Tag Archives: First Amendment

national news

How in the world did we elect this guy?

Never, not ever, in the history of the U.S. of A. have Americans had to witness an elected president who is so ignorant, so damn filled with hatred of his political enemies, who is such a pathological liar continue to function as the ostensible leader of what we used to call the free world.

Donald Trump has declared what amounts to war on Democrats in the Congress, threatening with death for speaking the truth about why service personnel should resist following illegal orders. One of them, Sen. Mark Kelly of Arizona, has been singled out as a particularly egregious target of Trump’s retribution campaign.

Kelly is a retired Navy captain, a former combat aviator, husband of a congresswoman who was nearly killed by a gunman in an assassination attempt, a former astronaut who has flowin space on four missions. He is a patriot. Kelly serves with honor and humility. He has spoken the truth. He dissents from Trump’s public policy … which the Constitution guarantees in its First Amendment.

Trump is ignorant of all of that. He doesn’t give a crap about the Constitution. He blindly accuses Sen. Kelly of commiting sedition, which carries a death penalty if convicted.

And yet … this nation somehow managed to elect this idiot to a second term as POTUS.

Kelly is not the only Democrat in power who has drawn Trump’s petulant anger.

Kids, we are living in a dangerous era in this nation’s long history.

The only recourse we seem to have at this moment happens to the federal court system, which appears to be stiffening its spine at just the right moment. Congress is rolling over for Trump’s idiocy. Trump has populated the executive branch with yes men and men. That leaves the court system to stand tall against this individual’s moronic overreach.

I have heartened by the actions of a Trump-nominated federal judge who tossed aside the indictments of former FBI director James Comey and New York AG Letitia James, calling those indictments pure political revenge brought by a U.S. attorney who is unqualified to hold her job.

Right there you have an example of the Constitution doing its job. I am clinging to the hope that it remains strong and that the courts stand firm against the Trump’s frontal assault on the rule of law.

media news

Kimmel is back to stick it deeper

As a rule I don’t plan my day around what’s appearing on TV … but Tuesday night I am making an exception.

I am going to be sure to watch Jimmy Kimmel’s return to his 10:35 pm (Central Time) slot on ABC’s “Late Night” show. This is a big … deal, man!

Why? Because the network that suspended Kimmel indefinitely from his talk show made an egregious error in judgment. Its decision to fire Kimmel flew directly into the teeth of the First Amendment to the U.S. Constitution, the amendment that guarantees free speech.

Kimmel had made a crack on the air that Charlie Kirk’s murder the other day well could have been a MAGA-inspired event and not a deed done by a lunatic who disagreed with the right-wing influencer’s point of view. ABC determined Kimmel was out of bounds.

Wait a second! Kimmel didn’t offer an original thought. Almost at the moment Kirk was mortally wounded, some lefties sought to argue that the MAGA crowd was looking for way to tear our attention away from those Jeffrey Epstein files that allegedly contain Donald Trump’s name and suggest that the president and the convicted sex trafficker and pedophile were friends.

Look, ABC overreacted. Kimmel did not need to be punished in this manner. I am glad Kimmel is coming back.

To be clear, on the rare occasion that I stay up late enough to watch one of the after-hours comedians, i prefer Stephen Colbert on CBS-TV. He’s funnier — and more biting — than Kimmel. But that’s just me.

On Tuesday night, I will dial in to watch Jimmy Kimmel march triumpantly on stage and listen to what he has to say about what the network did to shame him. Without a shred of doubt, I will not be the only American who does so.

political news

Flag burning … it’s protected speech

I am going to try to explain one more time for the thick-skulled among us a fundamental truth about the democratic republic we all call home … and are proud to do so.

It is that burning Old Glory, the Stars and Stripes, Betsy Ross’s most famous piece of stitchery is protected political speech. The protection lies in the First Amendment to the U.S. Constitution, in the clause that declares that citizens have the right to “petition the government for a redress of grievances.”

Donald Trump, the guy masquerading as POTUS, has issued an executive order that would sentence a flag-burner to a year in jail.

How can I say this diplomatically? No … can … do!

The nation’s highest court has ruled that the First Amendment’s protection makes flag-burning a legitimate way to speak out politically. It’s done so repeatedly. One ruling involved a flag-burning case out of Dallas when someone burned Old Glory in a public square. Someone filed suit. It found its way to the high court. Justices ruled the moron who burned the flag didn’t break any law.

I also want to stipulate one other point. No one ever should burn Old Glory in my presence if they intend to make a political point. I hate the notion of burning a flag I have served and honored for my entire life. I wore an Army uniform for a couple of years in the late 1960s and went to war in service to the Red, White and Blue. No one who has a noble political cause can persuade me of the validity of that cause by burning a flag. I am likely to turn against the cause simply by witnessing that act.

However, I know that the flag itself is not the issue. The flag is a symbol of what we value as a nation, as Americans. One of the valued aspects of being an American is the ability to protest government policy.

Even if that protest involves lighting a match to the cherished symbol of our freedom!

I cannot possibly pretend to know what kind of rationale Trump is using to sign that executive order. The man has rocks in his noggin.

Uncategorized

Founders were right about secularism

Our nation’s founders were by and large brilliant men who gathered to craft a government from scratch at the end of our revolution.

They didn’t craft a perfect document, as it made white men the only inhabitants of a new republic with full rights of citizenship. We would amend our nation’s Constitution later to fix many of those shortcomings.

However, the founders got it exactly right on this point: They wanted to create a secular government that would not be governed by a particular religious belief. I wrote a blog item recently about concerns expressed in one North Texas community that Muslims in that city might want to legalize teaching of Sharia law in public school classrooms. That cannot happen. Why? Because the founders ensured the secular nature of our government.

You won’t see the word “Christian” anywhere in the Constitution. You won’t see “Muslim” there, either. Or “Judaism” or “Hindu” or “Buddhist.” The First Amendment to our Bill of Rights states clearly that “Congress shall make no law” that establishes a state religion or prohibits “the free excercise” of it.

The founders were direct descendants of those who fled European religious tyranny. They came across the ocean to start a new country that would be allow people to worship God as they chose, but did not mandate which god they would worship. They also left the door open for those who chose not to worship any deity.

So, when I caution against getting too worked up over the imposition of Sharia law in our public school classrooms, I also want to wave the ol’ red flag against placing Bibles in classrooms, which is what governors in many states want to do.

The founders weren’t perfect. No human being is. However, they got it spot-on correct when they said the government of the nation they created would be free of religious dictates.

Let’s just leave religion where it belongs … in houses of worship.

local news, religious news

Sharia law? It won’t happen!

I am hearing a rumbling or two from a community over yonder here in Collin County about what some folks assert is a growing Muslim influence.

It’s in Sachse, a city that staddles the Collin-Dallas County line. Sitting in a city council meeting the other evening, a woman rose to sound an alarm bell about Muslims, and about Islam. She said she is concerned that the community’s Muslim community is going to foist the teaching of “Sharia law” in our public school system.

Oops. Can’t happen. Sharia law is a strict Islamic interpretation of the Quran, the Islamic holy book.

As I read the U.S. Constitution, the First Amendment prohibits any law that imposes religious teachings. This is a secular nation, according to the founders’ view. It is not lost on me that they would list the imposition of state religion first as the rights protected under the First Amendment.

So, when someone complains about “Muslim influence” in our community, they should disabuse themselves of any notion that Sharia law is going to be part of any public school curriculum.

It is not going to happen! Period! Moreover, if such a matter were imposed and it ended up before the U.S. Supreme Court, hell would freeze over before this court in particular would approve of such a stunning reversal of the First Amendment.

Uncategorized

You serve to protect rights you surrender

Dakota Meyer is a Medal of Honor recipient who earned the medal in 2009 for saving his fellow warriors from Taliban fire in Afghanistan.

President Obama presented the medal to the U.S. Marine Corps sergeant in a White House ceremony. Meyer then left the Marine Corps for 15 years.

Now, though, he is returning to the Corps as a reservist. He had become highly critical of President Biden’s decision to withdraw our forces from Afghanistan. He was married for a time to the daughter of former Republican VP nominee Sarah Palin. He says now he will return to service, but plans to “stay out of politics.”

Good call. It’s also a prudent decision on his part. Why? Because even though he is serving to protect the rights of all Americans to speak their minds, men and women in uniform actually surrender that very right the moment they don the uniform.

The First Amendment guarantees the right of Americans to seek “redress of grievances.” Except that those on duty in the military cannot criticize the commander in chief, who is their commanding officer, so to speak. If the president issues a lawful order, then those under his command are obligated to follow those orders without bitching out loud about it.

There can be “redress of grievances” for those in the military, be they active duty, or reservists.

A member of my family retired from the Army not long ago after serving for 20 years on active duty. He served tours in Afghanistan and Iraq. He also was highly critical of President Biden. He sought a promotion in rank, but was routinely passed over. My belief? His commanding officer knew of his social media rants aganst the commander in chief and nixed his promotion.

I am delighted Sgt. Meyer has decided to return to the Marine Corps. I am equally delighted he understands the folly of bellowing out loud his discontent over political matters made by those who serve far above his pay grade.

 

media news

Obama: What if I did this?

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Barack Hussein Obama, speaking to a crowd of college students the other day, raised a fascinating subject out loud.

The 44th president of the United States wondered, “What if I did any of this?” He explained himself. “What if I had banned Fox News” from the White House briefing room? The outcry from the right, he said, would be vociferous.

He is correct. What’s more, the right would have been justified in expressing anger at a president banning a media organization from access it was giving to other such media outlets.

Then he went on. He noted how Donald Trump has banned some news outlets that have been critical of his policies from access to White House sources. “It’s not a partisan issue,” President Obama said. “It’s about who we are as a culture,” he added.

Indeed, the very people who would be angry as hell at a Democratic president doing such an outrageous thing have grown silent as their guy, Trump, seeks to silence The Associated Press, CNN and MSNBC as they seek to cover the events dictated by the current president.

Obama also noted that “a good many of my predecessors” would be aghast at what is transpiring these days within the White House now run by Trump, the MAGA morons who back him and Elon Musk, the richest man on Earth.

Trump has declared his desire to see MSNBC taken apart. By whom or what, he doesn’t say. The implication, though, is clear. He wants to sic the government on the left-leaning network. Trump, who is astonishingly ignorant of the Constitution, seemingly doesn’t know that the First Amendment declares that a “free press” must be kept free of any government interference.

President Obama was spot on in delivering his rhetorical question. He is right to question aloud where we are as a culture that allows people to accept as normal the machinations of a wildly out-of-control chief executive who exhibits every sign imaginable of wanting to run this country as a dictator.

media news

Media war is a loser

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Presidents of the United States, almost to a man, have acknowledged publicly the value that an independent press brings to the world government.

Many of them have not always liked the coverage they get from the media — be it broadcast, cable, print, radio or Internet — but they accept it as part of governance. The media keep the pols on their toes.

In the age of Donald Trump, though, the media have become the “enemy of the people.” They become targets of the president, of the Department of Justice, of politicians at every level. Trump now seeks to ban The Associated Press from White House press briefings because the AP refuses to describe the Gulf of Mexico as the Gulf of America.

Trump also has banned from the White House all media outlets that report issues with a critical eye. He wants to shutter networks such as MSNBC and CNN. He wants the public to receive only coverage he deems favorable to his policies.

This is one of the more frightening aspects of Trump’s return to the pinnacle of power. He is unhinged, unfettered, unbound and unambiguous about his disdain for the media.

The nation’s founders sought to provide press protection among the civil liberties they wrote into the U.S. Constitution. The First Amendment guarantees that the government “shall make no law” that impinges on a free and untethered press.

Donald Trump, the ignoramus in chief, needs to understand that a truly conservative government respects what it has identified as the founders’ “original intent.”

And the president should take his lumps just like his predecessors have done. That’s how democracy works.

religious news

Prayer still allowed in school

I am being overwhelmed with the need to dispel a lie that has grown wings and legs over the course of many decades.

It is that the U.S. Supreme Court “took prayer out of our public schools.” It did not do anything of the sort.

What the court ruled was that organized prayer sanctioned by an arm of government is an unconstitutional act.

The court made its ruling in 1962 in the Engel v. Vitale case. “One of the greatest dangers to the freedom of the individual to worship in his own way,” Justice Hugo Black wrote for the Court, “lay in the Government’s placing its official stamp of approval upon one particular kind of prayer or one particular form of religious services.”

The First Amendment to our Constitution states quite clearly that the government “shall make no law” that sanctions a particular religion.

So … what does that mean? The amendment doesn’t not limit government just to Congress, or just to county courthouses, or city halls. Any government entity, and that includes public school systems, must avoid ordering citizens to be indoctrinated into any specific religion.

I want to say as well that the amendment also declares that the government must not “prohibit the free exercise thereof” a religion. What I assume from that? I presume that citizens — and that includes public school students — are free to pray whenever and wherever they please.

I’ve heard it quipped over many years that “for as long as schools present final exams, students will be praying in school.”

So, let the students pray on their own without being forced to pray to a specific deity. I say this as a man of faith who believes with all my heart that religion should be taught at home and in our houses of worship … not in our public schools!

Uncategorized

Should I proclaim my political allegiance?

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I have been pondering a dilemma I have been facing during this election season, which is to what extent to what extent do I want to wear my political allegiance.

For decades I have forgone the displaying of yard signs at my home and bumper stickers on my vehicles. The answer is obvious: I was a journalist, and my craft presumes that its practitioners take an unsigned oath to keep our allegiance to ourselves.

I honored that pledge religiously for nearly four decades. To be frank, even though I am no longer employed by a media company, I am inclined to keep my pledge intact. I will stipulate that I do contribute freelance articles for a group of weekly newspapers in Collin County, but I am not on any payrolls. That means I am free to speak my mind … if I so choose.

I do write on this blog about my political leanings. You know, for instance, that I support President Joe Biden’s re-election. I oppose vehemently and viscerally the election of the presumed Republican presidential nominee, whose name I have been boycotting any mention on this blog.

I’ll need to stipulate that I know emotions run high on both sides of the chasm. Except that I never — not ever! — would damage anyone’s property if they decided to display a sign supporting the former Liar/Philanderer/Idiot in Chief.

Therefore, my angst at displaying my own allegiance has everything to do with how those on the other side might react.

To be candid, I dislike surrendering my First Amendment right to speak freely and peaceably about my government and the politics that produce our elected leadership. Yes, I am able to do so on this forum and for that I am grateful the founders granted us all that right. I just cannot take that expression to the next level, which would be to display a sign at my home or on my vehicle.

It’s just too weird out there … you know?