With the Republican House majority officially secured, Republicans will have a trifecta come January 20. They need to use their newfound power to repeal the so-called Inflation Reduction Act in its entirety. Democrats passed the IRA without a single Republican vote through budget reconciliation. Republicans can repeal it without a single Democratic vote through budget reconciliation. The law never had anything to do with inflation. Immediately after Congress passed it, the media...

Israel is reportedly planning to advance a ceasefire deal in Lebanon as an early foreign policy “gift” to President-elect Donald Trump. “There is an understanding that Israel would gift something to Trump … that in January there will be an understanding about Lebanon,” an Israeli official told The Washington Post.  The report comes as Ron Dermer, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s minister of strategic affairs, traveled to Mar-a-Lago on Sunday before heading to the White House to...

President-elect Donald Trump said Thursday that he will nominate vaccine skeptic and conspiracy theorist Robert F. Kennedy Jr. as secretary of the Health and Human Services Department. If the Senate approves Kennedy, the former independent presidential candidate will lead a sprawling department responsible for the huge Medicare and Medicaid health coverage programs, the Food and Drug Administration, the National Institutes of Health, and the Centers for Disease...

President-elect Donald Trump has tapped Robert F. Kennedy Jr. — a former independent presidential candidate who has a history of spreading conspiracy theories, including about vaccines — to oversee the Department of Health and Human Services. "For too long, Americans have been crushed by the industrial food complex and drug companies who have engaged in deception, misinformation, and disinformation when it comes to Public Health," Trump said in a statement on Truth Social. "The Safety...

President-elect Donald Trump announced Thursday that he would nominate Robert F. Kennedy Jr. for secretary of Health and Human Services. “I am thrilled to announce Robert F. Kennedy Jr. as The United States Secretary of Health and Human Services,” Trump posted on Truth Social. “For too long, Americans have been crushed by the industrial food complex and drug companies who have engaged in deception, misinformation, and disinformation when it comes to Public Health,” the president-elect...

Former House Speaker Kevin McCarthy predicted that President-elect Donald Trump’s nomination of Matt Gaetz to be attorney general would be rejected by the Republican Senate next year. “Gaetz won’t get confirmed, everybody knows that,” McCarthy said in an interview with Bloomberg Television at the Barclays Asia Forum in Singapore on Thursday. Gaetz, a Florida congressman who resigned from the House hours after Trump announced that he would nominate him to run the Justice...

President-elect Donald Trump’s Cabinet picks keep getting more outlandish, which may be part of the point. Attorney general? Rep. Matt Gaetz, the right-wing provocateur who is being investigated by the House Ethics Committee for allegations of sexual misconduct. Secretary of defense? Pete Hegseth, a weekend Fox News host who served in the Army National Guard. Director of national intelligence? Tulsi Gabbard, the former Democratic congresswoman who has expressed...

Reality revealed. The post “I’ve never met Courtney Love”: the truth behind Tori Amos song ‘Professional Widow’ first appeared on Far Out Magazine.

On a single day in late November 1943, Winston Churchill addressed two notes from Cairo, one going to both his Deputy Prime Minister, Clement Attlee, and his Home Secretary, Herbert Morrison, and one to Morrison alone.  Hold fast to the heights and together we will make American law great again. Churchill was writing on the extraordinary powers Parliament had granted his government when Britain was in its moment of greatest peril. The Nazi war machine in 1940 seemed invincible. Mighty France had fallen in six weeks. The British army barely escaped, leaving most of its equipment behind. Britain had no allies. The German invasion was expected at any moment. Parliament gave the government emergency powers to lock up without trial or charge anyone they considered a risk to safety. But now in the summer of ’43, on the way to meet Stalin and FDR at Tehran, three years had passed and the tide had turned. The Americans and the Soviets were allied with Britain in the fight. The great turning point battles of Stalingrad and El Alamein had been won and the Germans were in retreat. The direst phase of emergency was past and Churchill was pushing for change in the law. The emergency powers, Churchill wrote to Morrison, “should be completely abolished, as the national emergency no longer justifies abrogation of individual rights of habeas corpus and trial by jury on definite charges.” Writing to both Morrison and Attlee that same day, he wrote further, “On no account should we lend any countenance to the totalitarian idea of the right of the Executive to lockup political opponents or unpopular people.” If, out of caution, they still might oppose giving back these powers until the danger was more completely overcome, Churchill advised that they ought to be “proclaiming your resolve to use [those powers] with the utmost circumspection and humanity. Do not quit the heights.” The heights Churchill referred to were the moral heights that Britain and America commanded. Since the motivation of the people to fight and win that terrible conflict sprang from the stark moral contrast between Nazi tyranny and the liberty-preserving constitutional democracies, these heights were just as important strategically for Churchill as the commanding ground on the battlefield where the armies faced off. Both Obama and Biden chose to remove a bust of Churchill from the Oval Office when they took office (45 had restored the bust to its former position in between, and probably will do so again as 47). In the outbreak of political lawfare that characterized their attempts to destroy the political threat to their power that Trump posed, they showed why the petty case of bust removal was a symbol of their rejection of Churchill’s passionate constitutionalism. The imprisoning of Trump staff and the coordinated attempt to bankrupt, exhaust, and imprison Trump himself represented the exact opposite of the passion animating Churchill’s notes that wartime November. Churchill subordinated party to nation and galvanized all parties, left and right alike, in a sublime and magnificent war effort. He was gracious in defeat, headed a loyal parliamentary opposition for six years, and finally regained the votes of the people to be elected to a second term as prime minister. The key to the trust in the government was that no one faced loss of liberty save for violation of known laws and through a fair process. Obama, by contrast, served as the barely-hidden linch-pin of an opposition to Trump that used the apparatus of government intelligence and of federal law enforcement to put its thumb on the election scales in 2016 and 2020. In the lead-up to 2024, the Biden White House went further under the deep influence of Obama, who had broken precedent to remain in DC after his term of office in order to exercise influence. In a series of law cases that bear the hallmark of active coordination, novel and unprecedented uses of civil and criminal law — laws not known beforehand — were used to try to end forever the ability of Donald Trump to affect American politics. The use of law in these cases exhibited contempt for the attitude Churchill expressed in his plea to his ministers to “resolve to use [their legal powers] with the utmost circumspection and humanity.” All was subordinated to the political goal, in a logic which inevitably led to branding Trump and his 70 million supporters as Nazis and fascists. An immense and sustained media campaign augmented the claim that Trump represented a threat as grave as Hitler’s, a true threat to democracy. (READ MORE from Shmuel Klatzkin: We Must All Renew the American Covenant) How did that work out? Before the series of trials started about a year ago, Trump’s candidacy was not going well. People sought alternatives. They wanted the political drama to go away. They wanted, as voters did a century earlier, a return to normalcy. And then the court cases hit. Charges that didn’t sit right, weird and strange in their juicing of freshly-minted statute and bizarre twistings of older laws to apply to things never before acted upon as illegal. Trump’s drastic turn of fortune can be pegged precisely to the revulsion that shuddered through America when Trump was hauled into court. At each successive stage of the coordinated prosecutions — mug shot, indictment, gag order, enforced courtroom presence, and on and on — there was a bump upwards. Trump’s enemies believed that pasting on him the label of an indicted man, and finally of a convicted felon, would cause America to reject Trump for good. But each successive advance in the court processes brought out a deeper revulsion. Before their very eyes, people had been ready to leave Trump behind and give credence to his critics who saw what a real threat to democracy looks like.  And they got behind Trump. The political prosecutors and those who coordinated their work at every level lacked Churchill’s reverence for political liberty and the free, if often unpleasant, debate that living constitutional government requires. Equally, they lacked a respect for the intelligence and the good heart of a population whom they were always too ready to dismiss as deplorables, clingers, and garbage.  The people’s heart was with Churchill’s, not with those who demoted his bust and departed from his commitment to liberty. Their hearts have been touched by liberty and they saw through the propaganda and the oh-so-clever arguments of those who wanted Trump off the ballot, off the internet, off the street, bankrupted, and jailed.  Churchill saw the commitment to political liberty as realization of the great civilizational process of the ages. And he was right. It is. America decided it was not going backwards. In the book that did more to make the West literate than any other, the Bible, we see in the Book of Exodus the classic fight for freedom. In Egypt, liberty and knowledge and the protections of law belonged only to a few. It was dangerous to educate slaves; they were to be governed by force. Self-government was only for the powerful few and always at the mercy of someone with more power. Then came the great drama of the Exodus, the escape of a whole nation of slaves from the taskmasters’ control. What followed Israel’s escape from Egypt was even more important — the law was given to the people directly from its Source, a law to which even the most powerful were accountable. Most important, out of love for the One who so empowered them, the people were bidden to take the laws as their own, to place them “upon your heart, to teach them to your children, and to speak of them, whether sitting in your home, walking in your way, lying down or rising up.” The laws are to be known by the people, not by some professional class of experts alone. And because the laws were theirs, the people would cherish them, and most of all, the love that animates them. Pharaohs still lurk. Sometimes they are effective in convincing the people that the business of government is only for elite professionals. They preach Lennonism: turn off your minds, relax, and float downstream. They tell you: this is not dying. Let us do the business of governing. (READ MORE: Unity Is a Common Goal, Often Abused) Americans are trusting. We are willing to listen to challenging thought and even give it a try. But the tale of this last campaign is that in the end, the people’s hearts know the law they love and what constitutes its real threat. Their former leaders deserted the heights of which Churchill spoke. But the hearts of the people remain true and they held the post. It was enough.  It’s now up to Trump and his team to stay worthy of the trust in the smashing electoral victory the people gave them. Hold fast to the heights and together we will make American law great again, a law preserved in the hearts of a wise and understanding people. The post With Trump’s Win, The Law Wins appeared first on The American Spectator | USA News and Politics.

While Christians in America are celebrating an end to the hostile Biden-Harris regime, Christians in Europe witnessed increased persecution and hatred last year, according to a new report. The Observatory on Intolerance and Discrimination against Christians in Europe (OIDAC Europe) published its annual report on Friday, examining instances of “intolerance and discrimination against Christians” over the course of 2023. Unfortunately, the report found that religiously-motivated hate crimes against Christians more than doubled last year. “The majority of the attacks … were motivated by radical Islamism, a tragic consequence of mass immigration into Europe.” Relying on data from police and civil society organizations, OIDAC Europe found that there were 2,444 anti-Christian hate crimes, including over 230 “personal attacks,” across 35 different European countries last year alone. France, the United Kingdom, and Germany saw the most drastic increase, with hate crimes against Christians in Germany more than doubling last year. In France, there were nearly 1,000 hate crimes committed against Christians, including acts of vandalism and arson against churches and over 80 physical attacks against priests, preachers, and other persons on the basis of their Christian faith. There were over 700 anti-Christian hate crimes in the U.K. In Germany, there were over 2,000 attacks on churches, cemeteries, and other Christian sites alone. (READ MORE from S.A. McCarthy: Catholic Bishops Stumble on Immigration) According to OIDAC Europe’s report, 62 percent of anti-Christian hate crimes in Europe last year consisted of acts of vandalism, 10 percent were arson attacks, 8 percent consisted of threats of violence, 7 percent consisted of actual acts of physical violence, and 2 percent consisted of attempted homicides. Motivations behind anti-Christian hate crimes included radical Islam, anti-religion sentiment, and radical leftism, although OIDAC Europe noted that some crimes were “were linked to the war in Ukraine.” The report also observed that the share of anti-Christian hate crimes motivated by radical Islam nearly doubled in 2023. Some examples of anti-Christian hate crimes cited in the report include at least two instances of Muslims in the U.K. stabbing or attempting to murder converts to Christianity, considering them “infidels.” In Poland, a man intentionally drove his car through a Corpus Christi procession composed of over 100 Catholics, including 60 children. A priest in Spain was stabbed in the neck while distributing Holy Communion; the man responsible for the stabbing reportedly shouted curses at the Catholic Church and said that he “wanted to kill the bishop.” Also in Spain, a jihadist killed a sacristan with a machete and wounded four others, including a priest, as he attacked two churches. In comments to The American Spectator, Arielle Del Turco, Director of the Center for Religious Liberty at Family Research Council, said, “This data should cause European political leaders to take seriously the religious freedom concerns of Christians in their countries. No one should be physically attacked for their faith, and that this is happening in the West is particularly alarming.” She continued, “The majority of the attacks which we have data on were motivated by radical Islamism, a tragic consequence of mass immigration into Europe.” Del Turco added, “Rising anti-Christian hate crimes is a shameful and dangerous trend that European leaders should work swiftly to reverse.” OIDAC Europe also reported that instances of “discrimination” against Christians are on the rise, with hearings and surveys finding that some Christians have even lost their jobs because they profess fundamental Christian moral teachings, such as “marriage is a union between one man and one woman” or “human life begins at conception.” A survey conducted in the U.K. found that over half (56 perccent) of Christians polled said that they had been mocked, ridiculed, or ostracized for their Christian faith. Among Christians under the age of 35, 61 percent responded that they had been mocked, ridiculed, or ostracized for their faith. One male survey participant said that any “mention of faith in a CV precludes one from an interview. My yearly assessment was lowered because I spoke of Christ.” A female respondent said that she was “bullied” at her workplace due to her faith, and another Christian coworker was “bullied out of her job for her beliefs and refusing to do shifts on Sundays so she could attend church.” Religious and moral beliefs expressed privately over social media have also become an issue, with one woman profiled in the report having been fired for a Facebook post she made asking why transgenderism was being promoted in her son’s primary school. (READ MORE: Ireland Imposes Draconian ‘Hate’ Laws) In other instances, Christians and Christian organizations have been “debanked.” Two pro-life organizations in Sweden and the Netherlands, for example, had their bank accounts closed due to their pro-life advocacy. The Scandinavian bank Nordea even closed the personal account of Mats Selander, founder of the Christian Center for Bioethical Reform in Sweden. Christians in Europe are also being pressured to resign from political positions due to their religious beliefs. In one egregious example, Councillor Anthony Stevens in the U.K. was arrested at home in front of his children for supporting a Christian colleague’s right to freedom of speech. OIDAC Europe classified colleges and universities as “the most hostile environments” against Christians. The report cited a study of universities in the U.K. which found that Christians were the most likely to report discrimination and harassment for their views. OIDAC Europe noted, “In particular, students with pro-life views across Europe have reported hostility and even death threats.” According to Christian parents cited in the report, “too many teachers express anti-Christian sentiments” at European schools and universities. European media has also been particularly hostile to Christians, including openly excusing anti-Christian hate crimes. Some nations — such as Germany, Spain, and the U.K. — have also enacted “buffer zones” outside of abortion facilities, banning pro-life protest or prayer. In the U.K. especially, a number of individuals have been arrested for praying across the street from abortion facilities, even if the prayer is silent. In Scotland, a “buffer zone” law enacted last year criminalized pro-life activity even within one’s own home, provided that the home was close enough to an abortion facility. The Scottish government even warned residents within the “buffer zones” that “activities in a private place (such as a house) within the area … could be an offence if they can be seen or heard within the Zone and are done intentionally or recklessly.” Additionally, OIDAC Europe’s report noted that conscience rights for Christians, especially in the medical field, have been trampled across he continent. In Spain, for example, Christian doctors who do not want to commit abortions are required to publicly register their names in order to even request a religious exemption. Even then, Christian doctors may be forced to commit abortions against their religious convictions depending upon the availability of others who are willing to commit abortions. Parental rights have also been heavily restricted in parts of Europe, with homeschooling being either banned or heavily restricted or regulated, and with governments ensuring children are giving proper “sex education,” including transgenderism propaganda. In Switzerland, a 16-year-old was taken into state custody and separated from her parents because they would not consent to her gender transition attempts. In Germany, a private Christian school was forcibly closed for not adhering to the country’s new educational laws governing private schools. “With increasing secularization leading to growing religious illiteracy among public leaders and the influence of secularist ethics, Christians in Europe continue to face restrictions on the exercise of their religious freedom, including the right to express religious views on various issues relating to human nature and human relationships,” the OIDAC Europe report concluded. “Public awareness and government action are therefore needed more than ever.” The post Hostility Toward Christians Skyrockets Across Europe appeared first on The American Spectator | USA News and Politics.