Israel Declares War For The First Time Since 1973.

A consultant on the news made an interesting point. Hamas' attacks could have been to undermine negotiations for cooperation between Israel and Arab countries (I recall mention of Saudi Arabia) by forcing Israel into retaliatory actions that could turn into a religious matter. He pointed out that religious matters leave no room for compromise.So the problem with religion is not any inherent evil, but rather that religion can be so readily weaponized for evil and has been (and still is) weaponized far too often. We could construct analogies involving dynamite, C4, or even nukes that can be put to constructive use if handled properly, but are far too easy to be used for evil.

I think that Christian wrong idea comes from one of Jesus' first false dichotomies:

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Matthew 12:30 He that is not with me is against me; and he that
gathereth not with me scattereth abroad.

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In their thinking, there is no neutral middle ground; either you are with Jesus Christ or you are against him. No room for the vast majority of "who cares?". Strict black-or-white thinking that ignores the seas of gray in between.Yet another case of Christians rejecting reality. By their own logic, since they are not with reality then they are against reality.

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"Reality. What a concept!" -- Robin Williams at the Roxy (HBO special, c. 1980) 

As they say (eg, SS-Standartenführer Hans Landa): "To hunt a weasel, you need to think like a weasel."In order to understand why fundamentalists say the strange things that they do, you have to understand how they think. That means that instead of reading their "sources" correctly and in context, you need to follow their incorrect and out-of-context reading.Re-reading what I had written, you will notice that I had qualified that as "in their thinking."Though there is the added complication that they don't think about what they believe, but rather they just accept without comprehension what they are told to believe. It is difficult to analyze thought processes that never take place.

An example of that.My Aikido sensei in college (c. 1974) was from Japan. One day a student asked him about his experience in WWII. He was an elementary school student at the end of the war. One day they gave all the students sharpened bamboo sticks/staffs and trained them in how to use them against the invading soldiers. Fortunately, they never needed to use that training.That shows how determined they were to not surrender.

Just remembering what I was told about the French student anti-war protests of the late 60's. I was told this by a French co-worker when I worked construction in West Germany in the summer of 1973.According to him, the French government's strategy was to let the protesters get out of control and disrupt everybody else's daily lives. That caused public opinion would turn against the protesters strongly enough that they welcomed the harshness of the eventual police crackdown that reestablished order and normal life. Then, since the protesting students were of draft age and on student deferments, the government simply took their deferments away, drafted them into the Army, and shipped them out. To the public's relief and with their approval.

For the Christian Nationalist side, you are forgetting its origins in radical religious right (RRR -- remember back to Falwell et alia at the beginning of the first Reagan Administration). Because of my experience with the Jesus Freak Movement (c. 1970) which sparked the massive growth of fundamentalist churches into super-churches, I see Christian Nationalism's origins to be fundamentalist Christian. However, the roots for the drive to replace the Constitution with an Old Testament theocracy can be traced back to Christian Reconstructionism which was a fundamentalist Calvinist movement whose political agenda was adopted by the fundamentalists/evangelicals/crap-by-any-other-name (would stink no less) despite their enormous theological differences (eg, premillennialism v. postmillennialism).Besides their untenable and completely unrealistic beliefs in biblical literalism and inerrancy, the most striking characteristics of the Jesus Freak iteration was their driving obsession with two things: 1) demons and 2) End Times. Although young-earth creationism was present at the time (ie, circa 1970, though it had existed since the 1920's in Seventh Day Adventism which is the source of many YEC claims), in my experience it was little more than some vague broad claims (eg, "There's evidence of the Flood" but with no specific claims) and two specific claims which were obvious nonsense (eg, "living fresh-water mollusks dated as thousands of years old" and "the NASA computer that discovered Joshua's Lost Day"); it wasn't until a decade later when I was surprised to see that nonsense was still around so, wondering what their evidence was, I started researching it more deeply and of course it all turned out to be nonsense lies -- for the more complete story, refer to my 1990 essay, Why I Oppose Creation Science (or, How I got to Here from There). And a third fundamentalist obsession was arguing that the government should be based on Biblical Law, but that didn't build up any steam until circa 1980.The obsession with End Times and Armageddon has continued. So "Christian Nationalist" support for Israel has nothing to do with Zionism (movement for the establishment of a Jewish homeland), but rather solely for the "fulfillment of prophesies" related to the End Times and in order to bring about the Second Coming by igniting war in the Middle East war centered around Armageddon (gotta keep those End Times prophesies self-fulfilled, after all).IOW, their support for Israel has nothing to do with Zionism, with providing the Jews with a homeland, and everything to do with bringing about the end of the world. They have absolutely no interest in finding any solution to tensions in the Middle East, but rather they are obsessed with making the situation there worse and worse, eagerly (nay, zealously) waiting for war to break out.And if they are able to make money manufacturing and selling arms, then that's just icing on the cake.

It shouldn't, unless that individual fails/refuses to conduct himself in a professional manner.One of the key traits that the military teaches is professionalism:

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Professionalism is a set of standards that an individual is expected to adhere to in a workplace, usually in order to appear serious, uniform, or respectful. What constitutes professionalism is hotly debated and varies from workplace to workplace and between cultures. Professionalism is typically defined as a mix of professional ethics and dress code.

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Definition

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Common traits of a "professional" person include:

• integrity
• punctuality
• reliability
• organization skills
• emotional intelligence
• appropriate dress

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The aspect of professionalism that I am referring to is doing your job to the best of your ability regardless of personal feelings or prejudices.For example, the military is organized in units and subunits with particular missions. Those units with support missions provide services to other units. And within each unit are subunits with specific jobs supporting other subunits, etc.All interactions are expected to be professional, meaning that we work together with mutual respect and without involving personal feelings or animosities.DrJones*' remark was: Evangelical Christians supports Israel solely for the purpose of bringing about the End Times ... as well as in hope of fulfilling Martin Luther's dream of converting the Jews to Christianity (he had started out defending the Jews against traditional anti-Semitism, but in hope of converting them; when he failed in that endeavor he became a virulent anti-Semite). They care nothing for Israel nor for ensuring its future nor for working towards a peaceful solution to the problems in the Middle East. Rather, they just want to help end the world and so will work against peaceful solutions. In order to act professionally in the job Mike Huckabee is being put up for, an evangelical Christian would need to put aside his personal evangelical Christian agenda of sabotaging peace in the Middle East and instead work towards peace.How many evangelical Christians would have the ability to act professionally in that job? Not many.So what about Mike Huckabee? Here's what Wikipedia says of his position on Israel and Palestine:

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Israel & Palestine

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Huckabee is a strong supporter of Israel, opposing Palestinian statehood and rejecting Palestinian identity. Huckabee has also condoned West Bank settlements which are illegal under international law. In 2008, Huckabee argued that there is "no such thing as a Palestinian". In 2017, at an event in the West Bank, he stated: "There is no such thing as a West Bank - it's Judea and Samaria. There's no such thing as a settlement. They're communities. They're neighborhoods. They're cities. There's no such thing as an occupation."

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'Nuff said?

What State Dept lifers with years of experience working on behalf of the country? Not after 20 Jan 2025 when Trump reinstates his Schedule F plan to purge highly competent civil servants (AKA "the Deep State" which really is nothing more than non-partisan career civil servants loyal to country and charged with following the law as they keep the government working) with incompetent toadies whose only necessary requirement is complete personal loyalty to Trump.And indeed having long-term policies is very important in diplomacy. Instead, our policies will depend entirely on whoever was the last to blow in Trump's ear (whom he will then follow anywhere). Or on the latest bribe regardless of what he had been bribed to support previously (the size of those bribes being a factor, of course).

This time is not like the last. The first time it was Trump surrounded, with a few exceptions (eg, Steven "Nosferatu" Miller), by staff who were still loyal to Country and Constitution and Rule of Law and many of whom worked to protect the country from Trump's worst impulses. For example, on 01 June 2020 Trump twice called for mobilizing active duty troops against the demonstrators in Lafayette Square so that he could stage his Satanic display (displaying a Christian symbol, the Bible, upside down) in front of St. John's Episcopal Church and both times that was nixed by Defense Secretary Mark Esper.This time Trump will be surrounded both by sycophants who will only agree with him and will do nothing to hold him back and also by extremists intent on using their positions of power in the new Trump Administration to pursue and prosecute their own agendas. It was the latter who composed Project 2025 which outlines their plans and goals. Trump is far too lazy, illiterate, and just plain stupid to have formulated that 920-page plan, but rather it was created by extreme right-wing ideologues eager to exploit Trump's power.It's like what I seem to recall Bill Maher having said in the 2016 Republican primaries when that race was mainly between Trump and Ted Cruz -- I seem to recall him recommending Trump over Cruz (interspersed with gargling bleach):

from memory:

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Trump in the White House would break everything around him like a bull in a china shop, but he's too stupid to do too much damage. Cruz, on the other hand, knows exactly where to place the explosives to destroy the entire building.

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Several years ago I heard a historian's opinion that Hitler was not the architect of the atrocities of the Hitlerzeit ("Hitler Time", the Nazi Regime), but rather a catalyst. Hitler was too lazy and unimaginative to have accomplished all that, but rather he was surrounded by ambitious men who wanted to build their own bases of power and realms within Hitler's Reich. It was those power-hungry ambitious followers who, seeking to draw some of Hitler's power for their own, would try to curry favor by formulating and implementing operations that would appeal to dem Führer. Just like it will be in Trump's incoming administration.BTW, Mike Godwin (Godwin's Law, 1990) has approved of comparing Trump to Hitler:

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In 2023, Godwin published an opinion on The Washington Post stating "Yes, it's okay to compare Trump to Hitler. Don't let me stop you." In the article, Godwin says "But when people draw parallels between Donald Trump’s 2024 candidacy and Hitler’s progression from fringe figure to Great Dictator, we aren’t joking. Those of us who hope to preserve our democratic institutions need to underscore the resemblance before we enter the twilight of American democracy."

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Last I checked, that article was still behind a pay wall.Also from that same Wikipedia article:

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In August 2017, while commenting on the Unite the Right rally in Charlottesville, Virginia, Godwin himself endorsed and encouraged social-media users to compare its "alt-right" participants to Nazis.

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Godwin has denied the need to update or amend the rule. In June 2018, he wrote, in an opinion piece for the Los Angeles Times: "It still serves us as a tool to recognize specious comparisons to Nazism – but also, by contrast, to recognize comparisons that aren't." Additionally, when a potential subject of Godwin's law seems "intent on making the Hitler comparison", the comparison with fascism may be appropriate rather than devaluing the argument; a "MAGA" corollary to the Law recognizes the pernicious embrace of Nazi-inspired tropes and phrases by the "alt-right".

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A quote from memory: