Category Archives: Federalist

The latest prong of the Biden administrations open borders strategy is its negotiations to give away hundreds of millions of dollars to illegal aliens. The Wall Street Journal reported on October 28 that the administration is negotiating to pay criminal illegal entrants as much as $450,000 per person, and up to almost $1,000,000 per family.

The hopeful recipients were arrested for committing a federal crime: illegal entry into the United States in violation of 8 U.S. Code 1325. When arrested, some were separated from the minors accompanying them, whom they claimed were their children. The administration justifies the proposed payments as legal settlements to compensate the illegal entrants for alleged mental trauma from having been separated from family members.

Such separations, of course, are standard when any parent is arrested and detained for any crime. For example, those imprisoned for trespassing at the U.S. Capitol on January 6 were separated from their children when they were arrested.

There can be little doubt that the prospect of getting almost a million dollars from the U.S. government will further incentivize hundreds of thousands of would-be entrants from all over the world to take a chance on winning this particular lottery. Not only do illegal entrants get to stay in the United States, jumping ahead of hopeful legal immigrants, but they may get a windfall of hundreds of thousands of dollars, in addition to free medical care, free public education, and other gratuitous benefits proposed by the Biden administration.

There is no doubt that even President Joe Biden understands how outrageous this proposal is. His first public comments about it show that, like millions of other Americans, he thought such payments should never even be considered. After those initial disapproving comments, however, Biden and others have tried to change the narrative. In the process, Biden has contradicted himself and made an incoherent mishmash of his policy.

After a press conference at the conclusion of the G-20 meeting in Rome, Fox News Peter Doocy asked, Mr. President, is it true were going to give $450,000 to border crossers who are separated? Biden did not respond, but just rubbed his brow and looked down.

Doocy raised the issue again at a press conference six days later, to which Biden simultaneously blamed Fox News for attracting the flood of migrants and accused it of spreading fake news about the proposed $450,000 payments: If you guys keep sending that garbage out, yeah. He then added, But its not true It will not happen.

Doocys question was not a surprise, and Bidens response was not just a careless slip of the tongue. Biden had almost a week to consider it after the initial Wall Street Journal report and Doocys question in Rome. Bidens quick and unequivocal denial suggests he shares the widespread outrage at the idea of paying illegal entrants up to a million dollars per family when the only reason they had been separated was that they had broken U.S. law.

But one day later, the administration made clear that Biden was, in fact, perfectly comfortable with what he had just said, will not happen. In a press conference on November 4, Deputy White House Press Secretary Karine Jean-Pierre essentially declared Bidens one-day-old statement inoperative.

[T]he president is perfectly comfortable with the Department of Justice settling with the individuals and families who are currently in litigation with the United States government, he said.

At another press conference on November 6, Biden denied saying what he had said three days earlier. When a reporter questioned him about his statement to Doocy that the report about payments was garbage, Biden said, I did not say that.

Biden then squarely contradicted his prior unequivocal denial that such payments would occur. Waving his finger at the reporter, he added, If, in fact, because of the outrageous behavior of the last administration, you come in across the border, whether legal or illegal, and you lost your child You lost your child! Hes gone! you deserve some kind of compensation, no matter what the circumstances. What that would be, I have no idea.

This latest Biden statement was both dishonest and incoherent. It was dishonest because his new position that it is up to the DOJ and I have no idea what the payments should be cannot be reconciled with his original unambiguous promise that possibl[e] payments of up to $450 thousand per person will not happen.

Biden was further dishonest when he mischaracterized what Doocy had asked. Doocy said only that there had been reports that payments of up to that amount might possibly be made. Bidens mischaracterization was a clear effort to try to wiggle out of his earlier unambiguous promise that it will not happen.

Bidens November 6 statement also demonstrates the incoherence of his new thinking about the payments. He said all illegal entrants separated from a child deserve the payments, no matter what the circumstances. So, according to Biden, fault and illegal conduct are irrelevant; the facts do not matter. That is an incoherent prescription for unlimited payments without any boundaries.

All of those still in jail because of their alleged illegal entry into the Capitol building on January 6 will no doubt be comforted to know that that the presidents view is that they are entitled to compensation for family separation, no matter what the circumstances.

The proposed payments to those who have invaded our country are more evidence that this administration has its priorities wrong. If the DOJ can devote hundreds of FBI agents and U.S. attorneys to the investigations and trials of those charged with crimes in connection with their illegal entry into the Capitol on January 6, then surely it can devote the necessary resources to investigate and battle the grab for taxpayer money by those who have been charged with illegal entry into the United States.

Bidens initial reaction shows that he shared the outrage over these payments. His handlers changed his position to serve the politics of his open border policy.

John Lucas is a practicing attorney who has tried and argued a variety of cases, including before the U. S. Supreme Court. Before entering law school at the University of Texas, he served in the Army Special Forces as an enlisted man and then graduated from the U. S. Military Academy at West Point in 1969. He is an Army Ranger and fought in Vietnam as an infantry platoon leader. He is married with five children. He and his wife now live in Virginia.

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Biden Can't Keep It Straight On Paying Illegals $450K In Reparations - The Federalist

Polling in the Virginia elections just concluded this week showed parents breaking for Republicans over education policies, which has Democrats alarmed.

On MSNBC Wednesday, a former Obama campaign manager declared, in an urgent tone, The one thing that we need to make sure that Republicans in 2022 dont become is the party of parents. Because we need to be the party of parents.

Its too late; thats already happening. Even the hoax-mongering New York Times can see it, and theyre afraid too.

On Nov. 4, the Times issued a hysterical article covering the Virginia results with the same motif. Republicans Pounce on Schools as a Wedge Issue to Unite the Party, read the headline, followed by this malicious smear in the subheading: Rallying around what it calls parental rights, the party is pushing to build on its victories this week by stoking white resentment and tapping into broader anger at the education system.

Get that? Parental rights in scare quotes and insisting its racist to complain about the clearly subpar quality of instruction offered to most American children in public schools.

The multiracial coalition of parents who want neo-racism out of their childrens publicly funded schools might have something to say about that, as might the multiracial GOP politicians elected Tuesday night in Virginia, but we already know The New York Times doesnt exist to report facts it exists to control opinion.

Democrats have reason to be afraid of losing the parent vote, and theyre demonstrating that fear by deploying the only weapon they have left: false accusations of racism. The truth is, its an existential threat to their party if American parents as a demographic begin shifting to the Republican Party and that is already well on its way.

An October report from the Institute for Family Studies finds there is marked polarization in desires related to marriage and childbearing by income, religious attendance, and partisanship as COVID-19 abates.

The report shows the majority of voters ages 18-55 who identify as Republicans are married, at 56 percent, while just 40 percent of Democrats aged 18-55 are married. That 16-point gap persists among parents in that same age range: 61 percent of Republicans in that age range are parents, as are just 45 percent of Democrats.

As with other pre-existing social trends, lockdowns accelerated all this. In a Newsweek article about the report, family policy researchers Brad Wilcox and Isabel Sawhill summarize further aspects of this trend: The rich, the religious and Republicans reported the greatest overall increase in the desire to marry while the poor, secular Americans and Democrats reported less or no increase in marriage interest.

The report also finds COVID fear-mongering has depressed lefty voterss already anemic desire to marry (marriage predicts fertility) and have children. It finds that right-leaning voters were more likely to be more rational and less frightened about COVID, which gave them social and familial advantages with major political implications.

Republicans have been more open to socializing since COVID-19 struck, likely making it easier for the unmarried in their ranks to date, the report says. And there is evidence they weathered COVID-19 somewhat better emotionally. We find, for instance, that 16% of Republicans reported being sad most of or all the time, compared to 19% of Independents and 20% of Democrats aged 18-55, according to the IFS/Wheatley May-June survey.

Republicans emotionally better-adjusted response to COVID likely played a role in helping right-leaning Americans turn up as the only partisan group whose desire to have children didnt decline in the wake of COVID-19.

This is more evidence that Democrats fear-mongering about COVID will politically backfire in the long run. And not just in concentrating fertility among their political opponents, but also in detaching families from the lefts No. 1 recruitment facility public schools. Extended and irrational school lockdowns definitely contributed to families discontent with public schools that helped push Youngkin across the finish line.

What are some implications of all this?

For one, this also makes Democrats the party of unhappier people, since married parents are the most likely to report theyre happy than are singles, as Wilcox and Sawhill note:

At a moment marked by social distrust, political polarization and declining in-person interaction, Americans who are married with children have an advantage when it comes to built-in social support. As stressful as family life can be, men and women who have formed families are less likelyto report feelings of loneliness and meaninglessness. In fact, men and women aged 18-55 who are married with children are more likely tosay they are very or pretty happy, especially compared with those who are not married and do not have childrenalthough its unclear whether thats because family life creates happiness or because the happiest among us are more likely to get married and have children.

The politics of resentment are indeed bitter, as weve seen vividly already. Mary Eberstadts Primal Screams documents the connections between family disintegration and political extremism. If family alienation allies itself more tightly with the Democrat Party, we can expect more politics of rage from them ahead.

Representing people with less investment in the future through parenting children will also drag on Democrats ability to provide a positive vision for the country and our communities. It also makes Democrats less likely to see issues from parents perspective, Wilcox noted to me in an email about the IFS report findings. This could help explain The New York Times and other media leftists inability to understand parents political defense of their children in Virginia as an act of love, not white resentment or any kind of resentment at all.

It also makes Democrats less likely to express support for marriage and families through public policy. This is another problem, because marriage and family formation are existential issues, not just for political parties, but for the good of the country. Without children and the self-restraint and creativity that love for them fosters, the countrys future is at risk.

A main way for the left to stave off the threat all this poses to their electoral dominance is another longstanding strategy: converting peoples kids through the education institutions they dominate. But in their frenzy to get Trump by weaponizing COVID, Democrats may have set up a series of ticking time bombs that detonate on this most important political territory.

More of those time bombs are set to go off. We havent seen half of the devastating effect of school lockdowns, for example, on todays school-age generation. All that is yet to come. It will shock and motivate parents, and change their minds about Democrats, even more.

Another key question this all raises is whether Republicans are ready to capitalize on this massive opportunity by acting decisively on behalf of the families who are giving it to them. Its clear what they want. Its also clear they will not take I cant for an answer.

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Democrats Are Right To Be Scared About Losing The Parent Vote - The Federalist

The Biden administration is looking at a shutdown of Michigans Line 5 pipeline, White House Deputy Press Secretary Karine Jean-Pierre confirmed to reporters Monday.

The Army Corps of Engineers is preparing an environmental impact to look through this, Jean-Pierre said in a press briefing, after denying reports that President Joe Biden is preparing to revoke the Canadian pipelines permit as happened to the Keystone XL pipeline on his first day in office.

A new environmental impact under this administration, however, is often a precursor to the projects cancellation. Jean-Pierre said the study would help inform any additional action or position the U.S. will be taking on the replacement of Line 5.

Politico broke the news Sunday that the White House was actively surveying the market consequences of a shutdown. The Line 5 pipeline operated by the Calgary-based energy company Enbridge transports about 540,000 barrels of crude oil and other petroleum products per day from western Canada through Michigans Upper and Lower Peninsula. The pipeline begins in Superior, Wis. and ends in Sarnia, Ontario.

Line 5s shutdown would deal the biggest blow to Michigan residents, where the project supplies 65 percent of the Upper Peninsulas propane demand and 55 percent of the entire states propane, according to Enbridge. As Americans approach winter with repeated warnings from the Energy Department of higher power prices, propane users will be hardest hit, already expected to pay up to 94 percent more than last year over the six-month heating season, according to season projections from the U.S. Energy Information Administration. By comparison, homes heated by electricity are expected to face up to a 15 percent increase and those heated by natural gas face as much as a 50 percent spike from the year prior. The price shocks could mean hundreds of dollars in higher heating bills.

The quiet deliberations inside the White House provoked more than a dozen Republican lawmakers on Capitol Hill to send a letter demanding the administration hold back.

As we enter the winter months and temperatures drop across the Midwest, the termination of Line 5 will undoubtedly further exacerbate shortages and price increases in home heating fuels like natural gas and propane at a time when Americans are already facing rapidly rising energy prices, steep home heating costs, global supply shortages, and skyrocketing gas prices, wrote lead author Rep. Bob Latta, R-Ohio, on Nov. 4, as reported by Politico.

Line 5s shutdown would follow the late-summer completion of Russias Nord Stream 2 feeding natural gas into Germany with Bidens blessing. The White House waived sanctions for the projects construction in May enhancing Russian leverage over Europe with its supply of natural gas, as nations too reliant on wind and solar struggle in a low-wind season. The European Union reported in 2019 that 41 percent of member nations gas imports came from Russia.

President Biden has pledged to follow the same formula as European nations faced with an energy crisis after nearly half a dozen banned hydraulic fracturing. Within months Biden has suppressed oil and gas production with a cascade of taxes and regulation leading to high gas prices that the administration concedes it has no plan to bring down.

At this time, I dont have anything new to share, Jean-Pierre said Monday.

Biden himself conceded gas prices at seven-year highs are unlikely to come down until sometime next year.

I dont see anything thats going to happen in the meantime thats going to significantly reduce gas prices, Biden said during a CNN town hall last month, placing blame on OPEC for refusing his request to raise oil output after the presidents destruction of domestic production.

In early October, Enbridge announced the nearly $3 billion-dollar completion of the Line 3 pipeline replacement project in neighboring Minnesota ending at Superior, Wisconsin. The projects finish came after the U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) and Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) ordered aging pipelines to be replaced.

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Biden Puts Another Pipeline On The Chopping Block - The Federalist

Looking to cement his legacy as a transformational president, President Joe Biden has poured most of his legislative priorities into one omnibus spending bill known as the Build Back Better plan. Initially proposed with a whopping $3.5 trillion price tag, progressive Democrats have had to compromise with the more moderate faction of their caucus, whittling the bill down to a meager $1.75 trillion framework.

Democrats hold a three seat majority in the House, and with Independent Senators Bernie Sanders of Vermont and Angus King of Maine caucusing with the Democrats, the Senate is essentially split 50/50 between Democrats and Republicans with Vice President Kamala Harris breaking a tie. Since it is eligible to be passed in the Senate under reconciliation, Republicans cannot block a vote with the filibuster, enabling Senate Democrats to pass the measure with a simple majority and no Republican support.While Democrats work to craft a passable bill, considerable negotiating effort has been spent attempting to bridge the gap between progressive and moderate members of the Democratic Caucus. Such negotiations highlight the virtue of an overlooked yet fundamental principle of American government: federalism. In a country of more than 330 million people, it is nearly impossible to arrive at policy considerations that are acceptable to a broad swath of Americans, and it often feels impossible to create consensus between the national representatives of the American people. Such struggles are a feature of the American system, not a bug. House Progressive Caucus Chair Pramila Jayapal (D-Wash.) summed up House progressives attitudes towards the Build Back Better plan when asked about the state of negotiations: there is too much at stake for working families and our communities to settle for something that can be later misunderstood, amended or abandoned altogether.

I do not doubt that communities in Representative Jayapals district care deeply about the elements of Build Back Better. After all, they ostensibly elected her to represent their interests. Fortunately, the American system already consists of governing bodies that legislate issues of concern to particular communities, namely the states. Members of communities elect legislators who are intimately aware of their concerns and who rule not in Washington, but in their own backyards. Negotiations do not take place between legislators representing vastly different economies nearly unrecognizable to one another but between those representing neighboring counties. This is not to suggest that all states are homogenous, but there is certainly more homogeneity within states than between them. State legislators are empowered to institute programs desired by the citizens within their jurisdictions. If citizens do not like the laws and programs of their state, they can move to another state that has not instituted such laws or programs.

The Constitution of the United States is a remarkable document that requires major decisions to take place at the most local level possible. It grants specific powers and jurisdictions to the federal government, leaving other powers to states and municipalities. Under the American system, if the community members from Representative Jayapals district want 12 weeks of paid family leave, they can elect state legislators and a governor who would institute such a plan, drawing taxes from and bestowing benefits upon those who support the proposal. If citizens living in Senator Manchins state of West Virginia do not want the same plans that Representative Jayapals constituents do, they are under no obligation to institute such plans.

During the 2012 presidential election, Republican nominee Mitt Romney was criticized for opposing health care regulation at the federal level that he supported at the state level while governor of Massachusetts. Far from contradictory, Romneys position demonstrated an understanding of the beauty of the American federalist system. States do what the federal government cannot and should not do. Rather than ram life-altering legislation through a 50/50 senate, Democrat senators should return to their states and encourage their constituents to contact their city counselors, state legislators and governors. If citizens of Vermont want government subsidies for hearing, dental and vision care, there is no reason that they should demand Alabama citizens follow in their footsteps. Vermonts government is perfectly competent enough to institute such subsidies at the state level.

Federalism allows for the needs of individuals and communities to be met by the legislators beholden to those individuals and communities. Instead of trying to negotiate a broad spending package acceptable to both New York and Nebraska, the federal government should allow each respective state to legislate themselves as it sees fit. Everyday life experience demonstrates that consensus is more easily arrived at among small groups than among large conglomerates. States and localities are better equipped to meet the needs of their citizens than 538 egotistic politicians in Washington, D.C. who represent economically and culturally diverse constituencies. If Biden wants to leave a positive legacy, he should praise the constitutional system rather than spend four years trying to hammer a square peg into a round hole.

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Reconciliation Bill Makes the Case for Federalism | Opinion | villanovan.com - Villanovan

Democrats know they will have to come back to raise taxes on the middle class later, and want to prevent people from paying taxes on their retirement balances at todays lower rates.

I dont earn $400,000 per year. In fact, Ive never reported an adjusted gross income of even $200,000 on my federal tax return, yet Democrats want to raise my taxes. And the reason Democrats could raise my taxes now explains why they will almost certainly raise everyones taxes later.

The issue involves a decision I made shortly after President Trumps tax relief act passed at the end of 2017. Rather than using the laws rate reductions to lower my annual tax bill, I chose to put that money to use. I rolled over my old Thrift Savings Planthe version of a 401(k) for federal employeesinto an Individual Retirement Account, and began converting the funds in that pre-tax IRA into an after-tax Roth IRA.

But Democrats would effectively ban me from making this move going forward. Section 138311 of House Democrats reconciliation bill would prohibit individuals from converting their IRA balances to after-tax Roth IRAs if any portion of the distribution comes from a non-deductible IRAregardless of that persons income.

Because my income slightly exceeded Roth contribution limits in a few years, I made contributions to a non-deductible IRA instead. Now, Democrats reconciliation bill would prohibit people like me from converting those fundsand any rollover IRA dollars I commingled with those fundsto a Roth IRA, even though my income never approached the $400,000 threshold below which Joe Biden promised to hold Americans harmless from tax increases.

When I found out Democrats had proposed this provision in September, with an effective date at the end of this year, I accelerated my plans. I completed converting my IRA rollover account to a Roth in early October, even though recognizing all the income this year, as opposed to spreading the conversion out over several more years, could push me into a higher tax bracket for 2021.

Despite a potential higher tax bill this year, I view the conversion as necessary to stave off the tax increases Democrats immense welfare state will bestow on all Americans in the future. In fact, I began converting my Thrift Savings Plan balances into a Roth IRA in 2018 precisely because I knew taxes would eventually rise, and I view todays tax rates as discounted compared to future levels.

In poker terms, Section 138311 of the reconciliation bill represents a tell. Democrats know they will have to come back to raise taxes on the middle class later, and want to prevent people from paying taxes on their retirement balances at todays lower rates. Voters should therefore pay much less attention to what politicians say than what they do, Section 138311 being a prime example.

The president recently claimed that I give you my word as a Biden: If you make under $400,000 a year, Ill never raise your taxes one cent. But the politician who went on to claim that Im going to make those at the top start to pay their share in taxes himself dodged nearly $517,000 in Medicare and Obamacare taxes.

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Democrats Will Raise Taxes On The Middle Class, Both Now And Later - The Federalist

There wont be any speeches, awards, or special recognition for veteran David Baldwin on November 11. Despite a 17-year career in the Armed Forces four in the Army and 13 in the Air Force, including sending classified communications satellites into space at Cape Canaveral and installing classified communication systems on Air Force bases in the Middle East during Desert Shield and Desert Storm Veterans Day will be like any other for the active septuagenarian living in rural Alabama.

There will be lots of phone calls from his flock hes pastor of the 132-year-old Mt. Zion Baptist Church and many from his business associates and family.

Flags fly on the light poles in downtown Camden (population 2,200) and flowers bloom at the tiny veterans park across the street from True Value hardware store. A few phone calls and a look at the local weekly newspaper doesnt show any special services Thursday, but Baldwin could get a discount if he goes to the zoo in Montgomery or a free sandwich at Zaxbys in Selma.

Like most veterans, Baldwin is quietly going about his life, despite his remarkable military service that took him around the world on top-secret assignments, some of which he still cannot talk about today. He also will hobble into the Comprehensive Wound Center in Birmingham Thursday, as doctors continue to treat the wound on his foot caused by the only thing that has slowed him down in 70 years a rusty nail, something even a bite from a brown recluse spider couldnt do during his fishing trip two years ago.

Baldwin was born in 1951 in a tin-roofed shack in Pebble Hill, Alabama, to a dirt-poor, hardworking family, the second of 10 children. His father worked long hours at a lumber mill and spent Sundays circuit preaching at churches in Pine Level, Macedonia, Arkadelphia, and Boiling Springs.

Rev. L.V. Baldwin expected his sons to work hard too. In fact, his father wouldnt let him leave high school and go to college at age 15 because he needed him to pick beans, cotton, and black-eyed peas.But his humble beginnings, and the often terrorizing life for blacks in the segregated South, didnt limit Baldwins extraordinary life, which included a stint on the faculty of the National Cryptologic School run by the National Security Agency. (His oldest brother, Lewis, is professor emeritus at Vanderbilt University.)

Baldwin entered Talledega College in April 1968, at the age of 16, just days after Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. was assassinated in Memphis. Baldwin and his brother had heard King speak in Camden in 1965 in support of civil rights marchers. They were deeply moved by his words: You are somebody. You matter to the world. During summers, Baldwin worked at an inner-city church in Atlanta and on campaigns for Andrew Young.

Baldwin attended Alabamas oldest historically black college on a full scholarship and graduated in 1972 with a bachelors degree in math and physics. He was accepted to Dartmouth Medical School and wanted to become a neurosurgeon, but discovered he didnt have the science background he needed.

After graduate studies in science at several prominent universities, he married and enlisted in the U.S. Army in 1975, where he was trained as a combat medic. His overseas posting first was to the Battalion Medical Aid Station in Stuttgart, Germany. Later, he trained as a drug and alcohol abuse counselor and served at the Fifth U.S. Army Hospital, Bad Cannstatt, Germany.

When Baldwin returned stateside in 1979, he asked about his application to Officer Training School to become a commissioned officer, a fairly common assignment for college graduates. After searching, they found his application, with all the necessary signatures, hidden in a desk drawer of his supervisor, who was on leave, with a coffee mug stain covering his photograph.

He immediately switched his enlistment to the U.S. Air Force, doubled his salary, and was enrolled in Officer Training School, where he was commissioned as a second lieutenant, eventually becoming a major.

He switched fields from medicine to communications, becoming a specialist in classified communications systems installed at bases throughout the Pacific, including Japan, South Korea, and Saudi Arabia. He was serving in the Middle East during Desert Shield and Desert Storm.

Later, he received a master of business administration-aeronautics from Embry-Riddle Aeronautical University and worked alongside faculty at Stanford and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology developing systems for satellites. He was sent to Cape Canaveral to watch one of the satellite launches. He helped prepare top secret packages that went into war zones and were placed on airplanes flown by the secretary of defense.

I loved serving in the military; you learn so much, it was like a university in itself, Baldwin told me.

Baldwin retired from the military in 1996 when his wife Linda got sick, and took math and science teaching positions at high schools and middle schools in her hometown of Greenville, North Carolina, and in his hometown of Camden. He wrote two math picture books for young students that underscore his interest in preparing young minds for higher-level math.

In 2008, while visiting his dying mother, Baldwin told her he felt called then to ministry. A woman of few words, she squeezed his hand, and he knew she was grateful he was following in the footsteps of his father, grandfather, and older brother.

At the urging of his siblings, Baldwin returned home to rural Wilcox County permanently in 2018, after his wife died. Four of the 10 Baldwin siblings live in the area. He lives in Camden, the county seat, and works on business ventures with family in Gees Bend and pastoring the flock at Mt. Zion Missionary Baptist Church in nearby Coy.

Not one to slow down, Baldwin was also tutoring at an afterschool program in the community of Vredenburgh, until a rusty nail took him out this summer. He was at his church inspecting some repairs when he stepped on it.

Baldwin preached that day despite the pain, and finally hobbled into the local medical center the next day. Loaded up with antibiotics and a tetanus shot, he thought he was on his way to recovery. He was not.

Another two medical interventions, including lancing the wound, failed. The bone was infected and he had to have surgery on his right foot at Grandview Hospital in Birmingham, in September, where he was hospitalized for 10 days. They also discovered he had diabetes, which had contributed to the festering wound.

Although he didnt think hed lose his foot, he said there were times it looked pretty grim.

Baldwin still keeps an eye on the renovation of the historic church, and continues to preach while they meet temporarily at another Baptist church.

On the ground next to the church building is a cement slab with plumbing already installed that will be the home of the Mt. Zion Family Resource Center. Pastor Baldwin envisions a community gathering place where people can come together for hot meals, tutoring, prayer, counseling, and learning from each other, one generation to the next, in a community marked by generational poverty.

Its a big task and expense for a small congregation to take on with a pastor in his 70s. But Pastor Baldwin has done the math. And he figures with the Lord, its possible:When the Lord gives you something to do, you just have to do it, regardless of your age.

Christine Weerts, author of "Heroes of Faith: Rosa J. Young," is a researcher with the Alabama Black Lutheran Heritage Association. She won a commendation from the Concordia Historical Institute in 2020 for her historical writing on race. A freelance writer, she has degrees in music (BA) and religion (MA).

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This Veteran Has Served Our Country In Amazing Ways His Entire Life - The Federalist

Former President Barack Obama attempted to relitigate his administrations climate policies Monday in a speech to the COP26 global summit on climate change.

Some of our progress stalled when my successor decided to unilaterally pull out of the Paris Agreement in his first year in office, Obama said in Glasgow.

The direct shot at former President Donald Trump for withdrawing from the Paris Climate Accords is a reminder of how Obama sought to govern: without voter approval.

The American signature on the Paris Agreement was unilateral to begin with, signed under President Obama without a legislative mandate. President Joe Biden adopted the same standard on his first day in office with unilateral U.S. recommitment to the Paris pledge reducing emissions.

The goals of the agreement seek to keep global temperatures well below 2 degrees Celsius (3.6 Fahrenheit) compared to preindustrial levels, with under 1.5 degrees set as the preferential target. The planet has already warmed 1.1 degrees Celsius since theLittle Ice Age century of the 1800s, coinciding with the greatest rise in standards of living humans have ever experienced.

President Obamas record is a record of a country run on executive order, with 276 issued over an eight-year tenure. While not the most of any president, Obama pursued unilateral action to implement sweeping policy changes on major issues, from orders on climate change to mass amnesty welcoming unchecked immigration. Then the president would go on to blame Republicans over the administrations failures.

The same routine repeated itself in Scotland on Monday.

Both of us, Obama said in reference to himself and Biden, have been constrained in large part by the fact that one of our two major parties has decided not only to sit on the sidelines, but express active hostility towards climate science, and make climate change a partisan issue.

Obama was stripped of a Democrat Congress for the rest of his presidency in 2010 after an avalanche of far-left policies provoked a conservative uprising in form of the Tea Party movement. Rather than moderate his agenda to unite the country and court moderate support, President Obama pursued an alternative route through executive action.

Even with Democrat majorities in both legislative chambers, President Biden has already demonstrated a fondness for the pen, with more executive orders signed within his first 100 days than every predecessor in the same timeframe back to Franklin Roosevelt.

Last weeks elections in Virginia, New Jersey, and school boards across the country show once again, history is poised to repeat itself. Republicans swept Virginias top three offices in the first statewide wins in a state gone blue since 2009 while nearly capturing the New Jersey governors mansion.

The Biden White House, however, after redefining what it means to run a progressive presidency, has shown no signs of moderating. Its expressed frustration at a pair of moderate senators in a 50-50 chamber thats forced the party to trim down colossal spending packages pushed by leftist Democrats. The decline of the country has led to a drop in Bidens approval rating to George W. Bush-era lows hovered around 43 percent in the Real Clear aggregate.

After Bidens appearance in Glasgow last week was an advertisement for Chinese coal and Russian gas, Obamas was a reminder of Democrats strategy on climate change, giving advantage to overseas adversaries while forgoing the congressional go-ahead.

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Obama Speech In Glasgow Is A Reminder Of How Badly He Governed - The Federalist

Of all the intrusions on Americans civil liberties during the COVID-19 pandemic, mandates forcing those who have already had the virus to vaccinate anyway are the hardest to understand. By now, what has been known for centuries that survival confers immunity on the survivor has been borne out in numerous well-regarded studies on COVID-19 recovery. Yet government officials continue to disregard them, insisting COVID-19 survivors get the shot like everyone else.

In September, the Biden Administration announced a mandatory vaccine policy that fails to recognize natural immunity. Notwithstanding his early assurances that vaccines would not be mandatory, President Biden ordered a vaccine mandate for federal workers. And he said that a similar rule for employees at large private companies would be forthcoming from the Department of Labor. That rule was released on Thursday, November 4th, when the Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) issued an emergency temporary standard (ETS) detailing the vaccination requirements. Many private companies had already begun to comply, issuing their own workplace mandates.

State and local governments are also requiring the vaccine. In the coming months, The Wall Street Journal reported, [t]ens of thousands of U.S. workers across industries from healthcare to education to airlines and the military face dismissal if they fail to get vaccinated. Among the workers facing the loss of their jobs are those who have already had the virus and recovered.

Why is the government doubling down on COVID-19 survivors?

In his Nobel-prize winning book, Crowds and Power, Elias Canetti suggests the answer. Survivors, he argues, whether of battle or disease, are a symbol of strength. He presents the reader with the profile of the epidemic survivor famously recounted by Thucydides:

[T]hose who had the plague themselves and had recovered from it knew what it was like and at the same time felt themselves to be safe, for no-one caught the disease twice, or, if he did, the second attack was never fatal. Such people were congratulated on all sides, and they themselves were so elated at the time of their recovery that they fondly imagined that they could never die of any other disease in the future.

Survivors of the plague, in other words, were better off than if they had never gotten sick at all. What hadnt killed them made them stronger, both in their own eyes and the eyes of others.

Thucydidess understanding of natural immunity has stood the test of time. Writing for the Brownstone Institute, Harvard Medical School professor Martin Kulldorff observes that has been the case with other coronaviruses found in the population, We also have natural immunity after Covid-19 disease, as there have been exceedingly few reinfections with serious illness or death, despite a widely circulating virus. That natural immunity actually provides better immunity than a vaccine, he concludes, referencing a widely cited Israeli study.

Another outspoken critic of imposing vaccine mandates on COVID-19 survivors is Dr. Marty Makary. He faults our public health institutions for failing to come forward with good information on COVID-19 in general and on natural immunity in particular, especially compared to the caliber of studies coming out of highly vaccinated countries like Israel. The dearth of data on naturally acquired immunity makes no sense in a country like the United States that spends lavishly on health care.

It does, however, give cover to obfuscating public health officials when they are asked to explain why they disregard naturally acquired immunity.

Equivocal messaging from the White House chief medical advisor, Dr. Anthony Fauci, has compounded public uncertainty. As early as April of last year, The New York Times reported Fauci as saying he was really confident that people who recover are protected against re-infection.

But this past September, when asked whether the case could be made to COVID-19 survivors that they should get a vaccine notwithstanding natural immunity, Fauci replied, I dont have a really firm answer for you on that. Finally, last month, The Wall Street Journal reported that according to Fauci, vaccines are still the recommendation [over natural immunity] because there has been more precise research into vaccine-based immunity.

Kulldorff argues that Faucis approach undermines the legitimacy of naturally acquired immunity from contracting COVID-19. He calls the medical establishments questioning of it stunning.

The answer to Kulldorffs astonishment lies not in science, however, but in history and politics. For as soon as the COVID-19 pandemic began, the power-grabbing ensued, on every level. From governors never-ending executive lockdown decrees, to self-appointed experts and COVID-19 task forces, down to the neighborhood mask police, all who feared missing out on a good crisis seized control of what they could.

Vaccine mandates are the latest manifestation of the ongoing breakdown in the rule of law and the deprivation of civil liberties. As our public health authoritarians now toy with boosters in perpetuity, there is no end in sight to the amount of power they will seize if allowed.

This is why the public health establishment wont talk about, much less abide, natural immunity. They have no use for it. Indeed, it stands in the way. Those who have it dont need the government to force the vaccine on them. They can survive on their own power.

That unique power is a poke in the eye to rulers who presume complete control. Despots, Canetti explains, regard survival as their prerogative and are therefore especially hostile to the challenge presented by survivors. To the health care despots who seek the ultimate power over others, the COVID-19 survivors natural immunity represents the greatest threat of all: the power of the individual.

Excerpt from:

Why Politicians And Bureaucrats Are So Threatened By COVID Survivors - The Federalist

California Democrat Gov. Gavin Newsom hasnt appeared in public since Oct. 27, when the governor received a coronavirus booster shot nearly two weeks ago.

Two days later, Newsom canceled his trip to the COP26 global summit on climate change in Scotland. After the announcement said Newsom would participate virtually, the governor was left off the California delegations schedule entirely, and replaced by Lt. Gov. Eleni Kounalakis in his stead, according to the Associated Press. The only statement from the governors office explained the sudden absence as a consequence of unspecified family obligations.

On Sunday, California First Lady Jennifer Siebel Newsom defended her husbands break from public view in a since-deleted tweet. The tweet was screenshotted by Sacramento Bee politics reporter Sophia Bollag reposted to Twitter.

Its funny how certain folks cant handle truth, the first lady wrote. When someone cancels something, maybe theyre just in the office working; maybe in their free time theyre at home with their family, at their kids sports matches, or dining out with their wife. Please stop hating and get a life.

While week-long absences are not uncommon among high-profile public-facing figures, they are usually explained. Newsoms office however, has kept the public in the dark on the circumstances of Newsoms whereabouts despite media inquiries, including from the Associated Press. Newsoms office did not immediately respond to The Federalists request for comment.

In 2009, former South Carolina Republican Gov. Mark Sanford went missing in South America with an Argentine mistress while his office claimed the governor was hiking the Appalachian Trail. A decade later, President Donald Trump awarded Sanford the nickname Mr. Appalachian Trail as the former governor and House member challenged the incumbent president in a short-lived primary.

In the summer of 2018, CNNs Brian Stelter ran a CNN discussion on then-First Lady Melania Trumps whereabouts after she receded from the public spotlight.

While Stelters visual alleged the first lady had not been between May 10 and June 3, she was spotted in the West Wing by a CNBC reporter on May 29th.

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Where In The World Is Gavin Newsom? - The Federalist

On Wednesday, a federal lawsuit filed against the Michigan secretary of state revealed the states voter rolls potentially include more than 25,000 dead people, including names of more than 20,000 individuals who have been dead for more than a decade.

In the lawsuit filed by the Public Interest Legal Foundation, or PILF, a nonprofit law firm dedicated to election integrity, the group alleges that the Michigan Secretary of States Office, headed by Secretary of State Jocelyn Benson, violated Section 8 of the National Voter Registration Act of 1993. That federal law requires states to conduct a general program that makes a reasonable effort to remove the names of voters who have died.

In its 20-page complaint, the PILF detailed efforts it had made beginning in the run-up to the 2020 election to ensure Michigan voter rolls did not include deceased individuals. After obtaining data from the state in early 2020 and then hiring a data analysis expert who cross-checked the data against commercial databases and information obtained from the Social Security Administration, the PILF determined the current Michigan rolls included approximately tens of thousands of individuals who appeared deceased.

After providing that information to the Michigan secretary of state, the PILF re-ran the data at several junctions to determine if Benson had addressed the problem, but 94 percent of the individuals identified remain on the official rolls. Yet when the PILF sought to inspect the states records under the provisions of the National Voter Registration Act, Michigans secretary of state refused them access.

Further investigation by the PILF revealed evidence indicating 334 individuals had registered to vote after their deaths. Without further inquiry, the nonprofits claim says, there is no way to know for certain whether these post-death registrations are the result of identity theft, data input error, or for some other reasons.

The PILFs discovery merits investigation and action, the plaintiff alleged, noting that the same issue arose in Pennsylvania shortly before the November 2020 election. Also later, in early 2021, a Pennsylvania widower was indicted for allegedly impersonating his wife by registering to vote after she died and requesting an absentee ballot. The deceased wife in that case was one of the 100 names the PILF had discovered and provided to Pennsylvania officials.

It will be some time before last weeks lawsuit filed by the PILF against Michigan will result in concrete steps to ensure the voting rolls do not include dead people. But that is just the skin of the problem, as demonstrated by a press release Michigans secretary of state issued in January 2021. In it, she wrote of an additional 177,000 voter registrations slated for cancellation because the individuals appeared to have moved from their registration address.

How many of those individuals voted illegally in 2020? Given what has been discovered in Georgia since last Novembers presidential electionthat enough illegal votes were cast in the state to reach Joe Bidens margin of victoryit seems likely that some portion of those 177,000 votes were also cast illegally.

The problem over our election system does not begin and end, however, with inflated and inaccurate voting rolls, which permit untold illegal and fraudulent voting. Rather, as Michigans next-door neighbor Wisconsin exposed over the last two weeks, the problem runs bone-deepall the way to the election officials charged with ensuring fair and honest elections.

There, the Racine County Sheriffs Office revealed for the nation that the Wisconsin Election Commission illegally (and possibly criminally) directed municipalities to violate the election codes mandate that special voting deputies conduct elections at residential facilities, such as nursing homes. Also last week, after Wisconsins attorney general refused to investigate that blatant violation of state law, the sheriff referred charges to the Racine County district attorney.

Rather than address the crisis of confidence facing our countrys electoral system, as demonstrated by the situations in Racine and Georgia, as well as the recent case filed in Michigan, corporate media and self-interested politicians stay silentor instead sell the lie that the real problem Americans face is voter suppression.

We saw this last week when, hours after the media called the Virginia governors race for Republican Glenn Youngkin, the left began pushing the voter suppression canard. They also immediately re-upped calls for passing H.R. 1, the so-called For the Peoples Act, which would gut many popular and necessary state election integrity laws, such as voter identification laws.

There was no voter suppression in Virginia, however, or anywhere else for that matter. What there was, though, was a repeat of 2020s blatant disregard for election law by state officials and with no consequence.

In Virginia, we saw that when Fairfax County election officials issued ballots for voters who failed to comply with the states legal requirement that they include the final four digits of their Social Security numbers on their applications for a mail-in or absentee ballot. While that violation of election law could not have been more clear, a state court refused to enjoin Fairfax County officials, finding that the nonprofit the Virginia Institute for Public Policy lacked standing, or the right to sue, over the violation.

With Youngkins victory capped by more than 70,000 votes, what election officials did in the states most populated countyand one that went 70-30 for Joe Biden and Democrat Sen. Mark Warnerappears moot. But it isnt: Election integrity matters, no matter which party wins and no matter the spread of the victory.

To prove that, Virginias newly elected attorney general, Republican Jason Miyares, should launch an investigation into the violations of state election law by Fairfax County officials. If he wont, dont be surprised when we see a repeat in 2022 and beyond. Dont be surprised, either, when the average citizen learns from the pros how to lie, cheat, and steal his way to polls, which wont be hard with the messy voting rolls in Michigan and elsewhere.

Margot Cleveland is a senior contributor to The Federalist. Cleveland served nearly 25 years as a permanent law clerk to a federal appellate judge and is a former full-time faculty member and adjunct instructor at the college of business at the University of Notre Dame.The views expressed here are those of Cleveland in her private capacity.

The rest is here:

Why Does Michigan Still Have 25,000 Dead People On Its Voter Rolls? - The Federalist