The Bill Walton Show

The genius of the founders who gave us the United States Constitution was that they sought to provide a system of government to guard against the concentration of power by an elite few. Their clear-eyed understanding of human nature was that unchecked power almost always and everywhere has been the source of tyranny throughout history. But for more than a century in America, the Constitution, as drafted and ratified, has been either ignored or, creatively lawyered by Supreme Court rulings, to expand federal power. Washington DC today enjoys almost unchecked power. This is a systemic problem that requires a systemic solution. So says Mark Meckler, my guest on this episode. Mark is founder of the Convention of the States, which calls for using Article V of the Constitution to call a Convention of States to propose amendments. "This is about more than elections. Elections cannot and will not solve the problems of a broken system. The only solution big enough to fix our nation's problems is a Convention of States for proposing constitutional amendments to rein in federal tyranny." The Convention of States would only allow the states to discuss amendments that, "limit the power and jurisdiction of the federal government, impose fiscal restraints, and place term limits on federal officials." Here are some of the types of amendments that could be proposed: • Limiting Supreme Court Justices to nine members of the court • Preventing the federal government from adding states without the affirmative consent of three quarters of the existing states • A limitation on using Executive Orders and federal regulations to enact laws • A balanced budget amendment, including limitations on taxes and spending • Imposition of Generally Accepted Accounting Principles (GAAP) • Single Subject Amendment – One subject per bill in Congress • A redefinition of the General Welfare Clause back to original intent (the original view was the federal government could not spend money on any topic within the jurisdiction of the states) • A redefinition of the Commerce Clause back to original intent (the original view was that Congress was granted a narrow and exclusive power to regulate shipments across state lines–not all the economic activity of the nation) • A prohibition of using international treaties and law to govern the domestic law of the United States • Placing an upper limit on federal taxation • Requiring the sunset of all existing federal taxes and a super-majority vote to replace them with new, fairer taxes • Religious freedom amendment, prohibiting the government from further interference with our religious freedoms • Regulatory curtailment by forcing Congress to vote on regulations instead of deferring law making to regulators. Is any of this possible? Nineteen states have already voted to call for a Convention. Thirty four are need needed to make it happen. Listen in to learn how Mark believes we can bring this about.

This episode is set in our mountainside house in Rappahannock County, Virginia for a wide ranging conversation with my friend, the always engaging and provocative Matt Schlapp, leader and Chairman of CPAC. We cover a lot of ground, with some of the highlights being: Why we believe we're in the human flourishing business. Why the "diversity, equity and inclusion" mantra is a false God. How CPAC is finding that America's founding principles and freedoms are resonating all over the world with its international events in Japan, Brazil, Hong Kong, and this week, Israel. What we think is the most important word in CPAC's name. Where people who share our values should be investing their time and money. Why a "little bit of voter fraud and corruption" is unacceptable when it comes to our elections. What Ron DeSantis can expect if he becomes the Republican standard bearer. This is a fun conversation, especially as we joust and jest with my director Kenny, as the sun moves around the set.

The Supreme Court's most momentous decision was not the 5-to-4 vote to overturn Roe v. Wade. That simply sent the issue back to the states to decide.

Rather it was the blockbuster decision to rein in the Environmental Protection Agency from claiming powers that Congress did not grant.

When Congress passed the Clean Air Act it authorized the EPA to impose the "best system of emission reduction" for carbon-emitting activities. It did not authorize the EPA to shut down electricity generated from coal. It did not authorize a "generation shift" to so-called renewables like wind and solar.

The EPA had claimed these powers to order changes of vast economic and political significance and the Supreme Court essentially said "no you can't do that, not unless there's legislation that clearly and explicitly authorizes it."

As John Vecchione, my guest on this episode, puts it succinctly:

"Why do you write down laws? If you write down the laws, don't those words mean something or can they mean anything?"

What the EPA has been saying is 'We are going to set the CO2 levels such that the coal plants can no longer operate. We want to put the coal plants out of business completely.'

This was not its intended mandate.

Join me as I talk with John Vecchione and his colleague Casey Norman, both with the New Civil Liberties Alliance, about the EPA decision and what it means.

If you're looking a lively, engaging and plain English conversation about the issues, this is the place to start.

As we can all recall, when Donald Trump took office in January 2017, he didn't exactly come equipped with the detailed plans and the 1,000s of people necessary to bring about his agenda. Essentially, he had to start from scratch. That was part of his appeal. That he did accomplish so much was a testament to the strength of his mission - Make America Great Again - and the power of his personal leadership. Still, there were a lot of missed opportunities. With Republicans likely to get another chance when America elects a Republican President in 2024, we need to get it right. We need to be prepared. Working on just such a project is the America First Policy Institute led by its CEO Brooke Rollins, my guest on this episode. Brooke was Director of the Domestic Policy Council in President Trump's White House, where she also served as Director of the Office of American Innovation. Simply put, AFPI is developing a detailed blueprint for governing. To put in place the right people, policies, processes, etc.. to bring about transformational change. And doing this while knowing full well that the Deep State will fight tooth and nail to block this agenda - just as it did with Donald Trump. In just over a year, AFPI has assembled a team with 17 former White House senior staffers, 45 former administration officials, and is building an organization that, in Brooke's words, will "continue to execute, continue the America First agenda to be ready for the next White House, whether that is Donald Trump or Ron DeSantis or Ted Cruz or someone we may not even be talking about today. Our side has never been ready. And we're going to change that." Pay attention to AFPI and Brooke Rollins. What they're doing can be a game changer.

We've all been appalled by yet another school shooting, this time in Uvalde, Texas. We want these tragedies to stop. We want to do something. Of course the cries to "do something" almost always means doing something about guns. Yet, the gun bill just signed into law by President Biden is unlikely to prevent future school shootings. There's a lot of evidence to show why it won't work, especially when existing gun laws appear to cost more lives than they save. So says Dr. John Lott, my guest on this episode, and the nation's leading expert on guns and gun laws. Dr. Lott, with a PhD in economics, is president of the Crime Prevention Research Center. With almost three decades of research, his many books including More Guns, Less Crime, The Bias Agains Guns and Gun Control Myths which show that by allowing adults to carry concealed weapons significantly reduces crime in America. Some things you may find surprising: Between 1950 and May 2022, 96% of mass public shootings in the United States occurred in places where citizens were banned from carrying guns. Yet the mainstream media refuses to mention that the attacks occur in "gun-free" zones. "If someone were threatening you or your family, would you feel safe putting a sign in front of your home that said this home is a gun-free zone?" asks John. America's "average" gun crime statistics are badly distorted by black on black murders in our inner cities. Even average deaths of children killed by guns include teenagers, and most of those gun crimes are gang murders. "When people cite the rise in "mass shootings" in America, we need to know that almost 90% are gangs fighting each other over drug turf." Survey data and news reports show that the fear that targeted victims might be armed deters criminals, and that guns are used in self-defense or to ward off criminal threats about 2.3 million times a year. "Burglars in the United States spend about twice as long casing a home before they break in compared to their British counterparts. What's the reason that they give? They're worried about getting shot." In the more that 30 years since John Lott wrote More Guns, Less Crime, his facts, arguments and recommendations remain true as ever.

From the moment President Joe Biden's administration took office, the world has grown a more dangerous place, and the pace is accelerating.

There's a long list of national security worries that didn't used to be of concern to everyday Americans, but now are, or should be.

• Russia, Ukraine and the prospects of a nuclear war.

• China's mounting threat to envelop Taiwan, a world leader and supplier of semiconductors and information technology.

• Collapsing political stability in the Middle East thanks to the administration's blunders that have helped Iran's quest to obtain nuclear weapons.

• The mostly unreported Chinese and Russian quest to dominate outer space. The country that controls space controls the world.

• And, maybe worst of all, the made-in-America war on fossil fuels, which has driven inflation sky high and made us dependent on our enemies for our energy.

Triggered by our disastrous cut and run from Afghanistan last year, the world's bad actors have been emboldened by America's weakness.

Like Thema and Louise, Joe Biden seems determined to drive us off a cliff.

Joining me on this episode to see what we should and can be doing to keep America safe, is my returning guest, the brilliant Brandon Weichert, publisher of The Weichert Report. And author of "Winning Space" and the soon to be published "The Shadow War: Iran's Quest for Supremacy".

Brandon, who has been called a "brilliant and anxiety inducing scholar," has emerged as one of our most well-informed, original defense intellectuals since the great Herman Kahn.

He tells us what we do not want to hear, but need to know, about the gathering threats to our freedom and prosperity. He also offers solutions.

In this episode, my friend John Tamny interviews me about legendary Wall Street leader and Blackstone founder Stephen Schwarzman's book What It Takes: Lessons in the Pursuit of Excellence. There are many fascinating insights and lessons in Steve's book which we can all benefit from.

A few highlights:

• Steve Schwarzman started Blackstone with a unique strategic plan. There's a tremendous lesson in how he approached building his firm.

• For any young man or woman who wants to build a business, or any type of organization, Steve Schwarzman's book would be a great place to start learning about "what it takes."

• When Steve Schwarzman tells his team "don't lose money" it's about a mindset. Think through the downsides, what Jay Pritzker called "the horribles." Both, in part, became billionaires from thinking this way.

• One of my favorite Steve Schwarzman Rules: "Worrying is an active, liberating activity. If channeled appropriately, it allows you to articulate the downside in any situation and drives you to take action to avoid it." Great advice.

• Private equity's been demonized by a lot of people with agendas and who know nothing about it. True, it's a competitive and tough business, but it's created a lot of value over the past 4-5 decades. Look at the record.

• Do companies become woke because their young woke new hires demand it? Disney employees clearly seem to be running the asylum, not its CEO. Is this also true for Wall Street?

• One of ways our culture has changed, and not for the better, it that we seem to have lost the ideal of pursing excellence. In my private equity experience, making an investment successful was exhilarating.

• Under President Xi, China's becoming "uninvestable" for Western businesses. Even Chinese private equity investors say China's turned hostile to capitalism. No longer simply a competitor, China's turned enemy.

• In "What It Takes" Steve Schwarzman writes that had we not had FAS 157 mark-to-market accounting, the meltdown we had in 2008 would not have happened. I agree.

• One history's great ironies is that Dodd-Frank, the bill to supposedly cure the ills of the 2008 meltdown, is named after Barney Frank and Chris Dodd, who pushed banks to drop their underwriting standards to promote housing.

• When you're running an investment company there's a real tension between the roles of CEO and CIO (chief investment officer). It's a balancing act you must get right to succeed.

John Tamny is Vice President of Freedom Works and editor of Real Clear Markets, and author of the terrific book, When Politicians Panicked, which is about the government mishandling of the coronavirus pandemic. John's other books includeWho Needs the Fed, Popular Economics and The End of Work.

He asks some tough, penetrating questions and we hope you'll find the answers illuminating. Steve's book holds many many stories and lessons about "what it takes" to be both a leader and investor.

Hope you'll listen in.

Russian's war on Ukraine, and China's aim to take over Taiwan. Joining me is one the wisest national security experts around, Dr Stephen Bryen. With 50 years of experience in foreign relations and national security, he's seen it all. Called the Yoda of the arms trade, he was the Pentagon's top cop, the man whose job it was to ensure that sensitive technology would be kept from enemies, potential enemies and questionable allies. Stephen is the driving force behind the Center for Security Policy's just published Stopping a Taiwan Invasion. It's proposals, if adopted, will discourage any attack from China and strengthen peace and security in the Pacific. I've a lot of questions, and Stephen provides answers. And some deep insights. Was Russia's invasion of Ukraine inevitable, or did the we provoke it? Why is Russia's invasion failing? If Putin's ousted, what are the odds that someone much worse takes over? How concerned is the veteran intelligence community that we could lurch into a nuclear war over Ukraine? Shouldn't the Biden administration tell the Europeans and tell Zelensky, that it's time to sit down and figure this out? China is running a dedicated campaign to "uproot the rules based order that has existed in the Indo Pacific region since the end of World War II". China is mounting its largest military buildup in history. China is ramping up its ambitions to take over Taiwan. And Joe Biden says we'll go to war to prevent it. How would we win this war? Who would our allies be? Why would we now have more than ever? Why is Taiwan a much bigger issue for the U.S. than Ukraine? What lessons have the Chinese learned from Ukraine? What's behind President Xi's lockdown of Shanghai? Has Joe Biden finally gotten something right in drawing the line on Taiwan? There's a lot more packed into this episode with Dr Stephen Bryen. If you're looking for an easy-to-understand primer about what's at stake for America in Ukraine and Taiwan, this is a great place to start.

The FRTIB has decided to ignore directives by both President Trump - and President Biden - as well as strong opposition on Capitol Hill, to open a 'Mutual Fund Window' in June which would make available to Thrift Savings Plan (TSP) participants the opportunity to invest up to 25% of their savings in some 5,000 mutual funds.

The problem?

These funds would include businesses involved in the Chinese government's military, espionage, human rights abuses, and its aggressive industrial policy designed to undermine U.S. industry.

Why, after all we've learned about China's extensive aims at global domination, does the FRTIB plan to proceed with this? China is no longer simply an economic competitor, but rather an aggressive adversary.

The FRTIB public statements say it's "too much work" to winnow out CCP controlled or influenced companies. But are there deeper purposes at work?

Joining me to talk about this alarming development is Frank Gaffney, Host of Securing America with Frank Gaffney, Founder and Executive Chairman of the Center for Security Policy, and Vice Chairman of the Committee for Present Danger: China.

And Roger Robinson former Senior Director of International Economic Affairs at the Reagan National Security Council and Chairman of the Congressional US-China Economic and Security Review Commission.