First Amendment Rights Endangered
Search anywhere you choose on the internet for news of Jimmy Kimmel’s cancelllation by ABC. He joins Steve Colbert as victims of those in power in Washington who believe firmly in free speech only if what is said agrees with the President and those he appoints, often with the approval of a supine Congress, fearful of primary challenges from the right.
When Tucker Carlson and Heather Cox Richardson seem to agree with one another, it is time to distrust the President and his actions in regard to the First Amendment. Check her comments dated September 18 at https://heathercoxrichardson.substack.com/
JL
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How Originalism Killed the Constitution
A radical legal philosophy has undermined the process of constitutional evolution, and Harvard Professor Jill Lepore has written about it in the Atlantic. The writers of the Constitution went to great pains to keep it from being a static document but one that would be adaptable to change through a very demanding amendment process.
Not doing that would mean sticking precisely to the Constitution’s language, a position known as ‘originalism.’ The chief modern advocate of this was the late Justice Antonin Scalia, who is responsible for an ‘originalist’ misreading of the Second Amendment causing thousands of deaths through the unregulated proliferation of weapons. More about that follows.
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| Justice Scalia - Is there blood on his hands? |
JL
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The Second Amendment Was Originally About Militias … But That Has Changed
A recipient of Jackspotpourri took my statement in the last posting that there were ‘no absolute political truths’ to amount to an endorsement of the ideas promulgated by the late Charlie Kirk.
Not so! My statement included that such ideas should be dealt with in a non-violent manner.
This may be the wrong time to point out that Kirk regularly excused the very same sort of violence that tragically ended his life, but it cannot be denied that in 2023, in supporting the Second Amendment, he is quoted as having said “It’s worth it to have a cost of, unfortunately, some gun deaths every single year so that we can have the Second Amendment.” Words matter.
Kirk believed the Second Amendment was there to guarantee individuals the right to gun ownership for self-protection as well as being a defense against government tyranny, rather than its clearly stated purpose in its original first thirteen words, enabling States to have armed recruits available to serve in their militias.
Although this reduction of the Second Amendment to just its final fourteen words was approved by the Supreme Court in 2008 in D.C. vs Heller, I believe that is not what the Founding Fathers intended it to mean, or at least what it was for 219 years until 2008 when a politicized Supreme Court first decided that it was acceptable to ignore the Amendment’s first thirteen words (underlined below) in that decision.
(The Second Amendment, in its entirety reads as follows: ’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.’)
The late Justice Antonin Scalia’s tortured opinion, in effect cancelling the Amendment's first thirteen words, remains the basis for many laws regarding weapons today and has contributed to gun violence, allowing a proliferation of weapons in this country, and thousands of deaths.
It is my hope that a future SCOTUS decision will return the Second Amendment to what it was about: arming State militias, the predecessors of today’s State National Guard units, something that is now a function of the Federal government and no longer a concern of individual ‘free States.’
That leaves the final fourteen words of the Second Amendment standing alone, a right that no one ever challenged, and never needed to be nor intended to be amended into the Constitution by the Founding Fathers, but which is now standing alone there preventing reasonable local ordinances concerning guns from being passed. (That was what D.C. vs Heller was about.)
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If my statement regarding there being ‘no absolute political truths’ was inaccurate, it was in that it did not mention that actually there are some self-evident absolute political truths that most Americans recognize, and these are that ‘all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.’ This is made clear in the Declaration of Independence and made into law in the Constitution. These words will outlive the present occupant of the White House.
Meanwhile, we should join in recognizing that the acceptance of gun violence by some as an acceptable tool to advance their ideas is inexcusable, and that no American should ever be denied their First Amendment rights by bullets or other acts of violence, nor by words of condemnation by government officials.
JL
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Here Be Dragons
When ancient mapmakers reached the limits of what was then human knowledge, they simply labeled such areas with the notation ‘Here Be Dragons.’ Professor Barbara Walter (San Diego State – Univ. of California) so labels her periodic journeys into the unknown where indeed, there may be dragons or similar dangers awaiting us.
Her September 15 column appears below:
Why the Killing of Charlie Kirk Feels Different
It's a New Phase of Instability – Barbara F. Walter
Sept. 15, 2025
“I’m posting a bit earlier this week. This felt too urgent to hold back.
Wednesday was the kind of day that rattles you. My phone lit up. My inbox filled. Emails came from every major outlet in the United States, from London, Sydney, Berlin. I even got an email from People magazine. Everyone wanted to know the same thing: was America sliding into political violence, even civil war?
Something about this moment - the murder of Charlie Kirk - feels different. More dangerous.
It wasn’t like this after the attempted assassination of Donald Trump in July 2024. It wasn’t like this after Gabby Giffords was shot, or Steve Scalise, or Melissa and Mark Hortman. Those were shocking, tragic events. But the Kirk assassination has put the country on edge in a new way. The question is why.
I think there are three reasons.
1. Our Leaders are Reacting Differently.
After high-profile attacks in the past, leaders across the political spectrum almost always responded the same way: they condemned the violence, urged calm, and asked Americans to come together. This time was different. Elon Musk declared, “The Left is the party of murder.” Laura Loomer demanded the government “crack down on the Left… no mercy.” Stephen Miller called on conservatives to “dedicate ourselves to defeating the evil that stole Charlie from this world.” Eric Trump described the assassination as having “awoken that sleeping giant of American conservatism.” Donald Trump called it a “dark moment for America,” saying it was proof that conservatives are under siege.
In other words, the immediate response wasn’t about unity. It was mobilization. For the first time, mainstream MAGA voices turned a political killing into a rallying cry. And rhetoric matters. Political scientists have shown that when elites use violent or threatening language - especially when it comes from one’s own side - it increases public support for political violence. What shifted last week was the default script: no longer “thoughts and prayers,” but “prepare for battle.” That is a dangerous move.
2. Violence is No Longer One-sided.
For decades, far-right extremists - white supremacists, militias, anti-government radicals - have carried out the vast majority of lethal domestic terrorism in the United States. They still account for most of it. But in recent years, violence from the far-left has begun to rise. We don’t yet know what motivated Tyler Robinson, or whether he was tied to either camp. But President Trump is already pointing to the murder as proof that the Left is surging in its violence and must be subdued.
That is exactly the wrong way to contain violence. Domestic terrorism is a lot easier to control when it comes primarily from one direction, as it has for most of the last twenty years. Once both sides believe the other is targeting them, escalation is much more likely. The scholarly literature is clear: reciprocal violence - when each camp sees the other as an existential threat - sets off cycles of retaliation that are extremely hard to stop especially when people feel they need to act in self-defense. By framing conservatives as victims under siege, Trump is priming his supporters for violence. This is new and provocative.
3. America’s Law Enforcement Leaders Aren’t What They Used to Be.
The contrast with the 1990s is stark. Back then, militias were multiplying across the U.S., feeding off anger at the federal government. The breaking point came in April 1995, when Timothy McVeigh bombed the federal building in Oklahoma City, killing 168 people, including 19 children. Two things followed. First, Americans were horrified. Recruitment into militias collapsed. What had seemed fringe but tolerable now looked monstrous. Second, the FBI acted decisively. They infiltrated groups, prosecuted leaders, and shut down networks. Within a few years, extremist militias were in retreat.
That kind of reversal would be almost impossible today. For three reasons. The first is cultural. Surveys now show that more Americans than ever believe political violence can be justified under certain conditions (if an election is stolen, if government overreaches, if their way of life is threatened). Support is no longer confined to the fringes. The second is technological. In 1995, McVeigh’s ideology spread through newsletters and gun shows. Today, extremists use YouTube, Telegram, and TikTok to radicalize millions in real time. And the third is political will. Donald Trump has no interest in curbing far-right extremism. On the contrary, he has excused it, encouraged it, and sometimes embraced it. Under his leadership, the FBI has been stripped of independence and expertise, its senior ranks filled with loyalists rather than professionals. Even if it wanted to act, the bureau no longer has the capacity to replicate its success of the 1990s.
That is the difference between then and now. In the 1990s, Americans recoiled and institutions responded. Today, Americans are more polarized, extremists are more connected, and government is more compromised. That makes the threat of more violence bigger and harder to contain.
Why this matters: Taken together, these three shifts explain why the Kirk assassination feels like a turning point. It is. The danger isn’t only the killing itself. It’s what might come after: political leaders fanning the flames, violence becoming genuinely reciprocal, institutions too weak or unwilling to step in. We can’t undo the violence, but we can decide whether it becomes the spark for escalation or the wake-up call to pull together.
For a particular great podcast on this subject see Sarah Longwell’s interview with the wonderful Rachel Kleinfeld on The Bulwark. You can find it here: https://www.thebulwark.com/p/you-can-ramp-it-up-or-ramp-it-down.
'Here Be Dragons: Warning Signs from the Edges of Democracy' is free today. But if you enjoyed this post, you can tell 'Here Be Dragons: Warning Signs from the Edges of Democracy' that their writing is valuable by pledging a future subscription. You won't be charged unless they enable payments.”
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Accessing the link with which Professor Walter concludes the above posting will make available to you links to the many, many, blogs, newsletters, and podcasts dealing with current events. Some are free to a limited extent. Most look for paying subscribers as well. They are tempting, but beware; you can spend the rest of your life reading them, forgetting about eating, or sleeping, etc..
JL
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Artificial Intelligence Alert
We all should be aware that Artificial Intelligence can impact almost everything in our economy and society that up until now depended on the knowledge and skills of individuals. How you engage in creating, making, selling, doing, teaching, etc., all functions that originate in your brain, will be significantly changed.
At first, ‘AI’ might seem to be an ally, a useful tool, but eventually your brain might no longer be necessary, nor possibly, even you. Think about it: all human knowledge available at the click of a keyboard to do whatever you and other individuals did yesterday all by themselves. And that includes selecting your government, your mate, and what to eat for breakfast today.
An article in the New York Times on September 15 suggested ways of approaching this. CLICK HERE or copy and paste https://www.nytimes.com/2025/09/16/technology/what-exactly-are-ai-companies-trying-to-build-heres-a-guide.html#:~:text=The%20Promise:%20An%20Everything%20Assistant,to%20its%20Alexa%20voice%20assistant. on your device’s browser line for the good (or bad) news.
JL
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Housekeeping on Jackspotpourri
Your comments on this ‘blog’ would be appreciated. My Email address is jacklippman18@gmail.com.
Forwarding Postings: Please forward this posting to anyone you think might benefit from reading it (Friends, relatives, enemies, etc.) If you want to send someone the blog, you can just tell them to check it out by visiting https://jackspotpourri.blogspot.com or you can provide a link to that address in your email to them.
There’s another, perhaps easier, method of forwarding it though! Google Blogspot, the platform on which Jackspotpourri is prepared, makes that possible. If you click on the tiny envelope with the arrow at the bottom of every posting, you will have the opportunity to list up to ten email addresses to which that blog posting will be forwarded, along with a brief comment from you. Each will receive a link to click on that will directly connect them to the blog. Either way will work, sending them the link to https://jackspotpourri.blogspot.com , or clicking on the envelope at the bottom of this posting.
Email Alerts: If you are NOT receiving emails from me alerting you each time there is a new posting on Jackspotpourri, just send me your email address and we’ll see that you do. And if you are forwarding a posting to someone, you might suggest that they do the same, so they will be similarly alerted. You can pass those email addresses to me by email at jacklippman18@gmail.com
More on the Sources of Information on Jackspotpourri: The sources of information used by Jackspotpourri include a delivered daily ‘paper’ newspaper (now becoming the South Florida Sun Sentinel) and what appears in my daily email. Be aware that when I open that email, I take these steps:
1. I quickly scan the sources of the dozen or two emails I still get each day at my old email address to see from where they are being sent. Most are from vendors which I may have used years ago. Without reading 99% of them, I usually immediately delete them.
2. I then go to the email arriving at jacklippman18@gmail.com. Gmail enables ‘Promotion’ emails to be so designated and separated out. I believe their criteria are whether or not they end up asking for donations or if they are no more than advertisements. I ignore most of these ‘Promotion’ emails without reading them, deleting them. A very few, perhaps one or two a day, get moved over to the two or three dozen other emails which I will actually open.
3. Then I read my email.
Besides email, my other source of information is the Google search engine (or other search engines) where I can look up any subject I want. Lately, these search results have been headed by a very generalized summary clearly labeled as being developed by AI (Artificial Intelligence). On occasion I might use such search results, but when I do, I will say that I am doing so. Generally, however, I try not to use such summaries in preparing Jackspotpourri.
After such ‘AI’ search results, there follows the other results of my search. Unlike the anonymous AI-generated summaries, the sources of these results are clearly indicated, giving them a greater credibility than the AI summary. I feel that It comes down to who YOU want to be in the driver’s seat in seeking information: yourself or something else (Artificial Intelligence), the structure of which somewhere along the way had to have been created by others, with whose identity I am neither familiar nor comfortable. At least when I read a column by Timothy Snyder, for example, I know from where it comes, and to some extent, what to expect.
Caution should be exercised in using Artificial Intelligence.
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