From Under Rocks
Slithers Flynn and Many Others
“Make America Great Again” is now “Reawaken America” and many of the honorees at last week’s Reawaken America rally in Texas made disgraced former national security advisor Michael Flynn look downright mainstream. The rally was filled with characters both known and previously unknown who resemble any of a variety of creatures that crawled from beneath rocks, live in damp and darkened caves and dine on the remains of the dead.
The defiled Flynn, who was pardoned for lying to the FBI by trump, called for designating “one religion” in the U.S. at the rally but he was just one of many Christian nationalists, anti-vaxxers, anti-abortionists, white supremacists and others who have promoted and profited from dangerous, false and misleading information about the COVID-19 vaccine and other lies ranging from claims that trump was a victim of widespread voter fraud to QAnon’s utterly false averment that the Democrats are a party of pedophiles.
In a speech on the ReAwaken America tour in Texas this weekend, Flynn said, “If we are going to have one nation under God, which we must, we have to have one religion. One nation under God and one religion under God, right? All of us, working together.”
Flynn was subpoenaed last week by the House select committee investigating the January 6 attack on the Capitol. He pleaded guilty in 2017 to lying to the FBI over his conversations with Russia’s then-ambassador and for a time cooperated with special counsel Robert Mueller’s investigation into Russian meddling in the 2016 presidential election. But Flynn campaigned for the pardon, which trump willingly provided in November 2020.
Flynn is just one of a swelling number of Christian nationalists, including some who carried “Jesus Saves” signs at the Jan. 6 rebellion while opponents to mask mandates are becoming known in other actions with their shirts emblazoned with “Jesus is my savior, Trump is my president.”
The cornucopia of left wing, conspiracy honorees included Republican leaders, like Sen. Rand Paul, R-Kent.; South Dakota Gov. Kristi Noem, who is considered a likely GOP presidential candidate in 2024; Rep. Jim Jordan, R-Ohio, a strong supporter of trump’s false claims of voter fraud and the winner of the 2021 Presidential Medal of Freedom given by trump; and Robert F. Kennedy, Jr., who has promoted many conspiracy theories including claims that Anthony Fauci and the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation are profiting from the COVID-19 vaccine and that the vaccine contributed to the death of 86-year-old Hank Aaron and others. Kennedy’s YouTube account was removed in late September 2021 for breaking the company’s new policies on vaccine misinformation. And of course, there was former MyPillow CEO Mike Lindell who just refuses to stop his nonsense over Christian nationalist rhetoric and widely debunked election claims.
Hold your noses and lock up your valuables because here are a few others who were celebrated at the rally, where else, but in the grand Lone Star State.
Alex Jones, the Infowars founder, was found liable on Nov. 15 for damages for spreading misinformation about the Sandy Hook, Conn., school shooting. Jones told the cheering crowd at the rally that the end-times prophecies of the Book of Revelation were playing out and that they were living in the most important time on earth since Jesus lived.
Patrick Michael Byrne, the former CEO of Overstock.com is a leading promoter of conspiracy theories, including that the government is run by a secret “Deep State.” Byrne also claims that Trump won the 2020 presidential election due to voter fraud, while the under-brained and overstocked Byrne also toured the country to spread lies about the dangers of the COVID-19 vaccine.
Pastor Matt Hagee of the 17,000 member, Cornerstone Church in San Antonio, Texas, is the son of founding pastor John Hagee, and he reminded attendees of a Bible verse that urges people to choose life over death.
The tour organizer, Clay Clark of Oklahoma, is host of the Thrivetime Show podcast. He tweeted on Jan. 5, that trump had confirmed that he will be at the rally on Jan. 6, that led to the assault on the Capitol. “President Trump has confirmed he will be in attendance and you should be too!!! The time to stand with President Trump and to fight for your freedoms is NOW!!!” Clark tweeted.
Amanda Grace is pastor of Ark of Grace Ministries in Hopewell Junction, N.Y., coincidentally or not the location of the Trump National Golf Club. Grace appeared in a Jewish-themed prayer shawl to blow a ritual horn known as a shofar. The instrument, made from a ram’s horn is traditionally used in Jewish worship, but it has become a staple of Pentecostal gatherings since being featured prominently in the Jericho March, a post-election protest held in the run-up to the Jan. 6 Capitol attack. Grace, who calls herself the “Christian prophet” was on Clay Clark’s podcast where she “shares about the power of prophetic word of God, and what God has shown her about the future of America including the future of United States Senator Mitch McConnell.”
Greg Locke, a Trump-backer and COVID-skeptic, pastor at Global Vision Bible Church in Mount Juliet, Tenn., said anti-vaxxers are patriots. He was banned from Twitter for sharing vaccine disinformation while holding maskless, in-person worship services during the pandemic.
Providing worship music was Sean Feucht, a Christian singer and unsuccessful candidate for California’s state Legislature. Feucht has traveled the country, holding concerts that flaunt local COVID-19 restrictions. Feucht was with 50 other worship leaders who visited trump for a faith briefing at the White House in December 2019 where “We just laid our hands on him and prayed for him. It was like a real(sic) intense, hardcore prayer.”
Dr. Sherri Tenpenny is an osteopath from Ohio who has waged an ongoing campaign against the vaccine. She has been called one of 12 researchers responsible for most of the anti-vaccine misinformation. Tenpenny also hosts “Happy Hour with Dr. T,” a semiweekly Bible study on Instagram Live that weaves faith with erroneous claims about COVID-19 along with QAnon conspiracy theories.
Dave Daubenmire, a former public high school football coach was sued by the American Civil Liberties Union in the 1990s after he allegedly led his team in prayer and passed out Scripture to players. Tenpenny and Daubenmire claim they are trying to raise $100 million to fund “Christian Training Centers” to fight vaccines, mask mandates and “global tyranny.”
Phil Hotsenpiller, pastor of Influence Church in Anaheim Hills, Calif., has launched a news network called American Faith for his followers who he called “soldiers” fighting mandated coronavirus safety measures along with other battles.
Joe Pedick, pastor of Calvary Chapel of the Harbour in Huntington Beach, Calif., home to Alien Ant Farm lead singer Dryden Mitchell among other notables, has told his congregation that “a lot of things” would happen and that “justice is coming” before Joe Biden was sworn in as president on Jan. 20.
Pastor Artur Pawlowski of Calgalry, Alberta, Canada, was sentenced to 18 months of probation for holding church services in violation of a court order forbidding public gatherings without face masks and for repeatedly kicking out armed officials who went to the sanctuary to check COVID-19 compliance. He also refused a court order to note in any sermons a that the vaccine is safe and necessary, an order he called a clear instance of “compelled speech like in China and North Korea.”
The Reawaken America tour has been co-promoted by an organization calling itself “Charisma News” which presents a “spiritual perspective” on news and has included such recent topics as “The Spirit of Antichrist Has Enveloped America. Is This a Democracy Anymore?” and “Popular Ministry Leader States the Antichrist is Already Here.” Another co-promoter is the House of Destiny, an on-line church broadcasting service that includes “Destiny Kids, a channel just for KIDS.” A recent episode taught young listeners “about what the FULL armor of God is and how we apply it to our everyday lives.”
Among the media also promoting the tour has been Jacek Posobiec, an alt-right and alt-lite political activist, television correspondent, conspiracy theorist and Internet troll known for his pro-trump comments on Twitter, as well as using white supremacist and antisemitic symbols and talking points.
Dr. Stella Immanuel of Houston, Texas, has hyped use of hydroxychloroquine to fight COVID-19 and said that face masks aren’t necessary to stop transmission of COVID-19. Trump has retweeted Immanueal’s Facebook video about the claims of hydroxychloroquine, since totally debunked, while Immanuel also has claimed knowledge of alien DNA and the physical effects of having sex with witches and demons in your dreams.
Dr. Simone Melissa Gold, is founder of America’s Frontline Doctors, a right-wing group known for spreading misinformation about the COVID-19 pandemic. On Jan. 5, Gold told attendees at a rally in Washington D.C., to refuse to be vaccinated for COVID-19. The next day she joined in the Capitol attack and was later arrested for having entered the building.
Texas Dr. Richard Bartlett claimed that an asthma medication, budesonide, a corticosteroid, was effective in treating COVID-19. His claims, also roundly refuted, were seen by millions on You Tube and Facebook.
QAnoner Scot McKay has gained fame for carrying a tomahawk and terrorizing school boards to force them to ignore mask mandates. A middle-aged former bodybuilder, McKay’s followers call him “Patriot Streetfighter.” He has urged his followers to bombard specific school board members with complaints and his podcast has focused on Iowa Gov. Kim Reynolds, who has fought vaccine mandates, and Flynn.
So yes, it sends shivers down my spine to hear Flynn’s call for “one religion” but the thing that shivers even my shivers is that Flynn is a mirror image of trump’s twisted philosophy that is determined by the way the wind blows.
But maybe Flynn should get a medal for saying out loud publicly what has been gaining steam among the right wing for years, that the country started as a Christian nation and will always be a Christian nation. Carl Bernstein, who gained legendary fame for his Watergate reporting, said in an interview that 35 percent of the voters in the 2020 presidential election said they supported trump because they fear Christianity is being taken from them. NPR also has reported that polls from the 2020 election showed between 76 percent and 81 percent of white evangelical and “born again” voters supported Trump.
In God we trust is our mantra, and the founding fathers most certainly meant their Protestant God. Protestants have always ruled this country, there has never been a Jewish president and the only Catholics to win the White House were John F. Kennedy and Joe Biden. John Quincy Adams, Millard Fillmore and William Howard Taft were Unitarians while Richard Nixon and Herbert Hoover were Protestant Quakers.
What iteration or bastardization of Christianity is the issue and with Flynn and trump, it is no doubt the right wing, crazy form of evangelical, Christianity which believes that trump is sent directly from above to keep the nation white, to rid the nation of the curse of homosexuality, abortion, and science, to abolish the walls between church and state, to exterminate all Communists and to settle once and for all and reverse all the moral and ethical decadence wrought by Democrats.
Flynn is an utterly repugnant human being, but he no doubt has the philosophical support of millions of Americans because he, like trump, claims that he will take the mantel of the battle of good versus evil.