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Moving On Up!

This is the last post on Right of Middle.

I am joining forces with several other writers and launching a new site, called Free Liberty Writers.  There are quite a few of us out there who believe in saving the American Republic and who also know how to write clear and informative articles, with a desire to make them freely available to anyone interested.  At the same time, in the true spirit of American capitalism, we want to make a little extra scratch from what we do.  Wordpress does not allow us to collaborate easily with each other, and it doesn’t allow us to use a revenue generating program like Google AdSense.

So, we’re moving to a new site that allows us to publish our own material.  Our readers will be able to focus strictly on each of us if they choose, or they can expand their horizons a bit and see who else is out there.  And, we’ll get to make a little bit of extra spending money in the process.  Certainly not enough to quit our day jobs, but enough to pay for the rise in gas prices perhaps, since the Comrade-in-Chief can’t seem to get an energy policy in place that will alleviate the problem.

Please visit the new site and bookmark it.  If you are a subscriber here, you’ll need to create an account over there and subscribe to my blog to get notified of updates.  The new site is still undergoing some construction, so there might be a few growing pains, but it is functional.  All of the blog content that was here is now over there and ready for reading.

Thank you all for visiting Right of Middle, and a special thanks goes out to the faithful followers that have subscribed to the blog.  I hope I will see you over on the new site!

Sean

 

February 16, 2012 | Categories: Uncategorized | 2 Comments »

This Is Where We Are Failing

I had to pick up one of my kids today, and as luck would have it, I was getting my fill of Rush Limbaugh while we were in the car.  She doesn’t see the value of the information that Rush produces, and was eager to change the station to something more palatable to teenage ears.  She almost lost her fingers.

But it got me thinking a little bit about what teens think about today’s topics.  I first talked about a bill filed in the Iowa House to make it legal for dairy farmers to sell unpasteurized milk.  It seems that right now, if a farmer were to do that, he stands the very real risk of losing his farm and being thrown in jail.

I then chose a topic that has been making the rounds lately, that being the mandate by the Comrade-In-Chief about contraceptives and abortions being guaranteed by health insurance companies.  I figured that since she was a girl, perhaps this would be a topic more interesting to her.  In the end, neither was making much of an impact.

So I put it on very basic terms.  I told her to pretend that she was running her own cupcake shop, and the Feds came in and told her that she had to sell chocolate cupcakes.  No questions asked.  And, she had to sell those chocolate cupcakes to anyone who came into the store, and it didn’t matter if she lost money on the deal, she was allergic to chocolate, the customers were stealing from her…  none of that mattered.  She would make the cupcakes, sell the cupcakes, and be happy about it because the Feds told her to do so.  How would that make her feel?

She said she’d have to do it because that’s the government.  If they tell you to do something, you have to do it.

I think I bent the steering wheel.

I tried to explain to her that the Constitution was written to keep the government from doing exactly what I just described.  She replied with the comment that it didn’t matter what the Constitution says, the government is going to do what the government wants to do, and that’s just the way it is.

And that, dear readers, is how we are going to lose this republic.  If our next generation believes that the government is going to do whatever it wants, and the Constitution cannot protect us from those actions, then we’ve lost the war before it even gets started.

And I’m sure that’s just what the Department of Education and the Comrade-in-Chief are hoping for.

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February 13, 2012 | Categories: Government | Tags: , , , | Leave A Comment »

Linn County Sheriff Gardner’s Comments

Back when Linn County was having an election for Sheriff, Brian Gardner wanted members of IFC (then known as Iowa Carry) to know that he was the right choice for the citizens of the county who wanted to see their firearms rights protected and restored.  But in a perfect example of how quickly things can change, and exactly why NONE of our rights should EVER be subjected to the whims of any elected official, here is Sheriff Gardner talking to KGAN about the recent push to tighten up Iowa’s preemption law through HF 2114:

“When we no longer have the ability to control weapons from going into that building, it lessons the security and could potentially make it more dangerous,” said Linn County Sheriff Brian Gardner.

“It just seems to be too much too soon,” Gardner said. “Wisdom would say take a step back and see what happens here before you make all these changes.”

Does this sound like someone who cares about your right to self-defense?  Or does it sound like a Sheriff who wants to make sure that he and his staff are the “only ones” who can safely carry a firearm in buildings owned by the public in Linn County?

You decide.

Oh, and by the way Sheriff…  here’s a little insight on what’s happened in the past 13 months since Iowa went to a shall-issue system, also under your protests:

Nothing.

Thank you for your support.

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February 9, 2012 | Categories: Firearms Rights | Tags: , , , , , , , | 1 Comment »

Putting the Brakes on Traffic Enforcement Cameras

The House Transportation Committee today passed HF 2048 on a 15-6 vote.  HF 2048 would prohibit all speed and red-light enforcement cameras statewide.  With today’s passage, the bill will now go to the full House for debate and a vote on the floor.

Governor Branstad has said that he will sign this legislation if it ever reaches his desk.  However, the fly in the ointment will be Senate Majority Leader Mike Gronstal, who has said that he believes traffic enforcement cameras serve a purpose and they work to reduce accidents and enhance public safety.

Here we go again – usurping individual rights and liberties for “public safety.”  It’s a damn shame that the wise leaders who founded this country didn’t have a better grasp on what public safety was all about.  If they did, they could have removed the concept of “innocent until proven guilty” from one of our founding principles.  I appreciate the Senator Gronstal has been a supporter of firearms rights in Iowa lately, but on this topic, he is completely off base.  While the introduction of automated traffic enforcement devices might have played a part in reduced accidents, there can be no doubt that issuing citations to a driver based on a picture of the license plate and not on confirmation that the person was actually behind the wheel puts the burden of proof on the citizen, not on the government.  That goes against every concept that is supposed to be the bedrock of our judicial system.

To all the legislators who believe it is proper to have these systems in place, I would like to ask one simple question: would you be comfortable being found automatically guilty of an infraction, no matter how big or small, with no proof of the action being tendered by the government other than a photo of your property at the scene?  That is what happens with these cameras, and that is not how we as a society were meant to live.

Some might say it’s just a traffic ticket with no points, go ahead and pay it.  If so, where does that end?  What defines a penalty as too big or too small?  $100?  $500?  How about incarceration? 24 hours?  48 hours?  ”It’s just a day in jail, suck it up and be glad it wasn’t longer.”  If you think that can’t happen, then you have not studied history.

Others might say that 99% of the time, the registered owner is behind the wheel.  That’s making an assumption of guilt, as opposed to a presumption of innocence, and again, where does that end?

These are troubled times, and we are continuing to slide down a slippery slope.  We need our local and state politicians to protect the rights that we are supposed to have, not to trample on them because it is convenient and it provides money for the treasury.  We have enough of that in Washington.  We don’t need it in Des Moines.  If this legislation passes in the House and gets stifled in the Senate, it needs to be a defining issue the next time Senator Gronstal (or any other Senator who votes against it) comes up for an election.

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If you enjoyed this post, please use the buttons below to share it on your favorite social network.  (Google+ isn’t shown there yet, but that’s a great social network to use.) I depend on word of mouth to grow my readership.  “Share” the posts on Facebook and Google+, “RT” them on Twitter, and submit them to StumbleUpon.  All of that will help spread the word!  Comments are also welcome, and don’t forget, you can subscribe to my blog to get instant updates when I make a new post.

 

February 2, 2012 | Categories: Government | Tags: , , , , , | 1 Comment »

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