Our current form of government was founded on a specific set of basic principles, one that was argued and studied long before the Declaration of Independence was written. This included the idea of individual rights, and the resulting corollaries.

Their goal was to produce a way of organizing government to, as best as possible, promote and preserve these principles.

Since there can be no "perfect" form of government, they did their best to limit the power available to any one group or person. Government as a means, not an end. The system needed a lot of adjustment over time, and our history shows this.

But if those guiding principles are discarded, the process becomes erratic, and often even counterproductive.

If you are driving a car, it helps to know your destination. It guides the intermediate choices you make, and helps you decide what the best roads are. Pragmatism can take you only so far. It's like picking a road without a map or any knowledge of the destination. You start going by random perceptions and temporary expedience. This road looks smoother. This one has nice scenery. This one looks too hilly.

Your trip might go well. It might not.

Philosophy is a tool to deal with reality, not the reality itself (ancient philosophers forgot this sometimes). It is as real and as unreal as mathematics.

Nobody suggests we build bridges out of abstract numbers, but mathematics is needed to do it right. You can build a bridge by guesswork or tradition--many bridges in ancient times were built that way, using methods that sometimes didn't change for a thousand years. But real progress came when the science of engineering allowed us to build things like the Golden Gate Bridge.

Okay, enough metaphors for now.