Common Sense Reborn

New Year, New Evil

²When the godly are in authority, the people rejoice. But when the wicked are in power, they groan. (Proverbs 29:2)

Happy New Year?

Well, I had planned to put a post together wishing you all a Happy New Year. I had not posted since early last month, where I wrote about the hardships my family faced in 2025 losing my mother and my wife’s beloved grandmother, all in the span of three short months. I planned on sitting down and writing about the slimmer of hope I had for 2026, after the peace of the presence of God descended upon Savannah, GA for NYE and the city had a safe and joyous new year celebration. I planned on sharing the prayer of thanksgiving I gave to God for all He did to keep the world safe as another year began. I also planned on updating my audience here on my plans for the near future, as my free time grows increasingly sparse, and my ability to sit down and type out a meaningful post becomes more and more fleeting.

However, I woke up and saw the news alerts on my phone. donald trump and his corrupt regime have illegally invaded and kidnapped a world leader overnight. After months of deceiving the American people to believe that Venezuela was some big player in the illegal drug trade, trump illegally ordered military action to bomb a sovereign nation, and illegally order military forces to kidnap Venezuela’s President(yes, I meant to write the term ‘illegally’ so many times because I want to emphasize how illegal this is). This has never been about illegal drugs, as it is well known that Venezuela is responsible for a very small amount of drugs that enter the United States. This entire campaign has always been about oil, which trump himself admitted on December 17 when he falsely claimed that Venezuela “illegally took” US oil. trump stated in an interview: “We want it back. They took our oil rights. We had a lot of oil there, as you know they threw our companies out, and we want it back.” What Venezuela did was take control of its own oil and kick foreign companies out of its country. This happened in 2007 when Maduro took over, and certain American oil companies (Chevron and ConocoPhillips), who had invested heavily in the production of Venezuela’s oil industry, for their profit, were left out in the cold. However, it is traditionally understood that a country’s natural resources are protected by international law and belong to the country they come from. Venezuela’s oil is Venezuela’s. It was never America’s oil.

Now, I am no fan of Maduro, but he was a problem only to the people of Venezuela and if they wanted him removed, that should have been their problem to deal with. Not anymore. Now this is our problem. Instead of toppling truly evil regimes that invade other nations and kill thousands of innocent people (Russia and Israel, for example), America’s own tyrant has started the New Year off by ordering his most bold violation of Constitutional Law: starting a war without Congressional approval. At least when Bush invaded Iraq for their oil, they put up a good show of “weapons of mass destruction” before dragging innocent Americans into that war. Breaking news from trump’s cronies is that Maduro is being brought to the US to face charges of narcoterrorism that were secured in trump’s first term. If you are not asking yourself why trump is so fascinated with Venezuela if he was truly concerned about narcoterrorism, you’re not asking the right questions. The countries most responsible for illicit drugs entering the U.S. are Colombia, Mexico, Peru, Bolivia, Guatemala, Honduras, and Panama. Colombia remains the largest producer of cocaine, while Mexico is the primary transit and distribution hub. If this was truly about a war against “narcoterrorists”, America would be focused on Colombia for its production, and Mexico, for allowing the drugs to flow across the border. But it’s not about drugs, this is all about oil.

And let me stop and give my personal opinion on the “war on drugs”. Drugs are a choice. It is a choice every American makes. I fully recognize the power of addiction, but addiction starts with an individual making the personal choice to ingest dangerous drugs. And the dangers of addiction and substance abuse are drilled in every American from elementary school. My third grader participates in “Red Ribbon Week” where they are taught to “Say No To Drugs”, so for anyone to say “yes” to drugs, that was their freewill choice to make. If you want to eliminate the flow of illegal drugs into the United States, eliminate the demand for them.

So, with his orders overnight, trump has shown his true colors as a dictator that he will stop at nothing to accomplish his personal agendas. Even russia is condemning this attack. Talk about the pot calling the kettle black. The hypocrisy in the world right now is at an all-time high. If these are the steps dictator trump will take to remove a president he can not get what he wants from, what is he willing to do to anyone standing up to him? Buckle up America, if you thought 2025 was bad, it may be tame to what we are going to see in the next twelve months. We have entered the Great Tribulation. We are just seven years away from marking the 2000 anniversary of when Christ is believed to have ascended back to Heaven (this calculation comes from the widespread belief that Jesus was 33 years old when He was crucified). The world has had nearly 2,000 years to get it right, and we are failing miserably to grasp the teachings of Christ when He taught us to LOVE GOD and LOVE ALL PEOPLE. As a Christian (one that tries to walk humbly as a disciple of Christ), I personally condemn everything donald trump has done in his second term, from ICE’s horrible attacks on our neighbors seeking safety in America, to our support of Israel’s genocide against the Palestinian people, to this latest infringement on a country America needs no involvement with.

I really desired to get on here this morning and write a post about how I was removing myself from national affairs, because if it is something I cannot personally affect change of, why spend the time ranting about it. But after seeing my news feed blow up, I could not stay silent. However, for the rest of this year, I may be mute on here. I have big plans for 2026 for the good work I plan to do, and I foresee that to accomplish the work I desire to complete this next year in my professional and personal life, it will mean that I will not have a lot of free time for this platform. So, I urge you good Christian warriors, the time has come to stop sitting on the sidelines. The world needs us like never before. The least of us are being exploited and targeted and Christ compels us to stand up for them. Kill the distractions and do the work. Focus on the small, change your circles to be accurate disciples of Jesus. The time to harvest is over. Now is the time to roll up our sleeves, get out into our communities, and do the labor the Lord requires of us.