Author: Fritz Pettyjohn

In 2010 Ken Buck, the elected District Attorney of Weld County, Colorado, ran a “Tea Party” campaign against an establishment Republican, Lt. Gov. Jane Norton, for the Republican nomination for United States Senate.  He narrowly won the nomination, and lost the general to incumbent Democrat Michael Bennet by less than two points.

Three years later he was diagnosed with cancer, 34 tumors in all.  Somewhat miraculously, two months of intensive chemotherapy effected a complete cure.  Feeling blessed to have life at all, he decided to run for Congress in order to give back to the country that he loved.   He was elected in 2014 in Colorado’s 4th District  —  the eastern, agricultural, half of the State.

Now he’s come out with a call to arms, Drain the Swamp:  Washington Corruption is Worse Than you Think.  He provides new and fresh details of the swampland, and writes with verve and flair.  He’s a happy warrior.

But he’s done more than simply describe the rampant corruption in Congress.  He prescribes a cure, the use of Article V by the 50 State Legislatures to adopt a Balanced Budget Amendment to the Constitution, to be followed by other Amendments, beginning, possibly, with term limits.

There is no role for Congress in this process, other than the ministerial duty of setting the time and place for the Amendment Convention, and specifying the means of ratification.  If Congress had the power to protect its political turf, there would never be a Balanced Budget Amendment.  But under Article V, it is powerless.

This book is very well written, and Buck’s co-author, Bill Blankschaen, deserves credit for that.  Blankschaen is a Christian author, and undoubtedly shares the politics of Ken Buck. Which makes him a believer in Article V, and hopefully, soon part of the Article V effort.

This is a book to buy for any of your friends with an interest in politics.  Even light, non-political readers will like and learn from this book.  As far as I’m concerned, it’s the unofficial Bible of the Article V movement.

The BBA Task Force needs to raise the funds to distribute copies of this book to every State Legislator in our seven target States, maybe 1,000 copies in all.  We want this book to go to #1 on Amazon, and for Buck to do a full media circuit, mainstream and conservative.  All of Washington is corrupt,  but the Republicans are in power now, so the MSM will want to hear tales of internal Congressional corruption.

I’ll be trying to sell a few copies in an article I’ve submitted to the American Thinker.   Tomorrow I’ll do an Amazon review.  I’ll have to restrain my praise.

An American hero, Admiral Stockdale will be remembered as a dope.  As Perot’s V. P. pick in 1992, he opened a nationally televised debate with these rhetorical questions.  And he never got around to answering them.

In Shattered we learn that Hillary had the same questions about herself, and wanted her campaign staff to provide the answers.  They were unable to do so, and she blames their failure for her loss.  But where was her husband of forty years, a political genius and the winner of two Presidential elections?   Why couldn’t he come up with the answers?

I don’t think it’s that complicated.  She was running for Obama’s third term, but she couldn’t say it.  She was, at the same time, running for Bill’s third term, and she couldn’t say that.  She was the consensus choice of the Democratic Party establishment, but she couldn’t say that, either.

As for a platform, she didn’t have one because the Democratic Party doesn’t have one, other than the defense of the welfare state and its ruling class.  But they can’t say that.

Bernie Sanders had something to say, but he’s not a Democrat, he’s a socialist.  Which is where the Democratic Party is heading, an acknowledgement that it wants a more socialist society.  Like Europe, with its enormous taxes, and smothering government.   Nationalizing health care is just the start.  Socialism has never sold in this country, and I doubt it sells today, but we’ll see.  It’s Bernie’s party now, and that’s his prescription.

But as long as Trump is around, the Democrats don’t need a platform.  As long as they’re against Trump, the whole party is united.  2018 could be a good year for the Democrats.  They might even get close to winning the House, and they would almost certainly pick up State Legislative chambers, such as the Colorado Senate.  If that happened Soros and crew would be pursuing an Article V rescission Resolution from opening day.   Based on their success in New Mexico and Nevada, we would be hard pressed to stop them.  So as far as Article V goes, it’s 2018 or Bust.

Dave Biddulph highly recommends Rep. Ken Buck’s “Drain the Swamp”.    Rep. Buck says the only way to fix Washington is to use Article V, starting with a Balanced Budget Amendment, and then term limits.  Welcome aboard, Congressman.  We’ll be asking for your help.

Jerry Brown succeeded Ronald Reagan as Governor of California in 1974, and ran for President in 1976 at the age of 36.  Governor Jimmy Carter of Georgia beat him, but Brown did run second in the popular votes cast in the primaries.  After being reelected Governor in 1978, he ran against President Carter in 1980, but gained no traction after Senator Ted Kennedy also jumped in the race.

In the same year Brown first became Governor of California, 1975, the Article V Balanced Budget Amendment movement was formed by two Democratic State Legislators from Maryland and Mississippi, and spread rapidly in State Legislatures across the country.  Most of these legislatures were, at the time, under Democratic control, and it was a completely bipartisan effort.

When Brown first campaigned for President in 1976 the national debt was $620 billion, and it was considered a national disgrace that could no longer be tolerated.  Brown had three principal campaign themes, one of which was the adoption of a Balanced Budget Amendment through the use of Article V.  It made sense, politically.  It was a popular issue.  By 1980 30 States had adopted BBA Resolutions.

All of which leads me to believe we can get Governor Jerry Brown of California to come to the Phoenix Convention of States.  I’m going to see if I can get my old club, the Cal YR’s, to encourage him to come.  He’d be a great ally.

Bill Fruth self -published 10 Amendments for Freedom in 2010.   Three years later, radio personality Mark Levin latched on to the idea, and wrote his eleven Liberty Amendments, which are slightly different from Fruth’s.  Looking them over, I think I see room for another one more, an Initiative Amendment.

If 30 State Legislatures pass Resolutions calling for enactment of the exact same piece of federal legislation, it would appear on the ballot for the next regularly scheduled Congressional election.  The people of each Congressional District would vote on this proposal, and it would become the law of the land if approved by voters in a majority of the electoral college.  A State’s senatorial electoral votes would be determined by the statewide vote.

Congress is a failed institution, and it’s an institutional failure, not a failure of leadership.  I don’t think it’s going to get any better.   Pelosi and Schumer would make it even worse, and while Ryan and McConnell are weak leaders, they’re weak because their members are weak.  What’s going to change?  What’s going to get better?

If there was a meeting of the 99 State Legislative leaders  — all the Presiding Officers  — they might be able to agree among themselves on the language of an Obamacare Repeal and Replace Act.  I think they could write a better bill than Congress.  Once they reach agreement they go back to their States and get their Legislatures to pass the Resolutions, it would be on the ballot the following November of an even numbered year.  If it’s better than the status quo, which isn’t asking a lot, it could pass.

It’s a way around Congress.

This is the kind of idea that can be kicked around, informally, at Phoenix.  We’re looking for a consensus, on something.  Fruth has ten ideas, Levin has eleven, and I have one.  Maybe  — who knows?  —  one of these ideas is the consensus choice, the one that almost everyone can agree on.  And that would be the subject of the next Article V Amendment Campaign, once the balanced budget amendment is sent to Congress with 34 Resolutions.

The core elements of the BBA Task Force would be the place to start such a campaign.  The contacts made by Bill Fruth alone are enough to get the ball rolling, and quickly.  It would be a question of funding.  There would have to be some substantial money behind the next effort.  Of course, when I think of the incredible amounts of money wasted on political advocacy and politics, we’re not talking about really huge amounts.

Of all the active Article V efforts, only one was originally instigated by State Legislators themselves.  Senator Jim Clark of Maryland and Rep. David Halbrook of Mississippi began the BBA campaign in 1975.  It was organic, it came from within the body of State Legislatures themselves.   It wasn’t suggested to them, or somehow imposed on them.  It was their idea, and they quickly got 30 States.

If the Commissioners in Phoenix sit down and think about it, they probably could agree on something.  We’ll find out when the time comes.

 

“America First”, properly understood, is a simple statement of realpolitik.  Trump has probably never read a book about foreign policy, and his historical knowledge is superficial, but he’s a realist, a pragmatist, and an American patriot.  So he acts, almost instinctively, in what he sees as America’s best interest.  He respects other world powers, but not world opinion.  He’s surrounded by knowledgeable and experienced people, and has Herr Doktor Kissinger on call, so he’s getting good advice.  As a result he’s amazed his friends and confounded his enemies in his first foreign policy moves.

As a New Yorker, he’s familiar with the Five Families  —  the Bonanno, Colombo, Gambino, Genovese and Lucchese.  I see the world as the Five Boroughs of New York writ large, with Five Families  —  the American, European, Russian, Chinese and Japanese.  There’s one big distinction.  In the world we live in, one of the families, the American, doesn’t live in the same city as the other four.  We’re on the outskirts, and our turf doesn’t collide with anyone else’s.  So we’re the natural peacemaker.

The European/Russian border has been a source of tension for over 200 years, and it will be for a very long time.  But Russia also has to concern itself with its eastern neighbors, the Chinese and the Japanese.  There are territorial disputes, some going back to the Soviet invasion of Manchuria in 1945.  Both Russia and Japan claim ownership of the Kurile Islands.  The Rape of Nanking is remembered in China today, and these two sister families will never trust one another.   So it’s complicated.

Except for us.  Since, with the fracking revolution, we are a self sufficient North America, we don’t need to be friends with anyone we don’t want to be.  The exceptions are Israel and the Anglosphere, which we ally ourselves with for cultural and historical reasons.  We want and will pursue good relations with the other four families, but we don’t need any of them.

Trump came into office with the intention of coming to an understanding with Putin.  For a variety of reasons, that’s off the table for the moment.  A Trump/Putin summit will take place at some point, and both parties will have an incentive to come to terms with one another. No hurry.

For the moment our problem is the Norks, a bunch of renegade criminals operating on the turf of the Chinese family.  This is China’s part of town, and they have jurisdiction.  But Trump has bluntly told them, as a Genovese to a Gambino, if you don’t take care of this, I will.

He’s got to back it up.  He’s said the situation is intolerable, so that means he has to do something about it.  If a Gambino says he’s going to do a hit, and doesn’t do it, he loses face.  And losing face can cause big problems, since it suggests weakness.

I read that the carrier Ronald Reagan may be joining the Carl Vinson.  If any pilots are forced to engage, I hope they’re from the Reagan.  The Gipper would be proud.  He did the same thing in the Gulf of Libya in 1982.

If the Chinese do take care of the Nork problem, it would create a marvelous opportunity for an Chinese-American Grand Bargain.  Solve all our problems, geopolitical, territorial, economic, trade, currency, at one big meeting.  It could be the basis of a de facto alliance, a Pax SinoAmerica over the whole Pacific.  The Chinese family and the American family together could enforce the peace.  With our friends the Japanese.

Trump’s foreign policy is evolving before our very eyes.  He didn’t plan it.  It’s just happening.  China is no longer a trade manipulator because we’re offering them an incentive to take care of the Norks.  That’s flexibility, adaptation, evolution.  NATO is no longer obsolete.  When the situation changes the policy changes.  I’m delighted and amazed.