Paineful Truth

In Oklahoma City, another Ten Commandment monument has met its end. The Oklahoma Supreme Court reaffirmed in a 7-2 decision Monday that a Ten Commandments monument on the state Capitol grounds is unconstitutional and must be removed. Was the Oklahoma Supreme Court correct in their decision? And why does this matter to you and me? Under current federal law, Ten Commandment displays are completely constitutional. The First Amendment of the U.S. Constitution says, “Congress shall make no law respecting the establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof.” A Ten Commandment display does not constitute an “establishment of religion”. When writing this, the Founders were intending to avoid a state sponsored religion such as the Church of England from which they had just freed themselves. So, federally speaking, the display is Constitutional. However, in this particular instance, Oklahoma’s Supreme Court cited Article 2, Section 5 of the Oklahoma State Cons...

Are you confused yet? It’s ok, you can admit it. I’m a bit confused myself. The Iran Nuclear Deal. After endless weeks, several extended deadlines, and more than a couple threats to walk out, Secretary Kerry and President Obama have brought forward what they thinks is a good plan (it’s U.N. endorsed too) for maintaining relations with Iran while prohibiting them from obtaining nuclear weapons. Some, however, would disagree. The enrichment of uranium will continue under the deal, however it will be “closely supervised”. In exchange for Iran promising not to develop a bomb, some of the economic sanctions will be lifted that have been severely hindering Iran’s economy. Now, on one side, you have proponents that are touting this as the deal of the century. On the other, you have some saying this is just a pathway for a nuclear Iran. Which is right? Which is wrong? At this point it is hard to say. And I do not claim to be an analyst or expert. What I want to do with ...

I have said it before, and I’ll say it again and again - opinion polls are more often used to shape, not to report, public opinion. Data can be manipulated and molded to fit whatever point you are trying to make. Therefore, while I do not always discount them entirely, I make a point of looking into the polling method, and then taking the results with a very large grain of salt. For instance, it seems about three or four times a week, the media makes a top story with some poll telling us who the shoe-in for the White House is. This past week Donald Trump often appears to be the leader in said polls. Is Trump a worthy candidate? Is he someone the American people would truly want in office? The majority of his appeal, it appears to me, is that he is a straight talker. Whether people agree with him or not, no one can complain that he beats around the bush (no pun intended). Many candidate’s campaign videos sound like a regurgitation of the exact same things strung together in a...

It’s incredible how connected our lives, our world, has become. Mere days after the Charleston shooting , it was discovered that the alleged perpetrator, Dylann Roof, was of the ‘white supremacist’ persuasion. Since then, you would have thought the Civil War had started all over again. But before I get into this, I think one of the most sad and ridiculous parts of the whole Confederate flag debate, is that the American people, or at least a very visible, vocal portion, once again showed their sheep mentality. The media told them to be offended and they were. Suddenly the ‘Dukes of Hazzard’, which has been on air since 1979, was unbelievably horrid. Walmart pulled from their shelves any merchandise that contained the flag, suddenly aware of the evil of the Confederate flag. People are entitled to their opinions. However, bottom line, if this really was a true problem, that people in their heart of hearts were convicted of, then it would have been dealt with a very l...