Category Archives: Federalist

Four Senate Democrats wrote a letter this week, detailing their demand for the Big Tech anti-trust bill thats been working its way through Congress over the past year. They want to help, they say; to clarify. They even included the text they want added to make it all better. The reality, however, is their effort is a poison pill and just the latest effort to kill the best chance to regulate Big Tech that Americas yet seen.

The bill the American Innovation and Choice Online Act would prevent what it calls self preferencing behavior among those tech companies so large and powerful that engaging in commerce requires engaging with them. Specifically: Apple, Facebook, Google, Amazon, and Microsoft.

Amazon, for instance, is infamous for requiring companies to turn over large amounts of data as a condition of selling on Amazon. Theyve been caught red-handed using that data to copy the most popular products, then making sure users see their knock-offs first. Under this bill, Amazon could not use its platforms market power to force that disclosure.

The four dissenting liberal senators like the worthy goal of the legislation, mind you; just not the little bit that might impede some of the most powerful companies in world history from censoring hate speech, disinformation and misinformation convenient catch-alls for nearly anything they dont like.

Although important, they write, competition policy goals should not override the ability of platforms to moderate content in good faith.

More to the point: These four senators appreciate that some smart Republicans have co-sponsored the bipartisan American Innovation and Choice Online Act (AICOA); theyd just rather enjoy that support without any conservative or populist ideas along for the ride.

Sen. Chuck Grassley, the lead Senate sponsor of the bill, has reportedly already promised Republicans will walk if the changes are made, and hes right: Populists and conservatives like Sens. Josh Hawley, Sen. Ted Cruz, and Rep. Matt Gaetz would flee. And make no mistake: Populists and conservatives defecting would not only kill the bill, it would kill any meaningful chance of reining in Silicon Valley for the next three years at least (and probably more).

Republicans are on the cusp of a giant electoral victory in November, but that doesnt mean conservatives and populists are on the cusp of any great policy victories. While the likely incoming speaker of the House has shown more awareness of the political moment than his Senate counterpart, the Californian politician is still far from hostile toward Big Tech or Big Business in general.

In a House and Senate run by Kevin McCarthy and Mitch McConnell, Republican efforts to dismantle Big Tech will find even fewer GOP supporters than the ideologically diverse minority theyve assembled for the current effort.

Because even now, with cosponsors from Rep. Ken Buck to Gaetz, and from Hawley to Sen. Lindsay Graham, reformers need a lot of Democratic support.

Big Tech lobbyists are working hard to make the case to Republican members that leftist allies are proof of poison. But while its true its proof of compromise, the reality is both the left and rights bases are clamoring for action, and the American Innovation and Choice Online Act is the only game in town.

You can expect that Democratic support to evaporate overnight, however, if they lose the majority (which they will). Why? Simply put: They dont play like that. In the minority, their only goal will be to undermine the majoritys legitimacy; Republicans wont be able to pave a road or name a Post Office if it requires their support.

So yes: This is it. And thanks to the above, this is it, not only for this Congress, but for the next and likely the one after that.

There is reasonable resistance to the bill, of course. Senators like Mike Lee have expressed concern about its intrusion into the marketplace. Its a compromise, no doubt, but that is what the moment requires.

This isnt some boring squabble. In barrooms and boardrooms from D.C. to Oshkosh, activists on the right and left alike recognize Big Techs power is so large, it threatens our politics, markets, and civil society. Theres a fight coming, and this bill is the only viable fight coming for years.

Big Tech knows this: Every company targeted, save Microsoft, has dumped millions of dollars into lobbyists and ads opposing it. They say the bill poses a threat to their power and it does, because we know they pose a threat to us.

Washington works on momentum. People like to sign on to winning issues and are quick to defect from losing ones. But for both parties right now, reining in Big Tech is a winning issue.

These four Democrats? If Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer brings the American Innovation and Choice Online Act to the floor this summer (as hes promised), theyll likely fall in line. The alternative, they know, is a vote for Big Tech and no one wants to be seen doing that right now.

If they get their poison pill in there, however and the rare bipartisan coalition thats been assembled cracks Big Tech will win, and well all lose.

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This Bill Is The Last Game In Town For Checking Big Tech's Power - The Federalist

When I was a boy of fourteen, my father was so ignorant I could hardly stand to have the old man around. But when I got to be twenty-one, I was astonished at how much the old man had learned in seven years. So said Mark Twain, and so have felt countless sons. Well past twenty-one, I continue to be astonished at how much my old man has learned.

A memory illustrates. Early last year, I was driving home from Mass with my familyon Sunday morning. There the readings had included the Gospel of Lukes parable of the prodigal son. Its the tale of the headstrong son who demanded and squandered his inheritance and then begged for forgiveness, his older brother who never rebelled, and the father who loved them both.

I had always identified with the prodigal son, and figured everyone else did, too. This is partly due to my Irish heritage which, according to William Butler Yeats, means I have an abiding sense of tragedy, which sustains me through temporary periods of joy.

I said this to my wife, Devin, as we drove home from church. She said she understood the sentiment,but admitted at times feeling a certain kinship with the dutiful elder son.We clearly had interpreted the lesson differently, which surprised me. I decided to consult my father to break the tie.

I called him from the car, asking which character in the parable he identified with most. Easy, he answered. The father. Believing God alone had been, well, perpetually cast in that role, I never thought picking the father was an option. It seemed my dad, when faced with multiple-choice options (a) or (b), was puckishly choosing (c) as a write-in answer. Or so I thought.

Weeks later I shared the breezy exchange with Dr. William Muse of Knoxville, Tennessee.Muse, a contemporary of my father, is a dear friend whom I figured could use a smile. We were together in Dallas where he was tending to his daughter, Amanda, who was dying of cancer. Sad of heart but undaunted in his Catholic faith, he somehow found time to counsel me.

Read this, he said, pitching me Catholic priest and writer Henri Nouwens spiritual classic The Return of the Prodigal Son. Its a meditation inspired by the authors response to a reproduction of Rembrandts eponymous and hauntingly beautiful painting. How strange the book was there in Amandas bookcase, my own poor manstolle legeexperience.Your dad is not wrong. None of you are.

I devoured the book. It taught me that while we tend to be each actor prodigal son, elder son, even the father at different stages of life, we ultimatelyare called to progress tospiritual fatherhood. That is, were called to love one another exactly as the compassionate father did, with self-emptying hearts of mercy.

After all, neither the justice the prodigal son demanded nor the justice the elder son expected ultimately satisfies. Knowing this, the father gave his heirs freely and fully not the mere justice they sought but the far greater mercy they needed.

Justice may even the scales, but in mercy, the world is remade anew.As a broken world, so a penitent man.As we need merciful forgiveness, so must we grant it. As we are loved by God, so must we try to love one another. For nothing you have not given away, as C.S. Lewis wrote, will ever really be yours.

In other words, in the parable of the prodigal son we are, in fact, called to identify with the father, just like my old man said.

A Dutch painter inspired a fellow countryman priest centuries later, whose book helped a Tennessee doctor explain the true meaningof fatherhood to a North Carolina lawyer, but make no mistake. I was once again astonished at how much my old man had learned.

Mike Kerrigan is an attorney in Charlotte, N.C.

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What I Learned From My Father About The Prodigal Son - The Federalist

Last week House Speaker Nancy Pelosi unsurprisingly weighed in on the abortion case that is on everyones mind and displayed her usual tenuous grasp of the truth. Ireland, Italy, Mexico has had legislative initiatives to expand a womans right to choose very Catholic countries, she stated. Hers is, sadly, a narrative that seems common on both sides of the Atlantic.

Recently a Swedish colleague told me abortion is a major topic in Sweden right now. He wasnt talking about abortion laws in Sweden that isnt on the agenda of any major political party right now. Swedes are frequently discussing abortion laws in the United States in light of the much-anticipated Supreme Court ruling Dobbs v. Jackson Womens Health Organization this month.

Most of these conversations contain a touch of perplexity, as the Swedes take for granted that the United States already has particularly draconian abortion laws. How could this be, the narrative goes, since it is already practically impossible for a woman to get an abortion in America? My unusually informed colleague explained his own perplexity, as abortion is legal until 18 weeks in Sweden. But, surprising to him, in many parts of the United States abortion law is actually allowed much later than that.

I must admit my own ignorance of this fact represented a mirror image of the Scandinavians. I assumed full-term, perhaps even partial-birth, abortions were completely legal in the Nordic welfare state. My ignorance might be partially forgiven since the European Union Parliament voted 364-154 (with 37 abstentions) in favor of condemning the expected U.S. court decision. Never mind that the parliament has no competence to consider abortion laws, let alone any legal developments in the United States.

Upon further research, I felt comfortable asserting what I had suspected, and what so many Europeans seem not to realize: no matter how the justices rule in this case, the United States will continue to have looser abortion laws than virtually all of Europe. Thus, even if the worst fears of the pro-abortion lobby are realized, American abortion laws will remain radical within the Western world.

What does it say, then, that the possibility of such an outcome warrants, in some quarters, threats against justices and harassment (if not worse) of their children at school? Or the resignation of many Americans that we will witness widespread unrest, if not outright violence, this summer? I submit that it proves this uproar is primarily about ideology, not choice, or health, or any of the other political rhetoric frequently associated with that side of this issue.

If this were simply an argument over a womans basic rights, as the argument goes, one might think the European landscape would be satisfactory to the aggrieved parties. Notoriously laissez-faire Netherlands is the most permissive on the continent, with abortions allowed until 24 weeks. Frances limit is 14 weeks. Swedens fellow Scandinavian countries Denmark, Finland, and Norway allow abortions until 12 weeks, as does Germany.

Even Hungary, which spends 6 percent of GDP on family policies and has enshrined the right to life from the moment of conception in its constitution, allows abortion until 12 weeks. By contrast, perennial red state Alaska, for example, is one of seven states that has no term limits on the practice, and one of eight that allows it in the third trimester or beyond.

Self-professed leftist Bill Maher even opined on the topic this spring. If you are pro-choice, he stated on his show Real Time, you would like it a lot less in Germany and Italy and France and Spain and Switzerland. Did you know that? I didnt know that.

Inevitably the pro-abortion argument reverts at this point to access to the practice for low-income women, as 13 states are set to ban it if the Supreme Court decision rules accordingly. This is disingenuous. Contrary to popular belief, abortions are usually not free or even low-cost at facilities like Planned Parenthood.

According to the pro-abortion Guttmacher Institute, the average cost of an abortion at 10 weeks of pregnancy was more than $500 in 2014. Depending on the length of gestation, location of the facility, and insurance factors, the cost can easily surpass $1,000.

In 2015, virtually all of the 157,000 abortions covered by Medicaid were conducted in states that contribute funds specifically for the practice (in other words, states that are already pro-abortion). A bus ticket from, say, New Orleans (Louisiana would be the only state to be surrounded by other states in which abortion is illegal if the 13 state laws come into effect) to Mobile or Pensacola is a comparatively unrealistic barrier to access.

Thus, not all that much is likely to change in wake of the Dobbs case, as abortions were already especially expensive for low-income women in the states in question, and a woman pregnant at 40 weeks will still be able to cross into states like New Jersey or Oregon for what amounts to medieval butchery.

This all offers the next piece of evidence that this was never about women, or health, or rights. It has always been about the exercise of power and the quest to destroy all that is sacred, including the home, the family, and life itself.

To my friends in Sweden and other parts of Europe sadly, you are wrong about the state of abortion in America. To my fellow pro-lifers we have a lot of work ahead of us, no matter how the court rules.

Abortion is alive and well in America and will remain that way for the foreseeable future; and our opponents consider even the harassment of schoolchildren fair game in this moral conflict. This is the civil rights issue of our century. Let us not mistake a victorious battle (assuming it happens) for triumph in that war.

Michael OShea is a visiting fellow at the Danube Institute. He is part of the Budapest Fellowship Program, sponsored by the Hungary Foundation and the Mathias Corvinus Collegium.

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With Overturn Of Roe, US Will Have Looser Abortion Laws Than Europe - The Federalist

Leonard Leo, Co-Chairman of the Federalist Society, played a key role in building the Supreme Court's current 6-3 conservative majority. Pool/Getty Images hide caption

Leonard Leo, Co-Chairman of the Federalist Society, played a key role in building the Supreme Court's current 6-3 conservative majority.

As soon as Thursday, the Supreme Court could rule on Dobbs v. Jackson Women's Health Organization. A leaked draft opinion in that case showed a majority of justices agreeing to overturn Roe v. Wade, which would end the constitutional right to an abortion.

However the court rules, this moment is the culmination of a decades-long effort by conservative activists around the country. One man in particular has played an outsized role in that effort: Leonard Leo, Co-Chairman of the Federalist Society. He's devoted his career to getting conservatives appointed to the country's most powerful courts.

We look at how he came to have so much sway.

In this episode, you'll hear excerpts from the interview NPR's Deirdre Walsh conducted with Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky.

In participating regions, you'll also hear a local news segment to help you make sense of what's going on in your community.

Email us at considerthis@npr.org.

This episode was produced by Connor Donevan and Jonaki Mehta. It was edited by Bridget Kelley, Courtney Dorning and Krishnadev Calamur. Our executive producer is Sami Yenigun.

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Meet The Man Who Helped Build The Court That May Overturn Roe : Consider This from NPR - NPR

The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) is currently considering publishing regulations that will push for potentially irreversible medical and surgical interventions for people with gender dysphoria in the name of health care.In April, HHS Assistant Secretary Rachel L. Levine stated gender affirming care is medical care and included children and adolescents in that equation.

Levine also reaffirmed a principle articulated by Hippocrates that physicians should do no harm.Can a physician provide interventions like potentially sterilizing hormones and surgeries for children and adolescents without doing harm? Research on adolescent brain development and decision-making indicates these two concepts are contradictory.

Our society is encouraging adolescents to make crucial decisions with lifelong consequences as research continues to document the immaturity of the adolescent brain. It does not utilize the strategizing and planning center, the prefrontal cortex, in the same manner as adults.

The American College of Pediatricians, of which I am a board member, just published a new position statement entitled The Teenage Brain: Under Construction with research showing that adolescents brains are not developed enough to make sound decisions, and this should inform potential medical and surgical interventions on minors with gender dysphoria because of their lifelong consequences.

Neuroscientists studying decision-making have found adolescents are much more likely to rely upon emotions and peer pressure and less likely to consider future consequences. Researchers now talk about two systems for decision-making in the brain: a socioemotional system and a cognitive-control system.

The socioemotional system often involves intuitive responses that are made rapidly as the person responds to feelings and emotions, while the cognitive-control system is much more reasoned and deliberate. Coordination between both systems is important in order to make good decisions, but neither system is mature during adolescent years.

Unfortunately, emotionally charged and high-risk situations present the most challenges for adolescent decision-making, especially when influenced by peer pressure. Even individuals between 18 and 21 years of age demonstrated diminished cognitive performance compared with older adults when they were exposed to emotionally charged situations.

Adolescents are also less likely to incorporate and integrate their personal ethics and values when making important decisions. This means they do not improve their decision-making strategies when faced with more significant and important decisions, as adults do.

Given this research on the immature processing that occurs in the adolescent brain, it is crucial that adults assist with decision-making, especially those decisions that involve lifelong consequences.Practically, this means that adolescents who are struggling with gender dysphoria should not be allowed to make decisions that contribute to permanent, unnecessary surgical procedures, mutilation, and infertility.

The research on brain development indicates that adolescents should wait until they are 25 before attempting to make such significant decisions with lifelong consequences. This would mitigate the potential influence of peer pressure and emotions, while allowing the adolescent to experience natural puberty and associated hormonal influences on brain development.When allowed to do so, 85 to 90 percent of adolescents with gender identity concerns will accept their biological sex.

In addition, evidence is demonstrating that those who are allowed to undergo hormonal blocking of puberty, followed by surgical procedures, may experience regret and criticize the adults who did not properly warn them of the consequences of their immature decisions. An article published in Pediatric News on March 17, 2022, reported on a Zoom conference of people who had transitioned back to their natural sex.

They said the medical establishment initially failed them when they transitioned to the opposite gender, and again, when they decided to go back to their natal gender. This was confirmed in a 2021 study of 100 detransitioned patients in which over half felt they had not received appropriate information or evaluation prior to transitioning.

The American College of Pediatricians promotes an attitude of Best for Children and agrees that physicians should avoid causing harm.Using current research on adolescent brain development and decision-making, therefore, physicians should not encourage children and adolescents to make decisions with damaging and lifelong consequences.

Dr. Jane Anderson, MD, FCP is a board member of the American College of Pediatricians and retired faculty in Pediatrics at University of California San Francisco. For more information, please visit http://www.acpeds.org.

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The Science On Brain Development Rebukes Those Pushing Gender Transition On Kids - The Federalist

The International Swimming Federation (FINA) recently voted to limit the participation of males in female water competitions but the new policy rewards the chemical castration and mutilation of preteen boys by promising them a place in womens competitions as long as they start sex experiments before they turn 12 years old.

On its face, FINAs decision looks like a win for women who have begged and pleaded for fair, female-only sports competitions that cant be infiltrated by males. While its true that men such as infamous University of Pennsylvania swimmer Lia Thomas will not be permitted to compete in upcoming FINA competitions, the organizations new policy has caveats that allow men to compete against women so long as they undergo irreversible and risky sex experiments as young minors.

The corporate media and leftists may have lamented FINAs change for restrict[ing] transgender women from competing at elite level and deeply discriminatory, harmful, unscientific but the organizations gender inclusion policy doesnt actually stop men masquerading as women from participating and still apologizes to individuals and groups [who] may be uncomfortable with the use of medical and scientific terminology related to sex and sex-linked traits.

FINA President Husain Al-Musallams spokesman James Pearce clarified that this is not saying that people are encouraged to transition by the age of 12, but his so-called reassurance that transitions for children are not encouraged (nor allowed in many countries) and that puberty is what gives males an advantage in female competitions should raise eyebrows.

Being male isnt something that happens just because of puberty. Its something that begins in the womb and lasts in DNA for a lifetime no matter how many bodily alterations are applied. Limiting participation in womens competitions to men who took castration drugs when they were prepubescent boys is still a rejection of biology and the fact that sex is intrinsic. It also neglects the primary concerns of women who simply want a fair chance to compete against other females.

Thats not something to be celebrated or tolerated. Especially since other organizations such as the International Olympic Committee and the National Collegiate Athletic Association, which have long operated under reality-denying policies that claim sex is something that is measured by hormone levels in the body, have abandoned the truth about biology for a brand of inclusion that edges women out of their own sports.

Theres already a cultural push to brainwash and mutilate children. Even without sports organizations encouraging the castration of preteens, the recommendations for irreversible sex experiments on children get younger and younger each year. The last thing this world needs is elite, global sports associations rewarding parents of children still too young to join the JV team at school for carving up their little boys.

Jordan Boyd is a staff writer at The Federalist and co-producer of The Federalist Radio Hour. Her work has also been featured in The Daily Wire and Fox News. Jordan graduated from Baylor University where she majored in political science and minored in journalism. Follow her on Twitter @jordanboydtx.

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FINA's Trans Policy Rewarding Preteen Castration Is Nothing To Celebrate - The Federalist

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi is engaging in the same conduct her deputies on the Select Committee to investigate Jan. 6 have depicted as impeachable.

On Monday, Rep. Zoe Lofgren, D-Calif., spent the final portion of the committees second hearing complaining that former President Donald Trump fundraised off stolen election claims.

The big lie was also a big rip-off, Lofgren said twice in the hearing, referring to Trumps affiliated political action committees collecting donations to litigate 2020 election claims that were made in the press.

The former president laid the groundwork for these false claims well in advance of the election, Lofgren added, airing a video of Trump talking about his well-founded concerns of ballot fraud ahead of a contest that included underhanded, last-minute rule changes across key states.

The only way were going to lose this election is if the election is rigged, Trump said in one video played at Mondays hearing. Remember that. Its the only way were going to lose this election. This is going to be a fraud like youve never seen.

Except just one week prior, a Pelosi-affiliated super PAC solicited donations with an email campaign raising doubts about the legitimacy of the fall midterms.

I will NOT let McConnell, McCarthy, and their special interest donors steal the House from us and roll back our fundamental freedoms, Pelosi wrote in a message to supporters for her leadership PAC, Pac to the Future.

Nearly identical emails amplifying Democrats hysteria over a GOP effort to steal the House majority were also sent by the PAC on at least five other occasions, including May 27, April 11, April 17, July 18, and Aug. 3.

Pelosis fundraising campaign is far from an isolated double standard presented by the Jan. 6 Committee. Democrats on the panel spent Mondays hearing criminalizing objections to the certification of election results in the Electoral College. Some of the same members, however, objected to the 2017 certification of the 2016 results, alleging Russian interference. In fact, Democrats objected to more states in 2017 than Republicans did last year and they fundraised off of it. Democrats also objected to electoral certification in 2005 and 2001.

The Jan. 6 Committee will reconvene for its third hearing on Thursday after postponing a hearing originally planned for Wednesday.

Tristan Justice is the western correspondent for The Federalist. He has also written for The Washington Examiner and The Daily Signal. His work has also been featured in Real Clear Politics and Fox News. Tristan graduated from George Washington University where he majored in political science and minored in journalism. Follow him on Twitter at @JusticeTristan or contact him at Tristan@thefederalist.com.

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Dems Fundraise Off Claims The GOP Is Trying To 'Steal' Elections - The Federalist

With news that Congress is on its way to passing new gun control laws that will make it easier for bureaucrats to disarm law-abiding Americans, the United States is once again repeating the egregious mistake of responding to a perceived emergency by crippling constitutional protections for Americans unalienable rights.

First we had the post-9/11 passage of the Patriot Act and its creation of a national security surveillance state that tracks and records Americans digital communications despite the absence of probable cause, legal warrants, or explicit consent. Then we had the Department of Homeland Securitys recent flirtation with a disinformation board meant to regulate speech and censor points of view at odds with the governments officially sanctioned narratives.

Now we have a renewed push for red flag laws intended to deprive Americans of their weapons without proper due process or criminal conviction. Over the last 20 years, Americas First, Second, Fourth, and Fifth Amendments have been under sustained attack, and, amazingly, it has been elected officials sworn by oath to support and defend those same amendments who have led much of the charge.

Theres nothing so dangerous as a politician who undermines the Bill of Rights during a moment of tragedy or crisis. Those rights, set forth as the first ten amendments to the U.S. Constitution as a redundancy to make explicitly clear what is beyond the scope of the federal governments enumerated powers, are not wishy-washy suggestions meant to be ignored during times of emergency. On the contrary, it is during such times when their safeguards become most critical.

After suffering a terrorist attack, or enduring the ravages of lockdowns, or reeling from the staggering loss of young murder victims, trading freedom for the alluring promises of peace and security is at once reckless and irresistible. That is why our first ten amendments are a necessary line in the sand, so to speak, a caution from one generation of Americans to the next about the dangerous predilection of ever-encroaching government power to descend toward outright tyranny.

In this way, the Bill of Rights represents both a prohibition against illegitimate government action and a kind of easily digestible warning label counseling ordinary citizens: should your government attempt to infringe these most basic rights, then you will know that your continuing freedom is in jeopardy.

Too many elected officials today speak of the protections within the Bill of Rights as if they were created out of thin air and can be erased as indiscriminately as they are perceived to have been written down. It should be noted that many of the original ratifiers of the U.S. Constitution and its subsequent first ten amendments feared later generations would come to this erroneous conclusion.

Some opposed to the explicit adoption of a Bill of Rights thought it unnecessary, since the federal governments powers were already strictly limited to those enumerated. They also worried that guaranteeing certain specific rights might have the perverse effect of endangering American freedoms not affirmatively recorded.

The Ninth and Tenth Amendments dual assurances that The enumeration in the Constitution, of certain rights, shall not be construed to deny or disparage others retained by the people and that The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people were meant to redress this risk. The Bill of Rights, in other words, provides expansive protection for individual liberty, constrained only by those powers constitutionally delegated to the federal government.

This moral idea that personal freedom should be maximized and government power minimized has always been revolutionary. It recognized that all legitimate power first originates with the people before they voluntarily cede some of their power to a functioning government. Conversely, when Congress decides that it may disregard the express prohibitions set forth in the Bill of Rights in order to pursue its own policy preferences, then it resurrects that same system where those with power rule and those without power obey.

To have any value, individual rights must belong wholly to the people. If personal freedoms were understood as nothing more than gifts from the government to the people, then they would be reduced to mere privileges either granted or denied according to the states prerogative. For unalienable natural rights to have substantive meaning, they must be inherently possessed by individual Americans, immune from the vagaries of government whim.

For free speech, the right to self-defense, freedom from unreasonable search and seizure, and due process to protect Americans ably from the potential threats of government tyranny, they must exist irrespective of any government action seeking their dilution or outright abrogation. Whereas man-made laws may sway from side to side when a nation faces heavy winds, it is imperative that unalienable natural rights never bend.

Congress always has a good reason for disregarding the Bill of Rights. Its just a red flag law targeting crazies with guns. Its just a little warrantless surveillance meant to stop domestic extremists. Its just a little regulation of speech necessary to counter disinformation and lies. Every new restriction on Americans freedom is always touted as instrumental to saving lives.

Theres never any time, it seems, to stop and ask: who will be empowered to judge which Americans are crazy or extremist or spreading lies? Who will be given the authority to decide which Americans have unalienable rights and which Americans do not? When rights are reduced to nothing more than government privileges, after all, it matters a great deal who will be handing out those gifts.

As Congress and President Biden look to undermine the Second Amendment with new gun control laws this year, dont forget the hidden costs. When rights remain as strong as oak, they endure regardless of any perceived emergency. When rights become as malleable as plastic, though, they melt quickly under even the gentlest sun.

J.B. Shurk is a freedom-minded, anti-establishment, sometimes unorthodox, committed generalist and a proud American from Daniel Boone country.

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Congress Finds Even More Reasons To Disregard The Bill of Rights - The Federalist

This past week, a group of ten Republican senators, led by Sen. John Cornyn of Texas, met with the ten Democrat senators, led by Sen. Chris Murphy, in a bipartisan committee to write new federal gun control legislation. According to The Independent, the legislation will include an expansion of background checks for people under age 21 to include a search of juvenile justice registries, as well as a federal grant program that will encourage states to pass red flag laws, which allow family members or law enforcement to petition courts to temporarily restrict certain persons from owning firearms.

While Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell is hailing this as a great example of compromise and placating the do something! crowd, this is rather a shameless concession that will make Americans less safe, less free, and less represented while emboldening todays toxic Democrats to wreck the country even further.

Obviously, the proposed bill is meant to be a response to the mass shootings in Uvalde and Buffalo. Democrats want to disarm potential psychos by placing more barriers to owning and using a gun, and Republicans want more intervention with individuals who suffer from mental health problems. On the surface, their bill seems to be a win-win: fewer guns and fewer crazy people.

Except that these two incidents have almost nothing to do with guns or psychopaths, and everything to do with the profound dysfunction of American law enforcement. There were plenty of red flags with both shooters that warranted earlier intervention and immediate action, but nothing happened.

In Buffalo, there were already red flag laws, and no one bothered to enforce them. And in the Uvalde shooting, police officers actively impeded any kind of intervention while the shooter was shooting people, mostly children, for at least an hour.

So this new legislation would only empower and enrich incompetent police officers and punish and disable law-abiding Americans. Instead of deterring these monsters with armed civilians, the government will deter those civilians from becoming armed in the first place. Added to this is the costly and politicized bureaucracy to enforce these regulations on people who have done nothing wrong.

On a deeper level, it must be reiterated that these types of regulations are an unconstitutional violation of civil liberties. The Second Amendment guarantees Americans the right to use firearms to defend themselves according to Justin Trudeau, Canadians have no such right.

Like the right to free speech, the right to due process, or the right to be treated equally, the Second Amendment empowers individuals against all forms of tyranny, whether that be from the state, the corporate elite, the mob, criminal organizations, or any other oppressor. Take it away, and Americans have one less tool to protect their freedom, their property, and their lives.

For people who dont own firearms, this may be too abstract. Therefore, as a good analogy they can consider restrictions on their right to own and drive a car (which, by the way, kills thousands more Americans each year than firearms). At that moment, all people would be forced to depend on the governments approval to drive a car of the governments own choosing or rely on government-run mass transit.

Perhaps some may be fine with this, living in an urban area where they have a semi-functional bus and subway system and few places to go, unless they are rich, leftist, and own a fleet of Teslas. However, the great majority of people would resent being restricted in this way, and object that their right to automobility (which isnt an amendment, but probably should be) was being infringed.

In response, those who oppose such freedoms could always claim that there are fewer traffic accidents, and the United States is finally starting to resemble the rest of the developed world. The matter would finally rest there, and the government would put another freedom on the chopping block.

As it is with driving a car of ones choice, so it is with protecting oneself with a gun of ones choice. So many social reforms may fall under the heading of safety, but they inevitably translate to more government control. This is Democrats whole agenda. Whether its gun restrictions, diversity quotas, ending economic security in the name of climate change, or eliminating poverty, all of it amounts to the government having more control and making Americans less independent and self-sufficient.

All of this is why Republicans need to stop meeting their political opponents halfway. G. K. Chestertons criticism made more than a century ago is still quite apt: Compromise used to mean that half a loaf was better than no bread. Among modern statesmen it really seems to mean that half a loaf is better than a whole loaf. With this new bill, McConnell and the rest of the ilk are celebrating yet another half-loaf while their constituents already suffer from malnutrition.

Its a mistake to view todays Democrats as fellow Americans who share the same values and goals but have different ideas of how to get there. Rather, they have completely different goals and will employ any means to achieve them, even if that means putting on show trials, exploiting mass shootings, and intimidating and threatening opponents to say nothing of rigging elections, bankrupting the country, and ushering in millions of illegal immigrants.

The time for negotiation and crossing the aisle is over, and has been for a long time. Democrats have figured this out and continue to push their failed policies with impunity. Republican leadership continues to play political patty cake while their country goes up in flames. The American people are on their own right now. And its times like these where an individuals freedoms matter most, particularly the freedom to defend oneself.

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This Is The Wrong Time To Compromise With Democrats On Gun Rights Or Anything Else - The Federalist

The House Select Committee on Jan. 6 continued its show trials Thursday in the panels third hearing on the Capitol riot probing everything but the riot.

Retired federal judge Michael Luttig and former White House counsel for Vice President Mike Pence, Greg Jacob, testified before the committee on the vice presidents role certifying the election results over President Donald Trumps objections.

Luttig told the committee Pences compliance with Trumps orders to halt certification of the 2020 contest would have been the first constitutional crisis since the founding of the republic.

If I had been advising the vice president of the United States on Jan. 6, Luttig said, I would have laid my body across the road before I would have let the vice president overturn the 2020 election.

The panel spent hours reviewing Trumps efforts through theories espoused by attorney and law professor John Eastman to convince the vice president to thwart the electoral process on Jan. 6. Pence ultimately rebuked the president and continued with certification until the mob breached Capitol security interrupting the joint session of Congress. The vice president was taken to a secure location under the complex while rioters chanted hang Mike Pence above.

The Jan. 6 Committee characteristically dedicated little time to the Capitol security failures that put Pences safety in jeopardy, and instead blamed Trump for doing so through a pressure campaign to stop the count.

After about two hours, the House panel finally detailed Pences whereabouts at the Capitol as rioters overwhelmed police and entered the chambers.

California Democrat Rep. Pete Aguilar, who led Thursdays questioning, asked Pence counsel Jacobs, who was with the vice president throughout the riot about the days events.

Forty feet between the vice president and the mob, Aguilar said after playing footage from the Capitol. Mr. Jacob, you were there, seeing that for the first time, does it surprise you to see how close the mob was to the evacuation route that you took?

I could hear the din of the rioters in the building while we moved but I dont think I was aware that they were as close as that, Jacobs said, and was later asked to recount how his faith comforted him amid the riot.

The questioning was obviously designed to solicit emotion for a committee operating with the sole purpose of smearing political dissidents without any legitimate legislative value. If Aguilar and the rest of the panel were seriously concerned about Pences safety and the circumstances that led to the vice president being forced to shelter in a secure location, a more appropriate subject for questioning would have been former House Sergeant at Arms Paul Irving. If not Irving, then any other top official involved in maintaining Capitol security or Pences secret service detail, which must have coordinated with officials at the complex.

As House Speaker Nancy Pelosis chief security officer in the lower chamber, Irving is at the center of the controversy surrounding the failures that led the mob into the Capitol. According to former Capitol Police Chief Steven Sund, Irving and Pelosi refused to deploy the National Guard to reinforce the Capitol security team six times. Irving said the National Guard presence would be bad optics.

Capitol Police, meanwhile, were ill-equipped and ill-trained to handle the horde of demonstrators who flooded the Capitol, according to a 128-page bipartisan Senate report, and were only half-staffed on Jan. 6. Irving, however, refused cooperation with lawmakers in the upper chamber.

Tristan Justice is the western correspondent for The Federalist. He has also written for The Washington Examiner and The Daily Signal. His work has also been featured in Real Clear Politics and Fox News. Tristan graduated from George Washington University where he majored in political science and minored in journalism. Follow him on Twitter at @JusticeTristan or contact him at Tristan@thefederalist.com.

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J6 Committee Ignores Capitol Security Failures In Third Show Trial Hearing - The Federalist