Friday, February 26, 2016

Why Are Some Evangelical Leaders Supporting Trump?



Why do evangelical pastors like Robert Jeffress, a Fox News contributor and pastor of the 11,000-member First Baptist Church of Dallas, support Trump? He made headlines during the 2012 presidential election when he described The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints as a "cult" and said evangelicals should not vote for then-candidate Mitt Romney because he is a Mormon.

Gordon B. Hinckley, prior President of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (1995-2008), said: “We are Christians in a very real sense and that is coming to be more and more widely recognized. Members of our church pray and worship in the name of Jesus Christ. He is the center of our faith and the Head of our Church.”

Jeffress later conceded, “It is better to vote for a non-Christian (Romney, I presume) who supports biblical principles like life and marriage than voting for a professing Christian like Barack Obama who absolutely repudiates what Jesus Christ said about some key issues.”  

But the damage was done. Jeffress did not seem to realize that not voting for Romney was the same as voting for Obama. A small increase in the Christian vote would have defeated Obama in 2012.

In 2014, Jeffress released a book claiming that Obama’s re-election was paving the way for the Antichrist foretold in Scripture. Maybe he was promoting this future book when he helped with his reelection. 

The good pastor is back for the 2016 election. He appeared on Fox’s Lou Dobbs recently to again express his support for the Donald, saying that he is the only real “outsider” (which indicates a disturbing level of naiveté). He went on to say that after the Supreme Court’s ruling on same-sex marriages, evangelicals seem more open to a secular candidate, that they have decided to allow the government to solve “practical problems” and let the church solve Biblical problems. This was in answer to a question by Dobbs wherein he described Trump as a “very religious man—a Protestant . . . a Presbyterian”. 

So is Trump secular or Christian? Which is it, Dr. Jeffress? And are you seriously suggesting that Christians “give up” and vote for a candidate that does not reflect Christian values? What kind of twisted logic is that? 

How about that book of yours in 2014? Do you not realize that Trump’s values align almost perfectly with Obama’s?

Trump took deep offense when it appeared that the Pope was questioning his faith, but he has questioned the faith of at least three other candidates for the nomination many times. Maybe Jeffress is supporting Trump because they share a common personality trait of narcissists. They seem able to hold opposing ideas in their heads at the same time, to change positions regularly, and yet believe all positions held are exactly right. 

“The notion that the church, the press, and the universities should serve the state is essentially a Communist notion. In a free society these institutions must be wholly free — which is to say that their function is to serve as checks upon the state." —Alan Barth (1906-1979)

Food for thought: "Just how much must evangelicals and conservatives compromise themselves to support Trump? That is the ultimate problem. Every person supporting Trump has not just compromised on a candidate, but compromised their core values. ... These people are compromising their integrity for a presidential candidate willing to use profane language on the campaign trail and bombast to overcome a lack of knowledge of details. 'For what does it profit a man to gain the whole world and forfeit his soul?'" —Erick Erickson

Wednesday, February 24, 2016

Tweeter-In-Chief or Commander-In-Chief?



Donald Trump is an enigmatic phenomenon created by a sustained assault on critical thinking by the whining, oversensitive crybabies of political correctness encouraged by the likes of Obama, Reid, Pelosi et al. Americans are disgusted and angry at their attempts to take away our liberties and diminish America’s standing in the world, not to mention their utter devastation of our economy by running up more debt than all previous administrations combined. Yes, I said combined. There is a tipping point and we are nearing it.

“The Donald” is also a product of John Boehner and Mitch McConnell, who along with some other Republicans, made promises in order to get elected which they broke. Their policy of lying down, rolling over, and playing dead infuriated many of us.

I realized long ago that America is hungry for straight talk from a forceful leader. We want our intelligence to be respected and our freedoms to remain intact. For many, Trump seems to fill that need. But does he?

Trump supporters say:
He is not part of the establishment and will not be beholden to special interests. 

Nonsense. He is more establishment than any of the other candidates. The establishment is not just politicians, but the large donors who own them. Trump gave money to Reid, Pelosi, Obama, and even contributed $150K to the Clinton Foundation. He defines the term “crony capitalism”.

He will build a wall and make Mexico pay for it and rid our country of people here illegally who are draining our economy.

During the last presidential election, he called taking away welfare from illegal immigrants inhumane and is on record as supporting legalization and citizenship for folks who came here illegally. Will the real Donald Trump please come forward?

He will destroy our enemies, especially ISIS, and keep us safe.

Trump claims to have opposed the war in Iraq from inception. Yet he is on record as supporting it until a full eighteen months after it began. And what about his blaming W. for 9/11? Isn’t that an extreme left conspiracy position? Does that kind of deranged thinking befit a commander-in-chief?

He also shamefully hides behind 9/11, mentioning the hundreds of friends he lost. Though nobody can find records of his attending any of the funerals, I will accept what he says. But I do know he took (yes, I said took) $150K from the World Trade Center Business Recovery Grant program as a “small business” hurt by the attacks. His “small business” brings in $26.4 million annually and occupies a $400 million building.


He seems willing to equate his prep school time with military experience.

A military veteran said that Trump would take the lawyers off the battlefield (referring to the ridiculous rules-of-engagement that our Wimp-in-Chief imposes on our soldiers.)  Maybe he would, but Trump has surrounded himself with lawyers his entire adult life. 

Speaking of that . . .
He is currently involved in 169 federal lawsuits.
He is being sued for fraud for his now-defunct Trump University.
In 2013, he settled a lawsuit from investors who lost millions in his California resort that went belly-up.  

He is an extremely successful businessman.
           
Hard to argue that point, yet he has filed bankruptcy four times in the same gambling,  hotel, casino business. A lot of fine people have gone bankrupt and recovered, but four times in the same business?  Is he a slow-learner? He proudly says he used the laws available to him. Translation: He hid behind bankruptcy protection statutes to avoid paying creditors. If you had $9 billion, would you pay people who loaned you money or would you let them lose? How about the hundreds of employees who lost their jobs? If he wins the nomination, those folks will be in campaign ads.
             
What John Bright said of someone else applies to Trump. “He is a self-made man who worships his creator.”

He will get our budget balanced, reduce the national debt, and keep taxes low.

How does that square with his support of the bailout of large banks and the subsequent stimulus that added trillions to our debt without contributing to a real recovery? The only problem he had with either is that they were “not large enough”. 

He will get rid of Obamacare.

Maybe, but he promises to replace it with universal care, a single payer system controlled by the government. Do you really want your doctors to work for the government and hospitals run by bureaucrats?  Anyone who believes that the government should take over another 20-25% more of the economy is not qualified to run for any public office, much less president. P. J. O’Rourke said, “If you think health care is expensive now, wait until it’s free.”

He is a conservative.

He has not voted in a Republican primary for at least thirty years. Did he just skip voting or did he vote Democrat? 

He is pro-life and a Christian.

But wait … what about that pesky video a few years back where he said he was pro-choice including partial birth abortions? He is threatening to sue Ted Cruz for playing it in a campaign ad. He calls Cruz a liar for exposing his positions. Wouldn’t you love to hear the deposition when Cruz asks, “So, Donny, who is that guy speaking out of your face with your voice if it’s not you?” 

Donald says he is Christian but has never had to ask God for forgiveness. And what is a basic (maybe the basic tenet) of Christianity?  That’s right. It’s forgiveness. God knew man would continue to sin, so He sent His Son to die on the Cross so that we might be forgiven. 

He has a right to change his mind. 

Sure, but the man will be seventy before the general election. Shouldn’t his mind have been made up on significant issues long ago? 

What is more disturbing is that he is able to hold opposite positions in his head over short spans of time (sometimes in the same day). Another sign of severe narcissism.  Isn’t eight years with a narcissist in the White House enough? 

"Sixty-eight percent [of my followers] would not leave under any circumstance. I think that means murder, I think it means anything, okay?" —Donald Trump. Are you really going to vote for a man who insults you that way?

The Dems want this guy to win the nomination. He polls the worst against their candidates. He has the highest negative ratings of any candidate.

Donald Trump is a spoiled boy in a man’s body. Even in his senior years, he maintains the pursed-lips-pout of a small child and reacts angrily with threats of legal action to anyone who challenges him. Because of his personality disorder, he believes that any statement he utters is absolutely truthful, even when it is provably false.

Texans, we have a candidate from our state. Ted Cruz is a proven conservative, a constitutional scholar, a former Solicitor General for Texas, a man who has represented us before the Supreme Court nine times. Do I wish he had more private sector experience? Yes. Do I wish he had more charisma? Yes. But I am not looking for a guy to have a beer with; I am looking for a strong, principled leader. Cruz has kept his promises and proven courageous under national pressure from both the media and from his fellow Senators. If the media (including Fox) don’t like him and most politicians don’t like him, what better recommendation could there be?

Do we really want a president who Tweets, when a tweet could roil financial markets or cause an international incident? I think not. Common sense, intelligence, and humility are qualities I most admire in leaders. But I find hubris to be a dangerous trait.  I’ve worked with and for narcissists. I do not want another one to be the leader of the free world. 

Pastor Charles Stanley said, “Few people are excited about pursuing humility because it’s considered a weakness. But if we understand God’s view of it, we’ll realize that humility is an extremely significant quality. Philippians 2:3 says, ‘Do nothing from selfishness or empty conceit, but with humility of mind regard one another as more important than yourselves’.”

Ben Shapiro says: "In truth, we should never be comfortable with our politicians. We should never trust them. Our celebrities have become royals, and our politicians have become celebrities. That means we crown ourselves a king or queen every four years. And America needs no kings and queens. We need unimportant, decent people who focus on how to make themselves unimportant in our lives."