Not Who, and Not Really If, But Us

                                             The White House

I find it quite interesting that the political party that for years and years now has identified itself as "the party of traditional values", is seemingly not the least interested in "if", but only in "who". With all the hub-bub going on with "revelations" of a President "on the loose", possibly a danger to both our democracy and world peace, and now to top it all off, an anonymous op-ed in the New York Times that outlines a secret and quiet rebellion in the White House: and we find Republicans urging lie-detector tests to discover the author of the op-ed! An offended Mr. Trump is tossing around the threatening word of "treason"!

I think the dilly-dally of "who" a curious waste of time: anyone who is not asking "if" is either working for Mr. Trump or his own advancement, not for America. But even more important than "if" is "us". We, through our electoral system, put Mr. Trump in the White House: so it is "us" that needs a reckoning. The radical disconnect between our collective "values" and "myths" and our continuing reality of strict adherence to both force and greed (in service to Power) -- as both national policy and cultural identity -- is the beating heart of our societal problems.

What Mr. Trump lacks in verbal clarity is not shared by Israel's Mr. Netanyahu who has said, "The weak crumble, are slaughtered and are erased from history while the strong, for good or for ill, survive. The strong are respected, and alliances are made with the strong, and in the end, peace is made with the strong." No doubt Mr. Trump thinks that might have said these words first! Regardless, they do clearly articulate the perspective of Mr. Trump -- and also of our national policies and cultural values. This is who we are. But is it who we really want to be?

The so-called "operating dysfunction" going on in the White House is nothing other than the operating dysfunction of our entire nation and national identity! We practice what Mr. Netanyahu preaches, and yet we are perhaps the most "religious" nation on Earth -- and many of us like to think the "most Christian". And therein lies the root of national dysfunction. In every way we practice and extol the necessity of greed, of unlimited profits, and of the "best system ever devised by humanity". In every way we practice and extol the necessity of force -- not the gentle force of Gandhi or Thoreau, but the rapacious force of economic exploitation  and oppression, and when that loses its effectiveness, of "the greatest military might the world has ever seen".

How do we hear the words of Jesus, of Yeshua bar Alaha, on the Sundays we attend church? Do we uncomfortably squirm when we hear "Woe to you rich" and "Blessed are you poor"? Do we close our ears when the words over the sound system are, "Love your enemies and pray for those who use you badly"? Mr. Netanyahu and Mr. Trump are both counting on all of us to completely ignore the words of Jesus: to believe that what we do does not really matter: that what matters is only the lip service of a "profession of faith"! Such a profession of "faith" allows us to hate our black neighbor, hire police who will shoot him in the back, and guards to man the prisons that hold the survivors of the "war" on our American streets.

Such a profession of "faith" allows us to construct and keep rolling ("The best economy ever!" -- Mr. Trump) a predatory capitalism that is chewing up and spitting out the Planet that we call home: a predatory capitalism that is divvying up resources into the hands of a few, while 1 in 6 children in America suffer from daily food insecurity, and thousands of others around the world suffer the effects of malnutrition every single day, every year. Every minute given over to thinking of "who" may have written his anonymous op-ed and not of "how" we build a world of "small unities", of a new global rEvolution, in keeping with an "Activation of Faith", is our dysfunction and a complete waste of time and energy (which is exactly what Power wants of us).