When I returned home, frustrated by the voting behavior of my fellow Americans, I found my daughter watching the John Adams series created by HBO.

I concede my daughter, a mere 12 years old, may not be representative of the typical child of her age.  I must also admit it makes me proud to be able to say she chose to watch John Adams rather than turn on some ridiculous cable program. While not all pre-teenagers would choose to watch a series chronicling centuries-old events, she gives me hope.

If my 12 year old can appreciate the lessons found in the history of John Adams and the other Founding Fathers than so can other 12 year olds. Maybe we, the people of voting age should all spend some time thinking about why our first leaders built a system that so uniquely intertwined natural law, the will of the people and a series of checks and balances that would serve to protect the people from arbitrary rule of the government.  The authors of our founding documents clearly understood that any government system with unchecked power was destined to expand its own power and usurp the freedoms of the very people who elected its members.

Perhaps the lessons taught through the retelling of the struggles faced by the men who penned the founding principles should be enough.  But it is not enough to learn the lessons. We see now that we must also live the lessons. The people who built this country were a hearty bunch- they understood that freedom is costly and that no sacrifice is too great when the result ensures that future generations will enjoy those blessings of liberty so appreciated and cherished. 

Perhaps too many of today's Americans lead lives absent of true struggle. Perhaps too many of us have taken our liberty for granted. Maybe the notion that people appreciate what they work for and neglect what they are given holds more true today than ever before. 

The amazing generations of people who helped conceive and then mold our nation into existence survived more difficulty in a week than most of us can imagine over the course of years. As we sit on overstuffed furniture in homes heated and cooled with the turn of a dial, it has become too easy to take our countless gifts for granted. As we complain that we can't find the cable remote or that the battery on our cell phone died, we remain oblivious to the challenges men like John Adams and women like Abigail Adams faced with a steadfast faith and, I am sure, abundant good humor and an optimistic outlook. 

The men who penned the Declaration of Independence, the Constitution and the Federalist Papers and the people who contributed writings that captured the zeitgeist of their age were among the most brilliant of their day.  It would not be a stretch to assert those who argued in Independence Hall could stand toe to toe with any of the great thinkers peppered throughout history and with those who spout their rhetoric today.  I would also assert it would be very difficult to pull together a cast of modern day politicians capable of engaging the intellect of those men.

If we could bring the Founders here today, they would most likely shake their heads with a keen awareness that this result is the consequence of the people living with the very freedoms for which they yearned and fought so long ago.  Our comfort has led us to an unrealistic and short-sighted belief that our lives and our liberty are secure from the tyranny of ignorance.

Maybe more of we, the people of the United States need to experience some measure of the intense struggle required to form our country. Maybe the evolution, or devolution, of our political system is necessary to force the citizenry to examine our fortunes and recognize all that may be lost.  

The United States of America is the greatest nation on earth. We cannot be afraid to proclaim this. While we must not shirk from recognizing our missteps and our failings, we must remember that never before has such an incredible experiment succeeded.  Any political leader that allows our towering tree of democracy to be severed from its constitutional roots, will be held accountable for the consequences.  

As Thomas Jefferson noted in 1820: "The boisterous sea of liberty is never without a wave."

Now, my fellow Constitution-loving Americans, we must persevere as this current wave crests and then diligently begin rowing in unison to build an even stronger United States of America.