Mr. Pierce, far more succinctly than myself, stated what I believe in the post above.
Lets be a little more precise. Those are not beliefs, they are conclusions. And, as such, are relative to the information and consideration available to the person drawing the conclusion.
The underlying premise of John's statement is that the union is salvageable and can be returned to liberty. Or, possibly, he is uncertain but is unwilling to give up trying because the alternatives to restored liberty under the existing union is too scary or too risky. I happen to agree that the alternatives are scary and risky.
But, I happen to disagree that liberty will be restored under the existing union. Two reasons. The first here. The second in a succeeding post.
I am going to claim some extra knowledge. I am into my third biography on men who had a lot to do with the fall of the Roman Republic and its transformation into imperial Rome under the emperors. After reading a few of these, it becomes clear that the politicians and upper classes, rather than try to avert disaster, merely tried to either hold onto what advantages they already had or worked to get as much out of the situation for themselves as they could. Almost nobody but Cicero and a few others worked to actually preserve the Republic. The only folks who took a decisive act were Julius Caesar's assassins. But, all they did was start ten years of jockeying for power and civil wars. (They left Cicero out of the planning and the deed, so he's not a part of the assassination picture.)
The republic was totally dysfunctional. The lower classes, especially in the city of Rome, mainly taken advantage of by the senate and upper classes, wanted fairness for themselves (and some freebies). But, the senate and upper classes were unwilling to play fair, wanting to keep their property and advantage.
Everybody was so busy trying to make the most of the situation for himself, that almost nobody was working to make the tough sacrifices needed to preserve the Republic.
And, as it happened, way back in his early adulthood, Caesar aligned himself with the masses by way of marriage. And, remained a populist throughout his political career. So, the masses aligned themselves on the guy who was aiming for dictatorship. And, of course, as things got worse in the final run up to dissolution, the masses seemed to rely on Julius Caesar to look out for their welfare. Make no mistake, besides being a master general and conquerer of Gaul, he was a master politician. The boy was very good at politics. So, the masses were not particularly working on preserving the republic, either. Its not like there were crowds yelling at Caesar to knock off his obvious rise to power and restore the republic.
Now, here's the really dangerous part.
For all apparent purposes, only a very few people seemed to recognize that the Republic was so dysfunctional that it was effectively dead. Julius Caesar recognized it. I have little doubt that was the reason he went for it--aimed for dictatorship.
Even after Caesar's death, while some hoped the republic would be restored, people divided themselves into the Caesarian faction and the republican faction (the senate and upper classes who were earlier trying to hold onto their power and advantage.) Nobody seemed to be saying "lets restore the republic to the way it should be." There were sighs of relief when the armies of Octavian and Marc Antony (both Caesarians) seemed to gain the upper hand over things for the stability it seemed to offer; but nobody was coming forward and saying, "OK, you two. Assume the duties of co-consuls and put the republic back on sound footing."
As a chilling sign for today, the people in the government during the last years of the Republic didn't seem too concerned with following the Roman constitution, except maybe avoiding shocking supporters too much, or opening the door to being prosecuted by a political opponent.
The people in our government have shown no sudden turn to selfless service aimed at restoring our Republic, there is no reason to think they will suddenly have a collective epiphany and start. They're there for themselves--power and money. There is no reason to think they will suddenly give that up collectively and start working to restore the Republic. There is every reason to think they will try to hang on as long as possible out of self-interest, or try to engineer the most for themselves as each crisis develops. Ron Paul is our Cicero in a loose manner of speaking.
So, while liberty and a republic functioning under its constitution is possible--all it would take is a lot of agreement to go back to playing by the rules--I conclude that its pretty unlikely. Human nature hasn't changed.
Nonetheless, its worth trying because the alternative is pretty grim. So, I agree with John that we should try to work within the system. I just don't hold it as a vision; and I say why I have my conclusions.