Comments

1. On March 11, 2016 at 12:35 am, Fred said:

   I’ve heard similar threats from the left. This is why I say that the .gov will find no shortage people willing to take property and life for it’s glory. If you have a plan where you work 10 acres and live partially from hunting and stored food, forget it.The evil of “isms” don’t let people do that. Government kills people who try and takes their stuff, for the greater good, of course. Like Mr. Herschel says, ‘all government seeks more power, always’.

2. On March 11, 2016 at 9:27 pm, gyrwan said:

   I do have such a plan. It’s called “Plan A”. There is also a “Plan B”.
   (and God help the man who forces me to to adopt “Plan C”)

3. On March 11, 2016 at 7:29 am, Scrapple said:

   Dude, you are unhinged.

4. On March 11, 2016 at 11:09 am, UNCLEELMO said:

   He (empirical101) doesn’t realize it, but he’s fallen into the Obama-Alinsky trap (to pit American against American).

5. On March 11, 2016 at 7:33 am, Scrapple said:

   I can’t believe how many people are completely losing their minds this election season. People need to take a step back.

   Post something inflammatory on the Internet…don’t be surprised when someone replies with something equally as nutty.

6. On March 11, 2016 at 7:37 am, Frank_in_Spokane said:

   “Nutty” isn’t the same thing as “inflammatory.” (Just sayin’ … )

7. On March 11, 2016 at 9:45 am, Herschel Smith said:

   Oh good. I have a Trump supporter. This will be instructive. So I posted something “inflammatory.” You’re using that word, but I’m not sure you know what it means. I merely said that no one could persuade me, no matter what they did, to vote for Trump, pointing to a moral commitment of mine, not a person. My prose was directed generally at the audience, discussing something to which I am committed.

   How is that “inflammatory?” Be precise and specific. Explain.

   You said “something equally as nutty.” I stipulated that no one can persuade me to vote for someone, while the detractor threatened enslavement.

   (1) Voting, and (2) threat of enslavement. How are the two “equal?” Be precise and specific. Explain.

8. On March 11, 2016 at 10:11 am, Fred said:

   Come on Herschel, it’s gonna be “yuge” well, “tremendous” really to “make America great again.” Can’t you understand these astute policy positions and plans that will obviously be, once put in place, the result of careful and lawful consideration and implementation. I don’t understand your objection. Grin!

9. On March 11, 2016 at 10:37 am, Scrapple said:

   It was a confrontational post. I just think it’s silly when you acted surprised that some internet commando replied with his crazy talk.

10. On March 11, 2016 at 10:45 am, Herschel Smith said:

    How is it confrontational to say that nothing anyone can do will persuade me to vote for someone? I think of confrontational as calling people names, hurling insults, etc. (i.e., something derogatory directed at someone).

    I’m not surprised at all. This is happening all over the interwebz.

11. On March 11, 2016 at 11:25 am, Frank_in_Spokane said:

    Brownshirts.

    Brownshirts everywhere.

12. On March 11, 2016 at 11:40 am, Scrapple said:

    Heading back to my safespace now.

13. On March 12, 2016 at 12:11 pm, Ned Weatherby said:

    Herschel – check out Scrapple’s statement “Heading back to my safespace now.”

    Apparently Scrapple is a special little snowflake, and thus, what you wrote was inflammatory to him or her.

14. On March 11, 2016 at 8:56 am, Damocles said:

    Chump has more in common with the progressive statists than any conservative, he is cut from the same cloth. He acts just like them. If he is the nominee, the GOP will be over. The party is already dead. “We are fettered to a corpse”~Paul Von Hindenburg

15. On March 11, 2016 at 12:29 pm, Billy Mullins said:

    It’s too bad that asshat deleted all but the first line of his post. I would love to have had the chance to answer his paragraph regarding Social Security. We didn’t get a raise this year and I’m not expecting one next year.

16. On March 11, 2016 at 1:17 pm, Frank_in_Spokane said:

    You can still do so (respond to his deleted comments, that is). Just cite him from here — but don’t TELL him it was from here!

    It just might embarrass him and/or give him a case of the Whiskey Tango Foxtrots, knock some wind out of Mr. Toughguy’s sails.

17. On March 11, 2016 at 1:20 pm, Jack Crabb said:

    Color me skeptical, but I find it hard to believe that one could serve in the military during these modern times and be that illiterate.

18. On March 11, 2016 at 3:03 pm, Chris said:

    It really does not matter at this point. Trump is going to be the nominee
    and probably the next POTUS. So far he is the only candidate that answers
    a question asked of him. He is not politically correct and both the democrats
    and RINO’s hate him. That is reason enough to vote for him.

19. On March 11, 2016 at 3:17 pm, Herschel Smith said:

    He likely will be the nominee. But all of this matters a great deal. I see my vote differently, perhaps. My right to vote was earned by blood, lost treasure and wealth, and even sons who perished on the field of battle with the tyrant’s soldiers (King George). God expects me to use it wisely and with the utmost of moral diligence, just like he expects me to spend my wealth (what little I have) wisely. I tithe because of that.
    Thus will I honor God in my voting practices, and whether it redounds to anything important in the grand scheme of things politically is not my business. It is in the hands of a sovereign God.

    As to whether Trump will win, that is a more complicated issue. The Hillary email scandal might be problematic, but assuming that it isn’t, it will be difficult for Trump. Of the 5000 people I was with in Greenville, S.C. at the rally just before the primary, I would venture to say – based on signs being held, conversations, listening to discussions in the long line we were in – that very few of them will vote for Trump. They won’t vote for Hillary, they’ll just stay home. There are many hundreds of thousands like them all across the nation.

    I’ll go to the polls to overthrow my awful Senator if I can (Burr), but I won’t vote for president. My vote is earned, and the years of giving it away for nothing to the least bad candidate are long over for me. I repent of that practice.

    For those like me who don’t vote for president, i.e., conservative Christians, Trump will have to replace us with liberals in order to win. In order to do that, he will have to run to the middle as soon as possible. If he does that, he is likely to alienate many of the folks who enabled him to win the primary.

    Trump’s problems are just beginning.

20. On March 11, 2016 at 7:59 pm, Lisa Smiley said:

    Very good, Herschel. I suspect a lot of Christians may stay home or write in their candidate if Trump does become the nominee. I pray not!

    I wonder if these late endorsements for Ted Cruz will make any difference… I’ve lost so much respect for Carson today.

21. On March 11, 2016 at 3:49 pm, eskyman said:

    Thanks for the heads-up, Herschel. I’m a Trump supporter, and I’ve now removed the bookmark for your site from my browser.

    I certainly hope we don’t get saddled with Hillary due to the intransigence shown by you and some others, but if we do then I hope you take full credit for that result!

22. On March 11, 2016 at 4:05 pm, Herschel Smith said:

    “Intransigence.” Is that what you call trying to bind another man’s conscience, and not succeeding in my case?

    Listen man, you go where you wish, read what you wish, and don’t do that where you wish. We all have to make our moral choices. But if you think I’m going to violate my conscience in order to keep a reader, you should never have been stopping by here anyway.

    Edit: A single person can’t take the credit for anything. You give me too much credit and power. I’m a small blog, very small. Trump is a very rich man. He doesn’t need me.

23. On March 11, 2016 at 10:02 pm, gyrwan said:

    Herschel, I appreciate, but am surprised by, your responding to some of such commenters. You are a man of great patience and equanimity. I couldn’t do it.

    I have long since sworn off voting; so, I have separated myself to a great degree from election-season-hysteria. For reasons clear and unclear, Trump’s candidacy seems to have caused many to become unhinged … both Pro-Trump and Anti-Trump. I have to say, however, that I have never seen such super-aggressive zealotry for so little (if any) identifiable rational reason, as has been evidenced by some Trump supporters (e.g. “empirical101”). Mostly, though, what I have seen is more along the lines of “Scrapple”, above; which is a sort of “Bizarro”-Leftist argument where the greatest casualty — apart from reason — is the English language (e.g. “confrontational”). Though, I’m not positive that “Scrapple” wasn’t just messing with you.

    More recently, I have also seen a third thing from Trump advocates; and this comment by Eskyman exemplifies it. I have heard before the argument that Eskyman makes. I have heard it for the better part of 20 years, though I know it pre-dates me. It is the argument that is made every four years, like clockwork, without fail, without any modification or alteration except for its object, … by THE REPUBLICAN ESTABLISHMENT for their anointed establishment pick. It is, by a very large degree, the most vile argument in all of politics.

    ===========================

    It appears at this point that the most likely outcome of this 2016 election season will be a President Trump.

    I daresay that, should that likelihood prove out, Eskyman will feel no obligation to abide by his own admonition and “take full credit for that result!”

    The traditional GOP establishment never has, and I imagine that this newly-minted, politically-miscegenated, Trump-stablishment won’t be any different.

24. On March 11, 2016 at 10:10 pm, gyrwan said:

    “It is, by a very large degree, the most vile argument in all of politics.”

    In fact it is this argument, and this argument alone that has trapped Americans in a two-faced, single party system voting year after year for the lesser of two evils as people become convinced that voting for an actual good is somehow equivalent to, or worse than, choosing the greater of two evils …. and so, …. roughly half of them inevitably do.

    And the window inches ever evil-ward.

    Thanks, Esky

25. On March 11, 2016 at 4:26 pm, Fred said:

    Really! You will no longer frequent a thoughtful, honest, and insightful website over it’s politics? I guess men may no longer disagree and hold each other in esteem. Sad.

26. On March 12, 2016 at 7:25 am, Frank Clarke said:

    We have, at long last, arrived at the spot where it is no longer possible to distinguish Republican evil from Democratic evil. We are like the ass of fable, equidistant from two identical piles of evil (yes, his piles were of food) and unable to move lest we choose wrongly. The people who have led us here are those who have consistently chosen “the lesser of two evils”, encouraging that “lesser” evil while others encouraged THEIR lesser evil.

    And their solution to the present problem of being presented with two equally evil choices? Let’s do it again, but bigger and better! But this time, vote for MY dictator-of-choice — or else.

    A plague on all their houses.

27. On March 11, 2016 at 3:51 pm, Dennis said:

    All cultures have at some time or another used abortion to control birth. Animals do it spontaneously because they have not been deprived of their contact and connection to nature.

    The Native people did it, the Celts and almost all of the cultures. Jesus even says that when the time comes for the cleansing pray that you do not give suck….

    That being said wanton destruction of life because you cannot control your urges and don’t have the sense to control insemination otherwise is not a condition to kill a life. How do I balance this… not so well.

    Perhaps the Supreme Court did it correctly. Oliver Wendell Holmes:

    Buck v. Bell, 274 U.S. 200 (1927), is a decision of the United States Supreme Court, written by Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr., in which the Court ruled that a state statute permitting compulsory sterilization of the unfit, including the intellectually disabled, “for the protection and health of the state” did not violate the Due Process clause of the Fourteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution. The decision was largely seen as an endorsement of negative eugenics—the attempt to improve the human race by eliminating “defectives” from the gene pool. The Supreme Court has never expressly overturned Buck v. Bell.
    With all the many having children and not being able to support them and that being an destabilizing element in our country, easily manipulate people, it is a concern. The drain upon society is underestimated In any stretch of the imagination.
    While I do condone the taking of an innocent life, see the Common Law for the definition of Murder-also the Biblical Thou shalt not kill is actually Thou shalt not murder if you consult the original Hebrew-I do not contemplate being over run by people who cannot take care of themselves much less children. Forced preventive measures would be a solution.
    Is this moral…. without a doubt. Its is immoral to push this upon people who are not even closely related and the admonition of Jesus himself supports the concept, “Those who do not work, let them not eat.” Even the Old Testament mirrors this. Allowing orphans and widows to glean from your fields is a way of seeing that they work for their food. It is a law of nature that is also conveyed in spoiling the child by sparing the rod. Enough is enough… generation of welfare people is absurd and it merely grow minions for the hand out generation. If it were not for the working people these people would not exist. They are the fodder of communism.
    Like it or not sir, there is to be an accounting. How it is arrived at is one we as a people need to work out with God’s direction not some perverse doctrine, I agree. But allowing it to remain because the perversion of the Word has been made to appear that such a thing is mandated, burrowing that head deeply in the sand, is a major reason for our predicament we are in today.
    Praying for your enemy dose not mean lying down to let them trample you. Jesus had a mission. It was his cross to bear. He told the young man in the new scriptures to pick up your cross and follow me, bear your own karma and follow my example. Jesus was not the non violent person we have all been duped into believing by a wayward clergy, ask the Money Changers. He believed we should be able to defend ourselves in commanding some to obtain swords. The entire mess was predicated by the Harlot of Rome and remains in the Protestant Doctrine to this day. At some point in time we will wake up but perhaps not until we are doomed by our own mind and slave to a “Tradition of Men” that is false. Some of the Framers were called Deists because they knew the truth and the general population were wholly unaware. I think ti is to each and everyone of to see and hear the messages from Heaven ourselves so that we are all sons and daughters of the Most High God. We cannot do that by following perverse doctrines that do not follow the message of the Scriptures of the Old Testament. They were the only scriptures in existence when it was written in Timothy. Jesus admonished us to follow the Law-not the perversion of the Pharisees-in Matthew 5:17-20 until the Heaven and Earth pass away.
    What I have just said is going to challenge some realities. So be it. It is not my job to drag you kicking and screaming all the way, I simply have to show you that there is cause for concern and of the in continuities between the Word and man conceived doctrine. This was the chief complaint of Jesus toward the practice of the Pharisees and quite frankly the short fall of the Israelites during their whole history.
    My question is why in God’s Holy Name do we keep doing it. “Let no man deceive you.” Seems pretty danged clear to me. But it is like most people who have no concept of the what the Constitution actually means. Here is an example of what I am talking about.
    People believe the politicians and the courts even though their rationalization are completely counter to the actual words of the Constitution.
    I guess taking personal responsibility for yourself and yours is quite beyond some folks ability… Maybe it is like the Israelites, they keep desiring a king to preside over them, See I Samuel 8. Instead of being responsible for themselves, they elected to have some one tell them because Samuel’s sons were perverting the Law. When that happened the People were supposed to do judgment. It is the same in a Republic.
    We won’t so here we are again.

28. On March 11, 2016 at 4:02 pm, Herschel Smith said:

    You are actually trying to make a Biblical case for abortion. Good grief! I never thought I’d see that. The case against abortion, infanticide and eugenics is so comprehensive, so complete and so clear that it should not have to be reiterated. But if you wish, we could take this discussion offline.

    For the record, I expect this sort of thing (i.e., trying to find justification where there is none for Trump’s positions) to increase as the time approaches to vote.

29. On March 11, 2016 at 9:51 pm, Dennis said:

    Sir: I do not contend that the Bible suggests abortion. I have never found it in the Book myself. I have found it in many cultures and know that aborting in case of dire need was a practice of many ancient cultures. Because the Book is silent does not mean that it is not allowed in God’s eyes. There are many things not written in the Book and some things intentionally left out. The Book of Jasher is mentioned twice, one in Kings and once in Chronicles, still can’t find it. The b book of Enoch is also absent although referenced.
    What I say is, there are some things we are faced with as humans. We do have guidance in the Bible but it also tells us to go to God with difficult issues. Surely the difficult issues faced by the patriarchs was written down for us. They were not written down for them. They had to navigate through uncertainty and constraints that we are not privy to. We navigate through difficulties not imagined by them. All I am saying is we need to have a greater perspective than limiting us to constraints that are frozen and not even contemplated.
    My best response is James 1:5. Only God can answer some things. That is the source. Imagining that it is in a Book that has obviously been tampered with is limiting God and was the greatest sin of Israel. Even the Book says this.
    God Bless

30. On March 11, 2016 at 10:04 pm, Herschel Smith said:

    Sir, thank you for your thoughts, but the Holy Scriptures are absolutely, positively NOT silent on the issue of abortion.

    I see that in the future one of my articles needs to veer away from gun rights and focus on abortion. Only for one article. – and then it’ll be back to gun rights.

31. On March 11, 2016 at 10:08 pm, Dennis said:

    Thank you Herschel, I appreciate your comments as always.
    Regards

32. On March 11, 2016 at 10:05 pm, Haywood Jablome said:

    Still fighting the good fight with the Trumpbots, Herschel? God bless you. I just cannot do it!

33. On March 11, 2016 at 10:12 pm, Dennis said:

    Wow, Herschel was a gentleman about a difference of opinion and willing to discuss and exchange information.
    I guess reasonable does not exist in your vocabulary. Attacking the speaker is an absolute logical fallacy… Ad Hominem. Look it up and exercise your brain some, I think it is dying…

34. On March 11, 2016 at 10:45 pm, gyrwan said:

    Attacking the speaker, as you call it, is not an absolute logical fallacy. There are no absolute logical fallacies. “Ad Hominem” is not what you seem to think it is. It is not any insult or aspersion. It is also not any “attack on a speaker”.

    An ad hominem argument is an argument. Haywood made no argument. He merely stated his opinions.

    What is an ad hominem argument, however, is the last sentence of your comment. It is an actual ad hominem argument, as well as being what you falsely believe to be an “ad hominem” (to wit, an “attack on the speaker”).

    Moreover, your ad hominem argument is used to bolster a conclusion that no one is contending, in order to give your own personal attack the semblance of logic and reason when it has none, and is therefore also fallacious begging of the question.

    Ultimately, you back up your contention that Haywood is “attacking
    the speaker”, by attacking Haywood. Seems like solid reasoning.(/sarc)

    One can’t (though clearly you’re going to try your darnedest) fake logic. Merely googling a list of common logical fallacies, grabbing the moniker of the “fallacy” you think most applicable, and flinging it around like a wrecking ball is…. not …. logic. Nor is it reason.

    To properly pinpoint a logical fallacy requires more than a reference to a nicely latinate name for that fallacy. You must understand why it is logically fallacious; under what circumstances an argument is fallacious; and — here’s the important part — under what circumstances is it NOT fallacious even though it appears at first blush to match the brief definition given when you googled “logical fallacies” or “ad hominem”.

35. On March 12, 2016 at 8:16 am, Dennis said:

    Pretty good but there is no rational basis for his comment. It is one of minimizing the speaker or discrediting the speaker by using a derogative term that an audience identifies with.
    So here, working back, we have an appeal to popular sentiment-that which is popularly accepted in the instant audience-using a term that is demeaning without any logical connection to any factual information to support the use of the term… I had no idea that someone would fail to see that there is no evidence at all to suggest that I support Donald Trump. In that manner the Fallacy is absolute.
    I like you circular reasoning, however. Nice try but you come back to the point of I called a logical fallacy without supporting premises. I thought it quite obvious, didn’t know I was going to have to prove the proposition with truth tables. If X then Y. Not X, therefore not Y if you prefer if then statements….
    In closing I used his medicine on him… That usually garners an response, glad someone did it gets the air clear.
    So in response to you, if you have no proof of your allegation best not hurl rocks in a glass house. Remember the defense for slander and defamation is the truth. Dufus has no defense. Your circular reasoning is not logical yet you call me down for abusing a call of Fallacy???
    Really!

36. On March 12, 2016 at 8:59 am, Dennis said:

    Also try going from specific to general. You presentments are very general and you use them to attempt to support a specific point of my using a call of attack upon the speaker. Your construct is not deductive but inductive and is much weaker, the truth of the premises does not guarantee the truth of the conclusion.
    You actually do the very thing you accuse me of… how quaint. Guess I have to call Pot and Kettle on that one.
    Thanks for the exercise. I do enjoy an intelligent discussions. I am afraid your friend responded in the exact manner I thought he would. Sorry he may not have been worth the saving, but well played my friend. I don’t think he was up to the banter.
    Cheers

37. On March 12, 2016 at 8:41 am, Haywood Jablome said:

    Go drink your Kool Aid.

38. On March 12, 2016 at 8:48 am, Dennis said:

    There is a God. You responded exactly as I thought you would, couldn’t resist the bait could you.
    You have done wonders for my opinion of human kind. O’l gyrwan up their couldn’t wait to come to your defense. Dang he is on the same ship and I think it is the Titanic.
    You both have a good day and I hope you make it to liberation in this life.
    God Bless

39. On March 12, 2016 at 8:53 am, Haywood Jablome said:

    Nope. Couldn’t resist. You are smarter than me. Got me!

40. On March 12, 2016 at 8:55 am, Haywood Jablome said:

    I really want to be superior like you and Trump. Please tell me how? I wanna be like YOU!

41. On March 12, 2016 at 9:08 am, Dennis said:

    Friend, I was just serving you the same taste I got. You assumed that I am a Trump supporter and thus the Trumpbot comment. I was engaged with Herschel in a discussion. It has been something that I have been dealing with and trying to resolve with the limits of my knowledge, For you to chime in with an obvious derogatory comment following our discussion was, shall we say, accusatory. If that was not your intention a more civil response may have been forthcoming. No one like to be demeaned. Obviously you do not either.
    So that being said may we gather what we have learned and agree that sometimes what first appears is not always so???
    I hope we can reconcile our differences, life is too short and there are so many that want to see conflict or inflict conflict in everything. It seems that Peace sometimes is illusive and as fragile as glass.
    Here is hoping that we can make up but kissing is right out of the question :)

    God Bless

42. On March 11, 2016 at 4:10 pm, Joshua Forrest said:

    I feel like you have read my mind! I feel the exact same way about voting for Drumpf.

43. On March 11, 2016 at 8:00 pm, Lisa Smiley said:

    Thank you for the shout out and the kind words, Herschel!

44. On March 11, 2016 at 10:05 pm, Herschel Smith said:

    You’re most certainly welcome Ms. Smiley. I’m glad you visited my humble blog.

45. On March 11, 2016 at 8:42 pm, Haywood Jablome said:

    Weird. “Winner” and “articulate” never entered my mind while reading that guys respose.

46. On March 11, 2016 at 8:54 pm, TimeHasCome said:

    There is a great quote in the book “When Money Dies ” depicting Weimar Germany 1923 . It states the central German banks had manipulated the economy so badly that ” Everyone was Angry and Nobody Knew Why” . Today everyone is angry and it shows up everywhere.

47. On March 14, 2016 at 4:32 pm, Gregory_K_Sloat said:

    OK, I get it. Herschel and Mike do not like Trump. That’s fine. However, I don’t hear anything about a candidate who IS worthy of our vote. It can’t be Kasich or Rubio. These two are long-ago bought and paid for by their overlords. It can’t even be Cruz. I can’t get past his Goldman Sachs connection or the fact that he met with Kissinger. There’s more, but this is already going to be too long. So, WHO (whom)?

    As far as the GOP goes, it’s been controlled by the GOPe for longer than most of us are willing to any further endure. It is NOT the party of Goldwater. It is NOT the party of Ron Paul. Most of these traitors wouldn’t know “conservative” if it bit them in the hind end. Our country (the world, really) is being run by a criminal trifecta composed of Big Government, Big Business, and Big Media, and the individual and liberty be damned. So, there are a lot of us who, if not eagerly, are at least looking forward to wresting control of the GOP away from the globalists in charge of it. The fact that THEY are willing to destroy the party rather than allow it to be restored as a home for the keeper of liberty’s flame should speak volumes.

    Now, it’s true that if we’re looking for a political “savior” to turn this all around, we’re going to be sorely disappointed. Having a strong anti-establishment candidate, though, might (JUST might) slow the downward spiral to where we are forced into a more kinetic option. So, I put forth the question one more time. Which candidate IS worthy of our vote and support?

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