Victor Orban doppelgängers tread the sidewalks, take the bus, greet diners and volunteer at the shelter. And why wouldn’t they? Chicago has the second largest Eastern European residents in the U.S. If you live in Manhattan, you must see sixty two year-old, jowled-faced, grey-haired Orban lookalikes all the time. Of course, I hardly knew his face before he lost it in the recent Hungarian election.
For a few days Victor Orban appeared on every loopy screen in hotel bars, hamburger joints, doctor’s waiting rooms-everywhere I went. Orban touted his government as an illiberal democracy, one devoid of woke freedoms, gay rights, women’s rights, minority rights and protections for immigrants. Others described it as a kleptocracy, a mafia state. The Heritage Foundation fashioned their destruction of democracy after Orbanism and called it Project 2025, the Trump Administration’s roadmap. Orban’s loss was so monumental that freedom fighters the world over rejoiced.
Donald Trump’s role model as a loser created a shift toward a glowing hope in the world while cornering an animal in the Oval Office. More and more credentialed people started speculating that our President is sick, demented, mentally ill. MAGA podcasters turned on him. White Christian Nationalists turned on him. Republican talking heads turned on him. And he’s gotten crazier. Reports suggest he was kept out of the Situation Room while the high-stakes military operation in Iran to extract the downed pilots was underway.
Wall Street Journal, April 18: Aides kept the president out of the room as they got minute-by-minute updates because they believed his impatience wouldn’t be helpful, instead updating him at meaningful moments, a senior administration official said.
The entire month of April, Trump has been so weird. Orban’s loss is his loss. His ignorance of war strategy in Iran humiliates him. Bumbling diplomatic efforts in Western Europe, the Middle East and China belittle his leadership. Elites talk about his failures. He’s a hot table of delight for late night comedy. His reaction to getting backed in the corner is to post an array of crazy, from an AI photo of himself as Jesus to yelling about wiping out a whole civilization.
From sea to shining sea, Christian pastors are condemning Trump’s Jesus and his spiritual advisor Paula White for comparing him to Jesus at a White House event. Other preachers pride themselves on keeping politics out of the pulpit. But Trump and Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth, who lays Jesus on every military helmet, have brought the pulpit to politics. MAGA Christians like Paula White preach Trump has a divine mandate to rule. Divine.
If Trump were our relative we’d be huddled at the kitchen table scheming on how to take the car keys away. The last thing we’d do is rejoice over all the bad things happening to him as a result of his damaging behavior. Nor would we be kneeling down to say “God will take care of us” as he lit the house on fire.
But we can’t take away the keys. Or the matches.
God help us.
Regan Burke 
Some of the best humanitarians that I, as a big fan of Christ’s miracles and fundamental message, have met or heard about were/are atheists or agnostics who, quite ironically, would make better examples of many of Christ’s teachings/practices than too many ‘Christians’. Conversely, some of the worst human(e) beings I’ve met or heard about are the most devout believers/preachers of fundamental Biblical theology.
Too many institutional monotheists create their Creator’s nature in their own fallible and often angry, vengeful image. Seriously, if the Divine is as vengefully angry, even blood-thirsty, as He is generally portrayed, is anyone — including supposed ardent followers or conservative believers — truly safe or really ‘saved’? It could be theorized He’d be especially peeved by those self-professed Godly believers that He had (likely rightfully) deemed as fake or frauds.
In the case of institutional Christianity, Jesus, as God incarnate, was about non-violence, genuine compassion, love, charity and non-wealth. His teachings and practices epitomize so much of the primary component of socialism — do not hoard gratuitous wealth in the midst of great poverty. Yet, they are not practiced by a significant number of ‘Christians’, likely including many who idolize callous politicians standing for very little or nothing Jesus taught and represents.
For one thing, the Biblical Jesus would not have rolled his eyes and sighed: ‘Oh, well. I’m against what the politician stands for, but what can you do when you dislike even more his political competition?’
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Thank you. I wish we were discussing this over morning coffee. I know active Jesus believers are wide and deep, but I’m in continual search for more contact, now that my church of 50 years has been highjacked by middle-of-the-road, ego-driven, status quo preaching with no regard for the moral-deficit dumpster we find ourselves in.
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Thank you, Regan. You nailed it, once again. Sharing with my Hungarian friend, Eva.
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Once again, you ‘nailed it’ Regan. Sharing with my Hungarian friend, Eva. Thanks & cheers to you, Judy
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As always, nicely done! Thanks for sharing Sent from my iPhone
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Love your take on this plus The Wall.Street Journal article. Thanks S
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Brilliant!!
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First, you are such a typical leftist sheep. Orban lost to another more conservative party. The new President is appointing Orban as the EU President, idiot.
Secondly, and most importantly, Trump is not bumbling anything in regards to Iran. He is liberating my people and 90 million Iranians are chanting his name. He will have statues of him in every Iranian city in the next decade. He is Iran’s savior and we CAN NOT WAIT UNTIL OUR KING, REZA PAHLAVI, returns to Iran. I’m sorry your funding for the trash animals known as Palestine and Hamas is ending. FROM THE RIVER TO THE SEA, ISRAEL IS ALL YOU’LL EVER SEE!
LONG LIVE IRAN! JAVID SHAH! PAYANDEH IRAN!
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Many ‘Christians’, notably Trump and Hegseth, likely even find inconvenient, if not plainly annoying, trying to reconcile the conspicuous inconsistency in the fundamental nature of the New Testament’s Jesus with the wrathful, vengeful and even jealous nature of the Old Testament’s God.
According to AI Overview: “[U.S. secretary of defense] Pete Hegseth is a Christian and has openly identified with an evangelical, ‘conservative’ brand of Christianity. As Secretary of Defense, he has made his faith a central part of his official duties, including leading prayer services at the Pentagon.”
America (and proportionally also Britain) is well on its way to being damned — never mind it somehow being God-blessed.
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You wrote this
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Great story.many fine ideas and images.
Hungary is a country I hope to visit next year .
A
Sent from my iPhone
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