Matt Wells, Ex-Republican

My experiences over the last 9 months of this campaign season have been well documented on this blog. I've been all over the country and especially, Southeast Iowa representing principles I found in a candidate running for President of the United States. Many voters agreed but a large plurality didn't and Donald Trump is the presumed nominee for the Republican Party in this fall's election. This is my party getting off point. I attended my final Republican Central Committee meeting on Monday. After I was told by nearly everyone in the room to put aside my principles and "get on board the Trump train", I'd had enough. I requested time and was granted it. I spoke up. I told them that I could, in no uncertain words, support Donald Trump or give credence to his supporters. I explained how I'd seen so much all over the country. Here is what I posted to Facebook after coming home.

"Tonight, I attended my final Johnson County, Iowa Republican Central Committee meeting. I can no longer be associated with a group tasked with electing Donald Trump. 

I spoke before the committee telling them of my convictions and concerns. I didn't hold back. I didn't parse words. I referred to my faith and the fact that Donald Trump was unrepentant and in using Christianity as a tool for his gain, was a blasphemous man.
After the meeting, I was besieged by half of the group and yelled at and one little old lady, my guess is she is around 80, screamed at me, "What makes you so holy?!" She continued, "I've been a Methodist for 53 years and I know I'm a good Christian!"
I replied, "I'm a dirty sinner saved by grace through faith in Jesus Christ. If you died today, do you know where you'd go? Would you go to heaven?" 
She was dumbfounded. Nobody in her church had ever asked her to take Jesus Christ at His word."

This post has become the most interacted with post I've ever done on Facebook. I was thinking it wouldn't matter but to just a few local Iowans. I was wrong. It's been shared all over the country in the circles I happen to have a bit of influence in.

The evening disturbed me, for their sake, but it also helped me grow. All but a few people at that meeting were hostile to my remarks. Many are just Republicans because they've always been Republicans. Their hatred for Democrats has impaired their abilities to hold anyone with an R behind their name accountable. It is quite apparent that change in the party will not come from within, but from people leaving and taking their principles with them. 

This is really the crux of the issue. The false religion people have bought into has become my greatest pain. This final meeting as a member of the party turned my attentions completely toward more eternal goals. My involvement in politics will be limited to very special candidates worthy of extreme efforts and worthy of asking my friends to get on board. Sure, I'll continue to vote, but our nation's ills won't be cured until our nation get's on the side of Jesus. Our continued slide toward complete debauchery and moral relativism has led us to accept anything from anyone who has the ability to grab headlines, regardless of their wickedness or depravity.  

If someone were to ask me to describe myself with adjectives, I would say this; I am Born Again Christian American Conservative...full stop. Notice, there were no party identifiers. Unless the delegates to the Republican National Convention in Cleveland choose to form a barrier, to be a remnant, if you will, and deny Donald Trump the nomination next month, my divorce from the party will be permanent and complete. 

If you agree or disagree, comment below.

You can find me on Twitter here.

On a final, more personal note, I ask you to join me in praying for my friends, the Bontrager family, as they get ready to leave tonight on a seven week music mission tour of the Northeast US and eastern Canadian Provinces. I have seen them touch so many lives(mine included) that while I'm disappointed they are leaving Iowa and I won't be able to sit amongst them in church and adult bible fellowship, I know they are doing God's work and helping people to know Jesus in a more personal way.

Below, you'll find my email sent to the secretary of the Johnson County Central Committee. 

Johnson County Central Committee members,

I can no longer, in good conscience, be a member of the Republican party. I resign my position immediately on Johnson County Central Committee. The hatred and vile attitude of Trump are sweeping the party nationwide. I cannot be apart of anything associated with Donald Trump. My faith informs me to eschew wickedness and choose good. Donald Trump's bigoted comments about an American citizen this week, who happens to also be a federal judge adjudicating his fraud case, are just more evidence that he is manifestly unqualified for the highest office in the land. I will actively work against Donald Trump this fall. I also will advise people to not vote for Hillary Clinton. I hope this presidential election has the lowest turnout in modern history. The Republican party deserves to feel the brunt of this. They are partially to blame for the rise of a populist nationalist movement behind Trump. Make no mistake, this is a progressive movement, with elements of fascism seeping in. They've stopped advocating for conservative policies and principles. I will vote for only bonafide conservatives with a record to back their claims. No more campaign conservatives. I look forward to opposing anyone associated with Governor Branstad in the next gubernatorial election here in Iowa in addition to working against Donald Trump. Our politicians must be held to higher standards than they currently are.
You will likely see me outside of the GOP and Democrat offices this fall telling people about their choices and why they should turn away from both this November. A gospel tract will likely be my literature.
The reasons I am set so strongly in my principles are Biblical in nature.

Daniel 9:14   Therefore hath the LORD watched upon the evil, and brought it upon us: for the LORD our God is righteous in all his works which he doeth: for we obeyed not his voice.

Proverbs 29:2   When the righteous are in authority, the people rejoice: but when the wicked beareth rule, the people mourn. 

Ezekiel 18:24   But when the righteous turneth away from his righteousness, and committeth iniquity, and doeth according to all the abominations that the wicked man doeth, shall he live? All his righteousness that he hath done shall not be mentioned: in his trespass that he hath trespassed, and in his sin that he hath sinned, in them shall he die. 

Luckily, Jesus delivered those that call upon his name.

 John 3:15   That whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have eternal life. 

  John 3:16   For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life. 

  John 3:17   For God sent not his Son into the world to condemn the world; but that the world through him might be saved. 

  John 3:18   He that believeth on him is not condemned: but he that believeth not is condemned already, because he hath not believed in the name of the only begotten Son of God. 

  John 3:19   And this is the condemnation, that light is come into the world, and men loved darkness rather than light, because their deeds were evil. 

  John 3:20   For every one that doeth evil hateth the light, neither cometh to the light, lest his deeds should be reproved. 

  John 3:21   But he that doeth truth cometh to the light, that his deeds may be made manifest, that they are wrought in God. 

  John 3:22   After these things came Jesus and his disciples into the land of Judaea; and there he tarried with them, and baptized. 

  John 3:23   And John also was baptizing in Aenon near to Salim, because there was much water there: and they came, and were baptized. 

  John 3:24   For John was not yet cast into prison. 

  John 3:25   Then there arose a question between some of John's disciples and the Jews about purifying. 

  John 3:26   And they came unto John, and said unto him, Rabbi, he that was with thee beyond Jordan, to whom thou barest witness, behold, the same baptizeth, and all men come to him. 

  John 3:27   John answered and said, A man can receive nothing, except it be given him from heaven. 

  John 3:28   Ye yourselves bear me witness, that I said, I am not the Christ, but that I am sent before him. 

  John 3:29   He that hath the bride is the bridegroom: but the friend of the bridegroom, which standeth and heareth him, rejoiceth greatly because of the bridegroom's voice: this my joy therefore is fulfilled. 

  John 3:30   He must increase, but I must decrease. 

  

Romans 8:1   There is therefore now no condemnation to them which are in Christ Jesus, who walk not after the flesh, but after the Spirit. 

  Romans 8:2   For the law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus hath made me free from the law of sin and death. 

  Romans 8:3   For what the law could not do, in that it was weak through the flesh, God sending his own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh, and for sin, condemned sin in the flesh: 

  Romans 8:4   That the righteousness of the law might be fulfilled in us, who walk not after the flesh, but after the Spirit. 

  Romans 8:5   For they that are after the flesh do mind the things of the flesh; but they that are after the Spirit the things of the Spirit. 

  Romans 8:6   For to be carnally minded is death; but to be spiritually minded is life and peace. 

  Romans 8:7   Because the carnal mind is enmity against God: for it is not subject to the law of God, neither indeed can be. 

  Romans 8:8   So then they that are in the flesh cannot please God. 

  Romans 8:9   But ye are not in the flesh, but in the Spirit, if so be that the Spirit of God dwell in you. Now if any man have not the Spirit of Christ, he is none of his. 

  Romans 8:10   And if Christ be in you, the body is dead because of sin; but the Spiritis life because of righteousness. 

  Romans 8:11   But if the Spirit of him that raised up Jesus from the dead dwell in you, he that raised up Christ from the dead shall also quicken your mortal bodies by his Spirit that dwelleth in you. 

  Romans 8:12   Therefore, brethren, we are debtors, not to the flesh, to live after the flesh. 

  Romans 8:13   For if ye live after the flesh, ye shall die: but if ye through the Spirit do mortify the deeds of the body, ye shall live. 

My efforts will be focused on eternal truths and not the ways of the world any longer. This is why neither Hillary or Trump are worthy of the vote of any born again Christian.

Thank you and God bless,

Matt Wells

bigredmatt1011.blogspot.com

Time To Stop Playing Nice With Leftist Media

The leftist news media, for the past few days and even going back to late March when Texas Senator Ted Cruz launched his campaign, have been hot to trot about the two declared presidential candidates and their push back against their normal job of demonizing conservative politicians. Kentucky Senator Rand Paul's verbal dust up with Savannah Guthrie, of NBC News' Today Show, has them worried. Both Sen. Paul and Sen. Cruz will not hesitate to defend themselves when media hacks use predictable lines of questioning that amount to asking conservative candidates "So...when did you stop beating your wife?". Not allowing this to go on while still engaging with the American voter will do wonders for Republican base voters and those not in the "low information voter" class, to steal a phrase from Rush Limbaugh. They want to see candidates who stand up for what they believe and aren't afraid of bloodying the noses of their opponents, both in the media and the Democrat party as a whole.

Media types like George Stephanopoulos, of ABC, are nothing more than Democrat party operatives masquerading as straight news people. Currently, there is a revolving door between the leftist consultant class, the government bureaucracy, and left wing mass media. Frankly, it has become a rather nepotistic world that runs up and down the I 95 corridor. Here's a common scenario: an MSNBC/CNN/ABC/NBC/CBS/PBS employee is fired or quits and the next day that person has a job in one of the cabinet departments leaking info to other people that call themselves journalists or vice versa. The time to play nice with these folks is over.

Once more conservatives, candidates or not, realize that people in the leftist media are to be defeated rather than appeased, our national discourse will be much healthier. Our republican form of government needs a free and open press so that people, especially in the collective "flyover country", can be kept abreast of the doings and misdoings of their elected officials and bureaucrats. I think that is where we, the people, come in. We need to hold these people in the media accountable through engaging with their advertisers and, especially, the companies that carry their programming and letting them know of our displeasure. The left has been doing this for years. All you have to do is look at the #StopRush campaign, which was astroturf from the get go, to understand their tactics. It was orchestrated by a group of ten progressive activists that can't stand to have their warped point of view challenged in such a successful manner. There was and is nothing grassroots about most progressive media campaigns. The establishment media needs to be made to take their own medicine. Use the market against them.

We can also continue to use Twitter, Facebook and other platforms like this one here to combat the leftist media spin machine. One other great resource that I have found invaluable is the Media Research Center, run by Brent Bozell. They do a masterful job of identifying leftist media bias and calling it out. The MRC and other organizations like it deserve our support.

I, for one, am glad that we have a few candidates that are not afraid to paint with bold colors. Here's to encouraging more like them to also step forward.

You can find me on Twitter: @bigredmatt1011