As most of us know, several days ago, after receiving a referral from Robert Mueller, the FBI conducted a pre-dawn raid of the offices and residences of President Trump’s long-time lawyer, Michael Cohen. Many of us on the right look at these actions and scream “Unfair!” because after all, the FBI did not treat Hillary this way despite many wrongdoings. Meanwhile, leftist pundits are clapping their hands with glee over this move because they feel this action takes them one step closer to their ultimate objective — get rid of President Trump. Furthermore, many of these same pundits tell us we don’t need to worry about this attack on lawyer/client privilege.

After this happened, I, like many others, railed about the inequality of treatment in this country but there is an important issue other than injustice to which we must pay attention. In an article published by The Gatestone Institute, “Firewalls” and “Taint Teams” Do Not Protect Fourth and Sixth Amendment Rights, Alan Dershowitz wrote:

“An equally important harm is to important relationships that are protected by the law: between lawyer and client, priest and penitent, doctor and patient, husband and wife, etc. If an ordinary citizen, seeing that even the president’s confidential communications with his lawyer can be seized and perused, he or she will be far less willing to engage in such communications. As a society, we value such communications; that is why our laws protect them and that is why it should be extremely difficult for the government to intrude upon them, except as a last recourse in extremely important cases.

He ended this article with:

I challenge any reader who is not concerned about this raid to honestly answer the following question: If the raid had been conducted on Hillary Clinton’s lawyer’s office and home, would you be as unconcerned? The truth now!

It seems that every day we see assaults on our first amendment, the second amendment, and now the fourth and sixth amendment. What is happening to our country? Alan Dershowitz is a man we should all listen to as his voice seems to be one of few showing measured reason.

Yesterday, I defended Facebook when COO Sheryl Sandberg said that users who wished to entirely stop the social media platform from making money from their personal data would have to pay for the privilege, if the option were to be made available.  I still stand by that support.  However, today I learned that Facebook has censored Diamond and Silk, two sisters from North Carolina, social media stars, ardent supporters of President Trump, and said “The Policy team has came to the conclusion that your content and your brand has been determined unsafe to the community.”

Are you kidding me?  Censorship because someone in the Facebook company doesn’t like Diamond and Silk and their conservative opinions!?!  Really?  Facebook has seen live postings of shootings, murder, child abuse, and torture.  There have been countless instances of bullying and hate rants against police and military.  Facebook has been used to lure unsuspecting children and women into situations best not described. And yet, Diamond and Silk are determined to be unsafe by you.

We have a first amendment in this country which states:

Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.

On Thursday, Mark Zuckerberg announced that Facebook’s mission is to “give people the power to build community and bring the world closer together…”  Okay Mark–so do you believe that the world can only be brought closer together without debate, without  diversity of opinion?  Must we all believe the same as you?  You may be listed by Forbes as one of the world’s most powerful people but to me, you are a small, small man.  You need to learn that everybody is entitled to a viewpoint or opinion and we should respect that right even if we don’t necessarily agree with it.

All the political pundits seem to be apoplectic about the fact that Facebook says they may have to charge customers for a site where they are not inundated with advertisements.  Really?  How do they think Facebook makes money?  Most free apps include ads and that is just something you either deal with or pay to upgrade.  I see absolutely nothing wrong with that.  I, for one, am not a huge fan of Facebook and use it rarely.  Having said that, I do think it is a good platform for families and friends to share pictures and news.

My biggest problem with Facebook, texting, and other social media is that people don’t seem to communicate directly anymore–I mean actually talking and having full conversations.  You walk down the street and people are so busy looking down at devices that they are missing everything going on around them.  I’ve been to restaurants and seen several people at the same table, paying attention to the device in their hands rather than to each other. Our youth communicate with abbreviations and phrases rather than sentences.  Is this good?  And, as the cartoon shows–what is more important – life in front of you or the Facebook story you tell?

I’ve seen news stories that some Facebook and other social media executives don’t allow their own children to use these platforms so it makes you wonder.  The extent to which our youth depend on these devices can be scary.  And, what is so important that you need to look at your phone while you are driving?  What kind of example does that set?