Transitioning Social Security: Lessons from the GI Bill

The GI Bill provides a valuable example of how a large government benefit program can be restructured over time without breaking commitments to those already enrolled. When the GI Bill was updated, existing veterans retained their full benefits, while new recruits gradually began contributing toward their education benefits. This phased approach balanced fairness with fiscal responsibility.

Why Change Social Security?

Social Security, as it currently stands, faces significant financial challenges. With an aging population, longer life expectancies, and a shrinking ratio of workers to beneficiaries, the system’s trust fund is projected to be depleted within the next couple of decades. Without reform, benefits may need to be cut, taxes raised, or both — posing a serious risk to the retirement security of millions.

A Proposed Transition Model

• Grandfather Current Beneficiaries: To honor commitments, those already receiving Social Security benefits, or near retirement, would remain on the current system.
• Phased Implementation for Younger Workers: New entrants to the workforce would have their Social Security taxes redirected into private, individually managed retirement accounts (similar to 401(k)s), giving them greater control over their savings and investments.
• Government Role: The government would transition to a regulatory and safety net role—overseeing these private accounts, limiting investment risks, and potentially providing minimum guarantees to reduce individual risk.

Pros of this Approach:

• Individual Control: Workers manage their own retirement savings, tailoring investments to their risk tolerance.
• Potential for Higher Returns: Historically, diversified investment accounts have yielded better returns than the current Social Security system.
• Fiscal Sustainability: Reduces the long-term financial burden on the government by shifting responsibility toward individuals.
• Preserves Promises: Grandfathering current beneficiaries respects existing commitments.

Cons and Challenges:

• Transition Costs: Funding current retirees while accumulating private accounts for younger workers requires significant government outlays.
• Market Risk: Individuals bear investment risks, which could jeopardize retirement security if markets underperform.
• Administrative Complexity: While managing millions of individual accounts can be complex, much of the administration would be outsourced to private financial institutions—similar to how 401(k) plans operate today. This could reduce government overhead but would require strong regulatory oversight to ensure transparency, security, and fairness.
• Equity Concerns: Not all workers may have equal ability to save or invest wisely, raising concerns about disparities.

Conclusion

Just as the GI Bill’s phased transition balanced fairness with fiscal realities, a similar approach could help modernize Social Security. It offers a pathway to sustainability while empowering individuals—though it must be carefully designed to manage risks and maintain equity.

Anonymous

I’ve been watching the left’s response to Charlie Kirk’s assassination for over a full week. The irony is that this singular event has fully exposed the left – including political leadership – of qualifying violence against disagreeable debate (“fascist” / “racist” / “hitler” etc.) which has obviously made them directly culpable for his murder through incitement of hate among the most vulnerable, mentally unstable of the populace.

The news has been peppered with the consequences of what some on the left have called ‘free speech’ as they celebrate political murder, the killing of a deeply religious but respectful man for debating mere ideas and engaging conversations about sometimes emotional topics. These consequences have resulted in many losing their jobs, the most disturbing of whom are the people responsible for educating our children (and that includes at least one local example @ Thurston HS).

But the veracity of the left’s defense of Jimmy Kimmel’s FCC-violating blatant “MAGA” lie about Charlie Kirk’s assassin wasn’t the worst of it: The democrats’ standing ovation for ilhan omar’s comments about Charlie Kirk being a “hateful man” was the proverbial straw.

Thus, I must opine about some facts I’ve not read or heard discussed ANYWHERE:

The same people who are celebrating Charlie Kirk’s murder, defending such and all of the inciting rhetoric which preceded, including threatening those on the right who would choose to follow Charlie’s footsteps and engage in open debate…

…are the same people who are ironically beholden to the ‘religion’ of COVID: 6-feet, masking, lockdowns, and mandates…all of which they compelled via the STATE with special emphasis on “the science” which has been thoroughly and completely debunked, with real threats of state prosecution, fines and jail time, including censorship of debate of what were once labeled as ‘conspiracy theories’…

…all in the name of “if it saves just one life.” All lies, all with terrible consequences to both life & liberty.

Family relationships were damaged, careers destroyed, a generation of children adversely affected in ways they’ll be studying for decades, senior victims of COVID victimized and killed plus a whole segment of our population exposed to an anti-virus chemical compound that they told us was “safe & effective” under “emergency use authorization” which is now proving to be quite the opposite: Damaging to health, reproduction and downright deadly.

Yet I heard radio commercials here promoting said chemicals JUST THIS AFTERNOON.

So, I have a message:

To those who were hysterically beholden to the ‘religion’ of COVID – from bottom all the way up to those making & enforcing policy – and now stubbornly defiant in justification of your rhetoric and your supporters’ threats of violence against us on the right – the latest as of this writing against WH Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt – as you continue to dramatically expose your deep hatred of those with whom you disagree:

We…are…watching…you.

I’m not on social media. I’m angry. This is one of my only outlets. I wrote this after these thoughts occurred to me after reading breaking news yesterday afternoon:

I’ve been watching the left’s response to Charlie Kirk’s assassination for over a full week. The irony is that this singular event has fully exposed the left – including political leadership – of qualifying violence against disagreeable debate (“fascist” / “racist” / “hitler” etc.) which has obviously made them directly culpable for his murder through incitement of hate among the most vulnerable, mentally unstable of the populace.

The news has been peppered with the consequences of what some on the left have called ‘free speech’ as they celebrate political murder, the killing of a deeply religious but respectful man for debating mere ideas and engaging conversations about sometimes emotional topics. These consequences have resulted in many losing their jobs, the most disturbing of whom are the people responsible for educating our children (and that includes at least one local example @ Thurston HS).

But the veracity of the left’s defense of Jimmy Kimmel’s FCC-violating blatant “MAGA” lie about Charlie Kirk’s assassin wasn’t the worst of it: The democrats’ standing ovation for ilhan omar’s comments about Charlie Kirk being a “hateful man” was the proverbial straw.

Thus, I must opine about some facts I’ve not read or heard discussed ANYWHERE:

The same people who are celebrating Charlie Kirk’s murder, defending such and all of the inciting rhetoric which preceded, including threatening those on the right who would choose to follow Charlie’s footsteps and engage in open debate…

…are the same people who are ironically beholden to the ‘religion’ of COVID: 6-feet, masking, lockdowns, and mandates…all of which they compelled via the STATE with special emphasis on “the science” which has been thoroughly and completely debunked, with real threats of state prosecution, fines and jail time, including censorship of debate of what were once labeled as ‘conspiracy theories’…

…all in the name of “if it saves just one life.” All lies, all with terrible consequences to both life & liberty.

Family relationships were damaged, careers destroyed, a generation of children adversely affected in ways they’ll be studying for decades, senior victims of COVID victimized and killed plus a whole segment of our population exposed to an anti-virus chemical compound that they told us was “safe & effective” under “emergency use authorization” which is now proving to be quite the opposite: Damaging to health, reproduction and downright deadly.

Yet I heard radio commercials here promoting said chemicals JUST THIS AFTERNOON.

So, I have a message:

To those who were hysterically beholden to the ‘religion’ of COVID – from bottom all the way up to those making & enforcing policy – and now stubbornly defiant in justification of your rhetoric and your supporters’ threats of violence against us on the right – the latest as of this writing against WH Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt – as you continue to dramatically expose your deep hatred of those with whom you disagree:

We…are…watching…you.

Anonymous

With the holidays just a few months away, I’ve been thinking about something that we all seem to crave: Unconditional love. Readers, listeners and clients tell me all the time how unconditional love, especially for a child or a parent, is the highest ideal we could live up to. Really? Let’s look a little closer.

People yearn for unconditional love because it’s natural to want to be loved just for who you are. But the phrase “for who you are” clearly implies a stipulation that someone loves you for the qualities you possess. Let’s say you’re intelligent and courageous. Wouldn’t you prefer to be loved by someone who values intelligence and courage, rather than someone who couldn’t care less?

My point is this: Conditions are inescapable. As an adult, you can’t love, or be loved, unconditionally. Of course young children in their early years need to feel just plain loved, but older children will not benefit from literal unconditional love that sends the message that the parents blindly accept everything the child does – all in the interest of his or her supposed “self-esteem.” So, if the child lies or steals, a parent should not show anger or hurt at the risk of implying that their love is in jeopardy. Forget about telling the child that lying or stealing is wrong. If their love is truly unconditional, then there’s no need for right and wrong. That’s no way to raise a kid. The result? Just look at what’s happening today in the streets of many big cities.

This isn’t to say that young children don’t require a highly tolerant form of love. After all, their intellectual and psychological development is not yet complete. But even then, this love must include limits and conditions. If your child accidentally breaks a vase, you’ll feel temporary irritation. But you say, “Yes, I was aggravated when you dropped the vase, but I never stopped loving you.”

On the other hand, if your child does something deliberately malicious, such as stealing or initiating violence (outside of self-defense), then in that particular context you should wholeheartedly withdraw your approval. You should tell him why you disapprove of his actions, and why you’re disappointed in his choice to act that way. You can make it clear that you will forgive him only if he shows resolve not to repeat the behavior. My experience over the years has shown that the last thing a child needs to hear is that he or she will (and should) always be loved regardless of actions and behavior. A child needs to learn the distinction between innocent errors (like how easily vases can break) and willful actions such as lying, theft and violence. Of course, children need patience and time to acquire adult knowledge and that’s precisely why parents must apply consistent conditions and clearly stated consequences.

Such lessons can be difficult, and may require a temporary withdrawal of affection between the parent and the child. But that approach is kinder because it helps the child learn to think beyond the immediate whims of the moment. Without such training, he or she is likely to remain – from a psychological point-of-view – a child forever.

Conditions, however implicit, are part of life. It’s dishonest to claim that you love someone “unconditionally.” After all, don’t you love someone because they’re special and because they stand out in some way? Admiration and respect are a part of love. Parents love their children precisely because they are their own.

Be careful what you ask for! Unconditional love can include loving somebody out of pity, the need for control or for equally dishonest motives (which are, in fact, still conditions). This just doesn’t seem like the ideal relationship. There are always reasons why people are loved, whether they want to admit it or not. And the same goes for kids. By denying them conditions and consequences, they will never grow past the artificial “safe haven” of childhood and into independent, secure adults.

Michael J. Hurd, Life’s a Beach

Maybe you spent time last week perusing X postings related to Charlie Kirk’s assassination. Aside from the many accolades, conservative influencers did fine jobs identifying left-wingers who not only celebrated Kirk’s assassination, but offered attaboys to Tyler Robinson, the triggerman. Some even called for more violence. If you didn’t have time earlier, scroll through the Libs of TikTok’s and the Vigilant Fox’s threads, for starters. You’ll get an eyeful. “Somebody had to do it” wasn’t an uncommon refrain. Who, this side of hell, delights in an act of murder?

What was striking was that many of the posts featured females. Was that the result of sampling biases? Not likely. It was self-promotion. Call it malignant feminist self-empowerment. Not that there aren’t Charlie Kirk haters among “progressive” males — his killer is an XY, after all, who lived with a trans — but left-of-center females dominated the posted videos. Why so?

There’s no point rehashing Kirk’s qualities or listing his achievements. Others who knew him have provided rich, poignant testimony to his stellar character and unshakable dedication to his faith and freedom. His very public record is testament enough.

If you sift through the haters’ postings, you’ll think they inhabit an alternative universe. Abundant public record be damned. For them, Kirk was an ogre, some mythical beast. He checked off every box that inflames the leftist mind. Homophobe, transphobe, this-phobe, that-phobe. They fictionalized Kirk. Damn reality, too!

Are the celebratory outpourings over an innocent man’s murder indicative of a sickness in our society? Yes, they are.

That sickness starts with an obsession — the obsession with self. “If it feels good, do it” was a 1960s mantra that has sparked a decades-long deep dive into hedonism, regardless of the blarney about “self-actualization.” The Me Generation ethos metastasized, spreading throughout the society.

What does preoccupation with self do to a person’s mind and emotions? How does it affect relating to others? How does it warp perceptions? What happens when academics have, for decades, peddled the notion that there’s no external or objective truth? Should we be stunned that people — mostly females — popped up on TikTok and Blue Sky giggling, praising, toasting, and jigging in reaction to a cold-blooded murder? Shades of the Manson girls, huh? Perhaps females have been more greatly damaged by over half a century of being battered with me, me, me? Or are they just inclined to be more visible.

The counterculture, which arose in the 1960s, has been a pox ever since. Its indulgers have trashed norms, shredded traditions, denigrated faith, and demeaned family. The destruction was justified, we’re told. Had to tear down to build. Had to stamp out injustice and inequality to achieve both. But the building never started. That would put too many academics, activists, talking heads, and politicians out of business. You really don’t want what the left would build, anyway.

The counterculture’s early champions declared that they wanted a society guided by love, peace, and harmony. Instead, we saw the counterculture devolve into violence — campus riots, the Chicago Democrat convention riots in 1968 (remember the Chicago 7?), the Weather Underground and Symbionese Liberation Army, the Black Panthers, spiraling drug abuse and addictions, climbing rates of STDS, broken relationships, fatherless children. Anger, resentment, and score settling for real — or more often, imagined — wrongs replaced the hype about love and peace.

How far removed are today’s “social justice warriors” from that standard? You know, those who inhabit social media, who call for violence, or as the women of TikTok and Blue Sky have done, take fiendish pleasure in snuffing out a man who strove to build bridges and right America in accord with its traditions.

Perhaps, radical feminism’s — is there any other sort nowadays? — quest to erase differences between males and females has taken a toll on female psyches? The mission is to make women more like men. Radical feminism is about unmooring women from their natures. Okay, granted, there are more beta or feminized males today. But the primary goal is to make females on par with men in all regards. It’s gone to absurd lengths.

Biological and physical differences between males and females are mere social constructs, we’re informed. Males and females have distinct temperaments? Nonsense. Those can be remade. Men can have babies and breastfeed. Why not? Want to transition to the other sex? Do it. Nothing that surgery, hormone infusions, and playing dress-up can’t solve. Don’t let DNA and unambiguous physiological differences and performance interfere. Women can be lean, mean fighting machines. Open up frontline combat roles to females. Not really suited, huh? Well, just lower the bar and let’s all pretend.

Feminism is long past opening doors to opportunities — education and professions. We can all agree that’s good. It’s turned fiercely militant against nature. It’s veered deeper and deeper into derangement.

Manhood is routinely battered. A man being a man is “toxically masculine.” Yet, women might be pummeled more. Females are primary nurturers and civilizers. Today’s feminism is about depreciating marriage and childbearing — brazenly cheerleading abortion, now up to birth. It’s been about ridiculing stay-at-home moms. Virulent feminism is very much part of the Me Generation ethos. Sleeping around and forgoing marriage and kids in favor of career achievement — all wins. Self-sacrifice and giving? Dirty words. Those only lead to subservience.

Of course, none of the women who cheer Charlie Kirk’s assassination consider themselves fiends. They don’t because of their acculturation. Herein lies an irony. Progressives inhabit an insular world. For all the excess emphasis on individuality, independence of judgment is penalized. Groupthink is imposed. Progressives surround themselves with mirror images of themselves. They receive affirmation for expressions of right-think.

Charlie Kirk was a monster, the collective concluded. Say he was, because if you deviate — if you say he was a decent guy who didn’t deserve his fate — the collective will drum you out. Ask any progressive who has dared to dissent about being shunned by family, friends, and colleagues. That’s the stuff of a cult.

We’re now three generations from the counterculture explosion. That movement has done a fine job unmooring millions of people from foundational principles and values, which provide social stability and grounding. One by one, the guideposts have been ripped out. Truths have been replaced by fantasies. Nature and reality have been turned on their heads.

The affluent and better educated, who should serve as bulwarks against societal degradation, are, instead, the principal purveyors of heresies. Elite universities — attended by the rich and their children and underwritten by them — advance all sorts of bizarre ideas that lead to social deformities. It seems that academics are in races to produce ever fringier, ever weirder takes on humans and the human condition.

Do understand the power of ideas, however poisoned. Do appreciate that it’s easier to destroy than build. Do understand that an entire social movement dedicated to upending traditional society has caused significant harm and is still claiming victims. Has womanhood been more egregiously assaulted? If no more than the assaults on manhood, then the wounds may be more profound. It’s no small wonder that the ghoulish women of social media — fangs and claws barely concealed — are who they are.

J. Robert Smith can be found at X. His handle is @JRobertSmith1. At Gab, @JRobertSmith. He blogs occasionally at Flyover.

Charlie Kirk’s assassination by a radical young “all-American” leftist demonstrates that the ideological crisis that’s raging in education, politics, and pop culture has irreversibly escalated.  His death marks the beginning of a new chapter for America.  We’ve crossed a cultural Rubicon; the nation is irreparably divided by competing moral visions, national unity is forever lost, and conflict is unavoidable.

Kirk’s death was as tragic as it was predictable.  Many lay the blame on evil, but evil came in a virulent form of social Marxism, equity, that’s cloaked in the woke cultural rizz of transgender rights, social justice, equality, fairness, tolerance, Critical Race Theory, DIE, anti-racism, white supremacy, systemic inequality, and patriarchy, to name a few.  It’s a toxic philosophical cocktail, an expansion of classical Marxism transformed by Critical Theory and post-modern philosophy, that’s become the best of the worst of what the world’s deadliest ideology, the gospel according to Karl Marx, has to offer.

Equity is taking America by storm — it’s the price America pays for bailing on Christianity and religion in record numbers.  It captured the Democrat party.  (The Biden administration was committed to building equity into the “everyday business of government” — see Executive Order 14091.)  Countless Americans like Kirk’s assassin were drawn to its promise of an infinitely tolerant, progressive, permissive post-Christian society, where everyone is equally free to choose his gender, lifestyle, and sexual preferences without the moral judgment of the “Thou Shalt Nots” of the Christianity they despised.

But as it turns out, there’s a serious downside to decadence.

The despisers of religion can’t live as atheists.  A world without God leaves humanity suspended in moral ambiguity, lacking an ultimate authority.  It’s an intolerable existence that sends people searching for a new moral constitution that could liberate them from the constraints of a biblically influenced worldview.  Atheists need religion.  As John Grey notes in Seven Types of Atheism, “the God of monotheism did not die, it only left the scene to reappear as humanity — the human species dressed up as a collective agent pursuing its self-realization in history” (p. 1,157).

Post-Christian Americans looking for moral guidance turned to equity as a new secular religion, and equity was happy to oblige.

This set America up for the showdown that has plagued humanity for over a century, Christianity versus Marxism, and it put Charlie Kirk in the crosshairs.

Kirk was defending the nation’s Jewish and Christian moral vision, which placed well defined boundaries on the transgender community’s demand for equality and the universal acceptance of gender preferences.  His message upheld definitions of gender that had been universally accepted until the early 20th century.  As Marxism, Critical Theory, and postmodern philosophy made their long march through America’s institutions and culture, they successfully eroded confidence in freedom, free markets, and the moral guidance of the Jewish and Christian worldviews.  It took generations, but they deconstructed America’s foundations, offering a utopian vision for radicals who dared to transform the nation.

Their messages were nuanced but congruent.  America is genocidally corrupt, having creating countless inequalities through oppression and exploitation in the form of racism, homophobia, patriarchy, wealth, income inequality, transphobia, incarceration, policing, slavery, and white supremacy.  Western capitalist Jewish and Christian values were responsible for the total of human suffering, including war, starvation, crime, violence, drug addiction, poverty, slavery, and persecution of the LGB and transgender community.  It was ultimately destroying humanity, and there was only one solution to eliminate the disparities: equity.  Everyone must experience comprehensive equality, equal outcomes for all, across every level of society.  Marx’s demand for equality, “From each according to his ability, to each according to his need,” was reinterpreted in every context, including gender.

Equity for the trans community means unqualified acceptance of gender lifestyle preferences and complete access to protected spaces and sports.  Christianity’s morality was the quintessential roadblock.  It denied their validation and equality, which marginalized and stigmatized them, leading to transgender suicide rates approaching unparalleled numbers.  This was defined as an act of trans-genocide that must be ended by any means necessary to protect the community.  Anyone who refused to capitulate to the demands for gender equity was declared a fascist because he systemically oppressed the community by denying the unqualified equality and acceptance they needed to survive and thrive.

This narrative radicalized the heart and mind of a seemingly all-American Gen Z kid who despised Christianity and lived with a “transitioning” transgender partner.  Kirk was a hate-mongering fascist defending genocide; his death was a justified act of liberation that would help bring an end to American fascism’s victimization of the transgender community.

The death of an outspoken conservative American was only a matter of time.  The coming conflict remains unavoidable.

This is incomprehensible to conservative Americans.  We think America is indomitable; no American in his right mind would ever deny freedom to embrace Marxism in any form.  But we’re fatally naïve, because we don’t understand how ideas build nations and tear them apart.  America is caught in a war of competing ideologies, and we don’t know how these wars work.  We were too busy enjoying endless prosperity to learn that America, like any other nation, rises and falls based on the ideas that define its vision for equality and justice.

Every nation is built on a set of generally accepted ideas, beliefs, and assumptions that define concepts of justice, peace, freedom, property, equality, and acceptable sexuality and conduct that become the foundation for society.  That nation remains relatively stable until the ideological foundation changes, as radical ideas and theories cast a new vision of equality and justice that criminalizes the past and demands liberation for the future.  This ideological crisis results in bloodshed as irreconcilable visions of equality and justice compete for supremacy until one ultimately defeats the other.  This is the story of the battle between the Jewish and Christian West and Marxism throughout the 20th century.  The battle has come to America.  It’s as vulnerable to Marxism as any nation.

Aleksander Solzhenitsyn warned us: “Alas, all the evil of the twentieth century is possible everywhere on earth.”

If you’re incredulous, ask those who suffered under Stalin, Mao, and Pol Pot what happens when equity captures the hearts and minds of young radicals who were willing to liquidate over 100 million to achieve the utopian promise.  Kirk’s death reveals that equity has no intention of leaving America unscathed.

The right is incapable of accepting the reality that equity is entrenched in America and refuses to accept that they can’t vote their way out of this ideological war.  The left has no idea that equity opens a Pandora’s box that pours out an incomprehensible bowl of wrath upon America.  As long as these two facts remain unchanged, the nation’s future is as predictable as Charlie Kirk’s tragic death.

Chuck Mason (M.Div., Fuller Seminary) is a conservative Christian author and social commentator.  You can read his perspectives at www.chuckmason.net.

The lover of Charlie Kirk’s alleged assassin ‘hated’ his family and had been kicked out of his parents’ home for addiction and substance abuse, according to new claims.

A relative of Lance Twiggs said that he was living with murder suspect Tyler Robinson after his relationship with family deteriorated and he became ‘detached [and] radicalized’.

The relative, speaking anonymously, said Twiggs had been struggling with gender identity, substance abuse problems, and was addicted to video games.

‘[His father] thought he wasn’t being respectful and was problematic, so they kicked him out,’ Twiggs’ relative revealed in an interview with Fox News.

‘He then lived with [his grandparents] until he was 18 and graduated from high school’.

‘But the real reason he was acting out was because he was using drugs and alcohol, and was addicted to gaming,’ she added.

Twiggs hasn’t been charged with any crimes, and authorities said he was cooperating with the investigation.

Robinson now faces aggravated murder charges for fatally shooting conservative activist Charlie Kirk on September 10 at an event held by Turning Point USA at Utah Valley University.

The relative said that Twiggs moved into a townhouse with other college students before Robinson lived in the home.

The other roommates eventually moved out, leaving Twiggs and Robinson in the townhome together. The relative added that the two were in a romantic relationship.

In a separate interview, an anonymous relative told Fox News that Twiggs developed a ‘hatred’ for Christians and conservatives. 

‘He hated us. He was not raised that way, but he, over the years, has become really detached [and] been radicalized,’ the relative said. 

The relative added that Twiggs was ‘always angry’ and his behavior got worse over the last few years. 

They also speculated that Twiggs may’ve influenced Robinson’s politics during their time living together. 

‘I think Tyler got a whole lot worse in the year they have been dating. They are big gamers, and obviously they have that group that influences them as well as others. But my gut tells me [Twiggs] did more of the influencing,’ they said. 

Twiggs was dragged into the investigation when Robinson texted him: ‘Drop what you are doing, look under the keyboard’.

Twiggs allegedly found a note that read: ‘I had the opportunity to take out Charlie Kirk and I’m going to take it’, prosecutors said.

‘What?????????????? You’re joking, right????’ Twiggs responded.

Robinson was arrested after he turned himself in for the shooting with his parents and a family friend at the Washington County Sheriff’s Office. 

Robinson said back: ‘I am still ok my love, but am stuck in Orem for a little while longer yet. Shouldn’t be long until I can come home, but I gotta grab my rifle still. To be honest I had hoped to keep this secret till I died of old age. I am sorry to involve

Their texts also mentioned a rifle allegedly used in the shooting. Robinson ended their text exchange by telling Twiggs not to talk to the media or answer any questions from the police. 

Robinson appeared in court virtually for the first time on Tuesday. The prosecution announced during the hearing that they filed a notice of intent to seek the death penalty. 

His surrender came after authorities searched for 33 hours. Two people were arrested and released during the manhunt. 

Sophie Gable, Daily Mail UK

As President Donald Trump recently warned, far-left ideology is still a major threat in K-12 schools that parents and grandparents must remain on guard against.

During remarks at the Museum of the Bible during a meeting of the White House’s Religious Liberty Commission earlier this month, Trump took the opportunity to highlight the continued dangers of political indoctrination in the classroom. After thanking attendees, the President called up 12-year-old Shea Encinas to the podium to share his experience as a fifth-grader in a California public school.

As Encinas shared, he was forced to read “My Shadow Is Pink” to a kindergartener — a story about a boy who likes “things not for boys.” The book has clear LBGTQ themes and encourages children to accept the idea that they could be born in the “wrong” body.

“I’ve been a Christian my whole life, and Jesus means everything to me,” Encinas said. “The book said, you can choose your gender based on feelings instead of how God made us. I knew this was not right, but I was afraid of getting in trouble.”

“After my family spoke up, the school treated us badly, and kids started bullying me and my brother because of our faith, and the school did nothing to stop it,” Encinas said. “I believe kids like me should be able to live our faith at school without being forced to go against what we believe. I hope no other family has to go through what mine did.”

Trump blasted the episode as proof of “radical gender ideology” being pushed on students.

While the culture war over American public education has largely faded into the background in recent years, that battle remains as urgent as ever – as cases like that of Shea Encinas show.

In another recent story out of Maryland, a Damascus High School senior was barred from graduating after his family objected to a required health class that promoted gender identity and LGBTQ+ content. His father, Seth Gottesman of Gaithersburg, sued Montgomery County Public Schools for religious discrimination, but a federal judge denied the emergency bid one day before graduation.

Maryland law technically lets parents opt their children out of the “family life and human sexuality” unit. But Gottesman argued the district scattered LGBTQ themes across the entire course, rendering the opt-out effectively “meaningless.”

“In the Health course, MCPS teaches minors that non-traditional sexuality, non-traditional family units, and transgenderism are as natural and beneficial as heterosexuality, traditional family structures, and acceptance of one’s biological sex,” Gottesman stated in his motion.

U.S. District Judge Deborah Chasanow issued a one-page order denying the family’s emergency motion, siding with school officials and leaving the student unable to walk with his classmates.

Meanwhile, in Virginia, Loudoun County Public Schools suspended two high school boys who objected after a female student who claimed to be male entered the boys’ locker room and began filming other students – a violation of district policy and state law.

But instead of punishing the female student, the district charged the male students with harassment under Title IX, slapped them with 10-day suspensions, and barred them from sharing classes with the girl.

Virginia Attorney General Jason Miyares blasted the punishment as a “disturbing misuse of authority” that trampled the boys’ constitutional rights. LCPS has since doubled down on its transgender bathroom and locker room policy despite Trump administration warnings that the district and others that have the same policy could lose federal funding for failure to comply with Title IX requirements that students only use facilities that correspond to their biological sex.

In Texas, Attorney General Ken Paxton has also filed a lawsuit against Coppell Independent School District after undercover video showed its curriculum director explaining how the district had “gotten around” the state’s ban on Critical Race Theory. Paxton’s suit alleges officials knowingly violated Texas law by using taxpayer resources to distribute CRT-related materials.

In Wisconsin, special education teacher Kally Bishop says she was forced to transfer schools because the Madison-area district mandated “culturally responsive practices” — effectively scoring teachers on how much they emphasized race in the classroom. Despite glowing performance reviews, Bishop was pushed out under the policy, which weighted “race responsiveness” more heavily than seniority or actual educational results.

Earlier this year in New York, a school board meeting in Monroe County descended into chaos after furious parents discovered that elementary students had been assigned “The Rainbow Parade: A Celebration of LGBTQIA+ Identities and Allies.” The book, shown to children as young as five, includes illustrations of a naked person walking down the street, a pair of men in bondage outfits, and other adult-themed parade scenes.

Dozens of parents shouted down school officials, demanding to know how such material could possibly be considered age-appropriate.

“If you think that that’s appropriate for children to see, then there’s something wrong with you,” one father said. “You need to have a mental evaluation. There’s no reason that should be in the schools whatsoever at all.”

Unable to take the heat, school officials abruptly shut down the meeting and left without hearing any official public comment.

In June, parents notched a major win when the Supreme Court ruled 6–3 that Montgomery County, Maryland, violated religious liberty by forcing children to sit through LGBTQ storybooks without an opt-out.

Writing for the majority, Justice Samuel Alito said the policy placed “an unconstitutional burden” on parents’ rights. In dissent, Justice Sonia Sotomayor argued children should be exposed to ideas that conflict with their parents’ faith, a telling sign of how far the education establishment has drifted from respecting family authority.

The case, Mahmoud v. Taylor, revealed just how far the problem had spread. Only after families fought all the way to the nation’s highest court did they secure the right to keep their kindergartners from being read transgender storybooks and LGBTQ propaganda.

The fact that it took Supreme Court intervention to stop schools from pushing gender ideology on five-year-olds shows how entrenched these policies are, and why parents cannot afford to let down their guard.

Meanwhile, schools are failing at their core mission. The 2024 Nation’s Report Card showed that nearly 70 percent of fourth and eighth graders are reading at or below “Basic,” the worst results in the test’s history. Math scores weren’t much better, stuck near historic lows. Instead of fixing the crisis, too many school officials are pouring energy into social indoctrination while real education falls by the wayside.

Teachers have been fired, parents silenced, and students punished for daring to question these leftist dogmas. Radical ideology is smuggled into classrooms under the banner of “inclusion,” while parents are treated as the enemy.

Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels openly argued in The Communist Manifesto that the education of children should belong to the state, not their parents. Increasingly, school bureaucrats seem intent on the same goal — stripping parents of authority and handing their children over to leftist ideology.

The battle for the souls and minds of America’s kids is far from over, and parents must not relent.

Sarah Katherine Sisk, AMAC Newsline

According to a recent Gallup poll, in 2010, socialism had a net approval rating of +7 among Democrats, which is bad enough.

Fifteen years later, the margin has jumped to +37 — an increase in net approval of more than 500%.

As I wrote yesterday when discussing the bizarre Hochul/Mamdani relationship–she endorsed him, but not the reverse–I pointed to the fact that no Democrat with national ambitions can afford to offend the communists, even if it endangers their general election prospects nationwide. And Hochul wants to be president.

Before you drop the inevitable “Democrats just think socialism means more social programs” argument, you would have to explain to me why, if that were so, Democrats didn’t say the same thing in 2010.

After all, Democrats were just as excited about expanding government benefits then as now. In other words, that dog don’t hunt. In fact, it is so incompetent at hunting that it should avoid Kristi Noem.

Your median Democrat is no longer center-left. There are plenty of center-left Democrats left, providing their margin of victory in elections–but the weight of opinion in the Democratic Party is friendly to socialism, and in fact to communism. For many of them, socialism is just the term they use to describe actual communism, just as the Soviet Union was the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics

Sure, there are some “socialists” who have genuine disagreements with the state ownership of the means of production, but then again, 50% of New York City’s voters–not Democrats, but all voters–are going to vote for a man who explicitly calls for the elimination of private property. 

That’s communism, regardless of what Politifact says.

“Moderate” Democrats–and there ARE, as I keep insisting, moderate Democrats–are fooling themselves about what their party has become. They are laser-focused on hating Donald Trump and musing about how cruel they are while they stay in a party that literally valorizes assassinations and riots, defends Venezuelan gangs taking over apartment buildings, and chooses to defend wife-beating human traffickers.

No, those are not fringe opinions in the Democratic Party. They are the mainstream, and the moderates are at the fringe of the Party.

This is why Gavin Newsom had to do a 180 earlier this year as he soft-launched his political campaign, and Seth Moulton rapidly walked back his moderation on trans issues. Newsom, you may recall, began the year sitting down with conservatives for his new podcast and dropped hints that he was actually moderate on trans issues, sort of, and after an avalanche of criticism, he switched over to doing a mini-me version of Trump as a lefty. 

There is no room for moderation in the Democratic Party on the national level. That is why Pete Buttigieg, who cosplays one at times, has a ceiling of support far below that which is necessary to get the nomination in 2028. About a quarter of the Democrats long for a normal candidate and gravitate to him, but the left will eviscerate him when push comes to shove. Not because he isn’t very very liberal, but because he works hard not to appear radical. 

The base wants radical. That’s why the most energy in the party is behind Mamdani, Sanders, Warren, and AOC. For God’s sake, Jasmine Crockett is super popular with Democrats, and she cosplays a radical idiot (she is actually smart, believe it or no

The Democratic Party is not, at its core, liberal in any sense anymore. There was a time when it was aiming for a version of a free market system with a heavy dose of social insurance. 

Now? The base is anticapitalist and authoritarian. 

I understand why moderate Democrats cringe at the modern Republican Party. I honestly do. Culturally, the base of the Party is alien to them, and many moderate Democrats are reflexively creeped out by talk about God. 

But geez, man. Look at who your fellow travelers are. They are violent and insane. 

Richard Dawkins gets it, although I can’t say that he would vote Republican should he be able to. The West is in danger. 

Moderates are going to have to wrap their heads around the fact that there are, currently, two sides in the war for civilization, and they are currently on the wrong side. We can argue about social insurance when we win, but if they help the radical left win, we will have bigger problems than whether the state funds dental care or not. 

Cuba has “free” health care. Do you want to live there? Or Venezuela? 

We can’t fool ourselves about what is at stake. 

David Strom

• Editor’s Note: The Democrat Party has never been less popular as voters reject its globalist agenda.

Homeland Security @DHSgov AND STAY OUT!

In less than 250 days, 2 MILLION illegal aliens have left the United States.

Jimmy Kimmel has always been a fraud. He poses as a comedian, but he’s not funny. He never was funny. He didn’t miss his calling as a CNN or MSNBC propaganda specialist.

He’s a barbarian. His true calling is running the 21st Century, woke version of concentration camps. He will get his wish if the people who put President Trump back in the White House ever let down their guard.

In the meantime, he will continue to spew unhinged hatred once Disney puts him back on the air, as they eventually will.

Or: Maybe he’ll run for President. He’ll be a folk hero to Democrats everywhere. Sadly, they’re all barbarians now.

Michael J. Hurd, Daily Dose of Reason