George Navarini

Very rarely, in the instance where the mother's life is in danger

Strongly Agree

Strongly Disagree

According to the Tax Foundation, in 2014, the Federal Tax Code (26 USC), printed by the Government Printing Office in two volumes, consists of 2,652 pages. If we calculate about 450 words per page, we're at well over one million words, or about the same as the entire series of J.K. Rowling's Harry Potter series. War and Peace, usually offered as an example of a "long" novel, is half that, and the Bible (KJV) has 788,280 words of divinely-inspired wisdom. Our tax code today is very far from being called "divinely inspired, but instead a poorly cobbled-together collection of laws, many of which are painfully obsolete and mostly written to pick winners and losers, the latter determined by the power of well-heeled donors and lobbyists. In a perfect world, our taxes should be a flat tax, paid by every wage earner earning more than an annually set poverty threshold. The set percentage of each year's flat tax will be one-third of the percentage of the prior's years percentage of government spending compared to the GDP. (The other two-thirds would be paid in the same manner through corporate taxes). In this manner, what we pay is directly tied to what Congress spends in our name. As most members of Congress seem to be very keen on getting re-elected, this will tie them back to the people. If they go overboard in spending, the people will know within a year, and right on time to show them the door. Tax returns would become obsolete, saving billions in processing expenses for both the citizenry and the government, and only a fraction of audits would be necessary. No one has a loophole or an inside track to pocket money at another person's expense. Only the very poor would be free of taxation, and everyone else will pay in direct and unfiltered proportion to their income.

An excellent follow-on question to the first, as the actions of the first, are directly related to the results of the second. If you ask any racecar driver, they will tell you that pressing the accelerator never wins a race. You win it by learning how and when to use the brakes. The same is much the same in budgets. The most effective and permanent way to reduce our spending, however, is to reduce the size of the federal government itself. The current “administrative state” that functions as a de facto parallel government needs to be trimmed down to reflect the true and limited scope of authority as defined in the U.SU.S.nstitution. Across the decades, our national government has usurped the duties and authorities of the several states. In so doing, it has not just amassed immense, almost authoritarian power but has become bloated and ineffective. Today, the default answer for a local to state-level issue is to use the “three thousand mile screwdriver” from D.C., the costliest and least effective tool in the toolbox. Once we have the moral courage and leadership to devolve these powers and authorities back to the several states, our cost of government will drop accordingly.

Disagree

Strongly Disagree

People speak of the separation of church and state as if new, but its origins come from the Enlightenment, whose writers guided the Framers. The term itself is from a letter Jefferson to the Danbury Baptists, not the Constitution. The First Amendment does not bind the people but rather places restrictions on the state from interfering with a person's free practice of their faith. Forcing a person to act in contradiction of their beliefs is a gross and unacceptable violation of their rights.

Only in such rare and unfortunate instances when, for whatever reason, the house of worship was severely damaged, and its present, unrepaired condition posed a threat to the health and safety of its inhabitants. Other than that, any forced closures or other forms of restriction or limitation imposed on the church, both as a faith community and/or as a structure, by the state or any agency wherein, constitutes an unacceptable violation of the First Amendment rights of congregants of said house of worship from freely practicing their faith, and of its faith leaders from proclaiming their faith and leading their people in the practice and ceremonies of their beliefs.

C) Medicaid and Medicare should remain available, but no other taxpayer-funded programs are necessary. That said, the problem goes deeper than this, and so is the solution. We may need to think about ways to back-stop healthcare costs, which for decades have been climbing at a far faster rate than inflation in general, largely due to the lack of normal economic restraints. The well-worn rule of supply and demand determining the price has been tampered with, and the government has, perhaps inadvertently, placed its thumb on the scales

When they are properly tested and approved vaccinations, e.g., those currently required to be admitted as a student in every Florida public or private school. These include the proper doses of Diphtheria-tetanus-acellular pertussis (DTaP), Inactivated polio vaccine (IPV), Measles-mumps-rubella (MMR), Hepatitis B (Hep B), Varicella (chickenpox), Haemophilus influenzae type b (Hib), and after the seventh grade, tetanus-diphtheria-acellular pertussis (Tdap). Of course, parents can apply for a permanent medical exemption if their child cannot be fully immunized due to medical reasons. and certified to the same in writing by the child's physician, noting the reasons for exemption based on valid clinical reasoning or evidence. Additionally, parents can apply for a religious exemption if immunizations are in conflict with the religious tenets and practices of the child's parent or guardian and based on established religious beliefs or practices.

Choose its conflicts more wisely. If we recall our history, or at the very least are familiar with the words of the Marine Hymn, we are aware that we have been dealing with Islamic violence since the beginning of our existence as a nation. An intrinsic component of Islam is to advance their faith and political hegemony from the dar-al-salam (the abode of peace, or Islamic-controlled territory) to the dar-al-haram (the abode of war, or territory controlled by non-believers). The current strife emanates from this position but is enflamed by the results of the Sikes-Picot Agreement during the First World War. This agreement, crafted by the United Kingdom and France, forced Western influence and hegemony into lands traditionally held by the Caliphate of the Ottoman Empire. As British influence waned after the Second World War, the United States took its place as the focus of evil in the minds of many, especially those influenced by the writings of Sayyid Qutb. In short, it is a region of the world we should not be operating in without an overarching interest worth more than the price to pay for being in the traditional lands of a people ready to die to defend it. Afghanistan is a perfect example. The English bled out on these barren rocks in the 19th century, the Russians/Soviets did the same in the 20th Century, and we put in twenty years and far-too-many lives, and in the end, there is nothing to show for our blood, toil, and treasure, but sad monuments in England, Russia, and in the United States. None of these countries changed or modernized Afghanistan, but all three were made older and poorer in the process. Short answer? Pick your fights well. Make sure the fight is worth the cost (and there is always a cost), and as you get there, always have a plan to get back out.

Strongly Disagree

It is in the best interests of the United States and the Western world to support Israel. When the Balfour Agreement was signed, and later the partition of the British Mandate in Palestine, both these documents created a Jewish homeland, Israel, and an Arab homeland, Jordan. The current fighting is of a small group of people wanting to forcibly change the results of this accord, and originally fomented by the Soviet Union to create another fissure point to extend their influence

Strongly Agree

Those that do so legally and add value to our country. As a son of immigrants from Argentina and a historian, I know the value and depth our collective immigrant heritage brought to this country. We are indeed a reflection of our official motto, e Pluribus Unum (out of many, one), that what we call "America" is the collective best of many lands. The problem here is not our porous border or the millions of illegals. These are the symptoms; the disease is that of neglect, self-interest, and, sadly, a substantial measure of bias and prejudice. Our immigration laws are antiquated and reflect the reality of a post-second world war era, under the sector of the Cold War. We need to have the courage to sit down and re-write the entire immigration system so we don't have engineers and physicians wait for ten or twelve years to come in legally while seventeen-year-old gang-bangers, drug dealers, and human traffickers go back and forth into our country as if on the Interstate. We need to leave out all but one "special interest" in this process, and that particular special interest is the good of the country.

Strongly Agree

The money follows the child, and the parents ALWAYS have the last word. Period, hard stop.

Strongly Agree

While we protect and defend the rights of everyone to worship as their faith moves them, we recognize that Judeo-Christian values are the cornerstone of Western civilization and permeate our foundational documents, from the Mayflower Compact, through to the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution.

Strongly Disagree

"Identifying" as something you're not is another way of saying you're "pretending," and most of us left this behind once we became adults. The state has no obligation or interest in those who are stuck at sixteen by their own volution.

Strongly Agree

The statement above, as written, is a foundational statement to our way of life. To run counter to this is the starting point of the destruction of humankind.

Strongly Disagree

CRT, as a subset of Critical Theory, is a form of cultural Marxism created by Horkheimer and Adorno in the 1920s as a way to deconstruct the precepts of individualism found in Western civilization and replace it with collectivism under the control of a "benevolent" one-world government.

I am a practicing Christian. A say "practicing" as none of us have hit the level of perfection of our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ. So, we keep at it. We fall, we pray, and try again.

Strongly Disagree

No!

Actually, at least here in Florida, follow the laws we have, equally and fairly.

Tribalism in all its various forms is baked into our fallen nature. As a primitive society, this was a form of protection between "us" and "them." As society extended beyond family units, this concept morphed into what today we can nationalities and regionalism, but it still spills out. In friendly ways, it is the subconscious genesis of our team rivalries, be they Florida and Georgia football teams, for example. The most prevail form of tribalism is that between groups that look different, which brings us to skin color. As we gain education and understanding, we can subdue and eventually conquer these inherent biases, but in times of stress, fear, or threat to survival, these formally protective instincts come back to haunt and today hurt us as a civilized society. Can it be a threat? It all depends on us, and what we teach our kids.

Strongly Disagree

Oh... no. The predecessors of the vast majority of people in our country were not even in the United States during the slave-owning era. It would be intricately unfair to burden them with the pain of a sin they or their forefathers did not commit

C - Somewhere in the middle. We ignore or damage the environment at our own peril. Here in Soutth Florida, over ten million people directly depend on a healthy and vibrant Florida Everglades for 100% of their drinking water.

Disagree

Only in places where the impact does not cause irreparable damage to the ecosystem, such as the Florida Everglades (each question above).

To provide for domestic tranquility, public safety, and the common defense.

Conservative

I can refer you to the over 1,500 books in my personal library

No

I invite the readers to check out my website at Navarinifor Florida.com, or to send me a note at George@NavariniforFlorida.com

Agree

Strongly Disagree

The second Amendment is pretty clear on this, at least according to the Supreme Court.

Strongly Disagree

Can the estate of people at die of heart disease sue a food company or Mcdonald's?