There were two particularly disturbing news reports recently. The first was about a group of white students who turned their backs to a visiting black high school basketball team while holding a Trump sign. The second was reported in the news organization Alternet, among other places, and concerned a college professor in Orange County, CA. She was giving a lecture in which she was critical of Trump, while unbeknownst to her a student was videotaping. The tape went to a Republican group and was posted on the internet. Since that posting, the professor has been harassed by over 1000 emails and phone calls, many of them death threats. A photo of her house with the address was posted. One message said “You want communism, go to Cuba. Try bringing it to the US and we’ll put a (expletive) bullet in your face.” She left California, fearful for her life.

And then there was the union leader in Indiana who called out Trump’s hypocrisy on the Carrier deal, and faced similar retribution. Every day, it seems, brings new horror stories.

Intimidation, blackmail, and violence are the weapons of angry mobs, but those who incite the mob come from elsewhere. The inhuman disparity of wealth in America has created a billionaire class, who instigate the violence. With some exceptions the billionaire oligarchs exemplified by Trump live in an Ayn Rand world, where the rich and powerful rule by something akin to divine right, and the commoners are despised as nothing but workers for the factories. During these long winter evenings, my wife Margaret has been reading aloud a short story by Charles Dickens, and how painful it is to realize that the attitude of the elite powerful has not changed one iota over the years. The old nobility, inherited by birth and contemptuous of the common man, has been replaced by the billionaire class, including not all, to be sure, but only and certainly those who give in to the temptations of greed and power.

Pre-election, Trump supporters seemed to number about 40% of the electorate, which I rounded down to 100 million, and came up with 40 million Trump supporters. In the election itself, he got about 63 million votes, many of whom are living in an artificial world of Trump’s creation. When I say artificial, I mean a world divorced from what we normally refer to as reality. Rachel Maddow quotes a recent poll. 40% of Trump supporters think he won the popular vote. In fact, Hillary won by 2.7 million of us, and still gaining. Almost 40 per cent (39) of them believe that the Dow went down during Obama’s term. It actually went up from 7950 to 19,600. 67% think unemployment went up under Obama; it actually went down from 7.8 to 4.6 per cent. And had it not been for Republican obstructionism, these numbers could have been better. More recent polls indicate that 40 % of Americans support Trump’s picks for cabinet positions. And despite the ruckus about Putin possibly determining the election of Trump, an increasing majority of his supporters are growing fond of the Russian dictator, no doubt because Trump likes him. The power of a demagogue over his followers is indeed frightening.

These supporters fall into at least three groupings. There is, first, those left behind by the political/economical system, a large number of whom have no job and no prospects, who hurt, who are without sufficient education, are without hope, and want to believe in promises of better times (make America great again), no matter how deceitful. Many in this group die an early death due to disease and drugs.

The second grouping are those easily prone to violence. Unfortunately, Trump has led all these people to believe…. Blacks, Muslims and Mexicans are the enemy. They are the reason you are jobless and hopeless. Or maybe it’s women, you know, the ones in heels who have taken over the high rise Manhattan office space. And for God’s sake, protect your guns. The Democrats will take them away. (By the way, the NRA is not an organization created by or for hunters. 75% of the board are representatives of the gun industry. The titans of industry, once again.)

A new phrase has become popular of late: post truth. That is, we now live in a culture where truth and reality no longer matter. Believe what you want. It’s okay. And the oligarchs no longer feel obligated to tell the truth, if they ever knew it, because people don’t care. Bernie Sanders has identified this as one of our gravest threats. When opinion masquerades as fact, and fact disappears in spin, there is neither rational discourse nor democratic foundation. And it’s a vicious circle: 40% of the populace don’t care, so the politicians/hackers don’t tell the truth, float trial balloon witch hunts, and now spread false “news” reports. And social media is the perfect medium. No watchdog, no editor, not even a reporter. Just send it. With any luck, it will go viral. An armed militia at the ready to be activated by a single tweet.

The third group are certain evangelicals. They profess to like Trump because he will defund Planned Parenthood and nominate a Supreme Court justice or two who will overturn Roe v. Wade. And not force county clerks to issue marriage licenses to gays. Who will allow the churches to exercise their “religious freedom”, even at the expense of breaking the law. Their hidden hope is that they will be empowered to create a biblical theocracy, based of course on biblical law, as they interpret it. What can all this be but a last gasp to bring back what never was: a Christian nation of white people saved by Jesus.

There is an alternative, of course. Suppose we actually remember who Jesus was, what he taught and what he did. Historically, we can do that. What do we find? I have talked about this many times before in these reflections, so, in short, leaving all the god talk aside, look at Jesus the man, someone both Christians and humanists can agree on. One who loved all, who broke down barriers between men and women, who died in the fight for justice for all, justice that was equated with food, shelter, health, peace for all. This is who Jesus was.

Now the question: who is right? Or is everybody right? If we choose to live in the world of post truth, then nothing matters. Believe what you will- it’s all the same. It’s a world of pure relativity, where might makes right.

But that is a world that we must not choose. Remember the purported encounter between Jesus and Pilate? Jesus says: “I have come into the world to bear witness to the truth.” To that Pilate responds “And what is truth?” This brief dialog is found in the gospel according to John, written just less than a century after Jesus was crucified, so it’s not eyewitness and most likely did not happen. But still, what John says is accurate. The powers that be would have us confused as to what truth is, perhaps leading us to believe it doesn’t matter. Then they can control us. To the contrary there is Jesus, whom John believed was truth incarnate.

Is it possible to believe Ayn Rand ( who died, ironically, while on Medicare and Social Security) and Jesus at the same time? No. Is it possible to follow Jesus and threaten to shoot someone in the face? No. Is it possible to turn your back on any brother or sister because they are of a different race? No. Whom we believe and who we choose to be is within our power. Individually, and collectively as a nation, we must choose the truth.