Tag: police state

Texas Lawmakers Take Up Another Bill To Block Voters From Locally Decriminalizing Marijuana

A Texas House committee took up a bill on Friday that would prohibit cities from putting citizen initiatives on local ballots to decriminalize marijuana or other controlled substances.

Just two days after a Senate version of the measure cleared that full chamber, the House State Affairs Committee held a hearing on the companion version from Rep. Jeff Leach (R), with proposed amendments to align both bills.

In the last few years, members, several local governments across the state of Texas have adopted policies and ordinances that are designed to decriminalize controlled substances or instruct law enforcement or prosecutors not to enforce our state’s drug laws,” Leach said, noting that Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton (R) has filed lawsuits against multiple municipalities where the local reform was enacted.

“Although these lawsuits are still pending, there’s a growing trend across our state for local governments to adopt these policies, and this bill is intended to address that,” he said.

Under the proposal as introduced, state law would be amended to say that local entities “may not hold an election for voter approval of a proposed charter or an amendment to a charter that violates” state drug laws.

They also could not “adopt, publish, enforce, repeal, maintain, or amend an ordinance, order, policy, rule, or regulation” that contravenes state statute on controlled substances.

Leach described amendments included in a substitute version of the bill that seem intended to match what the Senate passed on Wednesday.

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Actually, “personal beliefs” DO supersede “the public good”

Personal beliefs do not supersede the public good – and vaccination is a public good

The above quote – taken from a headline in the Globe and Mail – is wrong. It is wrong in general and the specific.

It doesn’t matter what “personal beliefs” are being referred to, and it doesn’t matter which particular “public good” is being protected, it is wrong.

It is wrong because “personal belief” is a placeholder phrase for “individual liberty” and “public good” for compelled action.

In this instance, it is talking about vaccination and religious freedom – these causes are often linked and used to sell decreased individual liberty as “common sense” to the “sensible” agnostic majority – but vaccination could be any behaviour, and religion any thought or opinion.

Good sense dictates and history demonstrates that anyone promoting “the public good” at the expense of individual liberty is steering society toward tyranny.

If you don’t believe me, simply observe the language used in this kind of editorial…

Respecting religious freedom is important, but it has to be balanced against other rights.

Freedom of religion was never meant to exempt people from societal obligations…

…we cannot allow those with anti-science beliefs to harm others.

The state cannot tell you what to think, but it can tell you what to do. Especially when it’s for the greater good.

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North Dakota Governor Signs Bill To Legalize Medical Marijuana Edibles That Meet Certain Requirements

The governor of North Dakota has signed a bill into law legalizing select marijuana edibles for registered medical cannabis patients.

About a week after the measure from Rep. Steve Vetter (R) cleared the legislature, Gov. Kelly Armstrong (R) gave it final approval on Monday.

Under the newly enacted law, the state’s medical marijuana program will be expanded to permit the sale of cannabis edibles, which is defined as a “soft or hard lozenge in a geometric square shape into which a cannabinoid concentrate or the dried leaves or flowers of the plant of the genus cannabis is incorporated.”

While a fairly restrictive definition compared to many other legal states, advocates are encouraged by the development, as North Dakota patients were previously expressly prohibited from using cannabis products other than flower, tinctures, capsules and topical patches.

The new law requires edibles to contain no more than 5 milligrams of THC per serving in a package that can be up to 50 milligrams total.

In written testimony discussing the legislation, the sponsor emphasized that, “if this bill becomes law, it would be the most conservative edibles law in the nation.”

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Texas Senate Passes Bill To Ban Cities From Putting Marijuana Decriminalization Initiatives On Local Ballots

The Texas Senate has approved a bill that would prohibit cities from putting any citizen initiative on local ballots that would decriminalize marijuana or other controlled substances—as several localities have already done despite lawsuits from the state attorney general.

The legislation from Sen. Charles Perry (R) is responsive to those local reforms, and it passed the chamber on Wednesday in a 23-8 vote. It now heads to the House of Representatives.

Under the proposal, state law would be amended to say that local entities “may not place an item on a ballot, including a municipal charter or charter amendment, that would provide that the local entity will not fully enforce” state drug laws.

The latest version of the legislation as amended in the Senate Criminal Justice Committee would also specifically bar localities from putting initiatives on the ballot that would contravene the state’s consumable hemp laws.

It would also require the attorney general to create a form for people to report violations of the law. And it’d expedite legal proceedings to challenge any city, mandating that an appellate court “render its final order or judgment with the least possible delay,” a legislative analysis says.

Cities found to be in violation of the law by placing a decriminalization initiative—or any measure that conflicts with state or federal drug laws—would be subject to a $25,000 civil fine for a first offense and a $50,000 fine for any subsequent offense.

“In the last few years several local governments have adopted policies and ordinances that are designed to decriminalize controlled substances or instruct law enforcement or prosecutors not to enforce our state drug laws,” Perry said in a statement of intent.

“In 2024, the attorney general launched lawsuits against multiple cities for adopting non-prosecution policies that violate Texas laws concerning marijuana possession and distribution,” he said. “Although these lawsuits are still pending, this is a growing trend across our state.”

It’s not clear why, if the attorney general’s lawsuits assert that local decriminalization laws are already prohibited under statute, the proposed amendments to the code are necessary. But the legislation does appear to escalate enforcement and penalties.

A House companion version of the bill, sponsored by Rep. Jeff Leach (R), is scheduled for a hearing in the State Affairs Committee on Friday.

The Senate vote comes about a week after a Texas appellate court sided with the state in its lawsuit challenging the city of San Marcus over the implementation of a local marijuana decriminalization law approved by voters.

That marked a setback for activists who’ve led the charge to enact local marijuana policy changes through the ballot, many of which have been contested by Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton (R).

Meanwhile, despite the ongoing litigation and Senate bill’s advancement, Texas activists have their targets set on yet another city, Kyle, where they hope put an initiative before voters to enact local marijuana reform at the ballot this coming November.

Despite the state’s resistance and the latest development in San Marcos, advocates have seen several courts rule in their favor amid the legal challenges.

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Trump’s Solicitor General Asks Supreme Court For More Time To Weigh Challenge To Gun Ban For Marijuana Consumers

The government’s top lawyer is asking the Supreme Court for more time to consider whether to challenge a February appeals court ruling concerning the federal prohibition on gun ownership by people who consume marijuana. It’s the latest development in a series of recent cases around the constitutionality of the firearm restriction.

The new filing, from Solicitor General D. John Sauer, concerns a case in which the defendant, Keshon Daveon Baxter, was found in possession of both a firearm and a bag of marijuana. The government charged him under 18 U.S.C. § 922(g)(3), which prohibits gun ownership by “unlawful” users of controlled substances.

Baxter argued in district court that the prohibition was itself illegal, contending both that “unlawful” use was too vague in the statute to be enforceable and also that the government’s ban on drug users’ possession of firearms was unconstitutional under the Second Amendment.

The lower court rejected both arguments—a ruling Baxter appealed to the U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals for the Eighth Circuit.

It a February opinion, an Eighth Circuit panel upheld the portion of the district court’s decision denying Baxter’s vagueness claim but reversed the lower court’s ruling on the constitutionality of the firearms ban. However, judges wrote that there were insufficient factual findings in the record “for this Court to review Baxter’s as-applied Second Amendment challenge.”

Nevertheless, the Eighth Circuit wrote, “We reverse the district court’s ruling on Baxter’s as-applied Second Amendment challenge and remand to the district court for further proceedings consistent with this opinion.”

The federal government currently has until May 6 to decide whether to file a writ of certiorari asking the Supreme Court to review the appeals court ruling. The new filing from Sauer asks for a 30-day extension on that deadline.

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Colorado parents terrified of ‘totalitarian’ transgenderism bill that could take kids away if they misgender them

Protecting kids proved bipartisan in Colorado as moms reached across the aisle to take a stand against gender ideology legislation threatening custody rights.

Democratic Party lawmakers in Washington, D.C. were hardly alone when it came to advancing the Marxist whims of their alphabet activist supporters. Now, more than two weeks after the Colorado State House took a Sunday to advance gender ideology, a Colorado mother and a California parental rights activist have joined together in an effort to stop so-called “misgendering” and “deadnaming” from breaking families apart.

Monday on Fox News’ “The Faulkner Focus,” Protect Kids Colorado Director Erin Lee and attorney Erin Friday, a lifelong Democrat, joined host Harris Faulkner to decry the “totalitarian” HB 25-1312 which, if signed into law, would give courts cause to take custody from parents who refused to buy into the “preferred” gender identities of their own children.

“This is giving the authority to our state to take our children away if we don’t agree with these gender transitions. And so it’s got huge ramifications for all parents, especially those in custody situations who are fighting with their ex-spouses to stop their children from being medicalized,” said Lee.

“But it opens the door for all parents to potentially have their children forcibly removed by the state if they’re not willing to affirm their child’s mental health distress,” she went on as her social media account promoted Colorado state Rep. Ken deGraaf’s (R) HCR25-1003 which sought to amend the state constitution to protect parents’ rights “to direct the upbringing, education, and care of their children.”

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‘Fact-Checking’ Was Always Just Censorship. Polls Show Americans Could See Through It

Legacy media and Big Tech colluded with so-called “fact-checkers” to censor Americans’ speech for years — from Covid-19 to the Hunter Biden laptop story to the 2020 election to former President Joe Biden’s mental decline. Now, these self-appointed arbiters of speech are losing power because the public can see through their lies.

Mentions of “misinformation” and “disinformation” — the left’s favorite terms for disapproved speech — on CNN, MSNBC, and Fox News have apparently dropped to the lowest levels since 2020, according to Axios. “Professional fact-checking went mainstream during the first Trump administration, but it’s since become politicized,” Sara Fischer wrote for Axios. 

The outlet should know, as it has engaged in repeated propaganda operations under the guise of “fact-checking.” After reporting former Vice President Kamala Harris was “appointed by Biden as border czar,” Axios tried to fact-check Republicans, claiming “she never actually had” the title. As The Federalist previously reported, this is the same outlet whose co-founders demanded now-President Donald Trump apologize for getting shot in the head.

So Axios’ admission that fact-checking has “become politicized” is telling. It speaks to the fact that Americans are no longer willing to fall for media hoaxes. After all, Pew Research found that this year, public support for censorship fell for the first time since 2018. And as Axios reported, the number of so-called “fact-checking” sites had been growing since before 2016 — but in recent years, it began falling. 

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The Rise of Corporate Totalitarianism

In 1992 following the end of the Cold War, Francis Fukuyama’s published The End of History and the Last Man in which he argued that Western liberal democracy had triumphed over communism and represented the last stage of human ideological development. In response to his former student’s book, Samuel Huntingdon wrote the Clash of Civilisations thesis where he predicted that the post-Cold War period would see the emergence of conflicts along religious and cultural lines. However, what neither of them predicted was the emergence of a new threat to peace and security: corporate totalitarianism.

Corporate totalitarianism represents a new ideological development in the history of humanity. Its proponents are the oligarch class who own investment funds and corporations, dynastic families and individuals of extraordinary wealth. They belong to the same class from which powerful politicians and statesmen are drawn, and they help coordinate their activities at the helm of political parties, from within Government departments and across the multitude of non-governmental bodies that are involved in the policymaking process. Global in nature and outlook, their identification is not with any country, religion or culture, and among their chief goals is the continued accumulation of wealth and power.

This transfer is occurring under the ideological umbrella of ‘woke’; a set of values and beliefs that at first glance appear to be emancipatory and concerned with fairness, justice, health and environmental protection. Further scrutiny of the woke agenda reveals a set of deflections from actual progress and a lack of authentic concern about the human condition. Instead ‘woke’ is a vehicle for maximising wealth and power to corporations and fantastically wealthy individuals. The COVID-19 vaccination programme saw the transfer of billions of pounds of taxpayers’ money to pharmaceutical companies and their investors, while concerns about diversity and equity deflect scrutiny from growing class inequality.

But the woke agenda is more malignant than just a fig leaf for egregious acts committed by corporations, often referred to as woke washing, and the oligarchs are inspired by tactics from both ends of the political spectrum. A dissection of corporate totalitarianism reveals three core themes: alienation, fear and authoritarianism. The first theme of alienation seeks to introduce policies designed to destroy all social bonds between humanity, thus undermining family, marriage, parental authority, community, neighbourhood, religious faith, culture and national identity. The destruction of social bonds leaves people atomised and undermines solidarity that might result in a successful challenge to corporate totalitarianism.

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Real ID: Phony Security, Real Authoritarianism

Those who hoped the second Trump Administration would reject big spending, war, and restrictions on liberty continue to be disappointed. A new disappointment came when Department of Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem announced her department would in May begin enforcing the REAL ID law.

Passed in 2005, the REAL ID Act created federal standards for driver’s licenses. The law requires everyone applying for a driver’s license to provide the DMV with his social security number, proof of legal residence, and two proofs of his home address. The REAL ID Act allows the Homeland Security Department to mandate, as it sees fit, the including of addition items in the related government database, including “biometric” identifiers. Biometric identifiers include personal data such as retina scans, fingerprints, and DNA.

People who doubt that this database will be used to violate the rights of US citizens should ask what a present-day J. Edgar Hoover — a former FBI director who was notorious for collecting private information on politicians and other prominent individuals — would do with a database containing personal and even biometric information on American citizens. They should also consider the IRS’s history of targeting presidents’ political opponents. Americans also have the threat of violations of their rights by hackers. The government has a poor track record of protecting data of US citizens.

REAL ID’s supporters deny the law turns state driver’s licenses into national ID cards because states have no mandate to implement REAL ID. However, citizens of any state that refuses to adopt REAL ID will be unable to use their state-issued IDs for boarding an airplane or riding on a train.

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There Is A Growing Plot Against Dogs

At the airport, the staff now offers comfort dogs, gorgeous Golden Retrievers and German Shepherds available for petting and holding. The idea is to comfort scared kids, delight passersby, and generally lift up the space. Yes, that’s exactly what dogs do.

What a wonderful idea. However, not everyone is happy about our love of dogs.

We’ve all become sensitive about threats on the horizon, small hints in science journals or from establishment media that target what we love. There was a time when we could treat these as an opportunity for debate and discussion. Events of the last five years suggest that parlor games are over. With so much trust lost, we are newly aware that these threats can turn out to be real and thus merit more attention.

The issue now concerns pets and dogs in particular. Are they coming for them?

In August 2020, Anthony Fauci co-authored an article in Cell that broadly called for “radical changes that may take decades to achieve: rebuilding the infrastructures of human existence.” Among the specifics, the article obliquely targets pet ownership, urging that we must reduce “unsafe exposure to animals.”

I wondered about that line at the time. The whole theory of the article is that humans are everywhere surrounded by icky things that can infect us. We’ve neglected these threats for many thousands of years by traveling around, moving here and there, domesticating animals, and living too closely together. This must change, they opine, because bad pathogens are ever more leaping from the outside world into humans.

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