Words that they can't say, due to fear of being seen as disloyal, and Article 88 (for at least some of them), and frequently lack of prior opportunity to reflect on the full scope of their duties as members of the leadership. Sometimes they've been so coopted that they don't know, or in extreme instances have lost the ability, to think about them. But none of those limitations apply to me any longer, so:
Those "duties as members of the leadership" point to another part of the owner's manual, a part that reminds the leadership — all of whom have taken that oath and continue to be bound by it; an oath almost unique in world governments, proclaiming as it does ultimate loyalty to a linguistically-bound abstraction rather than an anthropomorphized one — that they are all social justice warriors by definition. They have sworn to
…support and defend the Constitution of the United States against all enemies, foreign and domestic; that I will bear true faith and allegiance to the same; that I take this obligation freely, without any mental reservation or purpose of evasion; and that I will well and faithfully discharge the duties of the office on which I am about to enter… (5 U.S.C. § 3331)
when that Constitution includes these:
…no religious Test shall ever be required as a Qualification to any Office or public Trust under the United States. (U.S. Const. Art. VI cl. 3)1
No State shall… deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws. (U.S. Const. Amd. XIV § 1)
It doesn't get much more directive to be a social justice warrior than demanding that all holding "positions of trust" support and defend the equal protection of the laws for everyone. Even people they don't particularly like.
It's not 1948 any more.2 Even if a substantial proportion of the incoming government would rather it were 1785, the true high point of "states' rights." Neither is it the Republic of Korea, a nation that has been under a military dictatorship in my lifetime (hell, during my adult lifetime) and really would rather not go back. It's not just the military, either: The oath applies to every federal, every state officer.3
So go out and do your jobs, to the best of your ability, supporting and defending the Constitution of the United States against all enemies, foreign and domestic. The hard part is determining who is the enemy at any one moment; blaming someone's parents for having the wrong skin color, wrong religion, wrong nation of origin, wrong social class, wrong whatever, is always suspicious, however. After all, on September 16, 1789, there was not one natural-born citizen of the United States; the once-and-future President is only a second-generation natural-born citizen of the United States; a not-so-long-ago Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff was an immigrant — from Warsaw by way of Peoria.
- Those of you who persist in religious nationalism, or in perpetuating the mythic propaganda that the US was formed as a christian nation, should consider this carefully. And if still not convinced, I suggest a careful reading of Matthew 5, Numbers 30, and Ecclesiastes 8 — among others. The only reason the Devil can cite scripture for his own purposes is that someone wrote down scripture intending it to be cited…
- Cf. Executive Order 9981 (26 Jul 1948) (Truman's order desegregating the military, applying only to "race, color, religion, or national origin"; all else came later, or remains yet to come).
- "The Senators and Representatives before mentioned, and the Members of the several State Legislatures, and all executive and judicial Officers, both of the United States and of the several States, shall be bound by Oath or Affirmation, to support this Constitution… U.S. Const. Art. VI § 3 (emphasis added).