This is it, folks. On Tuesday, November 2, 2004, the US will elect a president for the next four years. While there are many candidates running, essentially, there are two choices: George W. Bush and John Kerry. I can't help but wonder what the founding fathers would think about the fact that we've become a two party system. I can't help but wonder what they'd think about the fact that the winner of the popular vote is not the current president of the US. I can't help but wonder what they would think about this current administration's slow but steady dismantling of the US Constitution and the freedoms it protects-- a document they took such great pains to create, designed to protect the individual not only from "mob rule" but from the government itself.

There's no doubt in my mind that this election is the most important election in the history of this country. If Bush and company remain in power, I truly and honestly believe that we will see the end of the United States of America as we have always known it. If Bush and company remain in power, before the next election, this nation will most likely either become a theocracy or there will be a civil war, although not one that will necessarily involve guns and violence.

The next president will appoint at least one US Supreme Court justice-- Justice Renquist was set to retire even before the sad news that he is fighting thyroid cancer. The balance of power in the US Supreme Court is so close that adding another Scalia or Thomas threatens a woman's right to choose, black civil liberties, gay civil liberties, affirmative action, separation of church and state and a whole host of other issues. If Bush remains in power, and both houses of Congress remain in the hands of the Republican party, there is no doubt that another Scalia or Thomas is exactly what we will get. As it stands today, there are 30 states who already have laws written and ready to introduce to their state legislatures if the Supreme Court reverses its ruling on Roe v. Wade.

But perhaps the most dangerous threat to this nations civil liberties is to be found in the foundations of Bush's supporters: conservative and fundamentalist Christians. More than ten years ago, I wrote an article on the dangers posed by such groups as the Christian Coalition. Ralph Reed, former second in command of the CC, once said on national television that it was the goal of the CC to "return" this nation to its Christian roots and to make this the Christian nation it was intended to be from its conception. I won't argue the fact that the first European settlers on these shores set out to create religious colonies. But those same settlers never intended to become a free nation. The founding fathers, who sought to create and eventually did create a new nation, never intended for this nation to be a "Christian" nation. The strategy of the CC, as revealed by Mr. Reed during that interview, was to take over school boards and town councils slowly but surely and eventually to have "one of their own" in the White House. They have, for the most part, succeeded in their goals.

Now their goal is to eliminate all other forms of worship-- and they're working on that through cases like the one in New York where a mother is suing her daughter's school district for forbidding her daughter to distribute "testimony" pamphlets on how Jesus saved this little girl and gave her a "new life in Christ". They're doing it through the preachings of the fundamentalist Christian preachers like Jimmy Swaggart, who recently commented in a televised sermon that he'd kill a gay man for looking at him the wrong way and then lie to God and tell him that the gay man died. His audience laughed and clapped and cheered. They're doing it through the use of the executive order signed by Bush that allows "faith-based initiatives". They can now get federal funding to try to "treat" gays and "cure" them of their homosexuality. They're doing it by attempting to pass laws that forbid the desecration of the US flag-- thereby setting a precedent for limiting free speech and dissent.

There is one chance to save the US-- and that is to vote Bush out of office. And the only viable alternative to Bush is John Kerry. There is much about Kerry that I don't agree with: his stand on gay marriage and his stand on the issue of this unwinnable "war on terror" are only two. But the alternative is to sign the death certificate of the freest nation on earth.

For those of you who have either not decided who to vote for or who have not decided whether or not to even go to the polls, please take a stand against the destruction of the US and get out and vote on election day. And vote John Kerry.

Previous	Home	Index	Next

onespiritproject.com