Republished with permission from Steve Schmidt
Fourteen years ago, an oddball candidate named Christine O’Donnell, who may or may not have been a witch, knocked off Delaware congressman Mike Castle in a Republican primary in the normally staid “First State.” Castle had served as lieutenant governor, governor, and had spent 18 years as Delaware’s sole member of Congress. His defeat was shocking, and Christine O’Donnell became a bonafide Tea Party celebrity. Another wacky candidate from that election cycle was Nevada’s Sharron Angle, who posited that it was George W. Bush—and not Al-Qaeda—behind the 9/11 slaughter. It was clear that something was unfolding in 2010, but what it was hadn’t completely come into focus.
This is the Speaker of the House, Mike Johnson, second in line to the office of President of the United States. He is a dangerous man because he is a fanatical man. All fanatics are dangerous.
Johnson is a particular stripe of fanatic. He is a religious fundamentalist in pursuit of political power to impose his delusions and extremism on society. His conviction is absolute. His belief is unshakeable. He is a vessel of God’s will, and through him, God’s grace. Societies where such men come to power are the most evil places on Earth.
There is no virtue in mocking sincerely held beliefs by sincere people who have faith in things beyond proof or even comprehension. Tolerance demands faith be respected as it demands that faithful people not seek to impose any faith on another against their will. There is nothing wrong with appreciating what it is that the man second in line to the presidency believes. His judgement, intellect, integrity, values and basic knowledge are all appropriate issues for public discussion and dissection.
Here is one thing he believes that is not true. Mike Johnson believes human beings and dinosaurs lived together 6,000 thousand years ago. This isn’t so any more than the Earth is flat, or the moon made out of cheese.
What it demonstrates is that Mike Johnson can be made to believe nonsense is real, which is a disqualification for the speaker of the US House of Representatives. His ignorance and intellectual incompetency is spectacular enough in its luminescence to shine as brightly as Kevin McCarthy’s cynicism and seedy ambitions. Each is unfit. Each is a threat, though when it comes to Mike Johnson, his theocratic penchants and taste for fascism are far less transactional than Kevin McCarthy’s tepid tolerance.
When “My Kevin” (Trump’s affectionate nickname for Kevin McCarthy) went to Mar-a-Lago after the insurrection to make sure a depressed Trump was eating, according to Liz Cheney, Mike Johnson was worshipping Trump. Johnson was spreading lies about Trump’s victory in the name of God, with absolute certainty that he is an angel in an army of God’s chosen leaders—or “dominionist” agents of social transformation—who seek control over American society through the Seven Mountain Mandate or Seven Mountains of Influence (click this link for more on each of the elements below):
- Religion
- Family
- Education
- Government
- Media
- Arts and entertainment
- Business
Today, they are an army in waiting. They are a mob before the formation. They have grown tired of democracy and the concept of pluralism. They want you to hear from them, and according to their plans, you will soon.
Related to all of this are the robust plans by the Claremont Institute and Trump to incinerate the US civil service. They plan to decimate the functioning of government in favor of conforming the government to the service of a leader, an ideology and a cabal of enforcers who will restrict political liberty, while apportioning economic favors to special friends and favored classes. They will be the vanguard in a re-ordering of American life away from the idea that all are created equal, and more towards the idea that the saved and powerful are first among equals—always. It is a recipe for not just disaster and chaos, but evil.
Mike Johnson isn’t just an ideologue and a fanatic. He is a malicious chump or a malicious accomplice. Either way, the effect is the same. His decision to order the blurring of January 6 insurrectionists’ faces to obstruct the ability of citizens to help identify wanted criminal suspects is an unsurprising outrage. Mike Johnson tried to overthrow a presidential election and throw away millions of legally cast votes. He did it with purpose, intention and conviction that power is served by the lies. He has given his delusions a license to be real, and thus, noble. He is a monster in waiting.
Steve Schmidt
Steve Schmidt is a political analyst for MSNBC and NBC News. He served as a political strategist for George W. Bush and the John McCain presidential campaign. Schmidt is a founder of The Lincoln Project, a group founded to campaign against former President Trump. It became the most financially successful Super-PAC in American history, raising almost $100 million to campaign against Trump's failed 2020 re-election bid. He left the group in 2021.
