How to Restore Republic After It's Fallen into Corruption

By Rich Kozlovich

This quote by Mike Vanderboegh appeared on The Last Refuge saying: 

“This is no small thing, to restore a republic after it has fallen into corruption. I have studied history for years and I cannot recall it ever happening. It may be that our task is impossible. Yet, if we do not try then how will we know it can’t be done? And if we do not try, it most certainly won’t be done. The Founders’ Republic, and the larger war for western civilization, will be lost.”

“But I tell you this: We will not go gently into that bloody collectivist good night. Indeed, we will make with our defiance such a sound as ALL history from that day forward will be forced to note, even if they despise us in the writing of it.” 

All that sounds great, but what's all that mean?  It’s a clarion call for courage, commitment, understanding and intelligence.  It’s a clarion call for leadership.  Real leadership!

John Boehner once said, a leader without followers is a man taking a walk by himself.  Well, that's true, and then again, maybe it's not.  What I've found over the years is most leaders aren't really leaders.  They're managers who have been chosen to organize the direction everyone wants to go.   Neville Chamberlain was amazingly popular when he appeased Hitler at Munich because WWI had only been over for 20 years and the losses from that slaughter still haunted the British, and they would have done anything to avoid another war.  Churchill was considered nuts.   

What if everyone is wrong?  What if everyone is going in the wrong direction?  Well, there are consequences for driving on the wrong side of the road, and we’re seeing that now.  And what happens next is the one going in the right direction, all by himself, will become the leader.  Society merely has yet to come to grips with that. 

How does that happen? 

At some point, society reaches the apex of reality, and the tide changes.  Guess who's in the lead?  Unfortunately, the go along to get along managers often remain fouling the water with their efforts at appeasement, which usually entails attacking those who are trying to do what needs to be done.  We've seen a lot of that with people like Paul Ryan and John Kasich, and it's continuing.   A leader can hire a great manager, not the reverse.

These so-called leaders, who aren't, were chosen because they've been go along to get along for all of their lives, and being a rock in the current is totally alien to them.  Whereas real leaders are prepared to be the rock in the current.  Prepared to be unliked in order to accomplish their mission.  Prepared to stand up and say, you're all wrong, and I'm going to tell you why.  Prepared to suffer the slings and arrows of their adversaries. 

Rhetoric can be high sounding, and that’s important, but rhetoric needs a plan, because without a plan there's no substance.   So, let me outline a plan, and it's one I've touted in the past, a plan that must deal with the self-perpetuating foundational flaws in the system.

First, eliminate the 16th Amendment.  That's the income tax amendment, then pass a national sales tax and a hard debt limit. Repeal the 17th Amendment.  Originally Senators were not elected directly by the people, that was for the House or Representatives.  In order to maintain a balance of power Senators  were chosen by the states to be de facto ambassadors from the states to the federal government in order to prevent the central government form getting out of hand.

Repeal the 26th Amendment,which lowered to voting age to 18.  Make thirty the minimum age for voting.  Pass an 28th Amendment that puts age and term limits on Congress and the federal judiciary.  Pass a 29th Amendment that only the Departments of State, Treasury, Justice, and Defense, are permanent, and place a sunshine clause on all other departments, commissions, agencies, and bureaus, of the federal government, and eliminate the FED. 

Place a sunshine clause on all taxes and regulations.   Let Congress deal with each of these as they occur and be on record for their actions.  And absolutely end public employee unions, especially the teacher’s unions. While that's a states issue, but pass a law that ends funding for any state that refuses, and state that law cannot be reviewed by the courts.  It's the legislature that Constitutionally determines the jurisdiction of the federal judiciary, not the judiciary. 

Finally, all that corruption must be dealt with for what it is, crimes!   Investigations must be conducted, indictments must be served, trials must be held and criminals must go to prison.  If all the criminal corruption we've witnessed over these many years isn't dealt with, there can be no restoration. 

That's foundational.  That's The Basics.