Point of View March 17, 2025 – Hour 2 : News from the Weekend

[00:00:04] Across America, Live, this is Point of View, Kirby Anderson. Second hour, let's see if we can focus some time and attention on a couple of issues in the news, all starting with the letter D, first DOGE, then deportation.

[00:00:29] That probably will take us for about a half an hour, and then we'll get into some other topics that are certainly relevant as well. When you talk about DOGE right now, the center of focus has been on the Department of Education. So our next article that you can read comes from the editorial board of the Wall Street Journal, which I was surprised.

[00:00:49] I know that they probably know that the bureaucracy hasn't been that helpful, but again, there is always a tendency for one institution to support another institution. So to have an editorial from the Wall Street Journal that says, don't cry for the education department, I thought, well, maybe they're making some progress here. Over the weekend, some of you that might have watched Bill Maher, and you can decide whether you want to or not.

[00:01:18] Although again, one of the guests he had on the program is somebody I've quoted recently and actually surprised him with some of her comments. That is a liberal. She supports many of the things Donald Trump is doing. He didn't see that coming. But nevertheless, when they came to the Department of Education, he says, you know, I'm a little bit ambivalent about that. And I thought, that's very interesting. Because as the editors, and I want to quote from them, said, Republicans have been calling to raise or to take down the U.S. Department of Education,

[00:01:48] essentially since Jimmy Carter opened the doors in 1980. And President Trump is now actually trying to do it. The 1,300 layoffs that were announced last Tuesday have reduced the size and scope of the Department of Education by about half. And so they are critical of the blunderbuss way in which Trump does it. They had to get at least one shot in on Donald Trump. I knew that would happen.

[00:02:15] But nevertheless, they point out that Education Secretary Linda McMahon and told the Senate during her confirmation hearings that her department was set up by Congress. And clearly cannot be shut down without it. And that is true. A lot of people said, well, you can't really get rid of the department. And if you can't get the requisite number of votes to end it, you can certainly starve it. And that's another way of going about that.

[00:02:42] The concern that I think all of us have had about the so-called deep state, and I've got a deep state booklet we made available to you, the administrative state, as Vic Ramashwamy refers to it as, or the swamp, as so many people call it, is that it's almost impossible to shut down any government program, any government agency. There is always the issue of goal succession, something else is done.

[00:03:09] And, of course, let's recognize that there was a time when education had a cabinet level. It was the Department of Health, Education, and Welfare. But it was Jimmy Carter really as a payoff to the National Education Association, the NEA, Teachers Union, to actually create a separate Department of Education. And that has existed since 1980. And there was a real desire under Ronald Reagan to do so.

[00:03:39] But his first Secretary of Education was Bill Bennett. Everybody liked Bill Bennett. Everybody thought, well, maybe Bill Bennett can bring some things to the program. Did. As a matter of fact, I remember doing some face-to-face interviews with him on some very good ideas that he had proposed to improve education. The Undersecretary of State at that time was Gary Bauer. You know who he is. Everybody liked him. He ended up, of course, being the individual looking at domestic policy.

[00:04:08] The rest of that, eight years for Ronald Reagan. But nevertheless, that is the case. And so, again, the editors remind us that when Jimmy Carter signed the bill, he argued that elevating education to a cabinet post, separate from the old Department of Health, Education, and Welfare, would eliminate unnecessary bureaucracy, cut red tape, and promote better service to local school systems. It would even save tax dollars.

[00:04:34] The editors add this little line, feel free to pause until the laughter is subsiding. That has not been the case. Five decades later, the Education Department runs a student loan boondoggle. And it is a boondoggle with $1.6 trillion portfolio, while also harassing schools, states, and districts with progressive diktats,

[00:04:58] or policies, if you will, on everything from transgender bathrooms to the use of COVID-19 mask rules. When the Education Department hasn't done, and what it has not done is to improve academic performance of American students. The real action is in the states, including, of course, school choice, which has a proven record.

[00:05:19] But, nevertheless, the argument is, is that at least we could pass out these dollars that come from the Department of Education without strings cutting federal regulations and allowing the states and the local communities, which are closer to the issue, to actually make wiser decisions about how to spend those funds. The better way is to keep the money in the states and in the communities in the first place.

[00:05:47] Don't send them to the Department of Education, having all sorts of money spent on bureaucracies and bureaucrats and regulations and the rest, and have a percentage of that money then eventually trickle down and back to the states. So, again, the argument they're making is the Republican Party has a political opportunity to focus on improving school performance, expanding choice for families, and holding districts accountable for results.

[00:06:15] And that is certainly the case. Let's see if, indeed, that is the case. And they point out that the closer President Trump can get to shutting off the lights at the Education Department, the better. But then he'd best have an answer to voters who want to know what's next to help children get a better education. There have been attempts to try to work with the Department of Education. No Child Left Behind, of course, was one of the ideas under George W. Bush.

[00:06:45] How's that working out for you? And if you've listened to this program or looked at almost any of my commentaries over the last couple of months, including the one that I posted just recently by our friend Larry Sand, that one which came out on Friday, Uncivil Education, just reminds us again that the recent educational report, which oftentimes is referred to as America's Scorecard,

[00:07:13] showed that only a significant number and a rather dwindling number of fourth graders and eighth graders can actually read. And so they're not really good at reading, but they're really good at Karl Marx. Because, as I pointed out in that commentary, at least a fourth, 25% of Americans' classrooms use the Marxist book written by Howard Zinn, known as A People's History of the United States.

[00:07:43] And in my commentary, I point out that we've even had Mary Grebar on the program because she wrote this very good book on debunking Howard Zinn and even have a link to the hour-long interview we did with her. So if your children or grandchildren are learning about American history through a Marxist perspective in this book, A People's History of the United States, maybe we need to try something else.

[00:08:10] And more importantly, we might even put up with some of the ideology along the way if we just had children that could read and write, could think and use any kind of critical thinking skills. And that's not what we're doing right now. No wonder so many parents are thinking about homeschool, Christian schools, looking for charter schools and the rest, because, indeed, education has not flourished when we've had a separate department of education.

[00:08:40] If you'd like to know a little bit more, it's our second article on the website. We'll come back and talk about some other Doge issues right after this. This is Viewpoints with Kirby Anderson. Early this month, President Trump signed an executive order that establishes a strategic Bitcoin reserve.

[00:09:07] It will capitalize the Bitcoin already owned by the Department of Treasury that was taken from criminal or civil asset forfeiture proceedings. It will not sell any Bitcoin, and the Secretaries of Treasury and Commerce have been given the task of developing budget-neutral strategies for acquiring more. At the same time, the executive order also establishes a digital asset stockpile that would consist of other digital assets owned by the Department of Treasury. There are no plans to acquire any more, and likely those will be sold off.

[00:09:37] As you might imagine, there are proponents and opponents to this strategic Bitcoin reserve. Many members of Trump's cabinet are proponents of Bitcoin and have Bitcoin within their financial portfolios. The executive order reminds voters of the pledge by candidate Trump to make the U.S. the crypto capital of the world. The opponents can be divided into two groups. One group opposes a Bitcoin strategic reserve because they believe it won't work. I first discussed Bitcoin on radio in 2017,

[00:10:03] and for the last eight years I've read and heard what is often called FUD, fear, uncertainty, and doubt. We will no doubt hear all those erroneous claims once again. The opponents are those who believe the strategic reserve will work and don't want to reward bad behavior. This asset, with a fixed supply of 21 million coins, will increase in value and can be used to offset our current and future national debt. The debt came from politicians who ran up massive deficits

[00:10:29] and the Federal Reserve that printed the money to fund this fiscal irresponsibility. Some people in the past feared the government might ban Bitcoin. Instead, the government will be acquiring Bitcoin. I'm Kirby Anderson, and that's my point of view. For a free booklet on a biblical view of genetic engineering, go to viewpoints.info slash geneticengineering. viewpoints.info slash geneticengineering.

[00:10:58] You're listening to Point of View, your listener-supported source for truth. We talked about Doge. We're going to get to deportation in just a minute, but I thought I'd just make a real quick comment, and that is that there are a number of evangelical groups, groups that we've had on this program, who are upset about the fact that there have been some cuts in foreign aid. Now, part of that goes back to when you're trying to do things quickly, sooner or later something is going to break,

[00:11:26] and this has to do with the fact that there were some funds that were going to be available to the National Association of Evangelicals, which is World Relief. And you might remember, if you listen to this program, that we've had Matthew Sorens on this program talking about World Relief, and they received a stop-work order in January. It wasn't really canceled, but it's difficult for them to know what they're going to do in the future. Matthew Sorens, who's been on the program,

[00:11:55] said it's difficult to operate until we're convinced and confident that we'll be reimbursed. First of all, next time we have him on, I might say, I didn't know you were using funds from USAID. Okay, that was news to me, because I assume that was funds in the humanitarian arm and the National Association of Evangelicals, that those of us that gave money went to that. Another individual that was part of this prayer vigil was Eugene Cho. He's been on the program at least three times.

[00:12:25] He is a pastor, but also CEO of the group Bread for the World, in which he was denouncing what he called broad, untargeted cuts, implemented by, again, USAID. So, again, I think it is worth mentioning that evangelicals sometimes have been upset about this, and so some of those Christian groups gathered together back about six days ago, and maybe in the future we'll get them on the program to talk about some of the concerns.

[00:12:55] As you may have heard me say before, Elon Musk has been quite willing to admit on more than one occasion, we will make a mistake. When we make a mistake, you can hold us accountable, and we'll try to fix it. And so I think that's about all you can ask when there is an attempt to move so quickly. And you might say, well, why are they moving so quickly? Because that's another criticism I've heard people making.

[00:13:21] Well, if you've seen the pushback, you can see why they wanted to move quickly, because it just gives the other side, which is not willing to cut even a small amount. And you've heard me talk on this program about the number of cuts. The biggest cut so far has been Department of Education, 50% of the personnel. But in most of these others, whether it's the FAA or the Department of Homeland Security,

[00:13:47] we're talking about a fraction of a percent of individuals that have actually either taken early retirement or have been let go. So this is insignificant in terms of the massive budget. And for anybody that's upset with Elon Musk, and there are a lot of people that are, they're pounding on their Tesla cars, and they're shooting into some of these Tesla dealerships,

[00:14:13] and they're setting fire to some of these electric charging stations and all that, you've got to realize that don't blame Elon Musk. You might blame everybody that has built a government, which even though we are going to this year bring in $5 trillion. Are you understanding how much $5 trillion is? $5 trillion is $5,000 billion.

[00:14:36] $5 trillion we're bringing in to the federal revenue of the U.S. Treasury. And $5 trillion is not enough to keep all of the programs fully funded. Because mostly what was happening in the last four administrations, but especially the last administration, you have a budget right now of $7 trillion. I think $5 trillion should be enough for the federal government,

[00:15:06] but it's going to take a lot more work than what Elon Musk has been able to do to cut that, because some of those cuts are going to have to be in things like defense, health delivery, which also includes entitlements like security, social security, Medicare, Medicaid, and the rest. And that is probably almost untouchable, and it just illustrates again that the reaction, the overreaction to some of this is really inappropriate

[00:15:35] when you start looking at the few people involved compared to the mass of individuals in the federal government and the few dollars involved when you're looking at, again, a $7 trillion expenditure that comes every fiscal year. And so they will be spending that up to September 30th, and it just, again, it's mind-boggling, given the fact that just a few years ago the budget for the federal government was $4 trillion. We're bringing in $5 trillion,

[00:16:04] but unfortunately we're spending $7 trillion, and obviously we can't continue to do that. Okay, let's get to deportation. The big issue, interestingly enough, has been the deportation of these illegal criminal gangs. If you're not familiar, we have posted an article, and this article is one that is relatively critical of Donald Trump and relatively supportive of a decision made by one judge,

[00:16:32] and again, it's one judge, U.S. District Judge James Boasberg, who actually said that as you were taking these individuals, these are criminal gang members, they were actually shipped from here to El Salvador, even though many of the gang members are from Venezuela, but they were shipped to El Salvador because the president of El Salvador,

[00:17:02] President Bukele, by the way, we're going to be talking about Bitcoin in just a minute. He has a Bitcoin standard in his country, but anyway, President Bukele has been putting his own gang members in these prisons, and I'm talking about hardened prisons for gang members, criminal gang members. These are not the prisons where the guards come and tuck you in at night, where they leave a little pillow, maybe a mint on your pillow. This is where, if you've seen some of the pictures,

[00:17:33] pretty amazing, but nevertheless, this has been a choice that was made by the Secretary of State, Marco Rubio, and also, I think indirectly, Tom Holman, who is the director, if you will, or the czar of the border, and most importantly, by Donald Trump. And Secretary of State Marco Rubio actually negotiated this deal with President Bukele in El Salvador and said,

[00:18:02] we sent over 250 alien enemy members of Tren de Agua, which El Salvador was agreed to hold in their jails. But in addition to that, there were some others that were pulled, some of these other Venezuelan gangs, and even some of those that are from the Mexican cartels. And that was considered to be inappropriate because the President, Donald Trump, used what was called the Alien Enemies Act,

[00:18:31] which was implemented all the way back in 1798. Now, it has been used in World War I, has been used in World War II, but it hasn't been used in a long time. And so that is what led to this particular judge in the D.C. Circuit Court to actually call for a halt and not only said that we want to pause sending these criminal gang members to El Salvador, but I want the plane to turn around,

[00:19:00] which I thought was pretty strong kind of comments. The argument made by the press secretary and others is, well, the plane, when this particular edict was issued by one justice, our judge, was actually in international space, so it was no longer under the jurisdiction of the United States. So what we have right now are some individuals saying, well, what can we do to turn this around?

[00:19:29] Some are talking about getting a writ of mandamus. I noticed that Congressman Brandon Gill, who is a member of Congress from the Fort Worth area, and I'm pretty sure, isn't he, the son-in-law of Donetsha D'Souza, has actually decided to file articles of impeachment against Judge Boasberg, so we'll see where this goes. But nevertheless, I think most Americans would say taking hundreds of illegal criminal gang members

[00:19:59] and sending them out of the country and then housing them instead in the country prisons in El Salvador with all sorts of other gang members would be a good idea. But nevertheless, that's the latest controversy about that as well. We come back from the break. I'll real quickly talk about Mahmoud Kahil, because that is an individual that they're talking about wanting to deport because he's here on a visa.

[00:20:28] Actually, just withdraw his visa. Doesn't even have to be deported. If he no longer has a visa, you'll no longer be in this country. And that was what led to some of the protests that ended up in the Trump Tower just the other day. So we'll get into that one. It's not quite deportation, but it sort of fits in that general category. And then we'll get into some other issues as well, because we certainly have lots of things to talk about here today on Point of View. And I don't think that they're going to diminish anytime soon.

[00:20:57] If you find yourself saying, okay, I would like to read a little bit more about this, I've tried to be fair. This article by Nicholas Riccardi actually appeared in Real Clear Politics, tends to disagree with the Trump administration, give, if you will, sort of the other side. So you can read about that, and you can get some perspective, both pro and con, on this latest flap about deportation of criminal gang members. I'm glad to see them go.

[00:21:27] Love to know your thoughts. We'll be right back. 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. London was in many ways the center of the world, economically, militarily, and intellectually. Marx sought to destroy religion,

[00:21:57] 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? Get the light you need on today's most pressing issues delivered to your inbox when you sign up for the Viewpoints commentary

[00:22:24] 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. Point of View will continue after this.

[00:22:57] 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. Back once again, let me, as a program note, mention that tomorrow we're going to be spending some time talking with Junie Henderson. She has written this book, When the Light Finds Us. She was a woman, a mother, who was trying to raise her children

[00:23:27] while she was in prison. Now again, we recognize that people sometimes end up in prison for all sorts of reasons. They make a bad mistake, they were involved in a criminal enterprise, whatever it might be, due to either mistakes they made or others made around them, and they find themselves in prison. We also want to do what we can to have a ministry in prison, so we'll be talking about that with her tomorrow. I think you'll find that powerful, powerful story, one that has actually made its way

[00:23:56] to the mainstream media. I think there's an article we've got there from CNN and some others about that. And so then we'll get back into some issues in the news. Let me also, for those of you watching online, hold up some of these booklets. These are the booklets I was just showing a while back to Reggie Littlejohn, and she said, oh, these are so good. I need these kind of booklets because she says, you know, I'm a lawyer, and I write these long treatises, and then I find nobody reads them, so really you have to come up with something that's maybe two pages of summary

[00:24:26] and realistically more one page. And I said, yeah, that's why I think people love these booklets so much. I've got this one on artificial intelligence we were talking about with her, privacy and surveillance, digital surveillance. We talked about globalism a little bit off the air with her. We talked about the great reset, censorship, the deep state. Those are just a few I pulled out of our more than 70 of these booklets. And one of the reasons why I would encourage you to join with us next week when we have our Truth Team Week,

[00:24:56] it's got the theme of Anchor to Truth. You can go to the website right now and find out a little bit more. We do bring this opportunity for you to support this ministry. But one of the many benefits, of course, we send the Outlook magazine. I held up earlier the one on China, which is March, and I've already received now the one in for April that will be going out shortly. These are great resources you receive for your donation. But if you give as little as a dollar a day, $30 a month or more,

[00:25:25] you become part of the Truth Team. And what happens is you also not only receive the Outlook magazine, you receive these booklets. And I just cannot tell you, as a matter of fact, she wanted to walk out with all sorts of booklets here because she could see very quickly how she could use those in her ministry. And I think she was excited about the fact that even as she looked at it, she says, you're even doing a biblical point of view on some of these issues. And that's something that even though I know she has a husband that has been in the ministry,

[00:25:54] that's not something she's focused on and probably would be time-consuming for her to try to put together. And I could see her wanting to get some of those as well. I guess I should have just said, hey, you could be a member of the Truth Team and then you receive them automatically. But she wants to get some of the ones we've already written. So, nevertheless, just another reminder that next week we'll be bringing some great programs to you. One of those, which I'm looking forward to, relates to our conversation about China. And that is,

[00:26:24] next week we have Joel Rosenberg and his latest novel deals with China and the relationship between China and Israel. I think you will find that fascinating. And so we're going to talk about that on Wednesday. I'm going to do that, bringing some of the material from the book by Tom Cotton and also by Gordon Chang. But then a week later we'll be talking about China again because we'll have our good friend Joel Rosenberg and we have a variety of other individuals that will be joining us throughout the week. But let's get back to,

[00:26:53] this isn't really deportation, but it's similar. And that is, you remember that we talked about the fact that this protest at the Trump Tower had to do with the detention of Mahmoud Khalili. And Khalil, is actually how you should say his name, and he is here, came to the United States on a student visa. He's actually an Algerian citizen who grew up in Syria and Palestine. I'm going to talk about Syria

[00:27:23] in just a minute. And his offense, which I think is significant, is that he has been part of and a major leader and spokesman for the Columbia University Apartheid Divest group. Now, the argument people said is, well, doesn't he have free speech? And the answer is, yes, he has free speech. He has free speech to actually denounce Israel if he wants. He has free speech to call for the disinvestment

[00:27:52] of Columbia University or any university from Israel, but he doesn't have the right to break things or hurt people. So, sometimes what you hear is, well, this man is going to be removed from this country because he has no longer free speech. And even if you're not a citizen of the United States, you do have free speech, but here's the issue. Your actions have consequences. And so, yes,

[00:28:22] he can talk about the fact that October 7th was a wonderful event because if you go to the website, they talk about the fact that October 7th was a glorious occasion. But you then come to the other part of his story. And don't take my word for it, let's go to the president of Barnard College, which is the sister campus of Columbia University. And the president reminded us that he has caused over $30,000

[00:28:51] in damage in vandalism at the Columbia and Barnard campuses. And on two occasions, because of his leadership, these individuals who are pro-Hamas have forcefully entered the halls of the university campus and refused to leave. So the question is, does he have a right as a resident, even though he's here on a student visa, does he have a right to

[00:29:20] speak on whatever he wants to speak on? He does. But does the State Department have a right to consider whether to issue a renewal of his visa or whether they have the right to cancel his visa on what he has actually done? Then they have a right to do that as well. And Marco Rubio made it very clear and he says, look, we issue thousands of visas to all sorts of people who say all sorts of things, and that's perfectly fine.

[00:29:49] Whether it's obnoxious or obscene, whatever they want to say under the First Amendment because of course of rules, those residing in the United States have the same rights of free speech as Americans. However, you knew we're going to get to the however, however, we don't have to let people in the United States automatically. We can make a decision on whether we feel they're in the interest of the United States or whether they pose a danger to the United States. And on numerous occasions, the groups under Mr.

[00:30:19] Khalil have supported groups that have committed vandalism, have harassed Jews, and most importantly have called for the destruction of Western civilization and glorified a group that is designated by the U.S. State Department as what? A terrorist group. So I don't want people to confuse or conflate free speech with acts of vandalism. These are two different issues. And that's why they are looking

[00:30:49] seriously as to whether or not to actually cancel his visa. And the argument is, well, because he married an American citizen, well, then, that should be enough to keep him here. Not necessarily. So we'll see where this goes, but I just thought it would give you a little bit of a history on that. And while we're talking about Syria, my last article here is by our good friend Jerry Newcomb. I was with him just the other day, the National Religious Broadcasters. And as you might remember,

[00:31:18] we talked about the fact that about 1,300 Christians in Syria have been killed. And he points out that Christians being killed is nothing new, but the intense nature of this prosecution of Christians in places like Nigeria and now Syria are of great concern. And then he points out an interesting irony because this persecution of Christians in Syria is taking place in

[00:31:48] a country that historically has been very important in the Christian faith. I think we'll talk about this when we have our trip to Greece, May 17th to the 27th, because if you think about it, the first time Christians or any believers in Jesus were called Christians was in Antioch, Syria. Paul's conversion, he was known as you know, of Saul of Tarsus took place in what? Syria. He talks about the fact that the missionary

[00:32:17] journey of Paul and Barnabas that changed the world, that first missionary journey was launched from Antioch, Syria. And one of the chief companions with Paul on his missionary journeys was a doctor by the name of Luke. Luke, and he was the author of the gospel that bears his name, and also of course is the author of the Acts of the Apostles. And Luke was from where? Well, he was

[00:32:46] from Antioch, Syria. So it is, I think, ironic and perhaps even tragic that at a place which has so much meaning to Christians, it certainly is a time in which we reflect on those who become martyrs, and later on in his article, he reminds us that Jesus told his disciples that they were to be his witnesses. Of course, you see that in Matthew 28, also in Acts 1.8, and the Greek word

[00:33:15] which we translate witness is the word from which we get the word martyr. And so in some respects, we can understand that sometimes in being a witness, you end up being a martyr. We will, as we always do, spend some time in the future talking with our good friends of Voice of the Martyrs and open doors, but I just thought you might be interested in seeing that interesting connection between Christians in Syria and Syria in the history of Christianity.

[00:33:45] We'll be right back. You're listening to Point of View, your listener-supported source for truth. Back for a few more minutes, and certainly one of the things you've heard me talk about so often is the need for us to have discernment and to be skeptical and to maybe check things out, not always believe the first thing you hear.

[00:34:14] And this article, it's our fourth article by Noah Rothman, is entitled, They Think We're Stupid, The Bipartisan Habit of Patronizing the Public. By the way, I do have to put bipartisan in quotes because in order to make it look bipartisan, you go through three and a half pages, and he's given one example after another of Democrat leaders doing that, and then he comes to one at the end where he talks about how Republicans have borrowed some of these ideas from the left in

[00:34:44] terms of how they've identified Robert F. Kennedy Jr., and I'm thinking that's a bit of a stretch, but I know he wants to try to make it look bipartisan so it doesn't look like he's just beating up on the Democratic Party, but that's where most of the examples in three and a half pages out of his four pages come from, and one of those is probably well-known, so let's start with the easy one, and that's where Chuck Schumer, Senate minority leader, is on with Kristen Welker of NBC News, and this was about the whole issue

[00:35:14] about whether or not President Biden was mentally fit, and back in February 2024, which again was more than a year ago, at that time Chuck Schumer said all of these comments about him being an elderly man with a poor memory are a right-wing propaganda that that has mental acuity is really wrong, and so again, the then when he

[00:35:42] came back on this last year when the of course President Biden stepped down, she said, well, don't you feel as though you have misled the American people about President Biden's mental acuity, and this so bothered Chuck Schumer, he said, look, we didn't, and of course then, as Noah Rothman points out, oh yes, we did, we all saw that, we read that, we saw many times in which people were attributing any concern

[00:36:12] about the mental fitness of President Biden this time a year ago to be nothing more than a right-wing propaganda stunt, and so one of the questions that Noah Rothman asks is why would Chuck Schumer invest his credibility in such an obvious dead stock? because even when Democrats in the press were promulgating the flimsy cover story, more than six out of ten Americans told NBC News pollsters that Biden

[00:36:41] lacked the necessary mental and physical health to be president for a second term. Does Schumer think we're just idiots? No, maybe not, but he thinks maybe we're stupid or thinks he can get away with it because the compliant press has been so good at that so often, and he goes on, Noah Rothman says, the Democrats' assumption that we're all inordinately gullible should explain why the party so frequently tries to convince Americans to ignore the evidence of their own eyes. He gives another example,

[00:37:11] and this one we talked about this time last year as well, in which when we started seeing the price of meat going up, the price of all sorts of groceries going up, the answer was very quick. Senator Elizabeth Warren said, quote, meatpacking monopolies that are using inflation as a cover to raise prices and make Rettford profits. Then later on, it got worse. Grocery store chains force high food prices onto American families while

[00:37:40] rewarding executives and investors with lavish bonuses and stock buybacks. And this is what happens when only a handful, she says, of giant grocery store chains dominate the market. We need to strengthen our antitrust laws to break up giant corporations and lower prices. At the time, I gave you the numbers, and they were very easy to show. This one takes you into it as well. There are no grocery store monopolies, and the

[00:38:10] average grocery store, as I reported at the time, and it talks about it again in this article, gets a whopping 1.6% profit margin after taxes in 2023. 2023, which is up a percent from 2019. In other words, it isn't exactly the most profitable venture you can go into, and we've talked about this before. Well, then we talk about, of course, the issue of inflation, the $1.9 trillion

[00:38:38] American Rescue Plan. You have the economist, the former Treasury Secretary from the past, Larry Summers, who was also the president of Harvard, warning that this could have consequences for the dollar and financial stability. It could increase inflation, and of course, as it did. And so, you had all the attempts to try to cover that. And then, finally, when you had one professor, the University of Michigan,

[00:39:06] claiming in August of 2022 that we had zero inflation, immediately, Kareem Jean-Pierre, Jean-Pierre, Joe Biden, and everybody said, see, prices didn't go up. No, no, no. It's 1% that didn't increase from the previous ones, but all the others did indeed go up. And all it was simply saying is inflation was rose at a slower pace. But he points out consumers

[00:39:34] understood that inflation is cumulative. They were feeling that because over that entire year was an 8.5% increase. And again, that's just the CPI, which I think is actually very erroneous. And so, he goes through literally three and a half pages of examples. I've given you more than you probably needed. So, he does come to the point where he says, well, Republicans have actually borrowed from the

[00:40:03] left because when they talk about Robert F. Kennedy Jr., they want to sometimes make us believe that if Robert F. Kennedy was not the Secretary of Health and Human Services, we as a country would subsist on a diet of Cheez-Its and Captain Crunch and as a result would allow pharmaceutical companies to continue to advertise on television and all the rest. And so, that's probably true but not even close to the

[00:40:31] outright line to the camera face that has come time and time again. And the theory that he has is this. They think we're stupid. His last comment is this. Those who think they can work you like a marionette are possessed of an abiding belief that they are a better class of operator. smarter, cleverer, more intellectually numble than the average American.

[00:41:00] And the reinforcement of this view from their allies on social media was for reasons that are entirely elucidive, they seem to believe they have sorted themselves into America's society's upper caste. So, the elites think that they're smarter than you. They think that they can manipulate you. They think that they can actually look into a camera and lie to you. And as a result, that's why I think we're going to have to

[00:41:29] exercise even more discernment. The good news is, is they're getting called out on the social media. Sometimes, as I just pointed out, they're getting called on the legacy media. And that's a good thing. But even when they're not, check it out. It may not be true. They may have told you with great conviction that they're right and you're wrong. And guess what? We found out many times they were wrong and we were right. I might just mention my commentary today is on the

[00:41:58] Bitcoin Strategic Reserve, if you don't know much about it. Kind of a good summary. I don't think that's going to happen on the federal government level quite yet. I think it's probably going to happen more at the state level. And that's an easy prediction to make because the other day, the Texas Senate passed the Texas Bitcoin Reserve, Senate Bill 21. So it's passed the Senate, now goes to the House. I think the House is going to pass it. And I'm virtually certain that Greg Abbott, the governor, is going to sign it.

[00:42:28] So the first Bitcoin Reserve might be a state reserve. But over time, maybe we have a strategic Bitcoin Reserve at the national level. As I point out, that may be a way to offset the tremendous amount of debt that we as a country have incurred. We'll talk more about that as the week unfolds. Most importantly, I want to thank Megan for help with her ability to pull all of this together. Don't forget, of course, we

[00:42:57] have the Point of View Spotify hotlights that we have on there as well, the Point of View highlights on Spotify. I also want to thank Steve for help producing the program. Most importantly, we look forward to seeing you tomorrow right here on Point of View. Do you know anyone who would appreciate a news source that is anchored to God's Word and not to a political party? Do you know someone who wishes they could hear today's most confusing questions addressed with biblical clarity?

[00:43:26] Do you know anyone who wishes they felt equipped to make a difference in this nation? Well, here's the good news. Point of View is anchored to God's Word above all else. Point of View tackles every issue of the day from a biblical perspective. Point of View equips Americans to take action. And you can bring Point of View to more listeners. Make a difference today by joining Point of View's Truth Team.

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