Ukraine’s Nazi Problem Gets Worse: Kyiv City Council Set to Name Street After SS Official

Ukraine’s Dark History of Nazi Collaboration and Animus Toward Israel

  • Ukraine was an unapologetic supporter of the Nazis and has historically been a bastion of antisemitism.
  • Ukraine has consistently voted against Israel at the U.N. and supported Israel’s enemies.
  • The Ukrainian government honored two Third Reich collaborators and denied the mass murderer status of one of them.
  • One Nazi collaborator extolled by Ukraine is lionized with a statue in Lviv and multiple eponymous streets.
  • The Neo-Nazi Azov battalion, which has been recruiting and training American citizens, is fully integrated into the Ukrainian Army.

There has been considerable concern since before the start of the war in Ukraine about the influence of National Socialists, or Nazis, there, and now it has gotten considerably worse. Rather than apologize for or at very least ignore the nation’s past ties to National Socialism, the city council in the nation’s capital of Kyiv is reportedly considering naming a street after a National Socialist collaborator who actually served in the SS during the Holocaust, Voldymyr Kubiyovych. Apparently the Ukrainian government is so certain that Western aid will continue that it feels no hesitation about flaunting its openness to National Socialism.

The Jerusalem Post reported Tuesday that according to Eduard Dolinsky, director of the Ukrainian Jewish Committee, “a street in the Ukrainian capital will be renamed following a motion passed by the city council, and will bear the name of Volodymyr Kubiyovych, who during the Holocaust was heavily involved in the formation of the Waffen-SS Galizien, a Nazi military force made up of Ukrainian volunteers.”

This startling move comes after a “historical expert commission within the council had put forward several options for the renaming of what is currently Przhevalsky Street in Kyiv,” and several names were put to a public vote. “The option to rename the street after Volodymyr Kubiyovych has so far received a majority, with 31% of the vote, with the second and third highest options receiving just 18% and 10% respectively,” although this could change, as the voting remains open until Sunday. Then, “once the public vote is closed, the Kyiv City Council will then vote to approve renaming the street after Kubiyovych.”

This is an astonishingly bad idea for a number of reasons. Before the National Socialist invasion of the USSR, Kubiyovych “requested the creation of an autonomous state within Ukraine in which Poles and Jews would not be allowed to live.” Then, once the National Socialists had occupied much of Ukraine, Kubiyovych “took on a key role in the formation of the Waffen-SS Galizien, publicly announcing his willingness to take up arms and fight for the Nazi cause.”

Is this the hero Zelensky’s Ukraine needs? Is this the hero Zelensky’s Ukraine wants?

None of this comes as any surprise to longtime Ukraine watchers. The independent journalism site Kanekoa News reported as long ago as last June that “on October 16, 2019, the top Democrat on the House Homeland Security Committee’s counterterrorism subpanel, Rep. Max Rose (NY), led a letter signed by forty Democrats asking the State Department why they had not placed Ukraine’s Azov Battalion on the U.S. list of ‘foreign terrorist organizations’ (FTOs).” The irony couldn’t be richer, for in October 2022, the New York Times, that reliable organ of far-Left opinion, refers to “Ukraine’s celebrated Azov Battalion,” and claims that “the group’s defense of the Azovstal steel plant in Mariupol — the southern port city decimated by Russian forces in the first months of the war — has become a powerful symbol of the suffering inflicted by Russia and the resistance mounted by Ukraine.”

Every last Democrat who condemned the Azov Battalion likely reads and respects the Times, and every last one of them also would likely prefer us all to forget that they once likened the Azov Battalion to the Islamic State (ISIS) and noted that it “openly welcomes neo-Nazis into its ranks.” The Democrats’ 2019 letter added that “the 115th Congress of the United States stated in its 2018 omnibus spending bill that ‘none of the funds made available by this act may be used to provide arms, training or other assistance to the Azov Battalion.’” But that was when Volodymyr Zelensky was widely regarded as some kind of ally or tool of the Left’s Emmanuel Goldstein of the day, Donald Trump; after all, the first Stalinist show trial impeaching the America-First president took place over a phone call to Zelensky. So it was in the Democrats’ interest at that time to play up the National Socialist element in Ukraine, just as it is in their interests now to pretend that element doesn’t exist.

The Democrats’ letter even declared “Azov has been recruiting, radicalizing, and training American citizens for years according to the Federal Bureau of Investigation.” Yet now it seems as if there is no limit to the taxpayer billions that must be funneled to these gallant Ukrainian defenders of freedom. Is anyone exercising any kind of oversight at all? Is Azov still “recruiting, radicalizing, and training American citizens”? Is our taxpayer money now being used to fund such activities?

One thing is certain: the full extent of the ties between Ukraine and the posturing, self-righteous, desperately corrupt, hypocritical and self-serving U.S. Democrat establishment is not publicly known, and may never be known. But what we do know should have brought that entire establishment crashing down years ago.

AUTHOR

RELATED ARTICLES:

CIA Knows Zelensky & Top Generals Are Skimming Hundreds Of Millions In U.S. Aid

One of the most prolific pro-Russia propaganda channels is run by a former US Navy officer living in Washington

EDITORS NOTE: This Geller Report is republished with permission. ©All rights reserved.

Society-Wide Lack of Restraint a Cause of Mass Shootings: Mohler

Only two weeks after the Covenant School shooting in Nashville, another mass murderer killed six people and wounded nine at a shooting at Old National Bank in Louisville, Ky. The incident was “absolutely horrifying and frightening,” Dr. Al Mohler, president of Southern Theological Seminary in Louisville, said on “Washington Watch,” but that should make it a call to action for Christians.

Mohler, whose predecessor’s son-in-law died in the Louisville shooting, diagnosed the tragedy as a symptom of “restraint being lifted off” of American society; “you see it just about in every dimension of life.” “Washington Watch” guest host Jody Hice said that “it seems like almost daily something like this is taking place,” these “extreme acts of violence taking place across the country.”

“There’s only one explanation for this, and that is premeditated violence carried out with a murderous rampage. There is no other factor here,” said Mohler. He warned against the attempts of secular society to reduce a mass shooter’s moral culpability to either socioeconomic factors or mental infirmity; neither explanation, he argued, applied in this case. “Many people want to reduce all sin and wrongdoing, even criminal behavior to some kind of socioeconomic explanation,” he added. “That’s basically all a secular society has.”

But Mohler said the real root cause is the same affliction we all suffer from. “The heart is deceitful above all things, and desperately sick; who can understand it?” said the Lord through Jeremiah (17:9). “If it turns out someone says this is ‘just this’ or ‘just that,’ I think we as Christians know that is not plausible,” Mohler summarized.

“As we’re watching more of these events take place all across the country,” Hice agreed, “we can’t blame it all on guns. We can’t blame it all on mental issues. There is a heart issue that must at some point be addressed.”

“When you look at … both the Old and the New Testaments, there’s plenty of evidence to the fact that one of God’s great gifts to humanity is restraint. And when those restraints are taken off of a society, horrible things happen,” Mohler continued. “When you look at the entire structure of biblical morality and biblical law, if you begin to unravel things over here, the unraveling is going to take place over [t]here as well.”

After recounting how a Sodom-esque crime unraveled into civil war, the book of Judges concludes, “In those days there was no king in Israel. Everyone did what was right in his own eyes” (21:25). David’s last words poetically celebrate restraining authority, “When one rules justly over men, ruling in the fear of God, he dawns on them like the morning light, like the sun shining forth on a cloudless morning, like rain that makes grass to sprout from the earth” (2 Samuel 23:3-4). Paul wrote, “Rulers are not a terror to good conduct, but to bad. Would you have no fear of the one who is in authority? Then do what is good, and you will receive his approval, for he is God’s servant for your good. But if you do wrong, be afraid, for he does not bear the sword in vain” (Romans 13:3-4).

For decades, Americans “have been unraveling the entire moral fiber, the moral structure of Western civilization … that’s based upon very clear biblical principles of morality,” Mohler went on. “Eventually, you end up with people who basically demonstrate what it looks like for a restraint to be gone, for inhibitions to be gone, and for people to follow example after example of horrifying behavior. … If God’s restraining grace is taken away from a society, the list of horrible things happening just continues.”

Mohler insisted the “break down of order and … restraint” is “not just in terms of giant crimes,” but it “gets all the way down to the way parents deal with children, the way that the schools deal with students. … Frankly, you look at America’s major cities, [and] you don’t see much restraint about anything.” Paul warned that “in the last days … people will be lovers of self, lovers of money, proud, arrogant, abusive, disobedient to their parents, ungrateful, unholy, heartless, unappeasable, slanderous, without self-control, brutal, not loving good, treacherous, reckless, swollen with conceit, lovers of pleasure rather than lovers of God” (2 Timothy 3:1-4).

Mohler said the digital revolution and especially social media was instrumental in creating the conditions for people to cast off restraint. “It used to be that people were told, ‘think before you say something. Take responsibility for your words. Don’t say anything you don’t want to live with the rest of your life,’” he said. But now, “it’s an unmitigated … just sheer express. It is just absolute, uncontrolled, rampag[ing] emotion.”

Hice agreed, “It’s so easy just to throw out emotions” on social media. “And that certainly is fuel to the fire of extremism and whatever other isms we want to talk about.”

Given the societal ills we face, “we do not have a toolkit of policies with which to respond to this,” explained Mohler. “We as Christians understand that there is no solution for the basic problem of the human heart that comes from within ourselves, or that can be arranged by society. … Policies and laws? They can suppress, to some extent, the full expression of human evil. But the problem is in the heart and the only solution for the problem in the heart is the gospel of Jesus Christ.”

So, “what we have is the good news of the gospel of Jesus Christ,” Mohler said. “The gospel of Jesus Christ is first and foremost about how sinners are saved from our sin through the blood atonement of the Lord Jesus Christ and the full justification of sins that comes to those who, by faith, come to know the Lord Jesus Christ as Savior.”

This means that “we have to return to first principles biblically,” Mohler argued. “We as Christians don’t have anywhere else to go anyway. The Christian church doesn’t have some kind of ‘policy exit’ from theology. … The New Testament gives us our agenda, that is, to preach the gospel of the Lord Jesus Christ, to build godly families, to build churches, and through that, to help bear witness to Christ.”

“But the larger society benefits by the presence of Christians and by the influence of Christianity,” Mohler added, because Christians “also have the sure biblical knowledge that the way you build a civilization is with healthy marriages based in a mother and a father and a husband and a wife who love each other and are devoted to each other; having children and raising them in the nurture and admonition of the Lord; building a society, a civilization based upon consistency with God’s law and God’s command; and seeking human flourishing in such a way that we know can only come by obedience to the Word of God and can only come by God blessing and providing restraint and protection.”

“As we look at a more radically secularizing society, it’s not just a challenge to us evangelistically,” said Mohler.” It’s a challenge to us just with the breakdown we see in the order around us.” Proverbs states, “Where there is no prophetic vision the people cast off restraint, but blessed is he who keeps the law” (29:18).

“The answer for Christians has to come back to the gospel of Jesus Christ and our eager witness to the fact that there is no rescue from sin but Jesus,” Mohler concluded. For this purpose, even the apostle Paul said his powers were insufficient apart from the power of God, “not that we are sufficient in ourselves to claim anything as coming from us, but our sufficiency is from God” (2 Corinthians 3:5).

In keeping with Paul’s recognition of his own weakness, Mohler urged Christians to pray. “Our priority,” he said, “has to be to pray that God’s grace and mercy will be evident, especially in a situation such as this, and that Christ’s people will be deployed as agents of grace … that Christian parents will teach their children, Christian pastors will teach their congregations, and all of us will together learn by the spirit and the word what it means to be faithful Christians in such a difficult age.”

“God put us here in this time by his sovereignty for a purpose,” said Mohler. “Let’s pray we’ll be faithful to that purpose.”

AUTHOR

Joshua Arnold

Joshua Arnold is a staff writer at The Washington Stand.

RELATED ARTICLE: The GOP Should Look To New Solutions To Win Over Blue-State Voters Concerned About Crime And Mass Shootings

EDITORS NOTE: This Washington Stand column is republished with permission. ©2023 Family Research Council


The Washington Stand is Family Research Council’s outlet for news and commentary from a biblical worldview. The Washington Stand is based in Washington, D.C. and is published by FRC, whose mission is to advance faith, family, and freedom in public policy and the culture from a biblical worldview. We invite you to stand with us by partnering with FRC.

Dutch Activist: ‘Politicians know when they control the food, they control the people’

Eva Vlaardingerbroek was the guest of Tucker Carlson. She is a Dutch legal philosopher, and she opposes the rise of the totalitarian state in the Western World.

Watch as political activist Eva Vlaardingerbroek provides insight on why politicians are pushing people to eat bugs on special previewing of ‘Tucker Carlson Originals.’

RELATED VIDEO: Dutch Farmers: Canaries in the Globalist Coal Mine | Michael Yon & Eva Vlaardingerbroek

©2023 Tucker Carlson Originals. All rights reserved.

Planned Parenthood And Rachel Levine Partnered Up To Peddle Cross-Sex Hormones, Emails Show

  • Planned Parenthood, now a major provider of cross-sex hormones, collaborated with Rachel Levine and several LGBT groups and gender clinics while establishing programs to administer hormones, according to emails obtained by the Daily Caller News Foundation. 
  • Levine’s assistant connected the local Planned Parenthood affiliate with a transgender clinic to set up an observation and learn about operations and the referral process, and other members of Levine’s Transgender Health Working Group celebrated the clinic’s eventual administration of hormones. 
  • “Trans-identifying kids are cash cows, and they are kept on the hook for the foreseeable future in terms of follow-up appointments, bloodwork, meetings, etc., whereas abortions are (hopefully) a one-and-done situation,” a former “reproductive health assistant” for a Planned Parenthood clinic previously told Abigail Shrier.

Planned Parenthood collaborated with now-Assistant Secretary for Health Rachel Levine, along with gender clinics and LGBT groups, in its effort to provide cross-sex hormones at its clinics, according to documents obtained by the Daily Caller News Foundation.

Levine, who was acting secretary of health for Pennsylvania in 2017, ran a working group of medical providers and LGBT activists called the Transgender Health Working Group, which included representatives from Planned Parenthood, the Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia (CHOP) gender clinic and the Mazzoni Center. Levine’s office played an active role in connecting a local Planned Parenthood affiliate with transgender clinics throughout the year it began offering hormones, documents obtained through public records requests show.

The collaboration was part of a broader push from Levine’s office to promote cross-sex treatments that coincided with a meteoric rise in state funding for the procedures, including for children. Six years later, Levine is now a high-ranking Biden official with power to steer federal policy on health care.

“This is such a dangerous ideology, far from any form of health care or medical science,” PA Family communications director Dan Bartkowiak told the DCNF. “Anyone responsible for overseeing the push for more children permanently harmed by these drugs and irreversible surgeries should not be in public office, let alone be given promotion to higher office.”

Levine’s secretary, Sarah Boateng, coordinated with Planned Parenthood of Southeastern Pennsylvania (PPSP) in February 2017 to arrange an observation session at the Mazzoni Center, a Philadelphia-based group offering cross-sex medical treatments, in order to learn about operations and referrals for clinics offering hormones, according to the emails. PPSP had worked with other Planned Parenthood clinics offering hormones, but it was particularly interested in learning from Mazzoni because of its high volume of patients, according to the emails.

“We’re still crossing our fingers about Mazzoni. The volume of daily trans heath [sic] visits at a PP affiliate is low and we fear we’d go and only see a visit or two,” the PPSP worker wrote in the email to Boateng.

By July 2017, PPSP had begun offering hormones at two Pennsylvania clinics, and Levine had visited their offices ahead of the launch, according to the emails.

“Staring this month two Planned Parenthood locations will offer transgender health services, a location in Center City Philadelphia and a location in Pottstown, PA,” Boateng wrote to the working group on July 7. “Dr. Levine and I had a chance to visit their Philadelphia location prior to the launch and we very impressed with the significant planning, training and care they took in developing their program.”

Levine responded that it was “great news” that the Planned Parenthood clinics had begun administering hormones, and CHOP gender clinic co-founder Linda Hawkins offered to collaborate with the group in the same thread.

The Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia (CHOP) Gender and Sexuality Development Program offers medical interventions for children seeking gender transitions as young as eight years old, including surgical referrals at age 14. The clinic also partnered with schools in the state to train teachers to use children’s preferred pronouns and keep gender identity issues hidden from parents.

The exact extent of PPSP’s growth in patient visits following this collaboration remains unclear, although its website states that there’s currently a six to eight month wait list for new “gender-affirming care” patients.

PPSP has a policy against prescribing hormones to minors because it requires mental health services and sometimes legal services, although they are considering offering hormones to those under 18 in the future, according to their website.

PPSP continued its involvement with Levine’s LGBT working group throughout 2017, and the group was slated to appear at least four meetings that fall, along with LGBT advocacy groups and gender clinics including the CHOP clinic and the Mazzoni Center, according to emails reviewed by the DCNF. Discussion topics for these meetings included physician training guidelines, appropriate signage within clinics, policy on transgender military participation, “Transgender 101” and “Penn State Hershey – increased access.”

Planned Parenthood is now one of the largest providers of cross-sex hormones in the U.S. A former “reproductive health assistant” reported that the small town Planned Parenthood clinic she worked at saw one to two teen girls each day seeking cross-sex hormones, and that gender transitions for young people brought in more consistent long-term revenue than abortions, according to journalist Abigail Shrier.(RELATED: ‘Paranoia’: Transgender Gun Community Features Fears Of ‘Genocide’, Mental Illness)

“Trans-identifying kids are cash cows, and they are kept on the hook for the foreseeable future in terms of follow-up appointments, bloodwork, meetings, etc., whereas abortions are (hopefully) a one-and-done situation,” she told Shrier.

Planned Parenthood’s national and local offices have focused intensely on transgender issues in recent years, with a particular focus on opposing state-level restrictions on children’s cross-sex medical procedures.

Click here for PAFamily.org infographic: Pennsylvania’s Rise in Taxpayer-Funded Reassignment on Children

Levine’s tenure in the Pennsylvania government ran from 2015 to 2021, during which state spending on cross-sex medical procedures for those 18 and under rose about 5,000%, according to public records obtained by the PA Family Institute. Levine helped bring this to fruition by collaborating with various groups to successfully block state legislation that would have blocked taxpayer funding for child sex changes in 2017.

“The sad reality is, from 2015 to 2021, Pennsylvania saw a nearly 5000% increase in spending on ‘gender-affirming’ care for children 18 and under. That’s evidence of a priority being made by our state officials to harm children with this type of dangerous ideology,” Bartkowiak told the DCNF.

Levine’s time in President Joe Biden’s Department of Health and Human Services has been similarly marked by a push for child gender transitions, including official guidance endorsing cross-sex biomedical interventions, such as surgeries, for children.

Levine, Planned Parenthood and PPSP did not respond to the DCNF’s requests for comment.

AUTHORS

MEGAN BROCK AND LAUREL DUGGAN

Contributors.

RELATED ARTICLES:  

Biden’s DOJ Recommends No Jail Time for Trans Vandal Who Desecrated Catholic Church

Nike Sponsors ‘Queer Youth Field Day’

EDITORS NOTE: This Daily Caller column is republished with permission. ©All rights reserved.


All content created by the Daily Caller News Foundation, an independent and nonpartisan newswire service, is available without charge to any legitimate news publisher that can provide a large audience. All republished articles must include our logo, our reporter’s byline and their DCNF affiliation. For any questions about our guidelines or partnering with us, please contact licensing@dailycallernewsfoundation.org.

HERO: Trump Grilled for 7 Hours in AG Letitia James’ State Case, ‘Describing in Detail his Extraordinary Business Success.’

The relentless political persecution of President Trump by far left racist radicals is the death knell of a once great now crime riddled banana republic of a city.

A lawyer for Trump’s business said the Republican presidential contender spent nearly all seven hours “describing in detail his extraordinary business success.”

Trump bragged about ‘extraordinary business success’ during 7-hour grilling in NY fraud case.

A lawyer for Trump’s business said the Republican presidential contender spent nearly all seven hours “describing in detail his extraordinary business success.”

Trump grilled for 7 hours in AG Letitia James’ state fraud case

By Allie Griffin, NY Post, April 14, 2023:

Former President Donald Trump was grilled for nearly seven hours Thursday during his second deposition in the $250 million civil case brought against him by New York Attorney General Letitia James.

Trump, 76, was “not only willing but also eager to testify” during the meeting with James’ lawyers who questioned him about his company’s businesses practices, his attorney Alina Habba said as the Republican headed into the attorney general’s Manhattan office.

“He remains resolute in his stance that he has nothing to conceal, and he looks forward to educating the Attorney General about the immense success of his multi-billion dollar company,” Habba said.

The openness to talk is a staunch reversal from Trump’s previous deposition in the civil case last year when he invoked his Fifth Amendment rights hundreds of times in order to remain silent and avoid self-incrimination.

James claimed Trump and three of his children lied to banks about his net worth and overvalued his assets including his hotels and golf courses by billions.

Keep reading.

AUTHOR

RELATED ARTICLES:

New York Democrat Councilman to Testify Against Bragg, ‘Soft on Crime’ DAs at Judiciary Hearing

Billionaire Democratic Megadonor Secretly Funded E. Jean Carroll Lawsuit Against Trump

Biden’s Deficit Tops $1 Trillion in First Six Months of 2023, UP 65% FROM LAST YEAR

EDITORS NOTE: This Geller Report is republished with permission. ©All rights reserved.

Islamic Republic of Iran: Prison guards break kneecaps of 70-year-old woman who participated in protests

Iran’s Islamic regime has only one tool, the tool that the Qur’an gives it: terror.

“Make ready for them all that you can of force and of warhorses, so that by them you may strike terror in the enemy of Allah and your enemy…” (Qur’an 8:60)

Iranian guards ‘break kneecaps of pensioner, 70, during interrogation in hellhole jail after she was jailed for anti-governmental protests

by Christian Oliver, Daily Mail, April 11, 2023:

A 70-year-old grandmother has reportedly had her kneecaps broken by Iranian prison officials in Tehran’s notorious Evin jail.

Human rights campaigner Mahvash Sabet Shahriari was said to have been under interrogation by officials when she was inflicted with the barbaric punishment.

She had been serving a 10-year prison sentence in Evin jail for participating in anti-government protests.

The news of the attack emerged from independent Iranian media which said the activist’s knees had been broken by an interrogator during questioning.

Evin jail has a brutal reputation for its inhumane living conditions and merciless treatment of its detainees, with prisoners frequently subject to beatings and torture.

Mahvash Sabet Shahriari was said to have been under interrogation by officials when she was inflicted with the barbaric punishment.

Frud Sabet, son of Shahriari, said he was yet to hear of his mother’s condition since her initial trial.

He told RFERL Radio Farda: ‘The family is very worried about her health. We don’t know where she is, and we don’t know if she’s alive.’

Shahriari, a poet, was seized last summer as part of the Iranian regime’s repression of the Baha’i community that saw several community leaders detained.

The Bahaʼi faith is a religion that counts up to eight million members in the world….

Read more.

AUTHOR

RELATED ARTCILES:

Islamic Republic of Iran: Female human rights activist beaten, threatened with rape in custody

Death Toll During The Holy Month Of Ramadan 2023

Iran: Women post photos without hijabs despite harsh government crackdown

Losing His Head: ‘RuPaul’s Drag Race’ Co-Creator On ‘Mission’ to Take the Show to Iran

Minneapolis changes noise ordinance to allow Islamic call to prayer over loudspeakers five times a day

France: ‘Islamophobia’ fizzle as mosque attacker turns out to be Muslim

Ramadan in Syria: Islamic State jihadis murder three more truffle hunters

Italy: Muslim migrant stabs his wife and mother-in-law to death

Jihadi Control and Influence In U.S. Evangelical Community is Overwhelming

EDITORS NOTE: This Jihad Watch column is republished with permission. ©All rights reserved.

Pro-Growth Policies Have Americans Flocking To These States

As Americans continue to pay more for groceries and gas, most have little appetite for higher taxes. That didn’t stop President Joe Biden from recently pushing a $4.7 trillion federal tax increase in his new budget proposal, targeting American businesses, families, and energy producers.

The tone-deaf call for federal tax hikes comes amid record setting federal tax collections last year, totaling $4.9 trillion. Washington can’t quit its spending addiction either, as the national debt is approaches a previously unfathomable $32 trillion.

There is, however, hope to be had across the 50 states – the laboratories of democracy. This legislative session, a growing number of states are countering D.C.’s big government policies by implementing pro-growth and pro-worker policies at the state level. And that’s the smart approach. As the latest Census data reveals, millions of Americans are voting with their feet by moving to states with more freedom and more opportunity.

These states are highlighted in the newly released 16th edition of Rich States, Poor States: ALEC-Laffer State Economic Competitiveness Index. The 15 economic-policy variables used to rank the economic outlook of states have proven over time to be influential for state competitiveness and growth. Since 2007, our research has documented how cutting taxes, paying down debt, and maintaining free-market policies have significantly helped states attract new residents.

With that in mind, it’s no surprise the top five states in economic outlook for 2023 are Utah, North Carolina, Arizona, Idaho, and Oklahoma. The least competitive states may not come as a surprise either: Illinois, New Jersey, Minnesota, Vermont — with New York dead last.

For 16 years in a row, Utah has earned the top ranking, thanks to its pro-taxpayer policies. During these years, the Beehive State has created a flat personal income tax (and continued to chip away at its rate, which is now under 5 percent), reformed its public pension system to the benefit of both workers and taxpayers, and kept property taxes in check with its innovative Truth-in-Taxation law.

Down south, North Carolina is ranked second in the nation for economic outlook. Thanks to of historic tax reform in 2013, which significantly lowered and flattened income taxes, North Carolina improved from its ranking of 26th overall in 2011 and attracted more than 600,000 new residents in the past decade. Once North Carolina completes its phaseout of the state business income this decade, the sky is the limit for the Tarheel State.

Just up Interstate-95 from Raleigh, the Virginia Comeback story is underway in Richmond. Last year, Virginia received its lowest rank ever at 24th overall – the result of a long decline brought on by resting on its laurels. However, the 2022 legislative session was productive in creating tax cuts for Virginians. Thanks to the leadership of free market legislators and Governor Glenn Youngkin, Virginia reversed a nearly decade long losing streak and climbed an impressive six spots to 18th in this year’s economic outlook rankings.

Kentucky was another bright spot this year, jumping an impressive seven spots to 27th overall. Over the last 15 years, Kentucky has moved up a total of 17 places, due to its creation of a flat personal income tax in 2019 and its continued progress cutting rates in recent years.

On the other hand, New York is once again ranked 50th for economic outlook due to its punishing tax burdens, overspending, and heavy-handed regulatory policies. The Empire State has also hemorrhaged more than 1.7 million residents in the past decade – and more than 300,000 in the past year alone.

Massachusetts fell four places in the rankings this year to 37th, after voters approved a teachers union-backed ballot measure in November that changed the personal income tax structure from a flat tax to a progressive tax. Massachusetts had been a 5% flat tax state, but now will add a 4% surcharge for those earning more than $1 million, creating a new top income tax rate of 9%. This marks the return of Taxachusetts, and the state will struggle in the competitive New England region, where neighboring New Hampshire boasts no sales tax and no personal income tax on wages.

While the tax-and-spend crowd in D.C. pushes bigger government, many states are leading the way by promoting economic growth through lower taxes, responsible budgeting and better policies that benefit the American people. Though some states like California and New York continue to teach what not to do, others like Utah and North Carolina are building stronger state economies and limiting the damage done to the national economy by Washington. As Rich States, Poor States reveals, Americans will continue to vote with their feet towards these freedom loving states.

AUTHORS

JONATHAN WILLIAMS AND LEE SCHALK

Jonathan Williams is the executive vice president of policy and chief economist at the American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC). Follow him on Twitter @TaxEconomist.

Lee Schalk is vice president of policy at ALEC.

The views and opinions expressed in this commentary are those of the author and do not reflect the official position of the Daily Caller News Foundation.

RELATED ARTICLE: PETER ROFF: Republicans May Be Down In DC, But They Dominate The States

EDITORS NOTE: This Daily Caller column is republished with permission. ©All rights reserved.


All content created by the Daily Caller News Foundation, an independent and nonpartisan newswire service, is available without charge to any legitimate news publisher that can provide a large audience. All republished articles must include our logo, our reporter’s byline and their DCNF affiliation. For any questions about our guidelines or partnering with us, please contact licensing@dailycallernewsfoundation.org.

The Biden Admin Hands Out Millions To Green Groups That Supported His Climate Bill

The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) awarded $177 million to environmental groups, including some who publicly supported the Biden administration’s signature climate law, the Inflation Reduction Act, the agency announced Thursday.

The funding will be spread across 17 groups, which will each receive a minimum of $10 million to serve as Environmental Justice Thriving Communities Technical Assistance Centers (EJ TCTACs), to help “underserved and overburdened communities” access government funding to support environmental justice initiatives, the EPA reported in a press release. Groups named by the EPA include the National Wildlife Federation (NWF), WE ACT for Environmental Justice and the Deep South Center for Environmental Justice (DSCFEJ), which each supported the president’s signature climate law, the Inflation Reduction Act.

While the NWF supported the law in its totality, the other two organizations offered more measured support, over concessions made to fossil fuels at the behest Democratic Sen. Joe Manchin of West Virginia. The EPA also tapped the Research Triangle Institute — a nearly billion-dollar nonprofit with a longstanding working relationship with the agency — to serve as an environmental justice center.

“These EJ TCTACs are in direct response to feedback from communities and environmental justice leaders who have long called for technical assistance and capacity building support!” the EPA’s Office of Environmental Justice and External Civil Rights said in a tweet thread Thursday. “The EJ TCTAC program is partnered with [the Department of Energy] and is part of the Federal Interagency Thriving Communities Network to deliver on the Biden Administration’s Justice40 Initiative to ensure that 40% of the benefits of certain federal investments flow to disadvantaged communities.”

The funding represents a significant boost to groups like the NWF and DSCFEJ, two environmental groups tapped by the EPA. In 2021, the NWF generated roughly $118 million in revenue, while the DSCFEJ generated just $3.54 million in 2020, according to publicly available documentation.

“We know that so many communities across the nation have the solutions to the environmental challenges they face,” said EPA Administrator Michael Regan in the press release. “Unfortunately, many have lacked access or faced barriers when it comes to the crucial federal resources needed to deliver these solutions. Today we’re taking another step to break down these barriers.”

Including Thursday’s announcement, the EPA has announced a combined $827 million in funding for environmental justice initiatives in 2023, according to the agency’s press release.

RTI, NWF, DSCFEJ and WE ACT did not immediately respond to a Daily Caller News Foundation request for comment.

AUTHOR

JOHN HUGH DEMASTRI

Contributor.

RELATED ARTICLES:

California Electric Utilities Announce Income-Based Billing Proposal

After Pushing To Shut Coal Plants Down, Biden Shells Out Millions For Green Projects In Coal Towns

Fox News Host Spars With Liberal Activist Over Biden’s New Electric Vehicle Rules

Germany will shut down its last nuclear plants amid warnings of new energy crisis

EDITORS NOTE: This Daily Caller column is republished with permission. ©All rights reserved.


All content created by the Daily Caller News Foundation, an independent and nonpartisan newswire service, is available without charge to any legitimate news publisher that can provide a large audience. All republished articles must include our logo, our reporter’s byline and their DCNF affiliation. For any questions about our guidelines or partnering with us, please contact licensing@dailycallernewsfoundation.org.

The Biden Regime Wars

Americans who serve their government in the civil or uniformed services take an oath to support and defend the Constitution of the United States against all enemies, foreign and domestic.

Increasingly, our foreign enemies have identified themselves, even if the current American regime (and I use that word purposefully) is loath to acknowledge them.

I speak about them nearly every week on Prophecy Today Weekend. They are Russia, China, Iran, and to a lesser extent, North Korea.

LISTEN:

But most Americans, myself included, are loath to speak of domestic enemies, perhaps out of an inherent optimism that we live in the greatest country the world has ever known, where even Socialists have a hard time eradicating our God-given freedoms.

But those enemies exist. And we saw two of them on display this week.

First is the 21-year-old Airman First class, junior rank, Jack Teixeira, the person identified by federal law enforcement as responsible for the “Pentagon Leaks.”

His defense attorney said he was just “a dumb kid showing off to his friends” – and that is probably true.

And while some of us might applaud him for revealing the lies of the Biden regime regarding Ukraine, nevertheless he did immense damage to our nation, its legitimate intelligence-gathering capabilities, and its credibility. (You have to wonder about his superiors, who gave such broad access to highly classified documents to such a young and obviously immature individual.)

The second domestic enemy that revealed themselves recently took that very oath I mentioned at top. They are the federal and state prosecutors such as Alvin Bragg in New York and Erik L. Barron in Baltimore, who have weaponized our criminal justice system to go after political opponents of the regime.

It seems nearly every week, we learn of a new case that reminds me we are Back in the USSR,” where Leventiy Beria told Stalin, “show me the man, and I’ll find you the crime.”

They are doing it against President Trump. And this week, they launched a vicious, clearly politically-motivated prosecution against a conservative county sheriff who who has stood for they people and their 2nd amendment rights against the federal gun-grabbers.

©2023 Kenneth R. Timmerman and the Middle East Data Project, Inc. All rights reserved.. All rights reserved.

Tim Scott Blasts Hakeem Jeffries For ‘Inflammatory,’ ‘Disgusting’ Smears of Black Conservatives

In an interview with Fox News on Thursday, Sen. Tim Scott of South Carolina slammed race-mongering radical Rep. Hakeem Jeffries of New York for ugly comments about black conservatives that the House Democrat leader made as a college student.

Scott, a rising star in the GOP and a black Republican, blasted Jeffries for calling black conservatives “right-wing opportunists” and “House Negroes” in a college paper he wrote.

In a recent CNN story centered on him using racial politics during his college days at Binghamton University in upstate New York, Jeffries defended his antisemitic uncle Leonard Jeffries and called black conservatives “token” and “opportunists.”

CNN reported Jeffries, as a member of the executive board for the Black Student Union, had invited his uncle to speak on campus after he made inflammatory comments in the early 1990s, such as “rich Jews” being in the African slave trade and about Jewish executives in the film industry.

Additionally, CNN found a previously unreported college editorial in which he defended his uncle and the Nation of Islam‘s ragingly antisemitic leader Louis Farrakhan, explaining that the two were unfairly targeted by “white media” for challenging “the longstanding distortion of history.”

“The House Negro of the slavery era and the Black conservative of today are both opportunists interested in securing some measure of happiness for themselves within the existing social order,” Jeffries wrote.

Tim Scott said, “You listen to those comments that, as inflammatory and disgusting as they really are, you’re talking about African Americans not being able to think for ourselves. When our leaders suggest that we cannot, that’s always heading in the wrong direction.”

Scott, who launched a presidential exploratory committee this week as he moves closer to jumping into the 2024 White House race, emphasized that “one of the things that I hope we find along the way is that we’ll quit demonizing people who look like us, who disagree with us.”


Hakeem Jeffries

19 Known Connections

Portraying Trump Supporters As “Domestic Terrorists” & “White Supremacists”

In a January 28, 2021 interview with MSNBC, Jeffries characterized supporters of former President Trump as “domestic terrorists and the white supremacists.” Asked “what happens if there’s no accountability for him or the rioters” who had occupied the Capitol on January 6, the congressman replied: “[P]art of the lesson of the first impeachment trial for him was that he could shoot holes in the Constitution on Pennsylvania Avenue and get away with it because Senate Republicans were prepared to bury their heads in the sand…. [E]very available option to hold him accountable for his actions should be undertaken…. And we’re not going to be cowed by the domestic terrorists and the white supremacists and the enemy combatants who want to stop us in our tracks. That would be giving in to them, and that’s not going to happen.”

To learn more about Hakeem Jeffries, click here.

RELATED ARTICLE: In College Paper, Jeffries Called Black Conservatives ‘Tokens,’ ‘House Negroes’

EDITORS NOTE: This Discover the Networks column is republished with permission. ©All rights reserved.

Conservative Group Rolls Out ‘Woke Alerts’ to Combat Activist Corporate America

Counter Punch” written by Floyd Brown, 40 year political consultant and Owner/Publisher Western Journal, discusses that America is about to go onto life support unless Americans arise and defend this exceptional nation. I enjoyed a conversation with Floyd on my show ArizonToday.com.

WATCH:

Our founders gave us a gift if we would keep it. Well…start keeping, begin punching back to the Marxist demonic alteration taking place before our eyes. Make no mistake, and do not simply write off my comment as reactionary or conspiracy theory or merely conservative politics. The United States of America has been targeted to collapse into the global community, the New-World Order where national sovereignty is a memory.

For those still wearing face masks, leave them alone, don’t even waste your time they are already indoctrinated and will be among the first to load into train cars for relocation. For those who think the WOKE philosophy will simply go away, wear out, join those wearing masks. Counter Punch…Now! Find a few others who believe the same as you, and begin to push back in creative and even financial ways. The Budweiser Company has lost over $6 Billion thus far as they proudly tout their new transsexual spokesman, I mean spokeswoman; sorry…woke transexual non-homophobic individual pushing Budweiser. Guess what? Some proud Americans have punched back, beginning a new beer that proudly states it is truly good and tasty, all American and non-transsexual. Some Americans had enough!! They Counter Punched!

The article below will take you to still another group no longer willing to sit back, rationalize and watch as America becomes a memory, a country of the past.

I am not so much challenging you as I am forewarning you. Stand up and begin to Counter Punch. Hurt them in the pocket book. Hurt them by picketing their homes, recalling them where possible, alert a network not to shop here or there, not to buy this product or that. Wake-up America now! We are in similar straights as the colonists in 1775 who were up against phenomenal heavy forces and odds to succeed. Wake-up America or realize the game plan is well under way to collapse the United States into something you will not ever be able to recognize, a country where freedom is dictated by the Elite and you will be free to either go along with the Elite or be killed by the Elite – your choice, your freedom to choose.


Sign Up for Woke Alert!


Conservative group rolls out ‘Woke Alerts’ to combat activist corporate America

By Ramsey Touchberry – The Washington Times – Friday, April 14, 2023

The conservative advocacy organization Consumers’ Research has launched a text notification system dubbed “Woke Alerts” to inform users when they believe a major company is engaging in liberal political activism.

The service is the latest strategy by the group, which brands itself as the leading anti-woke crusader, to combat what they call “woke capitalism” by shining a spotlight on corporations believed to be bending to a liberal agenda.

Consumers’ Research Executive Director Will Hild told The Washington Times the goal of “Woke Alerts” is not necessarily to tell Americans which companies to boycott, but rather to “arm consumers with the best information so that they can make decisions that are in line with their values.”

“We want to make sure we’re educating people when we see a company take a turn like we saw with Bud Light,” Mr. Hild said. “We can give them a way that they can know and avoid that company and stop giving them their money.”

The group is putting six figures behind the service. Last year, it launched a seven-figure culture war battle against the world’s largest asset manager, BlackRock, over its support of climate-conscious investing known as ESG. Consumers’ Research has also targeted corporations such as Coca-Cola, Nike, American Airlines and Disney in recent anti-woke advocacy campaigns.

What qualifies for Woke Alerts will be subjective and is not defined by any set standard of criteria. Mr. Hild said Americans who subscribe for the free service will see a company be put on blast in their text messages if it appears to be pandering to liberal culture war issues.

He cited Bud Light’s recent ad campaign featuring transgender influencer Dylan Mulvaney as an example of what would trigger a notification.

“If we see a company that is instead of focusing on serving their consumers is cozying up to woke activists or woke politicians, then that will trigger a Woke Alert,” Mr. Hild.

• Ramsey Touchberry can be reached at rtouchberry@washingtontimes.com.

2023 Lyle J. Rapacki, Ph.D. All rights reserved.

RELATED ARTICLE: Nike Sponsors ‘Queer Youth Field Day’

How many American’s think LGBTQ+ is a new fad? It is not.

Mind Control is Better Than Bullets


How many  American’s think LGBTQ + is a new fad? It is not. It is an ancient action that was promoted in some form of theater/pup petering and was used to reinforce the desires of the ruler. Humans nature pushes the emotional button which says I have a desire to belong, to be accepted. So the leader will tell us what clothes to  wear, how to say the right words, act in the prescribed manner, follow the script or suffer the consequences…being canceled.

Being canceled on social media feels just like it did getting punched by the bully in school. You know in your heart the Elite are wrong, there is no such thing as climate change, you need CO2 and fossil fuels to live, the economy does suck, the border is wide open for your replacement, Covid and vaccines were lies, Donald Trump may not be as bad as you were told, inflation and lower wages are transitory all their programs are based on lies.

They are solving problems that they have created.

They are offering solutions that don’t work.

Propaganda works.

For years I have been saying that America is repeating the Roman Empire. Instead of sending the masses to the arena, we are sending them to the movies, video games or social media. Instead of clapping for the gladiators, we clap for the best performance. We become or supply prostitutes, Queen’s, Dancers,  and when everyone is drugged up or drunk, we sell our bodies. Not to worry if there is a baby from the distorted sex, we are told to have an abortion.    Ancient ritual  dictates that the subjects must sacrifice children aka abortion aka murder. Today the same ritual with a new name paid by the US taxpayer is called abortion. I call it murder We are paying for murder.   The Communist Elite made the populace dumb and compliant so we would accept their insane policies, designed to fail but be expensive.

We are repeating the Roman  Empire.

Is America worth saving?

What are you doing?

Podcasts and ArticlesKarenschoen.com

©2023 Karen Schoen. All rights reserved.

RELATED ARTICLE: The Slow Death of the American Dream

RELATED VIDEO: Tucker Carlson does a deep dive into the attack on human dignity and individual autonomy that is the eat-ze-bugs plan by the globalists. Anyone doubting that is the purpose of these measures only needs to check the menu at the last Davos conference and look at the parking lot of the airport nearby.

VIDEO: Hunter Gun Scandal Update!

Judicial Watch Sues FBI for Records on Hunter Biden Gun Scandal.


Joe Biden’s FBI and Secret Service are actively trying to keep the American people from learning the facts about how a gun owned by Hunter Biden was reportedly tossed in a grocery store trash can across the street from a high school.

We filed a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) lawsuit for FBI records about the gun (Judicial Watch v. U.S. Department of Justice (No. 1:23-cv-00920)).

Judicial Watch sued after the FBI withheld records in response to our January 30, 2023, FOIA request for:

  • All records, including investigative reports, telephone logs, witness statements, memoranda, and firearms purchase documentation, related to the reported purchase, possession, and disposal of a firearm owned by Hunter Biden discarded in a Delaware trash receptacle circa October 2018.
  • All records of communications of FBI officials regarding the reported purchase, possession, and disposal of the firearm.

In a separate lawsuit, we received records from the United States Secret Service that implicate the FBI in the unusual action to help Hunter Biden.

Included in those records is a response to a February 2021 email inquiry from Politico reporter Ben Schreckinger regarding the Secret Service’s involvement in the investigation of the Hunter Biden gun incident. In the response, the Communications Department asks for “more information or documentation.” Schreckinger responds: “Sure thing. Agents visited StarQuest Shooters & Survival Supply and asked to take possession of the paperwork Hunter had filled out to purchase a gun there. The FBI also had some involvement in the investigation.”

Also in those records is a March 2021 email from New York Post reporter Lorena Mongelli, who reached out to the Secret Service Communications Office, asking for comment on text messages on Hunter Biden’s lost laptop:

It appears the text messages were sent from Hunter Biden in which he indicates that the Secret Service did in fact respond to the Oct. 23, 2018 [gun] incident. This information contradicts your previous statement relating to the incident and we would like to know whether the Secret Service would like to respond to these new findings.

A person from the Communications Office, whose name is redacted replies: “We have received your inquiry, would you be able to provide copies of these alleged text messages for reference?”
Mongelli responds:

The Daily Mail actually posted copies of the same text messages the NY Post is referencing.

This is what one text message says:

“She stole the gun out of my trunk lock box and threw it in a garbage can full to the top at Jansens [sic]. Then told me it was my problem to deal with,” Hunter wrote.

“Then when the police the FBI the secret service came on the scene she said she took it from me because she was scared I would harm myself due to o my drug and alcohol problem and our volatile relationship and that she was afraid for the kids.”

In October 2020, The Blaze reported that in October 2018, Hunter Biden’s handgun was taken by Hallie Biden, the widow of then-presidential nominee Joe Biden’s son Beau. In 2021, Politico reported:

Hallie took Hunter’s gun and threw it in a trash can behind a grocery store, only to return later to find it gone.

Delaware police began investigating, concerned that the trash can was across from a high school and that the missing gun could be used in a crime, according to law enforcement officials and a copy of the police report obtained by POLITICO.

But a curious thing happened at the time: Secret Service agents approached the owner of the store where Hunter bought the gun and asked to take the paperwork involving the sale, according to two people, one of whom has firsthand knowledge of the episode and the other was briefed by a Secret Service agent after the fact.

What all this means: the FBI and Secret Service have both been implicated in a corrupt clean-up operation to protect Hunter Biden from the criminal consequences of his gun scandal. We will keep you updated as we learn more!

RELATED ARTICLE: New York Democrat Councilman to Testify Against Bragg, ‘Soft on Crime’ DAs at Judiciary Hearing

EDITORS NOTE: This Judicial Watch column is republished with permission. ©All rights reserved.

Taking America for Granted

Shame on all the people who take America for granted.  Like the silly 21-year-old who leaked secret American military documents to video gamers online.  And shame on everyone else who fails to appreciate the magnificence of the Founders’ ideals – popular sovereignty, representative limited government, and individual rights.  Where would we be without those ideals?  Under the boot of a Putin or a Xi Jinping, that’s where.

Speaking of silly, shame on the Tennessee Democrats who proposed replacing the federal Columbus Day holiday with Super Bowl Monday.

Shame on Nancy Pelosi for saying Donald Trump has to prove his innocence, in complete contradiction to the constitutional principle people are innocent until proven guilty.

Shame on the Democrats who are trying to remove a statue of Lincoln who kept the Union together and freed the slaves.

Shame on Whoopi Goldberg who objected to House members saying the Pledge of Allegiance.

Shame on the California teacher who removed the American flag from her classroom and had her students pledge allegiance to the gay pride flag instead.

Shame on Tim Kaine’s wife for saying the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution enshrined slavery without mentioning amendments to the Constitution that got rid of the vestiges of slavery and perfected the Founders’ vision of liberty and justice for all.

Shame on the Florida Democrat who said exercising your Second Amendment right to bear arms is “fascism”.

And shame on the woman who trashed American citizenship as ‘racialized’, really just a white thing.

So, to all these people I say you better get a grip.  You don’t know what you have until it’s gone.  This is the best country on earth and lots of serious people before you have spent their time improving it for everyone instead of running their mouths.  Stop making fools of yourselves and showing us your ignorance when you have no idea what you would replace America with.

Our founding documents are based on classical liberalism, the most coherent, sustainable, and humane idea in the entire history of political thought.  You don’t have anything that can compete with it.  If you’re as mindless as I think you are, you don’t have anything at all in that empty head of yours.  Leave governance to serious people who have bothered to inform themselves on the principles of good governance and who have studied what happens when tyrants, mobs, and utopians succeed in taking over – blood flowing in the streets, that’s what.

You’re enabling them with your mindlessness and it’s gotta stop.  This is no video game.

©2023 Christopher Wright. All rights reserved.

Visit The Daily Skirmish and Watch Eagle Headline News – 7:30am ET Weekdays

RELATED TWEET:

RELATED ARTICLES:

Suspect In Pentagon Leaks Charged, Faces 15 Years In Prison

U.S. intel leak suspect allegedly railed against Jews in online rant at shooting range

FBI Agents Arrest Man In Connection To Classified Document Leak

The Queen of Queer Hill

David Carlin: Transgender ideologues are nothing less than monsters.  And the very worst monster of this kind is the parent (usually a mother) who encourages her little boy/girl to believe that he/she is a girl/boy.


Just as there are degrees of hot and cold, so there are degrees of political leftism, some very mild, some stronger, and some way too strong.

The mildest degree is what used to be called liberalism.  I don’t mean the liberalism of today, which is pro-abortion, pro-homosexuality, pro-transgender, etc.  No, I mean the liberalism of the old days, the kind of liberalism characterized by Franklin Roosevelt, Harry Truman, John F. Kennedy, and Lyndon Johnson.  New Deal liberalism it may be called.

I myself am a liberal of that old kind.  It’s a center-left kind of liberalism that believes the federal government should play an important role in helping American society make progress by incremental steps that do no violence to American traditions.  It’s a liberalism that is relatively conservative.  A splendid example was Harry Truman, a political liberal who was a temperamental conservative: rather an ordinary American who just happened to be President of the United States at a critical moment in modern history.

Catholics also used to be good examples of this.  On the one hand, they belonged to a profoundly conservative religion; on the other, they supported a liberal political party, the Democrats.

Today, though I still think of myself as a liberal of this old-fashioned kind, I deplore almost everything that now passes under the name of liberalism.  I don’t just deplore it.  I hate it.

But I feel degrees of hate.  I don’t hate all elements of the new progressivism equally.

My mildest degree of hatred (so mild it should be called dislike, not hatred) is aimed at the bicycle tyrants, the people who want to make the world safe for bicycles (as President Wilson wanted to make it safe for democracy).  In progressive cities with very broad streets (e.g., Boulder, Colorado), ample bike lanes can be provided with little or no inconvenience to car drivers.  But in progressive cities with very narrow streets (e.g., Cambridge, Massachusetts), a zero-sum game is being played between bicyclists and car drivers: the more convenient you make it for one, the more inconvenient you make it for the other.

Now I happen to live in Newport R.I., an old city (settled in 1639) with lots and lots of narrow streets.  A few decades ago the state decided that Newport should have at least one four-lane highway; and so one was built, at the unfortunate cost of demolishing much of the most ancient part of the city.  In warm weather, when tens of thousands of tourists come to town, the streets of Newport are of course congested, including (sad to say) our four-lane highway.

Well, the bike tyrants have recently come up with a new idea.  They would like to reduce these four lanes to two, giving the other two lanes over to the exclusive use of bicyclists.  Needless to say, this will lead to a great increase in our already bad traffic congestion.  Not surprisingly, many of Newport’s ordinary people (people rather like Harry Truman) are up in arms about this.

Now I myself am somewhat (I stress “somewhat”) sympathetic to the concerns of the climate-change fanatics, and I was a great bike rider when I was a kid.  But I am an old man now, and I’m not willing to trade in my car for a bicycle, no matter how much my riding a bike might improve my precarious health or contribute to lowering the temperature of the Earth.

But local leftists are not active on bike paths only.  They are also active in our public schools.  Recently our middle school sponsored a “Transgender Appreciation Day.”  If the bike tyrants annoy me, those who promote transgenderism enrage me, in truth, drive me nearly mad.

Now my rage is not directed at people who are so much in the grip of transgender lunacy as to switch genders at an adult age.  I feel sorry for such people, but I don’t hate them.  Why should I?

But I do feel something like hate for leftist ideologues who promote transgenderism for kids, the ideologues who promote what they call “gender-affirming health care” – a 1984-ish euphemism which, among other horrible things, encourages mentally deluded, barely pubescent girls to undergo breast-removal surgery.  It encourages them to be proud of their scars, just as German university students used to be proud of the scars they obtained from duels.

Even when these ideologues are not actively busy promoting gender-transforming surgery and hormone treatment, they are busy encouraging something just a little bit less Satanic.  They are telling kids – all kids – that they owe it to themselves to ask themselves the important question, “Am I a boy or a girl?”, while assuring these kids that the answer to this question has little or nothing to do with the reproductive equipment they may find between their legs.

I was a kid, once upon a time.  I remember that in those long-ago days, I used to spend more than a few anxious hours worrying about needless things.  Those hours of needless anxiety are a price almost all kids have to pay for their necessary journey through adolescence.  How cruel one has to be to inflict one more needless worry – and such a worry! – on kids.  “Billy, you should think about the possibility that you may be a girl.  And Mary Sue, could it be that you are really a boy?”

These ideologues are nothing less than monsters.  And the very worst monster of this kind is the parent (usually a mother) who encourages her little boy/girl to believe that he/she is a girl/boy.  This allows the mother to say to herself, “Oh, how glorious!  To be the mother of a trans child!  I am super-cool, the envy of all my friends.”

And she adds: “I am even more cool than my old college roommate who for years boasted of being the proud mother of a gay child.  Eat your heart out with jealousy, old friend.  Now it is ME at the top of Queer Hill.”

You may also enjoy:

Robert Royal’s Transgenderism and Perfect Freedom

Brad Miner’s Further Thoughts on Transgenderism

AUTHOR

David Carlin

David Carlin is a retired professor of sociology and philosophy at the Community College of Rhode Island, and the author of The Decline and Fall of the Catholic Church in America and, most recently, Three Sexual Revolutions: Catholic, Protestant, Atheist.

EDITORS NOTE: This Catholic Thing column is republished with permission. All rights reserved. © 2023 The Catholic Thing. All rights reserved. For reprint rights, write to: info@frinstitute.org. The Catholic Thing is a forum for intelligent Catholic commentary. Opinions expressed by writers are solely their own.