Author Interview: From Inception to Current Events

I ran across this Jumping in Pools interview from 2010, and it still reflects some good points about the creation of Tempest at Dawn and its relationship to current events. Here's a snippet:

"All of my writing had been highly technical, but storytelling has always fascinated me. Although I now write fiction, I had a bumpy start. I had to read piles of books on the art of fiction, hire a writing coach, and attend numerous workshops. Then I blundered around until I started to get the hang of it. It took years for me to shed the baggage that I had brought from the technical, non-fiction world. The main thing I had to learn was how to relay history and facts without interrupting the flow of the story. Much tougher than I expected."

 You can read the rest of the interview here...

The real story of our nations founding.

Ronald Reagan's "shiny city on a hill"

In 1630 while still onboard ship, John Winthrop sermonized to his fellow Puritans that they were sailing to “a city upon a hill—the eyes of all people are upon us.”

One hundred and fifty years later, the Founders believed this to their core. They believed they were building an exceptional nation and the world was watching. 

Although many politicians have used the idiom, the phrase “a shiny city on a hill” is most closely associated with Ronald Reagan. He used it many times in his political career, but never so poignantly as in his farewell address. 

Excerpt from Ronald Reagan’s Farewell Address

"I've spoken of the shining city all my political life, but I don't know if I ever quite communicated what I saw when I said it. But in my mind it was a tall, proud city built on rocks stronger than oceans, windswept, God-blessed, and teeming with people of all kinds living in harmony and peace; a city with free ports that hummed with commerce and creativity."

Our forefathers moved through the founding period knowing the world was watching. The Founders were good people guided by solid, well-thought-out principles. They set their sights high. They chose to do something great. They wanted to be the light of the world.

The United States of America is exceptional, but we are not exceptional because we are a different kind of people. People are the same the world over. We are exceptional because of the uniqueness of our founding. The Declaration of Independence and United States Constitution were not events. They were processes that took many years to come to fruition. They both engaged an entire nation. They both were guided by clear principles. They both reflected timeless truths that inspired us to move ever closer to greatness.

America is not the Constitution or the Declaration of Independence. America is a commonly held culture that emerged from writing and approving these documents. Somewhere deep inside, we know it’s important to preserve them as they were originally intended. They are our heritage. It hurts when someone assaults them.

We often hear laments that our politicians no longer honor their pledge to preserve, protect, and defend the Constitution of the United States. This is backward. The Constitution was not written for politicians. Our political leaders have no motivation to abide by a two-hundred-year-old restraining order. Americans are the ones who must enforce the supreme law of the land. The Constitution’s first, outsized words are We the People. The people did “ordain and establish this Constitution for the United States of America.” It’s our document. It was always meant to be ours, not the government’s. We should always treat it as our most prized possession because the Constitution is unique.

The Founders didn’t set out to build a run-of-the-mill nation fit for people to inhabit. Their aspirations went far higher. Early Americans worked for more than three decades to craft a republic that would harness the worst in people, while giving free rein to the best in people. The country didn’t start out perfect, nor is it perfect today, but few other nations constantly strive to be nobler tomorrow than they were the day before. 

The Constitution and our American culture were established using a few simple but amazing principles. These principles collectively preserve liberty. Because we have been fortunate, it’s difficult for Americans to remember that liberty is a precious and highly unstable commodity. It takes the work of millions to protect liberty, not just a few politicians. That’s why each and every American has an obligation to preserve, protect, and defend the Constitution of the United States of America. Our children deserve nothing less.

James D. Best American Exceptionalism on Amazon

Time Magazine: “Does It Still Matter?”

“Let us not make it a blank paper by construction. ... If it is, then we have no Constitution.” Thomas Jefferson

“Can it be of less consequence that the meaning of a Constitution should be fixed and known, than a meaning of a law should be so?” James Madison

The cover of the 10th Annual Time Magazine History Issue from a couple years ago shows the Constitution being shredded under the title, “Does it still matter?”

Richard Stengel, Time’s managing Editor, opens his essay with these words, “Here are a few things the framers did not know about. World War II. DNA. Sexting. Airplanes. The atom. Television. Medicare. Collateralized debt obligations. The germ theory of disease. Miniskirts. The internal combustion engine. Computers. Antibiotics. Lady Gaga."

Commentary: Is the Constitution’s purpose to advance life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness?

Conor Friedersdorf published an article that reflects the thinking that has gotten us so far away from constitutional government.

The title of the article is illustrative: “Preserving Liberty Is More Important Than Making a Fetish of the Constitution: Though important, the document isn't an end in itself—advancing life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness is the end.” The title could have as easily read, “The Constitution should never stand in the way of lofty goals.”

James Madison

Conor Friedersdorf

(I trust my liberty to the guy on the right.)

As a writer, I’m familiar with the effect of selecting emotion-laden words. For example, the article would have been different if titled, “Preserving Liberty Is More Important than Adhering to the Constitution.” The change from fetish to adhere makes the argument clear and allows the opposing side a measure of respect. Now, readers would dig into the article to find out whether adherence to the Constitution is dangerous to liberty.

(By the way, at the risk of being accused of “making a fetish of the Constitution,” it annoys me when someone uses a quote from the Declaration of Independence to make an argument about the Constitution.)

The Heritage Guide to the Constitution

A reference Book for Every American Home

Many Americans have taken to carrying a copy of the Constitution. No one will want to lug around The Heritage Guide to the Constitution, but the book is an indispensable reference companion. The first words in the book read, “The Heritage Guide to the Constitution is intended to provide a brief and accurate explanation of each clause of the Constitution as envisioned by the Framers and as applied in contemporary law.” It achieves this goal admirably.

As you would expect from the Heritage Foundation, this is an Originalist reference book, and the editors have done an excellent job of explaining the Constitution as envisioned by the Framers. But it also explains the Constitution as applied in contemporary law, which means the book describes how courts have interpreted the Constitution.

Commentary—As California Goes, so Goes the Nation?

If the citizens neglect their duty and place unprincipled men in office, the government will soon be corrupted. — Noah Webster

My wife and I are vacationing in Southern California. The warm and sunny weather has made a perfect respite from the storms lashing our home in Nebraska. We both grew up in California, but moved out-of-state twenty-five years ago. We weren’t fed up with the place. A quarter century ago California was still livable. Actually, California is still livable, as long as you have piles of cash and a fondness for government.

Beltway elites like to fixate on a couple botched 2010 Senate races, but in truth that election was a rout for progressives. Republicans captured an additional 63 seats in the House of Representatives to win the majority, the largest midterm seat change in seventy years. Republicans gained 6 seats in the Senate, but not enough to gain control. Republicans won a record 680 additional seats in state legislatures. Five states saw both chambers switch from Democrat to Republican. In four additional states, Republicans flipped one of the chambers to give them control of both chambers. In three more states, Republicans increased their control in both houses, and in four states they picked up one chamber to split control of the legislature. Republicans also saw a net increase of six governorships to gain a national majority.

Commentary: How to Kill an Economy!

"I'm sure everyone feels sorry for the individual who has fallen by the wayside or who can't keep up in our competitive society, but my own compassion goes beyond that to the millions of unsung men and women who get up every morning, send the kids to school, go to work, try and keep up the payments on their house, pay exorbitant taxes to make possible compassion for the less fortunate, and as a result have to sacrifice many of their own desires and dreams and hopes. Government owes them something better than always finding a new way to make them share the fruit of their toils with others." --Ronald Reagan

When I was an economics major in college, I was taught that Franklin Roosevelt saved capitalism using Keynesian principles. The unchallenged assertion was that the sole reason the Great Depression lasted a decade was because New Dealers were too timid in spending borrowed money. In many economists’ minds, skyrocket spending to win World War II proved conclusively that huge deficits were the cure for slow growth. To a large extent, this is a rewriting of history. It didn’t happen this way.

Instead of spending our way back to wealth, two phenomena saved the American economy. Impending war forced Roosevelt to cease bashing business and the 80^th Congress elected in 1946 balanced the budget and undid the worst aspects of the New Deal.

Freedom’s Forge, How American Business Produced Victory in World War II by Arthur Herman does an excellent job of describing the shift from an anti-business bias to acquiescence of capitalism during Roosevelt’s third term. The new tolerance of a profit motive had a huge impact on the production of war materials. The United States manufactured two-thirds of all weapons and supplies used by the Allies, “yet the output of consumer goods was larger every war year than it had been in 1939, despite the restrictions and rationing. In 1945 Americans ate more meat, bought more shoes and gasoline, and used more electricity than they had before Hitler invaded France … total economic production in the United States had doubled; wages rose by 70 percent.”

Commentary—Debating Jobs is Wrongheaded

“The circulation of confidence is better than the circulation of money.” James Madison

There has been endless debate and angst over the government’s failure to create jobs. This is a dangerous and highly inappropriate debate.

Goals are important. They can mean the difference between success and failure. Improper goals destroy people, organizations, or even nations. The most common error is to set goals based on effect, rather than cause. This is why the jobs debate is dangerous. The government cannot create jobs. It’s true government can hire a person, but the process only shifts money from the private sector to the public sector. Nothing was created.

The public sector has no innate growth potential. It doesn’t invent, innovate or drive productivity. This is because there is no profit motive to drive entrepreneurship. In fact, the only way to gain personal wealth in government service is through corruption.

Commentary—The Nightmare that is ObamaCare

“It will be of little avail to the people, that the laws are made by men of their own choice, if the laws be so voluminous that they cannot be read, or so incoherent that they cannot be understood; if they be repealed or revised before they are promulgated, or undergo such incessant changes that no man, who knows what the law is to-day, can guess what it will be to-morrow. Law is defined to be a rule of action; but how can that be a rule, which is little known, and less fixed?”—James Madison

Rube Goldberg’s cartoons illustrated insanely complex ways to do simple tasks.  He could have been a congressman. The Affordable Care Act may be the most convoluted and tortuous act ever passed by Congress. It is not a law to resolve an issue; it’s an odd conglomeration of features to garner support or stifle resistance. Political bribes to vote for the bill got stacked on top of each other until they built a leaning Tower of Babel.

The law is so complex that members of Congress didn’t read it, journalist didn’t read it, and even the major architects of the plan never read the complete bill. Nancy Pelosi famously said they had to pass the bill to find out what’s in it. There are nearly half a million words in the bill itself, and government agencies have already issued millions of words enacting regulations. And this doesn’t count the words written to delay, alter, or tweak the plan. And this is only a small fraction of ObamaCare’s 800+ directives to develop and issue regulations. Be prepared for chaos.

There is a reason few have read the law. It’s incomprehensible. Remember when the Supreme Court ruled on the constitutionality of the individual mandate. As most people understand the mandate, you either have the minimum allowed coverage or you pay a penalty or tax, depending on the day. Here is a snippet of the text for the individual mandate.

Commentary—A Truly Ugly Precedent

“It has long, however, been my opinion, and I have never shrunk from its expression...that the germ of dissolution of our federal government is in the constitution of the federal Judiciary;...working like gravity by night and by day, gaining a little today and a little tomorrow, and advancing its noiseless step like a thief, over the field of jurisdiction, until all shall be usurped.” Thomas Jefferson

It’s actually very seldom that a Constitutional issue is pure black and white. Home Building & Loan Association v. Blaisdell (1934), was one of those rare cases. In an attempt to stem home and farm foreclosures, Minnesota passed a law which allowed a mortgagor to pay court determined rent that was set well below the contractual mortgage amount. The mortgage holder could take no foreclosure action while the rent was being paid.

The Constitution reads, “No state shall pass any law impairing the obligation of contracts.” During the Constitutional Convention in 1787, foreclosures were rampant, and several states had passed laws that impaired contracts by forcing debtors to accept purposely inflated state-generated paper money as legal tender. The result of these laws put a stranglehold on credit markets, deepening difficult economic times. The Framers didn't want this to happen again. Their intent—and the wording could not be clearer—was to preclude the exact type of action that was taken by Minnesota.

How to protect our rights

“We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.” Declaration of Independence.

As reflected in the Declaration of Independence, and other writings of the period, the Founders believed that rights came from God, not the government. The Founders didn’t believe that governments bestowed rights, nor did they believe governments were an agent to protect rights.

When the Constitutional Convention convened in 1787, the delegates had to figure out how to protect rights and personal liberty from an oppressive government. They knew that rights were fragile. They can be suppressed by force, gradually eroded, or simply lost through neglect.

The original Constitution didn’t include a Bill of Rights. The delegates didn’t believe one was necessary. In their mind, rights were not protected by words, but by limiting governmental power. Montesquieu and Hume advocated separation of power into three equal branches, with each branch having potent checks on all of the other branches. Although this was a well-established theory at the time, no national government was designed along these principles, and existing state constitutions gave overwhelming advantage to the legislature.  Delegates to the convention believed that if they could architect a system consistent with the separation of powers doctrine, give the national government only enumerated powers, and effectively set up the states as checks on the national government, then the national government wouldn’t be able to trample rights or intrude into peoples’ lives.

Commentary—Were The Framers Fears Justified?

"Wherever the real power in a Government lies, there is the danger of oppression." James Madison

An idea is powerful. It can change the world. A great leader may be able to alter the course of history, but without instilling new ideas, the world resumes its old course. When an idea or value is shared by the majority of a community, it becomes a cultural linchpin. That culture will not change until that idea is jerked out of the general consciousness and replace with a different idea.

Constitutionalists share an idea. At one time, most Americans subscribed to this idea, but no longer. What is this idea? Fear of overly powerful government. 

It sounds simple. But this fear was the overriding emotion that drove the Framers to design a republic with limited national powers. Inside the State House, which we now call Independence Hall, the delegates’ fear of government was strong and universal. Their entire focus was on constraining, checking, and decentralizing government power. This had never happened in world history.

James Madison’s Worst Nightmare

“There are again two methods of removing the causes of faction: the one, by destroying the liberty which is essential to its existence; the other, by giving to every citizen the same opinions, the same passions, and the same interests.”

Madison believed the greatest threat to democracy was factions, what we call special interests. This wasn’t a theory; it was an observation he made by studying the demise of democracies down through the ages.  If a faction, or a coalition of factions, gained control of the levers of government, then democracy would collapse on itself—usually sooner, rather than later.

To protect America from this threat, Madison and the other Framers devised a limited republic instead of a democracy. Elected officials would make laws, not the people at large. This put a buffer between unbridled passions and lawmaking. A republican form of government would help, but the true shield would be enumerated, balanced, and decentralized powers with potent checks on abuses. The Framers believed that if they could harness government powers, they would reduce the risk of tyranny. This design of the Framers worked effectively for over two hundred years.

A Danger Greater than Factions

As much as Madison wanted to protect the nation from factions, there was something he feared far more than factions—attempts to eliminate factions.

Factions cannot exist if people do not possess the freedom to form and express opinions. In the above quote, Madison was being facetious with his second method of removing factions. He wanted to emphasize his point that liberty is essential to the existence of factions, and factions are a natural byproduct of a free people.

Democracies can be destroyed by factions; but eliminating the threat requires the withdrawal of the freedom to hold an opinion contrary to the public mood. It may sound like a Catch-22, but the Framers had an answer: let factions thrive, but craft a government that would be enormously difficult to capture as a prize.

We have veered from the Framers design, and now there are few restrictions on federal powers. Constitutional checks and balances are tattered. It may now be possible for a group of determined activists to gain control of an unfettered national government.

Constitutional Speed Bumps

“The powers of government should be so divided and balanced among several bodies of magistracy, as that no one could transcend their legal limits, without being effectually checked and restrained by the others.” Thomas Jefferson

To a degree, each branch of the national government operates in slight fear that another branch will chastise or even overrule its actions. This was an intended consequence of the design. Madison wrote in Federalist 51, “the great security against a gradual concentration of the several powers in the same department consists in giving to those who administer each department the necessary constitutional means and personal motives to resist encroachments of the others. The provision for defense must in this, as in all other cases, be made commensurate to the danger of attack. Ambition must be made to counteract ambition.”

In Madison’s opinion, liberty can only be protected by power restraining power. The Constitution doesn’t contain any language preserving the boundaries of the three branches. It is up to the three branches to defend their independence with their assigned powers.

Let’s take a look at the checks between the three branches, starting with Congress.

The United States Government vs. We the People

“That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed”—Declaration of Independence

In 1776, the world was ruled by royalty. Then some upstart colonialists penned the most revolutionary document in the history of man. The Declaration of Independence flipped the world upside down. The Divine Right of Kings became the consent of the governed. The individual was now endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights. This was a world-shattering concept.

Like most revolutionary visions, this one didn't just suddenly spring onto the world stage. Ironically, the philosophical basis for self-governance came from subjects of the British Crown. John Locke, David Hume, Adam Smith, and Thomas Paine were among many who maintained that this new way of life was ordained by the laws of nature and of nature's God.

The Founders were steeped in this incendiary idea. They believed that all political power emanates from the people. This concept provides the rational for the Declaration of Independence which declared it is the right of the people to institute new government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their safety and happiness.

Top Ten Reasons Government Can’t Cut Spending

“I have accepted a seat in the House of Representatives, and thereby have consented to my own ruin, to your ruin, and the ruin of our children. I give you this warning, that you may prepare your mind for your fate.” John Adams

Why is it so hard to cut government spending?

There are just so many reasons. Here're the top ten excuses carried on a 3x5 card by nearly every politician.

First Principles

Leading Journal of the Enlightenment 

The Enlightenment concepts of first principles and natural rights were important to the Founders. They served as the basis for the Declaration of Independence, the Constitution, the Bill of Rights, and many founding state constitutions and declarations. 

Interestingly, the 9^th and 10^th Amendments are imbued with the Founding Principles, oftentimes called First Principles. The amendments read:

9^th The enumeration in the Constitution of certain rights shall not be construed to deny or disparage others retained by the people.

10^th The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people.

Forty-nine words. That’s all it took for the First Congress to articulate these founding principles:

  

1. Rights naturally reside with people—rights are not bestowed by government
2. Political power comes from the American people—the government has no claim to any power without prior and formal delegation by Americans.
3. Powers are to be dispersed, and balanced between different branches and levels of government.
4. The Constitution is a written agreement intended to restrict government.

Commentary: The Heavy Hand of Government Trumps Capitalism

“The Great Depression, like most other periods of severe unemployment, was produced by government mismanagement rather than by any inherent instability of the private economy.”—Milton Friedman 

If you read the financial press, you can almost hear the gurus scratching their heads. They study past business cycles and can’t understand why robust growth isn’t the order of the day. Since WWII, strong recoveries have always followed recessions. And the deeper the recession, the faster the climb back to prosperity. Considering the depth of our latest crash, we should be rip-roaring into the stratosphere. What’s going on?

All the supposed stimulants have failed. Since December of 2008, interest rates have been near zero. The Fed has pumped so much cash into the economy that all of our wallets ought to be bulging. Bail-outs have increased government control of whole industries. Congress rammed through a huge health care entitlement, and celebrated with the kind of fanfare befitting simultaneous victory over hunger, global warming, and the common cold. Despite horrific deficits, our dear Congress continues to throw money around like it was confetti. Yet underemployment stays embarrassing, productivity is anemic, everyone is husbanding resources, and foreigners lecture us on irresponsible spending.