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Republican Sen. Rand Paul of Kentucky is ringing in the New Year with his annual “Festivus Report,” highlighting all the government’s pet projects taxpayers have been funding.

Paul’s 11th annual waste report totaled up to a whopping $1.6 trillion, including $1.22 trillion in interest payments on the $38.5 trillion national debt.

‘I hope you’re horrified.’

“No matter how much taxpayer money Washington burns through, politicians can’t help but demand more,” Paul said in a statement.

“Fiscal responsibility may not be the most crowded road, but it’s one I’ve walked year after year — and this holiday season will be no different. So, before we get to the Feats of Strength, it’s time for my Airing of (Spending) Grievances.”

RELATED: The 5 best Christmas decorations in recent White House history

Photo by Samuel Corum/Getty Images

The report features a roundup of the government’s most egregious spending, including experiments dosing dogs with cocaine and teaching ferrets how to binge drink. One program taught monkeys how to play a “Price is Right”-inspired video game for a whopping $14.6 million dollars.

Some spending was directed towards actual people, not just pets. One program from the Department of Health and Human Services spent $1.5 million on an “innovative multilevel strategy” to reduce drug use in “Latinx” communities by using influencers and celebrities in TikTok campaigns, which the report dubbed “TikTok therapy.” Other programs spent $2 million on “gender-affirming care” in Guatemala through USAID, as well as $2.8 million in DOD grants towards implanting humanized mice with aborted fetal tissue.

Other funds were just misused entirely, with nearly $200 billion in COVID funds for schools being wasted on excessive amenities like ice cream trucks, rooms at Caesar’s Palace, and renting out MLB stadiums.

RELATED: ‘Why would somebody have such hate?’ Churchgoers stunned at vandalism against Nativity display

Photo by Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images

“That’s all for today, folks,” Paul said in a post on X. “I hope you’re horrified – I mean, I hope you enjoyed it. The Festivus holiday must come to an end. If only the programs we write about would also come to an end.”

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​Rand paul, Festivus, Festivus report, Christmas, Government waste, National debt, Waste fraud and abuse, Usaid, Politics 

“For many, the American dream has become a nightmare,” Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) has said, capturing a sentiment that has become common on the political left and across modern culture.

That line now travels far beyond politics. Scroll social media for five minutes, and you’ll see the same message repeated in endless variations: Owning a home is impossible. Raising a family is irresponsible. Work doesn’t pay. The system is rigged. The future is closed.

The American dream was never a promise of ease or comfort by age 25. It was an invitation to build something meaningful over time through responsibility and perseverance.

This message is everywhere, and it is doing real damage.

Harder lives, false conclusions

Life has become harder in tangible ways. Housing costs have surged. College has grown bloated and expensive. Inflation punished families already living close to the margins. Young adults feel delayed, uncertain, and anxious about the future.

Those frustrations are real. The conclusion being pushed alongside them is not.

The lie is not that things are harder. The lie is that effort no longer matters.

That lie spreads quickly online because it feels validating. A 30-second video declaring the system broken beyond repair asks nothing of the viewer except agreement. Building a life requires patience, sacrifice, and time. One goes viral. The other happens quietly.

Much of this shift comes from where young Americans now form their beliefs. For many in Generation Z, ideas about money, marriage, and the future are no longer shaped primarily by parents, churches, employers, or local communities. They are shaped by algorithm-driven platforms like TikTok and X, where extremity is rewarded with attention.

In those spaces, online figures routinely dismiss the American dream as a scam and portray starting a family as a trap rather than a source of meaning or stability. Cynicism is marketed as realism. Detachment is framed as wisdom. A generation looking for guidance is taught to expect failure before it ever tries.

Why despair is profitable

This narrative didn’t arise by accident. It feeds on real pain, but it’s also profitable. Political movements gain leverage by convincing voters that only sweeping control from the top can fix a hopeless system. Media companies thrive on pessimism because fear keeps people watching. Online grievance entrepreneurs build massive followings by telling young people that nothing they do will ever be enough.

If Americans stop believing they can build a future, someone else will gladly build power over them.

History keeps disproving this story.

Tell the generation that survived the Great Depression that the American dream was dead. Tell the men who returned from World War II, many wounded and broke, who used the GI Bill to buy homes and start families, that the climb was too steep. Tell the children of factory workers who grew up without air conditioning, college degrees, or safety nets — but still built middle-class lives through work and sacrifice — that the odds were unfair.

Tell the families of the 1950s and 1960s who lived modestly, saved slowly, and delayed gratification for decades that life was easy. Tell the Americans who endured oil crises, layoffs, and double-digit inflation in the 1970s and early 1980s that the system was designed for their comfort.

The dream was never easy

Life has never been easy. The climb has always been steep. The American dream was never built on convenience. It was built on resilience.

The truth is less dramatic — and far more hopeful. The American dream didn’t disappear. It changed shape.

It was never a promise of ease or comfort by age 25. It was an invitation to build something meaningful over time through responsibility and perseverance. For generations, it rested on a simple foundation: Work hard, form families, contribute locally, and invest in something bigger than yourself.

That path was never easy. What changed is not the dream, but our tolerance for effort and our patience for delayed reward.

The quiet math of real life

Despite the noise, the American dream remains visible in places social media rarely celebrates. It shows up in the quiet math of real life.

Research from the Institute for Family Studies finds that stably married Americans approaching retirement hold, on average, more than $640,000 in household assets, compared with roughly $167,000 for divorced or never-married adults — even after accounting for age, education, and race. That gap reflects decades of shared sacrifice, income pooling, planning, and commitment.

These stories don’t trend online. They play out quietly every day.

Ironically, many of the loudest voices declaring the dream dead are doing quite well selling that message. Entire online brands are built on telling people that life is impossible — while generating substantial revenue and influence in the process. Despair has become an industry.

RELATED: Christmas is worth celebrating, even if your family is fractured

Chris Ratcliffe/Bloomberg via Getty Images

What truly threatens the American dream is not capitalism, competition, or even inequality. It’s a culture that encourages permanent adolescence. A culture that treats commitment as a burden, delays adulthood indefinitely, and then wonders why people feel anxious and untethered.

The American dream doesn’t die because life is hard. It dies when people are convinced that hard things aren’t worth doing.

Too many young Americans are told that marriage can wait, children are optional, faith is outdated, and roots are restrictive. They’re promised freedom through detachment and fulfillment through endless choice — then wake up years later with more options than ever and less meaning than expected.

Builders still have the advantage

This isn’t a policy argument. It’s a cultural one. No law can manufacture purpose. No program can force optimism. But a nation that teaches its citizens the dream is dead shouldn’t be surprised when fewer people try to live it.

The American dream has always belonged to builders of families, businesses, and communities. It never belonged to those waiting for perfect conditions or guaranteed outcomes.

The American dream isn’t dead. But telling Americans that it is has become fashionable, profitable, and politically useful.

The question is whether we continue to accept that story — or choose, once again, to build.

​American dream, Economy, Gen z, Great depression, Opinion & analysis, Hope, Building 

Glenn Beck has been one of the loudest and boldest voices in conservative media regarding the dangers of artificial intelligence. For three decades, he’s been warning that a day is coming when technology outpaces human control and reshapes society.

As that day draws ever closer, Glenn has urged his audience to learn how to use AI — not as a source for critical thinking, not as a companion — but as a tool beholden to our command.

Glenn has been modeling for his listeners what it looks like to use artificial intelligence well. On his radio program, he regularly shares how he employs AI for research, meal planning, budget optimization, brainstorming, and trend analysis, among other tasks.

Bottom line: AI isn’t good or evil. It just amplifies whoever’s holding the reins.

And this December, Glenn took that philosophy one joyful step further. While left-wing activists and institutions continue their annual push to secularize the holiday — replacing “Merry Christmas” with “Happy Holidays,” banning songs that mention Jesus, and swapping Christmas parties for generic “winter celebrations” — Glenn gave AI a simple but profound task: Produce a song that boldly puts Christ back in Christmas.

And it did not disappoint.

The lyrics are as follows:

Well, the season’s here, and the lights are bright, but they tell me, I can’t say Merry Christmas tonight.

They want RamaHanuKwanzMas all in one breath.

Buddy, that phrase is gonna bore me to death.

So grab some cocoa. Let’s reclaim this place.

It’s the birthday of the baby.

Yeah, remember who that is.

So I’m putting the Christ back in Christmas.

No microaggression here.

My friend, if words can break you, I’ll bless your heart, because that’s a battle we can’t defend.

Yeah, I’m putting the Christ back in Christmas.

Let common sense unfold. Out with the new, in with the old.

Merry Christmas. Let the truth be told.

And hey baby, it’s cold outside, relax.

It’s flirting, not a federal crime.

We used to laugh and dance in snow.

Now they fact-check mistletoe.

They say intent don’t matter.

Well, sure it does, ask Santa.

He’s judging hearts, not Twitter buzz.

So I’m putting the Christ back in Christmas.

You can keep your outrage warm.

If every jingle is problematic, buddy, that’s the real snowstorm.

Yeah, I’m putting the Christ back in Christmas.

Not buying what they sold.

Out with the new, in with the old.

Merry Christmas. Let the truth be told.

They say that greeting is oppressive.

Well, bless my soul.

Who knew if Merry Christmas makes you tremble, the problem ain’t the phrase, it’s you.

I’ll question with boldness. I’ll reason with grace, but don’t rewrite my holiday to make it a safe space.

So here’s to the manger.

The star in the sky.

The angels who sang up that holy night.

Here’s to the story that still brings hope

Even when cultures lost the remote.

Raise your voice, let the bells all ring.

This season was always about one King.

Yeah, I’m putting the Christ back in Christmas.

Let the real good news unfold.

The world may chase the wrapping paper, but the manger holds the gold.

So I put the Christ back in Christmas from the young to the gray and old.

Out with the new, in with the old.

Merry Christmas. Let the truth be told.

So crank up the volume, hit play, and let this AI-born anthem remind the culture: Christmas isn’t canceled — Christ is, and will forever be, King.

Want more from Glenn Beck?

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​The glenn beck program, Glenn beck, Blazetv, Blaze media, Secular christmas, Christmas, Put christ back in christmas, Christianity, Artificial intelligence, Ai, Ai song 

Everywhere you look, it seems like there is an embarrassment of riches when it comes to plans for futuristic, dystopian systems of government. However, one such plan has already materialized and has caught the attention of some very powerful people: freedom cities.

While it’s too early to tell if freedom cities will be a dystopian nightmare or, in the more likely scenario, a merely fascinating innovation, what is clear is that many powerful people have been interested in the idea for years.

‘Our objective will be a quantum leap in the American standard of living.’

First, what are freedom cities?

Freedom cities are essentially deregulated economic zones designed to encourage innovation and technological development without (or with much less) cumbersome bureaucracy, rules, and taxes.

RELATED: Biotech founder sliced open his own legs on camera to prove his product is safe for US troops

Photo by Drew Angerer/Getty Images

According to an article by Newsweek, the creation of a freedom city in the United States would require at least two states to demarcate land along their borders and to agree on taxation and policy.

But why should we care about what is probably just a billionaire pipe dream to ease the billionaire tax burden?

Well, one of the powerful people who is very interested in these cities is President Donald Trump.

Freedom cities have been on President Trump’s mind for nearly three years at least.

In March 2023, then-former President Trump issued a video statement detailing several plans to revitalize American innovation.

Past generations of Americans pursued big dreams and daring projects that once seemed absolutely impossible. They pushed across an unsettled continent and built new cities in the wild frontier. They transformed American life with the interstate highway system — magnificent, it was. And they launched a vast network of satellites into orbit all around the earth.

But today our country has lost its boldness. Under my leadership, we will get it back in a very big way. If you look at just three years ago, what we were doing was unthinkable — how good it was, how great it was for our country.

Our objective will be a quantum leap in the American standard of living. … Here are just a few of the ways we can do it.

Almost one-third of the land mass of the United States is owned by the federal government. With just a very, very small portion of that land, just a fraction, one-half of one percent — would you believe that? — we should hold a contest to charter up to 10 new cities and award them to the best proposals for development.

In other words, we’ll actually build new cities in our country again. These freedom cities will reopen the frontier, reignite American imagination, and give hundreds of thousands of young people and other people — all hardworking families — a new shot at home ownership and in fact the American dream.

While President Trump’s plans have not yet been put into practice in the United States, the idea of a freedom city has already been put into practice in Honduras, for example.

According to Newsweek, Pronomos Capital, a venture capital firm backed by tech billionaires Peter Thiel and Marc Andreessen, has helped push for the creation and development of Prospera ZEDE, a privately run economic zone on parts of Roatan, an island off the coast of Honduras, and on the coast of La Ceiba, Honduras.

According to the company’s website, Próspera ZEDE (Zone of Economic Development and Employment) is “a startup zone with a regulatory system designed for entrepreneurs to build better, cheaper, and faster than anywhere else in the world.”

However, this economic zone in Honduras has seen its fair share of criticism from locals, pushback from the Honduran government, and legal challenges since its establishment.

Think tanks like the American Enterprise Institute have also taken an interest in the creation of freedom cities in the United States. According to a March 2025 report produced by the AEI Housing Center, freedom cities “offer a dynamic framework for re-shoring critical industries, expanding housing affordability, and facilitating rapid progress in emerging fields such as biotechnology, aeronautics, and energy.”

The AEI even drafted a “homesteading map” showing the pockets of federal land in Western states that could potentially be used for freedom cities, forecasting that the development of freedom cities would take anywhere between 40 and 50 years.

​Tech, Freedom cities, Trump, Trump administration, Pronomos capital, Prospera zede, American enterprise institute, Honduras, Peter thiel, President trump 

As we come to the end of 2025, peace feels hard to find. We are surrounded by news of barbaric terrorism once again — most recently in Australia — erupting in violent displays of prideful, ethnic hatred. We watch regional wars grind on, prolonged by an implacable tyrant bent on self-glorification and the expansion of his own wealth and power.

At such a time, it is good to remember that 2,000 years ago, a child was born for whom there was no room at the inn — a child laid instead in a stable because there was nowhere else to go. Jesus spent his childhood in the simplest of households and his adulthood accounting for every penny, for the life of a carpenter brought little money.

Let us set aside the calamities of the world, if only for a moment, and celebrate the birth of the most extraordinary child ever born — the one who offers eternal love and shelter from the storm.

When Jesus left his home to serve the world, his life became unlike that of the foxes, who have dens, or the birds, who have nests. The Son of Man had no place to lay his head. He rejected the paths of wealth, power, and pride, choosing instead humility, love, and suffering.

His ministry began when he read from the prophet Isaiah: “The Spirit of the Lord is upon me, because he has anointed me to preach good news to the poor.” That good news was revolutionary. God was not, as the Greeks imagined, a distant and uncaring master of abstractions. Nor was he, as many expected, a cold and exacting judge.

The good news was that God is filled with love for humanity — and that was cause for celebration.

So Jesus’ first miracle was not an act of conquest or condemnation, but joy: the transformation of water into wine at a wedding in Cana.

When Jesus chose his companions, he chose people like himself — humble, ordinary, and yet extraordinary. He welcomed women into his ministry, from his mother Mary to Mary Magdalene, Joanna, Susanna, and many others, treating their womanhood as sacred. As F.R. Maltby observed, Jesus promised his followers three things: that they would be completely fearless, absurdly happy, and in constant trouble. Wherever they went, they brought hope, kindness, and cheer, and when Jesus spoke, his words carried the breath of heaven.

Jesus welcomed everyone he encountered — Jews and Romans, Greeks and Samaritans. He spoke with rabbis, tax collectors, and sinners alike. But he devoted his deepest attention to those who suffered: the blind, the deaf, the lame, the lepers. He touched those no one else would touch and loved those no one else would love.

When disciples of John the Baptist asked who he was, Jesus answered simply: “Tell John what you have seen and heard: the blind receive their sight, the lame walk, the lepers are cleansed, the deaf hear, the dead are raised, and the poor have good news brought to them” (Luke 7:22).

Even more radical was his teaching. “Love your enemies,” he said. “Bless those who curse you. Do good to those who hate you. Pray for those who mistreat you. As you would have others treat you, so must you treat them.”

And above all: “Love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, with all your strength, and with all your mind, and your neighbor as yourself” (Luke 10:27).

RELATED: The algorithm sells despair. Christmas tells the truth.

Photo by Fine Art Images/Heritage Images/Getty Images

Jesus taught through parables, stories anyone could understand. Perhaps the most famous is that of the prodigal son — a young man who squandered his inheritance on gambling, drink, and excess, only to be welcomed home with celebration rather than condemnation. Jesus explained it this way: “If a man has a hundred sheep, and one of them has gone astray, does he not leave the ninety-nine on the mountains and go in search of the one that went astray?” (Matthew 18:12).

God, in his love, was searching for a lost humanity, and Jesus was the shepherd sent to bring it home.

When the Pharisees asked when the kingdom of God would come, Jesus answered, “The kingdom of God is within you” (Luke 17:21). It is entered freely — not by force, not by empire, not by the power of Caesar. There exists a realm where Caesar’s writ does not run, a domain belonging wholly to God.

To bring us into that kingdom of peace, Christ endured the cross — the only place on earth that finally made room for one so profoundly good.

Before he departed, he instructed his apostles to greet every home with a prayer for peace — a peace available only in the kingdom he builds within each of us.

So let us set aside the calamities of the world, if only for a moment, and celebrate the birth of the most extraordinary child ever born — the one who offers eternal love and shelter from the storm.

Merry Christmas.

​Opinion & analysis, Christmas, Jesus christ, Gospel, Gospel of matthew, Gospel of luke, Love, Salvation, Sacrifice, Kingdom 

The news never stops telling us everything is falling apart, but the latest data says the exact opposite — at least when it comes to preventable deaths.

On this episode of “Stu Does America,” Stu Burguiere dives into five sets of federal numbers that prove America is quietly winning on life-and-death issues.

1. The US mortality rate is the lowest it has been since 2020, with COVID no longer a leading cause

According to the CDC’s latest provisional data, the 2024 mortality rate “was 3.8% lower than in 2023 and was the lowest death rate since 2020.”

Further, for the first time since the virus’ emergence, COVID was not one of the top 10 leading causes of death.

“This is going to disappoint the Taylor Lorenzes of the world, who want to still wear masks outdoors right now, but COVID is pretty much off the map,” says Stu.

2. Deaths related to heart attacks have plummeted

Research conducted by Stanford Medicine and published in the Journal of the American Heart Association indicates that over the last five decades, there has been a substantial decline in deaths from heart attacks.

The study concluded that since 1970, age-adjusted heart attack deaths have decreased by nearly 90%, while deaths from heart disease are down roughly 66%.

Although chronic heart conditions have risen alongside obesity and diabetes, these drops still reflect major progress in preventing and treating sudden heart attacks.

“Deaths from other types of heart disease … increased by 81% in the United States according to the study, so there are still issues, and that has a lot to do with us becoming fat fat fatties,” Stu jokes.

3. Drug overdose death have declined

A recent CDC report revealed that deaths from drug overdose have declined nearly 24% in the 12 months ending September 2024, compared to the previous year.

Stu displays the following chart to give a visual of this significant improvement in deaths from drug overdose, which skyrocketed during the 2020 COVID pandemic and remained high until last year.

“We’re not back down quite to the pre-COVID levels, but we are approaching that, which is a real positive,” he says.

4. US mass killings are the lowest they’ve been since 2006

Based on the latest data from the Associated Press and USA Today Mass Killing Database, which tracks incidents in which four or more people are killed (excluding the perpetrator) within a 24-hour period, there have been just 17 mass killings in the U.S. this year — the lowest annual total since the database began in 2006.

While one mass killing is too many, the dip indicates that we are thankfully beginning to return from “big COVID/Biden-era peaks,” says Stu.

“We’re going in the right direction.”

5. Teen suicide is declining

Recent federal data from the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration and the CDC reveals a decline in teen suicidal thoughts and behaviors. The 2024 National Survey on Drug Use and Health — an annual federal survey of over 70,000 people ages 12 and older that tracks mental health, substance use, and related trends — shows positive shifts among adolescents (ages 12-17) between 2021 and 2024, following pandemic-era spikes.

Serious suicidal thoughts in adolescents fell from 13% in 2021 to 10% by 2024. Further, suicide attempts in this age group dropped from 3.6% to 2.7%.

“Obviously, all way, way too high, but a good decrease,” says Stu.

All in all, Stu is encouraged by these statistics.

“This is really, really good news. … It is important to every once in a while note the fact that not everything sucks,” he says.

To hear more, watch the episode above.

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.

​Stu does america, Stu burguiere, Blazetv, Blaze media, Mortality rate, Death rate, Teen suicide, Overdose deaths, Heart attacks, Covid, Biden era 

As the years pass by, it can feel like Christmas has become less about the birth of Christ and his salvific mission and more about secularism and winter.

Look no farther than some of the most popular “Christmas” carols of the past 100 years: “White Christmas,” “Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer,” “Deck the Halls,” “Grandma Got Run Over by a Reindeer,” and on and on.

This Christmas, as you gather with your family, return to the meaning of the holiday — the birth of Christ — by reflecting on the original French version of “O Holy Night.”

The closing lyrics proclaim, without equivocation, that it is Christ who has saved us and we celebrate his coming. In other words, Christ is King!

For those in the French-speaking world, and especially the Acadian and Quebecois diaspora in New England, “Minuit Chretien” was a staple entrance hymn of midnight Mass.

While the English version “O Holy Night” is a beautiful song, the lyrics were adapted by Unitarian minister John Sullivan Dwight, reducing the theological weight of the original French.

Here are those English lyrics.

O holy night, the stars are brightly shining;
it is the night of the dear Savior’s birth.
Long lay the world in sin and error pining,
till He appeared and the soul felt its worth.
A thrill of hope, the weary world rejoices,
for yonder breaks a new and glorious morn!
Fall on your knees! O hear the angel voices!
O night divine! O night when Christ was born!
O night divine! O night, O night divine!

According to Chicago Catholic, the newspaper of the Archdiocese of Chicago, the song quickly became popular in Northern U.S. abolitionist circles due mainly to its third verse, which deals with breaking the chains of slavery.

Truly He taught us to love one another.
His law is love and His gospel is peace.
Chains shall He break, for the slave is our brother,
and in His name all oppression shall cease.
Sweet hymns of joy in grateful chorus raise we.
Let all within us praise His holy name.
Christ is the Lord! O praise His name forever!
His power and glory evermore proclaim!
His power and glory evermore proclaim!

Again, this is beautiful, but it downplays the truly salvific mission of Jesus Christ, God incarnate.

Before examining the French lyrics and their literal English translation, listen to the definitive version of the song, sung by Luciano Pavarotti at Notre Dame Basilica in Montreal, Quebec, in 1978. The concert in which he sang this rendition was a long-standing PBS Christmas special.

French lyrics

Here are the French lyrics, as compiled by the Oxford International Song Festival.

Minuit, Chrétiens, c’est l’heure solennelle,
Où l’homme Dieu descendit jusqu’à nous
Pour effacer la tache originelle
Et de son Père arrêter le courroux.
Le monde entier tressaille d’espérance
À cette nuit qui lui donne un sauveur.
Peuple, à genoux, attends ta délivrance.
Noël, Noël, voici le Rédempteur.

The tone is set right at the start. The verse boldly announces that this song is for believers. “Midnight, Christians, it is the holy hour.”

There is no mistaking this for secularism or a postmodern, easy Christianity. It calls the listener to remember that he is Christian and that Christmas is about the coming of the Savior, as the second line says, “When God as man descended unto us.”

The next part boldly proclaims the reason Christ became man: to save mankind from the stain of original sin. “To erase the original stain, and to end the wrath of His Father.”

The next two lines are very close to the English translation: “The whole world thrills with hope on this night that gives it a Savior.”

The end of the first verse brings it home: “Kneel, people, await your deliverance: Christmas, Christmas, the Redeemer is here!”

A bold declaration of what the night is about: the coming of deliverance that Christ the Redeemer brings!

The second and third verses are as reverent and hopeful as the first. The closing lyrics proclaim, without equivocation, that it is Christ who has saved us and we celebrate his coming. In other words: Christ is King!

​Christmas, Culture, Lifestyle, Music 

A Democratic politician from Rhode Island was caught on camera berating and arguing with police officers during a DUI traffic stop.

‘God forbid I was a black person, I’d be arrested!’

East Greenwich police pulled over Cranston Democratic Committee Chair Maria Bucci after midnight on Thursday.

Bucci, a former Cranston City Council member and former mayoral candidate, told authorities that she only had one glass of wine and was driving her cousin home from a Christmas party, according to the officer’s bodycam footage.

One of the officers claimed that he could smell alcohol on her breath and noted that her driving was “pretty erratic.”

Bucci accused the officer of abuse and claimed he was trying to embarrass her.

“You know who I am, right?” she asked.

“I don’t know who you are, miss,” the officer responded.

RELATED: Police video shows unhinged Democrat official melting down during arrest: ‘You’re gonna regret this!’

Photographer: Stefani Reynolds/Bloomberg via Getty Images

After several outbursts, Bucci reluctantly agreed to a field sobriety test. The officer asked Bucci to follow the tip of his pen with her eyes, then asked whether she would submit to a walk-and-turn test.

Bucci began arguing with the officers at the scene.

“I honestly feel bad. If I was a black human, I think you guys — no, honestly … I feel bad for the people that are not in my position,” she shouted while pointing at the officers.

Bucci shouted at her cousin, who remained in the vehicle to make some phone calls for her.

“Call my husband right now, and call the attorney general and everybody else in town,” Bucci said.

RELATED: The carnage no one talks about: Drunk driving and illegal aliens

Photo by MARK RALSTON/AFP via Getty Images

“This is disgusting. God forbid I was a black person, I’d be arrested,” she continued.

“What are you going to do? Shoot me? … Arrest me?”

After Bucci continued to be argumentative and did not complete the walk-and-turn portion of the sobriety test, the officer instructed her to turn around so he could place her in handcuffs.

“Give me the camera,” Bucci said, as she leaned toward the officer’s body camera. “You’re a dick!”

Bucci received a misdemeanor DUI charge, the New York Post reported.

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​News, Maria bucci, Rhode island, East greenwich, Dui, Politics 

“What is a Christmas movie?”

This is probably a question you’ve heard before in passing. Most of us instinctively have a good idea of what one is, but more than likely, that understanding is rather inexplicable, abstract, or trapped in the minutiae.

Only by leaning into my Christian faith did I begin to see these films and the unique glow that turns a regular film into a Christmas film.

We all know the tropes of Christmas movies — Santa Claus, joy to the world, peace and goodwill toward men, white snow on a warm Christmas morning, jingle bells, presents under the tree, hot chocolate and eggnog, sugar plums, figgy pudding, Nativity scenes, et cetera.

For most people, Christmas is a feeling and an idea as much as it is a day on the calendar. However, trying to put the abstract into words is challenging. In my capacity as a film reviewer, amateur filmmaker, and member of the Music City Film Critics Association, I have spent more than three years talking with friends and puzzling over the question for fun. For the most part, this debate was a lively intellectual exercise between my philosopher and cinephile friends and me; I can recall one particularly fun session of debate with my girlfriend as we discussed the Aristotelian implications of the definition of Christmas movies.

As it will become clear in this text, though, the answer to the question, “What is a Christmas movie?” is surprisingly hard to narrow down and answer definitively.

This was a problem I set out to try to formally solve in late 2024, during a rare moment of adult life when I had the time to sit down for three months and binge-watch out-of-season Christmas movies, while attending to a lengthy family hospice situation. As strange as it felt spending the month of October bingeing on Christmas movies, it was enlightening. Surveying films between the years 1935 and 2024, one sees a number of patterns and tropes fly by, evolving with the culture year by year.

Subsequently I partnered with my good friends at the evangelical ministry Geeks Under Grace to put my ideas to paper, publishing 10 weekly articles on the subject between November and December 2024. But even as I was penning those first essays, I struggled to find the right words; I didn’t have an answer in mind from the outset, merely a series of arguments and anecdotes. I would need to find my thesis in the act of writing this book.

There aren’t enough books written about Christmas films as a genre. If there are many, they are buried under an ocean of histories for specific films, best-of collections, or works written by obscure academics.

It’s easy enough to find resources on the production history of “It’s a Wonderful Life” but less so about the subgenre that flows out of it. Much has been said about the great entries in the subgenre: how “Miracle on 34th Street” became the first financially successful Christmas movie in 1947; how “It’s a Wonderful Life” and “A Christmas Story” were popularized via television broadcasts; how “Mister Magoo’s Christmas Carol” became the first animated Christmas special specifically released for television in 1962; how 2003’s “Elf” is the last Christmas film to be considered a blockbuster.

There is less said about what connects these data points.

One of the few experts on the subject I found was Scottish scholar Tom Christie, who has published multiple books on the history of Christmas films in the past decade through Extremis Publishing, including “The Golden Age of Christmas Movies: Festive Cinema of the 1940s and ’50s” and “A Totally Bodacious Nineties Christmas: Festive Cinema of the 1990s.” The rest of the insight I found was buried in individual articles and YouTube essays, to which I owe a tremendous debt for helping me shape the greater picture. They helped me break through my writer’s block and made the connections I needed to complete the project.

However, the seeds of insight I found in my reading turned me away from the films themselves.

From first principles, there can be no understanding of Christmas movies without first understanding Christmas. And there is no understanding of Christmas without understanding religion, society, secularism, consumerism, and the nature of what American society considers “normal.” It was only through this that the seed blossomed into what I think is the best achievable conception of a Christmas film, and only by leaning into my Christian faith did I begin to see these films and the unique glow that turns a regular film into a Christmas film.

I apologize to any secular readers who may have picked up this book imagining it would be relatively areligious, but I must beg their pardon in the necessity to discuss these issues through the lens of theology. I’m a practicing Christian, and I cannot help but think of life through the lens of a high-church Protestant. However, Christmas is a Christian holiday (at least tacitly), and I don’t think it’s possible to completely excise Jesus from the day bearing his name — at least not without turning the holiday into a parody of itself.

Christianity teaches us that Jesus Christ, the second person of the Trinity, became flesh and walked among us. He was both fully God and fully man and became the hinge of history. He was a paradox, described in His Nativity by the apologist C.S. Lewis, “Once in our world, a stable had something in it that was bigger than our whole world.”

The idea that a God so seemingly wrathful, distant, and lawful would be so humble as to allow Himself to be born as a fleshy human baby to a peasant woman in the backwater of the Roman Empire is strange. But this is the event Christmas celebrates — a contradiction and a miracle; the fullness of history fulfilled in humility; the logos breaching into the world; a quiet resistance manifesting against the evils of this rebelling silent planet.

Reflecting on this and the modern reality of Christmas, an idea began to unfold slowly in my mind. The realization came to me that Christmas movies are not defined so easily but are defined by a connection to the supernatural. They are downstream of something greater, containing within them a small drop of the divine-like spring water filtering into a mighty river.

That water may no longer be clear and crisp, or even drinkable, but its flowing is evidence of a source.

Christmas movies are utterly unique in modern film due to the way we interact with them. They are a subgenre unto themselves, intertextually linked with other Christmas movies and the holiday itself, but it is that very intangible glow that makes them unique. They contain an essence of what Lewis once described, in his book “The Problem of Pain,” as “the numinous”:

Those who have not met this term may be introduced to it by the following device. Suppose you were told there was a tiger in the next room: you would know that you were in danger and would probably feel fear. But if you were told, “There is a ghost in the next room,” and believed it, you would feel, indeed, what is often called fear, but of a different kind. It is not based on the knowledge of danger, for no one is primarily afraid of what a ghost may do to him, but of the mere fact that it is a ghost. It is “uncanny” rather than dangerous, and the special kind of fear it excites may be called dread. With the uncanny one has reached the fringes of the numinous.

This is not to call Christmas movies dreadful but that they contain within them a sense of the supernatural, what we might call “awe.” Connecting with that awe is downstream of the supernatural source that created it. Christmas movies grab that stream like a third rail and feel electrified by it.

It may seem like a bit of a leap to say that mean-spirited and cynical movies like “Christmas Vacation” or “Bad Santa” are in some way a reflection of God’s divinity, but as we will come to see, the thing that sets Christmas films apart from other films is an embrace of the supernatural essence of Christmas.

A Christmas movie always contains an element of hope that warps cynicism and pain of its story toward an ideal.

A Christmas movie glows with Christmas spirit.

A phrase like “the true meaning of Christmas” does this too, alluding to some unspoken notion that culture agrees upon, that Christmas is meaningful because it changes people. It scratches upon something divine while remaining achingly human and unspecific.

That thing is not entirely limited to the faithful, as secular people enjoy Christmas too. Muslims, Jews, Buddhists, and atheists all celebrate Christmas in equal measure. And while I wouldn’t say they celebrate in the same manner as I do at the communion rail on Christmas morning, they are communing with something beyond the superficial layers of cheap plastic junk that Christmas would be if it were merely another day in December.

This book is the result of many months of thought and reflection, brought into the world by the good graces of my friends and colleagues who helped me write it, host it, critique it, and bring the original articles to fruition, here expanded to a thematically rounded 12 chapters. Each chapter has been revised to reflect the conclusions I discovered in the very act of writing the book. One often finds his destination only by setting out on an unknown journey!

So let us start by asking the most immediate and controversial question and then let our understanding unfold: Is “Die Hard” a Christmas movie?

From there, we will discuss Christmas as a secular phenomenon; explore Christmas movies as a subgenre; the role religion, consumerism, normality, and nostalgia play in Christmas cinema; and close on the incarnational implications of Christmas films.

What is a Christmas movie?

Let’s find out!

The above essay was adapted from the book “Is ‘Die Hard’ a Christmas movie? And Other Questions About the True Meaning of Christmas Films,” which is available here.

​Book excerpt, Entertainment, Culture, Movies, Die hard, It’s a wonderful life, Elf, Criticism, Christmas, Christianity 

A CBS reporter, with an alleged history of inaccurate reporting, accused editor in chief Bari Weiss of censoring her story for “political” reasons. But journalist Michael Shellenberger outlined other reasons Weiss may have had concerns.

A Sunday episode of “60 Minutes” was slated to air a 13-minute segment on the infamous maximum-security prison in El Salvador known as CECOT. The segment, “Inside CECOT,” aimed to highlight the stories of Venezuelan men who were deported to the terrorist detention center by President Donald Trump’s administration.

‘An editorial decision is not the same as censorship.’

Less than 48 hours before the segment was scheduled to air in the U.S., Weiss pulled it, arguing that it was flawed and incomplete, according to the New York Times. During a Monday newsroom call, she reportedly stated that the segment was removed “because it was not ready” but that she looked forward to airing it “when it’s ready.”

“We need to push much harder to get [the Trump administration’s] principals [sic] on the record,” Weiss wrote in an internal memo to “60 Minutes” producers, the Times reported. She suggested pursuing an interview with White House Deputy Chief of Staff Stephen Miller.

Weiss also reportedly instructed producers to obtain more information about the criminal history of the deported men.

“We do our viewers the best service by presenting them with the full context they need to assess the story,” she wrote. “In other words, I believe we need to do more reporting here.”

Sharyn Alfonsi, the reporter who created the segment, accused Weiss of “corporate censorship,” according to a leaked email to colleagues. She explained that she had attempted to obtain a comment from the Trump administration for the segment but was unsuccessful, noting that this was one of the reasons Weiss had stopped it from running.

RELATED: Woke ’60 Minutes’ host Scott Pelley claims diversity is now ‘illegal’ in progressive rant at Wake Forest commencement

Photographer: Al Drago/Bloomberg via Getty Images

In her original report, she claimed that the Department of Homeland Security declined an interview request. However, the White House reportedly responded on Thursday.

“’60 Minutes’ should spend their time and energy amplifying the stories of Angel Parents, whose innocent American children have tragically been murdered by vicious illegal aliens that President Trump are [sic] removing from the country,” the White House spokesperson stated.

While the segment did not air in the U.S., it was broadcast in Canada because it was not pulled in time, the Times reported.

The White House’s statement did not appear in the original report.

“Our story was screened five times and cleared by both CBS attorneys and Standards and Practices,” Alfonsi wrote Monday, according to Fox News Digital. “It is factually correct. In my view, pulling it now, after every rigorous internal check has been met, is not an editorial decision, it is a political one.”

“If the administration’s refusal to participate becomes a valid reason to spike a story, we have effectively handed them a ‘kill switch’ for any reporting they find inconvenient,” Alfonsi added.

Journalist Michael Shellenberger criticized Alfonsi for having a history of “biased and inaccurate reporting.”

RELATED: ’60 Minutes’ finally responds to criticism for hit piece on Florida Gov. DeSantis: ‘Some viewers … applauded the story’

Sharyn Alfonsi. Photo by Marla Aufmuth/Getty Images for Texas Conference for Women

Shellenberger stated that in April 2021, Alfonsi worked on a “60 Minutes” episode that falsely accused Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis (R) of exclusively choosing Publix, a supermarket chain, to distribute COVID-19 vaccines because the company had donated to his political campaign.

He explained that Alfonsi made these false claims despite Rep. Jared Moskowitz, a Florida Democrat, repeatedly refuting the accusations.

After the episode aired, Moskowitz wrote in a post on X, then-Twitter, “@60Minutes I said this before and I’ll say it again. @Publix was recommended by [the Florida Division of Emergency Management] and [the Florida Department of Health] as the other pharmacies were not ready to start. Period! Full Stop! No one from the Governor’s office suggested Publix. It’s just absolute malarkey.”

Shellenberger noted that “three major liberal or left-wing fact-checking organizations” criticized the inaccuracy of the DeSantis segment.

He argued that Alfonsi has failed to present any evidence of “corporate censorship” concerning Weiss’ decision to postpone the CECOT segment.

“And an editorial decision is not the same as censorship, particularly since Weiss said she is delaying, not killing, the segment,” he wrote.

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​News, Cbs, Bari weiss, Sharyn alfonsi, Cecot, El salvador, Donald trump, Trump administration, Trump admin, Trump, Cbs news, 60 minutes, Michael shellenberger, Politics 

It’s Christmastime, and you can feel the shift in the air.

Something has changed in the nation’s mood. People smile more easily. Familiar music returns. And — quietly but unmistakably — you can say “Merry Christmas” again without apologizing for it. The president of the United States quotes the Gospel of John when he speaks about Jesus.

Christians need to face a hard truth: The truce was a mistake.

For a few short weeks, Americans remember what this season is actually about. Not a generic winter festival. Not a vague celebration of “light” or “togetherness.” But the birth of Jesus Christ — a real event in history that changed everything.

For centuries, Christians have marked this season to reflect on the incarnation of the Son of God. “Christ is the reason for the season” is not a slogan; it is a confession. God entered history. He took on flesh. He came to save sinners. Christianity is not built on myth or metaphor but on eyewitness testimony to what actually happened.

America is now remembering — haltingly, imperfectly — the central role of Christ in its own history. That recovery follows decades of effort by atheists and secular ideologues to banish Christ from the public square. Unfortunately, Christians largely agreed to the truce that made this possible. They kept their faith private while Marxists were happy to occupy public education.

In the 1960s, American Christians accepted what amounted to a truce. I half-jokingly call it the Madalyn Murray O’Hair deal. The now largely forgotten atheist activist sued to remove prayer and biblical instruction from public schools. Christians acquiesced. Public education, they were told, would be “neutral.” Religion would be kept out. Faith would be private.

Christians kept their side of the deal.

The Marxists did not — because they never agreed to one. They announced their intentions openly. They promised to march through the institutions, and they did. Universities filled with faculty who identify as left or far left and who teach Marxist frameworks as settled truth.

Today, it is easier to find a committed Marxist on campus than a practicing Christian.

For 60 years, Marxist philosophy crept into K-12 education and then saturated higher education. What was once smuggled in under euphemism is now proudly declared. Professors announce their ideology on syllabi and use taxpayer dollars to teach students that America is structurally racist and that “whiteness” is a form of oppression.

There was never neutrality. There was only a vacuum — and Marxism rushed in to fill it.

I saw this emptiness firsthand on my own campus at Arizona State University.

At ASU’s West Valley campus, administrators recently installed a “winter wonderland” display. Not Christmas lights — “winter” lights. Decorations carefully stripped of any reference to Christ. The existential meaninglessness was almost overwhelming.

Lights were strung up to flicker briefly in the darkness before being taken down and discarded. What did it mean? What did it point to beyond itself?

Or, as Hemingway wrote, was it simply nada y pues nada y pues nada — nothing, and then nothing, and then nothing?

This is what happens when you preserve form while evacuating content. Ritual without meaning. Celebration without hope. Light without truth.

Christmas is the opposite of that.

Christmas does not offer a vague lesson about darkness giving way to light. It proclaims that Jesus Christ is the light of the world. It is not a symbolic story to be endlessly reinterpreted but a declaration that Christ was born in history, of a virgin, in fulfillment of prophecy, to redeem a fallen world.

That is why efforts to drain Christmas of its meaning always feel strained. When leftists substitute “winter celebrations” and “seasonal observances,” they do not offer neutrality. They offer emptiness — sometimes dressed up as inclusion, sometimes as bureaucracy, sometimes as pagan revivalism. Light shows without the Logos. Rituals without redemption.

Christians need to face a hard truth: The truce was a mistake.

There is no neutral education. There never has been. Every curriculum conveys values. Every institution forms souls. The only question is whether students will be formed in the light of Christ or in the ideology of those who openly despise Him.

RELATED: The truth about Christmas: Debunking the pagan origin myth once and for all

Photo by: Sepia Times/Universal Images Group via Getty Images

Christmas exposes the lie of neutrality. It reminds us that history has meaning, that truth entered the world, and that human beings answer to something higher than administrative guidelines or ideological fashion.

So this year, I am not whispering, “Happy Holidays.” I am saying, “Merry Christmas” — to students, to colleagues, to anyone who will hear it.

Parents and students should remember something crucial: Universities answer to you. You are not passive consumers. You set expectations. You decide what kind of formation is acceptable.

When you see your professors, say, “Merry Christmas.” Say it cheerfully. Say it unapologetically. What you are affirming is not sentiment but truth: that Christ came into the world, and no amount of bureaucratic rebranding can erase Him.

The lights will flicker and fade. Christ will not.

Merry Christmas.

​Christians, Christmas, Radical left, Marxists, American left, American christians, Opinion & analysis, Atheists, Madalyn murray o’hair, Lawsuits, First amendment, Faith, Public square, Prayer in school, Arizona state university, Neutral 

Members of the Bethany Lutheran Church in Ashtabula, Ohio, said they were speechless to find that someone had vandalized their Nativity scene ahead of Christmas.

The near life-size display was found scattered on the ground, and a church worker initially believed the wind had blown it down. However, they discovered evidence that it was intentionally vandalized.

‘All I know for sure is we need to pray for the person or persons who did that because God wants us to pray for their soul, and it’s going to be hard to do that, but that’s what we have to do.’

“You could see the tire tracks coming in from the north, and we are 50 feet off the road,” said Bob Oxley, who has put up the display for five years. “They came through one time, wiped it out, came through a second time, wiped it out again.”

He said there were three sets of tire tracks going through the location of the display, and on the third pass, the vandals destroyed the lighting that was set up.

“Life-sized characters. You could see they are driven in the ground with conduit to hold up to the wind. They came down, they went down through the whole length of it, and it’s probably 10, 20, 30, 40 feet long,” he added.

Church board member Jackie Featsent said she has worshipped at the church for most of her life and cannot understand what would motivate the vandalism.

“It’s just so sad that somebody would have such hate for something that is supposed to bring joy. Why would somebody have such hate to do something like that? I don’t understand, I can’t understand that,” said Featsent.

Oxley estimated that the damages added up to about $1,500 and said the display was unrepairable.

RELATED: Church displays political Nativity scene with Jesus in zip ties and centurions as ICE agents

“The last couple of years, it just seemed so much bigger and nicer,” Featsent added. “Bob had it spread out, added some extra lighting. You could see it from the main drag another block over, but you could see it from there. It just stood out.”

The church filed a police report, and church members hope cameras will help catch the culprits responsible.

“All I know for sure is we need to pray for the person or persons who did that because God wants us to pray for their soul. And it’s going to be hard to do that, but that’s what we have to do,” Featsent added.

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​War against christmas, Anti-christian vandalism, Nativity scene, Ashtabula church, Politics 

Having identified a problem they created, Democrats are now blaming “affordability” on Republicans. It is a striking display of audacity — the very definition of chutzpah.

For more than a year, Democrats have struggled to find a message that resonates because they keep recycling losing ones. They have lashed out at immigration enforcement —storming ICE facilities, attacking ICE officers, and defending violent illegal aliens.

Democrats are now left with a single strategy: campaigning on the consequences of their own incompetence and hoping voters forget who caused them.

They voted for the largest tax increase in U.S. history by opposing the extension of the 2017 tax rates under the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act.

They continue to cling to climate alarmism even as the rest of the world moves on.

They remain soft on crime, opposing President Trump’s deployment of the National Guard in cities where criminals run rampant and law-abiding citizens live in fear.

And in a final act of desperation, they triggered the longest federal government shutdown in history — before caving and achieving nothing.

Same issues. Same failure to connect.

The results speak for themselves. Democrats’ favorability sits at an abysmal 32.5%, well below Republicans’ 38.2% and far below President Trump’s 43.8%.

Then came Zohran Mamdani, the neophyte New York Democratic Socialist who toppled Democrats’ old guard in consecutive elections — first Mayor Eric Adams, then former Gov. Andrew Cuomo. Mamdani did what Democrats have always done: promise voters lots of free stuff. Only he did it on a far grander scale — buses, housing, child care, grocery stores.

Faced with his success, Democrats opted for the familiar response: If you can’t beat ’em, join ’em. They sanitized Mamdani’s socialism, rebranded it as “affordability,” and declared it their new cause.

That affordability is now Democrats’ issue should surprise no one. After all, they caused the crisis they now loudly lament.

Start with New York City, where affordability has collapsed most dramatically. According to Visual Capitalist’s ranking of America’s least affordable cities, Manhattan is No. 1, Brooklyn ranks sixth, and Queens seventh. In fact, the top 10 least affordable cities are overwhelmingly governed by Democrats and located in Democrat-dominated states: New York, Hawaii, California, and Massachusetts. By contrast, nine of the 10 most affordable cities are in Republican-dominated states.

The reasons are no mystery. They are the left’s preferred policies: high taxes that drive up the cost of living and chase out taxpayers; rent control that discourages new construction and fuels homelessness; and excessive regulation and litigation that inflate the cost of everything they touch.

The same pattern holds at the state level. U.S. News and World Report lists the 10 least affordable states, and the top six are California, New Jersey, Hawaii, Massachusetts, Washington, and New York. Nine of the 10 are blue states. Florida — the lone red-state exception — also boasts the No. 1 economy, ranks second in education, levies no state income tax, and continues to attract new residents in large numbers. Meanwhile, all 10 of the most affordable states are Republican-led.

RELATED: The socialist spell: Why modern minds keep falling for an old lie

Photo by Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images

What about inflation? Isn’t that a national problem?

Yes, but inflation didn’t materialize out of thin air. It began under the Biden administration, reaching a 40-year high of 9.1% in June 2022. CPI-U inflation was just 1.4% when Biden took office in January 2021. By March, it had nearly doubled. By June, it had surged to 5.4%. By December, it hit 7%. A year later, it still stood at 6.5%. Inflation did not fall below 3% until July 2024 — the 43rd month of Biden’s presidency.

Excessive Democrat spending fueled this surge. From fiscal years 2021 through 2024, the Congressional Budget Office shows cumulative deficits of $8.9 trillion, driven by roughly $8 trillion in spending above the pre-pandemic baseline. The only reason Democrats didn’t spend more is that members of their own party balked.

Inflation works like weight gain: it comes on fast and comes off slowly. Even when the rate of inflation declines, prices remain higher. There is no economic Ozempic. Americans are still paying the price for four years of Democratic fiscal gluttony.

None of this has stopped Democrats from claiming “affordability” as their issue — or from demanding more of the same policies that caused the crisis in the first place: higher spending, higher taxes, and more regulation.

Stripped of winning ideas, Democrats are now left with a single strategy: campaigning on the consequences of their own incompetence and hoping voters forget who caused them.

​Affordability, Affordability crisis, 2026 midterms, Inflation, Housing prices, Opinion & analysis, Government shutdown, Taxes, Cost of living, Economy, The democrats 

One of the White House’s longest and most anticipated traditions is the Christmas tree decorations unveiled every year by the first lady.

Although administrations had already been decorating the White House for Christmas for decades, back in 1961, then-first lady Jackie Kennedy became the first to decorate in accordance with a theme.

Since then, Americans across the country have been able to enjoy countless Christmas displays at the People’s House, no matter their party affiliation. No doubt, some decorations have been more controversial than others, but most have provided unique and festive insights into the personal taste of each first lady.

That said, here are the five best Christmas instillations in recent White House history.

5. 2011, Michelle Obama: ‘Shine, Give, Share’

Photo by Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images

First lady Michelle Obama’s 2011 Christmas display featured warm Christmas lights, garlands, and ornaments reminiscent of the best the 1980s had to offer.

Obama’s theme balanced familiarity and festivity, even featuring a decorative recreation of their dog, Bo.

But the real showstopper was a commemorative Christmas tree honoring the brave men and women of the military whose service allows millions of Americans across the country to enjoy the holiday peacefully at home.

Photo by Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images

On the tree hung framed medals awarded to America’s finest military members, with the blue star families fittingly being honored in the White House’s Blue Room. The tree was also adorned with handmade holiday cards written by children from military families.

4. 1983, Nancy Reagan: ‘Old-Fashioned Toys’

Bettmann/Getty Images

First lady Nancy Reagan’s Christmas decorations were unpretentious and relatable. The Christmas tree above features an eclectic mix of garlands, tinsel, and playful ornaments that suited the 1983 theme “Old-Fashioned Toys.”

The tree seemed to celebrate the excitement of Christmas as seen through the eyes of a child, anxiously waking up early to unwrap gifts after noticing that Santa finished his plate of cookies. The tree was not particularly glamorous or high fashion, but rather comforting and familiar. It felt like going home for the holidays.

To top it all off, Reagan’s display featured a surprise celebrity appearance.

Bettmann/Getty Images

While Reagan unveiled the Christmas decor, she also appeared alongside Mr. T dressed up as Santa Claus.

3. 1967, Lady Bird Johnson

Bettmann/Getty Images

First lady Claudia Alta “Lady Bird” Johnson integrated every nostalgic Christmas motif imaginable in her Christmas decorations.

The tree itself had garlands made of popcorn and cranberry, sugar-cookie ornaments and candy canes hung on branches, as well as classic silver bobbles and felt decorations. The tree looked as if it had been decorated entirely by ornaments and embellishments children made at school to proudly hang on the tree in their family living room.

Johnson’s decorations also included a beautiful 18th-century Italian Nativity scene complete with floating angels.

Photo by UPI/Bettmann Archive/Getty Images

The Nativity scene was presented to the White House as a Christmas gift by an American philanthropist and art collector named Jane Engelhard, who also made major donations to the Metropolitan Museum of Art.

2. 2006, Laura Bush: ‘Deck the Halls and Welcome All’

Photo by Chuck Kennedy/MCT/Tribune News Service via Getty Images

First lady Laura Bush included all of the classic elements that make Christmas festive, but she also added a unique, whimsical detail.

Bush’s trees featured faux snow caps on the branches that made them appear as though they had just been plucked out of a Christmas Claymation movie. The trees were also adorned with cascading silver tinsel and garlands, sparkling snowflakes, and glass ornaments tied with red bows.

Photo by Alex Wong/Getty Images

Similar trees were found throughout the halls of the White House beside bold garlands of red and silver ornaments consistent with the tree’s color palette.

1. 2025, Melania Trump: ‘Home Is Where the Heart Is’

Photo by SAUL LOEB / AFP via Getty Images

First lady Melania Trump’s taste in Christmas decorations has been consistently exquisite, and 2025 is no exception.

Most will remember Trump’s iconic display featuring a hallway of bold, red Christmas trees or stark, white branches from her husband’s first term. Although her decorations made a splash both of those years, 2025 is arguably her most stunning display yet.

Dozens of trees are illuminated by twinkling lights and floating candles with dashes of red and gold ribbon running between the branches. Matching red presents are laid at the base of the trees as well as countless wreaths on every window of the White House.

Photo by SAUL LOEB / AFP via Getty Images

Trump also featured several playful elements throughout the White House, including a Lego portrait of President George Washington, President Donald Trump, and matching Lego bows on the wreaths above them.

In a touching tribute, one tree displayed in the Red Room is decorated with tens of thousands of blue butterflies to commemorate the hundreds of thousands of foster children across the country, one of her signature causes.

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​Christmas, White house, White house christmas decorations, Christmas decorations, Jackie kennedy, Michelle obama, Jfk, Barack obama, Bo, Blue star families, Military, Nancy reagan, Ronald reagan, Kennedy administration, Reagan administration, Obama administration, Mr. t, Santa claus, Lyndon johnson, Lady bird johnson, Nativity set, Johnson administration, Laura bush, George w bush, Bush administration, Melania trump, Donald trump, Trump administration, Politics 

An Ohio family says that authorities did little to protect their 12-year-old son after they reported online harassment that included a death threat plot.

The messages were allegedly made by other students from Madison Local Schools in Butler County, according to the victim’s aunt, Courtney Sorrell.

‘We didn’t want this to blow up, but we want the kids to know you can’t make these threats and bully someone or say these things and not be held accountable.’

Sorrell said the harassment began after a breakup, which led to the girl group targeting her nephew.

“Her and her friends were targeting my nephew individually at first,” Sorrell said to WKRC-TV. “Just calling, texting, FaceTiming, and harassing him to the point he would block one person’s number, and then they would reach out from another number. They would say disgusting things like how he’s hated and he needs to just go kill himself.”

The girls allegedly added him to a group chat where they discussed their alleged plan to kill him. Some of the messages were included in a Butler County Sheriff’s Office report.

“Can we kill him,” one message read.

Another read, “Yas we will kill him tomorrow,” and, “Who has weapons that we can bring to school.”

Others said they could bring a pocketknife, baseball bats, and a gun.

Screenshots of the group chat showed 13 participants.

The kids who participated in the chat were suspended for 10 days, but the family is upset that the district didn’t appear to take the threat seriously. Sorrell said the family went to the media because they felt the district wasn’t doing enough.

In response, the school district released a statement.

“We are aware of social media posts regarding a potential threat toward Madison today,” the statement reads. “The district is actively addressing the situation and has taken appropriate steps to ensure the safety of our students and employees. We appreciate your cooperation and support as we prioritize the well-being of our school community.”

RELATED: ‘Just end him’: 5th-grade girls allegedly plotted to stab boy to death at school and make it look like a suicide

Sorrell says the family wants greater accountability at the district and far more transparency. They also want the children who made the threats to face more stringent punishments.

“Why don’t you call the cops? Why don’t you go to the school? Well, we tried that at the beginning,” Sorrell continued.

“We didn’t want to come to social media,” she added. “We didn’t want this to blow up, but we want the kids to know you can’t make these threats and bully someone or say these things and not be held accountable.”

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​Sixth grade murder plot, 12 year old online harassment, Courtney sorrell, Student death threat plot, Crime 

The Great Replacement theory is a conjecture popularized by French writer Renaud Camus in his 2011 book, “Le Grand Remplacement,” claiming that globalist elites are deliberately orchestrating mass immigration of non-white people into Western countries to demographically replace and ultimately disempower or even eradicate white European populations.

It’s often branded as a far-right conspiracy theory, but just look at the evidence:

Mass illegal immigration is orchestrated or deliberately enabled under progressive administrations, despite polls indicating that most citizens want less immigration. Skyrocketing housing costs, student debt, stagnant wages, and taxes make it nearly impossible for young white/middle-class natives to afford children, while many immigrant households (legal and illegal) get access to welfare, EITC, child tax credits, Medicaid, and housing aid that effectively subsidize higher fertility or larger families.Politicians, corporate media, and advertising openly celebrate that the country is becoming “majority-minority,” cheering it as a moral and cultural improvement.Anyone who complains about the speed or scale of immigration (even mildly) gets instantly branded “racist,” “white supremacist,” or “xenophobic,” faces censorship, bans, and job cancellation, and is shut out of respectable discourse.

So it’s not just a theory. It’s a scheme that’s very much in action right now.

“Demographic replacement of the American stock is the plan in order to manipulate elections in the democracy,” says Auron MacIntyre, BlazeTV host of “The Auron MacIntyre Show.”

He plays a clip from White House Deputy Chief of Staff Stephen Miller telling Sean Hannity the same thing.

“The Biden administration, Secretary of Homeland Security Alejandro Mayorkas, devised a scheme to fly illegal aliens into the country and then to escort them en masse across the border by the millions and to give them something known as parole, which gives them a work permit, which gives them a Social Security number, which gives them access to the voting booth,” Miller declared. “This was the plan all along.”

To its core, the plan is deeply undemocratic, MacIntyre explains. “The whole idea of the democracy is that it represents the beliefs and will of the people and that the popular sovereignty is supposed to guide the politicians,” he says.

“So if instead of the popular sovereignty guiding the politicians, the politicians [via immigration] can create and manufacture popular sovereignty in their favor, then they can control the entire system.”

And that’s exactly what the Democrat Party wants, he says — to secure all future elections by turning the nation into a blue blob of welfare-dependents who will reliably vote Democrat to keep their benefits.

“[The Great Replacement theory] is not a conspiracy theory. This is not some weird internet idea. This is the plan of the Democratic Party. This is what they want. This is their political strategy,” MacIntyre reiterates.

The masses of immigrants from Afghanistan, Somalia, and Venezuela — they’re “here for a reason,” he insists. “They’re here to replace you.”

“You address this, or the country drowns.”

To hear Auron’s in-depth breakdown of the Great Replacement theory, watch the video above.

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To enjoy more of this YouTuber and recovering journalist’s commentary on culture and politics, subscribe to BlazeTV — the largest multi-platform network of voices who love America, defend the Constitution, and live the American dream.

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A Delaware state trooper was killed in a shooting Tuesday at a DMV facility in New Castle County, according to police.

Law enforcement officials responded to an active shooter situation at the facility in Minquadale on Hessler Boulevard at about 2 p.m.

‘They said a guy just walked up to the motor vehicle and just started shooting. It don’t have to be like that.’

“Law enforcement acted swiftly to secure the scene, and the shooter has been confirmed deceased,” Gov. Matt Meyer (D) wrote on social media. “State and local law enforcement are on the scene and coordinating response efforts. Please avoid the area and follow guidance from authorities.”

He added that there was no active threat to the public.

Video from inside the facility showed what appeared to be bullet damage in a window, but it was unclear whether the gunfire came from within or from outside.

“It’s just really sad. Like, when does it stop?” said Roxzanne Johnson to WPVI-TV. “They said a guy just walked up to the motor vehicle and just started shooting. It don’t have to be like that.”

Others at the scene were treated for minor injuries, including a 40-year-old woman as well as a 35-year-old for shortness of breath.

RELATED: Bodycam video shows Buffalo cop shoot and kill man as he dragged him on the side of his car

WPVI also reported that the facility might have had an officer stationed at the scene before the shooting.

Officials told the public to stay away from the scene as the investigation continued.

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The iconic voice that sings the song “You’re a Mean One, Mr. Grinch” from the animated special “How the Grinch Stole Christmas” ensured the tune has stayed a classic for ages — but the man behind the voice was never given credit.

“They needed somebody that could bring the Grinch, somebody who had a scowl that could match the Grinch. And that’s when the guy who was never named comes into the picture and walks into the studio,” Blaze Media co-founder Glenn Beck explains.

“And somewhere in a Los Angeles recording booth late at night, I think 1966, he steps up into a booth, up to a microphone, and his voice is so deep, it’s almost as if it rolled out of the earth itself,” he continues.

“He steps up to the microphone, and he records the now really super famous anthem in ‘The Grinch,’” he adds.

The song may only be six verses, but while he recorded the song, the crew and those who worked on it said that “they knew that that performance would outlive all of them.”

“They put it in the show. The show airs. Credits roll. His name’s not on it. Not a mention, not a whisper,” Glenn says.

While he was never officially given credit, the man who delivered what Glenn calls “one of the most unforgettable performances in Christmas history” was named Thurl Ravenscroft.

“His name is nowhere to be found, but it should be. And it should be remembered, because he’s great,” Glenn adds.

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A case involving an alleged career criminal threatening to kill elementary school students in Austin has prompted Republican Texas Gov. Greg Abbott to take decisive actions against “progressive DAs.”

Abbott cited claims from the Austin Justice watchdog group that Michael Nnaji had been arrested over 34 cases since 2019 but was released or had charges reduced by lenient prosecutors.

‘Those DAs must be held accountable and prosecutorial power must be shifted to actual prosecutors.’

Nnaji allegedly “banged on the locked glass doors” of Padrón Elementary School in Austin in Oct. 2024 and screamed “I’m going to go inside and kill, I’m gonna find a way to get in.”

The man skipped court after being released on bond, according to Austin Justice, and had charges dropped over a Dec. 5 trespass at a gas station while he was fleeing justice over the school threat charges.

Abbott wrote on social media Monday that he would push legislation to reel in progressive district attorneys.

“I am calling for legislation that creates a Chief State Prosecutor to actually prosecute criminals like this that DAs in places like Austin refuse to prosecute,” he wrote.

“Progressive DAs are literally leading to the murder of Texans,” Abbott added. “Those DAs must be held accountable and prosecutorial power must be shifted to actual prosecutors.”

RELATED: Soros-backed LA district attorney under fire over lax sentence in hit-and-run of mom and baby

Billionaire tech entrepreneur Elon Musk backed the proposal in a statement on social media.

“This is a great idea! I initially read this as ‘let’s prosecute DAs that refuse to prosecute,’ which is also a good idea,” he posted, adding a laughing emoji.

Prosecutorial discretion under current Texas law lies with local prosecutors who are elected by the voters.

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Over the past 11 months, Immigration and Customs Enforcement and other federal agencies have worked to put away numerous murderers, pedophiles, rapists, gang members, drug traffickers, and terrorists.

The Department of Homeland Security listed over a dozen of the “worst of the worst” criminal illegal aliens who were arrested by federal law enforcement agents in 2025 in a press release exclusively obtained by Blaze News.

The department stated that 70% of ICE’s arrests were illegal aliens who were either convicted of or charged with a crime in the United States.

‘Americans can be proud of DHS law enforcement who worked around the clock this year to remove the worst of the worst from American neighborhoods.’

The DHS year-end roundup highlighted ICE New Orleans’ arrest of Olvin Rodriguez-Inestroza, a Honduran national with active warrants for 394 counts of pornography involving juveniles and two counts of sexual abuse of an animal.

In July, the then-22-year-old pleaded guilty to distribution of child pornography after investigators found hundreds of disturbing photos and videos on his phone, including some involving toddlers.

RELATED: ICE’s Christmas crackdown: Gang members, pedophiles, and an attempted murderer are now off the streets

Olvin Rodriguez-Inestroza. Image source: Department of Homeland Security

Federal agents also arrested Diego Barron-Esquivel, a Mexican national who was sentenced to 20 years in prison for violently assaulting and strangling an ICE officer in February in Wichita, Kansas. Barron-Esquivel was accused of consistently harassing his former spouse, and he was previously arrested on multiple counts of domestic battery, protection order violations, aggravated robbery, felony theft, and other offenses.

Diego Barron-Esquivel. Image source: Department of Homeland Security

Jaan Shah Safi, an Afghan national, entered the country under former President Joe Biden’s “Operation Allies Welcome” in 2021. He was previously arrested for allegedly providing support to the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria-Khorasan, also referred to as ISIS-K. According to the DHS, Safi provided weapons to his father, who is a commander of an Afghan militia group. The DHS announced in early December that ICE agents arrested Safi in Waynesboro, Virginia, after his Temporary Protected Status application was terminated.

Jaan Shah Safi. Image source: Department of Homeland Security

ICE captured Gerson Emir Cuadra Soto, an MS-13 gang member from Honduras who is believed to have illegally entered the U.S. in 2022 after he allegedly bribed his way out of jail in his home country. He is wanted in Honduras for a quadruple homicide and is an alleged member of an assassination squad. Federal immigration agents caught up to Cuadra Soto in Grand Island, Nebraska, on December 8.

Gerson Emir Cuadra Soto. Image source: Department of Homeland Security

Jose Alfredo Uzeta, a Mexican national, was accused of performing dental procedures without a license. He was convicted of dentistry act violation and indecent assault in Harris County, Texas.

Jose Alfredo Uzeta. Image source: Department of Homeland Security

Rafael Alberto Cadena-Sosa, from Mexico, was accused of running a sex trafficking operation in Miami, Florida, with his family. ICE Los Angeles arrested Cadena-Sosa in San Pedro, California, in December. According to the Department of Justice, he and his family approached females, some as young as 14, in Mexico to lure them into the U.S. under false promises of work opportunities. Once in the U.S., they allegedly imposed a smuggling debt and used threats and violence to force the females into engaging in prostitution 12 hours a day, six days a week.

Rafael Alberto Cadena-Sosa. Image source: Department of Homeland Security

ICE agents also rounded up Antonio Israel Lazo-Quintanilla, from El Salvador, who is a confirmed gang member of the 18th Street Gang, which is designated a foreign terrorist organization. He is wanted in his home country for aggravated homicide, extortion, drug possession, and other felonies. Federal agents nabbed Lazo-Quintanilla in March.

Antonio Israel Lazo-Quintanilla. Image source: Department of Homeland Security

Walter Leonel Perez Rodriguez, from El Salvador, was convicted of sexual assault of a child under 17 years old. His criminal history also includes multiple DUIs, child fondling, and illegal re-entering of the U.S. During his November arrest, the convicted pedophile allegedly assaulted an ICE officer with a metal coffee cup, resulting in a laceration that required 13 stitches.

Walter Leonel Perez Rodriguez. Image source: Department of Homeland Security

ICE agents arrested Thao Van Cao, a Vietnamese national who is a member of the Asian Cheap Boy criminal gang. His lengthy rap sheet includes 25 convictions for crimes such as flight to avoid prosecution, possession of a controlled substance, second-degree robbery, cruelty toward the elderly, arson, and theft.

Thao Van Cao. Image source: Department of Homeland Security

Aldrin Guerrero-Munoz was picked up by federal immigration agents in October. The criminal illegal alien was previously sentenced to 32 years in prison for the intentional murder of his 3-month-old son.

Aldrin Guerrero-Munoz. Image source: Department of Homeland Security

ICE apprehended Jung Choi, a 53-year-old from South Korea. She was sentenced to 11 years in prison for voluntary manslaughter after she and her male companion were accused of murdering his wife.

Jung Choi. Image source: Department of Homeland Security

Jonatan Monzon-Olivares, a Guatemalan national, was taken off the street in August. He had been arrested 38 times with 15 convictions for crimes including sexual assault, aggravated assault, burglary, larceny, possession of stolen property, and obstructing justice.

Jonatan Monzon-Olivares. Image source: Department of Homeland Security

Federal agents nabbed Alejandro Lima-Ramirez, who was previously arrested two dozen times in California and Oregon. He has 16 convictions, including for drug trafficking, robbery, fraud, and carrying a concealed weapon.

Alejandro Lima-Ramirez. Image source: Department of Homeland Security

In August, ICE agents apprehended Michael Kabiona, from the Democratic Republic of the Congo. He was sentenced to 12 years in prison after he was found guilty in 2015 of repeatedly raping his stepdaughter, starting when she was 9 years old.

Michael Kabiona. Image source: Department of Homeland Security

Pedro Luis Ortiz-Mendez and Jose Vicente Ortiz-Mendez, brothers from Mexico, were also arrested by federal immigration agents in August. The two men are wanted in their home country for multiple murders.

Pedro Luis Ortiz-Mendez and Jose Vicente Ortiz-Mendez. Image source: Department of Homeland Security

Lastly, the DHS highlighted this year’s arrest of Yehia Elham Badawi, an Egyptian national with a lengthy criminal record, including robbery, aggravated assault, and reckless endangerment, among other violent felonies. His convictions stem from a 1994 shoot-out that seriously injured a Philadelphia police officer.

RELATED: Illegal alien truck driver walks out of jail after allegedly killing American — and sanctuary policies appear to be to blame

Yehia Elham Badawi. Image source: Department of Homeland Security

“Americans can be proud of DHS law enforcement who worked around the clock this year to remove the worst of the worst from American neighborhoods. Our law enforcement has put their lives on the line to arrest murderers, pedophiles, rapists, gang members, and terrorists,” said DHS Assistant Secretary Tricia McLaughlin.

McLaughlin stated that under the leadership of President Donald Trump and DHS Secretary Kristi Noem, “criminals are not welcome in the U.S. If you come to our country and break our laws, we will find you, arrest you, and deport you.”

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