Prince Otto von Bismarck famously said “God watches over children, drunkards and the United States of America”. You could just as easily apply this aphorism to the Grand Old Party; if there’s any political organization that doesn’t know what it’s doing and yet for some unknowable reason keeps on winning, it’s the Republicans (also known as The Stupid Party).
Having said that, every time I want to kick the GOP to the curb, ever time I think they’ve snatched defeat from the jaws of victory and I feel justified in tearing up my membership card and mailing it to GOP-HQ, they keep on doing something right. Or perhaps it’s just Bismarckian dumb luck.
The startling election of Trump was one such ginormous example. Since then, in every by-election to fill a vacant seat, the GOP candidate has won. That’s four for four by my count. The next one is in the Atlanta suburbs in June. We’ll see how that one goes.
The cuckservative establishment still doesn’t get it. Rather than take their victories and running with them, they’re simply counting each of the transgressions against Emily Post that Trump makes. These are idiots of the first water. Say what you will about Democrats but they know how to win; whether it’s spiking the ball or taking a victory lap, they know how to relish victory. Republicans on the other hand think it’s bad form to press a victory. (They would do well to heed the Prophet Elijah’s warning to King Ahab of Israel. It’s still not too late.)
More will be said about this later. For now, I’d like to introduce you to Dr Steven Turley. I discovered him fairly recently on YouTube. Like me, he’s a conservative but he’s far less abrasive. An Orthodox convert, he’s got interesting perspectives on many issues. I especially like his critique of the Evangelicals who are exercised by Hank Hanegraaf’s recent conversion.
In the meantime, he’s got an Orthodox analysis on the most recent by-election in Montana, one which honestly escaped me. Please take the time to watch it as well as subscribe to his YouTube channel.
P.S. At about 3 min, he mentions Fr Alexander F C Webster, a contributor to Monomakhos.
Enjoy!
Not a bad explication of righteous wrath and the passions. I like this guy.
The distinction he seems to make is between the violence of sin and the retribution of divine love. As he also says few are able to reach the level that our violence is not tinged by self love. The hypocrisy of the “left” is clearly on display nonetheless.
There are times when force is not only required but necessary to stop aggression and evil.
Fr. Alexander calls this a lesser good.
That is a moral/spiritual decision but we should err on the side of non-violent action or the least amount of physical force required.
In the example of St. Nicholas, the video fails to mention that even after the dream, St. Nicholas was excluded from the rest of the Council.
The normative Christian approach remains Love your enemy and overcome evil with good. The rest is due to the hardness of our hearts.
In a schitzophrenic dystopian world it becomes more and more difficult to discern what is appropriate and more difficult to hold onto our peace as we are assulted continuely.
May God have mercy.
I watched the whole wretched video, and boy do I have some thoughts.
1) Between the audio and the eyewitness accounts, there was nothing ‘reportedly’ about it
2) So-called journalist in the sense Steven Turley is a so-called PhD?
3) Violent unprovoked physical assault is an appropriate answer to a question about a CBO report from any person of any profession? REALLY?
In other words, grabbing someone by the neck and throwing them to the ground, in a sudden, violent, unprovoked and unplanned/unconsented act. And, according to those eyewitnesses, following up with a punch. This is physical assault, not carefully choreographed and rehearsed physical stuntwork for professional wrestling. Which, even knowing what is coming, and lots of experience and practice, still frequently results in physical injury for the wrestling performers. And that’s the ‘fake’ violence, not the real stuff as delivered by Gianforte.
Steven Turley apparently thinks being aghast at a physical assault in response to a question about a CBO report is not in fact the normal, proper human response. This says a lot about Steven Turley, none of it good.
Almost as if during the campaign Trump vilified the press, even pointing them out to crowds in his rallies and making them the target of scorn and abuse! And continuing that behavior while in office!
What is Steven Turley smoking? He clearly doesn’t actually read ‘mainstream’ media, or even ‘mainstream’ political media to claim this. He has this pretty much backwards, in that there was speculation whether or not it might cause him to lose a election he was expected to win, but even that was tempered in observation that a huge chunk of the votes had already been cast.
I’m a bit concerned that Steven Turley is less able to distinguish fantasy from reality than your average WWE fan. I guess he *does* have a PhD.
Apparently describing an unprovoked physical assault for asking a question about a CBO report makes someone a babyface? What does that make the guy about to face the crucible of Capitol Hill, if he can’t even field a question in his own office without losing control of himself?
Steven Turley airheadedly conflates real world physical violence with highly choreographed professional wrestling stunts, and then to add insult to injury HAS NEVER HEARD OF THE IRON SHEIK.
And we are only ninety-six seconds into his stupid video so far. Thankfully the rest can be summarized more concisely as he gets long winded.
1) It would be amusing, and not entirely unfair to draw a conclusion from his take so far that if the voters like physical assault that makes it morally right? So, if a majority of Americans think abortion should be legal, does that make it morally right from an Orthodox Christian view? I’m confused as what exactly makes this an “Orthodox Christian” take so far (yes, I know it’s coming, except, no, it’s actually not)
2) Gianforte won by six points a state Trump won by twenty. Crowing about that result as portending to the seems to be a classical set up for hubris.
Steven Turley, thug-lover.
NO. KIDDING.
This is a good question! Or, if we are being accurate, body-slam and then punch someone.
YES WE KNOW THE ST. NICK STORY. Although it begs a couple questions:
1) Isn’t it a bit offensive if not faintly blasphemous itself to conflate orthodox doctrine of the Trinity with a CBO report about a health care bill?
2) If the CBO is in fact a secret member of the Trinity, according to Turley’s own account of the St. Nick story, in order to escape the consequences of his actions, Gianforte apparently needs the personal dream intervention of Christ and the Theotokos to take his seat in Congress.
I missed the part where that happened.
Wait, he’s going to cherry pick a handful of incidents over 2,000 years of church history, the last of which happened well over a millennia ago, involving a select group of individuals venerated as Church Fathers, saints and an elite group of men, and then throw a random GOP congressman with impulse control issues in with them?
Because I don’t think righteous anger about the nature of God is on the same level as a CBO report about a health care bill?
I wonder what an example of this would be? Perhaps a congressional candidate with a known temper, who had been dodging questions about his stance on a controversial health care bill on the basis of waiting to see a pending CBO score, on the eve of a contentious stressful election being confronted by a reporter wanting to know his opinion now that the excuse of the CBO report had been removed?
Nah, too far fetched! That would never happen!
He does realize what this is describing right, because…
…throwing someone to the ground and yelling “Sick and tired of you guys!” sounds like one of these things but not the other.
Or tax cuts. Same diff.
AHA! Shorter Turley summary: Yeah, all that blathering about righteous anger I’ve done? None of that is applicable to this situation. This is the part where he admits his twitter critics were right, right? Right?
Someone else did a bad thing, so I shouldn’t have to feel bad about enjoying a person from my political leanings physically assaulting someone I disdain.
Really.
So, to recap Turley:
* Downplays the level of physical violence involved and conflates it with television fantasy violence
* Throws out ‘so-called’ journalist, which might as well be wink-wink-nudge-nudge guy deserves a punching for existing
* Acts like being aghast at an unprovoked physical assault over a question about a CBO report is not a normal human response
* Creates a false narrative about media coverage of the event and how it pertained to the election
* Proudly admits to cheering on Gianforte on election day the day after the assault
* In response to criticism about the Christianity of his approval of the circus, starts asking a rhetorical question ‘is it ever ok to assault someone not in self defence’
* Goes on a sanctimonious spiel about righteous anger and a number of incidents that can be counted on one hand in 2,000 years of Church history
* Then goes on to explain anger and the passions and the motivation, which pretty much sounds exactly like what Gianforte, as opposed to Gianforte’s nous being so offended at a heretical statement about the nature of God that out of pure love he threw a Guardian reporter to the ground. Is this silly enough yet?
* Basically admits that Gianforte did was not in fact, righteous anger, and that he was right to apologize. But Turley never actually admits that the physical assault itself was *wrong* in the first place, nor that his Twitter critics had a point, all his gasbagging about righteous anger aside.
* With apparently no self-reflection whatsoever, congratulates Congressman Gianforte for giving into his passions. Does cheering someone giving into their passions mean you’re giving into your passions? Asking for a internet YouTuber.
tl;dr, Hi, I’m Steven Turley, I cheered when Gianforte assaulted a journalist for asking a question. For no good reason, I’m going to call him a so-called journalist, a babyface, and imply that he might have had it coming. I got criticized on Twitter for my cheering, but did you know that St. Nick once punched a guy out of pure love and Jesus showed up and said it was ok? And that Planned Parenthood exists? Because of that, even though what Gianforte did is nothing like what I described as righteous anger, and more like what the Church Fathers described as demonic, I’m giving him a thumbs up anyway, haters gonna hate, am I right?
Nate Trost, for once I agree with you. There was no excuse for the violence. No one was in fear of their safety and comparing said violence to Orthodoxy is just wrong. My only disagreement would be blaming President Trump with this violence. Mr Montana acted like a childish thug and all blame belongs to him.
Just like celebrities must put up with paparazzi, politicians must put up with reporters. If they can’t take the heat……
`Turley: claimed Gianforte assaulted him with what was described by eyewitnesses as more of an Undertaker-like choke-slam.’
Is this supposed to be a bad thing? I ask this because Undertaker was my favorite wrestler back in middle/high school (late 90s), so the idea of someone using his moves to set a reporter straight fills me with joy. For the most part mainstream journalism has become the enemy of the people; and in no way, shape, or form is it the free press.
Mr Pappas,
If the body slammed reporter was a conservative, or perhaps your father or son, I’m sure your attitude might differ. Stating that Mr Trost is a moralizing church lady does not apply to such unprovoked violence. Christians should know better, and I’m no church lady at six foot two and three hundred pounds. As much as I would love to put some hurt to these snow flakes, I know better as should you.
Trump isn’t out of the woods yet. His support, I suspect, is due in no small measure to the fact that he challenges (to some extent) the globalist, neo-liberal policies that have reigned dominant for at least the past 40 years. With “migration” and the “economics of geography,” the globalists are now simply moving poor, unskilled, non-Christian populations into western Europe and the US. If they can’t force their new Tower of Babel Babylonian system on voters then they’ll simply destabilize the countries they live in with weaponized immigration. If you look at the reconfiguration of Agenda 21 in its “The Future We Want” or “UN Agenda 2030,” you’ll see that technology plays a big role in promoting their border-less, totally managed world. Just go to Google and type those phrases into it and you’ll see what is being planned at an international level. And, if you think this can’t touch you, if you live in or near a major US city, see if your city is a member of ICLEI. The basic way these globalist, technocratic policies are implemented at the local level is through unelected boards and panels of so-called experts, usually engineers, scientists, or managers. This replaces democratic processes and institutions in favor of “experts” and planners. So, are you starting to see bike lanes, high density housing, light rail, bus lines, and recycling curb pick up popping up around you? Maybe smart meters and share-along bikes and cars? This has happened under the noses of most voters and is seldom an issue in elections because it’s being done through stealth. I don’t think there is much that can be done to stop this “system,” since so many Republicans and Democrats are on board. The noise surrounding Trump and those that oppose this globalist system has more to do with creating a case in the minds of the public that Trump is unfit for office. They are trying to prepare the “paperwork” needed to justify impeachment — sort of like a PIP at work prepares the way to fire someone. If they can get rid of him, they can revisit TPP, open the southern border, go after Assad, and continue lobbying for war with Russia.
Nate Trost, what do you mean to imply with your comment about “Turley’s ‘so-called’ Ph.D. ” ?
What is “so-called” about it ?
Did you even bother to read his credentials ? Ph.D., Durham University . Ever hear of it ?
Wow.
Deep much?