The Texas Plan

The US Constitution has been amended 27 times. Each of these times, the method has been that Congress passes the amendment, and then three-fourths of the states must ratify the amendment. This is a slow and arduous process. On purpose.

There is another method available, according to the Constitution. Here’s the entirety of Article V of the Constitution, with the relevant option highlighted:

Article V

The Congress, whenever two thirds of both Houses shall deem it necessary, shall propose Amendments to this Constitution, or, on the Application of the Legislatures of two thirds of the several States, shall call a convention for proposing Amendments, which, in either case, shall be valid to all Intents and Purposes, as Part of this Constitution, when ratified by the Legislatures of three fourths of the several States, or by Conventions in three fourths thereof, as the one or the other Mode of Ratification may be proposed by the Congress; Provided that no Amendment which may be made prior to the Year One thousand eight hundred and eight shall in any Manner affect the first and fourth Clauses in the Ninth Section of the first Article; and that no State, without its Consent, shall be deprived of its equal Suffrage in the Senate.

This method, called an Article V Convention, or sometimes a “Convention of States” to propose amendments, is not the same as a “Constitutional Convention.” The latter would be open to rewriting any and all of the Constitution. The Article V Convention would be a call for amending the Constitution in some specific way. It could handle more than one amendment, but only those that the states have called for and have authorized their representatives to discuss. It would be equivalent to Congress presenting a bill to amend the Constitution in one particular way at a time—and if the bill passed, then sending it to the states for the ratification process. Each amendment would require 34 of the 50 states to ratify it before it would take effect.

Texas Governor Greg Abbott
Uncommon Knowledge interview at
Texas Public Policy Foundation

Governor Greg Abbott, of Texas, recently did an Uncommon Knowledge interview, talking about his version, which he calls the Texas Plan. He answers questions about the need for it, the scope, and other concerns.

One concern has been that a convention could get out of hand. But Governor Abbot says that is easily handled by having the states agree beforehand on both the limitation of subject matter and the limitation of time for the ratification process. The states give no authority to deal with issues not previously authorized. And they would agree to a time limit, something like ten years, for the states to handle the ratification.

Governor Abbott explains, “The Texas Plan is not so much a vision to alter the Constitution as it is a call to restore the rule of our current one.” Near the end of the interview, he is quoted from the Texas Plan, saying, “The Constitution itself is not broken. What is broken is our nation’s willingness to obey the Constitution.” So the purpose of all this is to adjust course back to the Constitution.

Governor Abbott’s plan offers these specific possible amendments:

1.       Prohibit Congress from regulating activity that occurs wholly within one State.

2.       Require Congress to balance its budget.

3.       Prohibit administrative agencies—and the unelected bureaucrats that staff them—from creating federal law.

4.       Prohibit administrative agencies—and the unelected bureaucrats that staff them—from preempting state law.

5.       Allow a two-thirds majority of the States to override a U.S. Supreme Court decision.

6.       Require a seven-justice super-majority vote for U.S. Supreme Court decisions that invalidate a democratically enacted law.

7.       Restore the balance of power between the federal and state governments by limiting the former to the powers expressly delegated to it in the Constitution.

8.       Give state officials the power to sue in federal court when federal officials overstep their bounds.

9.       Allow a two-thirds majority of the States to override a federal law or regulation.

In the interview, likely amendments are summarized into three categories: Balanced Budget, Term Limits, and Limiting the Commerce Clause.

Another way to look at the list is addressing the deviations from the Constitution by all three branches of government: legislative, executive, and judicial.

Dealing with the legislative problems (and the Commerce clause), Governor Abbott says this:

What percentage of laws you live under from the federal government are actually even voted on by Congress? The answer is about 6%. About 94% of all the laws, rules, and regulations governing your lives are never even voted on by the people you elect to represent you in Washington, DC. That goes back, and violates a rule that even predates the United States of America Congress. If you go back to John Locke, and maybe even before Locke, it talks about the compact between the people and those they elect to represent them. And the people you elect to represent you are accountable to you. You should be able to hire and fire them based upon what they do.

That’s not how our government works. The laws that we live under are passed by unaccountable, unelected bureaucrats who run the EPA, the IRS—all these alphabet soup federal government agencies. I think that’s wrong, and what I propose is that no agency rule has any binding effect unless and until it is voted on by the United States Congress.

The legislative branch has ceded its lawmaking authority to the executive branch. Governor Abbott says, about these executive branch bureaucracies,

They make the law; they adjudicate the law; and they enforce the law. That was defined by Madison as tyranny itself. Our federal government has transformed into the very definition of tyranny by Madison, by having all three branches of government consigned into one, and that one branch is unelectable and unaccountable.

The solution, he says, it to have every agency regulation null and void until it is passed by legislative vote.

Because Governor Abbott was a state supreme court justice, followed by more than a decade as Texas Attorney General, suing the federal government and standing up to the bullying, he is especially effective talking about the overreach of the US Supreme Court. Here’s part of the interview:

Peter Robinson: The Texas Plan and the Supreme Court. I’m going to quote you from that 92-page document…. “The Supreme Court was for the most part able to control its ambitions for the first 170 years of our nation’s history. But in modern America, the policy preferences of five robed unelected septuagenarians will trump even the most politically popular legislation on any topic—from voting rights to abortion to religion to speech to criminal procedure to guns to healthcare to the environment.” I read that, and I thought, that’s the angriest sentence in this document. It’s the Supreme Court that really gets you, doesn’t it?

Governor Abbott: If you think that’s angry, you need to read this book. [holds up Broken but Unbowed, a book he has just written] I’ve got a lot more in there, where I fully expose the Supreme Court for what it has become….

Let me ask a question:… How many votes does it take to amend the Constitution? The audience knows the answer here. Most people think, well, it’s two thirds of the House and then three-fourths of the states. The fact is, the Constitution is amended every single year by five votes, of five liberal judges, sitting on the United States Supreme Court. If Madison and Hamilton saw that happening, they would never have created the system that we have now.

If we can’t trust our representatives in Washington to do straighten out the mess, then this is a remedy worth trying. Governor Abbott noted that, while it hasn’t been used before to amend the Constitution, it has been tried—at least twice. Once, a century ago, related to the 17^th Amendment, which came within one state of calling for the convention when the House decided to put forth the amendment themselves, rather than be forced. And a similar situation happened during the Reagan administration.

As Governor Abbott says near the conclusion:

It’s never too late. It’s never too large. Never too impossible. That was the attitude that Hamilton and Madison and Franklin and George Washington had. This is America. This isn’t some other country. This is a country where we can do anything—once we realize the necessity of doing it.

He tells the story of one person, who was responsible for getting the 27^th Amendment passed. And, when asked about his own handicap, he used the story as a parallel. Who would have thought that someone could go from a hospital bed, following a freak accident that left him paralyzed, to eventually becoming governor of the twelfth largest economy in the world. He was broken, but unbowed.

In the last Texas legislative session, a bill to propose a convention of the states to amend the US Constitution made it out of the House but not the Senate. This year, since it is a priority of the governor, it is likely to pass. Many states have already passed similar bills, and other states are somewhere in the process.

I’ve been slowly learning about this issue. I recommend the Uncommon Knowledge interview [below] as a primer. And read The Texas Plan. Governor Abbott’s new book Broken but Unbowed: The Fight to Fix a Broken America is likely to be another great resource. And for the past several years, people have been turning to Mark Levin’s book The Liberty Amendments: Restoring the American Republic.

I suggest getting up to speed quickly, and then doing some citizen lobbying to get your state on board for an Article V convention of the states to amend the Constitution—while there’s still an American Constitution to restore.

A Parent's Job

So, you’re a parent of school-age children. Suppose you have a family situation where you can’t take a vacation during summer, because of the job of one of the parents. But there is a week you can take off during a week in April, say. You look at your children’s grades and attendance records, and you make the decision to go to take a well-earned trip to Disney World. The kids will miss a full week of classes. You meet with their teachers and arrange for work to be made up. And you go make some good family memories.

And then you get fined for failing to have your child attend school, a criminal offense.

That’s ridiculous, so you take it to court. And you win, because a court isn’t going to go all the way to the logical conclusion that letting your child do something other than school for even a single day is criminal parental behavior.

This was big news in Britain on Friday.

A couple of days later, on a British news show, there was another educational issue that came up. As I recall, it was about a parent’s choice to take a child out of a failing neighborhood school and go into a school of the parents’ choice. The newsperson thought this was fair and right. But when she was asked about the outcome of the vacationing father’s case, she thought that was wrong. It would encourage other parents to take their kids out of school for holidays. The news people agreed that there was a limit to what sensible people could allow parents to do, and compulsory education was for a good reason.

Meanwhile, back in the US, the president put forth an ultimatum regarding his latest social agenda item. He sent out a decree to all public school districts in the country, threatening to cut off federal funding for education to any that did not comply with the requirement to allow self-proclaimed transgender students to use the bathroom and showers of their choice.

Texas Governor Greg Abbott responded, “I announce today that Texas is fighting this. Obama can’t rewrite the Civil Rights Act. He’s not a king.”

So maybe it’s time to think about education.

Let’s start with a basic question: Who has the natural right to see to the care and upbringing of their children?

If you believe the parent has that responsibility, you’re in the freedom zone. If you believe the government has that responsibility, you’re in the tyranny zone.

If you’re thinking, “Yeah, but it’s in everybody’s interest if we educate the next generation. And we can’t expect all parents to take care of that—or be able to. So we’ve agreed together to do that,” then you’re partially right, but there’s more to it if you follow the thought through.

Yes, we all have an interest in an educated populace. But that doesn’t automatically give the responsibility to the government. And yes, there are some parents who will not or cannot provide for the education of their own children. But, as an alternative to government monopoly, wouldn’t it be better to help only those incapable of affording education, and taking responsibility away from only those parents who have proven to be negligent?

Let’s assume we’re in agreement that, a) education isn’t a government responsibility; it is a parental responsibility with societal help as needed; b) to the extent any government participates in education, it should be the most local level possible and should exclude the federal level.

Given that, the next question is, how do we get there from here?

The answer, as usual, is to limit government to its proper role and allow the free market to find innovative solutions.

So then the next question is how.

I’m not sure of the answer, but a week and a half ago I spent a day talking with Heritage Foundation visitors to Houston. They were here to listen—I got to talk education one-on-one for a couple of hours, before even hearing from their panel and then evening speaker, Jim DeMint. Part of their purpose was to introduce an idea that I’m beginning to consider.

Have you heard of ESAs? That’s Educational Savings Accounts (or other meanings for the letters, depending on where you are, but with that general idea). It’s similar to a medical savings account—money that follows the child, that can be used in various approved ways for the education of that child.

This is already being tried in five states. In Arizona, it started with special needs students. It took 90% of their state funding (leaving alone their local and federal money) and gave it to the parents. The parent could leave the child in the local public school program, but they had the option to take the allotted money and spend it one some combination of tuition, tutoring, therapy, classes, and educational equipment. This could include, maybe, a parochial school plus tutoring and equine therapy (which helps rewire the brain).

Educational Savings Account in use
photo found here

One example we were given showed the parents being allotted some $19,000 of the total $21,000 (the amount spent by the state on each special needs student in public schools), to use as best they could. They were able to provide very well, doing all they had intended—and had about $2000 left over for the year.

This leftover could be spent later in the year, or rollover to the next year, or accrue for the child to use for a college education.

Arizona expanded its program beyond special needs. As the money is made available to families to use as they choose, the market responds. And competition drives both innovation and lower prices.

Heritage was suggesting to Texas that we endeavor to persuade the legislature to initiate an ESA program, and that we set it up from the start to include all students who choose it, including homeschool and private school students, whose family’s currently pay taxes for their children’s educations, which they do not benefit from, and additionally have to pay out-of-pocket for their expenses.

I’m hoping to consider this in more detail in the future—with my notes in hand, and with some of the data and charts that Heritage showed us. But I was heartened to see that people have been thinking about marketplace solutions to free us from the government monopoly of education.

If we’re able to find ways to get better and cheaper ways to educate our children, that is good for everyone. If we’re able to return the responsibility and choice to parents, bypassing the federal government and its social engineering coercion—that’s priceless.

The Demise of the Constitutional Republic

Since the world essentially crashed last Tuesday, I guess I should respond to that.

I’m referring to Ted Cruz suspending his campaign after the Indiana primary.

Ted Cruz suspends his campaign
image from here

Yes, I’m in mourning. As a lover of the US Constitution—and its purpose in getting us to freedom, prosperity, and civilization—Tuesday was the end of hope. There’s still the convention to come, technically, but….

I had hoped that the American people would have the opportunity to have a day-and-night clear choice between freedom, prosperity, and civilization versus tyranny, poverty, and savagery. That’s what the presidential election would have looked like with Ted Cruz on our side. He is the most consistently constitutional conservative candidate in my lifetime. The hope was for some recovery of the country we have been missing for at least a decade.

My realization, last week, was that my faith in the American people was misplaced. We hadn’t even moved toward the work of convincing Democrats that the Constitution was the way to get to prosperity and freedom. We got stuck at convincing some 40% of Republicans that the Constitution—and human decency—mattered enough to care about.

We didn’t win that debate. A plurality of Republicans joined with the totality of Democrats to choose some authoritarian, bullying, lying, pushy tyrant.

The choice has already been made. It doesn’t much matter who wins in November; the option of returning to the Constitution and getting out of the mire is now off the table.

But the pressure hasn’t ended. It’s coming at us Ted Cruz supporters from those who ought to be on our team, from our party. They’re saying if we don’t join them in voting for a progressive, lying, narcissistic tyrant, it will be our fault if we get a progressive, lying, narcissistic tyrant as our president. Ironic.

Here is what hasn’t happened: Donald Trump has not reached out to say he would welcome people like me. Instead, he has said there are some people he’d just as soon did not unite with his Republican Party:

I am confident that I can unite much of it. Some of it, I don't want. There were statements made about me that those people can go away and maybe come back in eight years after we serve two terms….

Honestly, there are some people I really don't want. I don't think it's necessary. People would be voting for me, they're not voting for the party.

So, if you didn’t fawn over him, you’re not welcome in the party of Reagan and Lincoln. Or whatever party it is now that he has made it anew.

Clearly it is not on me to forego my morals and join such a person. Unless I’m the kind of person who enjoys subjecting myself to abuse.

There are arguments from fellow Republicans, who suggest we must vote for Trump to avoid Hillary. Too late. But, let’s hear their arguments, out of respect. Because I really do respect many of these people, and keep looking to see if I’ve missed something.

Supreme Court: You have to vote for Trump, because the next president will get several chances to appoint Supreme Court justices, and we could lose the court for a generation or longer. This was a very good argument for voting for Cruz in our primary; he knows how to select a constitutional originalist. Trump does not; he seems unaware of the concept. Will his appointees be as anti-law as Hillary’s? I don’t know. But I expect there is zero possibility of getting any justices more law-abiding than Justice Kennedy. In other words, a vote for Trump guarantees we will lose the court for a generation or longer.

It’s done. We warned you. You didn’t think it was important enough to vote for Cruz instead of Trump. So, don’t blame us.

The Border: Hillary is going to continue the open-borders, invite-illegals-in status quo policy. Trump claims he will build a wall. And make Mexico pay for it. Which may be necessary, because he does nothing to work with Congress to provide him funding for whatever he wants to do. But his policy for illegals has been a temporarily-deport-and-invite-back policy that is more of a PR stunt than a solution. It's a lot of tough bully talk, but it isn’t an actual policy or plan.

Here in Texas we have been defending our own border for a while. Ted Cruz, a Texan, had a real plan. But we weren’t given that option. Because of Trump voters. It’s not on me. I’ll continue to work toward Texans protecting ourselves regardless of continued failure of the federal government to meet its obligations.

Foreign Policy: Hillary is a disaster in foreign policy: Benghazi. Russia. Arab Spring. No one in their right mind ought to trust her anywhere near foreign policy. Her cavalier failure to protect government secret documents is the final nail in that coffin. But Trump approves of Putin, likes his style. Thinks the deal with Iran might be OK, but he would have made a “better deal,” though without giving details. In other words, he doesn’t understand what principles to talk about related to the deal, but we should trust him because he knows about real estate. He threatens to annihilate ISIS members—and their families and children. Targeting noncombatants isn’t what we do, nor is torture, but he’s in favor of that, and he says the military will do whatever he orders them to do, “Believe me,” he says.

Hillary will be bad; but she will try to claim she’s doing good. Trump will be bad; and he’s telling you how bad. Is it all bravado? Maybe. But voting for someone because you don’t think they’ll do what they say is not wisdom. That’s not on me. Can he convince me otherwise? Not if he’s unwilling to try, because gaining the goodwill of people like me doesn’t matter to him.

The Economy: Hillary is a socialist. Hardcore in favor of controlling the economy. Get rid of capitalism. Let government decide who gets government’s favor or disapproval based on support of the administration’s preferences. Trump is a cronyist. Sometimes that’s called “crony capitalism,” but that confuses things. Crony capitalism isn’t free market capitalism; it’s government deciding who gets government’s favor or disapproval based on who supports the administration’s preferences. Sounds familiar.

Please don’t insult my intelligence by saying I should vote for Trump, because otherwise it’s a vote for Hillary, and that would be disastrous. Yes, I agree she would be disastrous; she’s clearly the worst candidate the Democrats have put forward in my life memory. Almost anyone the Republicans put forward should theoretically be able to beat her. 

But the Republicans didn’t choose a Republican; they chose Trump. I don’t believe Trump can beat her (she got about three times as many votes in his home state as he got in the primaries). And in a hypothetical world in which he actually won, I believe that would also be a disaster for America.

It’s already too late to bother about the presidency. There’s no silver lining. It is as bad and depressing as it sounds.

The principle should be to vote for the strongest anti-tyranny candidate you can. In this case, you get certain tyranny either way. So stop calling us “treasonous” for not jumping on the Trump train. 

I’m not giving up the quest for freedom, prosperity, and civilization. We vetted a lot of good people on our primary ballot in Texas, and we need to support those state and local candidates.

This past week I’ve begun looking at the level where it’s possible to make a difference. I’m fortunate to live in Texas. We’re big enough and strong enough to resist federal tyranny—if we can maintain the will.

As one fellow Cruz supporter said,

Real Cruz supporters can't possibly support Trump. What we can do, however, is continue to stand for Cruz's (and our) principles: the conservative principles that have made America and every other Western country great.

Those principles work at any level. The higher the level where those principles are at work, the more freedom there is for the lower levels to work, without interference. Our founding fathers set that in motion for the nation, and we had a good long run. I mourn the loss of our constitutional republic. But maybe strengthening the lower levels will lead others to follow suit, leading to some future rebuilding and returning to the Constitution. So we may have lost, but we haven’t succumbed.

I expect to write very little about the presidential election after this, since it has become a moot point. I don’t intend to try to persuade people to my view. People are free to differ with me on what to do in November. I think I’ll look into procedures for write-ins, and take a look at third party candidates, just in case there’s an option better than leaving the presidential race blank. But I won’t stay home; I’ll vote, because the rest of my ballot was vetted by people who voted mostly for Cruz. The rest of the Republicans on the ballot will be far better choices than the Democrats, and they’ll deserve my vote.

I don't know what life looks like going forward. I wake up thinking, "So this is what people in other countries feel like." But there's still good that can be effected by continuing to work toward the northern hemisphere goal of freedom, prosperity, and civilization. And so far we're not prevented from speaking out and persuading others to join us in our efforts.

So, it's a time to mourn. But it's not a time to stop living.

Hardening the Grid

Two years ago I wrote about the book One Second After, by William R. Forstchen, which novelizes the aftermath of an electromagnetic pulse (EMP) strike. It’s time to write about that issue again.

Frank Gaffney
photo from
Center for Security Policy

This past Saturday I was privileged to sit in a room with some influential people, and listen to Frank Gaffney, Founder and President of the Center for Security Policy, a national security think tank; Dr. Peter Pry, Executive Director of the Task Force on National and Homeland Security, a Congressional advisory board dedicated to protecting the US from an EMP attack and other threats; and others who were trying to get us informed about this issue.

Here’s the short of it: an EMP is a super surge that fries electrical systems. It’s like a lightning strike—only much much more powerful and much more widespread. It can affect any unprotected electronics, from giant transformers down to phones, computers, appliances, cars, and the whole gamut. It can mean that a large portion of our infrastructure—the electric grid—is vulnerable, leaving everything we use electricity for ruined.

There are natural and man-made threats. The natural threat comes from the sun: solar flares. Not just any flare, but really big ones, called a coronal mass ejection. The size to be concerned about is called Carrington class, named for a really big one that happened in 1859, taking down the telegraph system. Telegraph units burst into flame. Even trans-Atlantic underwater cables were affected.

We weren’t at that time dependent on electricity as part of our infrastructure, like we are today. Estimates now predict that loss of power could lead to the deaths of up to 90% of the population in a relatively short time—a few weeks or months. Our food, transportation, communications, and sometimes even air and water depend on electricity. People dependent on electricity for medical conditions might be most immediately affected. It could take up to several years (not days, weeks, or months) to rebuild infrastructure—assuming that the resources still exist outside the affected area.

Dr. Peter Pry
photo from Center for Security Policy

How likely is a large coronal mass ejection? Likely. In 2012 we had the largest one since 1859, and two years ago we had a near miss. It’s sort of like waiting for an earthquake. Chances are, at some point, the big one(s) will come. In the meantime, you can ignore the danger, but ignoring it does nothing to alleviate the threat. Such a solar flare would travel to us at a speed of 3 million miles per hour, so we would have nearly no warning time to prepare.

The man-made threat comes from a nuclear explosion above the atmosphere. Our enemies know our vulnerability. Enemies include North Korea, Iran, Russia, China, and any other bad actors with nuclear capabilities or seeking them. This type of attack is more likely than a nuclear missile attack on land. And since most of our defense technology depends on electricity, our ability to respond would be compromised.

The awareness of our vulnerability has actually been there a while. One of our speakers on Saturday was Texas State Senator Bob Hall, who gave us some history. Back after he graduated from the Citadel, in the 1960s, as a second lieutenant, he worked on the Minuteman Missile program. The Pentagon had become aware that their high altitude tests knocked out power in the islands below. 

Meanwhile, Russian tests knocked out power in the Soviet Union. That led to agreements to halt high altitude tests (underground testing continued after that). So, with the awareness that electronics were vulnerable, Senator Hall’s job was to protect—harden—the missiles.

He eventually left the military and never talked about this, because it had been highly classified. And then a few years ago people started talking about it openly. And he realized it was something he felt called to act on. He calls himself a “recovering political apathetic.” He stepped out of what he retirement, took on being a state senator—and in the last legislative session he carried the bill dealing with this issue.

Even though it’s a trans-partisan issue (we all use electricity, and we’re all vulnerable to the loss of our electricity), it’s just barely reaching people’s awareness. Issues often take multiple times in the legislature to get through. But we remain vulnerable as long as this isn’t handled.

Let me spell out a few important details. Hardening the grid is not technologically difficult. It’s something like putting metal in the right places, so that a surge would hit the metal rather than the electronics within. A Faraday cage is a simple version—scalable to use at home.

We learned Saturday that your home microwave can be used as a Faraday cage—to protect your essential medical equipment or something else, of course only when the microwave is not in use. Another simple home version can be a metal garbage can. Whatever you place inside should be placed in a plastic bag or container, so the electrical object doesn’t touch the metal walls of the can.

Nor is hardening the grid expensive. The entire US could have the basic grid protected for $2 billion. If we gave up a single unconstitutional regulatory program, we could immediately pay for it. Greater protection of the entire infrastructure could cost up to $20 billion. But that investment could come eventually; the immediate insurance should be the basic grid.

There are three electric grids covering the contiguous US states: the eastern grid handles about 75% of the population. The rest is covered by the western grid and the Texas grid. Yes, Texas has its own independent grid. We have no federal oversight. It is our responsibility. We can protect ourselves, regardless of what the federal government does or does not do.

Electricity is essentially a private industry product—85% private in the US. And those of us talking about it are free-market anti-harmful-government-regulation types on principle. So what’s going on? One question that came up Saturday was, why don’t the utility companies do something about this?

The answer isn’t exactly simple. Already in Texas, government officials have offered the money necessary to harden the grid—at no cost to the utilities. And the utilities said, “No thanks; we have it under control.” To this, Senator Hall asked directly if they were ready to be audited for an EMP attack; they obfuscated.

Their workers, board members, and owners will all be subject to the same loss of life and civilization as the rest of us. Yet they refuse to act.

One explanation is that these companies aren’t run by engineers; they’re run by lawyers. Their priority is to protect against liability. In a way, responding that they know the danger exists is an admission that they should have already protected the grid. So refusing to act is a way of refusing to admit knowledge—so their liability is safe.

The best answer I heard Saturday was from Dr. Pry, that the electrical industry is acting similarly to other industries in history. The zeppelin industry insisted on hydrogen, and refused to pay a little extra for helium, claiming they were so careful, an accident would never happen. Until it did. And then the industry was destroyed entirely.

The automobile industry didn’t put safety glass in cars, and seat bests and other safety measures—until public demand followed by government regulation forced them to.

Union Carbide pesticides are another example. They went to Bhopal, India, where they were free from regulation. Until they had an accident resulting in many deaths. This cost them $100 million that they could have saved if they had taken the required safety measures.

There is a natural reaction—put this off. Don’t think about it now. Maybe nothing bad will ever happen.

If the public demands grid hardening from the utility companies, it will happen. But maybe not soon enough. Maybe not until government regulation forces them.

So, that brings us to the what-can-we-do question. It’s time for some citizen lobbying.

There’s an awareness at the national level. At least eleven studies have led to the consensus: “The nation’s bulk power distribution system can be disrupted or destroyed over large areas due to various man-caused and naturally occurring phenomena.[i]” The Shield Act, to harden the grid, has come up in several legislative sessions. But it hasn’t gotten through both houses. The threat of an EMP strike was mentioned by Ted Cruz during one of the presidential debates. All of the Republican candidates have been briefed on the issue,but no one else has made it a priority.

Call your representative and senators; let them know you’re aware of the issue, care about it, see it as essential—and you will hold them responsible.

If you’re in Texas, contact your state representative and state senator. Let them know how urgent you believe this is. If we work during the next several months, we can get them to make it a priority in the next legislative session. Let them know that Senator Bob Hall will be carrying this bill again, and encourage them to sign on with him.

But that means we’re looking at the legislative session that starts January 2017. Most legislation that actually gets through that session gets implemented around September 2017, or even later. That’s another year and a half away, during which something could happen.

This could be handled by executive order. The necessary budget for handling this critical infrastructure could be diverted from other infrastructure funding—right away. Since offering help to the electrical industry hasn’t worked, and since protecting infrastructure is an essential government function, if we let Governor Abbott and Lieutenant Governor Dan Patrick know we care about this, we can get action much sooner.

If you’re in another state, press your governor to act. Once one governor acts, others will begin to follow.

Guilty Knowledge
by Frank Gaffney

If you need more information to take on this issue with knowledge, there’s a short book by Frank Gaffney, published by the Center for Security Policy, called Guilty Knowledge: What the US Government Knows about the Vulnerability of the Electric Grid, But Refuses to Fix. For updates and more information, try their website SecureTheGrid.com.

There’s also the Forstchen book I mentioned earlier; even though it’s a novel, it contains notes on what’s real and where to find that info. As I was researching today I came across a book called A Nation Forsaken: EMP—the Escalating Threat of an American Catastrophe, by F. Michael Maloof. I haven’t read it, but it looks informative.

Last Tuesday, April 26^th, on the Glenn Beck Show, he talked about this issue and other disasters with some experts, including what you can do to protect and prepare yourself at home if the government and utilities refuse to act. I believe he made that episode available without a subscription.

Among the suggestions for preparing for any disaster: have some food and water available to get you by for a while. Start with a three-day kit. Extend to a month. And then extend to a year if you can.

We have been prudent and done that, for a couple of decades, at our house. Long enough that a good portion reached its expiration date. We resupplied about eight years ago. But by then I was pretty limited in my diet. I need a refrigerator in order to eat without poisoning myself. So I’d much prefer hardening the grid—in time—to depending on my personal preparedness.

If you’re not ready to go off grid and live off the land, then this is the time and the issue to take on with citizen lobbying.

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[i] From the foreword of Guilty Knowledge, Frank J. Gaffney, Jr., p. 6.

Identity

Earlier this month I read an essay by Robert George, “Transgenderism,'Marriage Equality,' and Liberalism’s Tragic Error”—an excerpt from his recent book Conscience and Its Enemies. It’s philosophical, but I think it’s relevant to issues we’re dealing with. Issues we shouldn’t, if we’re sane, have to be dealing with, but here we are.

The essence of the essay is that there are two warring beliefs about who we are as humans: we are either mental energy in a random physical body—George refers to this as “nonbodily persons inhabiting nonpersonal bodies,”—or we are made up of a mind and body together, “a dynamic unity: a personal body, a bodily self.”

The difference is important, he says, because, “Whether in the courts, on campus, or at boardroom tables, it significantly shapes the expressive individualism and social liberalism that are dominant among elites.”

Christianity in general has rejected the nonbodily identity, in a similar way that Aristotle veered from Plato on the issue. As George continues:

The living body, far from being our external instrument, is part of our personal reality. So while it cannot exist apart from the soul—which is its substantial form—the body is not inferior. It shares in our personal dignity. The idea of the soul as the substantial form of the body is orthodox Christianity’s alternative to the heretical conception of the soul as a “ghost in the machine.” One can separate living body from soul in analysis but not in fact; we are body-soul composites.

My religion has something specific to say on this as well: we are who we are from before being born in a body; gaining a body is progress in becoming more like our Father in Heaven. This is the second paragraph of “The Family: A Proclamation to the World”:

All human beings—male and female—are created in the image of God. Each is a beloved spirit son or daughter of heavenly parents, and, as such, each has a divine nature and destiny. Gender is an essential characteristic of individual premortal, mortal, and eternal identity and purpose.

George’s piece is about the liberal elite view of marriage—based on what the mind wants to create and be, rather than what is biological or real. He is a mentor of Ryan Anderson, and one of the best minds on marriage today.

But I’m going to use these ideas to talk about a different letter of the LBGT etc. alphabet: the T.

found here

It is my belief that we are in this life who we were when Heavenly Father created our spirits, and this included our maleness or femaleness. It’s not a matter of which body we got randomly put into. It is part of who we have always been and who we will always be. God does not mistakenly put us into the wrong body.

That means that, if a person thinks they are a gender other than what they biologically and to the core of their soul are, then they have a mental problem, accurately called gender confusion.

It is not possible to change gender. Gender comes up in every cell of the body. Genetically a person will continue to have a Y chromosome or not. What can be done is chemical and surgical mutilation of a body that will continue to have in all its cells that Y chromosome or not.

With that reality in place, the question becomes, how do we treat people who claim to be a different gender than they are?

The human dignity answer is, treat them with kindness and dignity, but as who they really are when confronted. This would include allowing them the same natural rights as the rest of us, but ends at creating special rights that encourage their delusion or negatively affect the natural rights of the rest of us.

It could include better mental health science and research to help them in whatever way will lead away from self-harm and toward a fully functional human life of contribution and joy.

However, the politically dictated answer is, we go along with their delusion, no matter how that inconveniences the rest of us, and no matter how harmful to the gender confused person.

As I mentioned earlier this month, adults who have gone through surgical and hormonal reassignment suffer 20 times greater rates of suicide than those who don’t undergo a chemical and/or surgical change. Wouldn’t it be kinder—healthier for the gender confused person—to treat the mental illness, to help them come to terms with reality, rather than to indulge their delusion?

The American College of Pediatricians recently called it child abuse to submit children to gender reassignment, since 98% of gender confused boys and 88% of gender confused girls eventually accept their biological sex after naturally passing through puberty. Isn’t it kinder to deal with the child’s confusion as an error that can be corrected, rather than indulge the error and deepen the damage that could otherwise have self-corrected?

So, let’s start the “bathroom” question with the assumption that accepting the delusion is more damaging and less kind than indulging it.

We dealt with the bathroom question this past year in Houston. To remind you, the lesbian then-mayor of Houston had pushed through an ordinance, purportedly for “equal rights,” that imposed a demand on all places with public restrooms or locker rooms to allow self-identified transgendered people to use their choice of facilities. The people immediately gathered signatures to put the issue before the people on the ballot to repeal the bill. Mayor Anise Parker illegally threw out the signatures, but was overruled by the courts. She tried to intimidate local pastors by demanding copies, transcripts, and recordings of their sermons and communications so she could look for words against her agenda. Again the courts slapped her down. In November the issue was put before the people and her bill was repealed, in part because it was successfully accurately renamed “the bathroom bill,” rather than “equal rights.”

People in a liberal city that had already twice reelected a homosexual mayor did not want to force all businesses and public places to force women and girls to share intimate places such as bathrooms—and even more shockingly gym locker rooms--with “self-identified transgendered” men.

The worry has not been about transgendered people, who are not only rare, but are not necessarily sexual predators (are probably not—although they are likely to still be attracted to the actual opposite sex, whom they’re sharing these private places with). It is that there is no way to identify the difference, and it takes away the rights of women and girls to feel safe. The law should not label a woman as a bigoted lawbreaker because as a punishment for feeling uncomfortable or threatened by a man. It should be obvious that is an infringement of her rights, and a loss of her freedom—as well as for those who care about the endangered women and girls.

In locker rooms, where private parts are more likely to be exposed, women—and particularly minors in schools—absolutely should not be exposed to the naked opposite-sex body and have no privacy from that person. Many of us thought the most traumatic part of going to junior high was being forced to shower and change in front of others of the same sex. (I’m told guys never had this same issue, but I’m telling you it was a normal fear and feeling among females.) A person who feels such natural modesty should not be told they’re the mentally ill ones, while the gender confused or the blatantly lying predator is protected.

We will not eradicate gender confusion, any more than we’re likely to eradicate depression, schizophrenia, or other mental illnesses. While we can work toward treatment, we meanwhile want to live kindly among suffering people.

We’ve actually been dealing with “transgendered” men in women’s restrooms for a long time. If they are serious about looking like the opposite sex, mostly they have been tolerated in the opposite-sex restroom, without a law. And good parents have been taking precautions in all restrooms all along: women take young boys in the women’s restroom with them. Once their boys are too old to do that, the mom waits just outside, within hearing range, and makes sure not too much time has passed. And boys have been taught how to avoid predators in those spaces. It’s not as ideal as being able to magically identify all predators and quarantine them, but failing that it has sufficed.

But females are more vulnerable, biologically, to sexual predators. It makes no sense to increase the vulnerability and then to shame them for noticing.

It seems like a parallel universe, that we are needing to discuss this obvious truth: men and women are different, and being separate in intimately private settings is respectful and important for safety. But a decade or two ago it was unthinkable that we would redefine marriage as something in which maleness and femaleness was irrelevant.

The “nonbodily persons inhabiting nonpersonal bodies” believers have the media megaphone. They are shoving their ideologies down our throats. But we don’t have to swallow.

The Emperor's New Clothes
illustration found here

If we don’t speak up wherever we can, we lose our freedoms. We need more of the honest child who stands up and says, “The Emperor has no clothes!” In the Hans Christian Anderson story, once the child spoke the words, everybody else gave up their pretense and embraced the truth. We need that to happen.

Establishment and Grassroots

Sometimes there are words we assume we understand, but that aren’t clearly or easily defined. Establishment and grassroots are two of these. They are supposedly opposite, but lately establishment has been used as an epithet to silence disagreement from elsewhere in the grassroots, which is the exact opposite of what grassroots is about. So, let’s define and examine for clarity.

The term Establishment identifies an amorphous controlling elite. Lately this refers to those in the Republican Party, particularly in Washington, DC, who have a different agenda than the rank-and-file Republican citizen. Assumed to belong are the party leadership and leadership in the US Congress and Senate. Sometimes Paul Ryan, recently chosen to replace John Boehner as House Majority Leader, is included, and sometimes he’s exempted. He was chosen because he was acceptable to both the establishment and the non-establishment.

But it can’t be that being in a particular position automatically makes someone establishment. That would require, instead, some beliefs and attitudes in addition to position. Otherwise it would be pointless to try to elect people who share grassroots ideas into positions of leadership.

So, for our purposes, maybe we need to identify the beliefs and attitudes. There’s not an overriding authority, so this is from my observations.

The GOP Establishment consists of House and Senate members, sometimes including leadership, who focus on party power more than on party purpose—plus some lobbyists, crony capitalists, and various opinion makers who share an agenda with the rest of the establishment. Sometimes the difference in beliefs is as slight as wanting to go the right direction, but wanting to do it slowly and incrementally rather than suddenly. In other words, change slowly rather than radically.

But sometimes it’s more a matter of wanting to keep the status quo—quite a lot of power in Washington, DC, regardless of authority from the Constitution. And sometimes it’s a matter of going along with Democrat ideas because the media makes it seem that is what the public wants, so, to maintain power, going that direction but slower than the Democrats go there.

Staying where we are or going further the wrong direction are not acceptable to the grassroots.

Came across this on Facebook;
can't locate origin, but found here

Grassroots ideas, or political movements or campaigns, start and grow from the local community. This includes the grassroots of a party. I need to repeat that: the grassroots include ideas, movements, and campaigns within a party. The definition includes where the movement comes from: from local people in communities. They share the idea—or word about a candidate—with friends. This could look like local clubs and meetings, like my local Tea Party, where we hear from candidates and speakers, plus share ideas with each other. Or it could be what we do at precinct meetings, when we elect delegates for the next level up and propose ideas that we’d like to have included in the party platform. It might also include sharing our opinions on social media, or going around to people in our precinct to get them educated and registered to vote.

Grassroots ideas tend to come from people dissatisfied with the status quo. So they’re likely to disagree with any establishment in the “maintain our own power” camp of keeping the status quo.

Grassroots in the Republican Party is conservative in ways outside the status quo box. The Grassroots want smaller government—like you’d get if you actually followed the Constitution. Grassroots want lower taxes and less government spending. And less regulation interfering with innovation and entrepreneurship. Or interference with personal beliefs and opinions—like those listed in the First Amendment and the other Bill of Rights amendments.

It’s possible for grassroots movements to be extreme. Most associated with Democrats are. But it is not extreme to value the basic law of our country—the Constitution.

Grassroots tend to be made up of people committed to their communities, and to taking action to make things better. So, at the local level—precinct chairs, for example—you’re likely to find conservative grassroots ideas being shared around.

At least that has been my experience everywhere I’ve been involved. I started going to precinct conventions (by another name in a different state) as soon as I was old enough to vote. I first became a delegate to a county convention in 1984. Then we lived briefly in a couple of states where I never figured out how to get involved. Then, in yet another state, Mr. Spherical Model became a precinct chair. Both of us were delegates at the county convention. He went to the state convention several times. In Texas I started attending precinct conventions—and district and state conventions—as soon as I figured out how. And now I’m a precinct chair.

So I’m involved in my party. And I have been for decades. When the Tea Party showed up in 2010, I started attending, to make connections and to educate myself as a voter. But it has turned out that I also get to express my opinions quite a lot. During the past three legislative sessions I’ve led a group of us in following legislation and expressing our opinions to Texas lawmakers as citizen lobbyists.

Not all Tea Party people have been involved as long as I have. Some just woke up after Obama’s election and imposition of atrocities like Obamacare. And we have a range of opinions, although I’d say they’re nearly all in the Republican-to-Libertarian range, with not much (if any) overlap with the Democrat-to-Socialist range.

But the reason for my post today comes from a misunderstanding—or misrepresentation being exploited—by some newer to politics who think anyone involved with parties is corrupt establishment.

Some of this misrepresentation comes directly from the Trump campaign, which might indicate whether it’s actually grassroots or not. But they’re trying to convince the relatively new “activist” followers of Trump that no one who disagrees can be trusted.

About a contested convention, which happens if no candidate gets over 50% of the total delegates before the convention, there are no “brokers,” or establishment powers who get to override all those delegates and the voters who sent them to the convention.

On the first ballot, the delegates from most states are required to vote for the candidate they’re assigned to as a result of primary voting. Some states require the delegate to remain with that candidate for more than one ballot.

But when no candidate wins a majority of delegates on the first ballot, many—probably most—are free to vote their personal choice on the next ballot. And the next. Until a candidate wins a majority. There’s no stealing involved. The delegate was elected because of his/her leanings. Elected by delegates at lower levels, reaching to the most local grassroots.

Of the remaining candidates, longtime grassroots Republicans are much more likely to choose Ted Cruz, because he is a Constitutional conservative. He has reached out to those delegates and their grassroots support—in every state—and has given them his message and asked for their vote. And he has worked to find like-minded grassroots workers to run to become delegates.

It’s not a game. But it is a process. And he has shown respect for the grassroots through this process. Whereas Donald Trump has carried out a mostly-free-media top-down campaign with little attention offered to grassroots politics.

It wouldn’t matter whether Washington insiders actually wanted Trump to be their candidate; if a majority of the delegates do not want him (and he hasn’t won a majority coming in to the convention), he doesn’t get to be the nominee.

It is a grassroots decision.

It’s informative that some of those who are just recently awake to the dire condition of the country, who haven’t been participating in the grassroots for very long, might be skeptical and cynical about everyone and everything that disagrees with them.

But people involved for quite a while—people who are familiar with the Constitution, and are fully engaged in searching for leaders committed to lower taxes, less government interference in our lives, and protection of our God-given rights—are not inclined to support a candidate who blusters about some of those things but has no coherent plan to get us there. And no record of believing in the things that will get us there. And lacking the character that would show any actual change of heart.

In summary, I’ve been involved a long time—at the grassroots level only. I do not support Trump, specifically because I am a grassroots conservative who loves the Constitution. Calling people like me establishment because I have participated with the party and do not support Trump is ignorant both of the process of growing ideas, and of the strength of the grassroots desire to return to the Constitution.

And I support Ted Cruz because I am a grassroots conservative who loves the Constitution. We grassroots have been praying and watching for such a consistent Constitutional conservative for lifetimes.

I know and trust the grassroots around me here in Texas. We’re somewhat dependent on the grassroots elsewhere. But I have watched Ted Cruz reach out to others like me, and others respond to him as I have. So now it’s time to spread that word in our own grassroots communities. And then trust that what needs to happen for the sake of our beloved country will happen.

Words from the Wise

The other day I came across a quote I wanted to save to my Quote File (up around 75 pages now). I wanted to make sure it wasn’t one I’d already saved, so I searched the file for the author: Ezra Taft Benson. The quote was new, but I realized I had quite a number of quotes from him. Enough to maybe make up a post for today.

Ezra Taft Benson
photo from LDS.org

I’ve frequently referred to Ezra Taft Benson’s hourlong speech “The Proper Role of Government,” and his "The Case for the Free Market." He had some strong political opinions, always aligned with our beloved Constitution as well as God’s law. But he is best known as the thirteenth President and Prophet of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, from November 10, 1985 until his death May 30, 1994, nearing 95 years old.

A significant role he played—while he was also a member of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles for the Church—was Secretary of Agriculture from 1953-1961, during the Eisenhower administration.

Shortly after World War II, he was sent to Europe to help with relief efforts and mission efforts. Most notable was time spent in Germany, to help people there who had been our enemies but now needed our help. Some of those were members of the LDS Church needing to reconnect to their worldwide brotherhood. But one of the other places he spent time was Sweden, where my grandfather was serving as president of a mission. So they traveled the country together, and also traveled together into Finland to start a mission there.

When it became likely that Elder Benson would become president and prophet—he was at that time President of the Quorum of the Twelve, and President Spencer W. Kimball was aging after a life of health struggles—some people worried about his political views, that they might alienate members who had different political views. It turned out not to be an issue. As a person—indeed, as a lover of his country, freedom, and the Constitution—he spoke with passion. But as Prophet, the larger concern was to do whatever work God wanted him to do. He emphasized reading the Book of Mormon and doing away with personal pride.

I consider him a great man. Politically, I appreciate the bold, strong words he used—based on principles. So, with that introduction, here are a few of his words worth rereading.

Starting at the foundation of the pyramid, let us first consider the origin of those freedoms we have come to know are human rights. There are only two possible sources. Rights are either God-given as part of the Divine Plan, or they are granted by government as part of the political plan. –“Proper Role of Government.”

The smear seems to be the most widely used and effective tool of the conspiracy to discredit and weaken any effective effort. The smear of any individual or organization...is evidence of effectiveness. If any of you who are affiliated with patriotic organizations...which are not extensively smeared, you can rest assured your opposition is largely ineffective.

The price of peace is righteousness. Men and nations may loudly proclaim, “Peace, peace,” but there shall be no peace until individuals nurture in their souls those principles of personal purity, integrity, and character which foster the development of peace. Peace cannot be imposed. It must come from the lives and hearts of men. There is no other way.—“Purposeful Living,” Listen, A Journal of Better Living, Jan.–Mar. 1955, 19.

At this bicentennial celebration we must, with sadness, say that we have not been wise in keeping the trust of our Founding Fathers. For the past two centuries, those who do not prize freedom have chipped away at every major clause of our Constitution until today we face a crisis of great dimensions."—TheConstitution: A Heavenly Banner, p 24.

There were souls who wished afterward that they had stood and fought with Washington and the founding fathers, but they waited too long—they passed up eternal glory. There has never been a greater time than now to stand up against entrenched evil.—“Not Commanded in All Things,” 1965.

I do not choose to be a common man. It is my right to be uncommon. I seek opportunity to develop whatever talents God gave me—not security. I do not wish to be a kept citizen, humbled and dulled by having the state look after me. I want to take the calculated risk; to dream and to build, to fail and to succeed. I refuse to barter incentive for a dole. I prefer the challenges of life to the guaranteed existence; the thrill of fulfillment to the stale calm of utopia. I will not trade freedom for beneficence nor my dignity for a handout. I will never cower before any earthly master nor bend to any threat. It is my heritage to stand erect, proud and unafraid; to think and act myself, to enjoy the benefit of my creations and to face the world boldly and say, “This, with God's help, I have done.” All this is what it means to be an American. —Quoted in "An Enemy Hath Done This," p. 11.

I’d rather be dead than lose my liberty. I have no fear we’ll ever lose it because of invasion from the outside, but I do have fear that it may slip away from us because of our own indifference, our own negligence as citizens of this land. And so I plead with you this morning, that you take an active interest in matters pertaining to the future of this country.—“The LDS Church and Politics,” BYU Devotional, December 1, 1952.

Improve your community by active participation and service. Remember in your civic responsibility that “the only thing necessary for the triumph of evil is for good men to do nothing” [Edmund Burke, in George Seldes, comp., The Great Thoughts, New York: Ballantine Books, 1985, p. 60]. Do something meaningful in defense of your God-given freedom and liberty.—“To the Single Adult Brethren of the Church,” April 1988.

Socialism derives its philosophy from the founders of communism, Marx and Engels. Communism in practice is socialism. Its purpose is world socialism, which the communists seek to achieve by revolution, and which the socialists seek to achieve by evolution. Both communism and socialism have the same effect upon the individual—a loss of personal liberty….

Why is socialism incompatible with man’s liberty? Socialism cannot work except through an all-powerful state. The state has to be supreme in everything. When individuals begin to exert their God-given rights, the state has to suppress that freedom. So belief in God must be suppressed, and with that gone freedom of conscience and religion must also go. Those are the first of our liberties mentioned in the Bill of Rights.—“Socialism—a Philosophy Incompatible with Man’s Liberty,” a section in “A Vision of Hope for the Youth of America,” BYU Speech, April 12, 1977. [I attended this.]

Americans have always been committed to taking care of the poor, aged, and unemployed. We have done this on the basis of Judaic-Christian beliefs and humanitarian principles. It has been fundamental to our way of life that charity must be voluntary if it is to be charity. Compulsory benevolence is not charity. Today’s socialists—who call themselves egalitarians—are using the federal government to redistribute wealth in our society, not as a matter of voluntary charity, but as a so-called matter of right. One HEW [Health, Education and Welfare] official said recently, “In this country, welfare is no longer charity, it is a right. More and more Americans feel that their government owes them something” [U.S. News and World Report, April 21, 1975, p. 49]. President Grover Cleveland said—and we believe as a people—that though the people support the government the government should not support the people.—“Socialism Disguised under Welfare State Measures,” a section in “A Vision of Hope for the Youth of America,” BYU Speech, April 12, 1977.

Government can give you nothing but what it takes from somebody else. A government big enough to give you everything you want is big enough to take everything you’ve got, including your freedom.—[A version of part of this is attributed to Gerald R. Ford. I was unable to identify the source as Ezra Taft Benson, although he might have said it or quoted it. I found it on a Facebook meme attributed to him without a source. So maybe it doesn't belong in this collection, but, still, I like the words.]

In my hunt to identify the source for some of these quotes, I found this collection of around 40 pages:  “Ezra Taft Benson: Quotes on Freedom, America,Constitution, Liberty, Etc.”