El Bandolero has been absent from these pages for more than a year! Many followers abandoned hope and left. A few hardy and faithful souls stuck around. They are the ones who know that Bandolero may have been absent but he was not gone. When a loved one dies people tell the mourners that the deceased has not really left, but lives on in their hearts and minds; and as long as they keep the memory alive the deceased lives on. This applies not only to dead people, but as well to absent people. Kind of like when you see parents of an abducted or missing child and they say something like, “We know he/she will return to us, we will never lose hope.” And, so with Bandolero.
What people should really mourn is the deaths of the Founding Fathers. Like those hardy and faithful souls who kept Bandolero alive, the citizens kept the Founding Fathers alive for many decades after their physical deaths. Their vision, their hope, their passion for freedom lived on in the hearts and minds of the citizens. The power of their spirits enabled the citizens to fight and prevail over evil and powerful enemies who would deprive the citizens of their inalienable rights and freedoms. But, their power could not withstand the forces of indifference and greed; the greed of those who took what they wanted because of the indifference of the citizens. The vast majority of the citizens were unable to see what they were losing, because they were, nevertheless, comfortable enough. To stand up and actually fight to preserve what was being lost would be a risk to their comfort. Those who were devastated were a minority, who found that not only were they not protected by the vision and spirit of the Founding Fathers, they were also not protected by a majority who kept the vision and spirit of the Founding Fathers alive.
Is it too late to re-kindle the spirit of the Founding Fathers? Not only must indifference be overcome. Too many have accepted the preaching of the few who by their greed have taken and usurped the power that the Founding Fathers fought so hard to preserve to the citizens. The many in their comfort have taken to accepting the message preached by the powerful, the message that the vision and spirit of the Founding Fathers is outdated and no longer relevant to life in the 21st century. The many surrendered without firing a shot. Can they be revitalized? Or have they lost the ability to even see or understand what they have given up?
Bandolero has returned to these pages to challenge the few and powerful who themselves are now vulnerable because of their own complacency. They think they have already won. We shall see.