The United States military is being weakened from the top

December 20, 2022

One of the things that has earned the respect of most Americans through the decades is our military. Our armed forces have done wonderful things, like helping to save much of the world in World War II. It was able to do this because of the proper training of competent individuals.

Our military has been regarded as the best, most proficient and capable in the world. On the land and sea, and in the air, there were none better.

Recent developments now place those highly regarded forces in danger of being less ready and able to do their job of protecting America from its adversaries.

The men and women in the ranks are not the problem. They are well-trained and very competent, at least at the present time. The problem lies with much of the civilian and military leadership in the Pentagon and some officers in the services.

Non-military topics like diversity, equity and inclusion, and using the proper pronouns have crept into the thinking of some of the top brass.

The Department of Defense (DoD) has something called the Diversity and Inclusion Strategic Plan. The DoD explains that “diversity is a strategic imperative — critical to mission readiness and accomplishment.” 

And, Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin has said that it must be a priority for our military “to look like America and not only in the ranks, but our leadership should look like America.” 

“The new priority turns the Army into a social experiment at the cost of mission readiness,” said Robert M. Berg in National Review. “The new push within the DoD for diversity, equity, and inclusion goes well beyond measures to ensure equal opportunity and instead looks to create preferences that have nothing to do with merit. Our military will suffer if it does not change course.”

Imagine how the performance of sports teams would be affected if the main concerns were having the right mix of ethnicities and such, instead of having the most talented players. That is the direction our military is headed.

Also, the military released thousands of service people who refused to get a Covid vaccine, and the services are now having trouble attracting enough new recruits to meet their targets. Some of that is because those of the right age and physical condition are turned off by the misdirection of the military recently.

The largest military service, the U.S. Army, is revisiting some of the fitness standards and academic standards right now to try to meet its recruitment goals. Lowering standards does not bode well for keeping military readiness at the highest level.

The late Rush Limbaugh, in highlighting the military’s critical areas, said that its job is “to kill people and break things.” The military must have as its primary goals to be as skillful, efficient and well equipped as possible. The services must not emphasize things like race, religion, gender, or other non-merit-based traits. Instead, it must focus on combat readiness. Anything that stands in the way of that mission is dangerous and unacceptable. We must always be prepared to fight and win the nation’s wars.

And now this new twist comes to light, courtesy of the Wall Street Journal. “A little-noticed rule-making proposed by the Department of Defense, NASA and the General Services Administration would require federal contractors to disclose and reduce their CO2 emissions as well as climate financial risks. The rule would cover 5,766 contractors that have received at least $7.5 million from the feds in the prior year,” the Journal reported.

“Smaller contractors would have to publicly report their so-called Scope 1 and 2 emissions — i.e., those they generate at their facilities and from the electricity and heating they use. Firms with larger contracts would also have to tabulate their upstream and downstream Scope 3 emissions, including those from customers, suppliers and products used in the field.”

“In other words, this is a back door for the Administration to force businesses across the economy to report and reduce their CO2 emissions,” the Journal article continues. “As the U.S. military faces strained budgets and growing threats, climate will be a costly new priority in national defense.”

“But the very point of the rule, National Review said, “is to force CO2 emissions reductions across the private economy by leveraging $650 billion in annual federal contracts. By covering Scope 3 emissions, the rule would sweep in tens of thousands of non-federal contractors, including many small businesses.”

Thus, it is not only costly in terms of national defense, but it will affect the ability of these contractors to produce needed military goods as inexpensively and as quickly as possible.

The United States has already done pretty well in reducing CO2 emissions, compared to other nations. China, for example, continues to build new coal-fired electric generation facilities. And China is not focused on foolish “woke” concepts for its military, the largest in the world.

The civilian and military leaders who favor these new off-center ideas need to be replaced immediately with people who know and understand the critical purpose of our military, and who will focus on that.

How is Biden’s “Build Back Better” plan working out for the country?

December 27, 2022

President Joe Biden campaigned on the phrase “Build Back Better,” and as president has frequently used the phrase. The point he was trying to make was that things were really not so good under then-President Donald Trump, and if the country just had the good sense to elect Joe Biden and Kamala Harris to the White House, things would improve.

Nearly half-way through his term, how is he doing?

A column by Beth Whitehead on The Federalist website is titled “11 Of The Biden Administration’s Greatest Failures So Far.” Let’s take a look at a few of these failures.

** Facilitating a Deadly Border - The effects of Biden’s refusal to enforce U.S. border and immigration laws are devastating. Alejandro Mayorkas, Secretary of Homeland Security, has said before a Congressional committee that the border is not open. He also said that the problems were inherited. And, he later denied having said the border is not open.

Putting some detail on that claim, Newsweek reported in September that “Data from the U.S. Border Patrol and Office of Field Operations compiled by Newsweek show that the average number of encounters under Biden reached totals of roughly 189,000 per month, compared to an average of just under 51,000 per month during the Trump presidency.” Sounds like an open border, doesn’t it?

Our southern border is controlled by cartels, which make millions of dollars smuggling men, women, and children across the border, which can be, and has been deadly for many of them. 

They also smuggle drugs, like fentanyl, which is deadly, along with other dangerous drugs. The number of Americans and others killed by fentanyl is in the thousands, and other drugs have taken thousands more lives. 

Roughly 3 million persons will have walked or waded across the border in Biden’s first two years, and we know little if anything about most of them. Some of them are criminals. Some of them probably were ill. Some of them were likely kidnapped.

** Shipping Illegals to a Community Near You - The president secretly shipped illegal aliens across state borders and into suburban cities and neighborhoods, without taking measures to deal with them, or even notifying these cities that the illegals would be coming.

** Holding Kids Hostage to Trans Radicalism - “In May, the Biden administration attempted to strong-arm public schools into letting males who identify as transgender use girls’ bathrooms by threatening to pull federal funding for school lunches if they didn’t,” Whitehead reported. “That’s 30 million lunch-program students Biden took hostage to push his party’s trans radicalism.”

** Tapping into Emergency Petroleum Reserves - So dedicated to the idea of killing the American fossil fuel industry, Biden decided that he would kill thousands of energy jobs, cancel fossil fuel projects, and gives up our energy independence, which we gained in the Trump presidency, and make up for that loss of oil by releasing oil from the national reserve, which exists for emergency use. 

He tries to cover his tracks by blaming our shortage on Russian leader Vladimir Putin and the Ukraine war. But it doesn’t work. And Americans really enjoyed paying double for gasoline that now is only $1 or so per gallon higher than when he took office. He hasn’t told us how he plans to replenish the petroleum reserve’s oil, or if he knows he must. Perhaps he’ll buy the oil from Putin.

** Driving up Inflation - Biden’s brilliance has produced an economy that has chalked up 40-year high inflation of 7.9 percent. Trying again unsuccessfully to shift the blame to Putin, it is clearly Biden’s policies that have driven up the prices of everything Americans need and want, like gas, food, clothing, building materials and household items. 

He appointed Jerome Powell to be Federal Reserve chairman, and Powell printed money well after the “need” for it was over. That, along with the American Rescue Plan, set the stage for the current inflation cycle. So far there is nothing indicating an end to this misery.

“Under the Biden administration, consumer prices rose so much faster than wages that the average family lost $5,800 in real annual income,” reports the Heritage Foundation. “Skyrocketing interest rates account for another $1,300 in lost annual income,” for a total of $7,100.  

** Botching the Afghanistan Withdrawal - Moving American military out of Afghanistan was always something we knew we would do. But it was never intended to be the disaster that Biden created. We left too quickly, without giving the Afghan troops time to prepare, and abandoned Bagram Air Base. We left behind Americans and Afghan allies to fend for themselves. We also left billions of dollars in weapons and equipment, which are now in the hands of the Taliban.

No president is perfect, although some have done wonderful things. Biden, on the other hand, has set a new standard for imperfection. There is an ongoing debate as to whether these horrible ideas are his, or whether he is just doing as someone or some group is telling him. Regardless, the buck stops with him.

Summarizing Biden’s performance, his three Bs are actually four Ds: Dereliction, Dangerous, Disastrous, and Disgraceful.

Elon Musk’s releasing of Twitter files proves what so many thought

December 13, 2022

It is possible that there is a new person atop the left’s “Most Disliked Person” list. And that person, replacing former President Donald Trump, is the new owner of Twitter, Tesla owner Elon Musk. Or maybe Musk will merely be added to the list below Trump’s name.

Twitter and Facebook have long been criticized for censoring certain kinds of tweets and posts, including those of conservatives and those whose opinions run counter to liberal thinking. Now that Twitter is not owned and operated by someone who believes in censorship, things are changing. And evidence to support the long-held beliefs that social media sites were infringing on free speech is coming to light.

Not only is the censorship of certain topics now shown to be fact, but some, perhaps many, of the items censored were valid and important.

One conservative user, “Stanford University's Dr. Jay Bhattacharya — a longstanding opponent of a COVID groupthink during the pandemic who expressed opposition to lockdowns" was placed on the site’s secret blacklists, as reported by Fox News, which is as bad to the left was Twitter was good.

This man is no average guy expressing an uneducated opinion. Yet, in its efforts to protect a faulty narrative, Twitter blacklisted him.

Bari Weiss, founder and editor of The Free Press, posted on Twitter earlier this month that, “A new #TwitterFiles investigation reveals that teams of Twitter employees build blacklists, prevent disfavored tweets from trending, and actively limit the visibility of entire accounts or even trending topics — all in secret, without informing users.”

Her revelations are all based upon information provided by Musk from Twitter files he has released.

"Twitter denied that it does such things," Weiss noted. "In 2018, Twitter's Vijaya Gadde (then Head of Legal Policy and Trust) and Kayvon Beykpour (Head of Product) said, ‘We do not shadow ban.’ They added, ‘And we certainly don’t shadow ban based on political viewpoints or ideology.’" Former Twitter owner Jack Dorsey said as much in a Congressional hearing.

One technique used is visibility filtering, a senior Twitter employee told Weiss: “Think about visibility filtering as being a way for us to suppress what people see to different levels. It’s a very powerful tool.”

 A post on msn.com offered the following: “Liberals on Twitter panned the latest ‘Twitter Files’ revelations from Elon Musk and journalist Matt Taibbi Friday which showed the internal communications of Twitter leading up to the decision to ban former President Donald Trump from the social media platform in early 2021.

“The third ‘Twitter Files’ installment – this time dubbed, ‘THE REMOVAL OF DONALD TRUMP,’ presented documents showing that Twitter staff banned Trump not solely based on tweets he made during January 6th, but on the ‘context surrounding’ Trump and his supporters’ actions ‘over the course of the election and frankly last 4+ years.’”

And more inside information: A member of Facebook’s Oversight Board and former Prime Minister of Denmark Helle Thorning Schmidt, said, “Free speech is not an absolute human right,” at a Politico Europe event. “It has to be balanced with other human rights.” Schmidt may have said what’s what in Denmark, but that’s not the way things are in America, where free speech is guaranteed in the First Amendment to the U.S. Constitution. And that includes unpopular speech.

What we know and are learning shows that the mindset of Twitter’s boss and employees was one of cheating, censoring speech by deplatforming, suspending users, and other techniques to achieve its liberal/progressive goals, including winning the election of 2020.

“Deplatforming is certainly an effective tool when it comes to countering terrorist and like-minded extremist groups online. But the fact that this tactic is being used against individuals and organizations that do not fit these categories is a terrifying abuse of power,” reported The Washington Times.

“Such a tactic has proven to be just as effective in manipulating mainstream electoral campaigns. One of the most egregious examples of this was when Facebook and Twitter censored the New York Post over the paper’s exposés about Hunter Biden’s emails and corruption. In other words, social media platforms baselessly characterized the Post’s investigative journalism as ‘misinformation’ and blocked it.”

The Times story goes on to say that a news report from the Media Research Center shows that some voters “would not have voted for the Biden-Harris presidential ticket if they knew at least one of the eight news stories that were suppressed by big tech and mainstream media outlets.”

Twitter was and is a platform owned by a private company. According to webopedia.com, “Social media platforms are interactive digital channels that focus on the creation and sharing of thoughts, ideas, and information through virtual networks. These platforms enable users to take part in social networking by creating content, sharing their thoughts, commenting on other user content, and reposting it.”

Twitter and Facebook can control what is on their platform. They can prohibit truly dangerous language. But to take a political side, without a public statement to that effect, and then secretly censor the other political side is dishonest, and un-American.

Elon Musk has a good start to cleaning up Twitter, and hopefully will keep it politically neutral. Maybe Facebook will clean up, too.

Taking a step to restoring common sense to the legislative process

December 6, 2022

There are problems with the Congressional process of writing legislation. This process should be simple and straight-forward: if a representative or senator has a proposal he or she believes would benefit the country, it should be written up in the appropriate manner and submitted for consideration.

Usually, this would take several pages, but not hundreds of pages, as some bills do. It also would not involve some number of items added to a bill that are not related to the stated purpose of the bill.

These days we find proposed legislation of hundreds and hundreds of pages and many additional items, some or most of which do not relate to the bill’s purpose.

Unrelated items that are included are designed to serve other purposes. They frequently are used to benefit some particular special interest group or a political purpose that the proponent seeks to help by adding items to the bill that have nothing to do with its stated purpose. 

The authors believe these little goodies will slide through because the main purpose of the bill is a good one, and anyone who doesn’t vote for it will suffer bad press and political negatives for opposing it. If each of these items were required to be in a bill of their own, this tactic would be rendered useless, and legislation that achieves approval would be much cleaner, more appropriate, and less harmful.

Sometimes a bill is so long that in the busy atmosphere of legislative work some representatives and senators simply cannot read every word and effectively study the bill in the amount of time allotted before a vote is scheduled. They then are only partially prepared to cast a knowledgeable vote.

Nancy Pelosi, the Democrat Representative from California whose tenure as Speaker of the House blessedly ends with the 117th Congress on December 31, once said something to the effect of, “we have to pass the bill to find out what is in it.”

No, that isn’t the way a democratic republic passes legislation.

Republican Representative Morgan Griffith represents Virginia’s Ninth Congressional District, which covers 19 counties completely, and parts of three others, and is the Congressman for our region of the Commonwealth.

In one of his regular emails to his constituents, titled “Return to the Basics,” Griffith cites the need for changes, and says with the control of the House of Representatives moving to the Republican Party in the 118th Congress, it is time to make needed changes to the Rules of the House.

Of his suggestions, he wrote, “Most of these amendments restore old rules or clarify existing rules. It would mean a return to the basics of parliamentary procedure.” And, he recently testified before the House Rules Committee to offer those amendments to the rules.

He suggested restoring the Holman Rule, which was created in 1876. It was a tool that could cut government spending.

“One of my proposed rules changes is to restore the Holman Rule, which existed for more than 100 years,” he wrote. “[T]he Holman Rule was created by Congressman William Holman … [who] thought spending was out of control.”

“The Holman Rule allows representatives to offer retrenchment amendments on the floor of the House of Representatives to appropriations bills,” Griffith wrote. “Retrenchment means these amendments could rearrange an agency or department of the Federal Government to cut specific programs, positions, or salaries. In 2017, I revived this rule for the 115th Congress, but in 2019 Speaker Pelosi dismantled this tool,” he wrote.

He also suggested a change to the germaneness rule, that would only allow amendments to a bill that pertained to the bill’s purpose, and suggested that a bill could only have one purpose. He also suggested that those limitations could not be waived without a two-thirds vote of the House.

“Shouldn’t a bill address one issue and be straight forward,” he asked? “My single purpose rule would make it so. This rule would still allow for complex bills like an infrastructure bill. However, two bills or concepts could not be combined into a single bill unless their purposes were the same. For example, a bill to set doctors’ reimbursement rates under Medicare could not be amended into a rewrite of Medicare. To rewrite Medicare would require a separate bill.”

“Additionally, I proposed an amendment to set time limits for bill introduction. This would focus individual members on bills that the members are most passionate about,” Griffith wrote. “It would also reduce the practice of introducing a bill on the cause celebre of the day for publicity purposes,” and “allows a remedy for bills that are ‘truly’ important by giving members the ability to ask the House for permission to introduce their ‘vital’ bill late.”

These common-sense ideas, and others included in Griffith’s email, would go a long way to restoring the legislative process to a form that is straight forward, efficient, and offers more protection from political manipulation than the current process. As he wrote, “a return to the basics of parliamentary procedure.”

Is it too much to hope that a majority of House members will agree with these good ideas, and vote to adopt them?

America’s current pandemic is bad, and shows no signs of abating

November 29, 2022

The latest “virus” in our society has been around a good while, but has gotten more active in recent months. It’s not a biological thing, it’s a cultural thing, commonly referred to as the “cancel culture.” It is born of dissatisfaction with something or someone, based upon what is believed, but absent much or most of the relevant facts about the subject at hand. 

Such things as painting or removing statues of well-known people, changing the names of buildings and other things honoring someone, or demeaning traditions are some of the work of the “cancel culture.”

As the Thanksgiving observance approached, the idea that Thanksgiving should be cancelled arose.

But what is there about Thanksgiving that it should be done away with? Thanksgiving is a time for all Americans to “cease from their daily work” and give thanks for their “many and great blessings,” as then-President Theodore Roosevelt noted in his 1908 Thanksgiving Day proclamation.

Taking a different approach to Thanksgiving, Joy Reid, the host of “The ReidOut” MSNBC, said on Wednesday night, "Tonight, we begin with Thanksgiving, the day we gather with friends and family to enjoy turkey, stuffing, mashed potatoes and pumpkin pie. We throw on the game, catch up on with lives and discuss or quite possibly argue about religion and politics. For millions of Americans, it’s been a cherished tradition, and as Americans, we value those traditions. But it is also important to unpack the myth of Thanksgiving."

Enlightening the ignorant people who only think of Thanksgiving as a wonderful day of celebration and thanks, Reid then said: "It is a holiday riddled with historical inaccuracies, built on this myth that the indigenous welcomed their colonizers with open arms and ears of corn. A simplistic fairytale interpretation of a 1621 encounter between indigenous tribes and English settlers that erases the genocide that followed. It is the truth that Republicans want banned from our textbooks because here is the secret they want so desperately to keep: We are a country founded on violence. Our birth was violent."

Fortunately, there are millions of Americans who were not afflicted with this “unpacking,” as they prepared to enjoy the day with their families.

But now that the wonderful day has ended, looking into the substance of Reid’s diatribe can be done.

“We are a country founded on violence,” she proclaimed. Well, yes. Those British citizens who over the years ventured across miles of ocean in weeks-long trips on sailing ships, and through the many decades built themselves colonies which they cherished, were forced to employ violence to escape being under the thumb of their British masters who would not peacefully free them. 

This is not a secret. The Revolutionary War of 1775 to 1783 was an escape to freedom using violence, because that was what colonists were forced to do. Are we today supposed to apologize for that violent beginning? Or, does it make more sense to acknowledge what was needed and what was done, and move forward from there?

She makes fun of the first Thanksgiving in 1621, calling what most of us were taught a “fairytale interpretation.” She said “that the indigenous welcomed their colonizers with open arms and ears of corn,” was a myth.

Obviously, Reid was not there. But there actually is a first-hand account, written by Edward Winslow, who was one of the 102 people who sailed from England on the Mayflower in 1620.  After arriving in North America, they founded Plymouth Colony in what is now Massachusetts. His letter can be found online at mayflowerhistory.com.

According to the History of Massachusetts Blog, “What is known is that the pilgrims held the first Thanksgiving feast to celebrate the successful fall harvest. Celebrating a fall harvest was an English tradition at the time and the pilgrims had much to celebrate.

“The 53 pilgrims at the first Thanksgiving were the only colonists to survive the long journey on the Mayflower and the first winter in the New World. Disease and starvation struck down half of the original 102 colonists.

“These pilgrims made it through that first winter and, with the help of the local Wampanoag tribe, they had a hearty supply of food to sustain them through the next winter.” Later, the colonists had conflicts with indigenous tribes, but not before or during the first Thanksgiving.

Reid’s tunnel-vision view of history from inside her bubble seeks to erase the established history of our country that has been with us for nearly 250 years, and replace it with a story based upon selected facts that support her position that the American people have been horrible from before day-one until today.

She then endorses the fallacious 1619 Project, which attempts to re-date the beginning of America to that year, when a ship with more than 20 enslaved Africans landed in what is now Virginia. In 1619 there was no United States of America, nor even colonies from which America evolved. And no slavery on that first Thanksgiving.

These pathetic efforts to tear down America with intellectually-challenged stories of half-truths and outright lies are dangerous.

America is not perfect. But it is so much better than these self-gratifying falsehoods suggest.

Securing elections is a goal we must achieve before 2024

November 22, 2022

"Some of you probably remember the hotly contested and controversial 2000 presidential election that was highlighted by arguments about vote fraud; voter suppression; hanging, dimpled and pregnant chads; changes in who led in vote totals throughout election night; and legal challenges that delayed the decision for over a month. 

Ultimately, the U.S. Supreme Court intervened, called a halt to the craziness, leaving Republican George W. Bush, with his 537-vote margin, the winner of Florida’s 25 Electoral Votes, and the victory over Democrat Al Gore.

In 2002, Congress enacted the Help America Vote Act (HAVA) to address the wide range of issues brought to its attention by state and local officials and others throughout the country. 

Two years later, it was evident that HAVA had not resolved the arguments over state laws requiring voters to provide photo identification that were generating backlash amid claims of disenfranchisement, new concerns about new voting technology that led to fears of counting errors, and worries about growing numbers of absentee and mail ballots that raised concerns about the possibility of fraud.

"In response to these concerns, former President Jimmy Carter [a Democrat] and former Secretary of State James A. Baker, III, [a Republican] agreed to co-chair a bipartisan commission, housed at Washington D.C.’s American University, to examine these and other outstanding election reform issues. The final report, titled ‘Building Confidence in U.S. Elections,’ stressed the important role of elections in the nation’s democracy,” according to the Baker Institute for Public Policy at Rice University. 

The report made 87 recommendations, including:
o A national system to connect state and local voter registration lists
o Voter identification based on a universally available REAL ID card
o Policies to improve voter access for all communities, as well as innovations like vote centers and voter information lookup sites
o Stronger efforts to combat fraud, especially in absentee voting
o Auditable paper backups for all voting technology

Of the recommendations, the Daily Signal commented: “They called on states to increase voter ID requirements; to be leery of mail-in voting; to halt ballot harvesting; to maintain voter lists, in part to ensure dead people are promptly removed from them; to allow election observers to monitor ballot counting; and to make sure voting machines are working properly. They also wanted the media to refrain from calling elections too early and from touting exit polls.”

“Had Congress and state governments adopted many of the panel’s recommendations, the 2020 post-election mess between President Donald Trump and former Vice President Joe Biden might have been avoided,” said Carter-Baker Commission member Kay C. James, now the president of The Heritage Foundation, in the Daily Signal report. 

“So many of the problems we’re now hearing about in the aftermath of the 2020 election could have been avoided had states heeded the advice of the Commission on Federal Election Reform,” James continued. “Simple protections against fraud, like voter ID and updated voter registration lists, make perfect sense if we truly believe that every vote must count. Election officials should take another look at the commission’s recommendations and make sure they’re doing everything possible to protect the integrity of our elections,” she said.

Organizations concerned with election security have suggested many ideas for secure voting, which include:
o Voter rolls must be updated and accurate prior to every election.
o Photo IDs will be required, and assistance must be provided to those with difficulties getting IDs made.

o Voting will be in person on Election Day, except when voters will be away on Election Day, or are physically unable to vote in person. In these cases, ballots will be requested and furnished to registered voters, will be signed and verified by signature matching and returned to the designated location. 
o Election Days should be named as holidays, or voting should be accommodated by employers.
o There will be no ballot harvesting.
o Votes are to be made on paper ballots; may be counted by machines that are not online; must be verified by hand-counting done with transparency.
o Post-election audits will be conducted that can verify that outcomes are correct.

The National Election Defense Coalition makes the case for using paper ballots: “Hand Counted Paper Ballots are considered the "Gold Standard" of democratic elections. Only paper ballots provide physical proof of the voter's intent. Paper ballots can be safely recounted in case of a contested result. Counting paper ballots in public provides 100% oversight and transparency. Unlike computer voting systems paper ballots can't break down or malfunction; are not programmed secretly by unaccountable private corporations; and cannot be hacked or rigged.”

We are reminded that every registered citizen has the right to vote, and therefore it should be made convenient and easy. Yes, voting is a right. But it is also extremely important in our country. 

And because of its tremendous importance, convenience in voting must yield to procedures that provide the highest level of security we can achieve. Some inconvenience is a small price to pay for being able to trust that the election process and procedures are as secure as possible, and that every legitimate vote is properly counted.

Our states must secure their elections.

Is now really the right time to buy an electric vehicle?

November 15, 2022

One of the things the green movement strongly encourages is moving away from gasoline- and diesel-powered vehicles and replacing them with electric vehicles (EVs). Since EVs don’t burn gasoline or diesel fuel, they do not emit CO2 into the air, and this is one of the major advantages of EVs. There are also other positive things about EVs.

Some of those advantages, according to drivingelectric.com, are that they are simpler and more reliable. They are quiet and relaxing, but can also be fast and exciting. And since they have smaller engines and their very large batteries can be laid out underneath the vehicle, they have more luggage space and more legroom for passengers.

But there are other factors to the story.

Libertarian author, commentator, and consumer journalist John Stossel wrote an article published by the Daily Signal earlier this month addressing electric vehicles, explaining ways in which EVs are not the wonders their proponents would like for us to believe.

There is a rush to impose EVs on the public. For example, some states have banned gas-powered cars altogether. “California Gov. Gavin Newsom issued an executive order banning them by 2035,” Stossel wrote. “Oregon, Massachusetts, and New York copied California. Washington state’s politicians said they’d make it happen even faster, by 2030,” just several years from now.

Stossel quotes physicist Mark Mills of the Manhattan Institute, who said, “Electric cars are amazing. But they won’t change the future in any significant way (as far as) oil use or carbon dioxide emissions.”

Stossel wrote: “Inconvenient fact 1: Selling more electric cars won’t reduce oil use very much. ‘The world has 15, 18 million electric vehicles now,’ says Mills. ‘If we [somehow] get to 500 million, that would reduce world oil consumption by about 10%. That’s not nothing, but it doesn’t end the use of oil.’

“Inconvenient fact 2: Although driving an electric car puts little additional carbon into the air, producing the electricity to charge its battery adds plenty. Most of America’s electricity is produced by burning natural gas and coal. Just 12% comes from wind or solar power.” “You have to mine, somewhere on Earth, 500,000 pounds of minerals and rock to make one battery,” Mills said.

“If you’re worried about carbon dioxide,” says Mills, “the electric vehicle has emitted 10 to 20 tons of carbon dioxide (from the mining, manufacturing, and shipping) before it even gets to your driveway.”

“Volkswagen published an honest study [in which they] point out that the first 60,000 miles or so you’re driving an electric vehicle, that electric vehicle will have emitted more carbon dioxide than if you just drove a conventional vehicle,” Mills added. You would have to drive an electric car “100,000 miles” to reduce emissions by just “20 or 30%, which is not nothing, but it’s not zero.”

Stossel then adds: “If you live in New Zealand, where there’s lots of hydro and geothermal power, electric cars pollute less. But in America, your ‘zero-emission vehicle’ adds lots of greenhouse gasses to the atmosphere.”

There is also the possibility of batteries catching fire. Breitbart reported that “In July, a battery fire caused an electric bus to burst into flames in Hamden, Connecticut. Luckily, no one died in the inferno, although two transit workers and two firefighters were hospitalized as a result of the blaze, and a federal investigation was triggered.”

EVs will work pretty well close to home. They can be recharged overnight in your garage. But when you take a 200 mile or longer trip, finding a convenient charging station when you need one, and charging your EV may take a few hours. This depends upon the vehicle’s battery, the charging rate of the charger, and perhaps how long you must wait in line to access a charger.

“The average price for a brand new EV is about $55,000,” according to the National Motorists Association. “That’s considerably higher than the average four-door sedan, which runs about $35,000, according to Kelly Blue Book. Tax credits and gas savings can save you money, however, it’s going to take a few years to make up a potential $20,000 difference.”

“Totaling all factors [purchase price, maintenance and fuel costs] total costs over the average use of the vehicles are $71,770 for EV’s and $58,664 for gasoline powered cars.”

And then there’s the cost of replacing the battery, which lasts from 8 to 15 years. Consumer Affairs “reached out to five mechanics and technicians from different parts of the U.S. to see how much an EV battery replacement costs for different vehicles, and the average results ranged from $4,489 all the way to a staggering $17,658.”

So, the picture of electric vehicles to help save our environment from CO2 is a fuzzy one. And when costs and other factors are figured in, an EV is not yet a viable choice for millions of vehicle owners, especially those living in California, Oregon, Massachusetts, New York, and Washington.

As technology evolves, how we produce electricity, the capacity of our electric grid, and the prices involved will improve. But that is years in the future. We have to stop pushing new ideas so hard, and wait until they are ready for large scale use.

One political party is working very hard to change America

November 8, 2022

Candidate Joe Biden claimed all through the campaign that he would unite the country and that he would be president for all of America. Uniting the country at this time in its history, when it is so heavily divided, is a tall task. But that’s what he said he would do. And given his decades in political office, he surely knew that what he was promising was a very, very, very difficult task.

So how is he doing after nearly two years into his first, and hopefully last, term? Let us take a look at some of the Unifier-in-Chief’s comments.

“Equality and democracy are under assault,” Biden charged in one speech. Trump and his supporters are a menace to our system of government, its international standing, and our very way of life, because they “promote authoritarian leaders and they fan the flames of political violence.” They “are determined to take this country backwards,” he said.

Biden charged in a prime-time address that the “extreme ideology” of Donald Trump and his supporters “threatens the very foundation of our republic.”

“MAGA Republicans are semi-fascists,” he said. Interestingly, fascism is a product of the Left, the far Left, around the world, not the Right. 

Benito Mussolini was an Italian politician and journalist who founded and led the National Fascist Party. Mussolini defined fascism as: “Everything in the state, nothing outside the state, nothing against the state.” Centralized state power. There are private entities in fascists states, but they are subordinate to the power of the centralized state. This does not sound like Republicans.

Biden also stressed the need to “stand up against” political violence, saying, “we don’t settle our differences in America with a riot … or a hammer,” alluding to the attack on House Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s husband, Paul.

Remember the violence following the killing of George Floyd in cities across the nation, with burning government buildings, and other things? That violence was not done by Republicans, and those in positions of authority, mayors and governors, who sat back and watched it happen were also not Republicans.

He condemned Republicans who deny the results of the 2020 election, saying “American democracy is under attack” because Trump believes the election was stolen. But, so did Hillary Clinton, of the 2016 election that she lost. And Stacey Abrams of the gubernatorial election in Georgia, which she lost, and never conceded. By the way, both women are Democrats.

Biden was pandering to a mostly black audience when he said they are going to “put y’all back in chains.” And, “you ain’t black” if you weren’t going to vote for him.

“We’re at a serious moment in our nation’s history. The MAGA Republicans don’t just threaten our personal rights and economic security. They are a threat to our very democracy,” Biden said. "They refuse to accept the will of the people. They embrace — embrace — political violence. They don’t believe in democracy. This is why, in this moment, those of you who love this country, Democrats, independents, main-stream Republicans — we must be stronger, more determined and more committed to saving America, than the MAGA Republicans are to destroying America.”

This is an especially interesting comment, as it is the Democrats who want to destroy America by stacking or eliminating the Supreme Court; eliminating the Electoral College, the Constitutional method of electing the President; eliminating the Senate filibuster that protects the rights of the minority party. It is the Democrats who are working to achieve a federal takeover of presidential elections, now controlled by the states.

And, by the way, America is not a democracy. It is a republic that operates under democratic principles. No doubt that Biden would prefer a pure democracy, so that once Democrats gained control, they could change the government to guarantee their continued control.

Furthermore, Republicans are, by their opposition to the Left’s radical plans, working to protect and save our country as designed, our “democracy,” not destroy it.

Biden’s administration ignored the response to a leaked Supreme Court draft opinion that corrected an error in the decades-old Roe v. Wade decision. He initially refused to condemn the leak of the draft opinion or protesters’ illegal targeting of constitutionally conservative justices’ homes. And, House Democrats stalled a recent bill to provide police protection to justices’ families.

Chicago Mayor Lori Lightfoot — a Democrat — tweeted after the leak: “To my friends in the LGBTQ+ community — the Supreme Court is coming for us next. This moment has to be a call to arms.” Then, there’s Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer’s, also a Democrat, warning in March 2020 about high-court abortion rulings: “I want to tell you, Gorsuch. I want to tell you, Kavanaugh. You have released the whirlwind, and you will pay the price.” 

In the last two years under Democrat — “progressive” — control, America has lost its energy independence, is suffering under the highest inflation in 40 years, has seen historic increases in crime and the coddling of criminals, and dangerous and deadly levels of illegal immigration at the uncontrolled southern border.

If everyone votes for Republicans in this election, our country will not be harmed, because it is the Democrats whose agenda is to fundamentally change the United States of America.

Fossil fuels do much, much more than just produce harmful CO2

November 1, 2022

While President Joe Biden and those in the green movement are working hard to rid the world of fossil fuels because of the CO2 they produce, a broader understanding of all the things fossil fuels do might help our perspective.

Oil, natural gas, and coal, are fossil fuels that we use for heat, electricity and to power vehicles. However, they are also a source of raw materials that are used in the manufacturing of many products. Among these is plastic. “Most of the plastics we use are of synthetic origin from petroleum,” according to Global Recycle. “They are simple to manufacture, and the processes are low cost.”

Yes, it is true that too much plastic in many ways causes some problems. But in other ways plastic is a very useful material. Think of all the ways plastic is used today, and all of the products that we would not have without it. 

The most common use of fossil fuels is to power vehicles and planes with gasoline, diesel fuel and jet fuel. But of the 42.6 gallons of oil in a barrel, only about 35 gallons are used for these fuels. The rest of the crude oil is used to manufacture other useful products.

Some of the other materials are petroleum jelly, asphalt, synthetic rubber, paraffin wax, fertilizers, pesticides, detergents, paints, upholstery, carpets, floor wax, insecticides, tires, nail polish, dresses, basketballs, soap, anesthetics, body lotions, deodorants, toothpaste, and even our food is preserved with a little help from fossil fuels.

During the campaign in New Castle, New Hampshire back in 2019, Biden said: “I want you to look at my eyes. I guarantee you, I guarantee you we’re going to end fossil fuels.” But that wasn’t all. He added, “No more subsidies for the fossil fuel industry. No more drilling, including offshore. No ability for the oil industry to continue to drill, period,” he said of his energy policies if he won the election. “It ends.”

If he succeeds, there will be a hefty price to be paid by the people he was elected to serve, replacing thousands of jobs and the long list of products that we buy and use today that we get from fossil fuels. Biden has engaged in fulfilling his promise, cancelling the Keystone XL pipeline on January 20, 2021, and other actions that followed.

The idea that fossil fuels actually have beneficial qualities may shock some people. But it is the truth. Even some, or maybe many, of those who don’t buy into the catastrophic theme surrounding the use of oil, natural gas and coal may not realize the broad range of things that fossil fuels give us.

The negatives seem to be the controlling theme. Fossil fuels are bad because they produce CO2, which is dangerous to the environment, and to our existence. Nuclear energy and hydro energy produce no CO2, which is good. But many people also oppose these two alternatives.

Wind and solar power, on the other hand, are championed by the anti-fossil fuel group as the saviors of our planet. And if we don’t replace fossil fuels with them in a fairly short time, we are doomed, they tell us.

Yet, these same people oppose the processes involved in producing windmills and solar panels, like mining and great amounts of industrialization.

The author of The Moral Case for Fossil Fuels, Alex Epstein, has a new book out. Fossil Future: Why Global Human Flourishing Requires More Oil, Coal, and Natural Gas — Not Less.

In chapter 10, he wrote that “Since 1980, the percentage of humanity living on less than $2 a day has gone from 42 percent to under 10 percent today.” This is attributed to “increasing productivity, which is driven by the increasing and expanding use of fossil fueled machine labor and the enormous amounts of mental labor it frees up.”

Making life easier and less expensive for millions of people across the globe, including the poorest of us, is certainly a positive development. And continuing improvement in pollution-control technology will make it possible for even more of the poorest on Earth to use fossil fuels “to lift themselves out of poverty with less and less pollution,” Epstein wrote.

“All of this means more first light bulbs, more first refrigerators, more first rewarding jobs, more first years with a consistently full stomach, more first years drinking consistently clean water, more first years being comfortable no matter what the weather,” he wrote.

He explains how much more there is to the story of fossil fuels than the CO2 they produce. And as technology advances, cleaner burning fossil fuels result. America produces the cleanest crude oil in the world. And we should also remember that CO2 is fertilizer for trees and other plant life that then produce and release oxygen into the air. 

Billions of people rely on inexpensive fossil fuels for energy, and that number continues to grow. But the more expensive “renewable” energy sources are beyond their financial means.

So, while technology works to clean up fossil fuels, and to make the cleaner renewable sources more functional and affordable, we need to utilize all the benefits that fossil fuels provide.

What is wrong with America? The Left wants to dramatically change it!

October 25, 2022

Those among us who grew up when people learned about their country’s real history, agreed with its sensible principles, and appreciated its fundamental freedoms are very uncomfortable today. 

We watch as our traditions are being ignored or actively discarded, resulting in deconstructing what is generally regarded as the most free and successful form of government yet designed.

Mark Levin is a lawyer, former president of the Landmark Legal Foundation, and a conservative author, broadcaster and commentator. He discussed many things that are wrong with America today in a speech recently. 

“We don’t want to change the Constitution. We want to uphold the Constitution. They’re changing the Constitution. These people don’t even believe in the Constitution. 

“They don’t even believe in American history. They’ve destroyed Madison’s home. They’ve destroyed Jefferson’s home.

“They’re destroying our colleges and universities. They’re destroying our public schools. They’ve destroyed the southern border. They’re destroying our currency and our economy. They’re destroying our military; they’ve destroyed police forces across the country.

“We don’t need lectures from them about us destroying anything. We are the ones that want to uplift this country and believe in this country.”

“They” are the political Left. The Left is responsible for most of our current problems.

Our federal government as it was designed is virtually unrecognizable today. Under federalism, the system upon which the United States of America was formed, there is a balance between the federal government and the states. The federal government has certain authority given to it by the U.S. Constitution, and states have authority in areas not given to the federal government. The result was a limited federal government.

But the federal government has grown well beyond its intended size and scope. And the result is a gargantuan bureaucracy that costs a fortune to operate, and has produced bountiful regulations that so often interfere with the freedom our system was designed to insure.

Why should the federal government be telling people in the states what they can or cannot do with their property? Why should the federal government have any authority over how states and localities educate their children? Why should the federal government, control what businesses across the country pay their employees?

Why do elected officials continue to grow the size and influence of the federal government, increasing the need for higher taxes, and encroaching on the personal freedom of their constituents? Why is the Department of Justice paying any attention to parents in local school districts who attended board of education meetings to object to what is going on in their schools, and labeling them “domestic terrorists” for wanting to protect their children, which is their primary duty?

And why is one group of non-violent people facing large teams of armed federal agents confronting them to arrest them for non-violent crimes, while other groups are peacefully arrested for the same sort of crimes?

The political Left has a very different outlook on life in America. Since excellence in so many things is so critically important, why do they think it is better that good jobs or rewards be delivered to all ethnicities and genders equally, rather than all people having an equal chance to earn these things through performance and merit?

Since the best way to make good decisions is to be aware of the different possibilities that exist, why are ideas that liberals do not agree with being censored from being read or heard to the benefit of everyone? Why promote the ending of an unwanted pregnancy up to, and even beyond the minute of birth, rather than encouraging and assisting in the prevention of pregnancy, or suggesting adoption of the baby? 

Why do those in positions of authority in education or who teach in our public schools think it is okay to diverge from the approved curriculum and/or covertly insert controversial and often-dangerous social concepts into classwork?

Why is it suddenly necessary to change things that have worked to our benefit as a country for more than two centuries by trying to do things like packing or doing away with the Supreme Court, eliminating the Senate filibuster, or eliminating the Electoral College? Why do Democrats in the federal government not insist on a secure southern border that is able to prevent deadly drugs, child and sex traffickers, criminals and other illegal aliens from coming into the country so easily?

Meanwhile, President Joe Biden, who ended America’s energy dominance, now uses our Strategic Petroleum Reserve — which is intended to be used to provide fuel during real emergencies, not to lower Biden’s price increases by a few cents for a few days — to attract voters to Democrats in the mid-term election two weeks from now.

If America does not very soon reject these subversive efforts and return to the tried and true traditional values upon which it was established, it will be only a relatively short time before we will be kneeling to and obeying the Communist Chinese, or a cabal of Chinese, Russians, Iranians and North Koreans, all of whom are working hard to take us down.

As they say, elections have consequences, but offer opportunities

October 18, 2022

Voting in the midterm election of November 8th has already started, with early voting underway in some states. Exactly how the election will turn out is being debated, with predictions of Republican gains in Congress and statehouses, but is truly unknown at this point.

There are several issues that command the interest of voters. Those include the economy/inflation, the rising crime problem, abortion, education, immigration and voting policy.

A survey by the Pew Research Center in August placed the economy at the top of the list, with 77 percent of the registered voters polled ranking it first. Coming in fifth was voting policies, ranked first by 59 percent of those polled.

We all remember the chaos over the security of the 2020 election, but that one was not the only election that has been questioned. Four previous presidential elections have been seriously questioned, dating back to 1876 when Samuel Tilden ran against Rutherford B. Hayes. Amid much controversy, Hayes squeaked out a 185-184 majority in the Electoral College.

A bribery scandal marred the 1888 election between Benjamin Harrison and Grover Cleveland. Ultimately, Cleveland lost the race. More recently, the 1960 election between John F. Kennedy and Richard M. Nixon had some of the closest results in presidential politics. Kennedy won by just 100,000 votes.

And then there was the election of George W. Bush over Al Gore in 2000. With Bush receiving just 527 more votes than Gore, a U.S. Supreme Court decision ultimately led Gore to concede the race to Bush.

There was also a lot of chatter about the 2016 election between Donald J. Trump and Hillary Rodham Clinton, with many Democrats, including Clinton, complaining about the outcome. Many of these same Democrats were highly critical of Trump’s complaints about the 2020 election, which put Joseph R. Biden, Jr. in the White House.

The complaints by Trump and his supporters did not produce a change in the results of the election. And there is not going to be a discussion of that election here today.

However, it is appropriate to note that in many, if not most, elections, there are those who question the results, and there is the fact that in most elections voter fraud does exist, as well as other irregularities. The real issue is, to what extent do fraud and irregularities influence the outcome?

A very important issue in any election is the security of the process. 

Every eligible voter’s vote must be counted, and no ineligible votes can be counted. And while removing obstacles that make it a little inconvenient for people to vote is important, that is far less important than making the process as secure as possible. A little inconvenience in return for vote security is a small, but necessary price to pay.

In-person voting, where prospective voters go to the polling place, show their photo ID and are verified, and vote on paper ballots that are counted by honest poll workers, is generally considered the most secure method. Voting by mail is considered the most vulnerable to fraud, because the ballots are sent out and returned through the mail or in special ballot return boxes. This process makes the ballots available to being intercepted from home mailboxes and the boxes set up for ballots to be returned, and fraudulently used by those wanting to control the outcome.

And, states must insure that voting procedures are not changed by election officials or poll workers, etc. Only action by the state legislature may legally change election procedures. In 2020, five states did not abide by this requirement, perhaps for the best of reasons during the pandemic. But the law is the law, and it must be followed.

The country is in far worse condition than when Biden took office, and the problems that have resulted are causing much discomfort among Americans, both voters and non-voters.

Inflation has surged by double digits — 13 percent — since Biden first entered the White House. Higher prices of products like gasoline and food have put thousands or millions in financial distress.

Illegal immigration has killed people trying to cross the Rio Grande, thousands more who have mistakenly taken fentanyl brought across the border by illegals have died, as have others at the hands of illegal aliens who crossed the border, which is, for all intents and purposes, wide open.

Crime in many U.S. cities has spiraled out of control, as “progressive” prosecutors, judges, and others have eased up on punishing criminal behavior, refusing to prosecute some crimes and to jail criminals for some violent crimes, and generally catering to criminals, to the detriment of their victims.

This election and the 2024 General Election offer opportunities to reject the incompetence of the Biden administration, and to return life in America to where it was only a short time ago. Elect people who want to restore common sense to government, to use America’s resources to benefit Americans and the world, and move toward cleaner energy at a sensible, normal pace.

The policies of the radical left Democrats have created chaos, and put the lives of Americans at greater risk than ever before in our lifetime. It’s time to put a stop to that.

Lowering standards for success is a foolish and dangerous concept

October 11, 2022

Some of America’s younger generation are failing to understand what their country is all about, how it works, how they are supposed to work to succeed in it, and make the country work like it should.

In one of the more disturbing instances that demonstrate this problem, an 84-year-old New York University (NYU) professor with long tenure and wonderful credentials was recently fired.

Maitland Jones, Jr., who taught organic chemistry — an important subject for future medical doctors, and a necessarily difficult subject — authored the 1,300-page textbook “Organic Chemistry,” now in its fifth edition, and had been a star teacher at Princeton.

In its story on Jones’ firing, the New York Post wrote this about Jones’ subject: “Organic chemistry is a very difficult subject. Doing well in the course in college has been a litmus test for medical-school suitability. It demands discipline, ability to think in three dimensions, memorizing complex structures, managing a series of chemical rules and solving intricate problems. Its intellectual demands and need for disciplined study are surrogates for the discipline and problem-solving physicians must demonstrate throughout their careers.”

During the pandemic, Jones went the extra mile to tape his lectures, at his own cost, to help students who were having attendance problems attributed to the pandemic.

Despite Jones’ sterling credentials, his experience in the classroom, and his knowledge of the subject, 82 of his 350 students — about 23 percent — signed a petition against him claiming he had made his class too difficult and was at fault for their failing grades.

And that was enough for NYU to oust Jones for making the course “too hard.” The New York Times had a story about this saying that students revolted because they feared that “they were not given the grades that would allow them to get into medical school.”

Apparently, these students believe grades, that may not reflect what they actually learned, are more important than what they learned, or didn’t learn, in college.

The Post story, however, tells us, “The professor, meanwhile, saw a different problem: ‘They weren’t coming to class. … They weren’t watching the videos, and they weren’t able to answer the questions.’ But the school terminated his employment rather than the students, who are on track to become physicians despite struggling to get into med school.”

In an interview Jones had with the Times, he told the paper that “Students were misreading exam questions at an astonishing rate. In the last two years, they fell off a cliff. We now see single digit scores and even zeros.”

Don’t we want and need the country’s future physicians to have successfully mastered a difficult educational background in medicine and related topics? 

Dr. Stanley Goldfarb, who wrote the Post story, had this to say about the education of future physicians: “Jones could not be more correct in his judgment that his organic chemistry course should be tough. Entry into medical school these days is almost a guarantee that a student will one day have a medical degree and a license to practice medicine.”

Goldfarb then noted that “Even struggling students are coached through to graduation. I know this as I was the associate dean for curriculum at Penn’s medical school. But until recently, the standards for admission were so high that one could be sure that at least students admitted had the potential to excel. Jones’ experience at NYU makes clear that assumption is no longer correct.”

Today, many colleges and universities offer majors in subjects that may be interesting to students, but that do not prepare them to get a job when they graduate. 

NYU is bowing to fewer than 1-in-4 of Jones’ students’ demands that he be fired, because they think he is the problem. He was the problem because he made his class too hard — like it has been for many years — rather than that the students who were failing were the problem, using the pandemic as an excuse for why they didn’t study as they should have. This is a troubling sign, especially in a critical and demanding field like medicine. 

Goldfarb’s story increases concern: “Every American should be worried because this kind of standard-lowering is becoming commonplace in medical school.”

In every career field, in every job, we need the best available person to fill positions. That is accomplished not by the silly idea of equity, where positions are filled based upon gender and race, so that every gender and race gets its fair share, but on merit: he/she who is best suited for a position gets the position. 

The American standard is that we must all work to be the best we can be at whatever productive career we choose. That is what builds individual success, and what makes a country as good as it can be.

There are other countries in the world — China, Russia, Iran, North Korea, for example — that are doing their best to be effective and capable enemies of America. We need schools and the next generation to keep America at the top of its game against these and other challenges. And that means working hard, not easing up and looking for excuses.

The Biden administration has weaponized the Justice Department

October 4, 2022

A father often took his oldest son to a place he frequented. While there, a 72-year-old man often said “crude … inappropriate and disgusting things” to the 12-year-old boy. The father told the older man repeatedly to stop verbally harassing his son, but that didn’t stop the man from being vulgar.

One time the man got too close to the boy, into the boy’s personal space, and the father, after telling the man to stop harassing his son, and defending his son, pushed the man away. He fell back, but was not injured. The older man then sued the father.

The case was investigated by a District Court and the case was dismissed.

However, the family was awakened one morning by a team of 25-30 FBI agents carrying weapons.

“They had big, huge rifles” pointed at the father, “and pointed at me and kind of pointed throughout the house,” the mother said.

“The kids were all just screaming. It was all just very scary and traumatic,” the mother told a news agency, about the incident that she and her children witnessed. Her husband pleaded with the FBI agents to be calm, referencing the couple’s seven children, she said.  

Catholic News Agency reported that the FBI reported that the father was arrested outside his home “without incident.” According to federal court documents, the father was charged with assaulting the 72-year-old man.

Question: Why was the FBI arresting a man on a charge that the court had found warranted dismissal? And if an arrest was warranted in this case, why did the FBI show up early in the morning pointing weapons at the parents in front of their children, when a phone call, or a single agent appearing at the home with a warrant for the father’s arrest would have been a logical and appropriate way to proceed?

When you realize that the place the man and his son went was a Planned Parenthood abortion clinic, that the man was a pro-life advocate, that the older man was a pro-abortion protester, and that the Biden administration supports very liberal abortion rules, this makes more sense.

CBS News reported that, “With guns drawn, FBI agents in combat gear and night-vision equipment fanned out just before dawn Friday in front of the Florida home of President Trump's former campaign adviser, Roger Stone.”

The report said one of the agents shouted, "FBI! Open the door!" as he repeatedly pounded on the door in a video of the raid broadcast on CNN. "FBI warrant!"

Soon a light came on, and Roger Stone appeared in sleepwear. Are you Roger Stone?" an agent asked him. "Yes," he responded. Stone was arrested and then led away.

Stone commented about the raid, "This morning at the crack of dawn, 29 FBI agents arrived at my home with 17 vehicles with their lights flashing, when they could simply have contacted my attorneys and I would have been more than willing to surrender voluntarily," he said. "They terrorized my wife, my dogs."

The raid was "completely unnecessary," Stone's attorney, Bruce Rogow, said. “He's not in hiding."

Stone was charged with seven counts: one count of obstruction of an official proceeding; five counts of false statements; and one count of witness tampering.

These charges do not indicate the need for a dawn swat team raid. And, how, exactly, did CNN know about the raid in advance?

While some Trump supporters have been charged with crimes, legitimate charges in at least some of the cases, this spectacular event seems more than a little over-the-top.

And the arrest of a pro-life supporter after a court had dismissed a lawsuit on the same charge as the arrest seems completely inexplicable.

These two incidents, as well as the incident where Trump supporter Mike Lindell was approached in public, rather than in a less spectacular way, indicates a particular motive on the part of the FBI, and the Department of Justice of which the FBI is a part.

Lindell was in the drive-through at a fast food restaurant when FBI agents approached him, showed him a warrant, and demanded he give them his cell phone.

This is the same DOJ that ignored the federal law-breaking by demonstrators at the homes of the judicially conservative U.S. Supreme Court Justices, following the Court overturning of the incorrect Roe v. Wade decision made decades ago.

This is the same DOJ that sent agents to harass parents who attended school board meetings and complained about the course of events at their children’s schools. 

In some cases, these parents were termed “domestic terrorists” because they used their First Amendment right to speak freely when they expressed their dissatisfaction with the behavior of school boards, schools, and teachers that abandoned the approved curricula, and began indoctrinating young students without notifying the parents of these changes in the curriculum. It is parents, after all, who are the ones whose taxes support public education.

The DOJ appears to be targeting the right. Is there a greater wrong against the people when their government targets one group for the benefit of another group?

The Democrats are moving the country in the wrong direction

September 27, 2020

We see liberal/Democrat prosecutors who deliberately refuse to enforce some laws, under-charge persons arrested for crimes, enact no-bail laws that release arrested persons back on the street hours after their arrest so that they can, and often do, commit more crimes. These dangerous moves are pro-criminal and anti-victim.

Liberals/Democrats also failed to curtail the crazy riots, arson and looting in well more than 100 cities that followed the killing of George Floyd in 2020 at the hands of a Minneapolis police officer. This rioting, which was often defended as “mostly peaceful,” did as much as $2 billion dollars of damage to insured property, an unknown amount of damage to uninsured property, and worse, cost 15 people their lives.

Then came the not-so-brilliant idea of defunding the police, “re-imagining” law enforcement. This resulted in crime spikes in blue-run cities at shocking levels. Police officers grew tired of the lack of support, anger and violence they experienced, and took retirement or just quit working. And that contributed further to the crime sprees that still exist.

Liberal educators and school boards have been secretly changing approved and traditional curricula to include indoctrination; teaching young kids about dangerous gender transition, that boys can become girls, and girls can become boys at will, except that they say there are no such things as males and females anymore. 

Instead of teaching legitimate school subjects full time, there is the idea that everyone must use each persons’ chosen pronouns instead of their birth pronouns; mothers and fathers are now “birthing parents” and  “parents,” aunts and uncles are a “parents’ sibling”; and they falsely teach that America is filled with white oppressors mistreating the oppressed non-white minorities in what is called “Critical Race Theory.”

While China teaches its youth about math and science, the U.S. increasingly is spending less time on real education, and more time on indoctrination of “woke” ideas.

One political party is proposing radical changes to fundamentals of our Constitution and the way the nation operates. The Democrats in Congress support eliminating the Electoral College, a device created by our Founders to protect smaller states from being under the thumb of the most populous states.

Also in their tool chest of dominance, is doing away with the Senate filibuster, which Democrats have themselves used when desired. The filibuster enables the minority party to act to stop the passage of measures it believes are bad law. Without this long-time feature, the tyranny of the majority can become reality.

The Democrat leader, the President of the United States, is accusing the opposition party — the party that defends the Constitution and generally supports the current ways of doing things — of doing what his party is actually doing, which is radically attacking our democracy, our democratic republic style of government.

This party also supports weakening the election process, the security and reliability of which must be beyond question. For example, it opposes voters being required to show photo IDs that prove who they are in order to vote. 

But it also supports mailing ballots to all registered voters, even to voters who did not request a ballot, and collecting ballots by mail. It also supports voted ballots being dropped into unguarded drop boxes along the streets 24 hours a day for days on end so that anybody can dump as many “ballots” as they want.

In-person voting is the most secure method, and voting by mail is the least secure.

Other things on the Democrats’ list of accomplishments are these items, highlighted by Virginia 9th District Congressman, Republican Morgan Griffith in his weekly email communication. “In less than two short years, unified Democrat control of the Federal Government has diminished our country in ways that would astound even a pessimist,” Griffith wrote.

“Inflation has risen to levels not seen in forty years. Gas prices hit record highs earlier this year. More than two million illegal immigrants have been encountered at the southern border this fiscal year before it has even ended, not counting the significant number that have evaded detection.”

“President Biden and the liberals in Congress wreaked havoc on the economy by pouring trillions of dollars into it,” he continued. “Too many dollars chasing too few goods is the classic formula for inflation, yet Democrats persisted.”

With control of the Executive Branch and both the House of Representatives and the Senate, the Democrats could do so much to help the country. They could revise the U.S. tax code, designing it with fewer loopholes and sensible tax rates. They could have left intact our recently regained position of energy independence that would have allowed the U.S. to help provide energy to countries now buying energy from Putin’s Russia, among other things.

Instead, its control has botched the Afghanistan withdrawal that killed 13 U.S. military personnel and many local allies, allowed the highest inflation in decades, contributed to the death of many Americans from the Fentanyl flooding across the southern border, doubling the size of the Internal Revenue Service, and a new recession that shows no signs of letting up, to name a few.

And we have two more years of this disaster to come.