Quick Read

A masked figure shushes silence

Redefined “tolerance” in Foster-Glocester is the marker of civil rights lost.

By Justin Katz | June 13, 2022 |

The totalitarian Communist language of administrators in the Foster-Glocester school district is reason for concern about the direction in which our country is headed: Several students at Ponaganset High School brought “anti-tolerant” flags to school following a celebration of Pride Month. In an emailed statement to The Journal, district leaders said there had been an…

A wind farm at sea

Hey, don’t worry! It’s only an energy sector “transition.”

By Justin Katz | June 7, 2022 |

You can tell our country’s radicals — from Joe Biden on down — are going for the kill this time because they aren’t moderating on energy, even as gas prices shoot up and inflation decimates the wellbeing of Americans.  Instead, they talk about how it’s simply a “transition.”  Note the phrasing of progressive Democrat State…

Van Gough's Prisoners Exercising

The gun-controllers’ dehumanizing talking point proves the importance of the Second Amendment.

By Justin Katz | June 4, 2022 |

The day of the school shooting in Ulvade, Joe Biden took to his national platform to blame people who disagree him about the Second Amendment and the practical steps to stop mass shootings: “When in God’s name are we going to stand up to the gun lobby?” That talking point has filtered down throughout the…

Bill Bartholomew GenZ boot tweet

Bartholomew’s role in RI media feels like an early hint of the Cultural Revolution.

By Justin Katz | June 2, 2022 |

For the elimination of doubt, I don’t mean to evoke Americans’ historic appreciation of the concept of revolution.  I mean to warn of the actual possibility of something like this: Some 1.5 million people were killed during the Cultural Revolution, and millions of others suffered imprisonment, seizure of property, torture or general humiliation. The dark…

A joint in a dirty hand.

As with guns, the culture is important to consider when it comes to marijuana.

By Justin Katz | June 1, 2022 |

The issues of gun regulation and marijuana legalization have an interesting overlap, even as they head in opposite directions. To increase regulation of the former, advocates insist that we focus on the implements used for harm (the guns) and eschew — sometimes with great vehemence and insult to those who disagree — the notion that…

Image of Police Line tape.

Ulvade exposed a contradiction in our policy compromises around gun regulation.

By Justin Katz | June 1, 2022 |

Policy arguments driven by emotion will often have incoherent gaps in their logic, and the Ulvade shooting exposes a big one. Emotional people tend to focus on the most-dramatic element in a scene, which in this case is the shooter, and the solution appears to them to be removal of the gun.  The problem is…

Tidewater Landing design

Is anybody surprised the cost of the soccer stadium is going up?

By Justin Katz | May 31, 2022 |

When government officials allow a business to shift its risks onto taxpayers, the people can never be certain about how the costs will be “unexpectedly” driven up, but news like this is a near certainty: The cost of building a professional soccer stadium in Pawtucket has risen to $124 million, the city said Friday, $40 million…

Colors in a bubble

The flag of inclusion operates in an inverted way.

By Justin Katz | May 27, 2022 |

When I returned to college in 1996, after two years of difficult, low-paying labor, I pledged a fraternity, and one of the brothers asked another pledge and me to remove a triangle rainbow sticker that somebody had slapped on the rear bumper of his truck. I had to ask what the sticker meant, and the…

A child on a country road.

The impulse to turn every incident into a political question is unhealthy.

By Justin Katz | May 25, 2022 |

Especially when done with calculation for political gain. When our nation experiences another school shooting, advocates — right up to the White House, at this point — refuse to give us so much as a day to process the emotions and gather information.  They insist that they have the solutions, that they’re easy and obvious,…

Rudolf von Alt's Library of the Palais Lankorovnski

To Brown’s Ross Cheit, Republicans can’t simply participate in society.

By Justin Katz | May 24, 2022 |

Over the course of a day, readers of Twitter brush off many such tweets, but in this case, the writer is Ross Cheit, a political science professor at Brown University who was, until recently, the chairman of the state Ethics Commission: I imagine that anything that a GOP operative has in their possession can also…