Is Revolution Possible in the United States?

Perhaps not. After all, the U.S. is composed of a vastly more diverse population than that which existed approximately two hundred and thirty five years ago. At the same time, we may be, despite our diversity, less robust, physically and mentally, than our forefathers. If that is true, this may be due to the numerous and spectacular Enlightenment and Industrial Age driven achievements of the last one hundred and fifty odd years, achievements which have driven our collective quality of life relatively sky high, and equally, substantially raised our collective expectations of the future. In short, we Americans have become soft and riddled with a sense of entitlement that may work against finding the necessary fortitude to vigorously defend our fast receding Constitutional rights.

And if that weren't enough, how on earth is a diverse and shockingly ignorant population of over three hundred million people supposed to find enough common ground amongst itself to inspire the sort of effort that brings about a revolution? For example, I would very much like to see much less central government, and yet, for the most part, I abhor those who describe themselves as Republicans since they tend to hew to the idea that much of the Federal government's functioning should be turned over to a minimally regulated "Private Sector." And those not in slavish devotion to a corporate master operating in lieu of Federal Government, are, too often, in thrall to religious doctrine that invariably envisions government operating as a theocracy. Finally, it almost goes without saying that the typical "starve the beast" conservative has no interest in environmental conservation except, perhaps, in the abstract, via the application of such know nothing nostrums as "A Thousand Points of Light."

On the other side of the aisle, those who describe themselves as Democrats, and possibly liberals, though they are by no means one and the same, seem entirely content to have the state support a veritable bazaar of programs that, when closely examined, seldom add value to society except as a great grift mill from which a select number of public and private operators may pluck their living. In a sense, there is less to rail against where this is concerned, since Clinton long ago killed the social welfare state as we knew it. But, despite (wolf in sheep's clothing) Clinton's mostly successful efforts to co-opt and water down his Republican rival's agenda, the ethos of Federal Government maddeningly sticking its craw anywhere and everywhere (in the service of addressing a seemingly endless and sometimes arbitrary litany of perceived wrongs) still seems very much a part of the Democrat's modus operandi.

More disturbingly is the tendency both political parties have of displaying, at best, benign neglect towards the Constitution as suits their purposes. In truth, there have been too many egregious acts by both sides against the Constitution to mention, but, as infuriating as is the Democrat's systematic refusal to accept The Second Amendment's prescription in favor of the individual's right to bear arms, and as deplorable as is the Republican's attitude towards the separation of church and state (which proscribes religion from public affairs) perhaps the greater problem is that both parties are essentially bought and paid for servants of corporate power, which itself is an abomination, since no corporation should ever, under any circumstances, have the same rights and privileges as a living breathing person.

At the risk of going on something of a Marxist rant, corporate power has seemingly turned "We The People" into consumers first and citizens a distant second such that our every activity, whether we are conscious of it or not, is, in some way, in the service of some corporation's bottom line. I hasten to add that corporate imperatives diverge in many respects from those ideals enshrined in the Constitution, though certainly one could argue that successfully running a business (of any size) may equate with the idea of the pursuit of happiness for many people. Fair enough, and the point here is not to attack corporatism per se, though there is plenty to attack, but to outline the obstruction that corporatism poses to the very idea of revolution, let alone revolutionary activity itself.

As we can see, there exist, in our time, a wide range of conditions that are antithetical to the drive towards revolutionary change, which I define, in this time and place, not as a movement towards something new, as was the case in the eighteenth century, but as the reclamation of something already in existence, yet buried. So the original question, loaded as it is at this point, remains. Is revolution possible? In trying to answer it, we would do well to remember that the Constitution though great, is frail, and has, in the end, only one true advocate, "We The People."