A HARBINGER OF WHAT IS COMING: AMBULANCE CHASING HERESY HUNTERS - EXPANDED & CLARIFIED

With his mouth the godless man destroys his neighbor, but through knowledge the righteous will be delivered.

(Proverbs 11:9, NASB)

A man who lacks judgment derides his neighbor, but a man of understanding holds his tongue.

(Proverbs 11:12, NIV)

“The good man out of the good treasure of his heart brings forth what is good; and the evil man out of the evil treasure brings forth what is evil; for his mouth speaks from that which fills his heart.”

(Luke 6:45)

I have always enjoyed the field of Christian Apologetics, because it compelled me to search the Scriptures and study them thoroughly for its treasures of truth.  And I remember as a young believer in the 70s reading a copy of the late Walter Martin’s classic bestseller, The Kingdom of the Cults, a real treasure.  I devoured that book from cover to cover, learning the differences between what the cults taught versus what the Scriptures taught side by side.  This was very flower and heart of true Christian Apologetics.  No elaborate argument for or against a doctrine, simple Scripture versus the writings of the cults compared side by side.  One could easily distinguish between what the Scriptures taught and what the cults taught on Christ, His deity, resurrection, the Holy Spirit, spirituality, salvation/redemption, and other primary fundamental teachings of the Christian Faith. 

So I wish to make it clear here that what I am about to write in this update to my article, I want the reader to understand that I write also as an apologist, but do not include myself in this new trend of so-called “apologists” called “discerners” – a twisting of the meaning of discernment and misapplication of the spiritual gift imparted by the Holy Spirit because it is redefined by these new generation of “apologists” into a meaning it never had before and one which Scripture itself does not give it, at least in 1Corinthians 12:10b, which means the “distinguishing of spirits” as the New American Standard Bible correctly translates it.  One of these new “discerners” is Brannon Howse, though he’s been around for about ten years.

Yesterday, I listened to Brannon Howse’s interview of Justin Peters, which one can still download, because he hasn’t yet removed it to the “Situation Room,” and all they did was bash someone named Francis Chan because he said he loved Mike Bickle.  This is what appears on the Worldview Weekend website on this with the link to the podcast:

“Justin Peters joins Brannon today. Topic: Francis Chan violates 2 Corinthians 6:14, 2 John 9-11 and Romans 16:17 and goes to speak at IHOP for false teacher Mike Bickle.  Hear the disturbing audio of Francis Chan praising Mike Bickle.  Brannon explains in detail some of the false teaching of Bickle if you are not familiar with him.  Topic: We have played the audio of Beth Moore saying God speaks to her through visions but now she claims God is speaking to her through dreams.  Jude 8 warns of such dreamers of dreams.  Justin explains the dangers of this mysticism being promoted by Beth Moore.  Topic: The Biblical difference between mysticism and the Biblical prompting of the Holy Spirit.  Topic: We take your calls.”

I’ve been informed that Mike Bickell teaches error.  Ok.  I must reply that I would have to make that determination for myself, and have not yet made it yet, because I have never heard of the man.  But I do know this, I will not rush to judgment on the man, or anyone else, because I heard that he teaches error.  This is the grave error that Brannon Howse, Jimmy DeYoung, David James, and T.A. McMahon and others made with Pastor and Messianic Rabbi Jonathan Cahn and his book The Harbinger, and many others since.  I do not want to do that with anyone.  It precisely for that reason that I had to write my own corrective of what these people had said and written about Rabbi Cahn, titled, The Truth about The Harbinger: Addressing the Controversy and Discovering the Facts About This Prophetic Message, because the errors, misstatements, false witness, slander, and the urban legends they created on the Internet had become so egregious, so damnable, that justice demanded they be corrected biblically, but speaking the truth in love.  In my book, I do not name them, nor do I attack them; I address their objections, charges, and meaningless interpolations into the narrative of Rabbi Cahn’s book, as I do on my website, The Pepster’s Post: A Voice in Cyberspace. 

I also want to make it clear that it is not Mike Bickle’s or Francis Chan’s teachings that I am writing about here, but of a trend that is being seen increasingly among what is now called “discernment” circles, which formerly was called properly the field and ministries of Christian Apologetics; and that trend in recent years has been for some self-styled “discernment” ministries publicly vilifying others on the radio and other Internet.  In some, and increasingly cases, these “discerners” make daily public attacks broadly across the theological spectrum, hitting every target in their sights with very little discrimination and in many cases, with even less understanding and wisdom than before. 

There was a time when Christian Apologetics entailed the defense of the Christian Faith against heresies taught by the cults such as Christian Science, The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, also known as the Mormons, the Watchtower Bible and Track Society’s Jehovah's Witnesses, Islam, Theosophy, Buddhism, the Bahá'í Faith, Unitarian Universalism, Scientology, and Seventh-Day Adventism, as well as minor groups such as The Way International with their Twig Fellowships, including various New Age and Eastern religions and several others.  But never did Christian Apologists ever attack members of Evangelical Christianity; only the false prophets profiteering with the false “Faith and Prosperity Gospel” of phony materialism, and the “Name it and claim It” types of religious telemarketers peddling their wares on Christian Television, selling blessed cloths, ointments from the holy land, and all sorts items for a 100 to one return on their “investments” – and I’m not referring to those who gave, but the religious telemarketers. 

One them, Mike Murdoch, has spent hours on television fleecing Christians out of one thousand dollar seed money.  No Gospel, no repentance, just story upon story about himself and how he gave sacrificially and got back from God, as though God’s grace could be bought for money.  I remember seeing him for the first time, and before he even uttered a word, I felt a great quenching and grief in my spirit about him.  Then he opened his mouth and for the next hour and a half, confirmed my suspicions.  The false teacher and false prophet is so obvious that he stands out like a sore thumb to the discerning Christian who knows his Bible by God’s grace.  You know the phonies out there by their elaborate lifestyles.  These are the ones Jesus refers to when He warns that they will come up to Him and shamelessly claim they served Him, some will even claim to have effected miracles in His name, but did NOTHING for their suffering Christian brethren while they lived in great mansions with private jets and lavish living from the collections they took in on television from struggling Christians.

But in recent years, the noble work of Christian Apologetics has taken a turn for the worst, because some self-styled “discernment” types have come out targeting legitimate Christian ministries along with the heretics out there.  Without contacting the persons they target, they have pounced on these like wild animals in a feeding frenzy.  This is what I am writing about here.  I am not endorsing any ministry or the people I bring up as illustration above, they just happen to be in Brannon Howse’s “herescope” when he decided to attack someone for the day.  Every day he has a new victim to add to his list. 

So I want the readers to understand that when I mention such names as Mike Bickle or Francis Chan, I do not know about these men, but I am not writing about them either; I am only writing about the trend of attacking good Christians with bad ones, and lumping them with heretics, something that was not seen before in Christian Apologetics.  The late Walter Martin, the great pioneer of Christian Apologetics, focused on Christianity’s enemies, not other Christians inside the church.  With good reason; he was a true Christian Apologist who defended the faith from the errors of the cults, contending always with those who attacked it, and did not waste his time arguing with other Christians over denominational theological differences; something these new “discernment apologists” are apt to do, and some like Brannon Howse do it daily, smearing broadly and indiscriminately with a very big brush. 

Another thing that characterizes these people is that while they attack others as false teachers and false prophets, they seldom if ever, inform their audience what the error is.  They just connect the person to some organization that came out of another organization that followed some revival somewhere, and are guilty of such and such sin, etc.  Sound familiar?  It should.  This is what Christ contended with every day and it is throughout all four Gospels.  They accused Him of keeping the wrong company, of defiling Himself, of breaking the Sabbath, of breaking the Law of Moses, of sedition, of wanting to destroy the temple and rebuild it in three days, and many more things, including sorcery.

Well, I may not know Mike Bickle and his teachings, I may not know Francis Chan and his teachings; but I do know the Lord Jesus, and I do know His teachings and commandments to us.  And He has taught us – no commanded us – to do the following with others:

“Just as the Father has loved Me, I have also loved you; abide in My love.  If you keep My commandments, you will abide in My love; just as I have kept My Father’s commandments and abide in His love.  These things I have spoken to you so that My joy may be in you, and that your joy may be made full. ...”

(John 15:9-17)

Special emphasis, Christ enjoins us by commandment, not suggestion, but by commandment – a new commandment with the following words, “This is My commandment, that you love one another, just as I have loved you. (John 15:12)

Christ has said, “If anyone does not abide in Me, he is thrown away as a branch and dries up; and they gather them, and cast them into the fire and they are burned.” (John 15:6) 

What is the litmus test of discipleship in Christ?  How do men know if we are genuine followers of the Lord Jesus Christ?  By this standard which the Lord Jesus set Himself, when He said, “By this all men will know that you are My disciples, if you have love for one another.” (John 13:35)

And these were the last words Our Lord spoke at His last Seder – His Last Supper with His disciples – on the night He was betrayed to His enemies.  I repeat, His words were not suggestions of His, but a new commandment:

“A new commandment I give to you, that you love one another, even as I have loved you, that you also love one another.  By this all men will know that you are My disciples, if you have love for one another.”

(John 13:34-35)

So the distinguishing mark of a follower of Christ is not doctrine, though in no way is its importance diminished, it has its place in the church, and we are to be very careful with what we teach and what we hear, which must support Scripture; but before all other considerations, the measure of how Christ’s followers are distinguished from all others is their love for one another – and it is because genuine Christ-like love is to love someone to such an extent that they would willingly give their life for that person, or those people, as Christ Himself described it in this way, “Greater love has no one than this, that one lay down his life for his friends.” (John 15:13)  I did not set this rule up, Jesus Christ did.  And it is so important that aside from the topic of hell, the New Testament devotes almost as much time on this topic than it does any other.  Now in no way am I saying that just love is the metric we measure ourselves by, the fundamental tenets of our faith have a central place without which we cannot know or teach the truth.  That is unmistakable, so before anyone misunderstands what I am saying here, let them know that I affirm the purpose of sound conservative theology at the core of the most fundamental elements of Christian teaching that we must adhere to.  But I can prophecy and have great knowledge and be powerful in the Scriptures, and if I lack love for my fellow brother, I am nothing. (1Corinthians 13:1-3)

For this is the message which you have heard from the beginning, that we should love one another; not as Cain, who was of the evil one and slew his brother.  And for what reason did he slay him?  Because his deeds were evil, and his brother’s were righteous.

(1John 3:11-12)

Do not be surprised, brethren, if the world hates you.  We know that we have passed out of death into life, because we love the brethren.  He who does not love abides in death.  Everyone who hates his brother is a murderer; and you know that no murderer has eternal life abiding in him.  We know love by this, that He laid down His life for us; and we ought to lay down our lives for the brethren.  But whoever has the world’s goods, and sees his brother in need and closes his heart against him, how does the love of God abide in him?  Little children, let us not love with word or with tongue, but in deed and truth.

(1John 3:13-18)

Another mark of how to differentiate between those who are phonies out there, who claim to preach Christ, but do not, but spend most, if not all of their time, preaching something else – not necessarily a prosperity gospel, although that can be included – though in Brannon Howse’s case and in the case of others like him – the problem is that rather than preach Christ, they profess a type of Christology or Christian Faith by claiming to be followers of His (and some, but not all are, and those who are deluded by these), and then spend the bulk of their preaching on the radio and on television attacking other Christians, or gossiping about the latest teaching they consider a heresy; acting like some type of self-righteous religious gossip columnists.  They profess to know Christ, but by their actions, and their behavior, and their public statements day in and day out, they spend the bulk of their resources and precious air time on the radio in attack mode against others who preach Christ, but with whom they disapprove for varying reasons.  Does what I just explained, support what God’s Word says regarding this?  Yes.  It is in the fourth chapter of John’s First Letter.  I quote:

Beloved, do not believe every spirit, but test the spirits to see whether they are from God, because many false prophets have gone out into the world.  By this you know the Spirit of God: every spirit that confesses that Jesus Christ has come in the flesh is from God; and every spirit that does not confess Jesus is not from God; this is the spirit of the antichrist, of which you have heard that it is coming, and now it is already in the world.  You are from God, little children, and have overcome them; because greater is He who is in you than he who is in the world.  They are from the world; therefore they speak as from the world, and the world listens to them.  We are from God; he who knows God listens to us; he who is not from God does not listen to us.  By this we know the spirit of truth and the spirit of error.

Beloved, let us love one another, for love is from God; and everyone who loves is born of God and knows God.  The one who does not love does not know God, for God is love.  By this the love of God was manifested in us, that God has sent His only begotten Son into the world so that we might live through Him.  In this is love, not that we loved God, but that He loved us and sent His Son to be the propitiation for our sins.  Beloved, if God so loved us, we also ought to love one another.  No one has seen God at any time; if we love one another, God abides in us, and His love is perfected in us.  By this we know that we abide in Him and He in us, because He has given us of His Spirit.  We have seen and testify that the Father has sent the Son to be the Savior of the world.

Whoever confesses that Jesus is the Son of God, God abides in him, and he in God.  We have come to know and have believed the love which God has for us.  God is love, and the one who abides in love abides in God, and God abides in him.  By this, love is perfected with us, so that we may have confidence in the day of judgment; because as He is, so also are we in this world.  There is no fear in love; but perfect love casts out fear, because fear involves punishment, and the one who fears is not perfected in love.  We love, because He first loved us.  If someone says, “I love God,” and hates his brother, he is a liar; for the one who does not love his brother whom he has seen, cannot love God whom he has not seen.  And this commandment we have from Him, that the one who loves God should love his brother also.

You’ll note that the chapter begins with a strong admonition to test the spirits to see if they are from God, because not everyone who says, “Lord, Lord,’ will enter the kingdom of heaven, but he who does the will of” God “will enter.” (Matthew 7:21)  And take special note that the rest of the chapter follows through with a strong admonition for us to love one another and this way we abide in Him, because we abide in His love.  Think of it, if Christ has so commanded us to “love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you,” (Matthew 5:44) and to “do good to those who hate you” (Luke 6:27); because “He Himself is kind to ungrateful and evil men” (Luke 6:35), how then can we do that without first loving our brethren?  It is impossible to love an enemy and show him pity and kindness when we can’t or won’t love those with whom we disagree, because we don’t know how to love our brethren in the body.  And of course of what good is it to just love those who are “nice” to us?  Jesus asked this question.  “For if you love those who love you, what reward do you have?  Do not even the tax collectors do the same?” (Matthew 5:46) 

I commend brother Francis Chan for saying that he loves Mike Bickle; I don’t deride him for it, because of some disagreement he and I might have over something he teaches; I commend him for his Christian Orthopraxy.  Where is Brannon Howse getting his theology from!!!???  Not God’s Word!  Not Christ’s teachings!  Christ COMMANDS us to love God, love our brethren, and love our enemies UNCONDITIONALLY.  Is this any way to express the love of Jesus Christ to a brother by calling him a false teacher or false prophet because he expresses Christ’s love to another brother, and Brannon disagrees with their teaching because they’re Cessationists and these other brethren are Continuationists?  Of course not, but let us be discerning in the Holy Spirit and read again closely what John’s First Letter, Fourth Chapter in its entirety strongly admonishes us to do, because not everyone who professes to be a Christian walks in the Holy Spirit, or knows Christ, and loves as He loves us. 

And Brannon Howse, and some of his associates are dangerously manifesting more and more aberrant behavior and theology, while claiming to be mainstream, while they claim that the aberrant have now become mainstream.  Ironically, Brannon speaks of Orthodoxy, but in his zeal for Orthodoxy, he has forgotten to practice Orthopraxy.  He has forgotten how to love as Christ loved, and now spends precious and expensive air time bashing and trashing other Christians in the name of Jesus Christ whom he professes to serve.  How is it that the owners of VCY America not see what is going on day after day?  Has anyone brought this to their attention?  Either Brannon has to stop doing this, or he needs to be pulled off the air.  Enough is enough.

No Brannon; it is aberrant behavior for you to take to the airwaves and attack Christian ministers over disagreements you have theologically with them over how they express themselves, profess their love for one another in Christ, and practice their faith.  What they say and do is between them and God, and you are to preach the Gospel of Jesus Christ, not spend your days chasing after brethren and stalking their every move to see what gossip heresy you can find in a word, a phrase, or a statement you find offensive to your theology for you to criticize on the air and hold your brother in open reproach before others! 

Brannon, when you spend precious and very expensive air time attacking other Christians, and misuse the hard-earned funds that hard-working, and in many cases, struggling Christians across this country give you out of their love for the Lord, you dishonor them and dishonor God’s calling, and bring insult to the Lord whom you profess to serve, and bring to open reproach His servants whom you call false teachers and false prophets, while you sit there in your studio like some type of elitist religious snob, and so cavalierly and so easily judge their personal relationship with Jesus Christ and their calling and ministry on radio each and every day. 

Brother, I say this with great concern, but if you continue this, look around you, because you will not prevail and will find yourself without support, without a Christian radio station that will air your abuse, and will be out in the street without a ministry and shipwrecked as regards the faith, because you have broken Jesus’ commandments and have broken with your brethren to bring them to open reproach before God and before men.  Take care of what you say and what you do these coming days and months, and see if in a year’s time this does not come to pass IF YOU DO NOT CHANGE AND REPENT FROM WHERE YOU HAVE FALLEN.  You are playing with fire, and fire will consume you if you continue down this path.

I recently wrote Dr. David Reagan on this in reply to an e-mail he sent me about an article I wrote and posted on The Pepster’s Post: A Voice in Cyberspace, titled DISCERNMENT ON THE HARBINGER & OTHER THINGS: DISCERNMENT, OR DECEPTED DISCORD? he commended me for.  This was my reply in part to Dr. Reagan:

I try to get it across to these people that it is not doctrine that saves us, but Christ and His finished vicarious work on our behalf, and whether or not we personally appropriate it by simple true repentance and falling at the foot of the cross, at the Master’s feet to receive what we clearly do not deserve, but He willingly gives and does not retract once given; but these brethren are like the Pharisees of old, and the religious bigots of every age – self-righteous in all their ways, believing themselves to be without flaw, always learning and never able to come to the knowledge of the truth of simple faith in Christ and Him only for our salvation.  They always require something more than Christ, though they appear to preach Him.  So it is with all religions that add to God’s Word. 

That is the tendency in us all, we are so programmed to do things for ourselves that we fall flat on our faces trying to save ourselves, when God has already done all of the true heavy lifting.  Lest we forget, we could think there is something required of us to justify our salvation, and try to work our way, rather than abide in Him and He in us, so that we may work out our salvation with fear and trembling in Him, and not in ourselves out of some misbegotten sense that we can earn anything from God.  We can’t.  His work is complete, He helps us to grow within it, but it has nothing to do with secondary and tertiary matters that are essential for learning, and growing, but have no bearing on a person’s salvation. 

These people forget that one of the people who wrote most of the New Testament – the Apostle Paul – himself confessed that “we see in part and know in part” – where does that leave the rest of us?  This was a man whom God used to write inspired Scripture!  None of us have a monopoly on truth, not one.  These brethren should not be carrying on this way and mistreating fellow ministers, an Elder and honorable brother as yourself with anything but respect, dignified a leader in the body of Christ!  One to whom we look with love and admiration for your service in the Lord, and to whom we look as an example to emulate, not deride as Brannon does.

Eric Barger’s article drives home what I am trying to say, so I’ll conclude with it here.  He writes:

“Using the guise of "discernment," some individuals have been using their platform in the apologetics community as a means to promulgate a brand of sad, critical Christianity.  While predicated upon little more than an attempt to elevate their own narrow views concerning peripheral doctrines, these so-called "super discerners" operate with a grating, holier-than-thou brashness.  Painting those who dare disagree on virtually any point as ignorant or foolish, these few "brothers" spare little in an effort to bully others into conformity.  This "scorched earth" methodology is an evil, divisive plan that only Satan could concoct.  And who has fallen into it?  Apologists that should know better!  And why?  Perhaps pride and greed have blinded some to break fellowship over non-essential issues that should otherwise be off limits.  Besides the actual issues themselves, the environment created is frankly a twisted form of religious bigotry that has created enemies amongst third parties who have been and should still be allies - and all of this inside the Body of Christ!  The "us and them" atmosphere that has resulted from pretentious created controversies pertaining to peripheral doctrines and practices is poisonous - and unbiblical. Considering this, is it any wonder that some in the Church now reject anyone or anything pertaining to apologetics?

“As tragic as that fact may be, the biggest victim is likely the very ministry of apologetics itself.  What if the next generation of apologists mistakenly takes its cue from those who are currently more interested in promoting their own personal brand of sterilized Christianity then they are in truly defending biblical faith?

“Truth must be the motivator of discernment.  But biblical apologetics isn't about proving how correct one is and how heretical another may be - especially on secondary issues.  Though discernment is often about exposing darkness and warning the Church concerning aberrant theology and practice, we should always evaluate what spirit discernment is being carried out in.  Do we dare treat others in the Body with public disdain, even refusing to communicate with them concerning points that could never classify as "central" or "essential" doctrine?  Discernment at any level must be conducted in an authentic spirit of correction with grace as the barometer for our words and actions.  Otherwise we become little more than a "sounding brass, or a tinkling cymbal" (I Cor. 13:1).

“I'm calling on truly discernment-minded Christians to beware of those using the shell of apologetics but who come in the wrong spirit and push their own peripheral agendas.  True Christians can have a difference of opinion on many issues without trying to decimate or play "gotcha" with those we disagree with.  We need each other in the Body of Christ and those set on tearing down or even destroying another Believer over purely secondary ideas and beliefs are only helping Satan accomplish his vile mission.

“One final word.  Those who fit the description I've warned of in this piece and in the accompanying video clip have one thing in common: a haughty spirit.  Let's not forget what the Bible says about that.”

"Pride goeth before destruction, and an haughty spirit before a fall." (Proverbs 16:18)

Read more on the issues raise here in "When Discernment Turns Ugly."

Beloved brethren, God has not appointed us as judges of one another, but to preach the Gospel in season and out of season. (2Timothy 4:2)  There is only one Lawgiver and Judge, the One who is able to save and to destroy; but who are you who judge your neighbor? (James 4:12)  Anyone who tries to take His place judges the Law, and we are NOT called to judge the Law (James 4:11), but to be doers of it by loving our brethren.  Because love does no wrong to a neighbor; therefore love is the fulfillment of the law. (Romans 13:8-10)  The time of judgment is yet to come, and it will be the Lord’s.  Even now, church matters should be handled within the body of Christ with discretion (1Corinthians 6:1-8), and not on the airwaves every day, as these ambulance chasing heresy hunters do.  People who write books to discredit and disprove their fellow Christians on doctrine, even criticizing them for how they share Christ need to look at themselves first!  Can you imagine that!  Someone questioning how another brother shares Christ, and criticizing that brother because he is not up to his standards!!!????  Well, this is what they do, and it is a sign of the end times when brother will betray brother as Our Lord prophesied. (Luke 21:16)  There is the death of execution, but there is the death by a thousand cuts that comes from these ambulance chasing heresy hunters, who destroy ministries that they disagree with and target.  These people do this for a living, and they must be exposed and called for this.  It is not godly, and it has no place in the body of Christ.  

Occupy the time with raising Christ, not dragging your brethren through the dirt and dishonoring them.  You have a disagreement with a brother over a doctrine or a Scripture?  And you have access to radio?  Take it up with them privately first; reach out to them, or else take it to the airwaves in a moderated debate, and discuss it from the Scriptures; but don’t be quick to label your brother in Christ a false prophet or false teacher, or one who mishandles the Word of God, or say that they teach error.  Go to them, contact them, and discuss it, work it out.  Otherwise just shut up rather than bring their salvation and their ministry into question because they don’t agree with you.

AN AMERIKAN NIGHTMARE: Orwell or Huxley's Prophetic View of Our World Today

SIDEBAR: I have included in this report Christopher Hedges’ commentary so that I could posit a concise rebuttal to his clever, but flawed ruminations on what he calls “a brave new Dystopia,” the title of his aforementioned article in which he argues against several alarming trends he sees in society and in particular, certain policies of our government such as the War on Terror; a war he and other progressive socialists(1) attribute to George W. Bush, but which in reality had begun long before the US’ involvement in Iraq and Afghanistan.  To be precise, this war has been waged against the West since the founding of Islam by the prophet Mohammed, and in modern times it commenced in earnest with the taking of American hostages by Iran in 1979, but which Hedges and other “progressives” see as “Orwellian” because of its nature and duration, and many of the draconian steps the Bush Administration began taking after 9/11, which has since Barack Obama taken office expanded beyond anything the previous administration had ever envisioned.

While I agree partially with Hedges’ analysis of the dangers of our society having fallen into the wrong hands, and thus having become an Orwellian nightmare – for different reasons than his – I disagree with his belief that less centralized control via the repeal of certain federal regulations, has brought about some of the excesses we see today within the private sector, on the contrary, it is precisely the centralized controls and manipulation of our markets and the various sectors of our economy that has brought US to the brink of collapse. 

If truth be told, the excesses have been in federal power and not necessarily all in the private sector, as Hedges alleges.  Where Hedges describes that our society is increasingly, as he put it, “dominated by a repressive surveillance and security state that uses crude and violent forms of control,” and that a good part of the American electorate is “entranced by entertainment and spectacle, captivated by technology and seduced by profligate consumption” as it embraces unknowingly its own oppression via an ever growing federal bureaucracy with ever expanding federal powers; I do not agree with his disdain for the free market principles which once made the United States the envy of the world, and which even in its current caricatured and depressed form, has set the poorest American far above what is considered “normal” in many societies, even amongst western nations, as evidenced by the enormous amount of people from almost all of those other lands flocking to our shores for a better life they know they cannot obtain in their own lands.  America would not have the current illegal and undocumented immigration problem if this weren’t so. 

As bad as America is made out to be by liberal progressive writers, pundits, academics, and Marxists theologians, millions of others numbering tens of millions still consider her to be far greater than their own countries, otherwise they would have stayed where they were born, and would not be trying to “get in” by any means possible.  There is no better testimony to a nation’s greatness than to see people from other nations voting with their feet, or crossing shark infested waters, some in desperation to reach the glimmering shores of this great land for a life they cannot in any possible way enjoy in their own country of origin.

Because of Barack Obama’s radical agenda, America has only now awakened to the dangers enumerated above, which Hedges incorrectly attributes to the “Christian Right” and what he calls “corporate totalitarianism” – one which he has written about in such works of his as American Fascists: The Christian Right and the War on America where Hedges equates conservative mainline Christians with fascists and national socialists – an absurd mischaracterization from one who should know better, but does not. 

In this work Hedges attempts to draw parallels between Biblical Christian Theology (really Judeo-Christian ethics) and the Neo-Pagan Fascists and Nazis of Europe in the past century.  Obviously, he ignores history, because apart from the Jews of Europe, there was no greater persecuted group than the Christians of the lands conquered by the Hitlerian hordes.  One thing Fascists, Eugenicists, Fabian Socialists, National Socialists, and International Socialists – Globalists in general – have in common is their seething hatred of Jews and Christians.  History has taught US this, and we are now beginning to see it in our own nation coming from liberal progressives, secular humanists, and the militant radical Left.  It is not surprising to me that Hedges himself is a vociferous critic of Israel.  The Anti-Semitic fruit does not fall far from the proverbial Anti-Christian tree.  But we have been warned that we “shall know them by their fruits.” (Matthew 7:16, 20) (2)

In Hedges’ arguments which he cleverly posits in his books and articles such as the one below, one can see the “fruits” of the heavy Leftist indoctrination he received at Harvard Divinity School, where he studied under James Luther Adams, a Unitarian Minister of the liberal wing of Christendom’s elites, where Hedges obtained his Masters of Divinity degree.  Of course, we should not be surprised to hear that Hedges has an honorary doctorate from the Unitarian Universalist Seminary, Starr King School for the Ministry in Berkeley, California. which he was awarded in May 2009.(3)  These institutions are not bastions of Mainline Evangelical Christian Theology and are not representative of the rich teachings and traditions of the Judeo-Christian traditions that were once taught at our nation’s institutions of higher learning when they were founded as organizations to further “the Gospel of Jesus Christ,” something most Americans are unaware of, and which is no longer is taught in our public schools.

Why then should the reader be surprised that though Hedges is correct in deploring the nihilism and self-gratification and consumerism of current popular culture “seduced and manipulated…through sensual gratification, cheap mass-produced goods, boundless credit, political theater and amusement” – his attributing such foibles to capitalism, rather than to the signs of a society in moral social decline; which has beset every empire since the beginning of time, and the human race’s evil inclination – what Mainline Protestant Christianity has taught as “man’s fallen nature,” and what the Roman Catholic Church calls “original sin” – a human condition of fallen humanity which bedevils the human race, and has since Adam and Eve’s fall and banishment from the garden in the Book of Genesis?

Though he is correct to bemoan the decline and fall of this society due to what he sees as an increasingly authoritarian/totalitarian mindset, where the public is intentionally impoverished, Hedges misses the point of Aldous Huxley’s Brave New World, and George Orwell’s 1984; yet he understandably makes the following observations:

“Now that credit is drying up, good jobs for the working class are gone forever and mass-produced goods are unaffordable, we find ourselves transported from “Brave New World” to “1984.”  The state, crippled by massive deficits, endless war and corporate malfeasance, is sliding toward bankruptcy.  It is time for Big Brother to take over from Huxley’s feelies, the orgy-porgy and the centrifugal bumble-puppy. We are moving from a society where we are skillfully manipulated by lies and illusions to one where we are overtly controlled. 

Orwell warned of a world where books were banned.  Huxley warned of a world where no one wanted to read books.  Orwell warned of a state of permanent war and fear.  Huxley warned of a culture diverted by mindless pleasure.  Orwell warned of a state where every conversation and thought was monitored and dissent was brutally punished.  Huxley warned of a state where a population, preoccupied by trivia and gossip, no longer cared about truth or information.  Orwell saw us frightened into submission.  Huxley saw us seduced into submission.  But Huxley, we are discovering, was merely the prelude to Orwell.  Huxley understood the process by which we would be complicit in our own enslavement.  Orwell understood the enslavement.  Now that the corporate coup is over, we stand naked and defenseless.” (4)

Where Hedges misses the point is that our arrival at this point of our own brave new dystopia is part and parcel of the process which will usher in the Global New World Order of which Evangelicals and certain circles of Orthodox Jewish thinkers and theologians believe the world is headed before the coming/return of the Messiah.  Hedges attributes such signs of the times to a collapse that is brought on in Hedges’ own flawed Marxist worldview which posits that, “unfettered and unregulated capitalism is a brutal and revolutionary force that exploits human beings and the natural world until exhaustion or collapse.”(4)  Hedges, like Marx, is wrong; earning a wage is not exploitation, but a return on one’s productivity which accords those dutifully employed a means to purchase goods for a service, or services rendered through their labor, and collapse has come when the natural order has been manipulated by monopolies and repressive governments that along with certain corporate entities allied to them at the exclusion of all others, have brought societies to such collapse in order to change the social-economic order of such societies into the Hitlerian and Stalinist “paradises” that such orders have established throughout every society regardless of nationality, race, religion, or geographic location.  The historic track records are there for review and reflection.

Hedges is correct in sounding the alarm and clarion call to beware of the excesses we have seen in big government’s authoritarian methods against its own citizens as opposed to using these to combat America’s enemies, who live to destroy US and usher in Islamic Sharia Law with the defeat of Western Culture as it continues its thirteen hundred year Jihad against our civilization, and its ultimate goal of establishing Islam’s largest and most powerful Caliphate here in the United States once its demise has been secured from within through radical transformation and reinterpretations of its laws, which has already started in earnest in recent years. 

The bold attempt of building a mosque and Islamic Center in the hallowed grounds near Ground Zero is only one of many bold steps Islamists and those who promote these efforts have taken, in total being the evidence that the wheel of this process has turned full circle, and has increased in speed years after Hedges wrote this article.  But, Hedges is looking in the wrong direction.

Orwell’s description of this decline which Hedges cites as part of our decline sounds more like the policies and political ideology and mindset that has gripped Washington elitists of both parties than corporate America, though I understand where Hedges is coming, but his conclusions are flawed.  Orwell describes it in this manner:

“The Party seeks power entirely for its own sake,” Orwell wrote in “1984.”  “We are not interested in the good of others; we are interested solely in power.  Not wealth or luxury or long life or happiness: only power, pure power.  What pure power means you will understand presently.  We are different from all the oligarchies of the past, in that we know what we are doing.  All the others, even those who resembled ourselves, were cowards and hypocrites.  The German Nazis and the Russian Communists came very close to us in their methods, but they never had the courage to recognize their own motives.  They pretended, perhaps they even believed, that they had seized power unwillingly and for a limited time, and that just round the corner there lay a paradise where human beings would be free and equal.  We are not like that.  We know that no one ever seizes power with the intention of relinquishing it.  Power is not a means; it is an end.  One does not establish a dictatorship in order to safeguard a revolution; one makes the revolution in order to establish the dictatorship.  The object of persecution is persecution.  The object of torture is torture.  The object of power is power.”(4)

Again, where Hedges is wrong in his belief that Orwell is describing corporate America and not the all-powerful federal government which is now ruling under the most dangerous dictator this nation has known in its history, wielding untold powers through Executive Order, federal unelected bureaucracies such as OSHA, and the EPA, and others, and the more than thirty two radical and Marxist “Tsars” he has put in place without congressional oversight, answerable only to him; powers which far exceed those allowed by our Constitution, and which this president has been using since he came to the presidency five years ago, though he is correct in calling Obama an “attractive spokesperson” hired, as he calls it, to do the bidding of powerful corporate interests who control and manipulate the American political landscape more than most Americans realize.  Without naming names, or citing organizations, Hedges admits to the unnatural influence that elites from the Council on Foreign Relations and the Trilateral Commission and several others wield over a good number of our elected officials and the domestic and foreign policies they put in place.

Where he writes: “The corporate state does not find its expression in a demagogue or charismatic leader.  It is defined by the anonymity and facelessness of the corporation.  Corporations, who hire attractive spokespeople like Barack Obama, control the uses of science, technology, education and mass communication.  They control the messages in movies and television.  And, as in “Brave New World,” they use these tools of communication to bolster tyranny.  Our systems of mass communication, as Wolin writes, ‘“block out, eliminate whatever might introduce qualification, ambiguity, or dialogue, anything that might weaken or complicate the holistic force of their creation, to its total impression.’”

The result is a monochromatic system of information. Celebrity courtiers, masquerading as journalists, experts and specialists, identify our problems and patiently explain the parameters. All those who argue outside the imposed parameters are dismissed as irrelevant cranks, extremists or members of a radical left.” (4)

Such an observation is true, except that it is completely reversed.  It is not the Left which is demonized, because the Left predominates the organs of information such as academia, the trade unions, entertainment, the government at the federal, state, and local levels, and the news media, but it is conservatives, who are marginalized and called “extremists,” “racists,” “reactionaries,” “Zionists,” “homophobic” and “sexist,” and to do this, they employ such time rewarding phrases used by Marxists-Leninists such as “the Right,” “the Christian Right,” “the Zionist Conspiracy,” “Teabaggers,” and whenever they have the opportunity to use. 

Former Presidents Jimmy Carter, Bill Clinton, Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton, Nancy Pelosi (D. California), Barbara Boxer (D. California), Alan Grayson (D. Florida), Harry Reid (D. Nevada), Dick Durbin (D. Illinois), John Kerry (D. Massachusetts), Chuck Schumer (D. New York), Jerrold Nadler (D. New York), Anthony Weiner (D. New York), and Robert Menendez (D. New Jersey) have used such phrases against those who disagree with their policy objectives.  And why not?  It works. 

Lacking the intellectual or moral argument to support their point of view to rebut their opposition, they employ the best tried and true method of discrediting their political opponents as cranks and disgraceful liars who lack shame and are on the wrong side of the issues and history.  Of course, without a rebuttal or a defense, those who employ this method silence the opposition effectively by deflecting attention from the weakness of their own argument while avoiding having to defend it, while put the other side on the defensive, forcing them to explain themselves.  But, by the time this is done, all argument has been discarded, because the general public has been prejudiced by the discrediting remarks used.  But back to the topic at hand.

In a an article written by White House Correspondent Bill Koenig, he aptly makes the following observation, confirming my own above:

“We hear frequently of polarized partisan discourse and the lack of civility in American politics and among the public over Congress and the White House's actions.  Let's set this straight:

America's partisanship is fueled by conservatives' reaction to the political left's position on moral issues, the Obama Administration's fiscal irresponsibility, moves to make the federal government larger, and the federal takeover of health care — which is 6 percent of the U.S. economy.

Obama has called for unity when, in fact, his and the Democratic Party's policies and agenda are the very reason for the deep political divisions in America.

Adolph Hitler's propaganda master, Joseph Goebbels, would stir things up and then blame the Jews for the problem.  That is what the political left is doing to those who oppose their misguided agenda with the help of their enablers at CNN, ABC, CBS, NBC and MSNBC.

The good news is this birthed the tea party movement, which has a larger membership than the Republicans and Democrats, although most vote Republican and are Republicans.” (5)

The political correctness that has gripped the body politic in Washington, D.C., the mass media, and popular culture in this country is crushing free speech, dissent, and has all but emasculated our nation’s ability to function in its interests overseas, or forge a cohesive domestic policy here at home.  It has crippled this country and made it appear weak and vacillating before its enemies in what is one of its most delicate and dangerous periods in its two hundred and fifty plus years.  This political correctness is Orwellian, or rather the way in which Orwell wrote about it in his master work, 1984, is almost prophetic in its description of life in a society that has degenerated into a police state where free speech is what the state dictates, alliances are quickly and conveniently changed, and government-media complex control all means of information and uses this to dominate foreign and domestic policy.  Sound familiar?

I wrote this several years ago, when the Obama White House was entering its second year in office, and before the disastrous 2012 presidential elections, and its aftermath we are currently all suffering under – all, except the elites in Washington of both political parties, who daily work to undermine the institutions and way of life so many sacrificed to preserve – as these elites do their masters’ bidding to bring Obama’s dream of “fundamentally transforming the United States” into reality.  This is what they’re all about, and this is the only way to understand why there is no opposition to Barack Hussein Obama.

JB

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References:

1.) As he describes himself.  See Wikipedia, the Online Encyclopedia which includes the following about Hedges: “In December 29, 2008 column for Truthdig, Hedges identified himself as a ‘socialist’ in contrast to what he sees as ‘ruthless totalitarian capitalism.’"^[10])

2.)  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chris_Hedges

3.) http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chris_Hedges#cite_note-TruthOrg-1

4.) http://www.truthdig.com/report/item/2011_a_brave_new_dystopia_20101227/

5.) Bill Koenig, Koenig's Eye View, January 28, 2011

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2011: A Brave New Dystopia

Posted on Dec 27, 2010

By Chris Hedges

The two greatest visions of a future dystopia were George Orwell’s “1984” and Aldous Huxley’s “Brave New World.” The debate, between those who watched our descent towards corporate totalitarianism, was who was right. Would we be, as Orwell wrote, dominated by a repressive surveillance and security state that used crude and violent forms of control? Or would we be, as Huxley envisioned, entranced by entertainment and spectacle, captivated by technology and seduced by profligate consumption to embrace our own oppression? It turns out Orwell and Huxley were both right. Huxley saw the first stage of our enslavement. Orwell saw the second.
We have been gradually disempowered by a corporate state that, as Huxley foresaw, seduced and manipulated us through sensual gratification, cheap mass-produced goods, boundless credit, political theater and amusement. While we were entertained, the regulations that once kept predatory corporate power in check were dismantled, the laws that once protected us were rewritten and we were impoverished. Now that credit is drying up, good jobs for the working class are gone forever and mass-produced goods are unaffordable, we find ourselves transported from “Brave New World” to “1984.” The state, crippled by massive deficits, endless war and corporate malfeasance, is sliding toward bankruptcy. It is time for Big Brother to take over from Huxley’s feelies, the orgy-porgy and the centrifugal bumble-puppy. We are moving from a society where we are skillfully manipulated by lies and illusions to one where we are overtly controlled. 
Orwell warned of a world where books were banned. Huxley warned of a world where no one wanted to read books. Orwell warned of a state of permanent war and fear. Huxley warned of a culture diverted by mindless pleasure. Orwell warned of a state where every conversation and thought was monitored and dissent was brutally punished. Huxley warned of a state where a population, preoccupied by trivia and gossip, no longer cared about truth or information. Orwell saw us frightened into submission. Huxley saw us seduced into submission. But Huxley, we are discovering, was merely the prelude to Orwell. Huxley understood the process by which we would be complicit in our own enslavement. Orwell understood the enslavement. Now that the corporate coup is over, we stand naked and defenseless. We are beginning to understand, as Karl Marx knew, that unfettered and unregulated capitalism is a brutal and revolutionary force that exploits human beings and the natural world until exhaustion or collapse. 
“The Party seeks power entirely for its own sake,” Orwell wrote in “1984.”  “We are not interested in the good of others; we are interested solely in power. Not wealth or luxury or long life or happiness: only power, pure power. What pure power means you will understand presently. We are different from all the oligarchies of the past, in that we know what we are doing. All the others, even those who resembled ourselves, were cowards and hypocrites. The German Nazis and the Russian Communists came very close to us in their methods, but they never had the courage to recognize their own motives. They pretended, perhaps they even believed, that they had seized power unwillingly and for a limited time, and that just round the corner there lay a paradise where human beings would be free and equal. We are not like that. We know that no one ever seizes power with the intention of relinquishing it. Power is not a means; it is an end. One does not establish a dictatorship in order to safeguard a revolution; one makes the revolution in order to establish the dictatorship. The object of persecution is persecution. The object of torture is torture. The object of power is power.”
The political philosopher Sheldon Wolin uses the term “inverted totalitarianism” in his book “Democracy Incorporated” to describe our political system. It is a term that would make sense to Huxley. In inverted totalitarianism, the sophisticated technologies of corporate control, intimidation and mass manipulation, which far surpass those employed by previous totalitarian states, are effectively masked by the glitter, noise and abundance of a consumer society. Political participation and civil liberties are gradually surrendered. The corporation state, hiding behind the smokescreen of the public relations industry, the entertainment industry and the tawdry materialism of a consumer society, devours us from the inside out. It owes no allegiance to us or the nation. It feasts upon our carcass. 
The corporate state does not find its expression in a demagogue or charismatic leader. It is defined by the anonymity and facelessness of the corporation. Corporations, who hire attractive spokespeople like Barack Obama, control the uses of science, technology, education and mass communication. They control the messages in movies and television. And, as in “Brave New World,” they use these tools of communication to bolster tyranny. Our systems of mass communication, as Wolin writes, “block out, eliminate whatever might introduce qualification, ambiguity, or dialogue, anything that might weaken or complicate the holistic force of their creation, to its total impression.”
The result is a monochromatic system of information. Celebrity courtiers, masquerading as journalists, experts and specialists, identify our problems and patiently explain the parameters. All those who argue outside the imposed parameters are dismissed as irrelevant cranks, extremists or members of a radical left. Prescient social critics, from Ralph Nader to Noam Chomsky, are banished. Acceptable opinions have a range of A to B. The culture, under the tutelage of these corporate courtiers, becomes, as Huxley noted, a world of cheerful conformity, as well as an endless and finally fatal optimism. We busy ourselves buying products that promise to change our lives, make us more beautiful, confident or successful as we are steadily stripped of rights, money and influence. All messages we receive through these systems of communication, whether on the nightly news or talk shows like “Oprah,” promise a brighter, happier tomorrow. And this, as Wolin points out, is “the same ideology that invites corporate executives to exaggerate profits and conceal losses, but always with a sunny face.” We have been entranced, as Wolin writes, by “continuous technological advances” that “encourage elaborate fantasies of individual prowess, eternal youthfulness, beauty through surgery, actions measured in nanoseconds: a dream-laden culture of ever-expanding control and possibility, whose denizens are prone to fantasies because the vast majority have imagination but little scientific knowledge.”
Our manufacturing base has been dismantled. Speculators and swindlers have looted the U.S. Treasury and stolen billions from small shareholders who had set aside money for retirement or college. Civil liberties, including habeas corpus and protection from warrantless wiretapping, have been taken away. Basic services, including public education and health care, have been handed over to the corporations to exploit for profit. The few who raise voices of dissent, who refuse to engage in the corporate happy talk, are derided by the corporate establishment as freaks.
Attitudes and temperament have been cleverly engineered by the corporate state, as with Huxley’s pliant characters in “Brave New World.” The book’s protagonist, Bernard Marx, turns in frustration to his girlfriend Lenina:
“Don’t you wish you were free, Lenina?” he asks.
“I don’t know that you mean. I am free, free to have the most wonderful time. Everybody’s happy nowadays.”
He laughed, “Yes, ‘Everybody’s happy nowadays.’ We have been giving the children that at five. But wouldn’t you like to be free to be happy in some other way, Lenina? In your own way, for example; not in everybody else’s way.”
“I don’t know what you mean,” she repeated.
The façade is crumbling. And as more and more people realize that they have been used and robbed, we will move swiftly from Huxley’s “Brave New World” to Orwell’s “1984.” The public, at some point, will have to face some very unpleasant truths. The good-paying jobs are not coming back. The largest deficits in human history mean that we are trapped in a debt peonage system that will be used by the corporate state to eradicate the last vestiges of social protection for citizens, including Social Security. The state has devolved from a capitalist democracy to neo-feudalism. And when these truths become apparent, anger will replace the corporate-imposed cheerful conformity. The bleakness of our post-industrial pockets, where some 40 million Americans live in a state of poverty and tens of millions in a category called “near poverty,” coupled with the lack of credit to save families from foreclosures, bank repossessions and bankruptcy from medical bills, means that inverted totalitarianism will no longer work.
We increasingly live in Orwell’s Oceania, not Huxley’s The World State. Osama bin Laden plays the role assumed by Emmanuel Goldstein in “1984.” Goldstein, in the novel, is the public face of terror. His evil machinations and clandestine acts of violence dominate the nightly news. Goldstein’s image appears each day on Oceania’s television screens as part of the nation’s “Two Minutes of Hate” daily ritual. And without the intervention of the state, Goldstein, like bin Laden, will kill you. All excesses are justified in the titanic fight against evil personified.
The psychological torture of Pvt. Bradley Manning—who has now been imprisoned for seven months without being convicted of any crime—mirrors the breaking of the dissident Winston Smith at the end of “1984.” Manning is being held as a “maximum custody detainee” in the brig at Marine Corps Base Quantico, in Virginia. He spends 23 of every 24 hours alone. He is denied exercise. He cannot have a pillow or sheets for his bed. Army doctors have been plying him with antidepressants. The cruder forms of torture of the Gestapo have been replaced with refined Orwellian techniques, largely developed by government psychologists, to turn dissidents like Manning into vegetables. We break souls as well as bodies. It is more effective. Now we can all be taken to Orwell’s dreaded Room 101 to become compliant and harmless. These “special administrative measures” are regularly imposed on our dissidents, including Syed Fahad Hashmi, who was imprisoned under similar conditions for three years before going to trial. The techniques have psychologically maimed thousands of detainees in our black sites around the globe. They are the staple form of control in our maximum security prisons where the corporate state makes war on our most politically astute underclass—African-Americans. It all presages the shift from Huxley to Orwell.
“Never again will you be capable of ordinary human feeling,” Winston Smith’s torturer tells him in “1984.” “Everything will be dead inside you. Never again will you be capable of love, or friendship, or joy of living, or laughter, or curiosity, or courage, or integrity. You will be hollow. We shall squeeze you empty and then we shall fill you with ourselves.”
The noose is tightening. The era of amusement is being replaced by the era of repression. Tens of millions of citizens have had their e-mails and phone records turned over to the government. We are the most monitored and spied-on citizenry in human history. Many of us have our daily routine caught on dozens of security cameras. Our proclivities and habits are recorded on the Internet. Our profiles are electronically generated. Our bodies are patted down at airports and filmed by scanners. And public service announcements, car inspection stickers, and public transportation posters constantly urge us to report suspicious activity. The enemy is everywhere.
Those who do not comply with the dictates of the war on terror, a war which, as Orwell noted, is endless, are brutally silenced. The draconian security measures used to cripple protests at the G-20 gatherings in Pittsburgh and Toronto were wildly disproportionate for the level of street activity. But they sent a clear message—DO NOT TRY THIS. The FBI’s targeting of antiwar and Palestinian activists, which in late September saw agents raid homes in Minneapolis and Chicago, is a harbinger of what is to come for all who dare defy the state’s official Newspeak. The agents—our Thought Police—seized phones, computers, documents and other personal belongings. Subpoenas to appear before a grand jury have since been served on 26 people. The subpoenas cite federal law prohibiting “providing material support or resources to designated foreign terrorist organizations.” Terror, even for those who have nothing to do with terror, becomes the blunt instrument used by Big Brother to protect us from ourselves.
“Do you begin to see, then, what kind of world we are creating?” Orwell wrote. “It is the exact opposite of the stupid hedonistic Utopias that the old reformers imagined. A world of fear and treachery and torment, a world of trampling and being trampled upon, a world which will grow not less but more merciless as it refines itself.”

Chris Hedges is a senior fellow at The Nation Institute. His newest book is “Death of the Liberal Class.”

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