Republicans intent on grilling President Biden’s brother Wednesday were thrown onto defense over the indictment just days earlier of the FBI informant whose allegations against the president were central to the GOP impeachment inquiry.
EXTRA! EXTRA! EXTRA!
Since I posted this morning, three articles appeared. Prince William and Britain are against the aggressiveness of Netanyahu, and a Russian agent was arrested. Then news the Speaker of the House delivered a sermon at a meeting of Republicans. President Biden must demand Netanyahu and the Orthodox Zealots must condemn Putin for invading Ukraine and interfering with our elections with intent of hurting the Democrats, who returned the Jews to Zion.
John Presco
He said in a statement on Tuesday: “I remain deeply concerned about the terrible human cost of the conflict in the Middle East since the Hamas terrorist attack on 7 October. Too many have been killed.
“I, like so many others, want to see an end to the fighting as soon as possible. There is a desperate need for increased humanitarian support to Gaza. It’s critical that aid gets in and the hostages are released.
“Sometimes it is only when faced with the sheer scale of human suffering that the importance of permanent peace is brought home.
“Even in the darkest hour, we must not succumb to the counsel of despair. I continue to cling to the hope that a brighter future can be found and I refuse to give up on that.”
The speaker contended that when one doesn’t have God in their life, the government or “state” will become their guide, referring back to Bible verses, both people said. They added that the approach fell flat among some in the room.
“I’m not at church,” one of the people said, describing Johnson’s presentation as “horrible.”
“I think what he was trying to do, but failed on the execution of it, was try to bring us together,” that person said. “The sermon was so long he couldn’t bring it back to make the point.”
Hunter Biden leaves a House Oversight Committee meeting on Capitol Hill in January. (Kent Nishimura/Getty Images)© Provided by Yahoo News
The former FBI informant who was charged last week with making up false bribery claims central to the effort by Republicans in Congress to impeach President Biden told federal agents that Russian intelligence officials fed him a story about Hunter Biden, prosecutors say.
In a court filing Tuesday, they revealed that Alexander Smirnov, the former FBI informant, “admitted that officials associated with Russian intelligence were involved in passing a story about” the president’s son. They did not specify what the story was or clarify whether it was related to the bribery claims about the Biden family.
“”Navalny was targeted for having the audacity to speak out against Putin’s authoritarian regime and try to offer the Russian people a better option. He was poisoned, tortured, prosecuted without cause, imprisoned without cause, and ultimately murdered.”
Infidel is an ecclesiastical term in Christianity around which the Church developed a body of theology that deals with the concept of infidelity, which makes a clear differentiation between those who were baptized and followed the teachings of the Church versus those who are outside the faith.[3] Christians used the term infidel to describe those perceived as the enemies of Christianity.
Leopard attacking a criminal, Roman floor mosaic, 3rd century AD, Archaeological Museum of Tunisia
It appears to me, and I’m sure a million Earthlings, that Jews and Christians all over the world, are backing Ignorant and Violent Political Liars and Leaders – in order to prove God exists? However, there is real truthful history, such as the REAL President of the United (who is not Trump) is being forced to condemn Netanyahu and his Zealot Extremists for butchering women and children. Un-born, and Just-born babies – are in real peril! Why are such cruel lessons given to Non-Nazi humans? Is it because they refuse to believe in….The Return to Zion?
“Its over the top!”
More proof is surfacing every day that The MAGA Morons For Jesus, really don’t believe in Jesus – or God. They don’t even believe – IN TRUTH. The idea that – GOD IS THE TRUTH – is a BIG JOKE! It’s becoming apparent, that Orthodox Jews, and Right-wing Republican Christians, don’t subscribe to being true Followers of God and Son, but, want to be seen as persecuted and tortured believers, like those thrown into a Roman arena to be eaten by ravenous lions. Today, it is Putin, Netanyahu, and trump who are wanting to throw INFIDELS to the lions. We see Orthodox Rabbis throwing Palestinian Women and Children into an arena they say was built by Adolph Hitler, when the Lying Dictator declared Jews, sub-human animals – who were incapable of believing in The Master Race.
Donald Trump has anointed The New Master Race that devours every lie he puts on the plate of The Chosen Ones. They love it when the Liberal Infidel becomes irate – and confused. Secular Government – does not matter anymore – and thus lying to Infidels is encouraged. Non-believers have no feelings! How can they feel – anything? God made good feelings! If thinking doesn’t make you feel good..
STOP THINKING!
This morning I finally got around to googling “Infidel”. It’s a French word, and not a Muslin word as I had thought. I now apply it to how Mark and Joy Gall saw me as their son began to die of a rare disease. Joy became a Christian Scientist and there were many attempts to convert Jon and Mark – that failed. Jon told me he did not want to become a student of the Torah – or a Christian. We had in depth talks in the Gall home, and when I drove Jon to his medical appointments. I suspect Joy wanted me out of their lives – from the get. Her husband spent much time with me, fishing and playing golf.. Then we spent much time at Ed Corbin’s house playing video games and watching the Duck football games. Joy felt felt left out. We did do social things together. I just realized we have not spoken since 2015, since her son died. I was made….The Foil! I believe other Americans feel their Christian friends have thrown them under the bus, or into a Roman Arena – with their hands tied behind their back.
Study the mosaic above. Now see the man as a woman – seeking an abortion! Thanks to ravenous cult animals like Vough and Wolf, more victims will be thrown to wild animals. The truth is, Christians being fed to the lions – is another Christian Myth&Lie. I suspect Christianity is the source of narcissistic personality disorder. The definition of INFIDEL is to discrobe the core of a Narcissists, who puts on the Robe of Jesus, and exposes people around him/her as Un-believers! This is – TRUMP! He hates Jesus. Why? Is it because Jesus gets more attention then he does amongst his core followers? Is this why Trump paid millions for the body of Navalny, so he can parade around in his dead skin before the mirror as the Phantom of the Opera?
My fallout with the Galls began sever days after Bush beat Al Gore. The Gall friend, Greg, was a geeky Christian with a comb-over. He was a Deplorable. The Galls went to Harvard and Berkeley, and saw themselves as Egghead Liberal Royalty. Mark was the head of the department of Education at Oregon. Neither encouraged me to publish – or even write. However, they took Greg’s side when I told him he – and fellow Christian Creeps should stay out of politics. In the behind the scene Liberal Judgements, it was ruled I attacked Greg Deplorable – just because he is a Christian. The word “politics” was disappeared – to this day!
Here is Rachel Maddow’s blog on Trump comparing himself to Navalny. I watched her on TV last night, and this morning I felt like putting an end to blogging on Royal Rosamond Press. There is a real reason our Founding Fathers id not want this Democracy to be a Theocracy.
John Presco
“Navalny was targeted for having the audacity to speak out against Putin’s authoritarian regime and try to offer the Russian people a better option. He was poisoned, tortured, prosecuted without cause, imprisoned without cause, and ultimately murdered.”
As a Washington Post analysis noted last week, after Navalny was poisoned, Trump was asked about a possible U.S. response. The then-president “riffed on how tough he had purportedly been on Russia and noted that there was no proof of Russia’s involvement. Asked whether he doubted Russian involvement, Trump said it was interesting that people kept asking him about Russia.”
Referencing his many legal problems, including his recent civil penalty for business fraud in New York, the Republican went on to argue, “It is a form of Navalny.”
In other words, it took several years for Trump to even mention Navalny’s name out loud. Now, he’s willing to say the Russian’s name in public, but only to advance his own pitiful claims to being a victim of political persecution.
Symptoms
Symptoms of narcissistic personality disorder and how severe they are can vary. People with the disorder can:
- Have an unreasonably high sense of self-importance and require constant, excessive admiration.
- Feel that they deserve privileges and special treatment.
- Expect to be recognized as superior even without achievements.
- Make achievements and talents seem bigger than they are.
- Be preoccupied with fantasies about success, power, brilliance, beauty or the perfect mate.
- Believe they are superior to others and can only spend time with or be understood by equally special people.
- Be critical of and look down on people they feel are not important.
- Expect special favors and expect other people to do what they want without questioning them.
- Take advantage of others to get what they want.
- Have an inability or unwillingness to recognize the needs and feelings of others.
- Be envious of others and believe others envy them.
- Behave in an arrogant way, brag a lot and come across as conceited.
- Insist on having the best of everything — for instance, the best car or office.
At the same time, people with narcissistic personality disorder have trouble handling anything they view as criticism. They can:
- Become impatient or angry when they don’t receive special recognition or treatment.
- Have major problems interacting with others and easily feel slighted.
- React with rage or contempt and try to belittle other people to make themselves appear superior.
- Have difficulty managing their emotions and behavior.
- Experience major problems dealing with stress and adapting to change.
- Withdraw from or avoid situations in which they might fail.
- Feel depressed and moody because they fall short of perfection.
- Have secret feelings of insecurity, shame, humiliation and fear of being exposed as a failure.
Jon is survived by his parents, by his aunts Judi, Darlene, Diane, and Susan, and by his first cousins Darin, Jocelyn, and Kheir. He also leaves behind his good friend Gerard and his “second family”- Nitza, Benny, Nurit, and Amir. The Schwabskys warmly opened their Eugene home to Jon for ten years before they returned to Israel. Memorial contributions to United Leukodystrophy Foundation.
” he developed a progressive neurological disorder, adrenomyeloneuropathy, but continued to live a rich, challenging life.”
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Foil_(narrative)
In any narrative, a foil is a character who contrasts with another character, typically, a character who contrasts with the protagonist, in order to better highlight or differentiate certain qualities of the protagonist.[2][3][4] A foil to the protagonist may also be the antagonist of the plot.[5]
In some cases, a subplot can be used as a foil to the main plot. This is especially true in the case of metafiction and the “story within a story” motif.[6]
A foil usually either differs dramatically or is an extreme comparison that is made to contrast a difference between two things.[7] Thomas F. Gieryn places these uses of literary foils into three categories, which Tamara A. P. Metze explains as: those that emphasize the heightened contrast (this is different because …), those that operate by exclusion (this is not X because…), and those that assign blame (“due to the slow decision-making procedures of government…”).[8]
In Emily Brontë‘s 1847 novel Wuthering Heights, Edgar Linton is described as opposite to main character Heathcliff, in looks, money, inheritance and morals, however similar in their love for Catherine.
In Frankenstein; or, The Modern Prometheus, an 1818 novel by Mary Shelley, the two main characters—Dr. Frankenstein and his “creature”—are literary foils to each other, functioning to compare one to the other.
https://www.politico.com/news/2024/02/20/donald-trump-allies-christian-nationalism-00142086
Zero. Over the course of his four years as president, Donald Trump was occasionally asked about Alexei Navalny, but it appears the Republican managed to go his entire term never having mentioned the Russian opposition leader’s name in public.
Even after Navalny publicly urged the American leader to condemn the poisoning, Trump refused.
Four years later, the Republican is finally willing to acknowledge the fallen Russian leader’s existence. That’s the good news. The bad news is that the former president is referencing Navalny in the most demonstrably insane way possible.
On Monday morning, three days after the world learned of Navalny’s death, Trump briefly mentioned the Russian leader, but only as a launching point for a harangue complaining about the United States. It appeared at the time as if the presumptive GOP nominee was trying to draw some kind of parallel between himself Navalny.
A day later, Trump was less ambiguous. The Associated Press reported:
Referencing his many legal problems, including his recent civil penalty for business fraud in New York, the Republican went on to argue, “It is a form of Navalny.”
In other words, it took several years for Trump to even mention Navalny’s name out loud. Now, he’s willing to say the Russian’s name in public, but only to advance his own pitiful claims to being a victim of political persecution.
Fox News’ Laura Ingraham, it’s worth noting for context, did not ask the GOP candidate whether he held Putin responsible for Navalny’s death, and at no point in the discussion did Trump condemn Russia’s authoritarian leader.
To be sure, the former president isn’t the only one trying to draw a parallel between himself and Navalny. Assorted partisans — former Rep. Lee Zeldin, Dinesh D’Souza, former House Speaker Newt Gingrich, et al. — have pushed the same nonsense since Friday morning.
But as we discussed the other day, the rhetoric is stark raving mad, and it’s made worse by Trump embracing the line with such enthusiasm.
Navalny was targeted for having the audacity to speak out against Putin’s authoritarian regime and try to offer the Russian people a better option. He was poisoned, tortured, prosecuted without cause, imprisoned without cause, and ultimately murdered.
Moscow saw Navalny’s voice as inconvenient, so Russian officials silenced it. They saw his opposition leadership as a threat to Putin’s authoritarian control, so they crushed it.
To see Trump as a comparable victim is simply bonkers. The Republican is facing multiple legal crises, not because of a Democratic plot, but because the former president is, for all intents and purposes, a career criminal who got caught. While the charges against Navalny were baseless, we know prosecutors have found credible evidence against Trump because the indictments and court filings have been made public and subjected to extensive scrutiny.
For years, Trump’s public indifference toward Navalny was outrageous. The former president’s sudden interest in presenting himself as a Navalny-like figure is worse.
This post updates our related earlier coverage.
Christian nationalists in America believe that the country was founded as a Christian nation and that Christian values should be prioritized throughout government and public life. As the country has become less religious and more diverse, Vought has embraced the idea that Christians are under assault and has spoken of policies he might pursue in response.
An infidel (literally “unfaithful”) is a person who is accused of disbelief in the central tenets of one’s own religion, such as members of another religion, or irreligious people.[1][2]
Infidel is an ecclesiastical term in Christianity around which the Church developed a body of theology that deals with the concept of infidelity, which makes a clear differentiation between those who were baptized and followed the teachings of the Church versus those who are outside the faith.[3] Christians used the term infidel to describe those perceived as the enemies of Christianity.
After the ancient world, the concept of otherness, an exclusionary notion of the outside by societies with more or less coherent cultural boundaries, became associated with the development of the monotheistic and prophetic religions of Judaism, Christianity, and Islam (cf. pagan).[3]
In modern literature, the term infidel includes in its scope atheists,[4][5][6] polytheists,[7] animists,[8] heathens, and pagans.[9]
A willingness to identify other religious people as infidels corresponds to a preference for orthodoxy over pluralism.[10]
Etymology[edit]
The origins of the word infidel date to the late 15th century, deriving from the French infidèle or Latin īnfidēlis, from in- “not” + fidēlis “faithful” (from fidēs “faith”, related to fīdere ‘to trust’). The word originally denoted a person of a religion other than one’s own, especially a Christian to a Muslim, a Muslim to a Christian, or a gentile to a Jew.[2] Later meanings in the 15th century include “unbelieving”, “a non-Christian” and “one who does not believe in religion” (1527).
Usage[edit]
Christians historically used the term infidel to refer to people who actively opposed Christianity. This term became well-established in English by sometime in the early sixteenth century, when Jews or Mohammedans (Muslims; formerly called saracens), were described contemptuously as active opponents to Christianity. In Catholic dogma, an infidel is one who does not believe in the doctrine at all and is thus distinct from a heretic, who has fallen away from true doctrine, i.e. by denying the divinity of Jesus. Similarly, the ecclesiastical term was also used by the Methodist Church,[11][12] in reference to those “without faith”.[13]
Today, the usage of the term infidel has declined;[14] the current preference is for the terms non-Christians and non-believers (persons without religious affiliations or beliefs), reflecting the commitment of mainstream Christian denominations to engage in dialog with persons of other faiths.[15] Nevertheless, some apologists have argued in favor of the term, stating that it does not come from a disrespectful perspective, but is similar to using the term orthodox for devout believers.[16]
Moreover, some translations of the Bible, including the King James Version, which is still in vogue today, employ the word infidel, while others have supplanted the term with nonbeliever. The term is found in two places:
And what concord hath Christ with Belial? Or what part hath he that believeth with an infidel? —2 Corinthians 6:15 KJV
But if any provide not for his own, and specially for those of his own house, he hath denied the faith, and is worse than an infidel. —1 Timothy 5:8 KJV
Infidels under canon law[edit]
Right to rule[edit]
In Quod super his, Innocent IV asked the question, “[I]s it licit to invade a land that infidels possess or which belongs to them?” and held that while Infidels had a right to dominium (right to rule themselves and choose their own governments), the pope, as the Vicar of Christ, de jure possessed the care of their souls and had the right to politically intervene in their affairs if their ruler violated or allowed his subjects to violate a Christian and Euro-centric normative conception of Natural law, such as sexual perversion or idolatry.[17] He also held that he had an obligation to send missionaries to infidel lands, and that if they were prevented from entering or preaching, then the pope was justified in dispatching Christian forces accompanied with missionaries to invade those lands, as Innocent stated simply: “If the infidels do not obey, they ought to be compelled by the secular arm and war may be declared upon them by the pope, and nobody else.”[18] This was however not a reciprocal right and non-Christian missionaries such as those of Muslims could not be allowed to preach in Europe “because they are in error and we are on a righteous path.”[17]
A long line of Papal hierocratic canonists, most notably those who adhered to Alanus Anglicus’s influential arguments of the Crusading-era, denied Infidel dominium, and asserted Rome‘s universal jurisdictional authority over the earth, as well as the right to authorize pagan conquests solely on the basis of non-belief because of their rejection of the Christian God.[19] In the extreme, the hierocractic canonical discourse of the mid-twelfth century, such as that espoused by Bernard of Clairvaux, the mystic leader of the Cisertcians, legitimized German colonial expansion and practice of forceful Christianisation in the Slavic territories as a holy war against the Wends, arguing that infidels should be killed wherever they posed a menace to Christians. When Frederick the II unilaterally arrogated papal authority, he took on the mantle to “destroy convert, and subjugate all barbarian nations,” a power in papal doctrine reserved for the pope. Hostiensis, a student of Innocent, in accord with Alanus, also asserted “… by law infidels should be subject to the faithful.” John Wyclif, regarded as the forefather of English Reformation, also held that valid dominium rested on a state of grace.[20]
The Teutonic Knights were one of the by-products of this papal hierocratic and German discourse. After the Crusades in the Levant, they moved to crusading activities in the infidel Baltics. Their crusades against the Lithuanians and Poles, however, precipitated the Lithuanian Controversy, and the Council of Constance, following the condemnation of Wyclif, found Hostiensis’s views no longer acceptable and ruled against the knights. Future Church doctrine was then firmly aligned with Innocents IV’s position.[21]
The later development of counterarguments on the validity of Papal authority, the rights of infidels, and the primacy of natural law led to various treatises such as those by Hugo Grotius, John Locke, Immanuel Kant and Thomas Hobbes.
Colonization of the Americas[edit]
During the Age of Discovery, papal bulls such as Romanus Pontifex and, more importantly, inter caetera (1493), implicitly removed dominium from infidels and granted them to the Spanish Empire and Portugal with the charter of guaranteeing the safety of missionaries. Subsequent rejections of the bull by Protestant powers rejected the Pope’s authority to exclude other Christian princes. As independent authorities, they drew up charters for their own colonial missions based on the temporal right for care of infidel souls in language echoing the inter caetera. The charters and papal bulls would form the legal basis of future negotiations and consideration of claims as title deeds in the emerging law of nations during the period of European colonization.[22]
The rights bestowed by Romanus Pontifex and inter caetera have never fallen from use, serving as the basis for legal arguments over the centuries. The U.S. Supreme Court ruled in the 1823 case Johnson v. McIntosh that as a result of European discovery and assumption of ultimate dominion, Native Americans had only a right to occupancy of native lands, not the right of title. In the 1831 case Cherokee Nation v. Georgia, famously described Native American tribes as “domestic dependent nations.” In Worcester v. Georgia, the court ruled that the Native Tribes were sovereign entities to the extent that the U.S. federal government, and not individual states, had authority over their affairs.
Native American groups including the Taíno and Onondaga have called on the Vatican to revoke the bulls of 1452, 1453, and 1493.
Marriage[edit]
According to the Catholic Encyclopedia, the Catholic Church views marriage as forbidden and null when conducted between the faithful (Christians) and infidels, unless a dispensation has been granted. This is because marriage is a sacrament of the Catholic Church, which infidels are deemed incapable of receiving.[23]
As a philosophical tradition[edit]
Some philosophers such as Thomas Paine, David Hume, George Holyoake, Charles Bradlaugh, Voltaire and Rousseau earned the label of infidel or freethinkers, both personally and for their respective traditions of thought because of their attacks on religion and opposition to the Church. They established and participated in a distinctly labeled, infidel movement or tradition of thought, that sought to reform their societies which were steeped in Christian thought, practice, laws and culture. The Infidel tradition was distinct from parallel anti-Christian, sceptic or deist movements, in that it was anti-theistic and also synonymous with atheism. These traditions also sought to set up various independent model communities, as well as societies, whose traditions then gave rise to various other socio-political movements such as secularism in 1851, as well as developing close philosophical ties to some contemporary political movements such as socialism and the French Revolution.[24]
Towards the early twentieth century, these movements sought to move away from the tag “infidel” because of its associated negative connotation in Christian thought, and there is attributed to George Holyoake the coining of the term ‘secularism’ in an attempt to bridge the gap with other theist and Christian liberal reform movements.[24]
In 1793, Immanuel Kant’s Religion within the Boundaries of Mere Reason, reflected the Enlightenment periods’ philosophical development, one which differentiated between the moral and rational and substituted rational/irrational for the original true believer/infidel distinction.[3]
Implications for medieval civil law[edit]
Laws passed by the Catholic Church governed not just the laws between Christians and infidels in matters of religious affairs, but also civil affairs. They were prohibited from participating or aiding in infidel religious rites, such as circumcisions or wearing images of non-Christian religious significance.[23]
In the Early Middle Ages, based on the idea of the superiority of Christians to infidels, regulations came into place such as those forbidding Jews from possessing Christian slaves; the laws of the decretals further forbade Christians from entering the service of Jews, for Christian women to act as their nurses or midwives; forbidding Christians from employing Jewish physicians when ill; restricting Jews to definite quarters of the towns into which they were admitted and to wear a dress by which they might be recognized.[23]
Later during the Victorian era, testimony of either self-declared, or those accused of being Infidels or Atheists, was not accepted in a court of law because it was felt that they had no moral imperative to not lie under oath because they did not believe in God, or Heaven and Hell.[24]
These rules have now given way to modern legislation and Catholics, in civil life, are no longer governed by ecclesiastical law.[23]
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