Year: 2024

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#BookReview: Distorting Democracy by Carolyn Renee Dupont

Distorting The Discussion. For a book about the history of the Electoral College that opens up admitting that the author thinks the Electoral College is foolhardy at best… the actual history here is quite good, and absolutely stuff virtually no one learns about even with a major in American History in college. (Perhaps Masters’ or PhD students specifically studying the EC or at least the Constitutional Convention that created it would know at least some of this?) So absolutely read this book for Parts I and II, where Dupont shows that the fights that we have today about the Electoral College have been there basically since its creation and have reignited every few decades since.

It is in Part III, where Dupont begins discussing the current debates about the issue, that her acknowledged disdain comes to the fore and truly distorts the discussion. Here, she creates strawman after strawman after strawman and “debunks” them… without ever actually getting to the heart of any of the arguments she is “debunking”.

Which is a shame, because throughout parts I and II, Dupont almost goes to pains to show that there have been some throughout American history who had at least part of the actual solution to the problems we now see – and were working to push that part of the solution through. In Part II, she even notes the other part to the solution… and glosses right on by it.

The solution that Dupont brings up repeatedly is the “District method” (vs the “General ticket” method we now call Winner-Take-All). Here, each Electoral Vote is, essentially, chosen by the popular vote of each Congressional District, with the overall popular vote of the State determining the Electoral Votes represented by that State’s US Senators. Going to that method right now would mean that both “large State” and “small State” (to use the Founders’ terms) or “urban” and “rural” (to use more modern terms) concerns would be more accurately represented in the overall Electoral College system.

But wait! There’s more! The item that Dupont glosses over is the 1920s era law passed by Congress capping the number of US Representatives at 435. This was the final nail in the coffin as far as how unequal the system currently appears, allowing even a District based Electoral Vote in Wyoming to represent 400K ish people vs a District based vote in Los Angeles to easily represent 3x as many people. But that is “simply” an Act of Congress… meaning Congress can remove that restriction at any time, even, literally, the day you are reading this review.

And then there becomes a point in the Constitutional Convention that even Dupont completely misses. You see, while I haven’t examined the relevant records myself (and perhaps Dupont could, and possibly release a 2nd edition of this text examining this), there are some who point out that the First Amendment as we know it… wasn’t the actual First Amendment. Instead, it was the *second*, and the actual First Amendment actually closed the “Representational loophole” that Article I, Section II of the Constitution created when it noted that the “number of Representatives shall not exceed one for every thirty thousand”. Reading that carefully, it means that the population represented by a single US Representative has a *minimum* – 30,000 people – meaning that the overall number of US Representatives has a *maximum* – 11,234 US Representatives, based on the US population in August 2024 as I write this review. But notice what this does *NOT* do – set a population *maximum* – and therefore an overall number of US Representatives *minimum*.

THIS is where the fight over the Electoral College misses its most crucial point – and it is a point Dupont seems to be entirely unaware or even ignorant of. If this so-called “true First Amendment” had passed, it would have set the population maximum per Representative – and therefore the minimum overall number of US Representatives – at 50,000 – or 6,740 US Representatives based on current US population as of late August 2024 as I write this review.

Combining the District Method Dupont discusses at length in the text here + this missing “actual First Amendment” would largely solve every single argument Dupont has against the Electoral College, and yet she missed such a crucial detail of James Madison’s own efforts regarding the construction of the Constitution – thereby distorting the discussion from the get-go.

Recommended, mainly for Parts I and II, where most everyone will learn quite a bit.

This review of Distorting Democracy by Carolyn Renee Dupont was originally written on August 30, 2024.

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#BookReview: An Echo In Time by Boo Walker

Strong Multi-Generational Tale. With this tale, Walker expands into something I’ve never seen from him (though I *am* a somewhat recent fan, only finding him within the 2020s or so) – a dual timeline, present day/ historical fiction tale. Both periods are executed well for their time and setting, though there are some mystical elements to the present day setting that will be harder for some to accept – and some elements of the more practical present day setup that may seem just as unrealistic to others.

Still, Walker manages to write a female lead as well as most female authors within the women’s fiction space while *also* having a male lead that is also Walker’s typical greatness with such characters. That he *also* manages to give both of them a compelling romance – and proving some of my points re: “romance novels” along the way! – is even more icing on the cake there.

But really, the story here is about the trauma and the seeming generational nature of it. In this respect, I didn’t really see the present day issues as “trauma” so much as a lot of bad luck/ bad circumstances. Yes, any one of the things *suck*, but I didn’t really see them as “trauma”. (Though the one situation, part of the practical yet possibly unrealistic stuff noted above, … well, I’ll shut up now to avoid any possible spoilers.) This noted, the historical period was simply *full* of trauma, that part I absolutely got and it was 100% crystal clear – particularly as they relate to some other books I’ve read and raved about over the decades.

And yet, regardless of which part of which storyline’s traumas hit you, the reader of this review, harder… Walker, as always, shows superb skill in bringing the characters *back from it* – which isn’t really a spoiler, given this is very much Walker’s style in every book I’ve read from him. Indeed, it is a particular strength of his that sets his tales apart from many in whichever genre you may place his books. Thus, no matter your own traumas in your “real” life and no matter how much you may identify with a particular trauma found in this tale… you’re also going to find a degree of catharsis within these pages that is Walker’s particular brand of real-world “magic” with his words.

Very much recommended.

This review of An Echo In Time by Boo Walker was originally written on August 27, 2024.

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#BookReview: Behind Every Good Man by Sara Goodman Confino

Want An Election Themed Book That AVOIDS The Real Ones Entirely? Here Ya Go! Seriously, this book does a phenomenal job – truly, one of the best I’ve yet found in any medium – of showing both the nuts and bolts of elections and the high drama of elections and yet managing to present both in such a manner as to avoid most all (current) real world politics *and* without boring the viewer (reader) to tears. Because yes, while working elections is truly hard work (as I know as even a 2x former rural small town City Council candidate) and truly, utterly *boring* at times… this book manages to switch gears into its primary tale – that of a woman discovering her husband cheating on her and the actions she takes after that point – to keep the reader involved in the overall story.

Truly an excellent work on both the women’s fiction side and the elections side, and the two complement each other well in exactly the manners that would largely play out in real life, particularly given the backgrounds involved here.

You’re going to laugh. The room will get dusty at times. And in the end, you’re going to leave this book happy to have come across it. Isn’t that a good combination of a lot of what we all hope for in a fictional tale?

Very much recommended.

This review of Behind Every Good Man by Sara Goodman Confino was originally written on August 27, 2024.

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#BookReview: The Highest Law In The Land by Jessica Pishko

An Imagined History. Pishko starts off this text openly admitting that, as the Southport NC Police Dept cop who murdered Keith Vidal in North Carolina a decade ago this year said less than two minutes after encountering Vidal – and 14 seconds after Vidal had already been Tasered and was being held on the group by two other cops when the kill shot was fired -, she “doesn’t have time” (paraphrase from her, exact words of the murderous cop) to do any real investigative journalism that might show any degree of nuance or any alternative explanations for anything she writes about in this book. She openly admits in the prologue that she is going to label anything and anyone who is not a leftist progressive as “far right” because “The intent of this book is not to desegregate all of the complexities of the far-right movements – I do not think I could if I tried – which is why I have opted for the simplest terminology. Most important to me is the acknowledgement that these sheriffs and their supporters are plainly opposed to the left and progressives.” (An exact quote from page 18 or so, at least of the ARC text I read.)

Thus, Pishko proceeds to concoct her imagined history, complete with narrative-defining boogeymen, the “Constitutional Sheriff’s And Peace Officer’s Association” or CSPOA, as it is so frequently noted on seemingly every other page throughout the narrative. Pishko “cites” well-debunked “facts” such as Donald Trump calling the Nazis at the Charlottesville, VA “Unite The Right” rally “very fine people” (actual fact: He openly decried the violence of this group specifically, noting that *other* people *not associated with them* were the “very fine people” that happened to be at the rally as well), or the repeated-three-times-throughout-the-narrative-that-I-caught bald-faced LIE that “the leading cause of death of children is gun violence”. Even when looking at the CDC data *that Pishko herself cites*, the only way to get to this is to include people that are not legally children – indeed, some of the 18 and 19yos included in these numbers are actively serving the US military in war zones! Pishko also claims that “AR-15 SBRs are the weapon of choice of mass shooters” despite the number of homicides via rifle – any form of rifle, not just so-called “assault weapons” – proving that to be untrue for many years now. She claims that she observed a man walking around at one rally with an “automatic” rifle. While this is *possible*, it is also *extremely* rare – and without inspecting the gun in question (which Pishko does not detail that she did, if she did it at all), there is no way of knowing from a distance that the rifle at hand was fully automatic.

No, as with one of her criticisms of one of her primary targets of scorn throughout this text – Pinal County AZ Sheriff Mark Lamb – the best that can be said of this text is that while it is well documented, clocking in at 33% or so documentation, it is “light on substance and heavy on [extreme leftist] vibes”.

Read this book – if your politics are to the left of Bernie Sanders. You’ll find a new boogeyman to scare yourself with in your fantasy world.

For anyone to the right of Bernie Sanders and living in the *real* world, don’t bother with this drivel. There are *far* superior books about the problems with modern police and how we got to this point, such as Radley Balko’s Rise Of The Warrior Cop.

Not recommended, unless you’re an extreme leftist or extreme masochist.

This review of The Highest Law In The Land by Jessica Pishko was originally written on August 26, 2024.

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#BookReview: A World Of Hurt by Mindy Mejia

Fast Paced Action Thriller Featuring Atypical Hero – Yet Set During “Real”-World Collapse. Straight up: This would have *easily* been a 5* book for me had it been set in literally any period of human history *other than* 2020 – 2022… unfortunately, where it as actually set. Kara is awesome as a non-straight (it is never made clear in *this* text exactly what her sexuality is, though it may have been clarified in the preceding book, To Catch A Storm, which I read 20 months and 300+ books ago) badass with a certain condition that Mejia works with well to show its uses and detriments. Max is excellent as the more by-the-book cop just trying to do his best to do his job and get back to his wife and son, particularly during the period the book is set in. Together (and separately), they’re going to find themselves in some pretty cool to watch action sequences that would get most of us real dead, real fast in real life. But ultimately, that is exactly what you’re coming into a book like this for – escapist action of a near cinematic quality, and other than the time period this is set in (which, to Mejia’s both benefit and detriment, she *does* show all too realistically and all too well), this book *is* that very action first with solid backstory and drama kind of tale that is generally so pleasing to read.

So for those of you who can withstand a book set entirely within the COVID lockdown period… this is one of the best books I’ve seen written telling a story within that period. But for those of us who – for whatever reason – *don’t* want to read a story set in that period… unfortunately you’re going to miss out on a truly fun, kick ass book unless you can overcome that particular mental objection.

Very much recommended.

This review of A World Of Hurt by Mindy Mejia was originally written on August 19, 2024.

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#BookReview: Over Ruled by Neil Gorsuch and Janie Nitze

Brilliant Examination – Yet Outdated By The Author’s Day Job Just Before Publication. Define irony. One sense may be writing a book wherein you detail how one Supreme Court decision in particular a few decades ago allowed for an exponential growth in the number of laws and regulations Americans must abide by… and then just a handful of weeks before publication of the book you made this point in, joining with five of your eight colleagues in your day job in announcing that you collectively have… *over ruled*… that very prior SCOTUS decision in question. One might consider that a form of irony.

Beyond the discussion of Chevron though, Gorsuch and apparent longtime assistant Nitze do a truly admirable job here of showing just how much the laws and other edicts with force of law of the United States have grown in just the last few decades alone, primarily at the National level, but with brief examinations of the volume of State and local laws as well. Various case studies are used to illustrate various ways in which the explosion has occurred and how it has harmed every day working class Americans of nearly any imaginable stripe, and showing how many Americans can be in violation of some rule or regulation… and not even know it until cops raid their house with guns drawn in order to kidnap these “perpetrators”.

Indeed, some of the cases are quite sobering and harrowing indeed, including the one that opens the book – that of a Florida fisherman suddenly accused of tampering with evidence… due to a law that passed as a result of the Enron scandal. In other cases, Gorsuch and Nitze show various other “offenses”, including at least a few – such as civil asset forfeiture and occupational licensing – that will be on Gorsuch’s desk in his day job over the next couple of years, thanks in large part to the efforts of groups such as the Institute for Justice, which actively seeks to combat the very problem Gorsuch details in this book.

One thing that I can’t speak to that I normally do in this space is the length of the bibliography, as I read the Audible edition of this book on my way back home to Jacksonville, FL from my homeland north of Atlanta, GA yesterday. (Though I *can* note, from that, that it can easily be read at 1.5x speed on a 7 ish hr drive. 😉 )

Truly both a well written and genuinely important book for all Americans to read.

Very much recommended.

This review of Over Ruled by Neil Gorsuch and Janie Nitze was originally written on August 19, 2024.

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#BookReview: Hillbilly Elegy by JD Vance

All Too Identifiable. Ok, so the first version of this review was basically comparing my life to Vance’s as he relates in in this book, but let’s face it – y’all don’t care about the details there. 😀 Suffice it to say that as a trailer park kid from the southern Appalachian foothills outside of Atlanta, who also spent time “in the country” (though Atlanta has now fully taken over that region since my childhood) at his family’s farm and who also became the first person in his immediate family to go to – and graduate from – college… yeah, there was quite a bit I could identify with in this book. There was also quite a bit where we diverged, specifically in that while the hardships Vance lived through within his own family were frequently seen in my *friends’* and *schoolmates’* and *neighbors’* lives… *very* little of it was ever as immediately in my face for me, even back in the trailer park.

I read the Audible version of this book, actually as I was driving from my home in Jacksonville, FL to my homeland north of Atlanta over the weekend, so I don’t have any information about the breadth of any bibliography here. What I can say is that Vance’s words, from his perspectives of his experience, ring true with my own observations and experiences in a similar-ish background, time, and region.

I can also say that Vance describes his time in the Marines much as I’ve seen and heard others of our generation describe them, particularly as it relates to being crystal clear that while he served in the Green Zone in Iraq, he never directly saw enemy fire or fired on the enemy.

Overall there is truly little if anything to fault here. The writing style – and reading style, in Audible form – were very easy to flow with, it is clear that Vance is actively examining his life and not simply making excuses for himself or anyone else, and in the end, again, this truly does ring all-too-true to my own observations as a contemporary in a similar ish region of the country.

Very much recommended.

This review of Hillbilly Elegy by JD Vance was originally written on August 19, 2024.

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#BlogTour: When The Sky Falls *AND* When The Dawn Breaks by B.R. Spangler

For this blog tour we’re doing something I don’t think we’ve ever done in the history of this blog – we’re looking at *two* books at once! For this blog tour, we’re looking at the Dark Skies Apocalypse series, When The Sky Falls and When The Dawn Breaks by B.R. Spangler.

First, the review for When The Sky Falls I posted to the book sites (BookHype.com / TheStoryGraph.com / Goodreads.com):

Explosive Opener Leads To Survival Epic. One of the first things you need to know about this particular (now) duology of When The Sky Falls and When The Dawn Breaks is that this is now the third time this story has been revised and repackaged – thus, when it feels like the book suddenly switches gears and becomes seemingly an entirely different book at around the 2/3 mark or so… that’s because in its original forms, it *was* a second book at that point.

But taking that into consideration and reading this duology back to back, effectively reading what was formerly a four book series all at once, feels a bit like reading a shorter version of Douglas Adams’ epic five volume romp through space in The Hithhiker’s Guide To the Galaxy… but in a far more grounded, survival scifi type story. As with The Complete Hitchhiker though, this story actually works quite well in this form.

Part I has the explosive opener reminiscent of the opener of Brett Battles’ SICK, the opening salvo of his seven volume epic apocalyptic survival series PROJECT EDEN, and in some ways – the mall scenes in particular, but also some of the scenes between the opening and that point – really challenge Battles as to which is truly the more compelling story.

Part 2 of this text is set a bit “down the road” from the events of Part I. The Apocalypse has effectively happened, and the survivors have set up what civilization they can. Here, the story becomes more of an exploration-survival story, where we learn how the world has changed from the one we know… and how humanity, in many ways, never really changes much.

While Part I has its heart wrenching moments and makes the room a bit dusty at times in certain ways, Part 2 manages to twist these things a touch and do a bit of its own thing – which is why it can be jarring to read it in the same book as Part I – but also manages to up the stakes a bit in its own way, before finally leaving the reader almost literally begging for the continuation of the story – now to follow in When The Dawn Breaks, with both books being released together.

Very much recommended.

Next, the review for When The Dawn Breaks I posted to the book sites (BookHype.com / TheStoryGraph.com / Goodreads.com):

More Consistent Yet Less Grounded Storytelling Than Predecessor. When The Sky Falls, for all of its faults in rather clunkily combining two prior books into one, was a very grounded story of survival in both the immediate aftermath of an Apocalypse and several years later. Here, we continue not long after the events of Part 2 of When The Sky Falls leave off – indeed, seemingly just hours after the events of that book’s finale.

And we wind up getting a far more consistent – if also much more fanciful – tale in this book. Without going *too* deep into spoiler territory, I’ll say that some elements of the ending of When The Sky Falls are continued and continued quite effectively, but the newer elements of this tale are where it becomes far less grounded and much deeper into the realm of scifi than simply a post-Apocalyptic story. We get some versions of some answers to some questions, and we’re left with a lot more questions… seemingly leaving room for Spangler to come back to this world, if the third time revising and rereleasing these stories is indeed the charm and sales truly increase such that this may be an option for him.

While When The Sky Falls had a few dusty rooms, this tale has a very different feel that taps into a very different but nearly equally visceral emotion – particularly in some more blatant moments. It is hard to describe this part while avoiding all spoilers, so I’ll just leave it at that. I enjoyed this stretch and thought it well done, but admittedly it could be a bit much and perhaps a bit complex for some readers.

So come along for the ride and see what happens after the sky falls and when the dawn finally breaks. 😉

Very much recommended.

After the jump, the “publisher details” for both books – book info, description, author bio, social links, and buy links.
Continue reading “#BlogTour: When The Sky Falls *AND* When The Dawn Breaks by B.R. Spangler”

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#BookReview: Kent State by Brian VanDeMark

Well Documented History Of The Event. The massacre at Kent State happened when my parents were not quite 10 yrs old and still almost as long away from meeting. It wouldn’t be until over a decade after this event when they wed, and I was born just a couple of years later. One uncle was already nearly 30 by the time of the massacre, and my youngest aunt was still in middle single digits at the time. The rest of my dozen or so aunts and uncles were somewhere in between, including at least a couple of them that were college age at the time, and one that fought in Vietnam in this era. (I’m not sure exactly when he was deployed there, but I *know* he went and did… something. He was a career Marine, beginning then.) All of this is a long way of saying that this is a history of events that preceded me, but which my direct family knew of at various ages of their own lives and saw how it affected each of them.

Thus, other than the barest of facts of “there was a protest, the National Guard got called in, and the Guard shot and killed a few students”… I never really knew about the details of this massacre before reading this book. I’ve never read any of the other histories, I’ve never really seen it covered much at all – and certainly not to this detail – in any other medium. So I can’t really say if it has any “new” information about the event and its fallout.

What I *can* say about this book is that it is very well documented, with 23% of its text being official bibliography, and the extensive footnotes throughout the text probably adding another couple of percentage points, *maybe* up to an additional 5% or so. Bringing the total documentation here to somewhere in the 25-28% range, which is pretty solid in my extensive review work of the last several years – I’ve read books making far stronger claims than this that had far less documentation.

This book is also exceedingly detailed in its presentation of the events of those few days in May at this campus, giving brief biographical sketches of pretty well every single person named- be they victim, shooter, parent, lawyer, politician, commander, or anything else- and detailing with a fair degree of precision exactly where each person was in the periods before, during, and after the massacre. Up to and including which shooters had which guns pointing which directions. Indeed, one of the most tragic and explicit parts of this book is just how graphically the shots are described as they hit the 13 victims, and indeed there are some photographs of some of the bodies included in the text as well. So for those that get particularly squeamish about such details… you may want to skim over these bits. But also don’t, because VanDeMark’s presentation here, though excessively detailed, also does a tremendous job of showing just how tragic the event was.

To be clear, VanDeMark presents a remarkably *balanced* history as well, not really siding with either side in the debate as to who was at fault, simply presenting the available facts and showing how tragic it was that a group of young adults were all in this situation to begin with, from all of the varying sides. Indeed, perhaps this is the greatest overall strength of the text at hand – in its balance, we are allowed to get perhaps the truest picture available of what is known to have occurred and when, allowing the reader to decide for themselves, with their own biases, who was at fault and why.

After detailing the events of the day, VanDeMark closes the narrative with following the various efforts at criminal and civil trials of the shooters as well as various efforts to memorialize the events before moving on to how each of the survivors – family of the dead, the surviving victims, the shooters, and the various officials – handled the events of that weekend the rest of their lives, reaching right up into the 2020s.

Overall a truly detailed, graphic at times, and moving text, and one anyone with any interest at all in the subject should read.

Very much recommended.

This review of Kent State by Brian VanDeMark was originally written on August 13, 2024.

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#BookReview: The Jailer’s Reckoning by Kevin B. Smith

Is Michelle Alexander Wrong? Not even that arguably, one of the most cited texts in the field of mass incarceration examinations is Michelle Alexander’s The New Jim Crow, which alleges that the rise of mass incarceration is *solely* due to racism. Here, Smith puts that claim – and many others, including competing theories alleging racism has nothing to do with it at all – to the test, and, well, as he notes early in the text… pretty well *no* partisan is going to be happy with what he finds. He proclaims – and throughout the text shows – that almost no matter what you think causes mass incarceration… you’re probably at least partially wrong.

I’m not going to get into his actual conclusions here, you need to read this book for yourself to see them.

I will say that the text is reasonably well documented, clocking in at 23% of the text I read and with Smith claiming to have an even more extensive online appendix (which I have not examined at review time) detailing his methodologies used throughout the text.

Ultimately this is a short ish (sub 200 page) yet dense read, accessible to the non-scholar (in that the methodology discussion *is* left to said online appendix) yet still with a *lot* of at least discussion of the mathematical results (if a bit of hand waving about *precisely* how he got there, likely more detailed in that appendix). Still, if you’re interested in the causes of mass incarceration, what mass incarceration is costing the US, and at least a few potential suggestions on what might be looked into for potential solutions… this is actually a remarkable text, one that *should* supplant Alexander’s as among the most cited in the field. We’ll see if that happens. 😉

Very much recommended.

This review of The Jailer’s Reckoning by Kevin B. Smith was originally written on August 10, 2024.