liberty Archives - The Ohio Star

Commentary: You Don’t Need a Permission Slip to Go Back to Normal

May 19, 2021May 18, 2021 Ohio Star Staff

Group of people together socializing at dinner table

Last week, the Centers for Disease Control did an about-face, announcing that the fully vaccinated among us may resume normal activities. The news came more than a year after California initiated the first lockdown on March 19, 2020.

The CDC’s new posture comes with some narrow exceptions. If you’re traveling on a plane or find yourself in a homeless shelter or in a medical or correctional facility, you still need to wear a mask; and the CDC made sure to clarify, apparently out of great deference for federalism and Hayekian spontaneous order, that its guidance does not predominate over the requirements of federal, state, local, tribal, or territorial laws, rules, and regulations, including local business and workplace guidance.

Before the CDC updated its pandemic guidance, this was exactly the position espoused by libertarian law professor Ilya Somin of George Mason University’s Antonin Scalia School of Law. Writing from his regular perch at the legal blog The Volokh Conspiracy, Somin’s argument is summarized nicely in the subheading of his piece, “Free the Vaccinated from COVID Restrictions”: “Doing so will protect constitutional rights, reduce vaccine hesitancy, and increase liberty—all at once.”

Commentary: Advancing Liberty by Divesting from China

October 2, 2020October 1, 2020 Ohio Star Staff

No President in our lifetimes has been tougher on China than President Donald Trump. The Trump administration has courageously and steadfastly taken on China’s many trade abuses, threats to national security and human rights abuses. His Art of the Deal got China to agree to a phase one trade agreement even though it left tariffs of 25 percent on $250 billion of goods and another 7.5 percent on the remaining $300 billion of goods. The administration have made it clear to Beijing that its continued actions that threaten Hong Kong and Taiwan will not go unchecked. And the Defense Department has named 31 companies listed on U.S. stock exchanges that are either owned or controlled by the Chinese Communist Party and military.

Dr. Simone Gold Commentary: We Do Not Consent

June 29, 2020June 29, 2020 Ohio Star Staff

It is clear to me as a physician-lawyer that the disinformation about both Covid-19 and the Constitution has caused us to turn a medical issue into a legal crisis.

The scientific usefulness of a mask has been so aggressively overstated, and the foundational importance of the Constitution has been so aggressively understated, that we have normalized people screaming obscenities at each other while hiking.

Commentary: When Enough is Enough, the ‘Woke’ Are ‘Awakening’

June 29, 2020June 29, 2020 Ohio Star Staff

Recently, I read with great interest James Lindsay’s essay called “The Woke Breaking Point.” There, he invites his readers to ask friends and acquaintances “What would it take for you to say that the Woke movement has gone too far?” This, he suggests, is a way to help people keep themselves honest: if you consider in advance what state of affairs, specifically, would be “too far,” then you will be able to recognize better the excesses of the totalitarian Left and more ready to resist them at the point when it becomes absolutely necessary.

Commentary: Resolving the Argument Between Lockdown and Liberty

May 20, 2020May 19, 2020 Ohio Star Staff

As the debate between those who want an unlimited lockdown and those who want to reopen America as quickly as possible becomes more clangorous every day, months of intensive study and sad experience with the coronavirus enable us to determine the best course and resolve the argument.

The shutdown must end in all but severely afflicted areas. Its original purpose was to “flatten the curve.” In the early stages, the number of coronavirus reported cases and deaths in the United States was doubling every few days. Horrifying projections based on the scanty evidence available and hyped by the anti-Trump media to put as much pressure and blame on the president as possible for his initially somewhat casual treatment of the subject, stirred fears of millions of deaths and of a universal vulnerability to an almost untreatable fatal illness.

Commentary: Constitution-Respecting Sheriffs Refuse to Enforce Lockdowns

April 7, 2020April 7, 2020 Ohio Star Staff

Across the country governors, county commissioners and executives, and city and town officials have announced “lockdowns” or stay-at-home orders of dubious constitutional validity. The result of these orders is the bizarre situation in which jails are being emptied of criminals while individuals engaged in their ordinary business at appropriate social distance have been arrested for the crime of being outside their home.

One of the most high-profile examples of this inverted constitutional order happened in California, where a paddle boarder was arrested near the Malibu Pier for ignoring orders from lifeguards to get out of the water. CBS News Los Angeles reports the unidentified man spent 30 to 40 minutes paddling in the ocean waters off Malibu Beach after refusing to heed orders from L.A. County lifeguards to go ashore. LASD Harbor Patrol brought in a boat, at which point the paddleboarder voluntarily swam in and was taken into custody.

Commentary: ‘Density Ideology’ Will Destroy America

January 21, 2020January 21, 2020 Ohio Star Staff

If you’re searching for an organizing principle that unites the Left, density ideology should be at or near the top of your list. Far from being a sideshow, density ideology is behind the leftist drive to cram America’s rising population into the footprint of existing cities.

Commentary: Why Faith Is Key to Preserving Our Liberty

October 25, 2019October 25, 2019 Ohio Star Staff

Attorney General William Barr gave an extraordinary speech at Notre Dame Law School last week, providing one of the most robust defenses of religious freedom in a generation.

Commentary: The American Founding’s High-Minded Purposes

June 17, 2019June 16, 2019 Ohio Star Staff

by Edward J. Erler James Madison is justly celebrated for his frequently stated opinion that “all power in just and free Government is derived from compact.” But Madison’s view is not endorsed by all purported champions of the founders. A recent article, “Our Unwritten Constitution: Orestes Brownson and the Foundation…

Commentary: A Liberty Movement Is Growing in Putin’s Russia

February 6, 2019February 6, 2019 Ohio Star Staff

by Lawrence W. Reed Except for a fishing trip to northern Canada in the 1960s, my first visit to a foreign country was to the old Soviet Union in March 1985. It was the month in which Soviet leadership passed from the aging old guard of communist hardliners into…

There’s a New Tea Party Brewing… in Moscow

February 4, 2019February 4, 2019 Ohio Star Staff

by Vera Kichanova As Moscow celebrated its 870th anniversary, a futuristic $245 million Zaryadye Park was inaugurated in the heart of the capital — a generous present from Mayor Sergei Sobyanin to his citizens. The 32-acre park includes a ‘floating bridge,’ a piece of tundra, and even an ice cave. The miracle…

Commentary: When Did It Become Okay to Disrespect the Culture, Traditions, and Values of America?

August 17, 2018August 16, 2018 Admin

by Jeffery Rendall Wake up any particular morning and glance out the window. Do you notice anything different from the day before? Changes in weather or the seasons don’t count. Chances are you’ll see things appear pretty much the same – and if you’ve lived in one place long…

Christianity: The First Major Religion That Stripped the State of Its Theocratic Powers

July 29, 2018July 28, 2018 Admin

by Cuatro Jones When discussing the history of the West and exploring the ideas and philosophies that led up to the creation of the Magna Carta and the U.S constitution, eventually the religion of Christianity must be brought forward in the discussion. Why? Well, despite the many sins of Christians (and there are many),…

Commentary: Why So Many Intellectuals Can’t Understand Patriotism

May 24, 2018July 18, 2018 Admin

by John Miltimore Sam Haselby says this “should be the end times” for American patriotism. Yet the opposite seems to be happening, and he can’t understand why. America has no national education system, he notes. No conscription. No government agency that enforces the red-white-and-blue rituals performed at schools and…