There is so much to unpack here. Basically, what the court says is that these families can sue Remington and it isn't a violation of PLCAA because Remington marketed the guns to civilians for criminal use, a violation of CUTPA. Personally, I want to hear the argument for this when it comes up in court, because I missed the advertising materials being sent out by Remington about how to kill kids with their rifles. 

Obviously, being allowed to sue doesn't guarantee a win. That has to be said. But we need to look at the really big picture here. 

A lot of folks are using the comparison that if this is allowed you should be allowed to sue car manufacturers if you get hit by a drunk driver, and people come out telling us they're two completely different items and shouldn't be compared. Take this exchange from Instagram:

Here's the problem with this entire argument and what everyone misses. It isn't about comparing guns to cars. I could write an entire article about how the argument about guns vs. cars is mute because of people and cars, but we're not going to do that today. 

Today we're going to talk about how a win against Remington would clear the path for you to sue car manufacturers over drunk drivers. No matter how you view the cars vs. guns debate. 

Our court system is run off of case law, which is basically a lawyer finds a bunch of cases similar to the one he is arguing to figure out if the case is winnable and to argue it in court. I just did this in a class where I argued an appeal for a man convicted of running a chop shop by arguing illegal search and seizure based off of case law of search and seizure cases for illegal marijuana farms. What the people in the cases were convicted of was completely different from what the person I was arguing for was convicted of. But the case law was relevant. 

If these families win against Remington, a crafty lawyer could use that case to argue other lawsuits, and they don't have to be about guns. Meaning...

Let's say your kid is driving home from college one night and is hit and killed by a drunk driver. You, as a grieving parent, decide you want justice, and the charges against the person who killed your kid just aren't enough. You want those deep pockets. So you hire a lawyer who stumbles upon this case in his research. The families accused Remington of marketing their product to the civilian population for criminal purpose, removing protections against that type of lawsuit. 

The guy who killed your kid was driving a privately owned pickup truck. The lawyer could sue the manufacturer for marketing that truck - which was designed as a work vehicle, not a personal mode of transportation - to the civilian population to drive themselves home from bars while drunk. 

The lawyer could sue the manufacturer of the alcohol he was drinking for marketing their product to be consumed for the purpose of getting intoxicated at an establishment other than your home, thus marketing it for criminal purposes when they "encouraged" the driver to drive drunk. 

And the lawyer could sue the bar itself for marketing themselves as an establishment outside the home where you could get drunk, thus encouraging the driver to drive drunk, a violation of the law.

It doesn't matter how ridiculous you think that all is. It doesn't matter if you don't think the two cases have anything to do with each other. It doesn't matter if you think the lawyer couldn't win with this as case law.

A good lawyer could work with it. And they will try. If one gets a win off of it, more case law has been established, thus almost guaranteeing a win for future cases like this. And more lawsuits will follow. Bars. Car manufacturers. Alcoholic beverage makers. And it will go beyond that. Drug companies. Cities. Counties. Anything would become fair game. 

And we have an influx of what would be frivolous lawsuits... but no longer are because of established case law. That's exactly how our court system works. 

So this case has a much larger possible impact than just second amendment issues. This could shake up the court system pretty hard. It could impact our economy as well. I highly suggest following this one as closely as possible, because the impact could be massive. 

You might not know this, but there was other news this week besides Kanye meeting with Trump at the White House. Let's have a look!

Apparently, Trump signed legislation to clean up millions of tons of garbage from the world's oceans. You'd think the environmentalists would be all over this. 

​Trump also signed a bill to help patients from overpaying for drugs. Where is everyone who is all about healthcare? 

Democrats agreed to confirm 15 judges this week, too!

Kuwait has all but stopped shipping oil to the US for the first time since the early 90s. 

California "accidentally" registered 1500 people to vote who were not eligible. 

Why am I telling you all of this cheery news, especially when we have a Newsroom at the website? 

Consider this your friendly reminder that when there is a huge story - no matter what it is - you need to start paying extra attention to what isn't being talked about. While the Kavanaugh debacle was going on, you should have been doing the same. There was a lot of stuff going on behind the scenes that wasn't getting the attention it should. This week was worse. We were all hyper focused on a story that was, ultimately, a non-issue. Kanye was at the White House. Well, so what? 

Always start looking harder when a story seems to take over the news. While they sit around screaming and yelling about tweets and celebrities, start looking for the real news that isn't getting reported or is being under reported. You'll always find something. And it will always be far more important than what they are trying to hyper focus us on.

If you have a cell phone, odds are you got a "presidential alert" today. Apparently, some people didn't get the alert, and then some of us got two of them. For those who didn't get one, here are the two I got:

It was really rather... mundane. And no, I didn't think anything of it. I certainly didn't begin today thinking I was going to be writing something up on it, but here we are! 

But according to the internet, the world is ending!

There are a lot more out there to be found, but these are just a nice little sampling so you can see what's going on. 

OK, so what actually is this alert system? Well, it's a national emergency alert system. Similar to the emergency alerts you get on the TV and the radio, this is another way to reach more people. Let's face it, a lot of folks are actually getting rid of their TVs or going to subscription internet services, and fewer people than ever are listening to the radio. But we've all got phones in our pockets, it seems. 

​No, Trump isn't going to be sending out mass tweets or contacting you about random stuff. It is an emergency alert system. 

And you've probably already dealt with it on a state level. 

Hey, Hurricane Florence just ravaged my state. We got real familiar with those emergency alerts during the duration of that, from actual hurricane warning alerts to tornado alerts to flash flooding alerts, we were getting the noise constantly. It's real nice of them to go off in the middle of the night to let you know there's a tornado barreling towards your house while your family is asleep. If I travel out of state, I get the alerts from there, too. It isn't a new system... it's just a national system now on top of your state one. It would be useful for things like, oh, I don't know... 9/11. 

And those state alerts have been going on for years. Literally, years. I even get Amber Alerts this way.

All of a sudden, it's Trump "raping us through technology." Or it is setting off PTSD (I can actually see this, and I'm sorry to hear that, but again... it isn't just the national alerts, you are most likely getting state alerts, too). Or... it's a pre-cursor to martial law?!

That screen shot is actually from the #walkaway discussion group. So the irrational freak out isn't coming from just one side. 

​Folks. Calm the hell down. The world isn't ending. Trump isn't harassing you. The Russians aren't coming for your soul. We aren't going into martial law. It's just an alert system being put into place for national emergencies so we can alert people to imminent threats. Things like North Korea lobbing missiles at us or a large terrorist attack or mass rioting. You'll be OK, I promise. 

​Yep. He's back in the news again. I'm not going to go off on a tangent about him, I have spoken about him before in video form. So I won't just repeat the same stuff over again. 

What I want to discuss is actually something I am noticing about the reactions to the ad from not only the people who disagree with him, but from the people who agree with him. 

As I stated in the video, I do not agree with the protests, but I recognize their right to do it. That can, in fact, be done. No, I don't believe any government entity should step in to stop the protests. Whether those protests continue or not is to be left up to the NFL only. I also don't think any tax payer dollars should be going towards building stadiums and all, but I digress. 

In return, the fans can support those protests or not in any way they see fit. If you support it, you can buy game tickets, gear, support advertisers, whatever. If you don't, college football exists. 

The same goes for Nike. They can have whoever they want as the face of their marketing campaign. And you can buy Nike or not. It was a strong marketing ploy, I can say that much. While their stocks have dropped, Nike is living rent free in everyone's heads. People have been talking about them for days. There are memes. There are so many memes. And all that advertising is free! The aim of marketing is to get name recognition, and that's being created for them. For those not in the know of the situation, Nike is now the first brand to come to mind because they have been getting it beaten into their heads for a while now. And you'd be shocked by how many people have no idea what's going on with Nike or even who Kaepernick is. 

While burning your gear may make you feel warm and fuzzy and might get people to visit your YouTube channel, it accomplishes nothing. You already paid for the gear... the only person you are hurting is yourself. Put USA flags over the logo and wear the gear. Just don't replace it with more Nike when the time comes. 

Now, for the people who wholeheartedly agree with Nike, Kaepernick, and the kneeling protests. 

As I stated, all these things are protected under our Constitution. Yes, they have the right to free speech. No the government should not get involved.

No, we aren't required to get behind it or keep our mouths shut because they have free speech rights.

So do we.

​That's the beauty of this country and our Constitution. Everyone has a right to free speech. All speech is protected. The 1st amendment doesn't protect the right to free speech, but...; it protects the right to free speech, period.

That means that people who don't agree with the protests or with Nike's spokesman choice have all the right in the country to voice their displeasure. They are allowed to stop supporting the NFL and Nike. They are allowed to make fun of Kaepernick. They are allowed to create memes until their screens explode. You may not like it, but too bad. It isn't only your rights that are protected, it is everyone's rights.

Obviously, you have a right to debate them, but debate in the USA died a long time ago. Once name calling begins, the debate is over, and that more often than not begins in the first sentence. I remember when I was in college the rule was that the first person to bring up Nazis lost the argument. Now Nazis are the entire argument, and it's still just as meaningless. But it has effectively killed discussion and debate in this country. 

Bottom line: the protesters have the right. Kaepernick has the right. Nike has the right. Those who approve of it all have the right. Those who disagree have the right. No matter how much either group hates it. No one is required to support anything or stay quiet about anything because of someone's rights... because that is a violation of their own rights. And no one's rights are more important than anyone else's. 

In the past week or so, a viral video has taken the internet by storm. Millions of people have viewed the video, the man in the video has been doing a tour of shows on TV, and it's been an extremely hot topic on every social media platform you can think of. 

But what does it mean for the USA? 

Well, as I said millions of people have seen the video. It has apparently made enough of an impact that a lot of liberals and liberal media outlets are now calling it a fake campaign by Russian bots. Once you are labelled a Russian bot in this day, you know you've made an impact. As of this writing, there are 89.316 members of the Facebook group, and that number is ever growing (by the time I hit publish on this article there will be hundreds more members). 

If you take into consideration that some of those people aren't walking away from anything and are just there to support the people who are, you can assume about 3/4 of the people, give or take, are people who are actually walking away. There are women, transgenders, homosexuals, African Americans, Hispanics, etc. all joining this thing and leaving their stories as to why they decided to walk away. 

​Still, the about 90,000 members isn't really a huge swath of people considering it is a political movement. So why is there such an impact? Why are people getting scared of this enough to start accusing the group of being run by Russian bots? 

​I think we need to walk back a little bit toward Kanye West. Don't take this the wrong way, I'm not taking away credit for this movement and giving it to Kanye. But if you think back towards that whole debacle, you'll remember the outrage over Kanye saying pro-Trump things and all his Hollywood elite friends were unfriending him and stuff... and he didn't apologize. He moved forward unapologetically. The heat cooled down eventually and he's really not in the news anymore. But he got away with "being a free thinker" without his career going down the drain. 

After that, the approval ratings for Trump among African Americans began to rise. Now, there's this growing movement being led by a gay man who is now all over TV and seemingly overnight became a very recognizable face. It is packed full of people the left thought they had a monopoly on. These are people they have been telling for years that the right despises and wants destroyed, people they tell that Trump was elected to rid us of. 

The movement is getting so much attention because it is challenging the minority monopoly. 

​A common theme I am reading in these testimonials - and I admit, I've read hundreds of them - is that these people were taught to believe that only the left cared about them and everyone else hated them, but now they are seeing that this isn't true. They are watching the left talk a lot without any action. They are watching non-citizens and criminals getting preferential treatment. Many had long time good friends who cut ties with them when they began to question the left. I am seeing a lot of those stories, many of them are heartbreaking. Decades long friendships ended immediately because of one questioning moment. They are watching the reactions to that one questioning moment and realizing in seconds a group of people who claim to be tolerant and supportive of them are suddenly not so much when they question anything... while the side who was supposed to hate them is answering their questions and not really caring who they are. 

Right now, Americans are tired of the division. Everything is racist. Everything is sexist. And it's getting tiring. I watched a news story tonight about a woman who was questioned while entering the pool of a housing development, and I listened as she and the reporters - both local and national - immediately decided it was because she was black and compared it to other incidents that have happened. Seriously, the local news reporter actually began the story by saying, "There's been a recent rise in the amount of white people calling the police on black people while they do every day things." I watched the video, and my response was "I need more information." I didn't pass off their claims of it being racially motivated, but I refused to immediately call the man racist. My complex has a pool. I don't use it much, but when I did, there were times I was asked for ID to prove I was a resident. Once I was actually escorted out because I hadn't brought my ID. So yes, I need more information.

But we don't do that anymore. The news is a race to report first, and apparently making sure you have the correct reports isn't necessary. Everything is motivated by hatred and there is no more supply of evidence or allowing the other person to have a side of the story. 

White people are constantly admonished for being racist, while also being told that we're born racist. OK, so you mean it can't be fixed? Then why are we trying? Trump has a supreme court pick coming up, and everyone is clutching their pearls because obviously abortion is going to be completely outlawed immediately and gay marriage rights are going to be taken away, leaving gay marriages non-valid. Anyone who wasn't born in the USA is obviously going to be deported immediately. Everything is a massive crisis, the world is constantly coming to an end, and only about .0000002% of things being reported are actually things that are true and/or are of major concern. 

We're watching as groups of "marginalized people" are lifting themselves up by tearing everyone else down. Women have to tear down men. Blacks have to tear down whites. Immigrants have to tear down birth citizens. Gays have to tear down straights. Transgenders have to tear down cis genders. No, we don't! You don't have to tear anyone down to lift yourself up! You gain actual equality by raising yourself and your community up, not by tearing everyone else down. And when you raise yourself up, the country is better for it. When you tear others down, we're more divided and less of a nation. 

90,000 people have realized this and are sick of it. 90,000 people aren't going to cause a revolution. They aren't going to cause a wave in elections. But they are a start. They are proof that we as Americans can come together and be just that - Americans. We need to get past labeling each other to death and just be one people. We need to learn about each other and stop taking someone else's word for it when they tell you what someone else is like. 90,000 people were a little surprised to find out that people who don't identify as left wing didn't hate them. Those 90,000 people are going to be the voices that let others know. And that scares the extreme left, because it threatens their monopoly. It creates free thinkers who don't need them to tell them how to feel about things anymore. And I hope it grows. This is the first sign of real 'hope and change" that I've seen in years. 

This week has been an eye opener for me. As I cruise around the internet, I'm seeing more and more opinion articles about a second civil war in the USA. Some claim it is coming, some say we're already fighting it, and some say within five years we'll be in an all out war with each other. And I'm not talking about fellow bloggers, I'm talking about mainstream news sources. 

And I get it, tensions are high. The USA is extremely divided, or at least appears to be. People are afraid to publicly voice opinions. Groups are using fascist techniques to stop what they believe are fascists, and that means riots and violence. Mass shootings. Wanton threats towards politicians and average citizens who speak out. People frustrated because they are being censored or prevented from speaking. People attacking each other at rallies. Accusations of phobes and ists. Friends and families torn apart because of political differences. Doxxing. Anxiety over things they think are going to happen immediately even with no evidence of it being incoming. 

Among all of it, I see people joking about who would win and why. People puffing their chests out and saying they hope for it. They're ready. Locked and loaded. Bring it on. We can end it fast. 

Am I the only person on Earth right now who doesn't want to see us come to a civil war? Am I the only one who doesn't think we're at the point yet where it should even be getting discussed? Can we discuss this like rational adults?

Let's take a look at what civil war would actually look like. All you need to do is pick up a book about the first civil war in the USA and take those lessons... then amplify them because technology has advanced so far. 

What would you do if there was a second shot heard 'round the world? Yes, yes, I know... you're locked and loaded. But if you were face to face with a family member who disagreed with you, could you pull the trigger? Would you be anywhere near as enthusiastic? No one knows how they would really react if it came to that. You can puff your chest all you want, but reality is different than your own mind. 

What would it do to the USA? Do you want the answer?

The odds are, a second civil war would end the USA. Completely and totally. Look at the state of our world right now. If we were busy fighting among ourselves, do you think someone else wouldn't move on in on us? Here comes a bigger problem, because here comes Russia. Or China. And that brings on a second war that would last longer, if we could get on our feet to even fight.

If no one else moved in and the war was fought to the end, our economy would be destroyed. We would need to rebuild more than buildings. The stock market. The technological infrastructure we so depend on. Foreign alliances. Our national debt would be 1000 times worse than it currently is. China would, at the very least, call in their debts, which alone would destroy us. 

We're still not over the first war, so how long do you think it would take to mend from a second? Basically, it wouldn't solve the problem, no matter who won in the end. The country would remain divided. People would be fighting it for generations even after it officially ended. The old tensions would still exist, and new ones would be brought into the fold. 

Look at our soldiers coming home from foreign wars. The injuries. The flag draped coffins. The PTSD. How bad do you think it would be when a civil war was over and you had to live the rest of your days remembering how you had to kill your own countrymen? And we're not using muskets anymore. Now we're using drones with hellfires, weapons on burst, C4, and God knows what else. And there will be video for you to watch over and over and over again. 

This is what you are puffing your chest about. This is what we're discussing openly in the mainstream media. This is what some people are hoping for. Something that should be such a last resort that we'll do almost anything to prevent it. 

But let's step out of speculation for a moment and discuss reality. Before you sit down and decide civil war is imminent, I want you to shut off your TV. I want you to go outside. Not to a rally. Not to a protest. Go out into normal, every day life. What do you see? Do you see people ready to kill each other? Do you see the divide we're being told is there? Are you running in to the same things in person that you run in to online? When you remove people from their screens and their large protective groups, what do you see? 

I see people who talk to each other and don't weigh the pros and cons of it based on gender, race, sexual preference or anything else. I see people going about their normal lives - going to work, planting gardens, walking their dogs. I don't hear people talking about how war is the only way to fix our country. No one is attacking people randomly on the street. The drama online and in the media isn't there. I see people volunteering at homeless shelters and standing in line to help after devastating weather events. I see the drama as being condensed into places and groups and being highlighted for views and advertising dollars. Even people who take part in them stop mostly after the groups disperse and they step away from their computers. 

We're not there yet. We're not ready to go to war with each other. We're not even close. Every generation deals with the same sort of crap for different reasons. We haven't gotten there before and we're not there now. And before we hope for it, we need to sit down and think about why. To defend the country you love? The way of life that you love? Because both of those things would be gone forever during and after a civil war. 

Loving the USA and being proud of her means you do whatever you have to to prevent an event like a civil war. Knowing when we're not there and when we are. Hoping we never get there. Opening your eyes and looking at the reality of life, not what the media tells you it is and not what it is online. If the time comes, so be it. But let's take our time getting to that bridge.  

So by now you know that Ronny Jackson - Trump's choice to take over the VA - has withdrawn his name from consideration amidst a deluge of accusations against him about drunk shenanigans, passing out prescription drugs like candy, smashing up a government car, etc. 

For those who don't know him, Ronny Jackson is the White House doctor and has been for three presidents. Prior to this, he was in the news for giving Trump a clean bill of health that the folks on the left refused to accept - big surprise - and after that was chosen by Trump as the nominee to run the VA. Once he was announced, the deluge began. 

As the title states, I have questions. These accusations are coming out non-stop right now and apparently took place over the course of a number of years. To be clear, I'm not saying he did or didn't do the things he was accused of. I just have some questions about it. 

Why was he allowed to continue on as the White House physician? If he was doing these things, shouldn't he have been considered a threat to the president? Even Pres. Obama had glowing things to say about him, and most of these things took place during his presidency. I think he would have known, right? And if he did them, why was he not escorted out of the White House? Banging on people's doors? Smashing up a government vehicle? A list of other drunken antics? Is this not a threat to the safety of the president? Why, then, did he survive all the way through Obama's presidency and into Trump's? 

I saw an article earlier about how he was "shielded by the anonymity of the White House." Horse manure. If the people inside the White House knew this stuff was going on, why was he allowed to continue on? One would think that even if the president somehow didn't know, the other staff in the White House did. If he's passing out prescription drugs like candy, he's putting the staff at risk of overdose, addiction, and many other things. If he was pretty much out of control when drunk, and drunk often, would that not be considered a security risk to the president and his family?! 

I'm sorry, something stinks. If he didn't do these things, then someone worked real hard to railroad him. And if he did do these things, someone really dropped the ball on keeping the president safe. This isn't just a case of Ronny Jackson being an idiot, it's a case of someone looking the other way. It isn't a joke. If he really did all of these things, he should have been unemployed a long time ago and someone else isn't doing their job. 

Yesterday, a young woman walked in to the YouTube headquarters and opened fire, injuring three people and then taking her own life. 

Everything played out as it always does. Cries for gun control began before she was done shooting. Speculation. Accusations. No one waited for facts. Bad information released. Pundits. Twitter rampages. Hashtags. Crying celebrities. Memes. 

But I listened to the reports coming out and realized something no one wants to talk about. She was the embodiment of everything everyone always says after these shootings. 

For years, smaller media personalities and pundits have been saying that the mass attention given to these shooters is breeding the next killer. We spend days - weeks in some cases - analyzing the lives of these shooters. Who were they? What were their political leanings? What was their reason? We want to know everything there is to know. And every slight bit of information that they get comes to us via our computers and TV screens. These shooters become household names within minutes. And they can be remembered for years to come. People who were small children for the Columbine shooting can still name the killers. Their parents are still interviewed on TV and have done TED Talks. 

The Parkland shooter is getting letters, money, and other "fan mail" from "supporters." Which blows our minds. But it really isn't that strange. People write fan mail to serial killers. Women go out of their way to marry serial killers who are in jail. Why?! And why - knowing this - does it surprise us that mass shooters get fan mail, too? 

The point is, these shooters are becoming famous. They are their own category of infamous, and thanks to the regular coverage, they are household names. Stars. 

Now look at the YouTube shooter. Why was she there? What was her main gripe?

YouTube policies. She felt she was being censored and stifled by the YouTube policies. She was once getting views - possibly for being weirdly creepy, but what does she care? - and then those views began to slip. She felt fame slipping away. No one was watching anymore. No one cared. 

A lot of people these days are clamoring for fame and recognition because they think life would be one big party if they were just famous. And they don't care why they are famous. Just look at social media. Look at some of the bigger celebrities out there. What, exactly, is Kim Kardashian famous for, anyway? What does being "Instagram famous" actually get you in life? You have 600k followers on Twitter? So what does that get you? 

But she was the embodiment of that. She wanted to be famous. And she didn't care how. She thought she had it... and then it began to slip away. How can she get it back? Well, the mass shooters get famous really fast. 

No, I really think her goal was fame. I believe she went into that building with a chip on her shoulder. I believe she was mentally unstable. You'd have to be, not only to carry out something like this but to be so obsessed with fame and so taken over by it. But I believe she saw what has been going on in the world, and realized a mass shooting of note would make her a household name. She'd be dead, but she'd be remembered forever. She'd be famous. Finally. 

And now she is. 

​Look. 98% of the YouTubers out there aren't getting much attention. Famous YouTubers are actually rare, but a good portion of the people who go onto that platform expect that, in less than a year, they'll be making a full time income off of their YouTube channel, and maybe within six months after that they'll be doing commercials on TV like Liza Koshy or they'll be TV stars like Logan Paul. People like Liza Koshy and Logan Paul are the exception, not the rule. But people don't get it. And a lot of them get upset when it doesn't pan out for them. And now someone has shot up YouTube over it. 

I have a YouTube channel. And I'll be honest. Not many people watch it. But I do it anyway because I enjoy it. This website doesn't get the traffic a lot of others do. But this is my outlet. This is where I blow off steam. I love writing and I love current events. This is, for me, a passion. And if people read what I write, that tickles me to death. If one person reads it, I'm thrilled. My YouTube channel isn't doing as well as my website. Actually, my videos do better when I upload them here then they do at YouTube. A lot better. But I keep making the videos because I really enjoy it. And what I get out of it is what I got out of it last night. I did a random live stream last night. It was not announced, I just plugged in and did it. A couple of people dropped in and joined me. A couple of those people stayed from a few seconds after I went live until I logged off an hour and twenty minutes later. We talked and we laughed and we had a great time. And I thoroughly enjoyed that live stream. It was so much fun. And two people sent me "super chats," meaning they actually sent money. I was, to put it mildly, amazed by that. I wasn't expecting it, and I didn't ask for it, and I'm still blown away by it 24 hours later. It was a total of $30, but I am blown away that people handed me their hard earned money because they enjoyed the stream, too. A few people told me they enjoyed my videos and my site and thought I needed to be heard on a larger scale. Those words put me on cloud nine. I honestly can't even begin to tell you how good that made me feel. 

The difference is, to me, this is a passion and a creative outlet. I don't expect fame out of it. I do it because I like it. I'm spending money on this website to make it run. But that's OK. I don't expect to be a big name in the political world. It's amazing to me that anyone reads or watches what I do. And when someone tells me they do and they enjoy it, it truly does put me in the clouds! At no point am I going to blame anyone else because I'm not making back what I am putting into it, or because I'm not a household name, or I don't have several million viewers on YouTube and I'm not making a living making videos. My reasons are different. 

We need to stop making bad guys famous. We need to stop making stupid people famous. We need to stop chasing fame at all cost. You do things like YouTube because you enjoy it, not to make a living or become famous. If you do, you are going to be disappointed. Do you know why people enjoyed that live stream last night? Because I was just there to have fun. I was bored. And it got silly, but was still informative. They were entertained. And I was entertained. 

You can take a picture of something without being in the picture. You can be on social media without it taking over your life. You can have hobbies you enjoy that make you no money. Not everyone has to like you. Your life can be full even if you aren't a household name. Your life can be dull or it can be a party all the time just by doing what you do. Nothing going on in your life - good or bad - is the fault of anyone but you. Fame isn't all it's cracked up to be, and sure as hell isn't forever. 

The media has an agenda. They aren't going to stop making mass shooters household names. They aren't going to stop parading out kids to tug at your heartstrings (and make them famous, too, which is also what they crave). Let's not help them.

I am joining the other smaller media outlets. I am not going to say the name or post the pictures of mass shooters anymore. I am also not going to discuss the puppets paraded out by the media who also crave fame at all costs unless they do something truly newsworthy. But as for the mass shooters and criminals, no more. No more names, no more pictures. I'll discuss the crimes and the legislation or suggested legislation that comes from their crimes, but their faces and names will not be uttered here anymore. I will showcase heroes. Only the good guys. I hope you will join me. It's time to stop making the bad guys famous. 

This is a wild ride. I know people are probably expecting me to talk about the March for Less Freedom in Washington, D.C. today, but I'm actually going to skip that. They have a Constitutional right to protest until they are blue in the face. I'm a little ticked off at the media coverage, since there are protests and rallies there every day and none of those get coverage, but this one needed nonstop coverage and live feeds, but whatever. Also, for those who still don't know... no, the kids didn't organize the protest like the media tells you. The Women's March did, and it isn't a hidden secret. It's on all their marketing information. 

What I do want to discuss is the Omnibus bill that Trump threatened to veto and then signed. It was a pork filled disaster that should have been set on fire on live TV before forcing them all back in a room to rewrite the damn thing. It isn't an official budget, because our government is apparently completely incapable of coming up with an actual budget. But it is also so fiscally irresponsible it should make everyone sick. 

At this point, no breaks. You keep your butts in Washington, D.C. until you get your damn job done, and done right. Then you can leave. And not a minute before. 

I've taken some polls here, on Instagram, on Twitter, and on Facebook. The results are pretty even on your thoughts, with "Trump has a plan" squeezing out a narrow win. 

Personally, I think he screwed up by signing this bill. And I'm not alone. I spend most of the day in my car for work, and listen to talk radio during the week. Rush and Hannity are split on it. But I know the callers calling in to talk to Rush were not at all happy. I listened to their grievances. I listened to the people who sent me messages. I listened to the people talking all around the internet. Hopes are not high right now. 

If Trump has a plan of some kind, he better make that plan real clear sometime soon, because it sounds to me like his base is deflating. There are plenty of people coming up with their own theories as to what he's doing here, but at the end of the day, the only person who knows what the hell Trump is doing is Trump. And not being a diehard like some other folks, I am having a tough time rationalizing the signing of this thing when he could have fought for the American people instead. Seriously, we're going to fund border walls in other countries but not the one on our own border? We're funding overseas scholarships and women police? Why are we doing this? We're going $1.3 trillion deeper into debt to fund stuff in other countries while thumbing noses at the American people. We can't balance a budget. We refuse to listen to the suggestions on real ways to actually balance the budget. We're now poking China while we're in debt to them up to our ears. It should be real fun when China decides to call in their debt! And yes, they can. And yes, we'll be screwed.

The midterms are fast approaching, with most predictions being a blue wave. Yes, I know all the excuses about how the 2016 polls were wrong and all that good stuff. The fact is, polls are usually a pretty good predictor. Obviously they don't always work. But they do a lot of the time. Because people have decided polls are suddenly always wrong, the base is already not feeling powered enough to go out and vote because obviously we're going to win regardless of polls, so why bother. A lot of folks, myself included, are trying to get the base to get up and vote in the midterms because now isn't the time for complacency. But this omnibus may have made our jobs harder. 

People feel betrayed. No, not everyone. I can already see the angry comments. But a lot of folks are, in fact, feeling betrayed. How fired up are those people going to be about voting in the midterms? These are the folks who are looking at the republicans and figuring they are just going to give the dems whatever they want anyway, so what? And they're right. Our Senate and Congress are full of spineless amoebas. They scream and nod about rights and fiscal responsibility and then we get something like this omnibus. The libertarians are laughing and saying, "See? You should have voted 3rd party and should in the midterms!" But the fact is that the libertarians aren't on the ballot in most states, so no, they aren't going to win jack. They certainly aren't going to take Senate and Congress, and frankly, they wouldn't know what to do with it if they did! They can't stop fighting among themselves over their platform long enough. 

The right is in real trouble in November. In a perfect world, anyone currently holding office - and I don't care a drip who they are - would be voted out onto their butts and replaced with fresh new faces. It would be nice if average people who actually have to live with this crap were able to run for office so we could replace these pieces of trash with them. Every single person in office right now should be losing their jobs at the next election. Primary out every single one of them. Term limits should be put in place immediately. And from here out, government is no longer a career choice. You serve your term and get the hell out so you have to live with what you did like the rest of us! 

But it isn't going to happen because average people can't afford to run, the parties don't support new people, and we love to complain about our politicians so much we keep voting them back in so we can keep complaining. 

At this point, if you haven't realized your politicians - dems or repubs - don't give a single flip about you, you are a lost cause. They are there for themselves. They will blow smoke up your rear all day long to get you to vote for them, and then do whatever they want. And we'll complain. But we'll vote them right back in again. We won't hold their feet to the fire. And they know it. 

Stop making excuses for them. The omnibus was just another bad bill that got signed when it shouldn't have been. You can have as many long explanations as you want to. The fact is - we don't know what any of these people are thinking. Not really. And we're going to pay the price. The others are sitting back asking what the point is. And because the base is now deflating and the joy and confidence has been wiped out of so many, there very well may be a blue wave in November. It won't fix anything. It will make it worse. It will make it a lot worse. Nothing will get done. The dems will ramp up attempts at impeachment until Nancy Pelosi is the president or the people get so sick of it they don't vote in 2020, either (which is actually the goal). And we'll sit here scratching our heads asking what happened. We'll have a wasted two years to sit through when nothing gets done at all, we'll continue being wasteful, and we'll sit here day after day watching them poke each other in the eye without actually doing any work. Sounds like fun. 

I'm tired and I'm frustrated, and I know a lot of other people are, too. Something has to change. At some point, we need to stop letting our politicians crap on us. We need every single one of them out of office. We need to break the cycle of voting in one party and then the next and then back again, because nothing changes that way. Clear them all out in the primaries and get fresh faces in there. If we could do that, it would cost less to run for office and real people might get a shot at it. Wouldn't that be nice? Maybe we could actually get something done. But we need to stand up as a country and do this together. We need to get brave, we need to swarm to the polling places on primary day, and we need to vote these idiots out of office. Get your own name on the ballot for the primaries. And vote for anyone other than an incumbent or other old face. Clear them all out, one and all. 

Like a good portion of you, I am having a tough time supporting the kids walking out. And it isn't just because they are marching against the Constitution and their own freedoms and that what they are protesting for is something I am fully against. I'm not sure these kids have any idea what they are protesting. Yes, I am sure some of them do. But a good majority of them don't. And from what I have seen, knowing what you are protesting isn't something the schools are freely encouraging the kids to do. 

These kids are being fed. I'm sure they have opinions. I'm also sure they aren't getting both sides of the story. How many of them know the statistics for school shootings? The real ones put out by organizations who clearly define mass shootings and other crimes and keep track of them, not the padded numbers offered by the media. How many know the gun laws? The actual gun laws. How many know what representatives in their state to contact? Who was the protest aimed at? What, exactly, is an AR-15? What does "semi-automatic" mean? What is the difference between an AR-15 and an M-16? What independent research have they done without a parent or teacher over their shoulder? You all have smart phones, check it out while you're on the toilet. 

I'm going to assume not much personal research was done, otherwise this young lady would have realized that shirt wasn't appropriate for an anti-gun march, considering how prevalent that is in pro-gun culture. Like, you really can't do any opposition research without finding that term. 

The other reason I believe these kids are protesting based only on their parents and teachers' thoughts is because of the overuse of buzzwords and phrases. The above sign for example. Every anti-gun protest has that exact same sign. "Common sense gun control." "Gun show loophole." "I don't want to ban all guns, but..." "I'm pro second amendment, but..." The list goes on. The signs were the same generic signs at every gun control event. This is not the sign of independent thought. This is a sign of being showed one side of the story and argument. 

The same goes for the kids who were pro-gun. "Guns don't kill people, people kill people" is not an original thought. It's another over used phrase that, while true, was fed to a teenager. 

However. It goes beyond that. In NC, students were basically forced to participate in the walk out because all the teachers were participating and no students could be in the classrooms alone. Therefore, all the students had to be where the teachers were. 

A young man in Ohio was suspended from school because he wanted to be a-political. He basically didn't want to take a side, and going outside for the walkout was support for gun control, but going to the common area was supporting gun rights. Instead of providing a place for kids to stay who didn't want to take sides for whatever reason, they tried to force them to take sides. 

​This is not a protest. When kids are not being presented both sides of the argument, are being suspended for not taking sides, and are being escorted away for having an opinion against gun control, that isn't a protest or students expressing themselves. That is forced dissent. These kids are being forced to protest something they don't even understand fully. 

The proper way to do this would be to encourage the kids to study both sides. Teach them how to think, not what to think. Do a report on both sides. Do a report supporting one side or arguing against one side. Heck, when I was in high school we had a public speaking team, and one of the categories you could do was called the "Lincoln-Douglas Debate." You gave the kids a topic and told them what side they were arguing - it didn't matter what side they agreed with - they were given time to research the topic, and then they debated each other on the topic. In a learning situation, you could get the kids to argue in favor of the side they disagreed with. What better way to learn about the opposing side then to defend it in a debate with intent to win! It forces the kids to learn about both sides of the issue, they all get to listen to different points of view, and they get to learn how to do an actual debate on top of it all! Win-win! 

But this is the overall issue I have with kids leading the fight. Yes, people listen to kids because of emotion and how hard it tugs their heart strings, and the leftist politicians do love to parade around children even though they really don't give a crud about them past their own agenda, the same as they feel about everyone else. It's power over all. But the reality of it is pretty cold. No, we shouldn't be listening to kids. Do they have a right to protest? Of course. They are citizens, too, and have the same rights as anyone else. But like celebrities, their opinions hold no more weight than anyone else's.  Less, even. Kids are not being taught how to think. They aren't being taught to study both sides of an issue and to form an honest opinion. They aren't being taught to sift through the crap to find the facts. They are being told what to think. They are being given lines and buzzwords and chant like sayings for standard signs and are being pushed in front of cameras to parrot it all back at us, because we feel things for kids. And we were all there. At some point, you believed what your parents believed. Then you believed the opposite of what they believed because that was being rebellious. And then you had life experiences and began doing your own research and really looking into issues and you began to form your own opinions. You stopped caring about being accepted by your peers or making mom and dad proud. Some of your opinions stayed the same, but many changed. Right now, though, these kids are in their teen years. They want to make their peers accept them and they want mom and dad to be proud. They don't want to argue with their parents or stand too far out from the crowd. They don't want to be the weird kid no one talks to and who people whisper about as they walk down the halls. They don't want to be like the school shooters, the weird kids no one bothered with. 

So yes, I believe the kids should be allowed to protest. But I also believe we need to get back to teaching our kids how to think and stop telling them what to think. We need to encourage our kids to learn about a topic before diving into it. And I think we need to stop making national spectacles out of our kids for an agenda they don't fully understand. Let your kids be kids. Let them grow up and get some life experience. Let them learn and be carefree. Those carefree years go by so fast. They don't understand yet that the world isn't a safe place. They want it to be, we all do, but it isn't. But most of all, allow them to become who they are meant to become, not what you force them to be. 

And let's be fair. If the protests are allowed for one, they must be allowed for all, and the schools aren't prepared for that. Kids will find something to protest every day if it gets them out of class. But stop teaching them an agenda.