Wednesday 28 December 2016

When ideologies collide: Faithless Elector and Dark Network


Faithless Elector, and its sequel, Dark Network are stories about courage, duty, fidelity and a belief in ideology: and what happens when those qualities and ideologies collide.
The Electoral College vote has passed (Dec. 19)--not without incident or intrigue--and although the specific events described in my novel, Faithless Elector, did not happen, the fact is they could have happened. Faithless Elector is a work of fiction, after all, not a prediction.  The events described in the novel would throw the nation into chaos, precisely what the protagonists risk their lives to prevent.

Dark Network, draft cover
While the thrillers Faithless Elector, and its sequel, Dark Network (coming soon!) take current events as their impetus, they are first and foremost taut, plot-driven stories contending with themes that endure after the headlines have faded and events in the real world have expressed themselves. The stories are about courage, duty, fidelity and a belief in ideology: and what happens when those qualities and ideologies collide.  And as long as the Electoral College endures, the latent possibility for mischief and malfeasance also endures.

In Faithless Elector, a small, deadly efficient conspiracy seeks to overturn the result of a close election by getting a number of Electors to switch their votes, to become "faithless electors."  The conspirators operate in the shadows, but they seem to be everywhere.

In Dark Network, it becomes clear that the conspirators are still trying to influence the outcome.  The protagonist, FBI Agent Imogen Trager, must fight against time, a sinister network clinging to life and hope--even her own colleagues--to find out who is still trying to steal the election and stop them. There is barely one month until the inauguration...

In both books, each group of actors--the conspirators and the protagonists--believe they are doing the right thing.  The protagonists must ask themselves how far they are prepared to go in defense of their principles before they have abandoned them all along the way.

 James McCrone is the author of Faithless Elector, a suspense-thriller, that
Publishers Weekly calls a “fast-moving topical thriller.”  Its “surprising twists add up to a highly suspenseful read.” The sequel, Dark Network, is coming soon.

Faithless Elector, by James McCrone is available through Amazon.
If you live in Philadelphia, pick up a copy at Head House Books -or- Penn Book Center

Wednesday 21 December 2016

Faithless Elector's Enduring Themes

"Every nation gets the government it deserves," Joseph de Maistre observed in 1811. Do we also get the literature we deserve?
In the most recent review of the book, in the Plattsburgh Press Republican, the reviewer, Lauren Kiefer, begins by talking about her state of mind as she approached reading this thriller:
"I have to confess that the phrase 'political thriller' tends to make me brace myself for a combination of the predictable and the cringe-worthy: action-heroes and women in jeopardy in steamy romances; predictable plots with implausible twists; and in the worst cases, a not-so-hidden political agenda on the part of the author."
http://bit.ly/2eJ5gHb
I know what she means.

I have stopped reading a great many such books myself.  In fact, I briefly considered not calling the novel a thriller because of the negative associations.  Fortunately, Prof. Kiefer goes on to say that not only does Faithless Elector not fall into those sloppy cliches, it is compellingly well written while delivering the goods:
"The pleasure of James McCrone’s Faithless Elector lies not just in its smooth yet evocative prose but in its professorial hero and its equally intelligent FBI-agent heroine; in their relative and believable sexual restraint while both their lives and our nation’s democracy are being threatened; and in the author’s justified confidence that good writing can make chases through recognizable locales (freeway, building, city streets) sufficiently exciting without a Navy SEAL or a terrorist plot."
So why is there so much dreck out there?

One of my mentors at the University of Washington, Charles Johnson (Oxherding Tale, Middle Passage, Dreamer) used to exhort his students to write the kinds of books we would like to read ourselves.  And he, as did others, imparted what is essentially a contract the writer has with the reader:
  • Write what you yourself would like to read
  • Remember, you're telling a story; get on with it
  • Don't talk down to the reader
  • Don't dumb-down your ideas
  • Don't cheat--i.e. don't for the sake of suspense withhold information vital to the story, or introduce a character right at the end who sews everything up
There are many more commandments, but certainly as one begins writing all alone in a room it is helpful--and comforting--to construe a reader and to keep the above basics foremost in the mind.  It is equally helpful to conceive of the story one tells as an organic entity, with wants, dislikes, and to be in service to those needs.

I love thrillers.  I love politics.  I wrote a political thriller.

Some of my favorites growing up (and still!) are LeCarre's Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy, and The Spy Who Came in from the Cold; Graham Greene's The Quiet American; Day of the Jackal, by Frederick Forsyth; Hunt for Red October, by Tom Clancy; Laidlaw, by William McIlvanney.  They are varied titles and writers, but they are all thoughtful, thought-provoking, immersive, precise.  In the case of Greene and McIlvanney, these 'gateway' works led me on to others.  And others.

Each of the thrillers I love draws its energy from a character who is compelled to action because what is happening is wrong, and they are pitted against forces larger than themselves. Each has a moral center, a generosity of spirit--a belief in the face of the facts that things could and should be better (or at the very least, different). Graham Greene's main characters are generally cynics; but what I learned from reading his books is that a cynic isn't someone who doesn't care at all, but someone who cares too much.

Maybe there are so many poor examples of literature in general (and thrillers specifically) precisely because we permit them by accepting the substandard: works that cheat, that dumb-down, or are polemics masquerading as literature, even when something better exists. If, as in politics, we reward substandard candidates and refuse to scrutinize party platforms even at the level of verisimilitude, why would anything change?

While the immediate impetus that gave rise to Faithless Elector has passed, its themes still resonate--themes of vigilance, dedication to one's principles, courage.  In a post-2016 election world, it will be easy for some to wallow in cynicism. As Greene's characters would show us, cynicism has a kind of hypnotic attraction, an inward narcotic allure.  Cynicism is false, and it is a trap.  Good literature offers a hero caught up in fantastic forces, forced into action by circumstance.

I've been pleased by the reactions and overwhelmingly positive reviews for Faithless Elector. It's been quite a journey, and I am hopeful it is not near ending.

NOTE: Charles Johnson has recently published The Way of the Writer: Reflections on the Art and Craft of Storytelling.

 James McCrone is the author of Faithless Elector, a suspense-thriller, that
Publishers Weekly calls a “fast-moving topical thriller.”  Its “surprising twists add up to a highly suspenseful read.” The sequel, Dark Network, is coming soon.

Faithless Elector, by James McCrone is available through Amazon.
If you live in Philadelphia, pick up a copy at Head House Books -or- Penn Book Center





Saturday 17 December 2016

As American as Baseball

Saturday 17-December

New rules for baseball

The Electoral College is as American as baseball. And like baseball, the Electoral College system for electing the president often engenders the same frustrating sense of being a bystander in a game you're ostensibly playing: in the final inning of a game, for example, the pitcher could walk the bases full and then walk in a run or give up a home run. Even as a player on the field you are left with only the hollow, impotent rage of an onlooker, having had no part to play, having not even touched the ball.

Why does the similarity stop there?

The popularity and continued use of the Electoral College should inspire those of us who love the game--as we love the Republic--to greater depths.  If winner-take-all is indeed our national spirit, why must America's game cling to its outmoded scoring?  Total number of runs over nine innings is clearly too simple-minded a way of determining a winner, and likely to stir up passions.

Therefore, in order to address the unfair, un-American scoring discrepancy baseball presents, I would like to modestly propose a new set of plurality rules for scoring a baseball game:
  • The team who scores the most runs in a particular inning will be awarded ALL of the runs scored in that inning by either team. 
To illustrate: let us say, in the first inning Team 'A' scored 3 runs and Team 'B' scored 2.  Under electoral scoring, Team 'A' having received more runs that 'B' would receive all 5 runs scored in that inning.

Then, (to continue the scenario) if in the following inning, 'B' scored 3 runs and 'A' none, the running score would be 'A'-5 vs. 'B'- 3, each having won an inning and been awarded all the points that inning carried.

I'm sure we can all agree that this makes much more sense.

Having awarded the points thusly, after 9 innings there could still be a tie, of course.  In the new electoral plurality rules, the teams would play a 10th inning but to continue playing past that is pointless.  If, at the end of the 10th inning, there is still a tie, the decision as to who has won the contest would be remanded to a responsible body, with knowledge of the teams, players and their capabilities.

There could be no better group than living members of the Baseball Hall of Fame to weigh, consider and decide which team should win, a college Baseball Elders.  Like the electoral college, there could be some simple safeguards in place, such as a restriction on voting for a team on which an Elder had previously played.

What could be more American?


For a primer of past blog posts on the issues surrounding the Electoral College, click the links below: from the issues surrounding popular vote winners losing in the Electoral College, to Faithless Electors, to the democratic deficit inherent in the apportioning of EC votes.

Electoral College and the Popular Vote (19-July-2016)

Contested Convention and Faithless Electors (17-July-2016)

Power of the Small States, Part 1 -and- Part 2 (21-April-2016)

Alexander Hamilton & The First Contested Election (30-August-2016)

 James McCrone is the author of Faithless Elector, a suspense-thriller, that
Publishers Weekly calls a “fast-moving topical thriller.”  Its “surprising twists add up to a highly suspenseful read.” The sequel, Dark Network, is coming soon.

Faithless Elector, by James McCrone is available through Amazon.
If you live in Philadelphia, pick up a copy at Head House Books -or- Penn Book Center


Monday 21 November 2016

Dec 19 is the real election - Faithless Elector, a novel

  • In Faithless Elector I took as given the respected place voting and democratic accountability held.  Was I wrong?
Those familiar with the novel, Faithless Elector, know that its fictional conspiracy gathers steam (and bodies) beginning now in the days following the Nov. 8 general election.

When I became acquainted with the intricacies and vulnerabilities in the Electoral College system for electing the president, I saw an opportunity to write a good story, one I hoped would resonate with readers. Even as I began writing it, I was alive to the potential criticism that I was trafficking in scare-mongering, potentially trivializing something I regarded as important.  I knew I should pay attention and choose my steps carefully.

The core of what I hoped would resonate most strongly with readers, and what animated me, was the appalling nature of an attack on the election process.  I hoped the motivation of the main characters--to stop the plot and preserve our democracy (and their own lives)--would be firm ground; that readers would share the characters' incredulity, anger and disgust; that there would be verisimilitude in people risking their reputations and their lives in defense of the defining aspect of American life--voting.  So, for the premise of the thriller, I took as given the respected place voting and democratic accountability held in American life.

I find that my views on the sacredness of the franchise are not widely shared.  On the right, in approved campaign ads during the lead-up to the election, there were wide-spread claims that the vote would be rigged. Now, on the left and right, there are calls to coerce Electors to switch their supposed votes.

I find that my efforts not to trivialize the electoral process in the fictional realm have been trammeled by events in the real world, which make a mockery of what I had hoped was our collective faith and trust. Calder, Imogen Trager, Matthew Yamashita--characters in Faithless Elector--feel the injustice bone deep, not for one candidate or the other, but for the legitimacy of the government and the office of the president.

The more I read and hear these days, the more their belief seems comically pollyanna.  I find myself bewildered by what standards and norms we will abandon, what bridges we seem willing to burn.

I'm pleased that reviewers have noted the novel has no axe to grind, and indeed that the book works on a moral level.  Faithless Elector is no polemic against the Electoral College, nor a justification of it.  The defining principles are (I hope) those of good story-telling.  The villains are those who seek to exploit a weakness in the process and subvert the election process as we know it. Their goal is understandable, if evil.  I had hoped the theme of ordinary people fighting for something important while risking their lives would have been a bigger part of what people liked about the book.

In a way, I'm glad I wrote the novel long before any of what is currently happening came to pass.  I think the cynicism of the past months might have jaundiced my views, made me question the validity of some of the characters' reactions, skew their motivations.  It is certainly coloring my perceptions and writing as I finish off the sequel, Dark Network, which picks up the pieces of Faithless Elector.

I have chosen a quote from Adam Smith, as the epigram for Dark Network, one I think resonates all too well with the current myopic climate:  "Virtue is more to be feared than vice, because its excesses are not subject to the regulation of conscience."

I am pleased the book is doing well with readers and reviewers; that it delivers on the taut thrill-ride; that it delivers well-rounded, believable characters.  Still, I find myself wondering if, as Calder and Imogen run in terror from the conspirators, are any readers thinking, "yeah, but they're suckers for even caring"?

For a primer on issues relating to the Electoral College and Faithless Electors, click here

 Publishers Weekly calls the novel Faithless Elector a “fast-moving topical thriller.”  Its “surprising twists add up to a highly suspenseful read.”   
For a full list of reviews, check out http://FaithlessElector.com     
The sequel, Dark Network, is coming soon.

Faithless Elector, by James McCrone is available through Amazon.
If you live in Philadelphia, pick up a copy at Head House Books -or- Penn Book Center


Friday 11 November 2016

Faith in Faithless Electors

There is a petition calling on Electors to become Faithless Electors which has garnered some 2,500,000 signatures as I write this (Fri 12:55 p.m. 11/11/2016).  It is an excellent venting of frustration, and it serves to point up the weaknesses in our democracy.  For the second time in 16 years (2 of 5 of the most recent presidential elections), the popular vote winner has lost in the Electoral College.

Respect for, and confidence in, the process is a bedrock principle. When the Electoral College provisional count is at odds with the popular vote (again!), citizens are rightly dismayed and angry.

The most recent poll I'm aware of is a 2011 Gallup Poll that found 62% of Americans favor scrapping the Electoral College in favor of a popular vote (among Republicans only, the number is still 53%). Granted, I rather doubt that number would hold in the current climate--people are unwilling to kick out the ladder that is supporting them.  Indeed, Trump himself would love to distance himself from his Twitter remarks calling for a revolution in 2012 when he mistakenly thought Romney had won the popular vote but lost the electoral college.

The appeal, in the petition, to Electors to reject their pledges and vote for the nominee who actually won the popular vote is very unlikely to sway enough Electors to make a difference (they need 38 total votes to prevail).  In normal elections (and I must stress normal), the Electors are largely anonymous long-serving party stalwarts who are being honored for their service to the party in their respective states by being named to their party's "slate" of electors.  These are not folks who will be easily swayed; and whatever anonymity they possessed will be shattered as they are denounced, vilified and ostracized by their cohort should they break their pledge. Unfortunately, for those same reasons the issues of voter suppression in Ohio, Wisconsin and elsewhere are also unlikely to have any real impact, beyond, again, appeals to fairness.

There is a ground-swell of support for the National Vote Plan, and there may even be hope of an Amendment.

Many would respond that ours is a Constitutional Republic, that the Electoral College and the Senate protect us from “tyranny of the majority” and/or “mobocracy.”  They say it protects us from despots (ironic). The 'Republic v Democracy' dichotomy is a distinction without a difference, and it obscures a key question:

  • Where and when are we prepared to say that the loser gets to win, to dictate policy?
In the end, to put faith in Faithless Electors "doing the right thing" is like Charlie Brown believing that Lucy won't pull the football away at the last moment.

For a primer on issues relating to the Electoral College and Faithless Electors, click here


 Publishers Weekly calls the novel Faithless Elector a “fast-moving topical thriller.”  Its “surprising twists add up to a highly suspenseful read.” 
The sequel, Dark Network, is coming soon.

Faithless Elector, by James McCrone is available through Amazon.
If you live in Philadelphia, pick up a copy at Head House Books -or- Penn Book Center


Thursday 10 November 2016

Primer on the Electoral College

As the dust settles on the 2016 presidential election, I thought it might be helpful to put together a listing of posts regarding the ElectoralCollege and FaithlessElectors (for background and links, check out http://faithlesselector.com/)

I must stress that my novel, Faithless Elector, is not a polemic. It does not take sides, has no axe to grind.

It is a good story (if the reviews are to be believed), a gripping thriller about a small, self-interested group who seek to thwart the will of the people by exploiting weaknesses inherent in the system. Indeed, not only do they attack voting, they attack the Electoral College and its Electors. To write a credible, intelligent thriller, I had to become something of a student of the history and workings of the Electoral College.  Below, are some of the things I've gleaned.

When people defend the Electoral College as a way of putting country over the self-interest of the popular will, they are hearkening to a pre-political time that never existed, or more cynically, they are defending and advocating the ability of a small unaccountable group to impose their self-interest on the majority.

For the second time in 16 years (2 of 5 of the most recent presidential elections), the popular vote winner has lost in the Electoral College. Respect for, and confidence in, the process is a bedrock principle.  Many respond that ours is a Constitutional Republic, that the Electoral College and the Senate protect us from “tyranny of the majority” and/or “mobocracy.”

The 'Republic v Democracy' dichotomy is, I'm afraid, a distinction without a difference, and it obscures a key question: where and when are we prepared to say that the loser gets to win, to dictate policy? Under what circumstances?

Here is a primer of past blog posts on the issues surrounding the Electoral College, from the issues surrounding popular vote winners losing in the Electoral College, to Faithless Electors, to the democratic deficit inherent in the apportioning of EC votes.

Electoral College and the Popular Vote (19-July-2016)

Contested Convention and Faithless Electors (17-July-2016)

Power of the Small States, Part 1 -and- Part 2 (21-April-2016)

Alexander Hamilton & The First Contested Election (30-August-2016)

 Publishers Weekly says Faithless Elector is a “fast-moving topical thriller.”  Its “surprising twists add up to a highly suspenseful read.” The sequel, Dark Network, is coming soon.

Faithless Elector, by James McCrone is available through Amazon.
If you live in Philadelphia, pick up a copy at Head House Books -or- Penn Book Center

Saturday 29 October 2016

Imogen Trager's online presence

Apparently, Imogen Trager, the heroine of my book, Faithless Elector has a larger online presence than I do. When a friend recently took a Facebook personality test, it concluded that she should consider becoming an FBI agent.  In the comments section, I suggested she change her name to Imogen Trager--an FBI Agent.

My friend felt she knew the name (she has read the book), but Googled it nevertheless.  To her (and my!) surprise, Imogen has quite a large online presence.  In fact, Imogen Trager has a larger, more consistent online presence than I have.

I find I'm a bit jealous.  Or is it darker than that?

All writers hope their characters have a life "beyond the page."  We hope they seem real.  I remember one of the highest compliments I received some years ago was from an acquaintance who told me how at a dinner party he'd started telling a story about something that had happened to a friend of his.  But as he told the story, he later related to me, he realized he was talking about a scene in the book I was writing back then, and the "friend" was a character in the book he had read.

Why did that earlier instance make me feel good, where this leaves me troubled?  Am I a modern-day Major Kovalyov, obsessed with status and rank?

In Nikolai Gogol's absurdist short story, "The Nose," Major Kovalyov's nose goes missing and ends up living a better life than he, its owner. Kovalyov frets and seethes because his nose achieves greater social rank (status) than he ever had himself.

Perhaps the difference between now and twenty-five years ago is the nature of status: how it is achieved, and what it represents.  In the indy-publishing business, we live by 'mentions,' 'likes,' and 'follows;' by 'shares,' author- and sales rankings, all of it contributing to our rank in search engines. To be on page two of the search results is almost as bad as not existing.

I think it must be the exclusivity of her presence on the search results page that bothers me. Her rank is such that the first two pages of search results relate to her and no one else; whereas I have to share my presence with a musician, an insurance broker in London (they seem like very nice people) and an ad for Ancestry.com.

Will Imogen and her red hair continue this life of their own?  Will her status grow and mine wane?
Or am I just losing my mind?



Publishers Weekly says Faithless Elector is a “fast-moving topical thriller.”  Its “surprising twists add up to a highly suspenseful read.” The sequel, Dark Network, is coming soon.

Faithless Elector, by James McCrone is available through Amazon.
If you live in Philadelphia, pick up a copy at Head House Books -or- Penn Book Center



Monday 26 September 2016

Principled virtue is more to be feared than vice

Faithless Elector
I fell down the internet rabbit hole a few days ago while looking for a quote, and I have only just recovered. I wanted an epigraph for my novel-in-progress, Dark Network, the sequel to Faithless Elector. As is often the case, when I check something I think I know, I had it wrong.

I had thought Winston Churchill once said something along the lines of "God save us from men of principle," when in fact Churchill said:  "God grant that men of principle shall be our principal men." It's a nicely turned phrase, I suppose, but I suspect its validity; and at any rate it means the opposite of I was looking for.

My father, a political science professor, now retired, suggested the perfect epigram for Faithless Elector, from the Tammany Hall boss, George Washington Plunkitt:  "I seen my opportunities, and I took 'em," Plunkitt said during a morbidly fascinating disquisition on "honest graft."
I chose it as the quote for the book because its casual, neutral regard for something despicable and sinister fit with the attitude of the conspirators in the book, who are trying to subvert the 2016 presidential election.

That casual cynicism reminded me of the scene in The Great Gatsby, where Gatsby reveals to Nick that their luncheon guest, Meyer Wolfsheim, was the man who had fixed the 1919 "Black Sox" World Series:
"How did he happen to do that?" [Nick] asked.
"He just saw the opportunity."[Gatsby replied]

In both cases, if either of these men had been pressed regarding their integrity or the rightness of their actions, I think they would have been mystified by the question. It's indeed possible that Wolfsheim might have noted that in the larger scheme his act was a benefit, because it exposed hypocrisy and weakness in a smug, self-satisfied corner of America.  The fact he personally benefited from the arrangement would, of course, be immaterial.

As I began work on Dark Network, I kept coming back to an exchange between Control and Alec Leamus, from le Carre's very fine The Spy Who Came in from the Cold:
“I would say that since the war, our methods—ours and those of the opposition—have become much the same. I mean you can't be less ruthless than the opposition simply because your government's 'policy' is benevolent, can you now?”

Put more directly, the question becomes: how far can we go in the rightful defense of principles without abandoning them along the way?

This quandary becomes the central question for the FBI Agent, Imogen Trager, who is left to pick up the pieces as the Faithless Elector saga continues, and it becomes clear the plot is still going forward. She is upholding principles a great many of us would also seek to champion, truth, justice, fair elections. But the conspirators regard their actions, while regrettable, as necessary.  They are doing the right thing.  And people who believe they are doing the right thing rarely pause to interrogate their motives.

I think I found the perfect inversion of Churchill's "principled men" homily from an unsuspected source, pithier than Control's dismissal of benevolence, the Scottish philosopher, Adam Smith:
“Virtue is more to be feared than vice, because its excesses are not subject to the regulation of conscience.”

Maybe Wolfsheim's defense would be correct, and his actions do have benefit.  Maybe, like Mandeville's Fable of the Bees, private vices have public benefits.  
Fable of the Bees

At any rate, Agent Trager faces an enemy who will kill to defend their principles.  What will she do?


 









Publishers Weekly says Faithless Elector is a “fast-moving topical thriller.”  Its “surprising twists add up to a highly suspenseful read.” The sequel, Dark Network, is coming soon.

Faithless Elector, by James McCrone is available through Amazon.

Tuesday 20 September 2016

*Don't Invite the Vampire In*

NY Times
Don't invite the vampire in. In classical Dracula stories, a vampire can only enter your house if you invite him in. Faithless Elector is not a vampire story (spoiler alert). But it has at its core the terrible consequences of undermining the foundational principle of popular sovereignty and democratic governance--voting. 

In the novel, the conspirators strike at the heart of the electoral process by attempting to subvert the Electoral College vote. The underlying "reason" the faithless electors in the novel point to is voter fraud in Illinois. 

Since the novel's publication, I have watched the continued growth of the voter fraud/rigged election myth with trepidation (46% of Americans believe voter fraud happens 'somewhat' or 'very' often).  Authors love to see their ideas and creations breathe life beyond the page. I am no different. I struggle to create stories that resonate, characters who seem alive, situations and conflicts that seem real. 
But in this instance, I am conflicted. 

One of the central motivations for the characters in Faithless Elector is their bone-deep faith in the value of democracy; that what is happening to them and their country if the conspiracy succeeds is wrong. Their need to set that right pits them against powerful forces who have no love for, nor no regard for the nation and its people; who will stop at nothing. 

Here in the real world, Republican leaders have lately engaged in some very public hand-wringing apologies about the rise in power of the Tea Party and Donald Trump supporters. When pressed, many will admit that their rhetoric and tactics have backfired and undermined their credibility as a party, leaving only the nihilist likes of Donald Trump to cash in and drain the Grand Old Party of its lifeblood. After all, they invited him in.

But there is something even more insidious at work: their repudiation of voting. "Behind closed doors, some Republicans freely admit that stoking false fears of electoral fraud is part of their political strategy. A former Florida Republican Party chairman, Jim Greer, told The Palm Beach Post that voter ID laws and cutbacks in early voting are 'done for one reason and one reason only' — to suppress Democratic turnout." (NYTimes, Opinion 2016-09-20 http://nyti.ms/2ddKBIJ)

Will we be hearing yet more hand-wringing apologies come November?  How do you rescind your invitation to a vampire?



Publishers Weekly says Faithless Elector is a “fast-moving topical thriller.”  Its “surprising twists add up to a highly suspenseful read.”

Faithless Elector, by James McCrone is available through Amazon.

Sunday 18 September 2016

*Third Parties and the Electoral College*

The New York Times Sunday Review Section carried an interesting, informative piece today (Sun. Sept 18: link) regarding the history and the roles played by third-party candidates throughout US election history.
NYT 2016-0918, Widmer

The author, Ted Widmer, cites the chaotic first contested elections, which I have also written about (Hamilton and the First Contested Election); he cites the equally chaotic election of 1825, which I wrote about in the context of the popular vote.  And, of course, the 2000 election.

The danger of 3rd and 4th party candidates is that they can siphon off votes from one or another candidate's total.  One could say this is democracy in action...and it is, or rather it would be, if the Electoral College process were itself democratic.

 In a true general election 6-7% of the vote might be worrisome to whichever party/candidate is most at risk (and could, indeed, deprive them of a majority in a tight race), but in Electoral College voting, if those votes happen to be concentrated in a particular state(s), they can send ALL the votes that state carries to the other candidate, amplifying the loss far beyond what the relatively small numbers warrant.

The Electoral College process already favors people living in small states. Each state has the same number of electoral votes as it does members of Congress. Since congressional apportionment in the Senate favors the small states, the electoral college therefore favors small states, first by giving them the malapportioned Senate votes, and second by amplifying the voting power of those votes.

The novel, Faithless Elector, shines light on the weakness of the system as well as the opportunity for narrow, special interests to exploit that weakness and thwart the will of the majority. 

Publishers Weekly says Faithless Elector is a “fast-moving topical thriller.”  Its “surprising twists add up to a highly suspenseful read.”

Faithless Elector, by James McCrone is available through Amazon.

 

Tuesday 30 August 2016

Alexander Hamilton & The First Contested Election

Hamilton Letter
It was clear that the compromise rules governing the Electoral College could not even stand up to the first contested election in 1800.  The original writing had the candidate with the most Electoral College ballots becoming president; the second place candidate would be vice-president.  Those at the Philadelphia Constitutional Convention had not even conceived of there being political parties.

In 1800, there was a tie between Jefferson and Burr; and even had there not been, two candidates from different parties would have been president and vice-president.  The deadlock in the House in 1800 was broken on the 36th ballot, but only after Federalist Party leader Alexander Hamilton made known his preference for Jefferson, in words that ring eerily salient today: “In a choice of Evils let them take the least – Jefferson is in every view less dangerous than Burr.”

EXCERPT of the letter:   "Mr. Jefferson, though too revolutionary in his notions, is yet a lover of liberty and will be desirous of something like orderly Government – Mr. Burr loves nothing but himself – thinks of nothing but his own aggrandizement – and will be content with nothing short of permanent power in his own hands – No compact, that he should make with any other passion in his own breast except his Ambition, could be relied upon by himself – How then should we be able to rely upon any agreement with him? Mr. Jefferson, I suspect will not dare much; Mr. Burr will dare every thing in the sanguine hope of effecting every thing."
[Letter to Harrison Gray Otis, a Massachusetts Congressman, from Alexander Hamilton]

Responding to the problems from those first elections, the Congress proposed the Twelfth Amendment in 1803—prescribing that electors cast separate ballots for president and vice president, and replacing the system outlined in Article II, Section 1, Clause 3. By June 1804, the states had ratified the amendment in time for the 1804 election.  Keep in mind, however, that should there ever be a tie, or if no candidate receives the requisite majority of Electoral Votes, the vote will go to the House and Senate, who will vote separately on president and vice-president.

Initially, the Electoral College provisions conceived a set of knowledgeable persons, gentlemanly statesman of the political class who would put nation above self-interest. We have only to look at the 1800 election, where it is clear those involved were motivated more by what would be better for their state and their party than with the concerns of the nation to see how hollow that conception was. I am not casting aspersions on those Representatives, the 1800 election was a political struggle, with the clamor and rancor we would recognize today between contending visions of what is best for the nation. But it was hardly statesman-like.

When people defend the Electoral College as a way of putting country over the self-interest of the popular will, they are hearkening to a pre-political time that never existed, or more cynically, they are defending and advocating the ability of a small group to impose their self-interest on the majority. For all the criticism political parties routinely get, they are the only way non-political people (the majority) can have influence. The enduring recession has exposed how easily moneyed interests can manipulate rules at the heart of the Constitution itself.

The novel, Faithless Elector, shines light on the weakness of the system as well as the opportunity for narrow, special interests to exploit that weakness and thwart the will of the majority. 

Publishers Weekly says Faithless Elector is a “fast-moving topical thriller.”  Its “surprising twists add up to a highly suspenseful read.”

Faithless Elector, by James McCrone is available through Amazon.

Thursday 25 August 2016

Faithless Electors

Nate Silver's blog FiveThirtyEight.com recently discussed the 1976 "contested convention," the subsequent presidential election and the split in the Republican Party then and its relevance to the divisions tearing apart the Republicans now.  The 2016 Republican Party convention was a contentious--if not contested--convention. In 1976, Reagan, they say, stole the show.  I've seen that final speech.  It was a good one.

Although Ford prevailed at the contested 1976 convention, Reagan would ultimately prevail at the next election, having electrified and galvanized his base.  He would leave a legacy whose worth we still debate.  Is there anyone who can motivate and thrill the electorate now? Anyone who can have cross-over appeal?

One of the products of that contested convention, was the switched Faithless Elector vote, one I cite in my new novel, Faithless Elector (p.47)


In 1976, Ford won a plurality in Washington State, but he only received 10 of Washington's (then) 11 Electoral votes.  Mike Padden, a Republican Elector, cast his vote for Ronald Reagan rather than his party's candidate, Gerald Ford.

There have been two Faithless Elector votes since then--in 2000, Barabara Lett-Simmons, abstained in protest for lack of District of Columbia representation, and in 2004, an unnamed Minnesota Elector inadvertently cast his/her vote for John Edwards, the vice-presidential candidate.

None of these faithless elector acts had a bearing on the outcome of the election.  It is worth noting, however, that such acts of conscience, protest and error are not anomalies but are part of the checkered history of the Electoral College.  The ones listed above are merely the most recent.

Polls this early in an election are all-but meaningless, and we all need the Electors to keep the faith.

Publishers Weekly says Faithless Elector is a “fast-moving topical thriller.”  Its “surprising twists add up to a highly suspenseful read.”



Faithless Elector, by James McCrone is available through Amazon.

Tuesday 23 August 2016

Verisimilitude and Rigged Elections: Fiction Has to Make Sense

“He who would keep a secret must first keep secret that he has a secret to keep.”
--Sir Humphrey Appleby, Yes, Minister, BBC comedy

Novels—unlike presidential campaigns, apparently—need to have verisimilitude.  Fiction by its nature is not true, but for most fictional forms, the action and plot must be plausible, believable within a larger social-cultural context (“like truth”); and at the very least be plausible within the boundaries of its own genre.  In my new novel, the thriller, Faithless Elector, a group of conspirators try to alter the outcome of the upcoming presidential election by manipulating the Electoral College, and they sow the seeds of controversy by claiming the election was rigged in Illinois (p.6).  In the novel, the two main parties seem to be seeking to engineer the outcome in Illinois. 

Here in the real world, the Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump has not only continued to disparage the validity of voting, but has increased his condemnation and dismissal of any result that does not send him to the White House as “rigged,” citing partisan Republican Party talking-points regarding fraudulent voting.
System Rigged ad, Trump for president-PA


At no point while writing Faithless Elector did I contemplate suggesting that the outcome could be engineered by fraudulent voting; that is, one voter impersonating another.  As one of the main characters in the novel puts it, anyone breaking the law in this way would “seek to minimize their profile”(p.13). Only a tiny number of people can know about it, because the more people who are participating, the greater the chances of a slip-up:  three people together can probably keep a secret; 10 people, maybe; 100 or 1,000 people cannot. 

When you get into the kinds of numbers you would need to engineer an outcome by fraudulent voting (per Sir Humphrey, above) you probably couldn’t even keep secret the fact you had such a secret organization.  To organize—and to do it quietly—enough fraudulent voters across the nation to tip a race in one direction or another would be impossible.  In the fictional world, if I had tried it, critics would have said the plot “lacked verisimilitude” (if they were kind).

Are fiction writers, then, held to a higher truth standard?  As another thriller writer, Tom Clancy, would have it:  “The difference between fiction and reality? Fiction has to make sense." 


To read a free excerpt of Faithless Elector, click HERE


Publishers Weekly says Faithless Elector is a “fast-moving topical thriller.”  Its “surprising twists add up to a highly suspenseful read.”


Follow James!  Twitter:  @jamesmccrone4 and on Facebook at Faithless Elector by James McCrone

Faithless Elector, by James McCrone is available through Amazon.