Trump is the Enemy Within
Trump once said he wanted generals like the Nazis. Today, at his limp MAGA rally, he made his pitch. Photos show military leaders looking stunned, confused, and struggling not to laugh. His approval ratings are collapsing, especially in swing states, as he flails in an Epstein cover-up implicating Mike Johnson, who’s blocking the swearing-in of Arizona’s new Democratic representative–the vote that could force a House debate on releasing the Epstein files. Trump is the Frankenstein’s monster of a 50-year Christian nationalist plan using the prosperity gospel to turn America into a dictatorship, making him the most dangerous enemy from within.
The Seven Mountain Mandate reads like a discarded Lord of the Rings draft where Sauron wins. It’s a 50-year plan to bring a strongman like Trump to power and turn America into a dictatorship. Conceived in the 1970s by Bill Bright (Campus Crusade for Christ) and Loren Cunningham (Youth With A Mission), it emerged as a white-rage backlash to Civil Rights, bankrolled by Big Oil. Later, televangelist Lance Wallnau popularized it through Ziklag, a network for Christian nationalists worth over $25 million, and passed the torch to third-generation leaders like Charlie Kirk.
Kirk’s Turning Point USA targeted Matthew Boedy, a University of North Georgia professor, harassing him for speaking against guns on campus. After being placed on a “watch list,” Boedy began researching and wrote The Seven Mountains Mandate: Exposing the Dangerous Plan to Christianize America and Destroy Democracy.
The Mandate’s strategy is to dominate seven cultural “mountains”:
Religion – Shape faith and morality to normalize fascism.
Family – Patriarchal households dictate politics; LGBTQ+ people, feminists, immigrants, and academics are silenced, outlawed, and erased.
Education – Raise children in a dominance culture where “might makes right” to normalize fascism.
Government – Collapse church-state separation, recasting America as a “Christian republic,” not a democracy.
Media – Control the narrative so news becomes propaganda.
Arts & Entertainment – Capture Hollywood, TV, even TikTok, using culture as a weapon (i.e., attacks on Jimmy Kimmel).
Business – The prosperity gospel – “Jesus wants you to fund my jet” – drew greed-driven donors who built the movement across generations.
The goal: capture every cultural sphere until society mirrors their theology. Stopping it requires progressives to build their own generational strategy, rooted in empathy, inclusion, and solidarity. To start, see the Gaslit Nation Action Guide at GaslitNationPod.com.
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Show Notes:
The Seven Mountains Mandate by Matthew Boedy https://bookshop.org/p/books/the-seven-mountains-mandate-exposing-the-dangerous-plan-to-christianize-america-and-destroy-democracy-matthew-boedy/1246c2dda176acd7?ean=9780664269210&next=t
Trump said Hitler ‘did some good things’ and wanted generals like the Nazis, former chief of staff Kelly claims https://www.pbs.org/newshour/politics/trump-said-hitler-did-some-good-things-and-wanted-generals-like-the-nazis-former-chief-of-staff-kelly-claims
Progressive House Democrats rebuke DCCC ‘blacklist’ of companies working with primary challengers to incumbent Democrats https://www.cnn.com/2019/03/31/politics/dccc-primary-challenger-rule
Hillary Clinton's 3-Word Misstep: 'All Lives Matter' https://www.npr.org/sections/itsallpolitics/2015/06/24/417112956/hillary-clintons-three-word-gaffe-all-lives-matter
Trump Tells Military Leaders The Enemy Is 'Within' https://www.huffpost.com/entry/trump-speech-military-enemy-domestic_n_68dbf82ee4b003b6c8dc2fe2
Pete Hegseth accidentally flipping a skateboard into his nuts on live TV https://bsky.app/profile/patriottakes.bsky.social/post/3lzy5msbdis2t
Sequim Washington anti-fascist protest: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wxPBK-5N6UU
New: ICE has bought a tool that tracks the locations of hundreds of millions of phones globally, updates every single day. Usually harvested from apps and advertising https://bsky.app/profile/jasonkoebler.bsky.social/post/3m23j4tmzuc2t
Shadow Network: The Anne Nelson Interview - Part I https://www.gaslitnationpod.com/episodes-transcripts-20/2022/5/4/anne-nelson-part-01
Clip: https://bsky.app/profile/atrupar.com/post/3m22lragfsl2s
Clip: https://bsky.app/profile/atrupar.com/post/3m22rfis56223
Clip: Televangelist Asks His Followers For $54m For Private Jet – NBC Nightly News https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hiHghDYvpBU
Pete Hegseth (00:01):
A few months ago, I was at the White House when President Trump announced his liberation day for America's trade policy. It was a landmark day. Well, today is another liberation day, the liberation of America's warriors in name indeed and authorities. You kill people and break things for a living. You are not politically correct and don't necessarily belong always in polite society.
Donald Trump (00:29):
We don't want to even put them in that position, but they're not going to stand in our way ever again. You'll never see four years like we had with Biden and that group of incompetent people that ran this country that should have never been there. Because we are the United States military, the best of boldest, the bravest that the world has ever seen, that the world has ever known with leaders like we have right here in this beautiful room. Today, we will vanquish every danger and crush every threat to our freedom and every generation to come because we will fight, fight, fight, and we will win, win, win. I want to just thank you once again and God bless the United States military and God bless America. God bless you all. Thank you very much. Thank you.
Andrea Chalupa (01:36):
Welcome to Gaslit Nation. I am your host, Andrea Chalupa, a journalist and filmmaker and the writer and producer of the journalistic thriller, Mr. Jones, about Stalin's genocide famine in Ukraine. The film the Kremlin does not want you to see, so be sure to watch it, especially to get back at them right now because the Kremlin is laughing at America over their Russian asset that they've spent decades pumping money into, humiliating our country on the global stage, dragging our leaders across our military to a failed pathetic small d dictator, Nazi MAGA fascist rally. It was pathetic. It is a reminder to what one of this show's historical mentors, Dorothy Thompson, who was the journalist who defeated these clowns back in the 1930s, early 1940s with the power of the pen. Dorothy Thompson was the first journalist to be expelled from Germany by Hitler. When he became dictator, she regrouped, took to the pages of the Herald Tribune, got a column that was supposed to be for women, and it became the column in the world for fighting fascism.
(03:05):
And what Dorothy Thompson, what her angry ghost is saying to us today is these are small cowards. They're little men. Little men, and it shows in everything they do and say, yes, they're idiots, but they are dangerous idiots. And so what I saw in that crowd of military leaders is what you saw in that crowd. Believe your eyes and your ears a demoralized American military, and it's not just Trump. The military has been going through a very hard couple years. I think a lot of nations have been experiencing this. There was of course the once in a century pandemic. We may have more. That's not to say we're not going to have more pandemics, but we had, of course, the COVID outbreak. American soldiers were key in working with our NATO allies to help countries with their COVID response. Yes, we had American military soldiers, people up and down in all sorts of jobs, helping out all over the world, isolated from their families, working in emergency situations in communities, in countries where they didn't know the language, the culture, the people, but they're there to help.
(04:25):
Then we had of course Biden his objectively disastrous pullout from Afghanistan that's going to go down in history as just a very dark chapter in American history. However you feel about Afghanistan. No, we should not have been there. That was one of George w Bush's disastrous stupid wars along with Iraq. We should not have been there. I understand, but the way to get us out was not what Biden and Anthony Blinken did. That was a disaster. People needlessly died and then our American soldiers up and down the chain were helping those refugees, bringing them to safety, working really tirelessly. And then again with Ukraine, helping Ukraine in this massive full scale invasion by Russia. So our American military all over this massive organization, the largest military on this planet by far. They have had several tough, tough years. There have been reports on disturbing stats on suicide veterans dying by suicide.
(05:37):
There's been just a lot of hard things that they've been going through. And on top of all that, they get this, they get this. Do I believe that they're going to follow orders and shoot on American men and women, especially if it becomes apparent that Trump has stolen the stolen the presidential election in 2028 and refuses to step down from power. Do I think that our military will join him in being what he has said that he wants, which is Hitler's army? He wants an army of Nazi loyalists. He has said that there have been reports of that. Do I think they will do that? He cannot control them even if he mass purged and fired them like he's threatening to do to their faces on stage. He cannot. It's just a massive, massive organization. Certainly, we're going to lose talent. We're going to lose expertise.
(06:33):
However, they just deserve better. And if you are a veteran, if you are currently serving, God bless you, stay sane, stay strong, and just know that you are not alone in this darkest hour for our nation and the world because of America Falls. That's trouble for a lot of countries. I do believe that this is going to backfire on them. Trump's approval rating is massively tanking. The Libertarians that do make up his base, they are shocked in the Reddit shack groups because he looks like a douche bag sending these soldiers into peaceful Portland, Oregon where they have the most hilarious signs because it's such a creative well-read city. So God bless you, Portland. And the other thing is he cannot hide from the Epstein files forever threatening us in this military rally by telling the American military to experiment to fire on us in our cities.
(07:36):
This is all a big distraction from the Epstein files. His lackey, Mike Johnson, is delaying swearing in certifying the vote of the Democrat that just won an Arizona. Why? Because she would be the final vote needed to force a vote on the Epstein files. And yes, of course, on top of that, we have yet another Trump shutdown because of the chaos, the chaos machine that he creates in order to cover up his crimes with yes scandal. I know this is a hard time. I know it's a terrifying time, but stay strong. Don't just be glued to the news. Don't just check out if you're feeling a certain way. The best anecdote for it is to join me at the Gaslit Nation Phone Bank for Halloween. It's our annual Halloween party where we're going to be making calls with our friends at Sister District to get out the vote and must win Virginia and build the base that we need to overcome the MAGA Jim Crow in the midterms.
(08:39):
Okay, so the midterms start. Now I know people don't want to wrap their heads around that because they're all emotionally exhausted and deliberately beaten down, down, but do the work put in some time. It's just like brushing your teeth. It's just like going into the gym. It's just like eating right. You need to do that for your country where you live. You need to put in some time. So come join me October 22nd, Wednesday 6:00 PM put in some time with me. We're going to make some phone calls, have some fun check in and support each other as we fight like hell for our democracy. So I want to welcome this week's guest. Matthew Bode, a University of North Georgia professor who was harassed by Charlie Kirk's, turning Point USA for speaking out against guns on campus. And yes, Charlie Kirk would ultimately be killed by a gun on campus after being placed on a watch list, Bodhi began researching and wrote The Seven Mountains Mandate, exposing the Dangerous Plan to Christianize America and Destroy Democracy.
(09:48):
So as we're always saying on the show, Trump is the battering ram for the Christian nationalists. They've had a 50 year plan to get here, and they also partnered with the fossil fuel industry as we've covered in past shows, including with the historian and journalist and Nelson who wrote the Shadow Network. Looking at all this as well, we talked to Gil Duran of the Nerd Reich who pointed out how big tech is increasingly becoming Christian Nationalists itself. Peter Thiel, for instance, is obsessed with the antichrist and is using the idea of the antichrist to put a bigger target on us on the left. We're going to have an upcoming episode to talk about that now, to get into what is the seven mountain mandate and why does it feel that we are being attacked on all sides? It's the 50 year plan, it's bearing fruit for them.
(10:45):
So if they had a 50 year plan, where is our 50 year plan? If you know any wonderful people out there, experts, historians, anybody that you are turning to for insights today, books you're coming across, send them my way because I'm collecting a library of podcast interviews of wonderful experts to put together our own 50 year plan and normalize that long-term thinking. No, we're not going to get out of this overnight because we did not get into this crisis overnight. It is going to take short-term urgency by getting out the vote in the all important state races because there is zero substitute for political power. No one should be mind warped to the point where they give away their vote, they give away their civic duty. Don't go to that level of despair. Your vote still matters. Your voice still matters. Every single opposition group that saw the rise of authoritarianism, Hungary, Turkey, Russia, they did not fight hard enough and they gave into their despair, and we cannot afford to do that. And if we do, the world is crushed. So roll up your sleeves, get in with me, stay in. We have no other choice.
Jesse Duplantis (11:59):
I've owned three different jets in my life and used them and just burning them up for the Lord Jesus Christ.
Reporter (12:05):
Televangelist Jesse Duplantis says God himself told him it's time for an upgrade.
Jesse Duplantis (12:11):
He said, I want you to believe me for a Falcon seven x. So I said, okay,
Reporter (12:15):
A Falcon seven jet like this one to preach to more people around the world, and he's asking his followers for the $54 million.
Jesse Duplantis (12:24):
I really believe that if Jesus was physically on the earth today, he wouldn't be riding a donkey.
Reporter (12:29):
From his Louisiana headquarters. Duplantis is among a group of televangelists who preached that their wealth is God's will.
Jesse Duplantis (12:35):
This praise upon the poorest people that want and need money badly where they're told if they give money, God's going to bless them a hundred fold.
Reporter (12:45):
Deis lives in a 35,000 square foot mansion tax free.
Unknown Speaker (12:49):
He's asking everybody who has less than he has to pay for this jet. And I don't get that.
Reporter (12:55):
Fellow televangelist. Kenneth Copeland recently bought a $36 million Gulfstream five jet.
Kenneth Copeland (13:00):
Praise God, isn't that good?
Reporter (13:02):
The two have commiserated about how they can't fly or prey with commercial airline passengers.
Kenneth Copeland (13:09):
This dope filled world and get in a long tube with a bunch of demons, right? That's exactly the, and it's deadly.
Reporter (13:17):
We asked Jesse Duplantis and his ministries for common, but they declined to respond. So far no indication whether he's received any contributions for his jet.
Andrea Chalupa (13:26):
We had the big news of James Comey, no one's favorite person. The left blames him for 2016. Trump blames him for the deep state. And as I'm scrolling through that very Banana Republic authoritarian power grab of Trump's political opponent being indicted, then there's a big news flash of some far right lady attacking our school system, and it just feels like we're getting it from all sides in a deeply funded, extremely well coordinated campaign against every single facet of society that we live by and oversees the very quality of our lives and how we are allowed to express ourselves as independent beings with agency hitting us from all sides. And then I was like, well, thank God I'm talking to Matthew tomorrow. Tell us what in your research have you seen in terms of what's bearing fruit now from this far right operation?
Matthew Boedy (14:25):
Well, as you can imagine with Trump back in power, there are no obstacles to what he's doing, but he is just one part of a larger picture. As I said before, to other people, project 2025 is one of the seven mountains. So all the things you just described is a way in which they're trying to take back the culture in all seven of these areas all at once. And this is why you're feeling it all at once because there are many groups including Turning Point that are trying to do all seven at once. The Seven Mountains thing is a really simple strategy that way. There are areas you could go into, but there are also areas that add up to this larger culture that you want to overtake. They're easy to attack individually, but when you do them all at once, it feels like they're trying to win the culture.
Andrea Chalupa (15:11):
The whole Kimmel cancellation. Now, Kimmel, of course, is back for now, the Nexstar, CEO. He gave an interview where he mentioned his favorite book is the Bible, Sinclair Nexstar, all of these local affiliates owned by conservatives, they are pumping out local news, Fox News. Do you see that as part of the larger Seven Mountain strategy?
Matthew Boedy (15:33):
Certainly because one of the mountains is entertainment. And it used to be that Christians or conservative Christians would try to create their own content. We had veggie tales and we had other things that would run parallel to that, and they would try to win in the marketplace. Our stuff is better. But now really what they're doing is taking the fight to the Hollywood liberals, the news media, the fake media, and not just trying to attack them and saying they're wrong, but then we have, as you point out, many owners of these big networks and affiliates saying, we're not going to run the thing that A B, C wants. So it is a cultural movement. It's not just one person. It's not just one owner. It is a collection of people, you might call it an oligarchy that are saying on the mountain of media that we want to create this other type of culture.
(16:21):
And so silencing people, putting different shows on, focusing characters on individual things, all that is part of the media and entertainment. But I'll also say that Trump's fake news that has really blossomed into a policy and culture war strategy because it attacks the very people that are supposed to be reporting on you and then opens the door up for what they're doing at the White House. These new media spots in the briefing room and Turning Point USA has their own White House correspondence. So once you attack the people and get their audience down, you have these other people that can just step in and do the news you want them to do.
Andrea Chalupa (17:00):
Tell us the history of the Seven Mountain strategy. How did it start? Who was behind it and what is their ultimate goal?
Matthew Boedy (17:08):
So the Seven Mountains mandate, the metaphor of the mountains dates back to the seventies when two leaders of Youth Campus Ministries, Bill Bright, who founded Campus Crusade and a guy named Lauren Cunningham who founded a group called Youth with a Mission. They got together in August of 75 and said, these are the areas that we should take back for our culture. And they used that word take back influence because what they had seen in the sixties up to 75 was a very radically changing culture. So these two people got together and suggested that there was divine inspiration for this list of seven areas. And I always lead one off when I do this, so I'm just going to say business, education, media, entertainment, you could fill in the rest. But this list, of course, was not necessarily divinely inspired because this list of cultural institutions been in textbooks for decades, and you could guess them without even knowing that is they wanted to penetrate the culture for several years after that.
(18:04):
They really expanded their operations to do that. Lauren Cunningham, before he died two years ago, ran a global missions organization and they would go into countries to evangelize for Jesus, but also to do it in a way that, oh, if we hit these seven areas, we had better chance of evangelizing. Bill Bright was jointly known for the college Campus Ministry of Crew, but he became in the late seventies and early eighties, a political player. He wanted to expand the idea of his ministry to a national platform because at that time, as you know, conservative Christians were getting more involved in politics. Those two people and a guy named Peter Wagner who was a professor of church growth who wanted to expand churches and their membership and how they attracted new people are really the three founding fathers of this movement. Wagner started with the idea of culture war, culture dominion, and he wrote books and they really tapped themselves into a network of pastors and religious leaders in the eighties and nineties, more charismatic, that said, we want to take back our culture.
(19:07):
The fourth name I'll mention is a guy your listeners might know. His name is Lance Wall. Now he's certainly alive and he is one of the president's, I'll say biographers. He's written several books about how President Trump represents Old Testament Kings. He's the guy that is credited with the metaphor of the mountains. It was called Seven Areas of Influence or Seven Kingdoms or Seven Spears. But in around 2000, he met Lauren Cunningham and Lauren said, Hey, I got this list here and I've been trying to spread it around. Would you take it on? He's like, wow, this is a really good idea. So yeah, he became the guy known as the Seven Mountains Guy, and he traveled the world with a big whiteboard that he would draw seven peaks on and talk about the devil and Satan controlling all these areas. And eventually, of course, they needed a, as I say in the book, an heir.
(19:52):
They needed a third generation if Lauren Cunningham and Bill Wright were the first generation, Lance Wallnau is the second one, and the third generation is Charlie Kirk of Turning Point USA. He was convinced by other people and Lance to take this on around 2019, 2020. And really since then, Turning Point has not been just a college student conservative organization. It has been the organization in all seven of these areas. There is an arm of Turning Point for all seven of these areas, and Turning Point is the most indispensable organization for the conservative movement as we learned from the memorial service, but also it is the indispensable organization for the Seven Mountains mandate.
Andrea Chalupa (20:35):
So this has been a 50 year plan...
Matthew Boedy (20:39):
Yeah, yeah.
Andrea Chalupa (20:39):
...to hijack our democracy with Christian nationalism using an authoritarian strong man like Trump who they could justify as any of the strong man in the Bold Testament, a perfect Gods and perfect vessel. And that's why they have no problem with Trump and Epstein and all of his divorces cheating on his wife with a porn star when his wife just had a baby. And on the list goes, so who is funding all this.
Matthew Boedy (21:11):
In different ways? Obviously Turning Point gets its own funding from big mega donors and grassroots donors. I think over the years, one of the more interesting things about funding that I noticed is this group that Peter Wagner started called the New Apostolic Reformation, and other people have written about that group, and it is really a collection of charismatic, self-proclaimed pastors and prophets. And what they did over decades, over the eighties and nineties was sell to Christian businessmen the opportunity to learn how to be a kingdom creator, how to learn the culture war, which really wasn't a phrase back then. And they would come to these seminars and rake in money and teach these successful businessmen and people who wanted to be successful businessmen about how to create wealth, how to create money very quickly. And so that funded...
Andrea Chalupa (21:58):
Was this along the lines of the prosperity Bible?
Matthew Boedy (22:01):
Exactly. Right, right, right.
Andrea Chalupa (22:02):
Its like God wants me to fly a private jet, so give me your money.
Matthew Boedy (22:06):
Oh, yes. So the Prosperity Gospel is certainly a segment of this for the non-business guy, right? If you pray enough, if you bless enough financially God, or if you do things enough, God will bless you financially. That is certainly part of it. But it was also the idea that if you came to our seminars and learned the spiritual keys to generating wealth, so these businessmen certainly expanded their businesses in local communities, some nationally. I mean, there are groups that started out very small in one state and Bill Bright helped them expand nationally. So I think that's one part of the funding. There were just many of people who were eager to hand over $500 or a thousand dollars to do this, but once the political movement of Christrian Conservatives came along that would come in and fund these organizations or fund these seminars or fund candidates, and we've seen this obviously in different ways.
(22:55):
Up to Turning Point, I think that there isn't just one group. Obviously the Koch brothers comes up a lot and they fund different organizations. I think really what we saw though in the funding of Christian nationalism broadly is both churches and businesses and these kind of network apostles and profits. So there are many ways in which they get funding. We don't know all the ways in which Turning Point gets its funding, but it started out with big donors, but it has grassroots donors and they buy t-shirts and hats off the merchandise website now. So it funds that early on. People wanted to hear how God could bless them if they do certain things, and Charlie Kirk is an heir of that because he's gone and spoken at conferences about generating wealth. And so I think that's the Prosperity Gospel is the theme throughout the decade.
Andrea Chalupa (23:40):
It's the war that the Seven Mountain mandate is unleashing on universities large and small across this country. It is a hotbed of their culture war because it is the academics who are researching, investigating all this and seeing how it plays out in real life and doing the analysis of the detrimental impact it's going to have on people's lives and quality of life. So obviously they're coming after you. How did you fall into all this as an academic?
Matthew Boedy (24:13):
Fall in is an interesting term because I did not just come upon it. They came upon me. I think that I've always said that I didn't find Turning Point, Turning Point found me. Back in 2016 when nobody really knew who Turning Point was. They started this thing called a professor watch list, which they're not the first group to target professors or have a list, but they came up with a list of about a hundred or so professors, and it was a collection of people that said things they didn't like or comments they made or courses they were teaching that they thought were stupid. And mine was writing an opinion piece for our local newspaper about a bill that's now law in Georgia that allows concealed weapons on a college campuses. You can carry a concealed firearm on our campuses and Turning Point being a Pro Second Amendment gun rights organization.
(24:55):
This was one of their issues and me being a professor that just added to it. So I was put on this list and they were nice enough to use a fancy picture of me and put my contact information on, and they've been adding to my page as the years have gone on and things I've said about them, I think they're well aware of me, but that's how I was targeted by Turning Point. And so once I was started looking into them and writing about them, I started a blog about Charlie and the different things that he said that are inaccurate or incorrect. And I think over the year, I think Turning Point was a hobby for me, but once they switched from being a kind of pro-market free market capitalism, big government sucks organization to a Christian nationalism, that just moved it right into my, as you mentioned, research area.
(25:38):
So it was no longer a hobby, it was just like now I have to actually spend working time on it. So yeah, it was right up in my alley in many ways, and I think that I've not faced a lot of harassment or bad emails. I've gotten some in the last few days I think, but some of my colleagues around the nation who are female or black or do areas in which are more controversial, their stories are much more horrible. I'll just say one more thing is Turning Point, like making lists. They have a professor watch list, they have a school board list, which is school board members and school board districts that they don't like. So they like making lists because it's an easy ready-made made list of targets for people.
Andrea Chalupa (26:15):
It's saying that we have you on her list, we're watching you. It's very stocky.
Matthew Boedy (26:19):
Yes, we're watching you. Yes, we're going to pay very close attention to you. And we have seen this of course, in the last few days since Kirk's death, many professors being fired for social media comments.
Andrea Chalupa (26:29):
You wrote an article in Georgia speaking out against a law that allows people to carry guns on college campuses. And then Charlie Kirk was murdered horribly by someone carrying a gun on a college campus. Obviously, this man did not deserve what happened to him. His family did not deserve what happened to him. Do you think there's any chance that this murder could ultimately wake some people up on their side and say, enough is enough already? We have to. I know at that memorial service, there were comments like his wife said, I forgive the killer, but then Trump and Steven Miller, we're going to burn it down.
Matthew Boedy (27:13):
Yes, we're going to indict people. Yes.
Andrea Chalupa (27:15):
Any hope that you have that there are some folks on their side that are seeing what happened to Charlie and thinking, this is not, we need to tone down the temperature now and come together as a country.
Matthew Boedy (27:29):
The short answer is no, especially on the gun issue. We've seen obviously school shooting after school shooting happen, and nothing has changed there. So I don't sadly think that one death by a gun on a college campus is going to change that. The line from conservatives or pro-gun people is that the good guys would kill the bad guys, and that did not happen here.
Andrea Chalupa (27:51):
It hardly ever happens.
Matthew Boedy (27:52):
Right. So I do think that with your broader question about will things change in terms of the rhetoric, the answers no because we saw that at the memorial service, even with the, again, it was a Christian nationalism memorial service. We had the Christian part very clearly early on with the pastor speaking and the prayers and the worship of songs. And then as you point out, as we moved further and further along into the Trump administration officials, we saw the nationalism part. And they certainly were not toning down the rhetoric. Erica stood out from those other people with the forgiveness thing. And I don't think that, I'm not saying anything negative about her. She was there to be a grieving widow, and we all hope she could say words like that. She did very, very strongly. I think that because of who Charlie was to those people because of who Charlie was to President Trump and to his son and really the whole family, I mean, they've taken this death very personally.
(28:43):
They said that, and they're going to use the powers of the federal government to go after their enemies in his name. And this is the power of the martyrdom rhetoric. Everything we do now is in Charlie's name, and we not just have to honor him. It doesn't really matter if he would agree with it or not, it probably did, but that the power of his death now becomes the motivation to do all these things. Whether it is thousands or millions of Charlie Kirk's being politically organized, or whether it's indicting people, this is the power of martyrdom and this is why it's dangerous in our particular moment in America, to give someone that label, whether you think he was shot for saying Christian truth or not, they're using his name to do things that are not Christian.
Andrea Chalupa (29:28):
Oh, absolutely not. In fact, I'm fascinated by the early church. I'm fascinated by Roman Empire history, and the early church was a bunch of people who were like, oh, my life matters. Even though I'm a slave woman, my life matters. And we have records because the Romans were masters of bureaucracy. We have records of women especially being deacons in fighting with their bodies on the line to establish the church. It was very much like a socialist inclusive, antifa, anti-corruption reformist movement. And I'm just so fascinated by it. The early church, we're talking the early church, not what...
Matthew Boedy (30:08):
Full Constantine
Andrea Chalupa (30:10):
Devolve into under patriarchy popes, but so yes, I digress as I like to do. But I wanted to ask you, what is their ultimate outcome? What will happen to women under an American Christian nationalist dictatorship? What will happen to non-white people?
Matthew Boedy (30:29):
I do think that the Seven Mountains mandate is a broad spectrum of people. So I do want to be specific about, let's just say women and voting. There is a segment of that group that wants to undo the 19th Amendment that perhaps wants to do voting by head of household, which would obviously be the man. Charlie Kirk is not one of those. Erica is not one of those. They said directly that would ruin the voting power of conservatives. But there are certainly segment of population. There is also, as you point out, a sort of divide between whether or not women should be involved in the church or not, and whether women should be pastors or deacons or whatever. I think it's a theological debate you can have. But I think with the Seven Mountains movement of Christian nationalism more broadly, that the idea of there are certain gender roles, women would protect the home and make the home an inviting, welcoming place for the man and the man would protect the nation.
(31:21):
And we see this very directly, I think with the Secretary of Defense or Secretary of War, whatever you want to call him. Now, he comes from this background. He comes from this theological statement about gender roles. And so he is promoting the Warrior ethos. He's mentioned women a few times, but it really is about men protecting the nation and then the women creating a home. And Erica mentioned this, I think, I think it was the Thursday night speech before the memorial service. She thought she created a sacred space for home for Charlie to come home and not have to deal with any of the outside politics or voices. She wanted to be an encouraging place. That type of ideas is throughout Christian conservative churches, but also the Seven Mountains mandate Movement. There are some certainly Christian leaders, Paul, the White, Cain being one of them who are female and part of Trump's advisory board.
(32:10):
But generally speaking, these set roles are where they see women and men, and of course that leaves out people that don't match those gender categories. That leaves out people who are not married or not family and certainly without kids. And then it comes to the, okay, if you're going to enforce that Christian consensus on everybody, what does that mean for the rest of the people who are not? Charlie has said at times that the First Amendment, that generally means separation of church and state, even though that's not in it meant that the founders were not interested in choosing between Protestant sex. They were generally a Protestant nation. Obviously that leaves out the Catholics. There's a segment of Roman Catholicism that is Christian nationalists, but most of it's not. So that would leave out the Catholics. It certainly would leave out the other part of the Judeo-Christian heritage that we claim to have, which most people point out as erasing the first part of it.
(33:04):
And then of course, it erases to me the fundamental notion of democracy, which is what we are found upon is religious pluralism, that there is religious freedom for everyone, no matter if you're Christian or not. So a Christian consensus culture would be Christians running the culture. There might be a couple of places available to that, but some people in the Seven Mountains mandate movement have talked about, well, the federal government could have separation for state, but the states, they're not going to have that. So we would enforce a much tighter, stronger Christian culture in each individual states. That certainly could lead to all the things you just mentioned about voting and about no religious pluralism. So what do they want in the end? They want this Christian consensus culture. So electing people is certainly one mountain, but the other mountains are not as clear cut in terms of what they want to do, but they want to erase voices that they don't agree with that they don't think are Christian enough or not Christian at all.
(33:59):
And they want to set up policies and laws and morays, cultural morays that would perpetuate their version of Christianity. So the mountain of education comes very important. The long game for them is not just private schools, but public schools with a patriotic Christian education in it. So you can see in all seven areas, there are different ways in which they could do this. And I do think that turning point with one of the first organizations to say, we're going to do all seven at the same time, and that's really what they've done with their a hundred million dollars budget over the last five years is turn and say, we were going to expand on all seven of these areas.
Andrea Chalupa (34:35):
In your research, is there anything to counteract this a hundred million dollars? The Democrats have that among their donors, but unfortunately it's all going to overpaid consultants in Washington DC to flood our phones with text messages asking for more money. But do you see anything on the left that even comes close to challenging or trying to dismantle what they've built over 50 years?
Matthew Boedy (35:03):
No, because one, they've built it up over 50 years. And because this seven mountains thing is such a simple strategy, it's seven particular areas. And so everyone, if it really is on message, even if you might be in a different mountain area, the Democrat Party and the left and the progressive party are known for this kind of very unwielding big tent. They're trying to put all these different groups in, and that is a form of democracy. Let me doubt about that. But the right has said, we're not going to air our grievances with each other. We're not going to do disagreements. We're going to be on message. And this is what point I think was really good at. There is clear theological differences between the Christians that they brought into the tent. And also of course, there are some Christians that don't like Donald Trump, but would be for Charlie Kirk because he does it in a nicer way.
(35:50):
But Charlie specifically made it so that there would no be the no disagreements policy that the Reagan policy of don't talk bad about your fellow conservative. That has been going on for years, and then they've been building these networks. So that just for, again, back to the mountain of education, we have a voucher movement that has been expanding for decades so that now in the last five years or so, they're expanding the state voucher programs to any student who's never been to a public school. So that's taken decades. I don't think that there are organizations on the other side that are doing that and do it so effectively. So they're behind the eight ball behind in so many ways. And then you go out and try to win elections. As a person who I didn't vote for a long time, I voted against Donald Trump three times and for the other candidate, and I say that out loud to suggest that I wasn't convinced to vote for a long time before that. So I think that they're, but just behind in terms of how they message, but whether or not they can do that unified simple message is still unclear because we've seen the last three presidential candidates talk to everybody and it doesn't work because Donald Trump seems to be a better communicator. And I put that in quotations on the video.
Andrea Chalupa (37:04):
And when the Democrats try to get everybody in line where you have to worship Queen Pelosi, like Yas Queen, as they say online, and couldn't say anything bad about Kamala without Kayhive coming after you. And so there is this feeling among the Wiley big tent that any attempt by the Democratic Party establishment to get people in formation just comes across as creepy corruption and the DNC trying to rig things against the progressive base, which there is a reported document history of, for instance, political vendors were punished if they worked for progressive candidates in Democratic party primaries. That's all been recorded. So yeah, so the Democrats, I don't think what Reagan did in saying we're all going to love each other. I don't think that works with the Democrats. It just simply doesn't work. And I think what the Democrats ultimately need is values being led by values like Bernie had it.
(38:07):
I wasn't a big Bernie fan in 2016. I mean, he had an odd track record in Congress when it came to Russia and Ukraine that put up red flags. I've talked about on past episodes. I'll link to it in the show notes. But he did have a winning message of are you willing to fight for someone you don't know? And people are like, yes. And I think Democrats need values, empathy. You can lead with that. And I know Hillary's listening to this going, I led with that, but she also got caught on tape telling black activists All lives matter. And then Kamala is still getting hounded by Gaza activists because they couldn't just let a rep from Georgia Rua Roman on stage to deliver a unifying message at the DNC calling for peace. So...
Matthew Boedy (38:53):
They do eat their own very quickly. They eat their own. Yeah.
Andrea Chalupa (38:55):
Absolutely. I know conservatives aren't Kumbaya in all holding hands. I know they have their own tensions and turf wars and so on, but I guess that cohesiveness comes because they're socialized in the church.
Matthew Boedy (39:11):
Yeah.I think so yeah.
Andrea Chalupa (39:11):
So they're used to that socialization of seeing the same people every Sunday, going to cookouts every Sunday with the same people. And you get used to knowing your people, seeing your people, and now their churches are political action committees.
Matthew Boedy (39:26):
Oh, yeah. I think that is certainly true. And I think one of the things that Charlie and Turning Point did well when they started going into churches around 2020, was addressing the issue that churches should not be political. I mean, he directly called pastors who would not talk about political issues, cowards because they would not do it from the pulpit. But I think the way he addressed it was that the phrase they came up with, and it's biblical, not political. So they have these founding documents, if you will, the Bible and other things. If they say, make very clearly, here's what we should do with our nation. There isn't a document like that. Obviously there are Democrats who are Christians, but at the same time, it's not a straightforward, here's the thing, we can follow a plan we can follow. And I think that just for me, somebody who is in Georgia and who has knocked on doors for Democratic candidates in red districts values comes across certainly, but also you're never sure what you're for because the other side has been for something for a while. Now they're also against many things, but this strategy makes it seem like they're for this thing. And if you're for this thing, I mean, that's what Donald Trump Jr said at the Moral service. He listed all the things and said, if you agree with this, you're one of us. I mean, that phrase stuck out to me. And now four days later, I don't hear that from the other side.
Andrea Chalupa (40:39):
Nope. It's a mess over there. It's sort of like a feeding trough of consulting contracts. It really is. And Ken Martin, who came from Minnesota, there was a lot of hope in him, but it's just he's got a big mess to untangle there in dc I know my sister spent many years at the DNC as a consultant. I've seen it up close. So anyway, so moving on. I want to ask you in terms of the population of people we're up against, because we are a country of what, 300 million?
Matthew Boedy (41:07):
350 Sure. What the census was. Yeah, that's right.
Andrea Chalupa (41:10):
And probably less because people are leaving now or being kicked out. So how many of them are there?
Matthew Boedy (41:18):
There's been some polling on Christian nationalism and what elements you might agree with. There's been some polling surveys specifically on the Seven Mountains mandate naming that in polls. And generally speaking, there is probably about 30 to 40% of Americans that would identify themselves in some manners as agreeing with elements of Christian nationalism and specifically the Seven Mountains mandate. The Seven Mountains mandate as a strategy has taken over the Republican Party. So ever what a percentage you think are Republican party members. They have that now with conservative Christians or evangelicals, there's certainly a segment of the population that is that, again, 30, 30%. But I want to stress about the Seven Mountains mandate that it is not about winning masses of people. It is not about evangelizing. That is converting people to Christianity. So that we have a majority of people in the country who are Christians.
(42:13):
It is a minority movement on purpose. So whatever percentage we say that they are, they're okay with that percentage because they want to put individual people in the high places. And that's a Lance Wall now phrase. They want to elect people like Mike Johnson, who was a Seven Mountains person to a powerful pose. They want to elect John Q Public to a school board seat. They want to elect Nancy Q Public to a state government workforce development board. And then from there, using the democratic levers of power to be anti-democratic, to enforce the minority Christian consensus culture on the rest of us. So to answer your question, yeah, there's probably 30 to 40% of Americans who agree with this. And if you say again, the electoral is split 50 50, then Donald Trump brings in the extra 10% of independents or people who are not interested in this. So it's growing. It has grown over the recent years during the Biden administration and this percentage of people, but I think that it works itself as a minority movement on purpose.
Andrea Chalupa (43:14):
They just need to take political power. And once they have that, that's all that matters. So final question to you, America is about to celebrate its 200 birthday. And that birthday began of course, with the Declaration of Independence, and that was followed by the first big battle and the biggest battle ultimately of the American Revolution, which was the Battle of Brooklyn. One witness described something like 15,000 British troops descending on New York Harbor. It looked like all the ships that were coming in, it looked like all of London was suddenly on New York Harbor. And we have a beloved local military museum in Brooklyn at Fort Hamilton that commemorates the battle of Brooklyn, Washington. And the rebels ultimately lost the battle of Brooklyn, but they won the war. And that's sort of the message of hope as you hear in Hamilton, the musical. But so now Pete Hegseth wants to shut down this museum here in Brooklyn, right on near the water in Fort Hamilton, in Brooklyn, beloved Museum, getting ready to celebrate the 250th birthday of America.
(44:30):
Why? And this museum has fragile artifacts and documentation, and without that funding, it's closed down what happens to all that. And that's one of several American military museums on the chopping block by Pete Hegseth under the justification of their now. Now the Department of War as Trump now calls it, is prioritizing lethality. Lethality, like killing people, like being a killing machine, not education, not preserving our heritage, not preserving our history, and not preserving witness. What is the motivation of that? I was just thinking the Kremlin must love this because they're weakening us from within and they're taking away our sense of self and our history. The Kremlin is all about that in Ukraine right now. So what would the motivation be for Pete Hegseth, who's coming from this seven mountain mandate Christian national's movement? What is the end game in that?
Matthew Boedy (45:27):
I mean, I think that story that you laid out is repeated. It's being repeated in all the service academies. He has redone the board of trustees, Charlie Kirk, or was on one of them for the Air Force Academy. And those board of trustees are redoing the curriculum of the service academies, both in terms of the physical standards they have to pass, but also as you mentioned, the history that they get in their nation. And I think we've heard the story of museums being changed over or being erased or ended because of specifically, I think the mountain of education is about two things. One, a patriotic education. We're the greatest country on the earth. Here's our great history. We had some missteps back in the day, but we're good now. And then two, with the patriotism becomes this idea that God is on our side. We've had the Puritans in the city on the hill and other things go along with that, but that we can't debate our history because we know our history.
(46:27):
And that's the debate between the 1619 project and the 1776 Commission is a great example of that. They want to erase things that would open us up for debate or open us up for things that don't go along with their patriotic education. I don't know, losing a battle might be the reason that they're killing that museum there, but they're doing it in other places so that they can set up their own curriculum, their own museums, their own idea of what American history should be because they know that eventually teaching that history creates people in many ways, like Charlie Kirk who understands and says those things again and again.
Andrea Chalupa (47:03):
Yeah. Well, maybe this museum at Fort Hamilton might survive, but there are several that will not. So are they trying to purge to get money to do something just awful, like expand their gulag or militar, put greater military in cities across America?
Matthew Boedy (47:22):
No, I just think that they don't like museums that opened up for debate. You have these different pieces that could talk about the history in different ways. I mean, they're certainly reducing the size of government by paying for this museum, but I don't think necessarily they're interested in collecting a lot of money for another thing. They obviously want to fund the Department of War and Defense in its great lethality, but I think they're just interested in cutting the size of government and also suggesting that government should not pay for things. They don't agree.
Andrea Chalupa (47:49):
Alright, and so are we basically going to become like a white Iran with all these mullahs on the Supreme Court, final question.
Matthew Boedy (47:58):
Yeah, that's a tough one. I don't know what foreign country is the model here. We have a lot of examples from Hungary here. The UK is trying to do the same thing in terms of erasing their immigrant population. There are models for strong men around the nation. I do think the model for the Seven Mountains mandate is their mythical version of the founding of our country. It was a Christian nation. It had all these churches and the preachers were part of the political establishment. There's this myth about preachers fighting in the Civil War called the Black Road Regiment, but also I think there is a hierarchy of gender there. They may not necessarily want to take away the 19th Amendment, but clearly men should lead and women should do something else. Now, race, that might be a different story. There are some people out there really into our diversity. Some people are not in the Seven Mountains movement, but I do think the idea of what they think happened in 1776 is what they want to return to. And that may be the model they're searching for.
Andrea Chalupa (49:02):
Including slavery.
Matthew Boedy (49:05):
Well, intellectual slavery. Sure.
Andrea Chalupa (49:15):
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