Herbert Armstrong's Tangled Web of Corrupt Leaders

Tuesday, June 2, 2026

When Spaghetti Hits the Wall: Crackpot Bob's Vague Guesses, Post-Hoc Victory Laps, and Zero Accountability Since 2007



Crackpot Bob is a prolific reader of Banned and, as a result, is big mad that the meanie folks here on Banned who dared to point out the century-long Armstrongite prophetic clown car has never, ever delivered. How dare they notice the endless parade of "less than five years left!" reruns that somehow stretch into "any minute now... for the 87th time."

Let's take his sacred laundry list of "not coincidences, Divine Intervention" and give it the sarcastic roast it so richly deserves. These aren't prophecies—they're the prophetic equivalent of throwing spaghetti at the wall, claiming victory on anything that sticks, and then writing a book about your "fruits." As usual, this is all about HIM and HIM alone.

The Greatest Hits of "I Told You So... Sort Of"
  • Iran "neutralized" (2007 post → 2026 Netanyahu headline): Wow, Bob called it in 2007 that Iran might get slapped around someday. Groundbreaking. In a region that's been a powder keg for decades, predicting "Iran will face trouble" is like predicting "California will have earthquakes." By 2026, after actual wars and strikes, someone declares capabilities hit—Bob's victory lap. Never mind all the times Iran wasn't neutralized in between. Classic vague geopolitical guess + post-hoc high-five.
  • Meredith ministroke and death timeline prayers: You "warned" a top leader might get struck unless things changed... and then prayed for him to live 7-15 more years. He had a ministroke and died after ~8. This is "prophecy"? It's called being in a church with aging leaders and basic medical statistics. "I prayed for X and then X happened-ish" isn't divine—it's normal life plus confirmation bias. If prayers counted as prophecy, every grandma lighting candles would be Elijah. The fact that Crackpot Bob brags about this should show how morally depraved the man really is.
  • 2012 book with "32 predictions fulfilled": Ah yes, the book that said the world wouldn't end in 2012 (safe bet) and then retrofitted a bunch of vague "rise of secret sect/EU/whatever" stuff. By December 2012, Bob declares victory. This is the same playbook as every end-times huckster: predict enough fuzzy trends, ignore the flops, and sell books.
  • Beginning of sorrows, Australia troops, Guttenberg, etc.: "I speculated China might get mad about US troops in Australia!" Wow. Geopolitical tensions in the Pacific—truly a miracle. Guttenberg predictions: a German politician does politician things. Speculative fanfic elevated to "divine."
  • The Anointing Drama (Bonjour double-portion prayer): This is peak cult theater. Ministers say you don't need special hands-laid prophet status → you pray real hard on a trip → one guy anoints you and says "oops, mantle!" → you declare yourself validated and start the fastest-growing (tiny) splinter. Fruits? Sure, if "splinter group with a website" counts as Acts 2:17-18. Jesus talked about fruits like character and truth, not "my blog traffic grew."
  • Coronavirus warnings (2013+): "Novel diseases could be a threat!" and "coronaviruses are risky!" in the age of SARS, MERS, bird flu scares, etc. This is called reading the news, Bob. Then tying it to horsemen after the fact. Every epidemiologist warned about pandemics. You didn't predict the specific COVID-19 origin or timeline—you just said "viruses bad."
  • Crypto regulation, Ukraine to Russia, Crimea, Donetsk: Governments regulating money? Russia wanting Ukraine bits? In 2013-2022? These are obvious trends to anyone following news, not supernatural insight. Sanctions didn't stop Russia—shocker. Bob's "predictions" read like a slightly informed geopolitical newsletter with Bible verses sprinkled on top.
  • GMO mosquitoes stronger? Scientists release modified bugs, unintended consequences happen. Science does that. Not prophecy.
  • Trump books, Biden books, gold records, Mercosur, Chagos Islands: Endless books predicting administrations will do administration things (trade deals, economic moves, Europe reacting to Trump). Gold hits records during inflation/uncertainty—astounding. UK giving up islands—colonial wind-down continues. These are "fulfilled" by stretching "at least partially" so wide you could drive a truck through it.
Crackpot Bob's entire method: Rifle through headlines, find anything that vaguely matches a prior vague post, declare "confirmed sign!" while the mountain of Armstrong originals (failed dates for the Great Tribulation, Europe uniting as the Beast any day, etc.) gets memory-holed.

Deuteronomy 18 test for prophets: If it doesn't come to pass, they spoke presumptuously. Not "mostly sorta aligned if you squint." The Bible also warns against those who love to claim special dreams, private interpretations, and "I alone understand the signs" while the church splits into 400+ feuding COG fragments, each claiming to be the One True.

Thiel's list is what happens when you turn "watching world news and praying" into a prophetic brand. It's not divine intervention—it's the same retrofitting every failed end-times group does. The "laundry list" is just confirmation bias in chart form.

If Bob's the real deal, where are the unambiguous, specific, falsifiable prophecies that actually shocked the world instead of "I said tensions might rise and they did"? The Armstrong tradition has been recycling "five years left" since before most of us were born. At some point, the roadside wreckage of failed dates isn't "persecution"—it's a track record.

Truth hurts, Bob. Especially when it's been on public display for decades.

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