Letter: Time for a national CEO? No, reject Vance’s ploy
As we watch the new president’s attempts to concentrate the power of the US Government in the White House, Rachel Maddow’s recent exposure of the source of VP J. D. Vance’s ideology is particularly chilling. Two takeaways from her reporting are: (1) Vance is a both a product and champion of the Tech/Billionaire coalition that helped the president’s election (and was in clear evidence at his inauguration), and (2) Vance openly quotes Curtis Yarvin’s ideas of the need for a “National CEO” who he admits would be a “dictator,” but is the only hope for a new form of US Government because after 200 years, democracy has grown “stale.” (YouTube: “Rachel Maddow lays out why you should care about JD Vance’s real agenda”)
If this sounds like a desire to create a “king” in America, it’s because it is: a king by any other name (like “National CEO”) is still a king! When it comes to Kings in America, members of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints are in a unique position to sound a serious warning. Ancient scriptures are full of examples of people — against the words of their prophets and judges — who desired and got a king, and suffered the inevitable disastrous outcome.
Latter-day Saints have the words of an ancient prophet who spoke specifically of those in our day that would “be built up to get power and gain” and destroy the freedom of the people (see Ether 8:23-26). LDS Scholar, Hugh Nibley, once said in reference to these verses, “What makes the thing so frightening is not the parasite itself but the fact that a society is willing to offer it entry and encouragement.” (“Since Cumorah,” Maxwell Institute Publications, 1988, p. 247). This is real: it’s happening! TIME TO STAND UP!
Don Gardner
Ogden