Why is radical action necessary?

"The old world is dying, and the new world struggles to be born: now is the time of monsters."
Antonio Gramsci

The United States of America, the most powerful, successful empire in recorded human history, is in a catastrophic state of decline. The effects of a failing superpower are terrible for the American People and for the people of the world. For several decades, the USA has maintained a world order based on rule of law, free trade, and international cooperation; an order that provided a sheltered, stable environment that enabled the flourishing of our entire species. That safe environment is now crumbling along with the integrity of our civilization. If our nation falls to tyranny, the environment that generated so much peace and progress falls with it, and the world returns to the historic norm, where might makes right. Our collapse may bring joy to our geopolitical rivals and other anti-American individuals around the world, but putting the world’s dominant military in the hands of a petulant tyrant is the stuff world wars are made of. All of us, citizens and foreigners, suffer from a failed United States of America.

"America will never be destroyed from the outside. If we falter and lose our freedoms, it will be because we destroyed ourselves."
Abraham Lincoln

The corruption in American society is obvious and, more importantly, overwhelming. It seems that our decay is simply too entrenched to remove, that it has metastasized throughout too many vital institutions and diversified across too many executives. Destructive corruption is not unique to our nation, it is a pattern that is seen across history and around the world. Powerful empires fall victim to internal corruption; and while we like to think of ourselves as exceptional, we are no exception to this pattern. We have devolved from a healthy, democratic republic into an oligarchic kakistocracy, a society in which our most corrupt citizens are also the most powerful. The leviathan institutions that once protected the liberties, freedom, and prosperity of the American People have turned against us. The federal government has been captured by a powerful, wealthy aristocracy that acts in their own interests at the expense of the American People, enrichening themselves beyond reason.

"No nation can survive the treason of its elites."
Cicero

Tyranny, the very nemesis our nation’s founders risked everything to revolt against, can be seen from three noble perspectives.

"Tyrants preserve themselves by sowing fear and mistrust among the people, by banishing those of independent spirit, and by preventing citizens from becoming great or wise."
Aristotle

Aristotle, one of the most accomplished philosophers in antiquity, defined tyranny as rule for the ruler’s benefit, rather than for the benefit of people. In Citizens United v. FEC, the Supreme Court legalized unlimited political bribery, allowing corporate and aristocrat wealth to flood our elections, drowning out the voices of American citizens. The corruption stemming from this ruling has corroded our government across federal, state, and local levels, spreading pay-to-play politics like cancer. Politicians no longer serve their voters, they serve their donors; and they do so knowing that serving their donors means betraying their voters. Our elected officials use their positions to enrich themselves, trading on insider information and lining up high-paying, post-politics jobs. That systemic corruption is completely separate from the clear, ongoing corruption of the current administration, where the President and members of Congress are personally enrichening themselves and avoiding justice through the power vested in them. Our President is probably a pedophile, he has probably raped children, and he is using the power of the Presidency to shield himself from justice. Our laws no longer apply to the wealthy and the powerful, and that is a betrayal of the founding ideals of this nation. By Aristotle’s definition of tyranny, rule for the ruler’s benefit, we have a tyrannical government.

“The end of law is not to abolish or restrain, but to preserve and enlarge freedom.”
John Locke

John Locke, the enlightenment thinker who dared challenge the divine right of kings, believed that tyranny occurs when a government violates the natural rights of the people it governs. Under the new administration, the attack on our inalienable rights is only growing more severe. 1st Amendment rights are failing, with freedom of speech and assembly becoming increasingly restricted. Individuals are being arrested for simply voicing unpopular, uncomfortable opinions, and institutions pressured into bowing before the administration’s interpretation of events. There is public discussion relating to the suspension of habeas corpus. There are secret police arresting law abiding citizens on the basis of ethnicity. There are concentration camps being erected, areas where basic human rights are a fantasy. And looking beyond recent developments, the 4th Amendment, which protects us against unreasonable searches, has been shredded by the Patriot Act. Government intelligence agencies now spy on Americans, harvesting personal data without warrants, due process, or oversight; as do corporations. By Locke’s definition of tyranny, government infringement of their citizen’s natural rights, we have a tyrannical government.

"The accumulation of all powers, legislative, executive, and judiciary, in the same hands... may justly be pronounced the very definition of tyranny."
James Madison

James Madison, one of America’s original founding fathers, warned that tyranny arises when a single branch of government consolidates too much power. Trump v. United States granted the President absolute immunity from criminal prosecution while in office. And to skew the balance of power even further, our sitting President passed an executive order stating that the President’s interpretation of the law will supersede all other opinions, absorbing the authority and responsibilities of the judicial branch. The result of these decisions has resulted in the executive branch openly ignoring unanimous Supreme Court judgements. And finally, beyond the recent political turmoil, our President is capable of raining down death and destruction around the world, whenever they choose to do so, acting as judge, jury, and executioner. History has shown that Presidents exercise this power frequently, regardless of political affiliation. Our President has become, in effect, an unaccountable demigod, unchecked in any material way, and so by Madison’s definition of tyranny, the over-consolidation of power, we have a tyrannical government.

“Power tends to corrupt, and absolute power corrupts absolutely”
Lord Acton

A cancer of corruption now permeates every level of our government, it runs deeper than the Presidency, Congress, and the Supreme Court; these bodies are simply our most obvious tumors. Laws and politicians are purchased by corporations and aristocrats, regulators are controlled by the industries they oversee, and the average Americans is left powerless, forced into trading almost all of their time, energy, and lives in exchange for simply surviving. We are the strongest, wealthiest, most technologically advanced civilization on the planet, but it does not feel like it for most of us. It feels like slavery; one enforced by credit scores, college degrees, and resumes rather than chains and whips. Because of the unacceptable tyranny exhibited by our government, a revolution is not only justified, it is necessary for the sake of our lives and the lives of all future Americans. While the term revolution insinuates alarm, violence, and chaos, we must acknowledge that changing our entire political architecture is the only way to fully address the extent of decay in our civilization.

"If we fail to act now, the collapse of our civilization and the extinction of much of the natural world is on the horizon."
David Attenborough

Claiming that our lives are at risk might seem like a hysterical, unfounded claim, but the reality is that our lives depend on radical, coordinated action on a scale that is politically unimaginable right now. The climate catastrophe is way worse than people realize. It poses an overwhelming and obscure threat to the American People, as it does to most life on planet Earth. Consider this: James Hansen, a former NASA director known as the godfather of climate science, believes that an 8 to 10C of warming is already guaranteed. We have already passed the 1.5C limit set by the Paris climate accords, 25 years ahead of schedule, and as a species we are still emitting record levels of greenhouse gases. Our civilization is built on an agriculture system dependent on stable weather patterns and these weather patterns are changing dramatically. If these patterns change so much that we cannot grow food, our civilizations breaks down and we all suffer immensely. Our incredibly sensitive, just-in-time, all-consuming civilization is fundamentally unprepared for inevitable effects of climate change, changes like AMOC collapse, sea level rise, and mass agriculture failure. Our government was unable to prevent our civilization from literally destroying the habitability of the world, despite knowing the consequences decades ago, and so it must be replaced for our safety.

“You can have wealth concentrated in the hands of a few, or you can have democracy. But you can’t have both.”
Louis Brandeis

Infuriatingly, our society only really benefits a fraction of a fraction of us, most of whom inherited their privilege, wealth, and power. Our socioeconomic problems are rooted in the immense inequality in wealth, quality of life, and ultimately, suffering. Most Americans live paycheck to paycheck, and inflation is making it increasingly impossible to afford the basic necessities of life. Housing, education, and healthcare have become unaffordable for a huge number of us; and because we are bombarded with propaganda on a near-constant basis, tens of millions of us are manipulated into blaming the other political party for the increasingly unacceptable state of our lives and society. Our anger and suffering are being used by media conglomerates, foreign rivals, and bad faith actors to erode the bonds that bind us together into a Union, straining our collective national identity to the breaking point. Our government has proven itself incapable of regulating our society so that it provides an acceptable standard of living for all American citizens, and so it must be replaced.

"When tyranny becomes law, rebellion becomes duty."
Thomas Jefferson

Extraordinary circumstances require extraordinary responses, and we face a set of circumstance more dire than any in our history. We face an environmental crisis, and economic crisis, a technological crisis, a social crisis, and a political crisis – and we face them simultaneously! We have slowly inched into a reality where radical action is absolutely necessary for the survival of this nation. We live at a time where we must overcome tyranny or fall victim to it. Changing our civilization’s founding document creates immense uncertainty, but if we do not act now, life for all Americans will become increasingly worse as our government becomes increasingly tyrannical and the complex environmental, ecological, and economic systems become increasingly unstable. These threats will not materialize today or next week, but in the coming years and decades they will create a tragedy the likes of which we cannot imagine. Our lives depend on creating a government that is loyal to its citizens, one capable of handling the challenges of this age, and our current government is neither loyal nor capable.

“It must be considered that there is nothing more difficult to carry out, nor more doubtful of success, nor more dangerous to handle, than to initiate a new order of things.”
Niccolo Machiavelli

Our present government rests entirely on the Constitution. This document is the foundation from which every single office and law derive their powers. That Constitution is more than two centuries old, making it one of the oldest in the world. It was written in an age of sail-powered shipping and horseback messengers, an age where slavery was legal and women were property. We live in an age of geosynchronous satellites, ubiquitous social media, and pocket supercomputers, an age of complexity and technology light years beyond what the Founding Fathers could have foreseen. We are trying to run a 21st century society on 18th century software, and it is not working. Just as the Constitution replaced the failing system of law and order created by the Articles of Confederation, the time has come for the Constitution itself to be retired. Business as usual is no longer acceptable to the majority of the American People, but knowing what to change is an incredibly difficult task, one which lies beyond the capacity of any single person.

“That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness”
Declaration of Independence

As stated originally, the Constitution was genius for its time. We must recognize that outstanding success of our Constitution: it became the foundation for the strongest, wealthiest nation in recorded history. It became a living document that endured for a quarter millennium, evolving to keep pace with the needs of the American People, creating a civilization powerful beyond anything our ancestors could have imagined. But all things come to an end; and constitutions are no exception to this truth. Replacing this document creates immense uncertainty, but not replacing it results in increasingly terrible consequences. If we are to take this drastic step, we need to make sure we replace our government with a better one, conserving the values that made us so successful and implementing progressive policies and institutions capable of upholding those values.

"It is not the strongest of the species that survives, or the most intelligent, but the one most responsive to change."
Charles Darwin