Category: 435 - Bryan William Brickner

2020 Update: Representational Absence and Presence in Locke, Madison and Dahl (and Amar)

10/10/2018

Absenting creates a presence: presenting creates an absence.

This creates a political problem, meaning one of value.

John Locke, James Madison and Robert Dahl were political theorists who worked on this problem, the problem of a presence creating an absence (and vice versa).

Locke’s work presented liberalism and a way for particular groups to make absent other groups; this has worked against the likes of tribes, nation-states and monarchies.

Madison’s work presented the US Constitution and a way for a particular group (We the People) to make present and absent other groups (representation); this is done via the decennial census and the ratio of “one Representative for every thirty Thousand.” Madison’s presence is law, yet absented by the usurpation.

Dahl is simple, so to speak: he absented Madison’s presence by ignoring the “thirty Thousand” found in Article 1, Section 2, Clause 3. This makes Yale’s Professor Dahl the 20th century political theory front man for the representation usurpation; the 21st century Yale front man for the usurpation is Sterling Professor of Law Akhil Reed Amar. Amar is simple too, so to speak: he just argues / presents by absenting one of the two shalls in the aforementioned Article.

Viewed from the past, the constitutional concept “We the People” has been an absent presence; viewed from today, it looks like a presenting presence; viewed from the future, that would be a constitutional We the People and an end to the representation usurpation, or simply, 2020.

*Next Up: 14 November and a new pamphlet release, A Dissenting Opinion from Johnny Reb and Gus Yank about George Thomas.

Posted by Bryan W. Brickner

Usurpation Day 2018: Ex Falso Quodlibet / From a Falsehood, Anything (Follows)

4/9/2018

We the People

Willis and Millie

The phrase ex falso quodlibet / from a falsehood, anything (follows), is known as the “principle of explosion” because it blows-up (makes trivial) how true and false work.

The book Farm Boy by Archie Lieberman (1974) depicts my maternal grandparents, Willis and Mildred (Evans) Hammer, as they farmed and raised a family. I’m pretty sure Willis and Millie didn’t know any Latin other than what they learned in Bible study; they would have understood “from a falsehood, anything (follows)” though, and even taught a similar lesson: two wrongs don’t make a right.

There are two great wrongs involving We the People and the usurpation of representation according to numbers. The first involves the usurpation that happened 9 April 1792, when, in response to President Washington’s veto of the first bill sent from Congress regarding the enumeration (census of 1790) and representation, the House of Representatives usurped a shall; the House ignored Washington’s veto and the constitutional ratio of "one for every thirty Thousand" and passed a number more likeable to the usurpers: one for every 33,000.

Veritas

The original constitutional ex falso quodlibet may appear small and perhaps harmless, but consider this: it created the conditions for the second great usurpation, the one that began in 1920. With women getting the vote and other social disruptions within the WW1 era, the House of 1920 did something extraordinary for the second great wrong: nothing. Since the first usurpation, Congress had at least kept using a number, they just kept increasing the ratio in favor of the usurpers; instead of using the census as intended, the counting of We the People for representation, the 1920 House openly ignored Article 1, Section 2, Clause 3 of our Constitution. It wasn’t until 1929, with the next decennial enumeration looming, that a law was passed setting House representation at 435, regardless of number, thus counteracting the definition of We the People.

Things tend to end as they began. The original usurpation of 9 April 1792 was a fill-in-the-blank moment; the bill was prepared with a blank left for a number and then the usurpers wrote in 33,000. We the People might follow a similar plan, one of mimicry; the 1792 usurpers read the Constitution and acted with pen and paper: nowadays, it feels like We the People are beginning to do the same thing.

Veritas.

*Next Up: Gus Kotka and Johnny Reb begin a summer series on Juneteenth 2018, Somewhere On Our Way.

Posted by Bryan W. Brickner

Thereat: Gus Kotka and Johnny Reb, On Our Way A Gain

10/22/2017

Gus Kotka and Johnny Reb Thereat Steppin'

V of XIII

“Steppin’ Johnny.”
“With ya Gus.”
“On our way again.”
“With a gain.”
“Which one?”
“Clarity.”
“Regarding the paths?”
“Yes.”
“Agreed.”
“The two paths to 2020 step differently.”
“Say more.”
“One is already law.”
“Article 1 and its thirty Thousand.”
“And the other path is in the hands of individual states.”
“You talking states’ rights Reb?”

Gus Kotka and Johnny Reb Thereat States

“More like amendment rights by states.”
“So We the People have options.”
“We do.”
“To be constitutional, we can enforce the representation ratio in Article 1.”
“True.”
“And the other option, the one involving states: how would that work Johnny?”
“Complete the ratification of Article the first of the Bill of Rights.”
“How many states have ratified Article the first?”
“Eleven.”
“Indiana?”
“No.”
“Virginia?”
“Yes.”
“Do you know the other states that have already ratified Article the first?”
“Sure.”
“Which ones Johnny?”

Gus Kotka and Johnny Reb Thereat Fulcrums

“New Jersey, Maryland, North Carolina and South Carolina.”
“Okay.”
“Then New Hampshire, New York, Pennsylvania and Rhode Island.”
“That makes eight.”
“Then Vermont, Virginia and Kentucky.”
“Eleven.”
“Of the original 13, only Delaware voted no on Article the first: Massachusetts, Georgia and Connecticut never voted.”
“That’s interesting.”
“What are you thinking Gus?”
“About fulcrums.”
“Fulcrum states?”
“Yes: fulcrum states shift the weight.”
“Good point Gus: by ratifying Article the first, those eleven states reveal evidence of the representation usurpation.”
“Otherwise why did they vote for the amendment Johnny?”
“Exactly.”
“So We the People have eleven state allies against the usurpation.”
“We do.”
“That is a gain Reb.”
“Yes it is Yank.”

*Next Up: Sunday 29 October and Thereat part VI, Gus Kotka and Johnny Reb On Our Way Not Tumid.

Posted by Bryan W. Brickner

Thereat: Gus Kotka and Johnny Reb, On Our Way Happy Constitution Day

9/17/2017

Johnny Reb and Gus Kotka Thereat Happy

I of XIII

“Here Gus.”
“This is On Our Way Reb.”
“Thereat.”
“Where’s Virginia?”
“There.”
“Ahead of us.”
“Directly.”
“So this is a threshold moment?”
“For We the People.”
“Good for us.”
“Might be what Morgan meant.”
“Our Teamster’s ‘What are you two doing?’ moment?”
“That one.”
“Asking two citizens what the hell they be fighting about.”
“Right.”
“We ‘Mericans.”
“We are.”
“We’re not … what are the people called who take rights not granted in the Constitution?”

Johnny Reb and Gus Kotka Thereat Constitution

“Usurpers.”
“We’re not Usurpecans.”
“Usurpecan: an American citizen who supports the usurpation.”
“That.”
“It’s Constitution Day Gus.”
“Nice: must be about 230 years ‘eh?”
“Yes.”
“We can also call it Smudge Day.”
“That’s right, thanks to George.”
“Did he just tell’em to make the change Johnny, and they made it – changing the ‘forty’ in forty Thousand to ‘thirty’ in thirty Thousand?”
“It was a request.”
“And the vote?”
“Unanimous.”
“Then they made the change and left the smudge.”

Johnny Reb and Gus Kotka Thereat Day

“Yes.”
“Nice of George to do that.”
“Strengthened We the People.”
“That and leaving us some physical evidence.”
“The smudge is in Washington DC Gus.”
“Okay.”
“Maybe that’s where we go after Berryville?”
“Us in DC: I like your thinking Reb.”
“First though we have to get back to Virginia.”
“Threshold you said.”
“Yes I did.”
“Happy Constitution Day Johnny.”
“Happy Constitution Day Gus.”

*Next Up: Sunday 24 September and Thereat part II, Gus Kotka and Johnny Reb On Our Way ‘Mericans.

Posted by Bryan W. Brickner

2020: The Four Orders of Reality in a Baudrillardian Nativity

7/12/2017

The Immaculate Preconception

Simulations, Jean Baudrillard (1983)
Translated by Paul Foss, Paul Patton and Philip Beitchman
“The Precession of Simulacra,” pages 11-12

This would be the successive phases of the image:
            -it is the reflection of a basic reality
            -it masks and perverts a basic reality
            -it masks the absence of a basic reality
            -it bears no relation to any reality whatever: it is its own pure simulacrum.

In the first case, the image is a good appearance – the representation is of the order of sacrament. In the second, it is an evil appearance – of the order of malefice [evil enchantment]. In the third, it plays at being an appearance – it is of the order of sorcery. In the fourth, it is no longer in the order of appearance at all, but of simulation.

Baudrillard was harder to explain before our current political situation: now the first through fourth orders of the image (this is the “I m age” / ego) can be clearly discerned.

Imagine “We the People” as an image.

Is “We the People” a first order reality, one based on the constitutional representation ratio found in Article 1? Or is “We the People” a simulation of the usurpation and therefore a fake representation?

Perhaps the nativity scene is a useful image for understanding Baudrillard’s four orders. To begin with, to understand there is a baby Jesus missing, one has to know of the first order, of a complete Jesus nativity. Take Aspasia or Socrates, for example, individuals living 400 years before Jesus; they would have difficulty imagining the setting; even more difficult, meaning for the bottomless manger, absent baby Jesus and the third wise man represented as an ass. A Socrates might also see the angel more as a guiding spirit, a daemon, more than we allow ourselves to see directing signs and spirits.

Baudrillard also noted, to quote in paraphrase, that nostalgia assumes its full meaning when the real is no longer what it used to be.

We the People: to be or not to be first or fourth order? – To be constitutionally real or constitutionally fake?

The answer is on the horizon we call now.

*Next Up: Wednesday 19 July and a 2020: In High Spirits, a Seven-Twenty Preamble.

Posted by Bryan W. Brickner

2020: Jesus was poor and said a few things about being rich

7/5/2017

Beijing 1879

Jesus, son of Mary, was a poor man overflowing with riches.

The Gospels, in Matthew, Mark and Luke, report Jesus being asked by a rich man what actions lead to eternal life.

Follow the commandments Jesus said.

The rich man said he did: what else?

Sell all your possessions and follow me Jesus said.

The rich man was distraught, the disciples confused.

Jesus continued: How hard it is for the rich to enter the Kingdom of God / Indeed, it is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for a rich man to enter the Kingdom of God.

The disciples asked: Who can be saved?

What is impossible with man is possible with God said Jesus.

Possible.

Jews, Catholics, Muslims and Protestants agree; Jesus was a teacher of being rich in things other than worldly riches: someone poor in materialism, yet rich in material.

Citizens gathered in a US House according to numbers would represent our beliefs ~ the beliefs of We the People, poor and otherwise.

*Next Up: Wednesday 12 July and a 2020: The Four Orders of Reality in a Baudrillardian Nativity.

Posted by Bryan W. Brickner

2020: Tax Day Disses Our Revolution and Abraham Lincoln

4/15/2017

"No Taxation Without Representation"

Someone who disrespects is showing respect for another value.

For instance, the phrase “No Taxation Without Representation” animated the American Revolution. Taxation without representation is what monarchs and other toughies do and value; representation with taxation is a republican value.

So when We the People are disrespected, that is taxed without constitutional representation according to numbers, a usurper is actually showing respect to a monarchic mentality that we can call anti-republican and anti-USA.

President Abraham Lincoln February 1865

The same dis is observable in having Tax Day and the day Abraham Lincoln died coincide: usurpers did that, not republicans.

One can say Lincoln saved our Republic from killing itself; having Tax Day on his death day shows a lack of humility on the part of the usurpers. Simply put, it is arrogance.

April 15th is a double Republic dis: taxation without representation and it mocks the accomplishments and sacrifice of Abraham Lincoln. We are, by the logic of this day, the Usurped States of America and not the united ones.

*Next Up: This Wednesday April 19th and some serotonin receptor science.

Posted by Bryan W. Brickner

Usurpation Day 2017: Augustine, Freedom and Arendt Footnotes #8

4/9/2017

Usurpation Day 2017: Arendt Footnotes #8

Two hundred and twenty-five years ago, on 9 April 1792, Congress initiated the representation usurpation we still live under, the one against We the People and our birthright, constitutional representation according to numbers.

Usurpation of representation is illegal, immoderate and unconstitutional.

Usurpation of representation is a stolen American birthright.

Usurpation of representation is an act of war against We the People.

Speak your birthright America: for those who believe in the US Constitution, let 2020 begin today.

Hannah Arendt
The Human Condition
Section 24: The Disclosure Of The Agent In Speech And Action
(177, bold added)

To act, in its most general sense, means to take an initiative, to begin (as the Greek word archein, “to begin,” “to lead,” and eventually “to rule,” indicates), to set something into motion (which is the original meaning of the Latin agere). Because they are initium, newcomers and beginners by virtue of birth, men take initiative, are prompted into action. [Initium] ergo ut esset, creatus est homo, ante quem nullus fuit (“that there be a beginning, man was created before whom there was nobody”), said Augustine in his political philosophy. (footnote 2) This beginning is not the same as the beginning of the world; (footnote 3) it is not the beginning of something but of somebody, who is a beginner himself. With the creation of man, the principle of beginning came into the world itself, which, of course, is only another way of saying the principle of freedom was created when man was created but not before.

2. De civitate Dei xii. 20.

3. According to Augustine, the two were so different that he used a different word to indicate the beginning which is man (initium), designating the beginning of the world by principium, which is the standard translation for the first Bible verse. As can be seen from De civitate Dei xi. 32, the word principium carried for Augustine a much less radical meaning; the beginning of the world “does not mean that nothing was made before (for the angels were),” whereas he adds explicitly in the phrase quoted above with reference to man that nobody was before him.

Next Up: Saturday April 15th and a 2020: Tax Day Disses Our Revolution and Abraham Lincoln.

Posted by Bryan W. Brickner

Republican Values: Gus Kotka and Johnny Reb On Our Way Constitutional Solutions

3/19/2017

Gus Kotka and Johnny Reb OOW One

Part 13 of 13

“What happens next Reb?”
“Forward.”
“I mean for We the People?”
“Forward.”
“Specifically.”
“There are constitutional solutions Gus.”
“Amendment.”
“For sure.”
“Amend what though?”
“The representation ratio in Article 1, Section 2, Clause 3.”
“It’s 2017.”
“Yes.”
“So 2020 is the next Enumeration.”
“Correct.”
“If Congress is going to make amends, they have to get started.”
“True: Article 1 certainly does not say Congress can set its own number of representatives for We the People.”
“That’s our birthright.”
“And that’s the usurpation.”

Gus Kotka and Johnny Reb OOW Two

“How many constitutional solutions are there Johnny?”
“Three.”
“So amend the representation ratio from thirty Thousand to a new number is one way.”
“Yes.”
“What else?”
“Completing the original Bill of Rights.”
“That sounds appealing.”
“Of course.”
“What does completing the Bill of Rights mean?”
“States voting for Article the first.”
“Okay.”
“Article the first would raise the ratio from thirty Thousand to fifty Thousand.”
“What’s its status?”
“Available.”
“Meaning?”
“Something like 27 states would have to pass it to become law.”
“Sounds easier than a new representation ratio.”
“It would be, and it would complete part of our founding.”
“The Bill of Rights.”
“Yes.”

Gus Kotka and Johnny Reb OOW Three

“What’s the third constitutional solution Reb?”
“Honor our founding and the founders’ creation, We the People.”
“By using the thirty Thousand in 2020.”
“That’s it.”
“And it got this way because of George?”
“He put the thirty Thousand in the Constitution.”
“Washington did?”
“It was forty Thousand until the last day of the Convention.”
“Then George ordered the change?”
“No, he requested it.”
“Okay.”
“They made the change on the spot.”
“Left their mark ‘eh?”
“Left a smudge on the Constitution.”
“Metaphor.”
“Appears so.”
“What day did George smudge our Constitution?”
“Seventeen September 1787.”
“Constitution Day.”
“Forward is as easy as one, two three Gus.”
“Johnny, we should shine some light on representation.”
“Indeed.”

*Next Up: 4 April and some spring and summer thoughts. Gus Kotka and Johnny Reb will begin again 17 September 2017 in Part II of Republican Values: On Our Way.

Posted by Bryan W. Brickner

We Shall Dream Again: Women’s Day 2014 and Constitutional Representation

3/7/2014

We shall dream again.

The “we” is We the People. Women are more than half of We the People yet have only 18% representation in the US House.

The “shall” is constitutional. Counting the people is the purpose of the decennial Census; lawmakers are then to divide by the representation ratio in Article I, Section 2, Clause 3 of the US Constitution: “The Number of Representatives shall not exceed one for every thirty Thousand, but each State shall have at Least one Representative.”

The “dream” is foundational. The representation ratio is the constitutional definition of We the People.

The “again” is time. 2016’s presidential election is not about a woman in the White House: it’s about women in the US House of Representatives. Congress always added seats (representatives) to the US House after each Census: in 1920, they suddenly stopped.

We shall dream again America ~ as it’s a heritage dream ~ one that represents all of US.

Bryan W. Brickner

Women’s Suffrage Documentary