Category: The Prophet’s Grotto

The Pretti Good Immigration Decency Act

The Pretti Good Immigration Decency Act: Reimagining immigration with humanity, justice, and mercy for a better future.

The Pretti Good Immigration Decency Act asks only this: that a nation powerful enough to enforce the law be human enough to honor it.

The Pretti Good Immigration Decency Act

The Backstory

Two peaceful Minnesota protesters of ICE tactics are shot dead by ICE: Renee Good and Alex Pretti. A nation reels under the grief as their expression of First Amendment was met with a fatal response by the hand of government. There would not be enough space to contain the emotions and arguments of this national loss. Rather, today we will plant something beautiful that would capture their spirit and provide a path forward by creating a humane and decent Immigration process.

Grief Upon Grief

Then with the death of Pretti and Good came the revelation of children taken by ICE and used as bait to capture the parents. While ICE and its associated agencies denied this, their objections were drowned out by the wails of children and adults in detention. The wails, rather than hyperbole, came from direct testimony of U.S. Citizens detained then released after being wrongly snatched and held in ICE facilities due to their skin color or accent. These citizens observed that inhumane treatment began before the arrest, with physical assaults and handcuffs biting the wrists. ICE guards turned stone deaf to phone, water, and bathroom requests for hours as inmates languished in crowded cells, and when a toilet became available the degradation of voiding in public view added insult to human misery.

Then like a dark score for a B-rated horror flick, behind the incessant howls of misery the citizens reported hearing the guards laughing and joking as they became blind to the very misery they created. Down the chain of command came orders to treat fellow humans no better than a heap of discarded fast food bags and scraps. And, most chilling were the cries of children which floated through the dark air registers of these centers, like kittens drowning in a ditch, with grief too young to know they may never see their parents again.

The Death of Goodwill

The Public Perceived ICE Used Children, like Liam Conejo Ramos pictured here, as bait to capture Parents. While ICE denies this, their habitual lies record has dissolved public trust. Beyond eroding trust, these tactics devastated the goodwill of the U.S. government and replaced with with the visceral wrath of a mother stripped of her newborn infant — a catastrophic miscalculation.

This One Corporate Expression Separates Us From Pre-War NAZI Germany

The Pretti Good Immigration Decency Roadmap

Rather than leave the reader with, “Isn’t this awful;” The remainder of this blog will discuss the re-creation of the U.S. Immigration system. This is not a finished law, but a field of decency. A place where truth, justice, and mercy can grow, and where leaders are invited to add more, not less. The Pretti Good Immigration Decency Act asks only this: that a nation powerful enough to enforce the law be human enough to honor it. Here, decency is the currency, mercy has standing, and justice is allowed to take root.

This is not a finished law, but a field of decency. A place where truth, justice, and mercy can grow, and where leaders are invited to add more, not less. The Pretti Good Immigration Decency Act asks only this: that a nation powerful enough to enforce the law be human enough to honor it. Here, decency is the currency, mercy has standing, and justice is allowed to take root. — JPB

1. A Sliding Equity Model: Rooted in time, contribution, and belonging

Core Principle

Time lived in community creates equity.
Not abstract worth. Lived equity. Built through work, care, taxes, schools, churches, neighborhoods, and showing up.

This roadmap does not erase the law.
It teaches the law to recognize human investment.

2. The Sliding Equity Scale

Tier I: New Roots

0–2 years in the U.S.

Recognition

  • Presence acknowledged without criminalization
  • Protection from arbitrary detention and transfer

Guarantees

  • Attorney representation
  • Medical care
  • Open communication with family and counsel
  • No torture, no private prison warehousing with certified humane conditions

Pathways

  • Work authorization
  • Tax ID access
  • Community orientation and legal literacy

The goal here is stability, not punishment. No one builds well while falling.

Tier II: Growing Roots

2–5 years

Recognition

  • Documented contribution begins to count
  • Community presence matters

Qualifying Contributions

  • Tax filings
  • Employment or caregiving
  • School enrollment of children
  • Faith, nonprofit, or volunteer engagement

Protections

  • No interstate rendition
  • Nonpunitive supervision instead of detention
  • Local citizen and clergy review boards for enforcement actions

The law begins to say: we see you here.

Tier III: Deep Roots

5–10 years

Recognition

  • Presumption of community membership
  • Removal requires heightened justification

Qualifying Contributions

  • Consistent tax history
  • Stable employment or business activity
  • Social network verification (employers, neighbors, clergy, educators)

Benefits

  • Expedited legal status
  • Work mobility
  • Family unity protections
  • Immigration court deference to time served in community

At this stage, removal is no longer neutral. It is a civic harm.

Tier IV: Anchored Roots

10+ years

Recognition

  • Equity threshold reached
  • Deportation treated as extraordinary measure

Presumptions

  • Right to remain
  • Right to adjust status
  • Right to due process equal in gravity to criminal proceedings

Pathways

  • Permanent residency
  • Citizenship eligibility
  • Full labor and civic protections

At this point, the question shifts from Why should you stay?
to How could we justify tearing this apart?

Guardrails of Decency (Apply at All Tiers)

  • Honored immigration courts
  • Independent citizen and clergy review boards
  • No private prison profit incentives
  • Certified humane treatment from arrest, detention, and removal
  • Nonpunitive alternatives to detention
  • Medical and mental health care
  • Open communication with family
  • Absolute ban on torture and coercion
  • Truth, justice, mercy as governing standards

What This Roadmap Does Quietly but Powerfully

  • Rewards contribution without demanding perfection
  • Replaces fear with predictability
  • Aligns law enforcement with community stability
  • Turns time and care into recognized civic assets
  • Makes cruelty inefficient and decency administrable

This is not open borders.
It is open accounting of human investment.

Drinking the Chalice of Legislative Hemlock

Legal. Orderly. Deadly.

The reader may think this blog is a nice or a Pollyanna dream that only affects murderers and rapists who crept into the U.S. The truth, as stated above, affects not only noncriminal immigrants but U.S. citizens. The video and revision of the ICE funding bill below show the present Administration’s attempt to maintain a chokehold on deporting citizens. While “If we deport a citizen, they can contest it in court” sounds reasonable, has anyone priced attorney retention and timeline while you have been renditioned to a domestic or foreign torture prison? Presently we see citizens unlawfully detained as a tactic of political hazing. So this article is not a dream, rather a wake up call for a sleeping nation. And once this present administration is removed, we will spend decades sweeping the roots their legislative hemlock from our political house.

Legislative Hemlock

Presently we see citizens unlawfully detained as a tactic of political hazing. So this article is not a dream, rather a wake up call for a sleeping nation. And once this present administration is removed, we will spend decades sweeping the roots their legislative hemlock from our political house.

JPB

The Andy Griffith Show: The Last Day Otis Locked Himself Up

When the beloved Andy Griffith Show went from black-and-white to color, Andy Griffith asked that Otis, the town drunk who locked himself in Andy’s cell, be recast from drunk to sober because he felt that being drunk was not a life sentence. So, after locking himself in jail that last time, Otis left behind his drunk self and became the town ice cream man. In real life, Otis did not drink.

Likewise, being an immigrant need not be a life sentence where the stranger in our midst must drag himself before the court of degradation and be stripped of what dignity may still remain. Like Otis, the immigrant can be transformed in living color, bringing joy and stability to our towns in the family of America.

 The Pretti Good Immigration Decency Act: A citizen and clergy review board, respect for community, honor of Immigration courts, attorney representation, no interstate rendition, sliding scale of justice for years in U.S., private prison reform, nonpunitive incarceration, no torture, open communication for detainees, medical care, truth, justice mercy.

In Living Color,

JPB

"I was a stranger and you welcomed me" (Matthew 25:35).

up next respect: in a land of daddy warbucks be a rosa parks

The American Ownership Amendment

Empower employees! Discover the ‘American Ownership Amendment’ to end oligarch rule & build a future of shared prosperity.

“Employees to Take Control: ‘American Ownership Amendment’ Could End Oligarch Rule!”

Wealth hoarded, power concentrated – soon to be a thing of the past.

Congress, get ready. Coming to a Congressional Hall Near You

“An American worker will no longer serve as today’s pocket change of the privileged, but as partners in a tomorrow.” – JPB

Spark of Innovation

This concept ignited while watching U.S. billionaires, in plain daylight, hurl millions of dollars at lobbyists to feather their interests, as the American worker, sleeping in a Corolla behind a Walmart, is told to make do with a $3 chicken breast and a single stalk of broccoli.

A second spark came from an unlikely place. Gregor Mendel, an Austrian monk known as the father of genetics, transformed science in the 1850s by patiently studying pea plants. Through disciplined selection, he revealed how new traits emerge, not by chaos, but by design.

Applying Mendel’s insight to economics, the attached patent-ready concept cultivates a new breed of American enterprise: a publicly traded corporation that is majority employee-owned, while fully preserving the entrepreneur’s role, incentives, and capacity for innovation.

What follows is both a mathematical proof and a practical model.

This economic pea plant is designed to feed America’s future in an AI-emergent world.

— James P. Butler
Pastor, Theologian, & Inventor 🌱

T=Mi²

Title: Mass Economic Multiplier via Employee Ownership (T = Wi²)

Abstract:

A system and method to optimize national economic growth and innovation by granting employees ownership stakes in the enterprises they help build. The invention establishes a mathematical framework for predicting and amplifying economic impact via inflation-matched employee investment, defined as T = Wi², where T represents the mass economic multiplier, W represents worker earnings, and i² represents inflation-matched investment squared. By applying this model, enterprises achieve sustainable productivity, equitable wealth distribution, and enhanced AI-driven operational efficiency.

Employees to Take Control: ‘American Ownership Amendment’ Could End Oligarch Rule!

Wealth hoarded, power concentrated – soon to be a thing of the past.
Congress, get ready.

An American worker will no longer serve as today’s pocket change of the privileged, but as partners in a tomorrow.

T=Mi²
Math Proof: Mass Economic Multiplier via Employee

JPB

Claims:

A method of granting proportional equity to employees based on tenure and earnings, linked to a national inflation index.

A system that calculates the mass economic multiplier (T) using T = Wi² for individual firms, aggregates for regional/national impact, and forecasts GDP and innovation growth.

A predictive algorithm integrating worker ownership, investment scaling, and AI optimization for decision-making in corporate governance.

A model ensuring entrepreneurship is preserved while preventing economic capture by external lobbying interests.

Description of Drawings:

The infographic visualizes the framework: heroic employees at the foreground, T = Wi² formula centrally displayed, and GDP, innovation, wealth, and inequality outcomes projected as measurable effects.

Novelty & Advantages:

Transforms traditional corporate governance into a worker-centered model.

Creates AI-ready economic data loops for optimization of enterprise value and societal benefit.

Demonstrates a scalable, measurable multiplier effect for national economic planning.

James Butler, Pastor, Theologian, Inventor

appendix drawings

Planting the Pea of an Emergent Future

From the careful pairing of capital and work, a new economic trait appears: the entrepreneur-employee.

-James P Butler, Pastor, Theologian, & Inventor

Year 2225: The Legacy

Future Texas remembers truth! Unity Alliance honors democracy at Dallas stadium. Explore descendants’ legacy. What is your legacy?

Our Descendants Memorialize the Truth

Unity Alliance Stadium’s Democracy Hologram Night, Dallas, Texas, 2225

In the slums of the megacity stretching from Dallas through Fort Worth to Plano sits the Trump Memorial Landfill, where vicious ICE, AI-enhanced guard dogs protect recyclables from human pilfering. Nearby, humanoid AI units recharge alongside the landfill’s few remaining human workers at the “Java & Jolt Café.”

Tonight, The Unity Alliance hosts “Democracy Hologram Night,” honoring those who freed America from abusive leaders who sold immigrants for profit, invaded nations for oil, and ordered the shooting of U.S. citizens armed only with whistles.

Tonight as well, The Covenant of Shared Sovereignty gathers to celebrate its founding belief: a cooperative order linking nations, citizens, and AI as equal partners, grounded in reciprocal obligation rather than coercive power, where none is permitted to dominate the other.

To Be Continued …

What is Your Legacy?

JPB

Up Next The Fog of War … Between the Ears

The Fog of War … Between the Ears

Kent State: The 1970 shootings and a Pulitzer Prize-winning photo serve as a tragic reminder of division and the need for truth and healing.

A Collage of Trump’s Military & Police Strategy In The Shadow of ICE’s Shooting of Renee Nicole Good in Minneapolis.

A MAGAcution is an execution of a U.S. citizen followed by lies to justify the murder.

JPB

A Tragic Reflection of Kent State Shooting

Kent State Shooting II?

WHAT IS THE STORY BEHIND THE PULITZER PRIZE-WINNING PHOTO OF THE YOUNG WOMAN CRYING OUT IN HORROR OVER THE DYING BODY OF ONE OF THE STUDENTS? (From Kent.Edu)

A photograph of Mary Vecchio, a 14-year-old runaway, screaming over the body of Jeffery Miller appeared on the front pages of newspapers and magazines throughout the country, and the photographer, John Filo, was to win a Pulitzer Prize for the picture. The photo has taken on a life and importance of its own. This analysis looks at the photo, the photographer, and the impact of the photo.

The Mary Vecchio picture shows her on one knee screaming over Jeffrey Miller’s body. Mary told one of us that she was calling for help because she felt she could do nothing (Personal Interview, 4/4/94). Miller is lying on the tarmac of the Prentice Hall parking lot. One student is standing near the Miller body closer than Vecchio. Four students are seen in the immediate background.

John Filo, a Kent State photography major in 1970, continues to work as a professional newspaper photographer and editor. He was near the Prentice Hall parking lot when the Guard fired. He saw bullets hitting the ground, but he did not take cover because he thought the bullets were blanks. Of course, blanks cannot hit the ground.

The May 4 shootings at Kent State need to be remembered for several reasons. First, the shootings have come to symbolize a great American tragedy which occurred at the height of the Vietnam War era, a period in which the nation found itself deeply divided both politically and culturally. The poignant picture of Mary Vecchio kneeling in agony over Jeffrey Miller’s body, for example, will remain forever 

Students gather in a circle, holding hands around a May 4th memorial to remember the victims of the Guard shootings.

as a reminder of the day when the Vietnam War came home to America. If the Kent State shootings will continue to be such a powerful symbol, then it is certainly important that Americans have a realistic view of the facts associated with this event. Second, May 4 at Kent State and the Vietnam War era remain controversial even today, and the need for healing continues to exist. Healing will not occur if events are either forgotten or distorted, and hence it is important to continue to search for the truth behind the events of May 4 at Kent State. Third, and most importantly, May 4 at Kent State should be remembered in order that we can learn from the mistakes of the past. The Guardsmen in their signed statement at the end of the civil trials recognized that better ways have to be found to deal with these types of confrontations. This has probably already occurred in numerous situations where law enforcement officials have issued a caution to their troops to be careful because “we don’t want another Kent State.” Insofar as this has happened, lessons have been learned, and the deaths of four young Kent State students have not been in vain.

First they burn "The Handmaid's Tale" — then you live "The Handmaid's Tale." -JPB

Coming to a City Near You …

JPB

Up Next RESPECT: In a Land of Daddy Warbucks, Be a Rosa Parks!

The Deal of Misfortune

The Wheel of Misfortune

What do you get when you cross a game show host with a politician? Easy! “The Deal of Misfortune.”

JPB

The Sacrifice of Stability for the Spin of Greed

"Without our traditions our lives would be as shaky as a ... fiddler on the roof!" - Tevye in Fiddler on the Roof

Harry S. Truman declared no interest in pursuing the visionary path of his quick fix, budget busting Fair Deal predecessor, Franklin D. Roosevelt. His path was that of a dry goods store owner proud of honesty to customers while committed to run his business as a Missouri tightwad, balancing the checkbook weekly.

“I want to keep my feet on the ground. I don’t want any experiments; the American people have been through a lot of experiments and they want a rest from experiments.”

Attributed to Harry Truman. Cited from Please Understand Me II by David Keirsey (p. 82)

Guardians of the U.S. Galaxy

In the Keirsey Temperament Inventory, the SJs, shown below at the top of the four personality types, make up the Guardian temperament. The SJs types are characterized by their focus on concrete reality and their cooperative nature, emphasizing duty, responsibility, and social structure. 

SJs “The Pillars: Ensuring things run smoothly.” Analysis of David Keirsey’s “Please Understand Me” Temperaments

The SJs, as creatures of habit, reverence the past. They relish the familiarity of daily routine, like the feel of a well-worn cashmere sweater and Hush Puppy shoes. The comfort of the known, traveled daily path reassures the SJ that life is working out and that they have a place in life: to maintain it.

The SJ already knows her coffee in the pink, stainless to-go mug will take two packets of Stevia in the Raw, a dash of cinnamon, and a splash of lactose-free Irish Mint creamer. Her fulfillment rests in the assurance that her children and family have all they need for the day and that she played her part in it. Among the “passion fruits” of politicians stand the “simply vanilla” SJs who keep our schools teaching, our post offices delivering, and our healthcare systems healing.

When I met C.W. Brister, Professor of Christian Ministry at SWBTS seminary, he seemed a slow-speaking, milquetoast type of individual.

“I’m just vanilla… but everyone knows that vanilla is the world’s favorite flavor,” he said, introducing himself to the class.

When I tried to sit off to the side of Dr. Brister in the chairs at the front, he asked me to move where he could maintain eye contact. As the weeks passed, he unfolded the secrets of equipping a pastor for daily ministry. There was no hype and no exaggeration; rather, he gave us the theological cure to take to the spiritually sick in our future churches.

Then, one day as I approached the chapel, I overheard a voice on the speakers that sounded like one sending fire down from the mount. It was a fiery voice beckoning the seminarians to pursue the radical trail of their calling. As I opened the door and peeked in, to my surprise, the firebrand glowing in the pulpit was “Mr. Vanilla!”

And it is the SJ who will take seriously the tracing and the updating of the family tree, keeping track of births and deaths, weddings and baptisms, knowing that all such family observances become more important with each passing years. – David Keirsey, Please Understand Me II (p.92)

The Deal of Misfortune

Fictional Story Inspired by Actual Events

Guardian of The Mundane

Sam was a man of ritual, a guardian of the mundane. Every morning for fifteen years, he armored himself for his Federal job in the same uniform: a white, long-sleeved Oxford shirt—extra starch, collars pinned sharp—and a tie of crimson and cobalt blue. His closet was a gallery of precision: ten shirts, ten ties, four pairs of black shoes (gloss shine), and four black belts (no signs of wear), and one black Casio Illuminator watch, with a multi-timer function, and one Waterman cobalt blue marble fountain pen. He dined at 6:00 PM sharp, the flickering glow of the World News and the rustle of the Journal the only companions to his clockwork life.

12:45

Sam’s gift was his devotion to sameness. He understood a truth the politicians ignored: that the soul of the nation rested on the quiet expectation that tomorrow would look exactly like today. He was the guardian of the familiar—the treaties, the food chains, the steady heartbeat of a Midwest factory floor. At 12:45 PM. daily his mother texted him, and on weekends she called him as that was the only time he would pickup. At times she wished he would call her to say, “How are you?” and “I just called to say I love you.” But she knew her son, not as the one they first called “nonverbal” and later labeled “savant,” but simply as “Samuel.” She didn’t know what Sam did for his job but knew it was important, considering multiple the government bronze and gold service coins awarded him and cased in proud display in the living room entryway of his condo.

The Needle

As a national security analyst, Sam hunted the “needle.” He was the only man with the glacial patience to spend fifty hours a week staring into the haystack, waiting for the single glimmer of steel that could unravel the fabric of American security.

The U.S. rewarded his vigilance with a promotion to Senior Analyst. For thirty days, Sam inhabited the role like a well-worn glove. The weight of the international scope didn’t daunt him; it fueled him. Everything was in its right place. Until the silence was shattered.

A Ph.D. in Five Bullet Points

When the DOGE inspectors marched into his office, they didn’t see a guardian; they saw a line item. They interrupted him as he was descending into the digital depths of a morphing global hotspot—a flickering shadow moving through a porous foreign airport. They demanded a summary. They wanted the complexity of a Ph.D.-level security web reduced to five bullet points by the following evening.

A man of order, Sam complied. He bled his analysis into five bullet points, though he could not help but attach twenty-five pages of exhaustive endnotes to ensure the truth remained intact. He clicked “send,” expecting to return to the hunt. Instead, he received a digital guillotine.

Waste, Fraud, and Abuse … and other lies

“In an attempt to eliminate waste, fraud, and abuse, your position is terminated immediately.”

The words blurred. Why? When? How? The man who lived by the detail was suddenly cast into a void where no details existed. There were no instructions on how to leave, no process for the end of a life’s work.

Sam packed his cardboard box with the same artifacts he had carried in as a hopeful graduate fifteen years prior. His chest tightened; sweat slicked his brow as the world tilted. In a final, trembling act of surrender, Sam reached up and undid the crimson and cobalt tie. He folded it with agonizing care atop his belongings. For the first time in fifteen years, he unbuttoned his collar and let the cold air of the hallway hit his throat. He walked out of his second home with tears carving paths through the starch-dust on his face.

Falling Skies

Six months later, the sky fell.

A radical cell, armed with stolen Hellfire missiles, turned one of the world’s busiest civilian hubs into a graveyard. The politicians stood before cameras, beating their chests in hollow grief, blinded by the very “efficiency” they had championed. They never saw the shadow. They had fired the only man who was watching it.

To this day, the administration remains blissfully ignorant of the ghost in the cubicle. They never knew that the wall between the American people and the fire was a man in a starched white shirt who valued sameness—and that they were the ones who broke it.

I’m just vanilla … But everyone knows that vanilla is the world’s favorite flavor. – C.W. Brister, Professor of Christian Ministry, SWBTS

For The Simply Vanilla,

JPB

up next Time person of the year 2025: The unknown attorney

Just War Theory: When U.S. Interventions Become Piracy in the Caribbean and Beyond

Is it a Just War or ‘just a war’? From diplomacy to the ‘Easy in, Hard out’ reality, explore the ethics and true cost of conflict.

The Pirate of the Caribbean

The “Pirate of the Caribbean”! What’s the difference between Donald Trump and a pirate? Easy one! One walks the plank; the other talks it.

JPB

From Lawfire

A just war is an act of last resort. Prior to engaging in violence, a nation must make every effort to attain its intended goals by other means. This might include diplomacy, economic or legal actions, and so forth. This is a crucial tenet of just war theory: war results from the failure of all other options. It is not one option among many. As an extension of this idea, the government should seek to end the conflict as quickly as is reasonably possible.

–From What is the Just War Theory?

“Just War” versus “Just a War”

As a boy, my brother, Gary, Mom and Dad gathered around the kitchen table to listen to a cassette audio tape from our cousin Neal, a soldier in Vietnam. What happened to the ten-speed bicycle riding cousin who was now a voice telling about walking through rice paddies in Vietnam? How did he get there? When will he come home? As a boy, I didn’t understand the toll paid by our soldiers so far away, which would scar a generation. Hopefully, lessons learned behind those distant recorded words will spare us from the conflicts that will haunt the next generation of young soldiers.

U.S. Vietnam Soldiers Sent Audio Cassette Letters Home

“A Little Conflict Never Killed Nobody”

Politicians love the word conflict. Unlike war, it requires no approval of Congress with all the military-industrial benefits of a real war. Unfortunately, conflicts that begin as self-righteous crusades result in self-inflicted casualties. The Vietnam “conflict” exacted an enormous cost: estimates of Vietnamese soldiers and civilians killed range from 970,000 to 3 million. Some 275,000–310,000 Cambodians, 20,000–62,000 Laotians, and 58,220 US service members died.

Conflict: Easy to get in. Hard to get out.

In my MBA program one professor taught us how to evaluate a course of action:

  1. Do I want to do this?
  2. Can I do this?
  3. Easy to get in. Hard to get out.

How many of us have volunteered for a job for a “few months,” only to find we are still on the committee years later? That’s “Easy in. Hard out.” Nations of unjust wars must guard against being trapped in the battered-spouse repeated cycle of generational militarized violence. War, and the whitewashed conflicts—aka war-lite—are more addictive and costly to the U.S. than any drug ever created by cartels.

The U.S. military justified blowing up small boats in the Caribbean and killing survivors clinging to burning flotsam by stating the boats were transporting cocaine to the U.S. The reality is these boats were likely not headed toward the U.S., rather another country, with proof of cargo and crime lacking. How is administering a death sentence for a possible crime a “just war”? If this practice is not a “just war,” what is it?

What's the difference between a cocaine dealer and a Wall Street banker? Easy one! One makes cocaine for a dollar. The other takes cocaine with a dollar.

That’s “Easy in. Hard out.” Nations of unjust wars must guard against being trapped in the battered-spouse repeated cycle of generational militarized violence. War, and the whitewashed conflicts—aka war-lite—are more addictive and costly to the U.S. than any drug ever created by cartels.

JPB
Men of the 9th U.S. Marine Expeditionary force scramble out of a landing barge on to the peach at Da Nang in South Viet Nam, March 8, 1965. They were ordered to the area to bolster defenses around air base at Da Nang against possible Viet Cong attacks. (AP Photo)

Hubris shouts, “We answer to no one. We worship the battlefield god of our own destiny.” Reality raises a desperate hand for a tossed life preserver from allies whom we have forsaken as we launched a misguided course toward the dark shoals of our own destruction.

JPB

A Last Resort

58,276 Names of U.S. Casualties on Vietnam Memorial

“Only if all peaceful methods fail” is the first requirement of “Just War.” This guards against the “It’s just a war” groupthink that that politicians use to drop us in the next foxhole of unending conflict. Hubris says, “We won’t have any casualties. We’ll get in and get out to show those commies who’s the boss!” Reality ships home the trauma of our own unexpected casualties of those who laid down their lives for reasons unknown to the soldier and citizen alike. Hubris shouts, “We answer to no one. We worship the battlefield god of our own destiny.” Reality raises a desperate hand for a tossed life preserver from allies whom we have forsaken as we launched a misguided course toward the dark shoals of our own destruction.

Turn from evil and do good;
    seek peace and pursue it. - Psalm 34:14

Peace is Our Mission,

JPB

Postscript

The king who demands absolute loyalty without question knows his troops won’t trade lives for lies.

JPB

Up Next five bullet points … of a last week

The Golden Cage

No ‘Golden Age,’ just a ‘Golden Cage.’ See how corrupt power traps the poor and if living in cars is our stark reality. #GoldenCage

He never said, “Golden Age”!

“We are living in a Golden Cage.”

We live in a Golden Cage trapped behind bars forged by the corrupt and powerful.

JPB
"Whoever oppresses the poor shows contempt for their Maker,
    but whoever is kind to the needy honors God" - Proverbs 14:31.

Coming To a Town Near You …

Up Next Are We Better Off Living in Our Cars?

From ICE’s Shadow to Mary’s Song: Aretha Franklin’s Cry for Freedom and Hope

Aretha Franklin’s Mary Don’t You Weep: Coded messages of hope & resistance resonating with Black women’s historical grief and resilience.

Deaths in ICE custody raise serious questions, lawmakers say

As 2025 draws to a close, we remember those 24 who died this year in ICE custody and the unnamed immigrants disappeared into dark places into which the light of the Christ Child shines hope.

“A voice is heard in Ramah, weeping and great mourning, Rachel weeping for her children and refusing to be comforted, because they are no more” - Matthew 2:18.

"The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness has not overcome it" - Gospel of John 1:5.

Coded Message of Freedom

Aretha Franklin’s 1972 Amazing Grace recording at the New Temple Missionary Baptist Church became her biggest selling album. “Mary, Don’t you Weep” predates the Civil War as a “freedom song” that was sung by enslaved African Americans and contained coded messages of hope and emancipation. This Mary referenced the story of Mary and Martha of Bethany in the Gospel of John 11, when the sisters wept for their brother Lazarus, who has died, and said to Jesus that if he had been there, Lazarus would not have died. Jesus then miraculously raised Lazarus from the dead, demonstrating his divine authority over death. 

“Mary, Don’t You Weep” is a song that was initially sung by the enslaved—sung with coded messages of hope and resistance by our enslaved ancestors:

oh, Mary, don’t you weep, don’t you mourn…Pharaoh’s army got drown-ded…

However, when Ms. Franklin gets hold of it, she tells her own testimony while framing the grief and anguish of the sisters, Mary and Martha, over the death of their brother Lazarus (John 11:1-44):

One day while Jesus was away, that dear, that dear, that dear ole brother died, yeah yeah
But now Mary, went running to Jesus
She said Master, my, my, my, my, my, my, my, my, my, my SWEET Lord
Whoa, Lord if you hadda, if you hadda been here, my brother would not have died
Oh yes she did
Jesus said, come on and show me, show me where you buried him. Show me where you laid him down

I think a case can be made that Ms. Franklin, through her call and response, is also calling forth the experiences of unseen Black women who’ve also experienced loss. Black women who’ve had children sold away…husbands, sons, and daughters lynched…loved ones killed by the police…and, like Mary and Martha, wondered when, oh when, was Jesus going to show up for them.
Through her runs and moans, Ms. Franklin gave voice to the particular pain experienced by Black mothers, wives, sisters, and daughters—wailing for the theft of life of their children, husbands, aunts, uncles, lovers, fathers, sisters, and brothers. And this is a communal feature of womanism. As coined by Alice Walker, a womanist is one who:

Loves music. Loves Dance. Loves the moon. Loves the Spirit. Loves love and food and roundness. Loves struggle. Loves the Folk. Loves herself. Regardless.

Minister Kimberly Peeler-Ringer

God sent us the Martin Luther King, Jr.’s not only to deliver people of color from the chains of bigotry but to ready us for the day we meet our own oppressors.

JPB

Freedom Code,

JPB

Up next abuelo’s final sacrifice

Christ of the Somalis

From Christ’s birth, a message for all: no one is ‘garbage.’ A divine counter to hateful rhetoric against immigrants.

Then the angel said to them, “Do not be afraid, for behold, I bring you good tidings of great joy which will be to all people. For there is born to you this day in the city of David a Savior, who is Christ the Lord.  And this will be the sign to you: You will find a Babe wrapped in swaddling cloths, lying in a manger.”

And suddenly there was with the angel a multitude of the heavenly host praising God and saying:

“Glory to God in the highest,
And on earth peace, goodwill toward men!” – Gospel of Luke Chapter 2

Jesus came to establish a Kingdom by which no person would be called garbage, as Christ took the filth and hate of this world upon himself that we might be called children of God.

JPB

To All People,

JPB

Postscript

This post responds to US President Donald Trump’s statement who said he does not want Somali immigrants in the US, telling reporters they should “go back to where they came from” and “their country is no good for a reason”.

“I don’t want them in our country, I’ll be honest with you,” he said during a cabinet meeting on Tuesday. Trump said the US would “go the wrong way if we keep taking in garbage into our country”.

Up next if i had a hammer