Category: blaze media

Like most American Jewish kids, I went to a Jewish summer camp. It was a good time: archery, canoeing, crafts, and a first kiss. I forget how many years I went. It was two or three summers in a row, I think.

Aside from the standard Jewish cultural stuff, such as singing, dancing, and Jewish-themed crafting, we did some historical role-playing.

The more they try to incite panic, the more suspicious you should be.

One of these role-playing exercises was when we had to “Escape the Nazis.” The camp counselors played the Nazis, while the kids played European Jews. We had to sneak around to reach the safe area without getting caught.

Looking back with the perspective of a parent, I don’t see the wisdom of this sort of re-enactment. I feel that just learning about the Holocaust was valuable enough. But we all had fun with it, and I don’t think it caused any harm.

But one night, they crossed the line.

In the early morning hours, the camp counselors woke us up. They said it was an emergency and gathered us in the dining hall. One of the lead counselors told us that the Arabs had gotten a nuclear weapon and destroyed Israel.

They told us everyone was dead — vaporized and turned to ash, like the Jews at Auschwitz.

Needless to say, we were pretty freaked out. Some of the kids — the kids who had family in Israel — were crying and wailing, screaming things like, “But what about Auntie Rachel??”

But the counselor calmed us down, and we all stood in a circle, held hands, said prayers, and sang some songs.

But then … they told us (haha) that Israel did not get destroyed tonight and most of the Jews in the world did not, in fact, get vaporized, but it was important to remember that this was something that could happen, and that’s why we — as Jews — need to remain hypervigilant about the people who hate us.

Then they put us back to bed. Good night, kids!

Needless to say, this was pretty traumatizing. Even today, when I see the words “Arab” and “nuclear” in the same sentence, that old anxiety comes roaring back.

However, that old anxiety is immediately followed by anger and resentment over what they did to us. Because this is what brainwashing is.

In the 1980s, when I was a kid at summer camp, no Arab state was even close to getting a bomb. And no Arab state is close now.

In recent memory, I have been told numerous times by authoritative sources that Iran is “two weeks away from a bomb!” so we must “act now!” But several years have gone by, and it doesn’t seem like Iran has a bomb yet.

For what it’s worth, I was also told — by the same authoritative sources — that we needed to remain in our home for “two weeks to stop the spread.” So I’m starting to think “two weeks” is a standard BS timeline. Just like when my wife says she’ll be home in “five minutes.”

And yes, some Arab states had (and have) secret weapons programs. But every competently governed country in the world (including Israel) has a secret weapons program, because they would be stupid not to have a secret weapons program.

But from a rational standpoint, Israel was safe that night. At least as safe as it can be, considering that it is surrounded by hostile neighbors who would, in fact, like to destroy it.

So yes, the threat to Israel is a very real thing. Any Israeli will tell you this. But it’s a complicated issue. Anyone who has delved into the geopolitics of the Middle East knows that it is a complicated issue.

The messy Middle East

For what it’s worth, I like Israel. I want to see Israel and the people who live there thrive. And Israeli children shouldn’t have to hide in bomb shelters while Iranian ballistic missiles are bombarding their cities. And they certainly shouldn’t be slaughtered or kidnapped like they were on October 7. Just like I don’t think anyone should be slaughtered or kidnapped.

Sometimes force is needed — as I believe it was in Gaza — but sometimes not. And often, it is just plain messy.

I believe we can calmly and rationally parse these complex issues. But the point of waking us up in the middle of the night was to remove calm rationality from the calculation and replace it with visceral fear.

They tried to break our little brains. And it probably worked on most of the kids.

Looking back, I suspect there were complaints from parents, because I don’t recall this happening in subsequent years. But my revulsion remains.

This was a counterproductive way to educate us about very real issues. Instead of illuminating the very real danger of anti-Semitism, the experience gave me a deep skepticism of Zionist propaganda and a distrust of Jewish-American cultural institutions.

Today, over 35 years later, I’m a fairly secular Jew. And while we celebrate holidays at home, I have never let my kids set foot inside a synagogue or Jewish Community Center.

Now, I’m sure most people in these institutions are, in fact, earnest and kind and would never intentionally traumatize a child. But the risk remains.

Because there are self-righteous zealots in this world — and it’s not just limited to Jews. They tend to congregate wherever there’s some sort of political cause. Environmentalists, socialists, trans/gay activists — they’re everywhere.

These people are dangerous, and I don’t want them anywhere near my children.

Many years later — long after summer camp, when I was a professional adult — I met a woman at a party. It turned out that she worked for the parent organization of my childhood summer camp.

I told her I went to one of her camps, as did she, and we had a nice conversation.

Then she asked me if I wanted to “get involved,” which really meant “would you like to donate?” I politely declined, and she asked me why.

So I told her. I told her what happened that night in the dining hall, that I don’t approve of those methods, that it’s counterproductive, and that I would hate for this to happen to other children.

She turned white. Just stark white.

Because I had broached a topic that was not to be discussed, she knew this had happened before. But it wasn’t something to be discussed. Awkward and sheepish, she stammered, “Uh, no. We don’t do ‘Experiential Learning’ any more.”

The thing they did to us had a name. It was called “Experiential Learning,” and it’s quite the euphemism. I’m sure there are many research papers on the topic. But I’ll take her at her word. Maybe, as she said, they don’t do “Experiential Learning” any more.

They probably don’t do it because those types — the self-righteous zealots — found something better. They discovered the media hoax.

Media malcontents

I’ve been around media for most of my adult life, and I knew this sort of thing happened, but the recent federal indictment of the Southern Poverty Law Center laid it bare.

It would seem, like a shady tire repair shop scattering nails on the street to cause flats, that the SPLC was allegedly paying neo-Nazis, the KKK, and other hate groups to hold rallies and commit crimes to raise funds and justify the SPLC’s mission of combatting “hate.”

Among other things, the SPLC allegedly funded the organizers of the 2017 Unite the Right Rally in Charlottesville, Virginia.

How many brains were broken by a bunch of chuds carrying tiki torches in Charlottesville? Was it in the hundreds of millions? More?

It almost broke my brain. Because I watched the mainstream media coverage, and what I saw was blood in the streets. American blood. In American streets.

And I don’t like blood in the streets. Just like I don’t like Israeli blood in Israeli streets. Just like I don’t like to see any blood in any street.

But something didn’t add up. Something was off. Because Charlottesville was portrayed in the media as a morality play, as a simple story of good vs evil. But, as with Middle East geopolitics, nothing is that simple.

The so-called “organizers,” who were cast as the villains, were too cartoonish. There was something fake. The tone was off. It was inauthentic.

Just like the camp counselors were inauthentic that night in the dining hall.

I think about Charlottesville, Russiagate, January 6, COVID, and all the other media hoaxes. It’s all the same thing — with the same pathology. The camp counselors are all grown up now, but the self-righteous zealotry remains — as does their goal. They want you to feel fear. And they don’t want you to think for yourself.

So when you see something in the media that makes you afraid, stop and think. Not that you shouldn’t be concerned, but think it through first. Think about who’s trying to manipulate you and why.

The more they try to incite panic, the more suspicious you should be. Because what you’re probably seeing is just “Experiential Learning” for the rest of us. And it’s best to ignore it.

A version of this article was originally published as an X post.

​Brainwashing, Israel, Manipulation, Media hoax, Middle east, Southern poverty law center, Opinion & analysis 

The resurrection of the body and the true meaning of eternity is one of the most misunderstood ideas in Christianity, as many believe that the goal of being a Christian is to “go to heaven” after we die.

And BlazeTV host Allie Beth Stuckey and theologian Wes Huff are setting the record straight.

“It’s a sign of restoration, Allie,” Wes says of the “resurrection of the body.”

“It’s a sign that when Jesus says, you know, ‘I’m making all things new’ in the book of Revelation, that that’s a promise. That we understand that the world was not created to be the way that it is. That it was created good,” he tells Stuckey.

Huff points out that the phrase “it’s good” is repeated throughout the Bible as a reminder that the world is “marred by sin, but it was meant for so much more.”

“And that’s going to be restored. We’re going to see how God makes all things new,” he says.

As for going to heaven, Huff begins by noting “we often have this understanding that our end goal is to get to heaven.”

“We leave this mortal coil and that’s it, and we’re trying to escape. That’s actually an ancient pagan idea. The ancient platonic philosophers and the gnostics believed that the physical was bad and the spiritual was good and that our spirits are really trapped in these meat prisons. And the goal is to get away from this all,” he explains.

“And I think we swallow something that’s false when we think of heaven as the final goal. What we read about and what you see within the Old Testament in the hope of the resurrection is that all of the created order is going to be aligned and made new and restored and that’s going to be beautiful,” he continues.

God’s creations — the sunrise, the mountains, the ocean — will be restored to what they were meant to be.

“We’re going to be in awe once again at mountains, at stars, at oceans, at valleys, at, you know, forests, at deserts. These things are going to continue to bring us into awe in eternity because God is going to resurrect us in a body that is, I think … probably analogous to something that we have here on earth, but much, much better,” Huff explains.

“Heaven is the layover. It’s going to be a great layover. It’s going to be an amazing layover,” he says, adding, “but it’s not going to be the end goal.”

Want more from Allie Beth Stuckey?

To enjoy more of Allie’s upbeat and in-depth coverage of culture, news, and theology from a Christian, conservative perspective, subscribe to BlazeTV — the largest multi-platform network of voices who love America, defend the Constitution, and live the American dream.

​Allie beth stuckey, Ancient pagan idea, Awe in eternity, Blazetv host, Christianity goal, Created good, Created order, Final goal, Going to heaven, Hope of resurrection, Layover in heaven, Making all things new, Marred by sin, Meat prisons, Misunderstood ideas, Mountains ocean, Physical vs spiritual, Promise of restoration, Restored creations, Resurrected body, Resurrection of body, Sign of restoration, Theologian wes huff, True meaning of eternity, End goal, Blaze media, Blaze online, Blaze originals, Blazetv, Blaze podcasts, Blaze podcast network, Relatable with allie beth stuckey 

Whenever someone criticizes in vitro fertilization, the same response tends to come quickly: pictures of smiling toddlers, grateful parents, and testimonies from couples who spent years praying for a child.

For many people, that response feels decisive. How can something that produced such a beautiful little boy or girl be spoken of as morally troubling or wrong?

The public image of IVF — one happy baby — hides an unseen reality: other babies who never made it out of the laboratory.

On the surface, that reaction makes sense. Infertility can be a deep heartache. It is the repeated pain of empty nurseries, unanswered prayers, and hopes that seem to die month after month. People who have walked through that kind of grief are understandably drawn toward anything that promises relief.

My wife and I understand that heartache more than we wish we do.

We have lost multiple children through miscarriage. We have walked through a decade of infertility. We know what it is to ask God for life and hear silence. We understand the deep inward pull toward anything that might finally bring hope into reality.

This conversation is difficult. No decent person wants to speak carelessly into someone else’s suffering.

But moral questions do not disappear because suffering is involved. Pain can explain why a person reaches for something, but it cannot, by itself, make the solution righteous.

That is where the public conversation about IVF has gone extremely wrong.

RELATED: IVF CEO says conceiving naturally is for those with ‘genetic privilege’

Stephen McCarthy/Sportsfile/Getty Images

IVF is almost always presented to Americans as a compassionate medical service. The happy nursery photos become the public face of the debate, and because those photos are emotionally powerful, very few people ever stop to ask what the IVF process itself actually entails.

Modern IVF does not only involve the creation of one embryonic child who is then implanted in the womb; it involves the creation of several embryonic children at once.

Some are chosen for transfer, some fail in the process and are discarded, and some are intentionally destroyed during testing. And more than a million embryonic children are now estimated to remain frozen in cryogenic storage facilities across the United States, suspended indefinitely because they were the extras in someone’s attempt to have a baby.

That means the public image of IVF — one happy baby — hides an unseen reality: other babies who never made it out of the laboratory.

This is not a rare malfunction of an otherwise innocent process. In 2024, when Alabama courts recognized frozen embryos destroyed at a fertility clinic as children under wrongful death law, the fertility industry immediately panicked, and lawmakers rushed to shield IVF providers from liability.

The death of embryonic children is not an unusual accident hovering at the edges of IVF. It is the standard practice.

We should be willing to say clearly what that means.

When embryonic children are intentionally destroyed because they are unwanted or medically inconvenient, that is murder. When embryonic children are frozen indefinitely because they were not selected, that is not a harmless pause in treatment. It is human beings placed in suspended imprisonment.

At this point, defenders of IVF usually return to the same emotional appeal: “Yes, but look at the children it has produced.” Some will even say, “Look at my child.”

And this is where the deepest confusion is found. Because the children produced through IVF are not the issue under dispute. Of course those children bear the image of God. Of course they are worthy of every ounce of love their parents can give them.

RELATED: Fertility doctors are bullying women into IVF

Blaze Media

Their value is not diminished in the slightest by the means of their conception. But the value of the child is not the same thing as the morality of the process. We understand this distinction instinctively in other tragic circumstances.

A child conceived in rape is no less human because of the violence surrounding his conception. His life may be full of joy, dignity, and meaning. And he certainly has the image of God stamped upon him.

Yet no one would argue that the beauty of that child makes rape morally acceptable, because we know that a precious child does not retroactively justify wicked circumstances.

That same principle must be applied to IVF.

Yes, IVF has produced children who are deeply loved, but those children do not morally absolve a process that routinely murders some embryonic children, freezes others, and treats human life as laboratory surplus in order to obtain a successful outcome.

In fact, those surviving children prove the very point many people are trying to avoid.

If the child in the nursery photo is an image-bearer now, then the embryonic siblings destroyed, discarded, or frozen in the same process were image-bearers then.

The question is not whether children conceived through IVF have value. The question is whether the existence of those loved children gives us permission to ignore the murdered and imprisoned children involved in producing them.

A good gift does not justify an evil method. And gratitude for one surviving child cannot erase the moral guilt of the children that modern fertility medicine leaves frozen, discarded, and dead.

​In vitro fertilization, Ivf, Ivf debate, Moral questions, Infertility pain, Image of god, Infertility, Embryos, Opinion & analysis 

Imagine you’re traveling down a road in a bus, and your driver suddenly passes out. What emotions would you and other passengers feel in that moment? Surely it’s a terrifying situation.

Now imagine that scenario taking place aboard a bus filled with middle schoolers — and the only adult around is the one who just went limp behind the wheel.

‘It started gaining speed. I didn’t know it had air brakes, so whenever I clicked the brakes, it about threw me out the windshield.’

Well, that’s exactly what happened aboard a Mississippi school bus recently, WLOX-TV reported.

Driver Leah Taylor experienced a medical emergency while operating a Hancock Middle School bus on the afternoon of April 22, and she suddenly passed out, the station said.

The terrifying scene was captured on bus surveillance video.

“She kind of fell over, like flopped over, and everyone started standing up,” McKenzy Finch, a sixth grader, told WLOX.

Amazingly, the middle schoolers took fast action and worked together.

RELATED: Heroic HS football players rush to wrecked car as smoke pours from hood — and rescue woman trapped inside: ‘These kids really did run right into danger’

Jackson Casnave, a sixth grader, grabbed the steering wheel, the station said.

“I saw that the bus was veering off to the side. Then I grabbed the wheel,” Jackson told WLOX.

“It was just adrenaline pumping,” he added.

Darrius Clark, also a sixth grader, hit the brakes as the bus started going faster, the station added.

“So she passed out again, and then the bus started rolling forward. And, I mean, it started gaining speed,” Darrius told WLOX. “I didn’t know it had air brakes, so whenever I clicked the brakes, it about threw me out the windshield.”

Kayleigh Clark, an eighth grader, called 911, the station said, and Destiny Cornelius, also an eighth grader, gave the bus driver her medicine.

“I saw her medication in her hand, and I saw her reaching for it,” Destiny noted to WLOX. “I knew that’s what she needed.”

Video soon shows the bus having finally come to a stop as the students continue to shout instructions and rally around Taylor, their driver.

RELATED: Kindergartners on hijacked school bus asked armed intruder so many questions that he got ‘frustrated’ and let them off, hero bus driver recalls

Melissa Saucier, principal of Hancock Middle School, told the station that her students handled the emergency correctly.

“I’m not surprised to hear that our kids remained calm and acted swiftly,” Saucier added to WLOX. “This emergency situation could have definitely been detrimental. And they handled it exactly how they should have, and we’re extremely proud of them.”

In fact, the students later were recognized for their actions at a school pep rally, the station said.

As for Taylor, she told WLOX she’s back to normal, feeling better, and naturally very grateful and thankful for her young passengers.

“I’m very proud of them,” she told the station. “I couldn’t ask for any better students than my students on my bus. I love every single one of them.”

“I’m gonna think of how they saved my life,” she added.

Like Blaze News? Bypass the censors, sign up for our newsletters, and get stories like this direct to your inbox. Sign up here!

​Good news, Hancock middle school, Heroic kids, Middle school students, Mississippi, Runaway bus, School bus driver passes out, Video, Human interest 

Speculation is mounting that comedian and podcaster Theo Von is on the path to becoming a true Christian. Recent clips of him getting emotional about Jesus, attending Bible study with country music star Morgan Wallen, and asking God for a “new story” have gone viral, sparking Christian commentary and reactions about his faith journey. Von has even described himself as searching for the Lord and spiritual healing.

But is he really on the path to salvation in Christ?

BlazeTV host Rick Burgess asked this question and evaluated the evidence on a recent episode of “The Rick Burgess Show.”

“We know a pretty good friend of Theo Von … I reached out to that brother yesterday,” says Rick, noting that this person is “a man of God.”

He inquired about Von’s faith journey, and the message he received back was surprising: “I think sometimes people like Theo Von … has more trust in what Jesus can do than many people who already profess their faith in Him.”

Rick is encouraged by this message.

“Theo Von seems to know that Jesus Christ is going to transform his life,” he says.

The costliness of this transformation, Rick notes, is one of the more painful parts of the Christian walk.

“When Jesus says count the cost, usually what we think of are the martyrs. Nothing wrong with that. Or we think of I might lose my job, I might lose friends … I might have family members who abandon me. That’s all true,” he says, “but what Jesus is talking about that I think sometimes the most difficult for us is it’s going to cost us our sin. He is going to call us to a new life.”

To Rick, it seems like Von is “being honest” about this reality of the Christian faith.

“Theo Von seems to be fully aware of what is at stake here, and he’s being honest. He’s not sure that he wants it,” he speculates.

Rick then plays a recent clip of Von that he says captures this authentic wrestle he believes Von is currently caught up in.

In the video, an emotional Von recaps the story of Jesus healing a chronically ill man in Bethesda.

“Jesus asks him, ‘Do you want to be healed?’ … and that’s a crazy question because, you know, if I get healed then I’m different. You know, if somebody gets healed, they have a new story,” he said.

“So that’s just been something that I’ve been having to ask myself. It’s like, yeah, do I want to be healed? Do I really want something different? And sometimes, a lot of the answer is no, I don’t,” he continued, fighting tears.

“I don’t know if I’m scared of it. I don’t know what I am. I don’t know if I don’t want to do what it takes to get, I can’t even tell what it is. And it’s hard for me. Some of this stuff’s a little bit hard for me to say. I think I don’t even know why, but I think I want a new story.”

Rick is blown away by Von’s willingness to be so authentically vulnerable about his wrestle.

“That’s honest right there, folks,” he says, emphasizing that Von’s use of the word “hard” reflects a genuine understanding of Jesus’ warning in Matthew 7 about the two paths — an easy one that leads to death and an incredibly difficult one that leads to life.

It is clear to Rick that Von is aware choosing the path of life will prove costly to him.

He hopes, however, that someone who knows the Lord is teaching Von that if he chooses life, he won’t be walking the costly path alone.

“Theo knows something’s going to change, but I hope he understands that Jesus will do the changing,” he says, citing John 15:4: “Abide in me, and I in you. As the branch cannot bear fruit by itself, unless it abides in the vine, neither can you, unless you abide in me.”

While he doesn’t know what decision Von will ultimately make, one thing is clear to Rick: “The Holy Spirit is working on Theo.”

To hear more and see the clip of Von vulnerably admitting his wrestle with the gospel, watch the episode above.

Want more from Rick Burgess?

To enjoy more bold talk and big laughs, subscribe to BlazeTV — the largest multi-platform network of voices who love America, defend the Constitution, and live the American dream.

​Blaze media, Blazetv, Christ, Christian, Comedian, Faith journey, Matthew 7, New life, Podcaster, Rick burgess, The rick burgess show, Theo von 

Spend enough time around atheists, and you’ll hear a familiar refrain: the Bible as a bundle of fairy tales about a “sky god,” stitched together long after the fact and taken seriously only out of habit.

That tone has filtered down into the culture more broadly, where it is not always argued so much as assumed. The biblical world is treated as distant and half-imagined — useful for moral lessons, perhaps, but not something you would expect to intersect with recoverable history.

In 2004, work in Jerusalem uncovered a stepped pool that matched the description of the Pool of Siloam — where Jesus sends a blind man to wash.

Archaeology doesn’t answer the larger questions of faith. It doesn’t attempt to. But it does something more modest and, in its own way, more disruptive: It keeps turning up evidence that biblical events actually happened.

RELATED: 5 reasons this ‘Noah’s ark’ discovery is harder to dismiss than skeptics admit

Heritage Images/Getty Images

1. The Tel Dan Stele

It was once common to hear that King David belonged more to tradition than to history — a useful founding figure whose existence could not be confirmed.

That position became harder to hold after fragments of a ninth-century B.C. inscription were found at Tel Dan. Written by a neighboring kingdom, it refers to the “House of David,” using the standard language of dynasties.

It doesn’t tell us everything about David. It does show that, within a couple of generations, surrounding nations recognized a ruling line traced back to him. That’s not how ancient peoples spoke about fictional ancestors.

2. The Pontius Pilate Inscription

The Gospels place Jesus within a very specific Roman context, under a prefect named Pontius Pilate. Historians had references to Pilate in written sources, but for years nothing material.

A stone inscription found in Caesarea in 1961 supplied that missing piece, naming Pilate and identifying his office.

It is the sort of detail that rarely makes headlines. But it reinforces something the Gospels assume throughout: They are describing events within a functioning Roman administration, not an abstract or symbolic setting.

3. The Dead Sea Scrolls

Before the mid-20th century, the gap between the oldest surviving Hebrew manuscripts and the time of their composition left room for speculation. Some assumed the text had shifted substantially over the centuries.

The 1947 discovery of the Dead Sea Scrolls changed the terms of that discussion. Dating back more than a thousand years earlier than previously known manuscripts, they preserve large portions of the Old Testament.

What stands out is not perfect uniformity, but consistency. Variants exist, as they do in any manuscript tradition. Yet the overall stability of the text across such a long span is difficult to ignore.

For anyone concerned about how Scripture was transmitted, this matters more than any abstract argument.

4. The Pool of Siloam

The Gospel of John has often been treated as more theological in tone, with less confidence placed in its geographical detail.

Then, in 2004, work in Jerusalem uncovered a stepped pool that matched the description of the Pool of Siloam — where Jesus sends a blind man to wash.

What began as a partial discovery has gradually expanded. Last year, ongoing excavations revealed more of the pool’s full extent — confirming that it was not a small ritual basin, but a prominent landmark used by pilgrims making their way up to the Temple.

The discovery wasn’t driven by an attempt to confirm the Gospel. It emerged from routine excavation and has been clarified piece by piece since. Its alignment with John’s account has led even cautious scholars to acknowledge the text’s familiarity with pre-A.D. 70 Jerusalem.

5. Hezekiah’s Tunnel

Biblical accounts of kings often face skepticism, especially when they describe large-scale projects under pressure.

In 2 Kings and 2 Chronicles, King Hezekiah prepares Jerusalem for an Assyrian invasion by securing the city’s water supply — redirecting the Gihon Spring so that it can’t be used by enemy forces outside the walls. It’s described briefly in Scripture, almost in passing, but the implication is significant: a major engineering effort carried out under the pressure of an approaching army.

In Jerusalem, the tunnel itself has long been known and even traversed — an ancient water channel cutting through bedrock. What wasn’t clear for centuries was whether this was the tunnel described in Scripture or simply one of several.

Significant doubt was removed in 1880, when two boys exploring the passage discovered an inscription a few meters from the southern exit. Carved into the wall, it describes workers digging from opposite ends and hearing each other’s voices as they broke through. Jerusalem was part of Ottoman-ruled Palestine at the time, and the inscription was taken to Turkey, where it remains today.

The tone is practical, even understated. It reads like the kind of record people leave when they have completed something difficult — not the kind they invent later.

6. The Cyrus Cylinder

The Book of Ezra depicts Persia’s Cyrus the Great permitting the exiled Jews of Judah — the southern kingdom centered on Jerusalem — to return and rebuild their temple.

Some skeptics have regarded this account as suspiciously convenient — exaggerated to fit a theological narrative presenting Cyrus as a kind of divinely appointed liberator for Judah.

A clay cylinder discovered in Babylon in 1879 complicates this view. It describes Cyrus restoring displaced peoples and supporting their religious practices across the empire — not as a one-off gesture, but as a governing approach.

It doesn’t mention Judah directly, but it does place the return from exile within a broader, historically plausible imperial pattern.

7. The Ketef Hinnom Scrolls

Debates over when parts of the Old Testament were composed often turn on how early we can place recognizable text.

Two small silver scrolls found in a burial site near Jerusalem in 1979 contain a version of the priestly blessing from Numbers: “The Lord bless you and keep you …”

They date to the seventh century B.C., before the Babylonian exile.

Delicate and tightly rolled, they show that passages still read in churches today were already in use centuries earlier than some theories allowed.

None of this proves the claims that matter most to Christians. It doesn’t attempt to weigh miracles or settle theology.

It does, however, narrow the distance between the biblical text and the world it describes. Enough, at least, to make the old habit of dismissing it as a collection of late-arriving myths seem a little less secure than it once did.

​Apologetics, Christianity, Cyrus cylinder, Hezekiahs tunnel, Ketef hinnom scrolls, Pontius pilate inscription, Pool of siloam, Tel dan stele, Faith 

Two Florida 18-year-old males were arrested after taking part in what Ocala Police called a “social media stunt” last weekend.

And what did our heroes do, exactly?

‘You know what they say: They don’t arrest the smart ones. Somebody needs to take a lawnmower and a leaf blower to those haircuts though, good Lord.’

Well, police said Janek Szkaradek drove a lawnmower through a Target store on SW College Road on Saturday while Luke Charske recorded the hijinks on video.

Szkaradek’s questionable driving skills resulted in a damaged door at the store.

If that weren’t enough, Szkaradek the previous night used a leaf blower inside a Culver’s restaurant on SW College Road, police said.

Law enforcement officials weren’t amused.

“These actions endangered people and caused property damage,” police said. “They are crimes, not harmless videos. Think before you record — it’s not worth an arrest and a criminal charge.”

Police said Szkaradek was charged with criminal mischief and disorderly conduct for the incident at Culver’s and disorderly conduct for the incident at Target. Police said Charske was charged as a principal to disorderly conduct for the incident at Target.

RELATED: Video: Florida motorist decides to drive in reverse for a while — and then comes face-to-face with deputies

Many commenters under the Ocala Police Department’s Facebook entry about the lads’ bad behavior were at once merciless and hilarious:

“You know what they say: They don’t arrest the smart ones,” one commenter wrote. “Somebody needs to take a lawnmower and a leaf blower to those haircuts though, good Lord.””Beavis & Butthead 2026 Edition,” another user reacted.”I’m surprised natural selection didn’t take them with the mower,” another user observed. “They ought to make them take the mower and blower and do everyone’s yard work!” another commenter declared.”Congrats boys — now you have something to put on your resume,” another user quipped.”I want to know the brand name of the leaf blower. Left out that important detail,” another commenter noted. “Mine hardly moves the leaves off my patio … inquiring minds want to know.”

Like Blaze News? Bypass the censors, sign up for our newsletters, and get stories like this direct to your inbox. Sign up here!

​Dumb teens, Ocala, Florida, Lawn mower, Target, Arrests, Charges, Stunt, Crime 

On a recent episode of “Relatable,” Allie Beth Stuckey sat down with Latter-day Saints podcaster Jacob Hansen to dive into all things Mormonism vs. Christianity. Allie asked all the toughest questions that illuminated both the crossovers and the differentiations between her evangelical Christian faith and the faith of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.

In one of the spiciest segments of this 90-minute debate, Allie and Hansen tackled the crucial theological question: Are God, humans, angels, and even Satan all the same “type” of being?

In Allie’s perspective, this question isn’t about semantics. Our answer determines how we view God, Jesus, our great enemy, and what it means to be made in God’s image — all things that have eternal implications.

“There seems to be a little bit of a different origin story, though, that both Jesus and Satan were created in eternity past … that Satan and Jesus were brothers, [and] that we also — all of humankind — are brothers and sisters of Satan and Jesus. Is that correct?” Allie asks.

“I would say that Jesus and Satan are brother and sister in the same way that you and Nancy Pelosi are sisters,” Hansen jests.

“In Job 1, it says that the sons of God approached God and Satan was among them, right? So, okay, Satan is one of the sons of God, and Jesus is called the Son of God. So isn’t there some sense in which there’s some relationship there?” he continues.

But Allie interprets Scripture differently.

“How do you square that with the origin story that we read in Scripture that Satan was a fallen angel? … Jesus even says that he saw Satan fall like lightning from the sky, that he led his own army of rebellious angels who were demons in hell. And we don’t read that he was this being that was a brother to Jesus,” she counters.

“[Christians] would view angels as a totally different species from human beings, as some totally different creature. We don’t hold to that sort of view. We believe that angels are also the same species as human beings,” Hansen says.

“Scripture says that angels long to see what we see, that they long to know what we know. And so there does seem to be a distinction there,” Allie disputes.

Hansen concedes that there is certainly a difference between humans and angels, but that doesn’t necessarily mean they are different beings entirely. “Perhaps they’re pre-embodied beings or they’re post-embodied beings that are no longer embodied,” he says, “but we don’t make this distinction that there’s all these different sort of species of creatures that are out there. … We are all children of God.”

And that includes Jesus in the Mormon faith. Hansen points to Christ’s words in John 20, when he tells his disciples, “I am ascending to my Father and your Father, to my God and your God,” as evidence that Jesus is a created being just like humans.

Similarly, there’s nothing in Scripture, he argues, to suggest that angels “are of a different genus” than humans, making Satan (a fallen angel) a brother, in essence, to both human beings and Jesus.

“You’re kind of almost equating humans to God or that we can ascend to god-like status, and is that a belief that the LDS church has?” Allie follows up.

To hear Hansen’s answer, watch the episode above.

Want more from Allie Beth Stuckey?

To enjoy more of Allie’s upbeat and in-depth coverage of culture, news, and theology from a Christian, conservative perspective, subscribe to BlazeTV — the largest multi-platform network of voices who love America, defend the Constitution, and live the American dream.

​Ascend to godlike status, Christianity vs. mormonism, Church of jesus christ, Evangelical christian faith, Fallen angel, God humans angels, Jacob hansen, Latter-day saints, Lds church, Origin story, Relatable, Relatable with allie beth stuckey, Sons of god, Mormon theology, Blazetv, Blaze media 

The Android operating system is all about customization and user choice, but if you own a Samsung Galaxy phone, you’re getting ready to have one less option for texting your friends and family. Samsung recently announced that the official Samsung Messages app is shutting down this summer, and you will need to migrate to an alternative by the deadline.

Phasing out Samsung Messages

Although Google offers its core apps (colloquially known as GApps) on most Android devices for free, Samsung also has its own versions that come preloaded on its Galaxy phone lineup. One of those apps is Samsung Messages.

Samsung didn’t explicitly reveal why it is closing down its messaging app.

Billed as a simple text messaging app, Samsung Messages has long been the place where Galaxy owners send SMS and MMS to friends, family, co-workers, and anyone else with a phone number. That all changed in 2021 with the launch of the Galaxy S21 series. Those were the first phones in Samsung’s lineup to trade Samsung Messages for Google Messages, leading to all subsequent models launching with Google as the default texting option.

This year, Samsung is finally closing the loop, as it plans to shut down Samsung Messages entirely in favor of Google Messages, with a vague end-of-service deadline set for July 2026.

The end of Samsung Messages is a net benefit for users

Although it might be a pain for some users who have still hung on to the aging messages app, the shutdown and migration to Google Messages are actually a good thing. As we covered earlier this year, Google Messages is one of the only text messaging apps on Android that supports Rich Communication Services, the new texting gold standard that replaced SMS and MMS.

In case you need a quick refresher: RCS is better than antiquated texting tech because it offers end-to-end encryption for increased security between Android users (with iPhone encryption coming soon), cross-platform read receipts, improved group messaging features, and support for higher-res media files.

RELATED: RED FLAG: FBI says these apps let China suck up your personal data

Dragos Condrea/Getty Images

All in all, RCS is simply better, and since Samsung Messages doesn’t support it, Google’s version seems like a no-brainer.

How to set Google Messages as your default messaging app

Whether you still use Samsung Messages as your daily texting app or you’re not sure which app is set as your default, here’s how to check your settings to ensure that Google Messages is set up correctly:

Make sure Google Messages is downloaded and installed on your device. You can grab the app from the Google Play Store if you need it.Open the Settings app on your Samsung Galaxy device.Scroll down and tap “Apps” near the bottom of the page.Select “Choose default apps” at the top.Tap “SMS app.”Make sure the Google Messages app — the one with a blue messages icon and a white background — is selected.

Screenshots by Zach Laidlaw/Galaxy Z Fold7 on Android 16

Some caveats to consider

Before you do anything else, there are a few caveats to the shutdown that you should know:

Users on older Galaxy devices running Android 11 or lower will not be impacted by the switch. You can continue to use the same text messaging app unabated.Users on Android 12 or 13 may need to manually change the Messages app on their dock from Samsung Messages to Google Messages once the switch is complete. Everyone else will see Google Messages in their dock automatically once the switch is made.Samsung Messages will still be accessible and functional for emergency use for all users, even after the shutdown window has closed.

The reason Samsung Messages is shutting down

Samsung didn’t explicitly reveal why it is closing down its first-party text messaging app after all these years. However, there are a couple of possible reasons for the switch.

First is RCS support. Google doesn’t necessarily own the technology behind this new messaging standard, but it has championed the solution since bringing it to Android in 2019. More importantly, Google’s acquisition of Jibe Mobile in 2015 — an RCS company — gave it the foundation to sidestep carriers that drag their feet on enabling RCS support, in the same way that Apple subverted carriers with its own iMessage service on iOS. Through Google Messages, Google can control RCS features and adoption throughout the entire Android ecosystem and ensure a consistent experience across devices.

Second, Samsung and Google have grown closer in their partnership over the years, working together on huge projects like the Wear OS reboot in 2021, as well as the Samsung Galaxy XR headset that launched late last year. The switch to Google Messages is just another example of the companies collaborating to centralize and strengthen the Android ecosystem amid the growing threat that is Apple.

​Tech 

If the United States is serious about giving citizenship to worthy immigrants, we also need to be serious about revoking it from the unworthy.

More than 800,000 immigrants became American citizens in FY2024, and a comparable number are expected in FY2025. There are more than 25 million naturalized American citizens — about half the foreign-born population. I welcome those who followed the rules and took the Oath of Allegiance in good faith.

But many didn’t. That’s where denaturalization comes in.

Becoming an American citizen is a privilege, not a right.

The question of revoking citizenship from immigrants is part of a broader debate about what membership in our national community means — a debate made especially urgent by the waves of mass immigration the political class has allowed into our country over the past 50 years.

A vigorous, ongoing, and unapologetic commitment to denaturalization is an important part of the effort to restore integrity to U.S. citizenship. It is not about restricting citizenship gratuitously, but about demonstrating that becoming an American citizen is a privilege, not a right.

Historically, the number of people denaturalized has been quite low. From 1990 until the first Trump administration, fewer than a dozen immigrants a year on average lost their citizenship through a civil or criminal court process.

The most notable targets were not ordinary fraudsters but war criminals, terrorists, and human rights violators who lied on their applications.

The focus broadened in the first Trump term. The Justice Department created a unit devoted to investigating and litigating denaturalization cases, and the number of cases grew to around 40 per year.

An increase in denaturalizations actually first started under Obama due to technological advancements, and the effort has been stepped up even further in Trump’s second term.

Last year, the Justice Department issued a memo promising, among other things, that “the Civil Division shall prioritize and maximally pursue denaturalization proceedings in all cases permitted by law and supported by the evidence.” U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services, the part of the Department of Homeland Security that handles such matters, has set a target of referring 100 to 200 possible cases per month to the Justice Department.

The immigration game

Our relatively easy citizenship process is generally a good thing. Whether the number of newcomers each year is high or low, the goal for admitting foreigners should be their full absorption into American society.

This is not the way citizenship is handled in, say, the Persian Gulf states, where large foreign majorities are not part of the political community and never can be. In a republic like ours, however, the chief goal of immigration must be to turn newcomers into Americans.

Though it also involves a lot of paperwork, becoming a citizen is not like getting a driver’s license or opening a bank account. A better analogy is that the immigrant is “marrying” America, or being “adopted” by her. Such an arrangement should not be entered into lightly, but once consecrated, it should not be dissolved lightly.

If the candidate for citizenship lied or was never eligible for naturalization to begin with, the relationship must be annulled. A federal court ruling on the issue didn’t use the metaphor of annulment, but the parallel is clear:

Setting aside naturalization for failure to comply with the particular prerequisites to the acquisition of citizenship is not a punishment; it merely represents an undoing of that which should not have been done in the first place.Even now, the number of denaturalizations is lower than you might think, given how pervasive fraud is in every corner of our immigration system

Under current law, the reasons for denaturalization must predate the acquisition of citizenship rather than be based solely on conduct after the swearing-in ceremony, however repellent that conduct might be.

Conduct after naturalization can be considered, but only as evidence that the applicant was lying when he took the oath of citizenship. For instance, if you became a Nazi or communist shortly after naturalization, you were likely lying when you swore to “support and defend the Constitution and laws of the United States of America against all enemies, foreign and domestic.”

But even during World War II, the Supreme Court held the government to such a high standard of proof that the Justice Department found it difficult to denaturalize Nazis. In response, Congress enacted a provision that affiliation with a group that would have precluded naturalization within five years of becoming a citizen is prima facie evidence that the person was not attached to the principles of the Constitution when he took the oath.

This provision has never been challenged in court, mainly because it has seldom, if ever, been used. But it might end up in court soon if certain congressional proposals succeed.

For instance, in response to the revelations of widespread fraud by Somali-born naturalized citizens, Sen. Eric Schmitt (R-Mo.) introduced the SCAM Act to facilitate denaturalization. The bill would expand the five-year window to 10 years and widen the offenses that could lead to denaturalization.

Within 10 years after taking the oath, if the new citizen joins a foreign terrorist organization, defrauds the government, or commits an aggravated felony or an espionage offense, those facts would be considered prima facie evidence that at the time of taking the oath, the person was not of good moral character, was not attached to the principles of the Constitution, and was not well disposed to the good order and happiness of the United States — all bars to citizenship.

In other words, commission of the crimes would be evidence that offenders were never eligible for citizenship in the first place, so their acquisition of citizenship would be considered void.

One way to minimize the issue of denaturalization is to do a better job at the front end and not approve applications from unworthy people. To this end, USCIS has resumed neighborhood investigations into certain applicants, “reviewing their residency, moral character, loyalty to the U.S. Constitution, and commitment to the nation’s well-being.”

This is obviously labor-intensive, but it’s better to reject the citizenship applications of liars, fraudsters, and criminals than to try to denaturalize them after the fact.

RELATED: The homicidal empathy of the left’s immigration policies

John Moore/Getty Images

Taking citizenship seriously

Increased focus on denaturalization is but one front in the broader campaign to restore the integrity of American citizenship. President Trump’s birthright citizenship executive order — declaring that children born to illegal aliens, tourists, foreign students, and other nonresidents should not be citizens — was recently argued before the Supreme Court, which is expected to issue its ruling this summer.

The administration is also moving forward on an initiative to restrict birth tourism — where pregnant women enter on visitor visas specifically so their children will obtain automatic U.S. citizenship. This is designed to put some teeth in a regulation issued during the first Trump term requiring consular officers to deny visas to pregnant women whose primary purpose in coming to the U.S. is to obtain citizenship for their child.

Other changes necessary to restore the meaning of citizenship have not received the same attention. Foreign-language ballots, for instance, are an absurdity. Why even require candidates for citizenship to pass an English-language test if the core sacrament of our civic religion can be conducted in Korean, Spanish, or Armenian?

New citizens swear to “absolutely and entirely renounce and abjure all allegiance and fidelity to any foreign prince, potentate, state, or sovereignty, of whom or which I have heretofore been a subject or citizen.” But that part of the oath is legally meaningless since the Supreme Court in the Afroyim decision ruled that taking away someone’s citizenship for expressions of dual citizenship was unconstitutional.

While restoring the value of citizenship is not an issue confined to immigration, mass immigration exacerbates it in every way. Denaturalization would simply not be as pressing an issue if annual legal immigration were dramatically reduced. A smaller flow of new immigrants, and the consequent reduction in the number of applicants for citizenship, would reduce the number of mistakes and thus the need for denaturalizations.

As with almost every concern regarding immigration, part of the answer is always less, please.

Editor’s note: This article was originally published in the American Mind.

​American citizens, Birth tourism, Birthright citizenship, Mass immigration, Us citizenship, Denaturalization, Legal immigration, Supreme court, Immigration system, Trump, Opinion & analysis 

While BlazeTV host Sara Gonzales tries to give other parents the benefit of the doubt when it comes to their child-rearing approaches, there’s one style she cannot overlook: digital parenting.

“I just have a big problem with this generation of parents that are farming their parenting out to screens,” she says. “They’re essentially letting screens raise their children.”

While there is a movement within the parenting world to reduce — and even eliminate screens — in their children’s lives, iPad kids are still a big issue.

On this episode of “Sara Gonzales Unfiltered,” Sara speaks with three-time Billboard country artist, host of “Backwoods Wisdom,” and author of “Ain’t No Wi-Fi in the Woods” Buddy Brown, who has become a vocal advocate for screen-limited, nature-immersed childhoods.

Brown says that he was inspired to write his new book because so much of children’s literature today is “trash.” That’s why “Ain’t No Wi-Fi in the Woods” is deliberately wholesome and nostalgic.

“It’s the illustrator from ‘Winnie-the-Pooh.’ I mean, we went all the way, and it really came together great,” he says.

Sara shares Brown’s enthusiasm for resisting the digitization of parenting.

“We go out to a restaurant … and I look around, and everyone’s on the iPhones and on the iPads, and it makes me sad. It makes my heart sad for this generation of children who don’t understand the human connection like some of the kids who do not just live on screens,” she says.

Brown agrees, stressing the importance of parents being “intentional.”

“One of the things that we made our kids do from the time they were about 4 years old, which is very early, but we made them look at the waiter and order … and what that did was it just gave them that ability to not be afraid of adults, to make eye contact, which so few kids do now,” he shares.

Sara notes that so many older children, even teenagers, seem unable to communicate outside of their devices.

“All they’re doing is scrolling, and they’re typing stuff to their friends … and they’re not actually getting real human companionship. And I just worry what that does not just to their brains but just to their psyche in general,” she laments.

Brown concurs and adds another concern to the list: their futures. One day these screen-addicted kids will grow up and need the social skills necessary to thrive in the real world but will find that they simply don’t have them.

Parents who resist the urge to placate their children with screens will reap the benefits later, he encourages. “Fast-forward 15, 20 years, [your kids] are going to be standouts in whatever they’re doing. … They’re going to thank you later on.”

To hear more of the conversation and get the inside scoop on Brown’s new book — including the wilderness guide it features — watch the video above.

Want more from Sara Gonzales?

To enjoy more of Sara’s no-holds-barred takes on news and culture, subscribe to BlazeTV — the largest multi-platform network of voices who love America, defend the Constitution, and live the American dream.

​Aint no wifi, Backwoods wisdom, Buddy brown, Digital parenting, Human connection, Intentional parenting, Ipad kids, Sara gonzales, Sara gonzales unfiltered, Screen addiction, Social skills, Wilderness guide, Real world skills, Blazetv, Blaze media 

Millions over budget and years behind schedule have become defining features of the U.S. defense industrial base, and this dysfunction is colliding with a radically different character of war.

Asymmetric, robotic, and growingly autonomous systems are tactics being employed today by our adversaries. The shift in global security erodes the traditional advantages of scale, time, and mass that America’s defense industrial base was designed to deliver.

It also exposes an acquisition system that cannot move at the speed of relevance.

The fusion of established and startup contractors is the best strategic framework to reshore American manufacturing and reinvigorate our nation’s defense industrial base.

Rewiring these trends will depend on a new posture — one that should be defined by partnerships that marry the scale and sustainment power of established manufacturers with the speed and rapid system iteration of smaller but highly capable companies.

The influx of venture capital into defense technology has given rise to bold, disruptive upstarts that are leveraging agile, product-led engineering, operator-centric design, and best practices from the commercial ecosystem.

New, smaller companies like Palantir and Anduril rapidly iterate their systems and build breakthrough technologies on their dime — well before the U.S. government’s lengthy requirement-writing process plays out.

At the same time, established manufacturers like Lockheed Martin and Boeing have reignited their innovation arms and reprioritized significant resources to meet the modern needs of the Department of War.

Innovation without scale is as risky as the other way around. That’s why the fusion of established and startup contractors is the best strategic framework to reshore American manufacturing and reinvigorate our nation’s defense industrial base. When they are brought together, this business model creates real results.

General Dynamics Land Systems and Epirus, for example, have partnered to develop two mobile counter-UAS systems for short-range air defense and critical asset protection. Lockheed Martin and Hadrian have inked an agreement to increase production of critical parts for missile systems. Northrop Grumman has invested in Firefly Aerospace to accelerate production of Firefly’s launch vehicle. The list goes on.

These partnerships represent the epitome of American industrial excellence. Importantly, they also align with Secretary Pete Hegseth’s Warfighting Acquisition System by prioritizing the best practices from commercial technology development, AI integration into military technology, cloud-based architectures and system modularity, scalability, and software-driven upgradability.

Pairing establishment know-how and production capacity with startup integration cycles supports the War Department’s vision for rebuilding our military and is a tangible step the industry can take — and is taking today — to shorten the time between prototype development and operational deployment.

RELATED: The US military needs to adapt to modern warfare

USAF/Getty Images

America’s competitive edge always has come from partnerships: between industry and government, between commercial and defense innovation bases, and between engineers and operators. The next era of defense technology development demands the same alignment.

Established contractors and newer startups are not competitors in this race, and there is no need for them to offer competing visions for the future of defense. On the contrary, they share a mission as the co-architects of deterrence.

When America’s established defense contractors and new, cutting-edge startups work together, scale meets speed and innovation meets integration.

This is the industrial base the moment demands and the one we should focus on building together.

This article was originally published by RealClearDefense and made available via RealClearWire.

​American manufacturing reshore, Ground combat solutions, Palantir, Defense contractors, Lockheed martin, Us defense industry, American military, Opinion & analysis 

U.S. Senator Jon Ernst (R-Iowa) recently obtained access to Biden-era Small Business Administration communications revealing a “potential cover-up obscuring $90 million in taxpayer funds Biden officials gifted to Planned Parenthood,” America’s largest abortion provider and a leading supplier of sex-rejection hormones.

According to the pro-life lawmaker, Biden officials at the SBA — allegedly operating under the direction of former top SBA lawyer Peggy Hamilton — used the code word “Benghazi” to refer to discussions of Planned Parenthood and its receipt of forgivable COVID-era Paycheck Protection Program loans in the wake of congressional objections to those very loans and demands for greater transparency.

‘Just when we think the Democrats’ extremism can’t get more shocking.’

The use of a wholly unrelated term — the name of the Libyan city where four Americans were savagely murdered by Islamists in 2012 — is believed to have been employed strategically to ensure that future congressional or public record requests wouldn’t turn up the relevant and possibly damning documents regarding the funding of Planned Parenthood, a potential violation of the Federal Records Act.

“What does Benghazi have to do with Planned Parenthood? It appears the Biden SBA used it as a code name to hide the $90 million in taxpayer funds they gifted to the abortion provider,” Ernst said in a statement on Tuesday.

“This potential cover-up demands answers.”

In her letter asking acting Attorney General Todd Blanche to open an investigation into the matter, Ernst raised the possibility that the Biden White House may have been involved in the alleged effort to conceal official federal records and highlighted numerous emails sent by Hamilton in which “Benghazi” appears to have been used as a stand-in for the abortion giant.

In one instance, Hamilton made clear her intended meaning, writing, “Can I schedule a meeting so we can decision Benghazi (Planned Parenthood)?”

RELATED: ‘Baby could just die’: Left-leaning media omits key detail in outrage over pregnant Florida mom’s court-ordered C-section

Kayla Bartkowski/Getty Images

“Recipients and respondents in the SBA email chains knew Planned Parenthood was not in or even remotely related to Benghazi, yet by continuing the email chain and scheduling meetings, it appears several Biden political appointees, and some SBA employees, were knowingly concealing or attempting to conceal their records relating to Planned Parenthood,” Ernst stated in her letter.

She added, “With the records detailed here, and many more I’ve obtained, perhaps now we know why the Biden administration did not want to share its Planned Parenthood records with Congress.”

“Just when we think the Democrats’ extremism can’t get more shocking, we see the lengths they’ll go to in protecting the Big Abortion industry,” Marjorie Dannenfelser, the president of Susan B. Anthony Pro-Life America, said in a statement. “They knew letting Planned Parenthood help itself to taxpayer-funded COVID loans was illegal — so they tried to cover their tracks using, of all things, the national horror of Benghazi.”

These revelations come just months after the SBA issued letters to 38 affiliates of Planned Parenthood demanding proof that they were eligible to receive millions of dollars in PPP loans. The agency noted that affiliates found to have provided fudged or false eligibility certifications may face “severe penalties, including repayment of the loan, ineligibility for loan forgiveness, and possible referral for civil or criminal penalties.”

SBA Administrator Kelly Loeffler said in a statement, “Planned Parenthood Federation of America was never eligible to receive a dime in pandemic-era relief from taxpayers. As part of the review under way, not only will we expose the Planned Parenthood affiliates who took advantage of the American people — we will take every necessary step to force every bad actor to pay them back.”

Planned Parenthood 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!

​Abortion, Abortion provider, Benghazi, Covid loans, Eligibility, Ernst, Fraud, Joni ernst, Marjorie dannenfelser, Paycheck protection program, Planned parenthood, Ppp loans, Sba loans, Small business administration, Susan b anthony, Taxpayer funds, Todd blanche, Politics 

A strange criminal case got even more bizarre when the suspect of a gas station shooting appeared to confess in a video on social media.

Shantay Lashay O’Donnell, 46, of Virginia was caught on surveillance video allegedly pulling out a gun at the Columbia, Maryland, gas station and pulling the trigger.

‘I shot that man because he has a demon spirit, and he laughed in my face and thought it was funny. I bet he ain’t laughing now.’

Police said she was trying to rob the store but left without anything in the April 24 incident, as reported previously by Blaze News.

The 65-year-old worker was transported in critical condition to the Shock Trauma Center in Baltimore. Police released video of the shooting in an attempt to get public help to find the woman.

In the days following the shooting, O’Donnell allegedly posted a video confessing to the crime and laughing about the victim.

“I’m the one that did the shooting at the gas station,” she said in the video.

“I shot that man because he has a demon spirit, and he laughed in my face and thought it was funny. I bet he ain’t laughing now,” she added.

She went on to say that she was “getting ready to rob something right now” and claimed she didn’t pay for anything but stole what she needed.

Days later, O’Donnell was arrested more than 300 miles away in Johnson City, New York, after Binghamton police identified her through a license plate reader at another gas station.

She was charged with the illegal possession of two guns and is awaiting extradition to Maryland or Virginia.

O’Donnell is expected to face first- and second-degree attempted murder charges in Maryland, as well as other charges.

RELATED: Mother, pregnant teen daughter, and son found ‘brutally’ murdered — one nearly decapitated, police say

Howard County police spokesman Seth Hoffman said the “incredibly brazen” shooting was atypical.

“We have robberies and some thefts in gas stations where somebody may imply a weapon or show a weapon but not use it, and they usually leave with something,” he said. “Here, we have somebody who just shot and left with nothing.”

Like Blaze News? Bypass the censors, sign up for our newsletters, and get stories like this direct to your inbox. Sign up here!

​Social media confession, Gas station shooting, Shooting security video, Shantay o’donnell, Crime 

Many Americans today feel as if home ownership is a pipe dream. The prices, even for modest homes, are just too steep.

But why? What’s the real reason homes have become so unaffordable?

The answer is multifaceted, says Glenn Beck.

No doubt the broken economy is part of the problem. “We have to fix the fraud,” he urges. “The latest numbers from the GAO, the Government Accounting Office, is that they estimate that our government loses between $233 billion and $521 billion every year based on fraud between 2018 through 2022.”

However, there’s another factor most are unwilling to grapple with: Our expectations have increased.

In the 1950s — “the golden era of America,” says Glenn — the average size home for a family of four was “983 square feet.” Today, it’s “2,500 square feet.”

“If I told you you could afford a modest home of that size (under 1,000 square feet) and raise your family in it, would you take it?” he asks.

But the main driver behind the skyrocketing price of homes, he says, is the increase in land prices.

“Why is land so expensive?” Glenn asks. “Because our government made it that way” through “zoning laws, permits, restrictions, [and] endless layers of EPA approval.”

“We didn’t run out of land. We restricted the access to the land,” he emphasizes.

Add to that the immigration boom, which led to “an overwhelming demand for homes,” and you get the situation we’re in today.

But America has been in a similar predicament before and survived it, says Glenn. After WWII, millions of soldiers returned home eager to buy homes and start families, resulting in a housing shortage “far, far worse in many ways than what we’re facing today.”

Our answer back then was simply to build faster.

“Homes were built in days, not months — days,” says Glenn, noting that “the GI Bill,” “the interstate highway system [opening] up the land that had never been reachable before,” and “the government [getting] out of the way” are what allowed this to happen.

“Prices rose at first because everybody needed a home, and then they stabilized because supply caught up with demand,” he continues.

But today, things are different.

Instead of “unleashing builders,” we’re “restraining them”; instead of “expanding supply,” we’re “constraining it,” says Glenn.

“This is why the most important number is not the price of a home. It is the ratio between a home price and income,” he explains. “In 1960, the average cost was two times the average annual income. Today it’s over five times.”

“That’s the difference between opportunity and exclusion; that’s the difference between a young family starting a life and one stuck renting indefinitely.”

Today, we’re a nation that believes more in “obstruction” than “building” — a nation that cares more about the “planet” than “people.”

Once upon a time, “the country believed that growth was good, expansion was good, opportunity was something that you created, not something that you rationed,” says Glenn, “and somewhere along the way, that whole mindset of America changed.”

“We didn’t lose the land. We didn’t lose the resources. We’ve lost the will. And until that changes, this doesn’t get fixed,” he warns.

Contrary to popular belief, the American dream isn’t dead, he insists. It’s simply on pause until we can fix the long list of issues barring many Americans from buying homes.

While we have little control over fraud, government regulation, and land prices, we do have control over our own mindsets. Glenn urges his listeners to remember that the American dream isn’t about status — “it’s about freedom and opportunity and hard work and faith and building a life with the people that you love.”

“Let’s remember what it means to actually be happy,” he pleads.

Want more from Glenn Beck?

To enjoy more of Glenn’s masterful storytelling, thought-provoking analysis, and uncanny ability to make sense of the chaos, subscribe to BlazeTV — the largest multi-platform network of voices who love America, defend the Constitution, and live the American dream.

​Affordability, American dream, Demand, Economy, Fraud, Glenn beck, Home ownership, Immigration boom, Land prices, Obstruction, Supply, The glenn beck program, Zoning laws, Epa approval, Blazetv, Blaze media 

Why is the National Education Association encouraging students to skip school?

Yesterday was May 1 — May Day — and across the country, activists staged coordinated demonstrations under the banner of “no work, no school, no shopping.”

These are sweeping political claims, touching on immigration policy, cultural debates, and national partisan conflicts.

The National Education Association — with roughly 3 million members, making it the largest labor union in the United States — was among the organizations supporting the effort. On its website, the NEA offers organizational resources for participants, including a “solidarity toolkit.”

May Day? Mayday!

The union frames May Day as part of a long tradition of labor activism, tracing its roots to the late 19th-century movement for the eight-hour workday.

Broadly speaking, that’s true.

But May Day also carries a more complicated legacy. Over the course of the 20th century, it became closely associated with socialist and communist movements worldwide, and in the United States it has often re-emerged as a vehicle for broader political protest.

That broader agenda is evident in some of the demands the NEA highlights.

Among them:

“Stop the billionaire takeover and rampant corruption of the Trump administration.”“Stop the attacks on our communities, including policies targeting immigrants, people of color, Native people, people with disabilities, and those who identify as LGBTQ+.”

These are not narrowly labor-oriented concerns. They are sweeping political claims, touching on immigration policy, cultural debates, and national partisan conflicts.

Mission creep

Which raises a more basic question: What does this have to do with the NEA’s stated purpose?

The organization describes its mission as “to advocate for education professionals and to unite our members and the nation to fulfill the promise of public education to prepare every student to succeed in a diverse and interdependent world.”

Encouraging participation in a day of protest framed explicitly around “no school” sits uneasily alongside that mission. And May Day is just the tip of the iceberg

According to a new report from watchdog group Defending Education, teachers’ unions have spent more than $1 billion on political activity since 2015 — including roughly $669 million at the federal level and $336 million at the state and local levels.

Some of that spending aligns with what most people would expect. In California, for example, unions spent more than $20 million backing Proposition 15, a 2020 ballot initiative that would have raised taxes on commercial properties to increase funding for public schools and community colleges. The measure ultimately failed.

But much of it extends far beyond that.

RELATED: ‘Eco-Socialism’ now! Inside Sunrise Movement’s ‘revolution’ playbook

Defending Education | Robert Gauthier/Getty Images

PAC mentality

Defending Education’s report highlights tens of millions directed toward major Democrat-aligned groups, including:

$32 million to Senate Majority PAC.$25 million to House Majority PAC.$60 million to the State Engagement Fund, a progressive funding hub that supports state-level campaigns and advocacy.$44 million to For Our Future, a Democrat-aligned organizing group focused on voter turnout and elections.

At the state level, unions have also poured money into targeted political fights — opposing school choice initiatives, backing candidates, and influencing local school board races.

In California, union spending has extended into high-profile contests as well. The California Teachers Association’s PACs spent $1.8 million opposing the 2021 recall of Gavin Newsom and committed millions more to a 2025 ballot measure related to election policy.

The same report also points to funding for organizing groups like the Midwest Academy, which describes itself as “committed to providing organizers with the practical skills needed to address the challenges of forging change in a system rooted in white supremacy.”

It has received $1.7 million from the NEA since 2015 and has helped produce activist training materials tied to sustained protest efforts.

Out of school

Teachers’ unions have always played a role in politics. When that role is tied directly to classrooms — teacher pay, school funding, working conditions — the connection is clear.

But as their spending and activities expand into broader political organizing, electoral campaigns, and now protest mobilization, that connection becomes harder to define.

Unlike most political organizations, teachers’ unions are funded by member dues — payments that many educators make as a practical requirement of their profession. That makes their political activity qualitatively different from a typical advocacy group or PAC.

The question isn’t whether unions should — or can — be entirely “apolitical.” It is whether their current scope reflects the priorities of the educators who fund them — and the students they have pledged to serve.

​Culture, Donald trump, Education, Lifestyle, National education association, No kings, Public schools, Socialism, Teacher’s unions, May day, Counterrevolution 

Pope Leo XIV announced appointments of U.S. bishops that some characterized as being anti-Trump after a public feud with the administration.

Among the appointments were bishops that had criticized the attacks on diversity, equity, and inclusion policies, as well as the strengthening of immigration enforcement.

‘We are a diverse nation with people from all over the world. Diversity is a good thing. Diversity is of God.’

Washington Auxiliary Bishop Evelio Menjivar previously claimed that immigration enforcement had caused fear in immigrant communities.

“The federal government has pursued a ‘shock and awe’ campaign of aggressive threats and highly visible operations of questionable legality that go far beyond mere immigration ‘enforcement,'” he said.

Menjivar has been named as the new bishop for the Diocese of Wheeling-Charleston in West Virginia.

Father Robert Boxie III has been named as the new auxiliary bishop for the Archdiocese of Washington, but he previously defended policies on diversity.

“In a lot of ways we have made great progress, but in so many ways, I feel like we’re regressing,” Boxie said in an interview with OSV News in 2025.

“It’s really frustrating — especially this moment that we’re living in. The attacks on ‘DEI’ — I don’t even know what that means anymore. It’s a term that’s been hijacked. It means a lot of things to a lot of different people.”

He went on to defend diversity as central to the U.S. and to the Catholic Church.

“I think at its core, it’s what America is all about. We are a diverse nation with people from all over the world. Diversity is a good thing. Diversity is of God,” he continued. “And the fact that it’s been turned into something negative — or something that should be avoided or not talked about — just flies in the face of who we are as Americans.”

RELATED: Vatican finally responds to Trump’s invitation for Pope Leo to join Board of Peace

A third bishop referred to the rioting at the U.S. Capitol on Jan. 6 as “sickening unrest.”

Others rejected the framing of the appointments as having any political dimensions at all.

Like Blaze News? Bypass the censors, sign up for our newsletters, and get stories like this direct to your inbox. Sign up here!

​Pope leo vs trump, Bishop appointments, Anti immigration bishop, Catholics vs trump, Politics 

Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton fired back at the ActBlue Democratic donation organization after it filed a lawsuit Friday accusing him of violating the Constitution.

Paxton filed a lawsuit last month accusing ActBlue of illegally accepting donations forbidden by campaign laws. The portal has faced similar allegations from Republicans for years.

‘It is retaliation against constitutionally protected political speech and association, and it is exactly what the First Amendment forbids.’

The ActBlue lawsuit accused Paxton of violating the organization’s First and Fourteenth Amendment rights of the Constitution.

“ActBlue is trying to take me down,” Paxton responded on social media. “I sued the fundraising platform for deceiving Americans by lying about its donation processes that allow fraudulent and foreign donations. I will hold those who break the law accountable.”

ActBlue’s chief legal officer, Lawrence Oliver, made the case against Paxton.

“Ken Paxton has spent more than two years using the power of his office to investigate, harass, and sue ActBlue,” Oliver wrote in a statement.

“The timing of Paxton fighting for his political life in his run for a U.S. Senate seat and his use of the Attorney General’s office to attack ActBlue should not be lost on anyone. He is wasting taxpayer dollars to benefit his political ambitions,” he added.

“That is not law enforcement,” Oliver concluded. “It is retaliation against constitutionally protected political speech and association, and it is exactly what the First Amendment forbids.”

Among the claims made against Paxton was that his investigators tried to use an American Express gift card on ActBlue in an attempt to show the ease with which illegal donations could be made. Although they failed three times, ActBlue alleges that Paxton hid these facts from the Texas court.

RELATED: Texas AG Paxton accuses Democrat donation portal ActBlue of illegally funneling foreign money into US campaigns

ActBlue also reposted a message from a Democratic activist against Republicans on social media.

“Let’s be clear about something: the only reason Republicans are targeting ActBlue is that they want to destroy the Democratic Party’s ability to raise money from small-dollar donors,” the post reads. “It’s a completely bulls**t attack, and people in glass houses should not throw stones.”

Like Blaze News? Bypass the censors, sign up for our newsletters, and get stories like this direct to your inbox. Sign up here!

​Ken paxton vs actblue, Actblue free speech, Actblue fraud, Democratic donations fraud, Politics 

A compromise between the Chicago Teachers Union and Chicago Public Schools led to the city agreeing to bus students to the “International Workers’ Day” protest.

Activists across the world are joining in the May Day celebrations and protests while advocating for political causes across the left-wing spectrum.

‘The future belongs to the youth, and so they’re going to have to pick up the mantle and take it up,’ Queen Weiner said.

That includes some of the students of the Chicago public school systems thanks to the teachers’ union.

The union was demanding that staff and students have the entire day off so they could join the protests, but they agreed instead on busing students out for “field trips” to protest.

The union got other concessions, including an agreement for zero retaliation against those who chose to participate in the protests.

“The fight for justice, dignity, respect, and the blood, sweat, and tears that were shed and the justice that workers endured to sacrifice,” said Don Villar, the secretary and treasurer of the Chicago Federation of Labor.

Protesters will march to Daley Plaza after a rally in Union Park.

Queen Weiner, a retired member of the teachers’ union, told WTTW-TV that she showed up to the protest to battle billionaires.

“I’ve been fighting in the struggle for a long time,” Weiner said. “And, you know, the future belongs to the youth, and so they’re going to have to pick up the mantle and take it up.”

Some parents were not as enthused as Weiner was about the time off from instruction.

“We are already seeing kids all over the district that are not being pushed to their standards. Taking another day from instruction for them is not beneficial for the kids,” one parent of a CPS student said to WGN-TV.

Others were upset that the children were being placed in a “high-risk situation” at the protests and some said there should have been parental input in the decision.

RELATED: Video shows brawl after high school walkout protester allegedly hit pro-ICE man — and the man is charged with child abuse

The Kids First Chicago nonprofit said some parents were upset at the loss of instruction time.

Queen Weiner went on to say she hoped the students and teenagers were encouraged by the protest to “know that the fight never stops.”

Like Blaze News? Bypass the censors, sign up for our newsletters, and get stories like this direct to your inbox. Sign up here!

​Chicago teachers union, May day celebrations, Chicago public schools, Parents angry at teacher unions, Politics 

A debate over the U.S.-Israeli strikes on Iran nearly ended in fisticuffs on a CNN panel between Scott Jennings and a liberal commentator on Thursday.

Adam Mockler of the liberal MeidasTouch Network pointed to inflation and higher gas prices to argue that the decision to attack Iran has been a failure for the Trump administration.

‘Do you have the attention span of a gnat? Is that what you have?’

Jennings argued that the war has been successful insofar as it has significantly set back Iran’s program to gain nuclear weapons. Others on the panel argued that the U.S. was the aggressor in the war, while ignoring Iran’s previous attacks.

“I mean honestly they have been at war with us for 47 years,” said Jennings.

“We all know that Scott Jennings is more than happy to defend a war with a country that starts with the letters I-R-A that we are currently failing that is going to put us trillions and trillions of dollars more in debt,” Mockler responded.

“I was only a few years old while you were in the administration defending prior endless wars. Now this war is failing,” he added.

“Eight weeks is endless to you? Do you have the attention span of a gnat? Is that what you have?” Jennings laughed.

“I debated you on TV four to six weeks ago, and you said we were weeks away from it. Now you’re making condescending remarks because you can’t defend the fact that this war is not going your way,” Mockler pressed on.

“Not going your way?” Jennings repeated, exasperated.

“Name one political concession!” Mockler continued.

“Get your f**king hand out of my face! First of all,” Jennings said sternly.

CNN host Abby Phillip stepped in to calm the panel down.

“I’m not going to have this guy’s hand in my face,” Jennings added. “Honestly.”

Mockler went on to jab at Jennings in a post on social media.

“MAGA beta male with low emotional control and high cortisol CRASHES OUT on young man preoccupied with war,” he wrote along with a video of the altercation.

RELATED: Scott Jennings obliterates liberal spin on Charlie Kirk: ‘The evidence here is overwhelming!’

Also in the mix was Geraldo Rivera, who countered with his own experience covering a previous attack on U.S. soldiers by Iran.

“In 1983, I was in Beirut when the Marine Corps barracks was blown up by a suicide bomber sponsored by the Iranians. Two-hundred-thirty Marines died,” he said.

Kat Abughazaleh, a progressive journalist who ran unsuccessfully for Congress, replied by suggesting that the murder of 230 Marines had a statute of limitations.

“That’s awful, that’s terrible, but it’s not 1983,” she said.

CNN published 10 minutes of the debate, including the altercation between Jennings and Mockler on its YouTube channel.

Like Blaze News? Bypass the censors, sign up for our newsletters, and get stories like this direct to your inbox. Sign up here!

​Scott jennings video, Jennings vs adam mockler, Us-israeli strikes on iran, Heated cnn debate, Politics