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Trump gets Religion (not satire) [1]
['This Content Is Not Subject To Review Daily Kos Staff Prior To Publication.']
Date: 2025-02-07
Just to put his foot in it at the same time as he plans to take over Gaza, Trump had to tout his non-existent religious bonifides. To him, Muslims aren't human beings. Worse than undocumented immigrants.
Note that he never mentions Christianity.
"THE DAY THAT GOD INTERVENED" is at the top of his second edition, Made in China Bible. If he had put it at the bottom of the Bible, well, I still wouldn't give him a pass because he still put himself above the Holy Bible on the third version, the Inauguration Bible.
Trump is playing for the rubes. "After years of decline..." is a common theme for Trump. The U.S. is in decline. Morals are in decline. Democrats are to blame for all our ills. He always has somebody else to blame.
"...re-asserting our true identity..." are code words for white Christian nationalism. When you try to find out how many Christian nationalists there are, you get tons of data with sympathizers, leaners, but never just white. The one repeatable percentage is 10% for all of them. I think a realistic figure would be 6% to 8% for white Christian nationalists.
Why do they seem to have such an outsized influence? They don't. They are just allowed to have it. The theory is that the U.S.A. was meant to be a Christian nation, which gives politicians the power to exert influence, because Christianity is always right. Criticize it, and you're a godless heathen.
When you start saying "ordained by God," you can use that as justification for everything evil you do. Donald Trump uses that evil every day. It cycles between oppressing trans one day and Democrats the next.
A country "ordained by God" is always righteous and all-powerful. We can do anything because we're always right.
We have been "the freest and most exceptional nation to every exist on the face of the Earth." But not anymore. There are many organizations that rate countries in their position of being a democracy. The United States is now rated by The Economist as number 29, meaning a flawed democracy. At the top of the list at number one is Norway.
Trump has always had a perverted view of history. What little he knows. Whatever fits his fancy at any particular time is the truth. If it isn't the truth, he makes it the truth by repetition.
While none of the founding fathers were atheists, Thomas Jefferson, the author of the Declaration of Independence, was attacked by religious conservatives as an atheist.
The genius of the founding fathers is that they understood that Christianity could not only stand on its own but would thrive without being written into the laws and founding documents of the country. Many of the founding fathers, Washington, Jefferson, Franklin, Madison, and Monroe, practiced a faith called Deism. Deists believe in a supreme being who created the universe to operate solely by natural laws, and after creation, is absent from the world.
"... strengthened by the power of prayer..."
This is fine unless you use that phrase to mean that because you're religious, or pretend to be religious, that might makes right. The odds of Trump ever praying is next to nil. You may see Trump bow his head, but he'll never say the words. Watch when he is on camera when the national anthem is sung, and you'll see that he doesn't even know the words. When he holds the bible, it's usually upside down. Except when he's selling his own version.
Pretending to be religious to be able to sell a Bible is what Jesus fought against. He threw the money changers and those that were buying and selling out of the Temple. The only thing Trump knows is being the money changer and a snake oil salesman.
"... strengthened by the power of prayer..." is not to be confused with whipping people into a frenzy to do un-Christian things. There is so much evil that has been done in Christ's name. Look at the Crusades.
In the 1950s with the rise of communism, Senator Joseph McCarthy was allowed to take center stage and conduct an actual witch hunt.
"Today we are engaged in a final all-out battle between communistic atheism and Christianity. The modern champions of communism have selected this as the time. And, ladies and gentlemen, the chips are down, truly down," McCarthy said at one of his hearings.
McCarthy going after the godless communists made it possible for him to ruin many people's lives.
It's no different today with Trump's crusade against the Democrats, liberals, and the LGBTQ+ community. He has made them the equivalent of McCarthy's communists. In fact, Trump has used that phrase many times as well as Marxists. Trump loves using the buzzwords of hate.
Trump shouldn't even be allowed to say or write the words "In God We Trust." Francis Scott Key wrote almost those words in "The Star Spangled Banner."
Written in 1814, in the fourth stanza, which we don't sing, is the phrase, "And this be our motto, in God is our trust." "In God We Trust" is an adaptation of that.
The phrase first showed up on coinage in 1864 on a 2 cent piece. The idea was to boost morale for Union troops, telling them God was on their side.
The first postage stamps with it showed up in 1954. In 1955 President Eisenhower signed a joint resolution to have "In God We Trust" appear on all United States currency. In 1956 it became the national motto by law.
Trump, however, is simply trying to use the phrase as a weapon against the godless Democrats, and people of different faiths.
Never make the mistake that something Trump says almost sounds right. The man doesn't know how to be on the right side of the law or history.
I was ready to do a final edit on this diary, and then I went to look at the White House website, and there was a new executive order signed by Trump on Thursday called "Eradicating Anti-Christian Bias."
..end the anti-Christian weaponization of government.
I had no idea there was any. He could be talking about losing court cases trying to put the Ten Commandments in school rooms. It could be about state governments saying that taxpayer money can't support religious schools. It's not clear. That's a feature not a bug.
The Founders established a Nation in which people were free to practice their faith without fear or retaliation by their government.
Yes, but without giving deference to any religion at all. If there's anti-Christianity in government, there must also be anti-Jewish sentiment and anti-Muslim sentiment, anti-Buddism sentiment. The list goes on and on if you want to list all religions possible. To single out Christianity for special treatment is showing prejudice right off the bat.
Here come the lies.
Yet the previous administration engaged in an egregious pattern of targeting peaceful Christians, while ignoring violent, anti-Christian offenses.
That's just the lead in. I didn't think I could get worse but it does. Trump brings up two dozen cases of "pro-life" Christians who were illegally blocking abortion facilities entrances. Also attacking people coming and going. That's not what he said, that's what I'm saying, knowing the cases he's talking about. Trump gave pardons to these individuals on January 23rd. Probably everybody missed that. I didn't hear about additional pardons, other than the January 6th insurrectionist pardons and Ulbricht.
At the same time, Catholic Churches, charities, and pro-life centers sought justice for violence, theft, and arson perpetrated against them, which the Biden Justice Department largely ignored.
Trump doesn't use the right term for pro-life centers. It's really Crisis Pregnancy Centers. These are fake abortion clinics that suck people in thinking that they're going to get information on abortion and instead they're steered towards having the pregnancy go to term.
Trump, of course, never brings up the fact that anti-abortionists have killed doctors and healthcare clinic employees and nurses in their quest for death, not life. A fetus is more important than a full-grown adult to them.
And let's stop letting them use the word pro-life. They have no right to use that because they don't believe in the sanctity of life of adults or children. It's just words that they mouth.
The executive order gets worse.
Trump brings up that 2023 memo from the FBI that radical traditionalist Catholics were domestic terrorism threats. Well, when you attack people and try to kill them, you will be looked at as a threat.
This later-retracted FBI memorandum cited as support evidence propaganda from highly partisan sources.
Yes, I remember it. It really was much ado about nothing, but that never stops crazy radical Christians. And it gave Republicans a spot that they could hang their hats on.
The Biden Equal Employment Opportunity Commission sought to force Christians to affirm radical transgender ideology against their faith.
This was actually a case of following civil rights law. How easy it is for things to get blown out of proportion when you've got religion as a cudgel. Here's the one that really, really bothered Trump.
The Biden Administration declared March 31st, 2024, Easter Sunday, as "Transgender Day of Visibility."
Just like Trump to get really upset about the happenstance of March 31st, which had been the Day of Visibility for years, happening on the same day as Easter Sunday, the date for which moves around. There was nothing deliberate about it. Now I'm absolutely sure there's nothing Christian about this executive order. It's a cover.
He's going to establish a Task Force to "Eradicate Anti-Christian Bias". It will be centered within the Department of Justice, but the force will include every single secretary in his cabinet along with a good number of directors and administrators of agencies and bureaus.
Just like he's made every single Department to go through and eliminate DEI programs and information and websites, Trump wants the task force to go through all the departments of government that they've just gone through for DEI, and now do it for anti-Christian bias.
Trump wants a report within 120 days, and another report after a year.
The Task Force shall terminate 2 years from the date of this order unless extended by the President.
Why am I thinking of Mission Impossible where the message will self-destruct in 5 seconds?
The white Christian nationalists have gotten their wish. Trump is forcing the government to recognize a religion as a state religion. That is obviously unconstitutional. This order is obviously unconstitutional.
It's a misuse of power.
On the old TV show "Maude," Bea Arthur would regularly say to her husband, Walter, "God'll get you for that."
God'll get you for this, Trump, for corrupting the true meaning of Christiaity.
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