Tom Hanks hates you          

It bears remembering that many show-business monkeys earn their status by catering to callow customers. Given that, braying whatever titillates that wet-eared market is probably judicious business reckoning, crucial to currying buyer favor. As goes the saw: The customer is always right.

Some publicly subversive limelighters may seize different levers in the voting-booth's cover.

But the above does not explain Tom Hanks. He hosts Barack Hussein Obama on his yacht in the south of France, and likely is sincere in his foulness.

In early 2016, Hanks said of then-candidate Donald Trump: "I think that man will become president of the United States right around the time that spaceships come down filled with dinosaurs in red capes."

President Trump is now in his second term.

Today's headlines tell of Hanks, on last week's Saturday Night Live 50th anniversary broadcast, mocking the tens of millions of Americans who buoyed Donald Trump to the Resolute Desk. 

Tiresomely, SNL writers and Hanks dragged out the threadbare stereotype of Trump supporters as drawling, white racist hayseeds of minimal intellect.

(An earlier iteration of this false and demeaning depiction was Obama's 2008 dismissal of working-class voters: "[T]hey cling to guns or religion or antipathy to people who aren't like them..." the then-president trumpeted.)

Unfortunately common are entertainment luminaries who evince tremendous talents at their crafts but who, regarding political and cultural matters, seem to have skulls jam-packed with yellowish diarrhea.

Addle-pated though they be, they have no less right to opine on substantive topics than does the present writer. Free speech is a crucial factor in individual liberty, nevermind that most outspoken celebrities tend toward imbecility.

As Vice-President Vance recently declared in Europe: "In Washington, there is a new sheriff in town, and under Donald Trump’s leadership, we may disagree with your views, but we will fight to defend your right to offer it in the public square, agree or disagree."

No one disputes Hollywood subversives' right to spew inanities. Still, one wishes they would heed Laura I.'s admonition: Shut up and sing.

As for Tom Hanks, he should have stayed on that island.

Trump resistance redux                                                                   

An unintended and negative consequence of President Trump's landslide victory is the emergence of a subversive element, one which seeks to defy American immigration laws. Perhaps they wrongly believe their illicit misdoings are justified by fantasized moral superiority.

One national example is New Jersey Governor Phil Murphy, who implied to a recent interviewer that he and his wife were considering harboring an illegal in their home: "Let's have her live at our house above our garage, and good luck to the feds coming in to try and get her."

Sadly, this canker has also been exemplified here in Iowa.

In January, Waterloo Superintendent of Schools Jared Smith issued an official advisory (in numerous foreign languages) to illegal students. He advised them how to impede American legal authorities. 

Dr. Jared Smith

Can a more anti-American attitude be displayed than one evincing contempt for our nation's legal champions, and for statutes enacted by democratically-elected legislative representatives?

After he'd shoehorned into the letter boilerplate language with which he professed respect for law, Smith boasted: "We will not share student information or grant law enforcement building access unless legally required to do so."

(Last February, accompanied by a Christian pastor friend, this writer braved Waterloo's dangerously frigid temperatures to support Trump in the Iowa caucus; Iowa did favor the Republican candidate. The event was convened in a school. At each desk was a fresh copy of far-left radical Howard Zinn's "A People's History of the United States," which is fine. Students should consider ideas across the political spectrum. But I wondered whether opposing philosophies enjoyed equal schoolroom visibility.)

"Lastly, get the history books out," counseled former U.S. Representative Dave Nagle (D-IA), in a February 1 essay printed by the Waterloo Courier. (Full disclosure: The Courier has also published numerous pieces by this writer.)

Former U.S. Rep. Dave Nagle (D-IA)

"Study the Underground Railroad," Nagle continued. "For all those who, if given the time, could produce proper papers, pack them in your basement, give them the garage, hide them in your churches so we can organize a proper presentation of their right to be here...That will be your call when the federal government shows up."

Like Murphy, Nagle blatantly advocates challenging law enforcement. He skirts borderline criminality, broadly winking his scofflaw intent.

And that the former U.S. Representative would liken present-day, reprehensible Democrat anarchy to historic moral opposition to slavery is a howling offense deserving of the description 'surfboarding to status atop others' suffering.'

Most recently, Winneshiek County, Iowa Sheriff Dan Marx boasted in a February 4 Facebook post of his intention to do all he could to "block, interfere, and interrupt" ICE agents in the performance of their lawful duties regarding illegal immigration. 

Sheriff Dan Marx

Marx characterized U.S. citizenship laws as "unconstitutional." (Isn't that for the Supreme Court to determine -- and not the lowly "Sanctuary Sheriff" of Winneshiek County?)

Iowa Governor Kim Reynolds directed the accessory-to-crime county official to acquaint himself with a relevant 2018-adopted state law. 

"Specifically, Iowa law provides a sheriff shall not adopt or enforce a policy or take any other action under which the sheriff prohibits or discourages the enforcement of immigration laws," she wrote.

"Iowa law further requires that a sheriff shall not prohibit or discourage a law enforcement officer from assisting or cooperating with a federal immigration officer as reasonable or necessary," the governor continued. "Including providing enforcement assistance."

Gov. Reynolds also spoke of pulling state funding from Winneshiek County. And Iowa Attorney General Brenna Byrd opened an investigation.

Each above-cited wrong recalls former Alabama Governor George Wallace, a Democrat, 'standing in the schoolhouse door' to prevent federal authorities from entering to racially integrate public schools. 

Former Alabama Governor George Wallace, Democrat

Trump victory already benefiting Americans

After four years of anonymous White House functionaries enacting policies from under the shadow of a fast-fading slumberer, America has a bustling leader who maintains our interests uppermost on the list. 

"The golden age of America starts now," President Trump thundered in his inaugural speech.

His assuming of authority was an historic moment, one of magnitude few generations witness. The event was more than a ritualistic function; it signified that America is seizing back its position as the world's number one superpower.

Consider just some crucial victories the people's choice has to his credit, in just his first days behind the Resolute Desk:

- Locating and eliminating wasteful spending of millions of taxpayer dollars, through the Elon Musk-headed Department Of Government Efficiency.

- Billions (if not more) in new investments in our country's economy;

- Rigorous investigations (and potential prosecutions) of scheming politicos who choreographed nationwide lawfare against an electoral adversary;

- January 6 hostages released from years-long, unjust and tortuous imprisonment; 

- Illegal border invasions halved;

- Mass deportations of criminal gangs underway, bringing safety back to American streets;

- Biological males no longer allowed to participate in girls' and women's sports;

- An incoming (at this writing) executive order ridding our military of "transgenders;"

- Children protected from chemical harms and surgical mutilations perpetrated to "transition" the innocents;

- Advocacy of unborn babies' right to life, one manifestation of which is President Trump's nominations of contitutionalists to the judicial bench.

- An executive order barring states' use of federal monies for abortions.

More:

Supposed allies will no longer take advantage of us in trade and defense matters. No more will taxes paid by hard-toiling U.S. citizens be misused to bankroll hostile nations whose peoples chant for our demise, countries that provide abundant support to murderous terrorists. 

And rightly trash-canned are inherently divisive DEI policies and programs that sprang from the pernicious falsity that one's pigmentation or genitalia are primary attributes. 

Our future tax revenues will not be squandered on scholastic indoctrination that encourages hatred of America, of Judaism, of Christianity. 

The antisemitism that has raised its death's head on colleges and universities nationwide is a morally despicable foulness, one to be smited at every turn. President Trump is the best American presidential friend Israel has ever had. His election illustrated Americans' foursquare support of our historic Middle East ally.

Like millions of my fellow citizens, I watched the 47th president's inauguration with satisfaction, pride, and a "happy days are here, again" optimism. It was the culmination of a massive push undertaken nationally by Americans of diverse descriptions to return our country to its foundational principles - like equality, individual liberty, and the God-given right of all men to speak their minds without fear of oppression.

Citizens must now put aside marginal disputes and join together to embrace the unity that is, and has always been, our greatest strength. In President Abraham Lincoln's immortal 1858 words: "A house divided against itself cannot stand."

Of the first attempted assassination of him, in Butler, Pennsylvania, President Trump once remarked: "I was saved by God to make America great, again."

Now, all citizens are benefiting.

Ruination awaits America's enemies

An unintended and negative consequence of President Trump's landslide victory is the emergence of a subversive element, one which seeks to defy American laws advocated by patriotic people's chosen leader.

This canker was recently exemplified in Waterloo, when Superintendent of Schools Jared Smith issued an official advisory (in numerous foreign languages) to illegal students. He advised them on how to impede American law enforcement. 

Can a more anti-American attitude be displayed than one evincing contempt for our nation's legal champions and statutes enacted by democratically-elected legislative representatives?

After he'd shoehorned into the letter boilerplate language with which he professed respect for law, Smith boasted: "We will not share student informtion or grant law enforcement building access unless legally required to do so."

It's reprehensible to teach Waterloo youth that non-compliance with authorities carrying out legal responsibilities is acceptable - even virtuous. By his own admission, the superintendent doesn't naturally have it in him to comply with related laws, but would do so only if forced.

Last February, patriotic Americans flooded polls to endorse then-candidate Donald Trump. Among salutary results of his landslide election is that ultimate ruination will surely befall America's domestic enemies.

Addendum: Last February, accompanied by a Christian pastor friend, I braved Waterloo's dangerously frigid temperatures to support Trump in the Iowa caucus. (And Iowa did favor the Republican candidate.) The event was convened in a school. At each desk was a fresh copy of far-left radical Howard Zinn's "A People's History of the United States," which is fine. Students should consider ideas across the political spectrum. But I wondered whether opposing philosophies also enjoyed schoolroom visibility.

Chicago Mayor Brandon Johnson vs American law and order               

C hicago Mayor Brandon Johnson vs American law and order

Surely, many fine people live in Chicago. But Mayor Brandon Johnson is not one of them. Like fellow Democrat Governor George Wallace did in 1963, Johnson is 'standing in the schoolhouse door,' in defiance of federal law enforcement. 

Segregationist Wallace exploited the power of his office to impede federally-sanctioned racial integration of schools; Johnson hopes to emulate that dynamic, refusing today to cooperate with federal law officers fighting hordes of foreign invaders who imperil us all.

The subversive mayor is infamous for his staggeringly anti-American embrace of illegal immigrants' criminality. His horrific posture includes maintaining that Chicago police have no obligation to aid federal authorities in enforcing existent citizenship laws.

During remarks at a Tuesday press conference, Johnson implicitly likened President Trump to Confederacy President Jefferson Davis and racist Southerners of yore. Too, he barely veiled a comparison of legitimate enforcement of citizenship statutes to uncited past unjust efforts. (The mayor was too craven to vent his foulness without subterfuge.)

The attitude of 'progressive' Democrats like Johnson seems to be: If one dislikes a law, one may freely disobey it. That philosophy corrodes civilized societies in which laws governing behavior are determined by the legal populace.

In that same press affair, Chicago Police Chief Larry Snelling continually specified "violent" crimes, as if to Chicago officials' thinking, non-violent offenses (like entering America illegally) are unobjectionable - and perhaps even smiled-upon by the Johnson quislings.

It may be that when Mayor Johnson was an infant, his mother dropped him on his head thirty-two times. And that's gentle speculation.

Liberty not preserved by weakness          

In days of United States infancy, upstart patriots strove courageously to topple British King George III's tyrannical dominance of the emergent New Land. We owe a tremendous debt to those champions of precious liberty.

Not least, because voices now counsel timidity.

Iowa's Des Moines Register recently carried an article  originally featured by fellow Gannett newspaper USA Today. The Register's version was titled "Is the 2024 election giving you major anxiety? You're not alone. Here's how to cope."

The opening paragraph classes 'election anxiety' with legitimate concerns over wars and natural disasters. A mental health counselor laments apprehensions among progressives' routinely bannered "marginalized communities."

Once, elections were rightly viewed as vehicles for popular voices to enter national conversation, and as advantageous opportunities for minorities seeking visibility.

No more. Now they are portrayed as nerve-shattering menaces. And surviving the horrors of citizens debating topical matters and casting ballots per beliefs supposedly requires medical intervention.

Such imbecility is of recent vintage. Campus crying rooms were step one. Far-left worry-warts soon labelled unpopular racial opinions as "health hazards." They asserted untrammeled citizen speech posed perils from which government boot-stomps offered deliverance.

A 2018 Hill essay co-authored by Kristin Clarke, "It's time for an online Civil Rights Act," preposterously equated distasteful online expression with physical violence. The piece argued that governmental regulation be imposed on privately owned platforms, that sites be made "safer" for "disenfranchised and marginalized communities."

(Did Clarke suffer career setbacks for advocating Big Brother stifling of citizen speech? Hardly. The Washington Post reported that in 2021, Biden nominated her to head the U.S. Department of Justice Civil Rights Division.)

The right (even duty) of free people to stand independently and chart our nation's course - a right paid for by patriots' blood - remains as vital as when rebels dumped English tea in the Boston Harbor.

No matter that today's milquetoastian progressives sob otherwise.

Exposing a Fake News monger

Despite an unsympathetic Chicago Economic Club interviewer, Donald Trump excelled in the Tuesday afternoon event. He made strong cases for his positions on trade and other economic matters. And, by holding forth with characteristic bluntness and jocular swagger, he inspired attendees to loud bursts of cheering and applause.

Those wondering about interviewer/Bloomberg News Editor-In-Chief  John Micklethwait's knee-jerk contrary posture will find this background information of interest: 

A November 24, 2019 CNBC report (still up on CNBC's site) disclosed that EIC Micklethwait  had sent Bloomberg News  employees a memo advising them to give delicate treatment to then-Democrat nomination candidate Michael Bloomberg, as well as to all other Democrat-nomination aspirants.

"We will continue our tradition of not investigating Mike (and his family and foundation)," insisted Micklethwait. "And we will extend the same policies to his rivals in the Democratic primaries. We cannot treat Mike's Democratic competitors differently from him."

One is reminded of Trump's admonition that Fake News is the enemy of the American people.

This essay of mine ran in the October 13 edition of the Cedar Rapids Gazette [IA].

Under Trump, patriotic fervor swelled as he put 'America First'                 

Last July, a Butler, Pennsylvania aspiring assassin's rifle-bullet thankfully failed to kill President Trump. Bloodied but standing tall, the inspirational candidate thrust a defiant fist into the air. It was a stirring moment. The iconic photograph is one for the history books.

And now, having survived a second murderous attempt, Trump still holds high liberty's lamp; his redoubled determination bespeaks courage to which all good Iowans aspire.

Should he prevail this November, we can expect national return to greatness. Consider how good we had it during the previous Trump Years:

'America First' guided every policy. That's common sense. Every nation's citizens should demand their leaders pursue native interests over others' at each turn. 

Our economy was robust. Wallets smiled. Store-shelves were crammed with food and other products people wanted. (Unfortunately, inflation and shortages arrived later, under the Biden-Harris administration.)

Americans could depend on Trump to protect jobs. He understood working people's concerns and crafted sympathetic policies. Manufacturing jobs were safe. Factories were incentivized to remain in (or return to) our land.

Gas prices were low. We didn't need other countries' oil since we were energy dominant. Labor in the domestic gas-and-oil industry thrived, allowing countless hardworking men and women to feed families, pay for childrens' education, and maintain comfortable living standards.

Trump imposed right and just tariffs on products foreign nations imported. That ensured fair trade, benefiting American businesses and consumers. And his tearing to shreds the odious NAFTA and replacing it with USMCA further strengthened our employment and trade positions. 

Sinister globalization was championed by voices who did not wish us well. But Trump slew that menace, ensuring future Americans will work and live in the sunshine of national health.

An adage holds that "A country without a secure border is no country at all." Trump was and remains aware of that. Owing to the strict border-law enforcement and wall-construction undertaken during his first term, numbers of unvetted illegals invading our nation plummeted. 

Trump embroiled our nation in zero new wars, a fact for which peace-lovers should commend him. One wishes more elected officials would emulate Trump. Calm, reason, and justice were the order of the day.

Some warn WWIII looms on the horizon. Trump's record inspires confidence that he would avoid such devastation.

Through muscular sanctions, Trump reduced to pauperism the government of Iran, the world's largest terrorism sponsor. He crushed ISIS. And he mounted and maintained vigorous anti-terrorism postures, crippling vicious adversaries' capacity for depravity.

Because maleficent tyrants the world over understood Trump to be a rock-ribbed defender of American interests abroad, they dared not cross him. America loomed strong and was respected. 

Russia's invasion of Ukraine and Palestinian terrorists' animalistic slaughter of Israel's Jewish men, women, and children -- even babies -- did not occur when Trump received his mail at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue. Only when the craven, substandard Biden-Harris team put up feet there.

Police uphold laws we the people pass through representatives that we elect. Given that, attacks on law enforcement can be rightly viewed as attacks on us. On civilization. While Trump stood in the Bully Pulpit, law and order were respected. Citizen admiration for the valorous men and women who stand between us and devastating anarchy became the norm. 

In the common-sense Trump Era, citizens were unabashed in their public celebration of all-important religious faith. And patriotic fervor swelled Americans' hearts. Waving Old Glory was again popular, as was singing the National Anthem and standing for the Pledge Of Allegiance.

All that can again be ours. All we must do is pull the correct vote lever.

Waterloo writer DC Larson is the author of That a Man Can Again Stand Up and Ideas Afoot. He counts among freelance credits Daily Caller, The Iowa Standard, and American Thinker. 

Last week, this essay was published in the Marshalltown, Iowa Times-Republican newspaper.

The Trump Tank       

by DC Larson

In 1984's Tank, James Garner played a principled military retiree who challenged corrupt, small-town potentates. After he sought to meet with the governor and discuss his own son's judicial railroading, Garner's character became a national folk hero -- the proverbial little guy against callous City Hall.

Toward the movie's end, Garner's veteran strived to deliver to court a witness who had damning testimony about local officials. He slowly maneuvered a tank through a block-long, sustained hail of gunfire from snipers tactically arranged on building tops. They'd been deployed by guilty authorities to obstruct justice. 

Since Donald Trump announced his candidacy in 2015, Democrat snipers have riddled his effort. They have maintained without pause attacks on him remarkable for viciousness worthy of MS-13.

There have been impeachment maneuvers, mendacious allegations of Russian collusion, attempts to erase him from states' ballots, lawfare skullduggery choreographed nationwide, and congressional kneecapping swipes. (Mitch McConnell, Liz Cheney, and Adam Kinzinger were just three RINOs who muscled in with ugly relish.)

Two assassins' thankfully unsuccessful bids to murder peoples' champion Trump remain under investigation. 

But while President Trump may be the ostensible target, it is the American people who are truly under assault. Our crime? Daring to think we can determine our own nation's course and choose a president who reflects traditional American values.

Every hour, they imperil us -- common Americans who throng to Trump's rallies, who believe government should represent citizens and fight for our interests every day and in every way.

Our country. The way it was in the classroom history books we grew up reading, when hardscrabble men and women from all walks of workaday life forged a new land, created a glorious experiment in liberty, built great industries, raised an economic powerhouse, and defeated terrible tyrannies like Nazism and Communism.

When we boosted Trump on our shoulders and buoyed him to the Oval Office in 2017, we were standing up for ourselves and for the ideals Real America represents: Fairness, equality, and a patriotic faith that is rightly proud.

The war against Trump and regular Americans is waged not only by career-politicians, but also by more psychologically tilted Hollywood deviants than you can shake a Weinstein at.

Evident from their words and actions is that the sneering poobahs of the ruling, propaganda, and entitled classes hate anything that imperils their death-clutch on power.

Of course, their neverending witch hunt against Trump is often within the rules. They designed those rules for their own, opportunistic employ. To safeguard their authority and crush popular dissent. T's are duly crossed, and i's are dotted.

And when their selfish crusade dictates they pursue obscenities beyond on-paper propriety, they simply rely on their beholden judiciary to grant them indulgence. And proceed merrily on their grotesque way.

There is a manner in which upper crust-bombardments can be turned to average people's advantage. Let enemies' bullets make more resolute your determination that we the people will stand strong in defending the candidate we chose over the disapproving sniffs of the powdered and pompous.

By giving President Trump the support he deserves, we can help the tank break through.

reaction

For Democrats, media, there won't be a "morning after"          

Inarguably, the Democrat Party and establishment news media are as one. They share both values and ideological aspect. George Stephanopolous, Jen Psaki, James Carville, and Joe Scarborough are only some who've lurched through the revolving door. 

Charitable souls might venture leftists' histrionics will subside once election day passes, especially if the dreaded Trump suffers vanquishment. They won't. Ugly bellowings from that miserable quarter will swell to even greater proportion.

Only situationally principled, leftists lard anti-Trump commentary with vicious hyperventilations.

Kamala Harris warned numerous listeners that "Donald Trump is a threat to our democracy and fundamental freedoms."

"It's time to put Trump in the bullseye," Joe Biden told donors during a call reported by CNN. Last June, Biden exclaimed: "Trump is a genuine threat to this nation...He's literally a threat to everything America stands for."

Appearing on MSNBC in 2023, Rep. Dan Goldman told Jen Psaki that Trump "is destructive to our democracy" and "has to be eliminated."

Trump "needs to be shot," said Rep. Stacy Plaskett, in 2023.

Lincoln Project co-founder and board member Rick Wilson told MSNBC: "They're still going to have to go out and put a bullet in Donald Trump."

An exhaustive list of other scheming partisans who've slurred Trump, including portraying him as a new Hitler, would be too lengthy for inclusion, here.

White House-choreographed lawfare waged against the Republican candidate has accomplished nothing. Efforts to throw him off states' ballots also proved fruitless. Tucker Carlson correctly predicted murderous strategies would next be drawn up.

Tens of millions of patriotic Americans rallied to Trump's side, their faith strong that citizens, not pampered elites, should chart our nation's course. And overlords just will not have it.

Having transmogrified into aggressive ghoulishness, leftists surely see no reason to return to even elementary decency. They care not that Trump's now survived two assassination attempts. All that matters is winning.

Examples of post-shooting public slurs spring forth:

"We must stop [Trump/MAGA]," wrote  Rep. Hakeem Jeffries of New York, in a September X post.

Also on X, Colorado Democrat state representative Steven Woodrow asserted: "The last thing America needed was sympathy for the devil, but here we are."

"Trump is a threat to democracy, and saying so is not incitement," declared New York Magazine's Jonathan Chait.

In response to both the second assassination attempt and what has plainly been full-lunged malevolence with one foot in death-wish evil, the Trump effort issued a rebuttal: "Thankfully, the would-be assassin was stopped by the heroic action of law enforcement. But make no mistake, this psycho was egged on by the rhetoric and lies that have flowed from Kamala Harris, Democrats, and their Fake News allies for years."

Trump himself wrote on X that smears hurled his way had "taken politics in our Country to a whole new level of Hatred, Abuse, and Distrust. Because of the Communist Left rhetoric, the bullets are flying, and it will only get worse!"

Those who cranked the dial to extreme don't give a damn who sees their moral and ethical grubbiness.

There loom ahead two possible scenarios. Sadly, each promises continued raucousness. Trump's podium-pounding hitmen will certainly feel their unabashed vitriol is coldly efficacious, should they succeed in ending the Republican candidate. 

But if, contrarily, the nationwide MAGA movement (in which I march) buoys Trump down Pennsylvania Avenue a second time, the response from the Dark Side will be ear-rending, unspeakably foul, and sickeningly stuffed with underdog self-righteousness. 

Power-craving politicians, big-corporation journalists, and America-hating activists desire a terrible night without end.

And they wouldn't take a morning after even if it came with two pairs of pants.

Media should investigate Springfield pet-eating story

Sickening charges that Haitian migrants in Ohio have been eating pets recently arose. But instead of subjecting accounts to the scrutiny they merit, journalists great and small waved them away as racist lies. 

It's ridiculous to expect compassion for supposedly tortured animals from bloodless ideologues who champion murdering millions of unborn human babies each year. As they've already accepted that greater atrocity, they cannot be expected to now protest the lesser one - horrific, though it be.

(And one wonders where PETA is.)

The allegations are plausible. Peoples from foreign shores sometimes have preferences revolting to more refined Western sensibilities. That's indisputable. I've heard of an American missionary whose smiling African-village hosts offered him a plate of squirming bugs.Youtube hosts videos of Chinese street vendors hawking roasted rats on sticks.

In some nations, dog-meat is favored. Barack Obama admitted to eating it when a child in Indonesia. Gateway Pundit has posted an excerpt from his "Dreams From My Father" autobiography:

"With [stepfather] Lolo, I learned to eat small green chili peppers raw with dinner (plenty of rice), and, away from the dinner table, I was introduced to dog meat (tough), snake meat (tougher), and roasted grasshopper (crunchy)...One day soon, [Lolo] promised, he would bring home a piece of tiger meat for us to share."

National press operatives like ABC's David Muir and CNN's Dana Bash scoffed at the pet-eating claims. NBC denounced the story as a hateful "conspiracy theory," and slurred Trump's conveying of charges as "derogatory." PBS sneered of "false claims." MSNBC also cast them to the ground.

But establishment journalists are not automatically trustworthy. Consider these oft-regurgitated media lies:

There was Trump-Russia collusion/Hands Up, Don't Shoot/Hunter's laptop was "Russian disinformation"/Jussie Smollett was a "hate crime" victim/Kyle Rittenhouse took an AK47 across state lines, intending racial violence/video clips of Biden wandering were "cheap fakes."

Rushing to accept naysaying exclaimed by Ohio authorities, as media sorts have generally done, is irresponsible. Didn't liberals boast of distrusting authority and "speaking truth to power" not long ago?

Apparently, when officials mouth rhetoric to their fancy, reporters become uncritical 'stenographers to power.' 

Safeguarding localities' images from negative publicity is among city  leaders' ambitions. Economic interests are at risk. Businesses won't remain in or relocate to areas if word spreads that there's turmoil underway, and tax-paying residents who are able to flee will do so. Potential new ones will stay away. 

(Aurora, Colorado residents presently face migration-related criminal horrors, themselves.)

It is certainly true that average citizens can create hoaxes. And residents' claims should be regarded suspiciously. Plausibility is not actuality.

Still, Springfield residents have posted supporting videos online. They can be found here, here, and here. There are others.

And investigative reporter Christopher Rufo has put on X/Twitter footage purportedly depicting skinned felines on an Ohio grill. (I won't be viewing that.)

Lack of caring when foreigners violate American laws and customs is a product of the imbecilic notion that all cultures are morally equal, and that expecting newcomers to assimilate is "racist." (There's that word, again.)

Unfortunately, there are crude world regions in which foul practices are routine, Wife-beating and rapes are accepted in some cultures. There are immigrants now in America who perpetrate "Honor killings" and female genital mutilations.

Before discounting claims, reporters should actually talk to aggrieved residents, rather than simply amplifying local officials' denials.

Press-types turning away pet-eating charges without getting up from cushioned chairs and truly investigating them does dirt to the public interest they theoretically serve.

And it doesn't do domestic animals a damn bit of good, either.

It begins with "warning labels"

I carry no brief for Big Tech overlords. A sound case can be made that internet behemoths like Google and Facebook agitate to interfere with our electoral process, on behalf of Democrats.

Today, though, another matter demands attention:

42 states' Attorneys General are calling for governmental social- media clampdown. They caution of a legitimate problem: Young internet users' emotional well-being is endangered. But the cure they prescribe is a dangerous one.

The impetus for their present aggression was a June New York Times op-ed penned by US Surgeon General Vivek Murthy.

He advocated warning labels be forced onto social-media sites, much as cigarette manufacturers are legally required to put ones on their products.

But words aren't carcinogens. They don't compromise physical health.

"One of the most important lessons I learned in medical school was that in an emergency, you don't have the luxury to wait for perfect information," Murthy wrote. "You assess the available facts, you use your best judgment, and you act quickly."

His comparison is nonsensical. The impact of ideas merely held cannot be physically gauged like proveable health risks associated with tobacco use, food products, or medicines. 

In those instances, regulation is in keeping with the Constitution's mandate that democratically elected government safeguard public welfare.

Ideas themselves don't invariably lead to physical harm. One listener may accept a thought, but another reject it.

Murthy's advocacy of rash action undertaken on what he concedes to be imperfect data is unwise, at best. 

In their Sept. 9, 2024 letter -- sent to House Speaker Mike Johnson, Senate Majority Leader Charles Schumer, and Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell -- the signatories implored officials to accept Murthy's warning labels proposal.

The states' attorneys general wrote that warning labels posted on social-media pages would not, alone, be "sufficient to address the full scope of the problem" and would be only "one consequential step toward mitigating the risk of harm to youth."

They continued: "A warning would not only highlight the inherent risks that social-media platforms presently pose for young people, but also complement other efforts to spur attention, research, and investment into the oversight of social-media platforms."

"Other efforts?"

Those words suggest further governmental action imperiling citizen speech. Perhaps warning labels on social-media sites represent only a beginning. 

Should government legally codify the notion that words are health matters properly open to regulation, Americans' speech liberty would be only a memory.

The World Health Organizaton and National Institutes of Health have declared odious racist beliefs to be as dangerous to physical health as toxic chemicals. 

Of course racist beliefs are illogical and immoral. But there is only one First Amendment. And it protects speech equally. If bad ideas are stifled, good ones are necessarily at risk.

Today, some have perverted the meaning of "racism" to encompass legitimate values like maintaining cultural integrity and even the concept of legal citizenship.

Pressure to outlaw such expression has already resulted in related codes and statutes.

Should warning labels be strong-armed onto sites, speakers would eventually refrain from articulating controversial notions at all, fearing potential punitive actions.

Free conversation in the public square would then be a casualty.

A house undivided

In 2017, neo-Nazi Christopher Cantwell told an interviewer that he wished for a president who, unlike Donald Trump, "would not give his daughter to a Jew." He then sneered: "I don't think you can feel about race like I do and watch that Kushner bastard walk around with that beautiful girl. Okay?"

I shared those detestable words with a purpose: To convey what genuine bigotry sounds like. Calls to maintain national borders and assertions of American exceptionalism are not of a piece with Cantwell's repulsive notions.

In fact, they are not within philosophical miles of them.

Unity is Americans' greatest national strength. Not diversity, as some insist. Stressing differences rather than commonality encourages fracture. (Which is certain demagogues' ambition.)

In his 2017 inaugural address, Trump noted that Americans of different skin tones are united by patriotism: "No matter our color, we still bleed the same red, white, and blue!"

One faith of the multi-racial MAGA movement, possibly the largest political crusade America has witnessed, is that our country can best advance to strength and prosperity when we all stand together.

(Historical accounts remind it was Democrats who founded the Ku Klux Klan and enacted Jim Crow laws. Too, more Repulicans than Democrats voted for the Civil Rights Act of 1964.)

Trump's aversion to racial prejudice is emblamatic of moral rectitude. American stability and progress depend on such leadership.

But leveraging racial bigotry for electoral fortune, as Democrats still  do, divides Americans and allows animation to true hatred of the ugly type enunciated by the cretinous Cantwell.