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Vin Suprynowicz's Columns Archive

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Article Image The Libertarian

Vin Suprynowicz

In the 1992 film “The Distinguished Gentleman,” written by Marty Kaplan and directed by Jonathan Lynn (“My Cousin Vinny”), Eddie Murphy plays a con man named Thomas Jefferson Johnson who grasps his opportunity when long-time corrupt congressman (the

Article Image The Libertarian

Vin Suprynowicz

Jessica Lynne Carpenter was 14 years old on Aug. 23, 2000, the morning 27-year-old Jonathan David Bruce came calling at the Carpenter house in Merced, California.

Jessica Lynne knew how to shoot -- her father had taught her. And there were adequ

Article Image The Libertarian

Vin Suprynowicz

A report released by the U.S. Census Bureau last week places Nevada last among the 50 states in the per capita distribution of federal funds.

In 2004, the federal government spent $12,885 per person in Alaska and $12,150 per person in Virginia -

Article Image The Libertarian

Vin Suprynowicz

Let’s start a union.

Oh, I have my differences with modern organized labor. They’ve long since abandoned George Meany’s sensible advice to remain non-partisan, instead aligning themselves with the freakiest, most far-left “progressive” social ag

Article Image The Libertarian

Vin Suprynowicz

In popular literature, the chubby loser who eagerly pays the stern dominatrix in the black corset to whip, denigrate and otherwise abuse him is an object both of humor and of pathos.

In Washington, he’s called the Environmental Protection Agency

Article Image The Libertarian

Vin Suprynowicz

A couple of loyal readers asked me, in response to my recent evisceration of the discredited “militia clause” argument, “But Vin, do you think the Founders would have written the Second Amendment that way if they’d known we’d have Uzis”?

Leaving

Article Image The Libertarian

Vin Suprynowicz

It’s too bad the rhetorical smoke and steam generated in the House budget battle in Washington Monday couldn’t be funneled into a pipeline -- they might have saved millions in home heating costs in the frigid Northeast.

Rep. Mike Pence, R-Ind.,

Article Image The Libertarian

Vin Suprynowicz

The New York Times disclosed last week that in the wake of the Sept. 11 terror attacks, President Bush has authorized the National Security Agency to monitor telephone conversations and e-mails within the United States.

The president acknowledge

Article Image The Libertarian

Vin Suprynowicz

Quick: What powers are granted by the Constitution to the Department of Homeland Security?

No, it doesn’t matter that there was no such department till recent years. The Constitution grants its limited powers to “the executive” -- the president

Article Image The Libertarian

Vin Suprynowicz

Americans make a big hubbub over the Fourth of July.

True, the victory of 1781 was an amazing triumph, and the vision of those gathered in Philadelphia five years before -- that men may rightfully form or disband governments at will, for the h

Article Image The Libertarian

Vin Suprynowicz

My column of last week, dealing with uniformed cops shooting undercover cops, and the bizarre proposal that to solve this problem undercover cops must stop carrying guns so their uniformed brethren can continue to feel free to shoot any black man in

Article Image The Libertarian

Vin Suprynowicz

Originally published in Shotgun News Magazine

Despite the Constitution, only in Vermont (and now Alaska) can Americans carry a concealed firearm without a government “permit,” and not worry about being put in jail.

So, wishing to do t

Article Image The Libertarian

Vin Suprynowicz

Large sections of the Constitution and Bill of Rights may lie in tatters (“I’m seizing this. No, I don’t have to show you any advance list of what we can seize. Shut up and stand over there. I’m going to feel your genitals now with the back of my han

Article Image The Libertarian

Vin Suprynowicz

An "old police tradition of requiring off-duty officers to carry their weapons -- 'always armed, always on duty' -- is being scaled back in police departments nationwide following the shootings of off-duty officers by colleagues who thought they were

Article Image The Libertarian

Vin Suprynowicz

The Lied Institute for Real Estate Studies at the University of Nevada, Las Vegas delivered a report to the Clark County Growth Task Force Nov. 22, recommending the establishment of a community land trust that could buy federal land at a discount (in

Article Image The Libertarian

Vin Suprynowicz

And so, as our modern gladiators chase a pigskin down the field in Dallas or Detroit, we settle into our living rooms, loosen our belts, and remind the little ones this is the day we echo the thanks of the Pilgrims, who gathered in the autumn of 1621

Article Image The Libertarian

Vin Suprynowicz

It’s human nature. The doctor tells us our symptoms are more serious than we thought, that the repercussions could be catastrophic if we don’t make drastic changes in our diet, lifestyle, and exercise regimen immediately.

But we find some pills

Article Image The Libertarian

Vin Suprynowicz

It’s human nature. The doctor tells us our symptoms are more serious than we thought, that the repercussions could be catastrophic if we don’t make drastic changes in our diet, lifestyle, and exercise regimen immediately.

But we find some pills

Article Image The Libertarian

Vin Suprynowicz

Another group of East Coast academics has done another study on fast-growing American urban areas (Las Vegas right up there, of course), warning that this kind of “sprawl” is going to cost us.

Las Vegas ranks 15th on this latest list of communit

Article Image The Libertarian

Vin Suprynowicz

It’s widely asserted we’re fighting a “war on terror.” But that’s absurd.

Terror is a tactic -- an attempt to undermine the morale of a much stronger foe, whom the “terrorists” know they cannot defeat in traditional battle.

When we sent Joh

Article Image The Libertarian

Vin Suprynowicz

Billboards and magazine covers now display teasing images of feminine pulchritude that our grandparents would have considered shocking. Not to mention the far more hardcore material now available to any schoolchild with a few clicks of the mouse. <

Article Image The Libertarian

Vin Suprynowicz

Probably the California emigres should have to pass a brief economics test before being welcomed as Nevada voters. Something along the lines of: “Do you understand the role state government played in driving you from the Golden State? Do you agree no

Article Image The Libertarian

Vin Suprynowicz

Dawn Hansen is Nevada chairman of Mothers Against the Draft. Her husband, Christopher Hansen, is the paralegal and retired contractor who served as chairman of last year’s failed “Axe the Tax” tax-rollback petition drive. The couple are active in the

Article Image The Libertarian

Vin Suprynowicz

Sure enough. I predicted, when the videos started streaming back to America, showing our troops disarming civilians in Bosnia, Somalia, and more recently Iraq, that these brave lads and lasses were merely being trained for the new official version of

Article Image The Libertarian

Vin Suprynowicz

There are some who believe government has almost unlimited power to dictate what we can and cannot do with our own property.

True, they occasionally run up against that inconvenient Fifth Amendment, which says land owners must be compensated whe

Article Image The Libertarian

Vin Suprynowicz

Quite a bit of response to my parking-ticket column last week. Winning the award for the most distant correspondent is Don Morrison of Toronto, who writes “The death of every major North American city must be parking. Up here in Toronto our city coun

Article Image The Libertarian

Vin Suprynowicz

No, the war in Iraq is not cheap, and neither was the creation of the shambling giant known as the Department of Homeland Security. But those aren’t the main reasons federal spending has grown far faster under President Bush than under his Democratic

Article Image The Libertarian

Vin Suprynowicz

Halloween approaches, the day when many an American parent will suit up the little ones in black robes, matching 17th century conical hats, and oversized warty noses, sending them off to delight the neighbors with this impersonation of a witch, as tr

Article Image The Libertarian

Vin Suprynowicz

Supporters of President Bush may flirt with gloom in the face of the president’s withdrawal of the Supreme Court nomination of his friend and counsel -- and longtime former Democrat -- Harriet Miers.

If bad news comes in threes, this would seem

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