Anonymous comments, some I did publish and most I didn’t, and others under my most recent post, in which I briefly mentioned President Trump, were typical of what I get when I ever say his name. They are angry, insulting, unhinged, foul, devoid of reason, and carnal. And they want me to be a better Christian, or just a Christian period, by not uttering the name, Trump. It would have been easier for me not to have written more about Trump, but I’ve chosen to double down and write something right away, because the point of putting on the pressure — they would censor if they could. I’d say at least forty percent of the Democrat party would like public religious or biblical speech illegal and punished. It starts with intimidation.
I do not believe these are days for mincing words. I’m 63 1/2 years old & I have never seen anything in these United States of America I found more astonishingly seductive & dangerous to the saints of God than Trumpism. This Christian nationalism is not of God. Move back from it.
— Beth Moore (@BethMooreLPM) December 13, 2020
I’m 58 2/3 years old and I’m pretty sure that Moore picked up the terminology “Trumpism” from her good friend, David French, when she was directed to his just published article on The Dispatch, where he is senior editor, entitled, The Dangerous Idolatry of Christian Trumpism. He’s also a columnist at Time, and was a guest this morning on the Morning Joe show on MSNBC. The Dispatch was a publication launched in October 2019 by men notoriously neoconservative and never-Trump, Stephen Hayes and Jonah Goldberg. Trump, of course, has been hated by the pure neocons, ever since he came on the scene, pummeling Governor Jeb Bush out of the 2016 primaries.
For a start, whatever Trumpism is, Beth Moore herself, her kind, and their teaching are more dangerous than it. This is not to approve of much of what French exposed in his piece, even though I do understand the thinking of those people more than I do Moore’s and French’s. A very destructive problem is this faulty thinking that Trumpism, whatever it is, is the problem. I’m saying that I don’t know what Trumpism is because it is a word that serves as a vessel to pour many different definitions that might suit the one who uses it. Whatever it is though, I would evaluate Trumpism as a net gain in the United States, compared to the absence of Trumpism. It’s not a replacement for Jesus Christ. It isn’t the formation of a new gospel. It isn’t the answer, but it is a safe space ironically to find an answer.
Some of what is called Trumpism is not true. One should say that everything from the left is not true. The left lives in a world of lies or that a world that is a lie, both. Neoconservatives aren’t biblical Christians, which are the only Christians, that is, biblical ones. They are so associated with progressives now that they aren’t even liberal enough anymore to show up on Fox News. Their associations with the left annul them. They are relegated to CNN and MSNBC purgatory.
Just as an aside, who is the crowd of people that the Southern Baptist Convention or evangelicalism is going to receive and keep, who apparently accepts the gospel and this Woke thinking that accommodates the left? They think they’ll pick them up, while they ignore the deplorables? Or maybe they think they already have the people who, as President Obama put it, “cling to their guns and religion”? They don’t, but those are far more likely to consider the Bible than the ones they are attempting to impress. Those people have already sold their souls.
Trumpism has a Wikipedia page, certainly written by leftists there. You know that you’ve got make-believe when a big part of the definition is “narcisissm,” which is constitutive to critical theory. Narcissism was introduced to psychotherapy by the God-denying atheist, Sigmund Freud. Those who use it, like it’s being used today, I read apply it in Freud-like manner. It’s not what we might think, sinful pride, from scripture. The labeling of Trumpism, which includes Trump supporters, as narcissists is an aspect of critical theory through a marriage of Marxism and Freudianism.
The Trump supporter believes in liberty, which is tied to individuality, even in the definition of Americanism. For the Christian, which isn’t every Trump supporter, this is the individual relationship with God, rights God gives an individual (not a group), and individual salvation or redemption. God saves individuals, not groups. A major appeal of Trump to true believers is the individualism he represents in his beliefs, which to him probably stems from the era from which he comes, this being a far more prominent view, and then the Presbyterian church in which he grew up. It was a liberal church, but today it would look conservative.
The left puts its emphasis on the group — think group identity — and what you hear most often today, community, as in “community organizer.” Individualism is equated with narcissism. These are people so concerned for their own liberty, that they neglect the group. The practical purpose of critical theory is said to redirect individual narcissism towards collectivism. The individual lacks in critical reflection, destining for himself to act upon his own self-interests. One symptom then of this narcissism is the demonization of others, anyone different. Freud was Jewish, and especially at that juncture in history, saw this as the narcissism too in nationalistic tendencies that reject other ethnic identity, which later critical theory pointed out the need for this narcissism to find its expression in an autocratic leader.
Between the two, scripture, therefore, God, teaches individual rights: the right to life and the right to property. You don’t have true freedom if someone can play horseshoes in his neighbors front lawn or invade his refrigerator. Marxism believes that the state is God. At the root of its equality is equality of outcome, accomplished at the group level, the community. Capitalism is narcissistic because the person wants to keep what he owns instead of sharing it all with others. Anyway, you get the picture.
The protection of individual rights is the purpose of government. Trump supporters, not blind to Trump, don’t see Trump as a ruler who wants absolute power. I am a Trump supporter. I don’t see it. Trump was the de-regulator. He unchained individuals to innovate, much like we saw with the production of ventilators and then the vaccine.
The oligarchy of Big Tech is where I see autocracy. These Democrat governors closing their states for business are the autocrats. Trump was criticized during the pandemic for not “providing leadership,” which would mean a national mask mandate, something like that. Trump allowed the states the power reserved by the constitution to the states. His threat of intervention, which he didn’t really use, came with the endangerment of the citizens in Democrat run cities.
The freedom of religion is the right of the individual, as seen in the free exercise clause. Trump encouraged and supported the individual freedom to gather and worship against the Democrat instinct, like a state church, to conform to the state. The point of nationalism is the protection of individual rights again. Open borders destroys private ownership. People can’t be free if they are not protected, which is why the first role of government is protection. Protection requires borders and walls. These ideals have also been chosen to be superior to the alternative.
The left will call the individualism of Trump, not only narcissistic, but cultic. The only cultic tendency that characterizes Trumpism, that I see, yes, is taken to an extreme by some people. I don’t see it as a dangerous extreme, but I do see it as a necessary extreme right now to combat the collectivism of the left. I’ve heard the left call them black or brown shirts, which is a lie.
True Christians believe in the sovereignty of God. They believe God is the author of history. They believe that God brought Trump in whatever way they compare him to other leaders in world history whom God has providentially caused or allowed to gain power. Some probably have a cult like belief in this. They’re wrong to think that way, but I see them as a necessary, even providential, deterrent to the Marxists and Communists. They have far more adherents to their wicked, dangerous, and destructive collectivist cult. They are warped and blinded in far worse ways than the simplicity of the most fervent MAGA hat wearers.
A means to an end, Trumpism allows Americans to keep being Americans. Trump hasn’t come close to living like the country he wants to allow Americans to have. He hasn’t lived it himself, but he has fought for those who believe in it. Others who have said they have believed in it wouldn’t and didn’t fight. They capitulate still. If one of them had fought like he has, we may have preferred one of them to him. This is what we got, like Israel got Samson and Cyrus in the Old Testament.
Trumpism, the word itself, is a type of critical theory tool. Words are power. David French and Beth Moore want you, Trump supporter, to be ashamed of yourself. Don’t be.
If I go down as a patriot resisting the evils and dehumanizations of socialism, I will be content with that outcome. If I am resisting to the very end until everything has been taken away by vile brute force by these dishonorable barbarians who would up and rig an election, then I will be happy. Thankful even for the chance to stand for the truth. If that is what has to happen, so be it. Because at least I am not an outright traitor.
I didn't burn, shred or kneel at the flag of those who gave all for making possible our liberty.
So, if you think this is about Trump, you need to ease up on the meds. We all know what it is really about. There are as many "Trumps" (the last name is not important) as God needs to make sure this subversive movement is stopped cold if that is what is needed.
I don't know much about "Trumpism" or the author of this article, but when I saw your blog title, it reminded of the article I read last night. https://www.theamericanconservative.com/dreher/what-i-saw-at-the-jericho-march/
The Trumpists at the Jericho rally, I'm saying, of course, are closer to the truth than the Orthodox Church Rod Dreher types. We're not going to persuade the people he's explaining his embarrassment.
When you look at the bottom of French's article, he plays a Hillsong video, speaking of cultic, matching Beth Moore's famous direct lines to God via a voice in her head.
Hehe, let me 'splain something to you Kent. There is a very intelligent, well-reasoned defense of Never-Trumpism which I am and am proud to be. I am not going to go into it here because it is a waste of breath. Your defense of Trump has demonstrated that you are just not very smart. So, I would honestly just rather mock you than waste time engaging with you.
Your continued defense of Trump is like a child that reaches for a cookie out of defiance after getting spanked. You think like a child but what you really are is a hypocrite. Trumpism has decimated much of what remains of Christianity. If you cared about that, you would be looking for an exit ramp now that only the most insane of his zealots still think he won. But you go ahead and continue spouting conspiracy theory nonsense and see how that works for you.
Um no, French and Moore are not more dangerous than Trumpism. Unlike you and other Trump zealots, they have an eye on the big picture. You will figure out soon enough why they are right.
To the person who linked that Dreher article: Let us just look for a second at what happened in the four states that were part of the Texas suit.
Here we have:
1) Four states that determined the outcome of the entire race. PA, MI, WI, GA
2) Trump is ahead in all four of them by over 100k. Lead in PA is over 600,000.
3) Statistically, the odds of ALL the Biden votes he needs to win these states still hiding in the last few percentages of the race in ALL four states is something like one in four quadrillion.
4) Vote counting mysteriously stops in the middle of the night in all four states
5) Poll watchers, nonpartisan workers and media are all told to go home
6) Some counters for whatever reason stay behind in a handful of major cities
7) Somehow, all of the votes from this point, which were counted without observers, are something like 97% for Biden, but only in these four swing states
8) Media doesn't want us to talk about it, speech suppression is actively in place on social media
What happened here is obvious.
Meanwhile, the Republican incumbent wins 18 of the 19 counties that every former winning president always wins (apparently until now) throughout the rest of the country in a landslide except for one. The total turnout in total votes for his side increases drastically overall. Which, every incumbent who has done so in the past has won re-election. Losing incumbents get fewer votes because they significantly LOSE turnout. Also, the incumbent primary support was above 90th percentile. It was 94%. No incumbent with turnout above 75% in the primary has ever lost. All 27/27 of the down-ticket "tossup" seats were won by the incumbent's side. His primary turnout was 94%.
All of this, all of it is overturned by the result in these four swing states. All norms were broken by this magical performance in just cities in just these four swing states. States that just so happened to be needed to win. Winning these four automatically would make it impossible for Trump to win no matter his performance anywhere else.
And these four states, specifically, the precincts where the questionable behavior occurred, also happen to be run by the party that benefits from the change in the vote. What a funny coincidence!
And if you think the virus or mail voting had something to do with this, why did it seem to HELP Trump in everywhere but those four states/cities in those states? Because he outperformed, and Biden underperformed Hillary broadly outside of those four states.
What a strange, coincidence that all of those votes needed to win, in each of those four states, were hiding until the last few percentages were left to count, and that the counting in those very same four swing, democrat-run states all had to stop… before those hidden votes magically materialized at the end of the count, after the poll watchers were sent home also in those four states! All just a coincidence!
But to add insult to injury, they repeat propaganda to our faces like this article and purposely insult our intelligence by pretending we did not witness all these things. See no evil, hear no evil, right? Just like with the antifa mobs burning down buildings, the "peaceful" protests that are peacefully breaking glass to peacefully loot stores.
The answer for why you linked that article is multifaceted, but the one thing for sure is that you are in denial.
Anonymous #2,
Jeff Voegtlin wasn't saying that he agreed with the Dreher article. He just said he was reminded of it when he read my title.
Everyone,
I went ahead and posted Anonymous that started with "Hehe," because he didn't use foul language this time, but I wanted you to see the typical anonymous comment.
Anonymous "Hehe",
You hit children for reaching for a cookie?
Hehe Anonymous wrote: "Trumpism has decimated much of what remains of Christianity."
I am trying to understand what amount of Christianity has been destroyed by "Trumpism". "Decimate" means to reduce by 10%. "Hehe" is obviously intelligent so I am certain he knows this and used that term intentionally.
However, he only said 10% of "much of" Christianity has been destroyed. What is "much of" Christianity? Is it 80%? 50%? 20%?
30% could me much of in many situations. If "Hehe" means 30%, then "Trumpism" destroyed 3% of Christianity. (10% of 30%) That does not seem so bad, really. Even if "much of" meant 70%, that is only a 7% reduction in Christianity.
Given recent trends, a 7% reduction would be dramatically slower than recent movement, which has seen a tremendous slide in true Biblical Christianity. Perhaps "Hehe" is cleverly arguing "Trumpism" has been a boon to Christianity?
Farmer Brown needs to look up the meaning of decimate. His argument is a clown argument. It is the stupid nonsensical arguments that Trump-lovers have been reduced to. I am not responding to his argument beyond this because it is not worthy of response. He does not even know definitions of fairly common words.
Nor am I responding to Kent's silly tit-for-tat about spanking children. Is that the best you can come up with? Really? So pathetic.
To the anonymous who claims to be a never Trump person:
Are you not the one who defines yourself as against a person, in other words, personality politics? I won't disagree that that is childish. This is about more than personalities. It is only incidentally about Trump. Who you are arguing against are people who claim to be about issues. Election fraud is one. Did you know in California, an illegal alien can apply for a driver's license, and that under Obama half a million or more "provisional social security numbers" were issued to illegal aliens? https://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2015/apr/15/obama-amnesty-granted-more-500k-ssn/
Did you also know that possessing these two items are all that is required to vote in the state? This is an issue I have been telling people about since before the 2016 election cycle. It is still a problem and has gotten worse in several states. This country should be a sanctuary for the citizens of the country! not be letting illegals who commit crimes go free – paradoxically being much less harsh on illegals who break immigration law (who have been given a vote in California) than on the law-abiding individuals who follow laws.
In case you have not noticed, we have mobs burning down buildings that do not belong to them, we have people shooting congressmen at baseball games, and socialists signalling disloyalty to the Constitution in the form of flag-kneeling right now. Where are you on that? Too busy only doing things that help the Democrat position. So-called never-Trump people are simply "concern trolling" and are actually deeply pro-Democrat-agenda. We would expect the side that represents dishonesty and lack of integrity, and lack of justice, to do such things after all as pretend to be something they are not. They would also dishonestly accuse, and project onto, other people who are concerned about these issues, as being personality politics driven. They would also dishonestly accuse, and project, their own conspiracy theories like election "meddling" with NO evidence in 2016, which is probably what they told themselves as they intentionally rigged this 2020 election though they are too dishonest to actually admit their motives about this. Those are the conspiracy narratives we had to hear for all these years. Now they got caught red-handed.
Nobody even denies that fraud took place! They try to argue that it wasn't enough to overturn the result. That is what they argue. Who cares if we disenfranchised some people, they say. They admit this openly. But No. Every instance of cheating and breaking the laws, with districts dishonestly breaking the laws that their own representatives set up, should be pursued and prosecuted to the fullest extent absolutely. There is a problem of unaccountable cronies actively circumventing the will of the electorate they are supposed to serve. They are unaccountable and un-representative now. That criminality is what is causing this. If no criminality had taken place, there would be nothing to talk about here. Where are you on this? Approving of it. Because you anonymous are simply a card-carrying member of the Party of Crime.
Anonymous Hehe,
The apostates use ridicule as an argument in 2 Peter 3, your main way of arguing. You argue like an apostate. I understand mockery to come from people whose arguments don't hold up. It's the best argument they have. It's effective for most people as well, which is why it is used so much by people on the left.
You're the one who says you hit children for reaching for a cookie. It's hard to squirm out from under that with mockery. Good thing you're anonymous.
Hehe, there you go again. You Kent are worthy of mockery. I am supposed to take someone seriously that is making an issue out of spanking a child for reaching for a cookie. Like I am going to spend one ounce of my time on your silly distractions.
Yes I get it. If I don't worship Trump, I am apostate. If I don't agree that Trump really won the election, I am apostate.
Here is a non-mockery statement: you and the people posting here are fools.
Anonymous Hehe,
So you do hit children for reaching for cookies? I see the headlines, adult anonymous commenter hits children for reaching for cookies. Hide the children, anonymous hehe is here. You'll know who he is, he uses only mockery for argument, just like apostates. Says he isn't an apostate, argues, and only argues, just like an apostate. Add to that lies or prevarication. Hits children. Mocks. Prevaricates. He glories in his shame and not only does so, but has pleasure in others who do them.
Hehe (giggles)
I lie now too. Who is the fool parroting conspiracy theories on here? Yes, that would be you though I have to admit the one a few comments up is even more delusional.
Anonymous Hehe, Even though you didn't deal with the post at all, I decided to let you have a last word, minus the other comment on millennials. Your commentary here, I don't think it will make you feel any better, a kind of fools gold in that way. You seem like a troubled, broken, and unhappy person, the consequence of your own sin. You can find help in the only true Jesus, the Jesus of the Bible, and a Bible-believing and practicing church.
I'm pretty sure I know exactly where you are coming from.
You know what though, I've lodged my protest. I have NOT sided with the flag-kneelers. I also think you should listen to what the blogwriter has to say here as well. I don't want to speak ill, but you do seem delusional. And I do think it's necessary to point this out for your own help. Not just a mean comment.