The Wikipedia definition of idiot is: "a person perceived to be lacking intelligence, or someone who acts in a self-defeating or significantly counterproductive way;" while the Dictionary.com definition of moron is: "a person who is notably stupid or lacking in good judgment." Each definition fits each candidate to a T. As Secretary of State, HRC has shown she lacks good judgment and The Donald repeatedly acts in a self-defeating and significantly counterproductive way.

I have not been this conflicted in an upcoming election since the Edwin Edwards vs. David Duke battle for Louisiana governor in 1991. Obviously, I am a conservative Republican, but I ended up voting for Edwards, a Democrat. After casting my very reluctant vote, I went to the church and cried.

THE DRAGS BUBBLE TO THE TOP

As this presidential election season unfolds, I have watched with growing alarm as the two remaining candidates bubbled up to the top -- Hillary Rodham Clinton, the lifelong Democrat, and Donald J. Trump, the restyled Republican. There were far superior candidates and men of faith -- Ohio Gov. John Kasich (ACNA Anglican); New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie (Catholic); Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee (Southern Baptist); and Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker (Baptist) -- who were picked off in the laborious primary process so that those who remained were the dregs from the bottom of the barrel from both political parties. Somehow the remaining silt managed to emerge victorious.

I don't drink beer, but as I understand that creative brewing using the silt from the bottom of a beer vat might be great for developing a tasty bock beer, but for American politics, it is unthinkable. However, the unthinkable has happened.

But something now has tipped the election for me: Hillary and her staff's obvious distain for Christians living out their beliefs as voting Americans.

I am first a Christian! I believe in the Jesus Christ. He is my Saviour, He is my Lord, and I must FIRST defer to Him, first and foremost in all things including my vote for president.

The living out of one's faith in all things -- including at the ballot box -- is the trump card. Not only do things temporal depend on it -- for what we do on earth has eternal significance -- but the health of our very souls and the spiritual health nation may be hanging in the balance.

HILLARY THE METHODIST

Hillary, who is a lifelong Methodist, considers herself a Christian, but as I see it, she doesn't seem to allow her faith, such as it is, to color her politics or steer her public life. Her husband, Bill, was raised as a Southern Baptist, but he eventually left the denomination over its conservative leanings.

In a 2007 presidential forum, Hillary said: "I take my faith very seriously and very personally. And I come from a tradition that is perhaps a little too suspicious of people who wear their faith on their sleeves ... a lot of the talk about and advertising about faith doesn't come naturally to me."

People far and wide come to Hillary's defense as a Christian.

"One reason Clinton might not speak more about her faith is that her commitment to it has been challenged over the years by political foes for various reasons," writes Jocelyn Noveck for the Associated Press. "That's perhaps not surprising, given her decades as a polarizing political figure."

In her public life, Hillary Clinton has been a political figure since 1979. This timeframe has included stints as the First Lady of Arkansas (1979-1981 & 1983-1992); the First Lady of the United States (1993-2001); the junior US Senator from New York during 9/11 (2001-2009); and the Secretary of State in Barack Obama's Administration (2009-2013).

The Rev. William Shillady, the executive director of the United Methodist City Society, serves at Hillary's spiritual director. He helped to officiate at Chelsea's mixed marriage wedding ceremony to Marc Mezvinsky, a Jew.

Pastor Shillady explains that Hillary's faith walk is, in part, based upon the Methodist tradition of social justice service.

"... the spiritual component of her faith is pretty private," the Methodist pastor explains. "The Bible says to pray in your private closet, and do good at all times, and I think that's how she lives out her faith."

"Good Methodism is always a combination of acts of piety and deeds of justice," said Stephen Gunter, Duke Divinity School's Associate Dean of Methodist Studies, explaining that, for Hillary, faith "is not something that she wears on her sleeve as a badge of superior identity or something. It simply is who she is ..."But rather "her personal faith has played a significant role in her formation as a public servant."

Apparently, Hillary leaned heavily on her quiet faith during Bill's trying times as both the governor of Arkansas and the president of the United States, where she had to deal with the various "bimbo eruptions," then the Oval Office Monica Lewinsky affair and subsequent presidential impeachment trial. Through it all she remained true to her traditional marriage vows. She stuck by her man.

This January when the Pew Research Center polled Democrats and Republicans about candidates' religious beliefs, 65 percent of the blue state Democrats saw Hillary as "very" or "somewhat" religious, with 27 percent saying she was "not too" or "not at all" religious. However, when the same question was posed to red state Republicans the results were basically flipped with 65 percent said she was "not too" or "not at all" religious, and 28 percent said she was "at least somewhat" religious.

But from where I sit, Hillary is first a liberal Democrat who has openly stated that religion -- one's personal faith -- has no place in the market place and must be squashed or at least changed. In other words, keep your faith quiet, don't let it impact who you are as a person, especially in the political arena.

In April 2015 while speaking to the Women in the World Conference, she said: "... deep-seeded cultural codes, religious beliefs, and structural biases have to be changed." However, she is quick to point out in other instances that she is a Methodist and can easily quote Biblical verses that suit her for her benefit.

Yet at another time she says: "We need a president who understands the powerful role that faith, and communities of faith, have always played in moving our country towards justice."

One of those communities of faith -- the Roman Catholic Church -- is taking a direct hit from her and the Democratic Party through her campaign chairman. This unfolding story is largely being ignored by the liberalized mainstream media, who are slanting the stories to boost Hillary either by ignoring glaring Clinton shortcomings and purposely smearing Trump. It is the faith-based media outlets which are picking up on the Catholic-bashing story, the mainstream media has turned a blind eye and a deaf ear, preferring to chase after Trump's skirt chasing and "bimbo eruptions."

WIKILEAKS REVEALS ANTI-CATHOLIC BIAS

The Clinton-camp's Catholic-bashing was revealed last week through a series of e-mails uncovered and brought to light by WikiLeaks. Some of Hillary for President Campaign Chairman John Podesta's one thousand-plus e-mails, pointedly shows that the Democratic Party has a deep distain for the Catholic Church and for what that church holds dear and teaches, particularly when it comes to moral teachings.

Two of Clinton's top minions are Catholics, in name at least. They are: Hillary for President Campaign Chairman, John Podesta and Hillary for President Communications Director, Jennifer Palmieri. In 2003, Podesta founded the liberal Washington, DC-based think tank Center for American Progress (CAP), the very same organization that retired Episcopal Bishop Vicky Gene Robinson (IX New Hampshire) landed following his same-sex divorce from his "beloved" Mark Andrew.

Another CAP senior fellow John Helpin, also a nominal Catholic, ripped traditionally-held Catholic beliefs in a WikiLeaked e-mail exchange from him to Podesta and Palmieri under the subject line "Conservative Catholicism."

"Ken Auletta's latest piece on Murdoch in the New Yorker starts off with the aside that both Murdoch and Robert Thompson [sic], managing editor of the WSJ, are raising their kids Catholic. Friggin' Murdoch baptized his kids in Jordan, where John the Baptist baptized Jesus," Helpin penned in an April 11, 2011, e-mail to Podesta and Palmieri. "Many of the most powerful elements of the conservative movement are all Catholic (many converts) from the SC [Supreme Court] and think tanks to the media and social groups."

Then he goes on to say: "It's an amazing bastardization of the faith. They must be attracted to the systematic thought and severely backwards gender relations and must be totally unaware of Christian democracy."

Palmieri answered: "I imagine they think it is the most socially acceptable politically conservative religion. Their rich friends wouldn't understand if they became evangelicals."

"Excellent point," Helpin replied. "They can throw around 'Thomistic' thought and 'subsidiarity' and sound sophisticated because no one knows what the hell they're talking about."

At the time of the e-mails, Pelmieri was the Communications Director for the Center for American Progress. But before joining the Hillary for President campaign, she was the White House Communications Director for President Barack Obama. Podesta also has White House connections, for he served as one of President Bill Clinton's Chiefs of Staff and also served as co-chair for the Obama-Biden Transition Team.

Podesta's counterpart in the Donald J. Trump for President campaign is Kellyanne Conway, also a Catholic, who responded to the WikiLeaks e-mails revelation.

"For 30 years, Hillary Clinton has been openly hostile to practicing Catholics," she said. "Now her staff is calling Catholics 'backwards' in e-mails seething with distain."

Fr. Jonathan Morris, a contributor for FOX News calls the Helpin-Pelmieri e-mail exchange "bigotry." The Catholic priest thinks that Pelmieri and Helpin's take on
Rubert Murdoch and Robert Thomson's Catholic faith is solely for "political purposes."

Murdoch, a convert to Catholicism from Anglicanism, is the CEO of FOX News which he helped found in 1985 to compete with ABC, CBS and NBC. When the 2011 e-mail was written, Thomson (whose name was misspelled in the Helpin e-mail), was the managing editor for the Wall Street Journal; now he is the CEO of News Corp. He, too, was born in Australia, as was Murdoch.

"What they (Helpin and Pelmieri) don't understand, is that some people become Christian; that some people follow the pursuit of their faith not for political reasons but that they are actually trying to seek Truth and trying to come into a relationship with God and they want their kids to have a relationship with God," Fr. Morris explained. "This (the Clinton camp Catholic-bashing) is purely political and it's shocking."

CATHOLIC SPRING

On Feb.11, 2012, Voices for Progress President, Sanford "Sandy" Newman, e-mailed Podesta (Hillary's 2012 presidential campaign chairman) about creating a "Catholic spring" to bring a little democracy into the Catholic Church.

"... There needs to be a Catholic Spring, in which Catholics themselves demand the end of a middle ages dictatorship and the beginning of a little democracy and respect for gender equality in the Catholic Church," he e-mails Podesta.

Newman, a Jew, goes on to suggest that the "seeds of revolution" need be planted in the Catholic Church: "Even if the idea isn't crazy, I don't qualify to be involved and I have no thought at all about how one would 'plant the seeds of the revolution,' or who would plant them."

Podesta responds to Newman, suggesting that things are in place to help make that happen. An organization was specifically created to help organize American Catholics into opposing official Church doctrine: "We created Catholics in Alliance for the Common Good [CACG] to organize for a moment like this." Podesta writes. "But I think it lacks the leadership to do so now. Likewise Catholics United. Like most spring movements, I think this one will have to be bottom up."

CACG's Chairman of the Board, Fred Rotondaro, posted a disclaimer on the organization's website: "The content of these alleged stolen e-mails is being used to malign the character and faith of John Podesta, John Halpin, and Jennifer Palmieri. Such assertions are absurd. I know each to be faithful Catholics who love their faith and the Church. No one should fault them for having candid discussions about serious issues facing the Catholic Church."

As more than one thousand Podesta e-mails were being made public by WikiLeaks, the current Speaker of the House, Paul Ryan (R-WI), a Catholic, fired back: "To disparage the Catholic Church as 'severely backwards' is an insult to millions of people across the nation. If anything these statements reveal the Clinton Campaign's hostile attitude for people of faith in general."

Rather than disparaging and belittling Catholics and Evangelicals, Donald Trump, a professed Presbyterian, is struggling to understand them. Realizing that faith is an important part of many Americans' makeup, last month he created an advisory board of 33 prominent Catholics to help him wade through the Catholic faith issues that face him. He also has a similar 26-person advisory panel of Protestant Evangelicals to give him their religious perspective in the market place. Perhaps he will surround himself with another group of experienced political advisors to help him with the political mechanics of governing.

Joe Cella, the Trump Campaign Catholic liaison and founder of the Catholic Prayer Breakfast, responded to the Catholic-bashing by the Hillary camp: "Hillary Clinton and her campaign should be ashamed of themselves and should immediate apologize to all Catholics and people of goodwill in the United States."

Helpin responded as the WikiLeaks crisis deepened. "I'm a progressive Catholic who was reacting to a private e-mail to the arguments of leading conservatives who misuse Catholicism to defend their agenda." He said he wanted to "make a fleeting point about perceived hypocrisy and the flaunting of one's faith by prominent conservative leaders."

A "progressive Catholic," like "progressive Christians" in general jettison traditionally long-held Christian understandings of Scripture, gender, sex, marriage, life, and morality to open wide the gates which lead to aggressive gay rights, marriage equality, transgendered bathroom privileges in schools, unfettered abortion access and other deviant moral practices at the expense of a majority of Americans who cannot consciously embrace such activities. Then such progressives manipulate the federal government into chiseling such questionable activities into stone, either through executive orders or Supreme Court action, both of which bypass the full legislative process.

CATHOLIC SWING VOTE

For the most part, the Catholic vote is a swing vote. There are 69.5 million self- proclaimed Catholics in the United States. The Episcopal Church claims a mere 1.8 million baptized Episcopalians, of which 579,780 show up to church on Sunday.

According to figures mined by Our Sunday Visitor, 43% of Catholics define themselves as moderates, with 33% claiming to be conservative and the remaining 24% leaning towards liberalism. However, when the votes are counted, 48% of Catholics vote Democrat, 29% vote Republican, and 24% are independent or third party voters. Our Sunday Visitor is a popular, traditional Catholic newsweekly.

The Catholic Church's social justice stances on poverty, immigration, the death penalty and climate change are more consistent with the Democratic Party platform. Yet the Church's understanding of abortion, marriage, religious freedom and euthanasia are more in line with Republican thinking. This is why the Catholic vote becomes a swing vote and can easily tip this election either into Hillary Clinton's camp or Donald Trump's court. Regardless of what the polls say, the actual outcome of the election is a tossup until the final vote is cast, counted and tabulated and the Electoral College acts.

Pew Research showed that 25% of the electorate in 2012 were Catholics, of whom 50% voted for Obama (Democrat) while 48% checked the box for Mitt Romney (Republican). In post millennial presidential elections, Catholics voted 50% Democrat to 47% Republican in 2000; 52% Republican to 47% Democrat in 2004; and 54% Democrat to 45% Republican in 2008.

Even with Catholics making up 25% of the electorate, one group is gaining on their numbers fast ... the Nones (no religious affiliation). In 1974-1984, the Nones made up only seven percent of the electorate. This figure climbed to nine percent in1994 and 14% in 2004. Finally, in 2014, the Nones jumped to 21% of the electorate and their numbers are climbing. In 1974, Protestants made up a healthy 63% of the electorate and that number dropped to 49% in 2014.

NO PROTESTANTS IN SCOTUS

Even with Catholic Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia now dead, there are no Protestants or Evangelicals on the Supreme Court. The entire Court is made up of Catholics (Chief Justice John Roberts, Justice Clarence Thomas, Justice Anthony Kennedy, Justice Samuel Alito, and Justice Sonia Sotomayor) and Jews (Justice Stephen Breyer, Justice Ruth Bader Ginsberg, and Justice Elena Kagan). The last retiring Protestant Justice on the Supreme Court was Justice John Paul Stevens, a
nondescript Protestant.

Justice Sotomayor is a non-practicing Catholic and Justice Thomas was born Southern Baptist, raised Roman Catholic, converted to The Episcopal Church, then reverted back to Catholicism. He briefly studied for the Catholic priesthood, then went into law and now attends daily Mass.

However, even with a full court -- before Justice Scalia's death -- the Supreme Court voted to make same-sex marriage the law of the land. Two liberal Catholics -- Kennedy and Sotomayor -- joined the liberal Jewish faction to push gay marriage through, trumping the legislative process guaranteed in the U.S. Constitution and ignoring the sentiments of a great number of Americans. President Obama celebrated the Supreme Court decision by bathing the White House in Gay Pride rainbow colors.

When the next president is elected, there will be at least one -- if not four -- Supreme Court seats to fill. Last February, 79-year-old Justice Scalia unexpectedly died and now Justice Breyer is 78, Justice Kennedy is 80, and Justice Ginsberg is 83. Chances are good that the next president will fill their slots.

With Hillary's stated position that "... deep-seeded cultural codes, religious beliefs, and structural biases have to be changed," my fear is that she will load the Supreme Court with liberals who will overrun the wishes of the majority of the electorate and continue to ignore Constitutional safe guards. She is out to make religion -- all religion -- irrelevant in the market place.

Robert A.J. Gagnon, a Presbyterian and the Associate Professor of New Testament at Pittsburgh Theological Seminary, shares that fear. He worries that Hillary will make use of presidential executive order powers to her advantage and our disadvantage. Much the same way Barack Obama has.

"Hillary through executive orders, legislation, and prosecution of cases in the courts will install 'sexual orientation' and 'gender identity' regulations 'in every aspect of public life," he posts on Facebook. "Let me repeat: 'in EVERY aspect of public life'."

"The future of the LGBT movement hinges largely on the outcome of this election," Lifesite News adds. "For LGBT forces, the election of Hillary Clinton (not Donald Trump) is essential for fulfilling their goals."

However, Fr. Morris' opinion is that this election is all about religious freedom.

"I don't take any sides," the FOX News' Catholic priest-commentator noted. "We have to make sure that anyone who wants to be the Commander-in-Chief of the United States of America is making sure that that person -- he or she -- and their people are standing up for religious freedom even if you don't happen to agree with that particular faith. I want it from Donald Trump and I want it from Hillary Clinton."

The Bronx priest also said that Americans have to be weary of the people Hillary surrounds herself with.

"I've been very critical of Donald Trump. Some of the things he has done ...," the priest explained. "But this is a moment that we have to be very, very straight forward about. The type of people that Hillary Clinton has chosen to put around her which are anti-Catholic, anti-Evangelical people as expressed in their own e-mails."

Quoting an unnamed friend, Philadelphia's Catholic Archbishop, Charles Chaput, O.F.M. Cap., describes this year's presidential candidates' match up as an impossible choice between: "a vulgar, boorish lout and disrespecter of women, with a serious impulse control problem; or a scheming, robotic liar with a lifelong appetite for power and an entourage riddled with anti-Catholic bigots."

THE "TRUMP" CARD IS PLAYED

So it boils down to that fact that I have only one choice in voting for president. Unwittingly, Hillary and her campaign played the "Trump" card for me. However, Donald Trump is still a New York idiot and I have toyed with voting for Hillary because of it. My vote will not be cast with enthusiasm. It is more of a vote against HRC than a vote for The Donald, and afterwards I will go to the church and cry.

Ultimately, God is in control.

Mary Ann Mueller is a journalist living in Texas. She is a regular contributor to VirtueOnline