The people's voice of reason
The people's voice of reason
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Every 9/11 I take a moment, to reflect on that dark day in our history when we were blindsided by terrorists so evil that before this attack it was almost inconceivable what they were willing to do to innocent civilians in the name of Allah. It was also a day of unmatched heroism by the first responders and the beginning of a time of great unity and sacrifice as Americans put aside their differences. We were united in our country’s efforts to track down and punish those responsible for the c...
Experience is the practical scientific method. Some things succeed while other things fail; observing the reasons for success should help draft a blueprint for planning the future. It may be vogue to regard the past as nothing more than a sentimental embrace of the pre-modern world, but the laboratory of human conflict yields tangible results that can be examined, quantified and reviewed to consider best practices. What can we learn when the autocrat’s autocrat allows a form of pluralism that i...
The 2021 Economic Freedom of the World (EFW) rankings from Canada’s Fraser Institute show freedom essentially unchanged in the United States. But some important changes in the rankings will be coming soon. Economic freedom is based on “the concept of self-ownership.” We should have “a right to choose – to decide how to use [our] time and talents to shape [our] lives.” What does economic freedom mean in practice? “Individuals are economically free when they are permitted to choose for themselve...
The moral and economic decline of these united States is obvious. In many ways, this country has become unrecognizable. Part of the deterioration can be traced to the inferior quality of officials elected to key positions at all levels of government, combined with their support of radical and often immoral issues. The dearth of ethical individuals in public life may now be worse than at any other time in the life of the republic. As a student of American history, I am unaware of any American...
I will begin this article with a simple question: Is Public Education a Right? One may be reluctant to respond, after reading the title of this article. Let me recast this; I encourage you to ask a co-worker, neighbor or friend this question without any preface. My guess is they would quickly respond with a resounding yes, Public Education is a “Right.” Wrong answer, let me explain. In my view, our founding fathers were brilliant, deep thinkers and devout countrymen, who shaped our country on...
Nearly everybody understands the concepts of trespass—the violation of other people’s bodies and property. It can range from the petty (walking across one’s lawn) to more serious (hunting or fishing without permission) to the outright criminal (theft and vandalism). Most people understand that we should respect each other’s property, as well as their right to peacefully enjoy it without outside interference. Unfortunately, there are some who do not. One of the popular misconceptions is that pu...
by Russell Ki Tara (excerpts) The question is, should Christians adopt the pagan customs and superstitions of ancient peoples and “Christianize” them? The Bible is not silent on the subject: “Learn not the way of the heathen....for the customs of the people are vain.” (Jeremiah 10: 2-3), and, “When thou art come into the land which the Lord thy God giveth thee, thou shalt not learn to do after the abominations of those nations” (Deut. 18:9). Ephesians 5:11 declares, “And have no fellowship wi...
Imagine your football team is in the first quarter of a game, a couple of star players are sidelined and the opponent’s offense seems unstoppable. The score is already 28-0 when your head coach takes a time out. He lets his assistants coach up the team while he meets with an architect to design a new stadium to display championship trophies and meets with another head coach to discuss developing a new conference with more efficient rules to increase attendance and enthusiasm for the game. S...
The Biden Surge of illegal immigrants from the southern border and now Afghanistan has hit the exponential curve. As of this date, only 4,500 of the 75,000 removed from Afghanistan are Americans. Illegal Afghan immigrants being flown in U.S. funded aircraft are on their way to America. Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Japan and Great Britain (G7) have begged Biden to force a deadline extension with the Taliban for the removal of Americans and allies from Afghanistan, he has ignored their plight....
Inflation exceeded 5 percent in June. Double-digit inflation burdened Americans in the 1970s. Although we treat inflation as bad, economists find its costs hard to pin down. The three economic functions of money help us think about inflation’s costs. Money’s first role is a medium of exchange, meaning a good way to conduct transactions. With barter, if you have oranges and want potatoes, you must find someone with potatoes who wants oranges. The second role is a store of value, or a way to avo...
As I watched 13 brave American heroes being brought home after being killed in Afghanistan, it was tragic and heartbreaking. All but one were in their early to mid-twenties. They choose to defend the homeland while many of their classmates are playing beer pong, hanging out at the beach and enjoying life without regard to the dangerous world we live in. They gave their lives for freedom and are shining examples of what it really means to be an American. They and their fellow heroes who...
Western civilization has produced an enormous number of brilliant individuals. English writer Charles John Huffam Dickens would definitely be in the top echelon. Not only was Dickens a great writer, he was compassionate about those less fortunate, an opponent of slavery, and a frequent critic of the so-called “elites.” Dickens possessed a remarkable degree of social and political acuity. Dickens was born in 1812 in Landport, Hampshire, England, and died in 1870 in Higham, Kent, England. During h...
(Editor’s note: Please enjoy John Martin’s complete article here. In print, it will be a two-part series in the September and October issues.) We can be thankful that Governor Kay Ivey’s insane proposal to build and then rent three new mega-prisons has so far bitten the dust—as it should have. But “Poison Ivey” has not yet given up. And she has not even thought about any rational solutions to end our prison overcrowding problem. Building and filling up more gulags is a “solution...
Friday September 14, 2001 – President Bush Called For Prayer – On Friday September 14, 2001, I was awakened at 3:00 am with overwhelming grief for our nation on the heels of the September 11th attack. All I could see was the Statue of Liberty crying over her nation and was compelled to pour my heart out on paper, reflecting the pain felt by every American during this time of a national tragedy. Her name is Liberty and she is a 22-story tower of strength overshadowing the NY Harbor, which sym...
Few calendars in this part of the Western Hemisphere will note it, but on July 28, Peru celebrates 200 years of independence. Two centuries of anything is a big deal; it demonstrates generational resilience and that’s something to celebrate. But the occasion also offers us cause to examine, and understand the international, liberating forces unleashed by the success of American Independence, how these ideas permeated through other nations to create a culture of liberty and freedom, and the l...
State and local governments lure businesses with incentive packages. Yet these governments impose rules stifling entrepreneurs starting new businesses, forgetting that Amazon, offered multi-billion dollar deals for its HQ2, started out of Jeff Bezos’s garage. A new Cato Institute study, “Entrepreneurs and Regulations” by Chris Edwards, details the state and local government burdens on startups. Elected officials should carefully weigh these policies’ benefits against the burdens. The adminis...
In 2022, Alabama will elect a U.S. Senator to fill the seat held by Senator Richard Shelby for four decades. In 1986, as a skilled personal injury trial lawyer and shrewd Democrat candidate, Shelby beat the esteemed GOP A|dmiral Jeremiah Denton in a character assassination campaign. As Chairman and now ranking member of the U.S. Senate Appropriations committee, Shelby has channeled billions into Alabama, which has been good for the state economy, federal contractors, but used by Shelby as a...
During the last several decades, various people and groups have proposed term limits as a solution for stopping abuses done by politicians. The big argument is to return political offices back to people who actually want to serve for the public good instead of using the offices for their careers and political objectives. The idea sounds like a noble one. Our country was founded on the principle of citizen legislators—people who volunteered for limited times to perform public services for very m...
If the 4th of July has a pre-game, it is June 15th. On that date in 1215, the Magna Carta was signed, beginning a gradual process of defined individual rights and limiting the power and authority of the British crown. The Declaration of Independence, which outlined the colonists’ desire for freedom from the edicts of King George, is a direct descendant of the Magna Carta. It would be foolish to argue that the Magna Carta anticipated all the rights and freedoms we enjoy today, but it certainly p...
Full disclosure mandates that I aver that I graduated from Sidney Lanier High School in Montgomery in 1968. Technically, the actions of a governing organization in the Capitol City regarding name changes for three high schools aren’t anybody’s business if he/she doesn’t live there. And my family now resides in a rural area of Elmore County. However, a lot of folks who now reside in the Lake Martin area attended Montgomery public schools when the integration of that school system was in its i...
The 12-month change in the Consumer Price Index (CPI) exceeded 4 percent in April for the first time since 2008. Many economists have been predicting inflation following a 25 percent increase in the money supply in Spring 2020. Has inflation finally arrived? Inflation was a major issue in the 1970s and early 1980s. We experienced double-digit inflation between 1974 and 1981, hitting 14 percent in 1980. The U.S. has dramatically reduced inflation since then. Economists distinguish between...
Your silence is not only viewed as an endorsement, but adversarial notions will prevail with no visible opposition. A Change Agent has their finger in the dyke, while a Conformist runs for cover. The human body has been divinely created with adrenal glands, producing the natural chemical Adrenaline, which triggers the flight or fight reactions. America was born out of opposition to Great Britain’s overreach; America can be defeated without the first shot being fired. Nikita Khrushchev, former P...
What are PGMs, you ask? They are platinum group metals. There are six of them—ruthenium, rhodium, palladium, osmium, iridium, and platinum. They are noble metals—highly resistant to corrosion, acids, and decomposition. Like gold, they are also very rare—the rarest and least abundant stable metals in the Earth’s crust. Here they are listed in milligrams per kilogram (below right). Below, they are listed in parts per billion. Two sources show considerable disagreement on some of them. The discrep...
President Biden and the Democrats led by Chairman of the Senate Budget Committee, self-avowed Socialist Bernie Sanders, have proposed an unbelievable $6 trillion budget for fiscal year 2022. This budget would have the federal government spend more as a share of the economy than at any other time since World War II when we were fighting for our survival as a country. According to the non-partisan Tax Foundation this level of spending would immediately slash economic growth while killing tens of...
Critical Race Theory at its face is racism and a violation of our Constitution. The United States started as a country with many different people and different cultures. Our history has dark elements, specifically slavery, something everyone should recognize and be willing to face. However, our history does not define our present. Instead, we should study history so we may avoid its pitfalls. Unfortunately, for many in our higher education institutions and government it is being ignored. Yet...
