I’ve been looking, but I’ve yet to find out how much we, the American tax payers, are paying Donald Trump’s personal spiritual advisor, televangelist Paula “satanic pregnancies” White, for the work she’s doing as an official member of the White House staff to brand the President’s opponents as demonic entities that “operate in sorcery and witchcraft.” I have, however, been able to ascertain that her shameless hucksterism has continued to grow more brazen with her ascent to the Executive Branch. Here, for instance, is video taken recently of White, the wife of Journey’s Jonathan Cain, telling her followers that God transported her to heaven for an anointing ceremony, during which she was given a beautiful, magical cape.
I thought she might be making it up, but then she started going into detail about the color of the mantle that God's magnificent yet blurry face lay across her shoulders, and I started thinking, "No, this just has to be real."pic.twitter.com/D15GKBo0Ud
— Mark Maynard (@MarkAMaynard) February 21, 2020
“I literally went to the Throne Room of God,” White told those assembled. “There was a mist that was coming off the water, and I went to the throne of God, and I didn’t see God’s face clearly, but I saw the face of God… He put a mantle (on me) and it was a very distinct mantle… I saw it very distinctly. The color was like a goldish, a yellowish goldish… And then I saw the Earth for a moment, and (God) brought me back, and he put me in certain places, one being the White House, one being certain continents.” [The mist rising off the water, was clearly inside a bong.]
And this, again, is a woman who, thanks to Donald Trump, now has a position at the White House, a position which gives her credibility, credibility which makes it even easier for her to fleece fearful, elderly, housebound Christians… For what it’s worth, I’m not mocking those who fill White’s coffers. My great grandmother, toward the end of her life, sent checks to televangelists. I can understand the appeal. I can also see, however, why it’s all the more important for those of us who can comprehend what’s actually going on to step up and say, “No, this thrice-married millionaire with a lavish apartment in Trump Tower didn’t really get flown to heaven for a meeting with God.”
One more thing, as long as I’m sharing videos of White. Here’s White telling those assembled at the King Jesus church Supernatural Ministry School in Miami that it’s their duty to pay the church before paying their electric bill, and driving the point home by showing them what will happen to them if they refuse to do so. [Apparently, if you don’t pay financial tribute to those who God anoints in heaven, you’re cursed to walk around with your pants on her head, and your shoes on your hands.]
Here is presidential spiritual adviser Paula White attempting to demonstrate what people look like spiritually if they don't follow the mandate to give to the church before paying their bills. https://t.co/3L2Xp7IA1Y pic.twitter.com/5Lb5LvpE6l
— Right Wing Watch (@RightWingWatch) February 18, 2020
This, of course, is a common refrain from White, who likes to tell people that their lives won’t go well until they open up their purses and give their “first fruits” to her ministry. “If you don’t send the money, you’ll never see sustainment in your life, and your dream will die,” she told her viewers recently.
And, again, we are subsidizing this behavior. We are, through our tax dollars, legitimizing this charlatan, and it’s absolutely fucking shameful.
MLive to close their comments section… Should I keep mine?
MLive is reporting today that, as of this Thursday, they’ll no longer allow for readers of their site to leave comments. There was a time in my life when I would have given them shit for the decision, just as I’d given them shit for their decision, back at the beginning, to “aggressively moderate” the comments left by their readers, but I can sympathize with their predicament. As they said in their announcement today, it’s a relatively small percentage of readers who leave comments, and those that do leave “an out-sized impression,” often dragging conversations off-topic in uncivil ways, and requiring the intervention of MLive employees. It had gotten so bad, they said, that their moderators, and the employees of a firm they brought on to oversee the comments section, were “stay(ing) busy around the clock policing the conversations, addressing flagged comments, and even going so far as to ban some users.”
If I had to guess, I’d say it’s probably more about cutting overhead in this case, than it is about growing incivility, but I can certainly see why someone operating a website these days would choose to pull the plug. I mean, if you go to the comments section here on any given day, you’ll find all kinds of insanity. But, at the same time, you’ll find some really good, thoughtful stuff. And that’s why I keep it going. I like the possibility that an open comments section represents. I like thinking that, at any time, someone could come forward with a piece of trivia that I wasn’t aware of, or make a connection that I hadn’t seen. But, with that said, those instances seem to come less frequently these days, as the comments section here has been disproportionately utilized of late by anti-vaxxers, Trumpists, self-proclaimed Christian patriots, and followers of Qanon. And, I imagine, with the shutting down of the MLive comments section, and the approach of the 2020 election, that it’s only going to become more challenging to keep my doors open to anyone who wants to weigh in. [Unlike MLive, I’ve never attempted aggressive moderation. For the most part, I’ve been happy to let people have their say, with the understanding and hope that the community would regulate itself. In fact, I’ve only cut three comments over the past 15 years. And I’ve never banned anyone from this site.]
At any rate, I’m curious as to what you think. Should I continue to allow comments here? Do you find value in it? I’ve love to know your thoughts.