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The Supreme Law of the Land
October 27, 2006
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by Steve Bhaerman

At a time of great crisis and opportunity, of discord and disunity, where the shadow of fraud hangs over our electoral system and the voices of fear and deception try to drown out the truth, perhaps now is the time to get back to basics, to remember and invoke the Supreme Law of the Land.

For just as religions are founded in sacred text, so is our republic. Eleven score and ten years ago, a small band of spiritually-inspired freethinkers did something unheard of, and some would say, insane. They proposed that instead of subjects, we human beings are sovereign individual entities, banded together in commonwealth, and endowed by our Creator with the right to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness.

Furthermore, they took this stand against the greatest empire of its day, and its mightiest king. Interestingly, the king also was an owner of the largest multinational corporation of that time, the British East India Company. In its attempts to extract every extra penny out of the colonists, the British East India Company held a monopoly on the importation of tea. We all know what happened next. A band of colonists tossed the tea into Boston harbor, and shortly thereafter they made their statement and gave it to the world.

For more than two centuries now, those who understand that our human past is not our human potential have been inspired by the words of the Declaration on Independence -- even Ho Chi Minh, whom we fought against in the Vietnam War. In some ways, the freedom-seeking people of the world have understood the implications of the Declaration better than we have. And perhaps the neocon mantra repeated over and over after the 9/11 attacks, “They hate us for our freedom,” is a massive distortion. Perhaps it’s more accurate to say the people of the world are disappointed in us for selling our freedom so cheaply.

Our Founding Religion Was “Non-Dominational”

The more I read about our nation’s founders, the more I recognize that their spiritual wisdom far exceeded the religious doctrines of the day. Unlike the Puritan witch-burners and their fear-based, dominator counterparts today, Jefferson, Franklin, Washington and company were Deists who stood against both spiritual and material domination. Rather than buying into the rule by kings, bankers and priests, they sought to affirm each individual’s natural relationship both to Spirit and matter. By proclaiming all of us created equal in life and liberty, the agreement was this: We will not be dominated, nor will we dominate others. This might even be what Jesus meant when he said the meek shall inherit the earth.

An inspired Constitution -- based not just on the Enlightenment in Europe but the political structure of the Iroquois Nation -- was put in place to help us hold the balance of a healthy body politic. Over the next two centuries, a procession of lesser King Georges have contrived to swindle us out of our shared commonwealth and overrule the rule of the people. They’ve won some, and they’ve lost some. But they have persisted. And through sheer force of wealth, power, and the willingness to violate any holy principle, they have placed themselves once again in the driver’s seat.

The good news is, we don’t need a revolution in this country. We already had one. What we need now is an American Evolution, where we the people finally grow up and become the citizens our Founding Fathers wrote the Constitution for. We’ve been shirking our responsibilities for a while now, conveniently feigning ignorance. Instead of standing as free individuals, we have fallen for their protection racket. And now we are awakening to the sad truth that we need protection from our “protectors.”


America, Re-Colonized
We’ve failed to heed the warning issued by Republican President and military leader Dwight D. Eisenhower to beware of the military-industrial complex. Instead, we’ve acquiesced to a “don’t ask, don’t tell policy.” We promise not to ask what in the devil’s name our government is doing to “protect” us, and they promise not to tell. When they tell us that times have changed and the quaint freedoms guaranteed by the Declaration of Independence and the Bill of Rights no longer apply, what they are really saying is this: In a world that is rapidly awakening, the only way they can keep their power and influence intact is through increasingly totalitarian control.

Those who are willing to open their eyes can see this trend in the latest Big Brother extension of “the secret ballot,” where votes are counted in secret. Or the scary and unconstitutional powers recently granted to the President by a “robber stamp” Congress. Or the way the media is being used to keep the body politic occupied with weapons of mass-distraction while our commonwealth is being stolen out from under us.

In fact, I highly recommend two new books which outline both our loss of freedom and the shakedown of the commonwealth. The first, Delusional Democracy by Joel Hirschorn deconstructs the dysfunctional puppet show of Democrat vs. Republican (what Brad Blanton calls “RepublicRats”) and offers a transpartisan solution where we the people move past left and right and come front and center, face the music and dance together. The other, Screwed: The Undeclared War Against the Middle Class by Thom Hartmann, is an account of how the middle class has come to the verge of extinction, and what we can do about it.

Even those who’ve been medicating themselves with Deniatol are beginning to suspect that “we’re not in Kansas anymore, Toto” and those we’ve elected to serve us have elected to serve us up on a platter to their corporate cronies. Consider the engineers who have just begun to pay their massive $100,000 college loans, only to find their jobs outsourced to India. Or people like my friend who went to the emergency room and was charged $900 for two $5 pills -- and then was told his insurance doesn’t cover it because he didn’t notify them ahead of time he was going to suddenly get sick. Then consider the outrageous profits of companies like Halliburton in Iraq or Exxon Mobil announcing the second most profitable quarter of any publicly traded company in history.

The new American evolutionaries realize that the issues we face today cannot be addressed by two political parties that have outlived their uselessness. The Banana Republicans and their Democrat enablers have just about turned the United States into a banana republic. America has been re-colonized, and more and more of us are waking up and saying, “No thank you, we don’t want your colonic.”

Time to Awake and “Awise”

Read the Declaration of Independence, and take heart. For it is not enough to “wise up” in upwising. The heart and soul of America must be reawakened. Like it or not, we who live here were born into (or came to) a land of great opportunity. To paraphrase the Bible, “To whom much is given, much is required.” Whether our forebears came over on the Mayflower, were there to greet the Mayflower when it landed, or came in one of the many waves of immigration, they were given opportunities for social, economic (and yes, spiritual) advancement that were simply not possible in the more rigid societies in the “Old World.” Even those whose ancestors came as slaves now enjoy the rights of free citizens.

Instead of being intimidated by current circumstances and retreating in fear, denial or wishful thinking, we must step forward and embrace this opportunity for evolution. Just as without King George there would have been no Declaration of Independence, no Constitution, no America, we must now honor our latter day, self-proclaimed King George for awakening enough of us to make the evolution possible. This isn’t about impeaching George Bush, it’s about impeaching the entire impeachable system where the underworld and the overworld have become indistinguishable.

Before we the people declare or re-declare anything, we must acknowledge our role as complicit enablers. At the same time, we must also consider how much of what we say, think and do is just recycled, unconscious habitual behavior from the past. Just as we wouldn’t blame a child for not knowing what a child doesn’t know, why would we blame ourselves for acting out of unconscious patterns? Or blame anyone else, for that matter?

However, once we become aware there is a problem or condition, we now have the ability to respond. We are response-able. Now that the irony curtain has been parted, and we clearly see the dysfunction and deception, falling back into cynical withdrawal or blind acquiescence to illegitimate authority are options only for the spiritually immature.



Time to Declare Interdependence Too
If we remember that the American revolution encompassed the ultimate egalitarian libertarian Jefferson and elitist capitalist Alexander Hamilton, we realize that the American revolutionaries reached across dualistic distinctions to find a new paradigm. Just as they realized they’d all be better off pursuing their agendas free of the oppressions of King George, so we would do well to stand together as the vast majority we are -- those who want to pursue their happiness honestly and with as much consciousness as possible so as to create a world that enriches everyone.

As for the eye-rolling cynics who insist this evolution can never happen, tell it to Jefferson. Or Washington. Or Franklin, who said, “We must all hang together or assuredly, we will hang separately.”

That is why this new evolution must be accompanied by a new Declaration of Interdependence based on our newest understanding of “natural law.” As cellular biologists have discovered in studying the 50 trillion cell society beneath our skin, the body provides full-employment and universal health care to every participating cell. Truly there is no cell left behind. However, more “currency” in the form of ATP flows first to those cells providing the greatest benefit for the whole organism.

In our shrinking world that could use a good shrink, that organism can be seen as “humanity” or even Earth. In fact, if JFK were alive today he’d probably be saying, “Ask not what your planet can do for you, but what you can do for your planet.”

The new Declaration of Interdependence acknowledges there is a body politic, “we the people,” a collective entity representing each of us and all of us, where every equally-created individual counts as one. The notion of interdependence has nothing to do with co-dependence, by the way. Interdependence requires responsibility and participation. We must become grown-ups in the matter, not “freedom-loaders” who take without giving back. Evolutionary interdependence also requires that we be willing to move off of positions and be open to finding surprising solutions together.

So ... Where do we go? What do we do? We have one very obvious choice. We can return to our founding Document, the spiritual law of the land, which says that even when tyranny reigns, the people rule, even if it means overruling the rulers.

Read the Declaration of Independence, please. Read it aloud. Call your brother-in-law in Toledo, and read it to him. Bring it to church on Sunday. Pass out copies at the mall. It will be a great reality check when “security” escorts you off the property for passing out copies of our nation’s Sacred Text. And if they don’t, all the better!

Don’t wait for the police state to read you your rights. Go read them for yourself first. And then ask yourself if they’re worth anything. It might be easier to just go home and watch TV and have a pizza delivered. Or perhaps, like me, you’re a “fool” for America. One of those crazy people who actually pledged allegiance and meant it. Even as a non-religious kid, I was willing to have “under God” in there as long as they guarantee liberty and justice for all.

No matter what the results of the upcoming election, the so-called “leadership” of either party cannot take us through the difficult passage that lies ahead -- shifting from a consumer-based, money-based system to an earth-based love-based one. Most of these people are so entrenched in the dominator-victim paradigm that they find it hard to imagine anything else. So we must help them by becoming the leaders we have been waiting for. And we must build that leadership on our founding document, and reaffirm the Declaration of Independence as the Supreme Law of the Land.



Ten Days That Can Change the World
Keeping in mind the Supreme Law of the Land, what do we do between now and the election on November 7th? With even the mainstream press lamenting the possibility of miscounted votes and votes that don’t count, and with the possibility of a pre-election military strike on Iran still on the radar, how do we spend the next ten days?

I reiterate what Mark Crispin Miller said just a few weeks ago. The best way to counteract vote fixing is to show up in record numbers and overwhelmingly give this regime a vote of no confidence. Although there was evidence that votes were fixed in Pennsylvania in 2004 (based on discrepancies between exit polls and vote tallies) John Kerry still won the state -- because the margin was too large to overcome by fakery.

For those who rightfully believe that for the most part Democrats have done nothing to deserve to win other than not being Republicans, consider your vote as a strategic move to restore the rule of the people in America. You aren’t voting for Democrats, you’re voting for democracy. Context is everything. If you cast a vote for a “lesser of two weasels” Democrat, keep in mind that depriving the current regime of a majority in Congress is an important step in restoring the balance of powers. Instead of hoping for some sudden crash, why not shift the momentum now so we can begin the process of re-constituting the Constitution before the next presidential election?

Here’s what I’m doing, and I encourage you to do the same. MoveOn.org has made it easy to sponsor and attend house parties where you call voters in key districts and ask that they take a stand for restoring the rule of law in America. You don’t even have to be a Democrat to do it. As you call, keep in mind your primary intention: Restoring the Supreme Law of the Land and creating government of, by and for the people where the government does the people’s bidding, not the bidding of the highest bidder, and where some day in the not-too-distant future we can head to the polls and vote for ... the greater of two goods.

Something else to keep in mind is the dark but distinct possibility that there will be a preemptive strike on Iran before election day. While some think that even this Administration is incapable of something like that -- particularly in the light of opposition by many military leaders -- the best use of prophecy is prevention. So we should be forewarned about this possibility.

I have contacted several organizations including MoveOn, the Peace Alliance and several progressive religious groups to suggest two things: On the political front, publicity and support of Rep. Peter DeFazio's resolution to not launch a war without Congress’s consent. On the spiritual level, I have suggested a “preemptive peace strike” where the clergy people of America declare a day of prayer for peace and physically call on the Administration not to attack Iran. Why not? Because before we face the dangers from abroad, we must create spiritual unity and moral authority by facing our own toxic shadow -- that our presence in the Middle East is not so much about keeping the peace as it is about keeping the pieces.

I’m not joking when I suggest that with their Declaration, our Founding Fathers “made a pact with the angels.” In a country paradoxically founded on the backs of slaves and dead Native Americans, there has nonetheless been a consistent march toward greater freedom, greater access, greater justice and greater good for all. God has indeed, as the song goes, “shed His grace on thee.” But as you may have noticed, when it comes to grace we are currently running on fumes. The best way to coax grace back onto our shores is by facing our shadow, speaking our truth, and growing the field of loving functionality through our words, thoughts and deeds.

Will we win? Well, as Willie Mays once said, that’s what we’re playing the game to find out.

May the FARCE be with you,

Steve Bhaerman
(707) 525-0711

https://www.wakeuplaughing.com/

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