Donald Trump trounced Hillary Clinton in second debate, but...

By Chuck Baldwin

As debates go, it was a thrashing: Donald Trump totally dominated the second presidential debate, as Hillary Clinton was reeling on the ropes from the very beginning. Trump did very poorly in the first debate, as I noted in this column. But he was obviously much better prepared for this second debate, and it showed. Hillary was beaten so badly, a majority of the major news media actually STOPPED polling shortly after Hillary's embarrassing performance because respondents were giving Trump a landslide victory, and they didn't want to be forced to report it.

Trump finally brought up Benghazi and did a much better job of talking about Hillary's criminality in destroying emails after she had been subpoenaed by Congress to produce them. He also courageously made a commitment to appoint a special prosecutor to investigate Hillary's obvious criminal conduct if he is elected President. That was a bold move and must have sent shock waves throughout the political establishments of both major parties. I hope it also put a little bit of the fear of God in FBI Director James Comey, as he has become party to the Clinton cover-up with his refusal to press charges against her.

Trump boldly stated his support for the Second Amendment, which forced Hillary to publicly defend her support for more gun control. He reiterated his support for the right to life of unborn babies, which forced Hillary to defend her pro-abortion position. And for the first time, I heard Donald Trump actually make a statement in support of the U.S. Constitution. And, of course, he continued pushing his economic positions of reduced taxes and less government regulation. He also continued hammering the so-called free trade deals like NAFTA and TPP.

Donald also did a great job of pointing out that Russia, Syria, and Iran are the ones that are truly fighting ISIS and that we should acknowledge it and support them in it. I don't know that any other presidential candidate, Republican or Democrat, has or would ever admit that (except for Ron Paul and Pat Buchanan, of course). I give Trump big kudos for that one.

But the thing that sent Hillary reeling against the ropes was Trump's courageous statement regarding Bill Clinton's long history of abuse against women (including several alleged rapes) and Hillary's culpability in providing cover for her husband's abuse. Along with pressing the criminal cover-up in her deleted emails – and her culpability in the deaths of American soldiers and the American ambassador in Benghazi – the subject of both Clintons' long history of abuse of women knocked Hillary for a loop. She never recovered.

The thing I continue to dislike about Trump, however, is his emphatic and continual support for what, in essence, is a burgeoning Police State in this country. His "stop and frisk" proposals and his repeated calls for religious profiling and increased police intrusions into privacy are a direct violation of the Fourth Amendment and portends further police abuse under a Trump administration. Unfortunately, this plays WELL to most conservatives and Christians.

People on the "right" have a HUGE blind spot when it comes to Fourth Amendment issues and all things "law and order." On this issue, the Republican nominee could have been ANY of the contenders (excepting Rand Paul), and it would not have changed a thing. Republicans are notoriously anemic on the Fourth Amendment. If Republicans understood the Fourth amendment like they do the Second Amendment, America wouldn't be staring a Police State in the face the way we are. And while the late Supreme Court justice, Antonin Scalia (the man Trump uses as the model for his future Supreme Court picks), was terrific on the Second Amendment and life issues, he was very inconsistent (sometimes even terrible) on Fourth Amendment issues.

Without a doubt, however, this was Donald Trump's finest public showing.

BUT...

There is a much larger issue that I am compelled to address. And, unfortunately, it is an issue that hardly anyone else is willing to talk about. So, what I say from this point on is probably going to make me very unpopular in many circles. So be it. It MUST be said.

What Donald Trump was recorded as saying eleven years ago is disgustingly repulsive to anyone who has a moral compass. And there should be NO defending it. Yes, Trump was willing to publicly apologize for what he said; and I give him credit for that. None of us is perfect. Certainly not me, and not you either. Regardless, that does nothing to change the seriousness of the situation. (And, no, I'm not overlooking the fact that the release of this recording was timed by the establishment to do optimum damage to Trump's campaign; and it is also a fact that the establishment has damaging evidence against a variety of politicians – including the Clintons – that it withholds from the public. The hypocrisy of the establishment class is massive.)

And the seriousness of the situation completely transcends this election and even what Trump was recorded saying. Sadly, the ONLY thing people can focus on or talk about is the election. What Donald Trump's behavior implies is never brought up – except by people who merely want to use it as a political ploy to help Hillary get elected.

Please bear with me, and let me explain.

Both sides of the political aisle are equally culpable in the destruction of our national character. Even "Christians" are caught up with political partisanship and are unwilling to address the underlying principles that are being sacrificed on the altar of an election.

I constantly hear conservative and Christian personalities excusing Donald Trump's immoral lifestyle with a flippant comparison to Bill and Hillary Clinton's immoral lifestyles. To be sure, it would be difficult for anyone to get any lower in the moral sewer than the Clintons. But is that our standard?

Let's face the truth: Donald Trump has lived most of his adult life indulging in rampant narcissistic behavior. It is no wonder Donald has had so many marriages and divorces. In fact, if Trump is elected, he will be the first President in U.S. history who has had multiple failed marriages. The only other President to have had a divorce (one) was Ronald Reagan. Obviously, Trump would not be the only President to have bedded other women: including the obvious Bill Clinton, John F. Kennedy, Lyndon Baines Johnson, Woodrow Wilson, James Garfield, Grover Cleveland, Warren G. Harding, and Franklin D. Roosevelt.

But, to me, the current crisis is NOT Trump's admitted immoralities; it is the lack of a moral conscience by society itself – including and especially by our "Christian" society.

I'll say it straight out: our culture is in the toilet.

Granted, people are frail creatures: ALL OF US. We often come up short. The Bible itself is replete with examples of how even some of God's finest men and women fell short. And pride, arrogance, and judgmentalism are things that surely sicken God. The Pharisees prided themselves in being moral puritans, but Jesus condemned them FAR WORSE than those who had been guilty of fleshly sins. So, God forbid that what I am saying here be taken in such a light.

That being said, the glaring problem uncovered by the serial adulteries of both Donald Trump and Bill Clinton is the way our culture has come to promote and accept the sexual objectification of women. Our society is eaten up with it.

Hugh Hefner's playboy revolution of the sixties and forward has caused women to be seen as little more than sex objects. Everywhere one looks, women are treated as sex objects by our culture. Television commercials, television programs, billboards, sporting events, magazines, Hollywood movies, and even many "churches" are guilty of promoting such a culture. FOX News has turned news casting into the flaunting exploitation of women. I dare say that the modern feminist movement would never have come into existence without the flagrant and repeated sexual exploitation of women by narcissistic men. No, what Donald Trump did was not "just talk." It was part of an entire culture dominated by the sexual exploitation of women.

What Donald Trump and Bill Clinton have done is bad enough. But what is worse is the way people make excuses for them. People on the left (including the media) completely ignore Bill's exploitation of women, and people on the right (including Christians) completely ignore Donald's exploitation of women. (Yes, I understand the difference between forced sex and complicit sex, and in this regard, the sins of Bill Clinton are far greater.) The only thing either side is concerned about is winning an election. Neither side is the least bit concerned about what the sexual objectification of women has done to women and to our country as a whole.

Neither does either side seem to be concerned about what this continual sexual exploitation of women is doing to the young women and girls of our country. These young women and girls see the constant promotion of nudity or semi-nudity of women and grow up with the impression that the only way for them to be popular or liked is to join in. Other young women and girls wrongly compare themselves to what they see being flaunted before them, which causes them to develop deep inferiority complexes – all being predicated on a phony, manufactured and degraded cultural standard of what "beauty" should look like. The damage being caused our young women and girls by our culture's sexual objectification of women is incalculable.

And let me hasten to add: I see a BIG difference in the playboy lifestyle of a Trump or Clinton and the way others have had to endure separation for reasons known and understood only by God. No matter what the Pharisees among us say, not every divorce is created equal. Some people have a tendency to judgmentally lump every act of divorce into the same category; and that is very unfair. The Scriptures make a big distinction between those who fall into an act of immorality or those who must make decisions about love and marriage due to uncontrollable circumstances (I Corinthians 7) and those who are sexual predators. For example, there is a big difference in Holy Writ between the woman taken in adultery in Jesus' time and the sexual predator sons of Eli, Hophni and Phinehas, or the blessings of God upon Job with a second wife and family.

In reality, Donald Trump and the Clintons are mostly a reflection of what our society has become.

All of that said, however, if Donald Trump should be elected President (and at this point I think he will be unless the powers that be are able to somehow rig the elections, which is certainly possible), I pray that early on in his administration he will use the Bully Pulpit of his office to recall his past debauchery and use it as an example (and he has done this for other things such as the bankruptcy laws and tax laws that allow the wealthy to evade taxes) of how degraded our culture has become and then subsequently launch a national campaign to lead the men of America to stop the sexual exploitation of our women and give them back lives that are free of a societal condition that, in effect, has made them unwitting slaves to a double standard that no one should be forced to live under. If he would do that, he could possibly become the greatest President since Thomas Jefferson – providing he also casts off his seeming infatuation with a Police State, of course.

P.S. Sometime ago, I brought a message entitled "The Biblical Standard For Government." And believe me, the Biblical standard for government is NOT what most Christians think it is. The principles contained in this message were commonly taught from the colonial pulpits at the time of our country's founding. Sadly, they are seldom mentioned from America's pulpits today.

In this message, I delve into the Biblical requirements for civil magistrates. I truly believe if these principles were being taught in America's churches today, we would NOT be dealing with many of the problems currently confronting our country. Truly, the failure of America is a failure of America's pulpits.

I believe this message would be beneficial to anyone who is concerned about good government – and how to obtain it.

Order the DVD message "The Biblical Standard For Government" here:

The Biblical Standard For Government

© Chuck Baldwin