The Patriot's Prayer

The Patriot’s Prayer

 

By Lawrence John Brown

 

Shakespir Edition

 

Copyright January 30, 2017

 

 

Dear God,

 

During the first American Revolution, the patriot Thomas Paine wrote: “These are the times that try men’s souls.” With your help, God, we defeated the British and we prospered and grew into a nation of more than 320 million souls, a nation that was made stronger by immigrants from every country and from every race and religion on Earth.

 

God, today our nation is in great danger and we need your help again. You see, the forces of darkness—of xenophobia and fascism, racism and hatred, sexism and homophobia, arrogance and hypocrisy, selfishness and greed, militarism and fanatical patriotism—were unleashed when the American people made a demagogue the president of the United States.

 

This demagogue leading the dark forces has demonstrated by his words and deeds that he is morally, intellectually, and temperamentally unfit to be president of the United States. Moreover, he is an illegitimate president because he lost the popular vote by nearly three million votes.

 

Other presidents, when they took office, expressed humility and a willingness to work with others. But this president sees a mandate in his “alternative facts,” which tell him he won the Electoral College by a landslide, that he had the largest crowd ever at his inauguration, and that he really won the popular vote because 3-5 million illegal immigrants voted for Clinton.

 

But people who live in the real world and are not truth-challenged know his election was not an Electoral College landslide, that there were more people at President Obama’s first inauguration than at his, and that there is no evidence that millions of illegal immigrants voted.

 

Of course, we all know what he is up to here. He knows, as all Republican leaders know, that if you repeat a lie enough times, people will believe it. In fact, his followers are so well-trained that they only need to hear a lie once to believe it.

 

People who care about truth also know that he received only 26% of the eligible popular vote and that he is more unpopular at the beginning of his first term than any president before him since Gallup began polling for this more than sixty years ago.

 

This demagogue president is a monster without a conscience or a heart. He has talked about deporting eleven million people, which would result in incredible hardship and suffering. He has insulted women, the disabled, Mexicans, Muslims, POWs, and Gold Star families. And after he was criticized for bragging about assaulting women, he doubled-down, saying it was “locker room talk” and no one respects women more than he does.

 

In the midst of the biggest refugee crisis in history, he has indefinitely blocked all Syrian war refugees from coming to the United States and has blocked all other refugees for 120 days. And he has blocked for 90 days all citizens of seven Muslim countries from coming to the United States if they don’t have green cards. His executive orders for these actions were so poorly thought out that people on route to the United States with valid visas were pulled off planes. Some people who had arrived in the United States with valid visas were detained and handcuffed.

 

Meanwhile, he said the ban “is working very nicely.” Clearly, it’s not working very nicely if you’re a Muslim coming to the United States.

 

His denial of U.S. funds to foreign health organizations that discuss abortion will result in more abortions and more women dying from lack of medical care than if there were no ban. But he doesn’t care.

 

This demagogue president is a dictator in the making. During the presidential campaign, he threatened to imprison his opponent, to bypass due process, and to limit freedom of the press. One of his top advisors recently said the press is “the opposition party” and that it should shut up and listen. He has praised Putin and has defended Russia even after our intelligence agencies said that Russia tampered with our elections. His solution to the violence in our inner cities is more law and order, which can only mean federal troops.

 

This demagogue president is a disaster looking for a place to happen. He has brushed off the greatest crisis of our time, climate change, as a Chinese hoax. And, given his narcissism, his Twitter obsession, his impulsiveness, his vindictiveness, and his short-temper, we will all live under the threat of nuclear war as long as he is president.

 

There are at least ten good reasons why he should be impeached:

 

1. for his vulgarity

2. for his racism and xenophobia

3. for his sexism and misogyny

4. for his lack of empathy and for his cruelty

5. for the poor example he sets for our children

6. for his dangerous incompetence in foreign affairs

7. for his praise and defense of dictators

8. for his alternative truths, which not only demonstrate his contempt for the intelligence of the American people but also cast dishonor on the office of president

9. for his treason for asking Russia to interfere in our elections

10. for his endless conflicts of interest and his shady business deals

 

If a president can be impeached for lying about having sexual relations, then a president can certainly be impeached for any and all of the above reasons.

 

There is another way to get this monster out of the White House. It is through what could be called the “Illness and Insanity Clause” of the 25th Amendment to the Constitution. This clause allows for the removal of the president from office if the vice president and certain other executive branch officials certify that he is “unable to discharge the powers and duties of his office.”

 

When a president believes that reality is what he says it is, i.e., that he can create alternative facts which are more valid than real facts, then that president is insane. And an insane president cannot properly exercise his powers and perform his duties as president.

 

So it is time for the vice president to step up and do his duty. If he refuses to do his duty, Democrats should call for impeachment proceedings to begin immediately for both the president and the vice president.

 

This demagogue president who shames all Americans, this nightmare that doesn’t go away when we open our eyes in the morning, has already left a dark stain on the soul of America, a stain that can never be erased. Future generations will rightfully condemn us if do not quickly remove him from office either through the 25th Amendment or through impeachment proceedings.

 

And God,

 

We don’t mean to complain, but how is it, after Hillary Clinton got 2.9 million more popular votes than this monster, that the Republican Party came away with control over all three branches of government?

 

And how is it that the Democrats, who were expected to win the White House and the Senate and therefore the Supreme Court, came away with nothing but shock, disbelief, and tears?

 

It was painful to learn that our president was chosen by foreign organizations—the Russian government and WikiLeaks—and the Republican FBI director, who suggested eleven days before the election that Hillary Clinton may have engaged in criminal activity.

 

The Founding Fathers had a role too, creating an undemocratic Electoral College system because they did not trust the American people to make important decisions.

 

Yes, the election was rigged: It was rigged by the enemies of democracy. The American people are the ones who got the raw deal.

 

Why do bad things happen to good people?

 

 

My children,

 

Your attitude is bound to get you into more trouble. For your own good, you need to concentrate on positive events and thing you want to happen and not on negative events and things you don’t want to happen.

 

Now, I have had my eye on your demagogue for a long time. And I assure you that if there were a hell, there would be a seat waiting for him. But I can’t decide whether I would put him in the section for demagogues, in the section for unscrupulous businessmen and con men, in the section for liars and hypocrites, or if I should make a section just for him so that he can’t hurt any more people.

 

By the way, and I am saying this to everyone, just because there is no hell, don’t think that you can get away with doing anything you like. I am keeping score and everyone will have their day of reckoning. Sins that were not paid for in your present life will be paid for in a future one. “As you shall sow, so shall you reap,” in my Son’s words.

 

When your demagogue has his day of reckoning, I will ask him the same question that was asked of the last Republican demagogue, Senator Joe McCarthy in 1954: “Have you no sense of decency, sir? At long last, have you no sense of decency?”

 

Now, I cannot tell you how this will play out because, contrary to popular belief, I do not see the future. Since man has free will, the future cannot be known. But I do see trends and probabilities.

 

I see that now that you have had your dark night of the soul, you need to stop feeling sorry for yourselves and blaming others. Your intentions were good and the election should never have been close.

 

Your mistakes were complacency and being unprepared for the depravity of your opponents. No lie, no distortion of the truth, no fake news, no making a mountain out of a Benghazi or email molehill, no FBI dirty trick was going too far for them if it helped them to win the election.

 

They were determined to regain the White House no matter what the cost was to their souls, to democracy, or to the American people. They are the ones who should be locked up.

 

And what they did about the Supreme Court vacancy was nauseating. They call themselves the Party of the Constitution, but they had no trouble pretending the Constitution didn’t exist so they could deny President Obama his constitutional right to fill the vacancy. What a bunch of hypocrites! Two can play that game and I hope the Democrats have the backbone to block his appointment to the Supreme Court.

 

The Second American Revolution will not be fought by armies marching across battlefields. It will be a peaceful revolution in which patriotic citizens take back their country from corporations, the wealthy, and corrupt, selfish, and dishonest Republican politicians and public officials.

 

Like the phoenix, you will rise from your ashes because you now know what kind of people you are dealing with. And there will be times when you will need to fight fire with fire. But every time you get knocked down, you will get up stronger and you will remember the words of Victor Hugo: “No army can stop an idea whose time has come.”

 

The time has come for America to be the best that she can be—a nation where everyone’s rights are respected including the rights of women, minorities, LGBTs, the young, future generations, and nature. A nation where everyone has the opportunity to live the American dream. A nation that welcomes immigrants, knowing that, except for the Native Americans, all Americans are either immigrants or the descendants of immigrants.

 

And a nation that recognizes that immigrants from Mexico have a special claim to America because America took a large part of its territory from Mexico. As the character Miguel in the movie Bobby says, “We didn’t cross the border. The border crossed us.”

 

 

Dear God,

 

We will begin the Second American Revolution by demanding the impeachment of the demagogue in the White House. We will investigate his business dealings and we will not give him a pass on his conflicts of interest either. Politicians and public officials should not be allowed to enrich themselves before, during, or after they are in office.

 

God, in four years we can take back the White House and Congress with a little luck. Just a little. Please help us here. We’re on your team, after all!

 

 

My children,

 

Where is your faith? As my Son said with some exaggeration, “Faith can move mountains.”

 

Be assured that what your demagogue did—getting himself elected president while running a very negative and dishonest campaign—goes against the grain of the universe as I have designed it. Positive events are easier to create. As Theodore Parker and Martin Luther King, Jr. said, “The arc of the moral universe is long, but it bends toward justice.”

 

Be of good cheer. The tide will turn, but I cannot say when. So keep your boats in good repair.

 

 

Dear God,

 

We have traveled down many dark roads to be where we are today. Risking our lives and our fortunes, we signed our names to the Declaration of Independence. During the winter of 1777-1778 at Valley Forge, twenty-five hundred of us died from starvation, disease, and exposure, but even though the cause seemed hopeless, we did not give up. Before the Civil War, we hid runaway slaves riding on the Underground Railroad to Canada. During the days of Jim Crow and the KKK, we watched helplessly as black men and boys were lynched by white mobs.

 

In the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, we fought for women’s suffrage and the right of working people to be paid decent wages. We were hungry and poor during the Great Depression, but we survived and created the Social Security system that now provides a lifeline to tens of millions of senior and disabled citizens. We fought and died in World War II in order to make the world safe from fascism. In the 1960s and 1970s we marched for civil rights, peace, and women’s rights and we began Medicare and Medicaid. In this century, through the Affordable Care Act, we gave health insurance to tens of millions of people who couldn’t afford it or were denied coverage because of pre-existing conditions.

 

We proudly elected the first black president and we would have elected the first female president except for the undemocratic Electoral College and the Unholy Alliance of Republicans, Russians, and Wikileaks.

 

Today, we understand that LGBTs have the same rights as everyone else. And we will continue to fight to protect the environment so that our children can inherit a healthy planet.

 

We are the real American patriots in tune with the spirits of the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution and we have no patience for fighting old battles again. We want to continue building a better world for everyone who is ready to accept the truth of your love: There are no superior, chosen, or favored nations, people, races, religions, genders, or sexual orientations.

 

 

My children,

 

As a species you do your best work when your backs are against the wall. And so I say that the time has come for you to begin a golden age of peace on Earth based upon respect for others and universal disarmament.

 

On the cosmic scale, you are almost there. Like Dorothy in The Wizard of Oz, you now need to believe that the world that you want to live in exists and is waiting for you.

 

One final note: Don’t be afraid to reach for the stars. You never know what you may find.

 

Peace.

 

 

Dear readers,

 

If you’ve gotten this far, you might want to read my new book Truths That Will Set the World Free, which is not free but is, I believe, worth its $7.50 price. After all, you don’t come across world-changing truths every day! You can buy the book at Shakespir.com and at some of the other online bookstores.

---

---