On the latest episode of “The Tony Kinnett Cast,” we cringe to our very souls as President Joe Biden is wheeled out in front of cheering crowds and shouting journalists. The president didn’t appear cognizant of what was going around him, leaving the handlers to cart him away after a few moments of dazed confusion.
White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre shows contempt for Americans as she responds with scorn to questions about both the president and vice president. Who will hold this administration accountable, and where do these types of conversations lead?
Retired U.S. Border Patrol Chief Patrol Agent Chris Clem joins us to discuss some of the biggest tragedies along the U.S. border with Mexico and throughout the Sunbelt states, including the hundreds of thousands of children lost by the Department of Health and Human Services, and the role of Border Patrol agents in a time of changing rules, rhetoric, and priorities.
Finally, we dig through a bit of historical analysis and the importance of rearing kids to love studying history. “Sesame Street” doesn’t hold a candle to “Liberty Kids.”
Catch the live radio show and livestream weeknights at 7 p.m. EDT on The Daily Signal’s YouTube, X, or Facebook—and subscribe to the podcast so you never miss an episode or exclusive interview!
A woman holds a poster of Israeli hostage Omer Neutra during a memorial vigil for the Israeli people killed by Hamas during the October 7 attacks, in New York City on November 1, 2023. | Angela Weiss/AFP via Getty Images
Following the IDF’s announcement that the bodies of six hostages, including Israeli-American Hersh Goldberg-Polin, were recovered from Rafah, attention has now shifted to the remaining hostages still alive in Gaza.
Many U.S. citizens may not realize that four American hostages are currently held by Hamas in the Gaza Strip. This issue has received limited attention from U.S. President Joe Biden’s administration, which has made only a few statements about hostages with dual U.S.-Israeli citizenship being held by captive by Hamas in Gaza.
One of these statements came early Sunday morning when Biden said he was “devastated and outraged” by the Goldberg-Polin’s death.
Goldberg-Polin was one of eight U.S. hostages abducted by Hamas during the Oct. 7 massacres in southern Israel. With Hersh’s death confirmed, four of the eight are now confirmed by the IDF to have been killed by Hamas.
Four American hostages are still in captivity, and their current condition remains unknown.
Keith Siegel
Keith Siegel (64) was last seen with hostage Omri Miran in a video released by Hamas. In that video, Miran mentioned the recent Passover holiday, indicating the video was released soon after recording. Keith was abducted with his wife Aviva from their home in Kfar Aza. The couple was driven into the Gaza Strip in their own vehicle and kept together until Aviva’s release in the November hostage release deal.
Following her release, Aviva said her husband had not told Hamas that he was a U.S. citizen out of fear that Hamas would release him without her.
Sagui Dekel-Chen
Sagui Dekel-Chen was a project manager for the United Kingdom branch of the Jewish National Fund (Keren Kayemet Le’Israel) which organizes the construction of schools and youth centers.
Dekel-Chen was abducted from his home in Kibbutz Nir Oz on Oct. 7. He was a member of the kibbutz’s security team, and engaged Hamas terrorists in combat before eventually being captured after several hours.
His father Jonathan spoke at a J Street event on the sidelines of the Democratic National Convention (DNC) last month, where he called on Democratic leaders to hold Hamas accountable for its actions.
Omer Neutra
Long Island-born Omer Neutra was serving as a tank commander in the IDF on Oct. 7 when he was abducted by terrorists. Omer’s parents, Orna and Ronen Neutra, have been active ever since, raising awareness about his plight, as well as those of the rest of the captives.
Like the parents of Goldberg-Polin, Omer’s parents took their message to both the Republican National Convention (RNC) and the DNC, calling for both sides to work toward the release of all the captives.
Like Omer, Edan Alexander was captured while serving in the IDF on Oct. 7. Alexander spoke with his parents on the phone that morning, shortly after the rocket attacks from Gaza began. He assured his mother that he was safe. About half an hour later, she was not able to reach him.
Both Omer and Edan were assigned to the same post in southern Israel on Oct. 7. As soldiers, they would be part of the last group released during a hostage deal, with Hamas considering soldiers to be more valuable for negotiations.
Besides these four men, three other U.S. citizens who were killed or fatally wounded on Oct. 7 are also being held by Hamas in Gaza: Itay Chen (19); Judith Weinstein Haggai (70); and Gadi Haggai (73).
In early August, Denver Post columnist Doug Friednash wrote about the remaining American hostages, asking why their plight did not arouse the same media publicity as other hostages or prisoners, such as Brittney Griner, a member of the U.S. women’s national basketball team and a three-time Olympic gold medalist. Griner received international attention in 2022 when she was detained in Russia on a drug offense. She was found guilty and sentenced to nine years but was later released in a prisoner exchange.
Friednash noted that 33 Americans were killed in the Oct. 7 Hamas massacres, while eight were taken captive. Four of those eight are now confirmed dead.
He noted that most Americans could probably not even name any of the U.S. hostages, and the lack of media focus on their situation or the U.S. government’s efforts to free them.
“And, we need to ask the question: why are these five [now four after the death of Hersh Goldberg-Polin] Americans forgotten? Is it because they are Jewish or dual citizens? Is it because our nation’s leaders believe this is predominantly Israel’s problem, not ours? Or, is it for some other political reason?” he wrote.
Almost one month later, those questions appear to be unanswered.
Following the return of the hostages bodies, 97 of the 251 hostages abducted by Hamas on Oct. 7 remain in captivity in Gaza. This latest figure includes the bodies of at least 33 hostages who have already been confirmed deceased by Israel Defense Forces.
Democratic Senator Sherrod Brown of Ohio, who once proudly supported Biden’s climate agenda, is now facing a tough reelection and is running away from his previous positions on green energy policies, according to experts interviewed by the Daily Caller News Foundation.
Brown, who has been in office for more than two decades, has recently begun to oppose some of the Biden-Harris administration’s positions on climate change, such as advocating for a hydrogen tax credit and higher efficiency standards for power transformers, and calling for coal plants to cut 90% of their carbon emissions by 2032. This change is reflected in his declining ratings from left-wing environmental group the League of Conservation Voters (LCV), which has lowered his environmental score from 100% to 88% and is his lowest score in nearly a decade.
According to GOP polling analyst and vice president at North Star Opinion Research, John McHenry, Brown’s recent shift in stance on climate policy is strategic and calculated, with the senator voting in favor of such policies once every six years, but aligning with the views of Ohio voters in between those election cycles.
Just two years ago, in 2019, Brown boasted a 100% LCV score and expressed his support for the Green New Deal, stating that he believed in aggressively combatting climate change through legislation. However, his actions and votes in recent years tell a different story. For example, he voted in favor of the Inflation Reduction Act in 2022, which allocated billions of dollars towards tackling climate change, and has cast multiple “anti-environment” votes on climate legislation in the Senate.
This pattern of shifting stances is not new for Brown, with Republicans accusing him of flip-flopping in past election cycles. In 2011, the National Republican Senatorial Committee (NRSC) called out Brown for changing his position on tax cuts, and in 1997, while serving in Congress, Brown voted in favor of a constitutional amendment to impose term limits on congressional service, but later voted against a similar amendment in 2012, his 19th year in office.
From restricting drilling to blocking LNG exports, Joe Biden is the most anti-American energy President of my lifetime & Sherrod Brown has supported his agenda every step of the way. I'll fight to stop their liberal plans, so America can be an ENERGY DOMINANT country once again! pic.twitter.com/MJkr15HzDy
Brown’s shift in position on climate policy comes as he faces a tough reelection race against Republican businessman Bernie Moreno, whom a CNN list recently ranked as the third most likely senator to lose his seat in 2024. Brown is currently ahead of Moreno by only 5 percentage points, leading to speculation that his change in stance may be an attempt to secure votes from Ohio’s energy sector, which is a significant contributor to the state’s economy. Ohio is among the top ten natural gas producers in the country and the fourth-largest producer and seventh-largest consumer of electricity.
Greg R. Lawson, a research fellow at Ohio think tank The Buckeye Institute, believes that the economic consequences of the Green New Deal will be dire not just for Ohioans but for all Americans. He argues that as the state transitions to a more sustainable future, energy costs will play a crucial role in its success, and policies that drive up energy prices will harm Ohio’s economic growth.
Meanwhile, the U.S. has seen a significant increase in demand for electricity due to the growth of the data center industry, with projections indicating continued growth in the coming years. Ohio has also seen an influx of data centers, with major companies like Amazon and Google setting up campuses in the state. This industry, which is energy-intensive, relies heavily on access to affordable energy sources, making it vulnerable to the impacts of policies like the Green New Deal.
The NRSC spokesman Philip Letsou points out that Brown’s past support for the Green New Deal and a ban on some LNG exports will be hard for the senator to escape, particularly in light of his recent attempts to downplay his previous positions. Letsou argues that Brown sold out Ohio’s energy workers and endorsed Vice President Kamala Harris, who has previously called for a ban on fracking and offshore drilling nationwide.
The Biden administration’s decision to halt LNG export permits in January was met with criticism from Brown, who put forward a competing bill to ban LNG exports only to certain countries designated as geopolitical rivals. However, this attempt to counter the Biden administration’s policy is seen as a “messaging play” by Axios.
McHenry believes that the issue of climate change could play in Moreno’s favor in the upcoming election, but only if he communicates his stance effectively to Ohio voters. He argues that the rising electricity prices under the Biden administration may not sit well with voters, and it will be crucial for Moreno to highlight Brown’s support for policies that have driven up energy costs.
The DCNF reached out to Brown’s office for comment, but they did not respond. Moreno’s office referred the request to the NRSC. As Ohio heads towards election day, it remains to be seen how Brown’s changing stance on climate policy will impact his chances of winning another term in office.
We have previously discussed (here and here and here and here) the push for reparations in California that has been touted by California Gov. Gavin Newsom and Democrats for years. After the Democrats campaigned on the issue in past elections, I wrote a column about how this bill had come due after years of delay for study and recommendations. The legislature, however, just stamped the bill “return to sender” and shelved the two reparations bills with the reported support of Newsom. The reaction is not surprising that there has been a bait-and-switch by Democrats on the issue.
Last week, the California legislature did approve proposals allowing for the return of land or compensation to families whose property was unjustly seized by the government and issuing a formal apology for laws and practices that have harmed Black people. However, the two bills to establish a fund for reparation payments – Senate Bills 1403 and 1331 – were tabled. State Sen. Steven Bradford blamed Democratic California Gov. Gavin Newsom for the result, stating that the governor made clear that he would veto them.
Newsom signed a $297.9 billion budget in June that included up to $12 million for reparations legislation. However, that is a drop in the bucket given the billions demanded and it is not clear how the money will be spent. Adding to the anger is the fact that the legislature approved a bill to allow undocumented persons to receive no-interest loans of up to $150,000 to cover down payments on new homes.
It is now unclear what will happen next, though sponsors are saying that they will continue to push for legislation green lighting reparation payments. Some congressional Democrats have pushed for similar federal reparations and passed a bill out of the House Judiciary Committee in 2021 that failed to receive a floor vote. BET founder Robert Johnson has called for $14 trillion in federal reparations.
As discussed earlier, there are a host of legal and practical questions over the reparation payments that will have to be resolved. Even with passage, the bills would likely face constitutional challenges.
Brazil has not just banned X (formerly Twitter) from the entire country, but citizens will now be fined $9000 a day (more than the average salary in the country) for using VPNs to access the platform. X is the main source of news for Brazilians, who will now be left with government-approved sources or face financial ruin in seeking unfettered information.
The Guardian is reporting that the confiscatory fines are part of a comprehensive crackdown on efforts to get news through X, including ordering all Apple stores to remove X from new phones. The move puts Brazil with China in the effort to create a wall of censorship between citizens and unregulated information. For the anti-free speech movement, Brazil is a key testing ground for where the movement is heading next. European censors are arresting CEOs like Pavel Durov while threatening Elon Musk.
However, it is Brazil that foreshadows the brave new world of censorship where entire nations will block access to sites committed to free speech values or unfettered news. If successful, the Brazilian model is likely to be replicated by other countries.
The reason is that censorship is not working. As discussed in my book “The Indispensable Right: Free Speech in an Age of Rage,” we have never seen the current alliance of government, corporate, academic, and media interest against free speech. Yet, citizens are not buying it. Despite unrelenting attacks and demonizing media coverage, citizens are still using X and resisting censorship. That was certainly the case in Brazil where citizens preferred X to regulated news sources. The solution is now to threaten citizens with utter ruin if they seek unfettered news.
The question is whether Brazil’s leftist government can get away with this. The conflict began with demands to censor supporters of the conservative former president Jair Bolsonaro. When X refused the sweeping demands for censorship, including the demand to name a legal representative who could be arrested for refusing to censor users, the courts moved toward this national ban.
The man behind the effort is Justice Alexandre de Moraes, who has aggressively used censorship to combat anything that he or the government deems “fake news” or disinformation. With Socialist President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, they are the dream team of the anti-free speech movement.
Justice Alexandre de Moraes
Minnesota Attorney General Keith Ellison responded to the ban with a posting declaring “Obrigado Brasil!” or “Thanks, Brazil!” Ironically, he did so on X.
Ellison previously praised the virulently anti-free speech group Antifa and promised that it would “strike fear in the heart” of Donald Trump. This was after Antifa had been involved in numerous acts of violence and its website was banned in Germany. It is at its base a movement at war with free speech, defining the right itself as a tool of oppression. That purpose is evident in what is called the “bible” of the Antifa movement: Rutgers Professor Mark Bray’s Antifa: The Anti-Fascist Handbook.
Bray emphasizes the struggle of the movement against free speech: “At the heart of the anti-fascist outlook is a rejection of the classical liberal phrase that says, ‘I disapprove of what you say but I will defend to the death your right to say it.’” Bray admits that “most Americans in Antifa have been anarchists or antiauthoritarian communists… From that standpoint, ‘free speech’ as such is merely a bourgeois fantasy unworthy of consideration.”
The question is whether Brazil will become a nightmare for free speech around the world as other nations seek to force citizens to read and hear news from approved, state-monitored sites.
A.F. Branco Cartoon – The media and the Kamala campaign are trying to present themselves as the party of joy while America is burning with high prices across the board, crime, open borders, and oppressing free speech.
It’s looking more like a third-world country than something to be joyful about.
By Jim Hoft – The Gateway Pundit – August 18, 2024
Kamala Harris and the obedient media are attempting to push a platform of “joy.” Guess who else had a propaganda campaign of joy? Adolf Hitler. After the Nazi rise to power in 1933, the new regime immediately began efforts to bring German society completely under Nazi control in a process known as Gleichschaltung (German for “coordination” or “synchronization”). All political parties and trade unions were outlawed except for the Nazi Party and the Nazi German Labor Front (Deutsches Arbeitsfront). The German Labor Front started the “Strength through Joy” program (“Kraft durch Freude”) in November 1933 to improve “Aryan” workers’ quality of life and build popular support for the Nazi regime. Nazi leaders hoped that the athletic and cultural programs of “Strength through Joy” would improve the health and productivity of the German workforce while easing class tensions within the so-called “national community” (“Volksgemeinschaft”). READ MORE…
A.F. Branco has taken his two greatest passions (art and politics) and translated them into cartoons that have been popular all over the country in various news outlets, including NewsMax, Fox News, MSNBC, CBS, ABC, and “The Washington Post.” He has been recognized by such personalities as Rep. Devin Nunes, Dinesh D’Souza, James Woods, Chris Salcedo, Sarah Palin, Larry Elder, Lars Larson, Rush Limbaugh, and President Trump.
Members of the Proud Boys (left) clash with antifa after a rally on Aug. 22, 2021, in Portland, Oregon. (Mathieu Lewis-Rolland/AFP/Getty Images)
Demographer, historian, and author Neil Howe hasn’t just coined the term “Millennial,” he’s also predicted the future to an eerie degree—and he thinks America’s in for very rough seas ahead. He says a civil war in the U.S. is far more plausible than most people think, and he dismisses the reasons Americans often discount that possibility.
In 1997, he published a book with Bill Strauss, “The Fourth Turning: An American Prophecy—What the Cycles of History Tell Us About America’s Next Rendezvous with Destiny.” In that book, he suggested five catalysts for a major crisis—and four of the five have already come to pass.
“One of our events was a crisis over the debt, which would issue forth in a new tea party movement,” Howe tells “The Daily Signal Podcast.” He calls it “just completely random that we happened to use that phrase,” which the tea party movement adopted in 2010.
“The other one was a WMD [weapon of mass destruction] attack on New York City,” Howe says, noting the eerie parallel with Sept. 11, 2001. “The other one was the [COVID-19] pandemic, and the fourth one was Russia invading a former Soviet republic,” such as Ukraine.
The final potential catalyst? “A nullification crisis, where one or more of the states would actually nullify federal regulation, which would lead to a new secession movement,” Howe says.
According to his generational theory, America should expect a major crisis about every 80-100 years, and we’re due for another “rendezvous with destiny” such as the Great Depression and World War II. He calls these periods “fourth turnings,” and they force society to create a new order in the civic “outer world” about 40 or 50 years after “awakenings” drive people inward, seeking order in their spiritual “inner worlds.”
Why a Civil War Is Likely
Howe notes that “our politics have taken on this kind of Manichaean style, where the red zone and blue zone are so mutually exclusive in their sense of themselves, their agenda for the nation’s future, that it hardly even matters who’s leading the party.” (“Manichaean” refers to the tendency to view one side as perfectly good and the other side as perfectly evil, and it traces back to a world religion that arose with the prophet Mani in the 200s A.D., which taught that the physical world is evil, and the spiritual world is good.)
“When most of what you’re talking about is the width of sidewalks and the diameter of sewer pipes, just coordination issues, democracy works really well,” Howe says. “But when you’re talking about issues that virtually define who you are, it doesn’t work. He said no one is going to accede to a vote count that goes 51% against you.”
“You are not going to give up everything you believe in just because you came up three votes short,” he explains.
Howe says U.S. polarization reached similar levels in the 1770s, the 1850s, and the 1930s.
When The Daily Signal noted that American polarization doesn’t neatly fall along lines on a map like in the U.S. Civil War, Howe says the presence of blue cities in red states actually makes conflict more likely.
“One misconception people have is that civil wars require geographically separated places,” he notes. “This is not true and take a look at the Spanish Civil War. That was a brutal, horrible war, and there was very little geographical contiguity about it. … It was like honeycombed. The civil war in China was the same way.”
Even in the U.S. Civil War, there were “civil wars within states,” especially in “border states.”
“And actually, your point about blue zone cities within red zone states or vice versa is a classic reason why civil wars get touched off, and why they are never resolved amicably,” Howe says.
Problems for World in U.S. Civil War
“There are two ways in which we enter this fourth turning very differently from earlier fourth turnings, which are worrying,” Howe says.
First, he notes, “government is so huge going into this fourth turning,” while most fourth turnings require government to ramp up in order to face existential threats.
Second, he notes “the size and global power of our military” make the U.S. a central player in world affairs, so a U.S. Civil War will have massive ramifications across the globe.
“If it requires our forces around the world to stand down for six months, the entire world will remake itself,” he says. “The entire world, for better or for worse, depends upon our presence to be what it is.”
Howe also notes that during a civil war, one side often asks for external help: “This is a rule through all civil wars.”
So, When Would Civil War Start?
The Daily Signal asked Howe why the “mini starter crises” of 9/11, the tea party movement, COVID-19, and the Ukraine war did not “catch fire” and ignite the massive existential crisis that defines a fourth turning.
“The survival of the country has to be at stake,” the author says.
“With regard to World War II, I think FDR made the case—it was very persuasive for the country—we did not want to be the only democracy left on earth,” he explains.
“This is the way incentives work,” Howe says. “You’ve got to feel everything’s on the line to push you to do something.”
Things have to come to a head in order to force people to come together and create a new order in society. How exactly that will happen is yet to be determined.
Former Kansas Gov. Sam Brownback (middle) speaks while on a religious liberty panel as part of The Christian Post’s “Politics in the Pews” event at Fellowship Church in Grapevine, Texas, on Aug. 27, 2024. He was joined by First Liberty Institute Senior Counsel Jeremy Dys (second from left), former high school football coach Joe Kennedy (second from right) and FRC Senior Fellow Meg Kilgannon (left). Christian Post reporter Ian M. Giatti (right) moderated the panel. | The Christian Post
Editors’ note: This is part 14 of The Christian Post’s year-long articles series “Politics in the Pews: Evangelical Christian engagement in elections from the Moral Majority to today.” In this series, we will look at issues pertaining to election integrity and new ways of getting out the vote, including churches participating in ballot collection. We’ll also look at issues Evangelicals say matter most to them ahead of the presidential election and the political engagement of diverse groups, politically and ethnically. Read part 1, part 2, part 3, part 4, part 5, part 6, part 7, part 8, part 9, part 10, part 11, part 12 and part 13 at the links provided.
GRAPEVINE, Texas — Former U.S. Ambassador-at-Large for International Religious Freedom Sam Brownback and other experts warned earlier this week that Christians must continue to fight for religious freedom in American culture even if they are achieving major political or legal victories. The panelists gathered Tuesday as an extension of The Christian Post’s “Politics in the Pews” podcast and article series to discuss diminishing religious liberty in the United States and the growing threats to religious freedom, including the Equality Act and the politicization of the U.S. Supreme Court.
The panel, which was one of three moderated at Fellowship Church by Christian Post reporter and podcaster Ian M. Giatti, included insights from former GOP Kansas Gov. Brownback, First Liberty Senior Counsel Jeremy Dys, Family Research Council Senior Fellow Meg Kilgannon and Joseph Kennedy, the former football coach fired for praying on the field who won his case before the U.S. Supreme Court in 2022.
‘You’re going to have to fight’
Brownback, who resigned as Kansas governor in 2018 to serve as U.S. ambassador-at-large for international religious freedom under former President Donald Trump until 2021, emphasized the importance of standing up for religious freedom and the need for individuals to be proactive in defending their rights. Even if Christians like Kennedy are victorious in court under the current 6-3 conservative makeup, Brownback suggested that American Christians are going to have to fight for their religious freedom if they hope to maintain it.
“The Supreme Court doesn’t set the culture of the country; we do, it’s the people,” Brownback said. “But if you’re not willing to go out and exercise and find it and push for it — really, the bigger issue is you’re just not willing to stand up and fight a little bit, because you’re going to have to fight a little bit to do this — it won’t matter.”
He spoke of a time when he asked Supreme Court Justice Samuel Alito if religious freedom will persist in the U.S., to which the Roman Catholic reportedly said, “You’ll have it in the law, but I’m not sure you’ll have it in the culture.”
Brownback said some Christians are beginning to face financial persecution as major U.S. banks have allegedly started “de-banking” religious organizations such as his National Committee for Religious Freedom (NCRF). NCRF, a multi-faith 501(c)4 political action nonprofit, made headlines in 2022 when it alleged that JPMorgan Chase shuttered its bank account without explanation after demanding a list of its donors, the candidates they support and potential political donations.
NCRF’s situation is not unique, and Bank of America prompted a letter from 15 Republican state attorneys general earlier this year alleging the company “is responsible for some of the worst-known instances of debanking” while at the same time cooperating with the federal government to provide “innocuous” private information to paint some conservative customers as “potential domestic terrorists.”
Brownback said he is personally aware of a woman who heads a crisis pregnancy center and was recently denied Directors and Officers (D&O) insurance because the insurance company told her they did not approve of what she was doing.
“It’s de-insurance and de-platforming, de-banking, and it’s this effort to suffocate,” he said. “And we’ve got every right on our side. We’ve got the Free Exercise Clause, and now we’ve got a Supreme Court, that’s defined it and said, ‘You have this right to do this.'”
“I don’t care what other people think about it, you have a free constitutional right to exercise your faith, but we’ve got to fight for it,” he added.
Resetting the standards
Kennedy, an 18-year Marine veteran and former assistant coach for the varsity football team at Bremerton High School in Washington state, faced suspension and eventual firing in 2015 for kneeling in prayer at the 50-yard line after games. His case reached the U.S. Supreme Court, which ruled in 2022 that his prayers were protected by the First Amendment.
The court ruled 6-3 in favor of Kennedy and upheld the constitutional right of public-school employees to engage in brief, personal private prayer, which effectively overturned the 1971 Supreme Court decision in Lemon v. Kurtzman, which had established the three-prong “Lemon test.” The Lemon test permitted the government to be involved in religion only if it served a secular purpose, did not inhibit or advance religion and did not result in excessive entanglement of church and state.
Jeremy Dys, who serves as senior counsel at First Liberty Institute and represented Kennedy, explained the landmark nature of the Supreme Court ruling in Kennedy’s case.
First Liberty Institute Senior Counsel Jeremy Dys (second from left) speaks during The Christian Post’s “Politics in the Pews” event at Fellowship Church in Grapevine, Texas, on Aug. 27. 2024. He was joined by former Kansas Gov. Sam Brownback (middle), Coach Joe Kennedy (second from right) and FRC senior fellow Meg Kilgannon (left). Christian Post reporter Ian M. Giatti (right) moderated the panel. | The Christian Post
“It says that our religious speech is doubly protected, because what Lemon had done was to set up this, this fake battle between the two clauses in the Constitution governing religious expression — the Establishment Clause, which prevents the government from telling you what you should believe and how you should believe it — and the Free Exercise Clause, which guarantees your right to be able to express your religious beliefs.”
Dys said Kennedy’s case allowed the Supreme Court to decide that the Lemon test was a misreading of the U.S. Constitution and that the two clauses were intended to complement each other “to maximize your religious freedoms, to restrain the government from telling you what to believe and how to believe it, and to also give you the space to engage your freedom size of religion.”
Dys said that Kennedy’s case reset the standards back to the Constitution and “reminded everybody of the freedoms we once had in this country, that for four generations we have allowed to wither and die in the vine because the Supreme Court and other courts have said so.”
“We won the case; we won you the freedom back,” said Dys. “Go do something with it. I need you to go be a free people again.”
Dys also warned that if the Left succeeds in its purported goal of politicizing the Supreme Court by expanding the number of judges or imposing term limits, victories like the one Kennedy achieved will become less likely.
“If we don’t have fair umpires behind the plate, there’s nothing I can do to get the game fair,” he said.
Equality Act
Kilgannon, who serves as a senior fellow for education studies at the Christian conservative advocacy group Family Research Council, warned about the potential dangers posed to people of faith by the Equality Act championed by Democrats in Congress, which she noted is at odds with biblical values and has received the full-throated support of Vice President Kamala Harris. The act would codify discrimination protections based on sexual orientation and gender identity into federal law.
“We see so often it’s these questions surrounding human life and human sexuality, where our values as Christians come in direct contrast to what those kinds of proposals would entail and require us to say things that aren’t true, to agree with things we don’t believe in, and to promote those things and to endorse those things,” she said.
“And we simply cannot do that as Christians. We can’t do it for ourselves, but we also can’t do it because it’s not good for anybody, even the people who believe those things are true. And so, we really must stand fast against those kinds of pressures.”
During a recent “Politics in the Pews” podcast, Kilgannon said supporters of the Equality Act, such as Harris, are trying to use civil rights as a “skin suit” to enshrine sexuality and gender identity protections into law, which she warned would pose a threat to religious liberty.
‘Strap on the brass knuckles’
The panelists emphasized the importance of using truth and legal action to combat the threats to religious liberty. Dys noted that “there is a time and a place” for Christians “to be kind and gentle and good,” but added that for some Christians, there is “a time to strap on the brass knuckles and punch back and take back what is rightfully yours.”
“That is not in any way designed to foment violence,” he added. “Do not read into that at all, but that is metaphorically the position we find ourselves in today.”
Dys urged the audience to maintain the confidence of those who possess the truth, the Word of God and the protections of the U.S. Constitution.
“Take that confidence forward and move into the territory that you possess today,” he said.
When Giatti asked the panel their advice for the average Christian to make their voices heard, Kennedy jumped in and noted that while he might not be able to provide an in-depth answer like his fellow panelists, he believes the answer is simple and starts with men spiritually leading their own families.
“It starts on your knees in prayer,” he said, adding that “men need to feed their families and stand up and be men.” He also urged them to get involved in their local school districts and make small decisions about which companies they will subsidize.
“Not everybody is called to fight up in everybody’s face but support the people who are on the front lines,” he added. “Everybody can do that.”
Below is my column in the Hill on the victory of Elon Musk last week against the liberal media outlet, Media Matters. This follows similar recent victories by others against CNN and the New York Times to clear paths to trials. For those who have embraced advocacy journalism as the new model for media, a bill is coming due in the form of defamation and disparagement lawsuits.
Here is the column:
This week, a federal judge ruled that a lawsuit by Elon Musk against Media Matters can move forward in what could prove a significant case not just for the liberal outlet but the entire media industry. The decision comes at the same time as other court wins for former Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin (R) against the New York Times and a Navy veteran against CNN.
For years, media organizations and journalism schools have expressly abandoned objectivity in favor of advocacy journalism. This abandonment of neutrality has coincided, unsurprisingly, with a drop in public faith in media to record lows.
Former New York Times writer (and now Howard University journalism professor) Nikole Hannah-Jones has been lionized for declaring that “all journalism is activism.”Emilio Garcia-Ruiz, editor-in-chief at the San Francisco Chronicle, similarly announced that “Objectivity has got to go.”
“J-Schools” have been teaching students for years to discard old-fashioned ideas of simply reporting facts and as stated at the University of Texas at Austin, to “leave neutrality behind.”
In a series of interviews with more than 75 media leaders, Leonard Downie Jr., former Washington Post executive editor, and Andrew Heyward, former CBS News president, reaffirmed this new vision of journalism. Downie explained that objectivity is viewed as a trap and reporters “feel it negates many of their own identities, life experiences and cultural contexts, keeping them from pursuing truth in their work.”
As the public abandons mainstream media for alternative news sources, news organizations are now facing the added costs of bias in the form of defamation and disparagement lawsuits. Media lawyers are citing protections secured by the “old media” while their clients are publicly espousing their intention to frame the news to advance political and social agendas.
CNN, for example, is now facing a trial in a lawsuit by Navy veteran Zachary Young, the subject of an alleged hit piece over his work to extract endangered people from Afghanistan after the Taliban takeover. In a Nov. 11, 2021, segment on CNN’s “The Lead with Jake Tapper,” the host tells his audience ominously how CNN correspondent Alex Marquardt discovered “Afghans trying to get out of the country face a black market full of promises, demands of exorbitant fees, and no guarantee of safety or success.” Marquardt named Young and his company in claiming that “desperate Afghans are being exploited” and need to pay “exorbitant, often impossible amounts” to flee the country.
Discovery revealed how Marquardt said that he wanted to “nail this Zachary Young mfucker.” After promising to “nail” Young, CNN editor Matthew Philips responded: “gonna hold you to that cowboy!” That sentiment was echoed by other CNN staff. In allowing the case to go to trial, a judge found not just evidence of actual malice by CNN but grounds for potential punitive damages.
Likewise, Palin recently won a major appeal before the United States Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit, which found that Palin was denied a fair trial in a case against the New York Times.
In 2017, liberal activist and Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) supporter James T. Hodgkinson attempted to massacre Republican members of Congress on a baseball diamond, nearly killing Rep. Steve Scalise (R-La.). The New York Times, eager to shift the narrative, ran an editorial suggesting that Palin had inspired or incited Jared Loughner’s 2011 shooting of then-U.S. Rep. Gabrielle Giffords (D-Ariz.).
The Times’ editors stated that SarahPAC, Palin’s political action committee, had posted a graphic that put a crosshair on a U.S. map representing Giffords’ district before she was shot, suggesting that this was direct incitement to violence. In reality, Palin’s graphic “targeting” about 20 vulnerable House Democrats all across the country is typical of graphics used in political campaigns by both parties for many decades. No evidence has ever been offered that Giffords’ deranged shooter even saw it.
But Musk’s lawsuit may be the most defining for our age of advocacy journalism. He is suing Media Matters, the left-wing outlet founded by David Brock, whom Time described as“one of the most influential operatives in the Democratic Party.” Although Brock is no longer with the site, Media Matters has long been accused of being a weaponized media outlet for the left. After Musk dismantled the censorship system at Twitter, he became something of an obsession for Media Matters, which targeted his revenue sources. The outlet ran a report suggesting that advertisements of major corporations were being posted next to pro-Nazi posts or otherwise hateful content on the platform. As I discuss in my new book, this effort mirrored similar moves by the anti-free speech movement against Musk to force him to restore censorship systems.
Companies including Apple, IBM, Comcast and Lionsgate Entertainment quickly joined the effective boycott to squeeze Musk. The problem is that it is hard to squeeze the world’s richest man financially. Musk told the companies to pound sand and told his lawyers to file suit.
The allegations in the lawsuit read like a textbook on advocacy journalism. Media Matters is accused of knowingly misrepresenting the real user experience by manipulating the algorithms to produce the pairing alleged in its story.
The complaint accuses Media Matters of running its manipulation to produce extremely unlikely pairings, such that one toxic match appeared for “only one viewer (out of more than 500 million) on all of X: Media Matters.” In other words, the organization wanted to write a hit piece connecting X to pro-Nazi material and proceeded to artificially create pairings between that material and corporate advertisements. It then ran the story as news.
Indeed, two defendant employees of Media Matters did not deny that they were aware of the alleged manipulation and that they were seeking to poison the well for advertisers in order to drain advertising revenues for X.
Although the media covered another judge blocking an effort by state officials to sue Media Matters over the anti-Musk effort, there has been comparably less coverage of the green light for the lawsuit in Texas.
U.S. District Judge Reed O’Connor of the Northern District of Texas rejected an effort to dismiss the case on jurisdictional and other grounds. Musk will be able to continue his claims of tortious interference with existing contracts, business disparagement and tortious interference with prospective economic advantage.
Not surprisingly, although the media has heralded lawsuits like the one by Dominion Voting System against Fox News (which led to a large settlement), they are overwhelmingly hostile toward the Musk lawsuits. It is not hard to see why. The Media Matters lawsuit directly challenges the ability of media outlets to create false narratives to advance a political agenda. As with the CNN and New York Times cases, it can expose how the media first decides on a conclusion and then frames or even invents the facts to support it.
While rejecting the longstanding principles of journalism such as objectivity, these media outlets are citing the cases and defenses secured by those now-outdated media organizations. They want to be advocates, but they also want to be protected as journalists.
These cases still face tough challenges, including challenging jury pools in places like New York. However, they are exposing the bias that now characterizes much of American journalism.
In the age of advocacy journalism, a bill has come due. That is why Musk’s lawsuit against Media Matters . . . well . . . matters.
Jonathan Turley is a Fox News Media contributor and the Shapiro Professor of Public Interest Law at George Washington University. He is the author of “The Indispensable Right: Free Speech in an Age of Rage” (Simon & Schuster, June 18, 2024).
In my new book and prior columns, I have described a “radical chic” in academia, faculty who thrill audiences with extremist rhetoric and calls for radical reforms, even revolution. The latest example comes from Arizona State University where professors laid out their dystopian vision of America, a vision that apparently can be avoided by “dismantl[ing] capitalism” and “elect[ing] a female president.”
At the outset, it is important to note two things. First, the program covered by the conservative site College Fix was a small event. Second, these faculty members have every right to espouse these views, and it is good for students to have a wide variety of viewpoints on campus. My objection in the past has not been the presence of far-left faculty on campuses but the purging of conservative, moderate, and libertarian faculty.
It is also important to address what are becoming common and extreme arguments on our campuses, including a growing Anti capitalist movement.
The event titled “Jenny Irish’s HATCH: A Speculative Future for Reproductive Rights” was held both in person and via Zoom. Jenny Irish, an ASU English professor, was joined by Angela Lober, director of the Academy of Lactation Programs at ASU’s Edson College of Nursing and Health Innovation. Lober, who runs major programs at the school, offered some of the most extreme viewpoints, including the assertion that “the United States hates women and everything the female body does.”
It was a remarkable claim for a nation that has been a leader in the world in women’s rights for over a century and has long had major female leaders from the Vice President to the Speaker of the House of Representatives to various cabinet members.
Not to be outdone, Irish expressed her fear that the United States could see “forced breeding camps” and “cannibalism.” She told the students and faculty that “so much of our reality points toward those futures.” She was less clear on what specifically is pointing to that future other than the Supreme Court’s decision to leave abortion to the states.
Lober was, however, clear about the solution in calling for the audience to help “dismantle capitalism” and “elect a female president.”
The event was co-hosted by ASU Lincoln Center for Applied Ethics, which hosts events that aim to design “a future keyed to human flourishing.” Putting the hyperbolic rhetoric to the side, the anti-capitalist calls have become ubiquitous on campuses. Socialism has become a rallying cry with polls showing that young people have a more positive view of socialism than capitalism. There is an interesting dynamic to the push for socialism in the United States. Advocates may have a harder time convincing new migrants and citizens who fled socialist countries like Venezuela.
The draw of a “land of opportunity” has been due to not just our laws but also our economic system. The ability to sustain that growth (or support the existing social welfare systems) depends on a competitive economic system.
The irony is found in comments like those of Fidel Castro who declared that “my idea, as the whole world knows, is that the capitalist system now doesn’t work either for the United States or the world, driving it from crisis to crisis, which are each time more serious.” Cuba was (and continues to be decades later) an utter economic basket case without either liberty or prosperity.
Hugo Chavez made the same claim before driving his country into an economic tailspin.
As a student at the University of Chicago, I was fortunate enough to attend lectures by Milton Friedman and, despite being a liberal, I was convinced that there was a connection between capitalism and individual liberty. There are liberty-enhancing economic systems and those that are liberty-reducing. The freedom of economic choice in a capitalist system has historically reinforced individual liberty in my view.
The ASU event captures a rising call for dismantling an economic system that helped drive industrial innovation and massive wealth creation. It has also left great wealth disparities. We have sought to address poverty with social programs that offer greater opportunity for those who have not been able to escape cycles of poverty. We have much work to be done. However, the anti-capitalist movement often offers few specifics on the alternatives, as at the ASU event.
This is a debate that should be welcomed but not in this type of one-sided, jingoistic presentation. Imagine how much more substantive this panel would have been with an alternative viewpoint. Let’s have a discussion on the merits of capitalism and the record of alternative systems. That would offer educational and not merely emotive benefits to our academic community.
Jonathan Turley is a Fox News Media contributor and the Shapiro Professor of Public Interest Law at George Washington University. He is the author of “The Indispensable Right: Free Speech in an Age of Rage” (Simon & Schuster, June 18, 2024).
We have previously discussed the anti-free speech views of Clinton’s former Labor Secretary, Robert Reich, who has tried to sell citizens on the perfectly Orwellian view that more freedom means tyranny when it comes to the freedom of expression. He also demanded that former president Donald Trump be banned from ballots as a “traitor” — all in the name of protecting democracy from itself. Last week, Reich wrote a column declaring Elon Musk “out of control” in his refusal to censor citizens and appeared to call for his arrest.
Reich has long been a prominent voice in the anti-free speech movement discussed in my recent book, The Indispensable Right: Free Speech in an Age of Rage. Indeed, he has given a voice to the rage in calling for others to be silenced or arrested.
Elon Musk has long been the primary target of Reich and his allies after dismantling the censorship system at Twitter, now X. Reich called Musk’s purchase of Twitter with a pledge to reduce censorship to be “dangerous nonsense.”
Notably, Reich’s friend, Hillary Clinton, was one of the first to call for a crackdown on Musk after his purchase of Twitter. Hillary Clinton and other Democratic figures turned to Europe and called upon them to use their Digital Services Act to force censorship against Americans.
Reich has always shown a chilling fluidity in how free speech is protected and argued that public interest should be able to trump the right of any citizens in espousing views that he believes are dangerous.
In denouncing Musk, Reich encouraged a campaign to counter his efforts to resist censorship. He wrote that Musk “may be the richest man in the world. He may own one of the world’s most influential social media platforms. But that doesn’t mean we’re powerless to stop him.”
Like Hillary Clinton, Reich is calling on foreign governments and censors to silence American citizens including Musk: “Regulators around the world should threaten Musk with arrest if he doesn’t stop disseminating lies and hate on X.”
He even appears willing to undermine national security programs to stop unfettered free speech. He called for the U.S. government to cut off contracts with his companies despite their critical role in various national security efforts, including the possible rescue of the stranded two astronauts currently in space. None of that matters to Reich who appears to view free speech as a greater threat to our nation: “Why is the US government allowing Musk’s satellites and rocket launchers to become crucial to the nation’s security when he’s shown utter disregard for the public interest? Why give Musk more economic power when he repeatedly abuses it and demonstrates contempt for the public good?”
Reich’s call to regulate speech in the public interest is the Siren’s Call of every authoritarian regime in history. He will presumably tell us what speech is no longer tolerable for public policy reasons. Our “Indispensable Right” will, according to Reich, be safely in the hands of the European censors who can protect us from errant and dangerous thoughts.
As he explained earlier, “the kinds of things that we do about this is, focus less on thinking about free speech, but thinking about how the times have changed.” In this way, speech regulations can keep us “moving towards how we recommend content and … how we direct people’s attention is leading to a healthy public conversation that is most participatory.”
The “healthy public conversation” with Robert Reich increasingly appears to be his talking and the rest of us listening.
Jonathan Turley is a Fox News Media contributor and the Shapiro Professor of Public Interest Law at George Washington University. He is the author of “The Indispensable Right: Free Speech in an Age of Rage” (Simon & Schuster, June 18, 2024).
A.F. Branco Cartoon – After weeks, Kamala Harris finally does an interview that falls flat, though she had her emotional support pet next to her and several softball questions from Dana Bash.
INGRASSIA: The Art Of The Choke: How Kamala Harris’ Dumpster Fire Of A CNN Interview Indicates That She’s Not Presidential Material
By Paul Ingrassia – August 31, 2024
The takeaway of any honest viewer of Kamala Harris’ much-lambasted interview with CNN’s Dana Bash this past week is that of someone overwhelmed – burdened, one might say – by the stresses of campaigning, and for that reason, wholly unsuited to the office that she seeks. Even though the Left would beg to differ, one can still level a criticism against a so-called “person of color” that is not based on race or gender, but rather, stands alone as an objective assessment of the candidate’s performance.
In terms of conviction, Harris cut the opposite of the image of a confident leader. The fact that she needed Tim Walz with her in tow, who has been needled by the press as “Kamala’s comfort dog” – someone who is supposed to provide assurance for a candidate palpably in over her head, is hardly the look of a strong, independent woman. READ MORE…
A.F. Branco has taken his two greatest passions (art and politics) and translated them into cartoons that have been popular all over the country in various news outlets, including NewsMax, Fox News, MSNBC, CBS, ABC, and “The Washington Post.” He has been recognized by such personalities as Rep. Devin Nunes, Dinesh D’Souza, James Woods, Chris Salcedo, Sarah Palin, Larry Elder, Lars Larson, Rush Limbaugh, and President Trump.
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American Family Association
American Family Association (AFA), a non-profit 501(c)(3) organization, was founded in 1977 by Donald E. Wildmon, who was the pastor of First United Methodist Church in Southaven, Mississippi, at the time. Since 1977, AFA has been on the frontlines of Ame
American Family Association
American Family Association (AFA), a non-profit 501(c)(3) organization, was founded in 1977 by Donald E. Wildmon, who was the pastor of First United Methodist Church in Southaven, Mississippi, at the time. Since 1977, AFA has been on the frontlines of Ame
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American Family Association
American Family Association (AFA), a non-profit 501(c)(3) organization, was founded in 1977 by Donald E. Wildmon, who was the pastor of First United Methodist Church in Southaven, Mississippi, at the time. Since 1977, AFA has been on the frontlines of Ame
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American Family Association
American Family Association (AFA), a non-profit 501(c)(3) organization, was founded in 1977 by Donald E. Wildmon, who was the pastor of First United Methodist Church in Southaven, Mississippi, at the time. Since 1977, AFA has been on the frontlines of Ame
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