Tennessee lawmakers passed a bill permitting teachers and staff to carry a concealed weapon under certain conditions, despite angry theatrics from activists.
On Tuesday, hundreds of anti-gun radicals ramped up their efforts to stop the gun-rights legislation. They stormed the capitol building in Nashville, carrying signs and chanting unoriginal slogans such as “Blood on your hands!” and “Hey! Hey! Ho! Ho! The GOP has got to go!”
Noted Democrat agitator state Rep. Justin Pearson, who has already been expelled from the Tennessee House once for his disruptive activism, spoke in the midst of the group, railing in the cadence of a Southern preacher, “This is what democracy looks like!”
The activists, most of whom appeared to be women, then performed a protest known as a “die in,” whereby participants collectively collapse to the floor, pretending to be dead. They apparently believe the demonstration reflects the carnage of mass school shootings, though members of the public and law enforcement in the building that day instead likely enjoyed the brief moment of quiet.
The cries of the activists then reached a shrill pitch when the measure, SB1325, passed easily through the House, 68-28. Four Republicans joined all 24 Democrats in voting against the bill. Three more Republicans abstained.
“Vote them out!” one woman shrieked as a security officer escorted her and another individual out of the gallery. “Vote them out!”
The bill will now go to the desk of Republican Gov. Bill Lee. If he signs it or does nothing, it will become law. His only means of stopping the measure from taking effect would be to veto it, but he has never vetoed any piece of legislation since taking office in 2019. Thus, the bill will almost assuredly soon become the law of the state. But, cosponsor Republican state Sen. Paul Bailey clarified that it will not force any “faculty or staff member” to carry a weapon. It “simply gives” them “the option,” he said.
The bill also places several conditions on teachers and staff interested in arming themselves on campus. The following is a summary of those conditions, per CNN:
• Get an enhanced carry permit
• Get written authorization from the superintendent, principal, and the chief of the appropriate law enforcement agency
• Complete 40 hours of basic training in school policing and 40 hours of Peace Officer’s Standards and Training commission-approved training that is specific to school policing each year at the educator’s expense
• Complete a background check
• Undergo a psychological exam conducted by a Tennessee-licensed health care provider
As CNN noted, the bill passed just over a year after the horrific shooting at the Covenant School in Nashville, which left six Christians — three adults and three children — dead. However, CNN neglected to report that the individual responsible for the murders identified as transgender, describing the shooter only as “a 28-year-old former student.”
CNN also incorrectly asserted that “gun violence is the leading killer of children in the United States,” which has already claimed the lives of 436 children this year. The leading killer of children in America, by far, is abortion. According to NPR, more than 1 million children died from abortion in the U.S. in 2023 alone.
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Conservative media personality Steven Crowder allegedly obtained three pages of Nashville school shooter Audrey Hale’s manifesto, revealing that the transgender-identifying killer targeted Christian school children because they are white.
“[G]oing to fancy private schools with those fancy khakis + sports backpacks w/ their daddies mustangs + convertibles,” Hale wrote in her “DEATH DAY” plan shared by Crowder. “I wish to shoot you weak-ss d-cks w/ your mop yellow hair wanna kill all you little crackers!!! Bunch of little f-ggots w/ your white privileges,” she added.
The Federalist reached out to the Nashville Police Department and the Tennessee Bureau of Investigation (TBI), but neither would confirm or deny the validity of the manifesto. The Federalist also reached out to the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) but did not hear back.
If verified, the three pages published by Crowder are the first glimpse the public has had of Hale’s manifesto since she gunned down three children and three staff members at the Christian Covenant School in Nashville, Tennessee, last March. For 7 months, the FBI, TBI, and Nashville Police Department have hid the manifesto from public view.
Hale’s alleged manifesto reveals that Hale’s attack was premeditated. The leaked documents include minute-by-minute details of her planned attack, such as the time Hale intended to arrive at the Covenant school and how long it would take her to park her car. Hale even predicted that she would die the day of the shooting, writing at the bottom of her “DEATH DAY” schedule, “Time 2 die.”
The manifesto includes many disturbing quotes like her enthusiastic desire to “Kill those kids!!!” and to obtain a “high death count.” She also wrote, “Can’t believe I’m doing this, but I’m ready…I hope my victims aren’t.”
Journalist Ian Miles Cheong pointed out that Hale’s stated hatred of white people and white privilege is an outgrowth of “Diversity, Equity and Inclusion” ideology. “[Hale] is a product of DEI,” Cheong wrote on X. “This is why the media industrial complex, the government, and the institutions refused to publish it. They are all complicit. Hale’s actions and her motive go against the narrative that ‘white supremacy’ is the greatest threat to democracy. The greatest threat to freedom and democracy is DEI. It is the woke mind virus.”
Google and Facebook have reportedly censored news of the manifesto’s leak. This censorship is reminiscent of X’s actions back in March, when the social media company mass-suppressed reports on the “Trans Day Of Vengeance,” which was originally scheduled to take place the same week as Hale’s attack. Federalist CEO Sean Davis was among the censored, and his X account was locked for simply sharing a poster about the scheduled event.
If the leaked manifesto is real, it confirms that despite the Biden Justice Department (DOJ) knowing Hale’s attack was racially motivated, the DOJ did not investigate the shooting as a hate crime.
This adds to the dismissiveness and disrespect the Biden administration has shown to the Nashville shooting victims and their families. Thus far, the Biden administration has done nothing to seriously investigate the perverse, bigoted incentives behind the murders of the six slain Christians, nor has it, at the very least, done anything to memorialize the victims.
Recall, also, that in the wake of the shooting, White House Press Secretary Karine Jean-Pierre came out with statements in support of the “trans community,” and Vice President Kamala Harris met with rogue, insurrection-instigating Tennessee state representatives instead of the victims’ families.
Evita Duffy-Alfonso is a staff writer to The Federalist and the co-founder of the Chicago Thinker. She loves the Midwest, lumberjack sports, writing, and her family. Follow her on Twitter at @evitaduffy_1 or contact her at evita@thefederalist.com.
Tennessee Democrat Rep. Justin Pearson, who was expelled from his position for inciting an “insurrection” in the state Capitol, is now complaining to corporate media that Republicans are enlisting mob rule to once again stifle a leftist-led gun grab in the Volunteer State.
“I wonder what you make of the fact that the people of your state who you were standing up for would like to see some gun safety legislation, and the Republicans are ignoring the will of the majority,” MSNBC’s Nicole Wallace asked Pearson in an interview on Tuesday.
“Our democracy is in peril and the reality is we have people in the state of Tennessee Republican Party who are much more interested in turning our democracy into their ‘mobocracy,’ where mob rules,” the 28-year-old replied.
"Our democracy is in peril. The reality is we have people in the state of Tennessee, a Republican Party, who in much more interested in turning our democracy into their mobocracy for mob rules" – @Justinjpearson w/ @NicolleDWallacepic.twitter.com/jQe4Y8egew
Pearson’s comments are ironic considering he was one of the “Tennessee Three” representatives who encouraged a mob in the chamber gallery in March to bully legislators into passing restrictive gun control laws. Their attempts to rouse the rowdy crowd with jeers, taunts, and chants of “no action, no peace” were met with swift accountability from the General Assembly, which voted to boot Pearson and Rep. Justin Jones from the House days later.
Now, Pearson says Republicans’ fight to keep Gov. Bill Lee’s red flag law proposal and other unconstitutional gun policies off of the books in their state also constitutes undemocratic behavior.
“We are seeing in state legislature after state legislature the erosion of our democracy and so I’m deeply concerned about what is happening here in Tennessee, under the leadership of this extremist Republican Party of Cameron Sexton and William Lambert,” Pearson told Wallace.
Pearson specifically took issue with Republicans’ attempts to secure the state Capitol against another bout of unrest during their August special session.
“We are seeing that quite literally in the rules that are being passed that have now prohibited our own constituents from coming into session and holding a sign that says, ‘Protect kids not guns’ or that says, ‘Am I next?’ — that has now been banned during this special session,” Pearson said. “In fact, pieces of paper have more regulation than guns in our state.”
His colleague Jones joined in with a video posted to social media claiming that “The Guns Over People (GOP) Caucus has put more work into limiting the voices of the People and keeping them out of the Tennessee Capitol then listening to their demands for common sense gun laws.”
The Guns Over People (GOP) Caucus has put more work into limiting the voices of the People and keeping them out of the Tennessee Capitol then listening to their demands for common sense gun laws.
Corporate Media Really Want Gun Control in Tennessee Too
Pearson and Jones aren’t the only ones using empty definitions of “democracy” to browbeat and guilt-trip their legislative colleagues into doing their bidding when it comes to firearms. Desperate pleas for gun control littered front pages on Monday morning as the state chambers convened for the special session. Even Wallace’s initial question to Pearson indicated she believed Tennessee Republicans who refuse to infringe on the Second Amendment are in the wrong. Mere days before the special session began, The Washington Post published a feature of Melissa Alexander, the mother of a student who survived the Covenant School shooting.
“She’s a Republican gun owner. Now she’s pleading with GOP lawmakers for change,” the headline states.
The article claims that the only thing standing in the way of gun control activists like Alexander is “a powerful Republican-supermajority legislature that has resisted demands that lawmakers say infringe on rights guaranteed by the Second Amendment.”
“Grieving Governor’s Moderate Gun Proposal Is Spurned by G.O.P. Allies,” The New York Times also lamented once it became clear Republicans would focus more on mental health and safe gun storage than restricting Americans’ constitutional rights.
Local outlets such as The Tennessean published op-eds calling for Tennessee lawmakers to “listen to children about their gun violence fears.”
Missing from the front pages of these publications was any mention of polls suggesting that a majority of Tennesseans want current gun laws enforced instead of adding new laws to the books.
The specific gun law pushed by activists, Lee, Democrats like Pearson, and now the propaganda press is far from “moderate.” As my colleague Federalist Senior Editor David Harsanyi noted during the legislation’s debut in April, a law deeming someone who has a “psychiatric disorder” or “serious behavioral condition” eligible to lose his Second Amendment rights for 180 days or more is an “unconstitutional travesty.”
Lee’s failure to clarify whether transgenderism, the radical gender ideology that possessed the Covenant School shooter who murdered six, counts as a “psychological disorder” only furthered the GOP’s case against passing such a sweeping law.
Jordan Boyd is a staff writer at The Federalist and co-producer of The Federalist Radio Hour. Her work has also been featured in The Daily Wire, Fox News, and RealClearPolitics. Jordan graduated from Baylor University where she majored in political science and minored in journalism. Follow her on Twitter @jordanboydtx.
Children’s books are one of the most powerful tools parents have to help teach their kids how to be good humans. From picture books being read at bedtime to novels being read by flashlight under blankets, kids flourish in the safety of stories as they develop their belief systems. Resilience, empathy, respect, and many other noble traits are portrayed and experienced vicariously through books. What a powerful tool!
Having been a part of the children’s book publishing industry for several decades, and as a passionate participant, I have watched in growing dismay as the children’s literature, or “kidlit,” world has shifted and changed, and most recently taken a drastic plummet. Parents need to understand the destructive path this industry has taken, or they will discover too late as the damage hits home.
Seeing the Shift
This shift in kidlit has been happening for a long time. About 25 years ago, novels that portrayed kids as environmental activists began to win awards. About 15 years ago, the award-winning books showed shocking, disturbing scenarios. Ten years ago, books that depicted sexualization and abuse at younger ages began to win awards. Then, five years ago, it shifted a bit more to where books focused on systemic racism and sexual identity won awards. Today, if books don’t include any of the above depictions, they are rarely published by medium and large publishing houses.
And it’s the medium and large publishing houses that supply schools, libraries, and bookstores.
Eight years ago, I organized a statewide writer’s conference for children’s book authors. We brought in several high-powered industry members from major publishing houses. One editor’s words threw open the window to this shifting world. She asked a writer at our conference, who was a leftist himself, about his story. He explained that in his manuscript, his main character learns that his hero is gay. The protagonist is troubled by this and works through his feelings to come to acceptance later in the book.
The respected editor stopped the writer mid-explanation and said, “No.” She explained that in kids’ books, we must present the ideal as if it already exists. There can be no “being troubled by” gayness. There can be no “coming to terms with” sexual identity. The characters in our stories must immediately accept with positive responses any representation of modern social constructs. This immediately laudatory reaction to woke ideology is now required in kidlit. If an author doesn’t portray it as such, his book will not be published.
This pronouncement by the editor shocked me and many other writers there. The line had now been drawn. As writers, our hope of publication rested on our willingness to positively portray woke ideology.
Shortly after this conference, as a part of several online writers’ groups, I started to see comments like this: “We have a duty to save children from conservative, Christian thought,” and “It’s our responsibility as writers to right the wrongs of past traditional thinking.” In their minds, they were in a strategic position as writers of kids’ books to influence young minds in the direction they wanted. These groups soon canceled me.
“We have a duty to save children from conservative, Christian thought,” and “It’s our responsibility as writers to right the wrongs of past traditional thinking.”
A Normalization Campaign
In the past three years, there has been another dangerous shift. In 2020, the Publisher’s Weekly list of Best Middle Grade Books of the year featured 14 titles. These are books for kids ages 9 to 13. Out of the 14 books, nine on that year’s list openly spoke about racism and sexual identity. Each book’s description clearly identified these themes. Of the 14 books on the 2021 Best Books list, nine of the 14 again included topics of racism and sexual identity, but this time, some were clearly identified and others subtly presented. On the Publisher’s Weekly list of Best Middle Grade Books for 2022, nine of the 14 books discussed racism and sexual identity, but only one clearly stated so in the book description. Publishers no longer openly tell readers about the portrayal of radical social agendas in their books. They are subtly inserting the concepts that they want to teach young kids without letting parents know they are there.
Any more questions about why reading and math score are so awful?
This shift frightens me more. We have moved from the inclusion of liberal social agendas in kids’ books — and flaunting it — to sneaking them in under the radar of parents. This is called normalization. The goal is to include these ideologies in exciting, adventurous stories so they become commonplace. Woke ideology has shifted from being the make-up of a book’s plot lines to the fabric of the setting — the normal backdrop of the story as if it exists that way in real life. This normalization leads to acceptance, which leads to embracing. By weaving these social agendas into the “normal” background of a story, a child who feels shocked at a scene or description immediately shifts to feeling shame for being shocked in the first place. Kids will seek to replace their shame with acceptance. This is the power of normalization.
When I know what a book is about, I can make sure my child doesn’t read it. When I’m being kept in the dark, these ideologies may slip past me and fall directly into my child’s hands and mind. Strong storytelling mixed with normalized social agendas creates a book that will influence my child in ways I don’t want. This is the power the industry holds.
We can no longer walk into a library or bookstore, grab a children’s novel off the shelf, and expect it to be clean, based on traditional values, or to contain age-appropriate material. It won’t.
The Library Lurch
And not only books and publishers pose a problem. After the seismic cultural shift that happened in 2016, libraries across the nation purged their shelves of anything “old.” This weeding out pulled many classics, which got some attention, but the deepest cuts were made in the children’s departments. Traditional values were ejected to make room for new, modern left-wing values — from board books for babies to young adult novels.
Many homeschool families use literature extensively in their programs because of the versatility of the media. But these families have increasingly become dismayed at what they are finding at the local libraries they have depended on for so long. I have heard from many parents that they no longer go to the library at all. What a shame! Even when well-meaning people donate clean books with traditional values to their local libraries, in the hopes of spreading light, many new library acquisition policies dictate that the donations be thrown away.
Of 12,000 librarian donors to the 2020 presidential campaign, 93 percent went to President Joe Biden. The vast majority of public and school librarians across the nation are leftist in their personal beliefs and are more than happy to join the publishing industry in promoting their ideals. We see this in children’s book promotional displays, in the way librarians arrange books on shelves, and in the books they order. In your library, you may find more than a dozen different children’s biographies on Ruth Bader Ginsberg, but not even one on Amy Coney Barrett. This has become typical.
On Feb. 25, 2023, conservative children’s book publisher Brave Books, hosted a story hour at the Hendersonville, Tennessee Public Library. Kirk Cameron, Missy Robertson, and Riley Gaines went to read their traditional-value books to kids. When the librarian learned who they were, he tried to stop the story hour, saying he “didn’t want their movement” in his library. This librarian had previously hosted drag queen story hours. But Brave Books had arranged the story hour according to the library’s policies, so it couldn’t be stopped. So instead, the head librarian, along with his two assistants, did everything they could to disrupt the event. They blasted music, banged tables, and tried shouting them down.
Fortunately, Hendersonville is a very conservative community. Almost a thousand families came to the library for the story hour and appreciated the opportunity to stand up for traditional values in kids’ books. Due to public outcry, within a few weeks, the librarian had been fired.
This is what we’re up against. The entire children’s book publishing industry — from authors to publishers to librarians — believes it should have the power to control your children’s minds. And it has systematically and progressively gained that access.
Kiri Jorgensen is the Publisher and Senior Editor at Chicken Scratch Books.
I recently wrote about the current wave of rainbow-flavored “insurrections” sweeping through America’s red statehouses. I called them part of a color revolution. Color revolutions, you will recall, are traditionally “popular uprisings against authoritarian regimes, such as those that took place in former Soviet countries such as Ukraine and Georgia in the early and mid-2000s.”
In our American color revolution, the script has flipped. Here, red states are the only rebels standing strong in the face of increasingly authoritarian central power — wrapped, of course, in the rainbow flag.
Tennessee recently made a star out of State Rep. Justin Pearson, the code-switching preacher man with the afro who just a few years ago was a repp tie-wearing prep at Colgate, but this year led an invasion of screaming gun-control protesters into the Tennessee Capitol, shut it down, and got himself expelled (temporarily, of course. Plot twist: The lead characters on this show always win in the end!)
We’ve now seen color revolutionaries take to state capitols in Tennessee, Montana, Kansas, Kentucky, Florida, Oklahoma, and Missouri. This week, the color revolution came to Texas. The radicals are on top. And (if you will excuse my French), thanks to their total effete ineffectuality, red states are getting bottomed, hard.
The Best Little Statehouse in Texas
Showrunners set this week’s episode of “Transurrection” in Texas. Why? They can’t turn Texas blue, right? …Right?
Twitter soon filled up with clips of the state Capitol in Austin getting overrun by a shrieking mob of LGBT cuckoos waving transgender flags and shutting down voting on an important bill. They’ve been keeping Austin weird for years, biding their time, and it finally paid off.
A Texas Republican state delegate on the scene tweeted a video of the mob and reported, “Trans activists are losing their minds, shoving signs into [a Texas conservative’s] face, and allowing spit to spew from their mouths while they scream ‘no place for hate.’” You have to admire their shamelessness, frankly. “No place for hate!” they scream, as they bludgeon their enemies.
The “hate” bill in question, naturally, would ban genital mutilation of children statewide. As we know by now, the idea of not being permitted to permanently sterilize and castrate kids makes sterilized and castrated adults very, very mad. How dare you not let us ritually initiate your son into our family-friendly extreme body modification cult!
A local newspaper reported on the action: “More than one hundred protesters rallied at the Capitol in opposition to the bill Tuesday in anticipation of the floor debate, engaging in chants including, “Protect Trans Kids!” and holding signs reading, “Let Trans Kids Grow Up.”
Am I the only one who notices the irony here? They want to “let trans kids grow up” — by putting them on irreversible puberty blockers that literally stop them from growing up. Logic — like charm, charisma, and good looks — is not this group’s strong suit.
But, as always, their ugly tactics work. “As protesters were removed from the House gallery, Democrats in the House on Tuesday successfully delayed debate on Senate Bill 14, which would ban certain gender-affirming medical treatments for transgender minors. Using a procedural tactic … the bill was sent back to the House Committee on Public Health, then voted out of the committee again Tuesday evening,” the paper reported, emphasis mine.
They may still lose in the end, but they survived the day.
I feel like I’m watching a new streaming docudrama show on Netflix: “Game of Throngs.” “The Transmandalorian.” “Sex Reassignment in the City.”
Last week’s episode was set in Montana and guest-starred an unknown man in a dress, an impish scamp named Zooey Zephyr. Zooey is not your typical social media starlet; he’s got a strong jawline, a prominent Adam’s apple, and a deep voice. His script, however, follows the Tennessee storyline virtually line for line. Zooey led his “transurrection” over a new Montana bill that would outlaw transgender interventions for children. Just like in Tennessee, he broke the rules, caused a riot, got ejected, and then used the ejection as a battering ram to take down the Republican leadership. Here’s how Fox reported it:
‘The only thing I will say is if you vote yes on this bill and yes on these amendments, I hope the next time there’s an invocation when you bow your heads in prayer, you see the blood on your hands,’ Zephyr said when debating SB99. Critics demanded an apology. However, after refusing to do so, Republicans led the chamber in a 68-32 vote last week to bar Zephyr from accessing the House floor. Zephyr cannot enter the anteroom or gallery but can vote remotely. (Emphasis mine)
Even when they lose they win!
How many times can they run this same storyline? Answer: At least 50 times, one for each state that requires it.
I seem to remember some other event a few years back, when protesters holding flags entered a capitol to stop lawmakers from voting on something. If I recall correctly, a lot of them were sentenced to years in prison for daring to block a vote. I will pray none of the nonbinary furries in the Texas Capitol suffer the same fate! They don’t look like they could last five seconds away from their cats.
The foundation of modern American democracy is that all Americans deserve some kind of representation in the rooms where law and policy are made. Not content to control those rooms in states where they dominate the political scene, some Republicans have said, in essence, that representation is a privilege for communities whose chosen lawmakers don’t offend their sensibilities. (Emphasis mine)
I like to picture flustered Republicans hitting the smelling salts and the fainting couch, like Scarlett’s Aunt Pittypat, when the winsome Zoey Zephyr and his merry band of rebels made a bit of noise during working hours.
Hilariously, the title of Bouie’s column is “A Sinister New Page in the Republican Playbook.” Maybe I shouldn’t say this out loud, but: The Republicans don’t have a playbook.
I wish they had a sinister playbook! How can we get them a sinister playbook and teach them how to use it? Because they absolutely do not know what to do in the face of mob rule. They are off balance. Unprepared. And it will only get worse.
One of these was an almost-10-year-old Cassandra Robinson, who in the photos looks like a muscular little boy with long hair dyed green, and wore “a T-shirt that read: ‘inspired by the STRONG WOMEN in my life.’” There is no 10-year-old on Earth who would dream up a sentence like that and want it on a T-shirt. Is his name a cry for help?
End Game
So, what’s the end goal? This is not just about gun control, or the “right” to castrate 8-year-olds.
Here’s what I think it’s obviously about: performing a radical mutilation surgery on the Constitution. Neutering it, for good — irreversibly even. This is the ultimate prize. Of course, it’s incredibly hard to change the Constitution, with good reason. That’s why it’s rarely been done in our history.
There are a few ways to rewrite the Constitution, but all the paths go through the states. You need three-fourths of states to ratify a new amendment. Insurmountable? Democrats already have 20 to 22 blue and purple states. They need 37, and that means the South is the juiciest prize, especially with its rapidly changing demographics.
Even in red states like Tennessee, they’d only need to flip 10 percent of the voters to win the state house. Age and heart disease will take care of the boomer-aged bitter clingers. College indoctrination will take care of the rest. Every four years a new crop of teenage voters arrives ready to make their “voices heard.” Time is on their side, not ours. And they’ve got all the time in the world.
Well, color me reacquainted! “Our Constitution is one of the most difficult in the world to amend. … But the remoteness of the possibility of formal constitutional change today may be as much a product of constitutional culture as constitutional structure: Several generations of Americans have lost the habit and muscle memory of seeking formal constitutional change.” (Emphasis mine)
Got that? The color revolutionaries are developing new muscle memory they will get to flex again and again as they continue dominating us in their weight class. Meanwhile, hordes of radicals are greedily gnawing through the country’s aging superstructure.
The Color of Money
The “tranissaries” of the revolution are obviously well-funded and blessed with a loyal army of loudmouth fanatics willing to win by any means necessary.
Are you?
I don’t know exactly who is directing and funding the revolutionaries. But it’s clear the country’s largest foundations and NGOs have these unsuspecting states in their sights. They have arrayed the full might of their billions squarely at “voting rights” and “defending democracy.” In other words, they are the architects behind activist mobs and the skilled ballot harvesters that have so far netted them win after win — including the White House.
The Macarthur Foundation and Ford Foundation, which funds dozens of grassroots activist groups including something called the “Texas Civil Rights Project,” are on the case with their billions. The Carnegie Foundation is doing its part for the cause, too. And there are many others. These massive bloodless megaliths are cleverly wrapping themselves in the cozy civil rights issue of the day — poor little trans kids (or election overhauls favored by candidates who love that issue) — and winning enormous popular support.
The wealth of America’s greatest old families is being used to systematically strip the place bare, and they’re looting it of everything that’s not nailed down. Including any stray toddlers. Viva la rainbow revoluçion!
It’s time to build a counterrevolution, fast.
Peachy Keenan is a contributing editor and regular essayist for The American Mind, a publication of The Claremont Institute. She is the author of “Domestic Extremist: A Practical Guide to Winning the Culture War” (coming June 6th from Regnery). She also writes at peachykeenan.substack.com , and you can always find her on Twitter @keenanpeachy, at least until she is canceled.
The Montana House of Representatives came to a halt Monday after a crowd of transgender activists flooded the public gallery and shouted down the speaker. Demonstrators chanted “let her speak” after lawmakers refused to lift a censure on Democrat Rep. Zooey Zephyr over spewing hate-filled comments on the House floor last week. Zephyr, a first-term representative from Missoula and the first transgender-identified member of the lower chamber, mocked Republican prayers during debate on a bill to ban medical interventions for minors with gender dysphoria.
“The only thing I will say is if you vote yes on this bill, and yes on these amendments, I hope the next time there’s an invocation when you bow your heads in prayer, you see the blood on your hands,” Zephyr said.
Rep Zooey Zephyr of Missoula said the following when debating SB99 Amendments.
“The only thing I will say is if you vote yes on this bill and yes on these amendments I hope the next time there’s an invocation when you bow your heads in prayer, you see the blood on your hands.” pic.twitter.com/wuhlympbLq
— Montana Freedom Caucus (@MTFreedomCaucus) April 18, 2023
The bill in question ultimately cleared the chamber.
Republicans revoked Zephyr’s ability to speak on the House floor until issuing an apology.
“It is up to me to maintain decorum here on the House floor, to protect the dignity and integrity,” said House Speaker Matt Regier last week, according to the Associated Press. “Any representative that I don’t feel can do that will not be recognized.”
“Hate-filled testimony has no place on the House floor,” said Republican Rep. Caleb Hinkle, who serves on the House Freedom Caucus, which introduced the measure to censure Zephyr.
Mob demonstrators descended on the Capitol Monday to demand the lower chamber reinstate debate privileges. The crowd erupted after lawmakers voted again to keep Zephyr quiet when the freshman representative tried to speak on a bill restricting child pronoun changes in K-12 classrooms. Speaker Regier refused to acknowledge the chamber’s censured colleague igniting a roar of interruption from the gallery. Lawmakers were forced to pause proceedings as police in riot gear arrested disruptors, according to Montana Public Radio.
BREAKING: The Montana House of Reps has been shut down by left-wing protesters who are there protesting the censure of transgender Democrat Rep. Zooey Zephyr, that was led by the @MTFreedomCaucus, for telling his Republican colleagues they have "blood on their hands" for passing… pic.twitter.com/MnOyO4FhlN
Riot Police clear the Montana Capital making 5 arrests after a mob of Trans Activists stormed in demanding ‘trans rights’ and ‘her her speak’ in reference de to a Transgender legislator who had been silenced by the House Speaker for his violent rhetoric. pic.twitter.com/UijIeCd41t
Zephyr defended those arrested outside the statehouse.
“My constituents and community came up and shouted ‘let her speak’ — I felt pride in them,” Zephyr said. “Because when they stood up, they are standing on behalf of democracy.”
The scenes on day three of the saga at the Montana Capitol come weeks after transgender activists stormed the Tennessee statehouse at Nashville over similar legislation. The “insurrection,” as defined by an assault on a Capitol building, was led by a trio of Democrat lawmakers who were stripped of their committee assignments. Reps. Justin Jones and Justin Pearson were temporarily expelled from the legislature for using a bullhorn amid the demonstrations. Both were reinstated by local officials.
Tristan Justice is the western correspondent for The Federalist and the author of Social Justice Redux, a conservative newsletter on culture, health, and wellness. He has also written for The Washington Examiner and The Daily Signal. His work has also been featured in Real Clear Politics and Fox News. Tristan graduated from George Washington University where he majored in political science and minored in journalism. Follow him on Twitter at @JusticeTristan or contact him at Tristan@thefederalist.com. Sign up for Tristan’s email newsletter here.
Tennessee Gov. Bill Lee is asking lawmakers to support “new legislation that would temporarily block someone who is deemed a threat to themselves or to others from having guns,”writes Axios.
That’s one way of putting it.
Another, more precise, way would be to say Lee supports a law that forces people accused of a precrime to sit down with state-appointed psychiatrists and lawyers and prove their innocence before the government decides if they can keep their guns. If that person says the wrong things, cops can show up at his home, search it, demand the accused hand over his property — not just any property, but property explicitly protected by the Constitution — without offering any evidence that he’s committed, or ever planned to commit, a crime.
In selling his bill, Lee claims that guns can be taken from those accused of having a “psychiatric disorder, alcohol dependence, or drug dependence.” But federal law already prohibits the sale of a gun to anyone who “has been adjudicated as a mental defective.” And most people who drink or take drugs don’t have a propensity towards violence. Excessive drinking might be bad for you, but it’s legal. As is grumbling about chemtrails, pondering how to overthrow the government, and hating your neighbors.
Incidentally, if an alcoholic is found guilty of a precrime, Lee’s bill only affords him a single hearing to rectify the situation for each act of suspension, which can be in effect for up to 180 days — even if he pulls his life together, repents, and becomes a devout Seventh-Day Adventist. The state can keep asking for extensions in perpetuity.
Of course, even those with persistent depression, an emotional disorder, aren’t often would-be killers. One in eight Americans takes antidepressants. Yet, one suspects laws like this will only stigmatize depression and make gun owners less inclined to seek help.
More importantly, though, Lee fails to mention in his factsheets that the bill allows the state to take firearms on the basis of a “serious behavioral condition,” which includes “functional impairment that substantially interferes with or limits the person’s role or functioning in family, school, occupational, or community activities.” The incredulous italics are mine, because Lee’s standard, despite his contention that there is a high burden of proof, could include basically anyone who’s met the psychiatric diagnostic criteria for depression and stopped going to a weekly softball game.
Sure, the law includes penalties for false and bad-faith statements by cops and third parties, but those would be all but impossible to prove or prosecute because the basis for the state issuing a “temporary mental health order of protection” is extraordinarily broad.
If someone is threatening others with violence, Tennessee already has numerous laws on the books that allow for arrest. It already has a law that allows for the immediate detention of people deemed dangerous to themselves or others. Every state does. And yet, in numerous recent mass shootings, the perpetrator has been known to the police, and they did nothing.
The Covenant School shooting, Lee maintains, makes it impossible not to act. But it’s important to remember that, as far as we know, nothing in Lee’s proposal would have stopped that shooter. The mother, who never appears to have reported her daughter for mental illness, probably wasn’t even aware that her adult child still owned guns. As far as we know, the killer never threatened anyone publicly before the shooting, nor did she pose a danger to herself. For all we know, the shooting was an act of terrorism or conducted over some personal grudge. We won’t know until, or if, the sheriff in Nashville releases her manifesto.
One suspects that gun controllers will soon cook up studies to tell us red flag laws are amazing, but to this point no major study — including a meta-analysis conducted by RAND Corporation — has conclusively found them to be effective. Many of these state laws are even worse than Lee’s proposal as they are permitted ex parte orders. But even if these laws were useful on the margins, they are a serious attack on the Second, Fourth, Fifth, and Sixth Amendments. Red flag laws just give authorities power to work around normal evidentiary standards. Perhaps we should try upholding the tens of thousands of laws that already govern gun ownership before passing new ones.
In his platitude-laden Twitter video, Lee frames himself as a courageous nonpartisan, accusing anyone who opposes his proposal of being blinded by politics. The truth is, the governor’s do-something-ism is about the laziest, most politically motivated breed of leadership imaginable.
David Harsanyi is a senior editor at The Federalist, a nationally syndicated columnist, a Happy Warrior columnist at National Review, and author of five books—the most recent, Eurotrash: Why America Must Reject the Failed Ideas of a Dying Continent. He has appeared on Fox News, C-SPAN, CNN, MSNBC, NPR, ABC World News Tonight, NBC Nightly News and radio talk shows across the country. Follow him on Twitter, @davidharsanyi.
It’s no secret many on the left love to politicize tragedies, but the reaction from some to Monday’s deadly shooting at a Christian school in Nashville has reached a whole new level of malevolent. Local authorities have identified the shooter as Audrey Hale, a 28-year-old woman who pretended to be male and had reportedly attended the school years prior. After entering the Covenant School shortly after 10 a.m., the shooter killed six people before being gunned down and killed by police. Among the victims are three 9-year-old children and three school staff members.
Nashville Police Chief John Drake characterized the shooting as a “targeted attack” and said authorities discovered “a manifesto” and detailed maps of the school showing points of entry. Drake also confirmed “there is some theory” to the idea that Hale’s transgender identity contributed to her decision to target the school but that authorities are still investigating the motive. Police said Hale was considering “another location” to target, but after “a threat assessment by the suspect [and] too much security, [she] decided not to.”
Immediately following the attack, leftists began using the horrific tragedy as an opportunity to promote their radical agenda and spew insensitive remarks.
Joe Biden
During moments of crisis, Americans should be able to count on their president to put aside politics and bring the country together. But not when that president is Joe Biden. After talking about how much he loves chocolate chip ice cream on Monday, Biden used the Nashville shooting to push for more gun control.
“The shooter … reportedly had two assault weapons and a pistol. … So, I call on Congress again to pass my assault weapons ban,” Biden said.
Biden on Nashville shooting: "It's heartbreaking, a family's worst nightmare…we have to do more to stop gun violence…I call on Congress again to pass my assault weapons ban."pic.twitter.com/10sArjE8mC
During her remarks in Monday’s White House press briefing, Press Secretary Karine Jean-Pierre not only used the shooting to call for increased gun control, but appeared to blame the tragedy on Republicans.
“How many more children have to be murdered before Republicans in Congress will step up and act to pass the assault-weapons ban?” she asked.
Jean-Pierre weighs in on school shooting in Nashville:
"How many more children have to be murdered before Republicans in Congress will step up and act to pass the assault weapons ban?pic.twitter.com/bQp6S3Q4nu
ABC News Senior National Correspondent Terry Moran wasted no time in seemingly tying the shooting to Tennessee Republicans, who recently passed legislation protecting minors from experimental transgender surgeries, wrong-sex hormones, and drag shows. After providing viewers with details on the shooting, Moran immediately segued into discussing the legislation Tennessee Gov. Bill Lee approved earlier this month.
IT BEGINS: ABC's Terry Moran ties the Nashville school shooting to Tennessee's recently-passed legislation banning the hormonization and mutilation of minors. The shooter was 28. pic.twitter.com/MfKdOpQZIf
Washington Post contributor and former New York Times columnist Mike Wise went out of his way to thank a Twitter user, who referred to Tennessee as “an intolerant state that brainwashes children through religious indoctrination.”
“This is as deep and real as it gets. Thank you,” Wise wrote.
A Washington Post contributor just thanked someone who posted that the Christian school in Nashville that was shot up today was a religious indoctrination center pic.twitter.com/U6hW9AP6C4
The Virginia Democrat blasted Republicans with an unserious and bad-faith attack, saying the GOP thinks drag shows pose a greater physical danger to children than guns do.
Benjamin Ryan
In a now-deleted tweet, independent reporter and NBC News contributor Benjamin Ryan attempted to correlate the shooting with the fact that The Daily Wire, a conservative news outlet, is based in Nashville.
“Nashville is home to the Daily Wire, a hub of anti-trans activity by @MattWalshBlog, @BenShapiro, and @MichaelJKnowles,” Ryan wrote.
Anna Skinner
Newsweek Senior Writer Anna Skinner spent her Monday afternoon writing an article titled, “Tennessee Republicans’ Ban on Drag Shows Mocked After Mass Shooting,” in which she spun the news to be about bashing Tennessee Republicans and lamented that so-called “assault weapons” are still legal in the state.
“Tennessee Republican legislators are getting slammed after at least three children and three adults were killed in a mass shooting at a Nashville private school on Monday,” Skinner wrote. “Twitter users assailed state GOP officials in the wake of the bloodshed.”
Kyle Griffin
MSNBC Executive Producer Kyle Griffin published a tweet evoking similar absurdity.
Hayes Brown
MSNBC Opinion Writer Hayes Brown took a page from Griffin’s playbook and politicize the tragedy. In his column, Hayes bizarrely argued that “much of [America’s] gun policy is presaged on the idea that guns are cool,” and “[t]hat was the unspoken understanding behind the rapid spread of the AR-15.”
Republicans “think that their toys, their totems of masculinity, their props for playing the hero, are more important than the lives lost,” he wrote.
While now titled, “The gap between GOP gun rights fantasy and Nashville’s reality,” the article originally displayed the headline, “6 are dead in Nashville. Let’s revisit how much the Tennessee GOP loves guns.”
— James Lindsay, ultra-low social credit (@ConceptualJames) March 27, 2023
Josephine Harvey
In a so-called “news” article titled, “Gun-Loving GOP Congressman From Nashville Torched For Response To School Shooting,” Huffington Post Senior Reporter Josephine Harvey attempted to create a controversy surrounding GOP Rep. Andy Ogles — who represents the district that includes the Covenant School — by bringing up a 2021 Christmas photo of Ogles’ family holding firearms.
In her article, Harvey claimed the picture is a “gun-glorifying Christmas photo” and went on to cite tweets from leftists attacking Ogles for posting it on Facebook well over a year ago.
Shawn Fleetwood is a Staff Writer for The Federalist and a graduate of the University of Mary Washington. He also serves as a state content writer for Convention of States Action and his work has been featured in numerous outlets, including RealClearPolitics, RealClearHealth, and Conservative Review. Follow him on Twitter @ShawnFleetwood
Tennessee Senate Republicans passed a bill Monday that could block transgender people from changing their listed sex on government-issued documents including driver’s licenses and birth certificates. The proposed legislation, known as House Bill 239 – Senate Bill 1440, defines the term “sex” for use in the Tennessee Code as a “person’s immutable biological sex as determined by anatomy and genetics existing at the time of birth and evidence of a person’s biological sex.” It also clarifies that “evidence of a person’s biological sex” includes, but is not limited to, “a government-issued identification document that accurately reflects a person’s sex listed on the person’s original birth certificate.”
While it cleared the state Senate, the bill stalled in the state House due to potential budgetary impacts. In a floor speech Monday, its sponsor, Republican state Sen. Kerry Roberts, argued the legislation promotes “consistency” in the state code, rejecting concerns brought in a fiscal note, Axios reported. Krista Lee Carsner, executive director of the Tennessee General Assembly’s fiscal review committee, noted the proposed language “may result in increases to state and local expenditures associated with compliance measures, potential civil litigation and could jeopardize federal funding; however, due to multiple unknown factors, a precise fiscal impact cannot be determined.”
Tennessee Senate Republicans approved a bill defining “biological sex.” (David Underwood/Education Images/Universal Images Group via Getty Images)
In the fiscal note, Carsner says the state Department of Education asserts that the legislation could risk federal funding awards for several programs amounting to nearly $1.3 billion in the 2023-2024 fiscal year. The state Department of Health, which receives more than $750 million in federal grant funding, notes Title X; Women, Infants, and Children; and various other federal grants specify an alternate definition of “sex.” The state could lose funding if found out of compliance with federal requirements.
Tennessee Gov. Bill Lee recently approved legislation restricting drag shows, gender reassignment surgeries for minors. (AP Photo/Phelan M. Ebenhack)
In a statement Monday, Human Rights Campaign condemned the Tennessee Senate for passing the bill.
“Extremist Tennessee Senators are continuing their assault on LGBTQ+ Tennesseans’ ability to live their lives openly and honestly,” the advocacy group’s legal director, Sarah Warbelow, said. “This is their latest cruel attempt to stigmatize, marginalize and erase the LGBTQ+ community, particularly transgender Tennesseans. Let’s be clear: the goal of this bill is to exclude the LGBTQ+ community from nondiscrimination protections in the state of Tennessee and to perpetuate a false narrative of who transgender people are.”
Transgender advocates have condemned the Tennessee bill defining sex. (Getty)
Republican Tennessee Gov. Bill Lee has not said publicly whether he supports the bill. However, earlier this month, Lee did sign legislation banning healthcare providers in the state from legally prescribing puberty blockers or hormones for minors and performing gender transition surgeries for minors.
He also signed off on a law that prohibits drag shows from public property within 1,000 feet of schools, public parks or places of worship and limits them to age-restricted venues. The law includes criminal provisions for “adult cabaret performances” held in public areas where they could be seen by children. Both laws take effect on July 1.
Fox News Digital reached out to Lee’s office Wednesday for comment regarding House Bill 239 – Senate Bill 1440.
Danielle Wallace is a reporter for Fox News Digital covering politics, crime, police and more. Story tips can be sent to danielle.wallace@fox.com and on Twitter: @danimwallace.
In recent years, sentencing for violent criminals has been like common core math. You start out with a sum of 20 years, for example, but somehow even the worst career offenders wind up turning 20 years into 8 years’ time served. Tennessee has become the first state to finally implement truth in sentencing to make sure that a sentence is actually served.
Last week, after a decade of red states promoting the Koch/Soros jailbreak agenda, the Tennessee legislature put victims first and passed true criminal justice reform. HB2656 / SB2248, as amended, requires people convicted of one of nine criminal offense categories to serve 100% of their sentences – no exceptions. This means no good time credits or parole are available for those found guilty of homicide, vehicular homicide, attempted first-degree murder, robbery, aggravated kidnapping, aggravated burglary, or carjacking.
Additionally, those found guilty of 20 slightly lower-level but still significant crimes, such as aggravated assault with a deadly weapon, aggravated robbery, burglary, and arson, would still be eligible for good time credits, but only after serving 85% of the sentence.
This bill has reversed the decade-long tide of weak-on-crime legislation percolating through red-state legislatures. For years, we’ve been told that there is somehow an over-incarceration problem with people serving draconian sentences for nothingburger crimes. The reality is that even the most violent career criminals often serve a few months here and there and constantly get out to reoffend. With the growing crime wave in cities like Nashville and Memphis, the role of the de-incarceration agenda is hard to deny.
To begin with, most of the sentencing these days is very lenient. For example, in 2019, out of 17,355 felony convictions in Minnesota, only 3,612 were fully sentenced in accordance with the sentencing guidelines. Once you add all the parole and good time credit programs to that, even the worst career criminals are only serving a fraction of the sentence. This doesn’t even account for all of the ways they plead down throughout their criminal career, thereby incurring a sentence well below the threat level of their criminal proclivities. At a minimum, this bill ensures that violent and dangerous criminals will at least serve the entire sentence they are given. This bill should serve as a model in every other state, as the crime wave continues to grow.
The American Conservative Union, which hosts the annual CPAC gathering for alleged conservatives, vigorously opposed this bill because it apparently still believes there are too many, rather than too few, criminals behind bars. However, no sane person can believe we need to let more people out of prison.
Those who think we don’t have an under-incarceration problem should consider the following statistics from the FBI in 2019. Just 61.4% of the 14,325 homicides, 32.9% of the 124,817 rapes, 30.5% of the 239,643 armed robberies, and 52.3% of the 726,778 aggravated assaults were “cleared” cases. That means that in 5,529 murder cases, 83,752 rape cases, 166,552 armed robbery cases, and 346,673 aggravated assault cases, there was no arrest. Hence, just in the four violent categories alone, there were over 758,000 violent crime cases that went without a resolution just in one year.
What about duration of incarceration? According to BJS, among the prisoners released from state prison in 2018 – before some of the recent “reform” – they only served, on average, 44% of their sentences. Even for murder, it was only 58% of their sentences. The median length of time served for murder was less than 10 years in 30% of the cases and was more than 20 years in only 42%. The median time served for rape was less than 10 years in 64% of prisoners. In total, 71% of those serving time for a violent crime category served less than five years, and nearly half served less than two years.
In reality, the bromide of “criminal justice reform” for “low-level, nonviolent offenders” was always a ruse. Now groups like the ACU openly admit they oppose even truth in sentencing, much less enhanced sentencing, for the most violent and career criminals.
The truth in sentencing bill passed the Senate 20-6 and the House 86-9 with bipartisan support and now heads to Governor Bill Lee’s desk. The bill was sponsored by House Speaker Cameron Sexton, who made a rare speech from the well of the House chamber to present his bill. This legislation piggybacks on last year’s truth in sentencing law, which closed the early release loopholes for crimes traditionally committed against women and children, such as rape and child abuse.
Reminiscent of some of the debates over COVID, proponents of weak sentencing are demanding to see “studies” showing more jail time leads to less crime. Speaker Sexton believes no such study is needed when common sense dictates fewer criminals on the street equals less crime. “This solution creates the toughest penalties in America for violent criminals; it also establishes a firm line for criminals not to cross,” said the speaker in a statement to TheBlaze. “If they do, punishment will be swift and severe under our new law. I do not need a fancy study to tell me more bad guys in jail with longer sentences reduces crime.”
It is shocking how red-state governors and legislatures have failed to pursue these ideas until now. Even blue-state governors are now vulnerable to defeat because of the growing crime wave. A recent Gallup poll showed that 53% of Americans worry a “great deal” about crime and it ranks as the third most important issue on the minds of voters. A Pew Research poll showed that crime is the number-one issue among black voters.
Kudos to the Tennessee legislature for recognizing that weak-on-crime policies plague red states just as much as blue states and need to be rectified. Along with the passage of robust medical freedom bills and a new ivermectin over-the-counter bill, the Tennessee legislature is on its way to forging an agenda of freedom and public safety that should be emulated in every red state. If every GOP supermajority state would use its power to its fullest, we wouldn’t have to wait for ineffective GOP majorities in the irremediably broken federal system to make a difference.
IT Support Technician Michael Hakopian (R) distributes computer devices to students at Hollywood High School on August 13, 2020, in Hollywood, California. With over 734,000 enrolled students, the Los Angeles Unified School District is the largest public school system in California and the 2nd largest public school district in the United States. | Rodin Eckenroth/Getty Images
At least 26 state school board associations have distanced themselves from the National School Board Association after it urged the Biden administration to use federal law enforcement agencies against parents who oppose the teaching of controversial curriculum in public schools by labeling them as potential “domestic terrorists.”
The national grassroots organization Parents Defending Education says the states that have distanced themselves from the NSBA’s letter include: Alabama, Arkansas, Delaware, Florida, Georgia, Idaho, Illinois, Indiana, Iowa, Kentucky, Louisiana, Mississippi, Missouri, Montana, New Hampshire, New Jersey, North Carolina, North Dakota, Ohio, Pennsylvania, South Carolina, Tennessee, Texas, Virginia, Wisconsin and Wyoming.
Out of these, 12 states — Alabama, Florida, Kentucky, Louisiana, Missouri, Montana, New Hampshire, North Carolina, Ohio, Pennsylvania, South Carolina and Wisconsin — have taken further action to withdraw membership, participation or dues from the NSBA.
PDE wrote to NSBA member states for their comment on the Sept. 29 letter sent to them by NSBA Interim Executive Director Chip Slaven, which critics believe likened activism of concerned parents to “domestic terrorism.”
The letter said the NSBA had asked the U.S. Department of Justice to mobilize law enforcement agencies to respond to “threats and acts of violence against public schoolchildren, public school board members, and other public school district officials and educators” as actions of “domestic terrorism.”
While some school board members across the nation have publicly shared incidents of threats they’ve purportedly received from angry residents, critics believe the request to get federal law enforcement involved is unwarranted and an attempt to silence parents. Specific examples of concerning actions included the disruption of school board meetings “because of local directives for mask coverings to protect students and educators from COVID-19,” the incitement of “chaos” at school board meetings by “anti-mask proponents,” and the confrontation of school boards by “angry mobs” that have led boards to “end meetings abruptly.”
John Halkias, the director of the NSBA’s Central Region, wrote to Slaven the same day, on Sept. 29, sharing his belief that “the Board of Directors should have been consulted before a letter like this was sent out publicly, and no less to the President of the United States and the National Press.”
“I also agree that the letter took a stance that went beyond what many of us would consider to be reasonable and used terms that were extreme, and asked for action by the Federal Government that many of us would not request,” he added. “In fact in a recent press conference, the White House Press Secretary stated that when these incidents occur, it is a matter for local law enforcement and local authorities, and NOT the federal government.”
In an Oct. 2 email, NSBA President Viola Garcia told the organization’s board of directors that “NSBA has been engaged with the White House and the Department of Education on these and other issues related to the pandemic for several weeks now.”
Five days later, the Department of Justice published a memorandum directing “the Federal Bureau of Investigations, working with each United States Attorney, to convene meetings with federal, state, local, Tribal, and territorial leaders within 30 days” to “facilitate the discussion of strategies for addressing threats against school administrators, board members, teachers and staff.”
Republican members of Congress also criticized the memo.
“As someone who was born in the Soviet Union, I am … disturbed, very disturbed, by the use of the Department of Justice as a political tool, and its power as the police state to suppress lawful public discourse,” Rep. Victoria Spartz, R-Ind., said in a House Judiciary Committee oversight hearing. “The FBI is starting to resemble old KGB with secret warrantless … surveillance, wiretapping and intimidation of citizens.”
In times of crisis, we often look to our political leaders for guidance. But our faith in those leaders erodes when they hide information from the public for political purposes.
That’s what appears to have happened in Nashville, where local leaders apparently hid low coronavirus numbers related to bars and restaurants in order to support continued lockdowns.
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According to WZTV, contact tracing commissioned earlier this year revealed that nursing homes and construction sites were much more responsible for the coronavirus’ spread than bars and restaurants. In fact, the number of coronavirus cases traced back to bars and restaurants in Nashville was so low — just 22 cases as of June 30 — that the office of Democratic Mayor John Cooper and the Metro Health Department allegedly decided not to release the numbers to the public.
Now, however, emails have emerged between the mayor’s office and the health department in which officials appear to allude to hiding the numbers from the public.
“This isn’t going to be publicly released, right? Just info for Mayor’s Office?” Leslie Waller of the health department asked in one email, according to WZTV.
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“Correct, not for public consumption,”responded one of the mayor’s senior advisers, Benjamin Eagles.
The exchange certainly suggests that officials didn’t want the public to know just how few coronavirus cases could be traced back to bars and restaurants. Presumably, this is because such officials wanted to keep the city locked down instead of allowing those businesses to reopen. (Bars and restaurants in the city, it’s worth noting, were not allowed to reopen until the middle of last month, WTVF reported.) That’s unnerving and duplicitous.
First, Americans should be trusted to make their own assessment of their coronavirus risk level based on actual data. Government officials shouldn’t hide that data for political purposes.
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Second, for months now, the American public has been forced to make sacrifices in the name of slowing the spread and keeping coronavirus cases at a manageable level. Many people — including bar owners and restaurateurs — have lost their entire livelihoods due to the continued shutdowns. These people deserve to know the facts surrounding their sacrifices. It’s one thing to keep bars and restaurants closed. It’s another thing to do so despite knowing that very few coronavirus cases stem from such places.
About a month later, a reporter for the Tennessee Lookout asked the health department about a rumor that only about 80 cases could be traced back to the state capital’s restaurants and bars.
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“The figure you gave of ‘more than 80’ does lead to a natural question: If there have been over 20,000 positive cases of COVID-19 in Davidson and only 80 or so are traced to restaurants and bars, doesn’t that mean restaurants and bars aren’t a very big problem?” Tennessee Lookout reporter Nate Rau asked.
In an internal email, according to WZTV, Brian Todd of the health department then asked five fellow health department officials: “Please advise how you recommend I respond.”
One official reportedly replied: “My two cents. We have certainly refused to give counts per bar because those numbers are low per site. We could still release the total though, and then a response to the over 80 could be because that number is increasing all the time and we don’t want to say a specific number.”
The health department and the mayor’s office refused to confirm to WZTV that the emails were real. But a Metro staff attorney has confirmed that they are, according to Nashville Metro Council Member Steve Glover.
“I was able to get verification from the Mayor’s Office and the Department of Health that these emails are real,” the attorney reportedly told Glover.
A Nashville man told his local news station last week that he received at least three calls from the state about apparently testing positive for the novel coronavirus.
The problem? He was never tested.
According to News4 Investigates, Brock Ballou, a resident of the Nashville suburb of Mount Juliet, said he was anticipating a call from a contact tracer after one of his coworkers tested positive for COVID-19. However, the tracer repeatedly told Mr. Ballou that he was positive for the virus, despite the fact that he was never tested, he says.
“She specifically said – I’m looking at it right here – you tested positive – this is a follow up call to see how your symptoms are,” Ballou told the news station.
Asked if he possibly misheard the woman on the phone, Ballou said she reiterated his supposedly positive test results multiple times.
“I’m 100 percent sure that’s what she said, she was looking right at it,” he recalled, “she told me I’m in the system – looking right at it that you’re showing positive.”
Over the following days, Ballou received more calls from the state about his COVID symptoms.
“(The contact tracer) said I’m still seeing that you’re positive. Courtesy call – checking your symptoms,” he said.
News4 Investigates said all three phone numbers used to reach out to Ballou have been confirmed by the news station to have come from workers with the state health department of Tennessee. The apparent discrepancy has Ballou questioning the accuracy of the state’s COVID-19 case counts.
“I said I don’t know what’s going on, but it’s wrong. I’m just another number when I’m not.”
The Tennessee health department confirmed through a spokeswoman that they are investigating the discrepancy.
“I can also tell you there is no concern with our count of cases in regard to our reporting of those who test positive,” the spokeswoman said. “Those entries are based on lab results, not on information provided from the monitoring team.”
According to Ballou, he’s been told by the state that the calls made to him were done via a third party contracted by the health department.
As noted by The Daily Wire last week, the Florida State Health Department confirmed that some testing laboratories in the state have not been disclosing their negative novel coronavirus testing results accurately, skewing the positivity rates dramatically. At least two labs were discovered to have inflated their positivity rates of the virus by a factor of ten.
“Countless labs have reported a 100 percent positivity rate, which means every single person tested was positive. Other labs had very high positivity rates,” FOX 35 explained Tuesday.
It was uncovered that Orlando Veteran’s Medical Center’s reported positivity rate of 76% was actually around 6%, a spokesperson for the center revealed. FOX 35 added, “Orlando Health’s positivity rate is only 9.4 percent, not 98 percent as in the report.”
President Donald Trump was elected in large part on a promise to revitalize our nation’s economy through pro-business and pro-growth policies that would produce countless new jobs for American workers. Though Congress has been dragging its feet when it comes to economy-boosting tax cuts and reform legislation, Trump’s administration has done what it can to spur job growth through cutting regulations and fostering confidence among businesses and consumers.
Fox Business reported this week that Tyson Foods, one of the biggest food companies in the world, will be building a massive new plant in Tennessee. The plant will cost an estimated $300 million to build and will provide for at least 1,500 new jobs processing more than 1.25 million chickens per week. The plant is expected to generate upwards of $150 million in additional revenue for the state.
“This project will enable us to provide even more fresh chicken to consumers across the country,”Tyson Foods president and CEO Tom Hayes said in a news release. “As one of the world’s leading protein companies, we continue to raise the world’s expectations of how much good food can do.”
The new plant, which is expected to begin operations in 2019, was initially planned as an even bigger facility in Kansas, but was ultimately shifted to Tennessee after local residents expressed opposition in Kansas.
“The (Tennessee) location is attractive to us because of the strong support we’ve received from state and local leaders, the existing industrial park and availability of labor, as well as access to feed grains produced in the region,”stated Doug Ramsey, group president of Poultry for Tyson Foods.
Meanwhile, Fox Business also noted that progress is already underway in Tennessee for construction of a massive, one million square foot factory in which LG Electronics will manufacture new washing machines. That plant is also expected to be operational in 2019.
But even though Kansas may have been passed over as the initial choice for the new Tyson chicken plant, the company still has its eye on the state for an additional expansion in the future, according to The Kansas City Star, meaning even more jobs and economic growth in the years to come.
“We have been fully aware they were considering multiple locations and planning to build more than one new complex,”explained Jackie McClaskey, Kansas’ secretary of agriculture. “We anticipate positive news in 2018 as we continue to work with multiple Kansas communities and Tyson.”
Even as plans for the one plant in Leavenworth County were placed on hold due to local opposition, other communities have expressed interest in being home to a new Tyson plant that will bring in jobs and revenue.
Nor are there any hard feelings — at least in public — at being initially passed over for a new Tyson plant, as the Kansas Department of Agriculture issued a statement congratulating both Tyson and Tennessee on working out a deal, with an obvious eye toward working together in the future.
“Consumer demand drives growth in the food and agriculture industry, and we have been aware throughout our own discussions with Tyson Foods that their expansion plans included multiple facilities in more than one state, so this announcement was not unexpected,” said department spokeswoman Heather Lansdowne.
“We look forward to continuing to work with Tyson Foods as they further evaluate expansion of their poultry business unit growth opportunities in Kansas,” she added.
Meanwhile, as American businesses expand manufacturing capacity here at home, Trump secured dozens of business deals with foreign nations such as China during his recent trip to Asia, according to CNBC.
It was estimated that, of just 37 deals struck with Chinese companies alone, roughly $250 billion will flow into the U.S. economy as a result.
Left unspecified are similar deals struck with businesses in the other nations Trump visited that could also result in tens of billions more in tax revenue initially and create an untold number of jobs.
This is what Trump was talking about when he repeatedly promised to Make America Great Again.
Another state has taken a brave stand against the forces of LGBT political correctness: This week, Tennessee signed into law a major religious freedom act that allows therapists to refuse clients if their lifestyle and life goals violate their “sincerely held belief(s).” According to BuzzFeed (via WND), Tennessee’s Gov. Bill Haslam, a Republican, signed the bill into law Wednesday, allowing therapists and other mental health professionals to refuse clients without fear of being sued.
The law was bitterly protested by LGBT groups as well as the American Counseling Association.
However, Haslam said that the law was necessary to protect the deeply held convictions of therapists as well as the mental health of their patients.
Tennessee Gov. Bill Haslam
“I believe it is reasonable to allow these professionals to determine if and when an individual would be better served by another counselor better suited to meet his or her needs,”Gov. Haslam said in a statement.
“The substance of this bill doesn’t address a group, issue or belief system. Rather, it allows counselors — just as we allow other professionals like doctors and lawyers — to refer a client to another counselor when the goals or behaviors would violate a sincerely held principle.”
However, LGBT forces aligned against it, with one online petition calling the bill “hateful.”(I’ve never quite gotten how calling someone “hateful” for religious beliefs that might, at worst, slightly inconvenience them isn’t hateful itself, but this is just me.)
The petition claimed that “the lawmakers behind this bill don’t care about professional standards or truly helping those in need. Instead they are focused on forcing their personal religious beliefs into other people’s lives. Now innocent people seeking mental health care will pay the price it it passes.”
Let’s dissect that bit of nonsense.
First of all, this bill does not enable anyone to deny emergency care to anyone.
Secondly, if you’re forcing someone who is a therapist to work with a client to attain life goals that run counter to their religious beliefs, isn’t that forcing your religious beliefs on them?
However, I can see arguments against those, particularly from LGBT individuals who might be reading this article. Or, perhaps you’re an atheist or a polyamorist, or someone else who might be affected by this bill.
Let me speak individually to you, then: Even if you disagree with everything I’ve said thus far, wouldn’t you prefer it if your therapist came straight out and told you he didn’t believe he or she could give you the care you deserve?
A relationship with one’s therapist is one of the most intimate, long-lasting professional medical relationships that a person can have. Given the amount of influence that therapist would have over my life, I would want to know whether they had a deeply held belief that something in my life I had no intention of changing was sinful or morally wrong.
Sadly, that line of reasoning won’t work on political correctness types. It’s not about respecting their beliefs, but rather forcing their beliefs on everyone else. You know, just like they’re accusing the supporters of this bill of doing.
Aside from the subsidy/cost issue, there are many other reasons why this is bad public policy. (Photo: istockphoto)
Norbert Michel studies and writes about housing finance, including the reform of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, as The Heritage Foundation’s research fellow in financial regulations. Read his research.
Several politicians have recently been offering free goodies to voters. One of the most popular of these, oddly enough, is something that several state governments have already tackled: free college tuition.
Louisiana provides a great case study for advocates of similar federal policies.
Louisiana provides a great case study for advocates of similar federal policies. Louisiana just so happens to be in the news right now because the governor is threatening to suspend his state’s version of free college tuition for everyone.
In 1997 the state removed the income caps. At that point, all Louisiana students, regardless of financial need, were made eligible for “free” tuition at any Louisiana public college. Once in college, students had to maintain a C average to keep their TOPS awards.
As of 2010, approximately 70 percent of Louisiana’s high school graduates headed to college within one year. That’s nearly 20 percent higher than the rate in 2000.
Who’s Paying for It?
It’s easy to call the program a success because of this increase, but it’s just as easy to point out that the program doesn’t really provide free education. In one way or another, someone pays for it.
In one way or another, someone pays for it.
The eventual implosion of the program was easy to predict back in 1997 for the same reasons that pretty much any similar subsidy is destined to fail. Subsidies don’t really lower the cost of products and services; they only lower the up-front price that some people pay.
(In 1997, this program inspired my very first public critique of a government policy. Back then, I thought it was a terrible idea.)
No Such Thing as Free Tuition
A person receiving “free” tuition may not see it (or even care), but subsides actually raise the total cost of an education. The core problem is that they remove the paying customer—in this case the student—from the equation.
Without the subsidy, the paying customer receives the direct benefit for the service and bears the direct cost. If that person doesn’t think the cost is worth it, they don’t pay.
Louisiana’s program replaces this paying customer with groups of government officials. These officials neither receive the direct benefit nor endure the direct cost of obtaining an education. These groups do, however, benefit a great deal from obtaining more of your tax dollars.
And they rarely bear any direct cost from either increasing your taxes or delivering a substandard education product. (The incumbency rate is fairly high for politicians.)
On a practical level, Louisiana’s program converts tuition payments into a state budget item. In other words, a large chunk of each school’s “tuition” becomes nothing more than revenue sent in by the state bureaucracy.
In Louisiana, four separate higher education systems—each its own bureaucracy—fight over these “tuition” payments. Smaller schools inevitably get the smallest shares, but that’s kind of another story.
A Burden on University Resources
When the influx of students hits—more people going to school when tuition is “free” is pretty much a foregone conclusion—it strains universities’ existing resources. So the transfer of money has the natural tendency to lead to expanded facilities, faculty, and staff.
But these increases call for a permanently higher level of funding, and all of these effects tend to reinforce each other. That is, school officials have a built in reason to ask for larger transfers, and politicians have a built in excuse to raise taxes.
When the state’s coffers are not flush with cash, the schools’ budgets get cut. Thus, universities have every incentive to raise more money from students who are not a part of the Taylor Opportunity Program.
Of course, for any given level of Taylor Opportunity Program students, a higher posted rate of tuition results in a larger transfer from the state. If the program covered full fees and tuition for literally every student, then taxpayers would bear the full cost. But it doesn’t, so non-TOPS students bear some of the cost.
(Pretty much every student ends up paying higher fees directly, too, but that’s almost an aside.)
Non-subsidized markets don’t work this way—prices can actually fall in response to changes in demand and supply. Subsidized systems, on the other hand, are destined to result in higher—not lower—tuition.
What I failed to fully appreciate in 1997 was how bad of a deal the Taylor Opportunity Program would end up being for the smaller schools. Then I spent almost a decade teaching at Nicholls State University, a regional state school in Thibodaux, La.
Small Universities Are Hardest Hit
In one sense, the Louisiana program amounted to a cruel trick for these institutions. Smaller schools are the ones least able to sustain the permanently higher costs associated with the new TOPS-generated revenue stream.
When the state budget goes south—and it always does in Louisiana—smaller schools get slammed. (Louisiana State University has more than 25,000 students, so small changes in per-student fees go a long way).
No matter how much we want it to, subsidizing something simply doesn’t make it more cost-effective.
The Taylor Opportunity Program does give certain people a better deal on tuition at one point in time, but then it makes up for it somewhere else.
Ironically, the earlier waves of Taylor Opportunity Program graduates are among those about to get hit with a tax increase. That’s what politicians mean by free.
Ironically, the earlier waves of Taylor Opportunity Program graduates are among those about to get hit with a tax increase. That’s what politicians mean by free.
Aside from the subsidy/cost issue, there are many other reasons why this is bad public policy.
First of all—and I know this sounds crazy—everyone should not go to college. Some people simply aren’t cut out, and many just don’t need to. Yes, people with college degrees tend to earn more than those without, but it does not follow that everyone should go to college.
When the program was started, Louisiana public universities offered students a good value because they were relatively inexpensive. Now that Louisiana taxpayers have spent more than $2 billion on the program, tuition rates are out of reach for many students that don’t qualify for the program.
While the best solution for Louisiana would be to get rid of the program altogether (unlikely since politicians love the program), the best residents can hope for now is an increase in the program’s academic standards and some form of means testing. At least these changes would better direct subsidies to academically prepared students with more financial need.
While the holiday season often reignites complaints among some Americans that there exists a cultural war on Christmas, one Tennessee motorist recently captured an image that shows not all references to Christ’s birth have been erased from public settings.
Amy Basel reportedly passed by the Spring Hill McDonald’s and noticed not only the traditional manger scene adorning the restaurant’s street-facing windows, but an explicitly religious message.
“His name is Jesus,” one window’s message proclaimed.
Another decorative statement encouraged visitors to “rejoice.”
As of this writing, roughly 36,000 Facebook users have shared the image. Among the thousands of comments Basel has received in the two days since posting the status update are numerous kind wishes to the McDonald’s staff responsible for displaying the biblical message.
“Thank you McDonald’s for taking a stand,”one commenter wrote. “You have made my whole year! I am so proud of you for the stand you took was for Christ our Lord.”
Some social media users encouraged other businesses to follow suit, while others recognized local merchants who already embrace the faith-based component of the season.
At least a few critics, however, suggested that the Christians applauding this business would not be so open-minded were its owners of a different faith.
“I’d love to hear all of those ‘freedom of religion’ folks [sic] tunes if this business was owned and decorated by people of Muslim faith,”one user wrote. “Y’all are always so accepting of religion until it’s one that isn’t your own!”
On Monday and into Tuesday, more than two dozen governors moved to block Syrian refugees from entering their states. (Photo: Kelsey Lucas/Visualsey)
In the aftermath of Friday’s terrorist attacks in Paris, governors across the United States are attempting to shut their doors on Syrian refugees looking to find a safe haven in the country. As of Monday evening, more than two dozen governors announced opposition to policies that would permit Syrian refugees to enter their states amid concerns they could have ties to terrorists.
KentuckyGov.-elect Matt Bevin, who will take officeDec. 8, also said he opposes resettlement efforts.
The movement, which was overwhelmingly spearheaded by Republican governors, came after French prosecutors discovered aSyrian passporton one of the suspected Islamic State suicide bombers in Paris. That finding raised concerns that terrorists are embedding with refugees to enter Europe and other nations.
The series of attacks in Paris on Friday night left more than 130 dead and hundreds others injured. French President François Hollande called the attacks an “act of war” and launched airstrikes against ISIS.
President Barack Obama sharply pushed back against the growing number of states attempting to undermine his policies surrounding Syrian refugees, saying Monday at a press conference in Antalya, Turkey, that it would be “shameful” and “not American” to close America’s doors on Syrian refugees.
“When some of those folks themselves come from families who benefited from protection when they were fleeing political persecution, that’s shameful,”he said. “That’s not American. That’s not who we are. We don’t have religious tests to our compassion.”
In September, Obamavowed to accept10,000 Syrian refugees into the United States next year.
Those issuing executive orders to block refugees pushed back on the president’s narrative while announcing their decision.
“Michigan is a welcoming state, and we are proud of our rich history of immigration,”said Michigan Gov. Rick Snyder. “But our first priority is protecting the safety of our residents.”
In a letter addressed to the president, Texas Gov. Greg Abbott said, “Neither you nor any federal official can guarantee that Syrian refugees will not be part of any terroristic activity. As such, opening our door to them irresponsibly exposes our fellow Americans to unacceptable peril.”
While their responses send a clear message to the president, John Malcolm, a senior legal fellow at The Heritage Foundation, said the practical implications blocking refugees are limited.
“Governors can certainly order state agencies to stop doing anything to assist federal authorities with their resettlement efforts, but they cannot stop federal authorities from continuing those efforts, nor can they stop immigrants who are lawfully admitted to this country from moving to and settling in those states,”Malcolm said. “They can, however, ask state law enforcement authorities to keep an eye on the refugees who settle in their states, so long as those authorities do so within the bounds of the Constitution.”
“It’s abhorrent for the federal government not to consult with and consider the interests of the states,”added Jim Carafano, a foreign policy expert at The Heritage Foundation. “Particularly the views of governors, as it impacts the welfare and public safety of their citizens.”
Florida Gov. Rick Scott addressed those concernsin a lettersent to House Speaker Paul Ryan and Senate Leader Mitch McConnell. In that letter, dated Nov. 16, Scott wrote:
[I]t is our understanding that the state does not have the authority to prevent the federal government from funding the relocation of these Syrian refugees to Florida even without state support. Therefore, we are asking the United States Congress to take immediate and aggressive action to prevent President Obama and his administration from using any federal tax dollars to fund the relocation of up to 425 Syrian refugees (the total possible number of refugees pending for state relocation support at this time) to Florida, or anywhere in the United States, without an extensive evaluation of the risk these individuals may post to our national security.
In response, Sen. Rand Paul, R-Ky., introduced legislation on Monday afternoon that would suspend issuance of visas to refugees from countries with a high risk of terrorism until the U.S. Department of Homeland Security meets certain standards. Those standards include fingerprinting and screening all refugees, implement a tracking system “to catch attempted overstays,”and enhancing security measures that are already in place.
“The time has come to stop terrorists from walking in our front door. The Boston Marathon bombers were refugees, and numerous refugees from Iraq, including some living in my hometown, have attempted to commit terrorist attacks,”Paul said in a press release.
Sen. Richard Burr, R-N.C., chairman of the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence, also called to suspend the refugee program.
“The Syrian refugee program should be suspended until the American people are satisfied that they know exactly who the president is admitting into the country via this program,” Burr said. “There is simply too much at stake, and the security of the American people should be our top priority.”
This article and its accompanying map has been updated to reflect the growing number of governors who do not wish to permit Syrian refugees into their state.
While the videos have focused on the Planned Parenthood abortion business, the biotech firm StemExpress, which buys and resells aborted baby body parts from the abortion giant, has filed a lawsuit seeking to block some information the Center for Medical Progress obtained in its three year undercover operation. Just a short time after a judge issued a ruling that the biotech firm StemExpress can’t block the Center for Medical Progress from releasing videos, it put together a preview of its latest installment.
StemExpress is a for-profit biotech supply company that has been partnered with Planned Parenthood clinics across the country to purchase human fetal parts since its founding in 2010. StemExpress’ Medical Director, Dr. Ronald Berman, is an abortion doctor for Planned Parenthood Mar Monte in California.
“Oh yeah, if you have intact cases — which we’ve done a lot — we sometimes ship those back to our lab in its entirety,” she says.
“Tell the lab its coming,”she laughs about the intact unborn babies. “You know, open the box and go ‘Oh my God,’”Dyer adds.
The eighth video in the ongoing controversy over Planned Parenthood’s sale of aborted fetal body parts shows the CEO of StemExpress, a major buyer of fetal tissue from Planned Parenthood, admitting the company gets “a lot” of intact fetuses, suggesting “another 50 livers a week” would not be enough, and agreeing abortion clinics should profit from the sale.
In the video, actors posing as another human biologics company meet with StemExpress CEO Cate Dyer, plus Vice President of Corporate Development and Legal Affairs Kevin Cooksy, and Procurement Manager Megan Barr. StemExpress and the actors are discussing a potential partnership to supply extra fetal body parts to each other.
“So many physicians are like, ‘Oh I can totally procure tissue,’ and they can’t,”expresses Dyer, seeming to indicate that abortion doctors must do the procedure in a special way to obtain useable fetal parts. Federal law requires that no alteration in the timing or method of abortion be done for the purposes of fetal tissue collection (42 U.S.C. 289g-1).
“What about intact specimens?”asks one of the actors. “Oh yeah, I mean if you have intact cases, which we’ve done a lot, we sometimes ship those back to our lab in its entirety,”replies Dyer. “Case” is the clinical term for an abortion procedure. An “intact case” refers to an intact abortion with a whole fetus. “The entire case?” asks an actor. “Yeah, yeah,” says Dyer. “The procurement for us, I mean it can go really sideways, depending on the facility, and then our samples are destroyed,”she explains past botched fetal dissections, “so we started bringing them back even to manage it from a procurement expert standpoint.”
Feticidal chemicals like digoxin cannot be used to kill the fetus in a tissue procurement case, so a fetus delivered intact for organ harvesting is likely to be a born-alive infant.
“What would make your lab happy?” asks one of the actors. “Another 50 livers a week,”says Dyer. “We’re working with almost like triple digit number clinics,”Dyer explains, “and we still need more.”She later notes, “Planned Parenthood has volume, because they are a volume institution.”
Dyer also agrees that payments to abortion clinics for fetal body parts should be financially beneficial to them.
“Do you feel like there are clinics out there that have been burned, that feel like they’re doing all this work for research and it hasn’t been profitable for them?”she asks. “I haven’t seen that.” StemExpress publishes a flyer for Planned Parenthood clinics that promises “Financial Profits” and “fiscal rewards” for clinics that supply aborted fetal tissue. It is endorsed by Planned Parenthood Mar Monte Chief Medical Officer Dr. Dorothy Furgerson.
The sale or purchase of human fetal tissue is a federal felony punishable by up to 10 years in prison or a fine of up to $500,000 (42 U.S.C. 289g-2). The Sacramento Business Journal reported in June that StemExpress has an annual revenue of $4.5 million.
David Daleiden, the head of CMP, commented on the newest video in a statement to LifeNews.
“StemExpress is the ‘weakest link’ that unravels Planned Parenthood’s baby parts chain–they readily admit the profit-motive that Planned Parenthood and their proxies have in supplying aborted baby parts,” he said. “Congress and law enforcement should immediately seize all fetal tissue files from StemExpress and all communications and contracts with Planned Parenthood. The evidence that Planned Parenthood profits from the sale of aborted baby parts is now overwhelming, and not one more dime of taxpayer money should go to their corrupt and fraudulent criminal enterprise.”
The House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform wants to know if the Obama administration, via the Department of Health and Human Services, provided any federal grants to Planned Parenthood that ultimately went to pay for the sales of aborted baby body parts and if they were used by Planned Parenthood to “support transactions involving fetal tissue.”
The expose’ videos catching Planned Parenthood officials selling the body parts of aborted babies have shocked the nation. Here is a list of all eight:
In the first video: Dr. Deborah Nucatola of Planned Parenthood commented on baby-crushing: “We’ve been very good at getting heart, lung, liver, because we know that, so I’m not gonna crush that part, I’m gonna basically crush below, I’m gonna crush above, and I’m gonna see if I can get it all intact.”
In the second video: Planned Parenthood’s Dr. Mary Gatter joked, “I want a Lamborghini” as she negotiated the best price for baby parts.
In the third video: Holly O’Donnell, a former Stem Express employee who worked inside a Planned Parenthood clinic, detailed first-hand the unspeakable atrocities and how she fainted in horror over handling baby legs.
In the fourth video: Planned Parenthood’s Dr. Savita Ginde stated, “We don’t want to do just a flat-fee (per baby) of like, $200. A per-item thing works a little better, just because we can see how much we can get out of it.” She also laughed while looking at a plate of fetal kidneys that were “good to go.”
In the fifth video: Melissa Farrell of Planned Parenthood-Gulf Coast in Houston boasted of Planned Parenthood’s skill in obtaining “intact fetal cadavers” and how her “research” department “contributes so much to the bottom line of our organization here, you know we’re one of the largest affiliates, our Research Department is the largest in the United States.”
In the sixth video: Holly O’Donnell described technicians taking fetal parts without patient consent: “There were times when they would just take what they wanted. And these mothers don’t know. And there’s no way they would know.”
In the seventh and perhaps most disturbing video: Holly O’Donnell described the harvesting, or “procurement,” of organs from a nearly intact late-term fetus aborted at Planned Parenthood Mar Monte’s Alameda clinic in San Jose, CA. “‘You want to see something kind of cool,’” O’Donnell says her supervisor asked her. “And she just taps the heart, and it starts beating. And I’m sitting here and I’m looking at this fetus, and its heart is beating, and I don’t know what to think.”
Defense Secretary Ashton Carter said it is time for military branches to develop plans for the option of arming personnel at U.S. sites. Military personnel are generally not allowed to carry guns on base, a responsibility left to security……
In his first policy response to the killings of five American troops at a Tennessee reserve center, Defense Secretary Ashton Carter released a memo Thursday that will let more service members carry guns stateside while on base or at more vulnerable satellite offices.
A two-page memo tells service secretaries to review rules and revise as needed to meet security threats. It could mean that more armed security personnel are added to a base or center and that, in some cases, regular personnel are told to carry guns because of a heightened threat environment.
The Islamic State group, based in Syria and Iraq, has put great effort into trying to persuade Muslims via social media to kill U.S. military personnel.
“The tragic shooting on July 16 in Chattanooga, Tennessee, illustrates the continuing threat to DoD personnel in the U.S. homeland posed by Homegrown Violent Extremists,”Mr. Carter wrote. “This incident and the ongoing threat underscore the need for DoD to review its force protection and security policies, and procedures, particularly for off-installation DoD facilities.”
Mr. Carter reminded military leaders that current regulations allow authorized personnel to be armed at recruiting offices, such as the one attacked by Kuwait-born Muhammad Youssef Abdulazeez.
Pursued by police, Abdulazeez promptly made his way to a Navy-Marine Corps reserve center, where he gunned down four Marines and one sailor. Police shot and killed Abdulazeez.
The defense secretary said now is the time for the four branches to develop plans for the option of arming personnel, particularly 7,000 recruiting and ROTC stations that have no security and rely on local police.
Mr. Carter said he wants security improved at those sites. “Looking at arming personnel doesn’t mean that’s what the services will ultimately decide,”said Capt. Jeff Davis, a Pentagon spokesman, as quoted by The Associated Press. “But it does tell them that they have, within DOD policy anyway, the existing authority to do that.”
Military personnel are generally not allowed to carry guns on base. That duty is left to security personnel and military police.
“I’m sure that the service chiefs, as they look at this, will be well aware of the constraints that they face in doing this, and that will be part of their plans,”Capt. Davis said.
Rep. Scott E. Rigell, the Virginia Republican who represents the military-rich Tidewater region, sent a letter to Mr. Carter urging him to change policy. “I appreciate and support Secretary Carter’s decision to allow specified service members to carry firearms on military installations as a means of enhanced force protection,”Mr. Rigell said Thursday. “Our nation’s military Secretaries now have until August 21, 2015, to submit their specific policy recommendations to Secretary Carter. The solutions they advance should be comprehensive and equivalent to the known threat posed to our service members. Secretary Carter should move these policy changes forward deliberately and without unnecessary delay. Our service members have the right to defend themselves.”
Mr. Carter’s signed memo said, “I know commanders and other leaders will remain committed to the protection of our dedicated men and women of the all-volunteer force who sacrifice on a daily basis to keep our Nation free.”
Four flags, representing four Marines killed in an attack by a gunman, are seen at the entrance to the University of Tennessee in Chattanooga college during a vigil in Chattanooga, Tennessee July 17, 2015. Reuters/Tami Chappell
The governors of Florida, Louisiana, Arkansas, Oklahoma, Texas and Indiana on Saturday ordered National Guard members at offices and other facilities to be armed in the wake of attacks that left five servicemen dead in Tennessee.
“It is painful enough when we lose members of our armed forces when they are sent in harm’s way, but it is unfathomable that they should be vulnerable for attack in our own communities,” Oklahoma Governor Mary Fallin said in a statement.
Governors Rick Scott of Florida, Greg Abbott of Texas, Bobby Jindal of Louisiana, Asa Hutchinson of Arkansas and Mike Pence of Indiana issued similar orders for National Guard members after four U.S. Marines and a Navy petty officer were shot and killed on Thursday in Chattanooga, Tennessee. One site where the shootings occurred was a recruiting office in a strip mall.
All six of the governors are Republican.
In Florida, Scott ordered six storefront Florida National Guard recruiting centers to be moved to the nearest Guard armory buildings. The governor said Guard members who do not carry weapons should get them and obtain expedited concealed weapon permits, if necessary. In his executive order, Scott said bulletproof glass and better video surveillance equipment are among steps that should be considered to make recruiting offices safer.
Pence ordered the arming of military personnel at all Indiana National Guard facilities and recruiting storefronts, and Oklahoma Governor Fallin’s office said her executive order also included military recruiting offices. Military personnel in uniform would not usually have authorization to carry a personal weapon while working in recruiting offices, the Pentagon said on Friday. “It has become clear that our military personnel must have the ability to defend themselves against these type of attacks on our own soil,”Abbott said in a news release.
“Arming the National Guard at these bases will not only serve as a deterrent to anyone wishing to do harm to our service men and women, but will enable them to protect those living and working on the base,” he added.
After gunman Muhammad Youssef Abdulazeez, a Muslim immigrant from Kuwait, allegedly shot and killed four Marines in Chattanooga, Tennessee, former NYPD detective Harry Houck said the military’s “gun-free zone” mindset has to change.
Speaking to CNN Newsroom, Houck said, “I’m a Marine. And this really is hitting me a little harder here than normal that [these Marines] weren’t able to protect themselves at the time this occurred.” “We need people that are armed,”he added. He also said that even if that means getting armed guards, then so be it; something has to change.
The Tennessean reports that Abdulazeez pulled in front of a recruiting location, shared by various military branches, and shot holes through the “doors and glass… [of] the… Air Force, Navy and Marine offices.” He allegedly did this while sitting in his car.
Ironically, one of the earliest post-attack photos of the recruiting center shows shattered glass and bullet holes by the very sign that designated the office a gun free zone. Mike Ball tweeted the photo:
The Tennessean also reports that “within minutes” of the first attack, Abdulazeez allegedly opened fire on “the Navy Operational Support Center and Marine Corps Reserve Center Chattanooga.” The operational center is about seven miles from the recruiting offices where the attack began.
Houck pointed out that the police were in pursuit of the gunman when he began the second attack “and he still got… rounds off.” Houck praised the police for their bravery and commitment, but stressed again that the Marines inside the center simply had no way to respond to Abdulazeez’s attack; they had no means with which to defend themselves.
Follow AWR Hawkins on Twitter: @AWRHawkins. Reach him directly awrhawkins@breitbart.com.
More than a dozen states that saw gay marriage bans struck down last week by the U.S. Supreme Court are vowing to protect religious liberty, even though they grudgingly accept that the ruling is now the law of the land.
In the wake of Friday’s decision, Texas’s attorney general told county clerks in the state that they have a statutory right to refuse marriage licenses to same-sex couples if they have religious objections to gay marriage.
In Alabama, state Supreme Court Chief Justice Roy Moore — a staunch opponent of same-sex marriage — said a new state court order could temporarily delay the practice, only to walk back the remarks.
And in Louisiana, the attorney general contends there is nothing in the Supreme Court’s ruling that renders it effective immediately, raising questions about how soon the state would have to comply.
Many other states across the South and upper Midwest are criticizing the ruling as an encroachment on states’ rights and religious freedom, though most acknowledge they cannot ignore it. “Ultimately, my position is that the state should have been legally entitled to define marriage,” South Dakota Attorney General Marty Jackley told The Hill. “I feel the state has traditionally held that role, and certainly when it’s in the state’s constitution it should be respected.” “But we are a nation of laws and we must respect that,” he added.
Before the Supreme Court’s ruling last Friday, those states and 11 others — Arkansas, Georgia, Louisiana, Michigan, Mississippi, Missouri, Nebraska, North Dakota, Ohio and Tennessee — had laws prohibiting same-sex marriage. Though not outright defying the high court’s decision, states are now seeking to make clear the limits of its scope. “The ruling does not tell a minister or congregation what they must do, but it does make clear that the government cannot pick and choose when it comes to issuing marriage licenses and the benefits they confer,” said Kentucky Attorney General Jack Conway.
Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton said the state would issue exemptions to county clerks, judges and justices of the peace who express religious objections to issuing gay marriage licenses, promising to “defend their religious beliefs.” “The government cannot force them to conduct same-sex wedding ceremonies over their religious objections,” Paxton said, accusing the Supreme Court of “ignoring the text and spirit of the Constitution to manufacture a right that simply does not exist.”
In cases where there are objections, however, other public officials would issue the documents.
A federal judge ruled in May that Alabama’ s same-sex marriage ban was unconstitutional and stayed her opinion until the Supreme Court ruled on the issue. This week, Moore — the state Supreme Court’s chief justice — initially said a new motion in the earlier case would effectively table Friday’s U.S. Supreme Court decision legalizing gay marriage, a case known as Obergefell v. Hodges.
But same-sex marriage advocates argued that the order has no tangible effects thanks to a federal injunction, and Moore later backed away from the assertion. “In no way does the order instruct probate judges of this State as to whether or not they should comply with the U.S. Supreme Court’s ruling in Obergefell,” he said.
Still, Alabama Attorney General Luther Strange accused the Supreme Court of “overturning centuries of tradition and the will of the citizens.” “I expect the focus will now turn to the exercise of one’s religious liberty,”Strange said.
A number of attorneys general also complained that the Supreme Court’s decision infringes on states’ right to define marriage how they see fit. Louisiana Attorney General Buddy Caldwell said the court’s ruling “overturns the will of the people of Louisiana, and it takes away a right that should have been left to the states.”
Caldwell is threatening to essentially disregard the Supreme Court’s ruling for the time being, saying there is “nothing in [the] decision that makes the court’s order effective immediately. Therefore, there is not yet a legal requirement for officials to issue marriage licenses or perform marriages for same-sex couples in Louisiana.”
Gay rights activists warn that any acts of perceived defiance would threaten to undermine the legal system. “It’s a dangerous message for southern governors to disobey an order from the Supreme Court,”said Marc Solomon, national campaign director at Freedom to Marry. “The notion that public employees get to pick and choose which laws they follow based on their religious beliefs is a really dangerous precedent and a terrible public policy,”he added. “If you’re a public official, you need to carry out those laws, and you don’t get to decide whether they’re right or wrong.”
The attorneys general in North Dakota and Mississippi both said they are waiting on other court cases to be resolved before they enforce the Supreme Court’s ruling on same-sex marriage. Other states like Ohio and Nebraska expressed disappointment that the Supreme Court was interfering with their marriage laws but also indicated they would respect the ruling.
And top officials in a handful of states that formerly banned gay marriage are now welcoming the Supreme Court’s ruling. Missouri Attorney General Chris Koster said he would move swiftly to recognized same-sex marriage in the wake of the court’s ruling. “The history of our country has always been one of moving toward inclusion and equality,” Koster said in a statement. “I applaud the court for their courage and strong sense of fairness. Missourians should be seen as equals under the law; regardless of their gender, race, or whom they love.”
Austin Yack, Hanna Krueger, Kate Hardiman and Rachel Ravina contributed.
Rev. Bill Owens, the president and founder of the Coalition of African American Pastors. (Photo: Facebook/Bill Owens)
A coalition of African-American pastors vowed this week that there will be massive civil disobedience if the U.S. Supreme Court legalizes same-sex marriage in a ruling on the matter expected this month. At a press conference in Memphis, Tennessee, members of the Coalition of African-American Pastors joined Christian ministers at the Church of God in Christ’s historic Mason Temple to warn the Obama administration to prepare for massive civil disobedience among pastors and clergy if state bans on gay marriage are deemed unconstitutional.
“If they rule for same-sex marriage, then we’re going to do the same thing we did for the civil rights movement,” said Rev. Bill Owens, president and founder of CAAP. “We will not obey an unjust law.”
“The politicians and courts have tried to take God out of this country,” continued Owens. “This country was founded on Godly principles. We will not stand back.”
Rev. David Welch, president of the Pastor’s Council in Houston, Texas, spoke out at the conference explaining the lengths people of faith might go to resist gay marriage.
“God created marriage between a man and woman and no Supreme Court jurisdiction can define this,” said Welch. “We stand clearly saying we will acknowledge God’s law no matter what the cost, no matter what the price. If they want to fill jails with pastors across the nation of every color, denomination and every size who will stand for the laws of God and His truths.”
Welch also compared Christians resisting gay marriage to the civil rights movement of the 1960s and encouraged pastors to fight for their right to worship freely.
“If it comes down to declining to perform same-sex weddings, that we will be charged with a civil or criminal penalty, then we will accept the penalty,” said Welch. “But this isn’t just about the wedding ceremony itself. This is a core, fundamental issue of our First Amendment freedom that the court is toying with right now. Either we have the right of freedom of conscience and religion and the freedom to practice it, or we don’t.”
Opponents of gay marriage around the U.S. are going to different lengths to resist it. Texas Republican lawmakers proposed a bill that would seek to enforce a ban on gay marriage even if the U.S. Supreme Court decides to declare such bans unconstitutional, While it was co-signed by 87 Republican members of the House, HB 4105 wasn’t brought to the floor for debate before the midnight May 15 deadline, which rendered it dead. Democratic lawmaker and businesses such as Dell, Celanese and Dow Chemical lobbied against the bill.
Lawmakers in the state Senate, however, managed to pass a bill known as the “Pastor Protection Act,”which goes into effect Sept. 1, and allows clergy to refuse to conduct marriage ceremonies that violate their religious beliefs.
“Freedom of religion is the most sacred of our rights and our freedom to worship is secured by the Constitution,”Abbott said at a June 11 signing ceremony, according to the Texas Tribune. “Religious leaders in the state of Texas must be absolutely secure in the knowledge that religious freedom is beyond the reach of government or coercion by the courts.”
On April 28, the Supreme Court heard arguments on an appeal from the Sixth Circuit of Appeals regarding four state-level gay marriage bans. Many experts have said the Supreme Court will narrowly rule this month that all states must allow same-sex couples to obtain a state marriage license.
WASHINGTON (CBSDC/AP) — The Supreme Court declared Friday that same-sex couples have a right to marry anywhere in the United States. Gay and lesbian couples already could marry in 36 states and the District of Columbia. The court’s 5-4 ruling means the remaining 14 states, in the South and Midwest, will have to stop enforcing their bans on same-sex marriage. Gay rights supporters cheered, danced and wept outside the court when the decision was announced.
The outcome is the culmination of two decades of Supreme Court litigation over marriage, and gay rights generally. In the majority opinion, Justice Anthony Kennedy wrote that same-sex marriage must be allowed under the United States Constitution.
“No union is more profound than marriage,” Kennedy wrote, joined by the court’s four more liberal justices.
“From their beginning to their most recent page, the annals of human history reveal the transcendent importance of marriage. The lifelong union of a man and a woman always has promised nobility and dignity to all persons, without regard to their station in life. Marriage is sacred to those who live by their religions and offers unique fulfillment to those who find meaning in the secular realm. Its dynamic allows two people to find a life that could not be found alone, for a marriage becomes greater than just the two persons. Rising from the most basic human needs, marriage is essential to our most profound hopes and aspirations,” Kennedy wrote.
Kennedy also wrote the court’s previous three major gay rights cases dating back to 1996. It came on the anniversary of two of those earlier decisions. As Kennedy read his opinion, spectators in the courtroom wiped away tears after the import of the decision became clear. One of those in the audience was James Obergefell, the lead plaintiff in the Supreme Court fight. Outside, Obergefell held up a photo of his late spouse, John, and said the ruling establishes that “our love is equal.” He added, “This is for you, John.”
President Barack Obama placed a congratulatory phone call to Obergefell, which he took amid a throng of reporters outside the courthouse.
Kennedy was joined by the four liberal justices of the court: Ruth Bader Ginsburg, Sonia Sotomayor, Elena Kagan and Stephen Breyer.
Chief Justice John Roberts, along with Justices Samuel Alito, Antonin Scalia and Clarence Thomas dissented, and all wrote separate dissents.
Alito wrote, “Today’s decision usurps the constitutional right of the people to decide whether to keep or alter the traditional understanding of marriage.”
Roberts said gay marriage supporters should celebrate, but don’t celebrate the Constitution.
“If you are among the many Americans—of whatever sexual orientation—who favor expanding same-sex marriage, by all means celebrate today’s decision. Celebrate the achievement of a desired goal. Celebrate the opportunity for a new expression of commitment to a partner. Celebrate the availability of new benefits. But do not celebrate the Constitution. It had nothing to do with it,” Roberts wrote.
Scalia wrote his dissent “to call attention to this Court’s threat to American democracy.”
“Today’s decree says that my Ruler, and the Ruler of 320 million Americans coast-to-coast, is a majority of the nine lawyers on the Supreme Court. The opinion in these cases is the furthest extension in fact—and the furthest extension one can even imagine—of the Court’s claimed power to create “liberties” that the Constitution and its Amendments neglect to mention. This practice of constitutional revision by an unelected committee of nine, always accompanied (as it is today) by extravagant praise of liberty, robs the People of the most important liberty they asserted in the Declaration of Independence and won in the Revolution of 1776: the freedom to govern themselves,” Scalia wrote.
Thomas wrote, “Aside from undermining the political processes that protect our liberty, the majority’s decision threatens the religious liberty our Nation has long sought to protect.”
Obama called the ruling a “big step in our march toward equality.” In a statement in the Rose Garden, Obama said that justice arrived like a thunderbolt. “This ruling is a victory for America,”Obama said. The president thanked gay rights supporters who worked tirelessly for this cause. “America’s a place where you can write your own destiny,”he said.
Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton weighed in, calling the ruling a “historic victory for marriage equality.”
Republican presidential candidate Jeb Bush said in a statement that the Supreme Court should have allowed the states to decide. “Guided by my faith, I believe in traditional marriage. I believe the Supreme Court should have allowed the states to make this decision. I also believe that we should love our neighbor and respect others, including those making lifetime commitments,” the former Florida governor said. “In a country as diverse as ours, good people who have opposing views should be able to live side by side. It is now crucial that as a country we protect religious freedom and the right of conscience and also not discriminate.”
D.C. Mayor Muriel Bowser celebrated the ruling saying the court’s recognition of same-sex marriage as a right in every state “affirms our democratic values, that each of us is equal.”
The ruling will not take effect immediately because the court gives the losing side roughly three weeks to ask for reconsideration. But some state officials and county clerks might decide there is little risk in issuing marriage licenses to same-sex couples. The cases before the court involved laws from Kentucky, Michigan, Ohio and Tennessee that define marriage as the union of a man and a woman. Those states have not allowed same-sex couples to marry within their borders and they also have refused to recognize valid marriages from elsewhere.
Just two years ago, the Supreme Court struck down part of the federal anti-gay marriage law that denied a range of government benefits to legally married same-sex couples. The decision in United States v. Windsor did not address the validity of state marriage bans, but courts across the country, with few exceptions, said its logic compelled them to invalidate state laws that prohibited gay and lesbian couples from marrying.
The number of states allowing same-sex marriage has grown rapidly. As recently as October, just over one-third of the states permitted same-sex marriage.
There are an estimated 390,000 married same-sex couples in the United States, according to UCLA’s Williams Institute, which tracks the demographics of gay and lesbian Americans. Another 70,000 couples living in states that do not currently permit them to wed would get married in the next three years, the institute says. Roughly 1 million same-sex couples, married and unmarried, live together in the United States, the institute says.
The Obama administration backed the right of same-sex couples to marry. The Justice Department’s decision to stop defending the federal anti-marriage law in 2011 was an important moment for gay rights, and Obama declared his support for same-sex marriage in 2012.
Commemorating the 150th anniversary of the Battle of Gettysburg
Liberals’ Intollerance of History Sets Off Massive Purge. The Confederate Battle Flag is toast. Burnt toast.
South Carolina’s Governor and both U.S. Senators (one black, one white) have called for its removal from the capitol grounds. The legislature will take up the issue and will promptly vote to remove the flag.
The lonely voices of resistance to the purging of the Confederate flag will soon be silenced. It is simply not cool to display the Confederate Battle Flag.
Wait…correction. It is forbidden.
Just to be clear, I’ve never owned or displayed any item of confederate flag-ware. Don’t particularly support its display. But geez…I don’t think I’ve ever seen a stampede to political correctness quite like this one. Any moment I expect Jimmy Carter to issue a tearful apology for using the Stars and Bars to carry the South.
But after the flag has been rendered non existent if you thought that was going to be the end of it, silly you.
In New Orleans, the mayor is thinking maybe that statue of Robert E. Lee in Lee Circle has to go. Mayor Mitch Landrieu’s office is looking forward to New Orlean’s 300th birthday. His office issued a statement that the city “should include a close examination of the historical symbols throughout our city and what changes could be made as we approach 2018, including the Robert E. Lee statute in Lee Circle.”
The statement went on, in expand the scope of the purge: “These symbols say who we were in a particular time, but times change. Yet these symbols – statues, monuments, street names, and more – still influence who we are and how we are perceived by the world. Mayor Landrieu believes it is time to look at the symbols in this city to see if they still have relevance to our future.”
That’s a hint of what is to come. Jefferson Davis Highway? New name coming. Statue of the President of the Confederacy? Soon to be gone. In fact, the Atlantic Magazine is ginning up the next round of expunging the Confederacy from the pages of history, at least that part of history in public view. It is a looooonnnng list. “The database of the National Center for Education Statistics shows at least 20 schools named for Robert E. Lee, and nine apiece for Stonewall Jackson and Jefferson Davis,”the magazine says, clearly urging changes and quick.
In Tennessee there’s a bust of Confederate General Nathan Bedford Forrest in the state capitol. Gotta get rid of that. Same in Texas where there’s a statue of Jefferson Davis on the grounds of the University of Texas, Austin.
Out, thou foul flag… and statue and highway sign and school name! Be gone!
What are libs going to do when they want to call Republicans the Confederacy rising again when there is no sign that the Confederacy ever existed?
Will Levon Helm and The Band now go the way of the hated and banished flag for the offense of “The Night They Drove Old Dixie Down?” My god, the racism in that song, in his soulful voice, is just so obvious.
Fine. Purge to your heart’s content, Liberals. If you finish with the flags, statues, highways and schools, and you still have a taste for blood, there’s always the graves of Confederate soldiers. There they are under those headstones–maybe they’re not even dead yet.
You can always shoot ’em again. Of if that’s not enough, dig ’em up. The bones are probably dust, but go ahead–burn the dust. It will make you feel all righteous and superior.
And that’s what this is really all about, isn’t it?
The Republican-sponsored anti-sharia legislation which would ensure that Islamic and other foreign laws are kept out of consideration by South Carolina courts is being stonewalled by Democrat panderers who seek to appease Muslim supremacistspushing hard to get sharia law recognized by American courts.
Post and Courier: A vote on the anti-Sharia law bill was postponed until Tuesday at the earliest after an hours-long debate over Charleston Republican Rep. Chip Limehouse’s proposal. Limehouse has said a law is needed to prevent radical Islamic beliefs from infiltrating state courts. Democrats said the bill showed why the GOP was unfit to govern and why South Carolina is the butt of late-night television jokes. They accused Republicans of legislating off of Internet rumors.
Rep. James Smith, D-Columbia, called the bill “red meat” and “politics at its worst,” while Rep. Gilda Cobb-Hunter, D-Orangeburg, chastised Limehouse and others for having the wrong priorities.
Defenders of the measure said that events in Iraq and the growth of radical Islam in America mean that South Carolina should ensure that laws adhered to by militant groups like ISIS don’t end up in U.S. courts. Sharia law is also sometimes used in Muslim communities to settle contract disputes or family matters, although American courts are not bound by those rules. The terrorist group ISIS has used the 14th century laws to justify the beheading of prisoners in Syria and Iraq.
Limehouse has cited the Center for Security Policy, a conservative Washington, D.C.-based think tank, that has prompted states around the country to introduce laws banning the use of foreign or Sharia laws. The center has cited 146 cases in 32 states where Sharia law was used as a legal argument. Those states are Tennessee, Louisiana, Arizona, Kansas, Oklahoma, North Carolina, Washington, Alabama and Florida, according to the center.
A fear of Islamic law has grown particularly among conservative groups around the country as terrorist groups have carried out attacks and spread their message on social media. Rep. Joe Neal, D-Hopkins, said Republicans were fear-mongering. “Laws in this state ought to be based on our Constitution not on fear, not on suspicion,”he said. “We’re better than this because we don’t need to give in to fear … and the kind of low-brow politics this seems to represent.”
How would you feel if you drove into a town here in the United States and found that many of the street signs were in Arabic only with no English wording? Then you look around and discover that many of the signs on businesses were also in Arabic. Not possible you say? Think again! Welcome to Dearborn, Michigan.
Steve Tarani, author and speaker recounts what he saw when he rode with a member of the Detroit Metro SWAT Police as they drove around Detroit and into Dearborn:
“The street signs suddenly went from English to Arabic. There wasn’t a single English word on any shop or any street sign. And in fact, these little yellow signs were posted all along the edges. Jeremy said to me, ‘this is it. We don’t go past this line.’ And I said to Jeremy, ‘what do you mean? You guys are Detroit Metro. You’re the SWAT team. You can go anywhere you want. What if you get a call over there?’ He said ‘this is it, it’s hazardous for our team if we go past this line.’”
“I have seen it with my own eyes, witnessed it in the backseat of a car and it is for real. No-go zones exist in the United States.”
“Dearborn, Michigan is not the only place that these settlements exist. They are spread out over the country in various cities. There’s an estimate of over 5,000 known terrorist cells in the United States. However our most persistent and significant threat, right now, to us here today this morning, is the homegrown violent extremists.”
Some people try to discount Tarani’s account but I’ve seen too many reports that have come out of Dearborn that would tend to support his account of the Muslim takeover of the American city. Christians have been only attacked by Muslims without prosecution. They’ve also been told to stay away from the city’s Islamic festival and even banned from talking to people on the public streets outside the festival.
The Muslim influence is so strong in Dearborn that the high schools hold girls only proms because Muslim girls are not allowed to socialize or dance with boys. These proms are religious based and no one has said anything about a violation of church and state or tried to stop them. Christian students are banned from having Christmas parties, prayer meetings or Baccalaureate services, but Muslims are allowed to pray in school and hold Islamic proms.You have to ask why organizations like the ACLU, American Atheists, Freedom From Religion Foundation and Americans United for Separation of Church and State remain silent about what is happening in Dearborn schools.
Murfreesboro, Tennessee is fast becoming a second Muslim controlled city like Dearborn and there are others on the way. I have friends in the United Kingdom who have told me of how Muslims have taken over entire cities and areas in their country. What they tell me is that it all started with cities like Dearborn and Murfreesboro and just continues to spread. One of my friends compared Islam in England to a cancer that continues to spread and contaminate everything it encounters. In time it will spread to the point that the country dies from it and becomes the home of a religion that teaches hate, bloodshed and sharia law. Like a cancer, the only way to save the nation is to stop the spread of the religion of terrorism. Then he told me that in our modern sophisticated world full of freedoms and rights that it’s impossible to stop the spread of Islam without igniting a worldwide religious war.
Now realize that Barack Hussein Obama has been actively inviting Muslims to come to the US. He is also advocating opening our doors to up to 7 million Syrian Muslim refugees and there is no telling how many terrorists ware hiding among those 7 million. That would be like trying to cure a patient by injecting him with massive doses of cancer cells.
I have to honestly say that the future of America is not looking very bright and to be honest, I don’t know what to do to change it other than make others aware of it and encourage everyone to get on their knees and pray for the Christian revival of America.
It’s rare to receive a 911 call from the Secret Service, but that’s exactly what happened in January 2013 in Nashville, Tennessee, according to a new letter to the House Oversight Committee.
The Secret Service agents had gone to a Nashville resident’s home to investigate Facebook comments the Tennessean had made against the President.
Unsurprisingly, the Obama critic — who hadn’t violated any laws — wasn’t willing to come out of his home and be investigated by the federal government.
“He shoved the door in our face and went around the corner,”the Secret Service agent told the 911 operator. “Possibly, he had a gun in his hands.”
Of course, slamming a door in someone’s face isn’t against the law, and neither is having a weapon. The man, who’s a law-abiding gun owner, made no threats. He only demanded to see their warrant.
They didn’t bother to get one, but that inconvenient fact didn’t stop them. One of the agents asked the Nashville police sergeant to “wave a piece of paper” in order to fool the resident into believing they actually had obtained a warrant.
So, let’s recount this, shall we?
The Tennessean criticized the President in a non-threatening way… as is his First Amendment Constitutional right.
The Tennessean had a gun to defend his home… as is his Second Amendment Constitutional right.
The Tennessean asked to see a warrant… as is his Fourth Amendment Constitutional right.
None of these rights were respected by the Secret Service agents.
But you gotta love the Nashville Police.
Chief Steve Anderson wrote a letter to the former Nashville Secret Service Director Julia Pierson and Assistant Director A.T. Smith detailing these abuses. “I think you can see that had the MNPD officers complied with the directive from the Secret Service agents,” he wrote, “There was likelihood for this event to have escalated into a serious and/or embarrassing situation for both of our agencies.”
He never heard back from Pierson, but Smith responded with a “condescending and dismissive” tone. When Anderson went to their office to discuss whether they thought it was right to wave around a piece of paper to pretend they had a warrant, the Secret Service agent allegedly answered, “I don’t know. I’m not a lawyer.”
It’s good to see local authorities standing up to a corrupt, bloated federal government hell-bent on taking away our individual rights. Rep. Jim Cooper, D-Tennessee, one of the committee members who received the letter, thinks this is an outrage.
“There’s already a lot of fodder to attack the Secret Service with, and this will be more,”he said, before saying that the Secret Service’s tactics were grievous Constitutional violations.
Here’s the best part of the story. The Chief Anderson says that his officers are no longer allowed to work with the Secret Service unless they get a directive from the top.
Why? He wants to make sure his officers aren’t asked to engage in questionable and possibly unconstitutional activities.
Kudos to the Nashville police for standing up to a bloated, corrupt federal government and saying, simply, “no more.”
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This is what Trump was talking about when he repeatedly promised to Make America Great Again.
By: 
In response, Sen. Rand Paul, R-Ky., introduced legislation on Monday afternoon that would suspend issuance of visas to refugees from countries with a high risk of terrorism until the U.S. Department of Homeland Security meets certain standards. Those standards include fingerprinting and screening all refugees, implement a tracking system “to catch attempted overstays,” and enhancing security measures that are already in place.
How would you feel if you drove into a town here in the United States and found that many of the street signs were in Arabic only with no English wording? Then you look around and discover that many of the signs on businesses were also in Arabic. Not possible you say? Think again! Welcome to Dearborn, Michigan.
It’s rare to receive 
What Did You Say? 
Several politicians have recently been offering free goodies to voters. One of the most popular of these, oddly enough, is something that several state governments have already tackled: free college tuition.
The details vary by state, but Oregon, Tennessee, Georgia, Michigan, and Louisiana (among others) all use tax dollars to pay for at least some of their residents’ college tuition.
Louisiana provides a great case study for advocates of similar federal policies. Louisiana just so happens to be in the news right now because the governor is threatening to suspend his state’s version of free college tuition for everyone.
Louisiana’s Tuition Program
Louisiana’s plan is called the Taylor Opportunity Program for Students, or, more commonly, TOPS. This extremely popular program uses tax dollars to pay full tuition (and some fees) at any of Louisiana’s public universities. Other than residency requirements, all high school students qualify as long as they have a C average (2.5 GPA) and at least an 18 on the ACT.
So the Taylor Opportunity Program for Students doesn’t cover every student’s tuition, but it ends up covering it for a large chunk of middle-/upper-class families.
How It Started
The program started out in the late 1980s as the brainchild of oil tycoon/philanthropist Patrick Taylor. The program, which wasn’t originally named for him, started out as a tuition assistance plan only for low-income individuals.
In 1997 the state removed the income caps. At that point, all Louisiana students, regardless of financial need, were made eligible for “free” tuition at any Louisiana public college. Once in college, students had to maintain a C average to keep their TOPS awards.
As of 2010, approximately 70 percent of Louisiana’s high school graduates headed to college within one year. That’s nearly 20 percent higher than the rate in 2000.
Who’s Paying for It?
It’s easy to call the program a success because of this increase, but it’s just as easy to point out that the program doesn’t really provide free education. In one way or another, someone pays for it.
The eventual implosion of the program was easy to predict back in 1997 for the same reasons that pretty much any similar subsidy is destined to fail. Subsidies don’t really lower the cost of products and services; they only lower the up-front price that some people pay.
(In 1997, this program inspired my very first public critique of a government policy. Back then, I thought it was a terrible idea.)
No Such Thing as Free Tuition
A person receiving “free” tuition may not see it (or even care), but subsides actually raise the total cost of an education. The core problem is that they remove the paying customer—in this case the student—from the equation.
Without the subsidy, the paying customer receives the direct benefit for the service and bears the direct cost. If that person doesn’t think the cost is worth it, they don’t pay.
Louisiana’s program replaces this paying customer with groups of government officials. These officials neither receive the direct benefit nor endure the direct cost of obtaining an education. These groups do, however, benefit a great deal from obtaining more of your tax dollars.
And they rarely bear any direct cost from either increasing your taxes or delivering a substandard education product. (The incumbency rate is fairly high for politicians.)
On a practical level, Louisiana’s program converts tuition payments into a state budget item. In other words, a large chunk of each school’s “tuition” becomes nothing more than revenue sent in by the state bureaucracy.
In Louisiana, four separate higher education systems—each its own bureaucracy—fight over these “tuition” payments. Smaller schools inevitably get the smallest shares, but that’s kind of another story.
A Burden on University Resources
When the influx of students hits—more people going to school when tuition is “free” is pretty much a foregone conclusion—it strains universities’ existing resources. So the transfer of money has the natural tendency to lead to expanded facilities, faculty, and staff.
But these increases call for a permanently higher level of funding, and all of these effects tend to reinforce each other. That is, school officials have a built in reason to ask for larger transfers, and politicians have a built in excuse to raise taxes.
When the state’s coffers are not flush with cash, the schools’ budgets get cut. Thus, universities have every incentive to raise more money from students who are not a part of the Taylor Opportunity Program.
Of course, for any given level of Taylor Opportunity Program students, a higher posted rate of tuition results in a larger transfer from the state. If the program covered full fees and tuition for literally every student, then taxpayers would bear the full cost. But it doesn’t, so non-TOPS students bear some of the cost.
(Pretty much every student ends up paying higher fees directly, too, but that’s almost an aside.)
Non-subsidized markets don’t work this way—prices can actually fall in response to changes in demand and supply. Subsidized systems, on the other hand, are destined to result in higher—not lower—tuition.
Recent numbers support this explanation. The Taylor Opportunity Program has nearly doubled in cost since 2008, and most of that increase has been due to higher tuition.
What I failed to fully appreciate in 1997 was how bad of a deal the Taylor Opportunity Program would end up being for the smaller schools. Then I spent almost a decade teaching at Nicholls State University, a regional state school in Thibodaux, La.
Small Universities Are Hardest Hit
In one sense, the Louisiana program amounted to a cruel trick for these institutions. Smaller schools are the ones least able to sustain the permanently higher costs associated with the new TOPS-generated revenue stream.
When the state budget goes south—and it always does in Louisiana—smaller schools get slammed. (Louisiana State University has more than 25,000 students, so small changes in per-student fees go a long way).
No matter how much we want it to, subsidizing something simply doesn’t make it more cost-effective.
The Taylor Opportunity Program does give certain people a better deal on tuition at one point in time, but then it makes up for it somewhere else.
Ironically, the earlier waves of Taylor Opportunity Program graduates are among those about to get hit with a tax increase. That’s what politicians mean by free.
Aside from the subsidy/cost issue, there are many other reasons why this is bad public policy.
First of all—and I know this sounds crazy—everyone should not go to college. Some people simply aren’t cut out, and many just don’t need to. Yes, people with college degrees tend to earn more than those without, but it does not follow that everyone should go to college.
When the program was started, Louisiana public universities offered students a good value because they were relatively inexpensive. Now that Louisiana taxpayers have spent more than $2 billion on the program, tuition rates are out of reach for many students that don’t qualify for the program.
While the best solution for Louisiana would be to get rid of the program altogether (unlikely since politicians love the program), the best residents can hope for now is an increase in the program’s academic standards and some form of means testing. At least these changes would better direct subsidies to academically prepared students with more financial need.