“Whom the gods intend to destroy, they first make mad” - The Dangerous Lunatic Asylum of Trump and His Cult as His Third Arraignment Looms
Following Abraham Lincoln’s victory in the election of 1860 long time abolitionist writer and editor of The Liberator wrote:
Never had the truth of the ancient proverb “Whom the gods intend to destroy, they first make mad” been more signally illustrated than in the condition of southern slaveholders following Lincoln’s election. They were insane from their fears, their guilty forebodings, their lust for power and rule, hatred of free institutions, their merited consciousness of merited judgments; so that they may be properly classed as the inmates of a lunatic asylum. Their dread of Mr. Lincoln, of his Administration, of the Republican Party demonstrated their insanity. In vain did Mr. Lincoln tell them, “I do not stand pledged to the abolition of slavery where it already exists.” They raved just as fiercely as though he were another John Brown, armed for southern invasion and universal emancipation In vain did the Republican party present one point of antagonism to slavery—to wit, no more territorial expansion. In vain did that party exhibit the utmost caution not to give offense to any other direction—and make itself hoarse in uttering professions of loyalty to the Constitution and the Union. The South protested that its designs were infernal, and for them was “sleep no more!” Were these not the signs of a demented people?
Mark Twain reportedly said, “History doesn’t repeat itself, but it often Rhymes.” It is hard to believe that 160 years following the election of 1860 that former President Trump and his Cult, otherwise known as the Republican Party, have devolved into the same kind of insanity as the pro-slavery Southern Democrats, who first fractured their Churches in the 1840s, national institutions in the 1850s, and their party in 1860, and finally the nation in 1861.
Last night in my article about the indictment of the twice impeached and thrice indicted former President Donald Trump, I discussed the people who made him possible. I blamed the Right Wing political and religious machine that seized power over the Republican Party during a five decade long process of intense propaganda and lies, that indoctrinated the Republican base through a campaign of fear mongering to believe the worst about their fellow citizens, and to act on that fear by using their new found political power to elect a man whose life and actions were antithetical to all that they claimed to hold dear, even reinterpreting their deeply held religious beliefs in such a manner to justify actions that were the complete opposite to a message that barely a decade before they defended.
In 1994, conservative scion Barry Goldwater told John Dean in his book Conservatives Without Conscience:
“Mark my word, if and when these preachers get control of the [Republican] party, and they’re sure trying to do so, it’s going to be a terrible damn problem. Frankly, these people frighten me. Politics and governing demand compromise. But these Christians believe they are acting in the name of God, so they can’t and won’t compromise. I know, I’ve tried to deal with them.”
Above all people the Christian Nationalists who seized control of the Republican Party between 1976 and 2016 are the most responsible for the political monster named Donald Trump. Without them Trump could have never been nominated or elected.
One can also blame the incessant propaganda of Right Wing radio hosts like Rush Limbaugh, and the Fox News Network, but it was the nefarious work of men like Jerry Falwell, Pat Robertson, James Dobson, D. James Kennedy, Francis Schaefer, Tim LaHaye, David Barton, Paul Weyrich, Phylis Shlafly, Franklin Graham, and one most have not heard of, Rousas John Rushdoony, who believed that Old Testament civil law should be binding on the people of the United States. Rushdoony’s son-in-law, Gary North was an influential advisor to Ron and Rand Paul as well as many other GOP candidates was a leader in what is called Christian Dominionism, a theological basis of Christian Nationalism. North wrote:
“The long-term goal of Christians in politics should be to gain exclusive control over the franchise. Those who refuse to submit publicly to the eternal sanctions of God by submitting to His Church’s public marks of the covenant–baptism and holy communion–must be denied citizenship, just as they were in ancient Israel.”
Likewise, their activist groups such as the Moral Majority, Focus on the Family, the American Family Association, the Eagle Forum, the Christian Coalition, Concerned Women for America, the Christian Voice, and a host of others helped turn Evangelical Christianity into a first a reliable instrument of the Republican Party, and then to Donald Trump.
This is hard for me to say because until 2004 I was a reliable part of that movement, but by 2005 I began to have qualms, and when following my return from Iraq in 2008 the GOP selected Sarah Palin as its Vice Presidential nominee, I knew that the party I had been loyal to since I was a volunteer for the Ford Campaign, was on a course to oblivion. Then came the Tea Party, the Freedom Caucus, and the rejection of any sense of moderation after Mitt Romney’s defeat in 2012.
We have to be concerned at the chaos the Trump and his Cult will create following this indictment for Trump’s involvement in the insurrection of January 6th, 2021. Trump will be arraigned in Washington D.C. tomorrow. That is rather short notice for the Patriot Front, the Oath Keepers, whatever remains of the Proud Boys and other seditionist Right Wing paramilitaries to organize a massive protest in the Capitol, but they might commit smaller violent acts in the city or elsewhere. The one thing thing that is certain is their vitriol and threats will ramp up far beyond their already ludicrous level.
One of the most troubling things is that Republican leaders who should know better cannot stop lying for Trump, even after he savaged every one of them, and in some cases their family members in the 2016 GOP primaries. But now, like cowardly stooges they brazenly lie about events that we have all seen happen, including to them. Many of the most prominent Evangelical Christian leaders still treat Trump as as someone akin to a savior figure and refuse to even mildly criticize him. With every scandal, every offense, every lie, every indictment his Cult becomes more unified.
The lack of courage to stand up for their beliefs in regard to Trump is frightening. Likewise, the few GOP elected leaders, and Evangelical Christian leaders who have stood against Trump by telling the truth, find themselves isolated with no support. Robert Jeffress, the influential pastor of First Baptist Church of Dallas, Texas has been a long time defender of Trump who has so twisted his views on the morality of a leader to support Trump is one of them. At one time held that Christians should vote for leaders who not only said that they were Christians, but actually lived ethical lives that were in accordance with Christian teaching. He also was adamant about leaders needing to have a relationship with Christ that guided their actions, writing in his book The Twilight’s Last Gleaming: ““Suppose a hostile nation is threatening the security of our country. Would you prefer a president who only looked within himself and to his advisers for guidance? Or would you feel more secure with a president who sought the best counsel of others but also looked to God for direction?”. But in 2016 he flipped and during interviews supporting Trump described government as a “strongman to protect its citizens against evildoers,” adding, “I don’t care about that candidate’s tone or vocabulary, I want the meanest, toughest son of a you-know-what I can find, and I believe that’s biblical.” (see John Fea, Believe Me: the Evangelical Road to Donald Trump). So much for a leader that sought God’s direction.
What we have to admit is that the Christian Right has sacrificed everything that it supposedly stood for be it traditional Christian moral values, and their supposed veneration of the moral standards that our founders said were necessary for elected leaders, including those of Madison in Federalist 57:
“The aim of every political Constitution is or ought to be first to obtain for rulers, men who possess most wisdom to discern, and most virtue to pursue the common good of the society, and in the next place, to take the most effectual precautions for keeping them virtuous, whilst they continue to hold their public trust.”
But all of these deeply held spiritual and political values were thrown into the gutter in 2016, 2020, and today. Trump’s perfidious morality, and encouragement of violence barely registers as important to them. This is why I am so concerned. For all of our pious pretentiousness, with few exceptions in history, Christians, especially those of White European stock, don’t have a great history of tolerance and acceptance of others, or for protecting others civil or human rights.
What happens in the coming days and months will be pivotal in our lives and that of our lives and democracy. That begins at Trump’s arraignment in Washington D.C. tomorrow, and how Trump’s supporters, Christian or otherwise respond. Unfortunately, based on their initial reactions, that does not promise to be good for anyone, even if his supporters commit no acts of violence tomorrow. But there still is time as Tom Nichols wrote in The Atlantic:
The GOP base, controlled by Trump’s cult of personality, will likely never admit its mistake: As my colleague Peter Wehner writes, Trump’s record of “lawlessness and depravity” means nothing to Republicans. But other Republicans now, more than ever, face a moment of truth. They must decide if they are partisans or patriots. They can no longer claim to be both.
Those who believe in our Constitution, laws, institutions, and democracy must remain strong, speak the truth, and stop worrying if it costs us friends or family members. As Nichols wrote:
No one, including me, wants to lose friends or chill valued relationships over so small a man as Trump. But our democracy is about to go into legal and electoral battle for its own survival. If we don’t speak up—to one another, as well as to the media and to our elected officials—and Trump defeats us all by regaining power and making a mockery of American democracy, then we’ll all have lost a lot more than a few friendships. We face in Trump a dedicated enemy of our Constitution, and if he returns to office, his next “administration” will be a gang of felons, goons, and resentful mediocrities, all of whom will gladly serve Trump’s sociopathic needs while greedily dividing the spoils of power.
Until tomorrow…