HOW TO SAVE AMERICA

THE CATHOLIC KNIGHT: There is a foreboding spirit in the air lately, the "something big is about to happen" kind of spirit. Something that is likely to change the United States of America forever. We cannot know what exactly it will be, but we can know what the underlying causes are.

The American people are guilty of one great sin which will be our undoing. That sin is APATHY. We have allowed the success of our nation to make us decadent, and in becoming decadent we put our own personal desires above the good of our nation and our people. We stopped going to church (well most of us anyway) and we forgot about God. We elected politicians based on their promises of what they would give us, rather than on what was best for the country. We looked for what we could get out of America and the system, rather than what we could contribute and put back in. We allowed our courts to remove all trace of Christianity from our public schools and public square. We allowed our courts to decide that killing the helpless was "okay" so long as they couldn't speak for themselves. We permitted our courts and our politicians to promote all forms of abominable immorality and we looked the other way. When our politicians committed scandalous acts of immorality we laughed. They became part of our entertainment, while we looked for entertainment everywhere. We tuned into "American Idol" and "ESPN" while the fabric of our nation burned around us. Then in late 2008 the economy completely collapsed, and rather than make the sacrifices necessary to allow for it's slow recovery, we elected politicians that promised a quick fix with more government spending and entitlement programs.

Now the other shoe is about to drop and nothing can stop it. We have amassed a national debt topping $14 trillion with an annual deficit topping $1.4 trillion. This cannot be sustained. The end of our way of life is now upon us.

In a previous blog entry I gave a short summary plan for how to save Europe. Europe's social and cultural problems are far more serious that America's, and so my recommended plan had to be short and simple. For the United States of America, we are in much better shape socially and culturally. Yes, our nation has sustained significant damage, and these things are quickly eroding, however our situation is not as bad as Europe's and in spite of whatever economic and political catastrophe awaits us, America does have the resources to recover both socially and culturally. Unlike Europe, we do not need to import our cultural salvation from somewhere else.

The following points are designed to restore American society and culture to it's historic Christian standard. I honestly don't know if any of these suggestions will ever be implemented, but I do know this. If something akin to them is not implemented soon, the United States WILL FRACTURE into multiple smaller nation-states. Some of those nation-states will implement the suggestions below, and those nation-states will recover and thrive eventually. As an American however, I would prefer my nation stick together, so here is the plan...

1. Immediately implement a federal subsidiarity plan (i.e. "federalism") in which the federal government gradually turns all social programs and regulations over to the state governments, while the federal government takes a subsidiary role to the state governments. This plan should take no more than five years, and by it's end the state governments will be the supreme governments over the people of the United States, while the federal government will be almost invisible to them.
2. Remove all federal powers to tax the people directly (namely the income tax and entitlement taxes) and leave these matters for the states, while the federal government receives all of it's funding from tariffs and excise taxes.
3. Remove all federal court jurisdiction over issues related to religion, marriage, abortion, cloning and euthanasia, allowing the states to decide these issues for themselves.
4. Close all foreign U.S. bases, except in those countries that are willing to PAY US for our presence, and redeploy our troops to protect and patrol American borders.
5. Adopt a constitutional balanced-budget amendment for the federal government.
6. English should be made the official national language, and most-favored immigration status should be given to Mexico, provided immigrants learn English and how to assimilate into American society.
7. The federal government should enforce antitrust laws vigorously, break up monopolies in all industries including the banks and media, and pull out of NAFTA and GATT.
8. Each state should then make some formal declaration OFFICIALLY recognizing the historic significance of Christianity in the development of each state and the United States in general. If changes need to be made to the state constitutions to allow for this, than those changes should be made.
9. Each state should publicly fund alternatives to abortions and work toward eliminating all public funding of abortion. Some states are ready to ban abortion completely, and they should do so immediately.
10. Each state should adopt Sweden's model of subsidized school choice. If changes need to be made to the state constitutions to allow for this, than those changes should be made.
11. Each state should adopt a method of taxation that is non-intrusive to the American people and does not impose upon their religious or social freedoms.
12. Each state should print it's own currency. This is permissible under the U.S. Constitution and U.S. law. What is forbidden is minting coins for legal tender. Paper notes are legal to print under U.S. law, provided the appropriate federal regulations are followed. This is necessary to create alternatives to the U.S. dollar that promote spending at a local level on local goods and services rather than imported and interstate goods and services. This is vital toward the restoration of local economies.
13. Each state should encourage local cities and communities to adopt regulations (as they see fit) that prevent big corporate takeovers of local economies. The states should vigorously back these communities, while the federal government takes a subsidiary role to the states.

I know it is unlikely these measures will be enacted in the United States, and that is very unfortunate indeed, as they are necessary to save this nation from economic and political ruin. The good news is that American Christian culture and society is still strong enough to rise from the ashes without the need for importing Christians from other countries. The failure to implement the above suggestions will ultimately result in the economic and political collapse of the United States. What will arise from the ashes of the "Late Great United States" will be several smaller nation-states, made up primarily of like-minded states from the former Union. These like-minded states will likely combine to form new political unions, and some of them will likely implement measures similar to the suggestions above. When that happens, those new nations-states will prosper and thrive. As for the others - who knows?