On Islam & The Deliberate Artillery Fire Against The Merit Principle

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Isn’t it nice that someone else noticed?

There is more than a little truth to this

Pro Hamas mobs shut down Manhattan Bridge

It is good to see someone with the raw courage to simply tell the actual truth, as it is written in their scripture, and as it plays out in world history, and as it shows itself from time to time now across the West where Islam is imported en masse.

Another example of the true nature of the way our systems work. Compare this to the obvious Jan 6 victims of the ‘legal’ system. Add to that, the chief prosecutor has made it clear he is continuing to hunt down and arrest people at the protest who were not even near the Capitol Building, and that they would not stop arresting people for Jan 6 till they reach 2000 people. This of course has nothing whatsoever to do with law breaking. This is a Stalin like quota on counter revolutionaries, And no, I am not exaggerating whatsoever. The names change to not alarm people too too much. But the methods are what they always are in communist police states. This is a link to the Charlie Kirk show with Jan 6 lawyer, Julie Kelly. She is a MUST listen.

That link is from January 8, but she was on the Charlie Kirk show yesterday, December 12, 2023 and it was of spectacular importance. The details and facts on the Jan 6 arrests are unprecedented in a free society. Having a quota for arrests for people who have not committed a crime…

Thank you all for your kind attention to this site and its truly horrifying reveals.

A brief look at what happens when you abandon the merit principle and presumably substitute DEI:

A self proclaimed, mathematician and physicist, although really just a student, uses the authority he does not yet even have, to argue against counter-trans reasoning, by claiming the speaker “cannot even get his wife wet”. The classic argument of the scholarly mathematician. In a Hegelian world.

EDITORS NOTE: This Vlad Tepes Blog column posted by Eeyore is republished with permission. ©All rights reserved.

It’s Time to Right the Unrightable Wrongs

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“Now I will tell you the answer to my question. It is this. The Party seeks power entirely for its own sake. We are not interested in the good of others; we are interested solely in power, pure power.” — George Orwell, 1984.

“The day the power of love overrules the love of power, the world will know peace.” ― Mahatma Gandhi

“The measure of a man is what he does with power.” ― Plato

 “Power tends to corrupt, and absolute power corrupts absolutely.” — Lord John Emerich Edward Dalberg-Acton, 19th-century British historian.

As we the people approach the end of 2023 and look forward to 2024 it is time to right the unrightable wrongs done to us by those in power, from the school house to the White House.

The biggest and most pressing question of 2024 is who will have the power! We the people or our government.

This is the question that must be answered at the ballot box by we the people.

On Tuesday, November 5, 2024 we must answer with our vote the following questions:

  • Do we want a bigger and bigger government or not?
  • Do you want to continue to send billions in your tax dollars to dictators or not?
  • Do you want open borders or not?
  • Do want billions of taxpayer dollars going to illegal aliens or not?
  • Do we want parents to have control of what their children learn in public schools or not?
  • Do we want control over the type of automobile we own or not?
  • Do we want to make more money in order to pay our mortgage, feed and cloth our family or not?
  • Do we want to have available the cheapest and most reliable sources or energy or not?
  • Do we want the right to speak freely or not?
  • Do we want a Constutional Republican form of government or not?
  • Do you want to choose our sex or believe in the science that there are only 2 genders, male and female?
  • Do want America to be great or do we want the swamp to control America?
  • Finally, do we want a president who loves America or that hates America?

If you want less government, control over your children’s education, the ability to choose your car, pay your mortgage, feed and cloth your family, use cheap reliable power, speak freely, restore our Constitutional Republican form or government, be a man and a woman, drain the swamp and have a president who truly loves American then your know what to do.

On Tuesday, November 5, 2024 use your vote to take back America and return power to the people.

We wish all of our readers a very Merry Christmas and a happy, healthy and prosperous New Year.

©2023. Dr. Rich Swier. All rights reserved.

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RED ALERT: Dangerous Legislation to Expand Surveillance on American Citizens

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The march towards government control over the lives of every citizen in America continues with the proposed legislation mentioned below. Similar to the days of the colonists who brought the United States into reality in 1775, present-day citizens (colonists) better push back against every level politician; regardless if they are local, county or state and clearly national who does not measurably demonstrate their commitment to defending the Constitution, the Rule of Law, and the freedoms granted to the citizens of this exceptional nation. Push back against every politician who seeks office for their own agenda, rather than to serve and represent We The People. Do not regard the mere words of those already in public office or seeking such, but demand examples of their dedication to serve others first by demonstrating what they have already accomplished in their present sphere of influence.

Buried in the U.S. House Intelligence Committee’s Section 702 “reform” bill, which is scheduled for a floor vote today or tomorrow, is the biggest expansion of surveillance inside the United States and against citizens since the Patriot Act. The below link will provide a brief but clear example of this most intrusive act working its’ way into our lives unless killed!

The Global Elites and Uniparty club members are determined to bring down the sovereignty of the United States, and to push our nation into the global community, the New-World Order where national sovereignty is a thing of the past, as well as the freedoms Americans have enjoyed. Don’t read this and think you can do nothing. Pray…seek true wisdom and guidance as to what role YOU can take in keeping America “the shining city upon a hill” as President Reagan said in his farewell address in 1989.

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

RELATED ARTICLE: Poison pill in 2024 defense bill holds the military hostage to domestic spying

Congress Stops NewsGuard

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Radical, anti-American subversives have overtaken our most critical government agencies. It should chill every bone in the American body politic. In this instance, leftist destroyers blocked military recruitment ads on many conservative media outlets. Think about that.

Defense Bill Pushes Back Against NewsGuard, Woke Media Monitors

Pentagon dollars will not be allowed to be spent with ad agencies that use “misinformation” media monitors.

By Mark Swanson • NewsMax

House and Senate Armed Services committees last week concluded their negotiations on the National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA), and Speaker Mike Johnson, R-La., and House Republicans have won a significant victory opposing woke censorship programs that impact Pentagon recruiting.

The Democrat-led Senate has agreed with Johnson’s demand the annual defense spending bill not allow Pentagon dollars to be spent with ad agencies that use “misinformation” media monitors.

Left-wing groups such as NewsGuard and the Global Disinformation Index (GDI) have been used by major advertising agencies to block military recruitment ads on many conservative media outlets.

The new NDAA provision expressly prohibits any advertising agency the Defense Department contracts with from using services that engage in “determinations of misinformation.”

The new law would also require the Pentagon to inform the House and Senate Armed Services committees any time the recruitment division directly contracts with NewsGuard, GDI or a similar entity.

The provision had been first been offered as a House amendment to the defense bill by Rep. Rich McCormick, R-Ga., and Rep. Doug Lamborn, R-Colo.

“We are grateful to Speaker Johnson for his hard work to keep this amendment in the final language of the NDAA,” McCormick told Newsmax in a statement.

Read more.

AUTHOR

Pamela Geller

RELATED ARTICLE: What Country Is This? Jack Smith Collected Images, Website Visits And Usage Data From Trump’s Cellphone

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

American Muslims for Palestine Director: A ‘Jewish Person or Christian Zionist’ is ‘Enemy Number One’

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AMP’s co-founder also created Students for Justice in Palestine.

The Biden administration was forced to condemn CAIR after its boss, Nihad Awad, who had a history of supporting Hamas, attended the American Muslims for Palestine conference and bragged about how happy he was about the Oct 7 attacks.

Awad claims that his remarks were taken “out of context.”

Now here’s Taher Herzallah, Outreach and Grassroots Organizing Director for AMP, talking about how Jewish people are the enemy. “Anybody who has any relationship or any support or identifies himself as a Jewish person or as a Christian Zionist then we shall not be their friend, I will tell you they are enemy number one and our community needs to recognize that.”

I’m guessing this one will also be described as “taken out of context.”

The AMP conference included Awad, Herzallah, and Hatem Bazian, the co-founder of Students for Justice in Palestine, as well as AMP, who pretty much single-handedly made antisemitism the norm on college campuses.

Also present were Lena Masri, CAIR’s Civil Rights Director, and Fatima Mohammed: whose deranged CUNY Law grad speech went viral.

See if you can spot the pattern here.

Taher Herzallah is just quoting the Koran.

“O ye who believe! Take not the Jews and the Christians for friends. They are friends with one another. He among you who taketh them for friends is one of them. Lo! Allah guideth not wrongdoing folk.” (Koran 5:51)

So this hatred of Jews or Christians didn’t emerge on Oct 7 or 1967, 1948 or during any recent period. It was always there. It’s just more out in the open now.

AUTHOR

RELATED ARTICLES:

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Biden hits Netanyahu for not wanting ‘two-state solution,’ says he must ‘strengthen and change’ Israeli government

Hamas-linked CAIR operative reinstated to Maryland hate crimes commission

How America Undermines Israel’s War Effort

Turkish MP says Israel will suffer ‘wrath of Allah,’ then has heart attack and collapses

Canada hosts Palestinian and Turkish leaders to speak on behalf of ‘Muslim people’

Poland: Member of Parliament grabs fire extinguisher, sprays out candles on Hanukkah menorah

Switzerland: Muslim enters school, makes threats, screams ‘Allahu akbar’

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

Argentina Returning to Free Market Capitalism!

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The nation of Argentina here in beautiful South America is just about bankrupt. After years of insane out of control socialist deficit spending the people of Argentina finally had enough of this tax payer fleecing.

So they elected a conservative libertarian capitalist entrepreneur as their president. His name President , considered as South Americas Donald Trump.

His first action was to announce massive spending cuts to get the out of control inflation under control.

The new Economy Minister Luis Caputo stated “there is no more money.”  Thus when president Zelensky of Ukraine recently visited Argentina, he was told to put his hands back in his pockets and look for handouts elsewhere.

The Argentinian government has now commenced spending cuts equivalent to 2.9% of its gross domestic product.

The socialists and the communists In Argentina will soon be cut off from their former government handouts and instead will now have to work for a living.

Also, massive cuts to Argentinian energy companies (who are also used to getting free tax payer money) they too will be cut from the handout loop saving another 0.5% of GDP.

Plus, massive tax payer reductions to the government transportation system will be implemented saving another 0.2%, according to the government’s estimates.

Much like Amtrak in the USA that fleece millions of dollars from us tax payers in the USA while providing a crappy service. Time to privatize.

President Milei’s economic advisers also stated they will eliminate half of the government ministries, like the do nothing ministry of education and commerce and labor, cutting tax payer cash transfers to provinces and totally suspending public works.

The International Monetary Fund (IMF) is praising this swift and decisive leadership thus ending the socialist sucking machine draining tax payer money from the citizens wallets of Argentina.

The IMF said – “Their decisive implementation will help stabilize the economy and set the basis for more sustainable and private-sector led growth,”

Inflation is climbing at more than 140% so it’s time to cut off the socialists from their free tax payer spending spree and block the out of control spending insanity for the sake of future generations.

In my opinion and don’t be surprised If President Milei totally scraps Argentines currency altogether, and replaces it with the U.S. dollar.

The Venezuelan Bolivar is also totally worthless after the Chavez/Maduro Communist dictatorship their decimated its economy and they too now only use U.S. dollars.

The United States is following the same inflationary out of control spending path as Venezuela. The President of Argentina saw the same thing happening to his country and has stepped in to make Argentina great again.

In November 2024 Trump will be re-elected and will block the Communist Socialist UniParty from destroying our free market capitalist republic here in North America. No doubt Trump will be making friends very quickly with President Milei.

©2023. Geoff Ross. All rights reserved.

COP 28: Climate Campaigners Freaking Out

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Climate campaigners from Al Gore and John Kerry, down to the oddest imported student radical, are freaking out over the draft final text as the climate talks in Dubai near their conclusion.

At issue is whether the “outcome” will call for the “phase out” of fossil fuels, or merely call for fossil fuel “reduction” and similar “weasel words.”

Either term will leave nations with tons of wiggle room to avoid, or delay, destroying their economies through energy starvation.

As veterans of the UN climate process since the whole shebang began, CFACT has seen this drama play out before.

The UN conference nears its end with no agreement in sight and goes into late night extra innings.

No matter what happens, the conference officials emerge bleary-eyed and proclaim a major victory, leaving it up to the rest of us to sort through what happened and figure it out.  Often, as is likely this time, the conference ends in de facto collapse.

“COP28 is now on the verge of complete failure,” Al Gore said Monday.    “This obsequious draft reads as if OPEC dictated it word for word. It is even worse than many had feared. It is ‘Of the Petrostates, By the Petrostates.”  Gore concluded.

OPEC, along with Russia and China, did in fact write the text.

“The fact that the  U.N. chose a petro-state, the United Arab Emirates, to host COP28 was  an ominous sign to begin with.” Wrote Michael Mann of debunked temperature hockey stick fame.  “The UAE’s appointment of a fossil  fuel executive, Sultan Al Jaber, to preside as COP28 president made  matters worse.”
CNN reports that, “The secretary-general of the oil-producing group OPEC, Haitham Al Ghais, called on members and allies last week to ‘proactively reject’ any language that targeted fossil fuels rather than emissions.  The letter, written before the latest draft was posted, noted the  previous option for a “fossil fuels phase out” and said it would be ‘unacceptable that politically motivated campaigns put our people’s  prosperity and future at risk.’”
The announcement at COP 28 that next year’s climate summit will be held in Azerbaijan, another oil producing state, has team climate up in arms.  Next year is Europe’s turn, but Russia vowed to veto any E.U. member nation as host in protest of E.U. support for Ukraine.  Azerbaijan is a former member of the Soviet bloc, but not a member of the E.U. or NATO and was acceptable to Moscow.

Soon we will find out how far climate campaigners will be able to reshape the COP 28 outcome in the waning minutes of the summit.

The actual choice will be between a text which gives Russia, China and OPEC clear language enabling them to keep their fossil fuels, or whether they will agree to simply lie about “phasing them out.”

AUTHOR

Craig Rucker

Craig Rucker is a co-founder of CFACT and currently serves as its president. Widely heralded as a leader in the free market environmental, think tank community in Washington, D.C., Rucker is a frequent guest on radio talk shows, written extensively in numerous publications, and has appeared in such media outlets as Fox News, OANN, Washington Times, The Wall Street Journal, and The Hill, among many others. Rucker is also the co-producer of the award-winning film “Climate Hustle,” which was the #1 box-office film in America during its one night showing in 2016, as well as the acclaimed “Climate Hustle 2” staring Hollywood actor Kevin Sorbo released in 2020. As an accredited observer to the United Nations, Rucker has also led CFACT delegations to some 30 major UN conferences, including those in Copenhagen, Istanbul, Kyoto, Bonn, Marrakesh, Rio de Janeiro, and Warsaw, to name a few.

RELATED ARTICLES:

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Climate radicals are scrambling to gain power and money at the UN climate summit in Dubai.  Help CFACT expose and defeat them. Please make the most generous contribution you can right now

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

A Gift for You In the Spirit of Christmas

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Several appreciative readers have told me that my thought-provoking Substack commentaries here are a gift to them. They said that getting them to have a new perspective on the societal issues I cover (education, election integrity, energy matters, etc.) has been interesting and informative. In any case, it has inspired them to get more involved in their community on these issues — which benefits us all.

That said, in the spirit of Christmas, I will add something more.

Since we eat several times every day, the significance of food is something we can forget to think critically about. Having a quality meal can provide multiple important benefits. For example: 1) we feel better, 2) it improves our health, 3) it provides an ideal setting to be able to discuss family matters, current events, etc., and 4) it establishes tradition (e.g., good memories), etc. (For more see this and this.)

Special holidays (Thanksgiving, Christmas, Easter, etc.) are times when we tend to think more about food, but I’ve been blessed with a wife (Elaine) who makes me special meals several times a week, all year! She is a gourmet chef — even though if you tell her that she adamantly denies it. She looks at herself as a farmer’s daughter, just making a good effort to have tasty, nutritious meals.

Some cooks are specialists (e.g., bakers), but she continually produces quality results whether it is Breakfast, Lunch, or Dinner (hors d’oeuvres, salads, entrees, sides, desserts, etc.). People who experience these firsthand often ask me why I’m not 50 pounds overweight! (The answer is that I’m an active person, burning off those calories.)

I appreciate this blessing even more, as most of this is now in the past. Elaine has Parkinson’s (plus more), and is now unable to stand unassisted for more than a few minutes. Further, her hands have major tremors, so she has difficulty even holding a fork. For example, I’ve recently had to cut up the food on her plate for her.

Our meals now come from Factor, grocery stores, local meal providers, restaurant takeouts, etc. These have generally been very good. That said, they rarely have the quality and pizzazz of her prior culinary efforts.

Since she could see the end in sight, her birthday gift to me this year was a hard-cover binder, with over twenty of her best recipes printed out on special, decorative paper. What a treasure! (FYI, she came by these recipes from multiple places: family, friends, good cookbooks, experimenting, etc.)

My gift to you is that I will share three sample recipes of hers for you to enjoy with your family. I know some people relish (note the pun) tweaking a recipe. Please do NOT change it the first time! If you can’t help yourself on subsequent productions, I understand.

Recipe #1 is a morning celebration drink (e.g., great before a special breakfast): Orange Frost. Although it has no alcohol, you’ll likely want seconds…

Recipe #2 is a salad of sorts: Bing Cherry Jell-O. Whenever she serves this I tell her to skip the dessert, as I’ll just have more of this…

Recipe #3 is a vegetable side: Veg-all Casserole. Something illegal must be going on here, as vegetables are just not supposed to taste this good.

Savor and enjoy while keeping the Christ in Christmas.

©2023. John Droz, Jr. All rights reserved.

VIDEO: Families of American hostages being held captive in Gaza ‘not invited to White House Hanukkah celebration’

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Ruby Chen, whose son Itay is a reservist missing since the militant group’s October 7 attacks on Israel, said a number of the families of American hostages were in Washington, D.C., this week, and had reached out to the White House asking to attend the reception

The Biden White House declined to invited these families.

There are still seven American men and one woman unaccounted for since the Israel-Hamas war began, according to the White House. Four Americans – a 4-year-old girl and three women – have been released.

Watch the CNN report:

A White House spokesperson declined to comment.

©2023. Dr. Rich Swier. All rights reserved.

Trump Holds Biggest Recorded Lead In GOP Caucus Poll’s History

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“There must be a positive passion for the public good, the public interest, honour, power and glory, established in the minds of the people, or there can be no republican government, nor any real liberty.” —John Adams (1776)

Democrats rig elections.

Democrats don’t care.

They steal. 

Stolen elections are now common practice (with no recourse for the American people) but it will be fun watching Democrat criminals cheat out in the open, scrambling  to cover Trump’s overwhelming numbers on election night 2024.

AUTHOR

Pamela Geller

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

Washington, D.C. Removing 103,000 Ineligible Names from the Voter Rolls in Response to Judicial Watch

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Washington, D,C. – Judicial Watch announced today that it sent notice letters to election officials in the District of Columbia, California, and Illinois, notifying them of evident violations of the National Voter Registration Act (NVRA) of 1993, based on their failure to remove inactive voters from their registration rolls. The letters point out that these jurisdictions publicly reported removing few or no ineligible voter registrations under a key provision of the NVRA. The letters threaten federal lawsuits unless the violations are corrected in a timely fashion. In response to Judicial Watch’s inquiries, Washington, DC, officials admitted that they had not complied with the NVRA, promptly removed 65,544 outdated names from the voting rolls, promised to remove 37,962 more, and designated another 73,522 registrations as “inactive.”

The NVRA requires states to “conduct a general program that makes a reasonable effort to remove” from the official voter rolls “the names of ineligible voters” who have died or changed residence. The law requires registrations to be cancelled when voters fail to respond to address confirmation notices and then fail to vote in the next two general federal elections. In 2018, the Supreme Court confirmed that such removals are mandatory (Husted v. A. Philip Randolph Inst., 138 S. Ct. 1833, 1841-42 (2018)).

Federal law directs the Election Assistance Commission (EAC) to submit a report to Congress every second year assessing how states are complying with the NVRA. Federal regulations require states to provide data to the EAC for use in this report. On June 29, 2023, the EAC posted data from the most recent surveys it sent to the states and the District of Columbia for the reporting period from November 2020 through November 2022.

Based on the data contained in this report, Judicial Watch contacted a number of states and Washington, DC, to inquire about their compliance with federal law and to request public records. After processing the responses to these communications, Judicial Watch sent notice of violation letters to Washington, DC, California, and Illinois, detailing their non-compliance with the NVRA.

The notice letter to the District of Columbia, sent on behalf of Judicial Watch and the District of Columbia Republican Party, reports:

  • DC reported removing zero voter registrations in the last two-year reporting period for failing to respond to an address confirmation notice and failing to vote for two consecutive general federal elections.
  • DC flatly admitted in correspondence with Judicial Watch that it was failing to remove registrations as required by the NVRA, citing data conversion, staffing, and other issues.
  • DC’s total registration rate—its total number of registrations divided by the most recent census estimates of its citizen voting-age population—is greater than 131%.

The notice letter to California, sent on behalf of Judicial Watch and the Libertarian Party of California, states:

  • California’s survey responses to the EAC show that 27 California counties reported removing five or fewer—and, in most of those counties, zero—voter registrations in the last two-year period for failing to respond to an address confirmation notice and failing to vote in two consecutive general federal elections.
  • Another 19 California counties simply did not report any data about such removals.
  • Twenty-one California counties had more voter registrations than citizens over the age of 18, based on the most recent census estimates.

In all, 46 California counties reported removing only a handful, or no registrations under the NVRA’s change of address rules, or else failed to report any data at all. These 46 counties contain more than 14 million registered voters.

The notice letter to Illinois, sent on behalf of Judicial Watch, Illinois resident and voter Carol J. Davis, and Illinois Family Action, states:

  • In Illinois’ responses to the EAC’s survey, 23 Illinois counties reported removing fewer than 15—and, in almost half of those counties, zero—voter registrations from November 2020 to November 2022 for failing to respond to an address confirmation notice and failing to vote in two consecutive general federal elections.
  • Thirty-four Illinois jurisdictions simply did not report any data about such removals.
  • Fifteen Illinois jurisdictions have more voter registrations than citizens of voting age.

In total, 57 Illinois counties that either reported removing 15 or fewer registrations or failed to report any data at all under the NVRA’s change of address removal procedures. These 57 counties contain over five million registered voters.

Last month, the District of Columbia admitted in correspondence to Judicial Watch that it removed 65,544 inactive voters, will soon remove an additional 37,962 inactive voters, and that it has designated another 73,522 inactive names for potential removal.

California provided some public records and promised a further, substantive response. Illinois provided some public records and promises a further, substantive response. Ultimately, however, if Judicial Watch is not satisfied with the jurisdictions’ responses to its notice letters, Judicial Watch plans to sue under the National Voter Registration Act to ensure the jurisdictions take certain reasonable steps to clean up their voter rolls as the law requires.

“Dirty voter rolls increase the potential for voter fraud,” said Judicial Watch President Tom Fitton. “As Washington, DC’s, quick cleanup of tens of thousands of names in response to Judicial Watch shows, there are potentially hundreds of thousands of names on the voter rolls that should be removed by California and Illinois. Indeed, Judicial Watch litigation resulted in the removal of four million names from voter rolls in various states recently.”

Judicial Watch is a national leader in voting integrity and voting rights. As part of its work, Judicial Watch assembled a team of highly experienced voting rights attorneys who stopped discriminatory elections in Hawaii, and cleaned up voter rolls in California, Ohio, Indiana, and Kentucky, among other achievements.

Robert Popper, a Judicial Watch senior attorney, leads its election law program. Popper was previously in the Voting Section of the Civil Rights Division of the Justice Department, where he managed voting rights investigations, litigations, consent decrees, and settlements in dozens of states.

In July 2023 Judicial Watch filed an amicus curiae (friend of the court) brief, supporting the decision of the U.S. District Court for the District of Maine, which struck down Maine’s policy restricting the use and distribution of the state’s voter registration list (Public Interest Legal Foundation v. Shenna Bellows (No. 23-1361). According to a national study conducted by Judicial Watch in 2020, Maine’s statewide registration rate was 101% of eligible voters.

Judicial Watch in July 2023 also settled a federal election integrity lawsuit on behalf of the Illinois Conservative Union against the state of Illinois, the Illinois State Board of Elections, and its director, which grants access to the current centralized statewide list of registered voters for the state for the past 15 elections.

In April 2023, Pennsylvania settled with Judicial Watch and admitted in court filings that it removed 178,258 ineligible registrations in response to communications from Judicial Watch. The settlement commits Pennsylvania and five of its counties to extensive public reporting of statistics regarding their ongoing voter roll clean-up efforts for the next five years.

In March 2023, Colorado agreed to settle a Judicial Watch NVRA lawsuit alleging that Colorado failed to remove ineligible voters from its rolls. The settlement agreement requires Colorado to provide Judicial Watch with the most recent voter roll data for each Colorado county each year for six years.

In February 2023, Los Angeles County confirmed removal of 1,207,613 ineligible voters from its rolls since last year, under the terms of a settlement agreement in a federal lawsuit Judicial Watch filed in 2017.

Judicial Watch settled a federal election integrity lawsuit against New York City after the city removed 441,083 ineligible names from the voter rolls and promised to take reasonable steps going forward to clean its voter registration lists.

Kentucky also removed hundreds of thousands of old registrations after it entered into a consent decree to end another Judicial Watch lawsuit.

In February 2022, Judicial Watch settled a voter roll clean-up lawsuit against North Carolina and two of its counties after North Carolina removed over 430,000 inactive registrations from its voter rolls.

In March 2022, a Maryland court ruled in favor of Judicial Watch’s challenge to the Democratic state legislature’s “extreme” congressional-districts gerrymander.

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

The Moral Bankruptcy of Higher Education — and the Opportunity it Gives Christians

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In a disturbing House hearing this week, the heads of three of America’s most prestigious universities — Harvard, the University of Pennsylvania, and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology — equivocated on whether calls for the slaughter of the Jewish people are acceptable.

Used to employing the artful dodges of academic jargon, these “educators” did their best to use complex sentence structures and condescending nuance to avoid answering straightforward questions. When asked by U.S. Rep. Elise Stefanik (R-N.Y.) — herself a Harvard grad — direct questions about massive student demonstrations condoning violence against Israel and Jews in general, Harvard president Claudine Gay said, “We embrace a commitment to free expression even of views that are objectionable, offensive, hateful — it’s when that speech crosses into conduct that violates our policies against bullying, harassment, intimidation.”

Calling for mass murder is not “bullying, harassment, (and) intimidation?” And so it went — the cowardly evasions of the ivory tower flowing from the leaders of some of the reputedly greatest institutions of higher learning in the world. So now, alarmed by the unnerving calm of a group of PhDs defending their students’ “right” to call for slaughter, the University of Pennsylvania’s board of trustees met in an apparent state of panic over Penn president Liz Magill’s refusal to condemn genocide. Magill has now “promised to review the university’s code of conduct after she faced calls to resign for declining to say whether advocating genocide was a violation of the policy.” How reassuring.

For decades, conservatives have been warning that university liberal arts faculties are run by academics who are wandering so far left that were the earth flat they would fall off. Now, we have data to prove this. In a faculty survey published last fall, the Harvard Crimson newspaper reported that “more than 80 percent of Harvard faculty respondents characterized their political leanings as ‘liberal’ or ‘very liberal.’” Less than 2% characterized themselves as conservative. More broadly, a 2016-2017 study found that 60% of university faculty identified as “left or far left.”

To be clear, being liberal and being anti-Semitic are not synonymous. Rather, it should surprise no one that in environments where young people are taught that Israel is an illegitimate state, that claiming there are moral absolutes is oppressive patriarchal nonsense, and that “heteronormativity” (i.e., the norm of being attracted to the opposite gender) is merely a repulsive social construct that should be crushed, a good number of these young men and women will be swayed.

Post-teenagers are well-known for a proneness to moral indignation. Given that many have had virtually no moral training in the home or churches (just be nice, believe in some kind of deity, and vote Democratic — this is the de facto creed of “mainline” Protestantism) and have not been taught to think carefully and critically in their public schools, it should be unsurprising that when a post-modern professor waxes on about a real or imagined problem, sprinkling his lecture copiously with calls for “justice” and presenting well-culled “facts” to buttress his case, some impressionable youth will fall for his ill-conceived blather.

There is no such thing as values-neutrality. Between Josef Stalin’s celebration of his mass killings (or as he put it, “Who’s going to remember all this riff-raff in 10 or 20 years’ time? No one”) and Jesus’s teaching that we should love our enemies, there is a great gulf fixed. While no one (to my knowledge) stands behind a university lectern actually calling for murder, thousands of my fellow PhDs take their lecture hall podiums and foster theological unbelief, ethical confusion, factual distortion, and logical fallacies day by day, week after week.

So now, as we see major college campuses awash in anti-Israel and anti-Semitic rhetoric, many university donors and political commentators are shocked by what they are hearing. Why? Have they honestly assumed you can void an education of “the laws of nature and of Nature’s God” and produce men and women of character, moral bravery, and sound minds? Or, at least to some, is this the point: raise a generation for whom hopelessness, rage, and confusion confect into pre-revolutionary radicalism?

The very foundation of our country assumes the existence of a personal Creator Who, in His unmerited kindness, has endowed us with the rights He wants us to enjoy. Try asserting the truth of this claim in any secular university liberal arts faculty lounge. The response you receive will be less than pleasant.

There is another issue at play, as well: Cowardice. Saying no to an insistent child is aggravating; saying no to the insistent, demanding, and continuously outraged Left must be exhausting. But it is also needed. Some voices should not be given space to vent their cries of vicious and ignorant rage. Not every opinion deserves an equal hearing, especially if some of those opinions urge genocide. It is pure dishonesty to suggest that there’s a bright line between rhetoric and action. Fostering hatred leads to hateful actions — this is axiomatic. Evidently the presidents of Harvard, Penn, and MIT missed that class in simple moral geometry.

We should not be surprised by the sudden eruption of indignation now rising among rich donors and many in the major media, especially given the general inattention of much of American society to what’s happening all around us. And while we might hope that the current state of astonishment and anger on the part of wealthy donors and assorted cultural elites will force an accounting of what some of America’s most talented youth are learning, don’t bet on it.

When the president of Harvard — founded as a training ground for evangelical pastors — can’t simply say that when students yell for the destruction of Israel that they have gone too far, such a belief would not be an exercise of either faith or hope but pathetic fantasy.

What we can hope in is that the God of the Bible is real. Christ’s victory over sin, death, and Satan has inaugurated a new kingdom that no power on earth can so much as dent, let alone stop. This is the message we need to bring to a generation desperate for something permanent, something that transcends time and contention and pain.

AUTHOR

Rob Schwarzwalder

Rob Schwarzwalder, Ph.D., is Senior Lecturer in Regent University’s Honors College.

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EDITORS NOTE: This Washington Stand column is republished with permission. All rights reserved. ©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.

Meta Will Censor Adult Detransitioners but Not Pornographic Content for Minors

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In September, detransitioner Chloe Cole, widely known for her testimony about the dangers of transgender operations, was censored on Instagram so that her content would not appear to non-followers in any capacity. As the warning she received stated, “Your account and content won’t appear in places like Explore, Search, Suggested Users, Reels, and Feed Recommendations.”

For several years, conservatives have been skeptical of censorship from social media platforms, of which Cole is the most recent victim. In a 2020 Pew Research poll, results showed most Americans share this concern. Out of 4,708 U.S. adults, the survey stated “roughly three-quarters of U.S. adults say it is very (37%) or somewhat (36%) likely that social media sites intentionally censor political viewpoints that they find objectionable. Just 25% believe this is not likely the case.”

While Republicans remain the most skeptical about social media censorship, other concerns are making their way to court. Investigators in New Mexico filed a lawsuit after they created minor profiles on Facebook and Instagram that were, as the suit stated, “exposed to nudity, pornographic videos, and sexually suggestive images of young girls.” Additionally, as The Epoch Times reported, when the investigators used the fake profiles to report pornographic videos sent to it, Meta “said it investigated and found no violation of its community standards.”

Additionally, “Meta also offered the profile a professional account, which would enable her to make money. Meta would provide information on her audience, which was largely male and adult.” Although, its not just the New Mexico investigators that are showing concern.

A bipartisan letter addressed to Mark Zuckerburg, CEO of Meta, from the United States Senate disclosed “deep concerns about Meta’s apparent failure to comply with the Children’s Online Privacy Protection Act (COPPA), as alleged in a recently unsealed complaint filed by 33 states against [the] company.” The letter detailed the ways in which “Meta has not even tried to obtain informed parental consent to continue collecting data on those kids — in direct violation of COPPA.”

COPPA is the only online federal privacy law for children, and the states’ complaints emphasized in the letter are based on substantial evidence that Meta has and continues to violate it. The letter concluded, “Meta’s goal here is clear: To do everything in its power to avoid gaining actual knowledge — or, at least, create the perception that it never gained actual knowledge — that a user is a child. In so doing, Meta sought both to continue monetizing that child’s account and establish a lucrative, long-term relationship with them.”

Chris Gacek, senior fellow for Regulatory Affairs at Family Research Council, commented to The Washington Stand, “It’s almost beyond imagining that” Meta is not aware of the exploitation of minors occurring on its platforms. He explained how, in the last couple years, Elon Musk has managed to take control of Twitter (now X) and clean up a fair amount of the obscenity that was on the app. As far as Gacek is concerned, if Musk is accomplishing this, Meta could do the same. “They can clean this up if they want to,” he said. “So if it’s there, they want it to be there.”

Gacek noted that part of Meta’s indifference about these accounts and the explicit content is because it’s a “mechanism by which they’re making money.” But there is also “this sort of an ideological contour map,” he added, that can contribute even more to the equation. As Gacek put it, what this investigation seems to navigate is that “Chloe Cole can’t be seen, but the pervs can.”

He concluded, “There [could be] hundreds of millions of people watching” or coming across “this stuff, right? I can’t believe there aren’t more people reporting these things.”

AUTHOR

Sarah Holliday

Sarah Holliday is a reporter at The Washington Stand.

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EDITORS NOTE: This Washington Stand column is republished with permission. All rights reserved. ©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.

‘It’s “Me Too” Unless You Are a Jew’: Why Won’t Women’s Groups Condemn Hamas’s Rapes?

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Why won’t so-called “women’s groups” condemn Hamas terrorists for raping Israeli women on October 7? This is what a growing number of people are asking, including Former Miss World and Miss Israel 1998, Linor Abargil, who gave a very moving and emotional speech before the United Nations on December 4.

Abargil appeared on Fox News’s “America’s Newsroom” on Thursday. She said, “It’s ‘Me Too’ unless you are a Jew.” She observed, “It’s not about political, it’s not about ‘Free Palestine, it’s not about which side you’re on on the map: to use rape as an act of war is unbearable. I mean, what happened to humanity?” She then became very emotional and had to take a moment to compose herself before she shared:

“One of my friends… told me a story about this young woman — that he saw a video of her — she was raped by three Hamas people, one after another raped her. . .Screaming they beat her, spit at her, they then butchered her, and one of them took her cell phone and just send everything to her mother. Her scream just haunts my friend every night he’s tried to sleep. And her screaming should be out there for all the world to shout out for this girl that is not here to shout herself. But instead, all of the organizations are just silent. …I mean, I’m telling you, I’m just speechless.”

In the second hour of Thursday’s program, Dana Perino interviewed Senator Kirsten Gillibrand (D-N.Y.) who also called out the women’s groups that are usually her political allies. They include Emily’s List, Democratic Women’s Caucus, Women’s March, I Stand With Her, and American Association of University Women.

Gillibrand said, “When I saw the list at the U.N., I couldn’t believe it. I was so aghast, I was so furious. I don’t understand how we cannot have solidarity amongst all women in the United States and globally — that using rape as a weapon of war is unacceptable. It has to be condemned. The fact that the U.N. has not called Hamas a terrorist organization and condemn[ed] the horrific violence on October 7 is unacceptable. And they’re not even enforcing international law.”

She went on to say, “I think women’s rights groups in the United States should care deeply about women around the globe and should not turn a blind eye. They should not keep their head in the sand. They have a moral responsibility to have moral clarity…”

Perino asked Gillibrand if she watched the video of the October 7 massacre that the Israeli government provided for Congress to watch. She responded, “I did. It’s unspeakable. The horrific acts that were committed in the most heinous and evil ways you can imagine: beheadings, dismemberments, mass rapes, shooting of babies and children. It’s something that should never, ever happen. And it has to be called out not only by the U.N. but by the world community. … They did not show us the victims of rape, and they did not show us the videos of rapes happening because they thought it was too horrific for Congress to see, but we should see it. And these films and these photographs should be made public because the world has to condemn this…”

Abargil’s and Gillibrand’s emotional pleas stand in stark contrast to the cold words of Congressional Progressive Caucus Chairwoman Pramila Jayapal (D-Wash.) on CNN’s “State of the Union” on Sunday, December 3. When CNN host, Dana Bash, asked her why women’s groups are “downright silent” about Hamas raping and mutilating Jewish women on October 7, Jayapal shockingly downplayed Hamas’s evil acts, continually trying to compare those acts to Israel’s justifiable right to defend itself.

Bash said, “With respect, I was just trying to talk about the women, and you turned it back to Israel. I’m asking you about Hamas…”

Jayapal interrupted, “I already answered your question, Dana, I said it’s horrific. I think that rape is horrific — sexual assault is horrific. I think it’s horrific. I think that it happens in war situations. Terrorist organizations like Hamas obviously are using these as tools. However, I think we have to be balanced about bringing in the outrages against Palestinians…”

Bash pointed out, “And it’s horrible, but you don’t see Israeli soldiers raping Palestinian women.” To which Jayapal responded, “Well, Dana, I don’t want this to be the hierarchy of oppressions…”

Although U.N. Women finally condemned Hamas on December 1 (almost two months after the October 7 attack), Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is still pleading with groups such as the United Nation’s own World Health Organization and women’s groups around the world to be vocal advocates for the many Israeli women and girls that were raped on October 7 (and for the hostages that likely continue to be abused). He said, “I heard heartbreaking stories of abuse. I heard, as you have heard, about sexual abuse and unprecedented cases of cruel rape.”

He then asked, “Did you remain silent because it was Jewish women? … I say to the women’s rights organizations, to the human rights organizations, you’ve heard of the rape of Israeli women, horrible atrocities, sexual mutilation? Where the hell are you? I expect all civilized leaders, governments, nations to speak up against this atrocity.”

Family Research Council’s Senior Fellow for Education Studies, Meg Kilgannon, is not surprised by women’s groups’ lack of attention to this horrific issue. She told The Washington Stand, “National women’s groups have been part and parcel of the Democratic Party for years. For women who pay attention, we know that these groups will never represent our values or the real interests of women. The example of excusing depraved behaviors of terrorists is just another of many ways the leaders of women’s groups serve the interest of progressive and authoritarian men.”

FRC’s Director of the Center for Human Dignity, Mary Szoch, agreed and added, “The terroristic actions of Hamas are pure evil and should be denounced by everyone — especially those claiming to speak for women. Failure to speak out against members of Hamas raping Jewish women is inexcusable.”

AUTHOR

Kathy Athearn

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EDITORS NOTE: This Washington Stand column is republished with permission. All rights reserved. ©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.

Russia’s Resolve: The Family Comes First

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A valuable lesson from my days toiling away in the imperial capital was how little Americans know about what is going on in the rest of the world. Back in the heady days of hegemony, the default American setting was ethnocentric. Wherever we went, there was CNN Headline News, American entertainment, tourist menus, guides and cordial concierges ensuring that our language deficit was not an impediment to spending money.

Joe Biden, the guy presently playing president, said America is an “indispensable nation”. Strictly speaking, we haven’t been a nation since the Civil War. We’re not indispensable either, but believing so is indispensable to imperial hubris. I digress.

Year of the Family

On 22 November, American media ran the usual fare that passes for news: the wars du jour, the JFK murder 60th anniversary, and travellers headed home for Thanksgiving.

Across the globe, something momentous was underway. Western media mostly missed it. The event? Russian President Vladimir Putin signed a decree declaring 2024 the “Year of the Family“.

In order to promote state policy to protect the family and preserve traditional family values, the President has resolved to declare 2024 the Year of the Family in the Russian Federation. 

The Year of the Family initiative was kicked off in early November via a motion by Russian Federation Council Speaker Valentina Matviyenko. The mission: “promote state policy in the field of family protection and the preservation of traditional family values.”

The official organising committee will be in place on 27 December, headed by Tatyana Golikova, Deputy Prime Minister for Social Policy, Labour, Health and Pension Provision.

Consider: motion made in early November, decree issued 22 November, implementing committee up and running 27 December. By government standards, that’s moving like greased lightnin’. Guess they remember the glacial pace of things under Communism.

Now, I’m an America first guy, but when countries with fewer resources get things done faster and better, there’s no shame in following their example.

Socially conservative

The custom of dedicating each year to a national cause was inaugurated in 2007 to focus attention on Russian priorities. This is part and parcel of President Putin’s nationalistic approach, designed to conflate patriotism with problem-solving. To a surprising degree, it works. However, President Putin deserves only partial credit. US/NATO sanctions have done more to rally Russians behind him than any big bucks PR campaign or “Ukraine liberation” ever could.

Much has been happening in Russia of late that would be of keen interest to Americans. By US standards, Russia is “right-wing”, aka woefully unwoke. Western elites regard Russia (per the late Senator John McCain) as “a gas station masquerading as a country”. Not so.

But we do have domestic culture wars in common, though the folks ruling the roost in Moscow have quite a different take on things than their Washington counterparts.

In 2013, Russia’s law “For the Purpose of Protecting Children from Information Advocating a Denial of Traditional Family Values” was enacted.  Commonly known as the gay propaganda law, it prohibited the dissemination of “propaganda of non-traditional sexual relationships” and materials that could encourage minors to “form non-traditional sexual predispositions”.

In mid-November, the Russian Ministry of Justice filed suit averring that the LGBT movement fomented religious and social strife. On 30 November, the Russian Supreme Court agreed, ruling that the movement was an “extremist organisation”, placing it legally on a par with terrorist groups. The ruling bans public displays and activities supporting LGBT lifestyles.

Right to life

On 3 November, President Putin addressed abortion: “Of course, the problem of abortion is so acute. The question is: what to do about it?”

He cited prospective measures that would “ban the sale of drugs that terminate pregnancy, or improve the socio-economic situation in the country, increase the level of well-being, real wages, social services, [and] assistance to young families in purchasing housing.”

The Russian Orthodox Church is lobbying for more restrictive abortion laws and proposing a package of reforms, including:

  • Requiring the husband’s “informed consent” for married women to have an abortion; requiring parental approval for underage girls
  • Mandatory pre-abortion counselling, including an ultrasound scan
  • Extension of the “contemplation period” from 48 hours to one week
  • Banning abortion after 8 weeks of pregnancy (current law is 12 weeks)
  • Allow rape victims 12 weeks to request abortion (current law is 22 weeks)
  • Prohibiting private clinics from performing abortions

In 2000, there were 2.13 million abortions in Russia. That has decreased to 506,000 in 2022. With a shrinking population, it is likely that further restrictions are in the cards. While that could bump up birth rates a bit, any significant reversal of falling fertility depends on – drumroll – priorities.

History

The first Year of the Family was in 2008, when the government reformed policies on the foreign adoption of Russian orphans. In 2012, Russia banned adoptions by Americans and is considering extending that to countries permitting “gender change”. In 2013, Russia outlawed adoptions by same-sex couples.

Following the dissolution of the USSR in late 1991, Russia’s birthrate collapsed to levels not seen since World War II, when an estimated 27 million Soviet citizens perished. The economy spiralled into depression while crime and a host of social pathologies spread like wildfire. Russia’s estimated fertility rate has since rebounded to between 1.4 and 1.6, but there is no decidedly upward trend.

In a late November address to the World Russian People’s Council, President Putin said:

We will not overcome the daunting demographic challenges facing us solely with money, social benefits, allowances, privileges, or dedicated programmes. True, the amount of the budget’s demographic spending is extremely important, but that is not all there is to it. A person’s points of reference in life matter more. Love, trust, and a solid moral foundation are what the family and the birth of a child are built on. We must never forget this.

Thankfully, many of our ethnic groups have preserved the tradition of having strong multigenerational families with four, five, or even more children. Let us remember that Russian families, many of our grandmothers and great-grandmothers had seven, eight, or even more children.

Let us preserve and revive these excellent traditions. Large families must become the norm, a way of life for all Russia’s peoples. The family is not just the foundation of the state and society; it is a spiritual phenomenon, a source of morality.

Like him or not, give credit where it’s due: President Putin is trying.

Latest legislative initiative

In response to widespread concerns about Russia’s demographic crisis, last week legislators from the Liberal Democratic Party of Russia (LDPR) proposed legislation entitled “On State Benefits for Citizens with Children” that would provide for the award 200,000 rubles (US$2100) per child to women who give birth before age 25.

The average age of a mother at first birth is inching towards 30. On introducing the legislation, LDPR deputies cut to the chase, saying, “Almost 40 percent of Russian women refuse to have children due to unsatisfactory financial situation and living conditions.” All women under age 25, regardless of financial situation, would be eligible for the benefit.

Why write about Russia? Look no further than our Mercator masthead: Mercator is your first stop for news and analysis that places the dignity of the human person at the centre of everything.

There are so many people in Russia, and everywhere else, for that matter, who agree. They are pro-family and our comrades-in-arms on the issues that count.

Today, we’re on the precipice of world war. Russia and America should strive for better understanding and expend more effort trying to get along than on antagonising one another. Direct people-to-people cooperation working for traditional family values can make friends and mitigate the geopolitical tangles contrived by avaricious elites. World peace depends on it.

Merry Christmas, Mercator fans!

AUTHOR

Louis T. March has a background in government, business, and philanthropy. A former talk show host, author, and public speaker, he is a dedicated student of history and genealogy. Louis lives with his family in the beautiful Shenandoah Valley of Virginia.

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