The Never-ending Bad Dream

Do you get, as I do the unsettling sensation that leadership is absent from the gates of the nation? Is it just me that has not mumbling Joe frequently implied that his handlers set the guidelines and determine when and where he’s allowed to take questions from the press? This being so, who is pulling the strings behind the curtains? And who is telling the president which reporters to call on at press conferences? I have heard it said that White House staffs oftentimes suffer the delusion that the voters elected them. It is the way of arrogance, and there is hardly a greater citadel of pomposity than the White House. Every time presidents forget this; they vacate their seat in the gates and give it to the bureaucracy, better stated, the powers to be.

It is said “A wise leader will give due consideration to the advice of his or her staff.” Conversely, a foolish leader loses functional leadership when he or she becomes a sycophant of aides, assistants, counselors, cabinet officers... and all the other beasts who inhabit the zoo of big agencies, 1600 Pennsylvania Ave being the biggest animal house of all.

Sadly, the Biden White House internees’ look as if they have seized the gates of leadership, and the president has become the minion or sycophant rather than America’s Chief Executive par excellence. If this be the case, and I believe this to be true, there is chaos in the gates. Biblical history shows that whatever happens in the gates of leadership, for good and ill, determines what happens in the city, and what happens in the city dictates what happens in the nation. History has taught us that a Darwinian strain constantly runs through places of great power like the White House, in which the survival of the fittest becomes a grappling match, or a elbowing contest to see who can snuggle up closest to the president in the gates. On top of all the other crises America faces, now comes this threatening issue about who controls the president. Who really sits in the gates of the nation at this precarious moment?

Historically cities, in antiquity, were to be sanctuaries of order. They were walled off from the chaos outside. Enormous gates maintained the order of the city. But everything depended on who occupied the gates, and what they were willing, or could be enticed, bribed, beguiled, cajoled... to allow in. According to Isaiah 14, Lucifer’s aim is to “overthrow cities” to achieve his goal of bringing chaos to the world. That assault works its way incrementally through institutions crucial for the order of society; families, churches, schools, businesses, civil governments... all the way to the steps of White House itself. 

Joe Biden, as any president, must seek good counsel, but because of his issues with aging whether merely perceived or actual, he does need wise advisors, and he needs to be able to discern the hubristic from the truly humble public servants. Thus far he has surrounded himself with a group of unperceptive shlubs. America needs prayers. It also needs a leader to MAGA, and one who will surround himself or herself with a group of wise counselors that puts America First.