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I’d been in Budapest for a week, and I was running out of things to do, so I decided to check out a free walking tour.

Usually with these, you walk around with a local person who tells you random things: some local history, a little trivia, maybe a famous war they fought in 1832 that you’ve never heard of.

The Japanese girls became confused. And frustrated. Sofia tried to explain. Under communism, you were constantly denied things. Sometimes the leaders did this on purpose.

Often these tours were not very good. Often, they were so bad you had to sneak off in the middle of them.

This tour met up in a downtown park. I got there a little early and sat on a bench nearby. That way, I could escape if the tour group didn’t look promising.

People started to show up. Three college-age Japanese girls. A young American couple (newlyweds?). A German woman and her daughter. Other random tourists. About a dozen in all.

But I still kept my distance. I wanted to see what the tour guide looked like before I committed.

Punk perambulator

Finally, the guide showed up. It was a woman. 50-ish? Her name was Sofia. She was dressed all in black. She looked like the “cool” gender studies professor at your local community college. Short, dyed-black hair in an ’80s, punkish style.

In Budapest, it was often difficult to size people up by their fashion choices or their appearance. The city was still struggling style-wise because of its long history under Soviet rule. There were still a lot of babushka ladies wandering around.

But Sofia was at least trying to look like a chic European intellectual. That seemed like a positive sign.

I got off my bench. I joined the group

Nice revolution — when’s lunch?

She started us off with some normal stuff. The park we were standing in once held a famous rock concert. Pink Floyd? Metallica? Rock Against Racism? Something like that.

She told us some basic Budapest history. Lots of wars. Lots of violence and political upheaval.

She must have mentioned the Hungarian Revolution of 1956, which is a huge deal in Hungary. The people rose up against their communist rulers, and for a brief moment — a week or two — it appeared they might free themselves from Soviet rule.

But the communists regained control and of course executed anyone even remotely associated with the rebellion. I don’t remember how much Sofia said about this. And even if she did, our little tour group would probably not absorb it.

That is the nature of tours like this. You tell ordinary tourists about wars and brutality and horrific events, and they just nod and ask about lunch.

Hungary heart

About half way through the tour, Sofia began to talk about her family. By now, everyone liked Sofia, myself included. She was engaging. She was easy to listen to. Her English wasn’t the greatest, but that added to her appeal.

She told us about growing up in Budapest. She talked about her parents and siblings. Her father was educated and had a good job. Her mother was a teacher. They lived not far from where we were walking.

She described her childhood. For one thing, they didn’t have toys. They had other things to play with. But you couldn’t just go to the store and buy a Barbie doll. They didn’t have things like that.

Wait for it

Then she explained how her mother had to stand in breadlines. And sometimes her father would have to buy food on the black market. It was illegal to do this, but everyone did it. Sometimes you had no choice.

When Sofia got older, she only had two dresses and very uncomfortable shoes. The shoes were so stiff and badly made that by the time they stopped giving you blisters, you’d outgrown them.

Everyone listened without comment as she described these hardships. Nobody asked any questions. Sofia explained how frustrating it was to stand in a two-hour line, twice a week, to get bread. The tour group nodded their heads.

Droog, where’s my car?

Then she explained about the car. Her father had ordered a car when she was a child, maybe 6 years old. So she was excited that they were going to get a car. The whole family was.

But as Sofia got older, the car didn’t come. And this wasn’t the 1930s when cars were rare. This was the 1980s, when everyone in Western Europe had a car. Sofia and her friends could see on TV how common cars were in the rest of the world. But they were still waiting for her father’s car to come.

Eventually, Sofia turned 12. Still no car. And then her family stopped talking about it. Sofia continued to get older. She got well into her teens. The dream of riding in a car with her family was eventually forgotten.

The cheating classes

This was the point when one of the Japanese girls raised her hand. She didn’t understand about the car. Why didn’t her family get their car? Did Hungary not have factories to build cars?

Yes, said Sofia. They did build cars, but you had to wait to get one.

The Japanese girls didn’t understand. Why did they have to wait? Did her father not have the money for the car?

Yes, Sofia assured her, he had the money, but the car was like the bread. The government had the bread. They just made you wait for it. And sometimes, even if you waited a long time, you still couldn’t get it.

The Japanese girls became confused. And frustrated. Sofia tried to explain. Under communism, you were constantly denied things. Sometimes the leaders did this on purpose, to maintain control of the people.

Other times it happened because the leaders didn’t know how to run the country. The factory would break down. Or someone in the government would steal your car.

Beggaring belief

Everyone in our tour group thought this was very bad. The newlywed couple shook their heads. This wasn’t right. They didn’t like hearing about this.

Sofia explained that there was nothing you could do. You couldn’t leave the country. That wasn’t allowed. You couldn’t move to a different town. You couldn’t even move to a different apartment without permission. And then you had to bribe someone.

The Japanese girls looked at each other. There was a kind of rebellion in the tour group. Like, surely, it couldn’t have been that bad. Surely, Sofia was exaggerating.

I could feel Sofia getting upset on her side. How could these young people not know about this? This was history. Sofia thought everyone knew.

As I looked around, I saw that I might be the only one who fully believed Sofia’s story.

RELATED: What moving my family to Budapest has taught me about America

nedomacki/Getty Images

Cruel summer

I had visited several communist countries in the 1980s. I was shocked by how poor they were, how hopeless the people seemed, how cruel everyone was to each other. It was illegal to criticize the government, so they turned on each other.

But the nice Japanese girls couldn’t imagine that. It seemed impossible to them that a person could not have a car if he had the money to buy a car.

The other young people were also incredulous. Sofia’s father had a good job, but she couldn’t have toys? How was that possible?

And breadlines? You could tell people had heard of “breadlines.” But that couldn’t have happened to people in a modern society. How could there not be bread? That was the cheapest thing in the supermarket where they lived.

Tour’s end

When the tour officially ended, our group shifted back into docile tourist mode. Everyone thanked Sofia and gave her generous tips. Most people seemed happy and genuinely impressed by her, despite those few tense moments near the end.

And now they felt sorry for her. Having no toys as a child? And no car for her family? How sad!

The Japanese girls were especially polite and gracious. They were sorry if they had offended her. Sofia would get their highest ratings on Yelp, or whatever the equivalent was in Japan.

I hung back and waited for everyone else to leave. I had a big tip for Sofia. Also, I wanted to ask her to lunch. Or coffee. I liked her. I thought she was cool.

When it was just her and me, I quickly told her that I had been in Eastern Europe myself. Back in the 1980s. And I knew she was right. I had seen it myself.

On the other hand, I could understand how younger people had trouble believing it. It must seem like another age to them.

She agreed and thanked me. She took my money. But she never really made eye contact. She seemed wary of me. And suspicious in general. So I didn’t ask her to lunch.

Trust fall

Instead, I watched her hurry away. And then I had a weird thought: What if she did exaggerate the communist stuff? Probably that would get her bigger tips.

And what if she didn’t even live under communism? I couldn’t tell how old she was. 40? 50?

Maybe she was just repeating stories she’d heard from older people. What if she wasn’t even from Budapest?

I turned and headed back to my hotel. That’s how it is in cities like Budapest. A lot of strange stuff goes on. You never knew who was telling the truth, who you could trust, what the reality of the situation was.

And this was 30 years after communism fell. And it was still like that.

​Lifestyle, Culture, Socialism, Cold war, Hungary, Eastern block, Budapest, Breadlines, First person 

BlazeTV host Jason Whitlock doesn’t agree with Michelle Obama often, but when he does, it’s because she’s laughing at the expense of ESPN host Stephen A. Smith — which she did on a recent segment of her podcast.

“If I listen to ESPN for an hour, it’s like watching ‘The Real Housewives of Atlanta,’ you know? I mean, you know, it’s the same drama, and they’re yelling at each other, and they don’t get along, you know?” Obama said, before bringing up Stephen A. Smith.

“He’d be a great real housewife,” one of her guests chimed in.

“He would be, right?” Obama laughed.

“I’m like, what’s the difference? It’s just, you know, it’s just a sociological drama. I mean, the fact that people over seasons of working together still can’t get along, right? They still have the same arguments, and it’s just not women, but this happens in sports too. I find it fascinating,” Obama continued.

“This has got to be a high point for ESPN. … They’re talking about how feminine ESPN is. Hats off to Stephen A. Smith and Bob Iger and Gilbert Arenas and Shannon Sharpe. You have feminized ESPN,” Whitlock laughs.

“They look like a bunch of desperate housewives from Atlanta,” he continues. “Could they be calling you more ghetto than that?”

Whitlock isn’t letting Joy Taylor, who hinted in an interview that she was moving to Barstool, off the hook either.

“It just fits,” he says. “She’s a desperate housewife. She’s sexually liberated. Makes perfect sense for her to wind up at Barstool.”

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​Blaze news, Blaze online, Blaze originals, Blaze podcast network, Blaze podcasts, Blazetv, Camera phone, Desperate house wives, Fearless with jason whitlock, Free, Michelle obama, Real housewives of atlanta, Sharing, Stephen a smith, The blaze, Upload, Video, Video phone, Youtube.com 

The death of a loved one can prove devastating for a surviving spouse or parent. A study published on July 24 in the journal Frontiers in Public Health revealed that the bereaved faced an increased risk of dying from grief.

Research has long shown associations between bereavement and increased cortisol secretion, sleep disturbance, immune imbalance, inflammation, blood clots, and heart conditions, including Takotsubo cardiomyopathy — also called broken heart syndrome — and arrhythmias.

Numerous studies have also indicated that those grieving the loss of a loved one are at higher risk of dying.

A 2014 study in JAMA Internal Medicine, for instance, showed “25% higher mortality in the first year after partner bereavement in older couples, with a peak in the first 3 months.” Within 30 days of a spouse’s death, the study found that persons ages 60 or older were found to face twice the risk of a heart attack or stroke compared to those who had not suffered such a loss.

Dr. Lisa Shulman, a professor of neurology at the University of Maryland School of Medicine, told American Heart Association News that the death of a loved one triggers the body’s “fight or flight” response: “Your heart starts racing, your blood pressure increases, your respiratory rate increases, you become sweaty, as the body marshals defenses for you to protect yourself, one way or another.”

Shulman indicated that in some cases, grief can leave widows and widowers in a state of permanent stress.

RELATED: This is true fatherhood: My dad’s final act defined love and manhood

Photo by Spencer Platt/Getty Images

Dr. George Slavich, director of the Laboratory for Stress Assessment and Research at the Semel Institute for Neuroscience and Human Behavior at UCLA, indicated that prolonged grief can be debilitating for some individuals and is linked to serious health consequences, including increased risk for cancer and mortality.

The new study in Frontiers bolsters the connection between grief and mortality.

In the study, Danish researchers tracked the long-term health outcomes of 1,735 bereaved men and women over the course of 10 years. The median age of the participants at the time of enrollment was 62.

A national register of drug prescriptions tipped researchers off to which patients were recently prescribed treatments for terminal conditions. After identifying the corresponding moribund patients, the researchers invited them and their loved ones to participate in the study.

Among the participating relatives of the dying patients, 66% ultimately lost their spouse, 27% lost a parent, and 7% lost another kind of loved relation.

The researchers assessed participants’ grief symptoms prior to bereavement, six months after bereavement, and three years after bereavement, and divided the participants into five common categories of trajectories with those suffering persistently “low grief” on one end and those suffering persistently “high grief” on the other end.

Those in the “high grief” camp stood an 88% higher risk of dying within 10 years than those in the “low grief” camp.

Those in the “high grief” camp saw 186% higher odds of receiving talk therapy or other mental health services, 463% higher odds of being prescribed antidepressants, and 160% higher odds of being prescribed sedatives or anxiety drugs.

During the 10-year study period, 21.5% of the bereaved relatives in the “high grief” camp died. Only 7.3% of those in the “low grief” trajectory perished.

Dr. Mette Kjærgaard Nielsen noted that, “The ‘high grief’ group had lower education on average, and their more frequent use of medication before bereavement suggested that they had signs of mental vulnerability, which may cause greater distress on bereavement.”

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​Science, Heartbreak, Health, Study, Mourning, Despair, Sadness, Physiology, Psychology, Politics 

Just three days after President Donald Trump announced his 2024 presidential campaign, Biden Attorney General Merrick Garland unlawfully appointed prosecutor Jack Smith as special counsel to oversee two criminal investigations into the Republican candidate.

One of the Justice Department’s investigations concerned Trump’s alleged mishandling of classified documents; the other pertained to the imagined efforts by Trump to subvert the 2020 election.

While it was immediately clear to Trump that Smith was “a political hit man who is totally compromised,” Garland’s special counsel soon gave critics cause to suspect the president’s instincts were right once again.

Missouri Attorney General Andrew Bailey told Blaze Media co-founder and nationally syndicated radio host Glenn Beck last year that the Biden DOJ’s “witch hunt prosecution” of Trump was “not designed to obtain a legally valid conviction. It’s designed to take anyone running against Joe Biden — in other words, president Donald Trump — off the campaign trail.”

Although Trump was ultimately slapped with scores of charges, neither case went anywhere. The classified documents case was torpedoed in July 2024 because of Smiths’ unlawful appointment, and the Jan. 6 case was scuttled in November following Trump’s re-election.

Trump is no longer in hot water; however, Smith appears poised to take a plunge.

RELATED: Why an Epstein special investigator is a disastrously stupid idea

Photo by Drew Angerer/Getty Images

The U.S. Office of Special Counsel confirmed to Reuters on Saturday that it has launched an investigation into whether Smith violated the Hatch Act — a federal law that prohibits government employees both from using their “official authority or influence for the purpose of interfering with or affecting the result of an election” or from engaging in partisan political activity while on official duty time.

The investigation by the independent federal prosecutorial agency follows a request by Arkansas Senator Tom Cotton (R), who has accused Smith of interfering in the 2024 presidential election.

‘President Trump’s astounding victory doesn’t excuse Smith of responsibility for his unlawful election interference.’

“Jack Smith’s legal actions were nothing more than a tool for the Biden and Harris campaigns. This isn’t just unethical, it is very likely illegal campaign activity from a public office,” Cotton wrote.

In a July 30 letter to Jamieson Greer, acting special counsel at the OSC, Cotton highlighted a number of instances where Smith expedited trial proceedings and released provocative information allegedly “with no legitimate purpose.”

Cotton noted, for example, that Smith tried to rush Trump’s election subversion case, demanding a trial start date of Jan. 2, 2024 — just four months and three weeks after Smith filed the indictment against the president.

“Notably,” Cotton wrote, “jury selection was to begin just two weeks before the Iowa caucuses.”

RELATED: Ratcliffe releases damning Durham annex. Here’s what it reveals about Obama-Clinton Russia collusion hoax.

Photo by Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images

In another example, Cotton said that Smith filed a brief on Trump’s immunity from prosecution that was 165 pages long — exceeding the normal maximum page limit by four times — and “incorporated grand jury testimony typically kept secret at this point in other proceedings.”

“This action appears to be a deliberate and underhanded effort to disclose unsubstantiated and extensive allegations timed to maximize electoral impact,” Cotton wrote.

“These actions were not standard, necessary, or justified — unless Smith’s real purpose was to influence the election,” wrote the senator. “President Trump of course vanquished Joe Biden, Jack Smith, every Democrat who weaponized the law against him, but President Trump’s astounding victory doesn’t excuse Smith of responsibility for his unlawful election interference.”

The OSC could reportedly refer its findings to the DOJ; however, the Justice Department is already reviewing “politicized” actions taken by Smith, Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg, and New York Attorney General Letitia James through its Weaponization Working Group.

Blaze News has reached out to the White House for comment. Politico indicated that Smith did not immediately respond to its request for comment.

Smith’s office altogether blew over $47 million in taxpayer dollars on the two failed probes. He noted in his investigative report on Trump, “While we were not able to bring the cases we charged to trial, I believe the fact that our team stood up for the rule of law matters.”

Smith resigned 10 days before the president’s inauguration.

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​Jack smith, Special counsel, Lawfare, Weaponization, Tom cotton, Donald trump, Office of special counsel, Osc, Investigation, Election interference, Election, Joe biden, Merrick garland, Politics 

My son moved out of the house this spring. My daughter moves out in a couple of weeks, and my older kids are headed up north. Now, it’s just Tania and me — and it’s been quiet. Too quiet.

As I sit here in a house full of space and silence, my mind has been meditating on the reality of being a dad — and what that really means.

As a father, I’ve learned that sometimes the most important thing is simply showing up and doing the best I can — even when I’m not sure what that looks like.

I didn’t grow up with the model of fatherhood that I now find myself trying to live out. My dad wasn’t present. He worked hard — harder than most people I’ve ever met — but he wasn’t there for me the way I needed him to be. My dad was passionate about his job, and that job was providing for the family. He taught me about hard work, but there wasn’t much emotional connection. We didn’t start developing any real relationship until I was 30.

I’m not complaining. That was just the reality. But such memories inevitably materialize as I reflect on my own experience as a father and try to navigate this new chapter in my life.

When my kids were little, it was clear that I wasn’t home enough. And looking back, I knew that my work — this job — was costing me time with them. But we all talked about it as a family. When the opportunity to make this career change came in 2006, we discussed it openly because we knew it would change everything, for better or for worse. We made the decision as a team.

Now that they’re moved out, I walk around in this big house filled with all this stuff, considering whether anything was worth it. In the end, it’s just stuff. Everything in my home could be gone, and all I would miss are the kids.

The reality of fatherhood

Something I thought — and I think many others can relate — is that you think that your main job is to provide. You’re not needed in the same way mom is. You’re not the one the baby looks to in those early years. You watch your wife bond with the child, and you wonder where you fit in. It’s a strange feeling.

But as I’ve come to learn, you are needed in more ways than just a provider. You just don’t always get the immediate connection that mothers do.

A special season starts around age seven when dad becomes a little magical. You can feel it. The connection is there. It’s that sweet spot before the teenage years, when everything is awkward, when both dad and kid seem to be at odds. But in those years before, it’s golden.

Then, it all changes.

As kids hit the teen years, they start to pull away. The relationship with dad often becomes strained. They turn to mom when they need comfort, leaving dad in the background, unsure of where he stands. And that’s fine. That’s how it goes. But in this phase of life, as the kids start moving out and forging their own paths, I wish things were different.

I feel that loss deeply. As a father who wasn’t home all the time, I worked to provide. But now, I’m left with this ache in my chest, wondering, “Did I do enough?”

Releasing the outcome

The hardest part of fatherhood is when you stop expecting a certain outcome. My wife often tells me, “It’s going to happen. It will all work out.” And I believe her. But honestly, it’s hard not to be caught in the endless loop of second-guessing. Did I make the right decisions? Did I do enough? How can I fix this?

This struggle isn’t just about fatherhood. It’s about life. I’ve spent so much time looking ahead, planning, pointing to the horizon. I could always see the future and strive toward it. But in this season of life, I’m realizing that we also need to release our attachment to the outcome — whether it be over the injustices we see in the news cycle or the things we are wrestling with in our individual lives.

RELATED: How strong fathers shatter a poisonous narrative about manhood — one child at a time

Photo by Kelli McClintock via Unsplash

It doesn’t mean we’re not engaged. It just means we have to stop wanting a specific outcome. It’s a journey where the road is uncertain, and the destination might look different than what I expected.

I’ve always been someone who could picture the future and work relentlessly toward it. But it’s not just about getting to the destination — it’s about being present in the moment, doing the next right thing, and giving the end result to God.

Applying this to life

We live in a world obsessed with results, with winning, with reaching that end goal. But what if, just for a moment, we stopped obsessing over the outcome? What if we focused on doing the next right thing, one step at a time?

I don’t have all the answers. I’m still figuring it out. But what I do know is that there’s beauty in the process. There’s meaning in the moments, even if they don’t lead to the perfect outcome. As a father, I’ve learned that sometimes the most important thing is simply showing up and doing the best I can — even when I’m not sure what that looks like.

The house is quiet now, but the work isn’t over. There’s still plenty to do. And it’s time to focus on making each moment count.

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​Opinion & analysis, Opinion, Glenn beck, Fatherhood 

Unbeknownst to many, the New York Times has a podcast called “The Opinions,” which features columnists, staff writers, guest essayists, and editors diving into various issues and ideas.

In the latest episode titled “Why the Right Is Obsessed with Thinness,” Times opinion editor Meher Ahmad and opinion writer Jessica Grose discussed how being thin and fit is an unhealthy right-wing obsession.

BlazeTV host Sara Gonzales analyzes several audio clips from the interview.

In the first clip, Ahmad opens the podcast with the following preamble: “There’s been a resurgence in explicit ‘be thin’ messaging in culture. With the Ozempic boom, we see the body shaming of actresses like Sydney Sweeney and red carpets that were already filled with thin actresses becoming even thinner. On the right, there’s been a focus on body size that’s sort of been bundled up not just with health and wellness, but with religion, morals, and politics.”

“Being skinny is related to Christianity, I guess,” scoffs Sara.

In the second clip, Grose argues that conservatives are elevating thinness as a response to the body positivity movement.

“I think it’s a reaction to the body positivity movement, which I would say peaked about 10 years ago, and it was the idea that weight is not tied directly to health and that you can be healthy and not real thin. It was never predominant,” she says.

“That’s not what the body positivity movement has ever been,” Sara corrects.

“The leaders of the body positivity movement said things like, ‘Fat is fit, BMI is not a measure of wellness, healthy at every size, body size does not indicate health.”’

“We can have a debate on what people deem beautiful … but you can’t tell me that being morbidly obese is actually healthy, and yet, that is the lie that they tried to put on young women.”

In the third clip, Grose argues that conservative influencers aim to be attractive and physically fit because those endeavors align with conservative values, especially traditional gender roles: “It’s all traditional gender roles, right? I mean that litany of things … like marriage, babies, fitness, protein — it’s all one very narrow image, and anyone who is not conforming to that image is sort of outside the circle.”

“We do see fewer female leaders across the board, I would say Democrats and Republicans, and so the idea that women should be physically smaller goes along with the idea that they are not going to be the ones out front taking up space,” she added.

“It’s just so funny listening to them talk about, oh, conservative women, they just want to be physically smaller so they can take a backseat to all the powerful men. OK, well, I don’t know, I think that we’re doing OK as a whole here,” scoffs Sara, displaying a collage of beautiful conservative women who have large platforms and a lot of influence, including Alex Clark, Riley Gaines, Candace Owens, Lara Trump, Rep. Lauren Boebert (R-Colo.), and Nicole Shanahan, among others.

To hear more audio clips and more of Sara’s analysis, watch the episode above.

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​Sara gonzales unfiltered, Sara gonzales, Blazetv, Blaze media, New york times, Conservatives, Liberals, Body positivity movement 

Are Christians really trying to “cancel” Chip and Joanna Gaines?

The Magnolia power couple faced backlash last month over their new reality show, “Back to the Frontier,” because it features a homosexual couple with two children acquired via surrogacy. Understandably, Christians voiced dismay and disapproval that Chip and Jo — who once faced leftist wrath for being members of an evangelical church that opposed LGBTQ ideology — had capitulated to the rainbow mafia.

It’s possible to love people while still being honest about sin. Christians do this every day.

But according to New York Times columnist David French, the backlash is not about concerns over biblical fidelity. No, it’s really an example of “Christian cancel culture.”

In his telling, conservative Christians are behaving “exactly like their cultural opponents” because they feel “powerful” and wield “influence” to abuse it. And, of course, French accuses conservative Christians of hypocrisy because many of them support President Donald Trump.

Worse yet, French describes these Christians as “budding authoritarians.”

French’s broadside is as predictable as it is shallow (he regularly smears conservative Christians). He paints biblical conviction as “hypocrisy,” hides behind the “But Trump!” distraction, and pretends that calling sin by name amounts to silencing people.

But this isn’t an example of cancel culture. This is Christians exercising biblical discernment and refusing to support what God calls evil.

Not cancel culture

Everyone knows what cancel culture is. We’ve all seen it. It’s about seizing on people’s worst moments and erasing them: silencing them, destroying their careers, and driving them out of the public square.

But that’s not what’s happening here. Christians aren’t trying to strip Chip and Jo of their Magnolia empire, remove them from television, or erase them from polite society. Christians are not even demanding that “Back to the Frontier” be canceled.

What’s happening here is quite different — but much simpler.

Faithful Christians are calling out Chip and Jo — whom Christians have supported for more than a decade — for giving a platform to an anti-God lifestyle that harms children by depriving them of God’s design for a mother and father, a lifestyle the Bible explicitly condemns and Christianity has never endorsed.

That’s not cancel culture. It’s moral clarity and biblical accountability.

RELATED: Chip Gaines tells us not to judge — but we won’t pretend any more

Dimitrios Kambouris/Getty Images for Warner Bros. Discovery

French deliberately blurs this distinction because his argument collapses without it. He wants his audience to believe that public disagreement with someone’s decision is equivalent to the mob-driven erasure tactics of progressive cancel culture.

But scripture makes this distinction clear. When public sin is celebrated, public correction is often the prescribed remedy. Such accountability is not about “cancellation” but protecting the witness of the church and encouraging fellow Christians back to the truth.

The Christian problem with “Back to the Frontier” is obvious: Chip and Joanna Gaines decided or agreed to use their platform — one that Christian support helped build — to normalize sin. This is bad because it confuses believers, distorts the gospel, and damages the church’s witness.

‘But Trump!’

Like a playlist on repeat, French can’t resist making this, in some form or another, about Trump. In his view, conservative Christians lack the moral credibility to critique Chip and Jo because many of those same critics also support Trump.

But this is a tired and overused false equivalence.

I dare say not a single Christian voter who supports Trump endorses his sins — just as they don’t endorse the sins of anyone else. Voting for a candidate in an election is not the same thing as endorsing the candidate’s personal decisions. In fact, many Christians who support Trump vote for him in spite of his moral flaws. And, of course, the truth is that many Christians believe Trump’s policies more closely align with a biblical worldview than whatever gobbledygook the Democrats have on offer.

Here’s the real hypocrisy: While French lectures Christians about morality, he supports Democrats whose worldviews, ethics, morals, and political platforms are empty of anything that resembles Christian ethics or a biblical worldview.

How can someone who endorsed Joe Biden and voted for Kamala Harris seriously lecture other Christians about the morality of their vote, then use that vote as a cudgel to smear them? If French were serious about rooting out Christian hypocrisy, he’d start with his own politics.

A time for courage

Christians don’t want to cancel Chip and Jo. We’re simply being clear about what’s true and false, what’s good and evil in an age where everything is upside down.

Now is the time for Christians to stand up and courageously proclaim God’s truth with love.

What we cannot do is celebrate, excuse, justify, or normalize sin, especially sin of this magnitude, an issue that is foundational to creation and shapes the very fabric of society. And we definitely shouldn’t capitulate to the culture for the sake of pluralism, as French suggests we do. That’s not cancel culture. It’s what Jesus calls being “salt” and “light.”

After all, what good is salt if it has lost its saltiness?

On this issue, French is like a light hidden under a basket. He is not only dead wrong about his conclusions, but his framing is dishonest. This isn’t about cancel culture or partisan politics. The real issue here is whether Christians will be faithful to God and His ways or whether they will bend to a culture that hates God and His truth.

It’s possible to love people while still being honest about sin. Christians do this every day. Love does not require complicity.

The Christian faith isn’t a private hobby. It’s a comprehensive worldview that speaks to every part of life. If God’s design for sexuality and family is true — and it is — then pretending to be neutral in the public square is just another form of surrender.

That’s why Christians must reject French’s false equivalences and cheap moralism. Because in the end, this isn’t about Chip and Joanna Gaines. It’s about whether the church will have the courage to tell the truth and discern the difference between light and darkness.

Chip and Jo just gave Christians a test. The backlash — epitomized by David French’s absurd accusations — only confirmed how urgent it is for Christians to pass that test with flying colors.

​Chip and jo, Chip gaines, Joanna gaines, New york times, Christianity, Christians, David french, Lgbtq agenda, Faith 

Jean Garnett’s recent New York Times screed, “The Trouble with Wanting Men,” poses as cultural critique. It’s not.

It’s a bloated confession, narcissistic navel-gazing wrapped in feminist jargon.

If heterosexual relationships are fundamentally broken, what, one wonders, is the solution? Lesbianism by committee? Celibacy as political statement?

The article reads like a therapy session conducted in public. Unfiltered, sure — but more like a late-night voicemail from an unhinged ex. And painfully personal, without ever brushing up against anything profound. It’s Lena Dunham with a thesaurus, mistaking self-exposure for substance.

Fatal attraction

The premise is absurd. Women are “fed up” with the “mating behavior” of men. So fed up that they need a fancy name for it. Heterofatalism — the academy’s latest made-up spew. A term coined to canonize female disappointment and package failed flings as compelling commentary.

The term suggests fatal attraction to heterosexuality itself. As if being straight were a terminal diagnosis. As if desire for men were a character flaw requiring academic intervention.

Consider the writer’s “case studies,” if you can call them that. A man cancels a date because he’s anxious. This, we’re told, is proof of masculine failure.

A lawyer takes too long to text back. Suddenly it’s a crisis in male communication.

Then there’s the polyamorous sex enthusiast — honest, up front, emotionally literate. And yet even he disappoints. Too clear. Too composed. Too self-aware to project fantasy onto. His failure, it seems, is not failing enough. In Garnett’s world, men can’t win — not because they’re cruel, but because they’re human.

Tramp stamp

Garnett’s romantic history tells the real story, though she frames it as a feminist awakening. She and her husband enjoyed an open relationship, a setup that gave her license to chase new highs under the banner of sexual liberation.

What follows isn’t empowerment. It’s a slow-motion train wreck of bad choices, dressed up as theory. She blows up her marriage for a man defined by his “incapacity to commit” — J., the sad-eyed drifter who all but hands her a warning label. He’s detached, clear about his limits, uninterested in anything lasting. She pursues him anyway, certain she’s the exception.

When it all falls apart, as it inevitably does, she blames him for being exactly who he said he was. Garnett might be a capable writer, but she’s adrift — romantically, intellectually, and morally. Deluded, self-excusing, and painfully detached from reality, she isn’t just a product of modern feminism. She’s its poster child.

Soft boys

The “good guy” phenomenon reveals the deeper pathology. Men, having internalized decades of feminist scolding, now perform contrition. They soften their edges. They distance themselves from anything deemed traditionally masculine. They over-apologize, over-communicate, and tiptoe through relationships as if masculinity itself were a moral failing.

But this softness — the very quality they were told women wanted — has become the new target. Too hesitant. Too self-conscious. Too accommodating. In trying to be safe, they became invisible. The irony is brutal: Women spent years dismantling the masculine ideal, only to mourn its absence once it was gone.

Whine tasting

Garnett and her dinner companions ask, “Where are the men who can handle hard stuff?” They drove them out. They turned strength into suspicion, decisiveness into something diabolical. Now, faced with the results of their own demands, they sneer at the men left behind.

The restaurant scene is a window into this cultural mess. Four women, past their prime, wine in hand, mocking male inadequacy, giggling over penis jokes like it’s political commentary.

This woman’s work

Then comes the grievance inflation monologue. Women, apparently, are now burdened with interpreting “mystifying male cues.” They call themselves “relationship-maintenance experts,” as if carrying the emotional weight of a partnership is a modern injustice. But relationships have always required attention and effort, from both sides. What was once called being an adult is now considered a form of oppression.

And then there’s the pièce de résistance: “hermeneutic labor.” A term so overstuffed that it buckles under its own pretension. It’s academic nonsense for what used to be called understanding your partner.

Women read signals. Men retreat. That’s the rhythm. One leans in, the other pulls back. Not because of patriarchy, but because intimacy is uneven, unpredictable, and often inconvenient. This dynamic didn’t arrive with gender studies. It’s been around since the first couple argued under a tree.

Rebel without a cause

Garnett’s sexual encounters reveal the true dynamic. She wants dominance from men. The guitar player who makes her wait, who calls her a “bratty sub.” This excites her. Clear masculine authority works.

Yet she simultaneously resents male confidence as problematic. It never occurs to her that the contradiction isn’t societal. It’s entirely personal. She’s not uncovering a grand cultural flaw. She is the flaw.

The contradiction is stark. Feminist theory demands male sensitivity. Female biology craves male strength. Women caught between ideology and instinct blame men for the confusion. “Heterofatalism” becomes the convenient scapegoat.

Consider the broader implications. If heterosexual relationships are fundamentally broken, what, one wonders, is the solution? Lesbianism by committee? Celibacy as political statement? The heterofatalists offer no answers, only complaints. So many complaints.

The real tragedy is simpler. Modern dating culture has poisoned romantic relationships for everyone. Apps reduce people to profiles. Hookup culture eliminates courtship. Endless options prevent commitment. Both sexes suffer equally.

But women have weaponized their suffering into theoretical frameworks. Men’s pain remains invisible, their struggles dismissed as weakness, their anxiety mocked as inadequacy.

Intellectualizing idiocy

The solution is not new terminology. It’s old wisdom. Lower expectations. Accept imperfection. Stop treating romantic disappointment as social pathology. Recognize that good relationships require compromise from both parties.

“Heterofatalism” is not a real phenomenon, of course. It’s a fancy name for ordinary human disappointment, a way to intellectualize personal failures, to repackage private mistakes as cultural critique. To turn individual shortcomings into a shared burden everyone else is expected to answer for.

Academia enables the absurdity. Professors build careers on cataloging female dissatisfaction. Students earn degrees studying their own disastrous dating decisions. The circular logic is perfect. Every bad date becomes data. Every ghosting proves the theory.

Meanwhile, actual problems go unsolved. Birth rates collapse. Marriage rates plummet. Loneliness epidemics spread. But sure, let’s focus on heterofatalism. Let’s give hyper-liberal women another reason to avoid commitment. Another excuse to blame men for everything.

The real fatalism is accepting this story of victimhood, thinking half the population are powerless against their own desires. Women deserve better than this pseudo-intellectual mush. Men deserve better than being cast as villains in every failed relationship. And society deserves more than recycled heartbreak dressed up in academic drag.

We need honesty about modern romance. Not another made-up term for problems as old as desire itself.

​Dating, Lifestyle, Media, Media criticism, New york times, Heterofatalism, Feminism, Chattering classes 

Hyper-realistic baby dolls, commonly called reborn dolls, originated in the 1990s as a benign artistic hobby for doll collectors and artists who sought to push back against mass-produced dolls by creating lifelike versions using techniques including repainting, rooting hair, and adding realistic details.

For decades, this avocation remained niche, but in recent years, reborn dolls have become mainstream. Social media is saturated with content capturing adult women toting their reborn dolls around, treating them as actual children. Even the Wall Street Journal published an article about the waxing lucrativity of the reborn doll world, with prices ranging from a few hundred to several thousand dollars for a single doll.

Today, there are entire conventions and expos dedicated to reborn dolls, the most notable being Dolls of the World Expo, which just held its third annual event in June.

So why are dolls, specifically hyper-realistic ones, suddenly so popular among adults?

On a recent episode of “Relatable,” Allie Beth Stuckey dove into this strange new trend that’s grown into an entire industry.

In “Why People Are Buying $8,000 Lifelike Baby Dolls,” WSJ writer Rory Satran revealed one of the main reasons the reborn doll industry has boomed: Reborn dolls have become therapy tools. “Collectors argue that the dolls can be therapeutic for women who have lost babies or suffered miscarriages,” she wrote.

Allie, however, begs to differ. “I don’t think that this is a form of redemption and therapy for people who have lost or who have struggled with infertility. In fact, I know it’s not because it is a fake replacement for something that is real, and it is a fake balm for a real deep wound,” she says.

But attempting to use dolls as a palliation isn’t just futile, it’s injurious to the human spirit.

“You are creating an infection that is going to infest your heart and your soul by trying to attach to and put hope and belonging into an inanimate object. … At some point, the humanity inside you, the conscience you have, the real grief you’re feeling will collide with the reality that this is not a real person,” Allie says.

She disputes the claim that using reborn dolls for therapeutic purposes “hurts no one.”

Elevating dolls above human children is a “problem that creates disorder” in society, she says.

“Successful and healthy societies are ordered around caring for the most vulnerable, [and] I’m not talking about a welfare state. … I’m talking about how we order our communities, how we order our own lives, our own churches, how we create these systems of care,” she clarifies.

“It is disordered when we say, ‘Well, we are actually going to sacrifice the needs of children on behalf of adult desires,’ which we see in so many different ways.”

When adults use reborn dolls to quell their suffering, they are selfishly “ignoring their responsibility to care for real children — whether they’re their own children or they’re orphans or they’re poor children or they’re foster children,” Allie says.

She then plays a disturbing social media video of a grown woman changing, feeding, and rocking her newborn doll to illustrate that this isn’t just some hobby for oddballs. It’s “a form of worship.”

To see it, watch the episode above.

Want more from Allie Beth Stuckey?

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

​Relatable with allie beth stuckey, Relatable, Allie beth stuckey, Reborn dolls, Reborn therapy, Blazetv, Blaze media 

When I was in the fifth grade, an encyclopedia salesman visited our classroom to promote his collection of 12 leather-bound books. For readers under 20, encyclopedias were the forerunners of Wikipedia — or, perhaps more accurately, Google. If you wanted to learn something about anything, you had to look it up.

After his pitch, the salesman handed out buttons to each of us. They read: “We never guess, we look it up!”

We need prayer. Not just for revival, but for clarity. For courage. For love of truth and love of country.

So I, being just one of the self-appointed class clowns, pinned on the button and proudly declared, “I never guess, I make it up!”

The 10-year-olds giggled.

Never guessing and making something up might be a brilliant joke for young children, but as adults, it can become a dangerous mindset — even an evil way of thinking — when applied to important cultural and political issues. Such thinking can divide — and eventually destroy — a country.

The following four areas are particularly threatened by such falsehoods that have taken root and now threaten to tear us apart.

Shoddy journalism

Once a noble profession, journalism has become a playground for flimsy narratives based on anonymous tips with little to no evidence. Case in point: the Wall Street Journal’s recent hit piece claiming Donald Trump sent a warm birthday greeting to Jeffrey Epstein.

Evidence, anyone? Bueller? Bueller? Still waiting.

Does passing off shoddy evidence as absolute truth surprise anyone anymore?

When Jussie Smollett claimed that MAGA thugs put a noose around his neck, called him naughty names, and did other unspeakable things, the press took his word as gospel. The facts didn’t matter. The narrative did.

Did it really need to take a court case to finally drill down to the truth behind Smollett’s ludicrous claims?

And then came Trump’s impeachments. First, they accused him of being a Russian puppet. Later, they dragged him into court over a decades-old assault allegation lifted straight from a television script — and again for a real estate “fraud” case without a single victim.

It’s a classic projection: Accuse your opponent of the very thing you’re doing. Whether that came from Goebbels, Alinsky, or some other manipulator of mass opinion, it’s been remarkably effective. But it’s time we bury that tactic — and hold its promoters accountable.

On-demand abortion

I was a college sophomore in 1973 when the Supreme Court debated legalizing abortion. The argument was framed around “choice,” but I kept asking: What choice are we talking about?

If you wave away the smoke screen and charged rhetoric, the issue is plainly about human life. No one debates whether an eagle’s egg holds potential life — you destroy it, you pay a fine. But human babies? Their lives can be extinguished on demand, through nine months and, in some cases, even after birth.

That’s moral madness, not medicine.

Homosexuality and transgenderism

Remember when “what we do in the privacy of our own bedrooms is nobody’s business” was the mantra of the LGBTQ movement? That private preference has now practically become a public mandate.

Today, the demand isn’t tolerance. It’s celebration. It’s not just that two adults love each other. It’s that your children must learn to affirm their “gender identity” in school. And if a little boy thinks he’s a little girl, you have to support that too, even if it entails permanently changing his body before he’s old enough to get a driver’s license.

What began as “big Bill wants to love big Bill” has turned into “little Bill needs to become little Jill.”

Weaponized racism

As destructive as the above lies have been, none have proved as divisive as the redefinition of racism.

In its most weaponized form, racism has become acceptable. That’s how we got to the idea that electing someone like President Barack Obama was necessary “payback” for the sins of the past — for the horrible institution of slavery that your ancestors may or may not have condoned.

Voting for someone based on the color of their skin rather than the content of their character empowered an agenda bent on “fundamentally transforming” the country by uprooting the very ideals that once united it. That includes the belief — once self-evident — that all men are created equal.

RELATED: Self-evident truths aren’t so self-evident any more

Photo by dzm1try via Getty Images

Many Christians rightly see abortion as America’s greatest moral stain. But I believe God may be using the sin of racism — particularly the left’s weaponized version of it — as a means of divine judgment on this land.

A national reckoning

Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard recently uncovered a “year-long coup” orchestrated by President Barack Obama and his administration against Donald Trump during his 2016 campaign and first term in office. If proven true in court, these allegations could ignite racial unrest far worse than the George Floyd riots.

Those on the right have marched peacefully to end the evil of abortion; those on the left have paraded peacefully to celebrate homosexuality (in all its mutations and mutilations). But if race enters the equation, groups like Black Lives Matter and Antifa stand ready to turn streets into war zones.

A call to truth

These nefarious elements embedded in the nation’s lifeblood could spell very dark and destructive times ahead. We shall see.

In the meantime, we need to return to what that little button in fifth grade was trying to teach us: Don’t make it up. Look it up. Tell the truth.

We need prayer. Not just for revival, but for clarity. For courage. For love of truth and love of country.

This nation was founded by men who believed in a holy and righteous God — and who believed that truth was worth dying for. We don’t need more lies. We need that kind of truth again.

Editor’s note: A version of this article appeared originally at American Thinker.

​Opinion & analysis, Opinion, Abortion, Transgenderism, Blm, Racism, Self evident truths 

For generations, millions swallowed the lie whole. Earth meant nothing special. Humans amounted to cosmic dust. The universe spun as a random accident through meaningless space.

Wrong. Dead wrong.

Critics will scramble for explanations. Multiple universes. Anthropic selection. Observer bias. Anything but the obvious conclusion staring them in the face.

Fresh evidence undercuts the nihilist narrative. Earth sits dead center in a billion-light-year void. Not randomly. Not accidentally. Precisely where it needs to be.

As Britain’s Royal Astronomical society notes: “The existence of such a large and deep void is controversial because it doesn’t mesh particularly well with the standard model of cosmology, which suggests matter today should be more uniformly spread out on such large scales.”

Cosmic void … or cathedral?

This void transcends empty space. Call it a cosmic cathedral. It’s 20% less dense than the universe average. The perfect observatory. The only spot where intelligent beings can peer into the depths of creation and actually understand what they see.

Consider the implications. Trillions of galaxies. Countless worlds. Yet only one vantage point in the known universe where the cosmic expansion can be precisely measured, mapped, and understood. And that vantage point just happens to contain us.

The numbers tell the story. The so-called Hubble tension — that persistent discrepancy between local and distant measurements of the universe’s expansion rate — dissolves when calculated from Earth’s unique observational position.

Here, the math works. The instruments agree. From anywhere else, the data would be skewed. The light bent. The signals drowned. The expansion would appear warped or unreadable. Not because it isn’t happening, but because no other seat in the cosmic theater offers a clear enough view.

And we occupy that seat.

The VIP section

This discovery strikes at the heart of the Copernican principle — that ancient, philosophical wrecking ball that for centuries insisted we were nothing special. It told us we were average. Unremarkable. A cosmic accident swirling in a sea of indifferent stars.

But the data says otherwise.

We bear no mediocrity. We occupy no statistical middle ground. Our corner of space is not some forgettable speck, but the one location where the universe becomes legible. Where its expansion can be seen clearly, calculated precisely, understood fully. Not from anywhere. From here.

The fine-tuning argument was only the prologue. Carbon ratios. Nuclear binding forces. The strength of gravity. The charge of the electron. Every constant delicately poised, as if on a cosmic razor’s edge. Alter one decimal — just one — and the stars don’t ignite. The planets don’t hold. The chemistry of life never gets out of the gate.

The implications cut deep. Science spent decades trying to remove purpose from existence, to reduce everything to randomness, to convince us we represented accidents in an indifferent cosmos. The cosmos keeps disagreeing.

Every measurement points toward intention. Every discovery reveals design. Every breakthrough uncovers another layer of impossible precision. The void around us functions as more than our neighborhood. It serves as our pulpit, our designated spot for cosmic comprehension. The universe positioned us exactly where we needed to be to understand the universe.

That pattern suggests choreography, not randomness.

RELATED: Dawkins is wrong: Why you should still believe in miracles

Boonyachoat/iStock/Getty Images

Fear of meaning

Critics will scramble for explanations. Multiple universes. Anthropic selection. Observer bias. Anything but the obvious conclusion staring them in the face.

Some will resurrect tired statistical arguments, claiming we only think our place is special because we’re here to observe it. Others will leap into the multiverse, conjuring infinite realities to dilute this one into irrelevance. Theoretical physicists will pen papers faster than peer review can keep up, layering complexity upon complexity to mask the simplicity of what this suggests.

They’ll blame instrumentation. Measurement issues. Incomplete data. Anything to avoid confronting the raw implication: that the universe seems rigged for our comprehension, rigged in a way that mathematics alone cannot explain.

Journals will fill with damage control. Panels convened. Preprint servers flooded. Cosmologists will hedge, backpedal, reframe. “Yes, it looks that way,” they’ll say. “But it doesn’t mean what you think.” Because to admit what it does mean, to follow the evidence to its end, is to crack open a door they spent lifetimes trying to keep shut: a door not just to design, but to destiny.

Made to understand

The obvious conclusion becomes unavoidable. We arrived here not by accident, but by appointment.

The universe built us an observatory, then placed us inside it, then gave us the tools to recognize what we see — and then lit up the cosmic stage so we could watch the show.

This development extends far beyond astronomy. It represents a revolution in meaning. For centuries, we were told that consciousness represented an accident; that intelligence emerged as a fluke. That purpose amounted to a delusion.

But consciousness appears exactly where it can comprehend creation. Intelligence emerges exactly where it can measure infinity. Purpose reveals itself exactly where it can be recognized.

The pattern shows itself as unmistakable. The positioning proves intentional. The timing reveals perfection.

​Creationism, Astronomy, Cosmic void, Hubble tension, Physics, Faith, Christianity 

Tesla CEO Elon Musk recently opened a new diner in Hollywood that capitalizes on a strikingly unique retro futuristic aesthetic, the Tesla Diner.

It looks like it was dreamed up in mid-century America, when the culture was hopefully optimistic about technology’s evolution. It is shaped like a spaceship and adorned with two bright red strips of neon that make it look like a stop on Route 66.

New technology is extremely helpful for streamlining productivity. Unfortunately, the cost of this efficiency is counted in tangible relationships.

Outside, guests can drive up their Cybertrucks to a giant movie screen to watch a sci-fi flick on a 66-foot LED screen. Robots dole out buckets of popcorn for visitors to munch on while they peruse through the exclusive merchandise available in the gift shop. There is a kitchen, bar, and dining area where guests can order classic lunchroom favorites like burgers, fried chicken, and grilled cheese sandwiches.

The Tesla Diner is a sight to behold, a behemoth chrome-plated building surrounded by 80 different EV charging stations. It merges two contradictory aesthetics, pairing days-gone-by sentimentalism with one of the world’s most exciting technological corporations. Its changes feel almost unnatural.

For example, the diner uses geofence technology to track guests so that their pre-placed orders will be ready upon arrival. For those who prefer their meals to be hot and fresh, this is a welcome innovation.

Still, it can feel a bit dystopian and uncomfortable for a society unaccustomed to this robotic style of service.

RELATED: Musk-hating Tesla drivers go full irony to avoid backlash

AaronP/Bauer-Griffin/GC Images

As a result, many people have been extremely critical of the new Tesla cafe. Internet critics have chastised it for replacing humans with robots and for leaning into a virtual design.

But most of these critiques can be repelled with the fact that it is not a virtual space. And despite its many touch screens, robots, and geofences, it is a physical gathering space. People can stroll around the diner, interacting with other curious tourists and locals, sharing in the simple pleasure of movies and meals.

Loneliness boom

Between 2003 and 2022, in-person socializing for adults fell by about 30%.

The amount of time that people share with friends in companionship settings has dropped from an average of 202 minutes per day to only 174 minutes per day. The problem is not just prevalent among teenagers, but the rise of social media and online spaces has pushed all age groups into secluded spaces. For example, 12% of U.S. adults claim that they have no close friends, a number that has quadrupled since the 1990s.

This is not only a young person’s problem, but a cultural shift. Video games and chat rooms have increasingly become spaces for people to meet. In only 10 years, live chat usage has increased by 400%. Online messaging has exploded, with billions of people worldwide using it to connect with one another. Phone calls, handwritten letters, and in-person meetings are constantly traded for emails. After the COVID pandemic, many office jobs shifted toward work-from-home positions, which further isolated individuals from their peers.

Some of this new technology is extremely helpful for streamlining productivity. Unfortunately, the cost of this efficiency is counted in tangible relationships.

Social desert

Physical gathering spaces are increasingly rare.

In the past, movie theaters, concerts, and restaurants were popular spots for people to gather with friends and meet new people. The rise of streaming services has caused movie theater attendance to drop significantly, a problem only exacerbated by production studios dropping movies online with little to no wait after theatrical releases. Smaller concert venues have closed while larger venues backed by mega-corporations, such as LiveNation, sell tickets at shockingly high prices. Restaurants have downsized due to remote work reducing foot traffic and online ordering rendering dining rooms useless.

In 2025, American culture is extremely isolated. People are seeking ways to get out of the house after the pandemic spent years discouraging people from going out. The country is re-emerging from online spaces, looking for physical places where they can people-watch, meet friends, and engage in public life.

The Tesla Diner is a strange but creative concoction that tries to fill the loneliness of modernity while understanding the needs of the present. As new technologies become an increasingly relevant part of culture, businesses can and should capitalize on their popularity to help rebuild a thriving American culture.

Charging up community

Musk’s diner is odd, but it’s filling a need for people.

The amount of people who have to wait to “charge” their cars has exploded. Rather than seeing this as an annoying downtime, Musk has decided to use it to create a new shared space. Its robots and geofencing are kitschy and novel enough to make people curious. Its food offerings and movies are pleasant and simple enough to draw people in.

Humanity is learning how to reconnect with itself. The era of drive-in theaters and soda shops feels like a distant memory, but it also symbolized a time when it was easier for people to connect with one another. As times have changed, most of our connections have slowly mutated to become primarily virtual.

Still, humans naturally seek out shared spaces. In 2024, the U.S. National Parks Service reported its highest attendance levels ever recorded. This shows that people are eager to emerge from their seclusion and get back into the world.

Some may call it ugly, some may call it strange, but the Tesla Diner is a physical place. At a time when people desperately want a reason to feel like they are a part of a community, having a place to park your car and sip on a soda feels like a luxury.

​Tesla diner, Elon musk, Lonlieness, Physical space, Community, Culture 

Democrats, whose approval rating has plunged to its lowest in over three decades, have worked vigorously to prevent President Donald Trump from properly executing his agenda.

A big part of their strategy in the U.S. Senate has been to slow-walk the president’s nominees for the bench, assistant cabinet secretaries, and ambassadors by refusing their confirmation through unanimous consent or voice votes.

Republicans began to steamroll the opposition during a rare weekend session on Saturday, successfully voting on some of Trump’s nominees whom Sen. Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) smeared as “historically bad” picks.

In addition to confirming retired CKE Restaurants CEO Andrew Puzder as ambassador to the European Union earlier in the day, the Senate confirmed CatholicVote co-founder Brian Burch as U.S. ambassador to the Vatican in a vote along party lines.

“I am profoundly grateful to President Trump and the United States Senate for this opportunity to serve as the next U.S. Ambassador to the Holy See,” Burch said in a statement obtained by Blaze News. “I have the honor and privilege of serving in this role following the historic selection of the first American pope. In a remarkable coincidence, or what I prefer to attribute to Providence, Pope Leo XIV is from Chicago, which is also my hometown.”

When announcing Burch as his nominee in December, Trump noted that the Phoenix-born father of nine, who was president of CatholicVote until June, “received numerous awards, and demonstrated exceptional leadership, helping build one of the largest Catholic advocacy groups in the Country.”

Trump noted further that Burch helped him garner “more Catholic votes than any Presidential Candidate in History!”

Ahead of the election, CatholicVote helped raised awareness about Harris’ antipathy to Catholics — who make up roughly 20% of the U.S. population — as well as to Catholic organizations and Catholic moral teaching, running a multimillion-dollar ad campaign on theme in critical swing states.

RELATED: ‘Recess is for children’ — and Senate gridlock is for Democrats

Senate Majority Leader John Thune. Andrew Harnik/Getty Images

As part of this campaign, Burch provided Americans with a damning reminder about Harris’ suggestion in 2018 that a Trump nominee’s Catholic faith disqualified him from serving on the federal bench.

“Kamala Harris hates what we believe,” Burch said.

CatholicVote also released an eye-opening ad revealing Harris’ support for the Sisters of Perpetual Indulgence, an “anti-Catholic hate group” that has since its inception in 1979 mocked Catholic teaching and doctrine and ridiculed the church’s orthodox views on marriage, sexuality, homosexuality, transgenderism, and abortion.

‘The relationship between the Holy See and the United States remains one of the most unique in the world.’

Burch’s group appears to have helped move the needle.

Trump enjoyed a 12-point advantage among Catholics over failed presidential candidate Kamala Harris. The Pew Research Center indicated that 22% of those who voted in the 2024 election and cast a ballot for Trump were Catholic.

RELATED: Joe Kent secures Senate confirmation to work alongside Tulsi Gabbard

Photo by Ernesto Ruscio/Getty Images

Burch, also the president of Seton Academy Catholic Montessori School in Illinois, was set to be confirmed as ambassador in May — shortly after Chicago-born Robert Francis Prevost became Pope Leo XIV — but Hawaii Sen. Brian Schatz (D) put a blanket hold on all State Department nominees.

Sen. Eric Schmitt (R-Mo.) told the Catholic News Agency at the time, “I never thought I’d see the day when Democrats would be willing to block the nominee for ambassador to the Holy See simply to score political points with their far-left radicals, but it seems they’re still searching for rock bottom.”

Despite the holdup, Trump ultimately got his way, and Burch got his confirmation.

“The relationship between the Holy See and the United States remains one of the most unique in the world, with the global reach and moral witness of the Catholic Church serving as a critical component of U.S. efforts to bring about peace and prosperity,” Burch said in his statement to Blaze News. “As a proud Catholic American, I look forward to representing President Trump, Vice President Vance, and Secretary Rubio in this important diplomatic post. I ask for the prayers of all Americans, especially my fellow Catholics, that I may serve honorably and faithfully in the noble adventure ahead.”

Kelsey Reinhardt, who took over for Burch as president of CatholicVote in June, said, “For the past 17 years, Brian has faithfully championed CatholicVote’s mission to inspire American Catholics to live their faith in public life. We are confident that he will similarly excel in this new role and are forever grateful for the foundation he laid and the impact he had on millions of Catholics across the Nation.”

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​Brian burch, Catholicvote, Ambassador, Embassy, Vatican, Donald trump, Trump, Senate, Confirmation, Thune, Democrats, Democrat, Kamala harris, Catholic, Holy see, Catholicism, Politics 

Certain words and phrases take on new meaning as time goes by, often due to the politicization of our language. A clear example is the linguistic evolution of what it means to be an environmentalist.

Decades ago, concern for the environment largely centered on keeping the land free of clutter, the water protected from contamination, and the cities unpolluted by soot and smog. One of the major environmentalist movements of the 1960s was fronted by then-first lady Claudia “Lady Bird” Johnson, who initiated a campaign to “Keep America Beautiful.”

Trump’s executive order is a first step toward reclaiming environmentalism and unifying the country around the concept of a cleaner world.

Johnson explained that her passion for beautification was in perfect concert with other important objectives. “Getting on the subject of beautification is like picking up a tangled skein of wool,” she wrote in a 1965 diary entry. “All the threads are interwoven — recreation and pollution and mental health, and the crime rate, and rapid transit, and highway beautification, and the war on poverty, and parks — national, state and local. It is hard to hitch the conversation into one straight line, because everything leads to something else.”

The campaign to clean up the national landscape was bolstered by a heavy rotation of television ads showing litter along highways, in waterways, and in parks and imploring people to “Keep America Beautiful.” Most famous in the long-running campaign was an early 1970s ad ending with a close-up of actor Iron Eyes Cody, a tear falling from one eye as he surveyed a polluted environment. Cody turned out to be an Italian-American, not a Native American as portrayed, but that’s another story.

But as the “global warming” movement came into vogue, the definition of environmentalism began to shift. Left-wing media, politicians, and organizations began to define environmentalism almost solely on the basis of adherence to its greenhouse gas theories and demonization of the fossil fuel industry. In their world, anyone supporting our most reliable and dependable energy sources — natural gas, fuel oil, and coal — disqualified themselves as environmentalists. In fact, they were accused of being “anti-environment.”

Too often, the left’s political targets played right into their hands, struggling to defend themselves and sometimes even downplaying or ridiculing the importance of a clean environment. By allowing “environmentalism” to be redefined and co-opted by the radical left, true environmentalism was lost. Fortunately, a recent action by President Donald Trump will help reverse course.

Reclaiming true American environmentalism

While Independence Day weekend headlines were dominated by the passage and signing of the One Big Beautiful Bill Act, an executive order signed by Trump on July 3 went largely under the radar — but it may have an even more lasting impact. The president’s “Make America Beautiful Again” order “establish[ed] a council tasked with conserving public lands, protecting wildlife populations, and ensuring clean drinking water,” as the Washington Post described it, while adding that the order remained “silent on climate change.”

While the Post and other left-wing news outlets cling to the “climate change” definition of environmentalism, Trump’s executive order is a first step toward reclaiming the term and unifying the country around the concept of a cleaner world.

Trump’s order tasks all federal land management agencies with the following:

Promote responsible stewardship of natural resources while driving economic growth, expand access to public lands and waters for recreation, hunting, and fishing, encourage responsible, voluntary conservation efforts, cut bureaucratic delays that hinder effective environmental management, and recover America’s fish and wildlife populations through proactive, voluntary, on-the-ground collaborative conservation efforts.

Trump’s order was inspired by the years-long efforts of 27-year-old Benji Backer, a “conservative environmentalist” who leads a group called “Nature Is Nonpartisan.”

“This issue needs to get out of the culture wars,” Backer told the Post. “People just are so divided over President Trump, right? But if he could do one thing that brings people together, and it’s protecting the environment, it would change the course of the issue forever.”

RELATED: Environmental activists ‘horrified’ by Trump administration’s announcement on greenhouse gas rules

Photo by Documerica via Unsplash/Getty Images

By returning “environmentalism” to its original purpose of protecting the air, land, and water, the Trump administration will open the doors for those targeted by the left as environmental villains, welcoming everyone — right, left, and center — to actively engage in real environmentalism.

Environmentalism without costing energy

Those who provide America and the world with our most affordable and reliable energy sources have long cared about preserving the environment. In particular, they have continually invested in new technologies that make traditional energy cleaner than ever.

For example, advances in horizontal drilling and hydraulic fracturing technologies used to extract natural gas have allowed the United States to lead all major industrialized countries in carbon reductions. Home heating oil burner emissions have been reduced to near-zero levels, while sulfur content has been reduced from 1% to about 0.5%. Moreover, rapidly evolving coal plant technology means that modern pollution controls reduce nitrogen oxides by 83%, sulfur dioxide by 98%, and particulate matter by 99.8%.

As Benji Backer says, it’s time to move environmentalism out of the realm of the culture wars. Americans across the political spectrum love the environment and understand the need to protect it. Led by the president’s “Make America Beautiful Again” commission, the day is here when we can once again declare in unison that we are all environmentalists.

Editor’s note: A version of this article was originally published at the Empowerment Alliance via RealClearWire.

​Opinion & analysis, Opinion, Environmentalism, Environment, Conservation, Make america beautiful again 

Last month, the United States Olympic and Paralympic Committee silently complied with President Donald Trump’s February executive order, “Keeping Men Out of Women’s Sports.” The committee amended its policies to define women’s sports categories on the basis of biological sex and directed its affiliate national governing bodies “to ensure that women have a fair and safe competition environment.”

This policy change is cause for celebration.

As it turns out, ‘the thing that never happens’ has happened tens of thousands of times.

For more than a decade, Concerned Women for America and a few partners have been sounding the alarm on the dangers of male participation in women’s sports. But even as the USOPC moves to protect women in its sports and spaces, CWA will not allow the women and girls who have lost medals, missed scholarships, and endured sexual harassment in locker rooms to be quickly forgotten.

On July 22, 2025 — the same day the press stumbled upon the USOPC’s hush-hush policy change — Concerned Women for America released groundbreaking research on male participation in women’s sports. Analyzing data compiled from an international women’s sports database, the study found that trans-identifying males have stolen over 1,941 gold medals from women and girls in the U.S., pushing each rightful champion down to second place.

That figure includes just gold medals — and with every gold, an entire podium of girls displaced.

CWA also found that:

Trans-identifying male athletes have stolen over $493,173 in prize money from women in professional sports.In California alone, over 521 women and girls have taken silver below a biological man.Trans-identifying males have competed in more than 10,067 female sports events, amateur and professional.The most frequent violations occurred in USA Track and Field events, USA Cycling races, NCAA events (in all sports), and Professional Disc Golf Association championships.

We have all seen the photos: hulking, muscular men with long hair, a touch of makeup, and victoriously lifted arms at the top of a podium with apprehensively grinning women dwarfed at second and third place to his right and left.

We have all heard the stories. Paula Scanlon was forced to change with a man in a women’s locker room. Payton McNabb suffered an almost-deadly concussion from a man’s volleyball spike, and Stephanie Turner was disqualified from a fencing championship for refusing to face a man.

Still, progressives call trans-identifying male participation in women’s sports a “non-issue.”

Just one day after the USOPC’s decision hit the press, Sports Illustrated’s Michael Rosenburg reported, “The so-called ‘problem’ of transgender athletes dominating women’s sports is a ruse.” Rosenburg is wrong, and the left is wrong.

Numbers do not lie. Trans-identifying males do dominate in women’s sports.

RELATED: Aaron Rodgers drops truth bomb with Joe Rogan

Kirby Lee/Getty Images

The USOPC policy change will benefit the women and girls competing under its authority. But this change may not last. As soon as Democrats have the White House, President Trump’s executive order protecting women’s and girls’ sports is likely to be reversed, and the USOPC will be free to scrap its new policy.

Though the new policy is a huge step in the right direction for at least the next three years, women’s rights to safe sports should not waver with coming administration changes. Congress must pass the Protecting Women in Olympic and Amateur Sports Act. This bill is a simple amendment to existing legislation that will stipulate that the USOPC and its affiliate NGBs cannot receive federal funds if males are permitted to compete in women’s categories.

The fight for women’s rights in sports is far from over.

Every woman and girl who lost a gold medal, podium placement, cash prize, record, or scholarship to a male must have restored her rightful honors and accolades, and every leaderboard must be changed to reflect biological reality and female accomplishments. CWA will continue to urge the NCAA and all independent and nonprofit NGBs to follow in the USOPC’s footsteps and reverse any discriminatory policies that allow males to participate in women’s sports.

As it turns out, “the thing that never happens” has happened tens of thousands of times. The USOPC has made a historic decision to protect female athletes, and the fix must be made permanent by law.

This issue is not a “ruse,” and tens of thousands of women can agree that not one more woman or girl should lose a hard-earned medal to a male.

​Women’s sports, Olypmics, Trans agenda, Lgbtq ideology, Trans ideology, Culture 

I descended into the cavernous belly of the New York City subway system last week and waited on the platform for the R train to come — an experience akin to waiting for the Virgin Mary to appear in a grotto: Maybe she will (inspiring us to rejoice), or maybe she won’t (a cause of great sorrow).

“D, R, and N trains are experiencing delays,” intoned the algorithmic voice of the MTA for the third time. Sweat trickled down my forehead and seeped into my shirt. The stench of garbage wafted through the air as rats weaved in and out of the tracks.

Modern technology had rendered the nave more suitable for meatpacking than meditation. Our Lady of Perpetual Help had become Our Lady of Perpetual Refrigeration.

Then the light of the train peeked through the tunnel. I breathed a sigh of relief, thankful for my imminent deliverance from the hell of the platform.

Shivering in eternal shade

A blast of arctic air greeted me as I stepped into the train car. The wet spots on my shirt began to freeze, sending me into a fit of shivers. I recalled that the ninth circle of Dante’s Inferno is not burning hot but rather freezing cold.

I was staving off hypothermia by the time I reached my stop. As I waded into the dank, putrid heat of the station, my intestines began doing tricks and turns. The frenetic shifts in temperature seemed to be causing my nervous system to short-circuit.

Finally I reached my destination: a pleasant cafe where I intended to get some writing done. A fresh bout of shivering shattered my focus; astonishingly, the temperature in the cafe was even lower than in the subway car.

Foul abuse the wretch poured out

No sooner did I take a sip of my latte than I was interrupted by another alert of sorts, one decidedly more intimate and urgent than the one about the R train. I obtained the bathroom code from the barista in the nick of time.

Once restored to gastrointestinal equilibrium, I remembered that I had a light jacket at the bottom of my bag, buried somewhere beneath my books, laptop, chargers, cigarettes, essential oils, and Benadryl. I retrieved it, wrapped it over my body, and began writing again.

But it was no use — the thin fabric offered little protection against the wintry chill. Reasoning that heatstroke was preferable to freezing to death, I decided to move to a table outside.

Plunged down from heaven’s height

It was still hot out when I made my way to evening Mass. Nonetheless, I naively hoped that a Christian spirit of moderation and poverty would prevail in the house of God. Perhaps some simple oscillating fans and a few open windows?

It was not to be. Modern technology had rendered the nave more suitable for meatpacking than meditation. Our Lady of Perpetual Help had become Our Lady of Perpetual Refrigeration.

Of course, there’s nothing wrong with the moderate use of technology to make the climate indoors more tolerable — especially for the elderly and those with fragile health. But this was overkill, an example of our tendency to blast air conditioning without regard to the needs of the people inhabiting the space — or whether the space has any inhabitants to begin with.

RELATED: Only the Lonely

O.W. Root

Arm your soul against all dread

The French writer Jean Baudrillard noted this tendency nearly 30 years ago. In his 1986 travelogue “America,” he finds himself both scandalized and seduced by the “mindless luxury” he encounters. “The skylines lit up at dead of night, the air-conditioning systems cooling empty hotels in the desert and artificial light in the middle of the day all have something both demented and admirable about them.”

These days, I’m leaning toward “demented,” if not demonic. I hesitate to use the phrase “playing God,” but isn’t there something hubristic about our determination to eradicate all sensation of summer from our indoor spaces?

It is for this reason that I declare a crusade against air conditioning.

Note that I’m not advocating seizing the nearest CVS from the HVAC infidels and claiming it for piously perspiring Christendom. The battle we face is primarily within, against a certain spiritual malaise brought on by our relentless pursuit of comfort.

Consumerism compels us to create “needs” that don’t actually correspond with the good of our bodies and souls, needs that — in reality — often prove detrimental. The compulsion to maintain a certain ideal temperature at all times falls under this category.

To ascend into the shining world again

Baudrillard goes so far as to say that we seek nothing less than the “air-conditioning of life,” a state in which everything is processed, consumed, and “at last digested and turned into the same homogeneous faecal matter.” Cory Doctorow’s memorable term for this is “ens**ttification.” Perhaps that explains my volatile digestive system.

The late Pope Francis singled out our obsession with climate control in his 2015 encyclical “Laudato Si’.”

“People may well have a growing ecological sensitivity,” he notes, “but it has not succeeded in changing their harmful habits of consumption which, rather than decreasing, appear to be growing all the more. A simple example is the increasing use and power of air-conditioning.”

It’s a shame that Pope Francis didn’t go farther in his condemnation of air conditioning, choosing instead to focus on vices like tobacco (the sale of which he banned in the Vatican) and the Tridentine Latin Mass.

I can only pray that God has delivered Francis from the extremes of both cold and heat our earthly bodies are subject to and into the kingdom where the thermostat never needs adjusting.

​Culture, Air conditioning, Pope francis 

It’s easy to get wrapped up in the chaos of day-to-day life and forget just how much has changed in recent years. But if we took a step back and considered what life was like just a couple of decades ago, we’d be mind blown at how different modern living looks today — especially as it relates to technology.

Back in 2024, Glenn Beck sat down for an extensive interview with Dr. Phil about the toxicity of our increasingly digital world. Given the expansion of artificial intelligence and social media algorithms in just the last year, their conversation is perhaps more relevant than ever.

“In 2002, the first text message hadn’t been sent. … We weren’t at all digital,” says Dr. Phil.

However, in the subsequent years, “We started to get much more into the internet, and then [2008-2009], it was like a bunch of C130s flew over and dropped smartphones on everybody,” he says, “and that’s when I saw as big a change in our society as has happened in my lifetime for sure — I think as big a change to mankind as has happened since the Industrial Revolution.”

Fast-forward to today, and the vast majority of people are “walking around with as much computing power in [their] hand as we had when we did the moonshot.”

This leap in technological progress has caused a lot of damage to the human soul. Glenn considers artificial intelligence’s projected growth over the next few years. “Man is not geared for that. I mean, we are animals and our instincts — everything — comes from millions of years of experience. We’re not ready for this,” he says.

“And it’s showing,” Dr. Phil agrees, “because if you look particularly at our young people who immerse themselves in this technology, we’re seeing the highest levels of anxiety, depression, loneliness, [and] suicidality … since they started keeping records for that sort of thing.”

“Young people stopped living their lives and started watching people live their lives and comparing themselves to that, but the problem was they’re comparing themselves to fictional lives [of influencers],” he explains, recalling times he’s had influencers on his show who have admitted that their lavish lives on social media are a far cry from reality.

These phony content creators are setting unrealistic expectations for the younger generations, who buy into the lie that life is fun and easy and then find themselves depressed when their life doesn’t measure up.

Compounding the issue is the tragic reality that most people walk around looking downward at their phones instead of up where real life is happening. When the iPhone first came out, Glenn immediately noticed this shift in behavior and warned that these smart devices were a dangerous “experiment on humankind.”

We now know from recent studies that he was right – smartphones are indeed rewiring the brain and harming the human psyche in ways we don’t fully understand yet.

Even more disturbing is the fact that those who are developing the algorithms that dictate the content we see should not be trusted. Dr. Phil points to a study conducted on a 13-year-old girl that proved that an algorithm is just a “money grab,” designed to get people “emotionally invested,” usually to their detriment.

“We’ve seen the information that the girls get anxious, they get depressed, their self-worth goes down. It hurts them to see [curated content],” he says, but “[social media companies] don’t care … so they continue to feed them upsetting content because they click more and get more ad exposure.”

“They’re victimizing your child consciously,” he warns.

To hear more of the conversation, watch the full interview above.

Want more from Glenn Beck?

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​The glenn beck podcast, Glenn beck, Dr. phil, Digital age, Smartphones, Social media, Gen z, Influencer culture, Influencers, Algorithms, Social media algorithms, Blazetv, Blaze media 

Several U.S. military recruiting offices are communicating through a Chinese Communist Party-monitored messaging application as they seek to target Chinese nationals interested in enlisting, fueling concerns about potential national security risks.

CCP’s grip on recruiting

After looking into a Department of Justice affidavit filed in June, Blaze News has discovered that some recruiters have been using WeChat. The court document claimed that the U.S. Navy Recruiting Station Alhambra in San Gabriel, California, had a bulletin board displaying recent recruits, the majority of whom identified their “hometown” as “China.”

‘China is our nation’s greatest hegemonic adversary.’

The DOJ’s criminal complaint was filed against two Chinese nationals who have been accused of taking photographs of the bulletin board and sending them to an officer with the CCP’s Ministry of State Security.

The foreign adversary hometown designations spark serious concerns that individuals with divided loyalties and even potential CCP operatives have infiltrated the U.S. military.

While U.S. citizenship is required for officer and security clearance positions, noncitizens who are lawful permanent residents can enlist in the military. LPRs are generally eligible to naturalize after five years of continuous U.S. residence, and service members may qualify for expedited naturalization.

As of February 2024, roughly 40,000 foreign nationals were serving in the U.S. military. According to U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services’ reporting, China ranks among the top 10 countries of birth for U.S. service members who have become naturalized citizens through the military. Just over 2,000 Chinese nationals were approved for military naturalizations from fiscal years 2020 through 2024.

RELATED: Patel’s FBI arrests alleged Chinese spies targeting US Navy

Photo by Roberto Machado Noa/LightRocket via Getty Images

Experts sound alarm

Dr. Lawrence Sellin, a retired U.S. Army Reserve colonel and biological and chemical warfare defense expert, told Blaze News, “Infiltration of the U.S. military is a major goal of the Chinese Communist Party.”

“It is accomplished via Chinese immigrants to the United States who become permanent residents or U.S. citizens but remain loyal to the CCP, either directly by the Chinese immigrants themselves or their pro-CCP children,” he explained. “In fact, pro-CCP Chinese-American organizations are promoting such recruitment, facilitating CCP infiltration of the U.S. military.”

Gordon Chang, a Gatestone Institute senior fellow, similarly warned that China has “weaponized its nationals.”

He said in a comment to Blaze News, “China’s National Intelligence Law of 2017 requires Chinese nationals and entities to spy if relevant authorities make demands.”

“Moreover, in the Communist Party’s top-down system, no person can disobey an order from the Party. Additionally, the regime coerces all ethnic Chinese, regardless of nationality, to do its bidding by threatening harm to loved ones and relatives in China,” Chang stated. “Therefore, ethnic Chinese pose a special risk of espionage and sabotage to the U.S. military. Except under special circumstances, the U.S. military should not accept recruits who are Chinese nationals.”

Lily Tang Williams, a Republican congressional candidate in New Hampshire and a survivor of Mao Zedong’s Cultural Revolution, also argued against allowing foreign nationals from adversarial countries, including China, to enlist in the U.S. military.

Tang Williams told Blaze News, “China is our nation’s greatest hegemonic adversary. They have made it very clear that they are seeking to usurp the United States’ position in the world by taking advantage of our open society and using their nationals and businesses to spread their influence, doing military and economic espionage. The ‘China Dream’ is Xi Jinping’s ‘Soft Power Invasion’ slogan to enable China overtaking the U.S. as the dominant number one global power by 2049.”

More evidence of CCP reach

The troubling information that emerged from the DOJ affidavit led to further concerning revelations.

Journalist Jennifer Zeng uncovered another alarming detail about the Navy recruiting office in San Gabriel. She discovered that a suspected Chinese influencer had filmed a tour of the facility, which was later posted online as an apparent advertisement aimed at Chinese nationals.

The original video, posted to YouTube with nearly 25,000 views, is entirely in Chinese. The video shooter, “Rocky,” joins EN2 Qlang Wang on his commute to work. He then interviews several suspected Chinese nationals as they go through the recruiting process at the office.

One recruit tells Rocky that he is 37 years old, has been residing in the U.S. for six years, and that he wants to join the Navy because it is “a chance for new opportunities [and] life experience,” according to Zeng’s translation of the video. Two additional recruits similarly attribute their decision to join the U.S. military to its opportunities.

The recruitment video concludes by listing WeChat as the first way to contact Zhong Yang, a presumed recruiter at the office. Initially, the video’s YouTube description also highlighted WeChat as the main contact option, but that information was later removed, according to Zeng.

A Navy spokesperson confirmed to Blaze News that Wang and Yang are in the Navy, though declined to comment further.

‘Given that the CCP views the US as its No. 1 enemy and has actively infiltrated and spied on the US military, it’s hard to believe that the US Navy would tolerate such a massive national security risk.’

Zeng wrote in a post on X, “EVERY recruiter here is Chinese, as well as all the people coming to enlist. The working language here is also Chinese.”

Following her discovery of the Chinese-language tour video, Zeng posted her own videos from outside the U.S. Navy Recruiting Alhambra office and the neighboring Marine Corps Recruiting Station that showed bulletins taped to the windows.

The flyers were written in Chinese, featuring the U.S. Marine Corps seal, contact information for “Sgt Liu,” and a QR code linking to Liu’s WeChat.

“Joining the U.S. Marine Corps Reserve does not force you to become a citizen; you can maintain your permanent green card status,” one of the flyers read, according to Zeng’s translation. “Fast track to citizenship is also an option.”

Image Source: Jennifer Zeng

A spokesperson with the Marine Corps told Blaze News that the flyers had been removed.

“In December 2024, materials featuring a QR code linking to a personal WeChat account were displayed at a Marine Corps facility in San Gabriel, California. WeChat is not an authorized platform for official use, and the materials were promptly removed following review,” the spokesperson stated.

When asked about the screening processes for U.S. citizens versus green card holders, particularly those from adversarial nations, the Marines said, “All applicants, whether naturalized or birthright U.S. citizens, undergo the same screening process. Additional vetting is conducted for individuals with ties to countries designated as potential security concerns.”

RELATED: University of Michigan now under fire after Chinese scholars allegedly smuggle bio-weapon

Photo by PEDRO PARDO/AFP via Getty Images

Zeng told Blaze News that she was “truly shocked” that military recruiters were using WeChat for recruiting purposes.

“Virtually all Chinese dissidents — and many ordinary Chinese people — know that WeChat is 100% owned and monitored by the Chinese Communist Party (CCP). There are numerous documented cases of the CCP using WeChat to surveil and persecute Chinese citizens,” Zeng said.

“Given that the CCP views the U.S. as its No. 1 enemy and has actively infiltrated and spied on the U.S. military, it’s hard to believe that the U.S. Navy would tolerate such a massive national security risk,” she continued. “I sincerely hope the growing number of cases involving CCP agents stealing U.S. military secrets will serve as a wake-up call — and that the U.S. military and Navy will address this issue urgently.”

Zeng explained that after she posted her findings on social media, some of her followers informed her that another recruiting office in New York was similarly advertising with flyers written in Chinese.

Blaze News confirmed those claims.

A U.S. Army Recruiting Office in Flushing, New York, advertised reaching out via WeChat to contact the office’s recruiter in two posts on Google Maps.

Additionally, another U.S. Army Recruiting Office in Rowland Heights, California, similarly posted on Google Maps in Chinese, listing the recruiter’s contact information, including a WeChat account.

USCIS spokesman Matthew J. Tragesser told Blaze News, “USCIS’s first priority is rooting out malicious actors who seek to take advantage of our lawful immigration system, whether for their own enrichment or to attack and undermine our nation. Our agency was born out of the horror of Sept. 11, 2001, and every American counts on us to detect and stop threats to our country. Individuals from high-risk countries, or countries with known anti-American governments, may face enhanced measures to protect American interests.”

“USCIS screens all applicants for immigration benefits — regardless of military status. USCIS maintains the integrity in the U.S. immigration system through enhanced screening and vetting to deter, detect, and disrupt immigration fraud and threats to our national security and public safety,” Tragesser added.

When reached for comment, the White House directed Blaze News to the Department of Defense, stating that the department was looking into the allegations regarding WeChat. The DOD, in turn, referred the matter to the individual branches involved. Neither the U.S. Army nor any of the recruiters listed in the advertisements responded to a request for comment.

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​News, China, Chinese communist party, Ccp, U.s. military, U.s. army, U.s. navy, U.s. marines, Army, Navy, Marines, Chinese nationals, Ministry of state security, Department of justice, Doj, Lawful permanent residents, U.s. citizens, Foreign nationals, Lawrence sellin, Gordon chang, Lily tang williams, Jennifer zeng, Marine corps, New york, California, Politics 

Earlier this year, Millsap Independent School District in Parker County, Texas, faced a federal lawsuit after allegations surfaced that two staff members — special education teacher Jennifer Dale and paraprofessional Paxton Bean — abused special needs students. The pair have been charged with official oppression; Bean was also hit with an additional felony charge of injury to a child. Millsap ISD Superintendent Mari “Edie” Martin was charged with failure to report and intent to conceal the abuse allegations.

The lawsuit alleges that Dale and Bean physically abused special needs students, particularly a 10-year-old nonverbal autistic boy named Alex Cornelius. Video evidence shows Dale striking at Alex and Bean throwing an object at him, with additional claims of verbal and psychological abuse.

Martin is accused of attempting to cover up the abuse by failing to report it to the Texas Department of Family and Protective Services or local law enforcement, as required by law. Martin also reportedly instructed a witness to destroy evidence.

Dale, Bean, and Martin were arrested, indicted, and fired from Millsap ISD. Three other educators, Jami Riggs, Jeannie Bottorff, and Shannon Krause, were also indicted on misdemeanor charges for failure to report child abuse by a professional.

When Sara Gonzales, BlazeTV host of “Come and Take It,” heard the story, all she could think was, “If this had happened to my kid, I would be in jail right now.”

Sara plays the video footage taken by a whistleblower in the classroom that led to the lawsuit. “You’re going to want to take your blood pressure medication for this one,” she warns.

In the video, Dale can be seen aggressively taking a swing at Alex. Seconds later, Alex walks over to Bean, who repeatedly hits him with a toy before throwing it at him.

Further, according to the witness who took the damning footage, Dale and Bean “committed mental and verbal abuse against special needs elementary students, which included taunting, mocking, threats, profanity, and extensive timeouts.”

According to the probable cause affidavit, Dale and Bean are accused of “locking children in unlit closets for extended periods of time, where they screamed for help and pleaded to be released; assaulting children with their hands and objects and using other forceful measures; and verbal assaults calling the children names, mocking their disabilities, and commenting about their genitals.”

“In one documented incident, one plaintiff’s child accused Bean of punching him in the face while confining him in a calm-down room, which resulted in the boy being taken to the school nurse with a ‘gushing nosebleed,”’ Sara reads.

But it gets worse.

“This story … it’s like an onion,” says Sara. “The more layers that you peel away from it, it’s like the grosser that it gets.”

For example, the witness took the video evidence straight to the superintendent because the elementary principal of the school where the abuse was taking place, Roxie Carter, happened to be Paxton Bean’s mother. Carter even wrote her daughter a letter of recommendation to help her get another teaching job while the investigation was still pending.

When Superintendent Martin received the evidence, however, she tried to “intimidate the whistleblower into deleting the video,” says Sara.

Recorded audio captures Martin saying, “I would like us to take them off your phone. Those are educational records, and I now have them and our investigator now has them, and they’re put in a safe file, but I don’t want you to walk off with those because those are educational records, OK? So we need to delete them from your phone. … If you keep them on your phone, your phone likely will be sanctioned for an investigation.”

“Any sort of big, bloated government bureaucracy with way too much money gets corrupted. There are no exceptions. Public school is not an exception,” says Sara, “and that is why you are left with superintendents who want to cover for the teachers rather than actually hold them accountable.”

To hear more of Sara’s commentary and more wild details about the scandal, watch the episode above.

Want more from Sara Gonzales?

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

​Come and take it, Texas, Sara gonzales, Blazetv, Blaze media, Abuse, Public education, Millsap independent school district, Special needs kids 

In typical fashion, the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals completely misread the 14th Amendment’s Citizenship Clause and the congressional speeches of its principal framers in a July 27 decision, State of Washington, et al. v. Donald Trump, et al.

This ideologically motivated opinion was written by a three-judge panel composed of two Clinton appointees and a Trump appointee who registered a “partial concurrence and a partial dissent.” Overall, however, it was an embarrassment to the canons of legal reasoning and historical truth. It surely will be overruled by the Supreme Court — hopefully on an expedited basis.

The principal drafters, architects, and supporters of the 14th Amendment understood the meaning of ‘jurisdiction’ in terms of ‘allegiance.’

On January 20, 2025, President Donald Trump acted expeditiously to fulfill a campaign promise by issuing an executive order redefining who is “subject to the jurisdiction of the United States.”

I believe Trump is to be applauded for bringing the question of birthright citizenship to the attention of the public and provoking debate on this crucial issue. I have questions, however, as to whether an executive order in isolation is the most constitutional way of raising the question.

Constitutional end, questionable means

Congress clearly has power under Section 5 of the 14th Amendment “to enforce, by appropriate legislation, the provisions of this article.” One provision is that “no State shall make or enforce any law which abridges the privileges or immunities of citizens of the United States.” This has been controversial because the language of the amendment is couched in negative terms.

The question of how a negative is to be enforced by positive legislation has always been an enigma. Congress passed a sweeping Civil Rights Act in 1875, which, in part, foundered on this issue along with the issue of “state action.”

In the 1873 Slaughterhouse Cases, Congress’ power to enact regulatory legislation under the Privileges and Immunities and Equal Protection Clauses was thoroughly hobbled. No serious attempt to revise civil rights protection was made again until the Civil Rights Act of 1964.

The judges in the Ninth Circuit decision, citing contemporary dictionary definitions of “jurisdiction” from the time of the 14th Amendment’s passage, find that the “ordinary meaning of jurisdiction” is simply “‘the authority of government; the sway of a sovereign power.’” They easily conclude that this is “consistent with Plaintiffs’ interpretation of ‘subject to the jurisdiction thereof’ as subject to the laws and authority of the United States.” To drive this point home, the opinion alleges:

Defendants point to no contrary dictionary definitions that define jurisdiction in terms of allegiance and protection. Indeed, they make no arguments about the ordinary meaning of the Citizenship Clause at all. Defendants’ only argument based on the text of the Citizenship Clause is that “subject to the jurisdiction” cannot simply refer to “regulatory jurisdiction,” because that definition would render the Citizenship Clause’s requirement of jurisdiction surplusage. They claim that the United States has “exclusive and absolute” regulatory jurisdiction within its territory, so that all children born in the United States are subject to its jurisdiction.

It is entirely true that defendants do not prove their point about “jurisdiction in terms of allegiance” by recourse to contemporary dictionaries. Rather, they have recourse to the statements and arguments made during floor debates in the 39th Congress. The principal drafters, architects, and supporters of the 14th Amendment understood the meaning of “jurisdiction” in terms of “allegiance.”

The authors’ intent

Senator Jacob Howard (R-Mich.), a member of the Joint Committee on Reconstruction, was the floor leader for the debate on the Citizenship Clause. It was a late addition to the amendment, proposed by Senator Benjamin Wade of Ohio (R-Ohio), which initially stated that citizens are “persons born in the United States or naturalized by the laws thereof.” Wade added that he believed the matter of citizenship had been settled by the Civil Rights Act of 1866.

Wade’s proposal was referred to the Joint Committee on Reconstruction, and Senator Howard presented the committee’s draft, which became the first sentence of the 14th Amendment. The significant addition to Wade’s proposal was the clause that specifies its subject as those “subject to the jurisdiction” of the United States. Evidently, Senator Howard and the Joint Committee placed some importance on the addition of this jurisdiction clause.

This meant, at a minimum, that not all persons born in the U.S. were automatically citizens; they also had to be “subject to the jurisdiction” of the U.S. When he introduced the bill, Senator Howard said he regarded the Citizenship Clause as declaratory of the law as it already existed. He was clearly referring to the Civil Rights Act of 1866, passed over the veto of President Andrew Johnson by a two-thirds majority in both houses less than two months prior to the May 30, 1866, debate in the Senate.

The Civil Rights Act of 1866 established the citizenship of newly freed slaves and the protection of their rights and liberties on the exact same basis as those of white citizens. This included the right to own, rent, inherit, and convey property; make contracts; the right to keep and bear arms; and all other rights and liberties pursuant to full citizenship. In short, this was a color-blind law.

Some believed the Civil Rights Act was unnecessary, arguing that the 13th Amendment had already accomplished the intended purpose. Others believed that the amendment guaranteed only manumission, so that security of citizenship and rights should be recognized in legislation as a social compact. Still others, however, feared that such legislation could be repealed by future majorities. This concern became the impetus for the 14th Amendment to “constitutionalize” the Civil Rights Act of 1866.

Senator Lyman Trumbull (R-Ill.), chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee and principal architect of the 13th Amendment as well as the Civil Rights Act of 1866, joined Senator Howard, agreeing that the “law of the land” in the U.S. meant that “subject to the jurisdiction” connoted “complete jurisdiction,” not “owing allegiance to anyone else” — the very definition of citizenship in the Civil Rights Act.

Redefining citizenship

The Ninth Circuit Court refers to the leading case on the issue of citizenship, United States v. Wong Kim Ark, decided in 1898. Based on this ruling, the Ninth Circuit argues, “Supreme Court precedent makes clear that reading ‘subject to the jurisdiction thereof’ to mean ‘subject to United States authority and laws’ is not redundant.”

As proof, the Ninth Circuit Court, like the Wong Kim Ark court, cites an opinion by Chief Justice Marshall, Murray v. The Charming Betsy (1804). Justice Horace Gray, in his opinion for the court in Wong Kim Ark, alleges that Marshall’s opinion “assumed … that all persons born in the United States were citizens of the States.”

Justice Gray reports that the chief justice held that position, but it is nowhere stated in the opinion. The Charming Betsy was a complicated case, touching on various questions regarding whether a person can divest himself of American citizenship by swearing allegiance to one or more countries. In deciding the case, Chief Justice Marshall said:

Whether a person born within the United States, or becoming a citizen according to the established laws of the country can divest himself absolutely of the character otherwise than in such manner as may be prescribed by is a question which it is not necessary at present to decide. In other words, it was not necessary to decide the question of citizenship to determine the outcome of the case.

The Ninth Circuit also discusses the Supreme Court’s decision in Elk v. Wilkins (1884). In this case, the Supreme Court gives a social compact account of the status of native persons in the U.S. that could have been written by James Madison himself. The Ninth Circuit Court seems unaware that the opinion was written by Justice Gray (he does not admit he is the author in the opinion).

However, the opinion in Elk cannot be squared with the Wong Kim Ark opinion, and it remains a mystery why Justice Gray changed his mind on this important issue of the common-law basis of American citizenship.

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Photo by Win McNamee / Staff via Getty Images

The Ninth Circuit closes its opinion by arguing that “post-ratification public understanding of the 14th Amendment supports the Plaintiffs’ interpretation of the Citizenship Clause.” That understanding was that jurisdiction was equated with being subject to the laws of the United States.

Abraham Lincoln didn’t live to see the ratification of the 14th Amendment, but it is difficult not to see his spirit embedded in its first section. Lincoln said presciently in his First Inaugural Address that the “intention of the law-giver is the law.” This is a perfectly Aristotelian statement and undoubtedly understood by Lincoln as such.

Nothing can be more obvious, even to the most unpracticed eye, than that the intentions of the framers, architects, supporters, and friends of the 14th Amendment were that “jurisdiction meant, owing complete allegiance to the U.S. and to no other foreign jurisdiction.”

Editor’s note: A version of this article was originally published by the American Mind.

​Opinion & analysis, Opinion, 14th amendment, 14th amendment section 3, 14th amendment trump, Birthright citizenship, Constitution