Shred Our Enemies, Not Our Constitution

The Boston bombing exposes just how much U.S. priorities are screwed up.

I’m exhausted. I’m tired of being tired. I’ve had my fill of manufactured crises and tragedy from our President, and I’m worn down by the actual crises and tragedies that seem to be happening almost monthly. The problem with exhaustion is, you want to give up. Bury your head. Surrender to the grind. But we cannot and we must not.

A bruising election, the Newtown shooting, debt ceilings “horrors,” fiscal cliff “calamities,” gun debates, gay marriage debates, sequestration nail-biting, the Boston Marathon bombing and the ensuing hunt for and capture of the bombers, the Kermit Gosnell abortion butchery trial, an explosion in Texas, and now a new immigration bill. Most of which has happened in just the last few months, believe it or not.

For folks like you and me who pay attention to issues and news, it’s taxing. Oh yeah, taxes. That’s another one. Nevertheless, our individual and collective responses to these events are increasingly becoming perversely and cynically tied to Washington D.C. in ways I either don’t remember happening before, or in ways I was too naïve to understand prior to recent history.

Frankly, it’s starting to tick me off.

Certainly, our founders understood the frenetic nature of popular opinion. Dig through “The Federalist,” a collection of essays written by Alexander Hamilton, James Madison, and John Jay. These essays are the sales pitch, if you will, for our Constitution and system of government, made to an American public 226 years ago.

These men knew, by their own design, what Congress would look like and the kind of people they envisioned holding office. Members of the House of Representatives were given only two-year terms per election. This was purposely crafted to represent the constantly evolving whims of the electorate at a given time.

In essay #62 of “The Federalist,” James Madison describes the Senate. Thought to be the more deliberative body, Senators are given six years per term to counter the “infirmity” of the House structure. Yes, that’s how he describes the House. Here’s how Madison describes the Senate:

The necessity of a senate is not less indicated by the propensity of all single and numerous assemblies, to yield to the impulse of sudden and violent passions, and to be seduced by factious leaders in intemperate and pernicious resolutions.

May I translate? The Senate is supposed to be the adult when the House of Representatives throws a tantrum, and put the breaks on knee-jerk legislation the House passes pass that may or may not be constitutional or even necessary.

Now that we’ve established that, I have to imagine Madison doing barrel rolls in his grave watching the Harry Reid-led Senate’s behavior of late. Acting as a weather vein for media-fueled narratives, the Senate has managed to create some truly bad legislation.

Just two weeks ago, we were treated to “gun control” legislation drafted by two senators under the auspices of “background checks” that “90 percent of Americans support” because it’s just “common sense.”

Trouble is, a recent Gallup poll indicated only four percent of Americans deemed “gun control” a major issue in our country. Further, as more time and space came between the tragedy in Newtown, and actual facts, the American public didn’t see guns as the problem as much as the instrument of choice for a sick person to kill defenseless children.

In my exclusive interview with one of the authors of the bipartisan, now-defeated Manchin-Toomey gun legislation, Senator Pat Toomey admitted had his proposed legislation been law at the time of the Newtown tragedy, it wouldn’t have done a thing to prevent it from happening.

So why propose it? Emotion, emotion, emotion—the very thing the Senate was designed to blunt. The same goes for “immigration reform.” John McCain admitted last weekend it was something Republicans in the Senate needed to get behind to try and grow Hispanic support, thus votes.

I’ll give McCain this: The honest cynicism is refreshing. Depressing, but refreshing. Why vote to legalize 11 million illegal aliens in our midst? Because if we do, maybe Hispanics will like the Republicans more in the next election cycle! Another proud moment upon which our founders must surely be smiling.

Last week’s tragic bombing in Boston shocked our national conscience once again as two Islamic radicals killed innocent Americans for no other reason than simply hating our way of life. As we watched the carnage, and a major American city on lockdown, gripped with fear, it quietly occurred to me (as I suppose it did to so many millions of others): We’re in real danger here. Our priorities are screwed up.

Suddenly the idea of our Congress massaging our Second Amendment right to protect ourselves coupled with the discussion of legalizing millions of illegal aliens became stunningly dangerous. Infuriating before, flatly dangerous now.

“Provide for the common defense” is the first, and singly most important task laid out by the founders in the Constitution. Yet, what’s coming from Washington? Tax hikes on disposable income, tinkering with the Bill of Rights, and proposals to roll out the welcome mat for illegal intruders inside our borders.

If any good can come of this tragedy in Boston, it’s that we’re reminded that we are in danger, and our enemy is as resolved to harm us as they’ve been since the 1993 and 2001 attacks on our homeland.

Sometimes it takes a Boston Marathon bombing to shake the electorate awake and realize: We’re WAY off the mark on national priorities. It’s time for Congress, specifically the Senate, and our President to act like the adults the founders wished them to be.

What the Constitution doesn’t say, Congress can leave up to us in our individual states and communities to sort out. Guns, health insurance, marriage, abortion, schools, and on and on. We’ve got it. Butt out.

Trying to win popularity contests via bureaucratic central planning, micromanaging, and touchy-feely legislation only erodes the very thing radical Islam hates most about us all: our constitutionally protected freedoms.

Shred our enemies, not our Constitution. Provide for the common defense, folks.