What's A.I. Saying About Vital Signs Ministries?

After a conversation with a friend lately about the increasing presence and influence of A.I. on all aspects of our lives, we decided to try a couple of experiments. We thought you might find the results of interest also.

Here’s the deal -- we asked an A.I. program to “tell us about” 1) Vital Signs Ministries, 2) “When Swing Was King,” 3) my novel “The Christmas Room,” and finally 4) Vital Signs Blog. Here were the answers...

Vital Signs Ministries

Vital Signs Ministries is a Christian nonprofit organization based in Omaha, Nebraska, founded in 1982 by Denny and Claire Hartford. The ministry describes itself as “Christian activists in the service of ‘the least of these’” and operates with a core commitment to a comprehensive sanctity of life ethic. 

Here are the key aspects of their work:

Mission Focus: Their primary goals include preaching the gospel, making disciples, and serving others through education, direct action, intercession, advocacy, and fellowship. They are particularly known for their pro-life stance and efforts to promote a culture of life. 

Key Programs: Pregnancy Counseling: They established the AAA Center for Pregnancy Counseling to support women and families.

Sidewalk Counseling: They engage in prayerful, peaceful, and winsome sidewalk counseling at abortion facilities. 

Senior Outreach: They run the popular “When Swing Was King” ministry, which provides entertainment and companionship in senior care facilities. They also conduct Sunday services at local senior living communities like Aksarben Village. 

Media & Education: The ministry has produced radio broadcasts (“Vital Signs” and “Vital Signs Weekend”), maintains an active blog and social media presence, and hosts book discussions and film showings. Also, founders Denny and Claire Hartford have conducted thousands of speaking engagements across the U.S. and internationally. The organization remains active in 2026 continuing its long-standing work in Omaha and beyond through various outreach and educational initiatives.

“When Swing Was King”

“When Swing Was King” is a ministry program by Vital Signs Ministries designed to bring joy, memory stimulation, and social connection to seniors in nursing homes and assisted living facilities. The program features a live presentation that combines big band music from the 1930s and 40s (featuring artists like Glenn Miller, Benny Goodman, and Frank Sinatra) with a slideshow of 240–265 era-specific photographs depicting fashion, cars, military life, and daily life from that time.

Hosted by founders Denny and Claire Hartford, the show includes a DJ-style commentary that adds humor and historical context, followed by personal visits with residents to foster friendship. While primarily an entertainment outreach intended to combat boredom and lift spirits, it also serves as a winsome witness for the Christian faith, often opening doors for spiritual conversations and prayer. The program began in July 2010 as a single event for Denny’s mother but has grown to serve multiple facilities monthly.

“The Christmas Room”

Denny Hartford’s novel “The Christmas Room” is an inspirational Christian fiction story set within the walls of a nursing home, focusing on themes of faith, dignity, aging, and the enduring spirit of the elderly.

Plot Summary -- The story begins with Grace Trinisi, a woman in the ICU who is unaware that Christmas has passed. Her son, Tony, fulfills her wish to see a Christmas tree in her room, creating a small sanctuary of holiday cheer that becomes known as “The Christmas Room.” This space not only comforts Grace but also inspires the hospital staff. Grace survives her illness but is diagnosed with frontal lobe dementia, leading her son to move her to Villa Vista Care Community, an innovative nursing home. The Christmas Room travels with her, becoming a central, year-round fixture of the facility under the guidance of the visionary director, Carolyn Kovacs.

The narrative weaves together the lives of various residents and staff, exploring their struggles and triumphs. Key characters include: Clark Gritzner, the difficult son of a resident whose actions create a medical emergency for his wife, Mattie, and who hides a personal crisis; Carolyn Kovacs, the dedicated director who manages the facility's daily challenges, from lawsuits to expansion plans; Rita Costello: a nurse aide whose compassion leads to professional growth; and Ralph Yarborough, an elderly custodian whose heroic actions in a restaurant change the facility’s future.

The plot balances the day-to-day realities of long-term care with a mystery involving Clark Gritzner and a broader message about the value of every human life, regardless of age or ability 

Reception and Reviews -- The book has received a 4.4 out of 5-star rating on Amazon based on reader reviews. Readers and reviewers consistently praise the novel for its realistic and empathetic portrayal of nursing home life.

Emotional Impact: Many reviewers describe the book as “uplifting,” “heartwarming,” and “full of love.” It is noted for bringing tears and joy, resonating deeply with those who have cared for aging parents or worked in healthcare 

Educational Value: Several readers, including those working in senior care or studying for Clinical Pastoral Education, highlight the book’s ability to provide insight into the “blood, sweat, tears, and joy” of nursing homes. It is often recommended for training staff or helping families understand the aging process 

Spiritual Depth: As a work of Christian fiction, the story is praised for its exploration of faith, forgiveness, and the healing power of love. One reviewer noted it felt like “a bit of heaven in this cursed world.” 

Realism: While the setting is idealized, reviewers appreciate that it does not shy away from difficult topics like dementia, abuse, and family conflict, ultimately showing the potential for nursing homes to be places of dignity and community. One reviewer, a pastor, mentioned that while they initially wanted to deduct a star for the idealized nature of the facility, they awarded five stars because the book shows what nursing homes “can and should be.”

Vital Signs Blog

The Vital Signs Blog is the commentary platform for Vital Signs Ministries, a non-profit Christian organization based in Omaha, Nebraska. The blog is primarily written and curated by Denny Hartford, who co-founded the ministry with his wife, Claire, in 1982.

The blog and its content center around several core pillars:

1. Cultural and Political Commentary

Hartford writes extensively from a traditional Christian, conservative, and pro-life worldview. He frequently provides commentary on current events, local and national politics, and what he describes as the “culture wars.” This includes curating consistent roundups like “The Top 5 Plus,” where he highlights and critiques media articles on topics ranging from religious freedom to societal trends and geopolitics.

2. Pro-Life Advocacy

A major focus of both the ministry and the blog is anti-abortion advocacy. Hartford uses the blog to share insights on pro-life theology (such as analyzing biblical texts regarding the preborn), promote local activist events, and discuss political initiatives, particularly within Nebraska.

3. Literature and the Arts

Beyond politics and theology, Hartford frequently shares his personal reflections on classic literature, films, and history (he holds a master’s degree in history). He has a deep affinity for classic authors like Charles Dickens, Alexandre Dumas, and G.K. Chesterton, often drawing moral or spiritual applications from their works. He also runs a closely related secondary blog called The Book Den, which is dedicated more strictly to literature and popular culture reviews.

4. Ministry Updates and Community Engagement

The blog serves as a ledger for the ministry’s practical outreach programs. This includes updates on their “When Swing Was King” program (a multimedia big band music show they present at senior living communities and nursing homes) and their regular “letter-writing parties” aimed at advocacy and encouragement.

You can read his updates and commentary directly through The Blog - Vital Signs Ministries or follow his personal, ongoing posts at the standalone Vital Signs Blogspot.

The Top 5 Plus (May 16)

1) “Beyond the Precipice: Whether in the horrors of October 7 or the full-fledged US-Israeli alliance against Iran, I know of no modern precedents. The Jewish people stand at a hinge of history.” (Michael Oren, Substack)

From the article -- Thinly disguised as anti-Zionism, Jew hatred has been normalized in America. Elsewhere -- in Canada, Australia, and Europe -- it has metastasized. Young generations throughout the West, fed by an endless stream of anti-Israel posts, now view us as the source of all evil in the Middle East, if not the world.

In the not-too-distant future, we must assume, few foreign leaders will actively block efforts to boycott and sanction Israel or veto anti-Israel resolutions in the UN Security Council. As never before, Israel will be diplomatically and legally isolated.

The situation might be less alarming if accompanied by a reduction in the physical threats facing Israel. But, on the contrary, enemies both on our borders and throughout the Middle East continue to seek our destruction. Barring a decisive victory over Iran, the military dangers facing Israel are liable to persist if not multiply.

Confronted with these enormous challenges, the Jewish State must not remain passive. In Israel, traditionally, foreign policy has always been regarded as the poor stepchild of security. Washington hosts dozens of foreign policy institutes. In Israel, by contrast, virtually all the think-tanks focus on the military. We must cease viewing foreign affairs as a sideline, but rather regard it as a paramount component of our national defense. We must cease assigning vital diplomatic and foreign policy posts to political appointees bereft of serious international experience.

Israel and Anti-Semitism Related articles: “The Intifada Comes to Brooklyn Under New York’s Socialist Mayor” (Jarrett Stepman, Daily Signal)...“The Four Horsemen of the New Antisemitism: Demographic change, DEI ideology, anti-Israel radicalism, and political cowardice have mainstreamed hostility toward Jews.” (American Greatness) Victor Davis Hanson...“Nicholas Kristof’s IDF ‘Rape-Dogs’ Accusation Adds to the Bizarre List of Israel Weaponizing Wildlife” (Brad Slager, Red State)

2) “China: Our Enemy, Not Our Rival” (Ben Shapiro, Jewish World Review)

From the article -- China is not merely America's geopolitical opponent. It is America's geopolitical enemy -- and has been since the establishment of the Chinese communist regime in 1949. For decades, American leaders and elites indulged the fantasy that this reality could be softened or reversed. Richard Nixon opened relations with China in part to split Beijing from the Soviet Union. Later, economic globalists insisted that bringing China into global markets would moderate its politics. The theory was that free trade would lead to freer people.

It didn't.

China never stopped being what it has always been: a communist surveillance state with an appetite for repression at home and influence abroad. It is a historically mass-murdering regime and a government whose ambition is nothing less than the destruction of America's global dominance.

And China plays the long game.

China-related articles: “Who Really Needs Whom? Trump, Xi Jinping, and the Illusion of Chinese Strength: China projects strength abroad, but internal purge politics, economic strain, and structural dependence suggest a far more fragile system than it appears.” (Sasha Gong, American Greatness)...“Strange Trip: The U.S. war against Iran hasn’t ushered in American decline. It’s exposed China’s weakness.” (Lee Smith, Tablet)...“Defending Taiwan” (Mike Watson, Law & Liberty)...“Trump and Xi Are Meeting about AI -- Christians Should Pay Attention” (Robert Maginnis, Washington Stand)

3) “Habits for Americans in an Age of Disruption: Remarks at Manhattan Institute’s Hamilton Award Dinner, May 6, 2006” (Ben Sasse, City Journal)

From the article -- I’m on the clock tonight in more ways than one, so I want to make every minute count. I think the problems that we face collectively are problems of habits, love, and community, not chiefly of policy. So I’d like to spend our time together tonight thinking about families and especially about younger parents. Grandparents, aunts and uncles, and all those of us who’ve earned the titles of aunts and uncles to our friends’ kids have a role to play in this, of course, but my thoughts at this moment in America are aimed primarily at parents: the blurry eyed, overcaffeinated, ever-doubtful moms and dads who know the truth of the aphorism, “the days are long and the years are short,” who are in the business of raising souls and raising citizens. As Americans, our experiment in self-government and our pioneering spirit has always depended on wisdom and self-control. And these are not exactly the things that policy or Washington is known for and certainly not the things that politicians or bureaucrats could ever impart. Also, these are not exactly the things and the virtues that are fostered by technology’s illusion of endless consumption, infinite optionality, and cost-free disembodiment.

No, the virtues for a life well lived are taught, modeled, and practiced in the daily life of society’s smallest but most important platoons, the republic’s thickest yet pre-political institutions, chief among them the family. So I want to start with a big prediction and it is this. In the coming decades, if AI continues to progress as it has, America is going to have a big, messy debate about UBI, universal basic income. And in its long-term implications, this debate is going to dwarf the fights we had more than a decade ago about Obamacare and even the debates we’ve had about the Great Society and the New Deal.

To be perfectly blunt, it’s unlikely that I’m going to be around for this debate, but for the record, I am strongly against UBI. I think it’s terrible policy. But either way, whether we end up with UBI or we don’t, whether we end at the sunny uplands of abundance or the hellscape of an actual jobs apocalypse, Americans are going to need better habits than we have right now to help our people, our citizens, and our republic thrive. Because virtue has always been at the heart of what it takes to keep a republic.

4) “FDA Commissioner Resigns after Slow Admin. Progress on Abortion Pill Review” (Joshua Arnold, Washington Stand)

From the article -- Without an in-person appointment, physicians cannot verify the unborn child’s gestational age or rule out an ectopic pregnancy, two conditions that can threaten the life of a woman who takes the abortion pill, to say nothing of the life of the child. The lax oversight has also enabled abusive boyfriends and traffickers to coerce women into abortions against their will.

In October 2025, Senator Josh Hawley (R-Mo.) lambasted the FDA’s “shocking” approval of “ANOTHER chemical abortion drug, when the evidence shows chemical abortion drugs are dangerous and even deadly for the mother. And of course 100% lethal to the child.”

In February 2026, Republican senators received a private briefing from Makary, only to leave more convinced than ever “that this safety study is a dead end,” as Hawley put it. “I just think that [the] FDA is not serious about it. I don’t think that they’re proceeding with any sense of urgency whatsoever.”

When news of Makary’s resignation broke, Hawley called the news “welcome,” declaring that “Dr. Makary was uniquely destructive to the prolife movement. He attempted to place pro-abortion lawyers in key positions. He slow- walked a vitally necessary review of the abortion drug mifepristone. He used his discretion to approve a new abortion drug when the data shows it sends one in 10 women to the emergency room. He froze out prolife leaders and repeatedly stonewalled Congress.”

5) “Great Nations Aren’t Destroyed by Enemies. They’re Destroyed by Debt.: The greatest threat to American power may not come from Beijing or Tehran, but from Treasury auctions.” (Douglas Carswell, American Spectator)

From the article -- For the past 25 years (ever since Bill Clinton left the White House) Washington has spent more than it has taken in. Every single year. The national debt now stands at $39 trillion. In 2001, the United States owed less than $6 trillion. Today, we owe nearly $39 trillion. The federal debt has grown by $33 trillion in just 25 years. 

Here is the worrying part. In the entire 212 years from George Washington’s first inauguration through Bill Clinton’s last day in office -- through the Civil War, the Great Depression, two World Wars, and the Cold War -- the United States accumulated $5.8 trillion in debt. In the 25 years since, we have added $33 trillion more. More than four-fifths of the total debt the country carries today has been borrowed in the past quarter-century...

The pace is accelerating. Of that $39 trillion, $2.7 trillion was added in the past year alone. Ten trillion (more than 27 percent of every dollar America has ever borrowed) has been piled on in just the past five years. The federal government now adds roughly $8 billion in new debt every single day. When the cost of servicing old debts crowds out the essential investments that sustain national strength, decline becomes almost inevitable.

Great nations are rarely destroyed by external enemies. They are more often destroyed by debt. The historian Niall Ferguson has warned that when the cost of servicing old debts crowds out the essential investments that sustain national strength — especially defense — decline becomes almost inevitable. History is littered with cautionary tales. Habsburg Spain. Bourbon France. The Ottoman Empire. Each was once the greatest power on earth. Each was overstretched by debt.

Ferguson identifies a critical threshold beyond which a great power cannot long survive: the moment a nation spends more on debt interest than on defense. At that point, fiscal arithmetic begins to dismantle geopolitical power. The United States is now flirting with that threshold.

Other Excellent Reads from the Week:

* “Oh No, Canada!: How assisted dying became the easy answer in Canadian healthcare.” (Richard D. Kocur, American Spectator)

* “Biblical Insight: No Matter The Iran War’s Outsome, It Will Not Result In A Lasting Peace” (Robert Gottselig, Harbinger’s Daily)

* “How Social Media Created A Lost Generation Of Girls” (Auguste Meyrat, Federalist)

* “JFK’s revenge: On American attempts to overthrow Cuba’s Communist regime.” (James Piereson, New Criterion)

* “John ‘Failure Is Not An Option’ Thune Just Failed Election Integrity: Let’s face it, the debate show on the SAVE America Act was the plan all along. And Thune was the star of the ‘deliberative’ farce.” (M.D. Kittle, Federalist)

Dr. Jefferson Wouldn't "Just Stand Aside"

From the late Dr. Mildred Jefferson, a highly acclaimed surgeon at Boston University, the first African-American woman to earn a degree from Harvard Medical School, and a co-founder of National Right to Life.

“Many people try to hide behind the confusion of not knowing what happens before a baby is born. But we do not have to be confused. We in medicine and science have a different name for every stage of the development of the baby, but it does not matter at all whether you know those names or not. When a young woman has not had much opportunity to go to school and she becomes pregnant, no one has to tell her that she is going to have a baby.

“I became a doctor in the tradition that is represented in the Bible of looking upon medicine as a high calling. I will not stand aside and have this great profession of mine, of the doctor, give up the designation of healer to become that of the social executioner. The Supreme Court Justices only had to hand down an order. Social workers only have to make arrangements, but it has been given to my profession to destroy the life of the innocent and the helpless.

“Today it is the unborn child; tomorrow it is likely to be the elderly or those who are incurably ill. Who knows but that a little later it may be anyone who has political or moral views that do not fit into the distorted new order? To that question, ‘Am I my brother's keeper?’ I answer ‘Yes.’ It is everyone's responsibility to safeguard and preserve life. A child is a member of the human family and deserves care and concern.”

The Top 5 Plus (May 9)

1) “5 Insights from Ben Sasse as He Faces His Last Days on Earth” (Kathy Athearn, Washington Stand)

From the article -- Fifty-four-year-old former Nebraska senator, husband, and father of three, Ben Sasse, was tragically diagnosed only six months ago with stage 4 pancreatic cancer and told he had three to four months to live. While the clinical trial that his doctors put him on has given him more time on earth than doctors predicted, the cancer has sadly continued to spread to his liver, lymph nodes, lung, and vascular system.

Each day that he lives is a miracle. Knowing this has caused Sasse to focus on what is truly important, and he has graciously shared his wisdom in several interviews recently. The following are five insights that we would all be wise to listen to and reflect upon.

2) “It’s Time to Abolish Public Schools: Public schools survive what no business could: monopoly protection, union entrenchment, and taxpayer bailouts -- proof that education works best when government gets out of the way.” (Larry Sand, American Greatness)

From the article -- In the 1830s, education reformer Horace Mann viewed public schools as a “crucible of democracy.” He sought to have the state take over schools and raise taxes to fund them. Mann even predicted that if public schooling were widely adopted and given enough time to take effect, “nine-tenths of the crimes in the penal code would become obsolete,” and “the long catalog of human ills would be abridged.”

Clearly, Mann was dead wrong. Almost 200 years later, our nation, with its massive education bureaucracy, is more divided than ever, crime rates are high, and we have more “human ills” than we can handle. And taxpayers fork over about a trillion dollars a year in the process.

While Mann’s utopian goals obviously didn’t come to fruition, they did create a link in people’s minds between the “institution of public schooling and the ideals of public education” that, sadly, still exists today.

But the status quo is simply unacceptable.

Related articles: “Would You Leave Your Child There? One School District’s Answer Should Alarm Every Parent in America” (Julio Rivera, American Greatness)...”Declining Birthrates, Immigration Drive Enrollment Crisis in US Public Schools (AG News Staff)...“May Day Madness with the Chicago Teachers Union: Before students can engage in civic action, they must first learn to read and write.” (Aidan Grogan, City Journal)

3) “The Democratic Party Is Dead, Long Live the Jacobins! -- Today’s Democratic Party has abandoned its traditional working-class, patriotic roots and embraced a radical Jacobin ideology built on division, coercion, and political extremism.” (Victor Davis Hanson, American Greatness)

From the article -- For the past century, the agendas of the Democratic Party were predictable. They professed concern for working Americans and supported blue-collar unions. Unemployment insurance, a 40-hour work week, disability insurance, and Social Security were their trademarks—often rapidly achieved by growing government bureaucracies and continually raising taxes. Still, many Democrats were socially conservative.

By the 1970s, Democrats still deplored antisemitism. Party officials had rejected their own segregationists to champion civil rights. Presidents like Franklin Roosevelt, Harry Truman, and John F. Kennedy all supported strong defense and military deterrence.

All that is now passé.

Related article: “Why So Many Political Pyromaniacs, Assassins, and Other Scary Types?: How moral certainty turns crimes into causes and culprits into symbols.” (Daniel J. Flynn, American Spectator)

4) “Islam’s Turbocharged Takeover of Europe” (Nils A. Haug, Gatestone Institute)

From the article -- Meanwhile, Iran and its jihadist proxies appear innocent of the Western "infidel" concepts of just wars, international laws, human rights or the Geneva conventions. They are mainly directed, it seems, by medieval Sharia law.

"Leadership in times of crisis," it has been said, "is not measured by the absence of risk, but by the willingness to accept it." In avoiding risk, the cowardly leaders of Western Europe – those sell-outs to an increasingly antagonistic extremist Muslim electorate upon whom they are increasingly dependent for political office -- are a disgrace to their nations. They are also a great disappointment to those who believe in the preservation of history's finest civilization – one with freedom, democracy, human rights, and an embedded Judeo-Christian moral foundation.

These leaders seemingly reject any obligation to oppose attempts to destroy their nations' traditional way of life. In the tradition of British Prime Minister Neville Chamberlain, who in 1938 imagined that he had a peace deal with Hitler, they have taken on a greater risk: that of appeasement.

European nations, it appears, have succumbed to Islamization. Their rapidly changing demographics reveal it; their failure to adequately protect their small Jewish communities against vociferous hate reveal it; their compromise on basic individual freedoms in their own countries reveal it, and their refusals to support the US, their erstwhile protector, reveal it.

Related articles dealing with the War with Ira, Radical Islam, Europe’s surrender to Islam, Anti-Semitism --- “Hamas is Humiliating Trump's ‘Board of Peace’” (Khaled Abu Toameh, Gatestone Institute)...“Political Islam sees Europe as a territory to be claimed” (Konstantinos Bogdanos, Brussels Signal)...“An empire that cannot speak its name” (Ralph Schoellhammer, Brussels Signal)...“Antisemitism, Islam and the future of the GOP: The red-green alliance of Marxists and Islamists is fueling hatred for Jews and Israel among young people, while giving Tucker Carlson and Megyn Kelly a new audience.” (Jonathan S. Tobin, JNS)...“Why are liberals and Democrats embracing anti-Israel extremists?: Mainstream support for Senate candidates like Graham Platner and Abdul El-Sayed reflects both panic about Trump and the acceptance of antisemitism.” (Jonathan S. Tobin, JNS)...“How Intense Political Polarization Is Fanning The Flames Of Antisemitism (John Rodrigues, Harbinger’s Daily)

5) “When the Machine Decides: The Growing Threat of AI Agency” (Robert Maginnis, Washington Stand)

From the article -- Over the weekend of April 25-26, PocketOS founder Jer Crane confronted what every business owner fears — nothing. His company’s production database has vanished. Three months of customer reservations, payment records, and vehicle assignments gone in nine seconds, because an AI software assistant encountered a login error and decided on its own to fix the problem. The AI found a digital access key — essentially a master password — hidden in an unrelated file, connected to Railway, the cloud-hosting service where PocketOS stored its data, and issued a deletion command that wiped the database and every backup simultaneously, with no human being asked to approve a single step.

Most readers will not recognize PocketOS. The principle at stake touches every one of them.

What Crane experienced sits at the frontier of autonomous AI — software that no longer waits for human approval at each step but acts independently to complete tasks, make decisions, and execute commands in the real world. These systems already write news stories, conduct financial trades, screen job applicants, and assist military planners. Humans are increasingly supervisors of processes they cannot fully audit and, as Crane discovered, cannot always stop before the damage is done.

Related article: “It’s No Longer Just A Tool, AI Is Where The Self-Worship Epidemic Is Heading” (Greg Laurie, Harbinger’s Daily)

Other Excellent Reads from the Week

* “How Women Have Led to the Erasure of Women: Modern sexual and family norms have blurred the meaning of womanhood, weakening motherhood and accelerating a cultural shift that treats biology as optional.” (Jennifer Galardi, American Greatness) (Also see “Stop Telling Women They’ll Only Enjoy Motherhood When They Aren’t Watching Their Kids” (Abby Johnson, Federalist))

* “Price Gouging, Now Personalized Thanks to Surveillance Pricing and Collusion: Corporate greed isn’t just bad ethics -- it’s the fastest way to make socialism sound reasonable.” (Buck Throckmorton, American Spectator)

* “Is America an Idea? Not According to the Founding Fathers” (S.A. McCarthy, Washington Stand)

* “Neil Gorsuch Is Wrong, America Isn’t A ‘Creedal Nation’” (John Daniel Davidson, Federalist)

* “Bureaucrats Improperly Paid Out $186 Billion In Taxpayer Money In 2025: Will the public sector ever come to grips with the scale of the problem?” (Christopher Jacobs, Federalist)

If a Good Book Is a Good Friend..."

If a good book is a good friend -- and it is -- then why on God’s green earth would you not want to enrich your life by hanging out with good friends? I’m delighted to say this has been a priority in my life since I was little kid. Well, yes; there was a tragic period in my terribly misspent teen years where I departed from that lifestyle. But first with Thornton Wilder’s Our Town and then with Fyodor Dosteovsky’s The Brothers Karamazov, I see now how the Lord was using good books to draw me away from my intellectual and moral slide -- and towards the supernatural light and liberty He offered me through Calvary’s atoning sacrifice.  I began to read again. I began to think again. And I began to dream, aspire, and appreciate again. 

I thank the Lord for His rescue of my soul and my mind...and for continuing to bring the good gifts of good books my way. I thought of this the other morning when I mentioned to someone having had such delightful times the past couple of months in hanging out with old friends. “Really,” he asked. “What friends are you talking about?” I smiled and told him: C.S. Lewis, Francis Schaeffer, J.R.R. Tolkien, Charles Dickens, Rafael Sabatini, and the writers of the Old Testament books of Joshua, Judges, Ruth, I and 2 Samuel. Very good friends, indeed.

Charles William Eliot once observed, “Books are the quietest and most constant of friends; they are the most accessible and wisest of counselors, and the most patient of teachers.” He was spot on. And I pray I will effectively live out that conviction until I’m allowed entry into the libraries of the New Jerusalem!

The Top 5 Plus (May 2)

1) “Political Violence Is Cool Now: Why do so many elites support violent extremism?” (James B. Meigs, Free Expression WSJ)

From the article -- All the cool kids think killing people is OK now. Or at least understandable, as long as the killer has, like, a really good reason. Few of the people who talk this way want to pull the trigger themselves, thank God. But it gives them a kind of edgy thrill to talk about how violence in the service of a good cause might be necessary, even ennobling.

Some years ago, writer Rob Henderson coined the term “luxury belief” to describe fashionable opinions held by people who are insulated from the consequences of their views: for example, professors in safe college towns who advocate defunding the police. In a Free Expression article earlier this week Mr. Henderson noted that “glorifying ‘microlooting’ is a luxury belief because the people praising it aren’t the ones who pay for it.”

The people pursuing luxury beliefs are engaged in a kind of status competition. Who can épater la bourgeoisie with the boldest, most transgressive political statements? After Oct. 7, 2023, we saw this kind of status-jockeying on college campuses, where elite students vied to become the most fervent supporters of Hamas and Hezbollah. Keffiyeh scarves became de rigueur. Celebrating political murder is the next step on this progression. For most, it’s only talk. But there will always be a few who seek what they see as the ultimate status: actually carrying out a political attack.

Related articles: “From One Assassination Attempt to the Next: Mainstreaming Violence Against a President” (Victor Davis Hanson, American Greatness)...“The Young, Violent Political Left” (Michael Barone, Jewish World Review)...“Coddling Leftist Assassins” (Thom Nickels, Front Page Mag)...“Stoking Violence: The Assassination Culture In America Is Not A Problem Coming From ‘Both Sides Of The Aisle’ (Erick Stakelbeck, Harbinger’s Daily)...“Leftist Political Violence is an Existential Threat to the Republic (Josh Hammer, Front Page Mag)...“Party of Assassins: (The latest Trump assassin wasn’t a radical. He was a Democrat.” (Daniel Greenfield, Front Page Mag)

2) “The Pro-Life Movement Has An IVF Problem” (Nathanael Blake, Federalist)

From the article -- IVF is on the rise, and that’s a problem for the pro-life movement. The problem is that pro-lifers know that human life begins at conception, but the IVF industry intentionally destroys human embryos in vast quantities — yet IVF is very popular, including among those who describe themselves as pro-life. Even as the American birthrate plummets, more babies are being born through IVF, with the most recent release of data showing the number of IVF babies surpassing 100,00 in a single year.

This has established a pervasive dissonance. Many Christian churches proclaim from the pulpit that human embryos are fully human, but nonetheless seem untroubled when members, and even leaders, use IVF according to the industry-standard embryo-destroying protocols. They just prefer not to talk about the contradiction.

Thus, many people, not having thought about the issue much, do not realize that there is a conflict between the pro-life commitment to treating human embryos as human persons and what the IVF industry does. For instance, when President Trump unveiled his pro-IVF fertility policy, reporter Emily Jashinsky asked what his message was to those with “religious objections to IVF.” He replied, “I think this is very pro-life. … You can’t get more pro-life than this.” The apparent reasoning is simple: IVF helps people have babies and pro-lifers love babies. But the pro-life position is about protecting human life, not just helping people to have babies when they want them.

And protecting human life from conception is incompatible with how IVF is usually practiced. This is why IVF advocates are against recognizing human embryos as human persons. For example, Resolve (the National Infertility and Family Building Association) highlights the group’s opposition to laws that recognize that human life begins at conception.

3) “DOJ Report Reveals Biden Admin’s Expansive Religious Liberty Violations and Hostility to American Christians” (S.A. McCarthy, Washington Stand)

From the article -- “Our Nation’s origin and system of government bear the imprint of a Christian worldview and ethic, even as its laws protect religious pluralism. Christian beliefs, in conjunction with contemporary political thought and economic realities, influenced colonial settlers in their decision to overthrow tyranny and pursue independence,” the report’s introduction states. “After the Revolutionary War, Christians then informed the structure and contents of the United States Constitution, its amendments, and contemporaneous state constitutions.”

“But, when Christian beliefs about morality and human nature conflicted with the Biden Administration’s views, religious rights often suffered,” the report’s introduction continues. “The Biden Administration generally tolerated religious beliefs that were privately held but zealously pursued actions to limit Christians’ ability to act in accordance with their faith. This affected matters of deep personal importance to nearly every American: life, family, marriage, and self-identity,” it continues. “The Biden Administration’s policies regularly clashed with a Christian worldview and burdened traditional religious practices. These conflicts frequently arose over abortion, gender ideology, and sexual orientation. Ultimately, the Biden Administration penalized Christians who lived in accordance with their beliefs.”

The report details 14 “key findings” regarding the Biden administration’s abuse of power and violation of religious liberties, ranging from a two-tiered justice system and aggressive prosecution of pro-life activists to the coercive violation of conscience rights and the rabid promotion of LGBT ideology. The taskforce also identifies several “remedies” that the Trump administration has enacted to ensure that the federal government is not weaponized against American Christians.

Related articles: “New Report Thaws the Chill of Bias against Christians” (Tony Perkins, Washington Stand)...“Task Force Publishes Report on Eradicating Anti-Christian Bias and Restoring Religious Liberty” (Office of Public Affairs, Department of Justice)...“Pardons Aren’t Enough. The FACE Act Must Go” (Andrew Bath, Federalist)

4) “The New Religion of AI: Who Gets to Define What It Means to Be Human?” (Robert Maginnis, Washington Stand)

From the article -- On January 20, 2026, historian Yuval Noah Harari stood before the World Economic Forum at Davos and issued a direct challenge to Christians worldwide. “If religion is built from words, then AI will take over religion,” he said, then named Christianity by name: “This is particularly true of religions based on books, like Islam, Christianity, or Judaism.” And he left this question in the air: “What happens to the religion of a book when the greatest expert on the holy book is an AI?”

The clip accumulated 1.2 million views within days. The room at Davos did not object.

Harari’s 2026 remarks are the current edge of a worldview shift building for years — visible in the public statements of the most powerful technologists of our time, spanning five distinct domains of the human person.

Related articles: “China is Infiltrating the Anti-AI Movement”  (Daniel Greenfield, Front Page Mag)...“Artificial Intelligence Misquotes The Bible Up To 60% Of The Time” (Ken Ham, Harbinger’s Daily)

5) “Why Is Progressivism Incompatible With the Declaration of Independence? Clarence Thomas Explains (Tyler O’Neil, Daily Signal)

From the article -- With his characteristic brilliance, Thomas cut through the Orwellian masquerade of Progressivism to reveal what it truly is—a fundamentally backward movement. By rejecting the solid footing of the declaration, Progressivism opened America to central planning and administrative rule.

While the declaration bases governmental authority on the consent of the governed and God creating human beings with inalienable rights, under Progressivism, “liberty no longer preceded the government as a gift from God but was to be enjoyed at the grace of the government.”

Thomas noted that President Woodrow “Wilson and the progressives candidly admitted that they took it from Otto von Bismarck’s Germany, whose state-centric society they admired. Progressives like Wilson argued that America need to leave behind the principles of the founding and catch up with the more advanced and sophisticated system of relatively unimpeded state power.”

Yet Thomas also quoted President Calvin Coolidge, who delivered a powerful address on the 150th anniversary of the declaration. “If all men are created equal, that is final,” Coolidge said. “If they are endowed with unalienable rights, that is final. If governments derive their just powers from the consent of the governed, that is final. No advance, no progress, can be made beyond these propositions. If anyone wishes to deny their truth or their soundness, the only direction in which they can proceed historically is not forward but backward.”

Other Excellent Articles from the Week

* “Communism’s Comeback – and America’s Amnesia: A generation that forgot history is flirting with repeating it.” (Jeffrey Ludwig, Front Page Mag)

* “Biden Admin Used ‘Benghazi’ to Hide $90M to Planned Parenthood. Senator Wants DOJ to Probe.” (Fred Lucas, Daily Signal)

* “Teachers’ Unions Contribute a Combined $1 Billion Toward Left-Leaning Political Activism” (Kamden Muller, National Review)

* “Rep. Chris Smith welcomes Supreme Court’s decision in First Choice Women’s Resource Centers v. Davenport and protection of pregnancy care centers” (National RTL)

* “The Story Of Everything Hits At Just The Right Time To Boost America’s Faith Resurgence” (David Goodwin, Federalist)

The Top 5 Plus (April 25)

1) “The SPLC Was Paying the Ku Klux Klan, DOJ Indictment Claims” (Tyler O'Neil, Washington Stand)

From the article -- The Southern Poverty Law Center has raised money for decades claiming to dismantle white supremacy, but it funneled millions of dollars to white nationalist groups, including the Ku Klux Klan, according to a federal indictment handed down Tuesday. The SPLC claims it was funding informants inside the extremist groups.

While the SPLC “purports to fight white supremacy and racial hatred,” acting Attorney General Todd Blanche said in a press conference that “the SPLC was not dismantling these groups. It was instead manufacturing the extremism it purports to oppose.”

Blanche highlighted one example from the indictment, where the SPLC paid a member of the leadership group that planned the “Unite the Right” rally in Charlottesville, Virginia, in 2017. “The Southern Poverty Law Center themselves advertise to raise money to dismantle violent extremist groups … however, the SPLC used the money they raised from their donor network to actually pay the leadership of these very groups,” FBI Director Kash Patel explained at the press conference.

The indictment charges the SPLC with six counts of wire fraud, aiming to “obtain money via donations through materially false representations and omissions about what the donated funds would be used for.” It charges the SPLC with four counts of false statements to a federally insured bank by creating accounts for fictitious entities to funnel the money. Finally, it charges the SPLC with one count of conspiracy to commit concealment of money laundering.

Related articles: “SPLC Accused of Secretly Funding White Supremacist, Extremist Groups in DOJ Indictment” (Debra Heine, American Greatness)...“DOJ Charges Far-Left SPLC with Fraud, Money Laundering, ‘Manufacturing Racism to Justify Its Existence’” (Elizabeth Weibel, Breitbart)...“‘Fine People’ Hoax Uncovered in SPLC Fraud Scam” (Sasha Stone, Substack)...“A look back at the SPLC” (Scott Johnson , Power Line)...“DOJ: The SPLC Was ‘Paying Sources to Stoke Racial Hatred’” (John Sexton, Hot Air)

2) “A Catholic’s letter to an Israeli soldier: An appeal to the I.D.F. soldier who smashed a statue of Christ in southern Lebanon.” (Stephen Daisley)

From the article -- You have handed Israel’s enemies a piece of propaganda the likes of which they could never have dreamed. You have created for the Jew-haters a masterpiece of deicide, an antisemitic artwork for the ages. You have conspired to offend and disgust Israel’s millions of Christian Zionist admirers, in the United States and elsewhere, and for at least some of them this will mark a breaking point.

You have severely damaged your country’s reputation and, in alienating her friends, especially in America, you could be responsible for developments that reduce U.S. backing for Israel and therefore weaken her security. You have hurt Israel more than Peace Now, Breaking the Silence, and B’Tselem put together. I hope it was worth it, bro.

I guess I ended up adding to all the condemnation, after all. I didn’t mean to. I’m writing this, though I know you’ll never read it, because I am a supporter of Israel and I am also a Catholic. Not a terribly common combination. If you want to verify my Zionism, which is political and not religious, just check my back catalogue. I must have written hundreds of articles defending, consoling, and extolling Israel over the years. If you want to verify the Catholic part: I forgive you.

Personally, that is, for desecrating the holiest symbol in my faith. I’m afraid I can’t forgive you on anyone else’s behalf, but while seeing the image of you smashing a statue of my lord and saviour with a sledgehammer appalled and angered me, I forgive you.

I don’t hate you, I don’t think you’re a bad person; I think you did a cruel, obnoxious, sacrilegious thing, possibly because you thought it would be funny. I don’t think you intended to wound the world’s billion Christians, and even if you did, this wounded Christian wishes you only the best in return.

3) “Who Owns American History?” (John Fonte, American Mind)

From the article -- The President’s House, with an overwhelming emphasis on slavery, opened in December 2010. It was immediately attacked by cultural critic Edward Rothstein, then with the New York Times. Rothstein rejected the argument of the site’s adherents that the new interpretation was based on history previously not examined. In a rebuttal, the Times writer argued it was far more beholden to identity politics advocacy than nuanced historical analysis: “It is not really a reinterpretation of history; it overturns the idea of history, making it subservient to the claims of contemporary identity politics.”

He continued: After $10.5 million and more than eight years; after tugs of war between the city and the National Park Service and black community organizations; after the establishment of a contentious oversight committee and street demonstrations, overturned concepts and racial debates, it bears all the scars of its creation, lacking both intellectual coherence and emotional power.

Most importantly, Rothstein contended in a follow-up piece that the new ideological interpretation ignored what was significant for American history in the President’s House: the fact that the Washington and Adams administrations were influential in creating a new nation, a constitutional republic. Rothstein writes, “In the upstairs world of Washington and Adams, so blatantly ignored in the Philadelphia site, was the beginning of a national experiment: the faltering and difficult task of shaping a new society in which equality and liberty would indeed be governing principles, ultimately weakening the institution of slavery.”

4) “We Must Resist The Left’s War On Religious Freedom” (Mike Pompeo, Harbinger’s Daily)

From the article -- The collusion between the Justice Department – an arm of the Executive branch tasked with the fair and impartial administration of justice to all Americans – with pro-abortion activists against their ideological foes flies in the face of the DOJ’s mission, and the animating spirit of our Constitution. This doesn’t just compromise the rights of pro-life Americans – it opens the door for future abuses by government officials of all political and ideological stripes.

As a person of faith and as an American, I am grateful to the current Administration for doing the necessary to defend the First Amendment liberties of pro-life Americans. We cannot have a country in which the government treats our constitutional rights as conditional, or as favors to be granted to preferred political constituencies rather than God-given liberties.

But the fight doesn’t stop here. While we can hope that the legal remedies being pursued by the Trump DOJ will chill future efforts to engage in this type of behavior, there can be little doubt that pro-abortion activists will continue to use their power within the increasingly radical far-Left base to push for these tactics to continue. I give thanks every day for organizations like the ACLJ, which are truly doing the Lord’s work to ensure that these anti-constitutional, anti-faith zealots do not prevail.

5) “A Justice in Full: Justice Samuel A. Alito Jr. has served on the US Supreme Court for 20 years, but has never gotten the attention (or credit) he deserves.” (Mark Pulliam, Law & Liberty)

From the article -- In addition to the extensive interviews, Hemingway consulted with legal scholars, pored over the Court’s decisions, and reviewed the essays presented at a symposium on Justice Alito’s jurisprudence held in March 2022, which were published in the Harvard Journal of Law and Public Policy.

What emerges is the portrait of an earnest, even-tempered, hard-working, highly intelligent, resolute, modest, self-effacing champion of the Constitution. Acquaintances use the same adjectives to describe Alito: quiet, calm, brilliant, polite, unassuming, courageous. Hemingway puts Alito’s 20 years of service as a justice in the context of the Court’s evolution from a hotbed of judicial activism under Chief Justice Earl Warren to its current alignment—a historic 6-to-3 conservative majority—and explains how Alito has played a key role in that shift.

Hemingway also digresses surefootedly into profiles of and anecdotes about the leading figures in political and legal circles during the Reagan-to-Trump epoch. As I said about Hemingway’s co-authored book on the Kavanaugh confirmation process, Justice on Trial, due to her extensive interviews, “the reader feels like a fly on the wall, behind the scenes, as the events dramatically unfold.” Alito delivers the same insider scoop.

Other Outstanding Articles from this Week:

* “Living In A Culture That Silences Biblical Truth” (Skip Heitzig, Harbinger’s Daily)

* “We’re No Better Today Than Pagan Nations… And The Numbers At Planned Parenthood Prove It” (Ken Ham, Harbinger’s Daily)

* “’Study’ Claiming Mail-Order Abortions Are ‘Almost Exclusively’ Legal Is Fake News” (Jamie Bryan Hall, Federalist)

* “Hawley Hunts Down the Secrets of America’s Shady Abortion Drug Maker” (Suzanne Bowdey, Washington Stand)

* “Hey, Tucker: Christianity and Islam Have a Long and Very Bitter History” (Josh Hammer, Jewish World Review)

“The Earth Is the Lord’s” -- Arbor Day vs Earth Day

In 1872, right here in the state of Nebraska, a journalist turned politician began a campaign that he hoped would help stabilize and beautify the rather sparse landscape of his state.  The man was a Nebraska City resident who believed that such a campaign would be a good idea in other places too.  And it was.

J. Sterling Morton’s call for tree husbandry was answered by the National Agricultural Convention meeting in St. Louis that year and by numerous municipalities, newspaper editors, and thousands of citizens.  The result was that the very first Arbor Day, April 22, saw almost a million trees planted.

But though J. Sterling Morton was a tree planter extraordinaire, he was not a tree hugger.  His attitude towards the natural world was the traditional one; namely, that the earth was the Lord’s and man, acting as God’s servant, was to effectively oversee nature, to subdue it in a rational way, to beautify it, and properly benefit from it.

Morton was thus acting in accordance with the biblical mandate -- the program originally given to Adam in the garden of Eden -- a call to responsibly appreciate, nurture, and enjoy the created things with which God had adorned the earth.

And most of the people who answered the challenge of Arbor Day were operating in the same spirit.  They were planting trees because trees were good things.  They bore fruit that man could eat.  They helped with soil conservation and provided protection from wind.  And they were pretty.

These people understood that trees were pleasant and productive plants, but they were for man’s use.  They were good things, not fellow souls.

Indeed, J. Sterling Morton (a conservative Democrat who served as Secretary of Agriculture under Grover Cleveland and whose son became a prominent Republican who was Secretary of the Navy under Theodore Roosevelt) was a faithful Episcopalian.  His understanding of the monumental difference between man (created in the express image of God) and nature (created for the enjoyment and benefit of man) was part of the basic Christian worldview.

The kind of conservation ethic he represented was rational, healthy, far-seeing, and well-rooted in sound environmental ideas.  It was the same enlightened conservation ethic of farmers like George Washington and Thomas Jefferson, of visionaries like Johnny Appleseed, and conservation champions like Teddy Roosevelt and George Bird Grinnell, and other sportsmen who led the way in establishing our national parks and wildlife refuges. It was part of the longstanding tradition of taking care of the environment for man’s use -- not for nature’s sake.  It was the perspective of the farmer, the rancher, the hunter, and fisherman that we all be responsible and take care of the environment in order that man -- both in the now and in the future -- may be best served.   

Thus, Arbor Day was (and, by the way, still is) a responsible event, one that calls for individual volunteer efforts rather than government coercion.  In fact, the people associated with Arbor Day are decidedly apolitical.  “The only stand we take,” says an official with the Arbor Day Foundation, “is that it’s a great thing to plant trees.”  No demands for government intrusion.  No insistence on group think.  No call for Nanny State regulations and taxes. No worshipping Gaia or Mother Earth.

What a dramatic difference this is from the “holiday” that has tried to bully its way over and past Arbor Day, the extremely political, propagandist, and manipulative event that pirated the same day, April 22, and now tries to crowd out the very memory of Arbor Day. That event of course, is Earth Day. Or as the United Nations calls it -- International Mother Earth Day. To be sure, this newly-invented, politically-charged “holiday” is often dominated by socialist (even pantheistic) tenets and, therefore, absolutely ignores who the true heroes of American environmentalism are; namely, those hunters, fishermen, and other genuine conservationists mentioned earlier. 

And, of course, International Mother Earth Day also ignores the innumerable passages in Holy Scripture which deal with God as the Creator and Sovereign King of the earth...and those which testify to the glory of Almighty God that is revealed in His creation...and those which exhort men to carefully serve as responsible stewards of the natural order...and the eventual destruction of the earth which occurs not through man’s ecological failure, but rather by the holy judgment of God. 

The last item, by the way, occurs just before God creates a new heaven and, yes, a brand new earth. 

International Mother Earth Day vs Arbor Day? For the Bible-based Christian, the choice is an obvious and easy one.

The Top 5 Plus (April 18)

1) “The Larger Agenda Behind The Promotion Of Lawlessness In America” (Brandon Holthaus, Harbinger’s Daily)

From the article -- Author and investigative journalist Peter Schweizer has recently released a book titled Invisible Coup, which lays out a sobering thesis: immigration is being deliberately weaponized by foreign adversaries and ideological movements to destabilize the United States from within.

Schweizer documents how hostile foreign powers and transnational movements view mass migration not primarily as a humanitarian issue, but as a strategic tool. Migration brings not only people, but political networks, ideological loyalties, and organized movements that are often hostile to the nation receiving them. These networks operate inside our institutions, our universities, our streets, and our media ecosystem. I agree with Schweizer, and in my opinion, the goal is to demoralize and destabilize the West in order to usher in a new digital economy, a new digital identity system, and a new form of global governance. Binding it all together is a unifying ideology—the counterfeit, inverted religion of future Mystery Babylon—that provides the moral and spiritual glue for this system.

He also explains how Islamist movements have historically treated migration as a form of conquest, rooted in doctrinal concepts of Hijrah and expansion. Let me be blunt. Islam is a threat to Western society, Christians, and Jewish people.  Islam hides under the veil of a religion, but it functions as a political ideology that seeks to establish a caliphate and impose Sharia law. Islam functions as a political ideology because it possesses the defining characteristics of one. It includes its own civil law, its own system of justice, its own authority structure, its own loyalty demands, its own language, and its own comprehensive cultural framework governing every area of life, including the economy, social structure, and a two-tiered system of personal rights.

2) “Flying Over the Rainbow?” (Denny Hartford, Vital Signs Blog)

From the article -- Among the songs in our “When Swing Was King” performances that most strongly connects with our audiences is Judy Garland’s gorgeous rendition from 1939 of “Somewhere Over the Rainbow.”  It is, as you well know, a hauntingly beautiful song, one that underscores the human yearning for home, beauty, innocence and wonder...for escape from a world of drudgery, loneliness, and pain. “Birds fly over the rainbow; why then, oh why can’t I?”

Our audiences love the song. And so do we. But, of course, it is all too clear that when the strains of the song fade away, the listener is left only with the yearning, a sweet wishful longing that there might somewhere be a place of safety and bliss instead of this dark, troublesome, and increasingly decadent world we live in now...

3) “Seven Myths About the Iran War: Why so many, on both the left and the right, keep getting Trump wrong” (Michael Doran, Tablet)

From the article -- Yet while Trump has repeatedly defied the Beltway consensus on Iran and its allies over the past year and a half, none of the dire consequences that influential commentators predicted have come to pass. World War III hasn’t erupted. The global economy hasn’t collapsed. Instead, the Iranian leadership is dead or decapitated, its nuclear weapons program is buried beneath mountains of rubble, and most of its navy lies at the bottom of the sea. While the loss of 13 U.S. servicemen is a serious matter, it is hardly the thousands of dead and wounded that were routinely predicted as the consequence of any major U.S. action. Israel still exists. So do Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates, and Kuwait, along with their oil reserves.

Trump has inflicted heavy punishment in return for relatively light consequences, but pundits insist that a masterful Iran is dictating events. Tehran’s “successful” war-fighting tactics supposedly forced Trump to accept a cease-fire. Onlookers were then baffled when the United States walked away from talks in Islamabad, Pakistan, and took steps to reopen the Strait of Hormuz, to the strategic detriment of China and the benefit of U.S. energy producers.

In part, the surprises keep coming because the cognoscenti refuse to credit Trump and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu with a win.

Related articles: “As the West morally rots, we stand with Israel” (Petr Macinka, Israel Hayom)...“Iran secures UN role with backing from UK, France, Canada, Australia as US stands alone: UN Watch warns dictatorships will now hold a majority on the committee that controls NGO accreditation” (Efrat Lachter, Fox News...“The Board Of Peace: Could Israel Be Walking Into Another Kind Of Hostage Crisis?” (Chris Katulka, Harbinger's Daily)

4) “As Mail Order Abortions Flow Into Pro-Life States, The Promise Of Roe’s Reversal Remains Unfulfilled” (Tony Perkins, Harbinger’s Daily)

From the article -- During the period covered by the report, Planned Parenthood received more than $2.1 billion in total revenue, with about 40% of that coming from taxpayers. The report reflects a time before the “One Big Beautiful Bill” temporarily defunded them for one year. But as we warned when the Senate reduced that defunding from 10 years to one, it would be short-lived. That provision expires in July, unless Congress includes it in reconciliation 2.0, which begins in the Senate this coming week as lawmakers return from the Easter recess.

However, Congressional leaders have made clear that reconciliation 2.0 is focused on ending the prolonged shutdown of the Department of Homeland Security, making sure the entire department is funded, including immigration enforcement. With the GOP’s historically slim 218-214 majority in the House, leadership must keep nearly the entire conference unified. That leaves little room for additional priorities, meaning the bill will likely be narrowly focused and not include the defunding of the abortion giant.

So where does that leave the roughly two-thirds of Republican voters who identify as pro-life? The faded, brittle confetti of pro-life victories from five years ago offers little consolation amid a growing string of setbacks. What began as a 10-year defunding effort was reduced to one and is now about to expire. And earlier this month, the Trump administration effectively stepped back from the fight to remove Title X funding from abortion chains.

Related articles: “Federal Judge Declines to Block Mail-Order Abortions for Now, but Says Louisiana’s Case Is ‘Likely to Succeed’” (Katherine Hamilton, Breitbart)...“Biden’s FDA 2023 Rule Deregulating Mifepristone Caused Mail Order Abortions to Skyrocket” (Randall K. O’Bannon, NRL News)... “How Biden's DOJ Went After Pro-Lifers” (Ben Shapiro, Jewish World Review)...“Pro-Life Advocate Wins First Amendment Victory After Being Arrested By Biden Administration” (Ashley Bateman, Federalist)...“DOJ Confirms Biden Admin. Unjustly Targeted Pro-Lifers - with Abortion Industry’s Help” (S.A. McCarthy, Washington Stand)...“Taxpayer funding of Planned Parenthood increased to $832M in 2024-2025” (Tate Miller, Just the News)...“Biden DOJ’s FACE Act Weaponization Is Shocking but Not Surprising” (Joshua Arnold, Washington Stand)... 

5) “The Church versus Trump” (Scott Johnson, Power Line)

From the article -- So the Pope met with David Axelrod last week. David Axelrod. Obama’s campaign architect. A man who is not Catholic, has never met a pope before, and whose entire career has been engineering political narratives for the American left.

And then, by pure coincidence, the Pope immediately started lobbing shots at the Trump administration, and three US Cardinals popped up on 60 Minutes doing the same thing.

All organically, I’m sure.

I’m a practicing Catholic. I need you to understand that part. But in my opinion, Trump has all the right to lash out at him. Maybe you’ll disagree, but in the end, Trump talks like Trump. Water is wet. I’m talking about MY Church being run like a DNC satellite office but with a golden throne.

This is the same Vatican that watched governments padlock churches during COVID and said nothing. That let Biden take communion while funding abortion and said nothing. That fired Bishop Strickland for defending actual Church doctrine. That removed Bishop Fernández in Puerto Rico for defending religious exemptions THE CATECHISM ITSELF supports.

But somehow Trump is the threat to human dignity.

Related article: “U.S. and Catholic Church must maintain a united front against ‘the Antichrist of our time’” (Conrad Black, Brussels Signal)

Other Excellent Articles

* "A Modest Proposal On Tax Day" (I & I Editorial Board)

* “The Moment AI Stopped Being a Tool” (Robert Maginnis, Washington Stand)

* “Treasury Secretary Sounds The Alarm, Warns AI Tools Like ‘Mythos’ Pose Major Threat To Financial Cybersecurity” (Tom Gilbreath, Harbinger’s Daily) 

* “A Tale Of Two States: Why National Voter ID Is Critical To U.S. Elections” (M.D. Kittle, Federalist)

* “California Bill Would Censor Indy Journos Like Nick Shirley Who Expose Waste and Fraud” (Mark Tapscott, Washington Stand)

Flying Over the Rainbow?

Among the songs in our “When Swing Was King” performances that most strongly connects with our audiences is Judy Garland’s gorgeous rendition from 1939 of “Somewhere Over the Rainbow.”  It is, as you well know, a hauntingly beautiful song, one that underscores the human yearning for home, beauty, innocence and wonder...for escape from a world of drudgery, loneliness, and pain.

“Birds fly over the rainbow; why then, oh why can’t I?”

Our audiences love the song. And so do we.

But, of course, it is all too clear that when the strains of the song fade away, the listener is left only with the yearning, a sweet wishful longing that there might somewhere be a place of safety and bliss instead of this dark, troublesome, and increasingly decadent world we live in now. But “Somewhere Over the Rainbow” is only of the many songs that reflect this desire, songs that resonate with our intrinsically human longing for beauty, love, purity, and peace. “There’s a Place for Us” and “Somewhere, My Love” are examples. So too are “Rainbow Connection,” “A Summer Place,” “Up, Up and Away,” “Moon River,” “Bali Hai,” “There’s a New World Coming,” “Age of Aquarius,” and on and on. Plus, that’s not even beginning a list of the stories, movies, poems, and fairy tales that take our imaginations into pretty, idyllic pastures where we “live happily ever after.” 

What’s behind all this? Randy Alcorn is spot on with the answer in his marvelous book, Heaven. “We are homesick for Eden. We’re nostalgic for what is implanted in our hearts. It’s built into us.”...“Desire is a signpost pointing to heaven…I’ve never been to heaven, yet I miss it. Eden is in my blood. And the best things of earth are souvenirs of Eden, appetizers of the New Earth.”

Donald Bloesch in his Theological Notebook (1989) agrees. “Man’s greatest affliction is not anxiety, or even guilt, but rather homesickness -- a nostalgia or ineradicable yearning to be at home with God.” I couldn't agree more with these remarks. Indeed, two of my favorite authors C.S. Lewis and G.K. Chesterton also speak of his matter eloquently and often, as do Joni Eareckson Tada and David Jeremiah in their excellent books about heaven. There’s no doubting the undeniable fact that man is created in the image of God and is wired for paradise. Alas, we lost Eden through our sin but God, in His great mercy and to glorify His Name, has offered mankind something far better than even Adam’s garden. Through the promise of the gospel, the Lord offers us the wholeness, security, love, and bliss which will be ours forever in the New Jerusalem. Wow. And wow again.

So, while I certainly don’t suggest you stop loving songs like “Moon River” or “Somewhere Over the Rainbow” or “Moon River,” I do urge you to remind yourself often of the rock-solid reality that is our eternal inheritance, one that the apostle Peter describes as “imperishable and undefiled [which] will not fade away, reserved in heaven for you.” 

“I saw a new heaven and a new earth; for the first heaven and the first earth passed away, and there is no longer any sea. And I saw the holy city, new Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from God, prepared as a bride adorned for her husband. And I heard a loud voice from the throne, saying, ‘Behold, the tabernacle of God is among the people, and He will dwell among them, and they shall be His people, and God Himself will be among them, and He will wipe away every tear from their eyes; and there will no longer be any death; there will no longer be any mourning, or crying, or pain; the first things have passed away.’ And He who sits on the throne said, ‘Behold, I am making all things new.’ And He said, ‘Write, for these words are faithful and true.’” (Revelation 21:1-5)

And, in celebration of that immeasurably wonderful home that awaits us (a home that our Lord Jesus is personally creating and customizing for us!), may I offer you a song full of confident, joyful expectations of that stronger, weightier, infinitely more beautiful home beyond. 

Check it out right here...

The Top 5 Plus (April 11)

1) “Democrat Quits Politics, Says Party’s Agenda Is Incompatible With Scripture: ‘I Have Compromised For Too Long’” (Joseph Backholm, Harbinger’s Daily)

From the article -- Michigan State Rep. Karen Whitsett, a lifelong Democrat from Detroit, now says that’s not true. On March 2, she announced she will not seek re-election and will never run for public office again. The reason, she said, has nothing to do with polling or political strategy. 

“This is not a political calculation—it’s a spiritual decision,” Whitsett said. 

She then went further, naming the Democratic Party itself as incompatible with her Christian faith—not a particular candidate, not a single vote, but the platform.

“For me, it is impossible to be a faithful follower of Jesus Christ while remaining a member of the Democratic Party as it exists today,” Whitsett said. “I cannot reconcile that platform with Scripture.” 

The reflex when someone claims progressive political priorities are incompatible with the Christian faith is to shoot the messenger, but that’s more difficult to do in this case. She is not a conservative commentator, Fox News regular, or Jerry Falwell acolyte. She’s a black, female Democrat. By every demographic measure, she is precisely the kind of voter the Democratic Party has long claimed and counted on. 

But now she says she can’t be a Christian and a Democrat, and she explained why. “That conviction includes the issues I cannot reconcile with Scripture: abortion, the normalization of the gay lifestyle, and the push to redefine gender,” Whitsett said. “I have compromised my relationship with Jesus for too long, and I’m grateful God did not give up on me. He gave me time to repent, turn, and be fully devoted to Him.” 

The reaction from her party was swift. Michigan Democratic Party Chair Curtis Hertel offered a response that began simply: “Good riddance.” 

2) “The Monstrous Crime of Abortion: An Old Testament Perspective.” (Denny Hartford, Vital Signs Blog)

From the article -- A careful look at Exodus 21:22-25 results in a profoundly important understanding of the Creator God's value of preborn human life. And though the passage has been repeatedly misused by those who seek to “soften” the crime of abortion, even explain it as excusable violence, Exodus 21:22-25 is actually a strikingly clear passage -- when translated correctly.

Indeed, the opportunity for pro-abortionists to misinterpret the passage is aided by poor translations of the Hebrew text. For instance, the original Wycliffe translation and the Douay-Rheims version of 1899 insert words into the passage that are simply not in the authentic Hebrew text. Instead of simply translating the Hebrew words, the scholars preparing both the Wycliffe and the Douay-Rheims versions made remarkable presumptions, laying down their own ideas rather than honestly transliterating the text as it stood. Their errors were quite serious in that they created for some readers of the Bible a false impression that the life of a child in the womb is not as valuable in the sight of God as the life of the mother. 

3) “In-Depth: Evolution Is Running Out of Options -- Denying design is indefensible” (Calvin Smith, Harbinger’s Daily)

From the article -- The difference between empirical science and what we would call historical science is not some differentiation without a real difference made-up by creationists. Even famous evolutionists such as Ernst Mayr and E. O. Wilson have admitted the story of evolution isn’t conducted according to the conventional rules of empirical science. Here are two quotations from them (respectively) that demonstrate the point.

"Evolutionary biology, in contrast with physics and chemistry, is a historical science—the evolutionist attempts to explain events and processes that have already taken place. Laws and experiments are inappropriate techniques for the explication of such events and processes. Instead one constructs a historical narrative, consisting of a tentative reconstruction of the particular scenario that led to the events one is trying to explain."

Exactly. Laws and experiments don’t apply to the story of evolution because it’s a “tentative reconstruction,” a historical narrative. In other words, it’s not the kind of science that produces technology and medicines. And here is Wilson’s take:

"If a moving automobile were an organism, functional biology would explain how it is constructed and operates, while evolutionary biology would reconstruct its origin and history -- how it came to be made and its journey thus far."

Again, he’s admitting that real science shows us how things actually work, but they make up a story about how it supposedly came about by evolution. Unlike the mechanics of what we are studying that can be directly observed, no one saw the story about how it supposedly came to be. So if you believe that evolutionary story, you do so on faith, no matter how founded you believe that faith is. 

4) “New Planned Parenthood Report Has a Disturbing Takeaway: Abortions have only continued to increase post-Dobbs.” (Ellie Gardey Holmes, American Spectator)

From the article -- The data is in, and the conclusion is depressing: Planned Parenthood killed 434,450 babies in 2024, according to a new report released this week. That totals up to an impressive kill-to-patient ratio: 434,450 murders and 2.09 million patients “treated.” This of course shows that abortions are all Planned Parenthood cares about. The additional services they render, like STD testing and pap smears, are just window dressing for their systematic murder machine.

This year’s numbers showed that reality more than ever. Even as abortions increased year over year by 8 percent, cancer screenings fell by 8.6 percent, pap smears decreased by 2.5 percent, and preventative care visits fell by 3.2 percent.

Some of the other numbers Planned Parenthood gave show how little they accomplish that is actually beneficial. They only provided miscarriage care 2,852 times in the whole year, and they only provided prenatal services 7,685 times. Of course, it’s no wonder mothers don’t want their babies to receive prenatal care at a place that exists to execute children.

This data does not yet show the impact of the One Big Beautiful Bill Act’s defunding of Planned Parenthood via its restriction of federal Medicaid payments to abortion providers. Next year, we’ll see how effective that tactic was in stymying the number of abortions. There are some signs that the defunding has had an impact, as 50 Planned Parenthood clinics have closed since that law was passed, and Planned Parenthood said in its latest report that an additional 200 “health centers” — read: killing centers — are at risk of closure due to the law. President Donald Trump’s new budget proposal seeks to leave that defunding mechanism in place, offering hope that more Planned Parenthood clinics will indeed close.

However, given the increasing degree to which abortion pills are purchased online, including from overseas “pharmacies” and domestic criminal abortion providers, it remains less clear that closing Planned Parenthood clinics will actually cause a substantial decrease in the number of abortions in the United States. Causing the numbers to truly fall will require actually tackling the criminal trafficking of abortion pills, which the Trump administration has so far been reticent to do. 

5) “After Iran, Trump Needs To Bomb The Administrative State Into Submission” (Issues & Insights Editorial Board)

From the article --  Earlier this week, the Trump administration took another step toward liberating the economy by rolling back a Biden-era rule that needlessly hampered oil and gas production. EPA Administrator Lee Zeldin said that, with this and several other deregulatory actions, the administration “is unleashing domestic energy and revising burdensome, unworkable Biden-era oil and natural gas policies.”

That’s the good news.

The bad news is that President Donald Trump has barely scratched the surface of the gargantuan administrative state, and other Trump policies are raising the cost of doing business, a report released today by the Competitive Enterprise Institute shows.

Other Excellent Reads from this Week:

* “5 Things You Should Know About AI Right Now: Artificial intelligence can seem difficult to understand, but it’s important that we do.” (Adam Conner, The Contrarian)

* “The West’s fifth column: Iran has destabilized the entire region by using proxy armies to impose its murderous brand of Islam throughout the world.” (Melanie Phillips, (Jewish News Service)

* “Welcome Back to the Orgy Room: Minneapolis swaps COVID-era piety for post-AIDS amnesia as it seeks to reopen the bathhouses.” (Daniel J. Flynn, American Spectator)

* “The Rayner effect: Left-wingers are becoming stupid faster than right-wingers” (Professor Edward Dutton, TCW)

* “Senate GOP Needs New Leadership: John Thune’s leadership is turning a Republican majority into a graveyard for President Trump’s agenda.” (David Catron, American Spectator)