I wrote a column for the Los Angeles Times 22 years ago defining my position on abortion. They ran it because of my positions. I expressed support for first trimester abortions only and being in favor of no government funding. I favor parental notice. Not much has changed since then and I still hold 80% of Americans agree with that position.

The idea of trimesters did not even exist until Justice Harry Blackmun made it up in Roe V. Wade. In 1973 we had medical standards that were much different than today. Are we to believe that the science surrounding abortion and a fetus in the womb has not evolved? It has as well as the diseases that would cause many mothers to abort their unborn child. Since that time, it has become scientifically clearer that late-term abortions rarely if ever are justified and that the babies are viable. “Rare” is not the estimated 13,000 late-term abortions currently performed every year. I have since written that for many on the Left, there are three issues about which they are concerned – abortion, abortion, and abortion. Little has changed.

I also expressed that the argument that exists today was created because the Left does what… Read More

When the Supreme Court, in 1973, raised the issue of abortion from a state to state decision to a Constitutional one, it stained the Constitution and did violence to the concept of federalism. No matter what you may think of abortion as a practice or procedure, there is nothing written in the Constitution close to granting a Constitutional right to an abortion. Indeed, Roe v. Wade even perverted the concept of a “right to privacy,” also not in the Constitution but used to justify the invalidation of a number of state laws on a variety of different issues. Once again, no matter what my opinion of the policy of those laws may be, whether the Constitution bans them or not is a completely separate question.

That being said, today, the Sun is a little brighter, and the air is a little cleaner, as my daughter said to me in a text today. The stain of the federalizing of abortion law is dead, and, God willing, will stay that way. For me, it feels like 40 years of political activity has been vindicated. It was worth the effort to get to this point. Now the real fight begins.

For all of my time in the Legislature, most of my effort on the question of life… Read More

On February 27, 1933, the Reichstag – Germany’s Capitol building – was set on fire. Who was responsible remains in dispute even today. What is undisputed is that the Nazis, barely holding onto power in a coalition government – used the attack to besmirch their political opponents, consolidate their grip on the government, arrest hundreds of political opponents, and ultimately rescind the due process rights and fundamental freedoms of the German people.

It remains a cautionary tale, for obvious reasons.

The January 6th riot at the Capitol has become the centerpiece of the Democrats’ agenda. No other issue facing our country – not the worst inflation in 40 years, not the highest gasoline prices in history, not the fastest increase in homicides ever recorded, not the historically unprecedented illegal mass migration at our southern border – none of these crises has commanded prime time congressional hearings from the Democrats.

What happened here on January 6th was an affront to our Constitution and a national disgrace. Those who entered the Capitol with the intent to disrupt the counting of electoral votes deserve to be denounced by their fellow… Read More

One might think that calling a performer “underrated” for whom 84,000 people have list their profession as “Elvis Impersonator” on tax returns is a crazy statement. Yet, with the upcoming Elvis movie (June 24), he will still not be regarded as the remarkable vocalist he was before he left us.

The idea of calling him “underrated” might immediately be rejected because his career was overwhelmingly successful. But that career never totally veered from the moment he burst on to the scene with his September 9, 1956, tamed-down, hip-swiveling performance on The Ed Sullivan Show. As a rock ‘n’ roller, he was never considered a vocalist especially compared to the era’s greats, including Frank Sinatra, Ella Fitzgerald, and Tony Bennett.

Elvis was a victim of his own success. From the time of his first recordings at Sun Records he changed the face of the music business. Sam Phillips was seeking a white singer who could capture the essence of the black artists he had been recording. When Elvis broke out into a revved-up version of an old blues classic, That’s All Right Mama, Phillips knew he had his man and… Read More

If I had any complaint about conservatives, it is their tendency to abandon fellow conservatives in the midst of a political fight. Democrats play politics for keeps, Republicans just play politics. Democrats seek to end the political careers of their political opponents, Conservatives oftentimes sit on the sidelines and let them do it. That is what is happening to Dr. John Eastman right now.

I first met Dr. Eastman when he was running for Congress in 1990. I was running for State Senate. We were both fighting powerful Democrats. We both lost. However, in the midst of the fight, I found Dr. Eastman to be a true, committed conservative, unafraid of the fight. A good man, whose commitment to conservative causes could not be questioned. Over the years, we did not always agree, but I know our disagreements were not based on a difference of values, but rather a difference in the application of those values. He is a conservative deserving of our support and loyalty.

To set up this discussion, Dr. Eastman came up with a legal theory to challenge the voter outcome in Pennsylvania, Michigan, Wisconsin, Georgia and Arizona based on the voter fraud committed in… Read More

Did you know the Legislature actually passed a budget? If you weren’t paying attention, you would never know. It got very little media coverage.

It was, by and large, a meaningless act, since there is no deal on the budget with the Governor, but hey, the politicans will still get their paychecks. Back in the 2000-2010 decade, the Ds passed, and the voters approved, a budget constitutional amendment that had two major impacts: (1) it reduced the number of votes needed to pass the budget from a two-thirds vote of both houses of the Legislature to a majority vote of both houses. The rationale for the change was that almost every other bill only requires a majority vote (only emergency type bills require two-thirds), so why should it be different for the budget?

The real rationale for the Democrat controlled Legislature was that they were tired of buying off Republican Legislators to get the votes necessary to pass the budget. Not that there were enough Rs to stop out of control spending, there were always two, three or four R legislators in the Senate and six to eight R legislators in the Assembly willing to sell their vote for some local pork. I recall… Read More

As we approached the start of our annual trip to foreign lands, we were excited that the mask mandate for airplane flights was ending the day before our departure. We did not believe the Biden Administration would be foolish enough to extend it; then they did. We were thoroughly dejected. Then we met Judge Kathryn Kimball Mizelle. And we were exultant.

There were two reasons we were so happy. People being required to wear masks on airplanes is the ultimate act of bureaucratic overreach. Airplanes are the safest place you can be with the best and cleanest recirculated air you can experience. Victory for common sense and science. The second reason we were happy is that it set the Left into a tizzy of gargantuan proportions. They attacked Judge Mizelle, but in the multiple commentaries I read on the issue never once did they comment on the legality of her ruling. Only ad hominin attacks.

“If CDC can’t impose an unintrusive requirement to wear a mask to prevent a virus from going state to state, then it literally has no power to do anything,” said public health law expert Lawrence Gostin, faculty director of the O’Neill Institute for National and Global Health… Read More

After HR1, the Democrats bill to nationalize the election process, was defeated in two consecutive Congresses, one might think the supporters would get the hint and move on. That is clearly not the case as they are chastising Republicans for reestablishing voting rules at the state level, so there is not another free-for-all as we experienced in 2020. There is a new proposal that attempts to cheapen voting and place central control at the federal level for all election rules. Do not discount this can happen because ideas begin this way and then metastasize. You need to be aware.

Long-time Washington Post columnist E.J. Dionne Jr. authored this new proposal together with former Connecticut Secretary of State Miles Rapoport who currently is a fellow at Harvard’s Kennedy School of Government. They co-authored 100% Democracy: The Case for Universal Voting. I have not read the book but did read their column on the subject in the WaPo.

The authors make the argument that Americans have many obligations. They are obligated to pay taxes, show up for jury duty, get their kids vaccinated, etc. They should be obligated to vote. Here is the problem with that argument. Almost… Read More