August 11, 2026

Deliberative Democracy: A Way to Increase Civic Participation

April 25, 2011 by

The Problem: Dropping Civic Participation We live in a democracy that faces decreasing participation on a dramatic scale.   In many respects, because of our republican form of government, the only real opportunity we have to engage in public decision-making is during periodic elections. With so little control and distanced from the decision-making process, from […]

Filed Under: Political Thought Tagged With: , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

The answer to why Americans are OK with more spending

January 27, 2011 by

Yesterday, just before the State of the Union speech, I had an insightful conversation with a family member. This person is taking his first class in political science, something like a Polisci 101 class. He called me to ask some questions for an assignment he was working on. “What does ‘non-security, discretionary spending’ mean,” he […]

Filed Under: Laws and Lawmakers, Politics Tagged With: , , , , , , , , , , , ,

Amazon wins one for the 1st Amendment

October 26, 2010 by

For those out there who trust government too much, I present to you a case of government bureaucracy gone too far, as well as the lawsuit that said “no.” A few months back, I took note of a case wherein North Carolina was trying to force Amazon to give up records in order to collect […]

Filed Under: First Amendment Tagged With: , , , , , ,

The legal challenges to the health care bill

March 24, 2010 by

Apparently, there is some question about the legality of the bill recently (as in yesterday) signed into law by President Obama.  I’ve already discussed the questionable procedures used to pass it in the House.  But what about the bill itself?  Is it legal?  Is it constitutional? Let me just say at the outset that rational […]

Filed Under: Constitutional Law, Government, SCOTUS Tagged With: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,
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