One thing is crystal clear, Washington other cannot or will not reform itself. Article V is concededly a thin even a desperate hope but it at least it offers the promise, however remote, of reform because it is conducted outside of Washington.
The numbers are admittedly daunting, 34 states needed to propose amendments, a recalcitrant Congress to accede to the application and actually "call" a convention, and the legislatures or the conventions of 38 states agreeing to ratify the amendments. Indeed, except for Nebraska both the House and Senate of these 38 states must approve if Congress elects ratification to be conducted by the legislatures rather than state conventions.
So the bad news is also the good news. Even though Republicans control far more legislative houses than do Democrats, they do not have enough to make 34 and certainly not enough to ratify with 38. So the prospect of reform in view of these numbers is daunting.
But the good news is that the Democrats are even less able to persuade the legislatures to ratify any amendment they might propose -putting aside the likelihood that they would not be able to propose anything in a convention because the authorizing legislation from the states would not permit it. In any event, there is really no practical danger of a "runaway" convention producing an unpalatable result much less a result that would be ratified by 75 of 99 legislative bodies the great majority of whom are controlled by Republicans.
My view is that the danger of doing nothing clearly outweighs the remote danger of a "runaway convention" or the fanciful idea that Republican legislators in the in 75 legislative bodies would ratify such an amendment. I note the resistance on the right seems to be coming from gun rights groups, especially including the NRA, Phyllis Schaffly and the John Birch Society. I believe that the Second Amendment groups are exaggerating the danger beyond all proportion to reality.
If we do nothing we will continue on the path we are on which in my view is a path to destruction. In this sense the bad news, again, is also the good news. I believe it will require some sort of "Black Swan" event such as financial crisis, a war, or some utterly unforeseen situation which stirs the country to take action. We are losing our liberty and we are losing our solvency and we are doing so at an accelerating rate. The risks of doing nothing are unacceptable and events might well bring the people to see that.
