Just look at this picture. You can smell it, can't you?
There's nothing quite like the smell of bacon. That salty, sizzly goodness, especially fried to a crispy dark brown in an iron skillet, is one of the best smells and flavors around. Maybe it's my pioneer Indiana roots, iron skillets used to cook salt pork over an open fire in the hearth of a log cabin, the abundance of pork, raised in Southwestern Indiana, packed and shipped to far away ports, like New Orleans...
Yep, I have an affinity for bacon, especially thick cut, meaty bacon. The fat has to be brown and crispy. If it's springy and chewy, I gag. I'll eat it cut to any thickness, but I prefer the thicker cuts.
The smell of it frying in the morning immediately takes me back in time.
My dad was a breakfast connoisseur, often getting up early to make it for himself or the fam. Bacon, spam, mush, eggs, potatoes and such were typically on the menu. If you don't know mush, you don't have Appalachian roots (I see ya Kentucky and Southern Indiana!). But the smell of bacon often reminds me of early childhood and dad on the weekends in the kitchen. Mom liked to sleep in.
My Uncle John would be the first adult up on trips to our Sullivan, Indiana, cabin. I'd be sleeping on the cool sheen of Grandma Doyle's old couch in the living room and on the other side of the bar, Uncle John would be banging around in the kitchen. I'd hear the iron skillet come out and soon the sound and smell of bacon! That would rouse me from sleep the quickest. The smell of bacon reminds me of those cool, musty mornings in that old cabin, Dad and Uncle Al asleep on old Army cots on the screened porch, kids sprawled about the floor in sleeping bags, the smell of the smoldering fire pit wafting through the open windows. There was dampness from the swampy land Grandpa Doyle purchased for the family cabin, a low spot on Greenbriar Lake, a spring-fed strip mine pit, abandoned in the late 40's/early 50's.
There were countless mornings at my house, cooking breakfast for my girls, bacon first into the skillet before scrambling eggs or making muffins, toast or biscuits. Thanks to my Dad, I've always been a fan of breakfast. First thing when I get up, the coffee is brewing and I'm getting food out of the fridge. My girls would often wake to that glorious smell. It signifies some of the simplest, yet happiest memories for me of fatherhood. And when we'd go to the family cabin, I'd be the one up early banging around the kitchen, looking for that old skillet. My girls would be asleep on inflatable mattresses just long enough for their short bodies, built-in Disney Princess sleeping bags on top. The couch long gone, along with the interior walls, my ex and I would have just slept through the night on an inflatable mattress of our own. A day of fishing, swimming, exploring and rowing would usually begin with the smell of bacon and that smoldering firepit just outside the cabin. Sometimes, I'd even regnite the coals and cook out there over the open flame.
That brings me full circle to my pioneer roots.
Our cabin, built by Dad's father, was about two counties north of where Mom's family, my pioneer ancestors from the East Coast, settled circa 1811. In those days, rough hewn logs from recently felled trees were notched and placed, like Lincoln Logs, into a rectangular shelter, fireplace at one end for heat and for cooking. I can imagine my 5th great uncles banging around with the iron skillet and setting some salted pork or smoked bacon in to start sizzling to perfection.
That smell, tops among all other food smells (garlic being a close second), is what takes me right back to my childhood, to the cabin, to fatherhood and makes me very happy. The payoff, the thick, crispy breakfast meat, is the end result every time. Paired with a couple of over-medium eggs and skillet potatoes, maybe an English muffin hot and buttered, is one of my favorite meals, so good I'd eat it three times a day!
I posted to Facebook on May 30 that I was about to celebrate one year since returning to my happy place--Fort Myers Beach, FL. It was May 30, 2023, that my brother and I loaded what I had left since leaving Evansville (and most of my things) and made a road trip south. We drove down Interstate 65 from the southside of Indianapolis (Wannamaker, to be exact) all the way to Panama City Beach, taking U.S. 231 out of Montgomery, AL, to the white sand shores of the Florida Panhandle. We landed at my sister, Heidi Jacob's, new place that evening.
Wasting no time on May 31, we travelled down I-10 and made a stop in Tallahassee. I spent many years in the Capital City, starting my adult life, going to college, gaining employment and beginning a family there (1986-2006; 2014-2020). My brother, 10 years my junior, spent some of his formative years, 1986-89, in a three-bedroom apartment. We drove through the old complex where we once lived, then toured campus and several areas of town, before re-starting our journey to SWFL.
It was after dark the night of the 31st last May, that he and I pulled onto a dark and desolate barrier island still marked by devastation. There was an uneasy, eerie feeling as we drove under the crosswalk at Margaritaville and south down Estero Blvd. The place looked like a ghost town, the shells of buildings and piles of debris everywhere. Not many street lights were in operation at the north end, so we drove slowly down that dark, desolate road. Making the turn at Connecticut St and into the Beach Baptist property, it still felt very surreal. Knocking on Pastor Shawn's door at 9:30 at night, a surprise visitor with a brother he'd never even met, was equally as surreal.
He embraced me like a brother (which he has been since 2011) and instructed me where to store my things and that "work begins at 9:00," under the tent. I learned the next day that the church had just erected the tent and had moved most of what was stored under the damaged church building into it. My job began promptly at 8:30 June 1st, helping Jerry Warren and a few volunteers that morning move pallets, break down boxes and get the place organized. They were reopening their food pantry and disaster resource center and setting up a temporary worship center under the tent. I helped there through the summer heat and made lasting friendships.
At the end of our workday, I ventured over to the beach for the second or third time since my arrival the night before. I couldn't believe I had awakened that day on MY BEACH!!! I headed over from the tent, sweaty, a trucker cap hiding my wet, disheveled hair, and made a video for my daughters to let them know I was safe and sound.
My beard, as you can see in the above video, was epic! I kept that for several months until a female friend told me how badly it aged me. Good thing I shaved it, too, as my girlfriend doesn't care for it...AT. ALL! (And honestly, I was starting to look like Captain Caveman, LOL!)
Fast forward almost four months and we were preparing for the first anniversary of Ian on September 28, 2023. I'd met Jenn Turbeville while volunteering at the church. We sat down in July for our first extended conversation, which turned into an FMB Islander interview, about the commemoration to be held that day, and became REVIVE THE VIBE.
So I should back up a bit...
I was serving under the big, hot tent in early July when the thought occurred to me that, other than Beach Talk Radio, no one was really covering island news. I had once worked for the Island Sand Paper, an FMB-specific weekly, a decade ago. I decided I would start telling the island's stories once again, so I started the online paper, the FMB Islander.
Back to September 28th, and the festivities were underway at Bayside Park and in the last two blocks of Old San Carlos Blvd. in the island's "downtown district." I'm enjoying a beverage as I walk through a lively crowd at Wahoo Willie's. I get pulled over to a bayside-facing table by an old friend, a dear friend from Indiana who's lived down here in the Iona area for decades! She informed me, when I asked about my ex, that she was available after getting out of a 10-year marriage.
Hold the phone. Come again??
That planted the seed that months later took root and grew into a beautiful new relationship. But in the meantime, I reconnected with several old friends, including my partner in crime (and beach misfit and fatherhood) Christopher Alward. We became reacquainted while he was recovering from a leg amputation just below his knee. Around Thanksgiving 2023, he lost his other leg and I spent some time at Gulf Coast Medical Center with him. He kept me abreast of the ex's whereabouts as they'd kept up a decades-long friendship through social media and occasional interaction. She'd helped him and his neighbors out in the immediate aftermath of Hurricane Ian.
Alward took me in when I needed a place to stay and he needed companionship and someone to help out with his dog, cooking, cleaning, shopping, etc. While I was living in his off-island apartment, I reached out by text to the only number I had for Lynn Ann Farber, the woman I'd left on Mango St, FMB, February 13, 2014. It was months before she'd respond that the old Fort Wayne, IN, area code number was still her cell number.
I was dealing with health issues at the time and our paths had crossed so many times, including the hospital in late January. She'd dropped a patient to the ER where I was staying to await my pacemaker surgery Jan. 25, 2024. She contemplated coming to find me and check on my condition. She was worried about me, but I was completely unaware. I had thought I might run into her there. From her profile picture on Facebook, I'd known that she'd been working in EMS as an emergency medical technician for Lee County.
It wasn't two weeks late that she finally reached out for conversation, first by text from that old number I still had in my phone. Apparently, that wasn't all I'd saved for her. There was still unresolved business and a lot of love left in my heart from all those years ago (nearly a DECADE TO THE DAY!). It was February 10th when our text conversation at 4:45 p.m. turned into hours of phone conversation and a desire to reconnect. Two days later, she was at the apartment with Alward and I sharing drinks, memories and laughs. It felt like the decade between the three of us had magically vanished in mere hours. She wasn't even IN our apartment before the laughter over some shenanigans had begun.
Lynn and Alward shenanigans at Danny's Saloon in March
I met her in the parking lot and she was rummaging through her work gear in the SUV. Within minutes, I was doubled over laughing with her as I donned her jumpsuit, helmet and EMS gear, including blue latex gloves. The only thing that wouldn't fit me (or make it into that apartment) were her work boots. They were too small for my size 12.5 feet. The connection was instantaneous. The minute we locked eyes, it was over for the both of us.
Not long after, I was living with her back on the island, which I had missed for MONTHS by that point! Our love affair restarted, we boasted that we were rewriting the end of our story. We still are.
To recap, I returned to this beach the night of May 31, 2023. The next morning, I wasted no time grafting myself back into my first beach family, the Cristsers and their Beach Baptist family. I met my newest sister, DebyRoxane, that first morning and my brother, Jerry Warren, June 1st. He started bossing me around immediately and we joked about his OCD way of doing things and his "Illinois engineering" degree. LMAO!
In the first week, I reconnected with my musical brother, Craig Nelms, who had me volunteering at the church's food pantry (Choice Market) way back in 2011. So many new friends were made under that tent in the first two months I was here. I even joined Nelms' band "Simply-Fi" in August and played through some serious health concerns until mid-January. It was a blast! I didn't even own a set of drums anymore, but we worked out a solution.
Fred Johnson, the band's guitarist through December, became another musical brother and we remain in contact to this very day. In fact, he tagged me yesterday in a comment on FB. So many others, like Ollie Curan, Howie Hoffman, Turtle Rick, Jenn (who I mentioned above) and "Aunt" Pat, island icons, became instant friends. I found a home on the island among them, moving into a party house behind the Catholic Church until I moved in with Chris Alward, circa Thanksgiving Weekend.
So many great memories have been made this last year and three weeks on the beach, at places like Rude Shrimp, Wahoo Willie's, Danny's Saloon, The Whale, Times Square...
My work writing and reporting for the FMB Islander has introduced me to so many more friends than I would have otherwise met. Going to the Tiki Bar at the Lighthouse for NFL Sundays introduced me to more Hoosiers (and Colts fans) than I even knew existed on this island! I also met lots of Packers, Vikings, Bears and Browns fans, too! This island is made up mostly of Midwesterners! I've even made connections to my Indianapolis high school (our football coach's sister lives mid-island).
It has been a joy to relocate back to this seven-mile stretch of paradise. If I ever leave here, it'll either be for a tiny houseboat in Key West or by body bag. Period.
There are many reasons why people might hurt those they love, includingintentional and unintentional actions.Some reasons might include:
Emotional baggage: This could include guilt, self-loathing, or shame.
Fear: This could be a fear of intimacy, losing someone, or being unmasked.
Control: This could be a desire to assert control or independence.
Boundaries: This could be testing relationship boundaries.
Expectations: This could be expecting a lot from the other person.
Overreaction: This could be overreacting to a perceived slight.
Self-destructive behavior: This could include lying, cheating, or betraying.
Responsibility: This could be the responsibility that comes with being in love, where words and actions can have a big impact on someone else. (From Google AI)
"Once you've triggered them, they are going to resort to the same pattern behavior and speak from their trauma, not from their truth." ~Me
It's a sad fact of life that we shit all over the people closest to us. We take for granted the people in our lives, especially our families, because they've always been there for us. As close as you can possibly get to unconditional love in this life is with those in your inner circle. And because they typically won't leave you, they suffer your insufferability. They put up with all your shit.
I've been getting shit on a lot lately.
And I hate being taken for granted. I'm a nice guy and a good person, so it happens WAY too often. But it only hurts to your core when it's done by those you love most in this world.
In recent weeks, I've had reason to call out some pretty bad behaviors in those closest to me. Pattern behaviors by some, just outright bad behavior by others. And each time, it was turned around on me and I ended up getting viscously attacked.
The attacks seemed particularly viscous because of their nature, the reason and the target.
I didn't do anything to bring on the attacks. Like I said, I was merely making observations and pointing out particularly bad behaviors, acts of self-sabotage and such.
It takes a real man to own up to his own shortcomings. I've done that since my early 30's. I've been pretty transparent about my issues, my human faults and bad behaviors. I've tried to practice humility, like all the spiritual gurus have taught from Confucius through Jesus and Mohammed. I've blogged about it here DOZENS of times. It's central to my evolving faith and personality. So why can't I expect that same self-awareness from those I love most??
It seems to escape them, despite them all being intelligent, reasonably mature individuals.
But instead of owning their bad behaviors, they felt it necessary to project and deflect by lashing out at me and attacking my character. I'm sorry, what? My character didn't suddenly change because you perceive that I'm attacking you! The good person that you know me to be didn't suddenly become evil incarnate just because you don't like what I said. How about taking a LOOK IN THE MIRROR and see if what I pointed out is true. They KNEW that it was and that's why it bothered them so bad.
I get it. People don't like to be called on their shit. It's embarassing, humbling, uncomfortable, inconvenient...and can seem like an attack, especially to those who can't take one ounce of criticism. Often those who've suffered CPTSD brought on by childhood trauma can't take any criticism AT ALL! It's ALWAYS perceived as an attack.
But I didn't wake up one day and just decide to go on the offensive and start attacking those that I love. Why would I do that? I'm not a self-sabotager. I'm self aware. I'm the same person that all of those closest to me learned to love and admire. My behavior isn't at issue.
Still, I call out the behavior, not in a mean, vindictive or judgmental way, just as a conscious observer of those whom I care about most. Do I want them to live their lives in denial, repeating the same dangerous patterns or repeating the same false narrative so many times that they actually believe it? HELL TO THE NO!!!
If I love you, I'm not going to sit idly by and watch you spiral out of control, crash to the ground and burn to death! That's not what loving individuals who care about you DO!
But in the moment, after being called out, they can't be expected to behave rationally or deal with your criticism like a mature adult. Once you've triggered them, they are going to resort to the same pattern behavior and speak from their trauma, not from their truth. (QUOTE THAT!)
I've experienced this many times. I let things go until they become untenable, then I choose to bring receipts to the conversation where I sit them down and say, "Hey, enough. This is harmful behavior. It's hurting both of us. And that's not okay."
Then my character gets assassinated?
I'm sorry, in what universe is that acceptable?
Why am *I* now on the defensive? Did I put a gun to your head and say "mistreat me?" Did I do the bad behavior that I'm calling out? Is it my pattern being observed and corrected? NOPE! I did nothing but try to love you and bring some awareness to your behavior, as difficult as it was for me to do so after years of observation.
I'll be bluntly honest here. I was triggered most recently by my own daughters. The bad behavior I called out was snubbing me on Father's Day. Instead of an "I'm sorry" or "I forgot, my bad," I got a litany of excuses as to why I DON'T DESERVE to be honored and how I NEVER EARNED the title nor the respect.
EXCUSE ME?
I didn't choose you, adopt you and raise you?
If that really wasn't me all those years, in all those photos and on the adoption paperwork. WHO THE FUCK WAS IT??!?!?!
And so they chose not only to disrespect me on the one day of the year devoted to fatherhood, they viscously came at me with a distorted version of reality and a bunch of unfounded, personal attacks...attacks on my character.
I was devastated yesterday by their words. It cut me TO THE ABSOLUTE CORE of my being! And I did nothing wrong. I merely pointed out that I'd been dissed and hurt by their actions.
I'm not allowed to have a voice? Or feelings about it?
I sure let them have a voice. All day, I put up with their verbal abuse and baseless allegations, none so serious that I couldn't post here, but I'm not trying to air the details of our "dirty laundry." It's just typical, I'm an adult now and I know everything nonsense that we've all experienced. Our parents were the devil, mistreated us daily and are the source of EVERYTHING that is wrong in our lives. (Cry me a river, kids! I have the t-shirt.)
But, seriously, of all the people in their inner circle, who loved them, I was the LEAST toxic or harmful to them. I didn't shit all over them. But they sure did me!
I've been their punching bag for a number of years. They know that I can take it. I'm still going to absorb the blows and love them to my core...as I always have.
They had a great dad in me.
I always loved them, told them so, showed them with my actions and even expressed how lucky I felt to have "won the Dad lottery." If they heard that last part once, they heard it HUNDREDS OF TIMES!
And not only do I have receipts for this, I have a long fucking line of witnesses who know me personally, who saw the devoted, loving father I have always been to my two daughters.
THAT'S why this hurt so bad. It was unfounded, uncalled for and untrue. I know the person I am. I know the person THEY HELPED me to become. Being a dad is the single most important thing I've done in my life that's taught me the most valuable lessons about life and who I really am. I've always felt that way about being their Dad. Best. Decision. Ever!
But they don't get to speak my truth for me. They don't get to now, after 20 and 23 years of loving them to my core, rewrite history. I was NOT NOR EVER CLAIMED TO BE a perfect person or father. I am a flawed human being. But I did a HELLUVALOT better than my dad and his dad before him. And as time went by, I became an even better dad and version of myself. ASK. ANYONE! As I said, I have a LONG LINE of witnesses who can testify.
As to the others in my inner circle who have hurt me recently, just know it speaks volumes about YOUR CHARACTER not mine. So proceed with your character assissination of me if it makes you feel better. I won't stand for it, though. I KNOW WHO "I AM." It is a reflection of your human flaws and not my own. As I said, I've owned my shit. Now own yours. I'm not going to keep pointing it out.
And in conclusion, if anyone reading this would like to see real change in their life and experience some different results:.
DO. SOMETHING. DIFFERENT.
Repeating the same pattern behavior and expecting different results is a long-held urban dictionary definition of INSANITY. Doing the same shit, expecting different results. How does that work in any recipe. Going to put bananas in this bread, follow the recipe to a "T," but expect Pineapple Cake instead of Banana Bread. With or without walnuts, that IS NUTS! You get out what you put in. "Same shit, different day" routines don't make different results EVER. Period. You cut a dress from the same pattern and 100% of the time, you get the same result. That floral print sundress isn't going to become a Versace-wannabe ball gown. Do something different. Don't follow your pattern.
He replied: “Watch out that you are not deceived. For many will come in my name, claiming, ‘I am he,’ and, ‘The time is near.’ Do not follow them. Luke 21:8 (red letters)
But I am afraid that just as Eve was deceived by the serpent’s cunning, your minds may somehow be led astray from your sincere and pure devotion to Christ. 2 Cor. 11:3 (a follow-up to 1 Cor. 6:9 which warns that “wrongdoers” will never inherit God’s kingdom)
Do not be deceived: God cannot be mocked. A man reaps what he sows. Gal. 6:7
Revelation gives multiple warnings to the faithful not to be deceived by “the beast,” the devil” or others. Too many American Christians have not heeded the warnings, have not discerned or rightly judged the fruit. DJT’s fruit has borne consequences. He is reaping EXACTLY that which he’s sown. DO NOT BE DECEIVED. But church people are not always the brightest bulbs in the bunch or the sharpest tools in the shed, which makes them easy marks for sleazy, slimy business men (snake oil salesmen) like DJT…or the antichrist.
Look at the MAGA(t) minions. These “master race” bigots run around in their “Trump is my savior” T-shirts, draped in Trump flags, stumped by softball questions given by local reporters, that befuddled look in their eyes. They could no more clarify their position on GOP talking points than the man on the moon. They simply regurgitate talking points from the propaganda machine, Fox News, Q’anon message boards or talk in the church fellowship hall. Ignorant and uninformed sheeple who drink the orange koolaid and wouldn’t care if their cult leader were serving time for murder on death row. It wouldn’t disqualify him. They’d rally behind him, send him their money and buy his Bibles.
It’s nuts. And they would have you believe that they are “the silent majority” about to sweep the polls in November. If that WERE the case, why hasn’t DJT ever won in a landslide? Why has he never even garnered a majority of the popular vote??? WHY, pray tell, did he need to manufacture votes or otherwise interfere in the electoral process?
THE TRUTH IS…
The GOP is splintered.
Republicans do NOT speak with one voice. There are plenty of NEVER TRUMPers inside their party. Look at The Lincoln Project who has made it their sole aim to KEEP HIM FROM OFFICE! More recently, Republicans For The Rule of Law also do not support DJT. Their latest video, “Goodbye, and Good Riddance,” shows his face with #ConvictTrump over the top. The website of Republican Accountability bears the headline, “We’re reminding Americans that we still need accountability for January 6th.”
MAGA(t)s do NOT represent the whole of the party, though listening to the leaders on Capitol Hill you’d never know it. Those dirtbags are so addicted to power and so desperately want to hold onto it, they see no other way than to cast their lot with the minions. GOOD LUCK WITH THAT!
Don’t fall for their smoke-and-mirrors, snake oil sales pitch, Fox (Faux) News talking points. They are killing the Grand Ol’ Party, the Party of Lincoln.
I haven't posted much political content this year. I've been more focused on my health and reconnecting with an old flame. But with the recent conviction of Donald J. Trump and all the fanfare on social media, I felt the need to say something on this blog.
I was walking home from the grocery store on my island and ran across a work pickup with this window cling on the back of the cab. "Impeach Biden," is a ludicrous slogan (and pipe dream) meant to disparage the current president, the one who won the 2020 vote legally and fairly. He's NOT the one who interfered with the election! The other doofus is. He's not the one under investigation for criminality inside and outside the White House. There aren't even any TRUMPED up charges against him upon which to base an impeachment trial. That's what makes this window cling ridiculous. It is pointless and holds no merit.
IT IS IRONIC, THOUGH...
Ironic in the fact that the FORMER president actually underwent TWO impeachment hearings in the halls of Congress. Not once, but twice. No trumped up charges, only allegations supported by eyewitnesses and mountains of evidence. In my eyes, the douchebag WAS impeached.
He was also charged in a civil suit of sexual assault. He was convicted of paying off porn star Stormy Daniels after an illicit affair with her while current wife, Melania Trump, was pregnant with his child. Michael Cohen, who handled the hush money payoff, testified under oath that when he asked the former president if he was worried about the wife finding out, the orange buffoon's response was that he wouldn't be on the market long. His own wife, like every woman (or person), in the raging narcissist's life is 100% expendable. Once they aren't providing his "narc supply" (the goal of every narcissist to get their ego needs met), they are of no use to him. He just didn't want Ms. Daniels selling her story to a publisher, the press or the highest bidder. It would look bad for him.
NOT WITH HIS FOLLOWERS...
Nope, the slimy, curmudgeonly MAGA(t) masses who lap up his drivel and love every assault, sexual or otherwise, didn't think it looked bad at all. Cheat on your wife. Pay off the porn star. Laugh it off with your typical locker room vernacular. They just love their felons! I mean, their Christian Nationalist/Fascist Dictators! They'll continue to buy his Bibles, his hats, his lies and financially back his campaign for re-election this year. MORONS!
The 34 felony convictions did not bother them one iota, many of them Bible-believing Christians. The assault on our Constitution, the assault of women (multiple), the locker room talk, the illegal business dealings (his CEO is a convicted felon, too), the attempted coup to stop the peaceful transition of power and his inability to quote even ONE SCRIPTURE from the Bibles he's selling all points them to the logical conclusion that he's a moral guy, a Christ-like person.
UMMMMM...
Excuse me while I puke! Didn't Jesus take a bullwhip and kick people out of the Temple, turning over tables and tongue-lashing the "bible salesmen" of his day? Peculiar. Aren't there New Testament Scriptures, and I'm thinking primarily in that last book, about the anti-Christ and how easily he dupes Christians and the ignorant, heathen masses in the "end times?"
Stupid memes like this have been circulating on social media to compare what Trump is going through (the justice system) to Jesus Christ (persecution as a leftist rabbi)
Yeah, the orange one doesn't favor Damien from The Omen films at all.
On the contrary, his duped minions have taken to social media in the weeks since his conviction ON 34 FELONY COUNTS to compare their evil cult leader to Jesus Christ, Himself!!! NO LIE! If I've seen the comparisons once on Facebook, alone, I've seen them a gazillion times! Excuse me, the stomach bile is in my throat again.
That, in itself, is blasphemy. Do these dolts even OPEN their Bibles??? I haven't opened one in years and I can see it plain as the nose on my face!
I've seen this one posted over and over to Facebook. I see it in my news feed and I immediately SNOOZE the person, at the very least.
You don't ADD TO or TAKEAWAY from the "inerrant word of god," so the fundamental faithful say. Yet, here's this known snake oil salesman adding the U.S. Constitution and Declaration of Independence to the Holy Book. I mean, it makes perfect sense, since Christianity started on these shores all those years ago. Oh, wait, no that was the Middle East in about 80-120 A.D.
Christianity started as a Messianic sect of Judaism in the first century. The Bible was codified by the CATHOLIC CHURCH in the fourth century by a council of bishops (SHHHH! Most American Christians don't even know this and think the Catholics are heretics and demon worshippers!).
We are NOT a Christian nation, so Marjorie Taylor Knitwit can sit down with her nationalist dreams and STFU! Many of our founding forefathers were DEISTS, not necessarily Christian. They didn't set up our republic as any one religion. Pretty sure they mandated the separation of church and state, meaning religion has no seat at the table and governments can't interfere with religious practices. The two are to remain separate, but don't tell that the mega-church-pastoring, 501(c)3-protected billionaires who preach politics every week!
Religion is the opiate of the masses, it's been said.
History is bound to repeat itself.
We don't need to return America to her 1930's self. That's where the MAGA(t) morons get their moronic slogan--from 1930's Nazi propaganda when Hitler and the KKK were still popular among WASP-y Americans. They were duped back then, during the worst depression in history, that we were a great nation. Women, black citizens and those in the gay community didn't find it so great. History is written and rewritten by the rich, white elites in power, the same ones who've ALWAYS held the power. And if we don't learn from it--if we don't even know where the MAGA slogan came from--then we are doomed, as the prophets foretold.
Just quit with the Jesus comparisons, already! And quit shoving your narrow-minded, mega church mentality down all our throats. I could out-quote the Bible to most of you, ignorant hypocrites, buying Trump Bibles and backing the convicted rapist and felon! Jesus would label you a "brood of vipers."
I just think your ignorant, opiate-addicted, easily duped FOOLS!
There is no choice, in my mind, but to rebut and rebuke fascism in any and all forms, and support the guy who's been about our republic his whole life, dedicated his life to it, in fact. He's old. He's a career politician. SO F-IN WHAT??? You want four years of that convict and lunatic with the wispy, orange combover and spray tan???
