Bombastic, vain and slippery, Mr. Trump played the same small-screen character he has offered the viewing public for years.
Presenting himself as the leader of “a movement like the world has never seen before,” he offered no olive branch to the majority of American voters who opposed him. He displayed only petulance and braggadocio in response to issues that dogged him during the campaign.
.. He emphasized that, in his view, he wasn’t legally required to do a thing, presenting his largely symbolic measures as a high-minded sacrifice to the public interest.
.. This leaves in place problematic deals Mr. Trump has with politically connected business people in India, the Philippines, Turkey and elsewhere. She did not explain how the ethics adviser would remain free of coercion, or escape firing if he or she rejected any agreements.
Evangelicals should be deeply troubled by Donald Trump’s attempt to mainstream heresy
The basic idea of his “gnostic medicine” was that we’re sick only because we think bad thoughts. Illness and death are an illusion.
.. The Word of Faith movement was largely the brainchild of E.W. Kenyon (1867-1948), who blended Quimby’s Emersonian transcendentalism with his more evangelical “Victorious Life” beliefs. “I know that I am healed,” he wrote, “because [God] said that I am healed and it makes no difference what the symptoms may be in my body.”
.. Kenneth Hagin, revered as “granddaddy” in Word of Faith circles, gave the faith-healing movement its theological core. It included odd teachings about us all being “little gods.” Those who are born again, Hagin said, “are as much the incarnation [of God] as Jesus of Nazareth.” “You don’t have a God living in you,” says Hagin’s student Kenneth Copeland. “You are one.” Creflo Dollar adds, “[The] only human part of you is the flesh you’re wearing.”
.. In the 1950s, American theologian Reinhold Niebuhr described Peale’s message as a false gospel: “The basic sin of this cult is its egocentricity,” he said. “It puts ‘self’ instead of the cross at the center of the picture.”
.. the movement teaches that Jesus went to the cross not to bring forgiveness of our sins but to get us out of financial debt, not to reconcile us to God but to give us the power to claim our prosperity, not to remove the curse of death, injustice and bondage to ourselves but to give us our best life now. White says emphatically that Jesus is “not the only begotten Son of God,” just the first. We’re all divine and have the power to speak worlds into existence.
.. God spoke and created the universe; you have creative power to speak life and death! If you believe God, you can create anything in your life.”
.. Of course, to be a “little god,” you have to do your part, often involving a financial commitment. It’s what they call “seed faith.” White even gives her viewers the words to tell themselves: “So I’m going to activate my miracle by my obedience right now. I’m going to get up and go to the phone.” When you do that, she says, and “put a demand on the anointing,” you’re “going to make God get off His ivory throne.” “Don’t you miss this moment! If you miss your moment, you miss your miracle!”
.. In fact, one gets the impression that God isn’t necessary at all in the system. God set up these spiritual laws and if you know the secrets, you’re in charge of your destiny.
.. But it is striking that Trump has surrounded himself with cadre of prosperity evangelists who cheerfully attack basic Christian doctrines. The focus of this unity is a gospel that is about as diametrically opposed to the biblical one as you can imagine.
Trump, Trapped in His Lies, Keeps Lying. Sad!
Kellyanne Conway, went on TV on Monday to defend her boss. “He has debunked this so many times,” she said, casually contorting the meaning of “debunked.” (She meant “pathetically denied.”)
“Why is everything taken at face value?” she said. “You can’t give him the benefit of the doubt on this and he’s telling you what was in his heart? You always want to go by what’s come out of his mouth rather than look at what’s in his heart.”
This is where things got really weird. Ms. Conway’s quote is a glimpse into the heart of darkness that a Trump presidency portends. She wants us to swallow Mr. Trump’s reality without question. To accept only what he says now — not what he said then — over the evidence seen and heard by our own eyes and ears. She wants us overcome the dissonance by looking for the “truth” in his heart.
The truth is getting harder to see in the flickering gaslight of Mr. Trump’s America, but it’s there. Not “in his heart,” or out of his mouth, no matter how much this man and his minions say otherwise.
The Age of Fake Policy
On Thursday, at a rough estimate, 75,000 Americans were laid off or fired by their employers. Some of those workers will find good new jobs, but many will end up earning less, and some will remain unemployed for months or years.
If that sounds terrible to you, and you’re asking what economic catastrophe just happened, the answer is, none. In fact, I’m just assuming that Thursday was a normal day in the job market.
.. Bear in mind that corporations have every incentive to go along with the spin. Suppose that you’re a C.E.O. who wants to curry favor with the new administration. One thing you can do, of course, is steer business to Trump hotels and other businesses. But another thing you can do is help generate Trump-friendly headlines.