Did YOU Know . . . There are 27 of them!!

There have been 27 amendments to the Constitution.

Beginning with the Bill of Rights. 

The first 10 amendments, ratified December 15, 1791.

Bill of Rights - First 10 - December 15, 1791

First Amendment
Freedom of Religion, Speech, Press, Assembly, and Petition

Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.

Second Amendment
Right to Bear Arms

A well regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed.

Third Amendment
Quartering of Soldiers

No Soldier shall, in time of peace be quartered in any house, without the consent of the Owner, nor in time of war, but in a manner to be prescribed by law.

Fourth Amendment
Search and Seizure
The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated, and no Warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by Oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized.

Fifth Amendment
Grand Jury, Double Jeopardy, Self Incrimination, Due Process, Takings

No person shall be held to answer for a capital, or otherwise infamous crime, unless on a presentment or indictment of a Grand Jury, except in cases arising in the land or naval forces, or in the Militia, when in actual service in time of War or public danger; nor shall any person be subject for the same offence to be twice put in jeopardy of life or limb; nor shall be compelled in any criminal case to be a witness against himself, nor be deprived of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law; nor shall private property be taken for public use, without just compensation.

Sixth Amendment
Right to Speedy Trial by Jury, Witnesses, Counsel

In all criminal prosecutions, the accused shall enjoy the right to a speedy and public trial, by an impartial jury of the State and district wherein the crime shall have been committed, which district shall have been previously ascertained by law, and to be informed of the nature and cause of the accusation; to be confronted with the witnesses against him; to have compulsory process for obtaining witnesses in his favor, and to have the Assistance of Counsel for his defense.

Seventh Amendment
Jury Trial in Civil Lawsuits

In Suits at common law, where the value in controversy shall exceed twenty dollars, the right of trial by jury shall be preserved, and no fact tried by a jury, shall be otherwise re-examined in any Court of the United States, than according to the rules of the common law.

Eighth Amendment
Excessive Fines, Cruel and Unusual Punishment

Excessive bail shall not be required, nor excessive fines imposed, nor cruel and unusual punishments inflicted.

Ninth Amendment
Non-Enumerated Rights Retained by People

The enumeration in the Constitution, of certain rights, shall not be construed to deny or disparage others retained by the people.

10th Amendment
Rights Reserved to States or People
The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people.

11th Amendment - February 7, 1795
Suits Against States

The Judicial power of the United States shall not be construed to extend to any suit in law or equity, commenced or prosecuted against one of the United States by Citizens of another State, or by Citizens or Subjects of any Foreign State.

Reconstruction Amendments

12th Amendment - June 15, 1804
Election of President and Vice President

The Electors shall meet in their respective states and vote by ballot for President and Vice-President, one of whom, at least, shall not be an inhabitant of the same state with themselves; they shall name in their ballots the person voted for as President, and in distinct ballots the person voted for as Vice-President, and they shall make distinct lists of all persons voted for as President, and of all persons voted for as Vice-President, and of the number of votes for each, which lists they shall sign and certify, and transmit sealed to the seat of the government of the United States, directed to the President of the Senate; -- 

the President of the Senate shall, in the presence of the Senate and House of Representatives, open all the certificates and the votes shall then be counted; -- 

The person having the greatest number of votes for President, shall be the President, if such number be a majority of the whole number of Electors appointed; and if no person have such majority, then from the persons having the highest numbers not exceeding three on the list of those voted for as President, the House of Representatives shall choose immediately, by ballot, the President. 

But in choosing the President, the votes shall be taken by states, the representation from each state having one vote; a quorum for this purpose shall consist of a member or members from two-thirds of the states, and a majority of all the states shall be necessary to a choice. 

And if the House of Representatives shall not choose a President whenever the right of choice shall devolve upon them, before the fourth day of March next following, then the Vice-President shall act as President, as in the case of the death or other constitutional disability of the President.-- 

The person having the greatest number of votes as Vice-President, shall be the Vice-President, if such number be a majority of the whole number of Electors appointed, and if no person have a majority, then from the two highest numbers on the list, the Senate shall choose the Vice-President; a quorum for the purpose shall consist of two-thirds of the whole number of Senators, and a majority of the whole number shall be necessary to a choice. But no person constitutionally ineligible to the office of President shall be eligible to that of Vice-President of the United States.

13th Amendment - December 6, 1865
Abolition of Slavery

Section 1  -  Neither slavery nor involuntary servitude, except as a punishment for crime whereof the party shall have been duly convicted, shall exist within the United States, or any place subject to their jurisdiction.

Section 2  -  Congress shall have power to enforce this article by appropriate legislation.

14th Amendment - July 9, 1868
Citizenship Rights, Equal Protection, Apportionment, Civil War Debt

Section 1  -  All persons born or naturalized in the United States, and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens of the United States and of the State wherein they reside. No State shall make or enforce any law which shall abridge the privileges or immunities of citizens of the United States; nor shall any State deprive any person of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law; nor deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws.

Section 2  -  Representatives shall be apportioned among the several States according to their respective numbers, counting the whole number of persons in each State, excluding Indians not taxed. But when the right to vote at any election for the choice of electors for President and Vice-President of the United States, Representatives in Congress, the Executive and Judicial officers of a State, or the members of the Legislature thereof, is denied to any of the male inhabitants of such State, being twenty-one years of age, and citizens of the United States, or in any way abridged, except for participation in rebellion, or other crime, the basis of representation therein shall be reduced in the proportion which the number of such male citizens shall bear to the whole number of male citizens twenty-one years of age in such State.

Section 3  -  No person shall be a Senator or Representative in Congress, or elector of President and Vice-President, or hold any office, civil or military, under the United States, or under any State, who, having previously taken an oath, as a member of Congress, or as an officer of the United States, or as a member of any State legislature, or as an executive or judicial officer of any State, to support the Constitution of the United States, shall have engaged in insurrection or rebellion against the same, or given aid or comfort to the enemies thereof. But Congress may by a vote of two-thirds of each House, remove such disability.

Section 4  -  The validity of the public debt of the United States, authorized by law, including debts incurred for payment of pensions and bounties for services in suppressing insurrection or rebellion, shall not be questioned. But neither the United States nor any State shall assume or pay any debt or obligation incurred in aid of insurrection or rebellion against the United States, or any claim for the loss or emancipation of any slave; but all such debts, obligations and claims shall be held illegal and void.

Section 5  -  The Congress shall have power to enforce, by appropriate legislation, the provisions of this article.

15th Amendment - February 3, 1870
Right to Vote Not Denied by Race

Section 1  -  The right of citizens of the United States to vote shall not be denied or abridged by the United States or by any State on account of race, color, or previous condition of servitude.

Section 2  -  The Congress shall have power to enforce this article by appropriate legislation.

16th Amendment - February 3, 1913
Income Tax

The Congress shall have power to lay and collect taxes on incomes, from whatever source derived, without apportionment among the several States, and without regard to any census or enumeration.

17th Amendment - April 8, 1913
Popular Election of Senators

The Senate of the United States shall be composed of two Senators from each State, elected by the people thereof, for six years; and each Senator shall have one vote. The electors in each State shall have the qualifications requisite for electors of the most numerous branch of the State legislatures.

When vacancies happen in the representation of any State in the Senate, the executive authority of such State shall issue writs of election to fill such vacancies: Provided, That the legislature of any State may empower the executive thereof to make temporary appointments until the people fill the vacancies by election as the legislature may direct.

This amendment shall not be so construed as to affect the election or term of any Senator chosen before it becomes valid as part of the Constitution.

18th Amendment - January 16, 1919
Prohibition of Liquor

Section 1  -  After one year from the ratification of this article the manufacture, sale, or transportation of intoxicating liquors within, the importation thereof into, or the exportation thereof from the United States and all territory subject to the jurisdiction thereof for beverage purposes is hereby prohibited.

Section 2  -  The Congress and the several States shall have concurrent power to enforce this article by appropriate legislation.

Section 3  -  This article shall be inoperative unless it shall have been ratified as an amendment to the Constitution by the legislatures of the several States, as provided in the Constitution, within seven years from the date of the submission hereof to the States by the Congress.

19th Amendment - August 18, 1920
Women’s Right to Vote

The right of citizens of the United States to vote shall not be denied or abridged by the United States or by any State on account of sex.

Congress shall have power to enforce this article by appropriate legislation.

20th Amendment - January 23, 1933
Presidential Term and Succession, Assembly of Congress

Section 1  -  The terms of the President and the Vice President shall end at noon on the 20th day of January, and the terms of Senators and Representatives at noon on the 3d day of January, of the years in which such terms would have ended if this article had not been ratified; and the terms of their successors shall then begin.

Section 2  -  The Congress shall assemble at least once in every year, and such meeting shall begin at noon on the 3d day of January, unless they shall by law appoint a different day.

Section 3  -  If, at the time fixed for the beginning of the term of the President, the President elect shall have died, the Vice President elect shall become President. If a President shall not have been chosen before the time fixed for the beginning of his term, or if the President elect shall have failed to qualify, then the Vice President elect shall act as President until a President shall have qualified; and the Congress may by law provide for the case wherein neither a President elect nor a Vice President elect shall have qualified, declaring who shall then act as President, or the manner in which one who is to act shall be selected, and such person shall act accordingly until a President or Vice President shall have qualified.

Section 4  -  The Congress may by law provide for the case of the death of any of the persons from whom the House of Representatives may choose a President whenever the right of choice shall have devolved upon them, and for the case of the death of any of the persons from whom the Senate may choose a Vice President whenever the right of choice shall have devolved upon them.

Section 5  -  Sections 1 and 2 shall take effect on the 15th day of October following the ratification of this article.

Section 6  -  This article shall be inoperative unless it shall have been ratified as an amendment to the Constitution by the legislatures of three-fourths of the several States within seven years from the date of its submission.

21st Amendment - December 5, 1933
Repeal of Prohibition

Section 1  -  The eighteenth article of amendment to the Constitution of the United States is hereby repealed.

Section 2  -  The transportation or importation into any State, Territory, or possession of the United States for delivery or use therein of intoxicating liquors, in violation of the laws thereof, is hereby prohibited.

Section 3  -  This article shall be inoperative unless it shall have been ratified as an amendment to the Constitution by conventions in the several States, as provided in the Constitution, within seven years from the date of the submission hereof to the States by the Congress.

22nd Amendment - February 27, 1951
Two-Term Limit on Presidency

Section 1  -  No person shall be elected to the office of the President more than twice, and no person who has held the office of President, or acted as President, for more than two years of a term to which some other person was elected President shall be elected to the office of the President more than once. But this Article shall not apply to any person holding the office of President when this Article was proposed by the Congress, and shall not prevent any person who may be holding the office of President, or acting as President, during the term within which this Article becomes operative from holding the office of President or acting as President during the remainder of such term.

Section 2  -  This article shall be inoperative unless it shall have been ratified as an amendment to the Constitution by the legislatures of three-fourths of the several States within seven years from the date of its submission to the States by the Congress.

23rd Amendment - March 29, 1961
Presidential Vote for D.C.

Section 1  -  The District constituting the seat of Government of the United States shall appoint in such manner as Congress may direct:

A number of electors of President and Vice President equal to the whole number of Senators and Representatives in Congress to which the District would be entitled if it were a State, but in no event more than the least populous State; they shall be in addition to those appointed by the States, but they shall be considered, for the purposes of the election of President and Vice President, to be electors appointed by a State; and they shall meet in the District and perform such duties as provided by the twelfth article of amendment.

Section 2  -  The Congress shall have power to enforce this article by appropriate legislation.

24th Amendment - January 23, 1964
Abolition of Poll Taxes

Section 1  -  The right of citizens of the United States to vote in any primary or other election for President or Vice President, for electors for President or Vice President, or for Senator or Representative in Congress, shall not be denied or abridged by the United States or any State by reason of failure to pay poll tax or other tax.

Section 2  -  The Congress shall have power to enforce this article by appropriate legislation.

25th Amendment - February 10, 1967
Presidential Disability and Succession 

Section 1  -  In case of the removal of the President from office or of his death or resignation, the Vice President shall become President.

Section 2  -  Whenever there is a vacancy in the office of the Vice President, the President shall nominate a Vice President who shall take office upon confirmation by a majority vote of both Houses of Congress.

Section 3  -  Whenever the President transmits to the President pro tempore of the Senate and the Speaker of the House of Representatives his written declaration that he is unable to discharge the powers and duties of his office, and until he transmits to them a written declaration to the contrary, such powers and duties shall be discharged by the Vice President as Acting President.

Section 4  -  Whenever the Vice President and a majority of either the principal officers of the executive departments or of such other body as Congress may by law provide, transmit to the President pro tempore of the Senate and the Speaker of the House of Representatives their written declaration that the President is unable to discharge the powers and duties of his office, the Vice President shall immediately assume the powers and duties of the office as Acting President.

Thereafter, when the President transmits to the President pro tempore of the Senate and the Speaker of the House of Representatives his written declaration that no inability exists, he shall resume the powers and duties of his office unless the Vice President and a majority of either the principal officers of the executive department or of such other body as Congress may by law provide, transmit within four days to the President pro tempore of the Senate and the Speaker of the House of Representatives their written declaration that the President is unable to discharge the powers and duties of his office. Thereupon Congress shall decide the issue, assembling within forty-eight hours for that purpose if not in session. If the Congress, within twenty-one days after receipt of the latter written declaration, or, if Congress is not in session, within twenty-one days after Congress is required to assemble, determines by two-thirds vote of both Houses that the President is unable to discharge the powers and duties of his office, the Vice President shall continue to discharge the same as Acting President; otherwise, the President shall resume the powers and duties of his office.

26th Amendment - July 1, 1971
Right to Vote at Age 18

Section 1  -  The right of citizens of the United States, who are eighteen years of age or older, to vote shall not be denied or abridged by the United States or by any State on account of age.

Section 2  -  The Congress shall have power to enforce this article by appropriate legislation.

27th Amendment -  May 7, 1992
Congressional Compensation

No law, varying the compensation for the services of the Senators and Representatives, shall take effect, until an election of Representatives shall have intervened.

From this Website

Hero Edith Cavell From WWI - A Nurse Who Did MUCH - and Was Executed

Learn about Edith Cavell, the nurse who saved over 200 people and was later executed for doing so.

I tried to find this exact video on YouTube - but was not able to. Sorry. 

Find the YouTube video below:
 

Instagram video:

CLICK HERE

Life Story of Edith Cavell | British Nurse Who Rescued 200+ Soldiers in WW1

So unfortunately - this person won't allow other to play their video on other websites - you have to click on "watch on YouTube"

I'll look for another one!

For some reason this video sometimes does not show up

So here is the link, if it shows unavailable.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X7T4HhwKzMY

Sidney Poitier Takes Issues With Racist Journalist in 1968 Interview -

On this day (Feb 20) in 1927, 

actor and film director 

Sidney Poitier, was born.

Here is a powerful interview from him 

in 1968 addressing how he was 

being treated by the press.

He has words with the journalists after only 

being asked questions surrounding race.

9/11 explained in 5 minutes!

This may be the best video that I have seen explaining 911

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HXYswf3lzU8&ab_channel=martinone9

TRUTHS TO DISCERN . . . I Am A Cat . . . Do You Believe That I Am A Cat?

Probably the best explanation ever given to people about reality

........ 

listen to this very bright lady lay it out about how it really is!

 

COMMON SENSE

 

One Students Insights On Being "Political Correct"

This young man - Brad Taylor - his thoughts on his school district,

 Rosemount high school in Rosemount, MN.

 

Who Is in Control?

Who Is in Control? The Need to Rein in Big Tech

January 2021 • Volume 50, Number 1 • Allum Bokhari


Allum Bokhari
Breitbart News

Allum Bokhari is the senior technology correspondent at Breitbart News. He is a graduate of the University of Oxford and was a 2020 Lincoln Fellow at the Claremont Institute for the Study of Statesmanship and Political Philosophy. In 2018, he obtained and published “The Google Tape,” a recording of Google’s top executives reacting to the 2016 Trump election and declaring their intention to make the American populist movement a “blip” in history. He is the author of #Deleted: Big Tech’s Battle to Erase the Trump Movement and Steal the Election.

The following is adapted from a speech delivered at Hillsdale College on November 8, 2020, during a Center for Constructive Alternatives conference on Big Tech - 


In January, when every major Silicon Valley tech company permanently banned the President of the United States from its platform, there was a backlash around the world. One after another, government and party leaders—many of them ideologically opposed to the policies of President Trump—raised their voices against the power and arrogance of the American tech giants. These included the President of Mexico, the Chancellor of Germany, the government of Poland, ministers in the French and Australian governments, the neoliberal center-right bloc in the European Parliament, the national populist bloc in the European Parliament, the leader of the Russian opposition (who recently survived an assassination attempt), and the Russian government (which may well have been behind that attempt).

Common threats create strange bedfellows. Socialists, conservatives, nationalists, neoliberals, autocrats, and anti-autocrats may not agree on much, but they all recognize that the tech giants have accumulated far too much power. None like the idea that a pack of American hipsters in Silicon Valley can, at any moment, cut off their digital lines of communication.

I published a book on this topic prior to the November election, and many who called me alarmist then are not so sure of that now. I built the book on interviews with Silicon Valley insiders and five years of reporting as a Breitbart News tech correspondent. Breitbart created a dedicated tech reporting team in 2015—a time when few recognized the danger that the rising tide of left-wing hostility to free speech would pose to the vision of the World Wide Web as a free and open platform for all viewpoints.

This inversion of that early libertarian ideal—the movement from the freedom of information to the control of information on the Web—has been the story of the past five years.

***

When the Web was created in the 1990s, the goal was that everyone who wanted a voice could have one. All a person had to do to access the global marketplace of ideas was to go online and set up a website. Once created, the website belonged to that person. Especially if the person owned his own server, no one could deplatform him. That was by design, because the Web, when it was invented, was competing with other types of online services that were not so free and open.

It is important to remember that the Web, as we know it today—a network of websites accessed through browsers—was not the first online service ever created. In the 1990s, Sir Timothy Berners-Lee invented the technology that underpins websites and web browsers, creating the Web as we know it today. But there were other online services, some of which predated Berners-Lee’s invention. Corporations like CompuServe and Prodigy ran their own online networks in the 1990s—networks that were separate from the Web and had access points that were different from web browsers. These privately-owned networks were open to the public, but CompuServe and Prodigy owned every bit of information on them and could kick people off their networks for any reason.

In these ways the Web was different. No one owned it, owned the information on it, or could kick anyone off. That was the idea, at least, before the Web was captured by a handful of corporations.

We all know their names: Google, Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, Amazon. Like Prodigy and CompuServe back in the ’90s, they own everything on their platforms, and they have the police power over what can be said and who can participate. But it matters a lot more today than it did in the ’90s. Back then, very few people used online services. Today everyone uses them—it is practically impossible not to use them. Businesses depend on them. News publishers depend on them. Politicians and political activists depend on them. And crucially, citizens depend on them for information.

Today, Big Tech doesn’t just mean control over online information. It means control over news. It means control over commerce. It means control over politics. And how are the corporate tech giants using their control? Judging by the three biggest moves they have made since I wrote my book—the censoring of the New York Post in October when it published its blockbuster stories on Biden family corruption, the censorship and eventual banning from the Web of President Trump, and the coordinated takedown of the upstart social media site Parler—it is obvious that Big Tech’s priority today is to support the political Left and the Washington establishment.

Big Tech has become the most powerful election-influencing machine in American history. It is not an exaggeration to say that if the technologies of Silicon Valley are allowed to develop to their fullest extent, without any oversight or checks and balances, then we will never have another free and fair election. But the power of Big Tech goes beyond the manipulation of political behavior. As one of my Facebook sources told me in an interview for my book: “We have thousands of people on the platform who have gone from far right to center in the past year, so we can build a model from those people and try to make everyone else on the right follow the same path.” Let that sink in. They don’t just want to control information or even voting behavior—they want to manipulate people’s worldview.

Is it too much to say that Big Tech has prioritized this kind of manipulation? Consider that Twitter is currently facing a lawsuit from a victim of child sexual abuse who says that the company repeatedly failed to take down a video depicting his assault, and that it eventually agreed to do so only after the intervention of an agent from the Department of Homeland Security. So Twitter will take it upon itself to ban the President of the United States, but is alleged to have taken down child pornography only after being prodded by federal law enforcement.

***

How does Big Tech go about manipulating our thoughts and behavior? It begins with the fact that these tech companies strive to know everything about us—our likes and dislikes, the issues we’re interested in, the websites we visit, the videos we watch, who we voted for, and our party affiliation. If you search for a Hannukah recipe, they’ll know you’re likely Jewish. If you’re running down the Yankees, they’ll figure out if you’re a Red Sox fan. Even if your smart phone is turned off, they’ll track your location. They know who you work for, who your friends are, when you’re walking your dog, whether you go to church, when you’re standing in line to vote, and on and on.

As I already mentioned, Big Tech also monitors how our beliefs and behaviors change over time. They identify the types of content that can change our beliefs and behavior, and they put that knowledge to use. They’ve done this openly for a long time to manipulate consumer behavior—to get us to click on certain ads or buy certain products. Anyone who has used these platforms for an extended period of time has no doubt encountered the creepy phenomenon where you’re searching for information about a product or a service—say, a microwave—and then minutes later advertisements for microwaves start appearing on your screen. These same techniques can be used to manipulate political opinions.

I mentioned that Big Tech has recently demonstrated ideological bias. But it is equally true that these companies have huge economic interests at stake in politics. The party that holds power will determine whether they are going to get government contracts, whether they’re going to get tax breaks, and whether and how their industry will be regulated. Clearly, they have a commercial interest in political control—and currently no one is preventing them from exerting it.

To understand how effective Big Tech’s manipulation could become, consider the feedback loop.

As Big Tech constantly collects data about us, they run tests to see what information has an impact on us. Let’s say they put a negative news story about someone or something in front of us, and we don’t click on it or read it. They keep at it until they find content that has the desired effect. The feedback loop constantly improves, and it does so in a way that’s undetectable.

What determines what appears at the top of a person’s Facebook feed, Twitter feed, or Google search results? Does it appear there because it’s popular or because it’s gone viral? Is it there because it’s what you’re interested in? Or is there another reason Big Tech wants it to be there? Is it there because Big Tech has gathered data that suggests it’s likely to nudge your thinking or your behavior in a certain direction? How can we know?

What we do know is that Big Tech openly manipulates the content people see. We know, for example, that Google reduced the visibility of Breitbart News links in search results by 99 percent in 2020 compared to the same period in 2016. We know that after Google introduced an update last summer, clicks on Breitbart News stories from Google searches for “Joe Biden” went to zero and stayed at zero through the election. This didn’t happen gradually, but in one fell swoop—as if Google flipped a switch. And this was discoverable through the use of Google’s own traffic analysis tools, so it isn’t as if Google cared that we knew about it.

Speaking of flipping switches, I have noted that President Trump was collectively banned by Twitter, Facebook, Twitch, YouTube, TikTok, Snapchat, and every other social media platform you can think of. But even before that, there was manipulation going on. Twitter, for instance, reduced engagement on the President’s tweets by over eighty percent. Facebook deleted posts by the President for spreading so-called disinformation.

But even more troubling, I think, are the invisible things these companies do. Consider “quality ratings.” Every Big Tech platform has some version of this, though some of them use different names. The quality rating is what determines what appears at the top of your search results, or your Twitter or Facebook feed, etc. It’s a numerical value based on what Big Tech’s algorithms determine in terms of “quality.” In the past, this score was determined by criteria that were somewhat objective: if a website or post contained viruses, malware, spam, or copyrighted material, that would negatively impact its quality score. If a video or post was gaining in popularity, the quality score would increase. Fair enough.

Over the past several years, however—and one can trace the beginning of the change to Donald Trump’s victory in 2016—Big Tech has introduced all sorts of new criteria into the mix that determines quality scores. Today, the algorithms on Google and Facebook have been trained to detect “hate speech,” “misinformation,” and “authoritative” (as opposed to “non-authoritative”) sources. Algorithms analyze a user’s network, so that whatever users follow on social media—e.g., “non-authoritative” news outlets—affects the user’s quality score. Algorithms also detect the use of language frowned on by Big Tech—e.g., “illegal immigrant” (bad) in place of “undocumented immigrant” (good)—and adjust quality scores accordingly. And so on.

This is not to say that you are informed of this or that you can look up your quality score. All of this happens invisibly. It is Silicon Valley’s version of the social credit system overseen by the Chinese Communist Party. As in China, if you defy the values of the ruling elite or challenge narratives that the elite labels “authoritative,” your score will be reduced and your voice suppressed. And it will happen silently, without your knowledge.

This technology is even scarier when combined with Big Tech’s ability to detect and monitor entire networks of people. A field of computer science called “network analysis” is dedicated to identifying groups of people with shared interests, who read similar websites, who talk about similar things, who have similar habits, who follow similar people on social media, and who share similar political viewpoints. Big Tech companies are able to detect when particular information is flowing through a particular network—if there’s a news story or a post or a video, for instance, that’s going viral among conservatives or among voters as a whole. This gives them the ability to shut down a story they don’t like before it gets out of hand. And these systems are growing more sophisticated all the time.

***

If Big Tech’s capabilities are allowed to develop unchecked and unregulated, these companies will eventually have the power not only to suppress existing political movements, but to anticipate and prevent the emergence of new ones. This would mean the end of democracy as we know it, because it would place us forever under the thumb of an unaccountable oligarchy.

The good news is, there is a way to rein in the tyrannical tech giants. And the way is simple: take away their power to filter information and filter data on our behalf.

All of Big Tech’s power comes from their content filters—the filters on “hate speech,” the filters on “misinformation,” the filters that distinguish “authoritative” from “non-authoritative” sources, etc. Right now these filters are switched on by default. We as individuals can’t turn them off. But it doesn’t have to be that way.

The most important demand we can make of lawmakers and regulators is that Big Tech be forbidden from activating these filters without our knowledge and consent. They should be prohibited from doing this—and even from nudging us to turn on a filter—under penalty of losing their Section 230 immunity as publishers of third party content. This policy should be strictly enforced, and it should extend even to seemingly non-political filters like relevance and popularity. Anything less opens the door to manipulation.

Our ultimate goal should be a marketplace in which third party companies would be free to design filters that could be plugged into services like Twitter, Facebook, Google, and YouTube. In other words, we would have two separate categories of companies: those that host content and those that create filters to sort through that content. In a marketplace like that, users would have the maximum level of choice in determining their online experiences. At the same time, Big Tech would lose its power to manipulate our thoughts and behavior and to ban legal content—which is just a more extreme form of filtering—from the Web.

This should be the standard we demand, and it should be industry-wide. The alternative is a kind of digital serfdom. We don’t allow old-fashioned serfdom anymore—individuals and businesses have due process and can’t be evicted because their landlord doesn’t like their politics. Why shouldn’t we also have these rights if our business or livelihood depends on a Facebook page or a Twitter or YouTube account?

This is an issue that goes beyond partisanship. What the tech giants are doing is so transparently unjust that all Americans should start caring about it—because under the current arrangement, we are all at their mercy. The World Wide Web was meant to liberate us. It is now doing the opposite. Big Tech is increasingly in control. The most pressing question today is: how are we going to take control back?

The Man Behind the Undercover Planned Parenthood Videos Tells of His Arrest & Kamala Harris Involvement

 

A State of the Union Quiz - How Much Do YOU Know??

For the first time, a presidential State of the Union address is being rescheduled due to partisan politics. It takes place Feb 5, 2019, one week later than originally planned.  It’s the latest chapter in a tradition that stretches to the closing days of the 18th century.

How much do you know about the State of the Union speech? Take the quiz below and test your knowledge of the constitutional mandate that the president “shall from time to time give to the Congress Information of the State of the Union.”


1. Who delivered the first State of the Union speech?

A: George Washington, 1790
B. James Madison, 1812
C: Abraham Lincoln, 1865
D: William Howard Taft, 1911

2. Which president sent his report to Congress in writing, establishing a precedent that was followed for more than a century?

A: John Adams, 1797
B: Thomas Jefferson, 1801
C: John Quincy Adams, 1826
D: Chester Arthur, 1884

3. This president revived the custom of delivering the State of the Union in person to Congress.

A. William McKinley, 1899
B. Theodore Roosevelt, 1905
C. Woodrow Wilson, 1913
D. Herbert Hoover, 1930

4. This president had the first State of the Union address broadcast on radio.
A: Warren Harding, 1922
B: Calvin Coolidge, 1923
C: Franklin Roosevelt, 1933
D: Dwight Eisenhower, 1953

5. The first televised State of the Union address was delivered by:

A: Franklin Roosevelt, 1945
B: Harry Truman, 1947
C: John F. Kennedy, 1962
D: Richard Nixon, 1970

6. Two presidents never gave State of the Union reports because they didn’t live long enough. Who were they?

A: Abraham Lincoln and Benjamin Harrison
B: William McKinley and Warren Harding
C: Zachary Taylor and Millard Fillmore
D: William Henry Harrison and James Garfield

7. The longest address (in terms of time) lasted nearly 90 minutes, including applause. It was delivered by:

A: Ronald Reagan, 1988
B: George H.W. Bush, 1992
C: Bill Clinton, 2000
D: George W. Bush, 2005

8. Coming in at 1,089 words, which president had the shortest address based on word count?

A: George Washington, 1790
B: Martin Van Buren, 1838
C: Franklin Pierce, 1857
D: Grover Cleveland, 1887

9. Based on its staggering 33,667 words, which president’s address was the longest of all?

A: Andrew Johnson, 1867
B: Lyndon Johnson, 1967
C: Richard Nixon, 1973
D: Jimmy Carter, 1981

10: Which president’s address was first carried live on the internet via the House website?

A: Bill Clinton, 1998
B: George W. Bush, 2002
C: Barack Obama, 2009
D: Donald Trump, 2018

Answers: 
1-A
2-B
3-C
4-B
5-B
6-D
7-C
8-A
9-D
10-B




J. Mark Powell is a historical novelist and former broadcast journalist. He wrote this for InsideSources.com. The opinions are the writer's.

How much do you really know about Fourth of July?

Independence Day is filled with parades and picnics, fireworks, fairs and other festivities. Amid these celebrations, however, it’s important to remember that the Fourth of July commemorates a very important historical event: our nation’s declaration of its independence from Great Britain.

The quiz below, from the Ashbrook Center at Ashland University in Ashland, Ohio, provides an opportunity for you to test your knowledge of the Fourth of July and the Declaration of Independence.


1. Nearly 15 months prior to the Declarationof Independence, fighting between British Redcoats and colonial militiamen began at:

A. Bunker Hill
B. Fort Ticonderoga
C. Lexington and Concord
D. Long Island

2. Congress temporarily set aside this man’s June 7, 1776, resolution that “these United Colonies are, and of right ought to be, free and independent States”:

A. Light-Horse Harry Lee
B. Robert E. Lee
C. Francis Lightfoot Lee
D. Richard Henry Lee

3. In Jefferson’s original rough draft of the Declaration of Independence, he wrote “We hold these truths to be” not “self-evident” but:

A. “common sense”
B. “sacred &undeniable”
C. “obvious & atrocious”
D. “proved by Britannic blood & plunder”

4. The draft of the Declaration of Independence presented to Congress blamed England’s King George III for the slave trade, which Jefferson described as “a cruel war against human nature itself.” Delegates from these two states insisted this passage be removed:

A. Georgia and South Carolina
B. South Carolina and North Carolina
C. North Carolina and Virginia
D. Virginia and Maryland

5. As delegates signed their names to the Declaration of Independence, which man supposedly said, “We must all hang together or, most assuredly, we will all hang separately”?

A. Benjamin Franklin
B. Benjamin Rush
C. Edward Rutledge
D. George Wythe

6. Which two future U.S. presidents crossed the Delaware and fought at the 1776 Battle of Trenton?

A. John Adams and John Quincy Adams
B. John Adams and George Washington
C. George Washington and Thomas Jefferson
D. George Washington and James Monroe

7. When told that George Washington would return to private life and not remain in power if the United States won the American Revolution, this man reportedly said, “Then truly he is the world’s greatest man”:

A. John Adams
B. Marquis de Lafayette
C. George III
D. Lord Cornwallis

8. In addition to the Declaration of Independence, what other famous document emerged from the Assembly Room of the Pennsylvania State House?
A. The Stamp Act Resolves
B. The U.S. Constitution
C. George Washington’s Farewell Address
D. The Treaty of Ghent


9. Founded by Thomas Jefferson, which institution of higher learning officially commenced operations on July 4,1802:

A. University of Virginia
B. College of William and Mary
C. United States Military Academy
D. United States Naval Academy


10. Both these men died on July 4, 1826 — the 50th anniversary of the Declaration of Independence:

A. Thomas Jefferson and John Adams
B. Thomas Jefferson and George Washington
C. John Adams and James Monroe
D. James Monroe and John Quincy Adams

Answers: 

1-C

2-D

3-B

4-A

5-A

6-D

7-C

8-B

9-C

10-A

BY ROBERT M.S. MCDONALD   insidesources.com

Robert M.S. McDonald is a professor of history at the U.S. Military Academy, author of “Confounding Father: Thomas Jefferson’s Image in His Own Time” and editor of the Ashbrook Center’s compendium “The American Revolution: Core Documents.” He wrote this for InsideSources.com .

A Billion Dollars In Perspective!

The best I could find about this one - the email started circulating in 2008

A billion is a difficult number to comprehend, but one advertising agency did a good job of putting that figure into some perspective in one of its releases.

A billion seconds ago it was 1959.

A billion minutes ago Jesus was alive .

A billion hours ago our ancestors were living in the Stone Age.

A billion days ago no-one walked on the earth on two feet.

A billion dollars ago was only 8 hours and 20 minutes, at the rate our government is spending it.

While this thought is still fresh in our brain... let's take a look at New Orleans ... It's amazing what you can learn with some simple division.

Louisiana Senator, Mary Landrieu (D) was asking Congress for 250 BILLION DOLLARS to rebuild New Orleans. Interesting number... What does it mean?

Well .. If you are one of the 484,674 residents of New Orleans (every man, woman and child) You each get  $516,528 Or... If you have one of the 188,251 homes in
New Orleans, your home gets $1,329,787.Or... If you are a family of four... Your family gets $2,066,012.

Washington , D.C  HELLO!  Are all your calculators broken??

Building Permit Tax
CDL License Tax
Cigarette Tax
Corporate Income Tax
Dog License Tax
Federal Income Tax (Fed)
Federal Unemployment Tax (FU TA)
Fishing License Tax
Food License Tax
Fuel Permit Tax
Gasoline Tax
Hunting License Tax
Inheritance Tax
Inventory Tax
IRS Interest Charges (tax on top of tax)
IRS Penalties (tax on top of tax)
Liquor Tax
Luxury Tax
Marriage License Tax
Medicare Tax
Property Tax
Real Estate Tax
Service charge Taxes
Social Security Tax
Road Usage Tax (Truckers)
Sales Taxes
Recreational Vehicle Tax
School Tax
State Income Tax
State Unemployment Tax (SUTA)
Telephone Federal Excise Tax
Telephone Federal Universal Service Fee Tax
Telephone Federal, State and Local Surcharge Tax
Telephone Minimum Usage Surcharge Tax
Telephone Recurring and Non-recurring Charges Tax
Telephone State and Local Tax
Telephone Usage Charge Tax
Utility Tax
Vehicle License Registration Tax
Vehicle Sales Tax
Watercraft Registration Tax
Well Permit Tax
Workers Compensation Tax
(And to think, we left British Rule to avoid so many taxes and you had only considered at the most 10 taxes!)

Not one of these taxes existed 100 years ago...
And our nation was the most prosperous in the world.

We had absolutely no national debt...
We had the largest middle class in the world...
And Mom stayed home to raise the kids.

What happened?
Can you spell

'p o l i t i c i a n s’ !

What the heck has happened to our Country?????

Ronald Reagan - On His Knees

This is a rather short video that we all should watch, 
appreciate And fully understand its meaning.

It is also one that everyone in our government should be
forced to watch several times, at least until they get it!!!

Today's Wake Up Call

What A Hurricane Taught Me About The 2nd Amendment

Spencer Platt/Staff/Getty Images


By  BRAD SCHAEFFER

March 1, 2018

As a Midwest transplant, one of the first things I noticed after moving to my leafy New Jersey suburb was how few of my neighbors had ever even seen a real gun let alone held or fired one. Where I grew up, which at the time was a semi-rural outlier of Chicago, shooting guns was just part of who we were.


I shot my dad’s M1 Carbine; several of my friends had small bore shotguns and even a few pistols. We all could aim straight and true. Never once was anyone even close to being injured. When you grow up with responsible gun ownership pounded into you by unforgiving teachers like my 1st U.S. Marine Division Korean War veteran father, you very quickly come to appreciate their deadly seriousness and treat them with proper respect.


Several years ago I found myself pondering the meaning of the Second Amendment beyond the traditional argument that armed civilians are a check against the tyrannical inclinations of government. Rather, I considered its broader meaning through the prism of a regional catastrophe.



From October 29-31, 2012, Hurricane Sandy laid waste to much of New Jersey’s coastal region, flooding and washing away homes, ripping down power lines, paralyzing cable, internet, and telecom services, shuttering businesses, and halting food and gasoline shipments to some of the most densely populated areas of the most densely populated state.

Watching the chaos unfold in the storm’s wake, I was privy to a disconcerting fact of life: we in advanced societies have grown utterly dependent upon modern transportation and technology, but that doesn’t make us any more civilized than our medieval ancestors. All it takes to regress to our more lawless days is to turn out the lights, shut off the heat, close the supermarkets and make gasoline scarce; then you will see the baser elements of our human nature unleashed in no time.

After Sandy, the hum of generators and chainsaws and sirens was the ambient sound of my neighborhood. But there was also an undercurrent of subtle fear — much more so as you ventured into the less affluent parts of the surrounding area.

Fear that winter was coming and the power may not be restored for a long time. Fear that there would not be enough gasoline to fuel the chugging portable generators that were all that stood between limited vestiges of civilization and a cold, dark reality. One could sense the anxiety as people waited in the cold for hours in literally half-mile long lines, praying that the sign “Sorry No Gas” would not appear before their little red canisters had their fill.

As I said before, many conservatives view the right to bear arms as a check against an overbearing central government and indeed that was certainly a primary concern of the Framers when grafting this and other guarantees onto the body of their new Constitution.

But what if the threat comes not from government, but each other?

In 1775, Thomas Paine understood this: “The supposed quietude of a good man allures the ruffian; while on the other hand, arms, like law, discourage and keep the invader and the plunderer in awe, and preserve order in the world as well as property … for while avarice and ambition have a place in the heart of man, the weak will become a prey to the strong.”

Like Paine, the Framers realized that, in the end, an armed citizenry is the final line of defense not just against a tyrannical state but also human nature itself. After all, in times of crisis, what is one supposed to do if marauders come to his or her home and the squad cars are either too busy or too far away and out of gas to intervene?

Where then is Big Government? I sometimes need to remind the idealistic that government is not a thing unto itself. It is, in the end, just a vast collection of fallible, sometimes dull-witted and unmotivated people. The Framers had little faith in such a collective body either to protect us from itself or, during times like Sandy, from one another. As this latest atrocity in Florida shows, even when all the signs are there, the government can still drop the ball, with tragic consequences. Faith in government should be tempered by the reality that in the end we are the protectors of our own well-being.

After Sandy, New Jersey recovered, and life got back on track. The fears were admittedly unfounded. But this was only a category one hurricane. What about a category three or more? What happens if the next disaster is measured not by wind gusts and tidal swells but perhaps radiation levels? What happens when it is not a matter of when we get power back and when the gas trucks will arrive, but rather IF? What will the advocates of disarming the citizenry to achieve a sham peace have to say then?

Such thoughts are not the rumination of a right-wing zealot; anyone who thinks otherwise has yet to stand in a gas line and watch someone try to cut in.

Like the Framers, I simply do not have enough faith in government or humanity to dismiss the Second Amendment as a primitive leftover from a less civilized age.

Sandy’s aftermath exposed just how vulnerable today’s technological nirvana is to a takedown, either by an indifferent natural event or more sinister forces who I am sure watched and jotted down copious notes during those anxious weeks. Should such a disaster come, it will be my right to bear arms that will protect my family and neighbors.

I have a suspicion that should it ever come to pass, those desperately pounding on the doors of the homes of law-abiding gun-owners seeking shelter from the lawless mobs will be among the very lot who, once upon a time, in a more civilized age, self-righteously advocated that their saviors be disarmed in the first place.

Let's Talk Truth

This is one brave gal who 0WNS the truth! She lived it, and understands it!
     

 http://thefederalist.com/author/heather-barwick/
HEATHER BARWICK                                     
Dear Gay Community: Your Kids Are Hurting
http://thefederalist.com/2015/03/17/dear-gay-community-your-kids-are-hurting/
PARENTING

Dear Gay Community: Your Kids Are Hurting

I loved my mom’s partner, but another mom could never have replaced the father I lost.
Gay community, I am your daughter. My mom raised me with her same-sex partner back in the ’80s and ’90s. She and my dad were married for a little while. She knew she was gay before they got married, but things were different back then. That’s how I got here. It was complicated as you can imagine. She left him when I was two or three because she wanted a chance to be happy with someone she really loved: a woman.

My dad wasn’t a great guy, and after she left him he didn’t bother coming around anymore.

Do you remember that book, “Heather Has Two Mommies”? That was my life. My mom, her partner, and I lived in a cozy little house in the ‘burbs of a very liberal and open-minded area. Her partner treated me as if I was her own daughter. Along with my mom’s partner, I also inherited her tight-knit community of gay and lesbian friends. Or maybe they inherited me?

Either way, I still feel like gay people are my people. I’ve learned so much from you. You taught me how to be brave, especially when it is hard. You taught me empathy. You taught me how to listen. And how to dance. You taught me not be afraid of things that are different. And you taught me how to stand up for myself, even if that means I stand alone.

I’m writing to you because I’m letting myself out of the closet: I don’t support gay marriage. But it might not be for the reasons that you think.

Children Need a Mother and Father
It’s not because you’re gay. I love you, so much. It’s because of the nature of the same-sex relationship itself.

Growing up, and even into my 20s, I supported and advocated for gay marriage. It’s only with some time and distance from my childhood that I’m able to reflect on my experiences and recognize the long-term consequences that same-sex parenting had on me. And it’s only now, as I watch my children loving and being loved by their father each day, that I can see the beauty and wisdom in traditional marriage and parenting.

Same-sex marriage and parenting withholds either a mother or father from a child while telling him or her that it doesn’t matter. That it’s all the same. But it’s not. A lot of us, a lot of your kids, are hurting. My father’s absence created a huge hole in me, and I ached every day for a dad. I loved my mom’s partner, but another mom could never have replaced the father I lost.

I grew up surrounded by women who said they didn’t need or want a man. Yet, as a little girl, I so desperately wanted a daddy. It is a strange and confusing thing to walk around with this deep-down unquenchable ache for a father, for a man, in a community that says that men are unnecessary. There were times I felt so angry with my dad for not being there for me, and then times I felt angry with myself for even wanting a father to begin with. There are parts of me that still grieve over that loss today.

I’m not saying that you can’t be good parents. You can. I had one of the best. I’m also not saying that being raised by straight parents means everything will turn out okay. We know there are so many different ways that the family unit can break down and cause kids to suffer: divorce, abandonment, infidelity, abuse, death, etc. But by and large, the best and most successful family structure is one in which kids are being raised by both their mother and father.

Why Can’t Gay People’s Kids Be Honest?
Gay marriage doesn’t just redefine marriage, but also parenting. It promotes and normalizes a family structure that necessarily denies us something precious and foundational. It denies us something we need and long for, while at the same time tells us that we don’t need what we naturally crave. That we will be okay. But we’re not. We’re hurting.

Kids of divorced parents are allowed to say, “Hey, mom and dad, I love you, but the divorce crushed me and has been so hard. It shattered my trust and made me feel like it was my fault. It is so hard living in two different houses.” Kids of adoption are allowed to say, “Hey, adoptive parents, I love you. But this is really hard for me. I suffer because my relationship with my first parents was broken. I’m confused and I miss them even though I’ve never met them.”

But children of same-sex parents haven’t been given the same voice. It’s not just me. There are so many of us. Many of us are too scared to speak up and tell you about our hurt and pain, because for whatever reason it feels like you’re not listening. That you don’t want to hear. If we say we are hurting because we were raised by same-sex parents, we are either ignored or labeled a hater.

This isn’t about hate at all. I know you understand the pain of a label that doesn’t fit and the pain of a label that is used to malign or silence you. And I know that you really have been hated and that you really have been hurt. I was there, at the marches, when they held up signs that said, “God hates fags” and “AIDS cures homosexuality.” I cried and turned hot with anger right there in the street with you. But that’s not me. That’s not us.

I know this is a hard conversation. But we need to talk about it. If anyone can talk about hard things, it’s us. You taught me that.

Heather Barwick was raised by her mother and her mother's same-sex partner. She is a former gay-marriage advocate turned children's rights activist. She is a wife and mother of four rambunctious kids.