Real Reason They Don't Want Gays in Military

Thanks to Barbara Baty.

Real Reason They Don't Want Gays in Military (or, Is God Mad at Republicans?)
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Seems that god is really pissed at the republicans. Actually, god's mad at the repubs for that whole Reich-wing conservative "christian" thing.

Here's proof. All those wild-eyed RWC's were told (and did as they were ordered) to pray for "hurricane force winds and rains of biblical proportions out of the so-called "christian" right wing Focus on the Family and other tax free pulpits. [They wanted God to "rain on" Obama's victory-celebration.] So millions of these sheeple did just that-- prayed and prayed and prayed like the buncha friggin idiots they are, that they actually believe THAT is what prayer is for?

And ya know what? It turned out to be just the most beautiful night in Denver. Couldn't have been better for a giant outdoor party (when Obama gave his acceptance speech in front of over 80,000 people at Mile High Stadium). I guess it was just simply not god's will to cause that rain and wind, to NOT answer the pleadings of the millions. So much for the power of THEIR prayer, of THAT type of cloaked-in-hate prayer, that is!

Then, a few months later in California, all those good christians and especially Mormons (who, like Catholics, are NOT real christians as we all know) according to the BOAC born-again variety of christians (only THEY are the real chosen ones.) Anyway, they (BOAC) all wanted everyone to vote YES on Prop 8 in California to ban gay marriage. And, sure enough, Prop 8 did fail, and now the christians and Mormons are all happy.

But guess what? God is pissed AGAIN. How can ya tell? Well, what about all those fires immediately after Prop 8? The defeat of gay marriage (a yes vote defeated) has shaken California. Indeed, if Prop 8 had lost and allowed gay marriage, then those fires would have been called (by christians) the judgment of god; after all, vengence is mine, sayeth the lord-- of dance or the lord of the rings or whatever. Yes, the televised preachers would be railing against the goddless left coast and all those queer liberal faggots and lezzies and homos and sinners. Yes, Sarah Palin's "Real America" could feel justified in its discrimination and justified by all those fires and acts of "gawd"!

But wait! If California has done what they say is god's will, then why is California being punished with these fires? Next will be rains and mudslides and all that. Hmmmm. I guess god got it wrong again. Maybe, just maybe, "Gawd" is NOT a republican as we've been led to believe.

Or maybe, just maybe, this god of theirs simply does not give a care for their particular brand of hate! Maybe, just maybe (and back to the original point) this old-time choir is not what the GOP needs!

As republicans sort out the reasons for their defeat earlier this month, they will likely overlook or dismiss the gorilla in the pulpit.

Three little letters, great big problem: G O D. (I'm bathing in holy water as I type this).

To be specific, the evangelical, rightwing branch of the GOP is what ails the erstwhile conservative party and will continue to afflict and marginalize its constituents if reckoning doesn't cometh soon, or is it soon cometh?

Simply put: Armband religion is killing the republican party. And the truth, as long as we're helping to set them free, is that if one were to eavesdrop on the private conversations among the party intelligentsia, one would hear precisely that. Their choir has become absurdly off-key, and many republicans know it, but they need those votes! What to do?!

So it has been for the Grand Old Party (more emphasis now on Old and less on Party) since the 1980's or so. It has become beholden to a nutty element that they used to relegate to wooden crates on street corners. Yep, the GOP has surrendered its higher ground (moral authority?) to its lowest brows (Palins?) and in so doing alienated its base, including other people of faith and regular folks who prefer a more private
approach to worship. And what's so great is how defensive religious conservatives become at any suggestion that they've had anything to do with the GOP's erosion! Oh well, it just keeps getting better, doesn't it?

Whoops, my time is up, gotta run, gotta go pray for rain.
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Quiet Stillness

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You sound, as usual, quite busy; please be sure to get a moderate amount of rest to compensate for your nonstop busy-ness; remember that God is in the silence, and this world will do everything possible to rob us of that silence, and moments of quiet stillness.

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God and Goddess

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God does not have a physical body. God is not even localized, so that She has a particular place in the universe. For God is Mind, and Mind is everywhere.

Mind without a body cannot, by definition, be either male or female.
Ideas that insist that God is "male" have deep roots in our society, but they are nothing but a primitive, ancient cultural artifact. They are unfortunately reinforced by references to God as "Father." For God is not "Father" alone, but both Mother and Father.

God often expresses as Mother Nature. Ancient and very early Christians recognized a Goddess whom they called "Sophia."

But we have regressed to the very backward, and very archaic, view of God as all-male. This assumption arises directly from the Jehovah-myth of the Hebrew Scriptures. Like many other factors of the myth, it is mistaken.

For God is both, and equally, Goddess. In fact, the Enlightenment Tradition favors strongly the "feminine" qualities of God, such as Love, tenderness, gentleness, kindness, etc. The earliest Christians were gnostics (mystics), and the gnostic traditions also completely renounced and rejected the Jehovah-myth of an angry, frustrated male god. They taught that Jehovah was a limited and ignorant spiritual being, and that the material world was one of his "failed experiments." It was, they said, in full agreement with Hindu and Buddhist mysticsages, an illusion or dream only.

So, when referring to the One, the Ultimate, the Absolute, or great Mind, it is often more satisfying, and more accurate, to refer to God as "Goddess." God and Goddess are thus synonymous, not two different beings. There is only one God, and She is also Goddess.
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Christ and Jesus

Christ and Jesus
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To understand many of the words and teachings of Jesus Christ, you must use some discernment. There is a difference between Jesus the historical man, and the Christ, the Holy Spirit (God) who still lives in your heart and mine.

Here is one good example: Christ said, "I and the Father are one." (Jn. 10:30) And Jesus also said, "The Father is greater than I." (Jn. 14:28)

Now, logically, both statements cannot be true of the same being. So, they must originate with two beings. And they do. The first statement is from the everlasting Christ-spirit, and the second from the human and historical Jesus.

In many early Christian documents, writers made this careful distinction. That we all are part of the Christ (Holy Spirit; God) is implied, for example, in the gnostic Gospel of Phillip, where the early Christian author writes that, when converted to the faith, we do not become simply "Christians, but Christs." To the unaccustomed ear, it might well sound strange to speak of "Julia Christ," or "Kevin Christ." But, the truth is, we are all called to follow Christ within as the Way. For He said, through Jesus, "I am... the Way." (Jn. 14:6(

We cannot now "follow" Jesus, for he is no longer alive on earth. But Christ still lives, and never died. He is a "model" for us, the Scriptures say. Jesus predicted, "The things I do, you also will do; and you will do even greater things."

No one is as advanced, as complete, a being as Jesus Christ. For he is, in Western culture, the very archetype (symbol) of a completed and enlightened man. But that does not make us less than Jesus, as a species.

For he was truly "man," born of woman, although he was also as truly God. He was, in short, Love in incarnation. It is not blasphemy to declare that Jesus is a model, as the Scriptures say, "for you to follow his footsteps closely." Indeed, the true "blasphemy" would be to ignore this lovely specimen of God.

So, when people teach that "Jesus saves," it is the realization of the deeply interior Love-nature that saves. It becomes conscious (aware) to your conscious mind. And from what does Jesus Christ save? He saves, by grace, from the nightmare of ignorance, with its hatreds, fears, and assorted miseries. He also saves us from terrible slavery to our lower humanimal nature-- slavery to abject cruelty, loveless sexuality, greed, and similar abominations. By grace, we are liberated from a legion of interior "demons," who lose all their power in the Presence of Christ(Love).
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Masculine and Feminine Love

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I by far, by many lightyears, prefer the Goddess over the God. Both are necessary, and good. But I've been saturated with a negative Godimage since way back, and I've had it up to here with the ridiculous "monstergod," as I call him. I long for, and need, the tender side; I love the Love of men, but need much more the Love of women. Not sexual, you understand. But a woman's Love has a completely distinct and different "flavor" than Love between males. Both can be real, but the gentle flower of feminine hearts has a sweetness and delightful fragrance lacking in the harder, more logical, Love of males. The soft receptivity in the Goddess is very welcome and welcoming. To sink deeply into that yielding heart, filled with warm Love, is to taste of spiritual ecstasy.

I have always preferred even the company of women-- partly because of the terrible ways in which males are socialized in our society. You know, the old "sex, sports, tools" mindset. Women, by contrast, are fascinating, compelling, powerfully attractive, and profound. They exhibit the spiritual variety of butterflies or roses, and the same glowing beauty. They are not terrified of their emotions, however deep these feelings might be.

In visions and visualizations (call them "spiritual fantasies"), I also prefer vastly the mindpicture of the Goddess over the God. This is only a tiny bit sexual -- due to the attractive physical form of the Goddess. The greatest percentage, by far, is psychospiritual. A woman usually forms a deeper and truer friendship, with more understanding, forgiveness, and loyalty. This is based, in part, on earth-friendships.

But it also arises from deeper spiritual principles.

The very touch of a Goddess -- in the form of a human woman, or in the form of a visualized supernormal Goddess -- is healing. And, again, there is a very special and unique form of Love that blossoms -- non-sexually-- between a man and a woman in friendship. It is one of the great joys of this life.

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Mild Spiritual Experiences

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Professional psychological statistics show that between 33-48% of the populations of the U.S., Britain, and Australia have experienced mild "religious experiences," which some call "re's." In selfdescriptions and interviews, the characteristics associated with these tastes of altered states include:

1. awareness of a beautiful, loving Presence, often called the "Presence of God."


2. awareness that a prayer is being "heard," or even answered.


3. awareness of strong interior guidance, not necessarily from "God."


4. awareness of a sacred Presence in the self and in all of nature.


5. awareness of some kind of order, pattern, and synchronicity in the cosmos.


6. sometimes, awareness of the presence of a dead friend/relative.


7. the experience of all things as somehow "one" or unified.


8. disappearance of boundaries separating the "self" from the cosmos.


9. feeling that you are a part of a vast, immense, immeasurable Supermind.

Some experiences are esthetic, and these can be quite as powerful as those described as "religious." Music or other forms of beauty often trigger these. The "beauty of nature" is a common trigger for religious experiences.

This term can refer to very mild religious feelings. But the way in which it will be used here is to describe intense altered states of mind, clearly differentiated from normal everyday consciousness.

The very zenith of religious experience is the mystical. It is the peak, the best. Perhaps two percent of all re's are mystical.

An re tends to have a lasting effect on your life; its "footprint" is always there, in your heart. Re's are very democratic, and occur regularly to people of all faiths. (They can be extremely rare in denominations or cults that try to "explain" everything intellectually; they occur far more often in the intuitive personality than in the intellectual or pseudo-intellectual.)

Re's are thought to give the normal mind access to interior but transcendent realities. They "carry" you to what shamans call "another world."

A genuine re is not just a feeling; it involves a genuine altered state of perception and reality. Highly visionary forms, as contrasted with the purely mystical (which alter feeling) might contain images of Jesus, the Buddha, Parvati, Krishna, or Mary. At one extreme, the person might feel that she has become a completely different "self." In Western culture, this intensity is often described as the "born again" experience, but, again, members of any faith-- or none at all-- can experience the sensation of rebirth.

Real re's tend to occur in solitude and silence.

In re's, people often report paranormal events, ranging from spontaneous healings to precognitive flashes. Deja vu, esp, and clairvoyance are common. True re's often happen to older people, with some education.


Re's lead to positive life-changes and to life-satisfaction. ("Occult" experiences can lead to the opposite.) Specifically, re's lead to increased tranquility, being "at home" in the universe, and greater happiness. Most rde's (real-death experiences) begin with extremely powerful re's.

Here are some other factors associated with spiritual experience:

1. time stops; you enter a "timeless" state or condition.


2. tranquility and serenity blossom beautifully and profoundly.


3. bright light can be "felt" around the body., which can be felt to be "left behind."


4. an otherworldly "being" or "voice" might be encountered.


5. joy can spiral to ecstasy.


6. the mind "enters" a mystical "realm" or "world."

God is known, in the deepest experiences, as being "inside" or "within" the person-- deep within the heartmind. The experience brings both interior healing, and healing of relationships. Love is seen as the only essential. Light is felt "within" and "all around" at the same time. Most importantly, the deepest experiences are marked by an inignorable sense of "unity" with an "Absolute," "Ultimate," or simply "everything."

The feeling is that of falling into a vast, immense Mind of pure Love.

It is not unusual for these amazing states to occur during meditation, deep interior (or silent) prayer, or yoga.

A true re always has a component of social transformation: It changes the relationship with community. It makes one more people-loving, and impels one to serve people (and other living creatures). The sense of ultimate, limitless Love flows over into social situations, and one might feel gently melted into warm Love; one becomes Love.

The re creates an increase in openness to the cosmos, to other views of "truth." It amplifies one's tenderness, gentleness, empathy, and forgiveness.

In the very deepest (mystical) experience, there are no images or visions. They all have to do with only feelings.

Here are some more feelings associated with the deep re:

1. deep, utter, profound Love.


2. deep, profound, utter peace.


3. certainty that everything will work out okay


4. personal need to give, contribute to others


5. Love is the Center of everyone and everything


6. joy and laughter


7. "falling in Love" with self and everything


8. great emotional intensity


9. great advance in knowledge


10. sense of being very ancient


11. everything "one"


12. chance for "new life"


13. certainty of personal survival of death


14. miscellaneous indescribable feelings


15. all is "alive"


16. dealing with "other," more powerful, minds


17. immense, vast expansion


18. feelings of warmth, fire, or light


19. absence of all concern about "worldly" problems

An re can, under certain conditions, cure a depression of long standing. Or, it might be cured by several re's, a series. The sense of a perfect Mind or God inside yourself can do much to heal you.
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Our Response to God

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God does not command us to join any particular church to find salvation from the lower nature, darkness, or ignorance generally. Indeed, most people, throughout all of history, were unable to join modern churches, because they did not exist!

It is part of this enlightenment to recognize that the ancient Jewish community, that of the Hebrew Scriptures ("Old Testament"), worshipped a different god than the Lord of Love proclaimed by Jesus. Yes, Paul and some other early Christians did apply certain Hebrew texts about "God" to God, but this was so because they were intelligent proselytizers: The Jews of the time were enormously popular and powerful, and the early Christians were interested in making peace, not war, with the Jewish community. But Jesus was murdered because he taught that Jehovah was not the God of the entire universe; the Lord of Love was. In teaching that God was Love, Jesus taught a different, and universal, God-- a God for all people.

Jehovah was the local tribal god of the Israelis only. That is why they were so shocked when Christianity was offered to the Gentiles-- non-Jewish peoples. Had Christianity arisen in Greece, the early texts about Zeus would have been applied to the true God. Had the faith arisen in India, Christians would have applied the ancient texts about Brahman to the true God. For these Christians were, first, very smart; and second, they treasured peace, almost above all.

When Jesus taught that God was Love, he implicitly taught, enfolded within this larger teaching, a God who passionately longed, yearned, for the salvation of all His children. God was not the reticent Jehovah, who barely put up with human beings, or regarded them, as the "prophet" Isaiah said, as "grasshoppers."

No, the Lord of Love passionately, and profoundly, loved all His children, and was delighted when any one of them turned her life over to Him, trusting Him implicitly, without holding anything back.

What, then, should we do in response to this beautiful Lord of Love? We must live in Love twenty-four seven. This does not mean that we will become flawless or perfect. For, even while living "out of" our higher Nature, we will still have to contend with the lower. For that is the task, mission, or assignment of earth. But we can hold Love in our minds, to guide us, first in every situation. We can communicate (pray)
"without ceasing" to this interior Love. (Compare 1 Thes. 5:17)

Living in this purest Love was what early Christians meant when they recommended to "let Christ into your heart." For we must recognize the interior Christ of Love as our only "Master," and follow Love in every act, word, and thought in our lives-- as far as possible for imperfect beings. We must recognize that salvation (being "saved" from the lower nature and ignorance) comes only from the Christ, that interior Spirit of purest Love.

And, as far, and as often, as possible, we must turn to deep interior (sometimes wordless) prayer or meditation. We must begin by loving the Lord within our hearts with a blazing and exquisitely lovely intensity that wipes away every other priority.

We must awaken to the great truth that the only way to love God is by loving ourselves, other people, and other creatures. This will bring a life packed with joy, peace, and fun-- as God's many rewards begin to live in our hearts. We will have a clear conscience, not because we have never made mistakes, but because they are all forgiven. Jesus, in fact, was always getting into trouble for saying to people, often
strangers, "All your sins are forgiven."

This same wonderful message is a part of the interior communication of the Christ-spirit within our deeper Mind. First comes forgiveness, then rebirth-- as a son or daughter of God. For, as we reflect the genetics of our natural bioparents, we also reflect the image and likeness of God, in which we were created. We begin to manifest, among others, the nine "fruits of the Spirit" of Galatians 5:22, 23.

Like a tree, we produce these "fruits," not because we are smarter or better than others, but because God has smiled his tender Love upon us, through grace. Every minute, we must invite Love to take over our lives, and we must give ourselves over entirely to Its amazing and magnificent control. We must "obey God as ruler, rather than man," as it states in the book of Acts (5:24).

This means that we must become spiritually independent. We can no longer follow any guru, priest,pastor, or preacher. We follow only the Love of our hearts, which is perfect guidance. For, whatever else that you do or do not do, you cannot go wrong if you follow the Way of Love for all-- including the Way of harnmlessness. For, deep down, Love is all that we really want to do. It is all that we have ever wanted to do.
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Diversity

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Although there is only one "God, one Holy Spirit, and It is Love," there are dozens of things that can be said about God. For example, one can write a hundred pages about one book, for there are many things to say.

In the history of human development, human beings have come up with thousands of ideas about God. Some have come about, they claim, by "revelation." Others are developed through logic, and others, poetic expansions of spiritual themes.

Add to this that God expresses in a wide abundance of forms. At different times, in different cultures, to different peoples, God has expressed Him/Herself in thousands of manifestations or expressions. This has given birth to hundreds of varieties of religion. Some very strict people believe that only their religion is "right," and all others "wrong." They do this because they are desperate, and deep down, fear that they might be "wrong."

Religions are not the very best that God has to give. They are the best that human beings can create when they approach an infinite and unlimited God. Jesus set forth the simple but profound principle, "Nothing is impossible with God."

People love to argue and fight; they will say that one religion or another is "impossible to be true," but then, they contradict Jesus' principle. WARNING: Whenever anyone says that, "God cannot..." or, "That view is impossible...." she is betraying only her own limitations. For with God, all views, all ideas, all things, all activities, are possible, except those that violate Love, which is God Itself.

The multiplicity of religions is not a bad or sad event. It is a monument to human creativity, and to the glory of God, in His gigantic, vast, immense diversity. God loves diversity, and does not want everyone to be "the same." For nature has produced thousands of varieties of roses, thousands of kinds of butterflies, and as many species, as many stars. We do not find "conformity" in the whole of God's natural world.

God has made human brains-- the most complex items in the physical universe-- even more diversified. If God wanted us all to be alike, he would have given us all the same kind of brain.
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Message from Arnold White

Thanks to Arnold White.

Dear Friends,

Hello,

My name is Arnold Joseph White. I was born in Nashville, TN on July 7th, 1948. And as with most people, from time to time in my life, I have had experiences that could have possibility been the ~“Spiritual Realm”~ of ~“God”~ at work in my life ~ or not. I never had an experience that did not have a rational explanation behind it ~ until ~ 1996 or 1997 ~ when I began to experience “things” that at that time I concluded were “things” I thought were from the ~ “psychic realm” ~ of ~ “psychic phenomena” ~ as ~ “psychic ability” ~ and ~ “psychic power” ~. Then on Dec. 15th, of 000, I witnessed ~“something”~ that as I tried to come to a rational explanation of what I was witnessing, the first thing that came to my mind was “witchcraft"... What do I do with this ~“Revelation”~ of this ~“Epiphany”~? Were ~ these things ~ given to me to experience for my own personal knowledge and mine alone? Or was I supposed to share that ~ “My God! There actually is a God!” ~ with the world?... So over the course of the next five years, I wrote a book that you can read and download (free) at Love-God-Is-Love.org....And ~ that thought ~ was ~ "I hope that I hope." ~. To which ~“God”~ replied to me through Job 6:11 on page 715 of my ~“SPIRIT FILLED LIFE BIBLE”~....Many of you, if not most of you, will have a very real problem with much of what ~"God"~ has ~"called"~ me to ~"speak"~. But that is not my problem....You can see this very, very, very strong evidence on pages 31, 32 and 40-42 of my book, on my website. Recently I saw the following message on two different Church signs near
my house:
“God does not call the qualified. He qualifies the called."...

And again ~ you can read and download my entire book (free) at: www.Love-God-Is-Love.org.

My book is entitled "DIVINE 9/11 INTERVENTION"...

@ JUNCTURE / NOSTRA 1999 DAMUS 9111 / ~"LOVE!"~ ~"GOD IS!"~ ~"LOVE!"~.

Call me. ~"God"~ has.

~ “Love is the answer.” ~ ~“God is love.”~

Arnold Joseph White

Poetic Fragments

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Every small nail
Driven in for the sake of Love
Is the service of the
One.
There is no such thing
As an "insignificant" act of Love.
Every
act of Love-- mowing lawns, digging holes, listening to a friend--
Is an act of true "worship."
Every thought of Love
Is a prayer,
Worth a thousand Lents.

True faith is
Allowing our lives to unfold naturally,
Without concern
Or manipulation.

The voice of God is heard,
Not in the thunder, or in the ocean's mighty roar,
But in the squeal of puppies,
And the silence of desert canyons.
Every touch of every friend
Is God reaching out to you.
Every aid, every help, every assistance,
Of any person who reaches out a helping hand,
Is also God.

Serving God is the quiet mind.
God's glory is not found in selftrumpeting,
The blast of the tuba,
Never in selfdisplay.
Instead, the greatest is the least:
Infinite power and talent
Manifest in the quiet,
Self-abnegating, self-effacing person.
Glory and splendor cry out
In her silence;
The most beautiful diamonds shine
Also in silence.

The good man
Is self-erasing,
The ignorant self-spotlighting.
God's real beauty
Shines in the silent emerald.

There is no glory
Like the silent and tender,
Quiet splendors of the night-sky.
Stars the size of a million earths
Speak most loudly and clearly
The language of sweet silence.
When all are shouting,
Only the most quiet whisper gets attention.

God moves into thee
When there is deep silence.
Otherwise, She is pushed out
By all the self-talk,
All the thoughts and busy-ness.
Holy Spirit settles
Like sun-kissed morning dew
On the silent rose,
And on the silent person.
In deepest equanimity,
Most profound tranquility,
God as Love
Permeates the unspeaking
And untroubled heart.

Relax into God,
And God will relax into you.
Let the Captain
Guide his ship
Of your life.
Do not try
To take over
And drive it yourself.
It will find its home-port,
But only if you let the Captain drive it.
For the heart knows well
Where is its home.

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A Madman, not a Doofus

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Not Only the Worst President, but the Worst Possible President by Jane Smiley, HuffingtonPost.com

How do you build yourself a madman? Well, first you flatter him, and then you try never to make him angry, and then you feed him ideas that flatter him even more by making him seem to himself sentimentally visionary and powerful and righteous. You appeal to his already evident mean streak and his hot temper by reminding him all the time that he has enemies, and you cultivate his religious side so that the sense of righteous victimization inherent in extreme religion comes out. If he were not already an ignorant, dependant, fragile, and rigid person, he would not be susceptible to this sort of conditioning, but by temperament and practice, he has nothing of his own to counter your efforts. Then you hire a few shyster-sycophants like John Yoo to tell him (ignorant as he is, with no actual understanding of the Constitution), that as president he can do whatever he wants.

So, here he is, Little George, caught between the devil (Cheney) and the deep blue sea (fifty-some years of being infantilized by B/S/B). Cheney and Rumsfeld, aided by Rice and Miers and Hughes, convince him that his masculinity will only be enhanced by doing all the masculine things he missed out on over the years, especially making war. And Gerson gives his war a virtuous, godly gloss. And Gerson's words come out of his mouth so often that he believes them and thinks they are his. In the meantime, Karl Rove continues to think that he is the maestro, playing Little George (and his base and the rest of the nation) like his own personal piano. Playing the president, for Rove, means enhancing LIttle George's actual dependency while encouraging him to think that he's the boss (allowing him to call you "Turdblossom", for example, and isn't it telling that "turd" seems to be Bush's favorite imprecation, rather than, say, "fuck"?).

Bush is the worst possible president because he is simultaneously unusually ignorant for a president and unusually shallow, as well as desperate for a success he can call his own. I can see how in a certain sort of era--say an era of prosperity and world peace (can you think of one? I can't) an unusually ignorant and shallow man could bump along in the presidency for a few years without creating havoc and destruction, but these years didn't happen to be peaceful and prosperous, they happened to be delicate and dangerous. Clinton knew that, and he approached his compromising and self-contradictory foreign policy tasks with care. But Bush and his fellow boors were so blind that they adopted as their motto "anything but Clinton", sheer contrarianism and resentment. It wasn't enough to them for the US to be powerful, as it was in the Clinton years, or to be generally respected and appreciated--they wanted something more sensational--power they could feel, power that was erotic and fetishistic, power that was uncomfortable for others, power that would make them feel big by making others feel small, power that would show Clinton up. That's the tit Little George has been sucking for the last six years--the deluded propaganda of the neocons, addressed first to him and through him to the rest of us. What we saw the other night, when he proposed more war against more "foes" was the madman the last six years have created. This time, in his war against Iran, he doesn't even feel the need for minimal PR, as he did before attacking Iraq. All he is bothering with are signals--ships moving here, admirals moving there, consulates being raided in this other place. He no longer cares about the opinions of the voters, the Congress, the generals, the press, and he especially disdains the opinions of B/S/and B. Thanks to Gerson, he identifies his own little ideas with God (a blasphemy, of course, but hey, there's lots of precedent on this), so there's no telling what he will do. We can tell by the evidence of the last two months that whatever it is, it will be exactly the thing that the majority of the voters do not want him to do, exactly the thing that James Baker himself doesn't want him to do. The propaganda that Bush's sponsors and handlers have poured forth has ceased to persuade the voters but succeeded beyond all measure in convincing the man himself. He will tell himself that God is talking to him, or that he is possessed of an extra measure of courage, or he that he is simply compelled to do whatever it is. The soldiers will pay the price in blood. We will pay the price in money. The Iraqis will pay the price in horror. The Iranians will pay the price, possibly, in the almost unimaginable terror of nuclear attack. Probably, the Israelis will pay the price, too.

Little George isn't the same guy he was in 2000, the guy described by Gail Sheehy in her Vanity Fair profile--hyper-competitive and dyslexic, prone to cheat at games, always swinging between screwing up and making up, hating criticism and disagreement, careless of others but often charming. He is no longer the guy who the Republicans thought they could control (unlike, say, McCain). The small pathologies of Bush the candidate have, thanks to the purposes of the neocons and the religious right, been enhanced and upgraded. We have a bona fide madman now, who thinks of himself in a grandiose way as single-handedly turning the tide of history. Some of his Frankensteins have bailed, some haven't dared to, and others still seem to believe. His actions and his orders, especially about Iran, seem to be telling us that he will stop at nothing to prove his dominance. The elder Bush(es), Scrowcroft, Baker, and their friends, Cheney, Rumsfeld, Gerson, and the neocons have made the monster and in the process endangered the country, the Constitution, and the world, not to mention the sanity of wretches like Jose Padilla (for an analysis of the real reason Gitmo continues to exist, see Dahlia Lithwick's article in Slate, here. Maybe the bums planned this mess for their own profit, or maybe they planned to profit without mess; maybe some of them regret what they have wrought. However, they all share the blame for whatever he does next.

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(Thanks to Teresa Ramsey.)