Category: blaze media

The Democratic Party’s best chance to unseat longtime Sen. Susan Collins (R-Maine) is in the midst of yet another scandal tied to his old social media posts.

Graham Platner, the Marine veteran who is all but guaranteed to win the Democrat Senate primary in Maine on June 9 now that Gov. Janet Mills has bowed out, made other posts on Reddit that have raised eyebrows.

Platner ‘is someone whose instincts appear crude, reckless, and deeply unserious.’

Under the now-deleted username “P-Hustle” — which, according to Fox News, he has previously acknowledged as his — Platner strangely sexualized porta-john visits and graffiti. These posts are not unearthed, offhand comments from decades ago. Some are as recent as March 2021, when Platner was 36 years old.

In a thread entitled “GWOT D*ck Art,” Platner recalled a “Hot Rod C*ck” he saw graffitied on the inside of a portable restroom while he was in Manas, an Afghanistan War-era U.S. military transit hub in Kyrgyzstan.

“It was beautiful. Engorged and veiny, it rode towards its penetrative glory upon two smoking hot rod wheels, smoke and fire enshrouding its tumescence, winged like Nike as it pushed ever forward towards its conquests,” Platner wrote on March 11, 2021, according to the archives provided by the Maine Monitor.

“I sat there in sheer awe, my feelings of happiness to be going home washed aside by the soul filling joy to be allowed to witness such glory.”

Four years earlier almost to the day, in a thread in which a military vet discusses “aromatherapy,” Platner confessed to regularly masturbating in a porta-john on account of the “blue water smell” there. “I still have to jerk off every time I sit in a portas**tter….that blue water smell conditioned me,” he posted on March 8, 2017.

RELATED: Susan Collins reveals health condition ahead of likely matchup against Democrat enmeshed in Nazi scandal

Kent NISHIMURA/AFP/Getty Images

Platner has already spent months playing defense about other bizarre posts from the “P-Hustle” Reddit account. In September 2020, Platner wrote that white people “actually are” as racist and stupid “as Trump Thinks.”

In September 2012, Platner characterized himself as “crudely atheist” and joked that Jesus was a “zombie” and the Virgin Mary a “skank.”

For years, Platner also apparently had tattooed on his chest an image that highly resembled a Nazi SS guard “totenkopf” skull. He denied being a “secret Nazi” and recently had the tattoo covered over.

GOP strategist Mehek Cooke noted that these latest revelations from the “P-Hustle” account demonstrate that Platner has left a “years-long trail of vulgar, sexually degrading, and slur-filled commentary.”

“Platner is not a truth-teller,” Cooke said, according to Fox News. “He is someone whose instincts appear crude, reckless, and deeply unserious.”

Cooke also noted: “If they were really ‘jokes,’ why delete the posts? That sounds less like humor and more like a CYA cleanup operation.”

Graham’s campaign did not respond to a request for comment from Blaze News.

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​Senate, Graham platner, Susan collins, Maine, Democrat, Democratic party, Politics 

Remember around 2018 or so, when reviews on Rotten Tomatoes suddenly became suspicious?

Like movies that hit all the left-wing, DEI talking points would get 98% Fresh ratings from the critics, but then when regular people started weighing in, the audience meter would drop precipitously?

Paul Dano’s Baranov is fascinating. He’s the opposite of a typical Russian movie character. He’s sensitive, intelligent, creative, and socially aristocratic.

Or when a movie like “Sound of Freedom” came out and all the critics panned it because it was produced by a non-Hollywood Christian studio. But then, everyone who saw it loved it?

Generally, I still consult Rotten Tomatoes. But in any situation where a film can be seen as “political” or might touch on a controversial subject, I become skeptical.

Such was the case with “The Wizard of the Kremlin.” It was already getting roasted months before its release. Apparently, our brave American critics wanted to virtue signal their personal animosity toward Putin.

Because of this, I became interested in the film. If the critics hate it, it’s probably good.

RELATED: MacIntyre: The real reason journalists hate ‘Sound of Freedom’

Getty Images

Vive le cinéma!

Another aspect of the film I was excited about: It was made by French filmmaker Olivier Assayas. Not that the French are so independent-minded, but Hollywood filmmakers are literally incapable of addressing international politics above a sixth-grade level.

The French though. They’ve been through some stuff. They’re not afraid to talk about international affairs in a serious, adult manner.

Another thing that recommended the movie: the casting of Jude Law as Putin and Paul Dano as Baranov, his close personal adviser. (Baranov is a fictional character, almost everyone else is real.)

When I heard this, I thought: “Oh my goodness, this movie is going to be brilliant.”

Another good sign: The film was adapted from an acclaimed French novel by the same name. So the story was already established. The film just had to follow it.

Story of my life

The movie begins in the present, with an American journalist traveling to Russia to interview Baranov (Paul Dano) about his former role in the Putin administration.

Through this interview, Baranov tells the story of his life, which begins in the ’80s and moves through the dissolution of the Soviet Union and the emergence of Putin.

The film’s portrayal of life at the end of the Soviet Union was super interesting, in part because we rarely see this in films.

The avant-garde theater scene in Moscow in the late 1980s? Could you even picture that? I couldn’t. Until I saw it.

All the Russian interiors were super interesting. And the clothes. And the nightclubs. The supporting actors all looked very Russian. The whole thing was fun to look at. This was the end of the dowdy Soviet Union and the beginning of the reign of the gangster oligarchs.

No rush

It took 40 minutes for Putin to appear. This built suspense. You’re sitting there enjoying Paul Dano as Baranov, and then you remember Jude Law is still to come. Jude Law as Putin!

Meanwhile, Paul Dano’s Baranov is already fascinating. He’s the opposite of a typical Russian movie character. He’s sensitive, intelligent, creative, and socially aristocratic (his father and grandfather were high-level Communist Party members).

He speaks in a soft, unhurried voice. But with his big, wide, puffy face, he still looks totally Russian!

The whole “you’re in Russia” conceit was great. I don’t know if this was actually filmed in Russia, but it sure felt like Russia. (I noticed in the credits there were a few mentions of Latvia. So maybe they shot some of it there.)

Putin on the Ritz

So finally, 40 minutes in, we get our first look at Putin. In the beginning, it’s Baranov and his boss (they both work for Russian TV) who are recruiting the reluctant KGB agent.

They think Russia needs a new style of leader, someone young and energetic. They’ll help him. They’ll guide him. They’ll make sure he wins.

But Putin isn’t receptive. He’s happy where he is.

But once he gets a sniff of power, Putin rises quickly. Only Baranov is able to remain in his good graces, due to his low-key, soft-spoken manner.

Jude Law as Putin was hilarious. I laughed to myself when he first appeared. Not that it was intentionally funny. It was just a relief, and a little bit shocking, to finally see him.

It was actually a very good rendition. It was not politicized. Jude Law did the Putin scowl and facial and body expressions. It was really good. I was kind of blown away.

Smart art

Honestly, I was blown away by the whole movie. It was funny, moving, smart. It did have moments where plot points had to be explained to the audience, forcing characters to make little speeches of exposition. But that always happens when you adapt from a book.

There were also some historical/political plot points that I would maybe question. But this movie is designed for a European/American audience and has to adhere generally to our Western understanding of Putin and his crew. Because of this, Putin is ultimately “the bad guy.”

But he’s definitely a fully fleshed-out character in the film. When they show him hanging out with his old KGB buddies, you get a sense of the man behind the scenes.

“The Wizard of the Kremlin”: It was the most intelligent movie I’ve seen in years. I thoroughly enjoyed it. Highly recommend.

A version of this review originally appeared on the Substack Travels to Distant Cities.

​Jude law, Paul dano, Sound of freedom, French filmmaker oliver assayas, Culture, Movies, The wizard of the kremlin, Vladimir putin, Rotten tomatoes, Review 

Much of the internet is advertising in disguise, according to digital marketers who have worked with some of the biggest names in entertainment.

The information backs the popular Dead Internet theory, which alleges that most of what is seen online is populated mostly by bots, not actual human accounts.

‘Popular opinion is being formed, measured, and manipulated all at once.’

A recent interview with Joe Lim revealed the disturbing truth about the online marketing industry. Lim told Vulture that he ran a company called Floodify, which positioned itself as an agency that spreads content “organically.”

However, Lim told the outlet that 90% of online content is advertising, a lot of which he did himself. At his company’s peak, he controlled 65,000 dummy accounts on social media in order to fake trending content for paid clients.

Lim said he promoted music for all the major record labels and worked with top celebrities, saying that he garnered 40 million views for an artist who only had 100,000 followers.

A Billboard interview from late March revealed much of the same. Co-founders of digital promotion agency Chaotic Good Projects Jesse Coren and Andrew Spelman said they promoted artists’ songs by getting them plugged into fan pages, meme pages, and sports clips as the background music.

Spelman called the tactic “trend simulation” and used the motto “everything on the internet is fake.”

At the same time, Coren added, “I don’t know if this will make anyone feel better, but a lot of what we do on the narrative side is controlling the discourse. … That first comment [users] see becomes their opinion, even when they haven’t heard the whole album.”

RELATED: Trump phones begin shipping as liberal media melts down: ‘You got scammed’

Xinhua/Chen Junqing/Getty Images

New York Magazine noted that a writer named Lane Brown has been monitoring paid campaigns for artists like Justin Bieber. Lane said the idea or the “feeling” that everyone is talking about or seeing the same thing organically is a product of online manipulation.

“On social media, popular opinion is being formed, measured, and manipulated all at once, and every signal the platforms produce — a trending song, a backlash, a talking point, the feeling that ‘everybody’ is suddenly talking about the same thing — can now be fabricated by unseen actors with hidden agendas,” Brown said.

According to Vulture, these campaigns come from the labels or studios and even political operatives; it could be anyone. They hire a company to turn their content into clips by sending it out to a network of editors, who then push the material out to “normal-looking accounts.”

RELATED: Swedish government wants tracking devices on children — and it’s already watching them

Andrey Rudakov/Bloomberg/Getty Images

All of this lends credence to the Dead Internet theory, which has its basis in the fact that internet traffic from bots surpassed human traffic in 2016. That view has been perpetuated well into the modern era, with some now stating that simple bots have been taken over by AI bots, with AI bots reportedly growing by more than 8,000% since 2025.

As for Lim, he shut down his company after he accidentally posted the same video to 7,000 accounts, which he said got them all banned.

Lim said people will soon stop trusting social media — he claims in three to five years — and his plan is to start distributing content through AI, which he believes will find a way to convince humans of what they want.

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​Ai, Ai chatbots, Online bots, Online marketing industry, Social media, Tech, Trend simulation tactic, Ai bots growth, Trends, Online trends, Online advertising, Return 

With so much bad news in the world, it is worth pausing for one encouraging development: Marty Makary finally resigned as commissioner of the Food and Drug Administration last week.

Makary’s tenure at the FDA was marred by internal scandals, forced resignations, dreadful morale, and record staff turnover. More important, he actively sandbagged President Trump’s push to expand clinical trials for rare diseases through the aptly named “right-to-try” framework.

Trump’s next appointee should restore the spirit of right to try and make safe, effective treatments available to children as quickly as possible.

The idea behind right to try is straightforward. Patients with rare conditions, especially those for whom conventional medicine has failed, should have the freedom to pursue experimental treatments that have not yet received full FDA approval. Families fighting the clock have little left to lose. Government should not stand between them and a potentially lifesaving breakthrough.

Makary did.

Members of the MPS community sent more than 10 letters asking Makary for a meeting. They got a form letter in return. Sen. Ron Johnson (R-Wis.) later announced an investigation into the FDA’s denials. Makary’s agency responded by claiming approvals were already “at their peak.” The Wall Street Journal took notice of the FDA’s foot-dragging last year, yet the agency kept rejecting relevant rare-disease treatments in early 2026, including RGX-121 and drugs from Biohaven and Saol Therapeutics.

That stonewalling forced families to escalate.

In March, more than 100 mothers and other advocates staged a mock funeral outside FDA offices. Dressed in black and carrying a real coffin, they sought to draw attention to a group of rare metabolic disorders known as mucopolysaccharidoses. These disorders can show up as mild symptoms such as depression or hyperactivity, or as devastating conditions such as heart disease and skeletal abnormalities.

Many MPS disorders still have no approved treatments, even though they can severely diminish children’s quality of life or kill them outright. The FDA’s regulatory process serves a legitimate purpose. But when a bureaucracy grows so rigid, self-protective, and arrogant that it blocks desperately ill children from access to promising therapies, it stops functioning as a safeguard and starts functioning as a death sentence.

Mark Dant of the Ryan Foundation told Newsweek that some of these drugs were denied because of the FDA’s institutional “dislike” of the accelerated-approval pathway. “For decades we waited for science to find our tomorrows,” he said. “Now it has, and bureaucrats within the agency we pay for are keeping those treatments from our children. We know they are there. … We just cannot reach them.”

RELATED: The FDA seems to care more about celebrities than sick Americans

Valerie Plesch/Bloomberg/Getty Images

Makary’s resignation will not undo the damage. But it does create an opening. We may not yet know what the FDA’s next leadership will look like, but Trump’s appointee should restore the spirit of right to try and make safe, effective treatments available to children as quickly as possible.

Across the world, in the nation of Georgia, parents have staged a protest lasting more than 500 consecutive days, maintaining a round-the-clock presence outside the main government building in Tbilisi. They are willing to risk everything to give their children the best chance at life. Americans should not have to camp outside federal offices for 500 days to get their government to listen.

The new FDA leadership must explain denials of right-to-try clinical trials with enough specificity that sponsors and families understand what evidence could change the decision. Patient and caregiver testimony should shape decisions early, not get folded in at the end as a token gesture. And Congress must demand transparency without turning each drug review into a partisan circus.

Children’s lives are not bargaining chips. The FDA exists to serve the public, not to protect its own bureaucracy from embarrassment. If Makary’s departure opens the door to that truth, families battling ultra-rare diseases may finally have reason to hope.

​Bureaucracy, Drug approval, Fda, Marty makary, Mps, President trump, Science, Transparency, Opinion & analysis 

Thousands of Americans gathered Sunday on the National Mall for Rededicate 250 — an event aimed not only at preparing the United States for its 250th birthday with prayer, Scripture, and song but also recommitting America to uniting as “one nation, under god.”

House Speaker Mike Johnson, among those who addressed the multitudes, led believers in a prayer of rededication.

‘Quoting the Declaration of Independence is now putting God over the Declaration of Independence, I guess?’

In his prayer, Johnson noted that God’s “mighty hand has been upon our nation since the very beginning”; that God is the source of America’s many blessings; and that America is a nation premised on biblical and foundational principles.

Johnson also emphasized twice in the prayer that Americans’ inalienable rights derive from the Creator.

In the second instance, the Republican stated that individuals captive to “sinister ideologies” have “sought to distort the self-evident truth that we know so well and that our founders boldly proclaim in the Declaration: that our rights do not derive from the government. They come from you, our Creator and heavenly Father.”

MS NOW talking head Katy Tur evidently had difficulty processing the ancient and self-evident truth that rights aren’t sourced from men or their documents but from the Divine.

“What about this passage from Mike Johnson declaring that our rights do not derive from government? ‘They come from you, our Creator and heavenly Father,'” Tur said on Monday to panelists on her show. “Is this him putting God over the Declaration of Independence?”

RELATED: When Archie Comics found Jesus: Strange artifacts from a once-Christian culture

Photo12/Universal Images Group/Getty Images

The very document that Tur apparently fears being subordinated to the Creator states in its preamble, “We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.”

One of Tur’s panelists, Atlantic writer McKay Coppins, responded by noting that the “idea” that man’s rights come from God “is not wholly uncommon” and not “totally abnormal.”

Tur subsequently suggested that Johnson’s remarks, in the “context of this rally,” signal “the move toward Christian nationalism being more embedded in this culture.” She added that “the idea that the rights divine, or are divined from a higher power — you can say that across multiple religions, yes, but this is not representing multiple religions.”

Tur’s attempt to concern-monger over Johnson’s statements prompted swift backlash and mockery from conservatives and others familiar with the Declaration of Independence.

Sean Davis, co-founder of the Federalist, wrote, “Unreal. Literal retards.”

Texas state Rep. Mitch Little (R) tweeted, “Quoting the Declaration of Independence is now putting God over the Declaration of Independence, I guess? Someone run to the gift shop and get Katy a copy, pls.”

Texas Sen. Ted Cruz expressed confusion about how Tur could “be so historically ignorant.”

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​Ms now, Katy tur, Liberal media, Christian, Rededicate 250, Christianity, Faith, Religion, God, Self-evident truths, Rights, Unalienable rights, Divine, Government, Mike johnson, Politics 

A female candidate running for Congress in Michigan is testing the old adage that, when it comes to politics, there’s no such thing as negative attention.

Shelby Campbell, a 32-year-old apparently self-described “c***,” is looking to unseat far-left radical Democratic Rep. Shri Thanedar in the 13th district of Michigan, which includes Detroit and some neighboring cities. Thanedar was first elected in 2022.

There is also at least one video in which she imagines the genitalia of one of her male commenters.

To draw attention to her campaign, Campbell has released dozens of TikTok videos discussing, among other vulgar topics, how “f***able” she is, the explicit alleged circumstances surrounding the conception of the unborn child she claims to have aborted in 2023, and the fact that she “got some last night.”

In multiple videos, Campbell flips the bird, while in other videos, she performs highly suggestive dance moves to songs with pornographic lyrics. In some, she even dances on a stripper pole, sometimes with a flag that reads “p***y power” in the background.

In one particularly uncouth alleged video that appears to have been deleted, she positions the camera to film up her shorts, then says, “I am a c***. Great. But would you know a cl** if you saw one?”

There is also at least one video in which she imagines the genitalia of one of her male commenters.

According to her campaign website, Campbell believes she can represent the 13th district well because she speaks the “language” of the people there and “can translate the lived experiences of working people into real policy.” Perhaps to demonstrate her street cred, Campbell admits on the site that she has “been to jail” and even provides mug shots that document four arrests between 2012 and 2015.

“I’m not here to pretend I’m perfect,” her website says.

“Leadership is shaped by lived experience, not perfection.”

Her crude videos may have made the news, but she does have a political platform. She supports the Green New Deal, denounces capitalism as obsolete, demands “housing justice,” slams “white women” for letting down their black sisters, and even though she claims to be a member of the United Auto Workers union and is vying to represent the Motor City, Campbell wants to increase public transportation and “reduce car dependency.”

A caption in a video Campbell posted in December said that Charlie Kirk “died for what he believed in quit crying about it.”

She also attended a No Kings rally in March and brought a sign reading “F**k ICE.” Another similarly themed sign reads, “I like my ICE crushed.”

RELATED: Democrat plagued by primary challenges announces 7 articles of impeachment against Trump

Photo of Rep. Shri Thanedar by Elizabeth Frantz; Washington Post/Getty Images

Campbell professes to detest the two-party system in America but claims that if forced to choose, she sides more with Democrats. The New York Post and some social media accounts have also characterized Campbell as a Democratic candidate, as does her Ballotpedia page.

However, the truth about her party affiliation is a bit more complicated.

Campbell confirmed in a statement to Blaze News that she completed “the necessary paperwork and collected enough signatures to qualify for the Democratic primary ballot” but ultimately decided to run as an independent.

“As an independent candidate, I have until July 15 to submit the required valid signatures for ballot access. I am confident I can do that because I already demonstrated the ability to organize and collect enough support during the Democratic primary process,” she told Blaze News in an email.

A spokesperson for the Michigan Bureau of Elections confirmed to Blaze News that, as of Monday, Campbell had not yet formally filed petitions to run for Congress either as a Democrat or as an independent and that the deadline to file as a Democrat has already expired.

Multiple Republican candidates have filed to compete in the race, but the district is considered deep blue. The Michigan primary election will be held on August 4.

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​Shelby campbell, Michigan, Shri thanedar, Democratic party, Democrats, Detroit, Politics 

As headlines surrounding hantavirus continue to spark fear of another pandemic, BlazeTV host Liz Wheeler is urging Americans to take a breath and look at the actual numbers.

While the virus carries a frighteningly high fatality rate for those infected, Wheeler argues the odds of even contracting hantavirus remain astronomically low compared to everyday risks Americans routinely ignore.

“So, here are your odds of dying from hantavirus: 1 in 30 to 35 million,” Wheeler begins. “That’s your odds of dying from the hantavirus. You can compare that, and I suggest you do, to your odds of dying from being struck by lightning: 1 in 15 to 20 million. So, you are more likely to die from being struck by lightning in the United States than you are to die from the hantavirus.”

“Your odds, by the way, of dying in a car accident: 1 in 8 to 9,000. Your odds of dying from a medical error: 1 in 1,000 to 1,400. By the way, dying from a medical error is the third leading cause of death in our country after heart disease and cancer,” she continues.

“If someone is telling you to be frightened of the hantavirus, they are lying to you. If someone is telling you to be more worried about a 1 in 30 to 35 million odds chance of dying from the hantavirus while ignoring the approximately 350,000 people in the United States who die from a medical error from doctors messing up every year, you should mute them,” she adds.

While the fatality rate for hantavirus is high, the amount of cases per year in the United States is not.

“There’s an average of 30 cases of hantavirus per year that result in approximately 8 to 12 deaths per year. So, that is a case fatality rate, by the way, that’s extremely high. That’s 35 to 38% case fatality rate, which is a frightening statistic,” Wheeler says.

Hantavirus cases also historically mostly occur in a concentrated region, with 94% of the cases occurring west of the Mississippi River.

“They all happen around spring cleaning time when people in the Southwest, you know, clean out a shed that has the feces of the deer mouse, for example. That’s where the deer mouse is, in the Southwest. The dust, they inhale the dust, and they contract the hantavirus from it,” Wheeler explains.

Patient zero on the cruise ship also happened to put himself in a dangerous situation before contracting the virus.

“Before he boarded the cruise ship, [he] visited a dump, a landfill, that was contaminated with rodent feces. He went there, as an ornithologist might, to bird watch, despite the fact that local residents avoided the area because they knew it to be contaminated,” Wheeler says.

“They knew it to be dangerous to health. He did this anyway,” she continues, pointing out that while it may sound harsh, it was his decision.

“We should have societal recognition of decisions made by individuals that are bad decisions. For example, … this man died, and so maybe people don’t want to talk about his decisions because he’s dead, but are we avoiding the personal responsibility entirely?” Wheeler asks.

“He did something unwise. He did something imprudent. He hurt himself. He hurt his wife,” she says, “He hurt other people.”

And while there has been speculation that it’s a new strain, Wheeler explains that “it is not a new strain.”

“Has the virus actually mutated?” she asks. “Well, according to the science, according to an analysis of what the DNA looks like, the answer to that is no. In fact, it’s very, very similar to the strain of hantavirus that caused an outbreak in Argentina in 2018.”

“That is not a new strain,” she adds.

Want more from Liz Wheeler?

To enjoy more of Liz’s based commentary, subscribe to BlazeTV — the largest multi-platform network of voices who love America, defend the Constitution, and live the American dream.

​Americans, Blazetv host, Car accident, Case fatality rate, Concentrated region, Cruise ship, Deer mouse, Fatality rate, Hantavirus, Leading cause, Lightning strike, Liz wheeler, Medical error, Mississippi river, Odds of dying, Pandemic fears, Spring cleaning, The liz wheeler show, Rodent feces, The blaze, Blazetv, Blaze news, Blaze podcasts, Blaze podcast network, Blaze media, Blaze online, Blaze originals 

An 18-year-old New Jersey male is accused of stabbing his elderly grandmother to death — and police found knives protruding from the victim’s body Monday morning.

Louis Brown of Jackson Township on Monday was charged with murder, possession of a weapon for an unlawful purpose, and unlawful possession of a weapon, all in connection with the death of his grandmother, 69-year-old Darlene Brown also of Jackson Township, the Ocean County Prosecutor’s Office said.

‘An unbelievably nice person — the nicest person to talk to, intelligent, just always helpful, always kind.’

Jackson Township Police Department officers around 7 a.m. Monday responded to a residence on Justin Way in reference to a 911 call stating that someone had been murdered, officials said.

Officers found Louis Brown standing at the front doorway of the residence, officials said, adding that Brown exited the residence with his hands up and was immediately taken into custody while officers conducted their investigation.

Officers entered the home and found the body of a deceased female — later identified as Darlene Brown — in an upstairs bedroom with apparent stab wounds to her face and neck, officials said, adding that officers observed two knives protruding from the victim.

An investigation — which was conducted by the Ocean County Prosecutor’s Office Major Crime Unit, Jackson Township Police Department Detective Bureau, and Ocean County Sheriff’s Office Crime Scene Investigation Unit — revealed that Louis Brown was the individual who called 911 and was responsible for his grandmother’s death, officials said.

Brown was charged and taken to the Ocean County Jail, where he remained Tuesday morning. There is no hearing information in Brown’s jail record, which also lists no bail.

RELATED: Florida thug allegedly stabs his grandmother 11 times on Mother’s Day — after being asked to help carry in groceries

Image source: Jackson Township (N.J.) Police

Jasmina Perazic, a resident of the complex where the stabbing took place, told NJ.com Darlene Brown lived in a unit with her grandson, Louis Brown, a high school senior.

Perazic — the head women’s basketball coach at Georgian Court University — told the outlet that Louis Brown moved in with his grandmother after his mom died of sickle cell anemia. Perazic described Darlene Brown as a friendly person whom she spoke to at least five times a week, NJ.com added.

“An unbelievably nice person — the nicest person to talk to, intelligent, just always helpful, always kind,” Perazic said to the outlet in regard to Darlene Brown. “It just looked like she was working so hard to take care of him.”

Perazic added to NJ.com that Louis Brown was quiet and had been bullied in school, but she saw no warning signs that anything was wrong. In fact, Perazic told the outlet that his grandmother said Louis Brown was a good kid who was doing well in school.

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​Murder charge, Possession of a weapon for an unlawful purpose, Unlawful possession of a weapon, Jackson township, New jersey, Louis brown, Knives, Fatal stabbing, Elderly victim, Arrest, Jailed, Knives in victim’s body, Grandmother, Crime 

Former President Barack Obama joined other liberals earlier this year in championing an unlawful power-grab in Virginia that would have delivered to Democrats 10 of the state’s 11 congressional districts, and now they have a new plan cooked up in Georgia.

To Democrats’ chagrin, the Virginia Supreme Court ruled on May 8 that the costly gerrymandering scheme there was illegal, thereby preserving the 2021-era congressional maps in which Democrats and Republicans enjoyed a 6-5 split.

‘It’s unfortunate the other side, backed by money that’s from outside the state …’

On the eve of power-mad liberals’ humiliating defeat in Virginia, Obama turned his gaze southward to another opportunity for a potential increase in Democrat power.

“State supreme court justices play a critical role in defending your rights and freedoms, which is why the election happening in Georgia right now is so important,” wrote Obama. “Make sure you have a plan to vote for Jen Jordan and Miracle Rankin, the only two candidates in the race with strong records of standing up for all Georgians.”

Eight of the Georgia Supreme Court’s nine justices are presently appointees of Republican governors. Two GOP-appointed, conservative-backed justices — Sarah Warren and Charlie Bethel — are, however, fighting for re-election on Tuesday, and another three GOP-appointed justices will face re-election in 2028.

RELATED: Perpetual victim Fani Willis cries RACISM and SEXISM again, this time over common-sense election law

Megan Varner/Getty Images

Obama and other Democrats, unhumbled by their blunder in Virginia, appear keen to ideologically flip the Georgia court over the next two years.

As Obama indicated, Justice Warren is facing off on Tuesday against former Democrat state Sen. Jen Jordan, while Justice Bethel, a former Republican state senator, is facing off against Miracle Rankin, a personal injury attorney. Both of the Democrat-backed candidates are pro-abortion radicals who enjoy the backing of anti-natalist groups.

“This is the first time we’ve gone on offense, and we have raised a bit of money for it,” Charlie Bailey, chairman of the Georgia Democratic Party, told CNN.

“It’s unfortunate the other side, backed by money that’s from outside the state, is trying to make a nonpartisan race political,” said Republican Gov. Brian Kemp, who is backing both Warren and Bethel. “That’s not how our judiciary works in our state. And I would urge people to vote for the incumbents. They have bipartisan support from people who really understand how important it is to have a nonpartisan judiciary.”

Outside money and influence are hardly the only issue that has come up in this race.

A special committee within Georgia’s Judicial Qualifications Commission revealed over the weekend that the Obama-endorsed candidates likely violated the state’s Code of Judicial Conduct, reported the Georgia Recorder. Not only did Jordan and Rankin publicly endorse one another; they apparently conveyed that they would restore abortion rights — problematic because judges and judicial candidates are not allowed to make statements about issues likely to come before the court.

These damning accusations were suppressed, however, ahead of Election Day by Leslie Gardner, an Obama-appointed federal judge who is the sister of failed gubernatorial candidate Stacey Abrams.

Gardener blocked the special committee from issuing its statement, claiming that the candidates’ apparent abortion pledges were constitutionally protected and not explicit enough to constitute violations.

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​Georgia, Supreme court, Georgia supreme court, Barack obama, Jen jordan, Bethel, Miracle rankin, Democrats, Power grab, Misconduct, Atlanta, Election, Politics 

A viral video from Memphis recently drew national attention for good reason. A woman was filmed at a gender-reveal party murdering her preborn baby with abortion pills.

In the video, she aired grievances about her “baby daddy” and announced that she would not complete the pregnancy. As friends watched, cheered, and even shouted “kill it,” she opened a packet of abortion pills while whooping and singing, “Thank you, Jesus.” Instead of announcing whether the baby was a boy or a girl, she declared the baby was “no gender” and swallowed the pills.

Tennessee Republicans understand perfectly well that Democrats have no real power in the state. They can govern as they please. And they chose not to abolish abortion.

The episode horrified pro-lifers. But much of the reaction missed a harder truth: Tennessee Republicans recently had a chance to stop this kind of killing and chose not to.

In a later interview, the woman said she had consumed alcohol throughout the pregnancy and that she and the father believed the baby would be born “slow.” That, she said, is why they decided on an abortion. She then celebrated the abortion with the interviewer, who joked that she had managed both a gender reveal and a “funeral” on the same day.

The whole episode stands as a brutal commentary on the culture. Some pro-life leaders still describe women as abortion’s “second victims.” But more women now openly and brazenly celebrate the killing of their preborn children. In recent years, a sickening “shout your abortion” culture has taken root among women who do not merely defend abortion, but praise it as liberation.

This case drew intense backlash. Yet the Christians expressing horror may not realize that Tennessee lawmakers had a chance only months ago to stop such violence and refused to act.

Many state and national pro-life groups insist that the abortion issue is basically settled in Tennessee. Americans United for Life says “abortion is illegal in Tennessee, with limited exceptions” and that “chemical abortion pills are tightly regulated.” Tennessee Right to Life claims “abortion is illegal in Tennessee” and that the state is “a national leader” in protecting preborn babies. Students for Life Action has even described Tennessee as “abortion-free.”

The Memphis video exposes those claims as false.

RELATED: How a pro-life law in Kentucky lets mothers get away with murder

SAUL LOEB/AFP/Getty Images

The woman and her friends were able to obtain the supposedly “tightly regulated” abortion pills, use them to kill a baby, record the act, and post it online for the entire country to see. They could do that because Tennessee law grants complete immunity to women who procure abortions. In practice, that means no deterrent exists to stop a woman from willfully murdering her preborn child.

The statute that supposedly makes Tennessee “abortion-free” states plainly that it “does not subject the pregnant woman upon whom an abortion is performed or attempted to criminal conviction or penalty.”

In other words, the woman in the video cannot be held criminally accountable for intentionally killing her baby, no matter how openly murderous her intent was, because Tennessee’s pro-life laws shield her and every other woman from penalty.

Lawmakers had a chance to close that loophole this year through House Bill 570, which would have established equal protection for preborn babies. Instead of banning prenatal homicide only for third-party abortionists, the bill would have applied the same murder laws that protect those already born and criminalized abortion as murder for anyone willfully involved.

But when the bill appeared, pro-life establishment groups immediately pressured lawmakers to avoid supporting it. None of the Republicans on the Tennessee House Population Health Subcommittee even made a motion to grant House Bill 570 a hearing.

That failure matters because Tennessee is not some purple state with divided government. Republicans hold supermajorities in both legislative chambers. They recently pushed through redistricting and punished Democrats who objected. In other words, Tennessee Republicans understand perfectly well that Democrats have no real power in the state. They can govern as they please.

RELATED: Fleetwood Mac’s real breakup story: Death before motherhood

Kevin Winter/Getty Images

And they chose not to abolish abortion.

That means any woman in Tennessee, no matter how brazen or malicious, can commit prenatal homicide without fear of legal consequences.

The baby murdered in that video was no outlier. More than 5,000 preborn babies are killed every year in Tennessee through abortion pills obtained through telehealth providers. Thousands more die outside the formal medical system.

If Tennessee lawmakers want to stop this legally tolerated bloodshed, they must establish equal protection for preborn babies and treat them as the image-bearers of God they are. That means abolishing abortion and criminalizing it once and for all.

​Abortion, Abortion debate, Abortion drugs, Abortion pills, Pro life, Republicans, Tennessee, Pregnancy, Shout your abortion, Opinion & analysis 

The legacy media feverishly concern-mongered about COVID-19 and then tried unsuccessfully to generate similar hysteria over the gay-spread monkeypox virus.

Clearly desperate for a new health scare — especially after America formally rejected the World Health Organization — outlets seized upon reports of a deadly outbreak of hantavirus last month among passengers and crew of the MV Hondius, a Dutch cruise ship carrying 147 souls embarking from the southern tip of the Andes mountains in South America to the Canary Islands off the coast of Morocco.

‘We should shy away from making bold pronouncements that may prove dangerously misleading weeks or months later.’

While some publications rushed to attack emerging theories about the nature of the virus, including the notion that it was cooked up in a lab — narrative attacks that neglected to mention a recent gain-of function experiment involving hantaviruses — others pushed alarmist headlines such as:

“Is hantavirus the next COVID? Is the U.S. response on point? An outbreak update” — NPR“Why hantavirus is giving us a ‘sinking feeling,’ despite experts’ reassurance” — Canadian state media“Fears rat virus has spread to seven countries” — The Telegraph“Could human-transmitted hantavirus be the next pandemic threat?” — The Week“Hantavirus: Many unknowns surround an ‘unprecedented and worrying’ outbreak” — Le Monde

Despite provocative headlines and framing, many media outfits and experts have acknowledged that it is extremely unlikely that there will be a hantavirus epidemic, let alone a pandemic — though a news article at CNN cautioned against “calm-mongering” over hantavirus lest “post-COVID anxiety” be triggered.

A new article in the International Journal of Infectious Diseases, for instance, emphasized that while the suspected variety of hantavirus on the MV Hondius “can cause severe disease, high case fatality, and intense public anxiety when they emerge in mobile or closed settings,” such “outbreaks are not frequent” and are “unlikely to become a global outbreak.”

Hantavirus is a family of potentially deadly single-stranded RNA viruses that are naturally found in rodents. Only 890 cases of hantavirus were reported in the U.S. between 1993 and 2023, 35% of them fatal.

RELATED: Bizarre academic paper about releasing ticks resurfaces amid surging bites

The MV Hondius. Omar Havana/Getty Images

When spread to humans, hantaviruses can cause two diseases: hemorrhagic fever with renal syndrome — a condition affecting the kidneys — and hantavirus pulmonary syndrome, which affects the lungs.

The hantavirus affecting people on the MV Hondius, the HPS-associated Andes strain, is unique.

Whereas other strains leap from rodents to humans, the Andes virus — symptoms of which appear anywhere from four to 42 days after exposure — has been reported to transmit from person to person via saliva droplets and other oral fluids, although this transmission theory has not been definitively proven.

The breakout on the cruise ship, which has so far claimed the lives of three people, is hardly unprecedented in terms of alleged mass human transmissions of the disease — at least where South America is concerned.

From November 2018 through February 2019 in Chubut Province, Argentina, there was, for instance, a person-to-person outbreak that resulted in 34 confirmed infections and 11 deaths.

Amid continued uncertainty over the genesis of the latest outbreak and media fearmongering, a wide range of theories have emerged about the rodent-borne virus.

Having heard for years about the various efforts to enhance the transmissibility, virulence, or host range of certain viruses, some have speculated that human-to-human transmission of hantavirus points to gain-of-function experimentation.

While there’s been nothing yet to suggest that the virus responsible for the breakout on the Hondius was the result of intentional genetic meddling, scientists have previously modified viruses incorporating hantavirus components and increased their viral fitness in a lab setting. This is similar to the controversial work done on bat coronaviruses at the lab in Wuhan, China.

Hantaviruses are considered a bioagent requiring Biosafety Level 3 containment for research and viral propagation. Consequently, BSL-2 laboratories won’t cut it.

However, a peer-reviewed study funded by the National Institutes of Health and published in 2019 by the American Society for Microbiology describes how researchers developed a work-around for conducting hantavirus research in a lower biocontainment-security BSL-2 laboratory.

Researchers tried to make a safer chimeric virus — which is a hybrid virus created by piecing together parts of two different viruses. They used a relatively weaker virus, vesicular stomatis virus, as the main body, and then attached the entry proteins from the more dangerous hantavirus to the outside so that it could infiltrate and infect cells.

This new recombinant virus — the result of an artificial mash-up of genetic material — apparently started acting just like a real hantavirus and underwent a series of mutations to become more infective:

Serial passage of the rescued rVSV-HTNV Gn/Gc virus markedly increased its infectivity and capacity for cell-to-cell spread. This gain in viral fitness was associated with the acquisition of two point mutations: I532K in the cytoplasmic tail of Gn and S1094L in the membrane-proximal stem of Gc. Follow-up experiments with rVSVs and single-cycle VSV pseudotypes confirmed these results. Mechanistic studies revealed that both mutations were determinative and contributed to viral infectivity in a synergistic manner.

The lead researcher on the 2019 study declined Blaze News’ request for comment.

This study is anything but a smoking gun. Whereas the COVID-19 pandemic appears to have originated in the neighborhood of the Wuhan Institute of Virology, where dangerous gain-of-function experiments were being conducted on coronaviruses, the Hondius outbreak seemingly took place a world away from this ostensibly low-danger hantavirus study.

Still, researchers have yet to provide a comprehensive and satisfying explanation for how the Andes virus spreads, prompting speculation that members of the scientific community that possibly manufactured the SARS-COV-2 virus are again not being entirely forthright about what they know and don’t know regarding the Hondius outbreak.

“Public health officials have to be more honest and more humble about how this virus actually spreads,” noted Joseph Allen, professor of exposure assessment science at the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health. “An essential lesson from COVID is that officials should be candid about communicating that we are often learning in real time, and we should shy away from making bold pronouncements that may prove dangerously misleading weeks or months later.”

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​Andes strain, Andes virus, Argentina, Epidemic, Gain in viral, Gain of function, Gain-of-function, Hantavirus, Hondius, Liberal media, Media, Outbreak, Outbreaks, Research, Rodent, Scaremongering, Science, Strain, Virus, Wuhan, Wuhan institute of virology, Politics 

Meta was one of the first tech giants to bring smart glasses to the mainstream market, thanks to a partnership with Ray-Ban. Unfortunately, Meta’s reputation for spying on users just landed a vicious blow to its hardware ambitions. According to a former business partner, Meta is secretly recording and saving everything its users see through its Meta Ray-Ban glasses, from simple outings to much more intimate encounters.

Sama says Meta is watching

The claim comes from Sama, a Kenyan-based AI company that partnered with Meta starting in 2017. According to its website, Sama helps train AI and machine learning models by annotating, validating, and evaluating large swaths of data. It’s also part of the Everest Group, an organization recognized by former President Clinton and the Clinton Foundation for outsourcing jobs to “underserved communities.” During their partnership, Sama provided moderation services to Meta that are no longer part of its business portfolio.

Privacy is more at risk now than ever.

In 2022, Sama filed a lawsuit against Meta over poor working conditions, unreasonable pay, poor mental health support for employees, and infringement on employee privacy. As part of their moderation partnership, some employees were forced to view and flag distressing content on Meta’s platforms, including murder and sex crimes involving minors. However, the companies continued to work together for many years, leading up to this year.

In April 2026, Sama employees filed new complaints expressing that they reviewed intimate footage captured by customers’ Meta Ray-Ban glasses. While not as graphic as the scenes from 2022, content included users visiting the bathroom, undressing in their bedrooms, and even engaging in private adult relations.

Weeks after these details emerged, Meta severed its contract with Sama, forcing its former partner to fire more than 1,000 staff members to account for the financial loss.

The worst part

It’s honestly hard to pick out the worst part of this story. Is it Meta’s alleged negligence of Sama’s employees? Is it the illegal content that requires human moderation on Meta’s platforms? Is it the fact that Sama continued to work with Meta, despite the poor conditions?

It’s all terrible. But looking at the story from a tech angle, it’s particularly disturbing that Meta Ray-Ban smart glasses captured footage and uploaded it directly to Meta’s servers to be saved and reviewed, especially when users weren’t aware this was happening. The news is a clear violation of user privacy, and it highlights Meta’s blatant lie that “you’re in control of your data and content.”

Clearly not.

RELATED: Trump phones begin shipping as liberal media melts down: ‘You got scammed’

Avishek Das/SOPA Images/LightRocket/Getty Images

Meta’s privacy policies

The marketing drivel Meta pushes on a webpage is one thing though. What do its legally binding privacy policies say? Several times, the original policy mentions that humans may review user content for various purposes, especially to “combat harmful or unlawful behavior,” including scenes deemed to be troubling until a person reviews it and decides otherwise. The page reads:

The Meta products are designed to research and help ensure the safety, integrity, and security of those services and those people who enjoy them, on and off Meta products. We process information we have associated with you and apply automated processing techniques and, in some instances, conduct manual (human) review.

A second policy specifically for “supplemental Meta platforms” includes AI-powered smart glasses like Meta Ray-Ban. Under the photos, videos, and audio section, it states:

You can use the AI Glasses to take photos and video recordings with audio. … We will process your Media when you turn on cloud processing on your AI Glasses, interact with the Meta AI service on your AI Glasses, or upload your Media to certain services provided by Meta (i.e., Facebook or Instagram). You can change your choices about cloud processing of your Media at any time in Settings.

In other words, Meta Ray-Bans may process footage on Meta’s servers when cloud services are turned on, and this feature can be disabled in settings. Unfortunately, the only thing that mentions human review in the policy references audio processing for Meta VR products, like the Meta Quest. That means, as far as the supplemental privacy policy is concerned, Meta employees should not have the right to review footage captured on Meta Ray-Ban glasses.

Yet, Sama says it does.

Maybe don’t trust that camera on your face

Smart glasses are a niche product that haven’t fully caught on with the general public, and no one’s exactly sure how to feel about them. On one hand, smart glasses can be used for noble causes, like making the streets safer from illegal aliens and criminals. On the other, it opens Pandora’s box for mass surveillance of the American people. Clearly, Meta is choosing the latter, even if it doesn’t say it out loud.

The moral of the story is that Meta Ray-Ban glasses can’t be trusted, whether you wear a pair yourself or you know someone who does. These devices can record everything they see, with that footage accessible to third-party contractors and Meta employees.

Of course, this shouldn’t be a surprise to anyone familiar with Meta’s business practices. The company has found itself in plenty of privacy-related legal trouble over the years, from WhatsApp’s questionable encryption to its now-defunct Onavo Protect VPN data-tracking scandal, and more.

At their core, Meta Ray-Bans are intrusive with huge privacy implications for their users and the people around them. This is the same problem Google Glass faced more than a decade ago, and now that extended reality glasses are on the rise again, privacy is more at risk now than ever.

​Meta, Ray-ban, Surveillance, Privacy, Tech 

Incumbent Los Angeles Mayor Karen Bass bewildered many when the Democrat made an impassioned statement about fixing the rotting teeth of methamphetamine addicts.

Bass made the comments while campaigning for re-election at a candidate forum on the homelessness crisis.

‘They don’t have teeth. Why? Because meth rots your teeth!’

“How many people who are unhoused that you meet have no teeth at all? They don’t have teeth. Why? Because meth rots your teeth,” she said.

“You can’t succeed without teeth,” she added. “So there needs to be comprehensive health care provided to people.”

Bass was immediately hounded by critics who saw the crazed comments as emblematic of Democratic policies.

“Yes, we want our f**king taxes paying for dope heads to get teeth. How could this get any worse? God please, intervene,” reads one response on the X platform.

“Once they get those new choppers, they will become successful, gainfully employed, model citizens. It’s like Magic Teeth. If only we had known this sooner,” another user replied.

“Think of all the people in LA that aren’t drug addicts that need dental care and she’s not doing anything for them,” another critic said.

Homelessness was a main focus of the mayor’s main competitor, former reality TV star Spencer Pratt.

In a popular clip from the mayoral debate, Pratt mocked the homeless policies espoused by Bass and far-left candidate Nithya Raman, a former ally to Bass and a city councilwoman.

“The reality is, no matter how many beds you give these people, they are on super meth. They are on fentanyl,” Pratt explained.

RELATED: TMZ tries to nuke Spencer Pratt’s mayoral campaign — and gets bitten in the Bass

“The DEA statistic says 93% of this is a drug addiction problem,” he added. “I will go below the Harbor Freeway tomorrow with [Raman], and we can find some of these people she’s going to offer treatment for. She’s going to get stabbed in the neck!”

While the most recent polling showed Bass still in the lead, Pratt is firmly in second place, and he received the greatest gain among all candidates since the last polling in March.

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​Karen bass, Rotting meth teeth, Spencer pratt, Los angeles mayoral election, Politics 

A particular species of Christian now flourishes in America. I call him the “wet noodle Christian.”

He is easy to recognize. He attends Bible studies, laments the moral collapse of the nation over coffee after church, and speaks with deep concern about the culture. But ask whether Christians should publicly oppose evil or contend for the moral direction of society, and he recoils as though you had proposed human sacrifice.

When Jesus taught believers to turn the other cheek, he addressed personal vengeance, not civilizational surrender.

“Oh, I don’t get involved in politics,” he says.

Or: “The world is supposed to get worse anyway.”

Or, with special confidence: “Jesus told us to turn the other cheek.”

He says all this as though Christian ethics can be reduced to the consistency of warm pudding.

This attitude springs partly from biblical illiteracy, partly from a successful Marxist strategy, and entirely from sin.

Biblical confusion

Christians often invoke the crucifixion as though Christ’s death requires believers to become passive spectators while evil marches through every institution of society. That confuses the unique work of Christ with the ordinary duties of Christians.

Christ’s death was the once-for-all atoning sacrifice of the Lamb of God. No Christian is called to redeem the world by offering himself as a substitute for sin. That office belongs to Christ alone. Nor did Christ go unwillingly or by force.

During his earthly ministry, Jesus rebuked sin, denounced hypocrisy, drove money changers from the temple with a whip, and told adulteresses to stop sinning. Hardly the behavior of a celestial yoga instructor murmuring therapeutic affirmations beside a Himalayan stream.

When Jesus taught believers to turn the other cheek, he addressed personal vengeance, not civilizational surrender. The command restrains sinful retaliation. It does not abolish justice, civil authority, or moral responsibility.

The same Christ who taught mercy also stands behind Romans 13, where the civil magistrate bears the sword as a minister of God against evil. The same Jesus appears in Psalm 2 as the enthroned king while rebellious rulers “take counsel together, against the Lord and against His Anointed.”

The biblical picture is one of advance, not retreat.

In the Great Commission, Jesus does not tell Christians to preserve their private religious feelings until death mercifully arrives. He commands them to make disciples of all nations, teaching them to observe all that he has commanded.

One searches the text in vain for the line: “Go therefore and quietly lose every institution while avoiding conflict.”

And here the second problem appears: Marxists understood the wet noodle instinct long before many Christians did.

RELATED: Adults are refusing to grow up, and their children are paying the price

Matt Stroshane/Walt Disney World Resort/Getty Images

Marxist subversion

For roughly 70 years, leftist media, academic institutions, and entertainment industries have carefully catechized Christians into believing that public Christianity is somehow immoral.

Christians were told that bringing moral convictions into public life is divisive. They were taught that the First Amendment requires a functionally atheist public square, though this alleged neutrality somehow never excludes progressive secular dogmas. The Christian could privately believe whatever he wished, provided he kept it quarantined like a contagious disease.

Meanwhile, the left marched through the institutions with all the subtlety of Sherman marching through Georgia.

One suspects many Marxists privately thought: “I cannot believe how easy this is.”

They taught Christians that offending anyone is the supreme moral evil, that strength itself is suspicious, that certainty is oppressive, and that masculinity is toxic. They insisted public Christianity was dangerous, and most Christians agreed to stop speaking publicly.

The remarkable thing is not that Marxists advanced their agenda. The remarkable thing is that so many Christians surrendered before the battle even began.

Part of this surrender also comes from bad eschatology, the notion that Christians should expect inevitable defeat in history. If collapse is certain, why resist anything? Why build institutions? Why fight corruption? Why educate children? Why preserve civilization?

This mentality looks far more like ancient Israel than faithful Christianity.

The Old Testament repeatedly shows Israel absorbing the gods and practices of surrounding nations, surrendering covenant distinctiveness, and then coming under divine judgment. Defeatism was never treated as humility. It was treated as faithlessness. One can almost hear an ancient pagan telling his Israelite neighbor that the Temple sacrifices and the Law of Moses are simply not nice.

The New Testament continues the theme. Hebrews 12 reminds believers that God disciplines his people for their good, though “for the moment all discipline seems painful rather than pleasant.” Divine chastening does not mean abandonment. It means fatherly correction.

Perhaps America is living through precisely such discipline now.

RELATED: New book from Eric Metaxas shares the American Revolution’s forgotten Christian roots

ericmetaxas.com

Recovering the truth

Many Christians anxiously avoid offending anyone while ignoring Christ’s explicit command to disciple the nations. They have become highly obedient to a command Jesus never gave — be inoffensive at all costs — while neglecting the one he did give.

Christians often speak as though courage belongs to secular revolutionaries, while faith belongs to timid people waiting for evacuation. But biblically, faith grounds courage because faith rests on the certainty of Christ’s victory.

Christ will have the nations as his inheritance. The gospel will go into all the world. Faith lives here and now in light of what we know will be then and there.

The Great Commission is not a suggestion to attempt cultural survival until the batteries die. It is a declaration of conquest grounded in Christ’s authority: “All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to Me” (Matthew 28:18).

All authority. Not partial authority pending polling data.

The remedy for the wet noodle Christian, therefore, is not anger, resentment, or partisan hysteria. It is the courage of faith.

Christians must recover confidence that truth is true, that Christ reigns now, and that obedience does not become optional simply because it provokes pushback. They must stop confusing passivity with holiness and cowardice with kindness.

Above all, they must understand the strategy that has been used against them. The first step in losing a civilization is convincing its defenders that defending it is somehow unchristian.

​Marxists, America, Jesus christ, American christians, Christians, First amendment, Great commission, Bible, Opinion & analysis 

After winning the 2024 Republican primary for Kentucky’s 4th Congressional District, Rep. Thomas Massie cleaned up in the general election, securing 99.6% of the vote. Yet his political career still may not survive 2026.

The MIT-trained engineer proceeded to force the issue of the Jeffrey Epstein files’ release, speak out against the joint U.S.-Israeli entanglement in Iran, and pad his 86.79% lifetime Turning Point Action score. He also managed to once again draw the ire of President Donald Trump, who faulted Massie for being “an automatic ‘NO’ vote on just about everything.”

Months after vowing in March 2025 to “lead the charge” against Massie, Trump officially named his champion: Navy SEAL veteran Ed Gallrein.

The final polls conducted before the primary election indicate the race is virtually deadlocked.

Gallrein — who not only enjoys the president’s backing but the support of numerous powerful individuals and organizations, including War Secretary Pete Hegseth, the American Israel Public Affairs Committee, and the U.S. Chamber of Commerce — is now poised to possibly oust Massie from the congressional seat he has held since 2012.

As he is running on a platform textually similar to Massie’s, Gallrein has endeavored to distinguish himself from his competitor online and in rallies — but not in a debate — largely in terms of his relationship with Trump.

RELATED: Massie takes aim at AIPAC with new bill about Nazi-era law

Tom Williams/CQ-Roll Call, Inc/Getty Images

Gallrein has called Massie both a “turncoat” and a “roadblock to the America First agenda,” noting, for instance, that Massie:

Opposed the U.S. entanglement with Iran; Voted against a stopgap spending bill to keep the government funded; Voted against a resolution the congressman said would unhelpfully equate “anti-Zionism with anti-Semitism”; and Voted against the One Big Beautiful Bill Act — which the congressman said would “significantly increase U.S. budget deficits in the near term, negatively impacting all Americans through sustained inflation and high interest rates.”

Gallrein has shared a graphic stating that Massie also voted against the SAVE America Act, even though the congressman voted against a particular rule then ultimately voted to pass the legislation.

Unlike Massie, who has apparently failed to toe the line and has been characterized in attack ads as “cheating with ‘the Squad’ on the America First movement,” Gallrein has emphasized he will alternatively “stand with President Trump and put American first.”

Vice President JD Vance has likewise said that Massie ultimately is not helpful for the Republican Party.

“Being independent, having your own opinions is one thing,” Vance said at a TPUSA event six months ago. “Voting against the party on every single issue, you’re eventually going to make too many enemies. And that is the problem that Thomas has had. It’s not one issue. It’s not three or four issues. It’s that every time that we’ve needed Thomas for a vote, he has been completely unwilling to provide it.”

The final polls conducted before the primary election indicate the race is virtually deadlocked.

A Neighborhood Research poll published on Friday found that the candidates were tied but that Gallrein “seems to be surging as the election comes to a close.”

The poll found that Massie enjoyed a dominant 47-30 advantage among voters under 50, whereas Gallrein was leading 46-17 among women ages 50 and older. Men in the older cohort were split evenly between the two candidates.

The Public Polling Project also released a poll on Friday, this time finding that Massie led Gallrein among all likely voters 50.6% to 49.4%.

According to AdImpact, the battle between Gallrein and Massie for Kentucky’s 4th Congressional District is the most expensive House primary on record, with $32.6 million spent on advertising.

The Republican Jewish Coalition has reportedly spent $4 million on ads supporting Gallrein. The AIPAC super PAC United Democracy Project has spent another $2.6 million helping Trump’s champion.

In light of injections of cash into the primary battle by these and other pro-Israel groups, Massie has framed the race as a referendum on whether “Israel gets to buy seats in Congress.”

Massie and pro-Massie groups Kentucky 4th PAC and Kentucky First PAC have also dumped a fortune into ads, including an ad accusing Gallrein of being “bought and paid for by the LGBTQ mafia.”

A victory of Gallrein over Massie would be another scalp for Trump, who just in the past few weeks has seen crushing primary defeats for the Indiana state senators who defied him on redistricting and for Sen. Bill Cassidy of Louisiana, who voted to convict Trump on impeachment articles related to January 6.

Trump noted in a Truth Social post on Monday, “The Great People of Kentucky are wise to Massie — He only votes against the Republican Party, making life very easy for the Radical Left. Unlike ‘lightweight’ Massie, a totally ineffective LOSER who has failed us so badly, CAPTAIN ED GALLREIN IS A WINNER WHO WILL NOT LET YOU DOWN.”

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​America first agenda, Donald trump, Jeffrey epstein files, Pete hegseth, Republican primary, Thomas massie, Israel, Aipac, Kentucky, Congress, Congressional, Politics, Ed gallrein 

As Britain cracks down on free speech and heightens surveillance measures, it’s becoming a cautionary tale for the rest of the Western world — one that Tommy Robinson has experienced firsthand.

“They wanted us isolated, they wanted us alone, wanted total control, which they had. Total control. I was invisible,” Robinson tells Blaze Media co-founder Glenn Beck, explaining that the media in the U.K. has branded him as one of the “far-right, racist, extremist agitators who are intent on violence.”

“You couldn’t even mention my name … deleted from society for daring to show — and what was I showing? The problems of mass open-border immigration,” Robinson says.

“Why do they want to hide it?” he asks. “Because it lays at their feet.”

And U.K. Prime Minister Keir Starmer’s latest ad is only proving Robinson right.

“This is our country with a majority who share those values. A majority who may not always be as loud but must always define who we are. So my government will not stand in the way of peaceful protest,” Starmer said, adding, “But we will act decisively against hatred.”

“We will use the full force of the law when that hatred manifests as violence. And we will ban those coming into the U.K. who seek to stir it up as we have done already because this country belong to all of us, and I will not tolerate anyone who seeks to stand in the way of that,” Starmer finished.

Robinson notes that Starmer has already made his last few points in the video crystal clear.

“After the 2024 riots … he politicized the judiciary, weaponized the media, and he sent mothers to jail for 31 months for tweets. He sent Peter Lynch, a grandfather, to jail, who has died in jail. He sent innocent people to jail,” he explained, noting that Starmer did it to “instill fear in the British public.”

“The problem he’s got is he didn’t instill fear. It lit a fire in the heart of us. … This is a battle for the soul of this nation, and it’s a battle he’s going to lose. He’s losing,” he continues, adding, “They’re losing. We’re winning the hearts and minds of the public whether he likes it or not.”

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​Ban, Britain, Country, Extremist, Far right, Free speech, Hatred, Immigration, Judiciary, Keir starmer, Law, Media, Protest, Racist, Surveillance, The glenn beck program, Tommy robinson, Uk, Violence, Western world 

A major media company wants to expand while making a clearer commitment to free speech. You would think that would cheer any American who still believes in the First Amendment.

Instead, Democrats are furious.

That authoritarian impulse, not Ellison’s support for Trump, is the real free-speech crisis in America.

In April, Paramount CEO David Ellison hosted a dinner celebrating the First Amendment. That was no coincidence. Paramount, and Ellison in particular, have long signaled support for free expression. Yet Sen. Chris Murphy (D-Conn.) responded by branding Ellison an “oligarch” and vowing to break up “anti-consumer” media companies “into pieces.”

Apparently, supporting free speech while maintaining ties across the political divide now qualifies as anti-consumer.

The real source of Democratic outrage is not some abstract concern for consumers. It is Paramount’s planned acquisition of Warner Bros. Discovery. That deal could create a stronger competitor to Netflix and other streaming giants while opening more space for content that does not conform to left-wing orthodoxy.

That possibility has set off alarms on the left.

Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.), fresh off the permanent closure of Spirit Airlines after helping sink its proposed merger with JetBlue, posted on X last week that “we need to block this merger and break up monopolies everywhere.” Reps. Sam Liccardo (D-Calif.) and Ayanna Pressley (D-Mass.) both members of the House Financial Services Committee, tried to pressure Paramount out of the deal. California Attorney General Rob Bonta said his office would launch a “vigorous” investigation into Paramount and WBD.

None of this should surprise anyone. Democrats routinely use regulatory power to punish people and companies that support free speech.

The Biden administration pressured Facebook and what was then Twitter to suppress content that challenged Democratic talking points. Censored subjects included election integrity and the origins of COVID-19.

Elon Musk bought Twitter, renamed it X, and made it more open to speech the left dislikes. Democrats came after him too, including efforts to strip him of federal contracts. Meanwhile, criminals set Tesla vehicles on fire and torched dealerships in several states. This is the same Tesla that, as the Associated Press noted, “was once the darling of the left.”

The pattern extends well beyond social media and corporate regulation.

Former Secretary of State John Kerry complained that the First Amendment is “a major block” to stamping out so-called disinformation.

RELATED: The trial lawyers come for online free speech

BigNazik/iStock/Getty Images

On college campuses, the divide is even clearer. A 2017 Cato Institute study found major differences between Democrats and Republicans on allowing controversial or offensive speakers to appear on campus. Even on issues where Republicans might be expected to take greater offense, Cato found that Democrats were still more likely to support canceling the speaker.

That result fits the broader Democratic instinct. Free speech is welcome only when it serves the approved narrative. Once it threatens left-wing control over public discourse, it becomes dangerous, irresponsible, or anti-consumer.

That is what this fight over Paramount and WBD is really about.

If the merger succeeds, Paramount Skydance could become a more serious rival to the dominant streaming platforms. That competition could improve content and lower prices. But none of that matters to Democrats if Ellison is politically aligned with Trump and if the merged company might distribute material that leans right.

The left does not fear monopoly in principle. It fears losing its monopoly on the narrative.

Democrats have been losing ground at the ballot box and in the arena of ideas for years. Rather than examine why, they blame “disinformation” and target companies that refuse to toe the line.

That authoritarian impulse, not Ellison’s support for Trump, is the real free-speech crisis in America.

​Ballot box, Biden administration, Chris murphy, College campuses, Disinformation, Elizabeth warren, Elon musk, First amendment, John kerry, Opinion & analysis, Paramount skydance, Social media, Tim huelskamp, Warner bros discovery 

The Democratic members of the city council in Portland, Maine, lamented with the mayor that their sanctuary city policies were powerless to actually stop federal agents.

Democratic Portland Mayor Mark Dion touted the city for its previous efforts to protect illegal immigrants before admitting that they were limited legally from stopping Immigration and Customs Enforcement operations completely.

‘They don’t have any sense of what they’re supposed to do; they just go out and do things impulsively and destructively.’

Video of the meeting from May 4 resurfaced on social media and went viral.

Dion opposed a new proposal that would put the obligation of opposing ICE on city employees, but he said his opposition had nothing to do with partisan politics.

“Where I do have a fundamental disagreement is the nature of our employees,” the mayor said. “My sense of it [is] if they want to come, they’re coming.”

He went on to call the new policy “magical” thinking that would stop ICE.

“There’s a supposition that if we have this as an ordinance, that somehow ICE is gonna move on. That’s silly,” the mayor said.

“In my mind, that’s an interesting magical thought. My conclusion is they don’t have any sense of what they’re supposed to do; they just go out and do things impulsively and destructively,” he added. “The existence of this particular couple of sentences is not gonna change their equation. I’m confident of that.”

Dion was pressured by City Councilman Pious Ali, the Democratic author of the motion, that they had not done enough to protect staff as well as immigrants from ICE.

“If we don’t have a very strong protection for our staff and our community, nobody can predict what they can do,” Ali said.

The mayor disagreed.

“If that’s the case, if in your heart you understand that ICE is gonna do what ICE is gonna do, then why do we have to have our staff controlled under the guise of an order and an ordinance, other than for political purposes?” Dion continued. “As a pragmatic purpose, it’s not gonna deter ICE.”

Despite the mayor’s exhortations, the order passed 7-1.

“There you go,” the mayor said.

RELATED: Man served time for threatening to kill Trump — then gets arrested for more alleged threats against Trump

While Portland City Council members don’t have to designate their political affiliation, none are registered Republicans. All council members that have a political affiliation are either Democrats or democratic socialists.

Portland officials previously expressed their outrage at ICE operations in the city, and Councilman Wes Pelletier went so far as to call it a “war of terror” on immigrants. Pelletier is a member and leader of the Democratic Socialists of America.

The full video of the city council meeting from May 4 can be viewed on the Portland city website.

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​Portland maine city council, Portland mayor mark dion, Democrats vs ice, Sanctuary city policies, Politics 

The remains of a 23-year-old Alabama woman who had been missing for more than a week were found Saturday, and a male was charged with abuse of a corpse in connection with her death, AL.com reported.

Karen Deann Hollis vanished May 8 from Northport, the outlet reported, adding that Hollis was last seen around midnight in the area of 43rd Avenue in Northport.

‘Multiple search warrants were executed, and a great deal of physical, witness, and electronic information was obtained.’

Northport police said Hollis at the time of her disappearance was believed to have been living with a condition that could impair her judgment, AL.com added.

The Alabama Law Enforcement Agency issued a missing person alert in connection with her disappearance, the outlet said.

Tuscaloosa Violent Crimes Unit Capt. Jack Kennedy said the initial investigation led detectives to believe that foul play may have been involved, AL.com reported, adding that the violent crimes unit and Northport police have been working together on the case.

A person of interest was developed last week, but the victim still had not been located, AL.com reported.

But family and friends located Hollis’ remains on Saturday while searching an area determined to be of interest based on information received from an electronic device, the outlet said.

Kennedy said Hollis’ remains were recovered in Greene County, AL.com reported, adding that the Greene County Sheriff’s Office, Greene County District Attorney’s Office, and Greene County coroner assisted in the recovery of the remains.

“The investigation has been a priority for both agencies,” Kennedy said, according to the outlet. “Multiple search warrants were executed, and a great deal of physical, witness, and electronic information was obtained.”

The male identified last week as the person of interest — 44-year-old Randall Lendell Dejourney — was taken into custody, the outlet said.

RELATED: Manhunt under way for man seen dragging a body away before woman was found stabbed to death, police say

Dejourney is charged with abuse of a corpse, AL.com reported, adding that he was booked into the Tuscaloosa County Jail with a bond set at $15,000. A jail official on Monday afternoon told Blaze News that Dejourney was still behind bars.

Kennedy said Hollis’ remains have been sent to the Alabama Department of Forensic Sciences for an autopsy to determine the cause and manner of her death, AL.com reported.

The investigation is ongoing, and more charges could be brought following the autopsy results, the outlet added.

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​Alabama, Missing woman, Remains found, Abuse of corpse, Arrest, Crime 

Campaign ads may never look the same again after Spencer Pratt dropped yet another AI-generated video that looks more like a Hollywood sci-fi trailer than a traditional political ad — and BlazeTV hosts Pat Gray and Keith Malinak believe it could completely reshape how campaigns reach voters.

The viral video features Pratt soaring through a destroyed, burning Los Angeles on a futuristic vehicle straight out of “Star Wars,” while AI-generated versions of California politicians delivered sinister one-liners about the city’s decline.

“You didn’t finish burning the city to the ground in your first term. Make sure you finish the job in your second,” the AI version of California Governor Gavin Newsom (D) says with a grin.

The ad also features AI Mayor Karen Bass (D) saying, “The only thing that can stop us is someone telling the truth. As long as they don’t have any hope, the city’s ours.”

Bass then gets into a lightsaber duel with Pratt, before the citizens of Los Angeles all whip out their own lightsabers in defense of their city.

“If you don’t have a lot of money in your campaign, you just let AI take over,” Malinak says, while Pat Gray predicts the technology is about to revolutionize campaign strategy from here on out.

“I think we’re seeing a complete change in the political advertising world from now on. There’s going to be a lot of that kind of stuff, AI-generated things,” Gray says.

“I hope it works out for Spencer Pratt,” Malinak says.

“If they were ever going to get Republican leadership, it’s this cycle.”

Want more from Pat Gray?

To enjoy more of Pat’s biting analysis and signature wit as he restores common sense to a senseless world, subscribe to BlazeTV — the largest multi-platform network of voices who love America, defend the Constitution, and live the American dream.

​Aigenerated video, Blaze media, Blaze news, Blaze online, Blaze orginals, Blaze podcast network, Blaze podcasts, Blazetv, Blazetv hosts, Burning los angeles, California politicians, Campaign ads, Campaign strategy, Governor gavin newsom, Hollywood scifi, Keith malinak, Lightsaber duel, Mayor karen bass, Pat gray, Pat gray unleashed, Political ad, Political advertising, Republican leadership, Spencer pratt, Star wars, The blaze, Viral video