Point of View August 2, 2024 – Hour 1 : Weekend Edition

[00:00:00] This is… Joining us today for our Weekend Edition here on Point of View, I have two co-hosts in studio with me. One is Jeremy Dyde. He is Senior Counsel for Litigation and Communications at First Liberty Institute. Hi, Jeremy. Hello.

[00:00:34] Good to have you, and also Maryl Matthews, resident scholar at the Institute for Policy Innovation. This is a fun team for me. I enjoy co-hosting with you two and we're going to try not to do too much damage here

[00:00:46] although maybe we will do some and maybe God will use it. You know, some of the bad guys have been killed lately. We've had some terrorists killed. Three of them. I'm good with that.

[00:01:00] And also Khalid Sheikh Mohammed who is the mastermind of 9-11 and a lot of other terrorist acts and he was the guy that murdered Daniel Pearl, the Wall Street Journal reporter on the internet, beheaded him. And he's been hanging around for 20 years.

[00:01:20] They're hanging around not hanging but hanging around. No, no, it might have been better but the administration now has decided that he will not get the death penalty. There's been some kind of a plea deal and so you know he's gotten a pretty good

[00:01:35] deal and a couple of his other cohorts as well. So the US did that, that's on us. The Israelis did a little better because they've killed three terrorists in recent days. One Hezbollah leader, two Hamas leaders and then of course a very bad guy went free in

[00:01:53] exchange for a Wall Street Journal reporter and several other people with an exchange. Russia was holding these people. One of their killers, one of Putin's hit men was let go free but Evan Gershkovich, we've

[00:02:15] been reading, since I read the journal every day I've been reading about him and there's a huge story on him in the journal today. So he's back home and I guess they're all getting checked out but it was a very

[00:02:27] complicated deal that took place with the German government, our government and Russia. And so you know I mean I'm applauding the reporters being released but it's very sad that a Russian hit man is back out on the street.

[00:02:42] And especially because in a sense it rewards Putin, Vladimir Putin because he takes people now essentially hostages in order to hold them to get back his prisoners who are being held in other places. So it's a strategy for him. It's a strategy, absolutely.

[00:02:57] And I think the Wall Street Journal's piece sort of stresses that. This is political. Gershkovich was not doing anything wrong. Putin takes him, goes through a trial court, a show trial to get him convicted and then they work the deal there and so we're glad he's back.

[00:03:15] Biden flew to Texas to be able to be part of that there. Kamala Harris was already here in Texas because she did a funeral service yesterday and I think she's giving a speech today but it's good he's back but I just, it's problematic

[00:03:32] to me that Putin manages to get away with this by taking these people who are generally innocent. Well speaking of politics and Kamala Harris being here, I just wonder how many questions she's getting from reporters here in Texas that she's answering.

[00:03:50] My sense is and I've seen this several times she gets a presentation and she walks off and does not answer any questions because Kamala Harris can do a pretty fair job when she's

[00:04:00] got a telepompter and she's staying on message but when she starts ad libbing there it becomes a real problem because she gets her word salad, her laugh comes in and other things which they don't want to highlight right now.

[00:04:13] She wants to be unburdened from what has been I'm sure. And as opposed to her boss, the president who has asked a question after the journalist were announced and all that and someone asked a question about well President Trump said he'd

[00:04:26] do this this quicker and would have done this by now and all that and his response was he should have done it when he was president. Well three of the four individuals were jailed during the Biden administration so that would

[00:04:36] have been a little bit more difficult to actually happen but yeah we're glad they're back. Well I mean word salads aside and you know strange crazy laughter, weird laughter

[00:04:49] aside her positions on so many issues are so far to the left she's changed some of them but most of the time she's not even answering or talking about it and buddy we were talking before the show

[00:05:02] if she's going to do an 180 on something I mean I guess she's entitled to do that but I think she ought to give her reasoning to make it believable. Yes it's perfect people change their opinions on things over time sometimes you get better

[00:05:17] evidence and you think I was wrong there and I'm going to take this position but she has most of her positions have changed within the last week or so and it's not because she's gotten any

[00:05:27] better information it's because they're trying to moderate her position which is much further to well I'm going to say it's further left than Biden. Biden moved to the left but generally she's further to the left than Biden and they want to try to

[00:05:43] take her away from that and she they will get a lot of help from the media who simply will not highlight some of her older positions or if they do they'll just mention it in passing without demanding from her why have you changed your position on fracking?

[00:05:59] Do you still support a you basically a single payer government run healthcare system? If not why have you changed and we need to know those things just to the public needs to know them but I don't think the media will hold her feet to the fire from that

[00:06:14] and as a result they'll highlight her new positions but Republicans are already developing ads showing her positions in the past and comparing that to what she's trying to say now. She get away with it for very long because of because Republicans are putting out information

[00:06:31] and it will be more. She'll get away with it longer than the average because this is usually what is sifted through during a primary season. This is partly why we have these things so that we

[00:06:40] have a real narrowed focus on what the issues are going to be about in the general election but since the party that wants to save our democracy has anointed someone to be the candidate that

[00:06:49] has not received a single vote to be that candidate, a lot of those discussions just simply weren't there so we have to now go back to what 2016 when she was running for president

[00:06:58] of the first time and mine through some of those comments to figure out where she might stand on some of these issues but eventually the GOP I'm sure will get caught up with themselves

[00:07:09] and there's all kinds of tape that's out there to be able to roll and put into side of ads and put out on Twitter and talk in the media about so I suspect it'll get caught up but will it be caught

[00:07:20] up in time? I don't know. Yeah it's a short window less than 100 days until the election and you know she did so badly in 2020 that she she entered her campaign in December 2019.

[00:07:33] She didn't even make it. I got the dates wrong. Yeah yeah 2019. She didn't even make it to the and that was largely because the campaign was doing so poorly and there was so much media

[00:07:45] about internal infighting chaos and other things that she was head of so it will be we'll see what happens there but she doesn't have a great past so far on that. One of the well probably the most important issue for a lot of conservative Christians in the last

[00:08:06] election and actually in the 2016 election was the court the courts and it's a huge issue for the left right now they they want to change the role of the court in our country which basically would destroy the court and destroy the country and First Liberty Institute, Jeremy,

[00:08:25] we're going to talk after the break about this and I think it's so important to talk about it. They are probably the lead organization in fighting this quote unquote court reform that the left is pushing so we will talk about it right after this stay with us.

[00:08:44] This is Viewpoints with Kirby Anderson. Yesterday I talked about robots and wanted to follow up with some perspective on how artificial intelligence represents independent thinking and autonomous actions. There are reasons to believe that AI and robots will be learning and thinking in

[00:09:14] ways we might not predict. Let me illustrate this with a game Go. Go was an ancient east Asian game placed on a 19 by 19 grid with black and white stones. The goal is to surround your

[00:09:26] opponent's stones with yours once you do that you take them off the board. It is more complex than chess. After a few moves there are 200 quadrillion possible configurations. When computers beat chess masters they used a brute force method where they merely crunch through all sorts of

[00:09:43] possible moves. That is not possible with Go therefore engineers produced AlphaGo to learn by watching 150,000 games played by human experts then it played against copies of itself. The engineers then organized a tournament in South Korea against the world champion of Go.

[00:10:01] AlphaGo won the first game but it was the second game that had ever been talking. The machine made a series of moves that made no sense. Commentators explained to the people watching that it was a strange move and that AlphaGo had made a mistake. But the world

[00:10:16] champion knew something wasn't right. He took a very long time before he took his next move. Before long it was obvious that AlphaGo had won again and that Go's strategy had been rewritten right before everyone's eyes. Later versions essentially dispensed with human knowledge

[00:10:32] and developed their own strategies and thinking and this illustrates the power and the peril of artificial intelligence. I'm Kirby Anderson and that's my point of view. Free booklet on a biblical view of Patriot Preachers go to viewpoints.info slash patriot preachers viewpoints.info slash patriot preachers.

[00:10:59] You're listening to Point of View your listener supported source for truth. Welcome back to Point of View Dr. Merrill Matthews and Jeremy Dyes are with me. It's our Friday weekend edition and this week on Monday President Biden announced his plan to quote

[00:11:17] reform the Supreme Court. We have to understand that it's a very politically radical position to take. It was tried three years ago but then it was sort of given up. But I think they're serious about it now. Jeremy court packing was one thing.

[00:11:38] They seem to consider that thoroughly and throw it out and not do it. But there are other things that the left would like to do that would probably be just as bad or worse. Oh absolutely. Look basically what they have proposed is simply court packing by another name

[00:11:57] whereas one commentator put it reverse court packing and it's no secret what they're actually attempting to do especially with this term limitation baloney. They're making that apply immediately to the oldest serving justices on the

[00:12:09] Supreme Court of the United States. Well be a little more veiled in what you're trying to do. Obviously that is targeted at two people that the left despises. This is the whirlwind that Senator Schumer threatened years ago. It is now coming home to roost inside of

[00:12:23] the capital environment up there. This would target justices Thomas and Alito. The two people that the left I think more than anybody alive let alone on the court right now the left despises more they just simply despise these people and they want them gone.

[00:12:39] They don't care in the integrity of the process. All the window dressing they put together to make this sound like it's a legitimate plan is not truly felt by the left. They simply want

[00:12:50] the blood of justices Thomas and Alito. They want them out of there. They've wanted him out of there since Justice Thomas went on the bench almost 40 years ago now. So spare me the pearl clutching about the integrity of our court process that is simply not the case.

[00:13:07] I think I like to go back to our founding fathers and what did they think about the entire judicial system in our country. They've created three separate but equal branches of government for a reason why. Well students of history will understand and we'll go back to

[00:13:22] the Federalist Papers that helped unpack. I call it the treatise on our constitutional system, the footnotes of our Constitution itself explaining why the founding fathers went through this process and chose these particular ways of doing our government. Of all the ways

[00:13:37] they could do government why did they choose these? Well in Federalist number 78 Alexander Hamilton takes on the importance of the judiciary and explains why they came up with an independent judiciary and one of the things he says in that is that liberty has nothing to fear from a

[00:13:52] judiciary alone. It has everything to fear. Liberty has everything to fear from a judiciary being joined with the other branches. So what these proposals would do would be to join this court, the independent courts with the other branches. What does that look like? Well

[00:14:08] it would become another political football and with it a political nightmare because every administration would be using that as a political tool to get themselves elected. The justices or the judges that are running for these positions or would then be running

[00:14:22] for these positions would be currying favor within their lower court opinions or their other parts of their lives to be able to lobby for the job effectively to create political coalitions to support their candidacy for the higher offices that they want to seek.

[00:14:35] It would actually result in less independence and a more favor giving than what we currently have today which is actually very little favor giving obviously because this is an independent judiciary. The point is it would create one more political tool of a branch that

[00:14:51] is supposed to be apolitical, a branch outside of the political process whether Congress is controlling it or the executive is controlling it. It would be a political entity all together. We don't want that so why do we want that? Well think through a few things.

[00:15:04] Think of the last month and a little bit that we've been going through right now. Do you want that with our Supreme Court every two or four years? That would be lunacy for us to want.

[00:15:14] Do you want to have a judge or justice confirmed like we've had with Kavanaugh and Barrett and others every two or four years and have that entire political nightmare to go through all the time? That's what the left is basically proposing right now. The judiciary

[00:15:28] is supposed to be an independent body insulated from these political attacks so that they can actually step outside of the political process and say no, all the political imaginations that are out there, they have to yield to the Constitution here's what it actually says and applies.

[00:15:44] They're given that freedom to be able to be independent that way to ensure the freedom that we have and those that they can be the last safeguard for our civil rights found in our Constitution. If the left's proposals go through it would upend that process entirely. It would

[00:16:01] sharpen a political tool aimed at the max of all Americans and we simply cannot allow that to happen. Frankly, I don't think it's going to happen. Speaker Johnson has already said that that proposal is dead on arrival. I trust him when he says that. I don't think that's

[00:16:15] going to get a legitimate hearing but political factions change quickly which is precisely why this has been brought up in the first place. Here we are 98 days or something like that from

[00:16:26] a general election. The left is trying to make sure that their base is animated and turned out. Well, this happens to be a huge issue for the far left party far left in the party of

[00:16:37] the Democrats and so they had to turn them out now. They can't do it too soon because that would be too close to the election and they want that to get in. They've done it now

[00:16:44] but they've had four years, three and a half years now to do this. They're waiting until now. It is an obvious political overture to the very far left radical part of their party

[00:16:53] to satiate them and to excite them into supporting the crown princess of the party to run for this the presidency. Frankly, we have a lame duck president who's got nothing to lose to do so

[00:17:06] and there's no restraint on someone like Kamala Harris to be limited to what's being proposed here. Should she gain election in November? So the left has done a masterful job of proposing all

[00:17:15] this but like President Biden, then Senator Biden said back in the early 90s of FDR's judicial reorganization project it's a bonehead idea. It was a boneheaded idea then. It was a boneheaded idea in 1937. But he decided to propose it. He should leave it alone even today. It's still

[00:17:31] boneheaded but here we are. We've got to push back on it once again. And the irony here of course is that Biden says this in his closing speech when he's just announcing he's not going

[00:17:40] to run. He's going to work really hard to get this done before he leaves office. There's not a chance he could get this done before he leaves office. I'm not even sure why you'd sort of make the claim

[00:17:50] unless you're just trying to as you suggest energize the left. Yeah, I thought they're going to propose it ahead of his pulling out the election to be able to he was looking for political faction to get behind him because he's losing everybody.

[00:18:01] And so this would be a natural place for him to go if you're not going to find everybody in the center and certainly nobody on the right. Where do you have left to go? But the far,

[00:18:07] far left. And that's the only people that have really truly been pushing this issue in any kind of earnestness are those who are on the far, far left that want a uniggovernment anymore. They

[00:18:17] don't want the separation of powers. They want to have a one-party rule and one party fits all type of solution which is a would be a travesty for our American democracy or American Republic.

[00:18:28] And so it is clearly a political so when sweet didn't have to worry about re-election he becomes a lame duck to be able to do whatever he wants to try to do for a period of time.

[00:18:37] But also I don't think we can escape the fact that there is lurking right behind him Kamala Harris who wants to gain elevation to a seat as well. And she's as she said fully in support of

[00:18:50] this proposal so she has to own this as well. Well, if you get three branches of government and the Democrats hold all three, I think then we absolutely do have the possibility of getting this enacted. Until that point we don't. Now the government did not adopt court

[00:19:08] packing after having studied it. I think they felt it was politically too dangerous to do that. But some of these other things, even though they're probably worse like term limits for justices would make the court political but people don't really see the danger as much.

[00:19:25] Also some people don't like the immunity decision that the Supreme Court made because they hate Trump and they feel that it gave him a pass. So they want to get rid of that. And some of the

[00:19:35] people believe the news reports about Thomas going on a you know Harlan Crowe's jet and having a vacation with him and that's somehow just a sin. So these things are being brought up in order

[00:19:46] to you know whip up the public especially the public on the left. And I think that's why we can't drop it. We can't say oh it's not gonna pass. No, it will not probably pass soon.

[00:19:58] But it could pass if the left takes control of our government. It could and if we don't have a judiciary, we pretty much have a permanent totalitarian government. Right and I think Jeremy's

[00:20:09] point is right. When he talks about the attempt of the left they do not want an independent judiciary. Left-leaders always want a subservient judiciary which will then back what the left wants to do. And that's the real problem here is you have an independent judiciary.

[00:20:28] You sometimes have Republicans deciding things I disagree with. Sometimes you have Trump people deciding things judges I disagree with but that's an independent judiciary and that is not what the left wants right now. We can learn and we'll have to come back to this

[00:20:43] I suppose after the break but you've got a piece out talking about how that worked out so well in Venezuela. And when you look at other countries I love the fact that President Biden

[00:20:51] mentioned that we're the only country in the world that does whatever with our judiciary has this level of judicial independence effectively. But we're like yeah that's the point. That's exactly right. We're the only country that ensures that amount of freedom individually for any

[00:21:08] human being as well and we should be distinct in the world history about that point. Other countries ought to be following our example lest they have to learn from the example of Venezuela. A couple of pieces that posted at pointofview.net one is by Romesh Pomeru

[00:21:22] talking about this whole idea of reform of the courts kind of an interesting piece and it's from The Washington Post and Dr. Merrill Matthews piece on Ben Zawala. It seems like we live in a different world from many people in positions of authority. They say men can be

[00:21:38] women and women men. People are prosecuted differently or not at all depending on their politics. Criminals are more valued and rewarded than law-abiding citizens. It's so overwhelming so demoralizing. You feel like giving up but we can't. We shouldn't. We must not. As Winston

[00:21:59] Churchill said to Britain in the darkest days of World War II never give in never give in. Never never never never yield to force never yield to the apparently overwhelming

[00:22:11] might of the enemy and that's what we say to you today. This is not a time to give in but to step up and join point of view in providing clarity in the chaos. We can't do it alone but together

[00:22:26] with God's help we will overcome the darkness. Invest in biblical clarity today at pointofview.net or call 1-800-347-5151 pointofview.net and 800-347-5151. Point of view will continue after this. You are listening to Point of View.

[00:23:02] 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 Tana Dexter. And my co-hosts Dr. Merrill Matthews and Jeremy Dyes and we've been talking about

[00:23:22] Supreme Court reform being pushed by the left. Joe Biden announced he's calling for Supreme Court reform and gave out some particular pieces and parts of that including term limits for justices. And so we can look beyond our shores to talk about how well this works and that's what

[00:23:44] I want to do at pointofview.net. We have posted Dr. Matthews' piece on It's in the Hill and it's Biden's plan to Venezuela eyes the U.S. Supreme Court. It starts out President Joe

[00:23:56] Biden is calling for U.S. Supreme Court reform this week having seen how well court packing, term limits and crony justices have worked in the economically failed dictatorship of Venezuela. Our lame duck president who constantly warns us of threats to

[00:24:11] democracy wants to implement those Venezuelan reforms in the U.S. How has that worked out for them? It hasn't worked out well. So in 1999 Hugo Chavez the incoming strong he was elected but he becomes a strong man dictator in Venezuela and in 1999 he promised the public that

[00:24:31] the court would remain independent judiciary would remain independent would not become a tool of the state but that changed. So in 2004 he passed a law which essentially packed the court there in Venezuela and I'm reading from Human Rights Watch from 2004 they say this is a quote

[00:24:50] the law passed in May that's May 2004 expanded the court from 20 to 32 members in addition to the justices named to the 12 new seats five justices were named to fill vacancies that had opened up in recent months and 32 more were named as reserve jurist justices for the court.

[00:25:09] So if any of them get forced or the current ones get forced out they've got the reserve justice there in the background who can step in and you get forced out for political reasons

[00:25:18] forced out or whatever they also in that law made it much easier to push people out or to approve new justices. So in essence it makes it a tool of the administration to the point that

[00:25:32] just a few years ago the the International Court of Jurists published a paper and they're quoting from their paper the Supreme Court of Venezuela has been co-opted by the ruling party becoming an appendage of the executive branch and has ceased to exercise its constitutional

[00:25:52] function as the guarantor of the rule of law human rights and fundamental freedom. So the International Court of Jurists said it's just a tool of the executive branch which where what we're saying is that's what Biden wants he's not saying that specifically but

[00:26:08] that's exactly what they want whether or not they want to that's what the end effect will be right you'll have you'll have a judiciary or a supreme court about the same size as the

[00:26:17] galactic senate and star wars and just about as crazy as well I might add but then ultimately it'll be a controllable court because it'll be reported to or will be controlled by the political

[00:26:28] parties of the day and that puts in the backseat at all times not only judicial independence but because of that judicial independence being undercut it puts in the backseat all of our civil rights

[00:26:39] our court has been the last safeguard for our civil rights when congress acts too far the supreme court is able to say sorry that doesn't square the constitution the law has to

[00:26:49] yield when the president goes beyond his limits and authority the supreme court has been able to step in for both parties and say he has gone too far the constitution requires something less than that

[00:27:01] you must bend to the will of the people as written down in our constitution take away that independence and say you are just one more political entity of three in our in our

[00:27:12] government we've got real problems no longer do you have that that buffer that safe space for them to be in to be able to make these decisions instead you have the same kind of arguments that are made

[00:27:23] on the political campaign trail the same kind of um kabuki theater that is done inside of our inside of our legislative uh meet uh hearing rooms uh instead it'll just that'll pour over then

[00:27:36] into our judiciary as well uh it'll get bloated it'll get uh targeted on top of all of that it's not necessary we have been the envy of the free world for 250 years now and how we've

[00:27:51] organized our government we've had no problems about it until fdr thought that there was a problem and the senate judiciary said we're going to fix this such that generations will never come back

[00:28:02] to it and they did by the way that you can go back and read the notes in 1937 about that and then senator biden need reminds us that it was a bonehead idea we shouldn't go down this

[00:28:11] path but now that they've got some decisions that are going against them for the first time in 60 years they think that the court is quote rigged or whatever conspiracy theory that they want to put

[00:28:21] on a tinfoil hat and yell about and get behind shelton white house to do it doesn't make any sense we've got a free judicially independent organization about the the only question mark in terms of

[00:28:32] ethics that have come up here i think has been when just as soon as my or sad and judgment over a case in which her book publisher was a party beyond that there's only any window in speculation

[00:28:42] that has that has come up from the left again mostly by shelton white house and chuck schumer and a couple of others on the far left that are trying to continue to smear the good names of

[00:28:52] justices thomas and elito and put crosshairs on them and let's not forget that justice kavanaugh had a near miss with the would be assassin and maybe would have been the actual physical target of that had that assassin not turned himself in to realize hey this is a problem

[00:29:07] i might take actions i shouldn't take over here uh... don't forget we've had drum beats outside literal drum beats outside the house of justice baird and her young children while they're there as well protesting protesting a justice of the supreme court uh... in the only other

[00:29:23] protest that i've seen have been outside of the homes of justice uh... to elito achieve justice roberts i don't recall loud parties and loud angry mobs outside of the the liberal members of the justice's homes uh... it's just incredible that that would be the case

[00:29:37] so they can't get their way in the court of public opinion they lose in the in the actual courthouse and so they say you know what we're done playing this game according to

[00:29:46] the rules we're going to change the rules of the suit our political agenda for the moment so the uh... the issue there on the court packing but also abidin called for term limits venezuela has term limits twelve years it's a non-renewable term so you only get to serve

[00:30:00] twelve years and then you're out and of course biden is also calling for ethics reform a code of ethics to impose upon the justices which uh... you just have to be amazed at people in congress

[00:30:15] who might be people writing the code of ethics you have the swall well who was uh i had an affair with the chinese spy will he be the charge in charge of this

[00:30:24] maybe i don't know that's maybe bob menendez who's going to be having to leave because of taking money from egypt right and lost was convicted in court maybe he should be the head of the court of the uh... ethics reform not to mention the justices themselves all

[00:30:38] of them all nine of them have come out to reaffirm their commitment to their own code of ethics and saying that it's working just fine thank you very much uh... look i don't dispute congress is oversight of the of the judiciary they've got certain

[00:30:49] responsibilities when comes that as given by the constitution but this goes well too far and it really does threaten that independence of this judiciary that if if they're allowed to be uh... controlled and um... enabled by the uh... the other political branches uh... again i go back to

[00:31:06] to alexander hamilton in federalist number seventy eight uh... the court has neither force nor will he said they have independence entirely liberty has nothing to fear from a uh... judeus lee independent judiciary it liberty has everything to fear from the judiciary attached to the other political branches

[00:31:26] you know taking us back to venezuela uh... of course there's their election is contested yes and um... the opposition party there's you know most people think they got about seventy percent of the vote but the dictator madero is uh... maduro

[00:31:46] is proclaiming himself the winner yes and uh... so you know there's that fight if that should go to the court yeah i mean if it goes to the court you can almost be assured that the court supreme court there in venezuela will back up and necklace maduro there

[00:32:03] even though uh... i i i just heard today that uh... the united states has decided to uh... assumed that the uh... announced that the opposition was at the actual winner there so that's a good uh... that's a good start

[00:32:17] and several of the organization american states some of those uh... other uh... latin american countries are pushing back on maduro so he he's getting some pushback there but yes if it goes to the supreme court there they will do we recognize him as the winner

[00:32:32] so ladies and gentlemen uh... i am going to open the phones eight hundred three five one one two one two this issue is so important that if you have any questions on it and want something clarified in order make a statement

[00:32:44] about the uh... courts and the effort to reform them or the statements by the left that they wanted reformed eight hundred three five one one two one two this is what kelly shackleford says about it what is happening is that this is the number one goal

[00:32:58] of the less based taking over destroying the spirit supreme court they know they can't do it this year but number one it excites their base to get out and vote for comala and also if they win they will pack the court and be rid of it

[00:33:13] that's uh... that's an issue before us i don't know that uh... the mainstream media will call it an issue i wonder if there's a debate if the candidates would be asked about it but uh... it's it's a probably one of the most important issues and and uh...

[00:33:28] at stake in this campaign and the sub-presidential election so we want you to be aware of it we have the experts and the people leading on it in first liberty institute in our studio so often so that's a good thing

[00:33:40] so give us a call if you've got a question on it eight hundred three five one one two one two role played by drag queens in the opening ceremonies for the paris olympics was created to display france's inclusivity and showcase the french lgbtq plus community

[00:34:06] james leperlier president of a group called inter lgbt says the transgender community quote has difficulty being heard he told a bc news we are far from what the ceremony showed there's much progress to do in society regarding transgender people is a

[00:34:21] progress to offend christians all over the world who are watching the olympics the program's parody of the last supper featured eighteen drag queens and dancers posing behind a long table with the senate and i felt our in the

[00:34:33] background it mocks a central event of christianity the last supper was christ final meal with his twelve disciples when he instituted holy communion the ceremonies director thomas jolly previewed the opening in an interview with british vogue mister jolly who is gay says his measure for the

[00:34:50] production success is if everyone feels represented by it everyone not according to bestselling author and cultural commentator rod drear right he responded except for christians whose most sacred moments must be mocked for the sake of queer inclusion american catholic bishop robert barron founder of word on

[00:35:09] fire ministries has lived in paris he wonders would they ever have dared mock islam in a similar way arsonists are burning down churches all over france as rod drear points out mosques are growing up in france at the same rate

[00:35:22] that churches are coming down and yet he writes the contemptible elites who rule france stage this kind of blasphemous spectacle attacking the ancestral faith of france and what christians still remain there christianity is declining in the west normally when lgbt interests are elevated christianity

[00:35:40] loses it's becoming apparent that christians are no longer welcome in this culture rogerier concludes the enemy knows what time it is do we for point of view i'm pennadex sir you're listening to point of view your listener supported

[00:35:59] source for truth welcome back to point of view i had the great opportunity not long ago at being in a conference and there was a luncheon where kelly shackleford was talking to four navy seals for most of them were retired but

[00:36:17] they had all been in this represented by first liberty because they had refused to take the cobit vaccine for various well they had health reasons but they had religious objections to it and they actually won it took a long time

[00:36:33] but they they won their cases and this expanded to being giving the right to refuse the vaccine for religious reasons to the entire navy and it could actually be sort of lay the groundwork for the entire military so we've had one kind

[00:36:51] of a extra part of it there are a final settlement of this case that that took place this week and you explain that jeremy yeah no the the case had been designated as a class action meaning it wasn't just

[00:37:02] applying to the thirty some odd navy seals and swift boat members that are were a part of the original litigation but had expanded the entire class of the navy so everybody in the navy is going to be covered by this and we had

[00:37:13] to give some time for people to object to the filing of it all and make their positions known etc before was accepted by the court as as the settlement that would rule for the class itself and thankfully i guess

[00:37:24] was early last week that that settlement was finally accepted and taken and adopted by the court it is final and full and good and so that protects everybody in the navy and gives a lot of relief to those who have

[00:37:36] brought the initial lawsuit you know a couple weeks ago i met some of these guys i haven't working directly on the case so i haven't had a chance to interact with the seals very much but i got a chance at a recent event to

[00:37:45] interact with them a little bit more and realize how absolutely down to earth these guys are and on top of down to earth you know i think we have a misperception of the navy seal sometimes of these sort of muscle

[00:37:55] bound jocks that sort of the dumb jocks from high school well that is not the case i mean these guys are brilliant they are the most determined human beings on the planet i'm not entirely sure why the navy

[00:38:09] would take the navy seals off so much they trained them to never give up and they did not give up and it's taken a number of years for that to happen but thank goodness these guys are protected by it it's shocking that

[00:38:21] it took this long almost the entire by administration for them to to come to a level of agreement that would stop punishing the navy seals and give them the relief that they needed to be able to retire with the dignity that they

[00:38:32] need to retire without being forced to there's a time when they're going to be forced to repay for all their training because they objected to this whole thing i'm so glad we're and i hope we are past this point in our national craziness but let's not forget

[00:38:47] how absolutely bizarre it actually was so it ended up that the rights to refuse the vaccine and some people are still in the military and they didn't lose their jobs or they didn't lose their dishonorable discharge or they that was restored their honorable discharge of 4300 sailors were affected

[00:39:08] and as and this could help the other branches of the military now that this has been decided this way so it's wonderful and you know i agree when you met these seals that first of all they weren't muscle bound they a lot of

[00:39:20] them they just looked in good shape and these were all retired seals that spoke to us but they were in good shape some of their wives were there by the way i was confused for one of them so i mean yeah that made me feel pretty good

[00:39:31] well yeah i think it was the haircut not the body shape but it works out it was just inspiring to meet them because the other thing they are is brave and bold i found out they they kind of gave some talk about their

[00:39:42] training and you know you can actually die in the training for Navy Navy seals because it's so tough oh yeah no it's it's an incredibly tough experience to get through they don't call it hell weak for no reason i mean it's it's a

[00:39:55] tough thing to get through and uh the whole training is designed to get you to tap out to ring the bell to get out of the program itself only the ones who are the cream of the cream of the cream of the crop get through the

[00:40:07] entire training become lifelong navy seals and it is a real brother that was the other part that really hit me with this discussion we had with them you know it is a brotherhood inside the seal community

[00:40:19] and for the commanders and the people in the higher echelons to turn against them and then to turn their brothers against them just to try to force them into taking this this this shot that they have objections to and very good

[00:40:33] objections to that was perhaps the hardest thing for them to have to go through right they had they had literally bled and blistered together with these guys and they're they're they're supposed to be parts of

[00:40:45] you know one many parts of one whole one boat pulling together as it were and then they were the boatmates were put against them set against and purposely set against them and treated in ways that would be shameful in the

[00:40:58] private context but when you are the most elite fighting force on the planet is absolutely detrimental to the long-term function and functioning and readiness of that unit well speaking of readiness all branches of the military except I think there may be an exception with the

[00:41:12] Marines but are having trouble with recruitment they're not meeting their recruitment goals and so for instance the Navy was trying once this case then has been decided that maybe he's trying to get some of these people

[00:41:25] back yes and lure them back and some are coming back and their records are correct isn't all of that but you know why offend you know why really unnecessarily members of the military when you're having trouble with

[00:41:40] recruitment I think it was the Air Force of the army and the coast guard all had Marines all had people had who had left over this so it really hurt the numbers that they have and of course as you point out

[00:41:52] they've been having a number of problems trying to recruit people in part because so many of them in the military have gone to sort of this yeah okay so we posted a really good article at point of view dot net that

[00:42:06] tells this story and you can also go to first liberty dot org and you can see the stories about the the wins the recent wins and that's one of the ones that was reported on this week so

[00:42:19] very quickly Jeremy would you tell us about another one I have a press release in front of me about the third circuit court of appeals ruling in favor of one of your clients having to do with also refusing to

[00:42:31] receive the covid yeah Rachel Spivak was a it worked in the prosecutor's office in I think Pennsylvania is orthodox Jewish by background and faith and had no objection to to utilizing the covid shot and of course you know you can repeat the story over and over again

[00:42:47] we already know how the tune goes right and so we took up the case at the third circuit and hardly enough their argument was in I think November of 2023 and several members of the court staff were

[00:42:58] still wearing n95s to give you kind of a sense of the environment that we were arguing in it was awful interesting so we made those arguments and the court came down with an opinion this week on

[00:43:11] Monday I think saying that our client won and so she's got the right at least to take her case to a jury and have her live some reproductive big win is big win it's uh it's good news and you know that's

[00:43:23] when we talk about the courts as an institution to protect the independence of the course is so important for things like this because then our freedoms if we didn't have that protection our freedoms are at the whim of whoever's in power

[00:43:39] whoever politically is in control and that's a dangerous place for people to be so thankfully we have the courts and but we've got to not take that for granted well ladies and gentlemen next up you I'm sure heard the story and how much was made of

[00:43:57] vice president nominee on the republican side JD Vance's comments talking about childless cat ladies he said this was during his bid for the senate in Ohio he's now a senator in Ohio as most of you know he said in a fox news interview that we are

[00:44:15] effectively run in this country via the democrats and he referred to them as a bunch of childless cat ladies who are miserable at their own lives and the choices that they've made and so they want to make the rest of the

[00:44:26] country miserable too how's it making any sense that we've turned our country over to people who don't really have a direct stake in it of course he got all kinds of criticism op-eds written about it letters to the editor written about it texts and

[00:44:43] posts on various social media about it for instance here's one I love being a mom but JD Vance is horribly wrong about childless cat ladies here's another one I was a childless cat lady women respond to JD Vance but you know I think we're going to unpack a

[00:44:59] little bit first of all it was probably not the best choice of words but what was he trying to say what valid truths are behind the sentiment of what he was expressing and how has that been preferred and we'll do that after this break view we believe

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