Author: Fritz Pettyjohn

President Obama was justly criticized for his failure to ever articulate for the American people what the hell were we doing in Afghanistan.  He never addressed the nation, and gave a carefully reasoned rationale.  He owed the American people that.

Now it’s Trump that owes us an explanation.  If he’s honest with us, we can support him.  But we have to know what we’re fighting for.  Why is this problem our responsibility?  And if we’re responsible in Afghanistan, where else in the world are we responsible, and must shed blood if necessary?  How long is this list?

Peace and prosperity wins elections, and prosperity is on the way.  But peace comes first, and if Trump fails here he’s a failed President.

The American people don’t want to go to war.  Anywhere, for anything, except our own national security, and the freedom of the seas.  Trump knows that.  He just needs to act on it.

One of the most interesting elections in 2018 will be for Governor of Alaska, where a three way race has taken shape.  Highly unpopular incumbent Bill Walker will run as an Independent, former Senator Mark Begich will be the Democratic candidate, and State Senator Mike Dunleavy the Republican.  If you enjoy politics, this will be one to watch.  In his last campaign, Begich made a serious mistake, which may have cost him his senate seat.  We’ll see if he’s learned anything.

Out of the gate, I’d lay my money on Dunleavy.  But the race has just started.  Fourteen months to go.  The way I read it, it’s Dunleavy’s to lose, and I don’t think he’s a loser.

“A state legislature may establish rules and procedures for the recall of members of its Congressional delegation.”  —  The Recall Congress Amendment.

Presidents can be removed from office by impeachment.  Supreme Court Justices can be impeached.  Why can’t members of Congress be removed from office?

The original Virginia Plan of James Madison provided for the recall of members of the House.  19 states allow for the recall of elected officials.  Why shouldn’t there be a way to recall Senators and Representatives?

The proposed Constitutional Amendment set out above could, of course, only happen through the use of Article V.  State legislators, not voters, control the Article V process, so don’t expect a headlong dash from these politicians for a recall amendment.  State legislators hate the power of recall, at least insofar as it applies to them.  They don’t want people to start thinking too much about this whole “recall” business.  So this amendment would be very difficult to pass.  But if the use of Article V by the states becomes routine, it could have a chance down the road.

That shouldn’t stop some enterprising and ambitious legislator in Arizona or Alaska from introducing an Article V Recall Congress Resolution.  A lot of people are upset with McCain and Murkowski, and it might get a lot of public support in those two states.  It might even pass, in which case the Recall Congress movement will be born.  Two states down, 32 to go.

It might appeal to state legislators more if they realized the power this amendment would give to them.  It allows state legislators to control the whole recall process.  They could write a law that gives them, or a supermajority of them, the unilateral power to recall a member of Congress.

Talk about a hammer!  Every member of Congress, House and Senate, would be looking over their shoulders at their state legislature, and trying to stay on their good side.  All this talk of repealing the 17th Amendment is moonshine.  The people will never give up their right to elect United States Senators.  But the people might not mind if these Senators could be recalled, either.

There will be a lot of legislators from Arizona at the Phoenix Convention, and hopefully a few from Alaska.  This will be something to talk about.

“Virgil, quick, come see, there goes Robert E. Lee”

Hippie folk singer Joan Baez recorded “The Night They Drove Old Dixie Down” in 1971.  In her song, she spoke for Confederate Virgil Caine, mourning the loss of his proud and brave eighteen year old brother, laid in his grave by a Yankee.  This was still the Civil Rights era, and Baez was a progressive, but she still sang this sad song of the South.  If she tried it today she’d be physically attacked.  This is what Trump has done.  He has driven his opponents crazy.

There’s no difference between the Taliban destroying Bhuddist monuments and the morons pulling down Robert E. Lee.  Lunacy, in different forms.  People say Trump is crazy.   When you drive your opponents into this kind of frenzy, who’s calling who crazy?  Like a fox.

In next month’s budget battles, Trump has made clear his top priority:  The Wall.  It’s brilliant, and the latest example of his political gifts.  If he gets The Wall, he wins.  If he doesn’t get The Wall, his opponents lose.  Heads I win, tails you lose.  Not a bad bet.

We’ve been building walls since Jericho, 10,000 years ago.  A lot of people live behind walls today, especially the wealthy.  In fact, as you read this you’re probably behind some kind of wall.  Walls are a great way to defend your life and property.  Until the 15th century, and cannon, a walled castle was virtually impregnable.  Walls keep things in, but they’re mainly to keep things out.  They’re barriers, and borders.  They come naturally to men.

People understand all this, and they know why Trump wants The Wall, and they agree with him.  If the Democrats stop funding for The Wall, they will pay a price, politically.  But because the Congressional Republicans are so feckless themselves, they won’t benefit.

Because they’re such miserable failures, these Republicans deserve to lose control of the House, and I hope they do, and I hope Nancy Pelosi is the next Speaker.  Let the American people get a full two years of her, and 2020 will be a bigger Republican win than 2016, a true wave election, sweeping in Republicans up and down the ballot, including state legislators.  If the Article V BBA hasn’t got 34 states by then we’ll finally get there in 2021.  Just in time, maybe.  Better late than never.

The task ahead is to add to our total of 27 in 2018, and defend what we have from rescission.  The sooner we get to 34 the better, but hanging on what we’ve got means the cause lives on, to rise again, if necessary.  And if Pelosi is Speaker, we’ll have two years to wait.  The Democrats in Congress will kill any Article V Amendment, if they’re in power, by hook or by crook.

We’ve seen this movie before.  Last time, instead of waiting for two years, we had to wait for 30 years for the time to be right again.  After Alaska passed the BBA Resolution in 1983, becoming the 32nd state, 30 years went by before another state passed one.  After sixteen rescissions the BBA Task Force brought the movement back to life.

One thing I’m confident in between now and 2020.  Congress will further beclown itself, and the case for Article V will grow, and rise again, and succeed at last.

 

Richard Fernandez asks what comes after the War on Statues?  He says the current wave of lunacy sweeping the country started in 2005 when Larry Summers lost his job as President of Harvard.  He was dumb enough to suggest that, genetically, there are more math geniuses who are men than women.  He thought the truth would be his defense, and paid the price when he was proven wrong.

Twelve years later the Mayor of New York City is thinking about tearing down a statue of Christopher Columbus.  In a way, Columbus was the first American, so it’s doubtful he’ll survive.  He’s an icon to Italian Americans, and to the millions of Catholic men who have belonged to the Knights of Columbus.  No matter.  He mistreated the Native people of America, and must be condemned.

All, or most, of this nonsense will end when mainstream Republican Ed Gillespie is elected Governor of Virginia on November 7th.  He wants Confederate statues to stand.  The Democrat wants them to come down.  Gillespie, because he’s a smart politician, almost won the Governorship four years ago by defending the mascot of the Washington Redskins.  This time he will win defending the statue of Robert E. Lee.

It’s a piece of cake.  Ten days before the election he runs an ad featuring a decorated black Army veteran standing next to Lee’s statue.  He explains why, as an American patriot, an Army man, and a black man, he believes the statue should stand.  Slam dunk.  I’d get a guy with political ambitions.  This ad would be a great introduction to the voters of Virginia.

With Governor Gillespie’s help, we’ll have a shot for the Article V BBA next year.  The Virginia Senate will be a challenge.  Loren Enns of the Balanced Budget Amendment Task Force is on the case, and he’s as effective an advocate as we have.  But he’ll need help.

The rebellion against the Deep State started, in my view, in October of 2013 with the introduction of Obamacare to the American people.  Trump had nothing to do with it.  He  just took advantage of the building rebellion in getting elected.  He’s got tremendous political instincts, as do most demagogues.

In supporting interim Senator Luther Strange against Judge Ray Moore for the Senate seat vacated by AG Sessions in Alabama, Trump is going against his own base.  He’s doing the Swamp’s bidding, and it’s a mistake.  A poll shows Moore with a 20 point lead.  He’s too well known in Alabama to be taken out by negative ads, but McConnell will attack him nonetheless.  Backing Strange was a mistake for Trump, and Senator Ray Moore, after he wins on September 26th, will explain it to him.  He’s more Trump than Trump is himself.

All this statue craziness was started by Trump’s remarks after Charlottesville.  He knew precisely what he was doing.  He understood, on a gut level, that he was right.  And he was well aware what the reaction would be, and he welcomed it.  Normal Americans look at all this in amazement.  And it’s all because President Donald Trump had the courage to tell the truth.

Virginia Governor Ed Gillespie is going to owe the President a big one.

 

 

The fact that Hillary Clinton almost got elected in 2016 is a testament to the power of the deep state, and its auxiliaries in the media.  With any Republican other than Trump, it would have been a landslide.  The deep state did manage to get him nominated, and that was almost enough.  But he and his team were so much smarter than anyone realized that they pulled it off.

Embarrassed and humiliated, the deep state now plots Trump’s downfall.  A plan is in place, and is being executed.  His political survival is in doubt.

But his personal political fortunes are unimportant in the big picture.  What is important is the attack on the deep state that he is leading.  That attack must continue, and intensify.  He has a hand picked successor, ready and willing, at his side.  The Trump Insurgency will continue, and grow stronger, with President Pence.

Trump is wearing himself out as President, as most men do.  None worked harder than James K. Polk, who was smart enough to be satisfied with one term.  Even so he only lived five months after leaving office,  dying at the age of 51.  If Trump served a second term he’d be 78 years old when he left office.  It’s virtually guaranteed that his health will be gone by then.  Eight years in a pressure cooker will drain any man, of any age.

The attacks on his family are unfair, but they all seem to be good troopers, and are bearing up.  Not for themselves, but for him, at some point they have to sit down with him and ask him not to run again.

How much can one man do?  What’s more, under Pence, the work he’s begun can continue for eight more years.  Pence would win the 2020 election in an historic landslide, sweeping in Republicans at every level of government.  It would, in fact, be a referendum on the Presidency of Donald Trump.  What better way to exit the stage but in triumph?

We may not see Congress get much done under Trump, but that’s their fault, not his.  He can do enough with appointments, executive orders, and deregulation to get the economy growing strongly.  And he knows full well that the American people will not tolerate another war.  So Mike Pence will be running on a record of peace and prosperity, always a winner.

We were hoping for too much from a Trump Presidency.  Congress is the problem, and no President can solve that.  That’s up to the states, using Article V.  If an Article V Amendment  — any of them — is adopted in the next three years Congress will be on notice.  There is a power greater than yours, set forth in the Constitution, and now the states know how to use it.

There will be a lot to talk about at Phoenix.