Over the past several years, Popes have had an annoying habit of imposing themselves on American politics. I think it would be a good idea for them to butt out.

Some years ago, a killer on Death Row in, I believe, Missouri, wrote a letter to a Pope who was coming to the U.S. The convicted murderer asked the Pope for clemency, and the Pope, in response, used his influence to cow the governor to change the sentence to life imprisonment.

At the time, I felt the Pope was off base, but at least his position conformed with the Church’s position vis a vis capital punishment. However, having said that, I felt the Pope had no business saddling the taxpayers of Missouri with having to provide food and board for what could easily be several decades. I suggested as a solution that the Pope take the guy back with him to the Vatican and have the Church jail him and pay for his upkeep.

More recently, we had Pope Francis insisting that those of us who favor having a wall built between us and Mexico were not Christians. Well, some of us in America actually aren’t Christians, but I like to think most of us at least share Judeo-Christian values.

Pope Francis said that instead of erecting walls, we should build bridges, which is the kind of high-sounding baloney politicians and religious leaders often feel called upon to spout. But Francis didn’t have anything to say about those who often scale walls or tunnel under them. He also didn’t have a harsh word to utter about the nation, Mexico, he was visiting. You would have thought he might question a democracy that year after year sees millions of its citizens seeking to escape. I also waited in vain to hear him admonish Mexico, a nation that treats those who try to cross its own southern border far worse than we do.

It is generally assumed that Pope Francis was directing his words to Donald Trump. Well, I’m not a fan of Trump’s, but to be fair, Francis should reflect on the fact that neither Trump nor any of the other GOP contenders commented on the last election held by the College of Cardinals. Although the Cardinals had a far bigger and more deserving group of contenders to choose from than we Republicans do, they, to their great shame, wound up electing a socialist pinhead from Argentina.

As for walls, the Vatican has a great big one, and it wasn’t built by Donald Trump.

As for Trump, the more he speaks, the more I despise him. Having already dismissed John McCain as a loser because he’d been captured by the North Vietnamese, Trump has proceeded to call George W. Bush a liar, parroting the chant of the Left that “Bush Lied and People Died,” insisting that Bush knew the intelligence reports that Saddam Hussein had weapons of mass destruction were false, but nevertheless took us to war for his own evil ends.

As Ron Kessler has recently disclosed, it was Saddam Hussein who lied. Because he had been crippled so badly by the first Gulf War, he felt compelled to run a bluff for the benefit of Iran. He figured that if he said he had WMD, Iran would assume he was lying and would invade. But if he could convince the U.S. he had them, that, in turn, would convince the Ayatollah.

Moreover, after his capture, Hussein confessed to the FBI that he’d had every intention of acquiring a nuclear arsenal once the U.N. sanctions were lifted. But the events that took place on 9/11 left the sanctions in place and he had no option but to put his nuclear plans on hold.

If she weren’t such an evil shrew, a person might actually feel sorry for Hillary Clinton. I mean, on the one hand, she is having a hard time putting away a challenger who is even older than she is, who speaks with a Brooklyn accent and who makes more unrealistic promises than a department store Santa.

On top of that, she has to convince people that she shares the same agenda as Barack Obama, whose policies are so despised that over the past few elections his party has lost 14 seats in the Senate and about 80 in the House. One might regard her strategy as political suicide, except for one thing: Stupid Black Voters. For no other reason than Obama’s skin color, the black electorate, who have probably suffered the most during his seven years at the helm, feel a fierce sense of loyalty to him, and are unlikely to vote for someone who dares tarnish his image.

Many people have found themselves between a rock and a hard place, but Hillary is not only being challenged by Bernie Sanders and dealing with the prospects of a federal indictment, but she has to guarantee that Blacks will give her 90% of their votes, without which no Democrat can hope to be elected. But at the same time, if she ties herself too closely to Obama, she risks losing blue collar Democrats who abandoned the party 36 years ago to help elect Ronald Reagan.

At this point, I’m sure that the only thing that keeps her going, the only thing she has to cling to, is the trust she has in her faithful husband of 41 years.

Whenever a conservative such as Rick Santorum, Mike Huckabee or Ted Cruz, wears his religion on his sleeve, the Left is sure to insist that Republicans are out to turn America into a theocracy. There are two things that make this claim so absurd.

First of all, the only folks who would like to live under theocratic rule are Muslims, the very creeps for whom liberals are dying to roll out the red carpet.

But, second of all, we already have a theocracy, but most people don’t recognize it as such because it has nothing to do with God and there isn’t an Ayatollah leading it. Instead, the one we’re stuck with in the U.S. is called, quite inappropriately, Liberalism.

For openers, Liberalism requires that we all put the concerns of Muslims, urban blacks, unwed mothers, illegal aliens and homosexuals, above all others. Moreover, apostates and non-believers will face scorn and moral censure. They will be falsely labeled racists, sexists and fascists by those who actually are all of those things.

Those who question the liberal faith will be sued, banished and denied a livelihood, by those who deem themselves the most tolerant and are most likely to verbally defend the First Amendment, unless, of course, they happen to disagree with what non-liberals say, do or write.

In conclusion, I would observe that if you don’t have water, water is the most important thing in the world. If you don’t have money, money is the most important thing. If you are ill or injured, good health is the most important thing.

The good news is that if you happen to lack any of these essential items, it might just be a temporary setback, quickly resolved if you can come up with a way of providing yourself with what you need.

However, if you’re a devout Democrat, which is just another word for a moron, you trust that Bernie Sanders or Hillary Clinton will employ the power of the federal government to take what others have in order to give you what you want.

All they ask for in return is your vote. Well, that…and of course your birthright as an American.