Chapter review: The Uses and Abuses of History

Drat! I thought this was going to be a short review. Crud, foiled again. Darn those Christian nationalists! -- Germaine, 2021

Context

Chapter 6, The Uses and Abuses of History, is in investigative journalist Katherine Stewart’s 2019 book, The Power Worshippers: The Dangerous Rise of Religious Nationalism. Stewart spend 10 years in a deep dive into the powerful American Christian nationalism (CN) political movement. CN is now a dead-serious, anti-democratic global movement to Christianize and save the entire planet from whatever CN believes it needs to be saved from. 

In my mind, this book describes what increasingly looks to me like a nascent, early, form of some maybe milder variant of the utter brutality of totalitarianism that Hannah Arendt described in her 1951 masterpiece of human savagery, mass murder and brutal oppression, The Origins of Totalitarianism. 

It is still early days for this new form of oppression, or righteous enlightenment if that is how one wants to see it. CN ideology-dogma is cloaked in the righteousness and infinite love of the its vision of God. It is hard to tell what this ravenous (or loving) beast is going to evolve into.  

I feel no affinity or sympathy for what CN is and how it does its work. It scares the hell out of me because it is based on endless lies, deceit, emotional manipulation and motivated reasoning. The CN political and religious movement epitomizes moral cowardice because it relies on ruthless dark free speech to (i) accumulate power and wealth for people at the top, and (ii) enforce God's strict laws and morals on all of the rest of us. 

The Museum of the Bible - fabricating history

Stewart centers chapter 6 around a powerful CN propaganda factory and training site called the Museum of the Bible. She discusses the backers, thinkers and lies-based propaganda tactics that the museum is based on. It is not a real museum because it is based on a fabricated CN version of history. This CN operations site claims to be nonsectarian, but it is purely Christian sectarian. The most influential people behind CN operate there at least intermittently. Wealthy donors like the DeVos family, heirs to the Amway fortune, and David Green, founder and CEO of Hobby Lobby Stores[1], and his family (Steven Green, president of Hobby Lobby) are anti-democratic, autocratic and aggressive about spreading the CN's lies about history, especially American history. 

As usual for CN operations, this political operation gets religious tax privileges to subsidize the spread of its lies and slanders throughout the US and rest of the world. The CN leadership are hard core globalists and dead serious about converting the entire planet to belief in their false version of history and Christianity.

David Barton: the creator-in-chief and proselytizer-in-chief of CN’s fake history

David Barton rose from a math teacher and religious school administrator in the small town of Aledo in Texas to one of the top influencers and propagandists in the CN movement. He created TV ads and other materials that were and still are loaded with lies and out of context distortions of various truths. The religious right has fallen for all of it. Barton produced a film was shown at churches that depicted the Founding Fathers as Christian nationalists who founded a Christian nation based on Barton’s version of history. Like Barton’s other productions, it was a pack of lies and distortions. Nonetheless, that film was what snagged the Green family, with their power and wealth, and hauled them into the CN movement. 

Barton had refashioned and sold himself to the religious far right as a “historian” of “America’s Christian Founding.” Over time, Barton’s writings came to be scrutinized by real historians who debunked Barton's version of history and all the lies it was and still is based on. But that didn't matter for far right Christians. They and the Green family loved it and bought it all. The Green family hired Barton to produce ads that lie about America founded as a Christian nation. Stewart writes:

Like the bulk of David Barton’s own work, the Hobby Lobby ad was a mash-up of quotes wrenched out of context and dragooned into service of the Christian Nation myth. Rob Boston, senior advisor at Americans United for Separation of Church and State, .... posted a lengthy rebuttal .... remarking that it would “take a small book to dissect” and catalog all the distortions and calling it “an insult to the intelligence of its readers.” 

The error in the detail there was to provide cover for the great lie at the center of Christian nationalism. What David Bartion and the leaders of the Hobby Lobby corporation don’t want you to know is that America’s founders explicitly and proudly the world’s first secular republic. It seemed the point of the Hobby Lobby ad was not to celebrate America’s history but to counterfeit it. (emphasis added)

The Green family went on to set up a tax privileged 501(c)(3) nonprofit and raise about $500 million for the Museum of the Bible, which was intended “to bring to life the living word of God, to tell its compelling story of preservation [whatever that means -- White Supremacy?], and to inspire confidence in the absolute authority and reliability of the Bible.” 

Some of Barton’s and CN’s escapades

To shorten this long, sordid story, here are some highlights of the lies and distortions that chapter 6 is loaded with.

Barton’s one-way wall of separation: According to Barton, the first Amendment was “never intended to separate Christian principles from government.” Instead the wall of separation of church and state “was originally introduced as, and understood to be, a one-directional wall protecting the church from the government.” None of Barton’s assertions here are true. All are factually false. Barton and CN clearly want the government (1) to be powerless over what they want to do, and (2) to be powerless to prevent CN from turning government into a Christian theocracy and forcing their faux religion on all of us.

Barton’s fans: Mr. Barton has some enthusiastic fans, including the Green family, the DeVos family Newt Gingrich Mike Huckabee and etc. The chapter mentions a slew of such fine folks. Their enthusiasm is palpable. For example, Huckabee once said “I almost wish there would be a simultaneous telecast, and all Americans would be forced -- forced at gunpoint no less -- to listen to every David Barton message.” That’s real enthusiasm! 

Fact-checking blows up: By 2000, real historians were fact-checking Barton’s version of history and publishing works showing how false it was. Fact-checking didn't work. Instead, it backfired. Stewart writes:

Yet the adverse coverage did little to stop the Barton juggernaut. If anything, it affirmed his authenticity in the eyes of his followers. .... Barton’s demagoguery met with immediate scrutiny. According to National Public Radio, “We looked up every citation said was from the Bible but not one of them checked out. The History News Network soon named [Barton's 2012 book] The Jefferson Lies: Exposing the Myths You’ve Always Believed About Thomas Jefferson ‘the least credible history book in print.’ .... At the root of all the controversies over Barton’s work, one inevitably finds the same fundamental falsification of American history. Christian nationalism, by its nature, must deny the extraordinary achievement of America‘s founders in creating the world’s first secular republic and replace it with the kind of shabby religious-nationalist mythology that characterizes reactionary movements around the world. .... But it makes a certain kind of sense: you have to tell lots of little lies to promote one big lie.

But none of that mattered. Barton’s pseudo-history is too valuable to the Christian nationalist machine to let facts and scholarship get in the way, and his standing with his own audience has continued to soar. 

The situation with Barton’s The Jefferson Lies book got to be so nutty that his publisher decided to stop printing and distributing the book. That’s real crackpottery in action.

Secrecy is de rigueur: The CN movement likes to operate as quietly as possible, for obvious reasons. In 2004 the GOP hired Barton to help Bush and other Republicans to win elected offices. Barton flogged the evangelical community relentlessly for votes. Stewart writes: “His efforts, he told the online magazine Beliefnet, were ‘below the radar . . . We worked our tails off to stay out of the news.’ The effort proved critical in clinching George W. Bush’s narrow win over John Kerry.”

Barton on voting and civic duty: Stewarts writes: “President Donald Trump, he has said, is running on a ‘CEO model.’ Christians who fail to support the Trump presidency are ‘taking a very selfish view of what we do with voting. It’s not your vote, it’s God’s vote,’ says Barton. .... he paired up with evangelists Lance Wallnau, who wrote a book comparing Trump to king Cyrus, and Andrew Wommack, who has said opposition to Trump is ‘demonic deception’ and ‘one of the signs of the End Times.’”

Clearly, a citizens civic duty (a/k/a one’s duty God) is to vote for who CN leadership tells people to vote for and what their duty is after voting, i.e., support who the CN told them to vote for.

Yanking God out of public schools caused SAT scores to drop: According to Barton, in 1987 God told him to look up the date when the Supreme Court ruled against school-sponsored prayer and the trend in SAT scores before and after that date. The data indicates that in 1963 SAT scores stopped increasing and began a sharp decline. That was right after (1) the 1962 Supreme Court decision in Engel v. Vitale where, as Stewart put it, the court “yanked God out of America's classrooms,” and (2) a 1963 Supreme Court decision that school-sponsored Bible reading in public schools was unconstitutional. 

As we all know, correlation does not necessarily mean there is causation. But that inconvenient truth does not faze CN or Barton. Barton simply ignored massive changes in 1963 that expanded school systems to reach previously disadvantaged children. That correlated with, probably at least partly caused, increased numbers of test takers and decreased the average SAT scores. Barton also ignored the inconvenient fact that by the time of the Engel v. Vitale decision, most public schools had already kicked God out of the classrooms. 

Conclusion

Chapter 6 goes on and on like this, e.g., Barton calls the Bible “the document that is the true founding document of America” and characterizes the CN mission as one to “eradicate Bible poverty” by evangelizing “unreached people groups.” This review doesn't even include a description of what CN is doing to public school textbooks nationwide and how it has penetrated the US military and is spreading their poison and lies there with official military support. This chapter is just as much fun as a barrel of enraged monkeys (snakes?), because something about like that is what it describes.

One last thought, CN and Barton have lofty goals and they are patient, willing to work as long as they live. They acknowledge that they, or at least the CN ideology and dogma, are in this war forever.

Footnote: 

1. The Green family was the plaintiffs in an important religious Supreme Court decision in the 2014 Burwell v. Hobby Lobby Stores, Inc. dispute. In that case, the five CN judges on the court decided that secular business corporations can possess religious belief systems and have the right to exert their freedom of conscience. According to Stewart, “Even if that means refusing to comply with federal law regarding the provision of comprehensive health insurance to female employees.” As is common for the CN crowd, the Green family is preoccupied with sex and the sex lives of everyone around them. They demand that people they can control adhere to their beliefs about contraception and abortion as much as they can force their power on others. Obviously, they want the power to force their beliefs on all Americans, whether they want it or not.

We are on the eve of destruction

“Wherever law ends, tyranny begins.” -- John Locke, 1689, making a now forgotten statement of truth

Everything powerful I look at in American politics points to the rise of the rise of darkness and complacent incompetence. That is being replaced some form of kleptocratic, hateful, fascist Christian sharia. The fall of democracy, the rule of law and civil liberties is the goal among most conservatives. What most liberals what is unclear to me. The evidence of impending destruction is everywhere. So is public ignorance of the situation. Some see the seriousness of the threat, maybe 10-15% of Americans. Most do not.

In an earlier post here, I argued for the firing of Merrick Garland as a defender of indefensible partisan political power over the rule of law. I stand by that argument and repeat it. Fire Garland, right now. I also argue for the impeachment and removal of all nine justices on the US supreme court for the same reason. Impeach and remove them all, right now. Obviously, none of that has a snowball's chance in hell of becoming reality.

It appears that almost no one in either party in power in congress, the executive branch or federal courts is serious about vindicating the rule of law. Not Democrats. And absolutely not Republicans. Both stand for tyranny. Neither is fit to govern.

Questions: Is it unjustified or irrational to argue for getting rid of both the Democratic and Republican Parties as unfit to govern because they are pro-tyranny and anti-rule of law? If so, why does the rule of law for politicians, rich people and big corporations keep eroding, while the rest of us keep getting whacked? Or is just that a personal delusion?

🎜 You don't beleive, we're on the eve of destruction? 🎜

Humanity is a hot mess, if you ask me.  As Tom Cruise said in my favorite movie of all time (Born on the Fourth of July), “Everything’s falling apart.” 

Politics (with its stubborn tribalism), religion (with its pushy Christian/Islamic Nationalism), environment (with humanity’s slow systematic murdering of the planet), unchecked negative emotions (and all their ramifications/baggage), questionable morality (there’s a can-and-a-half of worms for ya), … you name it.  The world is barreling down a path of self-destruction, and at an ever-increasing speed. “It’s all falling apart.”  And I personally believe it’s irreparable.

When I think about all the dysfunction going on, it makes me wonder where we “went wrong” as a species.  And it makes me wonder if who we are today was destined to happen.  Indulge me in this thought experiment:

Suppose that Earth’s history was re-booted; a cosmic “do-over,” as in back to the primordial soup stage.  As Slimeous Erectus 😉 (a lame attempt at comedy relief) continues to develop over the eons, stage after stage (this thing, naturally evolves into that thing, that naturally evolves into that thing, etc. and etc.), into humanity as we know it today, here’s the question:

What do you predict would be that re-boot’s eventual outcome, as it relates to humanity’s status quo of today?  For example…

-Do you agree with me that humanity would have become exactly as it has become to this day?  In other words, were we, by our human nature, destined to turn out as we have?  Make your agree/disagree arguments.

-Do you think that somewhere along the line, humanity would have been able to rise above who we have become today, and learned to work with, rather than against Earth, and each other?  A Dawn of Correction situation? If yes, what do you see as the impetus for that? Give me specifics.

-Other?

How do you envision an Earth do-over panning out?

Thanks for thinking about it, posting and recommending.

 

The fall of American democracy is on the horizon

The New York Times and lots of other outlets are reporting that democratic West Virginia Senator Joe Manchin will vote against the democratic bill to protect voting rights. In a letter to a local newspaper, , Manchin wrote “I believe that partisan voting legislation will destroy the already weakening binds of our democracy.” What Manchin is unable to see, probably mostly because he is a radical right wing extremist, is that opposing protections for voting rights will further weaken and finally break American democracy. 

Manchin appears to be oblivious to the massive, anti-democracy voter suppression laws the GOP has been feverishly working to pass in nearly all states where they have to power to do so. Those voter suppression laws are knowingly and intentionally designed to shift power from less partisan election officials dedicated to free and fair elections to Republican Party hacks willing to subvert elections and deny voters their power to vote for anyone other than a Republican. 

This is how American fascism will rise and the fall of democracy, civil liberties and the rule of law. Joe Manchin gets a lot of credit for the disaster. he demanded GOP support, but he was not able to get any. That ought to have been a clear sign to him that the GOP has no interest in defending democracy or voting rights. Manchin is just too blind to see the lethal danger that is right in front of him. The NYT writes:

WASHINGTON — Senator Joe Manchin III of West Virginia said on Sunday in no uncertain terms that he would not vote for the Democrats’ far-reaching bill to combat voter suppression, nor would he ever end the legislative filibuster, a written promise that imperils much of President Biden’s agenda.

The bill, which all the other Senate Democrats had supported and the party had portrayed as an urgent effort to preserve American democracy, would roll back dozens of laws being passed by Republican state legislatures to limit early and mail-in voting and empower partisan poll watchers. The measure, known as the For the People Act, would also restore many of the ethical controls on the presidency that Donald J. Trump shattered.

In The Charleston Gazette-Mail, the newspaper of the capital of his home state, Mr. Manchin, a Democrat, wrote: “I believe that partisan voting legislation will destroy the already weakening binds of our democracy, and for that reason, I will vote against the For the People Act. Furthermore, I will not vote to weaken or eliminate the filibuster.”  

With Mr. Manchin’s vow, passage of the full For the People Act appears to be impossible, though parts of it could pass in other ways if Democrats are willing to break up the bill, a move that they have resisted. Mr. Manchin’s blockade of filibuster changes makes other Biden initiatives far less likely to pass, including any overhaul of immigration laws, a permanent expansion of the Affordable Care Act, controls of the price of prescription drugs and the most serious efforts to tackle climate change.  

“I continue to engage with my Republican and Democratic colleagues about the value of the John Lewis Voting Rights Advancement Act,” he wrote, “and I am encouraged by the desire from both sides to transcend partisan politics and strengthen our democracy by protecting voting rights.” 

Given this new development, it looks like the only thing left for the Biden administration and democrats in congress is to pass legislation by budget reconciliation. But even that requires Manchin’s vote. If he refuses to go along without GOP support, of which there will be none, we will have seen about all that the Biden administration will be able to do in terms of major legislation. We are on the verge of going back to the 6 years of gridlock we enjoyed under two Obama administrations. That there was nothing but unified, lockstep GOP opposition to Obama for all 8 years he was in office seems to be completely lost on the bipartisanship-seeking but clueless, naïve Manchin. His conservative anti-democracy ideology blinds him and betrays the rest of us, pro-democracy conservatives included. 

Obviously, fascist conservative Republicans are rejoicing in Manchin’s state of mind. He has brought the American experiment to an autocratic end.

Questions: Is it fair to put a lot of the blame for the fall of democracy and rise of fascism on Manchin, because without him, Mitch McConnell would still be in control of the Senate and there would not even be a COVID relief law passed? Is it too early to project the end of meaningful democracy and elections and the rise of fascism because the game has not finished playing out yet?

Employer vs employee: A power shift is underway

A balance of power shift has been underway since ~2009?

In a fascinating article, Workers Are Gaining Leverage Over Employers Right Before Our Eyes, the New York Times describes a new phenomenon, employees having and exerting more power over their working conditions. It is not clear low long this will last or how important it will turn out to be. The power shift seems to reflect at least in part years of employer power and labor weakness that led to many jobs being unpleasant. 

This power shift phenomenon may be linked to the pandemic in some ways. Younger workers have had to time to reflect on what they want from life. A few (about 1 in 28 according to an NPR broadcast in the last few days) who are not looking for work are using extended unemployment benefits from the COVID relief law to hold out for better jobs. Nearly all Republican politicians, i.e., about 99.5% of them, are anti-government. That ideology demands that they claim that extended employment is why employers are having a hard time finding employees. But the evidence indicates that is a small part of this phenomenon (~3.5% ?). Most employees are looking for a better quality of life and they are increasingly opting for jobs with intangible or hard to quantify benefits, e.g., flexible hours, some work at home time, etc.

The NYT writes:

“By creating your own dumb barriers, you’re actually making your job in the search for talent harder,” said Obed Louissaint, I.B.M.’s senior vice president for transformation and culture. In working with managers across the company on training initiatives like the one under which Mr. Lorick was hired, “it’s about making managers more accountable for mentoring, developing and building talent versus buying talent.” [Lorick was a bouncer in a bar working the “devil’s 9 to 5 shift” (9 pm to 5 am) and he hated it]

“I think something fundamental is changing, and it’s been happening for a while, but now it’s accelerating,” Mr. Louissaint said.

Efforts like the one at I.B.M. are, to some degree, a rediscovery in the value of investing in workers.

“I do think companies need to relearn some things,” said Byron Auguste, chief executive of Opportunity at Work, an organization devoted to encouraging job opportunities for people from all backgrounds. “A lot of companies, after the recessions in 2001 and 2008, dismantled their onboarding and training infrastructure and said that’s a cost we can’t afford.

“But it turns out, you actually do need to develop your own workers and can’t just depend on hiring.” 

“Traditionally in restaurants, it was: ‘Hey, this is the job. If you want these hours, great; if not, we’ll find somebody else,’” said Christopher Floyd, owner of the hospitality industry recruitment firm Capital Restaurant Resources in Washington. “Now employers have to say, ‘You have the qualities we’re looking for; maybe we can work out a more flexible schedule that works for you.’ Employers are becoming much more cognizant that yes, it’s about money, but also about quality of life.”

Whether it’s a bigger paycheck, more manageable hours or a training opportunity offered to a person with few formal credentials, the benefits of a tight labor market and shifting leverage can take many forms.

The NYT article points out that some companies have figured out that they can find good, reliable workers with no experience but if given some training. In some situations, employers find that a 6-month training period can replace the previously required 4-year college degree, including for jobs like computer engineers. In the past, most companies did not want to spend money training people. That locked many people out of the jobs they wanted but did not have the necessary experience the job qualifications listed. Now, a realization is dawning, that some of the past job qualifications weren't necessary at all, if the company was willing to train their employees.

Demographics also seem to be part of the power shift. Fewer employees are entering the workforce. Because of that, supply and demand is probably part of the reason for the power shift to the smaller supply side employees.

Context -- regarding the flow of power

One reason for this post is to point out the concept of the flow of power. It is a critically important concept to keep in mind in politics. In this situation, power is shifting in the economic context, but the idea of the fluidity of power is about the same in other contexts. One of my main areas of focus about politics relates to the flow of power in political, social and economic contexts. 

One of the key propaganda points that anti-government and anti-democracy republicans and conservatives constantly make is that deregulation increases personal freedom. But under that way of deregulating, special interests, businesses and employers, get deregulated and power flows from government to the special interests, not to consumers and average people. Those special interests turn around and exert it against society as they see fit, i.e., usually to increase profits and to externalize risks and social costs such as pollution and worker safety. By usually, I mean probably about 96% of the time or more. 

The entire concept of conservative power (and thus liberty) flow to the people is a myth. It’s a big fat dark free speech lie. The power flow they want is from government to special interests, including the GOP and rich people, not to average people. Another lie is that the people empowered by government deregulation does give them more power. That’s another big fat lie. What the GOP and conservatives never say (and will always deny) is that they are deregulating special interests, not government limits on civil liberties. In fact, right now the fascist conservative movement in the US is fighting dagger, tooth and claw to limit civil liberties, e.g., abortion, freedom from gun violence, and voting rights.

Modern conservatism stands for accumulation or concentration of power, wealth and liberty at the top. That demagogic fascism it is fighting dagger, tooth and claw against democracy and the rule of law, which stands for more distributed power and wealth.

That is why this issue of power flow to employees seemed a good thing to bring up. Never forget about power flow. It is central to most everything related to politics.

Climate change update: Things may be worse than experts believed

Clearing trees in a peatland forest for a palm oil plantation in the 

Central Kalimantan province on Indonesia’s Borneo island in 2014

The Washington Post writes on new research has has identified what has been a large but overlooked source of carbon dioxide emissions due to human activities. This one is unsettling. WaPo writes:

A new study finds a large, previously unknown contribution to climate change through human conversion of peatlands for agriculture.

Long before the era of fossil fuels, humans may have triggered a massive but mysterious “carbon bomb” lurking beneath the Earth’s surface, a new scientific study suggests. If the finding is correct, it would mean that we have been neglecting a major human contribution to global warming — one whose legacy continues.

The researchers, from France’s Laboratory of Climate and Environmental Sciences and several other institutions across the globe, suggest that beginning well before the industrial era, the mass conversion of carbon-rich peatlands for agriculture could have added over 250 billion tons of carbon dioxide to the atmosphere. That’s the equivalent of more than seven years of current emissions from the burning of fossil fuels for energy.

The new finding of an “ignored historical land use emission” suggests that even now, we lack a complete understanding of how the Earth’s land surfaces are driving and modulating the warming of the planet. That’s troubling, since the use of land to trap and contain greenhouse gases is set to play a critical role in the Paris climate agreement.

WaPo points out that peatlands are a type of wetland where dead plant matter only partly decay due to wet conditions. Normally peat slowly pulls carbon out of the atmosphere. But if it is disturbed decay resumes and carbon dioxide is released into the air. Draining peatland and using it for agriculture restarts the decay process. An expert estimates that CO2 from peatland amounts to ~10% of the carbon that humans have emitted from burning fossil fuels since 1850 based on the current study.

The new study is incomplete because it only considers Northern Hemisphere peatlands from the year 850 until now. And, it is possible that CO2 emissions could have been lower if humans had turned to draining peat only after once all other good land was in use. Further research and analysis is needed to better estimate how big this effect has been. 

Question: Are humans playing Russian Roulette by not taking climate change seriously, e.g., when special interests block or minimize climate change regulations, usually to protect profits.[1]

Footnote: 

1. A couple of days ago, the New York Times wrote this:

LONDON — During a contentious meeting over proposed climate regulations last fall, a Saudi diplomat to the obscure but powerful International Maritime Organization switched on his microphone to make an angry complaint: One of his colleagues was revealing the proceedings on Twitter as they happened.

It was a breach of the secrecy at the heart of the I.M.O., a clubby United Nations agency on the banks of the Thames that regulates international shipping and is charged with reducing emissions in an industry that burns an oil so thick it might otherwise be turned into asphalt. Shipping produces as much carbon dioxide as all of America’s coal plants combined.

Internal documents, recordings and dozens of interviews reveal what has gone on for years behind closed doors: The organization has repeatedly delayed and watered down climate regulations, even as emissions from commercial shipping continue to rise, a trend that threatens to undermine the goals of the 2016 Paris climate accord.

One reason for the lack of progress is that the I.M.O. is a regulatory body that is run in concert with the industry it regulates. Shipbuilders, oil companies, miners, chemical manufacturers and others with huge financial stakes in commercial shipping are among the delegates appointed by many member nations. They sometimes even speak on behalf of governments, knowing that public records are sparse, and that even when the organization allows journalists into its meetings, it typically prohibits them from quoting people by name.

Obviously, huge polluters like Saudi Arabia, Exxon-Mobile, etc., have no significant concerns about keeping the fossil fuels burning and the carbon spewing into the air. For the polluters, profit and power talks and risk of civilization collapse walks. After all, the rich believe they will always be able to take care of themselves. They could not care less about the rest of us.