I am a political Independent for one reason, both parties have surrendered to the political power of a direct and indirect oligarchy of wealth.  Over the last fifty years, in a me-first mania of belligerent victimhood, we have sunk from the historically unique dignity of citizens to the passive indignity of bloated consumers.  Both the belligerent victimhood and passive consumerism have been the tools used by the oligarchy to divide our Republic into a ruinous politics of anger and intolerance.  The Left prides itself in its psychobabble religion where the age-old vocabulary of moral, immoral, and amoral disappear in its ever-increasing 900-page Diagnostic and Statistic Manual of cures.  Everyone needs a therapist.  The Right prides itself in a crusader Christianity directly at odds with its Founder’s life and message.  Everyone needs a fundamentalist pastor.  No one can be (or is) asked to shoulder the duties our Founders practiced as essential to the unique challenges of freedom.  What were those duties?  Prudence, Justice, Fortitude, and Temperance were the ancient virtues of the first free peoples, Greek and Roman.  The Christians added Faith, Hope, and Love — wings to elevate and deepen the ancient virtues.  Lacking those virtues, we have become a self-contradictory beast, simultaneously licking and tearing at our self-inflicted and enfeebling wounds.   Who profits?  The question answers itself.

What follows is a brief biography to background the reasons I have for writing this letter.  Between the ages of 18 and 33, I was a soldier and blue-collar worker.  Before Vietnam, I was a roughneck, offshore in the Gulf of Mexico.  I voluntarily enlisted, spent a year in training, and then served as a combat squad leader in the First Infantry Division in a 2-year overseas tour of duty.  After Vietnam, I was successively an underground miner in Leadville, Colorado, a laborer and hod-carrier in Denver, and a union-trained journeyman bricklayer before and during a late undergraduate and law school education on the G.I. Bill.  I am 78-years-old.  I am an unashamed patriot of the ideals, visions, and hopes of our Founders.  I am writing this letter as a sacred duty to their sacrifices and wisdom.

What can be done now, today?  Any adult, rational person who understands the dignity and duties of freedom and wishes their children and grandchildren to have at least an opportunity to share in the unique and rare privilege of freedom can have only one choice: Kamala Harris.  That Donald Trump is an inveterate and delusional liar and vindictive demagogue wannabe cannot be challenged.  The evidence undeniably comes from his own mouth and actions.  That he triggered the attack on our government by insisting there was a national collusion of invalid ballots has been disproved by evidence beyond a reasonable doubt.  Despite the evidence, he continues to insist that the vote was rigged. That his patriotism is an insulting and shallow sham dressed up in a blue suit, white shirt, and red tie is proved by his admitted dodging of the draft during the Vietnam War and his later self-congratulation that he was not fool enough to go like the citizen-veterans of that war did.

Politicians are a unique breed, difficult to confidently assess.  Kamala Harris appears to have a tested and informed sense of duty.  Time will tell.  That said, she is not a better bet, but the only bet to initiate the changes necessary to our Republic’s future.

If you are a dedicated American, vote and encourage others to.  If Trump is elected, you’re only distinction will be what he promised to his “Christian” supporters.  He promised them that once reelected they would never need to vote again.