Four Democrats emerged as favorites for a 2028 run in this particular poll, including former VP Kamala Harris, California governor Gavin Newsom and Congresswoman Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez. Pete Buttigeig was also a leading candidate, but the poll didn't run a head to head between him and Vance. Vance and Secretary of State Marco Rubio were the Republicans matched up in the poll.

If Vance were the GOP nominee, the Democrats would all beat him by similar percentages in double digits, averaging around 11%. Rubio does better, but not by much, averaging around an 8% defeat. Even at this point, more than two years away from the election, this is good news for a couple of reasons. One, MSN has a strong GOP bias. Two, we are seeing polling numbers which suggest who the Democrats are leaning toward supporting as Presidential candidates and they are all outstanding possibilities, and the Republicans are stuck with Vance and Rubio.

The Democratic party seems to be on track to re-invent itself, based on the very strong political message being sent by the American people in opposition to Trump. Are they finally getting back to their roots among the working class? It seems like that is happening, though they are definitely listening to the American people on issues like the Iran War, now more unpopular, with less support than even the Vietnam War had toward the end, the economy and the rising cost of everyday items like groceries and gas, along with bigger rip-offs like housing costs and utilities.

The fact that someone like Trump, and the tangled confusion of MAGA ignorance and incompetence when it comes to determining what is important in American politics, is an indication that major reform must occur soon. We have lost our free press and the government now must be more than just pro-active in making sure conditions exist for getting it back. Whatever steps are necessary to break up the billionaire monopolies which control the companies that own television networks, internet communications, radio broadcasts and the online "newspaper" business must be taken. The structure is there, constitutionally and in the law. It must now be strictly enforced.

And perhaps, in the support that seems to be forming around candidates who are talking openly about what kind of reforms are necessary to prevent another political disaster from occurring, there is some genuine reform on the way. My hope is that this movement will not be corrupted by corporate dollars before it becomes possible to bring about the kind of reform that eliminates the influence of money in elections altogether.

I'm not a professional political analyst by any means, though I do consider myself well informed and perhaps with a little bit of an edge after having spent so much time as a social studies teacher specific to American History and Civics. I do a lot of reading, from a variety of sources outside the scope of the mainstream media, which is really where the American free press exists these days.

I watched the Democratic Senate primary in Maine pretty closely, mainly because I find Graham Platner to be the kind of candidate exactly suited to help Democrats win what I see as an overwhelming victory in the coming Mid-term elections. He's not a party-liner, nor is he a traditional or typical candidate by any stretch of the imagination. He's going to win. His opponent, Senator Susan Collins, is going to lose because she typifies the kind of Republican that most voters will be voting against in November, lacking anything of substance to offer and lacking any real commitment to convictions. But he is going to win because he does have something to offer that is attracting a lot of voters who might not participate in a moribund election otherwise.

The Republicans, and most notably Trump himself, have made the kind of slurs and attacks on Platner's character meaningless. I mean seriously, why should Democrats bother with a few verbal comments, emails and a tatoo when Republicans have ignored far worse than that in almost all of their major candidates and cabinet posts? They're the ones who have made these kinds of choices, which clearly are not representative of the candidate's character by the way, irrelevant and meaningless. This is the politics of the current hour, people, and it is stupid, and yes I will use that word in the full context of its meaning, to try and bring down the strongest Democratic candidate running for the Senate in Maine over a few long since past mistakes that are not only meaningless, but about which the other side has clearly demonstrated they don't give a damn.

I'm pleased to take note of the fact that whoever thought this might amount to something got kicked in the teeth by the primary vote supporting Platner. Honestly, whoever was responsible for that made him an even more viable candidate. He's a man of the people, and the way he is approaching this campaign is a gigantic threat to the billionaire establishment that runs the country now. People who are opposed to that saw this for what it was, and they turned out and gave him a win that went way beyond what pollsters were predicting.

Whatever there is to be known about the Daily Wire, and it's not really all that much, Ben Shapiro is good at something. He's good at playing on people's prejudices and biases, and if he tries to confirm something, there's a 100% chance it is a misconception or an outright lie. The fact that it depends on social media to spin its misinformation underlines the fact that it isn't credible news or information or commentary.

So when they attacked St. Andrews Presbyterian Church in Austin, Texas, the church where Texas Democratic nominee for the US Senate James Talarico is a member, the information they put out was clearly innuendo that counted on ignorance of the church, the denomination, and lacked proof or evidence of anything in the accusations. The article, written by Lief LeMahieu, made a list of standard, tired, inaccurate accusations.

The whole idea of Christian redemption, which relies on things like repentance, grace, loving God with all your heart, soul, mind and strength, and loving your neighbor as yourself is the very definition of "woke." In spite of the right wing use of the term as one of derision, what is now defined as "being woke" is exactly the kind of spiritual awakening that is at the very core of being Christian. It is, in fact, not possible to be Christian with any genuine sincerity of repentance that is exactly what being woke means. And when the Daily Wire accuses St. Andrews of being a "woke church," it is stating the very obvious fact that St. Andrews is a genuinely and sincerely Christian church.

So thanks for that.

Jim Rigby, senior pastor at St. Andrews, gave an outstanding summary of exactly what has happened to American Christianity as a result of right wing political extremism when he said, "Now anyone may be called a heretic if they presume to anchor Christianity on the actual teachings of Jesus instead of the rantings of televangelists and political moralizers."

If right wing extremists want to make James Talarico's faith, and the church where he worships, a political issue, then so be it. Look who he's running against. His opponent fits the defintion of "an ungodly person who perverts the grace of our God into a license for immorality" as the Apostle Jude defines in his epistle, verse 4. If that is the issue that is being pushed, and those are the standards that are being used, then no sincere, faithful Christian can cast a vote for Ken Paxton without completely violating the core principles of Christianity.

And I think that's as clear as it gets.

It's rooted in the unorthodox, distorted theology and doctrine that emerges from the combination of nineteenth century fundamentalism with the distorted interpretation of the sixty-six books of the Protestant Bible subjected to the doctrine of Biblical Inerrancy. It is complicated further by the push of Evangelical conservatives into right wing politics as a result of the pressures that come from white Christian nationalism creeping into the churches.

There's a power vacuum among Southern Baptists now, more than forty years after a movement tagged as the "Conservative Resurgence" was launched in 1979 with the dual purpose of bringing the denomination into full support of right wing Republican politics, using the theological and doctrinal claim that it was sliding down the "slippery slope" of liberalism, requiring restoration of the belief in the sixty-six books of the Protestant Bible as inerrant, and infallible, the sole authority for the faith and practice of the church.

The two men who used their personal connections, power and influence to orchestrate the political activity in order to bring about this resurgence, Dr. Paige Patterson, then president of broken down Criswell College, a fundamentalist school operated by First Baptist Church of Dallas, where the power-broker pastor W. A. Criswell still occupied the pulpit, and Paul Pressler, a Texas Appeals Court Justice and Republican Party community organizer and operative, revered among Southern Baptists as the "architects" of this movement, are both out of the picture, disgraced by their own involvement in the sexual abuse scandal that the denomination's leadership can't seem to resolve.

Patterson was involved in the negligent mishandling of abuse and rape accusations at both Southeastern Baptist Theological Seminary in Wake Forest, North Carolina and at Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary in Fort Worth, Texas, under his presidency at both schools. He was ultimately dismissed from Southwestern for this reason, and not for his gross mismanagement of the seminary, leading to an almost 70% decline in enrollment and financial resources. Pressler passed away two years ago, after charges of sexually abusing young men in the churches where he served as a youth pastor and Sunday school teacher, and in association with his law firm. You can click this link to Baptist News Global to read about all of that scandal.

I'll say it here, because it's true. It's not possible to understand the Christian gospel revealed by God through Jesus, if all that's available is a King James Bible and a man with a 6th grade education who has been taught to read, and interprets it literally, verse by verse. It's a disadvantage to start Bible study without even a basic understanding that verses and chapters are reference points and not the outline of the original text.

Over the course of the past three years, the messengers from the churches to the Southern Baptist Convention have defeated attempts to place a restrictive ban on women serving as pastors in its affiliated churches, though the denomination's statement of faith, the Baptist Faith and Message 2000, has allowed its credentials committee to sever ties to several churches considered to be in volation of this provision. The difference between this being a committee decision, as opposed to being included in the constitution and bylaws of the denomination is that doing the latter would automatically exclude any church which has, on its staff, a female in the role of a pastor who interprets scripture, teaches, or preaches to the church.

In order to be included in the Constitution, the amendment must pass with a two-thirds majority of the messengers in favor of it at two subsequence convention annual meetings. Mike Law, a Virginia pastor, introduced an amendment three years ago, which passed the first convention, but which failed to get the two thirds approval at the subsequent meeting to be included in the constitution. Juan Sanchez, a Texas pastor, introduced a similar proposal at the following convention meeting, but it, too, failed to get the two thirds majority required to advance. It should be noted that this proposal has been supported by the majority of messengers in attendance, but not enough support has carried it to the two-thirds threshold.

This proposal, made by one of the denomination's self-appointed inner circle, Al Mohler, President of Southern Baptist Theological Seminary in Louisville, Kentucky, got 75% of the messenger's votes at a convention being held in Orlando, attended by a relatively small number of messengers, just over 11,000. It's been convention meetings with higher attendance where the two-thirds threshold has been more difficult to meet.

I think it is vitally important for those who are working hard to oppose the fascist dictatorial tendencies of the sitting President to understand exactly how right wing conservative Evangelicalism works. Undermining this pseudo-Christian cult is a solid strategy in providing the kind of opposition necessary to prevent further damage and to motivate voters to get to the polls and make sure anything and anyone associated with Trump is defeated.

There are those who think it is futile to try and provide a reasonable argument for people to get out of this right wing religious-political mess, but I disagree. In the decade since Trump first ran for the Presidency, the Southern Baptist Convention has lost just over four million members, 25% of what it had in 2016, and has seen a 30% decline in the weekly attendance at its affiliated churches. Something is causing this massive exodus, and it is sure not the weak excuses being offered by its apologists. I tend to think that the sincere Christians among their ranks, those with a deep understanding of scripture, and Christian history, and the ability to discern the cultural and historical contexts of Christian faith and practice are deciding to get as far away from an apoostacy

There is, in fact, a growing group of podcasters and bloggers who are pointing out the grave theological errors of the SBC and their impact, and are showing people how it is possible to be a practicing Christian and an American Patriot and a Democrat at the same time, three representations of religious and political identity that are fully compatible with each other.

The moribund bureaucracy of the Southern Baptist Convention has failed, over the past five or six years, to follow directives given from the floor of the convention by the messengers to find ways to deal with the sexual abuse problem that exists among its pastors, church staff and missions personnel. The problem is larger than was originally exposed by the Abuse of Faith series in the Houston Chronicle and San Antonio Express News in 2019.

One good thing that happened, when an independent investigator was hired, was the resignation of a number of executive committee members who were upset about not being able to control and strong-arm the investigation. Some baggage that needed to be shed was gone as a result of that. But when it has come to really essential things that needed to be done as a result of the manner in which this scandal was handled by SBC bureaucrats, including actually giving the appearance of being Christian when it came to the known victims of abuse, nothing has happened. Victims, in fact, have been further victimized by the harsh and unforgiving manner reflected by the convention's national leadership.

The bureaucrats have, in fact, hidden behind what they claim is a core doctrinal principle of the Southern Baptist Convention and the way it is structured as a denomination, and that is the independence and autonomy of the local church. Churches affiliated with the SBC are independent and autonomous, according to the polity that has developed among Baptists, therefore, the denomination cannot assume a measure of ecclesiastical authority to put measures in place which prevent sexual predator pastors and church staff from moving to another church. And they can't seem to find a way to establish a database that will provide churches with a list of adjudicated offenders.

Messengers to this year's Southern Baptist Convention will be voting on a third proposal to change the denomination's constitution to disfellowship, a.k.a. "kick out," churches which have a female pastor, either as a senior pastor preaching from the pulpit, or on their staff in a role with the title "pastor" defining their duties. This is a blatant violation of the independence and autonomy of the local church, which, according to the Biblical interpretation of church polity Baptists have held for centuries, is not consistent scripturally.

So they won't interfere by helping churches avoid calling a sexual predator with a criminal record as their pastor, but they will tell their churches to hit the exit door if they decide to call a woman to serve as a pastor. It can't be possible to demonstrate more hypocrisy than this

The Southern Baptist Convention annual meeting will take place in Orlando, Florida on June 8-9. This denomination, considered the largest of American Evangelical and Protestant groups, with approximately 12.2 million members in 45,000 churches nationwide, has been dealing unsuccessfully with growing revelations of a clergy sexual abuse scandal that has been going on among its churches for quite some time. The scandal, exposed by the Houston Chronicle and San Antonio Express News in an expose called "Abuse of Faith" published in 2019, reached into the denomination's highest levels, including the discovery of multiple cover-ups of reports received by it's national Executive Committee.

When it was exposed, the scandal created an outrage among the membership of the churches. In response, the delegates elected by the churches to the annual meeting, known as "messengers," enraged by the revelations, began bypassing the cumbersome, deliberately slow denominational bureaucracy, to demand action directly from the floor of the convention. In spite of those demands, which resulted in the resignation of a dozen executive committee members and several personnel shake-ups at high levels, including the resignation of the executive director at the time, Frank Page, because of his own admission of marital infidelity, this convention body has been 100% ineffective at providing anything useful as a result.

They can't seem to get anything done about the sexual abuse running rampant in their churches, especially by those who have the title "pastor," but they are willing to entertain yet another proposal to make a permanent change to their constitution and bylaws denying membership to any church that calls a woman as a pastor. One of the denomination's insider elitists, the President of the Southern Baptist Theological Seminary in Kentucky, Dr. Al Mohler, who fancies himself as the SBC's "chief pontificator", will bring a motion to add this restriction at this year's meeting.

Making this kind of permanent change involves getting a full two thirds of the messenger vote total at two subsequent annual meetings. The last time this effort was made, it was approved in the first meeting, then failed to get the kind of majority required the second year. A lot of the success or failure of motions like this depends on how many people on the SBC payroll actually get elected as messengers from their church and go to the convention. When the bureaucrats and employees of the bureaucracies outnumber the regular people from the churches, these things tend to do well.

About half of my extended family no longer lives in West Virginia. They've scattered to other places, one group to the Washington, DC area, mostly Maryland, and another group westward into Ohio. The jobs just weren't there. The half that remains, because of the transition they've made as far as their jobs go, have a decidedly more Republican outlook than my parents and grandparents generations, all of whom were union members.

But that appears to be changing, especially among those who, like myself, are college educated and in a professional occupation. Most of those with whom I still have contact started out by supporting Trump in 2016 and 2020, and then again in 2024, though a few of them had cooled off by the last election and I actually had some great conversations with a couple of cousins who saw the truth. They'd basically dropped out of participation in politics, but since the indictments came down and reality set in, they have registered to vote and support Democrats.

For months now, among the scattered social media posts and other communication in which I've been involved, there are several of us trying to talk the rest of our family into voting for Rachel Anderson for the U.S. Senate. I won't be able to vote in West Virginia, but what I'm seeing in our conversations now is the realization that the senior Senator from there, Shelley Moore-Capito, has done nothing for the state, and has actually done nothing notable or vote-worthy for the entire time she has served in the Senate.

I doubt there are any political pundits who'd predict this would go any way except for the Republican. On the other hand, among Democrats in West Virginia, Anderson is well known, and one of the interesting political aspects of the state is that the only counties where there has been population growth in the last six decades are the ones where Democrats actually outnumber Republicans. And while Democrats had a relatively high turnout in their primary, Republican turnout was low. Don't get me wrong, it's still a long-shot.

West Virginia is one of the poorest states in the country, it is losing jobs and population regularly, and it has been since 1950. It is one of the most ignored areas of the country by politicians, and I cannot fathom how misinformed and ignorant the majority of the population must be, when they continuously vote against all of their own interests every election cycle, electing patrician politicians like Moore-Capito who vote for legislation that helps increase the poverty, does nothing to decrease unemployment or business development, and which continues to contribute to people leaving the state in droves.