MIKE JOHNSON IS WORSE THAN WE THOUGHT

Speakler of the House Fundamentalist Mike Johnson believes that “man is inherently evil, and must be restrained to follow the word of God.”

That, ladies and gentlemen, is a Very. Big. Deal.

Johnson told Fox News’ Sean Hannity in an interview after he was elected speaker: “I am a Bible-believing Christian.”

Johnson has been a member of the board of Living Waters Publications, a Christian ministry and publishing house whose CEO Ray Comfort suggested getting “monkeypox” was “an inevitable and appropriate penalty” for being gay and that former President Barack Obama was rumored to be the Antichrist because of his “leanings toward Islam.”

Last year, Comfort narrated a Living Waters video, titled “Monkeypox and God: Is It a ‘Gay Disease’?” in which he quoted Biblical scripture, saying that those who engaged in homosexual acts would get “in their own bodies the inevitable and appropriate penalty for their wrongdoing.”

In a Living Waters article published last March, Comfort complained about the fact that Christians could no longer call homosexuality “morally wrong.” “There was a time in America when we could say these things without any real repercussions,” he noted.

A spokesperson for Johnson said Comfort’s statements are “not a reflection of [Johnson’s] views.”

“Speaker Johnson joined the board of Living Waters years ago in support of its mission of spreading Christian gospel. His involvement was limited to two phone calls with fellow board members annually. He had not seen the content in question, was not aware of it, and does not agree with it.” Comfort declined to comment.

Johnson’s association with the far-right organization could further tarnish him in the eyes of socially liberal and moderate voters.

Democrats could even end up using it in campaign ads.

Comfort wrote in a pamphlet titled “God and Sexuality”: “Perhaps you believe you are gay, or maybe you are sympathetic toward homosexuality and you think that what people do sexually is their own business. Whatever the case, I want to convince you that you are sitting in a car on a railroad track with a train coming, and you don’t know it.”

More recently, in an October article about his belief that the Israel-Hamas war could lead to the Antichrist being revealed, Comfort wrote that Obama was a potential Antichrist figure since he had “leanings toward Islam” and said that “many” Christians believe that King Charles was another possible Antichrist since he is “able to speak some Arabic.” Comfort also said other “candidates” to be the Antichrist could be Vladimir Putin and Donald Trump.

Living Waters has published a video “Pleading for Babies’ Lives at Abortion Mill,” featuring people trying to stop women from getting abortions, with the presenter badgering one woman entering a clinic by telling her: “You think you’re getting rid of a problem. You’re gonna cause yourself a problem for the rest of your life. You’ll never forget this day.”

In Johnson’s recent podcast interview with Comfort, Johnson said he was first introduced to Comfort over 20 years ago when someone gave him a cassette tape of Comfort’s sermon, “Hell’s Best Kept Secret.” “It was a game-changer for me, Ray and I’ve told you that many times over the years. I am such a big fan of your ministry and of you, and I cannot overstate what a profound influence you’ve been in my life and my walk with Christ and so many other people that I know and I’m just really grateful for all that you do and the team at Living Waters. It’s just one of the most outstanding ministries that I’ve ever known or been involved with and keep going brother. God is using you.”

Johnson became a director of Living Comfort in 2013, according to its 990 tax form from that year. Johnson first met Comfort when he represented him in a religious liberty case.

Johnson’s spokesperson said that given his new role as speaker, he will be reconsidering all of his outside obligations, including his service on the board of Living Waters.

Comfort, who is originally from New Zealand, founded Living Waters, which is based in California and in 2021 reported almost $7 million in net assets, according to its 990 tax form.

Comfort’s brand of white evangelical Christianity seems like a throwback to 20th century fundamentalism, with its preoccupation with combating atheism and denying evolution, and tactics like street preaching and proselytizing with the distribution of simplistic biblical tracts,” said Robert Jones, president and founder of PRRI, a nonpartisan organization that conducts research on religion and politics.

Johnson also wrote the foreword and publicly promoted a 2022 book that spread baseless and discredited conspiracy theories and used derogatory homophobic insults. Written by Scott McKay, a local Louisiana politics blogger, the book, “The Revivalist Manifesto,” gives credence to unfounded conspiracy theories often embraced by the far-right – including the “Pizzagate” hoax, which falsely claimed top Democratic officials were involved in a pedophile ring, among other conspiracies.

The book also propagates baseless and inaccurate claims, implying that Supreme Court Chief Justice John Roberts was subjected to blackmail and connected to the disgraced underage sex trafficker Jeffrey Epstein.

Other sections of the book defend podcaster Joe Rogan from racism charges after it was revealed he used the N-word, which Rogan later apologized for. The book also disparages poor voters as “unsophisticated and susceptible to government dependency” and easy to manipulate with “Black Lives Matter ‘defund the police’ pandering.”

Johnson wrote in his 300-word foreword: “Scott McKay presents a valuable and timely contribution with The Revivalist Manifesto because he has managed here to articulate well what millions of conscientious, freedom-loving Americans are sensing,”.

Johnson’s endorsement of the book extends beyond the foreword: In 2022, he actively promoted the book on his public social media platforms and even dedicated an episode of his podcast he co-hosts with his wife to hosting McKay.

During the podcast episode, Johnson expressed his belief in the book, stating, “I obviously believe in the product, or I wouldn’t have written the foreword. So I endorse the work.” He also referred to McKay as a “dear friend” and highlighted that the book “really could make some waves.” Over the years, Johnson had written opinion pieces for McKay’s blog, the Hayride, and engaged with the author on public platforms like Facebook.

Since he was elevated to the speakership in October, Johnson’s views from his time as a socially conservative attorney, state lawmaker and Louisiana congressman have come under increased scrutiny – particularly his views on homosexuality which he has called an “inherently unnatural” and “dangerous” lifestyle and even blamed it, in part, for the fall of the Roman Empire.

“The elevation of Mike Johnson to speaker of the House of Representatives, with the unanimous support of his Republican colleagues, demonstrates how his particular conservative expression of Christianity is now at the very center of the party — both he and his favored policies can no longer be viewed as fringe,” said Andrew Whitehead, an associate professor of sociology at Indiana University who specializes in Christian nationalism and religion in the U.S.

Before being elected to Congress in 2017, Johnson worked for the Alliance Defending Freedom, a powerful organization that has won more than a dozen cases at the Supreme Court. They include reversing Roe v. Wade, allowing a baker not to make a cake for a same-sex wedding, and letting employers exclude birth control from health insurance policies.

Johnson, who identifies as an archconservative, is the natural heir to the political tumult that began with the Tea Party before evolving into Trumpism. It is now embodied in its purest form by the Freedom Caucus, the uncompromising group of conservatives who have tied up the House with their demands for steep spending cuts. And the situation won’t get any easier when Congress returns from its Thanksgiving respite to confront its unsettled spending issues and what to do about assistance to Israel and Ukraine.

The ranks of more traditional Republicans have been significantly thinned after the far right turned on them in successive election cycles. They have been driven out of Congress in frustration or knocked out in primaries, which have become the decisive contests in the heavily gerrymandered House Republican districts.

“They thought they could control it,” Michael Podhorzer, the former political director of the A.F.L.-C.I.O. - who has studied the House’s far-right progression - said of G.O.P. leaders. “But once you agree essentially that Democrats are satanic, there is no room in the party for someone who says we need to compromise with Democrats to accomplish what we need to get done.”

The result, Mr. Podhorzer said, is a Republican majority that his research shows across various data points to be more extreme, more evangelical Christian and less experienced in governing than in the past. Those characteristics have been evident as House Republicans have spent much of the year in chaos. “It isn’t that they are really clever at how they crash the institution. They just don’t know how to drive.”

From the start, members who were more rooted in the traditional G.O.P., which had managed to win back the House majority in 1994 after 40 years, struggled to mesh with the Tea Party movement, which was driven to upend the status quo. Many top Republicans had voted for the bank bailout of 2008, a disqualifying capital crime in the eyes of the far-right activists.

Leading congressional Republicans were leery of the Tea Party’s thinly veiled racism, illustrated by insulting references to Mr. Obama and the questioning of his birthplace, though they said they saw the activists as mainly motivated by an anti-tax, anti-government fervor.

Traditional Republicans appeared at Tea Party rallies where they were barely tolerated, while the far-right Representatives Michele Bachmann of Minnesota and Steve King of Iowa, then outliers in the party, were the stars. They tried to mollify activists with tough talk on taxes and beating back the Obama agenda, but saw mixed results.

The Republican National Committee also sought to align itself with the Tea Party, encouraging angry voters to send virtual tea bags to Congress in a 2009 Tax Day protest. Tea Party activists rebuked the national party, saying it hadn’t earned the right to the tea bag message.

But the Tea Party paid huge electoral benefits to the House G.O.P. in 2010, as it swept out Democrats and swept in scores of relatively unknown far-right conservatives, some of whom would scorn their own leaders as much as the Democrats. The steady march to the modern House Republican Conference had begun.

In the Senate, the Tea Party was having a different effect. Far-right conservatives such as Sharron Angle in Nevada and Christine O’Donnell in Delaware managed to prevail in their primaries, only to lose in the general election. That cost Senate Republicans a chance to win a majority. The extreme right has had less influence in the Senate than the House ever since.

The ramifications of the far-right bargain for congressional Republicans quickly became clear. Mr. Cantor was defeated in 2014; John Boehner, dogged by hard-line conservatives he branded “knuckleheads,” resigned in 2015. In 2018, Speaker Paul D. Ryan, Boehner’s successor and the party’s vice-presidential nominee in 2012, had his fill of clashes with President Donald J. Trump and chose not to run for re-election.

Then Representative Kevin McCarthy the last of the “Young Guns,” with Mr. Cantor and Mr. Ryan, that once seemed to be the future of the party lost the speakership in October. That ended the reign of House Republican speakers who had tried unsuccessfully to weaponize the ultraconservatives in their ranks while holding them at arm’s length.

McCarthy’s ouster cleared the way for Johnson, who was chosen only after House Republicans rejected more established leaders, Representatives Steve Scalise of Louisiana and Tom Emmer of Minnesota, who would have easily ascended in the previous era.

Despite his unquestioned conservative bona fides, Johnson is already encountering difficulties in managing the most extreme element within his ranks.

Freedom Caucus members blocked a spending measure in protest of Mr. Johnson’s decision to team with Democrats to push through a stopgap funding bill to avert a government shutdown.

The move underscored the far-right’s antipathy to compromise and the dominance it now enjoys in the House, raising the prospect that Johnson could face another rebellion if he strays again.

Johnson is edging closer to the same sort of clash with conservatives that helped bring down his predecessor.

Johnson has antagonized conservatives most acutely by engaging in policy talks with fellow leaders, rather than pushing exclusively for base-pleasing wins that won’t survive in the Senate. That traditional approach won’t hurt Johnson with most of the House GOP but as McCarthy’s ouster made clear, it only takes a handful of fed-up members to make a speaker’s life difficult.

The new speaker showcased his willingness to stand up to conservatives, as well as its limits, during his visit to the Senate. He delivered two messages: that he would call up an extension of government funding through the end of the fiscal year if lawmakers can’t reach a deal, and that he wants to see much of the House’s conservative border bill as part of any potential Senate agreement to aid Ukraine.

Johnson’s stance on government funding isn’t quite new — House Republican leaders have indicated that they wouldn’t pursue more patches and have no interest in a shutdown at the start of an election year. And his hard line on border talks amounts to a major setback for the Senate’s bipartisan work. Still, the GOP frustration with him goes beyond the Freedom Caucus.

“He continues to play games,” a livid Rep. Max Miller (R-Ohio) said in an interview. “We are talking about a man who 30 days ago said that he was an anti-CR guy. We are talking about a man 30 days ago that was anti-Ukraine funding. ... It shows me he was never really morally convicted in his positions to begin with. He just did a 180 on everything he believed in, and that to me is disgusting.”

Miller, an ally of McCarthy and former President Donald Trump, called Johnson a “joke,” describing the speaker’s decision to attach IRS cuts to Israel aid as “a slap in the face to every Jew” and a “fucking dumb” choice that set a precedent of tying domestic policy to foreign aid.

Since earlier this summer, conservatives have demanded government spending cuts below the budget levels established by the $1.59 trillion debt ceiling deal reached earlier this year. That push led to Republicans slicing $119 billion from that bipartisan total across a dozen annual spending bills, forcing vulnerable moderates to take hard votes for months and frustrating some unwilling GOP appropriators.

But last Wednesday, some of those same conservatives began more actively telegraphing a concession of sorts: They’d reluctantly entertain the same $1.59 trillion topline they once spurned.

Senators who met with Johnson on Wednesday didn’t see his acceptance of a potential continuing resolution funding the government at current levels through Oct. 1 as a shot across the bow to fellow Republicans. For North Dakota GOP Sen. Kevin Cramer, it was more of a concession to reality. “Whether that was a promise or a threat, … I think it’s actually obvious, just stating that fact that he doesn’t have the votes for another short-term CR.”

Johnson on the GOP plan to impeach Biden: We lamented openly, we decried how the Democrats politicized that process. They were brazenly political. And how they brought those meritless impeachment charges against the president. What you’re seeing here is exactly the opposite. We are the rule of law team. The Republican Party stands for the rule of law.”

If Johnson actually believes any of that bushel basket of bullshit lies, he’s delusional.

We need to start calling these people what they are: they are no “Christian,” they are Fundamentalists and have little to nothing in common with mainstream beliefs of actual Christians. They are not “conservatives.” They are “far right radical revolutionaries.” There’s a one word synonym for that word salad: fascists.

They cannot be negotiated with, because their goal is to create an America in which “There are no Democrats in office, and what Democrats who are left are to scared to run for office as we build the Republican party to rule this country,” in the words of polyamorous cuck Christian Ziegler, still the Chairman of the Florida Republican Party despite being credibly accused of raping his bible-banging wife’s lesbian lover and long-term sexual partner of both of the two hypocrites.

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