by Bob Barr | Apr 14, 2021 | Townhall Article |
Townhall When I use a word, ‘Humpty Dumpty said in a rather scornful tone,’ it means just what I choose it to mean – neither more nor less. As villains in 20th Century literature go, Ellsworth Toohey, the antagonist in Ayn Rand’s 1943 The Fountainhead, would hardly seem frightful. He was not a serial killer, terrorist, or supernatural stalker, but rather a diminutive newspaper critic who brought society to the brink of ruin through nothing more than corrupting the meaning of words. It seems clear that Democrats have a similar plan in mind. It is for this reason that conservatives should not dismiss out of hand Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand’s inane tweet last week that paid leave, childcare, and caregiving constituted “infrastructure” projects. In Gillibrand’s and President Biden’s world, as they collect votes for their $2.25 trillion infrastructure spending package, anything can become “infrastructure,” making it easier to sell to their colleagues and to voters. Similar linguistic chicanery is displayed whenever the Administration sidesteps responsibility for the current chaos at our southern border. Rather than a quickly spiraling health and national security crisis, the border situation is simply a “challenge” — a nuisance if you will, to be noted for the record. By the same legerdemain, and at times even in the same news cycle, “climate change” becomes “climate emergency,” “silence is violence,” and “education” devolves into plopping kids in front of a laptop for six hours a day. When words no longer have definite, objective meaning, they no longer anchor policies or actions to objective, universal principles. The result is public policies that are infinitely malleable, where nothing is certain, and where rebutting such arguments is...
by Bob Barr | Apr 7, 2021 | Townhall Article |
Townhall What makes a mass shooter capable of emotionless, indiscriminate killing remains largely a mystery. Such a depraved act is not within the normal programming of a human being, not even for most hardened criminals. We may never truly understand all the factors, both physiological and environmental, that turn angry people into mass killers, but there is much we do know and can figure out, if common sense is our guide. Since the 1999 massacre at Columbine High School, the mass shooting phenomenon has been intensively studied by experts in a number of disciplines, from law enforcement to sociology and psychiatry. The research has revealed patterns and understandings that have led to life-saving techniques for responding to mass shootings, such as law enforcement confronting the shooters quickly rather than waiting for a tactical approach, and implementing threat assessment protocols to identify at-risk individuals and get them needed help before reaching a tipping point. Noticeably absent from this school of research is any evidence of a pattern regarding the firearms used to commit these killings – a point hopelessly lost on Democrats. Rather than attempt to tackle the far more complex cultural and social issues at the root of mass shootings, the answer for Democrats is always more gun control; even when such crimes occur, as often they do, in jurisdictions that already have in place extremely restrictive gun control measures. Democrats’ persistence on gun control as a response to mass killings is not just perplexing, but counterproductive and downright stupid. With all we do know about mass shootings, there simply is no excuse for Democrats to play dumb when it comes to the...
by Bob Barr | Mar 31, 2021 | Townhall Article |
Townhall In 1850, American author Nathaniel Hawthorne wrote a novel in which the female protagonist was forced to wear a highly visible “scarlet letter” as a sign that she had committed a terrible sin (adultery). The term has ever since been used as shorthand for publicly stigmatizing someone who has done (or not done) something for which they should be ostracized or punished. Now, more than 170 years after “The Scarlet Letter” was published, President Joe Biden, New York Governor Andrew Cuomo, and others are calling for a 21st Century scarlet letter (in this case a “C” for COVID), in the form of an electronic app attesting that the bearer has either received a COVID vaccine or has otherwise been deemed immunized to the virus. Unlike the “A” that Hawthorne’s protagonist, Hester Prynne, was forced to display, the new-fangled “COVID Passport” works also in reverse, by identifying those who have not been immunized and are therefore to be denied admission to an event or service they might otherwise access. The hypocrisy of the Democrats’ plan for a COVID ID is glaring. Just last week, Biden blasted the governor and legislature of Georgia for mandating that absentee voters must show a valid ID in order to receive a ballot. There were other measures included in the legislative package, but the ID requirement caused the loudest howl by Biden and other Democrats who claimed it was “racist” in its intent, and in practice would “suppress” the minority vote. In a word, requiring a person to show a valid ID in order to obtain a benefit, here an absentee ballot, was, in the view...
by Bob Barr | Mar 24, 2021 | Townhall Article |
Townhall Old English law, transported to the United States centuries ago, holds that “a man’s home is his castle” and may be protected against unwanted entry except in limited circumstances. The Supreme Court of the United States has now taken under advisement a case from Rhode Island that could significantly weaken that protection. The Fourth Amendment to our Constitution enshrines the “castle doctrine” as it relates to one’s home, by requiring the police to obtain a warrant before they may lawfully enter that domicile and seize evidence. There are, of course, exceptions to this warrant requirement, and the Rhode Island case, on which the Supreme Court heard arguments just this week, is but the latest in a continuing effort by state police agencies to expand those warrant exceptions. As with most every case that finds its way to the High Court, this latest one (the facts of which actually occurred six years ago, in August 2015) presents a reasonable, if not persuasive argument for the government — at least on the surface. The local police were called by the wife of the homeowner, one Edward Caniglia, because she was concerned that, following an argument the previous day, he might harm her or himself with one of the two handguns he owned lawfully and kept in their home. The police came and reportedly told Caniglia they would confiscate his firearms unless he agreed to be taken to a local hospital for a mental evaluation. Based apparently on the officers’ pressure, Mr. Caniglia was transported to a hospital for such an evaluation, which concluded he did not pose any threat. However, while he...
by Bob Barr | Mar 17, 2021 | Townhall Article |
Townhall For those concerned with becoming a victim of today’s raging “Cancel Culture,” there is a rather simple solution: be born perfect. Actually, be born perfect, live a perfect life, and never run afoul of the unwritten, constantly changing, and haphazardly enforced rules determined by an anonymous committee of self-appointed social media scolds. Or, maybe it is not so simple. It is easy to make light of the obviously impossible standards liberals have set for acceptable thoughts, speech, and actions; to the point where liberals now are cancelling one another. Nevertheless, beyond this absurdity lies a less obvious and quiescent trait of the Cancel Culture – a depressingly pessimistic view of humanity. It would be one thing if this gloomy construct were about nothing more than exacting control over the public square; but the movement’s insatiable bloodlust has taken victims who dared make the mistake of putting even just a toe into the spotlight in any forum. In 2019, Carson King’s ESPN College Game Day sign asking for beer money donations went viral and turned into a million-dollar fundraiser for University of Iowa Stead Family Children’s Hospital. In today’s toxic and unforgiving culture, this was a mortal sin. Aaron Calvin, at the time a reporter for the Des Moines Register, quickly “discovered” tweets from King from seven years before, when he was just 16 years-old which, when taken out of time and context were considered by some to be “racist.” That was that. King was canceled and publicly humiliated. In the span of 10 days, King went from anonymous sign guy to million-dollar fundraiser, to “canceled” when, as he puts it, circumstances...
by Bob Barr | Mar 10, 2021 | Townhall Article |
Townhall It was a bad week for British Royals. While one royal family, the Windsors, handled damage control following last Sunday’s interview between Oprah and the now-California based Royals formerly known as Sussex, another British monarch was making waves on Twitter for all the wrong reasons. Burger King UK decided to use International Women’s Day to announce a new culinary scholarship program for women with the tweet, “Women belong in the kitchen.” As expected, it quickly went all to pot. One might wonder how a brand, especially a global one with armies of marketing and advertising professionals, could publicly disseminate a tweet so obviously tone-deaf it would not even pass for a bad joke in a country club locker room. This is what “woke blindness” looks like, where someone or something is so “woke” their pious self-righteousness makes them oblivious to normal human sensibilities. Basically, they believe their wokeness, like funding scholarships for women chefs, means they can do no wrong – even when making a joke of misogyny. As Burger King quickly discovered, woke movement scolds lack any sense of humor or mercy (common sense disappeared long ago). Contrary to the image of unity around the issue of “wokeness” (whatever it functionally means), the social justice movement is actually a highly fractured, highly competitive composite of intersectional groups, each with their own priorities, morality, and superiority complex. On the surface, they cooperate and generally unite around common causes (especially anti-capitalist ones), but when their paths cross – watch out. One of the best examples of this intersectional infighting is summarized in a 2018 article about Vanesa Wruble, a Jewish woman who helped found...
