Buddhist Catholic Contemplative Evangelical General Christian Hindu Jewish Latter-day Saint Muslim New Visions Progressive Christian

Beliefs

Topics

Columnists

Resource Library

Research Tools

Video

Podcasts

Thought Readers

Faith In Media Tracker

Newsletters

Ad-Free & Subscriber Log-In Subscription Support

Follow Patheos

Why I Still Talk to Jesus -- In Spite of Everything

Home
Politics and Religion
Dear Paul Ryan, I Have a Message To You From Your Mentor and My Old Friend Jack Kemp About You Endorsing Trump

Dear Paul Ryan, I Have a Message To You From Your Mentor and My Old Friend Jack Kemp About You Endorsing Trump

Last updated on: June 4, 2016 at 8:51 am by Frank Schaeffer

Dear Paul Ryan, I Have a Message To You From Your Mentor and My Old Friend Jack Kemp About You Endorsing Trump 2016-06-04T08:51:48-06:00 Frank Schaeffer

LOGO Patheos Explore the world's faith through different perspectives on religion and spirituality! Patheos has the views of the prevalent religions and spiritualities of the world.

(AP-Photo)

Paul Ryan: So you’ve changed your mind about Trump and endorsed him. I too changed my mind. Some 30 years ago-plus I changed my mind about being a Republican on the religious right. But I did not change my mind about loving my country. You have. You have embraced Trump. And you have betrayed us all. You have also betrayed our mutual friend Congressman Jack Kemp’s memory. Jack is remembered among other things as your mentor. You are a traitor to Kemp and to everything he stood for.

I used to stay in Jack’s home with Jack and his wife Joanne, as my kind hosts. They organised a number of political and religious events we jointly ran together in Washington DC, alongside my dad Francis Schaeffer, the religious right leader and founder of the Protestant wing of the anti-abortion movement (with C. Everett Koop). Dad was also a Kemp family friend. The Kemps even hosted monthly a “Schaeffer study group” based on my Dad’s books in their home that my mother, dad and I all spoke at.

I can’t remember if back in those days I ever met you as the young Kemp staffer and protegee. Had I met you Paul, I’ll bet that if I asked you then if you’d ever betray Jack to the point of endorsing a fascist thug for president, or put party unity ahead of country, or politics ahead of patriotism, you’d have denied it. But Paul Ryan: you are now only going to be remembered as the sidekick to Trump, and Trump is everything Jack hated most.

As someone who has turned my back on my evangelical and right wing past and on the GOP too am sometimes called a traitor. But nothing I’ve ever done while moving to the left has come close to your utter treason against America, virtue and goodness that you, Paul Ryan, now embrace as you suck up to Trump.

Trump campaigns on lies, bigotry, insults, fear-mongering and unreason. Too few “Kempian” Republican leaders of principle have offered even some resistance. You once did. Now, thanks to you, you Judas, the capitulation to Trump by the GOP is total.

The GOP is Trump’s party now. The mask has slipped. You are a white supremacist party Paul, nothing more. Period. Thus you will go down in history.

In other words, with your blessing Paul Ryan, the Republican Party is now officially the party of pure greed, evil, misogyny, racism and stupidity and outright fraud. You have stabbed Jack Kemp in the back. You have stabbed your children in the back too.

You capitulated to pure filth and ugliness. And you’ve taken the GOP down with you.

As the Washington Post noted “Explaining his endorsement of Mr. Trump in a home-state newspaper, the speaker said that conversations with the presumptive Republican presidential nominee have reassured him. Mr. Trump will help turn House GOP ideas into law, Mr. Ryan said, in a way that a President Hillary Clinton would not. This is fanciful, as Mr. Ryan must understand. Judging by his wild swings of position over the years, Mr. Trump does not believe in much of anything.”

Paul Ryan, you endorsed Donald Trump on June 2, but you two haven’t always seen eye-to-eye. “That’s the thing about politics,” you said, sounding very much like Jack Kemp, a while back. “We think of it in terms of this vote or that election. But it can be so much more than that. Politics can be a battle of ideas, not insults. It can be about solutions. It can be about making a difference. It can be about always striving to do better. That’s what it can be and what it should be.”

Paul Ryan you have just endorsed a man whose “solutions” to our problems include banning Muslims from entering the country, to build a WALL, who casts aspersions on and makes threats to judges because of their ethnicity, who mocks people with disabilities, who lies repeatedly, who would muzzle the free press, who has ripped off working class students at his “university,” who will literally destroy America if elected. You are in bed with scum that makes George Wallace look reasonable!

Each one of these Trumpisms is disqualifying — at least for anyone who believes in conducting the nation’s politics in a constructive, reasonable Jack Kempian, compassionate, Christian and tolerant manner or who claims to have the long-term interests of our beloved nation, rather than a short-term win at the ballot box or in Congress, in mind.

RIP, Jack Kemp.

RIP, GOP.

Paul Ryan, history will judge you very harshly. Someday your children will despise you. God Damn you Paul Ryan. You have betrayed all that is best in America at the darkest political hour in living memory.

Frank Schaeffer is a writer. His latest book —WHY I AM AN ATHEIST WHO BELIEVES IN GOD: How to give love, create beauty and find peace

Available now on Amazon

Follow Frank on Twitter www.twitter.com/frank_schaefferSee Frank’s paintings http://www.frankschaefferart.com/Follow Frank on Facebook https://www.facebook.com/frank.schaeffer.16 Contact Frank at http://www.frankschaeffer.com

2016 presidential election

Previous Post

June 4, 2016

HERE IS WHY I'LL VOTE FOR HILLARY, AND WHY YOU SHOULD TOO-- Please! Watch! Please Pass On! Let's Save America From the Casino FOOL!

Next Post

June 6, 2016 WATCH Morning Joe Tell the Republicans: Republicans, You Have Pure BACKWARD RACIST FILTH For Your Candidate. Are You Sorry Now GOP?

Browse Our Archives

Select a Category Art children Christmas family parenting political humor politics religion sex Uncategorized

Select a Month May 2017 April 2017 March 2017 February 2017 January 2017 December 2016 November 2016 October 2016 September 2016 August 2016 July 2016 June 2016 May 2016 April 2016 March 2016 February 2016 January 2016 December 2015 November 2015 October 2015 September 2015 August 2015 July 2015 June 2015 May 2015 April 2015 March 2015 February 2015 January 2015 December 2014 November 2014 October 2014 September 2014 August 2014 July 2014 June 2014 May 2014 April 2014 March 2014 February 2014 January 2014 December 2013 November 2013 October 2013 September 2013 August 2013 July 2013 June 2013 May 2013 April 2013 March 2013 February 2013 January 2013 December 2012 November 2012 October 2012 September 2012

TAKE THE

Religious Wisdom Quiz