Monthly Archives: April 2023

by

Daily Broadside | Carlson Pops Up With Material He Used at the Heritage Foundation and Crushes His Fox News Numbers

Tucker Carlson showed up on Twitter at 8:00 PM ET (heh heh) with an unannounced monologue last night that already had more views than his show on Fox ever got (averaged 3.2 million viewers) an hour after he posted it.

His topic was the “unbelievably stupid debates” we see on television, which are irrelevant and forgettable. Yet, he says, almost none of them concern really big topics like war, emerging science, demographic changes, civil liberties and corporate power, among them. His accusation: both political parties and their donors collude to shut down any discussion about those big topics because they aren’t in their best interests.

His conclusion: the United States is a one-party system.

His hope: our current moment is too ridiculous to last.

When honest people say what’s true, calmly and without embarrassment, they become powerful. At the same time the liars, who’ve been trying to silence them, shrink, and they become weaker. That’s the iron law of the universe: true things prevail.

This is a theme that he offered at the Heritage Foundation on Friday, the last night of his show (unbeknownst to him at the time).

The second you decide to tell the truth about something, you are filled with this — I don’t want to get supernatural on you — but you are filled with this power from somewhere else. Try it! Tell the truth about something. You feel it every day. The more you tell the truth, the stronger you become. That’s completely real. It’s measurable in the way that you feel.

You can watch his entire speech here.

I understand what he’s describing. I think it’s that sense of relief once you stop pretending that something is true that isn’t. If you hold a lie as the truth, it creates a tension within you. Once you admit the truth, that tension is released. That “power” you feel is the freedom the truth brings.

As Jesus said, “If you hold to my teaching, you are really my disciples. Then you will know the truth, and the truth will set you free” (John 8:31-32). That’s admittedly a bit of misapplication, but the principle, “the truth will set you free,” remains.

Carlson’s speech is interesting for another reason — it may be why he was fired from Fox. Here’s Matt Walsh’s take.

You can find the Vanity Fair article Walsh refers to here.

Of course, Carlson’s 8:00 PM slot at Fox News has already grown cold and thousands of viewers have canceled their Fox Nation subscriptions.

Fox must’ve thought their audience was so loyal to their brand that they could survive firing the most powerful conservative voice in cable news — in all of journalism, really. As I said on Tuesday, I’m guessing it will be a Bud Light moment, and a real head-scratcher at that.

But Carlson will be back and I hope he’ll hammer home the truth even more powerfully.

by - 1 Comment

Daily Broadside | The Movie “Nefarious” Lives Up To Its Billing

Almost two weeks ago I recommended a movie I hadn’t seen yet based on the recommendations of two men whose opinions I respect — John Zmirak and Eric Metaxas. The movie was Nefarious, and I saw it in the theater last night with my daughter.

Going into it my expectations were set by Zmirak’s review, which praised the “powerful performances, skillful camera work, intuitive direction … and a script that’s simply brilliant.” Except for one or two moments during the film, that description was accurate.

The setting — a maximum security prison — is spare, but it works because this isn’t an action movie. The film is driven completely by dialogue that is at once believable and tautly delivered. The story relies on the verbal dueling between the main characters rather than car chases, over-the-top jump scares or gory violence to keep you riveted to the screen. (There are a couple of disturbing scenes, but don’t let the “R” rating dissuade you from seeing it; I think that rating was a political decision, because I’ve seen worse in PG-13 movies.)

Sean Patrick Flanery delivers a powerful performance as Edward, the prison inmate scheduled to be executed at 11:00 PM that evening. His character has to transition between the man himself and the entity that now “owns” him, which Flanery does with subtle — and sometimes chilling — effect.

Jordan Belfi plays Dr. James Martin, a court-ordered psychiatrist called to evaluate whether Edward is mentally fit to be executed. He’s a smart, worldly, mid-thirties atheist who is confident in his ability to see through whatever mind games Edward is playing, but whose self-confidence slowly evaporates over the course of the film.

The story confronts the viewer with a question: are demons behind the destruction that we see in the world, or is it all simply a natural order operating without any unseen interference? The film, of course, implies that there is evil at work in our world — and not just “evil,” but a personal evil. It also suggests that cultural or political issues we face in our society — like abortion or mass murders — are driven by evil spiritual forces.

Christians will agree theologically with the movie’s premise, based on the biblical declaration that “our struggle is not against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the powers of this dark world and against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly realms” (Ephesians 6:12). They may, however, wonder if the depiction of a demonic presence as expressed through Edward is something that comports with reality. I’ve never encountered anything quite like it, but I’m not willing to say it doesn’t happen. On the other hand, atheists and agnostics may not be convinced by the portrayal of evil in the film, but it may give them pause to reconsider.

The only real complaint I have (besides the dialogue briefly getting preachy at a couple of points), is what amounts to an unnecessary epilogue. “One year later,” we’re told, Dr. James Martin appears on conservative Glenn Beck’s Blaze TV show to promote his new book (the real life book A Nefarious Plot by New York Times bestselling author Steve Deace, also a host on Blaze TV). Beck’s cameo is the only moment that felt disjointed in the movie, although the fake book promotion does flow from the story’s narrative arc.

Beck is a controversial and polarizing figure, even among conservatives. Did the directors think he appeals to Christians in particular? What about non-believers who watch the movie — would Beck’s appearance ruin the movie for them? It actually disrupted the movie for me because the story did what good stories do: draw you in while suspending your disbelief. The appearance of Beck broke that suspension because I was suddenly thrust back into “reality.”

Apart from that moment, I would encourage you to go see it if you haven’t. It’s a well done psychological thriller with a mature take on spiritual warfare. It will challenge your understanding of spiritual influence and, if you let it, be a great conversation starter among your believing or undecided friends.

You can go here to find times and locations where it’s still showing.

by - 2 Comments

Daily Broadside | Fox News Is All Tuckered Out

Yesterday brought news of a host of host firings and leavings, the most shocking of which was Tucker Carlson at Fox News.

Tucker Carlson, the provocative, conservative prime-time host who sustained Fox News as a ratings juggernaut, has been forced out of the network.

Fox News announced the stunning departure of its top-rated host Monday with no explanation, but people familiar with the situation who were not authorized to comment publicly said the decision to fire Carlson came straight from Fox Corp. Chairman Rupert Murdoch with input from board members and other Fox Corp. executives.

According to one person familiar with the discussions, Murdoch’s son Lachlan, executive chairman of Fox Corp., and Suzanne Scott, chief executive of Fox News Media, decided late Friday that Carlson had to go.

Carlson’s last show was Friday.

“Fox News Media and Tucker Carlson have agreed to part ways,” the network said in a statement. “We thank him for his service to the network as a host and prior to that as a contributor.”

This follows the exit of Dan Bongino last week and rumors that Maria Bartiromo will go, too.

Seems like Fox is bleeding off whatever remaining conservatives are still at the network. Sure, Hannity is a conservative, but he’s a largely ineffective conservative. He’s not a movement leader. I haven’t watched him in years because he talks too much about himself and is too predictable. He’s a soft and comfortable conservative.

Greg Gutfeld is a weird dude who isn’t all that funny but has parlayed a humorous schtick into a regular show torching liberals. He also burns Geraldo Rivera during The Five, but that doesn’t mean he’s a movement leader.

Tucker Carlson was the only reason I ever tuned into Fox News anymore. He was smart, bold, and insightful. His monologues were often shared and talked about. Now that he’s gone, I can’t think of a single reason to watch. It’ll be interesting to see what happens — it sort of feels like a Bud Light moment. When you alienate your core audience, I’m not sure what they expect will happen.

Over at CNN, Don Lemon — or, as Tucker called him, Don le Mon — was fired after 17 years with the network. A boorish gay news personality, Lemon had tested the patience of new CEO Chris Licht with his antics during his demoted gig as a morning show anchor with two women.

CNN fired longtime host Don Lemon on Monday following his short and disastrous run as a morning show host, a little over two months after he apologized for on-air comments about Republican presidential candidate Nikki Haley being past her prime.

The move quickly turned nasty. While CNN chairman and CEO Chris Licht announced, after Lemon had co-hosted the show Monday, that they had “parted ways,” Lemon characterized it as a firing and said it was surprise to him.

“After 17 years at CNN I would have thought someone in management would have the decency to tell me directly,” Lemon said. CNN said that Lemon was given the opportunity to meet with management but released a statement on Twitter instead.

CNN offered no public explanation for Lemon’s dismissal. During a February discussion on “CNN This Morning” with co-hosts Poppy Harlow and Kaitlan Collins about the ages of politicians, he said that the 51-year-old Haley was not “in her prime.” A woman, he said, was considered in her prime “in her 20s, 30s and maybe her 40s.”

Harlow challenged Lemon, trying to clarify what he was referencing: “I think we need to qualify. Are you talking about prime for childbearing or are you talking about prime for being president?”

“Don’t shoot the messenger, I’m just saying what the facts are,” Lemon responded.

Licht apparently decided that le Mon was past his prime. I never watched CNN, so my viewing habits won’t be affected by his ouster.

I think Licht is trying to pull CNN rightward after its sojourn into Trump Derangement Syndrome on the far left during Trump’s administration. On the other hand, it looks like Rupert Murdoch is pulling Fox News leftward from a more centrist position. It has a reputation for being a “conservative” network, but guys like Bret Baier, Geraldo Rivera, Jessica Tarlov, and former hosts Shepherd Smith, Juan Williams, and Chris Wallace, to varying degrees, aren’t and weren’t true conservatives. In addition, Fox News also has former House Speaker and RINO Paul Ryan on its board, and Lachlan Murdoch, Rupert’s son, is no conservative.

Carlson will be a hot commodity on the open market. Wherever he lands his audience will follow. Fox News will experience a severe drop in its ratings, and whoever picks up Carlson will experience a spike in theirs.

by

Daily Broadside | We’re In The Very Best of Hands

Hey, remember when 51 security officials all signed and published a letter declaring that the Hunter Biden laptop “has all the classic earmarks of a Russian information operation”? They all swore that in their expert opinion, we should ignore the emails, documents, videos and pictures that painted a picture of Hunter Biden as a whoring, exhibitionist drug user who sold his father’s influence for millions of dollars that he took for himself, his friends, and associates with ten percent for the “Big Guy” because Russia’s objectives were “to create political chaos in the United States” and “to undermine the candidacy of former Vice President Biden and thereby help the candidacy of President Trump.”

Probably all deep fakes and AI propaganda, right?

Yeah, well, that letter is exactly what we thought it was: a disinformation op organized by the Biden campaign and, specifically, by Anthony Blinken, the foreign policy advisor for the Biden campaign and current Secretary of State.

A former acting CIA director has admitted to Congress that he organized the letter that falsely portrayed Hunter Biden’s laptop as Russian disinformation in an effort to influence the 2020 election in favor of Joe Biden and that he did so at the direction of current Secretary of State Antony Blinken, according to a letter released Thursday by House Judiciary Committee Chairman Jim Jordan.

The extraordinary admission by career intelligence officer Michael J. Morell provides stunning evidence that the now-infamous letter from 51 security officials in October 2021 was not an organic intelligence community initiative but rather a political dirty trick originating with Blinken and the Biden campaign.

Jordan sent a letter demanding Blinken answer a series of questions about Morell’s stunning testimony, as lawmakers weighed the enormity of America’s top diplomat being willing to accuse a nuclear-armed superpower of interfering in the 2020 election without evidence. That letter included major snippets of Morell’s testimony.

“A political dirty trick.” That doesn’t even begin to describe it — it’s the very definition of election interference. Morell admits that he did what he did to help get Biden elected. They wanted to put these immoral scags in office because OrangeManBad.

He also testified that the Biden campaign team coordinated to release the statement on the laptop to a specific reporter at the Washington Post and admitted that he got involved to help give Biden a leg up on Trump during the debates. 

“There were two intents,” he said. “One intent was to share our concern with the American people that the Russians were playing on this issue; and, two, it was [to] help Vice President.” When asked why he wanted to help Biden, he replied, “because I wanted him to win the election.”

Blinken, Morell, and this cadre of soulless, unAmerican spooks conspired to sow doubt about what we knew then and know now: that the laptop is Hunter Biden’s and proves that the Biden family is a criminal enterprise that has enriched itself off the backs of the American people while it destroys our country.

In a sworn interview with the House Judiciary Committee last week, Morell admitted it was Joe Biden’s presidential campaign that prompted him to write the infamous letter, according to the Post.

After hearing from Blinken, Morell admitted that he solicited signatures for his letter from 50 other former intel officials.

House Judiciary Committee Chairman Jim Jordan (R-Ohio) is set to release a report in the next couple of weeks on the origins of the “Dirty 51” letter, and it will reportedly show “it constituted corrupt interference in the 2020 presidential election.”

“We can prove that the entire purpose of this letter at the outset was to influence a presidential election with some of the most senior people who have ever been in our intelligence community ­using the imprimatur of their security clearances to pave the way for Joe Biden’s presidency,” Rep. Matt Gaetz (R-Fla.) told Steve Bannon’s “War Room” podcast this week.

“Morell wanted to be Joe Biden’s CIA director, got a phone call from Tony Blinken, who was representing the Biden campaign, saying, ‘Gee, Mike, doesn’t this Hunter Biden laptop look like Russian disinformation?’ ” said Gaetz.

“Morell testifies that then triggers him to be the ringleader of an enterprise to go to others and to put together a letter for the specific purpose of use by Joe Biden in the presidential debate … We can prove that and much more,” the Florida congressman added.

Unlike Adam Schiff-for-brains who claimed to have irrefutable evidence of Trump’s RUSSIAN COLLUSION!, I trust that when Gaetz says they can prove it, they can prove it. And it would be nice, when they do, if SOMEONE WOULD GO TO PRISON.

Two days ago, Marjorie Taylor Green added more disturbing allegations about Hunter and the whole Biden family. Watch the video and have a barf bag nearby.

It’s all coming so fast and furious. There’s also an anonymous whistleblower alleging a coverup in the Hunter Biden investigation that involves possible perjury on the part of — wait for it — Attorney General Merrick Garland.

WASHINGTON — Attorney General Merrick Garland is the unnamed official whose sworn testimony before Congress is being challenged in a bombshell letter from an IRS whistleblower’s attorney that also alleges a coverup in the Hunter Biden criminal investigation, The Post has learned.

Attorney Mark Lytle wrote Wednesday that the longtime IRS employee wants to provide information to congressional leaders to “contradict sworn testimony to Congress by a senior political appointee” — Garland —and also to detail “preferential treatment” in the criminal probe of the first son.

The whistleblower already made disclosures to the inspectors general of the Treasury and Justice departments.

Please give me a second to catch my breath and absorb what I’ve just learned. Like you, I couldn’t have seen this coming in a million years.

These nasty anti-American grifters and power-mad politicians have done untold damage to our country. Without their interference, Trump may very well have had another four years to build on the foundation he laid during his first four. Instead, we’re in an economic, political and moral nightmare foisted on us by a few untouchables in the top echelons of government.

Government of the people, by the people and for the people is no longer true in our nation.

Our society is falling down around our heads, led by the evil and relentless progressive Democrats, media, national institutions and NeverTrump (I yet repeat myself quadrupley). But the one thing that never changes is the persistent strength of God alone.

There is a river whose streams make glad the city of God,
    the holy place where the Most High dwells.
 God is within her, she will not fall;
    God will help her at break of day.
 Nations are in uproar, kingdoms fall;
    he lifts his voice, the earth melts.

 The Lord Almighty is with us;
    the God of Jacob is our fortress.

— Psalm 46:4-7

I’m traveling this weekend so there will be no Daily Broadside on Monday.

Have a great weekend.

by

Daily Broadside | The Administrative State Will Be The Death of Us

I long ago came to the conclusion that the alphabet agencies populating the federal government are unconstitutional and should be defunded, decommissioned, razed and salted over — permanently abolished, never to be formed again. The federal government was supposed to be small with powers restricted to those enumerated in the U.S. Constitution.

Jefferson also felt that the central government should be “rigorously frugal and simple.” As president he reduced the size and scope of the federal government by ending internal taxes, reducing the size of the army and navy, and paying off the government’s debt. Limiting the federal government flowed from his strict interpretation of the Constitution.

Offices with the powers of the IRS, the EPA, the DOE, the HHS, the DOJ, FBI and on ad infinitum, were never envisioned by the founders.

Under that system of a separation of powers each branch of the Federal Government was expected to protect its own Constitutional powers such that no single branch accrued power it was not allocated by the Constitution. The Founders understood that individuals were free in direct proportion to each branch of the Federal Government staying strictly within its own bounds, and the most important lane was the legislative lane; a narrow road of strictly enumerated powers written by a Congress consisted of duly elected representatives; with the House of Representatives the body most regularly elected, and with special powers over the origination of revenue bills in the driver’s seat.

But today many legislative and budget powers have been ceded to Presidents and the executive branch through statutes delegating legislative responsibility to Federal regulatory agencies composed of unelected people; and statutes mandating automatic and increased spending on certain programs administered by the executive branch.

That bolded text is the crux of the issue: Congress has delegated its own authority to unelected bureaucracies which issue regulations and rules that have the practical effect of law. Constitutionally, however, only Congress has the power to make law — it’s the legislative branch of the government, for Pete’s sake! — and only the House has the ability to appropriate funds, the lifeblood of these agencies and extra-constitutional organizations.

Yet the pressures of keeping a seat in the House or the Senate means that outsourcing their responsibility to unelected bureaucrats is a convenient way of avoiding responsibility for the onerous administrative state that Americans suffer under.

At first Congress had the upper hand; Congress had been creating the bureaucracy to carry out its wishes. But the more Congress gave away its powers in the form of broad regulatory authority, the more bureaucrats effectively became the lawmakers. The rise of the new imperial Presidency, and it should be shocking but no surprise, as Congress has expanded the bureaucracy creating programs, delegating authority, neglecting budgeting; the executive has attained unprecedented levels of authority. Our executives can command the bureaucracy to implement new procedures and policies without the cooperation of Congress by abusing executive discretion, by exploiting the vagaries of poorly written laws, and now by willfully neglecting and disregarding the laws which indeed are clear.

In his testimony before the 2016 Task Force for Executive Overreach Judiciary Committee (in the same linked document), Dr. Matthew Spalding of Hillsdale College, wrote:

This transfer of lawmaking power away from Congress to an oligarchy of unelected experts who rule through executive decree and judicial edict over virtually every aspect of our daily lives, under the guise of merely implementing the technical details of law, constitutes nothing less than a revolution against our constitutional order. The significance of this revolution cannot be overstated. It threatens to undo the development of the rule of law and constitutional government, the most significant and influential accomplishment of the long history of human liberty.

This revolution has created an increasingly unbalanced structural relationship between an ever more powerful, aggressive and bureaucratic executive branch and a weakening legislative branch unwilling to exercise its atrophied constitutional muscles to check the executive or rein in a metastasizing bureaucracy. If the executive-bureaucratic rule now threatening to overwhelm American society becomes the undisputed norm — accepted not only among the academic and political elites, but also by the American people, as the defining characteristic of the modern state — it could well mark the end of our great experiment in self-government.

Against that background, Michael Walsh’s latest column takes on more urgency.

Bureaucratic parasitism has only accelerated since start of the Nixon administration … as demands for D.C. to “do something” about pretty much everything grew and grew. Having won the war in Europe with Soviet and British help, and defeated the Japanese Empire practically by themselves, Americans felt there was no task too big to tackle. On Nixon’s watch —Tricky Dick’s fatal flaw, like Donald Trump’s, was the fool’s errand of trying to get his enemies (who detested him) to like him—the regulatory agencies were summoned into being, dark golems bent on destroying the Constitution in the guise of trying to Save the Earth.

One of the first up was the Environmental Protection Agency, the demon spawn of the National Environmental Policy Act of 1970, which mandated (what an ugly word for a democracy to employ) “environmental impact” statements for future federal projects. Nixon put teeth in the law with the creation by executive order of the Environmental Protection Agency at the end of that same year. Then the unelected bureaucrats took over, and turned what had been sold as benign into a ravenous, uncontrollable, punitive beast. And now here we are:

The Biden administration is planning some of the most stringent auto pollution limits in the world, designed to ensure that all-electric cars make up as much as 67 percent of new passenger vehicles sold in the country by 2032, according to two people familiar with the matter. That would represent a quantum leap for the United States — where just 5.8 percent of vehicles sold last year were all-electric — and would exceed President Biden’s earlier ambitions to have all-electric cars account for half of those sold in the country by 2030.

It would be the federal government’s most aggressive climate regulation and would propel the United States to the front of the global effort to slash the greenhouse gases generated by cars, a major driver of climate change.

Death by a thousand cuts as the administrative state piles rule upon rule on top of our backs. Today’s Washington D.C. is a sinister, grotesque Gordian knot not unlike a cancerous tumor that has wrapped itself around the brain stem of its victim. Not doing anything will allow it to eventually kill any semblance of representative government — something I believe we are fast approaching.

Yet the alternative is an aggressive, unsparing treatment that cuts it out before it can do any more damage, and one of those agencies — the DOJ — has already demonized anyone who dares raise an objection to the administrative state as a “domestic terrorist.”

This is why I’ve warned that we’re heading for a significant conflict that can only be described as a civil war. That’s the trajectory we’re on, which is underscored by the literal movement of Americans out of blue zones across the fruited plain.

What we found was striking: There has been a vast migration out of counties that voted for Joe Biden into those counties that voted to reelect Donald Trump.

Census data show a net internal migration of almost 2.6 million (2,562,937 to be exact) from blue counties to red since Biden was elected. (These figures don’t count immigrants or births or deaths, just those Americans moving from one location to another.)

More than 61% of the counties that voted for Biden in 2020 lost population, while 65% of Trump-supporting counties gained population.

Some highlights:

  • Of the 555 counties Biden won, 335 (or 61%) lost population due to internal migration, our analysis found. Of the 2,589 counties that Trump won, 1,675 (or 65%) gained population.
  • Two Biden-voting counties that lost the most from net migration were Los Angeles County, which was down 363,760, and Cook County, Illinois, down 200,718. While many of the blue counties that lost population were urbanized, the exodus was widespread and nationwide, including many far more sparsely populated liberal areas.
  • In contrast, the biggest loss in any red county was Jefferson Parish, Louisiana, down just 18,470.
  • In 13 states that had a net loss of population, red counties nevertheless showed gains. In California, which saw a massive net outflow of 871,127 people in just the past two years, counties that backed Trump had a net gain of 8,412. New Jersey suffered a loss of 107,749 over the past two years, but counties in the Garden State that voted for Trump gained 22,507. Michigan lost 43,188 overall, but its red counties had a net gain of 28,091.
  • On the other hand, blue counties lost population in states that saw overall gains. For example, Florida had a net gain of 622,476 over the past two years. But counties that backed Biden nevertheless lost 3,374. Georgia had a large gain of 128,089, but blue counties still had a net loss of 28,178. Tennessee saw an increase of 146,403 people, but counties that voted for Biden saw a decline of 37,306.

Once the majority of moves have been completed, the red and blue state boundaries will harden and then there won’t be anywhere else to run to. As the federal government favors blue states over red, red states will either file for divorce or have to fight to leave the union.

We’re in for a long slog.

by - 1 Comment

Daily Broadside | U.N. Brings Pedophilia A Step Closer to “Normal” in New Report

Yesterday long-time Baptist minister, televangelist and one-time president of the Southern Baptist Convention, Charles Stanley, died at the age of 90.

He had been the pastor of First Baptist Church in Atlanta, Georgia since 1971. I remember regularly listening to his radio program, In Touch with Charles Stanley, in the late 80s, especially as I considered vocational ministry after college. His ministry wasn’t without controversy, his wife having divorced him in 2000 after multiple attempts at reconciliation. His son, Andy Stanley, leads another megachurch in Atlanta called North Point Community Church.

If you haven’t yet heard, the United Nations affirmed its support of pedophilia in a report titled “The 8 March Principles for a Human Rights-Based Approach to Criminal Law Proscribing Conduct Associated with Sex, Reproduction, Drug Use, HIV, Homelessness and Poverty.”

A shocking report issued by international legal experts with the backing of the United Nations appears to open the floodgates to normalize sex with minors. 

“Sexual conduct involving persons below the domestically prescribed minimum age of consent to sex may be consensual in fact, if not in law,” the Geneva-based International Commission of Jurists wrote in March with an assist from UNAIDS and the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights.

This follows on the heels of a number of disturbing developments.

The shocking recommendations from international legal elites underscore a number of major recent events in the United States and around the world that have unfolded with bewildering speed. 

Each development suggests people in positions of authority have worked to break traditional legal bounds, societal structures and once-universal taboos for the purpose of sexualizing children.

Among them: The disturbing case of Jeffrey Epstein, who was convicted of running an international prostitution ring, reportedly provided underage girls to global power players.

There is also the sudden dramatic rise in the number of transgender people and normalization of transgender culture, fueled by popular culture and public education, defying all known historic precedent. 

In addition, educators in many instances now brazenly state that parents have limited rights over their children while their classrooms grow increasingly sexualized. 

What is it with these Leftist pinko commie elites and their obsession with sexual perversion and the destruction of all sexual norms?

Cheong links indirectly to the document, which you can find here; I’ve screenshotted the relevant pages below.

So this is interesting, because “Principle 16” doesn’t give any minimum age of consent — it just says “persons under 18 years of age.” Does that mean that we should consult a five-year-old about whether he wants to have sex with a 51-year-old man? And don’t throw at me the “due regard to their age, maturity and best interests” (whatever that means) — these are very subjective markers. How does one evaluate “maturity” or “best interests”?

Note too the way it’s positioned: for the benefit of children. The “enforcement of criminal law should reflect the rights and capacity” of anyone under the age of 18 … those people currently referred to as “underage” for a reason.

Some of the groups involved in this five-year endeavor of evil include the usual suspects of global Marxism: the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR), the Joint UN Programme on HIV/AIDS (UNAIDS), the UN Development Programme (UNDP), and of course, no global nod to legal pederasty would be complete without the World Health Organization (WHO).

Again, this comes as parents in the U.S. fight LGBTQ+ groomers in school classrooms, pornographic books in school libraries, and drag queen shows at public libraries and in the classroom.

We’re watching the unraveling of our society right in front of our eyes. All of us should be drawing immovable red lines in our hearts and minds.

It always starts subtly, then grows larger and more obnoxious once it has a foothold.

by - 1 Comment

Daily Broadside | Washington Crosses the Rubicon in the Culture Wars

For the record, I did not see Nefarious this weekend, but I’m in the middle of making plans with a couple of buddies to see it this next week if we can arrange it. It grossed an estimated $1.3 million on 933 screens for an average of $1,425 per screen. That’s puny against two other new movies in the horror genre, The Pope’s Exorcist and Renfield, which made $9.1 million and $7.7 million, respectively. The new movies were shown on more than 3x the number of screens as Nefarious, though, and had a ton of marketing behind them.

Nefarious is also a good word to describe what is happening across our country with the trans-madness, the flooding of the US with foreigners across our non-existent southern border, the grooming of children in our public government-run schools, the anarchy on our city streets, the demands for reparations from people who were never slaves to people who never owned slaves, an economy in tatters, the rise of China as a military threat, and the woke religion infiltrating businesses trying to earn 100% on the CEI from the Human Rights Campaign.

The latest in our cultural upheaval is the passage of SB5599 in the Washington State Legislature last week.

Essentially, the bill allows licensed youth shelters to harbor a child against parents’ wishes while proceeding with sex-change procedures or abortions. Put another way, not only will parents have no say in the life-altering decision of girls and boys to defy their biological gender (or to kill a human life), but the children can be kept away from their parents and homes.

Note well: This is not meant to be a rare escape hatch for cases meeting the legal definition of parental abuse or neglect. Instead, it treats the mere possibility of parental opposition to “gender transition” as the very equivalent of abuse. The automatic assumption is in favor of the gender transition at least temporarily desired by a child or adolescent — age groups not necessarily known for wisdom or for consistency of emotions — and against consultation with parents.

And, again, all of this is to be done while the child is kept from living with her own parents, unless and until state bureaucrats decide the parents merit “reunification.”

The bill was passed 57-39 with the unanimous support of Democrats and the unanimous opposition of Republicans.

Think about this. A state in our “union” has now passed a law that does not require — in fact, discourages — a youth shelter or host home to tell a child’s parents where the child is. In effect, the state, through these shelters, takes the child from the parents. They do so under the guise that they are ‘protecting’ the child from parents who do not support the child’s desire to “transition.”

The bill does not require proof of abuse in the household nor even an allegation of abuse. As a result, merely seeking “protected health care services” is enough of a reason to keep the runaway’s location hidden from parents and clears the way for children between the ages of 13 and 18 to stay at these facilities without their parents’ knowledge for an indefinite time while seeking services related to gender dysphoria and gender transitioning.

The state supplants the parents if they refuse to consent to their child’s gender transition surgeries.

Sen. Marko Liias is a far-Left politician and (as far as I can tell) a homosexual man. His statement that “trans youth have been under a nationwide attack” is patently false, but that doesn’t stop him from declaring it so.

This is a moral abomination. It assumes that not allowing a child to undergo such surgeries is wrong and therefore abusive. It assumes as healthy what Normals would consider abusive — the radical, irreversible and destructive amputation or mutilation of healthy body parts — and makes evil what we would consider good — standing in the gap against such extreme self-harm.

If a parent says no to removing their 14-year-old daughter’s breasts, it is seen as neglect or abuse by many progressive activists and politicians. And that’s precisely the kind of health care service that would be allowed without parental consent, according to the bill summary.

This is Hitleresque totalitarianism — an all-powerful state strips you of your God-given right to raise your children in a biblically-centered home. Not that every parent would do so, but that’s not what we’re talking about here.

This is terrifying. That the state would pass a law that legally intervenes between parents and their children isn’t new, of course; laws exist that allow the state to step in when there is legitimate abuse, such as locking your children in a dog cage, or beating them to death. Being opposed to a so-called ‘gender transition’ is not abuse by any stretch of the imagination.

Now that we’ve gotten to this stage, it isn’t hard to imagine a day when taking a child to church is grounds for harboring them from parents in the same way. Why not? If a child can flee to a state shelter to follow through on an extreme, irreversible body modification, why not run to the state for something less extreme? Once the state becomes the de facto parent, what stops them from usurping more and more decision-making power when a kid doesn’t get what they want?

In my opinion, this is a bridge too far, an egregious over-reach by the state. The people of the State of Washington must fight it first in the courts, then, if necessary, in the streets.

When will enough be enough?

by - 2 Comments

Daily Broadside | You Should Probably See A Movie Before You Recommend It, But …

Short post today to recommend a film that I’ve not seen but at least two writers I respect have — and both enthusiastically recommend it. It’s made for Christian audiences, but avoids the pitfalls that most movies aimed at that audience stumble into: low production value, terribly moralistic and sappy messaging, idealized relationships, and avoiding the depiction of realistic evil.

I’m gobsmacked and thrilled to report that a movie of this quality is opening this weekend, Nefarious, based on the novel by conservative TV commentator and author Steve Deace of The Blaze. I heard about it from Eric Metaxas, who’d seen the preview screener and highly recommended it. I sat with a friend to watch it, and we were riveted. Imagine the insights of The Screwtape Letters conveyed with all the intensity of top-notch courtroom drama like To Kill a Mockingbird. Or the “Grand Inquisitor” scene from Dostoevsky’s The Brothers Karamazov, set on death row in a U.S. “red state.”

I don’t want to give away too much, and drain the film of its power to surprise, unsettle, and challenge. Suffice it to say that it’s an, intense, occasionally violent psychological thriller of a similar genre to The Exorcism of Emily Rose. The story is simple: a smug secular psychologist goes to evaluate a serial killer on the verge of execution … to see if he’s lucid enough to undergo capital punishment (as our law requires). But the killer insists he’s possessed by a demon. Is that proof he’s really insane?

The film confronts genuine evil — not confusion, bad ideas, mere human weakness, or even the sordid fact of Original Sin.

No, Nefarious brings us face to face with principalities and powers, the bloodless calculating entities who cast their shadows today in the abortion industry, the transgender movement, and the intolerant new gospel of the Antichrist we refer to as the Woke cult. We hear the subarctic voice of deathless spirits who whisper in our ears, who teach us to love the sin but hate the sinner, who manage our culture and politics and arrange for the State to groom our children.

I will make the disclaimer that John Zmirak makes: not every Christian will be comfortable seeing this movie. If you’re easily disturbed by intense situations and the portrayal of stone-cold evil, this may not be the film for you. As I said, I’m recommending it based the strong recommendation of Zmirak and Eric Metaxas, not on having seen it myself (yet).

The reason I bring it to your attention is that it opens in theaters today and a movie’s staying power is often determined by how well it performs at the box office. As this is its opening weekend, I’m encouraging you to help make it a strong one.

Whatever you choose to do, have a good weekend. I’ll be back Monday.

by

Daily Broadside | Go Woke, Lose $4 BILLION in Value

By now you’ve heard all about Anheuser-Busch’s choice to pander to the sexual anarchist wing of the Democrat party by featuring a mentally ill man who appropriates women’s fashion, makeup and stereotyped mannerisms to pass himself off as female.

No one except the trans-extremists believes transgender TikTok star Dylan Mulvaney is a woman, but Bud Light went all in on making this idiotic parody of a woman their new spokesman — and, yes, I mean spokesman. You will never get me to join your irrational lunacy that declares a man is a woman — and I’m not even a biologist. Don’t get me wrong; Dylan Mulvaney can pretend to be whatever he wants. Just don’t expect me to play along.

Bud Light obviously didn’t expect their current customer base to play along because it is clear they’re trying to develop a new customer base.

The brand’s new Vice President, Alissa Heinerscheid, discussed the decision to include Mr Mulvaney in the brand’s latest ad campaign, attacking the brand’s reputation and core-customer base for being “fratty” and allowing customers to drink while enjoying “out of touch humor.”

She told hosts of a podcast: “I had this super clear mandate… we need to evolve and elevate this iconic brand… [that] means inclusivity… it means shifting the tone, it’s having a campaign that’s truly inclusive and feels lighter and brighter…”

Ironically — and hysterically! — what they seem to have done instead is get a standing ovation from the LGBTQ+ lobby and its allies while alienating everybody else.

Consumers nationwide revolted against the nation’s top-selling beer brand after it stepped “recklessly” into the culture wars last week with its new spokesperson, transgender TikTok star Dylan Mulvaney, according to bar owners and beer-industry experts around the country.

“I think society flexes it muscles sometimes and reminds manufacturers that the consumer is still in charge,” Jeff Fitter, owner of Case & Bucks, a restaurant and sports bar in Barnhart, Missouri, told FOX Business.

“In Bud Light’s effort to be inclusive, they excluded almost everybody else, including their traditional audience.”

He cited sports fans, working people and women as loyal Bud Light consumers the brand suddenly excluded in its race to go woke. 

Well, that’s on brand for the woke crowd, who push tolerance, inclusion and diversity on everyone while excluding, say, evangelical Christians.

But her effort to be inclusive excluded the people who matter most — Bud Light drinkers, according to St. Louis-area operator John Rieker. 

“It’s kind of mind-boggling they stepped into this realm,” Rieker, who owns Harpo’s Bar and Grill in Chesterfield, Missouri, told FOX Business. 

“You’re marketing to an audience that represents a fraction of 1% of consumers while alienating the much larger base of your consumers.”

His customers, many of them loyal Bud Light drinkers, are baffled by the brand’s lack of inclusivity.

LOL. “Baffled by the brand’s lack of inclusivity.” The VERY THING Heinerscheid thought she was doing. Brilliant.

As funny as that is, the key point is “a fraction of 1% of consumers.” I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again: the only thing these woke corporations understand is the bottom line. It’s only and always about the money. The only way that businesses like Target or Gillette or Bed, Bath and Beyond will stay out of the culture wars is if they are punished financially.

If some business is going to cater to the woke crowd, I say, let them. Let them survive on that “fraction of 1% of consumers.” Speak with your checkbook or credit card. Keep it in your pocket or purse when considering your next purchase.

I know, I know. You fret about losing your favorite brands. But really — do you need Bud Light? Can you survive without Bud Light?

You can.

You don’t need, and can do without, all kinds of products. All you need is a little food, water, air and some shelter. Everything else is discretionary. Don’t fuel these woke corporations. Starve them of the funds that allow them to influence our culture for the worst.

It seems like Bud Light’s current consumer base has already started sending that message to Anheuser-Busch, whose market cap dropped by $4 billion in the wake of this marketing fiasco.

We won’t know if the self-inflicted damage is permanent for months, or even years, but the now-popular adage seems to be holding true: go woke, go broke.

by

Daily Broadside | Are You Being Watched While You Worship?

Every day brings more evidence that we’re rapidly evolving into a police state as our historic norms and traditions disintegrate and lawlessness is flaunted by our domestic enemies on the Left, whether in politics, education, science, entertainment, religion, medicine or business. We can no longer assume that we live in freedom with the U.S. Constitution guarding our rights, because those in power no longer respect that historic document.

Take, for instance, our rights of religion, speech, assembly and, though not specifically listed, freedom of association. Every one of those rights was to be violated with the latest revelation that the FBI planned to cultivate informants within the Catholic church.

The chair of the House Judiciary Committee has subpoenaed FBI Director Christopher Wray for all records relating to a leaked internal memo that proposed developing sources in traditionalist Catholic parishes to inform on potential “violent extremists” in such houses of worship.

In an April 10 letter (pdf) attached to the subpoena, Judiciary Chairman Jim Jordan (R-Ohio) noted that the committee’s investigation of that Jan. 23 memo, which has since been repudiated by the FBI, had revealed that it was produced by at least one undercover agent and that, despite leadership’s claims to the contrary, the bureau intended to act on the memo’s recommendations.

“Based on the limited information produced by the FBI to the Committee, we now know that the FBI relied on at least one undercover agent to produce its analysis, and that the FBI proposed that its agents engage in outreach to Catholic parishes to develop sources among the clergy and church leadership to inform on Americans practicing their faith,” Jordan wrote to Wray. “This shocking information reinforces our need for all responsive documents, and the Committee is issuing a subpoena to you to compel your full cooperation.”

“Shocking”? Really, Jim?

Is it really so shocking after all we have endured during and post-Trump? We’ve learned that the FBI helped fuel the Russia! Russia! Russia! hoax, likely took part in instigating the J6 “insurrection”, coordinated the raid on Trump’s Mar-a-Lago home with the White House, targeted concerned parents opposed to public (i.e. state-run) schools corrupting their kids with critical race theory and transgenderism, concocted a ludicrous entrapment scheme to kidnap Michigan governor Gretchen “Wretched” Whitmer, and abused their authority to arrest a pro-life activist in front of his family as a warning to anyone else who might think they can protest abortions at the little extermination camps set up across our fair nation without reprisal.

So, “shocking”? No. Not shocked at all.

This is the kind of police state activity you might expect in communist or socialist countries ruled by dictators-for-life. The FBI is acting more like the East German Stasi or the Russian NKVD than it is the domestic investigative unit whose mission is “to protect the American people and uphold the Constitution of the United States.” (*spit*)

FBI Director Christopher Wray denied that the FBI condoned such activity, protesting that, “we do not and will not target people for religious beliefs, and we do not and will not monitor people’s religious practices.” Yet, Jordan found that, “The document itself shows that its contents, including its proposal to develop sources in Catholic churches, were reviewed and approved by two senior intelligence analysts and even the local Chief Division Counsel.”

Say, I wonder if the FBI is developing sources within Islamic mosques to monitor for “potential ‘violent extremists’”? Or nah?

It’s not like the FBI had identified a specific threat coming from a specific church. The plan was simply to develop inside sources among “clergy and church leadership” to report to the FBI what certain church members were up to.

Can you imagine the distrust and suspicion that would be sown among the body of believers, especially as people found out that parishioners were winding up in federal prisons? The effect would chill relationships and conversation. After all, who could you trust?

For now it seems like the threat has been averted. But the fact that it was even proposed tells us all we need to know about how the FBI sees religious conservatives.

Today the Catholics; tomorrow the Protestants. Now that the precedent has been set and the idea of surveilling churches is out there, don’t be surprised when parishioners begin to be arrested or simply disappear without a trace.

It shouldn’t be that shocking.