The argument of the original post is, more or less, that leaders of modern democracies (like the President of the United States) have more power and are more authoritative than kings of the past, and that a return to a monarchy would result in less governmental power. As it says:

"Anywhere and everywhere around the world, as governments transitioned from monarchies to democracies and republics, they quickly became vastly more powerful, controlling and authoritarian. In other words, if Trump were a monarch, he would be far less powerful than he is as president."

However, there are severe problems with this argument.

If it is saying Trump would have less power if he were a king in the King Charles sense, sure. But then that makes the article's whole argument irrelevant. Charles's lack of power doesn't mean the government has less power, it just means he personally doesn't have it; the power is wielded by the parliament, in particular the prime minister, instead.

The actual argument the article appears to be making is to assert that monarchies were less powerful, controlling, and authoritarian, and a return to that--an absolute monarchy--would fix that. Thus, if America went back to a monarchy, it would be less controlling.

The article's whole argument, however, suffers from a major issue. It is comparing modern Presidents (or prime ministers or other such positions, but I'll say President) to past kings. Perhaps kings in the past did have lower power--but even if so, it is not the past anymore, but the present. So instead of comparing modern Presidents to past kings, how about comparing modern Presidents to modern kings? Why isn't it doing that?

If we look at modern monarches--actual monarchs with real power, not guys like Charles who are just figureheads--we don't see governments that are less "powerful, controlling, and authoritarian". We instead see Saudi Arabia and Oman, countries that are (domestically, at least) more powerful, controlling, and authoritarian than the United States or as far as I am aware any modern democracy is.

I would say the actual reason for governments being more directly controlling than the past isn't because monarchism somehow restrained the king. Practical realities were what did it; the length of time for travel or communication meant a king couldn't exert direct control on much outside of his most immediate lands. As anyone who played The Oregon Trail knows, back in the day it took months to get from Missouri to Oregon. Nowadays someone can go from Washington D.C. to Oregon and back in less than 24 hours. Due to the slow rate of information travel, Britain didn't even know about the US's July 4 Declaration of Independence until August; nowadays I can read news about events in Nigeria the same day they happen. This dramatically increased level of communication and travel allows rulers to be far more direct in their power than they ever could have been before.

So, sure, maybe if Trump (or any modern US President) was a king a thousand years ago, he would've had far less power. But a king in the modern age? That would just make him and the government as a whole way more powerful.

I think what's more problematic about Disney movies is the lack of real creativity. Deconstructing fairy tales obvious tropes isn't exactly artistically brave, it's actually more like a sucker punch, and thirty years two late.

Fantine said:

IVF is exponentially worse than abortion because many embryos are created and few are used.

The rest or discarded or kept on ice in a lab--as long as the owners pay rent.

PGT, pre-implantation genetic testing, insures that only embryos without genetic abnormalities are implanted. The affected embryos are discarded.

An abortion involves one embryo (or, in much rarer cases, a fetus.)

Ever wonder why so many 40-something acresses have boy-girl fraternal twins? PGT allows for designer babies.

I guess the candidate didn't hear all that--or doesn't care.

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Yes, what's more disturbing that abortion is the widespread acceptance of IVF as a "personal choice", even though it involves the commodification of human life in a profound way. But because it doesn't involve decisions made by poor or working class women (instead, it's mostly undertaken by the managerial class and wealthy), it's difficult for it to be moralized in the same way in an individualistic, Protestant-esque culture.

I was hoping Schumer would stick a feather in his hat and call it Macaroni.

Hentenza said:

Yep. Far left or far right are equally bad. This thread is about far left though.

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Fair enough.


But it is not the far left. It's that the left isn't fiscally far left enough.

Fervent said:

No, I'm not disputing Acts 1:5. But it is the presence of pneumati that makes it baptism in the Holy Spirit, while places without specification carry the implication of water being used. Baptism in Acts 1:5 is an analogy/metaphor because the pouring out of the Spirit at Pentacost was akin to being submersed. Using acts normatively is highly questionable, because it is a descriptive book so we can't generalize in a straightforward manner.

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And it seems more like Your answer is Eristic !!

dan p

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Comfort attributes to God the design of the Cavendish banana. But it was designed by the humans who bred it to be useful for humans.

And his little buddy Kirk tries a bit of dishonesty by selectively quoting Darwin about the human eye. The part that Kirk cut out of the quote is:

“When it was first said that the sun stood still and the world turned round, the common sense of mankind declared the doctrine false; but the old saying of Vox populi, vox Dei, as every philosopher knows, cannot be trusted in science. Reason tells me, that if numerous gradations from a simple and imperfect eye to one complex and perfect can be shown to exist, each grade being useful to its possessor, as is certainly the case; if further, the eye ever varies and the variations be inherited, as is likewise certainly the case; and if such variations should be useful to any animal under changing conditions of life, then the difficulty of believing that a perfect and complex eye could be formed by natural selection, though insuperable by our imagination, should not be considered as subversive of the theory.”

Darwin's prediction was eventually confirmed. We see all graduations of eyes. We even have living examples of such graduations in a number of phyla.

Nice try, Kirk.

I don't think Trump would of gotten elected if patriotism was declining that much. Trump ran on a very patriotic platform.

ViaCrucis said:

This administration is waging a lawless and wicked war against the Republic, and anyone who--peacefully--stands in the way of what they are doing is demonstrating their patriotic duty.

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Seems a bit over the top. There isnt any lawlessness, just law enforcement which has been lacking for some time. There is no war against rhe Republic. The republic is in good shape as Congress is still functioning as is Supremem Court. Voters are still voting, laws abd bills are still being created and the courts are still ruling.

Standing in the way of immigration law enforcement is criminal. It is not a patriotic duty to prevent LE from doing their duty to enforce immigration law. Immigration law has NOT been found to be unconstitutional and neither has enforcement action been found such.

Heretical religions have been deleting passages, books and wording of the bible since it was written. JW's come to mind, as well as Mormon's and many other protestants.

Why is the secular world so obsessed with death these days?

Godcrazy said:

that is not the topic of the discussion here, neither is it something to go in to without being unable to explain

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also, a no is enough

you wanna know about spiritual warfare what to do Russ Dizdar on youtube

Psalm147:3 Pray the brokenhearted family & friends of all those who died Air India 171 crash on 12 June25 are healed & for the binding of their wounds:

How baseless, contrived, lame and unfunny. When will the Left stop trying to meme? It's like a man trying to fly by flapping his arms. You just. can't. do it.

Yet they let hobos bug you like crazy for a dollar every time you step outside a store.

mark46 said:

why are you now responding to a post from 2019?

There are much more current issues than the vast numbers that have supported Trump, his family and his campaigns with cash, goods and indirect support.

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Sorry, I didn’t see the date on the post.

FaithT said:

I don’t want to see that. Freaks me out.

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I’ll probably just go, if I can get myself out of the house.

Pray that India Stops buying Russian oil so that money for funding Russia's aggressive war against Ukraine Stops:

I'll add a different Christian perspective that others don't seem to be addressing.

First, as the husband of your wife, I don't think she should be overuling your preference for cremation, nor can I see any Biblical reason not to do so. I understand the shared discussions on where to be buried (together) and what kind of grave stone to have, but what's underground as a body or ashes should not be cause for dispute.

Second, I would dismiss any cause she gives against cremation based upon her church beliefs or traditions (versus any Biblical cause that I'm not aware of).

Third, if you're an unbeliever, it won't matter that your wife overseas a Catholic funeral upon your passing. But if you're a Christian, it should matter a lot - that you not do so.

Fourth, be aware that you can offer up your organs before cremation; I just specified that for myself in my living will.

Personally, I think it's nice to have a grave to go to if you have anyone left in the world who cares to visit it, but the choice of cremation or not shouldn't matter to anyone except maybe yourself. Cremation's significantly cheaper, and in your case, the transportation issue makes it even more practical.

ozso said:

You're intentionally acting obtuse. I was obviously talking about MSM steering away from being dishonest.

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In this case, it is not the MSM being dishonest about the "unedited" Epstein prison tape, so who is being intentionally obtuse here? This is an unforced error from Trump's administrations both prior and current.

Unbelieving Jews are not the seed of Abraham (Jn 8:44, Ro 2:28-29, 9:6-8, Gal 4:24-26, 30-31, Php 3:3), and no longer inherit any promise to Abraham.

The Jews are disinherited and completely cut off from the promise to Abraham--just as God disinherited (Ge 17:18-21) and completely cut off (Ge 21:10-14) Ishmael from the promise to Abraham (Ro 9:6-7, Gal 3:16, 4:25-26, 30-31--because of their unbelief and rejection of the Gospel for the Law (Ro 9:30-33, Gal 3:18, 22).

The NT shows that not all the seed of Abraham inherited the promise to Abraham, but only the seed born of the promise; i.e., Isaac (Ro 9:6-8), which was a type of the only seed of Abraham inheriting the promise being the children born of THE promise (Ge 15:5); i.e., born of Jesus Christ (Gal 3:16, 29, 4:22-31) who is the promise (Ge 3:5, 12:3, 18:18, 22:18, 26:4); thereby
leaving no promise to Abraham remaining to the Jews, just as God left no promise of Abraham remaining to Ishmael (Gal 4:30), and
shutting up all promises in Jesus Christ (2 Co 1:20, Gal 3:16), just as God shut up all the promises in Isaac (Ro 9:6-9).

Only the son of Sarah (the new covenant, Gal 4:30) inherits the promise.

Part-time Pennsylvania police officer arrested after taking inappropriate photos, videos of children at YMCA​

[A mom confronts him.] However, the man denied taking any pictures or videos, refused to identify himself and refused to show his phone. The mother then reported the incident to the YMCA lifeguards, who approached the suspect and asked for identification.

The lifeguard said the suspect refused to identify himself, but instead showed his police badge.

Investigators said the videos appeared to be taken by Mackrell, who can be heard making sexual comments about the juveniles in multiple videos.

According to the affidavit, Mackrell also serves as a youth monitor at Abraxas Academy, a multi-service facility offering secure residential treatment and detention services in Morgantown, Pennsylvania.

Xeno.of.athens said:

Your post skipped all the interesting stuff and give a slick non-answer for the easy bit that your quote oh so selectively edited.

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You either stated such or you did not.

Feel free to address any error in my post #98.