This is not a diatribe on the LDS faith, nor is it a personal attack on Mitt Romney or Jon Huntsman on a personal level. Many Americans object to electing a Mormon to the Presidency, feel that a Mormon candidate is tainted goods, but seem to have trouble pinpointing the reasons behind this uneasiness in the pit of their stomachs. The purpose of this article is to delineate, point by point, the rationality behind this objection. Any affiliate of a dogmatic faith should give us equal pause when considering such individuals for the office of Chief Executive.

Humans are unique among the animal species in that we have the power to make our environment uninhabitable for us and for all animal species. With this power comes a grave responsibility for conservation of natural resources and husbandry of our planet’s health. It is the only moral and ethical approach to take. This is the reality of our situation on planet Earth, and it is a serious business.

The contrast of this reality with Mormon doctrine is stark. True-believing Mormons have been convinced that a millennium is pending, which is not unusual for religionists. But what is particularly insidious in Mormonism is the doctrine that the Earth has resources which are "plenty and to spare" for all God’s children who will be placed on the planet.

Former Prophet and President Ezra Taft Benson explained:

"The precepts of men would have you believe that by limiting the population of the world, we can have peace and plenty. That is the doctrine of the devil. Small numbers do not ensure peace; only righteousness does. After all, there were only a handful of men on the earth when Cain interrupted the peace of Adam’s household by slaying Abel. On the other hand, the whole city of Enoch was peaceful; and it was taken into heaven because it was made up of righteous people.

"And so far as limiting the population in order to provide plenty is concerned, the Lord answered that falsehood in the Doctrine and Covenants when he said:

"‘For the earth is full, and there is enough and to spare; yea, I prepared all things, and have given unto the children of men to be agents unto themselves.’ (

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"A major reason why there is famine in some parts of the world is because evil men have used the vehicle of government to abridge the freedom that men need to produce abundantly.

"True to form, many of the people who desire to frustrate God’s purposes of giving mortal tabernacles to his spirit children through worldwide birth control are the very same people who support the kinds of government that perpetuate famine. They advocate an evil to cure the results of the wickedness they support. (In Conference Report, Apr. 1969, p. 12.)

Translation: No matter what we do, including overpopulation, God will step in and heal the planet so there will be plenty for everybody. This is a core belief in Mormonism.

Native American tribes would leave the most important tribal decisions to the most elderly women in the tribe, with the directive that the women look forward six generations to weigh the effects. Native Americans understood that taking the long view and the humanitarian view should be the overriding considerations for any important issue. Electing a person who believes that it is impossible to deplete or irreparably damage our natural resources relegates Earth to the status of a disposable napkin and is unconscionable.

Anyone who has seen the movie "Thirteen Days" can appreciate the practical side of the proverb, "a soft answer turneth away wrath." John F Kennedy, if he harbored an Armageddon expectation, was able to suppress it completely. Kennedy’s actions were peace-making at every turn, and in direct opposition to the war-mongers who surrounded him. It was nothing short of a Herculean effort. He was exactly the right person to be the Chief Executive at that point in history. Many have asserted that the Vietnam War was touched off by a simple international miscommunication. Kennedy was determined that such a faux pas would not occur on his watch. I think a Mormon president would have the opposite mindset: anxiously awaiting the opportunity to go down in history as the one who valiantly defended the ‘promised land’ against evil. It is quite likely that a Mormon Chief Executive would harbor the belief that touching off Armageddon is his divine calling. Consider the words of an LDS church authority, a relative of Mitt Romney.

Marion G. Romney, a cousin to Mitt’s father George Romney, gave an address about the last days and the associated prophesies. In 1966 he said:

"….And certain it is that those who receive the blessings will have to prevail against great opposition, for the world in general is not improving. It is ripening in iniquity.

"As early as January 2, 1831, the Lord declared:

"About two years later he said again upon the subject:

It is clear that the LDS faith has a strong belief in an impending Armageddon, the final conflict of the last days. Many LDS look forward to that event, hoping it comes sooner than later, to vindicate their prophets, by default LDS affiliates are war-mongers at heart. I witnessed this groupthink first hand. See http://www.ldslastdays.com/ for more examples of LDS teachings on the subject.

Obviously, the Armageddon expectation is not unique to Mormonism, it is shared by many religions. But a companion prophecy to which Mormons ascribe is an expectation that the constitution will ‘hang by a thread’ and be rescued by Mormons. This is documented in several places, one being the Mormon Church magazine The Ensign in June 1976.

"The time would come when the constitution and government would hang by a brittle thread and would be ready to fall into other hands but this people the latter-day saints will step forth and save it." James Burgess Journal, 1818-1904, Church Archives, vol. 1-found among loose sermons. Also: D. Michael Stewart, "I Have a Question," Ensign, June 1976, 64-65

Add all this together and you have a disaster waiting to happen. There are hundreds of thousands of Mormons who assume that Romney or Huntsman will lead this charge. It is virtually certain that any Mormon elected would believe this himself, and it fuels his determination to be elected. He feels he has ‘divine destiny’ on his side, to lead his fellow latter-day-saints to save the constitution. So the danger of having him elected would not be contained to the Oval Office. All LDS members at home and abroad, in the FBI, in the CIA, and branches of Government holding key decision-making positions would harbor the expectation of Armageddon and having the constitutional fabric at the brink of being shredded. The influence of expectations in humans must never be underestimated, because whatever we expect with confidence becomes self-fulfilling prophecy. In fact, a Mormon Chief Executive’s subconscious mind would be working 24/7 to find a way to bring to pass these calamitous events. This is not what we want churning around in the mind of our Chief Executive.

"You see what you expect to see, Severus.” ―

Destructive mind control is a social process that encourages obedience, dependence, and conformity, while suppressing autonomy and independence. It is a system of influence that seeks to disrupt a person’s authentic identity and displace it with an alternate. It usually preys upon the emotions of guilt and fear, promising great rewards for ‘correct’ behavior. Conforming to the group think and obtaining the promised reward becomes everything, all else is irrelevant. Destructive mind control is strong in Mormonism, and many other religions.

Identity displacement is done subtly and by degree. Baptism is called a "rebirth". The member is asked to "become as a little child", completely innocent. The temple ceremony bestows a ‘new name’ which will be invoked in the eternities. The temple ceremony also asks the patrons to consider themselves as innocent as Adam and Eve. These are regression techniques which serve to suppress the authentic identity, and the person becomes an actor, playing a role defined by the group. Critical thinking skills are also effectively suppressed using these methods.

Where is all this leading? Well, in actuality, we do not know who Mitt Romney and Jon Huntsman really are. What’s more unusual is that Mitt and Jon do not really know who they are either. Discovering their authentic identities can only occur after breaking out of the mind control which binds them. Of course, Jon and Mitt think they know who they are, and will laugh off this assertion, as will any mind control victim. This is a common denominator among those thus duped; they unanimously deny the reality of mind control since its range precludes its recognition. With all due respect to Ronald Reagan, we do not need another actor in the White House.

Anyone watching the debates would conclude that all presidential candidates are utterly fearless. But fear can elude detection on the surface. Mormons grant power to an enormous host of fearful entities. Satan is credited with great power which is reinforced quite dramatically in the LDS temple endowment film. At one point in the ceremony’s film, an actor playing the role of Satan says: "I have a word to say concerning these people. If they do not walk up to every covenant they make at these altars in this temple this day, they will be in my power." It is as disturbing as it is dramatic.

But there is more to fear than just Satan. Mormons believe that during our pre-Earth life, there was a war in heaven, and Satan convinced 1/3 of the spirits in heaven to follow him and become his soldiers. His minions surround us, trying to deceive us and occupy our bodies if we are not valiant.

The only reliable way to effectively suppress these fears is through strict obedience. Obedience becomes a shield and a protection from the fiery darts of the adversary and his vast host of soldiers. It is also the primary self-defense against the fear and self-loathing which will be imposed if the demands of the group are not met. It is a precarious existence, and obedience to God and His emissaries comes first, not the interests of the USA or the human race. Many will say; "But we want a God-fearing person in the White House." That might not be a bad thing up to a certain point, but when this fear dominates decision making and suppresses objectivity, we have to weigh the risk that the fear and strict obedience to God mindset might cloud objectivity at a critical moment.

Michael Shermer observes:

"In the study on religiosity and belief in God …. We found openness to experience to be the most significant predictor, with higher levels of openness related to lower levels of religiosity and belief in God."

Of the popular religions in the USA, Mormonism is arguably the easiest to disprove. I have a friend, who, starting as a true believer was able to disprove to his complete satisfaction, the foundational claims of Mormonism in about eight hours, using the internet. The person who was able to do this held multiple PhDs, and was particularly open-minded. For most, including me, it takes 6-18 months of intense research to become satisfied that leaving the Mormon Church is the right thing to do with no risk of having drawn an incorrect conclusion, or basing the decision on contaminated/biased information.

I think we have some limited empirical evidence that any Mormon candidate is closed-minded, at least with regard to things which are ‘close to home’, like their heritage religion. I assert this because they have not taken time to show Mormonism to be false, a relatively easy task, which would have freed them from the toxic environment of Mormonism.

Note that in each instance, it is the trait (the core belief, the residual mind control damage, the fanaticism, the closed-mindedness) that is objectionable. One can find a large number of these same traits in any fundamentalist religion, Christian, Muslim, or otherwise. I would have the same objections toward candidates of other fundamentalist religions. Many of my friends and business associates are LDS, they are all nice people, genuinely likeable. However, I would not vote for any of them if they ran for the Presidency.

What do I mean by a fundamentalist religion? Winston Churchill, quoting Disraeli, observed "Sensible men are all of the same religion." What did Churchill mean? Disraeli also said "Sensible men never tell." Churchill, being a sensible man, did not tell, even when pushed by his public to expound on that quote. Well, most of those reading this do not need me to tell, they know already. For those who have any doubt, I will spell out what I think he and Disraeli meant (since I have no public). Sensible people:

Embrace uncertainty

Realize that religion is not about truth. Rather, it is about finding comfort, belonging to a community, and contributing to a service network

Do not fall into destructive mind control or fanaticism

Appreciate other faiths (do not try to convert others to their faith)

Regularly dismiss fundamentalist dogma when encountered

Are not motivated by fear, guilt, feel obligation, or assume superiority

If there has been any time in the history of the USA when we could use an open-minded Chief Executive, it is now. The past successes of the USA have biased our government to stick with outdated policies and methods. It is the hindsight bias, and its roots are strong in a closed-minded person. He already thinks he knows what life is about, he knows what to do, he knows what is going to happen, he knows how he is going to react and he becomes impervious to new ideas and information which might set aside the old ideas. A closed-minded person is not what is needed in the White House, not now, not ever.

From a very young age, Mormons are rewarded for ‘bearing their testimony’. Testimony bearing is a declaration of knowing that which is unknowable by definition: that God exists, that He talks to prophets, and so forth. Members of the Mormon church are encouraged to make these declarative statements when giving lessons, and even devote a meeting each month to foster this behavior, having the members make these statements to the largest possible audience; the entire congregation. Young children are encouraged and rewarded for declaring what they cannot know in this meeting. This they do to protect themselves from the emotional wounds of being ostracized from the group. The pressure on young people to declare their ‘testimony’ is intense, reaching a fever pitch by age 17. I know because I lived through it. If the monthly meeting venue does not work, the adults take the youth away to camps to accomplish the psychological blackmail needed to extract the declaration of testimony from each young man and woman.

Over time, young Mormons create a sophisticated denial system, where critical thinking is effectively suppressed, and replaced by obfuscation and even lying. They deceive so perfectly that they do not even notice the deceptions, they have come to believe their own lies. Once this skill is in place, the Mormon member is taught that deceptive declarative statements are a safe harbor, a last bastion of security in the event anyone challenges their core beliefs. This is labeled ‘testimony bearing,’ and the more a person ‘bears testimony’, the more readily the person will receive forgiveness for sin, and the stronger the testimony will become. This ‘stronger testimony’ claim, of course, is just a reinforcement of the ‘Saying is believing’ human bias, which does work! The transformation is complete at this point. The member has become a self-policing, thought-stopping, self-deceiving robot. This is not overly difficult to accomplish with adolescents, when thinking is mostly black and white and the need to believe and belong are overwhelming. Over the decades, many Mormon members soften and realize they do actually have some doubts and stop making outrageous declarations, but a large percentage remain in the blind declarative state their entire life.

Simply making declarative statements does not make them true, yet in the Mormon culture, it is a popular delusion, accepted and encouraged. This tendency for Mitt to declare that he knows something that is impossible to know came out recently when he claimed that Iran would not become a nuclear power if he were elected. By simply declaring it, he somehow believes it to be so. This is a hallmark of Mormonism, where the ‘saying is believing’ bias is very strong, and not a desirable trait for a Chief Executive.

A core belief of Mormonism is that Christ will return to rule the world and usher in a perfect theocracy through the channels of the Mormon Church. Another core belief is that the laws of God are perfect are perfect and the laws of the land are flawed. Preparing the planet for a theocracy will be in the back of the mind of any Mormon elected to the presidency, and theocracies are historically proven to be the least humane governments. The expectation of an imminent theocracy is not what is needed in the White House.

To get a grasp on the fundamental doctrines of Mormonism, which do not pass reasonableness tests for an unbiased evaluator, let us review some of them. Keep in mind that the member is required to believe these things in their heart of hearts, and ignore contradictory evidence. In fact, they are trained to ‘self-police’, discarding anything which does not agree with the groupthink and labeling it ‘anti-Mormon’.

1. Adam and Eve were literally the first humans on Earth. Archeological population estimates put the number of humans at about 5 million at the presumed time of Adam and Eve. The Garden of Eden was in Missouri.

2. The flood at the time of Noah literally covered the entire Earth to a depth exceeding the altitude of Mt. Everest. This because the Earth required baptism and renewal. The evidence contradicting a universal flood is overwhelming and conclusive.

3. A book (The Book of Mormon) dictated by a man looking into his hat through a peep stone must be accepted as the most correct of any book. Among other fantastic claims, this book asserts there were horses, chariots, sheep, steel, cattle, wheat, silk, etc. on the American continent before the arrival of the Europeans. Archeological evidence contradicts these claims. It also claims that people built submarines made of wood to cross oceans a few thousand years before Christ.

4. Despite an overwhelming need to combat suffering and oppression among the living inhabitants of the world, God has revealed that enormous resources must be directed to do work for the dead. Every member is expected to devote a significant portion of their time redeeming the dead.

This list could be expanded to several pages, but these four points suffice to illustrate the issue. How can someone who ascribes to nonsensical and illogical thinking, ignoring or discounting hard scientific evidence, and wasting time and energy chasing ghosts possibly be considered fit for the office of Chief Executive? We need the opposite in the White House. We need someone who will consider all the evidence, embrace science, readily identify and segregate myth from reality; an individual who is capable of pragmatic thought.

All fundamentalist religions discriminate against some element of humanity. That all humans are of the same race – the human race – and that men and women should have equal status is self-evident. That all humans, regardless of gender, skin color, lineage, and sexual orientation should have equal rights is equally self-evident. Throughout history we have seen a pattern where humans blame discriminatory treatment of minorities and women on policy from God. We have heard the cry over and over "I am subjugating my woman because God says her place is in the home", "blacks chose in the pre-Earth life that they would not hold the Priesthood", "AIDS is God’s judgment on gays", "fighting gay marriage laws is what God wants", and so forth. This argument no longer carries weight in an advanced society. It is a morally bankrupt and delusional society that blames discrimination on a higher power.

This presents a big problem for Mormon candidates. The LDS church has a long and lurid history of discrimination, which has been gradually improving, but only takes a step forward when forced. Polygyny essentially treated women as property (outlawed and banned under intense Governmental pressure and enforcement). The discrimination of blacks is well known, finally taking a stride in the right direction in 1979 under intense pressure. Women continue to be second-class affiliates in Mormonism. The LDS discrimination against gays is well known and mostly overt, although there is quite a bit of maneuvering of a covert nature as well. The documentary "8; The Mormon Proposition" documents this quite thoroughly. Less well-recognized is doctrinal-based discrimination against Native Americans, who according to Mormon doctrine are descended from a blood-thirsty and morally bankrupt savages. The exact opposite is true of course…. The conquering Europeans were the blood-thirsty and savage oppressors.

We simply cannot justify electing a Chief Executive who does not regard each and every citizen as equals. It disqualifies him outright.

　

A Mormon candidate should not be considered for the office of Chief Executive for the following reasons:

A similar case could be made for any candidate who is affiliated with a fundamentalist religion or other psychologically manipulative organization.