Point of View April 11, 2025 – Hour 2 : Weekend Edition

[00:00:04] Across America, Live, this is Point of View, Kirby Anderson. The second hour today is a broadcast from WPEO in Peoria, Illinois, and then of course we also have in studio with us Dr. Merrill Matthews and Kelly Shackelford.

[00:00:30] If you look at the calendar, you recognize it's April 11th, although some of you may be hearing this program later as we sometimes make it available during the weekend. But for those of you listening live right now, you're four days away from April 15th, the day we pay our taxes. Now the bottom line is that's not when we pay our taxes. Most of us have had our money and taxes taken out, withheld from paychecks. Tax day is when we file the 280 million tax returns to see if we get any money back.

[00:00:58] But I thought we'd spend some time talking about taxes and tax cuts. But certainly as we get into this issue of tax cuts, we have to recognize that for some of you it's going to be a long weekend if you haven't filed your taxes. For some of us, we then find ourselves, as I've said before, at the mercy of bookkeepers and accountants who have become the experts in the Byzantine tax code that runs more than 6800 pages and takes billions of hours to apply.

[00:01:27] So, Dr. Murrow Matthews, let me come to you first. We have this piece that was in the Wall Street Journal. And you and I talked about it before it came out, so now it's out, so people can find it on the website or they can go to the Wall Street Journal. Because right now, we just talked about this idea of tax cuts and we talked about taxes and tariffs and everything else.

[00:01:46] If indeed we do want to extend the tax cuts under Donald Trump of 2017, how can we extend the tax cuts and not end up with a federal deficit since we're almost running $2 trillion annual deficits? And you have an idea. I'd like to hear it. And that's one of the reasons why they've had so much trouble getting it through the Senate and especially through the House, which they were able to get through yesterday, I believe.

[00:02:13] And so the question was, how are we going to find some spending cuts? How are we going to find some increase? They want to be able to reduce the federal deficit that was $1.9 trillion last year under Joe Biden. And they'd like to be able to say we've made some progress on that because we're looking at about $36 trillion in federal debt.

[00:02:34] So the idea came when I was listening to the radio a few weeks ago and heard them talking about the 2017 tax cuts. And I mentioned to my wife at the time, I said, you know, one of the things about the 2017 tax cut provision is it allowed for repatriation of funds. A lot of multinational companies had businesses overseas in other countries. They make sales there. They get money, revenue.

[00:03:01] They pay the income tax in that country. But when they brought it back, they had to pay the difference between what the corporate income tax was in that country and what it is in the United States. And the United States at that time had the highest corporate income tax. And so most of them left that money overseas. And there was roughly $2.6 trillion as estimated.

[00:03:23] And the 2017 tax bill allowed them to bring that money back, pay a flat tax on that, and then repatriate it back to the United States. So companies brought hundreds of billions of dollars back to the U.S. because they had the chance to do just a low flat tax on that. And so I think my wife mentioned, I wish we could do something like that. And I said, well, you know, maybe we can because we have $15 trillion in IRAs in the U.S., $15 trillion.

[00:03:51] Another $26 trillion is in 401Ks. And so the idea was if the government needs additional money now to try to lower this gap so that we don't have quite the deficit, perhaps the thing to do is to allow us to take a portion of that IRA money, 401K money out, pay a small flat tax on it, and then we get the money to be able to use however we want to, and the federal government gets initial income.

[00:04:17] And the purpose of the IRA initially, Kirby, was the idea that when you're working, you're in a higher tax bracket. When you retire, you're in a lower tax bracket, so you'd be paying lower taxes on that money. So you avoid the taxes when you earn the money and put it in the IRA, and then you pay a lower tax rate. It turns out that's not necessarily the case for a lot of people because if they have a pension, Social Security. Social Security is actually taxed. The president wants to take that away. I want to take that tax off the Social Security income.

[00:04:47] But many of us are not necessarily. People continue to work and have other income coming in, so we're not necessarily in a lower tax break. So the idea was for if you're in the top – oh, there's seven individual tax breaks. If you're in the top five of them or so, you might see this as a real chance to bring money back, pay a lower flat tax rate on it, get the money out of the IRA. You can now use it to buy a home or whatever you want to do.

[00:05:11] And the government has additional income coming in to help shore up the revenue shortfall that we have right now. Kelly? Well, I think one of the things that's not talked about a lot, but what would happen if we didn't extend the tax cuts that we have right now? Well, good line. I mean – It would be a huge tax increase. Yes.

[00:05:36] And so anyway, I think it's a massive situation. A situation they know they have to do, and then they know that Trump's wanting these other things on top of it. No tax on tips. No tax on Social Security. No tax on overtime. No tax on overtime. I mean these are very popular. And so it's a lot.

[00:06:04] And so what I find interesting is you would think of all times that in this tax situation – and just the bill that the House got through the resolution last night and we'll go over to the Senate – you would think if there's any time you could cut some things in what Congress is spending, it would be right now.

[00:06:28] Number one, Doge is highlighting all kinds of things that – Doge is just cutting for now. They're not in the budget, right? So you could put – I mean just pick their favorite ones and put them in the budget and cut those, right? Additionally, you've got all the money that was still being spent from the Biden administration on COVID, all these bills. We could just take that off, right? And so before you even get started, it seems to me that you could cut some things.

[00:06:57] And yet they – we had a lot of the Freedom Caucus that was really upset and they ended up having to go on promises from the Speaker and the President that we'll get to those other cuts later. And we know how that usually works. So it's amazing how difficult it is, even with – I mean everything that's going on right now to encourage cutting, that is still so hard for Congress to cut. One of the things some of the Republicans would like to do is to cut Medicaid.

[00:07:27] And there's several ways you can do that just because we know there's so much fraud in Medicaid and others. But many of the states that are red states that have – Medicaid is a major health insurance program for their people. So some of those Republicans are pushing back on it. So you get tensions from both parties on that because once a subsidy or an entitlement program is out there, it is really hard to scale that back. Certainly is. We need to take a break.

[00:07:54] And when we come back, I want to continue that because I thought I might tell you when Tax Freedom Day is and the cost of government day and a few things like that because some of you might just be thinking, well, we just maybe shouldn't extend the tax cuts that existed in 2017 and thus we could increase taxes and we would pay off the national debt. No, we won't. And we want to try to provide a little bit of perspective to that as well. Then we'll get into some other issues.

[00:08:20] But we are talking about something, of course, that affects all of us because I suspect most of you listening to Point of View are indeed paying taxes. And you probably have a tax bill that you're working on right now or maybe have already taken care of. But what about the future of this country, especially for our children and grandchildren? We'll come back and talk about that right after these important messages.

[00:08:58] This is Viewpoints with Kirby Anderson. Corporate wokeness may be fading, and one illustration of that can be found in the change in corporate policies at one of the largest corporations in the world. Lathan Watts, Vice President of Alliance Defending Freedom, was on my radio program to talk about his article, Will Walmart Be a Leader in Abandoning Corporate Wokeness? Recently, Robbie Starbuck and the Rollback DEI campaign announced that Walmart distanced itself from its diversity, equity, and inclusion policies.

[00:09:28] Lathan Watts reported that investment advisors, corporate engagement consultants, and investors who manage billions in assets and millions in Walmart stock recently sent a letter of encouragement to Walmart. Also joining as signatories to the investor's letter were members of the State Financial Officers Foundation, a coalition of 38 financial officers from 28 states.

[00:09:50] The letter offered support for Walmart's decision, but also pointed to the fact that DEI has the opposite effect of its stated goals. DEI policies introduce serious legal, operational, and reputational risks to companies. In previous commentaries, I've documented numerous studies that illustrate the failure of DEI policies and the problems they often present to a company.

[00:10:12] In the letter, the investors and state financial officers also pointed to the most recent executive orders from President Donald Trump aimed at removing discriminatory DEI practices from the federal government and private companies. Walmart executives probably also learned from the cautionary tales of brands like Bud Light, Disney, and Target. Consumers want companies to provide quality goods and services and stay out of the culture wars. Walmart made the right decision. I'm Kirby Anderson, and that's my point of view.

[00:10:46] For a free booklet on a biblical view on chemical abortion, go to viewpoints.info slash chemical abortion. Viewpoints.info slash chemical abortion. You're listening to Point of View, your listener-supported source for truth. Once again, we were, of course, talking about this very good piece, which we have posted for you to read from the Wall Street Journal by Beryl Matthews,

[00:11:11] a retirement account fix for the funding gap, taking this idea of what happened in 2017, the repatriation of U.S. multinational funds that were in overseas bank accounts and brought back to the United States at a set amount. If you were to set it for maybe 10 percent for the $15 trillion of dollars sitting right now in IRAs, these would be individual retirement accounts. That would be an opportunity.

[00:11:41] So, again, if this is something that gets proposed in the next couple weeks, you heard it first here on Point of View from Merrill Matthews. But I'd like to go back to both of you for just a minute since we were looking at the fact that we have tax day coming up on Tuesday, and that's when our taxes are due. Merrill Matthews, you and I have talked about before that they have put together what's called Tax Freedom Day, and they have picked this year as Tax Freedom Day April 12th. Now, how do we do this?

[00:12:10] Well, you take, for example, the amount of all income earned in each year, and you divide that into, of course, the tally of taxes. So you can figure out when, in a sense, you've stopped paying your taxes and you're now paying yourself. And so Tax Freedom Day is April 12th, which is tomorrow. But, interestingly enough, that varies because citizens listening to us today in Louisiana, they've already had their Tax Freedom Day.

[00:12:39] Citizens say in New York, they still have to wait almost to the middle of May, which shows you a little bit of the tax burden. But talk about that for just a minute because when they start getting these numbers and saying Americans will pay more taxes than they spend on food, clothing, and housing, I saw another say maybe that's more taxes they pay in food, education, and health care. We, I think, don't realize how much we pay in taxes because, as I mentioned just a minute ago, it's withheld from our paycheck.

[00:13:08] And then when you finally do file your 1040, you look at that and go, wow, I paid a lot more taxes than I thought I did. And I think that would be a real interesting Tea Party experiment if one year we instead had to pay all our taxes in one lump sum. And so I think most people don't realize how much they pay in taxes right now. You know, California probably has to wait until September before they get tax free. Almost said that. Yes, you know, and when I had Dan Pella on last week,

[00:13:37] we talked about this because so many people are pleased when April 15 comes around because they get a tax refund. And the point is they've been overpaying their taxes over the year before, and so they get some money back and they feel like the government somehow that they're helping them out. No, no, you've given the government an interest-free loan for a year. Try getting an interest-free loan from the government for a year.

[00:14:03] But that goes on. So Dan would recommend people try to assess about how much they're going to owe in taxes and have that taken out early. But the other side of the thing is it would be nice. I would argue that what I'd like to see us do is have the money set aside in what we might call our tax account, so that like an IRA, for lack of a better term, the money set aside for the government.

[00:14:29] We can't have access to it until the previous year, until the year ends. And then we write a check out when we get that tax bill so that we know how much we're actually spending. We actually have to write a check out to the government or use our credit card, but set the money aside in something that belongs to us rather than the government holding on to it. Maybe we can even make a little interest on it. But force us to have to pay that so that we realize how much money is coming out for federal taxes.

[00:14:58] Now, income tax is a huge part of it. There's been some discussion that, well, wouldn't these tariffs offset what we pay in income taxes? Well, the tariff revenue that we get, and this has been true for decades, is about 2% of total federal revenue. It was roughly $70 billion or so coming in from tariffs right now.

[00:15:20] Now, even if you had the new tariffs coming in and we made a lot more, $6 trillion that Peter Navarro is suggesting we might pull over 10 years, that was our spending in one year. So even though he's suggesting that tariffs could bring in as much as $6 trillion in 10 years, that's actually more than the federal government receives, but that's about how much we've been spending in a year. Kelly, I wanted to come to you for just a minute because you always talk about regulations because there's another one.

[00:15:49] We just talked about Tax Freedom Day, but there's another one. It's called the Cost of Government Day, and that's where they take not only the taxes, but they also try as best as possible to figure out the cost of regulations, federal, state, and local. And that number is a little more imprecise, but sometime in July. But that puts it in perspective that if you talk about the cost of taxes and regulations,

[00:16:17] you work more than half the year to finally get the government off your back to begin to earn a living for you and your family. And I think that just illustrates, again, one of the reasons why when Donald Trump came in, he wanted to reduce the number of regulations just in the federal government alone. Yeah, I feel like in his first term, in addition to his Supreme Court appointments, probably the thing that had the greatest impact was his reduction of regulations.

[00:16:45] You know, he had that goal of for every new regulation on business, they were going to drop 12, and they did that. And I assume they're doing that right now again. And, boy, nothing will make the economy grow, I think, as much as that. When you take all these regulations off of small businesses and let them really flourish, that makes a huge impact.

[00:17:11] And, you know, one of the things you mentioned earlier, Kirby, that we haven't talked about today, but I think one of the things that would really free up a lot of time that should not be spent and allow people to be much more productive is to not have an income tax. If instead we had something like, you know, the fair tax, some sort of property tax, I mean, some sort of tax that we pay, sales tax,

[00:17:39] then nobody has to study all this stuff and figure out and how to put their money in this or that and go through all the tax season. And you just think of the whole IRS, you know, not needing most of it. Think of all the people that have to hire people, all the businesses that have to hire people, all the time that is spent. If that was used on productive work, that would be a huge boost for the country.

[00:18:07] And, again, I think the fair tax concept is a good one in that because the complaint is always that, well, if you just do sales taxes, the lower income people will really get hammered because it's a large percentage of what they have. But the way the fair tax worked is you get all that money back up to the, you know, amount of poverty. So you really don't have those taxes starting until after the poverty level.

[00:18:36] But, man, and I so love the idea of, you know, people getting to decide whether they pay the tax. If you don't want to pay the tax, then don't buy it. But if you do, you pay the tax. You see it like we're talking about now. It's not hidden where you're not sure how much you're paying. I mean, every time you pay, you see it in your bill. I just think that would be so good for our economy if we were to ever move in that direction.

[00:19:03] You know, Kirby, we live in Texas, and we don't have a state income tax here. We're one of the seven or eight states that don't have a state income tax, and so we never have to fill out a state income tax. I love that. So if we could – and the fair tax wants to try to include Social Security and Medicare in there because those are such big programs, it makes the amount you'd have to charge significantly higher. So I would say start out with a federal income tax that excludes Medicare and Social Security.

[00:19:31] I mean, yeah, because we have a payroll tax that covers most of that. But that way you get a little lower because if the sales tax is 30% or 40%, people start pushing back and finding ways. But if the sales tax were national sales tax 15% or something, then you add the state sales tax on that for states that have it. But it might be very workable, and we could get away from this federal income tax. What a great day that would be. And no tax fraud either, right?

[00:19:59] I mean, the people that are cheating on their taxes right now, it wouldn't work. I mean, you've got to pay it when you buy whatever you're buying. We can't cheat on our state income tax because we don't have one. Let me just mention that on Wednesday, Dr. Matthews had Sterling Burnett on, and I've quoted him many times. Of course, you had him talking about EPA, but he also brings a lot on tax policy. And certainly your other guest, Barbara Colm, is, of course, with the Austrian Economic Center.

[00:20:25] So if you are thinking about this, of course, I know, Dr. Matthews, if people type your name, they will find times in which you've written about the flat tax, the fair tax, and a variety of others. But it does seem to me that that time may be coming. And as creative as this administration wants to be with trying to figure out how to fund the government with tariffs and all sorts of other things, there certainly may be the possibility of coming to something that we've been talking about for a long period of time.

[00:20:53] So enough on economics. When we come back, I just thought this would be kind of interesting. Dr. Matthews and I traded stories about the reaction from some of the fans of Luigi Mangione. Now, again, we'll get into that whole issue, but that is, I think, a statement about something wrong in our society. So we thought we'd talk about that for just a minute. And I might just mention it upcoming also is the commentary by Penna Dexter on public broadcasting.

[00:21:22] So we have a lot more to cover. We'll take a break. Be back with more right after this. In 19th century London, two towering historical figures did battle, not with guns and bombs, but words and ideas. London was home to Karl Marx, the father of communism, and legendary Baptist preacher Charles Spurgeon.

[00:21:48] London was in many ways the center of the world economically, militarily, and intellectually. Marx sought to destroy religion, the family, and everything the Bible supports. Spurgeon stood against him, warning of socialism's dangers. Spurgeon understood Christianity is not just religious truth. It is truth for all of life. Where do you find men with that kind of wisdom to stand against darkness today?

[00:22:15] Get the light you need on today's most pressing issues delivered to your inbox when you sign up for the Viewpoints commentary at pointofview.net slash signup. Every weekday in less than two minutes, you'll learn how to be a person of light to stand against darkness in our time. It's free, so visit pointofview.net slash signup right now. Pointofview.net slash signup.

[00:22:47] Point of View will continue after this. You are listening to Point of View. The opinions expressed on Point of View do not necessarily reflect the views of the management or staff of this station. And now, here again, is Kirby Anderson.

[00:23:13] Back once again, broadcasting live from WPEO in Peoria, Illinois. And looking forward to some other opportunities to work with some of the other radio stations celebrating their time of broadcasting. Just as a program note, let me just mention we have Robert George next week. Looking forward to that conversation about truth matters. Doug Groteis will be with. They'll be talking about apologetics, Tom Hobson. And then a little bit later, I know we have John Kasich. So, just a number of people that you will want to hear here on Point of View.

[00:23:42] So, lots of great things coming up in the future. But, Dr. Merrill Matthews, let me come to you for just a minute because you suggested this piece. And it is, I'll just warn our listeners right now, one where you will just shake your head or roll your eyes. But, Lugiano Maggioni is now being hailed as a saint, the patron saint of healthcare access for all. If you're not familiar, here is the individual who is engaged in, I'll quote, Pam Bondi, Attorney General,

[00:24:11] a premeditated, cold-blooded assassination of a United Healthcare Executive, Brian Thompson. And if nothing else illustrates what is wrong with our country, Merrill Matthews, what is going on? Well, marketing for one thing, you can buy, and I'm reading from the journal piece on this, devotional candles bearing Mr. Maggioni's image and a, quote, prayer of St. Luigi on the back,

[00:24:37] a St. Luigi Sherpa fleece blanket for $69.99, a coffee mug for $12, a necklace for $45, a, quote, patron saint of capitalism's victims t-shirt, or a Luigi Maggioni, our patron saint of healthcare t-shirt for $16.99. And they have set up what's called a Give, Send, Go. It's a Christian crowdfunding site. They've raised $836,000 for his legal defense, $836,000.

[00:25:07] And then it also mentions in here more than 40% of Americans age 18 to 29 think the shooting of the healthcare CEO was acceptable or somewhat acceptable, according to a December 17 Emerson poll. Herbie, this is just, I just, I shake my head at this.

[00:25:25] And I just want to broaden it because, Kelly, I want to get your comments because they're also finding that a fair number of people on the left think that the person that tried to assassinate Donald Trump in Butler, Pennsylvania, shouldn't have missed. I mean, we have a problem. And I think these stories, but I'll just use Luigi Maggioni for the moment as an illustration of something has gone wrong in this country. Yeah, I was literally, I didn't know you were going to go to the second part of that, Kirby.

[00:25:55] And I was thinking the exact same thing. They just had the poll that came out this week. And it was basically 50% of Democrats thought it would be justifiable to kill President Trump. And so I think both of these things, I mean, the thing that's really weird about the Luigi Maggioni is the trying to put some sort of Christianity about it, about murder. A patron saint.

[00:26:22] Yeah, I mean, you know, but I think that, you know, what happens to a culture that, you know, celebrates death and abortion and, you know, you start to lose respect for life. You do that at the beginning with abortion. You do it at the end with euthanasia. And you start to coarsen your culture. And so I would surmise that of the 50% that think that, and they also, it wasn't just Trump.

[00:26:50] They had to say, they had a, it was close to 50%, like 48%, for Elon Musk. It was justifiable, you know, to kill him. And I think that most of these people don't know the Lord. But the thing that's scary about what Merrill Matthews brought up is those people are talking about the Lord. You know, those people really need some theology training. They need to read the Bible maybe once or something.

[00:27:18] A Christian self-funding site raising $836,000. That's not, that's not, hey. That is just, it's just, it's crazy. But that's what happens when you don't have, you know, when you don't have the Lord's standards, then you have whatever standard feels right. And so if you don't like somebody, then yeah, okay, I think it's justifiable if they get knocked off. And that's where you go. And so we're just seeing a culture that has moved away from the Lord.

[00:27:47] Now, one of the encouraging things on the other side is how we're seeing this rising up of our younger people at all the universities around the country. The huge sort of revival-like things going on, you know, Asbury and all that. But Auburn and Arkansas, I mean, just name the university. We've seen the pictures. And then you've got some of these studies that have come out in the last three or four months.

[00:28:14] You know, for the first time in the history of the country, more young men going to church and even young women. Now, part of that is the negative part. The young women are becoming, you know, more, you know, alienated or whatever by the church. They've been caught into this movement that's going on. But I think still the major part of that is the young men going back to church, the young men increasing.

[00:28:42] And, of course, that will lead to huge changes in the future. So while we see the message of those who don't know the Lord and certainly don't know Scripture, on the other side of the coin, I do think we see something coming from the younger generation that is highly encouraging. One of the things that I guess we could say, if I can borrow Charles Dickens for a minute, Tale of Two Cities, the best of times, the worst of times,

[00:29:09] because another positive we can talk about, Kelly, is Bible sales are up. Yes. And Christian book sales are up. So you really almost used to have kind of this middle mass of middle America, good values. And what you now have is a real schism between old and young, rich and poor, faithful and religious and non-religious.

[00:29:34] One of the growing statistics, sadly, is for those that are unaffiliated, sometimes referred to as the nuns. And so in some respects, that's what you're seeing unfolding. So at a time when we can talk about some of the positive things, and one of the things I'm hearing as I'm traveling around here, people really do appreciate hearing the positive stories. Hearing Kelly, for example, talk about having nine cases before the Supreme Court and winning all nine,

[00:29:58] the most recent one unanimously, hearing about the resurgence in faith and that. And at the same time, we're hearing about demented fans that are buying some of these religious artifacts, Dr. Matthews, that you just thought maybe were somebody making it up on the Babylon Bee, but unfortunately it really is happening. And, you know, they're talking about St. Luigi of health care access for all.

[00:30:23] Well, the head of UnitedHealthcare, the one he assassinated, they provided health insurance for millions of Americans. It was the largest health insurance company in the world. So their criticism is that they would maybe deny some people, but very few things are actually denied. So it's a strange thing where somebody who runs a company that provides access to health insurance for millions of Americans,

[00:30:50] including seniors, is killed because he denies access when, in fact, they're empowering access to so many millions. Kelly, it reminds me of the fact that we were talking about this before, and I think we talked to Samira Matthews as well. Elon Musk owns 12.8% of Tesla, which, if you want to do the math, suggests then that 80%, basically,

[00:31:14] 88% of almost of the amount is actually invested in your 401K or your IRA. So when you're trying to destroy Tesla, you're not going to affect Elon Musk. You're going to affect all the people who have these investments. The same thing here. If, indeed, you think that I want to take out an individual that is really harming health care in America, they are the very ones that were actually providing health care for America.

[00:31:43] So the lack of logic in any of this makes no sense, does it? No. No, it doesn't. It's really crazy, you know, what's going on. And that division is really true. Now, you know, the other good side to that is there are all these people who are – this is the reason, I think, we're seeing this movement. I think in America it was maybe 22% increase in Bibles, but overseas it's even greater.

[00:32:09] And I think it's – this division is creating – if you're on the dark side, you don't know the Lord, you don't have Scripture, you don't – you're searching. You're searching for something with meaning because you know where you are is not the answer. So there's a real opportunity when you have such a – you know, it's harder when things meld from one side to the other and you can't really tell, you know, where people stand or what you believe or what – you know,

[00:32:36] it's a little easier when the division is a little more stark to present the options. And so it's a great chance, you know, for people who really are searching. And, you know, it's one of those things you hear at church all the time is like – what was it? I don't remember the last percentage. I just remember it being very high. It's either 70 or 80 or maybe even 90% of people said that they would go to church if they were asked. And so just simple things like asking a neighbor or asking somebody if they want to go to church.

[00:33:06] That can be a start of a whole change of life for them because so many people are looking for something. And, you know, Kirby, the direct parallel with the assassination of Brian Thompson is people who have been going out and attacking Tesla cars and trucks. I mean, they've been scraping them, blowing them up, setting them on fire. It's amazing. Well, again, I think the Attorney General Pam Bondi is going to have something to say about that. And so we'll come back and talk about the Viewpoints commentary by Penna Dexter, defund public broadcasting.

[00:33:36] And we'll wind down for today. But a good time to invite people to Palm Sunday and to Easter. We'll be right back. President Trump recently told reporters he would be honored to defund National Public Radio and the Public Broadcasting Service. He said they are a waste of money.

[00:34:03] Both PBS and NPR have long exhibited a decidedly liberal political bias and, more recently, have advanced far-left positions on issues like gender ideology. Currently, PBS and NPR receive approximately $500 million per year in federal funding through the Corporation for Public Broadcasting. The Corporation for Public Broadcasting is a private, non-profit organization authorized by Congress in 1967 when there were three network television choices.

[00:34:31] Today, there are hundreds of channels. Plus, as Washington Post columnist George Will points out, 15,000 commercial radio stations, 425 U.S. satellite radio channels, and over 4 million registered podcasts worldwide. The heads of PBS and NPR testified at a recent House Oversight Committee hearing. PBS President Paula Kerger told the committee, We bring a diversity of viewpoints.

[00:34:54] But CEO Catherine Maher conceded in her testimony that NPR botched coverage of Hunter Biden's infamous laptop. House members also pointed out that the network misinformed the public on COVID-19 origins and the Russian collusion hoax. According to Victoria Taft at PJ Media, 87 out of 87 editors at NPR are leftist Democrats. Why are we funding them? If we stop, she writes, PBS stations won't be destitute. They fundraise through telethons and on-air messages.

[00:35:23] They receive funds from leftist organizations like the Ford and Rockefeller Foundations. Representative Marjorie Taylor Greene has called for removing all taxpayer funding of both PBS and NPR. At the House hearing, she told their leaders, We believe that you all can hate us on your own dime. Conservatives in Congress often advocate defunding these entities. But many legislators fear local pushback. If they can't summon the courage, Doge can help them. For Point of View, I'm Penna Dexter.

[00:35:54] You're listening to Point of View, your listener-supported source for truth. Back for a few more minutes, let's see if we can talk about the commentary that we oftentimes play on Friday, our weekend edition at this particular time, both in the first hour and the second hour. Penna Dexter's piece by Defund Public Broadcasting.

[00:36:14] And I'll come to Kelly for just a minute, but I just thought I might just mention that she talks about the fact that PBS and NPR receive a fair amount of federal funding through the Corporation for Public Broadcasting. And maybe that was a good idea decades ago, but certainly this is an organization and a broadcasting service that has become decidedly more liberal.

[00:36:35] And that was illustrated by even the testimony of the CEO, Catherine Mayer, who conceded that they botched the coverage of Hunter Biden's laptop, but then was interviewed by members of Congress about some of the statements that she had made there as well. So, Kelly, it does seem to me that if we're talking about doge, we're talking about government efficiency, we're trying to scale back the size and scope of the federal government,

[00:37:02] maybe one very good place to cut would be something that was established back in the days of Lyndon Johnson. Yeah, I think most Americans realize this is a really bad idea, especially after the testimony. It's just it's being used as a propaganda, the government propaganda for one side of the political aisle. It's it's a horrible idea.

[00:37:27] Now, certainly having, you know, some sort of, you know, message or program and other countries that is pro-America that, you know, that's one thing. That's not what this is.

[00:37:41] And this is a really bad idea to idea that you forcibly have taxpayers paying for clearly partisan kind of one sided, you know, slash, you know, quote news on the air. I mean, it's just wrong. It's wrong in everywhere. It's wrong politically. It's wrong morally. It's just a horrible idea. And it needs to stop. You know, Kirby, about a about a year ago, so maybe a little longer, Yuri Berliner, who had been a longtime producer at NPR,

[00:38:11] wrote a piece and explained how things had changed there in his time. And, of course, I used to I used to do commentaries for NPR's, all things considered, in the late 90s, early 2000s. And it was it was a liberal leaning organization then. But I thought they were perfect. They're very fair to me. And I'm doing conservative commentaries and so forth. But it began to change over time.

[00:38:33] And especially when Donald Trump came in 2017, you could just see the coverage began to change in ways that and we all know this. If you're a reporter and you want to skew the message, you go to certain people who have a skewed view of it and you cite them as people who are experts in this. And that's that's how you make sure you reinforce your point. NPR gets about eight percent of its funding from the federal government. That's I think can probably made up fairly easily.

[00:39:01] I don't know if PBS gets the same amount there, the Corporation for Public Broadcasting and the television. But certainly the NPR, at least as I see the PBS, you can get take PBS. Most of what I see on there is not. I mean, it's Masterpiece Theater and things. Right. I love those things. We watch it on Sunday evening. But certainly NPR is all day news. It's still all things considered in morning edition, still the best long format news.

[00:39:28] But it is clearly liberal and probably should not be funded by the taxpayers. Well, again, just thought that we would put that on the table. And again, if you would like to read Pentadexter's commentary, it is available on the website pointofview.net. Mine today is on corporate wokeness and about the fact that we see that Walmart and others that are now maybe backing away from this issue of DEI.

[00:39:53] And that relates very well to some of the conversation that we've had today about the fact that if you go to our website, pointofview.net, we have a take action item there in which you can contact your member of Congress about the dismantled DEI Act, which is there as well. But, Dr. Matthews, for just a minute, one of the things we mentioned the other day was about whether or not we're bringing these dire wolves back from extinction.

[00:40:19] And a good friend, Wesley J. Smith, said, you know, I think this is a little bit too much of a hype. Yes, they did. The company made 20 gene edits. But we aren't quite to the point where we can say that we've brought an animal back from extinction. And I think we're still a little bit further away from Jurassic Park. We're not at Jurassic Park yet.

[00:40:40] No, they took wolf genes and they made some adjustments to them using DNA from the dire wolf from what they say was 10,000 years ago. And what it looks like is a white wolf. They could have painted it. But, yeah. And, as a matter of fact, some of those genes had to do with fur color. So, again, we talked about that the other day, but I just wanted to hasten people to not think that we're anywhere close to Jurassic Park, are we?

[00:41:07] No, but I have to say the little wolf pups were really cute. They were really cute. Yeah, I think the main learning from all this is playing God is very dangerous. I would not advise it. Well, just before we run out of time, Kelly, I always like to talk about prayer requests. And I would have to say that one of the things I'm starting to run into is just as people really got excited about Coach Kennedy,

[00:41:35] because I think everybody had a favorite coach. There are a lot of people that are starting to tell me they're very upset about a woman that has served as a teacher for 30 years and then lost her job over a crucifix that isn't any bigger than about six inches. What's going on with that? Yeah, the Marisol Castro case is really exploding.

[00:41:57] We actually, you know, we've been doing cases for a long time, and we've gotten more, I don't know, readership, response, or whatever, from this case than any other case except for the SEALs case. I mean, it's amazing, right? So Marisol, 30 years, a teacher, and just loves her kids. And what happened is you could go through the school.

[00:42:23] Every teacher behind their desk on the wall has personal workspace where they can put whatever they want up there. They have like, I mean, you name it, it's up there, right? You know, Star Wars figures. I mean, you know, you could put a pride flag up. You could do whatever you want. Well, she had a lot of things, but one of the things was a cross. And they told her to take it down. In fact, they told her, well, it would be okay if you hung it under your desk.

[00:42:51] And so the union kind of forced her, and so she hung it under a desk, and she was so convicted by that that, and you could see the video, we interviewed her about this, that she refers to the father as Papa God. And she apologized to Papa God. She said, this was wrong, and I will never do this again. She brought the cross back, put it, along with all the other things she had.

[00:43:19] And they're now proceeding to, you know, they walked her out of the school like a criminal, and they're persecuting her, all in violation of law. Now, what's the argument? Well, you know, students, there are students nearby. They might see the cross. Now, gosh, I can swear we had a Supreme Court case where there was maybe somebody like a coach or somebody praying, and they said, hey, the kids are going to see the coach praying. And the Supreme Court said, so what?

[00:43:48] And they ruled, you can't restrict the coach from praying. That violates free speech. That violates free exercise of religion. Exactly, Marisol's case. But they're refusing to back down. In fact, they're persecuting her. And, you know, we've got one of the largest law firms in the world has joined us on behalf of Marisol, and, you know, we're going to do everything we can, not only to win for Marisol, but to set a precedent that really protects every teacher out there. They don't have to be ashamed of their faith.

[00:44:18] They're allowed to be who they are. So, again, that's a prayer target. Of course, I sign up for our Prayer for America because we send out some prayer targets each week, and, of course, Kelly has those there as well. So we're just about out of time. First of all, I want to thank both you guys. Kelly and Merrill, thank you for being with us. I also want to thank, of course, Megan and Karen back at the studio, and then in with me today, Steve. So we've had quite an opportunity to put together a rather unique Friday weekend edition where people are in two different locations at the same time.

[00:44:47] But, again, I want to thank those at WPEO. They've been such gracious hosts. We're going to be speaking tomorrow night and looking forward to that. And we're back on Monday, and as you heard, we've got a lot of great topics that we'll be addressing next week. So, again, thank you for listening to Point of View. Enjoy the weekend. We look forward to seeing you back here on Monday right here on Point of View. At Point of View, we believe there is power in prayer,

[00:45:14] and that is why we have relaunched our Pray for America campaign, a series of weekly emails to unite Americans in prayer for our nation. Imagine if hundreds of thousands of Americans started praying intentionally together on a weekly basis. You can help make that a reality by subscribing to our Pray for America emails.

[00:45:39] Just go to pointofview.net and click on the Pray for America banner that's right there on the homepage. Each week you'll receive a brief news update, a specific prayer guide, and a free resource to equip you in further action. We encourage you to not only pray with us each week, but to share these prayers and the resources with others in your life. Join the movement today.

[00:46:08] Visit pointofview.net and click on the banner Pray for America right there at the top. That's pointofview.net. Let's pray together for God to make a difference in our land. Point of View is produced by Point of View Ministries.