We have a representative democracy.

We don't vote on most issues, except locally. Congress votes for us on most issues or it would require that we spend our lives reading legislation. Hundred of bills are passed every year, and most people have no concept of what is passed or fails to pass.

We vote for representatives and they vote.

We don't have a national religion.

Freedom of religion is the basic tenant of this land.

Christians come in all flavors, from fundamentalist to cafeteria.

We have Muslims, Jews, Gnostics, Buddhists, Hindus, and everything in between and those who don't feel they need a faith to guide their behavior. People of all faiths have fought in this country's conflicts, honorably.

Every one is entitled to their own religious beliefs or lack thereof.

THAT will not change as long as it is OUR America. When we declare a national religion, we are no longer the America that was founded by Jefferson, Adams and Washington.

My folks have been here since the early 1600s, and founded Rhode Island with Roger Williams. They were proponents of religious freedom, and fair dealings with the Indigenous peoples.

Tolerance is a high order concept.