Tennessee Drifter

During our Christmas vacation, my son-in-law and I were engaged in a conversation where I was analyzing a condition in his new neighborhood.  His reply to me was, “You think too much”. 

I wonder, can a person “think too much”, or put another way, can a person try to understand too much?

I remembered that exchange this morning, while I found myself thinking about the current political climate in America and comparing it to the children’s fairy tale of the Three Little Pigs.  Do parents still read the Three Little Pigs to their kids…or any fairy tales?

In the fairy tale there are three little pigs, perhaps brothers, or brothers and sisters, or maybe just sisters, it really doesn’t matter in the story, because the story is about what the characters do and not about who they are.  Then there is a wolf, represented as evil, who desires to victimize the three pigs for his own pleasure. But again, it could be an evil she-wolf, but then does it really matter?

The pigs begin in a house built of straw.  The wolf arrives and demands the pigs open the door. They refuse.  The wolf blows down the house and the pigs flee and build a new house from twigs and branches.  Again, the wolf arrives and demands entrance.  And again, the pigs refuse and once again the wolf blows the house down and the pigs flee.

The pigs then built a third house, this time of brick and mortar.  The wolf arrives once more and again demands entry.  As before, the pigs refused and the wolf again tries to blow the house down but fails because the house was built of solid material and was well constructed allowing the pigs to remained safe and happy.

Consider for a moment, that the three little pigs represent the American citizens and the wolf represents the national political “leaders” and who seek to gain and hold power over the American citizens; while, gathering for themselves power, wealth, and protection that they deny the citizens.

The house built of straw is representative of citizen decision making based on emotion. The decisions tend to be weak, and the citizen easily manipulated.  In this situation, the wolf has all the power.

The house built of twigs is a little bit stronger, where decisions are based on very basic facts, but without an understanding of the history and foundation of those facts.  Again, the structure, the decision if you will, is weak and the wolf continues to control the situation and the citizen,

But when decisions are made based on facts, sound decisions rooted in a firm understanding of our history, our founding documents, laws and customs, the decisions are more like the house built of brick and mortar.  Stronger and better able to keep the wolf at bay and protect those inside.

Our founding documents serve to protect us, but when we fail to understand that in America power belongs to the People, then we let the wolves run amok with their hunger for power.

Those founding documents, with their limited amendments, provide for us rich protections through procedural process. It is in our knowledge of the foundations of our country and the history behind those protections, and our adherence to those provisions, that we will find the defenses we need to preserve us in the long run.

The weakness in the story, our story, is that we deny ourselves the power of knowledge and understanding and instead we elect the wolves and give them the power to decide how we build our house.