Author Archives: Gordon C. Stewart

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About Gordon C. Stewart

I've always liked quiet. And, like most people, I've experienced the world's madness. "Be Still! Departure from Collective Madness" (Wipf and Stock Publishers, Jan. 2017) distills 47 years of experiencing stillness and madness as a campus minister and Presbyterian pastor (IL, WI, NY, OH, and MN), poverty criminal law firm executive director, and social commentator. Our cat Lady Barclay reminds me to calm down and be much more still than I would be without her.

The first best thing…

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We’ve been silent recently on Views from the Edge. The world doesn’t need one more blah-blah-blah pundit.

But when a candidate (we won’t use the name because the media are flooded with it, to his advantage) tells a crowd there would be “nothing you could do” to stop his opponent from stacking the Supreme Court with anti-gun justices, and follows with “although, the Second Amendment people,  maybe there is, I don’t know,” a memory seems worth sharing.

During a 2013 public dialogue (First Tuesday Dialogues in Chaska, MN) to discuss the Second Amendment in light of gun violence in America, a participant proudly cited a Facebook posting that “the second best thing that could happen to Obama would be for him to be impeached.”

The speaker continues, “And we all know what the first best thing would be….”

What was said the other day in North Carolina is not new. Mr. ____ blamed the media for the widespread criticism of his remark. “Give me a break!” he said.

Insinuations of assassinations never deserve a break. It didn’t deserve a break in 2013. t does not deserve a break in  2016. It’s not a joke. It’s not funny!

Enough said. Thanks for dropping by.

  • Gordon C. Stewart, Chaska, MN, August 11, 2016.

 

 

 

An Evening of Sin

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Steve recently published A Sin a Week: Fifty-two Sins Are Described Here in Loving Detail for Folks With the Inclination and Ability to Do Wrong, but Who Have Run Out of Bad Ideas. You can hear Steve’s renditions in an audio book available on Amazon.

This morning he posted this invitation on his CaringBridge page:

A Sin a Week: 52 sins described in loving detail…

Remember my book reading tonight, Thursday, August 11, 7-8 pm @ the Philo Presbyterian Church, 105 E. Jefferson, Philo, IL.

Crackers, cheese, coffee & wine with words about sin. A whole evening with sin.
Free & open to the public. Free parking.

Bring your copy to follow along & see the illustrations. The bookless can use loaners–or just listen happily….

NOTE from Gordon: Steve’s poetry and reflections on life, death, and dying are featured on Views from the Edge. Just enter his name in the search box and he’ll pop up!

 

The Answer to “Who said it?”

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All the quotations in “Who said it?” (yesterday’s post) are from Adolf Hitler. According to Ivana Trump, Donald Trump’s first wife, Trump kept a collection of Hitler’s speeches in a cabinet by his bedside.

The quotes we cited in “Who said it?” also could have come from the likes of Italian strong man Benito Mussolini:

  • “I want to make my own life a masterpiece.”
  • “I don’t like the look of him.” (referring to his ally, Hitler)
  • “Better to live a day as a lion than 100 years as a sheep.”
  • “We do not argue with those who disagree with us, we destroy them.”

Or the quotes could have come from Heinrich Himmler, head of the SS and second in command in the German Third Reich, who later declared in a “60-Minutes” interview with Lesley Stahl,

“I still lack to a considerable degree that naturally superior kind of manner that I would dearly like to possess.”

 

  • Gordon C. Stewart, Chaska, MN, August 2, 2016.

 

Who said it?

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These statements come the same source. Name that person.

“Money glitters, beauty sparkles, and intelligence shines.”

“To be a leader means to be able to move masses.”

“The broad masses of a population are more amenable to the appeal of rhetoric than to any other force.”

“A single blow must destroy the enemy… without regard of losses… a gigantic all-destroying blow.”

“I believe today that my conduct is in accordance with the will of the Almighty Creator”

“How fortunate for leaders that men do not think.”

“I use emotion for the many and reserve reason for the few.”

“Demoralize the enemy from within by surprise, terror, sabotage, assassination. This is the war of the future.

“The doom of a nation can be averted only by a storm of flowing passion, but only those who are passionate themselves can arouse passion in others.”

“Make the lie big, make it simple, keep saying it, and eventually they will believe it.”

“The art of leadership. . . consists in consolidating the attention of the people against a single adversary and taking care that nothing will split up that attention. . . .”

“Through clever and constant application of propaganda, people can be made to see paradise as hell, and also the other way round, to consider the most wretched sort of life as paradise.”

“The leader of genius must have the ability to make different opponents appear as if they belonged to one category.”

“If you tell a big enough lie and tell it frequently enough, it will be believed.”

“The victor will never be asked if he told the truth.”

“The greater the lie, the greater the chance that it will be believed.”

“There must be no majority decisions, but only responsible persons, and the word ‘council’ must be restored to its original meaning. Surely every man will have advisers by his side, but the decision will be made by one man.”

“All propaganda has to be popular and has to accommodate itself to the comprehension of the least intelligent of those whom it seeks to reach.”

“I do not see why man should not be just as cruel as nature.”

Use the Comment feature to make your guess and say why you chose that source. The answer will be posted in the next two days.

  • Gordon C. Stewart, Chaska, MN, August 1, 2016

 

Reviving the heart of our democracy

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William Barber said last night what I’ve waited to hear. He said it at the Democratic National Convention. Amen!

The turtle on the fence post: the rise of Donald Trump

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“If you see a turtle up on a fence post, you can be pretty sure it didn’t get up there by itself.” Someone(s) put it there. This VOX video explains the rise of Donald Trump related to the rise of authoritarianism in an unsettling time. “If you see a turtle….”

 

 

Verse – NRC

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I fear for her life
haters speak their hate
Handgun rifle knife
Semi-automatic fate

Nothing could be worse
Her Chief Commander
USA will fail
To the blacks she’ll pander

Supreme Court she’ll stack
Liberal lawyers pack
Constitution lack
All have empty gun rack

Use them while we can
Vitriol drives our plan
Sneers give us our cue
We know what to do

  • Steve Shoemaker, Urbana, IL, July 21, 2016

When Trump becomes an adjective

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Trump is getting Trumpier is the headline of David Brooks’s NYT editorial. Its reference to psychological discussion of the sources of Narcissism and examples of the candidate’s speeches increasingly spiraling out of control are worth the read . . . and cause for prayer.

  • Gordon C. Stewart, Chaska, MN, July 19, 2016

Trump: a conversation in France

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Donald trump hand

The proprietor of a small shop in a small medieval town in France engages the American visitor in friendly conversation. He asks what’s happening in the U.S. He wants to know whether Donald Trump really could be elected president.

He explains that he has a brother who’s a narcissist. “Every time I see that finger pointing on TV, I see my brother,” he says with a cringe. I share his cringe.

I later ask a psychotherapist about the hand – the strangely pointed finger with the circle made by the thumb and ring finger. Notice, he said, that the circle is closed. There’s no room for disagreement. The finger sends the same message.

Lesley Stahl’s “60 Minutes” interview in Mr. Trump’s apartment in Trump Tower last night was worth its weight in gold. One couldn’t help noticing that the chairs on which Lesley, Mr. Trump, and Mr. Pence sat were gold-plated.

Gordon C. Stewart, non-partisan observer, author of Presidential Disorders – A Voter’s Guide 😇, Chaska, MN, July 18.

 

Verse – White Folks

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White folks can be the shade they want,
not be the shade they’re born.
Tanning beds, beach vacations, cruises
Creams, and dyes, all for one damn race.
Pale faces can become bronze.
Pasty legs and arms be brown.

Only white folks show their blushes–
they have so much, they should blush more…

  • Steve Shoemaker, Urbana, IL, July 18, 2016