The Weekly WTF: God mulls US request for overwhelming violence
Plus, bimbofication, biblical intervention in the Strait of Hormuz, and America's crashing reputation
This stuff actually happened:
Bimbofication. Will that be the Merriam-Webster word of the year? It’s off to a strong start now that the Daily Mail has caught Kristi Noem’s husband Byron posing in front of a webcam in absurd mockups of female anatomy, including what appear to be balloons that are supposed to mimic giant breasts squeezed beneath a salmon-colored Spandexy top. I dunno. AI slop looks more realistic. One of the nipples is in the wrong place. The hot pink leggings at the lower half of the getup look uncomfortably tight. Maybe I’m a prude, but bimbofication doesn’t seem very enjoyable.
So many questions. How did the Daily Mail get this “story?” The tabloid reported that Noem paid money to sex workers on the other end of the camera, so maybe one of them figured out he was the spouse of a Trump cabinet member—sorry, former Trump cabinet member—and sold the tip to the Daily Mail. (Unlike most American news organizations, the Daily Mail pays for some tips.)
Is this a news story? Man, if I had the material, I’m not sure what I’d do. Byron Noem is a public figure, but only by connection to his prominent and problematic wife. The Daily Mail claims it’s newsworthy because a foreign government could blackmail the spouse of a US government official if it had compromising information on him. In this case, it feels like a stretch. At any rate, icky.
Is Byron Noem as loathsome as his wife? This certainly doesn’t prove it. Kristi Noem defended the killing of two nonviolent civilians in Minnesota by government thugs belonging to the agency she used to run. She also faces allegations of corruption and possible misuse of millions of dollars of taxpayer money. There are open rumors of an affair with an aide who is also under investigation for possibly defrauding taxpayers.
Byron Noem is a South Dakota farm boy who runs an insurance agency in Bryant, South Dakota, population 471. He married Kristi Arnold in 1992 while he was still in college. They have three grown children. I’m not ready to dunk on Byron. I cropped his face out of the bimbo photo above. There’s no evidence he committed any crime, and as far as we know he spent his own money, not taxpayer dollars, on his unusual habit. I kinda wish we never had to find out. Of course, like everybody else, I assume Kristi will cut him loose, as if he’s the one who has unseemly baggage. Maybe she already has, and this is part of the drama.
Lord, please grant us overwhelming violence. Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth hosted a Christian prayer service at the Pentagon on March 25. What do you think he prayed for? That God would make him an instrument of peace? That where there is hatred, he could sow love?
HA! That’s the kind of feminist cosplay prayer you might have heard from the woke Biden administration. The Trump Christians are some mean mother-fers and they come to slay!
“Let every round find its mark against the enemies of righteousness,” Hegseth beseeched the Lord. “Give them wisdom in every decision, endurance for the trial ahead, unbreakable unity, and overwhelming violence of action against those who deserve no mercy.”
Hegseth pulled some quotes from the Old Testament, which is the go-to place for zealots seeking religious texts that justify violence. The OT is rife with mass killings, human sacrifice, enslavement, and all manner of smiting and savagery. You can find just about any quote you want in there, to justify any act of depravity. That’s why many scholars consider the OT to be best understood as parable, like the myths of the ancient Greek and Romans.
Jesus, when he came along, was a lot mellower. In the Beatitudes (Matthew 5: 3-10), Jesus said, “Blessed are the meek … blessed are the merciful … blessed are the peacemakers,” and so on. Jesus didn’t leave any good warfighting quotes for Hegseth to bastardize.
Maybe Hegseth could simplify his prayer down to this: “Death to Iran.” It has the medieval feel the man who calls himself “secretary of war” seems to be looking for.
Strait dope. Speaking of biblical events, Trump said during his April Fools’ Day speech updating the nation on the Iran war that the Strait of Hormuz “will open up naturally” once the war winds down. It sounds like Moses parting the Red Sea, which come to think of it, would be nice, if it meant we could open up another land route for oil to get from the Arabian peninsula to the Mediterranean and out to the rest of the world.
The April Fools’ Day speech had to be one of the most ridiculous wartime updates delivered by any president. In the days before the speech, Trump had suggested a deal might be in the works to end the war, which pushed oil prices down and stocks up. But he didn’t say anything about a deal in the prime-time speech, while threatening to escalate the war instead of winding it down.
Trump tried to counsel patience by pointing out that most wars last longer than the five weeks US and Israeli forces have been bombing Iran. He even pointed out that the Vietnam War lasted 19 years, as if we could wage the Iran war for another 17 years and it would still be shorter than the Vietnam ordeal. This is the same Trump who said on March 3, “we expect a very swift conclusion.” He must have meant swift in the biblical sense, like, years or decades.
China trumps America. America’s reputation stinks, according to Gallup survey data from more than 130 countries. Every year, Gallup logs approval ratings for the leaders of the United States, China, Germany and Russia. And for the first time, approval of the United States has dropped below that of China. Just 31% of global residents approve of the United States under President Trump, while 36% approve of China under President Xi Jinping. The only time the US rating was lower was in 2020, the last year of Trump’s first term, and the year of the Covid outbreak.
The United States under Trump ranks just five points above Russia and the tyrannical warlord Vladimir Putin. And this was before Trump started the Iran war. By next year, the land of the free may very well be in last place.
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Thank you for calling out Pete Hegseth's perverse (the kindest adjective I can think of to describe it) travesty of a prayer. As you suggest, so many people who claim to be Christians actually seem to be Old Testamentarians. The comedian Taylor Tomlinson calls the Old Testament "my favorite Taylor Swift album" (https://www.tiktok.com/@taylortomlinsoncomedy/video/7537779703021620535). The late, great singer/songwriter John Prine said he thought of the Bible as an unauthorized biography of God.
Both of those comments show immensely more insight – and even, in their own way, reverence – than Hegseth has ever displayed, despite (or because of) the fact that they come from people he'd disparage as unbelievers.
Personally, I envision Jesus reacting to most of what his self-proclaimed followers say and do with a face-palm and, "That's not what I said!"