Fentanyl is not Mustard Gas

by Rod Williams, Dec 20, 2025- Donald Trump has a way of stretching the limits of presidential authority far beyond what the founders or Congress ever intended, assuming authority he does not have. With a Congress that will not object, he gets by with it. His imposing of tariffs under the guise of responding to a national emergency due to the nation’s trade deficit, claiming authority for his actions under the International Emergency Economic Powers Act (IEEPA), is one example. We are not experiencing an emergency and the IEEPA does not give the president the authority to set tariffs even if we were. 

Trump does what he wants to do and just claims authority he does not have. Trump has done it again in declaring Fentanyl to be a weapon of mass destruction. This is nuts. Fentanyl is bad. A lot of our fellow citizens die from it. However, no one puts a gun to a person's head and makes them overdose. If there were no demand, there would be no supply. The victims of drug overdose are willing victims.  Beyond that, to classify a dangerous drug as a weapon of mass destruction means words have no meaning and we have a king who can just make up the law as he goes along. 

The following article explores this action of designating fentanyl a weapon of mass destruction. Andrew McCarthy quotes federal narcotics laws and the laws that deal with weapons of mass destruction. The law is clear. A weapon of mass destruction must be a weapon. Laws describe weapons and drugs. There is no ambiguity. I don't know that it does any good to point any of this out. Resanable people know it, and the committed Trumpinistas, don't care what the law says. They have no interest in the rule of law. To many, whatever Trump does is OK. They subscribe to a theory that the law is whatever the ruler says it is. If anyone is confused, however, and actually cares about the rule of law this article examines the issue. 

Trump Has No Authority to Categorize Fentanyl as a Weapon of Mass Destruction

By Andrew C. McCarthy, National Review, Dec. 22, 2025- Common sense tells us that narcotic drugs are different from WMD. As one would expect, these differences are reflected in law.

Law school is a three-year grind. But 40 years later, while I couldn’t tell you a thing about, say, the “rule against perpetuities,” I did internalize the most valuable lesson, which came in the first three hours. It wasn’t a precedent or a statute, just a bit of folk wisdom you mightn’t think would need teaching. But it does, now more than ever.

It’s this: If you hang a sign that says “horse” on a cow, that doesn’t make it a horse.

Get it? If you do, then you’ll quickly grasp that a Latin American dope dealer is not an alien enemy combatant. The Defense Department, a creature of statute, does not become “the Department of War” by a presidential decree that sends Pete Hegseth to the front of the Pentagon with a plaque and a screwdriver. A foreign terrorist organization does not, by the abracadabra of “designation,” become an authorization for the use of military force — even if we generously assume that a drug gang is the same thing as a terrorist organization. Lindsey Halligan is not the United States attorney for the Eastern District of Virginia. Riots are neither patriotic nor mostly peaceful. The congressionally established John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts is not, by dint of wand-waving by a crony committee, the Trump . . . anything.

And fentanyl is not a weapon of mass destruction, even if the “horse” sign in this instance happens to be an executive order. ... a president only gets to designate with Congress’s permission... Common sense tells us that narcotic drugs are saliently different from WMD. The former are controlled substances targeted to cause specific bodily effects in specific people, a generally salutary outcome when a drug is prescribed by a licensed physician, and a detrimental one when the drug is distributed illegally. WMD, in stark contrast, are objects designed to kill indiscriminately.

As one would expect, these differences are reflected in our law. ... Title 21 of the U.S. Code sets forth the federal narcotics laws .... Now, let’s turn to WMD. The term is defined in the federal penal code .... (link)

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The United States Ranks 15th on the Human Freedom Index 2025

 

by Rod Williams, Dec. 17, 2025- The Cato Institute and the Fraser Institute have just published the annual Human Freedom Index ranking 167 nations from most free to least free.  The United States comes in at number 15. The above list shows the fifteen highest-ranking countries for human freedom. The score range is from one to ten, with a ten being the most free and a one being the least free, however no scores of one or ten are awarded. The least free nations are listed below:

Other nations of interest to me and their rankings are Germany 17, United Kingdom 19, France 33, Mexico 91, El Salvadore 83, Ukraine at 119, and China at 149.

The Human Freedom Index (HFI) presents a broad measure of human freedom, understood as the absence of coercive constraint. This 11th annual index uses 87 distinct indicators of personal and economic freedom in the following areas:

Rule of law

Security and safety

Movement

Religion

Association, assembly, and civil society

Expression and information

Relationships

Size of government

Legal system and property rights

Sound money

Freedom to trade internationally

Regulation

I am not surprised by the rankings. While many may think the US is the freest nation on earth, I have been aware that there are other nations with more freedom than the United States for some time. The US ranking has fallen in recent years. In 2007, the US was the seventh freest country in the world; in 2021, it had dropped to 18th place.

While one could quibble over the weight given to various factors in scoring the nations,  one observation I make is that having the right to bear arms does not make one more free than some nations without the right to bear arms.  Another observation is that one can have universal health care and a generous welfare state and still be free.

As one would expect, the nations of Africa and the Mid-East rank lowest. The status of women in those nations is contributing to their low scores. There is a strong relationship between freedom and median and per capita income. Jurisdictions in the top quartile of freedom enjoy a significantly higher average per capita income ($53,635) than those in other quartiles; the average per capita income in the least free quartile is $14,201. The HFI also finds a strong positive relationship between human freedom and democracy, and between human freedom and a range of human well-being indicators, including tolerance, charitable giving, life expectancy, and environmental health, among other measures.

For more on the methodology and an understanding of weights given to various factors and an examination of a nation's change in ranking over time, view the index at this link. 

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Trump's Attack on Rob Reiner is a New Low

by Rod Williams, Dec. 15, 2025 - Every time I think Donald Trump has hit a new low, he outdoes himself and hits a newer low. I am not talking about policies or his corruption or authoritarian tendencies, or his ignorance of the Constitution, or his economic illiteracy. I am talking about his crealty, his vulgarity, his uncouth behavior, and his contempt for standards of human decency. 

When he made fun of a news reporter with a disability, when he said the Haitians were eating our cats and dogs, when he called immigrants "vermin," and so much more, I thought he had hit a new low. Well, he has outdone himself again. His comments following the brutal murder of Rob Reiner was a new low.

Trump was not obligated to offer any comment at all about Reiner. Rob Reiner, while an important Hollywood actor and director, was not an important political figure or a former president or a beloved national figure or a Trump protege. It would have been perfectly acceptable for the President to have said nothing unless he was specifically asked.

If asked, the normal thing to do would be to express condolences to the family, the old "our thoughts and prayers are with the family, ect..."  If he wanted to say more, he could have said he hoped the perpetrator was brought to justice, and he could have said he deplored the violence. 

Instead of doing what any decent human being would have done in this case, Trump used Rob Reiner's brutal murder as an opportunity to trash the man. Not yet dead twenty-four hours, and Trump had to attack the man and settle a score. Donald J. Trump is not nice. He is not normal. He is a despicable human being. 

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Abrego Garcia is Released and ICE is Ordered Not to Detain Him Again

by Rod Williams, Dec. 14, 2025- The drama surrounding Kilmar Abrego Garcia is almost at an end. His criminal case for human smuggling is still pending here in Tennessee, but it seems to be a weak case. In any event, what has been determined is that he was unlawfully removed from the country and ICE is prohibited from detaining him again. Earlier this month, Judge Xinis ordered Abrego Garcia's immediate release from immigration detention, ruling he had been held "without lawful authority" because the government never had a valid final order of removal. 

Abrego Garcia is the Salvadoran citizen with an American wife and child who lived in Maryland for years after entering the U.S. illegally as a 16-year-old teenager to escape gang threats. A 2019 immigration court order forbade his deportation to El Salvador, finding he had a "well-founded fear" of persecution there. This "withholding of removal" order also allowed him to live and work in the U.S. under supervision.  

In March 2025, as part of Trump's mass deportation effort, Abrego Garcia was deported to El Salvador and held in the notorious CECOT mega-prison, despite his protected status. The order prohibiting his deportation to El Salvador did not protect him from Trump's mass deportation campaign. The Trump administration deported him to the kind of place the US used to condemn as a gulag torture prison. An ICE official later called it an "administrative error."

His wife sued, and a U.S. District Court judge in Maryland ordered the administration to facilitate his return. After the Trump administration initially resisted, the U.S. Supreme Court weighed in, ordering the government to facilitate his return. This was one of the moments when the nation wondered if Trump would defy the Court. In the end, Trump complied. 

 In June 2025, the government returned him to the U.S. but immediately brought criminal charges against him in Tennessee for allegedly participating in a human smuggling conspiracy dating back to a 2022 traffic stop. Critics claim the charges were "vindictive" and politically motivated, an assertion a federal judge in Tennessee found a "persuasive case" for.

After his release on bond in the criminal case, Abrego Garcia was immediately taken back into immigration custody in August 2025. The government announced plans to deport him to a various African countries, including Uganda, Eswatini, Ghana, and Liberia, which his attorneys argued was an attempt to circumvent the court order and punish him. As it turned out, the Trump administration had not actually gotten these countries to agree to accept Garcia and when eventually asked, they refused to do so.

There is more to this story, but it demonstrates an abuse of authority and a trampling of rights and a royal screwup from the get-go. If not for public attention and Sen. Chris Van Hollen's efforts and an engaged press, Garcia would still be lingering in a notorious torture prison, never to be heard from again. 

One cannot help but wonder how many others suffer that fate.  I cannot help but wonder if even some American citizens have not been sent to such a fate. Without due process, we don't know who has been deported to prisons in third-world countries, and without due process, there is no way to prove one is an American citizen or a refugee with asylum status. Someday, when Trump is no longer in office, unlawfully imprisoned victims will be released and the extent of Trump's crimes against humanity will be revealed. 

For more on this story, see National Review's The Mind-Boggling Saga of Kilmar Abrego Garcia.

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BILLIONAIRES CAN’T PAY THE NATION’S DEBT

…the “Great Baby Boomer Wealth Transfer” could, but won’t

by Ralph Bristol, Facebook, Dec. 14, 2025- Inevitably, discussions about our national debt lead to unrelated conversations about the super-wealthy and the taxes they don’t pay.  “If only we could get more of that untaxed wealth of billionaires, the national debt would not be a problem,” seems to be the thinking.  To be clear, billionaires don’t pay taxes on most of their wealth, and that may not be a good thing, but it’s unrelated to our debt problem, which will one day be a debt crisis if we don’t deal with it before it does.

If you could take ALL the wealth of the 20 wealthiest Americans WITHOUT destroying the economy from which most of the tax revenue comes, that $3 trillion would cover the nation’s DEFICIT for 1.5 years.  Problem not solved. 

Okay then, let’s take ALL the wealth of ALL 905 billionaires in the U.S.  That gets you a little further.  That $7.8 trillion would cover the deficit for about 3.5 years. Problem still not solved.

• The total personal wealth of Americans is estimated by the Federal Reserve to be $176 trillion, which means all the billionaires own only about four percent of the wealth in the U.S.  

• The top one percent, which includes a lot more than just billionaires, own about one-third of that wealth 

The top 1 percent have lots of protection in the tax code 

• The nine percent below them, own about 40 percent of the nation’s wealth.

That is the crowd that is vulnerable to any meaningful tax increase that will be part of any fool’s errand to reduce the deficit with tax increases. 

• The 40 percent below them own about one-quarter of the nation’s wealth and are struggling to keep their operational heads above water with rising healthcare and childcare bills squeezing budgets much worse than previous generations.  

• The 50 percent below them own only 2-3% of the wealth.  You can’t get blood from that turnip.  

THE GREAT BABY BOOMER WEALTH TRANSFER 

Most of the wealth owned by Americans is owned by Baby Boomers, who will soon be passing that wealth to the next two generations.  Only $11 Trillion of today’s $176 trillion in American wealth lies in tax-deferred accounts that will be taxed when it is withdrawn by the boomer’s heirs, likely over many years, adding to millennial and gen-x income a little bit at a time, not a rich field for revenuers. 

With the estate tax exemption now at $15 million per person, nearly all $88-90 trillion (today’s figures) in boomer wealth will be transferred untaxed, so any federal government bean-counters licking their chops over that wealth are going to be disappointed. 

I listened to a conversation Saturday between two smart people, taxing their imaginations, musing about how the millennial and gen x’ recipients of the boomer wealth transfer, who will then occupy a higher rung on the wealth ladder, might respond. They wondered whether it might change their attitude about government wealth redistribution. That may be interesting to wonder about, but anyone trying to guess how generations below them will think is wasting their valuable brain power. 

That’s what people do – even smart people – when they are stuck – and have no clue how to solve the problem without doing what is politically unacceptable. They change the subject. 

HERE’S THE SUBJECT

• The nation’s debt is far too high, and it must, and will, one day be curbed.

• Billionaires can’t pay off the U.S. debt. 

• The great Baby Boomer wealth transfer will not solve the U.S. debt problem. 

• Tax increases cannot solve the U.S. debt problem.  

It would take a 66% across the board increase to balance the budget with taxes.  

THE ONLY ANSWER – THAT NO-ONE WANTS

There is NO solution involving more taxes on billionaires, or even the entire population that resolves the imbalance between taxes and spending by the U.S. government. 

It’s the spending, stupid, which is not aimed at any reader in particular, but at all readers collectively. A modest tax increase, to accompany a big spending cut may make the medicine go down easier for those who will be receiving much less help from the government, but any tax increase will be expensive sugar pills. It will interfere with the solution more than help it.

Only big spending cuts on the big spending towers will redirect the U.S. budget back to a fiscally responsible, and sustainable path.  That is the single hardest thing for any government to do, and the U.S. government will not do it until its back is against the wall. 

The sooner that happens, the easier it will be for the receiver class of all the government wealth redistribution to accept and endure the necessary correction in their income portfolios.  They will have plenty of company, including among the top 10%, who will lose trillions of dollars of wealth in the stock market, as people spend less and companies earn less. 

A correction will happen.  The world cannot lend the U.S. all the money the U.S. plans to spend in the next 75 years, under today’s budget trajectory.  Seventy-five years goes by quickly.  Sometime in the next 75 years, the U.S. will deal with its debt problem.  It won’t have a choice.  

If it happens when it should, the Great Baby Boomer Wealth Transfer will not be as great as expected, but the nation’s debt will be on a sustainable track, and the generations who inherit our wealth and our national debt will be better for it.

Ralph Bristol is the former long-time morning talk radio host broadcasting on Supertalk 99.7 WTN. He was one of the less provocative and bombastic of conservative radio personalities, more thoughtful and grounded in conservative ideas. He left talk radio in 2018 and retired. He lives in Nashville. 

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