MINOT, N.D. — If there has been a theme to this most recent news cycle, it’s one in which reporters and pundits, mostly from a left-of-center viewpoint, have insisted that the Supreme Court is doing dastardly things to us. The two epicenters for this earthquake of derision are the North Dakota v. EPA and Dobbs v. Jackson decisions, which…
Bill Gates shouldn’t have needed a loophole in the law to buy land in North Dakota
MINOT, N.D. — North Dakota’s ban on corporate farming is stupid. It cannot be reconciled with our society’s foundational notions about property rights and free association. Willing buyers should be able to purchase land from willing sellers. People who want to farm or ranch on that land should be able to organize their businesses with…
North Dakota’s abortion ban needs clarification and reconciliation
MINOT, N.D. — The Supreme Court has ruled, and now it’s up to the states to make and enforce abortion policy. Or Congress, I suppose. President Joe Biden is calling on Democrats to set aside the Senate filibuster and pass a law codifying legal abortion at the federal level, though that’s a bad idea. It’s not clear…
Pro-life Democrat running for U.S. House says he takes a ‘whole life’ approach to abortion issue
MINOT, N.D. — Believe it or not, there is such a thing as a pro-life Democrat. There are pro-choice Republicans too, of course, but on this episode of Plain Talk, it was Mark Haugen, the Democratic-NPL candidate for the U.S. House of Representatives, who is staunchly pro-life, who we were speaking to. Haugen’s party leaders…
Overturning Roe inflames the left’s own insurrectionists
MINOT, N.D. — Thanks in no small part to the Jan. 6 committee in Congress, we’re all aware of the lengths former President Donald Trump and his supporters went to overturn the outcome of the 2020 election. One of our national institutions, in this instance the Electoral College, produced an outcome Trump and company didn’t…
Sen. Cramer reports Hazen man for making violent threats, calls him a ‘menace to society’
MINOT, N.D. — A North Dakota man who was involved in an aggressive incident with Sen. Kevin Cramer in 2017 has been charged with trespassing after he refused to leave a Republican Party facility in Payson, Arizona. The 2017 incident, which happened at an open-to-the-public town hall event and involved Quinn pushing Cramer as he tried…
North Dakota might not have an abortion ban without the Democratic-NPL
MINOT, N.D. — When a draft of the Supreme Court’s opinion overturning Roe v. Wade was leaked earlier this year, the North Dakota Democratic-NPL was swift to condemn it. And they were positively hyperbolic about it. In an emailed statement, the party called it a “vile” and “damning” decision that will “relegate women across the…
Plain Talk: Wrigley will certify ND’s bipartisan (you read that right) abortion ban ‘in a matter of hours’
MINOT, N.D. — You couldn’t possibly have missed the news that the U.S. Supreme Court has overturned the Roe v. Wade precedent which held that it was unconstitutional for state governments to ban abortion. The ruling was unambiguous. “The Constitution does not prohibit the citizens of each State from regulating or prohibiting abortion,” the court ruled .…
Bill Gates can’t buy land in North Dakota?
MINIOT, N.D. — North Dakotans like to pride themselves on being pro-property rights. Except, it seems, when it comes to a private individual selling some land to iconic billionaire Bill Gates. At issue is 2,100 acres of farmland in Pembina and Walsh Counties that was sold to the Red River Trust , an entity associated with Gates,…
‘The Constitution does not take sides on the issue of abortion’
MINOT, N.D. — The U.S. Supreme Court, weeks after a draft opinion leaked and set off a firestorm of debate and protest, has finally issued an opinion overturning the Roe v. Wade precedent. You’re going to hear a lot of strong opinions on that turn of events, and almost all of them will be rooted in…