The Apocalypse is now!

While there may be some who read this who welcome the results of the BREXIT vote in the tenuously "United" Kingdom and/or support the erratic Presidential campaign of Donald Trump, the concurrence of BREXIT vote and Trump campaign is continuing evidence of the apocalyptic nature of our times where climate change threatens the extinction of humanity. Although he eschews the word "Apocalypse" Pope Francis has recognized the selfish instincts which threaten the survival of our posterity. The drought and fires in the western US and the epic floods in West Virginia are just two examples of what awaits humanities future.

The BREXIT vote in particular has drawn me this Sunday to one poem that has affected me deeply and guided my thoughts for decades: William Butler Yeats The Second Coming"  published in 1919.

"Things fall part" Yeats wrote. "the centre cannot hold; Mere anarchy is loosed upon the world . . . The blood-dimmed tide is loosed … The best lack all conviction, while the worst are full of passionate intensity."

In my book The Coming of the Quantum Christ I wrote of an Apocalypse of Selfishness. Trump is the embodiment of selfishness. When a horrible massacre occurred in Orlando, Florida, Trump's first message did not reflect sympathy and concern for the victims and their families but how everybody was congratulating him for being right about the threat of Islam. He was actually in Scotland the day after the BREXIT vote "trumpeting" the beautiful amenities of his two Scottish golf courses until he was directed to the BREXIT, the results which has embraced. Indeed, Trump remarked that because BREXIT is devaluing the British Pound Sterling, his resorts will do well, The devaluation of the pound makes US dollars more valuable and will attract  more US visitors to Scotland.  He expressed no sympathy for British pensioners whose pensions will be devalued along with the pound.

Is it any wonder that I earlier asked tongue not entirely in cheek whether he was the Anti-Christ? Pope Francis has made it abundantly clear that in his view that selfishness is the driving force of climate change. On May 21, 2014, he lamented “If we destroy creation, creation will destroy us.”

Only by united, unselfish actions can we ameliorate the extreme result of climate change: the extinction of humanity. Trump and the BREXIT vote are material manifestations of selfishness in action. I read the last stanza of Yeats poem to be not an inquiry about Christ but the Anti-Christ:

The darkness drops again but now I know
That twenty centuries of stony sleep
Were vexed to nightmare by a rocking cradle,
And what rough beast, its hour come round at last,
Slouches towards Bethlehem to be born?

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This is not a promo for my book "Quantum Christ" but if you are interested:

http://johnklotz.blogspot.com/2015_01_01_archive.html

Orlando and the Masque of the Orange Death

It turns out there was another attack on the LBGT community thwarted yesterday in Santa Monica, CA. "20-year-old Wesley Howell reportedly traveled from Indiana to attack the Southern California LGTB event" There is a disturbing resonance with the Orlando attack. In his car were three AR-15 assault rifles with high capacity magazines. Yesterday on my Facebook page, I noted that there seemed to be an emerging pattern in the "lone nut" attacks that indicated inspiration from an ISIS standard operating procedure (SOP) is confirmed by different common threads and in this case far more important and deadly: the AR-15s and the high capacity magazines.

One doesn't have to be Sherlock Holmes to at least suspect that the fact that Howell was carrying three AR-15s may indicate a thwarted meeting with co-conspirators.

My main point is that we are going to hear a lot about what we can do to thwart the ISIS self-motivated terrorists. Frankly we had done something in the wake of the attempted Assassination of Ronald Reagan the Brady Bill. A key feature of the bill was struck by the Supreme Court. Because of the perceived power of the National Rifle Association no progress has been made in protecting the American public from gun violence. Congress even defeated an Obama proposal that gun sales to individuals on the terrorist watch list be banned.

In some states, like New York the sale of high capacity magazines has been banned. But New York is helpless to the importation of AR15s and high capacity  magazines from sister states.

The Orlando massacre will become an issue in the Presidential campaign. Donald Trump has already congratulated himself for his foresight in demanding an end to ANY Muslim entering the United States although the Orlando assassin was a native born American citizen. The problem with ISIS inspired lone wolf attacks is that the supply of disaffected individuals seeking a place in the sun who are native born US citizens while not unlimited is undoubtedly quite large.

It's time to ban high capacity magazines nation wide and adopt reasonable restrictions of assault rifles. Sales to individuals on the terrorist watch list must also be banned although any individual who feels unjustifiable denied a gun ought to have a right to appeal. One candidate for President (and I expect one sitting President) will raise that issue. Another candidate for President having pledged his fealty to the NRA will oppose any remedial gun control legislation. His claim will be that his Mexican wall and barring any Muslim immigration is the answer.

Except that's irrelevant to what happened in Orlando and might have happened in Santa Monica. For a relevant essay on the topic see Edgar Alan Poe and The Masque of the Red Death. Or maybe this time the mask is orange.

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This is not a promo for my book "Quantum Christ" but if you are interested:

http://johnklotz.blogspot.com/2015_01_01_archive.html