The Secret Police Are Here

Rage churned in my gut, burned in my belly, burst into flame on my tongue. ICE is abducting 5-year-olds and using them as bait to get people to open their doors. It used to be you had to open your door to ICE before they could enter and they had to show a judicial warrant (as opposed to the administrative ones they have), but not any more. An internal memo instructs ICE officers they may break down doors and enter homes without a judicial warrant.

This comes after Stephen Miller announces that ICE officers have absolute immunity for anything they want to do. Jonathan Ross has total immunity for murdering Renée Good.

More and more people are being killed, abducted, kidnapped, rammed, beaten… often for no known offense. Just because a big strong, lily-livered coward with an assault rifle, combat gear and a face mask wants to assert his manhood and beat up a person of color. Or a White Anglo-Saxon Protestant, if they get in his way or try to film him.

I'm seething with anger, and I know that all this anger, on the left and on the right, comes from fear. I'm afraid my country is leaving me. The country I went to Vietnam to fight for. The MAGAts are afraid they won't be able to maintain their white supremacy.

As for so-called Christian evangelicals. They are not following Jesus. The only time Jesus got mad was when he saw fraudsters ripping off poor people in the courtyard of the Temple. All the White Christian Nationalists know of the Bible are sound bites from Franklin Graham. Political power in this world comes only from Satan. The Kingdom of God is not of this world. See Matthew 4.8,9 and John 18.36.

But if I'm going to follow Jesus, I have to say, "Father forgive them for they know not what they do." Jesus has set a place for them at his table. All they have to do is choose to join him.

Christian Nationalism

Adolph Hitler was a Christian nationalist.

https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Religious_views_of_Adolf_Hitler

Charlie Kirk was a Christian nationalist.

https://americanreformer.org/2025/09/charlie-kirk-christian-nationalist/ 

Many in the Trump Administration are Christian nationalists.

https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2025/apr/16/christian-nationalists-trump-administration

The Founding Fathers were NOT Christian nationalists.

https://www.britannica.com/topic/The-Founding-Fathers-Deism-and-Christianity-1272214

Repost from September 2012 - The US is not a Christian nation. Sorry.

The Tripoli Treaty, unanimously approved by the Senate and signed into law by President John Adams on June 10, 1797, between the US and the Barbary States, specifically states that the US is NOT a Christian nation. At that time, the US government was still dominated by those who are today referred to as the “Founding Fathers”.  Article 11 of the treaty has been interpreted as an official denial of a Christian basis for the U.S. government.  Article 11 reads:

Art. 11. As the Government of the United States of America is not, in any sense, founded on the Christian religion,—as it has in itself no character of enmity against the laws, religion, or tranquility, of Mussulmen [Muslims],—and as the said States never entered into any war or act of hostility against any Mahometan [Muslim] nation, it is declared by the parties that no pretext arising from religious opinions shall ever produce an interruption of the harmony existing between the two countries.

John F. Kennedy, on September 12, 1960, addressed the Greater Houston Ministerial Association.  In that address he stated:

I believe in an America where the separation of church and state is absolute--where no Catholic prelate would tell the President (should he be Catholic) how to act, and no Protestant minister would tell his parishioners for whom to vote--where no church or church school is granted any public funds or political preference--and where no man is denied public office merely because his religion differs from the President who might appoint him or the people who might elect him.

Separation of church and state was enshrined in the 1st Amendment to the U.S. Constitution, which states that “Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof.”

What the religious radicals don’t tell people, and what, tragically, many Americans apparently don’t know, is that when it comes to determining what the laws of the United States mean, the only document that matters is the Constitution, a completely secular document, that contains no references to God, Jesus or Christianity.

Now we have Mitt Romney and Paul Ryan committed to overturning the Griswold v. Connecticut and Roe v. Wade Supreme Court decisions through a constitutional amendment that defines life as beginning at conception. 

They are allowed to believe that.  YOU are allowed to believe that.  I am allowed to believe that.  But no one is allowed to impose their religious beliefs on the rest of America.

Hope is a sewer rat

I have often described myself as a skeptical optimist. I hope for the best, but expect the worst. Yesterday in church, the worship associate (lay person that gives a reflection) recited a poem by Caitlin Seida called "Hope Is Not a Bird, Emily, It's a Sewer Rat". I've attached it. The sermon from the minister was about "Hope On Trial". She said, "To hope or not to hope? That is the question we wrestle with as we consider divergent perspectives on hope in light of our times. Is hope a thing with feathers, or is it a sewer rat? Does it inspire acquiescence, or action? What role does hope play in our own lives and how does it shape our orientation to the future?"

I have hope for this country, the American people, and the world, but I can't just say "Oh, well" when things charge into oppression and injustice. My hope calls me to action. I demonstrate. I write articles for the climate newsletter. I post shit on Facebook. I write in my blog. Even the fiction I write aims to keep us looking up. I can see the best in people. Even people like Donald Fucking Trump. He'd be a lot better person if he'd had a better dad. Talk about grooming our children!

Giving up hope means turning to drugs or violence or suicide. People with hope don't commit suicide.

Anyway. Life goes on until it doesn't. And I intend to do whatever I can to keep it going on. It may get a lot worse before it gets better, but I'll never give up. And I'll never give up hope.

Thanksgiving

It's Thanksgiving. We have company coming. I did weeding and deadheading in front and back and moving furniture. My wife did a bunch of baking and cooking... and directing. I love the way we work together, always by consensus.

That's the number one thing I'm thankful for: my wife.

I'm thankful that we have a roof over our heads that doesn't leak, and that we have enough income to keep it there. Enough income to keep food in the larder. Enough income to pay for good health insurance. Enough income to keep the cars fed. Enough income to share with those in need.

I am also thankful for the community at church that we're a part of. I'm thankful for friends and for my ease at being friendly. I'm thankful for fellow writers, who read my stories and whose stories I get to read.

I'm thankful for the Sonoma County Public Library and the rich selection of books they have to lend for free.

I'm thankful that we're able to live in California, a deep blue state that, to a much greater extent than a lot of states, makes a safe place for people of other than the white, Christian, cisgender male persuasion.

I'm thankful for this Bellevue Ranch neighborhood, for its diversity, its (relative) peacefulness and its safety.

I'm thankful for my health, physical and mental, emotional and spiritual. For eyesight and hearing, for smelling and tasting, for touching and balance.

I'm thankful for my level of intelligence and for the upbringing I had that taught me to use it. For the upbringing I had that taught me not to hate.

It's a good life I have. Much better than most other folks have. I hope the next one is a little more equitable for all the souls in the Universe.

 

I just wrote an email to Donald Trump

 I just sent an email to Donald Trump. Here's what I wrote:

Dear Mr President--

I am very uneasy with your promise to "go after" your political enemies. Of course, your political enemies will never vote for you. But look at all the people, Republicans, Democrats and Independents who voted for you in 2024. You can get votes when you listen to and help the people. Please stop hurting the people: citizens, immigrants, poor people, sick people, people who aren't Christians. The only people you're not hurting are the obscenely rich people. Stop acting like a thin-skinned, insecure teenager and act like a man. I'm the same age you are. I know you can act like a grownup because I do.

Thank you for your attention in this matter.

Let me know if you agree, disagree, or have no opinion. Send your own email to him. Be polite, civil, reasonable and factual. You can go to https://www.whitehouse.gov/contact/ to send your comments.

H. R. 22 - Silencing Americans Act

House Republicans are calling it the SAVE Act. SAVE stands for "Safeguard American Voter Eligibility". It will require proof of citizenship in order to register to vote. Sounds like a good idea. We can't have non-citizens voting.

But in reality it is a Project 2025-inspired voter suppression act. Here are a few facts about it.

·         Overnight, it would essentially end online and mail-in voter registration. 

·        Proof of citizenship doesn’t mean a simple driver’s license. It means a birth certificate or a passport – documents that tens of millions of citizens simply don’t have access to. 

·        Married people who’ve changed their names wouldn’t be able to register using their original birth certificates -- effectively disenfranchising millions of women. 

·        Trans and nonbinary people who’ve changed their names to reflect their gender identity would also face massive challenges to voting -- and the State Department’s ban on updating sex designations on passports (if upheld in court) would add to the difficulty of satisfying the bill’s proof of citizenship requirements.

·        The burdensome requirements would disproportionately impact voters of color, low-income voters, elder voters and younger voters. How many college students do you know who have a birth certificate stashed in their dorm room?

·        Arizona and Kansas tried similar legislation and tens of thousands of eligible voters were disenfranchised. 

The Republicans in Congress do not represent their constituents fully. They only represent white Christians. This is a attempt to Make America Christian Finally. "Finally" because this country was never a Christian theocracy. But if the Project 2025ers have their way, it will become one.