The real problem is, skilled propagandists mask that rhetoric and fool many, presenting themselves as righteous ambassadors for truth.
For years, Democratic leadership across the country has demonized Donald Trump. He has been declared “Hitler” and Joe Biden, to this moment, claims the former president is “dangerous to democracy.”
But here is something few are talking about: Dangerous rhetoric from evangelical leadership.
On Friday, July 12, Russell Moore (editor-in-chief of Christianity Today) published an article titled “Our Old Leaders Won’t Walk Away, and That’s About More Than Politics”:
“The rest of the country looks to a porn-star-chasing former reality television host who says he wants to terminate the Constitution and put his enemies through televised military tribunals – and the country just laughs and enjoys the show.”
Trump has never “chased” porn stars. And, Dr. Moore, please cite a reference that Trump ever said he “wants to terminate the Constitution”! This is exactly the language of top Democratic operatives. It’s wholly false.
Closet leftist Moore (right), formerly president of the Southern Baptist Convention’s Ethics & Religious Liberty Commission, has made a second career out of Trump hate. That set the two on a path of antagonism rarely seen between religious and political leaders. (See related article from AFN)
While there are mountains of evidence that Moore is left-leaning, at least, I want to focus on his animus toward Trump.
According to Relevant magazine, Moore is always “advocating for human dignity, religious freedom for everyone, kindness and civility in the public square, racial reconciliation and justice, and the fight against the scourge of church sexual abuse.”
Kindness and civility in the public square? Moore detests Trump and his supporters – and says so often and loudly. In 2015, he weighed-in on foreign policy:
“Donald Trump is at it again. This time, the Republican presidential front-runner suggested that the United States close the border to all Muslims - including Muslim Americans traveling abroad. Anyone who cares an iota about religious liberty should denounce this reckless, demagogic rhetoric.
“Enter the Man in the Trump Tower with a plan to ‘get tough’ by closing the borders to Muslims, all Muslims, simply because they are Muslim.”
In point of fact, Trump asked for a temporary ban on Muslims from six countries that are boiling pots of jihadist activity. Moore lied about Trump wanting to ban all Muslims.
From CNN Politics 2017, we see Moore’s venomous tongue:
“He called him [Trump] ‘an arrogant huckster’ and directed his Twitter followers to an essay warning that Trump was ‘what the Founding Fathers warned us about.’ Even before Trump’s campaign was rocked by the Access Hollywood tape depicting him bragging in stunningly vulgar terms about sexually assaulting women, Moore compared the GOP nominee’s views of women to that of a ‘Bronze Age warlord.
Moore called evangelical leaders that supported Trump a “scandal and a disgrace.”
More kindness and civility in the public square
Moore routinely uses Democrat talking points to push his propaganda:
“There is no evidence for the ‘stolen election’ claim, despite Trump’s numerous declarations to the contrary.”
No evidence? Is he serious? There is enormous evidence that the 2020 election was stolen. But that wouldn’t fit Moore’s narrative, including his insistence that an "insurrection" was launched by Trump in the last days of his presidency.
It is Moore’s rhetoric about Trump that creates conditions for assassination attempts.
Joseph Rossell, in this 2016 piece from a Juicy Ecumenism article, echoes Moore’s thoughts, along with friends Max Lucado, Mark Tooley, and Michael Cromartie:
“Should Trump wins [sic] the Republican nomination, some self-identified Evangelicals may consider casting their vote for him. Perhaps they think that he will defend their voice in the public square.
“But the opposite might very well be true. ‘The Donald’ could prove to be an even bigger bully if given more power. He may even attempt to silence Evangelicals across the board who dare criticize him through intimidation and legal conniving.”
Bully. Woman-hater. Demagogic. Racist. Fruit of the Spirit, anyone?
In the weeks leading up to the assassination attempt, Moore revved-up his rhetoric. From his perch at Christianity Today, he published on June 7 another anti-Trump screed:
“For the first time in history, a former (and possibly future) president of the United States is now a convicted felon. A jury found that Donald Trump falsified business records to cover up a hush money payment to a porn star, with whom he had an affair, in order to keep the story from hurting his 2016 presidential campaign. If only President Trump could have seen the reaction from many white evangelicals to his sexual crimes and misdemeanors, he could have saved some money.”
In that laundry list of Democrat dog whistles, Moore once again, mere weeks ahead of the assassination attempt, resurrected his hateful rhetoric toward Trump.
But Moore is nothing if not a political operative. The old Democrat knows that getting in front of a story is key to damage-control and further manipulation of a wide audience. Two days after taking more shots at Trump, he penned an essay in CT (“Trump’s Would-Be Assassin and the Twisted Quest for Human Glory”):
“This raised a weighty question about radicalization and what’s gone wrong in American democracy.”
Here is the Moore who sits above the fray he helped foment. If he believes what he wrote, his level of lack of self-awareness is astonishing.
His own dangerous rhetoric about the former president contributed to the political violence in this country, because he’s been used (willingly or otherwise) as a useful idiot by malevolent figures like Barack Obama. On July 14, Moore tweeted:
“Political violence is evil to the core and is an attack on everything this country represents. Attempted murder is an attack on the image of God. This is awful.”
A tell for haters is when they can’t say the name of their object of hatred. Moore here does not name Trump. His tweet could be a comment about November 22, 1963. To repeat: I believe he is being disingenuous.
Anti-Trump rhetoric almost got the former president killed on July 13. Issues are being raised by those who have eyes to see and ears to hear. As Theodore R. Malloch wrote recently:
“The entire narrative of the Democrat campaign against Trump, who is beating them, is that he is some kind of Hitler, a racist, and an authoritarian fascist dictator and must be stopped by any and all means necessary, or we will lose our democracy. It is this extreme language and irrational behavior that set the tone and the context for an attempted murder of Trump.”
Many in evangelical circles have noticed Moore’s dangerous speech. This was posted on X in the last few days:
“My hope is that @drmoore will in good faith reflexively begin a deep dive into alt-left rhetoric, likening a former president to a sub-human demon, and the knock on effects of potential violence it creates in relation to progressive evangelicals.”
Let’s hope more evangelicals recognize that and see Russell Moore for what he is: a left-wing political operative masquerading as an angel of light.
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