Author: Fritz Pettyjohn

You don’t need any math skills to understand politics.  All you need to know is how to  count.  You need to be able to add and subtract, to multiply and divide.

There are magic numbers on politics.  I learned all this as a freshman state senator in Alaska.  There, the magic numbers were eleven and fourteen.  Eleven was a majority, and fourteen was a 2/3 supermajority.

For a President, the most important magic number is 34.  If he can retain the support of 34 Senators, he cannot be removed from office, and can serve out his term.

The magic numbers contained in the Constitution were the product of a lot of thought, by men like Madison and Mason.  They wanted Congress to be able to rein in a rogue President.  But they didn’t want it to be easy.

I was an intern with the City Attorney of Ketchikan when Nixon fired special prosecutor Archibald Cox.   At the daily morning coffee of the Ketchikan Bar Association in the Fireside Lounge, the mood was somber.   We were in the midst of a constitutional crisis.

I was a third year law student at the time, so I didn’t say anything to my elders.  But I didn’t know what the hell they were talking about.  What provision of the Constitution was under attack?

After I became an honest to God lawyer I figured out what all the fuss was about.  Nixon had told the Department of Justice to do what he wanted them to do.  But the Attorney General of the United States was the highest ranking member of the legal priesthood, and therefor knew the law better than the President.  He had legal training and experience, after all.  How could the President tell him what to do?

For those who are not members of the priesthood, the answer is clear, and is contained in the first sentence of Section 1 of Article II of the Constitution.

James Kallstrom is a former assistant director of the FBI.  He led off on Lou Dobbs’ show last night, and at the end he got a little emotional.   He handed Lou a copy of the Constitution, and then read aloud Article II, Section 1, “‘The executive Power shall be vested in a President of the United States.’  Period.  Exclamation point.”

This language is clear to anyone whose mind hasn’t been polluted by  a legal education, and it’s what makes President Trump bulletproof.

Some Christian minister from Dallas was on the Lou Dobbs show last night, and called him a general in the army of evangelicals who support Trump.

I’m not an evangelical, and I’ve never been a member of any army.  But I’ve quite lately learned that Lou Dobbs is, in fact, the leader of the counterresistance.

Because California voters are rabidly pro-choice, Republicans are left out in the cold.  The Republican base is pro-life, and wants Republican politicians to embrace that position.  It’s a no win situation.

But if Kennedy retires, Roe v. Wade will be overturned, and each state will be free to adopt its own laws on abortion.  In California, I expect the pro-choice position will be enshrined in the state constitution.  As such, it’s not an issue.  It’s settled.  A candidate’s personal position is irrelevant, unless they’re foolish enough to favor taking it out of the constitution.

That’s the theory, anyway.  In California, that’s all Republicans have got.