Category Archives: Federalist

This article contains obscene quoted material.

Its been less than two months since an associate professor teamed up with a pro-pedophile organization in an attempt to normalize the most repugnant crimes imaginable. Now, yet another unhinged professor has been caught advocating for pedophilia, this time even more brazenly.

Stephen Kershnar is a professor at State University of New York at Fredonia, and a pedophilia apologist.

Heres Kershnar on video saying that an adult male having sex with a 12-year-old girl is not obviously wrong, and that calling it wrong is a mistake. In the same clip, he refers to pedophilic rape as adult-child sex, another euphemism that, just like minor-attracted person, is being used in an attempt to run cover for evil.

It gets worse. Twelve isnt young enough for Kershnar. He continues to defend pedophilia, remarking The notion that its wrong even with a one-year-old is not quite obvious to me. He goes on. I dont think its blanket wrong at any age.

Kershnar even argues that children can consent to sex with adults, comparing it to a child willfully engaging in kickball or participating in bar mitzvah lessons.

What are the legal ramifications of such an unspeakably vile perspective? Kershnar lays it out. Since hes not sure if raping infants is good or bad, the thumb on the scale should go to liberty. Liberty for who? Moral monsters who want to rape infants.

Kershnar is open to the idea that pedophilia is deeply harmful to victims, but he just cant put his finger on why. He thinks it could be because of bigots like you and me, who go berserk when pedophiles rape kids.

He even argues that we often make children do things they dont want to do, like go to church or go to temple or go to their sisters ballet recital. His perspective is backed up by podcast host Thaddeus Russel, who makes an equally monstrous argument when he says all a childs life is, is coercion by adults often to make the child do something for the adults pleasure only.

Its also telling that these dangerous viewpoints have found their way into the mainstream through left-wing outlets. At one point, Russel boasts that he authored an article in The Daily Beast that argued for lowering consent laws.

If SUNY Fredonia would like to right this wrong, it can begin by correcting Kershnars bio, which adopts the language of child groomers by calling pedophilia adult-child sex.

Thus far, SUNY Fredonias response has been swift, although incomplete. In a statement, the university remarked that Kershnars views are reprehensible and do not represent the values of SUNY Fredonia in any way, shape or form also noting that The matter is being reviewed.

Only one moral decision can be made following such a review. Half measures, or any other move to placate those who are correctly outraged at the situation rather than remedy the crisis, are entirely unacceptable and unbecoming of any institution that hopes to maintain a shred of legitimacy.

Although SUNY Fredonia may in fact come to the correct decision, it must be recognized that these sentiments did not come out of nowhere. The institution is responding to a high-profile case thats just now been exposed.

Some of the schools alumni werent the least bit surprised. After all, were talking about a professor who published a book titled Pedophilia and Adult-Child Sex: A Philosophical Analysis all the way back in 2015. That SUNY at Fredonia is only now responding to this moral crisis in response to public outcry is disgraceful and deceptive.

When hearing about such an outrageous situation, it can be easy to believe that it is an isolated experience, that such insane notions couldnt possibly have taken root elsewhere. Unfortunately, this would be a misconception.

As mentioned previously, it hasnt been long since a former professor at Old Dominion University rebranded pedophiles as minor-attracted persons. Even this instance was not unique.

A professor at Yale University by the name of Joe Fischel publicly argued that children should be shown nudity, thereby victimized by acts of indecent exposure, at LGBT pride parades. His article was replete with the same strategies that child groomers use, as I outlined previously.

These handful of pedophilia apologist professors are just the tip of the iceberg, one facet of a wider campaign to normalize pedophilia. The logical results of these sentiments have trickled down into K-12 institutions, with gay pornography being featured in school libraries, while other government-run schools host LGBT clubs for four-year-olds, all while refusing to reveal if parents were required to be present on these clubs Zoom calls.

The crisis isnt relegated to education, either, with similar themes popping up in a number of totally different sectors. A commercial from Twix featured child cross-dressing, just one more example of the elite attempt to groom children.

A YMCAs LGBT center hosts youth-only events, and hosted a man who creates drawings that feature characters from childrens shows having sex. Meanwhile, a broader push to foist transgenderism on children has a dark and storied history of pedophilia, child abuse, and psychological torment.

Make no mistake, there is a broad and deliberate push in nearly all areas of public life to normalize pedophilia. This push must be fought wherever it is found, without reservation.

Lets be abundantly clear: this is not a complicated issue. In fact, there can be no simpler issue. Pedophilia is evil. Thats it. We shouldnt accept the notion that pro-pedophilia sentiments are valid ideas to be contended with in the marketplace of ideas by the use of rhetorical flourish or superior philosophizing.

Illiberalism is no crime when your opponent uses bad-faith arguments to justify moral atrocities that target the most vulnerable among us, victimizing them in ways they cant even comprehend.

These ideas, just like those who use their institutional positions to normalize this horrid evil, must be ostracized, shamed, shunned, stigmatized, and mocked out of any and all forms of socio-political or academic influence. This is not extreme. Its the natural immune system response that any healthy society enacts when confronted with a rising tide of danger and evil.

Here are some simple ways you can reject it:

By using euphemisms, you fight the battle against child groomers on their terms. You must completely reject phrases like minor-attracted person, or adult-child sex, both of which seek to grant sympathy and dignity to these atrocities and those who commit them. Maintain the moral high ground with terms that accurately identify evil.

Tolerance is a vice, not a virtue, when you are asked to tolerate unspeakable moral crimes. Our society has begun to see tolerance as the mark of an enlightened person. Reject this faulty framing, and all the degeneracy and spiritual rot that has followed closely behind it.

If there was ever a time to be uncompromising, to cling to your beliefs with unrelenting zeal, this is it. The only proper response to situations such as this is action backed by righteous anger. Root out attempts to normalize pedophilia anywhere and everywhere you find it. Publicize it. Send examples like this to The Federalist. Demand that institutions that are home to these sentiments condemn it wholeheartedly in speech and in action. Fight, fight, fight.

Kershnar did not respond to a request for comment.

See the original post:

Another Unhinged Professor Has Been Exposed As A Pedophilia Apologist - The Federalist

Meghan Markle and Prince Harry weighed in on the Spotify controversy this week, expressing concerns about Covid misinformation as the censorship police endeavor to deplatform Joe Rogan. Prince Harry, who declared the First Amendment bonkers last year, also serves on the Aspen Institutes Commission on Information Disorder, avehicle for corporate donors to generate items justifying censorship.

On Sunday, the couple released a statement from the Archewell Foundation, which the pair founded in 2020, raising alarm over hundreds of millions of people who are affected by the serious harms of rampant mis- and disinformation every day. The couple signed their own exclusive multi-year podcast partnership with the streaming service when they launched their latest venture, with only one episode published to date.

Last April, our co-founders began expressing concerns to our partners at Spotify about the all-too-real consequences of COVID-19 misinformation on its platform, they said. We have continued to express our concerns to Spotify to ensure changes to its platform are made to help address this public health crisis. We look to Spotify to meet this moment and are committed to continuing our work together as it does.

While not mentioning Rogan by name, the statement came on the heels of Spotify announcing it will add a content advisory to podcasts discussing Covid-19, including Rogans, after other artists pledged to strip their content from the service absent outright censorship of Rogan. Longtime music star Neil Young was the first major name to offer Spotify an ultimatum last week over fake information about vaccines.

They can have Rogan, or Young. Not both, Young wrote in an open letter. Spotify chose Rogan.

Youngs call for censorship, however, ignited a movement among left-wing content producers, who offered their own ultimatums to drop the Rogan podcast, which the Swedish company bought the rights to for $100 million in the summer of 2020.

The Aspen Institute did not respond to The Federalists repeated inquiries about whether the Institute would stand by its members perceived attacks on Rogan in an environment where narratives contrary to the media-manufactured consensus are labeled misinformation.

Other members of the commission include Katie Couric, who co-chairs the group and admitted in October to selectively editing a 2016 interview with now-deceased Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg. Couric toned down Ginsburgs criticism of the NFL kneeling protests led by 49ers quarterback Colin Kaepernick in an episode of routine manipulation by the legacy journalist.

In January last year, Couric also called for efforts to deprogram Republicans.

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.

Read more here:

Harry And Meghan's 'Concerns' About Joe Rogan Could Drive Anti-Speech Aspen Institute Project - The Federalist

I wrote yesterday about the Joe Rogan problem our elite faces today, where even such leading intellectual lights as Prince Harry and Meghan Markle must take up the solemn duty of condemning their Spotify colleague who actually does the work his contract demands. Of course, the companys decision to essentially add a dangerous, do not ingest warning to Rogans interviews is just a prelude to more crackdowns, as Zaid Jilani recognizes:

As Jilani notes, there has been a demonstrable increase in the number of leftists who favor censorship by any entity necessary including private corporations all in the cause of shutting down speech that they find irritating or inconvenient to the narrative they favor:

Youngs transformation from countercultural champion of freedom of speech to corporate censorship advocate and defender of the public-health bureaucracy didnt occur in a vacuum. Progressives have become increasingly censorious over the past few years. A majority of Democrats now believe that both private tech companies and the U.S. government should take steps to restrict false info online.

This is the reality based community coming home to roost: where once the counterculture spoke of dying to defend the right to disagree, now they will bring down the entire house of individual liberty to shut you up. But what is a leftist to do when someone like Rogan cant be shut up? When his work bizarrely coming in the form of interviews so long they outpace Doctor Zhivago is so defiantly popular that it attracts the eyes and ears of a nation hungry for more information?

In this case, they are turning into a mob appealing to the elites in this case, The Cathedral to shut down this troublesome talk. The network of power from the corporate media to the academy to big tech to the Aspen Institutes Commission on Information Disorder must act to save us all, before its too late!

This problem brings to mind a piece from two years ago, published at the onset of the pandemic in Commentary, by James B. Meigs, former editor of Popular Mechanics:

Disaster researchers call this phenomenon elite panic. When authorities believe their own citizens will become dangerous, they begin to focus on controlling the public, rather than on addressing the disaster itself. They clamp down on information, restrict freedom of movement, and devote unnecessary energy to enforcing laws they assume are about to be broken. These strategies dont just waste resources, one study notes; they also undermine the publics capacity for resilient behaviors. In other words, nervous officials can actively impede the ordinary people trying to help themselves and their neighbors.

As in war, the first casualty in disasters is often the truth. One symptom of elite panic is the belief that too much information, or the wrong kind of information, will send citizens reeling. After the 2011 tsunami knocked out Japans Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant, officials gave a series of confusing briefings. To many, they seemed to be downplaying the amount of radiation released in the accident. In the end, the radiation risks turned out to be much lower than feared, resulting in no civilian deaths. But, by then, the traumatized public had lost faith in any official statements. As one team of researchers notes, any perceived lack of information provision increases public anxiety and distrust.

The oddity of all this is that Rogan himself is not actually the source of the troublesome information the Covid authoritarians seek to quash. Instead, his show is merely the vehicle for them to express their opinions. He asks open-ended and often meandering questions before driving down to a point, seeking an answer from the person sitting across from him in ways that are, given the marathon length and intellectual breadth of the show, impossible to filibuster.

It is the rumbling host of intelligent guests with whom Rogan has these discussions often with impressive credentials in multiple spheres, but with well-earned reputations for contrarian perspectives that run afoul of the dominant narratives in their field of choice who are the real problem. And because CNN and Anthony Fauci and Prince Harry and his Hogwarts Ministry on Information Disorder cant shut them all down, they are instead seeking to shut down the popularizer.

Joe Rogan isnt the messenger. Hes just the interlocutor inviting the wrong people on an enormous stage. And how interesting it is that when he invites the right people, like Sanjay Gupta, they end up looking very foolish.

There is a tale told about Galileo Galilei that comes to mind here one that is almost certainly apocryphal, given that there is little indication it was printed until a century after his death. Galileos heliocentric heresy, published in 1632 in his Dialogue Concerning the Two Chief World Systems, resulted in a firestorm of reaction from the church. Intentionally or not there is evidence Galileo never intended to offend his friend and ally Pope Urban VIII the episode obviously resulted in his being brought before inquisitors, threatened with torture, and subjected to condemnation and imprisonment under house arrest for the duration of his life.

The legend is that, in the process of being transferred from one home to another, Galileo engaged in an act of defiance:

The moment he was set at liberty, he looked up to the sky and down to the ground, and, stamping with his foot, in a contemplative mood, said, Eppur si muove, that is, still it moves, meaning the Earth.

The inquisitions suffered by those who have defied the Covid narrative at very great risk to their careers are for the most part not comparable to anything suffered by Galileo, but they share certain commonalities. Pope Urban VIII was in some sense afraid of the machinations of court insiders and his foes who saw advantage in the moment, and cowed into going along with the persecution of an intellectual he admired.

There are similarly minded individuals today, largely silent, scattered around the heights of industry and politics. Their book recommendations and listening tendencies act as secret handshakes. They hold these views against the tide. They just dont have Elon Musks F-you money.

The motivation of the Cathedral now to protect their power against what they view as an unruly, prideful, and disobedient rabble is not without basis. The people are indeed fed up with the elite panic. They have, as the Monmouth poll indicated this week, moved on they believe its time we accept that Covid is here to stay and we just need to get on with our lives.

But the Cathedral does not accept that theyve lost control. They still think they can crush the revolt and re-establish the narrative. And they are too short-sighted to see the long-lasting and institution-destroying ramifications they are creating by engaging in such an obvious crackdown on people brave enough to tell the truth.

Read more:

Elite Panic In The Cathedral! - The Federalist

Foreigners are voting in our elections. It isnt just in the sanctuary city of New York, where 800,000 foreigners just got the power to vote in municipal elections.

Foreigners voting occurs all over the country. Over the past few years, the Public Interest Legal Foundation, of which I am president, has uncovered government records showing foreigners voting in Pennsylvania, Texas, New Jersey, and California.

Voter fraud deniers do not want to talk about the fact that foreigners are registering and voting in U.S. elections. They forget that the foreigners voting in American elections are sometimes victims of third-party voter registration drives that jeopardize their immigration status. These voter registration drives sign anyone up without regard to eligibility.

States are also victimizing these foreigners. Pennsylvania let aliens register to vote for more than two decades on a broken department of motor vehicles registration process.

Unwitting aliens often dont know they arent allowed to register and vote. Meanwhile, committing an election crime such as illegal voting subjects them to deportation. The only winner is the political party that reliably gets their votes.

Just this week, we uncovered more evidence of foreigners voting in our elections, this time in the swing state of North Carolina.

In 2019, the North Carolina State Board of Elections denied the foundation access to documents relating to foreigners registering and voting, so the foundation sued the board. Following a ruling by the Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals affirming that the National Voter Registration Act requires disclosure of these documents, the board agreed to settle the case.

In the settlement, the board agreed to disclose the records relating to foreigners registering and voting. There have already been 38 indictments of foreigners registering to vote and some casting ballots. These records will conclusively show how many foreigners have been voting in North Carolina elections.

Inspecting these list maintenance documents serves an important purpose by allowing one to identify how foreigners are getting registered to vote. That is a key first step to improve the system and ensure that these errors do not continue to happen.

Often, it is the fault of the government. For example, a voter registration form will have a question at the top asking if the potential registrant is an American. One may check no and, due to errors by local elections officials, still get registered to vote.

The same mistakes can happen when the potential registrant leaves the checkbox blank. The mistake may also be on the part of the potential registrant, incorrectly checking the box attesting that he or she is a U.S. citizen. The bottom line is, foreigners are registering and voting in states across the country.

Nobody should want this. Only Americans should be electing American leaders. States need to examine their voter list maintenance procedures and ensure they are keeping non-citizens off the voter rolls.

We will continue the effort to catalog and expose government mistakes and election malfeasance. Americans have a right to know about the vulnerabilities in our election system.

J. Christian Adams is the President of the Public Interest Legal Foundation, a former Justice Department attorney, and current commissioner on the United States Commission for Civil Rights.

Link:

The Real Foreign Election Interference Is Happening At Your Local DMV - The Federalist

When Mark Zuckerberg announced on Wednesday that Facebook lost daily users for the first time in its 18-year history last quarter, he blamed TikTok. And why shouldnt he? The young platform is both the most downloaded app and most visited website in the world. Its addicting and profitable, which also makes TikTok a tool of cultural control.

Beijing understands this, which is why the apps Chinese counterpart Douyin is run much differently by ByteDance. Indeed, the Chinese government recently acquired a 1 percent stake and a seat on the board of one of the Beijing-based companys domestic subsidiaries.

Andrew Schulz explained this perfectly in a clip he posted to Instagram this week.

You dont have to crush an opposing nation to convince them to crush themselves, Schulz wrote in the caption. If China seeks to undermine the power of the United States, controlling the algorithms that captivate its children isnt a bad place to start.

If you browse this BuzzFeed roundup of the top trends on TikTok in 2021, youll find explicit dances, songs, and gender-bending alongside adorable dogs and easy recipes. In 2020, Seventeen included the WAP dance on its roundup of the apps most popular trends, meaning millions of American kids were watching and making video after video of a song about wet ass p-ssy.

Its of course true that American culture is decaying on its own. But it doesnt help that a company based in and legally under the control of China is in charge of a place our kids spend hours a day, talking about politics, family life, and culture. It would be like Moscow owning our film studios during the Cold War, except worse because TikTok is omnipresent in every teens pocket.

TikTok is known for its sophisticated algorithm, which one expert told the New York Times tries to get people addicted rather than giving them what they really want. Theres mounting evidence that TikTok is having negative effects on users health, which you can read more about here. Beijing seems to understand this because the government is taking steps to prevent the app from addicting its own users.

In China, Douyin is subject to government control intended to make the app a force for cultural good and a vehicle for propaganda. Users under 14 can only access the app at certain times of day for a capped period of time, and are delivered interesting popular science experiments, exhibitions in museums and galleries, beautiful scenery across the country, explanations of historical knowledge, and so on.

All users are subject to mandatory five-second pauses after spending a certain amount of time on the app, during which theyre delivered videos that tell them to put down the phone, go to bed, and work tomorrow. The app censors political content that transgresses Beijings boundaries. It was fined last year for spreading obscene, pornographic, and vulgar content.

None of this is to say the U.S. government should start curbing free expression on TikTok. I think theres a good argument to be made that social media is a public health emergency and demands more transparency. The point is that ByteDance owns an app thats controlled by a government seeking to undermine us, and that app is designed to be less harmful than the one peddled in America.

We can talk about what kind of government action that might warrant, but it should immediately change the way we approach TikTok. Beijing knows the app can stoke discord and worsen the health of our teenagers. Why would we willingly give that tool to an opposition government? (Thats not even to get into the potential national security concerns.)

The simple answer is because were addicted.

Emily Jashinsky is culture editor at The Federalist. She previously covered politics as a commentary writer for the Washington Examiner. Prior to joining the Examiner, Emily was the spokeswoman for Young Americas Foundation. Shes interviewed leading politicians and entertainers and appeared regularly as a guest on major television news programs, including Fox News Sunday, Media Buzz, and The McLaughlin Group. Her work has been featured in the Wall Street Journal, the New York Post, Real Clear Politics, and more. Emily also serves as director of the National Journalism Center and a visiting fellow at Independent Women's Forum. Originally from Wisconsin, she is a graduate of George Washington University.

More:

Beijing-Based ByteDance Knows TikTok Is A Cultural Weapon - The Federalist

University of Pennsylvania transgender swimmer Lia Thomas, a man, has smashed records and shocked sensibilities. Thomass performance illustrates the effects and absurdity of denying differences between the sexes, especially mens obvious bodily advantages in sports.

Thomas presumably fulfilled the NCAAs policy requiring trans athletes to suppress testosterone levels for a designated time before competing on the womans team. In January, the NCAA tweaked the rules to place sport-specific limits on testosterone levels. The policy still falls short by ignoring the unchanging enhanced muscle strength and endurance amassed during male puberty.

Caitlyn Jenner (formerly Bruce), an elite Olympian athlete, weighed in on the Thomas controversy, saying him competing as a woman isnt fair to women athletes. Jenner says his physical advantages are still apparent many years after transition.

In Lia Thomass case, I dont care about her testosterone levels now for the last year or two, Jenner said. Honestly, I care about her testosterone levels for the first 16, 17 years of her life. Thats what we are fighting against here.

As a man who formerly identified as a woman, I now clearly see with the benefit of 30 years of hindsight and reflection a similar flaw in my thinking that led me astray. Like the people setting NCAA policies, I neglected to consider that it was categorically impossible to biologically change my internal male morphology: my skeletal structure, body mass, muscle strength, and myriad other sexually determined attributes.

This flawed and foolish thinking results in real-life consequences. Changing sexes is a myth and trans folklorists who promote it are harming people, especially children vulnerable to believing fairy tales can come true. Here are some of these trans myths at play in the Thomas story.

The entire folklore of transgenderism rests on the artificial construct that gender is separate from biological sex, and that sex doesnt matter, gender identity does. Its a house of cards built on the flimsiest of foundations, a feeling. Feelings can, and do, change.

Who we are cannot be separated from our bodily reality. We live our lives in our bodies. Our identities are rooted in our bodies. The whole body is organized around either being male or female, a sexual binary. Who we are is not based on a feeling but rooted in physical reality.

Sex does not come from an ideological vending machine filled with multiple choices. Starting at conception, sex is absolute, innate, and immutable: male or female.

During intercourse, approximately 250 million sperm cells start the journey from the testes of the man to the fallopian tube of the woman, where one lucky sperm cell joins the egg in the hours or days following sexual intercourse. The sperm and the egg each contain mitochondria and DNA. When the sperm fertilizes the egg, the nuclei from each fuse together, and a baby is conceived. The babys sex revealed in the DNA is fixed for life.

Now were told sex is assigned at birth. This phrase popped up out of nowhere and now has infiltrated everywhere. No one has ever had his or her sex assigned at birth. Its fixed nine months before birth, at conception.

The truth since the dawn of time is that a look at the babys genitalia reveals his or her sex. With todays ultrasound technology, parents can know the sex of the baby during pregnancy. Sex is innate and unchangeable, not assigned by a doctor after the baby exits the womb.

The deceitful language creates the foundation for an even bigger lie: Because sex is assigned at birth, it can be reassigned later.

Transitioning is a myth. Its not possible. Sex is unchangeable. That is not a transphobic smear; its biological fact.

No amount of female hormones forced into a mans bloodstream can transition him biologically into a woman, or vice versa. Sure, each can identify as the other if they want, but they do not magically become the other sex. Thomas did not magically change bodies, replacing male with female, by suppressing testosterone and ingesting estrogen.

The same goes for surgery. Surgeons may use their operating prowess to fashion a convincing replica of a man or a woman, but their efforts are feckless to change anyones biological sex. I have thought for years that lawyers should be having a field day jumping all over the medical fraud that has been perpetrated by surgeons who claim they have changed a persons sex. Thats an outlandish lie of biblical proportions.

Trans folklore requires us to ignore the ample, obvious evidence of physiological and structural differences between males and females, suppress any intellectual rational discussion, and swallow whole the lie that cross-sex hormones and surgery can flip sex. Reality goes out the window and we enter a world of Orwellian dystopia, where language gets distorted and free speech is dumped in the trash. Skeptics are bullied. Good people are canceled, and careers are ended by the slightest infraction in speech or thought.

Lawmakers, medical societies, and school boards disregard these biological facts and therefore make nonsense policies. Opportunistic males cloaked in cross-sex identities are permitted to invade womens spaces and sports, threatening womens safety and undoing the level playing field women have fought so hard to attain.

The truth is: God makes male and female; surgeons and hormone dispensaries dont.

The media paint a rosy picture of a transgender persons life after the so-called change of gender. Life will be rainbows and lollipops, they convey; everyone lives happily ever after. The trope they disseminate implies no one has ever regretted it. This myth leads gender-distressed individuals to think, Why not go for it? What do I have to lose?

The truth is, they have a lot to lose. Ive heard countless heartbreaking stories from people who lost years of their lives trying to erase who they are in a futile attempt to become someone they can never be. People need to hear the truth. Regret is not rare. My book, Trans Life Survivors, features the experiences of 30 such survivors, told in their own words. I could have included hundreds, perhaps thousands.

Regret can hit months, years, or decades after surgery. The survivors come to realize that a surgically fabricated and hormonally induced persona didnt cure what ailed them, and they want help to go back to living in authentic biological reality.

Gender discomfort exists, but like any pain, its purpose is to alert you of something wrong.It used to be that a counselors job was to methodically pinpoint the probable cause and work through it. Thats no longer the case. People who want to reclaim their lives tell me therapists diagnosed them with gender dysphoria after one or two visits, then encouraged them to transition socially, take cross-sex hormones, and undergo surgery. Parents report similar sessions with their childrens therapists. The therapist considers nothing else.

Yet gender distress is a symptom of other difficulties: adverse childhood experiences, or psychiatric or psychological issues such as panic disorder, post-traumatic stress disorder, major depression, bipolar disorder, eating disorders, dissociative disorders, and substance abuse. None of these benefit from cross-sex hormones and surgery.

For me, the desire to escape my male existence was the result of years of cross-dressing at the hands of my grandmother starting at age four, after which I was molested by my uncle. Deep psychological pain caused me to want to be female.

My transgenderism was a hiding place until I received proper psychotherapy, then set my sights on God. Slowly but steadily, Gods love healed the pain of childhood experiences and redeemed my life, and the desire went away. I no longer needed a hiding place.

Today, due to the successful efforts of transgender folklorists, successful talk therapy like I received is against the law in 20 states and the District of Columbia. Affirmation is the only treatment allowed for patients who utter the magic phrase gender distress.

It especially crushes my heart to see children and teens ensnared in this ideology. The American College of Pediatricians, one of the few medical associations not given over to woke indoctrination, has spoken to the experimental nature of transgender intervention for children and the many ways it impairs their mental and physical health.

Panicked parents contact me. One mother succeeded through loving intervention to divert her 10-year-old daughter from going down the transgender path. Other parents want to reach their older teenagers who are blind to the difficulties awaiting them with hormones and surgery. I hear from those teens after transition, in their later teens or early 20s when reality has dashed their dreams of living happily ever after.

Women bemoan their permanently lowered voices and scarred chests. Men mourn the loss of potency and prospects for future romance. From my experience and the testimonies of the thousands who have written me, I know these myths harm innocent people and that the path to freedom starts with acknowledging the truth.

No therapist, no doctor, and no surgeon has been effective in biologically changing anyones sex, full stop. Sex is not assigned at birth and cannot be reassigned later. Regret is real. Harm is done, no matter what trans folklorists claim.

Therein lies the hope for people who want to go back: you never really changed.

Walt Heyer is an accomplished author and public speaker with a passion for mentoring individuals whose lives have been torn apart by unnecessary gender-change surgery.

Excerpt from:

3 Myths Trans Folklorists Want You To Believe That Lia Thomas Smashes - The Federalist

While California schoolchildren remain muzzled with face masks and pay the price through speech impediments, Democrat Gov. Gavin Newsom is enjoying the high life that comes with flouting his own rules.

On Sunday, the California governor was caught maskless again just more than a year after a similar sighting fueled a statewide effort for a recall. Newsom was pictured with former Los Angeles Lakers star Magic Johnson at the NFL 49ers-Rams game despite a statewide mask mandate in place through Feb. 15. In L.A., masks are required for outdoor mega events with more than 5,000 in attendance regardless of vaccination status.

Hanging out at SoFi Stadium today! Johnson wrote in a Twitter post featuring pictures of himself with Newsom as well as L.A. Mayor Eric Garcetti and San Francisco Mayor London Breed. SoFi Stadium requires masks at all times in compliance with the health order, unless, apparently, youre a prominent politician or major celebrity.

This latest episode of Newsoms hypocrisy, however, comes after nearly 8 million California voters gave the governor their blessing to disregard public health orders under the Democrat-directed COVID caste system.

In September, Newsom maintained his grip on power when he survived a statewide referendum over his leadership nearly 62 percent to 38 percent. The effort to force a recall was sparked when the governor dined maskless at a luxury, three-star Michelin restaurant in the heart of Napa Valleys wine country in violation of his own orders.

When Newsom was caught maskless in November 2020 at the French Laundry, where prices run $300 a plate, the published photos plunged the governors office into scandal. At the time, Newsom was seeking to ban residents from gatherings of more than three households ahead of Thanksgiving.

While our family followed the restaurants health protocols and took safety precautions, we should have modeled better behavior and not joined the dinner, Newsom said afterward, before cracking down with even tighter restrictions days later.

By September 2021, voters would dismiss the episode and send him back to the governors office emboldened to do the same without consequence.

Update, Monday afternoon:

Newsom defended his routine hypocrisy following the online outcry claiming he was very judicious wearing a mask.

Magic was kind enough, generous enough to ask me for a photograph, and in my left hands the mask and I took a photo, Newsom said during a press conference. The rest of the time I wore it, as we all should, not when I had a glass of water or a thing, and I encourage everybody else to do so.

Except another photograph apparently from the same game shows Newsom maskless grinning ear to ear with no food or drink in sight.

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.

Originally posted here:

Gavin Newsom's Latest COVID Hypocrisy Came With The Voters' Blessing - The Federalist

If it were taking place 20 years ago, it would have been one of the top events on the calendar for Republicans. Once upon a time, a fundraiser sponsored by former Vice President Dick Cheney and his wife Lynne, with appearances by Utah Sen. Mitt Romney, Cheneys faithful aide Scooter Libby, former Solicitor General Ted Olson, columnist Mona Charen, and a large number of wealthy donors, and hosted by veteran GOP heavy-hitter Bobbie Kilberg and her lawyer husband Bill at their Virginia home, would have been the sort of thing that anyone in the world of GOP officeholders, consultants, and fundraisers would have wanted to attend.

But the March 14 shindig is taking place in 2022, not 2002. That makes the list of sponsors and guests the political equivalent of a baseball Old-Timers Game in which the stars of the past gather to put on their old uniforms and entertain their fans with an inning or two in which they pretend to be their former selves.

But the event in question is not an exercise in nostalgia. Its a fundraiser for Rep. Liz Cheneys re-election campaign. Although the people listed as sponsors may be political has-beens or are now utterly marginal to the Republican Party, their money is still green and Cheney needs every cent she can raise from her familys old friends.

Cheney is facing the fight of her political life as she attempts to fend off a primary challenge for renomination to her at-large House seat from Harriet Hageman, the lawyer and conservative activist who has been endorsed by former President Donald Trump. Hageman has raised more than $1 million for her campaign to date and has benefited from fundraisers hosted by billionaire Paypal founder Peter Thiel.

Moreover, the party apparatus in Wyoming, which once might have shown any member of the Cheney family great deference, has abandoned her. She was censured by the state GOP for voting to impeach Trump after the Jan. 6 Capitol riot. In November, Wyoming Republicans voted to no longer recognize her as a member of the party. That came after Cheney assumed a leadership role in House Speaker Nancy Pelosis Jan. 6 Committee despite the fact that the Democrats refused to allow the Republican conference to name, as was their right, their own members.

Cheney has essentially burned her bridges to the party she grew up in by falsely claiming to be the ranking member of the committee and enthusiastically participating in its fishing expedition that seeks to drag in for questioning a wide array of former Trump administration officials, conservative media figures, and even Republican House colleagues who had nothing to do with the riot. Indeed, there is a growing movement to oust her from the Republican conference, although House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy would probably prefer to avoid a purge and let Wyomings Republican voters deal with Cheney in the August primary.

Cheney, who has seemed to grow angrier at her party with each month for its refusal to play along with the notion that Jan. 6 was an insurrection that threatened American democracy, is not going down without a fight. And she can count on other GOP celebrities from the past, such as former President George W. Bush and former House Speakers John Boehner and Paul Ryan, to assist her with fundraising.

But the idea that the 2002 GOP All-Star team can compete against contemporary Republicans with voters who have long since repudiated their partys ancien regime is an absurd strategy.

The race is being spun by the liberal mainstream media as a case of a brave, principled conservative standing up against an army of GOP zombies who have sold their souls to Trump. But as in the rest of the country, Wyoming conservatives understand that Trumps populist defense of the working and middle class is a better fit for the party than one that seemed more in line with the interests of Wall Street.

They think the Bushes exploited them while Trump fought for them. To the surprise of many, Trump wound up leading the most successful conservative administration in memory until it was brought down by a pandemic unleashed by China and a mainstream media/Big Tech alliance aimed at silencing the truth about Biden family corruption.

Republicans understand that Cheneys acceptance of Democrats branding of not just the Capitol rioters or even Trump but all Republican voters as insurrectionist traitors targets them and their beliefs. Even if they arent still questioning the 2020 presidential election results, most Republicans seem to comprehend that the real threats to democracy are the McCarthyite tactics of the Jan. 6 Committee that Cheney is helping to lead and her Democratic allies attempts to silence dissent on the Internet.

That Cheneys fundraiser is being held in Virginia is something Hageman wont fail to play up. A Jan. 6 Committee advisor also recently dropped his name from the host line-up.

Cheney lived most of her life in the suburbs of Washington, D.C., before returning to her familys home state to pursue a political career. She first attempted to muscle Mike Enzi out of his Senate seat leading up to the 2014 elections. But when he refused to roll over, she backed down and settled for Wyomings sole seat in the House in 2016.

When Enzi retired in 2020, she flirted with another chance at joining the Senate, but was outmaneuvered by Cynthia Lummis. Still, by then Cheney was on a fast track to House GOP leadership, using her famous name to parachute into the partys number three position chair of the House Republican Conference after only one term. That put her in line to be a future speaker of the House.

But like many other members of the old GOP elite, Trumps ascendancy was too bitter a pill for her to swallow. While her voting record remained generally conservative, she seized on the Jan. 6 riot to go all in on impeachment and then in trafficking in conspiracy theories about the riot aimed at burning down the party for the sin of letting Trump lead it.

That makes the Wyoming primary more a referendum on the Republican past which she represents than about the relative merits of Cheney or Hageman. Although her family name still counts for something, her claim that she and the remnant of Never Trump allies backing her are the only legitimate standard-bearers for conservative values is not a viable political strategy in Wyoming or anywhere else. GOP voters have long since moved on from the Bushes and their family retainers even as the liberal media is now finally treating the former president and Cheneys father with some respect, if only as a way to further attack Trump.

Thats why the Cheney re-election campaign is so rooted in the partys past and her events have taken on the aspect of an ancien regime banquet in which pretenders to a throne lost in the past make-believe that they are about to return to power. Theyre in for a rude awakening in August.

Jonathan S. Tobin is a senior contributor to The Federalist, editor in chief of JNS.org, and a columnist for the New York Post. Follow him on Twitter at @jonathans_tobin.

Go here to read the rest:

Liz Cheney Marks The Last Stand Of The Ancien Regime Republicans - The Federalist

Former Vice President Mike Pence on Friday offered his most forceful rebuke of Donald J. Trump, saying the former president is wrong that Mr. Pence had the legal authority to change the results of the 2020 election and that the Republican Party must accept the outcome and look toward the future.

Speaking to a gathering of conservatives near Orlando, Fla., the former vice president said he understands the disappointment so many feel about the last election but repudiated Mr. Trumps false claims that Mr. Pence could reject the Electoral College results and alter the outcome last year.

President Trump is wrong, said Mr. Pence, in his remarks before the Federalist Society, a conservative legal organization. I had no right to overturn the election.

The comments marked the strongest rejection of Mr. Trumps efforts to overturn the 2020 election by his former vice president. Mr. Pence refused to give in on Jan. 6 to Mr. Trumps pressure campaign to change the results. Since then, he has remained relatively quiet about that decision, largely declining to directly attack Mr. Trump or assign him any blame for inciting the deadly siege on the Capitol. In public appearances last year, Mr. Pence defended his role in resisting Mr. Trump but did not go further than saying that the two men will never see eye to eye about that day.

But tensions between them have been rising in recent days. As Mr. Pence positions himself for a possible presidential bid in 2024, Mr. Trump has pushed more intensely a false narrative aimed at blaming his former vice president for failing to stop President Biden from taking office.

Mr. Pence cast his opposition on Friday as larger than the immediate political moment, implying that the false claims pushed by Mr. Trump and his followers threatened to undermine American democracy.

The truth is theres more at stake than our party or our political fortunes, he said. If we lose faith in the Constitution, we wont just lose elections well lose our country.

In a speech that largely focused on attacking the policies and record of the Biden administration, Mr. Pence described Jan. 6 as a dark day in Washington. Such a description runs counter to an attempt by some on the right to rewrite history by describing the siege as a peaceful rally and by calling the rioters political prisoners. And he urged Mr. Trump and his party to accept the results of the last election.

Whatever the future holds, I know we did our duty that day, Mr. Pence said. I believe the time has come to focus on the future.

But Mr. Pence stopped short of completely breaking with the right-wing base that remains deeply influenced by Mr. Trump.

Mr. Pence did not explicitly say that Mr. Trump lost the election and he declined to address the false claims of election fraud still being pushed by the former president and his supporters. The carefully constructed wording of his rebuke shows an effort by Mr. Pence to defend his own actions on Jan. 6, while not completely alienating a Republican base that remains animated by conspiracy theories of a stolen election. Their support could be crucial in any 2024 primary contest.

His comments came just hours after the Republican Party voted to censure two Republican lawmakers for taking part in the House investigation of the Jan. 6 attack. The lawmakers, Representatives Liz Cheney of Wyoming and Adam Kinzinger of Illinois, were censured for participating in what the partys resolution described as the persecution of ordinary citizens engaged in legitimate political discourse.

In a rambling statement issued Friday evening, Mr. Trump refrained from sharply attacking Mr. Pence. But he described Mr. Pence as being an automatic conveyor belt on Jan. 6 to get Biden elected President as quickly as possible. And he also did not back down from his assertion that Mr. Pence had the authority to change the results.

Mr. Trump added, I was right and everyone knows it. If there is fraud or large scale irregularities, it would have been appropriate to send those votes back to the legislatures to figure it out.

Legal scholars and officials from both parties say the vice president does not have the power to overturn elections. Mr. Pence agrees with that interpretation of the law: In a letter to Congress sent the morning of the Capitol attack, Mr. Pence rejected the presidents claims, writing that the Constitution constrains me from claiming unilateral authority to determine which electoral votes should be counted and which should not.

On Sunday, Mr. Trump falsely claimed that Mr. Pence could have overturned the election in a statement denouncing a bipartisan push to rewrite the Electoral Count Act of 1887. The former president and his allies misinterpreted that century-old law in their failed bid to persuade Mr. Pence to throw out legitimate election results. And on Tuesday, Mr. Trump said that the congressional committee investigating the role of his administration in the violent Jan. 6 attack on the Capitol should instead examine why Mike Pence did not send back the votes for recertification or approval.

Mr. Trumps attempts to influence his vice president have become a focus of the House committee investigating the Jan. 6 attack, with some members seeing the participation of Mr. Pences team as vital to deciding whether it has sufficient evidence to make a criminal referral of Mr. Trump to the Justice Department. Two of Mr. Pences aides testified privately before the committee this week and Mr. Pences lawyer and the panel have been talking informally about whether the former vice president would be willing to speak to investigators.

The Justice Department has also been examining the ways in which Mr. Trumps attacks on Mr. Pence influenced the mob. In recent plea negotiations in some Jan. 6 cases, prosecutors have asked defense lawyers whether their clients would admit in sworn statements that they stormed the Capitol believing that Mr. Trump wanted them to stop Mr. Pence from certifying the election.

As the attackers raided the Capitol that day, some chanted Hang Mike Pence. Mr. Trump initially brushed aside calls from aides and allies to call them off. Since then, Mr. Trump has defended the chants as understandable because, as he said in an interview with Jonathan Karl of ABC News, the people were very angry about the election.

Go here to read the rest:

Donald Trump 'Is Wrong' on Authority to Overturn Election, Says Pence - The New York Times

New York Times liberal David Leonhardt has had plenty of dumb things to say about the pandemic.

Exhibit A, this remark he made back in October on CNN: When people quit or get fired because they wont take the vaccine, I would think of that there is some really good news there.

A month before that, he said Republicans were rejecting vaccines at a higher rate than Democrats, in large part because conservatives had grown hostile to science. Then he acknowledged in a subsequent column that health officials were deliberately withholding information from the public, as happened with masks, and said their refusal to acknowledge uncertainty can undermine officials credibility. (When conservatives doubt what their leaders are telling them, its because theyre hostile to science. When Leonhardt does it, hes just being a skeptical journalist!)

In June 2020, he made the arrogant declaration that We know how to slow the spread of the coronavirus, and pointed to South Korea as a sterling example of one of those countries that had avoided outbreaks or beaten them back. A few months later, the deputy commissioner of the nations health department would say, We are facing our biggest ever coronavirus crisis because the current wave is neither temporary nor regional, but steady and nationwide. We dont have one central cluster that we can shut down with a focused testing and isolating campaign

And so, Leonhardt doesnt get any credit for his Johnny-come-lately attitude about how Democrat and media-championed restrictions on the economy, social life, and schools have severely retarded this country. Plenty of people knew that was the case from the beginning and when they said so aloud, elitist dummies like Leonhardt denounced them as reckless science deniers hellbent on ushering more spread of a deadly virus.

But its wild anyway that, for becoming more vocal lately about the harm Democrats have done to children and the economy with their beloved lockdowns, Politico decided it was time to let a bunch of miserable liberals trash him. And do it anonymously!

Reporter Joanne Kenen wrote last week that she had viewed a letter sent to the Times from a group of prominent pandemic experts who called Leonhardts Covid analysis irresponsible and dangerous. Who were these so-called prominent experts? We dont get to know. Kenen said when she got ahold of the letter, it came with the full list of signatures withheld.

How, then, does she know any of the names are prominent? Moreoever, how does she know theyre experts at all? Maybe we shouldnt ask. We wouldnt want to seem hostile to science.

But Kenen even declined to identify someone she interviewed directly and who said that the majority of Leonhardts opinion pieces downplay risk, downplay prevention. This assessment, according to Kenen, came from a physician at a prestigious academic medical center. If thats true, and were talking about a matter of life and death, and that a prominent writer is misleading millions of people about the risk to their health, there is literally no reason for a doctor to hide his name when making such a milquetoast accusation. And there is literally no reason for a reporter like Kenen to allow it other than that shes simply crap-stirring and continuing to feed the alarmism that invites Democrats to continue hyping up their control-freak restrictions.

These people swear that theyre not enjoying the pandemic, that everyone wants to be done with it. No, they dont.

Leonhardt isnt a sympathetic victim in this smear campaign. But hes a useful reminder that the people were told incessantly by the national media to listen to and trust are in no way forthcoming or honest.

Read the original:

Media's Smear Of NYT's Leonhardt Reminds Us Why They Can't Be Trusted - The Federalist