Bob meets Billy the Brain

You can spend a pleasant hour listening to none other than Bob Thiel, Th.D, being interviewed by "Billy the Brain," on KKZZ just this week. But be quick, the show is only available for a few more days.

"Billy the Brain" was generous to Dr Bob ("you have done your homework, sir"), listing his many splendid academic accomplishments (did you know Bob has written seven books?) before launching out into the topic of 2012. Strangely enough, there was no mention of the disputed Th.D. Hmm. That didn't stop Billy from touting his guest as an "absolute expert": obviously he's easily impressed. Maybe I'm just a cynic, but having had to wing it through a few situations myself from time to time, I got the distinct impression that "the Brain" had only just picked up the book and skimmed the chapter heads before going on air, and thought Bob was there to "debunk" the movie that is coming out next week.

Credit where credit is due though, COGdom's favorite naturopath came across reasonably well, and he didn't get sidetracked into Sabbaths and other red-herring issues, but stayed focused throughout. Not even a free plug for the Living Church of God or Tomorrow's World.

And how many callers did Bob attract? Well, zilch, zip, nada. Sad. It's doubtful that Bob will make his fortune selling this thing, and even if he did, well, there wouldn't really be time to spend it anyway would there?

Oh, and yes, while Bob won't commit to 2012, he nonetheless assured Billy that the End is scheduled for the next decade. When LCG collapses, could it be that Bob cuts free and establishes himself as the Willie Dankenbring for a new generation?

2012 Garbage

Wally Smith, media understudy to LCG's gerontocracy, has scribed some 2012 thoughts on his blog.

On the other hand, I read and digested more 2012-related garbage that I would ever want to do again. For instance, I’m not sure if it will make the DVD, but we created a clip in which we toss book after book onto a table, each one professing to contain 2012-related wisdom, knowledge and prophecy.

It seems Wally is a skeptic, on 2012 if nothing else. No mention here, let alone endorsement, of fellow LCG member and eminent scholar Bob Thiel (Th.D) and his recent book 2012 and the Secret Sect though. Could it be that Bob's magnum opus was one of those books Wally tossed onto the table? "Wisdom, knowledge and prophecy" are a Thiel specialty! Wally mentions that he spent time with a Mayan scholar ("a Ph.D. in Mesoamerican cultures who was a Maya expert") who was also, it seems, a closet devotee of British Israelism.

In other research, he had also come to his own conclusions about the identity of the ten “lost tribes” of Israel, which — though done without contact with our church — correlated incredibly very well with exactly what we teach of them and of the United States and Great Britain in the Living Church of God — but that is a tale for another day.

Of course Wally isn't about to identify this genius.

Wally is the LCG's expert on 2012, and has both written a feature article about it in the latest Tomorrow's World, and recorded a television program which will air when the 2012 movie is released just over a week from now. But wouldn't you have thought the TW editorial team would have been falling over themselves to get Bob Thiel to write this article, considering Bob not only holds the sole Th.D in the church, but has just written a full-length book on this subject?

Just as mysteriously, there is still no comment or clarification from Bob about the legitimacy of that very same Th.D which he recently added to his resume. As someone recently pointed out, Bob's sudden elevation to doctor of theology - assuming it was the real thing - would be a huge asset for the intellectually under-endowed sect. If however it's little more than a vanity degree that Bob picked up from a shonky operation in India, then Bob could well be the butt of an awful lot of humor at the Charlotte HQ.