Political Junkie

Several years ago, “Dateline NBC” had a series of recurring specials called “To Catch a Predator.”   The hidden camera series set up traps for those wishing to engage in sexual activity with minors.   Airing at a time when social media platforms were just beginning to explode in popularity, an employee at the Watchdog group Perverted Justice would create a profile on a chat room pretending to be a minor.   Then, the decoy would wait for an adult to initiate contact.     The decoy and the adult would then exchange a series of messages using the chat room, with many of them containing sexually explicit content.   The two would then arrange a meeting at a house that was rented out by the folks at “Dateline NBC.”   After arriving at the house, the show’s host Chris Hansen would greet the unsuspecting adults and confront them about their behavior.   “To Catch a Predator” did not come without its share of criticism; as some argued that it was inappropriate for a TV program to engage in

After the Democrats failed to win the special election in Georgia last week, some Democrats are calling for House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi to step aside.   One of Pelosi’s most vocal critics is Rep. Tim Ryan, who tried to unseat her as Minority Leader last year.   Ryan represents Ohio ’s 13 th Congressional District, which includes the former industrial powerhouse of Youngstown .   Ryan’s district provides quite a contrast to Nancy Pelosi’s Silicon Valley-based Congressional District, which has managed to do quite well in the age of globalization; if you ignore the fact that her “enlightened” home city thinks that public urination is acceptable . When asked by CNN’s Don Lemon if he thought Nancy Pelosi was more toxic than President Trump, Congressman Ryan replied “In some areas of the country, yes.”   Pelosi appears to be brushing off the idea that she is in jeopardy of losing her position as House Minority Leader; referring to herself as a “master legislator” and a “strategi

Last year, the Illinois Legislature passed Senate Bill 1584, which requires all doctors to refer anyone requesting an abortion to a doctor who will provide one; even if it goes against their religious beliefs.   No Republican lawmaker was dumb enough to vote for the bill; which was signed into law by Bruce Rauner, the state’s Republican governor.   I’m really struggling to come up with a reason why this bill was necessary.   Perhaps liberals in Illinois were jealous that states like California and Washington seem to be beating them in the contest for “ Most Progressive State .”   The controversial law has faced its share of court challenges, with the organizations Alliance Defending Freedom and the Thomas More Society arguing on behalf of pregnancy centers and doctors who believe it violates their First Amendment Rights.       Illinois has bigger problems to worry about than establishing street-cred with feminists.   The financial situation in the Prairie State is so

Perhaps in an ultimately unsuccessful effort to appeal to disaffected Bernie Sanders supporters, Hillary Clinton promised that if elected President, she would appoint a justice to the Supreme Court that was committed to reversing the Court’s decision in Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission.     In Citizens United, the Court ruled 5-4 that it was unconstitutional for the government to limit the amount of money voluntary associations such as corporations and labor unions can contribute to a political campaign.      I find it quite strange that Hillary would seek to undo a Supreme Court decision that she directly benefitted from.   In the 2016 Presidential Election, Hillary outspent Trump by a nearly 2-1 margin and still lost.   Talk about buyer’s remorse. Perhaps it never occurred to liberals that money is not the only variable that influences the outcome of election. If money really has the enormous effect on politics that the opponents of the Citizens United decisio

  There have been soooooo many dumb and/or inaccurate statements made by the left in the past couple of weeks.   It is time to set the record straight.     In the wake of last week’s assassination attempt on GOP lawmakers, liberals have resurrected the discredited theory that Sarah Palin is responsible for the 2011 Tucson , Arizona shooting that wounded Rep. Gabrielle Giffords (D-AZ) and killed six others.   The left makes this totally false claim by pointing to a map created by Palin’s political action committee, SarahPAC, which used crosshairs to identify the twenty House Democrats, including Giffords; who supported Obama Care despite representing districts carried by Republican Presidential Candidate John McCain in the 2008 Presidential Election.   The left seems to believe that this map was designed to point out targets for assassination.   The map was actually designed to point out which districts would be the best targets for Republicans to go after in the 2010 midt

We’ve all heard the phrase “elections have consequences.”   Last year, voters in the United States of America made it very clear that they were unhappy with the trajectory the country was on by electing Donald Trump the 45 th President of the United States and rejecting a career politician promising more of the same in favor of a political outsider who promised to bring needed change.   In the 2016 Election, Republicans maintained their majorities in both houses of Congress in addition to winning the Presidency, giving them complete control of the Federal government for the first time since 2006.                More than a year after Donald Trump clinched the Republican nomination and five months after his inauguration, it is time for an honest progress report.   The Trump Presidency has had its share of successes and failures.   Most of the failures can be attributed to poor planning on the part of Congressional Republicans.   Besides the fact that construction has yet

The new left has become everything that the left used to supposedly hate about the right.   The same folks who railed against Senator Joseph McCarthy for blacklisting and ruining the lives of Communist party sympathizers are now blacklisting and ruining the lives of conservatives. While the left is always accusing the Trump administration of authoritarian behavior, it is in fact the left that exhibits totalitarian tendencies.        One of the latest examples of left-wing censorship concerns a series of yearbook pictures at Wall High School in New Jersey .   Junior Grant Berardo wore a Trump T-shirt in his school picture and was shocked to discover that the reference to Trump on his shirt had been edited out upon opening up his yearbook; giving the impression that he was wearing a plain T-shirt.    Junior Wyatt Dobrovich-Fago wore a Trump sweater vest on picture day but you wouldn’t know that based on looking at his yearbook picture, where he appears to be wearing a plain b

What separates the United States of America and other western countries from oppressive third world dictatorships is the ability to engage in civil discourse.   For a long time, there have been fundamental disagreements between the left and right about how to best solve the country’s problems and these disagreements will likely continue for the foreseeable future. But we have always prided ourselves on the ability to engage in robust debate without getting violent.   This is not the case in Cuba where opponents of the oppressive Castro regime can be thrown in prison simply for expressing their discontent with the Supreme leader.          It’s safe to say that civil discourse in the United States of America has never been so uncivil.   There are plenty of examples of this; whether it’s Madonna talking about how she has thought an awful lot about blowing up the White House or Kathy Griffin holding a bloody decapitated head that was supposed to be President Trump’s.   It is s

Ever since he was elected, corrupt members of the deep state a.k.a. the Swamp have been leaking classified information to the press in attempts to damage President Trump.  The good news is that in the last week, we have made remarkable progress in determining who those leakers are.  When most people think of the deep state, they probably think of geriatric career bureaucrats who have not ventured outside of the beltway in fifty years.  However, the first intelligence official arrested for leaking classified information to the press turned out to be 25-year old Reality Winner, an intelligence specialist employed by Pluribus International Corporation in Georgia ; a company that works closely with the National Security Agency.  Prosecutors allege that Winner gave classified NSA documents detailing Russia ’s attempts to hack the 2016 US Presidential Election to The Intercept .  The Intercept’s article based on the leaked documents was published on June 5, two days after Winner’s arres

Former President Barack Obama delivered another speech on Tuesday; this time to a crowd of about 6,000 people in Montreal .   Following the speech, the Former President had dinner with Canada ’s Prime Minister Justin Trudeau; with whom he shares a similar worldview.   It’s safe to say that many in the American mainstream media wish they could swap leaders with our neighbor to the north.         In addition to praising the non-binding Paris Climate Agreement and mentioning how openness to immigration is “fundamental to who we are”, he criticized those who believe that “intolerance and tribalism and organizing ourselves along ethnic lines are the answer to today’s challenges.”   While his comments were directed at those on the right; they actually do a much better job of describing the left.     The left always likes to paint the right as intolerant; but the left is far more intolerant than the right.   It is always the left that is preventing those with political opinio

It is hard to believe that it has already been seven months since Election Day.   This Election Day was a very special one for me; as it marked the first time that I ever voted in a Presidential Election.   I had previously voted in the 2014 General election and the Republican Presidential Primary last spring. Even in a progressive state like Rhode Island , I needed to provide a valid voter ID before I could cast my ballot. Voting in both of those elections was a very quick, in and out experience.   On Election Day 2016, I ended up waiting in line for an hour just to feed the ballot into the one machine that was at my precinct.   But I felt that the wait was worth it; as I was performing my civic duty.        I planned on staying up late to watch the election results come in; it certainly helped that I did not have class until 2:00 the next day.   To be honest, I would have stayed up even if I did have class first thing in the morning.   When I finally decided to turn off the