What does MAGA mean?

Mulling over what Weinstein said in the Rogan interview about the MAGA slogan, how the last word "Again" pokes a finger in the eye and was intended to do so.   Whose eye according to him I'm not sure.  But the statement came as sort of a revelation to me, maybe explaining why that slogan is such an offense when to  me and I would suppose to most on my side of the political divide it holds a promise of restoring everything good that America once stood for that it seems to us the Left has been trying to destroy for decades but most determinedly under Obama.

Weinstein says it wasn't great "for everybody" but that it could become great for everybody.  That phrase "for everybody" shows an abysmal lack of understanding of the idea of America's greatness that I find both illuminating and deeply distressing.   Illuminating because I would never have guessed the level of ignorance that finds the slogan offensive and it's good to know if that is the right explanation, and of course distressing because it does show such an abysmal ignorance of American history and America's position in history.   In saying this I don't claim I have such a great education in these things either, I think we've all been deprived of the knowledge we've needed for decades to help fend off the powers of darkness that are trying to destroy us.

America's greatness is in its brilliant conception, it is not about anybody or everybody, it is about the concept of how to govern the flawed fallen human race for the good of all.  and if it had been practiced just as it was conceived it would have been just that...  for everybody.   Whatever the protestors are objecting to it is not America as it was meant to be and always could have been, it is people NOT living according to what it was meant to be.  However, the greatness is in the conception and not what fallen people do with it, though fallen people have been trying to pull it down for a long time now, and all Trump was saying was that we want to restore its original greatness which would be great "for everyone" if practiced as conceived.

A Very Welcome Liberal Voice -- up to a point

It's always exciting to discover people I can agree with.  It's most exciting to find Christians I'd never heard of before who preach a powerful orthodoxy, especially with a deep spiritual experience behind it.   But a strong voice for sanity inour disintegrating crazy world is an exciting thing to find too.  In this case I just discovered a liberal/leftist who is actually sane and sees the dangers in Black Lives Matter and the current uprisings all over the nation.  This is Bret Weinstein who as a professor at Evergreen State College in Washington was attacked some years ago as a supposed racist, which launched him into a whole new life of calling down this insanity, which as he rightly sees it is a threat to civilization itself.

I object to his leftist politics, he's a supporter of Bernie Sanders of all things, oh yikes (he obviously hasn't yet seen the Marxist foundation of all this madness), and he's an evolutionary biologist who has a lot to say from that perspective too, which gives me a case of violent eyeball rolling, but he's got a sane perspective on the current political situation that is enormously refreshing and hope-inspiring.  Besides, even what I object to in his thinking gives him a special credibility he wouldn't have as a right-winger, so I have to be happy about that.  There's hope for him though.  He likies a lot of what Tucker Carlson has to say.   He's no conservative but perhaps he'll get there.  "A conservative is a liberal who got mugged by reality."

Later:  Listening to another interview with Weinstein, a very recent one with Joe Rogan, and now I'm objecting to the way he justifies the actions of BLM as a function of a system, not the racism as the movement thinks of it but a system that somehow perpetuates the effects of slavery.  This is mystification.  I'm sure it sounds reasonable to a person imbued with Marxist logic but just as Marxist logic never touches down on Planet Earth so that one could get an idea of what is being talked about this also remains irritatingly abstract and theoretical and ultimately meaningless.  Besides, how exactly does this economic system single out blacks anyway?  No, sorry, this cannot explain any of what is going on.  But the effect of decades of Marxist indoctrination DOES explain it.  Love your ability to see what's wrong with all this Mr. W, do not think you have a clue about its causes.

People who "feel disenfranchised" or ARE disenfranchised but by a system of economics?  NO!  This is madness in itself.   NO!   Now I'm thinking this would just fan the flames, it's just a version of Marxism and the problem is already caused by Marxist indoctrination.  NO!  The "feeling disenfranchised" is caused BY Marxist indoctrination, the way Marxism creates class conflict by supposedly merely analyzing its presence.  No, this is a Marxist invention the whole thing and it's anti-American, anti-freedom, it's not real, it's a mad theory reified aimed at destroying the best form of government ever invented.

Wow, the more I listen the less I like what he's saying.  He "resents" Trump's slogan about making America great AGAIN because "there are populations for whom it has never been great."   Oh dear, all the work we've done to rectify the wrongs of the past and as usual nothing will ever be enough for the Marxist wrecking ball mentality.   And let's be clear that the "Again" is a reference to the hope of reversing the destructive policies of Obama that were aimed to diminish American greatness and in fact destroy the country, and he did NOTHING for the black community.  Trump did more economically for all minorities than any Democrats ever did.

This is simply a lie.  If anything blacks are the privileged class in the last few decades, not whites since they have been given all sorts of handicaps including Affirmative Action at the expense of ordinary whites..  They have plenty of problems but the cause is not racism, not some ghostly holdover from slavery in the economic system,  and let me bnote that their worst situation is in Democrat-controlled areas.  The cause is at least partly the result of being TOLD they are being mistreated and that the cause is outside themselves and their own communities and their own power to change.

No, this is a bogus analysis Mr. Weinstein.  Oh I agree completely, you are right that this could certainly morph into the next version of Mao's China or Hitler's Germany.  I think that's where it is definitely headed, but no there is no justification for any of it, I will not accept that.  Government has intervened and intervened and intervened and it's only made things worse because the Democrats don't have a clue what is needed or they don't care or they are too busy trying to get power over their political opponents.   They make it impossible for a real education to be had for instance, don't allow vouchers to give parents a choice to remove their children from the hideously bad schools to schools where they could actually get an eduation; they don't do anything about the crime in the black neighborhoods, they'd rather blame the cops, and now they are pushihng this insane solution of taking the police away altogether.  Yes Mr. W opposes that, he has some common sense, yes he sees where this is headed, but I can't accept his ridiculous analysis of the causes.  The kind of thinking that justifies any of this insanity can only make things worse.

His views made me feel better for a while, and I guess he still has some I can appreciate, but overall the whole thing has gone sour.  He's too much a part of the problem himself.

I hope to come back with some links.  But he's not hard to find through Google or You Tube.

MR. PRESIDENT!

Isn't it the President's job to bring order into all this chaos and destruction?   What on earth is holding him up?

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WE NEED LAW AND ORDER NOW!  

STOP THIS MADNESS NOW BEFORE AMERICA IS LOST COMPLETELY!  

THAT'S YOUR JOB!.

MacArthur's Jet Tour of the Book of Revelation, plus Rev 17

John MacArthur did a one-sermon "Jet tour of the Book of Revelation" sketching out the entire book in a little over an hour, which is very helpful for approaching that complicated subject.  I've listened to many of the sermons in his vey lengthy series on Revelation but still have many to go.  Having an overview like this is very helpful.

He doesn't try to identify the Antichrist or even the Harlot Church, which I understand to be the Pope and the Roman Church, as I've spelled out in many posts.  I also believe the "666" is the sum of Roman numerals in a title of the Pope, which I've also argued here, though MacArthur says it means only the number of Man.  Which doesn't tell us which man of course, which I thought was the whole point of giving us such clues.   None of it will be clear until it happens of course.

Added later:  Listening to MacArthur on Revelation 17 done back in the 90s he's talking about how risky it is to try to predict who the Antichrist will be from current events, naming a number of attempts to do that in those years.  And of course he's right so although I favor this current Pope, and have given my reasons for it, I know I may be wrong.  MacArthur mentions that in the early years of Christianity some offered various Popes as the Antichrist, and certainly the Bishop of Rome had been identified as Antichrist by "pope" Gregory on the occasion when Byzantine emperor Phocas made the Bishop of Rome Universal Bishop in the year 606 AD.  And I did a post here a while back showing tha the Popes have been identified as Antichrist down the centuries.    Which makes a particular Pope at the right time a very likely candidate for the Final Antichrist of the Tribulation period.  Francis is the current Pope and although he has some stellar qualifications for the role he is also old enough to make it unlikely.   What it means of course is that if he is that final Antichrist all these things would have to unfold rather soon.   Very soon.  If he has the health to live to ninety or more that's still pretty soon.

Chris Pinto I think believes the Antichrist will be a Pope.   As I recall Pinto identifies "the mark of the Beast" as the sign of membership in the Roman Church, which he argues from a historical usage of the idea in reference to the ceremony that brings one into that Church.

Anyway here's MacArthur's jet tour of the book about the final days of Planet Earth:
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Well, now I want to add his sermon on Revelation 17 since the question of the identity of the  Harlot Church has come up here.  He first describes the final Harlot Church, "Mystery Babylon" as an amalgam of all the false religions that come together to form the final World Religion.  Then (around 15:00 on the counter) he does finally identify the Roman Catholic Church as possibly the main form of that final world religion, and quotes Martyn Lloyd Jones who called it Satan's greatest achievement, even greater than Marxism.  He points out that Pope John Paul who was Pope at the time he gave this sermon, was totally devoted to "Mary" and that the RC version of Mary is derived from the religion of Babylon.  (See "The Two Babylons" by Alexander Hislop which traces the history of all the false religions from Babylon to Catholicism).  He goes on to describe all the false doctrine that contradicts Christianity, that may well characterize the final world religion.
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.Added on June 24:  Hm.  Wild thought hit me after hearing MacArthur's latest teaching which is all about the Antichrist..  What if Obama is the final Antichrist?  And Pope Francis the False Prophet?  I could defend the thought, using many bits of information I've collected in earlier posts that show his qualifications for the job, some going back years, but I think I'll just leave it at that for now.

A Pastor Talks on Cultural Marxism

Cultural Marxism explains so much of today's politics from the Left I often bring it up in discussions.  Political correctness is my usual emphasis.  I just found this talk about it by Pastor Voddie Baucham which gives the historical background:
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A Brief Explanation of Why the Rioting is not about injustice but is the imposition of Marxism.

I just want to give a brief sketch of the Marxist ideology that is the real foundation of Black Lives Matter.  I realize it needs more evidence than I'm up to providing but I should at least give a hint.  

Someone read the Black Lives Matter website over the radio recently, which is full of Marxist terminology, like "collective" and even "comrade."  There is no doubt that this and probably Antifa as well are expressions of Marxism which is an ideology that couldn't be more opposed to the principles of the American Constitution.  

It isn't about black lives as such, which is easy enough to see just in the fact that it's only a few black men arrested for petty crimes that inspired it while black policemen who have died trying to enforce the law are not included.  And it isn't about injustice either since the murder of George Floyd got the policeman charged with murder and others with aiding and abetting him.   The others like Michael Brown and Trayvon Martin died while trying to harm the policeman arresting them.  So it isn't about injustice.   What it's really about is the revolutionary aims of Marxist/Communism that got quite a kickstart in the sixties and has continued through the universities ever since as sixties Marxists became university professors.   They go out an preach the false idea of injustice and encourage the tearing down of society in its name to people who are ignorant of American history.  

You can feel the Marxist totalitarianism even in Political Correctness which aims to control people's speech, intimidate everybody into silence.  This sort of anti-freedom is really the hallmark of all Marxist-inspired movem3ents.  It started as a shaming indignation against those who refuse to accept the ideology, then escalated to getting people fired from jobs who don't toe the party line, and now we see it tearing down the whole society it defines as contrary to its utopian vision.  By one means or another it enforces conformity to whatever they decree is necessary to their utopian concept.   And destroying the culture it defines as the oppressor is a big part of the plan.  There is no respect whatever for other human beings who disagree with them, none whatever, they are to be eliminated in one way or another.

Utopias themselves are totalitarian.  Human beings are flawed and diverse and the American Constitution allows for a society of flawed people in a way that prevents any one ideology from dominating others.  Marxism is an ideology that refuses to tolerate anything that it doesn't approve which means it must intimidate dissenters, imprison them and murder them to enforce its vision.  Rioting and arson are just an expression of the same violence to impose their will on everybody else.  It is absolutely anti-freedom, anti all the freedoms that are supposed to be protected by our Constitution.  Get enough screaming rioting looting violent revolutionaries together with the self-serving ideology that has been  incubating for decades in our universities and they will just overthrow our Constitutional freedoms by force.   

Marxism must control everyone, freedom to be oneself is impossible.    You see this in every Communist regime because you can't have your utopia unless you force people to accept it.  It is sad to see this happening in our wonderful bastion of freedoms that is, or was, America.  

Fallenness: The Buddhists (and others) have it All Wrong

Can America recover this time?  Such evil uprisings of the Marxist ideology* that has been growing in the universities since the sixties at least have occurred before and eventually die out as some semblance of normality resumes for a while.  But each new phase of "normal" is really undermined at its core by the irrationality that is just waiting for another opportunity to burst out and destroy and kill everything good.  

This time around it's more virulent than ever as the usual forces of restraint are compromised and intimidated into ineffectiveness and some of them have even joined with the forces of destruction.  

What's going to happen now?  I pray pray pray for reason to return, but it's possible that God may have reached the point where he is going to let it all play out, and woe to all of us if that is the case.  If we are really approaching the Rapture, to be followed by the Day of the Lord which will be the final pouring out of God's wrath against an evil world, this may be a foretaste, or a preliminary phasing-in of that coming Great Tribulation period.  If not I shudder to think how much worse it could get before that happens.

It's the way sheer evil is being justified that is the worst of all of this.  Evil will always rise up, rampages of vandals and looters and murderers can always happen in a fallen world, but they are usually confronted by forces of good and this time those forces are weakened and silenced and treated as if they are the evil.  How can we survive this?

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This is a fallen world.  It is taken for normal by most people, even by Christians who should know better.  In a fallen world good is always undermined to some extent by evil.  We are all sinners, "there is no one good, no not one" says the scripture.   This is why we need a Savior, this is why Jesus came.  But the devil is highly intelligent and knows how to work on the sinful human soul so that we justify ourselves at the expense of others and at the expense of the entire fabric of security that protects all of us. 

I was pondering this as I listened recently to some teaching by the Tibetan Buddhist nun Robina Courtin at You Tube.  I got very interested in her teaching on karma, seeing how it is similar to the workings of God's Law as taught in the Bible.  They teach four precepts that are almost identical to four of the Ten Commandments for instance:  don't steal, don't lie, don't commit wrongful sex, don't murder, to which she adds don't misuse speech which is treated as more of a subcategory in the Bible rather than a separate commandment.  That is, speech can be a vehicle for all the other sins. 

It was the Buddhist teaching against killing that got me thinking about fallenness and how Buddhists have no clue about that.   They treat it as an evil thing to kill anything at all, insects, even bacteria.  E coli?  Apparently so.   

In a fallen world this blanket rejection of all killing is dangerous.  It may be that in the Kingdom of God it would make sense.  That is it would make sense in the ideal world where all living creatures are in harmony without doing any harm to each other.  That is biblically when the lion lies down with the lamg and the child can play int he viper's den without being hurt, when weapons of war have been turned into tools for constructive purposes and so on.

But in this fallen world, no.  Nature in this world is "red in tooth and claw," killing and eating each other, or in the case of insects and bacteria causing disease and death.

The biblical revelation tells us that when our first parents disobeyed God they lost their original idyllic world in which all forms of life lived in harmony, and from that point on death entered the universe.  We are told this in the New Testament, in ……………    Death entered as God said it would and since then we've been governed by the rule that says "the wages of sin is death."  Sin brought death and it continues to bring death, death in many forms including diseases and threat from predatory animals and injury by the environment.  Childbearing became painful and even life-threatening for women, the earth grew thorns and thistles and made growing food arduous.  Weather is both a blessing and a threat.

In fact that is a way of saying something about the nature of the sin that brought it all on:  eating of the "tree of the knowledge of good and evil."  Adam and Eve had known no evil until then, but their disobedience made it known through experience from then on.  In a world of both good and evil we are subject to the rising up of evil when good is demonized as it is now in this current rampaging of rioting and arson and vandalism, when the police are treated as the bad guys and the criminals as the good guys.

Back to the Buddhist teaching against all killing again, you have to restrain ALL threats by living things and that may mean killing them.  You can die of the diseases carried by rats and insects, so letting them live makes no sense in such a world as the one we live in now.  This is also why the death penalty is necessary, so that even killing human beings who kill other human beings is righteous in this world.

According to Robina Courtin the Buddha learned about everything by looking into his own mind.  He learned about the cause and effect of karma, which is how our actions produce consequences, bad actions producing suffering.  It can be described in fairly simple terms as receiving the same kind of treatment you mete out to others.  Jesus tells us we will reap what we sow which says something very similar.  Ending suffering by learning to stop producing bad karma is apparently a major goal of the Buddhist practice of watching the mind, as I understand it.

Apparently Buddha did not discover a Creator God through his meditations.  He did confirm the ancient Hindu teaching of reincarnation though.  The Buddhist view is that there is no beginning or end to anything, reality is beginningless and endless.  So every living thing just keeps getting recycled throughout aeons of time, the goal of each to reach the cessation of karma (I think).  Which raises the question wouldn't there be an end when absolutely every living thing has reached that point?   If everything is beginningless then no new living beings are being brought into existence so ultimately all of them should eventually make it to the goal of ending suffering and the cycles of reincarnation would be at an end.

It may be a legitimate question but it's a rabbit trail I allowed myself to pursue for the moment, but I have another question I'd like to ask and that's how the Buddha explains death?  Why is there death at all?  Why is there a portion of existence lived by each creature in a physical body, from which the usual exit is through death?  Perhaps there is a Buddhist answer but it doesn't seem to be a very important part of the teaching if so.  

By observing his mind there is very little the Buddha discovered that is similar to the Biblical revelation though there is the similarity between the four precepts and four of the Ten Commandments.   owever, I do think there is a  general similarity between the idea of karma as the Law that Runs the Universe and the Law of God which we'd describe in the same terms.   So it seems to me the Buddha was able to observe God's Law in operation in his own mind, however imperfectly.  The suffering that is caused by bad actions is in the Biblical frame of reference God's judgment against our sins.

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*  Why do I say this is an uprising of the Marxist ideology?  I'll do a separate post about that I think.  

To be continued.