April 14, 2020

Fiscal Conservatives of Hamilton County

I appreciate your inquiry about my positions on issues and shall answer the five questions, with clauses, you pose.

1) Do you favor term limits for members of Congress? If so, what period and why?

The way in which you phrase the question implies the answer is presumed to be “yes.” I oppose term limits for members of Congress. I would suggest your read Federalist 53, written by James Madison. The Framers…

White supremacists have taken control of the Republican Party (a/k/a GOP). They are a minority, but are well-financed and have an advantage: control of one of the two major political parties.

They had a hold on the Democratic Party, from 1865 until the mid-1960s, but both parties had “wings” that balanced racism and made it okay, as long as one was white. Then LBJ, a white southerner, backed the Civil Rights Act.

GOP strategists realized they could pick up where George Wallace left…

Nothing in The Constitution guarantees one-half of the political system belongs to forces of ignorance and hatred. The so-called Southern Strategy of parts of the GOP succeeded, and handed control of the party and half of our system to a minority.

We cannot both allow such forces to keep what they have taken (sometimes illegally) and vow to remove them from control. If we allow them to remain in control of the GOP, we have given up 50 yards before the kickoff.

In Indiana’s 5th…

Gosh golly - when candidate A in a party’s primary challenges to debate any of the other candidates in that primary, and one of those other candidates (me) accepts the challenge, one should (reasonably) infer A will reply to my acceptance.

Kent Abernathy - one of my opponents in the June 2 GOP primary for U.S. House in Indiana’s 5th Congressional District (INCD5) - issued such a challenge. I accepted. I have received no reply. There are several possible reasons: his stands on…

One of my opponents in the June 2 GOP primary for U.S. House in Indiana’s 5th Congressional District (INCD5), is Kent Abernathy, who apparently issued a challenge to any candidate who wants to debate him.

I accept that challenge - and we can debate via Skype or Zoom or one of those devices. If any other candidate accepts the challenge, I don’t believe it would be much of a “debate.” Implicit in the notion of a debate is a clash on issues.

The other candidates for the GOP nomination…

The re-election campaign for trump has issued a cease and desist letter to stop a TV ad that uses trump’s own words to illustrate how trump has bungled the COVID-19 pandemic by downplaying its seriousness.

Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes wrote: “The best test of truth is the power of the thought to get itself accepted in the competition of the market...” 250 U.S. at 630. trump speaks of, yet mocks, “truth” and is ignorant of the marketplace.

The First Amendment’s protection of free…

Devotion to ignorance in the face of fact - scientific or other - marks the current administration. trump lied yesterday when he said no one could have anticipated this pandemic. In fact the Obama administration HAD anticipated it.

And trump then dismantled the framework that had been established to address a pandemic, going so far as to eliminate the job of the person who - this is “on point” - monitored health crises in China.

I cannot be so cynical as to suggest voters who…

Anti-science, anti-humanity and absorption with absurd ideas rejected long ago - these forces coalesced in this administration and Indiana’s primary elections have been kicked back to June 2. This administration bungled the COVID-19 crisis.

IF: you live in Indiana’s 5th Congressional District (INCD5), your vote can make a difference. ALL of the other candidates for the GOP nomination advocate the same failed policies of the past three years. trump has told States should find supplies…

Indiana will hold its primary elections May 5 - unless our system is dead, and w/Cap’n Clueless at the helm, that is a possibility. IF: you live in Indiana’s 5th Congressional District (INCD5), your vote can make a difference.

Indiana’s primaries: quasi-open. A registered voter may request the ballot of either major party and vote. A voter overcomes challenge as a “real” R or D if s/he says s/he voted for a majority of the party’s nominees in the last election or promises to vote for a…

Tonight at 7 p.m. IndianaTownHalls.org will live stream a gathering of 14 of the candidates for the Republican nomination for Indiana’s 5th Congressional District. Each of the 14 provided a biography, limited to 200 words. I am one of the 14.

Given the request for a “biography,” the limit of 200 words and no direction to give statements on issues, one can understand why some candidates give little or no indication of their stands on issues. I shall try to summarize candidate positions…

KKK: 1920, D.C. Stephenson moved to Indiana, ran for Congress as a Democrat, lost, then joined the KKK. “He was an eloquent speaker, with a powerful personality and great magnetism.” He was assigned to organize KKK. Leibowitz, “My Indiana,” 1964, pp. 192-93.

KKK “principally backed Republicans (because they were generally in control)” but found support in both parties; at its peak, nearly 500,000 Hoosiers belonged to the KKK. Stephenson bragged he delivered KKK (winning) votes in the…

When I was a kid, I heard a trucking company owner talk about how he started, and in the early days learned to improve, his business. One of the most important things he did was to follow competitors’ trucks to see what they did differently.

Years later, as a law clerk, I was in Las Vegas for a pre-trial conference on a case. Afterward, still in a three-piece suit, I was in the sports book at Bally’s. The floor boss came up to me and wanted to know where I was from.

Turned out only…

I am a GOP candidate from the nomination for U.S. House District 5. I am pro-choice, pro-environment, anti-war and anti-dt. I want to address the issue of “immigration.” One thing to know: if you want less crime in your neighborhood, encourage immigrants to move there.

Statistics support the concept that immigrants commit fewer crimes and do more to improve the lives of their families and the lives of others around them. That’s kinda spiffy - especially in a country that, in its…

People cuss about the two-party system. The Framers of The Constitution expressed concern over political parties, or what they called “factions.” James Madison, the fourth President of the United States, has been called the Father of the Constitution.

Madison, Alexander Hamilton and John Jay wrote The Federalist Papers, 85 essays published to persuade those eligible to vote - white, male landowners - to support ratification in the individual States. The delegates were white, male…

As I have noted, Andrew Bales is one of my opponents in the May 5 GOP primary for United States House of Representatives in Indiana’s 5th Congressional District (INCD5). Mr Bales has called me an “imposter” as a GOP candidate.

The word “impostor” is defined, in this context, as “One who assumes a false character, or passes himself off as some one other than he really is.” Oxford English Dictionary, 1971 ed. Mr Bales tweeted last evening: ..when your platform is farther left than all 4…

One of my opponents in the May 5 primary for U.S. House in Indiana’s 5th Congressional District (INCD5), Andrew Bales, posted - and I think has removed the statement - on the home page of his campaign website that the “Impeachment fiasco” “potentially disenfranchises 64 million Americans.”

One may reasonably infer that Mr Bales refers to the people who voted for the individual who currently occupies the Oval Office. The Federal Election Commission (FEC) official final tally in the…

Andrew Bales is one of my opponents in the May 5 primary for United States House of Representatives in Indiana’s 5th Congressional District. To his credit, Mr. Bales is more specific on more issues than other GOP candidates.

Mr. Bales, on most of those issues and in reasons for his decision to run, are ill-founded and in conflict with long-held principles of conservatism and reality - reality goes out the window when Mr. Bales says he agrees with the current occupant of the Oval Office…

We have been lied to for years about why military intervention absolutely is imperative: Korea, Vietnam, Dominican Republic, Lebanon, Grenada, Panama, Gulf War I, Gulf War II, Somalia, Bosnia, Kosovo, Afghanistan, Iraq.

A lot of US military personnel have been killed. A lot more people from other countries have been killed. Bottom line, if someone bitched, was: They’re fighting for our freedom and democracy!

Like hell they have been.

Today the individual who currently…

People on Twitter and friends of mine here, in Indiana, purportedly a very “red” State, ask how the [Expletive deleted] I can run as a candidate for the United States House of Representatives from Indiana’s 5th Congressional District - or any office - in the Republican Party (GOP).

As I started to write this blog during the evening of January 7, the results of the actions of the current occupant of the Oval Office were playing out on TV. Twice I have watched, in real-time on TV, attacks…

The roots of anger, held predominantly among older white males, are hard to ascertain. This demographic, to which I belong, has had greater benefits than nearly any other in history. The United States was tremendously affluent when we were born.

In general we have had good food, decent housing, and an economy that’s been quite stable - compared to the rest of the World. Our own economy has been relatively stable since FDR and the New Deal.

Bankers and stock brokers, in general,…