Is that the lists never really go away.

In the below video, Congressman Gowdy (R-SC), grills Kelli Ann Burriesci the Deputy Assistant Secretary, U.S. Department of Homeland Security about "chilled" rights.

A chilled right is a right normally afforded the citizen that has been revoked. A good example is the right to vote. If you are convicted of a felony, the right to vote has been chilled after due process. The due process is you have to charged with a serious crime, the government then has to prove beyond a shadow of a doubt to a jury of your peers that you are the responsible party.

The term "terrorist watch list" which has been bandied about since the Orlando shooting is one of those "sound good" ideas that aren't "good, sound" ideas for the very reason there is no due process involved. It has a lot in common with the "no-fly" list.

There is no substantive process for a citizen to be added to the list. In the case of the "no-fly" list, all it can sometimes take is a name that is spelled somewhat like the name or pseudonym of a known bad guy. You haven't done anything, yet a computer algorithm who sees you as a frequent flyer and has a name similar to a known terrorist operative's name and *poof* your right to travel as you wish using an airline is now chilled. And a lot of people didn't know it until they bought a ticket, showed up at the airport and tried to board the aircraft.

Now Liberals are screaming about how the Orlando shooter "WAS ON THE TERRORIST WATCH LIST AND WAS ALLOWED TO BUY A$$AULT WEAPONZ!!!!" Yeah, well despite being investigated by the FBI twice he managed to pass several background checks and land a job at a company handling security for the the federal government. That says a lot about the coordination and competence of the feds no matter how you look at it.

Back to the due process. Because someone didn't like you, what you wrote or said, and they call up the FBI and say "I think he's a terrorist. He's been talking a lot of subversive stuff" and the FBI puts you on the terrorism watch list. Many of your rights are now chilled and you haven't committed a crime, nor have you been convicted of a crime.

What in the hell every happened to that right of "innocent until proven guilty?"

Then we have this to exemplify my point:

At just after the 2:00 mark, you get this exchange:

DICKERSON:
So if you have been under investigation over some period of time, you would trigger --

FEINSTEIN:
That's correct.

DICKERSON:
And what's the time period there for --

FEINSTEIN:
There is no time period, but --

DICKERSON:
So ever -- if you've ever been looked at by the FBI?

FEINSTEIN:
That's correct.

DICKERSON:
Well, so then what about the fact that somebody could be looked at they -- you know, maybe the FBI got it wrong. So now they never can buy a firearm?

FEINSTEIN:
Well, that doesn't mean that it would be -- they would be subject to being pinged. They would look at it.

Of course, we all know that the deductive reasoning and decision making powers of government officials are impeccable and they would never do something like deny a family from boarding a plane because one of their children had a G.I. Joe in their hand and that G.I. Joe has a 2" long plastic M-16 in its hands, right?

By her own words, Senator "Mr. and Mrs. America, turn them all in" (D-CA) says that if you get on that list, you're going to stay on that list for the rest of your life. No appeal, no due process, you'll have to prove a negative (that you're not a terrorist) every time you attempt to exercise your chilled rights. Which in the end means you'll take your lumps and like them.

You know, I respect Gersh Kuntzman (the reporter that "developed temporary PTSD" from firing an AR-15) more than this turd. STEINBERG: Would-be terrorists can buy guns, but a reporter? No.

This story, filed on 6/16/2016, does not pass the smell test. I bring the date up because in Illinois, you need a FOID (Firearms Identification Card) in order to purchase or possess any firearm in that state. The reporter stated quite clearly in the opening that he has never owned a weapon before this and never had any intent to do so. With that being said, I have to ask, how he was able to obtain a FOID instantaneously? The Orlando shooting was on Sunday 6/12 and it took two days (6/14-6/15) for the events in the story to unfold, then Mr. Steinberg had to write the story. While I may be wrong, I highly doubt a bureaucratized behemoth as Illinois would issue such a license in the same business day.

This story also screams the reporter's feelings, "I DON'T WANNA DO THIS!!!" He had to be ordered to do it, he was thinking about all the reasons why he should not be doing this story and it is quite clear he doesn't want to do it under any circumstances. The reporter had zero concept of Illinois or Chicago firearm laws and didn't know where to look or didn't look very hard.

Mr. Steinberg then has a "flashback" listening to a friend going through a rough time, suggesting he surrender his firearms. He also opines about a house down the street. He has never spoken with nor seen anyone around the house in 15 years, yet he feels qualified to say this:

...A house on the next block has a high fence and an electric gate across the driveway. The blinds are drawn and in 15 years of walking by, I’ve never seen a person there. I would guess the owner is afraid. Maybe just shy. But he sees a hazard requiring that fence, gate and security service that I do not. I imagine he owns a gun. Or many guns. [Emphasis mine]

So, this wonderful, astute, insightful, unbiased person sees no people at this house, does not know if the current owners built the house or fence, does not know the slightest thing about them, yet does not hesitate to describe them as "afraid" and "shy." Mr. Steinberg also implies that they own a lot of guns. Because all rational people thinks like he does.

In the end, the gun store denied the purchase. The statement the store gave to the Chicago Sun-Times (the entire statement was not released, just this section) says,

“it was uncovered that Mr. Steinberg has an admitted history of alcohol abuse, and a charge for domestic battery involving his wife.”

So a gun store with a moral compass looks at a man who admitted he's doing this as a stunt for a story, sees that he has had in his past a lack of self-control and violence (the story never said if the domestic charges were dropped, amended or he was convicted) and they decided that he lacks the correct wherewithal to responsibly handle a firearm, even if it's for (as he says) only for a few minutes.

To me, it sounds like the system worked.

To close out the story, our whiny Liberal crybaby writes this:

Now I’ll state what I believe the real reason is: Gun manufacturers and the stores that sell them make their money in the dark. Congress, which has so much trouble passing the most basic gun laws, passed a law making it illegal for the federal government to fund research into gun violence. Except for the week or two after massacres, the public covers its eyes. Would-be terrorists can buy guns. Insane people can buy guns. But reporters . . . that’s a different story. Gun makers avoid publicity because the truth is this: they sell tools of death to frightened people and make a fortune doing so. They shun attention because they know, if we saw clearly what is happening in our country, we’d demand change.

"Congress, which has so much trouble passing the most basic gun laws, passed a law making it illegal for the federal government to fund research into gun violence." That's called neutrality, because every researcher has a bias. Congress did not pass a law making research on that subject against the law, it said the government won't pay for it. If you want a gun study, just give some researchers some money and tell them what the results you want the study to "prove." It's worked for years with the Global Warming crowd, why not the gun control crowd?

"Would-be terrorists can buy guns. Insane people can buy guns. But reporters . . . that’s a different story." Being a nation of laws, this country has a novel concept (that he probably hasn't heard of) that says citizens are "Innocent until proven guilty." The National Instant Criminal Background Check System (NICS) is a federal database where felony convictions and mental health incidents are kept. People who attempt to purchase a firearm from a dealer are checked against this database.  The problem is the information is at best incomplete.  Only about 80% of State felony convictions are reported to the NICS system.

When a reporter goes into a gun shop and takes up a part of the owners time and the reporter makes clear by his words and demeanor that the resulting story will not be kind to the gun store owner, his customers or his industry, I think the gun store owner is justified in being at least a little hostile towards the reporter. Then you have the loss of money the shop owner will experience because the new weapon the reporter bought will have to be sold at a lower price and marked used to the next customer.

I found an article about a Liberal reporter who actually tried to understand why over 3.5 million households own at least one AR-15. In trying to understand, he traveled to Philadelphia (first mistake) and asked a gun shop owner who's an expat from Europe about weapons and gun control in the United States (second mistake).

The Internet is ablaze with how this reporter thought an AR-15 was "It’s horrifying, menacing and very very loud." He also reported that:

The recoil bruised my shoulder. The brass shell casings disoriented me as they flew past my face. The smell of sulfur and destruction made me sick. The explosions — loud like a bomb — gave me a temporary form of PTSD. For at least an hour after firing the gun just a few times, I was anxious and irritable.

You would think I would be critical of the reporter for being a "girly man" because of his takeaway of the experience as many pro-Second-Amendment people were.

I would like to commend this reporter because he got way out of his comfort zone to do try and report objectively. Not everyone can leave their comfort zones. Not everyone likes the experience of shooting a weapon and you know what? That's okay.

Just as a side note, with the exception of the "explosion" of the rifle report and the shell casings, it sounds like he took his first drag on a cigarette.

I do blame the gun shop owner for probably making it rough on the reporter. It seems from the pictures that he shot the AR-15 in an indoor range. That alone will make a rifle report significantly louder (and the smell more intense), especially if it was only 5 or 6 lanes. If the reporter bruised his shoulder, that means that most likely he was not holding the butt of the weapon firmly against his shoulder or standing correctly. Either the owner didn't tell the reporter to hold the weapon firmly against his shoulder, or the reporter didn't listen, I don't know and the article does not elaborate. If the brass was flying across his face, he was either shooting a right-handed weapon left-handed or the brass was bouncing off the lane divider and back into his field of view. As a Patron member of the NRA and an avid firearm enthusiast for over 25 years, if my second experience firing a weapon (the reporter had fired a handgun before) had been as unpleasant as this, I might have been turned off by that kind of experience.

I also want to criticize all of the people who posted hateful comments to this reporter. He actively and with no pre-conceived notions tried to understand the attraction this weapon has on so many people. If we as Pro-Second Amendment activists had been supportive and instructive rather than critical, we might have ended up with one person in the Liberal-dominated media who might have been sympathetic to our side.

Remember, John Lott started out his seminal study on firearms as a member of the anti-gun camp. He started out with the intent to prove gun-control worked. After his study showed that firearms in law-abiding citizens prevented over a million crimes a year, that's when he switched sides and became pro-Second Amendment. We, you and I, had that chance here with this reporter and we blew it.

Over the years of this blog I have a self-imposed policy of not commenting too quickly on events such as the Orlando Pulse shooting. I like facts to come out so I do not go off in the wrong direction. I did not follow my own advice this time, so I will keep going and correcting my course until I arrive where I should have if I had waited.

I want to start this by saying I commend CNN. A friend watched their special on the attack Sunday and told me they never showed a picture of the shooter nor ever mentioned his name. This "denying of the legacy" should be the standard to which all news agencies should follow. Let this piece of trash disappear into anonymity forever. I have "X'ed" out his name in my original post on this tragedy.

In the three days since the shooting, facts have come out that indicate this was probably a crime of hate, rather than terrorism. It turns out the shooter was a regular at that nightclub. Many of the survivors recognized him right off. It also seems that he had a profile on a Gay dating site. No one will ever know for sure, my best guess is the shooter either could not reconcile his homosexual feelings with what his father was saying ("all gays should be killed") or some kind of jilted/denied relationship. Only time will tell.

I saw this on FB, and it took a while to get to the original article.

Remember when the CEO of Chik-fil-A publicly proclaimed that he was not in support of same-sex marriage? Do you remember all of the backlash, protests and boycotts of his company by all of the militant pro-LGBT organizations? Do you remember the "Chik-fil-hAte" campaign on social media? I do.

Well, it seems that Chik-fil-A is trying to be consistent with the CEO's Christian ideals, which includes compassion for all people. Chick Fil A Did WHAT After Gay Club Shooting? Why Isn’t This Viral?

It turns out that the Chik-fil-A store located at 11350 University Blvd, Orlando, FL 32817 opened up Sunday the 12th of June to cook hundreds of sandwiches and brew gallons of sweet tea, then gave them to the people who were donating blood to help those wounded in the Orlando shooting. Without fanfare or publicity, they demonstrated compassion and support of all people, regardless of race, gender or sexual orientation. Wouldn't it be great if more people lived up to this ideal?

This is a fine example of "hate the sin, not the sinner." If someone does not approve of one passion of your life, that does not mean they hate you as a person. I highly disapprove of many Liberal policies and stances. That does not mean I hate the person espousing the ideal. I have multiple friends with Liberal viewpoints. I respect them for being passionate for what they believe in, no matter how much I believe they *might* be wrong (I'll admit, I am not infallible, *I* might be the one in error). And just because that other person and I disagree on that one point, we find that we agree on other subjects, as well as share hobbies and other passions where that point of disagreement would never come up.

When we hate others because of one point of disagreement, we limit ourselves to our own detriment.

If you want to call and support this store, the phone number is (407) 737-0002. If you are viewing this on your phone, you can click on the number and it will call for you.

I am really, really getting sick of this shit.

Not even all of the victims are identified and already the line for more gun-control is out the door, down the street and around the corner.

This article by The Telegraph, Orlando gunman used AR-15 assault rifle to kill his victims - the weapon of choice for mass shooters is a bad mix of sensationalism and incomplete knowledge. And frankly, to have another country to lecture us about gun-control who requires by law a "proportional defense" and a "retreat if able" tone to their laws, plus now that there is almost total gun control there, now because of the 130,000+ annual knife attacks, they are going for knife control there, all I can say is, "Kettle, meet pot."

In England, the law requires you to retreat from the confrontation if you are able. You must retreat out of your own home if bad guys are beating on your door, as there is no "castle law" over there. For the "proportional defense," if you are accosted by a criminal with a knife, you can defend yourself with no more than a knife. The English laws stipulate the blade length may be no more than 3" in length, unless it is required for your work. If the assailant is unarmed, all you can have are your fists. If the assailant is a 25 year-old MMA fighter going after a 50 year-old regular bloke, that won't end well for the target. If you bring a gun to a knife fight, or a knife to a fist fight to defend and protect yourself, the target of the criminal will also be accosted by the police.

Now that you have an understanding of how they view self-defense, the article in question lists the AR-15 as an "Assault Weapon," which to anyone knowledgeable knows that's false on its face. "Assault weapon" means the weapon is capable of semi-automatic (one trigger pull = one bullet) AND fully automatic fire (one trigger pull = empty magazine).

The article talks about how there are 3,700,000 households with an AR-15. May such owners I know have more than one of them, but for the sake of argument we'll stick with 3,700,000 weapons. They then list FOUR mass shootings and a total of 61 people were killed where AR-15's were used. With Saturday's tragedy, that's five events and 91 casualties. I'm a generous guy and I don't want to devalue their numbers in any way, shape or form. Let's slip the decimal point two positions to the right and make that 500 mass shootings and 9,100 dead.

500 mass shootings divided by 3,700,000 weapons equals 0.0001351% of all AR-15's in civilian hands, or 99.99987% of AR-15's weren't used by crazy people in mass shootings.

As far as the 6,100 people killed in our horribly inflated numbers, which is still less than 1/3rd the number of people killed every year by falls. Of course, those mass shootings took place over the past 3 1/2 years, so you're comparing 6,100 against 105,728.

This phrase shows the author has zero idea how things work in the US:

In the state of Florida, anyone over the age of 18 can buy an AR-15 as no state permit is required. The same goes for pistols and shotguns.

I cannot say that statement is wholly factually correct. Anyone over 18 can legally buy a rifle or shotgun. You have to be 21 or older to legally purchase a handgun. And while there is no "state permit," all of us who have purchased a firearm knows that the Federal laws apply, meaning the dreaded BATFE Form 4473 must be used in all purchases of firearms from a licensed firearms dealer.

The real reason why there are mass shootings anywhere is not the weapon. It's the heart of the user. Getting rid of weapons won't stop killings and mass events. The bad guys will adapt.

So Xxxx Xxx Xxxxxxxx Xxxxxx, who is a US-born citizen of Afghanistan immigrants, opened fire in an LGBT club Saturday, killing 50 and wounding dozens more. He "became upset" when he saw two men kissing months ago.

While facts are still coming out, this much is known:

• He worked for G4S Secure Solutions USA Inc., a major DHS security contractor since 2007.
• He was investigated by the FBI in 2013 and 2014 without definitive findings.
• He was on the FBI's watch list, so he was a "known wolf."
• He openly praised ISIS to co-workers.
• He openly voiced homophobic and racial comments to a police officer, who did report it to Xxxxxx's employer which did nothing.

Why this guy was not fired after the first investigation I don't know. Why he wasn't fired after he opened his pie hole and said "I support ISIS" to a co-worker is nothing short of malfeasance on the part of the co-workers (if they didn't report him) or management (if the co-workers did report him).

Of course, our Illustrious Leader made comments on this horrific tragedy. I'm surprised he waited until 3:45 of the statement to start the "how easy it is to get guns" shtick. Again.

Then we have this article, FAIL: Bill Rejected By The GOP 6 Months Ago Would Have Stopped Florida Shooter From Gun Purchase by the ever-so-biased bipartisanreport.com.

This article purports that a Senate bill (not mentioned in the article, or any source linked to by the article) stated that “Senate Republicans rejected a bill that aims to stop suspected terrorists from legally buying guns." Obviously research on things like facts have no bearing on advancing the agenda. I discovered all of the following facts with an "exhaustive 10 minute search" in various search engines.

It turns out that Senator Dianne Feinstein (D-CA) offered Senate Amendment 2910 to H.R. 3762, [T]he concurrent resolution on the budget for fiscal year 2016. There were 25 co-sponsors of this amendment, 23 Democrats and 2 Independents.

This amendment died within minutes, as there was an objection to the amendment due to section 313(b)(1)(c) of the Congressional Budget Act of 1974, ironically known as "Byrd's Rule." The amendment was ruled out of order after an attempt to waive Byrd's Rule. This was named after KKK Exalted Cyclops Robert Byrd (D-WV). Byrd's rule allows for blockage of legislation "if it purports significantly to increase the federal deficit beyond a ten-year term or is otherwise an 'extraneous matter' as set forth in the Budget Act." Gun-control legislation slipped into a budget bill the day after a mass shooting I think can be classified as "an extraneous matter."

I bring this up because the concept of the entire article is a bald faced lie. Suppose for a moment that it did get into the final version of the bill and the bill passed into law (it didn't, President Obama vetoed this bill and Congress couldn't override the veto), it would take at least 6 months for the agencies charged with enforcement of this part of the law to finalize how they would handle all of the administrative tasks involved with enforcement. Xxxxxx had his weapons probably well before the San Bernardino Shooting (Feinstein's inspiration for the amendment), so this "legislation" would not have prevented Saturday's catastrophe anyway.

The part you have to be scared about is the legal concepts and entanglements associated with such a "law." Because it means a person merely "suspected" of being a terrorist would be denied their Second Amendment rights. There is no legal process involving any proof to get someones name on such a list, all it takes is "suspicion." Currently there is no legal recourse for you to get your name off the list. If there was, you would have to prove you're not a "terrorist." I need someone to tell me how can you legally prove something that you haven't done? This concept violates every legal concept associated with the concept of "presumed innocent until proved guilty" enshrined in the Constitution.

I have come to the conclusion that our politicians scare me more than the terrorists do. The terrorists can only kill me once, the politicians can strip away everything I have with the stroke of a pen until I am left with only the thoughts in my head.

With Liberals, the agenda always comes first. Everything and anything must be done to advance the agenda, no matter the cost. In this case, gun control.

Katie Couric and Director Stephanie Soechtig (figuratively) shoots themselves in the foot with this "documentary," Under the Gun. They are so intent on advancing the agenda they massively compromise their integrity by doing this:

That nine-second "pause" after her "question" was derived from what is called "B-roll footage" shot before the interview began. If you notice between the video above and audio below that the question Katie asks is slightly different, which certainly implies that the video question was dubbed in during post-production (when they were adding in the B-roll).

Kudos to Katie's pro-Second Amendment "targets," the Virginia Citizens Defense League, because they did not trust her and thus covertly recorded audio of the interview. Here is the salient part:

[audio src="http://www.theconservativezone.com/dlfiles/under-the-gun-raw-audio.mp3"]

So, the film implies that the people interviewed by Katie were left speechless and without an answer, while in reality the answers were prompt, concise, rational, thoughtful, realistic and totally against the documentary's agenda.

Director Stephanie Soechtig indicated that she, not Couric, had editorial control. She tried to justify the deception by releasing this statement:

"My intention was to provide a pause for the viewer to have a moment to consider this important question before presenting the facts on Americans' opinions on background checks."

To tell you the truth, I could have accepted Soechtig's statement, if the responses from the VCDL had been included after the "pause." But since they weren't, I have to conclude that the intent for the exclusion was deception because the responses didn't advance the agenda.

I especially like that phrase, "...the facts on Americans' opinions..." because opinions do not change facts. People's opinions can agree or disagree with the facts, depending on how knowledgeable they are on the subject. If opinions are derived from biased commentary by the media on the subject of background checks, it is the fault of the media providing biased (instead of balanced) commentary and the people listening for not performing their own due diligence on the subject before parroting the biased information.

I also do not accept Soechtig falling on her sword (figuratively) and accepting all of the blame. If Couric (who was the interviewer for the film and also the Executive Producer, who is the bankroller of the documentary) had any integrity towards the truth rather than advancing the agenda, she could have been critical of the documentary. Instead, Couric released this statement after Soechtig released the one above:

"I support Stephanie's statement and am very proud of the film."

I have also discovered that the makers of this "documentary" scheduled an hour to interview John Lott, author of More Guns, Less Crime. Mr. Lott was an anti-gunner who in the 90's performed a study to prove his side of the argument. What he discovered conducting that study caused him to switch sides in the debate. Again, they scheduled an hour to interview him and the interview ended up with four hours of tape. How much of that four hours made it into Under the Gun? Zip, zero, zilch, nada. Because nothing he said advanced the agenda.

Just in case you think that there might be a slight possibility that this could be a balanced documentary, please check out the partners of the film, I have the links below. Eleven pro gun-control groups, zero pro-Second Amendment groups. Kind of telling, eh?

I ask that you click on each link, so this blog shows up in their refer lists. I want them to follow the links back here and know I am against their agenda. They will open in individual windows so you don't have to keep clicking "back":

This is a quick post, expounding on what I have learned since I made the post on Those in power... a few days ago.

First of all, I have learned that delegates for Sanders were intentionally given the wrong information on the time and place of the meeting. I am unaware of any Clinton delegates receiving erroneous information, and all of the Sanders delegates did not receive that bad information. This can only mean that the Party wanted to make sure to "shave" any votes in Clinton's favor.

Second, the initial votes on rules changes were held while many Sanders delegates were still outside the hall, in line trying to register. I have heard it both ways that the vote was held earlier than scheduled, or not delayed because there were delegates were still filing in.

To show the other side of things, I have heard that many Sanders delegates were not properly registered in time. Remember, Sanders was an Independent who only "caucuses with Democrats." He had to join the Democrat party to run against Clinton. I guess not all of his followers did the same thing. As far as the "rapping the gavel and walking off," I have also learned that that meeting had run a couple of hours over the scheduled time and the hall had to be cleared, plus the cost of security was about to go way up because the security personnel were going to start getting overtime.

As it has been said before, "The truth is a three-edged sword; your side, my side and the truth." No side is totally right, no side is totally wrong. I always look at the facts of the matter and what the truth actually is.

Here you go. This is my take on what I see in the current Presidential candidates. To try and remain neutral, I am listing them in alphabetical order by their last name.

Hillary Rodham-Clinton

I perceive this woman to be so fascist that she would give Hitler a hard-on. I see her as the controlling partner of Team Clinton. She is angry, elitist and driven to run things. Hillary was the driving force behind the Clinton Universal Healthcare, she destroyed the names and reputations of the women Bill had sex with who had the unmitigated gall to actually speak out against Bill. She loves the "little people" so much that when an Arkansas State Trooper who protected her said, "Good morning" to Hillary, she went off on the trooper like she was a drill sergeant. She was the head instigator in Travelgate and probably many other "-gates." I have little doubt she managed the assets that probably had something to do with the 20+ people who were close to the Clintons and came to untimely and questionable ends, Vince Foster and Ron Brown among them.

Most of the MSM is firmly in her pocket, ideologically and probably financially. While there are occasional news articles on things like Benghazi or her email scandal, they are downplayed by the reporters. I showed here where her contributions to state Democrat organizations has induced over 500 superdelegates to openly support her, months before the election.

She has made it clear that she is anti-business, as in among other things, openly stating she will destroy the coal industry. She is decidedly pro-gun, as long as the government is the only one with firearms that is. Hillary "misspeaks" (lies) more often than she says something resembling the truth.

Bottom line: Hillary has limited "real world" experience. It looks like every job and position she has held are nothing more than check marks on her resume to get her to the Oval Office. Hillary is after power and she is not afraid to use force of any kind to reach the ends she sees that she deserves.

Bernard Sanders

"Bernie" openly admits he is a Socialist. And we all know how wonderful Socialism is, that is until you run out of other peoples' money. Many of us older folk saw how wonderful Socialism worked in the old Soviet Union and its puppet states, the Cultural Revolution in China and how it is playing out right now in Venezuela. He joined the Young People's Socialist League (the youth affiliate of the Socialist Party) while in College at the University of Chicago (1960-64) where he received a PolySci degree.

He landed his first steady job at 49 years old when he lucked into being elected as the Mayor of Burlington, VT in 1981, serving a total of four two-year terms. Bernie had been running for various political offices since 1971. After a short attempt at teaching at a pair of colleges, he was elected to the House in 1991, then Senator in 2007. In his Congressional career, he has sponsored 362 bills, of which three became law. One was a COLA adjustment for veterans, the other two were the same bill, one in the House and one in the Senate to rename a Post Office in Fair Haven, VT. This can actually be considered average, as I checked several other Senators, Boxer (sponsored 827, 18 signed into law), Hillary (417/3), and one of my own Senators, Lamar Alexander (167/8).

Bernie's economic plans of "free" almost everything would bankrupt this country even faster than Obama is already trying to. Just because college students would get their degrees for "free" doesn't mean that someone doesn't have to pay those bills. The various levels of government already take 40%+ of our income, to try and pay for the Trillions of dollars of programs he wants to enact would boost our taxes to the 60% (or higher) level.

The MSM has basically ignored Bernie. If he gets coverage at all, it's in the "someone named Bernie Sanders is trying to ruin the coronation of Queen Hillary."

Bottom Line: Bernie has been a leech his entire life. He never held a job of any importance before his political career. He sponged off friends until he got into political life, and has continued to sponge off the People of the United States at various levels for the vast majority of the thirty-five years since then. He is a pacifist who will ruin the country economically and militarily before we are reduced to banana republic status and probably attacked by another country.

Donald Trump

As far as "The Donald" goes, I am not fully in his camp. He sounds like a Republican however I am not fully convinced. I like what he says despite the MSM distortions and half-truths. Example: the MSM says he wants to throw all of the illegal immigrants out of the country. That statement is factually correct. What they don't say is how he would let the immigrants back in under the current immigration laws.

I have a meme that states that had Trump taken his inheritance and safely invested it, he would have several $Billion more in assets than his current net worth. That again, is factually correct. The truth is he risked his fortune and did go broke several times, however he has managed to come back each time. Had he come out on top in all of his deals, he probably would have surpassed Bill Gates in net worth.

While I don't have all of the facts for a lot of his stories, they do have a theme of doing the right thing for the right reasons. From offering free use of his airliners to get troops home after the first Gulf War, to helping veterans get what they need from the VA, he appears to be genuine in his concern for others. I hear little stories about how he has helped others anonymously and refuses any fanfare.

When you truly look at it, The Donald has had Hillary, Bernie, the MSM, all of the other Republicans running for the president and the Republican power structure attacking him from every angle simultaneously. Yet he made it to the top of the heap and unless there is a major sea change in the few remaining primaries, he will be the Republican nominee for president.

The Donald also has one skill that both Hillary and Bernie lack: the experience of having to make a payroll. The economic experience of having a budget to complete a task and having dire consequences if he blows the budget. Hillary and Bernie merely call to raise taxes or borrow on our children's future if they go over budget.

As far as the MSM goes, if they had vetted Obama half as much as they are "vetting" (attacking) Trump, Obama wouldn't have made it to the Oval Office. A couple of days ago, the MSM was all in a panic because Trump "didn't pay any income taxes." Again, that is the truth. The context is, that was back in the 70's and was like two or three returns. Trump was able to exploit the tax laws to his advantage to avoid paying any income taxes. If you have a problem with that, let's go to a flat tax rate for everybody no matter their income. I always thought it was BS when Bill Clinton was buying votes with "targeted tax cuts," which were specific ways to help out those friendly to him. Most people heard the "tax cuts" part, never realizing that regular people could never qualify for them.

Bottom Line: The Donald is a risk taker. I once heard the saying, "A leader can be right or wrong. He must never be indecisive." If you take risks, you will occasionally fail. How you fail and how you recover are the important points. Donald has demonstrated he can bluster, bluff and make a deal. That being said, business is downright polite next to the bloodsport that is politics. Billions of people could die if one of his deals goes bad the wrong way. A single wrong estimation could cause hundreds of nuclear ballistic missiles to be launched against us.

When faced with a choice between these three, I do not like any of them. Hillary and Bernie in the Oval Office would be totally ruinous, just in different ways. Trump is still an unknown to me. He looks good, he sounds good. I still say there is a difference between good, sound ideas and ideas that sound good. There are subconscious alarm bells going off with him. Nothing I can put my finger on right now though.

I asked a rhetorical question about why Hillary had over 500 declared superdelegates in this post.

Then, I come across this article explaining why so many superdelegates are openly declaring their support for Hillary so early. The answer is simple, she bought them. I think Democrats actively and aggressively going after their "presumed" presidential candidate.

Daily Koz, an obviously left-leaning website, has this article, How Hundreds of Superdelegates were "bought" by the Clinton Campaign.

You see, these Superdelegates are members of their State Democratic Parties, upon whom they rely for support and funding for re-election. And the money that will be available for those re-election efforts has, in many cases, been provided by Hillary Clinton.

Clinton has provided funds for these candidates through a sophisticated system of money laundering that has allowed the Clinton campaign to funnel billionaire’s donations to State parties in return for their participation in a massive money-laundering payback system to also funnel money to the Clinton campaign itself.

So, just to spell it out and not leave anything to misinterpretation:

So if a Superdelegate whose State voted overwhelmingly for Bernie switched her support to Sanders under the reasoning that she was representing the will of her State, then Clinton’s Campaign COO would shut off the spigot and all that sweet, sweet billionaire cash would stop flowing into the coffers of her State Democratic Party — and the candidate herself.

The qualities of an effective head of state are an interesting mix. You must be personable, diplomatic and likeable, yet ruthless. An empathy for other people, while relentlessly and assertively pursuing the best interests of those whom you represent. The only thing I see in Hillary are the ruthlessness and aggressively pursuing her own private gains at the expense of the people she "serves."

People are going to vote for her simply because she has a vagina and they believe "it's time." They ignore the influence-peddling, bribery, strong-arm tactics that would make the Mafia blush and the large number of "accidental" deaths of people around both her and Bill.

We will be well and truly screwed if she makes it to the Oval Office.

...will do anything to stay in power.

The leadership of both the Republican and Democrat (not democratic; democratic is a process, not a group of people) parties are screwing over their members so that the power structure can decide who their presidential nominee is, rather than the voters.

Make no mistake, I charge both parties with the crime of Being Assholes. The difference between the parties is at least the Republicans stick to the rules they made, good or bad. Republicans pushed through rules changes last Presidential cycle that have come back to haunt them this time around. Trump has won the Republican nomination because he operated within those rules and exploited them to his advantage.

I remember during the 90's, during either the 1992 or 1996 Democrat Conventions, when the various subcommittees would develop "planks" for their parties platform (the parties official position on various stances like abortion) they would state, "This is the position of the party. All in favor say 'Aye', *raps gavel* motion carried." Notice there was no "All opposed say 'Nay' in that.

The same thing basically happened this past weekend in Nevada. A motion was made by the Chair of the Nevada Democrat party, Roberta Lange to perform a delegate recount, which was seconded by a member of her staff. I had to at least read up on Roberts Rules of Order for last year, and the person running the meeting is supposed to be neutral and cannot make motions. It's also "bad form" to have an underling second a motion. Ms. Lange then called for 'Ayes' but not 'Nays,' before rapping the gavel and walking off, leaving armed security to break up the Bernie supporters.

To get back to how the Democrats "fix" is in, the Democrats "superdelegates" are their way of controlling who gets elected to represent the party. Just like when you vote for President, you're not voting for the actual candidate, you're voting for someone who will vote for that candidate in the Electoral College. The presidential primaries run off the same system, you vote for delegates who will attend the convention and are pledged to vote for that candidate on the first ballot only. If there is no winner on the first ballot, these delegates can then vote for whomever they please. The Democrat superdelegate is never bound to a particular candidate and can vote for whomever they want on all ballots. Just as a rhetorical question, why are any superdelegates already "pledged" to a delegate?

As of today, Hillary has 1,716 pledged delegates, while Bernie has 1,443 pledged delegates, for a lead of 273 for Hillary. There are also 564 superdelegates, of which 524 are "for" Hillary and 40 "for" Bernie. As a "what if," if all of "Hillary's" superdelegates were to suddenly change their minds and switch to Bernie, he would have a lead of 281 rather than Hillary's current lead of 767.

The bottom line, the fix is in our national politics, it has been for a long time and until the current power structure is kicked out and replaced, it's going to keep happening.

This post is filed under the category, "Duct Tape Alert." Since I haven't used this category in a while, let me repeat what this means: A Duct Tape Alert means that I suggest you wrap your head in duct tape before reading, because when (not if) your head explodes, you will be able to find all of the pieces.

So I find this on the Huffington Post, and I am seriously wondering, "Who ties this guy's shoelaces???"

Justin Curmi has a three part series (so far) on "A Revision of the Bill of Rights." Part I, Part II, Part III and Part III, Questions Unanswered. All I can infer is there will be another seven articles until he has gone through nine of the ten Amendments in the Bill or Rights. I'm thinking he will probably skip the Third Amendment.

Justin misses entirely the purpose of the Constitution, which is a limitation on the scope of a federal government. I do agree that the Preamble sets the tone for the entire document, however he misses the overall point. He also seems to consider the Bill of Rights to be a secondary Constitution, rather than what they are, changes to the scope of original document.

The original Bill of Rights actually consisted of twelve, not ten amendments. The first has never been ratified, it being a plan on how to change the proportions of citizens to representatives as the population of the country grew. In 1911, Congress fixed the number of Representatives at 435. The second amendment ultimately became the 27th Amendment in 1992.

There is a preamble to the Bill of Rights:

THE Conventions of a number of the States, having at the time of their adopting the Constitution, expressed a desire, in order to prevent misconstruction or abuse of its powers, that further declaratory and restrictive clauses should be added: And as extending the ground of public confidence in the Government, will best ensure the beneficent ends of its institution. [Emphasis mine]

So, the Bill of Rights is a recognition that the rights of Man come from a Higher Power and the government constituted under this document must respect and not infringe upon these Rights. Every word of the Constitution as originally drafted and the Bill of Rights have the sole purpose of clearly defining and restraining the power of the federal government.

So, in Part II he says this:

If there are grievances, the people have the right to peaceably protest and write the government to address the grievance. Thus, the government cannot make a law but if there is a grievance brought to them by the people, they can ban or bar what is causing the grievance.

Again I am asking myself if someone pushes the straw into his drink box for him...

"The government cannot make a law but if there is a grievance brought to them by the people, they can ban or bar what is causing the grievance?" Really? Really? Of course they can make a law. And the various federal agencies can make additional regulations. They make these laws and regulations "public" in the Federal register, which it takes a special breed of person to effectively make their way through that and retain their sanity.

The United States is founded upon three Boxes: the Soap Box (as in the free expression and exchange of ideas and political opinions), the Ballot Box (throw the bums out of office) and the Cartridge Box (armed revolution if the first two don't do the job). If the government makes an unpopular law and the People protest, the government has two choices: either they can amend the law to remove the offending sections or void the law entirely, or tell the People to go screw themselves and start punishing people for violating the law. The People then have the option at the ballot box to vote in people to overturn said bad law, or rise up, overthrow the current power structure and try this experiment in freedom again.

His last paragraph in Part II almost gets it:

If a person is unaware of his or her rights, they will be doomed to laws that establish religions, prevent religious expression, limits free speech and press, and the right for people to protest peaceably. Ultimately ignoring the powers that an individual has, which is a detriment to democracy.

I agree, if the People are unaware of their Rights and Responsibilities, they will be doomed to laws that encroach upon their freedom.

It's Part III that really gets my blood boiling. It's about the Second Amendment. Again, Justin gets it wrong on the most basic level. Oh, sure he gets some of it right, but again, he misses the true intent by attempting to be nuanced.

The Second Amendment exists to recognize the Deity-granted right of citizens to defend themselves and limits the government from limiting that Right. It doesn't matter if the attacker is a local criminal or the federal government. That weapon is the power of the citizen to put an exclamation point to the word "No!"

Justin also does not grasp the basic concept of what exactly a "trial" is. In this instance, a trial is a legal process where another citizen or the state makes an accusation that another citizen has violated a law of the land. During this process, the accuser (the government) shows what law was broken and why the accuser believes the accused is the one to have committed the act. There are standards that the accuser has to meet, as far as the integrity of the investigators and the facts used to show the accused actually committed said offense. When we say "fair trial," we intend that the accuser must prove guilt, not the accused must show he did not commit the offense. If the accused must show innocence, this would be like standing outside on a sunny day at Noon, then trying to prove at that moment that the sun rises in the East and sets in the West. You can't do it.

If a criminal just so happens to select an armed citizen as their next victim and the criminal becomes dead in the process of unlawfully imposing their will on the victim, that was the criminals fair trial. I am 100% sure that if the criminal had not performed the act, the citizen would not have forced the criminal to assume ambient temperature. As Baretta said, "Don't do the crime if you can't do the time."

In Part III, Questions Unanswered, Our boy Justin gets it totally wrong, again. He questions the fair trial concept in the Fifth Amendment and fails to comprehend at any level what it means.

The appropriate part of the Fifth Amendment Justin is not understanding is:

No person shall be held to answer for a capital, or otherwise infamous crime, unless on a presentment or indictment of a Grand Jury, except in cases arising in the land or naval forces, or in the Militia, when in actual service in time of War or public danger;

In order to stand trial for a capital crime (generally felonies), the accuser (district attorney) must present their evidence to a Grand Jury, who will either approve or "no-bill" the charges. The accused nor the defense team is present at these proceedings. This is purely to determine if enough evidence exists to possibly prove the guilt of the accused. If someone is in the military under active duty status, they do not get the Grand Jury step of the process. An officer on the field of battle can summarily execute a soldier under their command right then and there for something like Cowardice Before the Enemy, desertion of his post or a similar offense that could result in the entire unit getting killed.

It is plain to me that Justin does not understand the concepts he is talking about. His views are so contorted and convoluted I have no frame of reference to truly comprehend this mans ignorance.

I found a video from the CBS affiliate in Miami. I can't post it because Joomla doesn't support that video player. The article I found about it is here. It relates how a teen was shot and killed after he burglarized a home. The video discussed several points that raised my suspicions about the shooting. Not knowing all of the circumstances of the event and Florida law, I am going to refrain from commenting on it.

What I am going to discuss is the comments made by the burglar's cousin:

"I don't care if she have her gun license or any of that. That is way beyond law... way beyond. He was not supposed to die like this. He had a future ahead of him. Trevon had goals... he was a funny guy, very big on education, loved learning.

You have to look at it from every child's point of view that was raised in the hood. You have to understand... how he gonna get his money to have clothes to go to school? You have to look at it from his point of view."

Umm, young lady, perhaps his parent(s) could purchase the clothes for him? How about he could get a legal job to earn the money?

This mindset that some people are entitled to the property of others (both in hoodlums and politicians) has to stop. If you engage in the actions of entering another persons space, be it their home or personal space, with the intent of depriving the other person of their possessions, you should fully expect to wind up seriously injured or dead. That should be the regular outcome, rather than the exception.

Before we had police, if you stole from another and got caught, you could fully expect a serious ass-whuppin' at a minimum. In Islamic cultures, they cut your hand off. While jail or prison today is by far from a pleasant place to be, for some people it's an upgrade in living standards. Punishment for violating the laws is supposed to be an incentive to not repeat those bad acts.

I don't know if Trevon was going to grow up to be a world-renowned surgeon, the CEO of a multi-billion dollar company, or even President of the United States. We will never know now that he has assumed ambient temperature. That being said, based on what caused his death (if he had survived) I think his most likely outcome would have been a life of crime, interspersed with stints in prison before dying in his 20's, either being killed by another criminal in a "deal-gone-bad" or by an armed citizen protecting their property.

Ronald Reagan said, "History teaches that wars begin when governments believe the price of aggression is cheap." This can be translated in this case to "History teaches criminals that they can commit crimes with impunity when the price of punishment is cheap." I don't know if Trevon had a police record, but I think it's a safe bet that was not his first burglary nor petty crime.

Well, President Obama has nominated Judge Merrick Garland this morning to sit on the Supreme Court. He was seated in the DC Circuit US Court of Appeals in 1997 and has been the Chief Judge since 2013. I do not know how he has voted, nor his political leanings and beliefs.

That being said, Obama has invoked the Liberal cry word of "fair."

The article states:

Republican senators, including Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, have outright refused to hold a hearing for Obama's nominee, no matter who he chose. The president called for the Senate to act in a "fair," bipartisan manner.

Obama has 310 days left in office, a little under a year. Yet, Chuck Schumer said this on 7/27/07, with 543 days (about 18 months) left in the Bush Presidency:

This again proves that the Liberal definition of words like "fair" and "bipartisan" means, "The Republicans should compromise and do it the Democrats way."

I am willing to listen to anyone who can provide evidence that the Republicans called on the Democrats to be "fair and do it our way" the Democrats did so. Because I don't think that has ever happened.

There has long been a debate over certain fields of study are an "art" or "science." Let me make this perfectly clear: If you can measure it, quantify it, reduce it to numbers and have a fairly predictable cause and effect, it's science. If you cannot do the aforementioned things, it's an art.

Liberals, when they trust and believe their feelings over quantified numbers, have to resort to this:

This is what has happened in the "Fight for $15" in Seattle. This open letter was written in January 2014 to the President and Congress in support of a $10.10 minimum wage, signed by over 600 Economists. The last paragraph reads:

In recent years there have been important developments in the academic literature on the effect of increases in the minimum wage on employment, with the weight of evidence now showing that increases in the minimum wage have had little or no negative effect on the employment of minimum-wage workers, even during times of weakness in the labor market. Research suggests that a minimum-wage increase could have a small stimulative effect on the economy as low-wage workers spend their additional earnings, raising demand and job growth, and providing some help on the jobs front.

However, when we see this enacted in real life, outside of the ivory towers of academia, we can clearly see the true cause-and-effect of such policies and laws.

In February 2016, Mark J. Perry wrote for the American Enterprise Institute an article titled, "New evidence suggests that Seattle’s ‘radical experiment’ might be a model for the rest of the nation not to follow."

Using the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) own data, you can see that jobs started tanking the moment Seattle's minimum wage law went into effect in April 2015 through December 2015. No matter if you look at the raw numbers, or the "seasonally adjusted" numbers, it's dropping hard after five years of steady growth. That's just Seattle. When you page down to near the bottom of the article, you see another chart that shows both the employment numbers of Seattle only, versus just the metropolitan area surrounding Seattle. Seattle went down 11,000 jobs, while in the same period the metro area outside of Seattle increased by 57,000 jobs. This shows that there is still job growth in the area and many workers who lost jobs inside Seattle probably became employed in the suburbs.

Even the New York Post admits this might be a bad idea, How the $15 wage is already killing Seattle jobs. The money quote:

Bottom line: A $15 law in New York is guaranteed to destroy jobs here — and boost employment in New Jersey, Connecticut, Pennsylvania and even Vermont.

Seattle is learning that it can’t unilaterally ignore basic economics. Businesses adapt to government dictates. To survive mandated pay hikes, they lay off employees, or avoid new new hires to control costs.

Now, I can tell you where people are getting paid $15 an hour to work fast food. Where you ask? In the oil boom area up in North and South Dakota. The oil boom is drawing workers of all trades and in order to support them, there have to be lots of jobs like fast food workers. In order to attract workers to menial jobs into an area where the snow can cover telephone poles, you have to pay them more to make it worth their while to move long distances to live and and work in a harsh environment.

Seattle and the Dakotas are two examples of how market forces work.

If you want to earn more money, upgrade your skills so you are worth more. Knowledge + hustle + a positive work ethic = more pay. If I was hiring someone, I would be much more inclined to hire someone who may not have the skillset needed but is willing to learn and work hard than someone who meets the skillsets but puts forth minimum work.

When I was in Guam, someone proposed to build a golf course directly over the northern aquifer where Guam got most of its drinking water. When someone asked, "What about the fertilizers and herbicides you'll be using on the golf course? Won't that end up in the drinking water?" The response of government was, "We will lay down a sheet of plastic under the entire course, keeping all of that bad stuff out of the water."

I'll let you think for yourself about the potential problems and consequences of that on your own.

I bring this up because there is a proposal to start a rock quarry just outside of Nashville. The location was poorly selected, because it's very close (a couple hundred yards at most) to an earthen dam which holds Old Hickory Lake back from running down the Cumberland River.

In May 2010, a record amount of rain hit the Nashville area. The dam that holds Old Hickory Lake back was opened to "save" Nashville, because it was either open the dam to relieve the pressure, or let the dam fail and things would have been significantly worse. A good friend and former co-worker of mine lost her house in that flooding. Nashville was flooded to the tune (if you excuse the pun) of $2 Billion in damages.

Just think about the blasting that will have to happen to excavate the stone from that quarry. Each blast doesn't have to be much, it would be a cumulative effect. All it would take is a trickle of water at first, almost imperceptible. A drop a minute would lead quickly to a drop a second, then a steady stream and finally to complete failure of the dam. All of that could happen very quickly.

Old Hickory Lake is about 20,000 acres in size. Imagine if the dam fails and just the top 10 feet of water rushes down the Cumberland river. That's 8.7 million cubic feet or a bit over 65 billion gallons that would be in downtown Nashville about 10 minutes after the dam fails.

Catastrophic could not begin to describe the carnage and devastation. A failure of this dam could functionally wipe Nashville off the face of the earth.

Now, it may never happen. Are you willing to take that chance that it won't? Are you willing to bet the lives of hundreds, perhaps thousands of people and $20+ Billion in damages on a hope and magical thinking that a failure of the dam won't happen? Would those making the decisions to move forward on this be willing to live on the banks of the Cumberland? I didn't think so.

Ladies and gentlemen, in 2014, right after the Bundy standoff, I made this post, A Second American Revolution. I had to dig it out of my last site's XML file and post it here, because I haven't been able to restore the entirety of the archives yet.

Anyway, I said in my OP, "The BLM will be back, and they will win, unless the entirety of the government is stopped."

Today, I find this press release, dated Thursday March 3rd, from the Department of Justice, U.S. Attorney’s Office, District of Nevada. This press release states that they have charged fourteen people (nineteen total) in connection with the Bundy Ranch Standoff.

A superseding criminal indictment was returned by the grand jury on Wednesday, March 2, and now charges a total of 19 defendants. The 14 new defendants are Melvin D. Bundy, 41, of Round Mountain, Nev., David H. Bundy, 39, of Delta, Utah, Brian D. Cavalier, 44, of Bunkerville, Nev., Blaine Cooper, 36, of Humboldt, Ariz., Gerald A. DeLemus, 61, of Rochester, N.H., Eric J. Parker, 32, of Hailey, Idaho, O. Scott Drexler, 44, of Challis, Idaho, Richard R. Lovelien, 52, of Westville, Okla., Steven A. Stewart, 36, of Hailey, Idaho, Todd C. Engel, 48, of Boundary County, Idaho, Gregory P. Burleson, 52, of Phoenix, Ariz., Joseph D. O’Shaughnessy, 43, of Cottonwood, Ariz., and Micah L. McGuire, 31, and Jason D. Woods, 30, both of Chandler, Ariz. 

Twelve defendants were arrested earlier today.  Two defendants, Brian D. Cavalier and Blaine Cooper, were already in federal custody in the District of Oregon.

The charges being brought against these citizens?

The newly-added defendants are charged with one count of conspiracy to commit an offense against the United States and conspiracy to impede or injure a federal officer, and at least one count of using and carrying a firearm in relation to a crime of violence, assault on a federal officer, threatening a federal law enforcement officer, obstruction of the due administration of justice, interference with interstate commerce by extortion, and interstate travel in aid of extortion.  The indictment also alleges five counts of criminal forfeiture which upon conviction would require forfeiture of property derived from the proceeds of the crimes totaling at least $3 million, as well as the firearms and ammunition possessed and used on April 12, 2014.

This is what I find sadly laughable. The last paragraph of the press release states:

The public is reminded that an indictment contains only charges and is not evidence of guilt.  The defendants are presumed innocent and entitled to a fair trial at which the government has the burden of proving guilt beyond a reasonable doubt.

I am now convinced that the United States is a Police State. Why? Because of this incident. When the government makes laws that are so vaguely written that they may be used in almost any circumstance, then arbitrarily decides that it has control over something, the only possible ending is bad for the citizens. Because when citizens stand up against governmental infringement and are punished for it, it means we as citizens no longer control the government as our Founding Fathers intended. The government now controls us.

This family claimed and worked land for 140 years, until the BLM "decided" that they (the BLM) would take control of it. When the Bundy's and some armed friends said "No," the government went away, let things defuse and people forget. Now they are back, quietly charging anyone who stood against them with vague and broadly-interpreted laws. I mean, really, "conspiracy to commit an offense against the United States"? Can you get more vague than that?

This is chilling. The Oregon Standoff was the culmination of multiple root causes all stemming from a systematic curtailment of liberty and personal rights of these people. A bullying federal government purposely destroyed farms and livestock in the area to perform a successful operation to intimidate others in the area and prevent support of these men and women from growing.

The seizure of a place or individuals to protest against the government is the last resort of reasonable men and women. The bad news is, it is defensive warfare and defensive warfare can only lead to defeat. Your supplies are limited, you are surrounded, your relief is not coming. It is only a matter of time until the patience of the other side wears thin and the final crushing blow is delivered.

Now is the time to become... unreasonable.

I bring this up because a journalist named Pete Santilli has been arrested and charged with conspiracy for his coverage of this standoff. He is currently being held without bond in a clear attempt to silence him. To be fair, I don't know this man, nor have I heard him or read any of his writings. The fact that he is being silenced due to his words is a chilling warning.

The First Amendment was written to protect the free exercise of all speech and specifically political speech. If the government can jail a person based only on his words is the most sincere evidence that we are transitioning from a Republic to a police state.

Mat dos Santos, the legal director of the ACLU of Oregon, said, "Situations like this - where words alone are used to label a speaker so dangerous or somehow threatening as to warrant the deprivations of his liberty - demand the highest caution. When there is any question, we should err on the side of the speaker." He also said, "If all of our statements can be cherry-picked and strung together over a number of years to label us a 'danger,' we risk silencing our civil discourse."

Those who seek to control the populace have taken to heart the lessons of George Orwell's Nineteen Eighty-Four. In that novel, the State controlled the people, in large part by its control of the language. If there are no words to express the concept of freedom or liberty, we might feel it in ourselves, however lacking those words, how can we communicate it to others? We have seen the restriction of speech progressively impede our free speech.

From the failed widespread use of "hyphenated Americans" (African-Americans, Jewish-Americans, etc.) which only served to divide and pigeon-hole us, to restriction of use of terms like "master/slave" regarding equipment. We now have an active movement to eliminate "hateful speech," which those who seek to limit it means, "things I don't want to hear or think about." Today we have movements calling for the elimination of the Confederate flag and any other symbols of that time as well as any other "unpleasant" aspects of our history.

We need to remember these events of our past so they do not happen again. If we do not learn, understand and remember these lessons, we are truly doomed to repeat them.

I do not call for an uprising against the government. I do wish to remind then that there are hundreds of thousands of veterans like myself, who swore to preserve, protect and defend the Constitution from all enemies, foreign and domestic. Despite my discharge 20+ years ago, I have not been relieved of my duties under that oath. Veterans very well know they can trace their lineage to the men who stood at Lexington and Concord. We all swore to protect the concept of the United States, not the interests of whomever is in power. I want to remind those with evil intentions against this country that those descendants are well trained in the fine art of warfare, chaos and havoc.

Those with evil intentions should pray the switch we turned off when we left the service never gets returned to the "On" position. Maybe that is why our veterans are subjected to a demoralizing VA where the only "help" they receive is a further restriction on their rights.

While I have heard of the name of Milton Friedman, I am ashamed to admit I never really studied him. I am currently in the process of correcting that error.

I have found a sampling of two YouTube videos I want to share with you. In the first clip, he takes Donahue to task. Donahue asks about all of the people in poverty in the world. Milton says simply:

"The world runs on individuals pursuing their own self-interests...The only cases in which the masses have escaped from the kind of grinding poverty you are talking about is where they had capitalism and largely free trade."

Some years ago, I had a conversation with a co-worker who openly stated government should confiscate the wealth of the rich. She could not answer my question, "How many poor people do you know who create jobs by employing people?"

This second video shows Dr. Friedman skewering a lady who was complaining about "too many millionaires." While she did realize what the millionaires were doing (investing their money instead of keeping it under their mattress), she did not realize that their investment in purchasing equipment and expanding production capacity made more wealth for everybody, especially the creation of jobs.

If the only thing a person can do is what someone else (namely government) tells them to do, that's all they will do. If you tell someone they can do anything they want, most will still do what they are told, some will do nothing and very few will do just that, pursue an idea they have, be it to create something new or to improve something already there and make something that changes the world.

To be able to invoke our own self-interest, to be in control of our own future and reap the benefits of our labor, this is what inspires people to do great things. When government stifles or destroys the incentive for greatness, there is no innovation or improvement of the lot of the common man. "They pretend to pay us, we pretend to work" is a common line from the workers of the now-dead Soviet Union.

Which brings me to the "Socialist Heaven" of Venezuela. Probably not too many people remember, but a couple of years ago the Venezuelan government (which owns or controls most industries in the country) had to purchase two billion rolls of toilet paper. Toilet paper. Their own country could not produce something so simple and inexpensive as toilet paper. Today, they can't provide enough food for their own people. As I said in an earlier post, the Soviet Union (another controlled economy) had to purchase American wheat to feed its own people, as their own farmland (they had more farm land than the United States had land, period) could not feed its own people.

I usually abhor weighing in on presidential politics as it is a very divisive issue. However, with Bernie Sanders losing to The Hillary by 0.3% (after multiple fraud accusations and six coin flips) in Iowa and then winning Hew Hampshire by 22 points, I feel the need to clarify just what a Socialist is.

Bernie Sanders is listed as an Independent who caucuses with the Democrats. He openly admits he is an avowed Socialist.

A Socialist is defined as "a member of a political party or group that advocates socialism." Which leads to the question, "what is Socialism?"

The Dictionary defines Socialism as, "a theory or system of social organization that advocates the vesting of the ownership and control of the means of production and distribution, of capital, land, etc., in the community as a whole."

This means that the government would own and control everything. Before you think that's a good idea (rather than those evil corporations), consider this:

If you are under 25 years old, you have not lived when the USSR existed. The Union of Soviet Socialist Republics [my italics] was formed out of the 1917 Bolshevik Revolution and dissolved under its own weight on December 26th, 1991. The USSR was exactly as the above definition. The State controlled everything.

For example, the farms that produced food for the USSR were "collectivized" meaning they were controlled by the government. This plan worked so well, the United States was selling great quantities of wheat and other food to the USSR. In the 1970's, the farmers were allowed "small plots" where they could grow food for themselves and sell the extra. Those small private forms outproduced the massive collective farms.

The Purges under Stalin was where at least 20,000,000 (that's 20 Million) Russians died by the hand of their own government. They died from starvation because the State didn't want to feed them, or they were worked to death in "re-education camps." When that wasn't fast enough, the USSR resulted to just shooting them.

As a fine example of how wonderful it was to live under Soviet control, all you had to ask was, "which way were the people running?" In August 1961, the Soviet Union erected the "Berlin Wall," which physically separated West Berlin (under the Control of the US, England and France) from East Berlin (under control by the USSR). That wall was torn down in November 1989. In that time, over two hundred people were killed trying to escape East Berlin into West Berlin. Uncounted hundreds more died crossing the general border from Soviet Bloc countries into "western" countries. Those Cubans trying to flee the "workers paradise" of Cuba (a Socialist State supported by the Soviet Union) would overload rafts and risk their lives crossing 90 miles of open ocean to get away from that kind of government.

Really, how many Americans (or Europeans) made the trip to become citizens of the Soviet State? Pretty close to zero.

Every country founded on Socialist principles has not survived. The producers of each country could not (or would not) produce enough for those who were content on the free ride.

Bernie and The Hillary love to hold Sweden up as an example of "how Socialism works."

Let's take a close look at Sweden and the United States, side-by-side:

While there are some things you can go from a certain size and scale up to a larger size, I don't think you can take something and literally multiply it by a factor of twenty and expect it to work in the same exact manner.

Please remember facts like this when you think about "Feeling the Bern."

2/16/16 UPDATE: I knew I forgot something! There is a 180 percent tax when you purchase a new car. I have updated the table above appropriately.

I happened across this image on my FaceBook feed and I thought it needed a response. Beware the twist at the end.

So, let's go down this point-by-point:

If lawmakers wanted to use your tax dollars to support private Muslim schools to teach children Islamic beliefs?

Outside of the school voucher program which allows parents to send their children to private schools of their choice, I am not aware of public dollars being used to support private schools. I am aware of public schools requiring students in public schools to study, dress and pray in Muslim ways, while anything remotely Christian is banned and persecuted.

If police cars and courthouses had the words "Allah be praised" on them?

You are right, many police vehicles and court houses examples display "In God We Trust" in the United States. If for whatever reason I, as a Christian, was living in a Muslim country, I would not object to the five calls to prayer over loud speakers every day and the variations of "Allah be praised" I would be exposed to every day. I would not object because I understand that is the religion and culture of the majority of people in that country.

The majority of Americans are Christian, so expect to see many Christian references in the United States. I would like to point out that a Muslim openly practicing their faith in public in the United States is a lot more able to do so than a Christian trying to openly practice Christianity in Saudi Arabia.

If your son or granddaughter was forced to recite Islamic prayers to be on a public school sports team?

Like I said above, there are children who are forced to practice Islamic customs and prayers in our public schools today. If you have a high school athlete who is Islamic, I am pretty sure the rest of the team would try to accommodate this athlete by making the prayer non-denominational, not mandatory, or maybe even alternate between Christian and Islamic prayers. At least they would have the option.

If presidential candidates said that the U.S. Constitution might be ignored in favor of Islamic teachings?

The U.S. Constitution was written with the concept of the Rule of Law, that all who live in this country live under this law. The man who wrote the Constitution, James Madison, very specifically did not have any religious references in the Constitution. In fact, Article 6 Clause 3 states that "...no religious test shall ever be required as a qualification to any office or public trust under the United States." The First amendment also says that the Congress shall not establish a National Church, "nor prohibit the free exercise thereof." This means if you want to worship, you are able to do so as your faith dictates. If you have no faith, you are perfectly able to do so as well.

The thing is, atheists are living with this every single day, not with Islam, but with Christianity.

Ah, there's the hook. It baits you with the Islamic "fear word" but then for the punch line it tries to make you feel guilty we are "subjecting" atheists to our "religious persecution."

I have a good friend who is an atheist who should be the example for the rest of the atheists. He does not speak bad of any religion and he isn't "militant" about his beliefs. He tells you he is an atheist, but only if you ask. He supports others in their beliefs, without reservation. If someone offers to pray for him, he says, "Thank you" and is sincere in his words. He told me, "If it makes them feel better to pray for me, who am I to object?"

The nice thing about the United States is your freedom. If a group of atheists want to form their own community, no one is going to stop them. If they want to leave this country they are also perfectly free to do so. Too bad there are many places where they would not be received as well as they are here.

The United States is a Republic. It is governed by the will of the majority within the rule of law which protects the minority from the tyranny of the majority. I don't see another country like this anywhere else right now.

These Democrats either have some extremely large cojones or (this is what I'm leaning towards) they are extraordinarily stupid. They could be grandstanding or something else.

No matter what, 123 Democrat Congressmen, about 65% of the total Democrats in the House, are sponsors or co-sponsors of this bill, H.R. 4269.

Normally, these guys are a little obfuscatory in the name of the bill, either short or long. This time, they lay it right out.

The bold and italic is mine.

The short name is, "Assault Weapons Ban of 2015."

The long name is, "To regulate assault weapons, to ensure that the right to keep and bear arms is not unlimited, and for other purposes."

I'm sorry, I don't see how these idiots can expect to pass this bill when they are a minority in both houses. This is why I think they are grandstanding, because if Senator Orrin Hatch (Senate Majority Leader) pulls a Harry Reid, the Senate bill will never be brought to the floor for a vote. And unless a large number of Republicans of both houses join in voting for this bill, it will never see the President's desk.

The core of this bill is the banning of private ownership (except for active and retired Law Enforcement, government agencies and other security personnel) of any "Assault Weapons." If you own one now, you can keep it. For the moment. However, you cannot transfer it to anyone. At your death, it has to go to the government or other authorized dealer.

This bill does not mean Assault Rifles, which can selectively fire a single shot, burst (3-5 rounds) or fully automatic. The term Assault Weapon has come to mean semi-automatic weapons.

The criteria of this bill is as follows:

(36) The term ‘semiautomatic assault weapon’ means any of the following, regardless of country of manufacture or caliber of ammunition accepted:

“(A) A semiautomatic rifle that has the capacity to accept a detachable magazine and any 1 of the following:

“(i) A pistol grip.

“(ii) A forward grip.

“(iii) A folding, telescoping, or detachable stock.

“(iv) A grenade launcher or rocket launcher.

“(v) A barrel shroud.

“(vi) A threaded barrel.

Also, this bill out-and-out bans possession of any magazine that holds more than 10 rounds that was made after the bill becomes law by any private citizen other than law enforcement.

Under the Clinton 1994 AW Ban a weapon needed to have two of their criteria to be outlawed. This time around if the weapon has any of the criteria, it is considered illegal.

And there is no sunset provision, so this one is forever until overturned.

Something fishy is going on here, because the chance of this bill becoming law is so small it can only be seen by an electron microscope. If it does become law, it won't pass Constitutional muster when SCOTUS hears it. There is a fix in here somewhere, or this is a smokescreen to distract us from something else.

I have been sitting back, watching these whiny children at Missiou, Yale, Princeton and other colleges and universities across this country protest and complain about "microaggressions," "lack of safe spaces" and "offensive speech." My old grey cells told me there was a root cause to all of this, but they took their sweet time telling me.

What I am about to state as the reason will probably make you laugh, then dismiss me and my opinion. I ask that you hear me out.

The root causes of these protests.... is hand sanitizer.

It's not actually hand sanitizer itself, there is no chemical in it that is causing this, but rather the concept of hand sanitizer. Physically, hand sanitizer kills bacteria wherever we rub it on us. Our emotional response (and training) from having a first response to anything "dirty" or "yucky" is to reach for that hand sanitizer teaches our children that "you need protection from all of the Bad Stuff in this world.

So, the overprotective parents that carry around fifteen bottles of hand sanitizer teach their children that they are fragile and must be protected (Participation trophies are a different, yet related subject). What we teach our children as they grow forms the foundation for the rest of their lives. When they reach adulthood (chronologically, not emotionally) they still have that "I must be protected from Bad Stuff" ingrained in them. All it now takes is their professors to say "anybody who doesn't agree with you, regardless of the facts" is bad. Bad = must be protected from.

The end result are the future leaders of our country are afraid of and refuses to listen to or consider any idea that they don't agree with. Facts and real world consequences are immaterial and do not matter to what is going on in their heads. They want what they want because they want it, and because they want it they must have it and that's the only justification needed.

So we have a generation of "intellectuals" who are basically begging the government to "protect them" against things that scare them. These whiny children demand safe spaces where they can go if they are traumatized because they were exposed to a person with a different idea on any given subject, someone used words they didn't like or they saw a sticker of a Confederate flag on a laptop 50 feet away.

They demand that they be relieved of their financial obligations (their student loans) and their education be at no cost to them, never mind someone has to pay for the services and learning they want to receive. It's okay that a government already $18 Trillion in debt pays for their education with money that doesn't exist. They also demand a $15 minimum wage, not realizing that artificially increasing the minimum pay decreases job opportunities and removes the incentive for people to improve their skills.

I was raised on the silly concept where you should listen to people who have different ideas, concepts and views on life, because that is how we learn and grow mentally. Where you should perform hard mental reasoning to determine what you believe in and why those concepts resonate with you. I realized early on I don't know everything and the axis the world turns on did not go through the top of my head. I didn't always follow my own advice, and when I didn't the world gave me a good, solid thump on the head to let me know when I was being stupid.

I was raised to be financially independent. The only two times I have been on public assistance was when I was disabled and when I was unexpectedly laid off. Both times I was ashamed to be in the position where I had to accept that assistance and when the first opportunity presented itself for me to get off public assistance I took it. 

This generation coming of age now are actively and willingly forging their own chains of slavery. They are perfectly fine with the idea of the government taking care of them so they don't have to do the hard thinking of determining their own path and destiny.

This came across my Facebook feed the other day. An Adam Ruins Everything on How the Electoral College Ruins Democracy. He rails against the Electoral College in presidential politics in this particular video and how some votes are "worth more" than others.

He is correct, the EC does ruin Democracy, and that's the whole point of its existence. Just not the way he thinks so.

The United States is NOT a Democracy, it is a Republic. While they share some aspects, at their core they are totally different approaches to government.

Democracy is mob rule. Whatever the mob wants, the mob gets. If someone could at election time get 51% of the voters to vote "yes" to a proposal which reads, "Starting at Noon tomorrow, any citizen who brings a dead [insert minority of your choice] to the steps of the county courthouse will receive a $50 bounty, no limit," that would become law and upheld as law until 51% of the voters say otherwise. No court could overturn the law (if courts even existed), because the only standard of law in a Democracy is the "will of the people."

The fact that we don't have such a law on the books is proof that we are a Republic.

Our Constitution was written so that it is hard on purpose to make laws. Gridlock is supposed to be the norm. On the State and Federal levels, you have a bicameral (two houses) Legislative branch that proposes laws. Each of these houses have to have a simple majority to pass a bill and send it to the Executive branch for approval. The President/Governor has a say in the matter by either signing it into law or rejecting it using their Veto power. If the President/Governor does veto a bill, the Legislative branch can override the veto and make it a law with a 2/3rds majority in both houses.

The Representatives of the House represent the People. Congressmen are elected by popular vote in the Congressional districts of each State. The power of the House is all spending bills must first be first introduced in the House. The size of the House was set at 435 members in 1911, because the Constitution says "a Congressional District will consist of no more than 30,000 people." If we stuck with that ratio today, the House would have over 10,000 Representatives. These 435 members are assigned proportionally to each state by proportion of the population.

The Senators in the Senate were elected by the Legislatures of the State and supposed to represent the interest of the States. They have the power to conduct foreign affairs by approving or not approving treaties with other governments. They also provide consent to the President by approving or not approving his nominations for judicial positions and senior Administration officials.

This setup means both the People and the State governments were represented in the Legislative branch of the Federal Government. The EC is an extension of that, because the EC is made up of 538 votes (each states Representatives and Senators, plus three for the District of Columbia) and for 48 states is set as a "winner take all" setup. Maine and Nebraska have a "semi-proportional" setup, where each Congressional district elects by majority, then the winner of the overall state vote receives the two votes representing the Senators.

Through this method, it is impossible for the government to drastically change its political leaning from a single election. It takes a constant effort of the People over three Federal election cycles (six years) to effect enough changes in their representatives in the Legislative and Executive branches of the Federal government to achieve that shift.

This way the course of the government does not change on the momentary whim of the People, President or a single house of Congress. Thus, this is an insulation against mob rule.

Our Founding Fathers wanted to prevent mob rule and rule of a king, both of which can be capricious and arbitrary. They wanted to have long periods of political discussion, followed by a vote to determine the overall will of the people. The People are supposed to be well-read and informed about the current events and at the appropriate time, to elect others to represent them and carry out the work of government according to the general will of the People.

The job of a Citizen is to keep their mouth open. This is performed by civil discussion among the People and with their representatives in all levels of government. If you don't communicate with your representatives, or vote in elections, you are not protesting, you are surrendering your power as a Citizen.

Think about that the next time you stay home on Election Day.