SB560: This bill would allow a person operating a vehicle that is “approached and surrounded by a person or persons engaged in unlawful activity who has blocked the road” to use lethal force in their attempt to escape. The bill is clearly a response to the wave of Black Lives Matter protests last summer, many […]
Author: Justin Klopfer
Legislative Digest
SB159: This bill authored by Democrat Jason Lowe would prevent life sentences without parole and mandatory minimum sentences of over 20 years to any individual under the age of 18 at the time of the corresponding criminal offense. To condemn someone to a lifetime of imprisonment for an action committed before their brain was finished […]
Trump and social media fueled new wave of nihilism
It’s no secret that the American right wing has taken a drastic step to the right in recent years. The obvious cause of this is the election of Trump and his particular brand of politics. He has fueled a new worldview for conservatives, offering a moral crusade against the satanic deep state in response to […]
Legislative Digest
SB 676: This bill authored by Warren Hamilton (R) concerns “gender reassignment medical treatment.” If passed, this kind of treatment would be illegal to receive for anyone under the age of 21. People who receive it at this age or doctors who provide it would be subject to prison sentences of at least three years. […]
Gamestop short squeeze fueled by hollow activism
From Jan. 12 to Jan. 27, Gamestop’s stock price rose from about $20 to a high of $483. The spike was driven by a massive short squeeze. Many Wall Street hedge funds had shorted Gamestop, meaning they thought it would fall in valuation over time. When the price began to rise, they had to buy […]
Legislative Digest
SB 223, 224 and 225: This collection of bills was authored by Nathan Dahm, who is ranked as the most conservative Senator in Oklahoma. The bills would prevent mandatory vaccinations and mask mandates, as well as make contact tracing purely voluntary. These bills were also written with a declaration of emergency for the “preservation of […]
A $15 minimum wage is necessary to respond to COVID
As he begins his presidential tenure, Joe Biden’s main focus is helping Americans through the ongoing COVID-19 crisis. One of the ways Biden has begun this process is by increasing the minimum hourly wage for federal contractors to $15. Biden has also expressed support for increasing the national minimum wage to this amount for all […]
Trump’s pardons of Blackwater mercenaries reveal unaccountability
Trump’s lame duck period was surprisingly calm policy-wise, with no large disruptions to the status quo of his administration. The now-ousted president did, however, unleash a series of final pardons for various Americans. Much of the news coverage around these pardons have focused on figures close to the Trump administration like Roger Stone and Stephen […]
Trump presented no real shift to Republican Party — it will not change after him.
The coming four years present an interesting situation for the Republican Party. Trump will no longer hold power as president, but the Republicans will likely still have control of the Senate and will certainly have implicit control of the Supreme Court. Many are wondering if the Republicans’ strategy will return to a pre-Trump form with […]
Democrats will never sweep an election without deep perspective change.
Not all votes have been counted as I write this, but it looks like Joe Biden will be elected the next president of the United States. This result came after days of tense ballot-counting in some of the same swing states that Hillary Clinton lost in 2016. Joe Biden’s victory is a good thing, but […]