Boy did that Rebel Yell feel good! This is nothing less than an uprising. Our chains have been stricken.
As I write this, Trump has breached the fabled Blue Wall. Without Wisconsin, there’s no way that Hillary can win the 270 electoral votes needed to win the Presidency.
I’m going to write more as the days come. For now I can safely say that the Trumpster sucker punched the Globalists and kicked them in the balls for good measure. If I may paraphrase Michael Moore (a man I absolutely despise), this was “the greatest [expletive deleted] you in history.”
I’m beyond ecstatic.
I’m also a conservative. That means I’m a realist. The Globalists are not going to go quietly into that good night. We’re talking active sabotage. Worse. The economy sucks. Foreign affairs are a mess. And all because of Obama, who single-handedly pretty much destroyed this country. And yeah, I’ll throw the Bushes into this parade of horribles as well.
I hope he goes to Russia soon and calms their nerves. Our Oligarchy is so benighted that they can’t see an ally when he’s staring them in the face. Trump could. I think the middle-aged white women of the heartland understand this as well. They’re pissed that the only prospects their sons have is to go fight oversees for the banking cartels. I’m an American. I’m tired of war. I’m sure most real Americans are as well.
I’d also like to see him deputize Dr Ben Carson and immediately call a summit of black leaders. The devastation in the African-American community demands that something productive needs to be done. Build the frickin’ wall. Stop all the Third-Worlders from coming in and stealing their jobs.
And yeah, put a moratorium on ALL immigration. Especially from Moslem countries. There, I said it.
Before we go after the Liberals and the Democrats, we’re going to have to go after the Nevertrumpers and the cuckservatives. Destroy them. Literally. They are traitors and they need to go.
I still can’t believe he won Wisconsin. I’m rambling. I’m tired. I’m going to bed. We got work to do.1
Hail Trump! Hail Victory!
P.S. I’d like to see him issue an executive order preserving Confederate monuments.
Trump will win and win in a landslide.
We now need to get to work to get the Gospel out to America. We got a respite, a reprieve. We best not squandered this hard fought and won victory. Time to get to work.
PS. My Good Bishop please send the whiskey to my office. Google my name and you can find my office address. Thank you, and Shibboleth.
Peter A. Papoutsis
Peter, not quite a landslide, but a win nonetheless! That counts! Very happy that we will not have 4+ years of more Clinton, Inc. Hopefully they will fade into oblivion, though somehow I doubt it. I hope we at least neutered them a bit.
If you think about it, Trump had everything against him — the media were clearly against him, the international oligarchs/elite/bankers, Wall Street, both the Republican and Democrat establishments were against him, HRC had way more money — all that was against him, and he still won. Are any of the elite getting this message?
Perhaps now, with this election result, God is giving America more time for repentance.
So many HRC supporters seem to be upset. George Stephanopoulos and his bud Martha Raddatz almost cried on TV last night. It’s so ridiculous; they act like over-emotional toddlers. For the life of me, I have no idea why anyone would like HRC. Guess I’ll add that to the list of things I will never understand.
And the “American Orthodox Holy Land” of Pennsylvania pulled it through in the end!
Thank God this election is over, and may God grant our new President wisdom. It all happened on the feast day of the Holy and Glorious Great-martyr Demetrius the Myrrh-gusher of Thessalonica (Oct 26/Nov 8).
St Demetrius, intercede for us! And George, thank you again for maintaining this site!
I agree. However, Trump is at 289 electoral votes and my threshold for a landslide is 300. Hey it could still happen. I think 2 or 3 states are not done yet. However, I am still happy and agree with you that God has given us a reprieve to repent and turn the hearts and minds of the majority of the People back to Jesus Christ and His Holy Gospel.
Peter
PETER!! Great call! Not a peep from the Bishop. Perhaps he stayed up a bit too late, hoping for a last minute Clinton comeback. Hope he doesn’t welch on your bet.
I warned him about the Chinese Prophet monkey Geda selecting Trump. Oh well.
The Good, oh so Good, Bishop is a fraud in my book and is symbolic of an Orthodox Clergy in all our Jurisdictions here in America. Truth be told Retired Bishop Tikhon Fitzgerald is the rule NOT the exception to the majority of Bishops, Archbishops and Metropolitans in all American Orthodox Jurisdictions.
Notable exceptions are Metropolitan Isaiah, Metropolitan Jonah, Archbishop Demetrios, Former Archbishop Spyridon, Bishop Basil, the Bishops of ROCOR (Of Course), and all the clergy that support the Fr. Ephraim Monasteries (Thank you George for that one).
The exceptions may seem like a lot, but compared to the Bishop Tikhons that are the rule, that share his Social Gospel heresy and mentality they are truly a tiny majority. Even my Bishop and Metropolitan here in Chicago think and believe exactly like Bishop Tikhon – more progressive than Christian.
We need to understand that the old guard is going to pass away and a new leadership will take over one day, and I hope soon. That leadership needs to be 100% and not progressive and not neo-conservative, but Christian.
For far too long Churches and other assemblies have been either the Democratic Party at prayer or the Republican Christian Coalition at prayer. What we need is an Orthodox Hierarchy, especially a future Orthodox Hierarchy, to be Orthodox Christians at prayer.
As for Bishop Tikhon he is 84 years old and retired. I will always pray for him and love him, but his judge will soon be God. Let Him take up his failings. We just need to move forward with the Gospel and with those that want to move forward with the Gospel, clergy ad laity.
Peter
Change will come to our church. The question is which direction. Who will lead, who will follow, and how many more will continue to leave. Honestly I don’t know the answers, or have solutions. The secular world we live in and our children grow in pulls us in many directions. Distractions everywhere. Our Bishop/Spiritual leaders confuse, and don’t always connect. Priests get bogged down by parish council politics, and are not always backed up by their Metropolitans. Those with the largest purse strings, get all the attention. UPR’s seem only suggestions. Leadership 100, and our Archons are becoming the puppet masters. Good Priests are pushed aside , and moved ,because certain parish committees don’t see eye to eye. Laity who try to have a relationship with their spiritual father, are left in the dust, and the sinful circle of clergy merry go round continues, because the Parish Presidents can’t find YES MEN in their priests, that they consider an employee.
Yes the Gospel is the answer, but getting the majority in our parishes to follow the Gospel is the question, and the problem. Many souls will be lost in the process.LORD HAVE MERCY!
It wasn’t a landslide at all! Mrs Clinton WON the popular vote by about 200,000 votes. It was the Electoral College and their votes by state that elected Mt Trump. I hope he isn’t found guilty when he appears in court next month for his trial….
Hillary Wins the Popular Vote — Not
By Steve Feinstein
http://www.americanthinker.com/blog/2016/11/hillary_wins_the_popular_vote__not_.html
Okay, let’s address this “Hillary might win the popular vote, isn’t that Electoral College situation just awful” thing head on.
No, it’s not awful. It’s great, and it protects the importance of your vote. It’s also uniquely American and demonstrates yet again the once-in-creation brilliance of the Founding Fathers.
First of all, she’s probably not going to win the actual number of votes cast. She may win the number of votes counted, but not the votes cast.
States don’t count their absentee ballots unless the number of outstanding absentee ballots is larger than the state margin of difference. If there is a margin of 1000 votes counted and there are 1300 absentee ballots outstanding, then the state tabulates those. If the number of outstanding absentee ballots wouldn’t influence the election results, then the absentee ballots aren’t counted.
Who votes by absentee ballot? Students overseas, the military, businesspeople on trips, etc. The historical breakout for absentee ballots is about 67-33% Republican. In 2000, when Al Gore “won” the popular vote nationally by 500,000 votes and the liberal media screamed bloody murder, there were 2 million absentee ballots in CA alone. A 67-33 breakout of those yields a 1.33-.667 mil Republican vote advantage, so Bush would have gotten a 667,000-vote margin from CA’s uncounted absentee ballots alone! So much for Gore’s 500,000 popular vote “victory.” (That was the headline on the NY Times and it was the lead story on the NBC Nightly News, right? No? You’re kidding.)
But… getting back to the “Win the popular vote/lose the Electoral College” scenario: Thank G-d we have that, or else CA and NY would determine every election. Every time.
I’ll draw a boxing analogy for you. In boxing, the scoring for a completed fight (one where there’s no knockout, but instead goes the full distance) is done either on a Rounds basis or a Points basis (agreed upon in advance). Let’s say it’s a 10-round fight, scored on the Rounds basis. The judges decide which boxer wins each round and the fight is scored 7-3 or 6-4 or 8-2.
The other way a fight can be scored is on the Points basis. Under this system, a fighter is given 10 points for winning the round, the loser gets 1-9 points, depending on how close or badly he loses it.
Let’s say Jones has two really big rounds where he knocks Jackson down a few times and really has him in trouble, winning those two rounds by scores of 10-6. But Jones only wins two other rounds, and those by very close 10-9 margins.
Jackson wins the 6 other rounds, all by 10-9 margins. No question that Jackson won those six rounds, but they weren’t overly dramatic. Just solid wins.
So Jackson wins by rounds, 6-4.
Jones wins by points, 94-90.
CA and NY are the 10-6 rounds. Those two states will unduly and disproportionately affect the election –every time. The other big population states are all 10-9 rounds. That means that the vast majority of 48 states and their populations will be subject to the whim and desire of just two states. If those two states have similar demographics and voting preferences at any particular point in time (which they do now), then those two states call the shots for the entire country.
But the Electoral College brilliantly smooths out the variances in the voting proclivities among states and regions. Farmers in the middle of the country and importers/exporters on the shore get roughly equal say, as do Madison Ave execs and factory workers in Tennessee.
Shortcomings? Sure. The EC can make an R vote meaningless in a very few heavily D states or vice-versa. But without the Electoral College, the country’s entire population is subject to the disproportionate voting preferences of the few most populous states.
From Trump’s victory speech [after the Electoral College OVERRULED the popular vote for Mrs. Clinton]: “”But I said, they can’t call you a superstar, Reince, unless we win … Like Secretariat. If Secretariat came in second, Secretariat would not have that great big beautiful bronze bust at the track.”
Does anybody know what equine “BUST” looks like? We;d got used to President Obama’s intelligent discourse, so we’ll get used to Mr Trump’s junior high style, too, no doubt!!
NOT A LANDSLIDE AT ALL: 59,814,018 votes—Mrs Clinton
59,611,678 votes—Mr Trump. Over 200,000 more for Clinton than for Trump!
Can’t you ever just throw in the towel instead of clinging to some obviously flawed argument? The Presidential Race is an “Electoral Race” not a “Popular Vote Race.” Both candidates know that from the outset. THEY CAMPAIGN ACCORDINGLY !! Do you get that? If it were a “Popular Race” Trump would not care so much about Wisconsin Michigan Ohio North Carolina. He would have other states on the radar. Maybe California which he visited I think briefly only once. Lets not be so naive. Obama speaks two words per minute. Mostly he clasps his hands, pauses, looks in one direction, says something, then looks the other way, pauses, says something else, Trump though tends with redundancy. Trump would of won a “Popular vote race” all the same if that is what the election race was and he campaigned for such. Its a virtual statistical dead heat as is and not all votes are in anyhow.
Five Horse lengths easy.
And remember this, this is what people who knew something going in and were not surprised like all the sad folk like yourself and MSNBC CNN.
(them poor poor sad lonely faces, I mean talk about “disillusionment” textbook disillusionment)
Nobody went to Hillary rallies. NOBODY WENT TO HILLARY RALLIES. News media did their best to cover that up with camera angles. Tim Kaine had one rally that had a whopping 30 people show !! This is a NATIONAL CAMPAIGN. They don’t go somewhere if only 30 will show. But they did !!
What a joke.
Your Grace, it’s flat-out false to state that the Electoral College has overruled anything. The Electoral College is what elects the President and Vice President, and they don’t vote until December 19th.
Thank you, Helga, for pointing out that Mr Trump hasn’t even been elected yet, and that the election won’t take place until a few weeks AFTER Mr Trump’s trial begins! Mr Papoutsis claimed a “landslide” of that Electoral College had already elected Mr Trump, no? Why did Mrs Clinton ALREADY concede and congratulate Mr Trump? Have you spilled the beans to Peter A. Papoutsis?
The voiceless American has spoken very spoke very clearly!
frd+
That wasn’t spoken very well. The voiceless American has spoken very clearly:
Bring back the jobs, build the wall, repeal Obama Care… the list is endless. frd+
No, Fr. David. He has not! You’re not thinking of the voiceless American, but of the Electoral College!
There will be no wall. It was fool’s candy of your flavor.
Anny, why don’t you click your ruby-red slippers together and say “there’s no place like home.”
Oh, yes, there IS going to be a wall. I am certain of that.
The Donald-elect is not certain of a wall (a fence, maybe). Remember, it is in God we trust, not an entertainer/politician.
Our Lord has taken pity on our nation to make her great again. Thank you.
Dino! Don’t forget to thank the Electoral College, since Trump lost the popular vote by about 200,000 votes!
BISHOP TIKHON!Your Grace, No one likes a sore loser. Don’t welch on your bet to Peter. After all I warned you about Geda the Chinese prophet monkey’s prediction of a Trump victory.
BISHOP TIKHON!Your Grace, No one likes a sore loser. Don’t welch on your bet to Peter. After all I warned you about Geda the Chinese prophet monkey’s prediction of a Trump victory.
YES! Thank you Electoral College. Of course if all was reversed, and Clinton won by Electoral College, and not popular vote, you would be thankful too, and demanding your Whiskey. Rules are the rules, and a bet is a bet. Never bet against a monkey.
“Dionysia Garbis!” The Lord had nothing to do with it! The Electoral College was REQUIRED by law to elect Mr Trump, even though more Americans voted for Mrs Clinton than voted for your Mister Trump!
Good old bait and switch! I expected nothing less from you my good oh so good bishiop. Please pay up so I can move on and leave you be.
God bless and Shibboleth.
Peter
Bishop Tikhon,
Do you really believe “The Lord had nothing to do with it!” as you wrote above to Dionysia Garbis? Does that mean that you actually don’t believe that God is always in control? WOW…
Hillary Wins the Popular Vote — Not
http://www.americanthinker.com/blog/2016/11/hillary_wins_the_popular_vote__not_.html
Okay, let’s address this “Hillary might win the popular vote, isn’t that Electoral College situation just awful” thing head on.
No, it’s not awful. It’s great, and it protects the importance of your vote. It’s also uniquely American and demonstrates yet again the once-in-creation brilliance of the Founding Fathers.
First of all, she’s probably not going to win the actual number of votes cast. She may win the number of votes counted, but not the votes cast.
States don’t count their absentee ballots unless the number of outstanding absentee ballots is larger than the state margin of difference. If there is a margin of 1000 votes counted and there are 1300 absentee ballots outstanding, then the state tabulates those. If the number of outstanding absentee ballots wouldn’t influence the election results, then the absentee ballots aren’t counted.
Who votes by absentee ballot? Students overseas, the military, businesspeople on trips, etc. The historical breakout for absentee ballots is about 67-33% Republican. In 2000, when Al Gore “won” the popular vote nationally by 500,000 votes and the liberal media screamed bloody murder, there were 2 million absentee ballots in CA alone. A 67-33 breakout of those yields a 1.33-.667 mil Republican vote advantage, so Bush would have gotten a 667,000-vote margin from CA’s uncounted absentee ballots alone! So much for Gore’s 500,000 popular vote “victory.” (That was the headline on the NY Times and it was the lead story on the NBC Nightly News, right? No? You’re kidding.)
But… getting back to the “Win the popular vote/lose the Electoral College” scenario: Thank G-d we have that, or else CA and NY would determine every election. Every time.
I’ll draw a boxing analogy for you. In boxing, the scoring for a completed fight (one where there’s no knockout, but instead goes the full distance) is done either on a Rounds basis or a Points basis (agreed upon in advance). Let’s say it’s a 10-round fight, scored on the Rounds basis. The judges decide which boxer wins each round and the fight is scored 7-3 or 6-4 or 8-2.
The other way a fight can be scored is on the Points basis. Under this system, a fighter is given 10 points for winning the round, the loser gets 1-9 points, depending on how close or badly he loses it.
Let’s say Jones has two really big rounds where he knocks Jackson down a few times and really has him in trouble, winning those two rounds by scores of 10-6. But Jones only wins two other rounds, and those by very close 10-9 margins.
Jackson wins the 6 other rounds, all by 10-9 margins. No question that Jackson won those six rounds, but they weren’t overly dramatic. Just solid wins.
So Jackson wins by rounds, 6-4.
Jones wins by points, 94-90.
CA and NY are the 10-6 rounds. Those two states will unduly and disproportionately affect the election –every time. The other big population states are all 10-9 rounds. That means that the vast majority of 48 states and their populations will be subject to the whim and desire of just two states. If those two states have similar demographics and voting preferences at any particular point in time (which they do now), then those two states call the shots for the entire country.
But the Electoral College brilliantly smooths out the variances in the voting proclivities among states and regions. Farmers in the middle of the country and importers/exporters on the shore get roughly equal say, as do Madison Ave execs and factory workers in Tennessee.
Shortcomings? Sure. The EC can make an R vote meaningless in a very few heavily D states or vice-versa. But without the Electoral College, the country’s entire population is subject to the disproportionate voting preferences of the few most populous states.
GEORGE MICHALOPOULOS! Please note that this post by “Centurion” was written today at 8;50 pm and it heads the column for this thread! I have contributed shorter posts this MORNING, and they are “awaiting moderation!”. I suspect that my posts are being held back until enough posts have been written AFTER THEM to insure they won’t be seen unless one goes digging!
Trump wins electoral and popular votes.
https://70news.wordpress.com/2016/11/12/final-election-2016-numbers-trump-won-both-popular-62-9-m-62-7-m-and-electoral-college-vote-306-232-hey-change-org-scrap-your-loony-petition-now/
Bishop Tikhon please pay up on your bet. You are way over due.
Peter
Exactly
California Proposition 43 was on the March 5, 2002 statewide ballot in California as a “legislatively referred constitutional amendment,” where it was approved. Proposition 43 amended the California Constitution to explicitly state that “every vote cast in accordance with state law – absentee or otherwise – shall be counted.” Arguments in support of Proposition 43 by its primary sponsors talked about how in Florida in 2000, votes cast for President were not counted. Proposition 43 was advanced as “a way to ensure that what happened in Florida would not be constitutional in California.” Virtually no money was spent either promoting or opposing the ballot measure. In 2016, more than half of registered voters in CA we registered as absentee voters and “may begin voting in person or by mail two weeks before the election, and mail-in-ballots are valid up to three days after the election if post-marked the day of the election.”
As CA stopped counting absentee ballots because of the observance of Veteran’s Day on Friday (with HRC leading Trump 61% to 32%), and suggests that more than 2 million ballots remain to be counted, the difference in the HRC “popular vote” favour could be substantial. Perhaps you need to account for the fact that this is not Florida, but rather CA in 2016, and any and all absentee ballots will be counted & accounted for by CA law.
By the way, the scoring in boxing is referred to as “The 10-Point Must System.”
Michael S. By your numbers there are more votes to be countered in CA than could possibly be cast here in Kansas.
Without the Electoral College, we Kansans would be disenfranchised, and the Presidential election would be decided in two or three states.
And SO MANY of those Californians are Okies and of Okie stock!
The game was the Electoral College, Your Grace, and it comes with a defined set of rules. Your candidate lost that game. She was over confident, as were her supporters, who didn’t turn out in sufficient numbers, in key states, to put her through.
Hillary’s gravest error, however, was underestimating Trump. She was duped. She assumed Trump’s crass statements and tough language would alienate the nation and even used this as the premise of her ad campaign. She had the media on her side and they discussed, ad nauseum, how unfit he was because of the things he said. It was nothing short of a coup, though, because every time they did what they did, they inched Trump closer to his goal. They were SO effective in communicating his rhetoric, he didn’t even have to run much of an ad campaign.
You see, when used all that “tough guy talk,” he wasn’t talking to the country. He wasn’t talking to you or to me. He was ONLY talking to white, male, high school graduates in the workforce. He figured out, early on, that they were the demographic that would put him over the top and everything he did was directed toward THEM, including the locker room talk.
Trump was very aware of the scrutiny he was under. He knew there were cameras everywhere. He also knew the Left would jump on everything he said so he used the Left to disseminate his message to those most likely to support him. The Left did an amazing job, too! He probably should have thanked them in his acceptance speech. He couldn’t have done it without them.
When you see Trump now, his demeanor will be entirely different. He will appear quite sober minded. What Trump did was genius. On that basis alone, he beat the pants off Hillary, as unseemly as that sounds.
* * *
Locker Room Talk: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HlgDbTpFYJc
I imagine Danny Zuko would have voted for Trump: White, high-school graduate, talking crap to his friends, ready to enter the workforce . . .
Gail, you may be right or wrong. I tend to think Mr Trump was surprised to win. Only he jnows the truth and knowing it, may reveal it.
I confess to shameful animosity to Trump. When he imitated a “handicapped” FOR LAUGHS, I’m afraid I wanted to slap him silly!
It will be interesting to see just HOW he will go after abortions!
Your Grace, he wants to overturn Roe vs. Wade and push the abortion issue down to the States. I don’t think he’ll get that far. I’m content knowing he will keep the Hyde Amendment in place, because the Democratic party was talking about repealing it. If a woman wants an abortion, I can’t stop her, but it’s completely unreasonable to expect me to pay for it.
I realize we already pay for it in cases where the mother’s life is in jeopardy or if it is rape or incest. The incest thing is relatively new. Not sure why THAT should make a difference. I feel less conflicted about situations where the pregnancy was forced on the woman or her health is in jeopardy.
Your Grace, I think he WAS surprised . . . that he pulled it off. He was not only counting on his demographic, he was praying that people like me were not SO turned off by his rhetoric, that we missed the message. – No, I can’t know that I’m right. But I bet I am.
Gail,
You are right about his appeal to blue collar whites. And I believe his rhetoric will stay toned down when it needs to. But what you saw in the campaign was what Trump really thinks and feels. He just said it openly for political advantage. On this I agree with the Left.
I don’t know how far he will take it. The path to maximizing his own power is clear. I have laid it out here and on AOIUSA. He will probably appoint originalist judges, support conservative social/moral causes and press on with a fair tax and trade policy as he outlined in his campaign.
The seismic fault lines sill be those we see here on Monomakhos: The Crits
He will alienate socialists/globalists (but not those liberals who merely insist on a welfare state), gender crits, race crits and LGBT crits.
True socialists, globalists, gender crits, race crits and LGBT crits were the big losers on November 8th. Their power was broken, probably irreparably. They know he is the devil as far as they are concerned and they will act accordingly.
Trump lost 3 percent to Gary Johnson since Johnson got his highest totals outside of New Mexico in Republican states like Oklahoma. In reality, Trump got less of the blue collar vote than political pudits are saying he won the white college vote by 4 percent and whites tend to have more college than minorites. His greatest totals were in upper-middle class white areas like Colin County Texas and he barely won the blue collar white counties in the midwest. In fact Collin County has an average income of 110,000. Trump supporrters made 80,000 a year while Clinton average 65,0000 because of minorities. Yes, the blue collar vote was exaggerated, Trump won better with whites with higher incomes and more educatioin. Nat Silver says about 44 percent of Trump’s followers have college. The college educated tend to vote MOre.
http://fivethirtyeight.com/features/the-mythology-of-trumps-working-class-support/ A very good article on who voted for Trump.
The article never proves its point really. First of all, it creates a straw dummy: “working class” = low income. It then proceeds to compare median incomes. The methodology is mismatched with the proposition.
Besides, what is being alleged is that Trump captured a greater share of the “white blue collar” vote, stealing it from the Democrats. The statistics offered mostly do not account for race or for those who are unemployed whose presence in the lower class would distinguish it from “working class”.
Don’t get me wrong, they are welcome to rationalize away what happened all they want. The only important thing is that Trump knows who voted for him.
I think he did pretty well with the white blue collar vote in the key manufacturing states that he won, however. That is probably what made the difference.
France also, it seems, is ripe for revolution. Le Pen may pull an upset there or at least do well enough to destabilize the core of the EU:
https://www.ft.com/content/141beb44-ad83-11e6-ba7d-76378e4fef24
Exciting times.
Yeeee haww is right! America was pushed into a corner, and reacted like true patriots.God bless President Trump, and God bless America. Now let’s get to work fellow patriots, and show the world we are unlike any nation the world has ever seen! Thank God for not forsaking us, and giving us a chance for change to the light. Lord have mercy!
I doubt that most Americans appreciate that WWIII (literally, and with the wrong enemy) was averted this morning. Nor do they appreciate that a constitutional crisis was defused.
So be it, all’s well that ends well.
What a frightening reality the country has chosen for itself.
Au contraire mon ami!
please explain? is it because Barbra Streisand will be leaving this country?
I’d love to pack her bags.
What a fluke, George! SHE got the most votes, but the Electoral College overruled the people. Don’t you admire Mrs Clinton for her gracious concession speech, in which she did NOT claim, as Trump would have continued to do if he were in her shoes, that the election was rigged! What short memories!
Old tired bait and switch argument, and your beloved Michigan went for Trump. Wow that must hurt.
Peter
Petr A. Papoutsis: That landslide just won’t quit! Here’s the “landslide popular vte as of this morning:
“Hillary Clinton not only won the popular vote in Tuesday’s election. It is now clear that she won it by a margin larger than two candidates who went on to win the presidency.
David Leonhardt, a columnist for The New York Times, noted on Friday that with a 1.7-percentage-point popular vote lead over Donald Trump,Clinton will have a larger margin of victory than Richard Nixon had over Hubert Humphrey in 1968 or John F. Kennedy had over Nixon in 1960. (Her edge is also larger than Al Gore’s popular vote victory over George W. Bush in 2000, though he too was stymied by an electoral college loss.)
In raw numbers, that amounts to an edge of roughly 1.8 million votes as of Saturday.”
BISHOP TIKHON, COME ON YOUR GRACE! You know better, so don’t play dumb with us all. The rules were rules, both candidates knew the rules. If we had a popular vote in play, then Trump would have spent more time in large populated areas, instead of flying from one small state to another. State representation is one reason we have a state by state electoral college vote, otherwise our federal government officials would only show favor to large cities, and states, and leave smaller states in the dust.
AND! Don’t believe for a second, that if their fates were reversed, Clinton would be more than happy to accept the electoral system, even if she had not received the popular vote. You can’t change the rules, after the game is over, Your Grace. Now pay up to Mr. Peter A. Papoutsis, he won fair and square, don’t be a sore loser, It’s not very honorable, Your Grace, to welch your bet. Even Geda The Chinese Prophet Monkey knows that!
Oh, and one last thing Your Grace, YEEEEEE-HAAWWWWW!
Dino and Peter! Please calm down. I’ve not said or even hinted anything AGAINST the Electoral College system. I’ve not advocated it being abolished. Yet you are convinced I MUST be against it because I pointed out that the American people gave Mrs Clinton the majority of their votes! Mrs Clinton got the most citizen votes; Mr Trump got the most electoral votes. Why does uttering these facts appear to you to be evidence of opposing the Electoral College system, the CONSTITUTIONAL system? Neither have I praised Mrs Clinton, by the way. I preferred her for president over Trump, but this doesn’t mean I LIKED her! Why on earth do you claim I am a poor loser? Mt Trump DID win “fair and square.” I find that disgusting, but I don’t contest it. Utterly, totally disgusting!
The American people did not give Clinton the majority of our votes. The mostly urban, secular folks voted in massive numbers and think the rest if us are ignorant bigots.
Well, I am ignorant of many things but not a bigot. I really do not understand how any committed Christian could vote for Hillary given stand on abortion and her desire to force us into re-education until we agree with the secular-nihilist philosophy she espouses.
Don’t like Trump, I understand that. I do not expect him to fulfill any of his campaign promises, but Hillary would have.
But to translate dislike of Trump into support of Hillary? I do not follow the rationale of someone who claims to be Orthodox.
Michael Bauman,
For the record, I wrote in the name of Mr. Kasich on my ballot, remaining true to my conscience as I indicated from the beginning of this disgusting process, and am now not compelled to scramble for rationalizations as you appear to be doing. Likewise, had you done even a cursory investigation, you would have found that during the 8-years Bill Clinton was in office, there were 15% less elective medical abortions in the US than in the 8-years of Regan & 12-years of Bush pere & fille combined, and nearly 16% less than Clinton during the 8-years of the Obama presidency. As your Gunnery Sgt. Hartman, Michael Bauman, you KNOW how much I hate people talking crap. In an OpEd in the NY Times yesterday, someone wrote Democrats fell asleep to identifying talent; no Dems wanted HRC, but she was “owed.” Thankfully, she lost “because Chelsea would be next.” What is sad is the foolishness that compells the belief that this time repentance will come to Ninevah, and morality will return. Where did I put that Lenten Triodion? “O Jerusalem, Jerusalem…”
Michael S. Not rationalizing. Since, in a rational election there was not one single candidate I could vote for I was originally going to vote “None of the above” while singing “Bring in the Clowns”
But I kept pondering and it became more clear that there was a point to saying “No more!” to the ideological darkness that is the nihilist agenda that Hillary champions.
Since Kansas’ 6 electoral votes were going to Trump no matter what I did, I could have done a none vote without impacting the result.
While Trump articulated some ideas that are mildly attractive, I voted for him in order to say NO to what Hillary serves.
Trump is neither an ideolog nor an intellectual so I never expected that he would stick to his articulated plan.
If some of it gets done by God’s grace– good.
This was not a rational election. We are living in Kafka land.
Eric Hoffer warned not to give intellectuals power. We have done that for to long. “The best and the brightest” that JFK ushered into power have led the country towards destruction and we have cooperated. All of the other possible candidates fit that b&b modal. They disgust me. Hollow men all.
So I voted for an irrational, vulgar man because it is either that type of man or a saint who can possiblly navigate in Kafka land or at least not destroy as much as Hillary, her master’s and her cronies would.
So, if Christians are not under constant attack by an anti-Christian tryanny during the next four years, that is the best I can hope for.
A little time.
Come Lord Jesus and judge the earth!
Anna Freud made this all simple: “Rationalization is the fallacious justification of an attitude, belief, or behavior which unconsciously brings me shame.” You spent a year doing everything but invoking the Notre Dame Fight Song to “call down the thunder from the sky” as to why not voting for either candidate was, indeed, a justifiable moral imperative. You apparently changed your mind, and that’s your business. Whatever. But now you appeal to what Freud pere referred to as the “sweet lemon,” a form of rationalization that allows you to ascribe the justification of wrongful behaviour of one party to “circumstance,” while similar behaviour in another you ascribe to “bad character,” all with the goal of resolving your own conflict. A full year of William Tell, daring anyone to knock that apple off your head, and in the end, it simply fell off because you couldn’t keep your head up. And you know damn well, Michal Bauman, I would never mention it if I did not respect you.
That’s Bush “père & fils”, not fille.
It’s an old French joke formed on the riff, “fils et filles de…” e.g. “fils et filles de” du cinéma français,” film celebrity by virtue of your parent. In this case, if you were to have asked Molly Ivins, late syndicated columnist of the of the NY Times and then the Dallas Times Herald, she would have said Bush fils was only qualified to be president by virtue “fils et filles de…” of the credentials of Bush père. It was a joke that at least one person got. wtf. You are correcting my French now? I would have given me that one on GP alone.
Boarding the Clinton bus for Canada right now.
I came back from polling and saw The Dow Futures down 4% and S&P 5%. I knew that was
good news and good news it was.
I came back from polling and saw The Dow Futures down 4% and S&P 5%. I knew that was good news. Markets don’t lie.
I know. I saw that too. I think about 7:30pm I saw on Drudge that the S&P futures were down 600 points. An hour later it was 700.
Probably Goldman Sachs liquidating all their shares of Amazon.
Fed Reserve now knows they can get fired, Yellen is thru. Appoint
Ron Paul Fed Chair. Put gold back into the currency, a 10% gold
clad 20 dollar coin. College team logos. But you still have to have
the mint mark of either Philadelphia Denver Carson City San Francisco.
All these actually were solid Hillary. Whatever.
Lock her up!
Mark E. Phesus, Trump has appear in court next month where he’s being sued.. Mrs Clinton has no court dates and no outstanding suits against her. As you said, what ever!
I still can hardly believe he did it. May God grant our President-Elect wisdom and discernment in the coming months and throughout his presidency.
PS. Hillary didn’t give a concession speech, and apparently has no plans to. She conceded by phone and that’s it. Where is the media that was calling Trump a sore loser? Ah well, who cares; she should enjoy her last few months of freedom.
My faith in the American people has been restored. Despite the in-the-tank media, big money, celebrities…….the American people voted for the best candidate. Couple this with Brexit and the Global elitists must be getting more than a little uncomfortable. And the icing on the cake was my adopted home state of Pennsylvania delivering the knockout blow!
Glad he won George but I wouldn’t get too wound up. Trump won, but a majority of the American people did not want him as President. Of course Clinton did not get a majority either. If it is a revolution it is a really slim one.
There is no mandate. If Trump appoints old pols to key positions not much will actually change. Might not anyway if he actually wants to govern.
Four reasons for slight hope:. He can easily overturn all of the executive orders, the likely constitution of the Supreme Court, the repeal of Obamacare ( though what it is replaced with might be as bad or worse at least the mandate will likely be gone); the possibility of making peace with Russia
The wall, the trade deals, even immigration policy will likely turn out differently than promised. What of the Global Warming nonsense and the UN treaty on guns that are out there. He has to act to put that stuff to bed. Do everything to actually negate those type of things not just ignore them.
We have yet to see how the violent fringe on both sides will react.
If Trump appoints an old Soros connected former hedge-fund manager as Sec of the Treasury as has been speculated that could be really bad.
Guliani as Attorney General? Gingrich at State?
Will he rein in the EPA? Can he?
One term then back to the oligarchy if Trump doesn’t go there too before then. He might get a second term that way.
It is a reprieve at best.
Lord bless your people and lead us into repentance to change our hearts and grant us mercy.
Well, there are landslides and there are landslides. The popular vote is very close, currently 48% – 48%. The electoral vote is another matter. Landslide is perhaps the best term if taken literally. In terms of territory, Trump carried the day royally.
Yet let us reflect upon that. About half the country in terms of population drank the Clinton kool-aid. Perhaps the majority of voting individuals. George’s point is well taken, best case scenario is that America escaped WWIII and a constitutional crisis by a hair. Fasting, repentance, sackcloth and ashes are all in order.
That said, the Times and Post are livid. While the EU elite is in disarray with their tails in a knot over this, the European people have been telegraphing dissatisfaction for quite sometime now. Russia is openly relieved, I’ve seen the streams of posts and news articles since 3am this morning. Both Vladyka Kirill and Putin are talking in positive terms about a thaw already. Moscow was celebrating with renewed hope for the American people.
Very heartwarming.
What is still forthcoming is a recognition from the elite media, Washington, Manhattan, etc of the fact that America, by and large, just repudiated the beliefs of the elite Establishment. They’re chalking it up to “anger at Washington” and “gridlock” etc.
If you look at the black and Hispanic communities as wedge issue voters (voting almost exclusively on the basis of the candidate’s commitment to expanding the welfare state), apart from that issue, the vast majority of Americans decisively reject the moral and geopolitical worldview of Progressive, Inc.
Decisively.
Regarding the welfare state, the country is bankrupt. You can only expand the welfare state by devaluing the currency, which is really just an illusion.
I’m cautiously optimistic that this has legs.
Russia and China (once trade is straightened out and hegemonic spheres are agreed upon) will cooperate with Trump and a Republican Congress. Those are the two other nuclear powers of note. Deprived of American backing for their attempt at Middle Eastern hegemony and the colonization of Europe, Amalek [Saudis/Sunnis/al-Qaida/ISIS – it’s all the same people] will probably be easier to contain.
If we are out of the business of spreading Western style democracy through destabilization and bombing, we will find leaders willing to stabilize their relations with the United States so long as it is led by a strong alpha leader.
So, thank God.
Text of Pres. Putin’s congratulatory message to President-elect Trump:
* * *
Donald Trump, President-elect of the United States of America
9 November 2016 11: 30 – Congratulatory message
Dear Mr. Trump,
Accept my sincere congratulations on the occasion of your victory in the United States of America’s presidential elections.
I look forward to working with you toward the normalization of Russian-American relations from their current state of crisis and to addressing the pressing issues on the international agenda and searching for effective responses to global security challenges.
I am convinced that building a constructive dialogue between Moscow and Washington based on principles of equality, mutual respect and taking into account our respective strategic interests addresses the interests of our peoples and the world community.
I wish you good health, prosperity and success in your responsibilities as head of state.
Sincerely,
Vladimir Putin
Original Russian:
Дональду Трампу, избранному Президенту Соединённых Штатов Америки
9 ноября 2016 года 11:30Поздравления
Уважаемый господин Трамп,
Примите искренние поздравления по случаю Вашей победы на выборах Президента Соединённых Штатов Америки.
Рассчитываю на совместную работу с Вами по выведению российско-американских отношений из кризисного состояния, а также по решению актуальных вопросов международной повестки дня и поиску эффективных ответов на вызовы глобальной безопасности.
Убеждён, что выстраивание конструктивного диалога между Москвой и Вашингтоном, основывающегося на принципах равноправия, взаимного уважения и реального учёта позиций друг друга, отвечает интересам народов наших стран и всего мирового сообщества.
Желаю Вам доброго здоровья, благополучия и успехов в столь ответственной деятельности во главе государства.
С уважением,
Владимир Путин
And now, Trump’s tax returns will be leaked showing his TREASONOUS dealings with foreign enemy govts. He will be disqualified as President and Pence will step in as a moderate Conservative!
Joe, NO! Will not happen.
It’s morning again in America! Glory to GOD in the highest! Thank you LORD for hearing our prayers and not abandoning us.
Chris, at best a dusky twilight. Misha is correct. Time for deep repentance for all of the ways our culture offends God and my own all too eager participation in it.
Glory to God for all things. This is part of His plan, now we need to get on board.
Also, I will let it be known that I for one, will hold Trump’s feet to the fire. But at the end of the day, if he solidifies our sovereignty and avoids the needless provocation of Holy Russia, I’ll be a happy man.
Trump will need two terms, and someone from his cabinet to win a third term, to really make a difference. Reagan’s first term was a struggle and Trump’s will be twice as hard, as the world is so much more complicated now.
What a difference we would experience, if Russia and America truly became allies, in regards to the war against Islamist terrorism.
Possibly. I can see Trump ruling by Executive Order and getting things done. Heck, just reversing all or most of Obama’s EOs will result in the shackles being stricken from the feet of the American economy.
In my own personal life, I feel like a great funk has been lifted.
George’s dream life revealed: “I can see Trump ruling by Executive Order and getting things done. Heck, just reversing all or most of Obama’s EOs.”
To make my “dream life” complete, I would ask to be Colonel-General of the new Praetorian Guard. Or perhaps Minister of Fear.
I’d even be happy being Ambassador Plenipotentiary to the Russian Federation in charge of organizing the counter-jihad.
Have you considered changing the name of this blog? It’s not really about Orthodoxy anymore. Has anyone noticed that?
From the start, this Blog was about Tradition, Culture and Politics, from a Rightist/Classical Liberal (with a some blood-and-soil thrown in) perspective.
It seems to be more of a alt-right site now. You should call it that and remove the graphics of any icons or symbols (Chi/Rho signs) etc.
People will come to this site thinking it is Orthodox, read the contents, and think this is what Orthodox believe and support, when nothing could be further from the truth.
The true faith resides here, and George tells it like it is. I couldn’t be more proud of him and is stellar representation of the Orthodox faith. Maybe you thought OCANEWS was Orthodox? Think again.
Peter
Peter, it’s funny how for such a long time OCANews bamboozled so many of us (myself included).
Let’s kick them all –The Wheel, Leonova’s Coven, OCANews, the Fordham Group–while they’re down.
Yup. Let’s do it.
“Peter, it’s funny how for such a long time OCANews bamboozled so many of us (myself included). ? ? ?
It’s NOT funny that they crushed an honorable protopresbyter and his spouse and family! AND PROBABLY TOAST THEIR DIRTY WORK AT THE WEDDING ANNIVERSARY CELEBRATIONS of the main player and his husband!
On that we agree. Could be the start of a beautiful relationship.
Seriously speaking, do you think he had a hand in what happened to him down in Florida? Somehow I think he did, but have no proof. Do you know anything?
Peter
Hello, your Grace,
Wasn’t this ” honorable protopresbyter” convicted of robbing another church after his previous scandalous behavior? Isn’t this ” honorable protopresbyter” an admitted thief?
No.
A refresher:
http://www.heraldtribune.com/news/20131021/man-pleads-guilty-to-embezzling-from-venice-church
Kondratick entered a guilty plea on Oct. 16 to a second-degree felony charge of larceny, court records show.
He agreed to serve two years of community control and eight years of probation……He will also pay restitution.
ANNOYED! George is a true patriot, and Christian, flawed as we all are, but pure in spirit in so far as his love of God and country, in my humble opinion.
We should appreciate the hours he puts into this Site every day, regardless if you agree or disagree with his topics. We are all free to “change the channel” if so inclined.
Actually, “Monomakhos” is a great name given all the particulars. “One who fights alone.”
George hosts an Orthodox website looking at this or that issue from an Orthodox perspective. That has always been what I thought the site was about. I have an FB page that has tried to do the same thing on and off regarding news stories of strategic interest during this Cold War between the West and Orthodoxy.
Trump is certainly an example of one who “fights alone”. He overturned the prevailing orthodoxy of the Republican establishment, took on political correctness at the national level, lived to tell about it, and actually won the election with enough coattails to leave him with a Republican congress and a judiciary that at least is not openly hostile to him.
That’s “prowess”. I wondered whether he had enough of it. He talks the talk. Yesterday we learned that he walks the walk. Machiavelli referred to it as virtu. “Prowess” is the closest English equivalent. Manly power. Dominant energy.
Now, make no mistake about this. I’m not endorsing him as a democratic leader or democracy. Far from it. But simply as a leader, I am impressed and . . . cautiously supportive.
Consider that Trump spent only exactly what he needed to in order to make the electoral map yield victory. Not a penny more. It is as if his team was Karl Rove on steroids. It was still debatable yesterday whether he even won the popular vote.
Yet he clearly wanted the presidency and clearly had vastly more money to spend on the project if he thought it was necessary. Hillary outspent him about 5:3. She had more in reserve as well, but she was completely convinced by her own bs and the echo chamber media that she had won up until the last week and by then it was too late to call in the financial cavalry.
That is truly amazing. In an age when we can look at a piece of property by google satellite photo almost in real time, you would expect the science of electioneering to be a high art. Trump mastered it. I have little doubt that if he wants to be reelected he can manage it without difficulty.
In the midst of it there was a spiritual lesson to be learned to which I tried to refer in my “Love of money” post. What got Hillary and all the other Progressives in trouble so that they could not see Trump coming was the same thing that causes them spiritual and moral illness – – their atheistic, Progressive-totalitarian worldview. Progress is their religion and Mammon is its chief idol.
That is the thing about Christians that really irritates them: Christians know that love of money is the root of all evil and that envy is just as dangerous as avarice. Trump has enough money that envy and avarice are not particularly tempting to him. A man that wealthy can’t really be bought.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lucius_Quinctius_Cincinnatus
I had no plans to vote yesterday, but, at the end, I went to the polling station and did my duty.
This is Chicago, after all.
When I came to the desk at the polling station, I inquired of the lady, “Pardon me, ma’am, if I have my death certificate on me, do I still need to register?”
LOL!!!
Me too, George! Guys who quote themselves are a laugh riot!
America and the world owes President-elect Donald J. Trump a debt of gratitude; he destroyed the corrupt Bush and Clinton dynasties. I worry about his economic plans to cut taxes and increase military spending. Our greatest President Calvin Coolidge proved that a president must cut taxes and cut spending to make America truly great. Our country can’t afford trillion dollar annual deficits ad infinitum.
Let’s hope President- elect Trump can successfully eradicate the cultural marxism endemic in our society. Believe it or not, one of the things Trump said many times during the campaign that I loved is that we will be saying, “Merry Christmas” again – not that I ever stopped.
President – elect Trump grew tremendously during this campaign. He’s not the same man as he was when he first began his run for the White House. He will govern very wisely and will have great advisers. How blessed we are to probably have Newt Gingrich as Secretary of State and Rudy Giuliani as our Attorney General. President – elect Trump will be a better president than Ronald Reagan; he has given us Mike Pence as his Vice- President while Reagan gave us the odious George H.W. Bush as his Vice – President. You know- Mr. No New Taxes.
By the way, instead of wearing those horrid pant suits, I think Lady Gangster will look fantastic in an orange prison suit. She needs to be prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law for her treasonous crimes against the United States of America.
This is my last post on this excellent forum, therefore I would like to conclude with these words- to Michael Stankovich: Mikie boy, I think you are one obnoxious, arrogant, pompous man. Mikie boy, you can take your self absorbed posts and shove them. Adios!
Mr. Millman,
If I had the chance to save your life, I would do it without without a thought, and if our God gave me the opportunity, your soul with tears. It ain’t about me, brotha. Peace.
There M.Stankovich goes again! Speaking in an idiom totally foreign to debate/argument on Monomakhos! Won’t he ever learn?
A new rebirth of freedom in the US, could only occur if the American government outlaws abortion again. Father delivering up the son unto death, is a step past the point of no return as far as true freedom is concerned. The right to life is the first God given human right, and without out it, all other human rights are rendered useless, because their dead. Jesus Christ stated these points of no return in His description of the time of the end. It will end, because the Holy God will not tolerate it, but will hurl His Just wrath upon these godless fools. 70 million and counting. Stop it or perish. The Word of the Lord never ever returns to Him void. All created in the image and likeness of God, do have a human spirit which is the only requirement to be considered worthy of the freedom given to each individual human creature. Us.
Whatever one may think about it being – or not being – a landslide in terms of the popular vote, consider this.
A candidate who had historically (almost unbelievably) high negatives managed to upset the apple cart of the Progressive socioeconomic and globalist agendas.
The message that in my opinion gets lost: The electorate, many of whom went directly against their natural political inclinations, was willing to overlook a great deal and risk the complacency of the devil they know in order to stop the havoc wrought by the Progressive Left.
It makes one wonder what a true, unquestionable landslide might have resulted had the candidate’s negatives been in more normal a range.
Regardless of what one thinks of Trump or his agenda, this is sign of hope.
George and Peter P: congratulations on your predictions. Peter was wrong about the landslide, but it was a comfortable Electoral College win, so, close enough as far as I’m concerned.
I was very wrong in my own prognostications, and have never been more glad to be wrong. As I said in my couple of posts on the subject, I thought Trump ran a bad campaign in key ways and had doomed himself to lose a winnable election, and lose it solidly (it was my anger about that that was talking in my predictions)– I said I hoped you were right but was sure you were wrong. I have usually been on the nose in my predictions of what is going to happen in major elections (you’ll have to take my word for it) so I was pretty glum coming into this election day. I knew I was right that Hillary was going to win in a walk, after all!
Again, I’m glad to have been wrong. I literally was dancing a jig to Irish music in my kitchen floor on election night. I hadn’t felt like that since 1980, to be honest. Every year I back an outsider for the GOP nomination, and every year we got a Bush or Dole or Romney or whatever. All I really cared about this year was keeping out a neocon patsey like Jeb and Rubio and company. Still would rather have had Rand, but I’ll gladly take Trump.
I still wish Trump had run a less self destructive campaign. Had he done so, I think he would also have won the popular vote and spared us some Gore-like whining, and probably Kelly Ayotte would have won, giving another Senator to bolster the upcoming wars over Trump’s nominations, but hey, a win is a win and I’ll take it.
The left will of course learn none of the right lessons from the shellackings of 2010, 2014, and now 2016.
Yes this year was a shellacking, too, because they claimed they were going to win in a landslide, take over the Senate, and maybe the House, and it wasn’t just wishful thinking — they really thought that — Mike Myers was being a very mainstream liberal Dem in his predictions here. We old fashioned sorts are, after all, on the wrong side of history and just need to hurry up and die off, don’t you know.
I for one am glad to have a President who won’t want to send me to a reeducation camp (er, “fun camp”) because of my retrograde views on marriage, gender, and the like. My ample gun collection is safe for the time being, my church won’t lose its tax exempt status and deductibility of donations, we might get a couple of decent Supreme Court justices, we might get some sanity to immigration, trade, and tax policy, Obamacare will likely die a well deserved death… the list of hopeful things is pretty long.
Now, I am going to pour a nice Icelandic vodka on the rocks and get back to my favorite occupation of the last 24 hours: browsing liberal websites, enjoying watching the precious little snowflakes melt down and clutch their pearls, to mix metaphors…
I wasn’t wrong about the landslide. Look again at the electoral votes. 300 and above is a landslide in my book.
Now if I can just get the good bishop to pay up that will make it all perfect.
Peter
Thank you Edward. However I still believe he won in a landslide given the final electoral college votes, but I am not going to quibble over that. He won, God answered the prayers of his people and we were given a reprive.
Like you I also will go back now and watch the precious little snowflakes continue to have their meltdown. They actually needed cry rooms, coloring books and therapy dogs to get through this. Wow!
Take buddy. Please pray for me enjoy the vodka. Now if the good bishop could send me the Irish Whiskey I’d enjoy a drink with you.
Peter
Edward,
In retrospect, I think Trump knew exactly what he was doing. When the full story is told, if his strategy ever comes out in detail, in print, before his re-election campaign, we will doubtless behold a magical matrix of political projection. To be that cock-sure and still have reserves, he had to have it figured down to the last household in the swing states he needed for the electoral win.
He is Archie Bunker, but with an IQ of about 160. He doesn’t speak or act like it. In some ways he seems very immature. He’s mastered the vocabulary he needed to do what he set out to do – close big deals.
This is just his latest deal.
As to what to expect: Best case scenario, like Putin’s Russia, worst case scenario, like Franco’s Spain. But really that depends on how much resistance he runs into and how adamant they are. He’s not a true fascist because he’s not a totalitarian. He has no illusions that the government, His Government, is God. Yet in some ways he is quasi-fascist, in the same way Putin is. Coming from me, this is not a criticism, mind you.
I expect that he will redraw the political map in America and that he will in no way shy away from whatever confronts him. That is his MO. He can also be expected to play chess well, if this election is any indication.
I doubt if either the Left, the Right, the Dems or Repubs, the Progressives or the Conservatives have any idea of what just happened to America. The Left feels it more strongly than the “Right” does here. They know that they got mauled royally, maybe fatally.
You have to understand: America has had no Right Wing. Recall what the term “Right” meant originally. It referred to those ministers in parliament most loyal to the crown; i.e., monarchists, who are unitary thinkers. They think in terms of national unity, not faction. Faction is just an annoyance.
Republicans were either Rockefeller or Reagan. But neither was really right wing in the pure sense of the term. Reagan played with libertarian economics and was adversarial to the welfare state. The Right has always been forthcoming with a measured welfare state. Largesse is leverage. Any king knows that. He needs healthy, loyal subjects.
William F. Buckley once wrote that “[A] Conservative is a fellow who is standing athwart history yelling ‘Stop!'” That is to say, someone who is simply trying to slow down “progress” because it is unsettling to him. Conservatives are not really rightists and that is why so many conservatives broke with Trump and were reluctant to support him. Some may have known what he is and thought, “That’s too radical. It’s not necessary to go that far.” Others just thought he was Archie Bunker with a microphone and a lot of money.
Trump is a Rightist. The Left can smell it. That’s why they’re going ballistic and marching.
Edward! You wrote this: “they claimed they were going to win in a landslide, take over the Senate, and maybe the House, and it wasn’t just wishful thinking — they really thought that — Mike Myers was being a very mainstream liberal Dem in his predictions here.”
I missed it, if Mike Myers ever claimed the Democratic party nominees were going to win in a landslide, take over the Senate and, maybe, the House! Mike Myers! Were those your predictions? They don’t sound to me like you at ALL!
Vladyka, there isn’t a search function on this site, so I can’t find the original post. I’m pretty sure that it was Myers who was giving detailed predictions down to the number of electoral college votes Hillary would get, what the final voting percentage would be, Senate and House predictions, etc. As I recall, he put it in all caps: FINAL ELECTION PREDICTIONS. It included a huge Hillary electoral college win and a Dem Senate takeover, as I recall. Don’t remember the House prediction, but most Dems were predicting a gain of 20 seats or more.
If it was someone else who did that, then I apologize to Mr Myers. I did, however, find at least one post where I said that I hoped Hillary lost but was confident she would win comfortably. Since at one point Peter P accused me (grouping me in with a list of other posters) of being a Hillary booster, I might as well link to it as long as it is in front of me.
Hillary supporter? I did that? I don’t remember ever insulting you like that, but if I did I greatly and sincerely apologize to you. That was never my intent. I would never have done that, and if I did I should never have. Please accept my apology if I even hinted at such a thing. Please forgive me Edward.
Peter
It happened, Peter, but no worries. It was a long election season that I am glad is over — especially given the result.
Edward,
Quick question. Which version of the KJV do you use? New Cambridge Paragraph Bible, American Bible Society version, Third Millennium Bible?
I am curious as all three have slight variations that appeal to different.
Let me know.
Thanks.
Peter A. Papoutsis
Peter, I have so many copies of the KJV that it is hard to keep them all straight — different sizes, different fonts, different kinds of paper, different kinds of layout. I probably own 30 copies if I own one — published at different times by different publishers throughout American and England. At different times and situations I will use different copies. Some date back to the 1800’s, others were recently printed. And quite frankly as far as the text is concerned, I never notice any differences between them.
Aside from some very minor priting corrections and spelling changes that took place in the the 18th and 19th c in England, the text of everything labeled KJV is the same — like the Byzantine text on which it is based, the KJV text has been remarkably stable through more than 400 years of printing. When I read a 1611 version, the only thing I notice is the occasional spelling difference. When I read a KJV from either England or America from the 19th century, I really don’t notice any differences at all, personally, because there aren’t any.
So what it then comes down to is what one’s eyes prefer in terms of font type and size, formatting, and paper size and type, and how extensive the footnotes and cross-references are. I personally do not care for paragraph-format Bibles, although I understand their theoretical appeal, and occasionally I will read out of one just for a change. But the two column traditional format is easy on my eyes and is what I have been used to using since I first learned to read using the KJV. I also generally don’t care for editions that have footnotes and cross-references, which I find to be distracting. I do like having those editions so I can look up cross references when I want to check a quotation or something, but for day to day reading I don’t care for them — I just want to read the text.
The edition I have used the most over the years is a World Bible publishing small format KJV with the most common features (cross-references, the traditional limited footnotes, a nice concordance, red letters, maps, etc.) that I received as a gift in college. It has been at my bedside for more than 30 years now.
At the moment, though, I have a few editions that I am using — all of which have in common a lack of cross-references and footnotes. In my chapel, I use a hard-back Oxford pew-Bible KJV with Apocrypha that dates back to the 1950s. I love the font, the paper is opaque, and it lays open nicely alongside my Slavonic Apostol and Slavonic Gospel. At my bedside, I am currently working through the KJV from front to back using a recent Barnes and Noble edition that has a nice font and the classic illustrations of Gustav Dore which I love. On my desk at work, I have a Thomas Nelson KJV printed in 1970. It’s appeal is that is the smallest format high quality KJV that I can find. It fits in a shirt pocket with ease. Everything on my desk is the smallest sizes I can find, for reasons of space — tiny molitvoslov, small chasoslov, small Slavonic Psalter, a very small Slavonic Gospel, a Jordanville English prayer book, the small green Boston Psalter…
I also have a copy of the marvelous edition of the KJV liturgical Gospel in Slavic format that was recently published by St. Polycarp Press (ROCOR Washington DC cathedral). I haven’t started going through it carefully, but it appears to be well-edited, and it at long last provides a liturgical Gospel using the KJV (Holoviak decided to go all-in with the NKJV some years ago — a real travesty).
The Third Millenium Bible is not the KJV — it is a pretty extensive KJV revision. But it does reflect the Byzantine text of the NT and LXX, just like the KJV, which is something. I have occasionally consulted it when I suspect that an English word has changed in meaning, but quite frankly when I need that kind of reference I instead almost always reach for one of two things:
1. George Ricker Berry’s interlinear edition of the KJV. The KJV is found in the outside column of each page, and the Greek Byzantine text is found with an interlinear English word for word translation. There are some KJV extremists who object to Berry’s work because his interlinear differs in places from the KJV, but that is because there are some words that have changed in meaning since 1611 and because there are a few mistranslations in the KJV. And any interlinear is going to have weaknesses, just by definition, since word-for-word translation is a limited technique. But it is a great reference.
2. The commentaries of Blessed Theophylact of the 4 Gospels (and a few of the epistles) translated by Fr. Christopher Stade. Fr. Christopher appropriately uses the KJV for his text, since it is virtually identical to the Greek text used by St. Theophylact, but he notes and corrects those very few places where English words have changed in meaning, notes the even rarer places where the KJV mistranslated something, and of course the rare as hens-teeth places where the KJV base text has a slight difference from the Byzantine liturgical text. The beauty of having a corrected KJV text where needed, plus interspersed authoritative patristic commentary on each passage — well, that is priceless.
My main objection to the 3rd Millenium Bible is that it dramatically over-revises the KJV. It changes a host of things that aren’t at all necessary for clear comprehension, and it is a stylistic travesty as a result. I suspect that this was a financial decision made in order to make it a work where the text itself could be copyrighted — to do that, you have to have alterations in virtually every verse The editors do fix most of the few problems in the KJV that come from changes in word meaning in particular, but they wantonly destroy the beauty and power of the text itself in the process. I find it hard to read.
I of course don’t need to even mention the travesty that is the so-called “New King James.” It has virtually nothing in common with the text of the KJV other than being based on the Byzantine text. Calling it the “New King James” was a mere marketing tool, of which the editors should have been greatly ashamed. It combines the stylistic problems of the NIV with the textual problems of the RSV. Yes, it is better than either because of getting the text right, but both it and the 3rd Millenium Bible were incredible wastes of time and effort.
And both reflect a money-grubbing attitude all too common among Bible publishers. It remains a huge shame that Fr. Gilquist, because of his long-standing connections with Thomas Nelson, drove the acceptance of this very poor proprietary text as part of the “Orthodox Study Bible.”
I agree with your assessments except for the paragraph format. That works for me.
I also have a nice KJV collection albeit not as nice or old as yours.
The King James Version I settled on was the New Cambridge Paragraph Bible with the Apocrypha.
I also use George R. Berry’s interlinear, and have Blessed Theophylact commentaries.
I now use both the KJV and RSV as my two go to Bibles.
I agree with you about the OSB, but still have hope that it and other versions will be made available to us as English-Speaking Orthodox Christians.
Take care.
Peter
Edward,
If you happen to come across an American Bible Society King James Bible with the Apocrypha publication date January 1, 1965 let me know. As I am looking to buy this Bible very badly.
Thanks and take care.
Peter A. Papoutsis
Edward’s recollection about an all caps FINAL etc. heading is mistaken. That was MMGA, I think. Who George has now banned for some odd reason.
The mathematical details Edward gloats about were playfully added for verisimilitude, which I’d have thought was obvious. It never occurred to me that he or anybody else might think that those of us who played this game wanted to be regarded as pre-cognitive, to the decimal point. My first map with vote breakdown was mostly meant to mock Peter’s P.’s continually posted pseudo-pre-cognitions of a Trump landslide. (HRC is already beyond Gore’s 2000 popular vote margin of 544,000, and the count isn’t over.)
The bottom line is that unlike the far more cynical George, the Peters and some others here, I hoped more Americans would reject a campaign explicitly built on lies, division, fear and hate-mongering and would turn out to vote than actually did. I don’t regret hoping.
The popular vote margin is irrelevant. As one writer noted, it is the score to a game neither side was playing, analogous to pointing out that the losing team of a football game gained more total yardage — an interesting stat, often correlative with scoring touchdowns and winning, but not necessarily.
We will never know who would have won an election where the point was to rack up as many popular votes as possible nationwide, since neither side based their strategies on that metric. Maybe Hillary would have won, maybe Trump.
Nor will any presidential candidate ever campaign with that strategy, since the Electoral College isnt going anywhere..
Mike Americans did reject a campaign built on lies, division, fear and hate mongering.
Your Grace, as a matter of fact I have to confess that I did quantify two hopes about a Clinton win/Trump defeat and a Democratic majority in the Senate on this vile blog. (I never used the word “prediction.” Since I don’t have a crystal ball, lack contact with meta-khairotic heptapods, and am not privy to or worthy of Divine revelations.)
These two hopes were quantified here and here. Both hopes were explicitly based right off the bat on a premise — about turnout, one more robust than the other. Neither premise panned out, and my hopes were therefore disappointed. In fact, aggregate Democratic turnout for presidential elections has fallen twice now since its peak in 2008, and this was the worst of the three. I had thought a fact about a certain warrant would be made public and galvanize Democratic/Independent and ‘rogue’ Republican turnout. It’s been little-covered. I wonder if even .01% of Americans know about it. The rest is history, but this plot is thickening. (Aggregate Republican turnout has been stable over this period.)
I never entertained serious hopes that the Democratic party would regain a House majority, as you can see above.
An informal remark here was partly correct and limited to calling a Clinton win. Of course she did win the popular vote, and it looks like she may well surpass Gore’s 544,000 PV win in 2000, the last time this PV/EC split happened. One recalls how well that turned out.
Edward is casting out his line with a bit of sly sorcery as bait (note his innuendo, linked up to some clearly articulated paranoias — this is typical with him). So I need to correct his misrepresentation of my position, the basics of which I’ve made clear in past chats with him. (Maybe he thinks I was lying then.) I’m a passionate centrist, not a liberal these days. Haven’t been for many years. I don’t fall into a neat slot of such political clichés. I work hard to avoid veering off from sanity in either direction. I try, quite incompetently, to follow Jesus and the prophets as I understand their message. My politics in a nutshell.
I hope you are well, Vladykho! Please pray for me, a sinner.
Mike, I apologize for calling you a liberal or grouping you on the left if that is not how you define yourself. I really don’t remember conversations in which you defined yourself on the political spectrum, but I will take your word for it. I also consider myself to be more center-right than far right, but I feel confident that many on the general left would choose the latter term to describe my views. To a certain extent it depends on where one is standing when making observations, so perhaps one can be forgiven for such mistakes.
To say that I am using sly sorcery and innuendo without saying which parts constituted such is itself innuendo. Just thought I’d point that out. My only “innuendo” about you personally is that your very specific numbers posted here reflected pretty accurately what Democrats were expecting on election day. Had you not posted such specific numbers, I would have had no reason to mention you. Although I now of course regret having done so. I thought I remembered more than 2 posts, and a final one on November 7 clearly labeled as a prediction, but I take you at your word and must be mixing you up with someone else, so I again apologize.
I admit to being paranoid about the left’s cultural agenda and theit aggressive use of the federal bureaucracy and other institutions to push it, and also admit to using intentional hyperbole (it’s a very human defence mechanism). That paranoia is in part a result of having lived through decades of the lefts tactics, which Rod Dreher has described as “the law of merited impossibility.” Namely, whenever the left is trying to push through step 1, and opponents are saying it will lead to steps 2 and 3, such concerns are dismissed as ridiculous paranoia. Then, when steps 2 and 3 do actually happen, the left shouts down complaints. Prime example is the path to gay marriage and other identity issues. Those innocently asking if someone could eventually be sued and lose their business for declining to bake a cake for a gay wedding, or imagining a world in which the president would send out a directive to the nation’s public schools on biological males being allowed to use the girls restrooms — well, back in the late 90s they would have been laughed at and derided for paranoia.
Or as Dreher sums up the law of merited impossibility: “it will never happen… and when it does, you bigots will deserve it.”
MIKE MYERS, You could have saved yourself a lot of time and worry if you just went with Geda the Chinese Prophet Monkey’s prediction of a Trump victory!
Go Geda!
Funny, but after all theses months of expert opinions from so many wise and elite leftist, A MONKEY STUMPS AND TRUMPS THEM ALL. These are definitely stange days we live in indeed!
An update on the 2016 vote: it’s going to exceed the 2012 turnout for sure in raw numbers and may exceed 2008. Millions of votes in SF and LA not counted yet.
But still 10-15 million short of what I’d hoped for, unfortunately, and on which I’d based the mocking and wildly optimistic map and the other more realistic one. It looks like the percentage of eligible voters who actually voted, either on election day or before, will turn out to be lower than in the last two elections. Interesting fact: Orange County, CA went blue for the first time since Roosevelt.
MIKE MYERS, Your candidate lost, even with all the dead and illegal aliens that “voted” for her she is still a loser. California plays by it’s own rules, they probably should leave the union, in disgrace. No matter how many paragraphs of hot air you produce Clinton lost, it’s over. I know it’s a tough pill for you to swallow, but come back and post after Trump puts more real jobs on the map, for American citizens, instead of catering to social issues for the 10% of Americans who would destroy America. Ironically we are saving them from themselves. Unless they like taking large leaps from tall buildings, or would like to see all of America turn into Mexico, like California is starting to. Not to mention befriending Russia, instead of threating them, I sure don’t want WW3. AND no I will not bring up Geda the Chinese Prophet Monkey again ,out of mercy for you!
Out.
Adios! Au revoir, ausfeidersen! (With apologies to the late Lawrence Welk.)
Thanks, Mike. Will (continue to) do!
Reince Priebus will be Chief of Staff. He’s Greek Orthodox. German father, Sudanese mother of Greek heritage. German/Greek/Orthodox, that’s almost Russian. I like him already.
George,
You Greeks sure do get around!
http://www.pravoslavie.ru/english/98617.htm
Steve Bannon is Chief Strategist and Senior Counselor (translation: “consigliere”). Here’s his bio, alt right connections.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stephen_Bannon
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alt-right
Think I’m off the mark?
Слава Трампу! Слава Победе!
I for one am ecstatic. The office of Chief of Staff is a tactical one. Priebus fits the bill. The office of Counselor to POTUS is a strategic one. Big picture. Steve Bannon fits that bill.
The left have lost their mind with the Bannon pick. They are all just short calling him the seed of Adolf Hilter. Actually quite amusing watching them lose it. I’ve heard that Kleenex tissue, and Costco toilet paper are selling of the shelves, poor teared and soiled leftist.
The choice of Bannon is a brilliant master-stroke.
I see some things don’t change. Bannon isn’t the seed of Hitler. Just potentially America’s Goebbels. I actually agree that it is a brilliant master-stroke, as an obedience test for fascism. I pretty much agree with the stakes laid out in this storified tweet storm.
https://storify.com/kryzja_coney/obedience-tests-582b331750d463154466a732
“There is never one single test, a poll asking “is it ok to kill Jews?”
“Instead: a series of tests, each edging toward atrocity, each relying on the previous one to have normalized the outcome of this one.”
“That last obedience test always happens. And: fascism moves faster than you expect. It doesn’t take long for the ramp to reach it.”
“How long? It took Hitler, in an age before instant ubiquitous communication, 4 months to lead up to that question.”
“Fascism moves, let us say, 5 times faster than you expect. You don’t have 4 months, you have 24 days before that last exam question.”
FR. HANS JACOBSE, Your post is 100% right on the mark. Traditional Judeo/Christian American values have been turned completely upside down. I know I am not a racist, yet if I show my support for Trump in San Francisco I would be one, according to the enlighten leftist. I would also be a, mysoginist, homophobe, Islamophobe, etc. Diversity only works one way for the leftist. THEIR WAY! HYPOCRITES! Speak your mind, and you might lose your job, or any advancement. Wear your cross, or say Merry Christmas, you might offend. Ask your lawmakers to uphold our immigration laws, your a racist. Ask a man to leave the ladies room you may start a fight, and get arrested, but not the man. Father walk down the street with your collar on, watch the snickers, and hear the whispers “child molester”, after all CNN says so. The majority of leftist think us fools ,and hypocrites for our belief in God, we are uneducated hicks, they the enlighten, who will save us from ourselves.
Say what you want of Trump, and his sins,(which never killed anyone) but he has given voice to the majority of the silent American, who has been overlooked, ignored, and vilified, by both political parties. Hopefully more Americans will come out and vote in the future. Only about a third of Americans vote. Time to get off our couches, put down the remotes, and get America back to those traditional values that made us great. Politicians only take notice with our votes. Ten to twenty percent of Americans who make up this death cult, should not control the majority of American policies.
Father, it is also important to note that Nietzsche’s premise for the transvaluation of all values was the rejection of the Cross and all that goes with it.
He saw Christianity as weak , regressive and the doom of humanity.
Historically, hatred and of the Cross by those in power is linked to tyrannical leaders and governments.
One rarely sees a 100% correlation of any two things in history but blatant rejection of Christ and His Cross and tyranny comes real close.
The Democrats do that in their platform, in their politicians and those who run the party. The fact that they are proposing an Islamic politician who has not, to my knowledge, rejected Sharia Law is yet another indication of the tyranny they embrace.
Nate, the fascism is on the Democrat side.
Soros, a known Nazi collaborater; the affinity they seem to have with Islam(Islamic governments were allies and collaboraters with the Nazi regime).
The fact that Slick Willy chose Pascha to bomb the capitol of an Orthodox country in support of Islamic thugs and their takeover of Kosovo should also be noted.
At the very least the Democrats are ideologs who always govern tyrannically because they are absolutely sure that they know what is best for you.
Ideology is a Procrustean Bed. Ideological leaders will always kill to achieve their aims and kill without compunction(abortion, assisted suicide, euthanasia, wars)
Trump is a vulgar man apparently lacking in Christian virtue. But he is not an ideolog . He may not follow through on his promises because he is a pragmatist. We have gotten so used to thinking in ideological terms that such pragmatism is seen as a vice and as a betrayal. I fell prey to that myself.
Trump is not a fascist. Neither is he a puppet.
The selection of Priebus as Chief of Staff may be a case of “keep your friends close, but your enemies closer”.
An ideolog would have never made such a selection. Unfortunately the ideologs of the Right such as Mark Levin and Michael Savage have already thrown Trump’s whole Presidency out the window because of that.
I too was set to do the same. I believe I was wrong.
Historically, factually and rationally your charge of fascism against Trump is simply untrue. In fact I will go so far as to say the majority of the charges leveled at Trump by his ideological opponents are simply projections of their own beliefs and behavior in similar circumstances.
There have been maybe three Presidents in American history with a similar personality to Trump’s but they were all life long politicians who consciously worked their way up the political ladder.
Trump is unique. When we try to stuff him in the same box, we are wrong. Big reason Hillary lost.
BTW kudos to Michael Moore for forcefully countering the racist charge levied against Trump supporters. In this case he had the heart and courage to speak the truth.
Nate, our freedom comes from embracing the Cross and being obedient to Him, in love. All ideology is shackles and slavery because ideology creates, in fact is, an idol. Political, religious, economic, social ideologies bury the truth and poison our hearts.
Heresy is fundamentally ideology. When we give ourselves over to it we begin serving lies.
When we oppose an ideology with another ideology we are still serving lies. The wheat and the tares grow together in our hearts to be sure, but ideology fertilizes and attempts to harvest the tares.
May our Lord have mercy on us.
Father Hans, No doubt inverted applies better. The good news is that more and more people are noticing the insanity of leftist’s policies. One simple example are our sanctuary cities, and the protection of not just criminal aliens, but violent criminal aliens, why would we not want to send violent criminal aliens back to Mexico. There simply is no argument to keep them, yet the leftist insist upon us doing so. If a legal immigrant, not yet a citizen, commits a felony they are usually deported. Truth is the leftist just want as many illegal aliens brought in, so they can become votes in the future. Liberalism is suicide for the mind, body, and soul, and now they can be called traitors as well. Borders, language, culture must not be destroyed by the invasion of Illegals pouring into our country. We must preserve our traditional American culture before it is inverted, and perverted any more!
Interesting Nate, I see fascism much more strongly at work in the so-called ” left” and the neo-cons(those who oppose Trump) than I do in Trump.
Clearly fascism and nihilism have a long history in us. The strange combination of Calvinism, neo-Platonic idealism and the utopian dream have perverted the American soul since the beginning.
There has always been an element of fascism in our government. Participatory government always tends toward tyranny because it tends to create anarchy.
As good Americans, we tend to want to make other people perfect and we fall prey to the delusion of progress expecting, even demanding we always get better. Not good preparation for embracing the Cross.
In the course of justice, none if us should see salvation.
Come oh merciful Lord!
Despite my many misgivings with some of your posts, Michael Bauman, you still strike me as a person that when the writing is truly on the wall would probably rise to the occasion. In other words, I can see you hiding Jews or Muslims in your attic.
If you did, I would not confide that to posters on this board, for many of them, I an equally convinced they would turn you in in a heartbeat.
Nate, probably wouldn’t get that far. Christians will be picked off first and I don’t have an attic. Under a Democrat control, the government would likely use jihadists to come for us. I hope I would welcome them with cries of Al-Masih qam!
I have a profound mistrust of Muslims primarily due to the experience of the people in my parish that has been passed down and the direction of a priest who is first generation US in how to respond to the Muslims moving into my neighborhood. Personal experience too. If they would uncategorically deny Sharia law has any importance or value, I would at least listen. Islam us inherently fascist.
I did play Otto Frank, Anne Frank’s father, in high school. The utter steadfastness of his faith is what got them through the attic experience and it is no accident he was the only one who survived the camps and that experience was important in leading me to Christ. They were the chosen people through whom God Incarnated and deserve that honor, though they sure do not like us staying in the Holy Land.
I also spent my whole senior year in college reading Nietzsche and his principle commentators trying to understand him. That too was significant in confirming me toward Christ.
You do not really understand fascism.
The neo-cons and the progressives embody the philosophy. While there are certainly some who support Trump who are fascist, the man himself does not seem to be. He is too pragmatic.
The fact that fascism is part of the US character makes it impossible to avoid it entirely. If you have a doubt just read Ralph Waldo Emerson and compare him to Nietzsche. Scary.
Manifest Destiny, the refusal to enforce the treaty rights of Native Americans have fascistic elements. Simply asserting that a government has the right and the duty to establish and defend it’s borders and culture, within the law, is basic to civilization.
Equating that with fascism is ridiculous.
There is no question that the global economy is fascist, but Trump wants to temper that. Killery was all in favor. One of the fundamental reasons she ignored the problems of the Rust Belt and the rest of us in economic depression is because she honestly does not see us as important to the global economy with its neo-fascist cabals.
I think it cannot be over emphasized that George Soros supported Hillary, not just with money but strategically. Hillary would have handed the US over lock stock and barrel.
Took me almost too long to realize it myself.
Michael is right, I suppose. One could characterize the Davos/SDG[Strategic Development Goals] crowd as fascists. They are most certainly totalitarian. The only god they believe in is the State, ideally one world government. Internationally, they seem to be attempting to mobilize industry, agriculture and information into a single fasces (bundle) on a worldwide basis, without consideration of the economic or moral well being of the nation-states affected, in order to propagate their socio-economic ideology.
That is indeed fascism. They just replace the nation-state with the globe. Globalization.
Boy have you got it wrong, Nate.
I completely agree with Michael. It’s the Church which is in the cross-hairs of the NWO. Zionists and Jihadis are the shock troops. Don’t believe me? Then why is Imam Obama letting in only Moslems from Syria into the US? And yes, for all practical purposes 99% being Moslem constitutes “all”.
I agree 100%
George Michalopulos wrote
And enough people like you who actually believe that, and a President like Trump in power, is how we end up with concentration camps of Muslims and Jews in the United States. Remember Korematsu was never actually overturned. There is a bitter amusement that the late Justice Scalia saw a revival as a sad inevitability, and the same ones who freaked out about his musings out of wild conspiracy fears of FEMA camps and the like are the same ones who would be cheering for the type of camps the US would actually end up with.
Because Congress doesn’t care enough to change the procedures of taking refugees through a UN pipeline that in the case of Syria, is heavily weighted to Muslims for a variety of reasons? As usual, you are so poorly informed on the issues that you are easily led by conspiracy theories. However, that problem is being fixed, instead of continuing to take a small number of Syrian refugees and adding a more proportional number of Christians into the mix, the US simply won’t take any refugees at all.
Monomakhos is a site that revels in selective dehumanization, and George Michalopulos bears the brunt of the responsibility for this. “orcish hordes”, “barbarous races of the world”, “shock troops”, this language is the drum beat to a steady march that ends in mass killings and genocide.
What did you say immediately after the election, ah yes:
I think we all know what an appropriate outfit for a Minister of Fear is.
Hi Nate,
I was wondering how your protest of a totally legitimate election is going. How are the puppies, pacifiers, milk and cookies, diapers, kleenexes, and coloring books working out for you and the rest of the libtards?Of course, you can always move to Mexico.
Fr. Hans Jacobse seems to think I’m a progressive because I am opposed to encroaching fascism. If that’s the low bar to be branded as a progressive these days, so be it. I guess my ‘Progressive’ armband can sit above the Muslim one and below the Jewish one.
Personally, Fr. Jacobse, I think you might want to be a little less concerted with transgender bathroom issues, and a little more concerned with the imminent and growing danger to the Arab-American Christians in your own archdiocese amid a growing tide of white nationalism. It’s not like there haven’t been warning signs:
http://www.cnn.com/2016/08/16/us/tulsa-arab-american-shooting-trnd/
The transgender community isn’t coming for your parishioners. Whether or not the Breitbart combox mob does remains to be seen.
I challenge you this, Fr. Jacobse, what is your breaking point for your conscience? I mean surely there must be a point at which your assured denouncements of political correctness and cultishness fade off into growing horror as realization dawns on you? At what point will that be Fr. Jacobse? Would you be aghast at a mandatory government registration database of Muslims? If not, what if we add anyone of Middle Eastern ancestry because who can be sure about ‘those people’? If that crosses a line in the sand for you, does a person like Bannon in the halls of power make that scenario more or less likely?
Congratulations, you don’t have to worry about a Hillary Administration. But it is clear you haven’t done nearly, nearly enough worrying about the implications of the Trump Administration.
If history has taught us anything, it is that your failure to do so could be a matter of life and death to people that I know you love and care about.
Fr. Jacobse, you didn’t even bother to get my name right, I think that your disinterest in actually seriously engaging me in a conversation can be well assumed. Your blithe dismissal of my concerns about the well-being of your own flock, and branding me a cultist is on your own head. I pray to God that I am wrong, but I fear you have unpleasant awakenings in your future.
As to what you are picking out as a salient point: the “Arab Spring” has been over for a long time, but the end of the US worsening matters in the Middle East is far from a forgone conclusion: do you deny that it looks like the Trump Administration is going to have its share of Iran hawks? That if the deal with Iran is torn up we face a potential nuclear arms race between Iran and the Saudis?
No, improvement is far from assured. Although what does seem assured, is that under Trump, there will be no sanctuary for Middle-Eastern Christians in the US, even if things continue to go south for them. Bannon in the White House does not make it more likely that might change, quite the opposite.
Nate,
From your perspective, given your assumptions, I will agree with you that Trump is a “fascist” of a sort. I doubt he is a racist, but he may be ethnocentric and he will likely disfavor affirmative action, the “black lives matter” stuff, and race baiting in general. Rightists are not amused by such things at all.
As to Middle Eastern Christians, Trumps remarks of record apply to Muslims, not Christians. The headhunters and the ones that go boom are the ones we’re concerned about.
And regarding this “Fascism”, progressives brought it upon themselves and have only themselves to thank for it. In selling out white blue collar workers to MNC’s, progressives committed the unforgivable sin. That was their original base.
They themselves made it necessary for a non-progressive to come in and save these people from globalism. The fact that in doing so, this non-progressive thereby assembles a coalition and policy framework reminiscent of fascism is simply the logical result of progressive shenanigans.
Be careful of what you wish for, you will surely get it.
Misha, isn’t it ironic that the “worker’s parties” of both the US and Great Britain sold out their white working class base in favor of multiculturalist gangs and grievance groups? And the “conservative parties” of both countries adopted the cultural Marxist stances regarding traditional religion?
Misha,
You weren’t paying close enough attention to Trump’s statements. A blanket ban on Muslims no matter what country they come from, but a ban on anybody from, his words, “from any nation that has been compromised by terrorism”
From Meet the Press back in July:
Donald Trump said his latest proposal to stop immigration “from any nation that has been compromised by terrorism” is an “expansion” of his blanket ban on Muslims, in an interview aired Sunday.
“I actually don’t think it’s a rollback. In fact, you could say it’s an expansion,” Trump told NBC’s Chuck Todd on “Meet the Press.” “I’m looking now at territory. People were so upset when I used the word Muslim. Oh, you can’t use the word Muslim. Remember this. And I’m OK with that, because I’m talking territory instead of Muslim.”
Are you going to suggest to me with a straight face that label isn’t going to apply to Syria, Lebanon and Iraq?
George,
It all kind of makes sense if you look at how capitalism works. If you draw a circle and say this is the arena in which it operates, what capitalism does is pay workers less than the end value of their labor. The value added is the profit to which the capitalist is entitled by his ownership. Without redistribution of wealth, this has the effect of perpetually impoverishing the lower class. So eventually, within this arena, some sort of reform or revolution takes place which creates a welfare state, moving money from the upper to lower classes. Earlier in history, each country was an arena. Now, capital is decidedly multinational and not tied down by nation-states. Thus the internal redistributions of wealth that civilized capitalism within each arena are no longer effective globally. There is no effective international system of redistribution or minimum wage or union activity to humanize capitalism.
That Beast is what Soros and the Globalists are championing, unbridled international capitalism. They are socialists in name only. They like socialist policies in their home countries but are also more than happy to allow capitalist exploitation to operate in the third world to the detriment of their own workers at home.
That’s what makes them especially despicable people.
What Putin did in Russia, and what Trump seeks to do in the United States, is protect their respective national economies from the amoral economic vultures called “globalists”, “oligarchs” or MNC’s. It is not that international business is evil per se. It is simply that it must be harnessed in each nation state for the good of the people therein. International business cannot be allowed to become an unregulated international sovereign.
Once Russia re-establishes Assad firmly in power, it will be safe for Syrian Christians to go home. They were not being admitted to the West in any significant numbers in any case. It was mostly Muslims who were coming.
Regardless, until we can sort out who is who, better safe than sorry.
Nate,
You are correct; Father Hans didn’t get your name right. He should have addressed you as Nincompoop.
Father Hans is accusing Mike of being in a cult! This is a serious charge from an Antiochene Presbyter, since they keep watch over their lips! Is that the cult that teaches that mocking the disabled for laughs is beneath contemptible?
George! ho do you consider to be “the working party?” I didn’t see any Socialist Workers’ Party’s candidate on the ballot, yet you wrote,
“Misha, isn’t it ironic that the “worker’s parties” of both the US and Great Britain sold out their white working class base in favor of multiculturalist gangs and grievance groups?” Tell us more! Do you consider that the Democratic Party is the party of the white working class, then?
Fritz,
It seems to have abandoned that role in favor of globalist outsourcing, hence their defection to our president-elect.
Nate, the murder of our Antiochian brother, Khalid, here in Tulsa, which you cite to Fr. Hans as an example of potentially growing threats of white nationalism to Father’s Lebanese members is ill-conceived. You should know that Khalid’s killer is not only angry and deranged but a homosexual living with his “spouse” and, while white, ignorant and bigoted, is not to my knowledge a representative of white nationalism.
lxc+
Father Jacobse, quite honestly I can’t accept the compliment implied in your apparent confusion here, conflating me with Nate Trost. Among my other shortcomings in such a comparison, I’m far less patient and charitable than Nate. Sadly. I’m flattered, though.
Permit me a little segue. As you probably know, Pope Francis recently visited Sweden. A month before that journey to mark the 500th anniversary of Luther’s Reformation, he had some things to say, in honest, respectful and insightful dialogue with Ulf Jonsson, Jesuit priest and editor-in-chief at the Swedish magazine Signum.
I’d like to call your attention to this excerpt from words he spoke during that dialogue. :
As you know the Holy Father referred to these words, which have come down to us clothed in Koine garments. They were reported by his contemporaries as attributable to the Holy Apostle James, known in your Tradition as the Brother of God.
καὶ ἡ γλῶσσα πῦρ, ὁ κόσμος τῆς ἀδικίας, ἡ γλῶσσα καθίσταται ἐν τοῖς μέλεσιν ἡμῶν, ἡ σπιλοῦσα ὅλον τὸ σῶμα καὶ φλογίζουσα τὸν τροχὸν τῆς γενέσεως καὶ φλογιζομένη ὑπὸ τῆς γεέννης.
Hearken to them, Father Jacobse.
Over.
p.S.
I
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Now, with my prior two posts as preface, I think I can paradoxically reply, in the context they supply, to your apparently erroneous addressing of me, Fr. Jacobse.
First, I want to get something off my chest. Your crass insensitivity to Nate Trost, your deafness to and arrogant dismissal of his worries about the fates of millions of Americans is appalling, frankly. I’m 100% sure they’re shared by God only knows how many millions here and around the world, people in immediate danger now and others who may be next. Not to mention all those who are probably safe enough but nevertheless deeply concerned about these others, and whose very real charity and hospitality you seem to dismiss with evident contempt. And your horribly bad habit of ascribing views and opinions to others, without any reasonable cause, and then wagging your finger at them for it is repulsive, too. You remind me of a bad cop planting evidence.
All of this is only the more disturbing in the context of your perfectly evident approval of George’s Der Stürmer style of bigotry and ugly caricaturing, on a blog which certainly seems to have your informal imprimatur, and that of Fr. Webster, too.
I said perfectly evident because I’ve never read here so much as one rebuke by you of his grotesque excesses — the occasional depravity and obscenity in his essays, or the incessant indifference to truth and falsehood, or his lack of respect for elementary probity about facts, both there and in his comments. The hideously crude and at best poshlost tone of his “painting in broad strokes,” as he puts it. Of course you may have admonished him privately about this, if you notice it and care. I don’t know. But here’s one thing I do know: all of these problems have only grown worse. At least they seem worse to me, from the baseline of reading and participating here on and off for more than five years.
Although I’m speaking just for myself now, I doubt I’m alone in thinking this: you are a truly terrible listener and grossly incompetent in dialogue. At least in this medium. Reading you and some others here, I often wonder if what can seem like soliloquies masquerading as communication events are nothing but a conscious pose, almost a running joke, a house anti-style. A vicious mockery.
Back to your very odd selection of a “salient point”:
A couple of preliminary questions for you, before I respond to the above, where I am paradoxically addressed by you. If not in dialogue, in something or other. You’re real big on labeling and categorizing. Why do you qualify foreign policy here with “neocon” and “liberal?” One of the many reasons I ask is that I know for a fact that you were all in when it came to criticizing those of us who exercised our rights, in a representative democracy, to dissent against the rush to invade and occupy Iraq at the time of that debacle. Was the foreign policy acted out then “liberal”? A closely related question: Was the foreign policy acted out in the same region during the Reagan Administration “liberal?” Please define “liberal.” Define neo-con too while you’re at it, if you’d be so kind.
Actually, Trump shared Fr. Hans Jacobse’s support of the Iraq War at the time it began, his false claim of being against it from the start was one of the most rebutted elements of the whole election. Not that he didn’t keep repeating the fiction.
But what has Bannon said here?
http://www.hollywoodreporter.com/news/steve-bannon-trump-tower-interview-trumps-strategist-plots-new-political-movement-948747
I look forward to Fr. Hans Jacobse again calling me a cultist for my criticism of Bannon, in this case for having reservations about the cavalier use of Satan as a positive role model by a man in a prime support position to the most powerful office in the world.
Fr. Hans,
Rather, I would think, my argument would be that you deserve disapproval because you are not sufficiently sensitive to the the need of the salvation of millions of Americans, being that you are, after all, first and foremost an Orthodox priest. Your calling is patristic, not the “cutting edge” of society and “religion.” I have said to you many times, if you devoted a quarter as much time to a pursuit of the Holy Fathers as you obviously pursue the Christian Right polemic – so full of agendized jingo, if I did not your writings were of an Orthodox priest, I would presume it to be a heterodox politician – you would be a significant voice in the church. Instead, you choose to be perceived as far-right obscurity. Why your bishop allows this says either says much about your bishop, or much about your obedience.
Fr. Hans,
Here’s a translation for you so you understand what’s behind the verbiage:
“We’re apoplectic and preemptively ‘terrified’ that that mean Nazi Trump will come for our delicate fairy souls.”
End translation.
Bannon, Sessions and Flynn . . . shew . . . straight, 176-proof Balkan with a Cuban cigar.
Ever see Tombstone with Kurt Russell?
Ah, the Iraq War. We’re still fighting that one aren’t we?
My take on it is that at the end of the day, it is better to have a Shiite dominated Iraq than a Sunni dominated Iraq.
Divide and conquer.
However, as I said from day one of the Second Iraq War, we should not for a minute indulge in “nation building”. That was our fatal mistake. Decapitate, reorganize, pull troops back to the oil fields. The illusive, fools-errand push for democratization was the problem that caused all that carnage. The Neo-Con Abyssal.
But, God takes lemons and makes lemonade. Now Iraq is Shiite and can be a force against the ISIS/Sunni/al-Qaida/Saudi Axis.
Fr. Hans,
Progressivism is worse than a cult. It took over the Democratic Party after JFK’s assassination, worked against Conservatism during Reagan’s efforts to defeat “the evil empire” since it was pro-communist, and after the collapse of the Soviet Union, it became an ideology hell-bent on world domination no less than the Soviets and Nazis.
When you look at the UN’s Sustainable Development Goals and the Left’s cooperation (the Samantha Powers doctrine) with the neo-cons in the defense of radical Islam and spread of Western democracy by military force, it is hard to come to any other conclusion but that they intend to form one world government by force and impose their sick, twisted values on humanity.
It is indeed strange that they are in collusion with Sunni Islam, but that is clearly the case in the Middle East. One might assume it is a bit like the Ribbentrop pact and will be breached eventually, but in the meantime the Progressives and Sunni Islam are the main antichrists on earth today. Neither of them are any less dangerous than the Bolsheviks or Nazis.
That is why I believe in fighting them by any means necessary. If Nicholas II had made Lenin an offer he couldn’t refuse when he returned from Germany, or Hindenburg had done the same to Hitler early on, history might be different. Alas, not every good person has the will to pull the trigger when necessary.
I suppose I have projected a bit regarding Trump. I don’t really know whether he has the right stuff, whether he can reform American culture permanently by disarming his opponents by any means necessary. He should have plans ready to make irrefusable offers to Soros, Sulzberger et al.
Agreed, Fr: a reprieve. I said this as much in the days leading up to the election. The trajectory is still downward despite Trump’s stunning victory. The next four years are nothing but a reprieve so that we can get our individual spiritual, economic and personal houses in order.
If however I am wrong and we are seeing the rise of a new Constantinian order, basically a fifth national revival then I can see the US and the West undergoing a renaissance. It’s possible but the underlying moral rot as exemplified by homosexualism, feminism and egalitarianism is too pervasive to extricate IMO.
I would love to be wrong on this point, however.
Agreed in total, Fr. Hans. A reprieve.
And Dostoevsky is priceless. I read and wrote on him extensively in our Russian Studies program. Myshkin, the Brothers, Zosima, the Grand Inquisitor, etc.
“The man who lies to himself and listens to his own lie comes to such a pass that he cannot distinguish the truth within him, or around him, and so loses all respect for himself and for others. And having no respect he ceases to love, and in order to occupy and distract himself without love he gives way to passions and coarse pleasures, and sinks to bestiality in his vices, all from continual lying to other men and to himself.” (Book II, Chapter 2, Brothers Karamazov)
Fr. Alexander Webster,
I ordinarily enjoy “proofs of concept,” but the above saddens me tremendously. As I noted to you previously, I believe most profoundly that our God intervenes in our world and in our lives directly and irrefutable. I maintain and offer the teaching of St. Gregory Palamas, that foolish are those those who would attempt to “corral” the Energy of God, as Fr. Florovsky wrote, “proceed[ing] [to] manifest His own Being,” and that
Further, I have, largely again drawing upon Fr. Florovsky, described the subsequent action as Patristic – carrying and delivering the message of the Salvation of our God, through the Glorious Resurrection of our Lord, and the descent of Fire-from-Fire, the ever-Inspiring and ever-Invigorating All-Holy Spirit – as the calling of the ordained clergy. I have also suggested to you that this is a calling I originally believed you concurred was shockingly and sadly abdicated by virtue of laziness, lack of courage, secularism. ethnicity – enough where you dramatically called for “men of muscle” to again assume the voice of moral authority in the Church.
So, I ask your opinion on what I have read above as primary examples of what you complain having to “abide” of what amounts to my unjust “whining” in this forum: dedication not to the writings of the Holy Fathers – where I maintain one could spend a portion of one’s day, every day of one’s priestly ministry with St. Chrysostom’s On the Priesthood and be edified – but to Dostoevsky? Not to the glorious, heavenly poetry of St. Symeon the New Theologian, but Dostoevsky? Not the joyous writings of St. Seraphim of Sarov, who is said to have had the Pascha Canon on his lips every day of the year, but Dostoevsky? And to what end? Regale us with the jingo of the christian right heterodox as to how the “new” SCOTUS will turn this society from corruption and malfeasance into the “city on the hill” and all we have to do is…
Hand-in-hand is something you read in the Marvel Comix, with a failing grade in Statistics 101 that suggests that if God didn’t want one and “allowed” the other… Lack of Patriarchy, Big Momma defeated here (Thanks to God), but there is still Germany. Progressives, “cults,” coming tyranny, all born of “talk radio” and assorted lunacy that is so foreign, so offensive, so misguided, and so devoid of the one thing useful:
I don’t have to ask what you are reading Fr. Alexander. I believe I know.
Dr. S, I think you have confused me with Fr. Hans on this particular thread. It is, from where I sit, a happy association.
As it happens, I have not invoked Fyodor Dostoevsky here, but I would affirm Fr. Hans’ perception of the great Russian Orthodox novelist’s relevance to the more recent left-wing radicalization and debasement of Western Civilization in our own lifetime. Though written in 1872, Dostoevsky’s The Possessed (or The Devils) is, in particular, remarkably prescient.
Your wide point, however, is quite troubling. Why must you choose between great Russian Orthodox novelists such as Dostoevsky and Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn, on the one hand, and, on the other, the treasury of patristic wisdom as invaluable and essential components of Orthodox moral and spiritual tradition? The answer is, of course, you do not. And yet you try to force such a false, exclusive, self-impoverishing choice upon Fr. Hans and those of us who read this blog.
Perhaps Fr. Hans and I have a more inclusive understanding of Orthodox Tradition than you are prepared to acknowledge.
The devil quotes Scripture and the Fathers, often ineptly. But his purpose is a dead giveaway.
Actually, Archpriest Alexander, I know your dedication to studying the Holy Scripture daily, which is why I did need to ask what you are reading. For this you have always had my admiration and respect. Likewise, I respect your service, if only because for a short period, I was personally and profoundly impacted by men and women who, quite literally, put duty, integrity, obedience, and honour ahead of themselves. And finally, God has called you from among men – as the Lord said to the Prophet Jeremiah, foretelling the priestly call, “Before I formed you in the womb I knew you; and before you came forth out of the womb I sanctified you, and I ordained you a prophet to the nations.” (Jer. 1:5) – and ordained you to the Holy Priesthood; and whatever I else I may or may not conclude of or about you, that much I would never dishonour.
If I thought for a moment, that face to face, man to man – not behind the cloak of the internet or the telephone – you sincerely believed what you wrote to me above, Archpriest Alexander, I would weep.
Orthodox or Greek. Being a titular Orthodox, if that is what he is, gets him minus points from me.
Is he Orthodox the way Dukakis, and Stepheoplous and Snow are Orthodox and Tim Kaine, Kathleen Sebalieus and Nancy Pelisi are Catholic?
The Rules:
https://www.archives.gov/federal-register/electoral-college/
Michael S. Re:my supposed rationalization.
I have an unusual method of discourse (although I find it quite natural). I proclaim my ideas with strength given the fullest understanding of them that I have to see what feed back I get. Then I listen. I did this with you BTW. That does show consistency of method.
In this case the listening brought a change in my announced decision and action. The tipping point came when I listened to the quite words of my monastic friend. Not in direct support of Trump, but in a different way to consider the consequences of the choice.
Trump may end up as an utter failure, but that will not make him different from the majority of Presidents in our country’s history.
If I were Candide, we would have had better candidates. But we did not and the other big-time candidate was objectively evil. As the reality of that sank in, I decided against my own innate rational preference.
Chalk it up to an irrational vote in an irrational election. I will note though that the percentage of votes for a third party candidate was among the greatest in modern history. That resulted in neither Hillary or Trump getting 50% I believe. Neither has the votes of the majority of the electorate.
A properly organized, articulated and run campaign with a message that is outside the normal scope of our political elites has a genuine chance. It would take more than one election cycle, but possible.
It will take an adherence to the message and a staying power that is rare.
Thanks for your input
Michael, you’re absolutely right: Trump may turn out to be a failure and again, that would make him no different from the vast majority of presidents. Having said that, he’s not even president yet and he’s off to a rollicking good start: TPP is dead, both Mexico and Canada are talking about renegotiation NAFTA, the dollar is the highest it’s been in a long time and the DOW is as well.
It get’s better: a lot of illegals are self-deporting, Russo-American relations are on the mend, ISIS is on the run, etc. The only dark cloud I see on the horizon is the figure of John Bolton being peddled as SecState. I realize he was the only Neocon who broke with the pack and endorsed Trump so something must be said for loyalty but hopefully he’ll be given some worthless sinecure where his Neocon ideas will do little harm. Maybe ambassador to Papua New Guinea or something like that.
It isn’t just ‘neo-cons’ you have to worry about. Tom Cotton seems to have been floated as a potential SecDef this week. What did he have to say earlier this year?
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/tom-cotton-russian-plane-isis_us_57910697e4b00c9876ce7955
“The United States has the authority to shoot down Russian fighter jets because Congress voted 15 years ago to authorize a war against al Qaeda, Sen. Tom Cotton (R-Ark.) argued Thursday.”
Mexico?
If Trump sells out or fails, we are certainly in no worse shape than we would have been otherwise.
Putin called out Saudi Arabia today regarding terrorist support:
http://www.awdnews.com/top-news/president-putin-russia-will-bomb-saudi-arabia-back-to-the-stone-age-life-unless-riyadh-desists-from-supporting-terrorism
McCain is livid that Trump may make nice with Russia:
http://nypost.com/2016/11/15/mccain-doesnt-trust-putin-and-thinks-trump-shouldnt-either/
Those who can’t let the Cold War go lost on Nov. 8th. Thank God McCain never became president.
Here’s to hoping that Trump can tell the good Muslims (those that sign nuclear proliferation deals and have stable relations with Russia) from the bad ones (those that chop heads and go boom).
??
Source? Did you read this on Breitbart or Infowars or Sputnik or Pravda? Think for a couple of seconds. Clinton is winning the state 61.5 to 32.9 at the moment; a margin that will only increase as the count finishes up. So how likely is it that what you wrote above could be true? Did you see this yet?
Some facts, from Realityworld:
Alameda 79.0 %
Contra Costa 68.8
Imperial 68.7
Los Angeles 71.5
Marin 78.9
Mendocino 60.4
Monterey 66.9
Napa 64.9
San Francisco 85.3
San Mateo 76.3
Santa Barbara 61.3
Santa Clara 73.2
Santa Cruz 75.4
Solano 61.9
Sonoma 70.7
Yolo 68.1
Way up in the northeast woods, under the stern gaze of Mt. Shasta, an active volcano, Trump’s wins in Tehama, Modoc, Lassen, Shasta were similarly lop-sided his way. But other than the medium-sized city of Redding in Shasta, these counties are rural forest hermitages. Lotsa black-tailed deer, black and brown bears, cougars and Roosevelt elk. Not too many Trumpistas.
Never know what? Since your major premises are false (cf. above and below), even if I could somehow divine what you meant, I doubt there’s anything to it.
(Not what Fr. Jacobse said. Anyway, if it’s true that 35% of the D. delegation come from those three states, that’s partly because 70 million people live in them. The rest of the Democratic Congress come from our population centers — urban America. This election was mostly about the urban/rural-exurban divide. The chasm between us yawns more and more, like a Grand Canyon.)
Even more wrong there. See for yourself.
I’ll reply to the rest of your post’s points if I have time. I moved this over here because the title and content of Michalopulos’s thing where it was at is insufferable. Worse and worse. But we were warned about that.
I would argue that at this point, failure is not an option. He better damn well come through.
Something about you makes me almost certain you’ve been right about … well, not much.
Since I doubt you could see it in a mirror, I want to do you a favor. You got some boot polish in your beard, Father. It’s there on the right, all around your lips.
If I could make a suggestion, Father: I think you would do better to excise from your polemic arsenal that exhausted cliché about ‘finger wagging.’ It was old the first of lo, these hundreds of deployments. Dialogue torpedoes of that ilk are unoriginal, ineffective, and quite pointless aside from utility in lame deflection. In that, prudent tactics for you, true, but I doubt it fools many with as much insight as a newt. (Then there’s the fact that your own habituation to finger wagging, and your penchant for projection, couldn’t be more obvious, but that’s old news.)
And if it’s true that you fail to discern any clear ideas in my two posts, explicit and implicit ones, then I can safely assure you that is due much more to your own inadequacy than to mine. Removing your ideological and egoistic blinkers might help you a great deal there. Nevertheless I learned years ago with you to think mainly of addressing the interested audience. The padre is either uninterested in or incapable of dialogue. His forte is squid-inkery. I’ve come to have little doubt he has his reasons.
I avoid them mostly because, with respect to George, down here in the lower regions, and to many of the evidently ‘ascendant’ crew hovering greedily for power about your favored candidate, contingently much higher up, the gig of Captain Obvious isn’t really my thing, Father. I cannot ascertain whether or not you enjoy, and endorse, George’s at best poshlost and way too often hideous sensibility. But your failure to rebuke his dissemination of libel, fake news, monstrous lies and all manner of disinformation makes clear all that at least is A-OK with you. Thanks for the heads-up. I doubt at all I’m the only one taking note of that.
I’ll let that go, though there is much I could say. But like Nate, I fear some terribly painful eye-opening is on its way in your near future. I’m not your confessor, and anyway public airing of these shameful revelations of the secrets of your heart isn’t my intention, or to my taste. Far more than enough ugly these days.
Petulant? You grossly abuse language much more often than someone with your didactic pretensions ought to do. I recommend more frequent consultation of a good dictionary.
Father Hans Jacobse, Unless you enjoy headaches, and running in circles, avoiding Mr. Myers would be my advice to you. Personally I get vertigo reading his essays.
Oh, for heaven’s sake, Fr. Hans! Where do you live? Who do you live with? Who do you “deal” with? Nowhere near anyone who suffers these daily indignities, obviously. Out of sight, out of mind. And “indentured servitude” in the inner city? How silly can you be? Poor Black and Hispanic people do not live in the inner city of San Diego, of Brooklyn, of Manhattan, of Chicago, and the majority of America’s major cities. You or I – or at least I – couldn’t afford to live in the inner-city of America’s largest cities. Spike Lee sold his family home in Brooklyn for $8,000,000 and moved to the upper-west side! You can’t get back to the facts because you don’t know them, and you don’t know them because you’re the epitome of white privilege who has struck the death toll for racism, homophobia, and so on simply because you’ve normalized them, not eliminated them. Nothing more, nothing less. How many times have I invited you to take off that silk cassock and I would be happy to show around the streets you never see; the homeless, the jobless, those that have health insurance for the first time in 20-years and are not choosing food over cardiac medications. You know, real people.
Wash your hands in innocence, Priest Hans. Someone else will speak to Nineveh. Somehow the world and the politiking of “morality” will bring salvation.
Your Grace, I will give you this one. On a per capita basis Kansas gets quite a few more electoral votes than California. If Kansas has 6, like we do, then California ought to have 80.
But what safeguards would you put in to allow for meaningful representation for smaller states?
As it stands now a candidate needs only 10 states to get to 270 if he got the 10 most populous. Only two of those states are west of the Mississippi. It would be worse if electoral votes were proportioned strictly on a per capita basis. It would take about six states.
That would not be good.
Just remember we are not nor were we intended to be a democracy. The President is to be elected by states weighted by their population. If I were doing it, each state would get one vote. Takes 30 states to win.
But that has about as much chance of being a successful amendment as to do away with the electoral college.
All blowing smoke.
Sooner or later the states between the Mississippi River and the Sierra Nevada are going to have to secede if we want a government that represents us.
Michael, Your Grace, et al, a modest proposal:
How about apportioning Electoral votes as does Maine and Nebraska? One vote for each congressional district carried by a specific candidate with the two “senatorial votes” thrown to the winner of he who got the majority of the districts or the majority of the actual votes?
In this situation, California would be competitive because not all 55 Electoral votes would go to the man who got 50.01% of the votes in that state. So would Texas, so would Florida, so would New York and Illinois for that matter.
I have never liked winner take all. A proportional electoral system has a lit to recommend it.
Then petition your state legislature to apportion your state’s electoral votes proportionally.
I personally prefer winner-take-all. I would also prefer if the legislatures chose the electors (as well as Senators), but we can’t always have what we want.
Michael, Michael, Michael who is rationalizing now?
As to the health insurance, even assuming everything the proponents day is true (it is not), the plan is unsustainable and before it totally implodes will bankrupt the Medicare system and create a rationed system in which the “insurance” will mean nothing, not to mention the massive tax increases along the way.
The Dems knew all of this when they passed it (the health insurance actuaries of all of the states, despite political positions said as much)
It was never intended to provide actual care but to destroy the system in place. That system was inadequate but better than Obamacare
The real problem is insurance itself. Third party money always raises cost and leads to lawyers and fraud. When you throw government into the mix it becomes really poisonous.
Keep in mind that realitive to you I have a PhD in insurance and how it works. I have been in the psych-wards of health insurance since 1997, the insurance industry for 36 years.
Kansas had a workable system that could have been scaled up nationally with little trouble. The troubles that the Obamacate proponents complained about were all in Democrat states and could have been dealt with on a state level.
Obamacare is a lie sold by lies.
Michael Bauman,
Save your polemic for white geese who didn’t have to take a day off work to sit in a community clinic because their child was sick, or who chose heating oil over essential medications. What do they care if the Medicare is bankrupted, and I can’t say as I blame them. These aren’t malingerers or the “welfare nation.” These are working individuals who, because of the change in the minimum wage – a wage by which they barely survive – are suddenly making them inelgible for Medicaid; or seniors who, because of a minuscule Social Security or SSI “cost of living” increase are denied a housing subsidy of $45 per month or a seasonal $150 home fuel oil supplement on which they have come to depend.
All of this means nothing to entitled white people who traditionally received their insurance through their employers, never uttering a word as to the shameful disparity of healthcare provision to the working poor. You undoubtedly know infinitely more about insurance than me, Michael Bauman, but you know nothing about the difference in treating insured patients and uninsured patients, where the fundamental lack of normal preventative and prophylactic care can raise illness to crises, and the prevalence of such untreated diseases such as diabetes and hypertension are epidemic. I’m not defending “Obamacare” and I’m not interested in politics whatsoever. But we live in different worlds, and if millions of people on the periphery now have health insurance and access to quality care, and there is a chance it will bankrupt Medicare, let white people step up and bail it out. It’s about time.
Dr S, you raise several salient points regarding the delivery of health care but in the main, Mr Bauman is spot-on. As a retail pharmacist I can tell you that even before Obamacare, the delivery of health services (in my case prescription medications) started taking a nose-dive in the late 90s and only accelerated since.
When I received my degree back in 1984, my job as a pharmacist was to fill and sell any legitimate Rx. We moved heaven and earth to fill any Rx written by a qualified physician written in the normal scope of his practice in no time flat. Today, I’d say about every 6th Rx I receive has some impediment to it being filled in a timely manner. Of those 18% or so, maybe 50% will never be filled.
Some reasons are legitimate: new Rx software alerts us to the early filling of a Controlled Drug and will put a hard-halt until a certain date. That’s a good thing overall (unless you’re going to be out of town for whatever reason). However, the majority of time it’s because of something picayune, such as needing a Prior Authorization for “X”, which itself will take up to 5 days and then there’s a 50% chance that at the end of that period the Insurer will say “no: change it to “Y”.” (Which I can’t do because only a Dr can change an Rx. So the process has to start all over again.
It’s particularly pathetic when Medicaid won’t pay right off the bat for some little boy’s ADD med (which in itself is a different moral dilemma). To get this process rolling is normal however that means that said little boy can’t go to school unless he’s on said medication. This means that this boy’s mother –usually a single mother in a dead-end job–has to take off work to baby-sit her son until Medicaid finally approves it. We’re talking a financial nightmare scenario here unless she has a mother herself who’s willing to watch the child.
I could go on but I’m already pre-depressing myself before work. Bauman is right: any type of third-party insurance –whether public or private–has bent the arc of medical care away from efficient delivery in ways that are too numerous to mention. And unless some type of anarcho-capitalism breaks out, it’s not going to get any better.
In 2016, the fewest people in history were without health insurance in the USA. It went from an approximate 16% on average for the decade prior down to an approximate 10% under the ACA.
This statistic makes conservatives very angry Michael.
They don’t like the idea that the poor, working or not, would be receiving some handout that would facilitate such a statistical jump. Good heavens, the government is doing this, it must be bad!
In the Orthodox church, sometimes we pray for the hard hearted.
This is one of those times.
A healthy population serves the common good. It belongs in the commons. The conservatives shiver again.
The most fun happens when the rates of health care costs continue to rise and even people with decent wages can’t afford it. That is when they blame the freeloaders for all their woes.
When the ACA comes up for repeal, the Dems should all Yay it, so Trump has to veto the friggin thing. It’d be hilarious.
As George alludes, there is no way to control costs in the system where the 3rd party is the payer. Even less when the third parties buying leverage is weak by state vs state insurance laws. The best solution is to require all insurers to be eligible in every state under some twist of the commerce clause and Medicare for anyone that wants it.
The idea a family member wants insurance in a given state and gets a max of 3 quote requests is the biggest joke capitalism ever had.
Anonymous, you may be right about the numbers of uninsured but I’d like to see the official stats for myself. What I do know is that Aetna and others are bailing out of the healthcare exchanges so that dip in numbers of uninsured may be temporary. In other words, I wouldn’t pop the champagne yet, this debacle is far from over.
Having said that, as a healthcare provider, I can honestly say that the delivery of healthcare is the worst it’s ever been in my 33 years of practice.
What I believe you are committing is the logical fallacy of assuming that because a higher percentage of people are now insured, that this same percentage is actually receiving more healthcare. From my own experience, the exact opposite is the case.
If it’s one thing I learned from the Cold War, just because citizens of communist countries were guaranteed free housing, it didn’t mean that they actually got free housing. On the other hand we in the West were never guaranteed housing of any sort, yet our market economies made it possible for everyone to have housing in a timely manner.
Boom, here you go. Graph from CDC statistics in this report:
http://kff.org/uninsured/fact-sheet/key-facts-about-the-uninsured-population/
In the time it took you to type your ‘I’d like to see the official stats for yourself’ sentence you could have looked this information up.
Nate, thank you for providing those stats.
However, I would still caution you from popping the champagne corks. We are actually seeing (in real time) Obamacare failing before our very eyes. My expectation –brought on as it is in real-world healthcare delivery–is that unless something is done, and soon, then those numbers which you cite will turn upside down in very short order.
If Obamacare is repealed, as the GOP is planning on doing, those numbers will turn upside down in very short order. I don’t classify the consequences of Obamacare being repealed as a failure of Obamacare, but rather of the blithe indifference of the ‘pro-life’ party to the human costs of the action.
I’m not popping any champagne corks, I have seen too many worried acquaintances with chronic, life threatening health conditions openly discussing how they are being confronted with the consequences of the rollback being they are going to lose their health coverage, and it is going to kill them.
Speaking of popping champagne corks, how excited is George Michalopulos for Ryan setting his sights on ending Medicare next year? I imagine the phase-out timelines will probably align just right to work out swell for a man currently in his 50s who has pre-existing and chronic health conditions, when he hits 65. And by swell, I mean, really awful.
Actually, quite excited. Medicare is going bust regardless of whether Ryan pulls the plug or not. We are in need of top-down, bottom-up, all-the-way around medical reform, period.
Anon, even though I am responding to a boiled frog here goes again: first I don’t trust the numbers. Too much bias. Second, the health insurance many have they cannot afford to use. In my state the networks are so restrictive that you better hope you get taken to the right hospital in an emergency and you better not get hurt or sick out of state.
The premiums went up an average of 45% nationwide. The 25% figure that the propagada gives out is only for the heavily subsidized silver plans, probably including the subsidy.
Before ACA I could not get most folks to consider an out of pocket exposure of much over $2500 even if it meant meeting their price point. Under ACA the minimum in my state is twice that and most plans are higher.
The coverage is inadequate and you have 60 year old single men paying for maternity coverage, contraceptives and pediatric dental and vision.
One reason more people have coverage is the incessant publicity. It is the reaction of sheep. Most have no idea what they are buying, how much it will cost them when they use it or which doctors and hospitals they have to use.
I can go on but you are not interested in reality, just with the good feelings you have because “more people have health insurance.” It is akin to people without a car getting a Yugo or a Trabant.
The way the plans are designed, priced and paid for is unsustainable.
That is the reality.
A plan that delivered an actual affordable payment mechanism for healthcare could have been designed. ACA is not that, nor was it intended to be.
Oh, in case it slipped by your notice, health insurance is not healthcare. Health insurance is a method to pay for and manage (restrict) care.
Insurance by definition is reimbursement for a sudden and unexpected loss. Even before ACA health insurance had trouble meeting that definition. Another thing that makes it difficult to price.
Michael S. Emotional shaming that really is beneath you that is also short on reality and knowledge. I know more about public (community) health than you as well. My father singlehandedly established just about everyone clinic to deliver community care in this town at one point. He was a master at understanding, martialing the necessary resources and delivering the goods of all sorts of community based care paid for on a sliding scale using appropriate tax dollars. He bullied the city and county fathers into funding his plans. I was privey to his reasoning, his plans and the budgets it took to carry them out and got to see the clinic’s in action frequently. (Although budget time in our house was quite a roller coaster). His clinics and the main department offered a full range of care including mental health, dental, pre-natal care and post-natal follow up as well as immunizations and venereal disease control and treatment, epidemiology services and food handling classes. Literacy and household maintenance were also taught.
As soon as the city/county idiots could, they fired him. His successor promptly dismantled his approach leaving the department in a shambles and left for San Francisco just in time to boxlic up the AIDS epidemic when it burst upon the scene. Could not have happened to a nicer guy.
What was not destroyed became captive to various levels of bureaucratic social insurance and micro-managing that is more costly and less effective in delivering care. Most of the clinics he established have been closed. Certainly the scope and quality of care diminished significantly.
Even in the best possible circumstances private health insurance is notoriously difficult to price, in part due to the escalator effect it’s presence in the market has on cost and the depressing effect it has on efficiency. Not to mention the way that providers and patients cone up with to game the system.
The further away from the actual patients the decision makers are and the payors are, the greater the difficulty becomes.
Even on a state wide level in a small relatively homogenous state such as Kansas it becomes difficult to accurately price. That is why you see county by county pricing for health insurance.
The larger and more diverse a state is the tougher it becomes.
Traditional health insurance can no longer be effective, and all social insurance is bankrupt or soon will be. It probably needs to be, but people who rely on those programs to access and pay for treatment still have to have some way of doing it.
The solution lies not in increasing the scale, but in creating local solutions in a way similar to what my Dad did. Actually concierge medicine could be a part of that. Local free clinics or sliding scale pricing places. Any thing that relies heavily on federal government/insurance money or management will fail.
The widely touted solution of selling across state lines will only make things worse. What actually works in zip code 90210 will not work in zip code 67009.
Your histrionics are even less helpful.
Michael Bauman,
No one believes in shame any longer. Yours is a pointless commentary.
I was attempting to make a simple point and you twice clogged it with detritus I don’t understand and, honestly, don’t care about. This much I know: I provided healthcare to the working poor who had no access to health insurance, and therefore no preventative, routine medical care that we take for granted. They had a significantly greater prevalence of hypertension, diabetes, asthma, and so on. They were sick more frequently and more seriously, and were more frequently treated in the ER for a later-stage illness. If the hospital didn’t give them the necessary meds (e.g. simply gave a prescription), it often went unfilled. This was especially true of meds for chronic conditions. This situation has changed and it is a documented epidemiological change, discernible for anyone who follows the CDC’s Morbidity & Mortality Weekly Report (MMWR). How this affects the system, what the implications are for the system, blah, blah, blah, I don’t care. Intelligent, experienced people like yourself will just have to fix it, Michael Bauman. Maybe some white people will have to pay larger deductibles for their prescription meds, I don’t know – that would only seem fair after all these years. I’m sure you all can figure it out.
We could figure it out if the government, the idiots who manage insurance companies and the ideologs would listen to and support real solutions.
It will not be a mass solution for everybody every where–perish the thought.
As it is there is no incentive.
Michael Stankovich,
It may surprise you to learn that I largely agree with you about the working poor. But that is an entirely different subject than the ACA.
The ACA was sold to the public by saying (among the many other things that proved to be blatant lies), “No one should have to file for bankruptcy simply because they get sick or injured.” However, the ACA does little prevent this for the vast majority of the working poor,
My black God-daughter’s family is a prime example. Her mother works full-time in a low-wage job making less than $20,000 and qualifies for the maximum subsidy. At her earnings level it should not be surprising that she has little or no savings. While some very basic preventative care is covered at no out-of-pocket cost, here is what she now faces should she or her daughter get sick, need to see a doctor, or God forbid need to be hospitalized:
Annual Deductible – Family: $11,000
Out-of-Pocket Maximum – Family: $13,000
Copay for Primary Care: $30
Copay Specialist: $60
Copay Urgent Care: $100
Emergency Room: 20% Coinsurance after deductible
Hospital Stay: 20% Coinsurance after deductible
For this coverage she will pay $95.55 per month after subsidy.
If those who sold this ACA can explain how she will, without outside assistance, avoid bankruptcy should she get seriously ill or injured in a way that causes her even to approach the maximums of these out-of-pocket expenses I, for one, would like to hear it.
I doubt that Michael Bauman or many others who comment here do not see the need to ensure that the poor receive healthcare which, as he rightly points out, is not at all the same as health insurance coverage. Michael simply pointed out – quite rightly – that the ACA itself is a disaster while I am pointing to the fact that it does little to accomplish the stated goal of actually helping those in need.
I would also remind Anonymous that the statistics about the decrease in those “not covered by health insurance” are deceptive (although not untrue in terms of what is being measured) because they include hundreds of thousands, perhaps even millions, of those who are “covered” in the same fashion as my God-daughter’s family.
Brian, absolutely correct. It has been reported that significant numbers of “covered” folks in CA still use the free clinics.
I am surprised your God daughter did not also qualify for risk sharing which would reduce the out of pocket to a more manageable level.
The only good thing about the ACA is the lack of medical under writing. We had that here in Kansas before ACA in a separate pool financed by premium, state taxes and premium taxes. The premiums were less expensive than ACA for coverage that was better but with an annual cap of $1,000,000.
It was not publicized and the premium structure made it difficult for some to get it at the time. They would leap at it today.
Michael Bauman,
I will look into the risk sharing for her. Thank you for the tip.
By “free clinics” I assume you are talking about the FQHC’s (Federally Qualified Health Centers), more commonly known as Community Health Centers (or CHC’s). I am very familiar with this model, as many of them are my customers (I am in the medical supplies and equipment business).
CHC’s aren’t actually free clinics, although their services can be free if a person qualifies. They charge on a sliding scale based upon income. They are able to do this due to the Federal, state, local, and other grants they receive, as well as the fact that the government essentially covers the malpractice insurance of the providers. They are also reimbursed by Medicaid at a far higher rate per patient encounter than private physicians. In exchange for this higher Medicaid reimbursement rate, the fee for each encounter includes almost all services provided (ECG’s, Point-of-care lab tests, etc.) for which private providers bill Medicaid separately. Although largely funded by Federal dollars, as well as state Medicaid funds for each Medicaid patient encounter, by law they must be locally controlled with non-physician boards of directors. They normally have beautiful facilities equal in quality to private facilities as a result of multiple billions in Federal grants over the years for buildings and capital start-up costs (something significantly accelerated under the Obama administration) as opposed to what was once the only choice for the poor – substandard, often filthy, private physician offices that primarily serve the Medicaid population. CHC’s also either operate their own pharmacies or partner with local private pharmacies that participate in the 340B Rx program. This affords both the clinics and their eligible patients the ability to purchase drugs at a cost of pennies on dollar.
CHC’s are actually (in my opinion) among the best existing solutions for providing primary and preventative healthcare to the working poor. They do not, however, solve their problem of healthcare outside of the primary care environment. Serious injury or hospitalization can still bankrupt them.
Shame is real whether people “believe in it” or not. Your rhetoric that fosters it while at the same time denies it’s reality is nominalism at work. Have you become a nominalist?
You are better than that. I really like the Michael S. I talk with off this site. The Michael S that shows up here, not so much.
RE: “white geese” and “white people”
Dr. Stankovich, is that what you’ve sunk to here on this website: crude, mindless race-baiting?
No, Fr Alexander, I’ve sunk to this, the final sermon of Fr. Alexander Schmemann on Thanksgiving Day:
Everyone capable of thanksgiving is capable of salvation and eternal joy.
Thank You, O Lord, for having accepted this Eucharist, which we offered to the Holy Trinity, Father, Son and Holy Spirit, and which filled our hearts with the joy, peace and righteousness of the Holy Spirit.
Thank You, O Lord, for having revealed Yourself unto us and given us the foretaste of Your Kingdom.
Thank You, O Lord, for having revealed Yourself unto us and given us the foretaste of Your Kingdom.
Thank You, O Lord, for having united us to one another in serving You and Your Holy Church.
Thank You, O Lord, for having helped us to overcome all difficulties, tensions, passions, temptations and restored peace, mutual love and joy in sharing the communion of the Holy Spirit.
Thank You, O Lord, for the sufferings You bestowed upon us, for they are purifying us from selfishness and reminding us of the “one thing needed;” Your eternal Kingdom.
Thank You, O Lord, for having given us this country where we are free to Worship You.
Thank You, O Lord, for this school, where the name of God is proclaimed.
Thank You, O Lord, for our families: husbands, wives and, especially, children who teach us how to celebrate Your holy Name in joy, movement and holy noise.
Thank You, O Lord, for everyone and everything.
Great are You, O Lord, and marvelous are Your deeds, and no word is sufficient to celebrate Your miracles.
Lord, it is good to be here! Amen.
“I have never made but one prayer to God, a very short one: Oh Lord, make my enemies ridiculous. And God granted it.”
(Voltaire. Letter to Étienne Noël Damilaville, May 16, 1767)
lol
Voltaire also said: “Tell me who you can’t criticize, and I’ll you who rules you.”
It must be galling Mike, to wake up in a new America in which your proglib pieties are being questioned and your tin-horn idols have been smashed.
Regardless, have a happy Thanksgiving. We have a lot to be thankful for.
Amen to that George!
George, I give thanks to our good and humanity-loving God continually, more than you could possibly imagine! Glory and thanks to Him for all good things! And even for some of those other things he permits, too, for a time, insofar as they serve as warnings, yellow and red lights, signs and omens, strange stimuli of catharsis and inspirers of the good zeal to all persons seeking genuine humility and repentance, a more and more cleansed, illuminated and discerning nous, a Holy spirit and a truly good, loving, just and merciful will: in short, to all the sons and daughters of our God of Peace! May the entire human race with all of His Creation join God one day in His Kingdom, in and through Christ and His Prophets, Evangelists, Patriarchs, Matriarchs, Saints, Scholars and Scribes et al.! Amen!
Oh, and Glory to God for the (at least) temporal blessings granted to us by art genres, such as the various modes of chiaroscuro, for example!
My best wishes to all for a most blessed, fruitful, and clarifying Feast of Thanksgiving!
“your proglib pieties” “your tin-horn idols.”
Oh well. What’s Monomakhos FOR, if not for such puerile labels?
You might check today’s NY Times, Fr. Hans, for an article about a special grant of the NYC Dept. of Education to desegregate the schools of the Lower East Side and the East Village. WAT! Desegregate?
Now you have to ask, who is indenturing whom and for how long? “But the department recently told the working group that it did not think the district was ready and would not begin the program this year. The group was unhappy.” Silly white geese Trumpeting. It would appear that the “racist shibboleth” lives and works on the front page of the NY Times.
Well, Trump and Pence missed a wonderful opportunity to teach out.
The statement the cast of Hamilton made to Pence was not rude. It was taking advantage to peacefully petition their government in person (something we have far too few opportunities to do). Trump made a strategic error that reinforces the fear.
Pence could have taken the stage and simply acknowledged their fears, thank them (since they told the people booing to stop) and then assure the folks that while there were clearly policy and ideological differences, he and Trump have no hatred for anyone. Change needs to come but that change is not motivated by ill-will toward anyone. If they would participate in that change, peacefully, the outcome will be good for everyone.
Most opponents would not believe Pence, but it would be effective.
Taken the stage? I think not.
First, they wanted to make a statement, not have a conversation. Everyone knows what the other’s position is, they just don’t agree.
Second, it’s Broadway. This is LGBT Central. No amount of reassurance will suffice. They know his project, he knows theirs.
Was it rude? Actually, I would have to say it was impolite. Isolating one patron/spectator at the end of a performance and embarrassing them by disparaging their political sentiments is crass and tactless.
But you should expect much, much more of it. Remember, they have no shame. Shame left them long, long ago. Humility, propriety, . . . all that is left is a self affirming arrogance.
Sure. All true. That is not the point. Pence is Vice-President elect. If he wanted to go up on stage they could not have stopped him. When an actor breaks the fourth wall, it is an invitation for a response.
Pence could have turned the tables on them. His position and his natural visual presence and practiced stage presence would have allowed him to do that. He need not have invited a rebuttal or gotten into a debate.
CNN: Clinton: 62,523,126; Trump: 61,301,031
My California vote isn’t worth as much as that of a voter in Oklahoma, Same goes for most of Mrs Clinton’s 62,523,126 votes (and growing). We still haven’t learned whence Mr Michalopolis got his popular vote totals.