The greatest run-on sentence in our history...

I needed to shake off the mental sludge building after yesterday's walk through the politics of personal attack, so I did what I normally do in those situations...I went to Tower Records.

Of course I saw a lot of mass media items I wanted to acquire, but thanks to my "overdeveloped sense of entitlement" (tm pending) from living in Nashville for a decade and a half, made the mental notes to call the relevant publicity folks to see if I could get review copies. One of the few perks of the freelance life.

But then, out of the corner of my eye, I saw it. The perfect flashback to my pre-misspent youth...the complete DVD edition of Schoolhouse Rock. And it was on sale.

*Swipe!*

Haven't had time yet to go through all 46 (yeah, 46!) shorts, but for some reason, I was compelled to jump right to the one concerning the preamble to the Constitution. If you're like me, you sang that song quietly to yourself during an 8th grade history exam. But if you're also like me, you often wonder why we get so riled up jockeying for position defending fractions of the first two amendments to the document when more emphasis needs to be put on the promises set forth in these 52 words...

"We the People of the United States,
in Order to form a more perfect Union,
establish Justice,
insure domestic Tranquility,
provide for the common defense,
promote the general Welfare,
and secure the Blessings of Liberty
to ourselves and our Posterity,
do ordain and establish this Constitution
for the United States of America."

If our leaders and lawmakers on all levels of government regularly reminded themselves of those lofty ideals, even in the midst of the arcane insanity that directing this country in a modern age requires, how much better off could we all be?

When somebody takes an oath to "preserve and defend the Constitution of the United States," I hope this is what they're thinking about, not about how they can simultaneously expand that document and contract certain freedoms at the same time.