Monday, January 6, 2025

I will also say we’re going to be coming back to the historical context of January the 9th, that’s Thursday of this week, as a National Day of Mourning and the date of the state funeral of former president Jimmy Carter. And we’re going to be talking about the significance of those kinds of events, why a state funeral is different than other funerals, and we’re going to be talking about the continuation of the Christian legacy in terms of that service, whether or not it’s acknowledged by the secular world or not.

But we also need to turn to the fact that there were other headlines, and at least at the top of that list, very troubling headlines having to do with two terror attacks, or apparently two terror attacks, that took place as we were looking at January the 1st of 2025. And it was in the wee hours of that morning that there was a truck that was deliberately driven into the crowd on Bourbon Street in New Orleans, even as that city was getting ready, not only having celebrated the New Year celebration in a city that is basically synonymous with partying, but as the city was also preparing to host the Sugar Bowl. And it was on that date, it was New Year’s Day, about 3:15 in the morning, local time there in New Orleans, when a man ran a rented pickup truck into a crowd, deliberately killing and wounding a number of people.

It is now believed that 14 persons were struck by this particular attacker with the truck and died, and there were dozens, one way or another, who were injured, some of them very critically injured. The death toll of the event, in terms of the historical record, is 15 at this point, but that includes the perpetrator. It includes the man now properly and even in a legal context, rightly spoken of as a domestic terrorist. And it is because his death is a part of the total death toll. He was shot by police even as they sought to stop him in terms of proceeding with his attack. It was also discovered that he had explosive devices that he at least evidently intended to detonate, causing further death and injury. And by the time about 24 hours had passed after that event, it was very clear it was an act that is described as domestic terrorism.

Now, the reason why the word domestic is in front of the word terrorism, or terror attack in this particular context, is because there was no direct foreign influence that was cited. On the other hand, just a matter of hours after this attack, it became very clear that even if there was no overt foreign orchestration, this was an exhibition, a deadly exhibition and demonstration, of Islamist jihadism, and the direct source of the influence here was the terror group known as the Islamic State. Now we need to remind ourselves that the Islamic State is basically a group that came to prominence in terms of our attention with the form of the Islamic State known as ISIS, and that was a particular group operating there in the Middle East. And even as ISIS was largely neutralized as an individual military unit, the fact is that the ideology of ISIS, and the virus basically of Islamic terrorism, and the claims of the Islamic State, and the historic aims of the Islamic State as it’s known, this is a group that continues, and they continue to influence persons.

Here’s where modern technologies like the internet are turned into basically missionary avenues for Islamic terrorism. It is now abundantly clear, and the FBI has confirmed that this was a man who was mobilized by the Islamic State, also known as ISIS, and an Islamic State flag was actually affixed to the truck he used as a deadly weapon, having rented the truck through the app known as Turo. That becomes relevant to another story that has to follow immediately after this one. This terror attack was carried out with intentionality and with brutality. You have a man who deliberately drove this rented truck around barriers, most importantly, police cars that had been put in the place, and he went onto Bourbon Street, there about 3:15 a.m. and tried to hit as many people, and thus injure and kill as many people as possible. And he was quite successful, tragically enough, in terms of that attack until he was stopped by New Orleans Police.

Shamsud-Din Jabbar was formerly one who served in the United States military, serving in the U.S. Army, and identified as, “a decorated Army veteran,” who at the time of the attack held what’s identified as a $120,000 a year job. With a private firm, he held the title of senior solutions specialist. Evidently, he had been unraveling. The New York Times describes the path leading up to the attack as a path of isolation and radicalization. In a series of videos that really came to public attention after the attack, tragically enough, it became clear that Mr. Jabbar had considered killing many members of his own family, but instead turned to this attack there on Bourbon Street in New Orleans, and he was seeking to make a statement, including the fact that he wanted others to, “witness the killing of the apostates.”

Now, as we’re looking at this, we do need to recognize there are intermingled questions here. We’re looking at a tangle of ethical and worldview questions that demand our attention. For one thing, we see the fact that there is undoubtedly the continuing threat of Islamic terrorism, and not only out there somewhere around the world but right here on the streets of American cities. It is quite clear that there are those who at, the very least, are extremely troubled in psychological or psychiatric terms. And even if, for example, the argument is made that this is a man who took advantage of a terrorist argument based in Islamic thought, and he did so in order to basically capitalize having some other motivation, the fact is, this was a self-radicalization that was carried out under the influence of the Islamic State, whether or not the Islamic State was a direct actor in this situation or not.

In moral terms, the Christian worldview would tell us that the indirectness, in this case, is basically a matter of legal concern, not really a matter of moral concern. The moral responsibility is clearly there and it’s everywhere. It’s on the Islamic State and it is on Mr. Jabbar. And as you’re looking at this, you recognize the secular world basically still, still after all of the experience with Islamic terrorism and Islamic militancy over the course of the last several decades, not to mention several centuries in terms of the engagement between the Islamic world and the Christian West, the reality is that a secularized elite in this country doesn’t want to admit that theology can ever matter, and that in reality it is a theological ideology turned into a murderous instrument of terrorism that is behind all of this.

Now, keep in mind that in the days leading up to Christmas, there was another vehicular attack that took place at a Christmas marketplace in Germany. And once again, you have a vehicle, which is of course intended for transportation, that is turned into a deadly instrument of murder, and in some cases as there in Bourbon Street in New Orleans, mass murder. But you’re also looking at the fact that the related story is the fact that later on the same day, change the city from New Orleans to Las Vegas, and there was an explosion in which a truck blew up just outside of a Trump-named hotel, and it led to the death of the driver and to at least the injury of several other persons. It was not clear exactly what was behind the explosion of the Cybertruck.

Now here’s the interesting link, both of the men involved in carrying out these particular events, we’ll just use the word event for just a moment, carrying out these acts, they both had experience in the U.S. military, and at least at some point had served in the same base or at the same base by assignment. It is also clear that there were links about the date, January the 1st of 2025, and there was the fact that both of them had used a vehicle in the commission of their acts, and both of them had used the same app in order to arrange for the rental of the vehicle.

Now, one took a truck and drove it into a massive crowd on Bourbon Street, New Orleans, the other is seemingly filled the Cybertruck with explosives and just before setting it off with some kind of mechanism, he shot himself. In any event, he was the only fatality in the attack. But you can understand why you had national security, police, and law enforcement officials who immediately went to the conclusion that the use of the same app, the common background in the U.S. military, there must be, with a common date, there must be some very, very clear parallels that are at least seemingly suggestive of some kind of link. But it is interesting that within just a matter of hours, major law enforcement officials in the United States came back to say, “We do not see a link.” And one of them was clearly a very dramatic suicide, and the other was a very dramatic homicide.

Jabbar, who carried out the murderous attack there in New Orleans, was a military veteran, but when it comes to the man who blew up the Cybertruck there in front of the Trump Hotel in Las Vegas, Matthew Livelsberger, he was an active duty Green Beret, a highly decorated American soldier. He had served for nearly 20 years in the American uniformed services, and he had been deployed repeatedly in Afghanistan and elsewhere. And so even as he had also been giving some indications of mental instability, no one had flagged either one of these two individuals as someone likely to carry out an attack upon himself, not to mention others. And so you look at this, you recognize there are a lot of complexities here.

For one thing, you look at the fact that without the internet, without that technology, none of this would’ve happened. And I mean that specifically in the case of the attack in New Orleans, the mobilization by ISIS is something that didn’t take place by, say, long distance telegram or telephone call. It didn’t take place by some kind of postal service. It took place because of the internet, and the internet has opened up a vast ocean, not only of filth, but it has opened a vast sea of terrorist information.

Now, we discussed the fact that there were those, decades ago, who were arguing that it ought to be legal to publish what was known as the Anarchist Cookbook, which was basically a printed book that was a part of the radical movement in the 1960s that suggested ways to make a bomb and carry out other kinds of domestic attacks. They used the free speech argument, but all of that now seems rather quaint when, whether on the active internet in terms of publicly accessible pages or in the netherworld of the internet where you have the dark internet, the reality is, one way or another, if you’re looking for this kind of material, you’re probably going to be able to find it. And if you are looking for ISIS, you can count on the fact that ISIS is looking for you. And when you look again at this, you notice that the secular world around this just can’t handle the fact that this really is a theologically motivated terrorist act, and that’s made very clear by the terrorist himself.

It’s also a very humbling issue when you recognize that the power, even in terms of a highly technological age with all kinds of technological powers at the hands of, say, the state, the government, the police, the reality is there is almost no way to keep a would-be terrorist from gaining information, not only about the motivation about carrying out this kind of attack, but also about the technique and the engineering, the details that are involved in carrying it out. That is something that is new in terms of human experience. Now, again, the Christian worldview tells us that the intention, the murderous intention, is not new, but the technology that has allowed this to happen, it is new. And just to state the matter most clearly, without the invention of something that would lead to a modern truck, you don’t have a truck to drive into people with murderous intent.

Without the internet, which of course can be used for much good, including podcasts, the reality is it can be used for much evil as well, and that’s something that Christians understand. That’s a Genesis 3 understanding of sin and its effects in terms of corruption throughout the entire civilization, the entire structure of human society. It is also a reminder of the fact that sin, as the Apostle Paul describes it, “will seize the opportunity,” and that’s exactly what it does. But that also is a humbling realization when we recognize that sin can now seize many opportunities, in terms of modern technologies and ideologies, that didn’t exist in these forms in times past. But as Christians, try to think through these issues in terms of a biblical worldview, we also need to understand some distinctions.

In the case of the attack in New Orleans, this clearly appears to be rooted in a clash of worldviews and in the influence of a deadly ideology in terms of Islamic terrorism, the Islamic State. When it comes to the incident there in Las Vegas, it appears that this is a demonstration of what is probably best described as personal despair, and that’s also deadly. But in this case, it was deadly when it came to the man himself who was really carrying out, it appears, a very ritualized and very public form of suicide, using a Cybertruck filled with explosives as his weapon. Christians understand two things out of this. One is the commonality of all sin in terms of what comes down to a very, very dark motivation, but we also understand that motivation comes in different forms, and in this case, different deadly forms, one in New Orleans, one in Las Vegas within hours of each other.

Just in terms of moral significance, we had to start with those headlines, but now we turn to domestic political headlines and most importantly, to the election to a new term of the Speaker of the House, Mike Johnson, Republican of Louisiana. And you’ll recall that even as we were headed into the formation of the new Congress, and the sitting of that Congress, and one of the first things that is required in the House of Representatives is the election of a Speaker. Given the fact that there is a thin but real Republican majority in the House of Representatives, Republicans had the opportunity to elect a Speaker and they did. They re-elected Mike Johnson to that role. But as you know, the big drama leading up to it was the question as to whether or not Mike Johnson would get sufficient support to be re-elected as Speaker of the House. And if not, by the way, the result could have been a series of things that, well, if not described as catastrophic, would be at least problematic.

One of them is that if indeed you didn’t elect the Speaker and the Speaker wasn’t in place for the Congress to be in session, for example, for the certification of the presidential election, that could create a problem for the President-elect Donald Trump, and he knew it. And there is no doubt he put his personal political energy behind the re-election of Mike Johnson as the Speaker of the House. Now, there are all kinds of tangled issues here, but the most important thing to recognize is that when you look at the United States Congress right now, you look at the House of Representatives, there are two great divides that characterize just about everything that happens in the House.

The first divide is between Republicans and Democrats. You had that figured out already. The second big divide is Republicans versus Republicans. And even as you look at Republicans versus Democrats, that’s pretty clean. You have two different parties, and at this point, they are separated by such divergent agendas, political identities and ideologies that you really can’t put them together in terms of much confusion about Democrats and Republicans. The idea that there will be moderates who would just have a D or an R incidentally connected to their name, that’s a part of politics past in the United States. The political, moral, cultural polarization in this country means that you’re pretty much R or pretty much D, or you wouldn’t hold the seat. And of course that means the big contest is which party will be in the majority, and the Republicans have a majority, but it is an extremely thin majority. And that means that when you look at the reality of the election of a Speaker, Mike Johnson could afford to lose very, very few votes, and by that, we mean one to two at the most.

Beyond that, there would not be the election of a Speaker, and this could go into a very long and very fractious, unpredictable process that wouldn’t have served anyone. And I think that’s the reason why President-elect Trump leaned in pretty heavily in support of Mike Johnson. It’s also clear that Mike Johnson has made clear to the President-elect that he intends to be his partner in terms of moving legislation forward. The same thing is true, by the way, with John Thune, who is the new Republican majority leader in the Senate, but the House is far more fractious. And by the way, that’s not a new development, it’s always been that way. But something else we need to recognize is the fact that the majority leader in the Senate is a very powerful position, but it’s not a constitutional position. The Speaker of the House is a constitutional position.

Well, here’s the strength of what Mike Johnson can say. He can say that he was elected again as Speaker of the House, elected in order to be Speaker of the new Congress, and he was elected on the first vote, and that’s a happy story. The less happy part of that is that there were three votes that were withheld, and basically Mike Johnson had to put a delay on the closure of the vote in order to persuade at least two of those three to vote for him so that he would have the majority necessary to be elected Speaker of the House. And so in the cloak room there behind the rostrum, at least some kind of negotiation took place in which at least two out of the three came out and voted for Mike Johnson as Speaker, thus giving him the role and the House can now move on.

But the question is of course, for how long? Because being elected by this kind of process with that thin of a margin, the reality is that the signal is sent to the Speaker of the House, that every single vote, every single day is a test to whether he will continue to have sufficient support to continue in that job. Of course, you see something else in this. You see the fact that President-elect Trump, at the very least, did not want to have a fractious debate and headlines about who would be the Speaker of the House when he is doing his best to direct energies towards putting together a new administration for Inauguration Day, which let me just remind you, is just days away.

The President-elect would not have been well served by the failure to elect a speaker, but even as the House now has a speaker, recent history has indicated that it can unmake a speaker about as fast as it can make one. And so we’re seeing a redefinition of the power structures in the House of Representatives. Again, the Speaker of the House is a constitutional role, but the politics behind how an individual is elected Speaker of the House, that turns out to be very, very interesting.

We’re going to have to follow very clearly the intra-Republican debate and struggle over many of these issues, including the definition of the party and the legislation in terms of its content, and there are some real differences. For one thing, you have some Republicans who don’t want to basically make spending limits the most important issue. They’re more interested in other agendas. And then you have some such as, say, Texas Congressman Chip Roy, who’s made very clear he’s not going to budge off of his agenda to reduce, genuinely, substantially, federal spending. Now, that’s not going to be an easy thing to pull off, but you are looking at people, all of whom will say they want to cut spending, but when it comes to actual spending bills, it turns out that fewer of them really want to cut spending when it might cost them key political support.

By the way, one of the most interesting things is how the Democrats put some of the funding from the massive spending bills that were undertaken by the Biden administration, they put some of that massive federal spending in congressional districts held by Republicans, not to be nice, but in order to make it extremely difficult for those very same Republicans to come back and constrict the spending because it might lead to less government money flowing into their own district and fewer jobs undergirded by that federal largesse, or at least arguably supported by that federal funding. In other words, they tried to put in a suicide pill when it comes to Republican intentions to, in any sense, meaningfully reduce the national debt or the national budget, either or both. But that leads to another big question we need to think about and focus on the days ahead, and that is what does it mean that we will now have a Republican president, a Republican majority in the Senate and a thin but real Republican majority in the House of Representatives?

Now, if you just look at the numbers, you would think, well, now this is similar to the situation in the British Parliament where the prime minister, by the very fact that he is the head of the majority party, conceivably he or she can’t lose a vote, but as you know, sometimes they do. And when it comes to the American system, it is a bit different. And in this case, even though you have a Republican president coming into office, and you have a Republican majority in the House, and a Republican majority and even more substantial Republican majority in the Senate, there is still a problem because most of the bills that will be considered in the United States Senate still must get past the filibuster, and that means must gain 60 votes. And even as there are 53 Republican senators, 45 Democrats, and two independents who basically vote with the Democrats, so say it’s a 53/47 split, it takes 60 votes to move most legislation.

So the interesting thing is how this is going to play out with some of the biggest controversies, not so much in the House, but I think you can predict at this point that many of the most explosive controversies are going to be in the Senate. Then the big question is, once the Senate comes to some kind of consensus that can achieve 60 votes, what is President Trump going to do with that and what will the Republican House of Representatives do with that? If you are interested in these things, and I trust as listeners to The Briefing you are, you can count on the fact that we are in for a very interesting, very explosive, very immediate lesson in civics in the United States, and that is likely to begin in week one of the Trump administration, which is going to come quickly, so get ready.

Sometimes the big story behind the story in politics is not so much the clash of parties as it is the continuation of certain forms of civility, even something that can be described at times such as respect and kindness. Buddy MacKay, the former governor of Florida, died just in recent days, at age 91. Here’s what makes that story really interesting, Buddy MacKay was not elected governor of Florida. He became governor when, after serving as Governor Lawton Chiles’ lieutenant governor, when Lawton Chiles died on December the 13th of 1998, well, all of a sudden, Buddy MacKay, the lieutenant governor, became governor of the state of Florida, and he remained governor for all of 23 days.

Okay, here’s where the story gets even more interesting. Just days before the governor died and the lieutenant governor became governor, the lieutenant governor lost the governor’s race to the man that his governor, his boss, had defeated, and that was Jeb Bush, who became Florida Governor Jeb Bush. So Lawton Chiles was the governor. His lieutenant governor Buddy MacKay ran against Jeb Bush. Jeb Bush won, and so at this point, Buddy MacKay is not going to be governor and he’s going to be no longer even lieutenant governor, but then Lawton Chiles dies unexpectedly. Buddy MacKay is the governor. He’s governor of the state of Florida, the office he sought, and he is governor for all of 23 days.

Okay, so Buddy MacKay became governor of Florida, and even if he held the office for 23 days, he held the office. Here’s where the kindness and respect comes in. The newly elected Republican Governor Jeb Bush, took office, and years ago, a Florida legislator told me what happened. Because Buddy MacKay had been governor for only 23 days, the question is, do you hang an official oil portrait of a governor of Florida who served for 23 days and was never elected? And inevitably the question fell to the incoming governor, Jeb Bush, who had defeated Buddy MacKay in the gubernatorial election. And I was told that when he was confronted with this question, governor Bush said, “Well, here’s what you’re going to do. You’re going to hang the full-size portrait of Governor MacKay because after all, it doesn’t matter how many days or years he served, he was constitutionally the governor of Florida and deserves to be honored as such.”

You also have to give to the now late governor a great line out of politics. When he was asked why he lost the election, he said, “I got out of politics because of illness.” He then went on to say, “The voters got sick and tired of me.”Let’s just say that It’s rare to hear that kind of candor from a politician.