There are obviously some situations in which police have to shoot. That's why they are armed with guns. In this case, the use of firearms would seem to be well, justified. But sometimes, some officers get a little too free with their use of those guns. The case earlier this year, when that woman, Breona Taylor was shot and k**led while sleeping, was a case where the use of firearms would seem to have been unjustified. And when this becomes too common, folks get upset and that's why people are protesting in some cities.

Back in 1777, when the Republic of Vermont declared itself independent of Great Britain, New York, New Hampshire and the United States, the 16th article of the Constitution (still in use today) states that "The people have the right to keep and bear arms for the defense of themselves and the state, and as standing armies (professional armed forces in modern terms) are a danger to liberty, in time of peace they ought not to be kept up but if maintained must be kept in strict obedience to the civil power." There were no police in those days and we have shredded out a lot of the duties of Europe's professional armies to other organizations, like police forces, today. They can be a protection to society, but if the civil power is corrupt, they can still be a danger to liberty, just like the old timers said. They knew that from personal experience.

Probably because neither of the canidates could speak intelligently for that long. I have often made the comment that these are not debates. They are merely Q&A sessions. I was on a college debate team back in 1951. I got a topic and had to research it and then give a 30 minute presentation in support of it. Then the other teams speaker gave a 30 minute presentation in opposition to it, then each of us got a 15 minute rebuttal. Just like you say, no moderator. Just a real debate. I think that the media and the politicians think we are too stupid to listen to things like that, but a few years ago, I was in Alton IL, when CNN put on a reenactment of the Lincoln/Douglas Debates of 1856. It was held on the very same place where the original had taken place and there was a huge crowd (many of whom had made period clothing for the event!) who stayed for the entire event and paid close attention. You are absolutely right. Your somewhat shorter times might work better for TV timing. But think of all the advertizing time the media could get if they took that multitude of candidates we had and paired them off and had real debates and the winners then debated each other so v**ers could make an intelligent decision in primaries.

I got my absentee b****t a couple of weeks ago. I've been going through it and going online to read the websites of the various candidates. Here in Vermont we do not have to register as a Democrat or a Republican. We just register as Vermonters. There are 21 parties running for president on this b****t! Only Democrats or Republicans have a real shot at it, but there are five Independents, Prohibitionists, Constitutionalists, Greens, American Solidarity, Alliance and even a C*******t! I get to v**e for my state rep and he then v**es for anything Mike Bloomberg pays him to v**e for, which is a heck of a way to run a democratic republic. When I have figured out which candidates will do the least harm to the Constitutions of Vermont and the United States, I will v**e for them and take it down to the Town Clerk's office myself instead of trusting the USPS. Tho' I don't always agree with you, Proud Republican, I enjoy your comments. Stay safe and healthy.

It seems that in all the cases cited, Obama ordered Federal contractors to do various actions such as paying minimal wages etc. This he might well have the Constitutional authority to do. Executive orders are orders that the chief executive, (the President) issues to folks who work for the executive department. Washington started the practice in the late 1790's. He had to as there was no way that he could do the job he was elected to do by any other means. Executive orders from the President of the United States do not apply to me or to you if you do not work for the executive department or one of its sub divisions. A Federal Contractor is a temporary employee of that department, so such an order legally applies to him/her. So long as funds, v**ed by Congress for some other purpose are not used, such an order would seem to be legal and Constitutional.

A lot of people mistakenly think that the civil War was about s***ery. It is easy to see why they think this though, because every state that left the Union stated in the documents passed by its legislature that they were doing so to protect the institution of s***ery. And I can't believe that Lee owned no s***es. He had a big farm near DC and he couldn't run it by himself when he was on active duty before the war. That farm is now Arlington National Cemetary.

That is absolutely hilarious! Thanks for sharing that.

Funny that I have seen a lot of B*M signs all over Chittenden County, Vt and I haven't seen any of them defaced by anyone. Vermont is a strange place. For those of you unfamiliar with it, a little background info might be of interest. It exists due to a navigational error in the 17th century. Without accurate clocks the old timers could not determine longitude and some of the maps had lake Champlain east of the Connecticut River. As a result, both NY and NH thought they owned it (disregarding the Abenaki, who mistakenly thought they owned it just because they had lived there for 10,000 years) In 1777, the settlers got s**k of being a political football and declared independence as the "Republic of Vermont," and adopted a Constitution. The first article of that Constitution banned s***ery. It is cleverly worded so you can keep the kids working on the farm 'till the girls are 16 and the boys are 18, but we can't own humans. Even after we got accepted into the US in 1791, and modified our Constitution a bit, we still could not own humans. In the 1850's, the Vermont legislature passed laws forbidding any Vt officials from cooperating with Federal or private parties in enforcing the Fugitive S***e Law and that law was never enforced in Vermont. So B*M signs are not very strange in Vermont. We have our share of i***ts of course, but there is no mass outbreak of sign destruction. I suspect that the morons who wrote this have never been near The Republic of Vermont. Just a lot of merde de vache.

I suspect that the DNC members would rather have Trump than Bernie. Of course they would rather have Biden than Trump, but Bernie is way down on their list. He might disrupt the money flow.

Wow! I must have missed this. What did she do?

While the author has some valid points, I think he is delusional. But my crystal ball has a crack in it and I may be wrong. I think that what is wrong with our politics is that too many politicians of both parties are monarchists. Let me explain. This came up in one class at the Air Command and Staff College many years ago. The subject was political systems. Both Tom Jefferson and Adam Smith, the English economist, wrote that there were only two forms of government and the two forms depended on the ideas of the folks running the government. One bunch, the Monarchists, as Smith called them, believed that humans are stupid, cowardly, cruel and have to be ruled by absolute monarchs, assisted by clergy and nobles. The other bunch, "republicans" as Smith called them, (no relation to the modern Republican Party) believe that humans are intelligent, cooperative, brave when they have to be, and able to make good decisions in their own best interest when they can get enough information. So what has happened to US is that too many of our politicians who have wormed their way into positions of power, are monarchists. And too many of the people who have acquired loads of money, enough live high on the hog and have enough left over to buy politicians, and news media, are also monarchists. And that is the most serious problem. Monarchists in the form of corporations, have taken over the news media. I saw a report, years ago, that 96% of the news media was owned by just six corporations! So if we can't get full information, how can we make good decisions in our own best interest?

Obviously, the entire world is lying, just to make our glorious leader look bad. Seriously, when I was a kid, and my folks couldn't afford baby sitters, they used to take me to the movies about once a week. (admission was 25 cents for adults and kids got in free.) So I had the chance to watch this sort of stuff on the newsreels that came between the 'double features' in movies of those days. It took place in Germany in the 1930's and I'm watching it take place right here in the good ol' USA today. It doesn't end well. Sometimes, humans aren't a lot smarter than lemmings.

Lying to congress is not a probable cause? Sacre merde!!1

Even engineers have to know a bit of science. And as for middle school science, that is about the level that far too many people are at. So Bill Nye does a necessary service.

In my experience, it has not been "liberals" who would not wear masks. It has become a sort of political statement among some Trump supporters to not wear a mask. Now that the President himself is wearing a mask, maybe they will also start protecting other folks, not themselves, by wearing a mask. I suspect, (and this is only a hypothesis) that less lethal varieties of c****a v***s may have infected many people in the past and these people may have developed antibodies against these less lethal v***ses that may work against C19 v***s as well. Folks who have these antibodies (if they exist) may get light cases or perhaps even show no symptoms at all, but may still be able to infect other people. If the nitwits in DC would treat this as a scientific/medical problem instead of a political one, they might get it under control and get the economy running a lot sooner.

Thar did not piss me off.

I'm sure that is very gratifying to him, his i***t wife and their poor kids.