Principalities and Powers.

Ephesians 6:12 King James Version

12 For we wrestle not against flesh and blood, but against principalities, against powers, against the rulers of the darkness of this world, against spiritual wickedness in high places.

At work, last night, I found myself having a conversation with a conservative co-worker. He'd stopped by to begin the yearly tradition of giving me shit by counting down the days until Christmas, and instead we ended up having a serious conversation. Now, this dude is Pentecostal, he's active in his church, and in 2016 (Ironically, after voting for Bernie Sanders in Michigan's primary) he ended up voting for Trump. He's your basic Christian dude bro in all respects. Now, we generally agree regarding our view of Christmas...that it's not about Christ, but about commercialism and greed, things that Jesus was very against. We spoke about this...as it seems like we do most years...mutually lamenting something we actually agree on.

Because it was my Monday last night and I was feeling punchy, I pushed ahead: "Christmas? Dude I honestly feel like Christianity isn't even about Christ anymore." Surprisingly, he was like "Yep. I hear you, bro." Again, I pushed ahead: I told him "Sometimes I feel like I'm counting down the days until some of these Evangelicals start worshiping Donald Trump." Again...and very much to my utter shock, he agreed with me. "Yep." He continued "It bothers me." We both further agreed that we had each gotten a bad spiritual vibe from our national situation, and from the way things were going with the Trump Supporters. He specifically said that even some Pastors he knew who'd been to Seminary and who should have the knowledge to do better...just weren't. He did say that he felt that his faith hadn't been shaken...but he'd seen others lose theirs. I also told him, that given my status as an Agnostic Theist...it sort of bothers me that I still "get" a lot of the same stuff, spiritual vibes and whatnot, that I used to.

In truth, these last few years, in watching much of American Conservative Christianity fall head over heels for Trump, I have genuinely felt like I'm watching somebody I've known for a long time make a grievous mistake. I know from having done this (and from having been that guy) that there's no talking them out of it. These people are going to have to learn the hard way.

And now these bigotry-obsessed fools are kicking Christian Pastors who preach the truth out of their events?

I should add, my co-worker is the third person I've spoken to in recent days who's confirmed (per Christian terminology regarding such things) some variation of this bad vibe I've been feeling.

After all the stuff I saw last night and this morning, I think I know why.

I have, as I've increasingly written about in recent articles, long been feeling that for at least some of these people...and certainly most of the ones that are left...it never was about anything that they said it was about. It was always really all about the bigotry, and the hate. Funny thing is but I can remember when being a conservative didn't automatically mean you were a bigot.

Of course, and as Rick points out here, if they were to actually set the precedent of gutting the 14th Amendment by Executive Order (something that's automatically Unconstitutional, and would probably end up destroying the country in the long term if enacted) it's not like the next President, and the next one after that, and so on...wouldn't continue to revise our founding document by executive fiat. Do that long enough, or enough times, and we don't have a nation anymore. It's really that simple, all these amendments were put in for a reason, and there's a legit process that makes it very hard to change the Constitution FOR A DAMN REASON. This absolutely cannot be replaced by executive orders.

Of course, we're already looking at probably (at least) 50 years of court cases, lawsuits, legal problems, expensive settlements, etc. just from where we're at right now in the Trump Presidency and its endless carnival-barker cruelty and stupid shit, but I digress.

So what's having to reform and likely redo our entire Constitution when this is over? Eh? (Aside from the fact that most people who aren't on either of the hard ends of our political spectrum dread such a prospect...again, for a reason.)

I suppose these dumb asses figure that if they burn enough shit down, maybe they'll get away with it?

Take this far enough, and it becomes "Why not just let Trump be king?"

Of course, Trump could ask Louis XVI how that worked out...oh, wait.

I wonder, when the next one is King Chuck or Queen Nancy, will These Fucking People be so enthusiastic about that? I mean, I'm pretty sure I know some people who'd think Crown Prince Beto has a nice ring to it, but let's get real, this is America and we need to keep it that way.

You know, there's a solution to all this stupidity, and I think a lot of people are finally getting it. I saw on Twitter that ten states now have surpassed their entire 2014 early voting totals.

We've a week to go, so I think more will come. I keep hearing from friends in Texas that they've seen impressive turnout in early voting, so there's that, too. We can only hope the streak holds, because this may be our last chance.

People need to see through all this frenetic stupid last-minute bullshit, and just plain show up and vote. I don't give a damn if you don't like the choices, I don't give a damn if you think it isn't important. It is...that's the whole damn point of Democracy.

They care...why don't you? Even if all they want to do is break shit, the traitorous moron brigade shows up. Why can't you?

It needs to be said. Screw Trump, alright?

Trump is the symptom, it's the broken and divided nature of America...and the fact that conservatives hate and fear other Americans more than (for example) the Russians...that's the damn problem.

If you don't show up, this time, you're letting Boris here determine your future. You know, the guy who's openly lamenting the fact that Trump didn't cause a civil war and is hoping he'll at least be a Herbert Hoover and drag us into Depression.

But remember, the last time America's economy caught a cold it screwed up the rest of the world, too. The only reason Russia wasn't affected that much is because Russia's economy is shit. They're the biggest country in the world and they have an economy that ranks somewhere between that of Portugal and that of Spain in terms of all the usual metrics.

We owe it to ourselves to show up, and take our country's future back into our own hands.