As Biden’s push to defend democracy is seen by many as too little too late, the twenty first century’s John Birchers continue to deny that the United States was ever intended to be a democracy. They parrot the talking points of earlier demagogues while exhibiting no depth of knowledge and little interest in developing any. They say the word democracy doesn’t appear anywhere in the U.S. Constitution, even though the first three words of the Preamble clearly define it.

Excessively prominent, mammon serving evangelicals, continue to hijack pulpits once used to glorify the Way, the Truth, and the Life. They instead use them to promote numerous backroads to Hell, a reckless indifference to the Truth, and a perpetual orgy of darkness and death. On January the 13^th in 2022, the Republican National Committee publicly announced it may prohibit future GOP presidential nominees from participating in official general election debates. Their scheme, to compel the most uninformed consent of the governed, is intended to bring government of, by, and for the people to an end.

Corrupting the election process, under the banner of Election Integrity, is the inevitable consequence of dark money politics. The foreign potentates, that exploit the so-called free speech rights of American corporations, gained that advantage through the Supreme Court’s sociopathic notion of corporate personhood. Autocrats have been granted the license they use for distorting our national dialogue. When every debauched value proposition is packaged for simpleton consumption, our only option for going forward is to stop acting like simpletons.

In 1765, Jean-Jacques Rousseau wrote six books. The last in the series contained a sentence that has gracefully transcended the intervening centuries and is commonly translated as: “I remembered the last resort of a great princess who, when told that the peasants had no bread, replied: “Then let them eat cake.”

Whenever a controlling interest in a corporation is held by outside investors, the corporation is no longer composed of people associating for a common purpose and acting corporately. It becomes systematically dumbed down. The employees suffer tamped down wages and hollowed out benefits packages at the behest of despots, the likes of which have been handling slaves for thousands of years. And now they complain about people’s reluctance to again participate in an economy replete with dead-end jobs. The Great Resignation may just represent a glimmer of new hope on the horizon. As people reduce their dependence on those industries with a history of exploitation, the implications for democracy are slowly coming into view. 

In 1985, Mikhail Gorbachev promoted glasnost (“openness”) and perestroika (“restructuring”) in an attempt to overcome the Soviet Union’s economic stagnation and stunted growth. These initiatives promised the “utmost respect for the individual citizen and favorable consideration for protecting one’s personal dignity.” By creating a dependable and effective mechanism for accelerating economic and social progress, Gorbachev hoped to encourage initiative and creative endeavor.

Gorbachov gained authority to create joint-stock companies out of state enterprises. The shares became available on stock exchanges. As privatization became a primary goal of the new Russian Federation, vouchers were circulated equally throughout the general population between 1992 and 1994. The wide distribution, which included minors, had a participation rate of 98%. It started as an equal distribution of national wealth, based upon the conversion of state-owned enterprises to promote share-holder stakes that would be held, enjoyed, and controlled by Russian citizens.

Self-centered forces wasted no time in turning that benevolent vision into a variety of schemes to exploit the poor. What started as a largely equal distribution of national wealth became concentrated within the ranks of management as the starving masses relinquished whatever they may have held of any value, including personal shares, settling for fire-sale prices just so they could buy foodstuffs. When they did scrape up a little cash, they faced the bleak reality of purchasing power that was dramatically reduced.

Vladimir Putin commanded the FSB, a successor to the KGB, as Director. He was later appointed as Prime Minister and uniquely positioned to benefit personally from the rise of the oligarchs. Because he had organized the transfer of the assets from the former Soviet Union and Communist Party to the Russian Federation, he knew where the real value was. As a former Lieutenant Colonel of the KGB, he also knew where the bodies were buried.

As the gamesmanship over vouchers and loans for shares played out, one such grabber, an oil oligarch, ran afoul of Putin and was put on trial. Putin arranged for the Defendant to be seated in a cage at the center of the courtroom. According to the prevailing legend, one by one the other oligarchs came to Putin and asked: “How do we stay out of cages?” Putin’s answer: “Fifty percent.”

For Putin, working “useful idiots” like Mitch McConnell and Donald Trump is child’s play. For us, the challenge is to recapture the wisdom of the American colonists. Edmond Burke once described them as “able to sniff the approach of tyranny in every tainted breeze.” Can we regain that ability while mustering the courage to confront Putinesque prevaricators?

Obie-Wan Kenobi once described the Light Sabre as an elegant weapon. We might add: Especially when it is energized by just the right combination of physical light, intellectual insight, and Spirit luminosity. In the Gospel According to Matthew, the author wrote: If the light within you is darkness, how great is that darkness! I’ve come to believe the triune energy complement of the high precision metaphorical Light Sabre is the best way to pierce the darkness within the minds and hearts of those in perpetual slumber. 

Most of us thrive in light. We lay on the beach absorbing it. Those of us with a true love of learning, search continuously for more forms of enlightenment. And then there are some of us who habitually avoid the light. I was one of those. In 1969 I was scanning the FM radio dial and heard a sound that resonated with me. It was like electric bagpipes but somehow more pleasing. The band was singing “Darkness, darkness, be my blanket – Cover me with the endless night – Take away, take away the pain of knowing – Fill the emptiness of right now.” Within weeks I had an after school job at that radio station.

I am convinced that every step along the way in this little journey was guided by the choreography of the Spirit. I went from scanning the FM dial, through the appealing music, to a job at that very radio station. After finishing my all night show one morning, my boss walked into the studio and told me “The Youngbloods are coming into town tonight and we’re going to broadcast them live. It’s going to be Washington DC’s first live quad-cast. And oh, by the way, because we don’t have a quadraphonic audio board, you will have to build it.”

Now if you think I was going to build it,and then let somebody else run it, think again. Especially when no one at the station had a greater affinity for the sound of that particular band than me. Twenty-four hours without sleep, no problem. A steady diet of meatball subs and caffeine, no problem. Being eighteen years old, and doing the mix for my favorite band, definitely no problem. I was just inches from one side of the glass facing the guys that were inches from the other side of the glass facing me. If I wanted to hear more of Banana’s bass or Earthquake’s harmonica, I just twisted the knob to make the music fit my ear. I really loved that job.

The next day, The Youngbloods played an outdoor concert on P-Street Beach in Washington, DC. Jesse was writing songs that meet people where they live, to take them someplace far, far higher. I will never forget how after the he loaded the truck with all the band’s equipment by himself, without complaining. He did this while the rest of the band and I played Frisbee alongside Rock Creek.

As time passed, I began to really appreciate another song by Jessie Colin Young and The Youngbloods. It went like this: If you hear the song I sing – You will understand (listen!) – You hold the key to love and fear – All in your trembling hand – Just one key unlocks them both – It’s there at your command – Come on people now – Smile on your brother – Everybody get together – Try to love one another – Right now.

I can’t imagine a better, more individualized way to fill the God-shaped void that was once inside of me. I was no longer singing about the “emptiness of right now,” as if I had some special relationship to it other than one of reminiscence. I don’t want to miss out on anything just because I am not adequately responsive to Divine Leading. Sure, I know how to develop and execute my own plans. But, I’ve learned, from experience, that God’s plans are always better.

I once had a long conversation with an old friend named Troy while I was on a long drive. I have lots of projects that are just inching forward. And, it really bugs me if anything is running behind my self-imposed schedule. My friend is a systems analyst that has guided some of the largest computer initiatives on the planet. Accordingly, he is experienced in managing projects that have a great number of moving parts. During that long drive he told me two things that I will never forget.

He said that “God doesn’t just want to be your upstairs advisor, he wants to be your partner.” At that I thought, “Well, senior partner obviously.” Then, Troy said something else that I really didn’t understand at first. He said “One-hundred percent of ten percent is more than ten percent of one-hundred percent.” I thought “No it’s not!” But in reality it is.

That completed ten percent is of tremendous value. There is a qualitative difference. It is more serviceable in the way that you get to make use of it.

On March the 7^th in 2021, on Fox News Sunday, Senator Joe Manchin said “The filibuster should be painful, it really should be painful and we’ve made it more comfortable over the years.” On NBC’s Meet the Press, Manchin also said “If you want to make it a little bit more painful, make him stand there and talk.”

The filibuster was originally established to protect the rights of a Senate minority. It gave senators the ability to slow down or block a vote on any bill by talking, extensively, about the issue at hand. Senators could thereby draw attention to their own priorities. And the country would derive an important benefit when bills were fully and openly debated.

As the Senate became more compromised in an era of dark money politics, a creeping cowardice took hold through a series of rules changes. Where the original filibuster required members to stand up for their principles and actively engage in debate, senators could now avoid a vote without ever having to justify their positions. 

There was a time when the Senate called itself the world’s greatest deliberative body. It no longer has any real credibility with respect to that particular claim. When our leaders were required to stand up for their principles through the talking filibuster, they would proclaim their beliefs and explain why they disagreed with the majority. When they instead began to insert cookie recipes into the record, it became clear that any informed consent of the governed was not held to be of value.

Today, the filibuster is simply used as a pocket veto. Standing on principle and openly defending one’s stance is seen as an arcane banished idea by self-serving politicians with an insatiable appetites for dark money. It is understandable that a politician, intent on promoting an abhorrent set of values, would be reluctant to engage in honest introspection as he or she surreptitiously sells out the nation. In that context, the secret filibuster is a useful obfuscation device.

The filibuster was never a part of our Constitution. It was also not a part of the original Senate rules. Vice President Aaron Burr removed the rule, which allowed a simple majority to force a vote, in 1806. Senator Strom Thurmond holds the record for the longest individual filibuster. He spoke for 24 hours and 18 minutes to stall passage of the Civil Rights Act of 1957. A few years later, Democrats led by Richard Russell Jr. famously held up the passage of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 for 60 working days.

After the Supreme Court of the United States gutted the major provisions of these Civil Rights Acts, Republican Senators led by Mitch McConnell, in January of 2022, have clearly defined themselves as they refuse to put a check on states that are still fighting the Civil War. Such senators refuse to engage in reforming those police departments that maintain a cop culture deeply rooted in the traditions of the slave patrols. They enable state legislatures and governors that are intent on sustaining the last gasp of the Three-Fifths Compromise which insured a black man or woman would never amount to more than three-fifths of a person at the ballot box. 

Senator Manchin’s fetish of bipartisanship, together with his reverence for a filibuster that is actively corroding the democracy underpinnings of our constitutional republic, are a great delight to real enemies of the United States. When the Senate rules were changed, so any Senator could block any bill from consideration or debate without having to explain or defend their action, the electorate was thrust into darkness.

The ability to block legislation, without ever engaging in open debate, helps senators to keep their dark money secrets. The “nuclear option” that then Senate Majority Leader McConnell used in 2017 to undermine the historic precedent of appointing judges that could draw consensus from both parties, was pivotal. The only ones that seem to be concerned about setting precedent, in punching through the filibuster, are those who have failed to learn from McConnell’s history of duplicity.

Any rookie salesperson could tell you that the Reconciliation Process would likely fail to deliver the Build Back Better legislation. Declaring the price up front, without first running through the features and benefits, was, to put it charitably, exceedingly stupid. But, it was the only option because of the filibuster. Likewise, all the voting rights initiatives are doomed to fail unless Senators are forced to stand in harsh lighting that is likely to penetrate any thin veneer of religiosity.

The changes, carve-outs, and exceptions have been playing out for decades. And yet, the secret filibuster continues to undermine the will of the majority in America. When Senators who want to block a vote must stay on topic, doing the difficult and open work of holding the floor; When they must explain why votes should not be honored, why healthcare should not be a basic right, why early childhood education should not be the norm, the content of each Senator’s character will be, as it should be, center stage. Talk about painful.

Inscribed over the doors of the Supreme Court building in Washington, DC are the words ‘Equal Justice Under Law.’ Unfortunately, those words have never rung true within the United States. They are now hardly even seen as aspirational by several of the justices currently occupying the high court. Consider, for example, the court’s sociopathic notion of corporate personhood.

While certain addled jurists have proclaimed that corporations are persons with rights, such as those of free speech, executives are seldom held accountable for policies, even when it is shown they are the proximate cause for death and destruction. Fatalities from the daily use of opioids as promoted by the owners of Purdue Pharma, or those brought about by executives at Pacific Gas and Electric through their criminal negligence, occur behind the corporate veil and are not of interest to pretenders in law. They might gratify themselves by declaring the non-corporeal entities are guilty of manslaughter, but the actual persons behind the decision making routinely get a pass.

The Supreme Court of the United States has consistently placed the proposition of societal equity on a plane of unreality. Members of the judicial monastery are fully immersed in a fantasyland of their own making. They display none of the intellectual rigor that was touted when they were nominated and, once seated, publish incoherent opinions that clearly advance the corporate sociopathy that secured their nominations, confirmations, and accommodations. They enjoy lifetime tenure and are therefore the primary beneficiaries of the dark money politics they have not only permitted, but intentionally and willfully advanced.

The ideal expressed in the Declaration of Independence, as the ‘consent of the governed,’ has been held in high regard since the Ordinatio was published in the 1290s. And yet, the kind of “informed consent” that would typically be required before having a mole removed, is not considered important by certain misfits occupying positions of honor and trust. Their form-fitting seats notwithstanding, they are the ones that have brought their fitness for high office into question.

They respect precedent when they want to double-down on dumb-assed decisions. And they simply ignore it when they find it inconvenient in light of their political ideology. They sit idly by as unqualified members are seated, after politically corrupted FBI investigations put the vetting process and the reputation of the bureau squarely into the category of hocus-pocus. And then they have the gall to whine about the reputation of the Court. They don’t just have a perception problem. They have an integrity problem that is undeniable.

Justices, masquerading an originalists and textualists, routinely set aside the cardinal precepts of the Constitution as they were so carefully delineated in the Preamble. They support the nefarious schemes of grifty politicians that consistently place donor interests above voter interests. They have gutted the voting rights legislation of the sixties and have enabled media monopolies to the point where a handful of billionaires control the information flow to about three-hundred and thirty-million American citizens. They have, bytheir decisions, converted the whirlpool of information into a malodorous cesspool of disinformation. And, they have no plausible deniability on that.

SCOTUS is keenly aware of just how integrity challenged state legislators have been laying in wait for the court’s ideological balance to shift. They have resisted the kind of change that would provide for randomizing the seating of panels, that hear any given case, so that the will of ideologues would no longer be so predictable. When an unprincipled Senate Majority leader, in collusion with a one term President, can pack wing-nuts into one third of the seats on the high court, claims of judicial impartiality and independence are not credible. And, those making such claims are either intent on deceiving the public, or are themselves delusional.

There is only one way to purge the court of integrity challenged justices. And that is to legislate against the grift and dark money politics that have eclipsed the promise of a great nation. When people who are elected or appointed to high office operate with impunity, in ways that are so far afoul of their constitutional oath that the electorate has lost confidence, no amount of blame-shifting to We the People will restore their reputations. Their posterity will hold them accountable even, if their contemporaries are unwilling, lacking the courage to ask a career ending question.

While SCOTUS justices have enjoyed a safe work environment during the COVID pandemic, the average worker in the United States is subject to the whims of a government that has consistently failed to “provide for the common defense.” The pattern of judicial conduct, as revealed in an array of decisions that demonstrate contempt for any obligation “to promote the general welfare,” while imposing conditions of peonage on average people, is troubling.

If the individuals involved were not held in such high esteem and considered above reproach, such predictable deference to corporate interests would seem very suspicious. Of course the general public is not generally aware that, unlike all other federal judges, the justices of the Supreme Court are not subject to a code of ethical conduct.

What would happen if George Costanza was the relevance guy at VeryBigSearchEngine.com. Why then a search for major celebrations during December would likely place Festivus at the very top of the results page and Christmas might not place at all. Now this could be simply because the calendar editor placed the birth of Jesus in August and ignored the tradition of celebrating it in December.

Suppose someone posted an article on the Life of Jesus. The relevance rankings would determine your ability to find it using a search service. These rankings are conditioned by the search algorithms, some group’s doctrine concerning reliable sources and of course the quality of the subject article. The essay may not even be indexed depending on the editor’s attitude towards religion or the editorial policies of the search service provider. 

A large thesaurus could contain tens of thousands of synonyms and hundreds of thousands of cross references. And, while one would think the content of an article would itself be the primary relevance factor; naming, tagging and formatting also affect placement in search results to varying degrees. It very much depends on the person authoring, packaging, and submitting the article. 

Jesus touched on this with the question: “Which of you fathers, if your son asks for a fish, will give him a snake instead? Or if he asks for an egg, will give him a scorpion? If you then, though you are evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your Father in heaven give the Holy Spirit to those who ask him!”

In the days before its Declaration of Independence in what is now the United States, Edmond Burke wrote a Report to King George. He described the colonist’s ability to recognize an ill principle in this way. “Here they anticipate the evil and judge the pressure of the evil by the badness of the principle. They honor misgovernment from a distance and snuff out the approach of tyranny in every tainted breeze.” 

Clearly the “tainted breeze” in our day, and throughout our world, is that of the special interest that would eclipse or discount the interests of average citizens. It was the unmitigated selfishness of those living high while demanding increased revenue that brought the global economy to the edge of oblivion in 1929 and 2008. Such individuals should not be seen as somehow more respectable than the person robbing a convenience store; also in the interest of “increased revenue.” In the first case, the revenue supported the pampered executive’s featherbedding, and in the latter case, it was likely used for the most basic elements of survival.

Throughout history, and during our present time, information is power. One of Martin Luther’s greatest challenges was a priesthood insistent on playing the Judeo-Christian scriptures close to the vest. Slaves, in the early United States even found it necessary to hide their bibles. Freedom of the press has always been limited to the guy that owned the press. And today, the question of net-neutrality will be pivotal to future societal evolution.

The Internet will either be free and unfettered, the self-interested will determine what information is conveniently presented to you in accordance with their priorities. Implicit to the consent of the governed is informed consent. Tampering with factual accounts has serious democracy implications. So does the ability to get a handle on information free of someone’s dollar skew. 

We must learn to see beyond individual or institutional attitudes, beyond vestings and bias factors. To the content spewing and trolling broadcaster, if it bleeds it leads. To the next-gen fisher of men, engaged in precisely directed, full duplex narrowcasting, we are inclined to fine tune our offerings. The consumer of information relevant to the Gospel has lots of choices. And consumers of all types are becoming increasingly annoyed by irrelevant stuff that clutters their screens; distractions that are thrown in their faces just when they are trying to focus on the subject at hand.

The avenues of spiritual, intellectual and practical reality merge into the narrow road. That road leads to a door that can only be unlocked with sincerity. And such sincerity is the product of faith that is tempered through experience. It is the Master Key to the Kingdom. 

Where wisdom is clearly lacking; where humility lessons are everywhere, there is new opportunity for those willing to bring a historical perspective and learn from history. It is important to keep the kind of perspective that will support services rendered on behalf of those Jesus called “the least of my brethren.” We are often surprised to discover that so much of what we know today was known by our ancestors. Their grasp of rudimentary chemistry and physics, the taming of fire and the industrial technique of early man suggest a science of sorts. It would appear that a substantial investment was made in pooling the experience of more than one generation. We can draw from an even greater experience, for Our Father in Heaven is the First Source of all Reality.

In 1960, A.J. Liebling tossed off one of his most memorable lines. In his May 14 column, in the New Yorker, Liebling wrote: “Freedom of the press is guaranteed only to those who own one.” Even back then, in the face of corporate takeovers of newspapers and layoffs of hundreds of journalists, he worried that the power of the press was being concentrated in too few hands. Today it is estimated that about seven hundred billionaires control the information flow to three-hundred and thirty-million people in the United States.

As I was capping off 2021, with a brief bout of Omicron, I had time to think about the phrasing our press uses with respect to that variant, and what they habitually call “break through infections.” Thanks to my three doses of an mRNA vaccine, my natural immunity was augmented and informed on precisely how to recognize and combat the COVID-19 virus.

Because the press is so imprecise about what it means when one gets infected despite being vaccinated, people think that the vaccines don’t work and that is probably a reasonable inference. However, nothing could be further from the truth. Unless an infection is present, there is really nothing for the immune system to do. It can only mitigate damages from such an infection once the infection is detected. Vaccinated or not, if you inhale the infection, you are infected. Sooo, use of the term “breakthrough” is actively promoting the erroneous idea that a vaccine is a barrier. That’s simply not how it works. An mRNA vaccine informs the immune system by means of it’s messaging.

Intellectually undisciplined and integrity challenged bloviators have also exploited the misconception many people have about bacterial infections, as opposed to viral infections. Accordingly, they confuse the role of antibiotics and vaccines. They lead the incurious to equate the two and engage in hearsay based upon the bloviator’s erroneous or intentionally misleading conclusions. 

Now you may ask yourself what might motivate an excessively prominent influencer to mislead their followers. And it is, perhaps, not comforting when one realizes that he or she is being played for a fool. Consider how those, the most entitled at the commanding heights of the world’s power dynamics, think of what they view as the “great unwashed.” Is it beyond the realm of possibility that they actually want someone, that’s foolish enough to take Ivermectin for COVID, to self-sterilize?

Now you may be inclined to dismiss this as one of many wild conspiracy theories that are currently in vogue. Still, at this juncture, I am inclined to believe that at least some of the following quotes, by well known individuals, will surprise you.

Theodore Roosevelt said “society has no business to permit degenerates to reproduce their kind.” And, Herbert Hoover said “There shall be no child in America that had not the complete birthright of a sound mind in a sound body.” Oliver Wendell Holmes, the justice who wrote the Supreme Court’s 1927 Buck v. Bell decision, also wrote “It is better for all the world, if instead of waiting to execute degenerate offspring for crime or to let them starve for their imbecility, society can prevent those who are manifestly unfit from continuing their kind. … Three generations of imbeciles are enough.” 

Adolf Hitler took note of these American sentiments when he said “There is today one state in which at least weak beginnings toward a better conception are noticeable. Of course, it is not our model German Republic, but the American Union.” Winston Churchill had advocated for sterilization and compulsory labor camps for mental defectives in 1911. In that vein he said “The unnatural and increasingly rapid growth of the Feeble-Minded and Insane classes … constitutes a national and race danger which it is impossible to exaggerate.” 

Other influencers such as George Bernard Shaw supported this line of reasoning when he said “We should find ourselves committed to killing a great many people whom we now leave living, and to leave living a great many people whom we at present kill. . . . A great many people would have to be put out of existence simply because it wastes other people’s time to look after them.” Even the words of Helen Keller will surprise many for she said “Our puny sentimentalism has caused us to forget that a human life is sacred only when it may be of some use to itself and to the world.” 

Margaret Sanger aligned her fight for contraception with that of the eugenics movement. She stated that “birth control is nothing more or less than the facilitation of the process of weeding out the unfit [and] of preventing the birth of defectives.” W. E. B. Du Bois, the African-American activist and writer, promoted marriage and reproduction of the most desirable group while breeding out the least.

The most boisterous of the know-it-alls, through their abysmal ignorance, are self-selecting to breed out the least fit voluntarily. By taking their Ivermectin and trans-femme cocktails, they are sterilizing themselves. And that is precisely what the Tucker Carlson types want them to do.

As a teenager, my relationship with my father was always contentious. My questions about things that seemed important were often dismissed in ways that left me without soul satisfying answers. Although he was one of the most generous people I’ve ever known, I had developed no real appreciation for that until I was born-again into a larger, truly universal family.

My rebirth occurred right around Christmas of 1972. It was a long labor. Before that, my highest conception of any Supreme Deity, if one existed at all, was that it was the sum total of our collective human experience. As I began to consider the possibility of a Supreme Being, one that might even have personality, my focus shifted from the ancient Hindu concept of the It Is to the things Jesus revealed about the I AM.

In those days my personal bible was the record library of the FM radio station where I hosted an all night show for a year or so. It was a twenty-three hundred watt flower pot, inside the Washington Beltway, that featured album rock. Because of the free form way, in which the station operated, I could simply spin what interested me. It was a time of spiritual growth as my interests and my selections were gradually moving away from themes of darkness and death to those of light and life.

Jim Morrison’s shouts of “Cancel my subscription to the resurrection” no longer appealed to me. While I continued to love the music of the Doors, I was developing a real affinity for the Moody Blues. The song Have You Heard reached me. I was especially touched by the lyrics: Life’s ours for the making, Eternity’s waiting, Waiting for you and me.

My first flight instructor was George. He was into Scientology in a big way and, although I had read some of the Hubbard stuff, I found a statement contained within one of his books rather off-putting. He wrote: “Don’t mix this with modern psycho-analytic theory.” I remember thinking “How self-serving.”

George however, was an impressive individual. One television commercial that aired in Washington featured George flying a little red biplane wearing a leather aviator’s cap and a white silk scarf that was trailing him. He spun the plane into a dive and, in the voiceover, George said “My life was in a spin; but then I found the modern science of Dianetics by L. Ron Hubbard.” At that point George had put the plane back into straight and level flight. It was a great commercial. Although I had already read Dianetics and found some of it useful, the commercial didn’t persuade me to buy into Hubbard’s package deal. But it really was a great commercial!

Years before, during my first flying lesson, and with his elbow propped up on the wing of a Cessna 152, George had said: “Don’t try to memorize what I say to you. Just make sure you understand it. At that point memory will be automatic.” I thought “What a great teaching technique,” and I immediately recognized the culture from which George drew his inspiration.

At some point, during one of the many flights that followed, George said something else that stuck with me. He said “after you get your pilot’s license, be sure to get a seaplane rating.” When I asked why, George said “Because it’s the easiest to get and it’s definitely the most fun.” In the days, months, and years that followed that conversation, I was drawn to every picture in every magazine that featured a seaplane. Some would have a person sitting on the wing while fishing. Others would have kids swimming around the plane. I thought: “I get it now: Island hopping for one vacation and lake hopping for the next.”

Then, I had the dream. It was an impressive dream. It was kind of like a short clip that seemed to be spliced onto the end of every dream I had for a period of years. I had landed a seaplane on some lake that was too small to support a takeoff run. And it always ended with me going around in circles hoping for that rare gust of wind that would finally get me airborne. Now if that ain’t a metaphor for something, I don’t know what is.

Here’s what I do know. There are times when we look at a problem as if we’re wearing blinders. We may think the only thing that’s going to get us out of a bad situation is a gust of wind or a winning lottery ticket. Waiting and hoping for luck to come our way may give rise to a teachable moment. Then, we must be responsive to Divine leading.

The Phil Keaggy song Disappointment described God’s appointment this way: “Well, He knows each broken purpose leads to fuller deeper trust. And the end of all His dealings proves our God is wise and just.” It is that wisdom, that flows from the heart of our loving Heavenly Father, that is our best evidence of the Supreme Being.

With each rising tide there is a process of increase known as accretion and, as the tide recedes, there occurs a necessary cleansing and reduction along with some sorting and sifting. Our life experience is built up and refined through a similar ebb and flow and, without this process, wisdom could not evolve. 

Acquiring and proving factual matter is essential to the conservation of knowledge. At times facts reveal patterns reminding us of essential truths that may lead us God-ward. But how does this happen? At what stage and under what circumstances do we attribute meanings and assign value to a collection of facts. And by what process do we aggregate and assimilate individual facts? 

We often take note of effects without necessarily understanding the causes much like the way atheists can develop an affinity for the things of God while failing to develop an appreciation for the Source and Center of all. Even so, the one and only uncaused cause leaves his signature on everything. It may be barely discernible in our shadowy light, but it is there none the less. 

The Deity centric cosmos reveals the fact of the fatherhood of our eternal God and a correlated truth, the brotherhood and sisterhood of human kind. It is the vibrantly alive, rock solid principle of reality upon which Jesus based his gospel concerning the gift of salvation through faith and the inevitable consequence of rebirth, to awaken as part of the Divine family. What is the universe of universes if not nurturing infrastructure? There is precise science, a coherent reason, a predictable path to and a gravity influence emanating from the center of all things. Nothing escapes his grasp. 

The self-preservative endowments of primitive animal life, including the instinctive power of quick perception and reflexive action, suggest a form of intuition that is beyond the scope of inheritable learned behaviors, far superior to those capabilities inherent to small brains and the envy of those engaged in leveraging robotics technology. How many years of technological evolution had passed before our display technologies began to approach, in capabilities, that compact dazzling light show taken for granted by the cuttlefish? 

The automatic association and referencing of ideas combined with the coordination of acquired knowledge suggest a capacity for understanding. Reason, seasoned judgment and decision making all depend upon understanding; a comprehension of meanings for which there is no ready neurological explanation. The conscientious self-direction that accompanies character development and moral stamina manifests spiritually as courage; a quality for which there is no adequate physiological explanation. 

The scientific quest, the curiosity that leads to adventure and discovery yields knowledge that guides us along useful and progressive paths of physical, intellectual and spiritual growth. The collaborative urge, the desire to socialize and the ability to harmonize all point to a Spirit of Counsel prompting the exchange of ideas and opinions as we learn to cooperate for mutual benefit. Such an endowment transcends natural law and provides further evidence of mind ministry. 

The religious impulse serves to differentiate the soul deprived creature from those with the capacity to appreciate origins. The worshipful expressions of the appreciative individual create deep channels through which wisdom may flow. This wisdom yields an even greater appreciation. And so we come full circle to the rolling tides. A process that favors the granularity, particularity and the specificity from which meaningful constructs and useful value propositions are built. 

Once we have learned to test all things and adhere to that which is true, beautiful and good, we can become reality centered within the greatest possible reality. As for all the things we take at face value, we should remember that the truth never suffers from close examination. So there is no disloyalty implicit to revisiting all prior assumptions. It doesn’t serve God’s purpose to artificially prop up sophistries based upon faulty analysis. Our mandate is to promote Truth; to prayerfully consider the things that are set before us and to allow ourselves to be led into all Truth by the Spirit of Truth. 

The question of whether to facilitate or teach is much easier when we consider the context: when we realize that perfection is not prerequisite to making meaningful contributions that help advance individuals and groups. The contextual relationships are only revealed through a balanced understanding of the things, meanings and values that encompass the essential curriculum. 

You can be instrumental in creating that rising tide that lifts all boats. You can help with the cleansing, the sorting, the sifting. You can lift others to stand on the shoulders of greatness. And your analysis can be the one that is tested through experience and tempered by wisdom. If Jesus is your teacher, the world becomes nurturing infrastructure. Where God is your thesis advisor, the universe becomes a grand conspiracy to insure your success. When the faith- fellows of the kingdom of heaven befriend you, an exciting career begins to unfold before you. And, whether you decide to embrace this, your first, best destiny, is left entirely up to you. 

And then it dawned on them, the Epiphany would be sullied by the one year anniversary of the racist riot that occurred in Washington on January the 6^th in 2021. Like the poo flinging monkeys that breached the nation’s capital on that day, defecating on the floor and smearing feces on the walls in Statuary Hall, members of the Sedition Caucus would continue to soil themselves in a high profile way. Theirs is not a profile in courage, far from it. History will correctly characterize them as vacillating jellyfish. Today, they are simply seen as Benedict Donald’s bootlickers.

They have desecrated the memory of all who courageously sacrificed, some dying face down in the mud, to preserve our constitutionally grounded democratic republic. Many of the country’s major corporations that took a stand, pledging to withhold campaign donations in the aftermath of the failed coup, have since demonstrated their own contempt for government of, by, and for the people. Their early declarations about not supporting seditionist politicians proved insincere. As the New York Times would opine: “The donations also reflect the fact that, over time, lawmakers are a more influential constituency for companies than consumers.”

What the old corporate guard has failed to comprehend is that workers and consumers have become more intentional as they decide who they’re willing to work for, and as they vote with scarce dollars. Unlike the featherbedded corporate CEOs, that enjoyed pay raises of over 940% over a period of 40 years, compensation for the average worker had increased by only 12%, not even keeping pace with inflation. Even so, due to the generosity of taxpayers, members of the United States House of Representatives and the Senate were also benefitting from generous vacation schedules and automatic pay raises. And yet, the minimum wage in the United States had increased by only two dollars and ten cents, from $5.15 in 1997 to $7.25 at the close of 2021.

As the nation struggled to recover from the COVID pandemic, price gouging was used to create inflationary political pressures. At the same time, the Hosea 4:12 contingent became even more boisterous. Though considered a minor prophet, Hosea had described this type of excessively prominent evangels of mammon perfectly, In about 750 BC, he wrote: “. . . for the spirit of whoredoms has caused them to err, and they have gone a-whoring from under their God.”

Ever since Plato wrote his philosophical dialogue, dealing with the composition and structure of the ideal state, a republic has been defined as a body of persons that comprise a commonwealth. It was not a nation in which the government is ruled by a hereditary head of state or monarch. It’s a state in which the supreme power is exercised by representatives chosen directly or indirectly by the body of citizens entitled to vote.

And there’s the rub. “The body of citizens entitled to vote” was an acceptable concept as long as the body was white. And, to guarantee it remained that way, the three-fifths compromise was used to insure a black man or woman would never amount to more that three-fifths of a person. When the Civil Rights Act of 1960 authorized court-appointed referees to help African Americans register and vote, those Democrats that were sympathetic to Neo-Nazis, the Ku Klux Klan, and other white supremacist groups were enraged, and they changed parties.

The Republican Party of today is decidedly unrepresentative of all but the tiniest – whiniest of minorities. They purge voter rolls, gerrymander, intimidate voters, suppress votes, and subvert elections to sustain the last gasp of the three-fifths compromise. The only way they can win elections with their abhorrent set of values is to lie, cheat, and steal while, in the Goebbelian tradition, accusing others of that which they are guilty. There are many who would argue that the Insurrection of January 6^th in 2021 was just the beginning. But, the fact is, racist riots are nothing new. The “Final Solution” in Nazi Germany was nothing new. The Tulsa Race Massacre was nothing new. The Trail of Tears in North America was nothing new just as the Armenian Genocide was nothing new.

For a significant number of citizens in the United States, democracy is ok, as long as it’s the white-bread variety. A representative republic is ok, as long as it too is representing the interests of whites only. Bigots are terrified by the notion of a multi-cultural, multi-ethnic, and multi-racial democracy. They are running from it, without looking to where they are running. And they are working, feverishly, to convert the United States Senate, and the House of Representatives, into Vladimir Putin’s brothels, where all the members are goin’ a-whoring.

When those religiously agnostic look at the unmitigated selfishness of Ted Cruz, they think to themselves; “If that’s the face of Christianity, I want no part of it!” In addition to diminishing the value of a Harvard education, Cruz has consistently been an embarrassment to the Christian faith. Although, trading one’s witness for a masquerade seems to be very much in vogue for so-called Christian politicians.

Imperfect as they were, the authors of the United States Constitution got it exactly right with phrasing that defined our democracy. “We the People of the United States, in Order to form a more perfect Union, , ,” epitomizes the spirit of constitutional law. Without an understanding of precisely what is meant by these words, and the cardinal precepts that follow, one cannot competently approach the letter of the law. Two thousand years before, Jesus accused the courts of his day saying they were “straining at gnats while swallowing camels.” He was referring to each whited sepulcher’s habit of setting aside the best interests of the people, in order to instead serve a club of self-righteous exclusivity comprised of a self-interested few.

Wholehearted and intelligent conformity to the kind of benevolence, that Jesus revealed as the Divine will, is the only way to build the kind of nation that is truly of, by, and for the people. The true consent of the governed is only achieved by insuring such consent is fully informed. The authenticity of any representative government will always be determined by the character and caliber of those who compose it. It depends upon the installation of true to their oath representatives, that are not inclined to hide anything; together with active engagement by an intelligent electorate. It is conditioned upon the practice of electing to public offices only those individuals who are intellectually and technically competent. They must be morally fit and possess a character that is loyal to society as a whole. This is the only way that government of the people, by the people, and for the people can be achieved and preserved.

Our strife-torn planet is replete with forms of liberty that are unintelligent, unconditioned, and uncontrolled. Any exercise of freedom that works to the detriment of others is not serving the long term best interests of any civilization. In fact, it is far more likely to result in abject bondage for someone. Reality based freedom and liberty is always mindful of the fact that every person on earth has a right to be the true arbiter of his or her own destiny.

We must recognize that imbalances within the global economy deprive some people of the right to be free. We also need to acknowledge that excessively burdensome access to food, housing, and healthcare are significant problems imposed as a result of systemic inequities. Such an imposition is typically brought about through the unmitigated selfishness of those at the commanding heights of the world’s economy. The idea of a multi-cultural, multi-ethnic, and multi-racial democracy terrifies them. They pay mere lip service to the values of those who are fervent advocates for the right of each person on earth to determine their future and that of their posterity. At the same time, they surreptitiously plot to undermine all that is true, beautiful, and good.

The potentate model of corporate and national governance is an awkward and outmoded relic of the past. It may hang on in a pathetic attempt to remain relevant. But, as Thomas Jefferson wrote; “We might as well require a man to wear still the coat which fitted him when a boy as a civilized society to remain ever under the regimen of their barbarous ancestors.” The new world has outgrown its relics. Leadership that can evolve to keep pace and operate in a way that is truly commensurate with the intellectual, sociological, and spiritual development of a great humanity is slowly but steadily emerging.

There are, of course, times when a leader must rise to the occasion and become the supreme authority. When the Fire Chief tells you to put a fourteen foot ladder against the North wall to help the hose brigade fight a raging fire that’s about to jump to the next building, it’s not an appropriate time to question his or her authority and engage in prolonged debate. A fire department that’s actively on scene is not a democracy. When the fire is out, and the game tape is being evaluated, the best departments become more collaborative, drawing upon the experience from each of their members.

Authentic corporations and democracies are like the collaborative team. They are composed of people associating for a common purpose and acting corporately to insure success. A loyal opposition is highly valued, like an opposable thumb, for both make it easier to grasp each and every problem that comes before us. Such opposition is described as loyal because, even though there may be disagreement on the best way to overcome obstacles to ultimate success, the objectives are shared. Our depth of understanding is enhanced precisely because we are blessed with two eyes. Think about how much more meaningful the world will become when we have finally learned to also see it through the experience of others.

We must also learn to properly evaluate the opposition we encounter on the basis of its loyalty to, and affinity for, the values of those working to achieve a more perfect union that serves the highest and best interests of We the People.