Years ago in discussions with my writing friends, I proposed a novel about a President with an undiagnosed brain tumor who signed an Executive Order banning the civilian possession of all semi-automatic weapons. His diseased brain had become increasingly obsessed with creating a utopian society, free of personal choices and personal responsibilities.

One writer said the premise of my novel was "too far fetched." Another said the idea did not reflect "the political realities of our Constitutional government." As a final insult, a third writer asked if I could revise the plot, so as to make a science fiction thriller. "Perhaps adding an alien invasion to the original story line would give the idea more credibility?"

So...here...we...are.  

The President of the United States is publicly threatening to sign an Executive Order restricting civilian access to semi-automatic weapons.

It is no historical accident that this country's most serious Constitution crisis since Ft. Sumter revolves around civilian possession of small arms. Remember Paul Revere? His midnight ride was to warn the countryside that ,"The Regulars [British] were coming out."  The Redcoats, under Lieutenant Colonel Francis Smith, were "coming  out" of  Boston and marching toward Concord to seize "military stores."  When they reached Concord, the Regulars went door to door looking for, and confiscating, guns and gunpowder.

An armed citizenry has always checked tyranny and the dictator's lust for authority. Conversely, tyranny always hungers to disarm its citizens as soon as it assumes unbridled power. These are the immutable laws of empires and tyrants. If America begins to walk the path of further gun control, history teaches us in exquisite detail that we will not survive as a constitutional republic.

As this constitutional crisis unfolds, millions of citizens are made slack-jawed by the Obama's Administrations rabid attacks on the 2^nd and 5^th Amendments and Article 1, Section 1 of the Constitution.  It will be illuminating to see what  key institutions of American society recognize the enormity and the precarious nature of our situation.

Are our colleges and universities so politically indoctrinated that they fail to see the tyranny of disarming citizens?  Did the deadly experience of gun free zones on the Virginia Tech shooting go unheeded?

What about Wall Street? Can these financiers really believe that their political contributions  will protect them from a rapacious government? Sorry guys, all those millions of dollars will only mean that you will be eaten last. If a government can confiscate guns then all private property is at risk.

What  do our military officers and enlisted men think of this constitutional crisis ?  Our West Point and Annapolis grads are bright, independent thinkers. As officers they took a solemn oath to support and defend the Constitution against all enemies foreign and domestic. We know as serving military officers they cannot publicly comment on what they are thinking. But how many senior grade officers are thinking seriously  about their oath to the Constitution, and mistrusting  the motives and actions of their Commander-in- Chief?

Finally, we come to the most egregious breakdown of any American social institution, our national media.  It is inexcusable, contemptuous and willfully arrogant that the MSM refuses to recognize this constitutional crisis as a crisis.  This is not the usual President vs. Congress legislative dust-up. This  malevolent administration, as promised by Obama, is attempting to fundamentally change the relationship of the government to its citizens. And the media treats its biased, one-sided gun control "conversation" as just another 30-second sound bite. The MSM, as America's most visible social institution, has utterly failed to bring the enormity and danger  of gun control to the attention of the public. They refuse to link gun control to the incredible murder rates in Chicago. They refuse to acknowledge this nation's growing governmental tyranny, spearheaded first by Obamacare and now by gun control.

We are in the midst of a constitutional crisis, unseen since the Civil War. The 2^nd Amendment was written to protect the individual citizen from the abusive powers of a tyrannical government. Freedom to hunt and personal self-defense are additional benefits to our country. With the erosion of civilian ownership of firearms, citizens will increasingly become slaves to the government. 

Everything else in this debate is just a magician's misdirection. Obama and his co-enablers are betting the house that we won't notice that the unique American experiment of freedom has drifted away on the winds of history.