"[A] foolish man devours all he has." -- Proverbs 21:20

In 1776, when Adam Smith published The Wealth of Nations, Great Britain was faced with a monumental sovereign debt crisis that would not be seen again until the 21st Century -- when the U.S. finds itself with a $12.4-trillion national debt, rising to 100 percent of the Gross Domestic Product within a few years. The last chapter of his opus magnum, "Of Public Debts," was dedicated to persuading the British Parliament of the calamity the British Empire was faced with. And, alas, they did not listen.

Reading through it today, one might easily surmise that Adam Smith, the Scottish economist and Enlightenment political philosopher, was actually a time-traveler who had foreknowledge of the crisis that faces the world today. For the crisis he describes in exquisite, haunting detail eerily suggests the calamity that now threatens the economic survival of the modern world -- and threatens to enslave future generations for decades to come.

"We must see the need for nonviolent gadflies." -- Martin Luther King Jr.

When it comes to the staggering loss of civil liberties, the Constitution hasn't changed. Rather, it is the American people who have changed.

Once a citizenry that generally fomented a rebellion and founded a country, Americans are no longer the people they once were. Americans today live in a glass dome, says author Nicholas von Hoffman, a kind of terrarium, cut off from both reality and the outside world. In his words, they are "bobbleheads in Bubbleland. They shop in bubbled malls, they live in gated communities, and they move from place to place breathing their own private air in bubble-mobiles known as SUVs."

Quite simply, most Americans, having been beguiled by materialism and technology, are more or less compliant lambs, only protesting when someone takes away their cell phone or causes them material discomfort. And if the specter of a terrorist attack (no matter how tenuous) is raised, most are willing to give over their rights to feel safer. Indeed, while the government inches ever closer to authoritarianism, many Americans are blissfully oblivious to the fact that a police state -- even martial law -- may be one terrorist attack away.

Ominous developments in America have been a long time coming, in part precipitated by "we the people" -- a citizenry that has been asleep at the wheel for too long. And while there have been wake-up calls, we have failed to heed the warnings.

Just consider the state of our nation:

We're encased in what some are calling an electronic concentration camp. The government continues to amass data files on more and more Americans. Everywhere we go, we are watched: at the banks, at the grocery store, at the mall, crossing the street. This loss of privacy is symptomatic of the growing surveillance being carried out on average Americans. Such surveillance gradually poisons the soul of a nation, transforming us from one in which we're presumed innocent until proven guilty to one in which everyone is a suspect and presumed guilty. Thus, the question that must be asked is: Can freedom in the United States flourish in an age when the physical movements, individual purchases, conversations, and meetings of every citizen are under constant surveillance by private companies and government agencies?

Pfizer, the huge drug company, has announced that it will be leaving a large research complex in New London, Connecticut, and moving several hundred jobs to nearby Groton. Such belt-tightening in tough economic times would normally draw little criticism. In this case, however, it deserves attention.

Recall that Pfizer played a central role in getting New London to seize the homes of local residents who lived adjacent to the Pfizer site. Pfizer, according to accounts, wanted that mixed residential area, called the Fort Trumbull section, to be leveled and replaced with an upscale development that would include a five-star luxury hotel, top-tier condos, and private office space for Pfizer's suppliers, workers, and visitors. Now Pfizer is leaving New London "high and dry." How did this happen?

"The essence of Government is power; and power, lodged as it must be in human hands, will ever be liable to abuse." - James Madison

Over the course of his first year in office, Barack Obama has shown himself to be a skillful and savvy politician, saying the things Americans want to hear while stealthily and inexorably moving forward the government's agenda of centralized power. For example, in one breath, Obama pays lip service to the need for greater transparency in government, while in another, he issues an executive order that will result in even more government secrecy.

He is aided in this Machiavellian mindset by a trusting populace inclined to take him at his word and a mainstream media seemingly loath to criticize him or scrutinize his actions too closely. A perfect example of this is the media's relative lack of scrutiny over Obama's recent transformation of Executive Order (EO) 12425 from a document that constitutionally limits the domestic activities of the International Criminal Police Organization (Interpol) to one that establishes it as an autonomous police agency within the U.S.