SAARBRUECKEN, GERMANY — This week I’m observing the final days of the German federal election campaign that will wrap up when the polls close Sunday evening, September 24 — Election Day in the European Union’s most populous nation.

Chancellor Angela Merkel’s CDU party with its Bavarian CSU counterpart is currently projected to again win the largest single block in the Bundestag, and that’s good news. The real drama involves which of the smaller parties will place third, thus giving shape to the governing coalition that will follow.

Under the leadership of Merkel’s CDU/CSU, Germany’s economy is booming, it’s running a strong trade surplus, and its… Read More

“Fallacies do not cease to be fallacies because they become fashions.”

~G.K. Chesterson

Concerned parents of school-aged children know that sexual revolutionaries and cultural Marxists are destroying our public schools and universities. But Charter schools were thought to be safe from these dark ideological radicals.

Sexual revolutionaries and cultural Marxists believe that there are no… Read More

In Part l of my interview with El Dorado County Superior Court Judge Steven Bailey, who recently retired from the bench to run for California Attorney General after nearly nine years on the bench, we discussed how the current and recent attorneys general have weaponized the office to use the law against political enemies.

Judge Bailey, who has been an attorney since 1990, is a contrast against Xavier Becerra, thecurrent Attorney Generalwho has been a politician his entire career rather than practicing law. Becerra’s law license was filed “inactive” with the California State Bar Association until 1/1/2017.

Judge Bailey is concernedhow law enforcement is being misused and put in the position of having to be mental health case-workers, thanks to… Read More

In April of this year I wrote an article about what a disgruntled California conservative or libertarian should consider when pondering a move to another state. I recommended looking at the 2016 “Trump vote” as a simple indicator of the future probability of a conservative state “turning” (to use zombie parlance).

Nevada had obvious warning signs. It voted for Hillary. BOTH state legislatures are now controlled by Democrats. Only the governorship remains in GOP hands.

Even the political future of Texas is suspect long term. I have a soft spot for Tennessee, a state that voted almost 2-1 for Trump and is completely phasing out its remaining state income tax. BTW, I’m not much of a Trump fan, but that presidential vote is a great indicator of the political leaning of a state. Here’s my article: http://riderrants.blogspot.com/2017/04/2016-trump-vote-tells-us-californians.html

I thought I’d look again at one state — perhaps the first state many Californians consider:… Read More

Occasionally the public gets upset about our “bully boy” policing system. A recorded incident of a cop taking money from an unpermitted hotdog vendor in Berkeley created substantial online blowback.

There have been calls for the officer’s firing. But in truth he was “just following orders.” It’s the practice of many California police departments to grab any cash at the “scene of a crime” under the guise of “asset forfeiture.”

I feel so much safer, knowing that my California police force (each cop making well over $150,000 in total compensation annually) is out there ticketing (and stealing from) these “street criminals.” It’s a GREAT ad for why we should end asset forfeiture.

Keep in mind — these are the same Berkeley police who have REPEATEDLY refused (on orders, but still refused) to actively prevent violent left wing attacks on peaceful right wing demonstrators. REPEATEDLY.

But in the cops’ defense, there are a LOT of “illegal” street vendors out there to ticket and steal money from. It’s a matter of priorities, I guess.… Read More

The numbers were startling.

According to media reports, a newly formed group affiliated with Harvard Law School called the “Fair Punishment Project” (FPP) supposedly reviewed court decisions from 2010 to 2015 involving the Orange County District Attorney’s Office. The “study” found that the OCDA had seven convictions reversed due to prosecutorial misconduct and 24 overall findings of prosecutorial misconduct, and these numbers were ranked amongst the highest in the state. Curiously, the authors of the report chose not to “show their work” behind their claims, or list any of the qualifying cases they had deemed to be prosecutorial misconduct. The media accused our prosecutors of “cheating” to win, and wrote an editorial stating “these are not cases of errors, but of willful and serious misconduct,” while a local politician who covets the Office of the District Attorney proclaimed we had “the worst record in the entire state.”

There was just one problem: The numbers in the study were completely wrong.

In their rush to criticize the men and women of the OCDA who handle over 60,000 new cases each year, the media, politicians, and… Read More

El Dorado County Superior Court Judge Steven Bailey recently retired to run for California Attorney General. A Superior Court judge since 2009, Bailey stepped down last month to mount his campaign for the office of Attorney General.

Bailey, an attorney since 1990, was a State of California Criminal Law Specialist, and handled complex criminal matters including death penalty, life in prison, homicide and sexual offenses.

This is significant since Xavier Becerra, the current Attorney General has been a politician his entire career rather than practicing law. Becerra’s law license was filed “inactive” with the California State Bar Association until 1/1/2017.

I met with Judge Steven Bailey and we covered a lot of ground. This is Part l.

Judge Bailey, a Republican, said he decided to run for Attorney General, “when after 8 ½ years on bench, you see all of the problems that revolve through the courtroom, but have no… Read More

This week California Republican Party delegates received an email from some former legislators with the odd pitch that Republicans should preserve the deeply flawed “top two” primary system better known as Proposition 14.

While we all respect those Republicans who have served in the legislature, this request is truly bizarre given what has happened to our party under this failed system.

Proposition 14 should be repealed – immediately – so every voter in California has the opportunity to vote for a Republican in general elections.

As we all know, last year because of Proposition 14 California voters had the “choice” of voting for either liberal Democrat Kamala Harris or liberal Democrat Loretta Sanchez for U.S. Senate. This is like choosing between vanilla and French vanilla.

A choice between two Democrats is no choice at all.

Under Proposition 14, literally millions of Californians have been denied the opportunity to vote for Republican candidates for Assembly, Senate, Congress, and statewide offices because only two Democrats were in the “top two.”

How… Read More