Heroes Of The Empire (Soviet Jesus, Four.)

Hess: So what shall we toast to, boys? I can blather on about “To health” or “To success,” but I’d like to do somethin’ a little less rote. Where you from, Brown Eyes?

Migs Mayfield: How ’bout a toast to Operation Cinder?

Hess: Now there’s a man who knows his history.

Mayfield: No, I don’t just know it. I lived it. I was in Burnin Konn.

Hess: Burnin Konn?

Mayfield: Mmm.

Hess: That was a hard day. I had to make many unpleasant decisions.

Mayfield: Yes, you did. Entire city gone in moments, along with everybody in it. We lost our whole division that day. Man, that was like 5-10,000 people.

Hess: Yep. All heroes of the Empire.

Mayfield: Yeah. And all dead.

Hess: Well, it’s a small sacrifice for the greater good, son.

Mayfield: Depends on who you ask, don’t you think?

Hess: [irritated] What you gettin’ at, trooper?

Mayfield: All those people, the ones who died, was it good for them? Hmm? Their families? The guys I served with? Civilians, those poor mud scuffers, died defending their homes, fighting for freedom. Was it good for them?

Hess: But we’ve outlasted them, son. They’re eating themselves alive. The New Republic is in complete disarray, and we grow stronger. You see, with the rhydonium you’ve delivered, we can create havoc that’s gonna make Burnin Konn pale by comparison. And then they’re gonna turn to us once again. You see, boys, everybody thinks they want freedom, but what they really want is order. And when they realize that, they’re gonna welcome us back with open arms. Ah. To the Empire.

[Mayfield chuckles, then fires a blaster at Hess' chest, killing him instantly. He and Mando then shoot their way out of the mess hall] ~From The Mandalorian, Season 2, Ep. 7 "The Believer"

...

For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life. ~John 3:16

I saw this yesterday.

Evidently former Trump advisor Peter Navarro got convicted of Contempt of Congress.

And Fani Willis smacked around Jim Jordan's attempt to bully her over holding Trump accountable.

And my thing is...still...what the hell kind of shitty life does one have to have to throw away their life or their reputation for *Checks Notes* Donald Trump, of all fucking people??

Especially considering that Trump would never do the same for anybody else.

I spent much of my life as a Christian.

Maybe it's just me, but I simply cannot see a potential up-side to selling my soul to a "god" that rather publicly doesn't give a shit about me. And no, mutual reactionary hatreds aren't (and never would have been) enough of a draw. I've been disgusted by Trump for literally as long as I've been aware of his dumb, greedy ass.

At least...like it or not, right or wrong, whether it's actually true or not in any Metaphysical sense or whatever...and however you want to interpret the act itself...Christianity says that Jesus Christ gave His Earthly life, by choice, Crucified as a substitutionary atonement for the sins of all Mankind.

So, I can at least get why that would have some appeal.

On the other hand, if Trump could crucify others for his own sins, he would do so. 

So, what's the draw, here??

It's not a secret, the motherfucker basically loudly says so anytime anything goes wrong. Anytime anything happens, it's never his fault...and one way or another, he finds somebody to throw under the bus. Almost always, this is in as indirect or insulated-from-retaliation fashion as physically possible, because Trump is a chickenshit.

The motherfucker routinely fired people by Tweet, for fuck's sake, and then whipped up shitty mob behavior among his followers towards whoever it was.

And by the way, these fucking people are still doing this, you can ask pretty much any Ukrainian person that's still on Twitter. It seems like the only "Sin" these fucking people even recognize in MAGA-land is "Refusing to let oneself get corn-holed or otherwise fucked over by Power, for any reason whatsoever." But then they get hella mad whenever anybody else holds anybody accountable...especially anybody that's one of their "own."

I can't make this make sense, and I've used drugs.

Near as I can figure, at some point these idiots were promised if they'd be a good little mob, they'd get someone thrown to them to rip apart for basically no reason.

The central promise of Trumpism as both New Religious Movement and Political "Philosophy" is that these small, angry people will get to have their jackboot on someone else's throat before they die a horrible death their own damned selves...and then go to hell.

Because you cannot believe in any other Gods besides Trump unless you basically substitute Trump for Jesus Christ...keeping (in theory) the basic form, but not the message, of Christianity. Only problem is, it doesn't work that way. It's not a form-letter you can fill out where you get to "Choose Your Own Savior" in some kind of childish adventure. And, whether it's Donald Trump or Vladimir Putin, all your Idol of Choice will do is mutely condemn you to Hell no matter what offerings you make to it.

I'm not a Born-Again anything, that's What I Read.

That's what the Bible...and all of the Abrahamic religions...say.

Idolatry is a Sin.

Literally, one way or another, they all say this.

And blaming others for your bullshit and your failures and your wrongs does not absolve you of them.

You'll note that nobody's ever come right out and said that Trump is innocent of what he's been charged with. They're just mad that he got charged.

Nobody ever comes right out and says that they think Vladimir Putin should be deified like the Caesars of Rome and called "Tsar Vladimir The World-Conqueror" or that the Ukrainians are somehow collectively the Devil (as are the EU/NATO/The USA for supporting them, and throw in LGBT people just because) but the implication is there...and it gets pretty explicit in some of the Tankie arguments I've seen over on Blue-Sky, where a friend of mine keeps engaging with these people.

Personally I'll never understand how so many Americans could be dirty Commie Putin simps, let alone support a wannabe-Fascist like Trump, but here we are.

I can't even understand the followers of the Soviet Jesus.

If these are the people you've appointed as your gods, you're doing it wrong.

So, why do it??

America is based on citizenship, freedom and individual rights, submission to or worship of Power has nothing to do with it.

So, naturally, "Conservatives" have decided that they have nothing but contempt and hatred for America...even for an America possibly governed by their own claimed "Values."

Even the most traditionalist of traditional Evangelical Christian and Republican values inspire nothing but hatred from MAGA and they're coming right out and saying so.

If you don't think that stopping these fucking people from screwing over the rest of us is going to come down to a fight, you're just plain wrong.

And they're telling us so.

The question is, why?

Why do these fucking people hate America...and everything about it... so much?

What is it about these "Conservatives" that's become so strident that even somebody like Mike Pence earns nothing but their hatred?

I'm almost afraid to ask what it is that these people do love.

It's like they'd rather be dead Heroes of the Evil Empire (with Trump as Kraft-dinner Palpatine) than live, free Americans, even if they get nothing for it but destruction.

"The fight is here; I need ammunition, not a ride." ~Volodymyr Zelenskyy, allegedly 25 February 2022, Associated Press

Three

Never have I witnessed such sincere hospitality and the overwhelming spirit of true brotherhood as is practiced by people of all colors and races here in this ancient Holy Land, the House of Abraham, Muhammad, and all the other Prophets of the Holy Scriptures. For the past week, I have been utterly speechless and spellbound by the graciousness I see displayed all around me by people of all colors...

You may be shocked by these words coming from me. But on this pilgrimage, what I have seen, and experienced, has forced me to rearrange much of my thought-patterns previously held, and to toss aside some of my previous conclusions. This was not too difficult for me. Despite my firm convictions, I have always been a man who tries to face facts, and to accept the reality of life as new experience and new knowledge unfolds it. I have always kept an open mind, which necessary to the flexibility that must go hand in hand with every form of intelligent search for truth.

During the past eleven days here in the Muslim world, I have eaten from the same plate, drunk from the same glass, and slept in the same bed (or on the same rug) -- while praying to the same God -- with fellow Muslims, whose eyes were the bluest of blue, whose hair was the blondest of blond, and whose skin was the whitest of white. And in the words and in the actions and in the deeds of the "white" Muslims, I felt the same sincerity that I felt among the black African Muslims of Nigeria, Sudan, and Ghana. We were truly all the same (brothers) -- because their belief in one God had removed the "white" from their minds, the 'white' from their behavior, and the 'white' from their attitude. I could see from this, that perhaps if white Americans could accept the Oneness of God, then perhaps, too, they could accept in reality the Oneness of Man -- and cease to measure, and hinder, and harm others in terms of their "differences" in color.

With racism plaguing America like an incurable cancer, the so-called "Christian" white American heart should be more receptive to a proven solution to such a destructive problem. Perhaps it could be in time to save America from imminent disaster -- the same destruction brought upon Germany by racism that eventually destroyed the Germans themselves.

They asked me what about the Hajj had impressed me the most. . . . I said, "The brotherhood! The people of all races, color, from all over the world coming to gether as one! It has proved to me the power of the One God. . . . All ate as one, and slept as one. Everything about the pilgrimage atmosphere accented the Oneness of Man under One God. 

~Malcolm X, Letter following the Hajj.

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