Broken norms and bad faith are interfering with the proper functioning of our government. How can we tolerate this in a time of pandemic and economic calamity?

Warnings from History

Aug 11th, 2020 21m 44s

Using several sources, we explore the kinds of actions and trends that should alarm us about the advance of tyranny. Both recent books such as How Democracies Die and On Tyranny, and works a few decades old are used to inform us on how to be v

Agenda for the Political Season

Jul 10th, 2020 12m 5s

The issues for discussion in the next several episodes of Stand Up Citizen are presented to help us work through this political season.

Informed Citizen

May 13th, 2020 19m 34s

In our current political and cultural climate we need citizenship education more than ever. We look at what our founders had to say about the need for informed, educated citizens in the republic they created for us

On the Electoral College

Mar 19th, 2020 19m 57s

We review the founders design for the electoral college method of electing the president. Selections from Hamilton's presentation of the electoral college give us insight into how the process fit in the entire Constitutional scheme. I hope th

Corrosive Bad Faith

Feb 17th, 2020 20m 24s

We explore the effect of bad faith actions by our political officials and candidates on the health of our body politic, and ask the question whether the candidate who wins their election, but resorts to bad faith, deceit, misstatements, has pro

The Case Against Citizens United

Jan 16th, 2020 17m 1s

Using the principles that informed and directed the founding generation, we analyze the Citizens United ruling that led to far more corporate money in campaigns. By applying the Madison's concerns about factions, the principles of the Declarat

On Civic Virtue

Dec 29th, 2019 22m 4s

We explore the importance of civic virtue, public virtue, to our founders when they created our republic. Then the comments of other luminaries on virtue, government and citizenship. Finally, we ask how our state of the nation has preserved, o

The Secret of Freedom is Courage

Dec 11th, 2019 20m 19s

The founders of our country are much in the news of late. Even the Federalist Papers are getting lots of air time. Let's remind ourselves that our founders tried to solve the challenge and threat of faction by encouraging a diversity of inter

A Debate for the Ages

Nov 25th, 2019 25m 52s

The Constitution is published after months of hard work, and there is lots of push back. Opposition to many of its aspects comes even from leading citizens, including Sam Adams, John Hancock, and Patrick Henry. Essays opposing the Constitutio

Rule of Law - Constitution

Nov 6th, 2019 32m 29s

Setting the stage for the creation of the Constitution, this episode gives background and context for how the framers created our Constitution. It is about the times and events that affected them, what influenced and concerned them, and some o

First Principles

Sep 20th, 2019 27m 33s

We take a tour through the principles our founding generation set out for our country. There is much more to the Declaration of Independence that life, liberty, the pursuit of happiness. We look at the many influences on the founders of our c

Looking Back to Our Founders

Sep 7th, 2019 20m 52s

In this first episode, we look back on our history and refresh our memory of the American experience compared to other nations. A brief review of the history of other major nations over our 243 year history allows us to see how we have fared.

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