A Rare Moment to Change the course of History

"American Theocracy" a book written by Kevin Phillips in 2006, along with its review by historian Alan Brinkley  defines three interconnected themes from seemingly different domains of analysis;  From the N.Y, Times review:  Philips identifies three broad and related trends --- that together threaten the future of the United States and the world. One is the role of oil in defining and, as Phillips sees it, distorting American foreign and domestic policy. The second is the ominous intrusion of radical Christianity into politics and government. And the third is the astonishing levels of debt -- current and prospective -- that both the government and the American people have been heedlessly accumulating. If there is a single, if implicit, theme running through the three linked essays that form this book, it is the failure of leaders to look beyond their own and the country's immediate ambitions and desires so as to plan prudently for a darkening future.             

President Trump has recently stated that in Iraq "we should have taken the oil" being candid about what Phillips sees as one of three central pathologies of our political culture.  He sees the other dire threat in "astonishing levels of debt" now a multiple of what existed 2006, unlike the debt accumulated to win WWII which was quickly reversed during the peace and prosperity that followed. 

The subtitle of Phillip's book is central, "the ominous intrusion of radical Christianity into politics and government" What the book did not explore is the complex and paradoxical cultural-legal infrastructure that results in an educated populace accepting a religious ethos that most do not personally believe.  Right now it seems impossible to transform this country from ostensible religiosity, I say ostensible because of surveys showing Catholics generally have acceptance of  Roe v. Wade; as other other denominations, in spite of this being inimical to a central religious edict.

This is being written only days before the impeachment hearings of president Trump are to begin.   Many witnesses will be sworn in, meaning that if they make an intentional false statement it will be a criminal act.  Such an oath is often administered with the the words, "So Help Me God" with no overt realization of what such an oath implies. 

One of the chairpersons of a committee that will be taking evidence, Jerold Nadler, was among nine members of congress who recently voted to revert the present national motto "In God we Trust." back to "E Pluribus Unum."  Our founder's were clear in the first amendment,  which both restricted and liberated belief in God,  "Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof"

Whatever one's feelings toward president Trump, and few are neutral,  the process of impeachment hearings itself can be the occasion for acknowledging our founders effort to create a secular government.  This can only be done if those who administer the oath to witnesses do so without the implication that God has anything to do with it's legality.  (Reference to article of legal support)

More importantly, an expected challenge and explanation will place in the public domain the open discussion of a subject that still remains forbidden to speak about, yet dooms our nation  to a religiosity that defined the pre-enlightenment era.