DOUBLE JEOPARDY = Damned if you Do or Don't!!

When “Free for the Picking” Became “Please Present Your Documentation” There was a time in Florida when a person looking across a field of saw palmetto bushes might have seen exactly what it appeared to be: a lot of bushes with a lot of berries. Back then, if law enforcement discovered you in a field of saw palmettos, you might at most, get trespassed. But get caught in an orange grove or be caught with oranges you picked, back then and currently, you could be facing a third degree felony. But saw palmetto berries, priced back then at about 20 cents a pound, were not a priority for law enforcement. Today, Florida sees something else....a regulated commercial commodity. And depending upon where you pick, whose land you're standing on, whether your paperwork matches that particular property, and what happens to the berries afterward, that innocent-looking berry can become the centerpiece of a criminal investigation. Welcome to Florida's newest seasonal cottage industry: Illegal P...

As I get closer to senility in my 60's, I've found myself thinking about something that never really interested me back in high school civics class...Politics. More specifically...Why do Democrats and Republicans seem to dislike each other so much? Growing up, there were always disagreements between the parties. Republicans blamed Democrats. Democrats blamed Republicans. Elections came and went. But it never seemed quite like it does today. Today, politics often resembles less of a disagreement over policy and more of a decades-long family feud worthy of the Hatfields and McCoys—except with television cameras, social media, and enough campaign emails to fill several lifetimes. That curiosity led me back to the writings of one of America's Founding Fathers...James Madison. And what I discovered surprised me.... Wait... Are We a Democracy? For years I've heard politicians proudly proclaim: "We're a democracy." We've heard about protecting democracy...Exp...

Serious reporting with a smirk — because when a Bill being put in front of the Florida Legislature proposes putting together a task force to analyze Florida citizens “ patterns of life ,” the punchline may be a bit overdue. Florida lawmakers have proposed creating a permanent, statewide counterintelligence machine inside Florida Department of Law Enforcement — pushed in the House by Danny Alvarez ( HB 945 ) and mirrored in the Senate by Jonathan Martin (SB 1712).  The bills would stand up a unit designed to detect and “neutralize” threats from what the text calls “ adversary intelligence entities ,” with powers that stretch from analyzing patterns of life to making arrests.  Here’s the short version of what the legislation would do, and why civil-liberties groups are not exactly RSVP-ing “yes” to the launch party. What the bills propose (plain English) • Mission & placement: Create a Statewide Counterintelligence and Counterterrorism Unit inside FDLE to address forei...

By a Trump Supporter Who Believes Loyalty and Honesty Are Not Opposites... Let me tell you who I am before I tell you what I think — because in today’s political climate, context is everything. I voted for Donald Trump . Twice. And I would do it again. I watched crime rates fall in my community after his immigration policies took hold. I watched my retirement account grow under his economic stewardship. I watched him move the American embassy to Jerusalem , broker the Abraham Accords , and take on a political establishment that had been failing working Americans for decades. I believe in his vision of an America that puts its own citizens first. I believe the mainstream media spent years trying to destroy a man they feared rather than covering a man they disagreed with. And I believe the Russia collusion narrative — built around a politically funded dossier and later exposed as deeply compromised by official investigations — was one of the most consequential political controversi...