'It seems unreal'

'Unidentified, untracked, and untested'

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The costs for all of this treatment will be overwhelming

Center-left media outlets know they can gin up a couple of curiosity- or hate-based clicks by periodically profiling some new “trend” in the upper-middle-class mating scene. “Ethical nonmonogamy” has had its day, “polyamory memoirs” get respectful reviews, and major broadcast networks know they can pull in some rubberneckers curious about pairings that go from “Couple to Throuple.” After all, once society has deconstructed marriage down to the point of meaninglessness, why should we have any compunction about celebrating such creative alternatives to bourgeois fidelity? If Bob and Carol and Ted and Alice want to go all in on creating a modern-day polycule, what difference does that make to us? The push to unwind traditional social scripts around marriage, fidelity, commitment, and procreation hasn’t just been a question of individual fulfillment, but also has had widespread social consequences. That’s the argument made by Washington Examiner commentary editor and former Senate staffer Conn Carroll in his new book, “Sex and the Citizen: How the Assault on Marriage Is Destroying Democracy.” Carroll takes the reader on a globe-trotting tour across the ages, dipping into evolutionary psychology, anthropology, and history to make the case that “monogamous marriage binds men and women into a long-term project of cooperative care for each other and their children,” and that we tinker with that wisdom at our peril. The casual reader’s mileage may vary on how much academic speculation about the mating habits of primates or our Pleistocene-era ancestors can tell us about the form and structure of what family life should look like today. But Carroll’s dissection of how modern liberals and leftists try to justify their preference for maximum autonomy by appealing to prehistoric biology and postmodern critical theory is worth taking seriously. And the anthropological excursions are in service of a broader point; namely, that marriage is instituted for the well-being of children, not the two (or more) consenting adults that would enter into it. As former Heritage Foundation scholar (and my current boss) Ryan T. Anderson pointed out in 2013: “State recognition of marriage protects children by encouraging men and women to commit to each other and take responsibility for their children. While respecting everyone’s liberty, government rightly recognizes, protects, and promotes marriage as the ideal institution for childbearing and childrearing … [yet] in recent decades, marriage has been weakened by a revisionist view that is more about adults’ desires than children’s needs.” The cultural and legal skirmish that ended in Obergefell v. Hodges was just one form of attempting to redefine marriage around adult companionship, rather than being the institution properly ordered toward the bearing and rearing of children. Marriage is no longer about how best to order society to support the children male-female romantic partnerships inevitably produce, and is instead about increasingly surpassing the bounds of tradition and biology in the name of autonomy. And as we are seeing in popular magazines, and will doubtless see in courts, an uncomplicated logic of “love is love” has no inherent guardrails to prevent against ethical monogamy, polyandry or polygyny, or other forms of nonexclusive romantic relationships from being recognized in the same way as traditional marriage. Some left-wing activists don’t just want to abolish the gender binary when it comes to self-expression. They’d like to see the entire idea of the binary relationship at the heart of parenthood blown up and replaced with one of “chosen family.” We see this in the push to replace or erase a child’s biological parents on birth certificates, robbing them of not just information about their biological ancestry, but potential information about their genetic predisposition to certain diseases. Italy’s recent decision to ban international surrogacy for its citizens is a welcome pushback against the mindset that children should be able to be purchased on the open market, rather than the natural result of a loving two-parent household. Carroll delves into the historical record to argue that the monogamous, conjugal family so many think of as traditional was actually an outgrowth of the distinctive understanding of the human person that Christianity introduced to the Western world. Perhaps it should come as no surprise, then, that as traditional religious belief begins to decline, so too does the traditional conception of marriage as being oriented toward procreation, permanence, and fidelity. Now, marriage is just one life path among many, to be undertaken once the participants are materially comfortable, having sown their wild oats, gotten that big promotion, and are ready to throw a big party for their friends and extended family. Carroll rightly worries that “marriage” is becoming, in the words of Johns Hopkins sociologist Andrew Cherlin, a “capstone” rather than a “cornerstone.” We’ve hollowed out the economic and social privileges that used to be associated with marriage, which means that it is now predominantly being entered into by those who already have those benefits. That helps explain why the decline in marriage rates have been fastest among adults without a college degree. Carroll has a proscriptive vision for conservatives: “Marriage doesn’t have to be the new marker of class and privilege. It can be a foundational, egalitarian, and democratizing institution for every American again.” That will require a shift from the current GOP, which tends to offer lip service in favor of being pro-family without necessarily offering economic and social policy plans up to the task. Making men more marriageable, rewarding marriage over cohabitation, prioritizing an affordability agenda, and more should be at the top of a Republican agenda. The cultural trends that Carroll traces didn’t happen overnight. Restoring marriage may well take decades, if not longer, but can be accelerated through sound economic policies. After all, the familiar wreckage he highlights from marriage’s decline—more children raised in unstable homes, depressed rates of economic mobility, higher levels of loneliness and social isolation, rising opioid deaths, falling birth rates—are too important to shrug our shoulders at. Seeing marriage as something more than simply one life choice among others—that is, more than just serial cohabitation that starts with a blowout party on a Caribbean island somewhere—would go a long way to restoring a popular understanding of family as the cornerstone of a healthy society. “Sex and the Citizen” is a welcome contribution to these discussions, and Carroll’s point—that marriage has an inevitable social dimension, not just an individual one—is one that more conservatives should understand and apply to debates about how to best to save America in the years ahead. We publish a variety of perspectives. Nothing written here is to be construed as representing the views of The Daily Signal. The post New Book Explores Cultural Entropy Eroding Traditional Marriage, Family Norms appeared first on The Daily Signal.

Biden-Backing Obama Now Says What About Old People?

It’s late October in an election year and Meta is once again throttling a story that embarrasses Democrats, prompting Federal Communications Commissioner Brendan Carr to sound the alarm on Fox Business. Carr condemned the social media giant during the Oct. 22 edition of Mornings with Maria Bartiromo. Carr said that Facebook had censored a post about the Biden-Harris administration’s incredible failed internet rollout. “Here is the information about Vice President Kamala Harris' record that both Facebook and the administration itself don't want the American people to know,” Carr said. “In 2021, Vice President Harris agreed to lead the administration's signature $42 billion plan to connect millions of Americans to the internet. Back then, Vice President Harris said we can get the job done today.” Carr noted that despite this massive expense, Harris had absolutely nothing to show for her efforts. He specifically said, “Well, flash forward to today, it's been now 1,072 days, since she took the helm of this program and as you noted, not one single American has been connected to the internet, not single shovel's worth of dirt has been turned and calling that out resulted in a now false and debunked fact check but that's the information that the American people should be having access to right now.” For context, Facebook placed a fact check interstitial over a photo of an X post going after Harris for a serious failure. After the passage of the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act in 2021, the Biden-Harris administration presided over a $42 billion rural broadband program to give high-speed internet to millions.  Carr recently published a Wall Street Journal article noting that Harris personally “agreed to lead” the program. Carr noted that not only had no Americans been connected so far but that the administration did not expect anything to be built at all until 2025 or 2026.  Carr also wrote that politics took precedence over serving Americans without internet. Carr wrote that the program “has adopted regulations that include diversity, equity and inclusion requirements, climate-change rules, price controls, preferences for union labor, and schemes that favor government-run networks.” During the interview, Fox Business Host Maria Bartiromo mentioned the shocking fact that Meta’s fact-check depended on the word of the same administration that had failed to connect any Americans. Carr also emphasized this in an Oct. 19 post on X, writing, “The fact checker’s only sources are Biden-Harris officials.” This is not the first time that Meta has interfered in an election. Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg recently confessed in writing that Facebook and Instagram bowed to government pressure and  wrongly censored the Hunter Biden laptop story and “COVID-19 content.”  In his post on X, Carr reminded Zuckerberg of Facebook’s past on this issue, pointedly writing, “I thought Zuckerberg promised Congress that it had stopped censoring posts at the behest of the Biden-Harris Administration.” Unfortunately, censorship is still happening in this cycle on Facebook. Recently, Facebook removed an ad from Michigan Republican Senate candidate Mike Rogers attacking his opponent over her radical views on transgenderism. Meta told The Daily Wire that the removal was an error.  Conservatives are under attack! Contact your representatives and demand that Big Tech be held to account to mirror the First Amendment while providing transparency, clarity on so-called hate speech and equal footing for conservatives. If you have been censored, contact us using CensorTrack’s contact form, and help us hold Big Tech accountable.

The October 23 New York Times ran a Donald Trump headline on the top-right corner of the paper, and a Kamala Harris headline just underneath it. The headline contrast is so cartoonish you might blink twice and think this is a Babylon Bee prank.  First, the Trump headline, from reporter Peter Baker:  A Scandal-Plagued Career Nears a Decisive Moment Trump Has Been Accused of Wrongdoing at Scale Unseen at Presidential Level  Underneath that, a Kamala story by reporters Tim Arango and Heather Knight:  Harris, Crime Fighter by Day, Courted High Society at Night This has the Bat-Girl vibes, she's a masked superhero in the daylight, then she's unassuming Barbara Gordon in the evening. Arango and Knight sounded like they were writing a screenplay:  OAKLAND, Calif. -- In August 1996, a jury in an Oakland, Calif., courtroom convicted a man of slicing off a portion of his girlfriend’s scalp. The prosecutor was Kamala Harris, and the gruesome case was one of the few that made news early in her career.  “It was a vicious crime,” Ms. Harris told The Oakland Tribune. She was in her seventh year as a rank-and-file prosecutor in Alameda County, doing battle with suspected drug lords and murderers in Oakland, which was still contending with the crack epidemic. Weeks later, Ms. Harris was back in the news, this time across the bay in San Francisco as a boldface name in the society pages, among the young and fashionable who had gathered for a martini party at a Polo Ralph Lauren store ahead of the Fall Antiques Show…. By day, she developed the courtroom skills that have shaped her methodical approach as a candidate. By night, she moved through San Francisco high society, nurturing the financial and political connections that became instrumental in her national rise. And this is how Peter Baker began the Trump take-down:  WASHINGTON -- When the history of the 2024 election is written, one of the iconic images illustrating it will surely be the mug shot taken of Donald J. Trump after one of his four indictments, staring into the camera with his signature glare. It is an image not of shame but of defiance, the image of a man who would be a convicted felon before Election Day and yet possibly president of the United States again afterward. Sometimes lost amid all the shouting of a high-octane campaign heading into its final couple of weeks is that simple if mind-bending fact. America for the first time in its history may send a criminal to the Oval Office and entrust him with the nuclear codes. What would once have been automatically disqualifying barely seems to slow Mr. Trump down in his comeback march for a second term that he says will be devoted to “retribution.” ....His persecution defense, the notion that he gets in so much trouble only because everyone is out to get him, resonates at his rallies where he says “they’re not coming after me, they’re coming after you, and I’m just standing in the way.” But that of course belies a record of scandal stretching across his 78 years starting long before politics. Whether in his personal life or his public life, he has been accused of so many acts of wrongdoing, investigated by so many prosecutors and agencies, sued by so many plaintiffs and claimants that it requires a scorecard just to remember them all. Accusation = Guilt. This is one of many exhibits in the Museum of Liberal Tilt! 

Vice President Kamala Harris is facing another electoral dip among Latino voters, despite being a historically reliable voter demographic for Democrats. Former President Donald Trump has pulled ahead of Harris by 11 points among Latino voters at 49% while the Democratic nominee trails at just 38%, according to a USA TODAY/Suffolk University poll from Monday. While Trump has made inroads with the demographic, this slip in support is cause for alarm for the Harris camp.Latinos have consistently voted in favor of Democratic presidential candidates. In 2020, President Joe Biden secured 65% of the Hispanic vote while Trump pulled 32% support. Similarly, Democratic nominee Hillary Clinton won 66% of the Hispanic vote with 28% supporting Trump in 2016. "She needs to stop targeting specific groups and instead say, 'I'm going to be the president for all Americans,'" Jon McHenry, a GOP polling analyst and vice president at North Star Opinion Research, told Blaze News. "She's got enough leaks in her boat now that she just needs a new boat," McHenry continued. This trend could prove particularly consequential for the 2024 presidential race in swing states with substantial Hispanic populations. Roughly a third of the population in Arizona and Nevada is Latino, two states that have become increasingly tight for the presidential hopefuls. In Arizona, Trump is currently an average of 1.8 points ahead of Harris, which is a slimmer margin compared to a 4.2 point lead in July after President Joe Biden dropped out of the race. Trump is also holding a 0.9 point advantage in Nevada, which Harris has managed to narrow from four points in late July. "This puts Nevada in jeopardy, and it puts Arizona in jeopardy for sure, but it also puts Georgia and North Carolina in jeopardy," McHenry told Blaze News. "It's not a gigantic share of the population, but it may be enough, especially in the case of Georgia, where there was an 11,000 vote margin last time. At this point, she could lose that in almost any demographic."The Democratic nominee is still trying to recoup her losses. Harris' campaign released a list of policy proposals Tuesday that she said would "deliver real changes for Latino men and their families" just a week after unveiling her "opportunity agenda" for black men. Similar to last week's pitch, Harris is offering up no-interest, fully forgivable small-business loans for Hispanics, down-payment assistance for first-time Hispanic homebuyers, and a $6,000 child tax credit for Latino families. "She's got 55 plans to increase the deficit, but what is she really trying to do?" McHenry told Blaze News. "There's no real sense of an overarching goal. There's no real sense of leadership when you're cherry-picking the groups you're talking to."Harris is attempting to regain ground she has lost in light of her extremely unpopular track record. The majority of Hispanic voters, 55%, said they disapprove of her job as vice president while just 35% said they approved, according to the USA TODAY/Suffolk University poll. Hispanics also prefer Trump over Harris to handle issues that are most important to them. Among Hispanics, Trump outperformed Harris 58% to 34% on the economy and 54% to 38% on immigration, according to the poll. The majority, 56%, said Trump would provide strong leadership while just 38% said the same for Harris. "I just think that the Biden-Harris administration's record on the economy is forcing a lot of people to vote based on their pocketbooks rather than social issues, especially the Hispanic voter," McHenry told Blaze News. "She's terrified that she's going to lose," McHenry continued. "She's not going to lose Hispanic voters overall, but she's terrified she's going to lose too much of the Hispanic vote." The Harris campaign did not respond to a request for comment from Blaze News.Like Blaze News? Bypass the censors, sign up for our newsletters, and get stories like this direct to your inbox. Sign up here!

There are only two weeks left until Election Day 2024, and if there’s any truth to the latest polling trends, things are looking good for Donald Trump. While Stu Burguiere of “Stu Does America” is “always resistant to good news,” the polls he’s seeing seem to spell a “last-minute collapse” for the vice president. “To remind you, on polling averages, there’s a little bit of secret sauce in every polling average. It’s no polling average is pure, if you will. The closest thing you can come to pure would be RealClearPolitics,” Stu says before analyzing a Washington Post poll, which he admits does have “secret sauce.” The Washington Post poll has Kamala Harris up by very little in key battleground states, which Stu says reflects a “very close election.” The New York Times has reported a “slight Trump shift” but “no real favorite” in the presidential race. “If the polls missed like they did in 2022, as I mentioned, they underestimated Democratic support. Harris would sweep all of these states with the exception of Georgia and run away with the election win with over 300 electoral votes,” Stu says. “If the polls missed like they did in 2020, Donald Trump would dominate a lot of these polls in states, and would win all of these swing states and win with over 300 electoral votes,” he adds. Stu calls this “very uncertain territory” and says that “at the end of the day, you have a very close election and you don’t know what is going to happen.” However, Stu is optimistic. “You have to understand that this is the best chance Donald Trump has ever had to win an election. Now, he won in 2016, but he was a major underdog in 2016. In 2020, he was an even bigger underdog,” Stu says. “In 2024, it’s basically an even race. And if the past is prologue, if past performance is indicative of future results, in this particular instance, you’ve got a lot of room to sit here and be optimistic,” he adds. Want more from Stu?To enjoy more of Stu's lethal wit, wisdom, and mockery, subscribe to BlazeTV — the largest multi-platform network of voices who love America, defend the Constitution, and live the American dream.