Donald
Trump says he is a devotee, born again, his Christian conversion
claimed through the James Dobson ministry.[i]
[ii]
As a committed Christian he is bringing his private beliefs (how strong the
man’s faith is, who can tell?) into the workplace. He is stacking his cabinet with a range of
faith first, science second quacks, a move that in the face of Climate Change is
an assault on all of mankind.
Humans of
the world are facing oblivion through man-made super-fast global warming and
the real possibility of a final nuclear shoot-out, although a collapse of the US
dominated monetary system may come first. When it happens even the global
Middle Classes will be in a position as bad as the Yemeni peasant. Urgently
needed is a leader who will tackle these inter-nation issues with a modern,
enlightened approach, applying logic and reason. Trump, with his Bible-focused
agenda, is not that man.
The Dream Team
Trump began
his assault on science with the appointment of conservative
Christian[iii]
Scott Pruitt as head of the Environmental Protection Agency. He is known for his ‘extreme
anti-environmental positions’, for suing the EPA multiple times and his calls for
the deregulation of the fossil fuel industry.[iv]
Then came Tillerson into the powerful
position of Secretary of State. An ex CEO of Exon-Mobil, he is described as a ‘classic
Establishment Protestant’ with a lot of scorn for Climate Change. ‘It’s an
engineering problem, and it has engineering solutions’, he’s been known to say.[v]
The likelihood
of further regression is real with the choice of Betsy as
Education Secretary. She is the daughter of for-profit schools advocate Richard
De Vos [vi].
DeVos (and her Amway family[vii])
believe ‘Trump is much more likely to bring Christ into the world’ and it is
her ‘… desire is to confront the culture in ways that will continue to advance
God's kingdom.’[viii] She is paired with creationist Jerry Falwell
Jr., he chosen to lead a task force reviewing higher education[ix].
Multimillionaire Perdue (to the important
environment and poverty post of Secretary of Agriculture[x])
became the 9th Evangelical. Ted Cruz, the ultra-right Christian presidential
hope, couldn’t have sorted a more biased bunch.
Seventh-day Adventist Ben Carson, another
Republican presidential nominee-turned-Trump supporter, got the Senate’s
approval to be Housing Secretary. His blockbuster opinions go from dismissing
Climate Change to the deep gutter, to a comment where he compares women who
terminate their unwanted pregnancies to slaveowners who “thought that they had
the right to do whatever they wanted to that slave.”[xi]
He fits the Trump don’t-think-we’ll-tell-you-what-to-do mould perfectly.
War is decided inside the Oval Office where
Trump is advised by chief strategist Steven Bannon, recently of the right-wing
Christian Breitbart News.[xii]
He’s the dude who forecast he and Trump will take the war over to the South
China Sea within the next 10 years. The nuclear war-heads around today are
3,000 times as powerful[xiii]
as the bombs "Little Boy" and "Fat Man" dropped on Japan.
Reince Priebus, the Bible study and prayer
group leader[xiv]
is Trump’s chief of staff. We should be worried. As the documentary ‘Waiting
for Armageddon’ explored there are millions of bright Americans with very odd
foundations in faith. They’re praying ‘all good Christians disappear from earth
and rematerialize in the clouds (alongside the loving god Jesus) as chaos
(wrought by the hateful Jesus) seizes the world’[xv]
destroying all who weren’t born into Christian circumstances.
The spectre of a nuke-war was bad enough
when the war-expander Obama (for all 8 years[xvi])
was in front of the button, but historically the more there are people who
believe in belief of a tall, handsome and blue eyed US English speaking Jesus,
the greater the likelihood the world will be blown up.
The Trump administration almost went to war
with Iran at the start of February.[xvii]
The same Iran which the EU ‘forgave’ and welcomed back for trade well over a
year ago.[xviii]
The most dangerous organisation in the
world is the CIA. There Trump appointed Mike Pompeo. He believes ‘Jesus Christ
our Savior is truly the only solution for our world’[xix].
He is ok with all the Obama enhanced stuff: torture, Guantanamo Bay, defending America
in Iraq, the NSA spying on Americans[xx]
and in continuing to support and seek support from Saudi Arabia[xxi]
– its export is Wahhabism, identified by the European parliament in Strasborg
as the main source of global terrorism.[xxii]
With this dream-team in place expect a slew
of anti-LGBT rights, toilet access and women’s’ right bills, plus the need to
fight inequality ignored. More important, expect these tactics to dominate the
media, effectively deflecting attention from continued war-mongering and the most
dangerous of all, profit making in direct contravention of climate change
science.
The Opposition
Thankfully it is not the US that leads the
moral argument for the world. Europe and its substantially better educated
public are leading the pack. Christianity is at last dying in Europe, including
the UK.[xxiii] Last
year the Spectator wrote the ‘decline of Christianity is perhaps the biggest
single change in Britain over the past century’.[xxiv]
Where Christianity declared ‘there is the
big picture and the gods followed by Trump and his men made it all, love them or
go to hell’, Europeans (particularly the young) are applying logic and
reasoning. They’re opening double doors to knowledge through enquiry, discovering
truth piece by tiny piece as they proceed to understand for us all a
puzzle-picture of billions of years.
Brexit was a demonstration of undiluted
anger directed at the advance on Greed Capitalism started by Thatchernomics of
the 1980s. The British aren’t crying alone. France has just had the biggest
ever (mostly ignored by mainstream media) protest marches. The 31 March 2016
march connected 400,000 well educated, mostly white and well-off, and not just
in France.
‘It is about re-appropriating politics in
general by the people, for the people,’ says interviewed protestor Yann Le
Moullec.[xxv]
‘Democracy is failing,’ says Armand Degue.
The protests involved ‘tens of millions of
people across the European Union’ wrote The Telegraph, continuing, ‘it is a
fear for the future that can be felt from Athens to Amsterdam, from Warsaw to
Watford. They are fed up.’
It has been gathering momentum for almost
10 years. An austerity backlash mixed in with protest over anger at environment
destruction and elitism – exactly what Trump and Christian cabinet is about.
This dramatic shift in public awakening
that has been happening over the last 20 years or so in Europe (including the
UK) away from the two pillars of ultimate corruption and abuse,[xxvi]
Capitalism and Christianity, has finally reached the US.
Where in the USA 7/10 of the old white folks
(65 +) are Christians, only 3/10 of the young (18 to 29) call Jesus their
personal saviour.[xxvii]
And the young are the thinkers, the group
that is increasingly standing up and saying ‘no!’ They are the super-sharp
scalpel that will cut away the cancer and save the world. Activist Lawrence
Krauss reminds (in a supportive educational environment) that it takes only one
decade for change to happen.
But can the world wait for them to grow-up?
A maniacal group has power now. Analyst Chris Hedges wrote 'The Trump
kleptocrats are political arsonists. They are carting cans of gasoline into
government agencies and Congress to burn down any structure or program that
promotes the common good and impedes corporate profit.'
The Twin Towers; Capitalism & Christianity
In this war between Science and Religion
the true purpose behind Trump’s Christian cabinet can be found.
‘You don’t appoint a Cabinet of
billionaires to be taking on the establishment’ said Bernie Sanders on ‘Face
The Nation’. Trump’s new cabinet is a perfect reflection of the current
establishment, at least, the establishment that today’s Greed America needs to
continue unopposed. It takes blind belief to nurture religion, and the same for
today’s incarnation of Capitalism.
Capitalism is a pyramid structure. It works
by creating new markets and industries at ground level, with profits from there
travelling up to board room level, where they should be re-invested into
business and into the people of business.
But profits are not re-invested. They stay
at the top, disappear into havens, which means more industries and markets have
to be found at ground level for more profit to be siphoned up. But new
industries and markets will eventually run out.
Like an alcoholic, in order to continue the
system has to deny that there is a problem. That the raw materials that feed it are finite, that
production and consumption are polluting. America and the West rely on
stripping profit from their own disadvantaged and third world markets in order
to bolster coffers at home.
Christianity has been a money making
enterprise nearly since the beginning. Today the Vatican is worth hundreds of
billions.[xxviii]
Isn’t that enough to solve the world’s poverty problems? It would be, if that
were the true intention of the Church.
Religion is a model that engenders blind
belief, allowing those in power to continue unimpeded. The world of logic and
science is a direct threat to leadership structures looking to continue the
current model of elite money making and world destruction.
Slippery Slope
Regulations that limit corporates and their
freedom to exploit people and the natural environment are obstacles that have
to be removed, explains Joel Bakan.
On March 28 2017 Trump signed an order
undoing most of the restrictions around coal and put a major dent in internet
privacy.[xxix]
He is acting in (presidential) accordance with the Corporacy.
Trump’s working on the home-front where
just a few months before Obama did the identical but through international
trade agreements. Profit as a driver is right – sustainable. Profit (after the
quite ridiculous salaries and bonuses are met) at unreasonable levels to reward
shareholders no matter the cost to the environment is the time bomb.
Trump and his Christian team isn’t that different
from presidents past. Where Obama’s cabinet had its wealthy,[xxx]
Trump’s cabinet and outer support staff are choc-full of men and women of
amazing success. Paupers who made it to No 2 in Goldman Sachs, became President
Medal winning neurosurgeons, a dyslexic who turned broke companies into
billion-dollar winners.[xxxi] His cabinet has been favourably compared to Reagan,
an all-time favourite president, the one who added the Greed ingredient to the
Capitalism cake bake. But, where does the loyalty of these people lie? With
profits, or the earth?
The fossil fuel industry is hastening the
world toward climactic collapse; both Stephen Hawking and lesser known
Australian Professor Fenner give humans 100 years. Wall Street and its
colleague agencies like the IMF and World Bank are the number one cause of
ballooning billionaires in places exotic and poverty in the third world, but
that is not our biggest immediate concern. The derivative snowball the private
banks have created since Clinton set in motion deregulation is set to plunge
the world into an economic collapse that will make 2008 seem like a normal day.
We of the Affluent have had the choice to
oppose this president (and those of the past) but instead, since around 1950,
we have risen blowing bugles, quaffing champagne, releasing balloons and
getting unbelievably fat and sick. We live beyond the wildest dreams of just
100 years ago but it has come at the cost of the environment. In getting there,
under the slogan ‘that’s their problem’ we’ve sentenced billions to poverty but
we’re the ignorant ones. Their poverty adds hugely to Climate Change’s tipping
point. Think for a moment of how the poor live. Think of how rising temperatures
and icy-chills create more poor: Inequality not only adds to Climate Change,
Climate Change translates into greater inequality.[xxxii]
The Future
Trump
infers his belief in belief is not a recent political move but that it started
way back. When he was
sworn in the Bible[xxxiii]
his Mummy gave him in 1955 was used (Abraham Lincoln’s inauguration Bible was
back up). ‘Trump is humbled to place his hand on Bibles that hold special
meaning both to his family and to our country’,[xxxiv]
said his PR machine.
Fuzzy,
and cute, but what of life?
The threats ‘we now face are the most
severe that have ever arisen in human history … nuclear war, environmental
catastrophe’ Chomsky said in an interview in December with Democracynow. ‘… the stated
goal of the president-elect, who regards climate change as a hoax and whose
policy, if he pursues it, is to maximize the use of fossil fuels, end
environmental regulations … and, in other ways, accelerate the race to
destruction …[xxxv]
What we urgently need are not fairy tales
but an education system worldwide that has as a base, as an absolute starting point at kindergarten level, documentaries
like “The Journey of Man: A Genetic Odyssey”[xxxvi] and ‘Cosmos: A Spacetime Odyssey’ to
introduce an elementary understanding of the real world and our
inter-dependency on nature. We should be closing down the like of the Bush
initiated, millions wasted, Creation Museum,[xxxvii]
moving Christianity instruction to a neutral safe place alongside Greek
Mythology.
We need to teach science and maths,[xxxviii]
have as set book for moral orientation for 12 year olds the Humanists’ Bible,[xxxix]
and for environment appreciation ‘The greatest show on earth’.[xl]
We’ve problems out there – for example skewed
objectives see the deaths daily of some 25,000 kids[xli]
though the neglect of basics like food.
The problem with Climate Change is the
conditions to send the world tipping into human oblivion have already happened.
We’re waiting for them to take
effect. Prayers are useful only as a basic improbability exercise in a junior
arithmetic-fun class.
‘Religion and
science both offer explanations for why life and the universe exist.’[xlii]
Far from being filled with morality, saying ‘sorry, we
weren’t equipped to know better’ religion and Trump’s Christians aren’t
apologising for their failure to dump myth and the destruction it has caused –
they’re going on ahead to make it worse. Far from joining hands with our scientists Trump has
proceeded at a tangent and engineered the backing of the ardent Catholic[xliii]
Koch Brothers[xliv],
Mr and Mr Fossil Fuel America.
Trump and
the likeminded of the Corporacy enthusiastically join with science in one
sector – colonising space. Just as throughout the Western world the Middle
Class has deemed it its right to barricade itself from the growing poverty
classes so the super-rich, the elite and cronies likely see safety in space
communities. Instead of sitting next to Jesus from space stations orbiting the
moon they could look down on a frying – exploding earth.[xlv]
There is so far no heaven, only this
one-off life. No longer is it plausible to instruct people to work for the
profit of corporates or to go willy-nilly to die for the politician sitting
warming himself before the fire. Under Trump, evangelical USA is happy to bring
Jesus to open all Christian graves, as Armageddon sounds.
[ii] ‘He did accept a relationship with Christ.’ http://www.dailywire.com/news/6944/dr-james-dobson-trump-recently-accepted-christ
[iii] ‘He is a
deacon at First Baptist Church in Broken Arrow, Oklahoma, and on the board of
trustees of the Southern Baptist Theological Seminary, part of the conservative
Southern Baptist denomination, which claims over 15 million members” … http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2017/01/23/trump-s-epa-pick-blends-conservative-christianity-with-anti-environmental-activism.html
[iv] http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2017/01/23/trump-s-epa-pick-blends-conservative-christianity-with-anti-environmental-activism.html
[v] http://religionnews.com/2016/12/14/rex-tillerson-establishment-protestant-secretary-of-state/
And ‘Tillerson, now secretary of state, used the email pseudonym Wayne Tracker
to communicate with Exxon Mobil board members. – the emails over CC have
disappeared - see http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/exxon-mobil-rex-tillerson-emails-lost-us_us
[vi] The Corporation by Joel Bakan. The promotion of education as a new
growth industry not with the objective of broadening and deepening the scope
knowledge but to make money out of a necessity that is as important as water
was given new impetus under Bush Jnr. It was achieved through political
positioning and money muscle. The mill-stone hanging around the necks of
current students and those who went through or attempted to, over the last 20
-30 years bears testimony to the blackmail of for-profit education.
[vii] The basis of the business model is to work as cohesive family
units, isolated – no sharing- form others of lesser opinion. It is in a sense a
private group pyramid scheme. Here is another view … https://www.luckscout.com/amway-pyramid-scheme/
[viii] http://www.motherjones.com/politics/2017/01/betsy-devos-christian-schools-vouchers-charter-education-secretary
[ix] https://www.au.org/.../trump-appoints-creationist-jerry-falwell-jr-to-lead-higher-educa...
[x] Agricultural policies, in association with gangsters like the IMF,
have done huge damage to poor and developing countries abilities to feed
themselves. My first lesson in this area came from Chossudovsky.
[xi] https://thinkprogress.org/13-ridiculous-things-ben-carson-actually-believes-8ac626927019#.btoe6zd73
[xii] Many sites – here’s one. http://www.cosmopolitan.com/politics/a8288455/who-is-steve-bannon-trump-chief-strategist/
[xiii] http://www.popularmechanics.com/military/a23306/nuclear-bombs-powerful-today/
[xv] http://www.huffingtonpost.com/david-heilbroner/evangelicals-israel-and-t_b_391351.html
[xvi] www.latimes.com/projects/la-na-pol-obama-at-war/
… Jan 13, 2017
[xvii] political analyst Hasan @ http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/46568.htm
[xviii]
www.irishtimes.com/.../europe/eu-welcomes-iran-breakthrough-and-eyes-energy-deal...
Jan 18, 2016 - European Union
officials will visit Iran as early as next month to explore possible energy
links, the EU's energy commissioner said yesterday, ...
[xix] http://www.cnsnews.com/news/article/michael-w-chapman/cia-dir-pompeo-jesus-christ-our-savior-truly-only-solution-our-world
[xx] http://www.star-telegram.com/news/politics-government/election/article115636563.html
[xxi] There is little to doubt about the King’s visit to Malaysia last
being, primarily, on CIA’s behalf to warn Najiba about Chinese investment.
[xxii] ‘In July 2013, Wahhabism was identified by the European Parliament
in Strasbourg as the main source of global terrorism.’ … http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2016/03/29/what-is-wahhabism-the-reactionary-branch-of-islam-said-to-be-the/
[xxiii] (2015) ‘…about six percent of Danes attend church weekly compared
to about 11 percent in Germany and France. In the United Kingdom the figure is
about 22 percent, with the number rising to 26 percent in Spain and 30 percent
in the Netherlands.’ See http://www.christianexaminer.com/article/abandoned.by.missionary.agencies.christianity.is.dying.in.europe/47985.htm
And the picture is exacerbated by the
fact that for the ‘first time in modern history, Europe’s deaths have exceed
births’. … https://www.lifesitenews.com/opinion/europe-turns-a-fatal-corner-deaths-exceed-births
[xxiv] http://www.spectator.co.uk/2016/05/britain-really-is-ceasing-to-be-a-christian-country/
[xxvi] Christianity and Capitalism are the twins who, since the stealing
of the peasants’ lands in the century or two before the fullness of the
Industrial Revolution bit and marching on through the arrogant centuries of
colonial theft, have made the world such an unequal place.
[xxvii] https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/monkey-cage/wp/2016/08/15/white-christian-america-is-dying/?utm_term=.6b9476e95904
[xxviii] Nobody knows the worth of the Catholic Church, possibly a trillion. And they get involved in all sorts
of investments outside of its 'holy mission' ...
https://www.thestreet.com/story/13295788/1/how-rich-is-the-catholic-church-it-s-impossible-to-tell.html
[xxix] https://www.nytimes.com/2017/03/28/us/coal-miners-hope-trumps-order-will-help-but-few-are-counting-on-it.html
and https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/the-switch/wp/2017/03/28/the-house-just-voted-to-wipe-out-the-fccs-landmark-internet-privacy-protections/
[xxxi] http://thehill.com/blogs/pundits-blog/the-administration/310103-a-tale-of-two-cabinets-obamas-cronies-vs-trumps
[xxxiii] Of the Bible Trump declared ‘The Bible is certainly, it is THE
book. … I think religion is a wonderful thing. I think my religion is a
wonderful religion.’ http://hollowverse.com/donald-trump
[xxxiv] https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/morning-mix/wp/2017/01/18/the-symbolism-of-trumps-two-inaugural-bible-choices-from-lincoln-to-his-mother/?utm_term=.c4aae9428cf3
[xxxv] https://www.democracynow.org/2017/1/2/noam_chomsky_with_trump_election_we
[xxxvi] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W_xTG6VXlIQ
[xxxvii] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-lMzJ8rbBOI
[xxxix] At least we know this was written by AC Graylin with a workable
world in mind.
[xlii] Ibid Lorna Salzman
[xliii] ‘The Koch brothers are Catholic. Though their last name is Jewish
in origin, the Koch brothers have pledged over $3 million to the Catholic University
of America.’ … https://www.reference.com/
[xliv] A family who put money before all else, particularly, for example,
before Stalin a nd Hitler to make more money … http://www.truth-out.org/news/item/34413-jane-mayer-reveals-history-of-koch-family-and-the-nazis
[xlv]Privately-owned space stations could be orbiting the moon by 2020'
so presumably space homes for the super-rich won't be far off.
https://sputniknews.com/science/201703091051424941-private-space-stations-orbit-moon/