Same Shit, Different Acronyms
"Christians have an obligation, a mandate, a commission, a holy responsibility to reclaim the land for Jesus Christ -- to have dominion in civil structures, just as in every other aspect of life and godliness.
But it is dominion we are after. Not just a voice.
It is dominion we are after. Not just influence.
It is dominion we are after. Not just equal time.
It is dominion we are after.
World conquest. That's what Christ has commissioned us to accomplish. We must win the world with the power of the Gospel. And we must never settle for anything less...
Thus, Christian politics has as its primary intent the conquest of the land -- of men, families, institutions, bureaucracies, courts, and governments for the Kingdom of Christ."
Over the last quarter century or so, while most of us were -- well -- sort of asleep at the wheel or somehow too preoccupied and inattentive to it or deceived by it, a fearsomely totalitarian, fascist sociopolitical movement straight out of the Dark Ages has extended its roots and flourished in the United States, shielding itself from view and criticism by donning the sheeps' clothing of the Christian religion which most of us, even those of us not personally swayed by its tall tales, myths and superstitions, have been conditioned (indoctrinated, brainwashed, if you will) since our earliest childhoods to unquestioningly accept, honor, and respect. Looking at this movement, once shaken awake, one can see that the sheeps' tailor has just taken an ages old and much worn outfit off the shelves of history, dusted it off, dyed it with a slightly different pattern of uncompromising black and white, and sold it as, if not new and unused, at least wholly different and bearing no resemblance to its older representations.
Many call it "Christian Nationalism." Most disturbing about this contemporary revival of the Emperor's new sheeps' clothing is its close resemblance to a fairly recent, if too largely forgotten, donning of the same garment the last time it was widely fashionable. Then it was known as "National Socialism" (or Nationalsozialistische deutsche Arbeiter-Partei, or simply by its acronym NAZI), and its tailors had revived it in that era in central Europe during hard times in one of the most advanced nations on the planet.
Is "Christian Nationalism" really an updated and airbrushed version of Nazism, or is that both too harsh and an oversimplification? The more things progress, the more I think it is not at all off the mark. As a sign in an anti-Bush rally proclaimed, "Same shit, different asshole." They have put their drunken-frat-boy-"man" in the White House as "leader of the free world" and corrupted every branch of the U.S. government to their ends. While marching under the banner of Christian soldiers on a crusade for "freedom," they have murdered and maimed tens of thousands of people and otherwise totally desecrated, defiled, and corrupted the teachings of who they claim as their spiritual leader, Jesus Christ. (WWJD? - What would Jesus do? Who would Jesus bomb? Who would Jesus shoot? Who would Jesus torture? Who would Jesus refuse to heal? Who would Jesus deny medical care? Who would Jesus impoverish? Who would Jesus let starve and go without shelter? Who would Jesus exploit? Who would Jesus enslave? Who would Jesus execute? Who would Jesus hate? Would Jesus plunder and poison the environment? Would Jesus blatantly lie to seduce us into an unjust, illegal, and unwinnable war that has needlessly and pointlessly cost the lives and suffering of tens of thousands and left us isolated in the world and widely regarded as a rogue nation, thus far with no end in sight (Vietnam déjà vu)?
They have shown themselves to be every bit as murderously totalitarian in their methods and goals as the Islamic-Jihadist enemies they refer to as "evil-doers." They are very ambitious in their aim to dominate the world, although they couch it in Orwellian terms to make it palatable ("under the radar") to the mass of ignorant and apathetic citizenry. They hope for, and expect to accomplish, or by their actions aid in the accomplishment of, no less than death and eternal damnation beyond the grave for the majority of the world's population (Armageddon, anyone?) -- and let's not forget that Nazism and its accomplice, Japanese imperialism, were able to produce the deaths of a mere fifty-six million. How many more than that might die this time around -- especially if the drunken-frat-boy-"man" in the White House gets the ball rolling faster and even more out of control by lobbing "tactical" nuclear weapons onto Iran as some think he is actively planning to do?
I think by any measure of rationality or concession to objective reality they are certifiably insane, these "Christian Nationalists," but by virtue of the obsessive intensity of their delusionary false certainty in irrational belief and their paranoid stealth, their insanity makes them more influential and powerful -- and more fearsome -- not less. Every totalitarian despot in history has been deluded and his/her schemes covered by some variation of seemingly supportive religious or quasi-religious rationalization -- the very same wolf in sheeps' clothing that today wears the revived and refurbished cloak now dubbed "Christian Nationalism."
Oh, and the most familiar popular term associated with the "Christian Nationalism" movement is "Republican Party."
Two acronyms come to mind.
GOP and NAZI.
GOP = NAZI? It appears more and more to me to be so, though no historical analogy can ever be exact. I think it looks now much like the rise of totalitarian fascism must have looked to a citizen of Germany in 1936. And I read that Halliburton's (and therefore Bush-Cheney's) affiliate, Kellogg- Brown and Root, is building (for the federal government at taxpayers' expense while the wealthiest Americans with the most to gain financially within the short term business cycle from war profiteering get still more tax cuts as national deficits orbit ever higher beyond recovery) not only permanent bases in Iraq, but "detention centers" in the U.S. (Concentration camps, anyone? Torture? Summary executions? I don't know and hope not, but stay tuned to find out and stay tuned to something other than Fox News to anticipate. I recommend Air America Radio, streaming at http://www.airamericaradio.com/.)
The American public is showing signs of awakening from the deep sleep they have heretofore been lulled into. Bush's approval rating dipped to 29% last week.
For an excellent short article comparing the rise of National Socialism in Germany to the rise of Christian Nationalism in the United States, I refer you to the essay "When Democracy Failed" by Thom Hartmann at http://www.commondreams.org/...
For a brief summary of the rise of Christian Nationalism, see Michelle Goldberg's article at http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/...