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The Best Way to Redistrict

2/19/2021

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It should be a given: we should all agree every American citizen should be equal in the eyes of our law and our government. That is the promise of the equal protection clause in the Fourteenth Amendment of our Constitution. If we truly believe all should be equal before the law, then we must also support systems that expand informed participation by our fellow citizens in our political process to the greatest extent possible. Legislative districts that are drawn improperly effectively disenfranchise large numbers of our fellow citizens across the political spectrum. Such districts are widespread and, I believe, unconstitutional. We should draw all legislative districts to provide incentives for both citizens and elected representatives to maximize informed participation in our political process. 

It seems obvious that the overwhelming number of one-party districts is a major cause of the gridlock we are experiencing with our federal government. A few years ago, the Wall Street Journal estimated that 400 of the 435 congressional districts were dominated by a large majority of one-party. In these districts, the nominee of the majority party is virtually guaranteed to win the general election. Minority party voters are essentially disenfranchised. One-party districts reward candidates for appealing to the extreme members of their party who are reliable voters in primary elections. Ultimately, even moderate members of the majority party can be disenfranchised. Members of Congress from one-party districts have no incentive to compromise with the other party in the halls of Congress. 
It’s bad enough that one-party districts produce Members of Congress unwilling to compromise, but they also enable public officials who do not have to care about what most of their constituents think. I live in a one-party district. In 2014, I suggested to my representative that he should modify his web site to better engage and inform people. My fear, I said, was that people did not have time to chase down the information necessary to be informed citizens, so they just wound up being sheep. His response: “We should let them be sheep.” There is no motivation for majority-party incumbents in one-party districts to improve the level of civic engagement and participation in their districts. 
If we believe in our Constitution, and in the six purposes for our federal government enumerated therein, then building better legislative districts is one of the most important structural reforms we can accomplish. We can rebuild legislative districts at all levels to support the broadest possible scope of informed participation by our fellow citizens. Balanced districts, or districts with the closest possible balance between the parties, will provide incentives for all parties to encourage informed participation by the greatest number of our fellow citizens. 
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To Form a More Perfect Union...

1/14/2021

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The first guiding principle enumerated in the Constitution claimed that one of the purposes of the government was "to form a more perfect Union." While it is easy for modern readers to dismiss this phrase as mere hyperbole--an expression of the desire to make America better than the traditional monarchies of the Old World--this phrase had direct and visceral importance to the delegates at the Constitutional Convention in 1787. Those delegates knew that the first constitution of the United States was failing, and they knew from painful experience why it was failing. In 1787, the phrase "to form a more perfect Union" had to be the first guiding principle because the union to be replaced was crumbling under Articles of Confederation that did not give the central government sufficient power to hold the United States together for much longer.

The Continental Congress adopted the Articles of Confederation in November, 1777, and they were ratified by all thirteen states in 1781. The country they established was a confederation of 13 sovereign states. Each state controlled its own commerce and collected customs. Geographically fortunate states exploited their ability to control the flow of goods to and from less fortunate neighbors. The central government had no authority to collect customs. State legislatures were supposed to raise the money that funded the central government, but the central government had no authority to compel the states to pay anything or to provide any supplies. This put the Continental Army under a perpetual threat of disintegration during the Revolutionary War, and created post war financial pressures that ultimately led to Shay's Rebellion in late 1786. The failures of the Articles of Confederation, specifically a central government that was too weak to discharge its responsibilities, led directly to the effort to "form a more perfect Union."



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Trump Lost PA Because He Got Fewer Votes...Other Republican Candidates Won... Same Voters, Same Ballots, Same Election

1/8/2021

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Rep Conor Lamb (D-PA) pointed out that the Pennsylvania election in November was carried out under a law crafted and passed by the Republican-led state legislature, and that some  Republican candidates got more votes than Donald Trump did... on the same ballot and with the same voters.  He pointed out that there were cameras, and observers, and that the election had been heavily scrutinized without finding evidence of any voter fraud that would have changed results.  He points out that he presents these facts for the people of America, because he knows the Republicans in Congress, many from other states, are not interested in the truth but rather in cynically advancing a narrative that they know is not true and that caused the attack on the Capitol on Wednesday.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/video/politics/democrat-rep-conor-lamb-blames-capitol-violence-on-gop-election-lies/2021/01/07/a5ead590-1066-4564-a689-0a51778c3514_video.html
​

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Trump Tries To Change Score After Game

1/3/2021

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Theory to Practice: Government's Purpose in The US Constitution

12/1/2020

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In our last blog, we established that governments are NOT formed by people surrendering the imagined freedom of a pre-social, pre-governmental state for some specified benefit. The fact is that there is no pre-social state for human beings--the nature of our reproductive process and our long, vulnerable childhood make basic social cooperation at the family unit level essential for the survival of the species. Furthermore, any pre-social, pre-governmental state would lack meaningful freedom because everyone would have to spend all of their time meeting basic needs.

The only way to escape the tyranny of each person having to provide for every essential need is by expanding social cooperation to such a degree that specialization becomes possible. At that point, people can meaningfully speak of the freedom to choose a specialization they like or at which they are competent. At that point, people can decide how to spend the surplus time made available through specialization. The formation of broader social groups and governments then, is undertaken as a means to achieve the most basic freedom rather than a departure from that basic freedom.

The benefits of expanded social cooperation lead to increasingly complex cooperative arrangements. Governments come into being to manage these increasingly complex cooperative arrangements, and to protect or enforce compliance with group norms through the exercise of state sanctioned violence. What passes for a statement of purpose in the United States Constitution is really no more than an expression of guiding principles for how the founders envisioned the American government carrying out its management, protection and enforcement functions.

​Specifically, the United States Constitution provides its guiding principles in the following statement: "We the people of the United States, in Order to form a more perfect Union, establish Justice, insure domestic Tranquility, provide for the common defence, promote the general Welfare, and secure the Blessings of Liberty to ourselves and our Posterity, do ordain and establish this Constitution for the United States of America."

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Fix Your Sources of Information

11/26/2020

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There are two key elements to ensuring that you are properly informed: (1) consult a range of sources that span the spectrum of perspectives on key issues, and (2) ensure the sources that you consult are reputable sources of news.  In order to have an intelligent opinion on any subject, you must be able to respond intelligently to criticisms of that argument. You cannot respond intelligently to criticisms of your position unless you understand how people with different perspectives view your position. To gain this understanding, you must listen to sources that present those perspectives fairly, honestly and in the best possible light. 

Fifty years ago, you could turn from one news program to another on the three major networks and get basically the same perspective on the news. Now, there are far more than three options for news.  Each source is likely to have its own editorial slant. The stories that are emphasized are often completely different, and the editorial slant given to the common stories are likely to be completely different.  

Sometimes there are good reasons for different media outlets to offer different perspectives on the same issue. After all, there are different ways of identifying the correct or optimal solution to any given challenge. As discussed in previous essays, we can identify different approaches to any issue—constitutional perspectives, arguments from various moral or religious perspectives, and efficiency argument. All may have merit while yielding different solutions. 
Because sources of news have become more politicized and polarized, it is necessary to consult multiple, reputable sources across the spectrum to get a fair and honest portrayal of opinions contrary to your own. It is often hard to watch programs that present the opposing view, but you should make a practice of monitoring news as it is portrayed by media outlets that make you uncomfortable. Take note of the stories they cover that your favorite channels do not cover, as well as how their coverage of common stories differs.  

Reputable news sources are sources that do not deal in falsehoods. If you are watching or reading a news source that continually broadcasts or publishes stories that are subsequently identified as misleading or false, then you should find a higher quality source for news. Often such sources are labelled as “tabloids” rather than newspapers. 

Some of my recommended sources for serious news are the Wall Street Journal, the New York Times, the Washington Post, The Economist, both the broadcasts and website for NPR.org, and the BBC.com. You will often find this set of sources will cover the same major stories. These sources are world famous, have different owners, and have a reason to preserve their credibility as a source of their competitive advantage. For that reason, you can often use these sources to judge the quality of other media outlets, and to identify significant omissions or editorial slants. 

Surveying coverage over a range of media outlets can also help hone your skills at identifying better and worse quality in media outlets. For instance, you can get a liberal slant on stories by watching CNN and a conservative slant by watching Fox News. When you compare coverage with a magazine like The Economist or an outlet like NPR.org, you are likely to notice when CNN and Fox spend their time covering different stories. You will notice when they give very different perspectives on issues and personalities, and develop a feel for what is more likely to be true.  

In sum, broadening the scope of your news intake to cover a range of sources will make you a better-informed citizen. You will be more prepared to defend your opinions because you will be familiar with opposing views. Over time, you will build up your ability to discern quality in media coverage of current events. ​
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From Social Cooperation to The Nature of Government

11/1/2020

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In the last blog, we concluded that people are not born free. Rather they are born into a condition of necessity that initially precludes freedom. From the outset, there is an irreducible element of social cooperation. Humans would never survive their relatively long and vulnerable childhood without some minimal level of social cooperation. However, the necessity of providing essential needs like food, shelter and protection precludes meaningful freedom until such time as social cooperation expands enough to allow for some specialization and a surplus of time within the social group.

Political philosophers differ in their ideas on the nature of the most basic social cooperation and how government evolves from it. Often, the differences in political philosophy arise from different assumptions about human nature. Some assume humans to be fundamentally good creatures. In this context, good is defined as accepting social cooperation as a foundational value and subordinating self interest enough of the time to prevent unnecessary harm to the group. On this model, good people will, if properly informed, comply with a natural law where all are treated equitably and none will resort to violence except in self defense. Others assume humans to be fundamentally selfish creatures who will use any means necessary, including violence, to ensure the most favorable distribution of social goods for themselves even if their actions put the group at risk. On this view, any social agreements are fundamentally coercive and the chief characteristic of government is power and the monopoly of violence. It seems likely that there is no definitive "human nature" corresponding to one or the other of these extremes, 

The thought experiment by which political philosophers justify their preferred form of government is to project their vision of human nature backwards to some imagined, pre-governmental state of nature. Various visions of human nature have led to different depictions of the state of nature and have been used to justify very different forms of government. Often, the presumption is that individuals surrender the "freedom" of the state of nature to enter into a government that is based on a social contract.

But as we noted previously, the imagined "freedom" of a pre-social state is a fiction. First, the idea of a pre-social state is itself an illusion because the long period of vulnerability associated with human childhood demands some minimal social cooperation as a starting point. We are inherently social animals. Second, what we commonly refer to as freedom arises only when social cooperation expands to the point where specialization is possible. Specialization increases efficiency in meeting basic needs, and a surplus of time allows individuals freedom to choose certain voluntary activities over the tasks that would otherwise be required to meet basic needs.

As the modes and methods of social cooperation become more complex (in order to generate more surplus time and resources), one function of government is to manage the complexity of social cooperation. Ideally this is undertaken with the goal of enabling the greatest amount of freedom and well-being possible for citizens. Another function is to arbitrate the inevitable conflict that arises among stakeholders in the course of cooperative endeavor. In order to be able to truly serve as the arbiter of conflict, the state must possess the authority to force compliance with its mandates. In other words, the state must have a monopoly on the use of force to support the law.

In the next essay, we'll consider the merits of our United States government in performing these functions.


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Freedom, Social Cooperation and Government

10/30/2020

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Rousseau famously said, "Man is born free and everywhere he is in chains." Let's start by bringing Rousseau into the 21st century, correct his gender bias, and consider his meaning to be "People are born free and everywhere they are in chains." Rousseau wants to make bad government wholly responsible for the chains, but he clearly misses a step. The notion that we are "born free" is fundamentally incorrect. Before we can arrive at anything approaching an appropriate model for good government, we must begin by understanding the flaw in Rousseau's initial condition of freedom, and the implications this has on the necessary purpose of government.

People are not born free in any meaningful sense of freedom. If I were to define a human being, I certainly would include self awareness and free will. But the definition of a human must also include a description of the essentials of the body in which self awareness and free will abide. That body comes with inherent constraints. We experience the world from within individual bodies that exist in time and space. Those bodies grow during a long period of vulnerable childhood, require food and shelter, and a possess diverse sensory mechanisms inclined to feelings including emotional attachment, joy, sorrow, pleasure and pain. People are not born free--they are born in mortal danger of perishing immediately, unless there are other people willing and able to provide for their needs until such time as they can provide for themselves.

In the abstract, providing for oneself is a full time job. It takes a lot of time to secure and prepare food, find and maintain shelter, and perhaps reciprocate in duties of care for others. We see, immediately and inescapably, the fundamental need for some minimal social cooperation in order to sustain human life. But at that minimal level of social cooperation, there is no real freedom because most, if not all, available time is consumed in the provision of food and shelter and care for our immediate social group. Time is the universal constraint: we have only so much of it, and if we have to spend all available time providing for basic needs, then there really is little scope for freedom. And in a condition of even moderate scarcity, we might expect the individual pursuit of essentials to lead to conflict and thereby create another essential need: protection.

It is not hard to see that we can increase the scope for individual freedom through social cooperation. Tacit or explicit agreements on specialization with those in our own and neighboring social groups allow us to provide for our essential needs more efficiently. At some point, this efficiency may yield sufficient surplus time to allow us to meaningfully consider the concept of freedom. We are not born free. We are only able to speak of freedom once we have a level of social cooperation that allows for efficiency in meeting essential needs and creates a surplus of time.


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Trump's Chinese Bank Account Shows What A Liar and Crook He is

10/24/2020

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It is hard to understand how anyone could still believe a single word uttered by President Trump, or how any American in their right mind would still vote for him.

Every credible member of his administration has abandoned ship, from former Exxon Chairman Rex Tillerson (who referred to the President as a "f*ng moron") to his own former Chief of Staff, retired Marine General John Kelly and his former Secretary of Defense, retired Marine Corps General James Mattis.

Speaking about Trump, Kelly recently told friends that "The depths of his dishonesty is just astounding to me. the dishonesty, the transactional nature of every relationship, though it's more pathetic than anything else. He is the most flawed person I have ever met in my life."

And now, on top of the condemnation by even his former chosen cabinet members, we learn that Trump has a Chinese bank account from which he withdrew over $15 million AFTER he was president (New York Times, Oct 21, 2020)... this from the guy who staged a press conference at the beginning of his presidency with stacks of paper and allegedly signed over control of all his business interests to disinterested parties.  We have never had such a bald-faced liar and crook in the White House.

Shame on all of us if we allow this fraud another term. Please vote, and like me, please vote for Joe Biden.

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If Jesus were a Supreme Court Justice, He wouldn't Vote to Overturn Roe v. Wade

10/14/2020

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Here's Why

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Many Christians have been deceived into thinking of Jesus Christ as some sort of magical Teddy Bear from God, sent to make us all feel good about our salvation. This view is reinforced by focusing on pieces of scripture, with a heavy accent on the Old Testament and non-Gospel passages. This deception is used by some religious and political leaders for cynical purposes. Currently, many Christians seem to believe their religion requires them to vote for politicians who vote to overturn the Supreme Court case that legalized abortion. But it is clear to me that if Jesus were a Supreme Court justice, He would not vote to overturn Roe v. Wade.

When asked, “Why did God send his son to us?,” I am surprised at how many Christians’ answer is “To die for our sins.” But the Gospels tell us that Jesus came to give us an example of how we are supposed to live. The Great Commandment is the key to understanding that theme. Jesus' words and deeds reinforce that main message numerous times in the Gospels. Even the crucifixion itself can be seen as an illustration of what it means to truly live the Great Commandment. 

When asked to identify the most important part of the law, Jesus responds with one of the original ten commandments (Love the Lord your God) but combines it with something that comes from the 19th chapter of Leviticus in the Old Testament: "and love your neighbor as yourself." This is a huge deal! He says everything else (all the other commandments) hang on these two things! Together, these two elements form what Christians call the Great Commandment.


The scribes and pharisees knew that the Great Commandment was a big deal. That is why they asked Jesus right away: who is our neighbor? And Jesus answers with the Parable of the Good Samaritan.  In my new book, I say the Samaritans and Jewish people of Jesus' time were like Republicans and Democrats today. They did not like each other very much. They tended to assume the worst about each other. But those people — the ones we have a hard time liking—are exactly the people Jesus tells us we must love “as ourselves.” Those last words are important.

And this is not just one isolated part of the New Testament. It is the major theme that runs through the Gospels, when they are taken all together. In my Oxford Annotated Bible, Jesus calls out hypocrites explicitly on nineteen separate occasions. Implicitly, he calls out hypocritical behavior almost an equal number of times. What is hypocrisy? It’s when we hold others to rules that we don’t apply to ourselves, or that we don’t apply in the same way to ourselves. In other words, hypocrisy happens when we don’t follow the Great Commandment. We see many examples of that with both religious and political leaders these days.

But I still think many Christians don’t get the impact of Jesus saying that all of the law depends on than what he identifies as most important — the Great Commandment. In John [John 8:4-11], the scribes and Pharisees come to Jesus with a woman who has been caught in adultery, a violation of another commandment for which Mosaic law decrees stoning. Jesus tells them that the one who is without sin should throw the first stone. The crowd melts away, with no one claiming to be without sin. After the crowd leaves, with no one throwing a stone, Jesus asks the woman if there was no one left to condemn her. When she says no one, he says, “Neither do I condemn you; go, and do not sin again.” Here Jesus models for us what the Great Commandment means in action: loving your neighbor as yourself means we should not choose to throw stones unless we are perfect, and none of us are perfect. It means none of the other commandments, even thou shalt not kill, are as important as the Great Commandment.

And finally, of course, Jesus does die for us.  And on the cross he says, “Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do.” What a beautiful illustration of the Great Commandment in action. We are called to love our neighbors (the tough ones) as ourselves even if it kills us. That is hard. Probably not too many Christians can live up to that standard. So it's easier to downplay the Great Commandment and get really vocal about things like Roe v. Wade.

For me, being a Christian is not consistent with supporting what I see in most Republican candidates. A friend was shocked by this. He asked me to address how I could support Democratic candidates given their positions on abortion, same-sex marriage, and freedom of religion. Here is what I told him.

Christians argue that abortion is bad because it violates “thou shalt not kill,” correct?  And we have already established that Jesus told us the Great Commandment is more important than all the other commandments, including this one. But, that said, anyone who cares about following the commandments should want to minimize the number of abortions to the extent that is consistent with the Great Commandment.

Abortions are a function of unwanted pregnancies. A study conducted by Lancet Global Health concluded that, worldwide, 61% of unintended pregnancies end in abortion.  Since 1990, the proportion of unintended pregnancies ending in abortion has increased in countries where more legal restrictions are in place. In January of this year, The latest National Survey of Family Growth in the US showed that the contraception coverage in the Affordable Care Act (ACA) has resulted in a decrease in unintended pregnancies in the US. This evidence is reinforced by the fact that the number of abortions performed in the US has decreased almost 20 percent since 2011, and most of the decline in abortions has occurred in states where access to abortion has NOT been restricted. If you truly want to reduce abortions, the evidence shows you should support the ACA. Republicans have been working nonstop for ten years to undermine and overturn the ACA.

We have learned again and again that laws are not the best way to stop behaviors like drinking, drugs and sex. Prohibition did not work. It make alcohol a lucrative criminal enterprise. The war on drugs has been a disaster. Another example of a lucrative criminal enterprise has been incentivized by bad public policy. Eliminating legal abortions will cause women who can afford it to travel someplace else to have the abortion. Poor women will seek out illegal abortion providers. The effect of so-called Christians opposing Roe v. Wade will be to undo the gains in reducing unwanted pregnancies and abortions that have been made in the past ten years and to disproportionately harm poor women. Do you really believe that is how Jesus would approach the challenge of abortion? I, for one, do not.

Republican politicians say “vote for me and we will overturn Roe v Wade and eliminate abortions” while at the same time saying “vote for me and we will overturn the ACA because it is socialism.” Well, in 1992, with 8 Republican appointed justices, the Supreme Court still upheld the main finding of Roe v Wade in a 5-4 decision (Planned Parenthood v Casey). I think Republican politicians know very well that (1) abortion is an issue they can use to get Christian votes, (2) the Supreme Court is unlikely to overturn Roe v Wade regardless of how many Republican appointed justices there are [in part because of (1)], and (3) overturning Roe v Wade is not going to stop abortions in the United States. So Christians who vote Republican out of opposition to abortion are simply deceived.

Oh, and by the way, the ACA is not even close to socialism. Look up the definition of socialism and think about it.

Okay, now same-sex marriage… Jimmy Carter is one of my favorite Christians. As a politician and public figure, he has never been afraid of living his faith, even when doing so came at great personal cost. Say what you will about Carter, but the guy successfully commanded a nuclear submarine while he was in the Navy. He might not have been the most popular President, but he is not a hypocrite. Carter is on the record as saying he believes Jesus would approve of gay marriage. He said, “I think Jesus would encourage any love affair if it was honest and sincere and was not damaging to anyone else and I don’t see that gay marriage damages anyone else.” I agree with him.

Now all the evangelicals lined up and used Old Testament scriptures to say Carter was wrong. But I think the evangelicals are wrong. And I think a lot of them are pretty much hypocrites in a lot of ways. They like to use the Old Testament to let their followers stay in their comfort zone, because living the Great Commandment is hard, and challenges comfort-zone Christians.

Now for religious freedom. I am all for it. So is Biden. Of course, like everything, there is a limit. Our Constitution provides for freedom of religion, but we don’t allow religions that decide they believe in human sacrifice, or other things that violate individual rights in certain ways.

That brings us back to abortion, I think. Because many would claim that abortion is murder—human sacrifice.  But the fact is that not all religions believe that life begins at conception.  So freedom of religion protects the right of those people to believe that.  And, in fact, freedom of religion protects the right of people to not believe in religion at all.  I support freedom of religion in all of those dimensions, and I think we have ample processes for resolving disagreements over where your freedom of religion conflicts with mine.  What we clearly SHOULD NOT endorse, in my opinion, is the idea that freedom of religion means America should be governed by some sort of Christian Taliban, and that, frankly, is the way many Christians act.

Bottom line: Republican positions on abortion, the ACA, same-sex marriage, and freedom of religion are logically inconsistent with each other, if you think them through. For Christians, the only way out of that trap is by using the Great Commandment as your decision criterion. Current positions of the Democratic candidates on my ballot are more consistent with the teachings of Jesus than are the positions of their Republican opponents.

When in doubt, I like to remember some other great words from Jesus: “Give to Caesar that which is Caesar’s, and give to the Lord that which is the Lord’s.” So many things that are appropriate to address one-on-one and in a charitable way are simply not appropriately or effectively manageable as a matter of public policy.

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    Author of Thy King Dumb Come and Accountability Citizenship, Stephen P. Tryon is a businessman and technologist with extensive experience in e-commerce, a retired Soldier, and former Senate Fellow.

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