It is
commonly heard that there are no real differences between the Democratic and
Republican parties, especially in this age of corporations owning both of them.
My experience is that the differences are vast, not only in economic and social
policy, but in the way the different parties look at and treat the rest of the
world. I have spent a good part of my life working in foreign countries, some
of it employed by the government of the United States, so these differences are
personal and important to me. The doctrine of American Exceptionalism as
espoused by the Republican Party has not shown America to be a shining light on
a hill but more often than not a dark window in a dungeon or even a cold mass
grave in the ground. I have seen Republican Administrations participate in
genocide, drug dealing and gross violations of human rights and dignity, all in
the name of American Exceptionalism. I have seen Democratic Administrations on
the other hand try to assist nations of the world in their efforts to become
economically healthy and democratic, not by murder but by working in partnership
and by example, fighting against the brutality of dictatorships not chosen by
the people. I choose the latter, not alone for human rights, but because
healthy free people who have chosen democracy for their way of life can be our
true partners in the world, not our servants. Among other things, partners are
able to buy our products and do not need to flee their countries as political
or economic refugees.
As I see the
current crop of Republican candidates tell us that God is with them (certainly
not with anyone else, especially not Democrats and maybe not really with all of
them), and I watch the tears flow from their eyes as they just wish for those
days when their God, Ronald Reagan, showed our country how to exercise Power in
the world and beat back the threat of Godless Communism, I understand what they
are really saying. They long for those days when America, meaning that part of
America called the United States, could and did wield its God-given power over
the rest of the world and expected it to obey, else it would suffer the
consequences. Domestically, I see the same thing happening in local elections
where candidates seldom announce their real intentions and are supported by
floods of money from national organizations. Once in power, these conservative
Republican-sponsored groups attempt to pass laws requiring all citizens to live
by their specific religious beliefs, their Old Testament definitions of "Christian
morality" which are a far cry from the teachings of Christ who never
forced anyone to act according to his teachings. His philosophy was spread
through love, not force; I read nowhere in the New Testament where Jesus told
his followers to become members of the Sanhedrin, much less have I seen where the
Disciples were sent to all the world to force people to believe in the man who
professed love. When Peter and Paul went to Rome it was not to become Senators,
they were sent to tend to and strengthen the believers and to testify to those
who were ready to listen, not to take over the kingdom and or subdue its
citizens by force.
Today we are
faced with a different version of Christianity, one that believes in power. Not
everyone believes in this version of Christianity, hopefully most are appalled
by it. This version claims that we are a Christian Nation, given power by God
to rule the world and rule over the citizens of the United States, whether they
be Christians, Jews, Muslims or non-believers. Like children, these special Christians say, all
must learn to obey first, and the use of force is just fine, for once they
learn through obedience they will see the light. Like the very popular books
sold throughout the conservative Christian world which tell parents they have
the right to whip their children into subservient obedience; all of our citizenry
must learn to obey for their own good and for the protection of our great
nation, which nation has the right to whip the rest of the world into being
democratic, for that is God's form of government for His children on earth. So God
approves all that whipping, and those chosen by God to lead our country should
be those ready to do it. Otherwise, our country might be overrun by the enemy
which is always at our door.
The majority of our population professes to
believe in Jesus, but they believe in the Jesus of love, not force. These are
good people, people who don't whip their children and who don't think God wants
them to take over our government or anyone else's. Bit as usual, this majority
is being led by a louder minority of power-hungry believers which has taken the
name "Christian" for their own and formed an exclusive club. No one
else is a "real Christian" unless they believe and act as this group
does. Somehow they have set themselves up as the judges of who is and who
isn't. Even if you call yourself one, even if you go to churches that teach the
doctrines of Christ, you are not one unless the members of this group approve
of your conversion and subsequent behavior. Some of the pronouncements during
this Republican primary season have been almost humorous were they not so
serious. Romney is a Mormon so he is certainly not a Christian. But Obama says
he is a Christian but he is really a Socialist and certainly not a real
American. But since Romney is going to be the candidate, well, his non-Christianity
is as least a little better than Obama's non-Christianity. At least Romney
believes in American Exceptionalism.
This extreme
Christian group believes in un-Christian force, that it is their duty to save
our country any way they can. Failing to convince the nation that their way is
the one and only truth, they began about fifty years ago to try to take over
school boards, local governments and then state governments so that they can
force everyone to believe as they do and obey their laws. On a national level
they have brought government to a standstill. This is "my way or the
highway" Christianity, uncompromising on "principles" and it is
moving our country into a new Christian dark age.
In the
United States they are able to get laws passed at the local level by elections,
with local school board elections flooded with money from national
organizations and private donations from around the United States. Most are not
truthful about their agendas, but then lies are alright if one is doing God's work. As they make their agendas known after
getting elected, those who have not cared before have and should rise to vote
them out. That is one aspect of true American Exceptionalism that really does
work.
But in the world
outside the United States, those elected to high office in our country are much
freer to exercise the kind of force they wish they could here in order to teach
the children of the world to obey. Like we did in Iraq, and like we did in many
of the places I have lived. I have personally seen that teaching the children
to obey can also mean murdering them if they don't, all in God's name of
course, so it is justifiable. For God's plan for His people on earth is
democracy. Look at the most powerful nation on earth: it is Christian and it is
democratic.
Democracy is
not God's way in heaven, nor really is it the way of the true believers. I
don't think anyone has the idea that angels vote on what God should do with his
created souls, but in terms of how a man rules over his wife or his family,
there is no democracy there. Nor is there in the churches of the believers. But
on earth, as a way to eventually get to Him, democracy is God's gift to the
United States, and it is the United States' gift to the world. We might have to
force it on them until they learn, and like all children, we might have to whip
them into obedience, but it is for their own good. And, of course, it is for
the protection of our great country, which was founded by God.
While in the
United States these Power Christians are fanatic that no fetus be killed for
any reason, even though obviously "activist non-believing judges"
somehow made it legal years ago, it
seems to be just fine overseas if it is for the good cause of bringing
democracy to children there. We don't know how many pregnant women were killed
during Shock and Awe, but certainly some. That was for a good cause. Iraq's
dictator was an ungodly man who threatened us with weapons of mass destruction,
a man who we were falsely told, had something to do with that diabolic attack
by extremist Muslim fanatics. When the weapons were found and a our government
had to admit under pressure that no, Iraq had nothing to do with September 11,
well it was still alright, because it was a good thing to free the people in
that nation and bring them into the democratic fold. Besides, their own oil
would pay for it, which is also important. God does not like going into debt,
unless of course one has to in order to beat the godless Communists or the
Godless Muslim Extremists.
In Central
America, of the quarter million innocents killed because they "might
become" Communists, many were pregnant women. These people were not in
uniforms fighting a national army. No.
No, over eighty three percent of those killed had no weapons, will illiterate
and "ignorant" peasants. Proven testimony recounts that soldiers with
weapons, uniforms and vehicles from the United States on more than one occasion
lined up pregnant women to see how many a bullet from their new American
weapons would go through. A bullet through a living fetus is an abortion, isn't
it? But in this case abortion was fine.
That unborn child could never become a Communist.
Our heroic President,
Ronald Reagan, even went there to congratulated the man who ordered the
massacres, a good Christian man by the way, one of "us" in his
training and his Christian conversion. With his arm over the man's shoulder, our
Republican God told the surviving people of Guatemala that the murderer obviously
had the best interests of his country at heart.
President
Ronald Reagan was a Republican, and it was his administration which approved of
these murders. And the American people who voted for him still get tears in
their eyes wishing there could be another Ronald Reagan who could demonstrate
the God-given power of the United States around the world. Unlike Democrats,
who have never realized how they should exercise the power God has given them.
Democrats are weak, they apologize for such things, they seek sanctions rather
than truth, peace rather than war, and as we have seen during this new era of
the Arab Spring, they even support revolutions against long term dictators that
have been our friends, our partners in managing the children of the world and
our surrogates who are teaching them democracy over the long term. Sure, those
dictatorships have to be firm, and those who fight against them have to be
punished, but like children, that is the way they will learn.
In the case
of Guatemala, the greatest genocide we have never heard of took place during the
Reagan Administration. Why did we never hear about it? At this moment a Bosnian
Serb General is on trial in the International Court accused of Crimes Against
Humanity for the mass murder of eight thousand Muslims. No one has ever gone to
trial for the murder of two hundred thousand Guatemalans, until now. One man is
on trial in Guatemala finally, the man who over two years carried out the most
egregious massacres. But why not those who approved, who supplied, who gave the
money, the arms, the trucks, and the public smiles?
The murders were
documented by those who did them, much like the Nazi extermination camps were
careful to document the names of the people they killed. Those documents were
leaked to an investigator from the National Security Archives at George
Washington University and published, but very few people really cared. They
must have been Communists, like Reagan said they might become. The Catholic
Church researched the massacres and published their report, the Bishop who
wrote it and directed the research was brutally murdered the day after its
release. But no one really cared much here. The United Nations published the
results of its Truth Commission, which came up with the number of two hundred
thousand, over eighty percent of which were Mayan peasants murdered by
government forces, official and unofficial. President Clinton ordered the State
Department to release its files to the Commission, files which showed that the
U.S. and the Reagan and Bush Administrations knew what was going on there. He also
apologized, but then that's what Democrats do.
Anthropologists
have worked on mass graves in Guatemala and El Salvador, CNN did a photo essay
on a very recently discovered mass grave behind a church in Guatemala City
where they estimate more than three hundred bodies were secretly buried. Who
cared when those people went missing? Who cares now?
The issue is
simple. To care means that one has to admit that President Reagan and his
people lied to the American public. Which should not be hard, since they
admitted they did and were even prosecuted for it. Not the President, of
course, but the people who worked for him. And those convicted were pardoned,
of course. But not only did they trade missiles to Iran to get hostages free in
Lebanon, not only did they support an illegal secret army to invade Nicaragua,
not only did they supply money from the
missile sales to that army but also they looked the other way as people in that
secret army imported tons of cocaine into the United States (Vice-President
Bush was in charge of the War on Drugs); they covered up the murder of a
quarter million people in Central America and in other countries. But lying is
alright, if God is on your side. Besides, America, meaning that part of America
known as the United States, is Exceptional. Lying is alright because it is a
nation doing God's work. So is murder, apparently. And so is the manipulation
of a free press.
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