“When a man unprincipled in private life, desperate in his fortune … despotic in his ordinary demeanor, known to have scoffed in private at the principles of liberty — which when such a man is seen to mount the hobby horse of popularity to join in the cry of danger to liberty to take every opportunity of embarrassing the general government and bringing it under suspicion, to flatter and fall in with all of the nonsense of the zealots of the day, it may justly be suspected that his object is to throw things into confusion that he may ride the storm and direct the whirlwind.” Alexander Hamilton in 1792
We’ve been talking for four posts now on how catastrophic President Trump is to America and, in my opinion should receive a sound defeat this November.
I believe that those who have hitched their wagons to him are making a grave mistake. Donald Trump is a man who is pretty much the human embodiment of the question “What would Jesus not do?”
We’ve identified that he is deceitful, ignorant of the workings of government, has grossly mismanaged the pandemic, has no concern for those outside his tax bracket, tried to bribe a foreign power, has a flimsy if not faux pro-life ethic, defends white nationalism, is incompetent on foreign policy, denies of the science of climate change, resists common sense gun laws, treats women as objects for his own pleasure.
What a mouth full! Could it be worse than all this? Regrettably, yes. Let’s look at how he shows contempt for immigrants, denigrates the media, and foments vitriol and violence between our citizens.
• His policies regarding, immigrants, and asylum seekers fleeing horrific conditions in their home countries is inhumane and dangerous.
In order to create a Fortress America he has slashed the number of refugees admitted to our country to the lowest point in many decades. Some 85,000 refugees were admitted in the last year Obama was in office. Donald Trump has drastically cut that number to 18,000 per year.
He has tried to strip citizenship from naturalized Americans and subject “dreamers” raised in this country to deportation. His policies have separated thousands of children from their parents at the border, some of which have still not been reunited. And at the same time he has reduced aid to the very Central American countries from which people are fleeing for their lives by the thousands and coming to our border.
He calls them “an infestation, criminals and rapists” from “shithole countries.” Though completely untrue he claims that immigrants bring malaria and leprosy as well as flood the country with gangs and depletes our economy. He uses DACA recipients as pawns to get money for the monument to his name, his southern border wall.
Asylum seekers flee poverty, violence, and hunger in their countries. Building a wall and narrowing the window of safe passage into America is like padlocking people inside a burning building.
With all the boasting he does about creating the best economy in the history of the U.S. (which isn’t true) and the lowest unemployment (also untrue), he still finds it easy to justify the nation’s most stringent immigration policies and refuse to share some of that great wealth with suffering people.
A LifeWay Research poll found that 90 percent of all evangelicals say that “the Scripture has no impact on their views toward immigration reform.” Though the Bible appears to hold little sway for them, here is a tiny fragment of what it says on the subject:
“Cursed is anyone who withholds justice from the foreigner, the fatherless or the widow” Deuteronomy 27:19
“When a stranger sojourns with you in your land, you shall not do him wrong. You shall treat the stranger who sojourns with you as the native among you, and you shall love him as yourself, for you were strangers in the land of Egypt: I am the Lord your God.” Leviticus 19:33-34
“I was a stranger and you invited me in. … Truly I tell you, whatever you did for one of the least of these brothers and sisters of mine, you did for me” Matthew 25:35, 40
• Rather than foster calm and unity, he foments division, anger, and violence.
Peter Wehner said, “We’ve never had anybody as president who seems to take a psychic delight in dividing the public, who so intentionally does it, and who is purposeful and intentional in it. Now as long as that happens, we’re not going to make very much progress. At whatever point he ceases to be president, then I think the healing can begin.”
A Ugandan Evangelical Bishop observed that the central feature of Donald Trump’s M.O. is to engender fear in our citizens. “Fear is the story he embodies, projects, and presents. Fear is what he hopes will shape the present and the future of America and the world.” Bishop D Zac Niringiye went on to say, “It did not surprise me when Yoweri Museveni, the military dictator, who this year is entering his thirty-fifth year as president of Uganda, praised Trump as ‘one of the best presidents ever’ for America.”
In a rally in Cedar Rapids, Iowa he told the crowd to “knock the crap out of” a protestor. In another rally, in reference to a detractor he said, “Maybe he should have been roughed up!” In yet another he said he’d like to punch a protestor in the face. And in one notorious incident, he promised to pay the legal bills of anyone who physically attacked a protester at one of his rallies.
He traffics in violent innuendo and threats. During the protests in Portland he said, “When the looting starts, the shooting starts,” which is a not-so-veiled threat to send in federal troops locked and loaded, which he did.
At least once he has told audiences of law enforcement officers: “When you see these thugs being thrown into the back of a paddy wagon, you just see them thrown in, rough, and I said, ‘Please don’t be too nice.’’
Under the guise of being the “law and order president” he closes the border airtight, sends federal law enforcement to protests, and tear gasses peaceful protestors ahead of his entourage. During his first debate with Biden, Chris Wallace asked him, pleaded with him really, to tell white supremacist groups to “Stand down.” Instead he hummed and hawed and finally said, “Stand back. Stand by.” Even if he misspoke, as he claimed the next day, the violent militia group he addressed took it as a call to arms. “Standing by, Mr. President!” they said that very night and immediately printed t-shirts with that as their new logo!
Anger and fear are his stock-in-trade. Contrary to his claim to not want to “cause a panic” in America, it’s how he rolls. It’s what he’s good at, and he knows it.
“Warn a divisive person once, and then warn him a second time. After that, have nothing to do with him.” Titus 3:10
“A perverse person stirs up conflict.” Proverbs 16:28
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Next time we’ll look at his juvenile temperament, his profound narcissism, and his catastrophic damage to our Christian testimony.
barney wiget 