Once upon a time—in the late 18th century, actually—a group of farmers, merchants and amateur philosophers decided to go into business together, hoping thereby to pursue happiness and profit. They adopted the name USA Inc. and set about building a beautiful new structure—named The Republic—to house their ambitious operations.Recognizing that the most vital element of this edifice would be a strong, durable foundation, the so-called Framers deliberated mightily about what ingredients should be included in the foundational concrete. Once they had agreed on the desirable constituents for their mixture (a recipe they proudly nicknamed “novus ordo seclorum,”) they were ready to pour and cure the foundation of The Republic.
One special ingredient in the agreed-upon constitutional concrete was the “second amendment”—an additive intended to provide greater strength and durability to the foundation (now called The Constitution) and in particular to make the concrete’s surface harder and more resistant to attacks from intruders.Luckily, there weren’t many intruders and, for a while, the foundation held—even when the superstructure occasionally frayed or fissured. Over time, in fact, The Republic grew extensively, adding rooms, stories, gilded spires—all sustained by the original, second-amendment-infused foundation.
But slowly, things began to change. Cracks began to appear. Parts of the The Constitution began to crumble. Whatever was the problem? Well, upon investigation, researchers discovered that the second-amendment additive, so good at hardening the surface, was, beneath the surface, interacting destructively with the chemistry of the underlying bedrock (i.e., objective real-world context) to which the foundation was anchored but with which, thanks to the toxic second-amendment, it was increasingly incompatible. Thus, the very ingredient intended to strengthen the foundation was, in fact, slowly but surely, weakening it—threatening, over time, to bring the whole magnificent edifice of The Republic tumbling down.Whatever could be done to remedy this lamentable situation? Scholars and scientists proposed several procedures which might (though there was no absolute guarantee) successfully extract or neutralize all or substantial portions of the second-amendment contamination, thereby restoring the foundation and shoring up The Republic.
But, alas, the flaccid descendants of The Framers (NRA-bots) had grown too accustomed to the good old second-amendment-riddled foundation. How, they asked themselves, could they ever pursue profit and happiness if they were obliged to walk upon surfaces not armored with second-amendment hardness? Surely the second-amendment admixture could not be blamed for those cracks and crumbly spots. No extraction! No neutralization! No changing the constitutional make-up of the venerable floor.So, instead, the ruling NRA-bots directed their attention and their wrath toward the ultimate boogeyman—the real world bedrock—reality. And they concluded resoundingly that their crumbling foundation was the bedrock’s fault (a conspiracy, really), that any attempt to make the foundation of The Republic constitutionally compatible with Reality Bedrock would be most perturbing, and that it was, in self-evident consequence, UP TO THE BEDROCK TO CHANGE.
But the bedrock was unmoved. It did not change. And The Republic fell. So it goes.
