Ann Bernhardt for President

[Furrowed Brow]

I only recently came across blogger and activist Ann Bernhardt.

• Ann Bernhardt is a socially conservative American Christian (though I am not sure which church). She achieved some notoriety (at least in the alternative universe of the blogosphere) after burning a copy of the Quran. She is pro Jewish, rabidly anti Islam and anti Marxism, pro life, anti gay, and preaches the collapse of America.
  
  After watching several of her videos and visiting her blog I find Ann Bernhardt to be: driven, passionate, intelligent, honest and fearless in offering her views, reasonably well researched, and able to present her arguments in a clear and structured way. To someone who shares or partly shares her world viewed I imagined she is convincing. She is well informed on matters of finance and economics. Clearly Bernhardt feels herself on the side of righteousness battling against the forces of Satan. Sure of her intelligence she also has a considerable ego, and because she has worked out she cannot be wrong (being on God's side) she is very dogmatic and dismissive of others unless she agrees with them. She is hateful, and in aggressive tones belittles the intelligence of the folk she criticises, and is quick to compare her own intelligence favourably. On her blog she uses words like “vermin�, in her videos folk she does not like are "dim wits", "brain dead" and so on. She has called for the summary trials and executions of bankers. She is more intelligent than Ann Coulter but manages to make Coulter look like a warm cuddly bundle of fun and happy tolerance. I am not qualfied in psychology or psychiatry but I judge Bernhardt to have a loose wheel and at the times when she gets most venemous I find the flashes of the whites of her eyes scary. When in hate mode I find her attitudes vile. However when she is in calm mode and focusing on finance and economics I find myself agreeing with her. For example I found her description and analysis of fiat money penetrating and useful. She gives an 2hrs+ economic presentation in eight parts (link). the analysis that shows the true unit of value is man hours is interesting, there are a few flashes of nastiness along the way, and by part eight she goes full on crazy.
  
  Bernhardt has her own blog, a Youtube channel (link) of lectures she has given on economics, Islam, Christianity etc, and essays and interviews pop up in other places on the web. Her public footprint is small I assess though one of her youtube videos has over three hundred thousand views, another two hundred thousand. I do not know if her voice carries in the small halls of patriots, preppers, and the Christian right. Maybe she is better known in the US than I imagine, but as far as I can tell she exists mostly in alternative media and has not hit the mainstream.

Q1: In today’s world of uncertainty, recession, depression, and fear of collapse, should we fear the rise of a potential demagog like an Ann Bernhardt who appeals to the worst of American Christianity? Are there more like her? And if they are, is it possible one could rise up to spearhead a populist political movement promising to punish those they scapegoat for the decline of America?

Q2: if Ann Bernhardt or someone like her became President, what would America look like after 8 years?

[Nilloc James]

It seems a fairly consitent theme in history that when the going gets tough people turn to more extreme groups.

The french revolution the people divide radical repunlican vs reactionary monarchists.

Early 20th century russia: losing a war and broke people turn to the communksts against the tzars

Depressiom germany after the weimar republic has 13 competig parties both the reactionary nazis and radical communists see a large spike in popularity.

Late 40s china sees a divide.between the nationalists and communists.

Im not surprised christain reactionarism is popular in another time of uncertainty and fear.

[Furrowed Brow]

It seems a fairly consitent theme in history that when the going gets tough people turn to more extreme groups.

I think so. I'm am wondering how much it might take to catapult a Bernhardt into the mainstream. An ultra right female Republican....but intelligent.

To answer my second question. If Bernhardt got into power there would be quite quickly a series of trials and executions. On her list to be shot are people like Ben Bernanke, Jon Corzine, along with a list of bankers and political figures she thinks guilty of treason or financial crimes or both. Abortions would be made illegal. Marxists and anyone Bernhardt labelled a Marxist will fear being put on trial, they would certainly be persecuted. There would be a McCarthy style witch hunt. Universities would be cleared out of left and liberal leaning thinkers who would be labelled Marxists or homosexual. Homosexuality would have to go underground and would likely be criminalised and gay rights taken back to the 1950s. You would not be allowed to hold any kind of public office if it was known that you were gay. Muslims will also have to look out. I suspect Islam would be persecuted too, but I am not sure how this would play out. I’d expect mosques to be closed down.

After 8 years of this America would look like the worst nightmare of any left leaning liberal.

[dianaiad]

It seems a fairly consitent theme in history that when the going gets tough people turn to more extreme groups.

I think so. I'm am wondering how much it might take to catapult a Bernhardt into the mainstream. An ultra right female Republican....but intelligent.

To answer my second question. If Bernhardt got into power there would be quite quickly a series of trials and executions. On her list to be shot are people like Ben Bernanke, Jon Corzine, along with a list of bankers and political figures she thinks guilty of treason or financial crimes or both. Abortions would be made illegal. Marxists and anyone Bernhardt labelled a Marxist will fear being put on trial, they would certainly be persecuted. There would be a McCarthy style witch hunt. Universities would be cleared out of left and liberal leaning thinkers who would be labelled Marxists or homosexual. Homosexuality would have to go underground and would likely be criminalised and gay rights taken back to the 1950s. You would not be allowed to hold any kind of public office if it was known that you were gay. Muslims will also have to look out. I suspect Islam would be persecuted too, but I am not sure how this would play out. I’d expect mosques to be closed down.

After 8 years of this America would look like the worst nightmare of any left leaning liberal.

I've never read Berhardt. Never seen her videos...and therefore I can't comment. However, given the folks who criticise her, I have a suspicion that she's not as nutty as y'all might think.

I could be wrong, of course. Perhaps she is.

.......................but I'll bet she's not...after all, even THIS critic liked her stand on monetary issues.

The thing that struck me from your post, though, is the unfinished nature of it. You didn't end it with "but the trains will run on time."

[PhilosoRaptor]

To answer my second question. If Bernhardt got into power there would be quite quickly a series of trials and executions. On her list to be shot are people like Ben Bernanke, Jon Corzine, along with a list of bankers and political figures she thinks guilty of treason or financial crimes or both. Abortions would be made illegal. Marxists and anyone Bernhardt labelled a Marxist will fear being put on trial, they would certainly be persecuted. There would be a McCarthy style witch hunt. Universities would be cleared out of left and liberal leaning thinkers who would be labelled Marxists or homosexual. Homosexuality would have to go underground and would likely be criminalised and gay rights taken back to the 1950s. You would not be allowed to hold any kind of public office if it was known that you were gay. Muslims will also have to look out. I suspect Islam would be persecuted too, but I am not sure how this would play out. I’d expect mosques to be closed down.

After 8 years of this America would look like the worst nightmare of any left leaning liberal.

Where would Congress and Courts be during all this? I sincerely think people often get too riled up about the powers of the Presidency. Given, presidents are more powerful today than the founders probably intended, but it's not as though whatever a president happens to think becomes the law of the land.

[Jax Agnesson]

I agree with PhilosoRaptor. The USA includes as large a number of total fruitloops, far left to far right, as is healthy in a democracy. It also possesses a well developed system of checks and balances.
A few years ago I was beginning to wonder if, with the American Century being just about over, the US was starting to decline into a muttering, God-obsessed premature dementia.
Recent research, by various reputable groups, suggests that the wave of religious fruitloopery is abating, and a mature religious pluralism is developing in its place.
Lets hope so. The land that gave us one of the world's first statements of human rights, scientific and technological developments that have changed the world, and best of all, JAZZ, can't be all bad.

[bluethread]

After 8 years of this America would look like the worst nightmare of any left leaning liberal.

Where would Congress and Courts be during all this? I sincerely think people often get too riled up about the powers of the Presidency. Given, presidents are more powerful today than the founders probably intended, but it's not as though whatever a president happens to think becomes the law of the land.

It does until congress or the courts can get around to overturning it.

[Furrowed Brow]

I've never read Berhardt. Never seen her videos...and therefore I can't comment. However, given the folks who criticise her, I have a suspicion that she's not as nutty as y'all might think.

I could be wrong, of course. Perhaps she is.

.......................but I'll bet she's not...after all, even THIS critic liked her stand on monetary issues.

The thing that struck me from your post, though, is the unfinished nature of it. You didn't end it with "but the trains will run on time."

This is Ann Barnhardt on Mitt Romney I'll let you draw your own conclusions.

[youtube][/youtube]
Ann is only on half power and Mitt looks to be getting off light...though I gave up after about 4 minutes.

If the trains still fail to run on time it will be an Islamic homosexual Marxist conspiracy.

[bluethread]

That video had a distictly familiar tone to it. Hmmm.
Just a second. Change the viewpoint just a little to the left.
Yes, it's coming to me. A little more to the left.
Now, I have heard that somewhere, but where?
Let's try it a little more to the left. Yah, that is definitely something I have heard before.
Let's go all the way to the left. YES! that's it. It's what a far right conservative would sound like if they had a show on MSNBC.

[dianaiad]

I've never read Berhardt. Never seen her videos...and therefore I can't comment. However, given the folks who criticise her, I have a suspicion that she's not as nutty as y'all might think.

I could be wrong, of course. Perhaps she is.

.......................but I'll bet she's not...after all, even THIS critic liked her stand on monetary issues.

The thing that struck me from your post, though, is the unfinished nature of it. You didn't end it with "but the trains will run on time."

This is Ann Barnhardt on Mitt Romney I'll let you draw your own conclusions.

[youtube][/youtube]
Ann is only on half power and Mitt looks to be getting off light...though I gave up after about 4 minutes.

If the trains still fail to run on time it will be an Islamic homosexual Marxist conspiracy.

(grin)

OK, you win. She's a nutjob.

One question. HOW did you embed the video? I still haven't figured that out!