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Among neighboring states, Mississippi is the only one that has not passed a resolution to call for a Convention of the States under Article V of the U.S. Constitution. That’s something organizers from the Convention of the States organization seek to change.

Senate Concurrent Resolution 596, if passed, would make Mississippi the 14th state legislature to pass a resolution asking for an Article V Convention of the States.

Article V gives state legislatures the power to call a convention to propose amendments to the Constitution. It takes 34 states to call the convention and 38 to ratify any proposed amendment.

Lt. Col. Allen West (ret.) paid a visit to the state capitol as part of the conservative grassroots group Convention of States Action last week to encourage legislators to approve the resolution.

“The brilliance and prescience of our founding fathers, they knew if they didn’t have those righteous men and women serving in the federal government that the balance would get out of skew,” West said. “They made sure that those powers that aren’t enumerated to the federal government are retained by the states and by the people. That’s why they put Article V in there.”

The amendments brought in this convention would place fiscal restraints on Congress and mandate term limits for both representatives and senators. Any amendments passed in such a convention would require at least approval of two thirds of the nation’s state legislatures to become law.

The nation has more than $22 trillion in debt and another $122 trillion in unfunded liabilities for Medicaid and other entitlements. Mark Meckler, president of Convention of States Action, says that a constitutional amendment that forces fiscal responsibility on the federal government is needed to address this issue.

“Nobody’s even talking about debt and deficits and that is eventually going to crush our country,” said Mark Meckler. “We can impose a balanced budget amendment on the federal government and force them to live like your state and other states that live within their means.

He also said that the federal government needs to utilize generally-accepted accounting practices.

“I call it the unicorn and rainbow system. It is fantasy and you’d go to jail if you accounted that way,” Meckler said. “We could put in tax caps, spending caps, all kinds of things you can do to rein them in.”

Meckler said that criticism of a possible runaway convention was unfounded since only those specific amendments that would limit the power of the federal government would be addressed.

The states that have approved similar Article V resolutions include: Georgia, Florida, Alaska, Alabama, Tennessee, Indiana, Oklahoma, Louisiana, Texas, Missouri, North Dakota, Arizona and Arkansas.

Mississippi lawmakers have tried to pass a similar resolution in previous years.

A similar resolution passed the House 76-42 last year and it died in the Senate without making it out of committee.

Three resolutions that would have called for an Article V convention died in the 2017 session and three more perished in the 2016 session as well.

President Donald Trump announced over the weekend that he will soon be signing an executive order requiring colleges and universities to support free speech in exchange for federal funding.

Trump made the announcement to an audience of conservative activists at the annual Conservative Political Action Conference gathering outside of Washington, D.C.

“We reject oppressive speech codes, censorship, political correctness, and every other attempt by the hard left to stop people from challenging ridiculous and dangerous ideas. These ideas are dangerous,” Trump said. “Instead, we believe in free speech. Including online and including on campus.”

Campus free speech have been born out of recent examples of speakers being disinvited because of campus protests, the creation of small “free speech zones,” and/ or restrictive speech codes.

Legislation has been moving at the state level for several years, and to date 10 states have adopted some form of campus free speech protections. This includes two of Mississippi’s neighbors, Louisiana and Tennessee.

Similar legislation was introduced in both the House and the Senate, but both of those bills died early in the session without a vote.

Still, such legislation is widely popular in Mississippi. According to new polling from Mason-Dixon Polling & Strategy, 83 percent of Mississippi voters support a law that “would protect speech for all college students, even if others disagree with their point of view.”

This law has broad public support in every corner of the state. Seventy-eight percent of Democrats, 88 percent of Republicans, and 80 percent of independents support the law.

The United States Senate blocked the Born-Alive Abortion Survivors Protection Act on Monday. All but three Senate Democrats voted against the measure, preventing its passage with 53 in favor and 44 opposed. The Act needed 60 votes to proceed.

The bill would have punished doctors who failed to provide medical care to infants accidently born alive in failed abortion attempts. Late term abortions are committed in at least 7 states across America. Recently, New York became one of the most radical pro-abortion states in the US.

Upon learning of this legislation, many wonder what is so controversial about protecting the lives of babies born alive in a medical setting.

Senate Democrats and the abortion lobby contend that the Act is simply a ploy to shame women seeking third trimester abortions. President of the Planned Parenthood Federation of America, Leana Wen, said in her statement, “This legislation is based on lies and a misinformation campaign, aimed at shaming women and criminalizing doctors for a practice that doesn’t exist in medicine or reality.”

For people like Melissa Ohden and Gianna Jessen, surviving failed abortion attempts is a reality. In Melissa’s case, she was left to die by medical staff and only spared because of the actions of kind NICU nurses. Recently, Virginia Gov. Ralph Northam advocated for babies accidently born alive to be “kept comfortable” while they await their death. To be clear, babies left to die after failed abortions die of starvation, cold body temperatures, and oxygen deprivation.

Doctors who violate the Hippocratic Oath by not caring for born alive babies must be held accountable. As the left argues that infanticide is already illegal, they seem to be confusing themselves on whether or not leaving babies to die is infanticide or not. Bill author Sen. Ben Sasse (R-Neb.) argues that we need to make the penalty for this circumstance that doesoccur in reality abundantly clear for the medical community.

Sen. Patty Murray (D-Wash.) called the proposed legislation “clearly anti-doctor, anti-woman and anti-family.” If outlining the punishment for neglecting infants born alive is anti-doctor, anti-woman, and anti-family, America should buckle its bootstraps in preparation for more horrific and backwards abortion legislation.

The truth is, many on the left do not value any unwanted human being if it can be called reproductive rights and gleaned for political points. Sen. Mazie Hirono (D-HI) exposes their actual thought process for blocking the act: “…Women, in consultation with their families and doctors, are in the best position to determine their best course of care.” Sen. Jeanne Shaheen (D- NH) claimed the legislation “would interfere with the doctor–patient relationship and impose new obstacles to a woman’s constitutionally protected right to make her own decisions about her reproductive health.”

Their statements have pointed out that they actually do approve of post-birth infanticide if it is “neatly” decided between a woman and her doctor.

Dressing up infanticide with political buzzwords and phrases doesn’t change what it is—a doctor’s approval and aid in facilitating the death of a newborn child.

Hate is back in style but that’s no thanks to those who extol it. Those making their living from it are the ones truly prospering.

The conservative viewpoint on hate is that it is morally wrong to endorse any ideology that seeks to deprive an individual of his or her God-given right to life and liberty. And just as this extends to Neo-Nazis, it also extends to those who advocate for the deprivation of rights for anyone who presents ideas which oppose their own.

Liberals, progressive academics, and much of the mainstream media see this quite differently. When you understand how much of their wealth, power, and influence comes from a monopoly on outrage, it should come as no surprise.

American liberalism now abides by three principles. The first, if you do not demand groups which oppose progressivism be dismantled by the state or vigilantes granted special privilege by the state, you are complicit. Next, if you do not see people who hate as enemies of the state, only to be dispelled by force either provided by the state or vigilantes granted special privilege by the state, you are an enabler. Finally, if you do not participate in the crowdsourcing of outrage culture, which provides the foundation of the Hatred Industrial Complex, you are racist/homophobic/xenophobic/sexist and bigoted. Because the list of names a liberty-minded conservative can be called grows daily, I’m sure I missed a few.

Any violation of these three principles can lead you to be named as part of the irredeemable class, ineligible to work or live in this society. And this is true regardless of your ideology. After decades of educating academics who go on to train the permanent class of bureaucrats in government, progressives have finally gotten what they have longed for. No, not a world without hate, but a cultural super weapon which can be deployed to destroy anyone who challenges their power.

Progressive ideology cannot exist in a world based on the equality granted through objective judgements of character. It can only exist in a world where the permanent government class and the academics have the power to force their ideological opponents into submission. On the rare occasion the super weapon fails, progressives can quietly encourage people to stage inauthentic crimes of a bigoted nature to force through policies by crowdsourcing online outrage or through the vast network granted to them by political professionals and their allies in much of the national media.

The list of manufactured outrage from social stagecraft is long and distinguished.  From actor Jussie Smollett’s recently staged homophobic attack to Jackie Coakley’s erroneous report that a University of Virginia chapter of Phi Kappa Psi engaged in her gang rape during initiation rites to Nick Sandamann’s media crucifixion for smiling,  and to Justice Brett Kavanaugh’s attempted show trail, the left’s Kabuki theatre game is strong.

But, do you remember the 2014 racist incident at Oberlin College in which the faculty were fully aware the events were staged by students so that they could force through diversity programs? What about the arson of an African American church defaced with pro-Trump graffiti in Greenville, which turned out to have been perpetrated by one of the members? Don’t forget about the Episcopal church in Indiana, which was defaced in a false flag attempt. These serve as a few of the hundreds, or perhaps thousands, of examples of fake stories distributed by mainstream media to invoke outrage. In most cases, the invalidated stories were later quietly disregarded because the truth does not matter to people who seek to control our opinions and viewpoints.

Each of these “false flag” incidents under the guise of defeating hate, was carried out as an effort to make liberty-minded conservatives in America guilty by association.

The people in the Hatred Industrial Complex, whether members of mainstream media, academic progressives, or government careerist, despise the things you and I hold dear. They’re disgusted that you love your country or your spouse. They resent your respect for foundational ideas like natural rights and a constitution written to preserve those principals. They hate that you and I believe in God and have the temerity to associate with others who value religious liberty. The people in the HIC believe they know best and they aren’t interested in hearing your dissent, especially if it emanates from a rural town or a red state.  Unless you agree that America is a fundamentally unjust place with only victims and victimizers, we must spend trillions to save the planet from climate catastrophe, and capitalism is the root of all evil, you’re seen as an obstacle to progressive utopia. What exactly does this utopia look like? I’m not sure but I know it’s a place where the HIC can keep lining their pockets and leveraging their power.

Without a concerted effort by every liberty-minded conservative to limit the Hatred Industrial Complex, those who truly are the legitimate victims of crimes motivated by bias will no longer have the capacity to pursue justice. The very foundation of equality and justice under the law will be eroded and eventually destroyed.  If we don’t put up a fight for the real American values, truth will be lost to the theater of the outrageous.

If outrage soon becomes the policy currency, most of us are going to wind up being flat broke.

Both the State Senate and House have passed legislation that prohibits the abortion of an unborn child with a detectable heartbeat. Gov. Phil Bryant is standing ready to sign the bill into law once lingering differences have been settled.

This bill comes in the wake of the recent and shocking New York legislation, along with similar legislation concerning late term and post birth abortion.

If the heartbeat bill becomes law, the only way to obtain an abortion after the heartbeat is detected would be when medical emergencies, the life of the mother or loss of major bodily function, necessitate. The bill also stipulates that the Mississippi State Board of Health is to regulate the appropriate methods for performing an examination to detect the fetal heartbeat.

Furthermore, any physician who does perform an abortion procedure without first detecting a fetal heartbeat will be subject to license revocation or disciplinary action. The ramifications of this bill are far reaching on both sides of the debate.

Bryant, a fervent defender of life, has stated that an unborn child is a human being and he/she have rights bestowed upon them. When questioned about the recent legislation in New York, along with other states, he commented that he hopes that these blatant attempts to grow a culture of death will shock people into realizing just how horrific this movement has become and motivate action. It appears that this just might be true.

The states of Florida, Iowa, Missouri, Ohio, South Carolina, and Tennessee are also attempting to pass versions of a heartbeat bill and enforce stricter abortion laws.

Naturally, abortion proponents will do all they can to stop this.

This is not simply a political debate; it is a deeply personal one. Pregnancy centers around the nation, including the Center for Pregnancy Choices in Jackson, witness the powerful testimonies of women choosing life after hearing or seeing their baby’s heartbeat. As someone who has personally heard the accounts of such women, I can attest that it is a tender and life-altering moment.

“We see lives changed when women are able to connect with their baby through sonogram images, Erin Kate Goode, the executive director of CPC, stated. The CPC has seen this truth reflected in so many of its client’s journeys.

One expectant mother who visited CPC said, “Once I got my free sonogram, I fell in love with my baby, and I knew right away I wanted to keep her.”

“I saw my little bitty baby,” another former patient said, “I saw its heartbeat. I did my nervous laugh, attempting to hold back my tears, as I watched my tiny baby jump and dance around. That’s when I knew that I was going to do this, whatever it took.”

While the debate is considered from every angle, the same truth emerges; an unborn child with a detectable heartbeat is a life.

The heartbeat bill only reinforces what medical science has known all along, a heartbeat is not only an indication of a viable pregnancy, it is intrinsically bonded with life. It is with hope that we witness life beginning to win and it is with pride that we know Mississippi is a pioneer of the movement to value every heartbeat.

A majority of members in the Mississippi House voted Tuesday to add more than $173 million in bond debt to the taxpayers’ credit card.

The bill now heads to the Senate, where a companion bond bill has already passed. The difference between the two amounts to a deep chasm.

Senate Bill 3065 only has $12 million total for projects. Four-year state universities would share $10 million, community colleges would share $1 million, and Huntington Ingalls would receive $1 million.

Legislators from both chambers will have to settle the differences between the two bills in conference later this session.

The House bill’s final amount could be higher, as state Rep. Jeff Smith (R-Columbus) said Tuesday that the bill would be the vehicle to help members out with their (funding) requests.

House Bill 1674 has more than $85 million in borrowing for projects for the state’s universities, including $13 million for renovating the Cook Library at the University of Southern Mississippi and $12 million for matching funds for an expansion for the Blair E. Batson Children’s Hospital at the University of Mississippi Medical Center.

There is also $25 million for projects at the state’s community colleges.

There’s also $63 million spread over five years for restoration of historic buildings around the state. Some of these include:

The House has already voted to pass a bill that would provide $45 million to Huntington Ingalls Shipyard in Pascagoula. They have also approved several other bonds for various entities totaling over $40 million.

According to the latest Financial State of the States report released in September by the non-partisan public policy group Truth in Accounting, the state owes more than $5.8 billion in bond debt alone.

The state will also borrow $300 million for infrastructure needs after the 2018 special session.

On Tuesday, the House also passed HB 822, which passed by a 92-15 margin. This bill would levy a $400 tax on any attorney licensed to practice in Mississippi who doesn’t have a practice or lives in the state.

A bill passed by the Mississippi House could impact the rights of the accused in campus sexual assault cases.

The Sexual Assault Response Act requires all of the state’s universities and community colleges to adopt a comprehensive policy on sexual assault that a critic says could hurt the rights of the accused in sexual assault cases.

Joe Cohn, the Legislative and Policy Director for FIRE, said this year’s bill, House Bill 1300— authored by state Rep. Angela Cockerham (D-Magnolia) — is better than the previous two iterations, but still not ideal.

“HB 1300 is not the worst bill we’ve seen on sexual assault, but it’s far from good,” Cohn said. “They’re (the bills) incrementally improving, but they’re still problematic.”

One of those problems was the language in the bill, which labels anyone who brings an accusation as a survivor. He said this signals to people in charge that impartiality isn’t important in the proceedings.

He also had problems with the definition of consent in the bill, which he said means the institution which doesn’t make clear that it has to prove that the sexual activity was non-consensual.

Cohn also said that the bill doesn’t recognize some of the jurisdictional limits of Title IX. He cited a 1999 U.S. Supreme Court decision, Davis v. Monroe County Board of Education as setting these boundaries.

This decision says that institutions have a duty under Title IX to respond to known acts of sexual harassment or violence either on the institutional grounds or in the programs and activities of the institution.

Cohn said that those who oppose replacing Obama administration era regulations want the jurisdiction of institutions extended off-campus if both people involved are students. This would go far beyond the guidance given by the Davis decision.

He said HB 1300 takes that approach.

There is a provision in the bill that would have any federal guidance or regulation supersede it. Cohn said it’d make more sense to wait for the final regulations, due this summer, before passing a bill.

There have been two previous bills — all authored by Cockerham — which would’ve codified now-superseded guidance provided by a problematic “dear colleague” letter sent to federally-funded universities and colleges by the Obama administration in 2011 concerning Title IX and sexual harassment and assault.

The U.S. Department of Education and its Office for Civil Rights instructed higher education institutions in the letter to use a lower evidence standard to determine guilt and also mandated that accusers would also have the right to appeal a verdict, which meant even baseless allegations could result in a retrial.

Universities and colleges that receive federal funding are required to obey all Title IX regulations or risk having their funding pulled.

For three consecutive years, Cockerham has gotten a bill on campus sexual assault out of the House, but it hasn’t fared as well in the Senate.

In 2017, Cockerham’s first sexual assault bill died in the Senate Judiciary A Committee.

In 2018, a similar bill by Cockerham was doubled-referred (usually a death sentence for a bill) to a pair of Senate committees, Universities and Colleges and Judiciary A, where it also died.

This year, HB 1300 passed by a 115-3 margin on February 13 and has yet to be referred to a committee in the Senate for consideration.

Occupational licenses should cross state lines and the state of Arizona has a chance to be a national leader, while Mississippi falls further behind.

Republicans in the Arizona legislature have introduced a bill that would allow anyone with an occupational license from a different state to move to Arizona and automatically qualify for the same license without having to retake classes and pass tests again.

Contrast that attitude with the Magnolia State. Mississippi has one of the most restrictive occupational licensure regimes nationwide and the state licenses more occupations than most states.

Two bills that were far from any long-reaching reform that would’ve allowed licensed medical professionals such as physicians, dentists, dental hygienist, optometrists or nurses to practice in the state for charitable or voluntary health care without a fee didn’t even make it out of committee.

Senate Bill 2248, authored by state Sen. Angela Hill (R-Picayune), would’ve given out-of-state practitioners the right to practice in the state for charitable reasons and they would’ve been given one credit hour of continuing education for every 60 minutes of voluntary medical services.

House Bill 1491, a similar bill, but without the continuing education component, was authored by state Rep. Shane Aguirre (R-Tupelo).

The Arizona bill has several requirements. The license holder would have to pay a fee to the state board that administers the license and provide proof that they’re in good standing with the licensing authority in their old state. This would happen even if the license holder’s old state doesn’t reciprocate by honoring Arizona licenses.

“If you’ve been licensed to work in another state and want to move here, let it be known: Arizona will not stand in your way,” Gov. Doug Ducey said during his State of the State address earlier this month.

The Republican governor has said he’d sign the bill if it makes it to his desk.

Mississippi does have some limited reciprocity by honoring occupational licenses for military families that’s intended mainly for spouses of active members. There is also statutory language with some occupations — such as cosmetologists, general contractors and home inspectors — that allows reciprocity agreements. Doing so would be up to the individual regulatory boards.

The Mississippi Legislature did pass a bill in 2017 that created the Occupational Licensing Review Commission to put the state in compliance with a 2015 U.S. Supreme Court decision, North Carolina Board of Dental Examiners v. Federal Trade Commission. The court ruled that state occupational licensing boards can receive immunity only if they’re actively supervised by the state.

Today, approximately 19 percent of Mississippians need a license to work. This includes everything from a shampooer, who must receive 1,500 clock hours of education, to a fire alarm installer, who must pay over $1,000 in fees. All totaled, there are 66 low-to-middle income occupations that are licensed in Mississippi. According to a recent report from the Institute for Justice, Mississippi has lost 13,000 jobs because of occupational licensing and the state has suffered an economic value loss of $37 million.

A single mom in Mississippi was arrested after the start of the school year when she chose to homeschool her son rather than enroll him in the local public school.

The story began during the 2017-2018 school year. Her seven-year-old son’s health struggles led to attendance problems at the local public school that year. According to the Home School Legal Defense Association, who would provide counsel to the mother, the mother provided doctor’s notes for her son’s absences, but that wasn’t enough.

That is when she made the decision to homeschool. She would be able to educate her son, while still having the flexibility that her son needed. It seemed like a great option. 

She started homeschooling this past August. Homeschoolers in Mississippi have a considerable amount of freedom, but they must still file a notice of intent with the local school attendance officer. The cutoff date is September 15, more than a month about public schools begin.

But before the end of August, the mother was arrested on charges of truancy, booked at the sheriff’s office, and ordered to post bond. She was warned that she would face fines of up to $1,000 and a year in jail if she didn’t enroll her son in school.

HSLDA was able to persuade the local prosecutor to drop the case, and she is free to educate her son today.

Mississippi state law does provide parents with the freedom to educate their children at home, free of government intrusion. However, this isn’t the first time in the past year that local school districts have attempted to overstep their authority.

Mississippi families who choose to homeschool their children should not be susceptible to illegal attempts by school districts to regulate their education.

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