This series, titled Trump Dump, features outlandish, untrue quotes from Donald Trump, MAGA supporters, and Right Wing media. If you come across a quote for this series, please send it to me with a link to the news story that contains the relevant quote.
If we were to go through and just put in restraints on the use of food stamps to feed our people sugar, for example…we can save hundreds of billions of dollars.
We can do a lot of savings right out of the gate to reverse the Biden damage, get the economy going, reduce regulations – but not touch benefits that our seniors rely on – yes, we need to address Medicare and Social Security in the long haul, no question, but right now we should reverse Biden damage, get spending restraint on Medicaid, reforms that need to be put in place [and] tax policy that matches all of that.
That would only be a 13 percent cut, you and I can find 13 percent of waste, and I think the DOGE guys too and that would be fiscally responsible and the American people would cheer President Trump and Republicans if we do that.
U.S. Representative Chip Roy (R), as reported by Raw Story
Bruce Gerencser, 67, lives in rural Northwest Ohio with his wife of 46 years. He and his wife have six grown children and sixteen grandchildren. Bruce pastored Evangelical churches for twenty-five years in Ohio, Texas, and Michigan. Bruce left the ministry in 2005, and in 2008 he left Christianity. Bruce is now a humanist and an atheist.
Your comments are welcome and appreciated. All first-time comments are moderated. Please read the commenting rules before commenting.
This series, titled Trump Dump, features outlandish, untrue quotes from Donald Trump, MAGA supporters, and Right Wing media. If you come across a quote for this series, please send it to me with a link to the news story that contains the relevant quote.
I am supporting the speaker and let me say, if, you know, I hear from President Donald Trump, who I do speak with relatively regularly and I have a relationship with him, to the contrary, that would change my mind.
Let me say this, I’m a very independent person. So, I get it. I get it. Members of Congress want to express their individual viewpoint, ’We’re a coequal branch of government, etc, etc… but there was a mandate from the people of the United States of America in both the popular vote and the electoral vote to make change.
U.S. Representative Jeff Van Drew (R), as reported by the Huffington Post
Bruce Gerencser, 67, lives in rural Northwest Ohio with his wife of 46 years. He and his wife have six grown children and sixteen grandchildren. Bruce pastored Evangelical churches for twenty-five years in Ohio, Texas, and Michigan. Bruce left the ministry in 2005, and in 2008 he left Christianity. Bruce is now a humanist and an atheist.
Your comments are welcome and appreciated. All first-time comments are moderated. Please read the commenting rules before commenting.
This series, titled Trump Dump, features outlandish, untrue quotes from Donald Trump, MAGA supporters, and Right Wing media. If you come across a quote for this series, please send it to me with a link to the news story that contains the relevant quote.
Minutes after a terrorist attack killed fifteen people in New Orleans, Trump blamed the attack on illegal immigrants. Not long after, we learned that the perpetrator was a U.S. citizen, a member of the military.
When I said that the criminals coming in [illegal immigrants] are far worse than the criminals we have in our country, that statement was constantly refuted by Democrats and the Fake News Media, but it turned out to be true.
The crime rate in our country is at a level that nobody has ever seen before. Our hearts are with all of the innocent victims and their loved ones, including the brave officers of the New Orleans Police Department. The Trump Administration will fully support the City of New Orleans as they investigate and recover from this act of pure evil!
Bruce Gerencser, 67, lives in rural Northwest Ohio with his wife of 46 years. He and his wife have six grown children and sixteen grandchildren. Bruce pastored Evangelical churches for twenty-five years in Ohio, Texas, and Michigan. Bruce left the ministry in 2005, and in 2008 he left Christianity. Bruce is now a humanist and an atheist.
Your comments are welcome and appreciated. All first-time comments are moderated. Please read the commenting rules before commenting.
This series, titled Trump Dump, features outlandish, untrue quotes from Donald Trump, MAGA supporters, and Right Wing media. If you come across a quote for this series, please send it to me with a link to the news story that contains the relevant quote.
Could the American flag be adding another star in 2025? Well, Trump’s idea of making Canada great again by turning it into the 51st state is gaining some serious traction, especially from Canadian citizens.
Bruce Gerencser, 67, lives in rural Northwest Ohio with his wife of 46 years. He and his wife have six grown children and sixteen grandchildren. Bruce pastored Evangelical churches for twenty-five years in Ohio, Texas, and Michigan. Bruce left the ministry in 2005, and in 2008 he left Christianity. Bruce is now a humanist and an atheist.
Your comments are welcome and appreciated. All first-time comments are moderated. Please read the commenting rules before commenting.
This series, titled Trump Dump, features outlandish, untrue quotes from Donald Trump, MAGA supporters, and Right Wing media. If you come across a quote for this series, please send it to me with a link to the news story that contains the relevant quote.
Our Country is a disaster, a laughing stock all over the World! This is what happens when you have OPEN BORDERS, with weak, ineffective, and virtually nonexistent leadership. The DOJ, FBI, and Democrat state and local prosecutors have not done their job. They are incompetent and corrupt, having spent all of their waking hours unlawfully attacking their political opponent, ME, rather than focusing on protecting Americans from the outside and inside violent SCUM that has infiltrated all aspects of our government, and our Nation itself.
Democrats should be ashamed of themselves for allowing this to happen to our Country. The CIA must get involved, NOW, before it is too late. The USA is breaking down – A violent erosion of Safety, National Security, and Democracy is taking place all across our Nation. Only strength and powerful leadership will stop it. See you on January 20th. MAKE AMERICA GREAT AGAIN!
Bruce Gerencser, 67, lives in rural Northwest Ohio with his wife of 46 years. He and his wife have six grown children and sixteen grandchildren. Bruce pastored Evangelical churches for twenty-five years in Ohio, Texas, and Michigan. Bruce left the ministry in 2005, and in 2008 he left Christianity. Bruce is now a humanist and an atheist.
Your comments are welcome and appreciated. All first-time comments are moderated. Please read the commenting rules before commenting.
Genesis 1 and Genesis 2 record two different creation accounts. They cannot be reconciled without resorting to Bible gymnastics. Evangelicals, of course, love gymnastics.
Donald Trump is threatening to seize the Panama Canal unless Panama reduces the fees charged to go through the canal. I thought Trump was a capitalist.
Donald Trump, once again, is demanding Denmark sell Greenland to the United States. Evidently, he doesn’t understand the concept of sovereignty. This is understandable since the founding of our nation was built upon ignoring the sovereignty of indigenous people.
I am troubled by how many atheists think it is okay to commit murder, as in the case of Luigi Mangione’s murder of healthcare CEO Brian Thompson.
Is anyone surprised that Matt Gatez had sex with an underage girl, hired prostitutes, and used illegal drugs? I’m not. What surprises me is that Gaetz is married and his wife hasn’t divorced him.
Donald Trump plans to go after transgender people, banning access to gender-affirming care, not permitting them to serve in the military, and forbidding transgender women from playing women’s sports. These issues deserve a vigorous science-based debate, but that’s not Trump’s approach. He thinks he is a king, and citizens must bow to his edicts.
I predict Donald Trump and his current co-president Elon Musk will have a falling out. Musk is a publicity whore, and if there’s anything we know about Trump, he will quickly push Musk out of the limelight. In MAGA World, only Trump can be in the limelight.
It’s high school basketball time in Ohio, my favorite time of year. I miss photographing local high school games. I had to retire from doing so due to being unable to hold my camera properly. The weight of my professional camera and lenses put a strain on my neck and back, causing me increased pain. One thing I don’t need is more pain.
I feel bad for our feral/stray cats. Temperature lows are now in the teens. We have four inside cats — all stray/shelter cats — and that’s our limit. So we do what we can. We feed and water them. I also bought three oversized storage tubs, cut holes in their sides, and put straw in them, hoping they shelter the cats from the worst of winter. So far, five cats have been using the shelters.
The Democratic Party is headed for a nasty split as centrist, corporate Democrats continue to disparage and marginalize progressives. Nancy Pelosi and her gang of corporate shills need to go.
Bonus: MAGA Republicans in Congress have made it clear that they plan to reign in “entitlements,” including Social Security and Medicare. Instead of raising taxes, they plan to cut benefits by raising the retirement age. The suggestion that the Social Security Fund is insolvent is a bald-faced lie. How about demanding Congress pay back the trillions of dollars it has borrowed from the fund?
Bruce Gerencser, 67, lives in rural Northwest Ohio with his wife of 46 years. He and his wife have six grown children and sixteen grandchildren. Bruce pastored Evangelical churches for twenty-five years in Ohio, Texas, and Michigan. Bruce left the ministry in 2005, and in 2008 he left Christianity. Bruce is now a humanist and an atheist.
Your comments are welcome and appreciated. All first-time comments are moderated. Please read the commenting rules before commenting.
This series, titled Trump Dump, features outlandish, untrue quotes from Donald Trump, MAGA supporters, and Right Wing media. If you come across a quote for this series, please send it to me with a link to the news story that contains the relevant quote.
The Fox News poll is pretty, it’s obvious who we like, we’re all excited about him. How wonderful is it that we don’t, we might not have to worry about our children with autism or our kids with, you know, developing cancer or, you know, just it’s wonderful that he wants to clean up our foods.
Bruce Gerencser, 67, lives in rural Northwest Ohio with his wife of 46 years. He and his wife have six grown children and sixteen grandchildren. Bruce pastored Evangelical churches for twenty-five years in Ohio, Texas, and Michigan. Bruce left the ministry in 2005, and in 2008 he left Christianity. Bruce is now a humanist and an atheist.
Your comments are welcome and appreciated. All first-time comments are moderated. Please read the commenting rules before commenting.
Dr. David Tee, whose real name is Derrick Thomas Thiessen, has been busy writing about me and my British friend, Ben Berwick. Thiessen swore off using our content for “teaching,” but much like a crack addict, he failed to remain drug-free. Our posts are a drug he just can’t give up. I largely ignore his posts, but I thought I would share with readers a few excerpts from his recent posts about me. Ben has also responded to Thiessen. You can read his posts here, here, and here.
What follows are excerpts from four posts Thiessen has written about me since October 28, 2024. All spelling, grammar, punctuation, and irrationality in the originals.
As for BG [Bruce Gerencser], we wonder how his health is doing as he is taking longer breaks between writing content. We hope his health has not deteriorated too much.
Sometimes we wonder if he is trying to assuage some guilt by posting content that seems more positive toward Christianity than negative. He doesn’t really critique our content anymore and publishes other topics that seem to spread the good news about Christ and Christian living rather than oppose it.
We checked the BG and MM websites to see what they had to say about the election results. Needless to say, their responses have been consistent with a majority of athletes and celebrities who have, as Sky News labels their reactions, had meltdowns.
It is actually quite disturbing to read their responses as their treatment of Mr. Trump violates a lot of characteristics they claim to have about treating others, as well as violating the scriptures, ‘do unto others as you would like to be treated’.
We find their responses to be on the verge of delivering them into the realm of insanity. Some responses had youtubers screaming and wailing toward their viewers in a totally unhinged reaction to losing. All of them, including, BG and MM, have forgotten about how to be good losers.
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He [Bruce Gerencser] must have been watching a different Former President Trump than we saw as none of that is true. In fact, he just appointed a female head of staff so the accusations do not fit. But this is the way it is with democrats, liberals, and leftists. They hold minor things over people’s heads forever depriving them of the right to change and be better people.
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G should also look in the mirror when he describes MR. Trump in those terms as he has treated evangelicals and other Christians in the same manner. He is not perfect so he should not be saying one word.
Plus, his words show that BG is part of the problem much like the New York and New Jersey Governors, along with the female NY Attorney General who have made public statements containing threats against Mr. Trump.
The problem is not Mr. Trump, but the attitude of those who oppose him. We listened to his victory speech and none of those words ring true as Mr. Trump seeks to heal the nation not continue the divisiveness that the democrats have caused.
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This is nothing but lies as Mr. Trump praised his wife as well as other women working for him throughout the campaign. Since he has been faithful to one wife for a long time, it is doubtful he is a predator. But democrats, etc., ignore the good and only focus on the bad to dehumanize others while trying to bully them into submission.
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Except for the last line, none of this is true. Harris got over 65 million votes and some of those had to be men. or all the celebrities and athletes who said they would vote for her changed their minds and voted for Trump. But this is the level of nonsense the left brings to America.
They [Bruce Gerencser and Ben Berwick] look for excuses to blame anyone or anything for their candidate’s failure. The loss rests solely on Harris and her advisors shoulders for hiding away from press conferences and saying she would not change a thing from what Biden had done.
The mere fact that both people were unqualified & uneducated seems to be outside of the democrats scope and view. They suffer too much from TDS to see the real picture.
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This is just another lie as it ignores Mr. Trump’s accomplishments in his first term. It is amazing that BG ignores all the people who have been killed by illegal aliens under Biden’s & Harris’ watch. The country has been through 4 years of dark times already and Mr. Trump, with God’s help, will change that.
No one cares which party BG will support. He is just a speck of sand in a sea of sand hills. His insane rhetoric puts him on the fringe and is in need of some therapy. Then there is MM who did not write as much but felt he had to attack Mr. Trump as well.
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This is just stupid and not dealing with reality. It is also not true. It is a waste of time proving how wrong he is. YOu can read some of the accomplishments here. Besides building a wall to protect the country and fellow citizens he loves, Mr. Trump had a great first term. As for cognitive decay, that is just wishful thinking by anti-Trump people.
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The evidence that BG and MM have decided against following god and his way is seen in their quotes. They think they are better by forcing or bullying others to do as they want. But in reality, that makes them worse than they accuse Mr. Trump and evangelicals of being.
We have often said you cannot be Christian and vote for or support democrats but as you can see by the reaction of the athletes, celebrities, and politicians, as well as their supporters, there is nothing Christian in the democrat party or side of politics.
It is best for Christians to stay away from them and the misguided ‘Evangelicals for Harris’ and similar people. Do unto others does not exclude those you disagree with and Mr. Trump seems to be extending the fig leaf of peace to save the nation he loves and protect his fellow citizens. He gets it while many of the democrat supporters, etc., do not.
No matter where Christians turn, there is always some unbeliever putting forth often refuted arguments and thinking those arguments are true. BG is just one of those people and he continues to proclaim long-dead arguments that go nowhere and prove nothing. Here are some samples of his attempts to persuade himself that God does not exist.
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He is wrong of course. Atheists have tried for millennia to produce alternative answers to the Biblical record. They have always failed every time. Our origins is just one subject that atheists can’t answer as they cannot produce one shred of credible evidence supporting their point of view.
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Bg actually does know as he preached about it for 25 years. He just won’t admit it. Christians know because we have all the evidence supporting the biblical record. He won’t admit that either.
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Being a ‘faith claim’ does not exclude the answer from being true. Especially since all research fields have produced more evidence supporting the biblical record, this is more than a faith claim. It is proclaiming what truly happened.
The question ‘Were you there…’ is not illogical because it points out the fact that unbelievers are making faith claims of their own. They were not there, they did not see life develop thus their claims about life development are all based on faith.
Unbelieving scientists do not know what took place as they have no verifiable or credible evidence supporting their views. Since the Big Bang and Evolutionary theories violate the observable principle of science, these so-called learned men and women cannot come to the truth. They do not know if their mechanisms actually work or not.
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Sure it is fair to ask that question of Christians. We may not have been there BUT we got the word from someone who was. The scientists do not even have that advantage. His point i smoot as everyone has to take the scientists’ claims on faith as no one but scientists were in their laboratories when the experiments were conducted.
In other words, BG and other unbelievers do not have a leg to stand on. Their conclusions are based on faith as they cannot go back in time to see if their results matched their historical claims about life development. Evolution and the Big Bang are nothing but faith claims.
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Evolutionary scientists do the same thing. They do special pleading as everyone is supposed to take their word for it, an action Bg and other unbelievers hate when asked to do it for God. Then, all of science’s claims are human-written making their argument against biblical authors and God, moot.
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Yes, there is but BG won’t admit it.
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Not true.
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Also not true and we have heard of more scientific lies and distortion of scientific facts committed by unbelievers than by Christians. The only people trying to fit the ‘evidence’ to their theory are those who accept and believe the evolutionary theory.
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We know of many cases where forensic scientists have altered, distorted, and misrepresented science and scientific results to get convictions than Christians have been accused of. BG has no argument because he keeps repeating the same old tired arguments that have been refuted for millennia.
No unbeliever has any smoking gun evidence hidden away that would destroy or prove the Bible untrue. They are desperately grabbing at straws knowing they cannot win this debate.
BG has written an article lambasting Christians and God over a lack of supposed healing/
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He and other unbelievers will never understand how God works. The main reason is that they do not believe in God or that he exists. So how can they understand? They will reject any legitimate explanation in favor of trashing spiritual beliefs.
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But again, unbelievers do not accept these facts so they continue to criticize the Christian faith. The Bible also tells us that God’s ways and thinking are higher than ours, so how can Christians fully understand something that is beyond their capacity to grasp? It is for sure that unbelievers cannot grasp the reasons God does what he does.
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They would rather insult and attack than take the time to honestly learn about God. It is not up to us to criticize God’s decisions rather we are to learn from our experience and see how God works everything together for his good and ours.
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Yes, God could have healed her and millions of other Christians immediately. Would that have brought the person to a greater knowledge of God or to a level of trust? Not always. There may be lessons God wants the woman and other Christians to learn. We just are not privy to God’s intentions and he does not answer to us.
Instead, we learn to be patient until it is time to learn the correct lesson. But one of the most important lessons is that Christians are under, the verse, ‘it is appointed unto man once to die’ In other words Christians die and there is no escaping that event just because they believe in Jesus.
Yes, Jesus will heal people but when it is their time to pass on, there is no more healing in the works for those individuals.
….
We could say the same thing about modern secular medicine. Many doctors are great diagnosticians, but when it comes to healing, their track record thanthey claim God is in this department. Has BG looked at himself lately?
He claims to have several diseases and trusts medical science to find a cure. Yet he has suffered for approx., 14 years, and medical science has no cure for many of his ailments. WHy does he trust medical science and suffer through such great pain and discomfort when medical science has failed him?
Non-Christians like to point fingers and accuse God of the failures that medical science has. Unfortunately for BG, medical science is not greater than he is and has no higher purpose in keeping him sick.
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They may avoid healing him so they can have a continuous cash income from his insurance but they are no better than he accuses God.
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No, not true. The bad light is caused by unbelievers as they fail to understand how life works. The Bible tells us that both the righteous and unrighteous will suffer so we were warned about this in advance. We accept the fact that there will be Christians who suffer medically. It is a fact of life.
We just leave these things in God’s hands and look for the solution with his guidance. As the Bible says, we are not to worry about these things.
The unbeliever will rarely grasp these truths and when they recognize that they don’t it is best that they just ask questions and consider the answers honestly. They are in no position to criticize as they do not have an alternative to God. BG says:
For the atheist, in science we trust.
That is a misplaced trust for 100% of all medical science patients have died from day one of human existence till now. That is a lousy statistic to build trust in something that has no power over life or death. The track record of science is dismal and at no time should Christians trust science over God.
— end of excerpts.
As you can readily see, Thiessen doesn’t critique or respond to my posts. He quotes Bible verses, personally attacks me, and pompously and arrogantly says I am wrong. His comments about my health were offensive, well beyond thoughtful dialog. Why he refuses to thoughtfully and intelligently respond to my writing is a question for him to answer. I have my own opinion on the matter, but I will refrain from sharing it.
Bruce Gerencser, 67, lives in rural Northwest Ohio with his wife of 46 years. He and his wife have six grown children and sixteen grandchildren. Bruce pastored Evangelical churches for twenty-five years in Ohio, Texas, and Michigan. Bruce left the ministry in 2005, and in 2008 he left Christianity. Bruce is now a humanist and an atheist.
Your comments are welcome and appreciated. All first-time comments are moderated. Please read the commenting rules before commenting.
Come January 20, 2025, Donald Trump will be sworn in as the forty-seventh president of the United States. A grossly unfit, vulgar man, Trump won both the popular vote and the electoral college. Worse, Republicans took back the U.S. Senate and will likely continue to narrowly control the House of Representatives. With full knowledge of Trump’s racism, bigotry, misogyny, xenophobia, and criminal conduct, a majority of voting Americans voted him into office. Rational, thoughtful people saw Trump as unfit for office, but tens of millions of rural white working-class people and Latinos thought differently. Even women, knowing Trump is a sexual predator who routinely and frequently dehumanizes women, voted for him. We want to blame white Evangelicals for blessing the United States with a second term of Trump’s lunacy, but the fact is, Trump won virtually every demographic category that matters.
Kamala Harris had a hard road to walk in her attempt to defeat Donald Trump:
Harris, largely an unknown candidate, had 100 days to mount an effective campaign. Trump has spent the past nine years, from the trip down the escalator to today, campaigning and promoting the MAGA/Trump brand.
Harris refused to distance herself from Joe Biden, saying that there wasn’t anything she would do differently from President Joe Biden. Hooking her wagon to a President with a 40 percent approval rating was a bad idea.
Harris is a woman. Some men won’t vote for a female candidate regardless of her party and policies.
Harris is Black. Many Americans won’t vote for a Black candidate regardless of his or her party and policies.
Both Harris and Tim Walz failed to adequately address the skeletons in their respective closets.
Harris made several mistakes that cost her votes.
First, Harris chose to ignore and distance herself from Israel’s war against the Palestinian people. Not allowing pro-Palestinians to speak at the Democratic Convention was a big mistake. Not supporting an Israeli arms embargo was a bad idea.
Second, Harris flip-flopped on numerous policies, abandoning the progressive wing of the Democratic Party and attempting to position herself as a centrist (as Joe Biden, Barack Obama, and Bill Clinton before her).
Third, Biden, Harris, and the Democratic Party as a whole, ignored the economic plight of working-class Americans, telling them that their struggles with inflation and never-ending price increases were not a big deal; and that the U.S. economy was booming. Democratic politicians and cable news pundits — especially on MSNBC — ignored the plight of the poor and working-class people, choosing instead to tout and preach up Bidenomics.
Fourth, Americans are tired of endless wars. The United States’ withdrawal from Afghanistan was, by any measure, a debacle. Harris uttered not a word about the American war machine, the military-industrial complex, and runaway defense/security budgets. My God, Harris climbed in bed with Dick Cheney — a war criminal.
Fifth, Harris provided no comprehensive answer to the illegal immigration crisis at our southern border. Trump is right to point out we have an immigration problem even if his “answers” are racist and immoral.
I do not doubt that Trump will cause untold harm to our Republic and standing in the world. With Elon Musk and Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. as trusted advisors, it is likely the American people have hard times ahead. How Democrats respond remains to be seen. Personally, I am unsure of my continued support of the Democrats. I need time and distance before I decide who I want to support with my vote and money. As of today, I wonder if I should refocus my efforts on local/state issues. It’s been three presidential elections since the Democratic candidate for president was someone I voted for in the primary. Clinton, Biden, and Harris were not my first, second, or third candidates. I increasingly think that I have become too progressive/liberal for the Democratic Party.
In the end, the election was about despair. Despair over futures that evaporated with deindustrialization. Despair over the loss of 30 million jobs in mass layoffs. Despair over austerity programs and the funneling of wealth upwards into the hands of rapacious oligarchs. Despair over a liberal class that refuses to acknowledge the suffering it orchestrated under neoliberalism or embrace New Deal type programs that will ameliorate this suffering. Despair over the futile, endless wars, as well as the genocide in Gaza, where generals and politicians are never held accountable. Despair over a democratic system that has been seized by corporate and oligarchic power.
This despair has been played out on the bodies of the disenfranchised through opioid and alcoholism addictions, gambling, mass shootings, suicides — especially among middle-aged white males — morbid obesity, and the investment of our emotional and intellectual life in tawdry spectacles and the allure of magical thinking, from the absurd promises of the Christian right to the Oprah-like belief that reality is never an impediment to our desires. These are the pathologies of a deeply diseased culture, what Friedrich Nietzsche calls an aggressive despiritualized nihilism.
Donald Trump is a symptom of our diseased society. He is not its cause. He is what is vomited up out of decay. He expresses a childish yearning to be an omnipotent god. This yearning resonates with Americans who feel they have been treated like human refuse. But the impossibility of being a god, as Ernest Becker writes, leads to its dark alternative — destroying like a god. This self-immolation is what comes next.
Kamala Harris and the Democratic Party, along with the establishment wing of the Republican Party, which allied itself with Harris, live in their own non-reality-based belief system. Harris, who was anointed by party elites and never received a single primary vote, proudly trumped her endorsement by Dick Cheney, a politician who left office with a 13 percent approval rating. The smug, self-righteous “moral” crusade against Trump stokes the national reality television show that has replaced journalism and politics. It reduces a social, economic, and political crisis to the personality of Trump. It refuses to confront and name the corporate forces responsible for our failed democracy. It allows Democratic politicians to blithely ignore their base – 77 percent of Democrats and 62 percent of independents support an arms embargo against Israel. The open collusion with corporate oppression and refusal to heed the desires and needs of the electorate neuters the press and Trump critics. These corporate puppets stand for nothing, other than their own advancement. The lies they tell to working men and women, especially with programs such as the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA), do far more damage than any of the lies uttered by Trump.
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The American dream has become an American nightmare.
The social bonds, including jobs that gave working Americans a sense of purpose and stability, that gave them meaning and hope, have been sundered. The stagnation of tens of millions of lives, the realization that it will not be better for their children, the predatory nature of our institutions, including education, health care, and prisons, have engendered, along with despair, feelings of powerlessness, and humiliation. It has bred loneliness, frustration, anger, and a sense of worthlessness.
“When life is not worth living, everything becomes a pretext for ridding ourselves of it … ,” Émile Durkheim wrote. “There is a collective mood, as there is an individual mood, that inclines nations to sadness. … For individuals are too closely involved in the life of society for it to be sick without their being affected. Its suffering inevitably becomes theirs.”
Decayed societies, where a population is stripped of political, social, and economic power, instinctively reach out for cult leaders. I watched this during the breakup of the former Yugoslavia. The cult leader promises a return to a mythical golden age and vows, as Trump does, to crush the forces embodied in demonized groups and individuals that are blamed for their misery. The more outrageous cult leaders become, the more cult leaders flout law and social conventions, the more they gain in popularity. Cult leaders are immune to the norms of established society. This is their appeal. Cult leaders seek total power. Those who follow them grant them this power in the desperate hope that the cult leaders will save them.
All cults are personality cults. Cult leaders are narcissists. They demand obsequious fawning and total obedience. They prize loyalty above competence. They wield absolute control. They do not tolerate criticism. They are deeply insecure, a trait they attempt to cover up with bombastic grandiosity. They are amoral and emotionally and physically abusive. They see those around them as objects to be manipulated for their own empowerment, enjoyment, and often sadistic entertainment. All those outside the cult are branded as forces of evil, prompting an epic battle whose natural expression is violence.
We will not convince those who have surrendered their agency to a cult leader and embraced magical thinking through rational argument. We will not coerce them into submission. We will not find salvation for them or ourselves by supporting the Democratic Party. Whole segments of American society are now bent on self-immolation. They despise this world and what it has done to them. Their personal and political behavior is willfully suicidal. They seek to destroy, even if destruction leads to violence and death. They are no longer sustained by the comforting illusion of human progress, losing the only antidote to nihilism.
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We must invest our energy into organizing mass movements to overthrow the corporate state through sustained acts of mass civil disobedience. This includes the most powerful weapon we possess – the strike. By turning our ire on the corporate state, we name the true sources of power and abuse. We expose the absurdity of blaming our demise on demonized groups such as undocumented workers, Muslims, or Blacks. We give people an alternative to a corporate-indentured Democratic Party that cannot be rehabilitated. We make possible the restoration of an open society, one that serves the common good rather than corporate profit. We must demand nothing less than full employment, guaranteed minimum incomes, universal health insurance, free education at all levels, robust protection of the natural world, and an end to militarism and imperialism. We must create the possibility for a life of dignity, purpose, and self-esteem. If we do not, it will ensure a Christianized fascism and ultimately, with the accelerating ecocide, our obliteration.
As you might surmise, I will have a lot more to say on these issues in the days/months/years that lie ahead. Today, I am depressed, filled with despair and anger towards millions of stupid Americans. In time, I will reorientate myself to the present reality. I am not ready to quit fighting, though I do plan to rethink my methodologies and support of the Democratic Party.
It should come as no great surprise that a Democratic Party which has abandoned working class people would find that the working class has abandoned them. First, it was the white working class, and now it is Latino and Black workers as well. While the Democratic leadership defends the status quo, the American people are angry and want change. And they’re right.
Today, while the very rich are doing phenomenally well, 60% of Americans live paycheck to paycheck and we have more income and wealth inequality than ever before. Unbelievably, real, inflation-accounted-for weekly wages for the average American worker are actually lower now than they were 50 years ago.
Today, despite an explosion in technology and worker productivity, many young people will have a worse standard of living than their parents. And many of them worry that Artificial Intelligence and robotics will make a bad situation even worse.
Today, despite spending far more per capita than other countries, we remain the only wealthy nation not to guarantee health care to all as a human right and we pay, by far, the highest prices in the world for prescription drugs. We, alone among major countries, cannot even guarantee paid family and medical leave.
Today, despite strong opposition from a majority of Americans, we continue to spend billions funding the extremist Netanyahu government’s all out war against the Palestinian people which has led to the horrific humanitarian disaster of mass malnutrition and the starvation of thousands of children.
Will the big money interests and well-paid consultants who control the Democratic Party learn any real lessons from this disastrous campaign? Will they understand the pain and political alienation that tens of millions of Americans are experiencing? Do they have any ideas as to how we can take on the increasingly powerful Oligarchy which has so much economic and political power? Probably not.
In the coming weeks and months those of us concerned about grassroots democracy and economic justice need to have some very serious political discussions.
Bruce Gerencser, 67, lives in rural Northwest Ohio with his wife of 46 years. He and his wife have six grown children and sixteen grandchildren. Bruce pastored Evangelical churches for twenty-five years in Ohio, Texas, and Michigan. Bruce left the ministry in 2005, and in 2008 he left Christianity. Bruce is now a humanist and an atheist.
Your comments are welcome and appreciated. All first-time comments are moderated. Please read the commenting rules before commenting.
On one level, this is a silly question. Since I do not think there is a God, if I hated God, I would be hating a nonexistent entity. This would be akin to hating Santa Claus, the Easter Bunny, or the Tooth Fairy. However, I understand why religious people might think someone like me hates “their” God. I spend a lot of time writing things that are negative about God and Evangelical Christianity, so surely I must HATE God. Maybe some atheists do hate God, but I don’t. It is a non-issue for me.
As a writer, my focus is on religion — particularly Evangelical Christianity and the Independent Fundamentalist Baptist (IFB) church movement. Religion is the human attempt to answer what I call the “hard” questions of life. Where did we come from? What is the essence, the substance of life? Is there life after death? What gives life meaning and purpose? These are not easy to answer. I realize many atheists will say “no evidence”. . . end of discussion, but I think these kinds of questions are worthy of friendly, thoughtful, pointed discussion. The problem is many religious people can’t discuss these questions in a friendly manner. Thinking their God and belief system are equivalent to “truth,” Evangelicals condemn and marginalize anyone who thinks differently.
While I think evolution is the best answer to the “where did we come from” question, I am not at all satisfied with the answers science gives when dealing with the something rather than nothing question. Even Bill Nye, in his debate with creationist Ken Ham, admitted that, so far, science hasn’t answered the question of where the first particle came from. Of course, Ham, a man with cement in the place where his brain once sat, jumped up and down and said, TEACHER, TEACHER, I KNOW THE ANSWER! IT’S FOUND IN THE B-I-B-L-E. Ham thinks the question is answered, whereas Nye is willing to say, We don’t know, but we continue to try and find the answer to this important question.
I am an atheist because the evidence tells me, at this present moment, that there is no God. As a man who spent fifty years in the Christian church and twenty-five years in the pastorate, I am well versed in the teachings of the Bible and the one, true, and holy Evangelical faith. There’s no possible argument an Evangelical could make that I have not heard. It is not evidence that I am lacking. I have weighed all the available evidence in the balance and found it wanting. I am convinced, based on the available evidence, that the Evangelical God is a work of fiction, and that Christianity is an admixture of myths, legends, oral traditions, and religious teachings. Maybe someday a deity of some sort will reveal itself to us. If so, I will consider this new evidence just like I have the evidence for the plethora of human religions. I doubt this will happen, so I am not going to spend any time worrying about it. In the meantime, I remain agnostic on the God question and live my day-to-day life as an atheist. Reason, skepticism, humanism, family, friends, writing, good food and music, the Cincinnati Reds, and the Cincinnati Bengals are enough for me — no God needed.
My hatred is reserved for certain aspects of some religions. Since I live in the United States, my experience has primarily been with the Christian religion, especially the Evangelical form of Christianity. While I think the essence of Christianity can provide value and substance for some people — even in our modern, scientific world — I am convinced that twenty-first-century Christianity is so far afield from its original intent that it has ceased to be Christianity at all. How does the Christianity of today, in any of its various forms, remotely resemble the teachings of Jesus, the poor, itinerant do-gooder of first-century Palestine?
Part of the problem is that early in the history of the Christian church, the Christianity of Jesus was subjugated by the Christianity of Paul. The modern version of Christianity we see today is Paul’s version of it and not that of Jesus. It is doubtful, at least in my mind, that we can ever recover what Jesus wanted Christianity to be. We can’t even know if he wanted to start a new religion. Perhaps all he wanted was to reform Judaism. We can’t appeal to the Bible because it has been corrupted by errors, corrections, additions, and outright fraudulent changes. At best, we might be able to peer within the pages of the Bible and get a general idea of who Jesus was and what he was all about. And we can do this regardless of whether we consider Jesus divine or not.
When I look at American Christianity, what do I see? I see power, hatred, and wealth. I see arrogance. I see religious machinery. I see everything but what I should see. Where is Jesus? Where are good works? Look at all the Republican candidates for president over the past two decades. Jesus lovers, the lot of them, all trying to see who has the biggest Evangelical dick. Their beliefs and policies would likely be condemned by the Jesus of Nazareth they purportedly worship. Millions of Christians considered voting for these men, thinking they were voting for God’s man. (Please see Why I Hate Jesus.) And that’s precisely what Evangelical voters did in 2016, electing “baby Christian” Donald Trump as president, and attempted to do it again in 2020. Eighty-two percent of voting white Evangelicals voted for Trump. By doing so, Evangelical Christians traded their souls for a bowl of pottage, choosing power and preferential treatment over morality, ethics, and decency. And here we are, five days away from the 2024 election, and many Evangelicals still plan to vote for Trump.
Most churches and pastors seem to focus on building a kingdom, not in Heaven, but here on earth. Why all the fancy, expensive buildings? Why all the programs designed to keep fat, lazy sheep fed and happy? Why does most church income go to maintain buildings, pay staff, and provide programs for people who are already Christians? What happened to outreach to the “least of these?” Where can I find a church where the poor, sick, homeless, and dying are given preferential treatment? If Jesus were alive today, do we really think he would go to an American Evangelical church? I don’t.
Even though I don’t believe in the Christian God — nor do I think the Bible is divine truth — I could see myself going to a church that took seriously the teachings of the man named Jesus. (And yes, I am aware that some of his teachings are contemptible.) I still have a heart filled with compassion for the poor, sick, and marginalized, and I suspect many of the readers of this blog do too. As atheists and agnostics, we don’t have many meaningful opportunities or outreaches to help others. Imagine the help we could lend to churches focused on helping others instead of building kingdoms in this life.
I wonder if there is any room in the world for itinerant atheist preachers? While I couldn’t preach the Christian gospel of salvation in Jesus Christ, I could preach a humanist gospel that says salvation is found in the goodwill, mercy, and compassion we have for others. I could point to the teachings of Jesus, Buddha, and Bruce Almighty and show how the relevant parts of their teachings can help make us better human beings.
My hatred is reserved for any religion that is focused on power and wealth, and not people. For the most part, I despise Evangelical Christianity. To Evangelicals, words in a book are more important than loving their neighbors and helping the poor, the hungry, widows, orphans, prisoners, and the homeless. They prefer the narrowness of their religion to the wideness of human love, mercy, and compassion. They would rather concern themselves with abortion, same-sex marriage, immigration, gun rights, combatting socialism, refuting global warming, evolution, and getting Republicans elected, than trying to make a real difference in the lives of the “least of these.” Thinking evangelizing someone is more important than feeding and clothing them (better to go to Heaven with an empty belly, than Hell with a full one, the thinking goes), Evangelicals are viewed by non-Christians in the same light as door-knocking Jehovah’s Witnesses, Mormons, and siding salesmen.
My beef is not with God because I don’t think there is a God. My beef is not with Christians who are serious about loving and helping others. My disdain, and at times my anger, is reserved for those who have no regard for the plight of the poor and the sick, who only care about building a kingdom here on earth. No matter how much they talk about the future kingdom of God, their actions betray their true ambitions.
If churches took the teachings of Jesus seriously, they would merge, sell off the excess real estate, and use the money to help the poor, sick, and disadvantaged. If churches took the teachings of Jesus seriously, they’d fire all the professional Christians, forcing them to get real jobs. In doing so, these professional Christians would have to reengage with a world they lost connection with once they became gatekeepers and waitstaff at the local Evangelical churches.
If churches took the teachings of Jesus seriously, they’d stop programs that are little more than crack for religious junkies. These addicts bounce from church to church, program to program, service to service, hoping to get a Jesus Fix®. They are narcissists who have forgotten that what really matters is loving their spouses, children, family, and neighbors. They’ve traded the church for their common, dirty connection with the world. Sheltered from sinners, they listen to sermons that remind them of how wonderful it is in the church and how bad it is out there.
I don’t hate God. My hatred is reserved for evil done in the name of God. (Please see the Black Collar Crime series.) My hatred is reserved for those who value theological fealty, fidelity, and conformity more than they do people. Such thinking caused the burning of people at the stake and the slaughter of countless heretics. Given a chance here in America, Evangelicals with theocratic impulses would enact and enforce a Christian version of Sharia law. I hate all who dare attempt the subjugation and control of others in the name of their God. Thinking they are oracles who have THE truth, they demand everyone else bow to their truth. Willing to use violence and the power of the state to force others to embrace their God and Holy Book, they cause deep hatred and resentment. Thinking they are being hated for their beliefs, what they are really being hated for is their unwillingness to allow others to have the same freedoms they demand for themselves.
As I look at American Christianity, I search in vain for one good reason why I would/should become a Christian. Maybe there is a group somewhere that takes the teachings of the socialist Jesus seriously, but so far, all I see is ice cream—various flavors, but all ice cream. (Please see But, Our Church is DIFFERENT!)
Bruce Gerencser, 67, lives in rural Northwest Ohio with his wife of 46 years. He and his wife have six grown children and sixteen grandchildren. Bruce pastored Evangelical churches for twenty-five years in Ohio, Texas, and Michigan. Bruce left the ministry in 2005, and in 2008 he left Christianity. Bruce is now a humanist and an atheist.
Your comments are welcome and appreciated. All first-time comments are moderated. Please read the commenting rules before commenting.
