These are awkward days for Attorney General William Barr. The impeachment vise is tightening on his boss, as whistleblowers from inside the Trump administration line up to say the president abused his office for personal gain.

Trump just betrayed our Kurdish allies, without a care for how they would be slaughtered, for motives that are unclear. His most barefaced act of profiteering yet was a plan to hold the next G-7 summit of world leaders at his personal club.

And amidst all this, Barr had to face a crowd of law students at Notre Dame, a Catholic university. What to do?

Like a televangelist under a federal fraud investigation, he changed the subject. To godliness, naturally.

It is “secularists,” Barr charged in a thundering speech, who are destroying America. “Militant secularists” are the source of all of our woes, like violence, drug abuse and mental illness, he declared, based on zero evidence of any actual correlation.

These people are out to destroy the “traditional moral order,” because they believe in the separation of church and state, as enshrined in our Constitution!

The one that, as our country’s chief law enforcement officer, he has sworn to uphold and defend. For this, the Attorney General is now assailing them.

As an example of such moral rot, Barr cited New Jersey – where a new law now requires public schools to be open about the fact that certain historical figures were gay. It’s nice when good work gets recognized.

Like America’s founders, New Jersey understands that keeping religion and bigotry out of our public schools is the best way to protect rights for everyone.

Most people in our state, and in America, are not evangelical Christians; they make up only 13 percent of our residents. And most people in America say they support laws protecting gay people against discrimination in stores, restaurants, theaters, housing, and other public places.

This includes public schools, where as many as 70 percent of LGBTQ students report being harassed over their sexual orientation. They deserve less bias and more historical accuracy in their classrooms.

Separation of church and state is also what protects the religious freedom of people like Barr. An evangelical Christian is welcome to homeschool his kids, or enroll them in private school, and worship according to his own beliefs.

What he is not allowed to do is apply his personal beliefs to public policy and elevate his own faith above that of everyone else – whether they be Jewish, Muslims, non-believers or simply a different variety of Christian.

Even the top law enforcement official in America will be stopped by the courts if he tries to do so, thanks to the First Amendment. And for that reason, Barr is now portraying himself as persecuted. Please.

What he is actually doing here is using his Christianity the same way that soulless Stephen Miller uses fear-mongering about immigrants: As political demagoguery.

Like columnist Paul Krugman says, it’s part of “the efforts of Trump’s henchmen to use the specter of secularism to distract people from their boss’s sins.”

When all else fails, fire up the base. That means evangelicals. Blessed are the meek, for they shall inherit the earth – like Trump, who once said of poor people: “How smart can they be? They’re morons.”

Barr is playing the God card, in defense of a casino owner with three wives who paid off a porn star. We have a few choice words for that, here in New Jersey.

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