Do you question authority?

One night, a few months ago, I encountered perhaps the perfect example of synchronicity.

Resting after being on the road for nearly a week, I was surfing through the channels of my motel television in search of news. And I happened upon two separate news items, which were floating there on the sea amongst the usual flotsam and jetsam. The first was a snippet of an interview with Maya Angelou, and the second was a snippet of a speech given by Rick Santorum to a group of Christian conservatives.

Ms. Angelou, at the moment I surfed by her, was speculating on how wonderful everything might be if we, people in general, just used our intelligence. Mr. Santorum, on the other hand, was in the process of telling his audience the following, "We will never have the elite, smart people on our side, because they believe they should have the right to tell you what to do."

It was a matter of moments before I could shake off the effects of Mr. Santorum's irony overload, but once I did, I had to spend some time pondering my synchronous event.

The first thing I asked myself was why Mr. Santorum felt that his words would strike a harmonic chord in his audience. While I don't necessarily consider myself to be elite, (I said, modestly), I certainly consider myself to be intelligent. And I would be insulted, livid, horribly offended, by the insinuation that there were intelligent people on one side of an imaginary divide of some kind, while on the other side, there was I.

I would be offended as well to be placed in a group in which Mr. Santorum included himself, although, of course, he was only including himself to pander to his audience. He certainly doesn't believe it. Allegedly.

So why did his little speech not turn into an ugly incident? Why did his audience fail to rise as one and denounce him? Has something caused the members of his audience, not only to believe that they are not intelligent, but also to believe that this lack of intelligence is somehow acceptable, even desirable?

Why would people rally around a man who tells them they are not intelligent, rather than around a woman who knows they are, and who only wonders why they don't act like it?

The answer came to me far too easily. The answer is that there is a very large swathe of our population which has been trained, from birth, that mankind's purpose on earth is not to question, but to obey authority.

And this is unconscionable. It is an abuse of children greater than any other. It is an abuse which destroys the minds of children, and makes the minds of those children, and the adults they become, as useless as rotten cauliflowers inside their heads.

It starts with the kinds of parents who make rules they will not explain, other than, "Because I say so!" It continues into the kinds of churches whose preachers scream from their pulpits, "Because the Bible says so!"And insist that those who question are "of Satan."

Those preachers do their best to break down the spirits of their congregations. They tell their congregations that they are unworthy of the love of God, and that God will throw them into hellfire if they do not do his will. And the people, growing up in the shadow of this terror, become more and more docile, and more and more willing to do whatever the preacher tells them they must do. No matter how wrong the things he tells them make them feel inside.

And eventually they believe the lies. And they believe them adamantly! And they will wave their arms in the air if it makes their preacher think they are holy! (Even though Christ did not approve of making a big show of prayer and worship). And they will say such things as, "If it's in the Bible I believe it!" And they will defend the lies they are told, and they will hate those who challenge those lies, and they will hate even those who quietly turn away and choose their own paths.

"They are going to hell!" is their answer to everything. The preacher taught them that. It doesn't really feel very much like the sort of thing Christ would have said, but the preacher said it, and the preacher is the representative of God on earth. Right?

And those people carry their Bibles around aggressively. And they insist that the Bible is infallible. And they like to quote various verses to back up any argument they might happen to have.

But they don't read those Bibles. Not really. They couldn't possibly. They probably stopped long ago, when they had questions, and they were told that questions were "of Satan," or that there was no way they could possibly understand because they hadn't studied as long or as hard as the preacher, or gone to seminary school, or Bible college, or whatever.

They couldn't possibly be reading those Bibles, because to a Christian, the most important words in that Bible should be the actual words and deeds of Christ. The rest is other people's interpretation of those words, and some of those interpretations should probably be open to question, except, of course, for the fact that to question often leads to being deemed "of Satan."

But the words and deeds of Christ, as far as we can ever, possibly know, were written by people whose only agenda was their hope to save those words and deeds forever, for humanity. And even though much of what is now the Bible has been redacted, rewritten, tweaked by powerful men with agendas, the words and deeds of Christ seem to have been spared. Various versions seem in agreement, not contradictory.

If I were a Christian I would read those words, study those deeds, perhaps discuss any questions with others - not others who claimed to know better than I, but other questioners and seekers, and gradually I would have my own understanding of what it would be like to be a Christlike person.

The reason I would do it this way is because, if I were a Christian I would want to follow Christ's teachings, and Christ taught, in no uncertain terms, that small groups of people discussing his life and his deeds were what he wanted his church to be.

He warned his disciples not to become authorities and force their beliefs on others. He spoke against calling any man "Father" except for God himself. He taught a prayer for speaking directly with God, and never said any human had to go through any other human to talk to God.

He made miracles everywhere he traveled, he walked on water, he rose from the dead, and before he died, he let his disciples in on a secret: All of the things he had done, they would be able to do as well. In fact, he said, they would do even more than he had done, because they would have more time to do it.

So it makes me wonder why preachers even exist. They are claiming authority when Christ said not to do so. They are destroying the power of people who are meant to be able to do miracles. And it seems fair to say that Christ spoke against that as well. "Do not destroy the faith of these children." So when a child is in a church, and a preacher is screaming that the child is unworthy, and that God will let him burn in hell, that preacher is destroying the child's faith.

Children know, at birth, that they are born to be Christ. They are born to do miracles. But preachers take that knowledge away. And children squirm and cry in church because they know what is happening, but they are too small, just then, to run away.

I have often heard the parable of the mustard seed, and I have never heard a preacher explain what it really means, although some pretend to know. Those who pretend to know usually act as if it is some esoteric mystery we are not meant to understand, or that it simply means we must have faith that we will grow as we are meant to grow. And it occurs to me that the latter explanation is exactly what it means. A mustard seed has no doubt that it will grow to become a mustard plant. No one ever screams at it and tells it it is worthless, and that God, its father, who created it, would just as soon throw it into the fire as let it live.

So do children have no doubt that they will grow to be as Christ. Until preachers scream at them and take away that faith.

And what are we left with, when the churches wreak their havoc on our souls? People who are broken, who dare not question authority, who believe things told them by the very people Christ warned them about, and who allow those very people to create divisions among mankind.

Preachers have a lot of power over their congregations. Much of that power is based on fear, and fear is a strong motivator. And there are always others who see that power and want it for themselves. So there are politicians, like, perhaps, Mr. Santorum, (allegedly), who will try to turn that power to their own advantage. Such politicians will deliberately appeal to people whose will to question authority has been broken. They will deliberately appeal to people whose knowledge of their own power has been erased. They will deliberately appeal to people who are accustomed to being told that "others" are going to hell, and are therefore not worthy of empathy, or assistance, or common decency.

And those politicians are legion, these days. We can see it in their blatant disregard for the citizens. They are, in many ways, much like some preachers who make far more money than they need while their congregations, and people all around the world, are starving. Preachers have been known to say, when questioned about such things, that wealth is evidence of God's approval. And people in those preachers' congregations ignore the starving children, and believe whatever those preachers say, and pray that one day God will do them the supreme honor of making them wealthy, although Christ himself spoke of the difficulty a wealthy man would have becoming worthy of heaven.

Politicians would probably have taken over the churches by now if it had been feasible to do so, but with the aversion to the mixing of church and state which was once a strong part of our political belief system, that would have been a difficult task. Fate, however, was on the side of the politicians. It came, about a half-century ago, in the form of integration.

After ignoring the evils of segregation for years, because politicians thrive when the populace is divided, they were suddenly faced with a new system which had the very real possibility of unifying that populace. They were practically forced to become involved in the nation's school systems, and they could have done the right thing, those politicians of a half-century ago. Some of them probably tried to do the right thing. But other politicians, with an eye on their desire for power, chose instead to overhaul the school system which had once shone like a beacon around the world.

Since schools were the main focus of integration, politicians set about ensuring that integration would not work to bring people together, and the overhaul of the education system was a large part of their plan. They insisted that standards needed to be lowered, and that tests needed to be simplified, because, according to politicians, black children were unable to keep up. Politicians are so accomplished at dissembling that today, half a century later, that myth still lives. And those who believe the myth watch the continuing crumbling of our school system and blame black children, or, nowadays, hispanic and other immigrant children who, we have been told by politicians, simply cannot learn English without separate classes taught in their own language.

Among those who do not use their God-given intelligence to see through this lie the politicians have succeeded in creating, among their followers, resentment and anger among the races. The destruction of the school system was worth it, apparently, for politicians to achieve this goal.

And teachers are forced to teach "to the test." The test, which is set to the lowest possible standards, is the sole measure of success and failure now in many schools. Teachers are told that their students must, first and foremost, score high on the test, and are encouraged to forego any "extraneous" teaching. In addition to limiting the amount of knowledge to which a child will be exposed, teaching to the test also limits the amount of critical, analytical thinking a child will practice.

Students who learn to think critically and analytically ask questions. They ponder situations in their minds and sometimes realize that what they know, or what they are taught, might not be the best answer, the only answer, or even the truth. Politicians do not want people who ponder. They want people who learn by rote, who learn only what they are specifically taught and who do not question anything - especially authority.

Politicians benefit greatly from the work done by churches that teach that questioning is wrong, and by  schools that teach that questioning is counter-productive.

Politicians want people who will not ask why so many of us lose our homes while politicians thrive. They want people who will not question the justice, or the morality of a government that sends people to prison for reporting political crimes while the politicians who committed those crimes gain more power and wealth. They want people who will not realize that the decisions made by the government are overwhelmingly unfavorable to the citizenry and overwhelmingly favorable to big business, big energy, big pharmacy, and anyone who can give the politicians the most money "for their re-elections."

And politicians, like preachers, have a book about which they want to be seen as the authority. They have a book they want people to believe is too difficult for anyone but politicians to understand. Like preachers want the power that comes with being the perceived authority on the Bible, politicians want the power that comes with being the perceived authority on the Constitution.

And like the Bible, the truth inside the Constitution is not always what the "authorities" say it is.
Like preachers, politicians will say that when we the people question certain things in the book to which they claim authority, we the people are simply misinterpreting it.

"Leave it to the authorities," they will say, condescendingly, as they destroy the very soul of the book.

And any minute now I expect to hear politicians say, if they aren't saying it already, that anyone who questions their interpretation of the Constitution is the enemy - the political equivalent of "of Satan."

Watch out if they do, because while preachers can threaten hellfire and damnation from God in the future, politicians can actually bring it today. In fact, they've been doing it for decades. They can send their minions to break down the door of your home, seize your property, throw you in prison, take your children, or, to make matters easier, simply kill you. They face no repercussions whatever, except, perhaps, for a few days paid leave. All they have to say is that they had reason to believe you were a criminal, even for something as innocuous as smoking marijuana, and/or that you had the unmitigated gall to resist arrest (!)

None of this is Constitutional, of course. The plunder and pillaging of the homes and property of American citizens who have not been convicted of a crime is actually, specifically unconstitutional. Every one of us should know that. But too many of us have been taught not to question authority, so politicians have convinced huge numbers of us that such things are Constitutional, or that "making an end run around the Constitution" is perfectly acceptable. And these days hardly anyone even blinks an eye at the fact that mere suspicion of almost any crime is grounds for home invasion and seizure. (Please don't take my word for this. Learn for yourself how many more home invasions by police are occurring now than were occurring in the 1980's.)

In fact, if we read the Constitution, we would find that, instead of being helpless to control the kinds of things politicians are doing, we have the Constitutional right to simply tell them, in no uncertain terms, that their services are no longer required.

We can simply fire them. A passage in the Constitution, Section Three of the Fourteenth Amendment, states that if any politician, on a national level or even on a state level, undermines the Constitution that politician cannot hold office. Period. Section Three of the Fourteenth Amendment was written in the aftermath of the Civil War, but it still shines brightly. And if we ever read the Constitution, instead of taking the word of politicians that we are too stupid to understand it, we would know that passage is in there, and maybe we would not be in the fix in which we find ourselves today.

Politicians, lawyers, judges, justices, governors and attorneys general will try to argue us out of it, of course. Congress, if any members of that body are still eligible to retain their positions, will try to avoid the responsibility of enforcing it. But maybe, just maybe, this time we will hold our ground, and refuse to be treated like the nation divided, the nation convinced of our own ignorance, the nation which never questions authority, the nation which preachers and politicians have tried so hard to mold. Maybe this is something that will finally make us realize what we can do if we stand together as one.

Maya Angelou said that things would be better if we all used our intelligence. And of course she was right. No one could do the kinds of things our churches and our government have done to us if we all used our intelligence. It is, after all, our God-given intelligence. Such a wonderful gift. Why would anyone ignore such a gift?

A Christian Nation: Really?

Part One

Here is a scene I want you to imagine: You have just dropped off your three-year-old son for his first day in pre-school. You know you are going to miss him terribly for the next few hours, and it's hard to leave, so you tiptoe back to the door of the classroom, just for a moment, and press your ear against the door.

Mrs. Curry is speaking to the children. You can just make out her words:

"Welcome to your first day of pre-school, children. This is the book we will be using. None of you can read, so I am going to read this book to you and tell you what it means. I won't read all of it, of course, only the parts I want you to know. And if there are parts of it you don't understand, just remember that it is wrong to question me, because I am the authority on this book. And by the way, it would be very, very wrong for you to ask any other teachers what they think, or even listen to them talk about the book. You don't need to occupy your minds about this book, even after you learn to read. Especially after you learn to read. I will tell you everything you need to know. Your parents want it that way. I promise you, they do. I asked them and they told me so.

"Now I know you are curious about the book," she continues, "so I will tell you a few things we will find in it. First of all, you know those children down the street - the ones from that foreign family, that have that foreign religion? Well, all of them are going to hell! Their parents too. And you know those two men on your block who give you cut flowers from their garden to bring to your moms? They are going to hell as well! Your parents really hate all of those people. Those people are going to hell!"

You stand frozen, certain that you must have misheard Mrs. Curry. But there is more.

"Your parents love you," she continues, "but they know that none of you is actually worthy of that love. You are all very bad children. Sinners. All of you. You can't help it. It is in your nature to be bad, to be sinners. You should be grateful that your parents even pay attention to you at all. If you aren't better children, your parents have decided that when you die, they will not allow you to come into heaven with them. They will slam the door of heaven in your faces!

"But you aren't alone!" she shouts convincingly over the sound of sobbing, frightened children. "I'm not worthy of being loved by my parents either! We are all in this together. The only thing we can do is to keep trying not to be bad, keep begging for their forgiveness, and hope that when we die they will take mercy on us and let us come to heaven with them. Otherwise we will burn in hell!"

And now I have a question for you, standing there outside the door of that classroom. What is your next move?

Do you: A. Rush in and herd all the terrified children out of the room to safety, reassuring them that Mrs. Curry is wrong, and that nothing she said about their parents was true?

Or do you: B. Check your watch and see if you have enough time to go shopping before picking your son up from school?

If you answered A, then you might be interested in the rest of this piece.
If you answered B, then it is likely that you might benefit from reading this piece, but it is going to be difficult for you to do so. I hope you will give it a try anyway.

Most of you, A or B, have probably figured out where I am going with this, so I will probably be saying goodbye, now, to a few of the B's.

We have all heard the theory that children live up to what is expected of them. It is more than a theory, of course. We have all seen the truth of it in action. When you love and trust a child, give him responsibility, encourage him to make use of his God-given mind, and tell him he is becoming wiser and better and more wonderful every day, the chances are very high that he will prove you right.

When you tell a child he is irresponsible; too stupid to understand certain things; that it is in his nature to be evil; and that he is not allowed to question you, or other authority figures, the chances are very high that child is going to prove you right as well.

And yet for decades many of us, our parents, grandparents, great-grandparents, and back through the generations, have sent our children, and ourselves, into a room every Sunday where someone stands at the front of the room and tells all of us that we are not worthy of our Father's love, and that our Father hates the people down the street and is sending them to hell. And that our Father will send us to hell as well, if we don't do everything that person at the front of the room tells us our Father wants us to do.

If this is the kind of church you attend, think about that the next time you wonder why your three-year-old child is squirming and trying not to pay attention in church. Children are born with the knowledge that they are absolutely beloved of God, with no reservations. Your child is hearing his truth being ripped away. Your child is trying desperately to hold onto that truth.

And there are no questions allowed in some of our Christian churches. Some churches, not all of course, seem to want us to believe that the Bible is too difficult for ordinary men to understand, and has to be interpreted by authorities in their denominations. I have heard so-called authorities say that even to question their interpretations is to offend God. I have heard them say that our Father wants us to believe only what we learn inside the walls of their church, and that it is a sin to study any other religions or philosophies. I have heard those self-designated authorities tell their congregations that members of other churches, even other Christian churches, are being deceived, are under the influence of Satan, belong to a cult, and, of course, are going to hell.

I suspect that one of the reasons many church leaders discourage questions about their condemnation of other religions is that the very Bible which they cite quotes Jesus as saying, in no uncertain terms, exactly the opposite of what many churches claim about their own exclusivity. (Mark 9: 38-42); (Luke 9: 49-50). I hope some of you will read these very short, very important passages. I would be surprised and delighted if any of you had ever heard anyone claiming to be a church authority read them aloud to you.

What happens to the God-given mind of someone whose attempts at discussion, argument, and curiosity, about this book which plays such a large part in his life, are discouraged, belittled and reviled by someone he has been told to respect and believe without question?

Here is an example of the results:

A few days ago I was speaking to a friend about the Mars mission. "How wonderful if they discover life on Mars!" I said, expecting agreement and enthusiasm to match my own. But my friend disappointed me. 

"I hope they don't," he said. And then, before I could ask him why, he added, "If they do, it will mean that the Bible isn't true."

"Why would it mean that?" I asked, surprised. But he only shook his head and repeated, over and over, "It just would. It just would." It was obvious that he had no idea why he believed what he was saying, and yet his expression was a mixture of defiance, a bit of anger at me for daring to ask, and, strangely, pride.

"Did you learn that in church?" I asked, knowing the answer.

"Yes," he said. "Our pastor told us that, and that's good enough for me."

I do not have enough experience to say whether this discouragement of intellect and encouragement of trust in authority exists in other religions; and of course I know that it does not exist in all Christian churches. Some Christian churches welcome questions and discussion. But throughout my life I have studied various denominations of Christianity, and I have attended the services of many different denominations. At far too many of those services I have heard that the Bible should not be questioned, and that church authorities should not be questioned.

I have even heard some religious leaders say that ordinary men may not speak directly with God, or even ask his forgiveness for sins, but must use the religious leaders, or religious figures from the past, as liaison. And they say this in full knowledge that Christ taught the prayer which begins "Our Father," and told his followers to call no man Father but God. And Christ said that all men who believe shall be the sons of God. (John 1:12). And yet many self-designated religious authorities tell the children of God that they may not speak directly with their Father.

I have heard the claim that Christ brought a new covenant, and that the New Testament has the answers for Christians, while the Old Testament is valuable, but mainly historical. Despite such a declaration, I have heard self-appointed church authorities pick and choose, when it suited their purpose, parts of the Old Testament to use in their sermons. Unfortunately it often seems that the parts they choose are used mainly to condemn others, and to create more divisions among the children of God.

I have heard the so-called church authorities, and even members of the laity, scream in defiance when someone has countered with the logical observation that Jesus never discriminated or condemned, that instead he encouraged his followers, by his example of associating with all manner of men and women, to embrace all of mankind.

I have watched as church representatives put their own spin on everything from why it is a "sin" to dance to why it is a "sin" to sit quietly in church rather than showing off by shouting and waving hands. I have seen a congregation of friends split into two congregations of enemies by one specific self-proclaimed authority who used his bully pulpit to condemn those who sat quietly during the services, because, he claimed, those who worshipped in silence did not show true spirit. And he said this despite the fact that Jesus recommended that prayer should be silent and private, not done for show. (Matthew 6: 5-6)

Jesus chastised the Pharisees for creating arbitrary rules and for upholding rules that did not make sense. But the so-called heads of churches have always done this, and of course they still are doing this. And the rules they invent are then used to condemn those who do not comply, just as the Pharisees condemned Jesus for disobeying their rules.

Many sermons, or even casual mentions of Mary Magdalene have somehow contained the claim that she was a prostitute, although there is nothing in the Bible to suggest that. But there is a great deal of discrimination against women in some Christian churches. It is sad to think that the patriarchs of some churches, in their enthusiasm for keeping women "in their place," might simply have decided to saddle Mary Magdalene with the implication that she was a prostitute, hoping it might diminish her status.

After all, it seems she was one of the first allowed to see the risen Christ. (Matthew 28:9) That must be difficult to accept, if one wants to make people believe that women are somehow inferior to men.

And it troubles me that those who have studied the Bible to such an extent that they believe they are authorities actually set themselves up in the position of authority. If they know the Bible so well, they know that Jesus spoke against his message being taught with authority to one follower by another. (Matt.23: 5-10) Jesus actually made it clear that he wanted equality among his followers, (Matt.23: 8), and in point of fact it seems as if he expected very small groups to come together when necessary to ask for his guidance. (Matt. 18:19-20) Other than that, Jesus recommended that prayer be private. (Matthew 6: 5-6)

Jesus knew, we can be certain, the kind of dangerous power that could be wielded by someone who claimed a position of authority and superior knowledge in matters of faith. The Pharisees were doing that already. Jesus surely knew that the sort of person who would seek power and authority over others might also be the sort of person who would seek to convince others that his divisive, condemning and disempowering opinions were the will and the word of God.

Since Jesus spoke against anyone claiming the role of teacher, it follows that he must have wanted people to discuss, question, and attempt to understand the word of God on their own. It is difficult to imagine a situation in which a man, studying the Bible, alone or with friends, would suddenly say, "Oh, this is difficult. God must not want his word to be understood. We must stop trying to do so."

But what if that man has grown up, perhaps since the age of three or so, in a church where every week someone claiming to be an authority stands in front of and separate from the congregation, and claims that his opinions are the only true opinions, and that it is sinful to question them? If a man has grown up in such an atmosphere, then he very well might give up on trying to understand the word of his Father.

So the seeds are planted. So the beautiful, intricate minds of trusting and innocent people are shut down. So children of God, all equal in his eyes, are duped into believing they are not intended to think for themselves, but instead are intended blindly to follow authority. And if that authority lies to them, or even misleads them unintentionally, they believe they must, nonetheless, accept that authority's words, and live by those words even when a still, small voice tells them those words are not truth.

All people are capable of discovering great truths on their own. It is what we are meant to do with our God-given minds. But far too many church authorities have for at least two thousand years tried to shut that exercise down - to condemn it and to make it shameful. This is a very great wrong.

So why do they do it? Why do they discourage people from thinking for themselves? Why do these so-called men of God stand apart from their brothers and sisters and claim authority in the word of God when Christ said not to do so?

By now, if you have read this far, even those of you who have been taught since childhood not to question, not to use your God-given minds, have probably glimpsed the obvious reason. . . the reason that Christ's admonition against one person placing himself in the position of authority, or of teacher, is the best kept secret in the Christian church.

The harsh reality seems to be that those who are blatantly doing what Jesus spoke against doing, who are presenting themselves in a position of authority above their fellow man, who are spewing poisonous opinions Jesus never had, who pretend a closer relationship with God than their fellow man, who are making arbitrary rules such as Jesus warned the Pharisees against making, who are creating divisions among us where Jesus wanted unity, and who are telling millions of God's children that the Bible is far too difficult for them to understand, have chosen money and power over the word of God.

And they are terrified that we will one day read the Bible on our own, and ask those questions, and come to understandings on our own, and finally recognize the actual message Christ came to earth to tell.

Because once we do, all of the power they have pretended for two thousand years to have over us will be gone.

Although many religious leaders have long insisted that Christ came to earth mainly as a blood sacrifice, because mankind was so evil, and although they have chosen, from out of his life of miracles and wonders, the image of his death on the cross as the preferred symbol for Christianity, it is clear that Christ had another message for us, which has been given less emphasis over the years.

If we concentrate on only the words and deeds of Christ himself, and not on someone else's interpretation, we read that Christ says he came to earth to bear witness to the truth. (John 18:37). His words and deeds, for most of which we have four separate, very similar, accounts, consist of teachings, miracles, healings, raisings from the dead, and, of course, Christ's demonstration of power over his own death.

Among his words and deeds as well are Christ's statement that the greatest commandment is that we love God and love all of humanity, (Mark 12:29-34); his assurance that anyone who believes in him will have everlasting life; his assurance that all things are possible for those who believe, (Mark  9:23; Mark 11:23-24; John 14:11-13); and his assurance that everything he has done, and more, can be done by anyone with faith as a grain of mustard seed. (Matt. 17:20).

"Faith as a grain of mustard seed." These words have always intrigued me. I have always wondered what kind of faith a mustard seed would have. I have heard some self-appointed church authorities say that Christ meant our faith only had to be as big as a mustard seed, but I have never agreed with that. That doesn't seem like quite enough faith to allow someone to perform miracles. I thought about it for a long time, and let my God-given mind reach its own conclusion.

A mustard seed would have the faith that, since it was a mustard seed, it would grow into a mustard plant. By the same token, if children of God have that same simple faith, that they will grow into their ultimate potential, then the children of God will become Christ-like beings.

I believe that this faith is there when we are born, and that if it is not denied to us in some way, taken away from us, overwritten in our souls by lies and fear, we will grow to become like Christ. When Christ's apostles asked him who is the greatest in the kingdom of heaven, Jesus brought a little child, said that we must become as little children, and that we must not offend the little children who believe in him. (Matthew 18: 1-7)

But in far too many cases the faith with which we are born has been undermined by those who have placed themselves in positions of authority, and used that authority to tell the children of God, over and over and over, that they are sinners, first and foremost, and not worthy of God's love. 

It is easy to see why many who call themselves church leaders would not want people to think too long and hard about Christ's actual words. It is easy to see why they would want people to focus on the blood sacrifice, and only touch lightly on the rest. They fear that people will realize that Christ's message, all along, is not that he came to be a blood sacrifice because we were such terrible sinners, but that he came to demonstrate and explain to us our true legacy.

And I believe that it is our legacy. When Christ said that we would be able to do everything he did, and more, with the faith of a mustard seed, one thing he had done was to be born the son of God, in human form. We have all done that as well. We have all been born the children of God, in human form. We are seeds of Christ. It is time for us all to understand and believe that.

We are not going to do anything evil once we realize and accept who we are. No one will ever have to threaten us with hell. We will have no reason to commit sins. We will have no time or desire for that. Why would we want to do anything but heal the world? The beautiful world our Father gave us, which we have nearly destroyed in our ignorance of who we are. Why would we not want to accept such a magnificent legacy? Why would we not want to claim the power of love and the unity of mankind that Christ came to earth to show us, and which he asked for us from God. (John 17:20-22)

I would never expect those of you who have read this far to accept without question the things I have written. I do hope you will be brave enough to think about them. I hope you will realize that our incredible, God-given minds were created for that very reason.

And I hope you will give some thought to what our world will be like when we realize there is no division among the children of God except what we have put there in our own blind error. We are all the same, and we have the unlimited power of unity and love for the very taking. How wonderful our world will be when we decide to rely on the actual words of Christ, rather than those who claim to speak for him, and when we begin to approach what he has shown us is our potential.

As for those self-designated authorities and representatives of God, they are our brothers and sisters as well. And it is likely that they, too, had the knowledge they were born with - the reality of their true legacy as children of God, their faith in the way they were meant to grow - ripped away from them at a tender age just as children today are being denied knowledge of their own legacies.

Their hearts will turn toward truth when they glimpse that truth again. It is not too late for them, or for any of us. We must help mankind remember.







Part Two will follow shortly.

Eliminating All Other Possibilities

I do a lot of troubled thinking these days. I'll bet many United States citizens do. 

The actions that politicians have been taking recently seem somehow completely removed from the sorts of things we would expect reasonable, intelligent, responsible people to do.

Politicians are allowing corporations to knock the tops off of our mountains. They are forbidding citizens, even physicians, to disclose what chemicals are entering our water tables from fracking operations. They are allowing fracking to continue in areas where it has caused water to burn, and where it has caused earthquakes in lands where earthquakes have never been.

Politicians are exempting themselves from punishment for breaking laws, like insider trading and income tax evasion, for which the citizens of this country are sent to prison.

Politicians have passed laws like the Patriot Act and the ADAA, which are in no way Constitutional. They are passing laws every day that allow them to monitor every word we say, or text, or type, or e-mail. They are trying to pass laws that will allow them, at will, to shut down the greatest form of mass communication which mankind has ever conceived. And they have told us, while looking us right in the eye, that they have now devised a way to twist and torture the Constitution in such a way as to allow them to kill any American citizen, at will, with no trial, whenever and wherever they choose to do so.

Politicians are eliminating the rights of citizens, even some who have voted for their entire adult lives, ever to do so again. Politicians are, in at least one of our states, simply removing the right of self-government from the citizens who live there, and overturning any laws or protections those citizens thought they had.

Politicians are still saying, in spite of overwhelming evidence to the contrary, evidence of which they are certainly aware, that legalizing drugs, taxing them, regulating them would be worse than the alternative. Worse than the enormous criminal culture, the beheadings, the shootings, the kidnappings, the targeting of our children, the imprisonment of millions, all of which have been spawned by the war on drugs. Politicians claim, while looking us right in the eye, that their war on drugs is sacred, and honorable, and non-negotiable. They are strangely silent when asked if donations from large prison corporations, or money from property seizures have anything to do with the never-ending war.

Politicians are allowing people to be evicted from their homes by large corporations that have committed the most blatant and destructive acts of fraud we have ever seen in this nation. Fraud that did more damage than we have seen in our lifetimes. Politicians are allowing the people who were wronged by those corporations to suffer, while allowing the guilty corporations to carry on as if they had done nothing illegal.

Anyone can see that none of this is right. None of this is the way America is meant to be. It is, in fact, practically the through-the-looking-glass version of the way America is meant to be. And that's what worries me. Politicians are going about their business, continuing to do these things, in spite of the obvious fact that what they are doing is wrong, in spite of the outrage of the people they were hired to represent.

Why have they decided to behave, unapologetically, in such an abhorrent manner? They wage their wars on the poor, on women, on racial minorities, and these days they hardly even try to justify their actions. It is as if they don't know, or care, that we are watching their speeches, their interviews, their pandering performances in the halls of government, with looks of betrayal, of horror, of revulsion on our faces. 

It has begun to dawn on me that perhaps politicians truly do not care what We the People think. It has begun to dawn on me that perhaps they know, or at least believe, that there is really nothing we can do about it.

It's as if some line has been crossed. As if some point of no return has been passed. 

My suspicion is that they know that their abuses of power, their political gerrymandering, their insistence on keeping the electoral college, and their attacks on voting rights will go a long way toward allowing them to expand their micro-management of the vote. My suspicion is that they know, although they deny it a little too loudly, that the voting machines their supporters and cohorts manufacture are fully capable of being programmed. My suspicion is that they know the fix is already in. My suspicion is that honorable men and women, who honestly stand against corruption, will simply fail to be elected very often anymore. If ever. 

I have been standing back, and observing, and eliminating all other possibilities for too long, now. I have reluctantly realized that politicians, at least a very large percentage of them, care absolutely nothing about the welfare of the people who live on this planet. If they did care, how could they continue to allow the destruction of our water, our air, our land, our organic crops, our oceans?

And where a logical person might say, "But they have to live here, too," I am afraid that politicians could be saying, among themselves, that when there is no clean water, people will have to buy clean water from corporations. I am afraid that politicians could be saying, with a shrug, that many people might well have to go thirsty. Especially those who have not built for themselves unconscionable fortunes at the expense of others. But corporations will benefit, and politicians will be able to afford clean water.

I am afraid politicians could be saying, among themselves, that when the earth and water are contaminated to such a degree that people can no longer grow their own food, people will have to buy all of their food from corporations. And many people might well have to go hungry. But corporations will benefit, and politicians will be able to afford food.

I am afraid that the politicians could be saying, among themselves, that they will be fine. And their friends, the very wealthiest of world citizens, will be fine as well. They have their jets, their bank accounts and vacation homes in foreign countries, and of course the tunnels they built for themselves and their friends, not for the People, of course, at enormous expense, deep beneath the halls of government. 

Finally, I have said this before, and I will continue to say it until there are enough of us who can stand together and take our country back from these politicians and from those who pay these politicians to betray their own honor as well as the trust of the People:

Politicians are not our government. Our government is the Constitution. We do not want to overthrow the government. Those who are constantly misinterpreting the Constitution, defying the Constitution, and making little chips in its armor are the ones who are attempting to overthrow the government. And the Constitution itself, in Section 3 of the 14th Amendment, gives us the means to remove every single one of them from office.

Legally.

Peacefully.

Now.

"No person shall be a Senator or Representative in Congress, or elector of President and Vice President, or hold any office, civil or military, under the United States, or under any State, who, having previously taken an oath, as a member of Congress, or as an officer of the United States, or as a member of any State legislature, or as an executive or judicial officer of any State, to support the Constitution of the United States, shall have engaged in insurrection or rebellion against the same, or given aid or comfort to the enemies thereof." 

We have had the solution all along

When I was young my generation was united against the war in Viet Nam. But older generations felt no solidarity with us at all. In Florida, once, while my friend Ed and I, long-haired and a bit ragged, were hitchhiking to Fort Walton Beach, a woman who appeared to be only a few years older than we were rolled down the passenger side window of the car she was riding in and threw an orange at us as hard as she could.

The orange barely missed hitting Ed, but he leaned down and picked it up as the woman's angry face, a three-dimensional, ugly piece of pop art framed in a Buick window, disappeared down the road, along with the sound of her shrill obscenities. We ate that orange, and enjoyed it, despite the emotion with which it came into our lives. We were hungry, and that woman, apparently, had food to throw away.

Maybe the time was not right, back then, for widespread solidarity. Maybe the American people had not yet been pushed quite far enough. Maybe that woman in Florida, and others like her, had not realized, yet, that We the People all share the same enemy.

I laugh, wryly, when I hear politicians and certain unbalanced news commentators and pundits pretending, and hoping to convince anyone who will listen, that the 99 Percent have no message. Speaking only for myself it seems as obvious what they, and we, want as it is obvious what those citizens want who take to the streets in other countries all over the planet, and with whom we also stand in solidarity.

We want our freedom back. We want our power back. We want our country back. Young and old alike, we want what is rightfully ours, but has been taken from us by politicians, lobbyists, big business and financial institutions.

But we face an enormous burden if we try, one more time, to "vote the bums out."

We will face our government's attempt to convince us that computerized voting machines cannot be hacked or compromised. We will face the avalanche of secret funds which can easily destroy a candidate who has his honor and a sincere desire to serve his country, but no connections to the newest government answer to purchased democracy, the Super Pac.

We will face, as on so many other occasions, the fact that even if we replace every single incumbent running, our candidates will be far outnumbered by the politicians who remain. And we have seen how the best intentions of the minority can be overwhelmed by the self-serving intentions of the majority.

If only we had magic words that could make all of the old politicians simply go away and leave us alone, break their spell on those whom they have enchanted, leave their self-serving, thieving cronies without the power of a corrupt government to prop them up, and let the rest of us, who will dance in the streets to see them go, turn immediately to the rebuilding of this nation out of the virtual rubble which politicians and their cronies have nearly succeeded in making of it.

Amazingly, we do have those magic words. We have an answer - a solution to the problem. We have had the answer all along, but the time has never been right to make use of it. Until now.

Now, when 99 percent of us have begun to recognize our common problem, and are prepared to stand united, perhaps the time has come at last. The answer will not require violence. Instead, in this nation of laws, it is the law itself which is the answer.

Section Three of the Fourteenth Amendment of our Constitution will rise to our defense. We, in turn, each one of the 99 percent of us, must rise to the defense of Section Three of the Fourteenth Amendment, because we can be certain that politicians will do their best to fight it.

They have to fight it, because Section Three of the Fourteenth Amendment says, as you can read below, that the vast majority of politicians who waste space in state and federal government, in all branches, executive, legislative, and judicial, regardless of party affiliation, are wasting that space illegitimately, even illegally. It says they have effectively resigned their positions, and that they have to go. Now. Yesterday. They simply have to go away and leave us alone.

Here are the magic words of Section Three of the Fourteenth Amendment:

                                                                          *****

No person shall be a Senator or Representative in Congress, or elector of President and Vice President, or hold any office, civil or military, under the United States, or under any State, who, having previously taken an oath, as a member of Congress, or as an officer of the United States, or as a member of any State legislature, or as an executive or judicial officer of any State, to support the Constitution of the United States, shall have engaged in insurrection or rebellion against the same, or given aid or comfort to the enemies thereof.

                                                                           *****

The words are fairly self-explanatory, but in case you are reading them closely today for the first time, and cannot believe your eyes, be assured that every single politician in the country, elected or appointed, at state and federal levels, takes that oath to support the Constitution. Military personnel and civilian government employees take the oath as well. That oath is spoken by every government worker at any level, from private to president, before he or she embarks upon government service.

Note carefully that the oath is not to protect and defend the government, not to defend politicians and their cronies, and not even to protect and defend the country.

The oath is to protect and defend the Constitution of the United States of America.

That is how important our Constitution is to this nation's very existence. And Section Three of the Fourteenth Amendment, printed there above, says that if someone takes that oath and subsequently attacks the Constitution, he or she cannot "be" in government.

It looks as though the writers of Section Three of the Fourteenth Amendment did not want to leave room for any misunderstanding, either. Taking no chances they have, apparently, attempted to enumerate each and every possible government position, and then added words like ". . . any office, civil or  military, under the United States, or under any State . . . " to cover anyone who might try to slip through the cracks.

Politicians, of course, will try to remind us that the words of Section Three of the Fourteenth Amendment were aimed at those who had participated in secession, and fought against the Union in the Civil War. But that doesn't mean the words are limited in their application only to the Civil War. That doesn't mean the words aren't still in the Constitution, more than a century after the Civil War, as security that no one in government will ever commit insurrection or rebellion against any part of the Constitution again, in whatever manner.

And one commits insurrection or rebellion against the Supreme Law of the Land by weakening it, disregarding it, breaking it, and failing to support it. If politicians try to convince us that the things they are doing to the Constitution somehow do not rise to the level of insurrection or rebellion, we will know, from their words, just how little their oath to defend the Constitution means to them.

Politicians might also argue that the last line, "But Congress may by a vote of two-thirds of each House, remove such disability," provides the back door through which they can escape the fate stated in the first lines of Section Three.

If you have already opened your own copy of the Constitution and seen that last line, and if it sent a chill down your spine, you need have no fear. The line does not mean that Section Three of the Fourteenth Amendment no longer has power. 

In fact, Congress took advantage of the last line of Section Three on various occasions, in the years following its adoption, to forgive, on a case-by-case basis, the occasional statesman whom they deemed worthy of exemption. And at one time Congress even declared a blanket exemption.

But that was in the Nineteenth Century, and applied to politicians of that day and time who had dishonored the Constitution. It was not meant to remove the teeth of Section Three for all eternity, because not only would that have meant that Congress in the Nineteenth Century did not believe that politicians would ever again dishonor the Constitution, it would also mean that Congress had the power to repeal part of the Constitution.

And Congress did not, and does not, have that power. Only We the People do.

Section Three of the Fourteenth Amendment is still in the Constitution, in its entirety, and We the People are very fortunate that it is.

Granted, the senators and representatives of the Twenty First Century would likely remove the disability again, for themselves, if they could, but, as it turns out, they are no longer legally members of Congress! At least there are likely nowhere near two-thirds of them who can still make that claim. They resigned the moment that, having taken an oath to protect and defend the Constitution, they failed to do so.

It will be our newly-elected Congress that will have the power to decide, on a case by case basis, whether or not to exempt the occasional statesman its members might deem worthy of exemption. I cannot imagine that they will be able to find many such statesmen.

If you have ever wondered why the Constitution, the Supreme Law of the Land, is hardly taught at all in government-funded public schools; or if you have ever wondered why politicians insist that the document is too difficult for We the People to understand, and that it must be interpreted for our pitiful little minds by lawyers, judges, justices, and other politicians rather than by common sense, Section Three of the Fourteenth Amendment might very well be one of the reasons.

The other reason, those of you will find who might not have read the entire document before, is that the writers of the Constitution, well aware of how self serving, haughty, patronizing, overreaching, uncaring and even dangerous governments could become, wrote the document to prevent this country's government from becoming any or all of those things.

The writers of the Constitution had lived through times when governments passed laws enabling criminally invasive powers, for example, or simply granted themselves the power without laws, to do such things as send their enforcers to break down the doors of citizens' homes, terrify those inside, kill those who resisted, and steal the citizens' homes, cash, property, and private papers with no trial.

They had lived through times when governments would rather allow citizens to be thrown out into the street than help them survive hardships the government itself had caused, or had at least allowed, through careless negligence, to occur.

They had lived through times when government officials sold favors to the highest bribers, and paid little attention to those whose wealth those officials had already leeched away.

They had lived through times when governments assumed that most of the wealth and riches of the nation, along with steady salaries and the best health care, should belong to the members of government and their cronies, and that those whose labor and taxes helped create the wealth and riches could do without.

They had lived through times when governments thought nothing of lying to their citizens, and who imprisoned those who brought those lies to light.

The writers of the Constitution were well aware of how hideously ugly governments could become.

So the writers of the Constitution wrote a simple, straightforward document that would limit the powers of this country's government to specific actions; and within that same simple, straightforward document they gave the people of this country almost unlimited freedom and power. The Constitution was written to protect the people from government. It is full of magic words.

Politicians don't want us to know that particular truth. They want us to believe the Constitution is dry, boring, and irrelevant, so we will never all realize that truth at the same time. They love the power they have fooled us into believing is theirs, and not ours. Governments are like that. The writers of the Constitution understood that.

It will be interesting to see what politicians will do, when the knowledge of this truth becomes widespread enough to alarm them. Will they try to deny that they have attacked or weakened the Constitution? It will be laughably simple to find examples of such attacks.

 Or will they claim that the words in Section Three of the Fourteenth Amendment don't really mean what they say? If so, we must stand united to reclaim our Constitution, and to trust the evidence of our own eyes, our own minds, over anyone who might, for any reason, have a vested interest in deceiving us.

The bottom line is that the vast majority of politicians simply no longer hold their positions. And the numbers are staggering, because politicians break their oath to protect the Constitution on a daily basis, and they are so confident we will never realize, much less enforce, the consequences of breaking that oath that they don't even try to keep it a secret.

They actually brag about their "end runs around the Constitution." They commit mean-spirited acts, like seizing the car of a woman whose husband used it to be with a prostitute, and then ruling that seizure of the property of innocent citizens has been going on for so long that it is now considered Constitutional. (Bennis v. Michigan, 1996)!

They eavesdrop and record the private conversations of American citizens; they assassinate American citizens, and justify it by saying those citizens were a threat to the country, or even that those citizens were resisting arrest; they order their enforcers to attack citizens who are exercising their right peaceably to assemble; they interpret the Constitution by spewing forth such inanities as, "Corporations are people," or, "We can't tax the job creators!"

Do they think we don't know that the jobs are all being created overseas? Do they think we can't interpret their doublespeak? We can. Here it is: "These corporations are paying us a LOT of money, based mostly on our agreeing to put their wishes into law, and allowing them to avoid paying their fair share of taxes."

Politicians in the judicial branch rule that torture is perfectly legal, but that a moment of silence within public schools is not. They rule that the government actually has the right to control our bodies. Our bodies, for the love of God! And we have let them get away with this for decades.

And politicians in the legislative and executive branches love to pretend that such rulings are beyond their power to change. Politicians have a very real interest in pretending that the judicial branch of government is untouchable, and not simply a part of the system of checks and balances. Once the judicial politicians say that search and seizure without a trial is Constitutional, the rest of the politicians can just shrug, claim that their hands are tied, and keep searching and seizing. It's a tough job, but politicians will make sure that someone does it.

Politicians know that if We the People ever realized how blatantly they all are undermining the Constitution, we might demand, at the very least, restitution for all of the unconscionable wrongs they have committed.

But for now, all we demand, of the vast majority of our politicians, elected and appointed, executive, legislative and judicial, state and federal, cabinet secretaries, czars, heads of bureaus, on the left and on the right, is that they accept the fact that they no longer work for us, if they ever did. They effectively resigned at the very moment they made, or allowed to be made, that very first "end run" around our Constitution.

They must, literally, vacate the halls of government, go home, and never run for another state or federal office again. Because Section Three of the Fourteenth Amendment does not say that politicians who have failed to defend the Constitution must leave at the end of their terms, or that they can apologize and say they will never do it again, or that they can go home for a year and then run again. It says they cannot be in government. Period. We couldn't allow them to stay even if we wanted to.

Allowing them to stay would be unconstitutional.

Continuing to pay them would be unthinkable.

In fact, I wonder whether we might ask that they pay us back all of the money they took from us under false pretenses, for all those years, and all of the money they took to give themselves the excellent health insurance and retirement plans they claimed to deserve, while behaving as if the American people did not deserve them. Perhaps the money they return to us, its rightful owners, might help extract us from the debt into which their, dare I say, almost criminally negligent administration, has plummeted the nation.

Right now I do not advocate forcing them to repay the money, although perhaps our new government will feel differently. We are not, after all, arresting them for a crime at this time. We are simply accepting their resignations. Retroactively, in many cases. For there are politicians who have long since retired, or been voted out of office, whose pensions and health insurance payments will hereby cease, right along with the salaries and benefits we have been paying the current crop.

The vast majority of current and former politicians have not earned those salaries or benefits. And they cannot even claim, like those whose pensions politicians and large corporations so casually choose to dishonor these days, that they upheld their end of a contract. Because most politicians did not uphold their contracts.

And this goes for the highest ranking military officers as well, those who have participated in the practice of discrimination against gay military members, thereby attacking and weakening those parts of the Constitution which provide for the equality of all American citizens. We no longer have to bite our tongues with rage while they tell us that their precious wars are proceeding wonderfully, and morale has never been higher, while keeping from us for years the burgeoning rates of suicides among their ranks. We no longer have to subsidize those who have participated in the imprisonment or endangerment of even one person who attempted to shine a light on the corruption of the government.

How insidiously does such imprisonment attack the Constitutional rights of free speech and press?

If anyone should ask how we will get along without our politicians and certain high-ranking military and civilians, I would say that I, of course, have struggled with the possibility that everything could go terribly wrong.

But how can we live with ourselves if we let the corruption continue? How can we even consider allowing these politicians to remain in charge of us, our country, our future, when we know their real intentions, and have the means to deal with them? We have to stand firm, or we are as guilty as the corrupt.

This might well be the very first time that this entire nation has been united in the common understanding that politicians and their cronies are our common enemy. If we can't repair the damage they have done now, if we can't stand united in our determination to bring our nation back to the way it is meant to be, then I can't imagine that we ever will do so. And the pitiful remnant of what was once the proudest land in the world will be our children's heritage. How will we explain to them that we had this shining opportunity, and we let it slip away?

I watched the news footage of Occupy Oakland members standing up against the violence of those who would sully that organization's message, or discourage its messengers. And I believe that this is the time for all of us who want this transition to be peaceful and productive to stand up and do the same.

And we must remember that the possibility exists that there are some legislators who did not, for example, vote to pass the Patriot Act, or executives who did not choose to allow it to continue as law. There might even be some judicial politicians whose interpretations, rulings, and advice have not been a slap in the face of logic, reason, and Constitutionality.

Our upstanding press conglomerates rarely report on such politicians, but there are non-partisan watchdog groups whose very passion and pride lies not only in keeping track of the wrongs done by the majority of politicians, but also in finding any honorable men and women who might have managed to remain that way. If any can be found, perhaps those specific politicians can remain in our employ, and we will be glad to have them, to help us through this transition.

I also know that there are thousands of unsung heroes in government offices who keep the wheels turning, thousands of enlisted men and women who have proved their heroism, loyalty and valor in wars from which we can now bring them home immediately.

These unsung heroes, military and civilian, keep the wheels turning with no fanfare, and they do so in spite of having to deal with the most ridiculous, counterproductive and unfathomable regulations, and with the lies of a government which is willing to dishonor the contracts, civilian as well as military, those unsung heroes signed in good faith.

Without the presence of "upper management," I have faith that those in the trenches will come shining through. Because they, too, have taken that oath to protect the Constitution. Given the power to make decisions, I believe they will proudly honor that oath. Because they represent us. They are us. They are part of the 99 percent of us who have, for too long, been told we have no power.

Gradually, over a period of time, we will elect new politicians, managers for a country which has been seriously neglected and badly run for too long by its former managers. They will come, this time, from the ranks of We the People. They will not need vast riches to campaign, and since they will not, they also will need no secret funds, and no nefarious relationships with corporations and lobbyists.

They will be able to do the will of the People, because they will not have sold their souls for "campaign funds."

Perhaps the dismantling of the system of secret funds, lobbyists and "campaign contributions" might be one of our first priorities. Surely such dismantling of our outgoing politicians' latest insulting interpretation of our Constitution, "Free speech belongs to those who can afford it," deserves immediate action.

So many things can finally change, once these politicians accept that their days of bleeding this country dry are over.

Candidates, even those who are struggling financially, can publish their intention to run for office, and their views and ideas, on the internet without spending millions of dollars to do so.  They can debate with others on public access channels. They can collect signatures instead of money. Candidates for president will not need to travel in person to every single state, because we can let the Electoral College process die a long-overdue death. All candidates can be elected by the long, tedious process of paper ballots, the only safe way to have elections until we can know, with certainty, that they are not being compromised.

With the solidarity which is finally arising in the cities and streets all over this nation, we can do all of these things, and make logical, elegant decisions for our nation, because at last we can throw all of the bums out at once.

Inside the pages of the Constitution we have the solution to the biggest problem we face as we attempt to reclaim and repair our nation.

In Section Three of the Fourteenth Amendment of that incredible document, we have had the solution all along.