Here We Go Again With Not Voting For X Is A Vote For Y - Rev. J.T. Smith

 

Every four years America is treated to the Presidential election when Americans are directed to vote for one of two wealthy (anymore it's more like obscenely wealthy) candidates to run the country.  And for many decades now, American politics has been subsumed by a corporate duopoly divided between the Democrats and Republicans.  That duopoly has literally become its own industry that claims to cares about its customers (you guessed it: us) but in practice only serves to enrich itself.  And for free advertising, bring in major media outlets that drown out every other potential candidate.  Just look what happened to Bernie Sanders in 2016.

I've been hearing the trope about voting for a third party for decades now, about how it's a thrown away vote, or it's a vote for such-and-such candidate, etc.  I am NOT a fan of Trump by any means, so I will not vote for him.

The reality is that America desperately needs to break free of the corporate duopoly of the two-party system; but, as long as people continue to buy into the fallacy that it is the only viable system, which is a lie that you've been spoon-fed since you were in grade school and fed to you by the corporate "elites" who effectively control both parties with their extremely deep pockets, as long as Americans buy that lie, and as long as the Electoral College is allowed to remain in place, then America is screwed by it.

The only ways that I'm aware of to break that cycle is: 1) Permanently end the Electoral College; and 2) to finally vote for someone else, someone who is not so beholden to American corporatocracy, for enough people to both be registered to vote (finally starting to see some small movement on that, albeit infinitesimal) and for them to stop automatically simply voting for only either Democrats or Republicans.  That Senator Bernie Sanders held that office as an Independent for as long as he has is an indicator it can be done.

Eliminating the Electoral College is not impossible.  For things to do to achieve this, there are many avenues.  There are a plethora of petitions dedicated to this.  Sign all of them.  You can even start your own if you're so inclined.  You can also contact your government representatives, both state and federal.  You have the right, utilize it.  Write to and call your Representative and Senators.  And not just once and done, but repeatedly.  Don't let them ignore you.  To magnify your voice, also join or start a local group for this purpose.  For perspective, "gun rights" adherents and groups are calling in nearly daily.  It's one of the reasons Congress has failed so miserably to actually do anything particularly to curb gun violence  in America.  You can do the same.  As always, be polite or you'll be working against yourself.

Frankly I still think that if he had run as an independent in 2016 rather than falling into the trap of running as a Democrat against Hillary Clinton for the Democratic nomination, then we might finally have seen a solid crack in the system.  Especially considering Sanders was bringing in more small money donations and larger turnouts at his campaign rallies than Clinton and Trump combined.  But he was a clear and present danger to the established order which is why, since he was running as a Democrat, the Democratic Party was able to quash him and hand the nomination to Clinton.  Frankly, I could never vote for her as she never met a war she didn't like.

Until that break from the corporate duopoly happens, every cycle there will be people screaming that a vote for someone other than the corporate chosen candidate is a vote for the other corporate chosen candidate.

Want to keep Trump out of office?  Then do everything you can to make certain that the protections of the 14th Amendment are enforced, and throw his arse in prison where it likely belongs. 

Impossible is for the lazy.  Nothing is impossible if people start thinking rather than merely reacting.  It takes a lot of hard work and time invested.  As a hemorrhagic stroke survivor who's ambulatory again (after being completely paralyzed from the neck down on my dominant side, I'm not fully recovered YET), I am here to tell you impossible is for the lazy.   According to the laws of aerodynamics it's impossible for a bumblebee to fly.  Screw impossible and just DO it.

- Rev. J.T. Smith

 

Gun Rights And The Second Amendment, The Reality Behind The Arguments Ignore - Rev. J.T. Smith

Am I the only one who finds it outrageous that any member of the American military and police forces must be fully trained in how to use and store any weapon before they're ever issued that weapon, yet a civilian can just buy any weapon they want without ever being trained or demonstrating that they've been trained first?  Am I the only one who thinks that everyone in America who even wants to purchase or even use a gun must be fully trained in how to properly use and store that weapon first? 

First things first, the Second Amendment of the American Constitution:

It would help to no end if Americans, especially those members of the NRA and their sycophantic followers, would actually learn the most important and opening words of the 2nd Amendment: "A well regulated militia".  Having enough money to pay for the gun and requisite ammunition as well as the patience to wait out any waiting period does NOT make a person a part of "a well regulated militia".

A bit of history which used to be taught in high school and probably still is but gets ignored or glossed over:

The United States began as the loose coalition of states, originally the 13 British colonies, that were brought together under the Constitution thus forming a central government that gave both unity and some cohesion to those states.  While there was a standing army (in this context, this term is simpler to use than "armed forces"), the Continental Army, that was controlled by the federal government, it was still necessary in time of war to augment it with militias that were formed, controlled, and maintained at the state level.  Militias were then what the National Guard is now.

This was the most expedient solution as those militias already existed and were the armed forces used to defeat the British army during the Revolutionary War.  What's more, it was believed that every able-bodied man (in this, yes, they were sexist) in a given age range as determined by the individual states would eventually serve in their local militia, and that they would maintain their own small arms equipment as needed.  Equipment that they would actually be trained thoroughly in how to properly use and maintain prior to being allowed to ever have such weapons.  Larger weapons, such as cannons and requisite ammunition, were stowed in the armoury when not in use.

It was specifically those very militias that are referenced in the Second Amendment.

[Related:

https://www.commondreams.org/views/2022/06/06/its-time-democrats-stop-agreeing-second-amendment-protects-individuals-right-bear]

Next, guns themselves:
The sole purpose of a gun is to maim and/or kill at a distance quickly and efficiently.  Any argument of what physically does the killing demonstrates a distinct mental disconnect (not to mention a severe case of cranial-rectal inversion).

What's more, all a drawn gun demonstrates is two things:

First, whether it's drawn or holstered, empty or loaded, a gun simply demonstrates fear.  The fear felt by the person who's carrying and holding the gun.  This includes the American police and military.  Other nations (e.g. Great Britain) have police forces that are not constantly armed with a firearm and are further trained to do something Americans find unthinkable: they actually talk down the criminal with the gun and disarm them without firing a single shot or brandishing their own weapon.  They're not completely defenseless as they do have collapsible batons and tasers, but those are not their first used option.  Instead, they use a far more dangerous weapon: their BRAIN.

The second thing a drawn gun demonstrates is that you are immediately the prime target of anyone else with a loaded gun.  This obviously includes the police, who actually are properly trained in the proper use and storage of their weapons before they are ever issued their weapons.

I have an idea: Everyone in the NRA hierarchy and everyone who panders to them (including every politician who accepts any money from the NRA) should be shot, preferably embarrassingly and unexpectedly.  Note I said shot and not killed.  This way, they might learn from the experience.  Especially if it's done in such a way that even if they're armed themselves it wouldn't actually help them in the slightest.  Though I think the exercise would need to be repeated several times for each gun worshiper before they wake up to the outrageous danger their lust for guns puts everyone in.

Another suggestion would be to start heavily taxing ammunition.  People will definitely stop and think before firing a bullet that costs $1000 and can never be reused.

It is long past time that the carnage made so readily enacted by guns comes to an end.

by Rev. J.T. Smith 

National Day of mourning

Most people don't know that back in

1912, Hellmann's Mayonnaise was

manufactured in England.  In fact,

the Titanic was carrying 12,000

jars of the condiment scheduled

for delivery in Vera Cruz, Mexico,

which was to be the next port of call

for the great ship after its stop in

New York.  This would have been

the largest single shipment of

mayonnaise ever delivered to Mexico

. . .  But as we know, the great ship

did not make it to New York.  The

ship hit an iceberg and sank.  The

people of Mexico, who were crazy

about mayonnaise, and were eagerly

awaiting its delivery, were disconsolate

at the loss.  Their anguish was so

great, that they declared a National

Day of Mourning.

The National Day of Mourning occurs

each year on May 5 and is known,

of course, as - Sinko De Mayo.

WHAT???  You expected something educational from me?

You need a shot of Tequila.

The Munsters - RARE vocal version of Theme Song!

Perhaps A Reason Why The Right Is So Willing To Push For Eliminating Contraception & Abortion Coverage? - Rev. J.T. Smith

I think I've figured out a large, though not consciously acknowledged reason why the Right is so willing to push for eliminating contraception and abortion coverage that has nothing to do with religious teachings even though those teachings provide a handy cover. We must remember that the mindset of slavers of old still exists, albeit in a new guise: Corporations. The wealthy few have found a new way to create a slave class in America, and the only way to make sure the money, which is invariably equated with power, keeps pouring in is to continually grow the worker base, which simultaneously grows the consumer base. And if the slaves, who also don't realize they're slaves, are allowed to have easily accessible and safe contraception and abortion, well that threatens the growth of that worker/consumer class. And allowing bigotry and misogyny at all levels has the added bonus of acting as a handy diversion from the reality that unless they're one of the wealthy few then they're also slaves. Amazingly, while they have more power than the peons, even the millionaires are slaves to the ultra-rich.

by Rev. J.T. Smith 

Dreaded Taxes [UPDATED] - by Rev. J.T. Smith

It's that season again: Tax season.  No one likes having to pay them.  And whenever we hear politicians promise to somehow cut or lower them, we instinctively love the idea.

Then again, we don't like having to pay for things like phone bills, car repairs, rent/mortgage, or any of the other bills that keep our needs met either.  Unfortunately, if you don't pay the phone bill, then no phone service for you.  Don't spend the money on the car repairs and maintenance?  Then you're out a working car.  (This becomes an even bigger issue if you live in a rural area with no available public transportation.)  Don't pay rent/mortgage?  Then you're either rich, living with very understanding friends/relatives, or you're homeless.

The problem is that the same concept also applies to taxes as they are in fact what pays for all of the services that are all too often taken for granted: Police/fire/emergency services, roads and their accouterments and maintenance, public schools, et al.  And the taxes are meant to ensure that all of us chip in, thus lowering the cost per individual.  As usual, we have politicians who are looking to privatize all those services in order to “lower taxes.”  The fact is that the wealthy want to lower their own taxes, at the expense of everyone else.  It's similar to the concept of “trickle-down economics.”  While it might sound good on the surface, the reality is quite different as history has demonstrated that those latter ideas simply don't work.  By privatizing what would otherwise be public services, we’re effectively paying more money for what amounts to less services as that is what allows the corporations to make more money, and the bottom line of profits will always matter far more to corporate America than people’s lives.  And the politicians who push for privatization are really in the pockets of those corporations and the exceptionally wealthy through the lobbyists who are metaphorically whispering in their ear.

This can be changed, it can be fixed.  Sadly, it won’t happen overnight; but, that doesn’t mean it can’t be done.  We need people in every level of government who want and are willing to push for tax reforms that forces those who can afford it (e.g. earn/receive $300,000 per year or more) to pay more in taxes in that they have more available to pay, as opposed to always sticking the working poor with the bill as is done now.  Not only those wealthy people, but  corporations also need to pay their share.  “Each and every year, we lose $100 billion in revenue because large corporations and the wealthy are stashing their profits in the Cayman Islands, Bermuda, and other offshore tax havens.  That has got to stop.” [Senator Bernie Sanders (I-Vt)]  What's more, as Senator Sanders has also noted: “At a time when we now spend almost as much as the rest of the world combined on defense, we can make judicious cuts in our armed forces without compromising our military capability.” 

Really, cutting America's military spending in half, which would still result in greater spending than the next top three countries combined, along with forcing corporations and the super-rich to pay their fair share of taxes including on all of the money they have tucked away in other countries, would easily cover the social safety net, the desperately needed infrastructure repairs, the salaries for emergency services, fully fund top notch public education as well as college tuition, and still have money available to lift everyone in this country out of poverty.

A very strong message that we must send to every level of government, especially to those politicians who constantly cry about government spending, is that the Government is not a for profit business but is rather a non-profit organization that is meant to serve ALL citizens regardless of age, biological gender, gender expression, transgender, skin colour, ethnic background, physical ability or disability, sexual orientation, or any other grouping of citizens we might think of that I've missed.

We can begin to bring about the changes needed by first making certain our voter registrations are up to date.  When election time comes around again (Presidential, Congressional, Gubernatorial, Mayoral, etc., et. al.), we vote in those who would push for and through the above mentioned changes in taxation practices.  In the interim between voting cycles, we can still band together and push for change.  Join local activist groups or start your own.  Write letters to the editor, write and sign petitions.  And follow the advice of Hillary Clinton when she said at National Partnership's 2012 Annual Luncheon on June 26, 2012, “Get organized, get involved, and don't let anyone tell you it can't be done.”

 

by Rev. J.T. Smith

Cree Proverb

A Challenge - Rev. J.T. Smith

I already know that I'm not likely to make any friends by this, but that doesn't really matter.

I constantly hear how "American troops are  protecting [my/our] freedoms."  Yet I never hear anything specific about just which freedoms are being directly threatened by foreign powers that are not the result of Americans curtailing their own freedoms.

I challenge any American soldier in any branch of the American armed forces to not only name me a single freedom that any country in the Middle East (or any other nation in the world for that matter) in the last 50 years [i.e. since 1967 as it's now 2017] that has ever been jeopardized, but to also explain IN DETAIL exactly how that freedom was jeopardized!

One thing, the answer must involve direct action(s) on the part of that foreign nation.

This is my challenge to any American soldier who can answer in detail since, other than the media, they're the most vociferous in this claim. 

- Rev. J.T. Smith 

This Song Is Just As Fitting Now As When it First Came Out

Lyrics (in case you're interested)

Lives In The Balance - Jackson Browne

I've been waiting for something to happen
For a week or a month or a year
With the blood in the ink of the headlines
And the sound of the crowd in my ear

You might ask what it takes to remember
When you know that you've seen it before
Where a government lies to a people
And a country is drifting to war
 

And there's a shadow on the faces
Of the men who send the guns
To the wars that are fought in places
Where their business interest runs

On the radio talk shows and TV
You hear one thing again and again
How the USA stands for freedom
And we come to the aid of a friend
But who are the ones that we call our friends
These governments killing their own
Or the people who finally can't take anymore
And they pick up a gun or a brick or a stone

And there are lives in the balance
There are people under fire
There are children at the cannons
And there is blood on the wire

There's a shadow on the faces
Of the men who fan the flames
Of the wars that are fought in places
Where we can't even say the names

They sell us the president the same way
They sell us our clothes and our cars
They sell us everything from youth to religion
The same time they sell us our wars

I want to know who the men in the shadows are
I want to hear somebody asking them why
They can't be counted on to tell us
Who our enemies are
But they're never the ones to fight or to die

And there are lives in the balance
There are people under fire
There are children at the cannons
And there is blood on the wire

Update At Your Local Bookstore

The Shortsightedness Of Blaming Religion - Rev. J.T. Smith

Obviously, not everyone shares the same religious beliefs.  Right and wrong, good and evil, those are subjective rather than objective terms and ideas.  What's right and good for some can be considered wrong and evil by others.  Everyone is the hero in their own life story.  An often overlooked example of perspective is that America invaded Iraq and Afghanistan purportedly to fight the terrorists, yet to the noncombatant Iraqis and Afghans it's Americans (who invaded their countries, drop bombs, and launch missiles from planes and drones that destroy their homes, culminating in the combination of the missiles, bombs, and soldiers that kill their children and families) who're the real terrorists.  There's the adage that “there's two sides to every coin,” the obverse and the reverse (heads and tails).  Coins have a third side that people either forget or completely ignore: the edge between the sides that you can spin the coin on.  And just like situations involving contention, there are three sides: You're side, their side, and reality.

Regardless of your faith leanings, even if you're an atheist, the reality is that the three largest religions practiced in the West (i.e. Judaism, Christianity, and Islam) all worship the same God.  The only difference between Yahweh, Jehovah, and Allah is the same difference between Michael, Miguel, Mikail, et al.: Language.  Yahweh is the Hebrew name for God, Jehovah is one of the Christian names for God, and Allah is the Arabic name.  This matters because it's the perceived differences that are used as excuses by all sides for the current strife in the Middle East.

And there are those who will say that religion, regardless of its name, is nothing but superstition in the first place and science “provides all the answers,” and it's those superstitions that are the real cause for the various wars.  Yet they'll still proceed to use science as a tool and weapon and religion as an excuse to commit heinous acts of violence.

And because that excuse is usually stated both loudly and repeatedly regardless of the theatre of combat, both the targets and those who witness the senseless violence, killing, destruction, and overarching tragedy will typically have an overriding fear/anger response and blame the religion (especially if they're not practitioners of the blamed religion) of their enemy.  It's the easy answer.  The over-simplified and fails to look at the entire picture answer, but still the perceived easy answer.  And who doesn't like simple, easy answers that require little to no thought?

The thing is, while not only is there no religion safe from blame or being targeted, religion in and of itself is never the culprit.  The Crusades and the Spanish Inquisition were perpetrated by Christians and were just as violent (relative to available technology) as what ISIL is doing now in the name of Islam.

We, this means all of us regardless of ethnicity or religious beliefs (including atheism), need to stop blaming religion for the actions of its purported followers and to stop accepting extremists' claims of following their religious beliefs when their actions demonstrate their real motivations are of feeling the need for perceived superiority and their evident desire to bully and dominate others.  Just because someone uses something as an excuse does not automatically make that excuse the cause for their actions.

Islam is not the enemy.

Judaism is not the enemy.

Christianity is not the enemy.

Religion, regardless of the flavour, is not the enemy.

Greed, intolerance, hatred, those are the enemy!

Even science and religion really can co-exist without being at odds with each other if people would just get over themselves.  Now if only the same could be said of humanity in general.

by Rev. J.T. Smith

Religion Vs Science - Rev. J.T. Smith

That title seems to imply that science and religion (any religion, I am not singling out any specific religion here) are at odds with each other.  And it seems that the majority of people (well, most Americans at least) share that sentiment: that science and religion are at odds with each other.  The reality, though, is that they're not.  I'm writing this as an ordained minister and a scientist.  Even Einstein said: “I want to know God's thoughts - the rest are mere details.”

Scientists rely on methodology, testing, and evidence to come to their conclusions.  Scientists, for the most part it seems, concur that science has all the answers.   Science does not have all of the answers; science does, however, provide a way of getting the answers.   The catch is that there will always be questions, there will always be mysteries.

Religion was basically the earliest form of science, the earliest means available to explain world and the universe.  Science as we know it came about because Religion didn't seem sufficient to answering questions as there was evidence putting holes in many of the core statements of Religion.   Part of the problem is a difference in the mental approach.  Scientists have ideas that they test and either verify and/or adjust as needed, or reject the idea as determined by the testing and the resulting evidence.  Religion, on the other hand, tends to engender beliefs.  Beliefs are far more intransigent, much harder to adapt to new evidence.  What many people don't seem to grasp is that simply because new evidence may contradict one aspect of a given religion it doesn't mean that the religion itself is wrong, it simply means that our understanding needs to be adjusted.

The Jewish Torah and the Christian Bible (of which the first five books are in fact the Torah) contain an ancient understanding of how the world and the universe were created; but that's not necessarily the whole story.  Evolution still fits easily into it all.  Especially once you look at the Creation as described in Genesis as the highlights much the same way the sports section of the news (i.e. the evening news, the sports section of the newspaper/newsletter, etc., et al.) doesn't describe every moment of a game/match but instead just gives the highlights for the “big plays”, the big events.

Science will explain how people reproduce, how groups of people form cultures and how those cultures interacted physically, economically, socially, etc.   Science in and of itself does not set moral boundaries nor recommend any laws governing how people should treat each other.  In many societies, religion does set those moral boundaries and recommend those governing laws.  In fact, not only were the oldest documented legal codes based on religious doctrines, but many modern legal codes still spring at the base from religious-based ethical doctrines.  That does mot mean that atheists lack morals or that religion is required to create a working and just code of conduct.  In fact, the American legal system has roots not only in the 10 commandments of Jewish/Christian heritage/faith, but also numerous others including ancient Roman and Babylonian legal codes as well as civil and common law traditions of Europe.

Ultimately, what's mostly missed in all this back and forth is that both religion and science are really after the same thing: Both want to understand the universe.  The difference is simply the approach, the effective questions being asked.  Science seeks to explain and understand how it all happens, how it all works, the effective mechanics of it.  Religion seeks to explain and understand why it all happens, what's behind it all, a reason beyond “that's just the way it is.”  The easiest way to understand it is to think of science as the medical approach to the universe as a body, while religion could be thought of as the psychological approach to the universe.  Science will see the body, but for many they'll see that body as a machine rather than a living dynamic entity.  Religion tends to treat the body as a living entity and tries to work from there, but occasionally misses that the universe is dynamic rather than static, and has been since the Creation.

by Rev. J.T. Smith

Homeland Security

Hey, President Trump,

Hillary Clinton Did NOT Lose Because Democrats/Progressives Did Not Turn Out To Vote - Rev. J.T. Smith

First, full disclosure: I am not a registered Democrat.  Except for during the Primaries leading up to the 2016 Presidential Election when I officially changed parties to vote for Bernie Sanders, I am not now nor have I ever been a Democrat.  I am registered as independent.  I grant that I lean far more Democrat in general, but that's not the same thing.

And after the way the DNC treated Sanders from the beginning, from trying too keep him from getting any real press coverage even after he was clearly polling higher than she was against Trump to trying to claim he wasn't vetted against Trump even though Sanders withstood more directed attacks than Clinton and still managed to stay on the actual issues while calmly and cogently explaining things like socialism, I never will be a Democrat.

I do not hate Hillary Clinton nor do I think she's an idiot nor some version of the Antichrist.  I never have.  As noted in a prior posting, I simply cannot vote for her.  That doesn't change the number of people that did vote for her.  And if you buy into the (erroneous) notion that there's only two viable political parties, then Hillary Clinton makes a FAR saner choice than Trump.  And the fact is that nearly 3 Million more people agree that Clinton was the better choice than those who supported Trump.

Now, I don't know if it's the actual upper echelons of the Democratic party or simply the supporting arms like the National Democratic Training Committee and PACs like the Progressive Turnout Project and Democracy for America that honestly believe the entire problem was that not enough Democrats voted in the 2016 election and that was why Clinton lost.  What I do know is that if any of them or even any of the common Democrats honestly believe that then they're blind and stupid.  Again, the fact is that nearly 3 Million more people agree that Clinton was the better choice than those who supported Trump.

But I keep getting emails with petitions (for causes that I support from things like the environment to getting Representatives and Senators to block Trump's appalling nominations to offices with real political power) that when you sign the petitions you're asked (pestered more like) to fill out a survey.  Not only are the surveys realistically useless due to the questions having thoroughly leading answer choices, for example from the Progressive Turnout Project:

Official Research Poll

Did you vote for Donald J. Trump?

NO! Absolutely not. Yes, I did vote for Trump. I did not vote. 

They then follow up with another survey that both contains (usually though not always at the beginning) and reinforces the assertion of the erroneous assumption that turnout was the whole problem.

When 2.8 million more people vote for the candidate and that candidate still loses to Hitler mk II . . . er, a pathetic windbag like Trump, turnout is not so much the problem.  Or at least, it's only a small part of the much larger problem.

Then there's the media, like this article from the National Memo, that also completely misses the problem that allowed Trump to "win."

When you look back at the lead up to the election, the lion's share of the television adverts were for Hillary Clinton.  Trump aired almost no adverts until the weekend before election day, just as he had done during the primaries.  Considering the relative saturation levels, people would have been jaded on Clinton's adverts (including their overall lack of talk of the issues like the economy and her strengths in relation to those issues and focusing solely on Trump's numerous personal failings while ignoring all of his business failings or demonstrating clearly just how he's a con artist), which only allowed Trump's message of misinformation to resonate even louder.  For all the harm the Citizen's United decision caused, it was Hillary's massive fundraising compared to Trump's stingy spending that hurt her.  Still, while a facet of the problem, it's not the problem when you remember that Hillary dominated the popular vote by 2.8 Million more votes than the Great Pumpkin . . ., er, Trump.

Considering that she got that many more votes overall, getting the people out to vote wasn't quite the problem.  Though if you want to get more people out to vote, how about we end gerrymandering entirely as well as things like voter ID laws and other related barriers to voting.  It's also rather telling how the GOP relies so much on those barriers instead of actually trying to win elections on the merits of their ideas.

No, there are two basic general reasons Hillary lost.  The first is that within the Electoral College, Hillary lacked the votes of the whites in the Rust Belt.  She forgot in her wealth that the economy matters, and the con man focused on the economy.  That he did so with lies and misinformation is irrelevant when she ignores the economy so thoroughly.  That's only if you think the Electoral College does anything remotely useful.

The biggest problem, even if all those other barriers are legally and constitutionally eliminated, is the Electoral College.  The Electoral College has allowed the election to be stripped and flipped six times (in 1800, 1824, 1876, 1888, 2000, and 2016) relieving the public will of their choice of leader.

That is the main problem, the reason Hillary Clinton lost the election.  Science matters, but so does history.  “'History,' it has been said, 'does not repeat itself. The historians repeat one another.'” - Max Beerbohm.

Now if we can just wake the corporate media up to these facts and shine a light on them.  Then we need to break the notion that there are only two viable political parties.

First, we need to find a way to get corporate media's collective lips off of and their collective heads out of Trump's ass, though that may prove far more difficult than getting them to wake up and actually do their jobs of keeping the entirety of government honest.

by Rev. J.T. Smith

Origins Of Christmas - Rev. J.T. Smith

First let me start of by stating that I am an Ordained Minister of the Christian faith with a degree in archaeology.  Nothing I’m saying here is meant to deny or take away from God.  Rather, it is intended to educate so that our understanding is based on facts rather than misconceptions.

The modern view of Christmas actually isn’t the same now as what it was to begin with.  While the holiday is intended to celebrate the birth of Jesus, it is not actually his birthday.  For starters, in fact, no one knows exactly when he was born.

The modern calendar, the Gregorian calendar, is based around the approximate birth of Jesus; meaning that Jesus was born 2,016 years ago and that 0 AD would be the year Jesus was born.  Unfortunately, it seems that when the original date was being calculated, they mistranslated the Roman numerals and it should have been what is by modern calendars approximately 4 BC.  More recently, some scholars have determined from various references in the Bible that Jesus was born between 7 – 5 BC. 

Then there’s the day itself.  Jesus was not born on December 25.  The earliest mention of December 25 as Jesus’ “birthday” comes from a mid-fourth-century Roman almanac that lists the death dates of various Christian bishops and martyrs.  The first date listed, December 25, is marked: natus Christus in Betleem Judeae: “Christ was born in Bethlehem of Judea.”  Even looking at the setting of the story, things like the shepherds bringing their flocks in at night, dates between May and October have been suggested.

Even where Jesus was born is somewhat in question.   The Gospels say Jesus was born in Bethlehem, yet Jesus is called “Jesus of Nazareth” throughout the rest of the New Testament.  This small detail is causing scholars to question just where Jesus was actually born.

The term "Christmas" originated from the Catholic Church as “The Mass Of Christ” or more commonly “Christ’s Mass.”  Christ’s Mass was eventually bastardized to become Christmas.  The date of Christ’s Mass was placed on December 25 for two reasons.  The vast majority of Catholic Christian holidays were responses to pagan holidays, primarily in an attempt to “overthrow” older religions and practices.  The first reason Christ’s Mass was originally celebrated in December was to offset the pagan celebration of the winter solstice, also known as Yule.  While we might then logically conclude that Christ’s Mass should also be on the winter solstice as well, the Catholic Church went a step further, which leads to the second reason.  The ancients didn’t have watches, and clocks weren’t ubiquitous like they are now.  As a result, they were more attuned to nature and the changes in the seasons.  The 25th was chosen as the daylight hours were getting longer (they could more readily see that the daylight hours were getting longer immediately after the winter solstice) which came to represent the coming light of the Lord.  Since not only many pagan religions also give presents during the winter celebrations, the story of the Magi in the book of Matthew (for example) also bringing gifts, that practice was also incorporated in the Christian celebration.  The tradition that there were three wise men arose from the fact that the Bible mentions three gifts (see Matthew 2:11), but the Bible doesn’t ever actually say how many wise men made the journey to see the baby Jesus.

In fact, many of the other trappings of Christmas are either borne of older religions or are later additions from cultures that are also not Jewish.  (Always remember that Jesus, whose name was in fact Yeshua, which translates to Joshua but was such a common name that it was later translated to Jesus to separate him, ignoring that the Hebrew alphabet has no letter J, Jesus/Yeshua was first and foremost a Jewish Rabbi, meaning he would have observed all of the Jewish holidays and customs.)  For starters, the Christmas tree developed in early modern Germany, where it is today called Weihnachtsbaum or Christbaum, with predecessors that can be traced to the 16th and possibly 15th century, in which "devout Christians brought decorated trees into their homes".

You know the tradition of kissing under the mistletoe?  Well, the use of mistletoe can be traced back to ancient druids who believed it held magical powers, brought good luck to households, and like jack-o-lanterns, ward off evil spirits.  The notion of mistletoe creating love and celebrating with it came from Norse mythology, while kissing under the venerable plant got started in jolly old England.  The original custom of kissing involving mistletoe (now often hanging over doorways and in hallways or being carried by someone who wanted to make certain of getting that kiss) began as something of a game started by such that if someone could pick a berry from the sprig of the plant and there were no more berries, the kissing would cease.

Those are  just some examples.  So much of what’s equated with the Christian religion is really borrowed from or “in answer to” other, most often older, religions.

by Rev. J.T. Smith