I. History
WITHOUT MEMORY, we are lost. Without memory, there is no sense of self, whether an individual or a nation.
II. Amnesia?
Knowledge is the foundation of the
III. Origins
Many love the idea of
The country’s birth certificate is a document of dissent. It should be well-known to every citizen,
particularly by one who cared so much about an Other's birth certificate. Surely, the one making such a fuss knows the significance of the nation’s.
Being an American
is demanding: “And for the
support of this Declaration, with a firm reliance on the protection of Divine
Providence, we mutually pledge to each other our lives, our fortunes, and our sacred honor.” That is not
done by a crybaby country. It is not for the
close-minded and the faint-hearted.
The end of the country’s birth certificate is wedded to the Constitution which begins: “WE THE
PEOPLE…” The Preamble lays out markers by which WE THE PEOPLE measure our progress toward a shared destiny. Thus, the only time “I” appears is in the oath to uphold the supreme law of the land; the “I” acts on behalf of the “WE.”
The pillars in the oath, to “support and defend the Constitution…against all enemies, foreign and domestic”—invaders and traitors—are akin to the columns in the Temple, Yakin and Boaz, which were to establish strength. The foundation is the God of truth. (Deuteronomy 32:4, Isaiah 65:6, Psalm 31:5) “If a man vow a vow unto the LORD, or swear an oath to bind his soul with a bond; he shall not break his word, he shall do according to all that proceedeth out of his mouth.” (Numbers
30:2, KJV) And when George Washington raised his right hand to become President of the United States, he added four words: “So help me God.” Thus, character--the union of thought, word, and deed directed toward a noble end--prevailed.
IV. Conduct
He appeared to violate the rule. He was warned. He was given an explanation. Nevertheless, he
persisted.
During the transition, Richard Painter, former ethics lawyer for Bush the Younger, and Laurence Tribe, a professor of constitutional law at Harvard University, warned the gentleman from New York about the emoluments clause. Walter Shaub, the Director of the Office of Government Ethics, offered to assist him with divestiture. But that was given no consideration and was not accepted. And so, from the moment “So help me God” passed his lips, he has been in violation of the emoluments clause. (Article I, Section 9, Clause 8) The man who was supposed to “take care that the laws be faithfully executed” chose to terminate “the supreme law of the land” with extreme prejudice. (Article II, Section 3 & Article VI, Clause 2) And the oath was dismissed with a wave of his hand. After all, how can one “preserve, protect and defend” the very thing he upends? (Article II, Section 1, Clause 8) ALL OF THOSE ARE IMPEACHABLE OFFENSES. Together, they go beyond, say, civil or inherent contempt, to raise the curtain for an encore, a showstopper of an impeachable offense--contempt of the Constitution. Thus, there are already major violations regardless of the Russian investigation. And he has been working on more ever since.
V. Consequences
General Washington was in the field with his troops. But one day, the gentleman from New York will have an asterisk beside his name, which is ironic because he has never placed his aft at risk.
President Washington warned of foreign influence. The gentleman from New York, the draft dodger and a certified sissy, embraces it. Washington warned of “the impostures of pretended patriotism.”
The gentleman from New York wraps himself in the flag, giving new meaning to “the last refuge of
a scoundrel” as he wows the-more-patriotic-than-thou-crowd.
The benefit of the doubt cannot erase “high crimes and misdemeanors.” They are “those offenses which proceed from the misconduct of public men, or, in other words, from the abuse or violation of some public trust.” (Article II, Section 4 & Alexander Hamilton, The Federalist Papers, No. 65)
“Responsibility is of two kinds--to censure and to punishment. The first is the more important of the two, especially in an elective office. Man, in public trust, will much oftener act in such a manner as to render him unworthy of being any longer trusted, than in such a manner as to make him obnoxious to legal punishment.” (Alexander Hamilton, The Federalist Papers, No.70; emphasis added)
VI. Accuracy
Corruption comes by degrees through an opening created by falsehood. Instead of an orb, obfuscation is the object casting a shadow and causing “a total eclipse of the facts.”* Nuance--shaken, twisted, beaten, and run through with a sword--is tossed overboard tied to an anchor, which some manage to downplay.
We study history to remember who and what we are. Thus, we celebrate Independence Day.
But we also study history to avoid making the same mistakes repeatedly--whether our own or the
mistakes of others.
“The Holocaust did not begin with killing; it began with words.”^ And those despicable deeds transpired where Fatherland or H_ _ _land was apropos. But they did not happen all at once. Friends were forgotten before they were drowned, and now phrases face the same fate.
The Founders met in the Continental Congress. They created a Continental Army, a Continental Navy, and the Continental Marines. GIs, at that time, were called Continentals. John Adams was the head of the Continental Board of War and Ordnance. George Washington was the Commander in Chief of the Continental Forces. In peacetime, Alexander Hamilton, Receiver of Continental Taxes, which were placed in the Continental Treasury, pushed for a Federal Convention in a series of newspaper articles entitled “The Continentalist.” And after writing the Constitution, the Framers wanted candidates for the Presidency to be “continental characters.”
H_ _ _land is an alien term. It is a place for a particular ethnic or racial group, a place where “blood and soil” makes sense.
.
By definition, a nation of immigrants cannot be an H_ _ _land. For alien words and alien ways can corrupt and lead us astray, and they can, ultimately, destroy our freedom. Thus, a Fourth Reich, under pretext of an emergency, can separate children from their parents.
The history of the American Republic is defined by means and ends, and names given or titles
bestowed must strive for such balance. Those who used Continental have a better record of forming and maintaining the Union--another word preferred by the Framers, as was country and nation--and their example should be followed. Therefore a constitutional phrase provides the proper name for the most recent Cabinet post--the Department of Public Safety. (Article I, Section 1, Clause 2) Surely, self-styled “conservatives” and “strict constructionists” will lead the way.
Treason is the only crime defined in the Constitution because it is a threat to the life of the Republic. That is why Confederate monuments are objectionable, which self-styled “conservatives” or “strict constructionists” should understand. “Treason against the United States, shall consist only in levying war against them, or in adhering to their enemies, giving them aid and comfort.” (Article I, Section 3, Clause 1) Thus, treason cannot be rewarded; and traitors do not make precedents.
VII. Conclusion
When confusion rises as an envious and poisonous moon, ’tis time to return to return to the origin of things. For we do not pledge loyalty to a monarch nor to a land, but to ideas placed upon a pedestal--our ideals. Yet those who would turn the nation toward despotism, however disguised--and which always begins with “a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same object”--are citizens Elsewhere. For they doubt the country’s birth certificate and, therefore, have disgraced themselves.
That slovenly mass, which sits prisoner in your skull, is more like intestines digesting foul substance. It fuels your every grunt and gesture and assaults nostril and eye alike. Shallow wit at the speed of a sloth, and all the grace of the ill-mannered, fancy yourself what you will. But you are AINO--American in name only.
“Knowledge,” as James Madison noted, “will forever govern ignorance; and a people who mean to be their own governors must arm themselves with the power which knowledge gives.”
*https://youtu.be/tFhy72RR74o [CNN, Don Lemon, “a total eclipse of the facts”]
^https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/acts-of-faith/wp/2016/11/22/the-holocaust-did-not-begin-with-killing-it-began-with-words-museum-condemns-alt-right-meeting/?utm_term=.4c04ba620772
(c)2018 Marvin D. Jones. All rights reserved.
[“The Holocaust...began with words.”]
