"Raveling"

Some people
derive immense joy from solving puzzles. They commandeer the entire dining room
table to hold thousands of tiny pieces of cardboard … all of which are strikingly
similar. They spend endless hours attempting to reconfigure the picture
featuring the white kitty in the snow bank. Each little piece is uniquely
shaped and hued in order to limit its application to one distinct position in
the picture. While I am puzzled by those who enjoy such a painstaking pastime,
I do, however, appreciate their patience and persistence. It is the type of
calm tenacity that is necessary for restoring our constitutional nation. It
requires a sense of how the final product will appear (vision) and a plan for
choosing or discarding the various puzzle-pieces on hand (priorities). The
title of this column is “Raveling” because our nation has been unraveling in so
many ways.

We have
witnessed a political leadership that has blatantly ignored their
constitutional duties while, at the same, expanding extra-constitutional
government to the point where our government no longer serves the people by
defending our liberties, but has become an ominous threat to our freedom. Many
have joined the chorus to restore our nation or to return to our founding
principles, but those lofty goals are difficult to define and nearly impossible
to achieve. “Raveling,” on the other hand, is a process whereby we “re-weave”
the fabric of our nation. It involves the social fabric, the political and
legal tapestry and the broadcloth of fiscal and economic responsibility. Each
thread has to be grasped and carefully woven back into the whole cloth as
designed by our Framers. Presently, reformers are concentrating on the
political aspect. That focus is doomed to fail because the entire structure has
to be addressed and repaired for the fabric to regain its former integrity. If
the approach does not address the whole cloth, the shredded remnant will remain…incomplete,
unfulfilled and inadequate. The greatest obstacle to a systematic reconstruction
of the Framer’s original plan is the impatience of the citizens. As we discard
the chains of statism and knit together the liberty comforter, the
progressives, statists and socialists will agitate ferociously for a return to
the massive state apparatus. The fickle nature of surly voters could easily
undo the restoration movement, and the leftists would not fritter away their
opportunities to resume the construction of the dominant state.

Reality has
presented us with a seemingly insoluble quandary: go slowly and methodically to
reconstruct a firm(er) foundation, or accelerate the process to minimize
discontent and thwart a hostile big-government constituency. To follow the
deliberate foundational route is the preferred one because the Republic must be
rebuilt in a manner that will render it nearly fail-safe. All precautions must
be employed to prevent the hijacking of individual liberty and personal opportunity
in future eras. To successfully implement the methodical path will require a
massive education program that draws in the citizens as active stakeholders in
the historic reclamation and restoration undertaking. Selling a form of
government can be risky because there are clusters of people who will seek to
pervert the process to serve their own purposes. It is better to promote
liberty…choice…freedom…opportunity as benefits for individuals rather than
promote the collective benefits that might accrue from reigniting the Framers
plan. The sizzle should be in the sale by promoting the cornucopia of
advantages of working for one’s freedom and self-interest.

So the “raveling”
process breaks down into two basically unsatisfactory options: a slow
educational piecemeal effort while fighting intense rearguard skirmishes, or a
wholly disruptive dismantling of the present leviathan followed by a reconstructive
period with additional safeguards added to limit opportunities for mischief. The
slow route is extremely susceptible to assault and sabotage, and the faster
remedy could result in widespread chaos. Personally, I find the educational systematic
method more appealing, but I am aware that the more abrupt reconstructive
measure may be the best available option if our economic troubles bring the
nation to its knees amid swirling turmoil.

As we go
forward with this challenge to restore constitutional principles to our nation,
it is my hope that I can work with some like-minded patriots to design educational
methods and materials to assist other patriots, patriot/liberty groups and
citizens with their efforts to peacefully transition from the freedom-stealing,
opportunity-denying and constitution-undermining government of today toward a
re-establishment of the Constitution of the United States as the premier and
sole beacon for guiding our federal government. The educational project should
be a transformational tool that equips the people to shift from the present
state of too-big government to a slim, sleek constitutional republic that was
developed by our Framers. There is no magic wand for ending the oppressive
monolith we have today and replacing it with a federal government that values
freedom and protects individual liberty. We must begin work today on “Wand
Building 101.” Think about it and be prepared to participate. We must all
become teachers. We must all walk in the shoes of the Founders and the Framers.