Scott Nicholson Presents The Skull Ring: A Mystery Thriller - And, More Than a Little Horror

“No need to worry. I’m not afraid of a few extra pounds.” Only other things. Lions and tigers and bears and Satanic cults, oh my. 

Julia had watched them all her life, marveled at the endless power that dreams held on people, dreams that let them lie to themselves about the odds of making it. Or of being happy.

Dr. Danner told her that, although they had been progressing in the therapy, a move was probably a good thing for her. He’d encouraged her to take the job in Elkwood, depressurize, embrace a rural lifestyle. Dr. Danner even made a referral to a doctor here that Julia felt comfortable with, touting it as “a continuum of care.” Mitchell had been against her leaving, but his possessiveness had only made Julia more determined. If she was ever going to show him she was a big girl, now was the time. Big girls don’t cry, though. Julia wiped away her tears with the back of her hand. She was glad she didn’t wear make-up, because the streaks would show. Not that she cared much what the handyman thought of her. She definitely wasn’t out to appear attractive to anyone, especially a potential Creep in a Jeep.

I still remember when I went to the movie and watched the demon-possessed girl have her head turn around and around. While a Priest watched and tried to save her. That movie scared me at that younger age. I admit that I believed in demons and possession... That was many years ago and I've discovered that, if there are demons, there are also many more humans, mostly men, who perform much more evil things... at least in my opinion...

This book wound up on a page of one of my readers last week and with all of my medical issues taking control, I was reading it more slowly than usual. I had bought it in 2011 but have no memory of why... My first thought when I started reading were two: Am I having another God Incident? And, "Epstein files..."

You will find several references I've chosen of what seem to be reputable sites to share from on my sister blog.

And, of course, it reminded me of my own early childhood experiences...

Maybe Dr. Forrest would know what it meant. Dr. Forrest had helped her decipher an earlier dream, one where Julia was pregnant and a snake was trying to take her baby. According to the Freudian interpretation, the snake was her father, and the fetus was herself as a small child. Therefore, Julia’s father had stolen her childhood, and was the one to blame for Julia’s current disorder...

You see, Julia was just 4 when she went through an experience, which included some mutilation of her tiny body. Although she has grown and has even worked, she has panic attacks and more that keeps her afraid of just about any new experience. All she remembers was being taken into a location where there were many people with robes and hoods. Her clothes were removed and she was placed on what you might call an altar. Like with my earlier experience, Julia blacked out. But she had seen somebody with a skull ring pulling out a long knife...

What was interesting to me was that, as the author had declared of this book, placing it as a mystery, that is how I read it. As a mystery to be solved, along with Julia... Because she, for me, was the primary character that I would identify with... And she sure needed somebody helping her! Because the primary genre, in my opinion, is not as a thriller, but as a horror experienced by that main character... One that might have been experienced in one way or another by others for millions of years across the centuries...

A metallic click and whir brought Julia back to the blank TV as the tape finished rewinding. Tears burned in her eyes, refusing to fall. She wiped them away and pressed the remote. The screen flared to life and the tape started. Julia put her thumb on the fast-forward, ready to skip the pre-game analysis. The game wasn’t on the tape. 

Instead, the screen was filled with a man’s smooth-shaven face, his eyes fevered and bright. The man was pointing at the camera as if chiding both the camera operator and the audience. At high speed, the man looked comical, making wild hand gestures like something out of an old Keystone Kops short. Julia was positive she had set the tape for ESPN2, the network of choice for also-ran teams like the Cardinals. She double-checked the schedule lying open on the coffee table. There, Cardinals vs. Astros, 4 PM, Channel 27. VCR’s were notoriously complicated to program, but she’d taped much of the season without being thrown a single curve. Unless her memory of setting the VCR had been a tiny little game she had played on herself, another trick to scare herself stupid. And didn’t delusional people lie to themselves? No. I didn’t spread the blocks out on the table this morning, and I didn’t tape this . . .  this WHATEVER. 

She stopped the tape and let it play at regular speed. The man’s face crowded the edges of the screen, the close-up so intense that she could see drops of saliva spraying from his mouth as he spoke. The man’s manic voice thundered forth as she thumbed up the volume on the remote. “And Satan has come unto the world, the world that Satan owns, the one that he has stolen from God,” the man said. “And Satan spread his wealth, spread his lust disguised as love, spread his greed disguised as need, spread his warfare disguised as righteousness. Satan stretched his fingers out across the world, touching every man, woman, and child.” The man pointed at the camera, at Julia, his voice softening. “Touching you.” 

Yeah, right. The Devil touched me in the HEAD. Thanks, mister. Now I have an excuse. Here I was, all ready to accept the blame for my little problem, and now you come along and give me the greatest out of all time. I’m only a victim. Of course. Why didn’t I see it before now? The preacher allowed a dramatic pause. “This world belongs to the devil. It’s right there in the Book of Luke, set down by God’s own hand. ‘To you I will give all this power and glory,’ the Devil says to Jesus, as they stood on the mountain overlooking the wonders of this world. ‘For it’s been given over to me to do with as I please.’ The Lord could withstand the temptation, but you would snatch it right up, wouldn’t you? You’d take it all and still want more. “And I don’t blame you,” the wild-eyed man continued, wiping away the sweat that was collecting on his face from the Klieg lights and exertion. “I don’t blame you for biting into the apple, into that red, shiny, sweet apple. I’ve tasted it myself, we all have. How can we resist?” Julia almost clicked the screen off, but something about this televangelist’s spiel fascinated her. His hair was slick and perfectly styled, swooped up in a grand swirl that would stand in a hurricane. The man’s teeth sparkled, brighter than heavenly pearls, his jaw muscles contorted in the rapture of his delivery. She had no doubt of his utter sincerity. “How can we resist?” he repeated, and the camera pulled back to reveal the man’s outstretched arms, as if he were offering himself up for Christ’s welcoming hug or the next UFO. “We are empty vessels, and unless we fill ourselves with the Lord, the devil will wash in”–the man arched his arms as if diving into a lake—”and drown us with sin, drown us with sorrow. He’ll steal our breath with his false promises. He’ll take us down and we won’t even fight it. We’ll hug him right back and give him thanks.” The man paced back and forth in front of the plush purple curtain and floral arrangements that served as a stage setting. The Love Offering telephone number was emblazoned on a banner in great golden numerals. “But the Lord will fight,” said the man, voice lifting, fist shaking in the air. “The Lord will burn Satan’s eyes out, the Lord will take our love and use it as a weapon, a mighty sword that will cleave down into the fire—” He made a slicing motion with his free hand “—and cut Satan’s grasping fingers and silence that nasty tongue, the one that whispers such sweet lies to us. Lies of all the pleasures we can have, if we only turn our hearts from God.” Pause. Medium close-up. The man lowered his head in sad reverence. A perfectly scripted moment. He pointed again. “Satan wants you,” he said, almost a caricature of those patriotic Uncle Sam posters. “He owns you.” 

Julia pointed back, her fascination shifting to boredom. “No, he’s only borrowing me.” She’d rather watch the Cardinals lose by six. The VCR must have jumped its memory, shut off and lost its programming. First the clock and now this. She’d have to call George Webster and have Walter check out the wiring. Sure, blame it on mechanical failure, not operator error. Or operator insanity. Talk about God sending messages wrapped in ridiculous packaging. She clicked the set off, the sound dying, the televangelist’s face sinking rapidly to black. After checking the front-door lock, she went to the bathroom and took a shower. She managed to shampoo and rinse without once looking outside the shower stall. No Creeps here, no Anthony Perkins wannabes, no peepholes carved in the walls, nothing but the sweat of mist on the tiles. Before leaving the bathroom, she glanced at the figure in the full-length mirror on the back of the door. The steamy glass almost disguised the two long scars than ran up her belly and just under the swells of her breasts. Aside from the scars, she was not too bad for an old-timer of twenty-seven. Mitchell certainly found her worthy. She went to bed and read some Jefferson Spence and was carried away to a land where the protagonists always drew upon inner reserves to overcome evil obstacles. The clock was still behaving itself, so she set it to wake her early. As she turned off the bedside light, she went over a checklist in her head. Doors locked. Windows locked. Curtains pulled closed. Mace in the living room. Baseball bat under the bed, the commemorative Louisville Slugger her adoptive parents had given her for her sixteenth birthday. All set. Nothing but darkness and the quiet settling of the house. The leaves flapped a little on the trees outside, one of them occasionally brushing against the window screen. The neighbors had cut the music. They were pretty considerate about that, except during their weekend parties. She lay in the dark thinking of the morning’s episode of paranoia, the wooden blocks, the session with Dr. Forrest, the Satanic murder, Rick. Dr. Forrest. Something during the hypnosis. A memory, crawling from its slumber, fingers reaching from the damp murk of the cellar. Clawing its way out. The bad people, around her, touching and hurting her. No. That memory was for Dr. Forrest’s office, where it could be bound by walls. Not here, not in Julia’s house, where it could slither out of her ears and under the bed to lie in the beggar’s velvet and wait. Wait for just that right moment when Julia was asleep, tangled in the sheets of nightmare. Then it would grab her ankle, open its slathering jaws and— She sat up and flicked on the bedside lamp. The digital clock moved on, counted its way from the past or toward the future, however you wanted to look at it. Julia watched it for a while, and then picked up her book. Julia read until after midnight. By that time she was thoroughly irritated with Spence’s too-perfect heroine and his libertarian worldview, not to mention the obligatory dog chuffing here and there among the pages and occasionally bloated, pompous prose. But the book had helped her forget her troubles. Spence was reliable for that, as solid as a dictionary. She tried the pillow again. Not so bad this time. She was almost ready to try the dark, but decided to sleep with the light on. Just once more wouldn’t hurt. She thought of the tape, tried to remember setting the VCR. She could remember. She could see herself punching the buttons, Channel 27. And she’d gotten the hair-oiled preacher from hell. Oh, well. Everybody made mistakes. Her thoughts spilled into nonsense, Rick’s face, the lake at the club where she’d met Mitchell, her dead adoptive parents, a teacher she’d had in the sixth grade who had worn green suspenders, Mickey Mouse, images skipping by faster and faster on the preview screen of dreams. She was nearly asleep when she heard a crack outside the window. The sound of a damp stick breaking. She held her breath, kept her cheek against the pillow. Listened. Listened. A scrabbling sound on the outside wall. How close was the baseball bat? It’s nothing, Julia. Probably the neighbor’s boxer, leaving you a stinky present for tomorrow. Or a raccoon. You live right by the WOODS. Remember wildlife? A swashing across the window screen. The boxer couldn’t reach six feet off the ground. It’s a Creep. Should she pretend that she hadn’t noticed, turn off the light as if preparing to sleep? In the darkness, she could reach the bat unobserved. She could roll to her feet and wait by the window for the Creep to come through. Then— What? Whammo, like a steroid-stoked Mark McGwire in his prime feasting on a rookie pitcher’s fastball? No. She could call the cops. 

The cops. First cop: “You see anything?” Second cop (playing his flashlight beam on the ground outside the window): “Hmm. Looks like some kind of animal tracks.” First cop: “What kind of tracks?” Second cop: “Damn. I just stepped in dog crap.” Sometimes a cigar was just a cigar. Sometimes noises were only noises. She reached out, switched off the light without looking at the window. Swash against the screen. She couldn’t resist looking. Eyes. A scarce glint of fire on them from the distant streetlight, weak between the curtains. But eyes. And a face behind them? She eased one hand off the bed, tensing, ready to scream, to reach for the Louisville Slugger, the phone, anything. The eyes were gone. She lay in her own sweat, trying to convince herself that she’d imagined the eyes, that she was safe as milk. Dr. Forrest warned her about letting her fantasy world intrude on reality. Dr. Forrest wasn’t going to like hearing about nonexistent eyes at her bedroom window. The wooden blocks had been real. But, if she closed her eyes, she could picture herself selecting them off the toy rack, paying the cashier, taking them home and arranging the letters on her table. Then forgetting so she could scare herself later. That sounded crazy, multiple-personality loopy, and she was not ever going to be crazy. Dr. Forrest wouldn’t let her. Better to pretend that the blocks had never existed. No Creep played tricks on her except the one inside her head. Julia would leave that part out of the journal she would start in the morning. And if she didn’t want to imagine eyes at her window, the best thing was to shut her own eyes and watch the imaginary silent movies on the backs of her eyelids. For a moment, she longed for Mitchell’s presence in the bed beside her. Better the devil you know. She lulled herself into a shallow, exhausted sleep by the second reel. 

~~~~

One of the most interesting things I realized as I read was that the author has merged many facets of a theme in many different ways. And it is only as you read, and as a mystery writer provides, that we learn clues and can begin to form a basis for solving exactly what is happening in Julia's life.

“The cops identified the victim.” Julia nodded, half-listening, clicking her way through her files. “Poor guy.” “Charles Edward Williams. Age 39. Last known address, Memphis, Tennessee.” Julia froze over her keyboard. “Memphis?” “Your old stomping grounds. Is it known as a hotbed of Satanism?” “Well, aside from Elvis selling his soul to the devil and Richard Nixon . . . and we all know how that turned out.” “Eternal life on a hundred thousand collector plates and black velvet paintings, but in exchange, he had to die drugged out on the porcelain altar.” “You are so delicate, Rick.” “Yep. Journalism hardens your heart, and that explains everything,” he said, shifting into a mocking tone. “How long did you say you’ve been a reporter?” “Very funny. Do the police have any new leads?” “No. They’ve shipped the body off to the state medical examiner’s office. Should be able to tell if the guy was drugged when he died. If the Brotherhood used him as a sacrifice, they probably had to drug him pretty heavily.” “Unless the sacrifice was voluntary. What’s this ‘Brotherhood’ business?” “One of the names Satanists use for their group.” “Boy, even Satanists are sexist. What’s the world coming to?”

Julia had been working at a newspaper and had begun to be affected by one reporter who was working on a major piece about the worship of Satan. While he normally would discuss work with Julie, she tried to avoid his updates, responding flippantly, often, to show her lack of interest. She decided to follow her doctor's advice to move into a smaller community.

She had just moved in to her new home and began to feel the freedom of living in the country--woods were surrounding much of the building. But, then, it started to happen. She came home one day and a line of children's blocks were on a table. She had no children and knew they were not hers... As she walked through her home to see if somebody was there, she noticed that the clock in her bedroom was on 4:06, not the time... and, it no longer moved forward. 

There were only two individuals she knew here. Her landlord and his maintenance man, Walter, who had a key in case some emergency occurred. For some reason, Walter was cast as illiterate, often using ain't this, ain't that as if that was the only word that would confirm his difference to anybody else...

“Well, I’d better run. I’ve got some work to do.” Plus it will be dark very soon. And even though my house is only fifty yards away . . . Mrs. Covington walked Julia to the door. “Didn’t mean to scare you none. About Hartley and all that. It’s just best to be informed.” “Yes, ma’am,” Julia said. She reached down and petted the cat that rubbed against her leg. “You come on back any time.” “Thank you, Mrs. Covington.” “And call me ‘Mabel,’ hear?”

Because all of the individuals that came into the book in some way were rich, from her past, or strangers, at least at the beginning. Soon she learned that a former law officer with whom she had worked had also moved to the same town. And it was not surprising that, as she began to experience problems, that the police gave her little attention or acceptance that she was not just "forgetful..." or "confused..." These events, for readers, created an insidious reality for us. Something was definitely happening, but was it supernatural or just criminal or malicious actions by somebody... With a panic disorder and her personal history of being violently abused at the age of four, we watch as Julia tries to deal with what is occurring right now, as opposed to what she's being told by her psychiatrist, versus what began to occur, as Walter became involved...

Walter is an interesting character. His wife and child had disappeared many years ago, but Julia sensed from their interaction that he was not involved in that disappearance... Thankfully, she grew to trust him somewhat and then, one night, when he caught a man coming out of her bedroom through a window, and he caught him, they began to feel like they could at least trust each other...

Julia had reached the point, though, that she was not willing to allow herself to be in panic mode for the rest of her life... She began to do her own research!

“Were there any reports of Satanic activity in Memphis around that time?” The corners of Whitmore’s lips lifted a little as if he were about to laugh, but realized she was serious. He must have seen his reflection in the bar mirror. He covered his mouth, wiping away the milk mustache. “There’s always talk of that kind of thing,” he said. “And, no, I don’t believe the devil popped up and dragged your daddy down to hell through the bathtub drain.”

“I don’t, either. But some people apparently take it deadly seriously.” “We’ve had our share of mutilated animals,” he said. “Most of it was just high school kids with too much time on their hands and too many people to impress. As for an organized effort, we don’t have any Church of Satan branches here or anything. Who was that guy that started that mess out in San Francisco?” “Anton LaVey? The guy who wrote the Satanic Bible?” “You really did study up, didn’t you?” “Even better. I work with a guy who did. He’s either the world’s leading expert on Satanic ritual or else he ought to be writing horror novels. But LaVey was nothing but a glorified carnival barker. I’m talking about the real thing, people who are into it so deeply that they’re willing to kill to protect their secrets.” “Well, there was a lot of talk a few years back, claims of Black Masses and that sort of thing. Mostly came out of psychiatrist’s reports. You know, ritual child rape, child sacrifice, chronic abuse. Cops watch the news and read the papers, just like everybody else. Sometimes we’d see things that made us wonder, but there was one big problem with all those reports.” “Let me guess.” Julia took a large gulp of her drink. “Same as with my father. No hard evidence.” “If even a dozen kids were sacrificed every year, they would have been noticed. Sure, Memphis has a lot of runaways just like everywhere else, and probably more kids run to here than away from here.” Whitmore nodded his head toward the girl sitting beside the sound board, a pale, trembling fifteen-year-old blond. “It’s either music or go into the trade. Sometimes both.” “So you don’t think it’s possible for a huge, organized, underground cult to exist without being discovered?” Whitmore shrugged. “Hey, I was a cop for thirty-five years. I know anything’s possible. But, you’d think at least one or two of the cult members would eventually become . . . now, what’s that word I’m looking for? Disillusioned, maybe?” “‘Disenchanted’ might be more appropriate.” He laughed. “Maybe you ought to be a writer or something.” “Or a reporter, maybe. So nobody ever came forward?” “Not in my experience. But looking back, there’s maybe a handful of unsolved cases that still give me the Creeps. The Mississippi floats up something ugly once in a while.” “Like an eviscerated corpse?” 

She told him about the Elkwood victim, and Whitmore’s eyes opened wider. “We had a couple of cases like that,” Whitmore said, his voice soft. Julia had to lean forward to hear him over the noise of the gathering crowd and clinking glass. “Cut up just as you described,” he said. “Come to think of it, one of them turned up a month or so before your father disappeared. Of course, there was no connection between the two, and no reason to think there might be.” “You’ve got a good memory.” He looked down at the bar, at the streaks of light in the polished oak. “A detective never forgets the cases he doesn’t solve. Because, deep down inside, he never stops trying to solve them.” The guitarist had cranked his amplifier and strummed an ominous minor chord. The audience hooted, whistled, and drank. The drummer played a fill, checking the angles of the drum heads and cymbals. Ten years ago, the anticipation would have Julia electrified and ready to dance all night. Now, she preferred a radio so she could control the volume. Whitmore looked similarly pained. “That’s my cue,” he said, heaving himself from the stool. Julia gathered her purse, finished the last sip of her drink, and paid her tab. She walked Whitmore to the sidewalk and thanked him again. “Doubt if I helped you any,” he said. “Probably just made you more troubled than you already were.” “Trouble is only what you make of it,” Julia said, reciting one of Mrs. Covington’s mountain sayings. It sounded alien in that world of concrete and steel. “I won’t tell you that you’d be better off just letting the past alone, and getting on with your life,” he said. “I’ll bet you hear that enough already.” She smiled. “A detective never stops trying to solve them, right?” His teeth gleamed in the streetlights. “Keep my number and give me a call if anything turns up.” She shook his hand and went up to her room, slightly woozy from the drinks. She lay on the bed and listened to the steady throb of traffic, the city’s blood pumping through its monstrous asphalt veins. Why hadn’t Mitchell told her about the ring? Surely he knew that James Whitmore would mention such an unusual item. But he could have easily withheld Whitmore’s number from her, he could have failed to mention the detective at all. She may or may not have found Whitmore through her own efforts. By the time she fell asleep, fully clothed, she had convinced herself that Mitchell had only been trying to protect her. Mitchell didn’t want her bothered by the past because he wanted a perfect future for her. As she drifted into a haze of jumbled imagery, she tried to pray but no words came, and neither did a response to her seeking.

One of the things she had done was to go back to where she thought all of it started... And, as she started searching, she soon was to find a secret hiding place... And, there, inside that floor location, she found a box... With a Skull Ring...

Folks, there was no way that I read this book and didn't immediately start thinking about the Epstein cult. When information started to be released, I had learned about what was discovered. The Word Baal. I knew the word and did a preliminary check to verify my source. If you are interested in further information, I've provided a complementary post. It is not my intent to connect this book. Rather, I found it an informative and plausible story by which people can be seduced or pulled into such an activity. Through contact with others who lie, cheat, and care nothing about the harm done to others. 

I did like the book and would normally recommend it. And, BTW, Julia and Walter discovered love thought it all...

This book is well written and clearly respectful of a need to, in such a book, reflect multiple points of view. That was achieved, in my opinion. I do not consider this a straight review since my emotional response was influenced by all that has occurred to hide the Epstein Files and to protect, not the victims such as Julia, but to protect those who participate in search of money and/or power... You decide whether you will choose to learn more through the book or the accompanying sample news stories about what is being discovered.

GABixlerReviews

Stanislaw Kapuscinski Interprets Psalm 23 Bringing New Insight to Old Words! A Personal Book to Begin Exploration of...More...

 Please note that I am not now able to use colors to differentiate between excerpts and my narrative... Using quotes and indentation, both...

Of all of the Psalms, this one seems to have become the most popular, especially for songwriters and musicians... (Don't forget to read my Introduction by clicking on the right column spotlight.) I have not found any that I like as well as the one I first sung, but that is me, making a choice, based upon my life, my preferences, This following one, though, provides the soul of the song, don't you think...?

Stanislaw opens his book providing the "cosmologists' vision of the beginning of the world... You know, the "big bang" theory... For this "doubting thomosino," plus a Trekkie from my early life who looked to the future as opposed to constantly analyzing the past; or, like now, some are doing wanting everything to go back as it was--you know which political party candidate is doing that--I knew one thing. Earth could not have been created by accident... 

I can deal with fluctuating time periods, say, "created in 7 days" versus, many millions of years being equal in God's time... But the basic common sense that God had provided me necessitated that there was a creator somewhere... So, I went out to Google and did a search and learned that the word God was first created/coined in the 6th century... What that means is that quite some time had gone by before, God became the name for who He called Himself--I AM--which turns out to be quite a statement that clearly shows "I existed before you called ME your new word...God!" (That was me pretending to say what God may have said at some point...LOL

Stan's words are much more eloquent--lovely even-- with just a touch of snark for fundamentalists, which made me grin... As his words move us, what he is saying is quite logical! In fact, it makes more sense than you might imagine if you have ever thought about, read, or been taught the "how" of the beginning... 

"Enter Metaphysics. No, metaphysics is not mumbo-jumbo. It is a branch of philosophy that attempts to find the truth behind... physics. And the rest of reality which physics does not answer adequately. Like the big bang or any bang happening out of nothing. Now that really is mumbo-jumbo. And, after all, it is a little hard to believe that Aristotle, Socrates, Plato, Pythagoras, Kant, Descartes, Nietzsche, Confucius, Averroes and a host of other great men might have been wrong. Have you noticed that not one of them created a religion? (Nor, did Jesus.) Not one. They developed metaphysics. So... back to the Big Bang. Or even further back. Back to the pre-bang time when there was no time. There was no becoming. There was only Being. Before time, and space was born in the phenomenal Universe. The phenomenal, ephemeral, ever-changing, illusive Universe. The Universe which Albert Einstein called an illusion. A state of constant metamorphosis. Most scientists finally agree that the Universe is not only phenomenal but eternal. In fact, the phenomenal Universe is a process.  Whatever happens now may have happened many times before. What really matters is life, the journey, more so than the destination. After all, life is defined by constant change..."

~~~

Beginning an Interpretation of Psalm 23 means exactly that... Once he establishes the terminology supporting the metaphysical/scientific reason behind the words, Kapuscinski begins by taking each phrase of the total 23rd Psalm and provides an interpreta- tion, first establishing an overview of the Psalm itself and, then, how it all began. Each section of the book builds on each of the earlier teachings....

Still, I had in mind sharing Verse 4, the one I think many of us wonder most about... 

"4. Yea, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil: for thou art with me; thy rod and thy staff they comfort me."

Why did I choose to spotlight this statement? Because I know that many of us are afraid about what is happening in America... Our women will be more prone to die during childbirth given the changes pulling back health care... There are many moving toward a violent response to everything... more and more of our children in schools are being murdered! Is there really comfort in God, anymore? 

As God created man, he came into each of our lives, to a smaller or larger extent. Some of us choose to acknowledge and move forward in that awareness. I hope you all accept that as a basis of your faith. In recognizing that reality as is learned in this book, we should and can fear no evil. Yet, we have learned that the bodies in which we live are not immune to danger of any sort, including, merely old age! But this verse states clearly that God is with us. We can have no fear... Notice that I said we "can" have no fear... Because of course, that is indeed a freedom of choice isn't it...

Let me use a specific life example. Yesterday, I had a doctor's appointment, pulled in to a handicapped space in front of the door and was checking the time. Almost immediately a big truck pulled in the handicapped space beside me... His window was open, the music loud, but not loud enough for me to hear the words... I got out and went in. I passed the truck and saw two posters on the back, one related to second amendment... The other about (his feelings) which I choose not to repeat. I discovered that they needed me to wait until 10 to be able to register, given that I had arrived early. I went back to my car... and sat, deleting messages... As soon as I got in the car and just waited, the man zoomed out of the parking lot... as if disgusted I was going to be awhile and he wasn't going to wait! LOL  Given I recognized a possible MAGA, I might have become afraid...but I wasn't... 

I know the inseparability of my body and my God... even as I choose my own words, which may be a little different than Stan uses in his interpretation... as is David's use of the words--thy rod and thy staff comfort me... are more lyrical as a poet's would be, and also of those used at that time...but, they really all mean one thing, don't they? I thought so...

Stan goes on to say that David also recognized that what happens to us in life are corrective measures to guide us forward... Using my example above, and, as you know I've been outspoken about MAGA's violent activities... Yet, if, indeed, that man was following me which was suggested by his actions, then I weighed the threat and found it baseless for my life... and went on to deal with the reality of my continuing aged body becoming even more broken...and how to fix it!

Through Stan and so many other writers during the last 20 years or so, and presently, I am finding that more and more people are questioning "religion" as being the problem issue in today's world... Yet, I have found that those who dwell on having a relationship directly with God who dwells within us, have a much closer and positive relationship and awareness of his greatness and yet his, thankfully, knowing that each of us automatically allows our lives to always move forward... learning, using that knowledge to expand and increase all that we are and who we can become...

This is an excellent book for somebody who has never even thought of exploring what exactly the Bible they have read so often, is actually saying to us. After all, Neither God Nor Jesus wrote any part of these religious books. (That's why I've always called them Inspired). Even Jesus' words have been translated from different languages... You may find the use of new words a little strange, but you quickly get used to it as Stan moves slowly, but precisely... I recommend this book for curiosity's sake... Take a look and open your mind to the wonderful possibility of the great I AM who existed before human named him God...

And, so, I want to move on within this article and spend a little time with Stan's Dictionary! Essentially providing the front material provided by the author. The author also provides guidance on how to use the book and then proceeds directly into words in alphabetical order...

***

FOREWORD: 

430 B.C. Around 430 B.C. Democritus of Abdera said: Nothing exists except atoms and empty space; everything else is opinion. 

Today, some two-and-a-half millennia later, the same can be said of the Old Testament of the Bible: Nothing exists but a lot of Hebrew words arranged in a linear fashion; everything else is an opinion. 

Why? Because the ancient Hebrew had been written in capital letters only, in continuous lines without any breaks for paragraphs or punctuation. No proper names of either people or places had been identified in any way. All we have is a flood of words, flowing like a beautiful stream, perhaps a mighty river... All else is an opinion. For centuries self-proclaimed experts imposed their opinion on what those words mean. In extreme cases, those who disagreed with the scholars approved by the Orthodoxy had been burnt at the stake.

You needn’t worry. In most countries murder and torture for religious belief is now illegal. Today, in most countries, you can dare to think for yourself. And you must. In the Age of Aquarius, religions, all religions, have entered a protracted, lingering period of inexorable demise. 

Dogmatic authoritarians are rapidly loosing their credibility. We have entered an Age of individualization. We shall be forced to think for ourselves. It is with this sentiment that I am offering my Dictionary of Biblical Symbolism. Everyone who so desires will be able to study ancient Scriptures and attempt to understand the secret, perhaps sacred knowledge, hidden in their pages. And the knowledge of the ancients is staggering. On closer examination I found no evidence of any dogmas, no promises of unearned rewards now or hereafter, but also no dire threats of eternal damnation. 

But this is only my opinion. I shall not repeat the mistakes of the past by interpreting the Scriptures for you. I’m offering you the means to find your own wisdom. The rest is up to you. Good luck! 

INTRODUCTION The desert, near Nag’ Hammadi 365 A.D. As the dying wind sighed and heaved among the undulating dunes, a single dark shape, a hood pulled well over his face (the desert has many eyes), made its way towards the distant cliffs. Even from afar, brother El’zaphan could detect the agonizing whimpers of ghostly howling as it slithered low over the sand from the mountain ahead—the eerie mountain they called the Jobal al’Tarif. Its jagged slopes and contorted innards, ridden with countless forbidden caves and tunnels, held many secrets. For twenty-five centuries the dark, mysterious caverns guarded the scant remains of the noblest people. Perhaps some... not so noble. They said that the spirits of the unworthy howled, aye, howled and whimpered in the desert night air. Brother El’zaphan shrugged his narrow shoulders. He knew better. He was among the few who shared in the Secret Knowledge. Soon the caves would serve once again as nature’s sarcophagus to hold and protect the most noble remains. 

Those sacred volumes, or what remained of them, containing the Secret Knowledge which the inspired brethren had committed to papyrus. With such selfless love, such steadfast perseverance. At the risk of their lives. And just as well. The original Greek texts, those now translated into Coptic language, had been destroyed long ago. 

By whom? By the misguided ignorant men jealous of the secrets contained within the gospels. “Gnostic gospels,” they called them. “Pseudo-knowledge!” they sneered... “The ravings of drunkards... Yes, of drunks and heretics... The knowledge of the devil!” Brother El’zaphan quickened his pace. His robe, the color of the whispering sand, gave him only partial protection from the lurking ungodly. He inhaled deeply. The cool night air filled his lungs with fresh strength after the scorching heat of the merciless desert sun. Yet the Books were heavy. It wasn’t far now. Brother El’zaphan had been chosen go alone to Jobal al’Tarif, at night, and hide the thirteen books before the bishop’s men made a burnt offering of them to their jealous god. Thirteen books containing more then fifty manuscripts that the scribes had consigned to paper with such determination. 

He, El’zaphan, had helped to cover them with the very best leather. To help them last. Who knows for how long? “These are the secret words which the living Jesus spoke, and which the twin, Judas Thomas, wrote down.”(1) His parched lips moved in silence recalling the sacred stanzas. He did not really need the Holy Books anymore. He had committed them all to memory. Long ago. But what of those who will follow? It was only a question of time. 

Brother El’zaphan knew that ever since Bishop Irenaeus of Lyons had written his hateful dissertations some 200 years ago, calling for “The Destruction and Overthrow of Falsely So-called Knowledge,”(2) it would only be a question of time before the Orthodox Church, the fundamentalists, would lay their hands on his beloved Books and have them burnt as heresy. 

Ireneaus and his cohorts served a very jealous god. Soon the Manuscripts would be safe. Safely hidden among the caves of the dead. The Books of Life, Logos, among the silent corpses. Even the orthodox priests and deacons were afraid to enter the hollows of the departed. The wandering spirits would protect the sacred stanzas from the ungodly. For as long as it took. Until people were ready. Give not that which is holy unto the dogs, neither cast ye your pearls before swine, lest they trample them under their feet, and turn again and rend you.

(3) FOOTNOTES: (1). Gospel of Thomas, gleaned from The Gnostic Gospels by Elaine Pagels, thereafter referred to as TGG. (2). Irenaeus, Libros Quinque Adversus Haereses 3.11.9. Gleaned from TGG. (3). Matthew  7:6; [The Holy Bible, King James Version] Jobal al’Tarif near Nag’ Hammadi 1945 A.D. 

Many years have passed since brother El’zaphan risked his life on that lonely mission across the desert sands. Perhaps he was lucky. He had managed to avoid the needle of the deadly scorpion, the prying eyes of the Bishop’s men and even the bandits who were ever ready to pounce on anyone within reach of that dreaded mountain, the Jobal al’Tarif. Even in his day some had dared to rob the graves of the departed. Perhaps brother El’zaphan had been lucky, perhaps under a Special protection. 

Some 1580 years later, Muhammad ‘Ali’s mallet struck a tall earthenware jar. Quite by accident. “Gold!” he exclaimed.  Then, after glancing at his brothers, he bit his lips. He would have to share his find with them. In the name of Allah! Is there no justice in this world? His mallet struck the jar first, he must get the lion’s share of the riches. But there was no gold. There were just some books, wrapped in old-looking leather. But no gold. Perhaps he could sell them for a few piasters. If not, his mother could burn them in her cooking stove. And his mother did burn some of the loose sheets. But only some. 

The rest must have been well protected. Just like brother El’zaphan. It took another twenty-seven years before the first volume of photographic edition was released for publication. Nine more volumes were to emerge over the next five years. 

In 1977 the first complete, English language edition was published in the United States. Perhaps it was meant to be that way? 

We have now reached a stage in the history of the world when the whole of the human race as a body, or at least a large majority of people of every kind and of every race, are ready for the Second Coming of the Christ.... it is beginning to happen.... (it) is taking place now in the hearts of hundreds of thousands of people. 

(1) “If you bring forth what is within you, what you bring forth will save you. If you do not bring forth what is within you, what you do not bring forth will destroy you” 

(2) It would seem that the time is ripe for the next step in the development of the human psyche, or as the Bible prefers to call it, the human soul. 

About fifteen years ago, I came across some books written by the late Emmet Fox. I read them avidly. Later, I spent a good many years trying to find out if anyone had taken up the work, which Emmet Fox had began. I could find no one. I began looking for a dictionary that would explain to me the symbolism, which, according to Emmet Fox, served to conceal or rather to protect the mysteries of Truth and Wisdom, perhaps from those who might want to destroy them as heresy. 

The experience of Nag Hammadi had proven that whoever had chosen to leave over 3000 words of the King James Version of the Bible untranslated, must have done so for a good reason. I have not the slightest doubt, that if orthodox religions had the key to Biblical Symbolism, all the volumes would have been destroyed long ago as heresy. Or altered beyond recognition. Orthodoxy demands conformity and obedience and doctrinal conformity defines the orthodox faith. Effulgent diversity defines Divine creation. 

The two are at odds. I have no degree in theology nor a doctorate in Divinity, though I had been offered the latter title, for $10 U.S. by post, when I visited Florida in 1982. I also lay no claims to divine revelations, though I believe that we all serve as channels through which the Divine reveals Itself to us. I do claim to have read a number of books and done some considerable research which, I hope, will serve the reader to look beyond the letter of the law and recognize the spirit thereof. 

I offer no more than a few brief examples of the manner in which the Dictionary of Biblical Symbolism can be used, or applied to the original Biblical text. The examples are to serve as illustrations of how symbolism can be applied to unravel the allegories, and to increase our understanding of the original authors’ intent. In my opinion the Dictionary works. Whether it will work for all the Books of the Bible, I have no idea. If not, I hope the readers will contribute additional information, which will augment and complement the work I have done to date. 

I firmly believe that anyone who lays claim to possessing the final key to the total wisdom hidden in the Bible is both presumptuous and absurd. After all, those who will venture on this exciting journey of discovery should bear in mind that the Bible (Gk. biblos, a book) had been written by and for ancient people, living mostly in the Orient, under very different conditions and needs to ours and, perhaps most of all, for people who could neither read nor write. 

The Books had been written in the ancient languages of Hebrew and Greek, the first of which did not even make use of vowels, as we know them, and the second of which few of the present day Greeks can understand. 

Furthermore, the Truth, or the deeper sense that the authors intended to convey, is hidden behind symbol, while the allegories are typical of their time, their customs and their spiritual needs. 

It has been said that Truth is One for all time. I have no intention to dispute this thesis but, if so, than I am sure that it must be constantly rediscovered. I

t is my contention, however, that there is Secret Knowledge in the biblical writings. Furthermore and in spite of innumerable difficulties, the Truth seems to flow in great abundance to him, or her, who takes the trouble to look beyond the obvious. 

All too often the principle problem seems to lay not in the translation or the etymological origin of the word per se, but rather in our inability to rise above the belief in our own limitations to cope with such problems. But most of all, we seem to refuse to let go of our established mindset, our preconceived ideas.   

Of one thing I am certain. Should we put as much effort into the pursuit of Truth, biblical or otherwise, as we do into almost any other facet of our day to day existence, we would advance on the scale of spiritual evolution at the same pace as we presently advance in physics, or chemistry, or medicine, or any branch of pure or applied sciences. 

Principal Rules Governing Biblical Symbolism There are very few such rules. 1. All the names of geographical locations, cities, towns, deserts, even houses, dwellings and tents symbolize conditions in which a soul may find itself at the particular moment when the story is being recounted. The names therefore refer to different states of consciousness the soul or psyche may enter on its path towards Self-Realization. 

2. The personal names of the biblical characters, including their titles: mean something. There are over 3000 proper names (of places, tribes or individuals) in the Bible which have been left untranslated. Why? To protect the Truth? Possibly. In the Bible the name always  describes or symbolizes the nature or the principle traits of character of the person so named. 

3. The Bible appears to assume that every person on earth is an Individualization of the Infinite Consciousness. As such we all must define and express a different aspect of the One Truth. “We are all children of God”.(3) Therefore, as there are no two identical blades of grass, it would be absurd to assume all souls are identical. We must postulate that each of us take charge of our own spiritual growth and find our own interpretation of those parts of the Bible, which are necessary for our individual development. 

4. It is of absolutely no consequence whether the events or places described in the Bible have a “real” i.e. physical background or a recognizable geographical location. Whether or not they are historically valid is of absolutely no consequence. Spirit knows neither place nor time. The interpretation of biblical symbolism and allegory neither denies nor confirms the “physical” meaning contained therein. 

5. Often a number of actual or apparently divergent or even contradictory meanings are given for the same word. One of the reasons for such apparent confusion is that, according to the English translation, the same Hebrew word is used to name a mountain, a city, a man or a group of people. The student must decide if and when to apply any of the meanings suggested. [In my research, I also found instances where more than one Hebrew spelling is given for the same English translation]. The countless scholars responsible for the superb body of knowledge comprising the bibliography which often inspired, and equally as often confirmed my own years of study attest to a proven scholarship and erudition far greater than any to which I, or anyone alone, could aspire. Yet those diverse sources, more often than not, disagree on the precise translation of any particular word. In fact, on occasion, the sources provide either more than one possible meaning, or offer an answer with a question mark. And these gentlemen are acknowledged experts in the field! 

Why such subterfuge? The Bible has been written essentially in two languages; the Old Testament in Hebrew, and the New Testament in ancient or classical Greek. Greek is a relatively easy puzzle to resolve, but Hebrew? To find the meaning of the Hebrew words the scholars had to reach back to etymological roots of over a dozen ancient languages. In my studies I came across references to: Akkadian, Arabic, Aramaic, Assyrian, Avestan, Babylonian, Egyptian, Ethiopic, Greek, Hebrew, Masoteric Text, Old Persian, Sanskrit, Syriac, Ugaritic... I am sure the list goes on. And even then, before the scholars could reach out to the etymological roots of comparative sounds, they had to decide on the Hebrew letters or phonetics. And that could not have been easy. The prophets may well have been divinely inspired, but the scribes were eminently human. Consider, for instance, that the Hebrew letters “y” and “w” (often transliterated as “i” and “u”) are so similar in appearance and in the manuscripts are virtually indistinguishable. 

But my work is not intended to baffle a curious reader. If the scholars could not agree on the ‘correct’ translation of any particular proper name, I decided to offer both, or three, or four of their best efforts. Whatever I accumulated over the years. After all, whatever the translation, the Dictionary is intended to inspire the readers to discover spiritual truth, not to impress them with the etymological roots of unpronounceable words. The Dictionary does not necessarily offer the meanings but rather the ideas that the words, sites, places or people symbolize. I repeat that I am not in the least concerned with the geographical location of a city called Bethel, but with the symbol the word represents. The translation of the word Bethel is: house of God, but the symbol behind the meaning refers to a state of raised consciousness. Furthermore, I do not mean to imply that all the “names” must invariably carry a “hidden” meaning. More often than not, the translation itself provides the key to the spiritual intent of the inspired writer. 

Finally, a word about the methods which many biblical scribes have used to protect their ancient revelations. For some reason there are people who imagine that although Jesus taught using, almost exclusively, the form of a parable or allegory, this teaching method was not known to the people of the Old Testament. These present-day adherents to orthodoxy [a somewhat questionable title derived from orthos: correct, and doxa: opinion] choose to retain their belief in spite of abundant references to the allegorical method of teaching in both the New and the Old Books of the Testament (see below). The Hebrews were always steeped in tradition, probably more so than any other race in the world. We can rest confident in the knowledge that if we cannot detect an allegory in the traditional Hebrew writings, than there is an excellent chance that we cannot, as yet, understand the true meaning of the scriptural teachings. 

Let us at least try! In the Old Testament there are no less then nineteen references to the use of parable as a tool for teaching. We find those references widely spread in the Books of Numbers, Job, Psalms, Proverbs, Ezekiel, Micah and Habakkuk.(4) But even this abundant proof is greatly surpassed in the New Testament. Here we find no less then forty-four references to the parable (Gk. parabole) in the gospels of Matthew, Mark and Luke.(5) The gospel of John avoids reference to the word as such, but not to the teaching method itself. Thus if we had any doubt that allegory or parable are the normal teaching methods employed in most if not all of the Bible, then surely, such doubts must now be totally dispelled. 

What remains now is to recognize the parables as such, then to interpret them. Judging by the literary output of the orthodox religions over the last one or two thousand years, no one will do it for us. A question begs to be asked: 

Should the whole Bible be translated into a modern day language? I most sincerely hope not!  To lose the flow of the inspired poetry, the lyrical beauty of David’s Psalms, the sheer enchantment of so many stories told in the most vibrant allegories... to lose the thrill of great expectation... to lose all that—only to convert this compendium of mystery and vision into a dry, impersonal, long-winded, religious mystification would be a crime. And after all, let us not forget what Jesus said some two millennia ago, when his disciples had asked him why he spoke in parables. His response: “Because it is given unto you to know the mysteries of the kingdom of heaven, but to them it is not given.” (6) Why? Perhaps only a few were ready—then. Before we plunge headlong into the new adventure, it is important that we all agree and attach the same meaning to the words: symbol, allegory and parable. Noah Webster defines them as follows: (7) symbol, n. [Fr. symbole; L. symbolum; Gk. symbolon, a token, pledge, a sign by which one infers a thing, from symballein, to throw together, compare; syn., together, and ballein, to throw.]   (further Webster definitions follow...) allegory, n. [L. allegoria; Gk. allegoria, description of one thing under the image of another; from allos, other and agoreuein, to speak in the assembly; agora, a place of assembly.] 1. a story in which people, things and happenings have another meaning, as in a fable or parable: allegories are used for teaching or explaining. 2. the presentation of ideas by means of such stories; symbolical narration or description. (other examples follow... ) parable, n. [O.Fr. parabole, from Latin parabola, from Gk. parabole from paraballein, to throw beside, to compare; para, beside, and ballein  to throw.] 1. a short, simple story from which a moral lesson may be drawn; it is usually an allegory. 2. an obscure or enigmatic saying. The King James Version of the Holy Bible defines a parable as a religious allegory.(8) Having established the semantics, let us briefly consider the broader meaning of a ‘symbol’. Is not every word a symbol? Is not a symbol that which invokes a certain image in our mind? If so, then the best I can hope to do is it to offer to you an “up-to-date” symbol with which you are conversant for one with which you might be less familiar. On the other hand, the symbols employed in the Bible are of a universal nature, as though ingrained deep in the human psyche. We respond to them at a subliminal level, without conscious awareness. Or, as Carl Jung would have it: “a word or an image is symbolic when it implies something more that its obvious and immediate meaning.” And later he qualifies: “As the mind explores the symbol, it is led to ideas that lie beyond the grasp of reason.”(9) The ideas are not ‘unreasonable’, they go beyond reason, or as a student of the Bible could say, into the realm of the unconscious—onto the threshold of spirit. This is the principle reason why every person (who is interested in self-knowledge) must engage in their own interpretation of the Bible, as the unconscious is a personal, subjective, individual property of every man, woman and child. Joseph Campbell issues a second warning. He asserts that: “Symbols are only the vehicles of communication; they must not be mistaken for the final term, the tenor, of their reference.”(10) I choose to assume that Mr. Campbell refers to the communication between our conscious and unconscious mind. Perhaps even with our spirit, our Higher Self. Today, the desert wind blowing from Nag Hammadi promises to raise the veil of mystery it has held for a duration. The powers of orthodoxy no longer wield the authority to burn a heretic [from Gk. haireticos: able to choose] at the stake, nor even to effectively threaten with fire and brimstone the soul which is ready to embark on the glorious path of self-discovery. Yet now, even as two millennia ago, we shall find that we all must make a very special effort. For the real veil hiding the Truth is neither in the desert sands, nor in the allegory nor symbol. It is drawn across our own eyes. Perhaps, if we try just a little harder, if we muster just a little more courage, if we have just a little more faith in the Silent Voice whispering in our soul, the mysteries of the Kingdom shall be given to us. As always, there is no free ride. I offer you the best key to the Pearly Gates I could find. The rest is up to you. We have entered the age of Aquarius. The symbol of the age is a man watering his garden. His own garden. The garden of his own consciousness. Good luck. FOOTNOTES: (1). Diagrams for Living by Emmet Fox, (2). Eleine Pagels, The Gnostic Gospels. From the Introduction pg. xiii [Gospel of Thomas logion 70] Another translation: Jesus said: If you bring forth that within yourselves, that which you have will save you. If you do not have that within yourselves, that which you do not have within you will kill you. [The Gospel According to Thomas, Publ. Leiden E.J. Brill] (3). Galatians  3:26; (4). The actual examples are provided in the Analytical Concordance to the Bible, [ACB] on pg. 730 (5). Matthew 13:11 (6). pg. 98 of the CONCORDANCE;  HB. (7). WEBSTER'S New Twentieth Century Dictionary Unabridged, Second Edition, (8). Matthew13:11

Kapuscinski's Dictionary is approximately 230 pages based upon his research, as well, as the use of the Bible itself and other sources, including as above, Webster's Dictionary. I have made no real use of this book; however, I can attest to its intent, based upon his opening. He provides exactly what the reader needs to know as to whether he wishes to take on the monumental task, which for me, and even Stan, may be too late in our lives...

On the other hand, I think Stan, especially, and I, as even more recently, have opened our hearts, our mind to the reality of being "ONE" with God... May we always strive to move forward to the future of what He, Himself, has in store for each one of us. And may we be open to all that the possibility means to us, to America, to the Earth and to the Universe...

God Bless Us All,

May We Find Each Day 

     How to move Forward...

GABixlerReviews

Note I was able to use 2 different colors for the second book because I planned to do so...The first one would have required an ability to introduce color as needed. At present this is not functioning. I have reported the change, seeking support.

What's Happening at Book Readers Heaven - Celebrating Women's Day, March 8th, Spotlighting Women's Issues at Forbes 30/50 Summit! And, The State of the Nation Address!

What a Wonderful Way to Celebrate my Own Birthday! I went to bed excited to have listened to  President Biden's State of the Union Address to America! Are you not as excited as I am? Well, what this President has in store for his vision of his next term will be celebrated by all women! Don't you think?

Obviously Women's Health Issues were spotlighted, as women affected by the chaos that has occurred since the overthrow of Roe under the previous republican president, who actually brags about it... Women, doctors and fathers are angry that once again the government wants to be a third member in every bedroom in America... stopping parents from making their own plans for their families. Biden will ensure that the will of the majority of Americans want to have Choice related to these personal issues is ensured. I've already stated my opinion. The government should NOT be involved in this matter, except as needed for providing access to basic medical support to our women...to our families!

And then, this morning, I listened as discussions occurred on MSNBC, as one of the moderators at the Forbes 30/50 Summit, Mika Brzezinski, discussed what was happening at this year's event! I don't remember any time in my life that I wasn't interested in supporting women in one way or another. One of the issues I thought of--which was spotlighted in Biden's plans--was about our teachers. My second-grade teacher was my neighbor during my early years. Her husband was a dentist. My Mom worked for the family, taking care of an elderly parent... That dentist provided all dental care for Mom's four children!

Later, when I started working, in Personnel of West Virginia University, I was involved in creating the permanent employee records, including for financial benefits. I knew salaries and I knew that the level paid to our teachers in public schools and at the lower level of instructors at the university level were very low--given the fact that these were the people who were teaching us to move upward in life! Now, it is wonderful to know that the president plans to increase the salaries for teachers in public schools!

And so much more! Listen to all that he said last night and provided above. 

My heading for this post, before all of the above, was "Are You As Frustrated As I Am?" Now, I can't even remember what I was going to write about... Our President is working for the best for America! He's now answered all the questions that many have had, clearly providing his position on each issue.

I am being led to books that respond to all the
questions we might have, including about immigration which I'm now reading and will tell you about soon...

And finally, I'm finding more and more Christian leaders who are differentiating between being a Christian, a believer in Jesus, and that of those who speak of christian nationism, which is a group who are definitely not of Our Heavenly Father... Please believe that I had the following two videos on my "Watch Later..." list. These are the two videos that He led me to watch today and share! Note that the man talking says that he is an atheist. I have no problem with that, because I agree with what they are talking about. Something has happened and those of us who see it clearly in America, are concerned! America welcomes all beliefs, even those who doubt...

I have found a group who speaks Jesus as I know him... Below is the beginning of a longer essay. I encourage you to move next if the beginning interests you as it did me... In my opinion, it speaks to the republican party's move for retribution, violence and hate as led by the past president... Please do your research and vote, I believe, for the man who wants to support America's citizens as Jesus would...

God Bless

Gabby 

He will come again in glory to judge the living and the dead,

And his kingdom will have no end.

There we have it.  Christ is judge.  And with that bit of information, there are countless people both inside and outside of the church who walk away.  Why insist that Christ is judge?  And why – of all things – feature it in a Creed that occupies so few lines?

Doesn’t this just prove that Christianity is for judgmental and cruel prudes?  Doesn’t it prove that God is really out to get us?  Doesn’t it prove that – for all the church has to say about love – that it is all just smokescreen and window dressing for condemning people to hell and sending a handful of people to heaven?

At first blush, it certainly sounds like it, especially if you have never looked evil straight in the eye.  Especially, if you have never seen the unspeakable horrors it inflicts.  Especially, if you have never watched your future be destroyed.  But what if we get in touch with just how far we can sink?

Let me offer you an example.  Recently, I’ve been listening to Ken Burns’s new documentary on the United States and the Holocaust.  Burns, who confesses his own deep love of America, notes that in exploring this subject, he was troubled to learn that our history as a country is anything but straightforward and laudable.

Contrary to the popular storyline that describes the GIs as the first Americans to discover the horrors of Nazi concentration camps, most Americans already knew that Jews were being exterminated in horrific numbers.  They knew it from radio reports, newsreels and newspapers.  Newspapers alone, for example, published over 3000 articles on the persecution of Jews during the first 100 days of Nazi rule in 1939.  And, to be fair, many Americans were alarmed by the news and took to the streets.

Continue Reading...

Bruce Hoffman and Jacob Ware Presents God, Guns, and Sedition: Far-Right Terrorism in America - Part 2

 

I highlighted quite a bit of the preface by the two authors about writing this book... I want to start by sharing those highlights:

We began work on this book a month into the global COVID lockdown in April 2020. It was a dark, dangerous, and uncertain time. Conspiracy theories that had already gained widespread currency throughout the preceding years were now rampant across the internet and social media. The vilification of Jews, Asians, persons of color, and immigrants, among others, was reaching unprecedented levels. And I (Bruce Hoffman) had recently been the target of a serious hate crime. It was time to return to my analytical roots. Violent, far-right extremism was the first “account” I worked on as a young terrorism and counterterrorism analyst when I joined the RAND Corporation’s Security and Subnational Conflict Research Program in 1981. Everyone else in the program had already taken one of the more prominent left-wing and ethnonationalist and separatist terrorists active at the time, so I decided to focus on a threat that was receiving less attention. This resulted in my first professional publication and a series of additional reports and scholarly articles on the threat posed by neo-Nazi and neofascist groups in Europe.1 Shortly afterward, however, my research shifted to focus on a similar trend then unfolding in the United States. By the middle of the 1980s, the U.S. Department of Energy had become increasingly concerned about the rise of violent, far-right extremism and violence in this country. Because many of its nuclear-weapon research, production, and storage facilities were located in states where this activity was increasing, the department asked RAND to conduct a detailed threat assessment. Between 1986 and 1995 I led a number of research projects and was the author or coauthor of several reports and articles addressing the danger of far-right terrorism in the United States. One of these reports, published in 1988 and cited in this book, identified these terrorists as the most likely to perpetrate a major, future mass-casualty attack in the United States. And another, published just weeks before the 1995 bombing of a federal office building in Oklahoma City that killed 168 people, again underscored the continuing threat from violent, far-right extremists in this country and offered policy recommendations on how to address it. The historical pattern and potential for future violence from far-right terrorism in the United States also featured prominently in the first edition of my book Inside Terrorism, published in 1998. But then the September 11, 2001, terrorist attacks occurred. And, like most other terrorism analysts, my attention was diverted to al-Qaeda and then ISIS as well as their various affiliates and branches. Meanwhile, a succession of terrorist incidents in Oslo and Utøya, Norway, in 2011; in Charleston, South Carolina, in 2015; in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, in 2018; and in Christchurch, New Zealand, Poway, California, and El Paso, Texas in 2019 clearly showed that the same sanguinary ideology and hateful mindset that had fueled far-right violence during the closing decades of the twentieth century had neither disappeared nor abated. I thus approached my friend and colleague at the Council on Foreign Relations, Jacob Ware, and proposed that we together write this book. The plot by a Michigan militia cell to kidnap and execute Democratic governor Gretchen Whitmer uncovered in October 2020 and the January 6, 2021, insurrection at the U.S. Capitol infused our work with greater urgency.  I was sixteen years old on the day a bloodthirsty white supremacist murdered dozens of children at an island summer camp near Oslo in Norway—an incident covered in these pages.--Hoffman

I was sixteen years old on the day a bloodthirsty white supremacist murdered dozens of children at an island summer camp near Oslo in Norway—an incident covered in these pages. As a citizen of a neighboring country who shared both an age and idealism with those murdered, the shooting shook me to the very core. This incident—coupled with my younger sister’s brush with jihadist terrorism during a school trip to Toulouse in France and my own experiences as one of the school-shooting generation’s earliest graduates—drove my desire to join the fight to make the world a safer and happier place and to rid our nation of the cancerous hate by which it has too often been defined. My early counterterrorism research, in graduate school at Georgetown University, focused on more youthful networks, often composed of men and boys who had grown up in the same era I had. Like Bruce, my first report, published some thirty-seven years later with the International Centre for Counter-Terrorism in The Hague, studied the far right, providing a threat assessment of the Atomwaffen Division, a neo-Nazi group whose members were responsible for several murders in the United States. By the time 2019 arrived and the trajectory of the violent far right covered in this book reached an urgent stage with outbursts of violence at Christchurch, Poway, El Paso, and beyond, I was offered the opportunity to work under the legendary Bruce Hoffman—with this book project beginning shortly thereafter. --Ware

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I had several false starts in writing this review... Like one of the video leaders for the Council, I found it both elucidating...and terrifying... Even more terrifying since I knew that the book was written by two researchers who were working with a think-tank type of organization (See Part 1 for full information). To me that meant that they were probably both totally dedicated as well as brilliant. Indeed the overall work on this book is outstanding and, in this way, even further reinforces the great concern for our nation!

President Biden first started talking about fighting for the soul of the nation. Indeed, he has stated that he chose to run for the presidency because of what he was seeing about those who are working against our democracy... Although I have read and already reviewed a number of nonfiction books which supported this belief, I found this book the most comprehensive, primarily because statistics and results of significant research has been included. Let's start with what I found to be the most terrifying:

In July 1983 the thirty-year-old Mathews was a rising star in the white power movement. He had both impressed Butler and was sufficiently integrated into the Aryan Nations family to have had the Christian Identity pastor baptize his adopted son. Mathews had also distinguished himself as the most proactive member of Butler’s personal security detail at an Aryan Nations rally held in Spokane, Washington, a month earlier. The muscular, boyish-looking Mathews was not tall, but he had a commanding presence and magnetic personality. He was “enormously charismatic,” one contemporary observer noted, and thus was well situated in the wake of Kahl’s killing to translate the movement’s hate-filled and seditious rhetoric into concrete action. Mathews was particularly moved by the exhortations of one speaker at the 1983 gathering—Louis Beam, the Aryan Nations’ “ambassador at large” and a former Grand Dragon of the Texas Ku Klux Klan. With the exception of Pierce, perhaps no one has had as great an influence on the modern white power movement as Beam. A decorated U.S. Army veteran who had served an extended eighteen-month tour as a helicopter door gunner in Vietnam, Beam had grown up in a segregated company town on Texas’s gulf coast. He was apparently already a committed racist while still in elementary school. Classmates recall Beam boasting in the fourth grade about being a member of the Ku Klux Klan and attempting to recruit them. Beam returned from Vietnam in 1968 disgruntled and disillusioned. He railed against flag-burning antiwar protestors and blamed the “communists” in the U.S. government for restraining the military in Vietnam and thus selling out him and his fellow warriors in an unwinnable war. He promptly joined the local chapter of the Ku Klux Klan. Years later, Beam would blame “Post Viet Nam Stress Syndrome” for his anger toward the government. “There is no relief, and can be none,” he ranted in one treatise. We are forever trapped in the rice paddies and skies of Vietnam. We can neither go back or go forward, but are suspended for eternity in the place that they put us.… I wonder if stress can be defined as wanting to machine gun all the people who sent us over there, along with the ones who spit on us when we returned. Or, is perhaps stress something more simple like crying out for justice in the name of the mangled dead, and not being heard? Or is stress more of a mathematical function, like trying to figure out how much blood 57,673 bodies can hold? In 1971 Beam was charged with the bombings of a progressive radio station and the Houston office of the Socialist Workers Party but escaped imprisonment. Thereafter, he organized a series of paramilitary training courses in Texas designed “to turn Klansmen into soldiers.” Beam ran at least four such facilities. At “Camp Puller,” a fifty-acre tract of swampland reminiscent of Vietnam’s rice paddies, both teenagers and children—some reportedly as young as eight years old—received instruction in “strangulation, decapitation using a machete, hijacking airplanes, and firing

 

automatic weapons.” As Beam ascended through the Klan ranks from Grand Titan to Grand Dragon, he also created two elite, special operations–type units for his fellow Klansmen—the Texas Emergency Reserve and anti-immigrant Klan Border Watch. Beam also organized Klan recruitment drives at Fort Hood in Killeen, Texas, and rallies featuring David Duke, the smooth-talking Louisiana-based founder and leader of the Knights of the Ku Klux Klan. Duke represented a new kind of hatemonger. He wore a suit and tie, came across as educated and articulate, and claimed that he was not against blacks as much as he was an advocate for the rights of white Christians. This would prove to be a harbinger of a wider trend reflected in today’s alt-right, for example, the polo shirts and chinos worn by neo-Nazis at the 2017 Charlottesville demonstrations and other protests. Beam was again arrested in 1979 after trying to gain entrance to the Houston hotel where Vice Premier Deng Xiaoping of China was staying. He hoped to murder Deng and thereby avenge “the 100,000 GI’s” who perished because of the support China had provided to North Vietnam during the war. As the state’s preeminent Klan leader, Beam attracted widespread attention in February 1981 for his role in the Texas chapter’s sustained harassment of Vietnamese fishermen working the gulf waters off Galveston. Within months, however, a combination of a federal court ruling specifically prohibiting such activities along with Beam’s conviction on misdemeanor charges of conducting paramilitary exercises on federal land without a permit prompted him to resign as Grand Dragon and head to Idaho—supposedly on vacation. Two months later, Beam and his family were still there—living at the Aryan Nations’ Hayden Lake compound. His arrival had attracted the attention of the local FBI office in Coeur d’Alene, who would soon have him under surveillance. In 1982, Butler appointed Beam the Aryan Nations’ “ambassador at large.” This new role suited the energetic former Klansman well, and soon Aryan Nations chapters had been established in Colorado, Florida, Missouri, Tennessee, and Texas. Beam claims to have opened a business in Hayden Lake selling survival and camping gear and spent most of his time drinking coffee and changing his infant daughter’s diapers. In fact, his time spent in Idaho would have a lasting effect not only on future white power violence but on the trajectory of modern terrorism. Beam’s lasting contribution was to rescue from obscurity the concept of clandestine, underground warfare known as “leaderless resistance.” Writing in a 1983 issue of the Inter-Klan Newsletter and Survival Alert, which he coedited, Beam explained the principles of an approach to warfare that a World War II veteran of the Office of Strategic Services (OSS)—a forerunner of the CIA—named Colonel Ulius Louis “Pete” Amoss had developed. Exasperated by the Soviet bloc’s ability to penetrate and neutralize traditional, hierarchically organized partisan units and other resistance forces, the wartime spy and inveterate cold warrior concluded that “we do not need ‘leaders’; we need leading ideas. These ideas would produce leaders. The masses would produce them and the ideas would be their inspiration. Therefore, we must create these ideas and convey them to the restless people concerned with them.” This was music to Beam’s ears. He and his fellow white power leaders were continually frustrated by the ability of government informants and undercover agents to penetrate their movement. This concept, the Aryan Nations’ newly appointed ambassador-at-large now enthused, “is that any one cell can be infiltrated, exposed and destroyed, but this will have no effect on the others.… The efficient and effective operation of a cell system … of course, is dependent upon central direction which means impressive organization, [and] funding from the top.” Beam identified only one significant hurdle. “At first glance, such a type of organization seems unrealistic, because the natural question is, how are the cells to cooperate with each other, when there is not intercommunication or central direction?” By the time of the Aryan Nations Congress just weeks later, he would have a solution to that challenge, too. Gordon Kahl’s fate loomed large as the attendees gathered in Hayden Lake. In a stirring panegyric by Beam, the North Dakota farmer was hailed as a modern-day William Travis and Davy Crockett—akin to these brave warriors who had made the ultimate sacrifice in the fight against tyranny at the Alamo. Beam also glowingly described Kahl’s imagined ascent to heaven, complete with a Viking honor guard “standing at the gate to Valhalla—arms outstretched in salute.” Addressing the congress, Beam was just as blunt and unequivocal. “WE ARE AT WAR,” he declared. An attendee would later recall that Beam’s words brought tears to Mathews’s eyes. “I’m here to tell you that if we can’t have this country,” Beam continued, “as far as I’m concerned no one gets it. The guns are cocked, the bullets are in the chamber.… We’re going to fight and live or we’re going to die soon. If you don’t help me kill the bastards, you’re going to be required to beg for your child’s life, and the answer will be no.” In addition to the workshops, seminars, and plenary events, a small group of thirteen white power leaders and movement elders, along with their impatient youthful counterparts, met privately in Butler’s living room—surrounded by heavily armed guards. As Ellison later told Noble, the gathering agreed that it was “time for action.” The battle plan that emerged reflected both Beam’s leaderless resistance strategy and his proposal to utilize emerging computer networking technology to ensure the security of the movement’s internal communications and support the revolution that they had agreed to commence. Leaderless resistance fused with computerized bulletin board systems (BBSes) brought the movement unparalleled advantages of both real-time and clandestine connectivity—effectively concealing it from the prying eyes and attentive ears of federal authorities. It is difficult to appreciate just how singularly profound this development was. Typewriters were still a ubiquitous feature of offices everywhere, and facsimile transmission (fax) machines had only recently entered the workplace. Desktop computers were both mostly unknown and expensive to acquire. At the time, these primitive machines, with their limited memory and slow processing capabilities, were far from the must-have household item they would eventually become. An Apple IIe starter system with 64k memory, for instance, cost $1,260 in 1983—about $3,315 today. And modems (modulator-demodulators) to transmit BBS data over conventional telephone lines had only become affordable and hence somewhat accessible some two years earlier. The “Aryan Nations Liberty Net” that Beam created was therefore truly revolutionary and arguably marked the beginning of terrorist exploitation of digital communications for radicalization, recruitment, fundraising, the exchange of best practices, and the planning and execution of operations. In an era before the World Wide Web, much less the internet, and with primitive dial-up rather than wi-fi and broadband, Beam’s system ran on Apple network software, was text only, and used 300 baud dial-up modems over ordinary telephone lines to transmit information. The rate of transmission of data was described as “well below reading speed.” It took Beam nearly a year of work before his Aryan Nations Liberty Net was finally up and running. As he had intimated in his article on leaderless resistance, Beam announced this new development in the spring 1984 issue of the Inter-Klan Newsletter & Survival Alert. “It may very well be that American know-how has provided the technology which will allow those who love this country to save it from an ill deserved fate,” he gushed. Computers, once solely the domain and possession of governments and large corporations, are now bringing their power and capabilities to the average American.… It has been said that knowledge is power, which it most assuredly is. The computer offers, to those who become proficient in its use, power undreamed of by the rulers of the past.… Imagine, if you can, a single computer to which all leaders and strategists of the patriotic movement are connected. Imagine further that any patriot in the country is able to tap into this computer at will in order to reap the benefit of all accumulative knowledge and wisdom of the leaders. “Someday,” you may say? How about today? Such a computer is already in existence and operation. We hereby announce Aryan Nation Liberty Net. Dial 208-772-6134, listen to the computer talk. The article, titled “COMPUTERS AND THE AMERICAN PATRIOT,” also imparted helpful buyers’ advice and detailed log-on instructions. Beam provided a phone number and post office box for those who had additional questions. “At last, those who love God and their Race and strive to serve their Nation will be utilizing some of the advanced technology available heretofore only to those in the ZOG (Zionist Occupation Government) government [sic] and others who have sought the destruction of the Aryan people,” he promised. Sponsored by the Aryan Nations, the Aryan Nations Liberty Net served five key purposes. First, it sought to tap into a new demographic and build a broader white supremacist constituency by appealing to young computer “hackers”—a newly popularized term at the time. Second, it sought to obviate restrictions on the mailing of hate literature to Canada and European countries like West Germany. Third, it identified like-minded “patriotic groups” across the country to encourage and facilitate greater networking. Fourth, it was an innovative fundraising mechanism. “The Aryan Nations computer network is designed to bring truth and knowledge to our people on the North-American continent,” Butler explained in one such appeal for donations. “You may ask ‘why the computer . . technology?’ The answer is simple, because it is our Aryan technology just as is the printing press, radio, airplane, auto, etc., etc. We must use our own God-given technology in calling our race back to our Father’s Organic Law.” Finally, it was an inexpensive, quick, and easy way to spread the movement’s propaganda unhindered by government interference, intrusion, or monitoring. The site contained some repackaged material that had originally appeared in print along with files with titles like “Know Your Enemy,” which contained the addresses and telephone numbers of all the ADL offices in the United States, as well as those of the branches of the U.S. Communist Party and, even more menacingly, lists of the names of “race traitors” and “ZOG informers.” In perhaps the first warning about far-right exploitation of new online technologies, the ADL in 1985 cautioned that the networks were “[seeking] to spread their hate propaganda among young people, surely the most vulnerable to its influence.” The report also drew a direct link to violence. “More troubling,” the report noted, “the use of new technology to link together hate group activists coincides with an escalation of serious talk among some of them about the necessity of committing acts of terror.” As previously recounted, Beam’s call to battle at the 1983 congress had deeply resonated with Mathews. The former Klansman had been unequivocal. Violence was imperative if the white race was to save itself. Mathews departed Hayden Lake infused with a newfound sense of mission and purpose. Beam’s powerful words in addition to everything else Mathews had heard at the gathering and likely at the private meeting in Butler’s living room had convinced him, according to the journalist Stephen Singular,

that “it would be the young men who commenced the battle and won the war.” Mathews had in fact already reached this conclusion. Everything that he heard and saw during that visit to the Aryan Nations compound had only hardened his resolve. Earlier that year, for instance, Mathews had formed a new organization that he called the White American Bastion. Mathews recruited friends and acquaintances from the northern Idaho white supremacist milieu and with two companions had spent the summer building the group’s headquarters and a living quarters on his farm. In Mathews’s “Last Letter,” written over a year later, he explained the logic animating his decision to wage a terrorist campaign to overthrow the U.S. government. “I have no choice,” Mathews had declared. “I must stand up like a White man and do battle. A secret war has been developing for the last year between the regime in Washington and an ever growing number of White people who are determined to regain what our forefathers discovered, explored, conquered, settled, built and died for.” In September 1983, Mathews addressed the National Alliance’s annual conference in Washington, DC. His membership in and recruitment efforts on behalf of multiple white supremacist organizations was hardly atypical of the movement either then or now. As the journalist Peter Lake, who successfully infiltrated these groups, later explained, “It’s like the difference between the Army, Navy, and Marines—they all salute the same flag.” Indeed, unbeknownst to the conferees listening, Mathews’s message presaged the violent trajectory he was about to embark upon. “My brothers and sisters,” he began, from the mist-shrouded forested valleys and mountains of the Pacific Northwest I bring you a message of solidarity, a call to action, and a demand for adherence to duty as members of a vanguard of an Aryan resurgence and ultimately total Aryan victory. The signs of awakening are sprouting up across the Northwest, and no more than among the two-fisted farmers and ranchers.… The task is not going to be easy. TV satellite dishes are springing up like poisonous mushrooms across

the domain of the tillers of the soil. The electronic Jew is slithering into the living rooms of even the most remote farms and ranches. The race-destroying dogs are everywhere. In Metaline Falls, we have broken the chains of Jewish thought.… The future is now! So stand up like men and drive the enemy to the sea! Stand up like men and swear a sacred oath upon the green graves of our sires that you will reclaim what our forefathers discovered, explored, conquered, settled, built, and died for! Stand up like men and reclaim our soil! Look toward the stars and proclaim our destiny! In Metaline Falls we have a saying: Defeat, never! Victory forever! Three weeks later, nine men styling themselves as “Aryan Warriors” joined hands in a circle around a white baby girl meant to symbolize the Aryan race and its future. In appropriately reverential voices they pledged fealty to the white supremacist revolution proclaimed by Mathews. “I, as a free Aryan man, hereby swear an unrelenting oath,” they affirmed, upon the green graves of our sires, upon the children in the wombs of our wives, upon the throne of God almighty, sacred is his name, to join together in holy union with those brothers in this circle and to declare forthright that from this moment on, I have no fear of death, no fear of foe; that I have a sacred duty to do whatever is necessary to deliver our people from the Jew and to bring total victory to the Aryan race.

The FBI agent in charge of the Coeur d’Alene office, whose attention they soon attracted, found nothing particularly noteworthy about the group. They were people “much like your next door neighbor,” Wayne F. Manis observed. Indeed, the youngest person around the circle, Richard Kemp, age twenty, had been a star player on his Salinas, California, high school basketball team. Andrew Barnhill was a twenty-seven-year-old former seminarian who had joined and then left the CSA before ending up dealing poker in a Montana casino. Bruce Pierce (no relation to William), at age twenty-nine, was an impetuous drifter from Kentucky who had settled in Montana and discovered Identity theology only the previous year. An invitation to visit the Aryan Nations compound in March 1983 had sufficiently impressed him that he moved his family to Hayden Lake. Two months later, Pierce was among the bodyguards surrounding Butler at the same Spokane rally where Mathews had distinguished himself. Pierce decided then and there that Mathews was the leader that the white power movement had always been waiting for. Although the prematurely balding thirty-two-year-old Randy Duey looked like a “meek accountant,” he was a U.S. Air Force veteran who had studied history at Eastern Washington University, just across the Idaho state border. Duey had befriended Denver Parmenter, another mature student and a fellow veteran. Age thirty-one, Parmenter had served three years in the U.S. Army and was washing dishes and mopping floors to make ends meet when Duey introduced him to Mathews. Richard Scutari arguably had the most diverse career of the men who gathered that day at Mathews’s farm. In his mid-thirties, Scutari had been a U.S. Navy diver where he supposedly gained experience “with explosives training and [became an] instructor in hand-to-hand combat as well as assault rifle and combat pistol shooting.” Scutari then worked as a deep-sea diver in the North Sea oil fields, owned a construction company for a time, and became expert in several different martial arts. Through his friendship with Barnhill, Scutari had done some work for the CSA’s Jim Ellison and then had flown to Spokane from his home in Florida to meet Mathews and check out this new group. David Lane, age forty-three, was the eldest. An amateur golf champion who hailed from Aurora, Colorado, Lane had made a name for himself in white power circles as the state organizer for David Duke’s Knights of the Ku Klux Klan and later for the Aryan Nations. He was also an accomplished propagandist, having helped turn the innocuously titled Primrose and Cattlemen’s Gazette into a platform for his violently anti-semitic rants. Lane is also renowned as the author of the popular white supremacist credo known as the “14 Words,” which proclaims the following mission for white supremacists everywhere: “We must secure the existence of our people and a future for White children.” It is frequently cited in contemporary white power memes, publications, and communications simply as “14.” The only person in the circle who had done time was a twenty-seven-year old from Arizona named Gary Lee Yarbrough. While AWOL from the U.S. Marines, Yarbrough was arrested for burglary and sentenced to a five-to-eight-year prison term at the Arizona State Penitentiary in Florence. It was there that he first read about the Aryan Nations and imbibed its literature. Yarbrough headed for Idaho upon his release and found work on Butler’s personal security detail and in the print shop producing hate literature. Although their ages and backgrounds varied, these men were united by the belief of an America gone wrong. Although, unlike Beam, they had not fought in Vietnam, they were patriots who were profoundly disillusioned with a government that had sent its young citizens overseas to fight a needlessly prolonged and increasingly pointless war. Their view, like Beam’s, was that spineless politicians had restrained the military and squandered an opportunity to stop the spread of communism. As white men in a demographically changing United States, they also felt alienated by a population that was becoming increasingly more diverse. They were especially opposed to affirmative action efforts and other such compensatory programs and themselves felt economically ignored or disadvantaged. “As adults, they came to view America as a land beset with dark forces of chaos in the forms of immigration, drugs, crime, and Ronald Reagan’s ‘trickle down’ economy,” the criminologist Mark Hamm explains. The Equal Rights Amendment, passed by the U.S. Congress in 1972, which would have constitutionally guaranteed legal gender equality for women and men had it been ratified by the requisite number of states, was also vehemently opposed by this movement. Feminism was regarded as emasculation and thus became a key dimension of white supremacism’s simultaneous advocacy that relegated women back to narrow, historically gendered roles as cook, cleaner, and mother. Accordingly, Hamm notes, “Masculinity and whiteness became entwined as never before—to be a ‘real’ white man was to be hyper-masculine. In this way, paramilitary mythology became the path to redemption.” Having sworn unremitting allegiance to the “sacred duty to do whatever is necessary” to ensure the triumph of the Aryan race, the eight men listened as Mathews outlined his plan. It was drawn entirely from The Turner Diaries. Although at that moment these men referred to themselves simply as “the Group” or “the Company,” they would soon adopt the name “the Order”—in homage to Pierce’s fictional creation. They also sometimes called themselves the Brüder Schweigen (German for the “Silent Brotherhood”). The book had in fact become Mathews’s “bible,” according to both Thomas Martinez, a later recruit and subsequent FBI informant, and Wayne Manis, the veteran FBI agent who had arrived in Coeur d’Alene that November to oversee the bureau’s investigation of this regional hub of white supremacist activism. That a novel should provide the “blueprint” for the real-life Order’s terrorist campaign underscores how unprepared the group was for so monumental a task as triggering an uprising that would overthrow

 

the U.S. government. “Many of Bob’s followers were in a state of shock to suddenly come to grips with the fact that they were about to leave their mundane day-to-day existence as law-abiding citizens and embark on a career of crime with the goal of overthrowing the United States government,” Manis marveled. “Clearly, this would entail taking up arms and killing people who were the object of their aggression and hatred.” But however fantastical the Order’s grandiose ambitions may have been, their fervent belief in the efficacy of violence to achieve them was completely serious. This would not be the last time that The Turner Diaries would fulfill the dual role of template and inspiration for violent insurrection. Accordingly, what the Order lacked in operational skills and experience was simply to be adopted from The Turner Diaries and grafted onto their six-step strategy. First was organizing themselves to prosecute this revolution. The next steps of amassing a “war chest”—and then resorting to armed robbery, if necessary—had been identified two months earlier in Butler’s living room. Robert Miles had persuasively argued that to have any chance of success, such a venture would require ample funds. A Grand Dragon of a Michigan KKK chapter, “Pastor Bob” was a well-respected elder statesman of the white supremacist movement. He had the bona fides and gravitas that a six-year prison stint for conspiring to bomb school buses in defiance of court-ordered school desegregation efforts inevitably bestows on the self-styled community of “Aryan Warriors” in which racists like Miles circulated. Like many of its other leading figures, Miles cloaked himself in clerical authority—presiding over the Mountain Church of Jesus Christ the Savior that he founded on his seventy-acre farm in rural Cohoctah, Michigan. It was in essence a Midwestern version of Butler’s Church of Jesus Christ Christian, performing a similar convening and coordinating function. The ADL described the church’s ethos as “violence, white supremacy, antisemitism, and racism, as

 

well as hostility to the federal government.” At Butler’s house that July, Miles had cited the success that left-wing terrorists in the Black Liberation Army along with remnants of the rebranded Weather Underground, now calling themselves the May 19th Communist Organization, had two years before in robbing a Brinks armored car of $1.6 million in Nyack, New York. “If we were half the men the leftists were,” the fifty-eight-year-old cleric had observed, “we’d be hitting armored cars, too.” Hence, Mathews and his band concluded the best way to build the “war chest” they required was through armed robbery. The fourth step was to recruit more members; fifth was to commence operations with the assassination of the movement’s most insidious enemies; and the sixth step would culminate in the “armed guerrilla operations” by a dedicated band of clandestine warriors depicted in The Turner Diaries. Less than fifteen months later, however, Mathews was dead. Twenty-four of his followers would soon be arrested. They were indicted on sixty-seven racketeering and conspiracy counts, and all but one was convicted. Of these, ten received prison sentences of between twenty years and life. None of the Order’s grand schemes to jumpstart their terrorist campaign with the assassinations of well-known Jewish persons such as former secretary of state Henry Kissinger; Elie de Rothschild, scion of the famous international banking family; and the renowned television producer Norman Lear; or gentiles like the prominent New York banker David Rockefeller or the civil rights advocate Morris Dees, the cofounder and chief trial counsel of the Southern Poverty Law Center, ever came to fruition. Instead, on June 18, 1984, the Order’s gunmen murdered Alan Berg, a controversial Denver radio talk show host, who was Jewish and had incurred the group’s wrath because of his combative on-air interviews of various white power advocates. Although no one was ever specifically convicted of Berg’s murder, David Lane and Bruce Pierce initially received prison sentences of forty and one hundred years, respectively, in one trial and an additional 150 years on other charges. Lane had been one of the enraged persons who would call in during Berg’s broadcasts. Even the group’s initial effort to acquire operational funds fell flat. The robbery of a Spokane video and pornography store netted only $369,177 and an exploding dye pack concealed in a bundle of cash Mathews had just stolen from a Seattle bank had blown up in his face and either ruined or permanently stained the bank notes. But by heeding Miles’s advice and focusing their attention on armored cars, the Order’s fundraising efforts grew more successful. Three such heists enabled Mathews and his band to accumulate over $4 million in cash.179 The single largest haul of $3.6 million came from the combined ambush and armed robbery of a Brinks armored car near Ukiah, California, in July 1984.180 After the seven gunmen each pocketed $40,000 themselves as combined salary and bonus,181 Mathews proceeded to distribute a portion of the loot to some of the white power movement’s leading personages. Dan Gayman, the pastor of the Church of Israel, outside Schell City, Missouri, and an exponent of the “two seed” theory, was given $10,000; Butler and the Aryan Nations received at least $40,000; William Pierce was reportedly gifted $50,000; Frazier Glenn Miller Jr., the founder and leader of the North Carolina–based White Patriot Party, got $200,000; and $300,000 was reputedly channeled to Californian Tom Metzger for his White Aryan Resistance group, with the same amount going to Miles for his Michigan parish. Even so, the bulk of the stolen cash was neither ever recovered nor fully accounted for. As much as two-thirds of it seems to have disappeared. As of 1997, for instance, the FBI had traced only $600,000 of the Ukiah haul. Mathews and other Order members appear to have variously spent, doled out, stashed, or laundered the rest of their haul into legitimate business ventures. Two government informants, for instance, maintain that Mathews gave a Denver lawyer at least $1 million and perhaps as much as $2 million to invest on behalf of the movement. An additional 10 percent of the stolen cash was supposedly donated to the Aryan Nations—in addition to the sum given to Butler after the Ukiah robbery. One of Mathews’s other followers claimed to have dug up $100,000 that had been secretly buried on a farm in the Pacific Northwest and to have handed it to Beam. And Mathews reputedly opened a surrogate mother program and sperm bank in Portland, Oregon, to promote the propagation of the Aryan race. It was the group’s counterfeiting scheme, however, that arguably led to its demise. Less than two months after the oath-taking ceremony, Bruce Pierce was arrested in Union Gap, Washington, trying to pass the group’s amateurishly produced initial run of $50 banknotes. Although he jumped bail and disappeared, the FBI now had Pierce firmly in their sights. A weapon inadvertently left behind by Mathews during the Ukiah armored car robbery that had been legally purchased by Andrew Barnhill in Montana provided another key lead. By September, more than a hundred FBI agents were deployed against the Order. Nearly half that number was assigned to the hitherto tiny Coeur d’Alene office, with some forty agents actively watching the last known residences of Mathews, Parmenter, and Yarbrough, among others. The following month, Yarbrough spotted a U.S. Forest Service vehicle on the backwoods dirt road leading to his house. Guessing correctly that it was the FBI in disguise, he opened fire on the truck, stopping the agents in their tracks. Although Yarbrough managed to flee, the search of his house netted important evidence. By this point, all the Order’s key personnel were on the run. In hopes of escaping the FBI dragnet closing in on them, Mathews, Yarbrough, Scutari, and Frank DeSilva, a recent recruit, fled to Oregon.190 Then, in November 1984, Thomas Martinez, whom Mathews had recruited to the group, was arrested in Philadelphia passing a phony banknote. He agreed to become an FBI informant and soon after flew west to meet with Mathews in Portland.191 The FBI raided the motel they were staying in on November 24, 1984. Mathews and Yarbrough tried to shoot their way out. Although Mathews escaped, Yarbrough was arrested. But the net around Mathews was tightening. In a desperate act of defiance, Mathews fired one last rhetorical salvo at the government that was relentlessly closing in. As Alan Berg’s biographer Stephen Singular observed of the document, “Earl Turner would have been proud.” The Order’s formal “Declaration of War,” dated November 25, 1984, attacked immigration from the Southern Hemisphere as well as legalized abortion. It decried capitalists and communists as well as bankers and Jews. Kahl’s heroism was lauded and the “Government agents” that “shot him in the back” decried. In words reminiscent of much contemporary discourse, Mathews proclaimed: We will resign ourselves no more to be ruled by a government based on mobocracy. We, from this day forward declare that we no longer consider the regime in Washington to be a valid and lawful representative of all Aryans who refuse to submit to the coercion and subtle tyranny placed upon us by Tel Aviv and their lackeys in Washington. We recognize that the mass of our people have been put into a lobotomized, lethargic state of blind obedience and we will not take party anymore in collective racial suicide! A similarly verbose “Open Letter to the U.S. Congress” was appended. It blamed the country’s elected representatives “for what has happened to America” and vowed ominously to hold each one responsible. Although neither Mathews nor Pierce nor Scutari nor Duey nor any of the three other signatories had ever served in Vietnam, they still pledged that they would exact revenge for the “betrayal of the 55,000 Americans who were sacrificed.” The “anti-American ‘Israel Lobby’ ” was castigated for its steady erosion of the Second Amendment. Fascinatingly, common cause was made with “our Arab friends,” whom the U.S. government was blamed for having turned “into enemies.” After citing the Vietnam War again, the letter concluded with an ominous warning. “When the Day comes, we will not ask whether you swung to the right or whether you swung to the left; we will simply swing you by the neck.… With these things said, let the battle begin.” It was over less than two weeks later. At 4:00 AM on December 7, about a hundred FBI agents converged on a two-story wood chalet on Whidbey Island—a vacation area at the mouth of Puget Sound in Washington State. The Seattle field office had received a tip that Mathews was hiding there. He had a 9mm Uzi submachine gun, thousands of rounds of ammunition, and a gas mask. An FBI negotiator tried to talk Mathews into surrendering. “I have been a good soldier, a fearless warrior,” the Order leader responded. “I will die with honor and join my brothers in Valhalla.” As the siege dragged on, the following afternoon the FBI resorted to tear gas, hoping to force Mathews out of the dwelling. More than 250 canisters were fired into its upper floor, where Mathews had taken refuge, with no result. An FBI SWAT team preceded by blindingly loud flash-bang grenades gained access to the ground floor but was met with a hail of machine-gun fire and forced to retreat. As darkness fell, the FBI summoned a helicopter to illuminate the scene—which attracted more gunfire from Mathews as he attempted to shoot it down. An illumination flare was then fired into the chalet’s ground floor in hopes of lighting the way for a more successful SWAT assault. The wood-frame house caught fire and was rapidly engulfed in flames. Mathews refused to leave and perished—just as he had promised. As Noble observed, “The right-wing now had its second significant martyr.”

~~~

I've told this short story before, but I want to share it again, today. I was born in 1945. When I was old enough to begin asking questions, I asked my widowed mother my nationality. She quickly said American and I could tell that was the end of the conversation. Both of my parents were of German descent. Perhaps it was too close to the past war that my mother chose not to tell me I was of German descent. After reading this book, I can honestly say that I have never before felt so much an American, a believer in our Constitution, and its being a melting pot for those who value freedom... Further, I believe in Jesus as my Savior and do not support the present use by some who claim their hate and violence are guided by their beliefs... as Christians...

We’re storming the Capitol, it’s a revolution! —Elizabeth from Knoxville, Tennessee

In the summer of 2020, the messaging across far-right American internet forums was jubilant. The one-two punch of the novel coronavirus pandemic, coupled with widespread protests and nationwide unrest triggered by the murder of another unarmed African American by police, had laid the country low. Yet in this moment of collective despair, America’s racists, bigots, antisemites, white supremacists, and anti-government extremists reveled in the newfound opportunities that had emerged throughout that year. Now was the time, their hateful posts on Telegram channels and seditious summons on Facebook proclaimed, to act decisively and bring the United States to its knees. On Facebook that April, President Donald Trump’s tweets to “liberate” various states from their governors’ COVID stay-at-home orders and defend Second Amendment rights had galvanized exponents of the “boogaloo”—the mass insurrection-initiated civil war meant to overthrow the U.S. government. “Yo the president is boog posting,” exclaimed one typical message. Until Facebook removed these friend groups and their posts from the platform at the end of June 2020, its author was among over 72,000 members of such Facebook groups devoted to “boogaloo.” Using other colloquialisms, such as “big igloo” and “big luau,” or referring to themselves as “boojahideen,” they explained how “We the people need to stand up to what’s right and revolt. We CAN NOT allow our freedoms to be stopped or silenced. Organize and get off our ASSES and let’s take back AMERICA!!” Another announced, “This Has Been A Long Time Coming: Stand-By For Instruction,” while a third showed a photograph of a loaded assault rifle with the message “I heard there was gonna be a Big Luau. Thought I’d dress appropriately.”

The book begins, rightly so, in my opinion, with the call for coming to the Capitol on January 6th. It is clear to most Americans who saw the devastation that it undoubtedly had been planned ahead and was incited by the past president of the United States. Many of those insurrectionists have already been placed in jail. The search continues for all of those involved. The authors then move backward, stopping to point out the attempt to kidnap Gretchen Whitmer, the governor of Michigan. Following with historical references on those who support White Supremacy going back to 1980. At that time, a call for acceleration of their goals was made!

It clearly stated that only the overthrow of the government (and its people) could allow for a new white-dominated country--and a new order...

And that would require, of course, GUNS. Preferably those assault guns that could kill many at one time. Thus, America watched as more and more guns were sold. Watched while the republican representatives would never vote for some type of pull-back on guns. In fact, those who were/are involved indicated that when they started seriously talking about taking away guns, that was the time to act... We have seen attacks on Black and Jewish house of worship, the murder of Black men, in particular, through questionable actions by law officers, and, heightened with the death of George Floyd. The move by the past president to ban Muslims as soon as he took office...and more...

The movement into local church resulted in local community havens turning “into a violent, paramilitary, right-wing, white supremacist group.” The change was prompted by a self-proclaimed divine vision Ellison had of the Lord visiting retribution upon America’s cities because of the depravity and licentiousness that had “reached heights beyond that of the Tower of Babel.” In his retelling of the vision, Ellison claimed that “the only hope for America … is for Christians to leave the cities and organized churches..." Was that the beginning when the Evangelical Church hierarchy also began supporting Trump?

Did you know that there had been a law against military-type guns in 1994? We have learned that both Trump and Pence spoke at NRA conventions... And, certainly, we've known that the republicans have continued to prevent any gun laws reducing the numbers of guns... Slogans have been created to reinforce the ownership of guns: "Fear the Government That Fears Your Gun." Or, “A Man with a Gun Is a citizen, A Man Without a Gun Is a Subject.” Surely, we now know that the republican party in office right now are supporters of those who care nothing about murdering Americans... And, that the initiation of this need for guns is through those who look toward the overthrow of our government...

The thing is that even while all of this is happening, these individuals continue to lie about January 6th being a "peaceful protest." While vowing that "next time... Unfortunately, only one option remains when we return. We bring guns and take the Capitol building without intention of being peaceful. This ends with the government bombing their own people. I had hopes it wouldn’t. But here we are.”

Have you learned enough yet? Do you now understand why our President worries about Losing the Soul of the Nation?" If you haven't read enough from Part 1 and 2, I highly recommend you get this book and, hopefully, finally realize that there is a major divide within our country... And the other side from those who respect our Constitution and all of our citizens... are those White Supremacists who claim that God gave them America and they want to kill all of us who disagree and start over...

God Help Us Be Strong To Fight For America, Land of the Free... Land Where Democracy Survives Only By All Americans Working With And Not Against The Constitutional Laws Of The United States! The following conclusions are:

The United States today thus requires a comprehensive, wide-ranging, institutionalized strategy to effectively counter these threats—including measures to strengthen American civil society as well as those that specifically target violent extremist groups, their activists and supporters, their propagandists and sympathizers, and their recruiters and financiers. The policy recommendations that emerge from this examination and exegesis of the far-right terrorist threat in the United States fit into three categories: short-term measures to create a stronger regulatory framework, with relatively immediate effects; medium-term measures to strengthen civil society, with impacts over the next five to ten years; and, long-term measures to build national unity, which will break the cycle of recruitment and regeneration that has sustained this movement across multiple decades and therefore build resilience that will benefit future generations and inoculate them against the allure of extremist ideologies. All these efforts need to commence immediately and not unfold sequentially. They should be undertaken without delay but with the expectation that, while some can have more immediate effects, others will take years, if not decades, to achieve the desired impact. This range of measures, it should be emphasized, is applicable to both extremes of the political spectrum—left as well as right—and include, as the preeminent goal, restoring the integrity of and respect for the American political system. To implement this admittedly optimistic but nonetheless crucial goal, a series of equally critical additional steps is required, such as enacting legislation designed to address all manifestations of extremist violence, whether from the right or the left or any other section, and effectively counter the ideological and social appeal of extremism and conspiracy theories more generally.

By taking decisive action today, the United States can begin to make meaningful inroads against these highly corrosive and insidious threats to our democratic values and ensure the safety and security of our fellow citizens in a more secure and inclusive environment than currently exists.

Note: Selection of Relevant Videos by GABixler