Friday, October 17, 2025

Judgment Day (Self On The Throne, Two.)

We welcome change and openness; for we believe that freedom and security go together, that the advance of human liberty can only strengthen the cause of world peace. There is one sign the Soviets can make that would be unmistakable, that would advance dramatically the cause of freedom and peace. General Secretary Gorbachev, if you seek peace, if you seek prosperity for the Soviet Union and Eastern Europe, if you seek liberalization, come here to this gate. Mr. Gorbachev, open this gate. Mr. Gorbachev...Mr. Gorbachev, tear down this wall!
~Ronald Reagan

...

And war broke out in heaven Michael and his angels fought with the dragon; and the dragon and his angels fought, but they did not prevail, nor was a place found for them in heaven any longer. So the great dragon was cast out, that serpent of old, called the Devil and Satan, who deceives the whole world; he was cast to the earth, and his angels were cast out with him. ~Revelation 12:7-9

...

Karis Nemik: There will be times when the struggle seems impossible. I know this already. Alone, unsure, dwarfed by the scale of the enemy. Remember this. Freedom is a pure idea. It occurs spontaneously and without instruction. Random acts of insurrection are occurring constantly throughout the galaxy. There are whole armies, battalions that have no idea that they've already enlisted in the cause. Remember that the frontier of the Rebellion is everywhere. And even the smallest act of insurrection pushes our lines forward. And then remember this. The Imperial need for control is so desperate because it is so unnatural. Tyranny requires constant effort. It breaks, it leaks. Authority is brittle. Oppression is the mask of fear. Remember that. And know this, the day will come when all these skirmishes and battles, these moments of defiance will have flooded the banks of the Empire's authority and then there will be one too many. One single thing will break the siege. Remember this. Try. ~From the Star Wars series Andor, S1.E12 "Rix Road."

...

When men stop believing in God, it isn't that they then believe in nothing: they believe in everything. ~Umberto Eco

I saw this last night.

See that guy on the far right-hand side of this group of "Young Republicans?" 

He doesn't get more votes than his political opponents in internecine Republican elections, he eats them.

It's sad to see the Republican Party of Lincoln, Teddy Roosevelt, Eisenhower, Reagan and even the Bushes come to...this. To people who have no business considering themselves superior calling themselves the "Master Race" and praising Hitler...who Eisenhower and a number of members of the Roosevelt family (Not Just FDR) fought against. Ted Roosevelt...Theodore Roosevelt Jr. died during the Normandy landings of a heart attack while leading his troops after storming ashore on Utah Beach with his cane in one hand and a Colt M1911A1 .45 pistol in the other like it was San Juan Hill with better weapons and more water.

And now, Republicans are this.

Stop and think about that for a second.

I'm tired of these fucking people's hate, their misogyny, their racism, and even more tired of them thinking that because they're miserable bastards everybody else should have to be one too.

I couldn't live like that. I'm an addict and have had issues with depression. I would not still be alive.

But...These Fucking People??

As the world and the rest of America increasingly defies them and finds its voice and uses its power to do so...they absolutely keep doubling down to the point of actively trying to sacralize their miserable bastardy and shitty behavior.

These Fucking People's ideal world is basically the Killing Fields of Khmer Rouge Cambodia, but with a church and a mall.

The wind whispers of fear and hate. The war has killed love. And those that confess to the Angkar are punished, and no one dare ask where they go. Here, only the silent survive. ~Dith Pran, The Killing Fields

I've been saying this since the height of the COVID-19 pandemic.

This will be worse.

The Pope is effectively breaking up Opus Dei.

My read on that, is that it likely will cause those kind of Catholics (a hell of a lot of whom were Protestant Fundamentalists before) simply to return to the open arms of Evangelical Protestantism, a fair number will probably go schismatic if not full Sedevacantist, but on the level of how it looks to the rest of us...basically this shit will probably cause Dark Catholicism and at least some branches of Evangelical Protestantism to fuse, informally if not actually formally. 

Why? 

Because whether they realize it or not, at least on the level of certain parts of the United States, the Evangelicals do actually have the kind of infrastructure and levels of church attendance...if not actual belief...to create the kind of cultural religion These Fucking People want.

Note I did not say "Christianity" and there's a reason for that.

Because their entire basis is anything but "Love Thy Neighbor."

They aren't interested in Love or Redemption or substitutionary Sacrifice.

At least not in having to do any of that themselves.

These motherfuckers want other people to die for their Sins.

And then they have the balls to want to call that "Redemption."

"God" as these assholes define Him might as well be Dis Pater or Mammon or some other Biblical demon.

And I guarantee you, when they do this...I do not think it's an "If" I think they are going to deliberately aim for a level of Crusading Atrocity that'd make both the First Crusade and the most bloody-minded interpretations of Radical Islam blanch in utter horror.

They literally want everybody else who does not join them to have to fight just to survive.

They see Putin's attitude towards Ukraine, just for one example, as how the world gets made.

All they care about is the expression of raw Power, even if it's against them, so long as it's delivered with a grim-enough affect. God is not on the throne in their hearts, their Self is.

Why?? Because these assholes are all narcissists, bowing down to them or fighting against them, either way, you're paying attention to them and that's all they really care about.

And yes, it's absolutely going to come down to a fight.

You either believe in freedom or you don't.

And you're either willing to fight for it or you're not.

This crap never ends well, not least for the goddamned fascists themselves.

But they don't care, so long as they get to take others down with them.

And I think that's why These Fucking People are going to try to make their shitty politics into their literal religion, so they can try to escape Hell.

But they aren't the ones who get to make that call. 

God judges us, not Man.

Remember that.

No Kings tomorrow, but Judgment Day is coming, in this life or the next.

You watch and you see what These Fucking people will do to try to escape that.

We're fortunate that these people are as pathetic as they are.

Слава Україна!

My black face fades,
hiding inside the black granite.
I said I wouldn't
dammit: No tears.
I'm stone. I'm flesh.
My clouded reflection eyes me
like a bird of prey, the profile of night slanted against morning. 
I turn this way—the stone lets me go.
I turn that way—I'm inside
the Vietnam Veterans Memorial
again, depending on the light
to make a difference.
I go down the 58,022 names,
half-expecting to find
my own in letters like smoke. 

I touch the name Andrew Johnson; 
I see the booby trap's white flash.
Names shimmer on a woman's blouse
but when she walks away
the names stay on the wall.
Brushstrokes flash, a red bird's
wings cutting across my stare.
The sky. A plane in the sky.
A white vet's image floats
closer to me, then his pale eyes
look through mine. I'm a window.
He's lost his right arm
inside the stone. In the black mirror
a woman’s trying to erase names:
No, she's brushing a boy's hair.
~Facing It, by Yusef Komunyakaa, US Army Veteran


[At ISB headquarters, Major Partagaz plays a clip of Karis Nemik's audio diary as Supervisor Lagret enters the conference room]
Major Leo Partagaz: I'm assuming you've heard it before.
Supervisor Lagret: Bits and pieces.
Partagaz: Just keeps spreading, doesn't it?
Lagret: It's been hard to contain.
Partagaz: Who do you think it is?
Lagret: I'm afraid they're waiting for you, sir. I told them I'd bring you down.
Partagaz: [breathes heavily and inhales sharply] May I have a moment to collect my thoughts?
[Lagret leaves. Outside the room, he hears a blaster sound, indicating Major Partagaz has shot himself.] 

~From the Star Wars series Andor, S2 E12 "Jedha, Kyber, Erso."



Thursday, October 16, 2025

Hubris and the Fall of Man (Self On The Throne, One.)

For the Lord will have mercy on Jacob, and will yet choose Israel, and set them in their own land: and the strangers shall be joined with them, and they shall cleave to the house of Jacob.

And the people shall take them, and bring them to their place: and the house of Israel shall possess them in the land of the Lord for servants and handmaids: and they shall take them captives, whose captives they were; and they shall rule over their oppressors.

And it shall come to pass in the day that the Lord shall give thee rest from thy sorrow, and from thy fear, and from the hard bondage wherein thou was made to serve,

That thou shalt take up this proverb against the king of Babylon, and say, How hath the oppressor ceased! the golden city ceased!

The Lord hath broken the staff of the wicked, and the scepter of the rulers.

He who smote the people in wrath with a continual stroke, he that ruled the nations in anger, is persecuted, and none hinders.

The whole earth is at rest, and is quiet: they break forth into singing.

Yea, the fir trees rejoice at thee, and the cedars of Lebanon, saying, Since thou art laid down, no logger is come up against us.

Hell from beneath is moved for thee to meet thee at thy coming: it stirs up the dead for thee, even all the chief ones of the earth; it hath raised up from their thrones all the kings of the nations.

All they shall speak and say unto thee, Art thou also become weak as we? art thou become like unto us?

Thy pomp is brought down to the grave, and the noise of thy viols: the worm is spread under thee, and the worms cover thee.

How art thou fallen from heaven, O Lucifer, son of the morning! how art thou cut down to the ground, which didst weaken the nations!

For thou hast said in thine heart, I will ascend into heaven, I will exalt my throne above the stars of God: I will sit also upon the mount of the congregation, in the sides of the north:

I will ascend above the heights of the clouds; I will be like the most High.

Yet thou shalt be brought down to hell, to the sides of the pit.

They that see thee shall narrowly look upon thee, and consider thee, saying, Is this the man that made the earth to tremble, that did shake kingdoms;

That made the world as a wilderness, and destroyed the cities thereof; that opened not the house of his prisoners?

All the kings of the nations, even all of them, lie in glory, every one in his own house.

But thou art cast out of thy grave like an abominable branch, and as the raiment of those that are slain, thrust through with a sword, that go down to the stones of the pit; as a carcass trodden under feet.

Thou shalt not be joined with them in burial, because thou hast destroyed thy land, and slain thy people: the seed of evildoers shall never be renowned.

Prepare slaughter for his children for the iniquity of their fathers; that they do not rise, nor possess the land, nor fill the face of the world with cities.

For I will rise up against them, says the Lord of hosts, and cut off from Babylon the name, and remnant, and son, and nephew, says the Lord. ~Isaiah 14:1-22

...

If we lose freedom here, there is no place to escape to. This is the last stand on Earth. And this idea that government is beholden to the people, that it has no other source of power except to sovereign people, is still the newest and most unique idea in all the long history of man's relation to man. This is the issue of this election. Whether we believe in our capacity for self-government or whether we abandon the American revolution and confess that a little intellectual elite in a far-distant capital can plan our lives for us better than we can plan them ourselves. ~Ronald Reagan

...

When men stop believing in God, it isn't that they then believe in nothing: they believe in everything. ~Umberto Eco

I keep seeing this shit.

A whole bunch of "Young Republicans" some of whom are *Checks Notes* like, 40, get caught in a group chat calling Black people racial slurs, expressing love for Hitler, making rape jokes and threatening to gas or otherwise execute their [Republican] political opponents.

Meanwhile all the ringleaders of the group look like somebody took Jabba The Hutt out of Star Wars, poured him into a suit and gave him a bad haircut.

Why for is the "Master Race" always like this??

Not some of the time, not most of the time, always.

And not to be outdone, the "Conservative" Evangelical Christians are making it all about them to the point where Lucifer himself (as depicted in the Old Testament, no less) looks humble and kind and self-deprecating by comparison.

When your basis for everything is "Me" I guess that's gonna warp things a little, at least.

But here's the thing, Lucifer fell from Heaven for a fucking reason.

Hubris and the Fall are always intertwined, one of these things very much is like the other one.

This crap isn't Christianity, it isn't even religion, it's narcissism.

I mean, my Gods, what the fuck is wrong with these people??

I mean, they're still on the "Charlie Kirk is Jesus" kick, seriously??

Again, it sucks that he got shot, but dude wasn't (and didn't claim to be) some holy prophet!

Meanwhile the country is falling apart, the government is shut down, and the majority of people are so disgusted with all this shit that I literally don't see the country holding together much longer because none of our national government institutions have one damn bit of credibility left because of Republicans and Trump.

And all Evangelicals, Fox News, and Republicans can think about is how they think they're somehow gonna come out ahead in all this crap.

But how do they measure this?

In selling shit, apparently. Never mind I can tell you from personal experience that 99% of the time it's the same fucking people buying the same fucking shit over and over and over. That doesn't mean they actually believe in anything. Commercialized Evangelicalism is the problem.

I mean, if you wanna get really technical about it, I've bought two Bibles in the last year (A hardcopy and one on Kindle) and I'm not a Born-Again anything.

I've also bought Kindle versions of the Quran and the Torah.

I'm not shouting Allah Akbar or keeping Kosher.

None of this stuff is even evidence of people being religious, much less Christian.

So, Why?? 

Because I couldn't find my copies of any of them and I need that kind of stuff for quotes and research now and again.

Partaking of Capitalism is not the same as saying the Sinner's Prayer.

Listening to Charlie Kirk makes one neither a Christian nor a conservative.

And even saying the Sinner's Prayer (or, by extension, repeating the Shahada the prescribed number of times in converting to Islam nor doing whatever one has to do to convert to Judaism nor whatever rituals go with joining any other religion) is not evidence of Belief or Faith.

It's evidence that you can talk, you can make words come out your mouth. Go you. You now have shown proficiency in one of the main forms of human communication.

Even if these "statistics" are real or have any meaning, which I suspect they don't, they are still not evidence of inner life or inward work or True Faith in anything whatever.

Jesus Himself spoke against that kind of religiosity as a core part of His earthly ministry, it was like His whole bit!

And if you want to know why the American Church is in spiraling decline and America is in the mess that it's in...you might even start with the fact that a whole hell of a lot of Evangelical and Pentecostal type churches don't know the difference between Congregants and asses in the seats, measure their success in collected donations (to the church or the Pastor, not charity) and spend more money on their church "Praise and Worship" band's music setup every damn Sunday than they do on supporting the communities around them!

Maybe if the American Christian churches spent 10% of the money helping disadvantaged youth as they did on lawsuit settlements and trying to hide or protect the sort of skeevy child-molesting Youth Pastors that generate those two things, we wouldn't have this problem??

If you wanna know why people think shit like that Trump is Jesus, well I think it starts with the fact that people are not the least bit acquainted with the real Jesus nor are they encouraged to be so in the least. 

It's a rare church that encourages Biblical literacy rather than literalism.

And in a country where half the population can barely read (if they can read at all) how in the hell do you even reliably share something like the Lord's Word...which is by definition, written??

It's not an accident that we have millions of people who literally don't know the difference between Christian doctrine and Republican (or MAGA) politics.

And when I was bitching about that 20 years ago, I was a conservative!

Even then, I knew One Of These Things Is Not Like The Other One.

The people getting annoyed with me the last month or so that I said it sucks Charlie Kirk got shot, but he wasn't Jesus? 

Their parents got mad when I pointed out that George W. Bush was not some holy prophet either.

And now the vast majority of Republicans from 20-25 years ago that are still Republicans freaking hate George W. Bush!

Honestly, the cycle is getting shorter, too! Only a few fanatics on the Right are still talking about Charlie Kirk at all! I only brought him up because Tania up above provided a handy reference.

MAGA? The day will come when Trump is damned near forgotten by them also. How long, you ask??

Well, if there's anything I learned from the COVID-19 Pandemic it's that the collective faith, memory, resilience or willingness to sacrifice of all too much of the American public lasts about two weeks, especially when whatever they're for or against isn't right in front of their faces all the time.

Everybody was gung-ho about protecting themselves or stopping that shit for the first couple weeks and then they (mostly starting with conservatives, but also some alleged liberals) got bored. Live sports going off the air was treated as a bigger catastrophe than tens of thousands of deaths were.

Tell me something, the people who were like that, in their hearts was God on the throne or was their Self on the throne?? Yes, I'm using the old Christian trope I was taught for a damn reason.

If "Love Thy Neighbor" isn't the point, what are you even doing it for??

Christianity doesn't need "Saving" from anyone...but Divine Truth is no good if nobody can understand it or even read it!!!

What matters more? Your own petty lusts or the fact that people are dying and the world is burning down??

If you think a second American Civil War will be any damned different, you have another thing coming.

People will not understand that they can't go to Disney World or party it up on South Padre Island because it's not there anymore or it's in a different country now, and they'll be even more mad that their kid came home in a box and have to be made to understand that he or she died fighting people even more ignorant than their own damn selves.

There's a reason Goldfish don't have a great civilization.

There's reasons most modern nations don't have (or last long with) leaders that are narcissists and in the modern era most such places are considered Third World shitholes.

The trouble with that is I've been to parts of America that could easily qualify as Third World shitholes if they weren't part of the same national polity as California and Michigan and New York and tracked on that basis.

And I'm sorry but I think the goddamn problem is that, screw the leadership, too many of the People are petty little narcissists!

How is the Constitution supposed to protect us from that?

Look, if some of These Fucking People prefer narcissism or racism or religiosity to civilization and modern society or want to die in a ditch of a preventable disease like some medieval peasant, have at it...but you cannot expect all that many of the rest of us to want to live with you...nor that your own house will be very happy for very long.

You either believe in civilization...and freedom...or you don't.

The trouble with freedom is you have to be smart enough to know if you have it or not, I guess.

Remember that, it's going to be on the test.

Слава Україна!

"I didn't want to do it,'' he hears himself saying. "I didn't want to leave them behind.''

The void laughs at him. There are miles of empty air beneath his dangling feet. "You had no choice.''

"Yes I did! I didn't have to come here.'' He pauses. "I didn't have to do anything,'' he says quietly, and inhales another lungful of death. "It was all automatic. Maybe it was inevitable.''

"-- Evitable,'' echoes the distant horizon. Something dark and angular skims across the stars, like an echo of extinct pterosaurs. Turbofans whirring within its belly, the F-117A hunts on: patrolling to keep at bay the ancient evil, unaware that the battle is already lost. "Your family could still be alive, you know.''

He looks up. "They could?'' Andrea? Jason? "Alive?''

The void laughs again, unfriendly: "There is life eternal within the eater of souls. Nobody is ever forgotten or allowed to rest in peace. They populate the simulation spaces of its mind, exploring all the possible alternative endings to their life. There is a fate worse than death, you know.'' 

~From A Colder War, a novella by Charles Stross.

Last Post

Karis Nemik: There will be times when the struggle seems impossible. I know this already. Alone, unsure, dwarfed by the scale of the enemy. Remember this. Freedom is a pure idea. It occurs spontaneously and without instruction. Random acts of insurrection are occurring constantly throughout the galaxy. There are whole armies, battalions that have no idea that they've already enlisted in the cause. Remember that the frontier of the Rebellion is everywhere. And even the smallest act of insurrection pushes our lines forward. And then remember this. The Imperial need for control is so desperate because it is so unnatural. Tyranny requires constant effort. It breaks, it leaks. Authority is brittle. Oppression is the mask of fear. Remember that. And know this, the day will come when all these skirmishes and battles, these moments of defiance will have flooded the banks of the Empire's authority and then there will be one too many. One single thing will break the siege. Remember this. Try. ~From the Star Wars series Andor, S1.E12 "Rix Road."

Bonus Content

And war broke out in heaven Michael and his angels fought with the dragon; and the dragon and his angels fought, but they did not prevail, nor was a place found for them in heaven any longer. So the great dragon was cast out, that serpent of old, called the Devil and Satan, who deceives the whole world; he was cast to the earth, and his angels were cast out with him. ~Revelation 12:7-9

Monday, October 13, 2025

On The Turgidity Of Evil (The Abyss, Five.)

When the Son of man shall come in his glory, and all the holy angels with him, then shall he sit upon the throne of his glory:
And before him shall be gathered all nations: and he shall separate them one from another, as a shepherd divides his sheep from the goats:
And he shall set the sheep on his right hand, but the goats on the left.
Then shall the King say unto them on his right hand, Come, ye blessed of my Father, inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world:
For I was an hungered, and ye gave me meat: I was thirsty, and ye gave me drink: I was a stranger, and ye took me in:
Naked, and ye clothed me: I was sick, and ye visited me: I was in prison, and ye came unto me.
Then shall the righteous answer him, saying, Lord, when saw we thee an hungered, and fed thee? or thirsty, and gave thee drink?
When saw we thee a stranger, and took thee in? or naked, and clothed thee? Or when saw we thee sick, or in prison, and came unto thee?
And the King shall answer and say unto them, Verily I say unto you, Inasmuch as ye have done it unto one of the least of these my brethren, ye have done it unto me.
Then shall he say also unto them on the left hand, Depart from me, ye cursed, into everlasting fire, prepared for the devil and his angels:
For I was an hungred, and ye gave me no meat: I was thirsty, and ye gave me no drink:
I was a stranger, and ye took me not in: naked, and ye clothed me not: sick, and in prison, and ye visited me not.
Then shall they also answer him, saying, Lord, when saw we thee an hungered, or athirst, or a stranger, or naked, or sick, or in prison, and did not minister unto thee?
Then shall he answer them, saying, Verily I say unto you, Inasmuch as ye did it not to one of the least of these, ye did it not to me. 

~Matthew 25:31-45

...

Karis Nemik: There will be times when the struggle seems impossible. I know this already. Alone, unsure, dwarfed by the scale of the enemy. Remember this. Freedom is a pure idea. It occurs spontaneously and without instruction. Random acts of insurrection are occurring constantly throughout the galaxy. There are whole armies, battalions that have no idea that they've already enlisted in the cause. Remember that the frontier of the Rebellion is everywhere. And even the smallest act of insurrection pushes our lines forward. And then remember this. The Imperial need for control is so desperate because it is so unnatural. Tyranny requires constant effort. It breaks, it leaks. Authority is brittle. Oppression is the mask of fear. Remember that. And know this, the day will come when all these skirmishes and battles, these moments of defiance will have flooded the banks of the Empire's authority and then there will be one too many. One single thing will break the siege. Remember this. Try. ~From the Star Wars series Andor, S1.E12 "Rix Road."

I saw this last night, reading a thread on Russell Vought, Trump's OMB guy and an apparent cheaper Jim Bakker knockoff who went into accounting instead of becoming a Prosperity Gospel liar.

Dude apparently thinks he can rewire American culture completely by simply destroying the government, and then (although I'm not sure how) dictating terms in some unspecified fashion to the rest of us. 

Hold on, what?? What is this, the Underpants Gnomes theory of social change?? None of this works that way!

Among other things, culture isn't a top-down thing that someone dictates and a few hundred years of a changing and vibrantly growing American body politic and culture isn't going to be remade in the image of these White-bread Fundamentalist freaks in just a few years...no matter how bad they fuck things up.

More to the point, the entire point of America is that we as a nation choose our government, they do not define us like, say, the King of Saudi Arabia might get to define that country, and I've been to Saudi Arabia, that's a good thing. Despite apparent recent efforts to dispel that image, trust me, nobody goes to the Kingdom looking for a good time in any way whatever.

Ronald Reagan described America as a country with a government, rather than a government that had a country...and I think the Gipper knew what he was talking about.

Look, I don't care if they can't imagine things work any differently than their own idiotic hierarchal views, things just don't work that way. I mean, if you really wanna change things over like, a decade or two, you have to persuade people and prick the conscience of the nation and work very hard at it. 

Consider for example, Black civil rights activists or LGBT people over the last few decades.

And then, factor in that these guys don't want to do the work. These assholes think they're too good to have to persuade anybody, they think they're going to just tell people what to do and that nobody's going to punch them in the face for being Turgid sacks of flabby infected assholes as soon as the opportunity arises.

They think they can just break stuff and the changes they think they want will occur naturally somehow.

No, bitch, I'll be 52 next month, I literally own stuff I had as a little kid that's older than Russell Vought. I'm a former Christian, former Conservative (specifically having been a Reaganite Republican) and I'm a United States Air Force veteran. I have an extensive church background, a wide variety of skills, and enough of an understanding of people to know this bullshit ain't going to work. It's just gonna break stuff.

My partner is 40, Autistic, bisexual and still kinda-conservative and like me, she has a solid range of basic skills and currently works in a medical job. She's not down with this kind of shit either, and like I was she's the small-government Reaganite type. The difference being she still is.

Small government isn't what these assholes want.

She's not interested in things being broken, either. Both by inclination and professionally she's dependent on a variety of structures actually working. And neither of us wants the kind of "Traditional" relationship these chuds think we should have.

No, most of the time breaking stuff just...breaks stuff. 

And when people who needed that stuff or who it belonged to see what you did, they're going to get mad. It's usually a short hop from getting mad to getting even.

These fucking people don't care about that and they're goat-eager...to the point of a turgid purple priapism level of excited about it...to simply fuck things up for everybody else.

In these fucking people's idea of a "Natural Order" we'd both be dead by now because (maybe) 40 or so would be where life expectancy topped out for the average person, and society pretty much would consist of incestuous nobles, their lackeys, the Church...and a whole mass of peasants and serfs.

Humanity tried that already, it didn't work out very well and its overall collapse led to about 500 years of violent struggle, and their side lost anyway.

But they think Trump is the guy who can get it for 'em.

Yeah, I don't think that's gonna work out the way you think it's gonna work out.

Among other things, these fucking people are incompetent.

They'll fail, but they don't care. What they really want to do is simply kill millions of people trying to do all this.

In fact, they think they have some kind of "Divine Right" to do this shit.

They don't care if they end up in The Abyss.

In fact, I think the Republican addiction to miserable bastardy is such that they'd probably rather go there than Heaven anyway.

But if you wanna have a choice in the Afterlife, you got to stand up in this one, because the alternative is to sell your soul to these fucking people and their bullshit.

This crap isn't religion, it's narcissism.

You either believe in freedom or you don't.

And you're either willing to fight for it or you're not.

It's really that simple.

Слава Україна!

If we lose freedom here, there is no place to escape to. This is the last stand on Earth. And this idea that government is beholden to the people, that it has no other source of power except to sovereign people, is still the newest and most unique idea in all the long history of man's relation to man. This is the issue of this election. Whether we believe in our capacity for self-government or whether we abandon the American revolution and confess that a little intellectual elite in a far-distant capital can plan our lives for us better than we can plan them ourselves. ~Ronald Reagan

Four

Do you see the face on the TV screen
Comin' at you every sunday?
See the face on the billboard?
Well, that man is me
On the cover of the magazine
There's no question why I'm smilin'
You buy a piece of paradise
You buy a piece of me
I'll get you everything you wanted
I'll get you everything you need
You don't need to believe in hereafter
Just believe in me
'Cause Jesus, He knows me and He knows I'm right
I've been talkin' to Jesus all my life
Oh, yes He knows me and He knows I'm right
And He's been tellin' me everything is alright
I believe in family
With my ever lovin' wife beside me
But she don't know about my girlfriend
Or the man I met last night
Do you believe in God?
'Cause that's what I'm selling
And if you wanna go to heaven
Well, I'll see you right. ~Genesis, Jesus He Knows Me.


Sunday, October 12, 2025

Unhearing (The Abyss, Four.)

 The bow of God’s wrath is bent, and the arrow made ready on the string, and justice bends the arrow at your heart, and strains the bow, and it is nothing but the mere pleasure of God, and that of an angry God, without any promise or obligation at all, that keeps the arrow one moment from being made drunk with your blood. Thus all you that never passed under a great change of heart, by the mighty power of the Spirit of God upon your souls; all you that were never born again, and made new creatures, and raised from being dead in sin, to a state of new, and before altogether unexperienced light and life, are in the hands of an angry God. However you may have reformed your life in many things, and may have had religious affections, and may keep up a form of religion in your families and closets, and in the house of God, it is nothing but his mere pleasure that keeps you from being this moment swallowed up in everlasting destruction. However unconvinced you may now be of the truth of what you hear, by and by you will be fully convinced of it. Those that are gone from being in the like circumstances with you, see that it was so with them; for destruction came suddenly upon most of them; when they expected nothing of it, and while they were saying, Peace and safety: now they see, that those things on which they depended for peace and safety, were nothing but thin air and empty shadows.


The God that holds you over the pit of hell, much as one holds a spider, or some loathsome insect over the fire, abhors you, and is dreadfully provoked: his wrath towards you burns like fire; he looks upon you as worthy of nothing else, but to be cast into the fire; he is of purer eyes than to bear to have you in his sight; you are ten thousand times more abominable in his eyes, than the most hateful venomous serpent is in ours. You have offended him infinitely more than ever a stubborn rebel did his prince; and yet it is nothing but his hand that holds you from falling into the fire every moment. It is to be ascribed to nothing else, that you did not go to hell the last night; that you were suffered to awake again in this world, after you closed your eyes to sleep. And there is no other reason to be given, why you have not dropped into hell since you arose in the morning, but that God’s hand has held you up. There is no other reason to be given why you have not gone to hell, since you have sat here in the house of God, provoking his pure eyes by your sinful wicked manner of attending his solemn worship. Yea, there is nothing else that is to be given as a reason why you do not this very moment drop down into hell. ~Sinners In The Hands Of An Angry God, Jonathan Edwards, 1741

...

Karis Nemik: There will be times when the struggle seems impossible. I know this already. Alone, unsure, dwarfed by the scale of the enemy. Remember this. Freedom is a pure idea. It occurs spontaneously and without instruction. Random acts of insurrection are occurring constantly throughout the galaxy. There are whole armies, battalions that have no idea that they've already enlisted in the cause. Remember that the frontier of the Rebellion is everywhere. And even the smallest act of insurrection pushes our lines forward. And then remember this. The Imperial need for control is so desperate because it is so unnatural. Tyranny requires constant effort. It breaks, it leaks. Authority is brittle. Oppression is the mask of fear. Remember that. And know this, the day will come when all these skirmishes and battles, these moments of defiance will have flooded the banks of the Empire's authority and then there will be one too many. One single thing will break the siege. Remember this. Try. ~From the Star Wars series Andor, S1.E12 "Rix Road."

I keep seeing stuff like this.

Trump s mad because he didn't get the Nobel Peace Prize. Trump thinks if he does the right amount of "Good Works" he'll go to heaven, and so on, and somehow these two things seem tied together.

A few things about that:

Believe in Jesus, and you have to actually be sorry for all the shit you did. Repent, For the Kingdom of Heaven is at hand, or nothing. While "Good Works" are naturally, good, and faith without works is dead...the Lord's Word is a double-edged sword, and that's the point.

Eternal Life comes through Compassion, not Greed, by love of neighbor, not love of Self. One gets there through love, not hate.

You can dick around with this stuff all you like, but basically all the Holy Books, of all religions, in effect say the same thing through doctrines and laws of differing words but similar import. Buddhism has its Four Noble Truths and Eightfold Path, Christianity has the Ten Commandments and the Sermon On The Mount, Islam has its Five Pillars, and so on.

In the Abrahamic faiths, to one degree or another it boils down to submission to God as a choice that must be freely made by an individual.

The Truth is simple. Man makes it complicated because he does not want to obey it.

Love God, love your fellow humans, be sorry for it when you do wrong and try to make amends.

Is that so hard??

And I saw when the Lamb opened one of the seals, and I heard, as it were the noise of thunder, one of the four beasts saying, Come and see.

And I saw, and behold a white horse: and he that sat on him had a bow; and a crown was given unto him: and he went forth conquering, and to conquer.

And when he had opened the second seal, I heard the second beast say, Come and see.

And there went out another horse that was red: and power was given to him that sat thereon to take peace from the earth, and that they should kill one another: and there was given unto him a great sword.

And when he had opened the third seal, I heard the third beast say, Come and see. And I beheld, and lo a black horse; and he that sat on him had a pair of balances in his hand.

And I heard a voice in the midst of the four beasts say, A measure of wheat for a penny, and three measures of barley for a penny; and see thou hurt not the oil and the wine.

And when he had opened the fourth seal, I heard the voice of the fourth beast say, Come and see.

And I looked, and behold a pale horse: and his name that sat on him was Death, and Hell followed with him. And power was given unto them over the fourth part of the earth, to kill with sword, and with hunger, and with death, and with the beasts of the earth.

And when he had opened the fifth seal, I saw under the altar the souls of them that were slain for the word of God, and for the testimony which they held:

And they cried with a loud voice, saying, How long, O Lord, holy and true, dost thou not judge and avenge our blood on them that dwell on the earth?

And white robes were given unto every one of them; and it was said unto them, that they should rest yet for a little season, until their fellow-servants also and their brethren, that should be killed as they were, should be fulfilled.

And I beheld when he had opened the sixth seal, and, lo, there was a great earthquake; and the sun became black as sackcloth of hair, and the moon became as blood;

And the stars of heaven fell unto the earth, even as a fig tree casteth her untimely figs, when she is shaken of a mighty wind.

And the heaven departed as a scroll when it is rolled together; and every mountain and island were moved out of their places.

And the kings of the earth, and the great men, and the rich men, and the chief captains, and the mighty men, and every bondman, and every free man, hid themselves in the dens and in the rocks of the mountains;

And said to the mountains and rocks, Fall on us, and hide us from the face of him that sitteth on the throne, and from the wrath of the Lamb:

For the great day of his wrath is come; and who shall be able to stand? ~Revelation 6, King James Version.

And I'll note a lot of these same people who don't want to do the most basic shit that the Bible and the Lord Jesus Christ tell them to do love to talk about the End Times, as if they think they can bullshit God into not putting them in the "Goats" section automatically??

I said it before and I'll say it again, Peter Theil is closer to being an Antichrist than to fighting Antichrist, and if you do not see this...it's because you do not want to.

The Kingdom of Heaven is not a fucking Tax Shelter. I don't even know why I have to say this.

When the shit really does hit the fan, these fucking people will raise up temples to Dis Pater and Mammon and worship literal Demons rather than obey the Lord's Word.

All the Demons would have to do is present as somehow Something Something Gazpacho being vaguely "Conservative" and maybe talk shit about Barack Obama.

And you know it as well as I do.

Look, I posted the bits from the Campus Crusade for Christ spiel for a reason. I was taught, literally trained on this stuff when I considered going into ministry myself.

I've heard countless variations of the whole bit, and given the same spiel myself many times, right or wrong.

My initiation into the "End Times" narrative was, as a young Senior Airman, listening in as two Senior NCO's were discussing this stuff while sitting at the same table as me in the chow hall at KI Sawyer Air Force Base. And I, having a (mainstream) church background and already being familiar with Revelations, started asking questions.

Especially if somebody claims to be a conservative Christian Republican, there's n excuse not to know this stuff. I don't give a damn how cafeteria-ized your personal beliefs or how privileged you personally are. Right or wrong this shit is everywhere.

On a global level, you pretty much have to be blind, deaf, not have internet, radio or TV and live in a remote cave in Antarctica to not have heard some version of the message of the American church in particular whether you ever wanted to or not.

And all these rich guys supposedly don't know this stuff?? This level of Unhearing-ness, of sleepwalking into the Abyss, requires deliberate effort.

Whether I want it or not, a lot of these words are engraved on my soul. And the knowledge of them is and always will be as basic and natural to me as breathing is.

And it will be that way, unbidden in my mind, for as long as I am alive even though I have rejected organized religion and I'm not a Born-Again anything anymore.

Because it's what I read.

My partner is in a similar boat, and also bisexual, but her Catholic and conservative upbringing still weighs heavily on her, too.

Things like that are why people who teach this stuff have a duty to try and get it right.

Your words affect other people.

And believe it or not we have a duty to seek and try to understand the Truth, to check what people say against the Word.

So why not do it??

When the Son of man shall come in his glory, and all the holy angels with him, then shall he sit upon the throne of his glory:
And before him shall be gathered all nations: and he shall separate them one from another, as a shepherd divides his sheep from the goats:
And he shall set the sheep on his right hand, but the goats on the left.
Then shall the King say unto them on his right hand, Come, ye blessed of my Father, inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world:
For I was an hungered, and ye gave me meat: I was thirsty, and ye gave me drink: I was a stranger, and ye took me in:
Naked, and ye clothed me: I was sick, and ye visited me: I was in prison, and ye came unto me.
Then shall the righteous answer him, saying, Lord, when saw we thee an hungered, and fed thee? or thirsty, and gave thee drink?
When saw we thee a stranger, and took thee in? or naked, and clothed thee? Or when saw we thee sick, or in prison, and came unto thee?
And the King shall answer and say unto them, Verily I say unto you, Inasmuch as ye have done it unto one of the least of these my brethren, ye have done it unto me.
Then shall he say also unto them on the left hand, Depart from me, ye cursed, into everlasting fire, prepared for the devil and his angels:
For I was an hungred, and ye gave me no meat: I was thirsty, and ye gave me no drink:
I was a stranger, and ye took me not in: naked, and ye clothed me not: sick, and in prison, and ye visited me not.
Then shall they also answer him, saying, Lord, when saw we thee an hungered, or athirst, or a stranger, or naked, or sick, or in prison, and did not minister unto thee?
Then shall he answer them, saying, Verily I say unto you, Inasmuch as ye did it not to one of the least of these, ye did it not to me. 

~Matthew 25:31-45

So what the fuck is These Fucking People's excuse??

If you believe in the Truth, if you care about any of that stuff, and you want to keep believing in it? If you wish to retain that right it's going to come down to a fight to do so.

You either believe in freedom or you don't.

And you're either willing to fight for it or you're not.

I suspect when push comes to shove we're going to find out that the American Right is as Atheistic and violently anti-Christian as any Chinese Communist Red Guard at the height of the Cultural Revolution or Soviet Gulag jailer from Stalin's purges, or worse.

Слава Україна!

Nebuchadnezzar spake and said unto them, Is it true, O Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego, do not ye serve my gods, nor worship the golden image which I have set up?
Now if ye be ready that at what time ye hear the sound of the cornet, flute, harp, sackbut, psaltery, and dulcimer, and all kinds of musick, ye fall down and worship the image which I have made; well: but if ye worship not, ye shall be cast the same hour into the midst of a burning fiery furnace; and who is that God that shall deliver you out of my hands?
Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego, answered and said to the king, O Nebuchadnezzar, we are not careful to answer thee in this matter.
If it be so, our God whom we serve is able to deliver us from the burning fiery furnace, and he will deliver us out of thine hand, O king.
But if not, be it known unto thee, O king, that we will not serve thy gods, nor worship the golden image which thou hast set up.
~Daniel 3:14-18

If we lose freedom here, there is no place to escape to. This is the last stand on Earth. And this idea that government is beholden to the people, that it has no other source of power except to sovereign people, is still the newest and most unique idea in all the long history of man's relation to man. This is the issue of this election. Whether we believe in our capacity for self-government or whether we abandon the American revolution and confess that a little intellectual elite in a far-distant capital can plan our lives for us better than we can plan them ourselves. ~Ronald Reagan

Three

When men stop believing in God, it isn't that they then believe in nothing: they believe in everything. ~Umberto Eco

Friday, October 10, 2025

Millions Of Golden Images (The Abyss, Three.)

When ye therefore shall see the abomination of desolation, spoken of by Daniel the prophet, stand in the holy place, (who so readeth, let him understand.)

Then let them which be in Judea flee into the mountains:
Let him which is on the housetop not come down to take any thing out of his house:
Neither let him which is in the field return back to take his clothes. ~Matthew 24:15-18

...

American capitalism is predatory, and American politics are corrupt: The same thing is true in England and the same in France; but in all these three countries the dominating fact is that whenever the people get ready to change the government, they can change it. The same thing is not true of Germany, and until it was made true in Germany, there could be no free political democracy anywhere else in the world — to say nothing of any free social democracy. My revolutionary friends who will not recognize this fact seem to me like a bunch of musicians sitting down to play a symphony concert in a forest where there is a man-eating tiger loose. For my part, much as I enjoy symphony concerts, I want to put my fiddle away in its case and get a rifle and go out and settle with the tiger. ~Upton Sinclair.

...

[Cassian plays Nemik's audio diary]

Karis Nemik
: There will be times when the struggle seems impossible. I know this already. Alone, unsure, dwarfed by the scale of the enemy. Remember this. Freedom is a pure idea. It occurs spontaneously and without instruction. Random acts of insurrection are occurring constantly throughout the galaxy. There are whole armies, battalions that have no idea that they've already enlisted in the cause. Remember that the frontier of the Rebellion is everywhere. And even the smallest act of insurrection pushes our lines forward. And then remember this. The Imperial need for control is so desperate because it is so unnatural. Tyranny requires constant effort. It breaks, it leaks. Authority is brittle. Oppression is the mask of fear. Remember that. And know this, the day will come when all these skirmishes and battles, these moments of defiance will have flooded the banks of the Empire's authority and then there will be one too many. One single thing will break the siege. Remember this. Try. ~From the Star Wars series Andor, S1.E12 "Rix Road."

I saw this yesterday.
Peter Theil thinks he's fighting the "Antichrist."

Apparently he thinks all his money will keep him warm in the cold and darkness of the Abyss, or somethig.

Sorry, but Peter Piper here is closer, Biblically, to being an Antichrist than fighting Antichrist, and a lot of Evangelicals would back that statement up simply because he's gay.

(And this dude enables that horseshit, too.)

These fucking people's bullshit isn't politics in the normal sense, even in the sense that one might use words like Fascism or Nazism and I've had a hard time making people understand this.

Yes, there are fascistic or supposedly-religious elements, but the truth is it's narcissism and nihilism by people who've pretty much been allowed to cafeteria-ize their beliefs like a kid that's a picky eater working their way down a buffet line. The results of this end up being flat-out nonsense. But because it's rich people, America thinks we have to indulge this crap.

And again I say unto you, It is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle, than for a rich man to enter into the kingdom of God. ~Matthew 19:24

Just sayin.'

But apparently a lot of these fucking people are eyeing the exits, too. Apparently Trumpist Fascism isn't going nearly as well as they thought it would.

I mean, I could have told you that.

Why? Because for all of their pretensions (intellectual and otherwise) these guys are idiots. Dudes like Curtis Yarvin and Peter Theil pretty much scan as 13-year-old boys who never had to grow up, either because of money or being sheltered by indulgent parents or whatever. Sooner or later, reality is gonna catch up. 

Republicans basically trying to start a civil war by repeatedly provoking the public in a country with more guns than people doesn't exactly seem like the smartest idea even by that standard, either.

I mean, say what you will about the man but I guess Curtis Yarvin is at least smart enough to figure out that he needs a consistently-working power grid and technology to be able to do whatever it is he does and he's managed to put two and two together and figure out his ideas aren't exactly popular with those of us who aren't billionaires. So there's that, I guess??

Sorry to sound like a cultural and intellectual snob here, but one hell of a lot of American Idiots don't even have that much going for them.

And the motherfuckers are so high on their own goddamned Narcissism that they think they can talk down to the Pope who is also *Checks Notes* American.

This isn't religion, not even the Prosperity Gospel kind, it's narcissism.

It's basic Heresy and outright Self-Worship by people who've been convinced (or worse, convinced themselves) that they are the most special of Special Snowflakes and that others aren't. (And that those "Others" basically anybody who isn't a bigoted MAGA narcissist, aren't even worthy of the most basic of considerations.)

Not only is this not sustainable, it never should have been allowed to progress to this point. Like a lot of this crap could have been solved by Matt's parents whupping his ass once or twice or by some other kid smacking him in the mouth when he lipped off with stupid shit in the 7th Grade and then someone making him sit in "Why did this happen?" for a couple minutes.

And this kind of idiocy is not just on the Right. A hell of a lot of These Fucking People are on the supposed-Left, too...but they were so high on their own supply with "Principles" that they couldn't even be bothered to vote against *Checks Notes Again* Actual Goddamned aspiring Fascism.

In terms of what the Bible means by the Abomination of Desolation or the Golden Image of Nebuchadnezzar, there's a lot of people who think it's them and it's the fault of the World for not recognizing how "Great" they are.

I've pretty much been saying since last November that FAFO is the only cure for a lot of this kind of bullshit. But then, what about those of us who did our duty to civilization and didn't fuck around in the first place??

People like me or my partner, for example.

Nebuchadnezzar spake and said unto them, Is it true, O Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego, do not ye serve my gods, nor worship the golden image which I have set up?
Now if ye be ready that at what time ye hear the sound of the cornet, flute, harp, sackbut, psaltery, and dulcimer, and all kinds of musick, ye fall down and worship the image which I have made; well: but if ye worship not, ye shall be cast the same hour into the midst of a burning fiery furnace; and who is that God that shall deliver you out of my hands?
Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego, answered and said to the king, O Nebuchadnezzar, we are not careful to answer thee in this matter.
If it be so, our God whom we serve is able to deliver us from the burning fiery furnace, and he will deliver us out of thine hand, O king.
But if not, be it known unto thee, O king, that we will not serve thy gods, nor worship the golden image which thou hast set up.
~Daniel 3:14-18

Where do those of us stand for whom the Golden Image is at least...not ourselves??

And honestly, counting on "These people are idiots" is the coldest of cold comfort.

In the end, these fucking people being this stupid and their beliefs in conspiracy theories and woo woo being tolerated by others will only end up getting more people killed, didn't we learn this from the COVID-19 pandemic??

Freedom requires a basic level of intelligence to maintain (or even recognize) it.

So does proper religious belief or pretty much anything else. Just to use religion as a specific example; If it ends up coming down to endorphins or feelings or subjective experience long enough...after awhile, how do the people in a given church even know what they're worshiping, anymore??

Keep that crap up long enough and sooner or later everybody becomes their own god.

Think about how much chaos that implies, will ya?? Sure, some people like Donald Trump or Peter Theil can buy a bigger pedestal to put their gold statue on...but trust me, I work with the public and it's not much better lower down.

And if you think things suck now??
I'm here to tell you they can and will get worse if we don't stop this crap.

You either believe in freedom or you don't. That sort of means you have to acknowledge that other people exist.

And you're either willing to step up and stand against the fall of night, or you're not.

Слава Україна!

When men stop believing in God, it isn't that they then believe in nothing: they believe in everything. ~Umberto Eco

Two

If we lose freedom here, there is no place to escape to. This is the last stand on Earth. And this idea that government is beholden to the people, that it has no other source of power except to sovereign people, is still the newest and most unique idea in all the long history of man's relation to man. This is the issue of this election. Whether we believe in our capacity for self-government or whether we abandon the American revolution and confess that a little intellectual elite in a far-distant capital can plan our lives for us better than we can plan them ourselves. ~Ronald Reagan