Tag: socialism

The New Communism—The Influencers

This morning while starting to write this post, I happened to notice the following news headline on my iPhone:

AOC pushes ‘democratic socialist’ foreign policy: More ‘decolonization,’ less ‘exploitation’

AOC (Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez) goes on to say in the article that the U.S. needs to “ramp up its climate efforts” and leave behind its legacy of imperialism, colonialism, exploitation, & ‘security state.’ She emphatically declares that “TRADE POLICY IS CLIMATE POLICY.”

Unless I’m missing the point here, AOC wants the U.S. to abandon its imperialistic approach to foreign policy and at the same time, dictate how sovereign nations should conform to ‘climate benchmarks’ imposed on them through their trade agreements with the U.S.

Sounds contradictory but this is exactly how the new communists want to expand their revolution globally by using the United States as a role model for the rest of the world. But in order for that to happen in a moral and material way, the “system,” meaning our society, must be totally transformed, not reformed, from a capitalist society into a communist society.

Lately, many of the commentators and contributors on Fox News opinion/news shows on the Web, particularly Laura Ingraham, Sean Hannity, and Tucker Carlson, have been at a loss to explain why the 2020 Democratic Presidential candidates are endorsing such extreme policies. Many have stated that the current Democratic Party is unrecognizable from the party of JFK, Clinton, and even BHO. In reality, the Democratic Party has become the New Socialist Democratic Party. Many blame the influence of AOC and the other members of The Squad but I believe these new mainstream democrats are a product of the ideology espoused by radicals from the 1960s and are being influenced today by the New Communism and its architect, Bob Avakian.

Bob Avakian
Bob Avakian
https://revcom.us

So, who the heck is Bob Avakian? I never heard of him until recently when I stumbled upon the REVCOM.US (REVolutionary COMmunist?) website. What particularly struck me on the site was the introduction to a writing by Avakian, “Hope For Humanity On A Scientific Basis Breaking with Individualism, Parasitism and American Chauvinism.” It was enough to get me interested, so I clicked around and found a video of a dialog between Cornel West and Bob Avakian that took place in 2014 at the Riverside Church in NYC. I was familiar with Cornel West from his somewhat infrequent appearances on both Laura Ingraham and Sean Hannity episodes on Fox News. Needless to say, Avakian’s 2-hour screed was laced with total and complete hatred for God, the United States, and Israel.

BREAKING NEWS: Vladimir Putin successful in changing the minds of thousands of voters and caucus goers in the early democratic primaries to vote against Joe Biden in an unprecedented bid to solidify Donald Trump’s re-election chances in 2020.

Does that headline sound outrageous? Not really, since this is the news ticker that CNN and MSDNC are dying to run. Let’s face it, if Putin, did in fact, attempt to influence our elections in Donald Trump’s favor then Russia would be America’s best friend.

Ever wonder where Antifa got its inspiration from? Well, my guess is that it was from Avakian and from the extreme content headlines on the REVCOM.us website. Many headlines on their website declare that America is Fascist and is ruled by a Fascist Regime. In the Avakian article, “Fascists and Communists: Completely Opposed and Worlds Apart,” Avakian provides his version of what fascism means through what he calls the “5 Stops.” I’ll take his “5 Stops” all of which are don’ts and give my interpretation of what Avakian is really saying in the form of do’s:

STOP #1: Release all incarcerated people of color, particularly black and brown people, restrain the police from stopping and interrogating any person of color, and avoid prosecution of same.

STOP #2: Prevent all biological males, particularly Caucasian Christian males, from holding any position of authority.

STOP #3: Downsize the military with the ultimate goal of eliminating the service branches altogether.

STOP #4: Eliminate all immigration enforcement agencies and open the borders to anyone and everyone.

STOP #5: Discontinue all forms of human activity that produces CO2 with the ultimate goal of eliminating human activity altogether.

In order to support my aforementioned conclusions, I’ve gleaned the following notes from viewing the film, REVOLUTION AND RELIGION: The Fight for Emancipation and the Role of Religion; A Dialogue Between CORNEL WEST & BOB AVAKIAN.

  • Morality is a human creation
  • Bible supports slavery
  • God is a bloodthirsty tyrant
  • The “system” i.e., capitalism, is the problem
  • Israel conducts genocide against the Palestinians
  • There is no such thing as immigrants
  • No need for police or the military
  • Reality is evolution, creation is a myth
  • Evolution is science
  • Science can put an end to suffering
  • Police are murderers
  • Majority of the world are suffering
  • Thomas Jefferson was not moral
  • The United States is an empire
  • The CIA is an organization of mass murderers
  • Communism is an international movement
  • America doesn’t come first
  • Capitalism is the cause of climate change
  • People in the streets can bring about change (mob rule?)

The above points are just a sampling of Avakian’s 2-hour rant from the Riverside Church in NYC. Bob Avakian was billed as a Revolutionary Communist and Cornel West as a Revolutionary Christian. After Avakian spoke he introduced Cornel West and both men embraced in a show of solidarity.

Dr. Cornel West
Dr. Cornel West
http://cornelwest.com

During Dr. West’s time at the podium, he recognized Harry Belafonte in the audience who he introduced as a freedom fighter with 60 years of participation in the struggle. Of course, most people would accredit Harry Belafonte as being “One of the most successful Jamaican-American pop stars in history,” being “dubbed the ‘King of Calypso’ for popularizing the Caribbean musical style with an international audience in the 1950s.” I guess he did all right for himself considering all the exploitation and oppression he had to overcome.

Dr. West’s 30-minute discourse was nothing like Avakian’s 2-hour rant, it was very academic and high-minded while staying within the democratic socialist framework of course. Even so, Dr. West regurgitated much of Avakian’s rhetoric on capitalism, the police, internationalism, oppression, exploitation, and so on and so forth. Even though both men agreed on many economic, social, and political issues, they seemed to disagree strongly on religion and theology. Dr. West is a revolutionary Christian and Avakian is an atheist. Dr. West believes Christians can “work together” with the leaders of the New Communism in order to achieve emancipation for the oppressed in America and the rest of the world.

Dr. West appeared as a guest on The Sean Hannity Show February 20th along with Dan Bongino and Geraldo Rivera. Hannity almost immediately fired out the accusation that Bernie Sanders is “pro-soviet” and a “Bolshevik” but Dr. West defended Bernie by saying that he is “like me,” implying Bernie is a democratic socialist not a “Soviet communist.”

Nevertheless, many are accusing Bernie Sanders of being a communist and if Bernie gets the Democratic nomination, he is going to be in the fight of his political life when he is forced to go up against President Trump. And now, as in 2016, the Democratic establishment is working against Bernie’s nomination because you know it’s getting worrisome when James Carville, a prominent Democratic Party consultant, makes comments like, “I’m a political hack! At least I’m not a communist.”

The New Communism—The Ideologues

Welcome to the first installment of a new Crosshairs series on the 2020 United States presidential election. Unlike the 2016 election where there were 17 Republican candidates, this time the Democrats came out of the woodwork seemingly en masse all vying for the nomination—29 in all. But only one candidate has even the remotest chance to beat Donald Trump, and that candidate isn’t even a Democrat.

With the possible exception of Tulsi Gabbard, the rest of the field are unfortunately members of the lunatic fringe. But this installment doesn’t concern the congresswomen from Hawaii, it concerns the other person who also beat HRC in 2016 and that person is Bernie Sanders.

Okay, so you don’t like Donald Trump or Bernie Sanders, but what other choice do you have? Well, you might like the candidate with the unpronounceable last name who was the former mayor of one of the most dangerous cities to live in who looks and sounds too perfect, kind of like a 3D printed automaton.

In this field of Democrat candidates, 28 ≠ 1. Yes, some have dropped out of the race, but the inequality will still remain true even when 1 ≠ 1.

It’s hard to believe that five years have gone by since I wrote my first Crosshairs post in a series on the 2016 election. We are now less than a year away from the 2020 election and the only somewhat traditional Democrat running is the previous administration’s vice-president who hasn’t even been able to get his former boss’s endorsement.

Bernie Sanders
Bernie Sanders
mark reinstein/Shutterstock.com

In 2016, Bernie helped Hillary clinch the nomination when he made the stunning yet sympathetic statement, “Americans are sick of hearing about your damn emails!” during one of the debates. Bernie needs to take the old adage, “nice guys finish last” to heart if he wants to go toe-to-toe with Donald Trump.

But this installment isn’t necessarily exclusively about the socialist senator from Vermont, it’s about his ideological underpinnings which I believe are firmly communistic. After all, was it not Vladimir Lenin who said, “The goal of socialism is communism?” But do Bernie Sanders’ supporters really understand the consequences of adopting a socialistic political/economic system in the United States?

Bernie Sanders and most every Democrat, claim to be democratic socialists not socialists. Democratic socialists believe in bringing about change through “fair” elections and not through revolution. That’s why you hear talk about abolishing the Electoral College as a way to achieve “fair” elections along with policies of unrestricted immigration from Mexico and Central America. After all, isn’t it true that under socialism all people are equal? Democracy in a socialist state necessarily leads to the “dictatorship of the proletariat.”

Okay, just so you know, the Orlando Sentinel is nothing more than a left-wing propaganda rag for the Democratic Party or simply, The Party. Don’t believe it, then check out this biased, hate filled, factually inaccurate, criminally stupid article written by Barbara Fowler asserting that the Russian’s are using President Trump to “destroy America from within.” Yea, but wasn’t Bernie Sanders the one who honeymooned in the former Soviet Union during the 1980s?

The coordination of the media is pervasive, not only nationally but locally as well.

Propaganda won the day for the Bolsheviks during the Russian Revolution in 1917, and it will win the day again for the Democrats in 2024. As Lenin agitated for revolution among the masses, so it is with certain Hollywood types, academia, and the lamestream (mainstream) media today. Then, the masses were the workers, but today the masses are the sanctioned perpetual victims of systemic racism, white-supremacism, patriarchalism, and Christianism.

Communism…socialism…what’s the difference? I think those socioeconomic systems can be summed up in the following doctrine:

The State gave and the State took away, blessed be the name of the State.

A socialist’s worst nightmare is when a country and its people are prosperous. How can you agitate for revolution when things are going well? The way you agitate for revolution is to create a boogeyman, something to make the gullible and uninformed public seek salvation in the government. And that boogeyman in 2020 is [man-made] climate change. Back in 2007, a politician turned environmental scientist, won the Nobel Peace Prize for promoting the man-made climate change hoax along with the IPCC. Today, we have another potential Nobel Laureate in Greta Thunberg, a teenage Swedish climate activist.

At this point you may be asking yourself, “what does all this climate change stuff have to do with communism?” Well, the answer is it has everything to do with communism, all you need to do to convince yourself is to read H. Res. 109, 2019 which was originally sponsored by Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (AOC) and Edward Markey. The Green New Deal proposes to achieve “net-zero global emissions by 2050” through a radical transformation of the United States economy. Note that the language states “global emissions” a point that will be revisited in a future post.

Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez
Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez
JStone/Shutterstock.com

AOC’s message to the congress and to the voters as laid out in the H. Res. 109 is “It has become necessary to destroy the economy in order to save it.”

Until recently, the American character has been one of self-reliance and individualism but is rapidly becoming one of collectivism and conformity.

If you’re like me and like to watch news and opinion debates particularly on Fox News then you probably noticed how some program guests like to talk-over other guests holding opposing views. Without fail, the guests who like to play this game are always the ones representing radical left-wing positions.

For example, every time Candace Owens, a conservative activist, appears on Laura Ingraham’s show opposite Leo Terrell, a civil rights attorney, Terrell does his best to talk-over Candice so as to prevent the audience from hearing any of her arguments. I noticed the same behavior exhibited by Tim Kaine during the 2016 Pence/Kaine Vice-Presidential debate. Intolerance is a trademark of the socialist Left.

So, what does Bernie Sanders, and most every other Democrat in the presidential race, really believe? I’ve taken just a few examples of where Bernie stands on select issues directly from his campaign’s website.

Live up to our ideals as a nation and welcome refugees and those seeking asylum, including those displaced by climate change.

Create a Medicare for All, single-payer, national health insurance program to provide everyone in America with comprehensive health care coverage, free at the point of service.

Transform our energy system to 100 percent renewable energy and create 20 million jobs needed to solve the climate crisis.

Ensure justice for frontline communities, especially under-resourced groups, communities of color, Native Americans, people with disabilities, children and the elderly.

Double union membership within Bernie’s first term.

Will raise an estimated $4.35 trillion over the next decade and cut the wealth of billionaires in half over 15 years, which would substantially break up the concentration of wealth and power of this small privileged class.

Create a nation in which all people are treated equally.

Honor Native American tribal treaty rights and sovereignty, moving away from a relationship of paternalism and control toward one of deference and support.

Enact a federal jobs guarantee, to ensure that everyone is guaranteed a stable job that pays a living wage.

As can be seen from just the above list, Bernie makes liberal use of the climate change boogeyman to justify unrestricted immigration. Notice he doesn’t explicitly say “unrestricted” immigration but how else would you describe a system that proposes “breaking up ICE and CBP” federal law enforcement agencies?

Bernie hits a double when he calls out Native Americans (a class of sanctioned perpetual victims) and “paternalism” in the same sentence.
Progressives like to accuse conservatives of inserting “dog whistles” in their communications but the socialists also have their own trigger words which Bernie uses frequently such as “union,” “class,” “justice,” and “equality” or “equally.”

Too bad the Constitution prohibits anyone under the age of 35 from becoming president otherwise AOC would be leading the Democratic ticket. Likewise, the Electoral College prevents elections from being decided by the vote of only two or three states. The Constitution…a major stumbling block for the progressives.

In this initial entry in my series on the 2020 election, I’ve chosen to present “truth over facts” because it is much better to be “morally right” than to be “precisely, factually, and semantically correct.” Agreed? Besides, anyone who can make statements like that with a straight face deserves to be President.

 

The End Times: Apostasy, Antichrist, and Politics

Apostasy

In a previous post I identified three things concerning Jesus’ return that are indisputable: visible and unmistakable; unexpected; and normalcy, as in the days of Noah and Lot.1 And now we have a fourth thing, apostasy in the Church.

In a letter the apostle Paul wrote to the church at Thessalonica, he reminded them that they shouldn’t be deceived into believing that the day of the Lord had come unless the apostasy has come first. (2 Thess. 2:3 NASB) So what is apostasy and how are we to identify it? Well, according to the online dictionaries: merriam-webster.com and dictionary.com, apostasy is defined as abandonment and departure respectively. To abandon something is to let go of it and you can’t let go of something unless you first had possession of it. Unbelievers, people who were never saved, cannot be apostate since they can’t let go of something they never had; only saved people can become apostate.

A common misconception is that apostates are Christians who have lost their salvation. However, I don’t subscribe to that theory; I believe apostates are Christians who have left their first love, (Rev. 2:3) that is, they have abandoned or compromised many or most of the fundamental doctrines of the faith. They hold on to the “Jesus loves me this I know for the Bible tells me so…”2 refrain from the well-known children’s song, but they put aside other biblical doctrines or strong teachings that conflict with the popular culture that we find ourselves in the 21st century. Everyone is familiar with the current social issues that are in conflict with biblical teaching: women in ministry; divorce; same-sex marriage; and abortion but not everyone would consider belief in evolution; man-made climate change; and economic inequality as qualifications for apostasy, but they are. And yes, a person’s political and religious beliefs are both interrelated and inseparable.

Antichrist

Children, it is the last hour; and just as you heard that antichrist is coming, even now many antichrists have appeared; from this we know that it is the last hour. (1 John 2:18)

Who is the liar but the one who denies that Jesus is the Christ? This is the antichrist, the one who denies the Father and the Son. (1 John 2:22)

By this you know the Spirit of God: every spirit that confesses that Jesus Christ has come in the flesh is from God;
and every spirit that does not confess Jesus is not from God; this is the spirit of the antichrist, of which you have heard that it is coming, and now it is already in the world. (1 John 4:2-3)

For many deceivers have gone out into the world, those who do not acknowledge Jesus Christ as coming in the flesh. This is the deceiver and the antichrist. (2 John 1:7)

Antichrist is anyone who doesn’t believe that Jesus is the Christ. Contrary to Hollywood’s misappropriation of the term, antichrist is not a specific person.3 The character Damien in The Omen is portrayed as the antichrist, but in reality, he is really the beast who the Bible introduces in Revelation chapter 13. Antichrist and beast are sometimes used interchangeably; I guess because “antichrist” has more of a ring to it than “beast.”

Christians can be apostate but they cannot be antichrist. But according to Jesus, it’s possible for false Christians (antichrists) to become assimilated in the Church such that they become almost indistinguishable from the true believers; nevertheless, God is able to differentiate the wheat from the tares. (Matt. 13:29-30)

Politics

The theology of liberation or liberation theology is one such example of blending politics and religion. In liberation theology, Scripture is reinterpreted with a bias towards the poor. This brand of theology advocates its followers to engage in the struggle to liberate the poor from their male-dominated, rich, white capitalist oppressors.4 You know the old saying, “If it looks like Marxism and smells like Marxism, it’s Marxism.” So, the question becomes, can a person still be a believing Christian while embracing socialism and Marxism? Well, according to William Montgomery Brown, the answer would unequivocally be “No!”

The Rt. Rev. William Montgomery Brown, D.D. was a bishop in the Episcopal Church who published a very interesting and enlightening booklet in 1920 called Communism and Christianism Analyzed and Contrasted from the Marxian and Darwinian Points of View. In his booklet Rev. Brown describes the relationship between supernatural Christianity and science (Darwinism); Christianity and socialism; and Christianity and communism (Marxism). I present here some excerpts from Rev. Brown’s booklet. I have numbered them for later reference:

[1] No man can be consistently both a Socialist and a Christian.5

[2] It is, therefore, a profound truth that Socialism is the natural enemy of religion.6

[3] The Creation idea is unsupported by evidence, and is in conflict with every scientific law.7

[4] Religion, which is the ideal half, and politics, which is the practical half, of the same reality, human socialism, are like all else in the universe, constantly changing, and necessarily so, because life and progress are dependent upon change.8

[5] Yes, strange, even blasphemous, as the representation may seem, it is nevertheless true, the machine is the only name given under heaven whereby the world can be saved.9

[6] Darwinism and Marxism constitute one gospel, the only true, comprehensive and sufficient gospel which the world has ever had or can have, and there is no hope for the future of mankind except in it.10

[7] Christianity has held the world back from civilization instead of advancing it towards civilization.11

While Rev. Brown was never a real Christian, he definitely was a bonafide, dyed-in-the-wool communist. Note how in excerpt [5] and [6] he professes to worship the creation (the machine) instead of the creator (God) whereby the machine becomes the savior of the world not Jesus. In fact, Rev. Brown never actually believed that Jesus was a real person let alone the son of God. He vigorously denounced the supernatural or spiritual aspect of Christianity. (It’s Interesting to note that Rev. William Montgomery Brown remained a professing Christian even after he was convicted of heresy in 1925—the only person to be convicted since the Middle Ages.)12

In excerpt [4] he declares that religion and politics are really two sides of the same coin. That is to say religion being the theoretical side and politics being the practical side. In his mind, he attributes capitalism (the scourge of the working class) as being created and sustained by Christianity. Capitalism being the devil and Darwinism/Socialism/Marxism being the triune god that saves the world.

In excerpt [1] and [2] the battle lines are drawn; Christianity is declared the enemy of socialism. After reading Rev. Brown’s booklet, it should come as no surprise to the reader why the political Left is so hostile to Christianity. The Left believes that Christianity is hindering their entire agenda, namely wealth redistribution, income equality, social justice, and whatever else that goes along with it.

Since all public school curriculum has been coordinated along left-wing ideology, there’s no tolerance for creationism or intelligent design as inferred from excerpt [3].

Has Christianity really held the world back from civilization as stated in excerpt [7]? Certainly Rev. Brown thinks so, but so does President Obama based on his “pattern” of anti-Christian remarks such as his infamous comment made during an Easter breakfast held at the White House:

On Easter I do reflect on the fact that, as a Christian, I am supposed to love. And I have to say that sometimes when I listen to less-than-loving expressions by Christians, I get concerned.13

Or how about this comment:

In the United States, Eid also reminds us of the many achievements and contributions of Muslim Americans to building the very fabric of our nation and strengthening the core of our democracy.14

And this one:

Unless we get on our high horse and think this is unique to some other place, remember that during the Crusades and the Inquisition, people committed terrible deeds in the name of Christ. And in our home country, slavery, and Jim Crow, all too often was justified in the name of Christ.15

So, based on his own words, Obama really is acknowledging that ISIS is carrying out terrible deeds in the name of religion; otherwise, why would he draw a comparison with the Crusades and the Inquisition which everyone identifies with the Roman Catholic Church. Furthermore, like Obama said, the ISIS threat is not unique; history records wars against militant Islam for almost four hundred years during the 7th, 8th, 15th, and 16th centuries.16 Even though the “Mohammedan Arabs with fire and scimitar had crushed and subjugated the entire Persian Empire and over half of Christendom,”17 it was the Crusaders who were the oppressors.

Nevertheless, the one thing President Obama can’t do is label ISIS for what it really is, an organization that wants to convert the world to its brand of Islam through terror and intimidation.

So then according to the Left’s rewriting of history, it really was the Christians who held back civilization. And “Yes, Virginia, there is a Santa Claus.”

  1. Gerard Sczepura, “The End Times: Arguments Against a Pre-Trib Rapture,” Theological Ruminations (blog), May 4, 2015, http://gerardsczepura.com/?p=627. ↩

  2. Anna B. Warner, Jesus Loves Me, 1860, http://library.timelesstruths.org/music/Jesus_Loves_Me/. ↩

  3. Gerard Sczepura, “The End Times: Hollywood’s Take,” Theological Ruminations (blog), March 7, 2015, http://gerardsczepura.com/?p=599. ↩

  4. “Christian Revolution in Latin America: The Changing Face of Liberation Theology,” Ron Rhodes, accessed June 21, 2015, http://home.earthlink.net/~ronrhodes/Liberation.html. ↩

  5. Brown 1855-1937, William Montgomery (2010-02-16). Communism and Christianism Analyzed and Contrasted from the Marxian and Darwinian Points of View (p. 10). Public Domain Books. Kindle Edition. ↩

  6. Ibid., 12. ↩

  7. Ibid., 17. ↩

  8. Ibid., 44-45. ↩

  9. Ibid., 53. ↩

  10. Ibid., 54. ↩

  11. Ibid., 60-61. ↩

  12. “Bishop Brown,” Galion Historical Society, accessed June 22, 2015, http://www.galionhistory.com/about-bishop-brown/. ↩

  13. “Obama’s anti-Christian ‘pattern’ disconcerting to some,” Chris Woodward, OneNewsNow.com, April 8, 2015, http://onenewsnow.com/politics-govt/2015/04/08/obamas-anti-christian-pattern-disconcerting-to-some. ↩

  14. “What Obama just said about Muslims and their influence on America is beyond disturbing,” Joshua Riddle, Young Conservatives, July 28, 2014, http://www.youngcons.com/what-obama-just-said-about-muslims-and-america-is-beyond-disturbing/. ↩

  15. “People are freaking out after Obama compared ISIS to the Crusades,” Colin Campbell, Business Insider, February 6, 2015, http://www.businessinsider.com/people-are-freaking-out-after-obama-compared-isis-to-the-crusades-2015-2#ixzz3divxEH1V. ↩

  16. “On the Spanish Inquisition and the Crusades,” Dr. Miguel Faria, Hacienda Publishing, September 12, 2011, http://www.haciendapub.com/randomnotes/spanish-inquisition-and-crusades. ↩

  17. Ibid. ↩