Trump in humble prayer: Not a joke

Bowed in prayer

Surely this painting is done as irony. It is laughable on its surface. Right?

No. It is dead earnest.

Trump does not come across as humble and prayerful in real life.

Painter James McNaughton has a niche. The Utah painter sells prints and giclee reproductions of his work on his website, and copies of them circulate constantly in email chains among evangelical Christians. 

I get sent some version of this painting about once a week. The image obviously strikes a chord within some segment of Americans. E-mails are sent my way with comments like "Painting the truth," and "a picture is worth a thousand words, and could not be more true of this painting," and "a chilling painting that is so true."

So true: pious, prayerful Trump. The painting is there to prove it.

I might be wrong about something. The circulation of this image, done not as irony, contradicts one of the ongoing observations and conclusions of this blog. Donald Trump has teflon, I have written, because he plays the role of Bad Boy Hero, the rule breaker. Trump fits into a character archetype, in professional wrestling the "heel"; in police shows the "bad cop" whose roughness serves the cause of justice; in movies it is the Magnificent Seven gunmen who "deal in lead" and defend the town against the bandits; in TV westerns it was Paladin; in legend it is Robin Hood; in comics it is Batman; in deepest myth and literature it is Odysseus the trickster.

Democrats, trampling American flag, holding foreign flags.

We know and like that character. He is often glamorous, a playboy, Independently rich, attractive to women. He is bad, but he is a good guy and hero.

He can disrupt corrupt systems because he--almost always male--considers his enemies, corrupt and unjust, and therefore rule breaking is moral. It is OK for the James Bond character to kill villains and their henchmen because in the spy world, killing each other is part of the game and they wanted to kill him.

Killing for the team

Trump said the political system was corrupt, that there was a swamp, that Hillary was crooked and now Mueller headed a witch hunt, so the normal rules don't apply. Only a fool plays by the rules, if the game is rigged. In that case, the smart--and moral--course is to rig things better and smarter than the other guys.

But this image circulates: Trump as pious. Trump head bowed. Trump praying. This contradicts the Bad Boy hero brand. 

In what world is Trump humbled and contrite? He is proudly the opposite. Chin up. Defiant. Brave. He doesn't apologize; he doubles down. 

What is doing on? Another Trump brand.  

Christian Trump supporters imagine a pious Trump hero, a prayerful, churchgoing one. They have created an alternative Trump, one in which he is good the way pious Christians want to be good--meek, humble, virtuous, set upon by enemies. He reflects a projection of their imagined best selves, humble like Jesus.

Proud. Defiant. 

Trump enables that second brand by giving himself and his supporters a fig leaf of denial to the descriptions of his Bad Boy character. You need not believe your eyes, and especially not the fake news media.

He denies having had sex with Stormy and the Playboy model he gave hush money to. He says the claimants of his sexual assault are all lying. He says he doesn't believe Saudi Arabia killed Khashaggi. He said he was totally exonerated by Mueller. He says he is draining the swamp. He said the Access Hollywood tape was just locker room talk. 

He says the economy was carnage on the day he was inaugurated and absolutely wonderful two months later. He says it like he believes it.

The result is that people are not 100% forced to believe Trump is a scamp. He gives them reasonable doubt, or at least the possibility of doubt.

McNaughton's Jesus

We don't believe what we don't want to believe. The marijuana we find in a teenager's sock drawer--she says she is only storing it for a friend, and maybe, just maybe, that is true.

McNaughton paints a Jesus that American Christians can feel at home with. White. Clean. Blue eyed. Trump could feel comfortable praying to that Jesus. 

We versus them. Within the Trump/Fox news ecosystem, Trump is the victim of a witch hunt and false accusations. He is only a rule breaker as regards foreigners--the other--not us. Sure he pulls out of the Iran deal and the Paris Climate Accords, and sure he renegotiates trade deals, sure he puts tariffs on Chinese goods, sure he says Mexico will pay for a wall, and sure he blocks Muslims from coming to America, but that is against others and for us. 

In the circulated painting, Trump's opponents carry the flags of other countries, while Trump defends our flag. It isn't about right and wrong; it is about we versus them. There is a mindset and moral virtue that associates the in-group--the tribe--as being sacred, connected to God.

Whatever Trump's inner life, he communicates that he considers native born Americans to be our team, and therefore in the minds of many people, sacred.

He is on our side, and that makes him Godly.