Meet the Prophet from Orange County

Among the more troubling aspects of our political culture is the insistence and reliance upon some people in significant positions of power to call upon the almighty for justification. This is contingent, of course, upon something successful happening; if things go well, the good Lord has blessed us. If not, some evil people, cursed with awfulness of sin, are doing bad deeds.

So it was that Mike Pompeo, the blessed Secretary of State, pronounced to Benjamin Netanjahu the other day that "The Lord was at work" in how Israel has been protected through the years.

Meet the prophet from Orange County. How does he come off in making such a pronouncement, especially in front of the leader of a nation based on the ascendance of a people who do not believe in the divinity of that same Lord?

But that's the thinking of the fuzzy-headed, excessively religiously afflicted members of this administration: Israel is the place for god's chosen people, thus America, which has also been blessed by god, stands as Israel's protector and caretaker in perpetuity.

Something like that. If I've missed a detail or two, so be it, but to these people, such details are superfluous, especially when supernatural forces are involved. It's called theocracy, espoused by those who do not accept anything not eventually connected to eternity, and are very willing to intimidate and bully those who do not submit to such thinking, if not treat them with condescending backhandedness. Sarah Huckabee Sanders, 45's horrible excuse for a press secretary, is such a person. If you can stand it for more than two minutes, listen to her lies and deflections through that lens.

Actually, there are far more nefarious forces at work, speaking of the awfulness of sins. Saudi Arabia protects Israel every bit as much as we do. The Saudis are sworn opponents of Iran, since the Saudis are Sunn-i Muslims and Iranians are Shi-ites. The difference between the two are about like the synods of the Lutheran church in America, but far more passionately drawn and viciously defended.

The Saudis govern about that viciously, too. They regularly torture and murder people who don't seem to adhere to the regime's absolute rule in the way that it prefers--thus the Khashoggi murder and the 45 administration's success in letting it slide without calling out, or sanctioning in any way, the Saudi kingdom for its brutality. If someone's god is at work here, it's one that punishes are more than it blesses and comforts.

But that, too, is part of the mentality: Don't mess up or someone's gonna gitcha. If you have any questions, best not to ask them or else you'll be singled out as a doubter--in something, anything, that makes the wrong people wonder about you. It creates a submissive, mousey polity that nods like bobbleheads.

And there is the specter of oil, too, of course, which we desperately need because someone getting lots of money from it says so. It's all tied up in the reactionary, hyper-religious, pro-capitalist philosophy of Republicanism, arranged nicely so that most of the richest people regularly contribute to the campaigns that now, because of a mostly Republican-appointed Supreme Court, have few if any accountable strings attached to them.

Their god didn't completely arrange for all this, but since their god is obviously on their side, the implication is clear and obvious. Isn't it?

So, too, it is with the recent send-up of the Mueller report by Attorney General William Barr, whose four-page summary gave 45 and friends their immediate, though narrow, reasoning of vindication (which it isn't, but the delay in the publishing of the whole report plays upon the public's need to move on, which is the nice, neat strategy of obfuscation and substitution of other crises that this administration is awfully good at). Wait and see: religiosity will be worked into this massive mess in some subtle but clear way, so that the faithful will beat their breasts and conclude that divine intervention was at work every minute.

That makes resistance, or the Resistance, as it were, all that much more difficult to sustain, in Congress and out. 45ers don't want a fair discussion of anything, as they continually whine about not having: They want submission to their god's will, which by chance coincides with everything they could possibly want, even if it's not in their best interests. They want no discussion at all. They demand agreement.

We're the ones who are stupid, not them. After all, who could disagree with their god? Only those who refuse to think, or are so fundamentally evil that they are beyond salvation. If their dear leader is divinely destined to lead us, who are we to question? Remember Stephen Miller's then-ridiculous sounding comment that "the president is not to be questioned"? It wasn't posturing. He meant it.

That seems to be what Mike Pompeo thinks of those who object to our reversal of position on the Golan Heights--namely, that Israel can now have it forever. Never mind that it may lead to a future war, once Syria cleans up its act. Will war be the Lord's work, too? Only twisted minds can conclude that.

But then, what else can we conclude about the mentality we are dealing with? It's a mentality that I cannot merely disagree with. I am constantly repelled by it, as if it can't have anything to do with my country. How I wish.

Be well. I'll see you down the road.


Mister Mark