure to anyone who does not do what he wants....attempting to destroy the economies of enemies...taking this risk not because our economy is hurting....but because he wants to build his own personal glory greater and greater and greater! These are not well-conceived plans....with all the boxes on consequences checked........but crap shoots. He is in effect pushing the world to the brink of war. His Achilles Heel may be that these enemies have more than forty years of dossiers and psychological profiles on him to work with.
Whenever trade relations between the US and China become threatening you can always find an article on what would happen if China retaliated by dumping US treasury bonds....(over $1 trillion.). The articles always leans on the security that such retaliation would hurt China as much as the US....but there is more to this problem than meets the eye. If China's economy tanks it could very well be followed by civil unrest.....of course President Trump would probably be laughing....because that's what he does when he gets the better of someone....but the world markets could also go under. China would have a difficult time with civil unrest if the US and everyone else are stable.....but if the world economy is collapsing then....one....the Chinese people might not be so incensed....and two.....if they were then the communist government....with the world economies already in a tailspin....could react much harsher. My concern....one of them....is that China....now on the defense....might initiate chaos in order to take the offense to better position themselves for a situation....many of the world's economies collapsing....that one segment of economists are already predicting.
