Monday 18th of November 2024
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... and on january 20th 2025, trump fixed everything....

If you are like me, you are fed up with the so-called educated ‘Left’ who are not at all educated in the underlying causes of humankind’s current problems and the solutions to them. You will also be fed up with people believing that when we elect Left or Centre-Left parties, the world is on track to solve its problems, and we can live happily and equitably in the meantime.

 

The failure of the Left    By Philip Lawn

 

If you look at what has happened over the past fifty years to the greenhouse emissions and ecological footprint of nations, you will see that they have continued to rise regardless of who is in government, with the global Ecological Footprint now 1.7 times global Biocapacity and patently unsustainable. You will see that the Gini coefficient of income inequality has risen in almost all countries regardless of who is in government. And you will see that a policy of full employment has been abandoned and that unemployment rates are much the same, notwithstanding changing economic circumstances, regardless of who is in government. In other words, it is clear that Left and Centre-Left governments have failed to deliver on all the things they say they believe in, yet blame the ‘Right’ for all our problems.

The ongoing failure of the Left has meant that the world’s problems magnify over time; the most vulnerable people suffer disproportionately, become disillusioned, eventually get angry, and vote in a reactionary manner; and our capacity to solve our problems is further undermined.

We will not solve our environmental problems – indeed, they will only get worse – unless we do something about population growth and until rich nations make the transition to a steady-state (non-growing) economy and poor nations do likewise in the near future. And we will not make the transition in a just way unless currency-issuing central governments use their fiscal capacities to ensure an equitable share of what is already a sufficient stock of real wealth through the agency of paid work (full employment) and not a Universal Basic Income, as many on the Left are now advocating oblivious to its disastrous effects. A just transition will also require an increase in the share of wealth comprised of quality and accessible public goods, which implies reducing the production of trivial goods and many luxury goods. Would you rather a publicly provided hospital bed in case you or your aging parent or grandparent gets sick or a third flat-screen television?

Yet all we hear from the Left are messages about ‘green growth’, ‘circular economy’, ‘decoupling GDP from natural resource use’, ‘fiscal sustainability’, ‘demographic transition’, and ‘aspirationalism’. Much the same as the past but done a little differently. If you believe these are solutions, you are exactly the sort of person I’m referring to. The bottom line? A Donald Trump victory in the USA and more of his type to follow.

If people on the Left (and Right) believe that growth can continue on a finite planet, don’t argue with me. Argue with those operating in the physical sciences who will tell you otherwise – the people who justifiably make jokes of economists and the social sciences generally. The term ‘social science’ has virtually become an oxymoron because it is almost entirely devoid of science. Of course, physical scientists aren’t omniscient. Most don’t understand modern money and modern markets – both functional requisites of a modern sophisticated economy – and how best to regulate modern markets to bring about oikonomic outcomes (the sustainable and equitable management of the economy for the benefit of all people) as opposed to chrematistic outcomes (the manipulation of assets, both real and financial, for the benefit of the individual regardless of whether it benefits society). Sadly, mainstream economists are just as lacking in their understanding of modern money and modern markets as physical scientists. But at least most physical scientists steer clear of areas they know little about. Conversely, for fifty years, we’ve had successive governments defer to mainstream economic advice on just about everything and have constantly reconfigured national economies in line with chrematistic principles. Neoliberalism, it should be stressed, is nothing but institutionalised chrematistics with continuous growth, needles fiscal austerity, and institutional deprivation at its core.

Meanwhile, things get worse, as the above evidence indicates; introducing genuine policy solutions becomes more difficult because the comfortable existence of movers and shakers, which includes the educated Left, depends on rising GDP, rising stock market values, and rising property prices; and the election of Trump-like characters becomes ever more likely.

Humankind had its best chance fifty years ago. Except for mainstream economists and denialists on the ideologically obsessed Right, we once took seriously the things said by the likes of Paul Ehrlich (population bomb) and the Club of Rome (limits to growth). We also possessed many of the physical and institutional structures required to make a smooth, painless, and equitable transition to an ecologically sustainable and qualitatively-improving steady-state economy, which would have ended the era of fossil fuel dependence and marked the completion of what should have been the shift to a renewable resource-based post-industrial society. But we chose not to and the Left, by succumbing to neoliberalism, has played its part in making the managed transition highly improbable. There is now enormous institutional rebuilding required to return to where we were fifty years ago, except making things more difficult will be twice the number of mouths to feed, twice the per capital resource consumption to satisfy, a sick planet, and a global economy seemingly locked into a destructive growth imperative.

From now on, I won’t be voting for political parties if they fail to represent the interests of the planet, vulnerable people, and future generations. Only when they offer something to my liking will they deserve and get my vote. Thus, no more voting for the lesser of two or more evils. I’ll leave it to your imagination to contemplate my intentions come the next federal election.

 

YOURDEMOCRACY.NET RECORDS HISTORY AS IT SHOULD BE — NOT AS THE WESTERN MEDIA WRONGLY REPORTS IT.

 

“It’s hard to do cartoons without shedding tears…”

         Gus Leonisky

humility, no dancing in the streets....

 

Jack Graham challenges Christians to ‘be on our knees’ following Trump win, calls for ‘grace and humility’
By Leah Marie and Ann Klett, CP

 

Jack Graham, senior pastor of Prestonwood Baptist Church, has challenged Christians who supported former President Donald Trump to be “on our knees” after he was reelected for a second, non-consecutive term to serve as the 47th president of the United States.

“The posture for Christians should be on our knees, the posture should be prayer, and we should pray for unity in the country,” the 74-year-old Plano, Texas-based pastor and former Southern Baptist Convention president told The Christian Post.

“We know the country is deeply divided and half the country is disappointed in the result of the election, and yet now is our opportunity,” he continued. 

“If you supported the election of President Trump, as I do, it is our opportunity to now, with the president and our government, to govern well and to respond with grace.”

Graham, who leads an estimated 50,000-member congregation, stressed that this isn’t a time to “spike the ball,” adding that he’s observed the shift in culture toward overt celebrations of political victories — gestures he said do little to heal the divides. 

“Now, everybody dances in the end zone, spikes the ball, jumps up and down, struts, flips the bat,” he said. “In my era, we tried to win with a little more grace and humility.”

Christians, who are called to be both witnesses and ambassadors of their faith, should respond to this political moment with a similar measure of grace and restraint, the pastor said. He stressed the need for spiritual revival and awakening — his foremost hope for a divided nation.

“Christians need to show a great deal of humility and integrity, and in praying for our leaders and living the Christian life,” he said. “We need to pray for spiritual revival; we need to do what we've always been called to do, which is to proclaim the Gospel, to witness to our neighbors and the nations. We can make a difference by living out our faith and praying for spiritual revival and spiritual awakening in our country. That, in the end, is what I'm most interested in.”

Graham has been vocal about his support for Trump and Sen. J.D. Vance, R-Ohio, who defeated the Democratic ticket of Vice President Kamala Harris and Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz on Nov. 5. 

Ahead of the election, Graham was among Christian leaders who prayed over Trump at the National Faith Advisory Board summit in Georgia, along with televangelist Paula White.

"We love you, Jesus, and we also love our country. And we thank you that you have raised up a man, Donald J. Trump, to be a warrior for the word of God and the wisdom that comes from God," Graham prayed. "Thank you for protecting him, for keeping your hand of blessing upon him, and we pray as you raise him up once again to be our president that you would give him strength, wisdom and joy in the journey."

Ahead of the election, he also expressed his disapproval of fellow Christian leaders who advised against voting in the election. 

 

He wrote: “If you are a pastor or Christian leader advising people not to vote in this most consequential election, you have lost all credibility not only in the church but before a watching world,” referencing Matthew 5:14-16.

The pastor previously told CP that in his many decades of church leadership, he’s seen the Body of Christ deal with hot-button issues, such as “the question of marriage,” like never before.

“The Bible is clear on male and female; He created them. So, we're not going to be flying rainbow flags in the church that's reaching families for Christ, because it is an opposition to the Bible.”

“We have to deal with it. We have to give people a reason to believe and a reason to know, but people don't know their Bibles,” he said. “That's why I keep getting back to the Bible. People just don't know what the Bible says. So we go by our feelings, or we go by culture, we go by what our friends are saying, or even maybe what our parents said. We're just trying to get people to open their Bibles and to help explain what the Bible says about all these issues.”

The pastor, who hosts “The Bible in a Year with Jack Graham” podcast, also told CP that Christians have a duty to support Israel, rooted in both faith and moral conviction.

"For Christians, we do have a biblical obligation to love Israel," he said, pointing to the deep-rooted connection between Christianity and Judaism. 

"God loves Israel," Graham emphasized. "He chose them according to His Word as His own particular people. He established them as a nation, gave them a land, a life and a legacy for generations. As Christians, we are forever grateful for the heritage that we have in the Old Testament and the Jewish people. […] Our Messiah, our Bible, came from the Jewish people […] so we have this tremendous connection with the Jewish people.”

Graham also clarified the distinction between spiritual and political support of Israel. "The Church, in my understanding of the Bible, does not supplant Israel," he noted, dispelling notions that the Church has replaced Israel in God's plan.

"God still has a plan and a purpose for Israel,” he said. “That’s where we start. If we love someone, we stand with them and support them. It doesn’t mean we support, as Christians, everything political Israel, the government, may do.”

“But [we support] the people and their right to exist. What you have now is this movement of genocide and antisemitism that's rising, not only in the Middle East but in Europe and America. And so, we must stand against that hatred at our church.”

https://www.christianpost.com/news/jack-graham-as-christians-we-must-be-praying-post-election.html

 

'Anointed by God': The Christians who see Trump as their saviour

 

Standing on a podium in a Florida convention centre on the night of the election, a row of American flags behind him and a jubilant crowd looking on, Donald Trump declared: “Many people have told me that God spared my life for a reason, and that reason was to save our country and to restore America to greatness.”

This was one of the most striking themes of his election campaign - that he had been chosen by God. Yet even before the attempt on his life on 13 July in Butler, Pennsylvania, millions of Americans already felt guided by their faith to support the former, and now future, president. 

Some cast the election in an apocalyptic light and likened Trump to a Biblical figure.

Last year, on the Christian show FlashPoint, TV evangelist Hank Kunneman described “a battle between good and evil”, adding: “There's something on President Trump that the enemy fears: it's called the anointing.”

 

READ MORE:

https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/c20g1zvgj4do

 

GUS LEONISKY IS A RABID ATHEIST, POLITICALLY CARTOONING SINCE 1951.

 

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YOURDEMOCRACY.NET RECORDS HISTORY AS IT SHOULD BE — NOT AS THE WESTERN MEDIA WRONGLY REPORTS IT.

 

“It’s hard to do cartoons without praying to Zeus…”

         Gus Leonisky