I am hearing another casualty of the election will be FOX NEWS. Perhaps Trump will start his own TV Station. He has some loyal Twitter supporters who are enraged by what is happening. Stay tuned.

++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

Ross Rants:

If you are having trouble making sense of what happened in the market when the vaccine

was announced, it was a vast over reaction by the algos and the Robin Hood investors. If

you were to believe the market, the vaccine will be fully distributed by morning, and all

the fine companies that have driven the market like TMO or ADBE are going out of

business. TMO makes lab and testing equipment, and is a leader in its field. If anything, as

the pandemic ramps up, they will sell more, not less, and even after the vaccine is widely

distributed, their products will be in strong demand. I chose TMO as a proxy for many

others, and the absurd, thoughtless crashing of the stock. Some investors call what

happened, rotation. I call it uninformed and stupid lack of any real thought. The vaccine is

months away from widespread administering, and we are maybe a good 9 months away

from real impact across the country.

Nobody is rushing back to work in the office just because the clinical trials are very

promising. There is still a long way to go in getting the vaccines final approval, and then

getting people to get it. In the meantime, Biden’s new virus board is talking new major

lockdowns. That would be a disaster. The issue is, many people stopped adhering to the

basics, and stopped wearing masks and started to party again. We need to re-instill the need

to do the things that will stop the spread. Masks, no big parties, etc. Ignore the

comparisons Biden and his people make to Asia. The cultures are very different, and

getting compliance is easy there. The Great Barrington report made it clear that a

lockdown is far worse than dealing with the disease. I am sticking with my high

performing stocks that include MSFT, ADBE, TMO, QQQ, APPL, HD etc. These are

very good stocks, and will continue to churn out strong earnings.

Many of you were angry that I said Biden will be president, but that is just how it will

likely play out. I try to deal in reality, not anger or hope. Maybe Trump will prove there

was widespread fraud, but it is very unlikely to prevail to the point of overturning the

, so we must plan on, and deal with the most likely outcome. The reality of the election is

50% voted for Trump, and millions more voted against Trump the person, but not for

Biden, nor for his policies. I have numerous friends in that category. The proof is the

Republicans may have gained 11 seats in the House vs the forecast that Pelosi made of

Dems gaining 20 seats. Also Republicans won every state legislative race, plus all but AZ

senate races with GA up in the air. In short there was a major vote against the left wing,

and if Jan 5 goes well, Biden will not be able to push through his worst policies.

Everything depends on GA. Hopefully there will not be the mass turnout by Dems that we

saw last week, and they will stop the vote harvesting that occurred, and Republicans will

flock to polls to keep control of the Senate. A loss of control of the Senate will be a

disaster for the country and the stock market. If the Dems get control of the Senate, get out

of stocks. Even if the Republicans do retain control, Biden will use executive powers in

agencies to do a lot of bad tings for the economy through massive new regulation, and

punitive legal actions.

After my last Rant, my email lit up like never before with several seemingly credible

examples of fraud in the election in various places like WI, MI, PA, NV. I have no way to

know if any of this is real or just speculation. Based on past history, and what these various

people have sent me, and who they are, I have no doubt there was some games played with

votes. Was it sufficient to change the outcome? I do not have any way to know. Unless

Trump can deliver to court a specific and provable set of cases of fraud in three states, it is

over. If he can, and if the courts agree, then if the election is really called into question, and

the outcome reversed, there will be riots the likes of which we have never seen in many

decades. The rioting and looting will be unprecedented, and will make the ghetto riots of

the 60’s look not as bad. For that reason I suspect some judges will not want to take it on.

John Roberts really made a terrible error and bad political decision re: the PA vote count

issues, and maybe now it will be reheard, but the ballots are all mixed together so it is

unlikely they can be separated. Roberts failure to act may have thrown the election to

Biden. The games in WI are pretty clear, but again will a judge take it on, or leave it to the

legislature to fix it for the next election. At the end of the day it is likely Biden will be

president. The press thought it was wonderful for Stacy Abrams to try to claim she really

won in GA, but they lambaste Trump for the exact same thing. I have never gotten such a

vibrant response to a Rant, which indicates how deeply upset so many people really are.

Biden has no mandate for anything, even though he has already started to talk about the

usual left wing issues of systemic racism, climate, mask mandates, the Iran deal etc. On

day one he already has a long list of executive orders ready to sign to reverse many of the

very good key policies of Trump, and to institute numerous new regulations. In the key

states, he won by under 1%. If the R’s hold the Senate, he will run into a wall. Then the far

left Dems will scream, and here we go again. There will be no “healing”, no coming

together. That is just ignoring the reality of the massive pushback across the country

against the leftist agenda. At the same time the radicals, led by the squad and Bernie, are

ramping up their rhetoric and demands.

The fact that Republicans won maybe an extra 11 seats in the House will make it much

harder for the far left to pass their priorities. It is going to be very messy in DC as the far

left screams at the leaders of the House and Biden to pass their policies. The bartender has

already attacked her fellow Dems pretty viscously, and she is just getting started. It will get

really ugly. Anyone who thinks there is going to be a coming together of any kind is in

lala land. I assume they are having victory celebrations in Iran and China right now. Note

that Putin has not congratulated Biden. The world just became a much more dangerous

place.

Biden is not mentally capable to deal with all that stress, and will not know what to do as

the competing factions battle for control of him. That is when Harris becomes really

dangerous, and, along with Pelosi and Schumer, he gets pushed to concede to far left

policies. The press and Silicon Valley will continue to push a leftist agenda now that

newsrooms are dominated by young left wing activists and not journalists. I suspect the

next two years will remain very ugly as the far left demands what they want, streets will be

filled periodically with demonstrations, universities will be hotbeds for indoctrinating the

students, and the rest of us will need to push back hard with our Congressmen.

This election repudiated the far left ideas, but Pelosi will retain control, and she and Harris

will push Biden to the left. In 2022, the election will go to the right. Nicky Haley will begin

her push to run for president, and Tim Scott, Ted Cruz, and Tom Cotton will be right out

there. Cotton intends to run. In 2024 it will be Haley vs Harris. Haley will sweep. Pence

has no chance at all to get the nomination. 2022 will be when the Republicans can possibly

gain back the House, and more senate seats. This election for House seats was substantial

push back against the left, but Trump’s personality got in the way. Biden’s last two years

will be very messy as he will not be mentally able to cope. The chaos is far from ended.

There is a lot of strong passion on the right, and a lot of violent protestors on the left. They

will continue to make outrageous demands, and will be stopped by a Republican senate. It

is going to be a long, chaotic 4 years.

Biden says he will bring everyone together. That is nonsense. After this election the

country is as divided and angry as ever, and tens of millions believe the Biden win was as

result of fraud. They will never accept Biden, and surely not Kamala. Unlike the BLM and

ANTIFA rioters, it is unlikely the Republicans will riot and loot. But the anger will boil

until 2022. It is interesting to note that the R’s took 5 and possibly as many as 11 House

seats, and lost zero, a clear repudiation of Pelosi and the left wing. The R’s also took

control of several state legislatures. That suggests had it not been Trump and his

personality issues, the president would have been a Republican in a landslide. That is key

since the R’s now control redistricting in many states.

If you noticed who was mostly out in the streets on Saturday, they were mainly college

kids who have been indoctrinated by their professors, and who have no historical context at

all for what has been accomplished in this country as to civil rights, and technology

advances made by a bunch of white and Asian men. Now they resent us for having

provided the wonderful life they lead and take for granted. I know the life story of some of

you, and the sacrifices you made to earn money and make your families a good life. The

kids think now they are entitled, and we are oppressors not entitled to enjoy the fruits of

our labor and risk taking, and we should just pay it over to minorities and illegal aliens.

Entitlements never made anyone successful and rich. Only hard work and brains do that.

One good thing now that the election is over. No more garbage in my mailbox and no more

robocalls from politicians trying to tell me how wonderful they are .

My predictions of minority votes were not far off. I predicted 25% blacks -it was 18%. I

predicted 35% Hispanic, it was 36%. I predict blacks will become more Republican as time

goes on, and they realize the Dems take them for granted, and that all the entitlement

programs just create more dependence, and not real jobs, and Dem resistance to charter

schools is not in the best interest of their kids who are really suffering educational setbacks

now with school shutdowns.

What we now have is a Democratic party leadership and money supporters that is made up

of the “elite” who think they know better than us how we should live our lives, and what

we should think and say. This comes right out of universities where they are taught that

unless you think like the professor, you get admonished at best, and expelled at worst.

There are now tens of thousands, or millions of these kids who have been indoctrinated to

believe that there is only one way to think, and if you deviate you will be canceled and

punished. Orwell has arrived, and it is not just in the US now. We get Bloomberg spending

$100 million just in FL to try to get people to vote the way he wants. It used to be that it

was the Dems screaming about the Koch Bros as evil, but Bloomberg and other billionaires now make the Kochs look like pikers, and they think that is just fine.

There is a group of “elites” made up of the press, Silicon Valley child billionaires, Wall St

rich guys, presidents of universities, and Washington power brokers who think they know

better than us how we can speak and think. This is very dangerous. Trump upset all of

that, and had he done it in a better tone, he would have won by a landslide. But the press

and elite could not stand that someone would actually tell them to F off, and who did things

that were not as the elite said they should be done. He was a massive threat to them, and

their effort to control us, and so they tried everything from the Hilary Russia collusion, to

impeachment, to censoring, to the press demeaning him. On campus he was made the

ultimate evil racist villain.

Now they possibly resorted to voter fraud to finally get rid of this threat to their power.

Just consider, they control the universities, the press, the internet, the ABA, and the House.

They have people inside the CIA and FBI who created this false story about Russia

collusion, and they send out Adam Schiff to go on TV continually to lie, topped off by

Pelosi who shows utter disrespect for the office of president. Then they roll out a guy who

is going senile, who they can control, and they make him president. The ACLU is

supposed to protect free speech, but do you ever see them acting against universities. This

is now a problem across the western world, and not just in the US. This election, however,

showed that many blacks, Hispanics, and middle class are not buying it, and in 2022, the

final election battle will be fought. Trump was a phenomenon made possible by the

pushback of us ordinary people who do not want to be told what to think and say.

Pelosi will now be pulled apart between the moderates who have to run in two years and

the radicals. The moderates are furious at Pelosi for the leftward policies she followed that

led to so many R’s wining seats and unseating Dems. This is going to be most interesting

to watch. If Pelosi wants to go out a winner she has to tend to the moderates policies or she

causes the Dems to lose the House. In 22 we could see a full repudiation of the far left.

Where to invest. Hard to say yet. We need to wait for the runoff in GA. If Purdue and

Loeffler both win, then there will be a strong wall to stop a lot of the left wing disaster.

Unfortunately the president has great powers of executive power, and has the control of

foreign policy, so a lot of bad things are likely to happen as they did under Obama. Just

look at the Iran deal which happened without full Senate approval. Biden has already said

on Saturday, he wants carbon neutral-translation no more fracking, and he will rejoin the

failed Paris accord that nobody else who signed it has adhered to. The Paris Accord

requires the US to give tens of billions to corrupt developing countries, instead of using

that money at home. It will be interesting to watch to see if the moderates in the House

push back on Pelosi and refuse to vote for the worst left wing nonsense. She controls a lot

of money and unions, so it will take a lot for Dem reps to go against her. Schumer is up in

2022, and the bartender from the Bronx will try to unseat him. That will be the contest for

the soul of the Democratic party. Schumer will go far left for the next two years to try to

counter her.

The assumption is the R’s win in GA and no tax increases, a vaccine getting emergency

approval by middle of December , and maybe a small stimulus package. It is not clear to

many of us who pay attention to the economic data, that a stimulus package is really

critical now. The economy is doing very well at the moment despite the surge. Having the

vaccine about to be approved will help reassure consumers and investors. Assuming

Purdue and Loeffler prevail, then equities will do well for at least a year or two. Manchin

has already said he will not vote for an end to the filibuster, court packing, major tax

increases, nor other radical agendas. That is a huge help in preventing the far left from

pushing through the crazy stuff in his own words. The deficit will not get too out of

control, the court will not get packed, taxes will not go up, and spending will be

moderated. The military will get the funds they need to counter China. The economy is on

a real roll now, and so should continue to do so as long as the R’s control the Senate.

The mantra from Biden and the press that he needs to build back the economy is pure BS.

What he needs to do is what Trump did, reopen everything, and get out of the way. His

national mask mandate effort will fail and just breed anger. People know to wear masks,

and those who do not are not going to be told by Biden they have to. Although the virus is

surging now, the last thing needed is another series of shutdowns. Once Biden takes office

the press mantra about an economic crisis will suddenly become an economic growth story.

Reality is the economy is very strong, and unemployment will continue to decline. 6.9% is

not bad considering where we were in April. Owning bank stocks may not be a good idea

as they will be attacked and forced to do things they should not do. Housing will still boom as rates are not going up a lot until 2022 or 23 if the R’s do control the Senate and restrain spending. Bonds will remain very high risk as rates will rise no matter what over

the next few years. The ten year could possibly hit 1.0% in a few months. One thing to

watch out for is whether the vaccines become available by January so we avoid another

lockdown by Biden and Fauci.

A bit of finance and economics. In 1994 the ten year was 8%. Now it is .8% In 1993 BAA

was 9%. Now it is 3.0%. That alone makes investment choices very different, not just for

stocks, but for all investments. That also demonstrates why bonds were a good investment

during that whole period as rates declined. That game is now over, and bonds will likely

lose money from here while they also pay no real return. A double loss. You are better off

with some quality high dividend stocks. The debt yield between product types of REITs is

instructive as to how the market perceives risks. Hotel REIT debt yields 2.9% while

Apartments yield 1.6% and self-storage 1.4% and industrial is 1.3%. Office is at 2.0%. Ten

year Treasury yields are up 13.9 bp in a month. The 5 year futures nominal yield is only 1.84%.

The bond market is often the best indicator of risk. GDP in Q4 will likely surprise on the

upside despite the virus surge.

One of the original authors of the Great Barrington Declaration has written an article which

makes it very clear that the lockdown was a disastrous decision. So much for Fauci and

the experts that Biden says he will go by. 43,000 medical and health experts have now

signed on to the Declaration. It has very widespread support of the scientific community

now. The vast damage done to the mental and physical health of society as a whole, and to

the economy, and the minority kids who are not getting a real education, is massive vs a

tiny percentage of the population who died-.07of 1%. You may recall several Rants in April

, May where I said there was a cost benefit trade off, and the lockdown was a very bad

trade. That position has now been confirmed by the scientists. More kids are dying this

year from flu by far than from Covid.

You notice now the lockdowns are extremely limited, and the action is pushing harder for

mask wearing and distancing, and the isolation of nursing homes. The virus also changed

the election outcome. Had it never happened Trump would have won a landslide. This was

the ultimate black swan. You should look up the Great Barrington Declaration, and an

article by Jay Bhattacharya of Stanford, one of the authors, “Sensible and Compassionate

Anti-Covid Strategy”. Trump was right -we need to fully reopen and people need to heed

the wear a mask routine and distancing, and the virus will be mostly gone by late next

summer or fall, once the vaccine is widely administered. It really has been a V recovery.

Trump had it right. The press had, and still has it wrong.

Don’t confuse hotel brands stocks with hotels. The brands got rid of most of the real estate

years ago and now just collect fees. So they could cut costs quite a bit and as the fees start

coming up again, they get a lot of earnings leverage vs the fixed costs of owning a property.

Most hotels are still suffering, where Marriott reported a profit.

++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

Powell is also Flynn's lawyer and is a solid attorney and validates what I posted earlier:

Sidney Powell Makes Explosive Voter Fraud Allegation: 'They Had This All Planned'

By Leah Barkoukis

Sidney Powell, a member of President Trump’s legal team, alleged that Democrats had a widespread voter fraud operation on Election Day, saying an audit on all computer systems "that played a role" is necessary.

“The computer glitches could not and should not have happened at all,” she told Fox News’s Maria Bartiromo on Sunday. “That’s where the fraud took place where they were flipping votes in the computer system or adding votes that did not exist. We need an audit of all of the computer systems that played any role in this fraud whatsoever.”

The Michigan Secretary of State has disputed such claims about a glitch in Antrim County, saying they have "no merit" and that the error was accidental, adding that the "equipment and software did not malfunction and all ballots were properly tabulated."

Powell said Biden was right when he claimed to have “the most extensive and inclusive voter fraud organization in the history of American politics.”

“They had this all planned, Maria, they had the algorithms, they had the paper ballots waiting to be inserted if and when needed and notably President Trump’s vote in the blue states went up enormously,” she continued. “That’s when they had to stop the vote count, and go in and replace votes for Biden and take away Trump votes.”

Bartiromo pointed out some of the Election Day glitches that occurred in a software program came from Dominion Voting Systems, which has some Democratic ties.

"I've never seen voting machines stop in the middle of an election, stop down and assess the situation, I also see reports that Nancy Pelosi’s longtime chief of staff is a key executive at that company," Bartiromo said, referring to Nadeam Elshami, who became a lobbyist for Dominion last year. "Richard Blum, Sen. Feinstein’s husband, significant shareholder of that company," the Fox News host added. "What can you tell us about the interests on the other side of this Dominion software?"

"Obviously they have invested in it for their own reasons and are using it to commit this fraud to steal votes," responded Powell, who's also the lead attorney for retired Gen. Michael Flynn. "I think they’ve even stolen them from other Democrats in their own party who should be outraged about this also. Bernie Sanders might very well have been the Democratic candidate. But they’ve stolen it from whoever they wanted to steal it from.”

++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++ This from a former, and outstanding, district attorney. He trained Meg Heap.

We’re finally rid of Trump, which must be a relief for every American, even, deep down, for those of us who loathe the man but can nevertheless give him fair credit for his constructive achievements.

The obvious question is, what comes next? Caution must inform any predictions. When Trump was elected, the smartest people in the world were confidently predicting the wholesale destruction of the basic institutions of our republican democracy, including the silencing of our free press, as well as a global depression with the US in the vanguard, and an increase in military adventurism with the added prospect of nuclear war. In every case, it is the opposite that has actually occurred.

In the past year I’ve asked a number of my more liberal friends, What is the thing Trump has actually done that has resulted in the greatest actual harm to the republic? The answers don’t inspire unbridled outrage.

What does Biden bring to the job of governance? If past is prologue, the answer is, pretty much nothing. After almost fifty years in politics Biden has no record of political achievement that comes within even a faint whisper of Trump’s record in the space of four years -- which, without tedious enumeration and amplification, includes a fifty percent increase in economic output, lower unemployment among blacks than at any time since 1972, the long-awaited “pivot” to Asia, a reclaiming of our recently scorned relationship with Israel, and a broader Mideast policy that’s no longer hostage to the Palestinians.

There is no defect of character or intellect in Trump that doesn’t also describe Biden and find expression in specific conduct; again without amplification: bullying, arrogance, coarseness, lying, gross and divisive incivility, sexual assault and now, perhaps, influence pedaling and money laundering in collusion with foreign powers.

As one who fancies himself a liberal by instinct and conservative by necessity, I hope this will be an opportunity to rediscover a centripetal force and center of gravity in American politics – perhaps even in our broader culture as well. I use the word center advisedly.

In an ideal future as I imagine it, a Republican Senate will help Biden resist the most hysterical and deranged demands of the Sanders-Warren-AOC-Pelosi wing of his party while preserving what remains of the traditional liberal-democratic agenda as a subject for compromise. The Senate could serve Biden as a wall he can hide behind and blame for his failure to enact the Screamers’ agenda. Meanwhile, as he plods along in Republican-enforced moderation, he might find that the only hope of salvaging any credibility for his party lies in abandoning the habit of treating half the country with elitist condescension and sanctimonious insult: no more “...cling to their guns and religion,” “you didn’t build that,” and “Deplorables.”

If Republicans keep the senate it will appear, broadly speaking, that the Democrats won the Oval Office while the Republicans came out ahead almost everywhere else. I’m thinking both sides were hoping for a result that would allow them to ram their triumph down the gagging throats of the other side. Maybe the thrill of victory and the agony of defeat will now be so broadly dispersed that neither will be able to do that, and both can meet, staggering and coughing, in some dimly-remembered middle.

At a minimum I believe we can breathe a little easier, confident that we won’t be treated to another brainless, utterly adolescent, media-led “Resistance.”

Of course, one fly in my ointment is the possibility that Georgia’s runoff election in January might not preserve a Republican senate. I’ve long considered it axiomatic that the incumbent is at a disadvantage in a runoff because everyone who voted for numbers two and three were essentially voting against number one, and will do so again but this time in combination – assuming the necessary turnout.

On the other hand, it appears that in Georgia the vote that went to the Libertarian candidate exceeded Biden’s margin of victory over Trump. If correct, I interpret this to mean that if the Libertarian vote had gone to Trump, he would have carried Georgia; if the senate contests resolve themselves as Republican vs Democrat (with no Libertarian spoiler) the Republican should be the presumptive winner.

Another known unknown is whether Biden will be permitted to function through a full term, even as some kind of harmless avuncular figurehead. It seems certain that the people around him will bear an ineradicable lean and hungry look, and it won’t be merely appearance. I think the White House will reek of raw ambition, like cheap perfume in a bordello. Just in recent weeks the ever-intemperate Speaker Pelosi, on the strength of no provocation, proposed invoking the Twenty-Fifth Amendment to remove President Trump from office. Can anyone be sure a Vice President Harris, or someone acting on her behalf (Pelosi?), won’t do the same to Biden? “Uneasy lies the head that wears a crown.”

We’ll see.

-- Spencer

And more commentary:

MRC's Bozell: Big Media and Big Tech Stole the 2020 Election

By CNSNews.com Staff | November 9, 2020 | 10:20am EST

(CNS News) -- A new post-election poll shows that 36% of Biden voters were not aware of the evidence linking Joe Biden to corrupt financial dealings with Communist China through his son Hunter. Further, 13% of these voters (or 4.6% of Biden’s total vote) say that had they known these facts, they would have not voted for the former vice president.

Such a shift away from Biden would have meant President Trump would have won the election with 295 electoral votes, according to the Media Research Center (MRC), confirming that the national media played an instrumental role in stealing the election for the Democrats.

(MRC)

“It is an indisputable fact that the media stole the election," said MRC President Brent Bozell. "The American electorate was intentionally kept in the dark. During the height of the scandal surrounding Hunter Biden’s foreign dealings, the media and the big tech companies did everything in their power to cover it up."

"Twitter and Facebook limited sharing of the New York Post’s reports, and the liberal media omitted it from their coverage or dismissed it as Russian disinformation," said Bozell.

“Now we know the impact of that cover-up," he added. "4.6% of Biden voters say they would not have voted for him had they been aware of evidence of this scandal. This story would have potentially changed the outcome of this election."

"The media and Silicon Valley were fully aware of this, so they actively tried to prevent it from reaching the American public," said Bozell. "The American people deserved to know the truth; now it’s too late.”

The nationwide survey of 1,000 voters was conducted Nov. 3 by McLaughlin & Associates.

Voters were asked about the bombshell reporting from the New York Post: “At the time you cast your vote for President, were you aware that evidence exists in emails, texts, eyewitness testimony and banking transactions that the FBI has been investigating since last year directly linking Joe Biden to a corrupt financial arrangement between a Chinese company with connections to the Chinese communist party and Hunter Biden’s business, which may have personally benefited Joe Biden financially?”

(Screenshot, NYP)

While 73% of respondents said they had heard about these allegations, 27% had not — including 36% of Biden voters. Those Biden voters were then asked: “If you had been aware of this actual evidence in emails, texts, testimony and banking transactions being investigated by the FBI, would you have...”

Those voters were then given several options: still voted for Joe Biden (86.9%), voted for a third party candidate (5.6%), not voted for any presidential candidate (4.7%), not voted at all (1.7%) or switched their vote to Donald Trump (1.1%).

The net effect: 13.1% of these voters (4.6% of Biden’s overall vote) say they would not have voted for Biden if they had been properly informed. Applying this to the most closely-decided states, Arizona, Georgia, Nevada, North Carolina, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin would today all be in the Trump column, giving the President 295 electoral college votes.

Disclosure: The MRC is the parent organization of CNSNews.com.)

And:

https://tennesseestar.com/2020/11/10/democrats-invite-voters-to-exploit-georgias-weak-residency-rules-to-stuff-ballot-boxes-in-runoff-elections/

++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++ Guess what happened:

Guess Who Turned Out in Droves for Trump

Despite the Media's Best Efforts to Shame Them, This Group Turned Out in Droves for Trump

Find Out More

++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++ Sent to me by a very dear friend and fellow memo reader.

Don't you sometimes just shake your head and wonder, What on earth is happening in the world? Over

the course of my lifetime, I have witnessed numerous changes in the broader culture. Unfortunately, not

all have been for good. If Christians hope to make an impact in this world, it's imperative that we first

understand it. So let's take a look at three especially troubling changes that I see in our world.

First, I see a blurring of the line between right and wrong. In my lifetime, I have seen a move from a

wholesome standard of morality to a wholesale and undiscerning emphasis on tolerance. Many in our

world have replaced common sense with political correctness. We defend criminals more passionately

than victims. Standing against same-sex marriage labels a person an "intolerant homophobe" and "out

of touch with reality." Stating that Scripture teaches for or against some behavior or attitude no longer

carries the weight it once did. In this climate, holding to conservative moral standards makes one look

foolish. Why? Because there's a blurring of the line between right and wrong.

A second troubling change is occurring these days: I see a growing ignorance of biblical knowledge.

There was a time, even in recent years, when theological thinking, biblical understanding, and doctrinal

truth were our culture's standard guides for living. Politicians as well as educators quoted frequently

from the Scriptures. Prayer was a part of every classroom experience in my elementary-school-age

years. Pastors taught the Scriptures forcefully. Now? Sadly, in our times we have "a famine on the land

—not a famine of bread or water but of hearing the words of the LORD" (Amos 8:11).

Third, I see an intensifying embrace of postmodernism. We have clearly shifted from a Christian era to

a post-Christian era. We have postmodernism to thank for that.

Let me give you 10 quick signs to help you recognize postmodernism's presence in our world.1

No authority is valid. Those who hold this position challenge authority, asking, Who are you to
tell me what to believe? Respect for authority is virtually nonexistent.
No rules are valid. This means that we should make up our own minds about right and wrong,
following only those rules we feel are right for us.
Style is more important than substance. Here we get the idea that reality consists only of image
or appearance, rather than substance.
Morality is a matter of choice. This mentality suggests that it's all right to live however we want.
The cardinal virtue is tolerance. This kind of tolerance says that we must validate everyone's
beliefs . . . except the beliefs of those who aren't tolerant. Ironic, huh?
Words have no inherent meaning, so true communication is impossible. Words carry weight or
they carry nothing, yet in our world the significance of words continues to erode.
Western culture is oppressive. This mind-set says that someone else somewhere else always
has an answer to improve culture that's better than the West's answers.
The line between truth and entertainment is removed. So guess what? Hollywood becomes the
source of truth rather than the Bible.
Images and fantasy interpret reality. The unsavory images in video games or television become
reality for kids who are growing up under their influence.
What people believe is right, so they can do anything to achieve a goal. Postmodern thinkers
believe it's acceptable to react any way they wish if they feel wronged, because whatever they
believe is right.

Postmodernism presents numerous challenges for the believer in Christ. It's imperative that you have a

plan to live well in spite of these challenges. First, you need discernment. Discernment keeps you from

being deceived, duped, and disillusioned. Discernment tells you, "This situation is leading to a bad

conclusion, so I'm not going there." People of discernment can avoid many of the pitfalls of living in this

world.

Second, you need direction. Direction provides you with a goal to pursue, showing you what you ought to

do. But direction also forces you to make hard decisions. Exhibit the courage to do the right thing in the

face of opposition and discouragement.

Serious words . . . so much to think about. I know you care. But it is so easy to be swept along by the

waves of our times. I urge you to become a serious student of the Scriptures. Let God's Word be your

guide. Adopting this habit of relying on the Bible's timeless wisdom will do amazing things, as it helps you

hone discernment and develop direction in a world that has lost its way.

I have been especially influenced in the area of understanding our postmodern world by Woodrow Kroll's book Back
to the Bible: Turning Your Life Around with God's Word. I'd encourage you to read it as you deepen your
understanding of our times.

About the author

Pastor Chuck Swindoll

Pastor Chuck Swindoll has devoted his life to the accurate, practical teaching and application of God’s Word. Since 1998, he has served as the senior pastor-teacher of Stonebriar Community Church in Frisco, Texas, but Chuck’s listening audience extends beyond a local church body. As a leading program in Christian broadcasting since 1979, Insight for Living airs around the world. Chuck’s leadership as president and now chancellor of Dallas Theological Seminary has helped prepare and equip a new generation for ministry.

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Tuesday, November 10, 2020

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About the author

Pastor Chuck Swindoll

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