War, What is it Good For…Absolutely Something?

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In June of 1970, several months after President Richard Nixon decided that the best way to get out of the Vietnam War was to invade Cambodia, the hit song War was released. Originally a Temptation song, Edwin Stars’s version become a Billboard Number 1 hit. It held that spot for three weeks in August and September; and was later rated the Number 5 song of 1970.

Most of us are familiar with the bold drum opening and guttural question shouted out in the song: “War, huh yeah! What is it good for? Absolutely nothing uhuh…”

It must be good for something or someone because it seems as if we humans are constantly at war or continually marching towards it. If one pursues the files of history we come across several significant political and military events that occured in the month of June that sit right up with what is going on in the Ukraine and Gaza.

The first event that comes to mind is D-Day, the “Longest Day,” June, 6, 1944. It was the largest amphibious, airborne assault in history. Its aim was to liberate Europe from Nazi domination. Once the Allies established a foothold in Nazi occupied Europe, it was the beginning of the end for Hitler and his Nazi cronies quest for a thousand year Third Reich. A Germanic fascist pipe dream built from a belief that Charlemagne’s Holy Roman Empire was the First Reich.

The National Socialist German Workers’ Party, according to historians, the complicated moniker reveals more about the image the party wanted to project and the constituency it aimed to build than it did about the Nazis’ true political goals, which were building a state based on racial superiority and brute-force governance.–snopes.com

Three years earlier, on June 22, 1941, Hitler launched Operation Barbarossa, the invasion of Russia. This invasion was the largest military operation in history. The invasion had more soldiers, armored vehicles, artillery and aircraft than any offensive in WWII. It resulted in four years of brutal war. The Eastern Front racked up more death than the all the other theaters of war including the North Africa, Italy, Pacific, India and China Fronts. Russia alone lost 8.6 million soldiers and another 26 million Russians citizens were killed in WWII. It is estimated that 1,700 towns and another 70,000 villages were destroyed. This does not include a death toll from the countries that the two armies fought through to get each others homeland. I really don’t want to sound flip, but I will. It makes what is going on in the Ukraine and Gaza look more like urban renewal compared to the carnage of WWII bombing campaigns, concentration camps and nuclear attacks on Japan. But it is still War, and to those who are experiencing it–“it ain’t nothing but a heartbreaker…’cause it means destruction of innocent lives…“

On June 28, 1914 “The Great War, The War to end all Wars,” was instigated with the assassination of Austrian Archduke Franz Ferdinand. For the next four years European troops gassed each other, dug trenches throughout France and Belgium and started aerial bombardment of cities: all giant steps forward for mankind. France, Britain and Germany had a whole generation gutted from their populations creating social and economic upheaval. “The point of war blows my mind, War has caused unrest within the younger generation…”

As for the Russians, the 500 year rule of the Tsars came to an end from the weight of the war. Eventually, the Bolsheviks under Lenin took control bringing about the world’s the first communist socialist government. The end of WWI just reset the pins back up to be knocked back down again in WWII.

One might have thought the Europeans would come to their senses, but not so. As the Soviet Union slowly rusted away from Cold War pressures, the grip it held behind the Iron Curtain started to disintegrate. It could be argued that the Balkan Wars of the 1990s started with the breaking apart of the six republics that made up the federated Yugoslavia. According to United Nations International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia, “experienced a period of intense political and economic crisis. Central government weakened while militant nationalism grew apace. There was a proliferation of political parties who, on one side, advocated the outright independence of republics and, on the other, urged greater powers for certain republics within the federation.” The melting pot that was Yugoslavia was beginning to boil over.

Political leaders from used nationalist rhetoric to erode a common Yugoslav identity and fuel fear and mistrust among different ethnic groups. By 1991, the break-up of the country loomed with Slovenia and Croatia blaming Serbia of unjustly dominating Yugoslavia’s government, military and finances. Serbia in turn accused the two republics of separatism and the displacement of both Croats and Serbs. –United Nations International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia

This nationalist rhetoric began “to erode a common Yugoslav identity and fuel fear and mistrust among different ethnic groups. On June 25, 1991, Slovenia became the first of six Yugoslav republics to declare its independence.” From there it became a domino effect with Croatia declaring its independence. Its claim for independence became a back-and-forth conflict with Serbia, which resulted in more than 20,000 deaths.

But the disintegration of Yugoslavia was just getting warmed up. As Gill Scott Heron sings in B-Movie “…first one wants freedom, then the whole damn world wants freedom…” To intensify hostilities, throw in a spark of religious difference to the already centuries of smoldering ethnic divisions. Without the central control of the communist government a flash of ethnic cleansing ignited In Bosnia and Herzegovina. “It is estimated that more than 100,000 people were killed and two million people, more than half the population, were forced to flee their homes as a result of the war that raged from April 1992 through to November 1995.”

And then there was Kosovo. “Serb forces heavily targeted (Albanians) civilians, shelling villages and forcing Kosovo Albanians to flee. NATO entered the fray with a 78-day-long campaign of air strikes against Serbian targets in Kosovo and Serbia. In response, Serb forces further intensified the persecution of the Kosovo Albanian civilians.”

This year long war, according left more than 10,000 civilians killed or missing and displacing thousands. When the shooting finally ended the UN estimated that, “Some 750,000 Albanian refugees came home and about 100,000 Serbs – roughly half the province’s Serb population – fled in fear of reprisals.

In the 19th century, the U.S. Government’s drive for expansion clashed violently with Native Americans’ resolve to preserve their lands, sovereignty, and ways of life. This struggle over land has defined the relationship between the U.S. Government and Native tribes.–National Archives

The United States had its June moment, too. This moment actually starts on April 29, 1868 with a treaty signed between the U.S. Government and the Sioux Nation at Fort Laramie. Native Americans have been scammed out of their lands signing treaties since Colonials first crossed the Appalachian Mountains. But yet here they were signing another treaty. According to the National Archives The Treaty of 1868 “recognized the Black Hills as part the Great Sioux Reservation.” The treaty “set aside for the exclusive use by the Sioux people.” That is until Gold was discovered in 1874.

It is obvious that the Plains tribes did not hear about what happened to the Cherokee and The Trail of Tears when gold was discovered on their land in Georgia in 1830. Or maybe they had and saw history repeating itself. Because when interloping miners in the Black Hills discovered gold in 1874 the land was about to change hands. By the end of 1875 and early 1876 the gold rush was on trampling The Treaty of 1868 in a cloud of gold dust.

But unlike the 1830 Indian Removal Act, the Great Plains Native Americans had no intention of walking off to reservations under U.S. Army escort. Granted, a large portion of the Native American population were on the reservation, but those that were not raised concerns among miners and the government. There were skirmishes and battles between the Army and Native Americans. But none as the the battle that would take place at the Little Bighorn River. As one Indian Inspector wrote: “The true policy in my judgement is to send troops against them in the winter, the sooner the better, and whip them into subjection.”

The U.S. Army was tasked with whipping the Sioux, Cheyenne, Crow and other tribes that refused to relocate to their reservations into submission. A military operation of three columns of infantry and cavalry were sent out from various forts and directions. Any coordination between distant columns quickly fell apart and was exacerbated when Lt. Colonel George Custer galloped off on his own. What Custer found was was a Native American encampment of about 7,000 people that included 1,500 to 2,000 warriors.

The Battle of Little Bighorn was really a minor affair compared to already mentioned battles and wars. However, it was the worst defeat the U.S. Army suffered in all of the battles fought with Native Americans; and possibly one of the most complete defeats the Army has ever suffered. Although, the casualty figures were low, it was a massacre. All 210 soldiers with Custer were killed. It is estimated that Native Americans killed was around 100. As for the duration of the battle, according to some sources, Custer’s last stand lasted less then a half-hour. One Native American survivor later said the fighting lasted only “as long as it takes a hungry man to eat a meal.”

Custer’s Last Stand shocked the nation that was celebrating its Centennial. How could such a defeat happen? If anything, Custer’s defeat, as decisive as it was, only increased the demand to relocate the Plains tribes to reservations. It may have been Custer’s last stand, but it was also the Native Americans last stand.

The Americans Indian Wars started with the massacre of the first settlers at Jamestown in 1622 when the Powhatan tribe killed nearly 350 colonists. Of course no massacre goes unpunished. Colonist began attacking Native American villages and hence the dogs of war are unleashed. For more than 260 years a crude and brutal frontier justice was practiced between Native Americans and the U.S. Army, farmers, miners and settlers moving west. The war was officially ended with another massacre at Wounded Knee in December of 1890.

Trying to answer “what war is good for” could come down to why people go to war in the first place and what they are willing to die for. Mexican revolutionary Emiliano Zapata said, “It is better to die on your feet then to live on your knees.”

Others might see war as Prussian General Karl von Clausewitz saw it, as “the continuation of politics by other means.” The definitions and the rationalization for wars are varied. Today we could ask what was Hamas thinking when it invaded Israel? What makes the Ukraine land so special that Putin would launch a “special operation” to have it become part of Russia? We could then question what good can come out of supporting combatants. What good will Iran get supporting Hamas or the U.S. supporting Ukraine?

However logical (or illogical) a war starts, it soons starts to slide down the slippery slope of faulty reasoning into some sort of elongated circular reasoning making it impossible to determine if the death and destruction, the outcome have any worth.

It’s a mixed, up muddled up Bizarro World we live in

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As a kid I never indulged in comic book reading. I never knew the difference between Marvel and DC comic heros or villians. I could not tell which capped character was is in the Justice League, Guardians of the Galaxy, or which one is an X-Man. I will admit I did watch the TV series Superman and later Batman as kid. But my comic book viewing never introduced me to the concept of the Bizarro World–or how it would be relevant today.

Today’s political world reads like a comic book. Instead of the Justice League we have the Freedom Caucus. Although its members, like Jim Jordan and Marjorie Taylor Green, do not run around in fancy tights and cape, they do act bizarre form time-to-time. It is hard to tell who are the good guys or bad guys without a comic book. It all depends on how you perceive government and which comic book you get your news from. It would be interesting to see what Marvel or DC could come up with thrilling MTG battling Jewish space lasers and California wildfires and seeking out Hunter Biden’s private parts. And then there is Jim Jordan slinking out of a Congressional cave rooting out the so-called liberal agenda spearheaded by the Bizarro Captain America, Joe Biden.

Oh, but wait. We have Fox News, CNN and MSNBC already writing the never ending saga of the Trump crusade to make America great again. Or is it Bizarro Captain Joe trying to save America from fascism and tyranny. You pick. Marvel or DC.

According to one Google search there have been 37 Marvel movies and 27 DC movies. If you go to IMDB website there have been around 200 movies and televised Superhero flicks of some sort or other. As I mentioned, as a kid I did watch some episodes of Superman on TV with George Reeves as “the man of steel.” And in 1966 I watched Batman. Britannica described Adam West and Batman as a “kitschy” TV series. Despite being laughably tacky, it was popular show for ABC.

But then I grew up and that ended my fascination with comic book heroes. I spent more time reading Time and Newsweek, until 1989. I remember watching Batman with Michael Keaton. But, to this day I could not tell you a single event from the movie. In 2002 I watched Spider-Man with Tobey Maguire. I recall his un-heroic looking costume. But mostly I recall the upside down kiss with Kirsten Dunst.

Later, a colleague bullied me to watch the 2008 Iron Man film with Robert Downey, Jr. as Tony Stark. He gave me the CD to watch. I do remember a little more about this movie simply because my colleague made it mandatory that we have a post viewing discussion. Fortunately for me, it was more of him expounded on the movie and me nodding in agreement.

With my lack of interest in comics I naturally missed out on the concept of the Bizarro World. Strangely enough, It was through the TV show Seinfeld that I was awakened to the concept of the Bizarro World. How have I gone most of my life not knowing about the Bizarro World.

According to comicvine.gamespot, the Bizarro World is “where everything is different, and opposite of the way things are on Earth.” It is a planet populated with dopplegangers of Earth’s superheros. A planet that is a cube. The Bizarro concept seems simple, and it is one that I really do not want to delve too deeply in because I think many of the people today are already trapped in a real earthly Bizarro World.–starting with Qanon followers.

However, after a little research on the Bizarro World I am convinced it was created buy several guys stoned to the gourd sitting around a kitchen table coming up with stories as they passed a bong around. With the right amount of weed it is a storyline that can write itself, much like today’s political situation. The big difference is that the political pundits, squawking heads and consultants are not sitting around the same table getting stoned and agreeing on a storyline. It really is an easy writing technique taught in any middle school writing class: compare and contrast. If one side supports Ukraine the other has to be against it. If one side thinks the January 6 assault on the Capitol was a coup attempt, the other side believes it was freedom fighters taking the government back from leftists extremists who stole the election.

I would bet if we went to either political party’s House or Senate cloakroom late at night, and if we knew the secret knock, when the door opened, wafts of marijuana smoke mixed in with the aromatic smell of smoldering cigar smoke would greet us. We would see spaced-out senators like Ted Cruze as Baron Mordo, a man seeking to become the most powerful magician ever. On the other side of the Capitol we would find blitzed-out congressmen, like James Comer, sitting before half-scripted (Congressional investigations) comic panels as the Condiment King. Collider.com says, “Laugh all you want but he has a reputation…Condiment King may be goofy, campy, and pathetic, but that’s precisely the point. He’s meant to be a parody of the silly criminals that Batman used to fight back in the day.” And now that day is here in the Bizarro World. Stay away from the hot dog stand because you just might get splattered with mustard and onions.

And the looney left is not exempt from bizarre beliefs. We have been bombarded with its gender bending ideas. The English rock group, The Kinks, may have been way ahead of their time with their 1970 hit song Lola: “Girls will be boys and boys will be girls it’s a mixed up, muddled up, shook up (Bizarro) world…”

But stay tuned. These bizarro characters are coming up with the next issue. It is sure to be action packed as the Culture Wars heat up. What set of books will be banned next? And who will be awake on the Woke battlefield to defend or attack the belief of systemic injustices in our society? And then there is the January 6 rematch when the Progressive Caucus will battle the Freedom Caucus in the Halls of Congress to see who can validate fake electors.

With the help of the news media, Congress has turned the functioning of the government into a world of opposites. It is a place where the House Democrats support a GOP Speaker. The GOP was a party that was a firm believer in what President George W. Bush called the Axis of Evil–Russia China and Iran. It was a party that was opposed to socialism. It opposed communist Russia from its inception. But now it is the party that snuggles up to the breast of Vladimir Putin for bedtime stories on the new kinder gentler Russian bear.

This is a bizarre world is where there are alternative facts, as if a fact is like rolling dice and picking which of the 216 possibilities you wish to believe is true. It is the believing science is really fiction, elections are faked and losers are winners. It is a place where college students think Hamas is fraternity and that October 7th was fraternity prank, a form hazing for the University of Gaza’s Rush Week.

We are living in a world where the concept that no one person is above the law. That equal justice under the law is just a suggestion. Some believe one certain elected official is above the law. This bizarro belief is being marched through the court system with legal impunity. Many legal minds are championing this idea of immunity. This concept is currently sitting before the Supreme Court. A Court whose wisdom and association with the Bizarro World is being questioned. The real bizarro question is: If one man is above the law, then is anybody below the law?

Trump: the Nation’s Sweet Tooth

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Way back in August of 2018 I wrote, “Its 20/20: Trump in 2020.” I was wrong. Or maybe I was just off by six years.

And here we are in 2024 watching an election rerun like it was an old TV show canceled by one network now being picked up by a another–or so it seems. The 2024 election is like the animated Fox comedy Futurama, a TV show that aired on Fox from 1999 to 2003; but found new life on Comedy Central, where it lived on until 2013.

I am not sure anyone thought former President Donald Trump would just fade away and settle for reruns of his show. Without a doubt the Trump brand has unique selling and staying power. Unlike Enron it is a brand that defies all economic and social laws. In fact, it is beginning to have a shelf life like a package of Hostess Twinkies.

Like everybody, Trump knows that Twinkies hit the sweet spots. We also know, intrinsically, that something that tastes that good has to have some serious downsides. A package of Twinkies has 32 grams of sugar. And according to Eat This, Not That!, of those “32 grams of the sweet stuff, 31 grams are added sugar.” The American Heart Association recommends that men consume about 36 grams of added sugar while women should keep it to around 25 grams. Just do the math. Scarfing down that much added processed sugar adds no nutritional value to the diet.

I have seen cooking shows where a stick of butter was melted with a cup of sugar and then added to the mixing bowl. I could make the A Section of The New York Times taste palatable with a stick of butter, a cup of sugar and several teaspoons of vanilla extract–even the for most hardcore MAGA-man. (It is probably the only way MAGA would consume the NYT) We may be to the point where we are over indulging in Trump. There is no nutritional information coming from his campaign; and that is saying something when talking heads do not stray far from their talking points.

The former president, in reality, is peddling Hostess Twinkies to the American public in double doses. He knows he has hooked the American people, and in particular the media into delivering Twinkies on demand. We are, as a viewing nation, consuming a package or more of Twinkies a day. We are addicted. We have gotten fat for his crazy, zany antics. In fact, we crave them, hunger for them. We have become obese from Trump sugar nuggets. He has created the ultimate media show and it is presented across multiple media platforms. A show that is impossible to cancel, despite its lack of informational fiber.

Netflix originally introduced streaming in 2007 and debuted its first inhouse-produced programming in 2013; that show, House of Cards, exploded in popularity. While not true crime, its success — and the spotlight it shone on the appeal of binge-watching a series — helped open the coffers for Netflix-produced true crime content to come.

Sheila Flynn Independent

Because Twinkies lack fiber, which helps in digestion, gives us a fuller feeling and can help keep sugar levels stable, we remain in this fiberless hungry state craving more. Cable news networks, social media, late night talk shows, ego bloated bloviators and advertisers adding their own sugar to the mixing bowl of so-called news. They are the sugar delivery device–they package the Twinkies. It makes no difference if you are MAGA, A Never Trumper, a RINO or a far left socialist; there is a good chance you are addicted to cable news or scrolling about on social media for Trump Twinkies. We are like sugar-starved humming birds flapping around a feeder.

The Trump saga has way too much drama to walk away from. And this is not by accident. Particularly now with so many court cases. Cable news and social media have their very own Law & Order Trump spin offs. According to NBC “Law & Order dramas have a decades-long legacy. There are seven U.S. shows total in the franchise, which translates to well over 1,000 episodes — with more on the horizon.” America loves crime stories. The more morbid the better, especially if some celebrity is involved. The OJ Simpson case is an example. Accused of a double murder, Simpson’s trial lasted the better part of eight months. People were riveted to evening news shows for the latest up date. Today, Trump has multiple trials in various stages starting with state cases and federal cases with appeals reaching the Supreme Court. You want drama? Tune into Fox and Friends or Morning Joe.

It’s been 20 years since more than 150 million viewers —57% of the country — tuned in to watch the verdict in the O.J. Simpson trial at 10 a.m. on Oct. 3, 1995. The massive viewership of the verdict’s live broadcast was a fitting end to the saga that had captivated the entire nation since the infamous white Bronco chase of the previous June, and its legacy in the media still lasts today.

Time Magazine

We have been led to believe that the Trump drama will end with a conviction in at least one of his trials. But don’t bet on it. So far, Trump’s lawyers have managed to push every trial into the future. And with each court appeal or Supreme Court ruling Trump is creating more processed Twinkies for the American public to feed on. Whether it is additional drama by talking smack about the judges or looking into the sexual escapades of prosecutors it creates more melodrama for all to feast on. Trump may shoot your blood pressure up several notches or flood your brain with dopamine, we are all hooked in to see the next Trump sugar nugget drop–and he knows it.

And if you think the election is going to settle anything, you are wrong. The Trump Saga could run 10 more years with multiple spin offs and thousands of episodes playing across multiple media platforms. There is no cancelation in sight.

 

Gaza: A Battle of Biblical Proportion*

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If the Abel-Shittim area east of the Jordan River had a newspaper in 1400 BCE, the headlines one day might have read: Joshua defeats Canaanites at Jericho. Israelites burn the whole city.

The Israelites storm Jericho with the Ark of the Covenant.

Jean Fouquet, Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons

Joshua’s march into the Promised Land had just began. However, the second battle at Ai did not go so well for the Israelites. It is hard for me to say because I was not at Joshua’s war councils. But I would assume that most Israelite leaders of the time were familiar with Deuteronomy Chapter 20:10, “When you march up to attack a city, make peace…If they refuse to make peace and they engage in battle lay siege to the city. When the Lord your God delivers it into your hands, put it to the sword all men in it. As for the women and children, the livestock and everything else in the city, you may take these as plunder for yourself.”

But, if you read down to verse 16 it says if “God is giving you an inheritance, do not leave alive anything that breathes. Completely destroy them–Hittites, Amorites, Canaanites, Perizzites, Hivites and Jebusites–as the Lord your God has commanded you.” It doesn’t look like the verse mentions Palestinians. Not being familiar with Middle East ethnic descent and genealogy, I will not speculate on any sort of Biblical DNA connection to today’s Palestinians.

However, according to the National Institute of Health’s Pubmed National Center for Biotechnical Information, “Archaeologic and genetic data support that both Jews and Palestinians came from the ancient Canaanites, who extensively mixed with Egyptians, Mesopotamian, and Anatolian peoples in ancient times. Thus, Palestinian-Jewish rivalry is based in cultural and religious, but not in genetic, differences.”  Talk about an ancient melting pot.

But keep away from the devoted things, so that you will not bring about your own destruction by taking any of them. Otherwise you will make the camp of Israel liable to destruction and bring trouble on it.

Joshua 6:18 New International Version

It appears to me that the God of the Old Testament had some serious issues with the Israelites of that era. Take the Ten Commandments. The first two deal with God. He flat told the them I didn’t bring you out of the clutches of Egyptian deities, so don’t think about having other gods before me. And don’t let me catch you dancing around idols and wearing amulets. I think this is why God instructed them to what may be called devoted destruction. Basically, don’t be carrying back any of that junk from your conquered people. In Exodus 20:20 God tells Moses, “Whoever sacrifices to any god other than the Lord must be destroyed.” Maybe it is a short jog from carrying off idolitory war booty to finding yourself on the wrong side of the First and Second commandment.

For instance, Saul, the chosen King of Israel, ran afoul of God. In 1 Samuel 15 Saul was told to “attack the Amalekites and totally destroy all that belongs to them. Do not spare them; put to death men and women, children and infants, cattle and sheep, camels and donkeys.”

But Saul did not listen to his marching orders from God. He spared Agag, king of the Amalekites and took with him the “best of the sheep and cattle, the fat calves and lambs—everything that was good. These they (the Israelites) were unwilling to destroy completely, but everything that was despised and weak they totally destroyed.”

After the battle the prophet Samuel shows up in Saul’s camp. He ask Saul about “all this bleating of sheep in my ears? What is this lowing of cattle that I hear?” Saul like any good leader caught not following orders, blamed it on his underlings, his soldiers.

Samuel, however, was having none of it. He said, “Let me tell you what the Lord told me last night…he sent you on a mission, saying, ‘Go and completely destroy those wicked people, the Amalekites; wage war against them until you have wiped them out.’  Why did you not obey the Lord?”

Saul was not talking his way out this. In fact, he may have done his best Flip Wilson imitation, if Flip was around at that time, saying the “Devil made me do it.”

Let’s fast forward to the present day. There is nothing flip about what is happening in Gaza. The death and destruction could easily be compared to the Romans salting Carthage; or some of the bombing campaigns of World War II; or what is taking place is parts of the Ukraine. It is easy to say that this all started with hang gliding terrorist flying into Israel on October 7. But did it?

Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer is calling for new elections in Israel to replace Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. Schumer says, “The world has changed — radically — since then, and the Israeli people are being stifled right now by a governing vision that is stuck in the past.”

Schumer might be right, although, he did not indicate how far in the past. According to the highest elected Jewish official in the United States government, Netanyahu is allowing “his political survival to take precedence over the best interests of Israel ” But is his he?

I don’t know that much about Netanyahu’s right wing religious leaning government. But if the Zionists are as dedicated to God as some of our Evangelicals here in America, they may be more worried about running afoul of God then world opinion. Especially when Hamas is preaching “From the River to the Sea.”

God sent them into the Promised Land and a multitude of people from Joshua’ time to now have run them out what they believe is rightly theirs. The long Biblical story of this area has the Jews going up against some of the strongest empires in history: Assyrians, Babylonians, Persians, Greeks and Romans to name some of the ancients they battled. And now Hamas.

I am not condoning or defending Israel’s actions in Gaza; but from an Old Testament point of view it does not surprise me.

*As little as I know about the Bible I know even less about the Koran and Islamic writings and history. So this blog may sound one sided. I am sure if it were the Israelis being pushed into the sea we could find numerous Islamic writings that would religiously justify Palestinians’ actions if the tables were reversed.

https://www.timesofisrael.com/senior-hamas-leader-quran-tells-us-to-drive-jews-out-of-palestines-entirety

pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov

You say dictator I say tyrant

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The assassination of Julius Caesar, led by Brutus, by the Senate
Camuccini, Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons

There has been a whole lot of talk about dictators and democracy lately. Donald Trump claims that if he is elected to a second term he would be a dictator for one day. When Americans think of dictators names like Mussolini, Hitler and Stalin come to mind. One has to take a deeper dive into history to come up with the name Cincinnatus.

Political Scientist still debate how fledgling democracies in Italy and Germany went from Fascism to dictatorships in a handful of years. Some go so far as to make comparisons to then and now and the path our democratic/republic might take to find a dictator in the Oval Office.

It is interesting to point out that when the writers of our Constitution sat down in Philadelphia in that hot summer of 1787 they were not talking dictator. More about tyrants. These men were well schooled in ways of the Roman Republic and Athenian democracy. They incorporated many of those ancient concepts and Enlightenment ideas into a working constitution. But one office they did not put into Article I or II of our Constitution is the office of dictator.

In the Roman Republic there was actually a governmental Senate appointed position for a dictator, which seems to be a creeping ad hoc possibility today. It was an office that was started around 500 BCE at the time when Rome moved from more than 200 years as a monarchy to a Republic. According to the Oxford Classical Dictionary, “The Romans introduced the office of dictator, initially to create an additional and ranking military command whenever required. Appointed by the chief annual magistrate by decree of the Senate, the dictator had no equal colleague, the main constraints on his authority being his official commission as defined by the Senate and the obligation to abdicate promptly following the completion of this specific task…dictators were mostly appointed according to the exigencies of the moment to execute one or more routine tasks ranging from military commands to the conduct of obscure religious rituals normally undertaken by consuls or praetors.” 

We have the 25th Amendment which deals when a president is unable to perform the duties of the office. It says nothing about appointing a dictator, though. The closest thing we have to a dictator is a czar. Richard Nixon appointed an Energy Czar and the first Drug Czar. Believe it or not Bill Clinton appointed the first Border Czar in 1995. How has that been working for us?

It was a Roman dictator the George Washington looked to for inspiration, Lucius Quinctius Cincinnatus. Cincinnatus was Roman senator and a farmer. In 458 was a called forth to be dictator. According to Ryan Burns, writing in Decentes, Penn’s Classical Studies Publication, “he was chosen (twice) to be dictator. Once to rescue a surrounded army. Under his command, Roman troops defeated the enemy in just sixteen days, and his victory was celebrated in a triumph in Rome. After just sixteen days as dictator, Cincinnatus stepped down from his post and returned to the countryside. Cincinnatus’ resignation from dictatorship demonstrated his support of allowing the government to run as it was intended—by the people.”

Cincinnatus Leaves the Plough to Dictate Laws to Rome
Antonio de Ribera, Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons

Cincinnatus’s actions inspired George Washington and the foundation of American democracy by relinquishing power when the job was done. In fact, the Society for the Cincinnati, founded in 1783 and named after Cincinnatus, was created to commemorate the Continental Army of the Revolutionary War. Its motto Omnia relinquit servare rempublicam (He gave up everything to serve the Republic) draws a direct reference to Cincinnatus’ influence on Washington

Ryan Burns,

Burns writes that “Cincinnatus is a figure who understood the value in a republican system of government. He knew that his duty as a Roman dictator was to ameliorate the situation as quickly as possible. When order had been restored, his job was to allow the state to return to its normal operations: one without a dictator. Cincinnatus symbolized the will of the people, and his act represents the ideals of modern American democracy.” (Today the term normal operations of government is one that no one can agree with. It is more if you are for it I am against it. Just look at the muddled mess at the border in Texas.)

Similarly, after the Revolutionary War General George Washington, like Cincinnatus, returned to his farm, Mount Vernon. And again, like Cincinnatus, he was called back to serve his country. This time as president of the newly formed United States where he set the precedent of the peaceful transferal of executive power practiced by most presidents who came after him. He then retired once more to Mount Vernon.

Although President Jackson stepped down after serving two terms, his presidency rankled his opponents, who accused him of being a monarch. They so dubbed him: King Andrew the First.

Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons

However, not all of Rome’s dictators were so virtuous. We are probably more familiar with the last two Roman dictators: Lucius Cornelius Sulla and Julius Caesar. After 100 BCE the Romans were having a hard time getting along with one another. Social disorder spilled out into civil war. In 82 BCE Sulla steps in to settle the matter as a dictator. It was more like to settle old scores. It was so bad even a young Julius Caesar had to flee for his life. His crime: not divorcing his wife, who was the daughter of one of Sulla’s enemies. Romans have always had a propensity for blood letting. This was a time of bloody political retribution in the Republic. The vengeance and political retribution was more than the Republic could stand. It fell in 27 BCE when Gaius Octavius, Julius Caesar’s adopted son, became emperor. Doing away with the need of a dictator.

Most of us are familiar with Julius Caesar through William Shakespeare or the many movies like Cleopatra, Julius Caesar and HBO’s Rome. We are familiar with the Ides of March. Scores of books have been written about rise and fall of the Roman Republic and how it turned into an Empire. An empire that both Sulla and Caesar helped usher in. Both were accused of being Tyrants.

“All in all, a tyrant is an absolute ruler who is illegitimate and/or unrestrained by law. To maintain himself in such a precarious position, he (for it is invariably a “he”) usually resorts to oppression and cruelty.”

Psychology Today

I would venture to say that most of the men who met in Independence Hall who helped draft the Constitution, were well aware of Plato’s views that “tyranny naturally arise out of democracy.” In 1776 they were able to smear King George III as the quintessential tyrant of the time. A monarch above the law. Hence, they wrote a Constitution that would attempt to keep tyrants and tyranny from forming.

In almost 240 years of Constitutional rule and legal precedent some people today are treating the Constitution like hackers trying to find a cyber backdoor to the bank vault. Nixon’s had crew of bumbling Clouseau-like Watergate Plumbers who were caught with monkey wrenches in hand breaking into the Democratic Headquarters. Trump had a cadre of second-story lawyers trying to sneak around the Electoral College. These lawyers were more like the mob in Jimmy Breslin’s book, The Gang That Couldn’t Shoot Straight. They were a group of lawyers who “couldn’t run a gas station at a profit even if he (they) stole the customers’ cars,” They should have been out chasing ambulances for an insurance settlement instead of shaking down voting machines.  

https://web.sas.upenn.edu/discentes/2022/05/19/cincinnatus-a-roman-dictators-resounding-impact/

https://www.politifact.com/article/2023/dec/07/donald-trump-was-asked-if-he-will-be-a-dictator-if

Politically Speaking: It is time to move on

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The NFL season is over. And the Super Bowl is upon us. The two best teams from both conferences will be picked after a grueling season and playoffs loaded with wildcards. As the football season comes to an end the race to pick presidential candidates is just starting. Both Democrats and Republicans have kicked off the race to the White House with primaries in Iowa and New Hampshire.

With the season over, NFL teams have a chance to reflect back on how they fared. Some teams have been abysmal. Eight teams have fired their head coaches. The Washington Commanders shucked off their old name several seasons ago, and now it appears if they are shucking their whole front office and coaching staff. It is a team in desperate need of a compass.

The Seattle Seahawks decided it was time to part ways with the guy who was holding their compass, Pete Carroll. After 14 years and a Super Bowl win, Jody Allen, Chair of the Seattle Seahawks, twitted, “After thoughtful meetings and careful consideration for the best interest of the franchise, we have amicably agreed with Pete Carroll that his role will evolve from Head Coach to remain with the organization as an advisor.”

Jumping over to the other coast. The majordomo of New England football was shown the door. After 24 years the New England Patriots have set aside Bill Belichick. Belichick, the second winningest coach of all time, and as head coach of the Patriots he has won six Super Bowls. But he has struggled of late. And well, like all good things it was time “to move on.”

According to ESPN, team owner, Robert Kraft, he and Belichick had numerous conversations on how to break nearly a quarter century relationship amicably, which resulted in “no conflict, no disagreement and in the end, productive talks resulted in a mutual decision that left both sides comfortable and at ease.”

“Sources familiar with those conversations, there was said to be no conflict, no disagreement, and in the end, productive talks resulted in a mutual decision that left both sides comfortable and at ease.”

It is hard to say if both Carroll and Belichick could have turned next season around. “Wait till next year” was not in the interest of management. Both coaches had good runs but “it was time to move on.”

But unlike NFL coaches moving on, wait till next year is not a phrase catching on in this presidential election cycle of politics. Both Donald Trump and Joe Biden have had good runs, both have been president and both should be planning their presidential libraries, writing their memoirs. Biden should amicably be shown the door and Trump should be barred from the door.

I am not a pollster but I would bet that if most voters were asked if they want different people running for president, except for the hard-core extremest on team Trump, most people would say yes, Please! The country needs to go in a different direction. Hopefully one that advances the principles of democracy and not mired down in the ridiculous religion of political zealots. But here we are, stuck streaming reruns of the NFL’s greatest games.

Here is the problem. The Republicans lack a game plan. It is whatever Trump is bloviating at any given minute. The Democrats have a game plan. But neither party has a bench capable of taking the place of their aging candidates to either make a game plan or move it towards the goal line.

Most veteran GOPers are too afraid to suit up against Trump. Just look how quick the GOP B Team left the field. There wasn’t a wildcard amongst them. They could not even get to the line of scrimmage let alone get a first down, which would be the South Carolina primary. Only one, Nikki Haley, is still on the GOP sideline with Trump. I think there has to be more candidates out there without misguided fears of Trump. There has to be someone who can straps on a helmet and say “put me in.”

On the Democrat side no one wants to challenge the reigning leader. It is always considered a negative political move to take a run at unseating your party’s already sitting president. And it is the incumbent’s prerogative to step down–unless there is a term limit.

The Democrats, like the GOP, are looking at a thin bench, too. I get it. What political party or coach wants to go into the big game with players with limited playing experience at the pro level. Look how Florida Governor Ron DeSantis fumbled the political play calling and is now back on the Suwannee River fishing with the old folks at home and rekindling his feud with Mickey Mouse. DeSantis never faced an A Team of political operatives. He was playing against second stringers.

What is lacking in today’s politics is the old cigar chomping, backroom politicos, the head coach who filled out the party’s slate. The party hack who could make or break a politician’s career. Somebody who could tell Biden and Trump, amicably: It is time to move on.

Congress and Aliens

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The Extraterrestrial Highway conspiracy now runs from Area 51 in Nevada to the steps of Congress in Washington DC. It is the intersection of Unidentified Flying Objects, now given the more appropriate scientific/military name: Unidentified Anomalous Phenomenon (UAP), and Congress.

Flying saucers have managed to initiate something the American voter has failed to do: create bipartisan relationships in the conspiracy minded halls of Congress. This, in just a short two years after a mob of partisan terrestrials tried to overturn a presidential election. Some say our government never saw that unidentified anomalous mob making its way down I-95. Now Congress is looking into the cosmos to unite their conspiracy minded beliefs.

But there is nothing like a good conspiracy theory to bring people together. And the UFO conspiracy is still going strong. Fox Mulder was right. The truth is out there and Congress will get to the bottom of it no matter where the deep state is hiding ETs. (Congress will pursue it In the same vigorous manner it searched for missing government documents being used as paper placemats at seaside beach club restaurant.).

It makes sense. There is a strong possibility that intelligent life is out there. We have sent two Voyager probes out into deep space to see what they can see. And undoubtedly, if aliens see them, they will be UAPs. NASA is also using telescopes in space and on the ground to look back into the cosmos, searching for possible life. According to NASA they have “confirmed more than 4,000 exoplanets.” It’s possible maybe some entity on one of those planets was able to develop warp drive and boldly go where no entity has gone before.

What doesn’t make sense is that our government has been covering up some sort of “Independence Day” Bat Cave full of alien body parts and scraps of crashed space crafts. It makes as much sense as Jewish space lasers starting forest fires. But maybe instead of starting fires, Jewish space laser downed a UAP that caused those fires. So maybe, just maybe there are dead incinerated ET fertilizing a rejuvenated California forest. If that is the case, the Defense Department has done a much better job keeping a secret than our former president. He could not keep his cache of pilfered top secret documents hidden in a Florida bathroom.

Meanwhile, we have been told continually, by different administrations and Congresses, there is an alien crisis. This crisis, however, is not in the skies but at our borders. Hordes of unwanted (and somewhat identifiable) aliens are swarming over our walls, swimming across rivers and over coming whatever obstacles the state of Texas can erect.

In fact there is a deep concern that the House Homeland Security Committee is on path to recommend impeachment hearings against the head of Homeland Security, Alejandro Mayorkas. Republican Congressmen say that he is engaging in “egregious misconduct,” and has refused to enforce the law when it comes to keeping aliens from crossing the southern border. Nothing about alien ETs. At some time Congress may just turn the whole immigration crisis over to Texas.

I am not sure our Congress can get out from under its own parochial interests when it comes to UAP. According to NASA, which would play a huge part in investigating UAP, “The scientific method challenges us to solve problems by impartially evaluating our own ideas, by being willing to be wrong, and by following the data.” Does that sound anything like our Congress? We could not agree on a scientific method during the pandemic or how to implement a climate change policy. What makes us think there will be some sort of consensus in Congress concerning the ongoing mysteries of flying saucers?

Determining what UAP are is tough because most of our scientific satellites are looking out into deep space for life. Others are on hard ground, probes rolling around on Mars digging up Martian dirt. Our spaceborn satellites are not censored and calibrated to spot a UAP in our atmosphere. There is no traffic cop looking down for ancient aliens running red lights in our own ozones. For all we know ETs are using the Earth as a cosmic intersection while flying off to Alpha Centauri. We are the podunk planet without a flashing yellow light waiting for some galactic hitchhiker to put a thumb out.

The mission of the AARO (The All-Domain Anomaly Resolution Office ) will be to synchronize efforts across the Department of Defense, and with other U.S. federal departments and agencies, to detect, identify and attribute objects of interest in, on, or near military installations, operating areas, training areas, special use airspace and other areas of interest, and, as necessary, to mitigate any associated threats to safety of operations and national security. This includes anomalous, unidentified space, airborne, submerged and transmedium objects.

US Department of Defense

Now, all of a sudden there is a dire concern about aerial phenomena racing across the sky, or in some case just floating aimlessly across the continent. This is a stunner considering Congress can barely agree on closer earthly encounters, like paying our country’s debt. If there is a conspiracy it is the diploid dance being done in Congress. It has the makings of a legislative sleight of hand. “Look up look down your pants are on the ground!”

But relax, America. If Mars were to attack, your Congress is on the case. But should we really expect much from the same group of lug nuts that took three weeks to elect a new Speaker of the House? All this gives new meaning to: Take me to your Leader.

The thing is, it is not like UAP are falling out of the sky like acorns off an oak tree in September. According to NPR, “The Pentagon’s new office for investigating potential UFO sightings received hundreds of new reports in 2022, and while it can explain more than half of those events, a sizable chunk remains a mystery.

“The All-Domain Anomaly Resolution Office and the Office of the Director of National Intelligence say, they’re focusing on some 171 cases — including some in which objects “appear to have demonstrated unusual flight characteristics or performance capabilities, and require further analysis.”

“Current FAA guidelines suggest that citizens wanting to report UAP contact their local law enforcement or one or more non-governmental organizations, which is inadequate for drawing scientific inferences. Although such eyewitness reports are often interesting and compelling, they are insufficient on their own for making definitive conclusions about UAP.”

NASA Unidentified Anomalous Phenomena  Independent Study Team Report

It is the analysis where we fly into the unknown. What is needed is a systematic method for figuring out what is darting across our skies. For instance, if Joe Six Pack driving home one night after consuming a six pack at the local watering hole sees what he is sure is a flying saucer or some sort of aerial phenomenon his only reporting agency is the local sheriff’s office, which I am sure has more important things to do than chase after flying pink elephants. Chances are DUI charges will outweigh the UAP sighting.

Therein lies the true concern about UAP. Nobody flying at 35,000 feet wants to run into a weather balloon set loose in China. Worst yet no pilot wants to be sharing the skies with an alien using visual flight rules and who has not filed a flight plan with the FAA. There is a safety aspect to getting a grip on UAP flying at different altitudes no matter how fast they are flying. It is all about flying safe.

But really, do we want the United States Congress anywhere near trying to solve UAP mystery? All they want to know is where ET is.

Caution, Federal Cases at Work–Let the Dunking begin

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Former President Donald Trump is often going on about his legal troubles as if it was a witch hunt. At first glance when somebody says witch hunt they probably think of America’s most famous witch hunt: The Salem Witch Trials. These trials took place in 1692 and according to the The National Endowment for the Humanities, “19 (people) were hanged, one pressed to death and five others died in jail.”

According to NPR the last known witchcraft trial was in Virginia in 1706. Grace Sherwood was subjected to the only known way, at the time, to determine if she was a witch. The locals tied her up, and tossed her into the Lynnhaven River. Unfortunately for Sherwood, she floated, “which meant that the devil must be supporting her and therefore she was guilty as charged.” As far as I could tell that is still the only method around to determine if someone is a witch.

Since Trump has repeatedly called his legal woes a witch hunt, it might be reasonable to assume he is trying to avoid some sort of skulduggery that is akin to witchcraft. I have never witnessed a witch hunt but I am willing to bet that most witch hunts have been unsuccessful in actually bagging a real witch. It is like someone saying they rode a unicorn. This may be a good legal tactic on the part of the former president. If he can keep his legal woess in the realm of witchcraft, it is highly unlikely he will be convicted. Unless prosecutors are able to tie him up and chuck him into the Potomac to see if he floats.

But to think that Trump’s attorneys would play the witch card is ridiculous. It is more likely he is going to pursue a different definition of a witch hunt. The one we are more familiar with in modern times. Cambridge Dictionary states that a witch hunt is “an attempt to find and punish people whose opinions are unpopular and who are said to be a danger to society.” This definition is more akin to Senator Joseph McCarthy’s shaking the apple tree in the 1950s trying to see how many delicious pinko reds would fall to the ground.

That definition definitely works for some people. However, I think Trump is using the  Merriam-Webster definition that states a witch hunt is “the searching out and deliberate harassment of those (such as political opponents) with unpopular views.” This definition fits Trump better as he campaigns around the country. He can cast himself off as a victim of socialist regime hell bent on purging the country of people hell bent on making America great again. I think this definition is the paranoid Orwellian looking over his shoulder. What are you hiding in your basement?

The former president is facing some serious federal criminal indictments. Mixing federal cases and witchcraft makes little sense at first glance. But it really is ingenious. The last convicted witch was at the turn of the beginning of the 18th century. Federal cases, however, are a different matter.

Many years ago I heard a lawyer say if the Feds want you the feds will get. Trump has to realise this. He has mentioned Al Capone several times in speeches. Capone, one of the notorious and vicious mob bosses of the 1930s, gets convicted on income tax charges. Really. At least Hunter Biden has some gun charges thrown in with his tax fraud case. FBI.gov says, “Capone was convicted after trial and on November 24, (1931) was sentenced to eleven years in federal prison, fined $50,000 and charged $7,692 for court costs, in addition to $215,000 plus interest due on back taxes.” And to add a cherry on top, the feds threw in an extra six months for contempt of court.

In the past decade sports analytics have been used to improve teams performance on and off the field. I am sure high-priced law firms have an analytics department. “Legal analytics,” according to LexisNexis.com are “tools (to) help lawyers make data-driven decisions on which to build their legal strategies. That could mean things like knowing the probability of a specific motion outcome, how seemingly unrelated cases connect, or how much a settlement award could be.” A little bit more sophisticated than seeing if a person accused of witchcraft floats or not.

What is interesting is that Trump’s lawyers have to be aware of the success rate the Feds have when they go to trial. First off it appears that the Feds are always the home team. It is their ball, their court and their rules. According to pewresearch.com they have a huge winning percentage, too. “In fiscal year 2022, only 290 of 71,954 defendants in federal criminal cases – about 0.4% – went to trial and were acquitted, Another 1,379 went to trial and were found guilty (1.9%).”

But here is the kicker, almost 90% of defendants in 2020 didn’t even go to trial. They pleaded guilty “while another 8.2% had their case dismissed at some point in the judicial process.” Just looking at the percentages less than 9% of those defendants in a federal criminal case came out on top.

Witch hunts hardly, if ever, turn up a real witch let alone convict someone of some sort of sorcery. However, a witchcraft trial is an iffy outcome. If you float you are guilty. And, well, if you don’t, you drown. Despite the 50-50 odds of winning neither verdict generates a positive outcome. Analytics can’t be telling Trump’s lawyers to take those long shot odds in Federal court. Whichever course he takes it looks like he is going to get dunked in the Potomac River; or spending time in Secret Service protection, just not in the Oval Office

Religion and the Bible in an Era of Ill Feelings

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I can only imagine how much fun historians will have in 50 or so years from now will have in trying to come to terms for the era we are living in now. Will they try to give it some sort of official historical name like the Era of Ill Feelings. The Rouge Era, where political institutions went off the rails. The Second Great Awakening when religion finally brought government and God together. Or will they simply name it after a person like the Victorian Age and call it the Trumpian Age.

Historians in many ways are like astronomers without space mounted telescopes to look back in time. Instead of telescopes, historians use data, observations, primary sources from the time in question. And today, with so much technology, social media anybody with a smartphone can be a chronicler of history. There is a no dearth of information available. Our technology is so acute that we can even pick up somebody farting during an interview. Not that there is a whole lot of historical significance in that.  

But, just imagine if John Kennedy’s assassination took place in the age of the smart phone. Abraham Zapruder filmed one of the most defining moments of the 20th Century using a an 8mm Bell & Howell home movie camera. He filmed in Kodachrome but without sound. His 27 seconds of film has created never ending controversy and conspiracy theories to enthrall generations of conspiracy buffs. (With the emergence of the cell-phone cameras Kodak stopped making Kodachrome in 2009. The following year it went bankrupt.)

Today, football instant replays have more cameras and angles to determine if the nose of the football “broke the plane” of the end zone than we had in 1963 to determine which way Kennedy’ head was moving at impact. I know, too soon; but it is a point of conspiratorial contention. 

Just think how many smartphones would have filmed Kennedy’s assassination. And from all sorts of angles revealing information that investigators can only dream of—and not to mention Closed Circuit Camera filming traffic. We probably would have had well over 500 videos of the assassination. Heck, somebody was able to film Wagner Group’s mercenary leader, Yevgeny Prigozhin’s, plane “crashing between the villages of Kuzhenkino and Kuzhenkinskoe in Russia’s Tver region. All 10 aboard were killed” according to CNN. I am sure the twin “K” villages are no comparison to Dallas/Fort Worth—even in the1960s. But somehow somebody manage to get a video—Putin vision. Was there a lone missile man on the ground behind the goat pins; or was it a bomb in the luggage? Only the Main Directorate of the GRU knows and they ain’t sayin’.

Historians also can be prognosticators of the future. Look at ESPN’s College Gameday. Every Saturday during football season pundits try to predict this week’s games and how they relate to each other. Searching for which team will be upset ruining their quest for the coveted Number One ranking. Those commentators look at the past trying to piece together a future. 

For instance, we can look back 200 years ago and see some historical similarities of today. In 1817 President James Monroe went into the heart of Federalist territory: Boston Massachusetts. His visit was spun as a goodwill tour but to some Federalist Party members at that time it could have been seen more as an “in your face” moment. 

With the death of Alexander Hamilton the headless Federalist Party got thumped in the 1816 elections and again in 1820. They had lost every election to a clan of Virginian Democratic Republicans since 1800. (Those Republicans are no relation to today’s GOP.) Some, Federalist however, could see the writing on the wall. Our country was in the midst of what Boston journalist, Benjamin Russell, writing in the Columbian Centinel, termed as the “Era of Good Feelings.” The Federalist Party was still around but for all practical purposes it had already started to fade on into the history books.

What made it an Era of Good Feelings was basically the fact that Monroe and the Democratic Republicans had no opposition barking at them. Monroe basically ran unopposed in his second presidential bid, technically the last president to run unopposed since George Washington. So yes maybe it was a time of good feelings. Monroe and company were like the Yankees of the 1920s and ‘30s; the 40’s and 50’s.

Today it is different. It is time where civility has turned to an age of toxicity. The social atmosphere of this planet could be compared with that of Venus, where sulfuric acid rains down creating a hellish place to be caught without your stainless steel umbrella.

And then there is Mike Johnson the new Speaker of the House.  He said, “Someone asked me today in the media, ‘People are curious, what does Mike Johnson think about any issue?’ I said, ‘Well, go pick up a Bible off your shelf and read it. That’s my worldview.”

 That might be good spiritual advice in a swampy Louisiana bayou.  But today, I am not sure if most people are gonna find comfort in a leader looking back five or six thousand years for advice from Moses. I am not sure which part of the Bible Johnson prefers. For instance, if it is the Old Testament where it took two or three witness are needed to have a person stoned to death for certain crimes, Donald Trump might be in big trouble in Georgia. Three of his lawyers could put him center stage at a rock concert. 

However, Trump might want to thank James Madison. It could possibly be argued that Madison looked to Moses’ example of separating the Red Sea for inspiration in separating church and state when he wrote: “Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof.” Hence, comes the belief in church and state working different street corners in peace. This could then dovetail into the Eighth Amendment’s cruel and unusual punishment clause, which could keep Trump out of the rock pit in the belief that stoning someone to death sounds a bit cruel. So which is it, Old Testament fire and brimstone or New Testament forgive and love your neighbor–but no coventing?

But we have had Biblical difference before the New World even got settled and on its feet, Catholics and Protestants were going at it in Florida. In 1565 Spanish Catholics massacred French Huguenots (Protestants) who  tried to set up a colony, Fort Caroline, north of St. Augustine on the St. Johns River. Spanish General Pedro Menendez de Aviles made sure that the Protestant colony never got settled when he killed more than 300 settlers and soldiers. Menendez, however, being the good Catholic, and probably adhering to the current worldview at the time, gave the Frenchmen a chance to convert to Catholicism. Most refused and were put to the sword. I am not sure where Menendez found that worldview in scripture.

I do not mean to question the Bible. I will, however, question man’s interpretation of it. So whose world view is Mike Johnson talking about? Is the Bible being pulled off the shelf a Vulgate Bible, which according to vulgate.org “is a Latin version of the Holy Bible, and largely the result of the labors of St Jerome (Eusebius Sophronius Hieronymus), who was commissioned by Pope Damasus I in 382 A.D. to make a revision of the old Latin translations.  

Or is Johnson cracking open The New Revised Standard Version Updated Edition Bible. According to the episcopaliannewservice.org “The New Revised Standard Version Updated Edition Bible is the result of a commission of the Society of Biblical Literature by the National Council of Churches, which includes dozens of denominations representing 30 million church members.”

But here is the real kicker about this Bible. This “ecumenical and interfaith” Bible can be the one Bible “suitable in Catholic, Protestant, Orthodox and Jewish context.” Furthermore, “It attempts to reverse the historic trend in translation history from the 19th and 20th centuries in which some Christian communities and scholars of the Bible were historically excluded from the translation endeavors of our English Bibles.”

Sounds sort of woke to me. I just wonder what “Christian communities” could have been excluded. 

What is amazing about all of this is that it comes at a time when a portion of our country cannot agree on the results of the last presidential election. What makes us think we can decide on which Bible to pull off the shelf to get a unified worldview.  Or election results.

Help me! Help Me! I am losing my mind!

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It looks as if the paleomammalian (old mammal) brain has collectively taken over House Republicans. Led by the ever de-evolving King Lizard from Florida, Matt Gaetz, the GOP caucus just sacked the Speaker of the House with less thought than where they put their car keys.

Before the House Republicans search for a new leader they might want to begin looking for where they lost their mind. It was neuroscientist Paul McLean who came up with the theory that our brains are divided into three parts, much like our government. And like our government, each section of the brain has a specific function. For instance the primitive or reptilian part of the brain is responsible for keeping the lights on. That is to say things that we take for granted like breathing and blinking.

The paleomammalian brain, the limbic system, is thought to be the emotional part of the brain. It is the warning system of the brain that tells us “hey look out the sky is falling.” It is where subconscious responses come from to keep us safe. Which is really a good thing because it is times like those that we have to make that snap judgment to get out of the way of that falling piano. Something Wile E. Coyote always had a hard time doing.

This brings us to the third part of the brain, the part of the Republican Party brain that seems to have gone out to lunch for the last eight or so years: The neomammalian or new cortex–the prefrontal cortex. It is what thescienceofpsychotherapy.com calls the “‘smart brain’, the executive part of our system that is responsible for all higher order conscious activity.” Oh, but I forgot the House Republicans oppose the current executive decision maker.

There are two key difference (keeping it simple) between the primal and the neo-prefrontal cortex part of the brain. The neo side is a bit “slower in responding to incoming information” than the paleo-limbic system. It is, however, much more sophisticated in processing information. This “‘slow’thinking’ is the hallmark of human intelligence.” Something I am not sure is fully developed and functioning to capacity in the GOPers that roam the Halls of Congress. It is one thing to say, fire the Speaker of the House; but then like a bunch of middle schoolers they have no answer for their actions when hauled into the principal’s office. The “I don’t know” response may have seemed like a good idea at the time. But it is not a sufficient answer, as many of us who have had that little chat know.

cogsci.stackexchange.com

We could take all of this neuroscience to psychoanalysis and really muddy up the waters with Sigmund Freud’s theories on human behavior. Again, according to Freud, we have three elements to deal with: the id, ego and superego.

It would be impossible to put House Congressional Republican Party into some sort of psychoanalysis. But collectively it seems that they have lost a portion of their mind and and are operating at less than full-capacity. According to simplypsychology.org, “The id is the impulsive (and is the unconscious) part of our psyche that responds directly and immediately to basic urges, needs, and desires. The personality of the newborn child is all id.”

Furthermore, “The id is also stubborn, for it responds only to what Freud called the pleasure principle (if it feels good, do it), and nothing else.” The id also has a strong “death instinct.” And “when this energy is directed outward to others, it is expressed as aggression and violence.” The id, like the House Republicans, do not operate in the realm logic or reality of the everyday world. This might help explain January 6th.

Before I get to the ego, I think what is lacking in Congress today is the superego. “The superego operates on the morality principle and motivates us to behave in a socially responsible and acceptable manner.” And its “function is to control the id’s impulses, especially those which society forbids, such as sex and aggression.”

It would be unfair to the current group of Congressmen to say they lack certain moral principles. That claim could be made of a lot of past Congresses. But this group, the 117th Congress, appears to have broken the sound barrier on fundamental conventions of governance. So basically we have a House of Representatives being operated by an extremely large addled-minded kid with no morals and unchecked aggressive behaviors.

So we now we come to the third component of Freud’s trinitarian mind and the one most of us are familiar with: ego. Simply psychology says, “The ego operates according to the reality principle, working out realistic ways of satisfying the id’s demands, often compromising or postponing satisfaction to avoid negative consequences of society.” It is hard to imagine that all the stuffed shirts and blouses on Capitol Hill lacking an ego. But here we are.

But here is the kicker: It is called “reality testing.” If a plan of action (like firing the Speaker) does not work, then “it is thought through again until a solution is found. This is known as reality testing and enables the person to control their impulses and demonstrate self-control, via mastery of the ego.” At this point I am not sure if the House can master itself let alone function according to the Constitution. The main function of the House of Representatives is to come up with a budget. It fails miserably at this Constitutionally mandated duty.

I am not a psychoanalyst but then I do not think you need a PhD in psychology or one from the Harvard school of government to realize that we have a really dysfunctional Congress. It is a loony bin where the inmates hand out the meds and Matt Gaetz determines when to turn off the lights.

What is really frightening is that this group of inmates wants to hand out meds to the other two branches of the government, which most of us agree are barely cognisant without the House of Representatives help. Basically we have a House of Representatives that is semi-brain dead, an emotional cripple and unable to relate to others. Or as six grade teacher questioning an unruly student behavior: Have you lost your mind?