Reflection on Caliban's War (The Expanse #2)

     I think this book was better than the first expanse book. Cool new characters and interesting new stuff happening with the protomolecule. I didn't really take any notes, so I'm not gonna leave a long review. But I'll just say I liked it even though it had a lot of the problems of the first, mainly being that Holden is just not an interesting character to me. But that doesn't matter. Because I like this book for its plot and the really cool story of the protomolecule. That's what I read it for. Also, why's it called Caliban's War? Did I miss that? Who/what is Caliban?

Reflection on Kill Switch: The Rise of the Modern Senate and the Crippling of American Democracy by Adam Jentleson

            In this book, the author puts forth an excellent and short history of the development of the filibuster, from the time of the founding (when no such thing existed) to the modern day, when the minority party has a veto over all legislation the majority tries to pass with a simple majority. The filibuster as we knew it doesn’t even exist anymore. Senators no longer have to give long speeches to keep business from moving on the floor. In fact, floor debate is no longer a feature of what was once America’s greatest deliberative body. By claiming the right to unlimited debate, minorities in Congress can demand that the majority use 60 votes to “end” a nonexistent debate that lacks any significant number of floor speeches. So that means that in the polarized era when everyone votes along party lines, the majority party in the Senate needs 60 votes to pass any legislation, something brand new to our republic.

            In 1806, the Senate created a loophole eliminating the previous question rule, which allowed senators to close debate and vote on a bill. At the time, it seemed unnecessary because gentlemanly norms led to all senators sharing mutual respect and avoiding superfluous debate; they were able to self-regulate for decades without any problems. But in 1841, a half-century after the founding, Senator John C. Calhoun invented the filibuster when he sought to stop a bill regarding the national bank. However, all he could do was unnecessarily delay the bill and annoy his opponents. It surprised the bill’s supporters, who sought to restore the previous question rule but backed down, being satisfied with just passing the original bank bill when Calhoun’s supporters got tired.

            Calhoun’s model allowed senators to cloak themselves in high-minded ideas like minority rights as they obstructed the democratic will of the people. It became especially popular among Southern senators to block civil rights bills. For example, in 1891, when the Senate sought to pass a bill to institute better voting rights for blacks in the South, Southerners filibustered it. For the first time since 1841, the senators in support of the bill sought to restore the previous question rule and had a majority to do so, but Southern senators pounced when they realized one of the supporting senators would be leaving town. They quickly brought one of their own men out of his sick bed to the Senate and another from home to quickly advance the bill to the floor and vote it down.

            The modern filibuster is a product of Senate Rule 22, originally created in 1917 with the intent to curb obstructionist debate, but perverted into a tool of obstructionists against the majority. It allowed senators to vote on “cloture,” ending debate; however, unlike the previous question rule that allowed a simple majority to end debate, Rule 22 set the requirement at two-thirds (later amended to three-fifths). The majority of senators who created the rule wanted to set it at a majority, but they compromised, as the Senate still held onto certain norms that are gone today that made it seem unthinkable that a third of the Senate would obstruct the rest. Rule 22 backfired, and now that it existed, it became expected that the majority would have to use it. So instead of the minority giving in when it seemed reasonable, it became more common in the twentieth century for the minority to only give in when defeated by Rule 22.

            When reformers tried to change Rule 22, Senator Richard Russell of Georgia seized the opportunity to grants some ultimately meaningless changes, but to also peg the two-thirds cloture requirement to the total number of senators, not to the total number present, making it even easier for a minority to block a bill. He also added new requirements to make it nearly impossible to alter Rule 22 in the future. From 1949 onward, there was a constant struggle to defeat Rule 22 by reformers but they were defeated again and again. Eventually, changes were made in the 1970’s. One was the “tracking” of legislation, so that a filibuster could block one bill, but still allow Senate business to continue. However, this meant that filibusters were easier because a senator could block a bill and other senators wouldn’t be as annoyed with him because Senate business would continue. Then, the cloture rule was amended in 1975 to require only three-fifths of the chamber to invoke cloture, but that number became harder and harder to reach as Senators became more partisan.

            The Senate used to be a more chaotic place that was leaderless, as individual senators could become influential, but the role of “Majority Leader” was not a powerful one until Lyndon Johnson occupied it in the late 1950’s. Until then, committee leaders were decided by seniority, but Johnson convinced older members of the senate to step away and let newer, younger faces take over to save the Democratic party. With the backing of his mentor and close ally, Richard Russell, Johnson was successful in changing the committee assignments from a seniority-based equation to one where he had significant control. Johnson was considered to be an aberration as a powerful majority leader, as once he left to become Vice President and eventually President, the Senate reverted back to its old ways somewhat. However, in the 1980’s and 90’s that started to change.

            Democrats in the 1980’s started issuing a report, the first opposition document, that sought to draw differences between Republicans and Democrats in the Senate, something that had not been done before when the Senate was an institution more of individuals than of parties. It still hadn’t become systematic though, and after the Democrats retook the majority in 1986, they stopped publishing the document. But Senate Majority and Minority leaders began to take more control in ways not seen since Lyndon Johnson, especially in fundraising, where they started defending incumbents in primaries. Soon, because the leaders in the Senate could indirectly control funds to other senators’ campaigns, party leadership took control of the filibuster and in the 21st century, party leaders have used it to essentially create a requirement that every bill have three-fifths support to pass, not the original majority. Thanks to partisanship, few senators defect, and it is incredibly difficult for any one party to win three-fifths of the Senate.

The filibuster got completely out of control during the Obama administration, as Republicans filibustered against nominees they were still voting for. Under Clinton, nominees waited an average of 17 days for a vote and under George W. Bush it was 29 days. Under Obama, nominees waited an average of 125 days. Eventually, Democrats got fed up and executed what was dramatically called the “nuclear option” in 2013, abolishing the filibuster for non-Supreme Court judicial nominees. It was the biggest filibuster reform since the creation of Rule 22 in 1917. When the Democrats eliminated the filibuster for all judicial nominees except for the Supreme Court, they exempted the highest court in the land because they thought it would serve as a way to keep SCOTUS as the last line of defense for abortion and the filibuster would stop anti-abortion nominees. But within months of Trump becoming president Senate Majority Leader and Republican Mitch McConnell eliminated it, and put Justice Gorsuch on the court with 54 votes, one of the lowest vote-earning justices in modern times.

In the end of the book, Jentleson advocates for several change to Senate procedure to restore debate and make it more democratic. The biggest and best one is to require a minimum number of Senators to be on the floor for a minimum number of hours (more than half for five hours) before it can adjourn overnight or more than 16 hours. In practice, that would result in Senators being forces to spend at least some time on the floor together debating issues, which they no longer do. He also says that we should simply eliminate the filibuster. While budget reconciliation gives us a once-a-year exception to the filibuster, it is time to get rid of it and restore majority rule to the Senate. Additionally, he argues that the Democratic and Republican Parties should stop participating in primaries. It is not fair that they direct funds to incumbent Senators and stop new voices from joining politics.

All in all, this was a great and very readable book. It draws a lot from Robert Caro and Doris Kearns Goodwin on Lyndon Johnson as well as on Zephyr Teachout’s Corruption in America. I thought it was great and offered solid solutions. I would recommend all Democrats read it (it’s definitely written by a Democrat for Democrats).

 

Miscellaneous Facts:

• All other presidents combined endured 82 filibusters against their judicial nominees, but from 2009 to 2013, President Obama alone faced 86. 

Reflection on Leviathan Wakes by James S.A. Corey

             Leviathan Wakes was a really cool sci-fi book. I am trying to read more fiction and this was a really good choice. One excerpt from the book sums up the setting pretty well: “Earth had been so focused on her own problems that she’d ignored her far-flung children, except when asker for her share of their labors. Mars had bent her entire population to the task of remaking the planet, changing its red face to green. Trying to make a new Earth to end their reliance on the old. And the Belt had become the slums of the solar system.” Basically, the book is all about a time in the future when humans on Earth, Mars, the Asteroid Belt and the various moons of Jupiter and Saturn enter a time of conflict. About twenty million people live on the moons of Saturn and forty-five million on the moons of Jupiter. One moon of Uranus, the farthest out, as five thousand people. Earth has tens of billions. And meanwhile, Mormons are planning a mission to go even further into outer space. At the same time, a mysterious “protomolecule” is revealed that has the power to end all human life.

            I found the two main characters of the book whose perspectives we read from not incredibly interesting. I wished that we had more perspectives like in A Song of Ice and Fire. That said, it’s not really a character-driven book, and some characters felt cliché- mainly Holden, Miller, and Fred. But that said, the plot is what keeps you reading, and I read 300 pages in the first three days I read the book. It covers really interesting parallels to modern society like misinformation and the dangers of technological development. A really good debate that happens between two characters on whether to reveal some secret information is whether the public knows too much or doesn’t know enough. That feels so relevant to modern day when I think about the effects of the internet on society. Would we fix our problems by restricting the flow of information (including misinformation), or would it be better to spread even more information out there in the hopes that the truth will be more convincing in the end?

Reflection on Murder on the Orient Express by Agatha Christie

             I am undecided on whether or not I would recommend this book. I found it an interesting introduction to the murder mystery genre but ultimately unsatisfying. The end made the book feel kind of cheap and as if the story didn’t matter to me. I also got very annoyed by all the stereotyping of nationalities and faux diversity. Christie has all the characters go on about how diverse the people on the train are but they’re all just Europeans and Americans! They pass through Syria and Turkey and don’t encounter a single non-European person. Dumb. There’s also a ton of ridiculous statements people make like “Englishmen don’t stab.” Have you never heard of Jack the Ripper? Like there are so many moments where they remark on it being a womanly murder or with a “Latin temperament” and it really took me out of it. This detective is supposed to be a genius and he doesn’t think an Englishman will stab anyone? Now that I write all this down, I do not think I would recommend the book.

            All that said, I did fly through this book so it was definitely a page-turner. Christie’s style keeps you moving through things fast even if the story is a little confusing at parts. I was definitely very engaged by the book, but like I said, the ending made me feel like it wasn’t worth it. I have two other books of hers that I may or may not read.

Reflection on The Black Jacobins by C.L.R. James

             This is one of the most unique books I’ve ever read. James writes a history book with a polemical style, including his own thoughts on the modern era (1938) towards the end of most chapters in short asides. But the core of the book is the Haitian Revolution, the greatest slave revolt in history. The story is an incredible testament to the triumph of the oppressed over the oppressors and it is an exciting read. At times, it is difficult to keep up with the names so I had to do a bit of googling, but mainly you just need to know about one guy: Toussaint Louverture, the leader and hero of the revolution. One passage that best exemplifies both James’ love of Louverture and his modern polemicizing is when he writes of Louverture that, “He said afterwards that, from the time the troubles began, he felt he was destined for great things. Exactly what, however, he did not know; he and his brother slaves only watched their masters destroy one another, as Africans watched them in 1914 – 1918, and will watch them again before long.”

            The brutality of slavery seems worse than anywhere else I have ever read about. James gives the reader appalling descriptions of it, for example, telling us that one-third of enslaved children born on plantations died of jaw-sickness, a mysterious illness that seemed to only affect enslaved children and was likely the result of a choice by mothers and midwives to kill the children rather than let them grow up in the cruelty of slavery. Most colonists in San Domingo (pre-revolution Haiti) were transitory, a problem that existed in the Spanish colonies as well. This meant that unlike in the English colonies, where colonists sought to stay and build a society, the French colonists just wanted to make as much money as possible, extract what wealth they could from the island, and return to France as wealthy merchants. Interestingly, racism grew stronger and stronger as time went on in the 17^th and 18^th centuries. Mulattoes (an ugly term but the one that James uses) were all free up to the age of 24 by law in the 17^th century and the Negro Code of 1685 authorized white men to marry enslaved African women, freeing them and their children. Free Mulattoes and freed Africans had the same rights as free white men initially. But as the population grew, the French colonists developed a familiar hierarchy with Whites at the top, followed by Mulattoes, followed by Africans. Mulattoes were given just enough to bind them to the whites rather than the blacks and they formed the police organization responsible for protecting travelers and capturing escaped slaves. They also joined the militia. However, Mulattoes were still vulnerable to lynch mobs and would lose any case in court to a white man, significantly lowering their status. Yet until 1716, every slave who touched French soil was free, a law that was reaffirmed in 1762. Blacks and Mulattoes served nobility at court in Paris and some Mulatto children were sent to Paris to be educated. But in the 1750’s and 60’s persecutions of Mulattoes and free blacks grew. New laws were passed in San Domingo to ban Mulattoes from carrying weapons, meeting “on the pretext of” weddings, feasts or dances, staying in France, or taking the titles of Monsieur and Madame. They were left with the privilege of lending white men money (which I am sure they wouldn’t get back).

            The French Revolution came in 1789 and the Haitian Revolution in 1792, a time when San Domingo’s production of sugar cane and other agricultural products was at its most profitable heights. Slavers continued to bring in more and more slaves. In 1770 it was between 10-15 thousand brought in and by 1787, French slavers brought more than 40,000 slaves in chains to the colony per year. In 1789, there were half a million slaves in the colony, and more than two-thirds were born in Africa. This was not a stable society.

            When the French Revolution began, the “small whites,” AKA the whites who were not the largest landowners, joined the revolution. Due to their intense violence and lawlessness, the Mulattoes joined with the “big whites” and the royalists in opposing the revolution. The revolutionaries in Paris debated over what rights to give to Mulattoes in San Domingo and arrived at a compromise that every Mulatto born of two free parents would be given the vote- this meant giving the vote to just 400 men. This is pretty underwhelming, but at the time it was seen as a major achievement of equal rights. To bring the revolutionaries in San Domingo in order, the French government sent two regiments, but those soldiers quickly defected and joined the revolutionaries in San Domingo.

            Meanwhile, the enslaved Africans listened and understood that big changes were coming. Naturally, they began a revolution of their own and began escaping en masse to the countryside and mountains. The big whites, fearing the chaos in France, turned for help to Britain, Spain, and the United States but did not receive any. Instead, it was the Mulattoes, anxious about what little property they had, who volunteered to fight the slave revolution while the small whites demanded the exorbitant price of service of 2/3 of all the booty taken from recovered plantations. I won’t go into detail on Toussaint Louverture’s early life, except to say that when the revolution came, he was a middle-aged man, enslaved on a plantation where he was a sort of manager and had gotten some education.

            Upon becoming a leader, Louverture went to the Assembly of San Domingo, where he negotiated with the big whites to end the revolution. He pled that he would end it all if they would free just 60 slaves, but they would not accept even that. From then on, he knew that freedom would have to be taken by force. He built an army full of Africans born out of the colony who could not even speak French and the chief officers were also ex-slaves. I think that really emphasizes the breadth of the accomplishment—Louverture united men who didn’t even share a language under the leadership of former slaves—that is something astounding.

            Initially, Louverture did not seek independence, just the freedom of enslaved Africans in San Domingo, but the French government never believed that. Louverture eventually was forced to act against the Directory, then ruling France, when he invaded the Spanish side of the island, knowing that the French may turn on him and that he would need control over all of his flanks. Before Napoleon came to power, the colony was essentially in a civil war, with Louverture as the foremost warlord. Over the decade of the 1790’s, one-third of the 500,000 blacks were killed. Only 10,000 of the original 30,000 whites on the island remained, although about 30,000 of the original 40,000 free blacks and Mulattoes were still there.

            Despite all of the racism and betrayal by the whites, Louverture strongly believed in the greatness of revolutionary France and the importance of French culture and connection for Haiti. This was what killed him. He trusted too heavily in Napoleon, who sent General Leclerc to Haiti to reimpose slavery and secure the colony for France. Louverture simply did not believe this. As he fought with Leclerc, Louverture believed that the French general was acting outside of Napoleon’s orders and Louverture refused to believe that a fine revolutionary like Bonaparte would want to reimpose oppression on the island. Louverture was wrong. He planned to capture Leclerc and send him back to France with an account of Leclerc’s conduct, in the vain hope that Bonaparte would punish the not-so-wayward general. He hoped Bonaparte would see reason and that the relationship with France would be maintained but it was not to be. The author puts it well when he says that Louverture’s “politics lagged behind events.” Napoleon later said at St. Helena that he regretted capturing Louverture and putting him in conditions to die, as Louverture was truly a moderate who would have ruled the island as a colony of free men loyal to France or as a French ally. The critical moment when other Haitians began to lose trust in Louverture and everyone lost trust in Leclerc was when the French reimposed slavery in Guadeloupe, signifying the same plan for San Domingo. Even this caused Leclerc to lose faith in Bonaparte, as it made his job in San Domingo even harder as he and his troops were killed by Yellow Fever and other tropical diseases. Of the 34,000 French soldiers that landed, 24,000 were dead and 8,000 were in the hospital by the end of the expedition, leaving just 2,000 healthy and able to fight. They were ravaged.

            My biggest problem with this book is that the author is a complete and total raging Communist. He praises Robespierre and has a whole appendix lauding Fidel Castro and comparing him to Toussaint Louverture. I don’t know what to do with this information. The book was good, but stuff like that completely delegitimizes it in my eyes. I was literally writing “wtf” in my notes at points because I couldn’t believe what James was saying. Additionally, the author engages in a little too much hero worship over Louverture, talking about the man sleeping two hours a night and being satisfied only with a banana and a glass of water. I believe that he was a great and impressive man with lots of self-control but that is just plainly ridiculous. He was still a mortal.

            After finishing this book, I can’t help but think that there is sort of a trifecta of great American men (in the hemispheric sense) in this era: Washington, Bolivar, and Louverture. They have a lot of differences in class and race as well as language, but all three are legendary generals who were responsible for freeing their people from colonial oppressors. Bolivar even spent some time in Haiti. Yet all three came to different conclusion on slavery. Washington preserved it and was a slaver all his life. Bolivar was a slaver but sought to free the slaves. Louverture’s entire reason for being was to free his enslaved people. Both Louverture and Bolivar are especially famous for spending so much time in the saddle, riding insane distances frequently from one end to the other of their respective lands. Only Washington, though, can be said to have died with his country intact, as Bolivar watched Gran Colombia fracture and Louverture, tricked by Napoleon, was captured and died before his revolution was complete. All three were well-educated and they would all be very interesting dinner companions. None of them ever met each other but I would like to hear their conversation if they did.

            To end, I would just like to point out that this revolution was a bloody and horrible event on all sides, but that only the side of the freed slaves could be justified. In this war, General Dessalines famously massacred whites all over the island, but you have to remember that the whites had been burying black up to their necks near insects, drowning escaped slaves, and engaging in some of the worst cruelties imaginable for two centuries before revolution broke out. The whites fought a war of extermination just like Dessalines—only they lost. During the war, sixteen of Louverture’s generals were chained to a rock where they wasted away for 17 days. Prisoners were broken on the wheel. But in light of all this brutality on both sides, you just have to ask what were they fighting for? And obviously fighting to free people from slavery is far more righteous that fighting to put chains back on the slaves’ necks. So I’m with the Haitians.

 

Reflection on To Be a Jew by Rabbi Hayim Halevy Donin

            This was a really good book, although I definitely did not agree with everything in it. I found it at Barnes and Noble and enjoyed the parts that I read, so I bought it. I did not realize it was written by an Orthodox rabbi! But I did enjoy his discussions of Jewish morality especially, such as mercy, modesty, and acts of kindness being ritical to Jewishness, charity as being above all other offerings, how to best observe the sabbath, and the pro-poor laws on work and wages.

            However, the problem I see with the author’s writing is that he doesn’t really distinguish between which commandments and practices are most important and which or not. His interpretation of Judaism seems all-consuming to me, so that it would totally remove the Jew from society, constantly observing obscure holidays and engaging in arcane practices. It is unclear in the book which practices and observances are truly biblically-grounded. I am skeptical about the practices derived from non-biblical sources or strained metaphors So I would like to read a Reform Judaism version of this book.

Reflection on A History of American Law by Lawrence Friedman

            This book was excellent, and I would recommend it to other law students. I read it during the winter break of my first year in law school and I recognized many concepts from my Torts, Property, and Civil Procedure courses that I took last semester. I am sure that I also read plenty of pages covering topics that will come up in my next semester. The book is thorough and well-written. People who saw me reading it assumed that from the name and topic that it would be dry, but this was actually an extremely engaging book.

            On the subject matter, the book goes chronologically through American history, starting in colonial times. But it flies quickly through the twentieth century. The main focus is definitely pre-20^th century, especially the post-revolutionary period through the nineteenth century. All in all, this was an excellent read.