CPAC, the annual gathering of the right wing, is taking place this weekend. In a place full of advocates of the right - damn it, the right - to keep and bear arms, one would expect to see attendees strapped, i.e., carrying firearms.

After all, as I have heard more than a few gun advocates explain to me, gun violence is greater in “gun-free” - as in there are no guns - zones. CPAC, however, once again, has prohibited guns at its annual gathering. Perhaps it’s not their fault. It’s the…

People get scared if they are “served process” - usually by a civil sheriff’s deputy. And usually the document served is a subpoena: a “court order commanding the appearance of a witness, subject to penalty for noncompliance.” Black’s Law Dict., pocket ed., 1996, p. 601.

This is the Land of the Free where police cannot simply stop a person to question that person. Of course sometimes the police go a few steps further and beat or kill a person, but for an officer of the State even to…

On Saturday March 6, Precinct Committee people (PCs) of the Marion County GOP will caucus to elect a party chair. One candidate, Michael-Paul Hart, called me (I’m a PC) this week. He sent me his “Marion County GOP Plan of Action” (Plan) with a cover letter (letter).

The Plan focuses on organization and money, i.e. branding and sales. Issues at best are implied, e.g.: “democrats are tearing our City apart by shutting down businesses, letting rioters tear down our City, and aiding…

Strategy of this iteration of the GOP relies, in large measure, on buzz words. If voters are conditioned to shut their minds when they hear one or two words, then the GOP does not have to argue claims that lack merit. One such issue is ...

People who would limit our rights to what the Framers of the Constitution intended, in 1787, do not know how abortion was treated at the time the Constitution was written. Justice Blackmun noted that restrictions on abortion are relatively…

Individual States did not coordinate efforts of their respective militias or National guards in December, 1941, to fight in what became called World War II. A year ago the U.S. faced a World conflict with an “enemy” more implacable than in 1941.

If the (now nearly-500,000) deaths from COVID did little to change anyone’s mind about the efficacy of States’ experiments in how we address problems we face, the operation of free market forces in provision of energy in Texas probably won’t…

The dumbing down of America coincided with the spread of the audio virus people came to know as Rush Limbaugh. I shall not recount his generally misanthropic philosophy or cite specific instances of his hate-filled rants.

Instead, I want to quote the late Carl Sagan and what he foresaw: “I have a foreboding of an America in my children’s or grandchildren’s time - when the United States is a service and information economy; when nearly all the key manufacturing industries have slipped…

Paul Ogden blogged yesterday about the need for a new Constitution. Like many of my friend’s ideas, they are meant well, but horrible. A Convention can be called by two-thirds of both Houses of Congress or by two-thirds of the States’ legislatures. Const. Art. V.

The results of that convention would have to be ratified by the legislatures of “three fourths of the several States, or by Conventions in three fourths thereof...” THERE CAN BE NO LIMITS ON A CONVENTION ONCE…

In southern Indiana this morning I drove past three yards where Confederate flags flew, two with trump/pence flags. This afternoon trump was acquitted by the Senate, although the majority voted to convict. Seven members of the Republican Party voted Guilty.

The values of this iteration of the Republican Party are warped. They find impeachable the act of receiving oral sex in the Oval Office, but give a “pass” to a would-be dictator who sought to overturn the results of an election to…

Observations after Day 2 of the Impeachment trial. 1) Incitement to riot is not protected by the First Amendment. Feiner v. New York, 340 U.S. 315, 321 (1951). Trump, in his January 6 speech, used inflammatory words to move the mob.

trump (1) for months prior to and weeks after the 2020 election, disparaged its validity; (2) tweeted his followers to come D.C. for January 6, when electors’ votes would be counted: “Big protests in D.C. on January 6. Be there. Will be wild!"

The…

History is the past and the present. We can learn a lot from it. From when “with increasing frequency they were taking to the streets to molest and murder their political opponents. No election ... took place without savage battles in the gutters.”

Or how “auxiliary police” raised their flag “on office buildings everywhere” a symbolic gesture “tolerated or approved by the majority of state government ministers, who were intimidated by simultaneous demonstrations of massed columns in…

History is the past and the present. We can learn a lot from it. From when “with increasing frequency they were taking to the streets to molest and murder their political opponents. No election ... took place without savage battles in the gutters.”

Or how “auxiliary police” raised their flag “on office buildings everywhere” a symbolic gesture “tolerated or approved by the majority of state government ministers, who were intimidated by simultaneous demonstrations of massed columns in…

The Second Amendment consists of 27 words: “A well regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed.” An asterisk should note: an individual’s right is a relatively recent interpretation.

Under no conceivable reconstruction of our past could anyone rationally say the purpose of the Second Amendment was to enable mobs to force members of Congress to cower in fear as those members consider…

Yesterday a friend suggested I change the topic, guns, I planned to discuss. She said everyone is discussing the impeachment trial. I agree: trump’s trial is important. One issue that needs to be discussed, especially in light of January 6, is private ownership of guns.

One reason people own a gun is self-defense: to defend against a burglar. However, statistics, compiled by Jacksonville State University, show only 27.6% of burglaries occur when someone’s home. If you are not there to…

Today on Civil Discourse Now (4 pm): Guns! (To save space I’ll refer to “guns” instead “gun or guns.”) In the USA private ownership makes gunshot wound (“GSW”) a frequent mechanism of death. In 2018 that number was 39,740 people. (UC Davis, “What You Can Do.”)

Reasons people own guns: self-defense, oppose tyranny, sport/hobby (target shooting, hunting, collecting), inherited, and belief gun ownership is required. However, if a specific reason to own a gun is invalid, that’s a good…

In the Answer to the Article of Impeachment, attorneys for the former POTUS may have admitted, inadvertently, to important facts that could undermine the defense they intend to interpose - that a person, once out of office, cannot be impeached.

First, the statement of an opposing party made by the party in an individual or representative capacity is not considered “hearsay.” F.R.Evid. 801(d)(2)(A); United States v. Nixon, 418 U.S. 683, 700-01, 94 S.Ct. 3090, 3104, 41 L.Ed.2d 1039…

ONE: a call-in show sponsored by someone FROM THE LEFT. TWO: premieres tomorrow, February 4. THIRD: I’ll get to that.

On January 6, trump incited idiotic violent bullies to flood The Capitol and they, in turn, have scared the excrement out of GOP members of Congress who, in turn, are trying to bully other members of Congress.

Bullies are chicken ... well, to be polite, CS. (See, “American Graffiti”.) They bully others after having been bullied themselves. This thuggery has…